Fallen Mann

Author：佚名 Source：none Hits：110 UpdateTime：2008-10-19 1:27:25


The Mann Act, long relegated to the status of bawdy Frank Sinatra punch lines and literary asidesLolitas Humbert Humbert deplores the law as "lending itself to a dreadful pun"was serious news recently for the first time in a century. In March, when Eliot Spitzer resigned as governor of New York, pundits speculated that he might face criminal charges based on the law, passed in 1910, that forbade the interstate transportation of any woman or girl for "the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose." Named for Republican Congressman James R. Mann and officially known as the White Slave Traffic Act, the law had a tortured (and torturous) history well before it loomed as a threat to Spitzer or entered mid-century pop culture lexicon.

Much has been said about Spitzers hypocrisy in the matter: the self-proclaimed reformist governor who would scour New York State free of corruption, who has fervently prosecuted prostitution rings, who pointed out that such organizations are often linked to money laundering, drugs, and human trafficking. But Spitzer, while guilty of bad judgment and stunning arrogance, is no more disingenuous than the people and events that lead to this anachronistic law nearly a century ago.

The furor surrounding the Mann Act has been forgotten, but during the first decade of the 20th century, the "social evil," as prostitution was called, inspired daily newspaper coverage. In 1907, the federal government, concerned about the proliferation of red-light districts across the country, dispatched a team of agents to investigate conditions in several major cities. In Chicago, an ambitious young states attorney named Clifford Roe sought a face to humanize prostitution, and one night, she quite literally fell from the sky.

A teenaged girl, the story went, tossed a note from the window of a brothel reading, "I am a white slave," and it found its way to Roes office. No one, Roe least of all, paid much attention to discrepancies in the victims story, including a rumor that she was a prostitute by choice whod had a momentary spat with her pimp, and was back to work as soon as the case closed.

Roe used this case to argue for stricter laws against prostitution rings, eventually securing passage of seminal legislation in twenty-eight states and the District of Columbia. His colleagues, most notably Congressman Mann and Edwin Sims, the citys U.S. district attorney, fueled the hysteria with hyperbole and outright lies, recounting lurid tales of professional rapists and a head pimp known internationally as "The Big Chief."

By December 1909, when the federal agents presented their findings on various red-light districts, America was in the throes of white slavery panic. Churches, womens groups, and reform organizations bombarded their representatives with pleas to take national action. President William Howard Taft heeded the call, declaring Manns proposed bill "constitutional" and allocating $50,000 for the employment of special inspectors. A new branch within the U.S. Department of Justice called the Bureau of Investigationthe "Federal" to be added laterwould be charged with tracking down Mann Act violations. The Bureau, at this point, employed only twenty-three agents, but Manns law launched its transformation from a small office concerned with miscellaneous minor crimes to the governments most recognizable and powerful legal arm.