Untitled article by C. P. B.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · December 8, 1892

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 7, No. 48

An Anti-Christian Scheme.

By C. P. B.

THE Rev. Dr. Charles H. Parkhurst and a corps of 1,137 assistants, remarks the Sun, of this city, “are going to complete a map of this city showing the position and character of every house within the municipal limits, together with the names and social status of the occupants.”

The Sun continues:—

This enterprise is to be prosecuted under the auspices of the City Vigilance League, a new organization, somewhat resembling the Society for the Prevention of Crime. Dr. Parkhurst is President of the organization, and at a meeting held in Judson Memorial Hall in South Washington Square last night, he gave an outline of the policy of the League. It had been widely announced that Dr. Parkhurst on this occasion would speak “to men only;” and about 400 young men were present.

On this occasion the Doctor is reported to have said:—

Our immediate need is of 1,137 men of honest spirit and durable stuff, who will undertake to represent respectively each of the election districts into which this city is subdivided. It will be the responsibility of each one of these 1,137 men to make himself thoroughly conversant with all that concerns the district under his charge. The first duty of the district supervisor will be to prepare a careful and accurate chart of his district, drawn on the scale of twenty-five feet to the inch.

Dr. Parkhurst then gave an account of how the maps are to be arranged and what they are expected to show. Every building will be represented with its proportional frontage and its street number. There will be a tabulated list of the occupants of the residential portions of the districts, with their names and nationality. The tabulation will include a statement as to all houses of ill repute, pool rooms and policy shops, and gambling houses in the district.

“In this connection,” added Dr. Parkhurst, with much feeling, “it is expressly urged that no district supervisor should do anything that can be construed as compromising his own moral character.”

It was probably the memory of his own experience of a few months ago that led the Doctor to give this caution. It shows that Dr. Parkhurst is not wholly bad; that his beer-drinking with lewd women last summer was due to an error in judgment rather than to personal moral corruption. But having made such an error is he a safe guide for the 1,137 young men who are to work under his direction? And is this work that young men should be encouraged to undertake? Can anybody, either young or old, do such work and obey the divine injunction, “Enter not into the path of the wicked, and go not in the way of evil men. Avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away.” In short, is not the whole scheme contrary to the spirit of the gospel of Christ, which exhorts us thus:—

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

The Christian might well distrust this scheme because of the considerations suggested; but there are also other counts in the indictment against it, some of which are thus presented editorially by the Sun:

Parkhurst’s scheme of organizing a vigilance committee, or Vigilance League, as he calls it, proceeds on the assumption that the regular forces of law and order in New York are negligent of their duty, and that accordingly private individuals must step forward to save the town from going to the devil.

It does not appear that he proposes to go so far as the famous Vigilance Committee of San Francisco, and preserve the morals of the town by the administration of lynch law. He merely wants to carry out his detective operations on a large scale and with the assistance of a great number of subordinates. His scheme is to appoint young fellows as supervisors of the public morals in each of the 1,137 election districts, and to set them to work at spying about their neighborhoods to find out whether anything wrong is going on. Of course they will discover what they are after, even if they have to get up the wickedness themselves. Their curiosity will be stimulated, and the competition among them to gain distinction as detectives will be eager.

How the public will regard this new and extensive industry is another matter. Under Parkhurst’s plan every inhabitant of New York is liable to be shadowed by these impertinent young chaps. The names, residences, nationality, and political standing of the people of every district are to be obtained and tabulated as if they were suspected thieves. As a matter of course, the swarming spies will seek to magnify their detective office by keeping an eye on all the doings of the citizens to see whether they follow the line Parkhurst lays down for them. These shadowers, also, will watch the saloons and scrutinize every house and every business place for the same purpose.

It is, in fine, the spying system in its worst form, volunteer and not directed by official authority. Nearly twelve hundred loathsome creatures will be educating themselves in the art of poking their noses into other people’s business.

Vice and crime are bad enough, but they are not so bad as such a systematic hounding by a horde of amateur detectives as Parkhurst is planning. Only despicable young fellows would engage in the business, and the longer they pursue it the more slimy they will become.

It is a contemptible scheme, an outrageous project, and the self-respect of the people should at once rise up to compel the defiled Parkhurst to devise some other and less insulting method of keeping up the notoriety which he is after.

No doubt Doctor Parkhurst imagines that he is doing both God and man service, but he is in reality corrupting more than a thousand young men and is preparing an engine of espionage which he can not long control, and which is sure to be a potent factor in the utter destruction of the liberty so long and so fully enjoyed in this favored land.

C. P. B.