The Tramp Nuisance

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 3, 1878

The Tramp Nuisance.

THE machinery of our social system is becoming alarmingly disarranged. At one side of the continent evil overshadows the land from the shores of China, and California clamors at the doors of Congress, and hangs upon the skirts of the President, for an abatement of the “Chinese nuisance.” At the other side of the continent, people are agitated to an almost equal extent over the “tramp nuisance.” This army of vagrants has appeared suddenly like the grasshopper scourge, and the potato bug; but what shall be done with them? The various plans devised, and the loud demands for legislation, show the deep anxiety that exists in regard to it. Some writers fear that it will take fifteen or twenty years to rid ourselves of the evil. Why do not some of those who think the world is growing so much better, and that the good time coming is right at hand, explain how it is that these disorders are growing upon us so of late, and tell how they can be abated?