p. 8 | Three Calls by Mrs. C. D. M. Williams

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Feb 18, 1913

Three Calls

By Mrs. C. D. M. Williams

WANTED—fifteen hundred—for San Francisco! Fifteen hundred what?—Slaves. Slaves? O, no! This is the land of liberty. There is no slavery in the United States. "Sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing." The blot of slavery was wiped off the face of our country over fifty years ago.

The man, woman, or child with a colored skin is just as free as the birds to go north, south, east, or west. He may choose his occupation, and build his home where he will, protected by the law of the land. Thank God for this. Yet I repeat, Fifteen hundred slaves are wanted for San Francisco during the Panama Exposition.

Where are they coming from?

David Livingstone gave his life to open up Africa to missions and to legitimate trade, that he might stop the terrible traffic in human flesh.

Henry Stanley took up the work when the martyr dropped at his post, and carried it forward nobly.

Not from Africa

Africa will not furnish the slaves for San Francisco. It is emancipated. No slave-trader approaches its once unhappy shore. To what distant and unfortunate harbor is the black slave-ship, manned with hard, brutal-faced men, going?

Is it a far-away isle of the sea that is to contribute unpaid and unwilling workers for shops and kitchens of the great city? The idea is preposterous.

But listen, fathers and mothers who are living in the past of thirty or forty years ago. God has said the wickedness of the last days shall be as it was in Noah’s time, when He had to destroy the evil works of man by water. Attention, while I tell you of these slave-traders.

The Agents of These Slave-Hunters

They “that go down into the pit.” Ps. 28:1. Thousands and thousands a year.

Not fierce, bloodthirsty men with the traces of long years of vice written on every feature, but pleasant, companionable young men with suave manners and oily tongues. Women, yes, women, "wolves in sheep’s clothing," are also in this work, well-dressed, refined and pleasing in appearance.

No trace of the criminal is to be seen. Yet if our prison doors could be opened wide, thieves and murderers let go free, and these slave catchers take their places, our land would be the gainer thereby, our homes would be safer.

Again you ask, with incredulous stare and uninterested ear, of that call for fifteen hundred slaves.

We are used to sensational stories and all sorts of advertisements.

But, fathers and mothers, awake before it is too late, and save your daughters.

White Skins Rather than Black

It is white skins, and not black, you are called to save—not far-away unfortunates, but your own flesh and blood, that is crying out for protection from not the old-time slavery of kitchen and field—that were paradise compared with this most damnable slavery, which only man possessed by the spirits of demons could have invented.

It is the child of our neighbor, my daughter and yours, that, unconscious of danger, in innocence and girlish joy and freedom, call for the protection of loyal American citizens, and do not get it. They need more watchful care than it is possible for the fathers and mothers, unaided by the laws of the land, to give them.

Fifteen hundred girls—sweet, pure, and innocent—wanted for slaves in houses of prostitution in 1915 for the Panama Exposition! That’s plain English.

This poisonous plant has been nourished and screened till it has more roots than a banian-tree; and it is time that it be exposed in all its heinousness to the world, and that even "polite ears" hear the shrieks of despair and screams for help that go up unheeded from our daughters.

It is time—yes, high time—that the parents claim the protection of every patriotic—yea, of every decent—citizen of the United States for our young girls.

In years past, this illicit and infamous trade in souls was, to an extent, carried on by willing persons.

Ofttimes, unfortunates who had listened to flattery and false promises of marriage, and yielded themselves into the hands of unprincipled men, finding their fair names gone, and failing to get the needful help and encouragement to start again to win the respect and regard of their friends, have entered a career of shame, sometimes to be rescued later, but usually to live the short life of the prostitute, and be buried with the unknown.

Again, others, who for lack of proper home training were too lazy to work for an honest living, have flaunted their Babylonian garments, the price of their shame, in the face of the world, selling themselves, body and soul, for a mess of pottage. But they were free to go or stay, as they chose.

Kidnaped and Forever Lost

Times have changed. Evil men and seducers have "waxed worse and worse."

Instead of being led into evil, it is slavery. The ingenuity of man—and woman—is taxed to find new and effective ways of kidnapping girls, not to put in shop, kitchen, or field, to toil for their master, but to be imprisoned in a dark underground cell—called a bull pen—to be a helpless and hopeless victim of debased man.

Don’t read this with a blush, in a whisper; but shout it as a warning in the ears of the nation—that white slaves pure and virtuous—loved daughters, helpless orphans—are hopelessly lost, tortured in underground bull pens, where mourning fathers and mothers can never find them. According to the report of the Federal Commission, over five hundred girls disappeared in a few months in the one state of California, and could not be traced.

An honest girl, working to support her family, answered a call for a stenographer to a distant city. She was kindly(?) met at the boat, and conveyed, in a closed hack, to a house of ill fame. By some accident, she saw where she was, before the door was closed on her, and made a dash for liberty.

She found her way, crying, back to the boat, was kindly cared for, and returned to her home. But what of the other girls upon whom those barred doors have closed before they have had a glimpse of the character of the house they have entered?

Stolen in the Open Street

An automobile stopped on a street, picked up a girl, and disappeared.

Could it be followed?—No. The girl was not missed for hours. The only trace of her was that a little boy had seen her lifted into the machine and taken out of sight rapidly.

Advertisements with great inducements lure girls to the cities, where they are met at the trains, and carried away in closed hacks to their prisons.

Women well-dressed, but who have long ago bidden adieu to all womanly virtue, go out looking for girls for restaurants, hotels, stores, millinery or dressmaking shops, offering good wages, and their easy victims are never heard from again. After waiting weeks for the promised letter, the father goes to the great city in search of his little girl.

The Father Searches in Vain

Does he find her? He has no clue. He returns saddened and discouraged, and all wonder why she does not write to the loved ones waiting at home. It is a shadow in the home, but none realize the blackness of the tragedy enacted.

Our boys do not escape. What is their part? There must be patrons for this nefarious business. Young men must be seduced, and become the frequenters and supporters of this evil. Their hearts must be hardened and blackened, that they shall have no mercy for their pitiful victims.

But this is not all. Young men desire easy work and good pay, and this hellish business of capturing young girls for the White Slave Trade furnishes it. It would be almost an endless task to write of those things of which we know. But of the thousands that never come to the light of day—what of them?

Surely they cry to God and man for help. Good men have made law after law for the abatement of the "Red Light" evil, but it increases in extent and in enormity.

Words can not describe the tragedy of it. I would that words could be traced in living fire that would arouse California and sister states to take measures to wipe out and to exterminate this monster evil.

Iowa—thanks be to God—has solved the problem.

Will California arise en masse and call for her legislature to pass the "Red Light Injunction and Abatement Bill" during its present session?

Will men and women circulate petitions demanding the enactment of that law? Hold meetings, and educate the people regarding this danger, and work to have a clean state and save our sons and daughters?