nl_e17

Finch, White Slave Traffic, 1912
power "to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the
several states."
(b) By the same article and section it is given authority "to
establish post offices and post roads."
(c) By Section 1 of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution it is
provided that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a
punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to
their jurisdiction," and by Section 2 of the same amendment it is
provided that "Congress shall have power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation." It is believed that by these provisions sufficient
authority has been vested in the Federal Government to enable it, by
enacting and enforcing appropriate legislation, to absolutely wipe out
every vestage of this awful traffic.
Having in mind its powers under the interstate commerce clause
of the Constitution, Congress enacted, June 25, 1910, what is known
as the White Slave Traffic Law, by which the transporting or the
persuading, enticing or coercing of women and girls to travel in
interstate or foreign commerce for the purpose of prostitution or for any
other immoral purpose, is made a crime. It is of the highest importance
that legislation be immediately enacted which will absolutely prohibit
the use of the post office in procuring woman and girls (by
advertisements or otherwise) and in directing their movements, not
only from state to state, but also from one place to another in the same
state, and in soliciting and receiving earnings from victims of white
slavers.
With reference to the slavery clause of the Constitution, it will
perhaps be somewhat surprising to learn that there is no Federal law
which makes it a crime for one person to hold another in slavery or
involuntary servitude, unless such person has been, in the first
instance, kidnapped or carried away or bought or sold; and although
our investigations have, in numerous cases, developed the fact that
young women and girls have been actually deprived of their liberty and
held in involuntary servitude of the vilest kind (they having had their
street clothes taken away from them--in many cases having been
confined by barred windows and locked doors, and also having been
deprived of their liberty by drugs, threats of violence, and by actual
personal violence) there seems to be no statute under which persons
so holding them in slavery can be punished by the Federal
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