NEW YORK UNDERWORLD. «,

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1793, 4 July 1913, Page 10

NEW YORK UNDERWORLD.

REVELATIONS BY YOUNG MR, ROCKEFELLER. Mr. John D: Rockefeller, juu., has published a volume of 330 pages filled with '.'frets" relating to the social evil in New York. In a preface the son of the richest man in the world explains that the ,■volume is the result of the investigations of a grand jury of which he wasforeman. Those investigations led him to found his Bureau of Social Hygiene, whose trained investigators in the course of the last six months have "collected facts which constitute a flaming indictment of modern civilisation." The volume is edited by Mr. George J. Kneeland, who shows that New York is the centre of the traffic in vice not only for the United States, but also for Canada, Cuba, Argentina, and Brazil. The traffic is in the hands of comparatively a few capitalists, at whose head stands a man known as "The Underworld King." He is supposed to have great influence with the authorities. The investigations show that there exists in New York a regular exchange in vice, a sort of stock market, the prices of which quickly reflect ally change in the attitude of the authorities. From thii'tv houses in New York the "Kin? of the Underworld" and otlier members of the "combine" draw an aggregate profit of ,£40,000 a year, exclusive of the yield from the sale of liquor nnd tobacco at exorbitant prices. Altogether the investigations have located in New York IGO6 disorderly houses which apparently pay protection money to tho police 011 a monthly pay-roll. When any of the inmates are arrested .£5 is given to the policeman making the arrest as an inducement to him to forget some vital point of evidence, and ,210 is paid to a lawyer. It is alleged that 150,000 men and boys frequent these houses. The volume gives the personal history of more than a score of victims of the nefarious traffic, and shows that their slavery is due to intimidation. It is announced that-four other volumes will deal with the conditions in other cities as soon as the necessary data have been gathered.