Delinquent Daughters: Protecting and Policing

¶ … Delinquent Daughters: Protecting and Policing Adolescent Female Sexuality in the United States, 1885-1920 by Mary E. Odem. Specifically it will analyze the text, including the author's thesis and key themes. In this book, author Mary E. Odem studies the sexuality laws protecting young women in the late 19th and early 20th century, and the reformers who attempted to make sure these laws were held up in court. She writes, "This book explores both the moral reform campaigns that produced new policies of sexual regulation and the actual enforcement of those policies at the local court level" (Odem 2). This is the thesis for her work, and the underlying thread that ties the book together.

The book is actually broken up into two key periods, the 1880s, when society believed young women were morally corrupted by older men, and the two decades after the turn of the century, when reformers believed there was a new type of delinquent young woman who needed policing from her own decadent desires. The first period viewed young women as nothing more than victims of sexual predators, and one reaction was to raise the age of consent in the courts, in an attempt to catch more men preying on young women. The second period viewed young women as more willing participants in sexual activity, as "delinquents" who needed to be policed and managed by the court system. Using actual cases she researched, the author gives numerous examples of these theories, which makes the book come alive for the reader.

Odem uses several key themes in this work examining the sexuality and mores of the time, and how these mores affected young women. The book focuses on the court system, the girls and their families, and the reformers who were working to monitor teenaged girls and their sexual activity. Her first argument concerns older male predators luring young girls into "white slavery." The book

Another key theme is her theory that the moral campaigns created to manage female sexuality were based on a variety of social constructs. She writes, "First, moral campaigns to control teenage female sexuality were fueled by gender, class, and racial tensions in American society" (Odem 4). She maintains middle-class white women were at the forefront of this reform movement, and that they consistently ignored the plight of other women, notably blacks, in their quest for laws governing the morals and actions of men who preyed on young women. In the first reform movements in California, which took place in the 1880s, Odem notes the reformers wanted the age of consent raised from the age of 10 to the age of 18, and this followed a national trend to keep "vicious men" from victimizing young girls. It is fascinating to note that male legislators resisted the reformers for several years, and initially only raised the age of consent to 14 (Odem 9). This seems especially perplexing during a time when society was so very strict and moral about sexual relations and marriage. Today, with the age of consent at 18, freely allowing relations with young girls the age of 10 or 14 seems almost barbaric, and yet, the laws of the time allowed it. It seems like juxtaposition that in our morally loose society, the age of consent is higher than it was then. However, the reformers did succeed in getting the age-limit raised, and it still stands today.

This quest for morality laws stemmed from a larger "purity" movement gaining strength across the nation. The movement sought to ban prostitution, supported temperance, and increasingly sought to create laws to help protect women from predators and sexual abuse. They also wanted to change the way men thought about sex and sexual relationships, and make relationships between the sexes more equal and moral at the same time. However, their concerns did not translate to blacks and other minorities, but only white women, who might be lured into "white slavery" by unscrupulous men. The reformers were successful in many regards. They managed to raise the age of consent to 16 or 18 in almost every state by 1920, and the succeeded in creating many halfway houses and other places to protect young women who were in danger of sexual predators or had suffered from sexual abuse (Odem 37).

She also maintains that after the reformers gained action and legislation meant to control predatory males, that the courts did not always follow through with penalties and enforcement in the ways the reformers had envisioned, and that often, they were hostile to the reformers' and their work. She provides several illustrations of this in symbolic court cases, and shows that rather than being impartial, many judges clearly sided with the men in the cases, and reduced the women to "impure" women of ill repute. She also shows how the reform movement changed throughout the years, from victimization to delinquency, and how repeatedly, this moral judgment fell on women involved in court cases for statutory rape and other crimes, rather than on the men who committed them, along with other factors. She writes, "These reformers did not blame evil men for young women's moral downfall, but rather, influenced by recent trends in the social sciences, they looked to societal and family environments to explain sexual delinquency among young working-class women" (Odem 95-96). This begins to resemble modern ideas about sexual conduct and morals, in and out of the courts, and indicates how change comes to society, and how the social and legal constructs of society often react to that change.

Finally, she maintains that many middle-class families fought over the values and mores of their daughters, and this often led them into court in an attempt to control and mold their behavior. She writes, "As their traditional forms of sexual regulation eroded, numerous parents -- immigrant and native-born, black and white -- sought court intervention to restrain their rebellious daughters" (Odem 5). Odem uses several cases from both Alameda and Lost Angeles to prove this key theme. She discusses several families who discovered their daughters were involved with young men and turned them into the police, along with cases of runaway daughters, and even pregnant daughters. Odem notes, "Faced with an unmarried, pregnant teenage daughter, some families turned to the courts to pressure the suspected fathers into marriage or at least to obtain financial support from them for medical and child care expenses" (Odem 51). Thus, while the reformers initially thought they would protect victims from predatory older, middle-class men, increasingly, working- and middle-class families turned to the courts to solve internal and behavioral problems of their wayward or "delinquent" daughters, often at the expense of their daughters and the men they loved. Odem continues, "Instead of being the helpless victims of evil men, most of the young women were willing participants in a more complicated sexual drama than middle-class reformers or public officials could imagine" (Odem 53). Thus, the reformers had initially created these laws for one set of circumstances, but as society changed, another set took precedence in the courts, and in young women's lives.

The author clearly proves her thesis throughout this work. She uses specific court cases, and often cites the results of those cases in her discussion, but she includes other research materials, along with her own conclusions, to paint a graphic portrait of sexual mores, tensions, and change during this time. She shows young women that are reaching out for more in their lives, and as most young people do, rebelling against a society they feel is backward and does not recognize their needs or wants. She also illustrates how the courts looked on many of the morality laws passed during the time, and how the women hoped to remove the double standard of male sexuality and female purity, but that largely did not happen.

She uses her research to prove these points, and includes tables, charts, and appendixes to back up her theories. Throughout the book, she presents real cases to illustrate her points, and these cases form the real centerpiece of the book and why it is interesting. It is fascinating to compare the courts of the time to the courts today, and to see what constituted sexual misconduct at the time. It is also fascinating to see how many men received extremely light sentences for their conduct, while women were often condemned as "impure" by the courts. Society certainly has come a long way from these early days of moral judgment, and while there are many problems with a freer society today, it is interesting to see how sexual conduct, except for abuse and rape, is largely absent from modern court system, indicating how far society has come since these times.

The author clearly conducted intense research for this book. She includes all cases for statutory rape in Alameda County Superior Court from 1910-1920 and all delinquent girls charged before the Los Angeles Juvenile Court in 1910 and 1920. She uses this research to develop her thesis and back up her key themes, while presenting a well thought out argument and fascinating look back into young women's sexual history at the turn of the 20th century. She also presents a lengthy notes and bibliography section in the book, including appendixes, which help indicate the depth of her research and study into her topic. This helps make the book even more credible and believable, and indicates she understands her topic well, and presents valid and interesting arguments, backed up with factual research. She uses primary and secondary sources, such as newspapers, publications, journals, and private papers in an attempt to gain as much information as possible to back up her thesis and key ideas.