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The Investigation into the Traffic in Women by the League of Nations: Sociological Jurisprudence as an International Social Project

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2015

Paul Knepper
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During the interwar period, the League of Nations led an international campaign against traffic in women. Although important research about the League's work has started to appear, historians have concentrated on the “white slave trade” in the decades before the First World War. From 1924 to 1926, the League conducted the first intercontinental study to determine the number of women caught up in the traffic, and to map the strategies and routes used by traffickers. Undercover investigators visited more than 100 cities across Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Americas. The investigators talked to thousands of prostitutes, pimps, brothel-keepers, and others engaged in the sex trade. The “worldwide” investigation was not only the most significant aspect of the antitrafficking campaign in the interwar years, but also of the League's effort to build an international legal regime on a foundation of sociological jurisprudence.

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Law and History Review , Volume 34 , Issue 1 , February 2016 , pp. 45 - 73
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Copyright © the American Society for Legal History, Inc. 2015 

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27. Pedersen, Susan, “Back to the League of Nations,” American Historical Review (2007): 1091–117CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For Crowdy's institutional entrepreneurship, see Daniel Gorman, The Emergence of International Society in the 1920s (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 52–81.

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34. Grace Abbott to Raymond Fosdick, January 8, 1924. Edith and Grace Abbott Papers, Regenstein Library, University of Chicago (Box 61). The Council added three more names to the committee, which made the Special Body of Experts on the Traffic in Women and Children a committee of eight: Alfred de Meuron, head of the International Bureau for Suppression of the White Slave Traffic; Princess Cristina Guistiniani Bandini, social worker and leader of the Catholic women's movement; Isidore Mauss, head of the child welfare division of the Belgian government; Joseph Louis Hennequin, director of the French Antitraffic Society; Yotaro Sugimura, from the Japanese ministry of foreign affairs; Paulina Luisi, physician and professor at the University of Montevideo; and Sidney Harris, a specialist in child welfare at the British Home Office. When Hennequin died in 1926, he was replaced by Pierre Le Luc, a French official with expertise in police administration. Also, Tadakatsu Suzuki, chief of Japanese legation in Paris, joined two sessions.

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38. Wigdor, Roscoe Pound, 233–34.

39. Minutes of the First Session of the Advisory Committee on the Traffic in Women and Children, July 31, 1922 (Geneva: League of Nations, 1922), 16–18, 52–54.

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41. Bascom Johnson, “Draft report to the Special Body of Experts to investigate the traffic in women and children,” League of Nations archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box S181), 7–8.

42. Pound, “The Scope and Purpose III,” 513.

43. Alan Swingewood, A Short History of Sociological Thought (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000), 63–68. For the role of social science evidence in law, see further Simon, Jonathan, “Katz at Forty: A Sociological Jurisprudence Whose Time Has Come,” Davis Law Review 41 (2007–8): 935–76Google Scholar.

44. The idea for including Panama in the investigation appears to have originated with Katharine Bement Davis. She was director of the women's reformatory at Bedford, New York, and member of the board of directors of ASHA. On learning of the Bureau of Social Hygiene's decision to fund the League's investigation, she told Rockefeller about her idea for a study of prostitution in the “island possessions of the United States”: Hawaii, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Panama. She also spoke with Snow and Johnson, and they let Rockefeller know that they were both in favor of it. Katharine Bement Davis to John D Rockefeller Jr., March 1, 1924; and Raymond Fosdick to John D Rockefeller Jr., March 11, 1924. Rockefeller Archives (RG 2, Series 0, Box 9, Folder 71).

45. “Republic of Panama,” July 7, 1926, 1–2. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box 177).

46. “Panama City: Traffic in Women and Children,” August 14–15, 1924, 1–2. League of Nations archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box 177).

47. “Panama City,” August 16–17, 1924, 5–7.

48. “Panama City,” August 18, 1924, 12.

49. Ibid., 9.

50. “New York City: Unofficial,” November 24, 1926, 12–14. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box S180).

51. In his reports of the interviews, Kinsie gave Walker the codename of 18-R, using the system he devised: T for “trafficker,” M for “madam,” O for “official,” and G for “prostitute”. R was for “respectable person.”

52. Paul Kinsie to Bascom Johnson, November 26, 1926. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box S172).

53. Bascom Johnson, International Traffic in Women and Children (New York: American Social Hygiene Association, 1929), 12. Social Welfare History Archives, Elmer Andersen Library, University of Minnesota (Box 172).

54. Johnson, International Traffic, 5.

55. Report of the Special Body of Experts on the Traffic in Women and Children, Part 2 (Geneva: League of Nations, 1927), 165.

56. Pound, “The Need,” 608.

57. Ibid.

58. Legg, Stephen, “‘The Life of Individuals as Well as Nations’: International Law and the League of Nations Anti-Trafficking Governmentalities,” Leiden Journal of International Law 25 (2012): 648CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

59. Special Body of Experts, Verbatim Report of the 4th Session, July 9, 1926, 29–30. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box S169).

60. “White Slave Report Revised for the League,” New York Times, December 5, 1927, 10.

61. “The World to Print Facts League Vice Inquiry Found,” New York World December 4, 1927, 1.

62. Arthur Sweetser to Rachel Crowdy, January 4, 1928. League of Nations Archives, Geneva (Box R3024).

63. “U.S. Fares Well in Exposure of White Slavery,” New York World, December 8, 1927, 6.

64. Charles H. Tuttle, Life Stories of a Celebrated Lawyer in New York and Lake George (Clifton Corners, NY: College Avenue Press, 2002). Tuttle was often cited in the press for his determination to ferret out corruption in government. He turned to his anticorruption credentials for the theme of his campaign when he decided to run for governor (in opposition to Franklin D. Roosevelt) in 1930.

65. “Tuttle Starts Inquiry,” New York Herald Tribune December 29, 1927, 8.

66. “White Slave Inquiry Here Blocked by League Agent,” New York Herald Tribune December 30, 1927, 14; and “White Slave Inquiry Here,” New York Times December 29, 1927, 40.

67. William R. Castle to Eric Drummond, February 9, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box R3024).

68. Legg, “The Life of Individuals,” 649.

69. Advisory Committee on Traffic in Women and Children: Minutes of the Third Session, 7–11 April 1924 (Geneva: League of Nations, 1924), 24. Sidney Harris, the British representative, drafted a protocol. The Advisory Committee could not afford to react to every rumor, he said. Stories about white slave trafficking should be investigated by the central authorities of the country where they originated, so that the statement could be disproved. Such cases demanded immediate attention and quick action in the particular country, and it was important for the police, assisted by voluntary agencies, to bring offenders to justice. Where the allegation involved another country, this was not simple, but, under the treaty agreed at Paris in 1904, central authorities had an obligation to assist one another. Advisory Committee on Traffic in Women and Children: Minutes of the Third Session, 111.

70. Eric Drummond to William Snow, February 9, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box R3024).

71. William Snow to William Castle, February 6, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United States Library, Geneva (Box R3024).

72. Drummond to Snow, February 9, 1928.

73. Rachel Crowdy to Eric Drummond, February 10, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box R3024).

74. The name has been cut out from the copy of this document in the archives, but it appears in Kinsie's code book, which is also in the archives.

75. Eric Drummond to Gilson Blake, February 11, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box R3024).

76. “White Slave Data Refuted by Tuttle,” New York Times March 9, 1928, 26.

77. “Agents Deny White Slavery,” New York Herald Tribune January 5, 1928, 11.

78. “Tuttle's Aide Told of Panama Cabarets,” New York Times January 7, 1928, 19.

79. Olive Whitin to George Worthington, [c. February 1929], Committee of Fourteen Papers, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York City Public Library (Box 15). For the work of the Committee of Fourteen, see Keire, Mara, “The Committee of Fourteen and Saloon Reform in New York City, 1905–1920,” Business and Economic History 26 (1998): 573–83Google Scholar; Thomas C. Mackey, Pursuing Johns: Criminal Law Reform, Defending Character, and New York City's Committee of Fourteen, 1900–1930 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2005); and Fronc, New York Undercover, 2009.

80. Wigdor, Roscoe Pound, 190. Breaking down the law–fact distinction has been central to the development of social science evidence in law. Monahan, John and Walker, Laurens, “Social Authority: Obtaining, Evaluating, and Establishing Social Science in Law,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 134 (1986): 477–517CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See further the exchange between Roger Cotterrell and David Nelken over whether sociology and law are inseparable or distinct forms of inquiry. Cotterrell, Roger, “Why Must Legal Ideas be Interpreted Sociologically?” Journal of Law and Society 25 (1998): 171–92CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Nelken, David, “Blinding Insights? The Limits of a Reflexive Sociology of Law,” Journal of Law and Society 25 (1998): 407–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

81. Bascom Johnson to Eric Drummond, “Draft of points to be considered by US Attorney Charles H Tuttle for inclusion in any statement he may feel it necessary to give to newspapers concerning the League of Nations report on traffic in women and children,” March 2, 1928. League of Nations Archives, United Nations Library, Geneva (Box R3024). In 1929, the League agreed to allow Rockefeller's Bureau to fund a second investigation to cover the Far East despite opposition from the original Special Body of Experts and members of the Advisory Committee. Johnson continued to serve—the Bureau insisted on this—but Snow was replaced by the French choice, Eugène Regnault. Opponents of study also insisted on a Travelling Commission, which arranged sittings to take testimony from experts, instead of the on-the-spot field investigations in nighttime leisure districts of cities conducted by Kinsie and other undercover operatives. The report of 1933 did not receive the attention as did the 1927 report, and both Abbott and Crowdy had left by 1934. The League's experiment with sociological jurisprudence had ended. Report of the Commission of Enquiry into the Traffic in Women and Children in the East (Geneva: League of Nations, 1933). See further, Pliley, “Claims to Protection”; and Gorman, “Empire, Internationalism”.

82. Leonard Dunham to George Woods, March 9, 1928. Rockefeller Archives, Bureau of Social Hygiene Collection (Series 3, Box 10, Folder 203).

83. Paul Kinsie, “The Fight Against Commercialized Prostitution in the United States” (April 1957). Social Welfare History Archives, Elmer Andersen Library, University of Minnesota (Box 189).

84. Sacriste, Guillaume and Vauchez, Antoine, “The Force of International Law: Lawyers' diplomacy on the International Scene in the 1920s,” Law and Social Inquiry 32 (2007): 83–107CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

85. Barbara Metzger, “Towards an International Human Rights Regime During the Interwar Years: The League of Nations Combat of Traffic in Women and Children,” in Beyond Sovereignty: Britain, Empire and Transnationalism, c. 1860–1950, eds. Kevin Grant, Philippa Levine, and Frank Trentmann (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).