Page:Upbuilders by Lincoln Steffens.djvu/248



men did, and other things besides. The Judge got hold of this gang, in the usual way; one or two were arrested, won over, and persuaded to bring in the rest. They all came, and were interested in the game of correction. The good they could do, the Judge told them, was to help enforce the laws of the kids’ Court. They did it, too. They had trouble at first. One day Big Cahoot went to a saloon where some of the little fellers in his gang had bought tobacco. He told the man about the law and asked him not to sell to any Battle-Axes. The saloon-keeper, taken aback, became angry, and started for the boy. Big Cahoot wasn’t afraid. He stood his ground; there was a fight, and the young tough was kicked out into the street. But he told the Judge, and the Judge sent the man to jail for fifteen days. After that it was easier for the boys, who are still reporting to the Judge that the law is respected **over in Globeville and that the Battle-Axes are doin’ all right.”

One curious development of this policy was that many of the liquor dealers, having been made to understand what all this meant to the children, came to like the Judge and to help him to carry out his policy. The Baker case will illustrate.

One day a girl was brought in. She told her story; it was a wine-room story, and the Judge