ABSTRACT
Among European criminologists of the second half of the nineteenth century and almost until the World War, the conviction was widespread that England possessed the highest proportion of female delinquency. “In England,” wrote Alexander von Oettingen in his famous Moralstatistik, “the criminal tendency of women, from early childhood, is more intense than elsewhere.” In Professor Hacker computation the European country with the highest rate of female delinquency is Belgium, the one with the lowest Finland, whilst England and Wales stands between France and Germany. The numerical decline in prostitution since the War of 1914–18 has done much to clear the streets of the professional night-walker, and it is very rare to read complaints like that made by a West End hotel-keeper at a London Police Court concerning conditions in his neighbourhood at night. The system of dealing with prostitution offences is almost unanimously regarded as a failure.
