In the Matter of The Petition of Alexander Ferrier.
| Decision Date | 21 June 1882 |
| Citation | 1882 WL 10325,42 Am.Rep. 10,103 Ill. 367 |
| Parties | In the matter of the Petition of ALEXANDER FERRIER. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
APPEAL from the County Court of Cook county; the Hon. MASON B. LOOMIS, Judge, presiding.
Appellee filed a petition in the county court of Cook county, under section 3 of “An act to aid industrial schools for girls,” approved May 29, 1879. (Laws 1879, p. 309.) The petition set forth that Winifred Breen, the appellant, was a girl nine years old; had repeatedly been picked up by the police and others while wandering about the streets at night; was a truant from school, and had not proper parental care, and was in imminent danger of ruin and harm, etc.
Three witnesses testified as to the character and habits of the girl, Winifred Breen, stating that she was without proper parental care; that she wandered upon the streets of Chicago at all hours of the day and night; that she had been frequently picked up by the policemen of the city, late at night and miles away from her usual place of abode, and had been confined all night in police stations; that she kept bad company, and was in great danger of being ruined; that the mother of the child is weak-minded, and at times insane, having on one occasion attempted to hang Winifred; that she was unfit to have the control of the child, and incapable of managing her; that the step-father is poor and an invalid, earning only a small salary, and is compelled to be absent from his home the entire day, and he found it impossible to control the girl, and that she had been guilty of thefts and falsehood. The fourth witness, Mrs. Beveridge, stated that she was president of the Industrial School for Girls; that the school is situated in Evanston, in Cook county, on a five-acre tract of beautiful rolling ground, over which the inmates have free range as a play-ground; that there is no more restraint upon their liberty than that imposed upon children in an ordinary family or institution of learning; that they are taught ordinary household duties, sewing, and the ordinary branches of English education; that parents are permitted to visit their children when they desire, and that children are given places in private families whenever suitable places can be procured, but not without their and their parents' consent. The girl herself testified that she sometimes ran away; that her mother tried to hang witness, and then tried to hang herself; that she was afraid of her mother; that she knew about this industrial school and wanted to go there. The father of the child, if still living, appears to have been a worthless character,--a professional thief,--who when last heard from, three years ago, was at the Bridewell, and the mother was divorced from him.
The jury returned a verdict that Winifred Breen was a dependent girl, and that the facts set forth in the petition were true, and thereupon the county judge entered an order that said Winifred should be committed to said Industrial School for Girls, and appointed Mrs. Ellen Woodward, one of the vice-presidents of the school, guardian of the child, in accordance with a provision of the act. The county attorney, whom the court had appointed counsel for the girl, and who appeared for her, took an appeal to this court.
Section 3 of the act under which this proceeding was taken, is as follows: “Any responsible person who has been a resident of any county in this State one year next preceding the time at which the petition is presented, may petition the county court of said county to inquire into the alleged dependency of any female infant then within the county, and every female infant who comes within the following descriptions shall be considered a dependent girl, viz: Every female infant who begs or receives alms while actually selling or pretending to sell any article in public, or who frequents any street, alley or other place for the purpose of begging or receiving alms, or who, having no permanent place of abode, proper parental care or guardianship, or sufficient means of subsistence, or who for other cause is a wanderer through streets and alleys, and in other public places, or who lives with or frequents the company of, or consorts with, reputed thieves or other vicious persons, or who is found in a house of ill-fame, or in a poor house.” The petition is to be verified by oath, and notice is to be given to the parents and guardian. The female infant is brought before the court, and if without counsel, it is made the duty of the court to assign counsel for her, and a trial is had before a jury of six. Section 2 declares: “The object of industrial schools for girls shall be to provide a home and proper training school for such girls as may be committed to their charge.”
Mr. CONSIDER H. WILLETT, for the appellant.
Mr. JAMES K. EDSALL, and Mr. N. M. JONES, for the appellee.
It is insisted that the law under which the proceeding was had is unconstitutional--first, as being in violation of the Bill of Rights as to personal liberty, in respect of the provision that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law, and The People v. Turner, 55 Ill. 280, is relied upon as being a decisive authority in favor of appellant in this respect. That was an application by the father of a boy for a writ of habeas corpus to the superintendent of the “reform school” of Chicago, to free the boy from an alleged illegal restraint of his liberty, and it was held that the law providing for the commitment to that “reform school” was unconstitutional. That school was established under a statute different and much less careful in its provisions, and nearer in its approach to a criminal enactment, than the one in question. The judge was the only one to decide in the matter. Criminals between six and sixteen years of age, convicted of crime punishable by fine or imprisonment, were confined there. That institution was regarded in that case as...
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S**** S**** v. State
... ... Both cases originated by the filing of a petition for a writ of habeas corpus (postconviction) ... We ... is a possibility, at least, that the jury trial, if required as a matter of constitutional precept, will remake the juvenile proceeding into a ... of the Court in O'Connell were effectively discarded in In re Ferrier, 103 Ill. 367, 42 Am.Rep. 10 (1882) ... 3 See for example McKeiver v ... ...
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Gault
...do not afford him this custodial privilege, the law must do so.'); Ex parte Crouse, 4 Whart. 9, 11 (Sup.Ct.Pa.1839); Petition of Ferrier, 103 Ill. 367, 371—373 (1882). 22 The Appendix to the opinion of Judge Prettyman in Pee v. United States, 107 U.S.App.D.C. 47, 274 F.2d 556 (1959), lists ......
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M.M., In re
...8 Ill. at 438; see also People ex rel. Lehman v. Lehman (1966), 34 Ill.2d 286, 291, 215 N.E.2d 806; In re Petition of Ferrier (1882), 103 Ill. 367. Clearly, the adoption court in Scraggs could, in the exercise of its inherent equitable power, enjoin the father's visitation. The court's powe......