The Judge and the Brothel
A Tacoma magistrate’s attempt to move his court away from a neighboring brothel backfired when the City Council ordered him to clean up the street instead.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Judge Campbell of Tacoma recently presented a statement and petition to the Council of that city, in which he informed that body that a portion of the building occupied by him for court was used for vile and unlawful purposes, and asked the city government to provide him another, cleaner and more respectable place. The answer he got from the committee was unanimously adopted by the Council: Whereas, Alexander Campbell, Esq., Committing Magistrate of the city of Tacoma, and one of the Justices of the Peace of the county of Pierce, has charged that the proprietors of the building, a part of which is occupied as a Police Court for the city, has fitted up rooms adjoining said police rooms for a house of ill fame, and the same is now occupied by women for a house of prostitution; and whereas, it does not appear that said Police Magistrate has made any attempt to abate the nuisance; Resolved, that a decent regard to public opinion, and the due enforcement of the law by public officers, are surer preventives of crimes than the place of location of a police court. Resolved, that the committing magistrate be requested to forthwith cause to be abated the nuisance which he officially charges to exist, and that it is his duty to prosecute to the full extent of the law the keeper of said house of ill fame.
“A decent regard to public opinion, and the due enforcement of the law by public officers, are surer preventives of crimes than the place of location of a police court.”
This 1884 civic standoff highlights the perpetual tension between local government, public morality, and the responsibility of the law. Even in the 1880s, the Tacoma City Council recognized that shuffling a courtroom didn't solve the underlying issue—a precursor to modern debates about how cities handle vice, homelessness, and the enforcement of public order.
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