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32 JUVENILE DELINQUENCY The reason why he asked me to appear here was because I have been a field deputy for him for l7i/2 years. Primarily my interest in the office as it was divided up was people and all their problems—old people, young people, sick and poor and alcoholics, and so forth. I retired on January 1, but because of the fact that that has been my assignment for some 17 years he asked me to appear and read a statement for him. So he has given me a statement to read which I will read. Chairman Kefauver. How long is that statement, Mr. Miley? Mr. Miley. Oh, about 2 or 3 minutes. Chairman Kefauver. All right, sir. "Will you read it fast? STATEMENT OF JOHN ANSON FOED, MEMBEE, LOS ANGELES COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS (READ BY ARTHUR F. MILEY) Mr. Ford. The causes and cure of juvenile delinquency present one of the most complex social problems of our day. As indicated below, many factors not present when life was simpler contribute to the de- parture of boys and girls from normal living patterns. My comments are based largely on more than 20 3^ears service as a supervisor for the largest county government operation in this country. During most of these years the county probation department, the county's five juvenile forestry camps, El Retire School for Girls, and the county's detention home, known as Juvenile Hall, have been part of my committee assignments. Years of observing the administration of these jirojects have given me a broad field for observing delinquency. Basically city life is not wholly normal or natural for a young grow- ing boy, or even a girl, whose nature more naturally responds to life in ^"he wide-open spaces. Unavoidably city restraints in a score of ways irk the growing youngsters. Youtli found it hard, particularly a few years ago, to change from the war psychology of hate and destruction for the enemy, to a psy- chology of tolerance and cooperation for the gang in the next block or the crowd from another elementary or high school. Undoubtedly war has contributed indirectly to many of our youth problems. While small children have little or no regard for differences of race or color, adolescent youth and very young men and women are apt to give much emphasis to these differences, in an intolerant spirit. From this, much strife and even bloodshed results. Los Angeles colored youth and those of Mexican ancestry find them- selves in difficult social situations. Economic necessity and/or lan- guage handicaps tend to make many of tliese youth drop out of school before graduation. Unequipped for trade and with few if any skills, they increasingly resent being forced into unskilled work; they become sensitive and resentful of alleged social inferiority. Integration into self-support and self-respect in a society dominated by a middle class Anglo-Saxon psychology is not easily achieved by them. Even Boy Scounting and YMCA connections are shunned by many who are resentful of what life has brought them. It should be emphasized also that the many-sided social changes takmg place disconcertingly and simultaneously in all classes are re- sulting m delinquency of boys and girls for reasons quite distinctive