Juvenile Courts Essay

The establishment of the United States juvenile court system in the early 20th century marks a significant milestone in the history of juvenile justice. Prior to the creation of this system, children and youth who had committed crimes were punished in the same matter as adult offenders, rather than through rehabilitation. The juvenile courts’ historic claims to rehabilitate young offenders prompt a contradiction between treatment and punishment, something the system has disputed throughout decades (Feld, 2017). Through a historical analysis approach, I will explore both the changes and the goals of juvenile courts in the United States, examining news articles from the 1920s and the present day, while connecting to the idea of structural functionalism.

One article written in 1924, titled “Gives Bobar Case to Juvenile Court: Grand Jury Refuses to Indict Yonkers Girl Who Slew Her Brother,” and discusses a case about a 14-year-old girl who stabbed her brother to death. The other article written in 1933, titled “Says Juvenile Court Upholds Child Rights,” discusses which course of treatment or punishment offending children should receive based on their age and type of crime committed. Both articles include secondary information, or indirect evidence of something that can be learned though someone else. The broader themes include transitioning from punishment to rehabilitation, specifically sending youth offenders to a training or state school rather than placing them prison. They also discuss the environment and behavior of the children and how those factors have an impact on their actions. In general, the court wanted hearings to be away from the public and didn’t want to put children before the stand if they were too young. Overall, the articles reflect the idea that the responsibility of these crimes should not be placed on the children because they needed their innocence to be protected. This ultimately causes disfunction within society, as the juvenile justice system was developed to create a space for juvenile crime to be confronted and solved, rather than pushed towards somewhere

This reflects children in a way that shows they are unable to fend for themselves and be held responsible. It shifts the blame of the child’s actions from them to something else, which in this case are various aspects of their social environment: home surroundings and school behavior. In other words, while Progressives “recognized that social factors contributed to delinquency, they designed their programs to care for damaged individuals rather than to change the structural root causes” (Feld, 2017). In the more current articles, children are defined as vulnerable and distressed, but also as valued members within a community. Society places a value on children as they are a vital part to its functionality. There is an aspect of responsibility when it comes to youth committing crimes and there is also an understanding that they are learning and growing. They reflect the idea that children can be rehabilitated in a healthy way and are not a lost cause or something to put away and fix. Children still have the rights to be treated as a human and receive