court. Some eight months ago, however, the United States attorney there registered a complaint concerning the great number of small violations adopted from the police for trial in the Federal court. Following upon the heels of such objection came the slurring reference by one of the assistant United States attorneys to the local police force, fully discussed in one of the early paragraphs of this survey. Relations between municipal authorities and Federal agencies in Fort Worth are still outwardly cordial-cooperation is promptly rendered whenever so requested-but the edge of the one-time police zeal, especially with respect to prohibition violators, has been dulled, and enforcement of Federal law in the latter city is now pretty much in the hands of Federal officers.

Plenty of good, moderate-priced moonshine liquor is available both in Fort Worth and Dallas. Foreign liquor is likewise available, but in small quantities and at high prices. Most of the latter product finds a better market further north, in the oil region. Most natives of the Fort Worth-Dallas region manifest a pronounced preference for moonshine brew. Enormous stills are seized in that area. Prices there range from $5 to $7 the gallon. Great quantities of moonshine are sold in gallon glass jugs. The writer discussed the liquor situation in the above cities with prohibition authorities, local police, the county sheriffs, taxi drivers, bell boys, waiters, and friends. One of the latter, a former United States attorney for the northern district, ventured the opinion that there was not so much drinking now among his friends. His law partner, present at the time, immediately took issue with the latter assertion, stating that, in the circle of his acquaintances, drinking was more general. Fort Worth police, incidently, arrested 3,160 persons for drunkenness in 1929.

Dallas police are extremely active in connection with prohibition enforcement work. Many cases made by such authorities are adopted by Federal enforcement forces and prosecuted in the United States court there. At one time two police detectives were assigned to work under direction of the assistant United States attorney at Dallas in charge of prohibition prosecution. Ill feeling between the latter officer and the police, however, soon resulted in the withdrawal of such assistance.

Southern district.-The above territory comprises 46 counties, embracing more than 42,000 square miles, running from Laredo, on the Rio Grande, south along the Mexican border to Brownsville and thence north along the Gulf of Mexico to Houston. Headquarters for the district are located in the latter municipality; agents therein are distributed as follows: Houston, 6; Galveston and Victoria, each 2.

Few of the counties in the southern district could, by any stretch of the imagination, be regarded as bone-dry. Liquor is available in all-more or less difficult of acquisition, according to effectiveness or noneffectiveness of local enforcement organizations. Most border and gulf counties located close to the source of supply are plentifully supplied with foreign liquors at reasonable prices.

Conditions in Laredo, Brownsville, Corpus Christi, and Galveston are unsatisfactory. Liquor, dope, prostitution-everything under the ban in law-abiding communities is apparently given the proverbial "break" in the above places. The first three, with Mexican populations, the last-named predominantly Italian, regard such conditions with characterized Latin indulgence.

Liquor is also plentiful in Houston, though local police are quite active against prohibition violators. A special vice squad, assigned to such duty, made 239 arrests for liquor violations during 1929. Three hundred and one persons were arrested for drunkenness there during the same year.

The above city, by virtue of a canal connecting it with the Gulf of Mexico, is gradually overshadowing Galveston as the first port of the State. Trade with the world has broadened it. International commerce is brushing away provincialism. Ships from the seven seas bring, in their complements, a carousing, free-spending gentry who, in turn, bring the bootlegger, the dope peddler, the pimp, and the prostitute.

FIGURE 1.-Illicit distilling equipment seized at Fort Worth, Tex.

Galveston, not many miles distant from Houston, and the site of a one-time horrible tidal-wave catastrophe, is the first port in Texas. Claim is made that it is the second port of the United States in the value of merchandise entered and cleared there. Foreign vessels entering during 1929 totaled 456; vessels of the same denomination cleared to the number of 1,106. In addition to being an important port of the Nation, Galveston is somewhat of a bathing resort. Several palatial hotels, well patronized in season, adorn the spacious beach there. A larger, more durable sea wall, constructed in part by the State and partly by the Federal Government, protects against a recurrence of the tidal-wave tragedy.

"Galveston," remarked a prominent law officer in Texas, "is outside the United States." His reference concerned law-enforcement conditions. Municipal administration policies in Galveston are influenced by a foreign element, largely Italian. Statutes against liquor, gambling, prostitution, and other vices are practically ignored. Local police seldom, if ever at all, make a liquor case. Several city blocks are populated with bawdy houses. Gambling in all forms flourishes, though not in such notorious a fashion as prostitution.

Eastern district.-This area contains 41 counties, is bounded on the west by the Trinity River, east by the Sabine River, and about 40 miles of the coast line on the south. The Neches River is about centrally located in the district. The Trinity, on the western border, extends northward from the Gulf approximately 150 miles. the Neches about 100 miles, and the Sabine, which joins Texas and Louisiana, extends from the Gulf about 175 miles. The coast line of the district runs from about Sabine Light to the Chambers County line, near High Island, Tex. This country is thickly sprinkled with bayous, swamp, saw-grass, snakes, and stills. Some 25 bayous are adjacent to Lake Sabine, 33 on the Neches, and 5 on the Trinity, which, by the way, is navigable in small boats for about

75 miles.

The following excerpt from a report, submitted by the deputy prohibition administrator for the eastern district, contains information relative to the situation there:

Of the 41 counties in this district the local officers in about 9 are very diligent in the enforcement of the prohibition and Dean liquor laws. From the local officers in 10 counties we have no assistance whatsoever. On the contrary, they will prevent the enforcement of such laws, if possible. The remaining 22 counties are somewhat neutral. If called upon they will assist us, but will not voluntarily offer information or ask for assistance from this department in the enforcement of such laws. * The areas in this district where enforcement is most difficult is along the Sabine and Neches Rivers, including the entire Sabine Lake territory. This is due to the fact we don't have the proper equipment to compete with the speed boats used by violators in transporting liquor. In this territory mentioned, where the greater number of the distilleries are found, the points of violations are accessible only by water. It is isolated, with the exception of now and then a house boat, occupied by fishermen, the majority of whom act as lookouts for the violators. This area is marshland covered by high sea-cane and thickets, all of which tend to make enforcement difficult.

Beaumont, Port Arthur, and Sherman are the principal cities of the eastern district. One interesting feature of the liquor situation at Beaumont, brought to the writer's attention by the deputy administrator, is the fact that persons apprehended in prohibition violations there, now, generally run to the same class as those convicted of felonies in the saloon era. Moonshine liquor is plentiful in Beaumont, though local police and Federal prohibition forces are extremely active. Most of the seizures made indicate that illicit distillers are generally turning out a product that is palatable and, at the same time, moderate in price. Beaumont also harbors a redlight district, located in a part of the city known as Deep Crockett. Port Arthur, at the extreme southern point of the district, lies on the intercoastal canal and Sabine Lake. It is the port of shipment for most of the oil companies in the State. Liquor is plentiful and prostitution flourishes there.

Sherman, a strong church community in the northern section of the district, contains a population firmly committed to prohibition enforcement.

Disposition of agents in the eastern district is as follows: Beaumont, Port Arthur, Sherman, and Tyler each have two.

Professional automobile thieves, all All were armed when apprehended

FIGURE 2.-Present a problem to Houston police. under 17 years of age.

Western district.-Division of enforcement territory in the western part of the State comprises 68 counties, covering 74,300 square miles, running south along the Rio Grande from El Paso to Webb County, thence northeast through San Antonio and Austin to Burleson

County, and thence northwest to the New Mexico line, at Andrews County.

El Paso and San Antonio present the most serious law-enforcement problems in the western district. Both are located in the border area, both house influential Mexican colonies, both are important military centers, and both are popular tourist meccas.

Conditions in El Paso result more from geography than from dereliction on the part of local authorities. Both the chief of police and sheriff there are splendid officers. Both appear to be making a sincere effort to clean up the city. Both have reputations as men of courage and integrity.

The one apparently unsurmountable obstacle in the path of effective enforcement in El Paso lies across the river, in Mexican terri

FIGURE 3.-International bridge over Rio Grande River, Laredo, Tex., Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, in foreground

tory. The writer has reference to Juarez-flea-bitten, dirty, little, adobe metropolis-just a few steps over the international bridge-or, if one prefers a less formal route, a short, muddy ford, at a smuggling point in less-populated parts of the city.

Everything is on tap in Juarez. Three distilleries, a brewery, saloons, cabarets, gambling joints, bawdy houses, and a first-class race track-all, as advertised, 5 minutes from El Paso. The golden harvest that flows into Juarez from the latter place attracts numerous undesirables dangerous characters from American big city underworlds. El Paso, the jumping off point, houses large numbers of such undesirables.