biography
| name: |
Lindsey, Benjamin Barr
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1869–1943)
|
| biography:
| Jurist and reformer, born in Jackson, Tennessee, USA. The son of a debt-ridden, depressive Confederate officer, he moved with his family to Denver, CO at age 11. When his father killed himself five years later, he went to work as an office boy for a lawyer and, studying in his free time, was admitted to the Colorado bar in 1894. He became a crusader for the juvenile court movement, pushing through legislation that created the first such court in the USA. As juvenile court judge for more than a quarter-century (1900–27), he held that economic injustice caused crime and that juvenile offenders should be treated rather than punished. He also established the principle that adults may be legally responsible for contributing to the delinquency of a minor. In 1928 he moved to California and became a Superior Court judge in Los Angeles (1934). In later years he campaigned for sex education, contraception, and the liberalization of divorce laws, and his autobiography, The Dangerous Life, appeared in 1931. |
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