The entrance of women into the political combat in Chicago helped to defeat the régime which was undermining the Juvenile Court. A temporary setback was threatened by the decision of the state court that probation officers were not included in the officers under the civil service law, but until their position under that law could be strengthened the situation was met by an advisory committee, appointed by Judge Pinckney, in whose hands lay the appointment of probation officers, to examine and pass upon all applicants. Louise De Koven Bowen, president of the Juvenile Protective Association and of the Chicago Woman’s Club, and Leonora Meder, president of the Federation of Catholic Women’s Charities, were on this advisory council. In summing up the efforts of women for, and their attitude toward, the Juvenile Court, Julia Lathrop, chief of the Children’s Bureau, says: “Important as are the immediate services of a Juvenile Court to the children who are daily brought before it for protection and guidance, painstaking as are the Court’s methods of ascertaining the facts which account for a child’s trouble, his family history, his own physical and mental state, hopeful as are the results of probation, yet the great primary service of the Court is that it lifts up the truth and compels us to see that wastage of human life whose sign is the child in the Court. Heretofore the kindly but hurried people never saw as a whole what it cannot now avoid seeing—the sad procession of little children and older brothers and sisters who for various reasons cannot keep step with the great company of normal, orderly, protected children.” WOMEN JUDGES In view of all their interest in juvenile courts, their labors to procure their establishment, and their protective care for the children passing through the courts, it was only natural that women should take the next step and mount the bench to deal, particularly, with cases involving children and girls. Fourteen years ago, Judge Lindsey, in Denver, called a woman to his assistance, in cases pending before him, and the experiment was eminently successful. The St. Louis Juvenile Court has two women assistant judges to hear all cases of girls. The change took effect January 12, 1914, and was established by Judge Thomas C. Hennings, who appointed to these positions two women probation officers, Mrs. E. C. Runge and Catherine R. Dunn. No legislation was necessary to make the appointments. The girls are heard by these women privately and then their findings are submitted to him and entered as orders of the court. Only in cases of disagreement between the two women will the judge be called upon to hear the case.