Portland vice scandal

The scandal also exposed Theodore Kruse and the Louvre restaurant in Portland, which he had owned.

Kruse (February 13, 1864, Germany – November 3, 1941, Gearhart, Oregon[9]) started in Portland with the Kruse Grill around 1891. He married his second wife, Marion F. in Spokane, Washington in 1906 and divorced in 1908. He then purchased the Louvre restaurant, running it and Portland's Belvedere Hotel starting around 1907. He was married to his third wife, Marie E. Daggett, at the time. While in the process of setting up Hotel Carlton in 1911, he disappeared mysteriously in August 1911, days before a large payment was due to Gevurtz Furniture Company for the Carlton, who formed a company and took over the hotel lease. This was front-page news in the Oregonian; a month later, his wife sent people to Seattle to look for him, and the Oregonian described him as surfacing there with a young man. He suddenly reappeared on March 24, 1912, at the Carlton.[5][10][11][12]

In April 1912 his third wife was granted divorce from him, citing his "cruel and inhuman treatment" (a common grounds for divorce before no-fault divorce was legal). She described him as flirting with clientele at his restaurant in 1911 before his disappearance, and recounted that he was first in Quebec, then she sent a stepson (from his previous marriage) to Europe and found him in Germany. He stated his wife had died and he had retired. He then traveled through Europe (Monte Carlo, Naples, Rome), before suddenly reappearing.[6][12][5]

The Louvre was described as having an "immoral atmosphere" and on a list of eight "gay refectories" in Portland in 1911 by a local judge. It had a mens-only dining room. By 1912 it was linked to the clique, especially Kruse and Rigó. Kruse then closed the Louve and opened the Rainbow Grill in October 1913, which advertised "fat, juicy, delicious" oysters and a "Special Men's Grill" with meat of the diner's choosing. It closed in June 1915.[5][13]

The clique also exposed Hungarian violinist popular in Portland, Rigó Jancsi (known as "Gypsy" Rigó), described by The Oregonian as "violin virtuoso, gipsy of romance, gay Lothario." He had played at the Louvre, perhaps starting in 1909, then was caught in the clique in the November 1912 events. Rigó had previously been embroiled in scandal, eloping with Clara Ward, Princesse de Caraman-Chimay despite still being married to her first husband. The marriage didn't last, as Rigó continued with his "insatiable and well-publicized appetite for women". This also helped clear him of the vice charges.[5]

One of the most prominent members of the vice clique was Edward Stonewall Jackson McAllister, a Portland attorney, Progressive activist, leader in the state Democratic Party, and friend of William Simon U'Ren and C.E.S. Wood.[3]

During his trial, The Morning Oregonian would report that he was charged with committing an "immoral act."[14] According to the written opinion in State v. McAllister, 67 Or 480, 136 P 354, McAllister was charged with committing sodomy with 30 year old "boy victim" Roy Kadel (1882-1934) on October 28, 1912, in McAllister's law office in downtown Portland. The indictment merely stated that his charge was "commit[ting] the crime against nature," which was "too well understood and too disgusting to be herein more fully set forth." But Oregon Supreme Court justice Charles McNary, in his dissent in McAllister, shed more light on the matter:

The testimony of the witness Harry Work is undisputed, and, in narrative form, is that he met Roy Kadel on one of the busy thoroughfares of Portland, and accompanied him unwittingly to the office of the defendant, where both remained in the reception-room until Kadel was beckoned by defendant to enter his private office; that, growing impatient at the failure of Kadel to return, Work stepped into the hall and knocked on the door leading into defendant's private office, whereupon defendant opened the door and Work entered and saw Kadel wiping his penis with a handkerchief; that Work ejaculated [blurted out], "Hello, what is this?" and Kadel replied, "McAllister and I are having a little trade," which, in the parlance of the morally depraved, means the performance of the act defined in the indictment; that Work further stated: "Well, I'm in a hurry; I am going back to the hotel"--and defendant remarked, "All right, boys, I'll see you again"; thereat Work and Kadel stepped into the hallway and were gone.

A warrant for McAllister's arrest was issued November 19. According to a contemporary news report in The Morning Oregonian, he was in Marshfield (now called Coos Bay) on that day, "taking depositions in a legal case." Furthermore, he "was incensed when he heard the nature of the charge that had been lodged against him" and professed his innocence.[15] He promised to return to Portland to face charges, but on November 21, he was arrested on a southbound train at the Medford train station, near the California state line. He denied his identity, but several people in Medford recognized him.[16] He claimed he was headed to Ashland to meet with his law partner, but "authorities believe[d] he was trying to leave the state."[17]

In McAllister's trial, Judge John P. Kavanaugh permitted testimony of acts of sodomy allegedly committed by McAllister with people other than Kadel, "for the purpose of showing mental disposition and casting light on the probability of the committal of the act actually charged." Men testified he was known as "Mother McAllister" at Lownsdale Square, a gay cruising site. The defense argued that these testimonies infringed upon McAllister's constitutional rights.[3][18] In charging the jury, Kavanaugh gave the following instruction:

The court thinks that a man with normal sexual instincts is incapable of committing the crime, and that it is only a person of abnormal sexual sense that is capable of committing it. So if you were satisfied that one was possessed of this unnatural or abnormal sexual sense, you might infer that he had a motive, a reason or a force, impelling him to do such an act.

The defense would later argue on appeal, successfully, that Kavanaugh made a prejudicial error in giving his personal opinion to the jury rather than stating only matters of law.

McAllister made a closing argument for the defense on his own behalf, described as "an eloquent plea", wherein "he charged that he [was] the victim of a conspiracy."[3][14] On February 22, 1913, the jury convicted him, but recommended "leniency in punishment."[19] On February 25, he was sentenced to one to five years in the state penitentiary, the maximum sentence called for by statute. Notice of appeal to the Oregon Supreme Court was immediately filed.[3][20]

Others associated with the clique included William H. Allen, who attempted to commit suicide with chloroform at the YMCA following the exposure, Horace Tabb, physician Harry Start (and witness Robert Ray), clerk and bookkeeper Edward Wedemeyer, George Birdseye, Fred A. Clark, Alonzo "Billy" E. Ream (1856-1930), Earle Van Hulen, Fred Rodby, George Parker, Earl Taylor, Kenneth Hollister, Will Phelps, Horace Tabb (at the Multnomah Hotel) and Lionel Deane. Claude Bronner and Nathan Healy lived with each other at 1731 S.W. Taylor; Healy turned on Bronner, who served time. John Moffitt, a photographer, was caught in the scandal and then advertised his services as "Photographer of Men".[9]

Discussing the scandal, a letter to the editor in the Portland News said "If these degenerating practices were committed by Greeks or Hindus, these lily whites... would be in favor of drowning them in the Willamette [River]."[21] Boag also compares the scandal to a 1894 article in the Evening Telegram, which described "One of the most atrocious crimes ever committed in this city... a big stalwart negro named Fred Jones, a scowdweller...", showing the racist and working-class biases in the city.[22]

Walter Lafferty, Portland's U.S. Representative, vowed to bring the scandal to Washington's attention, though his efforts were short-lived.[23]

The Oregon state legislature responded to the scandal by amending the state's sodomy law via House Bill 145 (1913). The law was clarified and broadened to include "any act or practice of sexual perversity," including fellatio.[2] At the time, courts had previously ruled that sodomy laws similar to Oregon's did not cover oral sex, and it was believed that convictions based on oral rather than anal sex acts might be reversed. Also under H.B. 145, the maximum sentence for sodomy in the state penitentiary was tripled, from five years to fifteen.[24]

As urged by Governor Oswald West, the legislature also passed H.B. 69 (1913), a law to authorize sterilization of "sexual perverts" and "moral degenerates,"[25] which were defined as "those addicted to the practice of sodomy or the crime against nature, or to other gross, bestial and perverted sexual habits and practices prohibited by statute."[26]

People opposed to sterilization, including Catholic clergymen and reformers such as William Simon U'Ren, formed the Anti-Sterilization League and successfully forced a referendum on this legislation. Oregon voters repealed it by a vote of 56 percent to 44 in November 1913. However, the legislature passed a similar law in 1917.