The United States White-Slave Traffic Act of 1910 (ch. 395, 36 Stat. 825; codified as amended at 18 U.S.C. § 2421–2424) prohibited white slavery. It also banned the interstate transport of females for “immoral purposes.” Its primary stated intent was to address prostitution, immorality, and human trafficking. The act is better known as the Mann Act, after James Robert Mann, an American lawmaker. While its ambiguous language allowed selective pros...
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The United States White-Slave Traffic Act of 1910 (ch. 395, 36 Stat. 825; codified as amended at 18 U.S.C. § 2421–2424) prohibited white slavery. It also banned the interstate transport of females for “immoral purposes.” Its primary stated intent was to address prostitution, immorality, and human trafficking. The act is better known as the Mann Act, after James Robert Mann, an American lawmaker. While its ambiguous language allowed selective prosecutions for many years, it has been amended by Congress to apply only to actual criminal offenses.
The most common use of the Mann Act was to prosecute men for having sex with underage women. It was also used to harass others who had drawn the authorities' wrath for "immoral" behavior.
The first person prosecuted under the act was heavyweight boxing champion Jack Johnson, an African-American man. He had an affair with a white prostitute named Lucille Cameron. Johnson married Cameron so that she could not be forced to testify against him....
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