It depends on how purist you want to be. A purist libertarian position would get gov regulation ALL THE WAY OUT of the industry. Reasoning that "regulation" still implies a large degree of government control, that is what a purist would not want. But I suppose the best "regulated" position a libertarian might advocate would be where prostitution would be no more controlled than any other industry regarding zoning and licensing.
-------------------------- Legalization of Prostitution Kristin Davis, who calls herself the "Manhattan Madam" and who is a convicted prostitute who served four months in prison allegedly for supplying call girls to New York Governor Elliott Spitzer, is running for Governor of New York State. Her campaign has generated more publicity thus far than any other candidate and thus she must be taken seriously. http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-03-02/spitzer s-madam-runs-for-governor/ http://gothamist.com/2010/02/07/manhattan_madam_wants_to_run_for_ go.php#_login One controversy concerns the fact that she wants to have prostitution regulated by the government. This raises the question of how this regulation would work. One imagines that there would be licensed whores standing on street corners wearing their badges much as licensed street vendors and hot dog salesman stand on the streets of New York City today. Or, would the girls be confined to whore houses, out of the sight of the general public? Would there be a red light district, the only place where the whores could stand? When I was a taxi driver I learned some of the places where the whores stand. Two of those places were on the corner of 28th Street and Lexington in Manhattan and the corner of 23 rd Street and 23 rd Avenue in Queens and near to the entrances to the Queens side of the Queensboro Bridge. Some nights there would be as many as one hundred girls standing in these places between Midnight and 6:00 AM. This was an organized operation, because around 6:00 AM big charter buses would come and pick all the girls up. Back in the last part of 1975 and early 1976 a loophole in the law was discovered which made it virtually impossible for the police to arrest and prosecute the prostitutes in whorehouses. As a result, dozens of little whorehouse sprung up all around Midtown Manhattan. One was the Derby Club, located in the Diamond District on 47th between 6th and Fifth Avenues just two doors from the corner of the Sixth. It was a high end place that charged $10 a throw. The Biggest was the Pleasure Seekers Club on the SW Corner of 45th Street and 8th Avenue. Hundreds of girls worked there and they only charged $8 per lay. The place was very popular. However, the FBI closed them down. Turned out the girls were from Columbia, South America. The operators were convicted in federal court for violations of the immigration laws and received long prison sentences. More of the girls however were American, nice looking girls barely out of high school. What this proved was that there were thousands of girls interested in doing this kind of work, if it was legal. By mid-1976, however, these little whorehouses were all closed down, not for prostitution but for violations of the zoning laws. A loophole had been found that closed the loophole that made prostitution effectively legal. A ballot measure last year to make Prostitution legal in San Francisco failed but attracted 41% of the vote. Prostitution is legal in Holland, Japan and many other countries around the world. The question is: Should it be made legal in the USA and what form should it take? Should the girls be allowed to stand in the street or must they stay inside? Sam Sloan ------------------------------------ ForumWebSiteAt http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian Yahoo! Groups Links
