PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 
 
 IN THE CITY OF NEW YORK 
 
 Volume II] JULY, 1912 [Number 4 
 
 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 PUBLISHED QUARTERLY BY 
 THE ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 
 
 Columbia Uxiversity 
 ii6th Street and Broadway, New York 
 
 Entered as second-class matter Nov. 2i, iqio, at the post office at New York N. Y. 
 under the Act of Congress, J-uly ib, i8q4. 
 
 Copyright, 1912, by the Academy of Political Science 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 OF THE ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 
 
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 Volume I (1910-1911) consists of four numbers: 
 I. The Economic Position of Women 
 II. The Reform of the Currency 
 
 III. The Year Book of the Academy 
 
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 I. Capital and Labor Unified 
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 III. National Housing Association 
 
 IV. Organization for Social Work 
 
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PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 
 
 IN THE CITY OF NEW YORK 
 
 Volume II] JULY, 1912 [Number 4 
 
 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 The Academy of Political Science 
 
 Columbia University, New York 
 
 1912 
 
^^5 
 
 
 Copyright by 
 The Academy of Political Science 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I SOCIAL SURVEYS 
 
 The Spread of the Survey Idea . . . . i 
 
 Paul U. Kellogg 
 A Social Survey of a Typical American City . i8 
 
 Shelby M. Harrison 
 A Sanitary and Health Survey . . . .32 
 
 George T. Palmer 
 The Relation of a Neighborhood Survey to 
 Social Needs 51 
 
 Miss Pauline Goldmark 
 Statistical Methods in Survey Work . . .56 
 
 Robert Emmet C haddock 
 The Scope and Value of the Local Surveys of 
 the Men and Religion Movement ... 63 
 
 Orrin G. Cocks 
 
 II NATIONAL SOCIAL NEEDS 
 
 A Federal Commission on Industrial Relations — 
 Why it is Needed 71 
 
 John Bates Clark 
 Labor Legislation a National Social Need . . 75 
 
 Henry Rogers Seager 
 Next Steps in the Child-Labor Campaign . . 80 
 
 Owen R. Lovejoy 
 Budgetary Provision for Social Needs . . 86 
 
 William H. Allen 
 An Interpretation of Vocational Guidance. . 92 
 
 Miss Alice P. Barrows 
 Labor of Women and Children in Tenements . 114 
 
 Mrs. Florence Kelley 
 Two National Social Needs 116 
 
 Washington Gladden 
 Recreation and Youth . . . . . .118 
 
 Luther H. Gulick 
 Regulation of Public Amusements . . . .123 
 
 Mrs. Belle Lindner Israels 
 Commercialized Vice 127 
 
 George J. Kneeland 
 The Problem of Wayward Girls and Women De- 
 linquents 130 
 
 Miss Maude E. Miner 
 
 iii 
 
 253740 
 
iv CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Prevention of Cruelty to Children . .139 
 
 C. C. Cars tens 
 The Institutional Care of Children . . .146 
 
 Hastings H. Hart 
 The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. . .150 
 
 W. O. Stillman 
 Prison Labor .159 
 
 E. Stagg Whitin 
 The Extension of Organized Charity in the 
 United States 164 
 
 Francis H. McLean 
 The Social Program of the Federal Council of 
 the Churches of Christ in America . . .174 
 
 Charles S, Macfarland 
 
 III GREATER NEW YORK'S SOCIAL NEEDS 
 
 City-Planning in New York City . . . .180 
 
 George B. Ford 
 Housing Needs 188 
 
 Lawrence Veiller 
 The Protection of Factory Workers . . .191 
 
 George M. Price 
 The Education of Mothers and the Saving of 
 Babies 195 
 
 Philip Van Ingen 
 The Protection and Distribution of Immigrants . 199 
 
 Kate Holladay Claghorn ^ 
 
 Charitable Relief 'xSjb/ 
 
 W. Frank Persons '' 
 
 Social Work of the New York Schools . . 211 
 
 John Martin 
 
 Cooperation of the Churches in Housing Reform. 215 
 James Jenkins, Jr. 
 
 IV RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS AND 
 SOCIAL WORK 
 Addresses at the Dinner of the Academy of 
 Political Science 
 
 Monsignor Joseph F. Mooney .217 I Dr. Wilfred T. Grenfell . . ii'}, 
 Rt. Rev. E. R. Hendrix . . .219 Professor E. T. Devine. . . 226 
 Rabbi E. G. Hirsch 220 I Mr. John R. Mott . .... 228 
 
 Proceedings of Spring Meeting . . . .234 
 
THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA^ 
 
 PAUL U. KELLOGG 
 Director of the Pittsburgh Survey, 1907-09 
 
 IN most of our social movements, we are under the necessity 
 of starting something going. ^-We must stir up interest as 
 the first step.^ The survey movement, if we can call it that, 
 does not seem to be handicapped in this way. ggThere is more 
 spontaneous outcropping of the survey idea the country round 
 than as yet we have any sufficient organization or body of trained 
 workers to deal with.ii^lose on the heels of Pittsburgh came 
 Buffalo. <^The pioneer work in the steel district was instigated 
 by Charities Publication Committee and was carried out in 
 cooperation with militant Pittsburghers, under grants from the 
 Russell Sage Foundation. 'V The study of the Polish section of 
 Buffalo was the first undertaking of the sort instigated and 
 financed by the city surveyed." Then we had that interesting 
 state-wide tour of Kentucky by Mrs. Caroline Bartlett Crane, 
 which was a quick sizing up of conditions in a group of smaller 
 cities under the State Board of Health and the State Federation 
 of Women's Clubs. We know of the series of community 
 studies carried out by Mr. Aronovici in Rhode Island, and by Mr. 
 St. John and Mr. Stelzle in Newark, Sag Harbor and elsewhere ; 
 the studies of the Huntington Presbytery in seven counties in 
 central Pennsylvania; the work of the Presbyterian Board in 
 its rural surveys in Illinois, Missouri and Pennsylvania; and 
 the scores of neighborhoods, mill and mining towns which the 
 Federal Immigration Commission caught up in their schedules. 
 Last summer the Associated Charities of Syracuse, the Chamber 
 of Commerce, the Central Trades Assembly and the Ministerial 
 Association joined forces in the stock-taking of a single city 
 which is described (p. 8) by Mr. Harrison; while the findings 
 of the Lowell survey are just out in book form.^ Booth's Lon- 
 don y Rowntree's York, the Hull-House Books and Papers, the 
 
 'Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 18, 1912 
 
 (475) 
 
2 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 South End House Studies, Mr. Kirk's Providence, Dr. Roberts' 
 Anthracite Coal Communities, the Washington number of Chari- 
 ties and The Commons are instances, all of them, of social in- 
 vestigations which have embodied many of the elements we find 
 in the survey idea, but which are not identified with the more or 
 less crystallizes movement which to-day engages our attention. 
 For I have 4)ef ore me four closely typewritten sheets, thor- 
 oughly covered with the names of cities and organizations which 
 are either embarked on surveys or are considering surveys, or 
 would like to know more about them. *<rhe names of Minne- 
 sota, Missouri, Texas and Kansas towns show the spread of the 
 idea no less than those of the four chief cities of the British 
 Northwest. One inquiry comes from India. O 
 
 Just at this juncture, the more immediate aspect of the move- 
 ment presents itself in the fact that in nearly every city in which 
 the Men and Religion Forward teams have set forth a social 
 program, one of the planks in that program has been to recom- 
 mend a social survey. So we are faced with the question : 
 
 ■"What is a survey, and how shall the residents of the average 
 city go about one, with some prospect that they will be doing a 
 craftsman's job of it? We know in a general way that a survey 
 is something different from the ordinary operations of a mu- 
 nicipal league or a charitable society or a settlement — different 
 even from their campaigns for special reforms. We know also 
 that it is different from newspaper work, or a civic exhibit, or 
 an official report or scientific research as such ; although we 
 may have an inkling that it partakes of all of these things, in 
 one way or another. What then? What elements distinguish 
 the survey? The papers by Mr. Harrison, Miss Goldmark and 
 Dr. Palmer give concrete answers and give them with a preci- 
 sion and taking quality which can scarcely be bettered by any 
 generalizations. They tell, however, of three fairly well-defined 
 types of survey ; and it will help in arriving at a working con- 
 ception of the survey idea, to run over some of the elements 
 common to all. 
 
 *• And first, for purposes of comparison, let me set down the 
 
 elements, five in number, which we felt at the close of the 
 
 Pittsburgh Survey made that a distinctive enterprise. These 
 
 methods were : 
 
 (476) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 3 
 
 1. To bring a group of experts together to cooperate with 
 local leaders in gauging the social needs of one city. 
 
 2. To study these needs in relation to each other, to the 
 whole area of the city, and to the civic responsibilities of de- 
 mocracy. 
 
 3. To consider at the same time both civic acd industrial 
 conditions, and to consider them for the most part in their 
 bearings upon the wage-earnmg population. 
 
 4. To reduce conditions to terms of household experience 
 and human life. 
 
 5. To devise graphic methods for making these findings 
 challenging, clear and unmistakable, o 
 
 If I were recasting this formula to-day, I do not know that 
 I should want to change it materially. But it will perhaps give 
 a better approach to the survey movement to consider not what 
 sets it off from other undertakings, but what it draws upon 
 them for. 
 
 First of all, the survey takes its unit of work from the sur- 
 veyor. It has to do with a subject matter, to be sure, but that 
 subject matter is subordinated to the idea of a definite geo- 
 graphical area. It is quite possible to carry on a study of 
 tuberculosis, for example, as a piece of physiological research, 
 or as a piece of sociological research, wholly apart from where 
 it occurs. But just as a geological survey is not geology in 
 general, but the geology of a given mountain range or water 
 shed, so, even when a special subject matter is under study, 
 the sociological survey adds an element of locality, of neighbor- 
 hood or city, state or region, to what would otherwise pass 
 under the general term of an investigation. 
 
 And when the subject matter is not specialized, but concerns 
 the more intangible ** needs " of a community, the survey be- 
 comes necessarily different things in different localities. It can- 
 not be thought out at a far-away desk. It is responsive to local 
 conditions ; in a worn-out country district, suffering from what 
 Professor Ross calls '' folk-depletion," its content has little in 
 common with that of a survey in a textile center, tense with 
 human activity, and dominated by its terms of work. 
 
 In the second place, the survey takes from the physician his 
 art of applying to the problems at hand standards and experi- 
 
 (477) 
 
4 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 ence worked out elsewhere. To illustrate, if your pure scientist 
 were studying the housing situation in a given town, he would 
 start out perhaps without any hypotheses, tabulate every salient 
 fact as to every house, cast up long columns of figures, and 
 make careful deductions, which might and might not be worth 
 the paper they were written on. Your housing reformer and 
 your surveyor ought to know at the start what good ventilation 
 is, and what cellar dwellings are. These things have been 
 studied elsewhere, just as the medical profession has been study- 
 ing hearts and lungs until they know the signals which tell 
 whether a man's organs are working right or not, and what 
 to look for in making a diagnosis. 
 
 «M»In the third place, the survey takes from the engineer his 
 working conception of the structural relation of things. There 
 is a building element in surveys.*^ When we look at a house, we 
 know that carpenters have had a good deal to do with it, and 
 it is possible to investigate just what the carpenters have done ; 
 also the bricklayers, the steam-fitters and the rest of the build- 
 ing trades. But your engineer, like your general contractor 
 and architect, has to do with the work of each of these crafts in 
 its relation to the work of every other. So it is with a survey, 
 whether it deals with the major elements entering into a given 
 community which has structural parts of » a given master 
 problem such as Dr. Palmer describes in his survey of the sani- 
 tary conditions in Springfield. Only recently I received a letter 
 from a man engaged in making a general social survey of a 
 manufacturing town — a so-called survey. He did not think that 
 it was truly a survey, nor did I, because out of the scope of 
 that investigation had been left all of the labor conditions in the 
 mills. The local committee had been fearful of raising opposi- 
 tion in forceful quarters. Yet these labor conditions were basic 
 in the town's life ; on them, for better or worse, hung much of 
 the community welfare; and by ignoring them, the committee 
 could deal with partial solutions only. It was as if a diagnos- 
 tician in making his examination had left a patient's stomach 
 out of consideration because the patient was a dyspeptic and 
 irritable. They had violated the structural integrity of their 
 survey. 
 
 (478) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 5 
 
 ^ In the fourth place, the survey takes from the charity-organi- 
 zation movement its case-work method of bringing problems 
 down to human terms. ^ Death rates exemplify human units in 
 their barest essentials ; but I have in mind a more developed 
 unit. Let me illustrate from the Pittsburgh Survey in the pains- 
 taking figures we gathered of the household cost of sickness — 
 lost wages, doctor's bills, medicines, ice, hospitals, funerals, the 
 aftermath of an epidemic in lowered vitality and lowered earn- 
 ings, household by household — not in sweeping generalizations 
 but in what Mr, Woods called ** piled-up actualities." If I were 
 to set one touchstone, more than another, to differentiate the 
 true survey from social prospecting, it would be this case-work 
 method. In employing it the surveyor, because of lack of 
 means and time, must often deal with samples rather than with 
 the whole population coming within the scope of his study. 
 These samples may be groups of school children ; or the people 
 who die in a certain year ; or those who live in a certain ward. 
 The method is one, of course, which is scientifically justifiable 
 only so long as those who employ it can defend their choice of 
 the sample chosen, and show where it does and does not repre- 
 sent the entire group. ^ 
 
 *^ Under this head it is to be noted that the survey is in a field 
 friendly to what we have come to call municipal research? The 
 latter is indebted for its methods of unit-costs and efficiency to 
 the accountants. •^These methods may be applied to city bud- 
 gets and city departments as an integral part of a social sur- 
 vey, the distinction between the two movements in practise 
 being perhaps that the one is focused primarily on governmental 
 operations ; the other on phenomena imbedded in the common 
 life of the people. Zi 
 
 ^^ In the fifth place, the survey takes from the journalist the 
 idea of graphic portrayal, which begins with such familiar tools 
 of the surveyor as maps and charts and diagrams, and reaches 
 far through a scale in which photographs and enlargements, 
 drawings, casts and three-dimension exhibits exploit all that the 
 psychologists have to tell us of the advantages which the eye 
 holds over the ear as a means for communication. ^ With these 
 the survey links a sturdy effort to make its findings have less in 
 
 (479) 
 
6 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 common with the boredom of official reports than with the 
 more engaging qualities of newspaper ''copy" — especially 
 that simplicity of structure, tangible framework, and readability 
 which American magazine men have developed as their tech- 
 nique in writing for a democracy. This is not a counsel, bear 
 in mind, of flimsy sensationalism ; although those who have 
 matters to conceal seek to confuse the two. A startling article 
 patched up from a few glints of fact is a very different proposi- 
 tion from a crystal set in a matrix of tested information. 
 
 Underlying this factor of graphic portrayal is the factor of 
 truth ; truth plus publicity. It is often possible to work out 
 large and definite reforms internally, by getting a group of 
 forceful men around a table and convincing them that so and 
 so is the right thing to do. This is, I take it, a legitimate 
 method of philanthropic work and of social reform. But it is 
 not the method of a survey. The survey's method is one of 
 publicity ; it is another and separate implement for social ad- 
 vance, and its usefulness should not be negatived by a failure 
 to hold to its distinctive function. The philosophy of the survey 
 is to set forth before the community all the facts that bear on 
 a problem, and to rely upon the common understanding, the 
 common forethought, the common purpose of all the people as 
 the first great resource to be drawn upon in working that prob- 
 lem out. Thus conceived, the survey becomes a distinctive 
 and powerful implement of democracy. 
 
 With these five working principles in mind, how can the sur- 
 vey idea be applied to the average community, how and on 
 what scale should its working scheme be launched ? Here there 
 is already some experience upon which to draw. At one ex- 
 treme we have a superficial skimming of facts — what we call in 
 the Middle West a lick-and-a-promise. Perhaps it is Hmited to 
 passing round and filling out schedules devised to fit any city — 
 such as were used in many places in advance of the Men and 
 Religion campaign week. These were not without value in 
 throwing some facts of community life into relief and in show- 
 ing where released energies might at once be applied ; but 
 the team leaders very properly did not call them surveys, mak- 
 ing them rather a basis for recommending the larger work. 
 
 (480) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 7 
 
 They bear about the same relation to a survey that the blanks 
 which a mail-order tailoring establishment sends out for self- 
 measurement bear to a thorough-going physical examination. 
 
 At the other end of the scale we have the sort of a survey 
 which the Pittsburg Survey, if we regard it as an experiment, 
 demonstrated can with staff and resources some day be made in 
 one of our first-class cities. The Pittsburgh Survey made a 
 quick diagnosis of perhaps twenty phases of life and labor in 
 the steel district on the basis of standards worked out else- 
 where ; it brought these diagnoses together and studied some- 
 thing of the structural relation of the problems set forth ; but it 
 sank shafts of definite, consistent, active investigation in but five 
 or six fields and even there rigorous limitations had to be set 
 to the scope of the work. For example, we studied, case by 
 case, 500 families to see how they actually made shift when the 
 bread-winner was killed at his day's work. The super-survey 
 would not only gauge the chief factors entering into a com- 
 munity, gauge also their fabrication into its general working 
 scheme ; but would study the human bearings of every factor, 
 as searchingly as we studied the economic reaction of these 
 industrial accidents. 
 
 Not a few of the elements in such a survey will ultimately be 
 carried out as part of the routine work of our governmental, in- 
 stitutional and industrial organizations. This was illustrated in 
 the recommendation made by a stockholders' committee at the 
 recent meeting of the United States Steel Corporation. The 
 work which the Pittsburgh Survey put into gathering elementary 
 facts as to hours, wages and other labor conditions in the Pitts- 
 burgh district exhausted a very considerable share of our funds 
 and energy. This stockholders' committee held that in the 
 same way that their corporation had taken the lead in publish- 
 ing extensive reports on its financial operations and output, it 
 should be its policy in the future to lay before stockholders 
 and public the general facts as to labor conditions in their mills. 
 That, it seemed to me, was well-nigh revolutionary. •* Similarly 
 many of our city and state departments — health, labor, finance 
 and education — are putting out more and more as part of their 
 legitimate routine the salient facts upon which public opinion 
 can formulate working judgments. • 
 
 (43i) 
 
8 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 If this were done generally, the survey, to my mind, would 
 still be an opportune instrument for social advance; — on its 
 civic side, in enabling us to see whether or not there are great 
 gaps in the frontage with which a community faces the future, 
 and on its scientific side, in measuring the human reaction of 
 various institutions, agencies and measures, which are carried 
 forward in the name of progress and which should be tested 
 and checked up from time to time. 
 
 But what we can discuss most profitably here is the sort of 
 undertaking which as things stand to-day a community, ranging 
 anywhere from ten thousand to half a million, can take up, — 
 neither a skimping survey that does not get beneath the sur- 
 face, nor the comprehensive interlocking survey just outlined 
 which must needs require a large staff and resources. What 
 are we to recommend when a group of progressive people in 
 such a community come forward and say they want to start a 
 survey — a group with only general notions as to the things 
 most seriously in need of inquiry in their locality, and with 
 slender funds which may grow only as the undertaking shows its 
 usefulness? Two lines of action seem most promising. 
 
 The first of these is to recommend that they secure a man of 
 all-around experience in social work to come to their com- 
 munity for a quick sizing up of things — a report which will 
 enable them to see where the land lies — and either base a 
 general social survey upon this report, or follow up intensively 
 one or more of the principal '* leads " disclosed. 
 
 The second possible line of action is to start out with some 
 unit less than the general social problem of their city, with the 
 idea that work less spread-out and more exact will in the long run 
 lead farther. There are several ways in which this can be done. 
 One method is to take a given neighborhood, in the way that 
 the Buffalo survey took its Polish district. This method has 
 the advantage of focusing attention on a manageable area, 
 where definite results (like the Buffalo playgrounds and evening 
 schools for immigrants) can be reached while the survey is in 
 process. It has the disadvantage that it may tend to confirm 
 the impressions of squalor already held by polite residents of a 
 city as to some particular neighborhood, without forcing in 
 
 (482) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 9 
 
 upon them the fact that a community is like a human being 
 and none of its members can be sick without being a drag on 
 the whole ; without rousing the- whole city to action, or even, 
 as in Buffalo, leading up to a general city survey. A modifica- 
 tion of this method was discussed in New Haven — the sugges- 
 tion being to take a belt running through the town, so as to be 
 representative of good and bad conditions alike, the well-to-do, 
 the middling-to-do, and the poor. This plan has imaginative 
 values, a practical obstacle perhaps being the difficulty in fitting 
 existing sources of statistics to such a philanthropic gerry- 
 mander. Another method is to take a block and study its peo- 
 ple intensively in the matter of their social needs and the re- 
 sources of the city with respect to them, in much the same way 
 as (from the standpoint of racial composition and social mind) 
 Dr. Jones and Prof. Woolston have studied given New York 
 city blocks. Such a method would unquestionably supply an 
 exceptional group of citizens with rare insight as to the actual 
 operations and values of much of our social work. With this 
 insight they could reach judgments and execute reforms, but the 
 plan would scarcely usher in that self-consciousness which comes 
 when a whole community sees itself in the large, and which, to 
 my mind, gives the community survey its exceptional dynamic 
 force. 
 
 In contrast to these methods, which consider fairly small areas 
 in their relation to a wide range of social needs, another partial 
 method is to take some one social problem and study it in its 
 bearings on the entire community — such a problem as recrea- 
 tion. -^-This would cover not only a study of playgrounds and 
 play opportunities, but an examination of the city play bill 
 (nickleodeons, skating rinks, cheap shows, dance halls) as was 
 made by the Kansas City Board of Public Welfare, to see how 
 much fun was costing the people, how they could spend less and 
 get more, and how far commercialized amusements should be 
 supervised. It would cover the larger uses of school houses, 
 substitutes for saloons, the utilization of outdoors, and the nat- 
 ural resources of wood and valley back from a city ; the extent 
 of leisure and the social effects of its compression through over- 
 work and Sunday labor; the money surplus for recreation in 
 household budgets ; and so on. 
 
 (483) 
 
10 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 While local conditions, the agencies interested, the public 
 temper and the money available are considerations which must 
 be duly reckoned with, my feeling is that the first line of 
 approach described is the one which will serve most cities best ; 
 — that is, the quick sizing-up process to see how the land lies 
 and to plant what the civil engineers call '* bench marks " at points 
 of vantage. For this work can be done on a scale to fit any 
 town's pocket-book, it embodies in a rudimentary way the ele- 
 ments which we have seen are the essential methods of a survey, 
 and it gives perspective. The scientific farmer who has his 
 soils examined in taking up new land, the business man who is 
 used to inventories as a basis of planning for the year ahead, 
 the physician who is called on less frequently to doctor fevers 
 and set bones than to overhaul patients who are " all run down," 
 will not need to have the value of such a piece of preliminary 
 stock-taking argued out with them. A town with ten thousand 
 people can get a man with what you might call a general prac- 
 titioner's equipment in social work to spend half a week there 
 with fair prospect that his report will be something on which 
 they can build. Superficial though it would frankly be, it should 
 bring the more easily recognizable needs and opportunities in 
 the town's life to the test of standards worked out elsewhere — 
 which, as we have seen, is one of the first and easiest tasks of a 
 survey. It could scarcely fail to show how health hangs on 
 civic enterprise and in kindred ways make average citizens see 
 that things which they may have regarded as unrelated are bound 
 up in each other. It would correspondingly show these things in 
 proportion. The sky-scraping pride with which a growing town 
 points to an atrocious six or ten-story block on its chief corner 
 is not energy any more misapplied than many a philanthropic 
 enterprise, bred to suit city conditions, which the small town 
 swallows hoofs, hide and all. Such a report would gather up, 
 if rightly made, the progressive ideas held by local people who 
 have seen farther ahead than their neighbors ; and it would have 
 the force — and that counts for a good deal in a growing com- 
 munity — of being heralded as the judgment of a '* city expert," 
 thereby gaining a hearing for things which local prophets may 
 have despaired of. Further, such a report, if it sets a vision of 
 
 (484) 
 
 I 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 1 1 
 
 what the town might be, tugs at the imagination of the people 
 and loosens energies in many directions. The same things hold 
 true for a larger city — the city of twenty-five to fifty thousand 
 which can employ such a preliminary prospector for from a 
 fortnight to six weeks ; or the still larger city which can engage 
 for this sizing-up process a man of experience and all-round 
 equipment with two or three assistants, for a six months com- 
 mission. Its alternative would be to get experts in half a dozen 
 of the major fields of social concern to come on the ground for 
 say a fortnight each, relying upon a local committee to synthe- 
 size these special reports into a general scheme of procedure. 
 The Syracuse survey illustrated these two methods somewhat in 
 combination, for Mr. Harrison spent six weeks in his general 
 work, and various national and local bodies were successfully 
 appealed to to carry on the field work along special Hnes. 
 
 Such a preHminary report once in hand, the community small 
 or large is in much more favorable position than at the start to 
 make constructive decisions. It may decide to carry on any one of 
 the inquiries which I enumerated earlier as possible lines of action, 
 only with far larger chance of their being done intelligently and 
 with prospect of results for the whole city. It may do what 
 Rochester is doing — that is, what might be called a consecutive 
 survey, organizing and calling on experts to take up first one 
 phase of social concern and then another. This is the sort of 
 work done by the Pittsburgh Civic Commission. It may focus 
 its efforts on some district, and there sink its inquiries into the 
 structure of the common life. This the Bureau of Social Re- 
 search under Miss Goldmark has done on a district scale on the 
 upper west side of New York, scrutinizing in a given neighbor- 
 hood how courts and charitable agencies, the departments of 
 health and education come in contact with the life of the peo- 
 ple — how they may be turned from impersonal machines to in- 
 timate agencies within reach of the average family. The com- 
 munity may focus its attention, on the other hand, on the 
 coordination of governmental activities and by means of mu- 
 nicipal research, budget exhibits and the like, make the public 
 business take on new efficiency and new meaning. 
 
 But for cities of from 25,000 to 250,000 population, the 
 
 (48s) 
 
12 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 simple and natural and, I believe, most promising result of the 
 preliminary survey, would be a systematic community survey 
 growing out of it, one with sufficient staff, sufficient time and 
 sufficient expenditures to make a thorough-going inventory of 
 the life and labor of the place, to seek out the wastes in its eco- 
 nomic and vital resources, to captivate and give constructive 
 content to its evanescent and often sorely exploited enthusiasms, 
 and to lay a sure foundation of information on which to plan 
 and build for ten years ahead. 
 
 The scale on which such a permanent survey — and by per- 
 manent I of course do not mean a perennial enterprise, but one 
 enduring in the foundation it lays — should be undertaken, would 
 depend on the size and public spirit of the community. But 
 the survey movement has reached a point where we can say 
 with some degree of precision — as I have undertaken to do 
 earlier in this paper — what are the essential methods which 
 should enter into its work, and where we can say, with some de- 
 gree of conviction, that such a working scheme will have prac- 
 tical and far-reaching results. 
 
 ^ Right here, it may be well to interpolate two points as to the 
 civic investment which a community puts into a survey. No 
 town should be balked at launching one, under the impression 
 that it is a contraption suited only to a large city, or one 
 which only a great philanthropic foundation can afford. I have 
 indicated how a small town can make a start at modest expense ; 
 and Dr. Palmer describes the wide range of sanitary investiga- 
 tions which he carried out as commissioner of public health of 
 Springfield, Illinois, in cooperation with local people and at 
 almost no extra cost to the city. With a superintendent of 
 schools as far-sighted and resourceful as this health commis- 
 sioner, a judge who would look at jails, police and legal pro- 
 cesses with what the Wisconsin supreme court calls twentieth- 
 century eyes, an engineer with ingenuity and vision, and with 
 other volunteers and officials of like caliber, men with social 
 viewpoint and with some acquaintance with other cities, men 
 giving their leisure and to some extent their working hours to 
 the plan, you would have a local staff for a rounded community 
 survey. They could carry it out as a piece of good citizenship 
 
 (486) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 1 3 
 
 on a level which would command national attention and respect, 
 and which would set a new gauge for civic patriotism. On the 
 other hand, consider a city with say a cigar-store keeper as 
 health commissioner, without any health reports, and with acrid 
 resistance on the part of the dominant political machine to any 
 probing of its health service. The process of surveying in such 
 a backward city is a very different matter ; so also is the cost of 
 bringing onto the ground a sanitarian of Dr. Palmer's breadth 
 of outlook, gained from his work in the state and city public 
 health service ; and then keeping him there long enough to get 
 a thorough grasp of the sanitary situation, and to gather data 
 sufficient to carry the town with him. 
 
 And here we are close to the fact that while many of the 
 more obvious social conditions can be brought to light by lay- 
 men, the reach of social surveying depends on those qualities 
 which we associate with the expert in every profession ; knowl- 
 edge of the why of sanitary technique, for example, and of the 
 how by which other cities have wrought out this reform and 
 that. And townsmen who would think nothing of paying the 
 county engineer a sizable fee to run a line for a fence bound- 
 ary must be educated up to the point where they will see the 
 economy of investing in trained service in social and civic up- 
 building. Unscientific acquaintance with what other cities are 
 doing may lead only to duplicating their mistakes ; untraveled 
 advice may, on the other hand, lead only to finding out slowly 
 and at bitter cost what has elsewhere been demonstrated. 
 Ignorance of the facts that lie concealed in an unresolved mass 
 of local statistics is only less costly, humanly speaking, than the 
 too ready acceptance of notions which hearty but ignorant 
 handling can shake out of the same statistics. 
 
 My second point as to the civic investment in a survey is that 
 it pays not only for a city to get at its underlying facts but to 
 get those facts out into the open. There is no older subterfuge 
 than to beat the drums of local pride and charge that the 
 leaders who are overhauling bad conditions are injuring the fair 
 name of a city. This charge finds customary expression in the 
 rumor that manufacturing enterprises will keep away if they 
 learn that the schools are poor, the council is full of graft, or 
 
 (487) 
 
14 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 the water is infected; and that one who advertises these 
 things by rousing the public to reform is the town traitor. Yet 
 the city of the Southwest that, as a gala day approached, put 
 up a high board fence so that you could not see the shacks that 
 at one point lined its principal thoroughfare, may have fooled the 
 distinguished visitor who was driven past, but it could not fool 
 the manufacturer who is looking for a new site ; still less — and 
 this is equally important from the standpoint of local interests 
 — could it fool intelligent workmen who are looking for a town 
 in which to bring up their families. I have known of an enter- 
 prise that refused to settle in a city because it would not bribe 
 the aldermen for a side track (perhaps the first of a long series 
 of petty hold-ups) and of another that refused to settle where 
 skilled mechanics could not find the sort of living conditions 
 and recreation they were accilstomed to. It could not get 
 its men to come along. When such decisions hang in the 
 balance I fancy one factor that counts in Worcester's favor is 
 the fight of its manufacturers against tuberculosis, in Pittsburgh's 
 favor is the great filtration plant with which the city has downed 
 typhoid, in Cleveland's favor is the civic campaigns of its 
 Chamber of Commerce. All these things stand for enterprise. 
 They are upbuilding of the sort which means first of all getting 
 down to bed rock ; and that is the sort of investment which a 
 city puts into a survey. 
 
 Convinced as I am, however, that a survey is '' good busi- 
 ness " in the long run from the standpoint of a city's prosperity, 
 it has a broader appeal. It is one of the channels open to the 
 aroused social conscience of our generation. In the govern- 
 mental field we have two strong movements — one towards 
 greater efficiency ; the other towards greater democracy. The 
 first is reflected nationally by the President's Commission on 
 Efficiency and Economy; the second finds expression in the 
 Western insurgent movement which through the initiative, 
 referendum and recall, seeks to bring the legislative " say " 
 back to the people. If we were to personify the first move- 
 ment, it would be to give it the character of the expert ; the 
 second, the character of the average citizen. And in the gen- 
 eral trend, we have the expert and the average man coming to- 
 
 (488) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 1 5 
 
 gether : and jointly challenging the frontage which existing in- 
 stitutions, professions and organized forces bear toward the 
 needs of the times. 
 
 They challenge the church, the school, the city council, 
 the court, the mill, in the name of the mighty industrial 
 changes which have put new strains on old institutions ; in the 
 name of science, which has opened new possibilities and new 
 hopes ; and in the name of the common welfare which is strik- 
 ing a fairer balance between property and life. 
 
 For many existing conditions we have only ourselves to 
 blame ; but in changing them, we have to overcome the re- 
 sistance of those whose scheme of service to the community 
 has grown up with the old conditions. Dr. Palmer illustrates 
 this in what he says of the milk supply. Let us look at the 
 milkman as a factor in the community life — an institution if you 
 will. In the past we may have officially asked of him a certain 
 grade of butter-fat in his milk, but that is a dairyman's standard, 
 worked out in the cheese and butter trade. We have demanded 
 a collar of cream as a sign of richness — the uninformed milk- 
 drinker's notion of protecting himself against watered milk. 
 But we are only beginning to demand what the dietitians and 
 physicians are showing us is more important than either of 
 these, namely, clean milk — clean milk, rendered more difficult 
 to obtain by the very dirt and congestion of our new urban con- 
 ditions ; rendered vital by the laboratory discoveries of the last 
 twenty years in bacterial diseases; rendered possible by our 
 advances in methods of sterilization ; rendered an issue among 
 the people at large, by the demonstrable effect of dirty milk 
 upon the health of thousands of babies — a human test, this last, 
 such as enables the average mother and the expert sanitarian 
 to join forces in a campaign to clean up stables and milk routes, 
 and to put an end to dirty cans and tuberculous cows. I need 
 not show how through all this runs the three-fold challenge in 
 the name of mighty industrial changes, of scientific advance and 
 of the common welfare. 
 
 That challenge is one repeated over and over again in the 
 fields of social concern. It does not require a very wide stretch 
 of the imagination to apply the same analysis to the Titanic 
 
 (489) 
 
l6 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 disaster. Compare the commercial demand for speed and 
 capacity in ocean liners with the commercial demand for butter 
 fat. Compare the blind popular demand for luxuries in cabins 
 with the blind popular demand for a thick collar of cream. 
 Life boats are like clean milk. Safety is a human rather 
 than a commercial standard. Some naval experts have been 
 preaching it for years, but their judgments have fallen on deaf 
 ears. Now the average man at last sees; and (in high rage) he 
 is calling for a change. Those responsible for ocean vessels 
 are charged to make safety keep pace with the great structural 
 changes in the shipping industry ; to apply science to human 
 well-being, as well as to speed. 
 
 In many of these deep-seated social needs, apparently some 
 great disaster has to overtake us, and smite us, before as a peo- 
 ple we are aroused to them, and half-blindly, often wholly un- 
 thinking of our own responsibility, demand immediate reform. 
 This is so whether it is a dam which gives way like Austin ; or 
 a theatre which burns like the Iroquois ; or a blazing school- 
 house full of children like that at Cleveland ; or a loft building 
 like the Triangle. Coupled with this very human tendency is 
 another, equally human. For while it takes one of these great 
 disasters to drive the lesson home, we are faced with the fact 
 that the feeling of exasperation and purpose, the '* conscience- 
 smittenness" of the community, more often than not fritters 
 away before it accomplishes anything. Thus a year has already 
 elapsed since the lives of 146 working people were snuffed out 
 in the Triangle disaster in New York, and while public indig- 
 nation has vented itself in mass meetings and safety com- 
 mittees, in investigating commissions and fire bills, there has 
 been no action within the intervening twelve months which 
 would thoroughly prevent the recurrence of such a panic fire 
 and no sure provision which would get the people out, any more 
 than the Titanic's meager life-boat equipment was enough to 
 float the two cabins, the crew and the steerage, when the great 
 boat sank. Had a modern shipload of passengers in New York 
 harbor ever gone through the motions of getting into the 
 life boats and away, the safety equipment of our ocean liners 
 would have been put to a human test. That test would have 
 
 (490) 
 
No. 4] THE SPREAD OF THE SURVEY IDEA 1 7 
 
 borne out what the naval experts had been saying, and would 
 have demonstrated it so thrillingly that not only the people who 
 were left behind on deck would have seen their own helpless- 
 ness, but average citizens everywhere would have been alive 
 to what safety means in ocean travel. 
 
 To visualize needs which are not so spectacular but are no 
 less real, is the work of the survey — to bring them to human 
 terms, to put the operations of the government, of social insti- 
 tutions and of industrial establishments to the test of individual 
 lives, to bring the knowledge and inventions of scientists and 
 experts home to the common imagination, and to gain for their 
 proposals the dynamic backing of a convinced democracy. 
 
 The survey cannot count upon a catastrophe to point its 
 morals. The public interest it creates comes harder but has 
 better staying qualities. In so far as it must lay a framework 
 for setting forth the wide range of needs and opportunities 
 which fall within its field, so it has inherent the prospect of 
 a more sustained and organic accomplishment. 
 
 (491) 
 
A SOCIAL SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY' 
 
 J 
 
 SHELBY M. HARRISON 
 Director of the Syracuse Social Survey 
 
 UST as cities or communities differ, so will city or commu- 
 nity surveys be different. Any set method for this kind 
 of inventory-taking, intended for general application, must 
 after all be largely suggestive, leaving wide latitude for shifting 
 the emphasis according as conditions vary from city to city. 
 Not with the thought, therefore, that the recent preliminary 
 social survey of the city of Syracuse, New York, presents an 
 inclusive plan for city surveying nor that it is a sample of what 
 a full-fledged city survey ought to be ; but, rather, that it may 
 carry some suggestion for organizing and defining a city survey 
 and be an illustrative instance of what one city did toward secur- 
 ing a program of '* next-steps " in its civic and social develop- 
 ment, that undertaking is recounted. 
 
 About a year ago several citizens of Syracuse, among them 
 Rev. Murray S. Rowland and Paul E. Illman, became convinced 
 that the rapid growth of the city in the last decade, with its con- 
 sequent changes in social relationships, had brought new prob- 
 lems caUing for new diagnosis and treatment, and that the time 
 had come for at least a preliminary stock-taking of local con- 
 ditions affecting the life, health and progress of the city's i $0,000 
 people. This purpose became specific along at least two lines : 
 first, to gather sufficient data on points which seemed to call for 
 immediate action so that definite constructive recommendations 
 could be made ; and second, to make a sufficient diagnosis of 
 general conditions so as to determine whether and along what 
 lines a later, more intensive survey should be carried on. 
 
 In order to give the enterprise strong and wide local backing, 
 the support of the four large organizations in the city which 
 themselves were federations of other organizations was sought 
 and secured, namely, the Ministerial Association, which includes 
 
 *Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 18, 1912. 
 
 (492) 
 
SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 19 
 
 something over a hundred churches; the Chamber of Com- 
 merce, which represents employers and industrial and com- 
 mercial organizations; the Central Trades Assembly, which 
 represents all the labor unions of the city ; and the Associated 
 Charities, which represents to some extent the relief agencies. 
 The Chamber of Commerce subscribed two-fifths of the esti- 
 mated expenses of the survey, and each of the other three 
 organizations guaranteed one-fifth. Each organization chose 
 three representatives on a central survey committee of twelve, 
 and gave the committee full power to go ahead with the survey. 
 The committee included some of the most influential men in the 
 city. Representing, as it did, forces that are not always in 
 accord in city life, the committee developed into a very remark- 
 able working group — so remarkable, in fact, that people outside 
 the group were unwilling to see it broken up after it had com- 
 pleted the immediate work to which it was committed. 
 
 A director from outside the city was secured to carry the 
 social inventory as far as seemed practicable in five weeks ; and 
 several sub-committees were appointed to gather general in- 
 formation which would be of use to the investigators — including 
 city and county reports for a number of years back ; special 
 reports published by the chamber of commerce, the board of 
 education, the academy of medicine and other organizations ; 
 population figures ; maps ; city ordinances ; and so on. The 
 director spent most of his first week in company with some 
 member or members of the central committee, interviewing 
 city officials, business men, labor leaders, clergymen, teachers, 
 social workers, physicians and others familiar with social con- 
 ditions. The purpose of the interviews was to become saturated 
 with the main facts of the community, especially those which 
 indicated, from many points of view, improvements made in the 
 last ten or fifteen years, and improvements also from many 
 points of view that were thought to be needed in the next few 
 years ahead. With these facts digested the central committee 
 picked out the main lines of inquiry to be followed. They 
 were, in broad terms : 
 
 1. Health conservation and sanitation. 
 
 2. Housing conditions among unskilled workers. 
 
 (493) 
 
20 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 3. The betterment agencies of the city. 
 
 4. Foreign populations. 
 
 5. Juvenile delinquency. 
 
 6. Civic improvement. 
 
 7. Labor conditions. 
 
 Certain phases of municipal accounting, public finance and 
 local taxation, would have been included in the survey, but for 
 the fact that one member of the central committee had already 
 set on foot plans for handling such an investigation in another 
 way. This investigation has since been made by experts from 
 the New York Bureau of Municipal Research ; and interest in it 
 had undoubtedly been enhanced by the social and civic revival 
 which citizens are free to credit as one of the results of the 
 social survey. 
 
 All of these subjects chosen presented phases of such current 
 importance that the committee wished them followed further; 
 yet it was evident that each subject, to be covered adequately, 
 would require the investigator's time for more than the remain- 
 ing four weeks. A request was therefore made to several state 
 and national organizations, which sooner or later would be con- 
 ducting investigations of their own in Syracuse, to send their 
 representatives at once. They would thus cooperate with the 
 survey, and on the other hand they would gain for their own 
 work through the strong local backing afforded in the central 
 survey committee. A number of organizations responded im- 
 mediately, among them the New York Child Labor Committee, 
 the North American Civic League for Immigrants, the National 
 Housing Association, the National Consumers' League and the 
 National Prison Labor Committee. In addition to this outside 
 cooperation a score of Syracuse people volunteered their services 
 as a personal contribution to the survey — among them a young 
 physician, who made the study of the city's vital statistics; a 
 young rabbi, who prepared a statement of playground equip- 
 ment and needs ; the secretary of the associated charities, who 
 took charge of the housing investigation ; an official of the city 
 sewerage commission, who prepared a summary of the sewerage 
 situation; the probation officers, who studied juvenile delin- 
 quency ; a young lawyer, who gathered data on relief work in the 
 
 (494) 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 2 1 
 
 city ; students in a sociology class in the university, who aided 
 in the investigation of child labor in the street trades; and 
 others who made maps and charts, arranged exhibits, offered 
 prizes or acted as judges. The liberal cooperation of the news- 
 papers was invaluable. 
 
 A work-program indicating data to be gathered on each 
 major subject was worked out by the different investigators and 
 the survey director ; and the latter spent the remainder of his 
 time investigating several phases of labor conditions. As 
 already indicated, the reports were not expected to be analyses 
 of many or all sides of the subjects inquired into ; they were to 
 take up only those matters which seemed to call for immediate 
 action or which pointed the need for more extended study. 
 The outlines of facts to be looked for, however, covered a range 
 wide enough to allow the different investigators some degree of 
 latitude in deciding, as they got deeper into the fact-gathering, 
 what matters should be given special scrutiny. Several of the 
 work-programs follow : 
 
 A. Health and its Conservation 
 
 I. Vital statistics 
 
 a. General death rates for 1 907-08-09-1 o-i i ; and average 
 death rates for five-year periods running back twenty years ; 
 infant death rates, same period. 
 
 b. Distribution of deaths by wards, for 1910. 
 
 c. Population by age and sex in each ward, in 19 10. 
 
 d. Deaths from the more prevalent diseases for the last ten 
 years, especially contagious and preventable diseases such as 
 typhoid, tuberculosis, diarrhea and enteritis (under one and 
 under five years of age), and pneumonia. 
 
 e. Case rates of the diseases more prevalent locally for the 
 last ten years — especially contagious and preventable diseases, 
 such as diphtheria, typhoid, measles, scarlet fever, tuberculosis. 
 
 f . Births : reporting of ; still births ; birth rates compared 
 with other cities of similar size and population make-up. 
 
 II. Health administration 
 
 a. Effect of administering health work through a subordinate 
 
 (495) 
 
22 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 bureau of the department of public safety, instead of through a 
 department of health ; adequacy or inadequacy of heath appro- 
 priations. 
 
 b. Educational work for health; any special needs; opportu- 
 nities for increasing educational work as shown by work done 
 in other cities. 
 
 c. Organized work against venereal diseases ; its chief needs ; 
 work done by Syracuse Society for Prevention of Social 
 Diseases. 
 
 d. Quarantine practise in less serious contagious diseases. 
 
 e. Medical inspection of schools; how adequate? In all 
 schools? How financed? 
 
 III. Food inspection 
 
 a. Meat, fruit, fish. 
 
 b. Screening from flies. 
 
 c. Milk supply ; analysis of bacteriological count from Janu- 
 ary I to July I, 191 1 ; percentage of producers whose milk was 
 above the maximum bacterial count ; method of enforcing the 
 milk rule ; any licenses revoked ; analysis of cream count ; need 
 of better publicity work on milk and cream scoring. 
 
 IV. Water supply 
 
 a. Source of general supply ; water sheds ; cost. 
 
 b. Surface wells ; springs. 
 
 V. Sewerage system 
 
 a. Houses connected ; open privy vaults not connected with 
 sewers. 
 
 b. Location of sewer outlets. 
 
 VI. Garbage disposal 
 
 a. Cost; method. 
 
 b. Location of plants. 
 
 c. Method of collection of garbage. 
 
 B. Housing of the Unskilled Workers 
 I. A close study of six typical districts where the unskilled 
 workers live 
 a. Apartment buildings: number separate apartments; ma- 
 terial ; stories ; repair ; halls ; fire escapes ; basements. 
 
 (496) 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 23 
 
 b. Family apartments in the buildings (facts relating to indi- 
 vidual apartments rather than the whole building of which each 
 apartment is a part) : number of rooms ; number of famihes ; 
 number of adults, children and boarders; cleanliness; light; 
 ventilation ; plumbing. 
 
 c. Water supply : location ; number of persons per tap ; 
 bath; drainage. 
 
 d. Yards: area; cleanliness; live stock; alley; garbage; 
 rubbish. 
 
 e. Toilets : inside ; outside ; cleanHness ; number using ; 
 sewer connection. 
 
 f. Rent. 
 
 II. Similar close study of a few old tenement houses 
 
 III. Similar study of a few new apartment and tenement houses 
 To see whether the new ones are conforming to accepted 
 
 principles of good housing, or whether they are making the 
 same mistakes as those made in the old tenements. 
 
 IV. Lodging houses 
 
 Number ; rooms ; beds ; air-space per bed ; charges for 
 lodging. 
 
 V. A census of the number of open privy vaults, by wards, 
 
 throughout the city 
 
 C. Foreign Population 
 I. Statistics of foreign populations 
 
 a. Total number of foreigners ; number by nationalities. 
 
 b. Number, by sex and age groups. 
 
 c. Number of families. 
 
 d. Number of immigrants, by nationalities, admitted to New 
 York state during 1909-19 10. 
 
 e. Sex and ages of same. 
 
 f. Illiteracy of those 14 years old and over. 
 
 g. Number of immigrants, by nationalities, who arrived in 
 Syracuse during 1909-19 10. 
 
 h. Number, by nationalities, in hospitals, 
 i. Number in prison. 
 
 j. Number in almshouses; number applying for reHef and 
 charity. 
 
 (497) 
 
24. ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 II. Neighborhoods W 
 a. Map showing foreign quarters, by nationalities. 
 
 III. Housing and lodging conditions (made in conjunction with 
 
 general housing study) 
 
 a. Kind of lodging. 
 
 b. Study of a few old tenements in each neighborhood. 
 
 c. Number of persons in each house. 
 
 d. Number of lodgers and families. 
 
 e. Number of persons and beds in each room. 
 
 f. List of lodging houses and number of immigrant lodgers 
 in each place. 
 
 IV. Industrial opportunities 
 
 a. Industries employing foreigners. 
 
 b. Number, by nationalities, in each industry. 
 
 c. Methods of obtaining work. 
 
 d. Hours of work, in general. ' 
 
 e. Days per week. 
 
 f. Any night work. 
 
 g. Industries continuous through year, 
 h. Days worked yearly and quarterly. 
 
 i. Estimated average yearly wages for both skilled and un- 
 skilled workers. 
 
 V. Economic conditions 
 
 a. Amount of money transmitted to different countries dur- 
 ing 1 909-1910 by post-office money orders; drafts on foreign 
 banks ; express orders. 
 
 b. Number of local foreign bankers. 
 
 c. Number of steamship ticket agents. 
 
 d. Any need for postal savings banks? 
 
 e. Number of immigrants that own houses. 
 
 VI. Educational opportunities 
 
 a. Number and location of public schools ; of evening classes ; 
 of private schools. 
 
 b. Number of adults and children, by nationalities, attending 
 evening schools. 
 
 (498) 
 
 I 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 25 
 
 VII. Naturalization 
 
 a. Number of applicants for first papers, by nationalities, for 
 the last five years. 
 
 b. Applicants for final papers, by nationalities, for the last 
 five years. 
 
 c. Number of final papers issued. 
 
 d. Final papers denied. 
 
 e. Final papers still pending. 
 
 f. Number of naturalized citizens who voted at last few 
 elections. 
 
 VIII. Courts 
 
 a. Number of arrests and convictions, by ages and nation- 
 alities. 
 
 b. Juvenile delinquency. 
 
 c. Interpreters in court. 
 
 d. Shyster lawyers. 
 
 e. Any legal aid societies? 
 
 f. Action in accident cases. 
 
 g. Ambulance chasers. 
 
 IX. Social agencies for betterment, protection and relief. 
 
 a. Foreign societies. 
 
 b. Labor unions among foreigners. 
 
 c. Civic clubs among foreigners. 
 
 d. Settlements. 
 
 e. Playgrounds accessible to immigrants. 
 
 f. Pubhc baths. 
 
 g. Consuls or consular agents, 
 h. Handicap of foreign women. 
 
 i. Notaries public, midwives and doctors, among foreigners. 
 
 D. Juvenile delinquency 
 
 I. An analysis of cases of juvenile delinquency, by wards and 
 blocks, throughout the city 
 Its relation to the congestion of population and the lack of 
 open spaces where children may play. 
 
 (499) 
 
26 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 II. Nature of offenses 
 
 a. Proportion that are offenses against the person ; propor- 
 tion offenses against property. 
 
 b. Locality in which offenses against property predominate 
 over offenses against person, and vice versa. 
 
 c. Similarly, by nationalities. 
 
 d. Proportion that are first offenders ; proportion repeaters. 
 
 III. Individual conditions 
 
 a. Age of largest proportion of offenders of both sexes. 
 
 b. Physical condition — stature and weight; diseased? 
 
 c. Mental condition : proportions bright, dull, defective, fear- 
 less, venturesome. 
 
 IV. Social environment 
 
 a. Parental condition : proportion with both parents living ; 
 proportion fatherless, motherless, orphans, illegitimates. 
 
 b. Condition of home : regular employment ; kind of employ- 
 ment. 
 
 V. Conclusions 
 
 Remedial agencies needed ; playgrounds, boys' clubs, library 
 extension ? 
 
 E. Labor Conditions, General 
 
 I. Wages of men and women in industry 
 
 a. Weekly earnings ; skilled or unskilled, by trades. 
 
 b. Annual earnings. 
 
 c. Day labor or piece work, by industries. 
 
 d. Increases in pay in last 15 years. 
 
 e. Extra pay for overtime work. 
 
 f . Recent changes in hours per day affecting wages. 
 
 g. "• Speeding" tendencies, if any. 
 
 II. Hours of labor 
 
 a. Hours per day ; Saturday hours. 
 
 b. Days per week — any seven-day labor? 
 
 c. Extra time work. 
 
 d. Day work or night work. 
 
 (500) 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 27 
 
 e. Industry continuous through year. Days worked in year. 
 
 f. How long in the industry. 
 
 III. Conditions of labor 
 
 a. Sanitary conditions of plant — ventilation. 
 
 b. Occupational diseases. 
 
 c. Industrial accidents : safety devices ; settlements for injury 
 or death. 
 
 IV. Organization of labor and capital. 
 
 a. Trade unions. 
 
 b. Union of employers. 
 
 c. Protective agencies: insurance; hospitals; societies; legal 
 aid. 
 
 d. Avenues of expression regarding work conditions. 
 
 V. Individual and home conditions 
 
 a. Married ; any children ; keep boarders ; other members of 
 family work ; own home ? 
 
 b. Support self. 
 
 c. Save any money? 
 
 d. Leisure for reading or recreation. 
 
 e. Sanitary conditions of home surroundings. 
 
 VI. Any recent serious labor troubles ; strikes, lockouts. 
 
 F. Child Labor 
 
 I. Thoroughness of inspection 
 
 a. Number of children granted work certificates, by nation- 
 alities. 
 
 b. Number found by inspectors. 
 
 c. Number not found. 
 
 d. Number of inspectors. 
 
 II. Newsboys 
 
 a. Age classification. 
 
 b. Violators of the law. 
 
 c. Earnings. 
 
 d. Character of school work done by newsboys. 
 
 e. Newsboys in juvenile court. 
 
 f. Newsboys and truant school. 
 
 (SOI) 
 
28 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 III. Issuance and regulation of working papers 
 
 IV. Summer child workers 
 
 a. Number missing more than one week of school. 
 
 b. Average time missed. 
 
 c. Effect on scholarship. 
 
 V. Night messenger law 
 
 VI. Hours, pay, regulation, among child workers 
 
 a. Bootblacks. 
 
 b. Pin boys in bowling alleys. 
 
 c. Morning paper carriers. 
 
 d. Child workers in home industry. 
 
 The outline on betterment agencies laid special emphasis 
 upon the investment in equipment, the cost of relief work, and 
 the social responsibility felt by church, school, university, 
 hospital. Christian associations and settlements; and the out- 
 line on civic improvement covered the need of a city plan, 
 directions of the city's growth, recreation needs, park and 
 playground facilities, the elimination of grade crossings and the 
 improvement of water fronts. 
 
 As the investigations progressed the mass of data collected 
 began to show cleavages along certain clear-cut lines ; and by 
 autumn after the several reports were drafted the central com- 
 mittee was able to put its finger upon what it had reason to 
 believe to be the weak spots in local civic and social conditions. 
 
 In order to give the findings of the survey wide local publicity 
 the central committee determined to have a Know-Your-City- 
 Week last November. The week started off with forty minis- 
 ters preaching sermons, on Sunday morning, on the civic re- 
 sponsibilities of citizenship. On Monday exercises were held 
 in the public schools, the main feature being the reading of 
 prize essays written by the children of the schools on '* How to 
 Make Syracuse a Better City." Over looo essays were written 
 and the dominant note struck in the essays indicated that the 
 children had caught the point that a better city involves not only 
 greater business prosperity but the betterment of living and 
 work conditions ; in other words, that emphasis upon human 
 welfare, whether through better sanitation and public health 
 
 (502) 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 29 
 
 regulations, better houses to live in, safer places to work in, 
 or greater opportunities for self-improvement, is of prime im- 
 portance in city advance. The survey committee regarded 
 the essay contest as one of the best achievements of the whole 
 enterprise. On the other afternoons throughout the week, 
 conferences on concrete local problems were held in one of the 
 chambers of the county court house. In the main, the subjects 
 were closely related to those discussed at the respective evening 
 meetings ; and the discussions were led and participated in by 
 representative citizens, upon the shoulders of many of whom 
 the work of carrying out reform measures advocated by the 
 committee would undoubtedly fall. 
 
 At the evening mass meetings, which were attended by an 
 average of 500 persons per night, the survey reports were read 
 from the platform ; and speakers from out of the city pointed 
 the moral of local findings from the vantage point of a national 
 perspective. One of these meetings, the one which probably 
 involved the greatest outlay of both time and money, was com- 
 pletely taken charge of by the physicians of the local Academy 
 of Medicine. The larger audience reached, of course, was 
 through the medium of the newspapers, which cooperated 
 thoroughly. Several of the reports were reproduced in full by 
 the press. Further publicity for the facts was gained through 
 the exhibit of maps, charts, and diagrams showing graphically 
 the kernel of each report. The exhibit occupied sixty feet of 
 window space of a retail store on one of the most prominent 
 street corners in the city. 
 
 With reports in hand the central committee formulated seven 
 resolutions as a preliminary working program for the city, which 
 would not be partisan, sectarian or sectional, but would aim at 
 healthy industrial and social growth. In an eighth resolution 
 the committee sent back to the bodies which created it, and 
 which it jointly represented, a recommendation that they take 
 action to see that the program is entered upon. The resolu- 
 tions are as follows : 
 
 First, that the mayor and common council be urged to estab- 
 lish a city-planning and housing commission to secure a plan 
 for the city's growth and development, and draw up a housing 
 
 (503) 
 
30 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 code such as would meet the needs of the city for some time 
 to come. 
 
 Second, that the board of education be petitioned to consider 
 and adopt a far-reaching plan for the education of the foreign 
 population of the city by a larger provision of night schools, by 
 the introduction of civics and industrial courses in night schools 
 and by the extension of vocational training to the grades. 
 
 Third, that the police and school departments be petitioned 
 to enforce the child-labor laws relative to the street trades. 
 
 Fourth, that the board of health be petitioned to provide : 
 
 (a) For the inspection of mercantile establishments and for 
 the enforcement of those provisions relating to child labor, 
 hours of work of women, and sanitary conditions under which 
 such people work. 
 
 (b) For the publishing monthly of the milk score of all milk 
 producers whose milk is sold in the city. 
 
 (c) For more rigid inspection of tenements. 
 
 r- (d) For the engagement by the city of the services of some 
 sanitarian of national standing to study and report on the needs 
 of the public health of Syracuse, as a basis for planning future 
 health work. 
 
 Fifth, that the employers engaged in such industries as re- 
 quire the plant to be in continuous operation be urged to make 
 such adjustments as to assure every laborer one day of rest in 
 seven. 
 
 Sixth, that there should be among the betterment agencies of 
 the city a closer cooperation expressed in some system, such as 
 a united charities, a social-service league or an associated chari- 
 ties organized on broader lines than those in existence at 
 present. 
 
 Seventh, that the city at large have some organization to 
 study the needs and development of the city and to crystallize 
 the findings of such studies in some yearly program such as 
 this Know-Your-City-Week. 
 
 Eighth, that to accomplish this end the central survey com- 
 mittee recommend to the respective bodies represented in the 
 committee the formation of a comprehensive and democratic 
 body to study the problems and promote the adoption of the 
 reforms suggested by the survey. 
 
 (504) 
 
No. 4] SURVEY OF A TYPICAL AMERICAN CITY 31 
 
 In the few months since the resolutions were adopted, the 
 central committee has succeeded in getting local organizations 
 of one kind and another to back up nearly all of the resolutions 
 and to carry on a definite campaign for the changes advocated 
 in them. Several of these campaigns have already succeeded 
 and the success of others is believed by the committee to be 
 sure. A few of the results may be enumerated : 
 
 The mayor has publicly promised to appoint a city-planning 
 and housing commission. In the meantime a volunteer city- 
 plan commission is at work. A committee of the board of 
 education and a volunteer committee are at work gathering in- 
 formation from all over the country as to effective school work 
 for foreigners. The police are thoroughly enforcing laws regu- 
 lating the work of newsboys. The bureau of health has of its 
 own accord invited a trained sanitarian to the city to go over 
 its work and to make suggestions, and those who have been 
 watching the milk scores state that they have shown marked 
 improvement this winter over a year ago. A federation of all 
 betterment agencies in the city is being formed with enthusiastic 
 general cooperation. A further survey, by experts from the 
 New York Bureau of Municipal Research, as already noted, has 
 been made, and it is planned that other investigations shall be 
 carried on by the new federation. One more or less intangible 
 but nevertheless very real and important result is the awakened 
 interest of citizens in civic and social affairs of the city. 
 
 This has been accomplished at a total money outlay amount- 
 ing to only a little above $1100 — the investigations costing 
 about $500 and the publicity work about $600. 
 
 (505) 
 
A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY^ 
 
 GEORGE THOMAS PALMER, M. D. 
 
 Springfield, Illinois 
 
 ON account of the gratifying results in public health work 
 during the past few years, and on account of the popular 
 interest born of the realization of our ability actually to 
 reduce morbidity and increase the span of life, it is easier to 
 bring about public health reform in an American municipality 
 than to secure any other kind of civic improvement. 
 
 Jealous as they are of personal liberty, the people have come 
 to recognize that they must submit to a certain amount of 
 inconvenience and even to scrutiny and investigation of their 
 lives and personal affairs in the interest of the health of the 
 community. The business man who is not in sympathy with 
 many social reforms appreciates the practical utility of sanitary 
 and public health supervision. 
 
 We have ceased to question the right of health authorities to 
 extend their operations even far beyond the letter of the law, 
 while opposition to private agencies working for sanitary better- 
 ment, even when accompanied by wide publicity of unenviable 
 civic conditions, is usually inconsiderable. The intelligent por- 
 tion of the community is fully capable of appreciating the 
 benefits to be derived from such activities. 
 
 Hence, the sanitary survey may often be employed as an 
 entering wedge in general civic betterment, leading naturally to 
 increased interest in those other agencies for improvement which 
 extend more intimately into the moral and social lives of the 
 people, but all of which are more or less associated with public 
 health work. 
 
 It is on this account, in my opinion, that the sanitary survey 
 is the most important phase of general survey work just at this 
 time, when municipalities are but beginning to recognize the 
 value of systematic study of their underlying conditions. 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April i8, 191 2. 
 
 (S06) 
 
A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 33 
 
 Further, I am impressed by the fact that an enormous field 
 is opening up in the study of the sanitary and other civic con- 
 ditions in the smaller cities of the nation. The municipalities 
 ranging from 10,000 to 100,000 in population represent an 
 enormous number of people and present civic problems quite 
 as definite, if not so extensive, as those to be found in any of 
 the larger cities. And yet the civic student may find in almost 
 any of the hundreds of smaller American cities an absolutely 
 virgin field which so far has been shamefully neglected. 
 
 I feel that I should have no claim upon your attention this 
 afternoon, that I should not be here to present a plan of survey, 
 except on account of an experience which, it seems to me, 
 should have been looked upon as commonplace enough, but 
 which appears to have been regarded as somewhat unusual. 
 
 This experience was the study of the sanitary conditions of a 
 city of from 50,000 to 60,000 population and the attainment of 
 fairly satisfactory results without the expenditure of money. 
 Before offering to you a definite pi' n of sanitary survey, I feel 
 that it may be worth while to describe that simple investigation, 
 the methods employed and the results attained. 
 
 I certainly have no intention here and in the presence of 
 those who have done such brilliant things along those lines, of 
 discussing anything of the theory or principles of survey work. 
 I would suggest, however, that perhaps the very brilliancy of 
 your accomplishment has prevented many municipalities from 
 entering upon such undertakings. 
 
 With the Pittsburgh survey as the best known if not the only 
 generally known specimen of its class, many persons have come 
 to look upon the survey as a gigantic, technical and complicated 
 institution, demanding a large amount of expert skill and con- 
 siderable financial outlay for its accompHshment. 
 
 Wherever I have found intelHgent city officials and citizens 
 interested in civic betterment, I have found an earnest desire 
 for more thorough knowledge and understanding of existing 
 civic conditions ; but a conviction that the survey is entirely 
 beyond the reach of the average municipality. 
 
 In fact, at the time we undertook the sanitary study of 
 Springfield, if someone had suggested such a thing as a " sani- 
 
 (507) 
 
34 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 tary survey," I should have replied that we were not in a posi- 
 tion financially or otherwise for such an ambitious undertaking. 
 
 As it was, we simply started out in Springfield to ascertain 
 certain definite facts, and we had not the faintest idea how far 
 or where our studies would carry us. We knew that the city 
 had a higher typhoid-fever mortality than other cities of like 
 size and similarly situated. We knew that we had houses and 
 tenements which served as centers of infection of tuberculosis 
 and other diseases. We realized that our infant mortality was 
 too high. We started out simply with the purpose of ascertain- 
 ing the causes of our undue morbidity and mortality that we 
 might be enabled to take intelligent steps to decrease sickness 
 and lower our death rate. 
 
 It was not until our work was completed that we realized that 
 we had done anything which could be dignified by the term 
 ** sanitary survey." I cite this fact because I feel that there 
 ought to be something done to change the general conception 
 of the term " survey " and because I am convinced that we 
 must reach a clearer definition of the term before many cities 
 will undertake it. 
 
 I am also impressed with the belief that when a city sets out 
 to learn definite things about itself and for a definite purpose, 
 the results will be more satisfactory than when an attempt is 
 made merely to apply a plan of study for no better reason than 
 that other cities have done the same thing. That is, the desire 
 for knowledge without the plan will come nearer landing us 
 somewhere than the plan, however perfect, without the under- 
 lying intelligent desire for knowledge. 
 
 In the vaults of the city hall we recently unearthed several 
 massive volumes, the results of a sanitary survey carried out in 
 1885 on a plan suggested by Dr. John H. Rauch, then secretary 
 of the Illinois state board of health. The city council appro- 
 priated $1,000 for the purpose and the work was carried out 
 with most minute detail. The net result of this painstaking 
 application of a survey plan consists of these big, clumsy 
 volumes, dusty, moth-eaten and stowed away in a vault. In 
 fact, when our work was done in 19 10, no one recalled that a 
 sanitary survey of the city had ever been carried out. This is 
 
 (508) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AMD HEALTH SURVEY 35 
 
 merely an example of a city going through the motions and 
 carrying out a plan suggested by others, but without a desire 
 for specific results. 
 
 In 19 10 we awoke to the fact that Springfield had a typhoid- 
 fever mortality of something over 40 per 100,000 of popula- 
 tion. This mortality had been as high as 85 per 100,000 and 
 the last year recorded showed a mortahty of 52. That was 
 twice as high as it should have been. Half of our deaths from 
 this disease were apparently unnecessary. 
 
 Four million dollars had been expended by the city for water 
 works and sewer system, and the mains extended to all sections 
 of the town. We made repeated analyses of the city water, ex- 
 tending over a long period of time, and found that the public 
 supply was always safe for domestic use. We had to go further 
 to locate the cause of our excessive typhoid-fever mortality. 
 Analyses were made of 150 samples from supposedly good 
 wells. All but three were found to be dangerously polluted. 
 Then the question arose as to the extent to which wells were 
 used in the city and the cause of well pollution. On these 
 points, as is true in practically every other city in the United 
 States where wells are used, reliable information was entirely 
 unobtainable. 
 
 There was but one thing left to do and that was to have the 
 four underpaid, untrained but enthusiastic inspectors of the 
 health department visit each of the 9,000 homes spread out 
 over the i ,600 blocks of the city to locate every well and vault 
 and ascertain the general sanitary conditions of all premises. 
 It required two months to cover the city, the work being done 
 in addition to the rather exacting routine duties of the depart- 
 ment. The results plainly told the story of our typhoid fever. 
 
 The 9,000 homes of the city had 6,000 shallow wells, the 
 pollution of which was guaranteed by 7,000 privy vaults. There 
 were 6,000 polluted wells in the city, and the water mains and 
 sewers were convenient to 5,000 of the premises that maintained 
 them. That is, the use of 5,000 of the 6,000 polluted wells in 
 the city was entirely unnecessary. From a sanitary standpoint 
 the city's expenditure of $4,000,000 was wasted. 
 
 I should make this statement about my home town with 
 
 • (509) 
 
36 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 reluctance were it not that Mr. Hiram Messenger has advised 
 me, after studying the typhoid conditions of over thirty cities of 
 from 40,000 to 100,000 people, that Springfield is now the only 
 one in which he could obtain accurate data as to wells and well 
 pollution. 
 
 The results of our investigation were not bound in red morocco 
 and filed away to decay, nor were they hopelessly buried in 
 dreary and unread reports. We prepared a large map of the 
 city, large enough to show each house by number and the gross 
 sanitary conditions of all premises. Each unsanitary lot was 
 shown in red and every well, vault, sewer, water main, vacant 
 lot, business property and public building was indicated by 
 symbol or color. 
 
 We knew the facts ; but we had to demonstrate them to get 
 results. The map was shown at a luncheon to three hundred 
 members of the chamber of commerce, with a talk on " The 
 Truth About Springfield." The business men endorsed our 
 work and the newspapers gave the facts wide publicity. Next 
 the map was hung in the council chamber and the members of 
 the city council were shown why we should have ordinances 
 compelling property holders to connect their property with 
 sewers and water mains. The ordinances were passed in three 
 weeks, although we had vainly sought to secure such ordinances 
 for over two years. 
 
 Then another interesting thing developed. Protest on the 
 part of the business men gave way to serious consideration. 
 The work had gone too far to be stopped and it became the 
 part of wisdom to fall in line with it. Real-estate men adver- 
 tised their property on its sanitary merits and money became 
 harder to borrow on unsanitary property. For the first time in 
 the community, sanitation took on a commercial value. 
 
 But the Springfield sanitary survey — if you choose to dignify 
 it by that name — went a little further than a mere census of 
 wells and vaults. During the house-to-house canvass the in- 
 spectors made notes of all unsanitary conditions and all nuisances 
 and these were ordered remedied and abated. 
 
 They also noted all tenements and bad housing conditions 
 and the data furnished by them along this line afforded the 
 
 (510) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 37 
 
 basis for the housing investigations we have since carried on. 
 We have studied, charted out and photographed the worst con- 
 ditions in the city and we are now ready to do our part in con- 
 vincing the IlHnois General Assembly that there are slums in 
 the smaller cities and that there is a crying need for good state 
 housing laws. 
 
 In this housing investigation we took a tuberculosis census of 
 the worst tenements and fumigated and disinfected as far as 
 possible. We succeeded in improving the conditions of the 
 worst tenements ; but lack of state laws made satisfactory action 
 impossible. 
 
 As I have stated, we were making this investigation entirely 
 without a plan or system. Each undertaking when completed 
 had pointed out something else that required attention, and at 
 this juncture we found a new force urging us on. That was an 
 aroused public interest. The better element of the people were 
 watching to see what we would do next and the four daily news- 
 papers of the city backed up our work and featured everything 
 that was undertaken. This aroused interest was sufficient to 
 hush all opposition. 
 
 We were now ready to consider our infant mortality. Our 
 first effort was in the direction of an honest milk, containing a 
 reasonable butter fat and total solids and free from preservatives, 
 We recognized, however, that this was a commercial rather than 
 a public health proposition. 
 
 We realized that " the amount of manure a milk contains is 
 more important than the amount of butter fat" and we deter- 
 mined to visit and inspect all of the dairies supplying milk to 
 the city. In this tour of inspection we attempted to teach the 
 dairymen and farmers the prerequisites of pure and clean milk ; 
 but we warned all of them that inspections would be made from 
 time to time and that the condition of all dairies would be made 
 a matter of public record open to milk consumers. 
 
 This investigation of dairies was followed by inspection of 
 restaurants and bakeries, the details of which cannot interest 
 you here. The results, however, were gratifying to us. 
 
 We are now engaged upon an investigation of garbage collec- 
 tion and disposal, studying our own conditions and the methods 
 
 (511) 
 
38 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 of other cities. We are trying to solve what I am inclined to 
 regard as the livest public health problem of American munici- 
 palities — a problem, incidentally, which is not yet solved ideally 
 by even the largest of cities. 
 
 The Springfield sanitary survey is not complete, nor will it 
 be for several years to come. We are studying the town part 
 by part and we are preserving all of our data in the hope that 
 we may be able some day to show a complete sanitary survey 
 of a smaller city. But every step is being taken with a definite 
 plan in view. We have to produce results, and results that we 
 can show the people. 
 
 The people, as a rule, will give active cooperation to work of 
 this kind. They will be tolerant of criticism of local conditions. 
 But after a while they will meet you with the essentially practi- 
 cal and entirely proper demand, " Now that you have given us 
 all this undesirable publicity, what have you accomplished ? " 
 Incidentally, they are not to be satisfied with a story of '* inte- 
 resting data." The only way you can safely use a town as 
 clinical material is to cure its sores. 
 
 For twelve years the average mortality from typhoid fever in 
 Springfield had been something over 40 per 100,000 popula- 
 tion. In 1 9 10, the year our investigation was undertaken, it 
 was 52. In 191 1, the year after our agitation of polluted wells 
 and the passage of sanitary ordinances, our typhoid mortality 
 was in the twenties. The record of one year is not conclusive. 
 Such a result immediately following sanitary agitation, however, 
 is suggestive and encouraging. 
 
 In 1909, sixty-eight infants died from summer diarrhea; in 
 1910, even after we had a good commercial milk supply, there 
 were sixty-four deaths. In 191 1, after our dairy inspections, 
 there were forty-one deaths. This may be coincidence, but it 
 is suggestive. 
 
 My only excuse for burdening you with the details of our 
 work in a small mid-western town is to make you realize that 
 the small town has real sanitary and public health problems 
 unappreciated by the people, to demonstrate that reasonably 
 good results may be attained without an elaborate plan and 
 without any considerable expenditure of money. The same 
 excuse will justify this additional detail. 
 
 (512) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 39 
 
 The collection of data in our work was entrusted to four in- 
 spectors, already overworked, and receiving $60 per month — 
 men entirely without sanitary training and three of them with 
 little more than ward-school education. They have served as 
 sanitary inspectors, dairy inspectors, housing inspectors, as con- 
 ditions required, their only instruction being such as we could 
 give them ; but each man being fully informed as to what we 
 were trying to do and why. 
 
 In addition to the salaries of these inspectors, which had 
 been paid from time immemorial, the total cost of the survey 
 and the sanitary map to the city of Springfield was less than 
 $100. 
 
 There is but one other thought in connection with our sani- 
 tary study. We were after a direct result, the reduction of 
 morbidity and mortality. We are encouraged to believe that 
 we have accomplished at least enough to justify the effort. But 
 we now feel that we see other results more gratifying and far- 
 reaching than we had anticipated. 
 
 Our work had been accompanied by unrestrained publicity. 
 We accentuated the civic needs of the city in every possible 
 way and we feel that we perhaps stimulated others to activity in 
 their individual lines. We had demonstrated, perhaps, that 
 civic improvement was not so difficult to bring about as had 
 been generally believed and we had possibly stimulated a general 
 spirit of investigation. 
 
 At any rate, whether our sanitary investigations had anything 
 to do with it or not, a great many things have come about dur- 
 ing the past two years. A detention home has removed children 
 from the jail and has simplified the work of an excellent trained 
 probation officer. A tuberculosis association of i ,000 members 
 operates a dispensary and employs visiting nurses. Medical 
 inspection of school children is established. The almshouse of 
 Sangamon County is being thoroughly studied from a medical 
 and sociological standpoint and provision is being made for 
 county care of indigent consumptives. The dispensing of 
 county charity has been placed in better hands. But most 
 important, the people are awakened to the necessity of a thor- 
 ough knowledge of local conditions, and a broad and sweeping 
 
 (SU) 
 
40 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 survey of the city — a real survey this time — is being considered 
 and is practically assured. 
 
 The experience in Springfield, the gratifying results attained 
 without the employment of expert skill, has made me beheve 
 that similar results may be attained by other cities either 
 through the agency of their health departments or through the 
 activities of private agencies. The survey in Springfield was 
 carried out without a definite plan of action, and the following 
 scheme of study was the result rather than the foundation of 
 the work. 
 
 Unquestionably a well defined plan will serve to simplify the 
 survey, will render it more systematic and will prevent ineffective 
 labor in various directions. The one submitted here is little 
 more than a skeleton in the elaboration of which we are now 
 engaged. It may serve in its present form, however, to suggest 
 a rather simple and consecutive line of action which will prove 
 helpful to those about to engage in work of the kind. 
 
 SCHEME OF A SANITARY SURVEY 
 
 I. STUDY OF MORBIDITY AND MORTALITY FROM COMMUNI- 
 CABLE DISEASES 
 
 No intelligent work to reduce morbidity and mortality can be 
 undertaken until we know the present morbidity and mortality 
 and the averages for several years past. 
 
 In most instances morbidity from communicable diseases 
 may be ascertained from the records of the local health depart- 
 ment. Such records, however, are frequently faulty and in- 
 complete. Under such circumstances, the present morbidity 
 may generally be estimated after interviewing all members of 
 the local medical profession. Morbidity records for the past 
 will be unattainable. 
 
 Mortuary records for many years past should be obtained 
 from the local health department. If the municipality has no 
 registration of deaths, the desired data can usually be obtained 
 from the state registrar of vital statistics or from the state board 
 of health. 
 
 After securing the present and past average mortality from 
 preventable diseases, these should be compared with similar 
 
 (514) 
 
No. 4] 1 A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 41 
 
 figures from^otherjmunicipalities as near the size and existing 
 under as nearly the same conditions as possible. Much valuable 
 information for purposes of comparison may be obtained from 
 the last reports of the United States Census Office dealing with 
 mortalityj^statistics. It is only by such comparison of figures that 
 we can determine whether the local mortality is higher than it 
 should be. 
 
 1. Diseases to be Studied — (a) Typhoid fever; (b) tubercu- 
 
 losis; (c) malaria; (d) yellow fever; (e) small-pox; 
 (f) chicken-pox; (g) diphtheria; (h) scarlet fever; 
 (i) measles ; (j) whooping cough ; (k) industrial diseases 
 peculiar to the community; (1) summer diarrhea of in- 
 fants ; (m) accidental deaths. 
 
 2. Sources of Information — Local health department; state 
 
 health department; local physicians; reports of United 
 States Census Bureau. 
 Notes — Seek out the cause for every decided deviation from 
 the normal or average mortality. Such deviations are at 
 times due to outside influences bearing in no way upon 
 local sanitary conditions. 
 
 Ascertain total mortuary figures. Do not accept death 
 estimates in percentages. One death in the community 
 may affect the rate 100 per cent. 
 
 II. WATER SUPPLY AND SEWAGE DISPOSAL 
 
 (Special relation to typhoid fever.) 
 I . Source of Municipal Water Supply 
 
 (a) Results of last analyses. 
 
 A single analysis should not be accepted as final. 
 Conditions in an unprotected supply often change 
 from season to season. 
 
 (b) Possible pollution of the public supply at source. 
 
 Information should be obtained from the mu- 
 nicipal water company, the local water depart- 
 ment or the local health department. It would 
 be well to inspect personally the source of supply. 
 Note — If analyses have not been made, samples should be 
 
 (515) 
 
42 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 secured and sent to laboratories for analysis. In several 
 states, the state water survey, the state university or other 
 state departments will make analyses of local water supplies 
 without charge. Reliance should not be placed on the 
 so-called " simple water tests." 
 
 2. Private Wells 
 
 (a) Extent to which they are used. (If used at all, it will 
 
 be impossible to ascertain the extent without a 
 house-to-house canvass. The same is true with 
 privy vaults. See below.) 
 
 (b) Analysis of water from presumably good wells. 
 
 It is never worth while to make analyses of water 
 from wells which are obviously polluted. 
 
 3. Privy Vaults (Important on account of pollution of wells) 
 
 (a) Extent to which used. 
 
 (b) Enforcement of ordinances or regulations as to the 
 
 distance of vaults from wells or cisterns. 
 
 (c) General construction of vaults to prevent soil pollution. 
 
 4. Sewer System 
 
 (a) Extent throughout the city. 
 
 Location of those sections not reached by sewer. 
 
 (b) Location of outlets of sewers. 
 
 (i) Danger to people of this community, 
 (ii) Danger to other municipalities. 
 
 (c) Extent to which sewers are used by those to whom 
 
 they are available. / 
 
 Note — Information as to the sewer system a|id the sewer out- 
 lets may be obtained from the city engineer or the depart- 
 ment of public works. The extent to which sewers are 
 used by those to whom they are available can often be 
 determined only by house-to-house canvass. 
 
 5 . Methods of Sewage Disposal 
 
 (a) Is sewage ''treated" before discharge or is it dis- 
 
 charged in its raw state? If treated, what is the 
 method of treatment? 
 
 (b) Present and future dangers of the system employed. 
 
 (516) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 43 
 
 6. Pollution of Soil 
 
 (a) By privy vaults. 
 
 (b) By polluted ponds or streams receiving sewage. 
 
 (c) By sewers with loose joints. 
 
 (d) By tile or surface drains. Private sewers. 
 
 III. ALLEYS 
 
 (Special relation to fly-borne diseases; nuisances from de- 
 composition of organic waste matter; dust and mosquitoes.) 
 Remember that, as a general principle, the alley belongs 
 to the municipality and that it is unlawful to place ashes, 
 manure, garbage or any other material therein. 
 
 1. Ashes 
 
 (a) Extent to which they are placed in alleys. Loose or 
 
 in containers. 
 
 (b) Disposal of ashes. » 
 
 2. Manure (breeding place for flies) 
 
 (a) Extent to which it is placed in alleys. 
 
 (b) Loose or in tight, screened boxes. 
 
 (c) Frequency with which it is removed. 
 
 To guarantee against the breeding of flies, manure 
 should be removed at least once a week from 
 alleys and premises. 
 (c) Disposal of manure. 
 
 , (i) Dumps (sources of danger), 
 (ii) Burned, 
 (iii) Distribution to farmers for fertilizer. 
 
 In some cities this is carried out system- 
 atically and satisfactorily. 
 
 3. Garbage (nuisance and flies) 
 
 Presence in alleys (see Section IV) 
 
 4. Alley Grade 
 
 Drainage into yards. 
 
 Low places breeding-ground of mosquito. 
 
 Permitting the use of alleys for even the tem- 
 porar>^ disposal of ashes often results in raising 
 the grade of the alley above that of surrounding 
 (S17) 
 
44 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 property, causing the water to drain into nearby- 
 yards. 
 
 Note — In the house-to-house canvass proposed in this plan, all 
 bad alley conditions should be noted and reported to the 
 health department or to the department of streets and 
 alleys. 
 
 IV. GARBAGE DISPOSAL 
 
 (" The livest public health problem of American munici- 
 palities.") 
 
 (Special relation to fly-borne diseases, soil pollution. 
 Dumps bear a close relation to contagious diseases.) 
 
 1 . Handling Garbage at Home 
 
 (a) Are special cans or containers required ? 
 
 (b) Destroying garbage at home. 
 
 (i) To what extent practised ? 
 (ii) Method employed. 
 
 (c) Separation of refuse into garbage, ashes and rubbish. 
 
 (d) Wrapping garbage in paper (dry garbage). 
 
 2 . Collection of Garbage 
 
 (a) Public or private collection. 
 
 (i) Cost to householder. 
 
 (ii) Frequency of collection. 
 
 (iii) Specially constructed garbage wagons. 
 
 (iv) Regulations concerning collection. 
 
 3 . Disposal of Garbage 
 
 (a) Dumps. 
 
 (i) Location of dumps. 
 
 (ii) Character of waste taken to dumps. 
 
 (iii) Policing dumps. 
 Notes — The municipality has no more right to permit the 
 dumping of decomposable waste near to the home of a 
 citizen than it has to empty its sewers near to the home of 
 a citizen. 
 
 The recovery of articles from the dumps, as is often done 
 by the poor, is a common means of carrying contagious 
 diseases into those homes in which such diseases are most 
 
 (5i8) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 45 
 
 difficult to locate and control. Much of the most usable 
 salvage in a city's waste has been discarded on account of 
 contagious and infectious disease in the home. 
 
 (b) Feeding garbage. 
 
 (i) Distributing garbage to farmers, 
 (ii) Municipal hog-feeding. 
 
 Not a sanitary or practicable plan in the 
 
 ordinary climate. 
 
 (c) Incineration. 
 
 (i) Incineration of garbage alone. 
 
 (ii) Incineration of all waste. 
 
 (iii) Incineration with artificial fuel. 
 
 (iv) Burning garbage and other waste with its 
 
 own combustible material. 
 
 Notes — The ideal method of refuse disposal is incineration of 
 
 all kinds of waste — garbage, manure, ashes and rubbish. 
 
 In this way we avoid the necessity of dumps of any kind 
 
 in the community. 
 
 Ideal incineration implies the utilization of the fuel content 
 of the refuse itself. In this way sufficient heat may be 
 obtained to produce steam for power in municipal plants. 
 
 (d) Reduction of garbage. 
 
 (i) By public or private company, 
 (ii) Materials regained from garbage, 
 (iii) Revenues to the city from reduction. 
 (iv) Cost to the city. 
 
 V. STAGNANT POOLS AND OPEN CISTERNS 
 (Special relation to the mosquito and to malaria and yellow 
 fever. More important in southern cities.) 
 
 (a) Location of stagnant ponds and pools. 
 
 (b) Best means of draining same. 
 
 (c) Screening cisterns. 
 
 VI. HOUSING 
 (Special relation to tuberculosis, contagious diseases, im- 
 morality, physical inefficiency, deficient education, crime and 
 
 children). 
 
 (519) 
 
46 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 1 . General Survey of Housing 
 
 In the house-to-house survey, all bad housing conditions 
 should be located and noted for future investigation. 
 
 2. Intensive Study of Housing 
 
 The study of individual houses and blocks indicated in the 
 general housing study as being undesirable. 
 
 3 . Yard space 
 
 (a) Percentage of lot unoccupied by buildings, 
 (i) Grass and trees, 
 (ii) Paved. 
 
 (iii) Drainage and sanitary conditions, 
 (iv) Uses of yard space. 
 
 4. Light (A study of each room in undesirable buildings used 
 
 for dwelling purposes) 
 
 (a) Outside rooms. 
 
 (b) Light wells. 
 
 (c) Sky lights. 
 
 (d) Dark rooms and uses of dark rooms. 
 
 5. Ventilation (Studied according to above outlined scheme 
 
 for light) 
 
 6. Business Houses 
 
 Relationship of dwellings or tenements to saloons, immoral 
 resorts, business houses and industries. Dwellings over 
 stables. 
 
 7. Home Industries 
 
 8. Congestion 
 
 (a) Number of inmates. 
 
 (b) Room congestion. 
 
 (c) Roomers, boarders, homes and light housekeeping. 
 
 9. Water Supply 
 
 (a) Source. 
 
 (b) Convenience to living quarters. 
 
 10. Sewage 
 
 1 1 . Condition of Plumbing 
 
 This study should include observation of plumbing condi- 
 tions and facilities for ordinary cleanliness. 
 
 (520) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 47 
 
 1 2 . Disposal of Garbage and Waste 
 
 1 3 . Nationality and National Traits 
 
 14. Children 
 
 Number of children in each dwelling, with note as to the 
 manner in which they live, association with immorality, 
 sanitary conditions, etc. 
 
 1 5 . General Sanitation 
 
 16. Transient or Permanent Residents 
 
 Notes — In collecting housing data the name of the landlord 
 and agent of each piece of property should be obtained. 
 Each dwelling, building or block studied should be mapped 
 or platted out. 
 Photographs should be obtained of the worst conditions. 
 
 VII. RESTAURANTS, BAKERIES, BUTCHER SHOPS 
 I . Sanitary Conditions 
 
 (a) Cleanliness. 
 
 (b) Plumbing. 
 
 (i) Condition. 
 
 (ii) Location in relation to foodstuffs. 
 
 (c) Living quarters near to place of food handling. 
 
 (d) Protection from flies. 
 
 (e) Health of workers in foods. 
 
 (f) Spitting. 
 
 (g) Care and protection of food supplies. 
 
 VIII. MILK SUPPLY 
 
 (Special relation to infant mortality, tuberculosis and con- 
 tagious diseases.) 
 I. Chemical Content (Butter fats and total solids) 
 
 (a) How often tested by local authorities. 
 
 (b) Collection from homes of consumers or on open 
 
 market and testing privately. 
 
 (c) Freedom from preservatives. 
 
 A milk containing the legal amount of fats and 
 solids and free from preservatives is merely a 
 good commercial milk. The greatest importance 
 attaches to the amount of filth the milk contains. 
 (521) 
 
48 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 2. Dairy Inspection 
 
 (a) Health and condition of cows. 
 
 (i) General health, 
 (ii) TubercuHn testing, 
 (iii) CleanHness. 
 (iv) Feed. 
 
 (b) Condition and construction of barns. 
 
 (c) Condition and cleanliness of milk houses. 
 
 (d) Conditions and method of shipping. 
 
 (i) Cleansing cans. 
 
 (ii) Rapid reduction of temperature. 
 
 (iii) Pasteurization. 
 
 (e) Water supply. 
 
 3. Bottling 
 
 (a) Sterilization of bottles. 
 
 (b) Hand or machine botthng. 
 
 (c) Place of bottling. 
 
 (i) At the farm (good). 
 
 (ii) At the milk depot (unsatisfactory). 
 
 (iii) In the milk wagon (intolerable). 
 
 4. Health of Employes 
 
 Contagious diseases are often transmitted by the milk sup- 
 ply. Scarlet fever and diphtheria have been traced back 
 to this disease among milk handlers or their families. 
 
 5. Milk Depots 
 
 Methods of handling milk and general sanitary conditions. 
 
 6. Infant Mortality 
 
 Ascertain the source of milk supply in all cases where 
 there has been infant mortality in the family. 
 
 IX. METHODS OF STUDY 
 
 I. House-to-House Canvass 
 
 This is the foundation of every satisfactory sanitary survey. 
 Study each house and yard and note all wells, privy vaults 
 and the general sanitary conditions. Information is also 
 gathered during this house-to-house canvass upon which to 
 base the future investigation of water supply and sewage ; 
 
 (522) 
 
No. 4] A SANITARY AND HEALTH SURVEY 49 
 
 alleys; garbage disposal; stagnant pools and cisterns; 
 housing; restaurants and bakeries. 
 
 2. Sanitary Map 
 
 A large map of the city should be prepared with each lot 
 large enough to show house number, wells, vaults and all 
 gross sanitary conditions. This map should also show the 
 paved streets, sewer system and water mains. 
 The making of the map teaches a great deal about the city 
 as a whole and brings together the accumulated data in a 
 form which can be shown to the people or to the city 
 officials. 
 
 3. Study Water Supply, Sewers, Topography, etc. 
 
 Study of the data in the office of the city engineer and 
 department of public works. 
 
 4. Intensive Study of the Various Subdivisions of Work 
 
 (a) Visit all dumps and garbage-disposal plants. 
 
 (b) Study all housing conditions and plat out all blocks, 
 
 houses or rooms investigated. 
 
 (c) Inspect all dairies supplying milk to the community, 
 
 using the government score card as a guide. 
 
 (d) Visit and inspect all restaurants, bakeries, etc. 
 
 X. STUDY OF EXISTING LAWS AND ORDINANCES 
 
 Study the state laws under which the municipality is given 
 its right of public health control. 
 
 Study the city ordinances to see what improvements can 
 be brought about by merely enforcing existing laws. 
 
 XL NEW ORDINANCES 
 
 Ascertain what faulty conditions will require new ordinances 
 to bring about their improvement. 
 
 Study ordinances of other cities which are bringing about 
 satisfactory results in these lines. 
 
 XII. STUDY OF EXISTING HEALTH DEPARTMENT 
 (See the standards of public health efficiency in an article 
 by the writer, *' The Inefficiency of Municipal Health De- 
 partments," published in The American (7//;/, August, 1911)* 
 
 (523) 
 
50 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 1 . Duties of the Health Department under the Ordinances 
 
 2. What Ordinances are not Enforced? (Ascertain why). 
 
 3 . Study of Special Functions of the Department 
 
 (a) Water analysis. 
 
 (b) Milk inspection. I 
 
 (c) Quarantine. | 
 
 (d) Reports of communicable diseases. 
 
 (e) Isolation hospital. 
 
 (f) Abatement of nuisances. 
 
 (g) Registration of vital statistics, 
 (h) Constructive work. 
 
 4. Provisions for Efficient Service 
 
 (a) Qualifications of health ofificer. 
 
 (b) Salary and assistants. 
 
 (c) Reasonable appropriations. 
 
 (d) Freedom from politics. Civil service. 
 
 XIII. METHODS OF PUBLICITY 
 
 (a) The sanitary map. 
 
 (b) Newspapers. 
 
 (c) Expositions and exhibits. 
 
 (d) Bulletins and circulars. 
 
 (e) Public meetings. 
 
 (f) Churches. 
 
 XIV. DEALING WITH CITY OFFICIALS 
 Cooperation if possible. 
 
 Meet opposition by a showing of fact and overcome oppo- 
 sition by publicity. 
 
 XV. THE SURVEY STAFF 
 
 (a) A competent physician, preferably with some public 
 
 health training. 
 
 (b) A public-spirited and competent lawyer. 
 
 (c) Staff of paid or volunteer inspectors to collect data. 
 
 (d) A practical plumber, or better, a sanitary engineer. 
 
 (e) Clerical help and draftsman. 
 
 (524) 
 
THE RELATION OF A NEIGHBORHOOD SURVEY 
 TO SOCIAL NEEDS ^ 
 
 BY PAULINE GOLDMARK 
 
 Bureau of Social Research, Russell Sage Foundation 
 
 THE relation of a social survey to the social agencies in its 
 territory is to a large extent a test and index of its use- 
 fulness and service to the community. After an inves- 
 tigation has been made, one may fairly ask the question, How 
 does the new knowledge meet the social needs of the particular 
 city or neighborhood in which it is undertaken? How much 
 does it contribute toward solving the practical problems of the 
 active agents within the district? 
 
 It is, of course, true that in the new quest for wider knowl- 
 edge, merely descriptive investigations have been justified. 
 Fuller acquaintance with one's particular neighborhood, a closer 
 knowledge and contact with one's neighbor have been of dis- 
 tinct service. Such studies have widened the outlook for the 
 practical workers who are too closely attentive to their own 
 particular tasks. To know the various nationalities represented 
 in any district, to look up its housing conditions, its health rec- 
 ords, its representative industries, and all the descriptive mate- 
 rial that gives a general picture of the neighborhood — all this 
 is essential. 
 
 But in the first stages of this new search, are we not inclined 
 to be too readily satisfied with objective facts rather than going 
 deeper down under the surface to reach those subtler truths 
 which concern the whole community? It is surely not enough 
 to know the people statistically, to count their numbers, race, 
 and age distribution, and to note their mortality records. One 
 must also, in any given community, take note of the predom- 
 inating influences that are affecting life for good or ill. What 
 is happening to your community? What is its temper? Is it 
 progressing or deteriorating? What is the younger generation 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April i8, 191 2. 
 
 (525) 
 
52 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 doing and thinking ? What are all the social causes that underlie 
 these phenomena? 
 
 I can best illustrate my point by referring to some definite 
 instances with which I have become acquainted in the study of 
 a single neighborhood in New York city. A limited area was 
 chosen for an intensive investigation so as to reduce our problem 
 to a manageable unit. It is a West Side district which lacks 
 the picturesqueness of the immigrant quarters of the city. We 
 are dealing with the problems not of newcomers but of the 
 second and third generation of foreign parentage — hitherto 
 little regarded. Unlike the kaleidoscopic shifting of nationali- 
 ties on the East Side, where the newcomers succeed each other 
 with amazing speed, where Italians and Russians have dislodged 
 the earlier groups of Irish and Germans, this population on the 
 West Side is stationary. Here is one of the few spots on Man- 
 hattan Island where the population has not increased in the last 
 decade. The bulk of the community is Irish and German- 
 American. The immigrant groups are not yet conspicuous. 
 The problems of Americanization and amalgamation therefore 
 do not primarily concern such a neighborhood. These people 
 are American citizens, and we have to discover a fact of cardi- 
 nal importance, namely, what place are they and their children 
 taking in the community? In other words, what may happen 
 when a tenement-house population is comparatively stationary 
 for several generations ? 
 
 This district of ours is a '* back-set" fron the main current of 
 the city's life. It is discouraged and apathetic. The bolder 
 and more enterprising spirits are attracted to the more thriving 
 parts of the city. Here there are no signs of prosperity. 
 Loafers at every corner, street fights, drunkenness and poverty 
 are the obvious features of the neighborhood. All admit that 
 it is " tough." The waterside is infested with lawless thugs and 
 gangs and the neighborhood is hardened to deeds of violence 
 that would stir any other community to action. 
 
 In such an environment it is not surprising that the various 
 social agencies should share in the general discouragement. 
 The better elements, such as they are, do not show on the sur- 
 face. This district has never known great prosperity. The in- 
 
 (526) 
 
No. 4] NEIGHBORHOOD SURVEYS 53 
 
 dustries, which have since moved away, first attracted its people. 
 " Jerry " builders put up cheap tenements of a poor type in the 
 70's and 8o*s. These antiquated old houses, with their window- 
 less rooms, are still the only homes for the workers. Rents are 
 somewhat lower than in other parts of the city. This advantage 
 and the prevailing apathy and inertia have kept the people here. 
 Many have lived here during their whole lifetime. In brief, it 
 is a deteriorating rather than an advancing community. 
 
 Such then is our district at first sight. If the social survey is 
 to be helpful, it must go beneath the surface ; it must show the 
 underlying causes which have produced this sinister result. 
 However baffling the task, we must provide for the social agen- 
 cies which are doing the constructive work of the community a 
 knowledge of the fundamental facts and tendencies. Thus the 
 study of the industries, for instance, must embrace the far- 
 reaching results of employment. It is not enough to know the 
 industrial establishments and the immediate conditions of work ; 
 we need to consider other elements. Who, for instance, com- 
 pose the bulk of the working force ? What is the wage scale 
 and the chance of advancement? Are the foreigners under- 
 bidding the American workmen, and are the latter being driven 
 to less desirable employments ? Are the industries using up the 
 young and vigorous stock and crowding out the prematurely 
 old? Are there industries which require unemployment and 
 under-employment? We ought to examine each industry to 
 see whether it is leaving its workers stranded after a short trade 
 life and manufacturing an army of unemployables. And if then 
 employment is precarious for a man past middle life, what is he 
 driven to? What forms of casual labor can he obtain? Some 
 estimate must eventually be made of the social waste of such an 
 industrial system. 
 
 These suggestions do no more than touch the question of 
 economic pressure and its significance in the lives of the wage- 
 earners. They are questions of prime importance, however, 
 since they determine the earning capacity of the workers and 
 in consequence the status of the entire family. 
 
 For the social agencies of any community, to take another 
 instance, there is no more important task at the present moment 
 
 (527) 
 
54 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 than getting the right sort of employment for boys and girls. 
 In place of the present haphazard methods of beginning work, 
 the survey should be able to tell what are the really good occu- 
 pations for young people to enter, where advancement is as- 
 sured for the competent, and what ** dead end " occupations are 
 to be avoided. 
 
 In any community where there are foreign colonies, a totally 
 different range of problems opens up. Segregated from the life 
 of the city, and separated from all Americanizing influences, 
 their activities are often unknown to us. Who would imagine, 
 for instance, that in a Slavic colony in our midst, one would 
 find the government of a despotic master, whose control is ab- 
 solute over hundreds of adult men? To these immigrants he 
 is the sole connection with the American world. He provides 
 jobs, and takes them away at his own pleasure. The railroads 
 know him and rely upon him to provide freight handlers, but 
 the community know nothing of the exploitation of ignorant 
 foreigners going on at their very doors. 
 
 Clearly one of the most important socializing agencies in any 
 community should be the children's court. Our survey shows 
 that the children's court in Manhattan urgently needs better 
 investigations on which to base court action. At present it 
 cannot even take advantage of the information about families 
 which is available in relief and church records. It has no con- 
 nection with the schools, whereby it could be informed about 
 the gangs of toughs in the neighborhood, and about the ring- 
 leaders who lead the boys of the block into trouble. Often the 
 judge is forced to act blindly, since he receives no proper re- 
 port of the family or neighborhood situation. It is obvious 
 that the work of the court could be greatly strengthened and 
 improved if a probation officer specially appointed to work in 
 a given district were able to report on each case with a full 
 knowledge obtained from every one acquainted with the family — 
 for instance, from school, church, relief agency, settlement and 
 club. 
 
 The present system of indiscriminate arrests, which often 
 fails to bring into court the real ringleader, seems so unreason- 
 able to the neighborhood and has aroused its antagonism so 
 
 (528) 
 
No. 4] NEIGHBORHOOD SURVEYS 55 
 
 often that the influence of the court is seriously undermined. 
 The children's court in New York, which should be known in 
 the community as a friend of the children, is unfortunately con- 
 sidered nothing but a vague authority in league with the police, 
 which arrests a boy for playing in the street as well as for more 
 serious lawlessness. Its real purpose is entirely unintelligible to 
 the neighborhood. 
 
 The practical value of the social survey for any district can 
 here be only briefly indicated. Turning on the light and getting 
 at the facts is its contribution. It should give the diagnosis of 
 the social ills and direct the remedies and treatment more intel- 
 ligently. Surely there is no better way to rein vigo rate the 
 efforts of the leaders of the community and of all the progressive 
 forces working to improve conditions. If these efforts can be 
 well directed instead of working in the dark and taking the path 
 of least resistance, a first step will be gained. But the survey 
 should perform a still greater service ; through its new insight 
 it should stimulate larger and more constructive movements of 
 social betterment than have ever before been attempted. It 
 should open new vistas that lead us out of the narrow and local- 
 ized life. It should enlist the best forces in the community to 
 lighten the heavy toll of human suffering which poverty, igno- 
 rance and neglect now exact from the overburdened workers. 
 
 (529) 
 
STATISTICAL METHODS IN SURVEY WORK 
 
 BY ROBERT EMMET CHADDOCK 
 
 Assistant Professor of Statistics, Columbia University 
 
 VITAL statistics serve a two-fold purpose. They show 
 where to look for causes of bad health conditions, and 
 they demonstrate the success or failure of remedial 
 measures where applied. The record of deaths in a city, year 
 by year, may show a constantly high death rate from typhoid 
 fever — a rate double that of other cities of similar size. An 
 examination of the city water and milk supply may reveal con- 
 ditions that explain the high death rate. It may be necessary, 
 however, to investigate premises in various sections of the city — 
 the surface wells and drainage, the sewer connection and the 
 garbage removal. The cause may finally be located in the use 
 of surface wells and the lack of sewer connections. If it is 
 shown that one-half or two-thirds of the families are using these 
 surface wells polluted by the lack of sewer connections, it 
 amounts to a demonstration to the city authorities as to the 
 source of the typhoid germs. The method of prevention is 
 clear, and when adopted the typhoid rate declines fifty per 
 cent. This new statistical record is evidence of the success of 
 the plan, and those who were obliged to make improvements 
 required by law feel that the requirements were just. 
 
 It is the purpose of this paper to emphasize the importance 
 of vital statistics over smaller unit areas, and to make clearer 
 the reason why we must at present depend upon special inves- 
 tigations for most of our detailed information on social and 
 health conditions. 
 
 STUDIES NEEDED ON HEALTH PROBLEMS 
 
 Our present health reports are inadequate for social purposes. 
 
 Statistics is the bookkeeping of the public health movement. 
 
 The head of a business firm asks of his bookkeeper more than 
 
 a statement of general results. He wishes to know what lines 
 
 (530) 
 
STATISTICAL METHODS IN SURVEY WORK 57 
 
 of effort have yielded the best returns and what, if any, have 
 been conducted at a loss. He wishes to know the weak spots 
 in his system of business administration in order that efforts 
 may be concentrated at those points. Likewise, the health de- 
 partment of a city should ask of its bookkeeping division what 
 causes of death are increasing and what are decreasing in the 
 community as a whole. But the explanation of the increase or 
 decrease frequently involves a study of smaller portions of the 
 community in order to discover a particular set of conditions 
 operating. The department is anxious to find out what lines 
 of effort are most effective in decreasing disease and saving 
 lives ; what occupations are so dangerous to health as to require 
 legislative interference to protect employes; in what sections 
 of the city, or among what nationality, or under what sort of 
 industrial and living conditions the mortality rate of infants is 
 high. Does the crowding of population, as shown by the num- 
 ber of persons per room, result in a higher death rate ? Do 
 bad sanitation and ignorance affect the problem ? What is the 
 relation of pure milk supply to health ? What is the effect of 
 establishing milk stations ? What trades are especially danger- 
 ous from the point of view of tuberculosis? Is one nationality 
 more susceptible to the disease than another? How do bad 
 housing and ventilation affect the problem? Is the death rate 
 lower where hospitals and sanatoria have been provided for 
 dangerous cases and where nursing and instruction are given in 
 the home? 
 
 At present few of these questions are adequately answered 
 through the records and reports of health departments. It is 
 not sufficient to give general death rates for a city or even a 
 ward of a city. The divisions must be smaller so as to show 
 differences in health associated with differences in housing, sani- 
 tation, nationality, working conditions, and special provisions 
 for pure water and milk supply. The answers are left to special 
 inquiries into the housing, sanitation, milk supply and factory 
 conditions of certain sections of the city, and the correlation of 
 the health records with these facts. 
 
 (531) 
 
58 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 NEED FOR CORRELATION OF VITAL STATISTICS AND POPULA- 
 TION STATISTICS 
 
 In order to arrive at a measure of progress in sanitation and 
 health, rates must be computed for successive periods of time. 
 This cannot be done without a record of population to which 
 we may relate vital statistics. It is not enough to have simply- 
 total population for the city or ward. It is necessary to dis- 
 tinguish by sex, by age and conjugal condition and by nation- 
 ality. Further, it is exceedingly desirable to have this census 
 of population by smaller divisions than boroughs or wards. It 
 is only by intensive study of localities having certain living and 
 working conditions and certain classes of population, and by 
 comparison of these localities with others having different en- 
 vironmental and human conditions that we can secure the infor- 
 mation on which to base a program of future social action on 
 health problems. 
 
 Before the present census it was the hope of statisticians and 
 social workers that the population facts of our large cities 
 would be tabulated and published by smaller tracts than wards 
 or assembly districts, — for instance, by forty or eighty-acre 
 areas, which would cover from eight to twenty Manhattan 
 blocks. The director of the census states that the enumera- 
 tions have been made for New York city by forty or eighty- 
 acre tracts, but by reason of inadequate appropriation the re- 
 sults cannot be published for such tracts. The publication by 
 the bureau of the census will be by assembly districts only. 
 
 The chief objection to the assembly district as a unit is that 
 it is political and is, therefore, subject to change. There is no 
 assurance that it will cover the same area at the next succeed- 
 ing census. If it does not, we cannot compare the death and 
 birth-rates for the two periods without the danger of serious 
 error. Besides, we wish to know, at successive periods, the 
 changes in population over the same area, the changes in nation- 
 ality, in crowding, in sanitation, in living and working conditions, 
 so that we may relate these changes to changes in the birth and 
 death rates, accident and sickness rates, thus measuring sanitary 
 and health progress. 
 
 (532) 
 
No. 4l STATISTICAL METHODS IN SURVEY WORK 59 
 
 Besides, the assembly district is too large in many cases. In 
 order really to make evident relations of cause and effect in 
 health problems, intensive study of the local situation is fre- 
 quently the only method. It then becomes possible to apply 
 remedial measures intelligently to the sanitary, housing or work- 
 ing conditions. It is easy for bad conditions in water or milk 
 supply or in housing and sanitation over a narrow area to ex- 
 aggerate the death rate for a whole ward or assembly district. 
 The remedy must be applied where the bad conditions are 
 localized. 
 
 For New York City it is possible to secure population facts for 
 the smaller areas only by private initiative or at city expense. 
 The Federation of Churches, under the direction of Dr. Walter 
 Laidlaw, has divided the city into smaller tracts — not, however, 
 of uniform size — and has sent thirteen clerks to Washington to 
 secure the detailed tabulations by these areas from the schedules. 
 In the division of records of the health department the vital 
 statistics may be tabulated by houses, blocks, or any areas de- 
 sired, but the annual health reports give most of their figures 
 for the city as a whole or by boroughs, and very little of the 
 detail even by wards. The next problem will be, even if Dr. 
 Laidlaw succeeds in making his tabulations available for public 
 use, to secure cooperation with the health and tenement-house 
 departments, to have their data tabulated by the same areas in 
 order that population and vital statistics may be related without 
 the need of additional special tabulations from the health rec- 
 ords. Thus the outlook for publication of health statistics 
 useful for social purposes is not promising in New York City. 
 The health reports are two years behind, the special studies 
 are intermittent and lack continuity, the published facts are for 
 too large areas to be most useful for social purposes, and it is 
 not possible to relate them to population facts for smaller areas 
 than the boroughs or assembly districts, the latter not being 
 used by the health department for its tabulations. The need 
 is for a research department within the bureau of records to 
 study these special problems and bring together facts of popula- 
 tion and facts of vital statistics in local special studies to test the 
 results and efficiency of health expenditures in the past and to 
 
 (533) 
 
6o ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 indicate new lines of effort in protecting the public health for 
 the future. 
 
 NEED FOR PUBLICITY 
 
 It is not enough to have a careful investigation of the causes 
 of infant mortality, or of the facts as to the birth rate, or of the 
 data on the prevalence of tuberculosis, or of the information 
 concerning the nature and extent of industrial accidents. These 
 facts must be put in convincing form and must be used to in- 
 form the public. On the basis of these data public opinion 
 must support or condemn policies for the conservation of 
 health. The public looks in vain among the pages of the av- 
 erage health report for information which will furnish con- 
 vincing proof or disproof of the efficiency of t)ast policies and 
 which will guide to an intelligent shaping of future policy. The 
 public needs to be informed in regard to the meaning and pur- 
 pose of the work of the health department. One aim should 
 be, and is, to teach the individual citizen how to protect his 
 health and that of his family. This requires a weekly or monthly 
 bulletin so popularized as to educate at least the leaders in the 
 public health movement, i. e., physicians, teachers, clergymen 
 and social workers. The newspaper is being used to great ad- 
 vantage. The graphic method is effective in reaching the eyes 
 of those who will not read. 
 
 What has been said concerning health data is largely true of 
 other social facts. We know the area of the wards of a city 
 and can easily calculate the density of population per acre, but 
 we know comparatively little about the number of persons living 
 per room and the extent of increase in room-crowding in cer- 
 tain districts. The latter is the vital information for most pur- 
 poses, because density per acre does not take into consideration 
 the height of the tenements or the amount of space used in each 
 acre for factory or commercial purposes. Furthermore, an 
 average per room for a large area is of little value, because this 
 may fail to show seriously overcrowded conditions in certain 
 narrow localities, where overcrowding may seriously affect the 
 welfare of the population. 
 
 We may have a fairly accurate estimate of the number of in- 
 
 (534) 
 
No. 4] STATISTICAL METHODS IN SURVEY WORK 6l 
 
 dustrial accidents in a community, and this knowledge may be 
 sufficient to arouse us to action. But this is not enough knowl- 
 edge upon which to base a program of prevention or compen- 
 sation. It is necessary to locate the dangerous operations in 
 the various industries, to know the hours and speed of work, 
 the experience of the injured workers, the hour of the day when 
 the most accidents occur, as well as the number of hours at 
 work before th* accident, the safety devices employed, the in- 
 structions given, the nature and duration of disability, and other 
 similar facts, before schemes of prevention and insurance can be 
 intelligently worked out. We look in vain in most official re- 
 ports for material upon the basis of which accident rates can be 
 computed because the numbers employed in specific operations, 
 in supposedly dangerous industries, are not known. A larger 
 absolute numbe*r of accidents does not stamp a trade as spe- 
 cially dangerous if a larger number of men is employed in that 
 trade, and yet in legislation it would not be possible to uphold 
 preventive legislation applied to a specific dangerous operation 
 unless it could be conclusively shown that it was specially dan- 
 gerous to health and safety. There is little uniformity in the 
 published facts about accidents, so that comparison is impos- 
 sible. We have now a movement for a uniform schedule of 
 accident reporting, but we need uniform classification for pub- 
 lished reports as well as uniform collections of facts. 
 
 Statistical records often show us where to look for the causes 
 of social maladjustments, as was pointed out at the beginning 
 of this paper. A survey of conditions in a community and a 
 careful record of the findings which can be recorded in statisti- 
 cal form ought to be a useful guide in any preventive campaign. 
 It is for this reason that the quantitative study of social pheno- 
 mena is attracting wider and wider attention at the present time. 
 But this is not the entire function of statistical data in relation 
 to social problems. They are testing instruments for the 
 schemes of social reform in operation. They measure the suc- 
 cess or failure of a program that has been adopted. This being 
 the case, it is a responsible matter to plan out a survey of com- 
 munity conditions, so far as the methods to be used are con- 
 cerned. The survey finds the conditions to be of a particular 
 
 (535) 
 
62 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 nature at a given period. The important social question is, 
 what will their nature be at a period ten years in the future? 
 It is a great function of the survey to reveal actual conditions 
 in order to build up public opinion by education on the great 
 social responsibilities. It is an important service to hold public 
 officials up to a test of their efficiency at the particular time at 
 which the survey is made. But this, it would appear, is not the 
 only, or even the greatest function of the survey, because those 
 who are making it possible for the community to know itself 
 to-day wish to furnish methods and plans by which the same 
 community may keep a check on its conditions year by year, 
 in the future, and thus make the knowledge a permanent 
 possession. 
 
 (536) 
 
THE SCOPE AND VALUE OF THE LOCAL SURVEYS 
 OF THE MEN AND RELIGION MOVEMENT 
 
 BY ORRIN G. COCKS 
 Secretary of the Laity League, New York Federation of Churches 
 
 THE last campaign of the Men and Religion Movement, 
 which has touched nearly seventy-five cities of the 
 country, has been held in New York city. It has had 
 a five-fold method of attack : the presentation to the men of the 
 churches of the need of boys' work, Bible study, missions, indi- 
 vidual evangelism and social service. There is a clear recogni- 
 tion of the need of effort on the part of laymen. Almost no 
 attempt was made in the campaign to reach men outside the 
 church. This is a refreshing point of view. It implies a feeling 
 of dissatisfaction, an acknowledgment of only partial success ; 
 and it involves examination of the working force. This paper 
 is concerned chiefly with social service. 
 
 It has been the custom of the social-service leaders in other 
 cities to request a general survey to be taken of the social and 
 religious life of the cities, on which they might base their recom- 
 mendations to the men of the churches. The New York social- 
 service committee, of which William Jay Schieffelin was chair- 
 man, decided to make the formal survey secondary and to make 
 an intimate investigation of activities peculiar in many respects 
 to New York. 
 
 The committee approached the social problems of the city 
 from two standpoints. First, the names of the men from two 
 hundred seventy-five or three hundred churches in Manhattan 
 and the Bronx were obtained. These were presumably especi- 
 ally interested in social service. In order to facilitate the 
 gathering of data and to develop the neighborhood feeling, the 
 city was divided into twelve districts, eight of which were in 
 Manhattan and four in the Bronx. Survey blanks, dealing with 
 
 (537) 
 
64 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 the institutional and social life of the church, the equipment for 
 work and the methods used, the character of the community, 
 and the existence of such institutions as saloons, dance halls, 
 motion-picture shows, pool rooms, vaudeville houses and schools 
 were sent to every man. This involved for each man careful 
 personal investigation of an assigned district near his church. 
 In many cases for the first time, church men made a systematic 
 canvass of the social life surrounding their churches. This 
 study aroused much enthusiasm among men who were socially 
 inclined. For each of the twelve districts there was appointed 
 a chairman, who gathered the social investigators or key-men 
 together weekly for conferences. 
 
 The survey of the district below Houston street will serve as 
 an illustration of the kind of facts which were gathered : 
 
 (a) A study of the 1910 census for the district revealed the 
 fact that there were 420,000 people below Houston street. 
 These were separated by nationalities and time of arrival in the 
 country. Total native whites of native parents were found to 
 be only 1 7,01 1 . Some 315 ,000 persons were found to be living 
 east of the Bowery and 105,000 west of the Bowery. In the 
 district there were some 107,000 Italians. 
 
 (b) It was found that the members of the Protestant churches 
 amounted to a few more than 9000. Of the twenty-four 
 churches, fourteen were doing social work. Eleven missions 
 were found to be ministering to homeless men and sailors. An 
 investigation of the attendance at ten selected churches on Palm 
 Sunday morning and evening revealed the fact that there is a 
 very limited group from which to draw for formal church ser- 
 vices, and that the churches are forced to undertake neighbor- 
 hood and institutional work for the overwhelming foreign pop- 
 ulation. 
 
 (c) A study was made of the work of the hospitals and dis- 
 pensaries, both public and private, within the district. 
 
 (d) The fifty acres of park space, with the activities carried 
 on in each park, were listed ; also, the number and kinds of 
 special activities carried on in public schools, both summer and 
 winter. Some attempt was made to discover the completeness 
 with which the district was served with fresh-air agencies. 
 
 (538) 
 
No. 4] MEN AND RELIGION LOCAL SURVEYS 65 
 
 (e) Investigation revealed the fact that there were 1379 
 saloon or hotel liquor licenses below Houston street or one to 
 three hundred fifty-seven inhabitants, as against one to four 
 hundred forty-eight for Manhattan. Remarkable as it may 
 seem, when the saloons catering to the business group are de- 
 ducted, it is found that the people in the tenements are more 
 abstemious than those in other parts of the city. One hundred 
 and sixty pool rooms were noted, twenty-two moving-picture 
 shows, forty dance halls and forty-nine theaters and vaudeville 
 houses. A careful investigation was carried on of sixty-three 
 lodging houses also, with a total capacity of 10,161. 
 
 This slight summary of one interesting district will show the 
 kind of facts revealed elsewhere. The completeness of the work 
 varied in the twelve districts. The men representing the local 
 churches were finally called together for three evenings of con- 
 ference and discussion with such men as Charles Stelzle, Ray- 
 mond Robins and J. L. Lansing. In these meetings, clear-cut 
 and definite suggestions were made for future work by individual 
 men and churches. 
 
 The second way of approach to social problems was through 
 a social-service committee. The chairman recognized the im- 
 mensity of the field, the ignorance of the men of the churches, 
 the newness of social service on the program of the churches 
 and the importance of advice from men whose decisions would 
 carry weight. He called around him fifty men who were well 
 trained in some phase of social Christianity. The nucleus of the 
 committee was gathered from the Laity League for Social Ser- 
 vice, which for two years had been studying city problems from 
 the standpoint of the men of the churches. As finally constituted, 
 the committee comprised eleven of the younger and more active 
 ministers, nine lawyers, two educators, ten social workers, four 
 men in commercial life, two transportation specialists, two Young 
 Men's Christian Association secretaries, one efficiency engineer, 
 one social and religious statistician and others, all Christian men 
 of large vision. 
 
 The field for study was almost unlimited. When once a man 
 recognizes that rehgion is a matter of the spirit and lies in the 
 realm of motive, he discovers that all work is, or may become, re- 
 
 (539) 
 
66 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 ligious. Instead of following the general survey outlined by 
 the social-service experts of the Men and Religion Movement, 
 the committee decided to devote its activities primarily to defi- 
 nite studies along ten different lines. By means of a secretary 
 and a corps of investigators giving their full time, in addition to 
 the skilled assistance rendered by the members of the sub-com- 
 mittees, the following subjects were investigated : ( i ) municipal 
 agencies; (2) social agencies; (3) education; (4) industries 
 and industrial welfare; (5) recreation and amusements; (6) 
 housing and transportation; (7) health [including sex educa- 
 tion] ; (8) immigration and the foreigner; (9) justice and pro- 
 bation; (10) the police, with a statement on the social evil. 
 
 The reports of the sub-committees were directed to the men 
 of the churches and were intended primarily for their consider- 
 ation and action. As each subject was dealt with, the results of 
 the investigation were thrown into a statement, a series of reso- 
 lutions and one or more recommendations. Although the field 
 was by no means covered, these recommendations in the ten 
 lines totaled about one hundred eighty. 
 
 In every case the chairmen of the sub-committees and their 
 co-workers adopted the method of complete cooperation with 
 the skilled social, industrial, legal or municipal agencies that 
 were covering the subjects investigated. The committee was 
 unanimous in feeling that the period of independent work is 
 past and that success is dependent on complete cooperation of 
 all efficient agencies. This might be made clearer by saying 
 that the committee consulted with fully five hundred indi- 
 viduals, — city department heads, social agencies and private 
 experts. 
 
 Below will be found a short summary of the recommenda- 
 tions of several of the sub-committees : 
 
 Recreation and amusements, (i) Urge all church men to 
 cooperate with the public recreation commission. (2) Estab- 
 lish dancing in church houses. Encourage dancing in Young 
 Men's Christian Association buildings. Regularly inspect pub- 
 lic dance halls. Close up those that are disorderly or immoral. 
 (3) Support the ordinance governing the motion-picture shows. 
 Form a group to commend good plays and to reform or sup- 
 
 (540) 
 
No. 4] MEN AND RELIGION LOCAL SURVEYS 67 
 
 press theaters offending public morality. (4) Assist in reduc- 
 ing to the minimum excursion boats maintaining state rooms or 
 selling liquor. (5) Use church houses more generally for re- 
 creation. Maintain more vacation schools in churches and 
 public schools. Urge larger appropriations for this department 
 from the board of education. (6) Introduce pool and billiard 
 parlors in the churches. Support an ordinance closing public 
 parlors at a reasonable hour and exercise the supervision of 
 such games in the neighborhood of churches. (7) Urge the 
 establishment of well managed and wholesome public amuse- 
 ment parks. 
 
 Industries and industrial welfare. ( i ) Develop cordial co- 
 operation between the trade-union locals and the Federation of 
 Labor men and the men of the churches. (2) Support a state 
 bill for one day's rest in every seven. Take an advanced posi- 
 tion on the physical surroundings of labor, fire hazards in lofts 
 and factories, and safety appliances. (3) Become intelligent 
 on the question of "home work" and the wisest method of 
 meeting this situation. Let it be understood that the church 
 men understand and are opposed to child labor or harmful labor 
 of women. (4) Support enlightened laws upon employers' 
 liability and workmen's compensation. ( 5 ) Study the preferen- 
 tial shop as a sensible method of avoiding trouble between em- 
 ployers and trade unions. (6) Urge the proper study of the 
 pushcart situation and the possible establishment of city markets. 
 (7) Propose the larger use of the state and federal employ- 
 ment bureaus for removing excess labor from the cities to parts 
 of the country where the need for labor is great. 
 
 Social agencies, (i) Urge church men to attempt to under- 
 stand local and national social conditions and to make regular 
 study of progress. (2) Become volunteer social workers where 
 the need is great. Encourage individual churches to relieve 
 their own poor, but to do this in cooperation with other agencies 
 in the districts. (3) Support a confidential exchange of infor- 
 mation regarding needy people to avoid overlapping. Assist in 
 furnishing facilities for tubercular cases. (4) Lay upon the city 
 the burden of the care of homeless men and support the re- 
 quest for a farm colony for vagrants. (5) Provide permanent 
 
 (541) 
 
68 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 custodial care for the feeble-minded. This will serve to illus- 
 trate the kind of work that was done. 
 
 Much enthusiasm was engendered, which culminated in the 
 campaign. Thoughtful workers, however, realize that this is 
 but the beginning. The work of conservation is far more im- 
 portant. This subject has had the thoughtful attention of the 
 committee. They recognize that the work of obtaining perma- 
 nent results will be slow. The organization to handle such 
 work, however, must be of an interdenominational character 
 which will command the respect and support of the laymen of 
 all denominations. Since social service is involved in no way 
 with doctrinal questions, there is no reason why such an inter- 
 denominational group, working for social betterment and dom- 
 inated by the religious motive, should not include the Catholic 
 laymen and the Jews. Luckily such an agency has been in ex- 
 istence in New York long enough to test itself. 
 
 The leaders of the churches recognize that the church, as a 
 church, cannot commit itself to social, philanthropic, civic, san- 
 itary or penal work. The function of the church is to inspire. 
 The organization formed by the combination of individuals ex- 
 ists primarily to bring men into relationship with God irre- 
 spective of their political, social or philosophical opinions. All 
 recognize, however, that inspiration must find its expression in 
 action. Every man who has learned the value of clean living, 
 love of God and love of his fellows must work these out in his 
 life, otherwise his religion is a travesty. His definite line of 
 work, apart from his business of obtaining the necessities of life, 
 will depend largely upon his interests and his ability. No two 
 men can be expected to work out their religious conviction in 
 the same way. 
 
 There exist also in the Protestant churches organizations, 
 leagues or brotherhoods of men which have been formed for 
 social purposes. Although the church may not take action as 
 a unit, these men's organizations, as well as individual men, may 
 support certain convictions and assume certain positions in 
 society. These brotherhoods have already discovered that it is 
 essential to work upon problems external to the life of the in- 
 dividual and the church if they are to preserve life. The pro- 
 
 (543) 
 
No. 4] MEN AND RELIGION LOCAL SURVEYS 69 
 
 posals of the five departments of the Men and Rehgion Move- 
 ment come as a godsend to these agencies of the Protestant 
 churches. 
 
 The organization of conservation will be a thoroughly demo- 
 cratic one. Care will be used in its membership. The fairest- 
 minded men of executive ability, who will command the respect 
 of laymen throughout the city, will serve as the representatives 
 of the men of the church. They will select activities requiring 
 action and will bring them directly to the attention of the men 
 in the local churches. They will seek the opinions and support 
 of such men and will request their cooperation until results are 
 obtained. 
 
 A situation has developed in New York which requires care- 
 ful attention. The city has been found to be so large that it is 
 impossible to draw together the church and the social workers 
 for satisfactory action for all the boroughs or even for one 
 borough. Local neighborhood groups have been formed or 
 are in process of formation in several parts of the city. Believ- 
 ing heartily in cooperation, the conservation agency must take 
 into consideration these intensely loyal groups of religious and 
 social workers and must attempt a thorough fusion of workers 
 for local and neighborhood betterment. There is little doubt 
 that such neighborhood groups will rapidly develop into organ- 
 izations with an intelligent comprehension of city-wide problems. 
 
 The Men and Religion campaign has accomplished the im- 
 possible. In one short year it has convinced the Protestant 
 churches throughout the country that their mission is not only 
 individual but social as well. It has welcomed into its ranks as 
 thoroughly orthodox those social workers who have insisted 
 upon the social application of the gospel and who have hereto- 
 fore been regarded as heretical. It has convinced the men of 
 the churches of their essential narrowness and has led them, 
 with due humility, to link themselves with social workers. 
 
 The progress of the conservation of the work of the New 
 York Men and Religion campaign must necessarily be slow. 
 The men of the churches, both lay and clerical, are ignorant. 
 They have called too many things common and unclean. They 
 have been dominated by individualism. No one campaign, 
 
 (543) 
 
70 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 however effective it may be, can accomplish the conversion and 
 the education of the mass of laymen. The important result of 
 the campaign is a change in the point of view. The work of 
 training will come in due time. Without doubt, individual men 
 and individual laymen's groups in various parts of the city will 
 take up actively and effectively throughout the coming months 
 those parts of the program outlined by the social-service com- 
 mittee which appeal to the more active of their members. 
 
 (544) 
 
A FEDERAL COMMISSION ON INDUSTRIAL RELA- 
 TIONS—WHY IT IS NEEDED 
 
 JOHN B. CLARK 
 
 Professor of Political Economy, Columbia University 
 
 THE most critical issues pending in modern states are those 
 between employers and employed, and in our own coun- 
 try they are coming to have an overshadowing import- 
 ance. This is because the nation is democratic and is becoming 
 more and more industrial, and the demand is insistently made 
 that the voting power be used to improve the laborer's economic 
 status. 
 
 How much a government can do in promoting the settlement 
 of the wages problem can be known only after rather long ex- 
 perimenting ; but it is clear that in any case the problem must 
 be settled by some action on the part of the people. If the 
 manner of settlement is right, we can count on prosperity, 
 peace, and at least an approach to contentment ; if it is wrong, 
 there will be embitterment and serious peril ; while so long as 
 there is no settlement at all, industry will go haltingly, classes 
 will be increasingly antagonistic, and the government will have 
 no basis for a permanent policy. Law-making will yield to 
 whatever pressure is for the moment the strongest. 
 
 No one can guarantee that a commission will be able to an- 
 swer, once for all, the questions that chiefly perplex us, but it 
 should be able to do much in that direction, and at least put us 
 in the way of getting the answers we seek. Some of the most 
 essential facts are not now known. No one can positively tell 
 how great the income is which has to be divided between em- 
 ployers and employed. Statistics of income have never been 
 made complete, but a commission can make the most of what 
 figures there are and it can obtain more. Moreover, testing, 
 collecting and arranging figures will be a service of the highest 
 value, and a commission which has the confidence of the public 
 
 (545) 
 
72 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 will be able to prepare statistical material which is fit to be the 
 basis of public and private action. 
 
 Some facts which are needed have to do with the difficulties 
 inherent in the industrial system, and others with experiments 
 already tried for dealing with them. There is a long chapter of 
 attempts made in our own states and in foreign countries to 
 make employer and men more like partners and less like enemies. 
 It is necessary to know how much each one of these efforts has 
 accomplished. 
 
 The supreme question is a moral one. Is labor generally 
 getting its due? A belief in some quarters that it is not, ex- 
 plains the embittermentof the once cordial relations of employer 
 and employe. If there is any way of knowing in what part of 
 the system labor gets all that is due to it and in what parts it 
 gets less, and if there is any way of ascertaining what prevent- 
 able causes stand in the way of justice, that discovery should be 
 rated as in the first rank of discoveries making for the improve- 
 ment of mankind. A belief that the laborer is wronged and 
 that he will never get justice without a revolution accounts for 
 the growth of the dangerous parties that constitute the extreme 
 left of the labor movement. A belief that much can be done 
 without revolution — that reforms will work well and revolution 
 extremely ill for the workers themselves — accounts for the 
 earnest constructive work to which a great majority of citizens 
 are committed. We need therefore an authorized list of such 
 reforms as can claim immediate support. 
 
 There are many things we need to be sure of in connection 
 with the policy of reform. Some efforts to change the terms 
 of distribution in favor of the workers react badly on the 
 amount to be divided. Strikes and lockouts do so, and so does 
 the policy which organized labor sometimes adopts, of reduc- 
 ing its own efficiency — the so-called " ca' canny " of the English 
 trade-unionist. Different in its working, but closely connected 
 with these measures on the part of the workers, is the em- 
 ployer's effort to reduce the output of his own mills and of other 
 mills of like kind, for the sake of exacting higher prices from 
 the community. If we can stop all such efforts, how much will 
 society gain and what part of the gain will fall to the laborer? 
 
 (546) 
 
No. 4] COMMISSION ON INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS 73 
 
 Of course there will be more to be divided, but how can we 
 cause the excess to be shared fairly? 
 
 In so far as the laborers' plan of limiting the number of 
 pieces they can turn out is concerned, that appears, on its face, 
 to be an absurdity. How can any one expect to make his 
 wages greater by making his product smaller? And yet this 
 plan of action has some motive. There must be a way in 
 which, during a limited time and for a limited number of persons, 
 it may do something which, in their view, is rational. The 
 whole evolution that has led to such tactics should be examined 
 and, in the light of history, statistics and economic principles, 
 a reasonable plan of action should be determined. 
 
 Even the basic question of the justice and the utility of the 
 organization of labor is here and there called in question. This 
 means more than the rightfulness of particular things that trade 
 unionists do ; it concerns the principle of trade unionism, rather 
 than the practises which have grown up under it. If there were 
 any real doubt as to the necessity and the justice of organizing 
 laborers for collective action, that question would easily take 
 the first rank in importance. There is no real uncertainty, 
 however, as to this fundamental point, but there is actual danger 
 that, in taking ground against the violent measures of some 
 unions, even reasonable men may range themselves against the 
 principle of union ; and they will do so more and more as the 
 opinion gains ground that strikes are useless without violence. 
 
 Can labor get on without actual strikes ? How far can strikes, 
 when they occur, succeed without violence? Is there any 
 danger that a rigorous enforcement of law, without tribunals of 
 arbitration for the settlement of wage questions, will leave 
 laborers helpless in their employers' hands? On the other 
 hand, is there danger that no enforcement or a lax enforcement 
 of the law for protecting persons and property would make the 
 employers comparatively helpless and invite anarchy in every 
 great industrial center? 
 
 Sad indeed would be a state in which peaceful strikes would 
 lead to starving the workers and violent ones would destroy the 
 social order. Verily, it is a choice between the devil and the 
 deep sea ! But fortunately there is an alternative. Suc- 
 
 (547) 
 
74 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 cessful arbitration may both preserve order and do justice. 
 Recent history records a long series of possible measures aim- 
 ing to secure the laborer against exploitation, and the employer 
 and the non-union worker from the various forms of sabotage. 
 There are concihation, arbitration by committees created by 
 the contestants, each for a particular dispute, and arbitration 
 by permanent tribunals. There is adjudication having no 
 coercive power, and taking place only as a tribunal is invoked 
 by one or both contestants, and there is the same kind of ad- 
 judication which acts on its own initiative, though still without 
 power to enforce its decisions. There are tribunals that have 
 full coercive power, since they can fortify their decisions by 
 fines or other penalties for those who refuse to accept them. 
 There is a plan which requires no formal coercion, but invokes 
 a very real power when it publishes a decision. It investigates 
 the claims of workmen, announces a just rate of pay and merely 
 relies on a stern repression of disorder in case the rate is re- 
 fused. Workers who then refuse a really just rate are not able 
 to carry their point by " slugging " the men who accept it. 
 
 There is much more to be investigated and it is clear that the 
 field of inquiry is enormously large. That many studies and 
 fruitful ones have been made in this domain is no reason for 
 opposing the creation of a commission. It can serve as a com- 
 petent jury to weigh the arguments of those who have already 
 put their conclusions on record. The mass of literature on this 
 subject is so vast that no one reads the whole of it, and many 
 valuable parts of it reach very few persons. If a commission 
 makes the most of the studies of the past, if it summarizes con- 
 clusions and weighs the arguments in favor of them, its reports 
 should be very illuminating to the general public. Even a 
 small measure of success in so a vast an undertaking would be 
 a sufficient reward for the labor and the outlay it would cost. 
 It might easily open a vista leading to a state of future peace, 
 comfort and justice, gained without an overthrow of the social 
 order followed by a more than doubtful effort to build a new 
 one. 
 
 (548) 
 
LABOR LEGISLATION A NATIONAL SOCIAL NEED ' 
 
 HENRY R. SEAGER 
 Professor of Political Economy, Columbia University 
 
 AS preparation for discussing another's paper, it is but pru- 
 dent to have read it or at least to have heard it. Un- 
 fortunately, I have been prevented from either reading 
 or hearing the papers to which you have just listened. This 
 gives me an excuse, of which I am glad to avail myself, for in- 
 terpreting the invitation of the Academy to discuss the topic of 
 the morning as an invitation to point out still another national 
 social need. 
 
 The national social need with which I am most impressed just 
 now is labor legislation. This need and the efforts the Amer- 
 ican Association for Labor Legislation and other organizations 
 are making to meet it ought to be made articulate before this 
 audience. 
 
 An excellent illustration of the circumstances that call for 
 national labor legislation is the use of poisonous phosphorus in 
 the match industry, which has just been made subject to a pro- 
 hibitive tax by act of Congress. White or yellow phosphorus, 
 the poisonous form that is commonly used in the manufacture 
 of American matches, happens to be somewhat cheaper than 
 sesqui-sulphide or any of the other non-poisonous forms of 
 phosphorus which might be substituted. It happens also that 
 the poisonous, double-dip, phosphorus match is a little better 
 match from the point of view of ready ignition than any non- 
 poisonous match that has yet been made. In fact, it ignites so 
 readily that its presence in the community is a frequent cause 
 of destructive fires. (The Bureau of Fire Protection in New 
 York city has been so impressed with the danger in connection 
 with poisonous phosphorus matches that it has prohibited the 
 sale or use of such matches in New York city after January i, 
 
 ^Discussion at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 
 (549) 
 
76 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 191 3, simply and solely as a means of fire protection.) Be- 
 cause it is a little cheaper, and a little better, the poisonous 
 phosphorus match has continued to be manufactured in the 
 United States ; not because American match manufacturers are 
 so inhuman as to desire to expose their workers to the risk of 
 the terrible disease called '* phossy jaw," but because competition 
 left them no choice if they were to hold their own in competi- 
 tive markets. They might, of course, have agreed unanimously 
 to discontinue the use of poisonous phosphorus, but it illus- 
 trates the anomalous condition of our law, that such an agree- 
 ment, if entered into, would almost certainly have fallen under 
 the condemnation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. Moreover, 
 there was at least one manufacturer who denied the existence of 
 the danger of " phossy jaw " and who could not have been per- 
 suaded to give up the use of poisonous phosphorus unless com- 
 pelled to do so by law. 
 
 In this country, the first thought when confronted with an 
 industrial poison of this sort, for which substitutes almost as 
 cheap and almost as good are available, is that the prohibition 
 of the use of the poison should be secured through state legis- 
 lation. But the same circumstances that compel the well- 
 meaning manufacturer to meet the conditions set by his less 
 scrupulous competitor virtually compel the well-meaning state 
 to make its labor legislation as lenient as that of its less advanced 
 neighbor with which its industries may be in competition. The 
 half dozen states in which the match-manufacturing industry is 
 carried on could not individually prohibit the use of poisonous 
 phosphorus by their manufacturers, without running the risk of 
 driving out an important state industry. For a situation of this 
 kind, uniform regulations applying to all manufacturers through- 
 out the United States offer the only satisfactory solution. 
 
 Under the constitution of the United States, Congress has 
 the power to deal with this evil by means of a prohibitive tax, 
 or by means of the prohibition of interstate and foreign com- 
 merce in the poisonous phosphorus matches. The second 
 remedy was believed to be inadequate to the situation, since it 
 would not prevent the manufacture and sale of poisonous phos- 
 phorus matches within the limits of any state. For this reason 
 
 (550) 
 
No. 4] NATIONAL LABOR LEGISLATION 77 
 
 the American Association for Labor Legislation decided to urge 
 upon Congress the first remedy, a prohibitive tax. To this 
 plan, although opposed by only one of the match manu- 
 facturers, grave constitutional objection was made. It was held 
 by Judge Underwood and by several other of the most enlight- 
 ened members of Congress that to use the taxing power to put 
 an end to a domestic industry, rather than to secure revenue 
 for the federal government, was a perversion of this power 
 which, though permitted under numerous decisions of the 
 federal courts, was yet improper for Congress to exercise. The 
 conclusive answer to this objection seems to me to be that a 
 broad construction of our written constitution is essential to the 
 orderly conduct of government and the efficient adaptation of 
 our legal machinery to the changing requirements of our indus- 
 trial and social life. In conferring upon Congress the taxing 
 power, the framers of the constitution conferred that power 
 without any limitations as to its exercise. Repeatedly, the 
 courts have upheld as valid an exercise of that power designed 
 to regulate and even to prohibit imports or domestic transactions. 
 Where the need of prohibition through national legislation can 
 be clearly demonstrated, as in this case, the objection that the 
 taxing power was not intended for this purpose seems to me 
 academic. This was the view finally taken by the great majority 
 of the members of Congress after the matter had been clearly 
 presented to them in all its bearings. In the House, Judge 
 Underwood, who spoke strongly against the bill before the vote 
 was taken, was able to carry only twenty-nine of his colleagues, 
 so loyal to his leadership in connection with most legislative 
 proposals, along with him. On the Republican side, Mr. Mann, 
 the Republican leader, was the only one to have his vote 
 recorded against the bill. In the Senate, notwithstanding the 
 customary opposition of Senator Bailey, the bill went through 
 by viva voce vote. 
 
 The situation presented by poisonous phosphorus matches 
 was no doubt unique, and yet the same general conditions which 
 made national legislation desirable in this case already present 
 themselves in a number of other cases that will certainly be 
 pressed upon the attention of Congress as time goes on. Con- 
 
 (551) 
 
78 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 sider, for example, the situation with reference to the twelve- 
 hour day in American steel mills. Employes working on the 
 twelve-hour system are engaged in continuous processes. This 
 means that the only practical alternative to the twelve-hour 
 shift is the eight-hour shift. The steel-mill owners contend, 
 and with seeming truth, that they cannot change from the 
 twelve-hour day to the eight-hour day without making some 
 reduction in wages. They cannot, that is, unless all of them 
 make the change together. In this industry, labor organizations 
 which might be looked to to secure a uniform work-day for the 
 employes of different employers have been largely eliminated. 
 The consequence is that this change, so vital to thousands of 
 American wage-earners and their families, can only be made 
 voluntarily by the employers or through legislative interference. 
 I do not wish to go so far as to urge that the time is ripe for 
 national legislation to deal with this situation. I do contend, 
 however, that state legislation is inadequate to deal with it, 
 because competing steel mills are situated in different states, 
 and it is unreasonable to ask one state to impose this handicap 
 on an important domestic industry when in other states no such 
 restriction is found. 
 
 Or take another example. The coal-mining industry is car- 
 ried on in many different states, under highly competitive con- 
 ditions. This is one of the most dangerous industries in the 
 country. State regulations looking toward the elimination of 
 unsafe conditions and greater regard to the life and health of 
 mine-workers have proved quite ineffective. More has been 
 accomplished within a few years by the National Bureau of 
 Mines, attacking the problem on a national scale and relying 
 entirely on voluntary appeals to mine-owners and mine-workers 
 to cooperate in lessening accident risks than by all state regula- 
 tions taken together. At the meeting of the American Asso- 
 ciation for Labor Legislation held at Washington last December, 
 the proposal was made that a Federal Mining Commission be 
 substituted for the Bureau of Mines, and that this commission be 
 empowered to prescribe conditions of safe mining which must be 
 complied with by all operators of mines in the United States, as a 
 condition to having their products transhipped across state lines. 
 
 (552) 
 
No. 4] NATIONAL LABOR LEGISLATION yg 
 
 This is, of course, a very advanced proposal and many conside- 
 rations might be urged against it until, through the voluntary 
 work of the Bureau of Mines, we have fuller knowledge than we 
 yet possess as to the safety conditions that might reasonably be 
 prescribed. That such a plan, however, will in the compara- 
 tively near future be urged upon Congress as a practical and 
 desirable policy, can hardly be doubted, and when it is brought 
 forward as a practical proposal, shall we not all have to agree 
 that here too national labor legislation is needed to afford to 
 the wage-earners of the country the protection to which they 
 are entitled under a humane and progressive government? 
 
 I might enumerate other examples. The need of a uniform 
 child-labor law, imposing minimum requirements on all the in- 
 dustries of all the states, has already been urged upon Congress 
 in the so-called Beveridge Bill and will undoubtedly continue to 
 be a political issue. In fact, wherever the case in favor of the 
 regulation of labor conditions by law can be clearly and con- 
 vincingly established to the satisfaction of the great majority of 
 our citizens, the practical and effective method of legislation 
 will usually be found to be national legislation. Through use 
 of the taxing power and the power to regulate interstate and 
 foreign commerce. Congress may as rapidly as it chooses impose 
 regulations on our important national industries. The thought 
 I wish to emphasize is, that as our industries become more and 
 more national, transcending state lines in their operations, and 
 as our knowledge in regard to the regulations that ought to 
 be imposed becomes better, national labor legislation com- 
 parable with the national labor legislation of the United King- 
 dom, Germany and the other progressive countries of Europe 
 will be more and more a great national need. 
 
 (553) 
 
NEXT STEPS IN THE CHILD LABOR CAMPAIGN^ 
 OWEN R. LOVEJOY 
 
 Secretary National Child Labor Committee 
 
 FROM the national point of view, the first important question 
 regarding child labor is, how much is there in America? 
 There is more than ever at any one time in any other 
 nation of the western world. There are no comprehensive sta- 
 tistics later than those of 1900, which showed 1,750,180 work- 
 ing children between 10 and 15 years of age. 
 
 Second, we want to know why we have child labor. This 
 question would lead us to a consideration of problems of pov- 
 erty, ignorance, self-interest of employers as well as of parents, 
 and lack of constructive opportunities to fill in the otherwise 
 vacuous life of many young people. Of persons directly re- 
 sponsible there are three classes : employers, parents and chil- 
 dren. Of course the majority of all these three classes are 
 opposed to child labor ; but so far as it has supporters they be- 
 long ordinarily to these three groups. 
 
 In the third place, we need analysis and discrimination. Not 
 all kinds of child labor are bad. We have no objection to a boy 
 of fifteen years working eight hours a day at a good trade which 
 offers a fair wage and gives a chance for advancement ; but we 
 do believe that, despite all efforts to make work beautiful, there 
 is no way in which we can so idealize and beautify a ten-hour 
 day in a factory for a fourteen-year-old child as to make the two 
 elements harmonize. We believe girls ought to learn to sweep 
 and take care of the baby, to wash dishes so constructively that 
 they can be washed again, to prepare food and serve it, to prac- 
 tise all these household arts and many other arts ; and these 
 tasks ought to be made beautiful. Some of them do mean hard 
 work, but they can be so filled with significance that they will 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 
 (554) 
 
THE CHILD LABOR CAMPAIGN 8 1 
 
 attract the girl. Regardless of so-called social classes, every 
 child should learn at the earliest possible age the dignity and 
 honor, as well as necessity, of hard work ; but we must draw a 
 line somewhere, a line which is necessary partly on physiolog- 
 ical and partly on psychological grounds. We may develop 
 a wholesome relation of the child to education or to household 
 duties, but there is no relationship that can be made wholesome 
 between a twelve-year-old girl and a cotton-spinning frame for 
 twelve hours a day or twelve hours a night, however we adjust 
 it or attempt to idealize that spinning frame or cotton mill, and 
 however we talk about its beautiful lights flashing through the 
 darkness, and the luxurious hum of its perfectly-adjusted ma- 
 chinery, and the high colors of the fabrics being woven by the 
 machinery. When we try to adjust a twelve-year-old girl to it 
 we prostitute the divine element in that girl's nature. So there 
 are certain lines of a so-called repressive nature, whether we may 
 have any constructive opportunities for a twelve-year-old child 
 or not; whether or not we can provide a campfire or industrial 
 training or a well-ventilated schoolhouse. I protest that idle- 
 ness, broken by such exercise and activities as the child will dis- 
 cover for himself if they are not provided for him, is better for 
 a twelve-year-old child than a twelve-hour day in a mine, a 
 cotton mill, a glass factory, a sweatshop or one of the ordinary 
 street trades, which are considered by careful students of the 
 problem the most injurious of all child occupations. Therefore, 
 we need discrimination. 
 
 In analyzing and breaking up the problem we find we also 
 break up the army of people opposed to child labor; this offers 
 a difficult problem to the constructive student of this social 
 question. For example, no right-minded citizen will say he 
 believes in child labor. It is only when you break up your 
 problem into its constituent elements that you begin to lose 
 your adherents. The cotton manufacturer thinks the coal oper- 
 ator inexcusable for allowing little breaker-boys ten, twelve or 
 fourteen years old to bend over nine hours a day picking slate. 
 He would not do it. But he knows that the boys and girls who 
 have come down from the mountains of the South, and thus 
 escaped the ravages of the hookworm, are immeasurably blessed 
 
 (555) 
 
82 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 by working ten or twelve hours a day or night in his cotton 
 mill. In the same way the coal operator would not be guilty of 
 employing little boys every night every other week in the glass 
 factory ; that is intolerable. But it is all right to let these little 
 Polish and Italian boys bend over the coal chute, because they 
 are foreigners, anyway — and besides, coal cannot be mined 
 without them. The preachers in the coal regions are all op- 
 posed to the iniquity of employing little boys in the coal break- 
 ers, are they not? No, to the iniquity of Sunday base ball; 
 that is their text. 
 
 The glass manufacturer is sure the cotton manufacturer and 
 the coal operator are exploiters, but that a boy employed at 
 the feet of the glass blower is getting the best kind of industrial 
 training, and therefore child labor in the glass house is a social 
 benefit. So the newspaper men are all against child labor, but 
 not against the child laborer carrying papers on the streets. 
 The farmers are against it, but not on the farm. The people 
 in this city are all opposed to child labor, but suppose you try 
 to put an end to the employment of children in perhaps 13,000 
 or 15,000 homes in New York city, in the kinds of home work 
 now absolutely beyond the scope of law. No matter how 
 watertight we try to make the law, no matter how many in- 
 spectors we appoint, it is absolutely impossible to regulate home 
 work so long as we have families employed in their homes in 
 making articles for commerce. Child labor cannot be regu- 
 lated. But suppose you pass a law to put an end to that — do 
 you think the people of New York would stand for such pro- 
 tection of the children? They would immediately tell you that 
 you will starve some poor widow. So we break up our army ; 
 we lose our friends. 
 
 In the fourth place, we must study the social effects of child 
 labor, and I have not time to do more than indicate them. As 
 to health, we know from the few scattered reports that child 
 laborers are more often injured by industrial occupations than 
 adults. 
 
 The effect on education we know. The two are incompatible. 
 Where child labor thrives education declines. When measures 
 are taken that put an effective restriction upon child labor, 
 
 (556) 
 
No. 4] THE CHILD LABOR CAMPAIGN gj 
 
 education advances. A few years ago we were told by the 
 southern cotton manufacturers that it was not necessary to have 
 inspectors, because no child could be employed legally under 
 twelve years of age, and because they had a gentlemen's agree- 
 ment to obey that law. Finally a factory inspector was ap- 
 pointed for South Carolina, and in the first three months he 
 took out of the cotton mills of the state more than fifteen hun- 
 dred little boys and girls illegally employed. That was only 
 an incidental benefit of his work. The real constructive work 
 is that there has been an epidemic of schoolhouse building in 
 South Carolina ever since. 
 
 What of the effect on morals? If I had time to debate the 
 old proposition that '' Satan finds some mischief still for idle 
 hands to do," I would show you that a larger proportion of 
 working children get into the toils of the law than of so- 
 called idle children, who are getting an education and having 
 fun. These latter children escape arrest, escape the reform- 
 atory, escape the juvenile court, because their lives are filled 
 with the imaginative, with the constructive, with the beautiful 
 of which Dr. Gulick has spoken. We ought to have more of 
 these things. I should like every child in the country decorated 
 with a garland about the brow, to show that we still maintain 
 the faith that every child bears the divine image. We need 
 that. But the children who go into the factories and sweatshops 
 and street trades are the children who fall below the moral level 
 and get into trouble. 
 
 We need also to study the effect of child labor upon our 
 standards of living and wages. We need to learn how far the 
 competition of the ignorant, inefficient child breaks down the 
 standards of wages and family income. The connection is defi- 
 nite and direct, as can be amply proved. 
 
 In the fifth place, we need agencies and equipment to handle 
 these specific problems. I am not one of those critics of the 
 church who argue that every church ought to become a body 
 |of investigators and agitators to remove these specific abuses. 
 A church of fifteen hundred members cannot constitute itself 
 an investigation committee on child welfare in its community. 
 It is not trained for it. When my plumbing is out of order I 
 
 (557) 
 
84 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 send for a trained plumber. We have a committee organized 
 to handle these detailed questions that require expert training 
 and to act as agent for the church. What we want of the 
 church and all other religious, moral and social organizations, 
 is the moral and financial support to help do the work. 
 
 We need specific agents for investigation and for drafting 
 laws. The average citizen does not know how to draft any kind 
 of a law ; that task needs training. We need men trained in 
 promoting legislation and many other specific tasks which re- 
 quire special training. 
 
 We need to study efficient administration. I have a letter 
 from a man in Massachusetts saying, ** The factory inspectors 
 in this community are old soldiers, and the truant officers are 
 janitors, and the whole child-labor law and compulsory educa- 
 tion law in this town are jokes." Similar complaints come from 
 all parts of the country. We need to study that situation and 
 find how extensive it is. There is no use simply getting good 
 laws on our statute books. If we need good laws we need yet 
 more their careful, efficient, systematic enforcement. 
 
 We need also the arousing of public sentiment, through 
 speeches, newspapers, magazines, and all agencies of publicity. 
 This is shown by the complete victory that has just come after 
 a five-years* campaign on the part of the National Child Labor 
 Committee to get the federal government to establish a chil- 
 dren's bureau. After that bill was drafted, nearly six years ago, 
 the National Child Labor Committee took it up, and we have 
 been agitating for it ever since. Finding that general agitation 
 did very little good, we placed a lobbyist in Washington and 
 kept him there for four years, canvassing every man who came 
 to Washington and finding what support we could get. We 
 drew into this campaign churches, women's clubs, manufac- 
 turers' associations, labor unions and other organizations that 
 have reached an immensely larger public than we could reach, 
 and an aroused public interest carried the bill through. The 
 children's bureau has been established, and day before yester- 
 day the President appointed the best man in America as its 
 chief — Miss Julia C. Lathrop. Our victory is won. We have 
 tried to secure better laws in the different states, and during the 
 
 (558) 
 
No. 4] THE CHILD LABOR CAMPAIGN 8$ 
 
 past eight years thirty-eight states have strengthened their laws, 
 no less than thirty legislating last year. 
 
 We must cooperate with all other special agencies for child 
 welfare. We can cooperate with the Campfire Girls and the Boy 
 Scouts, the Playground Association and the vocational guidance 
 workers, for it is all one problem. Though we cannot separate 
 the problem into its constituent elements, each group of workers 
 must push its own part of the task and do it by special and well- 
 directed effort. 
 
 (559) 
 
BUDGETARY PROVISION FOR SOCIAL NEEDS ^ 
 
 WILLIAM H. ALLEN 
 Director New York Bureau of Municipal Research 
 
 THREE momentous budgetary opportunities now confront 
 social workers : the national budget's provision for 
 economy and efficiency ; the New York city budget esti- 
 mates for 191 3; and the congressional bill for chartering the 
 Rockefeller Foundation. Each of these opportunities typifies a 
 condition which prevails throughout the country; i. e., our vision 
 of social needs has far^outstripped our means and our habit of 
 cooperating to meet these needs. A few minutes given by 
 social workers in April 19 12 to these three opportunities 
 would do more good than millions of dollars and hundreds of 
 mass meetings given to the same subjects next December. 
 
 The same change is needed to give to the Rockefeller 
 Foundation bill the united aggressive support of social workers 
 and givers as is needed to arouse them to the aggravation of 
 social needs which must follow neglect to register the judgment 
 of social workers in favor of the other two enormous possible 
 benefactions above mentioned : (a) the national efficiency and 
 economy program and (b) an adequate budget for meeting 
 New York city's social needs in 191 3. 
 
 There is hardly a social agency in the United States that 
 aims at efficiency that has not tried to secure support from 
 Mr. Rockefeller. Colleges, charities, voters' leagues, hospitals, 
 settlements, churches — one and all are to be found among Mr. 
 Rockefeller's regular correspondents. One and all are offered 
 now, through a bill to charter the Rockefeller Foundation, 
 joint responsibility for spending a fund of at least one million, 
 perhaps five million dollars a year. The deed of gift says in 
 effect: "We want this money used for public welfare. There 
 is no restriction upon its use except that it shall be for the 
 
 •Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April i8, 1912. 
 
 (560) 
 
BUDGETARY PROVISION FOR SOCIAL NEEDS 87 
 
 public welfare. We want it spent according to the best-informed 
 suggestion and most enlightened criticism of those familiar with 
 social needs." 
 
 Yet so unaccustomed are we to thinking about our work in 
 terms of the way government does its business that we have 
 not in this matter of the Rockefeller Foundation connected our 
 judgment and wishes with the national machinery necessary 
 to give them effect. I mean that we have not let Congress know 
 that we believe it should pass this act of incorporation, and 
 that we want such passing done in the name of human welfare 
 and not as a courtesy to Mr. Rockefeller and the distinguished 
 legislators who sponsor the bill. If you can explain why you 
 and I have not spent two cents and ten minutes writing our 
 opinion to our congressman or senator in support of this huge 
 welfare fund, I can explain why so many of us overlook other 
 budgetary opportunities, 
 
 A second great opportunity which most of us will lose relates 
 to an item of $200,000 which Congress has been asked to insert 
 in its budget for next year for continuing the work of the 
 President's commission on economy and efficiency. No one 
 doubts that more efficiency and more economy are needed in 
 national departments. Everyone concedes that millions upon 
 millions could be saved whether or not Senator Aldrich over- 
 estimated the present waste when he said he could save $300,- 
 000,000 a year if given an opportunity to put efficiency methods 
 at work in national departments. Nobody denies that the 
 efficiency work which began two years ago under the direction 
 of Dr. F. A. Cleveland, chairman of the President's commission, 
 has already saved many times its cost and has laid the basis for 
 saving millions next year. 
 
 Yet practically without protest from the social-worker clan, 
 the majority in Congress actually proposes to cut out the $200,- 
 000 necessary to cure the disease of incompetence in national 
 business which these days does infinitely more harm than small- 
 pox or cholera. Men learned in the laws of political psychology 
 talk wisely of what the people want and do not want, and say : 
 '' If we cut out the $200,000, the masses are simple enough to 
 give us credit for a saving of $200,000. If we leave it in, the 
 
 (561) 
 
88 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 masses will see the $200,000 with big eyes and will give us no 
 credit for our intended saving of millions." Just think of its 
 being possible in April 191 2 for such assertions to go unchal- 
 lenged by the very group which best of all in the country per- 
 haps is able to picture what one million or five millions or ten 
 millions a year will buy if spent in meeting social needs. Think 
 of what even one million dollars a year spent efficiently by the 
 national government on education and health would do to 
 reduce the call for local charities and corrections, hospitals and 
 the like. 
 
 There is still time for social workers and philanthropists to 
 secure letters to congressmen and representatives, and to interest 
 editors, commercial bodies and city clubs in making it under- 
 stood that this national budgetary provision of $200,000 for 
 efficiency in spending a billion dollars a year is an urgent need 
 for every locality and every kind of uplift work. 
 
 The commission's studies relating to processes, organization, 
 personnel and supplies have already specifically located op- 
 portunities to save millions as follows: $1,000,000 can be saved 
 by omitting needless steps in handling mail; $250,000 can be 
 saved by using window envelopes; $100,000 by using multi- 
 graph processes ; $50,000 by discontinuing the affidavits ap- 
 pended to personal expense vouchers; $500,000 by merely 
 securing the usual reductions in purchasing railroad tickets, as 
 by return trips ; millions by standardizing 20,000 supply items ; 
 by extending (from 9,000 items before standardization to 30,000 
 after) the standardizing of supplies, specifications, contracts and 
 method of inspection ; millions more by consolidation of related 
 service. 
 
 $200,000 is needed next year : 
 
 a. To retain intact the group of experts who have been slowly 
 gathered with congressional approval during the last two years, 
 who are now practised in ** team-work," and whose dispersal 
 would be a grievous loss to the nation. 
 
 b. To utilize facts already collected throug:h expenditure of 
 the former appropriation of $200,000 and through the collabo- 
 ration of fully 2,000 employes and officials who have been 
 brought to cooperate with the commission. 
 
 (562) 
 
No. 4] BUDGETARY PROVISION FOR SOCIAL NEEDS 89 
 
 c. To utilize also facts that are in rapid process of collection 
 through improved methods of accounting and reporting already- 
 installed as the result of this efficiency work. 
 
 d. To assist department and division heads in the administra- 
 tive improvements declared by all to be necessary. 
 
 Congress has already been urged by three special messages 
 to give the efficiency work unanimous non-political, non-par- 
 tisan support. Putting national departments on an efficiency 
 basis has been unqualifiedly favored by Democratic, Republican 
 and independent papers. 
 
 The only avowed reasons for opposing the measure are: 
 (a) a $200,000 appropriation should be saved; (b) work 
 should be done by congressional committees; (c) work should 
 be done by departments. In answer to these reasons there is 
 ample evidence to prove that : 
 
 a. It will cost millions in 191 3, and each year thereafter, to 
 save this $200,000; many times $200,000 were saved in 191 1 
 and have already been saved in 191 2, through use made of 
 information furnished to Congress by the commission — and not 
 otherwise available. 
 
 b. This is work that can be done only by one continuing, 
 central, technical body, and cannot be done by numerous con- 
 gressional committees. Such committees have been compara- 
 tively futile because they have been unable to get enough facts 
 and have never had the continuity needful for success. Follow- 
 up work that rebuilds is quite as important as investigation that 
 discloses the need for rebuilding. 
 
 c. The departments are already doing much. They will do 
 vastly more if stimulated and guided by a central body of ex- 
 perts armed with authority to enforce uniform, appropriate, 
 modern business methods. 
 
 The fulfilment of platform and campaign pledges in 191 3 
 will be practically impossible without such information as this 
 work is accumulating. The continuance of the present effi- 
 ciency work is an indispensable asset to Democrats and Repub- 
 licans alike. 
 
 The business man's patriotic interest in national business is 
 reason enough for continuing this work for efficiency in national 
 
 (563) 
 
90 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 departments. But in addition, the citizen knows that putting 
 national departments on a modern efficiency basis must in in- 
 numerable ways benefit private business and give tremendous 
 impetus to efficiency in city, county and state business through- 
 out the country. 
 
 Fortunately New York city's citizens are not voiceless as to 
 budgetary provisions for that city's social needs. But this year 
 we must act earlier than usual. National and state campaigns 
 will make it almost impossible to secure public audience for 
 discussion of social needs and budgetary provisions after June. 
 Prompt action between now and June will pay huge dividends. 
 If we give the city government the benefit of definite knowledge 
 possessed by us respecting social needs not yet met by different 
 departments, the best results will come from pointing out gaps 
 between what the public agree ought to be done through gov- 
 ernment and what it is actually getting done through govern- 
 ment. Here and there is a social need which no government 
 department has yet undertaken to meet and which it is worth 
 while trying to lodge upon the shoulders of taxpayers. Even 
 here, however, success requires that the interest of the right 
 department be enlisted before that department submits its bud- 
 get estimates next July. 
 
 It is most exceptional that discussions of budget estimates 
 ever add to requests made by departments. They frequently 
 subtract from such requests. If, therefore, we wish departments 
 in 191 3 to do work never yet undertaken or to do more of cer- 
 tain kinds of work already undertaken, the time for us to pre- 
 sent our facts to departments and to the public is between now 
 and June first. 
 
 The greatest social worker in New York is the city govern- 
 ment; the only picture we ever get of what the city government 
 plans to do and is asked to do is the annual budget estimate ; the 
 time to get needs into estimates is now; the time to explain 
 needs is now ; although the budget is voted in October all the 
 time between now and October is required to inform the public 
 about budgetary provisions for social needs. 
 
 Another set of facts needs emphasis : each agency's budget 
 is all it has to spend plus what the city spends in all depart- 
 
 (564) 
 
No. 4] BUDGETARY PROVISION FOR SOCIAL NEEDS g i 
 
 ments ; every act of government relieves or aggravates a social 
 need; the most effective philanthropy is that which supple- 
 ments and inspires government action; the least effective 
 philanthropy is that which tries to take the place of work pro- 
 vided for in the city's budget ; the monthly loss of life in New 
 York city from preventable causes is greater than the Titanic's 
 loss ; the worst diseases are in people's attitude toward govern- 
 ment ; the only agency able to do educational work on a large 
 enough scale to change anti-social attitude toward government 
 is government ; the only means is budgetary provision. 
 
 To make our local city government discharge efficiently its 
 duties as our social-worker-in-chief, we need the enactment of 
 a charter for the Rockefeller Foundation; we need the ap- 
 propriation by Congress of $200,000 for continuing the 
 economy and efficiency work in national departments ; and we 
 need the interest of the social-worker group, including philan- 
 thropists who support social work, in the steps between now 
 and June upon which will depend next year's budgetary pro- 
 visions for social needs in Greater New York. 
 
 (565) 
 
AN INTERPRETATION OF VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 
 
 BY ALICE PRENTICE BARROWS 
 
 The Vocational Guidance Survey 
 
 NO one ever thinks until he has to, and he does not have 
 to until things go wrong. Sometimes, however, he 
 gets a warning that they are about to go wrong. 
 Whether he acts upon the warning depends upon whether he 
 has formed the habit of putting two and two together. The 
 sudden cry for vocational guidance is a warning to take thought 
 in a complex and disturbing situation. It announces the pre- 
 liminary struggle between industry and the schools ; it is the 
 cry, "They're at it!" We may rush panting to the rescue 
 with all the paraphernalia of aids to the injured after one or the 
 other combatant is down ; we may get control of the weapon of 
 one of them; or we may call a halt and say, ** What is all this 
 about, anyway?" In other words, the plea for vocational 
 guidance may herald a great democratic revolution in education, 
 or it may sound its death-knell. 
 
 Some years ago business descended upon the schools and 
 captured commercial education. The reason for the assault is 
 easily understood. The schools were said not to be '' prac- 
 tical." They did not prepare for life, which was spelled '' busi- 
 ness." But the attempt to graft a narrow commercial education 
 onto a little-understood general curriculum was probably the 
 most impractical thing ever started by '' business." It resulted in 
 compressing education into tabloid form for the consumption of 
 employers. It turned out children who were too early and too 
 superficially specialized to remain efficient when they got out 
 into the struggle for life. If that experiment proved anything. 
 it proved that education is an organic, not a mechanical thing, 
 and that to try to train children by suddenly '* tacking on " 
 highly specialized courses to an unrelated general curriculum 
 violates the processes of nature. A child simply does not grow 
 that way. Now vocational guidance is the popular warning of 
 
 (566) 
 
 I 
 
VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 93 
 
 the same danger in regard to vocational training, particularly- 
 industrial vocational training. Vocational guidance is not yet a 
 program. It is only an exclamation of dismay, perhaps of 
 prophecy. What it may become remains to be seen. 
 
 This is not the usual interpretation of vocational guidance, but 
 the history of its rise and the causes of its appearance will per- 
 haps show the reasons for its various interpretations and sug- 
 gest which one is most fundamental and far-reaching in its 
 possibilities. 
 
 It is significant of the present uncrystallized state of this 
 movement that the words vocational guidance and vocational 
 training are often used interchangeably, and that the terms 
 industrial education, decay of the apprenticeship system, blind- 
 alley occupations, and need of a lifework are all tangled up 
 with this ill-defined phrase vocational guidance. And they are 
 all bandied about in conferences and discussions in a loose and 
 solemn fashion, to the despair of those who want to know what 
 it is all about. It were well if we could throw all these hack- 
 neyed terms overboard, and start with a clean slate, go straight 
 to the facts and draw our conclusions freshly from them. 
 
 It should be remembered that the rise of vocational guidance 
 in this country differs from its rise in Europe, and that if we 
 are going to understand its development, we must study it with 
 relation to American conditions, temperament, and institutions, 
 rather than with respect to its evolution in an older country. 
 I have in mind two stories which are true and which give vividly 
 the history of the changing social conditions that made the cry 
 of vocational guidance to be heard in the land. 
 
 The first is the story of a man who probably represents the 
 finest type that America has yet produced. He was brought 
 up in the state of Maine, that land of pine-trees and granite 
 rocks, wild roses and a restless sea. In its sun warmth and 
 under its free skies he grew up without fear or favor, stalwart 
 of figure, slow of speech, keen-eyed, with that humorous, 
 shrewd appreciation of human foibles so characteristic of the 
 sons of that democratic state. 
 
 I left school to go to work when I was eleven years old, he said. I 
 
 (567) 
 
94 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 got all my education in the little red schoolhouse and in the school of 
 life — and a great school that was, too. We didn't have anything but 
 reading, writing and arithmetic, and an occasional whipping in the little 
 red schoolhouse, but outside we got hard knocks. I remember I began 
 as a clerk in a country store. I had to do everything in that store. 
 Pretty soon I knew everybody in the village. I had a whack at every- 
 thing going — fooled around the carpenter shop (it kind of fascinated 
 me), hung around the blacksmith shop after hours, and did a little 
 farming for Farmer Higgins before the store opened. I'll never forget 
 when I was doing odd jobs for the old man. The bull got acting up 
 and I caught him by the tail. Whew ! Only thing I remember after 
 that was old Higgins saying solemnly to me, ** Remember, my son, al- 
 ways to seize the horns of a difficulty — never the tail." Well, I could 
 turn my hand to about anything in that village. We had good times, 
 too. There was the baseball team, and there were the church sociables, 
 the husking bees and the skating in winter. 
 
 By seventeen I was running that store, and then another boy and I 
 went into partnership and started one of our own. I'll never forget 
 how proud I was when I saw my name on the sign-board. We moved 
 to a small town, but we didn't lose our old customers, because I got a 
 horse and buggy and took orders all over the countryside. Just before 
 the Civil War we moved up to Boston. I gave up the store business 
 and went into manufacturing. I had always been fond of machinery, 
 used to tinker with tools around the farm, and pretty soon I worked 
 out a machine that saved time in our business, and that landed me in 
 New York. 
 
 Yes, it was hard work, all of it, but somehow in those days we always 
 had time for another side of life — for sitting on the village bridge in the 
 moonlight spouting poetry, and for lying in the fields in summer swap- 
 ping yarns, or for sitting hunched up over the open fire in winter telling 
 each other how we were going to be Daniel Websters. It was good 
 fun — life was, then. If you worked hard it was your own fault, but 
 somehow you wanted to work because you kept discovering things faster 
 than you could say ** Jack Robinson." But boys aren't like what they 
 used to be. They don't seem to have any ambition. 
 
 The second boy lived about fifty years after the first boy w^as 
 born. His home was on the lower west side of New York city, 
 the great manufacturing center of the city. It is the region of 
 giant factories with hundreds of workers, and of huge tenements 
 with a bewildering multitude of families. Most of the things 
 
 (568) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 95 
 
 that the boy eats or wears or plays with are made here, and 
 these things are also made for hundreds of thousands of other 
 boys ^nd girls and men and women all over the country. It is, 
 at the same time, more like a village than any other part of the 
 city. It is a place of winding, irregular streets, quiet, sunny 
 side-streets of playing boys and girls, and unexpected horse- 
 cars ; streets of roaring ** elevateds" and congested truck traffic. 
 And on these streets you come suddenly upon beautiful old col- 
 onial mansions whose exquisitely simple carved doorways give 
 dignified, noncommittal entrance to bare, chill, dirty halls and 
 filthy rooms of human-hair factories, or to the alien rooms of 
 an Italian family of eight. It is the district of contrasts. It is 
 the region of small neighborhood stores — the cosy, ground- 
 floor corner shoe-shops crowded by paper-box factories, one of 
 whose wagon-loads carries boxes for more shoes than the old 
 spectacled shoemaker makes in a year; of picturesque Italian 
 restaurants, and of huge food factories ; of push-cart '* under- 
 wear at twenty cents," and shirtwaist factories with nine hundred 
 workers; of small printing shops standing in the shadow of 
 towering publishing houses. 
 
 Did the boy in this village, living only fifty years later than 
 the first boy, "get a whack at everything?" Did he know 
 everybody, get a friendly initiation into all the activities of the 
 neighborhood, and have time for reading and " spouting poetry " 
 and sitting in the moonlight talking, bright-eyed, of how he was 
 going to be a great man ? Here apparently were simple village 
 activities side by side with the great modern machinery of in- 
 dustry. Could he not start in the small shop and '' work up " 
 to the big factories? Had he not even a better opportunity 
 than the first boy to pick and choose different lines of work 
 among the small employers, and then advance, a self-respecting, 
 well-equipped workman, to the larger establishments? 
 
 The walk down Sullivan street to West Third, along West 
 Broadway, Prince, and Macdougal to the boy's home is sufficient 
 to answer those questions. It is true that the factory and the 
 small shop exist together, but they exist side by side with no 
 gradation from one to the other. The small shop is there, but 
 it is merely a picturesque bit of local color fast fading in the 
 
 (569) 
 
96 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 shadow of towering factories which crowd it for room. The 
 factory is the dominant reality. The vibration of its whirring 
 machinery is felt throughout the village. You get a sudden 
 gust of it as a door is unexpectedly opened. You feel the 
 reverberation of it as you ascend the stairs of an old dwelling 
 turned into a sweatshop. The dust from it blinds and chokes 
 you. It has entered into the spirit of the small shop so that 
 although to all appearances it is the oldtime village shop, it has 
 been fundamentally changed and no longer has time to offer 
 anything to the boy in the way of education. The machine 
 has entered into the nerves of the people. It pervades every- 
 thing. The whole place is speeded up. A friend of the boy 
 tried working in a small neighborhood shop, but he had '' to 
 stay all hours," as the employer tried desperately to make profit 
 out of his customers, who had only the evening for shopping 
 because their hours in the factory were so long. The taint of 
 the factory and the drive of the factory is in the home-work 
 and changes the home into a place where father and mother and 
 small children speed up far into the night on the making of 
 flower after flower — at three cents a gross ! 
 
 What happens to a boy in this village when he leaves school 
 to go to work? What kind of work does he take up? When 
 I first saw the boy whose story I am relating here, he was in 
 his home, a •' new-law " tenement, with stone floors and iron 
 stairs, ** like a prison." It was a well-to-do place, for it had 
 push buttons and speaking-tubes. You passed six families on 
 every floor, as you climbed to the boy's apartment — a place of 
 much furniture and sprawling children, a mother bending over 
 artificial flowers, and a father sitting reading the newspaper with 
 his hat on. The boy is an American, although one parent was 
 born in Europe. He is fourteen years old, and he left the 
 great gray school building down the street because he ** didn't 
 like to study." The family were both able and willing to keep 
 him in school, but "It's like this," said the mother; ** if he 
 doesn't want to go to school and doesn't want to study, we 
 thought he might play truant, and it would be better for him to 
 work, and besides, it's time he learned something." The boy 
 said he didn't like school, but he didn't disHke it. When 
 
 (570) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 97 
 
 asked what studies he had taken, he said, " the regular ones." 
 He had lost interest at about the fourth grade. He liked shop- 
 work but didn't have it until the seventh grade, and by that 
 time he had already made his plans for leaving school. 
 
 During the six months after he left he worked in six different 
 places, staying from one day to six weeks in each. He cer- 
 tainly did ** have a whack " at many things, but in a different 
 way from our first boy. The latter worked on the farm before 
 breakfast. The former " helped on the wagon of a milk 
 delivery concern," starting at one a. m. and helping to lift off 
 cans at the ferry until ten a. m. It was out-of-door work, but 
 on pavements in the midst of city sounds and smells. He was 
 paid $4.50 a week, but left because he didn't like the night 
 work. 
 
 He wandered around for a week and a half, and then found 
 work in a printing house because he '' knew a feller there," and 
 thought it a good chance. Here was a real trade, something to 
 study, with definite steps of advancement. What did this boy, 
 who had no influence or training, learn there? He " pulled 
 out" and *' slip-sheeted." ** You see," he said, " each press has 
 its own feeder. But as the sheets come out they must be piled 
 just so, with a sheet in between each one — something like blot- 
 ting paper. This is * slipsheeting.' Then when they are dry, 
 another boy piles them again, taking out the slip sheets. That 
 is ' pulling out.' " In spite of the monotony, he liked the work 
 and was trying to pick it up when the blight of the slack 
 season, that terror of modern industry, descended upon the 
 trade, and he was laid off. 
 
 For a month, he did not try for work at all because he knew 
 that everything was slack, but finally got a position in an arti- 
 ficial flower house, coloring flowers. " I stuck them in the 
 dyes, and then held them up and squeezed out the dye, but I 
 left because I didn't like the place. The dye gets on your 
 hands and you can hardly get it off. It smells awful." 
 
 For three weeks he " walked around " and looked in the 
 paper for jobs. He tried five or six places, ** but they didn't 
 need a boy, and there were always twenty ahead of me." At 
 last he " got into a human-hair place," but left at the end of 
 
 (571) 
 
98 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 fifteen days because he didn't like the trade. " I didn't have 
 no patience with it. I'd rather be something like a plumber's 
 helper or a carpenter's helper, something where you could use 
 your arms, and not just your fingers." He worked there nine 
 hours a day and got the same wages as in the first position. 
 When last heard from he was in a •' novelty place." He had 
 told an employment bureau that he wanted something where 
 he could learn a trade. He works on a copper buckle or 
 badge. He cuts out the sheet copper in a proper pattern with 
 heavy scissors. Then he pounds the metal upon a mold 
 made of ** like it was heavy lead." He stands all day for nine 
 hours doing this. When asked if he liked it, he said hesitat- 
 ingly, ** Yes, I like it, but the work is too heavy. I got five 
 blisters the first day from using the scissors to cut some brass. 
 And you stand up from morning till night. You never get a 
 rest. It's a man's work. I think he ought to pay me more." 
 He was receiving $5. 
 
 And what are his good times? Well, he, too belongs to a 
 baseball team, which plays at Dyckman street in the sum- 
 mer — ten miles away from where he lives. Instead of soci- 
 ables and husking bees, he goes to moving pictures, but he 
 ** likes to stay home pretty well," where the family of seven 
 lives in four rooms. He wanted to know '* how you can learn 
 a trade." 
 
 What do these two stories mean? I should say that they 
 mean two things : first, that in this country we have telescoped 
 centuries in a night with the result that one day we were living 
 in the village of the first boy, and the next were being whirled 
 through the city of the second ; second, that in the midst of 
 these lightning-like changes, one thing has been consistently 
 and constantly overlooked, aud that is education. The causes 
 of both these facts can be traced to American conditions and 
 the American temperament. 
 
 It is a curious fact that it is taken for granted that Americans 
 have always been devoted to education. They have not been. 
 They have been devoted to school systems. These school sys- 
 tems have been started in accordance with a theory of educa- 
 tion whose postulates Americans have never examined until 
 
 (572) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE gg 
 
 recently. It was as though the early Pilgrim Fathers, standing 
 on Plymouth Rock and observing the wilderness to be con- 
 quered, had said : " Here is a great practical task to be ac- 
 complished, but before embarking on it we must remember 
 that, for a democracy, education of all the people is necessary. 
 Schools must be erected." Whereupon, schools were erected 
 as they have been since the middle ages. Teachers and pupils 
 were put into them and then the early fathers, taking a long 
 breath at having that out of the way, went about the real busi- 
 ness of making a success of the country, trusting that the schools 
 would turn out citizens for the new republic. It is interesting 
 to observe the results. 
 
 It makes very little difference how a child gets his education, 
 provided it is a real one, one that cultivates in one the habit 
 of thinking for himself. The early Greek initiation into the 
 duties of citizenship was probably the best system of education 
 that ever existed. And in some ways the conditions of life in 
 New England in the early days resembled it a good deal. The 
 boy in the first story got a real education. He took part in all 
 the community activities. He could run the village and the 
 store because he had shared all its duties. He knew its history. 
 His father and his father's father had helped to make the state 
 where he lived. In his work on the farm, in the blacksmith 
 shop, in the carpenter shop, he came to know by doing the fun- 
 damental work by which every community is built up. And in 
 this way he found his own bent by trying himself out at various 
 things. He received an education not because of, but in spite 
 of the little red schoolhouse. That had as little connection with 
 his real life as it did with the real life of the second boy. Any- 
 one who comes of a line of New Englanders knows that school 
 meant to his fathers a small square room with the beckoning 
 fields outside, inexplicable tasks, much-whittled desks and a 
 dash for recess and freedom. But out of the real school, the 
 village life, came a race of shrewd Yankees, young with the 
 energy and optimism of youth in a new country. Conquering 
 the country was to them a high adventure, good sport. With 
 native smartness and inventiveness, the generation that had 
 been trained on the farm turned to creating cities. They 
 
 (573) 
 
lOO ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 passed industrial epochs at a bound, and had the youthful 
 strength to stand the strain. They covered centuries in a de- 
 cade, and had breath left to shout. They had the vigor that 
 comes from having lived close to the soil. But the multitudes 
 flowed into these cities that had been built for them ; and, be- 
 hold. New York city is a towering, menacing fact. Within this 
 city there has grown up a generation that lives on what has 
 been made for it. Here is the great inexplicable city where 
 they are whirled, jerked, rushed through existence, where they 
 are shot down into subways and up in elevators, where they find 
 themselves climbing stairs by machinery, and whisking lunch 
 off moving tables. 
 
 In this maelstrom the children are tossed about like chips. 
 They have been forgotten in the rush for ** making good." 
 The perplexing thing to them is that all about them they are 
 told that they are not " what boys used to be." Here, they 
 learn, is one great man that " began at eleven and worked up 
 by his own efforts." Or, " In my day a boy was always finding 
 a better and quicker way of doing his job. He took an interest 
 in it. There was my brother. He was in the shoe business. 
 He had to work a machine using both hands. Well, one day 
 the head of the firm came along and found him sitting there 
 with his machine going by itself. But boys aren't like that 
 nowadays." Or, they are told that " what you want to do is to 
 learn the business from start to finish. That is what my father 
 did, and now he is the richest man in the city." Well, that is 
 what they want to do. But they do not find it possible. The 
 modern boy of our story was not lazy — any more than most of 
 us. He was ambitious to learn a trade. He wanted *' some- 
 thing where you can use your arms; " he " would like to be a 
 carpenter's helper." But when he did get into a trade, in the 
 first place he not only had a very small unrelated task to do, 
 but the rush was so great that he could have no eyes for any- 
 thing but the pulling-out and slip-sheeting ; and because of this 
 same rush, the slack season cut short his chances of learning 
 the trade. In the other place, the value of any training that he 
 might get was rendered questionable by the fact that he had to 
 stand all day for nine hours doing a man's work, after which he 
 
 (574) 
 

 No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE lOl 
 
 went home along the noisy, clanging streets to a noisy, crowded 
 home. He simply did not have the chance of the first boy. 
 
 Instead of entering the village store the New York boy may 
 go into a department store and sit in the basement watching 
 check slips shot down through a tube and shot up again. On 
 the floors above, among the tramping feet, the department store 
 lavishes its wares in subdivision after subdivision of luxury. 
 " Work up," *' learn the business," in that maze which he never 
 touches except at the end of a tube ? If such a boy is an Ameri- 
 can with some lack of respect for established order, he leaves 
 in contempt and " walks around " until he finds another job, and 
 continues until he succumbs or is thrown aside. If he is of the 
 great army of immigrants who are even more persuaded than our 
 own people that this is a land of opportunity and education, he 
 stays, believing that in this land of promise this job must lead 
 somewhere. Industry is a tube, a needle, a foot-press, to the 
 average worker. He does not know what there is, or how to 
 get it. His work, to such a boy, is represented by a sidedoor 
 elevator in which he rides at his own risk, a military row of 
 heads bowed over machines or desks, a flash, a whirr, a tired 
 back and a desire to leave. 
 
 As long as the community life gave real education, the state 
 could without danger let the school remain the repository of 
 inexplicable truth, but to the extent to which the state fails to 
 order its social and industrial life so that the children may par- 
 ticipate in the fundamental community activities, to that extent 
 we must see to it that special institutions are set apart for the 
 special purpose of giving these children some understanding of 
 the life in which they find themselves. The more complex 
 conditions become, the more imperative this need is, and it is a 
 need that will be increasingly felt in this country, for it is use- 
 less to expect that conditions will become less complex. The 
 history of America, and of civilization in general, does not war- 
 rant such an expectation. But it is consistent with the history 
 of human achievement to expect that we may develop, along 
 with this increasing complexity, the power to control it by 
 analyzing and understanding it. This is the function of educa- 
 tion in a highly developed civilization. 
 
 (575) 
 
102 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 But the state in our country has, so far, failed to recognize 
 that fact. It fails to supply schools for training in good citi- 
 zenship and good workmanship ; and it fails because its people 
 have always neglected to articulate their mental life and their 
 " practical " life. The division between the school and life is 
 important, but even more important is the fact that the division 
 is due to the fundamental separation that there has always been 
 in America between '' practical " life and the life of speculative 
 thought. The following words of Santayana in regard to our 
 philosophic system will express my point better than any words 
 of mine, for education is, of course, only the expression of a 
 nation's philosophy: 
 
 America is a country with two mentalities, one a survival of the beliefs 
 and standards of the fathers, the other an expression of the instincts, 
 practise and discoveries of the younger generation. In all the higher 
 things of the mind — in religion, in literature, in the moral emotions — 
 it is the hereditary spirit that still prevails, so much so that Bernard 
 Shaw finds that America is a hundred years behind the times. The 
 truth is that one-half of the American mind, that not occupied intensely 
 in practical aifairs, has remained, I will not say high-and-dry , but 
 slightly becalmed ; it has floated gently in the backwater, while, along- 
 side, in invention and industry and social organization, the other half 
 of the mind was leaping down a sort of Niagara Rapids. . . . The one 
 is all aggressive enterprise ; the other is all genteel tradition.^ 
 
 If this hypothesis is true, and I believe it is, and if the fore- 
 going stories are typical of conditions, and I believe they are, 
 one or two things become clear in regard to the movement for 
 vocational guidance. It is evident that it has its roots in a 
 maladjustment deeper and more fundamental than is at first 
 apparent. If the lives of these two boys and the analysis 
 prove anything, they prove that the present clash exists be- 
 cause since the beginning of our history we have kept our 
 educational life and our practical life in separate compartments, 
 so that now when they need one another they do not know 
 how to talk to each other. It is not the fault of the schools. 
 
 * The Genteel Tradition in American Philosophy^ p. 4. 
 (576) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 103 
 
 It is the fault of the American temperament, which has al- 
 ways been content with the '* genteel tradition " in its thinking 
 life. 
 
 The foregoing is not meant to be a mere psychological 
 analysis. It has a direct, practical bearing upon the question 
 of vocational guidance. Americans are never going to be 
 content with the '* genteel tradition " when it really gets in 
 their way. As long as it is on the shelf and is only taken 
 down on Sundays and holidays, it can be sentimentalized over 
 with safety, but when it begins to interfere with Monday morn- 
 ing's work in the office, it has to go. It is beginning to do 
 just that. What is going to be put in its place? What is go- 
 ing to take the place of the school of our fathers ? 
 
 One of three things may happen. In the first place, we 
 may carry our real, every-day philosophy to its logical, 
 practical conclusion. The business man, who is America, may 
 say: 
 
 Yes, the schools are not related to life. This will never do. We 
 must relate them to life. Trade in New York city in the year 19 12 is 
 life. Therefore, train children for earning their living in trade in 
 New York city in 191 2. Never mind about what went before or what 
 is coming after. Guide them into vocations now. I want twenty 
 boys for my machine shops. 
 
 If that point of view prevails, we shall have short-course trade 
 schools, and vocational guidance will be a bureau for giving 
 advice about vocations. 
 
 Or we may fall back upon the omnipresent sentimentality of 
 the practical man — another fungus of the *' genteel tradition '' 
 — and say: 
 
 This state of affairs is pathetic. What are we going to do with these 
 children that school cannot hold? It's no use talking about keeping 
 them in school. They will not stay. You cannot make the schools 
 attractive. The boys and girls want to help their parents. Their 
 unselfishness should not be discouraged. Let us find work for them. 
 I need twenty boys in my machine shops. 
 
 (577) 
 
104 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 In that case vocational guidance becomes a regular employment 
 bureau for placing children in positions. 
 
 Either answer to the problem is dangerous because both, 
 continuing the American tradition, slight the problem of edu- 
 cation. The first would provide a '' practical " school adapted 
 to the needs of to-day ; but with trade conditions changing so 
 rapidly, such a school would fail to meet even the demands of 
 its own time. The second would simply swell the ranks of that 
 army of workers which, caught in the pressure of city life, is 
 not educated either by the normal community activities or by 
 the school. 
 
 Vocational guidance must face the fact that it must be, in 
 justice to the child, a problem in education. Since the school 
 does not really educate, and since the community no longer 
 educates, one or the other must be made to educate. It is 
 impossible to simplify the complexity or stay the heedless rush 
 of New York industrial life. It is the school which we must 
 grapple with. It must be given an opportunity to take the 
 place of that simple village life which, in its variety and in its 
 demand for personal service, instructed a generation for whom 
 there was no need of vocational guidance. This is the third 
 answer to the problem, and might be stated concretely as follows : 
 
 It is true that the schools are not related to life, and that consequently 
 the children are leaving them in alarming numbers. It is difficult to 
 hold them there, but it is not impossible. To do that, however, we 
 must recognize that our schools have never really educated , and conse- 
 quently that they must be reorganized from the beginning. Tacking 
 on six-months trade courses will not help matters. 
 
 There is reason to hope that such an answer may prevail, 
 because if America has been medieval in its school systems, it 
 has also produced one of the greatest educators of the century, 
 one who analyzed American tendencies and the flaws in Ameri- 
 can education long before the present agitation for reform. 
 He has, in fact, made it possible for the call for such recon- 
 struction to come from the schoolmen themselves, as it is com- 
 ing. If his school of thought prevails, we shall have the solution 
 of the problem in his definition of the training of a child. Says 
 John Dewey : 
 
 (578) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 105 
 
 The child is to be not only a voter and a subject of law ; he is also 
 to be a member of a family. He is to be a worker, engaged in some 
 occupation which will be of use to society and which will maintain his 
 own independence and self-respect. He is to be a member of some 
 particular neighborhood and community , and must contribute to the 
 
 decencies and graces of civilization wherever he is To 
 
 suppose that a good citizen is anything more than a thoroughly efficient 
 
 and serviceable member of society is a cramped superstition 
 
 which it is hoped may soon disappear from educational discussion. 
 
 If this third answer, involving the socializing rather than the 
 mechanizing of the school, carries the day, what will be the 
 school of the future, and what place in its development is there 
 for vocational guidance? Can vocational guidance be more 
 than a warning cry that such a newer type of school is needed ? 
 Can it be of practical assistance in making this school a 
 reality ? 
 
 Before considering that point, I should like to draw attention 
 again to the fact that the lack of educational advance is due 
 not to the school but to the blind optimism of the American 
 taxpayer in regard to the established order of education. 
 Convinced as he is that he only has to give money for schools 
 as they always have been, he opposes a polite but solid front 
 of uncomprehending disapproval to innovation or what he calls 
 "• fads." There is an interesting illustration of this fact in the 
 history of the New York public schools. In the beginning of 
 the manual training movement, as soon as the practicability of 
 manual training had been proved to the satisfaction of the ablest 
 educators, the superintendent of schools advocated the starting 
 of such classes in the public schools. He has only gradually 
 secured them from a grudging public, and even now has not so 
 many as he wants and he has none for grades lower than the 
 seventh. In the year 191 1, the budget for the board of 
 education was cut, thereby crippling the work so laboriously 
 built up. Again, the public has been slowly worked up to an 
 appreciation of the need of classes for defectives. Excellent 
 and beneficial as that is to the children as a whole, perhaps even 
 more important from a constructive point of view is the campaign 
 that the city superintendent has now started for the more ade- 
 
 (579) 
 
I06 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 quate education of the normal children. In his report this year, 
 he advocated the establishment of more vocational schools, and 
 the inauguration of continuation schools — a recommendation in 
 line with the most progressive thought of the times. It will be 
 interesting to see how long he will have to make this demand 
 before the city will permit such schools in New York. It is a 
 curious fact that, in spite of such widespread progressive move- 
 ments upon the part of educators, the school systems are still at- 
 tacked as behind the times, while appropriations for courses 
 consistent with development along progressive lines are only 
 reluctantly and protestingly granted. Criticism is much easier 
 than going down into one's pocket for the large expenditure 
 necessary for such changes. If the American is to give up the 
 *' genteel tradition," he must see the value of spending ten 
 times as much on education as he now spends. 
 
 In spite of the indifference of the average citizen, however, 
 there are two clearly defined progressive movements in the 
 school in connection with which vocational guidance can render 
 real service. They are the movement for the establishment of 
 vocational and continuation schools, and that for the ** six and 
 six plan." Both movements involve a real upheaval of present 
 arrangements. To be effective, they must be founded upon 
 accurate, concrete knowledge of present conditions and tend- 
 encies, and such knowledge cannot be secured in a short time. 
 And the schools have a very limited amount of time to give to 
 such work, as they are already overburdened with the task of 
 carrying on the machinery of the present educational system. 
 The tendency under these conditions would be, therefore, to 
 secure information from those to whom trade training and 
 the supply of workers is of practical importance, i. e.y the em- 
 ployers. But it would not be wise to take the word merely of 
 those who have private interests at stake. The information 
 should be secured by someone who can go into the matter 
 thoroughly enough to get the suggestions of both employers and 
 working men, and reduce them to an impartial statement of 
 facts on which to base action. Therefore, the school authorities 
 have the right to demand of the state the services of a bureau 
 not outside but within the school system, whose business it 
 
 (580) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 107 
 
 shall be to collect information which will enable them to carry 
 on these two reconstructive movements in accordance with the 
 facts of present conditions and sound educational theory. 
 Such, in my opinion, is at present the function of a vocational 
 guidance bureau. It would really be a School Bureau of Voca- 
 tional Information and would give guidance of the most funda- 
 mental kind, that is, guidance in this readjustment between 
 education and industry, by getting information about vocations 
 interpreted in their most social sense. 
 
 And what shall its practical work be? To explain that, I 
 must go back a moment to a description of the two lines of 
 progressive reconstruction mentioned above — the movement for 
 vocational schools and the suggested revision of the curriculum 
 in accordance with the *' six and six " plan. Because the 
 American people are likely to ignore the educational oppor- 
 tunities in the industrial demand, there is the gravest possible 
 danger that plans for changes in the curriculum advocated in 
 the "six and six" plan and in the vocational schools may be 
 too narrow in scope. A School Bureau of Vocational Informa- 
 tion may forestall that danger. To illustrate, the ''six and six " 
 plan will probably develop in one of three principal ways. The 
 proposition is, as I understand it, to cover the ground that is 
 now covered in eight years of elementary schooling, in six 
 years, so that the children will finish the general course in what 
 is now the sixth grade. That means that normally they would 
 finish that grade at twelve years of age. Actually, of course, 
 many children in the sixth grade are fourteen years old. How- 
 ever, assuming that under this new plan there would be less 
 retardation, let us divide the next six years into two-year groups. 
 The course for the children from twelve to fourteen years of 
 age might then be divided into industrial and commercial de- 
 partments, which would have a common denominator of general 
 studies with perhaps one third of the time in each department de- 
 voted to special trade or commercial work. In this arrangement, 
 boys and girls would probably be segregated, the boys taking 
 trade or commercial courses particularly fitted to them, and the 
 girls those for which it is considered that their capabilities make 
 them fit. According to this plan, the children during the next 
 
 (581) 
 
I08 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 two years, from fourteen to sixteen, might devote their whole 
 time to a study of the special trade or course which the previous 
 two years had convinced them they preferred. They could 
 spend two or four years on such a course, depending upon the 
 time at their disposal and the degree of training necessary. 
 
 On the other hand, the " six and six" plan might result in a gen- 
 eral course up to the sixth grade, with a general vocational course 
 from twelve years to fourteen years of age, with no division of 
 the work into industrial and commercial, or into that for boys 
 and that for girls, with special vocational work from fourteen to 
 sixteen, or fourteen to eighteen. Such a plan would be based 
 on the assumption that it is untrue to the facts of present-day 
 life to divide courses into industrial and commercial, as well as 
 educationally unsound to predetermine a child's bent at twelve 
 years of age. It would also assume that to divide courses into 
 boys' work and girls' work is to cling to an outworn prejudice 
 rather than to recognize the facts of actual life which record 
 that women are at work in all but three of the occupations recog- 
 nized by the census in which men are engaged, and therefore 
 need training for all of them just as boys do. As Mr. Arthur 
 D. Dean has said : " We must definitely fit her for the work 
 which she has chosen in the productive and distributive fields 
 of labor. Work here she will, and all the brooms of good 
 people will not sweep back the tide." The special vocational 
 courses under this plan could be carried on in one of two ways : 
 ( I ) By full-day vocational courses in the schools from fourteen 
 to sixteen, or fourteen to eighteen, according to the training 
 necessary, or (2) By half-time work in the schools and half- 
 time in the shops, from fourteen to sixteen, or fourteen to 
 eighteen. 
 
 There is a third possibility in this " six and six " plan. Experi- 
 ment may show that the kind of school outlined by Professor 
 John Dewey in The School and Society offers the most practical 
 method of correcting the maladjustment at present existing be- 
 tween the school and society. The more one reads that small 
 and unostentatious-looking book, and the more one goes out 
 into the streets and tenements and factories and playgrounds, 
 where the great mass of children in a city like New York live 
 
 (583) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 109 
 
 and work and play, the more one is convinced that in that little 
 volume is outlined the most practical and economic method of 
 meeting the maladjustment that makes the cry for vocational 
 guidance possible, because the author provides for the teaching 
 of those community activities the lack of which in the child's 
 life we have discovered to be the cause of the maladjustment. 
 
 Whichever way the ** six and six" plan is interpreted, there is 
 one other point of primary importance to be determined. If one 
 of the first two plans goes through, and children finish their gen- 
 eral course at twelve years of age, or in the sixth grade, is there 
 any danger of the law being changed to permit them to leave 
 school for work at twelve years, or will there be a law compel- 
 ling all children to attend school either half-time or full-time up 
 to sixteen years of age — in the first case receiving training in a 
 trade, part of the time in the shop and part in the school ; in 
 the second case spending all the time in the school? This of 
 course brings us into connection with the second movement for 
 reconstruction, that is, the vocational and continuation-school 
 plans. It is evident that this general and special school revision 
 cannot be divorced. The children who go into vocational and 
 continuation schools are coming out of the general elementary 
 schools. How is the vocational to supplement the general 
 school? That depends upon how we interpret education and 
 industry. A School Bureau of Vocational Information could 
 do much to make that interpretation sound by supplying data 
 for it. 
 
 In connection with what group of young workers shall we get 
 these data? There are three groups of children, and three 
 types of school, for which such a bureau might work: (i) Ele- 
 mentary schools and children, including the fourteen to sixteen- 
 year-old children who first leave school to go to work; (2) 
 Secondary, or high schools, and the group of children from 
 fourteen to eighteen; (3) The eighteen to twenty-one year old 
 group of children in technical or trade courses. It would be 
 difficult to say which is the most important. The first group 
 appeals to me as the most important, because ultimately, to 
 help the last two, we shall have to change conditions for the 
 first, and also because the reconstruction mentioned above 
 
 (583) 
 
no ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 centers about this group. There is one piece of work in this 
 group which it is of immediate importance for a bureau to 
 carry on, and that is an investigation of trades. There are 
 certain points upon which we already know that we need in- 
 formation before we can be sure that we are constructing trade 
 schools on the right lines. For example, there is at present a 
 discussion of the relative value of trade training given in all-day 
 vocational schools, and that given in half-time schools, i. e., 
 half time in the school and half time in the shop. 
 
 There are a number of facts that must be ascertained before 
 we can decide that point. Such facts can be divided roughly 
 into three groups: (i) The kind of trades to be taught in 
 either all-day or half-day vocational schools. (2) The kind 
 of pre-vocational schooling that will be necessary if the pupils 
 are to master the vocational work in the allotted time. (3) The 
 state supervision of the conditions under which the work is 
 done. The following are a few of the questions that might be 
 considered under each head : 
 
 I. The Kind of Trades to be Taught. 
 
 a. What trades is the state justified in spending the money 
 and the time to teach in either type of school? 
 
 b. What is a ''blind-alley" occupation? What is a skilled 
 trade ? Is the state justified in training children for paper-box- 
 making, for example? Or is it justified in training them for 
 industries that demand only specialized workers on subdivided 
 processes of subdivisions of trades? Would there be any 
 danger of systematically preparing workers for pieces of work 
 which, in the rapid changes in industry, might be obsolete in 
 five or ten years? Would the state, in that case, recruit the 
 army of unemployables which it has to take care of in other 
 state departments? But if such narrowly specialized workers 
 represent the majority demanded by industry, what are the 
 schools — which necessarily plan for the majority — going to do 
 about it? Give up the fight for training citizens, and train 
 '* hands? " Or shall we say that if that is the kind of worker 
 that industry wants, it is not the kind of man that the state 
 wants, and that, even if he has to go into such work, he shall at 
 
 (584) 
 
No. 4] VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE III 
 
 least know why ; shall know the industrial development that led 
 up to the present conditions, whether they are likely to last, and 
 in what direction they are tending so that he shall not have the 
 feeling of blind bewilderment of the second boy of our story? 
 In that case, what is industry going to say? 
 
 c. Is it true, on the contrary, that the tendency in certain in- 
 dustries is toward the invention of machines so complicated that 
 instead of the mechanical machine tender they demand the ser- 
 vices of a highly skilled man with all-round knowledge? If so, 
 what effect will this have upon the development of general and 
 vocational schools ? Could preparation for such trades be better 
 taught by half-time work in the shops? 
 
 d. Again, does the increasing complexity and unity in variety 
 of actual trade conditions point to the fact that our present 
 classification of trades is antiquated? Would it be possible to 
 construct curricula on the basis of the social need to be satisfied 
 rather than on the basis of individual crafts? In that case, of 
 course, the newer callings which take the place of an older trade 
 in the construction of something always in demand, such as 
 houses, for example, would be a part of the trade taught. 
 What effect would this have not only upon the school curricula, 
 but upon irregularity of employment, slack seasons, rules of 
 apprenticeship and similar matters? 
 
 II. The Kind of Pre-Vocational Schooling Necessary. 
 
 If this careful, thorough training in trade is to be given, what 
 kind of pre-vocational work must there be? Would the oppor- 
 tunity to handle tools generally in studying the different com- 
 munity activities — development of industry, for example, of 
 weaving, carpentry, mechanics — give a boy a general familiarity 
 with tools without which he would not be able to master a trade 
 so rapidly? 
 
 III. State Supervision of Conditions under which Children 
 Work. 
 
 Even if we get all these facts about the trade, how is the state 
 to make sure that the children will work under conditions not 
 inimical to health? 
 
 Such might be the general outline of one task of such a 
 
 (585) 
 
1 1 2 ORGANIZA TION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 bureau. This conception of vocational guidance as a kind of 
 School Bureau of Vocational Information will probably not ap- 
 peal to the majority so much as the idea of an advice bureau 
 or of an employment bureau. Its task is not so definite as that 
 of an employment bureau nor has it the popular emotional ap- 
 peal of an advice bureau. Such an interpretation of the cry 
 for vocational guidance is to me, however, more consistent with 
 the history of its rise, and is likely to yield results of more last- 
 ing benefit. I believe that, if we hold to this idea, we shall 
 " seize the horns rather than the tail of the difficulty." Of 
 course, the chief obstacle to putting such an interpretation into 
 effect is that the analysis of the situation and of the American 
 character, upon which the interpretation is based, is addressed 
 to an American audience, and for the very reason given in the 
 analysis, the average American business man who gives the first 
 answer to the problem is likely to brush aside this interpretation 
 as theoretical, thus of course proving my point and condemning 
 us to the inevitable fruition of the "■ genteel tradition." 
 
 If, however, this interpretation is accepted, we may per- 
 haps have a third type of boy in the future — one who had all 
 the varied training of the village boy, but who received it in a 
 school where he, too, began to use his hands and eyes and ears 
 as early as five years of age ; in which he learned by taking 
 part in all the fundamental activities of human life, studying 
 geography as the science of man's relation to the earth, not as a 
 complex chart of capitals and rivers, countries with exports and 
 imports in a paragraph on the right-hand side of the one hun- 
 dred and twentieth page ; studying history as the interpretation 
 of the present life on the island of Manhattan, for example, not 
 as an unending succession of battles and maneuvers, dates and 
 great men ; and English as the art of communication of ideas 
 and thoughts upon which our very existence is dependent, not 
 as a perplexing text-book of adverbs and adjectives, or as the 
 works of great men which we are told we ought to admire — and 
 do not. In such a school he would work in wood and metal, at 
 the forge and in the printing shop, neither in order to become 
 " all-round" nor to learn a trade, but in order to get a prelim- 
 inary knowledge of the fundamental facts of the industrial and 
 
 (586) 
 
No. 4] 
 
 VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 
 
 113 
 
 social activities whose later, more complex expressions lie all 
 about him, and from which, when he leaves school, he has to 
 pick and choose his own work. In other words, such a boy 
 would receive real education because he would learn to think, 
 learn to put two and two together. Perhaps in that case he and 
 the generation that follows will not get into such a tangle as the 
 one we are in; will, in truth, have learned so that it is second 
 nature to them, that no one thinks until he has to, but that a 
 nation advances as its imagination becomes sufficiently sensitive, 
 its powers of intellectual analysis sufficiently keen and its capacity 
 for reaction sufficiently vital to foretell when things are about to 
 go wrong, and act upon that foresight. 
 
 (587) 
 
LABOR OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN TENEMENTS' 
 
 T 
 
 MRS. FLORENCE KELLEY 
 General Secretary National Consumers' League 
 
 WO tasks of great difficulty confront those who are trying 
 to prevent the labor of women and children in tenement 
 houses. They are difficult because they are fundamental. 
 
 The first is to induce the court of appeals of the state of New 
 York to reverse itself, to reverse the opinion which has fast- 
 ened the curse and blight of tenement-house work upon this 
 city since the year 1888. In that year the court decided that 
 the attempt to prohibit tenement-house work in the interest of 
 the health of the people who do the work cannot be sustained 
 as a legitimate use of the police power. 
 
 When that decision was handed down people did not under- 
 stand, as they do now, the communicability of disease, the 
 relation of excessive fatigue of the workers to disease, or the 
 relation of home work to excessive fatigue of women and chil- 
 dren. We have now a body of new knowledge available for 
 the use of the court of appeals. Our first task is to give wide 
 publicity to the disease-breeding conditions of manufacture in 
 the tenements, thus leading the legislature to make a fresh 
 attempt at outright prohibition, at the same time making it 
 possible for the court of appeals gracefully to reverse itself. 
 Until that is done, all attempts at regulation of manufacture in 
 tenements are illusory; they simply lull the public conscience 
 vainly and cruelly, when it ought to be alert and militant. 
 
 The second task is to imitate Massachusetts in creating a state 
 commission to examine into the wages paid women and children 
 who work in the tenements, with a view to securing minimum 
 wage boards in all those industries that overflow into tenement 
 houses. 
 
 We have at present forty industries for which licenses are 
 required before work can be done in a tenement house ; but we 
 
 * Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 18, 191 2. 
 
 (588) 
 
WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN TENEMENTS 
 
 115 
 
 know of sixty-two additional industries carried on in the tene- 
 ments for which no license is required. There are over thirteen 
 thousand houses licensed as work shops, and in order really to 
 control them we ought to have twenty-six thousand inspectors, 
 an inspector in each house all day and all night. Without 
 this, all inspection of tenement-house work is illusory. 
 
 The Massachusetts method is to make it so expensive as to 
 be unprofitable to employ workers in the tenements. The 
 commission has made its report, the bill has been favorably re- 
 ported out of committee and is now before the legislature. The 
 members of the commission are hopeful that it may pass. 
 When our legislature meets next year we shall have an object 
 lesson, here at home, such as has existed in England for two 
 years, and for seventeen years in Australia, of this method of 
 dealing with home work by requiring that home workers shall 
 receive compensation not only for the work they do, but for the 
 relief they afford the manufacturer in the rent, heat, light, 
 cleaning, supervision and transportation of materials and finished 
 products. Where that has been done the joy of the manu- 
 facturer in the overflow work has been dampened, and he has 
 been encouraged to supply sufficient room for carrying on the 
 work under his own responsible supervision, without the inter- 
 vention of the great mass of sweaters who batten upon our 
 tenement industry. 
 
 In the opinion of the organization which I represent, these 
 are the two difficult and essential next steps to be taken — the 
 reversal of the decision of the court of appeals, and the estab- 
 lishment of a Minimum Wage Boards Commission in this state. 
 
 (589) 
 
TWO NATIONAL SOCIAL NEEDS ' 
 
 WASHINGTON GLADDEN 
 Columbus, Ohio 
 
 AMONG our national social needs is the need of a better 
 understanding among the sections of the nation. Our 
 land has grown so wide and sections are so far apart 
 that they are likely to develop separate interests and jealousies 
 and conflicts. Some of us are old enough to remember the 
 growth of sectional feeling between North and South, and 
 what came of it. There are those who say that that conflict 
 was necessary and inevitable. I do not believe it. It might 
 have been averted by a moderate degree of reasonableness and 
 goodwill on both sides. The nation could have paid for the 
 slaves at a tithe of the cost of the Civil War in money, to say 
 nothing of the waste of the best manhood of the land and the 
 engendering of race antagonisms which still threaten our peace. 
 If we had only been willing to reason together, and to bear one 
 another's burdens, we could have saved ourselves mountains of 
 misery. 
 
 Between East and West there are now possibilities of 
 similar sectional conflicts. The East is the lender, and the 
 West is the borrower. "The borrower is the servant of the 
 lender," as the wise man says, and that servitude is sometimes 
 unwelcome. Yet it ought to be a relation of friendship and co- 
 operation. So it may be if we will take thought for the things 
 that make for friendship and peace. Yet one who lives midway 
 between the East and the West is sometimes pained to see how 
 each misinterprets the other, and is often constrained to wish 
 for a better understanding between them. I cannot help re- 
 garding this as one of our vital national social needs. 
 
 The other national need of which I would speak is a clearly 
 defined national social purpose. I doubt if the ideal with which 
 
 ^Discussion at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 
 (590) 
 
TWO NATIONAL SOCIAL NEEDS 
 
 117 
 
 our fathers set out is adequate to-day to command and organize 
 and unify our national social life. It is true that their watch- 
 word was democracy, but democracy as they conceived it was 
 simply the child of liberty. Make way for liberty, and de- 
 mocracy was sure to follow. A free field for endeavor the state 
 must furnish. Within that field men must be let alone to work 
 out their fortunes. I do not mean that this was the whole of 
 the political philosophy of the fathers, but they put the em- 
 phasis on this, and their faith was strong that liberty was the 
 sovereign solution of all social problems. We have come to 
 the point where we can see that this idea must be greatly ex- 
 panded, and perhaps subordinated to a higher idea. It is 
 beginning to be evident that our nation has a larger and worthier 
 task than merely to set the people free. It must show them 
 how to work together for the common good. The ideal state 
 is not one that is content to form a ring, to furnish ropes and 
 an umpire, to formulate rules of the game, and then invite its 
 citizens to go in for a free fight. It is one which assumes 
 rather that the normal relations of men are those of cooperation 
 instead of conflict, and that the business of the state is not to 
 furnish a ring for a struggle, but to assist and foster and direct 
 all useful and practicable cooperations. This is not saying that 
 all industries shall be managed collectively, for I doubt if that 
 is possible. Many of them can best be left to individual initia- 
 tive, but many of the most important of them are managed now 
 by the cooperation of all of us through the commonwealth, and 
 that number will surely be considerably increased. I am think- 
 ing not so much of the economic as of the social aspects of this 
 problem. Rather, I mean that the social aspects must take 
 precedence in our national thinking. The human fact is first, 
 the economic fact second. We are brothers before we are 
 competitors. On the deck of the Titanic we get down to primal 
 relations. Competition is barred. We are helpers one of 
 another. That is what makes civilization possible, and it is this 
 great truth which must be recognized and made fundamental in 
 national life. All our commonwealths must be based on right 
 human relations. Not strife, but good will, is the regulative 
 principle of human society. 
 
 (591) 
 
RECREATION AND YOUTH ^ 
 
 DR. LUTHER H. GULICK 
 
 RECREATION I shall discuss from two standpoints. 
 First, from the standpoint of social engineering, I 
 propose to consider a definite plan of a constructive 
 character which has been put into operation. This plan has 
 endeavored to correlate the various human incentives to activity 
 with the known methods of social progress, in order to discover 
 whether a social organization could be made so large that it 
 would reach a great portion of all the girls of America, so 
 simple that average people could run it, and so beautiful that 
 the girls would want to enter it, not because it was good but 
 because it was beautiful and romantic. So far as I know, noth- 
 ing of this precise kind has ever before been attempted, and as 
 a pure experiment in the field of social engineering it is perhaps 
 worthy of consideration. 
 
 The second standpoint is that of the philosophy of construc- 
 tion as contrasted with the philosophy of prevention. No living 
 mountain stream can be dammed with safety, no matter what 
 devastation the spring freshets may bring. The evil will only 
 be accentuated by damming, and the disaster made greater. 
 The only thing worth while that can be done is to provide a 
 better bed for the stream. 
 
 Human instincts and desires are the great flowing streams of 
 human life. It is not to be considered that human instincts 
 and desires should be dammed, lest they go astray and do 
 damage. Damming them only produces added devastation. 
 
 The Chicago vice report was a strong and able piece of 
 work, but to my mind utterly hopeless. To spend serious time 
 and effort in this day and generation surveying the amount of 
 damage which comes because a great stream has broken its dam 
 and is devastating the country below it, to measure the amount 
 
 * Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 
 (592) 
 
RECREATION AND YOUTH 
 
 119 
 
 of the devastation and resolve merely to build bigger and better 
 dams against the evil is fatuous. The tremendous task society 
 must perform is to find out what constitute wholesome relations 
 between men and women under the new conditions of our cities. 
 Boys and girls no longer have the wholesome things to do in 
 the community which during all ages they have had to do ; that 
 is, we have put up the dams. We all know well enough that 
 broken dams make endless waste. Our effort and our skill must 
 be devoted to finding means whereby the splendid instinctive 
 feelings of life may have splendid course. It is not merely 
 that the river must be prevented from doing harm, but the 
 water of life itself must not be wasted, because our desires, our 
 hopes, our ambitions, the things we love, constitute life itself. 
 It is not eating nor working nor sleeping that makes life signifi- 
 cant ; it is the things that we desire, the things that we hope for, 
 the adventure of life itself. 
 
 Because of the machine, and the necessary routine ways of 
 working due to the machine, life for a great many people has 
 become full of drudgery, and against steady drudgery human 
 life revolts. At a recent meeting in Cooper Union a young 
 man in the audience told how he went to bed every night, slept, 
 got up every morning and went to work, back home again at 
 night and to bed, and that was all of life there was for him. 
 That represents the possible attainment of life for a large frac- 
 tion of our population, but that is not living. Adventure is the 
 fundamental thing of the soul. Without brilliant color in liv- 
 ing, without possible human attainment, aside from drudgery, 
 life appears insignificant. 
 
 The movement of which I speak, the Campfire Girls, is an 
 attempt to show that romance and adventure belong to every 
 day. The old days of physical adventure have gone for most 
 of us. Present-day adventure must be in the social field, the 
 most available unexplored world. If we can provide ways in 
 which adventure can count in connection with everyday work, 
 we may help direct the flow of the powerful streams of human 
 instinct, those tremendous streams which lead boys and girls in 
 their teens to want to know each other. Merely to try to pre- 
 vent the bad dance-hall and to dam up the other channels of 
 
 (593) 
 
120 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 this kind without giving attention to the providing of a new 
 and better bed for the stream is inadequate. This movement 
 is an attempt to find adventure related to daily life in the 
 everyday world. 
 
 When a girl appears before her Campfire and reports that 
 she has learned to make ten standard soups ; or that she is able 
 to recognize fifteen kinds of birds by their songs ; or that she can 
 describe three kinds of baby cries and tell the cause of each ; — 
 things which are equally matters of scientific observation — or 
 that she has walked forty miles in ten days, walking to and from 
 the office or in the woods ; or that she has slept for two months 
 with windows open ; or that she has kept a daily classified ac- 
 count for one month; or that she has organized the girls of 
 her street to beautify their yards, and that she has received 
 for each of these an award of honor, something which can be 
 added to her attire, the spirit of romance has been suggested 
 to her. Perhaps to receive this honor she wears her ceremonial 
 costume, a straight dress of galatea with fringe on the borders, 
 ^hich she has made herself at a total cost of sixty cents. Pos- 
 sibly her camp name is the Raven and she wears a head dress 
 suggestive of the name she bears as she stands very straight to 
 receive the beads which are the symbol of award — the red beads 
 which indicate attainment in health, or the blue beads, forming 
 a necklace, which indicate attainment in out-of-door craft, or 
 those beads which indicate proficiency in domestic things, tak- 
 ing care of the baby for a month, planning the family expendi- 
 ture for food at $2 a week for each person, and seeing that it 
 is carried out, doing the family marketing for one month — as she 
 stands before the Campfire and receives these tokens, the 
 things which are everyday drudgery are thereby indicated as 
 romantic and adventuresome. 
 
 When a girl is learning to distinguish three kinds of baby 
 cries or to make ten standard soups, it is not a part of an un- 
 measured, long-continued daily grind ; putting the girl's work 
 into definite attainable parts makes possible for the first time 
 the measurement of woman's work. The most profound dif- 
 ference at present between the work of men and women, in the 
 production of mechanical things, is that man's work is measured 
 
 (594) 
 
I 
 
 No. 4] RECREA TION AND YOUTH 1 2 1 
 
 by dollars or pounds or inches, and women's work is unmeas- 
 ured. No scientific adjustment is possible save upon a basis of 
 measurement, and woman's work has never been measured ; it 
 is simply repetition, one thing after another, without begin- 
 ning, without end. Women and girls no longer have their 
 status in a community because of doing woman's work or fem- 
 inine things. They are known by other things not necessarily 
 feminine, which are merely human. Women have never ac- 
 quired status according to the new standards of measurement, 
 and the old standards are going. The consequence is that 
 woman's work has become simply an endless round of drudgery. 
 The Campfire movement is an attempt at regularity in handling 
 all the things of daily life which are worth while, except those 
 of the school, which already has an accepted status, and to cut 
 them up into parcels that are attainable, thus serving as a basis 
 for romantic achievement. 
 
 It seems at first as if this were merely a device to throw a 
 bit of glamor over things which are in themselves dull and 
 gray and leaden. But it is much more than this. It is not a 
 disguise, but a transformation. Sleeping with one's window 
 open because it is one's duty is an entirely different thing from 
 doing it because it is one step in an adventure. Learning to care 
 for the table and to cook because it is a thing every girl should 
 know is one thing; learning to make ten standard soups, or 
 two ways of making bread, or four ways of making cake, or 
 four ways of cooking left-over meat, because they are part of a 
 definite social status, is quite another thing. 
 
 Aside from making the daily life show the adventure side 
 there is another reason for this sort of thing. During these 
 two generations woman's world is being readjusted. Instead of 
 being merely in the home, woman's work has gone out into the 
 community, but it remains still woman's work. Education, the 
 work of marketing, the care of the laundry have all practically 
 gone out. Marketing is done in stores, bread is cooked in the 
 bakery, not at home, our laundry is cared for in laundries; but 
 all this nevertheless remains woman's work. If the work is 
 badly done the reason is that she has let go her age-long task, 
 she has not yet followed it out of the home as she should. If 
 
 (595) 
 
122 
 
 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 woman is to have the same kind of relation to the world's work 
 in the future that she has had in the past, she must reach out 
 in the community and take hold again of those things which 
 have always been fundamentally feminine. That is the new 
 patriotism. The movement of women toward the stores, fac- 
 tories and workshops is but the first step toward the readjust- 
 ment of women to the work of the world. 
 
 (596) 
 
REGULATION OF PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS^ 
 
 MRS. BELLE LINDNER ISRAELS 
 Chairman, Committee on Amusement Resources of Working Girls 
 
 IT is only three and a half years since the first suggestion was 
 made that public amusements might be regulated by 
 statute ; and we were told then by thinkers and students 
 that we were planning an almost impossible thing. Yet to-day 
 we are discussing the regulation of public amusements as a 
 national social question. 
 
 In the city of Cleveland, Ohio, on any Saturday night, there 
 are ten thousand boys and girls in public dance-halls, and we 
 do not know how many additional thousands in motion-picture 
 shows and theaters or attending private parties. In the city of 
 Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania, where they have a population of 
 about 65,000, between five and six thousand people nightly are 
 visiting amusement places of all kinds, dance-halls, motion- 
 picture shows, vaudeville theaters and the like. In New York 
 city in any one week about one hundred thousand boys and 
 girls may learn to dance in dancing academies alone. In view 
 of such facts is it not worth while to consider whether the com- 
 munity ought to regulate public amusements? 
 
 Have we no responsibility toward the thousands of young 
 people who, night after night, throughout the whole country, 
 make use of public amusement facilities ? The story is the same 
 in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Denver, San Fran- 
 cisco. Everywhere we find the same standards, the same re- 
 sources, affording the same resulting dangers, the same class of 
 people making use of these places, and, alas, the same ignorance 
 with regard to the effect on the lives of young people. 
 
 There are only two methods by which we may deal with the 
 problem of public amusements. One is regulation by statute, 
 and the other is regulation by public opinion. Regulation by 
 statute works, if the statute is adequate and receives sincere 
 enforcement. New York is the pioneer in regulation by statute. 
 
 * Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 191 2. 
 
 (597) 
 
124 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 Fifteen cities throughout the country have followed New York's 
 example and either have enacted regulations governing public 
 amusements or are considering it, and in six other cities the 
 question of regulation is being studied and has not yet reached 
 the stage of submission to the public. An efficient regulation 
 of public amusements must take account of two things: the 
 amusements themselves and the conditions under which the 
 amusements are offered. No regulation is effectual that simply 
 considers the amusement by itself. Statutory regulation of the 
 dance hall to-day deals primarily with the conditions under 
 which dancing is offered. It licenses premises in which dancing 
 goes on, and in only two cities, thus far, has it gone farther than 
 that and dealt with the amusement itself or with the individuals 
 offering that amusement. In the cities where the dance-hall 
 regulation has gone so far as to require that every public dance 
 offered shall have a license, the regulation has been most effec- 
 tive ; it therefore seems reasonably clear that that is the only 
 way in which we can effectively regulate public dancing. First, 
 we must place conditions upon the conduct of the premises 
 themselves, and then upon the kind of amusements taking place 
 on those premises. 
 
 This applies with equal force to the motion-picture theater, 
 the vaudeville theater, and the burlesque show. For a few 
 years, until we educate public opinion, we may need a moral 
 and educational censorship. This ought to be cooperative as 
 between managers of amusement enterprises and the public. 
 This would prevent such obscenities as are to-day being uttered 
 upon the boards of some of the burlesque theaters in New York 
 from coming before the enormous audiences of boys and young 
 men who frequent them. 
 
 Public opinion regulates all forms of amusements, not only 
 those requiring an admission fee, but the public parks and the 
 free amusements offered by the city. Public opinion says how 
 many lights there shall be in a park at night ; how many lights 
 there shall be on a recreation pier ; what kind of people shall 
 supervise these places; what sort of amusements they shall 
 offer, in addition to being breathing spots or ornamental show 
 places. Public opinion may also regulate private enterprise, 
 but public opinion has to be educated to appreciate the need 
 
 (598) 
 
No. 4] REGULA TION OF PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS 1 2 5 
 
 for regulating private enterprise. Private amusement enterprises 
 to-day are the open door for the social evil. It is in these 
 places of amusement where girls go unguarded and unsupervised 
 that they are sought for by men and women who mean no good 
 to them. We have the right to demand that these places shall 
 be socially supervised since they cannot be personally super- 
 vised. By social supervision I mean the supervision that is 
 given by the community as a whole through inspection. Until 
 we have sufficient publicity regarding the conditions of public 
 amusement enterprises, we shall not have efficient public cen- 
 sorship of the kind that really forms and guides public opinion 
 into action. The needs of the poor are something broader and 
 more human than merely shelter, clothing and sufficient food. 
 The little child, the boy and girl and the father and mother 
 need a relief from the tasks of the daily round of life just as 
 keenly as they need food and clothing and shelter. We bring 
 art into our lives because of its cultural and softening influence 
 upon ourselves and our children. We need to bring it whole- 
 somely and carefully and sanely into the lives of all our people ; 
 we need to see that they get the right kind of recreation, because 
 recreation is an art, too. The wrong kind of recreation has dis- 
 astrous results ; the right kind, even if it be so humble a thing 
 as a five-cent moving-picture show, may bring about an uplift 
 that is equal to almost any form of art. The film that shows 
 Indian life in Bombay may open a whole new world to a woman 
 who has had neither life nor soul outside of her washtubs all day. 
 Thus we owe a public duty to each of the millions of people 
 availing themselves of the commercial forms of recreation. 
 We must see to it that the places where they are offered amuse- 
 ment are safe and wholesome and decent, and that the wrong 
 kind of people are kept out. It can be done by statute. It 
 can be required that every night in the week there shall be 
 someone whose duty it is to see that every place in the city is 
 properly conducted. An inspector of dance halls can be re- 
 quired, as in Cleveland, to know not only every dance hall in his 
 city, but the committee of every club which applies for the use 
 of any of those dance halls. He should determine whether 
 the group which represents ** The Jolly Tumblers " or *' The 
 Four Leaved Clover " is a proper group to be allowed to con- 
 
 (599) 
 
126 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 duct a public ball to which girls may come. Not only can 
 this be done, but it is being done. There is at least one man 
 who knows and controls absolutely, by virtue of statutory power, 
 just what goes on in every public ball-room in the city of which 
 he is the public inspector. 
 
 For a practical working program in the regulation of public 
 amusements the first requirement is knowledge. The church, 
 the school and social organizations of every kind need to know 
 at first hand what the amusement forces of their neighborhood 
 are ; need to know what they are doing, and how they affect 
 the lives of the people. On this basis they must make out a 
 constructive program. 
 
 Any constructive plan must allow not only for regulation, 
 but for substitution of the right kind of resources for the 
 wrong kind. The city must have recreation centers and 
 amusement places conducted for the people who cannot, or 
 will not, or need not pay for what they get. The city owes a 
 recreational duty to these people. But we must also keep a 
 watchful eye upon what is offered to the public commercially 
 in the guise of amusement. If we are able to show to the 
 management of all amusement places that we can control their 
 audiences so as to make it pay to offer wholesome, decent per- 
 formances, they will give such .performances. Once we can 
 show the dance hall that it need not sell liquor or entertain the 
 underworld in order to make money, we have taken a long 
 step toward making dancing as wholesome and safe as it 
 ought to be. 
 
 Fundamentally, however, we must admit to ourselves and to 
 the world that young people and old ones as well need and will 
 have recreation. Play is not a luxury, but an absolute neces- 
 sity to the working world to-day. The regulation of amuse- 
 ment is nothing more than the extension, socially, broadly, 
 generally, of the supervision that wise men and women give in 
 a private capacity to the young people with whom they associ- 
 ate from day to day. Even though we do not personally 
 associate with the boys and girls who make up the five 
 millions annually using the dance-halls in New York city, we 
 must appreciate our responsibilities toward them. We tend 
 
 rapidly to that point. 
 
 (600) 
 
COMMERCIALIZED VICE^ 
 
 GEORGE J. KNEELAND ^ 
 Director Department of Investigation, American Vigilance Association 
 
 TO my mind the most significant fact brought to light by 
 the report of the Chicago Vice Commission is this, that 
 public prostitution is a commercialized business of large 
 proportions, yielding tremendous profits each year, and con- 
 trolled largely by men and not by women as is commonly 
 supposed. 
 
 The yearly profit from this business in Chicago is estimated 
 to be over $15,000,000. This statement is based upon daily 
 account books kept by keepers of houses of ill-fame, some of 
 them used as exhibits in court cases, and in addition those 
 seized in raids upon such houses by the authorities. It is also 
 based upon the testimony of madams and inmates of houses, 
 on the known profits from the rental of property and from the 
 sale of liquor in houses and saloons where women are permitted 
 to solicit and sell drinks on a twenty or forty per cent 
 commission. 
 
 That this estimate of yearly profits is ultra-conservative is 
 seen from the fact that it is based upon the exploitation of only 
 3194 professional prostitutes, who were actually known to the 
 police or were discovered by the investigators for the Vice 
 Commission. 
 
 The recent report of an investigation of the police depart- 
 ment in Chicago by the civil service commission declared that 
 the number of professional prostitutes in that city was nearer 
 20,000 than 5,000 and that 15,000 is a conservative estimate. 
 
 The second significant fact brought out by the Chicago re- 
 port is that this enormous profit goes not only to degenerate 
 and vicious men who make a profession of the exploitation of 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 ' Formerly Director of Investigation, Vice Commission of Chicago. 
 
 (601) 
 
128 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 women, but is shared also by ostensibly respectable men and 
 women in the community who rent or lease their property for 
 this business. What is true in Chicago is true in every other 
 large American city where the social vice is tolerated or at least 
 winked at by the public and the authorities. 
 
 These facts explain many of the difficulties met with in 
 securing adequate enforcement of state laws and city ordinances 
 in certain municipalities. They explain why efforts to secure 
 the revocation of licenses of disorderly saloons and disreputable 
 hotels are so meager of results. They are at the basis of the 
 demoralization of police discipline. They furnish some of the 
 sinews of war whereby corrupt politicians are elevated to power. 
 With these facts in mind, why do we wonder at the extent of 
 the white-slave traffic, and the difficulty of securing proper pun- 
 ishment, or any punishment at all, for many of those who buy 
 and sell our women and girls? 
 
 This profit is the reason for the army of " cadets," politi- 
 cal guerrillas, exploiters and scoundrels who live on the earnings 
 of these unfortunate women who are led to think the life easy. 
 
 It also accounts for the other commercial interests that sup- 
 port and live upon this evil — the druggists, the fake doctors, the 
 costumers and all those who cater to the trade of the prostitute. 
 She is peculiarly susceptible to all forms of graft ; for every- 
 thing she buys she pays more than a double price in actual 
 dollars. 
 
 Whenever an attempt is made to study the social evil and to 
 offer recommendations for its repression we hear the conten- 
 tion from the morally inert that nothing can be done ; that this 
 evil ** always has existed and always will." We may grant for 
 the moment that a certain proportion of unfortunate women 
 always have drifted and perhaps always will drift into profes- 
 sionally immoral lives through inherited vicious tendencies. 
 But let us have faith enough in womanhood to believe that this 
 percentage is small, and that the great majority — and some hold 
 eighty per cent of the total— take up the life through ignorance, 
 are forced into it against their will or are driven into it by the 
 deception, lust and greed of men. We believe that certain of 
 these conditions can be corrected, and many women and girls 
 of the future saved to society. 
 
 (602) 
 
No. 4] COMMERCIALIZED VICE 1 29 
 
 Realizing these facts The American Vigilance Association/ 
 recently organized, has conceived a program of work which 
 strikes at the root of the problem. The plan of operation is 
 centralized in eight departments, namely : 
 
 Organization and Promotion 
 
 Legislation and Law Enforcement 
 
 International Co-Operation 
 
 Investigation 
 
 Library and Editorial 
 
 Literature 
 
 Education 
 
 Rescue and Protection 
 
 As an illustration, through the department of organization 
 and promotion the association desires to interest a large num- 
 ber of citizens and organizations, and to correlate so far as 
 possible the work of philanthropists, educators and reformers. 
 
 In time it is planned to have city, state and foreign powers 
 so effectually aroused and cooperating to such an extent that 
 the men exploiters of women and the white slavers will be 
 completely exterminated. 
 
 When a town or city desires to join in the campaign against 
 commercialized vice, the association will be prepared to assist 
 it. As a practical program it will recommend, first, a careful 
 survey and study of vice conditions in the city ; next, upon the 
 basis of a convincing and reliable report, a campaign to arouse 
 the public conscience to its moral and civic duty ; third, the 
 securing of convictions, with the aid of public opinion and by 
 help of lawyers skilled in conducting this particular class of 
 prosecutions ; and lastly, so far as is practicable, an educational 
 campaign for the betterment of public and private morals. 
 
 ' New York address, 156 Fifth avenue. Chicago, 105 West Monroe street. 
 
 (603) 
 
THE PROBLEM OF WAYWARD GIRLS AND 
 DELINQUENT WOMEN 
 
 MAUDE E. MINER 
 
 Secretary of the New York Probation Association 
 
 WE are only beginning to study the problem of the way- 
 ward girl and to discover something about the causes 
 of her waywardness and the best method of treating 
 her after she has become delinquent. If we can fully under- 
 stand the girls and women who are now passing through the 
 courts and prisons and deal effectively with them, a larger 
 number can ultimately be returned to society as useful members 
 and in the future many can be prevented from reaching the 
 courts. We have long been accustomed to consider the sen- 
 tence imposed upon the woman offender by the court as a pun- 
 ishment, having as its object the deterring of women from similar 
 acts in the future and the protecting of society by incarcerating 
 the criminal. More recently a new light has been dawning on 
 the horizon and we have been seeing that the women are not 
 really criminal and that the interests of society can be better 
 served by helping rather than by punishing them. What 
 methods can be employed to help in the wisest and best way 
 those who have reached the courts and by what means we can 
 prevent more young girls from joining the ranks of the wayward 
 and becoming delinquent, are the most important questions in 
 connection with the problem of the delinquent girl. 
 
 The offenses for which girls and women are brought to the 
 courts include soliciting on the streets for prostitution, intoxica- 
 tion, vagrancy, incorrigibility, larceny, and the more serious 
 crimes of robbery, forgery and the like. Only a small per- 
 centage of the convicted women are found guilty of the serious 
 offenses and we find that there is no criminal class of women, as 
 such, living by their acts of crime. Of the 11,273 cases in 
 which women were convicted or held for trial in a higher court 
 in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx during the year 
 
 (604) 
 
WAYWARD GIRLS AND DELINQUENT WOMEN 131 
 
 191 1, only 256 cases involved a crime of the grade of felony. 
 The largest groups were composed of those convicted of of- 
 fenses relating to prostitution and intoxication. By far the 
 greatest number of women had been leading a professionally 
 immoral life. 
 
 The failure of the present method of dealing with the women 
 in the courts is shown by the fact that so many return to the 
 court again and again for the same offense and that in such a 
 small percentage of cases is anything helpful done. Of the 
 1 1,273 cases during 191 1, there were 4,869 commitments to the 
 workhouse on Blackwell's Island and 3,820 fines imposed. In the 
 two magistrates' courts in the borough of Manhattan where the 
 largest number are brought for prostitution — the women's night 
 court and the Jefferson Market day court — there were, during 
 191 1 > 5>3^5 arraignments of women charged with soliciting oh 
 the streets and carrying on prostitution in tenement houses, and 
 4,739 convictions in these cases. This number represented 
 2,612 different women, as the finger-print record showed that 
 there were 2,127 repeaters who have been convicted from two 
 to eight times. Of the women convicted of prostitution, there 
 were 3,329 commitments to the workhouse and 882 fines im- 
 posed. In less than ten per cent of the cases were women 
 released on probation or committed to reformatory institutions. 
 
 The workhouse sentence is not helpful in any way and there 
 is no reformative influence in the institution. Between 500 and 
 600 women are herded in 1 3 1 cells and two hospital wards, and 
 frequently there are four or five or even a larger number of 
 women in one cell. Segregation of the different classes of 
 offenders is impossible, and women arrested for intoxication, 
 disorderly conduct, larceny and prostitution mingle freely 
 together. At times young girls seventeen and eighteen years 
 of age are placed in the same cell with hardened women. 
 Nothing is done to help the women when they leave the work- 
 house and the only way open to them is to return to their 
 former mode of living. The short sentences of five or ten days, 
 of which there are so many, are utterly futile and do not deter 
 the women from continuing their life of prostitution and openly 
 soliciting on the streets. 
 
 (605) 
 
132 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 The imposing of a fine of from $i to $io serves neither to 
 deter nor to help a woman. If she has not the money with 
 which to pay the fine, she can usually secure it from one of her 
 friends and can readily pay it back as soon as she returns to 
 her life of prostitution. The number of fines imposed upon 
 women for soliciting on the streets has greatly diminished dur- 
 ing the last year, yet many were imposed during 191 1 for this 
 offense. We convict men and send them to prison for living 
 on the earnings of prostitution and yet without protest we allow 
 these fines — the proceeds of prostitution — to enter into the 
 sinking fund of our city. The fining system is practically a 
 license system and should be abolished. 
 
 The present method of dealing with the women, as we see, is 
 inadequate and ineffective. It involves immense cost to the 
 city in maintaining courts, station houses, district prisons and 
 workhouse. It accomplishes little in helping these women or 
 in deterring them or others from further violation of the law. 
 Except in a small percentage of cases of women released on 
 probation and committed to reformatory institutions, the good 
 of the individual is not consulted and the sentences are not im- 
 posed with the idea that the defendant will be improved in any 
 way. 
 
 How can we more effectively help the woman offender who 
 comes into the courts? By thoroughly understanding the needs 
 of the individual and applying a method of treatment suited to 
 those individual needs. 
 
 The judge sitting in the court of justice with the evidence 
 before him can quickly decide upon the guilt or innocence of 
 the accused, but he cannot quickly judge as to the wisest and 
 best method of dealing with the offender. That must be based 
 upon a thorough knowledge and investigation of the past his- 
 tory and character of the woman and upon adequate mental 
 and physical examinations. 
 
 To make possible an adequate study of the individual girl 
 and woman and to determine the treatment suited to the needs 
 of the individual, the work of the judge should cease after the 
 defendant has been convicted and a commission composed of 
 specialists should have charge of investigations and examina- 
 
 (606) 
 
No.4l WAYWARD GIRLS AND DELINQUENT WOMEN 133 
 
 tions necessary to decide what disposition should be made in 
 the cases, and should have power to make such final dispositions. 
 A summary of this proposed plan is as follows : 
 
 I. Appointment of a commission of specialists to receive 
 under commitment women convicted by the courts. 
 
 II. Thorough investigation and examination of convicted 
 women under the direction of the commission. This includes : 
 
 (i) The taking of a complete history and record. 
 
 (2) Investigation of past history, home environment and 
 previous work. 
 
 (3) Mental examination to determine whether women 
 are feeble-minded, insane or constitutionally inferior, and a study 
 of character defects. 
 
 (4) Physical examination to determine whether women 
 are suffering from venereal disease, tuberculosis or other in- 
 fectious disease and are in need of medical care. 
 
 III. Commitment of convicted women to suitable reformatory 
 and custodial institutions and a restricted use of the probation 
 system : 
 
 (i) Release on probation of those who can reasonably 
 be expected to reform in view of their mental, physical and 
 moral condition, without commitment to an institution. 
 
 (2) Commitment to custodial institutions of those need- 
 ing permanent care because of mental condition. 
 
 ( 3 ) Commitment to the New York State Reformatory for 
 Women at Bedford and the New York State Farm for Women 
 of those eligible to these institutions. 
 
 (4) Commitment of those needing institutional care, not 
 eligible to other institutions, to an industrial farm colony under 
 the control of the commission, to be established in place of the 
 present workhouse on BlackwelFs Island. 
 
 The commission, itself an unpaid body appointed by the 
 mayor of the city, would appoint the skilled investigators, physi- 
 cian, neurologist and psychologist required for the work of in- 
 vestigating the cases of the convicted women and making the 
 necessary examinations. The decisions reached as to the best 
 disposition of each case would be- the result of the combined 
 reports of these experts. 
 
 (607) 
 
134 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 In making investigations of the cases all statements which 
 help to an understanding of the individual should be verified. 
 As far as possible the causes responsible for bringing her into 
 trouble should be determined. If the girl's home is in a city- 
 other then New York, investigations should be made by proba- 
 tion officers or some other duly authorized persons there. 
 When she has been in an orphan asylum, reformatory or other 
 institution, or has been previously arrested, these facts should 
 be learned and the reports secured. 
 
 In the large number of cases of women who have been so- 
 liciting on the streets, special effort should be made to determine 
 whether or not they have been associated with men who have 
 been living on the earnings of prostitution, or who have pro- 
 cured them for a life of prostitution, and corroborative evidence 
 should be secured for the arrest and conviction of such persons. 
 This would be the most effective means of breaking up the 
 " cadet" system, which is so closely connected with the problem 
 of women in prostitution. 
 
 The mental examinations will make it possible to determine 
 those who are mentally deficient and who are in need of perma- 
 nent care. This class constitutes a considerable percentage of 
 the women convicted of prostitution, although it is unknown 
 how great the percentage is. As the result of careful observa- 
 tion, it is estimated that approximately one-third of the immoral 
 girls who have been received into Waverley House are subnor- 
 mal mentally. It is only humane to care permanently for these 
 mentally deficient and feeble-minded women in custodial institu- 
 tions for their own sake and in order to prevent increase in 
 number of this class. 
 
 Provision must be made for the different classes of women in 
 suitable institutions where they will receive the kind of treat- 
 ment which they need. To take the place of the present work- 
 house, there is needed a new institution, where extended obser- 
 vation of women can be made, if necessary, before they are 
 transferred to other institutions, and where there can be adequate 
 provision for trade instruction and medical care. The habitual 
 offenders — women convicted five times within a period of two 
 years — can be sent to the New York State Farm for Women 
 
 (608) 
 
No. 4] WAYWARD GIRLS AND DELINQUENT WOMEN 135 
 
 as soon as that institution is completed. Many of the older 
 women now committed to the workhouse for intoxication would 
 be sent to the state farm under the provision of the present law. 
 Bedford Reformatory will continue to receive some of the women 
 under thirty years of age who have been convicted of prostitu- 
 tion as well as those guilty of the more serious offenses. 
 
 Probation remains for the chosen few whose minds are not 
 too poisoned by the life they have been leading and for whom 
 there seems to be a real chance of reform without commitment 
 to an institution. Many of these will be first offenders and 
 there will be others who have been convicted before, but have 
 never had a chance to try again. Effective probation work in- 
 cludes visiting the women in their homes, securing employment 
 for them, relating them to helpful influences, and truly befriend- 
 ing them. It is a system of discipline and correction outside of 
 an institution, dependent for its success largely upon the careful 
 selection of probationers and the efficiency and fitness of the 
 probation officers. The period of probation should be longer 
 than at the present time and should extend over a year, at least, 
 if changes in character and life are to be effected. In case of 
 violation of the terms of probation the women should be re- 
 turned to the commission for commitment. 
 
 During the time while women are being held for trial they 
 should remain in a house of detention, instead of in the dis- 
 trict prisons as at the present time. As the result of the ex- 
 periment made at Waverley House, officials of the New York 
 Probation Association urged upon the Inferior Courts Commis- 
 sion the necessity of providing a house of detention where 
 women could remain while investigations were being made to 
 determine the best disposition in their cases, and where the 
 younger girls could be separated from the older women. The 
 Inferior Courts Law passed June 25, 19 10, made mandatory the 
 establishment of a house of detention. The law provided as 
 follows : 
 
 There shall be established on or before October ist, 19 10, a place of 
 detention under the jurisdiction of the commissioner of correction, 
 convenient to the night court for women, where women may be detained 
 
 (609) 
 
136 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 both before and after being heard, and in such detention place the 
 young and less hardened shall be segregated so far as practicable from 
 the older and more hardened offenders. 
 
 Provision has not yet been made for this house of detention 
 although repeated requests have been made for an issue of cor- 
 porate stock necessary for its erection. It is planned to have a 
 new building erected in conjunction with a court for women 
 where all women arrested in the boroughs of Manhattan and the 
 Bronx will be arraigned. The court room on the ground floor 
 of the building should be small, so as to accommodate few 
 spectators. The house of detention should contain from 300 
 to 350 single rooms instead of cells, and five divisions for the 
 different classes, — three for white and two for colored women. 
 Offices for probation officers, psychologist and physician should 
 be provided in this building. 
 
 By having the women arraigned in a central court, providing 
 for them adequately in a house of detention, extending the 
 finger-print method of identification to all convicted women and 
 then dealing effectively with the convicted women according to 
 the plan described, a long step forward will be taken in solving 
 the problem of the delinquent women in our courts. 
 
 How can we prevent more girls from becoming wayward and 
 delinquent ? By pursuing constantly a policy of suppression of 
 the social evily bringing to justice the white-slave traffickers , im- 
 proving conditions at home and at worky providing proper re- 
 creational facilities for girls and giving to men and women 
 higher ideals and standards of morality. 
 
 When our girls see many women soliciting on the thorough- 
 fares of our city and meet others who are frequenting ** call 
 houses " and massage parlors and cafes, they hear that it is " easy" 
 and they are induced to enter the life. Others come in through 
 the influence of the procurers and white-slave traffickers, who 
 under promise of marriage, by** fake" marriage and even at 
 times by force and violence secure young girls for a life of pros- 
 titution. Many of the girls come from homes where there has 
 been no helpful influence and no moral or religious teaching. 
 Often they have left the home without preparation for work or 
 
 (610) 
 
No. 4] WAYWAJ^D GIRLS AND DELINQUENT WOMEN 137 
 
 for life. The pressure has been very great and temptations 
 have come to them which they have not been strong enough to 
 resist. With the grind of work and with Httle chance for re- 
 creation and play except in dangerous places, they have often 
 become discouraged or disheartened and have started on the 
 pathway which leads downward. 
 
 To improve conditions and protect our young girls and young 
 boys as well, we can demand that street soliciting shall be abol- 
 ished and the laws against prostitution enforced. We can help 
 to bring to justice the men who profit from the shame of women. 
 We can do much to improve the conditions under which our 
 girls live and work, can provide wholesome recreation for them, 
 can give them sex education and moral training as well, and can 
 inspire them to nobler and better things. We can protect those 
 who are mentally deficient by caring for them in custodial insti- 
 tutions long before the time when they are in danger of entering 
 prostitution. 
 
 The New York Probation Association each year helps many 
 of the girls who have erred morally, by caring for them at 
 Waverley House, securing positions for them and bringing help- 
 ful influences to bear so that it is possible for them to live 
 honest, useful lives. It aids in bringing white-slave traffickers 
 and procurers to justice, and witnesses in these cases remain at 
 Waverley House while cases are pending in the courts. The 
 association is also doing protective work for the girls who are 
 in grave moral danger, and its protective officers are at work in 
 different districts in the city. This year protective leagues have 
 been organized for the sake of securing the help of a large 
 number of girls in protecting other girls. The objects of these 
 leagues are as follows : 
 
 1. To protect other girls from moral danger. 
 
 2. To help in suppressing the white slave traffic. 
 
 3. To encourage pure thinking and clean conversation. 
 
 4. To promote moral education and knowledge of sex hygiene. 
 
 5. To secure wholesome recreation for girls. 
 
 6. To stimulate faith in the possibilities of life. 
 
 In the protective work we have had the cooperation of a 
 number of churches which have helped in maintaining our 
 
 (611) 
 
138 
 
 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 protective officers and which refer to us from time to time girls 
 who are in moral danger, cooperating with us in the cases of 
 individual girls. 
 
 There is much that all of us can do to help in solving the 
 problem of wayward and delinquent girls. In helping to secure 
 the adoption of a more rational policy for dealing with women 
 offenders in the courts throughout Greater New York ; in aiding 
 individual girls and women in connection with the probation 
 work of the courts, the reformatories and volunteer associa- 
 tions such as the New York Probation Association ; in helping 
 to suppress the social evil and demanding that existing laws be 
 enforced ; in seeking to improve conditions at home, at work, 
 and at play so as to prevent more girls from becoming way- 
 ward ; and in bringing to the great mass of men and women 
 more moral and religious training and so reaching the hearts of 
 men that they will more truly love their neighbors as themselves, 
 truly effective work can be done in the solution of this great 
 problem. 
 
 (612) 
 
THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN 
 C. C. Carstens 
 
 Secretary and General Agent of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of 
 
 Cruelty to Children 
 
 THE organized movement for the protection of children 
 started in 1874 by the organization of the New York 
 Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. This 
 was three years before the first charity organization society was 
 organized in Buffalo and eight years after the organization of 
 the first society for the prevention of cruelty to animals in New 
 York city. 
 
 The fact that the organized work in behalf of animals had 
 preceded the work in behalf of children by some years is of 
 importance when one seeks to understand the development of 
 the later movement. Prosecution work in behalf of helpless 
 animals had proved its usefulness in giving expression in a 
 tangible way to the desire to enforce humane standards in deal- 
 ing with dumb animals in distress. The helplessness of children 
 and the protection they needed from cruel and abusive treat- 
 ment led to an analogous movement in behalf of children. Its 
 value and effectiveness, wherever such an organization has been 
 intelligently and vigorously administered, few will question. 
 This analogy, while pointing the way toward the establishment 
 of an effective agency for children, also resulted in a tendency 
 to emphasize those forms of protection which were based upon 
 law enforcement and gave a strong trend in the direction of 
 having such societies become from the first adjuncts to the 
 poHce departments where offenses against children were con- 
 cerned as well as where children were the offenders. 
 
 Since the prevention of cruelty concerned itself principally 
 with the enforcement of law and the punishment of the offender, 
 at first only the grosser and more patent offenses were recog- 
 nized. The vigorous work of these societies immediately made 
 its impress upon the community and established humane stand- 
 
 (613) 
 
140 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 ards that have very much reduced the amount of cruelty in its 
 various forms throughout the world. 
 
 But the term "cruelty" like the term " charity" in our more 
 recent philanthropic development has taken on a new meaning, 
 a broadening significance. No longer interpreted only as a 
 malicious act inflicting severe pain, it is now more often inter- 
 preted to mean such conduct on the part of parent or guardian 
 as threatens the life or health of a child. As our communities 
 have become increasingly sensitive to new forms of protection, 
 workers in the prevention of cruelty have recognized as cruelty 
 the results of intemperance, vice, non-support, abandonment, 
 desertion and other crimes on the part of the adults in their 
 dealings with their own or others' children. 
 
 While it is fully recognized that a brutal beating requires in- 
 tervention on the child's behalf as before, association with 
 vicious or immoral persons not only corrupts the body but also 
 sears the child's soul. It is equally recognized that a commu- 
 nity's neglect to protect the safety and health of its children is as 
 serious as parents' neglect to protect their own children, and 
 €ven more difficult to guard against. The wider significance of 
 the term *' cruelty " can perhaps be illustrated by a few instances 
 of abuse. 
 
 A nine-year-old Jewish boy, a full orphan, came with his aunt 
 from Russia, the latter having represented him to be her son so 
 that she might have no difficulty to get him admitted. After a 
 year's stay with this family, the boy was driven out to go to 
 another relative who had, however, no more use for him. He 
 tried to make his own living by selling newspapers but without 
 much success. He slept wherever he could find shelter and 
 stole when hunger drove him to it. It was prevention of cruelty 
 that led to the boy's being given a chance to get wholesome 
 training in a good home. The immigration authorities when 
 apprised of the deceit issued a warrant for his apprehension so 
 that he might be deported, but when it was found that no one 
 of his own flesh and blood remained in Russia except a crippled 
 brother, it was prevention of cruelty when guarantees were fur- 
 nished that he should not become a public dependent if he were 
 given an opportunity to grow up in this land. 
 
 (614) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN 141 
 
 A wife and four children of a deserting husband had reached 
 the point where hunger stared them in the face, with the alterna- 
 tive of dependence on charity, from whose acceptance they 
 shrank with a feeling akin to desperation. It was prevention of 
 cruelty which led the society, after much trouble, to locate the 
 man, secure an indictment, bring about extradition from another 
 state, and arrange such terms of his parole as would save the 
 family from dependence upon others for their daily bread and 
 would give opportunities of education to the children. 
 
 A twelve-year-old girl, whose mother had disposed of her as 
 a baby in a home found by means of a newspaper advertisement, 
 and who had been sent back to this mother after twelve years, 
 was once more advertised for acceptance in a new home. With- 
 out inquiry of any sort, the little girl was given her bundle, put 
 on the train at a station in New Hampshire and sent to what the 
 child beHeved was to be a rich and beautiful home in Boston. 
 But the '' home " was a den of the worst infamy, and before the 
 child had been there a week she had suffered the most shameful 
 abuses. It was prevention of cruelty when the wretch to whom 
 she was sent by her negligent mother was apprehended and was 
 sentenced to a period in state prison and the child given into 
 the care of a children's aid society that will attempt to atone for 
 the parental negligence. But it is equally a prevention of 
 cruelty to insist that newspapers should refuse to make possible 
 through advertising in their columns such traffic in children. 
 
 A twelve-year-old boy of intemperate parents was before the 
 court on a charge of larceny. He had previously been before 
 the court on a similar charge. When inquiry brought out the 
 facts that he was a truant and quite backward in school, it 
 was prevention of cruelty which brought about the discovery 
 through a specialist's examination that he was feeble-minded 
 and later his commitment to an institution where he may be 
 protected from the temptations in community life that he seems 
 unable to resist. 
 
 The prevention of cruelty to children in its larger aspects 
 therefore concerns itself with the establishment and maintenance 
 of good community and family standards quite as much as any 
 other social agency dealing with children in their family rela- 
 
 (615) 
 
142 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 tions. It requires that those who are incapable mentally and 
 morally of controlling themselves for right action should be 
 given an opportunity to work under surveillance in farm or 
 other custodial colonies. It insists on the prompt reporting of 
 infants suffering from ophthalmia neonatorum so that important 
 steps may be taken to save them from blindness. It requires 
 that proper surgical and medical care be given to children that 
 are in danger of growing up crippled, weak and dependent when 
 the parents' stubbornness or neglect to accept the physician's 
 skill are all that stand in the way of the child's regaining full 
 health. 
 
 These are but a few of the many ways in which the word 
 ** cruelty" means more than a brutal physical punishment, and 
 those working in the prevention of cruelty to children soon find 
 themselves, if the task is conceived broadly, as part of a large 
 number of individuals and agencies working for social better- 
 ment, each attacking the large problem from his own angle. 
 
 In order that such work may not suffer therefore from over- 
 lapping of energies, or from incomplete plans and partial results, 
 the largest cooperation with other agencies is necessary. The 
 distinctive task of societies for the prevention of cruelty to 
 children is with family standards as they affect child life, but 
 this sphere is so large that it becomes an important part in any 
 large movement dealing with community standards. 
 
 The emphasis which social agencies are throwing upon pre- 
 vention has also begun to be felt by societies for the prevention 
 of cruelty to children. It is no longer thought enough to rescue 
 the child from degrading surroundings and place it in a new 
 environment where it may be happy, become well, or grow up 
 into self-respecting manhood or womanhood. It is also neces- 
 sary to study the abuses that exist in our communities and that 
 menace child life as problems in themselves ; to learn the steps 
 in the process of degeneration ; to discover the causes, and to 
 develop an orderly procedure for working out remedies. 
 
 The prevention of cruelty should mean more than a preven- 
 tion of recurrence. It should in time be such organized pro- 
 tection and such development of community standards that 
 most of the cruelty and neglect is stopped at the source. Much 
 
 (6i6) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN 143 
 
 of this preventive work must be done with groups in the com- 
 munity. While our native population neglects its children prin- 
 cipally because of crime, cruelty, drunkenness or other vice, the 
 newer immigrants, while suffering also from the effects of these 
 conditions, in many more instances neglect their children 
 because, through ignorance, they have failed to realize what the 
 best American standards are and what opportunities are at hand 
 by which their children may have better chances in this new 
 world. Both groups need the help which better adapted 
 schools, settlements and social centres will provide, and a society 
 for the prevention of cruelty to children, while perhaps not 
 directly conceiving of these enterprises as part of its task, 
 should, if it would prevent cruelty, give the fullest encourage- 
 ment to these agencies as far as they are efficiently managed. 
 
 The inter-relation of work for the prevention of cruelty to 
 children with other work in behalf of children is almost self- 
 evident. When local or state boards of health have not yet 
 equipped themselves to protect infants from blindness, it is pre- 
 vention of cruelty to help enforce laws for infants' protection, 
 or when these do not exist, to work for the necessary statutes 
 to safeguard the infants' sight. And so in a similar way, such 
 societies should work hand in hand with child labor committees, 
 with societies undertaking to reduce infant mortality, depen- 
 dence, pauperism, venereal infection and other conditions to 
 whose serious import in the lives of children we are becoming 
 increasingly sensitive. 
 
 The experience of a society for the prevention of cruelty to 
 children as an adjunct in law enforcement, its prestige with the 
 court and among those who are prone to neglect their children, 
 gives it unusual opportunities for interpreting to the court and 
 the police departments those social standards in child-helping 
 and protective work which these officials in the natural discharge 
 of their exacting duties are prone to underestimate if not 
 entirely to lose sight of. 
 
 But the proximity of these societies to the courts and to the 
 police has also brought with it grave dangers and harmful ten- 
 dencies. Some of these private societies have become mere 
 extensions of the police department. Where this is the case, 
 
 (6ir) 
 
144 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 either the protection of children has been left to the inadequate 
 working force of a private society, thus giving the community 
 less protection than if every officer charged with the enforce- 
 ment of the law were required to know and to enforce the com- 
 munity's standards in behalf of children and could call upon the 
 private society to assist him in making suitable disposition for 
 them, or where the force is sufficient, all of the private society's 
 resources are apt to be given over to the enforcement of law, 
 and the larger and more important task of the prevention of 
 neglect and the remedy of conditions that are remediable is im- 
 possible. This tendency to take part in law enforcement has 
 further had the tendency to make these societies become the 
 custodians of juvenile offenders, and in many instances their 
 prosecutors as well. 
 
 This task is so fundamental for the state itself to undertake 
 that its assumption by a private society is constantly in danger 
 of weakening the state's own responsibility for the protection of 
 the juvenile offender, and it is so extensive that the private 
 society finds itself unable to devote adequate resources to the 
 prevention of physical and moral conditions in family life in 
 which much juvenile delinquency arises and out of which a large 
 measure of adult crime develops. 
 
 A further danger arises in connection with societies for the 
 prevention of cruelty to children due to their nearness to gov- 
 ernmental agencies, /. e., their lack of appreciation of their being 
 after all private societies, responsible to their constituent mem- 
 bers and subject to suitable inspection and direction by the 
 properly constituted governmental agency so that their resources 
 may not be used foolishly and their work may not be a detri- 
 ment to the body politic. 
 
 After all, a society for the prevention of cruelty to children, 
 being a private society dependent on the generosity of the 
 public, is but an organized expression of the community's inter- 
 est in the protection of children. Because of its experience 
 with legal procedure and law enforcement, it may be in a 
 peculiarly helpful position toward other private organizations 
 and church bodies. Visitors in family homes from societies 
 and churches inevitably run across conditions that need to be 
 
 (6i8) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN 145 
 
 remedied, and the strong arm of the law must often be invoked 
 to make intervention effective. Societies for the prevention of 
 cruelty to children are ready to inquire into all instances where 
 alleged neglect exists, and to work in cooperation with other 
 agencies for the protection of the individual group of children 
 that may be suffering, and what is even more important, will 
 contribute of their experience to the community's knowledge 
 as to how conditions may be remedied and how standards of 
 family life may be permanently improved. 
 
 (619) 
 
THE INSTITUTIONAL CARE OF CHILDREN^ 
 
 HASTINGS H. HART 
 Russell Sage Foundation 
 
 IN listening to the addresses of the morning, I was impressed 
 with their bearing upon the problem of institutional chil- 
 dren, who number at the present time not less than 
 125,000 in the orphan asylums, children's homes, and juvenile 
 reformatories. These papers have suggested some of the forces 
 that bring deHnquent children into institutions. Child labor is 
 a direct cause, as has been indicated, of boys becoming delin- 
 quents. Boys who are overtaxed and deprived of proper edu- 
 cational opportunities, whose parents look at the commercial 
 advantages to be had from them, are quite liable to turn up in 
 the juvenile court. The lack of proper regulation of amuse- 
 ments is undoubtedly responsible for a large amount of juvenile 
 delinquency. Its influence is exaggerated, but it is an import- 
 ant factor. As regards the commercializing of vice, it is safe 
 to say that at least eighty per cent — and I think ninety per cent 
 — of all the young girls sent to industrial schools and institutions 
 for delinquents have had an immoral experience. Many have 
 been inmates of houses of prostitution. That is not all. The 
 commercializing of vice means that the great majority of those 
 girls, who after they have been through the institution start 
 out with habits of right living and desires for it, immediately 
 become objects of pursuit from the fact that they have been 
 so marked, and they are exploited to an extraordinary degree. 
 In connection with the future welfare of both the dependent 
 and the delinquent child in institutions, the subjects that have 
 been presented to us are vitally important. It is absolutely in- 
 dsipensable to the normal development of the child that his 
 recreation shall be right. I have visited hundreds of institutions 
 for children, and I have made special studies of recreation, and 
 
 * Discussion at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 19, 1912. 
 
 (620) 
 
THE INSTITUTIONAL CARE OF CHILDREN 147 
 
 the truth is that there is Httle careful regulation of recreation in 
 such institutions. I could cite institutions in New York and 
 Philadelphia where two or three hundred boys are turned loose 
 in a little playground where there is not room for more than 
 thirty or forty ; and the big, active fellows get the playground 
 and playthings, and the little boys stand around the edges and 
 watch wistfully. These children do not have any spontaneity 
 in life, and yet it is absolutely essential to their education. 
 
 There is not one institution for children in twenty that follows 
 the plan adopted by Mrs. Falconer in the girls' school in Phila- 
 delphia — that of having directed play. She has a college- 
 trained, well-bred young woman, who spends a large part of her 
 time in studying how to use the leisure time of these girls to the 
 best advantage. At the New York Orphanage, conducted by 
 Dr. Reeder, the whole life of the child is studied ; and people 
 come from all parts of the world to see that place, because 
 there are not half a dozen institutions of this class among all 
 those for dependent children. 
 
 It is very evident that the last word has not been said on 
 child labor in its relation to the institutional child. Institutional 
 children must have wholesome occupation, and they should 
 receive some kind of vocational training. But vocational train- 
 ing in the institution is beset with difficulties. In the first place, 
 as to boys, the most of those in our juvenile reformatories are 
 two or three years below the normal in their intellectual, and, to 
 a certain degree, in their physical development. If you under- 
 take to keep such a boy long enough to give him a trade, he 
 must remain in the institution three, five or seven years, and 
 that means that he becomes institutionalized. Further than 
 that, the process is exceedingly expensive if it is done right. 
 You cannot give all institutional boys the same training. There 
 is much nonsense talked now about making them all agricul- 
 turists. The moment you go into the mechanical trades, 
 you need expensive teachers and equipment that only a few 
 institutions can afford. 
 
 The vocational training of girls is simpler in a way, because 
 the range of occupations that ought to be taught is not so large 
 and because we recognize that every girl must learn domestic 
 
 (621) 
 
148 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 science. With a domestic science teacher, a teacher of dress- 
 making who is also a sewing teacher, and a teacher of typewrit- 
 ing and bookkeeping, a considerable number of girls can be 
 accommodated. As a matter of fact, however, and I speak 
 advisedly, from actual knowledge, three-quarters of all the so- 
 called vocational training for girls in institutions is a humbug 
 and a fraud. The reports of these institutions state that *' our 
 girls are taught domestic science, cooking, house work, laundry 
 work, sewing, dressmaking" and so on. The effort is made to 
 give that instruction along with the daily routine of the institu- 
 tion, but in nine-tenths of our institutions there is no daily 
 routine that teaches the girl the ordinary work of life. In the 
 institution the cooking and the washing are done by steam. 
 How train a girl there to do ordinary cooking and washing? 
 
 Not only that, but in three-quarters of the orphan asylums of 
 this country that admit girls you will find a little group of older 
 girls. One of these institutions states the reason in its annual 
 report : ^' We cannot send these older girls out into homes ; it is 
 not safe. The girls need the domestic training they will receive 
 in the institution and the institution needs the help of its older 
 daughters." Those girls are in the institution to help, to save 
 hiring servants ; they are doing free domestic service. A girl 
 can be given domestic training in the ordinary routine only if 
 the institution is organized with cottages that accommodate from 
 twelve to twenty at the outside, if the living is like the living in 
 an ordinary family, if the cooking is done and the meals are 
 served with the same care and dignity as in an ordinary family, 
 if the dresses for the girls are cut and made with the same neat- 
 ness and variety as in an ordinary family. I remember visiting 
 an institution for children where I learned that the girls were 
 being taught sewing. I went to see the girls' domestic work, 
 and there was a beautiful room, with sewing machines run by 
 electricity, with a machine to cut children's garments, fifteen or 
 twenty garments at a time, a machine to make buttonholes, 
 a machine to sew on buttons, a machine to do everything — and 
 that was teaching the girls sewing ! 
 
 As a result of it all, a wholesome reaction is occurring. We 
 are coming to recognize that the institution is not the right 
 
 (622) 
 
No. 4] THE INSTITUTIONAL CARE OF CHILDREN 149 
 
 place to give the child domestic training. His stay in the insti- 
 tution should be as brief as possible, and he should be quickly- 
 transplanted into the normal life of the community, there to find 
 his opportunity and take his chance with the rest of the normal 
 children. That means the development of the placing-out 
 system. We are learning to select our homes with greater care ; 
 to watch the child in order to see that he gets opportunity and 
 training, and that he is not exploited to take the place of the 
 hired servant. 
 
 (623) 
 
THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS 
 
 WILLIAM O. STILLMAN 
 President of the American Humane Association 
 
 THE first law for the prevention of cruelty to animals was 
 passed by the British Parliament in 1822. It was 
 known as Martin's Act, having been introduced and 
 passed through the efforts of Mr. Richard Martin, a member of 
 the House of Commons from Ireland. This law applied 
 particularly to domestic animals, and was incomplete from the 
 modern humane point of view. It was, nevertheless, an enor- 
 mous advance over the ideas which had previously ruled 
 throughout civilization in regard to recognition of the rights of 
 animals and their protection from cruelty. It may properly be 
 called the Magna Charta of the animal world. 
 
 This recognition of man's duty to the lower orders of creation 
 was not accepted without a bitter fight. It antagonized the 
 prevailing notions in regard to man's privilege to abuse his 
 domestic animals, and it introduced a new idea into the scheme 
 of civilization. It is true that great humanitarians in the past, 
 even as early as the days of Plutarch, made strenuous appeals 
 for kindly treatment for all harmless beasts. It remained, how- 
 ever, for an Anglo-Saxon legislative body to put into concrete 
 form these abstract propositions which had haunted the minds 
 of the merciful and philanthropic for many ages. 
 
 In 1824 the first society for the prevention of cruelty to 
 animals was organized in London. This organization is still in 
 existence and is known as the Royal Society for the Prevention 
 of Cruelty to Animals. The anti-cruelty movement was first 
 introduced into the United States through the efforts of Henry 
 Bergh, who organized the American Society for the Prevention 
 of Cruelty to Animals in New York city in 1866. Gradually 
 the movement has spread all over the world and active societies 
 for the protection of animals are to be found in almost every 
 civilized land. Efficient societies are in operation in India, 
 
 (624) 
 
PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS 
 
 151 
 
 Japan, Finland, Egypt, South Africa, South America, and 
 throughout Europe and North America. In the United States 
 alone there are 427 societies devoted wholly or in part to the 
 prevention of cruelty to animals. In addition to these there are 
 44 societies devoted exclusively to the prevention of cruelty to 
 children. Last year nearly one million six hundred thousand 
 dollars were received for the support of anti-cruelty societies in 
 this country and over twelve hundred paid employes were con- 
 nected with the work. In addition there were over six thou- 
 sand five hundred volunteer agents more or less active. Nearly 
 a million and a half animals were reported as affected by this 
 work in the United States during 191 1. 
 
 The humane movement when first started undertook only to 
 suppress cruelty to animals. Its scheme of activity was not 
 nearly so complex then as now. At the present time many of 
 the larger and wealthier societies are carrying on lines of work 
 designed to afford other relief for animals and some societies 
 are specializing, as for instance in the maintenance of animal 
 shelters, homes of rest for horses and work-horse parades. 
 Originally, humane literature was very limited in amount but 
 now humane tracts are being distributed by hundreds of thou- 
 sands, if not millions. The list of books inculcating humane 
 principles has also become a long one and the titles alone fill 
 pamphlets containing many pages. 
 
 Years ago practical humanitarians began to feel that if their 
 work was to prove permanently successful, children should be 
 interested in it. Accordingly, '' bands of mercy" were formed, 
 first in England and later in the United States. Millions of 
 children have now become members of these bands. They are 
 doing an active work in behalf of humanity by reporting cases 
 to societies managed by adults, which investigate the complaints 
 and often prosecute offenders. Books of recitations and plays 
 have been prepared for these children and they serve to increase 
 interest and enthusiasm. Banners, humane badges and not in- 
 frequently special rewards are offered to the children, with 
 excellent results. 
 
 Both in England and in the United States, some attention 
 has been given to offering a series of rewards for humane essays 
 
 (6a5) 
 
152 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 prepared by school children. In some cities in the United 
 States large numbers take part and essays are presented in com- 
 petition which show intelligent interest and considerable dis- 
 crimination. The prizes are adapted to the different grades of 
 school children so that all may be attracted to compete. In 
 London the distribution of such essay prizes to school children 
 draws many thousands of them to the yearly gathering, which 
 is usually honored by the presence of members of the royal 
 family. 
 
 In the United States much attention has been given by socie- 
 ties for the prevention of cruelty to animals to the introduction 
 of humane education in the public schools. Already fifteen 
 states have compulsory humane education laws, and I believe 
 that Massachusetts should also be added to this list on account 
 of laws passed some time ago encouraging humane instruction 
 in educational institutions. Chicago has now been operating 
 under a humane education law for about two years, and Mrs. 
 Ella Flagg Young, superintendent of schools in Chicago, wrote 
 to me recently that 
 
 when the moral and humane education law was adopted by the legisla- 
 ture of the state of Illinois, it was at first thought by the school people 
 that the plan of teaching humaneness as a definite subject of instruction 
 in the schools was a mistake. In the intervening two years, however, 
 there has been a change of opinion, and I think that now most of the 
 school people, at least in Chicago, recognize the advantage of the 
 definite presentation of this subject as a part of the course of study. 
 
 The Chicago board of education, on account of this state law, 
 on March 23, 19 10, adopted a scheme for humane education 
 and moral training in the schools and presented an outline for 
 such training accompanied by a list of books and periodicals 
 that furnished material adapted to aid in such instruction. 
 Humanitarians feel that to instruct a child in the principles of 
 justice and kindness to the helpless or the weak does much to 
 broaden the child's character and to increase its sympathy for 
 that which is noble and good, and cannot fail to produce a better 
 citizen for the future. It is a fixed principle of the policy of 
 the anti-cruelty societies gradually to extend this system of 
 
 (626) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS 153 
 
 education into the public schools of every state, and plans have 
 been definitely formulated for systematically carrying this work 
 forward. We believe it a means for the promotion of good 
 citizenship not to be ignored by persons who feel that the heart 
 should be educated as well as the mind, and that the funda- 
 mental object of all education is the proper development of 
 character. 
 
 The laws which have been enacted for the protection of 
 animals cover a large variety of offenses and are more or less 
 known to the general public. There are laws which provide 
 that proper food and drink must be supplied to them ; that dis- 
 abled animals must not be abandoned or any animals carried in 
 a cruel manner, whether in private vehicles or by common 
 carriers ; that substances injurious to animals shall not be thrown 
 in public places ; that cows shall not be kept in unhealthy places 
 or fed improper food ; that animal fights for sport shall be for- 
 bidden ; and there are a number of special provisions designed 
 to protect beasts from heedless or intentional cruelty. 
 
 The general policy of anti-cruelty legislation, however, has 
 been not to legislate specially for every conceivable offense, but 
 rather to provide general statutes designed to apply to most 
 cases of abuse. As New York state was the first one to pass a 
 special law for the protection of animals, its blanket statute has 
 been largely copied in other states. Section 185 of the penal 
 law of New York state is designed to cover all ordinary forms 
 of cruelty and will serve as an example of the legal protection 
 given to animals by a blanket statute. It reads in part as 
 follows : 
 
 A person who overdrives, overloads, tortures or cruelly beats or un- 
 justifiably injures, maims, mutilates or kills any animal, whether wild or 
 tame, and whether belonging to himself or to another, or deprives any 
 animal of necessary sustenance, food or drink, or neglects or refuses 
 to furnish it such sustenance or drink, or causes, procures or permits, 
 any animal to be overdriven, overloaded, tortured, cruelly beaten, or 
 unjustifiably injured, maimed, mutilated or killed, or to be deprived of 
 necessary food or drink, or who wilfully sets on foot, instigates, en- 
 gages in, or in any way furthers any act of cruelty to any animal, or 
 any act tending to produce such cruelty, is guilty of a misdemeanor. 
 
 (627) ' 
 
154 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 This law has been amply sustained in the courts and is an effi- 
 cient instrument for the protection of animals from most forms 
 of abuse. 
 
 The New York state laws assist the enforcement of the 
 section of the penal law just quoted, by providing two defi- 
 nitions which greatly increase the effectiveness of the law. 
 Thus Section i8o declares that "the word 'animal,' as used 
 in this article, does not include the human race, but includes 
 every other living creature." This same section also provides 
 that "the word 'torture' or 'cruelty' includes every act, omis- 
 sion, or neglect, whereby unjustifiable physical pain, suffering 
 or death is caused or permitted." There are special laws for 
 the protection of animals in railway transportation ; also others 
 relating to agricultural conditions and the licensing of dogs, 
 while the game laws and other laws affecting wild animals are 
 discriminating and in the main reasonable and effective. 
 
 There are two aspects of the anti-cruelty question which have 
 received special consideration on the part of those who are 
 deeply interested in its sociological value. The commercial or 
 economic side of animal protection has been studied attentively 
 and it has been calculated that the proper humane treatment of 
 animals in the United States would result in savings amounting 
 to hundreds of millions of dollars per annum. It is not possible 
 to develop this aspect of the question in detail in a paper of 
 limited length. The other general aspect of anti-cruelty work, 
 to which I have just referred, deals with the reflex action on 
 national character of the humanitarian movement. It was long 
 ago felt that a greater moral harm was done to man himself, 
 when guilty of cruelty to a beast, than was represented by the 
 actual suffering of the creature. It was argued that man was 
 degraded and debased by acts of cruelty and that the exercise 
 of cruelty could not fail to have a powerful influence in a retro- 
 grade way on his social development. 
 
 Nero, the Roman Emperor, as a child, is said to have been 
 diabolically cruel to animal life with which he came in contact. 
 As the head of a great empire he only amplified and extended 
 the cruelty which he had manifested as a youth. In a lesser 
 but analogous way, we believe that this law of development 
 
 (628) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS \ 5 5 
 
 applies to those countries where the humane treatment of 
 animals is discouraged, for humanitarians feel that humane edu- 
 cation and the enforcement of laws for the better protection of 
 helpless beasts has an important bearing on national character 
 and national instincts. 
 
 The anti-cruelty societies are desirous of having public co- 
 operation on the part of individuals and churches as far as 
 possible, in carrying out the beneficent work in which they are 
 engaged. Societies are desirous of establishing animal hos- 
 pitals and free dispensaries in every large city, where intelligent 
 and scientific care may be given to suffering animals, particu- 
 larly those owned by the poor. Many a man of very limited 
 means, who is dependent upon his horse for the support of 
 himself and his family, does not feel that he can afford to pay 
 the fee of a veterinarian for every slight ailment from which 
 the animal may suffer. There is a large field for philanthropic 
 work in the establishment and support, not alone of free dis- 
 pensaries and animal hospitals, which are now beginning to 
 spring up in the large cities, but also for the starting of courses 
 of veterinary lectures so that all of those interested in horses, 
 dogs, and others animals may obtain information how to care 
 for them properly. 
 
 In New York, Chicago, and Boston, excellent courses of free 
 lectures on the proper care of animals have been given for 
 several years. These courses of instruction are attended to a 
 considerable extent by the police, by drivers and horse owners, 
 and by officers of the anti-cruelty societies. They have a large 
 field of usefulness, as they aid those coming in contact with 
 animals to treat them humanely and intelligently in health as 
 well as in illness or disability. 
 
 Drinking fountains, from which animals may slake their 
 thirst, especially during the heated term, are very desirable in 
 all cities, and furnish an opportunity everywhere for those 
 philanthropically inclined. Many humane societies lack veteri- 
 nary ambulances, whereby injured or sick animals may be trans- 
 ported. Proper appliances for raising horses which have fallen 
 into excavations are usually needed in connection with these 
 ambulances. Many humane societies have such conveniences, 
 
 (629) 
 
1 56 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 but the majority have not. An active movement is under way 
 in some sections of the country to promote " horse vacations." 
 This is based upon the belief that a short rest during the sum- 
 mer will increase the value of a horse's services during the rest 
 of the year and prolong its life. It is based upon the supposi- 
 tion that what is good for a man is good also for a beast, as 
 both have bodies which are substantially alike in their general 
 anatomical construction and physiological functions. This idea 
 will probably become more popular in the future. 
 
 Quite a number of societies have " homes of rest" for horses, 
 where poor men may have their animals cared for, either 
 gratuitously or at a nominal cost. We should advise persons 
 interested in anti-cruelty work to offer farms, either by gift or 
 loan, to humane societies so that they may be used for this 
 purpose. Some enterprising anti-cruelty societies have under- 
 taken to loan without charge horses which may be used by poor 
 men who are dependent on their own animals for their living as 
 an inducement for them to send their horses for a rest during 
 the summer. 
 
 One of the greatest needs of anti-cruelty societies for animals 
 throughout the United States is an adequate endowment. 
 Societies which depend wholly on annual subscriptions for their 
 support are always more or less in debt if their work is a large 
 and active one. The largest and most efficient societies in this 
 country are dependent for the major part of their income upon 
 the interest from endowments. I know of no way in which the 
 humanely inclined can do a greater service than by making 
 testamentary provision toward the support of local anti- cruelty 
 societies, so that they may not be hampered in their beneficent 
 work. Many anti-cruelty societies in the past have died from 
 financial starvation. The majority of them are so situated that 
 a few earnest, hard-working philanthropists who are looking 
 after the protection of the animals have to spend at least half 
 of their humane working time in securing funds with which to 
 finance their societies. Humanity is a general social duty. It 
 is not the prerogative of the few. If persons humanely inclined 
 are performing a duty which should be undertaken by the many, 
 it is only fair that they should be more generously financed by 
 
 (630) 
 
No. 4] PREVENTION OF CRUEL TV TO ANIMALS i 5 7 
 
 those who are able to extend help but whose work in this 
 direction is being performed by others. 
 
 The anti-cruelty cause has suffered much in the past from a 
 lack of trained workers. Earnest and enthusiastic partizans of 
 the cause have often volunteered their services, and while mean- 
 ing well have not infrequently antagonized both the public and 
 the magistrates by their well-intended but impracticable 
 demands. Many times men have been employed to enforce 
 human'e laws for animals who had become superannuated as 
 policemen or deputy sheriffs, and who were destitute of any 
 real interest or personal fitness for the work. Others employed 
 have been those who have failed elsewhere and whose employ- 
 ment partakes very largely of the nature of a charity. Human- 
 itarians are beginning to realize the error of such a policy as 
 this and to feel that it is time that a special school should be 
 started which shall fit the workers of anti-cruelty societies for 
 their labors. 
 
 Society has trained workers for nearly every other philan- 
 thropic or business activity, as for instance, for social service, 
 for nursing the sick, for every variety of technical employment, 
 for bookkeeping and stenography, and so on through a long 
 list. The humane worker is obliged to have a knowledge which 
 is quite as technical and difficult as almost any of these. It is 
 felt that a school is the only effective means of attracting young 
 men and women of ability to enter this field of philanthropic 
 endeavor and to perform efficient service. 
 
 A paid agent of a society for the prevention of cruelty to 
 animals should be familiar with the office management necessary 
 for the successful carrying-on of an active society. He should 
 be familiar with the needed office books and with the blanks 
 required to receive complaints. He should know the proper 
 methods of filing and should be drilled and disciplined in the 
 carrying on of the more or less voluminous correspondence 
 which is necessarily required. He should also be familiar with 
 statistical methods, in order to present the results of the 
 society's operations to its patrons. The humane worker should 
 be taught how to keep up membership lists ; how to incorporate 
 anti-cruelty societies and legally conduct the same ; how to keep 
 
 (631) 
 
158 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 the minutes and records of the society and to prepare and pub- 
 lish annual reports. 
 
 In addition to all these things he must have the methods for 
 field work well in hand. He must be more or less of a veteri- 
 narian and must understand the anatomy and physiology of the 
 horse and other animals. He must be fitted to tell others how 
 to relieve suffering animals, and be able to determine with a 
 reasonable degree of exactness whether the animal is actually 
 suffering or not, and whether the case is one which should be 
 taken into court. Humane workers need to be wise in regard 
 to the law, for they must plead their own cases in most in- 
 stances; they must know how to draw legal papers and be 
 familiar with legal procedure and the intricacies of the law ; 
 they must know what evidence is necessary in order to secure 
 a conviction. It is desirable that an agent of a society for the 
 prevention of cruelty to animals should understand how to take 
 photographs well; how to adjust ill-fitting harnesses; how to 
 distinguish between a dog which is merely suffering from a fit 
 or lack of water and one which is really vicious and dangerous. 
 There are many other qualifications which are required and 
 which can be secured only by special training. 
 
 Over and above all the humane agent must possess the milk 
 of human kindness. He must be taught that the majority of 
 offenders are cruel more because of ignorance than because of 
 design, and that advice and friendly suggestion are what is 
 needed in the vast majority of cases. Humane officers need to 
 have enlightened good sense. They should be familiar with 
 the latest and best methods of carrying on the work. It should 
 be borne in mind, however, that all this theoretical knowledge 
 is comparatively valueless unless supplemented by actual field 
 work in connection with an active anti-cruelty society. It is 
 desirable to have the theoretical foundation and the academic 
 instruction for an officer, but in order to be properly fitted for 
 his work he must go out on the street and into the police court, 
 and learn actual methods by experience under the instruction 
 of veteran workers. A school will be established in the near 
 future through the efforts of the American Humane Association 
 and we invite financial support for the development of this 
 necessary work. 
 
 (632) 
 
PRISON LABOR 
 
 E. STAGG WHITIN 
 
 General Secretary, National Committee on Prison Labor 
 
 CHRISTIANITY has brought no greater change into the 
 world than the overthrow of slavery. The greatest war 
 of modern times had human slavery as its inciting cause, 
 yet behind the dark bastilles we call our prisons, penitentiaries, 
 reformatories, workhouses and refuges there still hides the 
 enemy of our social progress, the economically vicious slave 
 system. The abolition of the evils inherent in this system, 
 comprising as they do the exploitation of the helpless, the 
 perversion of state functions, the gnawing of graft and the cor- 
 rupting of politics, appears no limited task, even to the most 
 light-hearted of reformers ; to undertake to work out the recon- 
 struction, the peaceful reformation of this system throughout 
 the length and breadth of this land is at least to grapple with 
 fundamental issues. 
 
 Its dealings with the criminal mark, one may say, the zero point in 
 the scale of treatment which society conceives to be the due of its 
 various members. If we raise this point we raise the standard all along 
 the scale. The pauper may justly expect something better than the 
 criminal, the self-supporting poor man or woman than the pauper. 
 Thus if it is the aim of good civilization to raise the general standard 
 of life, this is a tendency which a savage criminal law will hinder and 
 a humane one assist. 
 
 Thus speaks Hobhouse. The level of the convict to-day is, 
 economically considered, slavery. He is the property of the 
 state and during his incarceration the economic value which is 
 in him may be disposed of by the state to those who desire to 
 lease it, or he may be worked by the state as it sees fit. 
 
 The leased convict is always exploited. The state-worked 
 convict may be made to work either to pay for his keep, to 
 sustain his dependents, to reform his ways or to bring revenue 
 
 (633) 
 
l6o ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 into the state treasury. Work he must and by the sweat of his 
 brow he must learn that society has rights to be protected and 
 he duties to perform. The conditions under which this training 
 is given need not debase the state, his disciplinary authority, in 
 the performance of its function. While we raise the level of 
 the convict and force up the level of industrial society we must 
 force up likewise the moral standard of the master who has 
 charge of the discipline. Negro slavery was more demoralizing 
 to the free man than to the slave ; convict slavery to-day demora- 
 lizes the community and the free individual in just the same 
 way. It is an old saying worthy to be believed of all men that 
 a state cannot exist half slave and half free. 
 
 The abolition of slavery in our prisons does not mean a jail 
 delivery, nor does it mean even an indiscriminate pardoning by 
 over-enthusiastic governors of large numbers of depraved and 
 diseased men who are now incarcerated. From a slave the 
 convict must become a ward and as a ward he must be disci- 
 plined, corrected, developed, trained through daily chores, 
 through honest work, with ever the hope of the brighter future 
 before him when he can again assume the position of citizen 
 and praise and bless the state that has trained him. Simple 
 was the process of the abolition of slavery as pointed out by 
 Lincoln when he said : 
 
 Free labor has the inspiration of hope ; pure slavery has no hope ; the 
 power of hope upon human exertion and happiness is wonderful ; the 
 slave master himself has a conception of it, hence the system of tasks 
 amongst slaves ; the slave whom you cannot drive with the lash to break 
 seventy- five pounds of hemp in a day, if you task him to break a 
 hundred and promise him wage for all over, will break you one hundred 
 and fifty. You have substituted hope for the rod, and yet perhaps it 
 does not occur to you that, to the extent of your gain in the case, you 
 have given up the slave system and adopted the free system of labor. 
 
 The movement which this thought represents is sweeping 
 over the country, finding its expression in many states. It is 
 championed by Wilson in New Jersey, Harmon in Ohio, Mann 
 in Virginia, Hadley in Missouri, Johnson in California. The 
 legislatures are responding, commissions are investigating, gov- 
 
 (634) 
 
No. 4] PRISON LABOR l6i 
 
 ernors are conferring. As an outcome of the discussion at the 
 governors' conference at Spring Lake the southern governors 
 met in May in special conference upon it and the gover- 
 nors in the West are soon to follow this example. But what is 
 the actual status ? Whither are they leading ? To point the 
 movement in a few brief phrases must suffice here. Economi- 
 cally two systems of convict production and two systems of dis- 
 tribution of convict-made goods exist: production is either by 
 the state or under individual enterprise; distribution either is 
 limited to the preferred state-use market or is made through 
 the general market. In the light of such classification the con- 
 vict-labor legislation of recent years shows definite tendencies 
 toward the state's assumption of its responsibility for its own 
 use of the prisoners on state lands, in state mines and as opera- 
 tives in state factories ; while in distribution the competition of 
 the open market, with its disastrous effect upon prices, tends to 
 give place to the use of labor and commodities by the state it- 
 self in its manifold activities. Improvements like these in the 
 production and distribution of the products mitigate evils but 
 in no vital way affect the economic injustice always inherent in 
 a slave system. The payment of wage to the convict as a right 
 growing out of his production of valuable commodities is the 
 phase of this legislation which tends to destroy the state of 
 slavery. Such legislation has made its appearance, together with 
 the first suggestion of right of choice allowed to the convict in 
 regard to his occupation. These statutes still waver in an 
 uncertain manner between the conception of the wage as a 
 privilege, common to England and Germany, and the wage as 
 a right as it exists in France. The development of the idea of 
 the right of wage, fused as it is with the movement toward gov- 
 ernmental work and workshops, cannot fail to stand out sig- 
 nificantly when viewed from the standpoint of the labor 
 movement. 
 
 In a word, the economic progress in prison labor shown in 
 recent legislation is toward more efficient production by the 
 elimination of the profits of the lessee ; more economical distri- 
 bution of the products by the substitution of a preferred market, 
 where the profits of the middleman are eliminated, in place of 
 
 (635) 
 
1 62 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 the unfair competition with the products of free labor in the 
 open market ; and finally the curtailment of the slave system 
 by the provision for wages and choice of occupation for the 
 man in penal servitude. 
 
 In administration the adaptation of these new principles pre- 
 sents many difficulties and points the need of much careful 
 study and detailed application suited to the special locality. 
 Dr. Hart's illustration from the Columbus reformatory finds its 
 counterpart in the horrors that have been perpetrated at the 
 Columbus penitentiary. The pen portraits of Brand Whitlock 
 in his Turn of the Balance exaggerate nothing in their depiction 
 of the horrors of the convicts in the shops, suffering from in- 
 dustrial diseases as horrible as the poisoning of which Dr. 
 Seager has spoken, but forced to work under the brutal con- 
 tractor till fatigue and anguish break them down — then the 
 paddle and the water-cure change them from men into brutes. 
 I should hesitate so to testify if the facts were not a matter of 
 court record in a case now pending in that great city of Ohio 
 whence came most of our inspiration at this morning's meeting. 
 This is but a type, however. The convicts in Alabama who 
 tried to become my slaves to avoid the mine-camp can be found 
 if you care to seek them ; all along the line the war goes on 
 between brutality and enlightened state control. What Dr. 
 Hart told of in Ohio is as true in many other places. You 
 have read of the abominable conditions in Maryland, the con- 
 tracts in Connecticut which sell the right to grasping con- 
 tractors to punish the convicts at their pleasure — but this phase 
 must soon belong to the past. 
 
 The National Committee on Prison Labor for two years has 
 been investigating the conditions, advising with state officials, 
 drafting legislation, organizing reform. Armed with a con- 
 structive program resulting from its studies and experiments it 
 will bring to the legislatures which are to be elected this year 
 the encouragement which comes from well-conceived plans 
 based upon actual conditions, and to the administrators whom 
 the new governors shall appoint a synthesis of the available 
 material upon which to work. It is not for support from these 
 men that we need ask ; they will be glad and ready to respond — 
 
 (636) 
 
No. 4] 
 
 PRISON LABOR 
 
 163 
 
 it is from the public which this association represents, the public 
 of the good citizen, the church-goer, the preacher, the tax-payer 
 and the educator. Reform is impossible of permanence until 
 these are fully alive to the problem and take personal interest 
 in aiding each community to make that adjustment upon 
 which permanent reform must rest. 
 
 What are the conditions in your community ? What are 
 you doing to improve them ? Do you realize that as a citizen 
 of a state that continues the slavery of its convicts you join in 
 the responsibility for its existence ? 
 
 (637) 
 
THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY IN THE 
 UNITED STATES 
 
 FRANCIS H. MCLEAN 
 
 General Secretary, National Association of Societies for Organizing Charity 
 
 IT is interesting to note that the movement which preceded 
 all the other social movements of the present day in the 
 United States was among the last to be nationally organ- 
 ized. When the charity organization idea' was transplanted 
 from England to the United States in the later seventies, the 
 whole problem of family rehabilitation and of the attendant 
 social campaigns which would have to grow out of the daily 
 work of an organization attempting to rehabilitate, was consid- 
 ered to be a strictly local or community problem. During the 
 whole of the eighties the rudimentary ideas connected with the 
 charity organization concept were more or less sprinkled out 
 over all portions of the country. A number of the societies 
 took deep root and grew up more or less sturdily, struggling 
 along to a better and wider standard of work. In most cities, 
 particularly the smaller ones, the roots were close to the surface 
 and spread out laterally riather than horizontally; that is, the 
 negative ideas of mere systematization of relief, the checking 
 of duplication and fraud and similar ideas constituted the whole 
 content of the program of these societies. This was to some 
 extent true of the early nineties, but approximately from 1895 
 to 1905 there was an increasing call made upon the recognized 
 associated charities or charity organization societies from com- 
 munities about to organize, asking for advice as to forms of or- 
 ganization. This marked a distinct step in advance, because 
 up to that time about the only things which had been borrowed 
 from older societies were the forms of constitutions, which 
 
 ^ Charity organization societies, associated charities and societies for organizing 
 charity are identical offshoots and these terms are used interchangeably throughout 
 this article. 
 
 (638) 
 
THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY 165 
 
 closely resembled one another. The objects as generally stated 
 included the development of cooperation, actual rehabilitation 
 (employment being often specifically mentioned as one form 
 of rehabilitation) , as well as the carrying on of social and sani- 
 tary reforms to improve the environmental conditions of the 
 neglected. It is worth noting that the purposes of the great 
 New York Charity Organization Society, with its manifold 
 activities, read just the same as the constitution of dead-in-life 
 societies which have been discovered by the writer in small 
 cities in the interior. 
 
 The recognized societies thus importuned to advise groups 
 organizing in new communities at first confidently replied upon 
 the basis of their own experience. Thus in each part of the 
 country there was a set of societies resembling a model to be 
 found in the nearest important society which had been con- 
 sulted. Thus weakness and strength alike were perpetuated. 
 Some new societies bodily seized ideas from some society which 
 had developed a particular activity, possibly to the detriment 
 of other more important activities. For instance, some soci- 
 eties too strongly developed industrial agencies, others devel- 
 oped other specialties. Committees writing to these particular 
 agencies copied their specialties. 
 
 During all these years there was growing up a recognition of 
 the essential unity of the field. This could not fail to come 
 into existence. There could be no barriers separating single 
 municipalities or other units. The small city found its most 
 difficult problem in this or that girl who had come in from the 
 rural sections. The intermediate city found that its group of 
 dependent families was recruited not only from the rural 
 sections, but from the smaller cities which had not intelligently 
 looked after their neglected families. The larger cities gathered 
 their cases from all over the country. Thus slowly came the 
 realization that this was not a mere community problem. This 
 did not mean that each community should not be locally and 
 independently responsible for the neglected families residing in 
 it. It did mean, however, that the different communities were 
 so inter-related that it was for the interest of all to have right 
 principles of rehabilitation everywhere being actively employed. 
 
 (639) 
 
1 66 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 So there came to the leaders in the movement the definite 
 appreciation of the need of field work, similar to that done in 
 other social activities. There was the need for the exchange 
 of experience, and for guarding new movements against falla- 
 cies and weaknesses, showing them how to start on right founda- 
 tions at the beginning, thus conserving local resources in every- 
 way. 
 
 The field work was inaugurated as a Field Department of The 
 Survey in 1907, being supported by the Russell Sage Founda- 
 tion. In 1909 it was taken over by the Foundation directly 
 and made a part of the work of the Charity Organization 
 Department. In 19 11 it was taken over by the National 
 Association of Societies for Organizing Charity. It is being 
 conducted now, therefore, under the direction of some seventy 
 of the recognized societies of the country for organizing charity, 
 and is being supported by subscriptions received from the cities 
 in which these societies are located. 
 
 The purpose of this paper is not to consider this movement 
 from the point of view of the societies, but rather from the 
 point of view of those individuals or voluntary organizations, 
 like churches, who are desirous of helping in the proper organ- 
 ization of local societies. For those so interested it is sug- 
 gested, first, that they write for certain pamphlets which are 
 published by the Charity Organization Department of the 
 Russell Sage Foundation for the benefit of the field work of the 
 association.' The first of the pamphlets whose title is given in 
 the footnote below presents concrete suggestions about the 
 preliminary period of propaganda and organization before 
 actual formation may be effected. The second is a small eight- 
 page pamphlet explaining the purposes of organized charity in 
 rudimentary form with illustrations, and is useful in interesting 
 people to whom it is desirable to explain the movement. After 
 carefully reading these pamphlets, correspondence with the 
 office of the National Association of Societies for Organizing 
 Charity is encouraged. Such correspondence should explain 
 
 * Write for single copies of The Formation of Charity Organization Societies in 
 Smaller Cities and What is Organized Charity ? to the Charity Organization Depart- 
 ment of the Russell Sage Foundation, 105 East 22d St., New York city. 
 
 (640) 
 
 I 
 
No. 4] THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY 167 
 
 just who is interested in the proposed plan, what existing soci- 
 eties may be more or less affected, from whom the proposition 
 for organization has come, and as far as possible should give 
 some characterization of the family problems which are coming 
 to the existing organizations and of the public health and child 
 problems which are most imminent. What will be emphasized 
 by the national association's officers is that there is need of 
 considering several elements in the community, and that until 
 all these elements are interested, it is foolish to attempt an 
 organization. To explain what is meant it may be well to say 
 that the idea of organization may come from totally different 
 sources. It may come from a group of churches who feel that 
 there is duplication in relief and that this ought to be changed. 
 This may be a public need, but no organization effected to deal 
 solely with this will ever gain any large public support. Its 
 work will be negative, and no negative enterprise will ever com- 
 mand the sympathy of a community. The idea may develop 
 in some commercial organization which, however, is looking at 
 it from largely the same point of view. That is, the men are 
 more or less bothered by applications of all kinds made per- 
 sonally and otherwise. Or again, it may develop out of a group 
 of broad-minded citizens who realize the need of a central re- 
 habilitating society, bringing into proper coordination in con- 
 nection with individual family problems all the social agencies 
 of the city so that comprehensive plans for individual treatment 
 may be worked out through the office and staff of the central 
 society. Wherever it starts from there is the need of interest- 
 ing the other two groups. This does not mean obtaining 
 unanimity of opinion. Such organizations always have more 
 or less opposition to deal with. It means, however, that the 
 business men must be interested to such a degree that the board 
 of directors created may be composed largely of business men. 
 It means that of the agencies already dealing with the families 
 in their homes, all, or at least some of the more important, 
 should be willing to work upon the committees of such a society. 
 It means that the interest of those who have social programs of 
 other kinds to carry on should be enlisted to some degree. 
 Another definite principle which must be accepted at the 
 
 (641) 
 
1 68 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 very start, if failure is to be avoided, is that such a society 
 must be led by a trained charity organization worker from 
 another city. This is where many of the earlier societies failed 
 completely. There was not sufficient backbone in the move- 
 ment to accept the principle and live up to it. Therefore, per- 
 sons without sufficient ability and training were accepted as 
 general secretaries, and the societies failed completely. In- 
 deed, the idea of service is the crux of the whole matter at the 
 start. There can be no compromise on this point. There may 
 be upon almost every other detail excepting this. The work 
 is too important to the community's welfare to be left entirely 
 to untrained hands. Furthermore, experience in the field 
 work of the last five years has demonstrated that cities of 
 10,000 or over are generally able to support a society with 
 proper trained service. For cities under 10,000 other special 
 plans may have to be tried. The national association is en- 
 deavoring to carry on experimentation in these smaller cities 
 with the hope of working out some general principles of action 
 which, with adaptations, may be generally used. At the pres- 
 ent time there is no publication dealing specifically with the 
 problem of the city under 10,000. The association, however, 
 welcomes correspondence regarding the problems of organiza- 
 tion in these smaller cities. 
 
 Another idea which is strongly emphasized in the pamphlet 
 above mentioned is that temporary enthusiasm should not be 
 confounded with grim determination. Societies which are 
 started upon the spur of the moment, and as the result of one 
 meeting, for instance, are liable to fall by the wayside. It is 
 necessary that there be a great deal of talking and advising. 
 The propaganda period should extend, therefore, from one 
 month to one or two years, indeed up to the point where those 
 interested feel certain that they have a group which is deter- 
 mined to stand by the movement during its first two years of 
 troublous existence. Not until there is this group, with this 
 determination, is it time to consider definite organization. 
 
 So far we have been reviewing some of the points which have 
 developed out of the field experience. We have suggested 
 above also that the national association will welcome corre- 
 
 (642) 
 
No. 4] THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY 169 
 
 spondence from either a single individual or a group that has 
 started on a campaign for organization. A great deal may be 
 effected through such correspondence. The records of the 
 national association show that in some instances organization 
 has been effected without going beyond this correspondence 
 stage, so far as the association is concerned. 
 
 This brings us up to the real field work. For the informa- 
 tion of local groups we would state that the kinds of visits made 
 by the field secretaries of the association are two-fold in 
 character. Visits of a day or two days are sometimes made, 
 whenever they may be fitted into the road schedules, upon 
 groups which are in the preliminary stages. Organization is 
 not attempted at this time. There may be the suggestion of 
 how best to steer the committee, there may be talks given be- 
 fore representatives of societies or before commercial organiza- 
 tions. Such visits make it possible for the field workers of the 
 association to speak with more local knowledge than if the visit 
 had not been made. These preliminary visits have increased 
 in numbers during the last two years. They have been found 
 quite effective. 
 
 The second type of visit comes at a later period, generally 
 just before the local group considers that the definite plunge 
 into concrete organization should be made. These visits are 
 generally of longer duration. If the demands upon the field 
 force were not so overwhelming it is probable that no organiz- 
 ing visit of less than a week would ever be proposed by us. 
 Of course, no field secretary himself can relieve a local com- 
 mittee of its responsibilities. He comes in simply to help in 
 the proper rounding up. In doing so he often finds it neces- 
 sary to press home the principles above indicated. These 
 principles may have been accepted by the group primarily 
 interested. This group may, however, have met with consider- 
 able opposition in the community itself. By reason of the 
 lack of concrete experience of its individual members, they 
 have been perhaps somewhat handicapped in answering the ob- 
 jections which have been raised by this or that individual or 
 society. These objections are of two kinds. The first have to 
 do with the form of organization itself, and the storm center is 
 
 (643) 
 
I70 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 often around the question of paid service. The second kind of 
 objections are the most difficult to meet oftentimes. These 
 objections acknowledge the reasonableness of the plan, but 
 affirm that while other cities may have been able to carry on 
 such a plan, this particular city is not able to undertake the 
 burden. It is the duty of the field secretary to show what 
 cities of the same size have done, and what their experiences 
 have been. It is his duty to make such observations as will 
 indicate that in the city concerned there are the same problems 
 as are found in other cities which have already met the need 
 by organizing. It is his duty constantly to give illustrations of 
 family rehabilitation work in other cities, to show how other 
 cities have financed their societies. It is his duty to uncover 
 any fallacies or weaknesses in plans which have been evolved 
 through the notions or ideas of people inside or outside of the 
 groups primarily interested. It is his province, not to be a 
 " spellbinder," but to meet with conferences of people whose 
 interest in the movement is absolutely essential. It is his duty 
 often to go even further and with members of the preliminary 
 committee to visit individually this person and that. He must 
 give advice as to the proper shaping up of final organization, 
 as to what committees there should be, how they should be 
 formed, what persons definitely should be asked to serve upon 
 them. In a good many instances he may help in securing the 
 consent of persons to serve upon the board of directors. He 
 can do all this, of course, by himself, but cannot effect organi- 
 zation. He must count upon the steering or preliminary com- 
 mittee serving as the responsible agent and working steadily 
 toward the final meeting for organizing purposes. In order to 
 render the most effective service, therefore, visits of not less 
 than a week should be made at this time. There are excep- 
 tions to this, of course. The trouble is that the association 
 has been obliged, by reason of the pressure of work, to limit 
 many visits to briefer periods, simply to cover as much ground 
 as possible. But on the whole the policy of the association 
 has been distinctly against the idea of covering the ground at 
 too great sacrifice of intensive work. 
 
 There are all kinds of variations from the two types of visits 
 
 (644) 
 
No. 4] THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY 1 7 1 
 
 above indicated. Thus there is the question of the reorganiza- 
 tion of old societies, which have seen the Hght and desire to 
 measure up to their community responsibilities. Each visit of 
 reorganization is radically different from the one preceding it 
 and the one following. There are also visits made to societies 
 not needing reorganization, but seeking specific advice as to 
 some particular activity which they may wish to inaugurate, or 
 desiring to learn whether in some particular department of work 
 they may not be strengthened. 
 
 It may happen that some individual or organization is in a 
 community where the society itself, though a dead-in-life one, 
 does not realize its condition. This society or individual 
 realizes the extent of the uncovered field and may wish to 
 learn how effective reorganization may be brought about. It 
 must be realized, of course, that the association must recognize 
 a comity in its relation with such societies. Of course, many 
 of these organizations are not really associated charities or 
 charity organization societies. It may be of interest here to 
 note that in addition to the some seventy societies which are 
 members of the national association, there are only about sixty 
 other societies whose standards are such that they are eligible 
 for admission to it. Yet there are almost two hundred and 
 fifty so-called associated charities which are listed in the 
 directory of such societies. In the case we are considering 
 there is an organization masquerading under the title. Nothing 
 can be hoped for from violent action. It is generally a mistake 
 simply to overlook the older organization and say we will start 
 afresh. It is far preferable to secure its consent to have a field 
 worker come in and in a perfectly friendly spirit make recom- 
 mendations for reorganization. Sometimes, indeed, the pres- 
 sure exerted by the other social agencies in the community 
 may induce such an old organization to develop to its proper 
 stature. In these different instances the national association is 
 glad to correspond with those who feel the lack. It feels much 
 easier and can help with greater effect whenever the coopera- 
 tion of the old society is secured. But the welfare of the com- 
 munity itself must be the most important consideration. 
 Therefore, other methods of meeting the situation are some- 
 times open and may be discussed with the association. 
 
 (645) 
 
172 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 We have just spoken of the welfare of the community as the 
 most important consideration. It may be permitted at this 
 point to indicate just how we consider the charity organization 
 society movement should function in the smaller cities of the 
 country. Most people would concede that out of the great 
 mass of people who have not been thinking socially the largest 
 number of recruits to the whole social army will come through 
 that particular social activity whose need in a rudimentary way 
 will be recognized by practically all in a community. That 
 need, of course, is the rehabilitation of dependent families. To 
 the great mass of the uninstructed that will simply indicate 
 material relief, but it is the natural starting point. With the 
 proper family rehabilitation society you are educating one per- 
 son after another of this uninstructed mass. Their ideas are 
 very rudimentary. Many do not get beyond the rudimentary 
 stage. But many others do travel along with the slowly unfold- 
 ing idea of an efficient society. Therefore, the importance of 
 a broadly founded society for cities of all sizes in the country 
 cannot be overstated. It is most important where the social 
 thinking of the whole nation, outside of those cities which are 
 great centers of social thinking, depends upon the proper ex- 
 tension of the family rehabilitation group. It matters not 
 whether a particular charity organization society itself carries 
 on the social reforms which are indicated by its family work, 
 or educates the community up to the point of other societies 
 undertaking them ; that must be decided by local conditions. 
 But it does matter very much to any community whether there 
 is in it this society which is day by day and week by week 
 opening the eyes of the uninstructed to a sense of social re- 
 sponsibility of varying kinds. And thus there is involved in its 
 proper extension far more than a strengthening of the com- 
 munity of action between the movement as one goes from city 
 to city. Its proper extension is the best foundation for the 
 local strengthening of all the other great national movements. 
 Thus it has got far beyond the provincialism which marked its 
 first twenty-five years of existence in this country. That pro- 
 vincialism was a fortunate one in many ways. Each one of the 
 societies had a hard fight against misunderstandings and toward 
 
 (646) 
 
No. 4] THE EXTENSION OF ORGANIZED CHARITY 1 73 
 
 greater efficiency. Those that were weak fell by the wayside. 
 Those that developed strongly could become a part of the 
 national movement. It has been somewhat difficult to awaken 
 many of the societies to a sense of the national responsibility. 
 Nevertheless the interest and enthusiasm in what the societies 
 regard as a great missionary movement is constantly upon the 
 increase. They have not become confused by the multiplicity 
 of other national movements in which their own leaders were 
 more or less involved, but are more strongly convinced than 
 ever that the very complexity of the social vision which they 
 observe makes it even more vitally necessary that the family re- 
 habilitation movement should be strongly pressed in every 
 community of any size. For that movement is becoming a 
 greater and greater national force towards socialization. 
 
 (647) 
 
THE SOCIAL PROGRAM OF THE FEDERAL COUNCIL 
 OF THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST IN AMERICA 
 
 CHARLES S. MACFARLAND 
 
 Secretary of the Federal Council and of its Commission on the Church and Social 
 
 Service 
 
 THE Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America 
 is composed of thirty-one evangelical denominations 
 united, not upon the basis of a common faith and order* 
 but under the principle of unity and diversity, uniting in one 
 common service all forms of faith and order as represented in 
 its constituency. The task of its commission on the church 
 and social service is that of inspiring in the churches of the 
 nation a deepening interest in the problems of the social order, 
 and of bringing to bear the influence of the Christian church in 
 the solution of our social problems. 
 
 Two great interests come together in this work, that of church 
 unity and that of social service. The various forms of social 
 uplift which are before the church offer one of the most vital 
 and permanent of reasons and opportunities for federating the 
 churches. On the other hand the opportunities for social ser- 
 vice are of such a nature that they can be fulfilled, in large 
 measure, only by the churches acting together. Social service 
 is thus in part the basis of the Federal Council, and the Federal 
 Council offers the basis for social service. 
 
 The task of the commission on the church and social service 
 is indicated by the recommendations unanimously adopted by 
 the Federal Council in Philadelphia in 1908, as contained in the 
 report of the committee, published under the title The Church 
 and Modern Industry^ of which the following are typical 
 utterances : 
 
 The churches of Christ in this Federal Council accept without 
 reserve and assert without apology the supreme authority of Jesus 
 Christ. Christ's mission is not merely to reform society, but to save it. 
 He is more than the world's readjuster. He is its Redeemer. 
 
 (648) 
 
SOCIAL PROGRAM OF THE CHURCHES 175 
 
 The Church becomes worthless for its higher purpose when it deals 
 with conditions and forgets character, relieves misery and ignores sin, 
 pleads for justice and undervalues forgiveness. The Church stands 
 forever for the two-world theory of life. The Church's doors open 
 upon the common levels of life. They should never be closed. Its 
 windows open toward the skies. Let their light not be darkened. The 
 Church is not an end in itself. The services of the Church become 
 subordinate to the Church's services to men. 
 
 At no time have the disadvantages of the sectarian divisions of the 
 Church been more apparent than when the call has come for a common 
 policy or a united utterance concerning such problems as modern in- 
 dustry now presents. This Federal Council may find some method 
 for bringing the Protestant Christianity of America into relations of 
 closer sympathy and more effective helpfulness with the toiling millions 
 of our land. The Church does not stand for the present social order, 
 but only for so much of it as accords with the principles laid down by 
 Jesus Christ. The Federal Council places upon record its profound 
 belief that the complex problems of modem industry can be interpreted 
 and solved only by the teachings of the New Testament, and that Jesus 
 Christ is the final authority in the social as in the individual life. The 
 Church now confronts the most significant crisis and the greatest oppor- 
 tunity of its long career. We recognize the complex nature of industrial 
 obligations, affecting employer and employe, society and government, 
 rich and poor, and most earnestly counsel tolerance, patience and mu- 
 tual confidence \ we do not defend or excuse wrongdoing in high places 
 or in low, nor purpose to adapt the ethical standards of the Gospel to 
 the exigencies of commerce or the codes of a confused industrial 
 system. 
 
 We deem it the duty of all Christian people to concern themselves 
 directly with certain practical industrial problems. To us it seems that 
 the churches must stand for equal rights and complete justice for all 
 men in all stations of life j for the right of all men to the opportunity 
 for self -maintenance, a right ever to be wisely and strongly safeguarded 
 against encroachments of every kind ; for the right of workers to some 
 protection against the hardships often resulting from the swift crises of 
 industrial change ; for the principle of conciliation and arbitration in 
 industrial dissensions ; for the protection of the worker from dangerous 
 machinery, occupational disease, injuries and mortality ; for the aboli- 
 tion of child labor ; for such regulation of the conditions of toil for 
 women as shall safeguard the physical and moral health of the commu- 
 nity ; for the suppression of the sweating system ; for the gradual and 
 
 (-49) 
 
176 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 reasonable reduction of the hours of labor to the lowest practicable 
 point, and for that degree of leisure for all which is a condition of the 
 highest human life ; for a release from employment one day in seven ; 
 for a living wage as a minimum in every industry , and for the highest 
 wage that each industry can afford ; for the most equitable division of 
 the products of industry that can ultimately be devised ; for suitable 
 provision for the old age of the workers and for those incapacitated 
 by injury ; for the abatement of poverty. 
 
 While this social or industrial creed of the churches relates 
 mainly to the problems of industry, it is thus far a significant 
 indication of the attitude to which the Christian church is 
 coming, with relation to all the questions of the social order. 
 In the carrying out of these principles a national office of the 
 commission, in association with the Federal Council, has become 
 a center for information, inspiration and guidance in the social 
 work of the churches. 
 
 Through interdenominational action, the commission will 
 bring about coordination and cooperation among the denomina- 
 tions composing the Federal Council, including, so far as may 
 be possible, the adoption of a common program, the use of 
 common literature and the presentation of the united appeal of 
 the gospel in its application to social problems and opportunities. 
 Through this interdenominational cooperation will come the 
 development of this aspect of the work of the churches, the 
 education of the ministry and the churches for it, and the 
 equipment of the churches for carrying it forward. 
 
 One of the most important matters in relation to the whole 
 problem is that of the preparation of the ministers to meet these 
 great tasks. Representing the churches of the Federal Council, 
 the commission will cooperate with the theological seminaries, 
 so far as it is invited and permitted, in the formulation of a 
 policy with regard to instruction and practical training in this 
 important subject. 
 
 While on the one hand our ministers have not been altogether 
 prepared in the theological seminaries for this work, it is perhaps 
 equally true that our social workers have gone out without 
 adequate training as to their relations with the Christian church. 
 
 (650) 
 
No. 4] SOCIAL PROGRAM OF THE CHURCHES \ 77 
 
 Therefore the same cooperation should obtain with the various 
 schools for the preparation of social workers, that they, upon 
 their side, may also come into a proper working relation with 
 the Christian churches. 
 
 The instruction in social sciences and ethics in our colleges 
 and universities, imparted to young men and women who will be 
 leaders of the church life of the nation, will be the subject of 
 investigation and mutual consideration, through conferences and 
 inquiry. 
 
 The relation of the churches to the multitude of agencies for 
 social reform and betterment is an important problem before 
 the commission. Its influence, together with that of the de- 
 nominations and churches which it represents, will be brought 
 to cooperate, so far as possible, with such societies and move- 
 ments, in relation especially to those measures which affect the 
 moral and spiritual welfare of the people. This will include 
 such matters as child and woman labor, occupational disease, 
 Sunday labor, seven-day labor, the reduction of hours, the 
 betterment of wages, health, housing conditions, vice and crime, 
 and many other similar questions, including both social wrong 
 and social wrongs, social righteousness and social rights. The 
 relations between local charity organizations, social settlements 
 and similar local work will be taken up and considered, by con- 
 ference and inquiry, from the viewpoint of the churches. 
 
 Few people have realized the extent to which our home 
 mission work involves social problems and includes the work of 
 social organization. Indeed, the churches in home mission 
 fields are often, if not generally, the initiators of the social and 
 community institutions. This work will be studied, encouraged 
 and developed. This commission and the home mission com- 
 mittee will work in cooperation to that end. In the foreign 
 mission field also, this branch of Christian service has in some 
 cases developed more fully than in our own land, especially in 
 industrial, medical and educational work, which has lifted for- 
 eign nations to a higher social level. This work will be made 
 the subject of careful research and continued development, by 
 a working relation between the commission and the committee 
 on foreign missions. 
 
 (651) 
 
178 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 By the constant issuing of literature in leaflets and handbooks 
 for serious study, and the use of the religious, daily and weekly 
 press, the growing accumulation of material relating to social up- 
 lift and social causes will be put into shape so as to be used by 
 the churches for education and incitement to service. Authors 
 are now being found for a series of handbooks of a popular 
 nature, to be placed in the hands of pastors for use in church 
 classes. 
 
 The labor and trade journals are receiving bulletins informing 
 industrial workers and managers of the deepening interest of 
 the church in their common problems and duty. 
 
 Lists of speakers, lecturers and instructors are being pre- 
 pared, and a lantern-slide bureau is being established and de- 
 veloped. The commission will confer with labor representatives 
 and will send its delegates to their gatherings. Similarly it will 
 confer with groups of business men and send delegates to their 
 gatherings. It will confer in joint meetings of both of these 
 groups in modern industry and issue its challenge to both of 
 them to unite with the church in a common service. The 
 secretary of the commission is a fraternal delegate to the 
 American Federation of Labor. 
 
 Investigations will be made in various large and important 
 industries, similar to the investigation of the steel industry by a 
 special committee of the commission in 19 10. Similar investi- 
 gations in local communities will be made through pastors and 
 other local agents. A report of such an investigation by a 
 committee which spent several days on the ground has just 
 been issued concerning the industrial situation at Muscatine, 
 Iowa. 
 
 A nation-wide campaign is being carried on, endeavoring to 
 cover all the states of the union, to secure one day's rest in 
 seven for industrial workers. Committees in the various states 
 are now being organized and the various forces brought to- 
 gether to this end. 
 
 The commission will continue to encourage the observance 
 of Labor Sunday in the pulpits and by the churches of the 
 nation. Last year thousands of pulpits carried out a program 
 prepared by the commission, in many cases union services 
 
 (652) 
 
No. 4] SOCIAL PROGRAM OF THE CHURCHES \ 79 
 
 being held, at which a large number of the churches of the 
 cities came together. 
 
 More recent activities of the commission have been in relation 
 to the Men and Religion Forward Movement. It now has the 
 task of assisting in the conservation of the social-service work 
 that has been begun in the various cities through the agency of 
 this great movement. For this work a comprehensive program 
 has been sent out to all the cities of the nation. A conference 
 on this subject will be held at Silver Bay in June. 
 
 Under the combined auspices of the Commission and other 
 agencies in the Federal Council a beginning has been made 
 toward coordinating the churches and religious agencies which 
 offer leadership in the work of rural betterment. An endeavor 
 will be made to provide bibliographies for the aid of rural 
 helpers, instruction as to social surveys by local churches, pro- 
 grams for community service for country and rural churches, 
 and a bureau for public service, relating to all rural studies, 
 methods and problems. In addition to these efforts, the com- 
 mission will stand ready to take up any special social task that 
 may fall to its lot. 
 
 The work of this commission must be done mainly through 
 the various denominational agencies, and for this purpose a 
 cabinet has been formed of the secretaries or other representa- 
 tives of the various denominational commissions on social 
 service. 
 
 The hterature of the commission is assuming large propor- 
 tions, and in addition to this the various denominational com- 
 missions are already providing the churches under their re- 
 spective care with definite, concrete programs for the social 
 work of churches or parishes. 
 
 At a conference held in Chicago in November 191 1 repre- 
 sentatives of seventeen denominations adopted this general 
 program of the Federal Council commission and voted to enter 
 into a working relation to carry it out. It looks as though in 
 this great task which is before the church at the present 
 moment she would move as one body ; and it may be said that 
 there has been no more potent agency in bringing about Chris- 
 tian unity than this task of social service. 
 
 (653) 
 
CITY-PLANNING IN NEW YORK CITY— HOW ALL CAN 
 
 COOPERATE 
 
 GEORGE B. FORD 
 Lecturer on City-Planning, Columbia University; City-Planning Expert, Newark, N. J. 
 
 CITY-PLANNING as a science is of recent origin, but city- 
 planning, such as it was, began with the first streets and 
 the first docks laid out by the original Dutch settlers in 
 New York. For the first two centuries of its existence the plan 
 of New York developed in a haphazard manner ; it followed the 
 demands of immediate convenience. It was not until 1807, 
 when a few optimistic men laid out a street plan for all the rest 
 of Manhattan Island, that any thought was taken for the future 
 of the city. The great mass of the public thought the men who 
 designed this plan absolutely crazy in imagining that New York 
 would ever grow to such a size ; however, this plan has been 
 followed above Fourth street and it is substantially our present 
 gridiron scheme. As water transportation was of primary im- 
 portance in those days, and as no one foresaw the changes 
 which would be brought about by the application of steam and 
 electricity to transportation, the whole street layout was based 
 on the idea of the maximum amount of intercourse between the 
 two waterfronts and a minimum amount of movement the 
 length of the island. In the Hght of our present knowledge 
 this arrangement should have been exactly reversed, and the 
 long city blocks should have run north and south instead of east 
 and west. 
 
 A few squares and small parks were sprinkled over this plan, 
 but no large park was provided for until Central Park was set 
 apart and laid out in 1858; then followed Prospect Park and 
 much later the Bronx parks. Morningside Park, the Speedway, 
 Riverside Drive with its extensions. Forest Park and other 
 smaller ones followed in due time ; while latterly we have the 
 new Coney Island and Rockaway reservations. These parks 
 have been the greatest boon to New York city ; they have been 
 
 (654) 
 
CITY-PLANNING IN NEW YORK CITY i8i 
 
 aptly described as the " lungs " of the city. They have had a 
 marked effect on its healthfulness and enjoyableness ; they have 
 been of particular benefit to the children. Furthermore, they 
 are among the most beautiful parks in the country. 
 
 New York has done much, too, in the way of playgrounds. 
 The playground movement, to be sure, has been of compar- 
 atively recent origin, the principal development being within 
 the last ten years ; and while there are a number of well- 
 equipped and well-managed playgrounds in the crowded portions 
 of the city, they are quite inadequate in size or number for the 
 needs of the community. The difficulty is that land costs so 
 much now in congested districts that anything like an adequate 
 acquisition of space for public playgrounds becomes impossible. 
 The recreation piers have done something to solve the difficulty, 
 but it remains so to plan the outlying districts that the mistakes 
 of the past may be avoided in the future. 
 
 New systems of streets are being laid out all the time ; not 
 only is the whole street layout of 1807 solidly built up, but the 
 same congestion extends into large areas of Brooklyn and the 
 Bronx, and is even beginning to extend into Queens and Rich- 
 mond. Each of the five boroughs has its own topographical 
 department or bureau of surveys, which is constantly laying out 
 new streets. Over all the bureaus is the engineering depart- 
 ment of the board of estimate and apportionment, which is try- 
 ing valiantly to unify the whole street development of the city. 
 Owing to the powerlessness of the city to control private sub- 
 divisions, it is most difficult to work out an ideal general plan 
 for the five boroughs. Attempts are being made to study this 
 problem in a scientific way, particularly in the Borough of 
 Manhattan, but this work receives very little support from the 
 pubHc, on account of a lack of understanding of its great 
 advantages. 
 
 The transit problem is at present much before the public. 
 We already have in our street cars, elevated railroads and sub- 
 ways an interesting and earnest attempt to solve this problem ; 
 the new routes now being laid out will do a great deal more 
 toward rounding out the transit system of New York. A great 
 deal remains to be done, however, and this can be done only 
 
 (655) 
 
1 82 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 when the general public awakes to a realization of the impor- 
 tance of the subject. 
 
 In its dock development New York is very fortunate. In 
 Manhattan, in particular, the city owns nearly ninety per cent of 
 the waterfront, and can thereby control its future development. 
 It is greatly to be regretted that it does not have a similar con- 
 trol over the waterfront in the other boroughs. It has in the 
 privately owned Bush Terminal in Brooklyn the best example in 
 America of a scientifically developed port scheme. The effi- 
 cient and economical relation here between the piers, the sheds, 
 the factories and the dwellings with their intercommunicating 
 railways and sidings are most worthy of careful study. The 
 present dock commissioner. Honorable Calvin Tomkins, has 
 presented many good schemes for the scientific use and devel- 
 opment of the city's waterfront. No unsupported public offi- 
 cial, however, can carry through such plans. 
 
 The railways are continually making progress in the solution 
 of the problem of the transportation of goods into and out of 
 the city and between different parts of the city, but they are 
 greatly hampered by lack of understanding and cooperation on 
 the part of the general public and thereby of the city. There 
 is an enormous amount of time, energy and money wasted in 
 New York by lack of adequate and scientifically placed and 
 planned freight terminals and connections. The problems of 
 what to do with the lower west side of Manhattan and how to 
 take care of the new industrial development in the Bronx are 
 problems of vital importance affecting the whole question of the 
 high cost of living, yet little is done to help bring about a 
 solution. 
 
 In the transportation of people in and out of the city by the 
 railways we have another great and important problem, one on 
 which an enormous amount of money has recently been spent 
 by roads like the New York Central and the Pennsylvania; yet 
 in the latter case in particular the city has done practically noth- 
 ing to cooperate. Again, public understanding and cooperation 
 are of the greatest importance. 
 
 In housing there has grown up in New York city a set of 
 conditions practically unique ; the five and six-story tenement 
 
 (656) 
 
No. 4] CITY-PLANNING IN NEW YORK CITY 183 
 
 covering seventy per cent of a lot one hundred feet deep is 
 almost exclusively a New York problem. Many attempts have 
 been made to solve this, most important of which was the work 
 of the tenement-house committee, resulting in the tenement- 
 house law adopted about ten years ago. This law, while far 
 from ideal, was a splendid achievement under the conditions 
 then existing and it has vastly bettered conditions. On the 
 island of Manhattan, further improvement of housing conditions 
 is extremely difficult ; already there are large sections of the 
 Bronx and Brooklyn to which the same statement applies; 
 attention should be concentrated on the areas as yet uncon- 
 gested. A popular appreciation of the evils of congestion is of 
 the greatest importance. Once the matter is understood it will 
 be much easier to bring the public to cooperate in demanding 
 a solution of the housing problem by scattering the dwellings 
 of the people over a larger area with a correspondingly de- 
 creased density per acre. Obviously people must live within 
 easy walking distance of their work or else the means of transit 
 between the places where they work and those where they live 
 must be quick, cheap, safe and comfortable. As transit is fast 
 reaching its efficient limit, it remains to concentrate on bringing 
 the work out to the people ; this means offering inducements in 
 the way of good waterfront and freight-handling facilities in the 
 outlying districts. A general provision of such facilities can be 
 secured only by an intelligent and general popular demand. 
 
 Together with this problem of housing comes that of markets, 
 schools, libraries, gymnasiums and baths. Popular interest and 
 demand has brought about a wise and fairly adequate disposition 
 of schools and libraries; the public has not yet awakened to 
 the corresponding necessity for a proper distribution of markets, 
 baths, and gymnasiums. A limited number of baths and 
 gymnasiums exist in Manhattan ; the other boroughs are suffer- 
 ing badly from the lack of them ; only in the Bronx has the 
 question of markets been agitated to any extent. 
 
 Civic centers as formally designed groups do not exist in 
 New York. Within the last few years, however, the question of 
 civic centers has been strongly agitated. This has resulted, in 
 Manhattan, in the acceptance of a scheme for a civic center 
 
 (657) 
 
1 84 ORGANIZAIION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 about the present city hall. With a view to unifying the 
 scheme, however, the location of the new municipal building is 
 most unfortunate. An attempt to unify the present Brooklyn 
 system about the Borough Hall is also a distinct step in 
 advance ; as is also the recent suggestion for a civic group in 
 connection with the present Borough Hall in Richmond. In 
 Columbia University, with its surrounding educational buildings, 
 we have a real educational center. Aside from these groups, 
 however, the gain in efficiency and beauty wherever civic build- 
 ings are grouped can be seen from many examples both in this 
 country and abroad. It is desirable that the public should be- 
 come acquainted with these facts so that they can demand 
 results along these lines. 
 
 In the various features of water supply, sewage disposal, 
 garbage and refuse collecting, and street cleaning. New York 
 compares well with other cities, but except in the matter of 
 water supply it has many possibilities of improvement. The 
 public in general is indifferent. While this indifference remains, 
 improvement is not likely to progress much more rapidly than 
 it now does ; and yet new problems are arising due to the very 
 vastness of the undertakings in New York which imperatively 
 demand radical changes, particularly in sewage disposal. 
 
 In the details of the architectural and landscape settings of 
 the streets, parks, and open places, the city is making good 
 progress, particularly in its street lighting and street signposts ; 
 but in the use of street trees, in the decorative handling of 
 street signs, and in the use of other such accessories as letter 
 boxes, hydrants, statues, public comfort stations, subway 
 entrances, elevated structures and water-troughs there is much 
 room for improvement. Here again popular demand is needed. 
 In its bridges and approaches the city has been reasonably 
 fortunate. The existence of the Municipal Art Commission 
 has helped materially toward getting good results in all these 
 public structures, but owing to lack of popular support the work 
 of the commission has been far more difficult than it should be. 
 
 In methods of taxation and assessment with a view to carry- 
 ing out public improvements New York city compares favorably 
 with other communities both here and abroad. It is noteworthy 
 
 (658) 
 
No. 4] CITY-PLANNING IN NEW YORK CITY 185 
 
 in this connection that a committee of the board of estimate and 
 apportionment is considering the question of new sources of 
 revenue for the city. The separating of assessments on land 
 and on improvements, the annual or biennial re-assessment of 
 property and the assessment of a betterment tax on the im- 
 mediate abutters on new improvements are changes of great value 
 to the city. The methods of taxation and the restrictions on 
 the use of land in other cities, however, should be seriously 
 considered here : such are the unearned-increment tax, excess- 
 condemnation laws, zoning, districting, regulating the height 
 and character of buildings. 
 
 Interest in city planning in general in New York has been 
 of slow growth, particularly as compared with other cities of the 
 country. The Pendleton commission appointed by the Mayor 
 about ten years ago handed in an elaborate report dealing 
 principally with the creation of new diagonal avenues in Man- 
 hattan and Brooklyn, the improvement of the bridge approaches, 
 the designing of civic centers and the extension of the park 
 system. Considering the state of the science of city-planning 
 at that time, their reports compared very favorably with those 
 of other cities. Very few of their suggestions have been 
 carried into effect, however, because few of them were based on 
 a scientific analysis of prevailing conditions. In other words, 
 the modern business man, with his common-sense ideas of 
 efficiency, found these plans to be impractical. 
 
 More recently, the Fifth Avenue Association in Manhattan 
 and the Brooklyn city-planning committee have been conduct- 
 ing an active campaign toward civic improvement, particularly 
 along the line of the *' City Beautiful." 
 
 The Municipal Art Commission, founded and backed by the 
 Municipal Art Society, has had a marked effect upon the 
 standards of civic architecture. The Mayor's Congestion Com- 
 mission of 1 9 10 and 191 1, for whose establishment the New 
 York Congestion Committee may claim credit, has accomplished 
 a great work in giving publicity to the economic and social evils 
 occasioned by overcrowding in New York City ; it has done 
 much toward arousing the general public and the city officials 
 to a feeling of social responsibility, particularly in civic matters. 
 
 (659) 
 
1 86 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 As a result of all these movements there has been a growing 
 demand of late for a city-planning commission for the whole of 
 New York city, similar in functions and powers to those existing 
 in other cities. Opposition on the part of the various borough 
 presidents who have been afraid that the creation of such a 
 commission would deprive them of some of their jealously 
 guarded prerogatives has prevented this matter from coming 
 to a head. 
 
 There is a vital need of such a commission ; the problems 
 which confront New York city are becoming more and more 
 involved every day; each of the city departments is going 
 ahead and trying to solve its individual problems as best it 
 knows how. Even where a favorable disposition exists, it is 
 extremely difficult for any one department to cooperate with 
 the others ; very few of the department heads have the time, 
 money, or breadth of vision to attempt to solve their problems 
 in relation to the needs of the city as a whole. The suggestions 
 that are being propounded now by the dock department, ad- 
 mirable as they are in themselves, may be distinctly detrimental 
 to the best interests of the city as a whole, in running counter 
 to its needs from the standpoints of housing, recreation, transit 
 or manufacturing. Plans now being proposed for transit im- 
 provement may run counter to the best interests of the city in 
 its commercial, manufacturing and housing development. It is 
 imperative to-day that a commission be appointed to correlate 
 and unify all these different phases of the city's development. 
 Such a commission should consist of men representing all that 
 is best in breadth of vision, variety of point of view and practical 
 common sense — men in whom the public can have confidence. 
 
 Such a commission will be secured in only one way, and that 
 is by educating the public to the needs of city-planning in its 
 broadest sense, and thus creating an irresistible demand for 
 action. This education will come about only by the coopera- 
 tion of all the civic, social, esthetic, legal, political and religious 
 bodies of the city. It means that in all such associations, 
 societies, clubs or other groups, active committees should be 
 formed to work continuously, in season and out, to spread the 
 propaganda of city planning. This can be done by circularizing, 
 
 (660) 
 
No. 4] CITY-PLANNING IN NE W YORK CITY 1 8 7 
 
 lectures, exhibitions, and personal work. Each body may 
 emphasize that phase of the general subject which more par- 
 ticularly affects its interests, but in every case the relation of 
 this particular phase to all the other aspects of the subject 
 should be kept constantly in mind. 
 
 City-planning as a subject is becoming of greater importance 
 every year. Within a comparatively short time, it is going to 
 be one of the most important questions before the public. It 
 affects all sides of life. It affects vitally every man, woman 
 and child. It is the part of far-sighted wisdom to take up the 
 subject of city-planning with promptness and zeal. 
 
 (661) 
 
HOUSING NEEDS ^ 
 
 LAWRENCE VEILLER 
 Director, New York Tenement House Committee 
 
 NEW YORK has devoted more effort to housing reform 
 than any other city in America; notwithstanding this, 
 its needs to-day are greater than those of any other 
 American city. That is due to the magnitude of the problem ; 
 for New York has over 100,000 separate tenement houses, 
 whereas in most American cities the tenement house is the 
 exception rather than the rule. The outlook in the city is dis- 
 tinctly encouraging. The present-day tenement house, built 
 under the existing law, is the best type of structure in the city 
 of New York. In fact it is the only kind of building except 
 theaters which has the safeguards that we have been taught to 
 believe essential for the preservation of life, health and morality. 
 The one-family house has not these safeguards, nor has the 
 two-family house. The Asch building fire called attention forci- 
 bly to the fact that lofts, factories and office buildings lack these 
 safeguards. The tenement house as built to-day comes nearest 
 of any building to being properly protected, but it is still very 
 inadequate in many particulars. 
 
 From the ideal point of view New York's greatest housing 
 need is a thorough revision of the tenement-house law. That 
 is a difficult thing to bring about. It would be advantageous if 
 we could materially increase the minimum width of courts, not 
 the inner court, 24 feet wide, but the narrower one, only six 
 feet and six inches. Similarly, it is highly desirable to increase 
 the size of the back yard to allow more light at the rear of the 
 building ; but it is practically impossible to do it by law. Un- 
 less we wait until the time is ripe, changes in the law are likely 
 to mean not progress, but retrogression. The legislative game 
 is a dangerous one. 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 18, 1912. 
 
 (662) 
 
HOUSING NEEDS 1 89 
 
 The next need is the regulation of houses other than tene- 
 ments. A dark inner bedroom in a two-family house is just as 
 dangerous from the point of view of tuberculosis as one in a 
 three or four-family house. The two-family houses which are 
 building in the outskirts of our city are practically unregulated. 
 They may have no yards, no windows, no toilet facilities and no 
 running water ; rooms may be as small as the builder wishes to 
 make them, and absolutely dark ; of all the safeguards thrown 
 around the tenement dweller, none is provided in the two or 
 one-family house. In many of our progressive western cities, 
 on the other hand, the housing laws apply to the one and two- 
 family houses, and the same requirement should be made in 
 Greater New York. The great field of building operations of 
 residence building is in Queens and in the Bronx. This is often 
 forgotten by residents of Manhattan ; actually more theaters than 
 private residences were built in the borough of Manhattan last 
 year. The far-sighted student, however, will look to the future 
 of the outlying boroughs. 
 
 Much can be done in improving the enforcement of the ten- 
 ement house law, by cooperation with the tenement-house 
 department, which is doing admirable work. It is important to 
 find out the facts and get at the view of the public official, to 
 see the limitations under which he is working, and give him due 
 credit for the good work he has done as well as to hold him 
 responsible for poor work. 
 
 Another housing need is the education of tenants. The 
 great mass of tenement-house dwellers in New York cit>^ need 
 to be taught how to live. A large part of the housing evils in 
 American cities are due to the people themselves, to their 
 ignorance, their lack of leisure time and their undue hours of 
 labor. These all make it easy to fall into bad habits of living. 
 Similarly the landlords and builders ought to be educated. 
 That is a much more difficult task than the education of tenants, 
 and yet it is not a hopeless one. The height of buildings ought 
 to be regulated, and especially the erection of high buildings 
 ought to be checked in the outlying districts of the city. There 
 are large stretches in Queens and Richmond and the Bronx, 
 nothing more than farm land, amid which five and six-story 
 
 (663) 
 
190 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 tenement houses are going up. That should be restricted by 
 law. It is serious not only for tenants in the outlying districts, 
 but even for the business sections of the city. People in gen- 
 eral are beginning to realize that unregulated building is not a 
 wise thing for them, for their investment or for the community. 
 
 New York is doing little about city-planning. Many of the 
 housing evils in this city have been due to the lot lOO feet deep, 
 no matter what its width. Yet we are cutting up farm land and 
 acreage to-day and making it into lots 20 feet by 120 and 100 
 feet. That is happening all over America, and it is preparing 
 trouble for future generations. It could all be obviated by a 
 wise study of the possibilities of the small lot of shallow depth, 
 and sometimes of narrow width. 
 
 As to room overcrowding, no city in America has ever done 
 anything. Some persons believe that it affects this community 
 more than any other evil, but we have no data to warrant any 
 definite conclusion. 
 
 Notwithstanding all these needs New York is strongly to be 
 commended for having done so much. She has done more in 
 the last ten years in the cause of housing reform than any other 
 city in the world has done in the same length of time, and more 
 than any other American city is doing to-day. 
 
 (664) 
 
THE PROTECTION OF FACTORY WORKERS' 
 
 GEORGE M. PRICE, M. D. 
 State Factory Investigating Commission 
 
 THE interpretation of the term *' protection of factory 
 workers " has undergone great changes since first the 
 need of such protection became evident. It is in- 
 teresting to trace the various stages in the evolution of this 
 idea from its birth until the present time. 
 
 The first theoretical impulse was given by the epoch-making 
 treatise of Rammazzini On the Diseases of the ArtizanSy pub- 
 lished at the end of the seventeenth century and translated into 
 EngHsh in 1705. In this book we first find a description of 
 various diseases of occupations and a statement of the need for 
 the protection of the worker from these diseases. Forty years 
 later appeared the work of Dr. Pringle On the Diseases of the 
 Army, followed in 1753 by Dr. Lind's On the Means of Pre- 
 serving the Health of the Seamen and by Dr. Blane's Observa- 
 tions on the Diseases of the Seamen, published in 1785. 
 
 Almost simultaneously with the birth of the modern factory 
 system in the latter part of the eighteenth century came philan- 
 thropic efforts to protect workers from the abuses of this 
 system. The agitations of Hanway, Dr. Percival, Dr. Ferriar, 
 and a host of others, — the forefathers of the present child-labor 
 committees, so to speak, bore fruit in the enactment in 1802 of 
 the first factory act protecting the health of children working 
 in cotton factories. The history of the progress of labor legis- 
 lation and of enactments for the protection of factory workers 
 since 1802 is replete with interest, but cannot be discussed 
 here. Beginning with the protection of pauper child-appren- 
 tices in cotton factories, protection has gradually been ex- 
 tended until it now comprehends various conditions of the life 
 and labor of the whole working class. 
 
 ^ Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April i8, 1912. 
 
 (665) 
 
192 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 It is interesting to analyze the protection of factory workers 
 as it is found at present in civilized countries. The measures 
 fall broadly into five classes which may be sub-divided as 
 follows : 
 
 1. The Worker 
 
 (a) Age. 
 
 Limitation, restriction and prohibition of child work. 
 
 (b) Sex. 
 
 Limitation, restriction and prohibition of woman's 
 work. 
 
 (c) Industrial education. 
 
 (d) Vocational guidance. 
 
 2. Working Conditions 
 
 (a) Wages. 
 
 (b) Hours of labor. 
 
 (c) Conditions of labor. 
 
 3. The Workshop 
 
 (a) Construction. 
 
 (b) Fire protection. 
 
 (c) Light and illumination. 
 
 (d) Ventilation. 
 
 (e) Sanitary care. 
 
 (f) Sanitary comforts. 
 
 4. Dangers of Occupation 
 
 (a) Safeguarding of machinery. 
 
 (b) Dusty trades. 
 
 (c) Industrial poisons, gases and fumes. 
 
 (d) Infectious materials and extra-hazardous labor. 
 
 5. Social Protection 
 
 (a) Right of labor organization. 
 
 (b) Housing of the working classes. 
 
 (c) Prevention of accident; accident insurance. 
 
 (d) Prevention of unemployment; unemployment in- 
 
 surance. 
 
 (e) Prevention of sickness; sickness insurance. 
 
 (f) Prevention of excessive industrial mortality; industrial 
 mortality insurance. 
 
 (666) 
 
No. 4] PROTECTION OF FACTORY WORKERS 193 
 
 The agencies for the protection of factory workers are many 
 and various. These agencies rarely take in the whole range of 
 the work, but limit themselves to one or more of the divisions 
 of labor protection enumerated above. These several agencies 
 can be classified as follows : 
 
 (i) Philanthropic organizations. 
 
 (2) Employers. 
 
 (3) Labor organizations. 
 
 (4) The state. 
 
 (5) The industry. 
 
 ( 1 ) The number of philanthropic organizations started from 
 time to time with the purpose of agitating for the protection of 
 factory workers is large. As already mentioned, the rise of the 
 humanitarian spirit dates far back to the end of the seventeenth 
 century. As a rule the specific phases of protection which 
 philanthropic bodies take up are child labor and woman's work. 
 
 (2) As far as the protection of workers by employers 
 themselves is concerned, since the time of Robert Owen there 
 have been a large number of enlightened and liberal employers 
 who have endeavored to introduce better conditions into their 
 industrial establishments and to ameliorate the condition of the 
 workers in their employ. In most cases this protection has 
 been in the form of improved sanitary conditions of factories, 
 and in certain limitations of hours of labor. 
 
 (3) The protection of factory workers by labor organizations 
 has been mostly in the increase of wages and in the lessening of 
 the hours of labor. 
 
 (4) The protection which factory workers receive from the 
 state is usually a result, on the one hand, of the agitation of 
 philanthropic bodies, and on the other hand, of the increasing 
 demands of labor organizations, which are often endorsed by 
 enlightened employers. 
 
 The forms of protection by the state are many and embody 
 practically all the measures enumerated above. Much pressure 
 must be brought upon legislative bodies and much agitation 
 must be carried on before the state exerts its powers. The 
 protection of factory workers depends naturally upon the defi- 
 niteness and lucidity of the laws, and upon the creation of 
 proper and intelligent organizations for enforcing them. 
 
 (667) 
 
194 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 ( 5 ) The protection of the workers by the industry seems to 
 be an ideal method, but is practical only when the components 
 of the industry — the employers, the employes and the con- 
 suming public — are educated to a point where their interests 
 may be mutually combined and protected by one another. 
 This is really an intelligent cooperation of the three principal 
 partners in an industry, and would afford the best protection for 
 the employes and the industry, especially if such protection 
 were conducted with the cooperation of the state. 
 
 I wish in no wise to belittle the efforts and the work of any 
 institutions or organizations for the protection of factory workers, 
 but it seems to me that the time has arrived when such pro- 
 tection is largely to be entrusted to the industry itself, working 
 cooperatively with the other legitimate protective agencies. 
 
 My suggestions, therefore, to this end are : 
 
 To form a closer cooperation between the various agencies 
 for the protection of workers, including a centralization and 
 unification of philanthropic bodies and their cooperation with 
 labor organizations and industrial societies. 
 
 To compel industrial employers to be responsible, in coopera- 
 tion with the state, for the protection of their workers. 
 
 Such a general concentration of forces on the improvement 
 of industrial conditions would inevitably result in a more pro- 
 gressive system of protection for workers than we now have. 
 
 (668) 
 
THE EDUCATION OF MOTHERS AND THE SAVING 
 OF BABIES^ 
 
 PHILIP VAN INGEN, M. D. 
 Medical Director, New York Milk Committee 
 
 THE subject of infant mortality is too well known to you 
 all to require many words from me. I wish merely to 
 emphasize one or two facts which have a direct bearing 
 on my subject. In a general way 25^ of the deaths of children 
 under one year of age belong to that class vaguely called *' wast- 
 ing diseases " by the English, or equally vaguely ** congenital 
 debility and malnutrition " in our country. To this latter group 
 belong deaths which we ascribe to marasmus, prematurity, con- 
 genital debility, and so forth, thus clothing our ignorance in 
 high-sounding terms. It is generally admitted that we can or 
 ought to be able to prevent a large number of these deaths. 
 
 The keynote of modern medical and philanthropic effort is 
 prevention. It is strange how slow we have been to apply pre- 
 ventive methods to the problem of infant mortality. Dispens- 
 aries and hospitals do a much-needed work, but comparatively 
 speaking their preventive work is, or has been till lately, far 
 from efficient. 
 
 The causes of infant mortality are many and varied. Practi- 
 cally all the great social questions of to-day have a direct relation 
 to the problem, but in the last analysis the great underlying 
 causes are poverty and ignorance. Poverty is a problem we 
 always have. Its effect upon a baby's chance to live will per- 
 haps always exist to a certain extent ; but ignorance — and many 
 things laid to poverty really should be laid in large part to 
 ignorance — we can fight, prevent and cure. 
 
 In Greater New York during the last few years the idea of 
 instruction has been coming more and more to the front, and it 
 is my belief, and that of the New York Milk Committee, whom 
 
 1 Read at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April 18, 1912. 
 
 (669) 
 
196 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 I represent, that the instruction of the mother is our most valu- 
 able weapon in preventing the waste of baby lives. It is 
 within the reach of all organizations or groups trying to better 
 conditions in their localities. 
 
 The New York Milk Committee was one of a number of 
 organizations to carry on last summer a vigorous campaign of 
 education through milk stations. The keynote of the campaign 
 was educational prevention of sickness through contact of mother 
 and baby with nurse and physician. The necessity of maternal 
 nursing was preached faithfully. Of 2,132 babies under obser- 
 vation between June ist and September 15th, 32.4^ were 
 breast-fed throughout. For those already weaned, or for whom 
 breast feeding was impossible, pure milk was provided — not 
 already prepared for the baby, but whole milk. The mother 
 was taught at her home by the nurse to prepare the milk her- 
 self according to the physician's orders. So important did we 
 consider this instruction that milk was refused unless mothers 
 attended consultations at the stations regularly and carried out 
 instructions. 
 
 But though this work was a most valuable one, it was found 
 when we tabulated our statistics that only about 2 ^ of our 
 babies were under two months of age, while about one-third of 
 all baby deaths occur in the first month of life. We were still 
 more impressed with the fact that to do our work we must get 
 at those babies. I say still more, because we had already been 
 working on these lines. Through the assistance of Dr. Hart of 
 the Russell Sage Foundation we had been able to put one nurse 
 on expectant mother work, and very soon had to add another. 
 
 The figures given for total deaths under one year in New 
 York city for 191 1 were 15,030, exclusive of still births. Still 
 births totaled 6,378. In France statistics show that pregnancy 
 lasts 20 days longer among women keeping moderately quiet 
 during the latter months ; that children of women carrying on 
 tiring work weigh about 220 grams (about 6 ounces) less than 
 those doing moderate work ; that the children of women keep- 
 ing moderately quiet during the last two or three months of 
 pregnancy weigh 300 grams (about 9 ounces) more than the 
 children of those who work up to the last minute. In other 
 words, the babies have a better start in life. 
 
 (670) 
 
No. 4] THE SAVING OF BABIES 197 
 
 In France the Mutiialite Maternelle, which has spread all 
 over the country, gives a small indemnity to pregnant women, 
 allowing them to keep quiet during the last weeks of pregnancy 
 and after labor, so that they can nurse their babies. In the 
 Paris society in 1903, 12.8^ of all pregnancies resulted in still 
 births or miscarriages. In 1904 there were only 7.5^; in 1905, 
 6.7^\ and in 1906, 4.5^. 
 
 In the summer of 191 1 our nurses came into contact with 
 nearly 1,000 expectant mothers. Five hundred of these have 
 since been confined. Four of the babies were still born and 
 there were three miscarriages. Eight babies died during the 
 first month of life. In New York city about 2^0 (or 4.7^) of 
 all pregnancies were reported as ending in still birth. Early 
 miscarriages in all probability would not be included in these 
 figures, as they would not be reported. Among our 500 cases, 
 counting both still births and miscarriages, the figure is 1.4^. 
 Roughly speaking, 41.3 per thousand babies born in New York 
 city died under one month of age; among our babies, 16 per 
 thousand. 
 
 The plan already being carried out, and very shortly to be 
 greatly extended, is as follows : A nurse specially trained for 
 her work is detailed to a definite district. Through cooperation 
 with milk stations, dispensaries, and various social organizations, 
 she gets into touch with expectant mothers. The effort is made 
 to do so as early in pregnancy as possible. The family condi- 
 tions are estimated by one or more visits to the home. The 
 advice given is not cut-and-dried, but is adapted to the in- 
 dividual needs and possibilities in the case. If it is a first baby, 
 the mother is urged to go to a physician or hospital for ex- 
 amination at once. She is told to keep herself in the best 
 physical condition, is advised what to eat and what not to eat; 
 is urged to avoid hard work as far as possible during late preg- 
 nancy. She is taught the necessity for the baby, and the saving 
 to herself, of nursing it. She is told how to prepare clothing 
 for the baby. She is urged not to intrust herself to an ig- 
 norant midwife, but to go to a physician or hospital. She is 
 helped to secure this attention by information and advice. She 
 is seen by the nurse every week or ten days before confine-- 
 
 (671) 
 
198 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 ment — oftener if necessary ; and afterward mother and baby are 
 kept under observation for a month, by which time it is hoped 
 they will be able to come under the care of a physician or milk 
 station. 
 
 This is a brief outline but should indicate the lines along 
 which organizations doing neighborhood or settlement work, 
 visiting nurses' associations, churches, general charitable organi- 
 zations and milk stations can work to prevent the waste of 
 infant lives and the misery and sorrow going therewith. 
 
 Mr. Alderman Broadbent of Huddersfield, who, when he was 
 mayor, was able in a single year to reduce greatly the infant 
 mortality of his city by offering to every baby born in his term 
 of office one pound in gold on its first birthday, says : "■ In 
 motherhood, properly instructed and respected, there is a 
 potentiality of health and well-being for future generations 
 beyond the dreams of the most enthusiastic sanitarian." 
 
 This is an effort, not only to save baby lives, but to make 
 babies stronger and healthier from the very start, to make them 
 still more worth saving. It should therefore appeal to the 
 eugenist as well as to those who consider the waste of life a 
 scandal in any community. 
 
 (672) 
 
THE PROTECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF 
 IMMIGRANTS 
 
 KATE HOLLADAY CLAGHORN 
 Registrar of Records, Tenement House Department, New York 
 
 THE most urgent social needs of New York city, of what- 
 ever kind, are closely bound up with the city's immi- 
 grant population. This port receives over two-thirds of 
 the total immigration to the country each year, and this number 
 makes its presence felt, either in transit to a final destination 
 out of the city, or through residence, temporary or permanent, 
 in the city. 
 
 The mass of the incoming immigrants are poor, illiterate, 
 ignorant of the country and its ways, and afraid of new ventures. 
 Under the contract-labor law, moreover, they cannot secure 
 themselves by definite offers of work which might induce many 
 of them to pass at once through the city to the interior. 
 
 In consequence large numbers of the new immigrants linger 
 in the city, for the immediate practical advantages they gain. 
 This city, in particular, both because of and in spite of its 
 crowded population, is the great labor market for the unskilled, 
 and here the newly arrived immigrant finds, as he does not in 
 smaller towns, others of his own kind, who speak his language 
 and know his ways, while they have also become used to the 
 ways of the new country, and are able to give him the first 
 lessons he needs in order to gain a foothold. 
 
 Against the immediate material advantages to the immigrant 
 of this lingering in the city, however, must be set the social and 
 moral disadvantages to the immigrant himself, and to the city 
 he is overfilling. A great influx of poor people into a restricted 
 area means bad housing — overcrowding, lack of light and ventila- 
 tion, lack of privacy, and difficult sanitation — conditions which 
 make strongly toward physical and moral degeneracy. Condi- 
 tions of labor, though temporarily favorable, are not perma- 
 nently so. Though employment is easily gained in the big 
 
 (673) 
 
200 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 labor market, the work offered is of a low grade and is likely to 
 be periodic or temporary, while the wages are low. This tends 
 to keep the immigrant a shifting, underpaid laborer, unable to 
 maintain a decent, permanent home. 
 
 Moreover, the big foreign colony of a city, while affording a 
 welcome refuge for the new immigrant, has its own evil influ- 
 ences to throw about him. In the colony swarm sharpers of 
 every description, who make their living entirely at the expense 
 of their inexperienced and poverty-stricken countrymen. They 
 meet him at the very port of entry, and begin the fleecing pro- 
 cess by outrageous charges for transportation, expressage and 
 hotel accommodations. Then come extravagant charges for 
 procuring the immediate job on which his life depends. Then 
 " bankers " come to the front, ready to absorb the little savings 
 as they begin to accumulate, and convert to their own use what 
 was meant for the helpless family at home, or for the starting 
 of the little business which would give comparative independ- 
 ence. And so on, — the list is endless. 
 
 As a result of all these conditions, is it any wonder that the 
 city has to struggle under a considerable burden of foreign 
 dependence and delinquency? 
 
 For many years, private agencies have been at work to 
 obviate some of these evils — to protect the immigrant from ex- 
 tortion on his first arrival, to find him employment, and if 
 possible to get him out of the city. Different religious bodies 
 and organizations representing different nationalities have 
 maintained immigrant homes and employment agencies near 
 the landing station, and have had accredited agents at the 
 station to protect helpless newcomers. Some of these societies 
 in their turn having developed abuses of their own have been 
 suppressed by the immigration authorities, and others have 
 taken their place. 
 
 With the beginning of the great influx of Hebrews, some 
 twenty years ago, special work in their behalf was started by 
 Jewish philanthropists, and with the coming of the Italians, 
 means of protection and aid were provided especially for 
 them. The most notable large undertaking for the benefit of 
 Hebrew immigrants is that supported by the Baron de Hirsch 
 
 (674) 
 
No. 4] THE PROTECTION OF IMMIGRANTS 20I 
 
 Fund, and an especially interesting feature of this work has 
 been that of inducing emigration from the crowded cities to 
 agricultural districts. It must be confessed that no large dimin- 
 ution of city crowding has been made by these efforts ; for, ac- 
 cording to information gathered in 1909 by the Jewish Agricul- 
 tural and Industrial Aid Society, which carries on the agricultural 
 work of the Baron de Hirsch Fund, there were only about 1 5,000 
 Hebrews in rural communities all over the United States. The 
 number of farms worked by Hebrews was said to be 2,701, and 
 the number of farmers was 3,040. This society, realizing that 
 attempts to colonize a non-agricultural people on cheap un- 
 improved land cannot be expected to succeed, has recently 
 made provision for instruction in farming on an experimental 
 farm established in Long Island. This is in addition to the well- 
 known farm schools in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. 
 
 As far as the experiment in agricultural transplantation has 
 gone with the Hebrew, it has been found to have a beneficial 
 effect. There has been an especial improvement in physical 
 health, and the ownership of land has developed independence, 
 self-reliance and self-respect. 
 
 A more promising avenue of distribution of Hebrew immi- 
 grants, as far as numbers is concerned, is that along industrial 
 rather than agricultural lines. The Industrial Removal Office 
 has been engaged for the past eleven years in finding homes 
 and employment outside of New York city for Hebrew immi- 
 grants and their families, mainly in industrial pursuits. During 
 that period they have established 58,415 persons (of whom 
 about 30,000 were wage-earners) in 1,388 cities and towns, 
 53,704 of the number being sent out by the New York office, 
 and 4,711 by the Philadelphia and Boston branches. Of those 
 sent out from New York, 31,638, or nearly 60 ^, went to the 
 central states, 14^ found homes in the Middle Atlantic, I3j(> 
 in the western and 10^ in the southern states. 
 
 The report of this society observes that the work of removal 
 is difficult, owing to *' the prejudice and timidity of our appli- 
 cants regarding the unknown lands to which they were contem- 
 plating removing." Even with outside aid it takes the immi- 
 grant some time to make up his mind to move, as is seen from 
 
 (675) 
 
202 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 the statement in the report that of the persons removed in 191 1 
 over three-quarters had been in New York over three years. It 
 is interesting to note that 2 1 ^ of the wage-earners distributed in 
 ten years of activity followed the needle trades, and 30 ^ had no 
 definite trade. This last group included peddlers. It is also 
 interesting to find that less than 2 ^ of the removals made have 
 turned out to be unsatisfactory or are still doubtful. Nearly all 
 of the persons removed have remained and succeeded in the 
 places to which they were originally sent. 
 
 An organization covering the field of immediate protection 
 for arriving Jewish immigrants is the Hebrew Sheltering and 
 Immigrant Aid Society. This society proposes to " keep track 
 of each and every Jewish immigrant passing through the port 
 of New York " — not only to see that they reach their destina- 
 tion in safety, but to look after their further welfare by way of 
 helping to secure employment and discouraging settlement in 
 congested cities. This society has found it comparatively easy 
 to follow up the Jewish immigrants whose destination is outside 
 of New York, and reports that *' immigrants in the interior are all 
 self-supporting, are eager to learn English, and bring even their 
 babies to the kindergarten." But much more difficulty has been 
 experienced in keeping in touch with the large mass who settle 
 down in the city, either temporarily or permanently. 
 
 A strong organization, the Society for Italian Immigrants, 
 enjoying a subvention from the Italian government in addition 
 to a private subscription list, does a similar work for Italian 
 immigrants. This society meets Italian immigrants at the pier, 
 gives escort service and shelter, finds employment, looks after the 
 transmission of money, and in short, takes the place of '* next 
 friend" to the newcomer in whatever way he needs it. 
 During the year 191 1, nearly 24,000 emigrants and immigrants 
 were escorted, nearly 18,000 were lodged at the home of the 
 society, and over $28,000 of the immigrants' money was cared 
 for or transmitted. 
 
 This society has furthermore taken a hand in the very neces- 
 sary task of educating the illiterate immigrant. Under its 
 auspices, the first schools in labor camps were started for 
 instruction in English, and these schools have afforded not only 
 
 (676) 
 
No. 4] THE PROTECTION OF IMMIGRANTS 203 
 
 this necessary first step to good citizenship, but a useful social 
 diversion to lonely men shut up in the unnatural surroundings 
 of a temporary camp. 
 
 Of especial interest are the society's efforts to procure work 
 for Italian immigrants and to assist in the process of distribu- 
 tion. This society is now the principal non-commercial em- 
 ployment exchange for Italians, having recently taken over the 
 work of a labor bureau for Italians formerly under the auspices 
 of the Italian government. 
 
 During the past year 3,493 immigrants applied for work at 
 the society's bureau, and requests for 1,425 laborers were made, 
 but only 528 laborers were actually placed. A Hght not only 
 upon this misfit, but upon the whole question of the agricultural 
 distribution of immigrants is thrown by the statement in the 
 report for 191 2 that 
 
 requests for Italian farm hands are persistent, but not of the kind any 
 capable or intelligent Italian farm hand would accept. Wages and 
 conditions offered are, as a rule, below any passable living standard, 
 and the Italian farmer has grown to understand that unless a contract 
 or a clear statement is offered him , he is often deprived of his legiti- 
 mate earnings or taken advantage of in some way. 
 
 Other societies and individuals in the past have made efforts 
 to transplant Italians to agricultural regions, but the net result 
 of this work in numbers of persons settled is not large. Of all 
 the Italian working men now in the country only a httle over 
 6^ are engaged in agricultural pursuits, although it is estimated 
 that over 60^ come from rural districts of Italy, where practi- 
 cally all were farmers or farm laborers. Throughout the coun- 
 try, however, are found agricultural settlements of Italians, many 
 of them started by outside aid, ranging from groups of two or 
 three households to three hundred and fifty households, which 
 are prospering, and which serve as nuclei for further accretions. 
 
 A society calling itself the North American Civic League for 
 Immigrants was started in 1908 with the ambitious purpose of 
 looking after all the immigrants throughout the country, and 
 of ''doing all things which will result in making immigrants 
 into efficient Americans." Its program includes protection, 
 
 (677) 
 
204 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 education, distribution and assimilation, and is to be carried out 
 by correlating the work of all agencies now busy among immi- 
 grants, rather than by doing direct work of its own. 
 
 In New York, the league has organized an immigrant guide 
 and transfer system, has assisted in bringing immigrant children 
 to the schools, has conducted investigations, and has made a 
 survey of the New York laws affecting immigrants, with a view 
 to the enforcement, repeal and amendment of such laws. It is 
 difficult, however, to measure the actual accomplishment of this 
 league in any very definite way, as its reports are more largely 
 taken up with the evils to be combated than with results of the 
 combat. 
 
 It must be plain after even so incomplete a sketch as the 
 present that private organizations are not by any means cover- 
 ing the field of protection and distribution, though their activi- 
 ties are most creditable in view of the restricted means at their 
 disposal. 
 
 It would seem that governmental bodies, with their greater 
 resources and their more comprehensive powers of control, must 
 be invoked to attain the greater accomplishment desired. This 
 has recently been done by the creation in 1910 of a new bureau 
 of industries and immigration in the state department of labor, 
 to carry on for New York state the same big tasks with which 
 the private organizations have been struggling. Unfortunately, 
 the report of its first year's work seems to show a smaller 
 record of accomplishment than the same year's work of the 
 stronger private bodies. 
 
 One reason is obvious. Although the bureau has had laid 
 upon it a multiplicity of mandatory duties, it was given, as its 
 first year's appropriation, less than $10,000, an amount less than 
 one-third of the annual income of the Society for Italian Immi- 
 grants. Another reason is that too small a proportion of the 
 bureau's work is directly administrative, and too much of its 
 time has been taken up with investigations which served mainly 
 to reveal conditions of abuse already familiar, and with scatter- 
 ing tasks of unofficial cooperation, the results of which cannot 
 be seen or measured. 
 
 This bureau has succeeded, however, in securing greater 
 
 (678) 
 
No. 4] THE PROTECTION OF IMMIGRANTS 205 
 
 safety for immigrants' savings through the better regulation of 
 immigrant banks, has brought under state control the employ- 
 ment agencies dealing chiefly with aliens, has registered and 
 inspected homes and philanthropic organizations which dis- 
 tribute aliens, and has secured the passage of an immigrant 
 lodging-place law, which is applicable to labor camps and will 
 assist in reducing the evils which flourish in such communities. 
 
 The federal government itself has taken a hand in the general 
 work through its newly-created division of information in the 
 bureau of immigration. This division attempts to provide the 
 entering immigrant with reliable information as to the country 
 and its resources, which will help him to find his way to the 
 interior of the country and secure employment. The division 
 was organized under the Immigration Law of 1907, and has 
 done a creditable amount of work since that time. In 191 1, 
 over 30,000 applicants received information for themselves and 
 others, representing perhaps over 100,000 people helped by the 
 division. Of the applicants for that year, 1,293 were Hebrews, 
 and only 624 were Italians, while 1,629 were Danes, 1,568 Nor- 
 wegians, 1,882 Swedes, 5,148 Germans and 5,211 Poles — the 
 latter all peoples who naturally take to agriculture, and all, ex- 
 cept the Poles, of the early immigration. During the year this 
 division actually distributed 5,176 immigrants, of whom 1,127 
 were Germans and i ,044 were Poles. Only 5 1 Hebrews and 5 1 
 Italians were placed by this means. 
 
 It seems that even government bodies are not accomplishing 
 a great deal in comparison with the mass of immigrants to be 
 dealt with. What may be suggested as a more adequate means 
 for meeting the situation than those now being employed ? 
 
 Perhaps the surest method is a drastic restriction of immigra- 
 tion, so that we shall not be swamped by an ever-rising flood, 
 while endeavoring to cope with the numbers already here. In 
 the past the problem seemed simpler. It was thought that with 
 an adequate entrance test, excluding undesirable immigrants, 
 and with the great demand for unskilled labor caused by our 
 developing industries, the immigrant once admitted could shift 
 for himself, with no further damage to himself or the commu- 
 nity than slight incidental disturbances arising in the course of 
 adjustment. 
 
 (679) 
 
206 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 We have come to see that adjustment is no such simple mat- 
 ter. The administration of entrance tests is a more or less 
 wholesale affair, and is the work of a day or an hour or a 
 minute, perhaps, for each immigrant. The work of protection 
 and distribution after the immigrant arrives, on the other hand, 
 must be intensive and individual ; it must extend over periods 
 of months or years. 
 
 If we cannot have restriction to help us catch up with our 
 work, a measure of help to New York would be the diversion of 
 immigration by government regulation of some sort, to other 
 ports, nearer to the sparsely settled territory where immigrants 
 are desired. In default of federal aid along this line, the state 
 and the city may help by taking measures to distribute indus- 
 tries as well as laborers. It has been shown that the great 
 attraction of the city to the immigrant is the opportunity for 
 employment it offers. New York is not only a great trading 
 center, it is also one of the greatest factory cities in the world, 
 and the removal of a considerable proportion of the factories 
 from crowded centers to suburban districts, through discrimi- 
 nating taxation or otherwise, would mean an automatic disper- 
 sion of our foreign working population. Other means are the 
 improvements in transportation and housing that we need for 
 our population at large, and finally, of course, a continued 
 development of the agencies already at work, both public and 
 private. 
 
 (680) 
 
CHARITABLE RELIEF 
 
 W. FRANK PERSONS 
 Superintendent, Charity Organization Society of the City of New York 
 
 TO all thoughtful persons the term "charitable relief" 
 signifies more than assistance in the form of monetary- 
 aid. It comprehends also the great variety of services, 
 material and other, which are bestowed upon needy persons by 
 individuals and by the rapidly increasing number of agencies 
 now doing practical, personal work in the homes of the poor. 
 
 The next step to be taken in the administration of charitable 
 relief, as thus defined, is in the direction of securing unity and 
 efficiency in such social service. This conclusion becomes 
 obvious upon a study of the present situation and the prevailing 
 tendencies in charitable endeavor. 
 
 There are more than a thousand private institutions and 
 societies in New York city offering charitable relief to the poor. 
 During the past five years there has been a remarkable extension 
 and diversification of the help available for the destitute and 
 suffering, especially in the sphere of pubhc medical service. 
 About twenty social-service departments of hospitals and dis- 
 pensaries have been established. It is their purpose to put 
 physicians in touch with home conditions, to relate patients to 
 other agencies whose services may be needed, and to enable 
 discharged patients to re-establish themselves permanently in 
 the industrial world without the extraordinary strain which too 
 often occurs. 
 
 There is now complete sanitary supervision of tuberculosis. 
 Hundreds of nurses are visiting the homes of those patients who 
 do not employ private physicians. These nurses do not, and 
 cannot, ignore factors affecting the health and welfare of other 
 members of such families as well as of the patients themselves. 
 
 There are hundreds of visiting school nurses. Each one 
 realizes that the child's physical defect, which it is her business 
 to have corrected, is frequently a symptom of unfavorable home 
 
 (68i) 
 
208 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 conditions. These may require not only her attention but the 
 services of one or of several special agencies to assure the 
 continuing health of the child. 
 
 The teacher nurses and milk-station nurses, who in growing 
 numbers are rendering increasingly valuable services in the 
 homes of the poor, cannot succeed in their work as they wish to 
 do without full knowledge of the needs and resources of each of 
 the families with which they deal. 
 
 There is certain to be a further extension of social service in 
 connection with medical relief. This is but another way of 
 saying that there is certain to be a wider and deeper apprecia- 
 tion of the necessity of considering and treating the needs of the 
 whole family, even when the illness of one member seems to 
 require special attention. 
 
 This reference to the development taking place in the work 
 of medical agencies is but an illustration of the growing con- 
 sciousness, spreading widely throughout the community, that 
 the real relief of need, in most instances, means the treatment 
 of a family problem. The whole family must be considered 
 with respect to the conditions, needs and possibilities of each of 
 its members. The treatment of the whole problem thus pre- 
 sented must be continued until self-dependence becomes possi- 
 ble and assured, or until some form of continuing assistance is 
 provided. Otherwise results worth while will not be attained. 
 
 In striving to attain such results, which are the only results 
 worthy the ideals of present-day charitable relief, the agencies 
 concerned are delving deeper into the essential facts of their 
 cases, making broader plans, holding more persistently to their 
 purposes, keeping more useful records and developing a more 
 cooperative spirit. They are drawing closer together in their 
 work with particular families. They are uniting to attack, in 
 accord with a common plan, the problems there presented. 
 
 It is generally conceded that this working together is mutually 
 helpful and that it makes for efficiency and economy. That it 
 occurs too infrequently is due largely to the fact that there is 
 no common, ready and certain means of information as to all 
 that is being done for any particular family. 
 
 It seems clear, therefore, that the next step to be taken in 
 
 (682) 
 
No. 4] CHARITABLE RELIEF 209 
 
 the organization of charitable rehef in this city is to find the 
 means and the method by which such information may be made 
 quickly available upon inquiry — or even without inquiry. It is 
 entirely practicable, by a simple device, to enable each of the 
 various agencies whose work may at any time be focused upon 
 the same family to share in the knowledge, experience and plans 
 of the others. The instrument which may be employed for this 
 purpose is the Confidential Exchange of Information, for which 
 there is now in this city a most pressing need. 
 
 The Confidential Exchange of Information will become a 
 central bureau of registration of the names and addresses of all 
 the families under care of those agencies which make use of it. 
 For each of these families there will be a card on which will be 
 written also the names of all the agencies who are, or have been 
 in touch with the family and who have records or available 
 knowledge concerning it. No other information will be recorded 
 save that which is necessary to assure identification — as, for 
 instance, the names and ages of children, and the ages and 
 occupations of other members of the family. 
 
 It is perhaps desirable to emphasize the confidential character 
 of such an exchange of information. The number of names 
 registered in New York city would in a short time become very 
 large. A consolidation of the present registration bureaus of 
 the Charity Organization Society, the Association for Improving 
 the Condition of the Poor and the United Hebrew Charities 
 would afford an initial registration of nearly three hundred 
 thousand names. Any one name would be absolutely lost in 
 such a vast number and would come to the attention only of 
 those interested persons who might make inquiry concerning 
 the family. Although personal interests and feelings would 
 thus be carefully protected, the mass of registration itself would 
 afford many social data of value in determining the character, 
 prevalence and causes of need, and in planning further preven- 
 tive and constructive effort. The extent to which studies for 
 such purposes could be carried would be limited only by the 
 time and money available to keep the necessary records. The 
 exchange would thus become the means of a general public 
 service. Its immediate purpose, however, and its greatest value 
 
 (683) 
 
210 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 would be in the every-day work of the administration of 
 charitable relief. 
 
 Any society or interested individual about to investigate the 
 needs of a family or to give assistance should first of all make 
 inquiry of the Confidential Exchange either by letter or by 
 telephone, preferably the latter. Instantly the names of all 
 other agencies already acquainted with the family would be- 
 come known. The exchange would, in turn, at once notify 
 each of these agencies of the new inquiry. Its responsibility 
 would then end, and it would lie with the agencies concerned to 
 confer, to share their information and their plans, and to make 
 such new plans as the occasion might require. 
 
 The Confidential Exchange, as thus conducted, will safeguard 
 the privacy of the families whose names are registered, by 
 avoiding duplication of investigation. A family under the 
 continuing and sufficient care of one organization will be pro- 
 tected against the undesirable and unintentional invasion of its 
 home by another society. In instances where cooperation is 
 desirable the use of the exchange will afford opportunity for 
 effective team work by the various agencies whose services are 
 required. 
 
 There need be no unconscious interference by one society or 
 individual with the success of plans carefully made and worked 
 out by someone else, as now frequently occurs. The families 
 themselves may be saved from the confusion and distraction of 
 the conflicting plans of agencies not in cooperation. The 
 various agencies in the community will surely profit by a saving 
 of time, effort and money, by interchange of experiences and 
 by closer relationships. 
 
 The essential purpose and most valuable service of the Con- 
 fidential Exchange, however, will be in promoting cooperation 
 and in stimulating thereby the development of thorough-going 
 case treatment. Concerted and effective action, as early in the 
 history of the family's need as possible, will result in rehabilita- 
 tion of family life in a larger proportion of cases. This is the 
 basis of our hope for the reduction of the number of persons 
 in poverty, and for the development of preventive measures to 
 eradicate many of the causes which now bring the poor into 
 
 distress. 
 
 (684) 
 
SOCIAL WORK OF THE NEW YORK SCHOOLS ^ 
 
 JOHN MARTIN 
 Member Board of Education, New York City 
 
 WITH all modesty it may be asserted that New York city 
 continues to lead the continent, and probably the 
 world, in the social use of the buildings, grounds, and 
 staff of the school system. So extensive are the activities of 
 the board of education outside of purely educational work, so 
 generous is the expenditure on recreation, music, dancing, con- 
 certs, lectures and the like, that few citizens, even in New York 
 itself, realize what a wide and well-managed social work is con- 
 ducted regularly in the school buildings at public expense. 
 Not infrequently, when some smaller city imitates one or two 
 of New York's multiform and well-established school activities, 
 — recreation centers, evening lectures for adults, mixed dances 
 or the like — the experiment is proclaimed throughout the land 
 as a brand-new, daringly original feat, a signal discovery of a 
 socialist mayor or of a wonderfully efficient commission govern- 
 ment. 
 
 In the winter season just closed the recreation centers of 
 Greater New York have been attended nightly, six times a week, 
 from October to May, by over 17,500 people. Some 650 clubs 
 — athletic, literary, social, musical, civic, dramatic, dancing and 
 parental — each with its regular organization, have found in 
 these centers a comfortable home, teachers to advise and help, 
 and facilities of all sorts. Boys and girls have played parlor 
 games, practised gymastics under trained instructors, and com- 
 peted for basket-ball trophies. Those of a more intellectual 
 turn have attended literary clubs, where readings, recitations, 
 essays and debates on current topics have filled the evening. 
 
 ^ Expanded from remarks made in discussion at the meeting of The Academy of 
 Political Science, April i8, 1912. Reprinted by permission from The Survey of 
 May 1 8th, 191 2. 
 
 (685) 
 
212 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 Forty-one centers included classes in vocal and instrumental 
 music in which forty or fifty youths and maidens, under the 
 guidance of a competent pianist, have sung such old and popu- 
 lar airs as ** Way Down Upon the Suwanee River " and " The Star- 
 spangled Banner. " Often, to vary the proceedings, some bud- 
 ding Caruso or Sembrich would come forward with characteris- 
 tic musicianly diffidence to warble a solo. On other evenings a 
 cornet or a violin in skilled hands would make the rafters ring. 
 A few years of such training will doubtless make the citizens of 
 New York as musical as those of any German city and will open 
 new avenues of enjoyment to thousands. 
 
 While social workers have been lamenting the vicious in- 
 fluence of dancing halls, the board of education has deprived 
 these resorts of many prospective customers by conducting, at 
 fifteen centers, mixed dancing classes under proper chaperon- 
 age. The board furnished piano music and often the clubs 
 themselves added to the gaiety by bringing cornets and violins. 
 Good music with jolly and modest dances was encouraged. 
 Little effort was necessary to bar the grizzly bear, the turkey 
 trot and other indecencies which have invaded high society. 
 
 Boy Scouts have held regular meetings for drill and organiza- 
 tion under the patronage of the board of education, to which 
 no scheme for the physical or moral uplift of youngsters or 
 their parents seems to come amiss. Still looking for new ways 
 to be of service, the board recently granted the use of a school 
 building to a special committee which has undertaken to organ- 
 ize neighborhood activities and to correlate the lectures, the 
 people's forums, the musical evenings, the clubs and the classes. 
 It expects to demonstrate how neighbors of all ages and tastes 
 may be accommodated in the school building to still further 
 advantage. 
 
 Under the will of the late Joseph Pulitzer money was left to 
 supply concerts of the highest quality, free of charge, to the 
 masses. The board of education gladly cooperated by grant- 
 ing the use of the assembly halls and organs in the high schools. 
 Consequently a series of orchestral and vocal performances, not 
 unfit to be classed with the Philharmonic concerts, has been 
 given in many sections of the city to very large audiences. 
 
 (686) 
 
No. 4] SOCIAL WORK OF THE NEW YORK SCHOOLS 213 
 
 Even the moving-picture theaters have not gone unchallenged. 
 In cooperation with a committee of the People's Institute, a 
 series of educational moving-picture exhibitions was shown to 
 great crowds of spectators. Though the somewhat overzealous 
 interference of the fire department, which objected to the form 
 of protection provided for the lanterns, stopped this work tem- 
 porarily, no doubt it will be resumed. After a trial of Sunday 
 evening concerts and lectures under the management of a vol- 
 untary committee, the free use of some high-school assembly 
 halls was recently granted for two series of meetings, which 
 promise to be as useful to the non-church-goers as the gather- 
 ings which have made Cooper Union famous. A new departure 
 has been made by allowing a collection to be taken toward de- 
 fraying expenses. This clears the audience of the sense of being 
 pauperized, and, by reducing the cost of the performances, ren- 
 ders extension of the work more easy. 
 
 Apart from the recreation centers the public lecture system 
 continues to flourish. About a million adults have attended 
 the illustrated lectures in science, civics, history, travel, music, 
 art and literature. All were given by competent lecturers, who 
 were bound to hold their audiences by the interest and force of 
 their remarks, since, unlike college students, the listeners were 
 free to show their displeasure with poor work by quietly with- 
 drawing or by staying away. 
 
 Funds have been provided for continuing, though not for 
 enlarging, during the coming summer, the social activities in 
 the vacation, evening, roof and open-air playgrounds for chil- 
 dren and mothers and babies, which last year were conspicu- 
 ously successful and extensive. In 191 1 no fewer than 832 
 teachers were employed in aiding 125,500 daily visitors at these 
 various play centers to amuse themselves rationally and health- 
 fully — a regiment of school soldiers of the common good which 
 no other city could duplicate. Swings, seesaws, and other ap- 
 paratus were so vigorously used that it is doubtful whether they 
 will last through another season. Mothers and babies sought 
 the quiet and shade of their special playgrounds. On the roof 
 playgrounds bands of musicians played for promenaders and 
 girl dancers. Gymnasts, baseball and basket-ball players and 
 
 (687) 
 
2 1 4 ORGANIZA TION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 folk dancers practised for tournaments or simply played for the 
 fun of playing. Nobody can measure the good which the 248 
 playgrounds did for the hundreds of thousands who made up 
 the aggregate attendance of 5,955,160. 
 
 Altogether, the tale of the social uses of the New York 
 schools is encouraging and creditable. Much remains to be 
 done, which the board of education is eager to do as soon as 
 the keepers of Father Knickerbocker's purse will permit ; but 
 enough has been accomplished to prove the beneficence and 
 wisdom of utilizing to the full the buildings, the organization 
 and the teaching skill of the school system for social enjoyment 
 and elevation. 
 
 (688) 
 
COOPERATION OF THE CHURCHES IN HOUSING 
 
 REFORM ' 
 
 JAMES JENKINS, JR. 
 Director of the Department of Social Betterment, Brookl)ni Bureau of Charities 
 
 ROM our experience on the Tenement House Committee 
 
 F 
 
 I believe that social workers have not sufficiently appre- 
 ciated the importance of connecting the churches with 
 various social movements. I will refer briefly to a campaign in 
 Brooklyn. The Tenement House Committee took up a specific 
 piece of work, the elimination of the dark room, realizing that 
 it was a source of immorality and disease. We secured the 
 cooperation of the churches, giving each church a specific 
 district. In each district they were to see if the tenements had 
 dark rooms, if so to report them, also to follow up these cases 
 and see that the city department did its work. The result was 
 that forty thousand dark rooms were eliminated in Brooklyn. 
 I think that the reason the churches have not been more active 
 in social work is because they do not generally understand 
 what they are to do. Our experience showed that if the work 
 was explained to them exactly they would go ahead and do it. 
 
 We are going to take up the sanitary conditions next, and 
 we wish again to have the churches' help. In this case they 
 will be given certain districts and will be asked to do the same 
 kind of work that they did before. The Brooklyn Men and 
 Religion Movement suggested that there should be a committee 
 in each church, made up of a lawyer, a doctor and a business 
 man, to consider all legislative measures and act immediately 
 in supporting or opposing them. The favorable progress of 
 tenement legislation during the past year was largely due to its 
 consistent backing in New York. 
 
 As a forward step in housing reform, would it not be a good 
 plan to form tenants' guilds of the people in a group of tene- 
 
 ' Discussion at the meeting of the Academy of Political Science, April i8, 1912. 
 
 (689) 
 
2 1 6 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 ments, a block or a street or a small section of a district, and 
 try to interest the people to keep their houses in as good con- 
 dition as possible ; also to teach them to use the various safety 
 devices? 
 
 I wish to endorse heartily the suggestion made by Mr. 
 Veiller for the regulation of two-family houses. Many of 
 these houses have as bad conditions in the way of dark rooms 
 and bad plumbing as the worst tenements. We are told that 
 room-overcrowding is unhealthy and increases immorality, but 
 we have never had a competent investigation to show the exact 
 results of this congestion. This investigation could be best 
 made by night inspection. This inspection would be difficult 
 but it could be accomplished and it would give us the real 
 facts about room-overcrowding. 
 
 (690) 
 
RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS AND SOCIAL WORK 
 
 ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER OF THE ACADEMY OF POLITICAL 
 SCIENCE, THURSDAY EVENING, APRIL 1 8, I912 
 
 President Lindsay : The subject for this evening's discus- 
 sion is ** Religious Organizations and Social Work." Religious 
 organizations from the beginning have been engaged in social 
 work, and social workers are necessarily engaged in religious 
 work. That is a fundamental point to keep in mind in a dis- 
 cussion like this. Monsignor Mooney, the personal representa- 
 tive of Cardinal Farley, will open our discussion. 
 
 Monsignor Mooney: As the chairman has stated, my 
 part in this evening's proceedings is to represent Cardinal Farley, 
 who is necessarily absent. If he were here, he would be pleased 
 to signify his appreciation of the courtesy of the Academy in 
 extending the kind invitation to him to be their guest, as well 
 as his accord with the general purposes and aims of the Acad- 
 emy. This is what he charged me to say and I only regret 
 that he himself is not here to say it, for in that case, it is 
 needless to remark, it would be much better said. 
 
 Speaking then solely for myself, I would aver that the religi- 
 ous body to which I belong believes that she will attain success 
 in social work by cooperating with that intelligent and broad- 
 minded public with whose views upon the ethical side of social 
 questions she in general agrees. This is the stand which she 
 is willing and ready to take. To the church it is most gratify- 
 ing to feel that on this platform she can come to agreement 
 with men of good-will, and men who are sincere in their desire 
 for the right. Yet she does not forget that her primary end 
 in the world is not really the solution of the social problems 
 as they arise from time to time. She maintains that she has a 
 special mission to fulfil at all times and that to carry out that 
 mission is the reason of her existence. That mission indeed 
 does not have regard primarily to social problems, yet the 
 
 (691) 
 
2i8 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 church must help solve social problems, and she rejoices that in 
 this work she is able to join hands with all men who seek the 
 amelioration of the race, and especially men who seek to pro- 
 tect labor and throw around it all the safeguards demanded by- 
 eternal justice itself. She ever bears in mind the injunction 
 given of old, which history itself has only made more evident, 
 namely, that ** justice exalteth a nation and evil maketh a nation 
 wretched." Justice is called for particularly in the social con- 
 ditions of life : the justice that teaches us our duties to our 
 neighbor ; the justice that teaches us where rightful competition 
 ends and oppression begins ; the justice that makes good to 
 man the right to happiness, to comfort, to peace, to liberty. 
 This is what the church has contended for, and she sincerely 
 rejoices when she can join in any movement that looks toward 
 the moral and social welfare of the people ; for her conception 
 of patriotism itself is a patriotism founded upon the principles 
 of unchanging righteousness. It is only those laws which take 
 into account the moral principles that she holds, which will, as 
 she is convinced, conserve the true relation and proportion 
 between matters of human and of divine import, between the 
 temporal and the eternal. Only such principles, placing the 
 well-being of humanity in connection with an eternity, can 
 offer a beneficent and permanent solution to social problems. 
 
 Again speaking for him whom I represent, I desire to repeat 
 his personal appreciation of the honor that has been extended 
 to him by the Academy, and to express his sense of gratifica- 
 tion in the existence in this community of a body such as this 
 Academy, whose principles and whose activities make it not 
 only possible, but most agreeable for him and for the church 
 that he represents, to stand with them in their devotion to those 
 principles and in their practical application of them to the up- 
 lifting of society. 
 
 President Lindsay : The great church, numbering its ad- 
 herents by the millions, which the last speaker has just repre- 
 sented, is perhaps no more numerous than the great body of 
 persons interested in religious work, although not members of 
 any one church, which is represented by the next speaker, 
 
 (692) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES A T THE DINNER 2 1 9 
 
 Bishop Hendrix of Kansas City, President of the Federal 
 Council of the Churches of Christ in America. 
 
 Bishop Hendrix : It is a great delight to live in these days 
 when our differences are being forgotten in the consciousness 
 of our agreements. Whatever differences exist in a general 
 way between religious bodies of different names to-day, our 
 teamwork for the race is making us more and more unmindful 
 of the differences and more and more delightfully conscious of 
 the points of agreement. 
 
 When our fathers were just finishing their work of framing 
 the constitution of our country, Edward Gibbon was completing 
 his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. His work was to 
 prove an object-lesson for all people, and for none more than 
 for that greatest nation of modern times, the United States. 
 What smote Rome to its fall? Carnal impurity and covetous- 
 ness. Are we in no danger in our own land from these two 
 evils which have smitten to the death every nation that has ever 
 fallen? I crave for my land that every child be born in wed- 
 lock and physically fit to live : that it have the opportunities of 
 elementary education ; that it be saved from the dwarfing and 
 degrading influence of child labor ; that it have the sanctities 
 of a home, and not the corrupting influences of a one-room 
 tenement ; that it have religious training and religious oppor- 
 tunity so that its moral nature shall be instructed and taught 
 along these essential lines. I lift up my voice to-night for the 
 protection of the youth of our land against all corruption, and 
 I crave greater vigor on the part of the pulpit. Let us 
 strengthen and upbuild our youth, let us cry out with fierceness 
 against all wrong-doing until we shall hear an awakened con- 
 science cry, " Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is 
 good." Then we shall establish and protect our youth and 
 make possible that blessed eugenics that is to bless the nations 
 all round the world. 
 
 President Lindsay : I am in doubt whether to present the 
 next speaker as a great religious teacher, a representative of a 
 great church organization, or a civic leader renowned for his 
 service in public life — Rabbi Hirsch, of Chicago. 
 
 (693) 
 
220 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 Rabbi Hirsch : If anybody has the right to claim fellowship 
 with a movement like this, it is the religious community of 
 which I happen to be the representative to-night; for if one 
 accent is struck more strongly than another by the religious 
 proclamation held to be true by this community, it is the cry 
 for justice. We of the liberal interpretation of the ancient 
 Biblical literature have good ground for holding that this was 
 the new note sounded by the ancient Hebrew prophets. They 
 were teachers, not so much of a new theology as of a new 
 social conscience, and what stirred their wrath was not in reality 
 the idol-worship, but those vices and those forms of social ex- 
 ploitation that had received their sanction in the name of the 
 foreign deities worshipped in the Holy Land. Justice is the note 
 struck in the warnings, admonitions and teachings of the ancient 
 seers of Israel ; it runs through the whole of Israel's conscious- 
 ness, this cry for justice, a cry most pathetic if it be remembered 
 that they who believed in the ultimate triumph of justice were 
 held for many a century the victims of injustice. To-day in 
 the synagogue, wherever this is understood, the pulpit is vocal 
 with the thunder of Sinai, because it pleads for justice and 
 condemns injustice of whatever kind. 
 
 The great Master's word that His kingdom was not of this 
 world has, according to our understanding of the Jewish phrase- 
 ology that he must have used, been entirely misunderstood. 
 Of course, the world by which he was surrounded was not the 
 world of the kingdom. Neither in Rome nor in Jerusalem was 
 justice enthroned ; neither in Rome nor in Jerusalem in those 
 days was the law understood, the law of love, the law of re- 
 sponsibility, the law of solidarity, that makes every man the 
 keeper of his brother man ; neither in Rome nor in Jerusalem 
 in those days did they know that whenever man turns aside 
 from his brother man and pleads that he is not his brother's 
 keeper, he commits murder, as did he who uttered this insolent, 
 impious expression as recorded in holy writ. Therefore the 
 Master was right in saying that his kingdom was not of this 
 world. What he meant, as we understand his words, was that 
 the world was to be changed so as to square with the implica- 
 tion of the kingdom, and that is the social ambition of the 
 synagogue, to change the world into a Kingdom of God. 
 
 (694) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 221 
 
 What does that mean? Our religion teaches that every man 
 is made in the image of God. Therefore it insists that no man 
 shall be deprived, in consequence of social pressure, of the 
 attributes involved in his being made in the likeness of the 
 Creator. When social conditions are such that man is degraded 
 to the level of a mere pair of hands ; and when these hands are 
 bought and sold as are the dead things in the market, at market 
 rate, when men are subject to the law of supply and demand — 
 then the law of solidarity of the human race is outraged and 
 broken, and conditions are such that no man can live up to the 
 divinity implanted in his soul by God. Man is more than a 
 pair of hands to be bought and sold at the lowest price, or to 
 be offered at the highest price. With the hands goes a heart, 
 and with the heart goes love, and with the love goes much more 
 than is compensated for in the tabulation of wage and the cal- 
 culation of profit. We are all stirred to our utmost depth when 
 the story is told of human degradation superinduced, maybe, 
 by human avarice, or invited by human passion, and many a 
 victim has sunk underneath the waves of the ocean of vice 
 simply because social conditions were not such that the victim 
 could maintain his, and in a thousand cases her, divinity. She 
 had to sell herself for bread, not out of lust ; and the civiliza- 
 tion that allows this form of slavery, or slavery of a social or 
 economic kind, the slavery of little children in the factories, 
 that civilization indeed is not of the Kingdom. Our church 
 wishes that every one coming under its influence shall strive to 
 help build up out of social elements a Kingdom of God. Or, 
 in other words, according to the teaching of my religion, prop- 
 erty is not the primary but the secondary consideration. Per- 
 sonality, morality, character, and humanity are much more 
 valuable than any right of property, and property has rights 
 only when property assumes and discharges the duties that go 
 with those rights. 
 
 Far be it from me to dispute that as long as humanity shall 
 exist there will be differences. Some are born with the capac- 
 ity for stewarding property ; others are gifted in other direc- 
 tions. We must serve each one at a definite place, so that out 
 of our service the well-being of society may develop. We can- 
 
 (695) 
 
222 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 not be equal in function, though we can be equal in worth and 
 in worthiness, and many a one who is a hewer of wood and a 
 drawer of water is much worthier than one who commands 
 thousands of lives and holds them to a grindstone in a factory 
 organized merely on the principle of the least expense, with a 
 view to the largest return to a stockholder or private owner. 
 
 Society, as we understand it, is based on this differentiation 
 of men, but it preaches, according to my religion, the law of 
 selection. We are elected to be what we are by God, and 
 therefore, according to this doctrine, we are responsible to 
 society or to God for the use we make of that which God has 
 placed within our charge. We are not the owners of our lives, 
 of our opportunity, we are not the proprietors of our talents, we 
 are not the absolute controllers of our property ; but we are 
 merely stewards placed there by God, that out of our strength 
 the weakness of others may be uplifted, and out of our abund- 
 ance the hunger of others may be appeased. 
 
 There is much more gnawing hunger than even the hunger 
 for bread, and that is hunger for righteousness. It is not true 
 that the social question is a question of the stomach. It is 
 not even a question of wage. It is of human dignity, of 
 human liberty, and it is ultimately the great problem of human 
 existence, of human solidarity. That is what my religion 
 attempts to teach those who walk in its ways. 
 
 We have been trying to apply these truths, of course in a 
 small degree, in the uplifting of our nearer kinfolk. We know 
 that our own Jewish poor have perhaps no one who can under- 
 stand them as the Jews can. We know their souls, for, as it is 
 written in the Book when God enjoins upon Israel to be mind- 
 ful of the needs of the stranger, " You know the soul of the 
 stranger, for strangers you were in a land not your own." The 
 Jew has tasted the bitter bread of exile, he has often hungered 
 and thirsted, and no one has offered him the bread and held to 
 his lips the water that refreshed. Therefore the Jew, knowing 
 what he himself had to contend against, understands what the 
 Russian Jews are pleading for ; he knows what their souls have 
 suffered and how they are warped, he realizes the dangers into 
 which they are plunged at once by coming to this land of 
 liberty — alas ! so often the land of unrestricted license. 
 
 (696) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 223 
 
 Two hundred fifty- six years ago the governor here in Man- 
 hattan was promised by the Jews that no Jew should become a 
 charge upon the community. We have remembered that 
 pledge, and it accounts for our seeming clannishness. Suppose 
 a mother trains two children of her own to be good men and 
 good women, does she not do as much for society as if she 
 trained two other children not her own ? The Jews that have 
 the social consecration of their religion are doing service for 
 this land and for humanity. The synagogue to-day preaches, if 
 that doctrine is preached anywhere, the glad tidings of a 
 humanity that will recognize distinctions only as stronger 
 appeals to duty ; it calls all men children of God, and it will 
 cooperate cheerfully with every movement that looks toward 
 breaking the shackles of slavery, be it slavery in the brothel, in 
 the factory or in the home of luxury. Therefore I come to 
 speak for every Jew in this country and the world when I say 
 that the synagogue is glad to stand by the church in the great 
 work of lifting up humanity and bringing in God's Kingdom on 
 earth, that will not come until justice be done everywhere, and 
 righteousness be the star that leads men on to their ultimate 
 destiny under God's appointment. 
 
 President Lindsay : We shall all agree in placing high on 
 the list of social workers the medical missionary. Dr. Grenfell 
 of Labrador is our next speaker. 
 
 Dr. Grenfell : I am neither theologian nor philosopher. 
 I am a humble member of the medical profession, and I ap- 
 proach the subject to-night from the point of view of an indi- 
 vidual rather than a leader of a large organization. To me 
 there is little difference between religious and social work. As 
 I read Christ's words, he says, '' All those that are not against 
 me are for me." The men or the women who love humanity 
 enough to saerifice themselves for the uplift of their fellow-men 
 I should class as religious workers. The definitions which have 
 served to separate the social worker and the religious worker, 
 and to separate one kind of religious worker from another, 
 seem to me to relate to the way in which each man receives the 
 strength to do his work, rather than to anything else. 
 
 (697) 
 
224 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 I have been working among deep-sea fishermen, and largely 
 at sea, and I went among them because I wanted to try and 
 carry to them that message of love which appealed to me, in a 
 practical effort to make their lives better. In the hospital work 
 in which I was engaged in London I used to see the surgeon 
 triumphing over many difficulties, spending time and skill and 
 money. I used to see the nurses giving untold affection to the 
 restoration to physical health of numbers of poor folk. When 
 I came myself to visit the houses of those people in the east 
 end of London, I found that often enough all the good done by 
 the worker was almost immediately undone by the same en- 
 vironment which had produced the original trouble. I came to 
 the conclusion that an ordinary surgeon might do a higher work 
 than merely to make the man with a crooked leg walk 
 straight. It is comparatively easy in these days to do that. 
 The really difficult problem is to make the man with a straight 
 leg walk straight. When I found a child that I had learned to 
 love in the children's ward going back to a home where selfish- 
 ness and lust and vice deprived him of any chance of a sound 
 physical condition, I saw that vice and sin and selfishness must 
 be cured if the end we were aiming at was to be attained. 
 
 As to the methods of our work, we try to approach a man 
 through his body, because we do not know any other way to 
 approach him. We started a hospital at sea for the simple 
 reason that otherwise an injured man when he came ashore was 
 often beyond reach altogether. A simple fracture became a 
 compound one. We talked to a man and said that we were 
 sorry for him, but did nothing more. To avoid the fatal loss 
 of time we sent our hospital out to sea. 
 
 Next I will speak of the liquor question. It was plain to me, 
 when I came to live among fishermen, that the dangers of the 
 sea were insignificant as compared with the dangers of the 
 land. And I will say that to-night — yes, when you are all 
 thinking of the present horrible disaster. I have seen more 
 children damned and robbed through the saloons than through 
 all the icebergs and fogs I have sailed among, and I have been 
 at sea twenty-five years. When a man has been drowned at 
 sea because he was drunk and you go ashore to his home and 
 
 (698) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 225 
 
 tell his wife she is a widow and the children are fatherless, and 
 you are awfully sorry for them, your sorrow is not worth any- 
 thing. I have floated on an icy sea for twenty-four years, and 
 I have never taken liquor. It is not necessary; one can do 
 well without it. Therefore we considered that the next social 
 or religious work for our men was to try and knock the liquor 
 out. I bought four tons of tobacco in Ostend and went to sea 
 with that, and in three months I had a tobacco flag on several 
 vessels. The men did not go to the saloons to buy tobacco, 
 they went to these clean vessels. It knocked the liquor vessels 
 out. 
 
 There is no need of my dilating on the uplift to the soul that 
 comes through a sound body. The body degenerated through 
 any cause cannot possibly express the soul or give it a fair 
 chance, and by the soul I mean the man. To me the man is 
 always absolutely different from his body. We consider our 
 hospitals and our hospital boats as simply a part of our 
 religious and social work. 
 
 I will add but one word. On what basis is one man going 
 to uplift another? I think he is going to lift him up on the 
 basis of loving him. That was Christ's method, and it seems 
 to be the right method. All power must come from faith. 
 Love is the power of faith. It must be based on the power 
 which Christ came to tell us about, the motive power of the 
 world, the love of man for God, and of God for man, and of 
 man for his fellow-man. I am glad to-day that the Catholic 
 and the Protestant and the Jew and the medical profession can 
 join together in feeling that we each have some place in trying 
 to interpret to somebody who understands it best through our 
 particular channel that divine message. I believe in the King- 
 dom of the Master coming from the heart. As has been said, 
 the old interpretation of religious organization was, when one 
 saw a wounded beggar lying by the roadside, to rush to 
 Jerusalem and have a prayer meeting, but now we all go across 
 the road and put the wounded man on the donkey. 
 
 President Lindsay : Our next speaker is a social worker 
 who has had the gratifying faculty of interpreting for us the 
 
 (699) 
 
226 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 social spirit of our times, Professor Edward T. Devine, of 
 Columbia University, Editor of The Survey. 
 
 Edward T. Devine, Professor of Social Economy, Colum- 
 bia University, and Editor of The Survey : For three days we 
 have been walking, groping in the valley of the shadow of 
 death. We cannot escape it. We cannot get it out of our 
 minds. What happened there on the fog banks,' the story of 
 which is now slowly creeping up the channel here, is constantly 
 in our minds. Since we cannot get rid of it, since in that 
 shadow the ordinary events of our lives some way change their 
 scale of values and seem relatively unimportant, why should we 
 not frankly speak about it? And yet, my friends, as our minds 
 turn, whether we will or not, to that great tragedy, titanic in 
 fact no less than in name, is it not true that the two things 
 which we consider to-night are the things which in a dark hour 
 like this retain their significance — religion and the social wel- 
 fare? Anticipating an hour like this, religion, in the words of 
 the psalmist that have come down to us through the ages, bids 
 us say, " Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of 
 death, I will fear no evil." In consideration of the social wel- 
 fare, the social spirit easily pictures itself on a ship, a ship on 
 which humanity is embarked, and the specific task of social 
 work is to keep an eye on the lifeboats, on the riveting of the 
 plates, on the messages that come warning us of the icebergs,, 
 and at last on the courage and the conduct of the individual in 
 the hour when his courage meets the supreme test. Does he 
 go down to death in sacrifice, if need be, that the weak may 
 be saved? 
 
 We have heard much of late of the biological doctrine of 
 eugenics. It has been referred to here in applications with 
 which I have no quarrel; but there are those injudicious 
 apostles of a half-assimilated idea who are teaching us a strange 
 philosophy ; who are saying to us in the name of biology that 
 the strong should ruthlessly trample on the weak; who are 
 saying to us that it is so desirable for the race that certain 
 qualities should be preserved in humanity that we must see to. 
 
 ^ The wreck of the Titanic. 
 (700) 
 
 I 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 227 
 
 it that the matings of the strong are encouraged ; who are say- 
 ing, on the other, hand, that it is so desirable for humanity to 
 eliminate certain qualities from the race that there should be 
 voluntary or enforced celibacy on the part of those who have 
 those qualities. With these last applications of the doctrine also 
 I have no quarrel. 
 
 But there are those who go still further and say that laws for 
 the protection of children from the evil consequence of prema- 
 ture employment, laws that seek to improve housing conditions, 
 laws that seek to prevent infectious diseases, are injurious to 
 the race because they are interfering with natural selection. 
 There are those who say that, just as in old times war and 
 pestilence and famine performed a beneficent function because 
 they stamped out the weak and enabled the strong to survive, 
 so now we have the slums and child labor and tuberculosis and 
 typhoid and industrial accidents, and that these natural succes- 
 sors to war and pestilence and famine are performing the same 
 beneficent function for society which those former agents of 
 natural selection performed. 
 
 Is it not time that religion and social work get together to 
 consider this strange philosophy? There are those here to- 
 night who have authority to speak on behalf of religion, and 
 they have spoken. Speaking quite unofficially for the social 
 workers, whose spirit I think I know, I venture to say to those 
 who condemn child labor laws on the ground that parents will 
 not care for their children unless they can get their wages at 
 nine and ten and eleven years of age, who condemn workmen's 
 compensation on the ground that it will interfere with the 
 beneficent working of natural selection — I say to them, " You 
 may be right. It may be that a society that protects the weak 
 and puts on the shoulders of the strong the burdens of society, 
 will go down. If so, we choose to go down." A society that 
 can survive only by trampling out the weak and giving artificial 
 encouragement to the strong does not deserve to survive. We 
 who have enlisted in these new crusades against tuberculosis, 
 against unsanitary houses, against the labor of women more 
 than fifty-four hours in a week, against the premature employ- 
 ment of children — we mean to see to it that compassion and 
 fraternity shall not disappear from the earth. 
 
 (701) 
 
228 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol.11 
 
 That is the message, if I understand it, of social service. Is 
 not that, Rabbi, Monsignor, Bishop, Doctor, the message also 
 of religion? I believe that it is. I do not know for what your 
 churches and cathedrals and synagogues have been founded and 
 kept alive if it be not to see to it that men hear the message to 
 do justice and to love mercy. We, too, like the eugenist, would 
 have our weak sister, the defective girl, cared for, but we do 
 not think that the strong argument in favor of that policy is the 
 danger of contaminating by her strain the stream of humanity. 
 We do not think it is the protection of society against her 
 degeneracy that will move society to act. We think that a 
 strong appeal lies in infinite compassion for her as an individual ; 
 we think that it is because she is to be protected against criminal 
 assault rather than that society is to be protected against her, 
 that people will give to her the tender care which she ought to 
 have. 
 
 Our ship is not sinking. It will come, we hope, to the port 
 where we fain would be. Our last word is not of sacrifice. 
 " Thou requirest not sacrifice, else would we give it." Our last 
 word is the rescue of the lost. Our last word is of rehabilita- 
 tion, of reintegration, of redemption. Redemption is the social 
 gospel. 
 
 President Lindsay : Our next speaker is one who has ap- 
 pealed in a remarkable way to the strength of young men — Mr. 
 John R. Mott, the General Secretary of the World's Student 
 Christian Federation, and the Associate General Secretary of 
 the International Young Men's Christian Association. 
 
 Mr. Mott: The most critical battlefield is not the slum, 
 nor is it the area of social injustice and neglect. Without a 
 shadow of doubt, the most critical battlefield of our day is the 
 universities. Any ideal or spirit which we wish to have per- 
 meate the nation must first dominate these centers of higher 
 learning. You recall the German proverb that what you would 
 put into the life of a nation, you must put into its schools. No 
 movement has ever permanently triumphed which has not at 
 one time entered the colleges and universities. These teach 
 the teachers ; these preach to the preachers ; these govern the 
 
 (702) . 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 229 
 
 governors. It is, therefore, not a matter of indifference but of 
 most vital concern whether our universities and colleges are fully 
 and constantly exposed to social influences, and whether those 
 who determine college ideals are dominated by the social 
 passion. 
 
 I go further and maintain that the universities and the 
 colleges need the social movement. They need it in order to 
 be saved. The most subtle dangers of our modern student life 
 will not be conquered, in my judgment, without a closer 
 relation to the processes of social advance. Some of these 
 dangers are the dangers of growing luxury and extravagance, a 
 tendency in not a few places to softness and an increasing love 
 of ease and pleasure — dangers that are eating into the best life 
 of some of our most honored institutions ; dangers likewise of 
 snobbishness, more than a remnant of the old town-and-gown 
 spirit of the middle ages and of the last century ; dangers from 
 the cliques that have broken our college life in these days by a 
 sharper cleavage than in any previous generation : dangers of 
 the ultra-critical and cynical attitude; likewise some of the 
 most subtle forms of selfishness. These tendencies are far 
 more dangerous than the so-called forces of sin and shame. 
 We must socialize the colleges for their salvation. 
 
 The colleges need the social movement in order that we may 
 have the note of reality sounded out not only within them, but 
 through them in the life of church and state. We need tasks 
 vast enough to appeal to the imagination of the future leaders ; 
 tasks so difficult that they will call out the best energies of the 
 minds and hearts of the students; tasks so absorbing that 
 students will forget themselves ; tasks whose tragic responsibili- 
 ties will startle students from their theorizing and dreaming 
 into reality. We need, therefore, this exposure to the social 
 conditions of our time. 
 
 The universities need this exposure and this attitude in order 
 also that they may fulfil the highest mission of universities. 
 What is that? To train men not simply for personal better- 
 ment but for public service. Why are the educated persons 
 entitled to stand in high places ? Noblesse oblige. They need 
 this also to call out their latent possibilities. It moves me 
 
 (703) 
 
230 • ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. II 
 
 deeply as I travel among the universities to see there the 
 capacities for vicariousness, for heroism, for unselfish achieve- 
 ment, dormant, needing to be related to social facts. 
 
 Not only do the universities need the social movement, but 
 the social movement needs the universities if it is to achieve its 
 principal mission. The movement for the betterment of society 
 needs the universities in order that we may have the thinkers 
 without whom these problems will not be solved. In what field 
 to-day is there so great need of scientific study and investiga- 
 tion, of broad and constructive treatment, amid surroundings 
 that make for unselfish detachment, as in the realm of social 
 difficulties, and where shall we look for this training if we do 
 not look to the universities and the colleges ? 
 
 The social movement must look there likewise to find not only 
 the thinkers, but the apostles. The church will not rise to her 
 social mission, nor will the other great religious forces, unless 
 we have this passion for unselfishness and heroic service seizing 
 the colleges with greater intensity. 
 
 The social movement must have the colleges also in order 
 that we may have entering the various influential walks of life 
 men who are dominated by this ideal and this purpose. It is 
 an idle dream to talk about solving these questions permanently 
 unless we have a larger stream entering politics, medicine, the 
 law, the ministry, to say nothing of engineering and the other 
 callings that bring leaders near the laboring men. Men must 
 bring to bear in the relationships of these professions the prin- 
 ciples and practises of pure religion. 
 
 This lends significance to the Christian Student Movement, 
 which is expanding in our universities and colleges. It is in a 
 position to render a large service in these ways because of its 
 numbers and personnel. It now counts nearly 150,000 students 
 and professors throughout the world, mostly young men and 
 young women in the vision-forming period of life, responsive 
 ever to the highest ideals, showing their ability to work together 
 in a mighty movement. We can expect much from it, because 
 of the esprit de corps that comes from linking together the future 
 leaders of countries such as this. We may expect much from 
 it, because it has a method and plan of work that make possible 
 
 (704) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 23 1 
 
 the bringing to bear of its ideals and spirit upon all of the 
 influential professions at their source. We may expect much 
 from it, because it has demonstrated its ability in the form of 
 foreign missions to wage a triumphant propaganda. If it has 
 been able to recruit six thousand students from the universities 
 of North America and Great Britain within twenty-five years, 
 who have been sent out to come to close grapple with the social 
 problems of the non-Christian world, it is able to do much 
 larger things in our home countries. We are not surprised, 
 therefore, to find this movement responsive to the ideals of 
 organizations such as that under whose auspices we are assem- 
 bled to-night. 
 
 What is the movement doing in the colleges? Under its 
 auspices are being given addresses by labor leaders and repre- 
 sentatives of every class, bringing vividly before the studying 
 youth in our generation the facts and forces that make for the 
 betterment of society. It goes deeper than that because it sees 
 we need not only knowledge, but realization in promoting the 
 scientific study of these subjects. Thousands of students are 
 studying the social facts through such books as Misery and its 
 Causes, by Dr. Devine, and Social Degradation and Social 
 Reclamation, by Malcolm Spencer of London. Hundreds of 
 these associations are also undertaking the study of their own 
 communities, leading the students before they enter the influ- 
 ential walks of life to learn how they may face these questions 
 in a sane, practical and helpful way. Besides this — and this is 
 important — this movement is leading the students to stand in 
 front of the social facts and ask themselves, How far are we 
 students responsible for these facts and what are we doing to 
 change these facts? 
 
 The place to bring power to bear is where it can be most 
 wisely and advantageously applied. Surely that place is the 
 colleges. But this movement comes nearer than that. It seeks 
 to socialize the colleges. By its democratic spirit, drawing into 
 its membership the members of all classes and organizations, 
 the rich and the poor, men holding different views on rehgious 
 questions, fusing them together in a solid brotherhood, it is 
 making for the socializing of the colleges. It is also doing so in 
 
 (70s) 
 
232 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK [Vol. I 
 
 the grappling with certain of the evils. I think one of the finest 
 things being done now is the grappling with the social evil as it 
 is eating like a cancer into the best life of some colleges where 
 you would least expect it. I want to resent bitterly charges that 
 we sometimes hear about the moral condition of our colleges. 
 I consider them among the most moral communities we have, 
 and yet I should be superficial if I did not recognize cancer 
 where I know it is working. This movement is to be recom- 
 mended for seeking in a quiet way to socialize the colleges in 
 this sense. 
 
 The movement is doing still more in some ways by enlisting 
 not hundreds, but thousands, of undergraduates in social service 
 in the college communities. You will find nearly two hundred 
 undergraduates in Yale, engaged in such activities; and in 
 Harvard one year three hundred sixty-seven men gave in their 
 names as desirous of engaging in some form of social service. 
 I could take you to Princeton, which is not so favorably situated 
 for these activities, and yet show you groups of men going out 
 for social service. Small colleges, like Williams and Amherst, 
 are conducting boys' clubs in nearby places. These are but 
 typical of how the undergraduates are being related to the 
 social needs in their diverse aspects. We are seeking to impress 
 upon the men as they graduate the great message of the colleges, 
 that they shall go out as statesmen and and lawyers and doctors 
 and editors and authors and engineers, sons of the wealthy, 
 sons of the poor, to make their influence tell on these great 
 social questions. 
 
 A few days ago I spoke in the House of Commons to a 
 company of members of Parliament, and we had a short dis- 
 cussion. A member from Scotland said, ** We in Parliament 
 now have become conscious of the power of this Christian 
 Student Movement." If he could say that now in the infancy 
 of this movement, what can we say a few years hence when its 
 network of unselfishness and of helpfulness has been spread 
 more intimately, not only over the undergraduates, but through 
 them over the graduates who are going out to dominate society 
 and lead the forces which make possible the solution of these 
 problems? You remember the morning when you read in the 
 
 (706) 
 
No. 4] ADDRESSES AT THE DINNER 233 
 
 paper that the 203-Meter-Hill fortress had been captured. It 
 did not require you to be a military strategist to predict that it 
 would be only a short time before the great citadel of Port 
 Arthur must fall. I remind you that the universities and col- 
 leges are the 203-Meter-Hill fortress of the nations. 
 
 (707) 
 
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SPRING MEETING OF THE 
 
 ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE HELD IN 
 
 NEW YORK, APRIL i8 AND 19, 1912 
 
 THE spring meeting of the Academy of Political Science 
 held in New York on April 18 and 19, 191 2, dealt with 
 Organization for Social Work. Three sessions were held 
 at Earl Hall, Columbia University. The program was as follows : 
 
 FIRST SESSION 
 Thursday morning, April 18 
 
 Topic 
 Greater New York's Social Needs 
 Charitable Relief 
 
 W. Frank Persons 
 Housing Needs 
 
 Lawrence Veiller 
 Protection of Factory Workers 
 
 George M. Price 
 Child Labor in the Tenements and Home Work for Women 
 
 Mrs. Florence Kelley 
 Budgetary Provision for Social Needs 
 
 William H. Allen 
 Education of Mothers and the Saving of Babies 
 
 Philip Van Ingen 
 Discussion by James Jenkins, Jr. 
 
 SECOND SESSION 
 Thursday afternoon, April 18 
 
 Topic 
 
 Social Surveys 
 
 The Spread of the Survey Idea. 
 
 Paul U. Kellogg 
 
 (708) 
 
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SPRING MEETING 235 
 
 The Survey of a Typical American City 
 
 Shelby M. Harrison 
 A Sanitary and Health Survey 
 
 George T. Palmer 
 The Relation of a District Neighborhood Survey to Social 
 Needs 
 
 Miss Pauline Goldmark 
 Discussion by Professor Robert Emmet Chaddock 
 
 FOURTH SESSION 
 Friday morning, April 19 
 
 Topic 
 NATIONAL SOCIAL NEEDS 
 
 Recreation and Youth 
 
 Luther H. Gulick 
 Next Steps in the Child-Labor Campaign 
 
 Owen R. Lovejoy 
 Regulation of Public Amusements 
 
 Mrs. Belle Lindner Israels 
 Commercialized Vice 
 
 George J. Kneeland 
 Discussion by Rev. Washington Gladden, Professor Henry R. 
 Seager and Dr. Hastings H. Hart 
 
 Robert W. deForest presided at the first session, Paul U. 
 Kellogg at the second session and Professor Samuel McCune 
 Lindsay at the fourth session. 
 
 CONFERENCE DINNER 
 The semi-annual dinner was held at the Hotel Astor on 
 Thursday evening, April 18, President Samuel McCune Lindsay 
 presiding. 
 
 The guests of honor were Monsignor Mooney, personal rep- 
 resentative of Cardinal Farley ; Rt. Rev. Eugene Russell Hen- 
 drix, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church South; Rabbi 
 
 (709) 
 
236 ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL WORK 
 
 Emil G. Hirsch, Professor of Rabbinical Literature and Phil- 
 osophy, University of Chicago ; Dr. Wilfred T. Grenfell of 
 Labrador; Mr. John R. Mott, General Secretary of the World's 
 Student Federation, and Professor Edward T. Devine of Co- 
 lumbia University. 
 
 (710) 
 
M'S^. 
 
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