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vision and Administration, because the papers read, in favor of State boards of control, consumed so much time as to leave very little for any opposing expression of opinion from the floor, and the proceedings therefore fail to represent the prevailing sense of the Conference, so that they will, when published, be misleading as guides to political action by the States.

The principal social events were a sail through Casco Bay and a reception to the ladies given by Mrs. George S. Hunt. To these must be added, as something quite out of the common, a dinner at Riverton, at which Sheriff Pennell was the host. It was attended by about thirty leading citizens—judges, lawyers, clergymen and men of affairs; and its purpose was to interest them in the prison question especially in that phase of it represented by probation and the juvenile court. Short addresses were made by Mr. Sanborn, on the history of prison reforms; by Mr. Warren F. Spalding, secretary of the Massachusetts Prison Association, on its present state of evolution; by Dr. Wines, on its outlook and promise; and by Mr. Lucius C. Storrs, of Michigan, on the need for a State board of charities in Maine.

The central thought of all the talk on the prison question (and much attention was paid it at Portland) was that the retributory or penal theory of the criminal law must sooner or later give way to that of the reformation of the convict; that reformation is an educational process; and that the criminal should be treated, as far as practicable, to quote Mr. Brockway's happy phrase, “in the open." Among the most remarkable utterances on this subject was the account given by Mrs. Kate G. Hayman, police matron at Louisville, Ky., of the work begun and planned for the future in the female department of the Louisville jail, which is to be made a social center for reformatory influence over women with criminal impulses and tendencies, in the nature of a social settlement; an entirely novel conception of the proper function of a prison, and a real advance step in practical criminology. It is also very noticeable that the conception of reformatory work with delinquent children as an educational process has taken deep hold on the officers of reform and industrial schools, so that at Portland they effected an independent organization, of which Mr. Nibecker was chosen President, to be known as the Educational Association, having special reference to backward, truant and criminally inclined youth of both sexes. This was the outcome of a meeting which convened two days in advance of the Conference, and was very helpful to all who took part in it. Another advance meeting was that of “visiting" nurses. There is a national organization of "trained" nurses, but that is a different affair. The visiting nurses will meet again next year as a section of the Conference. The session of 1905 will be at Portland, Oregon. Some objection to this choice was made by delegates from the Middle West, but it was the fifth time that Oregon had asked for the Conference, and the selection was finally assented to by a unanimous vote, in deference to the needs as well as the desire of the Pacific Coast.

The National Conference of Charities is the only organization in the world, so far as known, which claims and celebrates three distinct birthdays. The seed was planted at Madison, Wisconsin, in 1872, when the newly created State boards

of Wisconsin and Illinois first met for mutual exchange of experiences and views. They afterward invited the Michigan Board to meet with them in Chicago. Then, in 1874, all of these boards, numbering nine, then existing met, by invitation of Mr. Sanborn, with the Social Science Association, at New York. Finally, in 1879, at Chicago, the Conference held its first separate session and effected an independent organization. It was originally an almost purely official body, representing State governments. For a number of years it boasted that it was a body without a constitution, without rules, without principles, and without dues -the freest association upon earth, a forum for free discussion, and nothing more. In order that the members and officers of the State boards might better qualify themselves for the discharge of their legal responsibilities, the superintendents of State charitable and correctional institutions were encouraged to attend and to read papers on the care and treatment of the insane, the idiotic, the deaf, the blind, paupers, criminals, juvenile offenders and other special classes in which the States take a paternal interest. The question at the bottom of all the discussions was that of the duty of the State toward the victims of poverty, crime and misfortune. Light on this important question was also sought from officials of municipal and private charitable institutions of similar nature and aims.

The meeting at Louisville, in 1883, was the first at which a report was made by a standing committee on charity organizations in cities. This incident marked the beginning of a new departure in the policy of the Conference, the ultimate effect of which was not at first apparent. The non-official element in its composition was thus recognized, but it was not until the year 1895, at New Haven, that any one was elected to serve as its President, who was not a member or secretary of a State board. This honor belongs to Mr. Robert Treat Paine, of Boston, who was at the head of the Associated Charities of that city. With the rapid growth of the movement for the establishment of organized charity in cities and towns, there came a great and increasing influx of persons but slightly and incidentally interested in the original purpose of the Conference, whose main desire in attending its sessions was to profit by their mutual experience in a new but narrower field of philanthropic effort. Their numbers multiplied so fast that they were soon able to outvote the original membership and shape the organization to their own ends. They (and others) demanded the division of the body into sectional meetings, in order to give them more time for their own problems. A critical review of the annual reports of the committees on organization will show the great difference between the earlier and the later programmes adopted; the creation of sections on needy families in their homes, on the work of social settlements, on the proper division of work between public and private charity, on tenement house reform, on child labor and truancy, on neighborhood improvement, on fresh air summer outings, on boys' and girls' clubs, on recreation as a means of developing the child, on playgrounds as a part of the public school system, municipal lodging houses, the municipal regulation of newsboys and bootblacks, and the like. Some of these questions relate, it is true, to the work of institutions and to subjects which demand legislative action; but their primary interest is for private charity workers, dealing with individuals, one by one and

studying local municipal conditions rather than the condition and needs of the entire body politic.

The departure to which reference has been made was natural and inevitable. The Conference exists in order to assist in the accomplishment of three leading aims: the increase of the sum of knowledge, philanthropic and sociological, by the accumulation of facts and the development by scientific methods of sound theories based on actual observation and experience; the education of its own membership; and the exertion of a healthy, invigorating influence upon public opinion, sentiment and action. The representatives of private charities, particularly of the associated charities, are as deeply interested in these as are public officials. They are equally in need of such education and stimulus as the Conference imparts. They are able to contribute to the aggregate result information and suggestions of the highest value, of a character and along lines, especially the line of preventive effort, not so readily or generally accessible to the representatives of institutions, public or private. This is a case where neither element in the organization can say to the other, "I have no need of thee."

It must be admitted, nevertheless, that in these remarks a possible line of cleavage is indicated, which marks a danger point. At Portland, the conviction was widely and strongly expressed that the pendulum has swung too far in one direction, and that a reaction is desirable, if not essential—a partial return to first principles. The suggestion that the founders. of the Conference, if dissatisfied with its present drift, could secede and organize anew, though courteously made, provoked a certain mild resentment. The older, if not the wiser members, recalling the years when the younger men and women were still in their pinafores, if not in their cradles, declare that "the former times were better than these." They think that, if the programme has gained in breadth, it has lost in depth, in perspective and in true proportion. The larger part of the charitable and correctional work in this country is in the hands of the State, and the State collects the funds from all the people and serves all the people. The classes for which the State cares are typical. Compared with the superintendent of a State institution, who is a professional expert, the average private charity worker is an amateur. And the larger part of private charitable work is done in and by institutions, to whose aggregate population the total number of "cases" handled in any year by the associated charities bears an almost insignificant ratio. The pioneers in this movement accordingly lament the loss from the Conference of so many representatives of State boards, and so many experienced and skilled superintendents of institutions, driven away from it, as they think, because of the undue prominence given to subjects to which they sustain no definite and close relation. The municipal problem may enlist a larger number of workers, but the results attained do not affect so large a percentage of the population at large, including the rural with the civic; nor are they so far reaching in their bearing upon the future destiny of the nation.

Dr. Wines, in his speech of farewell, on the last evening, referring to this divergence of views, compared the Conference to a vessel rolling in mid-ocean, but staunch and powerful, always righting itself and sure to arrive in safety at

its destined but far distant port. He also called attention to the fact that, when the Conference was organized only a third of a century ago, there was not in the United States a charity organization society, a social settlement, a modern reformatory prison, juvenile courts, a probation officer, a training school for charity workers, nor even a chair of sociology in any institution of learning. The indeterminate sentence, graded prisons, and the parole were still in the State described in the words, "And Jacob dreamed a dream." All of our insane hospitals were constructed and conducted on the congregate plan. The movement for special training of the idiotic and feeble-minded was in its infancy, and little progress had been made in securing the adoption of the placing-out system in the care of destitute and neglected children. "The Conference," he said, “has not laid all these eggs, but it is the incubator in which they were hatched." He likened it to a power-house, supplying force to move the car of progress on its

way.

And all this has been done by quiet and unostentatious methods. One principle has governed the body from the outset. It makes no deliverances upon any question whatever, preferring to be all-inclusive rather than dogmatic and dictatorial. It recommends no legislation. Every member says what he thinks; it is printed, and goes for whatever it may be worth. The consensus of opinion may be inferred from reading the debates. So firmly is this principle inwrought into the organization that the members refused to consent to an apparently harmless little resolution, in response to a communication from the United States Census office, authorizing the appointment of a committee of five to confer with the Director of the Census as to the statistical information which it is desired to procure touching the classes which the Conference seeks to benefit, and the amendments to the Census Act necessary to obtain it. The parliamentary squabble over this resolution was most amazing and absurd.

The President for the ensuing year is the Rev. Dr. Samuel G. Smith, of St. Paul, who has been President of the State Board of Charities, President of the Associated Charities, and is now Professor of Sociology in the State University of Minnesota. Mr. Joseph P. Byers, the former Secretary, now warden of the Eastern Penitentiary of Pennsylvania, felt himself under obligations to resign that office, and is succeeded by Mr. Alexander Johnson, who has also had experience both in the service of the State board of Indiana and of the Chicago Bureau of Charities, as well as at the head of a large State institution. These gentlemen should be able, and no doubt will be able, to adjust and harmonize all pending disagreements, which at worst amount in fact to no more than a slight rift in the lute.

Women's Organizations.—“No person," says Mr. Samuelson, "who has followed the philanthropic movement of the last few years can have failed to be struck with the increase of woman's activity, both private and public, in furtherance of every laudable, social enterprise." The essential feature in this activity, however, is the fact that it is no longer limited to assisting the

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1 Samuelson, James Ed.: "Civilization of Our Day," p. 195.

outcasts of society, nor does it exclusively take the form of church charity, although the church still remains the great receptacle of woman's munificence.

Women of the same or different social classes, seem to realize that they do have interests as well as duties in common and that associated effort is indispensable in order to secure the best results. Accordingly, organizations of all sorts and descriptions are formed so that there is hardly a woman who is not in some way connected with an association, either as contributor or recipient. Some of these organizations have already developed into strong bodies. The Woman's Christian Temperance Union, for example, has a membership of 200,000. Its building in Chicago, where the headquarters are, cost $1,200,000. It has its own publishing house which prepares and issues all kinds of publications for the advancement of the objects of the society. Its official paper, The Union Signal, has a subscription list of 80,000. "It has pushed through the legislatures of thirty-seven States and Territories the laws that now compel, in all public schools, instruction in the nature and effect of alcoholic drinks and narcotics." 2 Sixteen million children are said to have been brought under this instruction. In short, the organization comprises five distinct departments, "Preventive, Educational, Evangelistic, Social and Legal," all of them are strenuously attended to. Of late the society has also identified itself with the woman's suffrage movement and is rendering valiant service to the "cause." The Young Women's Christian Association is another organization whose branches are spreading all over Christendom. The work this society does here may be seen in the following programme of the New York Women's Christian Association founded in 1872:4

I. The Bible class.

II. Free concerts, lectures, readings, etc.

III. Free classes for instruction in writing, commercial arithmetic, bookkeeping, business training, phonography, typewriting, retouching photo-negatives, photo-color, mechanical and free hand drawing, clay modeling, applied design, choir music and physical culture.

IV. Free circulating library, reference library and reading rooms.
V. Employment Bureau.

VI.

Needlework department, salesroom, order department, free classes in machine and hand sewing, classes in cutting and fitting.

VII. Free board directory.

This work is typical of the various working girls' clubs, college settlements, industrial and educational unions, neighborhood guilds, and girls' friendly societies, all having for their object the "intellectual, industrial and social advancement" of the self-supporting woman. In most of them mutual aid rather than charity is emphasized. The humblest working woman who has caught the spirit of the new era despises "charity" and is sensitively suspicious of anything which has a taint of pauperism. The ladies of leisure and culture

2 Meyers, p. 270.

3 Henderson, C. R.:" The Social Spirit in America," p. 188.

4 Meyers, p. 338.

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