Judge Henry Neil, Father of the Mothers' Pension T Pension System in England WO laws enacted by the State of Illinois in 1899, and by nearly all the other states in the following few years, have played a great part in the affairs of dependent mothers and children in the United States. The first one of the laws, known as the Industrial School Act, authorized private corporations to accept the guardianship and care of children whose parents were too poor to take care of their own. It authorized these private institutions to collect from the common tax fund about ten dollars per month, per child, while the children were under their care. These private institutions also collected by private contributions an amount equal to ten dollars per month per child or more. Being the legal guardian of these children they had the power to and did give them out by adoption to people who were willing to adopt other people's children, and after the children were given out by adoption the real parent or parents, usually the mother, lost all right, and title to, and knowledge of her children. The law made it a criminal offense to give the parents any information as to the whereabouts of the child. The other law enacted at the same time, known as our Juvenile Court Act, authorized the creation of Children's Courts, with power to take children away from the parent or parents when the child was not receiving proper care and to turn it over to these institutions. Tens of thousands of fatherless children were taken away from mothers who were too poor to pay for the food, clothing and shelter of their own children under these two laws, during the twelve years following their enactment in 1899. These institutions grew at a tremendous rate. The City of New York last year paid over three and a half million dollars for the care of 22,000 children in the institutions in New York City. One could hardly ride from one large city to another without seeing on the hillside great buildings containing from two hundred to two thousand of these dependent children. Early in the year 1911 I happened to go into one of these institutions and in questioning some of the children I found whenever I asked a child: "Where is your mother?" the muscle of its mouth would twitch, the tears would start down its cheek and it would be speechless with emotion. I soon saw that this was too tender a subject to recall to the child's mind. I then went to the Children's Court in Chicago to see the process of sending children to these institutions. The first case I saw was that of a mother with five children. She was too weak to stand so they gave her a chair, before the bar of the Court. The testimony was that the father had died three years before, the mother had taken up the double job of going out all day to work, keeping some other house clean, and then coming home at night to care for her own home and her five little ones—a thing that I have since found that no woman unskilled in the art of getting money can possibly endure for many years. The officers testified that this mother had endured this double job for three years and that she was now broken in health, weak and unable to stand. Being unable to go out to work any more, she could not pay the rent and the landlord had ordered her out of the house, and having 'nowhere else to go she had come to the Children's Court for help. Then the officers decided that they would send one child to this institution and another to that institution and so parcel out the whole five, each to a different institution. I saw the mother's face twitch in the agony of despair and I said: "Wouldn't it be more humane, more kind, if you took this woman out back of the Court House and shot her before she realized that you are about to take all of her children away from her forever?" Then I said: "Who pays for the food, clothing and shelter of these children after you have taken them away from this mother?" and the presiding Judge said: "The institutions collect by law from the tax funds ten dollars per month per child." Then I said: "Why don't you give the ten dollars per month per child to this mother and let her take care of her own children? She has been taking better care of them than any institution can, for less." Then the Judge said: "The law allows the money to be paid to the institutions but not to the mother." Then I said: "Let's change the law." The Judge said: "The institutions are organized, they have thousands of jobs to give outevery five children sent to an institution creates one more job for some person other than the mother. The institutions have great contracts to give out for food, clothing and other supplies, and they send expert lobbyists to every legislature with the result that they can get the taxpayers' money for the care of children but the mothers can't." Then I said: "Does no one go to the Legislatures and represent the mothers?" and he said: "No." Then I said: "I'll go." I at once went to the Legislature of Illinois. I said: "Mr. Legislator, I have been to your institutions, I know you buy healthful food, warm clothing and you build magnificent sanitary buildings for these children after you take them away from their mothers, but you can't buy mother-love. It is not for sale anywhere, at any price, and that is what these children need and will not be comforted without." I also said: "Mr. Legislator, you are wasting the taxpayers' money by eliminating the voluntary labor of the mothers. No one else will give her labor to the care of these children for so little It will cost the taxpayer much less to hire pay. the child's own mother to care for these children for him. Now, Mr. Legislator, won't you enact this little amendment to your law, stating that when the father is dead, or incapacitated for work, and the mother is fit, and it is to the best interest of the child to remain at home, and she can by no reasonable means get the money to support her children, the Court shall order the money paid to the mother instead of to the institution and that she be allowed to keep her own children." And that legislature enacted that amendment without a dissenting vote, and on July 1, 1911, that law, the first statewide Mothers' Pension Law went into effect in Illinois. Since then I have traveled from state to state, from legislature to legislature, telling this story, and now thirty states out of the forty-eight, those with the largest populations, have this law and are operating this Mothers' Pension System. Last year over one hundred thousand children were cared for by their own mothers under this system, and the taxpayers have found that it costs much less to hire the child's own mother than to hire any other person. It also saves the mothers and saves the children. For the Care of Homeless and Τ Dependent Children HE National Children's Home and Welfare Association is a federation of thirty-three state societies, each one chartered under its state law for the purpose of caring for homeless, dependent and neglected children. The policy of these societies is to receive all such children when requested to do so, care for their every temporary need, place them in selected, Christian homes and then carefully supervise them until they become of age, replacing them whenever the home in which they are becomes unsuitable for any reason. The National Society holds an annual convention, usually at the time and place of the National Conference of Welfare Work. The next annual convention will be held in Kansas City, Missouri, either in May or June of 1918. The present officers of the National Society are: D. F. Shirk, President, Topeka, Kansas. S. W. Dickinson, Vice-President, St. Paul, Minnesota. W. S. Reynolds, Secretary, Chicago, Illinois. Marcus C. Fagg, Assistant Secretary, Jacksonville, Florida. The following states are members of the National body and application for membership has been received from Arkansas, Arizona and Louisiana. Applications for children should be made to The Juvenile Court Record and local information can be obtained by addressing the state superintendent of any one of these societies, whose name and address are given in connection with their state. 1. Alabama Children's Home Society, Ralph Barrow, Superintendent, Birmingham, Alabama. 2. California Children's Home Society, Mrs. F. E. L. Bailey, Superintendent, 2414 Griffith Avenue, Los Angeles, California. 3. Florida Children's Home Society, Marcus C. Fagg, Superintendent, Jacksonville, Florida. 4. Georgia Children's Home Society, Robert B. McCord, Superintendent, 1319 Hurt Bldg., Atlanta, Georgia. 5. Idaho Children's Home Finding and Aid Society, 6. Illinois Children's Home and Aid Society, 7. Iowa Children's Home Society, Rev. A. T. Burnell, Superintendent, 8. Kansas Children's Home Society, 9. Kentucky Children's Home Society, 10. Michigan's Children's Home Society, 11. Minnesota Children's Home Society, 12. Mississippi Children's Home Society, Rev. John L. Green, Superintendent, Jackson, Mississippi. 13. Missouri Children's Home Society, Rev. C. C. Stahmann, Superintendent, 14. Montana Children's Home Society, 15. Nebraska Children's Home Society, Rev. E. P. Quivey, Superintendent, 541 Brown Block, Omaha, Nebraska. 16. New Jersey Children's Home Society, Rev. J. C. Stock, Superintendent, Room 42 Forest-Richey Bldg., Trenton, N. J. (Delaware Auxiliary.) 17. New Mexico Children's Home Society, 18. New York Children's Aid Society, 20. North Dakota Children's Home Society, 21. Ohio Children's Home Society, Dr. F. H. Darby, Superintendent, 22. Oklahoma Children's Home Society, 241 Terminal Arcade, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. 23. Oregon Boys' and Girls' Aid Society, R. E. Arne, Superintendent, E. 29th and Irving Street, Portland, Oregon. 24. Pennsylvania Children's Home Society, Rev. W. Henry Thompson, Superintendent, 519 Ferguson Bldg., Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 25. South Carolina Children's Home Society, J. H. Crook, Superintendent, Greenville, South Carolina. 26. South Dakota Children's Home Society, A. D. Stuckeman, Superintendent, Sioux Falls, South Dakota. 27. Tennessee Children's Home Society, B. G. Regen, Superintendent, Nashville, Tennessee. 28. Texas Children's Home Society, Mrs. I. Z. T. Morris, Superintendent, 29. Virginia Children's Home Society, 30. Washington Children's Home Society, 32. Wisconsin Children's Home Society, 59 Loan & Trust Bldg., Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 33. Wyoming Children's Home Society, Miss Allie Jewell, Superintendent, Wheatland, Wyoming. |