and relief is kept back if he refuses to work. The members of a family are primarily held responsible for each other, so long as they have ability to help; and they have many motives of interest and affection to perform this duty. If the family cannot carry the burden, the law holds the local neighborhood bound. Since each citizen may be supposed, normally, to contribute to the wealth of a place by his labor, that place should care for him in his distress. The neighbors of a man know him best, and can detect deceit better than strangers; and in a small district citizens are most watchful to prevent any policy of partiality or extravagance on the part of the officials.

But there are limits to the power of a small district, and the time comes when the need can be met only by coöperation of the people of a large territory, as a county or state. It happens that a community may be too small and poor to carry its load, especially if there are many dependents calling for aid. The township may require the help of the county, for example, when an institution is to be erected.

Local authorities are often too parsimonious, or, with the best intentions of benevolence, are wanting in knowledge and skill Thus they may neglect to provide suitable medical care and nursing for the sick, and suitable housing and watching for the insane.

Of certain classes of dependents, the defectives, there are not enough to justify the expense of a separate institution in each township. The insane, blind, feeble-minded, epileptics, of the whole state are, therefore, provided for in state institutions, the locality sharing the burden in proportion to its wealth. A county provides a poorhouse on this principle, and each commonwealth has its own charitable establishments for particular classes.

4. Dangers of Inadequate State Provision. - Frequently the legislature has established costly and splendid institutions for certain classes of dependents, as the insane, and then neglected to build enough edifices to accommodate all who require care. The result has been that, while a few have enjoyed extravagant

homes, many others, just as deserving, have been shut up in miserable almshouses, or even jails. Thousands of applicants are kept waiting because the institutions are already crowded, and this results in great suffering.

The law pro

5. The Care of Dependents without Settlement. vides for the relief of all the indigent at the place where the misfortune falls. Removal is not permitted, in case of illness and feebleness, where the health or life of the person would be in peril. This principle is now generally recognized, and sometimes explicitly stated in the law. Who, finally, will pay the cost of such cases? This question meets different answers in different communities. One method is, to permit the town or county where the person made appeal for aid to pay for strangers as well as for residents, and this is more customary in the newer states. In some states the local authorities are empowered to collect from the town where the pauper has a residence. In case of persons without local claims, the state assumes the expense and pays the sum out of a common fund.

6. The Administration of Funds is in the hands of elected or appointed boards or officers of state, county, township, or town, according to the system in vogue. The board of trustees, commissioners, or directors usually appoint a clerk to keep accounts of all receipts, orders, and expenditures. Township trustees report to county authorities. Publication of accounts, without the names of beneficiaries, is sometimes required. There is great need for the control of forms and reports by a state board of charities, and where such boards exist they inspect the books and budgets of state institutions. The local accounts of relief are frequently so mixed up with other matters, as roads and schools, that expenditures for poor relief cannot be separated and the amount of this burden made known.

7. Prospects of this Item in the Budget. — There is at present, and will be for some time to come, a great increase of cost in meeting the higher demands of scientific and humane penology and relief. But as the agencies become more effective in limit

ing defect and crime, and especially as the material and moral conditions of city life are improved, the cost will diminish.

Writers on finance have a right to a hearing on the best methods of economic administration of such funds; and from this standpoint there is general agreement on the principle, elsewhere advocated on grounds of advantage to the poor themselves, that there should be as much local direction and management as possible, but with such central state supervision and control as will check dishonesty and promote intelligence in method.

CHAPTER III.

OUTDOOR LEGAL RELIEF.

1. Definition. The phrase “outdoor legal relief” is here used to signify the assistance given to dependent persons or families in their own homes, out of means provided by taxation, administered by public officials. There is also “outdoor private relief,” which is given by voluntary benevolent associations. Medical aid is quite generally given in close connection with other outdoor relief, but this will be specially considered under the head of medical charity. In Massachusetts the term “outdoor relief" is applied to help given by the state to the poor who have no local settlement; and these are frequently found in hospitals and other institutions. In England the outdoor poor are all those who are not in almshouses or workhouses, and may include insane persons in asylums. Confusion will be avoided by keeping these different uses of the phrase in mind in the reading of the documents and discussions relating to this subject.

2. Statistics.-There is special necessity of calling attention to the very imperfect state of statistics of outdoor relief in the United States.

There is no question about the value of enumerations, if they could be obtained. We know social facts completely only when we can measure them. In the case of outdoor relief the social interest is vast and complex. We do not know whether pauperism is increasing or decreasing, whether our methods are promoting thrift or degrading the poor, whether our benevolence is beneficent or maleficent. A future field of martyrdom is this life-long pursuit of data for scientific conclusions. Nothing requires more self-denial, more willingness to sink self out of

sight, and coöperate with fellow-workers for a useful result, without glory or brilliant attractions. It is so much easier, especially for persons of active and sympathetic natures, to paint in golden rhetoric than to compare figures and tables and manipulate schedules. Happily some good people are born mathematicians. As the case stands at present, no help whatever can be derived from the census reports of the federal government. The census of 1880 did furnish a little fragmentary information, but the tables were so misleading that in 1890 no attempt to present statistics was made.

Our only reliable sources are the reports of those few states whose boards gather up returns from county and town administrators. The returns from local administrators ought to cover such points as these: name, sex, religious confession, birthday, birthplace, calling, family status (single, married, widow, legally divorced, living apart, deserted), number of dependent persons in the household, place of pauper settlement, date when the person began to live there, aid given during the year (outdoor, indoor, cash, or goods), causes of need, way of gaining settlement (residence, marriage, descent).

The Charity Organization Societies are collecting information on forms of schedules fairly uniform, which will be considered later. In states where the township trustee is required to send to the secretary of the state board, at regular intervals, a duplicate of his record of each case, a broad and reliable basis is laid for a complete census in the future.

The reasons for the imperfect condition of national statistics lie in the defects of the original records. No schedules of individual cases are made and sent to a central bureau for compilation and comparison; and it is impossible to find paupers by sending investigators from door to door to ask for the instances of public relief. Even if we had all official records, there would remain unknown the vast sum spent by associations and individuals on private outdoor relief.

Estimates for the whole country based on figures from states