The Commoner.
JUNE 13, 1913
Thirteen States Have Laws Pensioning Mothers
The Washington (D. C.) Herald prints tho
following Interesting review of the mother's
pension laws in the United States: While some
women are declaring that it is their inalienable
right to have their children cared for where
and bow they chose in order that they may go
outside the home and earn money, society is
deciding in many states to pay some women,
who otherwise would have to go out and earn
money, to stay at home and tako caro of their
children themselves.
The women teachers of New York city and
some other portions of the. community are much
stirred up becauso one of their number has
been refused a brief leave of absence with the
expectation that as soon as her child should be
a few months old she would return to her duties
in the schoolroom and turn the care of the in
fant over to some one else. Recently at a pub
lic meeting a number of prominent women pro
tested vigorously against this decision, and
urged that it is the right of any married woman,
children or no children, to continue her work
in any profession or other gainful occupation.
If she has children, they said, she could have
some skilled person take caro of them in her
own home, or send them out during the day to
one of those places that women skilled in
mother-work are establishing for that purpose.
And while all this was going on the legisla
ture was considering a bill to pay women whose
profession Ib . scrubbing, or day working, or
something of that sort, to stay home and tako
care of their children themselves. The scrub
woman would send her babies to an ordinary
"institution," while the professional woman
would send hers to a sort of glorified "institu
tion," but still a substitute, a makeshift, for
the homo and a hired foster-mother. And it is
exactly the homo and tho mother that various
legislatures are saying must bo saved for the
child, even if the state must pay that mother
to enable her to retain her natural place by its
side.
The situation has its. absurdities, but it is
not tho first time in tho course of civilization
th,at individual desires havo run counter to tho
social conscience and the convictions of the
social body. Will the feminists, in the end, re
cede from their standpoint of extreme individu
alism and consent to resume the world-old du
ties of motherhood? Or will a growing and
widening social conviction as to the economic
value of that motherhood finally lead the state
to pay all mothers for the time and effort they
spend in the rearing of their- children?
Whatever may be the outcome at present
among the manifold social movements of tho
time, there is none that is growing more rapidly
than this of providing assistance from the
public purse for the mother with children de
pendent upon her earnings who, otherwise,
would have to break up her home and send her
little ones to public instituions. Thirteen state
legislatures have passed these so-called "widows'
pension" laws, the greater part of them within
tho last year. A number of cities have provided
similar aid by municipal ordinances. New York
state barely missed joining the movement within
the last few weeks. The bill introduced by
Assemblyman Levy passed the lower house
triumphantly, but failed in the senate during
the hurried last days of the session. It, or a
similar bill, will be brought up again before the
next legislature, when it will probably become
a law. It is not unlikely, considering the rapid
growth of the movement, that within two or
three more years nearly every state in the union
will have decided that widowed and deserted
mothers must have the helping hand of the
state, if necessary, to keep their homes intact.
It has even been suggested that there should be
a federal law to this effect, but, as yet, no ono
seems to have taken that proposition seriously.
Illinois is credited with the initiation in this
country of this method of extending the help
ing hand. In that state the provision, which
is a section of the juvenile law, was passed just
two years ago, and went into operation July 1,
1911. California and Colorado soon followed
her example. Since the first of this year ten
more states Washington, Utah, South Dakota,
Idaho, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Ohio, New
Jersey, and Pennsylvania' have passed similar
laws. In addition, Missouri has authorized
Kanasas City to adopt the system. Wisconsin,
without definite enactment, has been conduct
ing a similar enterprise in a limited way, and
in three other states city ordinances or the
Powers bestowed upon state boards have estab
lished therein the principal of widow's pen
sions. Similar laws are now being considered
by seven other states.
Tho Illinois law provides that if the parent
or parents of any dependent or neglected child
are so poor as to bo unable to care for it proper
ly, but are otherwise suitable guardians, and it
is for the welfare of the child to remain in it
homo, the court may order the county board lo
pay to its parent such a sum of money, fixed by
the court, as may be necessary to provido
properly for Its care.
A special investigator, C. C. Carstens, sent by
the Russell Sage foundation to study the work
ings of this law In Chicago, made an unfavor
able report. He said that in half tho cases ho
studied relatives, churches, and employers had
greatly lessened their interest in the families
who were receiving these pensions; that in
eighty-nine cases the probation officers wore
found incompetent; that one-tenth of the fami
lies so helped were so drunken, immoral, and
diseased that the environment was not fit for
children to grow up in; and that one-third of
the homes were such that the help given was
of doubtful value to the state.
To his criticisms William Hard, who for
nearly two years has been conducting a depart
ment of the Delineator on tho subject of legis
lation concerned with women and children, and
has constantly favored the mothers' pension
idea, has replied that tho principlo should not bo
condemned because of local flaws in its appli
cation. He finds, by Mr. Carsten's own figures,
that such a large amount of tho money provided
went into homes where it was properly expended
and helped to keep together homes that were
worth preserving, that the law was as successful
and served as well the public benefit as do tho
majority of laws.
The Ohio law was passed a month ago, but
will not go into operation for a full year. It
was prepared with more care and with a fuller
understanding of the significance of what was
being done than was tho case with the Illinois
statute. Of this latter state's action captious
observers havo said that the legislators enacted
the mothers' pension law without realizing what
they were doing. It may be taken for granted,
however, that those social workers who had in
stigated the measuro knew what they wero
about, In Ohio a commission appointed by for
mer Governor Harmon to draft a children's
law code gave ample study to the question of
mothers' pensions, and made that provision a
part of the code, which passed the legislature
and received the sanction of Governor Cox prac
tically unchanged.
By this law assistance may be given to moth
ers whose husbands are dead, permanently dis
abled, prisoners, or have deserted their families
for three years, if their children are not old
enough to work and they can not support their
families without working away from home, and
they are themselves proper persons to have the
care of children, and have been legal residents
of any county In the state for two years. The
making of the allowance Is put into the hands
of tho juvenile court, and tho allowance Is
limited to $15 a" month for ono child and $7
additional for each child under legal working
age. The bill provides for an annual tax levy
of one-tenth of a mill, which, it is expected,
will create a mother's pension fund of $700,000
each year.
Pennsylvania followed Ohio within a fortnight
and passed a bill appropriating $200,000 from
the state treasury for mothers' pensions, to be
apportioned among the counties according to
their population. Any county desiring to use
its appropriation may petition tho governor,
whose duty it will then be to appoint a com
mittee of five women to administer tho law for
that county. They are empowered to investi
gate the case of abandoned or widowed mothers
and recommend payments of not exceeding $12
a month for one child, $20 for two children, $25
for three, and $5 per month for each additional
child. The New Jersey law makes a slightly
less generous appropriation per child, while tho
law of Michigan, also passed less than a month
ago, provides that needy mothers having chil
dren dependent upon them can draw from tho
public funds not to exceed $3 per week for
each child, upon tho order of the probate court.
All this legislation shjows by its wording that
it is" based upon the conviction that the best
person to care for a child, except In exceptional
cases, is its own mother, and that this mother
care for the state's future citizens and the con
sequent homo onvlronment arc? such valuablo
assets that it is worth the statu' while to spend
effort and money to conserve thorn.
Thus tho Ohio law in specifying tho condltlonfl
undor which tho allowanco may bo mad saya
that tho child for whoso benefit It Is offered
iiuiHt bo living with Its mother, that without tho
allowanco sho would bo required to work rogu
larly away from homo and chlldrcn, that with
It alio will bo ablo to remain at homo with her
children. Hor own character and the sort of
homo environment she will provido aro also
made tho subject of Investigation by accredited
officers. Hut, granted that these are found even
passable, It 1b tho evident conviction of the law
makers that humanizing, saving, ennobling In
fluenco Is exertod upon tho child's character by
the holding together of tho home, of their own
little possessions, and by enabling tho child to
feel that around him, and being exerted con
stantly for his interest, aro tho mother intorext,
tho mother care, tho mother love.
It Is a long recognized fact among social
workers that homo caro has to be very poor in
deed not to produce bettor results than does the
upbringing of children In instituions. It hai
been found In practice alao that tho plan ot
boarding out children in other families in not
nearly so efficient in fostering somo of tin best
elements of character as the plan of allowing
them to grow up In their own homes, provided
that theso are of equal or nearly equal grade.
Therefore, tho state Is beginning to deem It
expedient to step in and conserve that asset of
homo Influence and mother-care, just becauso
it produces better citizens tljan does any other
method of child rearing. Of course, tho move-'
mont Is a stop square In tho face of that modern
tendency to romovo children moro and moro
from tho hands of the mother and put them
undor specially trained supervision of ono sort
or another In order that the mother may bo left
free to follow hor own avocations, or, if sho
choose, her vocation.
Tho unanimity and heartiness of the mothers'
pension movement nnd the rapidity of its pro
gress seem to indlcato that society is recoiling
from tho Idea of allowing mother and children
to bo so much separated, to feel that it is un
natural and thereforo of sinister onion. Per
haps beforo long society will begin to ask itself
why, if it is so desirable, as much for the gen
eral benefit, for mothers who aro poor and un
cultivated to rear their own children, would it
not be still moro for tho public benefit for well-to-do
mothers of education and capacity to de
vote their Li mo and talents to that same work.
Many of tho advocates of the mothers' pen
sion system object to tho term "pension." They
feel that it implies, especially for Americans,
tho Idea of payment for past services, a rigid
rule of payment, regardless of needs or condi
tions, and a lack of responsibility on tho part
of tho person receiving It for its beneficent use.
They object still more to such terms as "relief"
and "charity" and "aid," becauso theso connoto
the dole of alms rather than payment for services
rendered. They object vigorously to having the
mother caring for her children by means of state
aid referred to as a "dependent." They want
her to feel, and every one elso to feel concern
ing her, that she is giving value received and
they do not want her self-respect to bo in the
least wounded. Says William Hard in a recent
article in tho Survey. "To call such a person
a 'dependent' is to mo as monstrous as to call
the librarian of congress a 'dependent.' Ho Is
paid for his work; sho for hers. And sho should
be paid by thoso for whom sho does it all tho
citizens of the state, not the subscribers to tho
charities."
It has been suggested by another writer that
"children's pensions" would be a better title for
this new form of stato aid than any other yet
proposed, and many of the proponents of the
principle agree with him. They urge that the
money is Intended to benefit primarily, not the
widow, but the children, and that to bring out
his idea more plainly would help people to seo
that such an appropriation is Intended to fur
ther the general good, just as Is an appropria
tion for bridges or good roads.
The Levy bill in this state recognized this
feeling against giving to such pensions the as
pect of charity, for it established a "department
of home assistance," which was to be applicable,
however, not to the whole state, but to New
York city only.
Prof. Hobhouse, of London university, haa
stated In very clear terms the position of those
who believe in mothers' pensions, but Object to
any characterization of them of any feeling
about them that carries the taint of charity. Jn
his book of "Liberalism" he says, -and his word