POOR RELIEF IN THE UNITED STATES. 



BY EMIL MUNSTERBERQ. 



[Emil Miinstorborp;, Gorman sociologist; is city councillor and director of poor relief 

 in the city of BctHii ; is pi^bably the greatest authority in the world in this line; editor 

 of the Ze'itschrift fiir das Arnienwassen, the organ of the Centralstctte fiir Arbeit- 

 erwohlfahrtseinrichtungen; Author: Die Annenpflege, Zur Frage der Stadtischen 

 Selbstverwaltung, etc.] 



The American system of poor relief resembles that of 

 Switzerland in the lack of unity of character. There is no 

 national American poor law. The federal government reg- 

 ulates poor relief in the District of Columbia, which occupies 

 an exceptional position; and it supervises immigration, and 

 of late has sought to restrict the entrance of pauperized and 

 defective persons. In time of extraordinary necessity con- 

 gress may give aid. The statistical offices of the union gather 

 information relating to public relief and private charity in all 

 the states. In general, poor relief is an affair of the states, 

 which they administer either directly or through the local 

 authorities of counties or towTiships. 



In order to imderstand the development of the American 

 poor relief system, one must properly estimate the manifold 

 conditions which have been developed in history along 

 economic lines. The reader should, as Henderson remarks, 

 keep before his imagination a map of the United States, and 

 hold steadily in mind the climatic, historic, and social differ- 

 ences; the striking contrasts between New England, the south, 

 the fertile plains of the middle states, the vast prairies of the 

 west, and the elevated mountain regions and fruitful valleys 

 and coast climate of the Pacific states. Quite as various as 

 these conditions are the forms of pubfic and private care of the 

 poor; in the western states they are frequently in the first 

 stages of evolution; in the old, the so-called New England 

 states, they are already affected by the evils of older culture. 

 On the other hand, it occurs that quite young cities are supe- 

 rior to older lands, because they have appropriated to their 



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