148 EMIL MUNSTERBERG 



drawn. While the board at the end of 1899 had inspected 

 over 1,200 benevolent agencies, from this time 663 must be 

 withdrawn because they are supported simply from private 

 means and perform no public function. Among these are 47 

 asylums, 74 homes for the aged, 35 institutions for children, 63 

 general hospitals, etc. The very useful statistics relating to 

 all the institutions which have been published by the board 

 must be abandoned. The board, in whose quarterly report 

 this discussion appears, very naturally expresses deep regret 

 at this turn in affairs, which must result in public injury. The 

 argument is significant, not only for the New York administra- 

 tion, but in relation to public supervision generally. 



As a matter of fact, the effects are already noticeable in 

 the refusal of several societies to receive inspectors. In vain 

 the state board sought in the year past by legal means to ob- 

 tain aid. One bill was introduced with the special object of 

 requiring inspection of the society for the prevention of cruelty, 

 and another aimed in general to extend the rights and duties 

 of the state board to benevolent agencies which received no 

 public subsidy, in cases where the state board had previously 

 gained the consent of the administrators of these societies. 

 Both these bills were defeated by the opposition of the presi- 

 dent of the society already mentioned, while at the same time a 

 new bill limited the right to supervise the state home for sol- 

 diers and sailors. We must join the state board and its friends 

 in expressing the hope that the decision of the highest court 

 may be rendered harmless by the enactment of a law which 

 will subject all charitable agencies to control. The sound 

 societies have no occasion to shun the light of publicity, while 

 the corrupt can be unmasked only by this means. 



In very happy contrast with the attitude of the Society 

 for the Prevention of Cruelty is that of another great private 

 society, the State Charities Aid association of New York, 

 which was foimded in 1872, with the object of doing all that 

 unselfish citizens can do to improve the administration of 

 public institutions. To Germans it seems a very unusual 

 proceeding to organize a private society to labor for the better 

 administration of public institutions; it is explained by the 



