TENDENCIES OF INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 689 



But this and such kindred developments as state boards of 

 charities, state charities aid societies, and state and national 

 conferences of charities and correction are not more expressive of 

 an economic instinct than of a democratic spirit. Indeed, all these 

 more representative associations arose coincident with and to meet 

 the demands of the people's assumption of the control of their own 

 affairs. Local autonomy in a district became coordinate yet cooper- 

 ative with the centralizing yet exclusive headquarters which formerly 

 claimed the whole field. Paid official positions became all the more 

 indispensable and honorable when under the supervision of the 

 unpaid representatives of the public. The salaried expert was recog- 

 nized to be all the more a leader when there were volunteer workers 

 and friendly visitors to be led. The few and select donors of large 

 gifts, who not without reason have sometimes been suspected of 

 monopolizing the " Lady Bountiful " type of benevolence, have 

 found neither their legitimate influence nor the scope of their giving 

 curtailed by sharing the democratic spirit which now supersedes 

 whatever exclusiveness there used to be in philanthropy. 



Moreover this spirit has begun to save the loss of individuality 

 suffered by those in the dependent and delinquent groups who have 

 been massed impersonally and indiscriminately together, under the 

 congregate system of institutional administration. . The reversion 

 to the more normal type of individual life in smaller family or house- 

 hold groups is the belated recognition of the democratic right of each 

 to personal consideration, which all are bound to respect in the care 

 of the dependent, the defective, and the delinquent. In respecting 

 this right the community equally regards its own welfare by taking 

 the most direct means of restoring to self-help and rightful place 

 among men those whose capacity for self-control and usefulness is 

 weakened, if not destroyed, by treatment, not less a violation of 

 nature than it is inimical to public interests. In line with the same 

 farther-sighted humanitarian economy is the enlistment of whole 

 populations, through their city governments, to grapple with their 

 social situation as a whole. The Elberfeld policy toward dependency; 

 the public control of the liquor traffic as in Scandinavia; the marshal- 

 ing of the legislative authority, resources of taxation, and a construct- 

 ive civic programme for the abolition of slums and the equalizing 

 of privileges and opportunity, as the borough and county councils 

 of England are doing it; the regulation of industrial forces in the 

 interests of the whole people, as in Australia and New. Zealand, 

 such attempts to reach a saner social order and realize a more human 

 ideal of collective life are impressive way-marks of progress such as 

 only the whole community can achieve for itself. 



The personal and community interests we have been considering 

 are so permeated by the ideals and influence of the religious group 



