208 RURAL LIFE IN CANADA 



States. Their number as tabulated is in the neighbor- 

 hood of seventy. The order of their appearance, ario 

 especially their rapid increase with each decade, is 

 instructive. The six decades before 1880 gave rise to 

 13 ; the decade of the eighties to 4 ; of the nineties to 

 12 ; the opening decade of this century to 39. Earliest 

 among those named the earlier associations for the 

 reform of the drunkard are not included came an 

 association for the care of the insane, then one for the 

 prevention of illiteracy; the American Association for 

 the Instruction of the Blind followed after an interval ; 

 and then, rapidly, the American Prison Association, 

 the Public Health Association, the Women's Christian 

 Temperance Union, the Purity Alliance, the Associa- 

 tion for the Feeble-Minded, and the National Confer- 

 ence on Charities and Correction. The eighties gave 

 rise to the Red Cross Association and the Chris- 

 tian Social Union. The nineties brought social 

 settlements, women's councils, the National Coun- 

 cil of Mothers, the Anti-Saloon League, and move- 

 ments for regulation of industries and of immigration. 

 After 1900 came a host of movements for the preven- 

 tion of child labor, of infant mortality, of blindness, 

 of tuberculosis ; for the education of backward chil- 

 dren, of negroes, the care of delinquents, of epileptics ; 

 for the suppression of the white slave traffic, and pre- 

 vention of infant mortality. The various denomina- 

 tions organize for social service the Presbyterian 

 Church's Department of Church and Labor ; of Church 

 and Country Life ; the Methodist Federation for Social 

 Service; the Industrial Committee of the National 

 Council of Congregational Churches, the Social Service 

 Commission of the Protestant Episcopal Church, the 



