CHARITABLE REFORM.*
THE Lord Mayor was placed in a position of some difficulty on Tuesday last, from which he extricated himself with no little tact and skill. Be was then presiding at the annual meeting of the Charity Organisation Society, whose claims to support had recently been rejected by the City authorities. It became impossible for him to avoid allusion to this rejection, for which he accounted by saying that the devotion of the City to charity was jealous of anything which even appeared to he hostile to that virtue. It is not necessary now to examine the motives of the Court of Common Council. Our present object is rather to inquire how it is that the Charity Organisation Society should excite such very opposite feelings. No one could have been present at the annual meeting, and at the con- ference which preceded and followed it, without perceiving that the cause of charity organisation is capable of exciting en- thusiastic devotion; while it is well known that there are others who hate it, with a perfect hatred. To many, the one enthu- siasm will appear as strange as the other. They look upon the organisation as a good thing, in its way, bnt as essentially a subject for moderate affection. Entire devotion to the cause, such as that evident, for example, in Mr. Loch's speech at the Mansion House, would be as unintelligible to them as the eager hatred displayed in other quarters. Here are three stand-points to be considered,—the "Everlasting No" of thorough opponents, the " Centre of Indifference " of, we fear, the greater number, and the " Everlasting Yes " of Mr. Loch and his colleagues.
" Some Necessary Reforms in Charitable Work," is the title of a paper, read by Mr. Loch at the evening conference, and now published by the Charity Organisation Society. Reformers are seldom universally admired ; and there are observations in this paper, those particularly referring to the gentlemen who hold important offices in a great number of charitable institutions at the same time, which cannot be quite pleasant reading to charitable pluralists. Those who read this and other publications of the Society, and com- pare its object and methods as now set out in a changed form in the Annual Report, with the earlier utterances of the Society, will see that there has been a great development, amounting almost to a new departure. In its youthful zeal, the Society was, perhaps, somewhat too forward in attacking all charities and charitable institutions framed on patterns of which it did not wholly approve. It thus came to be thought of, not as the Common council of charities, and the means of securing co- Some Necessary Reforms in Charitable Work. By C. S. Loch. Published by the Charity Organization 'Seeley, 15 Buckingham Street, Charing Cross.
operation among them, but as a separate Society, whose office was to criticise, and often to injure, others. Those whose charity had immediate reference to their own advantage, and those whose motives were pure but who resented what seemed to them unwarrantable intrusion, combined in their hostility ; while the general public saw only in the Charity Organisation Society a moderately useful institution for the repression of imposture, and mildly patronised it accordingly. It is, doubtless, important to expose the misdoings of knaves, and to criticise mismanaged charities ; but a society which is supposed to have this for its principal function cannot expect enthusiastic support, though it is sure of hearty hatred.
Bat, meanwhile, the Society was growing and developing. Men and women, paid and unpaid workers, were devoting themselves to a cause which is by no means that merely of repression, criticism, and the detection of imposture. The one object of the Society is now defined to be,—" To improve the condition of the poor ;" and it must be quite plain that nega- tive work can only incidentally, and in a secondary way, help towards this object. It is, and will continue to be, necessary to throw light on those dark places of so-called charity where impostors intercept the alms of the benevolent; and to show how faulty methods, insufficient supervision, and other defects stand between our vast charitable intentions, and our com- paratively insignificant charitable results. It is the duty of the Society to declare the evils that come of playing at charity ; and if those who make it their amusement to half-work some dozen charitable institutions at once, dislike remarks on the resulting evils, that dislike cannot be avoided. But the con- viction has grown and is growing, and is very effectually put in practice, that action rather than criticism is the first duty of the Society ; that it has to approve its methods by showing them in operation, and to gain the co-operation of other societies by good work excellently done, rather than by talking about what others ought to do. It is because the Society has too carefully concealed its good works, and somewhat unduly accentuated its critical functions, that so many look at it from the " Centre of Indifference." There is one gentleman, to take a single instance, who for a long time has been giving himself up to work in the far East of London, who has sat in the office day after day taking down the cases of applicants, and making it his one business to cure their distress. There is another committee, in a different quarter, which took in hand the case of a poor drunkard whose foul language and determined vice had scared off every one else, which actually redeemed him by steady perseverance, and was his friend until he died in hospital of premature old age. This is the kind of work which gradually converts those who come in contact with it from their old hostility or indifference, but of this the public at large know nothing.
The creed of the Charity Organisation Society may be summed up in a very few articles. First, it holds that charity is much too important an affair for playing with,—that the re- lief of distress is a science, to be carefully studied and persist- ently practised. We may, perhaps, be permitted to say here that the gentleman mentioned a few lines above is necessarily leaving his post, and that if any reader is inclined to under- take an office which means very hard work and no pay, now is his time to secure it. Secondly, it is maintained that relief must be adequate, that it must be such as to remove altogether the causes of distress. Charity of the imperfect kind gives more satisfaction to the donor than benefit to the receiver. The charity of the Society, when administered as it is, always ideally, and often actually, is a very troublesome and difficult business, but goes to the root of the mischief. This can, however, be done only by the co-operation of all available charitable re- sources. It is comparatively easy to give out a single fund, and to limit the gift by the means at disposal. That does not satisfy the true charity organisationist, who will wait, and work, a.nd write, until he has got all the assistancerequired from various charitable institutions or persons. Thirdly, the Society insists upon inquiry as the condition of relief. This insistance is often misunderstood. If necessary, instant relief is, in some cases, given ; but it is held that, in order to assist a case pro- perly, the history of the applicant must be known, not because imposture is suspected, but because, without complete know- ledge, it is impossible to tell how help may best be given, or from what sources it may be most surely obtained. To sum up, organising charity means combining charitable forces, and directing their full weight on to the true point of attack ; and
the true object of attack is pauperism. Poverty—decent, cleanly, self-respecting poverty—there will, probably, always be; but pauperism is as much a preventable disease as scarlet- fever or the plague. Charity as an amusement, charity which is no better than a passing impulse, and isolated oharity, have failed to grapple with pauperism. The aim of the Society is to treat the question iu a large and scientific spirit, and to remove the scandal that so many millions are spent in charity, while pauperism is worse than ever. So stated, it will not be unintel- ligible that Charity Organisation may be regarded by some with devotion and enthusiasm.
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