THE HOME LIFE OF THE POOR.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—Many women must have watched your columns in the hope of seeing some practical response to Miss Frances Low's suggestion (Spectator, February 1st). The Mothers Union attempts the national service of restoring to working women a sense of responsibility which would make much proposed legislation unnecessary. The strongest plea for the direct influence of women in politics is that legislation for the pro- tection of women and children lags behind the need. But, Sir, what we need is not so much fresh enactments as law- abiding citizens. Otherwise legislation can but create fresh evils in removing others. " The formation of men," wrote Manning to Gladstone in 1870, " is the work you are entrusting to, School Boards. God gave it to parents." The trend, both of our legislation and of our philanthropy, has for long been to destroy the home life of the poor, whose children are increasingly taken from them to be taught, fed, nursed, controlled, amused, Christianised, and even drawn into charit- able efforts, anywhere and everywhere except at home. One dire result shows itself in the gro;ving indifference to cramped and insanitary accommodation, matters of lessening import. ance, as the children tend to return only for sleep and snatched meals. Another is seen in the fact that throughout the discussions on religious education no one seems to con- template the idea that a mother would ever teach a simple prayer or a father his own Christian principle. At the same time, by a strange paradox, the State is seeking to place its own sixty-nine thousand destitute children in homes rather than in Homes for their upbringing. One hopeful feature in the new Children's Bill, in spite of its tendency to replace the parent by the policeman, is the provision which assumes parental knowledge of a child's whereabouts. Again, it is a significant fact that the moment old-age pensions came within the scope of practical politics the receipts of the Friendly Societies fell. Another blow had been struck at personal responsibility for family resources. And again, the recent " Cadbury " inquiry into the work and wages of women in Birmingham showed some real dangers of over-interference between employers and employed. One would suppose that the results of legislative abolition of free contract in Ireland were sufficiently apparent. Women who object to the suffrage agitation do so, if thoughtful, not because of any supposed unsexing properties in a vote, but because they feel that the remedy for admitted evils is not to be sought through political but through social work. And they grieve to see one more influence added to the many that are already causing wives and mothers to become incapable of wielding their due influence, authority, and power in the shaping of the English
Author of "The Child and his Book."
Previous page
