Indiana State sentinel. (Indianapolis, Ind.) 1861-1865, 1862-05-05
From the Philadelphia Evening Journal
CHARITY n Hama nrsrU.


A few weeks since, there was published in the
police record of city paper the case of poor
seamstress who had been driven by absolute want
10 pawn some acknowledgement to her TO be
made np--in order to buy food for her children,
until her employer should pay her what he owed
her for work previously done. In the course of
the evidence it appeared that the woman was
employed to make up drawers, for which she re-
ceived only ~ cents per pair.
A very rapid worker can, by working thirteen
hours day, make three pairs of drawers, thus
earning 221s cedts; but the average class of sew
ing women cannot make more than two pair
day, so that they earn only fifteen cents The
worst part of the story is that the woman in this
case was compelled to pawn part of the material
given to her, in order to procure food for her
children, because her employer would not pay her
punctually the wretched pittance due her; and he
also refused at last to settle balance due the
seamstress unless she deducted fifty cents for
each pair of drawers she had pawned.
While such hard cases ofdestitutiOn on the one
side, and oppression on the other, are by no means
uncommon in this city among The poor people,
who find it harder to get work than to procure a
support by street begging. the city is swarming
with new corners OF different race, who appear
to secure the sympathy and aid of most OF the
dispensers of charity.
Numbers of men and women of our own race
are either wandering about the streets in search
of work, or eking out wretched livelihood by
toiling more than half of the twenty-four hours
for the merest pittance. while crowds of fugitive
negroes from other States are daily received by
committees, teted by the "friends of the human
race" and quartered upon such families as are
willing to receive them rather than TO incur the
dispeasure of the philanthropists; and other fam
lilies are importuned for subscriptions to "fund"
for the relief of the down trodden'' but exceed
ingly fat and sleek looking slave who has for the
first time "inhaled the air of freedom"
While some of our wealthy inhabitants are thus
neglecting the wants of their fellow citizens to
administer to immigrants enticed from their
homes under false pretenses, they commit two
fold error, first by neglecting those who most as
suredly have the first claim on their sympathies
and the best right to their aid; and secondly by
! fostering class of immigrants which will not
only increase our already redundant population,
but will prove anything but valuable scquis-
ton.
] If white men are now able to earn only fifteen
cents a day, what may be their condition in an
other season, when our population shall be in
creased by a vast immigration OF negroes from
the Southern Statesl The true philosophy in Sc
curing the 'sperity of any country, is the proper
distribution of tie working population so as to
maintain an equilibrium in the productive and
consumptve elements of society Wherever
there is an excess of population over the CONNER
cial or productive capacity of a country, there
will, of course, be poverty, famine, and must
probably Pestilence and death in aggravated
forms. s
Surely it is the part Of wisdom as well as true
charity, first to protect the helpless among our
selves, before we invite thousands of mendicants
into our midst, to aggravate the sutferings of our
neighbors, who are without employment. and are
too poor to emgrate. Since our philanthropists
are too seriously affected with monomania to see
but subject. or to comprehend even that, Il is
the imperative duty of our State and city author
tiles TO do something to allay the growing evil,
and to do this as speedily as possible.