New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1871-02-08
THE PROBLEM or PAUPERISM.

WINTER i'll It's SltIuthb pIidSc II ul'oh u' WV
thriftless have exhausted their scanty savings,
if savings they had work is largely arrested
by frost and thousands all around us are
pinched with hunger and shivcring with cold.
Must each recurrence of Winter renew and
extend these agOnies
Alms-giving is excellent in its place let
those who can spare help those who are
perishing of want but not in the mistaken
belief that they are drying up the fountains
of Indebtedness. After all who can have
given, The Problem of Pauperism will remain,
and will demand quite different solution
from that which is made up of cold victuals
and cast-Off clothing.
Two months ago, a successful politician, who
has rapidly amassed great wealth, gave Fifty
Thousand Dollars to the needy inhabitants of
his native Ward. We envy no one who has
faculty of attributing the best acts to the
worst motives. In our judgment, this boun-
teous gift was well intended, and will warm
some children who would else have suffered
from cold. Yet no considerate person will
doubt that there will be more aims needed
merit Winter because of this bOunty-that some
will drink up next Summer earnings that
they might have saved, in the sanguine ex-
pectation of another such wind-fall to help
them through the ensuing Winter.
Contrast this generous donation with the
benevOence of those who, in Brooklyn, have
taught eleven hundred poor girls how to use
the Sewing Machine skilfully, charging each
dollar, to be paid when convenient, but re-
hitting the charge entirely for such as feel
too poor or too burdened to pay. Here are
not less than One Thousand persons raised
above want, wretchedness and dark tempta-
ton, evermore; and hundreds of them will
make their skill a means of helping Others.
We urge upon all the duty of looking the
Problem of Pauperism full in the face. Pau
pers increase faster than those who must work
for their subsistence; hence the load grows
annually heavier. Will it ever be lightened 7
aud how
We cannot safely answer these questions
without clearly understanding the cause Cor
causes) of the evil.
Intemperance is one immediate cause-per-
haps the greatest. Most of our paupers have
become such through the use of Alcoholic
Liqu0rs-Often by themselves sometimes by
their parents or other guardians. We estimate
that nine tenths of the paupers in our country
But Intemperance is rather symptom than
disease. There are causes back of this
which require investigation. For instance,
IdieneSS is assigned by Mrs. Swisshelm lin
The independently as a prime source of want
and woe. Parents too generally rear their
children to do little or no work. Mothers toll
and slave, when sons and daughters should
help them, but do not Thus the young are
launched upon the sea of active life unskilled
in any department of useful industry and
unqualified to earn and save if they would
She says:
1.-THE boy or girl who Ia brought up without regular
empoyment-daily tasks In manual labor-will, la nine
out Of ten. bring the mother shame,
| give her cause Of sorrow.
cit appears to be generally conceded that New-En.
gland brings up larger proportion of useful industrious
men than other portion Of this country her com
munes there are In advance OF those In other parts
the world In intelligence, morality and regIon and to
my mind IL Is very clear that this result IL due TO the
| domestic habits which IND employment for chill