Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1879-06-26


truant, and twenty-seven per cent. were
wholly illiterate. These statistics are
not full enough, possibly, to enable us to
reach definite conclusions, but they do
nevertheless constitute basis for safe
conjecture, 1t is safe to assume that
more than fifty per cent, of our juvenile
delinquents fall prematurely into the
hands of police and for the sufficient
reason that there are no other hands
open to them. They are hustled to prison,
herded with criminals, arraigned, con-
victed, condemned, and sent to be re-
formed, and then, when legal processes
have been exhausted, and the stamp of
crime irrevOcably fixed upon them, the
| facts deyelOpe that these delinquent
children" have wrought out the very
destiny that society had marked out for
them. Ask George E. Howe, the late
commissioner of the Boys Reform
School at Lancaster, who for twenty
years had the active oversight of that
Institution, and to whose custody dur
ing that time 2.646 boys were commit
ed, and he would tell you that it is not
overstating the facts to say fully one
half of these boys were in no sense GRIM
inal. Mr.. II. A. MODfOrt, of the Cincin-
natl Refuge, a gentleman cf large eX-
perience also, would scarcely bear a
different testimony But, if these gentle
men were to claim larger percentage
of actual criminals, they would scarcely
dare maintain as they do now that
eighty-five or ninety per cent. of these
boys actually reform under the discip-
line of their respective institutions.
There is no actual reformation in the
case. These children-for they are all
under sixteen years of age-have moth
ing in dispositions or habits to be re-
formed beyond what is inherent and in
cident to the life of all. 1t is not the
presence of positive tendencies to evil
with these children that they develop so
early in vice and crime, so much as it is
the negative conditions in which they
are placed-nO home, no education, no
| occupation, and still society insists that
these conditions shall stand for crime
against helpless child. No, it is not
reformation that these children need
What their condition requires ir rather
the formative processes of home where
they may be protected and trained.
We must take one step further before
dismissing this part of our subject.
This institution is to be our protest
against additional prisons, and so it is
important that we may, if possible, as
certain not how far prevention rather
than the punishment of crime cpnsti-
tutes actual economy on the part of a
community, but rather that we may be
impressed with the fragrant injustice of
| visiting the iniquities of community
upon defenceless children. At the or
phanage of Meltray, in France 1--WE quote
France because of care taken to secure
accurate statistics), ,"out of 1858 children
received, 297 were illegitimate, Ills or
phans ia foundlings, 3O2 whose parents
! were in prison, PA of parents married
again and 80 whose parents were living
in cOncubinage" There is sad uni
formity in these figures as compared
with what we know of corresponding
classes and conditions in our own coun-
try, and sadder uniformity that places
the responsibility for these conditions
upon society, while the sufferings which
they involve continue to blight and
wither every aspiration in the life of
childhood.
1t is to meet these responsibilities of
society by practical methods Of relief to
these classes that these homes for child
rem are designed. Still keeping the home
idea present to our thought, it is peril
nent to inquire how far this idea will ap-
ply to the practical solution of the dit1i-
culties to be overcome.
We may not trespass upon your pa
tience to discuss this idea in its applica-
tion to the higher forms of social life
with which we are surrounded, but we
cannot forbear to urge some considera-
tion of the subject, as it bears directly
upon interests which we are now seek
! ing to promote.
If we direct our inquiry to those in
| fluenceS which experience has shown to
be most potential in the organization of
society and promotion of its higher in
terests, we recognize law, education,
morality and religion. These are, each
of them, essential factors in the problem
of good government, and only as they
combine to protect, enlighten and ele-
vate, may we hope for permanency to
our free institutions and for the advanc-
ed civilization of the world.
But these are not all neither are these
things sufficient of themselves to insure
the public safety. These, essential as
they may be, are but supplemental forces
by which civilization holds the outposts
already taken, and by which the defences
necessary to occupation are organized.
In advance of these, however, come
the drilled and disciplined forces, with
the social and moral equipments needful
for civil conquest. Whence cometh this
grand army? We answer from christian
homes. Changing the metaphor to bring
| the figure more into harmony with the
subject we seek to illustrate, we should
say that home influences are the soil in
which the seeds of social progress, polit-
ical prosperity and religious principles
germinate, and only as this soil is cul-
| tivated, may we expect substantial
growth and satisfying products. 1t is
from these influences, connected with
the industrial training and social cul-
ture of the family, rather than from law
and its sanctions, schools and their syS-
tens, or from churches and their creeds,
that we have in the past derived the
more excellent qualities of individual
character, and in the aggregation of these
wemay trace the peace, prosperity and
progress of our Republic. @
we IUuSG HUI U6 ulluoISCOOu DIS ulluer-
valuing law, education or religion. We
would seek rather to exalt them, but
still insist that it is under the family
government, we first learn subsection to
authority; in the varied relations of the
household our social sympathies are de-
veloped, and it is 'at home," if anywhere
that the obligations of religion can be
enforced by the exemplification of it's
virtues. OF the Importance of domestic
training, to the advancement of public
interest, let me quote words uttered by
one of the wisest men of our day, one
who has lived, cotemporaneOusly with
the leading events of our national histo-
ry; who has been familiar with the lead
ing men of our country; one who has
borne no obscure part in shaping hither-
to the destiny of our government, and
who in State-craft is acknowledged
among the most sagacious of men now