Morning journal and courier., 1881-07-28
NEW HAVEN, CONN. THURSDAY MORNING.
Thursday Morning, July ss, 1881.
INSANITY AND 7TRAnIPs.

One of the most interesting papers thu far read before the National Conference o Charities and Correction, in session in Bostor this week. is that of the retiring president, MT Frank B. Sanborn of Massachusetts. Ths two principal topics discussed by MT. San born are insanity in this country and the tramp question. He says that there can bt no doubt that the number of the insane il the United States has greatly increased with in the last twenty years, and increased, too out of all proportion to the advance in oul general population, large as that has been. He supports this proposition by statistics which are unfortunately too convincing. He estimates that among the older communities of the northern and eastern States there is now one insane person to every four hundred persons, and in Massachusetts, where ssfor some reason or other the proportion is even greater than this, one person out of every achusetts they have precise returns, up to the first of the present month, showing the whole number of the poor fully supported at certain dates, and the number among those who were insane; and they have had these returns more or less com plete for twenty-ssven years or since the 1st of October, 1854, at which time the popu- been l, 10000 Now, while there were in October, 1854, 5,45O indoor poor, of whom but little more than thousand were insane, in October, 1864, (the whole number of the poor remaining the same) more than 1,6OO of them were insane; in 1874, when the number had increased to only 5, 734, about 2,2O0 of them were insane; and now Gin July, 1881) the whole number of indoor poor being about 7,8O0, the number of those who are insane is upward of 5000. That is to say, while the whole number of the indoor poor supported in Massachusetts at given date has increased in twenty-seven years about forty per centum (the population meantime having increased more than sixty per centum), the number of the indoor poor hundred per centum.
 What Mir. Sanborn has to say concerning tramps is much more cheerful than his re- marks concerning the increase of insanity During the last three years the number of tramps has been steadily diminishing He says: ''Three years ago Guly 1, 1s7s,) we had by actual count for that day 25,597 public paupers in this State, (Massachusetts) and among them 349 vagrants, while the number of vagrants lodged at poorhouses and station houses in each month was counted by thousands. This summer (July l, 18s1) the aggregate of pub lie paupers having been reduced below 19,- OO0-a falling away of more than 25 per centum in three years-the vagrants reported are now but 15O, or only two-ffths as many as three years ago-and these almost all in the city station houses-for tramping in the country towns of Massachusetts is almost unknown. The whole number of tramps lodged in the country poorhouses in a whole year does not now exceed the number who were formerly lodged there in single fort night. Yet it is to be remembered that with in the three years spoken of the population of our State has increased not less than 125, OO0-and that immigration has never been so large as within the past two years. The same thing has been taking place, so far as we can hear, throughout the country. until we have in the United States at this moment the smallest number of public paupers ever seen among civilized communities in an equal pop ulation of 5O,OOO, ,0OO."
 It is undoubtedly true that most of those now pursuing vagabond life in this country are doing so fro choice. As proof of this it may. be mentioned that the authorities at Castle Garden cannot supply the demand for laborers who are offered wages varying from $1.25 to $1.75 day.