The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1892-02-28
II
CITY SLUMS.

CITY SLUMs.
Is there increase or decrease in the
slums of the worlds great centers of
population Are the geographical
limits of the congested districts mar
rowing or expanding as the present cen
fury draws to a close? These are I'M
portant questions from every point of
view. among the most important in the
whole range of problems which confront
the student Of social science to-day,
Questions these whose interest is not
confined to any particular people
amongst the civilized nations of the
earth. They are common to us all. On
the answers which are given them de-
pends much Of the future, soEiaE ana
political, moral and physical, Of the
human rae. If the answers sound the
passimistic note Of increase. we are face
to face with a state of affairs whose
continuation and intensiticatioa no
thoughtful man car contemplate with
equan5s&9tN,
With tho advance of civilization. the
urban population is absorbing, With a
speed and a certainty that are alarm
ing, .he inhabitants Of the rural dis
tricts. Our own statistics prove the
fact beyond the shadow Of a doubt. The
proportion of urban population has
gradually increased from 3.35 per cent
in 1890 to 29.l2 per cent, Or nearly one
third Of the total population, in 1890.
T., +lo North Atlanta rrcrr nf ctntnc
51.5S per cent Of the population reside
in cities OF 5000 or more inhabitants.
The records Of other countries all tell the
samb tale. Political economists read
these figures and congratulate each
other on the increase Of our manufac-
lures and our commerce-pursuits
which compel the aggregation of popu-
lation in restricted localities. But q
broader point Of view reveals considera-
tions that are not dreamt Of in the
philosophy of the hide-bound theorist
in political enconomy.
Would it, we ask, be fair matter for
congratulation if the Drawn and sineW
of this country were gradually to be
penned up in fou. rookeries and NAL
odorous tenement houses? Is it FORUM
ate to believe that the sturdy a%gricul-
tural laborer will become the pallid-
faced, stoop-shouldered mechanic of our
teeming hives of industry, and that the
rosy-cheeked country maid is doomed to
hollow-eyed, WORKOUT motherhood IN
the rabbit hutches that shame the name
of houses in our large cities? Worse
than all this, are the majority of the
children Of this country -- God pity
tnem-to be reared to manhood and
w~omanhood with scarcely Il fair sight of
the suns face and without one actual
conception of the green leaves. the
songs Of birds aud the prattle Of
streams: What must be, what could
be, the future of d nation brought to
adult ago amid conditions like these?
The Sums of our great cities, of all
great cities, are one of the foulest blots
on our modern civilization. Their by
giene is a plague; their overcrowding
atrocIons; their morality vel, as bad
as we have every right to expect it.
The p~essilnistic view Of the situation
has undoubtedly met with more general
acceptance, and it is, therefore, matter
of profound satisfaction 20 learn on tho
authority Of SO eminent "a statisticjan as
Carroll ID. Wright that facts no longer
bear it out. Things in the slums are
bad enough in all conscience. but the,
are not steadily drifting 80 the worse
Mr.. Wright's Investigations cover tbs
extensive field of New York, philadel-
phla and Boston, and his results receive
singular confederation in the figures oil
the English census Of last year. Brief,
put, the very causes which created The
s!ums are now the means of thor un
dong. Commerce ana manufacture
are gradually claiming for thor own us,
ahe central situations of the slums, ans
the tenants Of the rookeries are migrat
ing not the country, but to the suburbs
Right there in the suburbs-js cen
tered the growth OF our large cities. aut
the suburbs are growing at the eypens,
of the Sums. The man of the futur
will therefore be a suburb-dwoIlcr. a res
ident neither CT the city nor of In
country, mother fish, flesh. fowl no
good red herring. But the quondan
resident OF the Sums, elevated to tn
rank of suburban jewellers, if he has nc
reached the gates of heaven, will at leas
have abandoned his dangerous propin
putty TO the portals Of the other placl