The Birmingham age-herald., 1906-01-14


 America and this remedy were the sub jects Miss Crozier discussed. These prob lems presented with surprising statistics that were ignored until Miss Croziers in- vestigations became known caused at least spasmodic interest in the helplessness of New York's destitute poor, but beyond this nothing was done to change con- dition. But Miss Crozier continued her investigations. She remained in New York city all of last summer, working, looking deeper into the problems of the poor, seeking their sufferings, their dis couragements. their struggles. Early in the fall in order to be in daily contact with these conditions on the east side she took a small apartment In Rutgers street, one of the most interesting sec tions in Western civilization. Living there among New York's poor, seeing daily hourly their misery, their despair. their helplessness and the indifference of New
 York'S officials to existing conditions, 1t is not surprising that she prefers death for the thousands and tens of thousands of helpless children.
 T would rather personally administer chloroform to the poor starving children of this city than see them living as they must do in squalor and misery today. Why should these helpless little lives go on?' she asks. Tt is only perpetuat- ing misery. Why should these diseased little bodies that lack food and proper
 warmth and nourishment suffer longer when the remedy Is at hand? The child lacking food and fuel will later lack physical health, and consequently char acter and morality.
 T mean what I say, and can prove what I say. Those who are cowardlv enough to neglect these children now
 the officials, the institutions, the civil and municipal authorities-the public are, of course, too cowardly to advocate chloroforming them.
 T am not theorizing, am not ex- plotting insane or impracticable views,
 but I know whereof I speak, and my views are the result of six continuous years of observation in New York City There is absolutely no coordination of the forces in this city looking to the im- mediate relief of these cold and hungry children. I tried them last winter-the whole lot of them--and they tacitly ig-
 nored my whole diagnosis.
 'I remained in the city last summer while its high salaried officials and oth- CTS fled to escape the heat. I remained and l saw the starving children-sixty thousand of them--drop out of life like the leaves of a tree because their ema- ciated bodies, weakened and impover- ished by the residence to the cold of the winter and of hunger could not with stand the heat"
 And holding such views 1t is not to be
 wondered at that Miss Crozier in an editorial which appeared in a New York paper on the "Thoughtless Poor" should
 have expressed her ideas In paragraphs like these
 "A well nurtured complacent matron, serene in the assurance of care and , keep, took occasion a few days ago, in addressing a fashionable meeting, to crlti- addressing a fashionable meeting to crit icise the 'thoughtless poor Amid the gaunt shadow of want Is as remote
 as the creation of fairy tale, some persons like to sit and discuss-t the riddle of poverty. as though 1t were mathe
 matical problem and one were dealing with cold figures and not with human beings.
 This good lady was politely indignant and curiously lacking fin sympathy, be-
 cause the poor persisted fin bringing so
 many children in the world! Even a
 casual study of society will reveal the fact that many who lack the courage to speak with such brutal frankness re-
 gard the fact as a well-nigh unpardon- able offense.
 Less births mean less souls to strug-
 gle and suffer, less to struggle and fall,
 less of the helpless and unproductive to burden and wear upon the healthier part Ol SOCltly. IneN mean dASO llc DtSifl- ming of the decay of a nation. Any at tempt to arrest the normal expression
 or life entails the most disastrous re- suits to the social body and the individ- ! ual as well The Rochester priest who draped the baptismal font in mourning ! tragically symbolized the condition among his flock.
 "'The thoughtless poor! In the ter TOT of want there is thought amending,
 bringing dull pain, and most of 1t whit- ened here and there by the exalted self sacrifice.
 But one will never fully understand
 and be able to give intelligent, warm sympathy and realize how the remedy is to be brought about until he has de- seconded into the pit and beheld the aw- full things which are there; until he has felt a bold kinship to the pale people and held in his own heart all of the an guish, all of the torture and pain which make the cross on which the abject poor ..tf f11