The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-06-26
HOSPITALS AND PRISONS, OLD AND NEW
Prevention is the Basis of the Modern Gospel Governing
 All of Our Social Institutions

| it is equally essential that it should guard effectively against the perver- sion of it's function. 1t must not itself
 multiply the occasions for it's exercise. Industry should not make workers unemployable. Here is opened up an exceedinly interesting field of specula- | tion- Excessive hours of labor, under
 pay. irregular employment, throwing l men out of employment as a first re- sort in periods of business retrench-
 ment, displacing workers at the first sign of advancing age by young men
 because of their extra strength and
 pliability, are among the features of industry which may be regarded not
 unfairly as perversions of it's natural
 function. They tend to make men un- employable, which is the very destruc-
 duced, and transported, and placed on
 the market, and sold, but all this should be done in such a way as to conserve the usefulness of those who
 do the work, notNin such way as to destroy their usefulness.
 The school should not make its pu- | pills inefficient The function of educa- tion is to pass on to the growing gener- ation the accumulated achievements Of the race. Its aim is to put the next generation on the shoulders of the pres ent both in respect to earning and pro- ducing capacity, and in respect to powers of enjoyment The life for which children are to be prepared is one of work and of leisure. They should be, made efficient in both- The school which makes misfits, either vo- cational or simply as living, rational
 human beings, compelled daily to choose between good and evil, and be- tween the good and the better, be- longs with the hospital, the prison, the
 police system and the charity, which
 miss their natural calling. The school.
 whatever else it does, should not make
 misfits. This is not the whole philos-
 ophy of education, but 1t is a good be-
 ginning of it. The axiom which is so
 useful when applied to other institu-
 tions, will at least help us determine
 whether a given school system is fail
 ing to meet the most elementary and
 fundamental of all tests, whether it is
 perverting its function, whether it is producing inefhciency instead of
 strength.
 Churches should not create an indif- fererce to religion. Missions should not make bread lines Recreation should not devitalize. Politics should not un- dernine good citizenship Retail trade should not result in the exploitation of consumers. Child saving agencies should not exhibit an excessive mortal ity. State labor departments should not neglect to make an intelligfble re- subject to their supervision. A federal investigation of the labor of women and children should not be unable to make reports of progress from time to Ilmo, like Ipc QulieIluS OI tue rSenSuS Bureau, and thus be compelled to pre- sent its results in bulk long after wards, when the facts upon which it reports are perhaps no longer of in terest or value
 The perversion of social institutions is oftener than not the result of thoughtless or indifferent direction. Those who ultimately pay the bills for their creation and maintenance have no desire that hospitals shall make people sick, or that prisons shall make criminals. or that charity shall make paupers, or that factories shall make unemployable.