United labor bulletin., 1910-08-18
REV. CHAS. STELzLE
DISCUSSES POVERTY
100000 In Poverty In the United
States-Workers Should Have More
Waees-Average Man Wants Justice
Not Charity.
CBy the Rev. Charles stelzle.)

(By the Rev. Charles Stelzle-)
1t is estimated that there are 10000
600 persons in actual poverty in the
United States Not that there are so
many in distress, but that much of the
time, they are underfed, improperly
housed and poorly clothed. According
to the census report, there are nearly
10000 persons in the almshouses of this
country. 1t is probable that the total
number of public and private abnormal
dependents in the United States is not
less than 100000, or one-thirtieth of the
total population of the country, for whom
is expended about $3.50, ,O00.0 900, OF one
tenth of the total wage income of all
manufacturing establishments of the
country. Every year about 10 per. cent.
of those who die in New York have
pauper burial. New York City alone
spends s35.000,000 year in charity.
There are over 10000 paupers lex
elusive of casual paupers) in the United
Kingdom. Fifty million dollars is spent
in London alone for the poverty-stricken.
Thirty per cent of the people are below
the poverty line" making altogether
about 100000 in this one city whose
condition is such as to require assist
ance of many kinds. II is needless to
say that thousands of deaths are directly
due to the long continued underfeeding
and exposure. and of these the young
children suffer most. The late Sir Henry
Campbell stated that there are l2,000,-
600 people in the British Isles who are
in this deplorable condition. In addition
to these there are over 2,500.O00 persons
who actually receive public relief in the
course of one year" In London, in 1904,
one person in every three died in the
work-house. hospital or lunatic asylum.
The bread lines in our great cities are
not composed exclusively of tramps and
vagabonds. There are large numbers of
bona fide workingmen in these lines, who
are out of jobs, and who, in many cases,
have come to the city for the purpose of
finding work. No artificial method of
supplying jobs for these men will suffice
We must find a normal system which
will permit men to live with their fam
lilies and build up their homes. The farm
colony is failure, so far as city men
are concerned Perhaps its worst effect
is the ''institutionalizing' of the work
ingman. The average man cannot sur
vive this ordeal.
W ulle et VI the poOA III Z
dependent upon charity-and it would
be disastrous in some cases If this char
ity were withheld-the average working
man does not want charity. He wants
justice and he wants work. The Charity
Organization Society of New York says
that from 4S per cent. to 80 per cent. of
the applicants coming to this organiza-
ton need work rather than relief.
Mr.. Samuel Gompers once said: The
workers want more wages; more of the
comforts of life; more leisure; more
chance for self-improvement as men, as
trades unionists, as citizens. These were
the wants of yesterday; they are the
wants of today: they will be the wants
OF tomorrow and of tomorrow's morrow.
The struggle may assume new forms.
but the issue is the irnmemorial one
an effort of the producers to obtain an
increasing measure of the wealth that
falls from their production"
1t is Organized Labor's job to see
that fhay cef n