The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1912-11-09

when the work is shared by voluntary
associations; but the resulting loss In
charitable feeling, personal RESPONSE
bility, and individual initiative, would
not be Offset by the lower cost of
financial administration.
Prevention and Relief.
Let us try now to give these princi-
pies a systematic application to the
facts of every day life Social dis
tress must be dealt with in two ways,
by prevention and by relief Taking
up prevention first, we see at once that
the State cannot forefend all social
suffering. It is powerless to prevent
those forms of distress which are due
to defects of individual character. In
the main, the State can deal effectively
only with the individuals environ
ment. Distress which has it's origin
in the moral delinquincies of the man
himself must be prevented by other
agencies, chiefly the family, the school,
and the Church. That much of the
existing social misery is of this kind,
is a truth that nowadays is frequently
denied or ignored; but it cannot escape
the person who looks facts in the face,
who thinks for himself instead of mere
ly repeating catchwords, who knows
the meaning of personal responsibility,
and who believes that the human will
is free. To ignore the elements of in
dividual character and individual re-
sponsibility in the problem of proven
ton, is to court failure in any attempt
to deal with it adequately.
The State, and only the State, can
prevent large part, probably the lar
ger part, of the social distress which is
due primarily to environment In the
physical order it can and ought to
provide suitable economic conditions
by enforcing reasonable minimum
standards of labor and livelihood.
Specifically, it should prohibit the en-
ployment of any worker of average
capacity at less than living wages, or
for longer day than is consistent with
the material and moral health of the
individual and the race, or in unsafe
and unsanitary work places. 1t should
also forbid child labor, and interdict
the employment of women and young
persons at tasks that are harmful to
health or morals. In so far as the
wage earners are unable to protect
themselves against the unfavorable
contingencies of life and employment
by adequate savings or insurance, the
State should supply the deficiency.
Hence the need in many communities
of workmen's compensation laws,
labor exchanges, insurance against
sickness, accidents, unemployment, and
disability, and system Of old age
pensions. In a word, the State ought
to provide and enforce all those eco
nomic and industrial conditions which
are necessary and sufficient for nor
NAL and reasonable human life. This
will not injure individual initiative,
or individual freedom, or the indi-
vidual desire to excel. 1t will merely
lift the plane of competition, and con,
fine these qualities within reasonable
and healthy limits.
The State and Education.
Another great environmentaI cause
of social distress is ignorance. It can
be abolished only through a system
of education that will give normal
development to all the faculties, ply
steal, mental, and moral. In the United
States our chief educational defects
are lack of moral training and lack
of industrial training. Until our
schools have become fitted to educate
| the conscience, the hand, and the eye,
as we'll as the intellect, they will con-
tinue to make large contributions to
the sum of our social misery. Where
these scholastic needs cannot be sup
piled by voluntary effort, they ought
to be provided for by the State. This
ho i1h al ~,
| by an efficient system of State schools,
and by State assistance to private
schools on the basis of results achieved
| in conformity with standards set up
| by the State. Indeed, the latter meth
cd has certain advantages over the
| former; for it stimulates individual
and local initiative and energy, en-
courages individuality, variety, origin.
atty, and competition, and counter
acts that mechanical mediocrity, that
depressing uniformity, that undesir.
able professional bureaucracy which
are the natural consequences of a sin
gle type or single system of institu-
tions under State monopoly. The
principle that the State should not do
for it's citizens anything that they can
do as well for themselves, suggests
that it can sometimes promote social
welfare more effectively by indirect
than by direct action, by substituting
efficient private institutions instead OF
conducting institutions of it's own.
A third cause of social distress
which the State should help to abol
ish, is bad sanitary conditions. Under
this head it ought to enforce reason
able minimum standards of housing as
regards area of ground, size Of dwell
ing, number of rooms to a family, and
sanitation; and search out the causes
of contagion, and prevent the spread