The Washington herald., 1914-03-15

tions are worse. Last winter and spring
the writer made house-to-house survey
Of four centrally located. denseiy popu-
lated alleys with total population Of
$40. There the death rate for 1919 was
fifty-one-three times the death rate on
the streets The tuberculosis death rate
was three times that for the general coll
ored population Of Washington and ten
times that Of the white population. II Is
equal to the total death rate from all
causes in the city Of Chicago. In the
worst Of these four alleys the death rate
was seventy-eight per thousand. Such
conditions are almost unbelievable. These
people are dying like sheep. That Is the
appeal of humanity. And whether we
like IL or not our fortunes are all bound
up togethers These are Fthe people who
wash our clothes and tend our babies.
This is the appeal Of self-interest
Suggestion of Example.
Jacob Riis well said, you can't raise
people in pig styes and then expect them
to act like men," You can't put them in
hoSses without bath tubs or running
water and expect them to be clean. You
can't put them under leaky roofs and
within damp walls and expect them to
keep healthy. You can't force four fami-
lies or even two (and I know cases of
sikh to use lockiess lin some cases door
lessD shed toilets and retain their self
respect. You can't cut of a group OF
people from the life of the community
and from the stimulus Of public opinion.
from the eve of the policeman and the
health inspector and the mere passer-by.
and shut It up in an interior alley, with
out noteworthy lowering of standards.
The people of the alleys are. as a class,
peculiarly suspectible to the suggestion
of example, especially unable to resist
the temptation that seeks them out. The
bad effect of five or ten vicious individ-
uals on a hundred well-meaning but weak
persons, when all are shut up together
in an alley, is infinitely greater than II
would be IL all were living on the open
street. One-half the children born in the
alleys are illeGitimate- Madison alley last
year furnished % arrests from a popula-
ton Of 80 men. women and children.
No, the alleys have been weighed in
the balance and found wanting. WASH
ington has been struggling to get rid Of
them since early '70s The time has
come to do II. The modern conscience
rccoils from alley conditions The in
habited alley must so. But year by year,
as we close the alleys TO human habita-
ton. We must provide modern sanitary
homes elsewhere, and have them ready.
Of the helpless people we are forcing out
OF the only homes they know.
Capital Can Be Model.
Thus and thus only can Washington
solve her alley problem. Thus and thus
only can she become a model for the
other cities of the nation
Granting that the alleys must 20 and
the alley people must be provided with
good. cheap homes mot makeshiftsD,
what Is TO be the method? Shall We
leave it to business initiative? Does sup
ply automatically correspond TO demand?
Not here. for the double requirement Of
quality and cheapness deprives the pro-
position of all attractiveness to the in
vestor. 1t has been demonstrated that
four rooms and bath and gas range
cannot be rented at 80 a month and pay
) per cent net on the money invested.
The margin of profit IL too small for ths
business man Shall We trust to private
phila lanthropy? Last summer, in the
height of enthusiasm over the alley cam
paign. with the stimulusNof Mrs. Wilson's
presence at meetings and her name at
the head of the list, the eloquence and
personal magnetism of Mrs Archibald
Hopkins raised $4,000 or $1,000 for model
houses TO be built by the Sanitary Hous-