Newark post., 1914-12-09

Wilson before the first national
conference on civic and social CEN
ter development, held at Madison,
Wisconsin, October %, 1911
The object of the (social CENTER
movement is to make the school
house the civic center of the CON-
munity, at any rate in such COM
munities as are supplied with no
other place of common resort.
1t is obvious that the schoolhouse
is in most communities used only
during certain hours of the day,
those hours when the rest of the
community is busily engaged in
bread winning work. 1t occurred
to the gentlemen who started this
movement that inasmuch as the
schoolhouses belonged to the com
munity it was perfectly Legitimate
that the community should use
them for it's own entertainment and
schooling when the young people
were not occupying them.
And that, therefore, it would be
a good idea to have all sorts of
gatherings, for social purposes, for
purposes of entertainment, for pur-
poses of conference, for any legiti-
mate thing that might bring neigh
bors and friends together in the
schoolhouses. That, | understand
it, in its simplest terms is the civic
center movement-that the school
houses might be made place of
meeting-in short, where by meet
ing each other the people of CON-
munity might know each other,
and by knowing each other might
concert a common life, a common
action.
The study of the civic center is
the study of the spontaneous life of
communities. What you do is to
open the schoolhouse and light it
in the evening and say: "Here is
place that you are welcome to come
and do anything that it occurs to
you to do. -.
And the interesting thing about
this movement is that a great many
things have occurred to people to
do in the schoolhouse, things social,
things educational, things practical
for one of the reasons why poll
tics took On a new complexion in
the city in which this movement
orifinated was that the people who
could go into the schoolhouses at
night knew what was going on in
that city and insisted upon talking
about it, and the minute they be-
gan talking about it, many things
became impossible, for there are
scores Of things that must be put
stop to in our politics that will stop
the moment they are talked Of
where men will listen. The treat
ment for bad politics is exactly the
modern treatment for tuberculosis
it is exposure to the open air.
Now you have to begin at the root
of the matter in order to under
stand what it is you intend to
serve by this movement. You in
tend to serve the life Of the COM
munities, the life that is there, the
life you cannot create, the life to
which you can only give release
and opportunity; and wherein does
that life consist? That is the ques-
ton that interests me. There can
be no life in a community so long
as its parts are segregated and sep
arated. 1t is just as if you separat-
ed the organs Of the human body
and then expected them to produce
life. You must open wide the chan
nels of sympathy and communica-
tion between them, you must make
channels for the tides Of life; if
you clog them anywhere, if you
stop them anywhere, why then the
processes Of disease set in, which
are the processes of misunderstand-
ing, which are the disconnections
between the spiritual impulses of
different sections of men.
My interest in this movement, as
it has been described to me, has
been touched with enthusiasm be-
cause | see in it channel for the
restoration of the unity of com
munities. Because l am told that
things have already happened
which bear promise of this very
thing.
| was told what is said to be a
typical story of a very fine lady,
woman Of very fine natural parts,
but very fastidious, whose automo-
bile happened to be stalled one
night in front of an open school
house where a meeting was going
on over which her seamstress was
presiding. She was induced by