The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1917-08-02
The HOPE OF THE
AMERICAN NATION

for ten years has been engaged in chill.
dren's relief work, having been con-
nected with the Portland Boys and
Girls Aid Society,"
1t is with some diffidence that come
here today to present for your thought.
full consideration on this subject, for
the reason that it is subject the mag
nitude of whose problems almost over
whelm one at times. and yet you and l
who are moulding and disciplining the
lives of the youth of our country have
got to grapple with it even in the face
of what at times appears to be invinci-
BILE odds.
We are all, | am sure, proud, and
Justly so, of our fair land. We boast
of its natural wealth and of its multi
tudinous natural assets with which ma.
ture's lavish hand has stocked it. In
these latter days we have heard much
of the need of conserving all these
wonderful assets, but let us not forget
that we have to deal with an asset the
most potent, the most precious, and
beside which all the others fade into
insignificance, the child of today, the
man and woman of tomorrow. As we
protect or neglect this asset so will we
tower or totter amid the nations of the
earth. What confronts us? We have
here a young, vigorous country, en-
dowed with everything that goes to
make country rich, and with stream
of peoples of other countries constant
ly pouring in in ever increasing num-
bers.
How are we going to assimilate this
cosmopolitan pOpualtion with differing
and different standards of thought,
morals and home life and instil into it
the high ideals of our nationality and
imprint upon it the stamp of good
American citizenship?
To my mind it will be only in one
way, and that is by fixing and con-
stantly holding up high ideal and
standard of home life.
The question of today is whether the
conditions of high and complicated
civilization have not overlaid the prim-
tive and sound instinct that the wealth
of the nation depends more on the race
than on the material riches within its
borders, that the family is the first
unit in the life of the community and
that as the family prospers so will the
state and nation. No nation can rise
higher than the highest type of home
within that nation. Protect the home
and you safeguard the child, safeguard
the child, mentally, morally and physi-
cally and you insure the future welfare
of the race.
We have had an opportunity to draw
upon the wisdom of the older countries
of Europe in this respect, but have
failed to profit by it, for it is not until
recent years that we have attempted
to propely safeguard the interests of
our juvenile population. AS conse-
quence we are now reaping the harvest
of crime, pauperism, suffering and dis
ease grown from the seeds of child
neglect. A harvest which it is safe to
say, if the proper precautions had been
taken at the proper time, could be re-
duced by at least fifty per cent.
What are the main reasons for the
breaking down of our home life? Dress
and luxury and with it idleness, di-
vorce, craving for pleasurable excite
ment, lack of moral training, license
and lack of parental restraining. 1t is
hardly necessary to say that | have
been brought face to face with these
causes time and time again in my in
vestigations during the past ten years.
While cannot take the time to go into
all of them in detail | would like to
enlarge somewhat on the matter of
parental restraint, the lack of which is
doubtless only too apparent to you.
think it was Mark Twain who wrote
''The way to train up child in the
way he should go is for the old man to
go that way himself" Fortunately in
dealing with careless parents the ju-
venile court is endowed with full au-
thority to impress the above rule on
their minds in such way that it will
not easily be forgotten.
Take the average boy or girl allowed
to grow up in an atmosphere of what
we call liberty, but probably license
would be better and more accurate
word. Arriving at the age of Is or 16,
they more or less arrange the conduct
of their own affairs as to their amuse-
ments, their friends, their books and
newspapers, and often as to their 90.
ings and comings. We will probably
admit that liberty is very great and
beautiful thing. but beyond everything
else it implies responsibility, and with
out it we have not liberty, but license.
A child grown accustomed to have it's
own way constantly will most infallibly
grow up to be selfish and egotistical
and will relentlessly pursue the gratifi-
cation of its every desire. In short,
"self" is the first and last word in
such character. There appears to be
too liberal abandonment of subordin-
| alton and discipline of the child in our
native American home of today. The
brutal corporal punishment of old has
given away in many cases tosssoft, eff
Terminate indulgence by parents of the
idlest whims and humors of their chill
dren. Corporal punishment, although
undesirable in the majority of cases,
cannot be totally abandoned either in
the home or in the school except at the
cost of the moral development of
limited number of children. We are
not yet ready for exclusive control by
moral suasion. If children were men,
tally mature they should be given COM
plete self-direction; but they are not,
and unless subjected to proper restric-
tions and discipline they will fail to
develop the essential trait of self.con-
troll. 1t is my belief that as long as
the parties to the marriage contract
lack that quality so long will there be
separations, divorces, desertions and
the misery they entail.
Without question the instability of
the family, the lack of proper parents
and consequent neglect in the matter
of home training is, comparatively
speaking, wholly responsible for the
dependency and delinquency of chill
dren. How are we to set about reme-
dying these conditions? Dress and
luxury will have to give way to SIM
plicity. The great cities of Europe and
America have set the standards and
useless and frequently corrupt example
of fashion and folly has led along the
broad and pleasant path which leads to
sterility in brain power and failing
virility in the race. 1t il only too ap-
parent that what were undreamed of