The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1934-03-30
SAVE THE CHILDREN
Lucy Meacham Thurston

with the ages. Love has protected
children in all centuries, yet there
has been child sacrifice, child aband-
onment. One of the most Colorful
of Viking customs was that in which
the father acclaimed beside his hall
fire and before his household the
new born babe, else 1t was abondon-
ed on some bare hillside. The
Chinese up to the last decade still
had their abandonment posts in
which the unwanted child was laid
upon a shelf overhanging ravine,
there the small bundle lay until
another similar one was brought,
then the newcome bit of humanity
rolled the one placed on the shelf
before it down into the far depths OF
chasm. And the latest reports
from Shanghai speak of abandoned
and dead babies-this because OF
dire poverty. Poverty and religious
fanaticism were causes of abandon
ment and sacrifice. To throw around
children all the protection ri Chris
tianity and of civilization is one of
the advances which mark the real
progress of humanity in spite OF
still sorely needed further protec-
ton.
Yet there was the day not so long
ago, historically, when tiny children
worked endless hours in factories.
This is still the case in backward
lands where industrialization is new
and life cheap. But backward
lands become few, the twentieth
century moves forward. In most
of the 48 states of the United States
permits have to be obtained for en-
ploying any child under sixteen and
in hazardous industries still fur
Their age limit is required. Educa-
ton and recreation, in most states
health protection, are alike provid-
ed
In spite of this progress the re-
suits of the World War provided a
greater tragedy than the world has
ever known. Hordes of Russian
children, lost, abandoned, left waits
after the great war, roamed the
country and hid in the cities, a
horde estimated at over $4,000.
Hundreds in all war-stricken lands
grew up undernourished, weak, like
sickly plants. In the United States
an older set of wanderers, boys and
girls in want of work leaving homes
and looking for jobs, drifting from
state to state! But in every coun-
| try efforts were made and are being
made to meet conditions, to save the
children. Russia claims she has
absorbed the waits into her progress
sing solution of social problems.
The United States is strainiEg tow
ards the same definite solution of
it's problem of unemployment, lack
of educational and recreaticnal IA
cilities, of standing behind the child
| in its ADJUSTMENT to the world, to
life.
The Russian problem of waifs is a
decade and half old, as is that of
the war orphans of Belgium, France,
Germany. The drifting youths OF
the United States is new problem
and a still more recent one has been
added by the children Of the Wen
nese riots and of the Jewish refu-
gees from Germany. Work for
children has been constant from the
end of the World War tragedy, feed
ing under Hoover in Russia, feeding
of German children, of Austrian,
taking helpless ones into English
homes and sending them back in
better physical condition, receiving
German children into French homes
and those of Alsace-Lorraine. send
| ing aid to Armenian orphanages,
these are major projects. Vienna,
war-crippled as she was, set a. world
example in her right about facing
for child care. In one important
point that city led the world. 1t
made no distinction between the le-
gitimate and the illegitimate child.
A society of the city received all de-
pendent and delinquent children and
acted as agent of the guardianship
denartment of the children born in
the city of Vienna. Now in this
hour of critical need Belgium has
started a fund for the orphans OF
the recent riots, so has Switzerland,
France has given generous aid to
Jewish refugees and to their child
rem, and in the United States a
strong movement is being made for
the same purpose of help. In Eng
land the Save the Child Society was
Established Immediately after the