Evening star., 1936-10-11


this was to patch up houses and some
to patch up slums To give employ
ment to labor was major need.
Equally needed was stimulus to
manufacture and trade. The idea was
good, the execution may in part have
been open to question. But if this was
the best we could do in the circum-
stances, one should not object.
Yet why should we have slums at
all? Will the Federal programs cure
those that we have? Does their pro-
gram help in slum prevention? Whose
responsibility is the slum? How can
we rid our cities of these cancers?
How stop the formation of new onesf
These are questions to face before the
policies Of the next four years are
framed.
You and I have often heard it re-
marked at home, or in our travels.
"Our city has no Sums" This SNUG
contentedness with things as they are
will be belied by little investigation.
Ask the city welfare workers where
they have the most cases of poverty.
Ask the local police where most crimes
occur or where most criminals and
juvenile delinquents reside. Ask the
tax collector where property values
are going down. Ask the sanitary in
spectors what districts have the high
est infant mortality rate, the highest
rate for tuberculosis. From their an
swers, with surprisingly few excep-
tions, you will be led to districts with
unkempt streets and yards, ugly
houses or tenements, poorly designed
and greatly in need Of repair, anti
quated sanitation or none at all,
crowded quarters, foul smells, rooms
and stair halls dark and often dan
gerous, basement or cellar lodgings,
Cluttered vacant lots, factories over
shadowing the homes, or nearby rail-
roads, canals, swampS, dumps.
Neglect is the essence of slums. Our
civilization has hurried by and left
them there They are areas we gladly
forget or speak of slurringly as Little
Italy, the Ghetto, Niger Hollow. Irish
town, Chinatown, or Greaser Village.
From them we expect no good and to
them we still grant no fundamental
aid.
Where Opportunity Is Restricted
Humanity speaking, slums are re-
gions of restricted opportunity. of
thwarted development. On the worst
streets or alleys are the homes of lifes
misfits - "unemployables" and casual
workers. derelicts, unfortunates who
40 q tO W dnpnnt
living. Some are the products of gen.
erations of slum living. But inter-
spersing and surrounding the core of
the slum are honest workers unable to
find work, families too large to subsist
adequately on a day laborer's wages,
migrant families from rural districts
or from other cities who have not yet
made good, families down on their
luck" Their luck stays tragically
down, in all too many cases.
For here is vicious circle Poverty,
1ow-rent paying capacity, insanitary
housing, consequent ill-health, heavy
doctor bills and loss of job, deeper pow
erty. But deeper poverty means still
lower rent-paying capacity, acceptance
of still more inSanitary quarters,
chronic illness and finally institutional
care unless the vicious circle is broken
The best point of attack-short of a
radical increase in wages-is upon in
sanitary housing.
Slums are not necessary. Since they
are product of neglect, patient study
and hard work must be substituted
for neglect. Existing slums can be
squeezed out of existence by pressure
on the edges, continuously narrowing
their area by staying the process of
blight and substitution of appropriate
uses of land for inferior housing, or
new or remodelled residences for
shambles.
New slums can be prevented by
discovering their seeds so as to keep
them from terminating, or by tearing
out their roots before they have grown
too deep. Thus cure slowly treats
effects as well as causes. But preven-
ton deals directly and quickly with
the causes.
The Federal slum clearance and
fehousing programs (P. w. A., useful
though they are for the few who bene-
At, may cut away a few blocks in the
heart of the slum but leave its roots
untouched or else leave the slum to
rot while homes for a chosen few of
its occupants are being erected upon
the city outskirts. The Federal pro-
grams for housing finance (H. o. L.
c., F. H. A. have touched only houses
here and there and have made no i'm
preston upon the slum itself Both
programs doctor the symptoms rather
than the disease.
Roots in Human Frailties
Slums have their roots in human
frailties-ignorance, materialism, lack
Of sense of responsibility. acquisitive-
ness and host of others. They grow
because of civic unconcern and neg
1ect. One frequently hears that "the
poor deserve no better" The state
ment Is false. In this land of oppor-
tunity the children born in the slums
spend more of their time amid un-
wholesome or communicating influences
than in school, playground and church
combined. They deserve better-an
opportunity to make the most of their
given capacities. . chance for health
and inspiring surroundings.
Other attitudes are in need of
change: The builders, If he is more
interested in quick profits from shoddy
building than in sound construction;
the landlords, If his only concern Is
maximum rentals and, minimum re-
pairs; the slum dweller's, If in his dis
couragement he says, Whats the use
Of keeping my tenement clean?"
Builder, landlord and slum dweller
each follow the materialEtic tradition.
Each displays ignorance. For hap
piness is to be found not in riches. but
in service-in doing ones best at ones
chosen occupation and in the routine
of daily living.
Attitudes can be changed. Human
slavery was abolished largely by con-
vincing the populace of its wrongful
ness. Attitudes toward disease and
sanitation have been changed greatly