Evening star., 1939-04-23

ference. They realized that those two
decades had seen the emancipation of
women, that the birth rate was falling,
that children were no longer an economic
asset to the great majority of American
families. that the home was no longer a
self-suff1cient unit.
The machine had emancipated both
mother and child. 1t had not been 50
in Theodore Roosevelt's day. The
Western world had come far in 1880
from the conditions described in the
verse:
''The golf course is so near the mill
That all the live-long day
The little children can look out
And see the men at play"
Such conditions were no longer eco
nomically feasible. Besides, there was a
new social consciousness The cynic
might say that the social consciousness
was a matter of sour grapes-but then
it existed and the conference sought to
mobilize it.
Since 1880 there also have been very
great advances. One of them is closer
contact with reality. Child specialists in
various fields have lost lot OF their
smugness In education there has been
a return to common sense This years
crop of teachers college graduates will
not go out into the world with such
supreme confidence in formulas by which
to make the child over closer to the
hearts desire. Pediatrics, and medicine
in general, has continued its advance at
an accelerated pace.
There is one very good thing to be said
for the Hoover conference Totalita-
rianism in 1880 was very, very dim
shadow on the horizon. The men and
women who compiled the reports and
met in Washington were concerned pri-
marily with the child, per sc. They were
interested in making this better world
for children. They sought to serve the
child. They considered the child, as a
child, worth their best efforts They
were not very much concerned-obvi-
ously not at all concerned in some fields
with serving the convenience of the
child's parents. They did not consider
the child as an asset to the State pri-
marily. Their philosophy was not the
cannon fodder" philosophy-using the
term in its broadest sense Rather, they
sought to determine how the state could
better serve the child.
New Scheme of Things.
A new scheme of things has gained
headway in the world since then. It has
not invaded America to any great extent,
but subconsciously men allow 1t to tinge
their thinking. The state should expend
its energies to better the lot of children,
it might be said, because they will be
the state of the future. The America of
tomorrow will be the American boys and
girls of today.
Perhaps there is only hairsbreadth
difference between the two ideas, since
they would both have the same objec-
tives. But somehow there is beauty
about the concept of the Hoover con-
ference which would be lacking in the
half-hidden utilitarianism of efforts to
improve the child for the sake of the
future state. President Hoover's con-
ferees had love in their hearts, largely
uncontaminated by any self interest. It
is sincerely to be hoped that the men
who draw up the next set of reports
will be actuated by at least as pronounced
an altruism.
The Roosevelt conference will be con-
cerned particularly with children in de-
mocracy." Says Miss Katharine F. Len
iaf 1f ho GfofAo
dren's Bureau. in summing up the OBJ
jectives of this third conference:
Matters of economic and social
organization deal with the external cir
cumstances of life and do not go to the
root of the problem of democracy in its
relations to children. The greatest need
of children and youth is for valid objec-
tives in personal and social living. Ex-
perience teaches that no individual can
>be truly free if he has d part in denying
freedom to any other. We and our
children are destined to live in a world
where reverence for personality is quail
fled and diminished by prejudices based
on race, or nationality, or economic
status, or religious belief or political
af1liation. In this world also there must
ever be compromise between freedom
and authority, though the area and ma
ture of such compromise must change
from age to age.
I'VE in America shall not escape the
necessity of defining the elements in Que
civilization which we would cherish
above all others-at great cost, 1t may
be, or resources of material goods and
of body, mind and spirit. OF one thing
we can be sure-that the democratic
ideal will not survive and Increasingly
be realized in human life If the great
majority of the population does not have
access to opportunity which makes in
dividual life valuable and personality
significant.
In 1880 democracy was not threatened.
The child stood in q different relations
ship to the world, to the Nation. Nobody
dreamed that in our day democracy
would be threatened.
Miss Lenroot sounds the chord Of the
new day.