THE ESSENTIALS OF A RELIEF POLICY It should be possible to formulate the general principles upon which charitable relief is to be given to dependent families, whether the source of such relief is the church, a relief society, the public treasury, or a private individual ; whether such relief is temporary or long continued ; and whatever the particular form of relief may be, i.e. whether money, food, fuel, clothing, tools, or some such special relief as medical treatment, legal advice, assistance in finding employment or transportation to another locality. The relief of distress is a much neglected field of research and discussion. There are innumerable leaflets and even books of respectable dimensions detailing for memorial or for practical purposes the work of particular charitable agencies and of individuals who have labored for their fellow-men. There are works of reference dealing with the administrative history of poor-relief systems, with laws of settlement, and with the financial aspects of public relief. The charity organization movement has called forth an extensive literature which treats of many aspects of the relief problem, but from a critical rather than from a constructive standpoint ; and in so far as it is construc tive, it deals mainly with cooperation among charitable agencies, rather than with the principles applying to the relief of individual cases of distress.
Within the past few years a noticeable change has taken place in the conferences of charities, in the dis cussions among social workers, in the special periodicals devoted to social problems, and in the more general daily and periodical press. A new unity has been discovered underlying various charitable activities which centre in the homes of the poor. It has become apparent that 10 relief societies, charity organization societies, religious, educational, and social agencies, and public departments charged with the care of dependents, form practically a single group with many common interests, methods, diffi culties, and dangers. It is found that for all alike the task of creating a normal, well-balanced family life is important. All are equally interested in determining the extent to which charitable relief should be drawn upon to supple ment the income already earned, or to supply the neces sities of life when the income has been entirely cut off.
While each smaller group will naturally have its own peculiar problems, the number of questions that are of common interest to all agencies which for any reason contribute to the care and relief of needy families and dependent persons has become sufficiently great, and their importance sufficiently clear, to justify more adequate treatment than they have yet received.
Preceding and accompanying this new recognition of the larger boundaries of social work, there may be dis covered a related series of changes in the conception of charity and of social obligations. At the same time that those who are engaged in divers branches of social effort discover the essential unity of their task, they become con scious that the task is not so simple as they supposed, and that its magnitude has not been at all appreciated.
Primitive man, in destroying the lives of those who have become dependent from sickness or old age, and in expos ing superfluous infants, acts intelligibly, if not in accord ance with the familiar and humane instincts of civilized man. With the growth of sympathy and of the sense of family, community, and racial responsibility, the duty of man toward his dependent fellow-creatures is less easily defined. A larger number of individuals are moved to acts of pity, kindness, and benevolence ; the conception of charity as a universal obligation springs up and receives a religious sanction ; the church inculcates the duty of giving ; the state assumes the burden of relief of certain kinds and degrees of distress ; voluntary associations are formed under the charitable impulse ; and individuals feel a distinct pleasure in ministering to the unfortunate. In this middle stage of development, tradition and custom are the most important factors in determining the direc tion of charitable effort. The idea that personal reward, either in the present or in a future life, will follow acts of charity, is dominant. Social standing and public ac claim await those who perform conspicuous acts of benevo lence. With the development of social classes based on heredity, on differences of income, and on differences of employment and vocation, there arises a class feeling which modifies the charitable instincts of each class, and pre scribes the relations of a charitable character among such classes.