Part 2

At the outset it has been decided to limit the services of the department to those who have had some training or experience. A year in social work, or in a school of philanthropy or a college degree, is required of applicants. A registration fee of one dollar is charged, and a small commission for positions secured through the bureau. No fee is charged to employers. Sigrid Wynbladh, formerly with the New York School of Philanthropy, has been appointed assistant manager, in charge of the Department for Social Workers, under the supervision of Frances Cummings, manager of the bureau. The office is located for the present in connection with the main office of the bureau, at 38 West 32nd Street, New York, but it is hoped that space may be secured later in the United Charities Building. The new department opened March 1. Already 182 well qualified applicants are registered and 107 calls have been received for responsible workers.

TO ORGANIZE RURAL FORCES

The United States Department of Agriculture which, together with the various state agricultural agencies, has hitherto given primary attention to the problems of production is now aiming to bring about a better organization of rural life. One of the first things the department will attempt is to look into existing organizations, enterprises and activities in order to determine just how they are working and just what their effect is on rural communities. Next, it expects to take steps to encourage and bring into active co-operation organizations that will be helpful in advancing rural life.

The Department of Agriculture and some of the states have already developed work in this field and it will be the object of the Rural Organization Service, operating through the department, to secure the co-operation of all these agencies. The Department of Agriculture is now charged specifically with the problem of studying the marketing of farm produce. Congress at its last session appropriated $50,000 to enable the secretary of agriculture “to acquire and to diffuse among the people of the United States useful information on subjects connected with the marketing and distributing of farm products.”

Marketing, however, is only one aspect of the problem of rural organization. The General Education Board, which for several years has co-operated with the Department of Agriculture in the support of its farm demonstration work, has expressed a willingness to extend its co-operation with the department in this problem of Rural Organization Service. This offer of further co-operation has been accepted. The secretary of agriculture has sought and secured the services of Dr. T. N. Carver, professor of economics in Harvard University, as director of this work, and the president of Harvard University has granted Dr. Carver indefinite leave of absence.

It is expected that the work of investigation, experiment and demonstration now conducted by the Department of Agriculture and by many of the state colleges and experiment stations will fit into the new scheme. The Rural Organization Service plans to co-ordinate and crystalize these results and apply them in community effort for the advancement of agriculture.

CONFERENCE OF NEGRO INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS

A conference on Rural Industrial Schools for Colored People in the South was held in New York April 17-18. The conference was called by six colored principals: Leslie Pinckney Hill, of Manassas, Va.; William E. Benson, of Kowaliga, Ala.; W. J. Edwards, of Snow Hill, Ala.; W. A. Hunt, of Fort Valley. Ga.; W. D. Holtzclaw, of Utica, Miss., and Emma Wilson of Mayesville, S. C. Between one and two hundred people attended the various sessions, and nearly every southern state was represented.

There are about 200 schools for Negroes in the South which are supported by private philanthropy. Some of these schools are supported by such bodies as the American Missionary Association but a larger number have been organized by the initiative of their principals and have no backing save that of their individual boards.

Mr. Hill, in his opening address, pleaded for co-operation among the principals and the boards of Negro schools. Under the present system he said each school works for itself, determines its own educational standard, buys its supplies and unaided raises its money. He recommended co-operation in the raising of funds, in the standardizing of studies, in the standardizing of accounts and in the buying of supplies.

These four suggestions were the central themes of the conference.

The problem of how to raise money received the most attention. At present the members of the board of the school and the principal appeal to any person of means who can be approached. As the number of schools increases the same people are solicited again and again, and the raising of money becomes increasingly difficult. The colored principal jeopardizes his school by his continued absences, and he often grows despondent as he knocks, frequently in vain, at the door of office or home.

Clarence H. Kelsey, president of the Title Guarantee and Trust Company of New York declared that the present system of money-raising is breaking down. Many of the smaller schools, he said, would in the future find it impossible to continue unless they could enlarge their plans for self-support.

Oswald Garrison Villard, editor of the New York _Evening Post_ and chairman of the board of directors of the Association for the Advancement of Colored People, suggested that the field be divided and one section of the country assigned to one school, another section to another. Instead for instance of twenty-five schools trying to get support from a city like Rochester, two or three should use this territory.

The city would then feel responsible he argued for a definite amount of support, and would take a keener interest in doing a good deal for a few schools than in doing a little for a score or two. The conference came to no decision on this matter.

The discussion on co-operation in the raising of funds incidentally indicated the need for carrying out Mr. Hill’s next two suggestions, the standardizing of the curriculum, and the standardizing of accounts. The curriculum in the Negro schools is left to the principal and his board. While recognizing the different conditions in different southern states, it was agreed that some uniformity in courses of study should be secured. The need of good academic training was strongly emphasized by the conference. It was argued that in his zeal for industrial work, the principal must not forget the foundation of all school work, the ability to read and write well, to use numbers, and to reason clearly and intelligently.

Standardizing studies it was recognized would facilitate the standardizing of accounts. A suggestive paper was read on this subject by Charles E. Mitchell, certified public accountant of the West Virginia Colored Institute.

The fourth suggestion that the schools might save by co-operative buying was a new idea to most of the people present, and was felt to be worth looking into carefully. Mr. Hill pointed to the co-operative movement in Germany, where the farmers, each insignificant as a unit, as a co-operative body can command a credit of 200,000,000 marks.

“Why,” he said, “should not the schools buy their flour from the same mill, their coal from the same mine? Such an arrangement would save them tens of thousands of dollars each year.”

While the conference was concerned with the smaller secondary schools of the South, delegates were present from Hampton and Tuskegee.

The conference closed with the formation of a temporary organization consisting of W. D. Holtzclaw, president; Emma Wilson, vice-president, Leslie Pinckney Hill, secretary and treasurer, and four other board members W. A. Hunt, W. J. Edwards, W. T. B. Williams and O. L. Coleman. These officers are to hold a meeting in Atlanta on June 17, and will submit their conclusions to the larger body of school principals in November. It was the hope of the meeting that a practical plan of co-operation might be presented.

THE RURAL CHURCH

In some great day The Country Church Will find its voice And it will say:

“I stand in the fields Where the wide earth yields Her bounties of fruit and grain; Where the furrows turn Till the plowshares burn As they come round and round again; Where the workers pray With their tools all day In sunshine and shadow and rain.

“And I bid them tell Of the crops they sell And speak of the work they have done; I speed every man In his hope and plan And follow his day with the sun; And grasses and trees, The birds and the bees I know and feel ev’ry one.

“And out of it all As the seasons fall I build my great temple alway; I point to the skies, But my footstone lies In commonplace work of the day; For I preach the worth Of the native earth— To love and to work is to pray.”

LIBERTY H. BAILEY in _Rural Manhood_.

FARMER SMITH AND THE COUNTRY CHURCH

FRED EASTMAN

Secretary Matinecock Neighborhood Association, Locust Valley, N. Y.

Farmer Smith needs help. He needs it here and now. He is trying to keep his family supplied with food and clothes. He is struggling to give his children an education and at the same time to pay off the mortgage on the farm and to save enough to keep his wife and himself from want in their old age. All around him are those who are waging the same battle, but they give him little help. Each one fights alone, as his father did before him.

Twelve years ago Farmer Smith had a $5,000 farm. It yielded him an income of about $500. That was a return of 10 per cent. Today, because of the general rise in land values, that farm is worth $10,000. It yields him about $700. It is now only a 7 per cent investment. His profits have decreased. Moreover, his land is poorer than it was twelve years ago. Smith never learned how to farm intensively. He knows only the crude methods used by his father in the days of virgin soil. The years ahead give him no promise that he will be able to make even as much from his farm as he is making now.

The economic pinch has left its marks upon his social life. Many of his old neighbors have sold their farms and moved away. Some have left their farms in the hands of tenants who are robbing the land of its fertility. Community spirit has vanished. The old forms of recreation have lapsed with the passing of the settled population. No new forms have taken their place except in the towns, and these are usually of a character that would not be tolerated in the country. Smith’s boy is waiting his first opportunity to get off the farm. His has been a life of all work and no play, and while it has not exactly made him a dull boy, it has made him hate farming. Smith’s wife is leading the life of a drudge, and she swears her daughters are not going to live on the farm if she can help it. With the stagnation in social life has come stagnation in moral and religious life, for morals do not flourish in a stagnant community.

Yes, Smith needs help. He needs to know how to farm more scientifically. He needs a better income. He needs to know how to organize with his fellow farmers to protect themselves against the inroads of the middlemen and the tenants. He needs better markets for his crops and better transportation facilities to those markets. He needs a school for his children that will give them as good an education as they would get in any city school, a school that will instill in them a love of the country, a knowledge of farming and an appreciation of its economic significance. He needs more recreation facilities for the whole family. He needs a handier kitchen for his wife and daughter and many more opportunities for them to broaden their lives and enrich their minds in literary and social activities.

The question is, Should the church give it? Should it go to Farmer Smith and say:

“Smith, I am a bit ashamed of myself; I have not been doing for you what I ought. I have been preaching about Elysian fields and allowing the riches of bluegrass, corn and wheat fields to be squandered with prodigal hand; I have been trying to pave your road to Glory Land, but I have paid no attention to your road to the nearest market; I have talked about mansions in the skies and cared little about the buildings in which you and your family must spend your lives here and now; I have been teaching your children God’s word in the Bible, but I have left his word in the rivers and the hills, in the grass and the trees, without prophet, witness, or defender.

“Forgive me, Smith; I am not going to do it any more. I am going to take an interest in your every day affairs—your crops, your stock, your markets, your school, your lodge and your recreations. I am going to see if I can help you in your effort to get your boy started on a farm of his own. I’ve preached a long time against Sunday baseball; now I’m going to try to give your children so much recreation through the week that they won’t care for it on Sunday. I am going to take as one of the articles of my creed, ‘I believe in better roads for Smith, and I propose to have them.’ I am going to try to save you and your family not only for Paradise, but for America and American farms.”

Should the country church take its place shoulder to shoulder with Smith in the line in which he is battling for existence? Should it take up the task of encouraging agricultural organizations that will work for more scientific farming, better roads and better markets? Should it throw open its doors, not three hours a week but three hours a day, to Smith’s sons and daughters that they may have a place to meet and to play and to mingle with each other in literary, athletic and social activities? Should the church forget all about itself and its creedal and polemic differences? Should it forget its own salvation in its effort to save Smith? Should it lose itself in his service, even if some churches have to die in the attempt, as long ago their Master died?

Should it?

“THE COUNTY MAN”

JOHN R. HOWARD, Jr. General Secretary Thomas Thompson Trust

The rural leader, whether his interest is primarily in the church, the school, good roads, health, wholesome recreation or the care of the neglected, must, if he would get anywhere, be interested, also, in better farming. For one reason, there is no better way to obtain the interest of the farmer. Then, too, a normal standard of health, intelligence or morals depends, in the country as in the city, upon a normal standard of living. Finally, the socialized church, the vocationalized school, good roads, sanitation, community play places, experienced advisers for family problems all cost money, and the majority of our rural townships are taxed already to the limit of endurance.

The “county man” is the man the United States Department of Agriculture is sending into the counties of the North, not only to make two blades of grass grow where one grew before, but to help the farmer earn two dollars where he earned one before—quite a different proposition. This entails not only scientific choice and treatment of crops, but co-operative buying of fertilizers and feed and co-operative marketing of products. Further, this “county man,” who is helping the farmer to double his dollars, has a rare opportunity to work out with him the problem of spending them and will prove to be a vital factor in the promotion of any of the ends of community betterment.

That the government requires the formation of a county organization to direct the work and to finance it, beyond the $100 a month allowed by the government toward the agent’s salary, establishes at the outset a co-operative county agency through which other work may be taken up. It is the intention of the government to encourage all purposes looking to a better country life.

There are 127 of these men now in the field. They are serving in twenty-three different states. The unfulfilled applications number 276. In January the number was but sixteen although fifty-nine more had been promised. This shows how eager counties throughout the country have been to take advantage of this important new service. Rural leaders should urge the establishment of this service in their counties, encourage it when started, and, whether the initial organization be an agricultural association or an improvement league, be ready to make use of it for the social and educational as well as the agricultural needs of the county.

SOUTHERN SOCIOLOGICAL CONGRESS[2]

PHILIP WELTNER

The second Southern Sociological Congress came to a close on the night of April 29. Its four days were given over to solid criticism and constructive suggestion. Eight hundred delegates gathered together from all over the Southland to learn from the ninety-six specialists the congress brought to Atlanta. Most of the ninety-six were men and women of the South.

One fact the Congress made plain enough, and that was that the South knew its problems and was busy about their solution. Those present seemed to realize that they were the empire builders of a new South. While the questions coming before the several conferences were the same as those that confront the North and West, they were treated from the standpoint of the peculiar needs of the South. But this was done without the slightest sectional consciousness. The South was taking counsel of itself that the entire nation might profit by its advance. Although the field of the congress was sectional, its outlook was national.

The plan of organization followed was much the same as that of the National Conference of Charities and Correction. There were seven special conferences gathered under the name of the Southern Sociological Congress. Each was separately organized and met with the other divisions only in the general night session. The seven divisions were: organized charities, courts and prisons, public health, child welfare, travelers’ aid, race problems and the church and social service.

The latter was an innovation with the Southern Sociological Congress. It served to emphasize the fact that “the church is the fellowship of those who love in the service of those who suffer.” The discussions in this conference all served to bring out in sharp relief the new spirit beginning to dominate the old church. It was agreed that the social worker who can satisfy only the bare material needs of life is poorly equipped for his task, that religion must lend its strength to every effort towards individual or social reconstruction, and that the call of the church is a call to service.

The individual conference that enjoyed the greatest popularity was the one on race problems. Throughout its four days of almost continuous session there were in attendance about 400 persons, half white and half colored. Some of the Negro delegates, fearing an unjust discrimination against those of their race in the conference sessions, had prepared, while on the way to Atlanta, resolutions of protest. These were never tendered. No reason was intruded for their presentation. One of the Negro delegates expressed the situation most aptly. He said:

“The old order of whites understood the old black man. But it has remained for this Congress to demonstrate the possibility of the young white men of the new order sympathizing in and appreciating the hopes and aspirations of the Negro of today.”

Too great a significance can not be attached to this simple statement of fact. Its optimism is the culture-soil out of which we may expect to see develop that happy adaptation of the two races, which after all is the solution of the race problem.

This incident, and what it goes to show, would alone justify the existence of a southern congress separate and distinct from the National Conference of Charities and Correction. The peculiar problems that faced the conference on courts and prisons make this separate treatment even more desirable. In the South there are not many of those great central, highly organized penal institutions known as penitentiaries. For the most part we have county chain-gang camps engaged in road work. A distinct contribution was made to southern penology by Hooper Alexander, of Georgia, when he showed the absolute identity of the convict lease in Georgia with the system once known as the institution of slavery.

The conference discussion made clear the fact that the county convict road camp, prosecuted without a scintilla of effort at training or character building, is not less immoral than the old lease system; that the wrong of public exploitation is as great as exploitation at the hands of a private lessee.

The congress made a tremendous impression on Atlanta and the whole state of Georgia. Its influence will spread over the entire South. It served to quicken the civic consciousness of our people and to make them better acquainted with their common problems. It took the mask off sociology and unfrocked it of scholastic appearance. In pointing out our needs, the congress unified our aims and at the same time broadened our vision.

UNIVERSITY FORUM

(_In downtown New York_)

JEREMIAH W. JENKS

Director of the Division of Public Affairs, School of Commerce, Accounts and Finance, New York University

New York University has added a chapter to the history of “town and gown” by opening a University Forum in lower New York. This has been held throughout the winter in the Judson Memorial Building in Washington Square, and its purpose has been to put the university at the service of people in New York interested in a thoroughly impartial discussion of questions of the day.

The purposes of the forum as announced last fall are to make the university a greater force in training students to perform the duties of citizenship, in helping citizens to understand the problems of government, and in making thinking men act and active men think. Public officials, business leaders, social workers, eminent authorities were asked to present important questions of government and industry and discuss vital problems of civic and commercial life.

The methods employed were somewhat different from those usually followed in public discussions. In order that the academic atmosphere of thoroughness, sincerity and impartiality might so far as possible be conserved without sacrificing at the same time the interest that comes from having questions presented by experts and from the stimulus of controversy, it was decided that each question discussed should cover three sessions. At the first session an able authority has presented one side of the question. If there were time, as has usually been the case in the hour and a half, the audience has questioned the speaker in order to bring out more fully the points made.

At the second session, a week later, the opposite side has been presented with similar questioning.

At the third meeting the director of the forum has enumerated briefly the most essential points made on both sides, giving his own judgment regarding their validity and the relation of the question under discussion to the public interest. In some instances where it has seemed desirable, he has supplemented the arguments presented in the discussion by points of his own in order to make the discussion as complete as possible. In this summary an effort has been made to present the questions as impartially as possible from the viewpoint of the public interest.