The youth and the nation; a guide to service

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THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO ' DALLAS
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.

TORONTO

Courtesy of The Smithsonian Institution

WALTER REED

When at the risk of his life, Dr. Reed brought to a successful con-
clusion his experiments with yellow fever, he wrote to his wife, "I could
shout for very joy that Heaven has permitted me to make this discovery."

THE YOUTH AND THE
NATION

A GUIDE TO SERVICE

BY
HARRY H. MOORE

AUTHOR ov "KEEPING IN CONDITION"

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
SAMUEL McCUNE LINDSAY, PH.D., LL.D.

PBOFE880B OF SOCIAL LEGISLATION
COLUMBIA UNIVKB8ITT

ILLUSTRATED

{fan fork
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1919

COPYBIQHT, 1917

BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Set up and electrotyped. Published July, 1917.
RtprinUd January, 19x8.

A CALL TO SERVICE

You, at this moment, have the honor to belong
to a generation whose lips are touched by fire. . . .
The human race now passes through one of its
great crises. New ideas, new issues — a new call
for men to carry on the work of righteousness, of
charity, of courage, of patience, and of loyalty —
all these things have come and are daily coming
to you.

When you are old . . . however memory brings
back this moment to your minds, let it be able to
say to you : That was a great moment. It was the
beginning of a new era. . . . This world in its
crisis called for volunteers, for men of faith hi life,
of patience in service, of charity, and of insight. I
responded to the call however I could. I volun-
teered to give myself to my master — the cause
of humane and brave living. I studied, I loved,
I labored, unsparingly and hopefully, to be worthy
of my generation.

JOSIAH ROTCE.

PREFACE

REPLIES to a series of questions collected from
eight hundred young men and older boys in nine
representative American cities have convinced the
author of the need for the information he has at-
tempted to set forth in this book. The questions
were formulated in an effort to reveal the youth's
attitude towards society and his information re-
garding the social problems which he must face
later as a citizen. The replies show a deplorable
amount of ignorance: in the minds of many, pov-
erty does not exist; the idea of choosing a vocation
for the purpose of becoming socially useful — the
mere idea of so doing seems never to have occurred
to many.*

If we are to make headway against the social
evils which threaten the nation, we must enlist
the youth. We must do more than offer courses in

* See The High School Boy and Modern Social Problems,
Harry H. Moore, The Educational Review, October, 1917

vii

viii PREFACE

sociology and economics in the college curriculum.
Many boys go to college to continue the studies
in which the, become interested while in high
school with no clear idea of the subject-matter of
sociology and economics. What is more impor-
tant, only a small proportion of high school boys
go to college. Many young men enter business
and professional life and become citizens without
any clear conception of our most fundamental
social problems.

This book is an attempt to arouse a wholesome
interest among young men and older boys of col-
lege and high school age in modern social evils, to
show them how men have combatted these evils
and to suggest vocational opportunities in the
warfare against them.

Seldom has an author been blessed with so many
helpful friends as has the writer of this little vol-
ume. Especially is he indebted to Professor
William F. Ogburn and Professor Norman P.
Coleman, of Reed College who constantly have
advised him in its development. Thanks are due
also to Dr. Edward 0. Sisson, Commissioner of Ed-

PREFACE ix

ucation of the State of Idaho, to Mr. C. C. Robin-
son of the International Committee of Young
Men's Christian Associations, to Jesse B. Davis,
Principal of the Central High School, Grand
Rapids, Michigan, to H. H. Herdman, Principal
of the Washington High School, Portland, Oregon,
to Professors Harold G. Merriam, Joseph K. Hart,
Ethel M. Coleman of Reed College, and to college
and high school students all of whom have made
valuable suggestions or have aided in other ways.

H. H. M.

REED COLLEGE, PORTLAND, OREGON,
June, 1917.

INTRODUCTION

WAR makes its strongest appeal to youth be-
cause it is a challenge both to physical prowess
and to the idealism of youth. Where the hazard
is so great the cause must have a value greater
than life itself. It becomes therefore a sort of
supreme vocational motive for the time being.
The surrender once made, what has been deemed
worth dying for is conceived to be the supreme
thing worth living for and fighting for.

The author is sincerely interested in the great
army of adolescent youth, the high school boys
in particular who have not yet found themselves,
and who are such a puzzle to their parents, their
teachers and their friends. In his "Keeping in
Condition" he struck the new and modern note
of physical efficiency, and put in an exceptionally
sensible and attractive way just the sort of good
advice which the average boy is altogether too apt
to overlook or treat with indifference.

It is a happy, timely and helpful idea to bring
together in the present volume on "The Youth
and the Nation," a collection of the vocational

xii INTRODUCTION

experiences of some of the leaders in the really
social vocations to fire the ambition and to idealize
the eternal war against disease, economic injustice
and man's inhumanity to man. Mr. Moore gives
us in language which the boy can understand
the vocational experiences of those who have gone
to the front, lived in the trenches and taken
the range of the enemy bacteria in the physical
universe or the germs of greed and economic
selfishness which are more numerous and harmful
to man and his social institutions than the tor-
pedoes of the submarine, the bombs of the latest
aircraft, or the bullets of the most modern machine
guns. This is the sort of "social literature"
which is needed everywhere and for all stages of
the educational process from the kindergarten to
the college. A little of it has penetrated the col-
leges and the universities in the last generation
but for the most part that is too late to have the
maximum molding effect in the choice of a voca-
tion. The choices are usually made before one
gets to college, and then there are so many that
never go to college who stumble blindly into vo-
cations that just turn up and never satisfy the
real longing of the soul. It is high time that the
effort was made, especially in these days of voca-

INTRODUCTION xiii

tional education and so-called vocational guidance
in our public school systems, to bring this material
to the high school and to adapt it to the atmosphere
and curriculum of secondary education.

It is not the sentimental appeal or the motive of
self-sacrifice which in the past has played so large
a part in recruiting the professions of teaching and
the Christian ministry, that the author relies upon
chiefly in his call to social service. Strangely
enough Mr. Moore passes over very lightly both of
these professions in his emphasis upon the larger
social vocations. Perhaps he thought they did not
need further emphasis, or that they are hardly up
to the highest standards demanded by the modern
social spirit. It is rather, and very properly, the
wonderful vista of conquest that he takes as the
more positive note of appeal. The modern sani-
tarian, the economist-administrator and the busi-
ness man armed with science and girt about with
the social values of invention, are rather the types
of the ideal. These furnish the incentive to en-
deavor which can only be successful in proportion
as it is unselfish and breaks down whenever trans-
muted into mere personal gain or arbitrary and
unsocial power.

In this pioneer effort Mr. Moore will receive

xiv INTRODUCTION

the thanks and co-operation of thousands of teach-
ers and parents for whom he has merely pointed
the way to a new method of attack and to new
resources of information and inspiration in the
vocational training and guidance of young boys.
He would doubtless be the first to admit that he
has merely scratched the surface of the vocational
experiences of typical men in many walks of life.
He will also be the more eager to welcome that
growing record which others imitating his example
will make of the incidents of the common everyday
life about us which reflect the true social spirit of
America.

SAMUEL McCuNE LINDSAY.

NEW YORK, May 15, 1917.

CONTENTS

PAGE

Preface vii

Introduction xi

CHAPTER

I. THE FIGHTING STRENGTH OP YOUTH 1

n. ENEMIES OF THE NATION 8

Disease 8

Feeble-mindedness 10

Juvenile Delinquency and Crime 11

The Evils of Immigration 15

Commercialized Prostitution 18

Liquor and the Saloon 20

The Disasters of Industry 21

Child Labor 23

Women in Industry 25

HI. MORE ENEMIES 28

Unemployment 28

Rural Poverty 31

Poverty in the City 34

The Luxury and Extravagance of the Rich ... 38

The Inequitable Distribution of Wealth 40

Will the Nation Survive 43

IV. SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST? 46

V. CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 55

Social Considerations in Various Voca-
tions 56

Considerations of Special Fitness 62

zv

xvi CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

VI. PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK 67

Physical Preparation 67

Mental Preparation 71

VII. DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN THE PROFESSIONS 77

A Physician 77

A Teacher 83

A Physical Director 85

A Lawyer 87

A Politician 89

An Engineer 91

A Minister 94

A Missionary 97

Three Men in the Field of Art 100

A Forester 101

A Journalist 102

Vin. DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN BUSINESS LIFE . . 106
A Student of Economics who became a Busi-
ness Man 106

A Business Man who Practiced the Golden

Rule 108

A Man who Gave his Business to his Em-
ployees 110

A Corporation President who Promotes

Welfare Work Ill

Attitudes Towards Profit Sharing and Wel-
fare Work 112

IX. DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN AGRICULTURE AND

INDUSTRY 116

From Farmer to Governor. 117

Other Useful Farmers 119

The County Agent 120

Social Usefulness in Farming 121

A Champion of Labor 123

A Leader of Miners . . .126

CONTENTS xvii

CHAPTER PAGE

X. DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN ORGANIZED SO-
CIAL WORK 131

The Secretary of the National Child Labor

Committee 132

A Prison Warden 134

The Founder of the Adirondack Cottage San-
itarium 136

A Secretary of the Young Men's Christian As-
sociation 139

XI. DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN AVOCATIONS 143

A Railroad President who Defended Public

Interests 143

Two Bankers who Served their City and

State 148

An Avocation for Students 150

Thoughtless Imitation vs. Intelligent Serv-
ice 152

Problems All Must Face 155

XII. A CALL TO ACTION 158

SELECTED BOOKS 169

NOTES . 171

ILLUSTRATIONS

Walter Reed Frontispiece

Facing page

Air Shaft Opening of a Tenement 16

Boys who will Never See 20

The Trapper Boy 24

A Street Gamin 52

Charles R. Henderson 90

John M. Eshleman 90

Who will Buy Food for the Children Now? 109

Sing Sing Prison 134

Owen R. Lovejoy 140

John R. Mott 140

William H. Baldwin, Jr 144

An Immigrant Boy 150

Two Ways of Getting a Meal 162

THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

A GUIDE TO SERVICE
CHAPTER I

THE FIGHTING STRENGTH OP YOUTH

WHEN the German army was invading Belgium
and had reached Liege, a Belgian youth of seven-
teen named Van der Bern was placed in charge
of a patrol of twenty men for reconnoitering out-
side the city. On the night of August 5, 1914,
he had been out with his men for twenty-five
minutes, when they unexpectedly came upon a
group of about fifty Germans. The surprised
Belgians began to flee, but Van der Bern shouted,
"A moi!" and ran fearlessly towards the Germans.
The others responded and together they hurled
themselves upon the enemy. The odds were over-
whelmingly against them and in a few minutes
Van der Bern was left with only two companions.
In thirty seconds these two fell. With almost
superhuman effort, the boy got them back to

2 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

safety, but not before two German bullets had
struck him. He placed his comrades in the care
of the Red Cross, went to his superior officer and
reported the engagement. Then he fell in a faint.

In an action in Russia near Ivoff, a company
of Russians in a trench was surprised by a large
body of Austrians. A murderous fire was con-
centrated upon them. Whenever a Russian hat
was seen, it was instantly perforated with bullets.
The Russians were able to do but little. They
soon ran out of ammunition. The officers in
charge called for a volunteer to make an attempt
to bring reinforcements from the Russian lines.
The Austrians were firing from a distance of
only three hundred paces; the risk was great.
A youth named Nicholas Orloff responded. As
soon as he started, the fire of the Austrians was
turned full upon him. He was shot. Wounded
as he was, he crawled forward until he reached the
Russian position. Reinforcements were sent and
his companions were saved. Nicholas Orloff was
awarded the Cross of St. George — the highest
Russian military decoration.1

When the Italian government in July, 1915,
issued an order forbidding the acceptance of vol-
unteers under eighteen years of age, says a dis-

FIGHTING STRENGTH OF YOUTH 3

patch from Lugano, there was great disappoint-
ment among sixteen and seventeen year old boys.
When they had to give up their arms and uniforms,
many broke down and wept.2

In American wars thousands of brave youths
have enlisted and their heroism is still remem-
bered. In the War of 1812, David Farragut,
when but a boy, distinguished himself in a bloody
battle with the English; and we are still thrilled
by the youthful exploits of John Paul Jones,
Ethan Allen and Commodore Perry.

Soon after the outbreak of the Great War, many
American young men, though their own country
had not yet become involved, enlisted in the
Canadian and French armies. One of these was
Victor Chapman. When the war broke out he
was studying in Paris. He immediately entered
the Foreign Legion and later joined a group of
young Americans in the aviation service of France.
On one occasion, Chapman, wishing to gratify a
wounded comrade's desire for an orange, obtained
a small basket of them and set forth in his aero-
plane for the hospital where his friend lay. While
on his way, he discovered several black spots
against the sky indicating an engagement between
French and German aircraft. Chapman imme-

4 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

diately dashed to a great height, put his machine
gun into action and brought down two German
aeroplanes. Then one of the Germans found his
mark and Chapman plunged lifeless to the earth.
Victor Chapman combined in his life young and
tranquil gayety with decision, energy, and char-
acter. The venerated French philosopher, Emile
Boutroux, said of Chapman in the Paris Temps,
"He was duty incarnate; disdaining all danger,
he dreamed only of doing his utmost in a useful
task." 3

To many youths in the Great War have come
opportunities for heroic action; and to most sol-
diers at the front has come the excitement of the
charge. To the rank and file, war brings also the
drudgery and monotony of camp life and the
sordidness of life in the trenches. Bullets may
be faced with courage. It is the mud and water,
the vermin, the stench, the weariness, the enforced
inactivity that try men's souls.

Yet the youths of every nation always have
been ready; and however unexpected have been
the drudgery, monotony and hardship, they have
met them cheerfully and courageously. Aroused
by patriotic emotions, they have gladly left loved
ones and the comforts of home in order that they

FIGHTING STRENGTH OF YOUTH 5

might fight for their country. The best fighters
of every nation have been its youths.

In attending to military warfare, however, the
youths of America have overlooked enemies within
our borders more dangerous than menacing
armies. They have failed to notice that disease,
crime and poverty have been causing destruc-
tion more serious than the devastation of war.
The number who died of typhoid fever in the
United States in 1912 probably exceeded the num-
ber killed in six of the greatest battles of the Civil
War; 4 crime, as we shall see, causes a vast amount
of suffering and poverty undermines the strength
of the whole nation.

In times of military warfare it is especially im-
portant to combat these internal enemies, be-
cause they sap the energies of the youth — the
nation's best fighters. Only as we are successful
in overcoming our internal foes, can we be in con-
dition for other wars. In 1916 and 1917 the men
and boys of the United States were in a deplorable
state of unpreparedness. Their physical unfitness
was shown by the small proportion of applicants
admitted into the regular army. During the
first fifty-eight days of the campaign for recruits
which began in March, 1916, four out of every five

6 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

were rejected because they were physically unfit.*
Every year thousands of men and boys are in-
capacitated for military service through injuries
sustained in industry; 6 other thousands are weak-
ened by dissipation and disease; 7 an army of
youths may be found at all times in our jails and
prisons, useless as fighters and a source of expense
to the nation; thousands of boys and men are
being weakened through lack of sufficient nourish-
ment due to poverty.8

In times of security from external foes, the na-
tion should seek to direct the skill of its army and
the fighting strength of its entire body of young
men into the warfare against poverty, crime and
disease. This is a warfare which must be waged
incessantly. The fighting seldom will be dramatic.
Most of it will be as monotonous as life in a mili-
tary training camp. Only a few men will be called
upon to die in action. Many will be required to
render a more difficult service. They will be
called upon to live for their country, giving full
years of active service, struggling against dis-
couragement and grappling with intricate, baffling
problems.

Alike in times of great national crises and in
periods of constructive activity, the young man

FIGHTING STRENGTH OF YOUTH 7

must consider thoughtfully what his duty to his
country is and what patriotism means. To wear
a little flag in one's button-hole, to march in a
parade, to applaud the manceuvers of battle-ships
on the moving-picture screen, to sing "My Coun-
try, 'Tis of Thee" with fervor — these things in
themselves are but empty forms. To have value
they must be accompanied by a love of country
so strong that it demands expression in some sub-
stantial service.

Men may serve the nation by fighting in army
or navy. They may render service which is as
important, by taking part in the warfare against
the nation's internal enemies. Young men always
are eager to defend their country from its foes
without. They will be eager to protect it from
enemies within our gates when they realize that
these enemies are a greater menace. If the United
States is to survive as a great nation, and if civili-
zation is to advance during the next quarter
century, the nation's youth must wage with vigor
and persistence this warfare against disease, crime
and poverty.

. CHAPTER H

ENEMIES OF THE NATION

EVERY man is familiar with the lives of one or more
military heroes, with the campaigns they have
waged and the battles they have lost and won.
Their lives have been an inspiration. Let us now
consider the warfare against crime, disease and
poverty and a few of its heroes. We shall find
that it is a warfare demanding energy, endurance,
determination and courage of a high order, and
a high degree of intelligence.

These ancient foes of mankind — disease, crime
and poverty — manifest themselves in many dif-
ferent social evils. Let us look at the devastation
and suffering which they cause.

Disease. — In July, 1916, there were mobilized in
New York City, the forces of nation, state and city
for one of the biggest battles to save human life
that has ever been fought. A million babies were
threatened with a mysterious disease, called in-
fantile paralysis. In a few weeks, there were thou-
sands of cases and hundreds of deaths.

8

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 9

Health Commissioner Emerson of New York
City, with the consent of the police department,
called out New York's 10,000 "home guards"—
citizens trained for co-operation in crises — to aid
in enforcing sanitary measures. Deputy Surgeon
General W. C. Rucker of the United States Public
Health Service established a complete laboratory
and an administrative force of public health serv-
ants to help the city health officers.9 By Septem-
ber, the epidemic seemed to have run its course.
The means of transmission, however, has not been
ascertained, and the conquest of the disease has
not yet been achieved.

In the United States, there are probably at all
times about 3,000,000 persons seriously ill, and
every day 1700 unnecessary deaths.10 Of the
20,000,000 school children in the country to-day
2,000,000 will die of tuberculosis (consumption)
if they continue to die at the present rate.11
If a single health officer were required to take the
names of these doomed children as they passed
through his office at the rate of one a minute, ten
hours a day, seven days in the week, the task would
take over nine years.

England and Germany protect their citizens
by health insurance. The only great industrial

10 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

country without such protection for its people is
the United States.

Systematic fights against infantile paralysis,
typhoid fever, tuberculosis and other diseases
are waged with vigor from time to time; a few
have given their lives in fighting them. A well
organized warfare against disease is developing.
When physicians adopt more vigorous methods
and attack disease in its many breeding places
instead of waiting for it first to attack human
lives, great victories will be won by science and
much human suffering will be prevented.

Feeble-mindedness. — In 1803, Martin Kallikak,
Jr., a feeble-minded man, married Rhoda Zabeth,
a normal woman. They had ten children and from
them have come not less than four hundred and
seventy descendants. Among these ten children
and their descendants were the following:
143 feeble-minded persons.

36 illegitimate children.

33 sexually immoral persons, mostly prostitutes.

24 confirmed alcoholics.
3 epileptics.

82 children who died in infancy.
8 persons who kept houses of ill fame.
3 criminals.12

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 11

Feeble-mindedness constitutes a serious menace
to society, for it is one of the chief causes of crime,
prostitution, alcoholism and poverty. Many of the
feeble-minded are unable to hold positions in in-
dustry; they can support neither themselves nor
their families. Feeble-mindedness is transmitted
from generation to generation. If both parents
are feeble-minded the children are almost sure to
be feeble-minded; if only one parent is defective,
feeble-mindedness is likely to show in either of the
next two generations.

There are from 300,000 to 400,000 feeble-minded
persons in the United States.13 In other words,
there are virtually as many feeble-minded per-
sons in the country as there are students in the
colleges and universities. Sociologists are seri-
ously considering what can be done safely to
prevent the feeble-minded from reproducing
themselves.

Juvenile Delinquency and Crime. — A Chicago
jail was full of the confusion of curses, screams,
groans and obscenity. "It's a dull night, but
noisy," said the patient turnkey. Suddenly two
figures appeared outside the entrance, one was a
big policeman, the other, a boy of seventeen, short
and slender.

12 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

"Have you got room for our young friend here?"
asked the officer with a grin, as the turnkey swung
open the heavy door. The boy's face was pale
and his eyes had a look of terror in them.

"Please don't lock me up, mister," he pled.

"Haven't you got some friend who'll go your
bail? How about the man you work for?" asked
the turnkey.

"Oh, no! If he knows I'm pinched, I'll lose my
job. I don't want nobody to know."

"We'll give you the best we've got," said the
turnkey. "Come along."

He opened a cell door and the boy went falter-
ingly in. There were two others in the cell, one a
dope fiend and the other a youth charged with
picking pockets. The dope fiend made room for
the boy on his wooden bench. For fourteen hours,
they were confined there together. Now and then,
the boy would fall to sleep only to be awakened by
the hideous screams of a prisoner with delirium
tremens. Occasionally the dope fiend leaned over
and talked with the boy in low tones. Later in
the night he began to suffer from lack of his drug;
presently he dropped to the floor; his head fell
back and his eyes rolled wildly. All night long,
at frequent intervals, there were outbursts of

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 13

drunken profanity as groups of new prisoners were
received and put into cells.

In the morning, the boy was taken in a patrol
wagon to the boys' court. It appeared in court
that, while riding his bicycle, he had run acciden-
tally into a child. He had stopped immediately,
had picked up the child and had taken it to its
mother. This was his crime. Because of it, his
self-respect had been assaulted; he had been ex-
posed to both physical and moral disease; he had
heard more profanity and vulgarity in one night,
than most boys hear in a year.14

Conditions in many city police stations are bad;
in county jails they are worse. Some are under-
ground, as were the dungeons of the dark ages.
In some cases, the cells are overrun with vermin
and rats. In many county jails, no attempt is
made to keep boys separate from adult murderers,
perverts and other criminals. A large proportion
of those detained are innocent.15

Many men leave state prisons worse criminals
than when they came. Said one man, "I will tell
you how I felt at the end of my first term. I hated
everybody and everything, and I made up my
mind I would get even."

The greatest crime in the United States is the

14 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

wholesale manufacture of criminals. Many of our
prisons, instead of reforming men who have made
bad beginnings in life, have been making hardened
criminals out of them. Often, when released,
they associate with youths who are just getting
out into the world and pass on to them the lessons
in crime they have learned while in prison. What
should we say of a hospital that released most of
its patients uncured to go out into the community
and spread disease broadcast? 16

There were probably not less than 100,000 chil-
dren before juvenile courts in 1910. Of these,
over 14,000, most of them boys, were committed
to reform schools and similar institutions.17

Juvenile delinquency tends to become more
serious in times of war. In Berlin in 1915 there
were twice as many crimes committed by children
as in 1914. In England, in 1917, juvenile delin-
quency had increased at least 34 per cent since
the war began.18

The development of home economics and other
movements which tend to strengthen the home life
will prevent much delinquency; so, too, will the pro-
motion of supervised playgrounds, gymnasiums and
swimming pools, social centers and club work for boys
and girls in settlements and religious institutions.

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 15

On January 1, 1910, there were 111,498 prisoners
confined in the prisons, penitentiaries, jails and
workhouses of the United States.17 If all these
prisoners were transferred to one institution, an
area of over seven square miles would be necessary
for the building and grounds.

Pioneers in prison reform have been working for
years. Society now is learning that the criminal
is a sick man mentally and that the prison ought
to be his hospital. To treat him as a sick man is
less expensive in the long run and it is far more
humane. Public officers are beginning to see this.
Selfish interests, prejudice and ignorance, are
giving way to enlightened public opinion. The
fight for prison reform has begun.

The Evils of Immigration. — On Wednesday, Jan-
uary 5, 1916, several thousand men employed by
the Youngstown Sheet and Tube Company, in East
Youngstown, Ohio, struck for an increase in wages.
On Thursday there were a few signs of disorder.
On Friday, thousands were on the streets, and
many were drinking. A large group were massed
near a steel bridge which constituted the main en-
trance to the company's plant. This bridge was
in charge of uniformed guards employed by the
company. There were signs of hostility between

16 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

the guards and the strikers, then some of the
strikers started onto the bridge toward the guards.
According to one report, the guards advanced and
fired; the strikers retreated until they came to a pile
of bricks. Using these for ammunition, they
pressed back against the guards. A general riot of
destruction followed.

The saloons were raided, and their doors and
windows broken. The rioters obtained dynamite,
threatening, as they said, "to blow East Youngs-
town to hell!" They tried to burn the enemy's
plant, and they succeeded in setting fire to the
business section of the town and assaulted the
firemen who tried to fight the flames. Eight were
killed and others were wounded; four complete
city blocks were destroyed at a loss of $500,000 to
$1,000,000. The next morning the militia arrived
and quiet was restored.

What was the cause of this warfare? The op-
pression of the workers was one cause; the saloon
was another. An important cause was the utter
failure on the part of East Youngstown to Amer-
icanize its foreign-born population. East Youngs-
town has a population of 9,700, most of whom are
Poles, Lithuanians and Serbs. Of these, less than
five per cent are registered voters. There were

mm

Am SHAFT OPENING OF A SIX-STORY TENEMENT IN NEW YORK
People live four stories below this roof. All the light and air they get
comes through this slit. This kind of construction is prohibited in new
buildings.

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 17

nineteen saloons, and not a church of any kind
in the town. There were no night schools. When
the Superintendent of Education was reproached
with this fact, he replied that the Board of Educa-
tion had refused to give a dollar "for teaching
foreigners." 19

In cities and towns throughout the Middle West
and the East, there are large groups of foreign-
born people. Over one-quarter of the foreign-
born in Buffalo, Cleveland and Milwaukee, in
1910, were unable to speak English.20 Many are
ignorant of our customs. They are underpaid and
shamefully abused. They cause serious trouble
in industry.

In the lower east side of New York City, dwell
500,000 human beings, most of them immigrants.
This is a population greater than that of Utah or
Montana. In 1910, there were over 10,000 ten-
ements with "air-shafts" furnishing neither sun-
light nor fresh air.21 A child living its early years
in dark rooms without sunlight and fresh air grows
up anaemic, weak and sickly like a plant grown
in the dark. It is handicapped in school, in in-
dustry, and in all of its activities. Strong nations
are not made of such material.22

During the year ending June 30, 1914, a million

18 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

and a quarter persons came to the United States
from foreign lands.23 This number was equal to
the population of the entire state of West Virginia
in 1910. Of all the problems before the people
to-day, the problem of Americanizing the immi-
grant is one of the most acute.

The public schools of the United States are doing
admirable work towards the Americanizing of
immigrant children. The public schools of many
cities also conduct night schools for adult immi-
grants. Cleveland, Ohio, and other cities are
making systematic efforts to educate adult immi-
grants in the responsibilities of citizenship. The
effort must be extended.

Commercialized Prostitution. — A girl of twenty-
two years married a man of twenty-six. About
a month after the wedding, the bride was con-
fined to her bed with severe suffering and fever.
She was taken to a physician who discovered that
she had gonorrhoea (clap). This wrecked her
health and made her incapable of bearing children.
Careful treatment produced but slight improve-
ment, and finally a surgical operation was per-
formed. This improved her health, but she was
never able to have children. The husband ad-
mitted that he had contracted a "mild gonorrhoea"

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 19

years before, but had considered himself cured.
An examination showed the germs of gonorrhoea in
him.24

Thousands of girls become the innocent victims
of men who have failed in their youth to recognize
the seriousness of illicit sex relations. Hundreds
of women become invalids for life; hundreds re-
main childless; other hundreds give birth to chil-
dren who soon become blind or who remain de-
fective in other ways all their lives.

While the guilty husband generally acquires
disease from a prostitute, this does not mean that
she is primarily responsible. The prostitute, in
the first place, is often the innocent victim of men.
After girls take their first few missteps, their
downfall is rapid. They become outcasts, and
are accepted only in the society of their kind.
For a short time, the prostitute's life may be a gay
one, but only for a short time. It soon becomes a
hell on earth. Hundreds of girls are sacrificed to
satisfy the lust of men. Men are largely to blame
for prostitution and for the infection of innocent
women and children.

Though the guilty man may suffer less than the
innocent woman and child whom he infects, these
diseases in men are serious because they render men

20 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

unfit for either civil or military service. According
to a recent report of the War Department, prob-
ably one man in five of the class from which re-
cruits are drawn for the regular army suffers from
syphilis.25

In many cities, prostitution still is permitted as
a business. It brings in thousands of dollars in
profits to property owners, keepers of bawdy-
houses and liquor dealers. Various regulative
methods have proved ineffective. The red-light
district is a plague spot, from which are spread two
vile and terrible diseases.

The work of recently organized Social Hygiene
Societies is focusing the attention of hundreds of
high-minded men on these problems. Sex educa-
tion and the enforcement of proper laws are being
advocated. It is believed that much can be done
to reduce prostitution and venereal disease.
Though an encouraging beginning has been made,
much more will have to be done, if the women
and children of the United States are to be
safe.

Liquor and the Saloon. — -That alcoholic liquors
cause much disease, crime and poverty is known
by many high school students. The United States
spends annually $1,750,000,000 for liquor. This

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 21

amount of money is almost beyond the grasp of
the mind.. It would build twelve hospitals in each
of the forty -eight states in the Union at a cost of
$600,000 each, twenty colleges in each state at a
cost of $1,200,000 each, 300 recreation centers with
gymnasiums and swimming pools at $500,000 each,
and there would be left over, $102,400,000 to pro-
mote industrial education.26

During recent years, the warfare against the
saloon has been achieving success. At the be-
ginning of 1916, nineteen states had voted out the
saloon. Reverses will doubtless come and there
will be many hard fights before this evil traffic
is finally destroyed. The success of prohibition in
war time should hasten the coming of permanent
prohibition.

The Disasters of Industry. — In November, 1909,
fire broke out in a coal mine at Cherry, Illinois.
There were 500 men in the mine at the time; of
these, 124 escaped. Then the shafts had to be
sealed in an effort to smother the flames. For
days, the wives, children and friends of the en-
tombed miners waited in fearful suspense. The
militia were called. They formed a human line
around the mouth of the shaft to keep back the
sorrowing throng as it pressed towards the pit

22 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

where their loved ones were imprisoned. Miners
who had escaped threatened to seize the shaft.

As soon as it was possible to make a descent into
the mine, a party of firemen from Chicago led by
three graduates from the Columbia University
School of Mines went down in the cage and for a
night and a day, three hundred feet underground,
they fought the flames. No sign of life was seen;
the state mine inspectors gave up all hope and
left the field. At last, the rescuers reported that
they had discovered living men who had walled
themselves in from fire and gas. Twenty were
saved. For seven days they had faced the horrors
of hell. Three hundred were found dead. They
sacrificed their lives in the coal industry; and the
widows and children of most of them were left
dependent on charity.27

In December, 1907, 344 were killed at the
Monongah mines in West Virginia, and 228 at
Jacob's Creek, Pennsylvania. The waste of human
life in industry is appalling. Men, women and
children are poisoned, maimed for life and killed.
Human life in America is cheap. There are 35,000
killed every year in the industries of this country
and 700,000 injured.28 Each one of us enjoys the
comforts of life because of the risks taken by the

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 23

workers in industry. Can we comprehend these
figures? They mean that every day in the United
States nearly one hundred are killed in industry and
nearly two thousand are injured — that one man is
killed every fifteen minutes, and that one is injured
every minute, twenty-four hours a day.

Systematic efforts are being made to protect the
worker in industry. Employers are now being
held liable for accidents, safety devices are being
installed, industrial insurance is being provided
by law. The "Safety First" movement is proving
effective. The slaughter continues, however, and
hard work must be done before the workers will
be reasonably safe. Every new industry as it
springs up will present new problems.

Child Labor. — On an early winter morning long
before the sun was up, two little girls, Mary and
Jane O'Connor, plodded along a Vermont mountain
road. Each carried a dinner pail. They were spin-
ners bound for the cotton mill. One was fifteen
years old ; she had worked three years. The other
was fourteen ; she had worked two years. They had
got up at four-fifteen in the morning, and had walked
two and a hah* miles to the mill, because they could
not afford to ride. Each earned three dollars a
week. In the mill where these children worked,

24 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

eighteen out of fifty employees were children from
eleven to sixteen years of age.

The law in each of the New England States
forbids the employment of children under four-
teen except under exceptional circumstances. But
laws are sometimes violated. The mill owner may
prefer children to adults; child labor is cheap;
children are docile; they seldom demand higher
wages and shorter hours. The earlier the child
goes to work, the more like a machine it becomes.
If the little body soon wears out, if the child is
seriously injured or killed, many mill owners
seemingly do not care. There are other children
ready to take its place.29

In the United States, nearly two million chil-
dren between the ages of ten and sixteen are em-
ployed in various gainful occupations. A proces-
sion of them advancing at the rate of one per
minute day and night would require nearly four
years to pass a given point.30

In times of war, children constitute the second line
of national defense. If they are taken from school
and required to work long hours in field or factory,
if they are underfed, if they are not guarded as the
nation's choicest assets, when they are needed later,
they will not be prepared and the nation will suffer.

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 25

Thousands of men and women throughout the
land are interesting themselves in the cause of the
children who toil. A definite campaign is being
waged against the employment of children. It is
a campaign of education, and a campaign for
better laws. In 1916, an important battle in the
campaign was won when Congress passed a law
prohibiting industries which employ children below
certain standards from shipping any of their prod-
ucts into other states.

Women in Industry. — Grace Brown, a sales-
woman, had been at work twelve years. Though
earlier in life she had earned as much as twelve dol-
lars a week in a knitting mill, the long hours and
unsanitary conditions had broken her health and
she was now getting six dollars and had given up
hope of advancement. She lived in a furnished
room with two other women, each paying one dol-
lar a week rent. She cared nothing for her fellow
lodgers, but stayed with them to keep down ex-
penses. She cooked her breakfast and supper in
this crowded room at an expense of $1.95 a week.
She said that her "hearty" meal was eaten in a
restaurant at noon; for this she paid fifteen cents.
Her entire expenditures for the week were: Lodg-
ing, $1.00; board, $1.95; lunches, $1.05; insurance,

26 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

$0.21 ; clothing, contributions to church, occasional
carfare and other expenses, $1 .79 ; total, $6.00. For
fifteen years she had given freely all her energies to
industry. Now she was thin and worn from hard
work and severe economizing, though she was only
thirty-five years of age. Miss Brown praised the
firm for which she worked for generosity in many
of its policies; but she felt profoundly discouraged
in not being able to make enough to enable her to
live more decently.31

Grace Brown's wages were six dollars a week.
What does this amount of money mean? To
many, it means three theater tickers, gasoline for
a week, a pair of shoes, or the cost of an evening at
bridge. To thousands of girls and women it means
that every penny must be carefully guarded. If
more food is needed than the regular meager
allowance provides, it must be bought with the
money that should go for clothes. If it is nec-
essary to buy a new waist to replace the old one
at which the forewoman has glanced reproachfully,
it may be necessary to go without lunches for
several days. Room rent must be paid regularly.
And behind it all lies the chance of losing one's
position in a slack season.32 Six dollars a week is
the wage not merely of a few women. Probably

ENEMIES OF THE NATION 27

two-fifths or more of the women wage earners in the
United States earn less than six dollars a week.33

In many cases, not only are the wages low; the
working day is long, often ten hours and longer.
To hundreds of girls, this means weakened vitality,
ill-health and disease. They are later unable prop-
erly to fulfil the duties of motherhood. Their chil-
dren may be handicapped from birth.

Hundreds of men and women, familiar with the
conditions, are attacking these evils with vigor.
The public conscience is being awakened. Massa-
chusetts, Wisconsin, Oregon and a few other states
have passed laws setting a minimum wage for
women workers; and many more laws are needed.

CHAPTER III

MORE ENEMIES

WE have considered several distressing manifesta-
tions of disease, crime and poverty. We must now
turn our attention to evils which, in the opinion
of many economists, are more fundamental.

Unemployment. — "Frank A. Mallin went to the
central police station Wednesday night and asked
to be locked up on a charge of vagrancy. He said
he had been conducting an unsuccessful search for
work for so long that he was sure he must be a
vagrant. In any event he was so hungry he must
be fed." 34 Incidents similar to this, reported by a
San Francisco newspaper, have not been uncom-
mon during the past few years.

"One family, in which the wife was soon to be-
come a mother, had not a scrap of food in the
house," reported the Detroit Board of Commerce,
in the winter of 1914-15. "Two children had gone
two days without food. The father was out of
work." 35 One man for the sake of temporary relief
advertised to sell to a physician "all right and title
to his body." 86

MORE ENEMIES 29

Two hundred and fifty men were found huddled
together in four dark rooms of an employment
agency, where they had to stand all night, because
if they lay down or sat up, some would have to be
turned out.37

Sometimes one hears it said that the unemployed
can get work if they want it. While it is true that
there are professional tramps and others who do
not want work, these do not make up the great
army of the unemployed. Such sweeping remarks
simply show how ignorant are the men who make
them. It is foolish to make such statements, when
often there are ten men for every available job.
Recently in Philadelphia 5,000 men answered an
advertisement for 300 workers at the Philadelphia
Ship Repair Company's yards. In Hartford, 700
men and women refused to leave the gate of a
tobacco warehouse which employed only twenty-
four of the entire number. In Atlantic City, 500
unemployed responded in a mad scramble to a
notice for fifty men to do construction work — it
was necessary to call the police.38

In unemployment, we have a most singular social
phenomenon — thousands of strong, able-bodied
men wanting work, but unable to get it, while
thousands of their women and children suffer for

30 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

the products of their labor. Idleness is demoral-
izing to an individual, and an idle nation inevitably
drifts towards degradation.39

According to the 1900 Census, there were over
735,000 wage earners who lost from seven to twelve
months' time during the preceding year.40 Three-
quarters of a million men is a large number.
They would fill a city of the size of Boston or St.
Louis without leaving any room for their wives and
children. Yet every one of them was out of work
more than half a year. Later figures for the en-
tire country are not available, but, as is well
known, conditions were much worse during the
winter of 1914-15; nearly a half million were un-
employed in New York City alone.41

Men have hardly awakened to the seriousness of
unemployment. It presents a baffling problem.
A few, however, are attacking it with determina-
tion. Federal and state employment agencies are
endeavoring to distribute the workers more evenly.
The co-operation of employers is being sought.
A beginning has been made, but only a beginning.

If during war, and if during unusually good
times, there is plenty of work for all, we cannot
assume that the problem has been solved. It will
recur until an adequate remedy has been carefully

MORE ENEMIES 31

worked out. The problem presents a challenge to
our ablest young men.

Rural Poverty. — A frail little woman with faded
eyes and broken body gave testimony in the spring
of 1915 at Dallas, Texas, before the United States
Commission on Industrial Relations. Her dress,
the best she had, was faded with many washings.
Her body quivered with nervous tension. The
crowd listened eagerly as she told her story in her
weak, thin voice.

"Do you work in the fields?" she was asked.

"Yes, ma'am."

"And do you do the housework?"

"There ain't no one else to do it."

"And the sewing?"

"Yes."

"Did you make your sun-bonnet, too?"

"Yes, ma'am. I make all the clothes for the
children and myself."

"Do you make your hats?"

" Yes'm, I make my hats. I only had two since
I been married."

"Only two hats?"

"Yes'm, two."

"And how long have you been married?"

"Twenty years."

32 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

"Do you do the milking?"

"Most always, when we can afford a cow."

"What time do you get up in the morning?"

"I usually gits up in time to have breakfast by
four o'clock in the summer time."

"And after breakfast?"

"In choppin' and pickin' time, I work in the
fields."

"Do you cook the dinner?"

"I generally leave the field at eleven o'clock to
get dinner ready."

"What do you do after dinner?"

"I most always goes back to the field."

"And then you get supper too?"

"Yes'm, and do up the dishes. Then I try to
do what sewing has to be done."

"Do you have many social gatherings in the
country?"

"Not very often. We usually have church once
a month."

"Are there any libraries in the communities in
which you have lived?"

"No'm."

She was the wife of Levi Stewart. Together
they had wandered over parts of Arkansas and
Texas. Life had been a dreary struggle. They

MORE ENEMIES 33

were seven hundred dollars in debt and had no
land of their own. In order to have "hands" for
picking cotton, they had tried to raise a large
family.42

The neglect and oppression of the farmer con-
stitutes a grave social evil. People are urged to go
"back to the farm," when economic conditions in
the country do not permit many to make even a
comfortable living. Though most farmers are
sure of sufficient food, many do not get much addi-
tional income. In a favored county in New York,
the average income of farmers is $423 per year.43

Farin land is being held at higher prices than
most men are able to pay for it. The farmer, in
many places, is being unjustly taxed. It is diffi-
cult for young men without capital to start life on
a farm of their own. An increasing proportion of
farmers are tenants.

Pests often prevent profits; poor roads make
marketing difficult; and when the farmer is ready
to sell his crop, he is often at the mercy of commis-
sion merchants. He must accept what they will
pay or nothing at all.

Many farmers are isolated, and their lives are
lonely. In many communities, their schools are
inefficient, and their churches are unattractive.

34 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

The farmer's wife often must work even harder
than the farmer.44 Thousands of farmers toil
from morning to night and are utterly unable to
make headway against the drudgery and sordid-
ness of their existence.

In recent years, efforts have been inaugurated
to remedy these evils. The Department of Agricul-
ture of the Federal Government has done much.
The Federal Rural Credits Law, passed in 1916,
will probably make it possible for many farmers
to borrow money at reasonable interest and make
better progress. State legislatures are considering
bills in the interest of the farmer. Where scientific
agriculture is being applied, there is dawning for
the farmer a better day.

Poverty in the City. — Walter A. Wyckoff, a pro-
fessor in Princeton University, lived for long
periods as a laborer in order to learn the facts of
industry at first hand. At a factory gate he heard
a man applying for a job. At home were an old
mother, a wife and two young children. The man
had got jobs off and on through the winter in a
sweat shop and had made just enough to keep them
all alive. "The boss had all but agreed to take
him," Mr. Wyckoff writes, "when, struck evidently
by the cadaverous look of the man, he told him

MORE ENEMIES 35

to bare his arm. Up went the sleeve of his coat
and of his ragged flannel shirt, exposing a naked
arm with the muscles nearly gone, and the blue-
white, transparent skin stretched over sinews and
the outlines of the bones. Pitiful beyond words
was his effort to give a semblance of strength to
the biceps which rose faintly to the upward move-
ment of the forearm." The boss sent him off with
an oath and a contemptuous laugh.45

The New York Journal reported the following
news item: "On a pile of rags in a room bare of
furniture and freezing cold, Mary Gallin, dead
from starvation, with an emaciated baby four
months old crying at her breast, was found this
morning at 513 Myrtle Avenue, Brooklyn, by
Policeman McConnor of the Flushing Avenue
Station. Huddled together for warmth in another
part of the room were the father, James Gallin,
and three children ranging from two to eight years
of age. The children gazed at the policeman
much as ravenous animals might have done. They
were famished, and there was not a vestige of food
in their comfortless home." 46

A laborer in New York asked a question that
was not answered at the time and has not yet
been answered. He was out of work and said he

36 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

would take a job in the subway at one dollar and
fifty cents per day, as he could find nothing else.
He had a wife and three children under twelve
years of age.

"I'll take the job/' he said, "but how in hell is
a man to support his family on a dollar and a half
a day, tell me that?"47

Working six full days a week for an entire year,
he would earn $468. According to the weight of
authority, the low limit of a living wage for cities
of the north, east and west for a family of five is
$650. This estimate is based on a purely physical
standard — "a sanitary dwelling and sufficient food
and clothing to keep the body in working order.
It is precisely the same standard that a man would
demand for his horses or slaves." What is a
man to do who can't possibly earn over $468 in a
year, when the very least he can live on decently
is $650 a year? 48

A certain writer, well known for his graceful
style, has said that the poor remain poor because
they show no great desire to be anything else.
Those who make such statements show their
ignorance of conditions. Thousands work from
morning till night, year after year, at the full
stretch of their powers, in an effort to attain some

MORE ENEMIES 37

degree of comfort. Yet the odds are against them.
They are miserable. Alfred Marshall, the English
economist, calls attention to the large amount of
genius lost to the nation, because it is born in poor
children, where it perishes for want of opportu-
nity.49

There are great groups of people who, through-
out their lives, have insufficient food, clothing and
shelter. They labor from childhood for the bare
existence they are able to sustain. Savings for a
rainy day, wholesome recreation, enjoyment of
the world's achievements in literature and art
are out of the question. Says Thomas Carlyle:
"It is not to die, or even to die of hunger, that
makes a man wretched; many men have died; all
men must die. . . . But it is to live miserable we
know not why; to work sore and yet gain noth-
ing ... it is to die slowly all our life long, im-
prisoned in a deaf, dead, Infinite Injustice" 50 —
this is the essence of poverty.

Suppose that a college youth were thrown
entirely on his own resources with a young wife
and three little children and he found he was un-
able to make enough to provide a sanitary dwelling
for his family and sufficient food and clothing to
keep their bodies in good working order. Suppose

38 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

he couldn't provide for his family the same stand-
ard of living one would require for slaves or for
horses, what would he do about it?

There are not just a few men in this predicament.
There are probably ten million persons in the
United States living in poverty. In addition,
there are probably five million dependent upon
some form of public relief.51

In New York's secondary schools have been
found 160,000 children who "show the stigmata
of prolonged undernourishment." Poverty kills
hundreds of children annually in the United States.
If a foreign nation were to invade the country and
kill a like number, millions would be spent in
forcing a retreat.52

No single campaign ever will eliminate poverty.
It is a result of ignorance, disease, low wages, un-
employment, and other causes. A vigorous per-
sistent warfare must be waged against all these
evils, and a larger number must enlist.

The Luxury and Extravagance of the Rich. —
There appeared in the daily newspapers of Feb-
ruary 20, 1916, the following dispatch from
Edensburg, Pennsylvania: "The Roman baths, the
sunken gardens, cascades, pergolas, wide, rolling
sweeps of green splotched with the rich coloring

MORE ENEMIES 39

of rare flowers and all the other luxurious, ex-
quisite and expensive things that will surround
'Immergrun,' the new million dollar summer home

of - , which has been started here, will rival

the glory of any other multi-millionaire's summer
home in America. The baths, encased in plate
glass, will cost $150,000, many times the cost of
the Roman baths of Lucullus, the most luxurious
Roman of them all." 53

Recent New York newspapers report a "Pan-
tomime Ball," at which one society woman wore
gems worth $500,000, also the loss of a $15,000
muff by a New York woman traveling in London,

and the sale of a set of dishes to for $120,000

to adorn his $7,000,000 Fifth Avenue Mansion.54

While thousands of girls are working long hours
in New York City at a wage insufficient to keep
their bodies in good working order, while thou-
sands of little children lack fresh air and a little
space hi which to play, "a tall, slim, fair man in a
white claw-hammer suit" dines at the Waldorf-
Astoria with a black cat wearing a diamond and
ruby collar, and a former Philadelphia girl returns
from Europe with a bulldog of ancient pedigree
wearing a pink necktie and a ruby ring in its nose.55
In a fashionable dog shop on Fifth Avenue in New

40 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

York, one may buy a dog's dressing table for $150,
trouserettes, dressing gowns, silk-lined blankets,
boots, stockings, manicure sets, woolen-lined
muzzles and a variety of drugs especially prepared
for dogs. One fashionable woman announced that
her pet poodle, Spot, had cost her $17,500 for
maintenance the previous year. 56 Flush times have
led to extravagance and debauchery. The luxury
of ancient Babylon was commonplace compared
with conditions among certain rich classes in the
large cities of the country.

The Inequitable Distribution of Wealth. — From
earliest times, by fighting, toiling, inventing, mi-
grating, organizing, man has been able to produce
a constantly increasing amount of wealth. Man's
first foes, the wild animals of the forest, were long
ago conquered. Man domesticated cattle and
made them a source of food supply. He learned
to till the soil and got food from it. He invented
machinery, and now he can produce in one hour
food value which before required twenty-three
hours of labor.57 Before the Great War there was
more wealth in the world than at any other time
in history. Even to-day there is probably enough
for all.58 And yet in the United States, the richest
nation in the world, misery is gnawing at the vitals

MORE ENEMIES 41

of society, hundreds of thousands lack the means to
keep their bodies in good working order. In the
minds of many, it is doubtful if the masses of human
beings are any happier than the cave men who
roamed wild in the forests thousands of years ago.

If there is enough for all, why must men suffer
for lack of food? Many believe it is because of an
unjust distribution of wealth. As the wealth of
the world has increased it has become concentrated
among a few. The careful estimates of W. I.
King, Instructor in Statistics at the University
of Wisconsin, indicate that over fifty per cent of
the wealth of the United States is owned by only
two per cent of the people.59

These owners of property have come by their
wealth in various ways. Many have earned their
wealth by honest, hard work. Some have ac-
quired large fortunes by dishonest dealings. Many
have inherited large sums of money. Others have
become wealthy because they were keen enough
to acquire large blocks of land in the center of
young growing cities. As the city developed
around their property, its value increased to many
times its cost price.

According to economic principles, much of the
world's wealth is created by society. A grocery

42 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

store in a desert would not earn money for its
owner. It must be set up in a community of
people who need food. This fact is so obvious that
its significance always is not recognized. It is
largely the community that makes a newspaper
profitable for its owners. As a community grows,
more persons buy newspapers, and as newspaper
circulation grows, advertising sells for more money.
So, also, as the population of a state increases, a
shoe factory hi the state becomes more valuable to
its owners. A downtown lot would be worth but
a few dollars without the business which society
builds up around it. Particularly have wealthy
men been dependent upon the labor of their em-
ployees. Without the workers to serve customers,
set type, make shoes, and erect buildings, men
with capital could not reap great profits.

There is a growing public sentiment against the
concentration into the hands of a few persons of
the wealth created in large measure by society.
Steps are being taken which will enable society
to get back for the use of all the people more of the
wealth which it has created. This is done to some
extent now by the income tax and the inheritance
tax. In 1917, the Federal Government made a
substantial increase in its income tax. In Call-

MORE ENEMIES 43

fornia inheritances of $500,000 and over are taxed
twelve to thirty per cent by the state.60 Steps
also are being taken which will prevent railroads
and other monopolies from making over a certain
rate of interest on their investments.

When a man in the meat-packing business
amasses a fortune of $1,000,000 and dies, is there
any good reason why his son should get all the
money, while many of the ranch men who raised
his cows and many of the workers who prepared
the meat have not enough to keep their bodies in
good working order?

Further tax reforms, higher wages in industry,
profit sharing, and other reforms should bring
about a more equitable distribution of the world's
wealth.

Will the Nation Survive? — The evils here dis-
cussed have developed largely during the last one
hundred and fifty years. Up to that time, man
lived a comparatively simple life. Then began
the age of machinery. Factories and mills were
built. Great industries developed. During the
last thirty or forty years, there have been more
mechanical inventions than in all the rest of his-
tory. These inventions have brought vast eco-
nomic changes, and have made more complex all

44 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

our social relations. To-day, when the general
manager of a corporation in one city decreases
his output, a machinist employed by another
corporation three thousand miles away may be
thrown out of work, his wife may be driven into
industry, his new born babe may die from mal-
nutrition, and his fourteen year old boy may go to
the reform school for juvenile delinquency. The
manufacturer thought (when he stopped to think)
that the invention of machinery would increase
wealth and improve living conditions. It is agreed
that it has increased wealth; it is doubtful if it has
improved living conditions.

The modern city has suddenly sprung up with
its overcrowded populations, its armies of the un-
employed, its crime, disease and poverty, and with
its fabulous wealth, its luxury, and its debauchery.
For hundreds and thousands of years man lived
a simple life; now, a complex civilization has
developed which man does not understand. Mod-
ern civilization has been likened to a huge intricate
machine which society has created almost over
night and which threatens to wreck its construc-
tor.61 Blind forces are at work which make
thoughtful people uneasy.

Greece, Rome, and other civilizations rose to

MORE ENEMIES 45

eminence, endured for three to five hundred years,
and then succumbed to decay from within and to
their enemies from without. Our nation is only a
hundred and fifty years old. Will it endure?
Disease, crime, poverty, in their many manifesta-
tions threaten our survival. They are working
insidiously. They are the nation's most dangerous
enemies.62

CHAPTER IV

SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST?

THE young man will reflect upon the conditions
that have been enumerated, if he is thoughtful
and courageous. He will ask, why must there be
so much suffering? What can be done to stop it?
Can not the government do something? The most
important question for him to ask is — "What am
/ going to do about it?"

"What shall be my attitude towards disease,
crime and poverty, — the three great enemies of
the nation? When I choose my career for life,
what shall be my relation to those in distress?
Shall I ignore the great social evils, or shall I enlist,
in one capacity or another, in the warfare against
them?" Of all questions before youth to-day, these
are among the most important.

In facing the problem of a life occupation, the
youth may assume one of four attitudes. First,
he may frankly say to himself: My purpose in life
shall be to make money; money will buy anything,
all the pleasures of the world; and I will get all of
it I can. Secondly, he may say: In these days of

46

SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST? 47

competition when it is difficult to get desirable
employment, my main purpose shall be to make
a decent living. If I can make enough to enable
me to live with a fair degree of comfort, this is all
I ask. In the third place he may say: What I
want is to get into something interesting. There
is so much drudgery in industry, so many who do
one irksome task from morning to night; if I can
get into a line of work I can enjoy, I shall be
satisfied. Finally, he may say: My purpose in
choosing a life work shall be to find an occupation
in which I may in some way and in some degree
reduce human misery. I shall have to make a
living, of course, in order to do efficient work; but
with proper training, I shall have no trouble in
doing that. My main purpose shall be to do some-
thing to aid in bringing to a successful conclusion
one or more of the great campaigns against dis-
ease, crime, and poverty. Of these four possible
attitudes which one should the youth adopt? Let
us examine them further.

1. Should an ambition to get rich be the controlling
motive in life?

A young man devoted his life to making
money, and he succeeded. He became the richest
man in Philadelphia, and when he died in 1831,

48 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

he had amassed a fortune of ten million dollars.
He married a woman who subsequently lost
her reason. He had no children; he was cold in
manner and was disliked by his neighbors. His
surroundings were mean and sordid; his great
wealth brought him little comfort. Having no
family when he died, he bequeathed his money to
various public and charitable institutes, to serv-
ants and relatives, but while he was alive, charity
seems to have had no place in his life.63

No thoughtful, mature person believes for a mo-
ment that this man was any happier than thou-
sands of men to-day who are able to make a com-
fortable living on an income of fifteen hundred
dollars a year. A man with an income of $600 a
year can multiply his comforts beyond all calcula-
tions by doubling his income. A man with a $1,200
per year income can increase his comfort by doubl-
ing the amount. As the income grows larger, how-
ever, a point is soon reached, after which the in-
crease of comfort grows less. A point is often
reached at which the victim is satiated with every-
thing that money can buy. To expect him to
enjoy increased income is like expecting a boy in
a candy store to enjoy more candy after he has
made himself sick by eating too much.64

SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST? 49

The money made by this Philadelphia man was
useful after he died, but the methods he used in
acquiring it were questionable; and it is doubtful
if the net effect of his life was beneficial to society.
Of course, there have been men of unquestioned
integrity who have become rich and who have
done wonderful good with their money. Often,
however, the qualities of character which have en-
abled them to acquire wealth have, at the same
time, so warped and shrivelled their natures as
to make it impossible for them to be generous.
Wealthy men have confessed that, while they have
had impulses to do good with their money, they
have found it impossible to bring themselves to
the point of actually parting with it. A boy may
aim to acquire wealth for the power to do good
that it will bring him, but in adopting such an aim,
he assumes a risk.

Furthermore, the good that money will do prob-
ably has been exaggerated. Leaving one's children
any large amount is a doubtful favor. F. H. Goff,
President of the Cleveland Trust Company, found
that many wealthy men in making their wills,
have difficulty in deciding what they will do with
their money.65 William H. Baldwin, Junior, who
was President of the Long Island Railroad, ob-

50 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

served that rich men seemed unable to spend
wisely large sums of money. He got this straight
from men who had tried it.66 What men want is
justice, not charity. Workers are beginning to
suspect the motives of employers who build club
houses for their employees and conduct so-called
welfare work, if, at the same time, they are un-
willing to pay a wage that will enable the worker
to support his family in comfort.

2. Should a desire to make an honest living be
one's chief purpose?

The young man who is now in college or high
school began his school Me ten or more years ago.
Out of perhaps thirty-five or forty boys who en-
tered, there are only a few left. One had to
leave school to help support his family; another
preferred work to study and got employment in an
office; another took up carpentering with his
father. In all probability only five or six of the
original thirty-five or forty are now in school
anywhere. Taking the country as a whole, of
those who enter the elementary school, only fifteen
per cent remain to graduate from high school,67 and
a still smaller proportion enter college.

College men and upperclassmen in high school
constitute a select group. They are far better edu-

SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST? 51

cated than the large majority. If the aim of the
untrained man is simply to make a living, should
not the college and high school youth with su-
perior educational advantages, aim to do more?
Many young men who have not been able to get
a high school education are making up their minds
to do more in the world than simply to make an
honest living.

3. Should one's chief aim be to find a life work one
will enjoy?

A young man of eighteen or twenty years desires
to become a civil engineer. As a boy of seven, he
laid many feet of track, built bridges and tunnels
in his back yard and never was so happy as when
playing with his engines and cars. He liked the
game. Now, as he faces the problem of a life work,
he desires to play the same game on a larger scale,
because he enjoys it. Another youth desires to go
into a retail business. As a boy he enjoyed buying
and selling samples of merchandise he collected.
It was a pleasure to handle even toy money. Now
he wishes to buy and sell on a larger scale, because
he enjoys the game.

In each case it is the game which fascinates —
the game of the child, dignified by larger equipment
and generally rendered more serious by the neces-

52 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

sity of getting out of the game a living wage — yet
it is the game, primarily, which absorbs the atten-
tion and which sometimes becomes the center of
a man's existence.

There is nothing dishonorable in playing this
larger game in the business world. It is entirely
legitimate to want to avoid drudgery and find in-
teresting work. If to play this larger game is one's
main purpose in life, however, has one passed very
far beyond the interests and ideals of childhood?

4. Should an ambition to aid in the fight against
social evils be one's chief purpose in life?

Behind the necessity of making a living, behind
enjoyment in work, in the lives of a considerable
number of men there is a larger purpose. Anthony
Ashley-Cooper, a student of fifteen years at Har-
row, England, when strolling down a hill near the
school, encountered a staggering, noisy set of men,
carrying a coffin which they bumped about and
finally dropped. They were burying a pauper.
The incident marked a deciding point in his life.
He then and there made up his mind to link his
life with the lives of the poor and to strike some
blow for better living conditions among his fellow
men. At twenty-one he took his degree at Oxford.
He travelled on the continent observing closely

SHALL THE YOUTH ENLIST? 53

the living conditions of the poor. Then he went
to London.

At that time London was sordid with poverty.
Said Thomas Arnold of Rugby to Cooper, after he
had seen those sections of the city where vice and
crime flourished and after he had observed the
awful conditions of the poor, "These classes form
the riddle of our civilization, and may yet destroy
us as did the Vandals of old."

Cooper gave his attention particularly to the
street boys of London. He was a member of the
House of Commons and, later, of the House of
Lords. There he worked for the poor. He suc-
ceeded in getting George Peabody, the banker, to
give large sums of money to improve living con-
ditions. Cooper is now known as Lord Shaftes-
bury. He was a true soldier in England's warfare
against poverty.68

Lord Shaftesbury and others, who will be men-
tioned later, have had the larger life-purpose.
They have thrown their energies, in one way or
another, into the warfare against human misery.

In business, in medicine, in law, in engineering
and in every vocation the youth will find oppor-
tunities to enlist in the warfare against the evils
that threaten the nation. In every vocation, he

54 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

will find vigorous and courageous men defending
the nation against these social evils. If he is awake
to his surroundings, he must inevitably face the
problems of disease, crime and poverty. If he be
a coward, after one look he will turn aside. He
will be careful not to come in contact with human
misery again, for misery is not pleasant. If he is
courageous, he will enlist in the fight.

CHAPTER V

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK

SUPPOSE, then, that a young man decides that he
will find an occupation in which he can in some
way and in some degree check or prevent the social
evils which threaten the nation. " That is settled,"
he says; "what should I do next?"

He should, of course, seek information regarding
various vocations which interest him, with the
purpose of determining in what occupation or oc-
cupations he can render the most efficient service.
He will likely find that social evils manifest them-
selves in almost every kind of life work, and that,
in almost every field, a man must choose between
two attitudes towards them. He must fight them
or become a factor, thoughtlessly or otherwise, in
their perpetuation.

The important thing, therefore, for the young
man to do next is to consider to what extent he is
likely to come into contact with crime, disease and
poverty in the vocations in which he is interested;
and to consider just what he will be able to do in

55

56 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

these vocations to check or prevent these evils.
These are the social considerations to guide the
youth in his choice of a vocation.

Social Considerations in Various Vocations. —
Suppose that a boy goes to a medical college and
becomes a physician. A call comes from a home
in the factory district. He drives in his automo-
bile through the congested streets, he passes
crowded tenements, little children playing on the
pavements, and great motor trucks. He stops and
enters a worn out dwelling. He passes through
dark halls and up a flight of stairs. Here in this
room is the sick woman he has come to see. Three
little children are in one corner of the room making
paper flowers for which they will receive a few
cents at the factory round the corner. He asks a
few questions. He quickly diagnoses the case.
The woman's illness is due to lack of good food
and fresh air. What will he prescribe? A good
beefsteak every day? A little exercise in the coun-
try? A nurse and a quiet, well ventilated room?
What irony! The income from making paper
flowers will not buy beefsteak — not if the rent is
paid.69 Will he turn aside from such baffling situa-
tions or will he seek to discover how physicians
may improve these conditions?

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 57

Suppose the youth enters the law. He becomes
the attorney for a landowner. Hard times have
come, and a tenant, out of work, is unable to pay
his rent. His client, the landowner, asks him to
evict the tenant. What will he do about that?
Later he may become a police justice. What will
he do with the poor drunks, the prostitutes, the
petty thieves who come before him? In later years,
he may become a judge of the Superior Court. A
man stands before him charged with murder; a
psychologist testifies that the prisoner is feeble-
minded. He learns, after the trial, that the man
has five children, all of them feeble-minded. They
are likely to become criminals. What will he do
about it? Will he ignore the underlying causes of
these various evils or will he seek to remedy them?

Suppose he becomes a teacher. He becomes the
principal of a high school in a small town. He
finds that the boys are wasting their time and their
energies in various forms of dissipation, and that
sexual immorality is prevalent. They have been
taught Latin, but little or nothing about the care
of their own bodies and about the function of the
sex instinct in human life. They have studied
history, but they know little about the urgent
problems of modern life. The school board is sus-

58 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

picious of new methods in education. Will he re-
fuse to do anything to improve the curriculum for
fear of losing his position, or will he take risks and
make some changes regardless of consequences?

Suppose the youth becomes an engineer. What
will be his aim in life as an engineer? Suppose he
is offered an attractive position in the construction
of a great water-power plant. A big manufactur-
ing corporation needs more power to run its ma-
chines; it proposes to take the water above a
natural falls near their factory and divert it into
turbines which will generate thousands of horse-
power. The falls is one of the beauty spots of the
state. There has been a loud protest from citizens
of the state against its use, but the corporation
has bought the rights and doesn't care about the
protests from citizens. At the same time, the
young man is offered another position in connec-
tion with a great irrigation project, opening for
cultivation a million acres of land which had pre-
viously been useless. Which will he accept?

Perhaps the youth will be a scientist. As a
chemist, will he work towards the invention of a
horrible explosive for use in war, or towards the
invention of a less expensive fuel that will lighten
the burdens of life for thousands of workers?

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 59

Suppose he becomes a farmer. Will he employ
ignorant immigrants for long hours and pay them
the lowest wages he can persuade them to accept?
Will he ignore his neighbors and go in his auto-
mobile to the nearby city for recreation? Or will
he seek to improve the conditions of labor on the
farm and to stimulate the social life of the com-
munity?

Suppose the youth goes into business. Suppose
that he acquires a business of his own, and that
he employs two salesgirls. What wages will he
pay them? He faces a question, not of theory, but
of hard cold facts. He is making little money.
How much can he pay them? Only what the law
requires? How many hours will he require them
to work?

Suppose that, in later life, he becomes the head
of a large corporation. Suppose that he gets a
salary of $10,000 a year as the company's presi-
dent, will he also keep for himself all he can make
in dividends? Or will he adopt a plan whereby
he can share the profits with his employees, whose
hard work has made his success possible? Will he
require his employees to work in dark, ill-ventilated
rooms, or will he provide light and fresh air and
make their surroundings attractive? Will he use

60 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

dangerous machinery and employ skillful attorneys
to protect him from damage suits when accidents
occur; or will he use modern protective devices
and, when unavoidable accidents happen, pay a
liberal compensation to the men who are injured?
Will he pay starvation wages or the wages he
would wish his own son to get?

The thoughtful youth must not only consider
the question of attitude towards poverty, crime
and disease, in the vocations which interest him;
he must also understand that the different occu-
pations have different social values.

Suppose that it seems wise for a boy to go to
work at the end, or even before the end, of his high
school course. Suppose he tries to find employ-
ment, and an employment agency sends him to
several business houses. At the end of a long
search for work, two positions are offered him. One
position is with a patent medicine firm. This com-
pany makes a soothing syrup for babies which has
been condemned by health officers on account of
a harmful drug it contains, though the law does
not forbid its manufacture. The offices of the
company are in a fine new down-town office build-
ing; the officers seem to be gentlemen; all the
clerks and stenographers are bright, nice looking

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 61

young men and women; a new up-to-date business
system has recently been installed; the salary
offered is $65 a month.

The other position is with a large dairy company.
It is trying to sell to the public pure rich milk at
the same price that others charge for an inferior
grade. The company's offices are on the outskirts
of the city, a half mile from any car line. The
officers and employees are plain, but enterprising
men and women. The office equipment is some-
what out of date; the company hopes to change
it, but thus far has not been able to. The salary
offered is $50 a month.

Both positions have been definitely offered the
youth, and there is little hope of other openings.
Which position should he take? In case he likes
business life and is successful, in which business
would he like to grow up?

Every business has a social utility. The man
who manufactures wholesome food, durable cloth-
ing, substantial furniture, useful books, depend-
able building material and honest tools for me-
chanic, surgeon, or scientist is a constructive factor
in the economic and social life of mankind. The
manufacturer of whiskey, injurious medicine or
adulterated food, and the promoter of fake mining

62 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

schemes and fraudulent real estate enterprises are
destructive forces in human life.

In any occupation, the youth may be, uncon-
sciously or deliberately, an opponent of social
progress, or he may be an effective fighter in the
warfare against crime, disease and poverty. In
every vocation, if he is alert, he will face perplexing
problems such as have just been referred to.
These problems will suggest to the youth oppor-
tunities for service. As he sees in the court room
the murderer whose parents are feeble-minded, as
he contemplates the ravages of sex diseases, as he
hears the cry of the children in factories and foul
tenements, as he studies the many manifestations
of crime, disease and poverty, there should come
to him a conviction that here in this or that par-
ticular field of work he will find his greatest op-
portunity.

Considerations of Special Fitness. — Before the
youth decides finally upon a particular vocation,
he must know that he possesses the essential qual-
ities for success in that vocation. To discover for
what occupation he is best fitted may take con-
siderable time. A man cannot judge from the
bumps on a boy's head that he is fitted for any
particular vocation. No vocational expert will at-

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 63

tempt, after asking a young man only a few ques-
tions, to advise him definitely regarding his life
work. There is no short cut to a wise decision.

To acquire the knowledge necessary to a judi-
cious choice, the youth should proceed along three
different lines of inquiry.

In the first place, he should discuss with a num-
ber of men actually engaged in the occupation he
desires to enter, its opportunities, and difficulties,
and the particular qualifications necessary. It
would be well to make a list of the qualities which
they agree are essential. Further aid may be had
from a few good books on vocations.*

Secondly, he should talk frankly with his par-
ents, his teachers and other friends who know him
well, in order to determine whether, in their opin-
ion, he possesses these essential qualities. If the
youth wishes to become an engineer and his friends
agree that he has but little mathematical ability,
he probably should drop engineering as a prospec-
tive vocation, unless he can strengthen himself at
this weak point. If his friends disagree regarding
his qualifications, he may have to act as his own
judge.

* See book list on page 170 for a list of selected books on the
choice of a vocation.

64 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Finally, it is well for the young man to obtain,
if possible, some actual experience in the occupa-
tion of his choice before making a definite decision.
If he wishes to enter business, let him work in
several different commercial positions. If he
wishes to become a physician, let him get some
kind of a job in a physician's office or in a hospital,
even though the pay is small. In case he wishes to
enter the law, it would be profitable for him to
get work in a lawyer's office for a few weeks, even
though he were to receive no financial compensa-
tion. If he wishes to become a civil engineer, he
should endeavor to get work as a member of a
surveying crew. In case he is considering agri-
culture, he should have little or no difficulty in
getting farm work during a summer vacation. If
the youth is considering several vocations, it would
be useful for him to get some experience in all of
them. Knowledge obtained through actual con-
tact with a vocation places one in a much better
position to make a wise choice, than does the
reading of many books about that vocation.

A testing out of this kind, however, need not be
considered final. Even though the advice of
friends and actual experience indicate that a boy
lacks a certain quality necessary to success in a

CHOOSING A LIFE WORK 65

particular vocation, perhaps that quality may be
won. Most qualities may be achieved by earnest,
persistent endeavor. If a youth is enthusiastic to
enter some particular vocation, if he is willing to
work and work hard to achieve his ambition, few
obstacles will be great enough to turn him aside.
The things which count most are these — a deep
interest in the vocation chosen, hard work, and a
determination to succeed.

Friends may help a boy by calling his attention
to various considerations in the choice of a voca-
tion; but when the time for decision comes, no
one can act for him; he must make his own choice.
The boy who is unable to decide definitely regard-
ing his life work after repeated efforts to reach
a decision, should not worry. It sometimes takes
years for important qualities to develop. In fact,
if a boy can arrange to go to college and take a
general course, he should deliberately refrain from
making a, final decision while in high school. If
he selects his college studies wisely, he will acquire
in college new ideas of life which will enable him
to make a wiser choice than would otherwise be
possible.

In general, it is desirable for a youth to inform
himself thoroughly and make at least a conditional

66 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

choice before the age of eighteen or twenty. He
will then be able to concentrate his energies in
preparing himself for a life work. To-day, thorough
training is essential for the highest success, and
it is well to begin training as early as possible.

The engineer, the physician, the lawyer, the
business man, the farmer, the worker in industry,
the journalist, the minister, the scientist — all
have opportunities to fight disease, crime and
poverty. If the youth has decided that, regardless
of consequences, he will aid in this warfare, he
will choose the vocation in which he can fight
most advantageously and for which he seems best
fitted. He will test each vocation which appeals
to him by this question — Precisely what good can
I accomplish in this occupation?

The question calls for clear thinking.

CHAPTER VI

PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK

IF the youth is to be an efficient fighter in the war-
fare against disease, crime and poverty, he must
train and keep himself in condition. He must
prepare himself thoroughly. If he is to stand the
strain of strenuous endeavor, he must, of course,
have a strong healthy body and if he is to render
intelligent service, he must naturally have a trained
mind. Both physical and mental preparation
are necessary.

Physical Preparation. — The youth should seek
first to develop physical vigor. To be in training,
to get the body into the best possible physical con-
dition, to keep fit, is the ambition of most young
men and boys. The human body is a marvelous
organism. It is delicately adjusted, yet it will
stand severe strain — a football game, a hard day's
work, nervous tension in business emergencies, the
stress of a strenuous political campaign, if it be
kept in good condition.

By intensive, specialized training a man may

67

68 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

become a record breaker in the quarter-mile run.
But the custom of training a few months each year
for some particular kind of athletics is short-
sighted compared with the custom of training for
manhood. A wiser way is to keep in the best
possible condition all the time. The thing to be
achieved is that excellent condition known as
fitness — fitness for athletics, for work, for any
task that a man may be called upon to perform.70

So to keep in condition necessitates careful atten-
tion to exercise, air, rest, food and the sex life.
Carelessness at any one of these points may be
fatal. Only when the youth trains himself along
these five lines will he achieve his maximum vigor.

Exercise must be participated in; sitting in the
grandstand will not help much in developing
health and vigor. Hiking, baseball, rowing,
canoeing and skating in the open air are excellent
exercises. Swimming is excellent when used
moderately. Football, basketball and track
athletics are good when one trains carefully for
them. For the sake of health, the time to stop
exercising is when slightly tired, not when ex-
hausted. After exercise, a quick shower bath
should be taken, first with hot water and soap,
then with cold water. A vigorous rubdown with

PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK 69

a coarse towel should follow. Exercise should be
taken daily.

Fresh air is one of the most beneficial gifts of
nature; it is given freely; it is the one cure-all,
more valuable than medicine and the skill of
physicians, yet many of us shut it out of our
houses. Every one should live as much out of doors
as possible, keep the air indoors fresh, and sleep
in the fresh air.

Sufficient rest is essential to health and vigor.
During the day's activities fatigue poisons are
manufactured. These are cast off during sleep
and the body recuperates. If sufficient sleep is not
provided, these poisons may accumulate and cause
sickness. Most youths between the ages of seven-
teen and twenty-one need from eight to nine and
one-half hours sleep each night.

Wholesome food is as necessary to the body as
is good coal to a fine machine. The youth should
avoid fads and eat plenty of wholesome food.
He should eat chiefly fresh vegetables, cereals,
bread and butter, eggs and fruit with a little meat
or fish once a day. He should drink milk instead
of coffee and other stimulants, and chew his food
to a pulp.

The control of the sex life is important to the

70 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

achievement of health and vigor. The sex glands
manufacture an important secretion which is ab-
sorbed by the blood. The blood takes this secre-
tion to the muscle and the brain and to all parts
of the body. It aids greatly in the development
of muscular strength, energy, endurance and
courage. Any interference with this work is a
risk.*

The sex instinct in human life is a source of
strength and of richer and fuller life if it be con-
trolled and directed into constructive channels.
If it controls the man and makes a beast of him,
if he indulges in vice, it will prove a destructive
force, and may cause disease and suffering for him-
self and for his wife and children. The sex in-
stinct should not be suppressed, however. It
should be controlled and directed into the service
of mankind. Devotion and loyalty to a noble
cause, effective service in the warfare against the
enemies of man is possible in high degree for the
man who lives clean and controls his sex life.f

* Emissions at night, which begin at fifteen, sixteen or
seventeen years of age, should not be confused with this
work of building up the body. Emissions at night are natural,
if they are not too frequent.

f See list of books, page 170 for further information upon
physical training.

$28,000 IS PAID
FOR A SALT CELLAR

Gem of Ashbumham Collector
Brings a Record Price

at Christie's.

$30.500 FOR A TOILET SE1

nni IMTCCC onruno

COUNTESS SPENDS
$50,000 TO HAVE

Former Brooklyn Girl Makes
Jjflarfv I aylthlv WhpttJflQjfiarn,

WOMEN SHOW PET DOGS
IN WALDORF-ASTORIA

Sawdust Ring Laid Out for Judg
ing in the East .Room.

ELEVEN FIRSTS FOR LAWSOI

s

.LEEDS AT
PANTOMIME BALL

Maxine Elliott a Statuesque

Bluebeard Wife — Craig

Wadsworth Appears in

Persian Attire.

$80.000 FOR A HELMET.

Specimen of Art Bought by Widcner
Of Philadelphia.

New York. February 26.— P. A. B
tfldener. ot Philadelphia. U was an
lounced to-day, has acquired th
amous M or os in I helmet, said to b
he finest specimen of its .kind, fo

JEWELED CAT DINES OUT

With Her Owner Looking Ever S
Well in a White Clawhammer.

The guests In the Summer dining room
jf the Waldorf-Astoria had their atten
ioa" attracted last night by the appear

nee of a talf. slim, fair man in a whit
tew hammer coat and Panama bat. wh
arNed a black cat wearing a- diamond

d ruby collar to the tble with him nnder
LIB tarm. He -was accompanied by tw

MORGAN PAYS $42;800
FORBOOKAT.HOESALE

Competitive Bidding to the Last

for "Le Morte D'Arthur."

Translated from the French*.

Adapted from a similar display in Harper's Weekly

"There are probably ten million persons in the United States
living in poverty "

DISTRESS OF POOl
REVEALED BY CO!

HUNGByMIINOESPEBffilWEOFSTARVATION,

TOO PROUD TO BEG

HtTSBAMD ASKS tO BE JAILED,
WIKE COBS TO HOSPITAL.

is A&o iu» with m

on Verge of Insanity «» Ke-
mdt or Poverty.

M*8. Ira Daniels Is tn tfto Kpanital
and her husband is in jail on- the verge
of insanity as a result of extreme pov-
erty.

yester-

Thousands Out of Employment

Appeal for Food and

Shelter.

MANY FAMILIES ASK

FAMILY OF FIVE DESTITUTE

Mother and Four Children Have No
Means of Support.

A mother and her four tittle children
he youngest isis weeks old and th
eldest four years, are destitute. Mrs
R. IS. Bondurant. of the Widows' pen
sion committee, discovered the womar

MOTHER AND

Authorities Find Home

Food Enough- for Family.

JOUBT, fit., Dec. ZS.—Mrs. William
Hafner and her new-born baby ware
ound dead in their homa on Bluff
treet here today, and (he authorities
gave starvation as

[Steven Farley and Wife Found

When Their Passalc Home

Is Broken Into.

HER DEAD BODY IN HIS ARMS

FOUND RAVING FROM HUNGER

Evicted Man Sent to Bell&vue, Aged |

Father Missing.

Dellftous from starvation. Benjamin

i'oley» 38 years old,' was found ycstor-

DEPICTS GIRLS' LIFE
ON $5 TO S7 A WEEK

Miss Packard TeRs Factory

Commission How Clerks Feel

tte Pinch of Poverty.

LUNCH MONEY. FOR SUITS

'in the United States, the richest nation in the world."

PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK 71

Mental Preparation. — Not only should the youth
so arrange his daily life as to provide for the de-
velopment of his body, he should also turn his
attention to his intellectual development. He
should, of course, take a full course of study in
high school, if this is possible, and make the most
of his opportunities there. In addition, he should
acquire more knowledge of human life than a high
school boy usually gets in his regular course of
study. True conceptions of life are not found in
many popular novels. They may be found in the
biographies of those who have lived close to hu-
manity, and in great poems, novels and drama.
The true facts of life may also be found in the
social sciences.

In the natural sciences — botany and zoology —
we find that certain organisms, when exposed to
light, will be repelled, and that other organisms
will be attracted. We find that under a certain
temperature, a certain degree of moisture, a cer-
tain amount of light, an organism will grow rapidly.
With the aid of chemicals and laboratory equip-
ment, we discover how microscopic organisms
behave in then* environment. Experimentation
and study of this kind is fascinating.

Many believe that it is still more important to

72 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

study human life in a scientific manner. For this
purpose, we have the social sciences — economics,
politics and sociology. In economics, the student
discovers the facts about wealth and income, and
their distribution. In politics, he studies the
science of government. In sociology, the social
scientist finds that, under a certain degree of
temperature, a certain degree of humidity, a cer-
tain kind of food, and a certain quality of air,
a thousand little babies weaken and die. He finds
that a twelve year old boy in the city slum responds
to his environment in a particular manner — he
becomes a juvenile delinquent. In this manner,
men have begun scientifically to study modern
society — that great intricate machine which
threatens to wreck itself.

Books on politics, economics and sociology are
not now popular among young men, but they
easily can be obtained at libraries and book stores.
If a young man is interested in any aspect of pov-
erty, crime or disease, he usually can find con-
siderable reading matter on the subject in books
and also in magazines, if he knows where to look.
Indexes of current magazine articles, such as are
found in most libraries, of course, are useful; book-
sellers and librarians usually are glad to be help-

PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK 73

ful.* The nation needs young men who will set
themselves to the intellectual task of solving at
least one modern social problem, even though it
may not be one of the most important, — men who
will stay with their task until they have thought
it through, determined upon a plan of activity,
and carried their plan into successful action.

A greater need, however, in the warfare against
man's enemies is leadership, and the youth who
would become a leader will do well to continue his
education in college. The subjects of the college
curriculum — social science, history, literature,
natural science, psychology and philosophy — will
train him for more intelligent service and they
will train him also for leadership. A business-
college course may be completed in a few months;
correspondence schools offer many brief courses;
short cuts to an education are widely advertised.
For careers of large usefulness, however, such
training is manifestly inadequate. Whether or
not a professional training is desired, if one is to
be a leader, one should get an education in a college
of Arts and Sciences. The leading schools of law
and of medicine now make the degree of Bachelor

* The titles of a few elementary books on economics and
sociology can be found on page 169.

74 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

of Arts a requirement for admission. Training
for leadership requires time. A baseball pitcher,
as has been well said, ripens early, but a Supreme
Court Justice is a more mature product.71

To get the most useful education from a college
career, the young man must choose his college
carefully. Some institutions have not yet recog-
nized the importance of the social sciences and
fail to offer a wide range of courses in this field.
Economics, sociology, history, psychology, social
psychology and social philosophy are important
for the man who would serve the nation in the
warfare against modern social evils. If the youth
will study the catalogs of various institutions, he
should be able to find one in which he can get the
kind of training he wants.

There are not only advantages in spending four
years in college; there are also dangers. There is
the danger of becoming theoretical and academic
and of losing contact with the world of reality.
A man, to become really useful, should avoid the
seclusion of college life. Sometimes it is best
for a boy to work a year or more before entering
college, in order that he may get into contact
with the real problems of modern life. Always it
is desirable that he take part during his college life

PREPARATION FOR LIFE WORK 75

in activities outside of the institution. Social
settlement work is helpful and is feasible for some
young men. Employment in the industries of
either city or country during vacations may be
stimulating to one's intellectual development.
And frequently, young men who are compelled
through lack of funds to work during the college
year make the best students and get the most
from their education.

There is also the danger of becoming shallow.
In a large number of colleges and universities,
many of the students live frivolous lives. They
attend college largely to have a good time, and
they create social standards which are pernicious.
The bad habits which many learn during their
first year in such institutions more than offset the
good derived from their books and professors.

There are too many men who go to college only
for entertainment, who fritter away their time
and their energies with shallow, useless activities,
the playthings and the tinsel of college life. There
are enough men who become students merely for
the pleasure to be derived from the exercise of their
mental faculties. Their aim in study is personal
gratification; their motives are wholly selfish.
We want men who can feel the zest of strenuous

76 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

mental effort, men who can say with Mrs. Brown-
ing, "If heads that think must ache, perforce, then
I choose headaches." But this is not sufficient.
The need to-day is for students who have the cour-
age to grapple with the intricate and baffling
problems of human society, and who are brave
enough to carry out in their own lives the con-
clusions of their study.

None but the serviceable man can rightfully be
called successful. A college education is largely
a gift from society. Students pay only a small
proportion of its cost. The man who uses his
college education for selfish ends, is not even play-
ing fair. The most successful college men are
those who go out from college to give their lives
to the struggle against the social evils which
threaten the nation.

CHAPTER VH

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN THE PROFESSIONS

IF a consideration of the perplexing problems
which have been suggested leaves the youth dis-
couraged, let him turn to the lives of the great men
who have achieved success hi the vocations in
which he is interested. Every youth should know
the men in such vocations who have been coura-
geous and effective in fighting disease, crime and
poverty. They need not be men whom he would
imitate in every particular. They should be men
who have loved humanity, who have stood for
justice and honesty and who have fought with
vigor and courage the social evils of modern
civilization. The achievements of a few such men
will be briefly related.*

A Physician. — Walter Reed was graduated from
the University of Virginia Medical School at the age
of eighteen, and spent six years in New York in vari-
ous hospitals. He obtained a position in the medi-

* See list of books, page 169, for biographies of other useful
men.

77

78 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

cal corps of the army and went to camp Apache,
in Arizona, seven hundred miles from a railroad.
There, he was called upon to attend settlers for
many miles around. At one time, when he him-
self was ill with fever, he insisted upon responding
to all urgent calls. Not strong enough to dress
himself without sitting down repeatedly, he would
start out when the temperature was far below
zero. He was devoted to his humblest patients.
After thirteen years of western life, he returned
to the East and continued his study, specializing
in pathology and bacteriology. When in 1900,
yellow fever appeared among the United States
soldiers stationed at Havana, Cuba, Dr. Reed
was appointed chairman of a committee to study
this plague. At that time no one knew in what
way it was transmitted. There were several
theories — one, that the fever tainted the air,
another, that it was conveyed by contact with a
patient or with a patient's clothing and another,
that the mosquito carried the germs.

Dr. Reed accepted the appointment and went
to Cuba to carry on the work. A series of ex-
periments were carefully arranged. Privates
John Kissinger and John Moran from the army
volunteered their services. Reed carefully ex-

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 79

plained that the experiments would involve the
risk of their lives. They refused any financial
reward. When preparations were completed they
entered a mosquito-infested house prepared for
them, were bitten and contracted the disease. No
less courageous were Dr. Cooke and Privates Folk
and Jernigan who exposed themselves to soiled
sheets and other articles which had been used by
yellow fever patients. As far as they knew, such
exposure constituted an even greater risk than
being bitten by mosquitoes. Associated with Dr.
Reed were Doctors James Carroll, Jesse Lazear and
A. Agramonte. With more than the courage and
devotion of soldiers, all risked their lives. Dr.
Lazear died; the other survived.

The experiments proved conclusively that yellow
fever is spread solely by the bite of the "stego-
myea" mosquito. With this knowledge, the
United States has been able virtually to stamp out
the plague.

When Dr. Reed realized that his experiments
were drawing to a successful close, he wrote to his
wife that he could shout for very joy that Heaven
had permitted him to make this discovery. Later
he wrote,

"The prayer that has been mine for twenty

80 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

years, that I might be permitted in some way or
at some time to do something to alleviate suffer-
ing, has been granted! " 72

Wilfred T. Grenfell, a young English physician,
in looking for a field of usefulness, decided to go
to Labrador. There he found the fisher-folk in
destitution and misery. They were in the clutches
of unscrupulous merchants and traders, education
was virtually unknown, they had practically no
religious guidance, and they were almost without
medical aid. He found children bare-footed and
almost naked in a zero temperature, and adults
who had to borrow each other's clothes in order
that they might come to him for treatment.

Within fifteen years, he brought about wonder-
ful changes. He clothed the naked, treated the
sick, built hospitals, sawmills and workshops, in-
stalled his own electricity, telegraphs and tel-
ephones, and established co-operative stores, pro-
viding much of the capital out of his private funds.
Not only is he a physician, business man and
educator. He is a minister, also, and preaches a
doctrine of practical Christianity.

Though Dr. Grenfell was knighted by King
Edward and entertained by President Roosevelt
and many other noted men, though Oxford honored

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 81

him with the only M. D. degree she had evei
bestowed up to that time, he is modest and re-
tiring. Devoted, earnest and self-sacrificing, he
makes light of dangers and sees in obstacles only
an incentive to greater effort. He loves his work.
"It is a bully good thing to be up against a prob-
lem," he says.

The story is told of a woman who came to him
after he had given a lecture on his work in
Labrador.

"Oh, Dr. Grenfell," she exclaimed, "how nobly
you are sacrificing yourself for those poor people."

Dr. Grenfell promptly replied, "Madame, you
do not understand. I am having the time of my
life in Labrador." Whether or not the story is
accurate, it expresses well the spirit of the man.73

Walter Reed and Wilfred Grenfell are only two
of many effective heroes in the field of medicine.
Lord Lister discovered the value of antiseptics.
He might have made himself wealthy by keeping
his discovery a secret. But he gave it to the world.
It has enabled physicians to save thousands of
lives. In the medical profession no man is reputa-
ble who patents any instrument, device or drug.
He is expected to give what he discovers, as soon
as its value is demonstrated, freely to the world.

82 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Other physicians are developing plans enabling
people to get the best medical service at the cost
of a specified sum to be paid in small installments.
These plans encourage persons to go to their doc-
tor for the most trivial ailments, thus enabling
the physician to strangle the disease before it
makes headway in the system. In many house-
holds, the father makes just enough to pay the
daily running expenses. When sickness comes,
the family falls behind financially and some-
times never catches up. Thus, sickness is
frequently an important cause of pauperism.
Great gains in the warfare against disease and
poverty may be made by extending these plans
into industrial communities and throughout
society.74

There are thousands of physicians in the United
States, trying to make a living by treating people
after they become sick. Society does not need
any more physicians of this kind now. There is a
need and an opportunity for men who have the
courage and ability to promote preventive med-
icine, to develop methods of teaching people how
to keep well. Typhoid fever, tuberculosis, in-
fantile paralysis and other diseases, as we have
seen, cause a vast amount of suffering. Much of

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 83

this misery may be prevented by statesmanlike
work in the field of medicine.

A Teacher. — As a teacher at the University of
Chicago, Charles R. Henderson was said to have
been the man most beloved by the undergraduates.
His classes for graduate students taxed the ca-
pacities of the largest rooms.

After thorough study in America and Germany,
Mr. Henderson rose rapidly in the teaching pro-
fession till he became full professor of sociology at
the University of Chicago. He wrote many well-
used volumes. He was President of the Chicago
Social Hygiene Society, The United Charities of
Chicago, and The National Prison Association;
he was chairman of the Mayor's Commission of
Unemployment, and held many similar offices.
Dr. Henderson was courageous and effective in his
work. Being a scientific investigator first, and a
social reformer afterwards, he was careful to base
reforms on facts. He was a man of invincible good-
will. Breaking into glorious passion, as he de-
nounced hypocrisy and greed, he would check
himself by a reflection that there was some good
in those whose weaknesses he was assailing.

Professor Henderson was told by his physician
in the fall of 1914, that he was in a precarious con-

84 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

dition physically and that he would have to drop
all his work for a time. If he had thought only
of himself, this is what he would have done. But
at that time, the unemployed were crowding into
Chicago and he felt that, as chairman of the
Commission on Unemployment, he must remain at
his post of duty. He worked tirelessly all winter,
and sent his report to the printer. Then came a
fatal apoplectic stroke. He died in the cause of
humanity. At a time when many heroes in Europe
were giving their lives in the work of destroying
their fellow-men, Charles R. Henderson gave his
life to the task of saving men.75

It has been said that education is the most
poorly paid and the most richly rewarded of pro-
fessions. This is not always so, because a con-
siderable number of educators receive large
salaries. On the other hand, the rewards are some-
times of doubtful value. Edward A. Ross was
dismissed from Leland Stanford University, and
Scott Nearing from the University of Pennsyl-
vania because, having the courage of their con-
victions, they taught beliefs that were considered
too radical. William Wirt, of the Gary, Indiana,
schools has rendered large service in the field of
education, and his work has met with widespread

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 85

approval. Horace Mann's life was rich in expe-
riences; he was a progressive and waged a success-
ful fight for educational reform in Massachusetts.

Because ignorance is one of the main causes of
disease, vice, crime and poverty, the educator
occupies a strategic position in the warfare against
these evils. Education is now becoming a science.
The United States is awakening to the wonderful
possibilities in advanced methods of education.
Men are wanted to develop vocational education;
to devise ways of keeping children in schools after
the law permits them to go to work, and to work
out courses of study which will enable young
people to understand better the vital problems of
human life. In education there are great opportu-
nities for men of initiative who have the courage
of their convictions and who are willing to take
risks in carrying out reforms.

A Physical Director. — James H. McCurdy went
to work in a machine shop after graduating from
the high school of Princeton, Maine. He took up
farming for a year and then blacksmithing. On
his twenty-first birthday, he accepted a position in
the Young Men's Christian Association as janitor,
assistant secretary and physical director. Mc-
Curdy saw that he needed more education; there-

86 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

fore he entered the Springfield Training School.
He graduated from medical school and later won
a Master's degree from Clark University. He is
now Professor of Physical Education at the Young
Men's Christian Association College in Spring-
field, Massachusetts, and editor of the " American
Physical Education Review." Though he was
awkward and clumsy, though he was advised not
to enter physical work, Dr. McCurdy, by persistent
effort, has made his way to the top of his profession.

There are many other men in physical education,
who have rendered large service to mankind.
J. Howard Crocker began his career by throwing
out of his gymnasium bodily a group of rough
members, thereby winning their deep respect. He
became the leading Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation physical director in Canada. He was
chosen by the Canadian Government as coach for
the first Canadian Olympic team. About 1910,
he went to China where he performed a remark-
able service in bringing to that nation a system of
modern physical education.76

The Director of Physical Education should be
a trained gymnast and a leader. It is well, also,
for him to be a coach. As a director of a gymna-
sium or playground, he may have a helpful in-

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 87

fluence on the lives of thousands of boys and young
men, by advising them regarding physical exercise,
rest, sleep, foods and sex. The well trained direc-
tor of physical education can do much to prevent
disease, thus making himself more useful in a
community than many practicing physicians,
who seek merely to cure people after they be-
come sick.

Physical education is developing rapidly in
high and elementary schools, and in municipal
institutions. The demand for well trained men
in gymnasium and playground work is greater
than the supply. Training in physical education
can now be had at Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion Training Schools and other colleges of physical
education. For the larger positions in this field,
a man should have a medical education.

A Lawyer. — Louis D. Brandeis was graduated
from the Harvard Law School and before the age of
thirty had a large practice in Boston. He soon de-
termined to give himself to public life, and there-
upon found large opportunities for useful service.
He appeared before a Congressional tariff commit-
tee and was ridiculed for the courageous stand he
took in behalf of the public. He worked out a plan
for the gas company in Boston which brought the

88 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

consumer lower rates and the company more
money.

Before the Supreme Court of the United States,
Brandeis argued that it was constitutional to
enact laws protecting women from overwork-
Until then, questions of this kind were argued be-
fore the courts as technical problems unrelated to
real life. In this case, Brandeis brought to the
Supreme Court for the first time the vital facts
regarding modern industry. He reminded the
Court that women are human beings, not mere
machines, and showed that they are entitled to
protection against exploitation.

In 1910, Mr. Brandeis acted as an arbitrator in
a bitter fight between the cloakmakers in New
York and their employers. It was due to him that
a settlement was reached. Mr. Brandeis is an
authority in the fields of conservation, transporta-
tion, public franchises and modern industrial
problems. To these questions, he has brought a
mind of extraordinary power and insight. In 1916,
President Wilson appointed Mr. Brandeis a mem-
ber of the Supreme Court of the United States.77

The profession of law is to-day overcrowded.
There are too many lawyers who will take any
kind of case for the sake of the money in it. There

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 89

is a need for men in the law, who, like Brandeis,
place service to one's fellow men above personal
gain. Through the aid of such men, laws are being
enacted which promise to do much in reducing
human misery. Several states have made laws
providing accident insurance and a minimum wage
for women. State health insurance and old-age
insurance prevent much poverty. They are in
force in Germany and England, though not yet
in the United States. Many promising reforms
await vigorous men in law who are willing to enter
the fight against selfish interests in behalf of the
oppressed. But to be effective a man must be
more than unselfish, he must be also a good lawyer.
He must have a keen mind and be a hard worker.

A Politician. — John M. Eshleman began life in
California as an orange-picker and a railroad
section-hand. He gave himself a high school edu-
cation by lantern-light, and put himself through
the law department of the state university, gradu-
ating as one of the two prize students of his class.
He became deputy labor commissioner for the
state, city attorney of Berkeley and then a member
of the legislature.

Eshleman was one of the leaders of the reform
minority in the legislature of 1907. He introduced

90 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

the first bill against race-track gambling and
thereby incurred the hostility of the railroad
machine, which was allied with the race-track
machine. Eshleman was notified that, unless he
withdrew his bill, no bill referred to his committee
could pass, not even the University appropriation
bills. He refused to compromise. The struggle
which ensued was so long and so bitter that
Eshleman's health broke under it. He never had
another well day in his life, but he lived to see the
race-track bill become a law and the railroad
machine destroyed.

A few years later he was elected a member of the
railroad commission, and was made its president
by the other members. With clearness and keen
intellect, a constructive grasp of law and politics,
a genius for hard work, unbending courage, and a
sense of justice towards railroads and public alike,
he made the commission a vital force. Its work
attracted nation-wide attention. He was induced
to run for lieutenant-governor, and was elected in
1914. Eshleman was in line for positions of large
service when, in February, 1916, he died.

This, in brief, is the career of a politician who
never played politics for private gain; of an office-
seeker who wanted nothing but an opportunity

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DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 91

to serve; of a railroad-machine destroyer who was
so scrupulously just to the railroads that they
never appealed from his decisions; of a student
who never lost touch with the people; of a re-
former who knew no cant; and of a big-souled man
whom a whole state loved.78

Many men used to enter politics for what
they could get out of it. Fortunately better men
now are entering public life. Brand Whitlock, re-
cently the United States Ambassador in Belgium,
was Mayor of Toledo for several terms. Writing
was the vocation of his choice. But his training
made him a valuable executive, and he was will-
ing to serve.79 Charles E. Merriam, Professor of
Political Science at the University of Chicago, has
had a training which peculiarly fits him for active
work in city government. He became a member
of the city council in Chicago because of the serv-
ice he could render. Men of this kind are needed
in public life.

An Engineer. — When President Roosevelt wanted
a man to build the Panama Canal, he chose George
W. Goethals. Goethals had graduated from West
Point, standing second in a class of fifty-four. He
had gained further experience under Colonel
Merrill at Cincinnati. "The most unfortunate

92 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

thing about you," Colonel Merrill told him when
he reported, "is that you are a lieutenant of
engineers. If you can subordinate that fact, you
may succeed." So Goethals, though a graduate,
started at the bottom as rodman. By loyalty to
his work, by his sturdy dependableness, by his
clearheadedness, and genius for hard work,
Goethals won a reputation at Washington that
led to his appointment at Panama.

There had been many administrative changes,
before Goethals took charge at the canal, and he
found considerable unrest among the men. In a
few months he had won their loyalty. Together
they attacked the greatest engineering task in
history. Goethals believed in industrial welfare.
He treated his men, not as machines, but as human
beings. "My chief interest at Panama is not in
engineering, but in the men," he said. "The canal
will build itself if we can handle the men." Special
privilege was eliminated. Shoulder straps and
brass buttons were kept out of sight, as was also
Goethals' own uniform. They were there, he told
the men, not for ceremony, but to dig the canal.
A jungle was to be penetrated, a mountain range
was to be cut through, gigantic locks were to be
built — these things took hold of the imagination

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 93

of the men. He aroused an irresistible spirit of
enthusiasm among them.

At one time, eight thousand were engaged at the
Culebra Cut. Every night as much soil slid into
the cut as could be taken out during the day. But
there was not a sign of discouragement — the men
enjoyed the fight. Colonel Goethals walked
through the cut one morning after an extensive
slide. The foreman had been on the job since mid-
night.

"Well, how is everything this morning, Mr.
Hagen?" asked Goethals.

"Fine, Colonel, fine. It buried that steam
shovel over there and tipped over two batteries of
drills and covered all the tracks through the cut
but one, but everything's fine. We're diggin'."

Goethals seemed never to lose faith and courage;
and he won the loyalty of his men by his sincerity of
purpose and his democratic ways. The same high
qualities of manhood exhibited in the charges of
armies in times of war were seen in the attacks of
Goethals' men upon Gold Hill at Panama. No
sooner would his soldiers be beaten back than they
would re-form, advance with batteries of drills and
giant steam shovels and storm the works. Goethals
has never sought publicity. He never makes a

94 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

speech if he can help it. He has always wanted
to be judged by what he does, rather than by
what he says.80

During the past ten or twenty years the en-
gineering schools of the country have been turning
out hundreds and thousands of civil, mechanical
and electrical engineers. Many have succeeded.
Others have been greatly disappointed. Only
rarely is a Goethals needed to dig a great canal.
There is probably a danger of overcrowding this
profession, if it is not overcrowded already. Men
who have the courage to insist upon adequate
sanitation, protection from dangerous machinery
and fair wages for the men under their control are
needed not only in the construction of great high-
ways and railroads, but in the reclamation of arid
lands and other new types of engineering directly
in line with social progress.

A Minister. — If Bishop Franklin S. Spaulding of
Utah had been an Indian, he might have been
called "Straight Tongue." He hated cant and
sham, especially in religion. Because he honestly
preached the truth as he understood it, the man-
agers of the corporations that owned certain towns
in Utah refused to sell him land for churches.
They told him that they proposed to control the

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 95

preaching in their towns. Therefore Bishop
Spaulding refused to build the churches. He was
a friend of the workers, and would not betray
them even for new churches.

"No one could long be in his presence," said one
who knew him, "without pronouncing his soul
pure white, his mind clear and far-seeing, and his
heart the clean, glad, responsive heart of a boy."

Recently Bishop Spaulding made an address in
the great Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New
York City on "Christianity and Democracy,"
declared by one Boston woman to be the most un-
compromising utterance she had ever heard from
a pulpit. "We worship," he said, "in a great
church like this, and it makes us forget the slums
just over the way; we wear our holy vestments,
and we forget the millions who have only rags to
wear ... we discuss hymns and prayers and we
forget that there are ten thousands of thousands
whose hearts are too heavy to sing and whose faith
is too weak to pray."

He did not hesitate to speak just as fearlessly
to a meeting of Socialists in Salt Lake City, though
they jeered him and challenged his honesty. He
died in September, 1914, and when his body lay
in St. Mark's Church in Salt Lake City, thousands

96 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

of working people crowded the church from morn-
ing until night.81

There are many other ministers who have been
effective fighters. H. Roswell Bates was pastor of
the Spring Street Church in the great factory dis-
trict of New York City. He established a Neigh-
borhood House next to the church, which was
crowded with men, women and children. A
Kindergarten, a Day Nursery, a Free Dispensary,
a troop of Boy Scouts, and clubs of many kinds
were organized.

Bates believed in taking his religion into every-
day life. He found one mother starving to death
with three little girls. A baby was in her arms,
dead from starvation. She had come from Italy
to America thinking it a land of promise. Bates
took them to the Neighborhood House. The
mother became a power for good in the community.
The three daughters graduated from high school,
and one went to college.

Many times during his twelve years of ministry,
he received calls to churches of great wealth and
large menbership. He refused them all, because he
believed that his work was among the neglected
people of Spring Street. Here he worked for twelve
years. And in those brief, strenuous years of serv-

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 97

ice, he wore himself out. He died a young
man.82

There is a great need in the ministry for vigorous
men who understand human life, and who have
the courage to apply the teachings of their religion
to the vital problems of life. The modern church
requires men who are forceful speakers, sym-
pathetic pastors, wise teachers, and able exec-
utives. Few positions demand more of a man.
Few positions offer greater opportunities to big,
capable men who wish to make their lives count
in the warfare against the enemies of justice and
righteousness.

A Missionary. — Arthur Jackson was an English
boy and decided at the age of sixteen to spend his
life in the foreign field. Shortly afterwards he de-
cided to be a medical missionary.

In preparatory school, Jackson was captain of
the Swimming Club and in college he was the best
oarsman of his day. He won a place on the soccer
eleven during his first year, and excelled as a rugby
player. He was active in debating and in the
Christian Union. Jackson was graduated from the
Cambridge Medical School at the head of his
class, and continued his medical education after
graduation until he left for Manchuria in China.

98 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

It had been decided to establish a medical school
in connection with a prominent hospital in Man-
churia. Dr. Jackson was appointed to be one of
the two men who should start this school. Into
this work he threw himself with enthusiasm. He
had been at work only a few weeks, when a plague
broke out. The authorities were alarmed. The
Viceroy made an older medical missionary his
special adviser and formed a Sanitary Board. It
was decided to guard the railroad station at Muk-
den in order to prevent infected persons from
passing through the city. A medical man was
needed to take charge of this work. Jackson
volunteered. The plague was treacherous, and
the position was extremely dangerous. He took
every precaution, was vaccinated, and worked
with a mask and hood that covered his face. He
was even more careful with his assistants. "Stand
back," he would say, "don't come too near, it's
risky and there is no use of all of us running risks."
He worked night and day, carrying on a vast
amount of organization work. _Only a man of
wonderful endurance could have done it.

On Monday, January 23, 1911, Dr. Jackson dis-
charged sixty Chinese who owed their lives to his
care, on Tuesday he became ill, and on Wednesday

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 99

he succumbed to the plague. China was saddened
yet thrilled by the lavish offering of so fine a life
in her behalf. A memorial service was arranged
by the Viceroy in honor of the martyr, who be-
lieved that he could best serve God by serving
China.83

While there is need for vigorous and capable
preachers, teachers, and physicians at home, there
is greater need in foreign fields. Especially in
China and India are men needed. While in the
United States there is a physician to every 691
persons,84 in China there is only one to about
150,000 persons — the equivalent in the United
States of one physician to a city the size of New
Haven, Connecticut.85 Missionary Boards want
men trained in the colleges, the theological and
the medical schools to go as teachers, ministers and
physicians to foreign lands where social conditions
are even worse than in the United States. Many
who have gone have done wonderful service; some
have sacrificed their lives. Many have been effect-
ive in bringing about a feeling of friendship be-
tween the United States and foreign nations,
thus aiding in the prevention of war and the estab-
lishing of a spirit of brotherhood among the na-
tions of the world.

100 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Three Men in the Field of Art. — Wilfred Wilson
Gibson is a young English poet, whose early work
was superficial and conventional. He saw that if
he were to make his art real, he must know life
intimately. Accordingly, he went into the mines
and into the slums; he talked with men starving
for lack of work and with wives and mothers whose
husbands and sons had been lost at sea. He lived
the vital throbbing life of humanity.

In his later verses, Gibson shows us the miners,
fishers, farm laborers, steel-workers, slum waifs
and factory girls. They are people who, from
morning till night, are concerned with the problem
of getting enough bread to keep body and soul
together. He knew their lives and could reveal
them with power and pathos because he had lived
among them. Persons who are familiar with the
cold facts and the statistics of economics and
sociology find in Gibson a poet who turns these
cold facts into human flesh, tears and flowing
blood.86

Ernest Poole was born in Chicago, attended
Princeton University and then took up work at the
University Settlement in New York. He was
particularly interested in the boys of the street —
messengers, newsboys and bootblacks. He mingled

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 101

with them, studied their life and helped them as he
could. Out of this experience grew several mag-
azine articles which had much to do in focusing
public attention on these neglected forms of child
labor. Mr. Poole studied labor conditions care-
fully. His book, "The Harbor" has done great
good in calling the attention of people all over the
country to the working and living conditions of
unskilled laborers in the great cities.87

Victor David Brenner was born in Russia and
came to America at the age of nineteen. For sev-
eral years he practiced his trade as a die-cutter.
He then studied in Paris for five years and has
come to be one of America's great sculptors. One
of his plaques shows "The Immigrant led by
America," and he is the man who designed the Lin-
coln penny. He is trying to bring the love of
beauty to the common people of America. Much
of his work is symbolic of social achievement.88

A Forester. — Overton W. Price pursued a special
course in forestry in this country and in Germany
and was for almost ten years Associate Forester in
the Forest Service of the United States. During his
term of office, attacks were made on the conserva-
tion movement. This meant personal attacks on
those who were guarding the nation's property.

102 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

The administration failed to support the foresters,
and Mr. Pinchot, Mr. Price and their associates
lost their positions. Mr. Price played his part
with rare courage and disregard of personal in-
terests. The result was costly. Unsparing of
himself in work, he broke down in health and died
in the early summer of 1914.89 Mr. Price is only
one of a number of men who have worked to con-
serve the nation's natural resources.

Several years ago President Van Hise of the
University of Wisconsin called attention to the
fact that our supply of coal, timber, oil, and other
natural resources was limited, and that, if it were
wasted, future generations would have to suffer.
In business and in public life men are needed who,
like Mr. Price, have the courage to fight against
greed, in order to save for our successors, the
wonderful gifts which nature has bestowed
upon us.

A Journalist. — Jacob A. Riis came to the United
States from Denmark as a youth in his teens. He
was not afraid of hard work and plunged into any-
thing he could get to do. He worked in a coal mine,
in a brick yard and on a truck farm. Later he got
into newspaper work in New York and became a
police reporter.

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 103

As a newspaper man, he discovered the city
slum and all the evils it stood for. For Riis to see
an evil meant for him to fight it. Many things
and many people seemed against him. Then
Theodore Roosevelt became Police Commissioner,
and Riis found in him a staunch helper. Together
they wiped out a dozen of the worse tenements in
the city.

Riis believed in the power of fact, and he be-
lieved in the people — the great mass of common
people. So he simply published photographs and
told people what he saw. This method was effective.
When he exposed the sources of New York's water
supply, the people demanded pure water; and they
got it at a cost of millions of dollars. He led Roose-
velt to abolish police station lodging-houses which
were little more than schools for crime. As a
journalist, he worked against child labor; he ad-
vocated more schools and playgrounds; he did ef-
fective work in the transforming of foul city blocks
into small parks.

According to one great philanthropist, it is better
to get a city to do things for itself than to give
money and do things for a city. Riis cost New
York millions of dollars. He was of greater service
to the city than its greatest philanthropists.

104 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Riis was a courageous fighter for all that was
noble and good. Often he fought alone, nearly
everyone else being wrong or indifferent; but
because he was right and persisted he won out.
He threw himself into the life of the people with
zest and vigor. He was a mighty soldier of
peace.90

The newspaper probably does as much to in-
fluence public opinion as do our public schools.
Newspapers have elected bad men to public office
and they have elected good men. Newspapers
have ridiculed and defeated political and social
reforms; they have also promoted and carried
them forward.

While often the opportunity of a reporter is
limited, there is a distinct need for men in jour-
nalism who understand the vital problems of
modern society. Men of broad sympathies and
journalistic ability may rise to positions in which
they can exert, as did Riis, a wonderful influence
for social betterment.

We admire the brave men who go to war and die
for their country. Should we admire less the men
who die in the warfare against disease, crime and
poverty? Many men in the professions risk their
lives; a few die. Seldom are they applauded; often

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 105

they fight alone. So to struggle, so to endure re-
quires courage of as high an order as does military
warfare. There are heroes of war, there are also
heroes of peace.

CHAPTER VIII

DEFENDERS OP THE NATION — IN BUSINESS LIFE

MUCH of the poverty, crime and disease of modern
life, seems to be due to modern industrialism.
Men have been so impatient to build up great
business enterprises, that they have given but
little attention to the damage done in the process of
development. Now, however, thoughtful business
men are beginning to understand the seriousness of
present conditions. They are taking steps to
reduce the evils of industry and make business
contribute to the welfare of society. To the timid,
these efforts seem radical; to others, they seem
inadequate. It will be stimulating to consider
briefly the careers of a few such business men.

A Student of Economics who Became a Business
Man. — William C. Proctor was a student at Prince-
ton University, and there he made a special study of
economics. His father was the head of a large soap
company. After he was graduated, he went into his
father's business, not at the top but at the bottom.
He put on overalls and accepted a laborer's salary,

106

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 107

determined to get the facts of life as a working-
man sees them. He came from college with live
ideas about economic life, but was willing to test
out those ideas as a common laborer.

Soon after he went to work the company was
bothered by labor troubles. Young Mr. Proctor
believed that the workers did not get a just share
of the profits of the business, so he worked out a
plan whereby the men were to get part of the
dividends. Now hundreds of employees have
acquired stock worth thousands of dollars.

Many examples might be given to show the
success of the plan. When Henry Brown went to
work for the company he was almost a drunkard.
The man who worked next to him had just come
into full ownership of $1,000 worth of stock. He
was enthusiastic about his newly acquired wealth
and could talk of nothing else. Henry caught the
spirit of the man. He straightened up and became
a stockholder himself.

Thomas Mason worked in the machine rooms,
and in an accident lost an arm. Some firms would
have discharged him or made him a night watch-
man at a greatly reduced salary, even though he
had a family. Through a pension fund, main-
tained by the company, he was able to get his

108 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

regular wage of twenty-one dollars a week. In
addition, by saving and entering the profit-sharing
plan, he became owner of $12,000 worth of seven
per cent stock.91

This company is trying to give its employees a
square deal. By putting into practice ideas re-
garding industry gained at college, Mr. Proctor
has become a force in the prevention of crime and
poverty.

A Business Man who Practiced the Golden Rule.
— At seventeen, Charles M. Cox was handling
barrels in Boston's produce market. He saved
exactly one-half of all he earned and accumulated a
thousand dollars. He found another man with a
thousand dollars, and together they went into
business. The partnership was not satisfactory to
young Cox, however, and he bought out his part-
ner. He established a one-man firm; he hired men
and fired men; he bought grain and he sold grain.
He was the owner and sole boss of the business.
Cox worked hard and made money, but he paid the
penalty for running a one-man business. His body
broke, and he went to bed a nervous wreck.

For weeks he lay in bed and watched his business
go to pieces; he lost customers and he lost credit.
He also did some thinking while he lay sick. He

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 109

was a companion of Edward Bellamy. Perhaps
Bellamy had influenced him; possibly Bellamy's
book, "Looking Backward," vitalized him. He
went back to his business with revolutionary busi-
ness ideals. He called his employees together in
his office, divided the business among them and
organized a co-operative company in which every
man held some stock. Under the new plan, no
laborer was to have less than a week's vacation on
pay each year, and no stenographer, bookkeeper,
or office boy was to have less than a month's vaca-
tion on pay.

The plan worked. The business became more
efficient, and the co-operative corporation made
money. Cox, himself, made money and used
much of it for the community. He built for the
children of Melrose Highlands, a suburb of Boston
where he lives, a swimming pool. He supplied the
ground for a playfield. He became the friend of
everyone in the town.

" Co-operation isn't charity," he says. " You've
got to feel the joy of being friends with your
employees. . . . The proud employer who
looks down on his men will catch it if he doesn't
watch out, even if he pays the best wages in the
world. . . . The happy man is the efficient man.

110 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

If you want efficiency, make your men happy.
Give them what you want yourself." 92

A Man who Gave his Business to his Employees. —
N. O. Nelson is a successful business man who
has worked out numerous profit-sharing plans
during the last thirty years. A few years ago, Mr.
Nelson got the idea of establishing a series of co-
operative grocery stores in New Orleans. In order
to study the needs of the people, he lived in a
tenement for several months. First, a small re-
tail milk station was established to furnish the
people with pure milk. Then the business grew;
the Nelson Co-operative Association was organ-
ized; and the business continued to grow until, in
1915, there were forty-seven stores selling honest
wholesome food at low prices. The Association
buys oranges, eggs, butter, potatoes and other
foods by the carload and sells them for cash prices.
Furthermore, customers are allowed to buy stock
in the company. Thus prices for the consumer are
kept at a minimum.

When these stores, with other property, had
reached a value of probably $500,000, Mr. Nelson
gave the entire business to the men and women
who worked for him, about three hundred in num-
ber. Now they own all the stock, they receive

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 111

dividends as well as wages, and are free from the
dread of poverty.

Mr. Nelson has developed other plans for the
benefit of his co-workers. Various provisions are
made for recreation, and when an employee mar-
ries, the Association contributes fifty dollars or
more towards the new home to be established.
Salaries continue during sickness and physicians'
services are paid from an accumulated fund.

Mr. Nelson says that if other large corporations
would adopt this plan "all the people would get
their dues, poverty would be impossible and our
prisons would be practically empty, or they would
empty themselves soon." 9S

A Corporation President who Promotes Welfare
Work. — Cyrus H. McCormick is a vigorous, big-
hearted man in the prime of lif e. He is president of
a large corporation manufacturing farm machinery,
and believes in recognizing the rights and interests
of the men who work with him. This corporation
subscribes fifty thousand dollars a year to a mu-
tual benefit association to which three-fourths of
its forty thousand employees now belong. It has
established a pension system; it provides for the
education of its grade school apprentices, and for
medical inspection and treatment of all.

112 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Particularly careful is the company to protect
the men from accident. Said Mr. McCormick in
an interview, so earnestly that there was little
room for doubting him, " We do not contract for
a machine without stipulating that it be made as
safe as possible before it leaves the factory . . .
we hold ourselves responsible not only for the
safety of our employees but for their general
health."

"Suppose that you do your utmost to make this
machine safe," he was asked, "and yet it goes on
injuring men. You realize that the supremacy of
your company in a certain field rests on your using
this machine" —

"That machine would go out of the works," he
burst in. There seemed to be no question about it.

This corporation has, in short, adopted a full
program of welfare work. Mr. McCormick thinks
that "welfare work" is an unfortunate name for
it, because it suggests charity. "Wherever you
find it mixed with charity you find it resulting in
failure," he says; "no American wants charity."
The welfare work of his company, he says, is co-
operation, it is partnership.94

Attitudes towards Profit Sharing and Welfare
Work, — Numerous profit-sharing plans have failed

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 113

and have been abandoned. Profit-sharing has met
with objections from both manager and worker.
It should be remembered, however, that a large
proportion of all business enterprises fail, a fact
that men sometimes do not remember. So we nec-
essarily should not be discouraged at occasional
failures in profit-sharing schemes. Failures some-
times stimulate men to try new methods.95

Welfare work also has met with disapproval
from both employers and employees. C. W. Post,
a former president of the National Association of.
Manufacturers, says, "I am not a warm advocate
of a lot of foolish, misapplied, maudlin sympathy
that has paraded under the name of welfare
work. . . . Workmen do not want to be sub-
jected to a lot of gifts and charities that would
place them under lasting servile obligations to
their employer. . . . The American workman
wants an honest, first-class price for his labor, and
then he wants to be let alone to follow his own
ideas as to his ways of life and the use of his
money."

Samuel Gompers, President of the American
Federation of Labor, calls attention to the fact
that, under the present industrial order, individuals
have no control over the conditions of their em-

114 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

ployment, and are unable to furnish for themselves
even such necessary things as pure water and fresh
air. Much welfare work, in his opinion, is little
more than common decency. Union men some-
times are suspicious of the motives of employers;
they vigorously oppose any attempt to substitute
welfare work for the activities of the union.

The positions of both Mr. Post and Mr. Gompers
seem to be well taken. There must be no paternal-
ism and no suggestion of charity in the relations
between employer and employee. On the other
hand, much can be done and much ought to be
done by the employer as a matter of mere justice.
Safety devices, proper ventilation, rest rooms,
sanitary toilets, dining-rooms, baths, good drink-
ing water and other similar provisions may be,
and, in many industries, ought to be established
without reference to "welfare work." If, in addi-
tion, employers will take a real interest in the wel-
fare of the men who work with them, they may do
much in helping the men themselves work out plans
for the educational and social improvement of all.96

To-day, it is ridiculous to assert that the manage-
ment of a huge corporation, which affects the
health and comfort of thousands of people, is a
mere private affair. Society now says that a man

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 115

cannot run his business as he pleases. The state
is demanding, through the acts of its legislatures,
that industry pay a fair living wage and provide
for the safety and health of its workers. The " cap-
tain of industry" must assume the responsibility
of an officer in command. In foreign lands the na-
tion protects its citizens with its flag; it proposes
to do as much to protect its citizens in industry.97

Regardless of the failures of the past in profit-
sharing and welfare work, if business men are
sincere in wanting to share the profits of industry
with the workers and to provide for their safety,
health and comfort, they ought to be able to work
out plans which will bring about a real co-operative
spirit. If they cannot, they should be willing to
step aside and turn over to the government the
ownership and operation of their industries. It is
true that government ownership might not be
successful; but private ownership has not been
successful either. If business men would unite
and direct their energies in an effort to bring about
better conditions, a much higher degree of justice
might be attained. Poverty in industry could be
largely eliminated. Men like Proctor, Cox, Nelson
and McCormick, are needed, who place economic
justice above private gain.98

CHAPTER IX

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN AGRICULTURE AND
INDUSTRY

THE production of wealth constitutes the found-
ation of society. TJie men on the farm who
produce the world's food, the men in mine and
forest who take from the earth its natural re-
sources, and the men in shop and factory who
make our clothes and other necessities of life —
these producers are essential to man's life as it is
now organized. Without the farmer and without
the industrial worker, our present civilization
would collapse. Fundamental to our welfare as
are these two groups of citizens, they have been
grossly mistreated. As we have seen, the condi-
tions under which many of them work and live
are degraded.

While much has been done to improve conditions
on the farm and in industry by those on the out-
side, the best work, in some respects, is being done
by the farmers and industrial workers themselves.
Leaders have arisen in the ranks who have fought

116

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 117

courageous and effective battles for better condi-
tions. The achievements of a few of these leaders
will be briefly related.

From Farmer to Governor. — W. D. Hoard was
raised as a butter and cheese maker in the State
of New York. At the age of twenty-one, he went
to Wisconsin. Disappointment met him, for there
was scarcely a well-bred dairy cow in the state.
But, while he could not work at his trade, there
was plenty of farm work, and he was not idle.

Soon after, in 1861, he enlisted for the Civil
War. Upon his return from the war, he started a
small county newspaper. He studied agricultural
conditions in the state and found that the wheat
crop was steadily dwindling. It had dropped to
an average of eight bushels to the acre, largely
because the farmers did not understand the prin-
ciple of crop rotation. They were using the same
land over and over for wheat and were then moving
on to other states to ruin more land. Through
his farm paper, Hoard began to preach dairying.
He issued a call that resulted in the organization
of the Wisconsin Dairyman's Association. By
hard work against heavy odds, he and his friends
developed a successful co-operative organization.
He went into various school districts and held

118 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

meetings to interest the people in dairying. In
three years, the annual production of cheese had
reached 3,000,000 pounds, and the local market
could not use it.

At that time the freight rate on cheese from Wis-
consin to New York City was $2.50 per hundred in
ordinary freight cars. Mr. Hoard went to Chicago
and called upon W. W. Chandler of the Star Union
Refrigerating and Transportation Company.

"I represent," said Mr. Hoard, "three million
pounds of cheese seeking a safe, quick and cheap
transportation to New York City. What are you
going to do about it?"

Mr. Chandler looked up slowly and asked," Who
are you?"

"I am W. D. Hoard, Secretary of the Wisconsin
Dairyman's Association."

"And what do you want?"

"I want you to send one of your cars to Water-
town and come yourself and explain it. Our people
are ignorant of your methods and need your help.
Then I want you to make a rate of one dollar per
one hundred pounds of cheese in iced cars from
Wisconsin to New York, Boston and Philadel-
phia."

The audacity of the Wisconsin farmer-journalist

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 119

caught the business man's attention. He prom-
ised to go and was as good as his word.

The production of cheese increased by leaps and
bounds. Wisconsin has become the largest cheese
and butter producing state in the Union. In
1888, Mr. Hoard, who was then probably the best
known man in the state, was elected governor.
Later he was elected a member of the State Board
of Regents and gave much time to the develop-
ment of the Wisconsin Agricultural College."

Other Useful Farmers. — Dallas H. Gray was a
young raisin grower in California. He had lost
$15,000 in four years, and determined that he would
try a new plan. He ordered a freight car, loaded
into it five tons of raisins — all the wealth he pos-
sessed in the world — and went with the car to Iowa.
The car was switched off the train at Boone. A
week later he had sold every raisin to the people
of the town.

Young Gray had been at the mercy of the com-
mission man; he had had to accept any price the
commission man offered. Now he was free.
Gray had the courage to stake all he possessed on
an experiment. It was successful and now others
are profiting by his experience.100 Farmers are
finding that, by co-operating, they can market

120 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

their products without the aid of commission
men.

Growers of wheat, raisin growers, almond and
walnut growers, and citrus fruit growers have used
the co-operative plan successfully. In co-operation
lies the hope of the farmer. More farmers of
initiative and organizing ability are needed in all
kinds of farming to extend the plan. The farmer,
himself, can do this more successfully than the
outsider.

The County Agent. — A few years ago, the County
Farm Bureau movement began to develop. In
1915, the farmers of 313 counties in various states
were organized for mutual aid with a salaried
"county agent" or "farm adviser" at the head of
each. In Kentucky, where the farmers of one
county had lost in a year hogs valued at $225,000
from hog cholera, the county agent arranged for
serum treatment. The next year the loss was re-
duced to $150,000, and the following year to a bare
$1,000.

One county agent started seventeen community
clubs in a district where the roads had been mainly
a succession of mudholes. Co-operation soon
resulted in a hundred miles of good roads. The
agent induced one man to develop a lawn and

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 12V

another to paint his house. Within a year every
farmer along the road had a lawn and a painted
house.

In 1915, 156 county agents submitted reports to
the Department of Agriculture at Washington,
showing that their work had added $10,000 to the
incomes of the farmers in each of their counties —
and the work of most of them had just begun.101

Social Usefulness in Farming. — There is im-
mense wealth in the soil. The value of crops in the
United States in 1915 was nearly $7,000,000,000. 102
The wretchedness of farm life is due largely to
an unjust distribution of the profits. The Ameri-
can farmer is entitled to far more than he gets.
Three reforms must be brought about. First,
an adequate system of rural credits must be
provided so that the farmer without large capital
can properly finance his work. The National
Rural Credits bill passed by Congress in 1916 may
meet this need. In the opinion of some men it is
not adequate. Secondly, co-operative methods
in marketing must be developed in order that the
farmer may be free from speculators and get a
fairer profit. Finally, the farmer must be better
educated; scientific agriculture and business man-
agement must be taught; the college must be

THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

taken to the farmer. If these reforms are devel-
oped, others will follow. Good roads, telephones,
modern farm machinery, automobiles, modern
schools and churches, social life and opportunities
for literature, music and art will be natural con-
sequences.

The success which a few farmers have achieved
is possible for many others. There have been
useful citizens in rural life besides ex-Governor
Hoard. Fourteen men have gone from the farm
to the Presidency of the United States. The
inventor of the modern plow, Jethro Wood, was a
farmer of New York State. McCormick built
his first reaper in a barnyard. There are now
probably twenty thousand graduates of agricul-
tural colleges on the farms of the country. In
the Department of Agriculture at Washington is
employed the greatest body of farm scientists
in the world.103 Farming is coming into its own.
There are wonderful opportunities for young men
of initiative and organizing ability who will prepare
themselves by getting a thorough course in an
agricultural college. Trained men are needed on
the farm, and they are needed by Federal and
State governments for an increasing number of
positions.

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 123

The farmer has the satisfaction which comes
from honest toil in the open country and from the
knowledge that he is a producer of wealth. To
the farmer of to-day may come also the pleasure of
co-operative effort, of working out with one's
neighbors enterprises for the welfare of the entire
community. Success in farming will go hand in
hand with social usefulness.

A Champion of Labor. — Joseph R. Buchanan as
a youth was an all-round handy man in a small
newspaper office in Louisiana. His preference was
for type-setting and he became a good compositor.
He moved to Denver, became a member of a Ty-
pographical Union, and soon showed unusual quali-
ties of leadership.

At that time (about 1880) laboring men were not
well organized. Although at present business men
are beginning to recognize the right of laboring men
to bargain collectively and to strike if the terms
of employment are not satisfactory, at that time
these rights generally were not recognized, there
were no boards of arbitration, and laboring men
had a harder time than they have now.

In May, 1885, the shopmen and trackmen of the
Denver and Rio Grande Railway decided that
they would no longer stand treatment which they

124 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

considered tyrannical, and that a strike was neces-
sary. They appealed to Buchanan for leadership.
He pleaded with the men not to strike at that
time, because he thought they could not win.
But when the strike was voted, he stood by them.

It was a bitter struggle. "The Rocky Moun-
tain News" conducted a campaign of abuse
against the strikers. Mr. Buchanan tried to pre-
vent violence, but notwithstanding all he could
do, dynamite was used. An engine was blown
from the track and the situation grew critical.
The "News" boldly announced that a committee
had been formed to lynch Buchanan "immediately
following the next explosion of dynamite in con-
nection with the strike."

Buchanan called at the office of a skilled detec-
tive. "I want to find out who is responsible for the
dynamite outrages on the Rio Grande road , . . "
said Buchanan, "We want you to find the dyna-
miters, whether they are our friends or our foes."
The fee, the detective said, would be $500. Bu-
chanan told him to go to work at once.

The detective was unable to find any evidence
indicating that the strikers had used dynamite.
He found most of the explosions were due to the
work of the railroad's hired guards. Apparently,

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 125

the railroad was endeavoring to develop public
sentiment against the strikers.

Threats against Buchanan's life continued and
arrangements were made with the mayor and
chief of the fire-department to ring the bell of the
central fire-station in a peculiar way to call the
lynchers together when the time came to string
him up. Buchanan considered it best to accept
protection and permitted twelve armed men to
guard him at night.

Three members of the Board of Trade called on
him and requested him to leave the city.

"Mr. T ," Buchanan said to the spokes-
man, "y°u have known me ever since I have been
in Colorado, about seven years. . . . Did you
ever know me to commit a dishonest or unmanly
act?"

Mr. T replied that he never had, but

that he and his friends wished to avoid further
violence. He admitted that, in his opinion,
Buchanan was not responsible for the dynamiting.
Buchanan advised them to go to the office of the
"News" for the cause of the agitation.

"As for me," said Mr. Buchanan, "I stay right
here. ... All I have in this world is my good
name among those who know me well, and the

126 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

respect and confidence of the laboring people of
this city, state and country. The working men of
Denver trust me and are standing by me; they,
as well as I, are taking chances in this fight. I am
not seeking martyrdom, and hanging is not the
way I want to die; but I would rather be hanged
forty times if that were possible, than to show the
white flag of fear to the men who are battling by
my side, or repay the trust and confidence re-
posed in me by an act of cowardice. ... I can-
not for a moment entertain your suggestion."

Thus Joseph R. Buchanan fought for the men
who had refused to take his advice. The men lost
the strike, but, to the cause of labor, the defeat was
only a temporary one. Buchanan has given his
entire life to his fellow men. He has helped the
unions win strikes and has served the cause in
many ways.104

A Leader of Miners. — John Mitchell was the son
of a coal miner in Illinois. His mother died when
he was less than three years old. When John was
six, his father was brought home from the mine
dead. At twelve, John was a breakerboy in the
mines. At sixteen he was president of an athletic
club of young miners. Down in the mines, he
studied arithmetic while waiting for cars. He

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 127

joined debating societies, athletic associations,
political reform clubs. While still a youth he be-
came President of a Knights of Labor "Local."
He has been the President or leading spirit of some
progressive movement ever since. He quickly
made friends and was rapidly promoted to posi-
tions of trust. Before he was thirty, Mitchell was
elected President of the United Mine Workers of
America.

Mr. Mitchell had been in office less than four
years when he was called upon to conduct the
greatest strike in the history of the labor move-
ment. Believing that they were justly entitled to
higher wages, 147,000 men and boys laid down
their tools for an indefinite period. The supply of
fuel for thousands of people was suddenly cut off.
The strike was a long and hard one. There was
much suffering. President Roosevelt decided to
intervene and called together for a conference the
railroad men who controlled the mines and the
officers of the Mine Workers. An impassioned
discussion followed.

"There was only one man in the room who
behaved like a gentleman," said Mr. Roosevelt,
"and that man was not I." Everyone lost his
temper except Mitchell. Though the most bit-

128 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

terly assailed, he was the quietest and most
dignified man in the room. Unmoved by the
attacks of his opponents, he calmly offered to
submit all questions in dispute to a commission to
be appointed by the President, and to abide by
the commission's decision, even if the miners were
not granted a single concession. The public was
eagerly awaiting developments. Mitchell won the
people to his side by his fairness. The public
forced arbitration. The miners won the strike.

Mr. Mitchell is a keen, cool-headed, sympathetic
advocate of the rights of the worker. He feels the
sufferings of the class to which he belongs. He is
scrupulously honest. The story is told of a man
who went to see Mitchell, determined to bribe
him regardless of what it might cost. He went to
Mr. Mitchell's hotel with the money in a valise.
They discussed the weather, and then the visitor
left. Standing in the presence of John Mitchell,
the man was unable to muster the courage to pro-
pose his dishonorable scheme.

When Mr. Mitchell became president of the
United Mine Workers, the organization had
43,000 members. He built up the membership to
300,000 with a contingent support of 200,000 more.
Though placed in a position which requires his

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 129

leadership in strikes, he is a peace-loving man. He
is unfailingly courteous to all. No miner grimy
with coal dust, no door boy, no mule feeder who
comes to him fails to receive a pleasant greeting.
When forced to fight, he fights in the open. As a
speaker, he resorts to none of the tricks of the
unscrupulous agitator. He is clear, logical and
convincing. Though he believes thoroughly in
short hours for his friends in the mines, he works
long hours himself — usually nine to twelve hours a
day. During the big strike, he generally worked
fifteen hours a day. Only a vigorous man could
stand the tremendous tasks he undertakes. Mr.
Mitchell has no political ambitions. He is not a
socialist. He is first and always a trade unionist
and gives his life, without reserve, to the cause of
his fellow workers.105

It is believed by many that most poverty and
much crime and disease are due to an unjust dis-
tribution of wealth and income. Laboring men
are demanding more and more vigorously a larger
share in the profits of industry and a larger share
in its control.

Economists agree that there is injustice and that
laboring men are entitled to a larger share in the
control and in the profits of industry. In order

130 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

to exercise larger control, laboring men must
educate themselves and develop wise and unsel-
fish leaders. Unions have been known to fall into
the hands of unscrupulous labor leaders who are
in the game for all the money they can get out of it.
There is a pressing need for educated men in
industry, — for more men like John Mitchell.
Leaders are needed who have a knowledge of
economics and sociology, and who can deal cour-
teously and convincingly with employers and with
legislatures. Men are needed who are able to
develop educational work among labor unions,
and who are able to extend unionism among un-
organized laborers. The youth who masters a
trade, who is honest, courageous and sympathetic
and who has qualities of leadership may do much
in safe-guarding the nation against decadence by
working among his fellow men in industry.

CHAPTER X

DEFENDERS OP THE NATION — IN ORGANIZED SOCIAL
WORK

CERTAIN men in business and professional life have
been effective in the fight against disease, crime
and poverty, first, by working independently in
their vocations, and, secondly, by working with
others in definitely organized movements. Charles
R. Henderson, for instance, did valuable work as a
teacher; and as president of The National Prison
Association, he also played an important part in
the prison reform movement. Louis D. Brandeis,
as we have seen, did much for the cause of labor
personally as a lawyer; he also rendered valuable
service as the Legal Adviser of the National Con-
sumers' League. Jacob Riis was primarily a
journalist, but was also actively identified with
social settlement work, playground work, and
other organized movements.

Other men have thrown all their energies into
some particular phase of the warfare against
social evils, as employed executive officers of

131

132 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

organized social movements and institutions. The
work of a few such men will be briefly described.

The Secretary of the National Child Labor Com-
mittee.— Owen R. Lovejoy came from a family of
good, plain people in Michigan. As a youth he
learned what hard work means, and now bears the
scar of an accident in a furniture factory. He ob-
tained part of his training by getting a college
education. During the big coal strike in 1902, he
investigated conditions in the coal fields and
learned much about child labor.

When in 1904, the National Child Labor Com-
mittee was organized, he was asked to investigate
conditions further. He was ready and glad to
accept. He wrote, "After I had seen those little
boys day after day carrying their lunch-pails to the
breakers every morning like grown men, bending
all day over dusty coal chutes, sometimes suffering
accidents in the chutes, and finally dragging them-
selves home at night in the dark, I couldn't think
of anything else. Sights like that cling to you. I
dreamed about those boys."

As an officer of the Committee, Mr. Lovejoy
investigated glass factories, fish canneries and
cotton mills, until he knew at first hand much
about child labor. Then he became the general

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 133

secretary of the Committee. He has developed an
effective organization with a corps of assistants
and executive officers in New York City.

Mr. Lovejoy is a hard worker and gives hun-
dreds of talks and lectures. "We would have all
America with us if we could only tell them all
about it," he says. So he reaches all the people
he can by his personal efforts on the lecture plat-
form. He speaks to an audience of school children
one day, to laboring men the next, club women the
next, and business men the next.

On the walls of Mr. Love joy's office are four
maps showing the development of child labor
legislation over the United States. There is a
map to correspond with each of four important
child labor laws. On these maps, the states that
have the law show white, those that have not, black.
Mr. Lovejoy's idea of a good map is a perfectly
white one.

Owen R. Lovejoy is a fighter. And he is the
kind of fighter who can take defeat with courage.
He may report at the end of a year of campaigning
fifteen victories and ten defeats — or it may have
been ten victories and fifteen defeats — then go
right to work to turn the defeats into victories
the next year. Largely through Mr. Lovejoy's

134 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

efforts, thousands of children have been rescued
from industrial slavery and have been given a
fairer chance in life.106

A Prison Warden. — A few years ago, Thomas M.
Osborne, a wealthy citizen of Auburn, New York,
was made chairman of the State Commission on
prison reform. Desiring to learn of conditions at
first hand, he spent a week as a prisoner in the
Auburn State Penitentiary, living in every respect
like the other prisoners. He wore the prisoner's
stripes; he lived in a small stone cell; he did his
daily work for a cent and a hah* a day; he disobeyed
the rules and was committed to a dark dungeon.
Osborne discovered for himself some of the evils
we have discussed here. He wrote a book describ-
ing his experiences and aroused the attention of
the public to the cruel methods of New York State
Prisons.

The Governor of the State appointed Mr. Os-
borne warden of Sing Sing prison. Not needing
the salary attached to the position, he paid it to
an assistant. Osborne's purpose was to change
the wretched conditions of the prison. He quickly
won the confidence and co-operation of the men.
A Mutual Welfare League was organized. In a
short time, hundreds of prisoners who had been

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DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 135

bitter and vengeful, were aiding him to keep the
men decent and orderly. He took away the guards
from the workshops, he permitted conversation
during work hours, and increased the output of
the workshops over fifty per cent. Under the old
system, when a prisoner escaped there was great
rejoicing; under Mr. Osborne's administration, the
prisoners sought to prevent escapes.

On one occasion, when a prisoner escaped, six of
his fellow prisoners came to Mr. Osborne.

"Can't we go out and hunt for that fellow?"
they asked.

The spokesman had been in prison for eight
years and had twelve more to serve. Osborne de-
cided to let him go. Fifteen went out and hunted
all night for the escaped convict. They were with
officers, but there were opportunities to escape.
Every man came back.

Exercise was provided, a band was organized,
educational classes were introduced, and the use
of drugs was virtually stopped with the aid of the
League. Best of all, men left the prison, deter-
mined to live better lives.107

Mr. Osborne had great difficulties in his work,
not because of the prisoners, but because of selfish
politicians who were profiting by the old methods.

136 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

In 1915, he was dismissed from office. When
tried, he was acquitted on every charge, and, in
July, 1916, was reinstated, much to the disappoint-
ment of the grafters. Later it seemed best for him
to resign and to take up the work of prison reform
in larger fields.

When a man begins a fight that necessarily in-
terferes with the financial interests of others, he
must be so clean and so honest that he can say to
the world: Make your charges and appoint your
investigation committees, I have nothing in my
life to conceal.

For years, we have been maintaining prisons
that have been turning out into the world men
less able to cope with the problems of society and
make an honest living than when they entered.
Men trained in the science of government are
needed to bring about changes in our prison laws.
Men trained in psychology are needed to study
crime scientifically and introduce new methods of
treating those who have fallen in the struggle for
existence.

The Founder of the Adirondack Cottage Sanita-
rium.— When Edward Livingston Trudeau was a
young man, an elder brother was stricken with
tuberculosis. Edward nursed him up to the hour of

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 137

his death six months later. He was graduated from
the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons
and practiced medicine in New York City. At the
age of twenty-five, he himself was pronounced
tuberculous and was ordered to leave New York.
He went to the mountains and was then not ex-
pected to live six months.

While living in the mountains, Trudeau and his
family were taking a short trip, and were caught in
a blizzard. The horses fell exhausted and all were
forced to remain in the snow for two days. Tru-
deau seemed none the worse for this ordeal and
began to consider the advisability of spending a
winter in the bracing air of the Adirondacks. His
medical advisers considered the proposal as a kind
of suicidal mania, all except one of them and his
wife. In those days the value of fresh air had not
been recognized. Trudeau carried out the experi-
ment and improved greatly in health. Soon he
was able to practice medicine among the mountain
people. Often he would travel forty miles a day;
and he would go out in all sorts of weather. His
sympathetic manner helped to make him success-
ful. Hah* of his bills were never rendered; his pur-
pose was to help those who needed him. Tears
came into the eyes of many a woman when she saw

138 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

him in later years; and men called him "the be-
loved physician." He lived the life of the people,
often hunting and fishing in the wilderness.

It is said that a local boxing champion once
coaxed the doctor to put on the gloves with him.

"I promise not to hurt ye," he said.

When the "champion" picked himself up at the
end of the bout, he said that "the doctor's the
quickest thing with mitts I ever run up agin!"

Four years after Dr. Trudeau left New York
City, he had a few tuberculosis patients who had
placed themselves in his care as a last hope of
prolonged life or cure. At about this time, Tru-
deau dreamed a dream. He saw the forest around
him melt away and the whole mountain side be-
come dotted with houses built inside out, as if the
inhabitants lived on the outside. He made the
dream come true. The Adirondack Cottage
Sanitarium was started and soon became famous
throughout the country. Trudeau's success in
treating tuberculosis by the open-air and rest
method attracted wide attention. Other sani-
tariums sprang up. To-day there are fully five
hundred in the United States and Canada. Ed-
ward Trudeau taught the world the value of fresh
air.

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 139

The Adirondack Cottage Sanitarium is a semi-
charitable institution that treats patients at a sum
that does not cover the cost of their board and
lodging. The deficit is made up by contributions
from public-spirited persons. Trudeau used to
raise this deficit by what he called his "begging
letters." Edward H. Harriman was a friend and
admirer of Trudeau and his work for humanity.
This railroad king would let great affairs hang
fire as he listened to the doctor tell of the develop-
ment of his work at the sanitarium. Trudeau
drew no salary, but earned a small income from
his private practice.

Probably many failed to understand the wonder-
ful spirit of the man. A doubter wrote: —

"What sort of man is Trudeau? Is he what
so many say he is, or just a clever doctor who
has made a fortune out of the Adirondacks?"

The great, generous spirit of Trudeau was
always puzzled to know why people failed to un-
derstand his work. He had his reward, however,
in the satisfaction that comes to a man, who,
though laboring against heavy odds, succeeds in
bringing happiness and health to others.108

A Secretary of the Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion.— John R. Mott attended Cornell University

140 THE YOUTH AND THENATION

about thirty years ago and distinguished himself as
a student. Soon after graduating he became the
head of the Student Department of the Young
Men's Christian Association of North America.
Now, he is General Secretary of the International
Committee, the highest position in the Young
Men's Christian Associations of the world. The
work of this institution is the making of well
balanced men — men strong in body, mind and
spirit. Many men are going out from the
Y. M. C. A. to assume positions of large useful-
ness in campaigns against disease, crime and
poverty.

Mr. Mott has rare executive capacity. Al-
though his responsibilities have grown immensely
year by year, he is always ahead of his work. His
capacity for steady work at high pressure is so
great as to wear out any associate who tries to
keep pace with him. Though he was ranked high
as a student of philosophy in college, he is pri-
marily a man of will and of action. He reads
the biographies of great generals, whose strategy
he tries to match in the field of organized
religion.

Mr. Mott's field of activity is the entire world.
He has travelled around the world at least five

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 141

times, and has made many other trips to South
America, South Africa and Asia. His recent book,
"The Present World Situation" calls upon the
church to prove itself equal to the present world
crisis.

Yale University conferred upon Mr. Mott the
degree M. A. in 1899, and in 1910, the University
of Edinburgh honored him with the degree of
LL. D. President Wilson offered him the post of
Ambassador to China, but Mr. Mott felt obliged
to refuse. In 1916, President Wilson appointed
him one of the three American members of the
Mexican Commission,109 and, in 1917, a member
of the War Commission to Russia.

Many other men might be mentioned who, as
employed officers in organized social movements,
are giving their lives in the warfare against disease,
crime and poverty. Robert A. Woods of the
South End House (Boston's well known Social
Settlement), Peter Roberts, Immigration Secre-
tary of the Young Men's Christian Association;
Edward T. Devine of the New York School of
Philanthropy, Paul U. Kellogg of The Survey, Gra-
ham Taylor of Chicago Commons, Raymond Rob-
bins of the Young Men's Christian Association,
Rabbi Stephen S. Wise and others in the fields of

142 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

Public Recreation, Housing, Organized Charity
and institutional work are rendering service of in-
estimable value. As soldiers on the firing line,
they should be numbered among the bravest of
the nation's defenders.

CHAPTER XI

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION — IN AVOCATIONS

MANY men will find that they are not fitted for
the more conspicuous forms of service that have
been discussed. Some will find that their occupa-
tions do not offer sufficient opportunity for public
service. Every man, however, regardless of his
vocation, can take up some form of service as an
avocation.

The work of three men who have given much of
their lives in such service will be related briefly.

A Railroad President who Defended Public In-
terests.— William H. Baldwin, Junior, was a whole-
some and happy boy. In preparatory school, he
was a leader. If anything was to be organized, from
a baseball team to a musical quartette, he was the
one most likely to be chosen for the task. At
Harvard, he was a member of his class crew for
two years, and participated in many college
activities. He was sincere and straightforward
and had contempt for shams and empty forms.

From his college education he acquired the ability

143

144 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

to get at the heart of a knotty subject. Irrelevant
details did not confuse him; he was quick to see
the main issue.

After graduation from college, Baldwin had
difficulty in choosing a vocation. He was earnestly
interested in social problems and what a college
man could do about them. "I am sure of one
thing," he said. "I want to work for humanity."
The ministry, medicine and law were in turn
considered. He was advised to take up the law if
he could put his whole soul into it; but this, he
thought he could not do. After months of indeci-
sion, his choice was quick and confident. He ac-
cepted a position with the Union Pacific Railroad,
and entered upon his work with enthusiasm. He
was promoted rapidly and at the age of thirty-three
was President of the Long Island Railroad. This
position he held until his death in 1905.

Baldwin went into the railroad business with
high ideals and adhered to them throughout his
career. He loved to succeed and make money,
yet he would coolly turn down chances which
would have netted him thousands of dollars, when
the methods involved were against his principles.
Said a lifelong friend, "His whole idea of the
railroad was to develop it in the interest of every-

WILLIAM H. BALDWIN, JR.

Harnessed though he was to a great corporation, Mr. Baldwin
championed the cause of the common people.

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 145

body along the route. Its prosperity was to be the
common prosperity." This was at a time when
other railroad men were exploiting the public by
dishonest methods. Baldwin wrote to a friend,
"I am not a sentimentalist . . . but every day
makes me more and more convinced I can carry
out my ideals."

As an employer, he was invariably fair. He
believed strongly in labor unions, and in the right
of laboring men to bargain collectively. He was
democratic and had genuine sympathy with his
fellow men throughout the railroad system. At
one time, it was necessary to reduce the running
expenses of his road. He studied the problem
thoroughly and sympathetically. In the end, he
cut the wages of the men ten per cent, and set a
minimum below which no man should be paid.
Then he cut his own salary fifteen per cent.

Though Baldwin was an exceedingly busy rail-
road man, he was seldom too busy to lend a helping
hand to one in need. From the window of an
elevated train, he saw upon the street the white
face of a child that had in it an appeal of suffering
he could not resist. He abruptly left the train and
found that the child needed hospital treatment.
Then he was not satisfied until the child was safely

146 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

lodged with proper care in a hospital. Baldwin
heard that a woman had been committed unjustly
to a New York State Prison. He found convincing
evidence of her innocence, and obtained her par-
don from Theodore Roosevelt, then Governor.
On an European trip, he found a distressed woman
with a sick child. Her stateroom accommoda-
tions were poor. His own spacious quarters be-
came at once uncomfortable to him, and he gave
them up to the mother and child.

Baldwin was alive to the big problems of human
life and undertook much public work. His chief
avocations were the education of the negro and
the fight against commercialized prostitution.

He became a fellow student of the negro problem
with Booker Washington and was an active mem-
ber of the Board of Trustees of Tuskegee Institute.
He literally lived with the problems of the institu-
tion day and night. In one of Baldwin's visits, last-
ing several days, he became so absorbed in the
work that Mrs. Booker Washington wrote her
husband (temporarily absent) that she could not
bear to see the intensity with which he gave him-
self to his investigations. He looked, she wrote, as
if he would "burn up." He became absorbed in
individual negro boys and girls who seemed to

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 147

need special attention. Baldwin at one time under-
took the financial reorganization of the Institute.
He gave the task the same kind of attention he
would have given the reorganization of a railroad.
Over important speeches, Baldwin would spend
hours with Booker Washington, sometimes not
breaking up the conferences until after midnight.
He became one of President Roosevelt's advisers
on problems of the South.

To the still more difficult problem of commer-
cialized prostitution, Mr. Baldwin gave the same
careful study. He was chairman of the Committee
of Fifteen in New York, which has become famous
for its pioneer work. After a hard day in his
office, he would give his attention to the affairs
of the committee, sometimes superintending the
details of the work till the small hours of the
morning. No amount of work seemed too arduous
for him. Fear of ridicule and adverse criticism
could not stop him.

As the most aggressive worker on the committee,
he necessarily aroused the antagonism of the
political machine in New York. This was when
he was President of the Long Island Railroad,
which was a part of the Pennsylvania system.
As a railroad president, it was important for him

148 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

not to incur the illwill of the politicians. He knew
his reform work might be criticised by his supe-
riors, and he made his decision. Selfish interests
must not interfere with the work of the Committee;
the women and children of New York must be
protected from the evils of prostitution, and he
must stay by his post of duty. He sent his resigna-
tion to President Cassett of the Pennsylvania
Company. To the credit of Mr. Cassett, it was
not accepted.

Mr. Baldwin's friends believed he was able to do
more for Society as a business man than he could
do by giving all his time to social reform. His
passion, however, was for service to mankind.
It is possible that, had he lived longer, he would
have dropped his business altogether. He asked,
"Harnessed into a great corporation as I am, can
one really fight for the big human causes? Can
one, through thick and thin, defend his own cor-
porate interests and at the same time defend
public interests?"

He answered the question by his life. He
succeeded in serving humanity as a business
man.110

Two Bankers who Served Their City and State. —
Charles W. Garfield lives in Grand Rapids, Michi-

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 149

gan. His vocation is banking. His avocation is
the planning of parks and playgrounds.

He was graduated from the Michigan Agricul-
tural College, later was an instructor there and then
became a member of the State Board of Agricul-
ture. Largely as a result of his enthusiastic work,
the city has taken all sorts of vacant lots and
blocks and turned them into parks. Some are
close to great factories. He also aided in making
playgrounds. Now there is a playground within
a half mile of every child in the city. They are
well equipped with pools, tennis courts and ball
fields. In this work, he has waged an indirect,
but effective fight against juvenile delinquency
and crime.

Mr. Garfield's greatest joy is in the fact that the
working men of the city share its beauty. It is a
city full of trim little houses. Through the policy
of the bank of which he is the head, hundreds of
laboring men have been able to own homes of
their own. Mr. Garfield's main aim in life is to
make Grand Rapids the finest city in the world
to live in.111

Thomas M. Mulry, of New York, who died
recently, was the president of the largest savings
bank in the world in point of deposits and assets.

150 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

As a member of the State Board of Charities, the
State Constitutional Convention, and other sim-
ilar bodies he rendered effective service to city
and state. Mr. Mulry was a man of immense
capacity for work; and for every hour he gave to his
business, he gave another hour to public service. He
could be found engaged in social work in the early
hours of the day long before most business men
begin work, and late at night when others were
at home.112

An Avocation of Students. — Not only may busi-
ness and professional men perform social service
as an avocation, students also may.

On a rough bench in a box car, near a rusty iron
stove, in which a roaring fire burned, sat five
Greek laborers. Before them stood a college
student.

"I am going to teach you a lesson about ' Getting
up in the Morning,' " he said. Most of the Greeks
seemed not to understand a word he said. He
began stretching himself, yawning, and pretending
to wash and put on his clothes. The men under-
stood. By watching his actions and imitating
his words, the Greeks soon memorized "awake,"
"open," "find," "see." Though tired, they were
eager to learn. Thus the lesson proceeded.

AN IMMIGRANT BOY
Will he become a wrecker or a builder of society?

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 151

Hundreds of college students are giving freely of
their time under the direction of the Student
Department of the Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation in an effort to Americanize the foreign-
born, by teaching them the English language.
When men come to America from Italy, Greece,
Bulgaria, Hungary and other countries, knowing
nothing of our language, our customs, and our
government, and having only vague ideas about
liberty and citizenship, is it any wonder that,
when oppression comes, we have such outbreaks
as the one at the steel mills in East Youngs-
town?

The movement is enlisting many of the strongest
men in the colleges, and they are not only rendering
valuable service to the nation, but they also are
broadening their own education, by studying at
first hand the problems of industry.

"My class of Italians," one of them reported,
"is composed of the finest fellows I've ever met;
bright, earnest, good-natured, appreciative to an
embarrassing extent. They have done me more
good than I have ever done them." 113

If more college students would get into close
touch with laborers, there would be fewer mis-
understandings between capital and labor, when

152 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

the students, in later years, assume positions of
responsibility in business and professional life.

Thoughtless Imitation vs. Intelligent Service. —
Mr. Baldwin, Mr. Garfield, Mr. Mulry and many
business men have rendered intelligent service.
There are other men, unfortunately, who are less
discriminating. They get caught in the enthusiasm
of some public enterprise and do not stop to ask
what good it will do.

An enterprising city has a population, let us say,
of 140,000. It wants to grow bigger. A "200,000
Club" is started. Everyone is asked to join, pay
a membership fee of a dollar or more, and wear a
button. The money is used to advertise the city,
to get people living in the country or in other cities
to move there.

The motives of those who join this club seem
most commendable: they show fine public spirit.
Perhaps they are not close students of social
problems, but certainly, they would say, it is
natural and good for cities to grow.

But let us see why a city with 140,000 should
want 200,000. Large cities offer greater opportu-
nities for people to enjoy music, drama and art,
and to hear and see the great men of the nation.
Large cities can develop great park and boulevard

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 153

systems. A larger population will bring more
business to the merchants, lawyers and doctors
of a city; but it will also bring more merchants,
lawyers and doctors. There are other considera-
tions. Does a substantial growth in population
generally reduce tuberculosis and venereal disease?
Does it make the city healthier to live in and de-
crease the death rate? Does it give better homes
to working men and reduce poverty? Does it
lessen juvenile delinquency and crime? In some
cities, growth seems to have resulted in a dis-
proportional increase of disease, crime and poverty.
If a city does not prepare properly for develop-
ment, the evils accompanying growth may counter-
balance the advantages to be gained.

In another growing city in an agricultural state,
the Chamber of Commerce decides to advertise
and encourage capitalists to build manufacturing
plants in the city. The newspapers take up the
movement. "We must get more industries here,"
business men say; "why should we send to New
York for our tin cans and hardware, our carpets
and our clothes, when we can make these commod-
ities right here at home?" Members of the legis-
lature are urged not to enact labor laws for several
years, for legislation of this kind tends to keep

154 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

capital away. Business men subscribe large sums
of money to advertise the industrial advantages
of the city. The city must develop manufacturing.

Are we sure that it is good for a city to develop
manufacturing? Are the great manufacturing
cities of the United States the cities where the
people are the happiest? Manufacturing gives
work to man, it is true, but what kind of work?
Work at short hours with pleasant surroundings,
or monotonous drudgery? Pittsburg is one of the
greatest industrial cities in the country, yet a
survey of Pittsburg made a few years ago dis-
closed sordidness, disease, ignorance and crime
to an appalling degree. On the other hand, the
manufacturing which has come into such cities as
Dayton, Ohio, Gary, Indiana, and Garden City,
Long Island, seems to have encouraged high
standards of living among the people.

It may be that certain states have high stand-
ards in respect to wages, hours of labor, sanitation
and accident compensation; that then* laws pro-
tect the worker from exploitation; and that they
have housing laws which will prevent the conges-
tion of population. It may be that, in these
states, industries are desirable. But many states
are not ready now for more industries. They need

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 155

first to solve the problems created by the indus-
tries now in operation.

The youth, when he becomes a business or pro-
fessional man, may carelessly enter many public
movements regardless of their social significance,
or he may be discriminating and engage only in
those movements which promise to contribute
to true social improvement. Most young men
have enthusiasm and energy that is not needed in
their business or profession. Many have a little
more money than they need. This extra energy
and extra money may be called a man's surplus.
Depending upon the use a man makes of his
surplus, he becomes either a constructive or de-
structive force in the social world.

The man who understands the social dangers
which the nation faces will want to do more than
have a part in some useful business. He will want
to do more than get in the band wagon and shout
for every popular movement which thoughtless
citizens may promote. He may be generous with
both his time and his money, but if his time and
money are to be effective, he must do more — he
must give both intelligently.

Problems All Must Face. — A young man is going
home from the theatre. He turns a corner and

156 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

another young fellow, who is shivering in his ragged
clothes accosts him.

"Please, will you give me the price of a bed?"
he begs.

What will he do? Will he give him a quarter
to get rid of him? Will he turn him down, be-
lieving he would buy whiskey with every cent he
can beg? Will he send him to the Salvation Army?
Will he forget all about him and those like him
the next day or will he attempt to discover why
boys, not yet of age, are reduced to such a hopeless
condition?

The youth has finished college and is now suc-
cessfully engaged in business. Between his home
and his office is a large shoe factory. Near the fac-
tory are the homes of the workers. Business be-
comes bad. A hundred workers are laid off . Many
mortgage their little homes. Many are reduced to
poverty. He sees these men occasionally as he rides
to his office. Perhaps half of them worked on the
pair of shoes he is now wearing. Perhaps the low
wages they were getting enabled him to buy this
particular pair of shoes for five dollars instead of six
or seven dollars. What is he going to do about
these men whose families face starvation? Will he
seek to aid them by sending a check for ten dollars

DEFENDERS OF THE NATION 157

to the Associated Charities? What can the Asso-
ciated Charities do?

While the Salvation Army does good, and while
the relief work conducted by well supervised
Associated Charities is necessary in every large
city, the good these organizations can do is only
temporary at the best. Thoughtful men realize
now that we must get at the causes of unemploy-
ment, vagrancy and poverty. William C. Proctor,
N. O. Nelson, Louis D. Brandeis and many others
seem to be proceeding wisely. Better conditions
can be brought about by such systematic efforts
as they are promoting.

Every intelligent man, who has the welfare of
the nation at heart, will want to enlist in the fight
against some one of man's social enemies, not as a
thoughtless contributor of money, not as an idle
member of a board of directors, but as an active
fighter.

CHAPTER XII

A CALL TO ACTION

A HUNDRED years ago, William Lloyd Garrison
moved to Baltimore and established a newspaper
of which he became the editor. In Baltimore there
were slave-pens in the principal streets. He had
long recognized the evils of slavery, and here he
saw scenes which stirred him to action. In his
paper he denounced the slave trade between
Baltimore and New Orleans as "domestic piracy"
and gave the names of several citizens engaged in
the traffic. One of these men had him arrested
for "gross and malicious libel"; he was found
guilty and was fined fifty dollars and costs. He
had no money with which to pay the fine, and, at
the age of twenty-four, was thrown into prison.
While in prison, Garrison prepared several lec-
tures on slavery. He was released after seven
weeks, when a friend in New York paid his fine.
He went to Boston, and started another paper,
called the "Liberator." The Vigilance Association
of South Carolina offered a reward of $1,500 for

158

A CALL TO ACTION 159

the arrest and prosecution of any white person
found circulating it. Georgia passed a law offering
$5,000 to any person securing the conviction of its
editor. A mob composed largely of merchants
got hold of Garrison, coiled a rope around his
body, nearly tore his clothes off and threatened to
lynch him. The Mayor of Boston had him taken
to jail to protect him from the mob.

Garrison and his "Liberator" became more
widely known, and famous men joined the move-
ment against slavery. Its development and ulti-
mate success at the end of the Civil War are now
well known. William Lloyd Garrison came to be
highly honored by the greatest men of the United
States and of England.114

To-day, there are evils as horrible, as firmly en-
Drenched and as dangerous to our civilization as
was slavery. These social evils of to-day — poverty,
crime and disease in their present aggravated
forms — are no more necessary than was slavery.
When the abolition of slavery was proposed, men
said slaves were necessary to the production of
cotton. Now, when changes less radical are
proposed, we hear similar opinions.

A half century ago when the people of Russia
were living under the oppression of a cruel, auto-

160 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

cratic government, a small group of young men
from wealthy families renounced lives of ease and
luxury, and gave themselves and their fortunes to
social reform. In five years, thousands of Russian
youths were following their example. In nearly
every wealthy family, there came a struggle
between those who would maintain the injustice
and oppression of the past and those who would
bring about a brighter day. Young men left
business positions and flocked to the university
towns. In every quarter of St. Petersburg, in
every town of Russia, small groups were formed
for self-education. They had but one aim — to be
useful to the people of Russia. They were watched
by government spies and had to correspond in
cipher. Their homes were raided; many were
imprisoned and sent to Siberia. In the prisons,
some went insane, others contracted tuberculosis
and died. The slightest suspicion of hostility
towards the government was sufficient cause to
take a young man from high school, to imprison
him for several months, and finally to exile him in
some remote province.115 Persecution seemed not
to deter them, however. Girls, after passing
teachers' examinations and learning to nurse,
went by the hundreds into the villages of the

A CALL TO ACTION 161

poor. Young men went out as physicians, as
physicians' assistants, teachers, agricultural labor-
ers, blacksmiths and woodcutters. They taught
the people to read, gave them medical aid, and
were ready for any service that would raise them
from darkness and misery.116 Their work helped
make possible the Revolution of March, 1917.

To-day in the United States there is probably
less misery than there was in Russia a half century
ago; but reform seems in some respects to be as
difficult. Then, reform measures were met by the
open opposition of government officials, by im-
prisonment and exile. Opposition awoke the
fighting spirit of youth. Men were ready for
heroic sacrifice. Now, social reform often is
greeted by criticism, ridicule or social ostracism —
a kind of opposition which seems sometimes to
be more effective than persecution.

The warring nations of Europe have been
purified by the fire of battle. The acid has burned
away the decayed tissue of European civilization.
Europe is down to brain and brawn. Destructive,
wasteful and terrible as war is, it has this in its
favor, — it arouses people from selfish and frivolous
living. Among those on the firing lines and those
at home, shallow living has given way to patient

162 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

suffering, sacrifice and noble endeavor. The idle
rich have learned the simple joy of honest work.
Class prejudice seems largely to have broken
down. Europe has been regenerated.117

In the United States, there is now a class
of people living in extravagance and indolence.
While frail women labor long hours, while babies
die from neglect, while little children starve, while
tuberculosis and its allies, and the disasters of
industry kill thousands — in the midst of all this
misery, there are bright, capable American men
and women who fritter away their time in wasteful
amusements and other extravagances. In June,
1915, 82,000 persons in Chicago paid $400,000 to
see an automobile race.118 The people of the
United States spend over $400,000,000 per year
for diamonds and pearls.119 Wholesome recreation
is stimulating and necessary, but when men give
themselves to frivolous amusements and ex-
travagance not only do they waste money, they
also waste time and energy which they owe to the
service of humanity.

Those of us who have clean, comfortable homes,
with wholesome food, fresh air, rest and recreation
in abundance, those of us who see nothing of crime,
those of us who are in robust health, know little of

Two WAYS OF GETTING A MEAL

A CALL TO ACTION 163

the sordidness, the suffering, the misery, caused
by poverty, crime and disease. We live in a little
world of petty concerns and pleasures. We are
blind to the throbbing life of humanity. Indif-
ference is prevalent. Many are not able to see
through outward signs of prosperity to the misery
at the heart of society. Others, in their ignorance,
think that people live sordid lives because they
do not want to live differently. Some are indif-
ferent because they lack the mental and spiritual
capacity to look seriously upon life. A few, at
some time in their lives, come into direct contact
with human misery, but they have not the courage
to face it. They turn aside. They ignore the
misery of the world and live selfish lives because
they are cowards.

Our failure to grapple effectively with disease,
crime and poverty is not due to lack of power. No
civilization in history has had so great resources
as has our nation. Never has there been so much
wealth and human energy in any country as there
is to-day in the United States.

The inventive genius, the organizing ability
and the energies of thousands of men in America
are given over to the upbuilding of huge commer-
cial enterprises which yield vast fortunes for their

164 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

promoters. We have wealth and power to spare.
During the first five months of the European war,
the British Admiralty received 16,000 offers of
new scientific devices for use in the war.120 The
inventive genius, the organizing ability and the
energies of thousands of the best trained men of the
world have been given over to the science of war-
fare. The wealth of nations has been placed at the
command of the warring nations. Their armies,
even in time of peace, consumed millions of dollars
annually. They developed marvelous efficiency.

If the same wealth, the same inventive genius,
the same organizing ability, and the same energies
were directed in a great campaign against poverty,
disease and crime, these enemies might be almost
annihilated within a period of twenty-five years.
Poverty, crime and disease are not necessary evils,
though complacent persons may say that they
are. Slavery used to be regarded as a necessary
evil; many diseases used to be considered necessary
evils which to-day are either preventable or curable.
The great social evils of the present day are no
more necessary than was slavery, no more nec-
essary than was yellow fever. Yet no nation has
yet directed its full strength in a campaign against
them.

A CALL TO ACTION 165

A crisis is upon us. If we do not make radical
changes in OUT social and economic life, social
decadence or a bloody revolution will result. As
the people of Russia revolted under the oppression
of an autocratic government, so may the oppressed,
the starving, the unemployed of modern industry
take arms against our present industrial system.121
Jack London wrote, a few years ago, that there
was then a revolutionary army millions strong.
He said, "The cry of this army is, 'No Quarter!'
we want all that you possess. . . . We are going
to take your governments, your palaces, and all
your purpled ease away from you." 122 Probably
most students of sociology do not believe that
there will be such a revolution. But upon this,
all well informed men agree — either we shall have
a revolution or we shall succumb as did Greece and
Rome, unless we attack vigorously the evils which
threaten us.

Here, in the United States of America, lies the
hope of mankind. One by one, the nations of the
world have risen to eminence and then have passed
away. Must this nation do likewise? To us are
being brought the vices and the virtues of all the
peoples of the world. Here in America, in a civ-
ilization more complex than it has ever been be-

166 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

fore, there are struggling the wreckers and the
builders of society. The hour of the nation's
supreme need has come.

In this hour, the nation calls for its youth.
Young men of action are wanted; men who will
take arms against the nation's enemies, men who
will take risks and make sacrifices. We must
confer of course, we must weigh issues, study is
essential. We must not study less, but we must
act more. Words are discounted; they are losing
their force because they have been used so glibly.
To prove that we are sincere, we must do less
talking and more acting. What if we do make
mistakes? What if we are defeated? What if we
do die, if it is for the cause of humanity? Is it not
better to die fighting for a noble cause than to live
soft, useless lives of cowardly and passive enjoy-
ment? "Work is life, idleness is death." True
happiness is in action, in struggling, in strenuous
endeavor.123

Men like William Lloyd Garrison are needed
to-day, men who have the courage to break with
old customs and cry out with a loud voice against
the injustice and oppression of our own time, and
the strength to endure discouragement. Men are
wanted like Jacob Riis, Charles R. Henderson

A CALL TO ACTION 167

and John H. Eshleman, for they not only had
visions of a better day, but they spent their lives
in making these visions come true.

Few men will be called upon to sacrifice life and
to die in action. A larger number are wanted for
a more difficult service — they are needed to live
for humanity, enduring criticism and ridicule, and
fighting on day after day without the stimulus
of dramatic conflict.

Disease, crime and poverty thrive because they
are treacherous enemies; they have been insid-
iously developing; they fight in the dark. Our
energetic and courageous youth, in business, high
school and college have hardly seen them, so
stealthily do they go about their work. But
when these enemies of mankind are pointed out
to our young men, their fighting strength will
assert itself. They will enlist; and then we may
look for a better day.

Formerly man looked upon these enemies from
afar. Now, he has grappled with them for a fight
to the finish. Started by a few vigorous, deter-
mined men, the fight is being waged with increasing
enthusiasm. The ranks are being constantly in-
creased by young men from the colleges and uni-
versities equally vigorous and determined. Some

168 THE YOUTH AND THE NATION

have given their lives in the fight, but others have
taken their places. Companies of recruits are in
training for field work. Brave generals with ar-
mies of seasoned men are already in action. Social
engineers are planning statewide and country-
wide campaigns. If a sufficient number of men
enlist, disease, crime and poverty as menacing
enemies of the nation, will be conquered in the
next generation.

SELECTED BOOKS

Enemies of the Nation

Jacob A. Riis: How the Other Half Lives.

Walter A. Wyckoff : The Workers (2 Volumes), The East and

The West.

John Spargo: The Bitter Cry of the Children.
Thomas Mott Osborne: Within Prison Walls.
Robert Hunter: Poverty.
Edward T. Devine: Misery and its Causes.
David Starr Jordan: War and Waste.

Elementary Text Books

C. A. Ellwood: Sociology and Modern Social Problems.

Ezra Thayer Towne: Social Problems.

Ely and Wicker: Elementary Principles of Economics.

Defenders of the Nation

Jacob A. Riis: The Making of an American.

Alexander Irvine: From the Bottom Up.

Brand Whitlock: Forty Years of It.

Joseph R. Buchanan: The Story of a Labor Agitator.

Booker T. Washington: Up from Slavery.

John Graham Brooks: An American Citizen, The life of

William H. Baldwin, Jr.

Howard A. Kelley: Walter Reed and Yellow Fever.
S. Ralph Harlow: The Life of H. Roswell Bates.
Stephen Chalmers: The Beloved Physician.
Peter Kropotkin : Memoirs of a Revolutionist.
Ida M. Tarbell: New Ideals in Business.

169

170 SELECTED BOOKS

Social Problems in Fiction, Drama and Verse

Ernest Pooler The Harbor.

Henry Sydnor Harrison: V. Vs. Eyes.

Winston Churchill: A Far Country.

The Inside of the Cup.
James Oppenheim: Doctor Rast.
William Allen White: A Certain Rich Man.
Ralph Connor: The Doctor.
John Galsworthy: Strife (Drama).
Wilfred Wilson Gibson: fires (Verse).
John Carter: Hard Labor and other Poems (Verse).

Choosing a Vocation

Weaver and Byler: Profitable Vocations for Boys.

F. W. Rollins: What can a Young Man do.

William De Witt Hyde (Editor): The Young Folks Library

of Vocations, ten volumes.
Salaried Positions for Men in Social Work, The Intercollegiate

Bureau of Occupations, 38 W. 32d St., New York.

Physical Training

H. H. Moore: Keeping in Condition.
Michael C. Murphy: Athletic Training.

Vocational Guidance — For Teachers and Parents

Meyer Bloomfield: Youth, School and Vocation.
Frank Parsons: Choosing a Vocation.
Jesse B. Davis: Vocational and Moral Guidance.
J. Adams Puffer: Vocational Guidance.

For further information upon particular subjects, see Notes,
pages 171 to 177.

NOTES

1. T. P. O'Connor, M. P.: Great Deeds of the Great War,
T. P. O'Connor's Journal Publishing Co., Ltd., London,
Vol. 1, p. 148.

2. The New York Times, Aug. 3, 1915.

3. The Outlook, New York, Vol. 113, No. 11, July 12, 1916,
pp. 567-8 and No. 15, Aug. 9, 1916, p. 822.

4. Irving Fisher: Memorial Relating to the Conservation
of Human Life, Senate Document No. 493, 62d Congress,
Second Session, p. 9.

5. New York Evening Post, May 16, 1916.

6. R. C. Richards, Chairman Central Safety Committee,
Chicago and Northwestern Railroad in a statement
before the First Co-operative Safety Congress; see Pro-
ceedings, Princeton University Press, 1912, p. 129.

Final Report of the Commission on Industrial Rela-
tions, Washington, D. C., 1915, p. 95.

7. Bulletin No. 8, June, 1915, War Department, Office of
the Surgeon General, p. 36.

8. Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce, Bul-
letin No. 121.

Ezra Thayer Towne: Social Problems. The Mao-
millan Co., New York, 1916, p. 298.

9. The Oregon Journal (Portland), July 9, 1916.

10. Fisher: National Vitality, Its Wastes and Conservation,
Senate Document No. 419, 61st Congress, Second Ses-
sion, p. 656.

See also Towne: Social Problems, p. 384.

11. Lewis M. Terman: Medical Inspection, Chap. 14, Report
of the Survey of the Public School System of School
District No. 1, Multnomah County, Oregon, 1913, p. 260.

171

172 NOTES

12. H. H. Goddard: The Kallikak Family, The Macmillan
Co., New York, 1912, pp. 18, 19.

13. Goddard: Feeble-mindedness, Its Causes and Conse-
quences, The Macmillan Co., New York, 1914, p. 582.

14. Henry M. Hyde: The third of a series of articles in The
Chicago Tribune, Sept. 27, 1915.

15. Ibid: Sept. 28, 1915.

16. Richard Harding Davis: The New Sing Sing, New York
Times, July 18, 1915.

Thomas Mott Osborne: Prison Efficiency, Efficiency
Society Journal, November, 1915.

Osborne: Prison Reform, A Circular of the National
Committee on Prisons and Prison Labor, Broadway and
116th St., New York, p. 10.

17. Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce, Bul-
letin 121.

18. National Child Labor Committee, New York, April,
1917, Pamphlet No. 276.

19. John A. Fitch: Arson and Citizenship, Survey, New
York, Jan. 22, 1916, Vol. 35, No. 17, p. 477.

See also The Outlook, Jan. 19, 1916, Vol. 112, pp. 121,
122; also Jan. 26, 1916, p. 168.

20. United States Census, 1910, Vol. 1, p. 178, Table 37 and
p. 1282, Table 22.

21. Lawrence Veiller: Housing Reform, Charities Publica-
tion Com., New York, 1911, p. 10.

22. Ibid., p. 5.

23. American Year Book, D. Appleton and Co., New York,
1914, p. 385.

24. The Chicago Society of Social Hygiene, Chicago, Cir-
cular No. 3.

25. Bulletin No. 8, June, 1915, War Department, Office of
the Surgeon-General, p. 36.

26. Towne: Social Problems, p. 263.

27. The Survey, Jan. 4, 1908, Vol. 19, No. 14, p. 1325.

NOTES 173

28. R. C. Richards, Chairman Central Safety Committee,
Chicago and Northwestern Railroad in a statement before
the First Co-operative Safety Congress; see Proceedings,
Princeton University Press, 1912, p. 129.

Final Report of the Commission on Industrial Rela-
tions, Washington, D. C., 1915, p. 95.

29. Mary Alden Hopkins: New England Mill Slaves, Good
Housekeeping Magazine, Sept., 1913, Vol. 57, No. 3,
pp. 323-330.

See also publications of the National Child Labor
Committee.

30. Edward T. Devine: The Normal Life, Survey Associates,
Inc., New York, 1915, p. 87.

31. Sue Ainslee Clark and Edith Wyatt: Making Both Ends
Meet, The Macmillan Co., New York, 1911, pp. 13-16.

32. Final Report of the Commission on Industrial Relations,
p. 26.

S3. Scott Nearing: Wages in the United States, The Mac-
millan Co., New York, 1911, pp. 213-214.
Towne: Social Problems, pp. 85-86.

34. Jack London: Revolution and other Essays, The Mac-
millan Co., New York, p. 19.

35. American Labor Legislation Review, New York, Nov.,
1915, Vol. 5, No. 3, p. 491.

36. London: Revolution, p. 18.

37. Victor Murdock: A National Bureau of Employment,
Speech in the House of Representatives, May 1, 1914,
p. 5.

38. American Labor Legislation Review, Nov., 1915, Vol. 5,
No. 3, p. 477.

39. E. H. Gary: Unemployment and Business, Harpers
Magazine, New York, June, 1915, Vol. 131, p. 72.

40. American Labor Legislation Review, June, 1915, Vol. 5,
No. 2, p. 173.

41. Towne: Social Problems, pp. 141-142.

174 NOTES

42. Charles W. Holman: The Tenant Farmer, The Survey,
April 17, 1915, Vol. 34, pp. 62-64.

43. Warren H. Wilson: Farm Co-operation for better Busi-
ness, Schools and Churches, The Survey, Apr. 8, 1916,
Vol. 36, No. 2, p. 51.

44. Graham R. Taylor: From Plowed Land to Pavements,
The Survey, April 1, 1916, Vol. 36, No. 1, p. 25.

45. Walter A. Wyckoff: The Workers— The West, Charles
Scribner's Sons, New York, pp. 249-250.

46. New York Journal, Jan. 2, 1902.

47. William H. Matthews: The Muckers, The Survey,
Oct. 2, 1915, Vol. 35, p. 5.

48. F. H. Streightoff: The Standard of Living Among the
Industrial People of America, Houghton, Mifflin Co.,
Boston, 1911, p. 162.

Robert Hunter: Poverty, Grosset and Dunlap, New
York, p. 7.

49. Alfred Marshall: Principles of Economics, Macmillan &
Co., Limited, London, 1910, pp. 212-213.

50. Thomas Carlyle: Past and Present, Charles Scribner's
Sons, New York, pp. 210-211.

51. Jacob H. Hollander: The Abolition of Poverty, Hough-
ton Mifflin Co., Boston, 1914, p. 9.

W. I. King: The Distribution of Wealth and Income in
the United States, The Macmillan Co., New York, 1915,
p. 168.

Streightoff: The Distribution of Incomes in the United
States, Longmans, Green & Co., New York, 1912, p. 139.

Hunter: Poverty, p. 60.

Towne: Social Problems, pp. 288-9.

Charles A. Ellwood: Sociology and Modern Social
Problems, American Book Co., New York, pp. 243-244.

Nearing: Income, p. 106.

52. The New Republic, New York, April 21, 1917, Vol. 10,
No. 129, p. 339.

NOTES 175

Bulletin No. 76, U. S. Public Health Service, Mar. 1916,
pp. 26-28.

53. Oregon Journal, Portland, Feb. 20, 1916.

54. Harper's Weekly, New York, Feb. 13, 1915, Vol. 60,
pp. 160-161.

55. Ibid.

56. Richard Barry: Dogs and Babies, Pearson's Magazine,
Dec., 1909, Vol. 22, No. 6, pp. 727-736.

See also Anne Watkins : Dogs in Society, Good House-
keeping Magazine, New York, March, 1913, Vol. 66,
No. 3, pp. 293-301.

57. United States Bureau of Labor Report, statistics on
wheat production quoted by London, Revolution, pp.
24-25.

58. Nearing: Income, p. 198.

59. King: The Distribution of Wealth and Income in the
United States, p. 81.

60. The World Almanac for 1916, Press Pub. Co., New York,
pp. 278-279.

61. Graham Wallas: The Great Society, Macmillan Co.,
New York, 1911, Chap. 1.

62. Walter Rauschenbusch: Christianity and the Social
Crisis, The Macmillan Co., New York, 1908, Chap. 5.

63. Gustavus Myers: History of Great American Fortunes,
Charles H. Kerr and Co., Chicago, 1911, Vol. 1,
pp. 83-94.

64. Bernard Shaw: Socialism for Millionaires, The Fabian
Society, 3 Clement's Inn, Strand, W. C., London, Tract
No. 107, pp. 3, 4.

65. Ida M. Tarbell: He Helps Capitalists Die Poor, The
American Magazine, New York, Sept., 1914, Vol. 78,
No. 3, p. 56.

66. John Graham Brooks: An American Citizen, The Life
of William H. Baldwin, Jr., Houghton, Mifflin Co., New
York, 1910, pp. 302-303.

176 NOTES

67. Paul Monroe: Cyclopedia of Education, The Macmillan
Co., New York, 1913, Vol. 5, p. 169.

68. Harvey Leigh Smith: The Christian Race, Association
Press, New York, 1908, pp. 136-143.

See also Hillis: Great Books as Life Teachers, Life of
Shaftesbury.

69. Peter Kropotkin: An Appeal to the Young, Max M.
Maisel, 422 Grand Street, New York.

70. Harry H. Moore: Keeping in Condition, The Macmillan
Co., 1915, Chaps. 1 and 2.

71. William T. Foster: Specializing in the Humanities, Reed
College Record (Portland, Oregon), No. 13, Jan., 1914.

72. Howard A. Kelly: Walter Reed and Yellow Fever, Mc-
Clure, Phillips and Co., New York, 1906.

Walter D. McCaw: Walter Reed, A Memoir, Annual
Report of the Smithsonian Institute for Year Ending
June 30, 1905, Government Printing Office, Washington,
D. C., pp. 549-556.

73. P. T. McGrath: Grenfell of Labrador, Review of Re-
views, Dec., 1908, Vol. 38, No. 6, pp. 679-686.

74. Richard C. Cabot: Better Doctoring for Less Money,
American Magazine, April, 1916, Vol. 81, No. 4, pp. 7-9.

75. The Survey, April 10, 1915, Vol. 34, No. 2, pp. 55-56.

The Outlook, June 9, 1915, Vol. 110, No. 6, pp. 299-300.

76. Physical Training, 124 East 28th Street, New York,
Dec., 1915, p. 49.

77. The Outlook, Feb. 9, 1916, Vol. 112, p. 295.

The New Republic, New York, Feb. 5, 1916, Vol. 6,
No. 66, pp. 4-6.

78. The Fresno (Cal.) Morning Republican, Feb. 29, 1916.

79. Brand Whitlock: Forty Years of it, D. Appleton & Co.,
New York, 1914.

80. Ray Stannard Baker: Goethals, The Man and How He
Works, The American Magazine, Oct., 1913, Vol. 76,
pp. 22-27.

NOTES 177

81. The Outlook, Nov. 25, 1914, Vol. 108, pp. 666-667.

The Survey, Oct. 17, 1914, Vol. 33, No. 3, p. 77.

82. S. Ralph Harlow: The Life of H. Roswell Bates, Asso-
ciation Press, New York.

83. Murray and Harris: Christian Standards in Life, Asso-
ciation Press, New York, 1915, pp. 10-19. See also
Alfred J. Costain: The Life of Dr. Arthur Jackson of
Manchuria.

84. Council on Medical Education in the United States,
Journal of the American Medical Association, Aug. 19,
1916, Vol. 67, No. 8, p. 623.

85. From a letter written by Kenneth Scott Latourette,
Ph. D., formerly with the Yale College in China.

86. Robert Shafer: Two of the Newest Poets, The Atlantic
Monthly, April, 1913, Vol. Ill, No. 4, p. 494.

John Haynes Holmes: Wilfred Wilson Gibson, The
Survey, Jan. 6, 1917, Vol. 37, No. 14, pp. 409-10.

87. The Bookman, April, 1915, Vol. 41, pp. 115-18.

88. The Survey, Vol. 35, No. 1, Oct. 2, 1915, pp. 15-22.

89. The Outlook, June 27, 1914, Vol. 107, p. 432.

90. Jacob A. Riis: The Making of an American, The Mac-
millan Co., New York, 1908.

91. Janet Ruth Rankin: Profit Sharing for Savings, The
World's Work, Garden City, N. Y., July, 1914, Vol. 28,
No. 3, pp. 316-320.

92. Donald Wilhelm: Charles M. Cox, The Outlook, Nov. 25,
1914, Vol. 108, pp. 695-698.

93. Harry H. Dunn: Fifty Shops given to Clerks, Technical
World Magazine, June, 1915, Vol. 23, No. 4, pp. 444-448.

94. Wilhelm: Cyrus H. McCormick of the Harvester Trust.
The Outlook, Sept. 23, 1914, Vol. 108, pp. 196-201.

95. Charles R. Henderson: Citizens in Industry, D. Apple-
ton and Co., New York, 1915, Chap. 3.

96. Ibid., Chap. 1.

97. Ibid., p. 53.

178 NOTES

98. Ida M. Tarbell: New Ideals in Business, The Macmillan
Co.

99. Walter A. Dyer: From Farm Hand to Governor, The
Craftsman, New York, May, 1914, Vol. 26, pp. 156-161.

100. F. Morton: Co-operation among Five Million, Technical
World Magazine, Aug., 1914, Vol. 21, No. 6, pp. 917-920.

101. Taylor: From Plowed Land to Pavement, The Survey,
April 1, 1916, Vol. 36, No. 1, pp. 22-26.

102. Monthly Crop Report, Secretary of Agriculture, Wash-
ington, D. C., Feb. 29, 1916, Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 16.

103. Herbert N. Casson: The New American Farmer, Farm
and Forest, Edited by Wm. Dewitt Hyde, Hall and
Locke Co., Boston, Vol. 3, of Vocations, pp. 64-76.

104. Joseph R. Buchanan: The Story of a Labor Agitator,
The Outlook, New York, 1903.

105. Walter E. Weyl: John Mitchell, The Outlook, March 24,
1906, Vol. 32, pp. 657-662.

Franklin Julian Warne: John Mitchell, The American
Monthly Review of Reviews, New York, Nov., 1902,
Vol. 26, No. 5, pp. 556-560.

Current Literature, New York, April, 1912, Vol. 52,
No. 4, pp. 401-404.

Elizabeth C. Morris: John Mitchell, the Leader and
the Man, The Independent, New York, Dec. 25, 1902,
Vol. 54, No. 2821, pp. 3073-78.

106. Information furnished by Helen C. Dwight, National
Child Labor Committee, 105 E. 22d St., New York.

107. Osborne: Prison Efficiency.

Osborne: Prison Reform.

108. Stephen Chalmers: The Beloved Physician, Edward
Livingston Trudeau, Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston and
New York, 1916.

109. Galen M. Fisher: John R. Mott, An Appreciation, Jap-
anese Young Men's Christian Association Union, Tokyo,
1907.

NOTES 179

110. Brooks: An American Citizen, The Life of William H.
Baldwin, Jr.

111. Tarbell: Charles W. Garfield, The American Magazine,
Mar., 1914, Vol. 77, No. 3, pp. 63-65.

112. Edward J. Butler: Thomas M. Mulry, a sketch in Bul-
letin No. 74 of the National Conference of Charities and
Correction, 315 Plymouth Court, Chicago, April, 1916.

113. Fred H. Rindge, Jr.: 3500 College Students Humanizing
Industry, The World's Work, Mar., 1914, Vol. 27, No. 5,
pp. 505-511.

114. Sarah K. Bolton: Lives of Poor Boys who Became Fa-
mous. Thomas Y. Crowell and Co., New York, pp. 156-
171.

115. Kropotkin: Memoirs of a Revolutionist, Hough ton,
Mifflin Co., New York, p. 310.

116. Ibid., pp. 301-302.

117. Frederick Palmer: When Peace Comes, Collier's, Feb.
19, 1916.

118. The Chicago Tribune, June 27, 1915.

119. John P. Pulleyn: American Extravagance, The World
Magazine, August 24, 1913.

120. New York Times, July 20, 1915.

121. Nearing: Income, p. 191.

122. London: Revolution, p. 8.

123. Charles Wagner: Youth, Dodd, Mead and Co., New
York, 1893, pp. 182-191.

Printed in the United States of America