We must, therefore, claim—
(1) The removal of the present limit of the father’s payment to “an amount not exceeding 5s. per week.” The alimony paid should vary according to the means and social status of the father: in all cases it should include some kind of training to enable the child to earn its own living; until that time the payments of the father should continue. And if the child should be physically or mentally deficient, so as to be unable to support itself, the father must continue his aid for all its life.
(2) A further charge should be made upon the man for the support of the mother for a period, certainly not less than one month before and three months after the birth of the child. He should be compelled to pay for a doctor and a nurse for the mother, and provide clothes for the child.
(3) The father’s responsibility should be truly recognised so that, if the mother is driven to commit any deed of violence against the child, he must be held accountable with her and punished, should he have known of her condition and refused to help her.
(4) In the case of the death of the mother, it should be possible to bring an order against the father or the supposed father. The mortality in childbed in these cases is much higher than among married women, and it is clearly unfair that the mother’s death should leave the child unprotected, without any power on the part of its guardians to compel the father to fulfil his parental responsibilities.
(5) The father against whom an order has been made must be prevented from leaving the country unless he has first paid a sum sufficient to discharge his obligations or has made suitable arrangements for payments during his absence.
Probably all these conditions could better be secured if paternity was proved before, instead of after, the birth of the child. Registration on the part of the woman at the time of conception would be the best way to prevent the crime of anonymous paternity.
There is much more that ought to be done. We shall still be far behind the reforms of Norway. But the carrying out of even these simple demands will lead us a great step forward in practical morality. Can we, I ask myself, who in this twentieth century no longer are quite ignorant as to the factors that act in the making of fit citizens, who know that of all causes tending towards degeneracy, bad ante-natal and early life conditions are the greatest, can we pursue our policy of carelessness as if this knowledge were not ours? A recognition of the claims of the child is being forced home by our need. No longer can we afford to be careless of the life of the future. A new sense of our responsibility—a responsibility not to punish sin, but to prevent sin—is surely dawning on our social conscience. And as soon as we understand, we must hasten to reform our inhuman bastardy laws.