Rural Problems of Today

by Ernest R. Groves

Any effort to determine the value and obligations of the family, whether urban or rural, requires first of all a clear statement of the significant places of irritation, where at present the family is meeting strain that makes readjustment necessary. These may be classified as difficulties created by changes in:

1. The equipment or environment of the family.

2. The function of the family.

3. The internal adjustment of the family.

Regarding the family equipment, the situation in the city is certainly radically different from what it was. The usual dwelling place of the home was, in former times, a house which the family occupied exclusively. It made home seclusion and family fellowship easy and gave the family group a sense of responsibility for its place of living. For an increasing number of people, this type of dwelling place no longer exists. In its place we have the flat, the hotel, and the apartment house. The new conditions do not provide the present family with a favorable equipment. The seclusion of the family is largely removed. The fellowship within the family circle is greatly decreased because of the limitations of the place of abode, and the increased attraction of places of amusement outside, made necessary because of the failure of the home to give satisfactory recreation. Of course, the sense of personal responsibility for the place of habitation is almost entirely destroyed. Such is the equipment furnished the family by modern city life. In the country, however, the family has had little significant change in its equipment.

The largest function of the family is its moral training. It is this service which has made the family the most important element in our past civilization. Were the family of the future to fail morally, it would be hard to imagine how its existence could be justified. Without doubt this moral function of the family has centered about the children. The conditions of modern urban life, however, tend to make the moral training of the child by the home increasingly difficult. The city dwelling does not offer the child a normal opportunity for his play. The school and other institutions have to take over service formerly rendered the child in the home. In a large number of cases the urban home regards the child as merely a burden and therefore in such homes every effort is made to have no children born. This prevents the home from attempting the moral service for which it exists. Instead, the futile attempt is made to build up an enduring, satisfying home life upon the basis of the mere personal pleasure of husband and wife. In the country we find the home, for the most part, attempting to carry out its former function as an educational and moral institution.

The most serious difficulty in our present family appears to be internal. Economic changes have brought women, to a very great degree, into industry as wage earners. Women are at present earning a livelihood in almost every form of occupation. New ethical and political ideas, in addition to this great economic change in woman's life, have influenced her status. She no longer has to marry in order to obtain the necessities of life. She can become a wage earner. If she marries, she brings into her new state of living the sense of independence that has come to her from her experiences as a wage earner. In many cases, after marriage she continues to work away from the home for wages. Marriage, as it used to be, made no provision for the new status of woman. It assumed a dependence, a subordination, and a limitation to which in these days many women refuse to assent. This internal change in the conditions of home life brings about a host of difficulties that require satisfactory adjustment if the living together of the husband and wife is to be a happy one.

In the country the demand for this new adjustment is less serious, for there, to a greater degree than in the city, there are women who have not claimed their new status.

The rural home with reference to its equipment, function, and internal adjustment appears superior to the city home. When this conclusion is reached, many students of rural problems are content to drop the discussion of the rural family. Such an attitude of satisfaction concerning the country home is neither logical nor safe. It may well be that the country family will meet the strain due to modern changes later than the urban family, but sooner or later it will have to face the need of new adjustment. Only time itself can disclose whether the country home will find serious difficulties in the way of its final adjustment to the significant changes of modern life. There is certainly little security in the fact that numerous country families have as yet been insensible to the matrimonial unrest so characteristic of urban people. What has come first to the urban centers must, sooner or later, to a greater or less degree, enter country life. Indeed, it is impossible to doubt that family discontent is growing in the country.

The important question, however, to the moral and social worker is whether the country is obtaining all that it should from its superior family opportunity. Assuming that it is healthier than the city, with reference to the equipment, function, and adjustment of the family, it is reasonable to ask, "What are the obstacles that keep the country home from making its largest moral contribution to society?"