The Elements of Child-protection

by Sigmund Engel

Every social institution serves for the attainment of some particular end—is, that is to say, a means to that end. If an end can be obtained without consuming wealth—that is, without employing the means involving such an expenditure of wealth, then the sacrifice of this wealth and the employment of these means are superfluous, and even harmful. The tendency of every social institution is, in fact, to become superfluous, and to be superseded with the passage of the years.

The wise physician who has to deal with the diseases affecting the human body does not confine his efforts to the treatment and relief of symptoms, but endeavours to ascertain and to remove the causes of those symptoms. He is well aware that a method of treatment which is confined to the relief of mere symptoms will effect no more than a temporary improvement, and that as long as the cause of the symptoms remains in active operation, the morbid phenomena will continue to recur. Now these considerations apply with just as much force to the social organism as they do to the individual human organism. When we pass judgment upon a social institution, we must always endeavour to ascertain whether any defect we may notice connected with its working belongs to the social institution as such, and whether the fault is inseparable from the institution, or whether we may reasonably expect that in the further course of development, or as a result of better organisation, this particular defect will disappear. In the work of child-protection, these fundamental principles must always be kept in mind.

Objections to Child-Protection.—A number of objections have been formulated against child-protection, of which the following may be mentioned. In crèches and other institutions for the care of young children, the spread of infectious diseases very readily occurs. Most of the institutions aiming at child-protection are really rewards of immorality, and thus tend to encourage immorality. It is a natural law that a child should be cared for by its own parents, and child-protection, in so far as it separates the child from its parents, is unnatural.

Most of these objections are invalid. Many authors maintain that the protection of juvenile criminals does more harm than good; but even if this is true to-day, it does not follow that juvenile criminals should not be protected, but simply that our methods of protection should be better adapted to their purpose. The objections urged against crèches and other institutions for the care of young children should not lead to the inference that no such institutions ought to exist, but should rather draw our attention to the necessity for taking better measures to prevent the introduction and spread of infectious diseases. No one can doubt to-day that the suppression of these diseases is within our power.

Objections to the Care of Foundlings.—In the literature of our subject we find great diversity of opinion regarding the care of foundlings, and it is therefore necessary that we should examine the objections that have been made to institutions for this purpose. A careful study of the matter will show that the criticisms apply not to the general principle on which foundling hospitals are instituted, but to a particular form of this institution. It is well known that the foundling hospitals of former days received children by means of a turn-table, through an aperture in the wall (so that the person who brought the child might remain entirely unknown), that the children grew to maturity in such institutions, that the infants were artificially fed, that the most elementary hygienic precautions were neglected in these buildings, &c. &c. It is natural that such foundling hospitals as these should be attacked by many writers as harmful in the highest degree. But these writers completely ignore the fact that the defects were not characteristic of all foundling hospitals, and that therefore they did not attach to the institutions as such, but were the outcome simply of defective organisation; they also fail to observe that the care of foundlings may be undertaken without instituting foundling hospitals. The weightiest of all the objections to foundling hospitals is that the cost of maintenance of these institutions is disproportionate to any good they may effect, inasmuch as the value to society of those foundlings who attain maturity is no proper equivalent for the pains expended in attaining this result. In view of the lex minimi, to which reference was made at the beginning of [this chapter], has such an institution any right to exist?

The turn-table for the reception of children was instituted for two reasons. In the first place, the whole act of “exposing” a child was to be discreetly veiled from the public eye; and, in the second place, no excuse was to be left open for the crime of infanticide. It is true that in our own day there are many reasons to be alleged against retaining the turn-table; it provides a means whereby the parents of children born in lawful wedlock can evade their natural obligations, and impose these upon society at large; it involves a legal contradiction, inasmuch as it tacitly permits, and even formally invites, parents to expose their children, although this is a criminal offence; finally, it leads to the overcrowding of the foundling hospitals. In short, all the objections to the institution of the turn-table are perfectly sound; but it would be altogether unwarrantable to infer from this that foundling hospitals themselves are unnecessary and even harmful. Foundling hospitals can exist without a turn-table (not a single modern foundling hospital contains any such thing); the defects of foundling hospitals with turn-tables are not defects of foundling hospitals as such, but defects attaching to the institution of the turn-table.

If we are told that foundling hospitals fail to attain their ends (the prevention of infanticide and the increase of the population), if we are told that the foundling hospitals were themselves murder-traps, and that all they could do was to preserve for society a few individuals competent for harm rather than for good, we may rejoin that in modern foundling hospitals the death-rate is much lower than it was in those of former times, that children now receive in these institutions a much better upbringing than was formerly the case, and that the defects alleged do not attach to foundling hospitals as such, but merely to this or that way of managing such institutions. Finally, it is necessary to point out, that whereas the foundling hospitals of former times, owing to their defective administration, probably did not “pay,” the progress of medical science has greatly reduced the death-rate in foundling hospitals, the children in these institutions are now much better brought up, and for these reasons the effective return made by foundling hospitals to society is far greater than it used to be.

Darwinism versus Poor-Relief.—Many Darwinians oppose Poor-Relief. The interest of the community demands that its members should be physically, intellectually, and morally sound. Social evolution and social well-being depend upon the survival of the fittest. It follows from this that the interest of the community demands that we should prevent the birth of diseased and weakly individuals; and that if such individuals should nevertheless be born, the sooner they perish the better. If this were unconditionally true, we should have to admit that the relief of destitution is not merely useless to society, but is positively harmful.

In many instances, by the application of medical skill and knowledge, it is possible, at considerable expenditure of effort, to keep alive sickly persons, those predisposed to crime, and those predisposed to particular diseases—persons who, in default of such special care, would inevitably have succumbed. Such defectives, attaining maturity, procreate their kind, producing a new generation of sickly individuals, with deficient powers of resistance. Such applications of medical science are doubtless valuable from the point of view of the individuals thus benefited, but they promote the deterioration of the race. This anti-eugenist influence is exerted in a twofold manner: not only are the defectives kept alive and enabled to procreate their kind, but these defectives utilise goods and services which would otherwise have been allotted to healthy persons, whereby these latter become less well able to found and rear families.