Sir: Having been invited by you to participate in a conference on the care of dependent children . . . we desire to express the very great satisfaction felt by each member of this conference in the deep interest you have taken in the well-being of dependent children. The proper care of destitute children has indeed an important bearing upon the welfare of the nation. We now know so little about them as not even to know their number, but we know that there are in institutions about 93,000, and that many additional thousands are in foster or boarding homes. As a step, therefore, in the conservation of the productive capacity of the people, and the preservation of high standards of citizenship, and also because each of these children is entitled to receive humane treatment, adequate care, and proper education, your action . . . will have, we believe, a profound effect upon the well-being of many thousands of children, and upon the nation as a whole....

Our conclusions are as follows:

1. Home life is the highest and finest product of civilization.

   It is the great molding force of mind and of character. Children should not be deprived of it except for urgent and compelling reasons. Children of parents of worthy character, suffering from temporary misfortune and children of reasonably efficient and deserving mothers who are without the support of the normal breadwinner, should, as a rule, be kept with their parents, such aid being given as may be necessary to maintain suitable homes for the rearing of the children. This aid should be given by such methods and from such sources as may be determined by the general relief policy of each community, preferably in the form of private charity, rather than of public relief. Except in unusual circumstances, the home should not be broken up for reasons of poverty, but only for considerations of inefficiency or immorality.

   PREVENTIVE WORK

2. The most important and valuable philanthropic work is not the curative, but the preventive.... We urge upon all friends of children the promotion of effective measures, including legislation to prevent blindness; to check tuberculosis and other diseases in dwellings and work places, and injuries in hazardous occupations; to secure compensation or insurance so as to provide a family income in case of sickness, accident, death, or invalidism of the breadwinner; to promote child-labor reforms, and, generally, to improve the conditions surrounding child life. To secure these ends we urge efficient cooperation with all other agencies for social betterment.

   HOME FINDING

3. As to the children who for sufficient reasons must be removed from their own homes, or who have no homes, it is desirable that, if normal in mind and body and not requiring special training, they should be cared for in families whenever practicable.... Such homes should be selected by a most careful process of investigation, carried on by skilled agents through personal investigation and with due regard to the religious faith of the child. After children are placed in homes, adequate visitation, with careful consideration of the physical, mental, moral, and spiritual training and development of each child on the part of the responsible home-finding agency is essential.

   It is recognized that for many children foster homes without payment for board are not practicable immediately after the children become dependent and that for children requiring temporary care only the free home is not available.... Contact with family life is preferable for these children, as well as for other normal children. It is necessary, however, that a large number of carefully selected boarding homes be found if these children are to be cared for in families.... Unless and until such homes are found, the use of institutions is necessary.

4. So far as it may be found necessary temporarily or permanently to care for certain classes of children in institutions, these institutions should be conducted on the cottage plan, in order that routine and impersonal care may not unduly suppress individuality and initiative.... It secures for the children a larger degree of association with adults and a nearer approach to the conditions of family life, which are required for the proper molding of childhood. These results more than justify the increased outlay and are truly economical.... Cheap care of children is ultimately enormously expensive, and is unworthy of a strong community. Existing congregate institutions should so classify their inmates and segregate them into groups as to secure as many of the benefits of the cottage system as possible, and should look forward to the adoption of the cottage type when new buildings are constructed.

   The sending of children of any age or class to almshouses is an unqualified evil, and should be forbidden everywhere by law, with suitable penalty for its violation.

   INCORPORATION

5. To engage in the work of caring for needy children is to assume a most serious responsibility, and should, therefore, be permitted only to those who are definitely organized for the purpose, who are of suitable character, and possess, or have reasonable assurance of securing, the funds needed for their support. The only practicable plan of securing this end is to require the approval, by a state board of charities or other body exercising similar powers, of the incorporation of all child-caring agencies....

   STATE INSPECTION

6. The proper training of destitute children being essential to the well-being of the State, it is a sound public policy that the State, through its duly authorized representative, should inspect the work of all agencies which care for dependent children....

   INSPECTION OF EDUCATIONAL WORK

7. Destitute children at best labor under many disadvantages.... It is desirable that the education of children in orphan asylums and other similar institutions or placed in families should be under the supervision of the educational authorities of the State...

   PHYSICAL CARE

8. .... Each child ... should be carefully examined by a competent physician, especially for the purpose of ascertaining whether such peculiarities, if any, as the child presents may be due to any defect of the sense organs or other physical defect. Both institutions and placing-out agencies should take every precaution to secure proper medical and surgical care of their children and should see that suitable instruction is given them in matters of health and hygiene.

   COOPERATION

9. Great benefit can be derived from a close cooperation between the various child-caring agencies, institutional and otherwise, in each locality.... The establishment of a joint bureau of investigation and information by all the child-caring agencies of each locality is highly commended, in the absence of any other suitable central agency through which they may cooperate.

   UNDESIRABLE LEGISLATION

10. We greatly deprecate the tendency of legislation in some States to place unnecessary obstacles in the way of placing children in family homes in such States by agencies whose headquarters are elsewhere, in view of the fact that we favor the care of destitute children, normal in mind and body, in families, whenever practicable....

    The people of the more prosperous and less congested districts owe a debt of hospitality to the older communities from which many of them came....

    PERMANENT ORGANIZATION

11. The care of dependent children is a subject about which nearly every session of the legislature of every State in the Union concerns itself; it is a work in which State and local authorities in many States are engaged, and in which private agencies are active in every State. Important decisions are being made constantly.... Each of these decisions should be made with full knowledge of the experience of other States and agencies, and of the trend of opinion among those . . . able to speak from wide experience and careful observation. One effective means of securing this result would be the establishment of a permanent organization to undertake, in this field, work comparable to that carried on by . . .similar organizations in their respective fields. It is our judgment that the establishment of such a permanent voluntary organization, under auspices which would insure a careful consideration of all points of view, broad mindedness and tolerance, would be desirable and helpful, if reasonably assured of adequate financial support.

    FEDERAL CHILDREN'S BUREAU

12. A bill is pending in Congress for the establishment of a federal children's bureau to collect and disseminate information affecting the welfare of children. In our judgment the establishment of such a bureau is desirable, and we earnestly recommend the enactment of the pending measure...

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