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two centers in this little community of 7,500 people, and in each one of them there is a television set. There are very few families in the neighborhood that can have television sets, but all the children in the neighborhood can see television at these centers.

I must confess that while I was there the children were playing games and not one was looking at television. It was interesting to me to see how active games were more significant to them.

Every week they have motion pictures, so if a child does not have the money to go to the motion pictures, he can come here. They provide these low-income families with services they would not otherwise obtain, and might otherwise steal to get money for them. They are not raising their income, but they are raising what the children get, and the interesting thing is that the better-off families in the neighborhood take responsibility. They make a membership canvass for dues, just dollar dues. They get somewhat over one-third of the families in the community to make this payment. Many of the other two-thirds do not even have the dollar for that purpose.

That is one way to raise the actual income in terms of goods and services, although not the money income of these poorest families.

Mr. HUBER. I was thinking while you were talking that there exists in my district a Government housing project. I believe it would be the finest place in my entire district, the third largest in the United States, to rear children. There is a recreational center where they have movies, they have supervised play for children. In our so-called silk-stocking districts, the children are largely unsupervised, it is some distance to any playgound, and some of them are little snobs and I do not think they would want to play in a playground anyhow.

The interesting thing about it now is I hope the Government will sell it to a cooperative being formed by the tenants, who will look after it. It is not fancy or elaborate, but it is the most modern home most of them have ever lived in.

If I may make a brief comment on what Senator Flanders mentioned, I remember Dr. Reid yesterday blamed-and probably rightly so the Marshall plan for an increase in food prices, but she would not admit, for better or for worse, that at least temporarily, at any rate, our economy had been aided by the shipments.

I presume you feel it has at least temporarily; is that right, Senator?

Senator FLANDERS. I feel that way.

Senator SPARK MAN. Anything further?

Senator FLANDERS. I think not.

Senator SPARKMAN. The hour of 12 having arrived, the committee \ will stand adjourned until Monday at 10, and at that time we will meet in room 318.

Doctor, we certainly appreciate your being with us this morning. Mr. BURGESS. Thank you very much, Senator.

(Whereupon, at 12 noon, the subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene at 10 a m., Monday, December 19, 1949, in room 318, Senate Office Building.)

LOW-INCOME FAMILIES

MONDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1949

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON LOW-INCOME FAMILIES, JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE ECONOMIC REPORT, Washington, D. C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10: 10 a. m. in room 318, Senate Office Building, Senator John Sparkman (chairman) presiding.

Present: Senators Sparkman (chairman) and Flanders.

Also present: Samuel L. Brown, economist, and Mrs. Elizabeth G. Magill, research assistant, Subcommittee on Low-Income Families. Also present: Helen Hall, director, Henry Street Settlement, moderator for the group; Earl Parker, associate director, Family Service Association of America; Mildred Gutwillig, head worker, recreation rooms in New York, National Federation of Settlements; Dr. Margaret Creech, director, department of information and studies, National Travelers Aid Association; Reginald Johnson, field director, National Urban League; Mrs. Gertrude Zimand, general secretary, National Child Labor Committee; Edmond D. Butler, president, National Conference of Catholic Charities; Lt. Col. Chester Brown, secretary, social welfare department, Salvation Army; Arthur Kruse, executive director, United Community Services of Washington, D. C.; and Sirchitz Kripalani, Member of the Indian Legislature and Delegate to the United Nations. [Visitor.]

Senator SPARKMAN. Let the committee come to order, please.

I am sorry that all members of the subcommittee could not be here today. We did have them all in attendance at different times during the past week, but unfortunately some of them had to return to their homes.

Senator Flanders and I are here and are happy to have you here with us.

Miss Helen Hall, director of Henry Street Settlement, I understand, will be the moderator for the group.

I wonder, Miss Hall, if you might have those in your group identify themselves around the table for the benefit of the record.

Miss HALL. All right, Senator. We might go around this way, and if each person will tell who they are and what they represent it will make it easier.

Senator SPARKMAN. And from where.

Miss HALL. Yes.

Mr. KRUSE. I am Arthur H. Kruse, executive director of United Community Services here in Washington. It is the over-all directing and planning agency for health and welfare work in the city.

Mr. BUTLER. I am Edmond D. Butler, president of National Conference of Catholic Charities, which has its office in Washington, but I am from New York.

Mrs. ZIMAND. I am Mrs. Gertrude Zimand, general secretary of the National Child Labor Committee which has its headquarters in New York City.

Senator SPARKMAN. We have already identified Miss Hall.

Miss GUTWILLIG. I am Mildred Gutwillig, representing the National Federation of Settlements with headquarters in New York.

Mr. BROWN. I am Lt. Col. Chester Brown of the social welfare department of the Salvation Army, New York City.

Miss CREECH. I am Margaret Creech, director of the department of information and study of the National Travelers Aid Association, with headquarters in New York.

Mr. JOHNSON. I am Reginald Johnson, director of field services of the National Urban League, New York City.

Mr. PARKER. I am Earl Parker, associate director, Family Service Association of America, with headquarters in New York.

Senator SPARKMAN. We are delighted to have all of you with us. and we hope the discussion may be both interesting, instructive, informative, and profitable.

Miss HALL. Senator, we are very glad to come. And we also hope it will be as informal as possible.

We have arranged among ourselves as to what order we might speak in, but we know that there will be recurring factors in everything we say because that is what happens with the income group about whom we are speaking. We have tried to fix it so that we will not repeat each other's story any more than we can help. We will go right into it and I hope you will, and know you will, interrupt when things are not clear and when you would like a little more information on any one subject.

Mr. Earl Parker, who is the associate director of the Family Service Association and who has, of course, a wealth of material back of him, will start us off.

Mr. PARKER. I would like to say first that the organization I represent is not only very much interested in the problem being taken up by the committee, but we are very much in accord with the problem being faced as an economic problem rather than purely a social problem. We are convinced that the solution or solutions to be found are primarily going to be economic solutions. We have some conviction they will have to be accompanied by some social measures, and we do have some opinions and some convictions about that.

I should like to say a word about the organization I represent, not to advertise or publicize the organization, but merely as a background for the material, the information, that we may be able to offer to the committee.

This is a membership federation of the leading family welfare and family service agencies in practically all of the cities of the United States. Most of these agencies have quite a long history. They are the descendants of the charity organization societies which were at their height around the turn of the century and the early part of the twentieth century.

Those organizations emphasized prevention and their efforts were rather pioneering in trying to get at the causes of family and personal difficulties.

The present-day family welfare and family service agencies are not primarily relief organizations. That is quite incidental to their principal function, which is to assist families in understanding and getting at their own problems, whether they arise from health or environmental situations, or whether they arise from personality difficulties, matters of adjustment, lacks in relationship and ability to get along with other members of their family and other people.

Quite recently our organization made a check-up of our member organizations as to what they found as the principal deprivations of families of low-income level, and I want to read a list of those as they came back to us from our member agencies, the local agencies.

Insufficient food with attendant lowered vitality, poor health and decreased work capacity.

Inadequate clothing accompanied oftentimes by children's absence from school.

Mothers out of the home to supplement family income, resulting in children not having needed care, in school problems, neglect.

Bad housing: The most common hardship of the low-income families. Poor neighborhoods, unwholesome companionship for children, overcrowding with resulting health hazards and bad behavior patterns. Low educational level: Little vocational training, poor equipment for jobs.

Limited opportunity for recreational and cultural activities.

Postponement of needed medical and dental care, leading sometimes to incapacitating individuals to hold jobs.

Inability to secure or replace household equipment which, in turn, increases family labor and hardships.

Impossibility of supporting aged or sick relatives.

And there is one other thing which is very difficult to list in any categorical way. That is the indirect results of the deprivations and bad living conditions necessitated by low income.

One result is the increase in family tensions which our affiliated agencies find to a remarkably greater extent in such families.

All these deprivations and substandard living conditions have their effect on the mental health as well as the physical health and the productive capacity of the individuals in the family group-resentment, quarrels, friction between husband and wife, bad parent-child relationships, all these occur more frequently as an accompaniment of low living standards.

All this, in turn, results in a higher incidence of separation, desertion, children dropping out of school, children running away from home, joining up with gangs, petty thievery, juvenile delinquency, and a great variety of antisocial conduct.

An expression which is frequently heard, "poverty breeds crime," I personally believe is not true. But the conditions, that are generally found with poverty are much the same conditions as are gen erally found in creating criminals.

Senator SPARKMAN. I wonder if I may interrupt right there. I am interested in that statement that you made, and it is in line with the

statement that was made to us Saturday by Dr. Burgess of the University of Chicago. Yet I cannot quite differentiate clearly the two ideas in my own mind. You say "poverty breeds crime" is not a correct statement, but that usually where there is poverty you find the conditions which do breed crime. Now the thought in my mind is that poverty brings those conditions.

Mr. PARKER. That is right.

Senator SPARKMAN. And if it does, then how can we correctly say that poverty itself does not breed crime? It seems to be just a second step.

Mr. PARKER. It could be stated that way. I was trying to make the point, Senator, that the fact of being poor, of having to live at the low level, does not necessarily mean that such people are predisposed to be criminals.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, I certainly agree with you on that if that is the differentiation.

Miss HALL. Is it not that the living conditions under which you have to live when you are poor are the things? Was not that your difference?

Mr. PARKER. Yes.

Senator SPARKMAN. If you mean just being poor does not stamp one as being a criminal or being a person of criminal tendencies, I agree with you. But poverty and delinquency and disease and crime, and those things occur so much with the same incidence that I think we must be careful in saying that the one does not breed the other. Perhaps technically it does not, but they go hand in hand.

Miss HALL. Senator, I think you will find us all leaning backwards to make plain our inherent belief in the people we are talking about. I think all of us feel very strongly on this point. We are very grateful that you are focusing on this question because we feel these people can be so valuable to the community. It is not the people themselves but more often the conditions under which they live and work.

Senator SPARKMAN. I fully agree with you. But it is easy to jump from that conclusion to another conclusion which would be erroneous. Miss HALL. You are right; we agree with that.

Senator SPARKMAN. In other words, in the communities that are poverty ridden you find

Miss HALL. A higher delinquency rate?

Senator SPARKMAN. Yes.

Miss HALL. That is right.

Senator SPARKMAN. I think we must keep those things in mind.

Senator FLANDERS. The traditional, poor but honest parents, have they disappeared from the American scene?

Mr. PARKER. By no means.

Senator FLANDERS. I hoped they had not.

Miss HALL. That is what he was talking about.

Senator SPARKMAN. Their job of raising their children, though, is certainly made heavier by reason of the impoverished surroundings, is it not?

Mr. PARKER. Very much so.

I was trying to make the point that poverty and conditions of poverty did not necessarily result in all these bad effects, but it was much more difficult to avoid reaching that result.

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