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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/38821-8.txt b/38821-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3f7f792 --- /dev/null +++ b/38821-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5200 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Ten Year War, by Jacob A. Riis + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Ten Year War + An Account of The Battle with The Slum in New York + +Author: Jacob A. Riis + +Release Date: February 10, 2012 [EBook #38821] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TEN YEAR WAR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + + A TEN YEARS' WAR + + AN ACCOUNT OF THE BATTLE + WITH THE SLUM IN + NEW YORK + + BY JACOB A. RIIS + + + AUTHOR OF "HOW THE OTHER HALF LIVES" + + _WITH ILLUSTRATIONS_ + + [Illustration: The Riverside Press] + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + + 1900 + + COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY JACOB A. RIIS + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + TO THE FAINT-HEARTED AND THOSE OF LITTLE + FAITH THIS VOLUME IS REPROACHFULLY + INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR + + + + +[Illustration: COLONEL GEORGE E. WARING, JR.] + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAP. PAGE + + I. THE BATTLE WITH THE SLUM 1 + + II. THE TENEMENT HOUSE BLIGHT 30 + + III. THE TENEMENT: CURING ITS BLIGHT 68 + + IV. THE TENANT 104 + + V. THE GENESIS OF THE GANG 139 + + VI. LETTING IN THE LIGHT 169 + + VII. JUSTICE FOR THE BOY 204 + + VIII. REFORM BY HUMANE TOUCH 239 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + PAGE + + COLONEL GEORGE E. WARING, JR. _Frontispiece_ + + POLICE STATION LODGING ROOM ON EAST SIDE 18 + + THE MOTT STREET BARRACKS 74 + + ALFRED CORNING CLARK BUILDINGS--_Model Tenements + Of City And Suburban Homes Company_ 84 + + EVENING IN ONE OF THE COURTS OF MILLS HOUSE NO. 1 94 + + BONE ALLEY 134 + + MULBERRY BEND PARK 180 + + LETTER H PLAN OF PUBLIC SCHOOL NO. 165 (SHOWING + FRONT ON WEST 109TH STREET) 214 + + PLAYGROUND ON ROOF OF NEW EAST BROADWAY SCHOOLHOUSE + (AREA 8,348 SQUARE FEET) 220 + + A TAMMANY-SWEPT EAST SIDE STREET BEFORE WARING 242 + + THE SAME EAST SIDE STREET WHEN COLONEL WARING + WIELDED THE BROOM 248 + + THEODORE ROOSEVELT 262 + + + + +A TEN YEARS' WAR + + + + +I + +THE BATTLE WITH THE SLUM + + +The slum is as old as civilization. Civilization implies a race, to get +ahead. In a race there are usually some who for one cause or another +cannot keep up, or are thrust out from among their fellows. They fall +behind, and when they have been left far in the rear they lose hope and +ambition, and give up. Thenceforward, if left to their own resources, +they are the victims, not the masters, of their environment; and it is a +bad master. They drag one another always farther down. The bad +environment becomes the heredity of the next generation. Then, given the +crowd, you have the slum ready-made. + +The battle with the slum began the day civilization recognized in it her +enemy. It was a losing fight until conscience joined forces with fear +and self-interest against it. When common sense and the golden rule +obtain among men as a rule of practice, it will be over. The two have +not always been classed together, but here they are plainly seen to +belong together. Justice to the individual is accepted in theory as the +only safe groundwork of the commonwealth. When it is practiced in +dealing with the slum, there will shortly be no slum. We need not wait +for the millennium, to get rid of it. We can do it now. All that is +required is that it shall not be left to itself. That is justice to it +and to us, since its grievous ailment is that it cannot help itself. +When a man is drowning, the thing to do is to pull him out of the water; +afterward there will be time for talking it over. We got at it the other +way in dealing with our social problems. The doctrinaires had their day, +and they decided to let bad enough alone; that it was unsafe to +interfere with "causes that operate sociologically," as one survivor of +these unfittest put it to me. It was a piece of scientific humbug that +cost the age which listened to it dear. "Causes that operate +sociologically" are the opportunity of the political and every other +kind of scamp who trades upon the depravity and helplessness of the +slum, and the refuge of the pessimist who is useless in the fight +against them. We have not done yet paying the bills he ran up for us. +Some time since we turned to, to pull the drowning man out, and it was +time. A little while longer, and we should have been in danger of being +dragged down with him. + +The slum complaint had been chronic in all ages, but the great changes +which the nineteenth century saw, the new industry, political freedom, +brought on an acute attack which threatened to become fatal. Too many of +us had supposed that, built as our commonwealth was on universal +suffrage, it would be proof against the complaints that harassed older +states; but in fact it turned out that there was extra hazard in that. +Having solemnly resolved that all men are created equal and have certain +inalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness, we shut our eyes and waited for the formula to work. It was +as if a man with a cold should take the doctor's prescription to bed +with him, expecting it to cure him. The formula was all right, but +merely repeating it worked no cure. When, after a hundred years, we +opened our eyes, it was upon sixty cents a day as the living wage of the +working-woman in our cities; upon "knee pants" at forty cents a dozen +for the making; upon the Potter's Field taking tithe of our city life, +ten per cent, each year for the trench, truly the Lost Tenth of the +slum. Our country had grown great and rich; through our ports was poured +food for the millions of Europe. But in the back streets multitudes +huddled in ignorance and want. The foreign oppressor had been +vanquished, the fetters stricken from the black man at home; but his +white brother, in his bitter plight, sent up a cry of distress that had +in it a distinct note of menace. Political freedom we had won; but the +problem of helpless poverty, grown vast with the added offscourings of +the Old World, mocked us, unsolved. Liberty at sixty cents a day set +presently its stamp upon the government of our cities, and it became the +scandal and the peril of our political system. + +So the battle began. Three times since the war that absorbed the +nation's energies and attention had the slum confronted us in New York +with its challenge. In the darkest days of the great struggle it was the +treacherous mob; later on, the threat of the cholera, which found swine +foraging in the streets as the only scavengers, and a swarming host, but +little above the hog in its appetites and in the quality of the shelter +afforded it, peopling the back alleys. Still later, the mob, caught +looting the city's treasury with its idol, the thief Tweed, at its head, +drunk with power and plunder, had insolently defied the outraged +community to do its worst. There were meetings and protests. The rascals +were turned out for a season; the arch-thief died in jail. I see him +now, going through the gloomy portals of the Tombs, whither, as a +newspaper reporter, I had gone with him, his stubborn head held high as +ever. I asked myself more than once, at the time when the vile prison +was torn down, whether the comic clamor to have the ugly old gates +preserved and set up in Central Park had anything to do with the memory +of the "martyred" thief, or whether it was in joyful celebration of the +fact that others had escaped. His name is even now one to conjure with +in the Sixth Ward. He never "squealed," and he was "so good to the +poor"--evidence that the slum is not laid by the heels by merely +destroying Five Points and the Mulberry Bend. There are other fights to +be fought in that war, other victories to be won, and it is slow work. +It was nearly ten years after the great robbery before decency got the +upper grip in good earnest. That was when the civic conscience awoke in +1879. + +In that year the slum was arraigned in the churches. The sad and +shameful story was told of how it grew and was fostered by avarice, that +saw in the homeless crowds from over the sea only a chance for business, +and exploited them to the uttermost, making sometimes a hundred per +cent, on the capital invested,--always most out of the worst houses, +from the tenants of which "nothing was expected" save that they pay the +usurious rents; how Christianity, citizenship, human fellowship, shook +their skirts clear of the rabble that was only good enough to fill the +greedy purse, and how the rabble, left to itself, improved such +opportunities as it found after such fashion as it knew; how it ran +elections merely to count its thugs in, and fattened at the public crib; +and how the whole evil thing had its root in the tenements, where the +home had ceased to be sacred,--those dark and deadly dens in which the +family ideal was tortured to death, and character was smothered; in +which children were "damned rather than born" into the world, thus +realizing a slum kind of foreordination to torment, happily brief in +many cases. The Tenement House Committee long afterward called the worst +of the barracks "infant slaughter houses," and showed, by reference to +the mortality lists, that they killed one in every five babies born in +them. + +The story shocked the town into action. Plans for a better kind of +tenement were called for, and a premium was put on every ray of light +and breath of air that could be let into it. Money was raised to build +model houses, and a bill to give the health authorities summary powers +in dealing with tenements was sent to the legislature. The landlords +held it up until the last day of the session, when it was forced +through by an angered public opinion. The power of the cabal was broken. +The landlords had found their Waterloo. Many of them got rid of their +property, which in a large number of cases they had never seen, and +tried to forget the source of their ill-gotten wealth. Light and air did +find their way into the tenements in a half-hearted fashion, and we +began to count the tenants as "souls." That is one of our milestones in +the history of New York. They were never reckoned so before; no one ever +thought of them as "souls." So, restored to human fellowship, in the +twilight of the air shaft that had penetrated to their dens, the first +Tenement House Committee was able to make them out "better than the +houses" they lived in, and a long step forward was taken. The Mulberry +Bend, the wicked core of the "bloody Sixth Ward," was marked for +destruction, and all slumdom held its breath to see it go. With that +gone, it seemed as if the old days must be gone too, never to return. +There would not be another Mulberry Bend. As long as it stood, there was +yet a chance. The slum had backing, as it were. + +The civic conscience was not very robust yet, and required many and +protracted naps. It slumbered fitfully eight long years, waking up now +and then with a start, while the politicians did their best to lull it +back to its slumbers. I wondered often, in those years of delay, if it +was just plain stupidity that kept the politicians from spending the +money which the law had put within their grasp; for with every year that +passed a million dollars that could have been used for small park +purposes was lost. But they were wiser than I. I understood when I saw +the changes which letting in the sunshine worked. We had all believed +it, but they knew it all along. At the same time, they lost none of the +chances that offered. They helped the landlords, who considered +themselves greatly aggrieved because their property was thereafter to +front on a park instead of a pigsty, to transfer the whole assessment of +half a million dollars for park benefit to the city. They undid in less +than six weeks what it had taken considerably more than six years to do; +but the park was cheap at the price. We could afford to pay all it cost +to wake us up. When finally, upon the wave of wrath excited by the +Parkhurst and Lexow disclosures, reform came with a shock that dislodged +Tammany, it found us wide awake, and, it must be admitted, not a little +astonished at our sudden access of righteousness. + +The battle went against the slum in the three years that followed, until +it found backing in the "odium of reform" that became the issue in the +municipal organization of the greater city. Tammany made notes. Of what +was done, how it was done, and why, during those years, I shall have +occasion to speak further in these pages. Here I wish to measure the +stretch we have come since I wrote "How the Other Half Lives," ten years +ago. Some of it we came plodding, and some at full speed; some of it in +the face of every obstacle that could be thrown in our way, wresting +victory from defeat at every step; some of it with the enemy on the run. +Take it altogether, it is a long way. Most of it will not have to be +traveled over again. The engine of municipal progress, once started as +it has been in New York, may slip many a cog with Tammany as the +engineer; it may even be stopped for a season; but it can never be made +to work backward. Even Tammany knows that, and is building the schools +she so long neglected, and so is hastening the day when she shall be but +an unsavory memory. + +How we strove for those schools, to no purpose! Our arguments, our +anger, the anxious pleading of philanthropists who saw the young on the +East Side going to ruin, the warning year after year of the +superintendent of schools that the compulsory education law was but an +empty mockery where it was most needed, the knocking of uncounted +thousands of children for whom there was no room,--uncounted in sober +fact; there was not even a way of finding out how many were +adrift,--brought only the response that the tax rate must be kept down. +Kept down it was. "Waste" was successfully averted at the spigot; at the +bunghole it went on unchecked. In a swarming population like that you +must have either schools or jails, and the jails waxed fat with the +overflow. The East Side, that had been orderly, became a hotbed of child +crime. And when, in answer to the charge made by a legislative committee +that the father forced his child into the shop, on a perjured age +certificate, to labor when he ought to have been at play, that father, +bent and heavy-eyed with unceasing toil, flung back the charge with the +bitter reproach that we gave him no other choice, that it was either the +street or the shop for his boy, and that perjury for him was cheaper +than the ruin of the child, we were mute. What, indeed, was there to +say? The crime was ours, not his. That was but yesterday. To-day we can +count the months to the time when every child who knocks shall find a +seat in our schools. We have a school census to tell us of the need. In +that most crowded neighborhood in all the world, where the +superintendent lately pleaded in vain for three new schools, five have +been built, the finest in this or any other land,--great, light, and +airy structures, with playgrounds on the roof; and all over the city the +like are going up. The briefest of our laws, every word of which is like +the blow of a hammer driving the nails home in the coffin of the bad old +days, says that never one shall be built without its playground. So the +boy is coming to his rights. + +The streets are cleaned,--not necessarily clean just now; Colonel Waring +is dead, with his doctrine of putting a man instead of a voter behind +every broom, killed by politics, he and his doctrine both,--but cleaned. +The slum has even been washed. We tried that on Hester Street years ago, +in the age of cobblestone pavements, and the result fairly frightened +us. I remember the indignant reply of a well-known citizen, a man of +large business responsibility and experience in the handling of men, to +whom the office of street-cleaning commissioner had been offered, when I +asked him if he would accept. "I have lived," he said, "a blameless life +for forty years, and have a character in the community. I cannot +afford--no man with a reputation can afford--to hold that office; it +will surely wreck it." That was then. It made Colonel Waring's +reputation. He took the trucks from the streets. Tammany, in a brief +interregnum of vigor under Mayor Grant, had laid the axe to the +unsightly telegraph poles and begun to pave the streets with asphalt, +but it left the trucks and the ash barrels to Colonel Waring as +hopeless. Trucks have votes; at least their drivers have. Now that they +are gone, the drivers would be the last to bring them back; for they +have children, too, and the rescued streets gave them their first +playground. Perilous, begrudged by policeman and storekeeper, though it +was, it was still a playground. + +But one is coming in which the boy shall rule unchallenged. The Mulberry +Bend Park kept its promise. Before the sod was laid in it two more were +under way in the thickest of the tenement house crowding, and each, +under the law which brought them into existence, is to be laid out in +part as a playground. They are not yet finished, but they will be; for +the people have taken to the idea, and the politician has made a note of +the fact. He saw a great light when the play piers were opened. In half +a dozen localities where the slum was striking its roots deep into the +soil such piers are now being built, and land is being acquired for +small parks. We shall yet settle the "causes that operated +sociologically" on the boy with a lawn mower and a sand heap. You have +got your boy, and the heredity of the next one, when you can order his +setting. + +Even while I am writing, a bill is urged in the legislature to build in +every senatorial district in the city a gymnasium and a public bath. It +matters little whether it passes at this session or not. The important +thing is that it is there. The rest will follow. A people's club is +being organized, to crowd out the saloon that has had a monopoly of the +brightness and the cheer in the tenement streets too long. The labor +unions are bestirring themselves to deal with the sweating curse, and +the gospel of less law and more enforcement sits enthroned at Albany. +Theodore Roosevelt will teach us again Jefferson's forgotten lesson, +that "the whole art of government consists in being honest." With a back +door to every ordinance that touched the lives of the people, if indeed +the whole thing was not the subject of open ridicule or the vehicle of +official blackmail, it seemed as if we had provided a perfect municipal +machinery for bringing the law into contempt with the young, and so for +wrecking citizenship by the shortest cut. + +Of free soup there is an end. It was never food for free men. The last +spoonful was ladled out by yellow journalism with the certificate of the +men who fought Roosevelt and reform in the police board that it was +good. It is not likely that it will ever plague us again. Our experience +has taught us a new reading of the old word that charity covers a +multitude of sins. It does. Uncovering some of them has kept us busy +since our conscience awoke, and there are more left. The worst of them +all, that awful parody on municipal charity, the police station lodging +room, is gone, after twenty years of persistent attack upon the foul +dens,--years during which they were arraigned, condemned, indicted by +every authority having jurisdiction, all to no purpose. The stale beer +dives went with them and with the Bend, and the grip of the tramp on our +throat has been loosened. We shall not easily throw it off altogether, +for the tramp has a vote, too, for which Tammany, with admirable +ingenuity, has found a new use, since the ante-election inspection of +lodging houses has made them less available for colonization purposes +than they were. Perhaps I should say a new way of very old use. It is +simplicity itself. Instead of keeping tramps in hired lodgings for weeks +at a daily outlay, the new way is to send them all to the island on +short commitments during the canvass, and vote them from there _en bloc_ +at the city's expense. Time and education must solve that, like so many +other problems which the slum has thrust upon us. They are the forces +upon which, when we have gone as far as our present supply of steam will +carry us, we must always fall back; and this we may do with confidence +so long as we keep stirring, if it is only marking time, as now. It is +in the retrospect that one sees how far we have come, after all, and +from that gathers courage for the rest of the way. Twenty-nine years +have passed since I slept in a police station lodging house, a lonely +lad, and was robbed, beaten, and thrown out for protesting; and when the +vagrant cur that had joined its homelessness to mine, and had sat all +night at the door waiting for me to come out,--it had been clubbed away +the night before,--snarled and showed its teeth at the doorman, raging +and impotent I saw it beaten to death on the step. I little dreamed then +that the friendless beast, dead, should prove the undoing of the +monstrous wrong done by the maintenance of these evil holes to every +helpless man and woman who was without shelter in New York; but it did. +It was after an inspection of the lodging rooms, when I stood with +Theodore Roosevelt, then president of the police board, in the one where +I had slept that night, and told him of it, that he swore they should +go. And go they did, as did so many another abuse in those two years of +honest purpose and effort. I hated them. It may not have been a very +high motive to furnish power for municipal reform; but we had tried +every other way, and none of them worked. Arbitration is good, but there +are times when it becomes necessary to knock a man down and arbitrate +sitting on him, and this was such a time. It was what we started out to +do with the rear tenements, the worst of the slum barracks, and it would +have been better had we kept on that track. I have always maintained +that we made a false move when we stopped to discuss damages with the +landlord, or to hear his side of it at all. His share in it was our +grievance; it blocked the mortality records with its burden of human +woe. The damage was all ours, the profit all his. If there are damages +to collect, he should foot the bill, not we. Vested rights are to be +protected, but no man has a right to be protected in killing his +neighbor. + +[Illustration: POLICE STATION LODGING ROOM ON EAST SIDE] + +However, they are down, the worst of them. The community has asserted +its right to destroy tenements that destroy life, and for that cause. We +bought the slum off in the Mulberry Bend at its own figure. On the rear +tenements we set the price, and set it low. It was a long step. Bottle +Alley is gone, and Bandits' Roost. Bone Alley, Thieves' Alley, and +Kerosene Row,--they are all gone. Hell's Kitchen and Poverty Gap have +acquired standards of decency; Poverty Gap has risen even to the height +of neckties. The time is fresh in my recollection when a different kind +of necktie was its pride; when the boy murderer--he was barely +nineteen--who wore it on the gallows took leave of the captain of +detectives with the cheerful invitation to "come over to the wake. They +will have a high old time." And the event fully redeemed the promise. +The whole Gap turned out to do the dead bully honor. I have not heard +from the Gap, and hardly from Hell's Kitchen, in five years. The last +news from the Kitchen was when the thin wedge of a column of negroes, in +their uptown migration, tried to squeeze in, and provoked a race war; +but that in fairness should not be laid up against it. In certain local +aspects it might be accounted a sacred duty; as much so as to get drunk +and provoke a fight on the anniversary of the battle of the Boyne. But +on the whole the Kitchen has grown orderly. The gang rarely beats a +policeman nowadays, and it has not killed one in a long while. + +So, one after another, the outworks of the slum have been taken. It has +been beaten in many battles; but its reserves are unimpaired. More +tenements are being built every day on twenty-five-foot lots, and +however watchfully such a house is planned, if it is to return to the +builder the profit he seeks, it will have that within it which, the +moment the grasp of official sanitary supervision is loosened, must +summon up the ghost of the slum. The common type of tenement to-day is +the double-decker, and the double-decker is hopeless. In it the crowding +goes on at a constantly increasing rate. This is the sore spot, and as +against it all the rest seems often enough unavailing. Yet it cannot +be. It is true that the home, about which all that is to work for +permanent progress must cluster, is struggling against desperate odds in +the tenement, and that the struggle has been reflected in the morals of +the people, in the corruption of the young, to an alarming extent; but +it must be that the higher standards now set up on every hand, in the +cleaner streets, in the better schools, in the parks and the clubs, in +the settlements, and in the thousand and one agencies for good that +touch and help the lives of the poor at as many points, will tell at no +distant day, and react upon the homes and upon their builders. To any +one who knew the East Side, for instance, ten years ago, the difference +between that day and this in the appearance of the children whom he sees +there must be striking. Rags and dirt are now the exception rather than +the rule. Perhaps the statement is a trifle too strong as to the dirt; +but dirt is not harmful except when coupled with rags; it can be washed +off, and nowadays is washed off where such a thing would have been +considered affectation in the days that were. Soap and water have +worked a visible cure already, that must go more than skin-deep. They +are moral agents of the first value in the slum. And the day must come +when rapid transit will cease to be a football between contending forces +in a city of three million people, and the reason for the outrageous +crowding will cease to exist with the scattering of the centres of +production to the suburb. That day may be a long way off, measured by +the impatience of the philanthropist, but it is bound to come. +Meanwhile, philanthropy is not sitting idle and waiting. It is building +tenements on the humane plan that wipes out the lines of the +twenty-five-foot lot, and lets in sunshine and air and hope. It is +putting up hotels deserving of the name for the army that but just now +had no other home than the cheap lodging houses which Inspector Byrnes +fitly called "nurseries of crime." These also are standards from which +there is no backing down, even if coming up to them is slow work: and +they are here to stay, for they pay. That is the test. Not charity, but +justice,--that is the gospel which they preach. + +Flushed with the success of many victories, we challenged the slum to a +fight to the finish a year ago, and bade it come on. It came on. On our +side fought the bravest and best. The man who marshaled the citizen +forces for their candidate had been foremost in building homes, in +erecting baths for the people, in directing the self-sacrificing labors +of the oldest and worthiest of the agencies for improving the condition +of the poor. With him battled men who had given lives of patient study +and effort to the cause of helping their fellow men. Shoulder to +shoulder with them stood the thoughtful workingman from the East Side +tenement. The slum, too, marshaled its forces. Tammany produced her +notes. She pointed to the increased tax rate, showed what it had cost to +build schools and parks and to clean house, and called it criminal +recklessness. The issue was made sharp and clear. The war cry of the +slum was characteristic: "To hell with reform!" We all remember the +result. Politics interfered, and turned victory into defeat. We were +beaten. I shall never forget that election night. I walked home through +the Bowery in the midnight hour, and saw it gorging itself, like a +starved wolf, upon the promise of the morrow. Drunken men and women sat +in every doorway, howling ribald songs and curses. Hard faces I had not +seen for years showed themselves about the dives. The mob made merry +after its fashion. The old days were coming back. Reform was dead, and +decency with it. + +A year later, I passed that same way on the night of election. The scene +was strangely changed. The street was unusually quiet for such a time. +Men stood in groups about the saloons, and talked in whispers, with +serious faces. The name of Roosevelt was heard on every hand. The dives +were running, but there was no shouting, and violence was discouraged. +When, on the following day, I met the proprietor of one of the oldest +concerns in the Bowery,--which, while doing a legitimate business, +caters necessarily to its crowds, and therefore sides with them,--he +told me with bitter reproach how he had been stricken in pocket. A +gambler had just been in to see him, who had come on from the far West, +in anticipation of a wide-open town, and had got all ready to open a +house in the Tenderloin. "He brought $40,000 to put in the business, and +he came to take it away to Baltimore. Just now the cashier of ---- Bank +told me that two other gentlemen--gamblers? yes, that's what you call +them--had drawn $130,000 which they would have invested here, and had +gone after him. Think of all that money gone to Baltimore! That's what +you've done!" + +I went over to police headquarters, thinking of the sad state of that +man, and in the hallway I ran across two children, little tots, who were +inquiring their way to "the commissioner." The older was a hunchback +girl, who led her younger brother (he could not have been over five or +six years old) by the hand. They explained their case to me. They came +from Allen Street. Some undesirable women tenants had moved into the +tenement, and when complaint was made that sent the police there, the +children's father, who was a poor Jewish tailor, was blamed. The tenants +took it out of the boy by punching his nose till it bled. Whereupon the +children went straight to Mulberry Street to see the commissioner and +get justice. It was the first time in twenty years that I had known +Allen Street to come to police headquarters for justice; and in the +discovery that the new idea had reached down to the little children I +read the doom of the slum, despite its loud vauntings. + +No, it was not true that reform was dead, with decency. It was not the +slum that had won; it was we who had lost. We were not up to the +mark,--not yet. But New York is a many times cleaner and better city +to-day than it was ten years ago. Then I was able to grasp easily the +whole plan for wresting it from the neglect and indifference that had +put us where we were. It was chiefly, almost wholly, remedial in its +scope. Now it is preventive, constructive, and no ten men could gather +all the threads and hold them. We have made, are making headway, and no +Tammany has the power to stop us. She knows it, too, and is in such +frantic haste to fill her pockets while she has time that she has +abandoned her old ally, the tax rate, and the pretense of making bad +government cheap government. She is at this moment engaged in raising +taxes and assessments at one and the same time to an unheard-of figure, +while salaries are being increased lavishly on every hand. We can afford +to pay all she charges us for the lesson we are learning. If to that we +add common sense, we shall discover the bearings of it all without +trouble. Yesterday I picked up a book,--a learned disquisition on +government,--and read on the title-page, "Affectionately dedicated to +all who despise politics." That was not common sense. To win the battle +with the slum, we must not begin by despising politics. We have been +doing that too long. The politics of the slum is apt to be like the slum +itself, dirty. Then it must be cleaned. It is what the fight is about. +Politics is the weapon. We must learn to use it so as to cut straight +and sure. That is common sense, and the golden rule as applied to +Tammany. + +Some years ago, the United States government conducted an inquiry into +the slums of great cities. To its staff of experts was attached a +chemist, who gathered and isolated a lot of bacilli with fearsome Latin +names, in the tenements where he went. Among those he labeled were the +_Staphylococcus pyogenes albus_, the _Micrococcus fervidosus_, the +_Saccharomyces rosaceus_, and the _Bacillus buccalis fortuitus_. I made +a note of the names at the time, because of the dread with which they +inspired me. But I searched the collection in vain for the real bacillus +of the slum. It escaped science, to be identified by human sympathy and +a conscience-stricken community with that of ordinary human selfishness. +The antitoxin has been found, and is applied successfully. Since justice +has replaced charity on the prescription the patient is improving. And +the improvement is not confined to him; it is general. Conscience is not +a local issue in our day. A few years ago, a United States Senator +sought reëlection on the platform that the decalogue and the golden rule +were glittering generalities that had no place in politics, and lost. We +have not quite reached the millennium yet, but to-day a man is governor +in the Empire State who was elected on the pledge that he would rule by +the ten commandments. These are facts that mean much or little, +according to the way one looks at them. The significant thing is that +they are facts, and that, in spite of slipping and sliding, the world +moves forward, not backward. The poor we shall have always with us, but +the slum we need not have. These two do not rightfully belong together. +Their present partnership is at once poverty's worst hardship and our +worst fault. + + + + +II + +THE TENEMENT HOUSE BLIGHT + + +In a Stanton Street tenement, the other day, I stumbled upon a Polish +capmaker's home. There were other capmakers in the house, Russian and +Polish, but they simply "lived" there. This one had a home. The fact +proclaimed itself the moment the door was opened, in spite of the +darkness. The rooms were in the rear, gloomy with the twilight of the +tenement, although the day was sunny without, but neat, even cosy. It +was early, but the day's chores were evidently done. The teakettle sang +on the stove, at which a bright-looking girl of twelve, with a pale but +cheery face, and sleeves brushed back to the elbows, was busy poking up +the fire. A little boy stood by the window, flattening his nose against +the pane and gazing wistfully up among the chimney pots where a piece of +blue sky about as big as the kitchen could be made out. I remarked to +the mother that they were nice rooms. + +"Ah yes," she said, with a weary little smile that struggled bravely +with hope long deferred, "but it is hard to make a home here. We would +so like to live in the front, but we can't pay the rent." + +I knew the front with its unlovely view of the tenement street too well, +and I said a good word for the air shaft--yard or court it could not be +called, it was too small for that--which rather surprised myself. I had +found few virtues enough in it before. The girl at the stove had left +off poking the fire. She broke in the moment I finished, with eager +enthusiasm: "Why, they have the sun in there. When the door is opened +the light comes right in your face." + +"Does it never come here?" I asked, and wished I had not done so, as +soon as the words were spoken. The child at the window was listening, +with his whole hungry little soul in his eyes. + +Yes, it did, she said. Once every summer, for a little while, it came +over the houses. She knew the month and the exact hour of the day when +its rays shone into their home, and just the reach of its slant on the +wall. They had lived there six years. In June the sun was due. A +haunting fear that the baby would ask how long it was till June--it was +February then--took possession of me, and I hastened to change the +subject. Warsaw was their old home. They kept a little store there, and +were young and happy. Oh, it was a fine city, with parks and squares, +and bridges over the beautiful river,--and grass and flowers and birds +and soldiers, put in the girl breathlessly. She remembered. But the +children kept coming, and they went across the sea to give them a better +chance. Father made fifteen dollars a week, much money; but there were +long seasons when there was no work. She, the mother, was never very +well here,--she hadn't any strength; and the baby! She glanced at his +grave white face, and took him in her arms. The picture of the two, and +of the pale-faced girl longing back to the fields and the sunlight, in +their prison of gloom and gray walls, haunts me yet. I have not had the +courage to go back since. I recalled the report of an English army +surgeon, which I read years ago, on the many more soldiers that +died--were killed would be more correct--in barracks into which the sun +never shone than in those that were open to the light. + +The capmaker's case is the case of the nineteenth century, of +civilization, against the metropolis of America. The home, the family, +are the rallying points of civilization. But long since the tenements of +New York earned for it the ominous name of "the homeless city." In its +40,000 tenements its workers, more than half of the city's population, +are housed. They have no other chance. There are, indeed, wives and +mothers who, by sheer force of character, rise above their environment +and make homes where they go. Happily, there are yet many of them. But +the fact remains that hitherto their struggle has been growing ever +harder, and the issue more doubtful. + +The tenement itself, with its crowds, its lack of privacy, is the +greatest destroyer of individuality, of character. As its numbers +increase, so does "the element that becomes criminal for lack of +individuality and the self-respect that comes with it." Add the +shiftless and the weak who are turned out by the same process, and you +have its legitimate crop. In 1880 the average number of persons to each +dwelling in New York was 16.37; in 1890 it was 18.52. In 1895, according +to the police census, 21.2. The census of 1900 will show the crowding to +have gone on at an equal if not at a greater rate. That will mean that +so many more tenements have been built of the modern type, with four +families to the floor where once there were two. I shall not weary the +reader with many statistics. They are to be found, by those who want +them, in the census books and in the official records. I shall try to +draw from them their human story. But, as an instance of the unchecked +drift, let me quote here the case of the Tenth Ward, that East Side +district known as the most crowded in all the world. In 1880, when it +had not yet attained that bad eminence, it contained 47,554 persons, or +432.3 to the acre. In 1890 the census showed a population of 57,596, +which was 522 to the acre. The police census of 1895 found 70,168 +persons living in 1514 houses, which was 643.08 to the acre. Lastly, the +Health Department's census for the first half of 1898 gave a total of +82,175 persons living in 1201 tenements, with 313 inhabited buildings +yet to be heard from. This is the process of doubling up,--literally, +since the cause and the vehicle of it all is the double-decker +tenement,--which in the year 1895 had crowded a single block in that +ward at the rate of 1526 persons per acre, and one in the Eleventh Ward +at the rate of 1774.[1] It goes on not in the Tenth Ward or on the East +Side only, but throughout the city. When, in 1897, it was proposed to +lay out a small park in the Twenty-Second Ward, up on the far West Side, +it was shown that five blocks in that section, between Forty-Ninth and +Sixty-Second streets and Ninth and Eleventh avenues, had a population of +more than 3000 each. The block between Sixty-First and Sixty-Second +streets, Tenth and Eleventh avenues, harbored 3580, which meant 974.6 +persons to the acre. + +[Footnote 1: Police census of 1895: Block bounded by Canal, Hester, +Eldridge, and Forsyth streets: size 375 × 200, population 2628, rate per +acre 1526. Block bounded by Stanton, Houston, Attorney, and Ridge +streets: size 200 × 300, population 2244, rate per acre 1774.] + +If we have here to do with forces that are beyond the control of the +individual or the community, we shall do well at least to face the +facts squarely and know the truth. It is no answer to the charge that +New York's way of housing its workers is the worst in the world to say +that they are better off than they were where they came from. It is not +true, in most cases, as far as the home is concerned: a shanty is better +than a flat in a cheap tenement, any day. Even if it were true, it would +still be beside the issue. In Poland my capmaker counted for nothing. +Nothing was expected of him. Here he ranks, after a few brief years, +politically equal with the man who hires his labor. A citizen's duty is +expected of him, and home and citizenship are convertible terms. The +observation of the Frenchman who had watched the experiment of herding +two thousand human beings in eight tenement barracks in Paris, that the +result was the "exasperation of the tenant against society," is true the +world over. We have done as badly in New York. Social hatefulness is not +a good soil for citizenship to grow in, where political equality rules. + +Nor will the old lie about the tenants being wholly to blame cover the +ground. It has long been overworked in defense of landlord usury. +Doubtless there are bad tenants. In the matter of renting houses, as in +everything else, men have a trick of coming up to what is expected of +them, good or bad; but as a class the tenants have been shown all along +to be superior to their surroundings. "Better than the houses they live +in," said the first Tenement House Commission; and the second gave as +its verdict that "they respond quickly to improved conditions." That is +not an honest answer. The truth is that if we cannot check the indraught +to the cities, we can, if we choose, make homes for those who come, and +at a profit on the investment. Nothing has been more clearly +demonstrated in our day, and it is time that it should be said so that +everybody can understand. It is not a case of transforming human nature +in the tenant, but of reforming it in the landlord builder. It is a +plain question of the per cent. he is willing to take. + +So that we may get the capmaker's view and that of his fellow +tenants,--for, after all, that is the one that counts; the state and the +community are not nearly so much interested in the profits of the +landlord as in the welfare of the workers,--suppose we take a stroll +through a tenement house neighborhood and see for ourselves. We were in +Stanton Street. Let us start there, then, going east. Towering barracks +on either side, five, six stories high. Teeming crowds. Push-cart men +"moved on" by the policeman, who seems to exist only for the purpose. +Forsyth Street: there is a church on the corner, Polish and Catholic, a +combination that strikes one as queer here on the East Side, where +Polish has come to be synonymous with Jewish. I have cause to remember +that corner. A man killed his wife in this house, and was hanged for it. +Just across the street, on the stoop of that brown stone tenement, the +tragedy was reënacted the next year; only the murderer saved the county +trouble and expense by taking himself off, also. That other stoop in the +same row witnessed a suicide. Why do I tell you these things? Because +they are true. The policeman here will bear me out. They belong to the +ordinary setting of life in a crowd such as this. It is never so little +worth living, and therefore held so cheap along with the fierce, +unceasing battle that goes on to save it. You will go no further unless +I leave it out? Very well; I shall leave out the murder after we have +passed the block yonder. The tragedy of that is of a kind that comes too +close to the every-day life of tenement house people to be omitted. The +house caught fire in the night, and five were burned to death,--father, +mother, and three children. The others got out; why not they? They +stayed, it seems, to make sure none was left; they were not willing to +leave one behind, to save themselves. And then it was too late; the +stairs were burning. There was no proper fire escape. That was where the +murder came in; but it was not all chargeable to the landlord, nor even +the greater part. More than thirty years ago, in 1867, the state made it +law that the stairs in every tenement four stories high should be +fireproof, and forbade the storing of any inflammable material in such +houses. I do not know when the law was repealed, or if it ever was. I +only know that in 1892 the Fire Department, out of pity for the tenants +and regard for the safety of its own men, forced through an amendment to +the building law, requiring the stairs of the common type of five-story +tenements to be built of fireproof material, and that to-day they are of +wood, just as they always were. Only last spring I looked up the +Superintendent of Buildings and asked him what it meant. I showed him +the law, which said that the stairs should be "built of slow-burning +construction or fireproof material;" and he put his finger upon the +clause that follows, "as the Superintendent of Buildings shall decide." +The law gave him discretion, and that is how he used it. "Hard wood +burns slowly," said he. + +The fire of which I speak was a "cruller fire," if I remember rightly, +which is to say that it broke out in the basement bakeshop, where they +were boiling crullers (doughnuts) in fat, at four A. M., with a hundred +tenants asleep in the house above them. The fat went into the fire, and +the rest followed. I suppose that I had to do with a hundred such fires, +as a police reporter, before, under the protest of the Tenement House +Committee and the Good Government Clubs, the boiling of fat in tenement +bakeshops was forbidden. The chief of the Fire Department, in his +testimony before the committee, said that "tenements are erected mainly +with a view of returning a large income for the amount of capital +invested. It is only after a fire in which great loss of life occurs +that any interest whatever is taken in the safety of the occupants." The +Superintendent of Buildings, after such a fire in March, 1896, said that +there were thousands of tenement fire-traps in the city. My reporter's +notebook bears witness to the correctness of his statement, and it has +many blank leaves that are waiting to be put to that use yet. The +reckoning for eleven years showed that, of 35,844 fires in New York, +53.18 per cent. were in tenement houses, though they were only a little +more than 31 per cent. of all the buildings, and that 177 occupants were +killed, 523 maimed, and 625 rescued by the firemen. Their rescue cost +the lives of three of these brave men, and 453 were injured in the +effort. And when all that is said, not the half is told. A fire in the +night in one of those human beehives, with its terror and woe, is one of +the things that live in the recollection ever after as a terrible +nightmare. Yet the demonstration of the Tenement House Committee, that +to build tenements fireproof from the ground up would cost little over +ten per cent. more than is spent upon the firetrap, and would more than +return the interest on the extra outlay in the saving of insurance and +repairs, and in the better building every way, has found no echo in +legislation or in the practice of builders. That was the fire chief's +way to avoid "the great destruction of life;" but he warned the +committee that it would "meet with strong opposition from the different +interests, should legislation be requested." The interest of the man who +pays the rent will not be suspected in this, so he must have meant the +man who collects it. + +Here is a block of tenements inhabited by poor Jews. Most of the Jews +who live over here are poor; and the poorer they are, the higher rent do +they pay, and the more do they crowd to make it up between them. "The +destruction of the poor is their poverty." It is only the old story in a +new setting. The slum landlord's profits were always the highest. He +spends nothing for repairs, and lays the blame on the tenant. The +"district leader" saves him, in these days of Tammany rule come back, +unless he is on the wrong side of the political fence, in which case +the Sanitary Code comes handy to chase him into camp. A big "order" on +his house is a very effective way of making a tenement house landlord +discern political truth on the eve of an important election. Just before +the last, when the election of Theodore Roosevelt was threatened, the +sanitary force displayed such activity as it has not since, up to the +raid on the elevated roads, in the examination of tenements belonging +very largely, as it happened, to sympathizers with the gallant Rough +Rider's cause; and those who knew did not marvel much at the large vote +polled by the Tammany candidate in the old city. + +The halls of these tenements are dark. Under the law, there should be a +light burning, but it is one of the rarest things to find one. The thing +seems well-nigh impossible of accomplishment. Two years ago, when the +Good Government Clubs set about backing up the Board of Health in its +efforts to work out this reform, which comes close to being one of the +most necessary of all,--such untold mischief is abroad in the darkness +of these thoroughfares,--the sanitary police reported 12,000 tenement +halls unlighted by night, even, and brought them, by repeated orders, +down to less than 1000 in six months. I do not believe the light burns +in 1000 of them all to-day. It is so easy to put it out when the +policeman's back is turned, and save the gas. + +We had a curious instance at the time of the difficulties that sometimes +beset reform. Certain halls that were known to be dark were reported +sufficiently lighted by the policeman of the district, and it was +discovered that it was his standard that was vitiated. He himself lived +in a tenement, and was used to its gloom. So an order was issued +defining darkness to the sanitary police: if the sink in the hall could +be made out, and the slops overflowing on the floor, and if a baby could +be seen on the stairs, the hall was light; if, on the other hand, the +baby's shrieks were the first warning that it was being trampled upon, +the hall was dark. Some days later, the old question arose about an +Eldridge Street tenement. The policeman had reported the hall light +enough. The president of the Board of Health, to settle it once for all, +went over with me, to see for himself. The hall was very dark. He sent +for the policeman. + +"Did you see the sink in that hall?" he asked. + +The policeman said he did. + +"But it is pitch dark. How did you see it?" + +"I lit a match," said the policeman. + +Four families live on these floors, with Heaven knows how many children. +It was here the police commissioners were requested, in sober earnest, +some years ago, by a committee of very practical women philanthropists, +to have the children tagged, so as to save the policemen wear and tear +in taking them back and forth between the Eldridge Street police station +and headquarters, when they got lost. If tagged, they could be assorted +at once and taken to their homes. Incidentally, the city would save the +expense of many meals. It was shrewdly suspected that the little ones +were lost on purpose in a good many cases, as a way of getting them fed +at the public expense. + +That the children preferred the excitement of the police station, and +the distinction of a trip in charge of a brass-buttoned guardian, to +the Ludlow Street flat is easy enough to understand. A more unlovely +existence than that in one of these tenements it would be hard to +imagine. Everywhere is the stench of the kerosene stove that is forever +burning, serving for cooking, heating, and ironing alike, until the last +atom of oxygen is burned out of the close air. Oil is cheaper than coal. +The air shaft is too busy carrying up smells from below to bring any air +down, even if it is not hung full of washing in every story, as it +ordinarily is. Enterprising tenants turn it to use as a refrigerator as +well. There is at least a draught of air, such as it is. When fire +breaks out, this draught makes of the air shaft a flue through which the +fire roars fiercely to the roof, so transforming what was meant for the +good of the tenants into their greatest peril. The stuffy rooms seem as +if they were made for dwarfs. Most decidedly, there is not room to swing +the proverbial cat in any one of them. In one I helped the children, +last holiday, to set up a Christmas tree, so that a glimpse of something +that was not utterly sordid and mean might for once enter their lives. +Three weeks after, I found the tree standing yet in the corner. It was +very cold, and there was no fire in the room. "We were going to burn +it," said the little woman, whose husband was then in the insane asylum, +"and then I couldn't. It looked so kind o' cheery-like there in the +corner." My tree had borne the fruit I wished. + +It remained for the New York slum landlord to assess the exact value of +a ray of sunlight,--upon the tenant, of course. Here are two +back-to-back rear tenements, with dark bedrooms on the south. The flat +on the north gives upon a neighbor's yard, and a hole two feet square +has been knocked in the wall, letting in air and sunlight; little enough +of the latter, but what there is is carefully computed in the lease. Six +dollars for this flat, six and a half for the one with the hole in the +wall. Six dollars a year per ray. In half a dozen houses in this block +have I found the same rate maintained. The modern tenement on the corner +goes higher: for four front rooms, "where the sun comes right in your +face," seventeen dollars; for the rear flat of three rooms, larger and +better every other way, but always dark, like the capmaker's, eleven +dollars. From the landlord's point of view, this last is probably a +concession. But he is a landlord with a heart. His house is as good a +one as can be built on a twenty-five-foot lot. The man who owns the +corner building in Orchard Street, with the two adjoining tenements, has +no heart. In the depth of last winter, I found a family of poor Jews +living in a coop under his stairs, an abandoned piece of hallway, in +which their baby was born, and for which he made them pay eight dollars +a month. It was the most outrageous case of landlord robbery I had ever +come across, and it gave me sincere pleasure to assist the sanitary +policeman in curtailing his profits by even this much. The hall is not +now occupied. + +The Jews under the stairs had two children. The shoemaker in the cellar +next door has three. They were fighting and snarling like so many dogs +over the coarse food on the table before them, when we looked in. The +baby, it seems, was the cause of the row. He wanted it all. He was a +very dirty and a very fierce baby, and the other two children were no +match for him. The shoemaker grunted fretfully at his last, "Ach, he is +all de time hungry!" At the sight of the policeman, the young imp set up +such a howl that we beat a hasty retreat. The cellar "flat" was +undoubtedly in violation of law, but it was allowed to pass. In the main +hall, on the ground floor, we counted seventeen children. The facts of +life here suspend ordinary landlord prejudices to a certain extent. +Occasionally it is the tenant who suspends them. The policeman laughed +as he told me of the case of a mother who coveted a flat into which she +well knew her family would not be admitted; the landlord was particular. +She knocked, with a troubled face, alone. Yes, the flat was to let; had +she any children? The woman heaved a sigh. "Six, but they are all in +Greenwood." The landlord's heart was touched by such woe. He let her +have the flat. By night he was amazed to find a flock of half a dozen +robust youngsters domiciled under his roof. They had indeed been in +Greenwood; but they had come back from the cemetery to stay. And stay +they did, the rent being paid. + +High rents, slack work, and low wages go hand in hand in the tenements +as promoters of overcrowding. The rent is always one fourth of the +family income, often more. The fierce competition for a bare living cuts +down wages; and when loss of work is added, the only thing left is to +take in lodgers to meet the landlord's claim. The Jew usually takes them +singly, the Italian by families. The midnight visit of the sanitary +policeman discloses a state of affairs against which he feels himself +helpless. He has his standard: 400 cubic feet of air space for each +adult sleeper, 200 for a child. That in itself is a concession to the +practical necessities of the case. The original demand was for 600 feet. +But of 28,000 and odd tenants canvassed in New York, in the slumming +investigation prosecuted by the general government in 1894, 17,047 were +found to have less than 400 feet, and of these 5526 slept in +unventilated rooms with no windows. No more such rooms have been added +since; but there has come that which is worse. + +It was the boast of New York, till a few years ago, that at least that +worst of tenement depravities, the one-room house, too familiar in the +English slums, was practically unknown here. It is not so any longer. +The evil began in the old houses in Orchard and Allen streets, a bad +neighborhood, infested by fallen women and the thievish rascals who prey +upon their misery,--a region where the whole plan of humanity, if plan +there be in this disgusting mess, jars out of tune continually. The +furnished-room house has become an institution here, speeded on by a +conscienceless Jew who bought up the old buildings as fast as they came +into the market, and filled them with a class of tenants before whom +charity recoils, helpless and hopeless. When the houses were filled, the +crowds overflowed into the yard. In one case, I found, in midwinter, +tenants living in sheds built of odd boards and roof tin, and paying a +dollar a week for herding with the rats. One of them, a red-faced +German, was a philosopher after his kind. He did not trouble himself to +get up, when I looked in, but stretched himself in his bed,--it was high +noon,--responding to my sniff of disgust that it was "sehr schoen! ein +bischen kalt, aber was!" His neighbor, a white-haired old woman, begged, +trembling, not to be put out. She would not know where to go. It was +out of one of these houses that Fritz Meyer, the murderer, went to rob +the poorbox in the Redemptorist Church, the night when he killed +policeman Smith. The policeman surprised him at his work. In the room he +had occupied I came upon a brazen-looking woman with a black eye, who +answered the question of the officer, "Where did you get that shiner?" +with a laugh. "I ran up against the fist of me man," she said. Her +"man," a big, sullen lout, sat by, dumb. The woman answered for him that +he was a mechanic. + +"What does he work at?" snorted the policeman, restraining himself with +an effort from kicking the fellow. + +She laughed scornfully. "At the junk business." It meant that he was a +thief. + +Young men, with blotched faces and cadaverous looks, were loafing in +every room. They hung their heads in silence. The women turned their +faces away at the sight of the uniform. They cling to these wretches, +who exploit their starved affections for their own ease, with a grip of +desperation. It is their last hold. Women have to love something. It is +their deepest degradation that they must love these. Even the wretches +themselves feel the shame of it, and repay them by beating and robbing +them, as their daily occupation. A poor little baby in one of the rooms +gave a shuddering human touch to it all. + +The old houses began it, as they began all the tenement mischief that +has come upon New York. But the opportunity that was made by the +tenant's need was not one to be neglected. In some of the newer +tenements, with their smaller rooms, the lodger is by this time provided +for in the plan, with a special entrance from the hall. "Lodger" comes, +by an easy transition, to stand for "family." Only the other night I +went with the sanitary police on their midnight inspection through a row +of Elizabeth Street tenements which I had known since they were built, +fifteen or sixteen years ago. That is the neighborhood in which the +recent Italian immigrants crowd. In the house which we selected for +examination, in all respects the type of the rest, we found forty-three +families where there should have been sixteen. Upon each floor were four +flats, and in each flat three rooms that measured respectively 14 x 11, +7 x 11, and 7 x 8-1/2 feet. In only one flat did we find a single +family. In three there were two to each. In the other twelve each room +had its own family living and sleeping there. They cooked, I suppose, at +the one stove in the kitchen, which was the largest room. In one big bed +we counted six persons, the parents and four children. Two of them lay +crosswise at the foot of the bed, or there would not have been room. A +curtain was hung before the bed in each of the two smaller rooms, +leaving a passageway from the hall to the main room. The rent for the +front flats was twelve dollars; for that in the rear ten dollars. The +social distinctions going with the advantage of location were rigidly +observed, I suppose. The three steps across a tenement hall, from the +front to "the back," are often a longer road than from Ludlow Street to +Fifth Avenue. + +They were sweaters' tenements. But I shall keep that end of the story +until I come to speak of the tenants. The houses I have in mind now. +They were Astor leasehold property, and I had seen them built upon the +improved plan of 1879, with air shafts and all that. There had not been +water in the tenements for a month then, we were told by the one tenant +who spoke English that could be understood. The cold snap had locked the +pipes. Fitly enough, the lessee was an undertaker, an Italian himself, +who combined with his business of housing his people above and below the +ground that of the padrone, to let no profit slip. He had not taken the +trouble to make many or recent repairs. The buildings had made a fair +start; they promised well. But the promise had not been kept. In their +premature decay they were distinctly as bad as the worst. I had the +curiosity to seek out the agent, the middleman, and ask him why they +were so. He shrugged his shoulders. With such tenants nothing could be +done, he said. I have always held that Italians are most manageable, and +that, with all the surface indications to the contrary, they are really +inclined to cleanliness, if cause can be shown, and I told him so. He +changed the subject diplomatically. No doubt it was with him simply a +question of the rent. They might crowd and carry on as they pleased, +once that was paid; and they did. It used to be the joke of Elizabeth +Street that when the midnight police came, the tenants would keep them +waiting outside, pretending to search for the key, until the surplus +population of men had time to climb down the fire escape. When the +police were gone they came back. We surprised them all in bed. + +Like most of the other tenements we have come across on our trip, these +were double-deckers. That is the type of tenement that is responsible +for the crowding that goes on unchecked. It is everywhere replacing the +older barracks, as they rot or are torn down. + +This double-decker was thus described by the Tenement House Committee of +1894: "It is the one hopeless form of tenement construction. It cannot +be well ventilated, it cannot be well lighted; it is not safe in case of +fire. It is built on a lot 25 feet wide by 100 or less in depth, with +apartments for four families in each story. This necessitates the +occupation of from 86 to 90 per cent. of the lot's depth. The stairway, +made in the centre of the house, and the necessary walls and partitions +reduce the width of the middle rooms (which serve as bedrooms for at +least two people each) to 9 feet each at the most, and a narrow light +and air shaft, now legally required in the centre of each side wall, +still further lessens the floor space of these middle rooms. Direct +light is only possible for the rooms at the front and rear. The middle +rooms must borrow what light they can from dark hallways, the shallow +shafts, and the rear rooms. Their air must pass through other rooms or +the tiny shafts, and cannot but be contaminated before it reaches them. +A five-story house of this character contains apartments for eighteen or +twenty families, a population frequently amounting to 100 people, and +sometimes increased by boarders or lodgers to 150 or more." + +The committee, after looking in vain through the slums of the Old World +cities for something to compare the double-deckers with, declared that, +in their setting, the separateness and sacredness of home life were +interfered with, and evils bred, physical and moral, that "conduce to +the corruption of the young." The statement needs no argument to +convince. + +Yet it is for these that the "interests" of which the fire chief spoke +rush into battle at almost every session of the legislature, whenever a +step, no matter how short and conservative, is to be taken toward their +improvement. No winter has passed, since the awakening conscience of the +people of New York city manifested itself in a desire to better the lot +of the other half, that has not seen an assault made, in one shape or +another, on the structure of tenement house law built up with such +anxious solicitude. Once a bill to exempt from police supervision, by +withdrawing them from the tenement house class, the very worst of the +houses, whose death rate threatened the community, was sneaked through +the legislature all unknown, and had reached the executive before the +alarm was sounded. The governor, put upon his guard, returned the bill, +with the indorsement that he was unable to understand what could have +prompted a measure that seemed to have reason and every argument against +it, and none for it. But the motive is not so obscure, after all. It is +the same old one of profit without conscience. It took from the Health +Department the supervision of the light, ventilation, and plumbing of +the tenements, which by right belonged there, and put it in charge of a +compliant Building Department, "for the convenience of architects and +their clients, and the saving of time and expense to them." For the +convenience of the architect's client, the builder, the lot was +encroached upon, until of one big block which the Tenement House +Committee measured only 7 per cent. was left uncovered for the air to +struggle through; 93 per cent. of it was covered with brick and mortar. +Rear tenements, to the number of nearly 100, have been condemned as +"slaughter houses," with good reason, but this block was built +practically solid. The average of space covered in 34 tenement blocks +was shown to be 78.13 per cent. The law allowed only 65. The +"discretion" that pens tenants in a burning tenement with stairs of wood +for the builder's "convenience" cut down the chance of life of their +babies unmoved. Sunlight and air mean just that, where three thousand +human beings are packed into a single block. That was why the matter was +given into the charge of the health officials, when politics was yet +kept out of their work. + +Of such kind are the interests that oppose betterment of the worker's +hard lot in New York; that dictated the appointment by Tammany of a +commission composed of builders to revise its code of building laws, and +that sneer at the "laughable results of the late Tenement House +Committee." Those results made for the health and happiness and safety +of a million and a half of souls, and were accounted, on every humane +ground, the longest step forward that had yet been taken by this +community. For the old absentee landlord, who did not know what mischief +was afoot, we have got the speculative builder, who does know, but does +not care so long as he gets his pound of flesh. Half of the just laws +that have been passed for the relief of the people he has paralyzed with +his treacherous discretion clause, carefully nursed in the school of +practical politics to which he gives faithful adherence. The thing has +been the curse of our city from the day when the earliest struggle +toward better things began. Among the first manifestations of that was +the prohibition of soap factories below Grand Street by the act of 1797, +which created a Board of Health with police powers. The act was passed +in February, to take effect in July; but long before that time the same +legislature had amended it by giving the authorities discretion in the +matter. And the biggest soap factory of them all is down there to this +day, and is even now stirring up a rumpus among the latest immigrants, +the Syrians, who have settled about it. No doubt it is all a question of +political education; but are not a hundred years enough to settle this +much, that compromise is out of place where the lives of the people are +at stake, and that it is time our years of "discretion" were numbered? + +And, please God, the time is at hand. Here, set in its frame of swarming +tenements, is a wide open space, some time, when enough official red +tape has been unwound, to be a park, with flowers and grass and birds to +gladden the hearts of those to whom such things have been as tales that +are told, all these dreary years, and with a playground in which the +children of yonder big school may roam at will, undismayed by landlord +or policeman. Not all the forces of reaction can put back the barracks +that were torn down as one of the "laughable results" of that very +Tenement House Committee's work, or restore to the undertaker his +profits from Bone Alley of horrid memory. It was the tenant's turn to +laugh, that time. Down half a dozen blocks, among even denser swarms, is +another such plot, where football and a skating pond are being planned +by the children's friends. We shall hear the story of these yet, and +rejoice that the day of reckoning is coming for the builder without a +soul. Till then let him deck the fronts of his tenements with bravery of +plate glass and brass to hide the darkness within. He has done his +worst. + +We can go no further. Yonder lies the river. A full mile we have come, +through unbroken ranks of tenements with their mighty, pent-up +multitudes. Here they seem, with a common impulse, to overflow into the +street. From corner to corner it is crowded with girls and children +dragging babies nearly as big as themselves, with desperate endeavor to +lose nothing of the show. There is a funeral in the block. Unnumbered +sewing-machines cease for once their tireless rivalry with the flour +mill in the next block, that is forever grinding in a vain effort to +catch up. Heads are poked from windows. On the stoops hooded and shawled +figures have front seats. The crowd is hardly restrained by the +policeman and the undertaker in holiday mourning, who clear a path by +force to the plumed hearse. The eager haste, the frantic rush to +see,--what does it not tell of these starved lives, of the quality of +their aims and ambitions? The mill clatters loudly: there is one mouth +less to fill. In the midst of it all, with clamor of urgent gong, the +patrol wagon rounds the corner, carrying two policemen precariously +perched upon a struggling "drunk," a woman. The crowd scatters, +following the new sensation. The tragedies of death and life in the slum +have met together. + +Many a mile I might lead you along these rivers, east and west, through +the island of Manhattan, and find little else than we have seen. The +great crowd is yet below Fourteenth Street, but the northward march +knows no slackening of pace. As the tide sets uptown, it reproduces +faithfully the scenes of the older wards, though with less of their +human interest than here where the old houses, in all their ugliness, +have yet some imprint of the individuality of their tenants. Only on +feast days does Little Italy, in Harlem, recall the Bend when it put on +holiday attire. Anything more desolate and disheartening than the +unending rows of tenements, all alike and all equally repellent, of the +uptown streets, it is hard to imagine. Hell's Kitchen in its ancient +wickedness was picturesque, at least, with its rocks and its goats and +shanties. Since the negroes took possession it is only dull, except +when, as happened last summer, the remnant of the Irish settlers make a +stand against the intruders. Vain hope! Perpetual eviction is their +destiny. Negro, Italian, and Jew, biting the dust with many a bruised +head under the Hibernian's stalwart fist, resistlessly drive him before +them, nevertheless, out of house and home. The landlord pockets the gate +money. The old robbery still goes on. Where the negro pitches his tent, +he pays more rent than his white neighbor next door, and is a better +tenant. And he is good game forever. He never buys the tenement, as the +Jew or the Italian is likely to do, when he has scraped up money enough +to reënact, after his own fashion, the trick taught him by his +oppressor. The black column has reached the hundredth street on the East +Side, and the sixties on the West,[2] and there for the present it +halts. Jammed between Africa, Italy, and Bohemia, the Irishman has +abandoned the East Side uptown. Only west of Central Park does he yet +face his foe, undaunted in defeat as in victory. The local street +nomenclature, in which the directory has no hand,--Nigger Row, Mixed Ale +Flats, etc.,--indicates the hostile camps with unerring accuracy. + +[Footnote 2: There is an advanced outpost of blacks as far up as One +Hundred and Forty-Fifth Street, but the main body lingers yet among the +sixties.] + +Uptown or downtown, as the tenements grow taller, the thing that is +rarest to find is the home of the olden days, even as it was in the +shanty on the rocks. "No home, no family, no morality, no manhood, no +patriotism!" said the old Frenchman. Seventy-seven per cent. of their +young prisoners, say the managers of the state reformatory, have no +moral sense, or next to none. "Weakness, not wickedness, ails them," +adds the prison chaplain; no manhood, that is to say. Years ago, roaming +through the British Museum, I came upon an exhibit that riveted my +attention as nothing else had. It was a huge stone arm, torn from the +shoulder of some rock image, with doubled fist and every rigid muscle +instinct with angry menace. Where it came from or what was its story I +do not know. I did not ask. It was its message to us I was trying to +read. I had been spending weary days and nights in the slums of London, +where hatred grew, a noxious crop, upon the wreck of the home. Lying +there, mute and menacing, the great fist seemed to me like a shadow +thrown from the gray dawn of the race into our busy day with a purpose, +a grim, unheeded warning. What was it? In the slum the question haunts +me yet. They perished, the empires those rock-hewers built, and the +governments reared upon their ruins are long since dead and forgotten. +They were born to die, for they were not built upon human happiness, but +upon human terror and greed. We built ours upon the bed rock, and its +cornerstone is the home. With this bitter mockery of it that makes the +slum, can it be that the warning is indeed for us? + + + + +III + +THE TENEMENT: CURING ITS BLIGHT + + +I stood at Seven Dials and heard the policeman's account of what it used +to be. Seven Dials is no more like the slum of old than is the Five +Points to-day. The conscience of London wrought upon the one as the +conscience of New York upon the other. A mission house, a children's +refuge, two big schools, and, hard by, a public bath and a wash house +stand as the record of the battle with the slum, which, with these +forces in the field, has but one ending. The policeman's story rambled +among the days when things were different. Then it was dangerous for an +officer to go alone there at night. + +Around the corner there came from one of the side streets a procession +with banners, parading in honor and aid of some church charity. We +watched it pass. In it marched young men and boys with swords and +battle-axes, and upon its outskirts skipped a host of young roughs--so +one would have called them but for the evidence of their honest +employment--who rattled collection boxes, reaping a harvest of pennies +from far and near. I looked at the battle-axes and the collection boxes, +and thought of forty years ago. Where were the Seven Dials of that day, +and the men who gave it its bad name? I asked the policeman. + +"They were druv into decency, sor," he said, and answered from his own +experience the question ever asked by faint-hearted philanthropists. "My +father, he done duty here afore me in '45. The worst dive was where that +church stands. It was always full of thieves,"--whose sons, I added +mentally, have become collectors for the church. The one fact was a +whole chapter on the slum. + +London's way with the tenant we adopted at last in New York with the +slum landlord. He was "druv into decency." We had to. Moral suasion had +been stretched to the limit. The point had been reached where one +knock-down blow outweighed a bushel of arguments. It was all very well +to build model tenements as object lessons to show that the thing could +be done; it had become necessary to enforce the lesson by demonstrating +that the community had power to destroy houses which were a menace to +its life. The rear tenements were chosen for this purpose. + +They were the worst as they were the first of New York's tenements. The +double-deckers of which I have spoken had, with all their evils, at +least this to their credit, that their death rate was not nearly as high +as that of the old houses. That was not because of any virtue inherent +in the double-deckers, but because the earlier tenements were old, and +built in a day that knew nothing of sanitary restrictions, and cared +less. Hence the showing that the big tenements had much the lowest +mortality. The death rate does not sound the depths of tenement house +evils, but it makes a record that is needed when it comes to attacking +property rights. The mortality of the rear tenements had long been a +scandal. They are built in the back yard, generally back to back with +the rear buildings on abutting lots. If there is an open space between +them, it is never more than a slit a foot or so wide, and gets to be +the receptacle of garbage and filth of every kind; so that any opening +made in these walls for purposes of ventilation becomes a source of +greater danger than if there were none. The last count that was made, in +1898, showed that among the 40,958 tenements in New York there were +still 2379 rear houses left. Where they are the death rate rises, for +reasons that are apparent. The sun cannot reach them. They are damp and +dark, and the tenants, who are always the poorest and most crowded, live +"as in a cage open only toward the front," said the Tenement House +Committee. A canvass made of the mortality records by Dr. Roger S. +Tracy, the registrar of records, showed that while in the First Ward +(the oldest), for instance, the death rate in houses standing singly on +the lot was 29.03 per 1000 of the living, where there were rear houses +it rose to 61.97. The infant death rate is a still better test: that +rose from 109.58 in the single tenements of the same ward to 204.54 +where there were rear houses. One in every five babies had to die, that +is to say; the house killed it. No wonder the committee styled the rear +tenements "slaughter houses," and called upon the legislature to root +them out, and with them every old, ramshackle, disease-breeding tenement +in the city. + +A law which is in substance a copy of the English act for destroying +slum property was passed in the spring of 1895. It provides for the +seizure of buildings that are dangerous to the public health or unfit +for human habitation, and their destruction upon proper proof, with +compensation to the owner on a sliding scale down to the point of entire +unfitness, when he is entitled only to the value of the material in his +house. Up to that time, the only way to get rid of such a house had been +to declare it a nuisance under the sanitary code; but as the city could +not very well pay for the removal of a nuisance, to order it down seemed +too much like robbery; so the owner was allowed to keep it. It takes +time and a good many lives to grow a sentiment such as this law +expressed. The Anglo-Saxon respect for vested rights is strong in us, +also. I remember going through a ragged school in London, once, and +finding the eyes of the children in the infant class red and sore. +Suspecting some contagion, I made inquiries, and was told that a collar +factory next door was the cause of the trouble. The fumes from it +poisoned the children's eyes. + +"And you allow it to stay, and let this thing go on?" I asked, in +wonder. + +The superintendent shrugged his shoulders. "It is their factory," he +said. + +I was on the point of saying something that might not have been polite, +seeing that I was a guest, when I remembered that, in the newspaper +which I carried in my pocket, I had just been reading a plea of some +honorable M. P. for a much-needed reform in the system of counsel fees, +then being agitated in the House of Commons. The reply of the solicitor +general had made me laugh. He was inclined to agree with the honorable +member, but still preferred to follow precedent by referring the matter +to the Inns of Court. Quite incidentally, he mentioned that the matter +had been hanging fire in the House two hundred years. It seemed very +English to me then; but when we afterward came to tackle our rear +tenements, and in the first batch there was a row which I knew to have +been picked out by the sanitary inspector, twenty-five years before, as +fit only to be destroyed, I recognized that we were kin, after all. + +[Illustration: THE MOTT STREET BARRACKS] + +That was Gotham Court. It was first on the list, and the Mott Street +Barracks came next, when, as executive officer of the Good Government +Clubs, I helped the Board of Health put the law to the test the +following year. The Health Department kept a list of 66 old houses, with +a population of 5460 tenants, in which there had been 1313 deaths in a +little over five years (1889-94). From among them we picked our lot, and +the department drove the tenants out. The owners went to law, one and +all; but, to their surprise and dismay, the courts held with the health +officers. The moral effect was instant and overwhelming. Rather than +keep up the fight, with no rent coming in, the landlords surrendered at +discretion. In consideration of this, compensation was allowed them at +the rate of about a thousand dollars a house, although they were really +entitled only to the value of the old material. The buildings all came +under the head of "wholly unfit." Gotham Court, with its sixteen +buildings, in which, thirty-five years ago, a health inspector counted +146 cases of sickness, including "all kinds of infectious disease," was +bought for $19,750, and Mullen's Court, adjoining, for $7251. They had +been under civilized management since, but nothing decent could be made +out of them. To show the character of all, let two serve; in each case +it is the official record, upon which seizure was made, that is +quoted:-- + +No. 98 Catherine Street: "The floor in the apartments and the wooden +steps leading to the second-floor apartment are broken, loose, saturated +with filth. The roof and eaves gutters leak, rendering the apartments +wet. The two apartments on the first floor consist of one room each, in +which the tenants are compelled to cook, eat, and sleep. The back walls +are defective; the house wet and damp, and unfit for human habitation. +It robs the surrounding houses of light." + +"The sunlight never enters" was the constant refrain. + +No. 17 Sullivan Street: "Occupied by the lowest whites and negroes, +living together. The houses are decayed from cellar to garret, and +filthy beyond description,--the filthiest, in fact, we have ever seen. +The beams, the floors, the plaster on the walls, where there is any +plaster, are rotten and alive with vermin. They are a menace to the +public health, and cannot be repaired. Their annual death rate in five +years was 41.38." + +The sunlight enters where these stood, at all events, and into 58 other +yards that once were plague spots. Of 94 rear tenements seized that +year, 60 have been torn down, 33 of them voluntarily by the owners; 29 +were remodeled and allowed to stand, chiefly as workshops; 5 other +houses were standing empty, and yielding no rent, in March, 1899. The +worst of them all, the Mott Street Barracks, are yet in the courts; but +all the judges and juries in the land have no power to put them back. It +is a case of "They can't put you in jail for that"--"Yes, but I am in +jail." They are gone, torn down under the referee's decision that they +ought to go, before the Appellate Division called a halt. In 1888 I +counted 360 tenants in these tenements, front and rear, all Italians, +and the infant death rate of the Barracks that year was 325 per 1000. +There were forty babies, and one in three of them had to die. The +general infant death rate for the whole tenement house population that +year was 88.38. In the four years following, during which the population +and the death rate of the houses were both reduced with an effort, +fifty-one funerals went out of the Barracks. With entire fitness, a +cemetery corporation held the mortgage upon the property. The referee +allowed it the price of opening one grave, in the settlement, gave one +dollar to the lessee and one hundred and ten dollars to the landlord, +who refused to collect, and took his case to the Court of Appeals, where +it is to be argued this summer. The only interest that attaches to it, +since the real question has been decided by the wrecker ahead of time, +is the raising of the constitutional point, perchance, and the issue of +that is not doubtful. The law has been repeatedly upheld, and in +Massachusetts, where similar action has been taken since, the +constitutionality of it has in no case been attacked, so far as I know. + +I have said before that I do not believe in paying the slum landlord +for taking his hand off our throats, when we have got the grip on him in +turn. Mr. Roger Foster, who as a member of the Tenement House Committee +drew the law, and as counsel for the Health Department fought the +landlords successfully in the courts, holds to the opposite view. I am +bound to say that instances turned up in which it did seem a hardship to +deprive the owners of even such property. I remember especially a +tenement in Roosevelt Street, which was the patrimony and whole estate +of two children. With the rear house taken away, the income from the +front would not be enough to cover the interest on the mortgage. It was +one of those things that occasionally make standing upon abstract +principle so very uncomfortable. I confess I never had the courage to +ask what was done in their case. I know that the tenement went, and I +hope--Well, never mind what I hope. It has nothing to do with the case. +The house is down, and the main issue decided upon its merits. + +In the 94 tenements (counting the front houses in; they cannot be +separated from the rear tenements in the death registry) there were in +five years 956 deaths, a rate of 62.9 at a time when the general city +death rate was 24.63. It was the last and heaviest blow aimed at the +abnormal mortality of a city that ought, by reason of many advantages, +to be one of the healthiest in the world. With clean streets, pure milk, +medical school inspection, antitoxin treatment of deadly diseases, and +better sanitary methods generally; with the sunlight let into its slums, +and its worst plague spots cleaned out, the death rate of New York came +down from 26.32 per 1000 inhabitants in 1887 to 19.53 in 1897. Inasmuch +as a round half million was added to its population within the ten +years, it requires little figuring to show that the number whose lives +were literally saved by reform would people a city of no mean +proportions. The extraordinary spell of hot weather, two years ago, +brought out the full meaning of this. While many were killed by +sunstroke, the population as a whole was shown to have acquired, in +better hygienic surroundings, a much greater power of resistance. It +yielded slowly to the heat. Where two days had been sufficient, in +former years, to send the death rate up, it now took five; and the +infant mortality remained low throughout the dreadful trial. Perhaps the +substitution of beer for whiskey as a summer drink had something to do +with it; but Colonel Waring's broom and unpolitical sanitation had more. +Since it spared him so many voters, the politician ought to have been +grateful for this; but he was not. Death rates are not as good political +arguments as tax rates, we found out. In the midst of it all, a +policeman whom I knew went to his Tammany captain to ask if Good +Government Clubs were political clubs within the meaning of the law, +which prohibits policemen from joining such. The answer he received set +me to thinking: "Yes, the meanest, worst kind of political clubs, they +are." Yet they had done nothing worse than to save the babies, the +captain's with the rest. + +The landlord read the signs better. He learned his lesson quickly. All +over the city, he made haste to set his house to rights, lest it be +seized or brought to the bar in other ways. The Good Government Clubs +did not rest content with their first victory. They made war upon the +dark hall in the double-decker, and upon the cruller bakery. They +opened small parks, exposed the abuses of the civil courts, the "poor +man's courts," urged on the building of new schools, compelled the +cleaning of the Tombs prison and hastened the demolition of the wicked +old pile, and took a hand in evolving a sensible and humane system of +dealing with the young vagrants who were going to waste on free soup. +The proposition to establish a farm colony for their reclamation was met +with the challenge at Albany that "we have had enough reform in New York +city," and, as the event proved, for the time being we had really gone +as far as we could. But even that was a good long way. Some things had +been nailed that could never again be undone; and hand in hand with the +effort to destroy had gone another to build up, that promised to set us +far enough ahead to appeal at last successfully to the self-interest of +the builder, if not to his humanity; or, failing that, to compel him to +decency. If that promise has not been kept, the end is not yet. I +believe it will be kept. + +The movement for reform, in the matter of housing the people, had +proceeded upon a clearly outlined plan that apportioned to each of +several forces its own share of the work. At a meeting held under the +auspices of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, +early in the days of the movement, the field had been gone over +thoroughly. To the Good Government Clubs fell the task, as already set +forth, of compelling the enforcement of the existing tenement house +laws. D. O. Mills, the philanthropic banker, declared his purpose to +build hotels which should prove that a bed and lodging as good as any +could be furnished to the great army of homeless men at a price that +would compete with the cheap lodging houses, and yet yield a profit to +the owner. On behalf of a number of well-known capitalists, who had been +identified with the cause of tenement house reform for years, Robert +Fulton Cutting, the president of the Association for Improving the +Condition of the Poor, offered to build homes for the working people +that should be worthy of the name, on a large scale. A company was +formed, and chose for its president Dr. Elgin R. L. Gould, author of the +government report on the Housing of the Working People, the standard +work on the subject. A million dollars were raised by public +subscription, and operations were begun at once. + +Two ideas were kept in mind as fundamental: one, that charity that will +not pay will not stay; the other, that nothing can be done with the +twenty-five-foot lot. It is the primal curse of our housing system, and +any effort toward better things must reckon with it first. Nineteen lots +on Sixty-Eighth and Sixty-Ninth streets, west of Tenth Avenue, were +purchased of Mrs. Alfred Corning Clark, who took one tenth of the +capital stock of the City and Suburban Homes Company; and upon these was +erected the first block of tenements. This is the neighborhood toward +which the population has been setting with ever increasing congestion. +Already in 1895 the Twenty-Second Ward contained nearly 200,000 souls. +Between Forty-Ninth and Sixty-Second streets, west of Ninth Avenue, +there are at least five blocks with more than 3000 tenants in each, and +the conditions of the notorious Tenth Ward are certain to be reproduced +here, if indeed they are not exceeded. In the Fifteenth Assembly +District, some distance below, but on the same line, the first +sociological canvass of the Federation of Churches had found the +churches, schools, and other educational agencies marshaling a frontage +of 756 feet on the street, while the saloon fronts stretched themselves +over nearly a mile; so that, said the compiler of these pregnant facts, +"saloon social ideals are minting themselves in the minds of the people +at the ratio of seven saloon thoughts to one educational thought." It +would not have been easy to find a spot better fitted for the experiment +of restoring to the home its rights. + +[Illustration: ALFRED CORNING CLARK BUILDINGS + +_Model Tenements of City and Suburban Homes Co._] + +The Alfred Corning Clark Buildings, as they were called in recognition +of the support of this public-spirited woman, have been occupied a year. +When I went through them, the other day, I found all but five of the 373 +apartments they contain occupied, and a very large waiting list of +applicants for whom there was no room. The doctor alone, of all the +tenants, had moved away, disappointed. He had settled on the estate, +hoping to build up a practice among so many; but he could not make a +living. The plan of the buildings, for which Ernest Flagg, a young +and energetic architect, with a very practical interest in the welfare +of the Other Half, has the credit, seems to me to realize the ideal of +making homes under a common roof. The tenants appeared to take the same +view of it. They were a notably contented lot. Their only objection was +to the use of the common tubs in the basement laundry,--a sign that, to +my mind, was rather favorable than otherwise, though it argued ill for +the scheme of public wash houses on the Glasgow plan that has seemed so +promising. They were selected tenants as to trustworthiness and +desirability on that score, but they were all of the tenement house +class. The rents are a little lower than for much poorer quarters in the +surrounding tenements. The houses are built around central courts, with +light and air in abundance, with fireproof stairs and steam-heated +halls. There is not a dark passage anywhere. Within, there is entire +privacy for the tenant; the partitions are deadened, so that sound is +not transmitted from one apartment to another. Without, the houses have +none of the discouraging barrack look. The architecture is distinctly +pleasing. The few and simple rules laid down by the management have been +readily complied with, as making for the benefit of all. A woman +collects the rents, which are paid weekly in advance. The promise that +the property will earn the five per cent. to which the company limits +its dividends seems certain to be kept. There is nothing in sight to +prevent it, everything to warrant the prediction. + +The capital stock has since been increased to $2,000,000, and the +erection has been begun of a new block of buildings in East Sixty-Fourth +Street, within hail of Battle Row, of anciently warlike memory. James E. +Ware & Son, the architects who, in the competition of 1879, won the +prize for the improved tenements that marked the first departure from +the boxlike barracks of old, drew the plans, embodying all the good +features of the Clark Buildings with attractions of their own. A +suburban colony is being developed by the company, in addition. It is +not the least promising feature of its work that a very large proportion +of its shareholders are workingmen, who have invested their savings in +the enterprise, thus bearing witness to their faith and interest in it. +Of the entire number of shareholders at the time of the first annual +report, forty-five per cent, held less than ten shares each. + +The success of these and previous efforts at the building of model +tenements has had the desired effect of encouraging other attempts in +the same direction. They represent the best that can be done in fighting +the slum within the city. Homewood, the City and Suburban Homes +Company's settlement in the country, stands for the way out that must +eventually win the fight. That is the track that must be followed, and +will be when we have found in rapid transit the key to the solution of +our present perplexities. "In the country" hardly describes the site of +the colony. It is within the Greater City, on Long Island, hardly an +hour's journey by trolley from the City Hall, and only a short walk from +the bay. Here the company has built a hundred cottages, and has room for +two or three hundred more. Of the hundred houses, seventy-two had been +sold when I was there last winter. They are handsome and substantial +little houses, the lower story of brick, the upper of timber and +stucco, each cottage standing in its own garden. The purchaser pays for +the property in monthly payments extending over twenty years. A plan of +life insurance, which protects the family and the company alike in the +event of the death of the bread-winner, is included in the arrangement. +The price of the cottages which so far have found owners has averaged +about $3100, and the monthly installment, including the insurance +premium, a trifle over $25. It follows that the poorest have not moved +to Homewood. Its settlers include men with an income of $1200 or $1500 a +year,--policemen, pilots, letter carriers, clerks, and teachers. This is +as it should be. They represent the graduating class, as it were, from +the city crowds. It is the province of the philanthropic tenement to +prepare the next lot for moving up and out. Any attempt to hasten the +process by taking a short cut could result only in failure and +disappointment. The graduating class is large enough, however, to +guarantee that it will not be exhausted by one Homewood. Before the +houses were contracted for, without advertising or effort of any kind to +make the thing known, more than eight hundred wage earners had asked to +have their names put on the books as applicants for suburban homes. + +Others had built model tenements and made them pay, but it was left to +Mr. D. O. Mills to break ground in the field which Lord Rowton had +filled with such signal success in London. The two Mills Houses, in +Bleecker and Rivington streets, are as wide a departure as could well be +imagined from the conventional type of lodging houses in New York. They +are large and beautiful structures, which, for the price of a cot in one +of the Bowery barracks, furnish their lodgers with as good a bed in a +private room as the boarder in the Waldorf-Astoria enjoys. Indeed, it is +said to be the very same in make and quality. There are baths without +stint, smoking and writing rooms and games, and a free library; a +laundry for those who can pay for having their washing done, and a +separate one for such as prefer to do it themselves. There is a +restaurant in the basement, in which a regular dinner of good quality is +served at fifteen cents. The night's lodging is twenty cents. The +dearest Bowery lodging houses charge twenty-five cents. The bedrooms +are necessarily small, but they are clean and comfortable, well lighted +and heated. The larger house, No. 1, in Bleecker Street, has room for +1554 guests; No. 2, in Rivington Street, for 600. Though this represents +more than twelve per cent, of the capacity of all the cheap lodging +houses in the city, both have been filled since they were opened, and +crowds have often been turned away. The Bowery "hotels" have felt the +competition. Their owners deny it, but the fact is apparent in efforts +at improvements with which they were not justly chargeable before. Only +the lowest, the ten-cent houses, are exempt from this statement. These +attract a class of custom for which the Mills Houses do not compete. The +latter are intended for the large number of decent mechanics, laborers, +and men of small means, hunting for work, who are always afloat in a +large city, and who neither seek nor wish charity. The plan and purpose +of the builder cannot be better put than in his own words at the opening +of the first house. + +"No patron of the Mills Hotel," he said, "will receive more than he pays +for, unless it be my hearty goodwill and good wishes. It is true that I +have devoted thought, labor, and capital to a very earnest effort to +help him, but only by enabling him to help himself. In doing the work on +so large a scale, and in securing the utmost economies in purchases and +in administration, I hope to give him a larger equivalent for his money +than has hitherto been possible. He can, without scruple, permit me to +offer him this advantage; but he will think better of himself, and will +be a more self-reliant, manly man and a better citizen, if he knows that +he is honestly paying for what he gets." + +Mr. Mills's faith that the business of housing the homeless crowds in +decency and comfort could be made to pay just as well as that of housing +families in model tenements has been justified. Besides providing a fund +sufficient for deterioration and replacement, the two houses have made a +clear three per cent. profit on the investment of $1,500,000 which they +represent. Beyond this, they have borne, and will bear increasingly, +their own hand in settling with the saloon, which had no rival in the +cheerlessness of the cheap lodging house or the boarding house back +bedroom. Every philanthropic effort to fight it on that ground has drawn +renewed courage and hope from Mr. Mills's work and success. + +While I am writing, subscriptions are being made to the capital stock of +a Woman's Hotel Company, that will endeavor to do for the +self-supporting single women of our own city what Mr. Mills has done for +the men. It is proposed to erect, at a cost of $800,000, a hotel capable +of sheltering over 500 guests, at a price coming within reach of women +earning wages as clerks, stenographers, nurses, etc. The number of women +whose needs an establishment of the kind would meet is said to exceed +40,000. The Young Women's Christian Association alone receives every +year requests enough for quarters to fill a score of such hotels, and +can only refer the applicants to boarding houses. Experience in other +cities shows that a woman's hotel or club can be managed and made +profitable, and there seems to be little doubt that New York will be the +next to furnish proof of it. It was the dream of A. T. Stewart, the +merchant prince, to do this service for his city, just as he planned +Garden City for a home colony for his clerks. It came out differently. +The Long Island town became a cathedral city, and the home of wealth and +fashion; his woman's hoarding house a great public hotel, far out of the +reach of those he sought to benefit. It may be that the success of the +banker's philanthropy will yet realize the dream of the merchant before +the end of the century that saw his wealth, his great business, his very +name, vanish as if they had never been, and even his bones denied, by +ghoulish thieves, a rest in the grave. I like to think of it as a kind +of justice to his memory, more eloquent than marble and brass in the +empty crypt. Mills House No. 1 stands upon the site of Mr. Stewart's old +home, where he dreamed his barren dream of benevolence to his kind. + +Of all these movements the home is the keynote. That is the cheerful +sign that shows light ahead. To the home it comes down in the end,--good +government, bad government, and all the rest. As the homes of a +community are, so is the community. New York has still the worst housing +system in the world. Eight fifteenths of its people live in tenements, +not counting the better class of flats, though legally they come under +the definition. The blight of the twenty-five-foot lot remains, with the +double-decker. But we can now destroy what is not fit to stand; we have +done it, and our republic yet survives. The slum landlord would have had +us believe that it must perish with his rookeries. We knew that to build +decently improved a neighborhood, made the tenants better and happier, +and reduced the mortality. Model tenement house building is now proving +daily that such houses can be built safer and better every way for less +money than the double-decker, by crossing the lot line. The dark hall is +not a problem in the tenement built around a central court, for there is +no common hall. The plan of the double-decker is shown to be wasteful of +space and wall and capital. The model tenement pays, does not +deteriorate, and keeps its tenants. After the lapse of ten years, I was +the other day in Mr. A. T. White's Riverside Buildings in Brooklyn, +which are still the best I know of, and found them, if anything, better +houses than the day they were built. The stone steps of the stairways +were worn: that was all the evidence of deterioration I saw. These, and +Mr. White's other block of buildings on Hicks Street, which was built +more than twenty years ago,--occupied, all of them, by distinctly poor +tenants,--have paid their owner over five per cent. right along. +Practically, every such enterprise has the same story to tell. Dr. Gould +found that only six per cent. of all the great model housing operations +had failed to pay. All the rest were successful. That was the showing of +Europe. It is the same here. Only the twenty-five-foot lot is in the way +in New York. + +[Illustration: EVENING IN ONE OF THE COURTS IN MILLS HOUSE No. 1] + +It will continue to be in the way. A man who has one lot will build on +it: it is his right. The state, which taxes his lot, has no right to +confiscate it by forbidding him to make it yield him an income, on the +plea that he might build something which would be a nuisance. But it can +so order the building that it shall not be a nuisance: that is not only +its right, but its duty. The best which can be made out of a +twenty-five-foot lot is not good, but even that has not been made out of +it yet. I have seen plans drawn by two young women architects in this +city, the Misses Gannon and Hands, and approved by the Building +Department, which let in an amount of light and air not dreamed of in +the conventional type of double-decker, while providing detached stairs +in a central court. It was not pretended that it was an ideal plan,--far +from it; but it indicated clearly the track to be followed in dealing +with the twenty-five-foot lot, seeing that we cannot get rid of it. The +demand for light and air space must be sharpened and rigidly held to, +and "discretion" to cut it down on any pretext must be denied, to the +end of discouraging at least the building of double-deckers by the +speculative landlord who has more than one lot, but prefers to build in +the old way, in order that he may more quickly sell his houses, one by +one. + +With much evidence to the contrary in the big blocks of tenements that +are going up on every hand, I think still we are tending in the right +direction. I come oftener, nowadays, upon three tenements built on four +lots, or two on three lots, than I used to. Indeed, there was a time +when such a thing would have been considered wicked waste, or evidence +of unsound mind in the builder. Houses are built now, as they were then, +for profit. The business element must be there, or the business will +fail. Philanthropy and five per cent. belong together in this field; but +there is no more reason for allowing usurious interest to a man who +makes a living by providing houses for the poor than for allowing it to +a lender of money on security. In fact, there is less; for the former +draws his profits from a source with which the welfare of the +commonwealth is indissolubly bound up. The Tenement House Committee +found that the double-deckers yield the landlord an average of ten per +cent., attack the home, and are a peril to the community. Model +tenements pay a safe five per cent., restore the home, and thereby +strengthen the community. It comes down, then, as I said, to a simple +question of the per cent. the builder will take. It should help his +choice to know, as he cannot now help knowing, that the usurious profit +is the price of good citizenship and human happiness, which suffer in +the proportion in which the home is injured. + +The problem of rent should be solved by the same formula, but not so +readily. In the case of the builder the state can add force to +persuasion, and so urge him along the path of righteousness. The only +way to reach the rent collector would be for the municipality to enter +the field as a competing landlord. Doubtless relief could be afforded +that way. The Tenement House Committee found that the slum landlord +charged the highest rents, sometimes as high as twenty-five per cent. He +made no repairs. Model tenement house rents are lower, if anything, than +those of the double-decker, with more space and better accommodations. +Such a competition would have to be on a very large scale, however, to +avail, and I am glad that New York has shown no disposition to undertake +it yet. I would rather we, as a community, learned first a little more +of the art of governing ourselves without scandal. Present relief from +the burden that taxes the worker one fourth of his earnings for a roof +over his head must be sought in the movement toward the suburbs that +will follow the bridging of our rivers, and real rapid transit. On the +island rents will always remain high, on account of the great land +values. But I have often thought that if the city may not own new +tenements, it might with advantage manage the old to the extent of +licensing them to contain so many tenants on the basis of the air space, +and no more. The suggestion was made when the tenement house question +first came up for discussion, thirty years ago, but it was rejected +then. The same thing is now proposed for rooms and workshops, as the +means of getting the best of the sweating nuisance. Why not license the +whole tenement, and with the money collected in the way of fees pay for +the supervision of them by night and day? The squad of sanitary +policemen now comprises for the Greater City some ninety men. Forty-one +thousand tenements in the Borough of Manhattan alone, at three dollars +each for the license, would pay the salaries of the entire body, and +leave a margin. Seeing that their services are going exclusively to the +tenements, it would not seem to be an unfair charge upon the landlords. + +The home is the key to good citizenship. Unhappily for the great cities, +there exists in them all a class that has lost the key or thrown it +away. For this class, New York, until three years ago, had never made +any provision. The police station lodging rooms, of which I have spoken, +were not to be dignified by the term. These vile dens, in which the +homeless of our great city were herded, without pretense of bed, of +bath, of food, on rude planks, were the most pernicious parody on +municipal charity, I verily believe, that any civilized community had +ever devised. To escape physical and moral contagion in these crowds +seemed humanly impossible. Of the innocently homeless lad they made a +tramp by the shortest cut. To the old tramp they were indeed ideal +provision, for they enabled him to spend for drink every cent he could +beg or steal. With the stale beer dive, the free lunch counter, and the +police lodging room at hand, his cup of happiness was full. There came +an evil day, when the stale beer dive shut its doors and the free lunch +disappeared for a season. The beer pump, which drained the kegs dry and +robbed the stale beer collector of his ware, drove the dives out of +business; the Raines law forbade the free lunch. Just at this time +Theodore Roosevelt shut the police lodging rooms, and the tramp was +literally left out in the cold, cursing reform and its fruits. It was +the climax of a campaign a generation old, during which no one had ever +been found to say a word in defense of these lodging rooms; yet nothing +had availed to close them. + +The city took lodgers on an old barge in the East River, that winter, +and kept a register of them. We learned something from that. Of nearly +10,000 lodgers, one half were under thirty years old and in good +health,--fat, in fact. The doctors reported them "well nourished." Among +100 whom I watched taking their compulsory bath, one night, only two +were skinny; the others were stout, well-fed men, abundantly able to do +a man's work. They all insisted that they were willing, too; but the +moment inquiries began with a view of setting such to work as really +wanted it, and sending the rest to the island as vagrants, their number +fell off most remarkably. From between 400 and 500 who had crowded the +barge and the pier sheds, the attendance fell on March 16, the day the +investigation began, to 330, on the second day to 294, and on the third +day to 171; by March 21 it had been cut down to 121. The problem of the +honestly homeless, who were without means to pay for a bed even in a +ten-cent lodging house, and who had a claim upon the city by virtue of +residence in it, had dwindled to surprisingly small proportions. Of 9386 +lodgers, 3622 were shown to have been here less than sixty days, and 968 +less than a year. The old mistake, that there is always a given amount +of absolutely homeless destitution in a city, and that it is to be +measured by the number of those who apply for free lodging, had been +reduced to a demonstration. The truth is that the opportunity furnished +by the triple alliance of stale beer, free lunch, and free lodging at +the police station was the open door to permanent and hopeless vagrancy. + +A city lodging house was established, with decent beds, baths, and +breakfast, and a system of investigation of the lodger's claim that is +yet to be developed to useful proportions. The link that is missing is a +farm school, for the training of young vagrants to habits of industry +and steady work, as the alternative of the workhouse. Efforts to forge +this link have failed so far, but in the good time that is coming, when +we shall have learned the lesson that the unkindest thing that can be +done to a young tramp is to let him go on tramping, and when magistrates +shall blush to discharge him on the plea that "it is no crime to be poor +in this country," they will succeed, and the tramp also we shall then +have "druv into decency." When I look back now to the time, ten or +fifteen years ago, when, night after night, with every police station +filled, I found the old tenements in the "Bend" jammed with a reeking +mass of human wrecks that huddled in hall and yard, and slept, crouching +in shivering files, all the way up the stairs to the attic, it does seem +as if we had come a good way, and as if all the turmoil and the bruises +and the fighting had been worth while. + + + + +IV + +THE TENANT + + +We have considered the problem of the tenement. Now about the tenant. +How much of a problem is he? And how are we to go about solving his +problem? + +The government "slum inquiry," of which I have spoken before, gave us +some facts about him. In New York it found 62.58 per cent. of the +population of the slum to be foreign-born, whereas for the whole city +the percentage of foreigners was only 43.23. While the proportion of +illiteracy in all was only as 7.69 to 100, in the slum it was 46.65 per +cent. That, with nearly twice as many saloons to a given number, there +should be three times as many arrests in the slum as in the city at +large need not be attributed to nationality, except indirectly in its +possible responsibility for the saloons. I say "possible" advisedly. +Anybody, I should think, whose misfortune it is to live in the slum +might be expected to find in the saloon a refuge. I shall not quarrel +with the other view of it. I am merely stating a personal impression. +The fact that concerns us here is the great proportion of the +foreign-born. Though the inquiry covered only a small section of a +tenement district, the result may be accepted as typical. + +We shall not, then, have to do with an American element in discussing +this tenant, for even of the "natives" in the census, by far the largest +share is made up of the children of the immigrant. Indeed, in New York +only 4.77 per cent. of the slum population canvassed were shown to be of +native parentage. The parents of 95.23 per cent. had come over the sea, +to better themselves, it may be assumed. Let us see what they brought +us, and what we have given them in return. + +The Italians were in the majority where this census taker went. They +were from the south of Italy, avowedly the worst of the Italian +immigration which in the eight years from 1891 to 1898 gave us more than +half a million of King Humbert's subjects. The exact number, as +registered by the Emigration Bureau, was 502,592. In 1898, 58,613 came +over, 36,086 of them with New York as their destination. The official +year ends with June. In the six months from July 1 to December 31, the +immigrants were sorted out upon a more intelligent plan than previously. +The process as applied to the 30,470 Italians who were landed during +that term yielded this result: from northern Italy, 4762; from southern +Italy, 25,708. Of these latter a number came from Sicily, the island of +the absentee landlord, where peasants die of hunger. I make no apology +for quoting here the statement of an Italian officer, on duty in the +island, to a staff correspondent of the "Tribuna" of Rome, a paper not +to be suspected of disloyalty to United Italy. I take it from the +"Evening Post:"-- + +"In the month of July I stopped on a march by a threshing floor where +they were measuring grain. When the shares had been divided, the one who +had cultivated the land received a single _tumolo_ (less than a half +bushel). The peasant, leaning on his spade, looked at his share as if +stunned. His wife and their five children were standing by. From the +painful toil of a year this was what was left to him with which to feed +his family. The tears rolled silently down his cheeks." + +These things occasionally help one to understand. Over against this +picture there arises in my memory one from the Barge Office, where I had +gone to see an Italian steamer come in. A family sat apart, ordered to +wait by the inspecting officer; in the group an old man, worn and +wrinkled, who viewed the turmoil with the calmness of one having no +share in it. The younger members formed a sort of bulwark around him. + +"Your father is too old," said the official. + +Two young women and a boy of sixteen rose to their feet at once. "Are +not we young enough to work for him?" they said. The boy showed his +strong arms. + +It is charged against this Italian immigrant that he is dirty, and the +charge is true. He lives in the darkest of slums, and pays rent that +ought to hire a decent flat. To wash, water is needed; and we have a law +which orders tenement landlords to put it on every floor, so that their +tenants may have the chance. And it is not yet half a dozen years since +one of the biggest tenement house landlords in the city, the wealthiest +church corporation in the land, attacked the constitutionality of this +statute rather than pay a couple of hundred dollars for putting water +into two old buildings, as the Board of Health had ordered, and came +near upsetting the whole structure of tenement house law upon which our +safety depends. He is ignorant, it is said, and that charge is also +true. I doubt if one of the family in the Barge Office could read or +write his own name. Yet would you fear especial danger to our +institutions, to our citizenship, from these four? He lives cheaply, +crowds, and underbids even the Jew in the sweatshop. I can myself +testify to the truth of these statements. Only this spring I was the +umpire in a quarrel between the Jewish tailors and the factory inspector +whom they arraigned before the Governor on charges of inefficiency. The +burden of their grievance was that the Italians were underbidding them +in their own market, which of course the factory inspector could not +prevent. Yet, even so, the evidence is not that the Italian always gets +the best of it. I came across a family once working on "knee-pants." +"Twelve pants, ten cents," said the tailor, when there was work. "Ve +work for dem sheenies," he explained. "Ven dey has work, ve gets some; +ven dey hasn't, ve don't." He was an unusually gifted tailor as to +English, but apparently not as to business capacity. In the Astor +tenements, in Elizabeth Street, where we found forty-three families +living in rooms intended for sixteen, I saw women finishing "pants" at +thirty cents a day. Some of the garments were of good grade, and some of +poor; some of them were soldiers' trousers, made for the government; but +whether they received five, seven, eight, or ten cents a pair, it came +to thirty cents a day, except in a single instance, in which two women, +sewing from five in the morning till eleven at night, were able, being +practiced hands, to finish forty-five "pants" at three and a half cents +a pair, and so made together over a dollar and a half. They were +content, even happy. I suppose it seemed wealth to them, coming from a +land where a Parisian investigator of repute found three lire (not quite +sixty cents) _per month_ a girl's wages. + +I remember one of those flats, poor and dingy, yet with signs of the +instinctive groping toward orderly arrangement which I have observed so +many times, and take to be evidence that in better surroundings much +might be made of these people. Clothes were hung to dry on a line strung +the whole length of the room. Upon couches by the wall some men were +snoring. They were the boarders. The "man" was out shoveling snow with +the midnight shift. By a lamp with brown paper shade, over at the +window, sat two women sewing. One had a baby on her lap. Two sweet +little cherubs, nearly naked, slept on a pile of unfinished "pants," and +smiled in their sleep. A girl of six or seven dozed in a child's rocker +between the two workers, with her head hanging down on one side; the +mother propped it up with her elbow as she sewed. They were all there, +and happy in being together even in such a place. On a corner shelf +burned a night lamp before a print of the Mother of God, flanked by two +green bottles, which, seen at a certain angle, made quite a festive +show. + +Complaint is made that the Italian promotes child labor. His children +work at home on "pants" and flowers at an hour when they ought to have +been long in bed. Their sore eyes betray the little flower-makers when +they come tardily to school. Doubtless there are such cases, and quite +too many of them; yet, in the very block which I have spoken of, the +investigation conducted for the Tenement House Committee by the +University Department of Sociology of Columbia College, under Professor +Franklin H. Giddings, discovered of 196 children of school age only 23 +at work or at home, and in the next block only 27 out of 215. That was +the showing of the foreign population all the way through. Of 225 +Russian Jewish children only 15 were missing from school, and of 354 +little Bohemians only 21. The overcrowding of the schools and their long +waiting lists occasionally furnished the explanation why they were not +there. Professor Giddings reported, after considering all the evidence: +"The foreign-born population of the city is not, to any great extent, +forcing children of legal school age into money-earning occupations. On +the contrary, this population shows a strong desire to have its +children acquire the common rudiments of education. If the city does not +provide liberally and wisely for the satisfaction of this desire, the +blame for the civic and moral dangers that will threaten our community, +because of ignorance, vice, and poverty, must rest on the whole public, +not on our foreign-born residents." It is satisfactory to know that the +warning has been heeded, and that soon there will be schools enough to +hold all the children who come. Now, since September 1, 1899, the new +factory law reaches also the Italian flowermaker in his home, and that +source of waste will be stopped. + +He is clannish, this Italian; he gambles and uses a knife, though rarely +on anybody not of his own people; he "takes what he can get," wherever +anything is free, as who would not, coming to the feast like a starved +wolf? There was nothing free where he came from. Even the salt was taxed +past a poor man's getting any of it. Lastly, he buys fraudulent +naturalization papers, and uses them. I shall plead guilty for him to +every one of these counts. They are all proven. Gambling is his +besetting sin. He is sober, industrious, frugal, enduring beyond +belief, but he will gamble on Sunday and quarrel over his cards, and +when he sticks his partner in the heat of the quarrel, the partner is +not apt to tell. He prefers to bide his time. Yet there has lately been +evidence once or twice in the surrender of an assassin by his countrymen +that the old vendetta is being shelved, and a new idea of law and +justice is breaking through. As to the last charge: our Italian is not +dull. With his intense admiration for the land where a dollar a day +waits upon the man with a shovel, he can see no reason why he should not +accept the whole "American plan" with ready enthusiasm. It is a good +plan. To him it sums itself up in the statement: a dollar a day for the +shovel; two dollars for the shovel with a citizen behind it. And he +takes the papers and the two dollars. + +He came here for a chance to live. Of politics, social ethics, he knows +nothing. Government in his old home existed only for his oppression. Why +should he not attach himself with his whole loyal soul to the plan of +government in his new home that offers to boost him into the place of +his wildest ambition, a "job on the streets,"--that is, in the +Street-Cleaning Department,--and asks no other return than that he shall +vote as directed? Vote! Not only he, but his cousins and brothers and +uncles will vote as they are told, to get Pietro the job he covets. If +it pleases the other man, what is it to him for whom he votes? He is +after the job. Here, ready-made to the hand of the politician, is such +material as he never saw before. For Pietro's loyalty is great. As a +police detective, one of his own people, once put it to me: "He got a +kind of an idea, or an old rule: an eye for an eye; do to another as +you'd be done by; if he don't squeal on you, you stick by him, no matter +what the consequences." This "kind of an idea" is all he has to draw +upon for an answer to the question if the thing is right. But the +question does not arise. Why should it? Was he not told by the agitators +whom the police jailed at home that in a republic all men are made happy +by means of the vote? And is there not proof of it? It has made him +happy, has it not? And the man who bought his vote seems to like it. +Well, then? + +Very early Pietro discovered that it was every man for himself, in the +chase of the happiness which this powerful vote had in keeping. He was +robbed by the padrone--that is, the boss--when he came over, fleeced on +his steamship fare, made to pay for getting a job, and charged three +prices for board and lodging and extras while working in the railroad +gang. The boss had a monopoly, and Pietro was told that it was +maintained by his "divvying" with some railroad official. Rumor said, a +very high-up official, and that the railroad was in politics in the +city; that is to say, dealt in votes. When the job gave out, the boss +packed him into the tenement he had bought with his profits on the +contract; and if Pietro had a family, told him to take in lodgers and +crowd his flat, as the Elizabeth Street tenements were crowded, so as to +make out the rent, and to never mind the law. The padrone was a +politician, and had a pull. He was bigger than the law, and it was the +votes he traded in that did it all. Now it was Pietro's turn. With his +vote he could buy what to him seemed wealth. In the muddle of ideas, +that was the one which stood out. When citizen papers were offered him +for $12.50, he bought them quickly, and got his job on the street. + +It was the custom of the country. If there was any doubt about it, the +proof was furnished when Pietro was arrested through the envy and +plotting of the opposition boss last fall. Distinguished counsel, +employed by the machine, pleaded his case in court. Pietro felt himself +to be quite a personage, and he was told that he was safe from harm, +though a good deal of dust might be kicked up; because, when it came +down to that, both the bosses were doing the same kind of business. I +quote from the report of the State Superintendent of Elections of +January, 1899: "In nearly every case of illegal registration, the +defendant was represented by eminent counsel who were identified with +the Democratic organization, among them being three assistants to the +Corporation counsel. My deputies arrested Rosario Calecione and Giuseppe +Marrone, both of whom appeared to vote at the fifth election district of +the Sixth Assembly District; Marrone being the Democratic captain of the +district, and, it was charged, himself engaged in the business of +securing fraudulent naturalization papers. In both of these cases +Farriello had procured the naturalization papers for the men for a +consideration. They were subsequently indicted. Marrone and Calecione +were bailed by the Democratic leader of the Sixth Assembly District." + +The business, says the State Superintendent, is carried on "to an +enormous extent." It appears, then, that Pietro has already "got on to" +the American plan as the slum presented it to him, and has in good +earnest become a problem. I guessed as much from the statement of a +Tammany politician to me, a year ago, that every Italian voter in his +district got his "old two" on election day. He ought to know, for he +held the purse. Suppose, now, we speak our minds as frankly, for once, +and put the blame where it belongs. Will it be on Pietro? And upon this +showing, who ought to be excluded, when it comes to that? + +The slum census taker did not cross the Bowery. Had he done so, he would +have come upon the refugee Jew, the other economic marplot of whom +complaint is made with reason. If his Nemesis has overtaken him in the +Italian, certainly he challenged that fate. He did cut wages by his +coming. He was starving, and he came in shoals. In fourteen years more +than 400,000 Jewish immigrants have landed in New York.[3] They had to +have work and food, and they got both as they could. In the strife they +developed qualities that were anything but pleasing. They herded like +cattle. They had been so herded by Christian rulers, a despised and +persecuted race, through the centuries. Their very coming was to escape +from their last inhuman captivity in a Christian state. They lied, they +were greedy, they were charged with bad faith. They brought +nothing,--neither money nor artisan skill,--nothing but their consuming +energy, to our land, and their one gift was their greatest offense. One +might have pointed out that they had been trained to lie, for their +safety; had been forbidden to work at trades, to own land; had been +taught for a thousand years, with the scourge and the stake, that only +gold could buy them freedom from torture. But what was the use? The +charges were true. The Jew was--he still is--a problem of our slum. + +[Footnote 3: According to the register of the United Hebrew Charities, +between October 1, 1884, and March 1, 1899, the number was 402,181.] + +And yet, if ever there was material for citizenship, this Jew is such +material. Alone of all our immigrants he comes to us without a past. He +has no country to renounce, no ties to forget. Within him there burns a +passionate longing for a home to call his, a country which will own him, +that waits only for the spark of such another love to spring into flame +which nothing can quench. Waiting for it, all his energies are turned +into his business. He is not always choice in method; he often offends. +But he succeeds. He is the yeast of any slum, if given time. If it will +not let him go, it must rise with him. The charity managers in London +said it, when we looked through their slums some years ago: "The Jews +have renovated Whitechapel." I, for one, am a firm believer in this Jew, +and in his boy. Ignorant they are, but with a thirst for knowledge that +surmounts any barrier. The boy takes all the prizes in the school. His +comrades sneer that he will not fight. Neither will he when there is +nothing to be gained by it. But I believe that, should the time come +when the country needs fighting men, the son of the despised immigrant +Jew will resurrect on American soil, the first that bade him welcome, +the old Maccabee type, and set an example for all the rest of us to +follow. + +For fifteen years he has been in the public eye as the vehicle and +promoter of sweating, and much severe condemnation has been visited upon +him with good cause. He had to do something, and he took to the +clothes-maker's trade as that which was most quickly learned. The +increasing crowds, the tenement, and his grinding poverty made the soil, +wherein the evil thing grew rank. Yet the real sweater is the +manufacturer, not the workman. It is just a question of expense to the +manufacturer. By letting out his work on contract, he can save the +expense of running his factory and delay longer making his choice of +styles. The Jew is the victim of the mischief quite as much as he has +helped it on. Back of the manufacturer there is still another +sweater,--the public. Only by its sufferance of the bargain counter and +of sweatshop-made goods has the nuisance existed as long as it has. I +am glad to believe that its time is passing away. The law has driven the +sweatshops out of the tenements, and so deprived them of one of their +chief props: there was no rent at all to pay there. Child labor, which +only four years ago the Reinhard Committee characterized as "one of the +most extensive evils now existing in the city of New York, a constant +and grave menace to the welfare of its people," has been practically +banished from the tailoring trade. What organization among the workers +had failed to effect is apparently going to be accomplished by direct +pressure of an outraged public opinion. Already manufacturers are +returning to their own factories, and making capital of the fact among +their customers. The new law, which greatly extends the factory +inspector's power over sweatshops, is an expression of this enlightened +sentiment. It will put New York a long stride ahead, and quite up to +Massachusetts. The inspector's tag has proved, where the law was +violated, an effective weapon. It suspends all operation of the shop and +removal of the goods until the orders of the inspector have been obeyed. +But the tag which shall finally put an end to sweating, and restore +decent conditions, is not the factory inspector's, I am persuaded, but a +trades union label, which shall deserve public confidence and receive +it. We have much to learn yet, all of us. I think I can see the end of +this trouble, however, when the Italian's triumph in the sweatshop shall +have proved but a barren victory, to his own gain. + +In all I have said so far, in these papers, I have not gone beyond the +limits of the old city,--of Manhattan Island, in fact. I want now to +glance for a moment at the several attempts made at colonizing refugee +Jews in this part of the country. Brownsville was one of the earliest. +Its projector was a manufacturer, and its motive profit. The result was +the familiar one,--as nasty a little slum as ever the East Side had to +show. We have it on our hands now in the Greater City,--it came in with +Brooklyn,--and it is not a gain. Down in southern New Jersey several +colonies were started, likewise by speculators, in the persecution of +the early eighties, and these also failed. The soil was sandy and poor, +and, thrown upon their own resources in a strange and unfriendly +neighborhood, with unfamiliar and unremunerative toil, the colonists +grew discouraged and gave up in despair. The colonies were approaching +final collapse, when the managers of the Baron de Hirsch Fund in New +York, who had started and maintained a successful colony at Woodbine, in +the same neighborhood, took them under the arms and inaugurated a new +plan. They persuaded several large clothing contractors in this city to +move their plants down to the villages, where they would be assured of +steady hands, not so easily affected by strikes. For strikes in +sweatshops are often enough the alternative of starvation. Upon the land +there would be no starvation. The managers of the Fund built factories, +bought the old mortgages on the farms, and put up houses for the +families which the contractors brought down with them. This effort at +transplanting the crowd from the Ghetto to the soil has now been going +on for a year. At latest account, eight contractors and two hundred and +fifty families had been moved out. The colonies had taken on a new lease +of life and apparent prosperity. While it is yet too early to pass sober +judgment, there seems to be good ground for hoping that a real way out +has been found that shall restore the Jew, at least in a measure, to the +soil from which he was barred so long. The experiment is of exceeding +interest. The hopes of its projectors that a purely farming community +might be established have not been realized. Perhaps it was too much to +expect. By bringing to the farmers their missing market, and work to the +surplus population, the mixed settlement plan bids fair to prove a step +in the desired direction. + +Some 18,500 acres are now held by Jewish colonists in New Jersey. In the +New England States, in the last eight years, 600 abandoned farms have +been occupied and are cultivated by refugees from Russia. As a dairy +farmer and a poultry raiser, the Jew has more of an immediate commercial +grip on the situation and works with more courage. At Woodbine, +sixty-five boys and girls are being trained in an agricultural school +that has won the whole settlement the friendly regard of the +neighborhood. Of its pupils, eleven came out of tailor shops, and ten +had been office boys, messengers, or newsboys. To these, and to the +trade schools now successfully operated by the de Hirsch Fund, we are +to look in the next generation for the answer to the old taunt that the +Jew is a trader, and not fit to be either farmer or craftsman, and for +the solution of the problem which he now presents in the slum. + +I have spoken at length of the Jew and the Italian, because they are our +present problem. Yesterday it was the Irishman and the Bohemian. +To-morrow it may be the Greek, who already undersells the Italian from +his pushcart in the Fourth Ward, and the Syrian, who can give Greek, +Italian, and Jew points at a trade. From Dalmatia a new immigration has +begun to come, and there are signs of its working further east in the +Balkan states, where there is no telling what is in store for us. How to +absorb them all safely is the question. Doubtless the Irishman, having +absorbed us politically, would be glad to free us from all concern on +that score by doing a like favor for them. But we should not get the +best of the slum that way; it would get the best of us, instead. Would I +shut out the newcomers? Sometimes, looking at it from the point of view +of the Barge Office and the sweatshop, I think I would. Then there +comes up the recollection of a picture of the city of Prague that hangs +in a Bohemian friend's parlor, here in New York. I stood looking at it +one day, and noticed in the foreground cannon that pointed in over the +city. I spoke of it, unthinking, and said to my host that they should be +trained, if against an enemy, the other way. The man's eye flashed fire. +"Ha!" he cried, "here, yes!" When I think of that, I do not want to shut +the door. + +Again, there occurs to me an experience the police had last summer in +Mulberry Street. They were looking for a murderer, and came upon a nest +of Italian thugs who lived by blackmailing their countrymen. They were +curious about them, and sent their names to Naples with a request for +information. There came back such a record as none of the detectives had +ever seen or heard of before. All of them were notorious criminals, who +had been charged with every conceivable crime, from burglary to +kidnapping and "maiming," and some not to be conceived of by the +American mind. Five of them together had been sixty-three times in +jail, and one no less than twenty-one times. Yet, though they were all +"under special surveillance," they had come here without let or +hindrance within a year. When I recall that, I want to shut the door +quick. I sent the exhibit to Washington at the time. But then, again, +when I think of Mrs. Michelangelo in her poor mourning for one child run +over and killed, wiping her tears away and going bravely to work to keep +the home together for the other five until the oldest shall be old +enough to take her father's place; and when, as now, there strays into +my hand the letter from my good friend, the "woman doctor" in the slum, +when her father had died, in which she wrote: "The little scamps of the +street have been positively pathetic; they have made such shy, boyish +attempts at friendliness. One little chap offered to let me hold his top +while it was spinning, in token of affection,"--when I read that, I have +not the heart to shut anybody out. + +Except, of course, the unfit, the criminal and the pauper, cast off by +their own, and the man brought over here merely to put money into the +pockets of the steamship agent, the padrone, and the mine owner. We +have laws to bar these out. Suppose we begin by being honest with +ourselves and the immigrant, and enforcing our own laws. In spite of a +healthy effort at the port of New York,--I can only speak for +that,--under the present administration, that has not yet been done. +When the door has been shut and locked against the man who left his +country for his country's good, whether by its "assistance" or not, and +when trafficking in the immigrant for private profit has been stopped, +then, perhaps, we shall be better able to decide what degree of +ignorance in him constitutes unfitness for citizenship and cause for +shutting him out. Perchance then, also, we shall hear less of the cant +about his being a peril to the republic. Doubtless ignorance is a peril, +but the selfishness that trades upon ignorance is a much greater. He +came to us without a country, ready to adopt such a standard of +patriotism as he found, at its face value, and we gave him the rear +tenement and slum politics. If he accepted the standard, whose fault was +it? His being in such a hurry to vote that he could not wait till the +law made him a citizen was no worse, to my mind, than the treachery of +the "upper class" native, who refuses to go to the polls for fear he may +rub up against him there. This last let us settle with first, and see +what remains of our problem. We can approach it honestly, then, at all +events. + +When the country was in the throes of the silver campaign, the +newspapers told the story of an old laborer who went to the sub-treasury +and demanded to see the "boss." He undid the strings of an old leathern +purse with fumbling fingers, and counted out more than two hundred +dollars in gold eagles, the hoard of a lifetime of toil and self-denial. +They were for the government, he said. He had not the head to understand +all the talk that was going, but he gathered from what he heard that the +government was in trouble, and that somehow it was about not having gold +enough. So he had brought what he had. He owed it all to the country, +and now that she needed it he had come to give it back. The man was an +Irishman. Very likely he was enrolled in Tammany and voted her ticket. I +remember a tenement at the bottom of a back alley over on the East +Side, where I once went visiting with the pastor of a mission chapel. Up +in the attic there was a family of father and daughter in two rooms that +had been made out of one by dividing off the deep dormer window. It was +midwinter, and they had no fire. He was a peddler, but the snow had +stalled his pushcart and robbed them of their only other source of +income, a lodger who hired cot room in the attic for a few cents a +night. The daughter was not able to work. But she said, cheerfully, that +they were "getting along." When it came out that she had not tasted +solid food for many days, was starving, in fact,--indeed, she died +within a year, of the slow starvation of the tenements that parades in +the mortality returns under a variety of scientific names which all mean +the same thing,--she met her pastor's gentle chiding with the excuse, +"Oh, your church has many poorer than I. I don't want to take your +money." + +These were Germans, ordinarily held to be close-fisted; but I found that +in their dire distress they had taken in a poor old man who was past +working, and had kept him all winter, sharing with him what they had. +He was none of theirs; they hardly even knew him, as it appeared. It +was enough that he was "poorer than they," and lonely and hungry and +cold. + +It was over here that the children of Dr. Elsing's Sunday school gave +out of the depth of their poverty fifty-four dollars in pennies to be +hung on the Christmas tree as their offering to the persecuted +Armenians. One of their teachers told me of a Bohemian family that let +the holiday dinner she brought them stand and wait, while they sent out +to bid to the feast four little ragamuffins of the neighborhood who else +would have gone hungry. I remember well a teacher in one of the +Children's Aid Society's schools, herself a tenement child, who, with +breaking heart, but brave face, played and sang the children's Christmas +carols with them rather than spoil their pleasure, while her only sister +lay dying at home. + +I might keep on and fill many pages with instances of that kind, which +simply go to prove that our poor human nature is at least as robust on +Avenue A as up on Fifth Avenue, if it has half a chance, and often +enough to restore one's faith in it, with no chance at all; and I might +set over against it the product of sordid and mean environment which one +has never far to seek. Good and evil go together in the tenements as in +the fine houses, and the evil sticks out sometimes merely because it +lies nearer the surface. The point is that the good does outweigh the +bad, and that the virtues that turn the balance are after all those that +make for good citizenship anywhere, while the faults are oftenest the +accidents of ignorance and lack of training, which it is the business +of society to correct. I recall my discouragement when I looked +over the examination papers of a batch of candidates for police +appointment,--young men largely the product of our public schools in +this city and elsewhere,--and read in them that five of the original New +England States were "England, Ireland, Scotland, Belfast, and Cork;" +that the Fire Department ruled New York in the absence of the Mayor,--I +have sometimes wished it did, and that he would stay away awhile; and +that Lincoln was murdered by Ballington Booth. But we shall agree, no +doubt, that the indictment of these papers was not of the men who wrote +them, but of the school that stuffed its pupils with useless trash, and +did not teach them to think. Neither have I forgotten that it was one of +these very men who, having failed, and afterward got a job as a bridge +policeman, on his first pay day went straight from his post, half frozen +as he was, to the settlement worker who had befriended him and his sick +father, and gave him five dollars for "some one who was poorer than +they." Poorer than they! What worker among the poor has not heard it? It +is the charity of the tenement that covers a multitude of sins. There +were thirteen in this policeman's family, and his wages were the biggest +item of income in the house. + +Jealousy, envy, and meanness wear no fine clothes and masquerade under +no smooth speeches in the slums. Often enough it is the very nakedness +of the virtues that makes us stumble in our judgment. I have in mind the +"difficult case" that confronted some philanthropic friends of mine in a +rear tenement on Twelfth Street, in the person of an aged widow, quite +seventy I should think, who worked uncomplainingly for a sweater all day +and far into the night, pinching and saving and stinting herself, with +black bread and chicory coffee as her only fare, in order that she might +carry her pitiful earnings to her big, lazy lout of a son in Brooklyn. +He never worked. My friends' difficulty was a very real one, for +absolutely every attempt to relieve the widow was wrecked upon her +mother heart. It all went over the river. Yet one would not have had her +different. + +Sometimes it is only the unfamiliar setting that shocks. When an East +Side midnight burglar, discovered and pursued, killed a tenant who +blocked his way of escape, a few weeks ago, his "girl" gave him up to +the police. But it was not because he had taken human life. "He was good +to me," she explained to the captain whom she told where to find him, +"but since he robbed the church I had no use for him." He had stolen, it +seems, the communion service in a Staten Island church. The thoughtless +laughed. But in her ignorant way she was only trying to apply the +standards of morality as they had been taught her. Stunted, bemuddled, +as they were, I think I should prefer to take my chances with her rather +than with the woman of wealth and luxury who, some years ago, gave a +Christmas party to her lap-dog, as on the whole the sounder of the two, +and by far the more hopeful. + +[Illustration: BONE ALLEY] + +All of which is merely saying that the country is all right, and the +people are to be trusted with the old faith in spite of the slum. And it +is true, if we remember to put it that way,--in spite of the slum. There +is nothing in the slum to warrant that faith save human nature as yet +uncorrupted. How long it is to remain so is altogether a question of the +sacrifices we are willing to make in our fight with the slum. As yet, we +are told by the officials having to do with the enforcement of the +health ordinances, which come closer to the life of the individual than +any other kind, that the poor in the tenements are "more amenable to the +law than the better class." It is of the first importance, then, that we +should have laws deserving of their respect, and that these laws should +be enforced, lest they conclude that the whole thing is a sham. Respect +for law is a very powerful bar against the slum. But what, for instance, +must the poor Jew understand, who is permitted to buy a live hen at the +market, yet neither to kill nor keep it in his tenement, and who on his +feast day finds a whole squad of policemen detailed to follow him around +and see that he does not do any of the things with his fowl for which he +must have bought it? Or the day laborer, who drinks his beer in a +"Raines law hotel," where brick sandwiches, consisting of two pieces of +bread with a brick between, are set out on the counter, in derision of +the state law which forbids the serving of drinks without "meals"? (The +Stanton Street saloon keeper who did that was solemnly acquitted by a +jury.) Or the boy, who may buy fireworks on the Fourth of July, but not +set them off? These are only ridiculous instances of an abuse that +pervades our community life to an extent that constitutes one of the +gravest perils. Insincerity of that kind is not lost on our fellow +citizen by adoption, who is only anxious to fall in with the ways of the +country; and especially is it not lost on his boy. + +We shall see how it affects him. He is the one for whom we are waging +the battle with the slum. He is the to-morrow that sits to-day drinking +in the lesson of the prosperity of the big boss who declared with pride +upon the witness stand that he rules New York, that judges pay him +tribute, and that only when _he_ says so a thing "goes;" and that it is +all for what he can get out of it, "just the same as everybody else." He +sees corporations to-day pay blackmail and rob the people in return, +quite according to the schedule of Hester Street. Only there it is the +police who charge the peddler twenty cents, while here it is the +politicians taking toll of the franchises, twenty per cent. Wall Street +is not ordinarily reckoned in the slum, because of certain physical +advantages; but, upon the evidence of the day, I think we shall have to +conclude that the advantage ends there. The boy who is learning such +lessons,--how is it with him? + +The president of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children +says that children's crime is increasing, and he ought to know. The +managers of the Children's Aid Society, after forty-six years of +wrestling with the slum for the boy, in which they have lately seemed to +get the upper hand, say in this year's report that on the East Side +children are growing up in certain districts "entirely neglected," and +that the number of such children "increases beyond the power of +philanthropic and religious bodies to cope properly with their needs." +In the Tompkins Square Lodging House the evening classes are thinning +out, and the keeper wails: "Those with whom we have dealt of late have +not been inclined to accept this privilege; how to make night school +attractive to shiftless, indifferent street boys is a difficult problem +to solve." + +Perhaps it is only that he has lost the key. Across the square, the +Boys' Club of St. Mark's Place, that began with a handful, counts five +thousand members to-day, and is seeking a place to build a house of its +own. The school census man announces that no boy in that old stronghold +of the "bread or blood" brigade need henceforth loiter in the street +because there is not room in the public school, and the brigade has +disbanded for want of recruits. The shop is being shut against the boy, +and the bars let down at the playground. But from Tompkins Square, +nevertheless, came Jacob Beresheim, whose story I shall tell you +presently. + + + + +V + +THE GENESIS OF THE GANG + + +Jacob Beresheim was fifteen when he was charged with murder. It is now +more than three years ago, but the touch of his hand is cold upon mine, +with mortal fear, as I write. Every few minutes, during our long talk on +the night of his arrest and confession, he would spring to his feet, +and, clutching my arm as a drowning man catches at a rope, demand with +shaking voice, "Will they give me the chair?" The assurance that boys +were not executed quieted him only for the moment. Then the dread and +the horror were upon him again. + +Of his crime the less said the better. It was the climax of a career of +depravity that differed from other such chiefly in the opportunities +afforded by an environment which led up to and helped shape it. My +business is with that environment. The man is dead, the boy in jail. But +unless I am to be my brother's jail keeper, merely, the iron bars do +not square the account of Jacob with society. Society exists for the +purpose of securing justice to its members, appearances to the contrary +notwithstanding. When it fails in this, the item is carried on the +ledger with interest and compound interest toward a day of reckoning +that comes surely with the paymaster. We have heard the chink of his +coin on the counter, these days, in the unblushing revelations before +the Mazet Committee of degraded citizenship, of the murder of the civic +conscience, and in the applause that hailed them. And we have begun to +understand that these are the interest on Jacob's account, older, much +older than himself. He is just an item carried on the ledger. But with +that knowledge the account is at last in a way of getting squared. Let +us see how it stands. + +We shall take Jacob as a type of the street boy on the East Side, where +he belonged. What does not apply to him in the review applies to his +class. But there was very little of it indeed that he missed or that +missed him. + +He was born in a tenement in that section where the Tenement House +Committee found 324,000 persons living out of sight and reach of a green +spot of any kind, and where sometimes the buildings, front, middle, and +rear, took up ninety-three per cent. of all the space on the block. Such +a home as he had was there, and of the things that belonged to it he was +the heir. The sunlight was not among them. It "never entered" there. +Darkness and discouragement did, and dirt. Later on, when he took to the +dirt as his natural weapon in his battles with society, it was said of +him that it was the only friend that stuck to him, and it was true. Very +early the tenement gave him up to the street. The thing he took with him +as the one legacy of home was the instinct for the crowd, which meant +that the tenement had wrought its worst mischief upon him: it had +smothered that in him around which character is built. The more readily +did he fall in with the street and its ways. Character implies depth, a +soil, and growth. The street is all surface: nothing grows there; it +hides only a sewer. + +It taught him gambling as its first lesson, and stealing as the next. +The two are never far apart. From shooting craps behind the "cop's" +back to filching from the grocer's stock or plundering a defenseless +peddler is only a step. There is in both the spice of law-breaking that +appeals to the shallow ambition of the street as heroic. Occasionally +the raids have a comic tinge. A German grocer wandered into police +headquarters the other day, with an appeal for protection against the +boys. + +"Vat means dot 'cheese it'?" he asked, rubbing his bald head in helpless +bewilderment. "Efery dime dey says 'cheese it,' somedings vas gone." + +To the lawlessness of the street the home opposes no obstacle, as we +have seen. Until very recently the school did not. It might have more to +offer even now. There are, at least, schools where there were none then, +and so much is gained; also, they are getting better, but too many of +them, in my unprofessional judgment, need yet to be made over, until +they are fit to turn out whole, sound boys, instead of queer manikins +stuffed with information for which they have no use, and which is none +of their business anyhow. It seemed to me sometimes, when watching the +process of cramming the school course with the sum of human knowledge +and conceit, as if it all meant that we distrusted nature's way of +growing a man from a boy, and had set out to show her a shorter cut. A +common result was the kind of mental befogment that had Abraham Lincoln +murdered by Ballington Booth, and a superficiality, a hopeless slurring +of tasks, that hitched perfectly with the spirit of the street, and left +nothing to be explained in the verdict of the reformatory, "No moral +sense." There was no moral sense to be got out of the thing, for there +was little sense of any kind in it. The boy was not given a chance to be +honest with himself by thinking a thing through; he came naturally to +accept as his mental horizon the headlines in his penny paper and the +literature of the Dare-Devil-Dan-the-Death-Dealing-Monster-of-Dakota +order, which comprise the ordinary æsthetic equipment of the slum. The +mystery of his further development into the tough need not perplex +anybody. + +But Jacob Beresheim had not even the benefit of such schooling as there +was to be had. He did not go to school, and nobody cared. There was +indeed a law directing that every child should go, and a corps of truant +officers to catch him if he did not; but the law had been a dead letter +for a quarter of a century. There was no census to tell what children +ought to be in school, and no place but a jail to put those in who +shirked. Jacob was allowed to drift. From the time he was twelve till he +was fifteen, he told me, he might have gone to school three weeks,--no +more. + +Church and Sunday school missed him. I was going to say that they passed +by on the other side, remembering the migration of the churches uptown, +as the wealthy moved out of, and the poor into, the region south of +Fourteenth Street. But that would hardly be fair. They moved after their +congregations; but they left nothing behind. In the twenty years that +followed the war, while enough to people a large city moved in downtown, +the number of churches there was reduced from 141 to 127. Fourteen +Protestant churches moved out. Only two Roman Catholic churches and a +synagogue moved in. I am not aware that there has been any large +increase of churches in the district since, but we have seen that the +crowding has not slackened pace. Jacob had no trouble in escaping the +Sunday school as he had escaped the public school. His tribe will have +none until the responsibility incurred in the severance of church and +state sits less lightly on a Christian community, and the church, from a +mob, shall have become an army, with von Moltke's plan of campaign, +"March apart, fight together." The Christian church is not alone in its +failure. The Jew's boy is breaking away from safe moorings rather faster +than his brother of the new dispensation. The church looks on, but it +has no cause for congratulation. He is getting nothing in place of that +which he lost, and the result is bad. There is no occasion for profound +theories about it. The facts are plain enough. The new freedom has +something to do with it, but neglect to look after the young has quite +as much. Apart from its religious aspect, seen from the angle of the +community's interest wholly, the matter is of the gravest import. + +What the boy's play has to do with building character in him Froebel +has told us. Through it, he showed us, the child "first perceives moral +relations," and he made that the basis of the kindergarten and all +common-sense education. That prop was knocked out. New York never had a +children's playground till within the last year. Truly it seemed, as +Abram S. Hewitt said, as if in the early plan of our city the children +had not been thought of at all. Such moral relations as Jacob was able +to make out ran parallel with the gutter always, and counter to law and +order as represented by the policeman and the landlord. The landlord had +his windows to mind, and the policeman his lamps and the city ordinances +which prohibit even kite-flying below Fourteenth Street where the crowds +are. The ball had no chance at all. It is not two years since a boy was +shot down by a policeman for the heinous offense of playing football in +the street on Thanksgiving Day. But a boy who cannot kick a ball around +has no chance of growing up a decent and orderly citizen. He must have +his childhood, so that he may be fitted to give to the community his +manhood. The average boy is just like a little steam engine with steam +always up. The play is his safety valve. With the landlord in the yard +and the policeman on the street sitting on his safety valve and holding +it down, he is bound to explode. When he does, when he throws mud and +stones and shows us the side of him which the gutter developed, we are +shocked and marvel much what our boys are coming to, as if we had any +right to expect better treatment of them. I doubt if Jacob, in the whole +course of his wizened little life, had ever a hand in an honest game +that was not haunted by the dread of the avenging policeman. That he was +not "doing anything" was no defense. The mere claim was proof that he +was up to mischief of some sort. Besides, the policeman was usually +right. Play in such a setting becomes a direct incentive to mischief in +a healthy boy. Jacob was a healthy enough little animal. + +Such fun as he had he got out of law-breaking in a small way. In this he +was merely following the ruling fashion. Laws were apparently made for +no other purpose that he could see. Such a view as he enjoyed of their +makers and executors at election seasons inspired him with seasonable +enthusiasm, but hardly with awe. A slogan, now, like that raised by +Tammany's late candidate for district attorney,--"To hell with +reform!"--was something he could grasp. Of what reform meant he had only +the vaguest notion, but the thing had the right ring to it. Roosevelt +preaching enforcement of law was from the first a "lobster" to him, not +to be taken seriously. It is not among the least of the merits of the +man that by his sturdy personality, as well as by his unyielding +persistence, he won the boy over to the passive admission that there +might be something in it. It had not been his experience. + +There was the law which sternly commanded him to go to school, and which +he laughed at every day. Then there was the law to prevent child labor. +It cost twenty-five cents for a false age certificate to break that, and +Jacob, if he thought of it at all, probably thought of perjury as rather +an expensive thing. A quarter was a good deal to pay for the right to +lock a child up in a factory, when he ought to have been at play. The +excise law was everybody's game. The sign that hung in every saloon, +saying that nothing was sold there to minors, never yet barred out his +"growler" when he had the price. There was another such sign in the +tobacco shop, forbidding the sale of cigarettes to boys of his age. +Jacob calculated that when he had the money he smoked as many as fifteen +in a day, and he laughed when he told me. He laughed, too, when he +remembered how the boys of the East Side took to carrying balls of cord +in their pockets, on the wave of the Lexow reform, on purpose to measure +the distance from the school door to the nearest saloon. They had been +told that it should be two hundred feet, according to law. There were +schools that had as many as a dozen within the tabooed limits. It was in +the papers how, when the highest courts said that the law was good, the +saloon keepers attacked the schools as a nuisance and detrimental to +property. In a general way Jacob sided with the saloon keeper; not +because he had any opinion about it, but because it seemed natural. Such +opinions as he ordinarily had he got from that quarter. + +When, later on, he came to be tried, his counsel said to me, "He is an +amazing liar." No, hardly amazing. It would have been amazing if he had +been anything else. Lying and mockery were all around him, and he +adjusted himself to the things that were. He lied in self-defense. + +Jacob's story ends here, as far as he is personally concerned. The story +of the gang begins. So trained for the responsibility of citizenship, +robbed of home and of childhood, with every prop knocked from under him, +all the elements that make for strength and character trodden out in the +making of the boy, all the high ambition of youth caricatured by the +slum and become base passions,--so equipped he comes to the business of +life. As a "kid" he hunted with the pack in the street. As a young man +he trains with the gang, because it furnishes the means of gratifying +his inordinate vanity, that is the slum's counterfeit of self-esteem. +Upon the Jacobs of other days there was a last hold,--the father's +authority. Changed conditions have loosened that also. There is a time +in every young man's life when he knows more than his father. It is +like the measles or the mumps, and he gets over it, with a little +judicious firmness in the hand that guides. It is the misfortune of the +slum boy of to-day that it is really so, and that he knows it. His +father is an Italian or a Jew, and cannot even speak the language to +which the boy is born. He has to depend on him in much, in the new order +of things. The old man is "slow," he is "Dutch." He maybe an Irishman +with some advantages; he is still a "foreigner." He loses his grip on +the boy. Ethical standards of which he has no conception clash. Watch +the meeting of two currents in river or bay, and see the line of drift +that tells of the struggle. So in the city's life strive the currents of +the old and the new, and in the churning the boy goes adrift. The last +hold upon him is gone. That is why the gang appears in the second +generation, the first born upon the soil,--a fighting gang if the +Irishman is there with his ready fist, a thievish gang if it is the East +Side Jew,--and disappears in the third. The second boy's father is not +"slow." He has had experience. He was clubbed into decency in his own +day, and the night stick wore off the glamour of the thing. His grip on +the boy is good, and it holds. + +It depends now upon chance what is to become of the lad. But the slum +has stacked the cards against him. There arises in the lawless crowd a +leader, who rules with his stronger fists or his readier wit. Around him +the gang crystallizes, and what he is it becomes. He may be a thief, +like David Meyer, a report of whose doings I have before me. He was just +a bully, and, being the biggest in his gang, made the others steal for +him and surrender the "swag," or take a licking. But that was unusual. +Ordinarily the risk and the "swag" are distributed on more democratic +principles. Or he may be of the temper of Mike of Poverty Gap, who was +hanged for murder at nineteen. While he sat in his cell at police +headquarters, he told with grim humor of the raids of his gang on +Saturday nights when they stocked up at "the club." They used to "hook" +a butcher's cart or other light wagon, wherever found, and drive like +mad up and down the avenue, stopping at saloon or grocery to throw in +what they wanted. His job was to sit at the tail of the cart with a +six-shooter and pop at any chance pursuer. He chuckled at the +recollection of how men fell over one another to get out of his way. "It +was great to see them run," he said. Mike was a tough, but with a better +chance he might have been a hero. The thought came to him, too, when it +was all over and the end in sight. He put it all in one sober, +retrospective sigh, that had in it no craven shirking of the +responsibility that was properly his: "I never had no bringing up." + +There was a meeting some time after his death to boom a scheme for +"getting the boys off the street," and I happened to speak of Mike's +case. In the audience was a gentleman of means and position, and his +daughter, who manifested great interest and joined heartily in the +proposed movement. A week later, I was thunderstruck at reading of the +arrest of my sympathetic friend's son for train-wrecking up the State. +The fellow was of the same age as Mike. It appeared that he was supposed +to be attending school, but had been reading dime novels instead, until +he arrived at the point where he "had to kill some one before the end +of the month." To that end he organized a gang of admiring but less +resourceful comrades. After all, the plane of fellowship of Poverty Gap +and Madison Avenue lies nearer than we often suppose. I set the incident +down in justice to the memory of my friend Mike. If this one went astray +with so much to pull him the right way, and but the single strand +broken, what then of the other? + +Mike's was the day of Irish heroics. Since their scene was shifted from +the East Side there has come over there an epidemic of child crime of +meaner sort, but following the same principle of gang organization. It +is difficult to ascertain the exact extent of it, because of the +well-meant but, I am inclined to think, mistaken effort on the part of +the children's societies to suppress the record of it for the sake of +the boy. Enough testimony comes from the police and the courts, however, +to make it clear that thieving is largely on the increase among the East +Side boys. And it is amazing at what an early age it begins. When, in +the fight for a truant school, I had occasion to gather statistics upon +this subject, to meet the sneer of the educational authorities that the +"crimes" of street boys compassed at worst the theft of a top or a +marble. I found among 278 prisoners, of whom I had kept the run for ten +months, two boys, of four and eight years respectively, arrested for +breaking into a grocery, not to get candy or prunes, but to rob the +till. The little one was useful to "crawl through a small hole." There +were "burglars" of six and seven years, and five in a bunch, the whole +gang apparently, at the age of eight. "Wild" boys began to appear in +court at that age. At eleven, I had seven thieves, two of whom had a +record on the police blotter, and an "habitual liar;" at twelve, I had +four burglars, three ordinary thieves, two arrested for drunkenness, +three for assault, and three incendiaries; at thirteen, five burglars, +one with a "record," as many thieves, one "drunk," five charged with +assault and one with forgery; at fourteen, eleven thieves and +house-breakers, six highway robbers,--the gang on its unlucky day, +perhaps,--and ten arrested for fighting, not counting one who had +assaulted a policeman, in a state of drunken frenzy. One of the gangs +made a specialty of stealing baby carriages, when left unattended in +front of stores. They "drapped the kids in the hallway" and "sneaked" +the carriages. And so on. The recital was not a pleasant one, but it was +effective. We got our truant school, and one way that led to the jail +was blocked. + +It may be that the leader is neither thief nor thug, but ambitious. In +that case the gang is headed for politics by the shortest route. +Likewise, sometimes, when he is both. In either case it carries the +situation by assault. When the gang wants a thing, the easiest way seems +to it always to take it. There was an explosion in a Fifth Street +tenement, one night last January, that threw twenty families into a wild +panic, and injured two of the tenants badly. There was much mystery +about it, until it came out that the housekeeper had had a "run in" with +the gang in the block. It wanted club-room in the house, and she would +not let it in. Beaten, it avenged itself in characteristic fashion by +leaving a package of gunpowder on the stairs, where she would be sure to +find it when she went the rounds with her candle to close up. That was a +gang of that kind, headed straight for Albany. And what is more, it +will get there, unless things change greatly. The gunpowder was just a +"bluff" to frighten the housekeeper, an installment of the kind of +politics it meant to play when it got its chance. There was "nothing +against this gang" except a probable row with the saloon keeper, since +it applied elsewhere for house-room. Not every gang has a police record +of theft and "slugging" beyond the early encounters of the street. "Our +honored leader" is not always the captain of a band of cutthroats. He is +the honorary president of the "social club" that bears his name, and he +counts for something in the ward. But the ethical standards do not +differ. "Do others, or they will do you," felicitously adapted from Holy +Writ for the use of the slum, and the classic war-cry, "To the victors +the spoils," made over locally to read, "I am not in politics for my +health," still interpret the creed of the political as of the "slugging" +gang. They drew their inspiration from the same source. Of what gang +politics means every large city in our country has had its experience. +New York is no exception. History on the subject is being made yet, in +the sight of us all. + +Our business with the gang, however, is in the making of it. Take now +the showing of the reformatory,[4] to which I have before made +reference, and see what light it throws upon the matter: 71 per cent. of +prisoners with no moral sense, or next to none, yet more than that +proportion possessed of "natural mental capacity," which is to say that +they had the means of absorbing it from their environment, if there had +been any to absorb. Bad homes sent half of all prisoners there; bad +company 92 per cent. The reformatory repeats the prison chaplain's +verdict, "weakness, not wickedness," in its own way: "Malevolence does +not characterize the criminal, but aversion to continuous labor." If +"the street" had been written across it in capital letters, it could not +have been made plainer. Twelve per cent. only of the prisoners came +from good homes, and one in a hundred had kept good company; evidently +he was not of the mentally capable. They will tell you at the prison +that, under its discipline, 83 per cent. are set upon their feet and +make a fresh start. With due allowance for a friendly critic, there is +still room for the three fourths labeled normal. The Children's Aid +Society will give you even better news of the boys rescued from the slum +before it had branded them for its own. Scarce five per cent. are lost, +though they leave such a black mark that they make trouble for all the +good boys that are sent out from New York. Better than these was the +kindergarten record in San Francisco. New York has no monopoly of the +slum. Of nine thousand children from the slummiest quarters of that city +who had gone through the Golden Gate Association's kindergartens, just +one was said to have got into jail. The merchants who looked coldly on +the experiment before brought their gold to pay for keeping it up. They +were hard-headed men of business, and the demonstration that schools +were better than jails any day appealed to them as eminently sane and +practical. + +[Footnote 4: Year-Book of Elmira State Reformatory, 1897. The statistics +deal with 8319 prisoners received there in twenty-three years. The +social stratum whence they came is sufficiently indicated by the +statement that 18.3 per cent. were illiterates, and 43.3 per cent. were +able to read and write with difficulty; 35.2 per cent. had an ordinary +common school education; 3.2 per cent. came out of high schools or +colleges.] + +And well it might. The gang is a distemper of the slum that writes upon +the generation it plagues the recipe for its own corrective. It is not +the night stick, though in the acute stage that is not to be dispensed +with. Neither is it the jail. To put the gang behind iron bars affords +passing relief, but it is like treating a symptom without getting at the +root of the disease. Prophylactic treatment is clearly indicated. The +boy who flings mud and stones is entering his protest in his own way +against the purblind policy that gave him jails for schools and the +gutter for a playground, that gave him dummies for laws and the tenement +for a home. He is demanding his rights, of which he has been +cheated,--the right to his childhood, the right to know the true dignity +of labor that makes a self-respecting manhood. The gang, rightly +understood, is our ally, not our enemy. Like any ailment of the body, it +is a friend come to tell us of something that has gone amiss. The thing +for us to do is to find out what it is, and set it right. + +That is the story of the gang. That we have read and grasped its lesson +at last, an item in my morning paper, which I read at the breakfast +table to-day, bears witness. It tells that the League for Political +Education has set about providing a playground for the children up on +the West Side, near the model tenements which I described. Just so! With +a decent home and a chance for the boy to grow into a healthy man, his +political education can proceed without much further hindrance. Now let +the League for Political Education trade off the policeman's club for a +boys' club, and it may consider its course fairly organized. + +I spoke of the instinct for the crowd in the tenement house boy as +evidence that the slum had got its grip on him. And it is true of him. +The experience that the helpless poor will not leave their slum when a +chance of better things is offered is wearily familiar to most of us. I +recall the indignant amazement of my good friend, the president of the +Baron de Hirsch Fund, when, of a hundred of the neediest families chosen +to be the pioneers in the experiment of transplanting the crowds of the +Ghetto to the country, where homes and work were waiting for them, only +seven wanted to go. They preferred the excitement of the street. One +has to have resources to face the loneliness of the woods and the +fields. We have seen what resources the slum has at its command. In the +boy it laid hold of the instinct for organization, the desire to fall in +and march in line that belongs to all boys, and is not here, as abroad, +cloyed with military service in the young years,--and anyhow is stronger +in the American boy than in his European brother,--and perverted it to +its own use. That is the simple secret of the success of the club, the +brigade, in winning back the boy. It is fighting the street with its own +weapon. The gang is the club run wild. + +How readily it owns the kinship was never better shown than by the +experience of the College Settlement girls, when they first went to make +friends in the East Side tenements. I have told it before, but it will +bear telling again, for it holds the key to the whole business. They +gathered in the drift, all the little embryo gangs that were tuning up +in the district, and made them into clubs,--Young Heroes, Knights of the +Round Table, and such like; all except one, the oldest, that had begun +to make a name for itself with the police. That one held aloof, +observing coldly what went on, to make sure it was "straight." They let +it be, keeping the while an anxious eye upon it; until one day there +came a delegation with the proposition, "If you will let us in, we will +change and have your kind of a gang." Needless to say it was let in. And +within a year, when, through a false rumor that the concern was moving +away, there was a run on the Settlement's penny provident bank, the +converted gang proved itself its stanchest friend by doing actually what +John Halifax did, in Miss Mulock's story: it brought all the pennies it +could raise in the neighborhood by hook or by crook and deposited them +as fast as the regular patrons--the gang had not yet risen to the +dignity of a bank account--drew them out, until the run ceased. + +The cry "Get the boys off the street" that has been raised in our +cities, as the real gravity of the situation has been made clear, has +led to the adoption of curfew ordinances in many places. Any attempt to +fit such a scheme to metropolitan life would probably result simply in +adding one more dead-letter law, more dangerous than all the rest, to +those we have. Besides, the curfew rings at nine o'clock. The dangerous +hours, when the gang is made, are from seven to nine, between supper and +bedtime. This is the gap the club fills out. The boys take to the street +because the home has nothing to keep them there. To lock them up in the +house would only make them hate it more. The club follows the line of +least resistance. It has only to keep also on the line of common sense. +It must be a real club, not a reformatory. Its proper function is to +head off the jail. The gang must not run it. But rather that than have +it help train up a band of wretched young cads. The signs are not hard +to make out. When a boy has had his head swelled by his importance as a +member of the Junior Street-Cleaning Band to the point of reproving his +mother for throwing a banana peel in the street, the thing to be done is +to take him out and spank him, if it _is_ reverting to "the savagery" of +the street. Better a savage than a cad. The boys have the making of both +in them. Their vanity furnishes abundant material for the cad, but only +when unduly pampered. Left to itself, the gang can be trusted not to +develop that kink. + +It comes down in the end to the personal influence that is always most +potent in dealing with these problems. We had a gang start up once when +my boys were of that age, out in the village on Long Island where we +lived. It had its headquarters in our barn, where it planned divers +raids that aimed at killing the cat and other like outrages; the central +fact being that the boys had an air rifle, with which it was necessary +to murder something. My wife discovered the conspiracy, and, with +woman's wit, defeated it by joining the gang. She "gave in wood" to the +election bonfires, and pulled the safety valve upon all the other plots +by entering into the true spirit of them,--which was adventure rather +than mischief,--and so keeping them within safe lines. She was elected +an honorary member, and became the counselor of the gang in all their +little scrapes. I can yet see her dear brow wrinkled in the study of +some knotty gang problem, which we discussed when the boys had been long +asleep. They did not dream of it, and the village never knew what small +tragedies it escaped, nor who it was that so skillfully averted them. + +It is always the women who do those things. They are the law and the +gospel to the boy, both in one. It is the mother heart, I suppose, and +there is nothing better in all the world. I am reminded of the +conversion of "the Kid" by one who was in a very real sense the mother +of a social settlement uptown, in the latitude of Battle Row. The Kid +was driftwood. He had been cast off by a drunken father and mother, and +was living on what he could scrape out of ash barrels, and an occasional +dime for kindling-wood which he sold from a wheel-barrow, when the gang +found and adopted him. My friend adopted the gang in her turn, and +civilized it by slow stages. Easter Sunday came, when she was to redeem +her promise to take the boys to witness the services in a neighboring +church, where the liturgy was especially impressive. It found the larger +part of the gang at her door,--a minority, it was announced, were out +stealing potatoes, hence were excusable,--in a state of high +indignation. + +"The Kid's been cussin' awful," explained the leader. The Kid showed in +the turbulent distance, red-eyed and raging. + +"But why?" asked my friend, in amazement. + +"'Cause he can't go to church!" + +It appeared that the gang had shut him out, with a sense of what was due +to the occasion, because of his rags. Restored to grace, and choking +down reminiscent sobs, the Kid sat through the Easter service, +surrounded by the twenty-seven "proper" members of the gang. +Civilization had achieved a victory, and no doubt my friend remembered +it in her prayers with thanksgiving. The manner was of less account. +Battle Row has its own ways, even in its acceptance of means of grace. + +I walked home from the office to-night. The street wore its normal +aspect of mingled dullness and the kind of expectancy that is always +waiting to turn any excitement, from a fallen horse to a fire, to +instant account. The early June heat had driven the multitudes from the +tenements into the street for a breath of air. The boys of the block +were holding a meeting at the hydrant. In some way they had turned the +water on, and were splashing in it with bare feet, reveling in the sense +that they were doing something that "went against" their enemy, the +policeman. Upon the quiet of the evening broke a bugle note and the +tramp of many feet keeping time. A military band came around the corner, +stepping briskly to the tune of "The Stars and Stripes Forever." Their +white duck trousers glimmered in the twilight, as the hundred legs moved +as one. Stoops and hydrant were deserted with a rush. The gang fell in +with joyous shouts. The young fellow linked arms with his sweetheart and +fell in too. The tired mother hurried with the baby carriage to catch +up. The butcher came, hot and wiping his hands on his apron, to the door +to see them pass. + +"Yes," said my companion, guessing my thoughts,--we had been speaking of +the boys,--"but look at the other side. There is the military spirit. Do +you not fear danger from it in this country?" + +No, my anxious friend, I do not. Let them march; and if with a gun, +better still. Often enough it is the choice of the gun on the shoulder, +or, by and by, the stripes on the back in the lockstep gang. + + + + +VI + +LETTING IN THE LIGHT + + +I had been out of town and my way had not fallen through the Mulberry +Bend in weeks until that morning when I came suddenly upon the park that +had been made there in my absence. Sod had been laid, and men were going +over the lawn cutting the grass after the rain. The sun shone upon +flowers and the tender leaves of young shrubs, and the smell of new-mown +hay was in the air. Crowds of little Italian children shouted with +delight over the "garden," while their elders sat around upon the +benches with a look of contentment such as I had not seen before in that +place. I stood and looked at it all, and a lump came in my throat as I +thought of what it had been, and of all the weary years of battling for +this. It had been such a hard fight, and now at last it was won. To me +the whole battle with the slum had summed itself up in the struggle +with this dark spot. The whir of the lawn mower was as sweet a song in +my ear as that which the skylark sang when I was a boy, in Danish +fields, and which gray hairs do not make the man forget. + +In my delight I walked upon the grass. It seemed as if I should never be +satisfied till I had felt the sod under my feet,--sod in the Mulberry +Bend! I did not see the gray-coated policeman hastening my way, nor the +wide-eyed youngsters awaiting with shuddering delight the catastrophe +that was coming, until I felt his cane laid smartly across my back and +heard his angry command:-- + +"Hey! Come off the grass! D' ye think it is made to walk on?" + +So that was what I got for it. It is the way of the world. But it was +all right. The park was there, that was the thing. And I had my revenge. +I had just had a hand in marking five blocks of tenements for +destruction to let in more light, and in driving the slum from two other +strongholds. Where they were, parks are being made to-day in which the +sign "Keep off the grass!" will never be seen. The children may walk in +them from morning till night, and I too, if I want to, with no policeman +to drive us off. I tried to tell the policeman something about it. But +he was of the old dispensation. All the answer I got was a gruff:-- + +"G'wan now! I don't want none o' yer guff!" + +It was all "guff" to the politicians, I suppose, from the day the +trouble began about the Mulberry Bend, but toward the end they woke up +nobly. When the park was finally dedicated to the people's use, they +took charge of the celebration with immense unction, and invited +themselves to sit in the high seats and glory in the achievement which +they had done little but hamper and delay from the first. They had not +reckoned with Colonel Waring, however. When they had had their say, the +colonel arose and, curtly reminding them that they had really had no +hand in the business, proposed three cheers for the citizen effort that +had struck the slum this staggering blow. There was rather a feeble +response on the platform, but rousing cheers from the crowd, with whom +the colonel was a prime favorite, and no wonder. Two years later he laid +down his life in the fight which he so valiantly and successfully waged. +It is the simple truth that he was killed by politics. The services +which he had rendered the city would have entitled him in any reputable +business to be retained in the employment that was his life and his +pride. Had he been so retained he would not have gone to Cuba, and would +in all human probability be now alive. But Tammany is not "in politics +for her health" and had no use for him, though no more grievous charge +could be laid at his door, even in the heat of the campaign, than that +he was a "foreigner," being from Rhode Island. Spoils politics never +craved a heavier sacrifice of any community. + +It was Colonel Waring's broom that first let light into the slum. That +which had come to be considered an impossible task he did by the simple +formula of "putting a man instead of a voter behind every broom." The +words are his own. The man, from a political dummy who loathed his job +and himself in it with cause, became a self-respecting citizen, and the +streets that had been dirty were swept. The ash barrels which had +befouled the sidewalks disappeared, almost without any one knowing it +till they were gone. The trucks that obstructed the children's only +playground, the street, went with the dirt despite the opposition of the +truckman who had traded off his vote to Tammany in the past for stall +room at the curbstone. They did not go without a struggle. When appeal +to the alderman proved useless, the truckman resorted to strategy. He +took a wheel off, or kept a perishing nag, that could not walk, hitched +to the truck over night to make it appear that it was there for +business. But subterfuge availed as little as resistance. In the +Mulberry Bend he made his last stand. The old houses had been torn down, +leaving a three-acre lot full of dirt mounds and cellar holes. Into this +the truckmen of the Sixth Ward hauled their carts, and defied the street +cleaners. They were no longer in their way, and they were on the Park +Department's domain, where no Colonel Waring was in control. But while +their owners were triumphing, the children playing among the trucks set +one of them rolling down into a cellar, and three or four of the little +ones were crushed. That was the end. The trucks disappeared. Even +Tammany has not ventured to put them back, so great was the relief of +their going. They were not only a hindrance to the sweeper and the +skulking places of all manner of mischief at night, but I have +repeatedly seen the firemen baffled in their efforts to reach a burning +house, where they stood four and six deep in the wide "slips" at the +river. + +Colonel Waring did more for the cause of labor than all the walking +delegates of the town together, by investing a despised but highly +important task with a dignity which won the hearty plaudits of a +grateful city. When he uniformed his men and announced that he was going +to parade with them so that we might all see what they were like, the +town laughed and poked fun at the "white wings;" but no one went to see +them who did not come away converted to an enthusiastic belief in the +man and his work. Public sentiment, that had been half reluctantly +suspending judgment, expecting every day to see the colonel "knuckle +down to politics" like his predecessors, turned in an hour, and after +that there was little trouble. The tenement house children organized +street cleaning bands to help along the work, and Colonel Waring +enlisted them as regular auxiliaries and made them useful. + +They had no better friend. When the unhappy plight of the persecuted +pushcart men, all immigrant Jews, who were blackmailed, robbed, and +driven from pillar to post as a nuisance, though licensed to trade in +the street, appealed vainly for a remedy, Colonel Waring found a way out +in a great morning market in Hester Street that should be turned over to +the children for a playground in the afternoon. Though he proved that it +would pay interest on the investment in market fees, and many times in +the children's happiness, it was never built. It would have been a most +fitting monument to the man's memory. His broom saved more lives in the +crowded tenements than a squad of doctors. It did more: it swept the +cobwebs out of our civic brain and conscience, and set up a standard of +a citizen's duty which, however we may for the moment forget, will be +ours until we have dragged other things than our pavements out of the +mud. + +Even the colonel's broom would have been powerless to do that for "the +Bend." That was hopeless and had to go. There was no question of +children or playground involved. The worst of all the gangs, the Whyós, +had its headquarters in the darkest of its dark alleys; but it was left +to the police. We had not begun to understand that the gangs meant +something to us beyond murder and vengeance, in those days. No one +suspected that they had any such roots in the soil that they could be +killed by merely destroying the slum. The cholera was rapping on our +door and, with the Bend there, we felt about it as a man with stolen +goods in his house must feel when the policeman comes up the street. +Back in the seventies we began discussing what ought to be done. By 1884 +the first Tenement House Commission had summoned up courage to propose +that a street be cut through the bad block. In the following year a bill +was brought in to destroy it bodily, and then began the long fight that +resulted in the defeat of the slum a dozen years later. + +It was a bitter fight, in which every position of the enemy had to be +carried by assault. The enemy was the deadly official inertia that was +the outcome of political corruption born of the slum plus the +indifference of the mass of our citizens, who probably had never seen +the Bend. If I made it my own concern to the exclusion of all else, it +was only because I knew it. I had been part of it. Homeless and alone, I +had sought its shelter, not for long,--that was not to be endured,--but +long enough to taste of its poison, and I hated it. I knew that the blow +must be struck there, to kill. Looking back now over those years, I can +see that it was all as it should be. We were learning the alphabet of +our lesson then. We could have learned it in no other way so thoroughly. +Before we had been at it more than two or three years, it was no longer +a question of the Bend merely. The Small Parks law that gave us a +million dollars a year to force light and air into the slum, to its +destruction, grew out of it. The whole sentiment which in its day, +groping blindly and angrily, had wiped out the disgrace of the Five +Points, just around the corner, crystallized and took shape in its +fight. It waited merely for the issue of that, to attack the slum in +its other strongholds; and no sooner was the Bend gone than the rest +surrendered, unconditionally. + +But it was not so easy campaigning at the start. In 1888 plans were +filed for the demolition of the block. It took four years to get a +report of what it would cost to tear it down. About once in two months +during all that time the authorities had to be prodded into a spasm of +activity, or we would probably have been yet where we were then. Once +when I appealed to the Corporation Counsel to give a good reason for the +delay, I got the truth out of him without evasion. + +"Well, I tell you," he said blandly, "no one here is taking any interest +in that business. That is good enough reason for you, isn't it?" + +It was. That Tammany reason became the slogan of an assault upon +official incompetence and treachery that hurried things up considerably. +The property was condemned at a total cost to the city of a million and +a half, in round numbers, including the assessment of half a million for +park benefit which the property owners were quick enough, with the aid +of the politicians, to get saddled on the city at large. In 1894 the +city took possession and became the landlord of the old barracks. For a +whole year it complacently collected the rents and did nothing. When it +was shamed out of that rut, too, and the tenements were at last torn +down, the square lay as the wreckers had left it for another year, until +it became such a plague spot that, as a last resort, with a citizen's +privilege, I arraigned the municipality before the Board of Health for +maintaining a nuisance upon its premises. I can see the shocked look of +the official now, as he studied the complaint. + +"But, my dear sir," he coughed diplomatically, "isn't it rather unusual? +I never heard of such a thing." + +"Neither did I," I replied, "but then there never was such a thing +before." + +That night, while they were debating the "unusual thing," happened the +accident to the children of which I spoke, emphasizing the charge that +the nuisance was "dangerous to life," and there was an end. In the +morning the Bend was taken in hand, and the following spring the +Mulberry Bend Park was opened. + +A million dollars a year had been lost while we were learning our +lesson. The Small Parks Fund was not cumulative, and when it came to +paying for the Bend a special bill had to be passed to authorize it, the +award being "more than one million in one year." The wise financiers who +framed and hung in the comptroller's office a check for three cents that +had been under-paid on a school site, for the taxpayer to bow before in +awe and admiration at such business methods, could find no way to make +the appropriation for two years apply, though the new year was coming in +a week or two. But the Gilder Tenement House Commission had been +sitting, the Committee of Seventy had been at work, and a law was on the +statute books authorizing the expenditure of three million dollars for +two open spaces in the parkless district on the East Side, where Jacob +Beresheim was born. It had shown that while the proportion of park area +inside the limits of the old city was equal to one thirteenth of all, +below Fourteenth Street, where one third of the people lived, it was +barely one fortieth. It took a citizen's committee appointed by the +mayor just three weeks to seize the two sites which are now being +laid out in playgrounds chiefly, and it took the Good Government Clubs +with their allies at Albany less than two months to get warrant of law +for the tearing down of the houses ahead of final condemnation lest any +mischance befall through delay or otherwise,--a precaution which +subsequent events proved to be eminently wise. The slow legal +proceedings are going on yet. + +[Illustration: MULBERRY BEND PARK] + +The playground part of it was a provision of the Gilder law that showed +what apt scholars we had been. I was a member of that committee, and I +fed fat my grudge against the slum tenement, knowing that I might not +again have such a chance. Bone Alley went. I shall not soon get the +picture of it, as I saw it last, out of my mind. I had wandered to the +top floor of one of the ramshackle tenements in the heart of the block, +to a door that stood ajar, and pushed it open. On the floor lay three +women rag-pickers with their burdens, asleep, overcome by the heat and +the beer, the stale stench of which filled the place. Swarms of flies +covered them. The room--no! let it go. Thank God, we shall not again +hear of Bone Alley. Where it stood workmen are to-day building a +gymnasium with baths for the people, and a playground and park which may +even be turned into a skating-pond in winter if the architect keeps his +promise. A skating-pond for the children of the Eleventh Ward! No wonder +the politician is in a hurry to take the credit for what is going +forward over there. It is that or nothing with him now. It will be all +up with Tammany, once the boys find out that these were the things she +withheld from them all the years, for her own gain. + +Half a dozen blocks away the city's first public bath house is at last +going up, after many delays, and godliness will have a chance to move in +with cleanliness. The two are neighbors everywhere, but in the slum the +last must come first. Glasgow has half a dozen public baths. Rome, two +thousand years ago, washed its people most sedulously, and in heathen +Japan to-day, I am told, there are baths, as we have saloons, on every +corner. Christian New York never had a bath house. In a tenement +population of 255,033 the Gilder Committee found only 306 who had access +to bath-rooms in the houses where they lived. The Church Federation +canvass of the Fifteenth Assembly District counted three bath-tubs to +1321 families. Nor was that because they so elected. The People's Baths +took in 115,000 half dimes last year for as many baths, and forty per +cent. of their customers were Italians. The free river baths admitted +5,096,876 customers during the summer. The "great unwashed" were not so +from choice, it would appear. + +Bone Alley brought thirty-seven dollars under the auctioneer's hammer. +Thieves' Alley, in the other park down at Rutgers Square, where the +police clubbed the Jewish cloakmakers a few years ago for the offense of +gathering to assert their right to "being men, live the life of men," as +some one who knew summed up the labor movement, brought only seven +dollars, and the old Helvetia House, where Boss Tweed and his gang met +at night to plan their plundering raids on the city's treasury, was +knocked down for five. Kerosene Row would not have brought enough to buy +kindling wood with which to start one of the numerous fires that gave it +its bad name. It was in Thieves' Alley that the owner in the days long +gone by hung out the sign: "No Jews need apply." Last week I watched the +opening of the first municipal playground upon the site of the old +alley, and in the thousands that thronged street and tenements from curb +to roof with thunder of applause, there were not twoscore who could have +found lodging with the old Jew-baiter. He had to go with his alley +before the better day could bring light and hope to the Tenth Ward. + +In all this the question of rehousing the population, that had to be so +carefully considered abroad in the destruction of slums, gave no +trouble. The speculative builder had seen to that. In the five wards, +the Seventh, Tenth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, and Seventeenth, in which the +unhoused ones would look for room, if they wanted to stay near their old +home, there were, according to the tenement census at the time when the +old houses were torn down, 4268 vacant apartments, with room for more +than 18,000 persons at our average of four and a half to the family. +Even including the Mulberry Bend, the whole number of the dispossessed +was not 10,000. On Manhattan Island there were at this time more than +37,000 vacant apartments, so that the question could not arise in any +serious shape, much as it plagued the dreams of some well-meaning +people. As a matter of fact the unhoused were scattered much more widely +than had been anticipated, which was one of the very purposes sought to +be attained. Many of them had remained in their old slum more from force +of habit and association than because of necessity. + +"Everything takes ten years," said Abram S. Hewitt when, exactly ten +years after he had as mayor championed the Small Parks Act, he took his +seat as chairman of the Advisory Committee on Small Parks. The ten years +had wrought a great change. It was no longer the slum of to-day, but +that of to-morrow that challenged attention. The committee took the +point of view of the children from the first. It had a large map +prepared showing where in the city there was room to play and where +there was none. Then it called in the police and asked them to point out +where there was trouble with the boys; and in every instance the +policeman put his finger upon a treeless slum. + +"They have no other playground than the street," was the explanation +given in each case. "They smash lamps and break windows. The +storekeepers kick and there is trouble. That is how it begins." "Many +complaints are received daily of boys annoying pedestrians, +storekeepers, and tenants by their continually playing baseball in some +parts of almost every street. The damage is not slight. Arrests are +frequent, much more frequent than when they had open lots to play in." +This last was the report of an uptown captain. He remembered the days +when there were open lots there. "But these lots are now built upon," he +said, "and for every new house there are more boys and less chance for +them to play." + +The committee put a red daub on the map to indicate trouble. Then it +asked those police captains who had not spoken to show them where their +precincts were, and why they had no trouble. Every one of them put his +finger on a green spot that marked a park. "My people are quiet and +orderly," said the captain of the Tompkins Square precinct. The police +took the square from a mob by storm twice in my recollection, and the +commander of the precinct then was hit on the head with a hammer by "his +people" and laid out for dead. "The Hook Gang is gone," said he of +Corlears Hook. The professional pursuit of that gang was to rob and +murder inoffensive citizens by night and throw them into the river, and +it achieved a bad eminence at its calling. "The whole neighborhood has +taken a change, and decidedly for the better," said the captain of +Mulberry Street, and the committee rose and said that it had heard +enough. + +The map was hung on the wall, and in it were stuck pins to mark the site +of present and projected schools as showing where the census had found +the children crowding. The moment that was done the committee sent the +map and a copy of chapter 338 of the laws of 1895 to the mayor, and +reported that its task was finished. This is the law and all there is of +it:-- + + "The people of the State of New York, represented in Senate and + Assembly, do enact as follows:-- + + "Section 1. Hereafter no schoolhouse shall be constructed in the + city of New York without an open-air playground attached to or + used in connection with the same. + + "Section 2. This act shall take effect immediately." + +Where the map was daubed with red the school pins crowded one another. +On the lower East Side, where child crime was growing fast, and no less +than three storm centres were marked down by the police, nine new +schools were going up or planned, and in the uptown precinct whence came +the wail about the ball players there were seven. The playground had +proved its case. Where it was expedient it was to be a school +playground. It seemed a happy combination, for the new law had been a +stumbling-block to the school commissioners, who were in a quandary over +the needful size of an "open-air playground." The success of the +roof-garden idea suggested a way out. But schools are closed at the time +of the year when playgrounds are most needed for city children. To get +the garden on the roof of the schoolhouse recognized as the public +playground seemed a long step toward turning it into a general +neighborhood evening resort that should be always open, and so toward +bringing school and people, and especially the school and the boy, +together in a bond of mutual sympathy highly desirable for both. + +That was the burden of the committee's report. It made thirteen +recommendations besides, as to the location of parks and detached +playgrounds, only one of which has been adopted. But that is of less +account--as also was the information imparted to me as secretary of the +committee by our peppery Tammany mayor, that we had "as much authority +as a committee of bootblacks in his office"--than the fact that the +field has at last been studied and its needs have been made known. The +rest will follow, with or without the politician's authority. The one +recommendation that has been carried out was that of a riverside park in +the region uptown on the West Side where the Federation of Churches and +Christian Workers found "saloon social ideals minting themselves upon +the minds of the people at the rate of seven saloon thoughts to one +educational thought." There is an outdoor gymnasium to-day on the chosen +site,--while the legal proceedings to take possession are unraveling +their red tape,--and a recreation pier hard by. In the evening the young +men of the neighborhood may be seen trooping riverward with their girls +to hear the music. The gang that "laid out" two policemen, to my +knowledge, has gone out of business. + +The best laid plans are sometimes upset by surprising snags. We had +planned for two municipal playgrounds on the East Side where the need is +greatest, and our plans were eagerly accepted by the city authorities. +But they were never put into practice. A negligent attorney killed one, +a lazy clerk the other. And both served under the reform government. The +first of the two playgrounds was to have been in Rivington Street, +adjoining the new public bath, where the boys, for want of something +better to do, were fighting daily battles with stones, to the great +damage of windows and the worse aggravation of the householders. Four +hundred children in that neighborhood petitioned the committee for a +place of their own where there were no windows to break, and we found +one. It was only after the proceedings had been started that we +discovered that they had been taken under the wrong law and the money +spent in advertising had been wasted. It was then too late. The daily +assaults upon the windows were resumed. The other case was an attempt to +establish a model school park in a block where more than four thousand +children attended day and night school. The public school and the +pro-cathedral, which divided the children between them, were to be +allowed to stand, at opposite ends of the block. The surrounding +tenements were to be torn down to make room for a park and playground +which should embody the ideal of what such a place ought to be, in the +opinion of the committee. The roof garden was not in the original plan +except as an alternative of the street-level playground, where land came +too high. The plentiful supply of light and air, the safety from fire to +be obtained by putting the school in a park, beside the fact that it +could thus be "built beautiful," were considerations of weight. Plans +were made, and there was great rejoicing in Essex Street, until it came +out that this scheme had gone the way of the other. The clerk who should +have filed the plans in the register's office left that duty to some +one else, and it took just twenty-one days to make the journey, a +distance of five hundred feet or less. The Greater New York had come +then with Tammany, and the thing was not heard of again. When I traced +the failure down to the clerk in question, and told him that he had +killed the park, he yawned and said:-- + +"Yes, and I think it is just as well it is dead. We haven't any money +for those things. It is very nice to have small parks, and very nice to +have a horse and wagon, if you can afford it. But we can't. Why, there +isn't money enough to run the city government." + +So the labor of weary weeks and months in the children's behalf was all +undone by a third-rate clerk in an executive office; but he saved the +one thing he had in mind: the city government is "run" to date, and his +pay is secure. + +Neither stupidity, spite, nor the false cry that "reform extravagance" +has wrecked the city's treasury will be able much longer, however, to +cheat the child out of his rights. The playground is here to wrestle +with the gang for the boy, and it will win. It came so quietly that we +hardly knew of it till we heard the shouts. It took us seven years to +make up our minds to build a play pier,--recreation pier is its +municipal title,--and it took just about seven weeks to build it when we +got so far; but then we learned more in one day than we had dreamed of +in the seven years. Half the East Side swarmed over it with shrieks of +delight, and carried the mayor and the city government, who had come to +see the show, fairly off their feet. And now "we are seven," or will be +when the one in Brooklyn has been built,--great, handsome structures, +seven hundred feet long, some of them, with music every night for mother +and the babies, and for papa, who can smoke his pipe there in peace. The +moon shines upon the quiet river, and the steamers go by with their +lights. The street is far away with its noise. The young people go +sparking in all honor, as it is their right to do. The councilman who +spoke the other day of "pernicious influences" lying in wait for them +there made the mistake of his life, unless he has made up his mind to go +out of politics. The play piers have taken a hold of the people which no +crabbed old bachelor can loosen with trumped-up charges. Their +civilizing influence upon the children is already felt in a reported +demand for more soap in the neighborhood where they are, and even the +grocer smiles approval. + +The play pier is the kindergarten in the educational campaign against +the gang. It gives the little ones a chance. Often enough it is a chance +for life. The street as a playground is a heavy contributor to the +undertaker's bank account. I kept the police slips of a single day in +May two years ago, when four little ones were killed and three crushed +under the wheels of trucks in tenement streets. That was unusual, but no +day has passed in my recollection that has not had its record of +accidents which bring grief as deep and lasting to the humblest home as +if it were the pet of some mansion on Fifth Avenue that was slain. The +kindergarten teaching bore fruit. To-day there are half a dozen +full-blown playgrounds downtown and uptown where the children swarm. +Private initiative set the pace, but the idea has been engrafted upon +the municipal plan. The city helped get at least one of them under way. +The Outdoor Recreation League was organized last year by public-spirited +citizens, including many amateur athletes and enthusiastic women, with +the object of "obtaining recognition of the necessity for recreation and +physical exercise as fundamental to the moral and physical welfare of +the people." Together with the Social Reform Club and the Federation of +Churches and Christian Workers it maintained a playground on the uptown +West Side last summer. The ball came into play there for the first time +as a recognized factor in civic progress. The day might well be kept for +all time among those that mark human emancipation, for it was social +reform and Christian work in one, of the kind that tells. + +Only the year before, the athletic clubs had vainly craved the privilege +of establishing a gymnasium in the East River Park, where the children +wistfully eyed the sacred grass, and cowered under the withering gaze of +the policeman. A friend whose house stands opposite the park found them +one day swarming over her stoop in such shoals that she could not enter, +and asked them why they did not play tag under the trees instead. The +instant shout came back: "'Cause the cop won't let us." Now a splendid +gymnasium has been opened on the site of the people's park that is to +come at Fifty-Third Street and Eleventh Avenue. It is called Hudsonbank. +A board fence more than a thousand feet long surrounds it. The director +pointed out to me with pride, last week, that not a board had been +stolen from it in a year, while other fences within twenty feet of it +were ripped to pieces. And he was right. The neighborhood is one that +has been anything but distinguished for its respect for private property +in the past, and where boards have a market value among the Irish +settlers. Better testimony could not have been borne to the spirit in +which the gift was accepted by the children. + +Poverty Gap, that was fairly transformed by one brief season's +experience with its "Holy Terror Park,"[5] a dreary sand lot upon the +site of the old tenements in which the Alley Gang once murdered the one +good boy of the block for the offense of supporting his aged parents by +his work as a baker's apprentice,--Poverty Gap is to have its permanent +playground, and Mulberry Bend and Corlears Hook are down on the League's +books; which is equivalent to saying that they, too, will shortly know +the climbing pole and the vaulting buck. For years the city's only +playground that had any claim upon the name--and that was only a little +asphalted strip behind a public school in First Street--was an old +graveyard. We struggled vainly to get possession of another, long +abandoned. The dead were of more account than the living. But now at +last it is their turn. The other day I watched the children at their +play in the new Hester Street gymnasium. The dusty square was jammed +with a mighty multitude. It was not an ideal spot, for it had not rained +in weeks, and powdered sand and cinders had taken wing and floated like +a pall over the perspiring crowd. But it was heaven to them. A hundred +men and boys stood in line, waiting their turn upon the bridge ladder +and the traveling rings that hung full of struggling and squirming +humanity, groping madly for the next grip. No failure, no rebuff +discouraged them. Seven boys and girls rode with looks of deep +concern--it is their way--upon each end of the see-saw, and two squeezed +into each of the forty swings that had room for one, while a hundred +counted time and saw that none had too much. It is an article of faith +with these children that nothing that is "going" for their benefit is to +be missed. Sometimes the result provokes a smile, as when a band of +young Jews, starting up a club, called themselves the Christian Heroes. +It was meant partly as a compliment, I suppose, to the ladies that gave +them club-room; but at the same time, if there was anything in a name, +they were bound to have it. It is rather to cry over than to laugh at, +if one but understands it. The sight of these little ones swarming over +a sand heap until scarcely an inch of it was in sight, and gazing in +rapt admiration at the poor show of a dozen geraniums and English ivy +plants in pots on the window-sill of the overseer's cottage, was +pathetic in the extreme. They stood for ten minutes at a time resting +their eyes upon them. In the crowd were aged women and bearded men with +the inevitable Sabbath silk hat, who it seemed could never get enough of +it. They moved slowly, when crowded out, looking back many times at the +enchanted spot, as long as it was in sight. + +[Footnote 5: The name was bestowed before the fact, not after.] + +Perhaps there was in it, on the part of the children at least, just a +little bit of the comforting sense of proprietorship. They had +contributed of their scant pennies more than a hundred dollars toward +the opening of the playground, and they felt that it was their very own. +All the better. Two policemen watched the passing show, grinning. But +their clubs hung idly from their belts. The words of a little woman whom +I met last year in Chicago kept echoing in my ear. She was the "happiest +woman alive," for she had striven long for a playground for her poor +children, and had got it. + +"The police like it," she said. "They say that it will do more good than +all the Sunday schools in Chicago. The mothers say, 'This is good +business.' The carpenters that put up the swings and things worked with +a will; everybody was glad. The police lieutenant has had a tree called +after him. The boys that did that used to be terrors. Now they take care +of the trees. They plead for a low limb that is in the way, that no one +may cut it off." + +The twilight deepens and the gates of the playground are closed. The +crowds disperse slowly. In the roof garden on the Hebrew Institute +across East Broadway lights are twinkling and the band is tuning up. +Little groups are settling down to a quiet game of checkers or +love-making. Paterfamilias leans back against the parapet where palms +wave luxuriously in the summer breeze. The newspaper drops from his +hand; he closes his eyes and is in dreamland, where strikes come not. +Mother knits contentedly in her seat, with a smile on her face that was +not born of the Ludlow Street tenement. Over yonder a knot of +black-browed men talk with serious mien. They might be met any night in +the anarchist café, half a dozen doors away, holding forth against +empires. Here wealth does not excite their wrath, nor power their +plotting. In the roof garden anarchy is harmless, even though a +policeman typifies its government. They laugh pleasantly to one another +as he passes, and he gives them a match to light their cigars. It is +Thursday, and smoking is permitted. On Friday it is discouraged because +it offends the orthodox, to whom the lighting of a fire, even the +holding of a candle, is anathema on the Sabbath eve. + +The band plays on. One after another, tired heads droop upon babes +slumbering peacefully at the breast. Ludlow Street, the tenement, are +forgotten; eleven o'clock is not yet. Down along the silver gleam of the +river a mighty city slumbers. The great bridge has hung out its string +of shining pearls from shore to shore. "Sweet land of liberty!" Overhead +the dark sky, the stars that twinkled their message to the shepherds on +Judæan hills, that lighted their sons through ages of slavery, and the +flag of freedom borne upon the breeze,--down there the tenement, +the--Ah, well! let us forget, as do these. + +Now if you ask me: "And what of it all? What does it avail?" let me take +you once more back to the Mulberry Bend, and to the policeman's verdict +add the police reporter's story of what has taken place there. In +fifteen years I never knew a week to pass without a murder there, rarely +a Sunday. It was the wickedest, as it was the foulest, spot in all the +city. In the slum the two are interchangeable terms for reasons that +are clear enough to me. But I shall not speculate about it, only state +the facts. The old houses fairly reeked with outrage and violence. When +they were torn down, I counted seventeen deeds of blood in that place +which I myself remembered, and those I had forgotten probably numbered +seven times seventeen. The district attorney connected more than a score +of murders of his own recollection with Bottle Alley, the Whyó gang's +headquarters. Two years have passed since it was made into a park, and +scarce a knife has been drawn, or a shot fired, in all that +neighborhood. Only twice have I been called as a police reporter to the +spot. It is not that the murder has moved to another neighborhood, for +there has been no increase of violence in Little Italy or wherever else +the crowd went that moved out. It is that the light has come in and made +crime hideous. It is being let in wherever the slum has bred murder and +robbery, bred the gang, in the past. Wait, now, another ten years, and +let us see what a story there will be to tell. + +Avail? Why, here is Tammany actually applauding Comptroller Coler's +words in Plymouth Church last night: "Whenever the city builds a +schoolhouse upon the site of a dive and creates a park, a distinct and +permanent mental, moral, and physical improvement has been made, and +public opinion will sustain such a policy, even if a dive-keeper is +driven out of business and somebody's ground rent is reduced." And +Tammany's press agent sends forth this pæan: "In the light of such +events how absurd it is for the enemies of the organization to contend +that Tammany is not the greatest moral force in the community." Tammany +a moral force! The park and the playground have availed, then, to bring +back the day of miracles. + + + + +VII + +JUSTICE FOR THE BOY + + +Sometimes, when I see my little boy hugging himself with delight at the +near prospect of the kindergarten, I go back in memory forty years and +more to the day when I was dragged, a howling captive, to school, as a +punishment for being bad at home. I remember, as though it were +yesterday, my progress up the street in the vengeful grasp of an +exasperated servant, and my reception by the aged monster--most fitly +named Madame Bruin--who kept the school. She asked no questions, but led +me straightway to the cellar, where she plunged me into an empty barrel +and put the lid on over me. Applying her horn goggles to the bunghole, +to my abject terror, she informed me, in a sepulchral voice, that that +was the way bad boys were dealt with in school. When I ceased howling +from sheer fright, she took me out and conducted me to the yard, where +a big hog had a corner to itself. She bade me observe that one of its +ears had been slit half its length. It was because the hog was lazy, and +little boys who were that way minded were in danger of similar +treatment; in token whereof she clipped a pair of tailor's shears +suggestively close to my ear. It was my first lesson in school. I hated +it from that hour. + +The barrel and the hog were never part of the curriculum in any American +boy's school, I suppose; they seem too freakish to be credited to any +but the demoniac ingenuity of my home ogre. But they stood for a +comprehension of the office of school and teacher which was not patented +by any day or land. It is not so long since the notion yet prevailed +that the schools were principally to lock children up in for the +convenience of their parents, that we should have entirely forgotten it. +Only the other day a clergyman from up the State came into my office to +tell of a fine reform school they had in his town. They were very proud +of it. + +"And how about the schools for the good boys in your town?" I asked, +when I had heard him out. "Are they anything to be proud of?" + +He stared. He guessed they were all right, he said, after some +hesitation. But it was clear that he did not know. + +It is not necessary to go back forty years to find us in the metropolis +upon the clergyman's platform, if not upon Madame Bruin's. Ten will do. +They will bring us to the day when roof playgrounds were contemptuously +left out of the estimates for an East Side school, as "frills" that had +nothing to do with education; when the Board of Health found but a +single public school in more than sixscore that was so ventilated as to +keep the children from being poisoned by foul air; when the authority of +the Talmud had to be invoked by the Superintendent of School Buildings +to convince the president of the Board of Education, who happened to be +a Jew, that seventy-five or eighty pupils were far too many for one +class-room; when a man who had been dead a year was appointed a school +trustee of the Third Ward, under the mouldy old law surviving from the +day when New York was a big village, and filled the office as well as if +he had been alive, because there were no schools in his ward; when +manual training and the kindergarten were yet the fads of yesterday, +looked at askance; when fifty thousand children roamed the streets for +whom there was no room in the schools, and the only defense of the +School Commissioners was that they "didn't know" there were so many; and +when we mixed truants and thieves in a jail with entire unconcern. +Indeed, the jail filled the title rôle in the educational cast of that +day. Its inmates were well lodged and cared for, while the sanitary +authorities twice condemned the Essex Market school across the way as +wholly unfit for children to be in, but failed to catch the ear of the +politician who ran things unhindered. When (in 1894) I denounced the +"system" of enforcing--or not enforcing--the compulsory education law as +a device to make thieves out of our children by turning over their +training to the street, he protested angrily; but the experts of the +Tenement House Committee found the charge fully borne out by the facts. +They were certainly plain enough in the sight of us all, had we chosen +to see. + +When at last we saw, we gave the politician a vacation for a season. To +say that he was to blame for all the mischief would not be fair. We +were to blame for leaving him in possession. He was only a link in the +chain which our indifference had forged; but he was always and +everywhere an obstruction to betterment,--sometimes, illogically, in +spite of himself. Successive Tammany mayors had taken a stand for the +public schools, when it was clear that reform could not be delayed much +longer; but they were helpless against a system of selfishness and +stupidity of which they were the creatures, though they posed as its +masters. They had to go with it as unfit, and upon the wave that swept +out the last of the rubbish came reform. The Committee of Seventy took +hold, the Good Government Clubs, the Tenement House Committee, and the +women of New York. Five years we strove with the powers of darkness, and +look now at the change. The New York school system is not yet the ideal +one,--it may never be; but the jail, at least, has been cast out of the +firm. We have a compulsory education law under which it will be +possible, when a seat has been provided for every child, to punish the +parent for the boy's truancy, unless he surrenders him as unmanageable; +and we can count the months now till every child shall find the +latchstring out on the school door. We have had to put our hands deep +into our pockets to get to that point, but we are nearly there now. +Since 1895 the expenditure of twenty-two and a half millions of dollars +for new schools in the old city has been authorized by law, and two +thirds of the money has been spent. Fifty-odd new buildings have been +put up, or are going up while I am writing, every one of them with its +playground, which will by and by be free to all the neighborhood. The +idea is at last working through that the schools belong to the people, +and are primarily for the children and their parents; not mere vehicles +of ward patronage, or for keeping an army of teachers in office and pay. + +The silly old régime is dead. The ward trustee is gone with his friend +the alderman, loudly proclaiming the collapse of our liberties in the +day that saw the schools taken from "the people's" control. They were +"the people." Experts manage our children's education, which was +supposed in the old plan to be the only thing that did not require any +training. To superintend a brickyard demanded some knowledge, but +anybody could run the public schools. It cost us an election to take +that step. One of the Tammany district leaders, who knew what he was +talking about, said to me after it was all over: "I knew we would win. +Your bringing those foreigners here did the business. Our people believe +in home rule. We kept account of the teachers you brought from out of +town, and who spent the money they made here out of town, and it got to +be the talk among the tenement people in my ward that their daughters +would have no more show to get to be teachers. That did the business. We +figured the school vote in the city at forty-two thousand, and I knew we +could not lose." The "foreigners" were teachers from Massachusetts and +other States, who had achieved a national reputation at their work. + +There lies upon my table a copy of the minutes of the Board of Education +of January 9, 1895, in which is underscored a report on a primary school +in the Bronx. "It is a wooden shanty," is the inspector's account, +"heated by stoves, and is a regular tinder box; cellar wet, and under +one class-room only. This building was erected in order, I believe, to +determine whether or not there was a school population in the +neighborhood to warrant the purchase of property to erect a school on." + +That was the way then of taking a school census, and the result was the +utter failure of the compulsory education law to compel anything. To-day +we have a biennial census, ordained by law, which, when at last it gets +into the hands of some one who can count, will tell us how many Jacob +Beresheims are drifting upon the shoals of the street. And we have a +truant school to keep them safe in. To it, says the law, no thief shall +be committed. It is not yet five years since the burglar and the +truant--who, having been refused admission to the school because there +was not room for him, inconsequently was locked up for contracting idle +ways--were herded in the Juvenile Asylum, and classified there in squads +of those who were four feet, four feet seven, and over four feet seven! +I am afraid I scandalized some good people, during the fight for decency +in this matter, by insisting that it ought to be considered a good mark +for Jacob that he despised such schools as were provided for him. But it +was true. Except for the risk of the burglar, the jail was preferable by +far. A woman has now had charge of the truant school for fourteen +months, and she tells me that of quite twenty-five hundred boys scarce +sixty were rightly called incorrigible, and even these a little longer +and tighter grip would probably win over. For such, a farm school is yet +to be provided. The rest responded promptly to an appeal to their pride. +She "made it a personal matter" with each of them, and the truant +vanished; the boy was restored. The burglar, too, made it a personal +matter in the old contact, and the result was two burglars for one. In +common with nearly all those who have paid attention to this matter, +Mrs. Alger believes that the truant school strikes at the root of the +problem of juvenile crime. After thirty years of close acquaintance with +the child population of London, Mr. Andrew Drew, chairman of the +Industrial Committee of the School Board, declared his conviction that +"truancy is to be credited with nearly the whole of our juvenile +criminality." But for years there seemed to be no way of convincing the +New York School Board that the two had anything to do with each other. +As executive officer of the Good Government Clubs, I fought that fight +to a finish. We got the school, and in Mrs. Alger, at the time a truant +officer, a person singularly well qualified to take charge of it. She +has recently been removed, that her place might be given to a man. It is +the old scheme come back,--a voter behind the broom,--and the old slough +waiting to overwhelm us again. + +But it will not get the chance. I have my own idea of how this truancy +question is going to be solved. Yesterday I went with Superintendent +Snyder through some of the new schools he is building, upon what he +calls the letter H plan, in the crowded districts. It is the plan of the +Hôtel de Cluny in Paris, and to my mind as nearly perfect as it is +possible to make a schoolhouse. There is not a dark corner in the whole +structure, from the splendid gymnasium under the red-tiled roof to the +indoor playground on the ground floor, which, when thrown in one with +the two open-air playgrounds that lie embraced in the arms of the H, +will give the children nearly an acre of asphalted floor space from +street to street, to romp on. Seven such schools are going up to-day, +each a beautiful palace, and within the year sixteen thousand children +will be housed in them. When I think of the old Allen Street school, +where the gas had to be kept burning even on the brightest days, +recitations suspended every half hour, and the children made to practice +calisthenics so that they should not catch cold while the windows were +opened to let in fresh air; of the dark playground downstairs, with the +rats keeping up such a racket that one could hardly hear himself speak +at times, or of the other East Side playground where the boys "weren't +allowed to speak above a whisper," so as not to disturb those studying +overhead, I fancy that I can make out both the cause and the cure of the +boy's desperation. "We try to make our schools pleasant enough to hold +the children," wrote the Superintendent of Schools in Indianapolis to me +once, and added that they had no truant problem worth bothering about. +With the kindergarten and manual training firmly engrafted upon the +school course, as they are at last, and with it reaching out to +enlist also the boy's play through playground and vacation schools, I +shall be willing to turn the boy, who will not come in, over to the +reformatory. They will not need to build a new wing to the jail for his +safe-keeping. + +[Illustration: LETTER H PLAN OF PUBLIC SCHOOL No. 165 + +_Showing Front on West 109th Street_] + +All ways lead to Rome. The reform in school-building dates back, as does +every other reform in New York, to the Mulberry Bend. It began there. +The first school that departed from the soulless old tradition, to set +beautiful pictures before the child's mind as well as dry figures on the +slate, was built there. At the time I wanted it to stand in the park, +hoping so to hasten the laying out of that; but although the Small Parks +law expressly permitted the erection on park property of buildings for +"the instruction of the people," the officials upon whom I pressed my +scheme could not be made to understand that as including schools. +Perhaps they were right. I catechised thirty-one Fourth Ward girls in a +sewing school, about that time, twenty-six of whom had attended the +public schools of the district more than a year. One wore a badge earned +for excellence in her studies. In those days every street corner was +placarded with big posters of Napoleon on a white horse riding through +fire and smoke. There was one right across the street. Yet only one of +the thirty-one knew who Napoleon was. She "thought she had heard of the +gentleman before." It came out that the one impression she retained of +what she had heard was that "the gentleman" had two wives. They knew of +Washington that he was the first President of the United States, and cut +down a cherry-tree. They were sitting and sewing at the time almost on +the identical spot where he lived and held office. To the question who +ruled before Washington the answer came promptly: no one; he was the +first. They agreed reluctantly, upon further consideration, that there +was probably "a King of America" before his day, and the Irish damsels +turned up their noses at the idea. The people of Canada, they thought, +were copper-colored. The same winter I was indignantly bidden to depart +from a school in the Fourth Ward by a trustee who had heard that I had +written a book about the slum and spoken of "his people" in it. + +Those early steps in the reform path stumbled sadly at times over +obstacles that showed how dense was the ignorance and how rank were the +prejudices we had to fight. When I wrote that the Allen Street school +was overrun by rats, which was a fact any one might observe for himself +by spending five minutes in the building, I was called sharply to +account by the Mayor in the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. There +were no rats, he said. The Allen Street school was the worst of them +all, and I determined that the time had come to make a demonstration. I +procured a rat trap, and was waiting for an idle hour to go over and +catch one of the rats, so that I might have it stuffed and sent to the +board over which the Mayor presided, as a convincing exhibit; but before +I got so far reform swept the whole conspiracy of ignorance and jobbery +out of the City Hall. + +That was well enough as far as it went; but that the broom was needed +elsewhere we learned later, when the Good Government Clubs fought for +the inspection of the schools and of the children by trained oculists. +The evidence was that the pupils were made both near-sighted and stupid +by the want of proper arrangement of their seats and of themselves in +the class-room. The fact was not denied, and the scheme was strongly +indorsed by the Board of Health and by some of the ablest and best known +oculists in the city; but it was wrecked upon an opposition in which we +heard the ignorant and selfish cry that it would "interfere with private +practice," and so curtail the profits of the practitioner. The proposal +to inspect the classes daily for evidence of contagious disease--which, +carried out, has proved a most effective means of preventing the spread +of epidemics, and one of the greatest blessings--had been opposed, +happily unsuccessfully, with the same arguments.[6] It is very well to +prate about the rapacity of politicians, but these things came often +enough to show what they meant by the claim that they were "closer to +the people" than we who were trying to help them; and they were all the +more exasperating because they came rarely from below,--the tenement +people, when they were not deliberately misled, were ready and eager to +fall in with any plan for bettering things, notably where it concerned +the schools,--but usually from those who knew better, and from whom we +had a right to expect support and backing. + +[Footnote 6: I set down reluctantly this censure of an honored +profession, to individual members of which I have been wont, in a long +succession of troubled years, to go for advice and help in public +matters, and never in vain. The statement of the chief sanitary officer +of the Health Department, reaffirmed at the time I am writing, is, +however, positive to the effect that to this opposition, and this only, +was due the failure of that much-needed reform which had for years been +with me a pet measure.] + +Speaking of that reminds me of a mishap I had in the Hester Street +school,--the one with the "frills" which the Board of Education cut off. +I happened to pass it after school hours, and went in to see what sort +of a playground the roof would have made. I met no one on the way, and, +finding the scuttle open, climbed out and up the slant of the roof to +the peak, where I sat musing over our lost chance, when the janitor came +to close up. He must have thought I was a crazy man, and my explanation +did not make it any better. He haled me down, and but for the fortunate +chance that the policeman on the beat knew me, I should have been taken +to the lockup as a dangerous lunatic,--all for dreaming of a playground +on the roof of a schoolhouse. + +Janitor and Board of Commissioners to the contrary notwithstanding, the +dream became real. There stands another school in Hester Street to-day +within easy call, that has a playground measuring more than twelve +thousand square feet on the roof, one of half that size down on the +ground, and an asphalted indoor playground as big as the one on the +roof. Together they measure a trifle less than thirty thousand feet. To +the indignant amazement of my captor, the janitor, his school was thrown +open to the children in the last summer vacation, and in the winter they +put a boys' club in to worry him. What further indignities there are in +store for him, in this day of "frills," there is no telling. A +resolution is on record which states, under date of May 18, 1897, that +"it is the sense of the Board of Superintendents that the schoolhouses +may well be used in the cause of education as neighborhood centres, +providing reading-rooms, branch offices of public libraries, etc." And +to cut off all chance of relapse into the old doubt whether "such things +are educational," that laid so many of our hopes on the dusty shelf +of the circumlocution office, the state legislature has expressly +declared that the commonwealth will take the chance, which Boards of +Education shunned, of a little amusement creeping in. The schools may be +used for "purposes of recreation." To the janitor it must seem that the +end of all things is at hand. + +[Illustration: PLAYGROUND ON ROOF OF NEW EAST BROADWAY SCHOOLHOUSE + +_Area 8,348 square feet_] + +In the crowded districts, the school playgrounds were thrown open to the +children during the long vacation last year, with kindergarten teachers +to amuse them, and half a score of vacation schools tempted more than +four thousand children from the street into the cool shade of the +class-rooms. They wrought in wood and iron, they sang and they played +and studied nature,--out of a barrel, to be sure, that came twice a week +from Long Island filled with "specimens;" but toward the end we took a +hint from Chicago, and let the children gather their own specimens on +excursions around the bay and suburbs of the city. That was a tremendous +success. The mere hint that money might be lacking to pay for the +excursions this summer set the St. Andrew's Brotherhood men on Long +Island to devising schemes for inviting the schoolchildren out on +trolley and shore trips. With the Christian Endeavor, the Epworth +League, and kindred societies looking about for something to try their +young strength and enthusiasm on, we may be here standing upon the +threshold of something which shall bring us nearer to a universal +brotherhood than all the consecrations and badges that have yet been +invented. + +The mere contact with nature, even out of a barrel, brought something to +those starved child lives that struck a new note. Sometimes it rang with +a sharp and jarring sound. The boys in the Hester Street school could +not be made to take an interest in the lesson on wheat until the teacher +came to the effect of drought and a bad year on the farmer's pocket. +Then they understood. They knew the process. Strikes cut into the +earnings of Hester Street, small enough at the best of times, at +frequent intervals, and the boys need not be told what a bad year means. +No other kind ever occurs there. They learned the lesson on wheat in no +time, after that. Oftener it was a gentler note that piped timidly in +the strange place. A barrel of wild roses came one day, instead of the +expected "specimens," and these were given to the children. They took +them greedily. "I wondered," said the teacher, "if it was more love of +the flower, or of getting something for nothing, no matter what." But +even if it were largely the latter, there was still the rose. Nothing +like it had come that way before, and without a doubt it taught its own +lesson. The Italian child might have jumped for it more eagerly, but its +beauty was not wasted in Jew-town, either. The baby kissed it, and it +lay upon more than one wan cheek, and whispered who knows what thought +of hope and courage that were nearly gone. Even in Hester Street the +wild rose from the hedge was not wasted. + +The result of it all was wholesome and good, because it was common +sense. The way to fight the slum in the children's lives is with +sunlight and flowers and play, which their child hearts crave, if their +eyes have never seen them. The teachers reported that the boys were +easier to manage, more quiet, and played more fairly than before. The +police reports showed that fewer were arrested or run over in the +streets than in other years. A worse enemy was attacked than the trolley +car or the truck. In the kindergarten at the Hull House in Chicago there +hangs a picture of a harvest scene, with the man wiping his brow, and a +woman resting at his feet. The teacher told me that a little girl with +an old face picked it out among all the rest, and considered it long and +gravely. "Well," she said, when her inspection was finished, "he knocked +her down, didn't he?" A two hours' argument for kindergartens or +vacation schools could not have put it stronger or better. + +The awakening of the civic conscience is nowhere more plainly traced +than in our public schools. The last five years have set us fifty years +ahead, and there is now no doubling on the track we have struck. We have +fifty kindergartens to-day where five years ago we had one, and their +method has invaded the whole system of teaching. Cooking, the only kind +of temperance preaching that counts for anything in a school course, is +taught in the girls' classes. Five years ago a minister of justice +declared in the Belgian Chamber that the nation was reverting to a new +form of barbarism, which he described by the term "alcoholic barbarism," +and pointed out as its first cause the "insufficiency of the food +procurable by the working classes." He referred to the quality, not the +quantity. The United States experts, who lately made a study of the +living habits of the poor in New York, spoke of it as a common +observation that "a not inconsiderable amount of the prevalent +intemperance can be traced to poor food and unattractive home tables." +The toasting-fork in Jacob's sister's hand beats preaching in the +campaign against the saloon, just as the boys' club beats the police +club in fighting the gang. + +The cram and the jam are being crowded out as common-sense teaching +steps in and takes their place, and the "three H's," the head, the +heart, and the hand,--a whole boy,--are taking the place too long +monopolized by the "three R's." There was need of it. It had seemed +sometimes as if, in our anxiety lest he should not get enough, we were +in danger of stuffing the boy to the point of making a hopeless dunce of +him. It is a higher function of the school to teach principles than to +impart facts merely. Teaching the boy municipal politics and a thousand +things to make a good citizen of him, instead of so filling him with +love of his country and pride in its traditions that he is bound to take +the right stand when the time comes, is as though one were to attempt to +put all the law of the state into its constitution to make it more +binding. The result would be hopeless congestion and general +uselessness. + +It comes down to the teacher in the end, and there are 5600 of them in +the old city alone, 10,000 for the greater city;[7] the great mass +faithful and zealous, but yoked to the traditions of a day that is past. +Half the machine teaching, the wooden output of our public schools in +the past, I believe was due to the practical isolation of the teachers +between the tyranny of politics and the distrust of those who had good +cause to fear the politician and his work. There was never a more +saddening sight than that of the teachers standing together in an almost +solid body to resist reform of the school system as an attack upon +them. There was no pretense on their part that the schools did not need +reform. They knew better. They fought for their places. Throughout the +fight no word came from them of the children's rights. They imagined +that theirs were in danger, and they had no thought for anything else. +We gathered then the ripe fruit of politics, and it will be a long +while, I suppose, before we get the taste out of our mouths. But the +grip of politics on our schools has been loosened, if not shaken off +altogether, and the teacher's slavery is at an end, if she herself so +wills it. Once hardly thought worthy of a day laborer's hire, she will +receive a policeman's pay for faithful service[8] in the school year now +begun, with his privilege of a half-pay pension on retirement. Within +three weeks after the passage of the salary bill forty-two teachers in +the boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx had applied for retirement. The +training schools are hard at work filling up the gaps. The windows of +the schoolhouse have been thrown open, and life let in there too with +the sunlight. The day may be not far distant when ours shall be schools +"for discovering aptitude," in Professor Felix Adler's wise plan. The +problem is a vast one, even in its bulk; every year seats must be found +on the school benches for twenty thousand additional children. However +deep we have gone down into our pockets to pay for new schools, there +are to-day in the greater city nearly thirty thousand children in +half-day or part-time classes, waiting their chance. But that it can and +will be solved the experience of the last five years fully warrants. + +[Footnote 7: The exact number for April, 1899, was 9989; number of +pupils registered, 401,761; average daily attendance, 370,722.] + +[Footnote 8: The teacher's pay, under the new act, is from $600 to +$1400. The policeman's pay is $1400.] + +In the solution the women of New York will have had no mean share. In +the struggle for school reform they struck the telling blows, and the +credit for the victory was justly theirs. The Public Education +Association, originally a woman's auxiliary to Good Government Club E, +has since worked as energetically with the school authorities as it +before worked against them. It has opened many windows for little souls +by hanging schoolrooms with beautiful casts and pictures, and forged at +the same time new and strong links in the chain that bound the boy all +too feebly to the school. At a time when the demand of the boys of the +East Side for club room, which was in itself one of the healthiest signs +of the day, had reached an exceedingly dangerous pass, the Public +Education Association broke ground that will prove the most fertile +field of all. The Raines law saloon, quick to discern in the new demand +the gap that would divorce it by and by from the man, attempted to +bridge it by inviting the boy in under its roof. Occasionally the girl +went along. A typical instance of how the scheme worked was brought to +my attention at the time by the manager of the College Settlement. The +back room of the saloon was given to the club free of charge, with the +understanding that the boy members should "treat." As a means of raising +the needed funds, the club hit upon the plan of fining members ten cents +when they "got funny." To defeat this device of the devil some way must +be found; but club room was scarce among the tenements. The Good +Government Clubs proposed to the Board of Education that it open the +empty class-rooms at night for the children's use. It was my privilege +to plead their cause before the School Board, and to obtain from it the +necessary permission, after some hesitation and doubt as to whether "it +was educational." The Public Education Association promptly assumed the +responsibility for "the property," and the Hester Street school was +opened. There are now two schools that are given over to evening clubs. +The property has not been molested, but the boys who have met under Miss +Winifred Buck's management have learned many a lesson of self-control +and practical wisdom that has proved "educational" in the highest +degree. Her plan is simplicity itself. Through their play--the meeting +usually begins with a romp--in quarters where there is not too much +elbow-room, the boys learn the first lesson of respecting one another's +rights. The subsequent business meeting puts them upon the fundamentals +of civilized society, as it were. Out of the debate of the question, Do +we want boys who swear, steal, gamble, and smoke cigarettes? grow +convictions as to why these vices are wrong that put "the gang" in its +proper light. Punishment comes to appear, when administered by the boys +themselves, a natural consequence of law-breaking, in defense of +society; and the boy is won. He can thenceforward be trusted to work out +his own salvation. If he does it occasionally with excessive unction, +remember how recent is his conversion. "_Resolved_, that wisdom is +better than wealth," was rejected as a topic for discussion by one of +the clubs, because "everybody knows it is." This was in the Tenth Ward. +If temptation had come that way in the shape of a pushcart with +pineapples--we are all human! Anyway, they had learned the right. + +With the women to lead, the school has even turned the tables on the +jail and invaded it bodily. For now nearly two years the Public +Education Association has kept school in the Tombs, for the boys locked +up there awaiting trial. Of thirty-one pupils on this school register, +the other day, twelve were charged with burglary, four with highway +robbery, and three with murder. That was the gang run to earth at last. +Better late than never. The windows of their prison overlooked the spot +where the gallows used to stand that cut short many a career such as +they pursued. They were soberly attentive to their studies, which were +of a severely practical turn. Their teacher, Mr. David Willard, who was +a resident of the University Settlement in its old Delancey Street +home,--the fact that the forces for good one finds at work in the slum +usually lead back to the settlements shows best that they have so far +escaped the peril of stiffening into mere institutions,--has his own +sound view of how to head off the hangman. Daily and nightly he gathers +about him in the house on Chrystie Street, where he makes his home, +three hundred boys and girls, whom he meets as their friend, on equal +terms. The club is the means of getting them there, and so it is in its +right place. + +Once a week another teacher comes to the Tombs school, and tells the +boys of our city's history, its famous buildings and great men; trying +so to arouse their interest as a first step toward a citizen's pride. +This one also is sent by a club of women, the City History Club, which +in three years has done strange things among the children. It sprang +from the proposition of Mr. Robert Abbe that the man and the citizen has +his birth in the boy, and that to love a thing one must know it first. +The half-dozen classes that were started for the study of our city's +history have swelled into nearly a hundred, with quite eighteen hundred +pupils. The pregnant fact was noted early by the teachers, that the +immigrant boy easily outstrips in interest for his adopted home the +native, who perchance turns up his nose at him, and later very likely +complains of the "unscrupulousness" of the Jew who forged ahead of him +in business as well. + +"Everything takes ten years." Looking back from the closing year of the +century, one is almost tempted to turn Mr. Hewitt's phrase about, and +say that everything has been packed into ten years. The tenth winter of +the free lectures, which the city provides to fill up in a measure those +gaps which the earlier years left, has just passed. When the first +course showed an attendance of 22,149 upon 186 lectures, we were all +encouraged; but the last season saw 1923 lectures delivered upon every +topic of human interest, from the care of our bodies and natural science +to literature, astronomy, and music, and a multitude of 519,411 persons, +chiefly workingmen and their wives, the parents of the schoolboy, heard +them. Forty-eight schools and halls were employed for the purpose. The +People's Institute adds to this programme a forum for the discussion of +social topics, nineteenth-century history, and "present problems" on a +wholly non-partisan, unsectarian basis. The Institute was launched upon +its educational mission within six weeks after the disastrous Greater +New York election in 1897. It has since drawn to the platform of the +Cooper Institute audiences, chiefly of workingmen more or less connected +with the labor movement, that have filled its great hall. The spirit +that animates its work is shown in its review of the field upon the +threshold of its third year. Speaking of the social issues that are +hastening toward a settlement, it says: "Society is about to be +organized, gradually, wisely, on the lines of the recognition of the +brotherhood of man. The People's Institute holds to-day, as no other +institution in this city, the confidence of all classes of the working +people; also of the best minds among the well-to-do classes. It can +throw all its influence upon the side of removing misunderstandings, +promoting mutual confidence.... This is its great work." A great +undertaking, truly, but one in which no one may rashly say it shall not +succeed. As an installment, it organized last spring, for study, +discussion, and social intercourse, the first of a chain of People's +Clubs, full of a strong and stirring life, which within three months had +a membership of three hundred and fifty, and a list of two hundred and +fifty applicants. + +While the Institute's plan has met with this cordial reception downtown, +uptown, among the leisure classes, its acceptance has been nothing like +so ready. Selfish wealth has turned a cold shoulder to the brotherhood +of man, as so often in the past. Still the proffered hand is not +withdrawn. In a hundred ways it is held out with tender of help and +sympathy and friendship, these days, where distrust and indifference +were once the rule. The People's University Extension Society, leaving +the platform to its allies, invades the home, the nursery, the +kindergarten, the club, wherever it can, with help and counsel. Down on +the lower East Side, the Educational Alliance conducts from the Hebrew +Institute an energetic campaign among the Jewish immigrants that +reaches fully six thousand souls, two thirds of them children, every day +in the week. Sixty-two clubs alone hold meetings in the building on +Saturday and Sunday. Under the same roof the Baron Hirsch Fund has +taught sixteen thousand children of refugee Jews in nine years. It +passes them on to the public schools within six months of their landing, +the best material they receive from anywhere. + +So the boy is being got ready for dealing, in the years that are to +come, with the other but not more difficult problems of setting his +house to rights, and ridding it of the political gang which now +misrepresents him and us. And justice to Jacob is being evolved. Not yet +without obstruction and dragging of feet. The excellent home library +plan that proved so wholesome in the poor quarters of Boston has failed +in New York, except in a few notable instances, through the difficulty +of securing the visitors upon whom the plan depends for its success. The +same want has kept the boys' club from reaching the development that +would apply the real test to it as a barrier against the slum. There +are fifteen clubs for every Winifred Buck that is in sight. From the +City History Club, the Charity Organization Society, from everywhere, +comes the same complaint. The hardest thing in the world to give is +still one's self. But it is all the time getting to be easier. There are +daily more women and men who, thinking of the boy, can say, and do, with +my friend of the College Settlement, when an opportunity to enter a +larger field was offered her, "No, I am content to stay here, to be +ready for Johnnie when he wants me." + +Justice for the boy, and for his father. An itinerant Jewish glazier, +crying his wares, was beckoned into a stable by the foreman, and bidden +to replace a lot of broken panes, enough nearly to exhaust his stock. +When, after working half the day, he asked for his pay, he was driven +from the place with jeers and vile words. Raging and impotent, he went +back to his poor tenement cursing a world in which there was no justice +for a poor man. If he had next been found ranting with anarchists +against the social order, would you have blamed him? He found instead, +in the Legal Aid Society, a champion that pleaded his cause and +compelled the stableman to pay him his wages. For a hundred thousand +such--more shame to us--this society has meant all that freedom +promised: justice to the poor man. It too has earned a place among the +forces that are working out through the new education the brighter day, +for it has taught the lesson which all the citizens of a free state need +most to learn,--respect for law. + + + + +VIII + +REFORM BY HUMANE TOUCH + + +I have sketched in outline the gains achieved in the metropolis since +its conscience awoke. Now, in closing this account, I am reminded of the +story of an old Irishman who died here a couple of years ago. Patrick +Mullen was an honest blacksmith. He made guns for a living. He made them +so well that one with his name on it was worth a good deal more than the +market price of guns. Other makers went to him with offers of money for +the use of his stamp; but they never went twice. When sometimes a gun of +very superior make was brought to him to finish, he would stamp it P. +Mullen, never Patrick Mullen. Only to that which he himself had wrought +did he give his honest name without reserve. When he died, judges and +bishops and other great men crowded to his modest home by the East +River, and wrote letters to the newspapers telling how proud they had +been to call him friend. Yet he was, and remained to the end, plain +Patrick Mullen, blacksmith and gunmaker. + +In his life he supplied the answer to the sigh of dreamers in all days: +when will the millennium come? It will come when every man is a Patrick +Mullen at his own trade; not merely a P. Mullen, but a Patrick Mullen. +The millennium of municipal politics, when there shall be no slum to +fight, will come when every citizen does his whole duty as a citizen; +not before. As long as he "despises politics," and deputizes another to +do it for him, whether that other wears the stamp of a Croker or of a +Platt,--it matters little which,--we shall have the slum, and be put +periodically to the trouble and the shame of draining it in the public +sight. A citizen's duty is one thing that cannot be farmed out safely; +and the slum is not limited by the rookeries of Mulberry or Ludlow +streets. It has long roots that feed on the selfishness and dullness of +Fifth Avenue quite as greedily as on the squalor of the Sixth Ward. The +two are not nearly so far apart as they look. + +I am not saying this because it is anything new, but because we have +just had an illustration of its truth in municipal politics. Waring and +Roosevelt were the Patrick Mullens of the reform administration which +Tammany has now replaced with her insolent platform, "To hell with +reform." It was not an ideal administration, but it can be said of it, +at least, that it was up to the times it served. It made compromises +with spoils politics, and they were wretched failures. It took Waring +and Roosevelt on the other plan, on which they insisted, of divorcing +politics from the public business, and they let in more light than even +my small parks over on the East Side. For they showed us where we stood +and what was the matter with us. We believed in Waring when he +demonstrated the success of his plan for cleaning the streets: not +before. When Roosevelt announced his programme of enforcing the excise +law because it _was_ law, a howl arose that would have frightened a less +resolute man from his purpose. But he went right on doing the duty he +was sworn to do. And when, at the end of three months of clamor and +abuse, we saw the spectacle of the saloon keepers formally resolving to +help the police instead of hindering them; of the prison ward in +Bellevue Hospital standing empty for three days at a time, an +astonishing and unprecedented thing, which the warden could only +attribute to the "prompt closing of the saloons at one A. M.;" and of +the police force recovering its lost self-respect, we had found out more +and greater things than whether the excise law was a good or a bad law. +We understood what Roosevelt meant when he insisted upon the "primary +virtues" of honesty and courage in the conduct of public business. For +the want of them in us, half the laws that touched our daily lives had +become dead letters or vehicles of blackmail and oppression. It was +worth something to have that lesson taught us in that way; to find out +that simple, straightforward, honest dealing as between man and man is +after all effective in politics as in gunmaking. Perhaps we have not +mastered the lesson yet. But we have not discharged the teacher, either. + +[Illustration: A TAMMANY-SWEPT EAST SIDE STREET, BEFORE WARING + +(_See picture facing page 248_)] + +Courage, indeed! There were times during that stormy spell when it +seemed as if we had grown wholly and hopelessly flabby as a people. +All the outcry against the programme of order did not come from the +lawless and the disorderly, by any means. Ordinarily decent, +conservative citizens joined in counseling moderation and virtual +compromise with the law-breakers--it was nothing else--to "avoid +trouble." The old love of fair play had been whittled down by the +jackknife of all-pervading expediency to an anæmic desire to "hold the +scales even;" that is a favorite modern device of the devil for +paralyzing action in men. You cannot hold the scales even in a moral +issue. It inevitably results in the triumph of evil, which asks nothing +better than the even chance to which it is not entitled. When the +trouble in the Police Board had reached a point where it seemed +impossible not to understand that Roosevelt and his side were fighting a +cold and treacherous conspiracy against the cause of good government, we +had the spectacle of a Christian Endeavor Society inviting the man who +had hatched the plot, the bitter and relentless enemy whom the Mayor had +summoned to resign, and afterward did his best to remove as a fatal +obstacle to reform,--inviting this man to come before it and speak of +Christian citizenship! It was a sight to make the bosses hug themselves +with glee. For Christian citizenship is their nightmare, and nothing is +so cheering to them as evidence that those who profess it have no sense. + +Apart from the moral bearings of it, what this question of enforcement +of law means in the life of the poor was illustrated by testimony given +before the Police Board very recently. A captain was on trial for +allowing the policy swindle to go unchecked in his precinct. Policy is a +kind of penny lottery, with alleged daily drawings which never take +place. The whole thing is a pestilent fraud, which is allowed to exist +only because it pays heavy blackmail to the police and the politicians. +Expert witnesses testified that eight policy shops in the Twenty-First +Ward, which they had visited, did a business averaging about thirty-two +dollars a day each. The Twenty-First is a poor Irish tenement ward. The +policy sharks were getting two hundred and fifty dollars or more a day +of the hard-earned wages of those poor people, in sums of from one and +two cents to a quarter, without making any return for it. The thing +would seem incredible, were it not too sadly familiar. The saloon keeper +got his share of what was left, and rewarded his customer by posing as +the "friend of the poor man" whenever his business was under scrutiny; I +have yet in my office the record of a single week during the hottest of +the fight between Roosevelt and the saloons, as showing of what kind +that friendship is. It embraces the destruction of eight homes by the +demon of drunkenness: the suicide of four wives, the murder of two +others by drunken husbands, the killing of a policeman in the street, +and the torture of an aged woman by her rascal son, who "used to be a +good boy till he took to liquor, when he became a perfect devil." In +that rôle he finally beat her to death for giving shelter to some +evicted fellow tenants who else would have had to sleep in the street. +Nice friendly turn, wasn't it? + +And yet there was something to be said for the saloon keeper. He gave +the man the refuge from his tenement which he needed. I say needed, +purposely. There has been a good deal of talk lately about the saloon +as a social necessity. About all there is to that is that the saloon is +there, and the necessity too. Man is a social animal, whether he lives +in a tenement or in a palace. But the palace has resources; the tenement +has not. It is a good place to get away from at all times. The saloon is +cheery and bright, and never far away. The man craving human +companionship finds it there. He finds, too, in the saloon keeper one +who understands his wants much better than the reformer who talks civil +service in the meetings. "Civil service" to him and his kind means yet a +contrivance for keeping them out of a job. The saloon keeper knows the +boss, if he is not himself the boss or his lieutenant, and can steer him +to the man who will spend all day at the City Hall, if need be, to get a +job for a friend, and all night pulling wires to keep him in it, if +trouble is brewing. Mr. Beecher used to say, when pleading for bright +hymn tunes, that he didn't want the devil to have the monopoly of all +the good music in the world. The saloon has had the monopoly up to date +of all the cheer in the tenements. If its owner has made it pan out to +his own advantage and the boss's, we at least have no just cause of +complaint. We let him have the field all to himself. + +As to this boss, of whom we hear so much, what manner of man is he? That +depends on how you look at him. I have one in mind, a district boss, +whom you would accept instantly as a type, if I were to mention his +name, which I shall not do for a reason which I fear will shock you: he +and I are friends. In his private capacity I have real regard for him. +As a politician and a boss I have none at all. I am aware that this is +taking low ground in a discussion of this kind, but perhaps the reader +will better understand the relations of his "district" to him, if I let +him into mine. There is no political bond between us, of either district +or party; just the reverse. It is purely personal. He was once a police +justice,--at that time he kept a saloon,--and I never knew one with more +common sense, which happens to be the one quality especially needed in +that office. Up to the point where politics came in I could depend upon +him entirely. At that point he let me know bluntly that he was in the +habit of running his district to suit himself. The way he did it +brought him under the just accusation of being guilty of every kind of +rascality known to politics. When next our paths would cross each other, +it would very likely be on some errand of mercy, to which his feet were +always swift. I recall the distress of a dear and gentle lady at whose +dinner table I once took his part. She could not believe that there was +any good in him; what he did must be done for effect. Some time after +that she wrote asking me to look after an East Side family that was in +great trouble. It was during the severe cold spell of last winter, and +there was need of haste. I went over at once; but although I had lost no +time, I found my friend the boss ahead of me. It was a real pleasure to +me to be able to report to my correspondent that he had seen to their +comfort, and to add that it was unpolitical charity altogether. The +family was that of a Jewish widow with a lot of little children. He is a +Roman Catholic. There were no men, consequently no voters, in the house, +which was far outside of his district, too; and as for effect, he was +rather shamefaced at my catching him at it. I do not believe that a +soul has ever heard of the case from him to this day. + +[Illustration: THE SAME EAST SIDE STREET WHEN COLONEL WARING WIELDED THE +BROOM + +(_See picture facing page 242_)] + +My friend is a Tammany boss. During that same cold spell a politician of +the other camp came into my office and gave me a hundred dollars to +spend as I saw fit among the poor. His district was miles uptown, and he +was most unwilling to disclose his identity, stipulating in the end that +no one but I should know where the money came from. He was not seeking +notoriety. The plight of the suffering had appealed to him, and he +wanted to help where he could, that was all. + +Now, I have not the least desire to glorify the boss in this. He is not +glorious to me. He is simply human. Often enough he is a coarse and +brutal fellow, in his morals as in his politics. Again, he may have some +very engaging personal traits that bind his friends to him with the +closest of ties. The poor man sees the friend, the charity, the power +that is able and ready to help him in need; is it any wonder that he +overlooks the source of this power, this plenty,--that he forgets the +robbery in the robber who is "good to the poor"? Anyhow, if anybody got +robbed, it was "the rich." With the present ethical standards of the +slum, it is easy to construct even a scheme of social justice out of it +that is very comforting all round, even to the boss himself, though he +is in need of no sympathy or excuse. "Politics," he will tell me in his +philosophic moods, "is a game for profit. The city foots the bills." +Patriotism means to him working for the ticket that shall bring more +profit. "I regard," he says, lighting his cigar, "a repeater as a shade +off a murderer, but you are obliged to admit that in my trade he is a +necessary evil." I am not obliged to do anything of the kind, but I can +understand his way of looking at it. He simply has no political +conscience. He has gratitude, loyalty to a friend,--that is part of his +stock in trade,--fighting blood, plenty of it, all the good qualities of +the savage; nothing more. And a savage he is, politically, with no soul +above the dross. He would not rob a neighbor for the world; but he will +steal from the city--though he does not call it by that name--without a +tremor, and count it a good mark. When I tell him that, he waves his +hand toward Wall Street as representative of the business community, +and toward the office of his neighbor, the padrone, as representative +of the railroads, and says with a laugh, "Don't they all do it?" + +The boss believes in himself. It is one of his strong points. And he has +experience to back him. In the fall of 1894 we shook off boss rule in +New York, and set up housekeeping for ourselves. We kept it up three +years, and then went back to the old style. I should judge that we did +it because we were tired of too much virtue. Perhaps we were not built +to hold such a lot at once. Besides, it is much easier to be ruled than +to rule. That fall, after the election, when I was concerned about what +would become of my small parks, of the Health Department in which we +took such just pride, and of a dozen other things, I received one +unvarying reply to my anxious question, or rather two. If it was the +Health Department, I was told: "Go to Platt. He is the only man who can +do it. He is a sensible man, and will see that it is protected." If +small parks, it was: "Go to Croker. He will not allow the work to be +stopped." A playgrounds bill was to be presented in the legislature, and +everybody advised: "Go to Platt. He won't have any objection: it is +popular." And so on. My advisers were not politicians. They were +business men, but recently honestly interested in reform. I was talking +one day with a gentleman of very wide reputation as a philanthropist, +about the unhappy lot of the old fire-engine horses,--which, after lives +of toil that deserve a better fate, are sold for a song to drag out a +weary existence hauling some huckster's cart around,--and wishing that +they might be pensioned off to live out their years on a farm, with +enough to eat and a chance to roll in the grass. He was much interested, +and promptly gave me this advice: "I tell you what you do. You go and +see Croker. He likes horses." No wonder the boss believes in himself. He +would be less than human if he did not. And he is very human. + +I had voted on the day of the Greater New York election,--the Tammany +election, as we learned to call it afterward,--in my home out in the +Borough of Queens, and went over to the depot to catch the train for the +city. On the platform were half a dozen of my neighbors, all business +men, all "friends of reform." Some of them were just down from +breakfast. One I remembered as introducing a resolution, in a meeting we +had held, about the discourtesy of local politicians. He looked +surprised when reminded that it was election day. "Why, is it to-day?" +he said. "They didn't send any carriage," said another regretfully. "I +don't see what's the use," said the third; "the roads are just as bad as +when we began talking about it." (We had been trying to mend them.) The +fourth yawned and said: "I don't care. I have my business to attend to." +And they took the train, which meant that they lost their votes. The +Tammany captain was busy hauling his voters by the cartload to the +polling place. Over there stood a reform candidate who had been defeated +in the primary, and puffed out his chest. "The politicians are afraid of +me," he said. They slapped him on the back, as they went by, and told +him that he was a devil of a fellow. + +So Tammany came back. The Health Department is wrecked. The police force +is worse than before Roosevelt took hold of it, and we are back in the +mud out of which we pulled ourselves with such an effort. And we are +swearing at it. But I am afraid we are swearing at the wrong fellow. The +real Tammany is not the conscienceless rascal that plunders our treasury +and fattens on our substance. That one is a mere counterfeit. It is the +voter who waits for a carriage to take him to the polls, the man who +"doesn't see what's the use;" the business man who says "business is +business," and has no time to waste on voting; the citizen who "will +wait to see how the cat jumps, because he doesn't want to throw his vote +away;" the cowardly American who "doesn't want to antagonize" anybody; +the fool who "washes his hands of politics." These are the real Tammany, +the men after the boss's own heart. For every one whose vote he buys, +there are two of these who give him theirs for nothing. We shall get rid +of him when these withdraw their support, when they become citizens of +the Patrick Mullen stamp, as faithful at the polling place as he was at +the forge; not before. + +The true work of reform is at the top, not at the bottom. The man in the +slum votes according to his light, and the boss holds the candle. But +the boss is in no real sense a leader. He follows instead, always as +far behind the moral sentiment of the community as he thinks is safe. He +has heard it said that a community will not be any better than its +citizens, and that it will be just as good as they are, and he applies +the saying to himself. He is no worse a boss than the town deserves. I +can conceive of his taking credit to himself as some kind of a moral +instrument by which the virtue of the community may be graded, though +that is most unlikely. He does not bother himself with the morals of +anything. But right here is his Achilles heel. The man has no +conscience. He cannot tell the signs of it in others. It always comes +upon him unawares. Reform to him simply means the "outs" fighting to get +in. The real thing he will always underestimate. Such a man is not the +power he seems. He is formidable only in proportion to the amount of +shaking it takes to rouse the community's conscience. + +The boss is like the measles, a distemper of a self-governing people's +infancy. When we shall have come of age politically, he will have no +terrors for us. Meanwhile, being charged with the business of governing, +which we left to him because we were too busy making money, he follows +the track laid out for him, and makes the business pan out all that is +in it. He fights when we want to discharge him. Of course he does. No +man likes to give up a good job. He will fight or bargain, as he sees +his way clear. He will give us small parks, play piers, new schools, +anything we ask, to keep his place, while trying to find out "the price" +of this conscience which he does not understand. Even to the half of his +kingdom he will give, to be "in" on the new deal. He has done it before, +and there is no reason that he can see why it should not be done again. +And he will appeal to the people whom he is plundering to trust him +because they know him. + +Odd as it sounds, this is where he has his real hold. I have shown why +this is so. To the poor people of his district the boss is a real friend +in need. He is one of them. He does not want to reform them; far from +it. No doubt it is very ungrateful of them, but the poor people have no +desire to be reformed. They do not think they need to be. They consider +their moral standards quite as high as those of the rich, and resent +being told that they are mistaken. The reformer comes to them from +another world to tell them these things, and goes his way. The boss +lives among them. He helped John to a job on the pipes in their hard +winter, and got Mike on the force. They know him as a good neighbor, and +trust him to their harm. He drags their standard ever farther down. The +question for those who are trying to help them is how to make them +transfer their allegiance, and trust their real friends instead. + +It ought not to be a difficult question to answer. Any teacher could do +it. He knows, if he knows anything, that the way to get and keep the +children's confidence is to trust them, and let them know that they are +trusted. They will almost always come up to the demand thus made upon +them. Preaching to them does little good; preaching at them still less. +Men, whether rich or poor, are much like children. The good in them is +just as good as it is said to be, and the bad, considering their +enlarged opportunities for mischief, not so much worse than it is +called. A vigorous optimism, a stout belief in one's fellow man, is +better equipment in a campaign for civic virtue than stacks of tracts +and arguments, economic and moral, are. There is good bottom, even in +the slum, for that kind of an anchor to get a grip on. A year ago I went +to see a boxing match there had been much talk about. The hall was +jammed with a rough and noisy crowd, hotly intent upon its favorite. His +opponent, who hailed, I think, from somewhere in Delaware, was greeted +with hostile demonstrations as a "foreigner." But as the battle wore on, +and he was seen to be fair and manly, while the New Yorker struck one +foul blow after another, the attitude of the crowd changed rapidly from +enthusiastic approval of the favorite to scorn and contempt; and in the +last round, when he knocked the Delawarean over with a foul blow, the +audience rose in a body and yelled to have the fight given to the +"foreigner," until my blood tingled with pride. For the decision would +leave it practically without a cent. It had staked all it had on the New +Yorker. "He is a good man," I heard on all sides, while the once +favorite sneaked away without a friend. "Good" meant fair and manly to +that crowd. I thought, as I went to the office the next morning, that +it ought to be easy to appeal to such a people with measures that were +fair and just, if we could only get on common ground. But the only hint +I got from my reform paper was an editorial denunciation of the +brutality of boxing, on the same page that had an enthusiastic review of +the college football season. I do not suppose it did any harm, for the +paper was probably not read by one of the men it had set out to reform. +But suppose it had been, how much would it have appealed to them? +Exactly the qualities of robust manliness which football is supposed to +encourage in college students had been evoked by the trial of strength +and skill which they had witnessed. As to the brutality, they knew that +fifty young men are maimed or killed at football to one who fairs ill in +a boxing match. Would it seem to them common sense, or cant and humbug? + +It comes down in the end to a question of common sense and common +honesty. For how many failures of reform effort is insincerity not to +blame! Last spring I attended a meeting at Albany that had been called +by the governor to discuss the better enforcement of the labor laws. We +talked the situation over, and Mr. Roosevelt received from those present +their ready promise to aid him in every way in making effective the laws +that represented so much toil and sacrifice, yet had until then been in +too many instances barren of results. Some time after, a workingman told +me with scorn how, on our coming home, one of our party had stopped in +at the factory inspector's office to urge him to "let up" on a friend, a +cigar manufacturer, who was violating a law for which the labor +organizations had fought long years as absolutely necessary to secure +human conditions in the trade. How much stock might he and his fellows +be supposed to take in a movement that had such champions? "You scratch +my back and I'll scratch yours," is a kind of politics in which the +reformer is no match for the boss. The boss will win on that line every +time. A saving sense of humor might have avoided that and many other +pitfalls. I am seriously of the opinion that a professional humorist +ought to be attached to every reform movement, to keep it from making +itself ridiculous by either too great solemnity or too much conceit. As +it is, the enemy sometimes employs him with effect. Failing the adoption +of that plan, I would recommend a decree of banishment against +photographers, press-clippings men, and the rest of the congratulatory +staff. Why should the fact that a citizen has done a citizen's duty +deserve to be celebrated in print and picture, as if something +extraordinary had happened? The smoke of battle had not cleared away +after the victory of reform, in the fall of 1894, before the citizens' +committee and all the little sub-committees rushed pell-mell to the +photographer's to get themselves on record as the men who did it. The +spectacle might have inspired in the humorist the advice to get two sets +made, while they were about it,--one to serve by and by as an exhibit of +the men who didn't; and, as the event proved, he would have been right. + +But it is easy to find fault, and on that tack we get no farther. Those +men did a great work, and they did it well. The mile-posts they set up +on the road to better things will guide another generation to the goal, +however the present may go astray. Good schools, better homes, and a +chance for the boy are arguments that are not lost upon the people. +They wear well. It may be that, like Moses and his followers, we of the +present day shall see the promised land only from afar and with the eye +of faith, because of our sins; that to a younger and sturdier to-morrow +it shall be given to blaze the path of civic righteousness that was our +dream. I like to think that it is so, and that that is the meaning of +the coming of men like Roosevelt and Waring at this time with their +simple appeal to the reason of honest men. Unless I greatly err in +reading the signs of the times, it is indeed so, and the day of the boss +and of the slum is drawing to an end. Our faith has felt the new +impulse; rather, I should say, it has given it. The social movements, +and that which we call politics, are but a reflection of what the people +honestly believe, a chart of their aims and aspirations. Charity in our +day no longer means alms, but justice. The social settlements are +substituting vital touch for the machine charity that reaped a crop of +hate and beggary. They are passenger bridges, it has been truly said, +not mere "shoots" for the delivery of coal and groceries; bridges upon +which men go over, not down, from the mansion to the tenement. We +have learned that we cannot pass off checks for human sympathy in +settlement of our brotherhood arrears. The church, which once stood by +indifferent, or worse, is hastening to enter the life of the people. In +the memory of men yet living, one church, moving uptown away from the +crowd, left its old Mulberry Street home to be converted into tenements +that justly earned the name of "dens of death" in the Health +Department's records, while another became the foulest lodging house in +an unclean city. It was a church corporation which in those bad days +owned the worst underground dive downtown, and turned a deaf ear to all +remonstrances. The church was "angling for souls." But souls in this +world live in bodies endowed with reason. The results of that kind of +fishing were empty pews and cold hearts, and the conscience-stricken cry +that went up, "What shall we do to lay hold of this great multitude that +has slipped from us?" + +[Illustration: THEODORE ROOSEVELT] + +Ten years have passed, and to-day we see the churches of every +denomination uniting in a systematic canvass of the city to get at the +facts of the people's life of which they had ceased to be a part, +pleading for parks, playgrounds, kindergartens, libraries, clubs, and +better homes. There is a new and hearty sound to the word "brother" that +is full of hope. The cry has been answered. The gap in the social body, +between rich and poor, is no longer widening. We are certainly coming +closer together. Ten years ago, when the King's Daughters lighted a +Christmas tree in Gotham Court, the children ran screaming from Santa +Claus as from a "bogey man." Last Christmas the boys in the Hebrew +Institute's schools nearly broke the bank laying in supplies to do him +honor. I do not mean that the Jews are deserting to join the Christian +church. They are doing that which is better,--they are embracing its +spirit; and they and we are the better for it. God knows we waited long +enough; and how close we were to each other all the while without +knowing it! Last Christmas a clergyman, who lives out of town and has a +houseful of children, asked me if I could not find for them a poor +family in the city with children of about the same ages, whom they might +visit and befriend. He worked every day in the office of a foreign +mission in Fifth Avenue, and knew little of the life that moved about +him in the city. I picked out a Hungarian widow in an East Side +tenement, whose brave struggle to keep her little flock together had +enlisted my sympathy and strong admiration. She was a cleaner in an +office building; not until all the arrangements had been made did it +occur to me to ask where. Then it turned out that she was scrubbing +floors in the missionary society's house, right at my friend's door. +They had passed each other every day, each in need of the other, and +each as far from the other as if oceans separated them instead of a +doorstep four inches wide. + + * * * * * + +Looking back over the years that lie behind with their work, and forward +to those that are coming, I see only cause for hope. As I write these +last lines in a far distant land, in the city of my birth, the children +are playing under my window, and calling to one another with glad cries +in my sweet mother tongue, even as we did in the long ago. Life and the +world are before them, bright with the promise of morning. So to me +seem the skies at home. Not lightly do I say it, for I have known the +toil of rough-hewing it on the pioneer line that turns men's hair gray; +but I have seen also the reward of the toil. New York is the youngest of +the world's great cities, barely yet out of its knickerbockers. It may +be that the dawning century will see it as the greatest of them all. The +task that is set it, the problem it has to solve and which it may not +shirk, is the problem of civilization, of human progress, of a people's +fitness for self-government that is on trial among us. We shall solve it +by the world-old formula of human sympathy, of humane touch. Somewhere +in these pages I have told of the woman in Chicago who accounted herself +the happiest woman alive because she had at last obtained a playground +for her poor neighbors' children. "I have lived here for years," she +said to me, "and struggled with principalities and powers, and have made +up my mind that the most and the best I can do is to live right here +with my people and smile with them,--keep smiling; weep when I must, but +smile as long as I possibly can." And the tears shone in her gentle old +eyes as she said it. When we have learned to smile and weep with the +poor, we shall have mastered our problem. Then the slum will have lost +its grip and the boss his job. + +Until then, while they are in possession, our business is to hold taut +and take in slack right along; never letting go for a moment. + + + ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED + BY H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO. + + The Riverside Press + + CAMBRIDGE, MASS., U. S. A. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Ten Year War, by Jacob A. 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Riis + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Ten Year War + An Account of The Battle with The Slum in New York + +Author: Jacob A. Riis + +Release Date: February 10, 2012 [EBook #38821] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TEN YEAR WAR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<div class="figright"> +<img src="images/tp.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h1>A TEN YEARS' WAR</h1> + +<h2>AN ACCOUNT OF THE BATTLE +WITH THE SLUM IN +NEW YORK</h2> + +<h2>BY<br /> +JACOB A. RIIS</h2> + +<h3>AUTHOR OF "HOW THE OTHER HALF LIVES"</h3> + +<h3><i>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS</i></h3> + +<h3>BOSTON AND NEW YORK</h3> + +<h3>HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY<br /> +The Riverside Press, Cambridge<br /> +1900</h3> + +<h3>COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY JACOB A. RIIS</h3> + +<h3>ALL RIGHTS RESERVED</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>TO THE FAINT-HEARTED AND THOSE OF LITTLE<br /> +FAITH THIS VOLUME IS REPROACHFULLY<br /> +INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR</h3> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus1" id="illus1"></a> +<img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>COLONEL GEORGE E. WARING, JR.</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table> +<tr><td>CHAP.</td><td></td><td>PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">I.</td><td><a href="#I"> <span class="smcap">The Battle with the Slum</span> </a></td><td align="right">1</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">II.</td><td><a href="#II"> <span class="smcap">The Tenement House Blight</span> </a></td><td align="right">30</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">III.</td><td><a href="#III"> <span class="smcap">The Tenement: curing its Blight</span> </a></td><td align="right">68</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">IV.</td><td><a href="#IV"> <span class="smcap">The Tenant</span> </a></td><td align="right">104</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">V.</td><td><a href="#V"> <span class="smcap">The Genesis of the Gang</span> </a></td><td align="right">139</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VI.</td><td><a href="#VI"> <span class="smcap">Letting in the Light</span> </a></td><td align="right">169</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VII.</td><td><a href="#VII"> <span class="smcap">Justice for the Boy</span> </a></td><td align="right">204</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VIII.</td><td><a href="#VIII"> <span class="smcap">Reform by Humane Touch</span> </a></td><td align="right">239</td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + +<table> +<tr><td></td><td align="right">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus1"><span class="smcap">Colonel George E. Waring, Jr.</span> </a></td><td align="right"><i>Frontispiece</i></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus2"><span class="smcap">Police Station Lodging Room on East Side</span> </a></td><td align="right">18</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus3"><span class="smcap">The Mott Street Barracks</span> </a></td><td align="right">74</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus4"><span class="smcap">Alfred Corning Clark Buildings</span>—<i>Model Tenements of City and Suburban Homes Company</i> </a></td><td align="right">84</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus5"><span class="smcap">Evening in one of the Courts of Mills House No. 1</span> </a></td><td align="right">94</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus6"><span class="smcap">Bone Alley</span> </a></td><td align="right">134</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus7"><span class="smcap">Mulberry Bend Park</span> </a></td><td align="right">180</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus8"><span class="smcap">Letter H Plan of Public School No. 165</span> (showing front on West 109th Street) </a></td><td align="right">214</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus9"><span class="smcap">Playground on Roof of New East Broadway Schoolhouse</span> (area 8,348 square feet) </a></td><td align="right">220</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus10"><span class="smcap">A Tammany-swept East Side Street before Waring</span> </a></td><td align="right">242</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus11"><span class="smcap">The Same East Side Street when Colonel Waring wielded the Broom</span> </a></td><td align="right">248</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#illus12"><span class="smcap">Theodore Roosevelt</span> </a></td><td align="right">262</td></tr> +</table> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2>A TEN YEARS' WAR</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>THE BATTLE WITH THE SLUM</h3> + + +<p>The slum is as old as civilization. Civilization implies a race, to get +ahead. In a race there are usually some who for one cause or another +cannot keep up, or are thrust out from among their fellows. They fall +behind, and when they have been left far in the rear they lose hope and +ambition, and give up. Thenceforward, if left to their own resources, +they are the victims, not the masters, of their environment; and it is a +bad master. They drag one another always farther down. The bad +environment becomes the heredity of the next generation. Then, given the +crowd, you have the slum ready-made.</p> + +<p>The battle with the slum began the day civilization recognized in it her +enemy. It was a losing fight until conscience joined<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> forces with fear +and self-interest against it. When common sense and the golden rule +obtain among men as a rule of practice, it will be over. The two have +not always been classed together, but here they are plainly seen to +belong together. Justice to the individual is accepted in theory as the +only safe groundwork of the commonwealth. When it is practiced in +dealing with the slum, there will shortly be no slum. We need not wait +for the millennium, to get rid of it. We can do it now. All that is +required is that it shall not be left to itself. That is justice to it +and to us, since its grievous ailment is that it cannot help itself. +When a man is drowning, the thing to do is to pull him out of the water; +afterward there will be time for talking it over. We got at it the other +way in dealing with our social problems. The doctrinaires had their day, +and they decided to let bad enough alone; that it was unsafe to +interfere with "causes that operate sociologically," as one survivor of +these unfittest put it to me. It was a piece of scientific humbug that +cost the age which listened to it dear. "Causes that operate +sociologically" are the opportunity of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> political and every other +kind of scamp who trades upon the depravity and helplessness of the +slum, and the refuge of the pessimist who is useless in the fight +against them. We have not done yet paying the bills he ran up for us. +Some time since we turned to, to pull the drowning man out, and it was +time. A little while longer, and we should have been in danger of being +dragged down with him.</p> + +<p>The slum complaint had been chronic in all ages, but the great changes +which the nineteenth century saw, the new industry, political freedom, +brought on an acute attack which threatened to become fatal. Too many of +us had supposed that, built as our commonwealth was on universal +suffrage, it would be proof against the complaints that harassed older +states; but in fact it turned out that there was extra hazard in that. +Having solemnly resolved that all men are created equal and have certain +inalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness, we shut our eyes and waited for the formula to work. It was +as if a man with a cold should take the doctor's prescription to bed +with him, expecting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> it to cure him. The formula was all right, but +merely repeating it worked no cure. When, after a hundred years, we +opened our eyes, it was upon sixty cents a day as the living wage of the +working-woman in our cities; upon "knee pants" at forty cents a dozen +for the making; upon the Potter's Field taking tithe of our city life, +ten per cent, each year for the trench, truly the Lost Tenth of the +slum. Our country had grown great and rich; through our ports was poured +food for the millions of Europe. But in the back streets multitudes +huddled in ignorance and want. The foreign oppressor had been +vanquished, the fetters stricken from the black man at home; but his +white brother, in his bitter plight, sent up a cry of distress that had +in it a distinct note of menace. Political freedom we had won; but the +problem of helpless poverty, grown vast with the added offscourings of +the Old World, mocked us, unsolved. Liberty at sixty cents a day set +presently its stamp upon the government of our cities, and it became the +scandal and the peril of our political system.</p> + +<p>So the battle began. Three times since<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> the war that absorbed the +nation's energies and attention had the slum confronted us in New York +with its challenge. In the darkest days of the great struggle it was the +treacherous mob; later on, the threat of the cholera, which found swine +foraging in the streets as the only scavengers, and a swarming host, but +little above the hog in its appetites and in the quality of the shelter +afforded it, peopling the back alleys. Still later, the mob, caught +looting the city's treasury with its idol, the thief Tweed, at its head, +drunk with power and plunder, had insolently defied the outraged +community to do its worst. There were meetings and protests. The rascals +were turned out for a season; the arch-thief died in jail. I see him +now, going through the gloomy portals of the Tombs, whither, as a +newspaper reporter, I had gone with him, his stubborn head held high as +ever. I asked myself more than once, at the time when the vile prison +was torn down, whether the comic clamor to have the ugly old gates +preserved and set up in Central Park had anything to do with the memory +of the "martyred" thief, or whether it was in joyful celebration<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> of the +fact that others had escaped. His name is even now one to conjure with +in the Sixth Ward. He never "squealed," and he was "so good to the +poor"—evidence that the slum is not laid by the heels by merely +destroying Five Points and the Mulberry Bend. There are other fights to +be fought in that war, other victories to be won, and it is slow work. +It was nearly ten years after the great robbery before decency got the +upper grip in good earnest. That was when the civic conscience awoke in +1879.</p> + +<p>In that year the slum was arraigned in the churches. The sad and +shameful story was told of how it grew and was fostered by avarice, that +saw in the homeless crowds from over the sea only a chance for business, +and exploited them to the uttermost, making sometimes a hundred per +cent, on the capital invested,—always most out of the worst houses, +from the tenants of which "nothing was expected" save that they pay the +usurious rents; how Christianity, citizenship, human fellowship, shook +their skirts clear of the rabble that was only good enough to fill the +greedy purse, and how<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the rabble, left to itself, improved such +opportunities as it found after such fashion as it knew; how it ran +elections merely to count its thugs in, and fattened at the public crib; +and how the whole evil thing had its root in the tenements, where the +home had ceased to be sacred,—those dark and deadly dens in which the +family ideal was tortured to death, and character was smothered; in +which children were "damned rather than born" into the world, thus +realizing a slum kind of foreordination to torment, happily brief in +many cases. The Tenement House Committee long afterward called the worst +of the barracks "infant slaughter houses," and showed, by reference to +the mortality lists, that they killed one in every five babies born in +them.</p> + +<p>The story shocked the town into action. Plans for a better kind of +tenement were called for, and a premium was put on every ray of light +and breath of air that could be let into it. Money was raised to build +model houses, and a bill to give the health authorities summary powers +in dealing with tenements was sent to the legislature. The landlords +held it up until the last day of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> the session, when it was forced +through by an angered public opinion. The power of the cabal was broken. +The landlords had found their Waterloo. Many of them got rid of their +property, which in a large number of cases they had never seen, and +tried to forget the source of their ill-gotten wealth. Light and air did +find their way into the tenements in a half-hearted fashion, and we +began to count the tenants as "souls." That is one of our milestones in +the history of New York. They were never reckoned so before; no one ever +thought of them as "souls." So, restored to human fellowship, in the +twilight of the air shaft that had penetrated to their dens, the first +Tenement House Committee was able to make them out "better than the +houses" they lived in, and a long step forward was taken. The Mulberry +Bend, the wicked core of the "bloody Sixth Ward," was marked for +destruction, and all slumdom held its breath to see it go. With that +gone, it seemed as if the old days must be gone too, never to return. +There would not be another Mulberry Bend. As long as it stood, there was +yet a chance. The slum had backing, as it were.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p> + +<p>The civic conscience was not very robust yet, and required many and +protracted naps. It slumbered fitfully eight long years, waking up now +and then with a start, while the politicians did their best to lull it +back to its slumbers. I wondered often, in those years of delay, if it +was just plain stupidity that kept the politicians from spending the +money which the law had put within their grasp; for with every year that +passed a million dollars that could have been used for small park +purposes was lost. But they were wiser than I. I understood when I saw +the changes which letting in the sunshine worked. We had all believed +it, but they knew it all along. At the same time, they lost none of the +chances that offered. They helped the landlords, who considered +themselves greatly aggrieved because their property was thereafter to +front on a park instead of a pigsty, to transfer the whole assessment of +half a million dollars for park benefit to the city. They undid in less +than six weeks what it had taken considerably more than six years to do; +but the park was cheap at the price. We could afford to pay all it cost +to wake us up. When finally, upon the wave of wrath excited by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> the +Parkhurst and Lexow disclosures, reform came with a shock that dislodged +Tammany, it found us wide awake, and, it must be admitted, not a little +astonished at our sudden access of righteousness.</p> + +<p>The battle went against the slum in the three years that followed, until +it found backing in the "odium of reform" that became the issue in the +municipal organization of the greater city. Tammany made notes. Of what +was done, how it was done, and why, during those years, I shall have +occasion to speak further in these pages. Here I wish to measure the +stretch we have come since I wrote "How the Other Half Lives," ten years +ago. Some of it we came plodding, and some at full speed; some of it in +the face of every obstacle that could be thrown in our way, wresting +victory from defeat at every step; some of it with the enemy on the run. +Take it altogether, it is a long way. Most of it will not have to be +traveled over again. The engine of municipal progress, once started as +it has been in New York, may slip many a cog with Tammany as the +engineer; it may even be stopped for a season; but it can never be made +to work backward. Even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> Tammany knows that, and is building the schools +she so long neglected, and so is hastening the day when she shall be but +an unsavory memory.</p> + +<p>How we strove for those schools, to no purpose! Our arguments, our +anger, the anxious pleading of philanthropists who saw the young on the +East Side going to ruin, the warning year after year of the +superintendent of schools that the compulsory education law was but an +empty mockery where it was most needed, the knocking of uncounted +thousands of children for whom there was no room,—uncounted in sober +fact; there was not even a way of finding out how many were +adrift,—brought only the response that the tax rate must be kept down. +Kept down it was. "Waste" was successfully averted at the spigot; at the +bunghole it went on unchecked. In a swarming population like that you +must have either schools or jails, and the jails waxed fat with the +overflow. The East Side, that had been orderly, became a hotbed of child +crime. And when, in answer to the charge made by a legislative committee +that the father forced his child into the shop, on a perjured age<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> +certificate, to labor when he ought to have been at play, that father, +bent and heavy-eyed with unceasing toil, flung back the charge with the +bitter reproach that we gave him no other choice, that it was either the +street or the shop for his boy, and that perjury for him was cheaper +than the ruin of the child, we were mute. What, indeed, was there to +say? The crime was ours, not his. That was but yesterday. To-day we can +count the months to the time when every child who knocks shall find a +seat in our schools. We have a school census to tell us of the need. In +that most crowded neighborhood in all the world, where the +superintendent lately pleaded in vain for three new schools, five have +been built, the finest in this or any other land,—great, light, and +airy structures, with playgrounds on the roof; and all over the city the +like are going up. The briefest of our laws, every word of which is like +the blow of a hammer driving the nails home in the coffin of the bad old +days, says that never one shall be built without its playground. So the +boy is coming to his rights.</p> + +<p>The streets are cleaned,—not necessarily clean just now; Colonel Waring +is dead,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> with his doctrine of putting a man instead of a voter behind +every broom, killed by politics, he and his doctrine both,—but cleaned. +The slum has even been washed. We tried that on Hester Street years ago, +in the age of cobblestone pavements, and the result fairly frightened +us. I remember the indignant reply of a well-known citizen, a man of +large business responsibility and experience in the handling of men, to +whom the office of street-cleaning commissioner had been offered, when I +asked him if he would accept. "I have lived," he said, "a blameless life +for forty years, and have a character in the community. I cannot +afford—no man with a reputation can afford—to hold that office; it +will surely wreck it." That was then. It made Colonel Waring's +reputation. He took the trucks from the streets. Tammany, in a brief +interregnum of vigor under Mayor Grant, had laid the axe to the +unsightly telegraph poles and begun to pave the streets with asphalt, +but it left the trucks and the ash barrels to Colonel Waring as +hopeless. Trucks have votes; at least their drivers have. Now that they +are gone, the drivers would be the last to bring them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> back; for they +have children, too, and the rescued streets gave them their first +playground. Perilous, begrudged by policeman and storekeeper, though it +was, it was still a playground.</p> + +<p>But one is coming in which the boy shall rule unchallenged. The Mulberry +Bend Park kept its promise. Before the sod was laid in it two more were +under way in the thickest of the tenement house crowding, and each, +under the law which brought them into existence, is to be laid out in +part as a playground. They are not yet finished, but they will be; for +the people have taken to the idea, and the politician has made a note of +the fact. He saw a great light when the play piers were opened. In half +a dozen localities where the slum was striking its roots deep into the +soil such piers are now being built, and land is being acquired for +small parks. We shall yet settle the "causes that operated +sociologically" on the boy with a lawn mower and a sand heap. You have +got your boy, and the heredity of the next one, when you can order his +setting.</p> + +<p>Even while I am writing, a bill is urged in the legislature to build in +every senatorial<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> district in the city a gymnasium and a public bath. It +matters little whether it passes at this session or not. The important +thing is that it is there. The rest will follow. A people's club is +being organized, to crowd out the saloon that has had a monopoly of the +brightness and the cheer in the tenement streets too long. The labor +unions are bestirring themselves to deal with the sweating curse, and +the gospel of less law and more enforcement sits enthroned at Albany. +Theodore Roosevelt will teach us again Jefferson's forgotten lesson, +that "the whole art of government consists in being honest." With a back +door to every ordinance that touched the lives of the people, if indeed +the whole thing was not the subject of open ridicule or the vehicle of +official blackmail, it seemed as if we had provided a perfect municipal +machinery for bringing the law into contempt with the young, and so for +wrecking citizenship by the shortest cut.</p> + +<p>Of free soup there is an end. It was never food for free men. The last +spoonful was ladled out by yellow journalism with the certificate of the +men who fought Roosevelt<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> and reform in the police board that it was +good. It is not likely that it will ever plague us again. Our experience +has taught us a new reading of the old word that charity covers a +multitude of sins. It does. Uncovering some of them has kept us busy +since our conscience awoke, and there are more left. The worst of them +all, that awful parody on municipal charity, the police station lodging +room, is gone, after twenty years of persistent attack upon the foul +dens,—years during which they were arraigned, condemned, indicted by +every authority having jurisdiction, all to no purpose. The stale beer +dives went with them and with the Bend, and the grip of the tramp on our +throat has been loosened. We shall not easily throw it off altogether, +for the tramp has a vote, too, for which Tammany, with admirable +ingenuity, has found a new use, since the ante-election inspection of +lodging houses has made them less available for colonization purposes +than they were. Perhaps I should say a new way of very old use. It is +simplicity itself. Instead of keeping tramps in hired lodgings for weeks +at a daily outlay, the new way is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> to send them all to the island on +short commitments during the canvass, and vote them from there <i>en bloc</i> +at the city's expense. Time and education must solve that, like so many +other problems which the slum has thrust upon us. They are the forces +upon which, when we have gone as far as our present supply of steam will +carry us, we must always fall back; and this we may do with confidence +so long as we keep stirring, if it is only marking time, as now. It is +in the retrospect that one sees how far we have come, after all, and +from that gathers courage for the rest of the way. Twenty-nine years +have passed since I slept in a police station lodging house, a lonely +lad, and was robbed, beaten, and thrown out for protesting; and when the +vagrant cur that had joined its homelessness to mine, and had sat all +night at the door waiting for me to come out,—it had been clubbed away +the night before,—snarled and showed its teeth at the doorman, raging +and impotent I saw it beaten to death on the step. I little dreamed then +that the friendless beast, dead, should prove the undoing of the +monstrous wrong done by the maintenance of these<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> evil holes to every +helpless man and woman who was without shelter in New York; but it did. +It was after an inspection of the lodging rooms, when I stood with +Theodore Roosevelt, then president of the police board, in the one where +I had slept that night, and told him of it, that he swore they should +go. And go they did, as did so many another abuse in those two years of +honest purpose and effort. I hated them. It may not have been a very +high motive to furnish power for municipal reform; but we had tried +every other way, and none of them worked. Arbitration is good, but there +are times when it becomes necessary to knock a man down and arbitrate +sitting on him, and this was such a time. It was what we started out to +do with the rear tenements, the worst of the slum barracks, and it would +have been better had we kept on that track. I have always maintained +that we made a false move when we stopped to discuss damages with the +landlord, or to hear his side of it at all. His share in it was our +grievance; it blocked the mortality records with its burden of human +woe. The damage was all ours, the profit all his. If there are damages +to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> collect, he should foot the bill, not we. Vested rights are to be +protected, but no man has a right to be protected in killing his +neighbor.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus2" id="illus2"></a> +<img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>POLICE STATION LODGING ROOM ON EAST SIDE</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>However, they are down, the worst of them. The community has asserted +its right to destroy tenements that destroy life, and for that cause. We +bought the slum off in the Mulberry Bend at its own figure. On the rear +tenements we set the price, and set it low. It was a long step. Bottle +Alley is gone, and Bandits' Roost. Bone Alley, Thieves' Alley, and +Kerosene Row,—they are all gone. Hell's Kitchen and Poverty Gap have +acquired standards of decency; Poverty Gap has risen even to the height +of neckties. The time is fresh in my recollection when a different kind +of necktie was its pride; when the boy murderer—he was barely +nineteen—who wore it on the gallows took leave of the captain of +detectives with the cheerful invitation to "come over to the wake. They +will have a high old time." And the event fully redeemed the promise. +The whole Gap turned out to do the dead bully honor. I have not heard +from the Gap, and hardly from Hell's Kitchen, in five<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> years. The last +news from the Kitchen was when the thin wedge of a column of negroes, in +their uptown migration, tried to squeeze in, and provoked a race war; +but that in fairness should not be laid up against it. In certain local +aspects it might be accounted a sacred duty; as much so as to get drunk +and provoke a fight on the anniversary of the battle of the Boyne. But +on the whole the Kitchen has grown orderly. The gang rarely beats a +policeman nowadays, and it has not killed one in a long while.</p> + +<p>So, one after another, the outworks of the slum have been taken. It has +been beaten in many battles; but its reserves are unimpaired. More +tenements are being built every day on twenty-five-foot lots, and +however watchfully such a house is planned, if it is to return to the +builder the profit he seeks, it will have that within it which, the +moment the grasp of official sanitary supervision is loosened, must +summon up the ghost of the slum. The common type of tenement to-day is +the double-decker, and the double-decker is hopeless. In it the crowding +goes on at a constantly increasing rate. This is the sore spot, and as +against<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> it all the rest seems often enough unavailing. Yet it cannot +be. It is true that the home, about which all that is to work for +permanent progress must cluster, is struggling against desperate odds in +the tenement, and that the struggle has been reflected in the morals of +the people, in the corruption of the young, to an alarming extent; but +it must be that the higher standards now set up on every hand, in the +cleaner streets, in the better schools, in the parks and the clubs, in +the settlements, and in the thousand and one agencies for good that +touch and help the lives of the poor at as many points, will tell at no +distant day, and react upon the homes and upon their builders. To any +one who knew the East Side, for instance, ten years ago, the difference +between that day and this in the appearance of the children whom he sees +there must be striking. Rags and dirt are now the exception rather than +the rule. Perhaps the statement is a trifle too strong as to the dirt; +but dirt is not harmful except when coupled with rags; it can be washed +off, and nowadays is washed off where such a thing would have been +considered affectation in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> the days that were. Soap and water have +worked a visible cure already, that must go more than skin-deep. They +are moral agents of the first value in the slum. And the day must come +when rapid transit will cease to be a football between contending forces +in a city of three million people, and the reason for the outrageous +crowding will cease to exist with the scattering of the centres of +production to the suburb. That day may be a long way off, measured by +the impatience of the philanthropist, but it is bound to come. +Meanwhile, philanthropy is not sitting idle and waiting. It is building +tenements on the humane plan that wipes out the lines of the +twenty-five-foot lot, and lets in sunshine and air and hope. It is +putting up hotels deserving of the name for the army that but just now +had no other home than the cheap lodging houses which Inspector Byrnes +fitly called "nurseries of crime." These also are standards from which +there is no backing down, even if coming up to them is slow work: and +they are here to stay, for they pay. That is the test. Not charity, but +justice,—that is the gospel which they preach.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p> + +<p>Flushed with the success of many victories, we challenged the slum to a +fight to the finish a year ago, and bade it come on. It came on. On our +side fought the bravest and best. The man who marshaled the citizen +forces for their candidate had been foremost in building homes, in +erecting baths for the people, in directing the self-sacrificing labors +of the oldest and worthiest of the agencies for improving the condition +of the poor. With him battled men who had given lives of patient study +and effort to the cause of helping their fellow men. Shoulder to +shoulder with them stood the thoughtful workingman from the East Side +tenement. The slum, too, marshaled its forces. Tammany produced her +notes. She pointed to the increased tax rate, showed what it had cost to +build schools and parks and to clean house, and called it criminal +recklessness. The issue was made sharp and clear. The war cry of the +slum was characteristic: "To hell with reform!" We all remember the +result. Politics interfered, and turned victory into defeat. We were +beaten. I shall never forget that election night. I walked home through +the Bowery<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> in the midnight hour, and saw it gorging itself, like a +starved wolf, upon the promise of the morrow. Drunken men and women sat +in every doorway, howling ribald songs and curses. Hard faces I had not +seen for years showed themselves about the dives. The mob made merry +after its fashion. The old days were coming back. Reform was dead, and +decency with it.</p> + +<p>A year later, I passed that same way on the night of election. The scene +was strangely changed. The street was unusually quiet for such a time. +Men stood in groups about the saloons, and talked in whispers, with +serious faces. The name of Roosevelt was heard on every hand. The dives +were running, but there was no shouting, and violence was discouraged. +When, on the following day, I met the proprietor of one of the oldest +concerns in the Bowery,—which, while doing a legitimate business, +caters necessarily to its crowds, and therefore sides with them,—he +told me with bitter reproach how he had been stricken in pocket. A +gambler had just been in to see him, who had come on from the far West, +in anticipation of a wide-open town, and had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> got all ready to open a +house in the Tenderloin. "He brought $40,000 to put in the business, and +he came to take it away to Baltimore. Just now the cashier of —— Bank +told me that two other gentlemen—gamblers? yes, that's what you call +them—had drawn $130,000 which they would have invested here, and had +gone after him. Think of all that money gone to Baltimore! That's what +you've done!"</p> + +<p>I went over to police headquarters, thinking of the sad state of that +man, and in the hallway I ran across two children, little tots, who were +inquiring their way to "the commissioner." The older was a hunchback +girl, who led her younger brother (he could not have been over five or +six years old) by the hand. They explained their case to me. They came +from Allen Street. Some undesirable women tenants had moved into the +tenement, and when complaint was made that sent the police there, the +children's father, who was a poor Jewish tailor, was blamed. The tenants +took it out of the boy by punching his nose till it bled. Whereupon the +children went straight to Mulberry Street to see the commissioner and +get<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> justice. It was the first time in twenty years that I had known +Allen Street to come to police headquarters for justice; and in the +discovery that the new idea had reached down to the little children I +read the doom of the slum, despite its loud vauntings.</p> + +<p>No, it was not true that reform was dead, with decency. It was not the +slum that had won; it was we who had lost. We were not up to the +mark,—not yet. But New York is a many times cleaner and better city +to-day than it was ten years ago. Then I was able to grasp easily the +whole plan for wresting it from the neglect and indifference that had +put us where we were. It was chiefly, almost wholly, remedial in its +scope. Now it is preventive, constructive, and no ten men could gather +all the threads and hold them. We have made, are making headway, and no +Tammany has the power to stop us. She knows it, too, and is in such +frantic haste to fill her pockets while she has time that she has +abandoned her old ally, the tax rate, and the pretense of making bad +government cheap government. She is at this moment engaged in raising +taxes and assessments at one and the same time to an unheard-of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> figure, +while salaries are being increased lavishly on every hand. We can afford +to pay all she charges us for the lesson we are learning. If to that we +add common sense, we shall discover the bearings of it all without +trouble. Yesterday I picked up a book,—a learned disquisition on +government,—and read on the title-page, "Affectionately dedicated to +all who despise politics." That was not common sense. To win the battle +with the slum, we must not begin by despising politics. We have been +doing that too long. The politics of the slum is apt to be like the slum +itself, dirty. Then it must be cleaned. It is what the fight is about. +Politics is the weapon. We must learn to use it so as to cut straight +and sure. That is common sense, and the golden rule as applied to +Tammany.</p> + +<p>Some years ago, the United States government conducted an inquiry into +the slums of great cities. To its staff of experts was attached a +chemist, who gathered and isolated a lot of bacilli with fearsome Latin +names, in the tenements where he went. Among those he labeled were the +<i>Staphylococcus pyogenes albus</i>, the <i>Micrococcus<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> fervidosus</i>, the +<i>Saccharomyces rosaceus</i>, and the <i>Bacillus buccalis fortuitus</i>. I made +a note of the names at the time, because of the dread with which they +inspired me. But I searched the collection in vain for the real bacillus +of the slum. It escaped science, to be identified by human sympathy and +a conscience-stricken community with that of ordinary human selfishness. +The antitoxin has been found, and is applied successfully. Since justice +has replaced charity on the prescription the patient is improving. And +the improvement is not confined to him; it is general. Conscience is not +a local issue in our day. A few years ago, a United States Senator +sought reëlection on the platform that the decalogue and the golden rule +were glittering generalities that had no place in politics, and lost. We +have not quite reached the millennium yet, but to-day a man is governor +in the Empire State who was elected on the pledge that he would rule by +the ten commandments. These are facts that mean much or little, +according to the way one looks at them. The significant thing is that +they are facts, and that, in spite of slipping and sliding, the world<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> +moves forward, not backward. The poor we shall have always with us, but +the slum we need not have. These two do not rightfully belong together. +Their present partnership is at once poverty's worst hardship and our +worst fault.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>THE TENEMENT HOUSE BLIGHT</h3> + + +<p>In a Stanton Street tenement, the other day, I stumbled upon a Polish +capmaker's home. There were other capmakers in the house, Russian and +Polish, but they simply "lived" there. This one had a home. The fact +proclaimed itself the moment the door was opened, in spite of the +darkness. The rooms were in the rear, gloomy with the twilight of the +tenement, although the day was sunny without, but neat, even cosy. It +was early, but the day's chores were evidently done. The teakettle sang +on the stove, at which a bright-looking girl of twelve, with a pale but +cheery face, and sleeves brushed back to the elbows, was busy poking up +the fire. A little boy stood by the window, flattening his nose against +the pane and gazing wistfully up among the chimney pots where a piece of +blue sky about as big as the kitchen could be made out. I remarked to +the mother that they were nice rooms.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Ah yes," she said, with a weary little smile that struggled bravely +with hope long deferred, "but it is hard to make a home here. We would +so like to live in the front, but we can't pay the rent."</p> + +<p>I knew the front with its unlovely view of the tenement street too well, +and I said a good word for the air shaft—yard or court it could not be +called, it was too small for that—which rather surprised myself. I had +found few virtues enough in it before. The girl at the stove had left +off poking the fire. She broke in the moment I finished, with eager +enthusiasm: "Why, they have the sun in there. When the door is opened +the light comes right in your face."</p> + +<p>"Does it never come here?" I asked, and wished I had not done so, as +soon as the words were spoken. The child at the window was listening, +with his whole hungry little soul in his eyes.</p> + +<p>Yes, it did, she said. Once every summer, for a little while, it came +over the houses. She knew the month and the exact hour of the day when +its rays shone into their home, and just the reach of its slant on the +wall. They had lived there six years. In June the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> sun was due. A +haunting fear that the baby would ask how long it was till June—it was +February then—took possession of me, and I hastened to change the +subject. Warsaw was their old home. They kept a little store there, and +were young and happy. Oh, it was a fine city, with parks and squares, +and bridges over the beautiful river,—and grass and flowers and birds +and soldiers, put in the girl breathlessly. She remembered. But the +children kept coming, and they went across the sea to give them a better +chance. Father made fifteen dollars a week, much money; but there were +long seasons when there was no work. She, the mother, was never very +well here,—she hadn't any strength; and the baby! She glanced at his +grave white face, and took him in her arms. The picture of the two, and +of the pale-faced girl longing back to the fields and the sunlight, in +their prison of gloom and gray walls, haunts me yet. I have not had the +courage to go back since. I recalled the report of an English army +surgeon, which I read years ago, on the many more soldiers that +died—were killed would be more correct—in barracks into which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> the sun +never shone than in those that were open to the light.</p> + +<p>The capmaker's case is the case of the nineteenth century, of +civilization, against the metropolis of America. The home, the family, +are the rallying points of civilization. But long since the tenements of +New York earned for it the ominous name of "the homeless city." In its +40,000 tenements its workers, more than half of the city's population, +are housed. They have no other chance. There are, indeed, wives and +mothers who, by sheer force of character, rise above their environment +and make homes where they go. Happily, there are yet many of them. But +the fact remains that hitherto their struggle has been growing ever +harder, and the issue more doubtful.</p> + +<p>The tenement itself, with its crowds, its lack of privacy, is the +greatest destroyer of individuality, of character. As its numbers +increase, so does "the element that becomes criminal for lack of +individuality and the self-respect that comes with it." Add the +shiftless and the weak who are turned out by the same process, and you +have its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> legitimate crop. In 1880 the average number of persons to each +dwelling in New York was 16.37; in 1890 it was 18.52. In 1895, according +to the police census, 21.2. The census of 1900 will show the crowding to +have gone on at an equal if not at a greater rate. That will mean that +so many more tenements have been built of the modern type, with four +families to the floor where once there were two. I shall not weary the +reader with many statistics. They are to be found, by those who want +them, in the census books and in the official records. I shall try to +draw from them their human story. But, as an instance of the unchecked +drift, let me quote here the case of the Tenth Ward, that East Side +district known as the most crowded in all the world. In 1880, when it +had not yet attained that bad eminence, it contained 47,554 persons, or +432.3 to the acre. In 1890 the census showed a population of 57,596, +which was 522 to the acre. The police census of 1895 found 70,168 +persons living in 1514 houses, which was 643.08 to the acre. Lastly, the +Health Department's census for the first half of 1898 gave a total of +82,175 persons living<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> in 1201 tenements, with 313 inhabited buildings +yet to be heard from. This is the process of doubling up,—literally, +since the cause and the vehicle of it all is the double-decker +tenement,—which in the year 1895 had crowded a single block in that +ward at the rate of 1526 persons per acre, and one in the Eleventh Ward +at the rate of 1774.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> It goes on not in the Tenth Ward or on the East +Side only, but throughout the city. When, in 1897, it was proposed to +lay out a small park in the Twenty-Second Ward, up on the far West Side, +it was shown that five blocks in that section, between Forty-Ninth and +Sixty-Second streets and Ninth and Eleventh avenues, had a population of +more than 3000 each. The block between Sixty-First and Sixty-Second +streets, Tenth and Eleventh avenues, harbored 3580, which meant 974.6 +persons to the acre.</p> + +<p>If we have here to do with forces that are beyond the control of the +individual or the community, we shall do well at least to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> face the +facts squarely and know the truth. It is no answer to the charge that +New York's way of housing its workers is the worst in the world to say +that they are better off than they were where they came from. It is not +true, in most cases, as far as the home is concerned: a shanty is better +than a flat in a cheap tenement, any day. Even if it were true, it would +still be beside the issue. In Poland my capmaker counted for nothing. +Nothing was expected of him. Here he ranks, after a few brief years, +politically equal with the man who hires his labor. A citizen's duty is +expected of him, and home and citizenship are convertible terms. The +observation of the Frenchman who had watched the experiment of herding +two thousand human beings in eight tenement barracks in Paris, that the +result was the "exasperation of the tenant against society," is true the +world over. We have done as badly in New York. Social hatefulness is not +a good soil for citizenship to grow in, where political equality rules.</p> + +<p>Nor will the old lie about the tenants being wholly to blame cover the +ground. It<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> has long been overworked in defense of landlord usury. +Doubtless there are bad tenants. In the matter of renting houses, as in +everything else, men have a trick of coming up to what is expected of +them, good or bad; but as a class the tenants have been shown all along +to be superior to their surroundings. "Better than the houses they live +in," said the first Tenement House Commission; and the second gave as +its verdict that "they respond quickly to improved conditions." That is +not an honest answer. The truth is that if we cannot check the indraught +to the cities, we can, if we choose, make homes for those who come, and +at a profit on the investment. Nothing has been more clearly +demonstrated in our day, and it is time that it should be said so that +everybody can understand. It is not a case of transforming human nature +in the tenant, but of reforming it in the landlord builder. It is a +plain question of the per cent. he is willing to take.</p> + +<p>So that we may get the capmaker's view and that of his fellow +tenants,—for, after all, that is the one that counts; the state and the +community are not nearly so much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> interested in the profits of the +landlord as in the welfare of the workers,—suppose we take a stroll +through a tenement house neighborhood and see for ourselves. We were in +Stanton Street. Let us start there, then, going east. Towering barracks +on either side, five, six stories high. Teeming crowds. Push-cart men +"moved on" by the policeman, who seems to exist only for the purpose. +Forsyth Street: there is a church on the corner, Polish and Catholic, a +combination that strikes one as queer here on the East Side, where +Polish has come to be synonymous with Jewish. I have cause to remember +that corner. A man killed his wife in this house, and was hanged for it. +Just across the street, on the stoop of that brown stone tenement, the +tragedy was reënacted the next year; only the murderer saved the county +trouble and expense by taking himself off, also. That other stoop in the +same row witnessed a suicide. Why do I tell you these things? Because +they are true. The policeman here will bear me out. They belong to the +ordinary setting of life in a crowd such as this. It is never so little +worth living, and therefore held so cheap<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> along with the fierce, +unceasing battle that goes on to save it. You will go no further unless +I leave it out? Very well; I shall leave out the murder after we have +passed the block yonder. The tragedy of that is of a kind that comes too +close to the every-day life of tenement house people to be omitted. The +house caught fire in the night, and five were burned to death,—father, +mother, and three children. The others got out; why not they? They +stayed, it seems, to make sure none was left; they were not willing to +leave one behind, to save themselves. And then it was too late; the +stairs were burning. There was no proper fire escape. That was where the +murder came in; but it was not all chargeable to the landlord, nor even +the greater part. More than thirty years ago, in 1867, the state made it +law that the stairs in every tenement four stories high should be +fireproof, and forbade the storing of any inflammable material in such +houses. I do not know when the law was repealed, or if it ever was. I +only know that in 1892 the Fire Department, out of pity for the tenants +and regard for the safety of its own men, forced through an amendment to +the building law,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> requiring the stairs of the common type of five-story +tenements to be built of fireproof material, and that to-day they are of +wood, just as they always were. Only last spring I looked up the +Superintendent of Buildings and asked him what it meant. I showed him +the law, which said that the stairs should be "built of slow-burning +construction or fireproof material;" and he put his finger upon the +clause that follows, "as the Superintendent of Buildings shall decide." +The law gave him discretion, and that is how he used it. "Hard wood +burns slowly," said he.</p> + +<p>The fire of which I speak was a "cruller fire," if I remember rightly, +which is to say that it broke out in the basement bakeshop, where they +were boiling crullers (doughnuts) in fat, at four A. M., with a hundred +tenants asleep in the house above them. The fat went into the fire, and +the rest followed. I suppose that I had to do with a hundred such fires, +as a police reporter, before, under the protest of the Tenement House +Committee and the Good Government Clubs, the boiling of fat in tenement +bakeshops was forbidden. The chief of the Fire Department, in his +testimony before the committee, said that "tenements<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> are erected mainly +with a view of returning a large income for the amount of capital +invested. It is only after a fire in which great loss of life occurs +that any interest whatever is taken in the safety of the occupants." The +Superintendent of Buildings, after such a fire in March, 1896, said that +there were thousands of tenement fire-traps in the city. My reporter's +notebook bears witness to the correctness of his statement, and it has +many blank leaves that are waiting to be put to that use yet. The +reckoning for eleven years showed that, of 35,844 fires in New York, +53.18 per cent. were in tenement houses, though they were only a little +more than 31 per cent. of all the buildings, and that 177 occupants were +killed, 523 maimed, and 625 rescued by the firemen. Their rescue cost +the lives of three of these brave men, and 453 were injured in the +effort. And when all that is said, not the half is told. A fire in the +night in one of those human beehives, with its terror and woe, is one of +the things that live in the recollection ever after as a terrible +nightmare. Yet the demonstration of the Tenement House Committee, that +to build<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> tenements fireproof from the ground up would cost little over +ten per cent. more than is spent upon the firetrap, and would more than +return the interest on the extra outlay in the saving of insurance and +repairs, and in the better building every way, has found no echo in +legislation or in the practice of builders. That was the fire chief's +way to avoid "the great destruction of life;" but he warned the +committee that it would "meet with strong opposition from the different +interests, should legislation be requested." The interest of the man who +pays the rent will not be suspected in this, so he must have meant the +man who collects it.</p> + +<p>Here is a block of tenements inhabited by poor Jews. Most of the Jews +who live over here are poor; and the poorer they are, the higher rent do +they pay, and the more do they crowd to make it up between them. "The +destruction of the poor is their poverty." It is only the old story in a +new setting. The slum landlord's profits were always the highest. He +spends nothing for repairs, and lays the blame on the tenant. The +"district leader" saves him, in these days of Tammany rule come back, +unless he is on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> the wrong side of the political fence, in which case +the Sanitary Code comes handy to chase him into camp. A big "order" on +his house is a very effective way of making a tenement house landlord +discern political truth on the eve of an important election. Just before +the last, when the election of Theodore Roosevelt was threatened, the +sanitary force displayed such activity as it has not since, up to the +raid on the elevated roads, in the examination of tenements belonging +very largely, as it happened, to sympathizers with the gallant Rough +Rider's cause; and those who knew did not marvel much at the large vote +polled by the Tammany candidate in the old city.</p> + +<p>The halls of these tenements are dark. Under the law, there should be a +light burning, but it is one of the rarest things to find one. The thing +seems well-nigh impossible of accomplishment. Two years ago, when the +Good Government Clubs set about backing up the Board of Health in its +efforts to work out this reform, which comes close to being one of the +most necessary of all,—such untold mischief is abroad in the darkness +of these thoroughfares,—the sanitary<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> police reported 12,000 tenement +halls unlighted by night, even, and brought them, by repeated orders, +down to less than 1000 in six months. I do not believe the light burns +in 1000 of them all to-day. It is so easy to put it out when the +policeman's back is turned, and save the gas.</p> + +<p>We had a curious instance at the time of the difficulties that sometimes +beset reform. Certain halls that were known to be dark were reported +sufficiently lighted by the policeman of the district, and it was +discovered that it was his standard that was vitiated. He himself lived +in a tenement, and was used to its gloom. So an order was issued +defining darkness to the sanitary police: if the sink in the hall could +be made out, and the slops overflowing on the floor, and if a baby could +be seen on the stairs, the hall was light; if, on the other hand, the +baby's shrieks were the first warning that it was being trampled upon, +the hall was dark. Some days later, the old question arose about an +Eldridge Street tenement. The policeman had reported the hall light +enough. The president of the Board of Health, to settle it once for all, +went over<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> with me, to see for himself. The hall was very dark. He sent +for the policeman.</p> + +<p>"Did you see the sink in that hall?" he asked.</p> + +<p>The policeman said he did.</p> + +<p>"But it is pitch dark. How did you see it?"</p> + +<p>"I lit a match," said the policeman.</p> + +<p>Four families live on these floors, with Heaven knows how many children. +It was here the police commissioners were requested, in sober earnest, +some years ago, by a committee of very practical women philanthropists, +to have the children tagged, so as to save the policemen wear and tear +in taking them back and forth between the Eldridge Street police station +and headquarters, when they got lost. If tagged, they could be assorted +at once and taken to their homes. Incidentally, the city would save the +expense of many meals. It was shrewdly suspected that the little ones +were lost on purpose in a good many cases, as a way of getting them fed +at the public expense.</p> + +<p>That the children preferred the excitement of the police station, and +the distinction of a trip in charge of a brass-buttoned guardian,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> to +the Ludlow Street flat is easy enough to understand. A more unlovely +existence than that in one of these tenements it would be hard to +imagine. Everywhere is the stench of the kerosene stove that is forever +burning, serving for cooking, heating, and ironing alike, until the last +atom of oxygen is burned out of the close air. Oil is cheaper than coal. +The air shaft is too busy carrying up smells from below to bring any air +down, even if it is not hung full of washing in every story, as it +ordinarily is. Enterprising tenants turn it to use as a refrigerator as +well. There is at least a draught of air, such as it is. When fire +breaks out, this draught makes of the air shaft a flue through which the +fire roars fiercely to the roof, so transforming what was meant for the +good of the tenants into their greatest peril. The stuffy rooms seem as +if they were made for dwarfs. Most decidedly, there is not room to swing +the proverbial cat in any one of them. In one I helped the children, +last holiday, to set up a Christmas tree, so that a glimpse of something +that was not utterly sordid and mean might for once enter their lives. +Three weeks after, I found the tree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> standing yet in the corner. It was +very cold, and there was no fire in the room. "We were going to burn +it," said the little woman, whose husband was then in the insane asylum, +"and then I couldn't. It looked so kind o' cheery-like there in the +corner." My tree had borne the fruit I wished.</p> + +<p>It remained for the New York slum landlord to assess the exact value of +a ray of sunlight,—upon the tenant, of course. Here are two +back-to-back rear tenements, with dark bedrooms on the south. The flat +on the north gives upon a neighbor's yard, and a hole two feet square +has been knocked in the wall, letting in air and sunlight; little enough +of the latter, but what there is is carefully computed in the lease. Six +dollars for this flat, six and a half for the one with the hole in the +wall. Six dollars a year per ray. In half a dozen houses in this block +have I found the same rate maintained. The modern tenement on the corner +goes higher: for four front rooms, "where the sun comes right in your +face," seventeen dollars; for the rear flat of three rooms, larger and +better every other way, but always dark, like the capmaker's, eleven<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +dollars. From the landlord's point of view, this last is probably a +concession. But he is a landlord with a heart. His house is as good a +one as can be built on a twenty-five-foot lot. The man who owns the +corner building in Orchard Street, with the two adjoining tenements, has +no heart. In the depth of last winter, I found a family of poor Jews +living in a coop under his stairs, an abandoned piece of hallway, in +which their baby was born, and for which he made them pay eight dollars +a month. It was the most outrageous case of landlord robbery I had ever +come across, and it gave me sincere pleasure to assist the sanitary +policeman in curtailing his profits by even this much. The hall is not +now occupied.</p> + +<p>The Jews under the stairs had two children. The shoemaker in the cellar +next door has three. They were fighting and snarling like so many dogs +over the coarse food on the table before them, when we looked in. The +baby, it seems, was the cause of the row. He wanted it all. He was a +very dirty and a very fierce baby, and the other two children were no +match for him. The shoemaker grunted fretfully at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> his last, "Ach, he is +all de time hungry!" At the sight of the policeman, the young imp set up +such a howl that we beat a hasty retreat. The cellar "flat" was +undoubtedly in violation of law, but it was allowed to pass. In the main +hall, on the ground floor, we counted seventeen children. The facts of +life here suspend ordinary landlord prejudices to a certain extent. +Occasionally it is the tenant who suspends them. The policeman laughed +as he told me of the case of a mother who coveted a flat into which she +well knew her family would not be admitted; the landlord was particular. +She knocked, with a troubled face, alone. Yes, the flat was to let; had +she any children? The woman heaved a sigh. "Six, but they are all in +Greenwood." The landlord's heart was touched by such woe. He let her +have the flat. By night he was amazed to find a flock of half a dozen +robust youngsters domiciled under his roof. They had indeed been in +Greenwood; but they had come back from the cemetery to stay. And stay +they did, the rent being paid.</p> + +<p>High rents, slack work, and low wages go hand in hand in the tenements +as promoters<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> of overcrowding. The rent is always one fourth of the +family income, often more. The fierce competition for a bare living cuts +down wages; and when loss of work is added, the only thing left is to +take in lodgers to meet the landlord's claim. The Jew usually takes them +singly, the Italian by families. The midnight visit of the sanitary +policeman discloses a state of affairs against which he feels himself +helpless. He has his standard: 400 cubic feet of air space for each +adult sleeper, 200 for a child. That in itself is a concession to the +practical necessities of the case. The original demand was for 600 feet. +But of 28,000 and odd tenants canvassed in New York, in the slumming +investigation prosecuted by the general government in 1894, 17,047 were +found to have less than 400 feet, and of these 5526 slept in +unventilated rooms with no windows. No more such rooms have been added +since; but there has come that which is worse.</p> + +<p>It was the boast of New York, till a few years ago, that at least that +worst of tenement depravities, the one-room house, too familiar in the +English slums, was practically<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> unknown here. It is not so any longer. +The evil began in the old houses in Orchard and Allen streets, a bad +neighborhood, infested by fallen women and the thievish rascals who prey +upon their misery,—a region where the whole plan of humanity, if plan +there be in this disgusting mess, jars out of tune continually. The +furnished-room house has become an institution here, speeded on by a +conscienceless Jew who bought up the old buildings as fast as they came +into the market, and filled them with a class of tenants before whom +charity recoils, helpless and hopeless. When the houses were filled, the +crowds overflowed into the yard. In one case, I found, in midwinter, +tenants living in sheds built of odd boards and roof tin, and paying a +dollar a week for herding with the rats. One of them, a red-faced +German, was a philosopher after his kind. He did not trouble himself to +get up, when I looked in, but stretched himself in his bed,—it was high +noon,—responding to my sniff of disgust that it was "sehr schoen! ein +bischen kalt, aber was!" His neighbor, a white-haired old woman, begged, +trembling, not to be put out. She would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> not know where to go. It was +out of one of these houses that Fritz Meyer, the murderer, went to rob +the poorbox in the Redemptorist Church, the night when he killed +policeman Smith. The policeman surprised him at his work. In the room he +had occupied I came upon a brazen-looking woman with a black eye, who +answered the question of the officer, "Where did you get that shiner?" +with a laugh. "I ran up against the fist of me man," she said. Her +"man," a big, sullen lout, sat by, dumb. The woman answered for him that +he was a mechanic.</p> + +<p>"What does he work at?" snorted the policeman, restraining himself with +an effort from kicking the fellow.</p> + +<p>She laughed scornfully. "At the junk business." It meant that he was a +thief.</p> + +<p>Young men, with blotched faces and cadaverous looks, were loafing in +every room. They hung their heads in silence. The women turned their +faces away at the sight of the uniform. They cling to these wretches, +who exploit their starved affections for their own ease, with a grip of +desperation. It is their last hold. Women have to love something. It is +their deepest degradation that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> they must love these. Even the wretches +themselves feel the shame of it, and repay them by beating and robbing +them, as their daily occupation. A poor little baby in one of the rooms +gave a shuddering human touch to it all.</p> + +<p>The old houses began it, as they began all the tenement mischief that +has come upon New York. But the opportunity that was made by the +tenant's need was not one to be neglected. In some of the newer +tenements, with their smaller rooms, the lodger is by this time provided +for in the plan, with a special entrance from the hall. "Lodger" comes, +by an easy transition, to stand for "family." Only the other night I +went with the sanitary police on their midnight inspection through a row +of Elizabeth Street tenements which I had known since they were built, +fifteen or sixteen years ago. That is the neighborhood in which the +recent Italian immigrants crowd. In the house which we selected for +examination, in all respects the type of the rest, we found forty-three +families where there should have been sixteen. Upon each floor were four +flats, and in each flat three rooms that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> measured respectively 14 x 11, +7 x 11, and 7 x 8-1/2 feet. In only one flat did we find a single +family. In three there were two to each. In the other twelve each room +had its own family living and sleeping there. They cooked, I suppose, at +the one stove in the kitchen, which was the largest room. In one big bed +we counted six persons, the parents and four children. Two of them lay +crosswise at the foot of the bed, or there would not have been room. A +curtain was hung before the bed in each of the two smaller rooms, +leaving a passageway from the hall to the main room. The rent for the +front flats was twelve dollars; for that in the rear ten dollars. The +social distinctions going with the advantage of location were rigidly +observed, I suppose. The three steps across a tenement hall, from the +front to "the back," are often a longer road than from Ludlow Street to +Fifth Avenue.</p> + +<p>They were sweaters' tenements. But I shall keep that end of the story +until I come to speak of the tenants. The houses I have in mind now. +They were Astor leasehold property, and I had seen them built upon the +improved plan of 1879, with air shafts<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> and all that. There had not been +water in the tenements for a month then, we were told by the one tenant +who spoke English that could be understood. The cold snap had locked the +pipes. Fitly enough, the lessee was an undertaker, an Italian himself, +who combined with his business of housing his people above and below the +ground that of the padrone, to let no profit slip. He had not taken the +trouble to make many or recent repairs. The buildings had made a fair +start; they promised well. But the promise had not been kept. In their +premature decay they were distinctly as bad as the worst. I had the +curiosity to seek out the agent, the middleman, and ask him why they +were so. He shrugged his shoulders. With such tenants nothing could be +done, he said. I have always held that Italians are most manageable, and +that, with all the surface indications to the contrary, they are really +inclined to cleanliness, if cause can be shown, and I told him so. He +changed the subject diplomatically. No doubt it was with him simply a +question of the rent. They might crowd and carry on as they pleased, +once that was paid; and they did.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> It used to be the joke of Elizabeth +Street that when the midnight police came, the tenants would keep them +waiting outside, pretending to search for the key, until the surplus +population of men had time to climb down the fire escape. When the +police were gone they came back. We surprised them all in bed.</p> + +<p>Like most of the other tenements we have come across on our trip, these +were double-deckers. That is the type of tenement that is responsible +for the crowding that goes on unchecked. It is everywhere replacing the +older barracks, as they rot or are torn down.</p> + +<p>This double-decker was thus described by the Tenement House Committee of +1894: "It is the one hopeless form of tenement construction. It cannot +be well ventilated, it cannot be well lighted; it is not safe in case of +fire. It is built on a lot 25 feet wide by 100 or less in depth, with +apartments for four families in each story. This necessitates the +occupation of from 86 to 90 per cent. of the lot's depth. The stairway, +made in the centre of the house, and the necessary walls and partitions +reduce the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> width of the middle rooms (which serve as bedrooms for at +least two people each) to 9 feet each at the most, and a narrow light +and air shaft, now legally required in the centre of each side wall, +still further lessens the floor space of these middle rooms. Direct +light is only possible for the rooms at the front and rear. The middle +rooms must borrow what light they can from dark hallways, the shallow +shafts, and the rear rooms. Their air must pass through other rooms or +the tiny shafts, and cannot but be contaminated before it reaches them. +A five-story house of this character contains apartments for eighteen or +twenty families, a population frequently amounting to 100 people, and +sometimes increased by boarders or lodgers to 150 or more."</p> + +<p>The committee, after looking in vain through the slums of the Old World +cities for something to compare the double-deckers with, declared that, +in their setting, the separateness and sacredness of home life were +interfered with, and evils bred, physical and moral, that "conduce to +the corruption of the young." The statement needs no argument to +convince.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p> + +<p>Yet it is for these that the "interests" of which the fire chief spoke +rush into battle at almost every session of the legislature, whenever a +step, no matter how short and conservative, is to be taken toward their +improvement. No winter has passed, since the awakening conscience of the +people of New York city manifested itself in a desire to better the lot +of the other half, that has not seen an assault made, in one shape or +another, on the structure of tenement house law built up with such +anxious solicitude. Once a bill to exempt from police supervision, by +withdrawing them from the tenement house class, the very worst of the +houses, whose death rate threatened the community, was sneaked through +the legislature all unknown, and had reached the executive before the +alarm was sounded. The governor, put upon his guard, returned the bill, +with the indorsement that he was unable to understand what could have +prompted a measure that seemed to have reason and every argument against +it, and none for it. But the motive is not so obscure, after all. It is +the same old one of profit without conscience. It took from the Health +Department<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> the supervision of the light, ventilation, and plumbing of +the tenements, which by right belonged there, and put it in charge of a +compliant Building Department, "for the convenience of architects and +their clients, and the saving of time and expense to them." For the +convenience of the architect's client, the builder, the lot was +encroached upon, until of one big block which the Tenement House +Committee measured only 7 per cent. was left uncovered for the air to +struggle through; 93 per cent. of it was covered with brick and mortar. +Rear tenements, to the number of nearly 100, have been condemned as +"slaughter houses," with good reason, but this block was built +practically solid. The average of space covered in 34 tenement blocks +was shown to be 78.13 per cent. The law allowed only 65. The +"discretion" that pens tenants in a burning tenement with stairs of wood +for the builder's "convenience" cut down the chance of life of their +babies unmoved. Sunlight and air mean just that, where three thousand +human beings are packed into a single block. That was why the matter was +given into the charge of the health<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> officials, when politics was yet +kept out of their work.</p> + +<p>Of such kind are the interests that oppose betterment of the worker's +hard lot in New York; that dictated the appointment by Tammany of a +commission composed of builders to revise its code of building laws, and +that sneer at the "laughable results of the late Tenement House +Committee." Those results made for the health and happiness and safety +of a million and a half of souls, and were accounted, on every humane +ground, the longest step forward that had yet been taken by this +community. For the old absentee landlord, who did not know what mischief +was afoot, we have got the speculative builder, who does know, but does +not care so long as he gets his pound of flesh. Half of the just laws +that have been passed for the relief of the people he has paralyzed with +his treacherous discretion clause, carefully nursed in the school of +practical politics to which he gives faithful adherence. The thing has +been the curse of our city from the day when the earliest struggle +toward better things began. Among the first manifestations of that was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +the prohibition of soap factories below Grand Street by the act of 1797, +which created a Board of Health with police powers. The act was passed +in February, to take effect in July; but long before that time the same +legislature had amended it by giving the authorities discretion in the +matter. And the biggest soap factory of them all is down there to this +day, and is even now stirring up a rumpus among the latest immigrants, +the Syrians, who have settled about it. No doubt it is all a question of +political education; but are not a hundred years enough to settle this +much, that compromise is out of place where the lives of the people are +at stake, and that it is time our years of "discretion" were numbered?</p> + +<p>And, please God, the time is at hand. Here, set in its frame of swarming +tenements, is a wide open space, some time, when enough official red +tape has been unwound, to be a park, with flowers and grass and birds to +gladden the hearts of those to whom such things have been as tales that +are told, all these dreary years, and with a playground in which the +children of yonder big school may roam at will, undismayed by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> landlord +or policeman. Not all the forces of reaction can put back the barracks +that were torn down as one of the "laughable results" of that very +Tenement House Committee's work, or restore to the undertaker his +profits from Bone Alley of horrid memory. It was the tenant's turn to +laugh, that time. Down half a dozen blocks, among even denser swarms, is +another such plot, where football and a skating pond are being planned +by the children's friends. We shall hear the story of these yet, and +rejoice that the day of reckoning is coming for the builder without a +soul. Till then let him deck the fronts of his tenements with bravery of +plate glass and brass to hide the darkness within. He has done his +worst.</p> + +<p>We can go no further. Yonder lies the river. A full mile we have come, +through unbroken ranks of tenements with their mighty, pent-up +multitudes. Here they seem, with a common impulse, to overflow into the +street. From corner to corner it is crowded with girls and children +dragging babies nearly as big as themselves, with desperate endeavor to +lose nothing of the show. There is a funeral in the block. Unnumbered +sewing-machines<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> cease for once their tireless rivalry with the flour +mill in the next block, that is forever grinding in a vain effort to +catch up. Heads are poked from windows. On the stoops hooded and shawled +figures have front seats. The crowd is hardly restrained by the +policeman and the undertaker in holiday mourning, who clear a path by +force to the plumed hearse. The eager haste, the frantic rush to +see,—what does it not tell of these starved lives, of the quality of +their aims and ambitions? The mill clatters loudly: there is one mouth +less to fill. In the midst of it all, with clamor of urgent gong, the +patrol wagon rounds the corner, carrying two policemen precariously +perched upon a struggling "drunk," a woman. The crowd scatters, +following the new sensation. The tragedies of death and life in the slum +have met together.</p> + +<p>Many a mile I might lead you along these rivers, east and west, through +the island of Manhattan, and find little else than we have seen. The +great crowd is yet below Fourteenth Street, but the northward march +knows no slackening of pace. As the tide sets uptown, it reproduces +faithfully the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> scenes of the older wards, though with less of their +human interest than here where the old houses, in all their ugliness, +have yet some imprint of the individuality of their tenants. Only on +feast days does Little Italy, in Harlem, recall the Bend when it put on +holiday attire. Anything more desolate and disheartening than the +unending rows of tenements, all alike and all equally repellent, of the +uptown streets, it is hard to imagine. Hell's Kitchen in its ancient +wickedness was picturesque, at least, with its rocks and its goats and +shanties. Since the negroes took possession it is only dull, except +when, as happened last summer, the remnant of the Irish settlers make a +stand against the intruders. Vain hope! Perpetual eviction is their +destiny. Negro, Italian, and Jew, biting the dust with many a bruised +head under the Hibernian's stalwart fist, resistlessly drive him before +them, nevertheless, out of house and home. The landlord pockets the gate +money. The old robbery still goes on. Where the negro pitches his tent, +he pays more rent than his white neighbor next door, and is a better +tenant. And he is good game forever. He never buys the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> tenement, as the +Jew or the Italian is likely to do, when he has scraped up money enough +to reënact, after his own fashion, the trick taught him by his +oppressor. The black column has reached the hundredth street on the East +Side, and the sixties on the West,<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> and there for the present it +halts. Jammed between Africa, Italy, and Bohemia, the Irishman has +abandoned the East Side uptown. Only west of Central Park does he yet +face his foe, undaunted in defeat as in victory. The local street +nomenclature, in which the directory has no hand,—Nigger Row, Mixed Ale +Flats, etc.,—indicates the hostile camps with unerring accuracy.</p> + +<p>Uptown or downtown, as the tenements grow taller, the thing that is +rarest to find is the home of the olden days, even as it was in the +shanty on the rocks. "No home, no family, no morality, no manhood, no +patriotism!" said the old Frenchman. Seventy-seven per cent. of their +young prisoners, say the managers of the state reformatory,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> have no +moral sense, or next to none. "Weakness, not wickedness, ails them," +adds the prison chaplain; no manhood, that is to say. Years ago, roaming +through the British Museum, I came upon an exhibit that riveted my +attention as nothing else had. It was a huge stone arm, torn from the +shoulder of some rock image, with doubled fist and every rigid muscle +instinct with angry menace. Where it came from or what was its story I +do not know. I did not ask. It was its message to us I was trying to +read. I had been spending weary days and nights in the slums of London, +where hatred grew, a noxious crop, upon the wreck of the home. Lying +there, mute and menacing, the great fist seemed to me like a shadow +thrown from the gray dawn of the race into our busy day with a purpose, +a grim, unheeded warning. What was it? In the slum the question haunts +me yet. They perished, the empires those rock-hewers built, and the +governments reared upon their ruins are long since dead and forgotten. +They were born to die, for they were not built upon human happiness, but +upon human<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> terror and greed. We built ours upon the bed rock, and its +cornerstone is the home. With this bitter mockery of it that makes the +slum, can it be that the warning is indeed for us?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>THE TENEMENT: CURING ITS BLIGHT</h3> + + +<p>I stood at Seven Dials and heard the policeman's account of what it used +to be. Seven Dials is no more like the slum of old than is the Five +Points to-day. The conscience of London wrought upon the one as the +conscience of New York upon the other. A mission house, a children's +refuge, two big schools, and, hard by, a public bath and a wash house +stand as the record of the battle with the slum, which, with these +forces in the field, has but one ending. The policeman's story rambled +among the days when things were different. Then it was dangerous for an +officer to go alone there at night.</p> + +<p>Around the corner there came from one of the side streets a procession +with banners, parading in honor and aid of some church charity. We +watched it pass. In it marched young men and boys with swords<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> and +battle-axes, and upon its outskirts skipped a host of young roughs—so +one would have called them but for the evidence of their honest +employment—who rattled collection boxes, reaping a harvest of pennies +from far and near. I looked at the battle-axes and the collection boxes, +and thought of forty years ago. Where were the Seven Dials of that day, +and the men who gave it its bad name? I asked the policeman.</p> + +<p>"They were druv into decency, sor," he said, and answered from his own +experience the question ever asked by faint-hearted philanthropists. "My +father, he done duty here afore me in '45. The worst dive was where that +church stands. It was always full of thieves,"—whose sons, I added +mentally, have become collectors for the church. The one fact was a +whole chapter on the slum.</p> + +<p>London's way with the tenant we adopted at last in New York with the +slum landlord. He was "druv into decency." We had to. Moral suasion had +been stretched to the limit. The point had been reached where one +knock-down blow outweighed a bushel of arguments. It was all very well +to build model tenements as object lessons to show<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> that the thing could +be done; it had become necessary to enforce the lesson by demonstrating +that the community had power to destroy houses which were a menace to +its life. The rear tenements were chosen for this purpose.</p> + +<p>They were the worst as they were the first of New York's tenements. The +double-deckers of which I have spoken had, with all their evils, at +least this to their credit, that their death rate was not nearly as high +as that of the old houses. That was not because of any virtue inherent +in the double-deckers, but because the earlier tenements were old, and +built in a day that knew nothing of sanitary restrictions, and cared +less. Hence the showing that the big tenements had much the lowest +mortality. The death rate does not sound the depths of tenement house +evils, but it makes a record that is needed when it comes to attacking +property rights. The mortality of the rear tenements had long been a +scandal. They are built in the back yard, generally back to back with +the rear buildings on abutting lots. If there is an open space between +them, it is never more than a slit a foot or so wide, and gets<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> to be +the receptacle of garbage and filth of every kind; so that any opening +made in these walls for purposes of ventilation becomes a source of +greater danger than if there were none. The last count that was made, in +1898, showed that among the 40,958 tenements in New York there were +still 2379 rear houses left. Where they are the death rate rises, for +reasons that are apparent. The sun cannot reach them. They are damp and +dark, and the tenants, who are always the poorest and most crowded, live +"as in a cage open only toward the front," said the Tenement House +Committee. A canvass made of the mortality records by Dr. Roger S. +Tracy, the registrar of records, showed that while in the First Ward +(the oldest), for instance, the death rate in houses standing singly on +the lot was 29.03 per 1000 of the living, where there were rear houses +it rose to 61.97. The infant death rate is a still better test: that +rose from 109.58 in the single tenements of the same ward to 204.54 +where there were rear houses. One in every five babies had to die, that +is to say; the house killed it. No wonder the committee styled the rear +tenements "slaughter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> houses," and called upon the legislature to root +them out, and with them every old, ramshackle, disease-breeding tenement +in the city.</p> + +<p>A law which is in substance a copy of the English act for destroying +slum property was passed in the spring of 1895. It provides for the +seizure of buildings that are dangerous to the public health or unfit +for human habitation, and their destruction upon proper proof, with +compensation to the owner on a sliding scale down to the point of entire +unfitness, when he is entitled only to the value of the material in his +house. Up to that time, the only way to get rid of such a house had been +to declare it a nuisance under the sanitary code; but as the city could +not very well pay for the removal of a nuisance, to order it down seemed +too much like robbery; so the owner was allowed to keep it. It takes +time and a good many lives to grow a sentiment such as this law +expressed. The Anglo-Saxon respect for vested rights is strong in us, +also. I remember going through a ragged school in London, once, and +finding the eyes of the children in the infant class red and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> sore. +Suspecting some contagion, I made inquiries, and was told that a collar +factory next door was the cause of the trouble. The fumes from it +poisoned the children's eyes.</p> + +<p>"And you allow it to stay, and let this thing go on?" I asked, in +wonder.</p> + +<p>The superintendent shrugged his shoulders. "It is their factory," he +said.</p> + +<p>I was on the point of saying something that might not have been polite, +seeing that I was a guest, when I remembered that, in the newspaper +which I carried in my pocket, I had just been reading a plea of some +honorable M. P. for a much-needed reform in the system of counsel fees, +then being agitated in the House of Commons. The reply of the solicitor +general had made me laugh. He was inclined to agree with the honorable +member, but still preferred to follow precedent by referring the matter +to the Inns of Court. Quite incidentally, he mentioned that the matter +had been hanging fire in the House two hundred years. It seemed very +English to me then; but when we afterward came to tackle our rear +tenements, and in the first batch there was a row which I knew<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> to have +been picked out by the sanitary inspector, twenty-five years before, as +fit only to be destroyed, I recognized that we were kin, after all.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus3" id="illus3"></a> +<img src="images/illus3.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>THE MOTT STREET BARRACKS</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>That was Gotham Court. It was first on the list, and the Mott Street +Barracks came next, when, as executive officer of the Good Government +Clubs, I helped the Board of Health put the law to the test the +following year. The Health Department kept a list of 66 old houses, with +a population of 5460 tenants, in which there had been 1313 deaths in a +little over five years (1889-94). From among them we picked our lot, and +the department drove the tenants out. The owners went to law, one and +all; but, to their surprise and dismay, the courts held with the health +officers. The moral effect was instant and overwhelming. Rather than +keep up the fight, with no rent coming in, the landlords surrendered at +discretion. In consideration of this, compensation was allowed them at +the rate of about a thousand dollars a house, although they were really +entitled only to the value of the old material. The buildings all came +under the head of "wholly unfit." Gotham Court,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> with its sixteen +buildings, in which, thirty-five years ago, a health inspector counted +146 cases of sickness, including "all kinds of infectious disease," was +bought for $19,750, and Mullen's Court, adjoining, for $7251. They had +been under civilized management since, but nothing decent could be made +out of them. To show the character of all, let two serve; in each case +it is the official record, upon which seizure was made, that is +quoted:—</p> + +<p>No. 98 Catherine Street: "The floor in the apartments and the wooden +steps leading to the second-floor apartment are broken, loose, saturated +with filth. The roof and eaves gutters leak, rendering the apartments +wet. The two apartments on the first floor consist of one room each, in +which the tenants are compelled to cook, eat, and sleep. The back walls +are defective; the house wet and damp, and unfit for human habitation. +It robs the surrounding houses of light."</p> + +<p>"The sunlight never enters" was the constant refrain.</p> + +<p>No. 17 Sullivan Street: "Occupied by the lowest whites and negroes, +living together. The houses are decayed from cellar<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> to garret, and +filthy beyond description,—the filthiest, in fact, we have ever seen. +The beams, the floors, the plaster on the walls, where there is any +plaster, are rotten and alive with vermin. They are a menace to the +public health, and cannot be repaired. Their annual death rate in five +years was 41.38."</p> + +<p>The sunlight enters where these stood, at all events, and into 58 other +yards that once were plague spots. Of 94 rear tenements seized that +year, 60 have been torn down, 33 of them voluntarily by the owners; 29 +were remodeled and allowed to stand, chiefly as workshops; 5 other +houses were standing empty, and yielding no rent, in March, 1899. The +worst of them all, the Mott Street Barracks, are yet in the courts; but +all the judges and juries in the land have no power to put them back. It +is a case of "They can't put you in jail for that"—"Yes, but I am in +jail." They are gone, torn down under the referee's decision that they +ought to go, before the Appellate Division called a halt. In 1888 I +counted 360 tenants in these tenements, front and rear, all Italians, +and the infant death rate of the Barracks<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> that year was 325 per 1000. +There were forty babies, and one in three of them had to die. The +general infant death rate for the whole tenement house population that +year was 88.38. In the four years following, during which the population +and the death rate of the houses were both reduced with an effort, +fifty-one funerals went out of the Barracks. With entire fitness, a +cemetery corporation held the mortgage upon the property. The referee +allowed it the price of opening one grave, in the settlement, gave one +dollar to the lessee and one hundred and ten dollars to the landlord, +who refused to collect, and took his case to the Court of Appeals, where +it is to be argued this summer. The only interest that attaches to it, +since the real question has been decided by the wrecker ahead of time, +is the raising of the constitutional point, perchance, and the issue of +that is not doubtful. The law has been repeatedly upheld, and in +Massachusetts, where similar action has been taken since, the +constitutionality of it has in no case been attacked, so far as I know.</p> + +<p>I have said before that I do not believe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> in paying the slum landlord +for taking his hand off our throats, when we have got the grip on him in +turn. Mr. Roger Foster, who as a member of the Tenement House Committee +drew the law, and as counsel for the Health Department fought the +landlords successfully in the courts, holds to the opposite view. I am +bound to say that instances turned up in which it did seem a hardship to +deprive the owners of even such property. I remember especially a +tenement in Roosevelt Street, which was the patrimony and whole estate +of two children. With the rear house taken away, the income from the +front would not be enough to cover the interest on the mortgage. It was +one of those things that occasionally make standing upon abstract +principle so very uncomfortable. I confess I never had the courage to +ask what was done in their case. I know that the tenement went, and I +hope—Well, never mind what I hope. It has nothing to do with the case. +The house is down, and the main issue decided upon its merits.</p> + +<p>In the 94 tenements (counting the front houses in; they cannot be +separated from the rear tenements in the death registry)<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> there were in +five years 956 deaths, a rate of 62.9 at a time when the general city +death rate was 24.63. It was the last and heaviest blow aimed at the +abnormal mortality of a city that ought, by reason of many advantages, +to be one of the healthiest in the world. With clean streets, pure milk, +medical school inspection, antitoxin treatment of deadly diseases, and +better sanitary methods generally; with the sunlight let into its slums, +and its worst plague spots cleaned out, the death rate of New York came +down from 26.32 per 1000 inhabitants in 1887 to 19.53 in 1897. Inasmuch +as a round half million was added to its population within the ten +years, it requires little figuring to show that the number whose lives +were literally saved by reform would people a city of no mean +proportions. The extraordinary spell of hot weather, two years ago, +brought out the full meaning of this. While many were killed by +sunstroke, the population as a whole was shown to have acquired, in +better hygienic surroundings, a much greater power of resistance. It +yielded slowly to the heat. Where two days had been sufficient, in +former years, to send the death rate up,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> it now took five; and the +infant mortality remained low throughout the dreadful trial. Perhaps the +substitution of beer for whiskey as a summer drink had something to do +with it; but Colonel Waring's broom and unpolitical sanitation had more. +Since it spared him so many voters, the politician ought to have been +grateful for this; but he was not. Death rates are not as good political +arguments as tax rates, we found out. In the midst of it all, a +policeman whom I knew went to his Tammany captain to ask if Good +Government Clubs were political clubs within the meaning of the law, +which prohibits policemen from joining such. The answer he received set +me to thinking: "Yes, the meanest, worst kind of political clubs, they +are." Yet they had done nothing worse than to save the babies, the +captain's with the rest.</p> + +<p>The landlord read the signs better. He learned his lesson quickly. All +over the city, he made haste to set his house to rights, lest it be +seized or brought to the bar in other ways. The Good Government Clubs +did not rest content with their first victory. They made war upon the +dark hall in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> double-decker, and upon the cruller bakery. They +opened small parks, exposed the abuses of the civil courts, the "poor +man's courts," urged on the building of new schools, compelled the +cleaning of the Tombs prison and hastened the demolition of the wicked +old pile, and took a hand in evolving a sensible and humane system of +dealing with the young vagrants who were going to waste on free soup. +The proposition to establish a farm colony for their reclamation was met +with the challenge at Albany that "we have had enough reform in New York +city," and, as the event proved, for the time being we had really gone +as far as we could. But even that was a good long way. Some things had +been nailed that could never again be undone; and hand in hand with the +effort to destroy had gone another to build up, that promised to set us +far enough ahead to appeal at last successfully to the self-interest of +the builder, if not to his humanity; or, failing that, to compel him to +decency. If that promise has not been kept, the end is not yet. I +believe it will be kept.</p> + +<p>The movement for reform, in the matter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> of housing the people, had +proceeded upon a clearly outlined plan that apportioned to each of +several forces its own share of the work. At a meeting held under the +auspices of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, +early in the days of the movement, the field had been gone over +thoroughly. To the Good Government Clubs fell the task, as already set +forth, of compelling the enforcement of the existing tenement house +laws. D. O. Mills, the philanthropic banker, declared his purpose to +build hotels which should prove that a bed and lodging as good as any +could be furnished to the great army of homeless men at a price that +would compete with the cheap lodging houses, and yet yield a profit to +the owner. On behalf of a number of well-known capitalists, who had been +identified with the cause of tenement house reform for years, Robert +Fulton Cutting, the president of the Association for Improving the +Condition of the Poor, offered to build homes for the working people +that should be worthy of the name, on a large scale. A company was +formed, and chose for its president Dr. Elgin R. L. Gould, author of the +government report on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> the Housing of the Working People, the standard +work on the subject. A million dollars were raised by public +subscription, and operations were begun at once.</p> + +<p>Two ideas were kept in mind as fundamental: one, that charity that will +not pay will not stay; the other, that nothing can be done with the +twenty-five-foot lot. It is the primal curse of our housing system, and +any effort toward better things must reckon with it first. Nineteen lots +on Sixty-Eighth and Sixty-Ninth streets, west of Tenth Avenue, were +purchased of Mrs. Alfred Corning Clark, who took one tenth of the +capital stock of the City and Suburban Homes Company; and upon these was +erected the first block of tenements. This is the neighborhood toward +which the population has been setting with ever increasing congestion. +Already in 1895 the Twenty-Second Ward contained nearly 200,000 souls. +Between Forty-Ninth and Sixty-Second streets, west of Ninth Avenue, +there are at least five blocks with more than 3000 tenants in each, and +the conditions of the notorious Tenth Ward are certain to be reproduced +here, if indeed they are not exceeded. In the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> Fifteenth Assembly +District, some distance below, but on the same line, the first +sociological canvass of the Federation of Churches had found the +churches, schools, and other educational agencies marshaling a frontage +of 756 feet on the street, while the saloon fronts stretched themselves +over nearly a mile; so that, said the compiler of these pregnant facts, +"saloon social ideals are minting themselves in the minds of the people +at the ratio of seven saloon thoughts to one educational thought." It +would not have been easy to find a spot better fitted for the experiment +of restoring to the home its rights.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus4" id="illus4"></a> +<img src="images/illus4.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>ALFRED CORNING CLARK BUILDINGS<br /> +<i>Model Tenements of City and Suburban Homes Co.</i></h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>The Alfred Corning Clark Buildings, as they were called in recognition +of the support of this public-spirited woman, have been occupied a year. +When I went through them, the other day, I found all but five of the 373 +apartments they contain occupied, and a very large waiting list of +applicants for whom there was no room. The doctor alone, of all the +tenants, had moved away, disappointed. He had settled on the estate, +hoping to build up a practice among so many; but he could not make a +living. The plan<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> of the buildings, for which Ernest Flagg, a young +and energetic architect, with a very practical interest in the welfare +of the Other Half, has the credit, seems to me to realize the ideal of +making homes under a common roof. The tenants appeared to take the same +view of it. They were a notably contented lot. Their only objection was +to the use of the common tubs in the basement laundry,—a sign that, to +my mind, was rather favorable than otherwise, though it argued ill for +the scheme of public wash houses on the Glasgow plan that has seemed so +promising. They were selected tenants as to trustworthiness and +desirability on that score, but they were all of the tenement house +class. The rents are a little lower than for much poorer quarters in the +surrounding tenements. The houses are built around central courts, with +light and air in abundance, with fireproof stairs and steam-heated +halls. There is not a dark passage anywhere. Within, there is entire +privacy for the tenant; the partitions are deadened, so that sound is +not transmitted from one apartment to another. Without, the houses have +none of the discouraging barrack look.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> The architecture is distinctly +pleasing. The few and simple rules laid down by the management have been +readily complied with, as making for the benefit of all. A woman +collects the rents, which are paid weekly in advance. The promise that +the property will earn the five per cent. to which the company limits +its dividends seems certain to be kept. There is nothing in sight to +prevent it, everything to warrant the prediction.</p> + +<p>The capital stock has since been increased to $2,000,000, and the +erection has been begun of a new block of buildings in East Sixty-Fourth +Street, within hail of Battle Row, of anciently warlike memory. James E. +Ware & Son, the architects who, in the competition of 1879, won the +prize for the improved tenements that marked the first departure from +the boxlike barracks of old, drew the plans, embodying all the good +features of the Clark Buildings with attractions of their own. A +suburban colony is being developed by the company, in addition. It is +not the least promising feature of its work that a very large proportion +of its shareholders are workingmen, who have invested their savings in +the enterprise, thus<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> bearing witness to their faith and interest in it. +Of the entire number of shareholders at the time of the first annual +report, forty-five per cent, held less than ten shares each.</p> + +<p>The success of these and previous efforts at the building of model +tenements has had the desired effect of encouraging other attempts in +the same direction. They represent the best that can be done in fighting +the slum within the city. Homewood, the City and Suburban Homes +Company's settlement in the country, stands for the way out that must +eventually win the fight. That is the track that must be followed, and +will be when we have found in rapid transit the key to the solution of +our present perplexities. "In the country" hardly describes the site of +the colony. It is within the Greater City, on Long Island, hardly an +hour's journey by trolley from the City Hall, and only a short walk from +the bay. Here the company has built a hundred cottages, and has room for +two or three hundred more. Of the hundred houses, seventy-two had been +sold when I was there last winter. They are handsome and substantial +little houses, the lower story of brick, the upper of timber and +stucco,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> each cottage standing in its own garden. The purchaser pays for +the property in monthly payments extending over twenty years. A plan of +life insurance, which protects the family and the company alike in the +event of the death of the bread-winner, is included in the arrangement. +The price of the cottages which so far have found owners has averaged +about $3100, and the monthly installment, including the insurance +premium, a trifle over $25. It follows that the poorest have not moved +to Homewood. Its settlers include men with an income of $1200 or $1500 a +year,—policemen, pilots, letter carriers, clerks, and teachers. This is +as it should be. They represent the graduating class, as it were, from +the city crowds. It is the province of the philanthropic tenement to +prepare the next lot for moving up and out. Any attempt to hasten the +process by taking a short cut could result only in failure and +disappointment. The graduating class is large enough, however, to +guarantee that it will not be exhausted by one Homewood. Before the +houses were contracted for, without advertising or effort of any kind to +make the thing known, more than eight<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> hundred wage earners had asked to +have their names put on the books as applicants for suburban homes.</p> + +<p>Others had built model tenements and made them pay, but it was left to +Mr. D. O. Mills to break ground in the field which Lord Rowton had +filled with such signal success in London. The two Mills Houses, in +Bleecker and Rivington streets, are as wide a departure as could well be +imagined from the conventional type of lodging houses in New York. They +are large and beautiful structures, which, for the price of a cot in one +of the Bowery barracks, furnish their lodgers with as good a bed in a +private room as the boarder in the Waldorf-Astoria enjoys. Indeed, it is +said to be the very same in make and quality. There are baths without +stint, smoking and writing rooms and games, and a free library; a +laundry for those who can pay for having their washing done, and a +separate one for such as prefer to do it themselves. There is a +restaurant in the basement, in which a regular dinner of good quality is +served at fifteen cents. The night's lodging is twenty cents. The +dearest Bowery lodging houses charge twenty-five<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> cents. The bedrooms +are necessarily small, but they are clean and comfortable, well lighted +and heated. The larger house, No. 1, in Bleecker Street, has room for +1554 guests; No. 2, in Rivington Street, for 600. Though this represents +more than twelve per cent, of the capacity of all the cheap lodging +houses in the city, both have been filled since they were opened, and +crowds have often been turned away. The Bowery "hotels" have felt the +competition. Their owners deny it, but the fact is apparent in efforts +at improvements with which they were not justly chargeable before. Only +the lowest, the ten-cent houses, are exempt from this statement. These +attract a class of custom for which the Mills Houses do not compete. The +latter are intended for the large number of decent mechanics, laborers, +and men of small means, hunting for work, who are always afloat in a +large city, and who neither seek nor wish charity. The plan and purpose +of the builder cannot be better put than in his own words at the opening +of the first house.</p> + +<p>"No patron of the Mills Hotel," he said, "will receive more than he pays +for, unless<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> it be my hearty goodwill and good wishes. It is true that I +have devoted thought, labor, and capital to a very earnest effort to +help him, but only by enabling him to help himself. In doing the work on +so large a scale, and in securing the utmost economies in purchases and +in administration, I hope to give him a larger equivalent for his money +than has hitherto been possible. He can, without scruple, permit me to +offer him this advantage; but he will think better of himself, and will +be a more self-reliant, manly man and a better citizen, if he knows that +he is honestly paying for what he gets."</p> + +<p>Mr. Mills's faith that the business of housing the homeless crowds in +decency and comfort could be made to pay just as well as that of housing +families in model tenements has been justified. Besides providing a fund +sufficient for deterioration and replacement, the two houses have made a +clear three per cent. profit on the investment of $1,500,000 which they +represent. Beyond this, they have borne, and will bear increasingly, +their own hand in settling with the saloon, which had no rival in the +cheerlessness of the cheap lodging house or the boarding house back<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +bedroom. Every philanthropic effort to fight it on that ground has drawn +renewed courage and hope from Mr. Mills's work and success.</p> + +<p>While I am writing, subscriptions are being made to the capital stock of +a Woman's Hotel Company, that will endeavor to do for the +self-supporting single women of our own city what Mr. Mills has done for +the men. It is proposed to erect, at a cost of $800,000, a hotel capable +of sheltering over 500 guests, at a price coming within reach of women +earning wages as clerks, stenographers, nurses, etc. The number of women +whose needs an establishment of the kind would meet is said to exceed +40,000. The Young Women's Christian Association alone receives every +year requests enough for quarters to fill a score of such hotels, and +can only refer the applicants to boarding houses. Experience in other +cities shows that a woman's hotel or club can be managed and made +profitable, and there seems to be little doubt that New York will be the +next to furnish proof of it. It was the dream of A. T. Stewart, the +merchant prince, to do this service for his city, just as he planned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +Garden City for a home colony for his clerks. It came out differently. +The Long Island town became a cathedral city, and the home of wealth and +fashion; his woman's hoarding house a great public hotel, far out of the +reach of those he sought to benefit. It may be that the success of the +banker's philanthropy will yet realize the dream of the merchant before +the end of the century that saw his wealth, his great business, his very +name, vanish as if they had never been, and even his bones denied, by +ghoulish thieves, a rest in the grave. I like to think of it as a kind +of justice to his memory, more eloquent than marble and brass in the +empty crypt. Mills House No. 1 stands upon the site of Mr. Stewart's old +home, where he dreamed his barren dream of benevolence to his kind.</p> + +<p>Of all these movements the home is the keynote. That is the cheerful +sign that shows light ahead. To the home it comes down in the end,—good +government, bad government, and all the rest. As the homes of a +community are, so is the community. New York has still the worst housing +system in the world. Eight fifteenths of its people<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> live in tenements, +not counting the better class of flats, though legally they come under +the definition. The blight of the twenty-five-foot lot remains, with the +double-decker. But we can now destroy what is not fit to stand; we have +done it, and our republic yet survives. The slum landlord would have had +us believe that it must perish with his rookeries. We knew that to build +decently improved a neighborhood, made the tenants better and happier, +and reduced the mortality. Model tenement house building is now proving +daily that such houses can be built safer and better every way for less +money than the double-decker, by crossing the lot line. The dark hall is +not a problem in the tenement built around a central court, for there is +no common hall. The plan of the double-decker is shown to be wasteful of +space and wall and capital. The model tenement pays, does not +deteriorate, and keeps its tenants. After the lapse of ten years, I was +the other day in Mr. A. T. White's Riverside Buildings in Brooklyn, +which are still the best I know of, and found them, if anything, better +houses than the day they were built. The stone<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> steps of the stairways +were worn: that was all the evidence of deterioration I saw. These, and +Mr. White's other block of buildings on Hicks Street, which was built +more than twenty years ago,—occupied, all of them, by distinctly poor +tenants,—have paid their owner over five per cent. right along. +Practically, every such enterprise has the same story to tell. Dr. Gould +found that only six per cent. of all the great model housing operations +had failed to pay. All the rest were successful. That was the showing of +Europe. It is the same here. Only the twenty-five-foot lot is in the way +in New York.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus5" id="illus5"></a> +<img src="images/illus5.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>EVENING IN ONE OF THE COURTS IN MILLS HOUSE No. 1</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>It will continue to be in the way. A man who has one lot will build on +it: it is his right. The state, which taxes his lot, has no right to +confiscate it by forbidding him to make it yield him an income, on the +plea that he might build something which would be a nuisance. But it can +so order the building that it shall not be a nuisance: that is not only +its right, but its duty. The best which can be made out of a +twenty-five-foot lot is not good, but even that has not been made out of +it yet. I have seen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> plans drawn by two young women architects in this +city, the Misses Gannon and Hands, and approved by the Building +Department, which let in an amount of light and air not dreamed of in +the conventional type of double-decker, while providing detached stairs +in a central court. It was not pretended that it was an ideal plan,—far +from it; but it indicated clearly the track to be followed in dealing +with the twenty-five-foot lot, seeing that we cannot get rid of it. The +demand for light and air space must be sharpened and rigidly held to, +and "discretion" to cut it down on any pretext must be denied, to the +end of discouraging at least the building of double-deckers by the +speculative landlord who has more than one lot, but prefers to build in +the old way, in order that he may more quickly sell his houses, one by +one.</p> + +<p>With much evidence to the contrary in the big blocks of tenements that +are going up on every hand, I think still we are tending in the right +direction. I come oftener, nowadays, upon three tenements built on four +lots, or two on three lots, than I used to. Indeed, there was a time +when such a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> thing would have been considered wicked waste, or evidence +of unsound mind in the builder. Houses are built now, as they were then, +for profit. The business element must be there, or the business will +fail. Philanthropy and five per cent. belong together in this field; but +there is no more reason for allowing usurious interest to a man who +makes a living by providing houses for the poor than for allowing it to +a lender of money on security. In fact, there is less; for the former +draws his profits from a source with which the welfare of the +commonwealth is indissolubly bound up. The Tenement House Committee +found that the double-deckers yield the landlord an average of ten per +cent., attack the home, and are a peril to the community. Model +tenements pay a safe five per cent., restore the home, and thereby +strengthen the community. It comes down, then, as I said, to a simple +question of the per cent. the builder will take. It should help his +choice to know, as he cannot now help knowing, that the usurious profit +is the price of good citizenship and human happiness, which suffer in +the proportion in which the home is injured.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> + +<p>The problem of rent should be solved by the same formula, but not so +readily. In the case of the builder the state can add force to +persuasion, and so urge him along the path of righteousness. The only +way to reach the rent collector would be for the municipality to enter +the field as a competing landlord. Doubtless relief could be afforded +that way. The Tenement House Committee found that the slum landlord +charged the highest rents, sometimes as high as twenty-five per cent. He +made no repairs. Model tenement house rents are lower, if anything, than +those of the double-decker, with more space and better accommodations. +Such a competition would have to be on a very large scale, however, to +avail, and I am glad that New York has shown no disposition to undertake +it yet. I would rather we, as a community, learned first a little more +of the art of governing ourselves without scandal. Present relief from +the burden that taxes the worker one fourth of his earnings for a roof +over his head must be sought in the movement toward the suburbs that +will follow the bridging of our rivers, and real rapid transit. On the +island<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> rents will always remain high, on account of the great land +values. But I have often thought that if the city may not own new +tenements, it might with advantage manage the old to the extent of +licensing them to contain so many tenants on the basis of the air space, +and no more. The suggestion was made when the tenement house question +first came up for discussion, thirty years ago, but it was rejected +then. The same thing is now proposed for rooms and workshops, as the +means of getting the best of the sweating nuisance. Why not license the +whole tenement, and with the money collected in the way of fees pay for +the supervision of them by night and day? The squad of sanitary +policemen now comprises for the Greater City some ninety men. Forty-one +thousand tenements in the Borough of Manhattan alone, at three dollars +each for the license, would pay the salaries of the entire body, and +leave a margin. Seeing that their services are going exclusively to the +tenements, it would not seem to be an unfair charge upon the landlords.</p> + +<p>The home is the key to good citizenship. Unhappily for the great cities, +there exists<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> in them all a class that has lost the key or thrown it +away. For this class, New York, until three years ago, had never made +any provision. The police station lodging rooms, of which I have spoken, +were not to be dignified by the term. These vile dens, in which the +homeless of our great city were herded, without pretense of bed, of +bath, of food, on rude planks, were the most pernicious parody on +municipal charity, I verily believe, that any civilized community had +ever devised. To escape physical and moral contagion in these crowds +seemed humanly impossible. Of the innocently homeless lad they made a +tramp by the shortest cut. To the old tramp they were indeed ideal +provision, for they enabled him to spend for drink every cent he could +beg or steal. With the stale beer dive, the free lunch counter, and the +police lodging room at hand, his cup of happiness was full. There came +an evil day, when the stale beer dive shut its doors and the free lunch +disappeared for a season. The beer pump, which drained the kegs dry and +robbed the stale beer collector of his ware, drove the dives out of +business; the Raines law forbade the free lunch. Just at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> this time +Theodore Roosevelt shut the police lodging rooms, and the tramp was +literally left out in the cold, cursing reform and its fruits. It was +the climax of a campaign a generation old, during which no one had ever +been found to say a word in defense of these lodging rooms; yet nothing +had availed to close them.</p> + +<p>The city took lodgers on an old barge in the East River, that winter, +and kept a register of them. We learned something from that. Of nearly +10,000 lodgers, one half were under thirty years old and in good +health,—fat, in fact. The doctors reported them "well nourished." Among +100 whom I watched taking their compulsory bath, one night, only two +were skinny; the others were stout, well-fed men, abundantly able to do +a man's work. They all insisted that they were willing, too; but the +moment inquiries began with a view of setting such to work as really +wanted it, and sending the rest to the island as vagrants, their number +fell off most remarkably. From between 400 and 500 who had crowded the +barge and the pier sheds, the attendance fell on March 16, the day the +investigation began, to 330, on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> second day to 294, and on the third +day to 171; by March 21 it had been cut down to 121. The problem of the +honestly homeless, who were without means to pay for a bed even in a +ten-cent lodging house, and who had a claim upon the city by virtue of +residence in it, had dwindled to surprisingly small proportions. Of 9386 +lodgers, 3622 were shown to have been here less than sixty days, and 968 +less than a year. The old mistake, that there is always a given amount +of absolutely homeless destitution in a city, and that it is to be +measured by the number of those who apply for free lodging, had been +reduced to a demonstration. The truth is that the opportunity furnished +by the triple alliance of stale beer, free lunch, and free lodging at +the police station was the open door to permanent and hopeless vagrancy.</p> + +<p>A city lodging house was established, with decent beds, baths, and +breakfast, and a system of investigation of the lodger's claim that is +yet to be developed to useful proportions. The link that is missing is a +farm school, for the training of young vagrants to habits of industry +and steady work, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> the alternative of the workhouse. Efforts to forge +this link have failed so far, but in the good time that is coming, when +we shall have learned the lesson that the unkindest thing that can be +done to a young tramp is to let him go on tramping, and when magistrates +shall blush to discharge him on the plea that "it is no crime to be poor +in this country," they will succeed, and the tramp also we shall then +have "druv into decency." When I look back now to the time, ten or +fifteen years ago, when, night after night, with every police station +filled, I found the old tenements in the "Bend" jammed with a reeking +mass of human wrecks that huddled in hall and yard, and slept, crouching +in shivering files, all the way up the stairs to the attic, it does seem +as if we had come a good way, and as if all the turmoil and the bruises +and the fighting had been worth while.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>THE TENANT</h3> + + +<p>We have considered the problem of the tenement. Now about the tenant. +How much of a problem is he? And how are we to go about solving his +problem?</p> + +<p>The government "slum inquiry," of which I have spoken before, gave us +some facts about him. In New York it found 62.58 per cent. of the +population of the slum to be foreign-born, whereas for the whole city +the percentage of foreigners was only 43.23. While the proportion of +illiteracy in all was only as 7.69 to 100, in the slum it was 46.65 per +cent. That, with nearly twice as many saloons to a given number, there +should be three times as many arrests in the slum as in the city at +large need not be attributed to nationality, except indirectly in its +possible responsibility for the saloons. I say "possible" advisedly. +Anybody, I should think, whose misfortune it is to live in the slum<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> +might be expected to find in the saloon a refuge. I shall not quarrel +with the other view of it. I am merely stating a personal impression. +The fact that concerns us here is the great proportion of the +foreign-born. Though the inquiry covered only a small section of a +tenement district, the result may be accepted as typical.</p> + +<p>We shall not, then, have to do with an American element in discussing +this tenant, for even of the "natives" in the census, by far the largest +share is made up of the children of the immigrant. Indeed, in New York +only 4.77 per cent. of the slum population canvassed were shown to be of +native parentage. The parents of 95.23 per cent. had come over the sea, +to better themselves, it may be assumed. Let us see what they brought +us, and what we have given them in return.</p> + +<p>The Italians were in the majority where this census taker went. They +were from the south of Italy, avowedly the worst of the Italian +immigration which in the eight years from 1891 to 1898 gave us more than +half a million of King Humbert's subjects. The exact number, as +registered by the Emigration<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> Bureau, was 502,592. In 1898, 58,613 came +over, 36,086 of them with New York as their destination. The official +year ends with June. In the six months from July 1 to December 31, the +immigrants were sorted out upon a more intelligent plan than previously. +The process as applied to the 30,470 Italians who were landed during +that term yielded this result: from northern Italy, 4762; from southern +Italy, 25,708. Of these latter a number came from Sicily, the island of +the absentee landlord, where peasants die of hunger. I make no apology +for quoting here the statement of an Italian officer, on duty in the +island, to a staff correspondent of the "Tribuna" of Rome, a paper not +to be suspected of disloyalty to United Italy. I take it from the +"Evening Post:"—</p> + +<p>"In the month of July I stopped on a march by a threshing floor where +they were measuring grain. When the shares had been divided, the one who +had cultivated the land received a single <i>tumolo</i> (less than a half +bushel). The peasant, leaning on his spade, looked at his share as if +stunned. His wife and their five children were standing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> by. From the +painful toil of a year this was what was left to him with which to feed +his family. The tears rolled silently down his cheeks."</p> + +<p>These things occasionally help one to understand. Over against this +picture there arises in my memory one from the Barge Office, where I had +gone to see an Italian steamer come in. A family sat apart, ordered to +wait by the inspecting officer; in the group an old man, worn and +wrinkled, who viewed the turmoil with the calmness of one having no +share in it. The younger members formed a sort of bulwark around him.</p> + +<p>"Your father is too old," said the official.</p> + +<p>Two young women and a boy of sixteen rose to their feet at once. "Are +not we young enough to work for him?" they said. The boy showed his +strong arms.</p> + +<p>It is charged against this Italian immigrant that he is dirty, and the +charge is true. He lives in the darkest of slums, and pays rent that +ought to hire a decent flat. To wash, water is needed; and we have a law +which orders tenement landlords to put it on every floor, so that their +tenants may have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> the chance. And it is not yet half a dozen years since +one of the biggest tenement house landlords in the city, the wealthiest +church corporation in the land, attacked the constitutionality of this +statute rather than pay a couple of hundred dollars for putting water +into two old buildings, as the Board of Health had ordered, and came +near upsetting the whole structure of tenement house law upon which our +safety depends. He is ignorant, it is said, and that charge is also +true. I doubt if one of the family in the Barge Office could read or +write his own name. Yet would you fear especial danger to our +institutions, to our citizenship, from these four? He lives cheaply, +crowds, and underbids even the Jew in the sweatshop. I can myself +testify to the truth of these statements. Only this spring I was the +umpire in a quarrel between the Jewish tailors and the factory inspector +whom they arraigned before the Governor on charges of inefficiency. The +burden of their grievance was that the Italians were underbidding them +in their own market, which of course the factory inspector could not +prevent. Yet, even so, the evidence is not that the Italian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> always gets +the best of it. I came across a family once working on "knee-pants." +"Twelve pants, ten cents," said the tailor, when there was work. "Ve +work for dem sheenies," he explained. "Ven dey has work, ve gets some; +ven dey hasn't, ve don't." He was an unusually gifted tailor as to +English, but apparently not as to business capacity. In the Astor +tenements, in Elizabeth Street, where we found forty-three families +living in rooms intended for sixteen, I saw women finishing "pants" at +thirty cents a day. Some of the garments were of good grade, and some of +poor; some of them were soldiers' trousers, made for the government; but +whether they received five, seven, eight, or ten cents a pair, it came +to thirty cents a day, except in a single instance, in which two women, +sewing from five in the morning till eleven at night, were able, being +practiced hands, to finish forty-five "pants" at three and a half cents +a pair, and so made together over a dollar and a half. They were +content, even happy. I suppose it seemed wealth to them, coming from a +land where a Parisian investigator of repute found three lire (not quite +sixty cents) <i>per month</i> a girl's wages.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p> + +<p>I remember one of those flats, poor and dingy, yet with signs of the +instinctive groping toward orderly arrangement which I have observed so +many times, and take to be evidence that in better surroundings much +might be made of these people. Clothes were hung to dry on a line strung +the whole length of the room. Upon couches by the wall some men were +snoring. They were the boarders. The "man" was out shoveling snow with +the midnight shift. By a lamp with brown paper shade, over at the +window, sat two women sewing. One had a baby on her lap. Two sweet +little cherubs, nearly naked, slept on a pile of unfinished "pants," and +smiled in their sleep. A girl of six or seven dozed in a child's rocker +between the two workers, with her head hanging down on one side; the +mother propped it up with her elbow as she sewed. They were all there, +and happy in being together even in such a place. On a corner shelf +burned a night lamp before a print of the Mother of God, flanked by two +green bottles, which, seen at a certain angle, made quite a festive +show.</p> + +<p>Complaint is made that the Italian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> promotes child labor. His children +work at home on "pants" and flowers at an hour when they ought to have +been long in bed. Their sore eyes betray the little flower-makers when +they come tardily to school. Doubtless there are such cases, and quite +too many of them; yet, in the very block which I have spoken of, the +investigation conducted for the Tenement House Committee by the +University Department of Sociology of Columbia College, under Professor +Franklin H. Giddings, discovered of 196 children of school age only 23 +at work or at home, and in the next block only 27 out of 215. That was +the showing of the foreign population all the way through. Of 225 +Russian Jewish children only 15 were missing from school, and of 354 +little Bohemians only 21. The overcrowding of the schools and their long +waiting lists occasionally furnished the explanation why they were not +there. Professor Giddings reported, after considering all the evidence: +"The foreign-born population of the city is not, to any great extent, +forcing children of legal school age into money-earning occupations. On +the contrary, this population shows a strong desire<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> to have its +children acquire the common rudiments of education. If the city does not +provide liberally and wisely for the satisfaction of this desire, the +blame for the civic and moral dangers that will threaten our community, +because of ignorance, vice, and poverty, must rest on the whole public, +not on our foreign-born residents." It is satisfactory to know that the +warning has been heeded, and that soon there will be schools enough to +hold all the children who come. Now, since September 1, 1899, the new +factory law reaches also the Italian flowermaker in his home, and that +source of waste will be stopped.</p> + +<p>He is clannish, this Italian; he gambles and uses a knife, though rarely +on anybody not of his own people; he "takes what he can get," wherever +anything is free, as who would not, coming to the feast like a starved +wolf? There was nothing free where he came from. Even the salt was taxed +past a poor man's getting any of it. Lastly, he buys fraudulent +naturalization papers, and uses them. I shall plead guilty for him to +every one of these counts. They are all proven. Gambling is his +besetting sin. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> is sober, industrious, frugal, enduring beyond +belief, but he will gamble on Sunday and quarrel over his cards, and +when he sticks his partner in the heat of the quarrel, the partner is +not apt to tell. He prefers to bide his time. Yet there has lately been +evidence once or twice in the surrender of an assassin by his countrymen +that the old vendetta is being shelved, and a new idea of law and +justice is breaking through. As to the last charge: our Italian is not +dull. With his intense admiration for the land where a dollar a day +waits upon the man with a shovel, he can see no reason why he should not +accept the whole "American plan" with ready enthusiasm. It is a good +plan. To him it sums itself up in the statement: a dollar a day for the +shovel; two dollars for the shovel with a citizen behind it. And he +takes the papers and the two dollars.</p> + +<p>He came here for a chance to live. Of politics, social ethics, he knows +nothing. Government in his old home existed only for his oppression. Why +should he not attach himself with his whole loyal soul to the plan of +government in his new home that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> offers to boost him into the place of +his wildest ambition, a "job on the streets,"—that is, in the +Street-Cleaning Department,—and asks no other return than that he shall +vote as directed? Vote! Not only he, but his cousins and brothers and +uncles will vote as they are told, to get Pietro the job he covets. If +it pleases the other man, what is it to him for whom he votes? He is +after the job. Here, ready-made to the hand of the politician, is such +material as he never saw before. For Pietro's loyalty is great. As a +police detective, one of his own people, once put it to me: "He got a +kind of an idea, or an old rule: an eye for an eye; do to another as +you'd be done by; if he don't squeal on you, you stick by him, no matter +what the consequences." This "kind of an idea" is all he has to draw +upon for an answer to the question if the thing is right. But the +question does not arise. Why should it? Was he not told by the agitators +whom the police jailed at home that in a republic all men are made happy +by means of the vote? And is there not proof of it? It has made him +happy, has it not? And the man who bought his vote seems to like it. +Well, then?<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> + +<p>Very early Pietro discovered that it was every man for himself, in the +chase of the happiness which this powerful vote had in keeping. He was +robbed by the padrone—that is, the boss—when he came over, fleeced on +his steamship fare, made to pay for getting a job, and charged three +prices for board and lodging and extras while working in the railroad +gang. The boss had a monopoly, and Pietro was told that it was +maintained by his "divvying" with some railroad official. Rumor said, a +very high-up official, and that the railroad was in politics in the +city; that is to say, dealt in votes. When the job gave out, the boss +packed him into the tenement he had bought with his profits on the +contract; and if Pietro had a family, told him to take in lodgers and +crowd his flat, as the Elizabeth Street tenements were crowded, so as to +make out the rent, and to never mind the law. The padrone was a +politician, and had a pull. He was bigger than the law, and it was the +votes he traded in that did it all. Now it was Pietro's turn. With his +vote he could buy what to him seemed wealth. In the muddle of ideas, +that was the one which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> stood out. When citizen papers were offered him +for $12.50, he bought them quickly, and got his job on the street.</p> + +<p>It was the custom of the country. If there was any doubt about it, the +proof was furnished when Pietro was arrested through the envy and +plotting of the opposition boss last fall. Distinguished counsel, +employed by the machine, pleaded his case in court. Pietro felt himself +to be quite a personage, and he was told that he was safe from harm, +though a good deal of dust might be kicked up; because, when it came +down to that, both the bosses were doing the same kind of business. I +quote from the report of the State Superintendent of Elections of +January, 1899: "In nearly every case of illegal registration, the +defendant was represented by eminent counsel who were identified with +the Democratic organization, among them being three assistants to the +Corporation counsel. My deputies arrested Rosario Calecione and Giuseppe +Marrone, both of whom appeared to vote at the fifth election district of +the Sixth Assembly District; Marrone being the Democratic captain of the +district, and, it was charged, himself engaged in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> business of +securing fraudulent naturalization papers. In both of these cases +Farriello had procured the naturalization papers for the men for a +consideration. They were subsequently indicted. Marrone and Calecione +were bailed by the Democratic leader of the Sixth Assembly District."</p> + +<p>The business, says the State Superintendent, is carried on "to an +enormous extent." It appears, then, that Pietro has already "got on to" +the American plan as the slum presented it to him, and has in good +earnest become a problem. I guessed as much from the statement of a +Tammany politician to me, a year ago, that every Italian voter in his +district got his "old two" on election day. He ought to know, for he +held the purse. Suppose, now, we speak our minds as frankly, for once, +and put the blame where it belongs. Will it be on Pietro? And upon this +showing, who ought to be excluded, when it comes to that?</p> + +<p>The slum census taker did not cross the Bowery. Had he done so, he would +have come upon the refugee Jew, the other economic marplot of whom +complaint is made with reason. If his Nemesis has overtaken<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> him in the +Italian, certainly he challenged that fate. He did cut wages by his +coming. He was starving, and he came in shoals. In fourteen years more +than 400,000 Jewish immigrants have landed in New York.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> They had to +have work and food, and they got both as they could. In the strife they +developed qualities that were anything but pleasing. They herded like +cattle. They had been so herded by Christian rulers, a despised and +persecuted race, through the centuries. Their very coming was to escape +from their last inhuman captivity in a Christian state. They lied, they +were greedy, they were charged with bad faith. They brought +nothing,—neither money nor artisan skill,—nothing but their consuming +energy, to our land, and their one gift was their greatest offense. One +might have pointed out that they had been trained to lie, for their +safety; had been forbidden to work at trades, to own land; had been +taught for a thousand years, with the scourge and the stake, that only +gold could buy them freedom from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> torture. But what was the use? The +charges were true. The Jew was—he still is—a problem of our slum.</p> + +<p>And yet, if ever there was material for citizenship, this Jew is such +material. Alone of all our immigrants he comes to us without a past. He +has no country to renounce, no ties to forget. Within him there burns a +passionate longing for a home to call his, a country which will own him, +that waits only for the spark of such another love to spring into flame +which nothing can quench. Waiting for it, all his energies are turned +into his business. He is not always choice in method; he often offends. +But he succeeds. He is the yeast of any slum, if given time. If it will +not let him go, it must rise with him. The charity managers in London +said it, when we looked through their slums some years ago: "The Jews +have renovated Whitechapel." I, for one, am a firm believer in this Jew, +and in his boy. Ignorant they are, but with a thirst for knowledge that +surmounts any barrier. The boy takes all the prizes in the school. His +comrades sneer that he will not fight. Neither will he when there is +nothing to be gained by it. But I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> believe that, should the time come +when the country needs fighting men, the son of the despised immigrant +Jew will resurrect on American soil, the first that bade him welcome, +the old Maccabee type, and set an example for all the rest of us to +follow.</p> + +<p>For fifteen years he has been in the public eye as the vehicle and +promoter of sweating, and much severe condemnation has been visited upon +him with good cause. He had to do something, and he took to the +clothes-maker's trade as that which was most quickly learned. The +increasing crowds, the tenement, and his grinding poverty made the soil, +wherein the evil thing grew rank. Yet the real sweater is the +manufacturer, not the workman. It is just a question of expense to the +manufacturer. By letting out his work on contract, he can save the +expense of running his factory and delay longer making his choice of +styles. The Jew is the victim of the mischief quite as much as he has +helped it on. Back of the manufacturer there is still another +sweater,—the public. Only by its sufferance of the bargain counter and +of sweatshop-made goods has the nuisance existed as long as it has.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> I +am glad to believe that its time is passing away. The law has driven the +sweatshops out of the tenements, and so deprived them of one of their +chief props: there was no rent at all to pay there. Child labor, which +only four years ago the Reinhard Committee characterized as "one of the +most extensive evils now existing in the city of New York, a constant +and grave menace to the welfare of its people," has been practically +banished from the tailoring trade. What organization among the workers +had failed to effect is apparently going to be accomplished by direct +pressure of an outraged public opinion. Already manufacturers are +returning to their own factories, and making capital of the fact among +their customers. The new law, which greatly extends the factory +inspector's power over sweatshops, is an expression of this enlightened +sentiment. It will put New York a long stride ahead, and quite up to +Massachusetts. The inspector's tag has proved, where the law was +violated, an effective weapon. It suspends all operation of the shop and +removal of the goods until the orders of the inspector have been obeyed. +But the tag which shall finally put<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> an end to sweating, and restore +decent conditions, is not the factory inspector's, I am persuaded, but a +trades union label, which shall deserve public confidence and receive +it. We have much to learn yet, all of us. I think I can see the end of +this trouble, however, when the Italian's triumph in the sweatshop shall +have proved but a barren victory, to his own gain.</p> + +<p>In all I have said so far, in these papers, I have not gone beyond the +limits of the old city,—of Manhattan Island, in fact. I want now to +glance for a moment at the several attempts made at colonizing refugee +Jews in this part of the country. Brownsville was one of the earliest. +Its projector was a manufacturer, and its motive profit. The result was +the familiar one,—as nasty a little slum as ever the East Side had to +show. We have it on our hands now in the Greater City,—it came in with +Brooklyn,—and it is not a gain. Down in southern New Jersey several +colonies were started, likewise by speculators, in the persecution of +the early eighties, and these also failed. The soil was sandy and poor, +and, thrown upon their own resources in a strange and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> unfriendly +neighborhood, with unfamiliar and unremunerative toil, the colonists +grew discouraged and gave up in despair. The colonies were approaching +final collapse, when the managers of the Baron de Hirsch Fund in New +York, who had started and maintained a successful colony at Woodbine, in +the same neighborhood, took them under the arms and inaugurated a new +plan. They persuaded several large clothing contractors in this city to +move their plants down to the villages, where they would be assured of +steady hands, not so easily affected by strikes. For strikes in +sweatshops are often enough the alternative of starvation. Upon the land +there would be no starvation. The managers of the Fund built factories, +bought the old mortgages on the farms, and put up houses for the +families which the contractors brought down with them. This effort at +transplanting the crowd from the Ghetto to the soil has now been going +on for a year. At latest account, eight contractors and two hundred and +fifty families had been moved out. The colonies had taken on a new lease +of life and apparent prosperity. While it is yet too early to pass sober +judgment, there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> seems to be good ground for hoping that a real way out +has been found that shall restore the Jew, at least in a measure, to the +soil from which he was barred so long. The experiment is of exceeding +interest. The hopes of its projectors that a purely farming community +might be established have not been realized. Perhaps it was too much to +expect. By bringing to the farmers their missing market, and work to the +surplus population, the mixed settlement plan bids fair to prove a step +in the desired direction.</p> + +<p>Some 18,500 acres are now held by Jewish colonists in New Jersey. In the +New England States, in the last eight years, 600 abandoned farms have +been occupied and are cultivated by refugees from Russia. As a dairy +farmer and a poultry raiser, the Jew has more of an immediate commercial +grip on the situation and works with more courage. At Woodbine, +sixty-five boys and girls are being trained in an agricultural school +that has won the whole settlement the friendly regard of the +neighborhood. Of its pupils, eleven came out of tailor shops, and ten +had been office boys, messengers, or newsboys. To these, and to the +trade schools now<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> successfully operated by the de Hirsch Fund, we are +to look in the next generation for the answer to the old taunt that the +Jew is a trader, and not fit to be either farmer or craftsman, and for +the solution of the problem which he now presents in the slum.</p> + +<p>I have spoken at length of the Jew and the Italian, because they are our +present problem. Yesterday it was the Irishman and the Bohemian. +To-morrow it may be the Greek, who already undersells the Italian from +his pushcart in the Fourth Ward, and the Syrian, who can give Greek, +Italian, and Jew points at a trade. From Dalmatia a new immigration has +begun to come, and there are signs of its working further east in the +Balkan states, where there is no telling what is in store for us. How to +absorb them all safely is the question. Doubtless the Irishman, having +absorbed us politically, would be glad to free us from all concern on +that score by doing a like favor for them. But we should not get the +best of the slum that way; it would get the best of us, instead. Would I +shut out the newcomers? Sometimes, looking at it from the point of view +of the Barge Office and the sweatshop,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> I think I would. Then there +comes up the recollection of a picture of the city of Prague that hangs +in a Bohemian friend's parlor, here in New York. I stood looking at it +one day, and noticed in the foreground cannon that pointed in over the +city. I spoke of it, unthinking, and said to my host that they should be +trained, if against an enemy, the other way. The man's eye flashed fire. +"Ha!" he cried, "here, yes!" When I think of that, I do not want to shut +the door.</p> + +<p>Again, there occurs to me an experience the police had last summer in +Mulberry Street. They were looking for a murderer, and came upon a nest +of Italian thugs who lived by blackmailing their countrymen. They were +curious about them, and sent their names to Naples with a request for +information. There came back such a record as none of the detectives had +ever seen or heard of before. All of them were notorious criminals, who +had been charged with every conceivable crime, from burglary to +kidnapping and "maiming," and some not to be conceived of by the +American mind. Five of them together had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> sixty-three times in +jail, and one no less than twenty-one times. Yet, though they were all +"under special surveillance," they had come here without let or +hindrance within a year. When I recall that, I want to shut the door +quick. I sent the exhibit to Washington at the time. But then, again, +when I think of Mrs. Michelangelo in her poor mourning for one child run +over and killed, wiping her tears away and going bravely to work to keep +the home together for the other five until the oldest shall be old +enough to take her father's place; and when, as now, there strays into +my hand the letter from my good friend, the "woman doctor" in the slum, +when her father had died, in which she wrote: "The little scamps of the +street have been positively pathetic; they have made such shy, boyish +attempts at friendliness. One little chap offered to let me hold his top +while it was spinning, in token of affection,"—when I read that, I have +not the heart to shut anybody out.</p> + +<p>Except, of course, the unfit, the criminal and the pauper, cast off by +their own, and the man brought over here merely to put money into the +pockets of the steamship<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> agent, the padrone, and the mine owner. We +have laws to bar these out. Suppose we begin by being honest with +ourselves and the immigrant, and enforcing our own laws. In spite of a +healthy effort at the port of New York,—I can only speak for +that,—under the present administration, that has not yet been done. +When the door has been shut and locked against the man who left his +country for his country's good, whether by its "assistance" or not, and +when trafficking in the immigrant for private profit has been stopped, +then, perhaps, we shall be better able to decide what degree of +ignorance in him constitutes unfitness for citizenship and cause for +shutting him out. Perchance then, also, we shall hear less of the cant +about his being a peril to the republic. Doubtless ignorance is a peril, +but the selfishness that trades upon ignorance is a much greater. He +came to us without a country, ready to adopt such a standard of +patriotism as he found, at its face value, and we gave him the rear +tenement and slum politics. If he accepted the standard, whose fault was +it? His being in such a hurry to vote that he could not wait till the +law made him a citizen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> was no worse, to my mind, than the treachery of +the "upper class" native, who refuses to go to the polls for fear he may +rub up against him there. This last let us settle with first, and see +what remains of our problem. We can approach it honestly, then, at all +events.</p> + +<p>When the country was in the throes of the silver campaign, the +newspapers told the story of an old laborer who went to the sub-treasury +and demanded to see the "boss." He undid the strings of an old leathern +purse with fumbling fingers, and counted out more than two hundred +dollars in gold eagles, the hoard of a lifetime of toil and self-denial. +They were for the government, he said. He had not the head to understand +all the talk that was going, but he gathered from what he heard that the +government was in trouble, and that somehow it was about not having gold +enough. So he had brought what he had. He owed it all to the country, +and now that she needed it he had come to give it back. The man was an +Irishman. Very likely he was enrolled in Tammany and voted her ticket. I +remember a tenement at the bottom of a back alley over on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> East +Side, where I once went visiting with the pastor of a mission chapel. Up +in the attic there was a family of father and daughter in two rooms that +had been made out of one by dividing off the deep dormer window. It was +midwinter, and they had no fire. He was a peddler, but the snow had +stalled his pushcart and robbed them of their only other source of +income, a lodger who hired cot room in the attic for a few cents a +night. The daughter was not able to work. But she said, cheerfully, that +they were "getting along." When it came out that she had not tasted +solid food for many days, was starving, in fact,—indeed, she died +within a year, of the slow starvation of the tenements that parades in +the mortality returns under a variety of scientific names which all mean +the same thing,—she met her pastor's gentle chiding with the excuse, +"Oh, your church has many poorer than I. I don't want to take your +money."</p> + +<p>These were Germans, ordinarily held to be close-fisted; but I found that +in their dire distress they had taken in a poor old man who was past +working, and had kept him all winter, sharing with him what they had. +He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> was none of theirs; they hardly even knew him, as it appeared. It +was enough that he was "poorer than they," and lonely and hungry and +cold.</p> + +<p>It was over here that the children of Dr. Elsing's Sunday school gave +out of the depth of their poverty fifty-four dollars in pennies to be +hung on the Christmas tree as their offering to the persecuted +Armenians. One of their teachers told me of a Bohemian family that let +the holiday dinner she brought them stand and wait, while they sent out +to bid to the feast four little ragamuffins of the neighborhood who else +would have gone hungry. I remember well a teacher in one of the +Children's Aid Society's schools, herself a tenement child, who, with +breaking heart, but brave face, played and sang the children's Christmas +carols with them rather than spoil their pleasure, while her only sister +lay dying at home.</p> + +<p>I might keep on and fill many pages with instances of that kind, which +simply go to prove that our poor human nature is at least as robust on +Avenue A as up on Fifth Avenue, if it has half a chance, and often +enough to restore one's faith in it, with no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> chance at all; and I might +set over against it the product of sordid and mean environment which one +has never far to seek. Good and evil go together in the tenements as in +the fine houses, and the evil sticks out sometimes merely because it +lies nearer the surface. The point is that the good does outweigh the +bad, and that the virtues that turn the balance are after all those that +make for good citizenship anywhere, while the faults are oftenest the +accidents of ignorance and lack of training, which it is the business +of society to correct. I recall my discouragement when I looked +over the examination papers of a batch of candidates for police +appointment,—young men largely the product of our public schools in +this city and elsewhere,—and read in them that five of the original New +England States were "England, Ireland, Scotland, Belfast, and Cork;" +that the Fire Department ruled New York in the absence of the Mayor,—I +have sometimes wished it did, and that he would stay away awhile; and +that Lincoln was murdered by Ballington Booth. But we shall agree, no +doubt, that the indictment of these papers was not of the men who wrote +them, but of the school<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> that stuffed its pupils with useless trash, and +did not teach them to think. Neither have I forgotten that it was one of +these very men who, having failed, and afterward got a job as a bridge +policeman, on his first pay day went straight from his post, half frozen +as he was, to the settlement worker who had befriended him and his sick +father, and gave him five dollars for "some one who was poorer than +they." Poorer than they! What worker among the poor has not heard it? It +is the charity of the tenement that covers a multitude of sins. There +were thirteen in this policeman's family, and his wages were the biggest +item of income in the house.</p> + +<p>Jealousy, envy, and meanness wear no fine clothes and masquerade under +no smooth speeches in the slums. Often enough it is the very nakedness +of the virtues that makes us stumble in our judgment. I have in mind the +"difficult case" that confronted some philanthropic friends of mine in a +rear tenement on Twelfth Street, in the person of an aged widow, quite +seventy I should think, who worked uncomplainingly for a sweater all day +and far into the night, pinching and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> saving and stinting herself, with +black bread and chicory coffee as her only fare, in order that she might +carry her pitiful earnings to her big, lazy lout of a son in Brooklyn. +He never worked. My friends' difficulty was a very real one, for +absolutely every attempt to relieve the widow was wrecked upon her +mother heart. It all went over the river. Yet one would not have had her +different.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus6" id="illus6"></a> +<img src="images/illus6.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>BONE ALLEY</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Sometimes it is only the unfamiliar setting that shocks. When an East +Side midnight burglar, discovered and pursued, killed a tenant who +blocked his way of escape, a few weeks ago, his "girl" gave him up to +the police. But it was not because he had taken human life. "He was good +to me," she explained to the captain whom she told where to find him, +"but since he robbed the church I had no use for him." He had stolen, it +seems, the communion service in a Staten Island church. The thoughtless +laughed. But in her ignorant way she was only trying to apply the +standards of morality as they had been taught her. Stunted, bemuddled, +as they were, I think I should prefer to take my chances with her rather +than with the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> woman of wealth and luxury who, some years ago, gave a +Christmas party to her lap-dog, as on the whole the sounder of the two, +and by far the more hopeful.</p> + +<p>All of which is merely saying that the country is all right, and the +people are to be trusted with the old faith in spite of the slum. And it +is true, if we remember to put it that way,—in spite of the slum. There +is nothing in the slum to warrant that faith save human nature as yet +uncorrupted. How long it is to remain so is altogether a question of the +sacrifices we are willing to make in our fight with the slum. As yet, we +are told by the officials having to do with the enforcement of the +health ordinances, which come closer to the life of the individual than +any other kind, that the poor in the tenements are "more amenable to the +law than the better class." It is of the first importance, then, that we +should have laws deserving of their respect, and that these laws should +be enforced, lest they conclude that the whole thing is a sham. Respect +for law is a very powerful bar against the slum. But what, for instance, +must the poor Jew understand, who is permitted to buy a live<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> hen at the +market, yet neither to kill nor keep it in his tenement, and who on his +feast day finds a whole squad of policemen detailed to follow him around +and see that he does not do any of the things with his fowl for which he +must have bought it? Or the day laborer, who drinks his beer in a +"Raines law hotel," where brick sandwiches, consisting of two pieces of +bread with a brick between, are set out on the counter, in derision of +the state law which forbids the serving of drinks without "meals"? (The +Stanton Street saloon keeper who did that was solemnly acquitted by a +jury.) Or the boy, who may buy fireworks on the Fourth of July, but not +set them off? These are only ridiculous instances of an abuse that +pervades our community life to an extent that constitutes one of the +gravest perils. Insincerity of that kind is not lost on our fellow +citizen by adoption, who is only anxious to fall in with the ways of the +country; and especially is it not lost on his boy.</p> + +<p>We shall see how it affects him. He is the one for whom we are waging +the battle with the slum. He is the to-morrow that sits to-day drinking +in the lesson of the prosperity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> of the big boss who declared with pride +upon the witness stand that he rules New York, that judges pay him +tribute, and that only when <i>he</i> says so a thing "goes;" and that it is +all for what he can get out of it, "just the same as everybody else." He +sees corporations to-day pay blackmail and rob the people in return, +quite according to the schedule of Hester Street. Only there it is the +police who charge the peddler twenty cents, while here it is the +politicians taking toll of the franchises, twenty per cent. Wall Street +is not ordinarily reckoned in the slum, because of certain physical +advantages; but, upon the evidence of the day, I think we shall have to +conclude that the advantage ends there. The boy who is learning such +lessons,—how is it with him?</p> + +<p>The president of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children +says that children's crime is increasing, and he ought to know. The +managers of the Children's Aid Society, after forty-six years of +wrestling with the slum for the boy, in which they have lately seemed to +get the upper hand, say in this year's report that on the East Side +children are growing up in certain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> districts "entirely neglected," and +that the number of such children "increases beyond the power of +philanthropic and religious bodies to cope properly with their needs." +In the Tompkins Square Lodging House the evening classes are thinning +out, and the keeper wails: "Those with whom we have dealt of late have +not been inclined to accept this privilege; how to make night school +attractive to shiftless, indifferent street boys is a difficult problem +to solve."</p> + +<p>Perhaps it is only that he has lost the key. Across the square, the +Boys' Club of St. Mark's Place, that began with a handful, counts five +thousand members to-day, and is seeking a place to build a house of its +own. The school census man announces that no boy in that old stronghold +of the "bread or blood" brigade need henceforth loiter in the street +because there is not room in the public school, and the brigade has +disbanded for want of recruits. The shop is being shut against the boy, +and the bars let down at the playground. But from Tompkins Square, +nevertheless, came Jacob Beresheim, whose story I shall tell you +presently.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>THE GENESIS OF THE GANG</h3> + + +<p>Jacob Beresheim was fifteen when he was charged with murder. It is now +more than three years ago, but the touch of his hand is cold upon mine, +with mortal fear, as I write. Every few minutes, during our long talk on +the night of his arrest and confession, he would spring to his feet, +and, clutching my arm as a drowning man catches at a rope, demand with +shaking voice, "Will they give me the chair?" The assurance that boys +were not executed quieted him only for the moment. Then the dread and +the horror were upon him again.</p> + +<p>Of his crime the less said the better. It was the climax of a career of +depravity that differed from other such chiefly in the opportunities +afforded by an environment which led up to and helped shape it. My +business is with that environment. The man is dead, the boy in jail. But +unless I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> am to be my brother's jail keeper, merely, the iron bars do +not square the account of Jacob with society. Society exists for the +purpose of securing justice to its members, appearances to the contrary +notwithstanding. When it fails in this, the item is carried on the +ledger with interest and compound interest toward a day of reckoning +that comes surely with the paymaster. We have heard the chink of his +coin on the counter, these days, in the unblushing revelations before +the Mazet Committee of degraded citizenship, of the murder of the civic +conscience, and in the applause that hailed them. And we have begun to +understand that these are the interest on Jacob's account, older, much +older than himself. He is just an item carried on the ledger. But with +that knowledge the account is at last in a way of getting squared. Let +us see how it stands.</p> + +<p>We shall take Jacob as a type of the street boy on the East Side, where +he belonged. What does not apply to him in the review applies to his +class. But there was very little of it indeed that he missed or that +missed him.</p> + +<p>He was born in a tenement in that section<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> where the Tenement House +Committee found 324,000 persons living out of sight and reach of a green +spot of any kind, and where sometimes the buildings, front, middle, and +rear, took up ninety-three per cent. of all the space on the block. Such +a home as he had was there, and of the things that belonged to it he was +the heir. The sunlight was not among them. It "never entered" there. +Darkness and discouragement did, and dirt. Later on, when he took to the +dirt as his natural weapon in his battles with society, it was said of +him that it was the only friend that stuck to him, and it was true. Very +early the tenement gave him up to the street. The thing he took with him +as the one legacy of home was the instinct for the crowd, which meant +that the tenement had wrought its worst mischief upon him: it had +smothered that in him around which character is built. The more readily +did he fall in with the street and its ways. Character implies depth, a +soil, and growth. The street is all surface: nothing grows there; it +hides only a sewer.</p> + +<p>It taught him gambling as its first lesson, and stealing as the next. +The two are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> never far apart. From shooting craps behind the "cop's" +back to filching from the grocer's stock or plundering a defenseless +peddler is only a step. There is in both the spice of law-breaking that +appeals to the shallow ambition of the street as heroic. Occasionally +the raids have a comic tinge. A German grocer wandered into police +headquarters the other day, with an appeal for protection against the +boys.</p> + +<p>"Vat means dot 'cheese it'?" he asked, rubbing his bald head in helpless +bewilderment. "Efery dime dey says 'cheese it,' somedings vas gone."</p> + +<p>To the lawlessness of the street the home opposes no obstacle, as we +have seen. Until very recently the school did not. It might have more to +offer even now. There are, at least, schools where there were none then, +and so much is gained; also, they are getting better, but too many of +them, in my unprofessional judgment, need yet to be made over, until +they are fit to turn out whole, sound boys, instead of queer manikins +stuffed with information for which they have no use, and which is none +of their business anyhow. It seemed to me<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> sometimes, when watching the +process of cramming the school course with the sum of human knowledge +and conceit, as if it all meant that we distrusted nature's way of +growing a man from a boy, and had set out to show her a shorter cut. A +common result was the kind of mental befogment that had Abraham Lincoln +murdered by Ballington Booth, and a superficiality, a hopeless slurring +of tasks, that hitched perfectly with the spirit of the street, and left +nothing to be explained in the verdict of the reformatory, "No moral +sense." There was no moral sense to be got out of the thing, for there +was little sense of any kind in it. The boy was not given a chance to be +honest with himself by thinking a thing through; he came naturally to +accept as his mental horizon the headlines in his penny paper and the +literature of the Dare-Devil-Dan-the-Death-Dealing-Monster-of-Dakota +order, which comprise the ordinary æsthetic equipment of the slum. The +mystery of his further development into the tough need not perplex +anybody.</p> + +<p>But Jacob Beresheim had not even the benefit of such schooling as there +was to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> had. He did not go to school, and nobody cared. There was +indeed a law directing that every child should go, and a corps of truant +officers to catch him if he did not; but the law had been a dead letter +for a quarter of a century. There was no census to tell what children +ought to be in school, and no place but a jail to put those in who +shirked. Jacob was allowed to drift. From the time he was twelve till he +was fifteen, he told me, he might have gone to school three weeks,—no +more.</p> + +<p>Church and Sunday school missed him. I was going to say that they passed +by on the other side, remembering the migration of the churches uptown, +as the wealthy moved out of, and the poor into, the region south of +Fourteenth Street. But that would hardly be fair. They moved after their +congregations; but they left nothing behind. In the twenty years that +followed the war, while enough to people a large city moved in downtown, +the number of churches there was reduced from 141 to 127. Fourteen +Protestant churches moved out. Only two Roman Catholic churches and a +synagogue moved in. I am not aware that there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> has been any large +increase of churches in the district since, but we have seen that the +crowding has not slackened pace. Jacob had no trouble in escaping the +Sunday school as he had escaped the public school. His tribe will have +none until the responsibility incurred in the severance of church and +state sits less lightly on a Christian community, and the church, from a +mob, shall have become an army, with von Moltke's plan of campaign, +"March apart, fight together." The Christian church is not alone in its +failure. The Jew's boy is breaking away from safe moorings rather faster +than his brother of the new dispensation. The church looks on, but it +has no cause for congratulation. He is getting nothing in place of that +which he lost, and the result is bad. There is no occasion for profound +theories about it. The facts are plain enough. The new freedom has +something to do with it, but neglect to look after the young has quite +as much. Apart from its religious aspect, seen from the angle of the +community's interest wholly, the matter is of the gravest import.</p> + +<p>What the boy's play has to do with building<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> character in him Froebel +has told us. Through it, he showed us, the child "first perceives moral +relations," and he made that the basis of the kindergarten and all +common-sense education. That prop was knocked out. New York never had a +children's playground till within the last year. Truly it seemed, as +Abram S. Hewitt said, as if in the early plan of our city the children +had not been thought of at all. Such moral relations as Jacob was able +to make out ran parallel with the gutter always, and counter to law and +order as represented by the policeman and the landlord. The landlord had +his windows to mind, and the policeman his lamps and the city ordinances +which prohibit even kite-flying below Fourteenth Street where the crowds +are. The ball had no chance at all. It is not two years since a boy was +shot down by a policeman for the heinous offense of playing football in +the street on Thanksgiving Day. But a boy who cannot kick a ball around +has no chance of growing up a decent and orderly citizen. He must have +his childhood, so that he may be fitted to give to the community his +manhood. The average boy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> is just like a little steam engine with steam +always up. The play is his safety valve. With the landlord in the yard +and the policeman on the street sitting on his safety valve and holding +it down, he is bound to explode. When he does, when he throws mud and +stones and shows us the side of him which the gutter developed, we are +shocked and marvel much what our boys are coming to, as if we had any +right to expect better treatment of them. I doubt if Jacob, in the whole +course of his wizened little life, had ever a hand in an honest game +that was not haunted by the dread of the avenging policeman. That he was +not "doing anything" was no defense. The mere claim was proof that he +was up to mischief of some sort. Besides, the policeman was usually +right. Play in such a setting becomes a direct incentive to mischief in +a healthy boy. Jacob was a healthy enough little animal.</p> + +<p>Such fun as he had he got out of law-breaking in a small way. In this he +was merely following the ruling fashion. Laws were apparently made for +no other purpose that he could see. Such a view as he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> enjoyed of their +makers and executors at election seasons inspired him with seasonable +enthusiasm, but hardly with awe. A slogan, now, like that raised by +Tammany's late candidate for district attorney,—"To hell with +reform!"—was something he could grasp. Of what reform meant he had only +the vaguest notion, but the thing had the right ring to it. Roosevelt +preaching enforcement of law was from the first a "lobster" to him, not +to be taken seriously. It is not among the least of the merits of the +man that by his sturdy personality, as well as by his unyielding +persistence, he won the boy over to the passive admission that there +might be something in it. It had not been his experience.</p> + +<p>There was the law which sternly commanded him to go to school, and which +he laughed at every day. Then there was the law to prevent child labor. +It cost twenty-five cents for a false age certificate to break that, and +Jacob, if he thought of it at all, probably thought of perjury as rather +an expensive thing. A quarter was a good deal to pay for the right to +lock a child up in a factory, when he ought to have been at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> play. The +excise law was everybody's game. The sign that hung in every saloon, +saying that nothing was sold there to minors, never yet barred out his +"growler" when he had the price. There was another such sign in the +tobacco shop, forbidding the sale of cigarettes to boys of his age. +Jacob calculated that when he had the money he smoked as many as fifteen +in a day, and he laughed when he told me. He laughed, too, when he +remembered how the boys of the East Side took to carrying balls of cord +in their pockets, on the wave of the Lexow reform, on purpose to measure +the distance from the school door to the nearest saloon. They had been +told that it should be two hundred feet, according to law. There were +schools that had as many as a dozen within the tabooed limits. It was in +the papers how, when the highest courts said that the law was good, the +saloon keepers attacked the schools as a nuisance and detrimental to +property. In a general way Jacob sided with the saloon keeper; not +because he had any opinion about it, but because it seemed natural. Such +opinions as he ordinarily had he got from that quarter.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span></p> + +<p>When, later on, he came to be tried, his counsel said to me, "He is an +amazing liar." No, hardly amazing. It would have been amazing if he had +been anything else. Lying and mockery were all around him, and he +adjusted himself to the things that were. He lied in self-defense.</p> + +<p>Jacob's story ends here, as far as he is personally concerned. The story +of the gang begins. So trained for the responsibility of citizenship, +robbed of home and of childhood, with every prop knocked from under him, +all the elements that make for strength and character trodden out in the +making of the boy, all the high ambition of youth caricatured by the +slum and become base passions,—so equipped he comes to the business of +life. As a "kid" he hunted with the pack in the street. As a young man +he trains with the gang, because it furnishes the means of gratifying +his inordinate vanity, that is the slum's counterfeit of self-esteem. +Upon the Jacobs of other days there was a last hold,—the father's +authority. Changed conditions have loosened that also. There is a time +in every young man's life when he knows more than his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> father. It is +like the measles or the mumps, and he gets over it, with a little +judicious firmness in the hand that guides. It is the misfortune of the +slum boy of to-day that it is really so, and that he knows it. His +father is an Italian or a Jew, and cannot even speak the language to +which the boy is born. He has to depend on him in much, in the new order +of things. The old man is "slow," he is "Dutch." He maybe an Irishman +with some advantages; he is still a "foreigner." He loses his grip on +the boy. Ethical standards of which he has no conception clash. Watch +the meeting of two currents in river or bay, and see the line of drift +that tells of the struggle. So in the city's life strive the currents of +the old and the new, and in the churning the boy goes adrift. The last +hold upon him is gone. That is why the gang appears in the second +generation, the first born upon the soil,—a fighting gang if the +Irishman is there with his ready fist, a thievish gang if it is the East +Side Jew,—and disappears in the third. The second boy's father is not +"slow." He has had experience. He was clubbed into decency in his own +day, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> the night stick wore off the glamour of the thing. His grip on +the boy is good, and it holds.</p> + +<p>It depends now upon chance what is to become of the lad. But the slum +has stacked the cards against him. There arises in the lawless crowd a +leader, who rules with his stronger fists or his readier wit. Around him +the gang crystallizes, and what he is it becomes. He may be a thief, +like David Meyer, a report of whose doings I have before me. He was just +a bully, and, being the biggest in his gang, made the others steal for +him and surrender the "swag," or take a licking. But that was unusual. +Ordinarily the risk and the "swag" are distributed on more democratic +principles. Or he may be of the temper of Mike of Poverty Gap, who was +hanged for murder at nineteen. While he sat in his cell at police +headquarters, he told with grim humor of the raids of his gang on +Saturday nights when they stocked up at "the club." They used to "hook" +a butcher's cart or other light wagon, wherever found, and drive like +mad up and down the avenue, stopping at saloon or grocery to throw in +what they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> wanted. His job was to sit at the tail of the cart with a +six-shooter and pop at any chance pursuer. He chuckled at the +recollection of how men fell over one another to get out of his way. "It +was great to see them run," he said. Mike was a tough, but with a better +chance he might have been a hero. The thought came to him, too, when it +was all over and the end in sight. He put it all in one sober, +retrospective sigh, that had in it no craven shirking of the +responsibility that was properly his: "I never had no bringing up."</p> + +<p>There was a meeting some time after his death to boom a scheme for +"getting the boys off the street," and I happened to speak of Mike's +case. In the audience was a gentleman of means and position, and his +daughter, who manifested great interest and joined heartily in the +proposed movement. A week later, I was thunderstruck at reading of the +arrest of my sympathetic friend's son for train-wrecking up the State. +The fellow was of the same age as Mike. It appeared that he was supposed +to be attending school, but had been reading dime novels instead, until +he arrived at the point where he "had to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> kill some one before the end +of the month." To that end he organized a gang of admiring but less +resourceful comrades. After all, the plane of fellowship of Poverty Gap +and Madison Avenue lies nearer than we often suppose. I set the incident +down in justice to the memory of my friend Mike. If this one went astray +with so much to pull him the right way, and but the single strand +broken, what then of the other?</p> + +<p>Mike's was the day of Irish heroics. Since their scene was shifted from +the East Side there has come over there an epidemic of child crime of +meaner sort, but following the same principle of gang organization. It +is difficult to ascertain the exact extent of it, because of the +well-meant but, I am inclined to think, mistaken effort on the part of +the children's societies to suppress the record of it for the sake of +the boy. Enough testimony comes from the police and the courts, however, +to make it clear that thieving is largely on the increase among the East +Side boys. And it is amazing at what an early age it begins. When, in +the fight for a truant school, I had occasion to gather statistics upon +this subject, to meet the sneer of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> the educational authorities that the +"crimes" of street boys compassed at worst the theft of a top or a +marble. I found among 278 prisoners, of whom I had kept the run for ten +months, two boys, of four and eight years respectively, arrested for +breaking into a grocery, not to get candy or prunes, but to rob the +till. The little one was useful to "crawl through a small hole." There +were "burglars" of six and seven years, and five in a bunch, the whole +gang apparently, at the age of eight. "Wild" boys began to appear in +court at that age. At eleven, I had seven thieves, two of whom had a +record on the police blotter, and an "habitual liar;" at twelve, I had +four burglars, three ordinary thieves, two arrested for drunkenness, +three for assault, and three incendiaries; at thirteen, five burglars, +one with a "record," as many thieves, one "drunk," five charged with +assault and one with forgery; at fourteen, eleven thieves and +house-breakers, six highway robbers,—the gang on its unlucky day, +perhaps,—and ten arrested for fighting, not counting one who had +assaulted a policeman, in a state of drunken frenzy. One of the gangs +made a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> specialty of stealing baby carriages, when left unattended in +front of stores. They "drapped the kids in the hallway" and "sneaked" +the carriages. And so on. The recital was not a pleasant one, but it was +effective. We got our truant school, and one way that led to the jail +was blocked.</p> + +<p>It may be that the leader is neither thief nor thug, but ambitious. In +that case the gang is headed for politics by the shortest route. +Likewise, sometimes, when he is both. In either case it carries the +situation by assault. When the gang wants a thing, the easiest way seems +to it always to take it. There was an explosion in a Fifth Street +tenement, one night last January, that threw twenty families into a wild +panic, and injured two of the tenants badly. There was much mystery +about it, until it came out that the housekeeper had had a "run in" with +the gang in the block. It wanted club-room in the house, and she would +not let it in. Beaten, it avenged itself in characteristic fashion by +leaving a package of gunpowder on the stairs, where she would be sure to +find it when she went the rounds with her candle to close up. That was a +gang of that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> kind, headed straight for Albany. And what is more, it +will get there, unless things change greatly. The gunpowder was just a +"bluff" to frighten the housekeeper, an installment of the kind of +politics it meant to play when it got its chance. There was "nothing +against this gang" except a probable row with the saloon keeper, since +it applied elsewhere for house-room. Not every gang has a police record +of theft and "slugging" beyond the early encounters of the street. "Our +honored leader" is not always the captain of a band of cutthroats. He is +the honorary president of the "social club" that bears his name, and he +counts for something in the ward. But the ethical standards do not +differ. "Do others, or they will do you," felicitously adapted from Holy +Writ for the use of the slum, and the classic war-cry, "To the victors +the spoils," made over locally to read, "I am not in politics for my +health," still interpret the creed of the political as of the "slugging" +gang. They drew their inspiration from the same source. Of what gang +politics means every large city in our country has had its experience. +New York is no exception. History<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> on the subject is being made yet, in +the sight of us all.</p> + +<p>Our business with the gang, however, is in the making of it. Take now +the showing of the reformatory,<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> to which I have before made +reference, and see what light it throws upon the matter: 71 per cent. of +prisoners with no moral sense, or next to none, yet more than that +proportion possessed of "natural mental capacity," which is to say that +they had the means of absorbing it from their environment, if there had +been any to absorb. Bad homes sent half of all prisoners there; bad +company 92 per cent. The reformatory repeats the prison chaplain's +verdict, "weakness, not wickedness," in its own way: "Malevolence does +not characterize the criminal, but aversion to continuous labor." If +"the street" had been written across it in capital letters, it could not +have been made plainer. Twelve per cent. only<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> of the prisoners came +from good homes, and one in a hundred had kept good company; evidently +he was not of the mentally capable. They will tell you at the prison +that, under its discipline, 83 per cent. are set upon their feet and +make a fresh start. With due allowance for a friendly critic, there is +still room for the three fourths labeled normal. The Children's Aid +Society will give you even better news of the boys rescued from the slum +before it had branded them for its own. Scarce five per cent. are lost, +though they leave such a black mark that they make trouble for all the +good boys that are sent out from New York. Better than these was the +kindergarten record in San Francisco. New York has no monopoly of the +slum. Of nine thousand children from the slummiest quarters of that city +who had gone through the Golden Gate Association's kindergartens, just +one was said to have got into jail. The merchants who looked coldly on +the experiment before brought their gold to pay for keeping it up. They +were hard-headed men of business, and the demonstration that schools +were better than jails any day appealed to them as eminently sane and +practical.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span></p> + +<p>And well it might. The gang is a distemper of the slum that writes upon +the generation it plagues the recipe for its own corrective. It is not +the night stick, though in the acute stage that is not to be dispensed +with. Neither is it the jail. To put the gang behind iron bars affords +passing relief, but it is like treating a symptom without getting at the +root of the disease. Prophylactic treatment is clearly indicated. The +boy who flings mud and stones is entering his protest in his own way +against the purblind policy that gave him jails for schools and the +gutter for a playground, that gave him dummies for laws and the tenement +for a home. He is demanding his rights, of which he has been +cheated,—the right to his childhood, the right to know the true dignity +of labor that makes a self-respecting manhood. The gang, rightly +understood, is our ally, not our enemy. Like any ailment of the body, it +is a friend come to tell us of something that has gone amiss. The thing +for us to do is to find out what it is, and set it right.</p> + +<p>That is the story of the gang. That we have read and grasped its lesson +at last, an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> item in my morning paper, which I read at the breakfast +table to-day, bears witness. It tells that the League for Political +Education has set about providing a playground for the children up on +the West Side, near the model tenements which I described. Just so! With +a decent home and a chance for the boy to grow into a healthy man, his +political education can proceed without much further hindrance. Now let +the League for Political Education trade off the policeman's club for a +boys' club, and it may consider its course fairly organized.</p> + +<p>I spoke of the instinct for the crowd in the tenement house boy as +evidence that the slum had got its grip on him. And it is true of him. +The experience that the helpless poor will not leave their slum when a +chance of better things is offered is wearily familiar to most of us. I +recall the indignant amazement of my good friend, the president of the +Baron de Hirsch Fund, when, of a hundred of the neediest families chosen +to be the pioneers in the experiment of transplanting the crowds of the +Ghetto to the country, where homes and work were waiting for them, only +seven wanted to go.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> They preferred the excitement of the street. One +has to have resources to face the loneliness of the woods and the +fields. We have seen what resources the slum has at its command. In the +boy it laid hold of the instinct for organization, the desire to fall in +and march in line that belongs to all boys, and is not here, as abroad, +cloyed with military service in the young years,—and anyhow is stronger +in the American boy than in his European brother,—and perverted it to +its own use. That is the simple secret of the success of the club, the +brigade, in winning back the boy. It is fighting the street with its own +weapon. The gang is the club run wild.</p> + +<p>How readily it owns the kinship was never better shown than by the +experience of the College Settlement girls, when they first went to make +friends in the East Side tenements. I have told it before, but it will +bear telling again, for it holds the key to the whole business. They +gathered in the drift, all the little embryo gangs that were tuning up +in the district, and made them into clubs,—Young Heroes, Knights of the +Round Table, and such like; all except one,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> the oldest, that had begun +to make a name for itself with the police. That one held aloof, +observing coldly what went on, to make sure it was "straight." They let +it be, keeping the while an anxious eye upon it; until one day there +came a delegation with the proposition, "If you will let us in, we will +change and have your kind of a gang." Needless to say it was let in. And +within a year, when, through a false rumor that the concern was moving +away, there was a run on the Settlement's penny provident bank, the +converted gang proved itself its stanchest friend by doing actually what +John Halifax did, in Miss Mulock's story: it brought all the pennies it +could raise in the neighborhood by hook or by crook and deposited them +as fast as the regular patrons—the gang had not yet risen to the +dignity of a bank account—drew them out, until the run ceased.</p> + +<p>The cry "Get the boys off the street" that has been raised in our +cities, as the real gravity of the situation has been made clear, has +led to the adoption of curfew ordinances in many places. Any attempt to +fit such a scheme to metropolitan life would probably<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> result simply in +adding one more dead-letter law, more dangerous than all the rest, to +those we have. Besides, the curfew rings at nine o'clock. The dangerous +hours, when the gang is made, are from seven to nine, between supper and +bedtime. This is the gap the club fills out. The boys take to the street +because the home has nothing to keep them there. To lock them up in the +house would only make them hate it more. The club follows the line of +least resistance. It has only to keep also on the line of common sense. +It must be a real club, not a reformatory. Its proper function is to +head off the jail. The gang must not run it. But rather that than have +it help train up a band of wretched young cads. The signs are not hard +to make out. When a boy has had his head swelled by his importance as a +member of the Junior Street-Cleaning Band to the point of reproving his +mother for throwing a banana peel in the street, the thing to be done is +to take him out and spank him, if it <i>is</i> reverting to "the savagery" of +the street. Better a savage than a cad. The boys have the making of both +in them. Their vanity furnishes abundant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> material for the cad, but only +when unduly pampered. Left to itself, the gang can be trusted not to +develop that kink.</p> + +<p>It comes down in the end to the personal influence that is always most +potent in dealing with these problems. We had a gang start up once when +my boys were of that age, out in the village on Long Island where we +lived. It had its headquarters in our barn, where it planned divers +raids that aimed at killing the cat and other like outrages; the central +fact being that the boys had an air rifle, with which it was necessary +to murder something. My wife discovered the conspiracy, and, with +woman's wit, defeated it by joining the gang. She "gave in wood" to the +election bonfires, and pulled the safety valve upon all the other plots +by entering into the true spirit of them,—which was adventure rather +than mischief,—and so keeping them within safe lines. She was elected +an honorary member, and became the counselor of the gang in all their +little scrapes. I can yet see her dear brow wrinkled in the study of +some knotty gang problem, which we discussed when the boys had been long +asleep. They did not dream<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> of it, and the village never knew what small +tragedies it escaped, nor who it was that so skillfully averted them.</p> + +<p>It is always the women who do those things. They are the law and the +gospel to the boy, both in one. It is the mother heart, I suppose, and +there is nothing better in all the world. I am reminded of the +conversion of "the Kid" by one who was in a very real sense the mother +of a social settlement uptown, in the latitude of Battle Row. The Kid +was driftwood. He had been cast off by a drunken father and mother, and +was living on what he could scrape out of ash barrels, and an occasional +dime for kindling-wood which he sold from a wheel-barrow, when the gang +found and adopted him. My friend adopted the gang in her turn, and +civilized it by slow stages. Easter Sunday came, when she was to redeem +her promise to take the boys to witness the services in a neighboring +church, where the liturgy was especially impressive. It found the larger +part of the gang at her door,—a minority, it was announced, were out +stealing potatoes, hence were excusable,—in a state of high +indignation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The Kid's been cussin' awful," explained the leader. The Kid showed in +the turbulent distance, red-eyed and raging.</p> + +<p>"But why?" asked my friend, in amazement.</p> + +<p>"'Cause he can't go to church!"</p> + +<p>It appeared that the gang had shut him out, with a sense of what was due +to the occasion, because of his rags. Restored to grace, and choking +down reminiscent sobs, the Kid sat through the Easter service, +surrounded by the twenty-seven "proper" members of the gang. +Civilization had achieved a victory, and no doubt my friend remembered +it in her prayers with thanksgiving. The manner was of less account. +Battle Row has its own ways, even in its acceptance of means of grace.</p> + +<p>I walked home from the office to-night. The street wore its normal +aspect of mingled dullness and the kind of expectancy that is always +waiting to turn any excitement, from a fallen horse to a fire, to +instant account. The early June heat had driven the multitudes from the +tenements into the street for a breath of air. The boys of the block +were holding a meeting at the hydrant. In some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> way they had turned the +water on, and were splashing in it with bare feet, reveling in the sense +that they were doing something that "went against" their enemy, the +policeman. Upon the quiet of the evening broke a bugle note and the +tramp of many feet keeping time. A military band came around the corner, +stepping briskly to the tune of "The Stars and Stripes Forever." Their +white duck trousers glimmered in the twilight, as the hundred legs moved +as one. Stoops and hydrant were deserted with a rush. The gang fell in +with joyous shouts. The young fellow linked arms with his sweetheart and +fell in too. The tired mother hurried with the baby carriage to catch +up. The butcher came, hot and wiping his hands on his apron, to the door +to see them pass.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said my companion, guessing my thoughts,—we had been speaking of +the boys,—"but look at the other side. There is the military spirit. Do +you not fear danger from it in this country?"</p> + +<p>No, my anxious friend, I do not. Let them march; and if with a gun, +better still. Often enough it is the choice of the gun on the shoulder, +or, by and by, the stripes on the back in the lockstep gang.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>LETTING IN THE LIGHT</h3> + + +<p>I had been out of town and my way had not fallen through the Mulberry +Bend in weeks until that morning when I came suddenly upon the park that +had been made there in my absence. Sod had been laid, and men were going +over the lawn cutting the grass after the rain. The sun shone upon +flowers and the tender leaves of young shrubs, and the smell of new-mown +hay was in the air. Crowds of little Italian children shouted with +delight over the "garden," while their elders sat around upon the +benches with a look of contentment such as I had not seen before in that +place. I stood and looked at it all, and a lump came in my throat as I +thought of what it had been, and of all the weary years of battling for +this. It had been such a hard fight, and now at last it was won. To me +the whole battle with the slum had summed itself up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> in the struggle +with this dark spot. The whir of the lawn mower was as sweet a song in +my ear as that which the skylark sang when I was a boy, in Danish +fields, and which gray hairs do not make the man forget.</p> + +<p>In my delight I walked upon the grass. It seemed as if I should never be +satisfied till I had felt the sod under my feet,—sod in the Mulberry +Bend! I did not see the gray-coated policeman hastening my way, nor the +wide-eyed youngsters awaiting with shuddering delight the catastrophe +that was coming, until I felt his cane laid smartly across my back and +heard his angry command:—</p> + +<p>"Hey! Come off the grass! D' ye think it is made to walk on?"</p> + +<p>So that was what I got for it. It is the way of the world. But it was +all right. The park was there, that was the thing. And I had my revenge. +I had just had a hand in marking five blocks of tenements for +destruction to let in more light, and in driving the slum from two other +strongholds. Where they were, parks are being made to-day in which the +sign "Keep off<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> the grass!" will never be seen. The children may walk in +them from morning till night, and I too, if I want to, with no policeman +to drive us off. I tried to tell the policeman something about it. But +he was of the old dispensation. All the answer I got was a gruff:—</p> + +<p>"G'wan now! I don't want none o' yer guff!"</p> + +<p>It was all "guff" to the politicians, I suppose, from the day the +trouble began about the Mulberry Bend, but toward the end they woke up +nobly. When the park was finally dedicated to the people's use, they +took charge of the celebration with immense unction, and invited +themselves to sit in the high seats and glory in the achievement which +they had done little but hamper and delay from the first. They had not +reckoned with Colonel Waring, however. When they had had their say, the +colonel arose and, curtly reminding them that they had really had no +hand in the business, proposed three cheers for the citizen effort that +had struck the slum this staggering blow. There was rather a feeble +response on the platform, but rousing cheers from the crowd, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> whom +the colonel was a prime favorite, and no wonder. Two years later he laid +down his life in the fight which he so valiantly and successfully waged. +It is the simple truth that he was killed by politics. The services +which he had rendered the city would have entitled him in any reputable +business to be retained in the employment that was his life and his +pride. Had he been so retained he would not have gone to Cuba, and would +in all human probability be now alive. But Tammany is not "in politics +for her health" and had no use for him, though no more grievous charge +could be laid at his door, even in the heat of the campaign, than that +he was a "foreigner," being from Rhode Island. Spoils politics never +craved a heavier sacrifice of any community.</p> + +<p>It was Colonel Waring's broom that first let light into the slum. That +which had come to be considered an impossible task he did by the simple +formula of "putting a man instead of a voter behind every broom." The +words are his own. The man, from a political dummy who loathed his job +and himself in it with cause, became a self-respecting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> citizen, and the +streets that had been dirty were swept. The ash barrels which had +befouled the sidewalks disappeared, almost without any one knowing it +till they were gone. The trucks that obstructed the children's only +playground, the street, went with the dirt despite the opposition of the +truckman who had traded off his vote to Tammany in the past for stall +room at the curbstone. They did not go without a struggle. When appeal +to the alderman proved useless, the truckman resorted to strategy. He +took a wheel off, or kept a perishing nag, that could not walk, hitched +to the truck over night to make it appear that it was there for +business. But subterfuge availed as little as resistance. In the +Mulberry Bend he made his last stand. The old houses had been torn down, +leaving a three-acre lot full of dirt mounds and cellar holes. Into this +the truckmen of the Sixth Ward hauled their carts, and defied the street +cleaners. They were no longer in their way, and they were on the Park +Department's domain, where no Colonel Waring was in control. But while +their owners were triumphing, the children playing among the trucks set +one of them rolling down into a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> cellar, and three or four of the little +ones were crushed. That was the end. The trucks disappeared. Even +Tammany has not ventured to put them back, so great was the relief of +their going. They were not only a hindrance to the sweeper and the +skulking places of all manner of mischief at night, but I have +repeatedly seen the firemen baffled in their efforts to reach a burning +house, where they stood four and six deep in the wide "slips" at the +river.</p> + +<p>Colonel Waring did more for the cause of labor than all the walking +delegates of the town together, by investing a despised but highly +important task with a dignity which won the hearty plaudits of a +grateful city. When he uniformed his men and announced that he was going +to parade with them so that we might all see what they were like, the +town laughed and poked fun at the "white wings;" but no one went to see +them who did not come away converted to an enthusiastic belief in the +man and his work. Public sentiment, that had been half reluctantly +suspending judgment, expecting every day to see the colonel "knuckle +down to politics" like his predecessors, turned in an hour, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> after +that there was little trouble. The tenement house children organized +street cleaning bands to help along the work, and Colonel Waring +enlisted them as regular auxiliaries and made them useful.</p> + +<p>They had no better friend. When the unhappy plight of the persecuted +pushcart men, all immigrant Jews, who were blackmailed, robbed, and +driven from pillar to post as a nuisance, though licensed to trade in +the street, appealed vainly for a remedy, Colonel Waring found a way out +in a great morning market in Hester Street that should be turned over to +the children for a playground in the afternoon. Though he proved that it +would pay interest on the investment in market fees, and many times in +the children's happiness, it was never built. It would have been a most +fitting monument to the man's memory. His broom saved more lives in the +crowded tenements than a squad of doctors. It did more: it swept the +cobwebs out of our civic brain and conscience, and set up a standard of +a citizen's duty which, however we may for the moment forget, will be +ours until we have dragged other things than our pavements out of the +mud.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> + +<p>Even the colonel's broom would have been powerless to do that for "the +Bend." That was hopeless and had to go. There was no question of +children or playground involved. The worst of all the gangs, the Whyós, +had its headquarters in the darkest of its dark alleys; but it was left +to the police. We had not begun to understand that the gangs meant +something to us beyond murder and vengeance, in those days. No one +suspected that they had any such roots in the soil that they could be +killed by merely destroying the slum. The cholera was rapping on our +door and, with the Bend there, we felt about it as a man with stolen +goods in his house must feel when the policeman comes up the street. +Back in the seventies we began discussing what ought to be done. By 1884 +the first Tenement House Commission had summoned up courage to propose +that a street be cut through the bad block. In the following year a bill +was brought in to destroy it bodily, and then began the long fight that +resulted in the defeat of the slum a dozen years later.</p> + +<p>It was a bitter fight, in which every position of the enemy had to be +carried by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> assault. The enemy was the deadly official inertia that was +the outcome of political corruption born of the slum plus the +indifference of the mass of our citizens, who probably had never seen +the Bend. If I made it my own concern to the exclusion of all else, it +was only because I knew it. I had been part of it. Homeless and alone, I +had sought its shelter, not for long,—that was not to be endured,—but +long enough to taste of its poison, and I hated it. I knew that the blow +must be struck there, to kill. Looking back now over those years, I can +see that it was all as it should be. We were learning the alphabet of +our lesson then. We could have learned it in no other way so thoroughly. +Before we had been at it more than two or three years, it was no longer +a question of the Bend merely. The Small Parks law that gave us a +million dollars a year to force light and air into the slum, to its +destruction, grew out of it. The whole sentiment which in its day, +groping blindly and angrily, had wiped out the disgrace of the Five +Points, just around the corner, crystallized and took shape in its +fight. It waited merely for the issue of that, to attack<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> the slum in +its other strongholds; and no sooner was the Bend gone than the rest +surrendered, unconditionally.</p> + +<p>But it was not so easy campaigning at the start. In 1888 plans were +filed for the demolition of the block. It took four years to get a +report of what it would cost to tear it down. About once in two months +during all that time the authorities had to be prodded into a spasm of +activity, or we would probably have been yet where we were then. Once +when I appealed to the Corporation Counsel to give a good reason for the +delay, I got the truth out of him without evasion.</p> + +<p>"Well, I tell you," he said blandly, "no one here is taking any interest +in that business. That is good enough reason for you, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>It was. That Tammany reason became the slogan of an assault upon +official incompetence and treachery that hurried things up considerably. +The property was condemned at a total cost to the city of a million and +a half, in round numbers, including the assessment of half a million for +park benefit which the property owners were quick enough, with the aid +of the politicians, to get saddled on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> the city at large. In 1894 the +city took possession and became the landlord of the old barracks. For a +whole year it complacently collected the rents and did nothing. When it +was shamed out of that rut, too, and the tenements were at last torn +down, the square lay as the wreckers had left it for another year, until +it became such a plague spot that, as a last resort, with a citizen's +privilege, I arraigned the municipality before the Board of Health for +maintaining a nuisance upon its premises. I can see the shocked look of +the official now, as he studied the complaint.</p> + +<p>"But, my dear sir," he coughed diplomatically, "isn't it rather unusual? +I never heard of such a thing."</p> + +<p>"Neither did I," I replied, "but then there never was such a thing +before."</p> + +<p>That night, while they were debating the "unusual thing," happened the +accident to the children of which I spoke, emphasizing the charge that +the nuisance was "dangerous to life," and there was an end. In the +morning the Bend was taken in hand, and the following spring the +Mulberry Bend Park was opened.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus7" id="illus7"></a> +<img src="images/illus7.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>MULBERRY BEND PARK</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>A million dollars a year had been lost while we were learning our +lesson. The Small Parks Fund was not cumulative, and when it came to +paying for the Bend a special bill had to be passed to authorize it, the +award being "more than one million in one year." The wise financiers who +framed and hung in the comptroller's office a check for three cents that +had been under-paid on a school site, for the taxpayer to bow before in +awe and admiration at such business methods, could find no way to make +the appropriation for two years apply, though the new year was coming in +a week or two. But the Gilder Tenement House Commission had been +sitting, the Committee of Seventy had been at work, and a law was on the +statute books authorizing the expenditure of three million dollars for +two open spaces in the parkless district on the East Side, where Jacob +Beresheim was born. It had shown that while the proportion of park area +inside the limits of the old city was equal to one thirteenth of all, +below Fourteenth Street, where one third of the people lived, it was +barely one fortieth. It took a citizen's committee appointed by the +mayor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> just three weeks to seize the two sites which are now being +laid out in playgrounds chiefly, and it took the Good Government Clubs +with their allies at Albany less than two months to get warrant of law +for the tearing down of the houses ahead of final condemnation lest any +mischance befall through delay or otherwise,—a precaution which +subsequent events proved to be eminently wise. The slow legal +proceedings are going on yet.</p> + +<p>The playground part of it was a provision of the Gilder law that showed +what apt scholars we had been. I was a member of that committee, and I +fed fat my grudge against the slum tenement, knowing that I might not +again have such a chance. Bone Alley went. I shall not soon get the +picture of it, as I saw it last, out of my mind. I had wandered to the +top floor of one of the ramshackle tenements in the heart of the block, +to a door that stood ajar, and pushed it open. On the floor lay three +women rag-pickers with their burdens, asleep, overcome by the heat and +the beer, the stale stench of which filled the place. Swarms of flies +covered them. The room—no! let it go. Thank God, we shall not again +hear of Bone<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> Alley. Where it stood workmen are to-day building a +gymnasium with baths for the people, and a playground and park which may +even be turned into a skating-pond in winter if the architect keeps his +promise. A skating-pond for the children of the Eleventh Ward! No wonder +the politician is in a hurry to take the credit for what is going +forward over there. It is that or nothing with him now. It will be all +up with Tammany, once the boys find out that these were the things she +withheld from them all the years, for her own gain.</p> + +<p>Half a dozen blocks away the city's first public bath house is at last +going up, after many delays, and godliness will have a chance to move in +with cleanliness. The two are neighbors everywhere, but in the slum the +last must come first. Glasgow has half a dozen public baths. Rome, two +thousand years ago, washed its people most sedulously, and in heathen +Japan to-day, I am told, there are baths, as we have saloons, on every +corner. Christian New York never had a bath house. In a tenement +population of 255,033 the Gilder Committee found only 306 who had access +to bath-rooms in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> houses where they lived. The Church Federation +canvass of the Fifteenth Assembly District counted three bath-tubs to +1321 families. Nor was that because they so elected. The People's Baths +took in 115,000 half dimes last year for as many baths, and forty per +cent. of their customers were Italians. The free river baths admitted +5,096,876 customers during the summer. The "great unwashed" were not so +from choice, it would appear.</p> + +<p>Bone Alley brought thirty-seven dollars under the auctioneer's hammer. +Thieves' Alley, in the other park down at Rutgers Square, where the +police clubbed the Jewish cloakmakers a few years ago for the offense of +gathering to assert their right to "being men, live the life of men," as +some one who knew summed up the labor movement, brought only seven +dollars, and the old Helvetia House, where Boss Tweed and his gang met +at night to plan their plundering raids on the city's treasury, was +knocked down for five. Kerosene Row would not have brought enough to buy +kindling wood with which to start one of the numerous fires that gave it +its bad name. It was in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> Thieves' Alley that the owner in the days long +gone by hung out the sign: "No Jews need apply." Last week I watched the +opening of the first municipal playground upon the site of the old +alley, and in the thousands that thronged street and tenements from curb +to roof with thunder of applause, there were not twoscore who could have +found lodging with the old Jew-baiter. He had to go with his alley +before the better day could bring light and hope to the Tenth Ward.</p> + +<p>In all this the question of rehousing the population, that had to be so +carefully considered abroad in the destruction of slums, gave no +trouble. The speculative builder had seen to that. In the five wards, +the Seventh, Tenth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, and Seventeenth, in which the +unhoused ones would look for room, if they wanted to stay near their old +home, there were, according to the tenement census at the time when the +old houses were torn down, 4268 vacant apartments, with room for more +than 18,000 persons at our average of four and a half to the family. +Even including the Mulberry Bend, the whole number of the dispossessed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> +was not 10,000. On Manhattan Island there were at this time more than +37,000 vacant apartments, so that the question could not arise in any +serious shape, much as it plagued the dreams of some well-meaning +people. As a matter of fact the unhoused were scattered much more widely +than had been anticipated, which was one of the very purposes sought to +be attained. Many of them had remained in their old slum more from force +of habit and association than because of necessity.</p> + +<p>"Everything takes ten years," said Abram S. Hewitt when, exactly ten +years after he had as mayor championed the Small Parks Act, he took his +seat as chairman of the Advisory Committee on Small Parks. The ten years +had wrought a great change. It was no longer the slum of to-day, but +that of to-morrow that challenged attention. The committee took the +point of view of the children from the first. It had a large map +prepared showing where in the city there was room to play and where +there was none. Then it called in the police and asked them to point out +where there was trouble with the boys; and in every instance the +policeman put his finger upon a treeless slum.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p> + +<p>"They have no other playground than the street," was the explanation +given in each case. "They smash lamps and break windows. The +storekeepers kick and there is trouble. That is how it begins." "Many +complaints are received daily of boys annoying pedestrians, +storekeepers, and tenants by their continually playing baseball in some +parts of almost every street. The damage is not slight. Arrests are +frequent, much more frequent than when they had open lots to play in." +This last was the report of an uptown captain. He remembered the days +when there were open lots there. "But these lots are now built upon," he +said, "and for every new house there are more boys and less chance for +them to play."</p> + +<p>The committee put a red daub on the map to indicate trouble. Then it +asked those police captains who had not spoken to show them where their +precincts were, and why they had no trouble. Every one of them put his +finger on a green spot that marked a park. "My people are quiet and +orderly," said the captain of the Tompkins Square precinct. The police +took the square from a mob by storm twice in my recollection,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> and the +commander of the precinct then was hit on the head with a hammer by "his +people" and laid out for dead. "The Hook Gang is gone," said he of +Corlears Hook. The professional pursuit of that gang was to rob and +murder inoffensive citizens by night and throw them into the river, and +it achieved a bad eminence at its calling. "The whole neighborhood has +taken a change, and decidedly for the better," said the captain of +Mulberry Street, and the committee rose and said that it had heard +enough.</p> + +<p>The map was hung on the wall, and in it were stuck pins to mark the site +of present and projected schools as showing where the census had found +the children crowding. The moment that was done the committee sent the +map and a copy of chapter 338 of the laws of 1895 to the mayor, and +reported that its task was finished. This is the law and all there is of +it:—</p> + +<blockquote><p>"The people of the State of New York, represented in Senate and +Assembly, do enact as follows:—</p> + +<p>"Section 1. Hereafter no schoolhouse shall be constructed in the +city of New York<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> without an open-air playground attached to or +used in connection with the same.</p> + +<p>"Section 2. This act shall take effect immediately."</p></blockquote> + +<p>Where the map was daubed with red the school pins crowded one another. +On the lower East Side, where child crime was growing fast, and no less +than three storm centres were marked down by the police, nine new +schools were going up or planned, and in the uptown precinct whence came +the wail about the ball players there were seven. The playground had +proved its case. Where it was expedient it was to be a school +playground. It seemed a happy combination, for the new law had been a +stumbling-block to the school commissioners, who were in a quandary over +the needful size of an "open-air playground." The success of the +roof-garden idea suggested a way out. But schools are closed at the time +of the year when playgrounds are most needed for city children. To get +the garden on the roof of the schoolhouse recognized as the public +playground seemed a long step toward turning it into a general +neighborhood evening resort that should be always open, and so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> toward +bringing school and people, and especially the school and the boy, +together in a bond of mutual sympathy highly desirable for both.</p> + +<p>That was the burden of the committee's report. It made thirteen +recommendations besides, as to the location of parks and detached +playgrounds, only one of which has been adopted. But that is of less +account—as also was the information imparted to me as secretary of the +committee by our peppery Tammany mayor, that we had "as much authority +as a committee of bootblacks in his office"—than the fact that the +field has at last been studied and its needs have been made known. The +rest will follow, with or without the politician's authority. The one +recommendation that has been carried out was that of a riverside park in +the region uptown on the West Side where the Federation of Churches and +Christian Workers found "saloon social ideals minting themselves upon +the minds of the people at the rate of seven saloon thoughts to one +educational thought." There is an outdoor gymnasium to-day on the chosen +site,—while the legal proceedings to take possession<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> are unraveling +their red tape,—and a recreation pier hard by. In the evening the young +men of the neighborhood may be seen trooping riverward with their girls +to hear the music. The gang that "laid out" two policemen, to my +knowledge, has gone out of business.</p> + +<p>The best laid plans are sometimes upset by surprising snags. We had +planned for two municipal playgrounds on the East Side where the need is +greatest, and our plans were eagerly accepted by the city authorities. +But they were never put into practice. A negligent attorney killed one, +a lazy clerk the other. And both served under the reform government. The +first of the two playgrounds was to have been in Rivington Street, +adjoining the new public bath, where the boys, for want of something +better to do, were fighting daily battles with stones, to the great +damage of windows and the worse aggravation of the householders. Four +hundred children in that neighborhood petitioned the committee for a +place of their own where there were no windows to break, and we found +one. It was only after the proceedings had been started that we +discovered<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> that they had been taken under the wrong law and the money +spent in advertising had been wasted. It was then too late. The daily +assaults upon the windows were resumed. The other case was an attempt to +establish a model school park in a block where more than four thousand +children attended day and night school. The public school and the +pro-cathedral, which divided the children between them, were to be +allowed to stand, at opposite ends of the block. The surrounding +tenements were to be torn down to make room for a park and playground +which should embody the ideal of what such a place ought to be, in the +opinion of the committee. The roof garden was not in the original plan +except as an alternative of the street-level playground, where land came +too high. The plentiful supply of light and air, the safety from fire to +be obtained by putting the school in a park, beside the fact that it +could thus be "built beautiful," were considerations of weight. Plans +were made, and there was great rejoicing in Essex Street, until it came +out that this scheme had gone the way of the other. The clerk who should +have filed the plans in the register's office<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> left that duty to some +one else, and it took just twenty-one days to make the journey, a +distance of five hundred feet or less. The Greater New York had come +then with Tammany, and the thing was not heard of again. When I traced +the failure down to the clerk in question, and told him that he had +killed the park, he yawned and said:—</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I think it is just as well it is dead. We haven't any money +for those things. It is very nice to have small parks, and very nice to +have a horse and wagon, if you can afford it. But we can't. Why, there +isn't money enough to run the city government."</p> + +<p>So the labor of weary weeks and months in the children's behalf was all +undone by a third-rate clerk in an executive office; but he saved the +one thing he had in mind: the city government is "run" to date, and his +pay is secure.</p> + +<p>Neither stupidity, spite, nor the false cry that "reform extravagance" +has wrecked the city's treasury will be able much longer, however, to +cheat the child out of his rights. The playground is here to wrestle +with the gang for the boy, and it will win. It came<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> so quietly that we +hardly knew of it till we heard the shouts. It took us seven years to +make up our minds to build a play pier,—recreation pier is its +municipal title,—and it took just about seven weeks to build it when we +got so far; but then we learned more in one day than we had dreamed of +in the seven years. Half the East Side swarmed over it with shrieks of +delight, and carried the mayor and the city government, who had come to +see the show, fairly off their feet. And now "we are seven," or will be +when the one in Brooklyn has been built,—great, handsome structures, +seven hundred feet long, some of them, with music every night for mother +and the babies, and for papa, who can smoke his pipe there in peace. The +moon shines upon the quiet river, and the steamers go by with their +lights. The street is far away with its noise. The young people go +sparking in all honor, as it is their right to do. The councilman who +spoke the other day of "pernicious influences" lying in wait for them +there made the mistake of his life, unless he has made up his mind to go +out of politics. The play piers have taken a hold of the people which no +crabbed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> old bachelor can loosen with trumped-up charges. Their +civilizing influence upon the children is already felt in a reported +demand for more soap in the neighborhood where they are, and even the +grocer smiles approval.</p> + +<p>The play pier is the kindergarten in the educational campaign against +the gang. It gives the little ones a chance. Often enough it is a chance +for life. The street as a playground is a heavy contributor to the +undertaker's bank account. I kept the police slips of a single day in +May two years ago, when four little ones were killed and three crushed +under the wheels of trucks in tenement streets. That was unusual, but no +day has passed in my recollection that has not had its record of +accidents which bring grief as deep and lasting to the humblest home as +if it were the pet of some mansion on Fifth Avenue that was slain. The +kindergarten teaching bore fruit. To-day there are half a dozen +full-blown playgrounds downtown and uptown where the children swarm. +Private initiative set the pace, but the idea has been engrafted upon +the municipal plan. The city helped get at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> least one of them under way. +The Outdoor Recreation League was organized last year by public-spirited +citizens, including many amateur athletes and enthusiastic women, with +the object of "obtaining recognition of the necessity for recreation and +physical exercise as fundamental to the moral and physical welfare of +the people." Together with the Social Reform Club and the Federation of +Churches and Christian Workers it maintained a playground on the uptown +West Side last summer. The ball came into play there for the first time +as a recognized factor in civic progress. The day might well be kept for +all time among those that mark human emancipation, for it was social +reform and Christian work in one, of the kind that tells.</p> + +<p>Only the year before, the athletic clubs had vainly craved the privilege +of establishing a gymnasium in the East River Park, where the children +wistfully eyed the sacred grass, and cowered under the withering gaze of +the policeman. A friend whose house stands opposite the park found them +one day swarming over her stoop in such shoals that she could not enter, +and asked them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> why they did not play tag under the trees instead. The +instant shout came back: "'Cause the cop won't let us." Now a splendid +gymnasium has been opened on the site of the people's park that is to +come at Fifty-Third Street and Eleventh Avenue. It is called Hudsonbank. +A board fence more than a thousand feet long surrounds it. The director +pointed out to me with pride, last week, that not a board had been +stolen from it in a year, while other fences within twenty feet of it +were ripped to pieces. And he was right. The neighborhood is one that +has been anything but distinguished for its respect for private property +in the past, and where boards have a market value among the Irish +settlers. Better testimony could not have been borne to the spirit in +which the gift was accepted by the children.</p> + +<p>Poverty Gap, that was fairly transformed by one brief season's +experience with its "Holy Terror Park,"<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> a dreary sand lot upon the +site of the old tenements in which the Alley Gang once murdered the one +good boy of the block for the offense of supporting his aged parents by +his work as a baker's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> apprentice,—Poverty Gap is to have its permanent +playground, and Mulberry Bend and Corlears Hook are down on the League's +books; which is equivalent to saying that they, too, will shortly know +the climbing pole and the vaulting buck. For years the city's only +playground that had any claim upon the name—and that was only a little +asphalted strip behind a public school in First Street—was an old +graveyard. We struggled vainly to get possession of another, long +abandoned. The dead were of more account than the living. But now at +last it is their turn. The other day I watched the children at their +play in the new Hester Street gymnasium. The dusty square was jammed +with a mighty multitude. It was not an ideal spot, for it had not rained +in weeks, and powdered sand and cinders had taken wing and floated like +a pall over the perspiring crowd. But it was heaven to them. A hundred +men and boys stood in line, waiting their turn upon the bridge ladder +and the traveling rings that hung full of struggling and squirming +humanity, groping madly for the next grip. No failure, no rebuff +discouraged them. Seven boys and girls rode with looks of deep<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> +concern—it is their way—upon each end of the see-saw, and two squeezed +into each of the forty swings that had room for one, while a hundred +counted time and saw that none had too much. It is an article of faith +with these children that nothing that is "going" for their benefit is to +be missed. Sometimes the result provokes a smile, as when a band of +young Jews, starting up a club, called themselves the Christian Heroes. +It was meant partly as a compliment, I suppose, to the ladies that gave +them club-room; but at the same time, if there was anything in a name, +they were bound to have it. It is rather to cry over than to laugh at, +if one but understands it. The sight of these little ones swarming over +a sand heap until scarcely an inch of it was in sight, and gazing in +rapt admiration at the poor show of a dozen geraniums and English ivy +plants in pots on the window-sill of the overseer's cottage, was +pathetic in the extreme. They stood for ten minutes at a time resting +their eyes upon them. In the crowd were aged women and bearded men with +the inevitable Sabbath silk hat, who it seemed could never get enough of +it. They moved slowly, when crowded out, looking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> back many times at the +enchanted spot, as long as it was in sight.</p> + +<p>Perhaps there was in it, on the part of the children at least, just a +little bit of the comforting sense of proprietorship. They had +contributed of their scant pennies more than a hundred dollars toward +the opening of the playground, and they felt that it was their very own. +All the better. Two policemen watched the passing show, grinning. But +their clubs hung idly from their belts. The words of a little woman whom +I met last year in Chicago kept echoing in my ear. She was the "happiest +woman alive," for she had striven long for a playground for her poor +children, and had got it.</p> + +<p>"The police like it," she said. "They say that it will do more good than +all the Sunday schools in Chicago. The mothers say, 'This is good +business.' The carpenters that put up the swings and things worked with +a will; everybody was glad. The police lieutenant has had a tree called +after him. The boys that did that used to be terrors. Now they take care +of the trees. They plead for a low limb that is in the way, that no one +may cut it off."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p> + +<p>The twilight deepens and the gates of the playground are closed. The +crowds disperse slowly. In the roof garden on the Hebrew Institute +across East Broadway lights are twinkling and the band is tuning up. +Little groups are settling down to a quiet game of checkers or +love-making. Paterfamilias leans back against the parapet where palms +wave luxuriously in the summer breeze. The newspaper drops from his +hand; he closes his eyes and is in dreamland, where strikes come not. +Mother knits contentedly in her seat, with a smile on her face that was +not born of the Ludlow Street tenement. Over yonder a knot of +black-browed men talk with serious mien. They might be met any night in +the anarchist café, half a dozen doors away, holding forth against +empires. Here wealth does not excite their wrath, nor power their +plotting. In the roof garden anarchy is harmless, even though a +policeman typifies its government. They laugh pleasantly to one another +as he passes, and he gives them a match to light their cigars. It is +Thursday, and smoking is permitted. On Friday it is discouraged because +it offends the orthodox, to whom the lighting of a fire, even the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> +holding of a candle, is anathema on the Sabbath eve.</p> + +<p>The band plays on. One after another, tired heads droop upon babes +slumbering peacefully at the breast. Ludlow Street, the tenement, are +forgotten; eleven o'clock is not yet. Down along the silver gleam of the +river a mighty city slumbers. The great bridge has hung out its string +of shining pearls from shore to shore. "Sweet land of liberty!" Overhead +the dark sky, the stars that twinkled their message to the shepherds on +Judæan hills, that lighted their sons through ages of slavery, and the +flag of freedom borne upon the breeze,—down there the tenement, +the—Ah, well! let us forget, as do these.</p> + +<p>Now if you ask me: "And what of it all? What does it avail?" let me take +you once more back to the Mulberry Bend, and to the policeman's verdict +add the police reporter's story of what has taken place there. In +fifteen years I never knew a week to pass without a murder there, rarely +a Sunday. It was the wickedest, as it was the foulest, spot in all the +city. In the slum the two are interchangeable terms for reasons that +are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> clear enough to me. But I shall not speculate about it, only state +the facts. The old houses fairly reeked with outrage and violence. When +they were torn down, I counted seventeen deeds of blood in that place +which I myself remembered, and those I had forgotten probably numbered +seven times seventeen. The district attorney connected more than a score +of murders of his own recollection with Bottle Alley, the Whyó gang's +headquarters. Two years have passed since it was made into a park, and +scarce a knife has been drawn, or a shot fired, in all that +neighborhood. Only twice have I been called as a police reporter to the +spot. It is not that the murder has moved to another neighborhood, for +there has been no increase of violence in Little Italy or wherever else +the crowd went that moved out. It is that the light has come in and made +crime hideous. It is being let in wherever the slum has bred murder and +robbery, bred the gang, in the past. Wait, now, another ten years, and +let us see what a story there will be to tell.</p> + +<p>Avail? Why, here is Tammany actually applauding Comptroller Coler's +words in Plymouth Church last night: "Whenever<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> the city builds a +schoolhouse upon the site of a dive and creates a park, a distinct and +permanent mental, moral, and physical improvement has been made, and +public opinion will sustain such a policy, even if a dive-keeper is +driven out of business and somebody's ground rent is reduced." And +Tammany's press agent sends forth this pæan: "In the light of such +events how absurd it is for the enemies of the organization to contend +that Tammany is not the greatest moral force in the community." Tammany +a moral force! The park and the playground have availed, then, to bring +back the day of miracles.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>JUSTICE FOR THE BOY</h3> + + +<p>Sometimes, when I see my little boy hugging himself with delight at the +near prospect of the kindergarten, I go back in memory forty years and +more to the day when I was dragged, a howling captive, to school, as a +punishment for being bad at home. I remember, as though it were +yesterday, my progress up the street in the vengeful grasp of an +exasperated servant, and my reception by the aged monster—most fitly +named Madame Bruin—who kept the school. She asked no questions, but led +me straightway to the cellar, where she plunged me into an empty barrel +and put the lid on over me. Applying her horn goggles to the bunghole, +to my abject terror, she informed me, in a sepulchral voice, that that +was the way bad boys were dealt with in school. When I ceased howling +from sheer fright, she took me out and conducted me to the yard, where<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> +a big hog had a corner to itself. She bade me observe that one of its +ears had been slit half its length. It was because the hog was lazy, and +little boys who were that way minded were in danger of similar +treatment; in token whereof she clipped a pair of tailor's shears +suggestively close to my ear. It was my first lesson in school. I hated +it from that hour.</p> + +<p>The barrel and the hog were never part of the curriculum in any American +boy's school, I suppose; they seem too freakish to be credited to any +but the demoniac ingenuity of my home ogre. But they stood for a +comprehension of the office of school and teacher which was not patented +by any day or land. It is not so long since the notion yet prevailed +that the schools were principally to lock children up in for the +convenience of their parents, that we should have entirely forgotten it. +Only the other day a clergyman from up the State came into my office to +tell of a fine reform school they had in his town. They were very proud +of it.</p> + +<p>"And how about the schools for the good boys in your town?" I asked, +when I had heard him out. "Are they anything to be proud of?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span></p> + +<p>He stared. He guessed they were all right, he said, after some +hesitation. But it was clear that he did not know.</p> + +<p>It is not necessary to go back forty years to find us in the metropolis +upon the clergyman's platform, if not upon Madame Bruin's. Ten will do. +They will bring us to the day when roof playgrounds were contemptuously +left out of the estimates for an East Side school, as "frills" that had +nothing to do with education; when the Board of Health found but a +single public school in more than sixscore that was so ventilated as to +keep the children from being poisoned by foul air; when the authority of +the Talmud had to be invoked by the Superintendent of School Buildings +to convince the president of the Board of Education, who happened to be +a Jew, that seventy-five or eighty pupils were far too many for one +class-room; when a man who had been dead a year was appointed a school +trustee of the Third Ward, under the mouldy old law surviving from the +day when New York was a big village, and filled the office as well as if +he had been alive, because there were no schools in his ward; when +manual training and the kindergarten<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> were yet the fads of yesterday, +looked at askance; when fifty thousand children roamed the streets for +whom there was no room in the schools, and the only defense of the +School Commissioners was that they "didn't know" there were so many; and +when we mixed truants and thieves in a jail with entire unconcern. +Indeed, the jail filled the title rôle in the educational cast of that +day. Its inmates were well lodged and cared for, while the sanitary +authorities twice condemned the Essex Market school across the way as +wholly unfit for children to be in, but failed to catch the ear of the +politician who ran things unhindered. When (in 1894) I denounced the +"system" of enforcing—or not enforcing—the compulsory education law as +a device to make thieves out of our children by turning over their +training to the street, he protested angrily; but the experts of the +Tenement House Committee found the charge fully borne out by the facts. +They were certainly plain enough in the sight of us all, had we chosen +to see.</p> + +<p>When at last we saw, we gave the politician a vacation for a season. To +say that he was to blame for all the mischief would not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> be fair. We +were to blame for leaving him in possession. He was only a link in the +chain which our indifference had forged; but he was always and +everywhere an obstruction to betterment,—sometimes, illogically, in +spite of himself. Successive Tammany mayors had taken a stand for the +public schools, when it was clear that reform could not be delayed much +longer; but they were helpless against a system of selfishness and +stupidity of which they were the creatures, though they posed as its +masters. They had to go with it as unfit, and upon the wave that swept +out the last of the rubbish came reform. The Committee of Seventy took +hold, the Good Government Clubs, the Tenement House Committee, and the +women of New York. Five years we strove with the powers of darkness, and +look now at the change. The New York school system is not yet the ideal +one,—it may never be; but the jail, at least, has been cast out of the +firm. We have a compulsory education law under which it will be +possible, when a seat has been provided for every child, to punish the +parent for the boy's truancy, unless he surrenders him as unmanageable; +and we can<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> count the months now till every child shall find the +latchstring out on the school door. We have had to put our hands deep +into our pockets to get to that point, but we are nearly there now. +Since 1895 the expenditure of twenty-two and a half millions of dollars +for new schools in the old city has been authorized by law, and two +thirds of the money has been spent. Fifty-odd new buildings have been +put up, or are going up while I am writing, every one of them with its +playground, which will by and by be free to all the neighborhood. The +idea is at last working through that the schools belong to the people, +and are primarily for the children and their parents; not mere vehicles +of ward patronage, or for keeping an army of teachers in office and pay.</p> + +<p>The silly old régime is dead. The ward trustee is gone with his friend +the alderman, loudly proclaiming the collapse of our liberties in the +day that saw the schools taken from "the people's" control. They were +"the people." Experts manage our children's education, which was +supposed in the old plan to be the only thing that did not require any +training. To superintend a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> brickyard demanded some knowledge, but +anybody could run the public schools. It cost us an election to take +that step. One of the Tammany district leaders, who knew what he was +talking about, said to me after it was all over: "I knew we would win. +Your bringing those foreigners here did the business. Our people believe +in home rule. We kept account of the teachers you brought from out of +town, and who spent the money they made here out of town, and it got to +be the talk among the tenement people in my ward that their daughters +would have no more show to get to be teachers. That did the business. We +figured the school vote in the city at forty-two thousand, and I knew we +could not lose." The "foreigners" were teachers from Massachusetts and +other States, who had achieved a national reputation at their work.</p> + +<p>There lies upon my table a copy of the minutes of the Board of Education +of January 9, 1895, in which is underscored a report on a primary school +in the Bronx. "It is a wooden shanty," is the inspector's account, +"heated by stoves, and is a regular tinder box; cellar wet, and under +one class-room<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> only. This building was erected in order, I believe, to +determine whether or not there was a school population in the +neighborhood to warrant the purchase of property to erect a school on."</p> + +<p>That was the way then of taking a school census, and the result was the +utter failure of the compulsory education law to compel anything. To-day +we have a biennial census, ordained by law, which, when at last it gets +into the hands of some one who can count, will tell us how many Jacob +Beresheims are drifting upon the shoals of the street. And we have a +truant school to keep them safe in. To it, says the law, no thief shall +be committed. It is not yet five years since the burglar and the +truant—who, having been refused admission to the school because there +was not room for him, inconsequently was locked up for contracting idle +ways—were herded in the Juvenile Asylum, and classified there in squads +of those who were four feet, four feet seven, and over four feet seven! +I am afraid I scandalized some good people, during the fight for decency +in this matter, by insisting that it ought to be considered a good mark<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> +for Jacob that he despised such schools as were provided for him. But it +was true. Except for the risk of the burglar, the jail was preferable by +far. A woman has now had charge of the truant school for fourteen +months, and she tells me that of quite twenty-five hundred boys scarce +sixty were rightly called incorrigible, and even these a little longer +and tighter grip would probably win over. For such, a farm school is yet +to be provided. The rest responded promptly to an appeal to their pride. +She "made it a personal matter" with each of them, and the truant +vanished; the boy was restored. The burglar, too, made it a personal +matter in the old contact, and the result was two burglars for one. In +common with nearly all those who have paid attention to this matter, +Mrs. Alger believes that the truant school strikes at the root of the +problem of juvenile crime. After thirty years of close acquaintance with +the child population of London, Mr. Andrew Drew, chairman of the +Industrial Committee of the School Board, declared his conviction that +"truancy is to be credited with nearly the whole of our juvenile +criminality." But for years<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> there seemed to be no way of convincing the +New York School Board that the two had anything to do with each other. +As executive officer of the Good Government Clubs, I fought that fight +to a finish. We got the school, and in Mrs. Alger, at the time a truant +officer, a person singularly well qualified to take charge of it. She +has recently been removed, that her place might be given to a man. It is +the old scheme come back,—a voter behind the broom,—and the old slough +waiting to overwhelm us again.</p> + +<p>But it will not get the chance. I have my own idea of how this truancy +question is going to be solved. Yesterday I went with Superintendent +Snyder through some of the new schools he is building, upon what he +calls the letter H plan, in the crowded districts. It is the plan of the +Hôtel de Cluny in Paris, and to my mind as nearly perfect as it is +possible to make a schoolhouse. There is not a dark corner in the whole +structure, from the splendid gymnasium under the red-tiled roof to the +indoor playground on the ground floor, which, when thrown in one with +the two open-air playgrounds that lie embraced in the arms of the H, +will give the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> children nearly an acre of asphalted floor space from +street to street, to romp on. Seven such schools are going up to-day, +each a beautiful palace, and within the year sixteen thousand children +will be housed in them. When I think of the old Allen Street school, +where the gas had to be kept burning even on the brightest days, +recitations suspended every half hour, and the children made to practice +calisthenics so that they should not catch cold while the windows were +opened to let in fresh air; of the dark playground downstairs, with the +rats keeping up such a racket that one could hardly hear himself speak +at times, or of the other East Side playground where the boys "weren't +allowed to speak above a whisper," so as not to disturb those studying +overhead, I fancy that I can make out both the cause and the cure of the +boy's desperation. "We try to make our schools pleasant enough to hold +the children," wrote the Superintendent of Schools in Indianapolis to me +once, and added that they had no truant problem worth bothering about. +With the kindergarten and manual training firmly engrafted upon the +school course, as they are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> at last, and with it reaching out to +enlist also the boy's play through playground and vacation schools, I +shall be willing to turn the boy, who will not come in, over to the +reformatory. They will not need to build a new wing to the jail for his +safe-keeping.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus8" id="illus8"></a> +<img src="images/illus8.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>LETTER H PLAN OF PUBLIC SCHOOL No. 165<br /> +<i>Showing Front on West 109th Street</i></h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>All ways lead to Rome. The reform in school-building dates back, as does +every other reform in New York, to the Mulberry Bend. It began there. +The first school that departed from the soulless old tradition, to set +beautiful pictures before the child's mind as well as dry figures on the +slate, was built there. At the time I wanted it to stand in the park, +hoping so to hasten the laying out of that; but although the Small Parks +law expressly permitted the erection on park property of buildings for +"the instruction of the people," the officials upon whom I pressed my +scheme could not be made to understand that as including schools. +Perhaps they were right. I catechised thirty-one Fourth Ward girls in a +sewing school, about that time, twenty-six of whom had attended the +public schools of the district more than a year. One wore a badge earned +for excellence in her studies. In those days<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> every street corner was +placarded with big posters of Napoleon on a white horse riding through +fire and smoke. There was one right across the street. Yet only one of +the thirty-one knew who Napoleon was. She "thought she had heard of the +gentleman before." It came out that the one impression she retained of +what she had heard was that "the gentleman" had two wives. They knew of +Washington that he was the first President of the United States, and cut +down a cherry-tree. They were sitting and sewing at the time almost on +the identical spot where he lived and held office. To the question who +ruled before Washington the answer came promptly: no one; he was the +first. They agreed reluctantly, upon further consideration, that there +was probably "a King of America" before his day, and the Irish damsels +turned up their noses at the idea. The people of Canada, they thought, +were copper-colored. The same winter I was indignantly bidden to depart +from a school in the Fourth Ward by a trustee who had heard that I had +written a book about the slum and spoken of "his people" in it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p> + +<p>Those early steps in the reform path stumbled sadly at times over +obstacles that showed how dense was the ignorance and how rank were the +prejudices we had to fight. When I wrote that the Allen Street school +was overrun by rats, which was a fact any one might observe for himself +by spending five minutes in the building, I was called sharply to +account by the Mayor in the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. There +were no rats, he said. The Allen Street school was the worst of them +all, and I determined that the time had come to make a demonstration. I +procured a rat trap, and was waiting for an idle hour to go over and +catch one of the rats, so that I might have it stuffed and sent to the +board over which the Mayor presided, as a convincing exhibit; but before +I got so far reform swept the whole conspiracy of ignorance and jobbery +out of the City Hall.</p> + +<p>That was well enough as far as it went; but that the broom was needed +elsewhere we learned later, when the Good Government Clubs fought for +the inspection of the schools and of the children by trained oculists. +The evidence was that the pupils<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> were made both near-sighted and stupid +by the want of proper arrangement of their seats and of themselves in +the class-room. The fact was not denied, and the scheme was strongly +indorsed by the Board of Health and by some of the ablest and best known +oculists in the city; but it was wrecked upon an opposition in which we +heard the ignorant and selfish cry that it would "interfere with private +practice," and so curtail the profits of the practitioner. The proposal +to inspect the classes daily for evidence of contagious disease—which, +carried out, has proved a most effective means of preventing the spread +of epidemics, and one of the greatest blessings—had been opposed, +happily unsuccessfully, with the same arguments.<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> It is very well to +prate about the rapacity of politicians, but these things came often +enough to show what they meant by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> the claim that they were "closer to +the people" than we who were trying to help them; and they were all the +more exasperating because they came rarely from below,—the tenement +people, when they were not deliberately misled, were ready and eager to +fall in with any plan for bettering things, notably where it concerned +the schools,—but usually from those who knew better, and from whom we +had a right to expect support and backing.</p> + +<p>Speaking of that reminds me of a mishap I had in the Hester Street +school,—the one with the "frills" which the Board of Education cut off. +I happened to pass it after school hours, and went in to see what sort +of a playground the roof would have made. I met no one on the way, and, +finding the scuttle open, climbed out and up the slant of the roof to +the peak, where I sat musing over our lost chance, when the janitor came +to close up. He must have thought I was a crazy man, and my explanation +did not make it any better. He haled me down, and but for the fortunate +chance that the policeman on the beat knew me, I should have been taken +to the lockup as a dangerous lunatic,—all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> for dreaming of a playground +on the roof of a schoolhouse.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus9" id="illus9"></a> +<img src="images/illus9.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>PLAYGROUND ON ROOF OF NEW EAST BROADWAY SCHOOLHOUSE<br /> +<i>Area 8,348 square feet</i></h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Janitor and Board of Commissioners to the contrary notwithstanding, the +dream became real. There stands another school in Hester Street to-day +within easy call, that has a playground measuring more than twelve +thousand square feet on the roof, one of half that size down on the +ground, and an asphalted indoor playground as big as the one on the +roof. Together they measure a trifle less than thirty thousand feet. To +the indignant amazement of my captor, the janitor, his school was thrown +open to the children in the last summer vacation, and in the winter they +put a boys' club in to worry him. What further indignities there are in +store for him, in this day of "frills," there is no telling. A +resolution is on record which states, under date of May 18, 1897, that +"it is the sense of the Board of Superintendents that the schoolhouses +may well be used in the cause of education as neighborhood centres, +providing reading-rooms, branch offices of public libraries, etc." And +to cut off all chance of relapse into the old doubt whether "such things +are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> educational," that laid so many of our hopes on the dusty shelf +of the circumlocution office, the state legislature has expressly +declared that the commonwealth will take the chance, which Boards of +Education shunned, of a little amusement creeping in. The schools may be +used for "purposes of recreation." To the janitor it must seem that the +end of all things is at hand.</p> + +<p>In the crowded districts, the school playgrounds were thrown open to the +children during the long vacation last year, with kindergarten teachers +to amuse them, and half a score of vacation schools tempted more than +four thousand children from the street into the cool shade of the +class-rooms. They wrought in wood and iron, they sang and they played +and studied nature,—out of a barrel, to be sure, that came twice a week +from Long Island filled with "specimens;" but toward the end we took a +hint from Chicago, and let the children gather their own specimens on +excursions around the bay and suburbs of the city. That was a tremendous +success. The mere hint that money might be lacking to pay for the +excursions this summer set the St. Andrew's Brotherhood<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> men on Long +Island to devising schemes for inviting the schoolchildren out on +trolley and shore trips. With the Christian Endeavor, the Epworth +League, and kindred societies looking about for something to try their +young strength and enthusiasm on, we may be here standing upon the +threshold of something which shall bring us nearer to a universal +brotherhood than all the consecrations and badges that have yet been +invented.</p> + +<p>The mere contact with nature, even out of a barrel, brought something to +those starved child lives that struck a new note. Sometimes it rang with +a sharp and jarring sound. The boys in the Hester Street school could +not be made to take an interest in the lesson on wheat until the teacher +came to the effect of drought and a bad year on the farmer's pocket. +Then they understood. They knew the process. Strikes cut into the +earnings of Hester Street, small enough at the best of times, at +frequent intervals, and the boys need not be told what a bad year means. +No other kind ever occurs there. They learned the lesson on wheat in no +time, after that. Oftener it was a gentler note<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> that piped timidly in +the strange place. A barrel of wild roses came one day, instead of the +expected "specimens," and these were given to the children. They took +them greedily. "I wondered," said the teacher, "if it was more love of +the flower, or of getting something for nothing, no matter what." But +even if it were largely the latter, there was still the rose. Nothing +like it had come that way before, and without a doubt it taught its own +lesson. The Italian child might have jumped for it more eagerly, but its +beauty was not wasted in Jew-town, either. The baby kissed it, and it +lay upon more than one wan cheek, and whispered who knows what thought +of hope and courage that were nearly gone. Even in Hester Street the +wild rose from the hedge was not wasted.</p> + +<p>The result of it all was wholesome and good, because it was common +sense. The way to fight the slum in the children's lives is with +sunlight and flowers and play, which their child hearts crave, if their +eyes have never seen them. The teachers reported that the boys were +easier to manage, more quiet, and played more fairly than before. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> +police reports showed that fewer were arrested or run over in the +streets than in other years. A worse enemy was attacked than the trolley +car or the truck. In the kindergarten at the Hull House in Chicago there +hangs a picture of a harvest scene, with the man wiping his brow, and a +woman resting at his feet. The teacher told me that a little girl with +an old face picked it out among all the rest, and considered it long and +gravely. "Well," she said, when her inspection was finished, "he knocked +her down, didn't he?" A two hours' argument for kindergartens or +vacation schools could not have put it stronger or better.</p> + +<p>The awakening of the civic conscience is nowhere more plainly traced +than in our public schools. The last five years have set us fifty years +ahead, and there is now no doubling on the track we have struck. We have +fifty kindergartens to-day where five years ago we had one, and their +method has invaded the whole system of teaching. Cooking, the only kind +of temperance preaching that counts for anything in a school course, is +taught in the girls' classes. Five years ago a minister of justice +declared in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> Belgian Chamber that the nation was reverting to a new +form of barbarism, which he described by the term "alcoholic barbarism," +and pointed out as its first cause the "insufficiency of the food +procurable by the working classes." He referred to the quality, not the +quantity. The United States experts, who lately made a study of the +living habits of the poor in New York, spoke of it as a common +observation that "a not inconsiderable amount of the prevalent +intemperance can be traced to poor food and unattractive home tables." +The toasting-fork in Jacob's sister's hand beats preaching in the +campaign against the saloon, just as the boys' club beats the police +club in fighting the gang.</p> + +<p>The cram and the jam are being crowded out as common-sense teaching +steps in and takes their place, and the "three H's," the head, the +heart, and the hand,—a whole boy,—are taking the place too long +monopolized by the "three R's." There was need of it. It had seemed +sometimes as if, in our anxiety lest he should not get enough, we were +in danger of stuffing the boy to the point of making a hopeless dunce of +him. It is a higher function of the school to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> teach principles than to +impart facts merely. Teaching the boy municipal politics and a thousand +things to make a good citizen of him, instead of so filling him with +love of his country and pride in its traditions that he is bound to take +the right stand when the time comes, is as though one were to attempt to +put all the law of the state into its constitution to make it more +binding. The result would be hopeless congestion and general +uselessness.</p> + +<p>It comes down to the teacher in the end, and there are 5600 of them in +the old city alone, 10,000 for the greater city;<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> the great mass +faithful and zealous, but yoked to the traditions of a day that is past. +Half the machine teaching, the wooden output of our public schools in +the past, I believe was due to the practical isolation of the teachers +between the tyranny of politics and the distrust of those who had good +cause to fear the politician and his work. There was never a more +saddening sight than that of the teachers standing together in an almost +solid body<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> to resist reform of the school system as an attack upon +them. There was no pretense on their part that the schools did not need +reform. They knew better. They fought for their places. Throughout the +fight no word came from them of the children's rights. They imagined +that theirs were in danger, and they had no thought for anything else. +We gathered then the ripe fruit of politics, and it will be a long +while, I suppose, before we get the taste out of our mouths. But the +grip of politics on our schools has been loosened, if not shaken off +altogether, and the teacher's slavery is at an end, if she herself so +wills it. Once hardly thought worthy of a day laborer's hire, she will +receive a policeman's pay for faithful service<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> in the school year now +begun, with his privilege of a half-pay pension on retirement. Within +three weeks after the passage of the salary bill forty-two teachers in +the boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx had applied for retirement. The +training schools are hard at work filling up the gaps. The windows of +the schoolhouse have been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> thrown open, and life let in there too with +the sunlight. The day may be not far distant when ours shall be schools +"for discovering aptitude," in Professor Felix Adler's wise plan. The +problem is a vast one, even in its bulk; every year seats must be found +on the school benches for twenty thousand additional children. However +deep we have gone down into our pockets to pay for new schools, there +are to-day in the greater city nearly thirty thousand children in +half-day or part-time classes, waiting their chance. But that it can and +will be solved the experience of the last five years fully warrants.</p> + +<p>In the solution the women of New York will have had no mean share. In +the struggle for school reform they struck the telling blows, and the +credit for the victory was justly theirs. The Public Education +Association, originally a woman's auxiliary to Good Government Club E, +has since worked as energetically with the school authorities as it +before worked against them. It has opened many windows for little souls +by hanging schoolrooms with beautiful casts and pictures, and forged at +the same time new and strong links in the chain that bound<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> the boy all +too feebly to the school. At a time when the demand of the boys of the +East Side for club room, which was in itself one of the healthiest signs +of the day, had reached an exceedingly dangerous pass, the Public +Education Association broke ground that will prove the most fertile +field of all. The Raines law saloon, quick to discern in the new demand +the gap that would divorce it by and by from the man, attempted to +bridge it by inviting the boy in under its roof. Occasionally the girl +went along. A typical instance of how the scheme worked was brought to +my attention at the time by the manager of the College Settlement. The +back room of the saloon was given to the club free of charge, with the +understanding that the boy members should "treat." As a means of raising +the needed funds, the club hit upon the plan of fining members ten cents +when they "got funny." To defeat this device of the devil some way must +be found; but club room was scarce among the tenements. The Good +Government Clubs proposed to the Board of Education that it open the +empty class-rooms at night for the children's use. It was my privilege +to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> plead their cause before the School Board, and to obtain from it the +necessary permission, after some hesitation and doubt as to whether "it +was educational." The Public Education Association promptly assumed the +responsibility for "the property," and the Hester Street school was +opened. There are now two schools that are given over to evening clubs. +The property has not been molested, but the boys who have met under Miss +Winifred Buck's management have learned many a lesson of self-control +and practical wisdom that has proved "educational" in the highest +degree. Her plan is simplicity itself. Through their play—the meeting +usually begins with a romp—in quarters where there is not too much +elbow-room, the boys learn the first lesson of respecting one another's +rights. The subsequent business meeting puts them upon the fundamentals +of civilized society, as it were. Out of the debate of the question, Do +we want boys who swear, steal, gamble, and smoke cigarettes? grow +convictions as to why these vices are wrong that put "the gang" in its +proper light. Punishment comes to appear, when administered by the boys +themselves, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> natural consequence of law-breaking, in defense of +society; and the boy is won. He can thenceforward be trusted to work out +his own salvation. If he does it occasionally with excessive unction, +remember how recent is his conversion. "<i>Resolved</i>, that wisdom is +better than wealth," was rejected as a topic for discussion by one of +the clubs, because "everybody knows it is." This was in the Tenth Ward. +If temptation had come that way in the shape of a pushcart with +pineapples—we are all human! Anyway, they had learned the right.</p> + +<p>With the women to lead, the school has even turned the tables on the +jail and invaded it bodily. For now nearly two years the Public +Education Association has kept school in the Tombs, for the boys locked +up there awaiting trial. Of thirty-one pupils on this school register, +the other day, twelve were charged with burglary, four with highway +robbery, and three with murder. That was the gang run to earth at last. +Better late than never. The windows of their prison overlooked the spot +where the gallows used to stand that cut short many a career such as +they pursued. They were soberly attentive<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> to their studies, which were +of a severely practical turn. Their teacher, Mr. David Willard, who was +a resident of the University Settlement in its old Delancey Street +home,—the fact that the forces for good one finds at work in the slum +usually lead back to the settlements shows best that they have so far +escaped the peril of stiffening into mere institutions,—has his own +sound view of how to head off the hangman. Daily and nightly he gathers +about him in the house on Chrystie Street, where he makes his home, +three hundred boys and girls, whom he meets as their friend, on equal +terms. The club is the means of getting them there, and so it is in its +right place.</p> + +<p>Once a week another teacher comes to the Tombs school, and tells the +boys of our city's history, its famous buildings and great men; trying +so to arouse their interest as a first step toward a citizen's pride. +This one also is sent by a club of women, the City History Club, which +in three years has done strange things among the children. It sprang +from the proposition of Mr. Robert Abbe that the man and the citizen has +his birth in the boy, and that to love a thing one must know it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> first. +The half-dozen classes that were started for the study of our city's +history have swelled into nearly a hundred, with quite eighteen hundred +pupils. The pregnant fact was noted early by the teachers, that the +immigrant boy easily outstrips in interest for his adopted home the +native, who perchance turns up his nose at him, and later very likely +complains of the "unscrupulousness" of the Jew who forged ahead of him +in business as well.</p> + +<p>"Everything takes ten years." Looking back from the closing year of the +century, one is almost tempted to turn Mr. Hewitt's phrase about, and +say that everything has been packed into ten years. The tenth winter of +the free lectures, which the city provides to fill up in a measure those +gaps which the earlier years left, has just passed. When the first +course showed an attendance of 22,149 upon 186 lectures, we were all +encouraged; but the last season saw 1923 lectures delivered upon every +topic of human interest, from the care of our bodies and natural science +to literature, astronomy, and music, and a multitude of 519,411 persons, +chiefly workingmen and their wives, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> parents of the schoolboy, heard +them. Forty-eight schools and halls were employed for the purpose. The +People's Institute adds to this programme a forum for the discussion of +social topics, nineteenth-century history, and "present problems" on a +wholly non-partisan, unsectarian basis. The Institute was launched upon +its educational mission within six weeks after the disastrous Greater +New York election in 1897. It has since drawn to the platform of the +Cooper Institute audiences, chiefly of workingmen more or less connected +with the labor movement, that have filled its great hall. The spirit +that animates its work is shown in its review of the field upon the +threshold of its third year. Speaking of the social issues that are +hastening toward a settlement, it says: "Society is about to be +organized, gradually, wisely, on the lines of the recognition of the +brotherhood of man. The People's Institute holds to-day, as no other +institution in this city, the confidence of all classes of the working +people; also of the best minds among the well-to-do classes. It can +throw all its influence upon the side of removing misunderstandings, +promoting mutual confidence....<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> This is its great work." A great +undertaking, truly, but one in which no one may rashly say it shall not +succeed. As an installment, it organized last spring, for study, +discussion, and social intercourse, the first of a chain of People's +Clubs, full of a strong and stirring life, which within three months had +a membership of three hundred and fifty, and a list of two hundred and +fifty applicants.</p> + +<p>While the Institute's plan has met with this cordial reception downtown, +uptown, among the leisure classes, its acceptance has been nothing like +so ready. Selfish wealth has turned a cold shoulder to the brotherhood +of man, as so often in the past. Still the proffered hand is not +withdrawn. In a hundred ways it is held out with tender of help and +sympathy and friendship, these days, where distrust and indifference +were once the rule. The People's University Extension Society, leaving +the platform to its allies, invades the home, the nursery, the +kindergarten, the club, wherever it can, with help and counsel. Down on +the lower East Side, the Educational Alliance conducts from the Hebrew +Institute an energetic campaign<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> among the Jewish immigrants that +reaches fully six thousand souls, two thirds of them children, every day +in the week. Sixty-two clubs alone hold meetings in the building on +Saturday and Sunday. Under the same roof the Baron Hirsch Fund has +taught sixteen thousand children of refugee Jews in nine years. It +passes them on to the public schools within six months of their landing, +the best material they receive from anywhere.</p> + +<p>So the boy is being got ready for dealing, in the years that are to +come, with the other but not more difficult problems of setting his +house to rights, and ridding it of the political gang which now +misrepresents him and us. And justice to Jacob is being evolved. Not yet +without obstruction and dragging of feet. The excellent home library +plan that proved so wholesome in the poor quarters of Boston has failed +in New York, except in a few notable instances, through the difficulty +of securing the visitors upon whom the plan depends for its success. The +same want has kept the boys' club from reaching the development that +would apply the real test to it as a barrier against the slum.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> There +are fifteen clubs for every Winifred Buck that is in sight. From the +City History Club, the Charity Organization Society, from everywhere, +comes the same complaint. The hardest thing in the world to give is +still one's self. But it is all the time getting to be easier. There are +daily more women and men who, thinking of the boy, can say, and do, with +my friend of the College Settlement, when an opportunity to enter a +larger field was offered her, "No, I am content to stay here, to be +ready for Johnnie when he wants me."</p> + +<p>Justice for the boy, and for his father. An itinerant Jewish glazier, +crying his wares, was beckoned into a stable by the foreman, and bidden +to replace a lot of broken panes, enough nearly to exhaust his stock. +When, after working half the day, he asked for his pay, he was driven +from the place with jeers and vile words. Raging and impotent, he went +back to his poor tenement cursing a world in which there was no justice +for a poor man. If he had next been found ranting with anarchists +against the social order, would you have blamed him? He found instead, +in the Legal Aid Society, a champion<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> that pleaded his cause and +compelled the stableman to pay him his wages. For a hundred thousand +such—more shame to us—this society has meant all that freedom +promised: justice to the poor man. It too has earned a place among the +forces that are working out through the new education the brighter day, +for it has taught the lesson which all the citizens of a free state need +most to learn,—respect for law.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>REFORM BY HUMANE TOUCH</h3> + + +<p>I have sketched in outline the gains achieved in the metropolis since +its conscience awoke. Now, in closing this account, I am reminded of the +story of an old Irishman who died here a couple of years ago. Patrick +Mullen was an honest blacksmith. He made guns for a living. He made them +so well that one with his name on it was worth a good deal more than the +market price of guns. Other makers went to him with offers of money for +the use of his stamp; but they never went twice. When sometimes a gun of +very superior make was brought to him to finish, he would stamp it P. +Mullen, never Patrick Mullen. Only to that which he himself had wrought +did he give his honest name without reserve. When he died, judges and +bishops and other great men crowded to his modest home by the East +River, and wrote letters to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> newspapers telling how proud they had +been to call him friend. Yet he was, and remained to the end, plain +Patrick Mullen, blacksmith and gunmaker.</p> + +<p>In his life he supplied the answer to the sigh of dreamers in all days: +when will the millennium come? It will come when every man is a Patrick +Mullen at his own trade; not merely a P. Mullen, but a Patrick Mullen. +The millennium of municipal politics, when there shall be no slum to +fight, will come when every citizen does his whole duty as a citizen; +not before. As long as he "despises politics," and deputizes another to +do it for him, whether that other wears the stamp of a Croker or of a +Platt,—it matters little which,—we shall have the slum, and be put +periodically to the trouble and the shame of draining it in the public +sight. A citizen's duty is one thing that cannot be farmed out safely; +and the slum is not limited by the rookeries of Mulberry or Ludlow +streets. It has long roots that feed on the selfishness and dullness of +Fifth Avenue quite as greedily as on the squalor of the Sixth Ward. The +two are not nearly so far apart as they look.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p> + +<p>I am not saying this because it is anything new, but because we have +just had an illustration of its truth in municipal politics. Waring and +Roosevelt were the Patrick Mullens of the reform administration which +Tammany has now replaced with her insolent platform, "To hell with +reform." It was not an ideal administration, but it can be said of it, +at least, that it was up to the times it served. It made compromises +with spoils politics, and they were wretched failures. It took Waring +and Roosevelt on the other plan, on which they insisted, of divorcing +politics from the public business, and they let in more light than even +my small parks over on the East Side. For they showed us where we stood +and what was the matter with us. We believed in Waring when he +demonstrated the success of his plan for cleaning the streets: not +before. When Roosevelt announced his programme of enforcing the excise +law because it <i>was</i> law, a howl arose that would have frightened a less +resolute man from his purpose. But he went right on doing the duty he +was sworn to do. And when, at the end of three months of clamor and +abuse, we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> saw the spectacle of the saloon keepers formally resolving to +help the police instead of hindering them; of the prison ward in +Bellevue Hospital standing empty for three days at a time, an +astonishing and unprecedented thing, which the warden could only +attribute to the "prompt closing of the saloons at one A. M.;" and of +the police force recovering its lost self-respect, we had found out more +and greater things than whether the excise law was a good or a bad law. +We understood what Roosevelt meant when he insisted upon the "primary +virtues" of honesty and courage in the conduct of public business. For +the want of them in us, half the laws that touched our daily lives had +become dead letters or vehicles of blackmail and oppression. It was +worth something to have that lesson taught us in that way; to find out +that simple, straightforward, honest dealing as between man and man is +after all effective in politics as in gunmaking. Perhaps we have not +mastered the lesson yet. But we have not discharged the teacher, either.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus10" id="illus10"></a> +<img src="images/illus10.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>A TAMMANY-SWEPT EAST SIDE STREET, BEFORE WARING<br /> +(<i>See picture facing page 248</i>)</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Courage, indeed! There were times during that stormy spell when it +seemed as if<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> we had grown wholly and hopelessly flabby as a people. +All the outcry against the programme of order did not come from the +lawless and the disorderly, by any means. Ordinarily decent, +conservative citizens joined in counseling moderation and virtual +compromise with the law-breakers—it was nothing else—to "avoid +trouble." The old love of fair play had been whittled down by the +jackknife of all-pervading expediency to an anæmic desire to "hold the +scales even;" that is a favorite modern device of the devil for +paralyzing action in men. You cannot hold the scales even in a moral +issue. It inevitably results in the triumph of evil, which asks nothing +better than the even chance to which it is not entitled. When the +trouble in the Police Board had reached a point where it seemed +impossible not to understand that Roosevelt and his side were fighting a +cold and treacherous conspiracy against the cause of good government, we +had the spectacle of a Christian Endeavor Society inviting the man who +had hatched the plot, the bitter and relentless enemy whom the Mayor had +summoned to resign, and afterward did his best to remove as a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> fatal +obstacle to reform,—inviting this man to come before it and speak of +Christian citizenship! It was a sight to make the bosses hug themselves +with glee. For Christian citizenship is their nightmare, and nothing is +so cheering to them as evidence that those who profess it have no sense.</p> + +<p>Apart from the moral bearings of it, what this question of enforcement +of law means in the life of the poor was illustrated by testimony given +before the Police Board very recently. A captain was on trial for +allowing the policy swindle to go unchecked in his precinct. Policy is a +kind of penny lottery, with alleged daily drawings which never take +place. The whole thing is a pestilent fraud, which is allowed to exist +only because it pays heavy blackmail to the police and the politicians. +Expert witnesses testified that eight policy shops in the Twenty-First +Ward, which they had visited, did a business averaging about thirty-two +dollars a day each. The Twenty-First is a poor Irish tenement ward. The +policy sharks were getting two hundred and fifty dollars or more a day +of the hard-earned wages of those poor people, in sums of from one and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> +two cents to a quarter, without making any return for it. The thing +would seem incredible, were it not too sadly familiar. The saloon keeper +got his share of what was left, and rewarded his customer by posing as +the "friend of the poor man" whenever his business was under scrutiny; I +have yet in my office the record of a single week during the hottest of +the fight between Roosevelt and the saloons, as showing of what kind +that friendship is. It embraces the destruction of eight homes by the +demon of drunkenness: the suicide of four wives, the murder of two +others by drunken husbands, the killing of a policeman in the street, +and the torture of an aged woman by her rascal son, who "used to be a +good boy till he took to liquor, when he became a perfect devil." In +that rôle he finally beat her to death for giving shelter to some +evicted fellow tenants who else would have had to sleep in the street. +Nice friendly turn, wasn't it?</p> + +<p>And yet there was something to be said for the saloon keeper. He gave +the man the refuge from his tenement which he needed. I say needed, +purposely. There has been a good deal of talk lately about the saloon +as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> a social necessity. About all there is to that is that the saloon is +there, and the necessity too. Man is a social animal, whether he lives +in a tenement or in a palace. But the palace has resources; the tenement +has not. It is a good place to get away from at all times. The saloon is +cheery and bright, and never far away. The man craving human +companionship finds it there. He finds, too, in the saloon keeper one +who understands his wants much better than the reformer who talks civil +service in the meetings. "Civil service" to him and his kind means yet a +contrivance for keeping them out of a job. The saloon keeper knows the +boss, if he is not himself the boss or his lieutenant, and can steer him +to the man who will spend all day at the City Hall, if need be, to get a +job for a friend, and all night pulling wires to keep him in it, if +trouble is brewing. Mr. Beecher used to say, when pleading for bright +hymn tunes, that he didn't want the devil to have the monopoly of all +the good music in the world. The saloon has had the monopoly up to date +of all the cheer in the tenements. If its owner has made it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> pan out to +his own advantage and the boss's, we at least have no just cause of +complaint. We let him have the field all to himself.</p> + +<p>As to this boss, of whom we hear so much, what manner of man is he? That +depends on how you look at him. I have one in mind, a district boss, +whom you would accept instantly as a type, if I were to mention his +name, which I shall not do for a reason which I fear will shock you: he +and I are friends. In his private capacity I have real regard for him. +As a politician and a boss I have none at all. I am aware that this is +taking low ground in a discussion of this kind, but perhaps the reader +will better understand the relations of his "district" to him, if I let +him into mine. There is no political bond between us, of either district +or party; just the reverse. It is purely personal. He was once a police +justice,—at that time he kept a saloon,—and I never knew one with more +common sense, which happens to be the one quality especially needed in +that office. Up to the point where politics came in I could depend upon +him entirely. At that point he let me know bluntly that he was in the +habit of running<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> his district to suit himself. The way he did it +brought him under the just accusation of being guilty of every kind of +rascality known to politics. When next our paths would cross each other, +it would very likely be on some errand of mercy, to which his feet were +always swift. I recall the distress of a dear and gentle lady at whose +dinner table I once took his part. She could not believe that there was +any good in him; what he did must be done for effect. Some time after +that she wrote asking me to look after an East Side family that was in +great trouble. It was during the severe cold spell of last winter, and +there was need of haste. I went over at once; but although I had lost no +time, I found my friend the boss ahead of me. It was a real pleasure to +me to be able to report to my correspondent that he had seen to their +comfort, and to add that it was unpolitical charity altogether. The +family was that of a Jewish widow with a lot of little children. He is a +Roman Catholic. There were no men, consequently no voters, in the house, +which was far outside of his district, too; and as for effect, he was +rather shamefaced at my catching him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> at it. I do not believe that a +soul has ever heard of the case from him to this day.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus11" id="illus11"></a> +<img src="images/illus11.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>THE SAME EAST SIDE STREET WHEN COLONEL WARING WIELDED THE BROOM<br /> +(<i>See picture facing page 242</i>)</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>My friend is a Tammany boss. During that same cold spell a politician of +the other camp came into my office and gave me a hundred dollars to +spend as I saw fit among the poor. His district was miles uptown, and he +was most unwilling to disclose his identity, stipulating in the end that +no one but I should know where the money came from. He was not seeking +notoriety. The plight of the suffering had appealed to him, and he +wanted to help where he could, that was all.</p> + +<p>Now, I have not the least desire to glorify the boss in this. He is not +glorious to me. He is simply human. Often enough he is a coarse and +brutal fellow, in his morals as in his politics. Again, he may have some +very engaging personal traits that bind his friends to him with the +closest of ties. The poor man sees the friend, the charity, the power +that is able and ready to help him in need; is it any wonder that he +overlooks the source of this power, this plenty,—that he forgets the +robbery in the robber who is "good to the poor"? Anyhow, if anybody got +robbed, it was "the rich." With the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> present ethical standards of the +slum, it is easy to construct even a scheme of social justice out of it +that is very comforting all round, even to the boss himself, though he +is in need of no sympathy or excuse. "Politics," he will tell me in his +philosophic moods, "is a game for profit. The city foots the bills." +Patriotism means to him working for the ticket that shall bring more +profit. "I regard," he says, lighting his cigar, "a repeater as a shade +off a murderer, but you are obliged to admit that in my trade he is a +necessary evil." I am not obliged to do anything of the kind, but I can +understand his way of looking at it. He simply has no political +conscience. He has gratitude, loyalty to a friend,—that is part of his +stock in trade,—fighting blood, plenty of it, all the good qualities of +the savage; nothing more. And a savage he is, politically, with no soul +above the dross. He would not rob a neighbor for the world; but he will +steal from the city—though he does not call it by that name—without a +tremor, and count it a good mark. When I tell him that, he waves his +hand toward Wall Street as representative of the business community, +and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> toward the office of his neighbor, the padrone, as representative +of the railroads, and says with a laugh, "Don't they all do it?"</p> + +<p>The boss believes in himself. It is one of his strong points. And he has +experience to back him. In the fall of 1894 we shook off boss rule in +New York, and set up housekeeping for ourselves. We kept it up three +years, and then went back to the old style. I should judge that we did +it because we were tired of too much virtue. Perhaps we were not built +to hold such a lot at once. Besides, it is much easier to be ruled than +to rule. That fall, after the election, when I was concerned about what +would become of my small parks, of the Health Department in which we +took such just pride, and of a dozen other things, I received one +unvarying reply to my anxious question, or rather two. If it was the +Health Department, I was told: "Go to Platt. He is the only man who can +do it. He is a sensible man, and will see that it is protected." If +small parks, it was: "Go to Croker. He will not allow the work to be +stopped." A playgrounds bill was to be presented in the legislature, and +everybody advised: "Go to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> Platt. He won't have any objection: it is +popular." And so on. My advisers were not politicians. They were +business men, but recently honestly interested in reform. I was talking +one day with a gentleman of very wide reputation as a philanthropist, +about the unhappy lot of the old fire-engine horses,—which, after lives +of toil that deserve a better fate, are sold for a song to drag out a +weary existence hauling some huckster's cart around,—and wishing that +they might be pensioned off to live out their years on a farm, with +enough to eat and a chance to roll in the grass. He was much interested, +and promptly gave me this advice: "I tell you what you do. You go and +see Croker. He likes horses." No wonder the boss believes in himself. He +would be less than human if he did not. And he is very human.</p> + +<p>I had voted on the day of the Greater New York election,—the Tammany +election, as we learned to call it afterward,—in my home out in the +Borough of Queens, and went over to the depot to catch the train for the +city. On the platform were half a dozen of my neighbors, all business +men, all "friends of reform." Some of them were<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> just down from +breakfast. One I remembered as introducing a resolution, in a meeting we +had held, about the discourtesy of local politicians. He looked +surprised when reminded that it was election day. "Why, is it to-day?" +he said. "They didn't send any carriage," said another regretfully. "I +don't see what's the use," said the third; "the roads are just as bad as +when we began talking about it." (We had been trying to mend them.) The +fourth yawned and said: "I don't care. I have my business to attend to." +And they took the train, which meant that they lost their votes. The +Tammany captain was busy hauling his voters by the cartload to the +polling place. Over there stood a reform candidate who had been defeated +in the primary, and puffed out his chest. "The politicians are afraid of +me," he said. They slapped him on the back, as they went by, and told +him that he was a devil of a fellow.</p> + +<p>So Tammany came back. The Health Department is wrecked. The police force +is worse than before Roosevelt took hold of it, and we are back in the +mud out of which we pulled ourselves with such an effort. And<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> we are +swearing at it. But I am afraid we are swearing at the wrong fellow. The +real Tammany is not the conscienceless rascal that plunders our treasury +and fattens on our substance. That one is a mere counterfeit. It is the +voter who waits for a carriage to take him to the polls, the man who +"doesn't see what's the use;" the business man who says "business is +business," and has no time to waste on voting; the citizen who "will +wait to see how the cat jumps, because he doesn't want to throw his vote +away;" the cowardly American who "doesn't want to antagonize" anybody; +the fool who "washes his hands of politics." These are the real Tammany, +the men after the boss's own heart. For every one whose vote he buys, +there are two of these who give him theirs for nothing. We shall get rid +of him when these withdraw their support, when they become citizens of +the Patrick Mullen stamp, as faithful at the polling place as he was at +the forge; not before.</p> + +<p>The true work of reform is at the top, not at the bottom. The man in the +slum votes according to his light, and the boss holds the candle. But +the boss is in no real<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> sense a leader. He follows instead, always as +far behind the moral sentiment of the community as he thinks is safe. He +has heard it said that a community will not be any better than its +citizens, and that it will be just as good as they are, and he applies +the saying to himself. He is no worse a boss than the town deserves. I +can conceive of his taking credit to himself as some kind of a moral +instrument by which the virtue of the community may be graded, though +that is most unlikely. He does not bother himself with the morals of +anything. But right here is his Achilles heel. The man has no +conscience. He cannot tell the signs of it in others. It always comes +upon him unawares. Reform to him simply means the "outs" fighting to get +in. The real thing he will always underestimate. Such a man is not the +power he seems. He is formidable only in proportion to the amount of +shaking it takes to rouse the community's conscience.</p> + +<p>The boss is like the measles, a distemper of a self-governing people's +infancy. When we shall have come of age politically, he will have no +terrors for us. Meanwhile, being charged with the business of governing, +which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> we left to him because we were too busy making money, he follows +the track laid out for him, and makes the business pan out all that is +in it. He fights when we want to discharge him. Of course he does. No +man likes to give up a good job. He will fight or bargain, as he sees +his way clear. He will give us small parks, play piers, new schools, +anything we ask, to keep his place, while trying to find out "the price" +of this conscience which he does not understand. Even to the half of his +kingdom he will give, to be "in" on the new deal. He has done it before, +and there is no reason that he can see why it should not be done again. +And he will appeal to the people whom he is plundering to trust him +because they know him.</p> + +<p>Odd as it sounds, this is where he has his real hold. I have shown why +this is so. To the poor people of his district the boss is a real friend +in need. He is one of them. He does not want to reform them; far from +it. No doubt it is very ungrateful of them, but the poor people have no +desire to be reformed. They do not think they need to be. They consider +their moral standards quite as high as those of the rich, and resent +being<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> told that they are mistaken. The reformer comes to them from +another world to tell them these things, and goes his way. The boss +lives among them. He helped John to a job on the pipes in their hard +winter, and got Mike on the force. They know him as a good neighbor, and +trust him to their harm. He drags their standard ever farther down. The +question for those who are trying to help them is how to make them +transfer their allegiance, and trust their real friends instead.</p> + +<p>It ought not to be a difficult question to answer. Any teacher could do +it. He knows, if he knows anything, that the way to get and keep the +children's confidence is to trust them, and let them know that they are +trusted. They will almost always come up to the demand thus made upon +them. Preaching to them does little good; preaching at them still less. +Men, whether rich or poor, are much like children. The good in them is +just as good as it is said to be, and the bad, considering their +enlarged opportunities for mischief, not so much worse than it is +called. A vigorous optimism, a stout belief in one's fellow man, is +better equipment in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> campaign for civic virtue than stacks of tracts +and arguments, economic and moral, are. There is good bottom, even in +the slum, for that kind of an anchor to get a grip on. A year ago I went +to see a boxing match there had been much talk about. The hall was +jammed with a rough and noisy crowd, hotly intent upon its favorite. His +opponent, who hailed, I think, from somewhere in Delaware, was greeted +with hostile demonstrations as a "foreigner." But as the battle wore on, +and he was seen to be fair and manly, while the New Yorker struck one +foul blow after another, the attitude of the crowd changed rapidly from +enthusiastic approval of the favorite to scorn and contempt; and in the +last round, when he knocked the Delawarean over with a foul blow, the +audience rose in a body and yelled to have the fight given to the +"foreigner," until my blood tingled with pride. For the decision would +leave it practically without a cent. It had staked all it had on the New +Yorker. "He is a good man," I heard on all sides, while the once +favorite sneaked away without a friend. "Good" meant fair and manly to +that crowd. I thought, as I went to the office the next<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> morning, that +it ought to be easy to appeal to such a people with measures that were +fair and just, if we could only get on common ground. But the only hint +I got from my reform paper was an editorial denunciation of the +brutality of boxing, on the same page that had an enthusiastic review of +the college football season. I do not suppose it did any harm, for the +paper was probably not read by one of the men it had set out to reform. +But suppose it had been, how much would it have appealed to them? +Exactly the qualities of robust manliness which football is supposed to +encourage in college students had been evoked by the trial of strength +and skill which they had witnessed. As to the brutality, they knew that +fifty young men are maimed or killed at football to one who fairs ill in +a boxing match. Would it seem to them common sense, or cant and humbug?</p> + +<p>It comes down in the end to a question of common sense and common +honesty. For how many failures of reform effort is insincerity not to +blame! Last spring I attended a meeting at Albany that had been called +by the governor to discuss the better enforcement<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> of the labor laws. We +talked the situation over, and Mr. Roosevelt received from those present +their ready promise to aid him in every way in making effective the laws +that represented so much toil and sacrifice, yet had until then been in +too many instances barren of results. Some time after, a workingman told +me with scorn how, on our coming home, one of our party had stopped in +at the factory inspector's office to urge him to "let up" on a friend, a +cigar manufacturer, who was violating a law for which the labor +organizations had fought long years as absolutely necessary to secure +human conditions in the trade. How much stock might he and his fellows +be supposed to take in a movement that had such champions? "You scratch +my back and I'll scratch yours," is a kind of politics in which the +reformer is no match for the boss. The boss will win on that line every +time. A saving sense of humor might have avoided that and many other +pitfalls. I am seriously of the opinion that a professional humorist +ought to be attached to every reform movement, to keep it from making +itself ridiculous by either too great solemnity or too much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> conceit. As +it is, the enemy sometimes employs him with effect. Failing the adoption +of that plan, I would recommend a decree of banishment against +photographers, press-clippings men, and the rest of the congratulatory +staff. Why should the fact that a citizen has done a citizen's duty +deserve to be celebrated in print and picture, as if something +extraordinary had happened? The smoke of battle had not cleared away +after the victory of reform, in the fall of 1894, before the citizens' +committee and all the little sub-committees rushed pell-mell to the +photographer's to get themselves on record as the men who did it. The +spectacle might have inspired in the humorist the advice to get two sets +made, while they were about it,—one to serve by and by as an exhibit of +the men who didn't; and, as the event proved, he would have been right.</p> + +<p>But it is easy to find fault, and on that tack we get no farther. Those +men did a great work, and they did it well. The mile-posts they set up +on the road to better things will guide another generation to the goal, +however the present may go astray. Good schools, better homes, and a +chance for the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> boy are arguments that are not lost upon the people. +They wear well. It may be that, like Moses and his followers, we of the +present day shall see the promised land only from afar and with the eye +of faith, because of our sins; that to a younger and sturdier to-morrow +it shall be given to blaze the path of civic righteousness that was our +dream. I like to think that it is so, and that that is the meaning of +the coming of men like Roosevelt and Waring at this time with their +simple appeal to the reason of honest men. Unless I greatly err in +reading the signs of the times, it is indeed so, and the day of the boss +and of the slum is drawing to an end. Our faith has felt the new +impulse; rather, I should say, it has given it. The social movements, +and that which we call politics, are but a reflection of what the people +honestly believe, a chart of their aims and aspirations. Charity in our +day no longer means alms, but justice. The social settlements are +substituting vital touch for the machine charity that reaped a crop of +hate and beggary. They are passenger bridges, it has been truly said, +not mere "shoots" for the delivery of coal and groceries; bridges upon +which men<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> go over, not down, from the mansion to the tenement. We +have learned that we cannot pass off checks for human sympathy in +settlement of our brotherhood arrears. The church, which once stood by +indifferent, or worse, is hastening to enter the life of the people. In +the memory of men yet living, one church, moving uptown away from the +crowd, left its old Mulberry Street home to be converted into tenements +that justly earned the name of "dens of death" in the Health +Department's records, while another became the foulest lodging house in +an unclean city. It was a church corporation which in those bad days +owned the worst underground dive downtown, and turned a deaf ear to all +remonstrances. The church was "angling for souls." But souls in this +world live in bodies endowed with reason. The results of that kind of +fishing were empty pews and cold hearts, and the conscience-stricken cry +that went up, "What shall we do to lay hold of this great multitude that +has slipped from us?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<a name="illus12" id="illus12"></a> +<img src="images/illus12.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<h3>THEODORE ROOSEVELT</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Ten years have passed, and to-day we see the churches of every +denomination uniting in a systematic canvass of the city to get at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> the +facts of the people's life of which they had ceased to be a part, +pleading for parks, playgrounds, kindergartens, libraries, clubs, and +better homes. There is a new and hearty sound to the word "brother" that +is full of hope. The cry has been answered. The gap in the social body, +between rich and poor, is no longer widening. We are certainly coming +closer together. Ten years ago, when the King's Daughters lighted a +Christmas tree in Gotham Court, the children ran screaming from Santa +Claus as from a "bogey man." Last Christmas the boys in the Hebrew +Institute's schools nearly broke the bank laying in supplies to do him +honor. I do not mean that the Jews are deserting to join the Christian +church. They are doing that which is better,—they are embracing its +spirit; and they and we are the better for it. God knows we waited long +enough; and how close we were to each other all the while without +knowing it! Last Christmas a clergyman, who lives out of town and has a +houseful of children, asked me if I could not find for them a poor +family in the city with children of about the same ages, whom they might +visit and befriend. He worked<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> every day in the office of a foreign +mission in Fifth Avenue, and knew little of the life that moved about +him in the city. I picked out a Hungarian widow in an East Side +tenement, whose brave struggle to keep her little flock together had +enlisted my sympathy and strong admiration. She was a cleaner in an +office building; not until all the arrangements had been made did it +occur to me to ask where. Then it turned out that she was scrubbing +floors in the missionary society's house, right at my friend's door. +They had passed each other every day, each in need of the other, and +each as far from the other as if oceans separated them instead of a +doorstep four inches wide.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Looking back over the years that lie behind with their work, and forward +to those that are coming, I see only cause for hope. As I write these +last lines in a far distant land, in the city of my birth, the children +are playing under my window, and calling to one another with glad cries +in my sweet mother tongue, even as we did in the long ago. Life and the +world are before them, bright with the promise of morning. So to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> me +seem the skies at home. Not lightly do I say it, for I have known the +toil of rough-hewing it on the pioneer line that turns men's hair gray; +but I have seen also the reward of the toil. New York is the youngest of +the world's great cities, barely yet out of its knickerbockers. It may +be that the dawning century will see it as the greatest of them all. The +task that is set it, the problem it has to solve and which it may not +shirk, is the problem of civilization, of human progress, of a people's +fitness for self-government that is on trial among us. We shall solve it +by the world-old formula of human sympathy, of humane touch. Somewhere +in these pages I have told of the woman in Chicago who accounted herself +the happiest woman alive because she had at last obtained a playground +for her poor neighbors' children. "I have lived here for years," she +said to me, "and struggled with principalities and powers, and have made +up my mind that the most and the best I can do is to live right here +with my people and smile with them,—keep smiling; weep when I must, but +smile as long as I possibly can." And the tears shone in her gentle old +eyes as she said it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> When we have learned to smile and weep with the +poor, we shall have mastered our problem. Then the slum will have lost +its grip and the boss his job.</p> + +<p>Until then, while they are in possession, our business is to hold taut +and take in slack right along; never letting go for a moment.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Police census of 1895: Block bounded by Canal, Hester, +Eldridge, and Forsyth streets: size 375 × 200, population 2628, rate per +acre 1526. Block bounded by Stanton, Houston, Attorney, and Ridge +streets: size 200 × 300, population 2244, rate per acre 1774.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> There is an advanced outpost of blacks as far up as One +Hundred and Forty-Fifth Street, but the main body lingers yet among the +sixties.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> According to the register of the United Hebrew Charities, +between October 1, 1884, and March 1, 1899, the number was 402,181.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Year-Book of Elmira State Reformatory, 1897. The statistics +deal with 8319 prisoners received there in twenty-three years. The +social stratum whence they came is sufficiently indicated by the +statement that 18.3 per cent. were illiterates, and 43.3 per cent. were +able to read and write with difficulty; 35.2 per cent. had an ordinary +common school education; 3.2 per cent. came out of high schools or +colleges.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> The name was bestowed before the fact, not after.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> I set down reluctantly this censure of an honored +profession, to individual members of which I have been wont, in a long +succession of troubled years, to go for advice and help in public +matters, and never in vain. The statement of the chief sanitary officer +of the Health Department, reaffirmed at the time I am writing, is, +however, positive to the effect that to this opposition, and this only, +was due the failure of that much-needed reform which had for years been +with me a pet measure.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> The exact number for April, 1899, was 9989; number of +pupils registered, 401,761; average daily attendance, 370,722.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> The teacher's pay, under the new act, is from $600 to +$1400. The policeman's pay is $1400.</p></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center">ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED<br /> +BY H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO.</p> + +<p class="center">The Riverside Press</p> + +<p class="center">CAMBRIDGE, MASS., U. S. A.</p> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Ten Year War, by Jacob A. Riis + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TEN YEAR WAR *** + +***** This file should be named 38821-h.htm or 38821-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/8/2/38821/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Riis + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Ten Year War + An Account of The Battle with The Slum in New York + +Author: Jacob A. Riis + +Release Date: February 10, 2012 [EBook #38821] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TEN YEAR WAR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + + A TEN YEARS' WAR + + AN ACCOUNT OF THE BATTLE + WITH THE SLUM IN + NEW YORK + + BY JACOB A. RIIS + + + AUTHOR OF "HOW THE OTHER HALF LIVES" + + _WITH ILLUSTRATIONS_ + + [Illustration: The Riverside Press] + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + + 1900 + + COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY JACOB A. RIIS + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + TO THE FAINT-HEARTED AND THOSE OF LITTLE + FAITH THIS VOLUME IS REPROACHFULLY + INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR + + + + +[Illustration: COLONEL GEORGE E. WARING, JR.] + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAP. PAGE + + I. THE BATTLE WITH THE SLUM 1 + + II. THE TENEMENT HOUSE BLIGHT 30 + + III. THE TENEMENT: CURING ITS BLIGHT 68 + + IV. THE TENANT 104 + + V. THE GENESIS OF THE GANG 139 + + VI. LETTING IN THE LIGHT 169 + + VII. JUSTICE FOR THE BOY 204 + + VIII. REFORM BY HUMANE TOUCH 239 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + PAGE + + COLONEL GEORGE E. WARING, JR. _Frontispiece_ + + POLICE STATION LODGING ROOM ON EAST SIDE 18 + + THE MOTT STREET BARRACKS 74 + + ALFRED CORNING CLARK BUILDINGS--_Model Tenements + Of City And Suburban Homes Company_ 84 + + EVENING IN ONE OF THE COURTS OF MILLS HOUSE NO. 1 94 + + BONE ALLEY 134 + + MULBERRY BEND PARK 180 + + LETTER H PLAN OF PUBLIC SCHOOL NO. 165 (SHOWING + FRONT ON WEST 109TH STREET) 214 + + PLAYGROUND ON ROOF OF NEW EAST BROADWAY SCHOOLHOUSE + (AREA 8,348 SQUARE FEET) 220 + + A TAMMANY-SWEPT EAST SIDE STREET BEFORE WARING 242 + + THE SAME EAST SIDE STREET WHEN COLONEL WARING + WIELDED THE BROOM 248 + + THEODORE ROOSEVELT 262 + + + + +A TEN YEARS' WAR + + + + +I + +THE BATTLE WITH THE SLUM + + +The slum is as old as civilization. Civilization implies a race, to get +ahead. In a race there are usually some who for one cause or another +cannot keep up, or are thrust out from among their fellows. They fall +behind, and when they have been left far in the rear they lose hope and +ambition, and give up. Thenceforward, if left to their own resources, +they are the victims, not the masters, of their environment; and it is a +bad master. They drag one another always farther down. The bad +environment becomes the heredity of the next generation. Then, given the +crowd, you have the slum ready-made. + +The battle with the slum began the day civilization recognized in it her +enemy. It was a losing fight until conscience joined forces with fear +and self-interest against it. When common sense and the golden rule +obtain among men as a rule of practice, it will be over. The two have +not always been classed together, but here they are plainly seen to +belong together. Justice to the individual is accepted in theory as the +only safe groundwork of the commonwealth. When it is practiced in +dealing with the slum, there will shortly be no slum. We need not wait +for the millennium, to get rid of it. We can do it now. All that is +required is that it shall not be left to itself. That is justice to it +and to us, since its grievous ailment is that it cannot help itself. +When a man is drowning, the thing to do is to pull him out of the water; +afterward there will be time for talking it over. We got at it the other +way in dealing with our social problems. The doctrinaires had their day, +and they decided to let bad enough alone; that it was unsafe to +interfere with "causes that operate sociologically," as one survivor of +these unfittest put it to me. It was a piece of scientific humbug that +cost the age which listened to it dear. "Causes that operate +sociologically" are the opportunity of the political and every other +kind of scamp who trades upon the depravity and helplessness of the +slum, and the refuge of the pessimist who is useless in the fight +against them. We have not done yet paying the bills he ran up for us. +Some time since we turned to, to pull the drowning man out, and it was +time. A little while longer, and we should have been in danger of being +dragged down with him. + +The slum complaint had been chronic in all ages, but the great changes +which the nineteenth century saw, the new industry, political freedom, +brought on an acute attack which threatened to become fatal. Too many of +us had supposed that, built as our commonwealth was on universal +suffrage, it would be proof against the complaints that harassed older +states; but in fact it turned out that there was extra hazard in that. +Having solemnly resolved that all men are created equal and have certain +inalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness, we shut our eyes and waited for the formula to work. It was +as if a man with a cold should take the doctor's prescription to bed +with him, expecting it to cure him. The formula was all right, but +merely repeating it worked no cure. When, after a hundred years, we +opened our eyes, it was upon sixty cents a day as the living wage of the +working-woman in our cities; upon "knee pants" at forty cents a dozen +for the making; upon the Potter's Field taking tithe of our city life, +ten per cent, each year for the trench, truly the Lost Tenth of the +slum. Our country had grown great and rich; through our ports was poured +food for the millions of Europe. But in the back streets multitudes +huddled in ignorance and want. The foreign oppressor had been +vanquished, the fetters stricken from the black man at home; but his +white brother, in his bitter plight, sent up a cry of distress that had +in it a distinct note of menace. Political freedom we had won; but the +problem of helpless poverty, grown vast with the added offscourings of +the Old World, mocked us, unsolved. Liberty at sixty cents a day set +presently its stamp upon the government of our cities, and it became the +scandal and the peril of our political system. + +So the battle began. Three times since the war that absorbed the +nation's energies and attention had the slum confronted us in New York +with its challenge. In the darkest days of the great struggle it was the +treacherous mob; later on, the threat of the cholera, which found swine +foraging in the streets as the only scavengers, and a swarming host, but +little above the hog in its appetites and in the quality of the shelter +afforded it, peopling the back alleys. Still later, the mob, caught +looting the city's treasury with its idol, the thief Tweed, at its head, +drunk with power and plunder, had insolently defied the outraged +community to do its worst. There were meetings and protests. The rascals +were turned out for a season; the arch-thief died in jail. I see him +now, going through the gloomy portals of the Tombs, whither, as a +newspaper reporter, I had gone with him, his stubborn head held high as +ever. I asked myself more than once, at the time when the vile prison +was torn down, whether the comic clamor to have the ugly old gates +preserved and set up in Central Park had anything to do with the memory +of the "martyred" thief, or whether it was in joyful celebration of the +fact that others had escaped. His name is even now one to conjure with +in the Sixth Ward. He never "squealed," and he was "so good to the +poor"--evidence that the slum is not laid by the heels by merely +destroying Five Points and the Mulberry Bend. There are other fights to +be fought in that war, other victories to be won, and it is slow work. +It was nearly ten years after the great robbery before decency got the +upper grip in good earnest. That was when the civic conscience awoke in +1879. + +In that year the slum was arraigned in the churches. The sad and +shameful story was told of how it grew and was fostered by avarice, that +saw in the homeless crowds from over the sea only a chance for business, +and exploited them to the uttermost, making sometimes a hundred per +cent, on the capital invested,--always most out of the worst houses, +from the tenants of which "nothing was expected" save that they pay the +usurious rents; how Christianity, citizenship, human fellowship, shook +their skirts clear of the rabble that was only good enough to fill the +greedy purse, and how the rabble, left to itself, improved such +opportunities as it found after such fashion as it knew; how it ran +elections merely to count its thugs in, and fattened at the public crib; +and how the whole evil thing had its root in the tenements, where the +home had ceased to be sacred,--those dark and deadly dens in which the +family ideal was tortured to death, and character was smothered; in +which children were "damned rather than born" into the world, thus +realizing a slum kind of foreordination to torment, happily brief in +many cases. The Tenement House Committee long afterward called the worst +of the barracks "infant slaughter houses," and showed, by reference to +the mortality lists, that they killed one in every five babies born in +them. + +The story shocked the town into action. Plans for a better kind of +tenement were called for, and a premium was put on every ray of light +and breath of air that could be let into it. Money was raised to build +model houses, and a bill to give the health authorities summary powers +in dealing with tenements was sent to the legislature. The landlords +held it up until the last day of the session, when it was forced +through by an angered public opinion. The power of the cabal was broken. +The landlords had found their Waterloo. Many of them got rid of their +property, which in a large number of cases they had never seen, and +tried to forget the source of their ill-gotten wealth. Light and air did +find their way into the tenements in a half-hearted fashion, and we +began to count the tenants as "souls." That is one of our milestones in +the history of New York. They were never reckoned so before; no one ever +thought of them as "souls." So, restored to human fellowship, in the +twilight of the air shaft that had penetrated to their dens, the first +Tenement House Committee was able to make them out "better than the +houses" they lived in, and a long step forward was taken. The Mulberry +Bend, the wicked core of the "bloody Sixth Ward," was marked for +destruction, and all slumdom held its breath to see it go. With that +gone, it seemed as if the old days must be gone too, never to return. +There would not be another Mulberry Bend. As long as it stood, there was +yet a chance. The slum had backing, as it were. + +The civic conscience was not very robust yet, and required many and +protracted naps. It slumbered fitfully eight long years, waking up now +and then with a start, while the politicians did their best to lull it +back to its slumbers. I wondered often, in those years of delay, if it +was just plain stupidity that kept the politicians from spending the +money which the law had put within their grasp; for with every year that +passed a million dollars that could have been used for small park +purposes was lost. But they were wiser than I. I understood when I saw +the changes which letting in the sunshine worked. We had all believed +it, but they knew it all along. At the same time, they lost none of the +chances that offered. They helped the landlords, who considered +themselves greatly aggrieved because their property was thereafter to +front on a park instead of a pigsty, to transfer the whole assessment of +half a million dollars for park benefit to the city. They undid in less +than six weeks what it had taken considerably more than six years to do; +but the park was cheap at the price. We could afford to pay all it cost +to wake us up. When finally, upon the wave of wrath excited by the +Parkhurst and Lexow disclosures, reform came with a shock that dislodged +Tammany, it found us wide awake, and, it must be admitted, not a little +astonished at our sudden access of righteousness. + +The battle went against the slum in the three years that followed, until +it found backing in the "odium of reform" that became the issue in the +municipal organization of the greater city. Tammany made notes. Of what +was done, how it was done, and why, during those years, I shall have +occasion to speak further in these pages. Here I wish to measure the +stretch we have come since I wrote "How the Other Half Lives," ten years +ago. Some of it we came plodding, and some at full speed; some of it in +the face of every obstacle that could be thrown in our way, wresting +victory from defeat at every step; some of it with the enemy on the run. +Take it altogether, it is a long way. Most of it will not have to be +traveled over again. The engine of municipal progress, once started as +it has been in New York, may slip many a cog with Tammany as the +engineer; it may even be stopped for a season; but it can never be made +to work backward. Even Tammany knows that, and is building the schools +she so long neglected, and so is hastening the day when she shall be but +an unsavory memory. + +How we strove for those schools, to no purpose! Our arguments, our +anger, the anxious pleading of philanthropists who saw the young on the +East Side going to ruin, the warning year after year of the +superintendent of schools that the compulsory education law was but an +empty mockery where it was most needed, the knocking of uncounted +thousands of children for whom there was no room,--uncounted in sober +fact; there was not even a way of finding out how many were +adrift,--brought only the response that the tax rate must be kept down. +Kept down it was. "Waste" was successfully averted at the spigot; at the +bunghole it went on unchecked. In a swarming population like that you +must have either schools or jails, and the jails waxed fat with the +overflow. The East Side, that had been orderly, became a hotbed of child +crime. And when, in answer to the charge made by a legislative committee +that the father forced his child into the shop, on a perjured age +certificate, to labor when he ought to have been at play, that father, +bent and heavy-eyed with unceasing toil, flung back the charge with the +bitter reproach that we gave him no other choice, that it was either the +street or the shop for his boy, and that perjury for him was cheaper +than the ruin of the child, we were mute. What, indeed, was there to +say? The crime was ours, not his. That was but yesterday. To-day we can +count the months to the time when every child who knocks shall find a +seat in our schools. We have a school census to tell us of the need. In +that most crowded neighborhood in all the world, where the +superintendent lately pleaded in vain for three new schools, five have +been built, the finest in this or any other land,--great, light, and +airy structures, with playgrounds on the roof; and all over the city the +like are going up. The briefest of our laws, every word of which is like +the blow of a hammer driving the nails home in the coffin of the bad old +days, says that never one shall be built without its playground. So the +boy is coming to his rights. + +The streets are cleaned,--not necessarily clean just now; Colonel Waring +is dead, with his doctrine of putting a man instead of a voter behind +every broom, killed by politics, he and his doctrine both,--but cleaned. +The slum has even been washed. We tried that on Hester Street years ago, +in the age of cobblestone pavements, and the result fairly frightened +us. I remember the indignant reply of a well-known citizen, a man of +large business responsibility and experience in the handling of men, to +whom the office of street-cleaning commissioner had been offered, when I +asked him if he would accept. "I have lived," he said, "a blameless life +for forty years, and have a character in the community. I cannot +afford--no man with a reputation can afford--to hold that office; it +will surely wreck it." That was then. It made Colonel Waring's +reputation. He took the trucks from the streets. Tammany, in a brief +interregnum of vigor under Mayor Grant, had laid the axe to the +unsightly telegraph poles and begun to pave the streets with asphalt, +but it left the trucks and the ash barrels to Colonel Waring as +hopeless. Trucks have votes; at least their drivers have. Now that they +are gone, the drivers would be the last to bring them back; for they +have children, too, and the rescued streets gave them their first +playground. Perilous, begrudged by policeman and storekeeper, though it +was, it was still a playground. + +But one is coming in which the boy shall rule unchallenged. The Mulberry +Bend Park kept its promise. Before the sod was laid in it two more were +under way in the thickest of the tenement house crowding, and each, +under the law which brought them into existence, is to be laid out in +part as a playground. They are not yet finished, but they will be; for +the people have taken to the idea, and the politician has made a note of +the fact. He saw a great light when the play piers were opened. In half +a dozen localities where the slum was striking its roots deep into the +soil such piers are now being built, and land is being acquired for +small parks. We shall yet settle the "causes that operated +sociologically" on the boy with a lawn mower and a sand heap. You have +got your boy, and the heredity of the next one, when you can order his +setting. + +Even while I am writing, a bill is urged in the legislature to build in +every senatorial district in the city a gymnasium and a public bath. It +matters little whether it passes at this session or not. The important +thing is that it is there. The rest will follow. A people's club is +being organized, to crowd out the saloon that has had a monopoly of the +brightness and the cheer in the tenement streets too long. The labor +unions are bestirring themselves to deal with the sweating curse, and +the gospel of less law and more enforcement sits enthroned at Albany. +Theodore Roosevelt will teach us again Jefferson's forgotten lesson, +that "the whole art of government consists in being honest." With a back +door to every ordinance that touched the lives of the people, if indeed +the whole thing was not the subject of open ridicule or the vehicle of +official blackmail, it seemed as if we had provided a perfect municipal +machinery for bringing the law into contempt with the young, and so for +wrecking citizenship by the shortest cut. + +Of free soup there is an end. It was never food for free men. The last +spoonful was ladled out by yellow journalism with the certificate of the +men who fought Roosevelt and reform in the police board that it was +good. It is not likely that it will ever plague us again. Our experience +has taught us a new reading of the old word that charity covers a +multitude of sins. It does. Uncovering some of them has kept us busy +since our conscience awoke, and there are more left. The worst of them +all, that awful parody on municipal charity, the police station lodging +room, is gone, after twenty years of persistent attack upon the foul +dens,--years during which they were arraigned, condemned, indicted by +every authority having jurisdiction, all to no purpose. The stale beer +dives went with them and with the Bend, and the grip of the tramp on our +throat has been loosened. We shall not easily throw it off altogether, +for the tramp has a vote, too, for which Tammany, with admirable +ingenuity, has found a new use, since the ante-election inspection of +lodging houses has made them less available for colonization purposes +than they were. Perhaps I should say a new way of very old use. It is +simplicity itself. Instead of keeping tramps in hired lodgings for weeks +at a daily outlay, the new way is to send them all to the island on +short commitments during the canvass, and vote them from there _en bloc_ +at the city's expense. Time and education must solve that, like so many +other problems which the slum has thrust upon us. They are the forces +upon which, when we have gone as far as our present supply of steam will +carry us, we must always fall back; and this we may do with confidence +so long as we keep stirring, if it is only marking time, as now. It is +in the retrospect that one sees how far we have come, after all, and +from that gathers courage for the rest of the way. Twenty-nine years +have passed since I slept in a police station lodging house, a lonely +lad, and was robbed, beaten, and thrown out for protesting; and when the +vagrant cur that had joined its homelessness to mine, and had sat all +night at the door waiting for me to come out,--it had been clubbed away +the night before,--snarled and showed its teeth at the doorman, raging +and impotent I saw it beaten to death on the step. I little dreamed then +that the friendless beast, dead, should prove the undoing of the +monstrous wrong done by the maintenance of these evil holes to every +helpless man and woman who was without shelter in New York; but it did. +It was after an inspection of the lodging rooms, when I stood with +Theodore Roosevelt, then president of the police board, in the one where +I had slept that night, and told him of it, that he swore they should +go. And go they did, as did so many another abuse in those two years of +honest purpose and effort. I hated them. It may not have been a very +high motive to furnish power for municipal reform; but we had tried +every other way, and none of them worked. Arbitration is good, but there +are times when it becomes necessary to knock a man down and arbitrate +sitting on him, and this was such a time. It was what we started out to +do with the rear tenements, the worst of the slum barracks, and it would +have been better had we kept on that track. I have always maintained +that we made a false move when we stopped to discuss damages with the +landlord, or to hear his side of it at all. His share in it was our +grievance; it blocked the mortality records with its burden of human +woe. The damage was all ours, the profit all his. If there are damages +to collect, he should foot the bill, not we. Vested rights are to be +protected, but no man has a right to be protected in killing his +neighbor. + +[Illustration: POLICE STATION LODGING ROOM ON EAST SIDE] + +However, they are down, the worst of them. The community has asserted +its right to destroy tenements that destroy life, and for that cause. We +bought the slum off in the Mulberry Bend at its own figure. On the rear +tenements we set the price, and set it low. It was a long step. Bottle +Alley is gone, and Bandits' Roost. Bone Alley, Thieves' Alley, and +Kerosene Row,--they are all gone. Hell's Kitchen and Poverty Gap have +acquired standards of decency; Poverty Gap has risen even to the height +of neckties. The time is fresh in my recollection when a different kind +of necktie was its pride; when the boy murderer--he was barely +nineteen--who wore it on the gallows took leave of the captain of +detectives with the cheerful invitation to "come over to the wake. They +will have a high old time." And the event fully redeemed the promise. +The whole Gap turned out to do the dead bully honor. I have not heard +from the Gap, and hardly from Hell's Kitchen, in five years. The last +news from the Kitchen was when the thin wedge of a column of negroes, in +their uptown migration, tried to squeeze in, and provoked a race war; +but that in fairness should not be laid up against it. In certain local +aspects it might be accounted a sacred duty; as much so as to get drunk +and provoke a fight on the anniversary of the battle of the Boyne. But +on the whole the Kitchen has grown orderly. The gang rarely beats a +policeman nowadays, and it has not killed one in a long while. + +So, one after another, the outworks of the slum have been taken. It has +been beaten in many battles; but its reserves are unimpaired. More +tenements are being built every day on twenty-five-foot lots, and +however watchfully such a house is planned, if it is to return to the +builder the profit he seeks, it will have that within it which, the +moment the grasp of official sanitary supervision is loosened, must +summon up the ghost of the slum. The common type of tenement to-day is +the double-decker, and the double-decker is hopeless. In it the crowding +goes on at a constantly increasing rate. This is the sore spot, and as +against it all the rest seems often enough unavailing. Yet it cannot +be. It is true that the home, about which all that is to work for +permanent progress must cluster, is struggling against desperate odds in +the tenement, and that the struggle has been reflected in the morals of +the people, in the corruption of the young, to an alarming extent; but +it must be that the higher standards now set up on every hand, in the +cleaner streets, in the better schools, in the parks and the clubs, in +the settlements, and in the thousand and one agencies for good that +touch and help the lives of the poor at as many points, will tell at no +distant day, and react upon the homes and upon their builders. To any +one who knew the East Side, for instance, ten years ago, the difference +between that day and this in the appearance of the children whom he sees +there must be striking. Rags and dirt are now the exception rather than +the rule. Perhaps the statement is a trifle too strong as to the dirt; +but dirt is not harmful except when coupled with rags; it can be washed +off, and nowadays is washed off where such a thing would have been +considered affectation in the days that were. Soap and water have +worked a visible cure already, that must go more than skin-deep. They +are moral agents of the first value in the slum. And the day must come +when rapid transit will cease to be a football between contending forces +in a city of three million people, and the reason for the outrageous +crowding will cease to exist with the scattering of the centres of +production to the suburb. That day may be a long way off, measured by +the impatience of the philanthropist, but it is bound to come. +Meanwhile, philanthropy is not sitting idle and waiting. It is building +tenements on the humane plan that wipes out the lines of the +twenty-five-foot lot, and lets in sunshine and air and hope. It is +putting up hotels deserving of the name for the army that but just now +had no other home than the cheap lodging houses which Inspector Byrnes +fitly called "nurseries of crime." These also are standards from which +there is no backing down, even if coming up to them is slow work: and +they are here to stay, for they pay. That is the test. Not charity, but +justice,--that is the gospel which they preach. + +Flushed with the success of many victories, we challenged the slum to a +fight to the finish a year ago, and bade it come on. It came on. On our +side fought the bravest and best. The man who marshaled the citizen +forces for their candidate had been foremost in building homes, in +erecting baths for the people, in directing the self-sacrificing labors +of the oldest and worthiest of the agencies for improving the condition +of the poor. With him battled men who had given lives of patient study +and effort to the cause of helping their fellow men. Shoulder to +shoulder with them stood the thoughtful workingman from the East Side +tenement. The slum, too, marshaled its forces. Tammany produced her +notes. She pointed to the increased tax rate, showed what it had cost to +build schools and parks and to clean house, and called it criminal +recklessness. The issue was made sharp and clear. The war cry of the +slum was characteristic: "To hell with reform!" We all remember the +result. Politics interfered, and turned victory into defeat. We were +beaten. I shall never forget that election night. I walked home through +the Bowery in the midnight hour, and saw it gorging itself, like a +starved wolf, upon the promise of the morrow. Drunken men and women sat +in every doorway, howling ribald songs and curses. Hard faces I had not +seen for years showed themselves about the dives. The mob made merry +after its fashion. The old days were coming back. Reform was dead, and +decency with it. + +A year later, I passed that same way on the night of election. The scene +was strangely changed. The street was unusually quiet for such a time. +Men stood in groups about the saloons, and talked in whispers, with +serious faces. The name of Roosevelt was heard on every hand. The dives +were running, but there was no shouting, and violence was discouraged. +When, on the following day, I met the proprietor of one of the oldest +concerns in the Bowery,--which, while doing a legitimate business, +caters necessarily to its crowds, and therefore sides with them,--he +told me with bitter reproach how he had been stricken in pocket. A +gambler had just been in to see him, who had come on from the far West, +in anticipation of a wide-open town, and had got all ready to open a +house in the Tenderloin. "He brought $40,000 to put in the business, and +he came to take it away to Baltimore. Just now the cashier of ---- Bank +told me that two other gentlemen--gamblers? yes, that's what you call +them--had drawn $130,000 which they would have invested here, and had +gone after him. Think of all that money gone to Baltimore! That's what +you've done!" + +I went over to police headquarters, thinking of the sad state of that +man, and in the hallway I ran across two children, little tots, who were +inquiring their way to "the commissioner." The older was a hunchback +girl, who led her younger brother (he could not have been over five or +six years old) by the hand. They explained their case to me. They came +from Allen Street. Some undesirable women tenants had moved into the +tenement, and when complaint was made that sent the police there, the +children's father, who was a poor Jewish tailor, was blamed. The tenants +took it out of the boy by punching his nose till it bled. Whereupon the +children went straight to Mulberry Street to see the commissioner and +get justice. It was the first time in twenty years that I had known +Allen Street to come to police headquarters for justice; and in the +discovery that the new idea had reached down to the little children I +read the doom of the slum, despite its loud vauntings. + +No, it was not true that reform was dead, with decency. It was not the +slum that had won; it was we who had lost. We were not up to the +mark,--not yet. But New York is a many times cleaner and better city +to-day than it was ten years ago. Then I was able to grasp easily the +whole plan for wresting it from the neglect and indifference that had +put us where we were. It was chiefly, almost wholly, remedial in its +scope. Now it is preventive, constructive, and no ten men could gather +all the threads and hold them. We have made, are making headway, and no +Tammany has the power to stop us. She knows it, too, and is in such +frantic haste to fill her pockets while she has time that she has +abandoned her old ally, the tax rate, and the pretense of making bad +government cheap government. She is at this moment engaged in raising +taxes and assessments at one and the same time to an unheard-of figure, +while salaries are being increased lavishly on every hand. We can afford +to pay all she charges us for the lesson we are learning. If to that we +add common sense, we shall discover the bearings of it all without +trouble. Yesterday I picked up a book,--a learned disquisition on +government,--and read on the title-page, "Affectionately dedicated to +all who despise politics." That was not common sense. To win the battle +with the slum, we must not begin by despising politics. We have been +doing that too long. The politics of the slum is apt to be like the slum +itself, dirty. Then it must be cleaned. It is what the fight is about. +Politics is the weapon. We must learn to use it so as to cut straight +and sure. That is common sense, and the golden rule as applied to +Tammany. + +Some years ago, the United States government conducted an inquiry into +the slums of great cities. To its staff of experts was attached a +chemist, who gathered and isolated a lot of bacilli with fearsome Latin +names, in the tenements where he went. Among those he labeled were the +_Staphylococcus pyogenes albus_, the _Micrococcus fervidosus_, the +_Saccharomyces rosaceus_, and the _Bacillus buccalis fortuitus_. I made +a note of the names at the time, because of the dread with which they +inspired me. But I searched the collection in vain for the real bacillus +of the slum. It escaped science, to be identified by human sympathy and +a conscience-stricken community with that of ordinary human selfishness. +The antitoxin has been found, and is applied successfully. Since justice +has replaced charity on the prescription the patient is improving. And +the improvement is not confined to him; it is general. Conscience is not +a local issue in our day. A few years ago, a United States Senator +sought reelection on the platform that the decalogue and the golden rule +were glittering generalities that had no place in politics, and lost. We +have not quite reached the millennium yet, but to-day a man is governor +in the Empire State who was elected on the pledge that he would rule by +the ten commandments. These are facts that mean much or little, +according to the way one looks at them. The significant thing is that +they are facts, and that, in spite of slipping and sliding, the world +moves forward, not backward. The poor we shall have always with us, but +the slum we need not have. These two do not rightfully belong together. +Their present partnership is at once poverty's worst hardship and our +worst fault. + + + + +II + +THE TENEMENT HOUSE BLIGHT + + +In a Stanton Street tenement, the other day, I stumbled upon a Polish +capmaker's home. There were other capmakers in the house, Russian and +Polish, but they simply "lived" there. This one had a home. The fact +proclaimed itself the moment the door was opened, in spite of the +darkness. The rooms were in the rear, gloomy with the twilight of the +tenement, although the day was sunny without, but neat, even cosy. It +was early, but the day's chores were evidently done. The teakettle sang +on the stove, at which a bright-looking girl of twelve, with a pale but +cheery face, and sleeves brushed back to the elbows, was busy poking up +the fire. A little boy stood by the window, flattening his nose against +the pane and gazing wistfully up among the chimney pots where a piece of +blue sky about as big as the kitchen could be made out. I remarked to +the mother that they were nice rooms. + +"Ah yes," she said, with a weary little smile that struggled bravely +with hope long deferred, "but it is hard to make a home here. We would +so like to live in the front, but we can't pay the rent." + +I knew the front with its unlovely view of the tenement street too well, +and I said a good word for the air shaft--yard or court it could not be +called, it was too small for that--which rather surprised myself. I had +found few virtues enough in it before. The girl at the stove had left +off poking the fire. She broke in the moment I finished, with eager +enthusiasm: "Why, they have the sun in there. When the door is opened +the light comes right in your face." + +"Does it never come here?" I asked, and wished I had not done so, as +soon as the words were spoken. The child at the window was listening, +with his whole hungry little soul in his eyes. + +Yes, it did, she said. Once every summer, for a little while, it came +over the houses. She knew the month and the exact hour of the day when +its rays shone into their home, and just the reach of its slant on the +wall. They had lived there six years. In June the sun was due. A +haunting fear that the baby would ask how long it was till June--it was +February then--took possession of me, and I hastened to change the +subject. Warsaw was their old home. They kept a little store there, and +were young and happy. Oh, it was a fine city, with parks and squares, +and bridges over the beautiful river,--and grass and flowers and birds +and soldiers, put in the girl breathlessly. She remembered. But the +children kept coming, and they went across the sea to give them a better +chance. Father made fifteen dollars a week, much money; but there were +long seasons when there was no work. She, the mother, was never very +well here,--she hadn't any strength; and the baby! She glanced at his +grave white face, and took him in her arms. The picture of the two, and +of the pale-faced girl longing back to the fields and the sunlight, in +their prison of gloom and gray walls, haunts me yet. I have not had the +courage to go back since. I recalled the report of an English army +surgeon, which I read years ago, on the many more soldiers that +died--were killed would be more correct--in barracks into which the sun +never shone than in those that were open to the light. + +The capmaker's case is the case of the nineteenth century, of +civilization, against the metropolis of America. The home, the family, +are the rallying points of civilization. But long since the tenements of +New York earned for it the ominous name of "the homeless city." In its +40,000 tenements its workers, more than half of the city's population, +are housed. They have no other chance. There are, indeed, wives and +mothers who, by sheer force of character, rise above their environment +and make homes where they go. Happily, there are yet many of them. But +the fact remains that hitherto their struggle has been growing ever +harder, and the issue more doubtful. + +The tenement itself, with its crowds, its lack of privacy, is the +greatest destroyer of individuality, of character. As its numbers +increase, so does "the element that becomes criminal for lack of +individuality and the self-respect that comes with it." Add the +shiftless and the weak who are turned out by the same process, and you +have its legitimate crop. In 1880 the average number of persons to each +dwelling in New York was 16.37; in 1890 it was 18.52. In 1895, according +to the police census, 21.2. The census of 1900 will show the crowding to +have gone on at an equal if not at a greater rate. That will mean that +so many more tenements have been built of the modern type, with four +families to the floor where once there were two. I shall not weary the +reader with many statistics. They are to be found, by those who want +them, in the census books and in the official records. I shall try to +draw from them their human story. But, as an instance of the unchecked +drift, let me quote here the case of the Tenth Ward, that East Side +district known as the most crowded in all the world. In 1880, when it +had not yet attained that bad eminence, it contained 47,554 persons, or +432.3 to the acre. In 1890 the census showed a population of 57,596, +which was 522 to the acre. The police census of 1895 found 70,168 +persons living in 1514 houses, which was 643.08 to the acre. Lastly, the +Health Department's census for the first half of 1898 gave a total of +82,175 persons living in 1201 tenements, with 313 inhabited buildings +yet to be heard from. This is the process of doubling up,--literally, +since the cause and the vehicle of it all is the double-decker +tenement,--which in the year 1895 had crowded a single block in that +ward at the rate of 1526 persons per acre, and one in the Eleventh Ward +at the rate of 1774.[1] It goes on not in the Tenth Ward or on the East +Side only, but throughout the city. When, in 1897, it was proposed to +lay out a small park in the Twenty-Second Ward, up on the far West Side, +it was shown that five blocks in that section, between Forty-Ninth and +Sixty-Second streets and Ninth and Eleventh avenues, had a population of +more than 3000 each. The block between Sixty-First and Sixty-Second +streets, Tenth and Eleventh avenues, harbored 3580, which meant 974.6 +persons to the acre. + +[Footnote 1: Police census of 1895: Block bounded by Canal, Hester, +Eldridge, and Forsyth streets: size 375 x 200, population 2628, rate per +acre 1526. Block bounded by Stanton, Houston, Attorney, and Ridge +streets: size 200 x 300, population 2244, rate per acre 1774.] + +If we have here to do with forces that are beyond the control of the +individual or the community, we shall do well at least to face the +facts squarely and know the truth. It is no answer to the charge that +New York's way of housing its workers is the worst in the world to say +that they are better off than they were where they came from. It is not +true, in most cases, as far as the home is concerned: a shanty is better +than a flat in a cheap tenement, any day. Even if it were true, it would +still be beside the issue. In Poland my capmaker counted for nothing. +Nothing was expected of him. Here he ranks, after a few brief years, +politically equal with the man who hires his labor. A citizen's duty is +expected of him, and home and citizenship are convertible terms. The +observation of the Frenchman who had watched the experiment of herding +two thousand human beings in eight tenement barracks in Paris, that the +result was the "exasperation of the tenant against society," is true the +world over. We have done as badly in New York. Social hatefulness is not +a good soil for citizenship to grow in, where political equality rules. + +Nor will the old lie about the tenants being wholly to blame cover the +ground. It has long been overworked in defense of landlord usury. +Doubtless there are bad tenants. In the matter of renting houses, as in +everything else, men have a trick of coming up to what is expected of +them, good or bad; but as a class the tenants have been shown all along +to be superior to their surroundings. "Better than the houses they live +in," said the first Tenement House Commission; and the second gave as +its verdict that "they respond quickly to improved conditions." That is +not an honest answer. The truth is that if we cannot check the indraught +to the cities, we can, if we choose, make homes for those who come, and +at a profit on the investment. Nothing has been more clearly +demonstrated in our day, and it is time that it should be said so that +everybody can understand. It is not a case of transforming human nature +in the tenant, but of reforming it in the landlord builder. It is a +plain question of the per cent. he is willing to take. + +So that we may get the capmaker's view and that of his fellow +tenants,--for, after all, that is the one that counts; the state and the +community are not nearly so much interested in the profits of the +landlord as in the welfare of the workers,--suppose we take a stroll +through a tenement house neighborhood and see for ourselves. We were in +Stanton Street. Let us start there, then, going east. Towering barracks +on either side, five, six stories high. Teeming crowds. Push-cart men +"moved on" by the policeman, who seems to exist only for the purpose. +Forsyth Street: there is a church on the corner, Polish and Catholic, a +combination that strikes one as queer here on the East Side, where +Polish has come to be synonymous with Jewish. I have cause to remember +that corner. A man killed his wife in this house, and was hanged for it. +Just across the street, on the stoop of that brown stone tenement, the +tragedy was reenacted the next year; only the murderer saved the county +trouble and expense by taking himself off, also. That other stoop in the +same row witnessed a suicide. Why do I tell you these things? Because +they are true. The policeman here will bear me out. They belong to the +ordinary setting of life in a crowd such as this. It is never so little +worth living, and therefore held so cheap along with the fierce, +unceasing battle that goes on to save it. You will go no further unless +I leave it out? Very well; I shall leave out the murder after we have +passed the block yonder. The tragedy of that is of a kind that comes too +close to the every-day life of tenement house people to be omitted. The +house caught fire in the night, and five were burned to death,--father, +mother, and three children. The others got out; why not they? They +stayed, it seems, to make sure none was left; they were not willing to +leave one behind, to save themselves. And then it was too late; the +stairs were burning. There was no proper fire escape. That was where the +murder came in; but it was not all chargeable to the landlord, nor even +the greater part. More than thirty years ago, in 1867, the state made it +law that the stairs in every tenement four stories high should be +fireproof, and forbade the storing of any inflammable material in such +houses. I do not know when the law was repealed, or if it ever was. I +only know that in 1892 the Fire Department, out of pity for the tenants +and regard for the safety of its own men, forced through an amendment to +the building law, requiring the stairs of the common type of five-story +tenements to be built of fireproof material, and that to-day they are of +wood, just as they always were. Only last spring I looked up the +Superintendent of Buildings and asked him what it meant. I showed him +the law, which said that the stairs should be "built of slow-burning +construction or fireproof material;" and he put his finger upon the +clause that follows, "as the Superintendent of Buildings shall decide." +The law gave him discretion, and that is how he used it. "Hard wood +burns slowly," said he. + +The fire of which I speak was a "cruller fire," if I remember rightly, +which is to say that it broke out in the basement bakeshop, where they +were boiling crullers (doughnuts) in fat, at four A. M., with a hundred +tenants asleep in the house above them. The fat went into the fire, and +the rest followed. I suppose that I had to do with a hundred such fires, +as a police reporter, before, under the protest of the Tenement House +Committee and the Good Government Clubs, the boiling of fat in tenement +bakeshops was forbidden. The chief of the Fire Department, in his +testimony before the committee, said that "tenements are erected mainly +with a view of returning a large income for the amount of capital +invested. It is only after a fire in which great loss of life occurs +that any interest whatever is taken in the safety of the occupants." The +Superintendent of Buildings, after such a fire in March, 1896, said that +there were thousands of tenement fire-traps in the city. My reporter's +notebook bears witness to the correctness of his statement, and it has +many blank leaves that are waiting to be put to that use yet. The +reckoning for eleven years showed that, of 35,844 fires in New York, +53.18 per cent. were in tenement houses, though they were only a little +more than 31 per cent. of all the buildings, and that 177 occupants were +killed, 523 maimed, and 625 rescued by the firemen. Their rescue cost +the lives of three of these brave men, and 453 were injured in the +effort. And when all that is said, not the half is told. A fire in the +night in one of those human beehives, with its terror and woe, is one of +the things that live in the recollection ever after as a terrible +nightmare. Yet the demonstration of the Tenement House Committee, that +to build tenements fireproof from the ground up would cost little over +ten per cent. more than is spent upon the firetrap, and would more than +return the interest on the extra outlay in the saving of insurance and +repairs, and in the better building every way, has found no echo in +legislation or in the practice of builders. That was the fire chief's +way to avoid "the great destruction of life;" but he warned the +committee that it would "meet with strong opposition from the different +interests, should legislation be requested." The interest of the man who +pays the rent will not be suspected in this, so he must have meant the +man who collects it. + +Here is a block of tenements inhabited by poor Jews. Most of the Jews +who live over here are poor; and the poorer they are, the higher rent do +they pay, and the more do they crowd to make it up between them. "The +destruction of the poor is their poverty." It is only the old story in a +new setting. The slum landlord's profits were always the highest. He +spends nothing for repairs, and lays the blame on the tenant. The +"district leader" saves him, in these days of Tammany rule come back, +unless he is on the wrong side of the political fence, in which case +the Sanitary Code comes handy to chase him into camp. A big "order" on +his house is a very effective way of making a tenement house landlord +discern political truth on the eve of an important election. Just before +the last, when the election of Theodore Roosevelt was threatened, the +sanitary force displayed such activity as it has not since, up to the +raid on the elevated roads, in the examination of tenements belonging +very largely, as it happened, to sympathizers with the gallant Rough +Rider's cause; and those who knew did not marvel much at the large vote +polled by the Tammany candidate in the old city. + +The halls of these tenements are dark. Under the law, there should be a +light burning, but it is one of the rarest things to find one. The thing +seems well-nigh impossible of accomplishment. Two years ago, when the +Good Government Clubs set about backing up the Board of Health in its +efforts to work out this reform, which comes close to being one of the +most necessary of all,--such untold mischief is abroad in the darkness +of these thoroughfares,--the sanitary police reported 12,000 tenement +halls unlighted by night, even, and brought them, by repeated orders, +down to less than 1000 in six months. I do not believe the light burns +in 1000 of them all to-day. It is so easy to put it out when the +policeman's back is turned, and save the gas. + +We had a curious instance at the time of the difficulties that sometimes +beset reform. Certain halls that were known to be dark were reported +sufficiently lighted by the policeman of the district, and it was +discovered that it was his standard that was vitiated. He himself lived +in a tenement, and was used to its gloom. So an order was issued +defining darkness to the sanitary police: if the sink in the hall could +be made out, and the slops overflowing on the floor, and if a baby could +be seen on the stairs, the hall was light; if, on the other hand, the +baby's shrieks were the first warning that it was being trampled upon, +the hall was dark. Some days later, the old question arose about an +Eldridge Street tenement. The policeman had reported the hall light +enough. The president of the Board of Health, to settle it once for all, +went over with me, to see for himself. The hall was very dark. He sent +for the policeman. + +"Did you see the sink in that hall?" he asked. + +The policeman said he did. + +"But it is pitch dark. How did you see it?" + +"I lit a match," said the policeman. + +Four families live on these floors, with Heaven knows how many children. +It was here the police commissioners were requested, in sober earnest, +some years ago, by a committee of very practical women philanthropists, +to have the children tagged, so as to save the policemen wear and tear +in taking them back and forth between the Eldridge Street police station +and headquarters, when they got lost. If tagged, they could be assorted +at once and taken to their homes. Incidentally, the city would save the +expense of many meals. It was shrewdly suspected that the little ones +were lost on purpose in a good many cases, as a way of getting them fed +at the public expense. + +That the children preferred the excitement of the police station, and +the distinction of a trip in charge of a brass-buttoned guardian, to +the Ludlow Street flat is easy enough to understand. A more unlovely +existence than that in one of these tenements it would be hard to +imagine. Everywhere is the stench of the kerosene stove that is forever +burning, serving for cooking, heating, and ironing alike, until the last +atom of oxygen is burned out of the close air. Oil is cheaper than coal. +The air shaft is too busy carrying up smells from below to bring any air +down, even if it is not hung full of washing in every story, as it +ordinarily is. Enterprising tenants turn it to use as a refrigerator as +well. There is at least a draught of air, such as it is. When fire +breaks out, this draught makes of the air shaft a flue through which the +fire roars fiercely to the roof, so transforming what was meant for the +good of the tenants into their greatest peril. The stuffy rooms seem as +if they were made for dwarfs. Most decidedly, there is not room to swing +the proverbial cat in any one of them. In one I helped the children, +last holiday, to set up a Christmas tree, so that a glimpse of something +that was not utterly sordid and mean might for once enter their lives. +Three weeks after, I found the tree standing yet in the corner. It was +very cold, and there was no fire in the room. "We were going to burn +it," said the little woman, whose husband was then in the insane asylum, +"and then I couldn't. It looked so kind o' cheery-like there in the +corner." My tree had borne the fruit I wished. + +It remained for the New York slum landlord to assess the exact value of +a ray of sunlight,--upon the tenant, of course. Here are two +back-to-back rear tenements, with dark bedrooms on the south. The flat +on the north gives upon a neighbor's yard, and a hole two feet square +has been knocked in the wall, letting in air and sunlight; little enough +of the latter, but what there is is carefully computed in the lease. Six +dollars for this flat, six and a half for the one with the hole in the +wall. Six dollars a year per ray. In half a dozen houses in this block +have I found the same rate maintained. The modern tenement on the corner +goes higher: for four front rooms, "where the sun comes right in your +face," seventeen dollars; for the rear flat of three rooms, larger and +better every other way, but always dark, like the capmaker's, eleven +dollars. From the landlord's point of view, this last is probably a +concession. But he is a landlord with a heart. His house is as good a +one as can be built on a twenty-five-foot lot. The man who owns the +corner building in Orchard Street, with the two adjoining tenements, has +no heart. In the depth of last winter, I found a family of poor Jews +living in a coop under his stairs, an abandoned piece of hallway, in +which their baby was born, and for which he made them pay eight dollars +a month. It was the most outrageous case of landlord robbery I had ever +come across, and it gave me sincere pleasure to assist the sanitary +policeman in curtailing his profits by even this much. The hall is not +now occupied. + +The Jews under the stairs had two children. The shoemaker in the cellar +next door has three. They were fighting and snarling like so many dogs +over the coarse food on the table before them, when we looked in. The +baby, it seems, was the cause of the row. He wanted it all. He was a +very dirty and a very fierce baby, and the other two children were no +match for him. The shoemaker grunted fretfully at his last, "Ach, he is +all de time hungry!" At the sight of the policeman, the young imp set up +such a howl that we beat a hasty retreat. The cellar "flat" was +undoubtedly in violation of law, but it was allowed to pass. In the main +hall, on the ground floor, we counted seventeen children. The facts of +life here suspend ordinary landlord prejudices to a certain extent. +Occasionally it is the tenant who suspends them. The policeman laughed +as he told me of the case of a mother who coveted a flat into which she +well knew her family would not be admitted; the landlord was particular. +She knocked, with a troubled face, alone. Yes, the flat was to let; had +she any children? The woman heaved a sigh. "Six, but they are all in +Greenwood." The landlord's heart was touched by such woe. He let her +have the flat. By night he was amazed to find a flock of half a dozen +robust youngsters domiciled under his roof. They had indeed been in +Greenwood; but they had come back from the cemetery to stay. And stay +they did, the rent being paid. + +High rents, slack work, and low wages go hand in hand in the tenements +as promoters of overcrowding. The rent is always one fourth of the +family income, often more. The fierce competition for a bare living cuts +down wages; and when loss of work is added, the only thing left is to +take in lodgers to meet the landlord's claim. The Jew usually takes them +singly, the Italian by families. The midnight visit of the sanitary +policeman discloses a state of affairs against which he feels himself +helpless. He has his standard: 400 cubic feet of air space for each +adult sleeper, 200 for a child. That in itself is a concession to the +practical necessities of the case. The original demand was for 600 feet. +But of 28,000 and odd tenants canvassed in New York, in the slumming +investigation prosecuted by the general government in 1894, 17,047 were +found to have less than 400 feet, and of these 5526 slept in +unventilated rooms with no windows. No more such rooms have been added +since; but there has come that which is worse. + +It was the boast of New York, till a few years ago, that at least that +worst of tenement depravities, the one-room house, too familiar in the +English slums, was practically unknown here. It is not so any longer. +The evil began in the old houses in Orchard and Allen streets, a bad +neighborhood, infested by fallen women and the thievish rascals who prey +upon their misery,--a region where the whole plan of humanity, if plan +there be in this disgusting mess, jars out of tune continually. The +furnished-room house has become an institution here, speeded on by a +conscienceless Jew who bought up the old buildings as fast as they came +into the market, and filled them with a class of tenants before whom +charity recoils, helpless and hopeless. When the houses were filled, the +crowds overflowed into the yard. In one case, I found, in midwinter, +tenants living in sheds built of odd boards and roof tin, and paying a +dollar a week for herding with the rats. One of them, a red-faced +German, was a philosopher after his kind. He did not trouble himself to +get up, when I looked in, but stretched himself in his bed,--it was high +noon,--responding to my sniff of disgust that it was "sehr schoen! ein +bischen kalt, aber was!" His neighbor, a white-haired old woman, begged, +trembling, not to be put out. She would not know where to go. It was +out of one of these houses that Fritz Meyer, the murderer, went to rob +the poorbox in the Redemptorist Church, the night when he killed +policeman Smith. The policeman surprised him at his work. In the room he +had occupied I came upon a brazen-looking woman with a black eye, who +answered the question of the officer, "Where did you get that shiner?" +with a laugh. "I ran up against the fist of me man," she said. Her +"man," a big, sullen lout, sat by, dumb. The woman answered for him that +he was a mechanic. + +"What does he work at?" snorted the policeman, restraining himself with +an effort from kicking the fellow. + +She laughed scornfully. "At the junk business." It meant that he was a +thief. + +Young men, with blotched faces and cadaverous looks, were loafing in +every room. They hung their heads in silence. The women turned their +faces away at the sight of the uniform. They cling to these wretches, +who exploit their starved affections for their own ease, with a grip of +desperation. It is their last hold. Women have to love something. It is +their deepest degradation that they must love these. Even the wretches +themselves feel the shame of it, and repay them by beating and robbing +them, as their daily occupation. A poor little baby in one of the rooms +gave a shuddering human touch to it all. + +The old houses began it, as they began all the tenement mischief that +has come upon New York. But the opportunity that was made by the +tenant's need was not one to be neglected. In some of the newer +tenements, with their smaller rooms, the lodger is by this time provided +for in the plan, with a special entrance from the hall. "Lodger" comes, +by an easy transition, to stand for "family." Only the other night I +went with the sanitary police on their midnight inspection through a row +of Elizabeth Street tenements which I had known since they were built, +fifteen or sixteen years ago. That is the neighborhood in which the +recent Italian immigrants crowd. In the house which we selected for +examination, in all respects the type of the rest, we found forty-three +families where there should have been sixteen. Upon each floor were four +flats, and in each flat three rooms that measured respectively 14 x 11, +7 x 11, and 7 x 8-1/2 feet. In only one flat did we find a single +family. In three there were two to each. In the other twelve each room +had its own family living and sleeping there. They cooked, I suppose, at +the one stove in the kitchen, which was the largest room. In one big bed +we counted six persons, the parents and four children. Two of them lay +crosswise at the foot of the bed, or there would not have been room. A +curtain was hung before the bed in each of the two smaller rooms, +leaving a passageway from the hall to the main room. The rent for the +front flats was twelve dollars; for that in the rear ten dollars. The +social distinctions going with the advantage of location were rigidly +observed, I suppose. The three steps across a tenement hall, from the +front to "the back," are often a longer road than from Ludlow Street to +Fifth Avenue. + +They were sweaters' tenements. But I shall keep that end of the story +until I come to speak of the tenants. The houses I have in mind now. +They were Astor leasehold property, and I had seen them built upon the +improved plan of 1879, with air shafts and all that. There had not been +water in the tenements for a month then, we were told by the one tenant +who spoke English that could be understood. The cold snap had locked the +pipes. Fitly enough, the lessee was an undertaker, an Italian himself, +who combined with his business of housing his people above and below the +ground that of the padrone, to let no profit slip. He had not taken the +trouble to make many or recent repairs. The buildings had made a fair +start; they promised well. But the promise had not been kept. In their +premature decay they were distinctly as bad as the worst. I had the +curiosity to seek out the agent, the middleman, and ask him why they +were so. He shrugged his shoulders. With such tenants nothing could be +done, he said. I have always held that Italians are most manageable, and +that, with all the surface indications to the contrary, they are really +inclined to cleanliness, if cause can be shown, and I told him so. He +changed the subject diplomatically. No doubt it was with him simply a +question of the rent. They might crowd and carry on as they pleased, +once that was paid; and they did. It used to be the joke of Elizabeth +Street that when the midnight police came, the tenants would keep them +waiting outside, pretending to search for the key, until the surplus +population of men had time to climb down the fire escape. When the +police were gone they came back. We surprised them all in bed. + +Like most of the other tenements we have come across on our trip, these +were double-deckers. That is the type of tenement that is responsible +for the crowding that goes on unchecked. It is everywhere replacing the +older barracks, as they rot or are torn down. + +This double-decker was thus described by the Tenement House Committee of +1894: "It is the one hopeless form of tenement construction. It cannot +be well ventilated, it cannot be well lighted; it is not safe in case of +fire. It is built on a lot 25 feet wide by 100 or less in depth, with +apartments for four families in each story. This necessitates the +occupation of from 86 to 90 per cent. of the lot's depth. The stairway, +made in the centre of the house, and the necessary walls and partitions +reduce the width of the middle rooms (which serve as bedrooms for at +least two people each) to 9 feet each at the most, and a narrow light +and air shaft, now legally required in the centre of each side wall, +still further lessens the floor space of these middle rooms. Direct +light is only possible for the rooms at the front and rear. The middle +rooms must borrow what light they can from dark hallways, the shallow +shafts, and the rear rooms. Their air must pass through other rooms or +the tiny shafts, and cannot but be contaminated before it reaches them. +A five-story house of this character contains apartments for eighteen or +twenty families, a population frequently amounting to 100 people, and +sometimes increased by boarders or lodgers to 150 or more." + +The committee, after looking in vain through the slums of the Old World +cities for something to compare the double-deckers with, declared that, +in their setting, the separateness and sacredness of home life were +interfered with, and evils bred, physical and moral, that "conduce to +the corruption of the young." The statement needs no argument to +convince. + +Yet it is for these that the "interests" of which the fire chief spoke +rush into battle at almost every session of the legislature, whenever a +step, no matter how short and conservative, is to be taken toward their +improvement. No winter has passed, since the awakening conscience of the +people of New York city manifested itself in a desire to better the lot +of the other half, that has not seen an assault made, in one shape or +another, on the structure of tenement house law built up with such +anxious solicitude. Once a bill to exempt from police supervision, by +withdrawing them from the tenement house class, the very worst of the +houses, whose death rate threatened the community, was sneaked through +the legislature all unknown, and had reached the executive before the +alarm was sounded. The governor, put upon his guard, returned the bill, +with the indorsement that he was unable to understand what could have +prompted a measure that seemed to have reason and every argument against +it, and none for it. But the motive is not so obscure, after all. It is +the same old one of profit without conscience. It took from the Health +Department the supervision of the light, ventilation, and plumbing of +the tenements, which by right belonged there, and put it in charge of a +compliant Building Department, "for the convenience of architects and +their clients, and the saving of time and expense to them." For the +convenience of the architect's client, the builder, the lot was +encroached upon, until of one big block which the Tenement House +Committee measured only 7 per cent. was left uncovered for the air to +struggle through; 93 per cent. of it was covered with brick and mortar. +Rear tenements, to the number of nearly 100, have been condemned as +"slaughter houses," with good reason, but this block was built +practically solid. The average of space covered in 34 tenement blocks +was shown to be 78.13 per cent. The law allowed only 65. The +"discretion" that pens tenants in a burning tenement with stairs of wood +for the builder's "convenience" cut down the chance of life of their +babies unmoved. Sunlight and air mean just that, where three thousand +human beings are packed into a single block. That was why the matter was +given into the charge of the health officials, when politics was yet +kept out of their work. + +Of such kind are the interests that oppose betterment of the worker's +hard lot in New York; that dictated the appointment by Tammany of a +commission composed of builders to revise its code of building laws, and +that sneer at the "laughable results of the late Tenement House +Committee." Those results made for the health and happiness and safety +of a million and a half of souls, and were accounted, on every humane +ground, the longest step forward that had yet been taken by this +community. For the old absentee landlord, who did not know what mischief +was afoot, we have got the speculative builder, who does know, but does +not care so long as he gets his pound of flesh. Half of the just laws +that have been passed for the relief of the people he has paralyzed with +his treacherous discretion clause, carefully nursed in the school of +practical politics to which he gives faithful adherence. The thing has +been the curse of our city from the day when the earliest struggle +toward better things began. Among the first manifestations of that was +the prohibition of soap factories below Grand Street by the act of 1797, +which created a Board of Health with police powers. The act was passed +in February, to take effect in July; but long before that time the same +legislature had amended it by giving the authorities discretion in the +matter. And the biggest soap factory of them all is down there to this +day, and is even now stirring up a rumpus among the latest immigrants, +the Syrians, who have settled about it. No doubt it is all a question of +political education; but are not a hundred years enough to settle this +much, that compromise is out of place where the lives of the people are +at stake, and that it is time our years of "discretion" were numbered? + +And, please God, the time is at hand. Here, set in its frame of swarming +tenements, is a wide open space, some time, when enough official red +tape has been unwound, to be a park, with flowers and grass and birds to +gladden the hearts of those to whom such things have been as tales that +are told, all these dreary years, and with a playground in which the +children of yonder big school may roam at will, undismayed by landlord +or policeman. Not all the forces of reaction can put back the barracks +that were torn down as one of the "laughable results" of that very +Tenement House Committee's work, or restore to the undertaker his +profits from Bone Alley of horrid memory. It was the tenant's turn to +laugh, that time. Down half a dozen blocks, among even denser swarms, is +another such plot, where football and a skating pond are being planned +by the children's friends. We shall hear the story of these yet, and +rejoice that the day of reckoning is coming for the builder without a +soul. Till then let him deck the fronts of his tenements with bravery of +plate glass and brass to hide the darkness within. He has done his +worst. + +We can go no further. Yonder lies the river. A full mile we have come, +through unbroken ranks of tenements with their mighty, pent-up +multitudes. Here they seem, with a common impulse, to overflow into the +street. From corner to corner it is crowded with girls and children +dragging babies nearly as big as themselves, with desperate endeavor to +lose nothing of the show. There is a funeral in the block. Unnumbered +sewing-machines cease for once their tireless rivalry with the flour +mill in the next block, that is forever grinding in a vain effort to +catch up. Heads are poked from windows. On the stoops hooded and shawled +figures have front seats. The crowd is hardly restrained by the +policeman and the undertaker in holiday mourning, who clear a path by +force to the plumed hearse. The eager haste, the frantic rush to +see,--what does it not tell of these starved lives, of the quality of +their aims and ambitions? The mill clatters loudly: there is one mouth +less to fill. In the midst of it all, with clamor of urgent gong, the +patrol wagon rounds the corner, carrying two policemen precariously +perched upon a struggling "drunk," a woman. The crowd scatters, +following the new sensation. The tragedies of death and life in the slum +have met together. + +Many a mile I might lead you along these rivers, east and west, through +the island of Manhattan, and find little else than we have seen. The +great crowd is yet below Fourteenth Street, but the northward march +knows no slackening of pace. As the tide sets uptown, it reproduces +faithfully the scenes of the older wards, though with less of their +human interest than here where the old houses, in all their ugliness, +have yet some imprint of the individuality of their tenants. Only on +feast days does Little Italy, in Harlem, recall the Bend when it put on +holiday attire. Anything more desolate and disheartening than the +unending rows of tenements, all alike and all equally repellent, of the +uptown streets, it is hard to imagine. Hell's Kitchen in its ancient +wickedness was picturesque, at least, with its rocks and its goats and +shanties. Since the negroes took possession it is only dull, except +when, as happened last summer, the remnant of the Irish settlers make a +stand against the intruders. Vain hope! Perpetual eviction is their +destiny. Negro, Italian, and Jew, biting the dust with many a bruised +head under the Hibernian's stalwart fist, resistlessly drive him before +them, nevertheless, out of house and home. The landlord pockets the gate +money. The old robbery still goes on. Where the negro pitches his tent, +he pays more rent than his white neighbor next door, and is a better +tenant. And he is good game forever. He never buys the tenement, as the +Jew or the Italian is likely to do, when he has scraped up money enough +to reenact, after his own fashion, the trick taught him by his +oppressor. The black column has reached the hundredth street on the East +Side, and the sixties on the West,[2] and there for the present it +halts. Jammed between Africa, Italy, and Bohemia, the Irishman has +abandoned the East Side uptown. Only west of Central Park does he yet +face his foe, undaunted in defeat as in victory. The local street +nomenclature, in which the directory has no hand,--Nigger Row, Mixed Ale +Flats, etc.,--indicates the hostile camps with unerring accuracy. + +[Footnote 2: There is an advanced outpost of blacks as far up as One +Hundred and Forty-Fifth Street, but the main body lingers yet among the +sixties.] + +Uptown or downtown, as the tenements grow taller, the thing that is +rarest to find is the home of the olden days, even as it was in the +shanty on the rocks. "No home, no family, no morality, no manhood, no +patriotism!" said the old Frenchman. Seventy-seven per cent. of their +young prisoners, say the managers of the state reformatory, have no +moral sense, or next to none. "Weakness, not wickedness, ails them," +adds the prison chaplain; no manhood, that is to say. Years ago, roaming +through the British Museum, I came upon an exhibit that riveted my +attention as nothing else had. It was a huge stone arm, torn from the +shoulder of some rock image, with doubled fist and every rigid muscle +instinct with angry menace. Where it came from or what was its story I +do not know. I did not ask. It was its message to us I was trying to +read. I had been spending weary days and nights in the slums of London, +where hatred grew, a noxious crop, upon the wreck of the home. Lying +there, mute and menacing, the great fist seemed to me like a shadow +thrown from the gray dawn of the race into our busy day with a purpose, +a grim, unheeded warning. What was it? In the slum the question haunts +me yet. They perished, the empires those rock-hewers built, and the +governments reared upon their ruins are long since dead and forgotten. +They were born to die, for they were not built upon human happiness, but +upon human terror and greed. We built ours upon the bed rock, and its +cornerstone is the home. With this bitter mockery of it that makes the +slum, can it be that the warning is indeed for us? + + + + +III + +THE TENEMENT: CURING ITS BLIGHT + + +I stood at Seven Dials and heard the policeman's account of what it used +to be. Seven Dials is no more like the slum of old than is the Five +Points to-day. The conscience of London wrought upon the one as the +conscience of New York upon the other. A mission house, a children's +refuge, two big schools, and, hard by, a public bath and a wash house +stand as the record of the battle with the slum, which, with these +forces in the field, has but one ending. The policeman's story rambled +among the days when things were different. Then it was dangerous for an +officer to go alone there at night. + +Around the corner there came from one of the side streets a procession +with banners, parading in honor and aid of some church charity. We +watched it pass. In it marched young men and boys with swords and +battle-axes, and upon its outskirts skipped a host of young roughs--so +one would have called them but for the evidence of their honest +employment--who rattled collection boxes, reaping a harvest of pennies +from far and near. I looked at the battle-axes and the collection boxes, +and thought of forty years ago. Where were the Seven Dials of that day, +and the men who gave it its bad name? I asked the policeman. + +"They were druv into decency, sor," he said, and answered from his own +experience the question ever asked by faint-hearted philanthropists. "My +father, he done duty here afore me in '45. The worst dive was where that +church stands. It was always full of thieves,"--whose sons, I added +mentally, have become collectors for the church. The one fact was a +whole chapter on the slum. + +London's way with the tenant we adopted at last in New York with the +slum landlord. He was "druv into decency." We had to. Moral suasion had +been stretched to the limit. The point had been reached where one +knock-down blow outweighed a bushel of arguments. It was all very well +to build model tenements as object lessons to show that the thing could +be done; it had become necessary to enforce the lesson by demonstrating +that the community had power to destroy houses which were a menace to +its life. The rear tenements were chosen for this purpose. + +They were the worst as they were the first of New York's tenements. The +double-deckers of which I have spoken had, with all their evils, at +least this to their credit, that their death rate was not nearly as high +as that of the old houses. That was not because of any virtue inherent +in the double-deckers, but because the earlier tenements were old, and +built in a day that knew nothing of sanitary restrictions, and cared +less. Hence the showing that the big tenements had much the lowest +mortality. The death rate does not sound the depths of tenement house +evils, but it makes a record that is needed when it comes to attacking +property rights. The mortality of the rear tenements had long been a +scandal. They are built in the back yard, generally back to back with +the rear buildings on abutting lots. If there is an open space between +them, it is never more than a slit a foot or so wide, and gets to be +the receptacle of garbage and filth of every kind; so that any opening +made in these walls for purposes of ventilation becomes a source of +greater danger than if there were none. The last count that was made, in +1898, showed that among the 40,958 tenements in New York there were +still 2379 rear houses left. Where they are the death rate rises, for +reasons that are apparent. The sun cannot reach them. They are damp and +dark, and the tenants, who are always the poorest and most crowded, live +"as in a cage open only toward the front," said the Tenement House +Committee. A canvass made of the mortality records by Dr. Roger S. +Tracy, the registrar of records, showed that while in the First Ward +(the oldest), for instance, the death rate in houses standing singly on +the lot was 29.03 per 1000 of the living, where there were rear houses +it rose to 61.97. The infant death rate is a still better test: that +rose from 109.58 in the single tenements of the same ward to 204.54 +where there were rear houses. One in every five babies had to die, that +is to say; the house killed it. No wonder the committee styled the rear +tenements "slaughter houses," and called upon the legislature to root +them out, and with them every old, ramshackle, disease-breeding tenement +in the city. + +A law which is in substance a copy of the English act for destroying +slum property was passed in the spring of 1895. It provides for the +seizure of buildings that are dangerous to the public health or unfit +for human habitation, and their destruction upon proper proof, with +compensation to the owner on a sliding scale down to the point of entire +unfitness, when he is entitled only to the value of the material in his +house. Up to that time, the only way to get rid of such a house had been +to declare it a nuisance under the sanitary code; but as the city could +not very well pay for the removal of a nuisance, to order it down seemed +too much like robbery; so the owner was allowed to keep it. It takes +time and a good many lives to grow a sentiment such as this law +expressed. The Anglo-Saxon respect for vested rights is strong in us, +also. I remember going through a ragged school in London, once, and +finding the eyes of the children in the infant class red and sore. +Suspecting some contagion, I made inquiries, and was told that a collar +factory next door was the cause of the trouble. The fumes from it +poisoned the children's eyes. + +"And you allow it to stay, and let this thing go on?" I asked, in +wonder. + +The superintendent shrugged his shoulders. "It is their factory," he +said. + +I was on the point of saying something that might not have been polite, +seeing that I was a guest, when I remembered that, in the newspaper +which I carried in my pocket, I had just been reading a plea of some +honorable M. P. for a much-needed reform in the system of counsel fees, +then being agitated in the House of Commons. The reply of the solicitor +general had made me laugh. He was inclined to agree with the honorable +member, but still preferred to follow precedent by referring the matter +to the Inns of Court. Quite incidentally, he mentioned that the matter +had been hanging fire in the House two hundred years. It seemed very +English to me then; but when we afterward came to tackle our rear +tenements, and in the first batch there was a row which I knew to have +been picked out by the sanitary inspector, twenty-five years before, as +fit only to be destroyed, I recognized that we were kin, after all. + +[Illustration: THE MOTT STREET BARRACKS] + +That was Gotham Court. It was first on the list, and the Mott Street +Barracks came next, when, as executive officer of the Good Government +Clubs, I helped the Board of Health put the law to the test the +following year. The Health Department kept a list of 66 old houses, with +a population of 5460 tenants, in which there had been 1313 deaths in a +little over five years (1889-94). From among them we picked our lot, and +the department drove the tenants out. The owners went to law, one and +all; but, to their surprise and dismay, the courts held with the health +officers. The moral effect was instant and overwhelming. Rather than +keep up the fight, with no rent coming in, the landlords surrendered at +discretion. In consideration of this, compensation was allowed them at +the rate of about a thousand dollars a house, although they were really +entitled only to the value of the old material. The buildings all came +under the head of "wholly unfit." Gotham Court, with its sixteen +buildings, in which, thirty-five years ago, a health inspector counted +146 cases of sickness, including "all kinds of infectious disease," was +bought for $19,750, and Mullen's Court, adjoining, for $7251. They had +been under civilized management since, but nothing decent could be made +out of them. To show the character of all, let two serve; in each case +it is the official record, upon which seizure was made, that is +quoted:-- + +No. 98 Catherine Street: "The floor in the apartments and the wooden +steps leading to the second-floor apartment are broken, loose, saturated +with filth. The roof and eaves gutters leak, rendering the apartments +wet. The two apartments on the first floor consist of one room each, in +which the tenants are compelled to cook, eat, and sleep. The back walls +are defective; the house wet and damp, and unfit for human habitation. +It robs the surrounding houses of light." + +"The sunlight never enters" was the constant refrain. + +No. 17 Sullivan Street: "Occupied by the lowest whites and negroes, +living together. The houses are decayed from cellar to garret, and +filthy beyond description,--the filthiest, in fact, we have ever seen. +The beams, the floors, the plaster on the walls, where there is any +plaster, are rotten and alive with vermin. They are a menace to the +public health, and cannot be repaired. Their annual death rate in five +years was 41.38." + +The sunlight enters where these stood, at all events, and into 58 other +yards that once were plague spots. Of 94 rear tenements seized that +year, 60 have been torn down, 33 of them voluntarily by the owners; 29 +were remodeled and allowed to stand, chiefly as workshops; 5 other +houses were standing empty, and yielding no rent, in March, 1899. The +worst of them all, the Mott Street Barracks, are yet in the courts; but +all the judges and juries in the land have no power to put them back. It +is a case of "They can't put you in jail for that"--"Yes, but I am in +jail." They are gone, torn down under the referee's decision that they +ought to go, before the Appellate Division called a halt. In 1888 I +counted 360 tenants in these tenements, front and rear, all Italians, +and the infant death rate of the Barracks that year was 325 per 1000. +There were forty babies, and one in three of them had to die. The +general infant death rate for the whole tenement house population that +year was 88.38. In the four years following, during which the population +and the death rate of the houses were both reduced with an effort, +fifty-one funerals went out of the Barracks. With entire fitness, a +cemetery corporation held the mortgage upon the property. The referee +allowed it the price of opening one grave, in the settlement, gave one +dollar to the lessee and one hundred and ten dollars to the landlord, +who refused to collect, and took his case to the Court of Appeals, where +it is to be argued this summer. The only interest that attaches to it, +since the real question has been decided by the wrecker ahead of time, +is the raising of the constitutional point, perchance, and the issue of +that is not doubtful. The law has been repeatedly upheld, and in +Massachusetts, where similar action has been taken since, the +constitutionality of it has in no case been attacked, so far as I know. + +I have said before that I do not believe in paying the slum landlord +for taking his hand off our throats, when we have got the grip on him in +turn. Mr. Roger Foster, who as a member of the Tenement House Committee +drew the law, and as counsel for the Health Department fought the +landlords successfully in the courts, holds to the opposite view. I am +bound to say that instances turned up in which it did seem a hardship to +deprive the owners of even such property. I remember especially a +tenement in Roosevelt Street, which was the patrimony and whole estate +of two children. With the rear house taken away, the income from the +front would not be enough to cover the interest on the mortgage. It was +one of those things that occasionally make standing upon abstract +principle so very uncomfortable. I confess I never had the courage to +ask what was done in their case. I know that the tenement went, and I +hope--Well, never mind what I hope. It has nothing to do with the case. +The house is down, and the main issue decided upon its merits. + +In the 94 tenements (counting the front houses in; they cannot be +separated from the rear tenements in the death registry) there were in +five years 956 deaths, a rate of 62.9 at a time when the general city +death rate was 24.63. It was the last and heaviest blow aimed at the +abnormal mortality of a city that ought, by reason of many advantages, +to be one of the healthiest in the world. With clean streets, pure milk, +medical school inspection, antitoxin treatment of deadly diseases, and +better sanitary methods generally; with the sunlight let into its slums, +and its worst plague spots cleaned out, the death rate of New York came +down from 26.32 per 1000 inhabitants in 1887 to 19.53 in 1897. Inasmuch +as a round half million was added to its population within the ten +years, it requires little figuring to show that the number whose lives +were literally saved by reform would people a city of no mean +proportions. The extraordinary spell of hot weather, two years ago, +brought out the full meaning of this. While many were killed by +sunstroke, the population as a whole was shown to have acquired, in +better hygienic surroundings, a much greater power of resistance. It +yielded slowly to the heat. Where two days had been sufficient, in +former years, to send the death rate up, it now took five; and the +infant mortality remained low throughout the dreadful trial. Perhaps the +substitution of beer for whiskey as a summer drink had something to do +with it; but Colonel Waring's broom and unpolitical sanitation had more. +Since it spared him so many voters, the politician ought to have been +grateful for this; but he was not. Death rates are not as good political +arguments as tax rates, we found out. In the midst of it all, a +policeman whom I knew went to his Tammany captain to ask if Good +Government Clubs were political clubs within the meaning of the law, +which prohibits policemen from joining such. The answer he received set +me to thinking: "Yes, the meanest, worst kind of political clubs, they +are." Yet they had done nothing worse than to save the babies, the +captain's with the rest. + +The landlord read the signs better. He learned his lesson quickly. All +over the city, he made haste to set his house to rights, lest it be +seized or brought to the bar in other ways. The Good Government Clubs +did not rest content with their first victory. They made war upon the +dark hall in the double-decker, and upon the cruller bakery. They +opened small parks, exposed the abuses of the civil courts, the "poor +man's courts," urged on the building of new schools, compelled the +cleaning of the Tombs prison and hastened the demolition of the wicked +old pile, and took a hand in evolving a sensible and humane system of +dealing with the young vagrants who were going to waste on free soup. +The proposition to establish a farm colony for their reclamation was met +with the challenge at Albany that "we have had enough reform in New York +city," and, as the event proved, for the time being we had really gone +as far as we could. But even that was a good long way. Some things had +been nailed that could never again be undone; and hand in hand with the +effort to destroy had gone another to build up, that promised to set us +far enough ahead to appeal at last successfully to the self-interest of +the builder, if not to his humanity; or, failing that, to compel him to +decency. If that promise has not been kept, the end is not yet. I +believe it will be kept. + +The movement for reform, in the matter of housing the people, had +proceeded upon a clearly outlined plan that apportioned to each of +several forces its own share of the work. At a meeting held under the +auspices of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, +early in the days of the movement, the field had been gone over +thoroughly. To the Good Government Clubs fell the task, as already set +forth, of compelling the enforcement of the existing tenement house +laws. D. O. Mills, the philanthropic banker, declared his purpose to +build hotels which should prove that a bed and lodging as good as any +could be furnished to the great army of homeless men at a price that +would compete with the cheap lodging houses, and yet yield a profit to +the owner. On behalf of a number of well-known capitalists, who had been +identified with the cause of tenement house reform for years, Robert +Fulton Cutting, the president of the Association for Improving the +Condition of the Poor, offered to build homes for the working people +that should be worthy of the name, on a large scale. A company was +formed, and chose for its president Dr. Elgin R. L. Gould, author of the +government report on the Housing of the Working People, the standard +work on the subject. A million dollars were raised by public +subscription, and operations were begun at once. + +Two ideas were kept in mind as fundamental: one, that charity that will +not pay will not stay; the other, that nothing can be done with the +twenty-five-foot lot. It is the primal curse of our housing system, and +any effort toward better things must reckon with it first. Nineteen lots +on Sixty-Eighth and Sixty-Ninth streets, west of Tenth Avenue, were +purchased of Mrs. Alfred Corning Clark, who took one tenth of the +capital stock of the City and Suburban Homes Company; and upon these was +erected the first block of tenements. This is the neighborhood toward +which the population has been setting with ever increasing congestion. +Already in 1895 the Twenty-Second Ward contained nearly 200,000 souls. +Between Forty-Ninth and Sixty-Second streets, west of Ninth Avenue, +there are at least five blocks with more than 3000 tenants in each, and +the conditions of the notorious Tenth Ward are certain to be reproduced +here, if indeed they are not exceeded. In the Fifteenth Assembly +District, some distance below, but on the same line, the first +sociological canvass of the Federation of Churches had found the +churches, schools, and other educational agencies marshaling a frontage +of 756 feet on the street, while the saloon fronts stretched themselves +over nearly a mile; so that, said the compiler of these pregnant facts, +"saloon social ideals are minting themselves in the minds of the people +at the ratio of seven saloon thoughts to one educational thought." It +would not have been easy to find a spot better fitted for the experiment +of restoring to the home its rights. + +[Illustration: ALFRED CORNING CLARK BUILDINGS + +_Model Tenements of City and Suburban Homes Co._] + +The Alfred Corning Clark Buildings, as they were called in recognition +of the support of this public-spirited woman, have been occupied a year. +When I went through them, the other day, I found all but five of the 373 +apartments they contain occupied, and a very large waiting list of +applicants for whom there was no room. The doctor alone, of all the +tenants, had moved away, disappointed. He had settled on the estate, +hoping to build up a practice among so many; but he could not make a +living. The plan of the buildings, for which Ernest Flagg, a young +and energetic architect, with a very practical interest in the welfare +of the Other Half, has the credit, seems to me to realize the ideal of +making homes under a common roof. The tenants appeared to take the same +view of it. They were a notably contented lot. Their only objection was +to the use of the common tubs in the basement laundry,--a sign that, to +my mind, was rather favorable than otherwise, though it argued ill for +the scheme of public wash houses on the Glasgow plan that has seemed so +promising. They were selected tenants as to trustworthiness and +desirability on that score, but they were all of the tenement house +class. The rents are a little lower than for much poorer quarters in the +surrounding tenements. The houses are built around central courts, with +light and air in abundance, with fireproof stairs and steam-heated +halls. There is not a dark passage anywhere. Within, there is entire +privacy for the tenant; the partitions are deadened, so that sound is +not transmitted from one apartment to another. Without, the houses have +none of the discouraging barrack look. The architecture is distinctly +pleasing. The few and simple rules laid down by the management have been +readily complied with, as making for the benefit of all. A woman +collects the rents, which are paid weekly in advance. The promise that +the property will earn the five per cent. to which the company limits +its dividends seems certain to be kept. There is nothing in sight to +prevent it, everything to warrant the prediction. + +The capital stock has since been increased to $2,000,000, and the +erection has been begun of a new block of buildings in East Sixty-Fourth +Street, within hail of Battle Row, of anciently warlike memory. James E. +Ware & Son, the architects who, in the competition of 1879, won the +prize for the improved tenements that marked the first departure from +the boxlike barracks of old, drew the plans, embodying all the good +features of the Clark Buildings with attractions of their own. A +suburban colony is being developed by the company, in addition. It is +not the least promising feature of its work that a very large proportion +of its shareholders are workingmen, who have invested their savings in +the enterprise, thus bearing witness to their faith and interest in it. +Of the entire number of shareholders at the time of the first annual +report, forty-five per cent, held less than ten shares each. + +The success of these and previous efforts at the building of model +tenements has had the desired effect of encouraging other attempts in +the same direction. They represent the best that can be done in fighting +the slum within the city. Homewood, the City and Suburban Homes +Company's settlement in the country, stands for the way out that must +eventually win the fight. That is the track that must be followed, and +will be when we have found in rapid transit the key to the solution of +our present perplexities. "In the country" hardly describes the site of +the colony. It is within the Greater City, on Long Island, hardly an +hour's journey by trolley from the City Hall, and only a short walk from +the bay. Here the company has built a hundred cottages, and has room for +two or three hundred more. Of the hundred houses, seventy-two had been +sold when I was there last winter. They are handsome and substantial +little houses, the lower story of brick, the upper of timber and +stucco, each cottage standing in its own garden. The purchaser pays for +the property in monthly payments extending over twenty years. A plan of +life insurance, which protects the family and the company alike in the +event of the death of the bread-winner, is included in the arrangement. +The price of the cottages which so far have found owners has averaged +about $3100, and the monthly installment, including the insurance +premium, a trifle over $25. It follows that the poorest have not moved +to Homewood. Its settlers include men with an income of $1200 or $1500 a +year,--policemen, pilots, letter carriers, clerks, and teachers. This is +as it should be. They represent the graduating class, as it were, from +the city crowds. It is the province of the philanthropic tenement to +prepare the next lot for moving up and out. Any attempt to hasten the +process by taking a short cut could result only in failure and +disappointment. The graduating class is large enough, however, to +guarantee that it will not be exhausted by one Homewood. Before the +houses were contracted for, without advertising or effort of any kind to +make the thing known, more than eight hundred wage earners had asked to +have their names put on the books as applicants for suburban homes. + +Others had built model tenements and made them pay, but it was left to +Mr. D. O. Mills to break ground in the field which Lord Rowton had +filled with such signal success in London. The two Mills Houses, in +Bleecker and Rivington streets, are as wide a departure as could well be +imagined from the conventional type of lodging houses in New York. They +are large and beautiful structures, which, for the price of a cot in one +of the Bowery barracks, furnish their lodgers with as good a bed in a +private room as the boarder in the Waldorf-Astoria enjoys. Indeed, it is +said to be the very same in make and quality. There are baths without +stint, smoking and writing rooms and games, and a free library; a +laundry for those who can pay for having their washing done, and a +separate one for such as prefer to do it themselves. There is a +restaurant in the basement, in which a regular dinner of good quality is +served at fifteen cents. The night's lodging is twenty cents. The +dearest Bowery lodging houses charge twenty-five cents. The bedrooms +are necessarily small, but they are clean and comfortable, well lighted +and heated. The larger house, No. 1, in Bleecker Street, has room for +1554 guests; No. 2, in Rivington Street, for 600. Though this represents +more than twelve per cent, of the capacity of all the cheap lodging +houses in the city, both have been filled since they were opened, and +crowds have often been turned away. The Bowery "hotels" have felt the +competition. Their owners deny it, but the fact is apparent in efforts +at improvements with which they were not justly chargeable before. Only +the lowest, the ten-cent houses, are exempt from this statement. These +attract a class of custom for which the Mills Houses do not compete. The +latter are intended for the large number of decent mechanics, laborers, +and men of small means, hunting for work, who are always afloat in a +large city, and who neither seek nor wish charity. The plan and purpose +of the builder cannot be better put than in his own words at the opening +of the first house. + +"No patron of the Mills Hotel," he said, "will receive more than he pays +for, unless it be my hearty goodwill and good wishes. It is true that I +have devoted thought, labor, and capital to a very earnest effort to +help him, but only by enabling him to help himself. In doing the work on +so large a scale, and in securing the utmost economies in purchases and +in administration, I hope to give him a larger equivalent for his money +than has hitherto been possible. He can, without scruple, permit me to +offer him this advantage; but he will think better of himself, and will +be a more self-reliant, manly man and a better citizen, if he knows that +he is honestly paying for what he gets." + +Mr. Mills's faith that the business of housing the homeless crowds in +decency and comfort could be made to pay just as well as that of housing +families in model tenements has been justified. Besides providing a fund +sufficient for deterioration and replacement, the two houses have made a +clear three per cent. profit on the investment of $1,500,000 which they +represent. Beyond this, they have borne, and will bear increasingly, +their own hand in settling with the saloon, which had no rival in the +cheerlessness of the cheap lodging house or the boarding house back +bedroom. Every philanthropic effort to fight it on that ground has drawn +renewed courage and hope from Mr. Mills's work and success. + +While I am writing, subscriptions are being made to the capital stock of +a Woman's Hotel Company, that will endeavor to do for the +self-supporting single women of our own city what Mr. Mills has done for +the men. It is proposed to erect, at a cost of $800,000, a hotel capable +of sheltering over 500 guests, at a price coming within reach of women +earning wages as clerks, stenographers, nurses, etc. The number of women +whose needs an establishment of the kind would meet is said to exceed +40,000. The Young Women's Christian Association alone receives every +year requests enough for quarters to fill a score of such hotels, and +can only refer the applicants to boarding houses. Experience in other +cities shows that a woman's hotel or club can be managed and made +profitable, and there seems to be little doubt that New York will be the +next to furnish proof of it. It was the dream of A. T. Stewart, the +merchant prince, to do this service for his city, just as he planned +Garden City for a home colony for his clerks. It came out differently. +The Long Island town became a cathedral city, and the home of wealth and +fashion; his woman's hoarding house a great public hotel, far out of the +reach of those he sought to benefit. It may be that the success of the +banker's philanthropy will yet realize the dream of the merchant before +the end of the century that saw his wealth, his great business, his very +name, vanish as if they had never been, and even his bones denied, by +ghoulish thieves, a rest in the grave. I like to think of it as a kind +of justice to his memory, more eloquent than marble and brass in the +empty crypt. Mills House No. 1 stands upon the site of Mr. Stewart's old +home, where he dreamed his barren dream of benevolence to his kind. + +Of all these movements the home is the keynote. That is the cheerful +sign that shows light ahead. To the home it comes down in the end,--good +government, bad government, and all the rest. As the homes of a +community are, so is the community. New York has still the worst housing +system in the world. Eight fifteenths of its people live in tenements, +not counting the better class of flats, though legally they come under +the definition. The blight of the twenty-five-foot lot remains, with the +double-decker. But we can now destroy what is not fit to stand; we have +done it, and our republic yet survives. The slum landlord would have had +us believe that it must perish with his rookeries. We knew that to build +decently improved a neighborhood, made the tenants better and happier, +and reduced the mortality. Model tenement house building is now proving +daily that such houses can be built safer and better every way for less +money than the double-decker, by crossing the lot line. The dark hall is +not a problem in the tenement built around a central court, for there is +no common hall. The plan of the double-decker is shown to be wasteful of +space and wall and capital. The model tenement pays, does not +deteriorate, and keeps its tenants. After the lapse of ten years, I was +the other day in Mr. A. T. White's Riverside Buildings in Brooklyn, +which are still the best I know of, and found them, if anything, better +houses than the day they were built. The stone steps of the stairways +were worn: that was all the evidence of deterioration I saw. These, and +Mr. White's other block of buildings on Hicks Street, which was built +more than twenty years ago,--occupied, all of them, by distinctly poor +tenants,--have paid their owner over five per cent. right along. +Practically, every such enterprise has the same story to tell. Dr. Gould +found that only six per cent. of all the great model housing operations +had failed to pay. All the rest were successful. That was the showing of +Europe. It is the same here. Only the twenty-five-foot lot is in the way +in New York. + +[Illustration: EVENING IN ONE OF THE COURTS IN MILLS HOUSE No. 1] + +It will continue to be in the way. A man who has one lot will build on +it: it is his right. The state, which taxes his lot, has no right to +confiscate it by forbidding him to make it yield him an income, on the +plea that he might build something which would be a nuisance. But it can +so order the building that it shall not be a nuisance: that is not only +its right, but its duty. The best which can be made out of a +twenty-five-foot lot is not good, but even that has not been made out of +it yet. I have seen plans drawn by two young women architects in this +city, the Misses Gannon and Hands, and approved by the Building +Department, which let in an amount of light and air not dreamed of in +the conventional type of double-decker, while providing detached stairs +in a central court. It was not pretended that it was an ideal plan,--far +from it; but it indicated clearly the track to be followed in dealing +with the twenty-five-foot lot, seeing that we cannot get rid of it. The +demand for light and air space must be sharpened and rigidly held to, +and "discretion" to cut it down on any pretext must be denied, to the +end of discouraging at least the building of double-deckers by the +speculative landlord who has more than one lot, but prefers to build in +the old way, in order that he may more quickly sell his houses, one by +one. + +With much evidence to the contrary in the big blocks of tenements that +are going up on every hand, I think still we are tending in the right +direction. I come oftener, nowadays, upon three tenements built on four +lots, or two on three lots, than I used to. Indeed, there was a time +when such a thing would have been considered wicked waste, or evidence +of unsound mind in the builder. Houses are built now, as they were then, +for profit. The business element must be there, or the business will +fail. Philanthropy and five per cent. belong together in this field; but +there is no more reason for allowing usurious interest to a man who +makes a living by providing houses for the poor than for allowing it to +a lender of money on security. In fact, there is less; for the former +draws his profits from a source with which the welfare of the +commonwealth is indissolubly bound up. The Tenement House Committee +found that the double-deckers yield the landlord an average of ten per +cent., attack the home, and are a peril to the community. Model +tenements pay a safe five per cent., restore the home, and thereby +strengthen the community. It comes down, then, as I said, to a simple +question of the per cent. the builder will take. It should help his +choice to know, as he cannot now help knowing, that the usurious profit +is the price of good citizenship and human happiness, which suffer in +the proportion in which the home is injured. + +The problem of rent should be solved by the same formula, but not so +readily. In the case of the builder the state can add force to +persuasion, and so urge him along the path of righteousness. The only +way to reach the rent collector would be for the municipality to enter +the field as a competing landlord. Doubtless relief could be afforded +that way. The Tenement House Committee found that the slum landlord +charged the highest rents, sometimes as high as twenty-five per cent. He +made no repairs. Model tenement house rents are lower, if anything, than +those of the double-decker, with more space and better accommodations. +Such a competition would have to be on a very large scale, however, to +avail, and I am glad that New York has shown no disposition to undertake +it yet. I would rather we, as a community, learned first a little more +of the art of governing ourselves without scandal. Present relief from +the burden that taxes the worker one fourth of his earnings for a roof +over his head must be sought in the movement toward the suburbs that +will follow the bridging of our rivers, and real rapid transit. On the +island rents will always remain high, on account of the great land +values. But I have often thought that if the city may not own new +tenements, it might with advantage manage the old to the extent of +licensing them to contain so many tenants on the basis of the air space, +and no more. The suggestion was made when the tenement house question +first came up for discussion, thirty years ago, but it was rejected +then. The same thing is now proposed for rooms and workshops, as the +means of getting the best of the sweating nuisance. Why not license the +whole tenement, and with the money collected in the way of fees pay for +the supervision of them by night and day? The squad of sanitary +policemen now comprises for the Greater City some ninety men. Forty-one +thousand tenements in the Borough of Manhattan alone, at three dollars +each for the license, would pay the salaries of the entire body, and +leave a margin. Seeing that their services are going exclusively to the +tenements, it would not seem to be an unfair charge upon the landlords. + +The home is the key to good citizenship. Unhappily for the great cities, +there exists in them all a class that has lost the key or thrown it +away. For this class, New York, until three years ago, had never made +any provision. The police station lodging rooms, of which I have spoken, +were not to be dignified by the term. These vile dens, in which the +homeless of our great city were herded, without pretense of bed, of +bath, of food, on rude planks, were the most pernicious parody on +municipal charity, I verily believe, that any civilized community had +ever devised. To escape physical and moral contagion in these crowds +seemed humanly impossible. Of the innocently homeless lad they made a +tramp by the shortest cut. To the old tramp they were indeed ideal +provision, for they enabled him to spend for drink every cent he could +beg or steal. With the stale beer dive, the free lunch counter, and the +police lodging room at hand, his cup of happiness was full. There came +an evil day, when the stale beer dive shut its doors and the free lunch +disappeared for a season. The beer pump, which drained the kegs dry and +robbed the stale beer collector of his ware, drove the dives out of +business; the Raines law forbade the free lunch. Just at this time +Theodore Roosevelt shut the police lodging rooms, and the tramp was +literally left out in the cold, cursing reform and its fruits. It was +the climax of a campaign a generation old, during which no one had ever +been found to say a word in defense of these lodging rooms; yet nothing +had availed to close them. + +The city took lodgers on an old barge in the East River, that winter, +and kept a register of them. We learned something from that. Of nearly +10,000 lodgers, one half were under thirty years old and in good +health,--fat, in fact. The doctors reported them "well nourished." Among +100 whom I watched taking their compulsory bath, one night, only two +were skinny; the others were stout, well-fed men, abundantly able to do +a man's work. They all insisted that they were willing, too; but the +moment inquiries began with a view of setting such to work as really +wanted it, and sending the rest to the island as vagrants, their number +fell off most remarkably. From between 400 and 500 who had crowded the +barge and the pier sheds, the attendance fell on March 16, the day the +investigation began, to 330, on the second day to 294, and on the third +day to 171; by March 21 it had been cut down to 121. The problem of the +honestly homeless, who were without means to pay for a bed even in a +ten-cent lodging house, and who had a claim upon the city by virtue of +residence in it, had dwindled to surprisingly small proportions. Of 9386 +lodgers, 3622 were shown to have been here less than sixty days, and 968 +less than a year. The old mistake, that there is always a given amount +of absolutely homeless destitution in a city, and that it is to be +measured by the number of those who apply for free lodging, had been +reduced to a demonstration. The truth is that the opportunity furnished +by the triple alliance of stale beer, free lunch, and free lodging at +the police station was the open door to permanent and hopeless vagrancy. + +A city lodging house was established, with decent beds, baths, and +breakfast, and a system of investigation of the lodger's claim that is +yet to be developed to useful proportions. The link that is missing is a +farm school, for the training of young vagrants to habits of industry +and steady work, as the alternative of the workhouse. Efforts to forge +this link have failed so far, but in the good time that is coming, when +we shall have learned the lesson that the unkindest thing that can be +done to a young tramp is to let him go on tramping, and when magistrates +shall blush to discharge him on the plea that "it is no crime to be poor +in this country," they will succeed, and the tramp also we shall then +have "druv into decency." When I look back now to the time, ten or +fifteen years ago, when, night after night, with every police station +filled, I found the old tenements in the "Bend" jammed with a reeking +mass of human wrecks that huddled in hall and yard, and slept, crouching +in shivering files, all the way up the stairs to the attic, it does seem +as if we had come a good way, and as if all the turmoil and the bruises +and the fighting had been worth while. + + + + +IV + +THE TENANT + + +We have considered the problem of the tenement. Now about the tenant. +How much of a problem is he? And how are we to go about solving his +problem? + +The government "slum inquiry," of which I have spoken before, gave us +some facts about him. In New York it found 62.58 per cent. of the +population of the slum to be foreign-born, whereas for the whole city +the percentage of foreigners was only 43.23. While the proportion of +illiteracy in all was only as 7.69 to 100, in the slum it was 46.65 per +cent. That, with nearly twice as many saloons to a given number, there +should be three times as many arrests in the slum as in the city at +large need not be attributed to nationality, except indirectly in its +possible responsibility for the saloons. I say "possible" advisedly. +Anybody, I should think, whose misfortune it is to live in the slum +might be expected to find in the saloon a refuge. I shall not quarrel +with the other view of it. I am merely stating a personal impression. +The fact that concerns us here is the great proportion of the +foreign-born. Though the inquiry covered only a small section of a +tenement district, the result may be accepted as typical. + +We shall not, then, have to do with an American element in discussing +this tenant, for even of the "natives" in the census, by far the largest +share is made up of the children of the immigrant. Indeed, in New York +only 4.77 per cent. of the slum population canvassed were shown to be of +native parentage. The parents of 95.23 per cent. had come over the sea, +to better themselves, it may be assumed. Let us see what they brought +us, and what we have given them in return. + +The Italians were in the majority where this census taker went. They +were from the south of Italy, avowedly the worst of the Italian +immigration which in the eight years from 1891 to 1898 gave us more than +half a million of King Humbert's subjects. The exact number, as +registered by the Emigration Bureau, was 502,592. In 1898, 58,613 came +over, 36,086 of them with New York as their destination. The official +year ends with June. In the six months from July 1 to December 31, the +immigrants were sorted out upon a more intelligent plan than previously. +The process as applied to the 30,470 Italians who were landed during +that term yielded this result: from northern Italy, 4762; from southern +Italy, 25,708. Of these latter a number came from Sicily, the island of +the absentee landlord, where peasants die of hunger. I make no apology +for quoting here the statement of an Italian officer, on duty in the +island, to a staff correspondent of the "Tribuna" of Rome, a paper not +to be suspected of disloyalty to United Italy. I take it from the +"Evening Post:"-- + +"In the month of July I stopped on a march by a threshing floor where +they were measuring grain. When the shares had been divided, the one who +had cultivated the land received a single _tumolo_ (less than a half +bushel). The peasant, leaning on his spade, looked at his share as if +stunned. His wife and their five children were standing by. From the +painful toil of a year this was what was left to him with which to feed +his family. The tears rolled silently down his cheeks." + +These things occasionally help one to understand. Over against this +picture there arises in my memory one from the Barge Office, where I had +gone to see an Italian steamer come in. A family sat apart, ordered to +wait by the inspecting officer; in the group an old man, worn and +wrinkled, who viewed the turmoil with the calmness of one having no +share in it. The younger members formed a sort of bulwark around him. + +"Your father is too old," said the official. + +Two young women and a boy of sixteen rose to their feet at once. "Are +not we young enough to work for him?" they said. The boy showed his +strong arms. + +It is charged against this Italian immigrant that he is dirty, and the +charge is true. He lives in the darkest of slums, and pays rent that +ought to hire a decent flat. To wash, water is needed; and we have a law +which orders tenement landlords to put it on every floor, so that their +tenants may have the chance. And it is not yet half a dozen years since +one of the biggest tenement house landlords in the city, the wealthiest +church corporation in the land, attacked the constitutionality of this +statute rather than pay a couple of hundred dollars for putting water +into two old buildings, as the Board of Health had ordered, and came +near upsetting the whole structure of tenement house law upon which our +safety depends. He is ignorant, it is said, and that charge is also +true. I doubt if one of the family in the Barge Office could read or +write his own name. Yet would you fear especial danger to our +institutions, to our citizenship, from these four? He lives cheaply, +crowds, and underbids even the Jew in the sweatshop. I can myself +testify to the truth of these statements. Only this spring I was the +umpire in a quarrel between the Jewish tailors and the factory inspector +whom they arraigned before the Governor on charges of inefficiency. The +burden of their grievance was that the Italians were underbidding them +in their own market, which of course the factory inspector could not +prevent. Yet, even so, the evidence is not that the Italian always gets +the best of it. I came across a family once working on "knee-pants." +"Twelve pants, ten cents," said the tailor, when there was work. "Ve +work for dem sheenies," he explained. "Ven dey has work, ve gets some; +ven dey hasn't, ve don't." He was an unusually gifted tailor as to +English, but apparently not as to business capacity. In the Astor +tenements, in Elizabeth Street, where we found forty-three families +living in rooms intended for sixteen, I saw women finishing "pants" at +thirty cents a day. Some of the garments were of good grade, and some of +poor; some of them were soldiers' trousers, made for the government; but +whether they received five, seven, eight, or ten cents a pair, it came +to thirty cents a day, except in a single instance, in which two women, +sewing from five in the morning till eleven at night, were able, being +practiced hands, to finish forty-five "pants" at three and a half cents +a pair, and so made together over a dollar and a half. They were +content, even happy. I suppose it seemed wealth to them, coming from a +land where a Parisian investigator of repute found three lire (not quite +sixty cents) _per month_ a girl's wages. + +I remember one of those flats, poor and dingy, yet with signs of the +instinctive groping toward orderly arrangement which I have observed so +many times, and take to be evidence that in better surroundings much +might be made of these people. Clothes were hung to dry on a line strung +the whole length of the room. Upon couches by the wall some men were +snoring. They were the boarders. The "man" was out shoveling snow with +the midnight shift. By a lamp with brown paper shade, over at the +window, sat two women sewing. One had a baby on her lap. Two sweet +little cherubs, nearly naked, slept on a pile of unfinished "pants," and +smiled in their sleep. A girl of six or seven dozed in a child's rocker +between the two workers, with her head hanging down on one side; the +mother propped it up with her elbow as she sewed. They were all there, +and happy in being together even in such a place. On a corner shelf +burned a night lamp before a print of the Mother of God, flanked by two +green bottles, which, seen at a certain angle, made quite a festive +show. + +Complaint is made that the Italian promotes child labor. His children +work at home on "pants" and flowers at an hour when they ought to have +been long in bed. Their sore eyes betray the little flower-makers when +they come tardily to school. Doubtless there are such cases, and quite +too many of them; yet, in the very block which I have spoken of, the +investigation conducted for the Tenement House Committee by the +University Department of Sociology of Columbia College, under Professor +Franklin H. Giddings, discovered of 196 children of school age only 23 +at work or at home, and in the next block only 27 out of 215. That was +the showing of the foreign population all the way through. Of 225 +Russian Jewish children only 15 were missing from school, and of 354 +little Bohemians only 21. The overcrowding of the schools and their long +waiting lists occasionally furnished the explanation why they were not +there. Professor Giddings reported, after considering all the evidence: +"The foreign-born population of the city is not, to any great extent, +forcing children of legal school age into money-earning occupations. On +the contrary, this population shows a strong desire to have its +children acquire the common rudiments of education. If the city does not +provide liberally and wisely for the satisfaction of this desire, the +blame for the civic and moral dangers that will threaten our community, +because of ignorance, vice, and poverty, must rest on the whole public, +not on our foreign-born residents." It is satisfactory to know that the +warning has been heeded, and that soon there will be schools enough to +hold all the children who come. Now, since September 1, 1899, the new +factory law reaches also the Italian flowermaker in his home, and that +source of waste will be stopped. + +He is clannish, this Italian; he gambles and uses a knife, though rarely +on anybody not of his own people; he "takes what he can get," wherever +anything is free, as who would not, coming to the feast like a starved +wolf? There was nothing free where he came from. Even the salt was taxed +past a poor man's getting any of it. Lastly, he buys fraudulent +naturalization papers, and uses them. I shall plead guilty for him to +every one of these counts. They are all proven. Gambling is his +besetting sin. He is sober, industrious, frugal, enduring beyond +belief, but he will gamble on Sunday and quarrel over his cards, and +when he sticks his partner in the heat of the quarrel, the partner is +not apt to tell. He prefers to bide his time. Yet there has lately been +evidence once or twice in the surrender of an assassin by his countrymen +that the old vendetta is being shelved, and a new idea of law and +justice is breaking through. As to the last charge: our Italian is not +dull. With his intense admiration for the land where a dollar a day +waits upon the man with a shovel, he can see no reason why he should not +accept the whole "American plan" with ready enthusiasm. It is a good +plan. To him it sums itself up in the statement: a dollar a day for the +shovel; two dollars for the shovel with a citizen behind it. And he +takes the papers and the two dollars. + +He came here for a chance to live. Of politics, social ethics, he knows +nothing. Government in his old home existed only for his oppression. Why +should he not attach himself with his whole loyal soul to the plan of +government in his new home that offers to boost him into the place of +his wildest ambition, a "job on the streets,"--that is, in the +Street-Cleaning Department,--and asks no other return than that he shall +vote as directed? Vote! Not only he, but his cousins and brothers and +uncles will vote as they are told, to get Pietro the job he covets. If +it pleases the other man, what is it to him for whom he votes? He is +after the job. Here, ready-made to the hand of the politician, is such +material as he never saw before. For Pietro's loyalty is great. As a +police detective, one of his own people, once put it to me: "He got a +kind of an idea, or an old rule: an eye for an eye; do to another as +you'd be done by; if he don't squeal on you, you stick by him, no matter +what the consequences." This "kind of an idea" is all he has to draw +upon for an answer to the question if the thing is right. But the +question does not arise. Why should it? Was he not told by the agitators +whom the police jailed at home that in a republic all men are made happy +by means of the vote? And is there not proof of it? It has made him +happy, has it not? And the man who bought his vote seems to like it. +Well, then? + +Very early Pietro discovered that it was every man for himself, in the +chase of the happiness which this powerful vote had in keeping. He was +robbed by the padrone--that is, the boss--when he came over, fleeced on +his steamship fare, made to pay for getting a job, and charged three +prices for board and lodging and extras while working in the railroad +gang. The boss had a monopoly, and Pietro was told that it was +maintained by his "divvying" with some railroad official. Rumor said, a +very high-up official, and that the railroad was in politics in the +city; that is to say, dealt in votes. When the job gave out, the boss +packed him into the tenement he had bought with his profits on the +contract; and if Pietro had a family, told him to take in lodgers and +crowd his flat, as the Elizabeth Street tenements were crowded, so as to +make out the rent, and to never mind the law. The padrone was a +politician, and had a pull. He was bigger than the law, and it was the +votes he traded in that did it all. Now it was Pietro's turn. With his +vote he could buy what to him seemed wealth. In the muddle of ideas, +that was the one which stood out. When citizen papers were offered him +for $12.50, he bought them quickly, and got his job on the street. + +It was the custom of the country. If there was any doubt about it, the +proof was furnished when Pietro was arrested through the envy and +plotting of the opposition boss last fall. Distinguished counsel, +employed by the machine, pleaded his case in court. Pietro felt himself +to be quite a personage, and he was told that he was safe from harm, +though a good deal of dust might be kicked up; because, when it came +down to that, both the bosses were doing the same kind of business. I +quote from the report of the State Superintendent of Elections of +January, 1899: "In nearly every case of illegal registration, the +defendant was represented by eminent counsel who were identified with +the Democratic organization, among them being three assistants to the +Corporation counsel. My deputies arrested Rosario Calecione and Giuseppe +Marrone, both of whom appeared to vote at the fifth election district of +the Sixth Assembly District; Marrone being the Democratic captain of the +district, and, it was charged, himself engaged in the business of +securing fraudulent naturalization papers. In both of these cases +Farriello had procured the naturalization papers for the men for a +consideration. They were subsequently indicted. Marrone and Calecione +were bailed by the Democratic leader of the Sixth Assembly District." + +The business, says the State Superintendent, is carried on "to an +enormous extent." It appears, then, that Pietro has already "got on to" +the American plan as the slum presented it to him, and has in good +earnest become a problem. I guessed as much from the statement of a +Tammany politician to me, a year ago, that every Italian voter in his +district got his "old two" on election day. He ought to know, for he +held the purse. Suppose, now, we speak our minds as frankly, for once, +and put the blame where it belongs. Will it be on Pietro? And upon this +showing, who ought to be excluded, when it comes to that? + +The slum census taker did not cross the Bowery. Had he done so, he would +have come upon the refugee Jew, the other economic marplot of whom +complaint is made with reason. If his Nemesis has overtaken him in the +Italian, certainly he challenged that fate. He did cut wages by his +coming. He was starving, and he came in shoals. In fourteen years more +than 400,000 Jewish immigrants have landed in New York.[3] They had to +have work and food, and they got both as they could. In the strife they +developed qualities that were anything but pleasing. They herded like +cattle. They had been so herded by Christian rulers, a despised and +persecuted race, through the centuries. Their very coming was to escape +from their last inhuman captivity in a Christian state. They lied, they +were greedy, they were charged with bad faith. They brought +nothing,--neither money nor artisan skill,--nothing but their consuming +energy, to our land, and their one gift was their greatest offense. One +might have pointed out that they had been trained to lie, for their +safety; had been forbidden to work at trades, to own land; had been +taught for a thousand years, with the scourge and the stake, that only +gold could buy them freedom from torture. But what was the use? The +charges were true. The Jew was--he still is--a problem of our slum. + +[Footnote 3: According to the register of the United Hebrew Charities, +between October 1, 1884, and March 1, 1899, the number was 402,181.] + +And yet, if ever there was material for citizenship, this Jew is such +material. Alone of all our immigrants he comes to us without a past. He +has no country to renounce, no ties to forget. Within him there burns a +passionate longing for a home to call his, a country which will own him, +that waits only for the spark of such another love to spring into flame +which nothing can quench. Waiting for it, all his energies are turned +into his business. He is not always choice in method; he often offends. +But he succeeds. He is the yeast of any slum, if given time. If it will +not let him go, it must rise with him. The charity managers in London +said it, when we looked through their slums some years ago: "The Jews +have renovated Whitechapel." I, for one, am a firm believer in this Jew, +and in his boy. Ignorant they are, but with a thirst for knowledge that +surmounts any barrier. The boy takes all the prizes in the school. His +comrades sneer that he will not fight. Neither will he when there is +nothing to be gained by it. But I believe that, should the time come +when the country needs fighting men, the son of the despised immigrant +Jew will resurrect on American soil, the first that bade him welcome, +the old Maccabee type, and set an example for all the rest of us to +follow. + +For fifteen years he has been in the public eye as the vehicle and +promoter of sweating, and much severe condemnation has been visited upon +him with good cause. He had to do something, and he took to the +clothes-maker's trade as that which was most quickly learned. The +increasing crowds, the tenement, and his grinding poverty made the soil, +wherein the evil thing grew rank. Yet the real sweater is the +manufacturer, not the workman. It is just a question of expense to the +manufacturer. By letting out his work on contract, he can save the +expense of running his factory and delay longer making his choice of +styles. The Jew is the victim of the mischief quite as much as he has +helped it on. Back of the manufacturer there is still another +sweater,--the public. Only by its sufferance of the bargain counter and +of sweatshop-made goods has the nuisance existed as long as it has. I +am glad to believe that its time is passing away. The law has driven the +sweatshops out of the tenements, and so deprived them of one of their +chief props: there was no rent at all to pay there. Child labor, which +only four years ago the Reinhard Committee characterized as "one of the +most extensive evils now existing in the city of New York, a constant +and grave menace to the welfare of its people," has been practically +banished from the tailoring trade. What organization among the workers +had failed to effect is apparently going to be accomplished by direct +pressure of an outraged public opinion. Already manufacturers are +returning to their own factories, and making capital of the fact among +their customers. The new law, which greatly extends the factory +inspector's power over sweatshops, is an expression of this enlightened +sentiment. It will put New York a long stride ahead, and quite up to +Massachusetts. The inspector's tag has proved, where the law was +violated, an effective weapon. It suspends all operation of the shop and +removal of the goods until the orders of the inspector have been obeyed. +But the tag which shall finally put an end to sweating, and restore +decent conditions, is not the factory inspector's, I am persuaded, but a +trades union label, which shall deserve public confidence and receive +it. We have much to learn yet, all of us. I think I can see the end of +this trouble, however, when the Italian's triumph in the sweatshop shall +have proved but a barren victory, to his own gain. + +In all I have said so far, in these papers, I have not gone beyond the +limits of the old city,--of Manhattan Island, in fact. I want now to +glance for a moment at the several attempts made at colonizing refugee +Jews in this part of the country. Brownsville was one of the earliest. +Its projector was a manufacturer, and its motive profit. The result was +the familiar one,--as nasty a little slum as ever the East Side had to +show. We have it on our hands now in the Greater City,--it came in with +Brooklyn,--and it is not a gain. Down in southern New Jersey several +colonies were started, likewise by speculators, in the persecution of +the early eighties, and these also failed. The soil was sandy and poor, +and, thrown upon their own resources in a strange and unfriendly +neighborhood, with unfamiliar and unremunerative toil, the colonists +grew discouraged and gave up in despair. The colonies were approaching +final collapse, when the managers of the Baron de Hirsch Fund in New +York, who had started and maintained a successful colony at Woodbine, in +the same neighborhood, took them under the arms and inaugurated a new +plan. They persuaded several large clothing contractors in this city to +move their plants down to the villages, where they would be assured of +steady hands, not so easily affected by strikes. For strikes in +sweatshops are often enough the alternative of starvation. Upon the land +there would be no starvation. The managers of the Fund built factories, +bought the old mortgages on the farms, and put up houses for the +families which the contractors brought down with them. This effort at +transplanting the crowd from the Ghetto to the soil has now been going +on for a year. At latest account, eight contractors and two hundred and +fifty families had been moved out. The colonies had taken on a new lease +of life and apparent prosperity. While it is yet too early to pass sober +judgment, there seems to be good ground for hoping that a real way out +has been found that shall restore the Jew, at least in a measure, to the +soil from which he was barred so long. The experiment is of exceeding +interest. The hopes of its projectors that a purely farming community +might be established have not been realized. Perhaps it was too much to +expect. By bringing to the farmers their missing market, and work to the +surplus population, the mixed settlement plan bids fair to prove a step +in the desired direction. + +Some 18,500 acres are now held by Jewish colonists in New Jersey. In the +New England States, in the last eight years, 600 abandoned farms have +been occupied and are cultivated by refugees from Russia. As a dairy +farmer and a poultry raiser, the Jew has more of an immediate commercial +grip on the situation and works with more courage. At Woodbine, +sixty-five boys and girls are being trained in an agricultural school +that has won the whole settlement the friendly regard of the +neighborhood. Of its pupils, eleven came out of tailor shops, and ten +had been office boys, messengers, or newsboys. To these, and to the +trade schools now successfully operated by the de Hirsch Fund, we are +to look in the next generation for the answer to the old taunt that the +Jew is a trader, and not fit to be either farmer or craftsman, and for +the solution of the problem which he now presents in the slum. + +I have spoken at length of the Jew and the Italian, because they are our +present problem. Yesterday it was the Irishman and the Bohemian. +To-morrow it may be the Greek, who already undersells the Italian from +his pushcart in the Fourth Ward, and the Syrian, who can give Greek, +Italian, and Jew points at a trade. From Dalmatia a new immigration has +begun to come, and there are signs of its working further east in the +Balkan states, where there is no telling what is in store for us. How to +absorb them all safely is the question. Doubtless the Irishman, having +absorbed us politically, would be glad to free us from all concern on +that score by doing a like favor for them. But we should not get the +best of the slum that way; it would get the best of us, instead. Would I +shut out the newcomers? Sometimes, looking at it from the point of view +of the Barge Office and the sweatshop, I think I would. Then there +comes up the recollection of a picture of the city of Prague that hangs +in a Bohemian friend's parlor, here in New York. I stood looking at it +one day, and noticed in the foreground cannon that pointed in over the +city. I spoke of it, unthinking, and said to my host that they should be +trained, if against an enemy, the other way. The man's eye flashed fire. +"Ha!" he cried, "here, yes!" When I think of that, I do not want to shut +the door. + +Again, there occurs to me an experience the police had last summer in +Mulberry Street. They were looking for a murderer, and came upon a nest +of Italian thugs who lived by blackmailing their countrymen. They were +curious about them, and sent their names to Naples with a request for +information. There came back such a record as none of the detectives had +ever seen or heard of before. All of them were notorious criminals, who +had been charged with every conceivable crime, from burglary to +kidnapping and "maiming," and some not to be conceived of by the +American mind. Five of them together had been sixty-three times in +jail, and one no less than twenty-one times. Yet, though they were all +"under special surveillance," they had come here without let or +hindrance within a year. When I recall that, I want to shut the door +quick. I sent the exhibit to Washington at the time. But then, again, +when I think of Mrs. Michelangelo in her poor mourning for one child run +over and killed, wiping her tears away and going bravely to work to keep +the home together for the other five until the oldest shall be old +enough to take her father's place; and when, as now, there strays into +my hand the letter from my good friend, the "woman doctor" in the slum, +when her father had died, in which she wrote: "The little scamps of the +street have been positively pathetic; they have made such shy, boyish +attempts at friendliness. One little chap offered to let me hold his top +while it was spinning, in token of affection,"--when I read that, I have +not the heart to shut anybody out. + +Except, of course, the unfit, the criminal and the pauper, cast off by +their own, and the man brought over here merely to put money into the +pockets of the steamship agent, the padrone, and the mine owner. We +have laws to bar these out. Suppose we begin by being honest with +ourselves and the immigrant, and enforcing our own laws. In spite of a +healthy effort at the port of New York,--I can only speak for +that,--under the present administration, that has not yet been done. +When the door has been shut and locked against the man who left his +country for his country's good, whether by its "assistance" or not, and +when trafficking in the immigrant for private profit has been stopped, +then, perhaps, we shall be better able to decide what degree of +ignorance in him constitutes unfitness for citizenship and cause for +shutting him out. Perchance then, also, we shall hear less of the cant +about his being a peril to the republic. Doubtless ignorance is a peril, +but the selfishness that trades upon ignorance is a much greater. He +came to us without a country, ready to adopt such a standard of +patriotism as he found, at its face value, and we gave him the rear +tenement and slum politics. If he accepted the standard, whose fault was +it? His being in such a hurry to vote that he could not wait till the +law made him a citizen was no worse, to my mind, than the treachery of +the "upper class" native, who refuses to go to the polls for fear he may +rub up against him there. This last let us settle with first, and see +what remains of our problem. We can approach it honestly, then, at all +events. + +When the country was in the throes of the silver campaign, the +newspapers told the story of an old laborer who went to the sub-treasury +and demanded to see the "boss." He undid the strings of an old leathern +purse with fumbling fingers, and counted out more than two hundred +dollars in gold eagles, the hoard of a lifetime of toil and self-denial. +They were for the government, he said. He had not the head to understand +all the talk that was going, but he gathered from what he heard that the +government was in trouble, and that somehow it was about not having gold +enough. So he had brought what he had. He owed it all to the country, +and now that she needed it he had come to give it back. The man was an +Irishman. Very likely he was enrolled in Tammany and voted her ticket. I +remember a tenement at the bottom of a back alley over on the East +Side, where I once went visiting with the pastor of a mission chapel. Up +in the attic there was a family of father and daughter in two rooms that +had been made out of one by dividing off the deep dormer window. It was +midwinter, and they had no fire. He was a peddler, but the snow had +stalled his pushcart and robbed them of their only other source of +income, a lodger who hired cot room in the attic for a few cents a +night. The daughter was not able to work. But she said, cheerfully, that +they were "getting along." When it came out that she had not tasted +solid food for many days, was starving, in fact,--indeed, she died +within a year, of the slow starvation of the tenements that parades in +the mortality returns under a variety of scientific names which all mean +the same thing,--she met her pastor's gentle chiding with the excuse, +"Oh, your church has many poorer than I. I don't want to take your +money." + +These were Germans, ordinarily held to be close-fisted; but I found that +in their dire distress they had taken in a poor old man who was past +working, and had kept him all winter, sharing with him what they had. +He was none of theirs; they hardly even knew him, as it appeared. It +was enough that he was "poorer than they," and lonely and hungry and +cold. + +It was over here that the children of Dr. Elsing's Sunday school gave +out of the depth of their poverty fifty-four dollars in pennies to be +hung on the Christmas tree as their offering to the persecuted +Armenians. One of their teachers told me of a Bohemian family that let +the holiday dinner she brought them stand and wait, while they sent out +to bid to the feast four little ragamuffins of the neighborhood who else +would have gone hungry. I remember well a teacher in one of the +Children's Aid Society's schools, herself a tenement child, who, with +breaking heart, but brave face, played and sang the children's Christmas +carols with them rather than spoil their pleasure, while her only sister +lay dying at home. + +I might keep on and fill many pages with instances of that kind, which +simply go to prove that our poor human nature is at least as robust on +Avenue A as up on Fifth Avenue, if it has half a chance, and often +enough to restore one's faith in it, with no chance at all; and I might +set over against it the product of sordid and mean environment which one +has never far to seek. Good and evil go together in the tenements as in +the fine houses, and the evil sticks out sometimes merely because it +lies nearer the surface. The point is that the good does outweigh the +bad, and that the virtues that turn the balance are after all those that +make for good citizenship anywhere, while the faults are oftenest the +accidents of ignorance and lack of training, which it is the business +of society to correct. I recall my discouragement when I looked +over the examination papers of a batch of candidates for police +appointment,--young men largely the product of our public schools in +this city and elsewhere,--and read in them that five of the original New +England States were "England, Ireland, Scotland, Belfast, and Cork;" +that the Fire Department ruled New York in the absence of the Mayor,--I +have sometimes wished it did, and that he would stay away awhile; and +that Lincoln was murdered by Ballington Booth. But we shall agree, no +doubt, that the indictment of these papers was not of the men who wrote +them, but of the school that stuffed its pupils with useless trash, and +did not teach them to think. Neither have I forgotten that it was one of +these very men who, having failed, and afterward got a job as a bridge +policeman, on his first pay day went straight from his post, half frozen +as he was, to the settlement worker who had befriended him and his sick +father, and gave him five dollars for "some one who was poorer than +they." Poorer than they! What worker among the poor has not heard it? It +is the charity of the tenement that covers a multitude of sins. There +were thirteen in this policeman's family, and his wages were the biggest +item of income in the house. + +Jealousy, envy, and meanness wear no fine clothes and masquerade under +no smooth speeches in the slums. Often enough it is the very nakedness +of the virtues that makes us stumble in our judgment. I have in mind the +"difficult case" that confronted some philanthropic friends of mine in a +rear tenement on Twelfth Street, in the person of an aged widow, quite +seventy I should think, who worked uncomplainingly for a sweater all day +and far into the night, pinching and saving and stinting herself, with +black bread and chicory coffee as her only fare, in order that she might +carry her pitiful earnings to her big, lazy lout of a son in Brooklyn. +He never worked. My friends' difficulty was a very real one, for +absolutely every attempt to relieve the widow was wrecked upon her +mother heart. It all went over the river. Yet one would not have had her +different. + +Sometimes it is only the unfamiliar setting that shocks. When an East +Side midnight burglar, discovered and pursued, killed a tenant who +blocked his way of escape, a few weeks ago, his "girl" gave him up to +the police. But it was not because he had taken human life. "He was good +to me," she explained to the captain whom she told where to find him, +"but since he robbed the church I had no use for him." He had stolen, it +seems, the communion service in a Staten Island church. The thoughtless +laughed. But in her ignorant way she was only trying to apply the +standards of morality as they had been taught her. Stunted, bemuddled, +as they were, I think I should prefer to take my chances with her rather +than with the woman of wealth and luxury who, some years ago, gave a +Christmas party to her lap-dog, as on the whole the sounder of the two, +and by far the more hopeful. + +[Illustration: BONE ALLEY] + +All of which is merely saying that the country is all right, and the +people are to be trusted with the old faith in spite of the slum. And it +is true, if we remember to put it that way,--in spite of the slum. There +is nothing in the slum to warrant that faith save human nature as yet +uncorrupted. How long it is to remain so is altogether a question of the +sacrifices we are willing to make in our fight with the slum. As yet, we +are told by the officials having to do with the enforcement of the +health ordinances, which come closer to the life of the individual than +any other kind, that the poor in the tenements are "more amenable to the +law than the better class." It is of the first importance, then, that we +should have laws deserving of their respect, and that these laws should +be enforced, lest they conclude that the whole thing is a sham. Respect +for law is a very powerful bar against the slum. But what, for instance, +must the poor Jew understand, who is permitted to buy a live hen at the +market, yet neither to kill nor keep it in his tenement, and who on his +feast day finds a whole squad of policemen detailed to follow him around +and see that he does not do any of the things with his fowl for which he +must have bought it? Or the day laborer, who drinks his beer in a +"Raines law hotel," where brick sandwiches, consisting of two pieces of +bread with a brick between, are set out on the counter, in derision of +the state law which forbids the serving of drinks without "meals"? (The +Stanton Street saloon keeper who did that was solemnly acquitted by a +jury.) Or the boy, who may buy fireworks on the Fourth of July, but not +set them off? These are only ridiculous instances of an abuse that +pervades our community life to an extent that constitutes one of the +gravest perils. Insincerity of that kind is not lost on our fellow +citizen by adoption, who is only anxious to fall in with the ways of the +country; and especially is it not lost on his boy. + +We shall see how it affects him. He is the one for whom we are waging +the battle with the slum. He is the to-morrow that sits to-day drinking +in the lesson of the prosperity of the big boss who declared with pride +upon the witness stand that he rules New York, that judges pay him +tribute, and that only when _he_ says so a thing "goes;" and that it is +all for what he can get out of it, "just the same as everybody else." He +sees corporations to-day pay blackmail and rob the people in return, +quite according to the schedule of Hester Street. Only there it is the +police who charge the peddler twenty cents, while here it is the +politicians taking toll of the franchises, twenty per cent. Wall Street +is not ordinarily reckoned in the slum, because of certain physical +advantages; but, upon the evidence of the day, I think we shall have to +conclude that the advantage ends there. The boy who is learning such +lessons,--how is it with him? + +The president of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children +says that children's crime is increasing, and he ought to know. The +managers of the Children's Aid Society, after forty-six years of +wrestling with the slum for the boy, in which they have lately seemed to +get the upper hand, say in this year's report that on the East Side +children are growing up in certain districts "entirely neglected," and +that the number of such children "increases beyond the power of +philanthropic and religious bodies to cope properly with their needs." +In the Tompkins Square Lodging House the evening classes are thinning +out, and the keeper wails: "Those with whom we have dealt of late have +not been inclined to accept this privilege; how to make night school +attractive to shiftless, indifferent street boys is a difficult problem +to solve." + +Perhaps it is only that he has lost the key. Across the square, the +Boys' Club of St. Mark's Place, that began with a handful, counts five +thousand members to-day, and is seeking a place to build a house of its +own. The school census man announces that no boy in that old stronghold +of the "bread or blood" brigade need henceforth loiter in the street +because there is not room in the public school, and the brigade has +disbanded for want of recruits. The shop is being shut against the boy, +and the bars let down at the playground. But from Tompkins Square, +nevertheless, came Jacob Beresheim, whose story I shall tell you +presently. + + + + +V + +THE GENESIS OF THE GANG + + +Jacob Beresheim was fifteen when he was charged with murder. It is now +more than three years ago, but the touch of his hand is cold upon mine, +with mortal fear, as I write. Every few minutes, during our long talk on +the night of his arrest and confession, he would spring to his feet, +and, clutching my arm as a drowning man catches at a rope, demand with +shaking voice, "Will they give me the chair?" The assurance that boys +were not executed quieted him only for the moment. Then the dread and +the horror were upon him again. + +Of his crime the less said the better. It was the climax of a career of +depravity that differed from other such chiefly in the opportunities +afforded by an environment which led up to and helped shape it. My +business is with that environment. The man is dead, the boy in jail. But +unless I am to be my brother's jail keeper, merely, the iron bars do +not square the account of Jacob with society. Society exists for the +purpose of securing justice to its members, appearances to the contrary +notwithstanding. When it fails in this, the item is carried on the +ledger with interest and compound interest toward a day of reckoning +that comes surely with the paymaster. We have heard the chink of his +coin on the counter, these days, in the unblushing revelations before +the Mazet Committee of degraded citizenship, of the murder of the civic +conscience, and in the applause that hailed them. And we have begun to +understand that these are the interest on Jacob's account, older, much +older than himself. He is just an item carried on the ledger. But with +that knowledge the account is at last in a way of getting squared. Let +us see how it stands. + +We shall take Jacob as a type of the street boy on the East Side, where +he belonged. What does not apply to him in the review applies to his +class. But there was very little of it indeed that he missed or that +missed him. + +He was born in a tenement in that section where the Tenement House +Committee found 324,000 persons living out of sight and reach of a green +spot of any kind, and where sometimes the buildings, front, middle, and +rear, took up ninety-three per cent. of all the space on the block. Such +a home as he had was there, and of the things that belonged to it he was +the heir. The sunlight was not among them. It "never entered" there. +Darkness and discouragement did, and dirt. Later on, when he took to the +dirt as his natural weapon in his battles with society, it was said of +him that it was the only friend that stuck to him, and it was true. Very +early the tenement gave him up to the street. The thing he took with him +as the one legacy of home was the instinct for the crowd, which meant +that the tenement had wrought its worst mischief upon him: it had +smothered that in him around which character is built. The more readily +did he fall in with the street and its ways. Character implies depth, a +soil, and growth. The street is all surface: nothing grows there; it +hides only a sewer. + +It taught him gambling as its first lesson, and stealing as the next. +The two are never far apart. From shooting craps behind the "cop's" +back to filching from the grocer's stock or plundering a defenseless +peddler is only a step. There is in both the spice of law-breaking that +appeals to the shallow ambition of the street as heroic. Occasionally +the raids have a comic tinge. A German grocer wandered into police +headquarters the other day, with an appeal for protection against the +boys. + +"Vat means dot 'cheese it'?" he asked, rubbing his bald head in helpless +bewilderment. "Efery dime dey says 'cheese it,' somedings vas gone." + +To the lawlessness of the street the home opposes no obstacle, as we +have seen. Until very recently the school did not. It might have more to +offer even now. There are, at least, schools where there were none then, +and so much is gained; also, they are getting better, but too many of +them, in my unprofessional judgment, need yet to be made over, until +they are fit to turn out whole, sound boys, instead of queer manikins +stuffed with information for which they have no use, and which is none +of their business anyhow. It seemed to me sometimes, when watching the +process of cramming the school course with the sum of human knowledge +and conceit, as if it all meant that we distrusted nature's way of +growing a man from a boy, and had set out to show her a shorter cut. A +common result was the kind of mental befogment that had Abraham Lincoln +murdered by Ballington Booth, and a superficiality, a hopeless slurring +of tasks, that hitched perfectly with the spirit of the street, and left +nothing to be explained in the verdict of the reformatory, "No moral +sense." There was no moral sense to be got out of the thing, for there +was little sense of any kind in it. The boy was not given a chance to be +honest with himself by thinking a thing through; he came naturally to +accept as his mental horizon the headlines in his penny paper and the +literature of the Dare-Devil-Dan-the-Death-Dealing-Monster-of-Dakota +order, which comprise the ordinary aesthetic equipment of the slum. The +mystery of his further development into the tough need not perplex +anybody. + +But Jacob Beresheim had not even the benefit of such schooling as there +was to be had. He did not go to school, and nobody cared. There was +indeed a law directing that every child should go, and a corps of truant +officers to catch him if he did not; but the law had been a dead letter +for a quarter of a century. There was no census to tell what children +ought to be in school, and no place but a jail to put those in who +shirked. Jacob was allowed to drift. From the time he was twelve till he +was fifteen, he told me, he might have gone to school three weeks,--no +more. + +Church and Sunday school missed him. I was going to say that they passed +by on the other side, remembering the migration of the churches uptown, +as the wealthy moved out of, and the poor into, the region south of +Fourteenth Street. But that would hardly be fair. They moved after their +congregations; but they left nothing behind. In the twenty years that +followed the war, while enough to people a large city moved in downtown, +the number of churches there was reduced from 141 to 127. Fourteen +Protestant churches moved out. Only two Roman Catholic churches and a +synagogue moved in. I am not aware that there has been any large +increase of churches in the district since, but we have seen that the +crowding has not slackened pace. Jacob had no trouble in escaping the +Sunday school as he had escaped the public school. His tribe will have +none until the responsibility incurred in the severance of church and +state sits less lightly on a Christian community, and the church, from a +mob, shall have become an army, with von Moltke's plan of campaign, +"March apart, fight together." The Christian church is not alone in its +failure. The Jew's boy is breaking away from safe moorings rather faster +than his brother of the new dispensation. The church looks on, but it +has no cause for congratulation. He is getting nothing in place of that +which he lost, and the result is bad. There is no occasion for profound +theories about it. The facts are plain enough. The new freedom has +something to do with it, but neglect to look after the young has quite +as much. Apart from its religious aspect, seen from the angle of the +community's interest wholly, the matter is of the gravest import. + +What the boy's play has to do with building character in him Froebel +has told us. Through it, he showed us, the child "first perceives moral +relations," and he made that the basis of the kindergarten and all +common-sense education. That prop was knocked out. New York never had a +children's playground till within the last year. Truly it seemed, as +Abram S. Hewitt said, as if in the early plan of our city the children +had not been thought of at all. Such moral relations as Jacob was able +to make out ran parallel with the gutter always, and counter to law and +order as represented by the policeman and the landlord. The landlord had +his windows to mind, and the policeman his lamps and the city ordinances +which prohibit even kite-flying below Fourteenth Street where the crowds +are. The ball had no chance at all. It is not two years since a boy was +shot down by a policeman for the heinous offense of playing football in +the street on Thanksgiving Day. But a boy who cannot kick a ball around +has no chance of growing up a decent and orderly citizen. He must have +his childhood, so that he may be fitted to give to the community his +manhood. The average boy is just like a little steam engine with steam +always up. The play is his safety valve. With the landlord in the yard +and the policeman on the street sitting on his safety valve and holding +it down, he is bound to explode. When he does, when he throws mud and +stones and shows us the side of him which the gutter developed, we are +shocked and marvel much what our boys are coming to, as if we had any +right to expect better treatment of them. I doubt if Jacob, in the whole +course of his wizened little life, had ever a hand in an honest game +that was not haunted by the dread of the avenging policeman. That he was +not "doing anything" was no defense. The mere claim was proof that he +was up to mischief of some sort. Besides, the policeman was usually +right. Play in such a setting becomes a direct incentive to mischief in +a healthy boy. Jacob was a healthy enough little animal. + +Such fun as he had he got out of law-breaking in a small way. In this he +was merely following the ruling fashion. Laws were apparently made for +no other purpose that he could see. Such a view as he enjoyed of their +makers and executors at election seasons inspired him with seasonable +enthusiasm, but hardly with awe. A slogan, now, like that raised by +Tammany's late candidate for district attorney,--"To hell with +reform!"--was something he could grasp. Of what reform meant he had only +the vaguest notion, but the thing had the right ring to it. Roosevelt +preaching enforcement of law was from the first a "lobster" to him, not +to be taken seriously. It is not among the least of the merits of the +man that by his sturdy personality, as well as by his unyielding +persistence, he won the boy over to the passive admission that there +might be something in it. It had not been his experience. + +There was the law which sternly commanded him to go to school, and which +he laughed at every day. Then there was the law to prevent child labor. +It cost twenty-five cents for a false age certificate to break that, and +Jacob, if he thought of it at all, probably thought of perjury as rather +an expensive thing. A quarter was a good deal to pay for the right to +lock a child up in a factory, when he ought to have been at play. The +excise law was everybody's game. The sign that hung in every saloon, +saying that nothing was sold there to minors, never yet barred out his +"growler" when he had the price. There was another such sign in the +tobacco shop, forbidding the sale of cigarettes to boys of his age. +Jacob calculated that when he had the money he smoked as many as fifteen +in a day, and he laughed when he told me. He laughed, too, when he +remembered how the boys of the East Side took to carrying balls of cord +in their pockets, on the wave of the Lexow reform, on purpose to measure +the distance from the school door to the nearest saloon. They had been +told that it should be two hundred feet, according to law. There were +schools that had as many as a dozen within the tabooed limits. It was in +the papers how, when the highest courts said that the law was good, the +saloon keepers attacked the schools as a nuisance and detrimental to +property. In a general way Jacob sided with the saloon keeper; not +because he had any opinion about it, but because it seemed natural. Such +opinions as he ordinarily had he got from that quarter. + +When, later on, he came to be tried, his counsel said to me, "He is an +amazing liar." No, hardly amazing. It would have been amazing if he had +been anything else. Lying and mockery were all around him, and he +adjusted himself to the things that were. He lied in self-defense. + +Jacob's story ends here, as far as he is personally concerned. The story +of the gang begins. So trained for the responsibility of citizenship, +robbed of home and of childhood, with every prop knocked from under him, +all the elements that make for strength and character trodden out in the +making of the boy, all the high ambition of youth caricatured by the +slum and become base passions,--so equipped he comes to the business of +life. As a "kid" he hunted with the pack in the street. As a young man +he trains with the gang, because it furnishes the means of gratifying +his inordinate vanity, that is the slum's counterfeit of self-esteem. +Upon the Jacobs of other days there was a last hold,--the father's +authority. Changed conditions have loosened that also. There is a time +in every young man's life when he knows more than his father. It is +like the measles or the mumps, and he gets over it, with a little +judicious firmness in the hand that guides. It is the misfortune of the +slum boy of to-day that it is really so, and that he knows it. His +father is an Italian or a Jew, and cannot even speak the language to +which the boy is born. He has to depend on him in much, in the new order +of things. The old man is "slow," he is "Dutch." He maybe an Irishman +with some advantages; he is still a "foreigner." He loses his grip on +the boy. Ethical standards of which he has no conception clash. Watch +the meeting of two currents in river or bay, and see the line of drift +that tells of the struggle. So in the city's life strive the currents of +the old and the new, and in the churning the boy goes adrift. The last +hold upon him is gone. That is why the gang appears in the second +generation, the first born upon the soil,--a fighting gang if the +Irishman is there with his ready fist, a thievish gang if it is the East +Side Jew,--and disappears in the third. The second boy's father is not +"slow." He has had experience. He was clubbed into decency in his own +day, and the night stick wore off the glamour of the thing. His grip on +the boy is good, and it holds. + +It depends now upon chance what is to become of the lad. But the slum +has stacked the cards against him. There arises in the lawless crowd a +leader, who rules with his stronger fists or his readier wit. Around him +the gang crystallizes, and what he is it becomes. He may be a thief, +like David Meyer, a report of whose doings I have before me. He was just +a bully, and, being the biggest in his gang, made the others steal for +him and surrender the "swag," or take a licking. But that was unusual. +Ordinarily the risk and the "swag" are distributed on more democratic +principles. Or he may be of the temper of Mike of Poverty Gap, who was +hanged for murder at nineteen. While he sat in his cell at police +headquarters, he told with grim humor of the raids of his gang on +Saturday nights when they stocked up at "the club." They used to "hook" +a butcher's cart or other light wagon, wherever found, and drive like +mad up and down the avenue, stopping at saloon or grocery to throw in +what they wanted. His job was to sit at the tail of the cart with a +six-shooter and pop at any chance pursuer. He chuckled at the +recollection of how men fell over one another to get out of his way. "It +was great to see them run," he said. Mike was a tough, but with a better +chance he might have been a hero. The thought came to him, too, when it +was all over and the end in sight. He put it all in one sober, +retrospective sigh, that had in it no craven shirking of the +responsibility that was properly his: "I never had no bringing up." + +There was a meeting some time after his death to boom a scheme for +"getting the boys off the street," and I happened to speak of Mike's +case. In the audience was a gentleman of means and position, and his +daughter, who manifested great interest and joined heartily in the +proposed movement. A week later, I was thunderstruck at reading of the +arrest of my sympathetic friend's son for train-wrecking up the State. +The fellow was of the same age as Mike. It appeared that he was supposed +to be attending school, but had been reading dime novels instead, until +he arrived at the point where he "had to kill some one before the end +of the month." To that end he organized a gang of admiring but less +resourceful comrades. After all, the plane of fellowship of Poverty Gap +and Madison Avenue lies nearer than we often suppose. I set the incident +down in justice to the memory of my friend Mike. If this one went astray +with so much to pull him the right way, and but the single strand +broken, what then of the other? + +Mike's was the day of Irish heroics. Since their scene was shifted from +the East Side there has come over there an epidemic of child crime of +meaner sort, but following the same principle of gang organization. It +is difficult to ascertain the exact extent of it, because of the +well-meant but, I am inclined to think, mistaken effort on the part of +the children's societies to suppress the record of it for the sake of +the boy. Enough testimony comes from the police and the courts, however, +to make it clear that thieving is largely on the increase among the East +Side boys. And it is amazing at what an early age it begins. When, in +the fight for a truant school, I had occasion to gather statistics upon +this subject, to meet the sneer of the educational authorities that the +"crimes" of street boys compassed at worst the theft of a top or a +marble. I found among 278 prisoners, of whom I had kept the run for ten +months, two boys, of four and eight years respectively, arrested for +breaking into a grocery, not to get candy or prunes, but to rob the +till. The little one was useful to "crawl through a small hole." There +were "burglars" of six and seven years, and five in a bunch, the whole +gang apparently, at the age of eight. "Wild" boys began to appear in +court at that age. At eleven, I had seven thieves, two of whom had a +record on the police blotter, and an "habitual liar;" at twelve, I had +four burglars, three ordinary thieves, two arrested for drunkenness, +three for assault, and three incendiaries; at thirteen, five burglars, +one with a "record," as many thieves, one "drunk," five charged with +assault and one with forgery; at fourteen, eleven thieves and +house-breakers, six highway robbers,--the gang on its unlucky day, +perhaps,--and ten arrested for fighting, not counting one who had +assaulted a policeman, in a state of drunken frenzy. One of the gangs +made a specialty of stealing baby carriages, when left unattended in +front of stores. They "drapped the kids in the hallway" and "sneaked" +the carriages. And so on. The recital was not a pleasant one, but it was +effective. We got our truant school, and one way that led to the jail +was blocked. + +It may be that the leader is neither thief nor thug, but ambitious. In +that case the gang is headed for politics by the shortest route. +Likewise, sometimes, when he is both. In either case it carries the +situation by assault. When the gang wants a thing, the easiest way seems +to it always to take it. There was an explosion in a Fifth Street +tenement, one night last January, that threw twenty families into a wild +panic, and injured two of the tenants badly. There was much mystery +about it, until it came out that the housekeeper had had a "run in" with +the gang in the block. It wanted club-room in the house, and she would +not let it in. Beaten, it avenged itself in characteristic fashion by +leaving a package of gunpowder on the stairs, where she would be sure to +find it when she went the rounds with her candle to close up. That was a +gang of that kind, headed straight for Albany. And what is more, it +will get there, unless things change greatly. The gunpowder was just a +"bluff" to frighten the housekeeper, an installment of the kind of +politics it meant to play when it got its chance. There was "nothing +against this gang" except a probable row with the saloon keeper, since +it applied elsewhere for house-room. Not every gang has a police record +of theft and "slugging" beyond the early encounters of the street. "Our +honored leader" is not always the captain of a band of cutthroats. He is +the honorary president of the "social club" that bears his name, and he +counts for something in the ward. But the ethical standards do not +differ. "Do others, or they will do you," felicitously adapted from Holy +Writ for the use of the slum, and the classic war-cry, "To the victors +the spoils," made over locally to read, "I am not in politics for my +health," still interpret the creed of the political as of the "slugging" +gang. They drew their inspiration from the same source. Of what gang +politics means every large city in our country has had its experience. +New York is no exception. History on the subject is being made yet, in +the sight of us all. + +Our business with the gang, however, is in the making of it. Take now +the showing of the reformatory,[4] to which I have before made +reference, and see what light it throws upon the matter: 71 per cent. of +prisoners with no moral sense, or next to none, yet more than that +proportion possessed of "natural mental capacity," which is to say that +they had the means of absorbing it from their environment, if there had +been any to absorb. Bad homes sent half of all prisoners there; bad +company 92 per cent. The reformatory repeats the prison chaplain's +verdict, "weakness, not wickedness," in its own way: "Malevolence does +not characterize the criminal, but aversion to continuous labor." If +"the street" had been written across it in capital letters, it could not +have been made plainer. Twelve per cent. only of the prisoners came +from good homes, and one in a hundred had kept good company; evidently +he was not of the mentally capable. They will tell you at the prison +that, under its discipline, 83 per cent. are set upon their feet and +make a fresh start. With due allowance for a friendly critic, there is +still room for the three fourths labeled normal. The Children's Aid +Society will give you even better news of the boys rescued from the slum +before it had branded them for its own. Scarce five per cent. are lost, +though they leave such a black mark that they make trouble for all the +good boys that are sent out from New York. Better than these was the +kindergarten record in San Francisco. New York has no monopoly of the +slum. Of nine thousand children from the slummiest quarters of that city +who had gone through the Golden Gate Association's kindergartens, just +one was said to have got into jail. The merchants who looked coldly on +the experiment before brought their gold to pay for keeping it up. They +were hard-headed men of business, and the demonstration that schools +were better than jails any day appealed to them as eminently sane and +practical. + +[Footnote 4: Year-Book of Elmira State Reformatory, 1897. The statistics +deal with 8319 prisoners received there in twenty-three years. The +social stratum whence they came is sufficiently indicated by the +statement that 18.3 per cent. were illiterates, and 43.3 per cent. were +able to read and write with difficulty; 35.2 per cent. had an ordinary +common school education; 3.2 per cent. came out of high schools or +colleges.] + +And well it might. The gang is a distemper of the slum that writes upon +the generation it plagues the recipe for its own corrective. It is not +the night stick, though in the acute stage that is not to be dispensed +with. Neither is it the jail. To put the gang behind iron bars affords +passing relief, but it is like treating a symptom without getting at the +root of the disease. Prophylactic treatment is clearly indicated. The +boy who flings mud and stones is entering his protest in his own way +against the purblind policy that gave him jails for schools and the +gutter for a playground, that gave him dummies for laws and the tenement +for a home. He is demanding his rights, of which he has been +cheated,--the right to his childhood, the right to know the true dignity +of labor that makes a self-respecting manhood. The gang, rightly +understood, is our ally, not our enemy. Like any ailment of the body, it +is a friend come to tell us of something that has gone amiss. The thing +for us to do is to find out what it is, and set it right. + +That is the story of the gang. That we have read and grasped its lesson +at last, an item in my morning paper, which I read at the breakfast +table to-day, bears witness. It tells that the League for Political +Education has set about providing a playground for the children up on +the West Side, near the model tenements which I described. Just so! With +a decent home and a chance for the boy to grow into a healthy man, his +political education can proceed without much further hindrance. Now let +the League for Political Education trade off the policeman's club for a +boys' club, and it may consider its course fairly organized. + +I spoke of the instinct for the crowd in the tenement house boy as +evidence that the slum had got its grip on him. And it is true of him. +The experience that the helpless poor will not leave their slum when a +chance of better things is offered is wearily familiar to most of us. I +recall the indignant amazement of my good friend, the president of the +Baron de Hirsch Fund, when, of a hundred of the neediest families chosen +to be the pioneers in the experiment of transplanting the crowds of the +Ghetto to the country, where homes and work were waiting for them, only +seven wanted to go. They preferred the excitement of the street. One +has to have resources to face the loneliness of the woods and the +fields. We have seen what resources the slum has at its command. In the +boy it laid hold of the instinct for organization, the desire to fall in +and march in line that belongs to all boys, and is not here, as abroad, +cloyed with military service in the young years,--and anyhow is stronger +in the American boy than in his European brother,--and perverted it to +its own use. That is the simple secret of the success of the club, the +brigade, in winning back the boy. It is fighting the street with its own +weapon. The gang is the club run wild. + +How readily it owns the kinship was never better shown than by the +experience of the College Settlement girls, when they first went to make +friends in the East Side tenements. I have told it before, but it will +bear telling again, for it holds the key to the whole business. They +gathered in the drift, all the little embryo gangs that were tuning up +in the district, and made them into clubs,--Young Heroes, Knights of the +Round Table, and such like; all except one, the oldest, that had begun +to make a name for itself with the police. That one held aloof, +observing coldly what went on, to make sure it was "straight." They let +it be, keeping the while an anxious eye upon it; until one day there +came a delegation with the proposition, "If you will let us in, we will +change and have your kind of a gang." Needless to say it was let in. And +within a year, when, through a false rumor that the concern was moving +away, there was a run on the Settlement's penny provident bank, the +converted gang proved itself its stanchest friend by doing actually what +John Halifax did, in Miss Mulock's story: it brought all the pennies it +could raise in the neighborhood by hook or by crook and deposited them +as fast as the regular patrons--the gang had not yet risen to the +dignity of a bank account--drew them out, until the run ceased. + +The cry "Get the boys off the street" that has been raised in our +cities, as the real gravity of the situation has been made clear, has +led to the adoption of curfew ordinances in many places. Any attempt to +fit such a scheme to metropolitan life would probably result simply in +adding one more dead-letter law, more dangerous than all the rest, to +those we have. Besides, the curfew rings at nine o'clock. The dangerous +hours, when the gang is made, are from seven to nine, between supper and +bedtime. This is the gap the club fills out. The boys take to the street +because the home has nothing to keep them there. To lock them up in the +house would only make them hate it more. The club follows the line of +least resistance. It has only to keep also on the line of common sense. +It must be a real club, not a reformatory. Its proper function is to +head off the jail. The gang must not run it. But rather that than have +it help train up a band of wretched young cads. The signs are not hard +to make out. When a boy has had his head swelled by his importance as a +member of the Junior Street-Cleaning Band to the point of reproving his +mother for throwing a banana peel in the street, the thing to be done is +to take him out and spank him, if it _is_ reverting to "the savagery" of +the street. Better a savage than a cad. The boys have the making of both +in them. Their vanity furnishes abundant material for the cad, but only +when unduly pampered. Left to itself, the gang can be trusted not to +develop that kink. + +It comes down in the end to the personal influence that is always most +potent in dealing with these problems. We had a gang start up once when +my boys were of that age, out in the village on Long Island where we +lived. It had its headquarters in our barn, where it planned divers +raids that aimed at killing the cat and other like outrages; the central +fact being that the boys had an air rifle, with which it was necessary +to murder something. My wife discovered the conspiracy, and, with +woman's wit, defeated it by joining the gang. She "gave in wood" to the +election bonfires, and pulled the safety valve upon all the other plots +by entering into the true spirit of them,--which was adventure rather +than mischief,--and so keeping them within safe lines. She was elected +an honorary member, and became the counselor of the gang in all their +little scrapes. I can yet see her dear brow wrinkled in the study of +some knotty gang problem, which we discussed when the boys had been long +asleep. They did not dream of it, and the village never knew what small +tragedies it escaped, nor who it was that so skillfully averted them. + +It is always the women who do those things. They are the law and the +gospel to the boy, both in one. It is the mother heart, I suppose, and +there is nothing better in all the world. I am reminded of the +conversion of "the Kid" by one who was in a very real sense the mother +of a social settlement uptown, in the latitude of Battle Row. The Kid +was driftwood. He had been cast off by a drunken father and mother, and +was living on what he could scrape out of ash barrels, and an occasional +dime for kindling-wood which he sold from a wheel-barrow, when the gang +found and adopted him. My friend adopted the gang in her turn, and +civilized it by slow stages. Easter Sunday came, when she was to redeem +her promise to take the boys to witness the services in a neighboring +church, where the liturgy was especially impressive. It found the larger +part of the gang at her door,--a minority, it was announced, were out +stealing potatoes, hence were excusable,--in a state of high +indignation. + +"The Kid's been cussin' awful," explained the leader. The Kid showed in +the turbulent distance, red-eyed and raging. + +"But why?" asked my friend, in amazement. + +"'Cause he can't go to church!" + +It appeared that the gang had shut him out, with a sense of what was due +to the occasion, because of his rags. Restored to grace, and choking +down reminiscent sobs, the Kid sat through the Easter service, +surrounded by the twenty-seven "proper" members of the gang. +Civilization had achieved a victory, and no doubt my friend remembered +it in her prayers with thanksgiving. The manner was of less account. +Battle Row has its own ways, even in its acceptance of means of grace. + +I walked home from the office to-night. The street wore its normal +aspect of mingled dullness and the kind of expectancy that is always +waiting to turn any excitement, from a fallen horse to a fire, to +instant account. The early June heat had driven the multitudes from the +tenements into the street for a breath of air. The boys of the block +were holding a meeting at the hydrant. In some way they had turned the +water on, and were splashing in it with bare feet, reveling in the sense +that they were doing something that "went against" their enemy, the +policeman. Upon the quiet of the evening broke a bugle note and the +tramp of many feet keeping time. A military band came around the corner, +stepping briskly to the tune of "The Stars and Stripes Forever." Their +white duck trousers glimmered in the twilight, as the hundred legs moved +as one. Stoops and hydrant were deserted with a rush. The gang fell in +with joyous shouts. The young fellow linked arms with his sweetheart and +fell in too. The tired mother hurried with the baby carriage to catch +up. The butcher came, hot and wiping his hands on his apron, to the door +to see them pass. + +"Yes," said my companion, guessing my thoughts,--we had been speaking of +the boys,--"but look at the other side. There is the military spirit. Do +you not fear danger from it in this country?" + +No, my anxious friend, I do not. Let them march; and if with a gun, +better still. Often enough it is the choice of the gun on the shoulder, +or, by and by, the stripes on the back in the lockstep gang. + + + + +VI + +LETTING IN THE LIGHT + + +I had been out of town and my way had not fallen through the Mulberry +Bend in weeks until that morning when I came suddenly upon the park that +had been made there in my absence. Sod had been laid, and men were going +over the lawn cutting the grass after the rain. The sun shone upon +flowers and the tender leaves of young shrubs, and the smell of new-mown +hay was in the air. Crowds of little Italian children shouted with +delight over the "garden," while their elders sat around upon the +benches with a look of contentment such as I had not seen before in that +place. I stood and looked at it all, and a lump came in my throat as I +thought of what it had been, and of all the weary years of battling for +this. It had been such a hard fight, and now at last it was won. To me +the whole battle with the slum had summed itself up in the struggle +with this dark spot. The whir of the lawn mower was as sweet a song in +my ear as that which the skylark sang when I was a boy, in Danish +fields, and which gray hairs do not make the man forget. + +In my delight I walked upon the grass. It seemed as if I should never be +satisfied till I had felt the sod under my feet,--sod in the Mulberry +Bend! I did not see the gray-coated policeman hastening my way, nor the +wide-eyed youngsters awaiting with shuddering delight the catastrophe +that was coming, until I felt his cane laid smartly across my back and +heard his angry command:-- + +"Hey! Come off the grass! D' ye think it is made to walk on?" + +So that was what I got for it. It is the way of the world. But it was +all right. The park was there, that was the thing. And I had my revenge. +I had just had a hand in marking five blocks of tenements for +destruction to let in more light, and in driving the slum from two other +strongholds. Where they were, parks are being made to-day in which the +sign "Keep off the grass!" will never be seen. The children may walk in +them from morning till night, and I too, if I want to, with no policeman +to drive us off. I tried to tell the policeman something about it. But +he was of the old dispensation. All the answer I got was a gruff:-- + +"G'wan now! I don't want none o' yer guff!" + +It was all "guff" to the politicians, I suppose, from the day the +trouble began about the Mulberry Bend, but toward the end they woke up +nobly. When the park was finally dedicated to the people's use, they +took charge of the celebration with immense unction, and invited +themselves to sit in the high seats and glory in the achievement which +they had done little but hamper and delay from the first. They had not +reckoned with Colonel Waring, however. When they had had their say, the +colonel arose and, curtly reminding them that they had really had no +hand in the business, proposed three cheers for the citizen effort that +had struck the slum this staggering blow. There was rather a feeble +response on the platform, but rousing cheers from the crowd, with whom +the colonel was a prime favorite, and no wonder. Two years later he laid +down his life in the fight which he so valiantly and successfully waged. +It is the simple truth that he was killed by politics. The services +which he had rendered the city would have entitled him in any reputable +business to be retained in the employment that was his life and his +pride. Had he been so retained he would not have gone to Cuba, and would +in all human probability be now alive. But Tammany is not "in politics +for her health" and had no use for him, though no more grievous charge +could be laid at his door, even in the heat of the campaign, than that +he was a "foreigner," being from Rhode Island. Spoils politics never +craved a heavier sacrifice of any community. + +It was Colonel Waring's broom that first let light into the slum. That +which had come to be considered an impossible task he did by the simple +formula of "putting a man instead of a voter behind every broom." The +words are his own. The man, from a political dummy who loathed his job +and himself in it with cause, became a self-respecting citizen, and the +streets that had been dirty were swept. The ash barrels which had +befouled the sidewalks disappeared, almost without any one knowing it +till they were gone. The trucks that obstructed the children's only +playground, the street, went with the dirt despite the opposition of the +truckman who had traded off his vote to Tammany in the past for stall +room at the curbstone. They did not go without a struggle. When appeal +to the alderman proved useless, the truckman resorted to strategy. He +took a wheel off, or kept a perishing nag, that could not walk, hitched +to the truck over night to make it appear that it was there for +business. But subterfuge availed as little as resistance. In the +Mulberry Bend he made his last stand. The old houses had been torn down, +leaving a three-acre lot full of dirt mounds and cellar holes. Into this +the truckmen of the Sixth Ward hauled their carts, and defied the street +cleaners. They were no longer in their way, and they were on the Park +Department's domain, where no Colonel Waring was in control. But while +their owners were triumphing, the children playing among the trucks set +one of them rolling down into a cellar, and three or four of the little +ones were crushed. That was the end. The trucks disappeared. Even +Tammany has not ventured to put them back, so great was the relief of +their going. They were not only a hindrance to the sweeper and the +skulking places of all manner of mischief at night, but I have +repeatedly seen the firemen baffled in their efforts to reach a burning +house, where they stood four and six deep in the wide "slips" at the +river. + +Colonel Waring did more for the cause of labor than all the walking +delegates of the town together, by investing a despised but highly +important task with a dignity which won the hearty plaudits of a +grateful city. When he uniformed his men and announced that he was going +to parade with them so that we might all see what they were like, the +town laughed and poked fun at the "white wings;" but no one went to see +them who did not come away converted to an enthusiastic belief in the +man and his work. Public sentiment, that had been half reluctantly +suspending judgment, expecting every day to see the colonel "knuckle +down to politics" like his predecessors, turned in an hour, and after +that there was little trouble. The tenement house children organized +street cleaning bands to help along the work, and Colonel Waring +enlisted them as regular auxiliaries and made them useful. + +They had no better friend. When the unhappy plight of the persecuted +pushcart men, all immigrant Jews, who were blackmailed, robbed, and +driven from pillar to post as a nuisance, though licensed to trade in +the street, appealed vainly for a remedy, Colonel Waring found a way out +in a great morning market in Hester Street that should be turned over to +the children for a playground in the afternoon. Though he proved that it +would pay interest on the investment in market fees, and many times in +the children's happiness, it was never built. It would have been a most +fitting monument to the man's memory. His broom saved more lives in the +crowded tenements than a squad of doctors. It did more: it swept the +cobwebs out of our civic brain and conscience, and set up a standard of +a citizen's duty which, however we may for the moment forget, will be +ours until we have dragged other things than our pavements out of the +mud. + +Even the colonel's broom would have been powerless to do that for "the +Bend." That was hopeless and had to go. There was no question of +children or playground involved. The worst of all the gangs, the Whyos, +had its headquarters in the darkest of its dark alleys; but it was left +to the police. We had not begun to understand that the gangs meant +something to us beyond murder and vengeance, in those days. No one +suspected that they had any such roots in the soil that they could be +killed by merely destroying the slum. The cholera was rapping on our +door and, with the Bend there, we felt about it as a man with stolen +goods in his house must feel when the policeman comes up the street. +Back in the seventies we began discussing what ought to be done. By 1884 +the first Tenement House Commission had summoned up courage to propose +that a street be cut through the bad block. In the following year a bill +was brought in to destroy it bodily, and then began the long fight that +resulted in the defeat of the slum a dozen years later. + +It was a bitter fight, in which every position of the enemy had to be +carried by assault. The enemy was the deadly official inertia that was +the outcome of political corruption born of the slum plus the +indifference of the mass of our citizens, who probably had never seen +the Bend. If I made it my own concern to the exclusion of all else, it +was only because I knew it. I had been part of it. Homeless and alone, I +had sought its shelter, not for long,--that was not to be endured,--but +long enough to taste of its poison, and I hated it. I knew that the blow +must be struck there, to kill. Looking back now over those years, I can +see that it was all as it should be. We were learning the alphabet of +our lesson then. We could have learned it in no other way so thoroughly. +Before we had been at it more than two or three years, it was no longer +a question of the Bend merely. The Small Parks law that gave us a +million dollars a year to force light and air into the slum, to its +destruction, grew out of it. The whole sentiment which in its day, +groping blindly and angrily, had wiped out the disgrace of the Five +Points, just around the corner, crystallized and took shape in its +fight. It waited merely for the issue of that, to attack the slum in +its other strongholds; and no sooner was the Bend gone than the rest +surrendered, unconditionally. + +But it was not so easy campaigning at the start. In 1888 plans were +filed for the demolition of the block. It took four years to get a +report of what it would cost to tear it down. About once in two months +during all that time the authorities had to be prodded into a spasm of +activity, or we would probably have been yet where we were then. Once +when I appealed to the Corporation Counsel to give a good reason for the +delay, I got the truth out of him without evasion. + +"Well, I tell you," he said blandly, "no one here is taking any interest +in that business. That is good enough reason for you, isn't it?" + +It was. That Tammany reason became the slogan of an assault upon +official incompetence and treachery that hurried things up considerably. +The property was condemned at a total cost to the city of a million and +a half, in round numbers, including the assessment of half a million for +park benefit which the property owners were quick enough, with the aid +of the politicians, to get saddled on the city at large. In 1894 the +city took possession and became the landlord of the old barracks. For a +whole year it complacently collected the rents and did nothing. When it +was shamed out of that rut, too, and the tenements were at last torn +down, the square lay as the wreckers had left it for another year, until +it became such a plague spot that, as a last resort, with a citizen's +privilege, I arraigned the municipality before the Board of Health for +maintaining a nuisance upon its premises. I can see the shocked look of +the official now, as he studied the complaint. + +"But, my dear sir," he coughed diplomatically, "isn't it rather unusual? +I never heard of such a thing." + +"Neither did I," I replied, "but then there never was such a thing +before." + +That night, while they were debating the "unusual thing," happened the +accident to the children of which I spoke, emphasizing the charge that +the nuisance was "dangerous to life," and there was an end. In the +morning the Bend was taken in hand, and the following spring the +Mulberry Bend Park was opened. + +A million dollars a year had been lost while we were learning our +lesson. The Small Parks Fund was not cumulative, and when it came to +paying for the Bend a special bill had to be passed to authorize it, the +award being "more than one million in one year." The wise financiers who +framed and hung in the comptroller's office a check for three cents that +had been under-paid on a school site, for the taxpayer to bow before in +awe and admiration at such business methods, could find no way to make +the appropriation for two years apply, though the new year was coming in +a week or two. But the Gilder Tenement House Commission had been +sitting, the Committee of Seventy had been at work, and a law was on the +statute books authorizing the expenditure of three million dollars for +two open spaces in the parkless district on the East Side, where Jacob +Beresheim was born. It had shown that while the proportion of park area +inside the limits of the old city was equal to one thirteenth of all, +below Fourteenth Street, where one third of the people lived, it was +barely one fortieth. It took a citizen's committee appointed by the +mayor just three weeks to seize the two sites which are now being +laid out in playgrounds chiefly, and it took the Good Government Clubs +with their allies at Albany less than two months to get warrant of law +for the tearing down of the houses ahead of final condemnation lest any +mischance befall through delay or otherwise,--a precaution which +subsequent events proved to be eminently wise. The slow legal +proceedings are going on yet. + +[Illustration: MULBERRY BEND PARK] + +The playground part of it was a provision of the Gilder law that showed +what apt scholars we had been. I was a member of that committee, and I +fed fat my grudge against the slum tenement, knowing that I might not +again have such a chance. Bone Alley went. I shall not soon get the +picture of it, as I saw it last, out of my mind. I had wandered to the +top floor of one of the ramshackle tenements in the heart of the block, +to a door that stood ajar, and pushed it open. On the floor lay three +women rag-pickers with their burdens, asleep, overcome by the heat and +the beer, the stale stench of which filled the place. Swarms of flies +covered them. The room--no! let it go. Thank God, we shall not again +hear of Bone Alley. Where it stood workmen are to-day building a +gymnasium with baths for the people, and a playground and park which may +even be turned into a skating-pond in winter if the architect keeps his +promise. A skating-pond for the children of the Eleventh Ward! No wonder +the politician is in a hurry to take the credit for what is going +forward over there. It is that or nothing with him now. It will be all +up with Tammany, once the boys find out that these were the things she +withheld from them all the years, for her own gain. + +Half a dozen blocks away the city's first public bath house is at last +going up, after many delays, and godliness will have a chance to move in +with cleanliness. The two are neighbors everywhere, but in the slum the +last must come first. Glasgow has half a dozen public baths. Rome, two +thousand years ago, washed its people most sedulously, and in heathen +Japan to-day, I am told, there are baths, as we have saloons, on every +corner. Christian New York never had a bath house. In a tenement +population of 255,033 the Gilder Committee found only 306 who had access +to bath-rooms in the houses where they lived. The Church Federation +canvass of the Fifteenth Assembly District counted three bath-tubs to +1321 families. Nor was that because they so elected. The People's Baths +took in 115,000 half dimes last year for as many baths, and forty per +cent. of their customers were Italians. The free river baths admitted +5,096,876 customers during the summer. The "great unwashed" were not so +from choice, it would appear. + +Bone Alley brought thirty-seven dollars under the auctioneer's hammer. +Thieves' Alley, in the other park down at Rutgers Square, where the +police clubbed the Jewish cloakmakers a few years ago for the offense of +gathering to assert their right to "being men, live the life of men," as +some one who knew summed up the labor movement, brought only seven +dollars, and the old Helvetia House, where Boss Tweed and his gang met +at night to plan their plundering raids on the city's treasury, was +knocked down for five. Kerosene Row would not have brought enough to buy +kindling wood with which to start one of the numerous fires that gave it +its bad name. It was in Thieves' Alley that the owner in the days long +gone by hung out the sign: "No Jews need apply." Last week I watched the +opening of the first municipal playground upon the site of the old +alley, and in the thousands that thronged street and tenements from curb +to roof with thunder of applause, there were not twoscore who could have +found lodging with the old Jew-baiter. He had to go with his alley +before the better day could bring light and hope to the Tenth Ward. + +In all this the question of rehousing the population, that had to be so +carefully considered abroad in the destruction of slums, gave no +trouble. The speculative builder had seen to that. In the five wards, +the Seventh, Tenth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, and Seventeenth, in which the +unhoused ones would look for room, if they wanted to stay near their old +home, there were, according to the tenement census at the time when the +old houses were torn down, 4268 vacant apartments, with room for more +than 18,000 persons at our average of four and a half to the family. +Even including the Mulberry Bend, the whole number of the dispossessed +was not 10,000. On Manhattan Island there were at this time more than +37,000 vacant apartments, so that the question could not arise in any +serious shape, much as it plagued the dreams of some well-meaning +people. As a matter of fact the unhoused were scattered much more widely +than had been anticipated, which was one of the very purposes sought to +be attained. Many of them had remained in their old slum more from force +of habit and association than because of necessity. + +"Everything takes ten years," said Abram S. Hewitt when, exactly ten +years after he had as mayor championed the Small Parks Act, he took his +seat as chairman of the Advisory Committee on Small Parks. The ten years +had wrought a great change. It was no longer the slum of to-day, but +that of to-morrow that challenged attention. The committee took the +point of view of the children from the first. It had a large map +prepared showing where in the city there was room to play and where +there was none. Then it called in the police and asked them to point out +where there was trouble with the boys; and in every instance the +policeman put his finger upon a treeless slum. + +"They have no other playground than the street," was the explanation +given in each case. "They smash lamps and break windows. The +storekeepers kick and there is trouble. That is how it begins." "Many +complaints are received daily of boys annoying pedestrians, +storekeepers, and tenants by their continually playing baseball in some +parts of almost every street. The damage is not slight. Arrests are +frequent, much more frequent than when they had open lots to play in." +This last was the report of an uptown captain. He remembered the days +when there were open lots there. "But these lots are now built upon," he +said, "and for every new house there are more boys and less chance for +them to play." + +The committee put a red daub on the map to indicate trouble. Then it +asked those police captains who had not spoken to show them where their +precincts were, and why they had no trouble. Every one of them put his +finger on a green spot that marked a park. "My people are quiet and +orderly," said the captain of the Tompkins Square precinct. The police +took the square from a mob by storm twice in my recollection, and the +commander of the precinct then was hit on the head with a hammer by "his +people" and laid out for dead. "The Hook Gang is gone," said he of +Corlears Hook. The professional pursuit of that gang was to rob and +murder inoffensive citizens by night and throw them into the river, and +it achieved a bad eminence at its calling. "The whole neighborhood has +taken a change, and decidedly for the better," said the captain of +Mulberry Street, and the committee rose and said that it had heard +enough. + +The map was hung on the wall, and in it were stuck pins to mark the site +of present and projected schools as showing where the census had found +the children crowding. The moment that was done the committee sent the +map and a copy of chapter 338 of the laws of 1895 to the mayor, and +reported that its task was finished. This is the law and all there is of +it:-- + + "The people of the State of New York, represented in Senate and + Assembly, do enact as follows:-- + + "Section 1. Hereafter no schoolhouse shall be constructed in the + city of New York without an open-air playground attached to or + used in connection with the same. + + "Section 2. This act shall take effect immediately." + +Where the map was daubed with red the school pins crowded one another. +On the lower East Side, where child crime was growing fast, and no less +than three storm centres were marked down by the police, nine new +schools were going up or planned, and in the uptown precinct whence came +the wail about the ball players there were seven. The playground had +proved its case. Where it was expedient it was to be a school +playground. It seemed a happy combination, for the new law had been a +stumbling-block to the school commissioners, who were in a quandary over +the needful size of an "open-air playground." The success of the +roof-garden idea suggested a way out. But schools are closed at the time +of the year when playgrounds are most needed for city children. To get +the garden on the roof of the schoolhouse recognized as the public +playground seemed a long step toward turning it into a general +neighborhood evening resort that should be always open, and so toward +bringing school and people, and especially the school and the boy, +together in a bond of mutual sympathy highly desirable for both. + +That was the burden of the committee's report. It made thirteen +recommendations besides, as to the location of parks and detached +playgrounds, only one of which has been adopted. But that is of less +account--as also was the information imparted to me as secretary of the +committee by our peppery Tammany mayor, that we had "as much authority +as a committee of bootblacks in his office"--than the fact that the +field has at last been studied and its needs have been made known. The +rest will follow, with or without the politician's authority. The one +recommendation that has been carried out was that of a riverside park in +the region uptown on the West Side where the Federation of Churches and +Christian Workers found "saloon social ideals minting themselves upon +the minds of the people at the rate of seven saloon thoughts to one +educational thought." There is an outdoor gymnasium to-day on the chosen +site,--while the legal proceedings to take possession are unraveling +their red tape,--and a recreation pier hard by. In the evening the young +men of the neighborhood may be seen trooping riverward with their girls +to hear the music. The gang that "laid out" two policemen, to my +knowledge, has gone out of business. + +The best laid plans are sometimes upset by surprising snags. We had +planned for two municipal playgrounds on the East Side where the need is +greatest, and our plans were eagerly accepted by the city authorities. +But they were never put into practice. A negligent attorney killed one, +a lazy clerk the other. And both served under the reform government. The +first of the two playgrounds was to have been in Rivington Street, +adjoining the new public bath, where the boys, for want of something +better to do, were fighting daily battles with stones, to the great +damage of windows and the worse aggravation of the householders. Four +hundred children in that neighborhood petitioned the committee for a +place of their own where there were no windows to break, and we found +one. It was only after the proceedings had been started that we +discovered that they had been taken under the wrong law and the money +spent in advertising had been wasted. It was then too late. The daily +assaults upon the windows were resumed. The other case was an attempt to +establish a model school park in a block where more than four thousand +children attended day and night school. The public school and the +pro-cathedral, which divided the children between them, were to be +allowed to stand, at opposite ends of the block. The surrounding +tenements were to be torn down to make room for a park and playground +which should embody the ideal of what such a place ought to be, in the +opinion of the committee. The roof garden was not in the original plan +except as an alternative of the street-level playground, where land came +too high. The plentiful supply of light and air, the safety from fire to +be obtained by putting the school in a park, beside the fact that it +could thus be "built beautiful," were considerations of weight. Plans +were made, and there was great rejoicing in Essex Street, until it came +out that this scheme had gone the way of the other. The clerk who should +have filed the plans in the register's office left that duty to some +one else, and it took just twenty-one days to make the journey, a +distance of five hundred feet or less. The Greater New York had come +then with Tammany, and the thing was not heard of again. When I traced +the failure down to the clerk in question, and told him that he had +killed the park, he yawned and said:-- + +"Yes, and I think it is just as well it is dead. We haven't any money +for those things. It is very nice to have small parks, and very nice to +have a horse and wagon, if you can afford it. But we can't. Why, there +isn't money enough to run the city government." + +So the labor of weary weeks and months in the children's behalf was all +undone by a third-rate clerk in an executive office; but he saved the +one thing he had in mind: the city government is "run" to date, and his +pay is secure. + +Neither stupidity, spite, nor the false cry that "reform extravagance" +has wrecked the city's treasury will be able much longer, however, to +cheat the child out of his rights. The playground is here to wrestle +with the gang for the boy, and it will win. It came so quietly that we +hardly knew of it till we heard the shouts. It took us seven years to +make up our minds to build a play pier,--recreation pier is its +municipal title,--and it took just about seven weeks to build it when we +got so far; but then we learned more in one day than we had dreamed of +in the seven years. Half the East Side swarmed over it with shrieks of +delight, and carried the mayor and the city government, who had come to +see the show, fairly off their feet. And now "we are seven," or will be +when the one in Brooklyn has been built,--great, handsome structures, +seven hundred feet long, some of them, with music every night for mother +and the babies, and for papa, who can smoke his pipe there in peace. The +moon shines upon the quiet river, and the steamers go by with their +lights. The street is far away with its noise. The young people go +sparking in all honor, as it is their right to do. The councilman who +spoke the other day of "pernicious influences" lying in wait for them +there made the mistake of his life, unless he has made up his mind to go +out of politics. The play piers have taken a hold of the people which no +crabbed old bachelor can loosen with trumped-up charges. Their +civilizing influence upon the children is already felt in a reported +demand for more soap in the neighborhood where they are, and even the +grocer smiles approval. + +The play pier is the kindergarten in the educational campaign against +the gang. It gives the little ones a chance. Often enough it is a chance +for life. The street as a playground is a heavy contributor to the +undertaker's bank account. I kept the police slips of a single day in +May two years ago, when four little ones were killed and three crushed +under the wheels of trucks in tenement streets. That was unusual, but no +day has passed in my recollection that has not had its record of +accidents which bring grief as deep and lasting to the humblest home as +if it were the pet of some mansion on Fifth Avenue that was slain. The +kindergarten teaching bore fruit. To-day there are half a dozen +full-blown playgrounds downtown and uptown where the children swarm. +Private initiative set the pace, but the idea has been engrafted upon +the municipal plan. The city helped get at least one of them under way. +The Outdoor Recreation League was organized last year by public-spirited +citizens, including many amateur athletes and enthusiastic women, with +the object of "obtaining recognition of the necessity for recreation and +physical exercise as fundamental to the moral and physical welfare of +the people." Together with the Social Reform Club and the Federation of +Churches and Christian Workers it maintained a playground on the uptown +West Side last summer. The ball came into play there for the first time +as a recognized factor in civic progress. The day might well be kept for +all time among those that mark human emancipation, for it was social +reform and Christian work in one, of the kind that tells. + +Only the year before, the athletic clubs had vainly craved the privilege +of establishing a gymnasium in the East River Park, where the children +wistfully eyed the sacred grass, and cowered under the withering gaze of +the policeman. A friend whose house stands opposite the park found them +one day swarming over her stoop in such shoals that she could not enter, +and asked them why they did not play tag under the trees instead. The +instant shout came back: "'Cause the cop won't let us." Now a splendid +gymnasium has been opened on the site of the people's park that is to +come at Fifty-Third Street and Eleventh Avenue. It is called Hudsonbank. +A board fence more than a thousand feet long surrounds it. The director +pointed out to me with pride, last week, that not a board had been +stolen from it in a year, while other fences within twenty feet of it +were ripped to pieces. And he was right. The neighborhood is one that +has been anything but distinguished for its respect for private property +in the past, and where boards have a market value among the Irish +settlers. Better testimony could not have been borne to the spirit in +which the gift was accepted by the children. + +Poverty Gap, that was fairly transformed by one brief season's +experience with its "Holy Terror Park,"[5] a dreary sand lot upon the +site of the old tenements in which the Alley Gang once murdered the one +good boy of the block for the offense of supporting his aged parents by +his work as a baker's apprentice,--Poverty Gap is to have its permanent +playground, and Mulberry Bend and Corlears Hook are down on the League's +books; which is equivalent to saying that they, too, will shortly know +the climbing pole and the vaulting buck. For years the city's only +playground that had any claim upon the name--and that was only a little +asphalted strip behind a public school in First Street--was an old +graveyard. We struggled vainly to get possession of another, long +abandoned. The dead were of more account than the living. But now at +last it is their turn. The other day I watched the children at their +play in the new Hester Street gymnasium. The dusty square was jammed +with a mighty multitude. It was not an ideal spot, for it had not rained +in weeks, and powdered sand and cinders had taken wing and floated like +a pall over the perspiring crowd. But it was heaven to them. A hundred +men and boys stood in line, waiting their turn upon the bridge ladder +and the traveling rings that hung full of struggling and squirming +humanity, groping madly for the next grip. No failure, no rebuff +discouraged them. Seven boys and girls rode with looks of deep +concern--it is their way--upon each end of the see-saw, and two squeezed +into each of the forty swings that had room for one, while a hundred +counted time and saw that none had too much. It is an article of faith +with these children that nothing that is "going" for their benefit is to +be missed. Sometimes the result provokes a smile, as when a band of +young Jews, starting up a club, called themselves the Christian Heroes. +It was meant partly as a compliment, I suppose, to the ladies that gave +them club-room; but at the same time, if there was anything in a name, +they were bound to have it. It is rather to cry over than to laugh at, +if one but understands it. The sight of these little ones swarming over +a sand heap until scarcely an inch of it was in sight, and gazing in +rapt admiration at the poor show of a dozen geraniums and English ivy +plants in pots on the window-sill of the overseer's cottage, was +pathetic in the extreme. They stood for ten minutes at a time resting +their eyes upon them. In the crowd were aged women and bearded men with +the inevitable Sabbath silk hat, who it seemed could never get enough of +it. They moved slowly, when crowded out, looking back many times at the +enchanted spot, as long as it was in sight. + +[Footnote 5: The name was bestowed before the fact, not after.] + +Perhaps there was in it, on the part of the children at least, just a +little bit of the comforting sense of proprietorship. They had +contributed of their scant pennies more than a hundred dollars toward +the opening of the playground, and they felt that it was their very own. +All the better. Two policemen watched the passing show, grinning. But +their clubs hung idly from their belts. The words of a little woman whom +I met last year in Chicago kept echoing in my ear. She was the "happiest +woman alive," for she had striven long for a playground for her poor +children, and had got it. + +"The police like it," she said. "They say that it will do more good than +all the Sunday schools in Chicago. The mothers say, 'This is good +business.' The carpenters that put up the swings and things worked with +a will; everybody was glad. The police lieutenant has had a tree called +after him. The boys that did that used to be terrors. Now they take care +of the trees. They plead for a low limb that is in the way, that no one +may cut it off." + +The twilight deepens and the gates of the playground are closed. The +crowds disperse slowly. In the roof garden on the Hebrew Institute +across East Broadway lights are twinkling and the band is tuning up. +Little groups are settling down to a quiet game of checkers or +love-making. Paterfamilias leans back against the parapet where palms +wave luxuriously in the summer breeze. The newspaper drops from his +hand; he closes his eyes and is in dreamland, where strikes come not. +Mother knits contentedly in her seat, with a smile on her face that was +not born of the Ludlow Street tenement. Over yonder a knot of +black-browed men talk with serious mien. They might be met any night in +the anarchist cafe, half a dozen doors away, holding forth against +empires. Here wealth does not excite their wrath, nor power their +plotting. In the roof garden anarchy is harmless, even though a +policeman typifies its government. They laugh pleasantly to one another +as he passes, and he gives them a match to light their cigars. It is +Thursday, and smoking is permitted. On Friday it is discouraged because +it offends the orthodox, to whom the lighting of a fire, even the +holding of a candle, is anathema on the Sabbath eve. + +The band plays on. One after another, tired heads droop upon babes +slumbering peacefully at the breast. Ludlow Street, the tenement, are +forgotten; eleven o'clock is not yet. Down along the silver gleam of the +river a mighty city slumbers. The great bridge has hung out its string +of shining pearls from shore to shore. "Sweet land of liberty!" Overhead +the dark sky, the stars that twinkled their message to the shepherds on +Judaean hills, that lighted their sons through ages of slavery, and the +flag of freedom borne upon the breeze,--down there the tenement, +the--Ah, well! let us forget, as do these. + +Now if you ask me: "And what of it all? What does it avail?" let me take +you once more back to the Mulberry Bend, and to the policeman's verdict +add the police reporter's story of what has taken place there. In +fifteen years I never knew a week to pass without a murder there, rarely +a Sunday. It was the wickedest, as it was the foulest, spot in all the +city. In the slum the two are interchangeable terms for reasons that +are clear enough to me. But I shall not speculate about it, only state +the facts. The old houses fairly reeked with outrage and violence. When +they were torn down, I counted seventeen deeds of blood in that place +which I myself remembered, and those I had forgotten probably numbered +seven times seventeen. The district attorney connected more than a score +of murders of his own recollection with Bottle Alley, the Whyo gang's +headquarters. Two years have passed since it was made into a park, and +scarce a knife has been drawn, or a shot fired, in all that +neighborhood. Only twice have I been called as a police reporter to the +spot. It is not that the murder has moved to another neighborhood, for +there has been no increase of violence in Little Italy or wherever else +the crowd went that moved out. It is that the light has come in and made +crime hideous. It is being let in wherever the slum has bred murder and +robbery, bred the gang, in the past. Wait, now, another ten years, and +let us see what a story there will be to tell. + +Avail? Why, here is Tammany actually applauding Comptroller Coler's +words in Plymouth Church last night: "Whenever the city builds a +schoolhouse upon the site of a dive and creates a park, a distinct and +permanent mental, moral, and physical improvement has been made, and +public opinion will sustain such a policy, even if a dive-keeper is +driven out of business and somebody's ground rent is reduced." And +Tammany's press agent sends forth this paean: "In the light of such +events how absurd it is for the enemies of the organization to contend +that Tammany is not the greatest moral force in the community." Tammany +a moral force! The park and the playground have availed, then, to bring +back the day of miracles. + + + + +VII + +JUSTICE FOR THE BOY + + +Sometimes, when I see my little boy hugging himself with delight at the +near prospect of the kindergarten, I go back in memory forty years and +more to the day when I was dragged, a howling captive, to school, as a +punishment for being bad at home. I remember, as though it were +yesterday, my progress up the street in the vengeful grasp of an +exasperated servant, and my reception by the aged monster--most fitly +named Madame Bruin--who kept the school. She asked no questions, but led +me straightway to the cellar, where she plunged me into an empty barrel +and put the lid on over me. Applying her horn goggles to the bunghole, +to my abject terror, she informed me, in a sepulchral voice, that that +was the way bad boys were dealt with in school. When I ceased howling +from sheer fright, she took me out and conducted me to the yard, where +a big hog had a corner to itself. She bade me observe that one of its +ears had been slit half its length. It was because the hog was lazy, and +little boys who were that way minded were in danger of similar +treatment; in token whereof she clipped a pair of tailor's shears +suggestively close to my ear. It was my first lesson in school. I hated +it from that hour. + +The barrel and the hog were never part of the curriculum in any American +boy's school, I suppose; they seem too freakish to be credited to any +but the demoniac ingenuity of my home ogre. But they stood for a +comprehension of the office of school and teacher which was not patented +by any day or land. It is not so long since the notion yet prevailed +that the schools were principally to lock children up in for the +convenience of their parents, that we should have entirely forgotten it. +Only the other day a clergyman from up the State came into my office to +tell of a fine reform school they had in his town. They were very proud +of it. + +"And how about the schools for the good boys in your town?" I asked, +when I had heard him out. "Are they anything to be proud of?" + +He stared. He guessed they were all right, he said, after some +hesitation. But it was clear that he did not know. + +It is not necessary to go back forty years to find us in the metropolis +upon the clergyman's platform, if not upon Madame Bruin's. Ten will do. +They will bring us to the day when roof playgrounds were contemptuously +left out of the estimates for an East Side school, as "frills" that had +nothing to do with education; when the Board of Health found but a +single public school in more than sixscore that was so ventilated as to +keep the children from being poisoned by foul air; when the authority of +the Talmud had to be invoked by the Superintendent of School Buildings +to convince the president of the Board of Education, who happened to be +a Jew, that seventy-five or eighty pupils were far too many for one +class-room; when a man who had been dead a year was appointed a school +trustee of the Third Ward, under the mouldy old law surviving from the +day when New York was a big village, and filled the office as well as if +he had been alive, because there were no schools in his ward; when +manual training and the kindergarten were yet the fads of yesterday, +looked at askance; when fifty thousand children roamed the streets for +whom there was no room in the schools, and the only defense of the +School Commissioners was that they "didn't know" there were so many; and +when we mixed truants and thieves in a jail with entire unconcern. +Indeed, the jail filled the title role in the educational cast of that +day. Its inmates were well lodged and cared for, while the sanitary +authorities twice condemned the Essex Market school across the way as +wholly unfit for children to be in, but failed to catch the ear of the +politician who ran things unhindered. When (in 1894) I denounced the +"system" of enforcing--or not enforcing--the compulsory education law as +a device to make thieves out of our children by turning over their +training to the street, he protested angrily; but the experts of the +Tenement House Committee found the charge fully borne out by the facts. +They were certainly plain enough in the sight of us all, had we chosen +to see. + +When at last we saw, we gave the politician a vacation for a season. To +say that he was to blame for all the mischief would not be fair. We +were to blame for leaving him in possession. He was only a link in the +chain which our indifference had forged; but he was always and +everywhere an obstruction to betterment,--sometimes, illogically, in +spite of himself. Successive Tammany mayors had taken a stand for the +public schools, when it was clear that reform could not be delayed much +longer; but they were helpless against a system of selfishness and +stupidity of which they were the creatures, though they posed as its +masters. They had to go with it as unfit, and upon the wave that swept +out the last of the rubbish came reform. The Committee of Seventy took +hold, the Good Government Clubs, the Tenement House Committee, and the +women of New York. Five years we strove with the powers of darkness, and +look now at the change. The New York school system is not yet the ideal +one,--it may never be; but the jail, at least, has been cast out of the +firm. We have a compulsory education law under which it will be +possible, when a seat has been provided for every child, to punish the +parent for the boy's truancy, unless he surrenders him as unmanageable; +and we can count the months now till every child shall find the +latchstring out on the school door. We have had to put our hands deep +into our pockets to get to that point, but we are nearly there now. +Since 1895 the expenditure of twenty-two and a half millions of dollars +for new schools in the old city has been authorized by law, and two +thirds of the money has been spent. Fifty-odd new buildings have been +put up, or are going up while I am writing, every one of them with its +playground, which will by and by be free to all the neighborhood. The +idea is at last working through that the schools belong to the people, +and are primarily for the children and their parents; not mere vehicles +of ward patronage, or for keeping an army of teachers in office and pay. + +The silly old regime is dead. The ward trustee is gone with his friend +the alderman, loudly proclaiming the collapse of our liberties in the +day that saw the schools taken from "the people's" control. They were +"the people." Experts manage our children's education, which was +supposed in the old plan to be the only thing that did not require any +training. To superintend a brickyard demanded some knowledge, but +anybody could run the public schools. It cost us an election to take +that step. One of the Tammany district leaders, who knew what he was +talking about, said to me after it was all over: "I knew we would win. +Your bringing those foreigners here did the business. Our people believe +in home rule. We kept account of the teachers you brought from out of +town, and who spent the money they made here out of town, and it got to +be the talk among the tenement people in my ward that their daughters +would have no more show to get to be teachers. That did the business. We +figured the school vote in the city at forty-two thousand, and I knew we +could not lose." The "foreigners" were teachers from Massachusetts and +other States, who had achieved a national reputation at their work. + +There lies upon my table a copy of the minutes of the Board of Education +of January 9, 1895, in which is underscored a report on a primary school +in the Bronx. "It is a wooden shanty," is the inspector's account, +"heated by stoves, and is a regular tinder box; cellar wet, and under +one class-room only. This building was erected in order, I believe, to +determine whether or not there was a school population in the +neighborhood to warrant the purchase of property to erect a school on." + +That was the way then of taking a school census, and the result was the +utter failure of the compulsory education law to compel anything. To-day +we have a biennial census, ordained by law, which, when at last it gets +into the hands of some one who can count, will tell us how many Jacob +Beresheims are drifting upon the shoals of the street. And we have a +truant school to keep them safe in. To it, says the law, no thief shall +be committed. It is not yet five years since the burglar and the +truant--who, having been refused admission to the school because there +was not room for him, inconsequently was locked up for contracting idle +ways--were herded in the Juvenile Asylum, and classified there in squads +of those who were four feet, four feet seven, and over four feet seven! +I am afraid I scandalized some good people, during the fight for decency +in this matter, by insisting that it ought to be considered a good mark +for Jacob that he despised such schools as were provided for him. But it +was true. Except for the risk of the burglar, the jail was preferable by +far. A woman has now had charge of the truant school for fourteen +months, and she tells me that of quite twenty-five hundred boys scarce +sixty were rightly called incorrigible, and even these a little longer +and tighter grip would probably win over. For such, a farm school is yet +to be provided. The rest responded promptly to an appeal to their pride. +She "made it a personal matter" with each of them, and the truant +vanished; the boy was restored. The burglar, too, made it a personal +matter in the old contact, and the result was two burglars for one. In +common with nearly all those who have paid attention to this matter, +Mrs. Alger believes that the truant school strikes at the root of the +problem of juvenile crime. After thirty years of close acquaintance with +the child population of London, Mr. Andrew Drew, chairman of the +Industrial Committee of the School Board, declared his conviction that +"truancy is to be credited with nearly the whole of our juvenile +criminality." But for years there seemed to be no way of convincing the +New York School Board that the two had anything to do with each other. +As executive officer of the Good Government Clubs, I fought that fight +to a finish. We got the school, and in Mrs. Alger, at the time a truant +officer, a person singularly well qualified to take charge of it. She +has recently been removed, that her place might be given to a man. It is +the old scheme come back,--a voter behind the broom,--and the old slough +waiting to overwhelm us again. + +But it will not get the chance. I have my own idea of how this truancy +question is going to be solved. Yesterday I went with Superintendent +Snyder through some of the new schools he is building, upon what he +calls the letter H plan, in the crowded districts. It is the plan of the +Hotel de Cluny in Paris, and to my mind as nearly perfect as it is +possible to make a schoolhouse. There is not a dark corner in the whole +structure, from the splendid gymnasium under the red-tiled roof to the +indoor playground on the ground floor, which, when thrown in one with +the two open-air playgrounds that lie embraced in the arms of the H, +will give the children nearly an acre of asphalted floor space from +street to street, to romp on. Seven such schools are going up to-day, +each a beautiful palace, and within the year sixteen thousand children +will be housed in them. When I think of the old Allen Street school, +where the gas had to be kept burning even on the brightest days, +recitations suspended every half hour, and the children made to practice +calisthenics so that they should not catch cold while the windows were +opened to let in fresh air; of the dark playground downstairs, with the +rats keeping up such a racket that one could hardly hear himself speak +at times, or of the other East Side playground where the boys "weren't +allowed to speak above a whisper," so as not to disturb those studying +overhead, I fancy that I can make out both the cause and the cure of the +boy's desperation. "We try to make our schools pleasant enough to hold +the children," wrote the Superintendent of Schools in Indianapolis to me +once, and added that they had no truant problem worth bothering about. +With the kindergarten and manual training firmly engrafted upon the +school course, as they are at last, and with it reaching out to +enlist also the boy's play through playground and vacation schools, I +shall be willing to turn the boy, who will not come in, over to the +reformatory. They will not need to build a new wing to the jail for his +safe-keeping. + +[Illustration: LETTER H PLAN OF PUBLIC SCHOOL No. 165 + +_Showing Front on West 109th Street_] + +All ways lead to Rome. The reform in school-building dates back, as does +every other reform in New York, to the Mulberry Bend. It began there. +The first school that departed from the soulless old tradition, to set +beautiful pictures before the child's mind as well as dry figures on the +slate, was built there. At the time I wanted it to stand in the park, +hoping so to hasten the laying out of that; but although the Small Parks +law expressly permitted the erection on park property of buildings for +"the instruction of the people," the officials upon whom I pressed my +scheme could not be made to understand that as including schools. +Perhaps they were right. I catechised thirty-one Fourth Ward girls in a +sewing school, about that time, twenty-six of whom had attended the +public schools of the district more than a year. One wore a badge earned +for excellence in her studies. In those days every street corner was +placarded with big posters of Napoleon on a white horse riding through +fire and smoke. There was one right across the street. Yet only one of +the thirty-one knew who Napoleon was. She "thought she had heard of the +gentleman before." It came out that the one impression she retained of +what she had heard was that "the gentleman" had two wives. They knew of +Washington that he was the first President of the United States, and cut +down a cherry-tree. They were sitting and sewing at the time almost on +the identical spot where he lived and held office. To the question who +ruled before Washington the answer came promptly: no one; he was the +first. They agreed reluctantly, upon further consideration, that there +was probably "a King of America" before his day, and the Irish damsels +turned up their noses at the idea. The people of Canada, they thought, +were copper-colored. The same winter I was indignantly bidden to depart +from a school in the Fourth Ward by a trustee who had heard that I had +written a book about the slum and spoken of "his people" in it. + +Those early steps in the reform path stumbled sadly at times over +obstacles that showed how dense was the ignorance and how rank were the +prejudices we had to fight. When I wrote that the Allen Street school +was overrun by rats, which was a fact any one might observe for himself +by spending five minutes in the building, I was called sharply to +account by the Mayor in the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. There +were no rats, he said. The Allen Street school was the worst of them +all, and I determined that the time had come to make a demonstration. I +procured a rat trap, and was waiting for an idle hour to go over and +catch one of the rats, so that I might have it stuffed and sent to the +board over which the Mayor presided, as a convincing exhibit; but before +I got so far reform swept the whole conspiracy of ignorance and jobbery +out of the City Hall. + +That was well enough as far as it went; but that the broom was needed +elsewhere we learned later, when the Good Government Clubs fought for +the inspection of the schools and of the children by trained oculists. +The evidence was that the pupils were made both near-sighted and stupid +by the want of proper arrangement of their seats and of themselves in +the class-room. The fact was not denied, and the scheme was strongly +indorsed by the Board of Health and by some of the ablest and best known +oculists in the city; but it was wrecked upon an opposition in which we +heard the ignorant and selfish cry that it would "interfere with private +practice," and so curtail the profits of the practitioner. The proposal +to inspect the classes daily for evidence of contagious disease--which, +carried out, has proved a most effective means of preventing the spread +of epidemics, and one of the greatest blessings--had been opposed, +happily unsuccessfully, with the same arguments.[6] It is very well to +prate about the rapacity of politicians, but these things came often +enough to show what they meant by the claim that they were "closer to +the people" than we who were trying to help them; and they were all the +more exasperating because they came rarely from below,--the tenement +people, when they were not deliberately misled, were ready and eager to +fall in with any plan for bettering things, notably where it concerned +the schools,--but usually from those who knew better, and from whom we +had a right to expect support and backing. + +[Footnote 6: I set down reluctantly this censure of an honored +profession, to individual members of which I have been wont, in a long +succession of troubled years, to go for advice and help in public +matters, and never in vain. The statement of the chief sanitary officer +of the Health Department, reaffirmed at the time I am writing, is, +however, positive to the effect that to this opposition, and this only, +was due the failure of that much-needed reform which had for years been +with me a pet measure.] + +Speaking of that reminds me of a mishap I had in the Hester Street +school,--the one with the "frills" which the Board of Education cut off. +I happened to pass it after school hours, and went in to see what sort +of a playground the roof would have made. I met no one on the way, and, +finding the scuttle open, climbed out and up the slant of the roof to +the peak, where I sat musing over our lost chance, when the janitor came +to close up. He must have thought I was a crazy man, and my explanation +did not make it any better. He haled me down, and but for the fortunate +chance that the policeman on the beat knew me, I should have been taken +to the lockup as a dangerous lunatic,--all for dreaming of a playground +on the roof of a schoolhouse. + +Janitor and Board of Commissioners to the contrary notwithstanding, the +dream became real. There stands another school in Hester Street to-day +within easy call, that has a playground measuring more than twelve +thousand square feet on the roof, one of half that size down on the +ground, and an asphalted indoor playground as big as the one on the +roof. Together they measure a trifle less than thirty thousand feet. To +the indignant amazement of my captor, the janitor, his school was thrown +open to the children in the last summer vacation, and in the winter they +put a boys' club in to worry him. What further indignities there are in +store for him, in this day of "frills," there is no telling. A +resolution is on record which states, under date of May 18, 1897, that +"it is the sense of the Board of Superintendents that the schoolhouses +may well be used in the cause of education as neighborhood centres, +providing reading-rooms, branch offices of public libraries, etc." And +to cut off all chance of relapse into the old doubt whether "such things +are educational," that laid so many of our hopes on the dusty shelf +of the circumlocution office, the state legislature has expressly +declared that the commonwealth will take the chance, which Boards of +Education shunned, of a little amusement creeping in. The schools may be +used for "purposes of recreation." To the janitor it must seem that the +end of all things is at hand. + +[Illustration: PLAYGROUND ON ROOF OF NEW EAST BROADWAY SCHOOLHOUSE + +_Area 8,348 square feet_] + +In the crowded districts, the school playgrounds were thrown open to the +children during the long vacation last year, with kindergarten teachers +to amuse them, and half a score of vacation schools tempted more than +four thousand children from the street into the cool shade of the +class-rooms. They wrought in wood and iron, they sang and they played +and studied nature,--out of a barrel, to be sure, that came twice a week +from Long Island filled with "specimens;" but toward the end we took a +hint from Chicago, and let the children gather their own specimens on +excursions around the bay and suburbs of the city. That was a tremendous +success. The mere hint that money might be lacking to pay for the +excursions this summer set the St. Andrew's Brotherhood men on Long +Island to devising schemes for inviting the schoolchildren out on +trolley and shore trips. With the Christian Endeavor, the Epworth +League, and kindred societies looking about for something to try their +young strength and enthusiasm on, we may be here standing upon the +threshold of something which shall bring us nearer to a universal +brotherhood than all the consecrations and badges that have yet been +invented. + +The mere contact with nature, even out of a barrel, brought something to +those starved child lives that struck a new note. Sometimes it rang with +a sharp and jarring sound. The boys in the Hester Street school could +not be made to take an interest in the lesson on wheat until the teacher +came to the effect of drought and a bad year on the farmer's pocket. +Then they understood. They knew the process. Strikes cut into the +earnings of Hester Street, small enough at the best of times, at +frequent intervals, and the boys need not be told what a bad year means. +No other kind ever occurs there. They learned the lesson on wheat in no +time, after that. Oftener it was a gentler note that piped timidly in +the strange place. A barrel of wild roses came one day, instead of the +expected "specimens," and these were given to the children. They took +them greedily. "I wondered," said the teacher, "if it was more love of +the flower, or of getting something for nothing, no matter what." But +even if it were largely the latter, there was still the rose. Nothing +like it had come that way before, and without a doubt it taught its own +lesson. The Italian child might have jumped for it more eagerly, but its +beauty was not wasted in Jew-town, either. The baby kissed it, and it +lay upon more than one wan cheek, and whispered who knows what thought +of hope and courage that were nearly gone. Even in Hester Street the +wild rose from the hedge was not wasted. + +The result of it all was wholesome and good, because it was common +sense. The way to fight the slum in the children's lives is with +sunlight and flowers and play, which their child hearts crave, if their +eyes have never seen them. The teachers reported that the boys were +easier to manage, more quiet, and played more fairly than before. The +police reports showed that fewer were arrested or run over in the +streets than in other years. A worse enemy was attacked than the trolley +car or the truck. In the kindergarten at the Hull House in Chicago there +hangs a picture of a harvest scene, with the man wiping his brow, and a +woman resting at his feet. The teacher told me that a little girl with +an old face picked it out among all the rest, and considered it long and +gravely. "Well," she said, when her inspection was finished, "he knocked +her down, didn't he?" A two hours' argument for kindergartens or +vacation schools could not have put it stronger or better. + +The awakening of the civic conscience is nowhere more plainly traced +than in our public schools. The last five years have set us fifty years +ahead, and there is now no doubling on the track we have struck. We have +fifty kindergartens to-day where five years ago we had one, and their +method has invaded the whole system of teaching. Cooking, the only kind +of temperance preaching that counts for anything in a school course, is +taught in the girls' classes. Five years ago a minister of justice +declared in the Belgian Chamber that the nation was reverting to a new +form of barbarism, which he described by the term "alcoholic barbarism," +and pointed out as its first cause the "insufficiency of the food +procurable by the working classes." He referred to the quality, not the +quantity. The United States experts, who lately made a study of the +living habits of the poor in New York, spoke of it as a common +observation that "a not inconsiderable amount of the prevalent +intemperance can be traced to poor food and unattractive home tables." +The toasting-fork in Jacob's sister's hand beats preaching in the +campaign against the saloon, just as the boys' club beats the police +club in fighting the gang. + +The cram and the jam are being crowded out as common-sense teaching +steps in and takes their place, and the "three H's," the head, the +heart, and the hand,--a whole boy,--are taking the place too long +monopolized by the "three R's." There was need of it. It had seemed +sometimes as if, in our anxiety lest he should not get enough, we were +in danger of stuffing the boy to the point of making a hopeless dunce of +him. It is a higher function of the school to teach principles than to +impart facts merely. Teaching the boy municipal politics and a thousand +things to make a good citizen of him, instead of so filling him with +love of his country and pride in its traditions that he is bound to take +the right stand when the time comes, is as though one were to attempt to +put all the law of the state into its constitution to make it more +binding. The result would be hopeless congestion and general +uselessness. + +It comes down to the teacher in the end, and there are 5600 of them in +the old city alone, 10,000 for the greater city;[7] the great mass +faithful and zealous, but yoked to the traditions of a day that is past. +Half the machine teaching, the wooden output of our public schools in +the past, I believe was due to the practical isolation of the teachers +between the tyranny of politics and the distrust of those who had good +cause to fear the politician and his work. There was never a more +saddening sight than that of the teachers standing together in an almost +solid body to resist reform of the school system as an attack upon +them. There was no pretense on their part that the schools did not need +reform. They knew better. They fought for their places. Throughout the +fight no word came from them of the children's rights. They imagined +that theirs were in danger, and they had no thought for anything else. +We gathered then the ripe fruit of politics, and it will be a long +while, I suppose, before we get the taste out of our mouths. But the +grip of politics on our schools has been loosened, if not shaken off +altogether, and the teacher's slavery is at an end, if she herself so +wills it. Once hardly thought worthy of a day laborer's hire, she will +receive a policeman's pay for faithful service[8] in the school year now +begun, with his privilege of a half-pay pension on retirement. Within +three weeks after the passage of the salary bill forty-two teachers in +the boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx had applied for retirement. The +training schools are hard at work filling up the gaps. The windows of +the schoolhouse have been thrown open, and life let in there too with +the sunlight. The day may be not far distant when ours shall be schools +"for discovering aptitude," in Professor Felix Adler's wise plan. The +problem is a vast one, even in its bulk; every year seats must be found +on the school benches for twenty thousand additional children. However +deep we have gone down into our pockets to pay for new schools, there +are to-day in the greater city nearly thirty thousand children in +half-day or part-time classes, waiting their chance. But that it can and +will be solved the experience of the last five years fully warrants. + +[Footnote 7: The exact number for April, 1899, was 9989; number of +pupils registered, 401,761; average daily attendance, 370,722.] + +[Footnote 8: The teacher's pay, under the new act, is from $600 to +$1400. The policeman's pay is $1400.] + +In the solution the women of New York will have had no mean share. In +the struggle for school reform they struck the telling blows, and the +credit for the victory was justly theirs. The Public Education +Association, originally a woman's auxiliary to Good Government Club E, +has since worked as energetically with the school authorities as it +before worked against them. It has opened many windows for little souls +by hanging schoolrooms with beautiful casts and pictures, and forged at +the same time new and strong links in the chain that bound the boy all +too feebly to the school. At a time when the demand of the boys of the +East Side for club room, which was in itself one of the healthiest signs +of the day, had reached an exceedingly dangerous pass, the Public +Education Association broke ground that will prove the most fertile +field of all. The Raines law saloon, quick to discern in the new demand +the gap that would divorce it by and by from the man, attempted to +bridge it by inviting the boy in under its roof. Occasionally the girl +went along. A typical instance of how the scheme worked was brought to +my attention at the time by the manager of the College Settlement. The +back room of the saloon was given to the club free of charge, with the +understanding that the boy members should "treat." As a means of raising +the needed funds, the club hit upon the plan of fining members ten cents +when they "got funny." To defeat this device of the devil some way must +be found; but club room was scarce among the tenements. The Good +Government Clubs proposed to the Board of Education that it open the +empty class-rooms at night for the children's use. It was my privilege +to plead their cause before the School Board, and to obtain from it the +necessary permission, after some hesitation and doubt as to whether "it +was educational." The Public Education Association promptly assumed the +responsibility for "the property," and the Hester Street school was +opened. There are now two schools that are given over to evening clubs. +The property has not been molested, but the boys who have met under Miss +Winifred Buck's management have learned many a lesson of self-control +and practical wisdom that has proved "educational" in the highest +degree. Her plan is simplicity itself. Through their play--the meeting +usually begins with a romp--in quarters where there is not too much +elbow-room, the boys learn the first lesson of respecting one another's +rights. The subsequent business meeting puts them upon the fundamentals +of civilized society, as it were. Out of the debate of the question, Do +we want boys who swear, steal, gamble, and smoke cigarettes? grow +convictions as to why these vices are wrong that put "the gang" in its +proper light. Punishment comes to appear, when administered by the boys +themselves, a natural consequence of law-breaking, in defense of +society; and the boy is won. He can thenceforward be trusted to work out +his own salvation. If he does it occasionally with excessive unction, +remember how recent is his conversion. "_Resolved_, that wisdom is +better than wealth," was rejected as a topic for discussion by one of +the clubs, because "everybody knows it is." This was in the Tenth Ward. +If temptation had come that way in the shape of a pushcart with +pineapples--we are all human! Anyway, they had learned the right. + +With the women to lead, the school has even turned the tables on the +jail and invaded it bodily. For now nearly two years the Public +Education Association has kept school in the Tombs, for the boys locked +up there awaiting trial. Of thirty-one pupils on this school register, +the other day, twelve were charged with burglary, four with highway +robbery, and three with murder. That was the gang run to earth at last. +Better late than never. The windows of their prison overlooked the spot +where the gallows used to stand that cut short many a career such as +they pursued. They were soberly attentive to their studies, which were +of a severely practical turn. Their teacher, Mr. David Willard, who was +a resident of the University Settlement in its old Delancey Street +home,--the fact that the forces for good one finds at work in the slum +usually lead back to the settlements shows best that they have so far +escaped the peril of stiffening into mere institutions,--has his own +sound view of how to head off the hangman. Daily and nightly he gathers +about him in the house on Chrystie Street, where he makes his home, +three hundred boys and girls, whom he meets as their friend, on equal +terms. The club is the means of getting them there, and so it is in its +right place. + +Once a week another teacher comes to the Tombs school, and tells the +boys of our city's history, its famous buildings and great men; trying +so to arouse their interest as a first step toward a citizen's pride. +This one also is sent by a club of women, the City History Club, which +in three years has done strange things among the children. It sprang +from the proposition of Mr. Robert Abbe that the man and the citizen has +his birth in the boy, and that to love a thing one must know it first. +The half-dozen classes that were started for the study of our city's +history have swelled into nearly a hundred, with quite eighteen hundred +pupils. The pregnant fact was noted early by the teachers, that the +immigrant boy easily outstrips in interest for his adopted home the +native, who perchance turns up his nose at him, and later very likely +complains of the "unscrupulousness" of the Jew who forged ahead of him +in business as well. + +"Everything takes ten years." Looking back from the closing year of the +century, one is almost tempted to turn Mr. Hewitt's phrase about, and +say that everything has been packed into ten years. The tenth winter of +the free lectures, which the city provides to fill up in a measure those +gaps which the earlier years left, has just passed. When the first +course showed an attendance of 22,149 upon 186 lectures, we were all +encouraged; but the last season saw 1923 lectures delivered upon every +topic of human interest, from the care of our bodies and natural science +to literature, astronomy, and music, and a multitude of 519,411 persons, +chiefly workingmen and their wives, the parents of the schoolboy, heard +them. Forty-eight schools and halls were employed for the purpose. The +People's Institute adds to this programme a forum for the discussion of +social topics, nineteenth-century history, and "present problems" on a +wholly non-partisan, unsectarian basis. The Institute was launched upon +its educational mission within six weeks after the disastrous Greater +New York election in 1897. It has since drawn to the platform of the +Cooper Institute audiences, chiefly of workingmen more or less connected +with the labor movement, that have filled its great hall. The spirit +that animates its work is shown in its review of the field upon the +threshold of its third year. Speaking of the social issues that are +hastening toward a settlement, it says: "Society is about to be +organized, gradually, wisely, on the lines of the recognition of the +brotherhood of man. The People's Institute holds to-day, as no other +institution in this city, the confidence of all classes of the working +people; also of the best minds among the well-to-do classes. It can +throw all its influence upon the side of removing misunderstandings, +promoting mutual confidence.... This is its great work." A great +undertaking, truly, but one in which no one may rashly say it shall not +succeed. As an installment, it organized last spring, for study, +discussion, and social intercourse, the first of a chain of People's +Clubs, full of a strong and stirring life, which within three months had +a membership of three hundred and fifty, and a list of two hundred and +fifty applicants. + +While the Institute's plan has met with this cordial reception downtown, +uptown, among the leisure classes, its acceptance has been nothing like +so ready. Selfish wealth has turned a cold shoulder to the brotherhood +of man, as so often in the past. Still the proffered hand is not +withdrawn. In a hundred ways it is held out with tender of help and +sympathy and friendship, these days, where distrust and indifference +were once the rule. The People's University Extension Society, leaving +the platform to its allies, invades the home, the nursery, the +kindergarten, the club, wherever it can, with help and counsel. Down on +the lower East Side, the Educational Alliance conducts from the Hebrew +Institute an energetic campaign among the Jewish immigrants that +reaches fully six thousand souls, two thirds of them children, every day +in the week. Sixty-two clubs alone hold meetings in the building on +Saturday and Sunday. Under the same roof the Baron Hirsch Fund has +taught sixteen thousand children of refugee Jews in nine years. It +passes them on to the public schools within six months of their landing, +the best material they receive from anywhere. + +So the boy is being got ready for dealing, in the years that are to +come, with the other but not more difficult problems of setting his +house to rights, and ridding it of the political gang which now +misrepresents him and us. And justice to Jacob is being evolved. Not yet +without obstruction and dragging of feet. The excellent home library +plan that proved so wholesome in the poor quarters of Boston has failed +in New York, except in a few notable instances, through the difficulty +of securing the visitors upon whom the plan depends for its success. The +same want has kept the boys' club from reaching the development that +would apply the real test to it as a barrier against the slum. There +are fifteen clubs for every Winifred Buck that is in sight. From the +City History Club, the Charity Organization Society, from everywhere, +comes the same complaint. The hardest thing in the world to give is +still one's self. But it is all the time getting to be easier. There are +daily more women and men who, thinking of the boy, can say, and do, with +my friend of the College Settlement, when an opportunity to enter a +larger field was offered her, "No, I am content to stay here, to be +ready for Johnnie when he wants me." + +Justice for the boy, and for his father. An itinerant Jewish glazier, +crying his wares, was beckoned into a stable by the foreman, and bidden +to replace a lot of broken panes, enough nearly to exhaust his stock. +When, after working half the day, he asked for his pay, he was driven +from the place with jeers and vile words. Raging and impotent, he went +back to his poor tenement cursing a world in which there was no justice +for a poor man. If he had next been found ranting with anarchists +against the social order, would you have blamed him? He found instead, +in the Legal Aid Society, a champion that pleaded his cause and +compelled the stableman to pay him his wages. For a hundred thousand +such--more shame to us--this society has meant all that freedom +promised: justice to the poor man. It too has earned a place among the +forces that are working out through the new education the brighter day, +for it has taught the lesson which all the citizens of a free state need +most to learn,--respect for law. + + + + +VIII + +REFORM BY HUMANE TOUCH + + +I have sketched in outline the gains achieved in the metropolis since +its conscience awoke. Now, in closing this account, I am reminded of the +story of an old Irishman who died here a couple of years ago. Patrick +Mullen was an honest blacksmith. He made guns for a living. He made them +so well that one with his name on it was worth a good deal more than the +market price of guns. Other makers went to him with offers of money for +the use of his stamp; but they never went twice. When sometimes a gun of +very superior make was brought to him to finish, he would stamp it P. +Mullen, never Patrick Mullen. Only to that which he himself had wrought +did he give his honest name without reserve. When he died, judges and +bishops and other great men crowded to his modest home by the East +River, and wrote letters to the newspapers telling how proud they had +been to call him friend. Yet he was, and remained to the end, plain +Patrick Mullen, blacksmith and gunmaker. + +In his life he supplied the answer to the sigh of dreamers in all days: +when will the millennium come? It will come when every man is a Patrick +Mullen at his own trade; not merely a P. Mullen, but a Patrick Mullen. +The millennium of municipal politics, when there shall be no slum to +fight, will come when every citizen does his whole duty as a citizen; +not before. As long as he "despises politics," and deputizes another to +do it for him, whether that other wears the stamp of a Croker or of a +Platt,--it matters little which,--we shall have the slum, and be put +periodically to the trouble and the shame of draining it in the public +sight. A citizen's duty is one thing that cannot be farmed out safely; +and the slum is not limited by the rookeries of Mulberry or Ludlow +streets. It has long roots that feed on the selfishness and dullness of +Fifth Avenue quite as greedily as on the squalor of the Sixth Ward. The +two are not nearly so far apart as they look. + +I am not saying this because it is anything new, but because we have +just had an illustration of its truth in municipal politics. Waring and +Roosevelt were the Patrick Mullens of the reform administration which +Tammany has now replaced with her insolent platform, "To hell with +reform." It was not an ideal administration, but it can be said of it, +at least, that it was up to the times it served. It made compromises +with spoils politics, and they were wretched failures. It took Waring +and Roosevelt on the other plan, on which they insisted, of divorcing +politics from the public business, and they let in more light than even +my small parks over on the East Side. For they showed us where we stood +and what was the matter with us. We believed in Waring when he +demonstrated the success of his plan for cleaning the streets: not +before. When Roosevelt announced his programme of enforcing the excise +law because it _was_ law, a howl arose that would have frightened a less +resolute man from his purpose. But he went right on doing the duty he +was sworn to do. And when, at the end of three months of clamor and +abuse, we saw the spectacle of the saloon keepers formally resolving to +help the police instead of hindering them; of the prison ward in +Bellevue Hospital standing empty for three days at a time, an +astonishing and unprecedented thing, which the warden could only +attribute to the "prompt closing of the saloons at one A. M.;" and of +the police force recovering its lost self-respect, we had found out more +and greater things than whether the excise law was a good or a bad law. +We understood what Roosevelt meant when he insisted upon the "primary +virtues" of honesty and courage in the conduct of public business. For +the want of them in us, half the laws that touched our daily lives had +become dead letters or vehicles of blackmail and oppression. It was +worth something to have that lesson taught us in that way; to find out +that simple, straightforward, honest dealing as between man and man is +after all effective in politics as in gunmaking. Perhaps we have not +mastered the lesson yet. But we have not discharged the teacher, either. + +[Illustration: A TAMMANY-SWEPT EAST SIDE STREET, BEFORE WARING + +(_See picture facing page 248_)] + +Courage, indeed! There were times during that stormy spell when it +seemed as if we had grown wholly and hopelessly flabby as a people. +All the outcry against the programme of order did not come from the +lawless and the disorderly, by any means. Ordinarily decent, +conservative citizens joined in counseling moderation and virtual +compromise with the law-breakers--it was nothing else--to "avoid +trouble." The old love of fair play had been whittled down by the +jackknife of all-pervading expediency to an anaemic desire to "hold the +scales even;" that is a favorite modern device of the devil for +paralyzing action in men. You cannot hold the scales even in a moral +issue. It inevitably results in the triumph of evil, which asks nothing +better than the even chance to which it is not entitled. When the +trouble in the Police Board had reached a point where it seemed +impossible not to understand that Roosevelt and his side were fighting a +cold and treacherous conspiracy against the cause of good government, we +had the spectacle of a Christian Endeavor Society inviting the man who +had hatched the plot, the bitter and relentless enemy whom the Mayor had +summoned to resign, and afterward did his best to remove as a fatal +obstacle to reform,--inviting this man to come before it and speak of +Christian citizenship! It was a sight to make the bosses hug themselves +with glee. For Christian citizenship is their nightmare, and nothing is +so cheering to them as evidence that those who profess it have no sense. + +Apart from the moral bearings of it, what this question of enforcement +of law means in the life of the poor was illustrated by testimony given +before the Police Board very recently. A captain was on trial for +allowing the policy swindle to go unchecked in his precinct. Policy is a +kind of penny lottery, with alleged daily drawings which never take +place. The whole thing is a pestilent fraud, which is allowed to exist +only because it pays heavy blackmail to the police and the politicians. +Expert witnesses testified that eight policy shops in the Twenty-First +Ward, which they had visited, did a business averaging about thirty-two +dollars a day each. The Twenty-First is a poor Irish tenement ward. The +policy sharks were getting two hundred and fifty dollars or more a day +of the hard-earned wages of those poor people, in sums of from one and +two cents to a quarter, without making any return for it. The thing +would seem incredible, were it not too sadly familiar. The saloon keeper +got his share of what was left, and rewarded his customer by posing as +the "friend of the poor man" whenever his business was under scrutiny; I +have yet in my office the record of a single week during the hottest of +the fight between Roosevelt and the saloons, as showing of what kind +that friendship is. It embraces the destruction of eight homes by the +demon of drunkenness: the suicide of four wives, the murder of two +others by drunken husbands, the killing of a policeman in the street, +and the torture of an aged woman by her rascal son, who "used to be a +good boy till he took to liquor, when he became a perfect devil." In +that role he finally beat her to death for giving shelter to some +evicted fellow tenants who else would have had to sleep in the street. +Nice friendly turn, wasn't it? + +And yet there was something to be said for the saloon keeper. He gave +the man the refuge from his tenement which he needed. I say needed, +purposely. There has been a good deal of talk lately about the saloon +as a social necessity. About all there is to that is that the saloon is +there, and the necessity too. Man is a social animal, whether he lives +in a tenement or in a palace. But the palace has resources; the tenement +has not. It is a good place to get away from at all times. The saloon is +cheery and bright, and never far away. The man craving human +companionship finds it there. He finds, too, in the saloon keeper one +who understands his wants much better than the reformer who talks civil +service in the meetings. "Civil service" to him and his kind means yet a +contrivance for keeping them out of a job. The saloon keeper knows the +boss, if he is not himself the boss or his lieutenant, and can steer him +to the man who will spend all day at the City Hall, if need be, to get a +job for a friend, and all night pulling wires to keep him in it, if +trouble is brewing. Mr. Beecher used to say, when pleading for bright +hymn tunes, that he didn't want the devil to have the monopoly of all +the good music in the world. The saloon has had the monopoly up to date +of all the cheer in the tenements. If its owner has made it pan out to +his own advantage and the boss's, we at least have no just cause of +complaint. We let him have the field all to himself. + +As to this boss, of whom we hear so much, what manner of man is he? That +depends on how you look at him. I have one in mind, a district boss, +whom you would accept instantly as a type, if I were to mention his +name, which I shall not do for a reason which I fear will shock you: he +and I are friends. In his private capacity I have real regard for him. +As a politician and a boss I have none at all. I am aware that this is +taking low ground in a discussion of this kind, but perhaps the reader +will better understand the relations of his "district" to him, if I let +him into mine. There is no political bond between us, of either district +or party; just the reverse. It is purely personal. He was once a police +justice,--at that time he kept a saloon,--and I never knew one with more +common sense, which happens to be the one quality especially needed in +that office. Up to the point where politics came in I could depend upon +him entirely. At that point he let me know bluntly that he was in the +habit of running his district to suit himself. The way he did it +brought him under the just accusation of being guilty of every kind of +rascality known to politics. When next our paths would cross each other, +it would very likely be on some errand of mercy, to which his feet were +always swift. I recall the distress of a dear and gentle lady at whose +dinner table I once took his part. She could not believe that there was +any good in him; what he did must be done for effect. Some time after +that she wrote asking me to look after an East Side family that was in +great trouble. It was during the severe cold spell of last winter, and +there was need of haste. I went over at once; but although I had lost no +time, I found my friend the boss ahead of me. It was a real pleasure to +me to be able to report to my correspondent that he had seen to their +comfort, and to add that it was unpolitical charity altogether. The +family was that of a Jewish widow with a lot of little children. He is a +Roman Catholic. There were no men, consequently no voters, in the house, +which was far outside of his district, too; and as for effect, he was +rather shamefaced at my catching him at it. I do not believe that a +soul has ever heard of the case from him to this day. + +[Illustration: THE SAME EAST SIDE STREET WHEN COLONEL WARING WIELDED THE +BROOM + +(_See picture facing page 242_)] + +My friend is a Tammany boss. During that same cold spell a politician of +the other camp came into my office and gave me a hundred dollars to +spend as I saw fit among the poor. His district was miles uptown, and he +was most unwilling to disclose his identity, stipulating in the end that +no one but I should know where the money came from. He was not seeking +notoriety. The plight of the suffering had appealed to him, and he +wanted to help where he could, that was all. + +Now, I have not the least desire to glorify the boss in this. He is not +glorious to me. He is simply human. Often enough he is a coarse and +brutal fellow, in his morals as in his politics. Again, he may have some +very engaging personal traits that bind his friends to him with the +closest of ties. The poor man sees the friend, the charity, the power +that is able and ready to help him in need; is it any wonder that he +overlooks the source of this power, this plenty,--that he forgets the +robbery in the robber who is "good to the poor"? Anyhow, if anybody got +robbed, it was "the rich." With the present ethical standards of the +slum, it is easy to construct even a scheme of social justice out of it +that is very comforting all round, even to the boss himself, though he +is in need of no sympathy or excuse. "Politics," he will tell me in his +philosophic moods, "is a game for profit. The city foots the bills." +Patriotism means to him working for the ticket that shall bring more +profit. "I regard," he says, lighting his cigar, "a repeater as a shade +off a murderer, but you are obliged to admit that in my trade he is a +necessary evil." I am not obliged to do anything of the kind, but I can +understand his way of looking at it. He simply has no political +conscience. He has gratitude, loyalty to a friend,--that is part of his +stock in trade,--fighting blood, plenty of it, all the good qualities of +the savage; nothing more. And a savage he is, politically, with no soul +above the dross. He would not rob a neighbor for the world; but he will +steal from the city--though he does not call it by that name--without a +tremor, and count it a good mark. When I tell him that, he waves his +hand toward Wall Street as representative of the business community, +and toward the office of his neighbor, the padrone, as representative +of the railroads, and says with a laugh, "Don't they all do it?" + +The boss believes in himself. It is one of his strong points. And he has +experience to back him. In the fall of 1894 we shook off boss rule in +New York, and set up housekeeping for ourselves. We kept it up three +years, and then went back to the old style. I should judge that we did +it because we were tired of too much virtue. Perhaps we were not built +to hold such a lot at once. Besides, it is much easier to be ruled than +to rule. That fall, after the election, when I was concerned about what +would become of my small parks, of the Health Department in which we +took such just pride, and of a dozen other things, I received one +unvarying reply to my anxious question, or rather two. If it was the +Health Department, I was told: "Go to Platt. He is the only man who can +do it. He is a sensible man, and will see that it is protected." If +small parks, it was: "Go to Croker. He will not allow the work to be +stopped." A playgrounds bill was to be presented in the legislature, and +everybody advised: "Go to Platt. He won't have any objection: it is +popular." And so on. My advisers were not politicians. They were +business men, but recently honestly interested in reform. I was talking +one day with a gentleman of very wide reputation as a philanthropist, +about the unhappy lot of the old fire-engine horses,--which, after lives +of toil that deserve a better fate, are sold for a song to drag out a +weary existence hauling some huckster's cart around,--and wishing that +they might be pensioned off to live out their years on a farm, with +enough to eat and a chance to roll in the grass. He was much interested, +and promptly gave me this advice: "I tell you what you do. You go and +see Croker. He likes horses." No wonder the boss believes in himself. He +would be less than human if he did not. And he is very human. + +I had voted on the day of the Greater New York election,--the Tammany +election, as we learned to call it afterward,--in my home out in the +Borough of Queens, and went over to the depot to catch the train for the +city. On the platform were half a dozen of my neighbors, all business +men, all "friends of reform." Some of them were just down from +breakfast. One I remembered as introducing a resolution, in a meeting we +had held, about the discourtesy of local politicians. He looked +surprised when reminded that it was election day. "Why, is it to-day?" +he said. "They didn't send any carriage," said another regretfully. "I +don't see what's the use," said the third; "the roads are just as bad as +when we began talking about it." (We had been trying to mend them.) The +fourth yawned and said: "I don't care. I have my business to attend to." +And they took the train, which meant that they lost their votes. The +Tammany captain was busy hauling his voters by the cartload to the +polling place. Over there stood a reform candidate who had been defeated +in the primary, and puffed out his chest. "The politicians are afraid of +me," he said. They slapped him on the back, as they went by, and told +him that he was a devil of a fellow. + +So Tammany came back. The Health Department is wrecked. The police force +is worse than before Roosevelt took hold of it, and we are back in the +mud out of which we pulled ourselves with such an effort. And we are +swearing at it. But I am afraid we are swearing at the wrong fellow. The +real Tammany is not the conscienceless rascal that plunders our treasury +and fattens on our substance. That one is a mere counterfeit. It is the +voter who waits for a carriage to take him to the polls, the man who +"doesn't see what's the use;" the business man who says "business is +business," and has no time to waste on voting; the citizen who "will +wait to see how the cat jumps, because he doesn't want to throw his vote +away;" the cowardly American who "doesn't want to antagonize" anybody; +the fool who "washes his hands of politics." These are the real Tammany, +the men after the boss's own heart. For every one whose vote he buys, +there are two of these who give him theirs for nothing. We shall get rid +of him when these withdraw their support, when they become citizens of +the Patrick Mullen stamp, as faithful at the polling place as he was at +the forge; not before. + +The true work of reform is at the top, not at the bottom. The man in the +slum votes according to his light, and the boss holds the candle. But +the boss is in no real sense a leader. He follows instead, always as +far behind the moral sentiment of the community as he thinks is safe. He +has heard it said that a community will not be any better than its +citizens, and that it will be just as good as they are, and he applies +the saying to himself. He is no worse a boss than the town deserves. I +can conceive of his taking credit to himself as some kind of a moral +instrument by which the virtue of the community may be graded, though +that is most unlikely. He does not bother himself with the morals of +anything. But right here is his Achilles heel. The man has no +conscience. He cannot tell the signs of it in others. It always comes +upon him unawares. Reform to him simply means the "outs" fighting to get +in. The real thing he will always underestimate. Such a man is not the +power he seems. He is formidable only in proportion to the amount of +shaking it takes to rouse the community's conscience. + +The boss is like the measles, a distemper of a self-governing people's +infancy. When we shall have come of age politically, he will have no +terrors for us. Meanwhile, being charged with the business of governing, +which we left to him because we were too busy making money, he follows +the track laid out for him, and makes the business pan out all that is +in it. He fights when we want to discharge him. Of course he does. No +man likes to give up a good job. He will fight or bargain, as he sees +his way clear. He will give us small parks, play piers, new schools, +anything we ask, to keep his place, while trying to find out "the price" +of this conscience which he does not understand. Even to the half of his +kingdom he will give, to be "in" on the new deal. He has done it before, +and there is no reason that he can see why it should not be done again. +And he will appeal to the people whom he is plundering to trust him +because they know him. + +Odd as it sounds, this is where he has his real hold. I have shown why +this is so. To the poor people of his district the boss is a real friend +in need. He is one of them. He does not want to reform them; far from +it. No doubt it is very ungrateful of them, but the poor people have no +desire to be reformed. They do not think they need to be. They consider +their moral standards quite as high as those of the rich, and resent +being told that they are mistaken. The reformer comes to them from +another world to tell them these things, and goes his way. The boss +lives among them. He helped John to a job on the pipes in their hard +winter, and got Mike on the force. They know him as a good neighbor, and +trust him to their harm. He drags their standard ever farther down. The +question for those who are trying to help them is how to make them +transfer their allegiance, and trust their real friends instead. + +It ought not to be a difficult question to answer. Any teacher could do +it. He knows, if he knows anything, that the way to get and keep the +children's confidence is to trust them, and let them know that they are +trusted. They will almost always come up to the demand thus made upon +them. Preaching to them does little good; preaching at them still less. +Men, whether rich or poor, are much like children. The good in them is +just as good as it is said to be, and the bad, considering their +enlarged opportunities for mischief, not so much worse than it is +called. A vigorous optimism, a stout belief in one's fellow man, is +better equipment in a campaign for civic virtue than stacks of tracts +and arguments, economic and moral, are. There is good bottom, even in +the slum, for that kind of an anchor to get a grip on. A year ago I went +to see a boxing match there had been much talk about. The hall was +jammed with a rough and noisy crowd, hotly intent upon its favorite. His +opponent, who hailed, I think, from somewhere in Delaware, was greeted +with hostile demonstrations as a "foreigner." But as the battle wore on, +and he was seen to be fair and manly, while the New Yorker struck one +foul blow after another, the attitude of the crowd changed rapidly from +enthusiastic approval of the favorite to scorn and contempt; and in the +last round, when he knocked the Delawarean over with a foul blow, the +audience rose in a body and yelled to have the fight given to the +"foreigner," until my blood tingled with pride. For the decision would +leave it practically without a cent. It had staked all it had on the New +Yorker. "He is a good man," I heard on all sides, while the once +favorite sneaked away without a friend. "Good" meant fair and manly to +that crowd. I thought, as I went to the office the next morning, that +it ought to be easy to appeal to such a people with measures that were +fair and just, if we could only get on common ground. But the only hint +I got from my reform paper was an editorial denunciation of the +brutality of boxing, on the same page that had an enthusiastic review of +the college football season. I do not suppose it did any harm, for the +paper was probably not read by one of the men it had set out to reform. +But suppose it had been, how much would it have appealed to them? +Exactly the qualities of robust manliness which football is supposed to +encourage in college students had been evoked by the trial of strength +and skill which they had witnessed. As to the brutality, they knew that +fifty young men are maimed or killed at football to one who fairs ill in +a boxing match. Would it seem to them common sense, or cant and humbug? + +It comes down in the end to a question of common sense and common +honesty. For how many failures of reform effort is insincerity not to +blame! Last spring I attended a meeting at Albany that had been called +by the governor to discuss the better enforcement of the labor laws. We +talked the situation over, and Mr. Roosevelt received from those present +their ready promise to aid him in every way in making effective the laws +that represented so much toil and sacrifice, yet had until then been in +too many instances barren of results. Some time after, a workingman told +me with scorn how, on our coming home, one of our party had stopped in +at the factory inspector's office to urge him to "let up" on a friend, a +cigar manufacturer, who was violating a law for which the labor +organizations had fought long years as absolutely necessary to secure +human conditions in the trade. How much stock might he and his fellows +be supposed to take in a movement that had such champions? "You scratch +my back and I'll scratch yours," is a kind of politics in which the +reformer is no match for the boss. The boss will win on that line every +time. A saving sense of humor might have avoided that and many other +pitfalls. I am seriously of the opinion that a professional humorist +ought to be attached to every reform movement, to keep it from making +itself ridiculous by either too great solemnity or too much conceit. As +it is, the enemy sometimes employs him with effect. Failing the adoption +of that plan, I would recommend a decree of banishment against +photographers, press-clippings men, and the rest of the congratulatory +staff. Why should the fact that a citizen has done a citizen's duty +deserve to be celebrated in print and picture, as if something +extraordinary had happened? The smoke of battle had not cleared away +after the victory of reform, in the fall of 1894, before the citizens' +committee and all the little sub-committees rushed pell-mell to the +photographer's to get themselves on record as the men who did it. The +spectacle might have inspired in the humorist the advice to get two sets +made, while they were about it,--one to serve by and by as an exhibit of +the men who didn't; and, as the event proved, he would have been right. + +But it is easy to find fault, and on that tack we get no farther. Those +men did a great work, and they did it well. The mile-posts they set up +on the road to better things will guide another generation to the goal, +however the present may go astray. Good schools, better homes, and a +chance for the boy are arguments that are not lost upon the people. +They wear well. It may be that, like Moses and his followers, we of the +present day shall see the promised land only from afar and with the eye +of faith, because of our sins; that to a younger and sturdier to-morrow +it shall be given to blaze the path of civic righteousness that was our +dream. I like to think that it is so, and that that is the meaning of +the coming of men like Roosevelt and Waring at this time with their +simple appeal to the reason of honest men. Unless I greatly err in +reading the signs of the times, it is indeed so, and the day of the boss +and of the slum is drawing to an end. Our faith has felt the new +impulse; rather, I should say, it has given it. The social movements, +and that which we call politics, are but a reflection of what the people +honestly believe, a chart of their aims and aspirations. Charity in our +day no longer means alms, but justice. The social settlements are +substituting vital touch for the machine charity that reaped a crop of +hate and beggary. They are passenger bridges, it has been truly said, +not mere "shoots" for the delivery of coal and groceries; bridges upon +which men go over, not down, from the mansion to the tenement. We +have learned that we cannot pass off checks for human sympathy in +settlement of our brotherhood arrears. The church, which once stood by +indifferent, or worse, is hastening to enter the life of the people. In +the memory of men yet living, one church, moving uptown away from the +crowd, left its old Mulberry Street home to be converted into tenements +that justly earned the name of "dens of death" in the Health +Department's records, while another became the foulest lodging house in +an unclean city. It was a church corporation which in those bad days +owned the worst underground dive downtown, and turned a deaf ear to all +remonstrances. The church was "angling for souls." But souls in this +world live in bodies endowed with reason. The results of that kind of +fishing were empty pews and cold hearts, and the conscience-stricken cry +that went up, "What shall we do to lay hold of this great multitude that +has slipped from us?" + +[Illustration: THEODORE ROOSEVELT] + +Ten years have passed, and to-day we see the churches of every +denomination uniting in a systematic canvass of the city to get at the +facts of the people's life of which they had ceased to be a part, +pleading for parks, playgrounds, kindergartens, libraries, clubs, and +better homes. There is a new and hearty sound to the word "brother" that +is full of hope. The cry has been answered. The gap in the social body, +between rich and poor, is no longer widening. We are certainly coming +closer together. Ten years ago, when the King's Daughters lighted a +Christmas tree in Gotham Court, the children ran screaming from Santa +Claus as from a "bogey man." Last Christmas the boys in the Hebrew +Institute's schools nearly broke the bank laying in supplies to do him +honor. I do not mean that the Jews are deserting to join the Christian +church. They are doing that which is better,--they are embracing its +spirit; and they and we are the better for it. God knows we waited long +enough; and how close we were to each other all the while without +knowing it! Last Christmas a clergyman, who lives out of town and has a +houseful of children, asked me if I could not find for them a poor +family in the city with children of about the same ages, whom they might +visit and befriend. He worked every day in the office of a foreign +mission in Fifth Avenue, and knew little of the life that moved about +him in the city. I picked out a Hungarian widow in an East Side +tenement, whose brave struggle to keep her little flock together had +enlisted my sympathy and strong admiration. She was a cleaner in an +office building; not until all the arrangements had been made did it +occur to me to ask where. Then it turned out that she was scrubbing +floors in the missionary society's house, right at my friend's door. +They had passed each other every day, each in need of the other, and +each as far from the other as if oceans separated them instead of a +doorstep four inches wide. + + * * * * * + +Looking back over the years that lie behind with their work, and forward +to those that are coming, I see only cause for hope. As I write these +last lines in a far distant land, in the city of my birth, the children +are playing under my window, and calling to one another with glad cries +in my sweet mother tongue, even as we did in the long ago. Life and the +world are before them, bright with the promise of morning. So to me +seem the skies at home. Not lightly do I say it, for I have known the +toil of rough-hewing it on the pioneer line that turns men's hair gray; +but I have seen also the reward of the toil. New York is the youngest of +the world's great cities, barely yet out of its knickerbockers. It may +be that the dawning century will see it as the greatest of them all. The +task that is set it, the problem it has to solve and which it may not +shirk, is the problem of civilization, of human progress, of a people's +fitness for self-government that is on trial among us. We shall solve it +by the world-old formula of human sympathy, of humane touch. Somewhere +in these pages I have told of the woman in Chicago who accounted herself +the happiest woman alive because she had at last obtained a playground +for her poor neighbors' children. "I have lived here for years," she +said to me, "and struggled with principalities and powers, and have made +up my mind that the most and the best I can do is to live right here +with my people and smile with them,--keep smiling; weep when I must, but +smile as long as I possibly can." And the tears shone in her gentle old +eyes as she said it. When we have learned to smile and weep with the +poor, we shall have mastered our problem. Then the slum will have lost +its grip and the boss his job. + +Until then, while they are in possession, our business is to hold taut +and take in slack right along; never letting go for a moment. + + + ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED + BY H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO. + + The Riverside Press + + CAMBRIDGE, MASS., U. S. A. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Ten Year War, by Jacob A. 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