Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/792

 776 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

amount of outdoor aid the township trustees might give, there was much real anxiety in different parts of the state as to the adequacy of the county poor asylums to receive the number who, it was felt, would of necessity be sent there. The poor-asylum census for August 31, 1899, was 3,i33- 22 In more than one coun- ty the officials seriously contemplated enlarging their asylums for the care of the expected additional applicants, but in every case they were advised by the Board of State Charities, which ex- pected no such need to arise, to wait for further developments. In 1900, under the operation of the new law, official outdoor relief dropped from $320,667.53 to $209,956.22, a decrease of 34 per cent. Instead of the expected increase in poor-asylum population, there was a decrease, both relative and actual. The census for August 31, 1900, showed 3,096 in those institutions. 23 From year to year as the administration of outdoor relief grew more business- like, there was a corresponding decrease in the population of the county poor asylums. The number present in such institutions on August 31, 1905, was 3,115, or 12.4 in every 10,000 of the state's population. 24 The population of the state, as shown by the United States census, increased 14 per cent, from 1890 to 1900. The population of the county poor asylums decreased 4 per cent, from 1891 to 1905. Had the same proportion of inmates to state population continued, the poor asylums at the present time would be caring for 650 more inmates, and this number, on the very conservative estimate of $85 annually per capita for maintenance, would have meant an additional yearly expense of $55,000.

These are the tangible proofs of better conditions in the ad- ministration of the poor funds the reduction in the cost of relief, in the number of persons receiving aid, and in the population of the county poor asylums. But there is abundant reason to believe that, along with and because of these improvements from the standpoint of the taxpayer, has come a better condition for the poor themselves. The old system encouraged dependence on the public, and the giving of aid to one family frequently had the result of infecting the whole community with the blight of pau-

"Annual Report, 1899, p. 51. ** Ibid., 1905, p. 82.

18 Ibid., 1900, p. 78.