Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 3.djvu/497

 THE RELIEF AND CARE OF DEPENDENTS 483

EXPLANATION OF CHART.

Where X is placed, special provision has been made.

Where is placed, no special provision has been made.

Where X* is placed, special provision has been made and the class excluded from the almshouse.

Under the heading of " Dependent children " only those are marked which have what may be called a system of child-saving.

Under the "Chronic insane" "B" stands for boarding with private families; " I " for institutional care a special asylum.

'Mississippi makes it unlawful to retain children between ten and sixteen years of age in the almshouse.

Ohio provides that when children are retained in the almshouse they must be kept in a separate department.

3 Texas, Iowa, and Nevada have state institutions for orphans and half-orphans.

4 Iowa and California have state homes for the indigent adult blind.

Delaware of one "trustee for the poor," thus apparently taking away the power of the superintendent of lodging "casuals." Thus, in Delaware, "casuals" (non-residents of a hundred) are to be admitted only upon the certificate of the "trustees for the poor" of two hundreds. 1 The almshouse is open to all indigents except those classes definitely excluded. The inmates remain until ready to leave, as there is no provision for their detention. In no case is their departure restricted, except in the case of vagrants, where, in a few states, they may be confined in the almhouse on definite sentence.*

If not explicitly excluded, or if other adequate provision has not been made for them, the dependent children and destitute defectives, as well as the ordinarily dependent, are found in the almshouse. Although it anticipates our later articles, it is thought well to append a chart here showing what special pro- vision, if any, has been made for these classes. And, although where special provision has been made for a class it may now be inadequate, and so many are of necessity detained in the almshouse, we can by this process of exclusion obtain some idea of the classes found in the almshouses of the several states.

1 1 1, chap. 48.

Wisconsin seems to form an exception to the statement here made. An act of 1891 (chap. 241) authorizes the court to commit persons who, because of sickness or . other disability, are either temporary or permanent charges, dtfinilely or indffinitfly, to the almshouse. As is seen, this may apply to persons not strictly vagrant.