Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 86.djvu/584

580 Section 1841—6.—Each county shall bear all the expenses incident to the transportation of each child from such county to such "Bureau of Juvenile Research," together with such fees and costs as are allowed by law in similar cases, which fees, costs and expenses shall be paid from the county treasury upon itemized vouchers, certified to by the judge of the juvenile court.

Section 1841—7.—The provisions of this act shall become valid on and after the first day of July, 1914.

It is thus seen that Ohio plans through the "Bureau of Juvenile Research," to study the problems of delinquency from the points of view of the best technology afforded by sociology, psychology and the biologic sciences. The law contemplates in this bureau a great laboratory for the study of vital phenomena—of sociologic material in the widest sense. The records of observations and examinations upon children, in the first place, will be expected to enable the authorities to deal with each child much more intelligently than they have been able to do heretofore. The reasonable expectations in regard to education will be set forth clearly in each case. Futile efforts to overcome native defect will be avoided. Doubtful cases of defective delinquents will be given experimental treatment in reform schools, till they are proved to be unimprovable or are improved. The non-defective delinquents will be saved from institutionalization, which will result in great economy both to the individual and to society.

There will result a new conception of the work of our reform schools, and also a new conception of the work of its field officers. The reform school is not to be expected to overcome native defect, but it is to be an experiment station trying out doubtful cases, ascertaining what retardations may be overcome. The field officer is to be a very highly trained practical sociologist, skilled in all the arts of guiding into proper lines the forces of socialization. His is to be the art of making personalities.

The lines of work undertaken in such technological studies are sure to result in new conceptions and divisions of feeble-mindedness. They are also likely to bring new visions as to the relations of intelligence to the will and emotions—the relations of knowledge to the springs of action and conduct.

It is also reasonable to expect that the clinic with its constantly flowing stream of delinquents, and the archives resulting from exhaustive physical, mental and social examinations made in the clinic and in the field will become a great museum for research into the kakogenics of the state. Society is not ready to demand eugenic marriages, but the accumulation of such material as this Bureau of Juvenile Research is making constitutes a most intelligent procedure to prepare us to control and to eliminate the propagation of the unfit. These investigations will also make contributions to pure science in psychology, sociology and biology.