_yj>_ . INTERCHURCH WORLD MOVEMENT OF NORTH AMERICA WORLD SURVEY CONFERENCE ATLANTIC CITY JANUARY 7 to 10, 1920 PRELIMINARY Statement and Budget for Home Missions • PREPARED BY SURVEY DEPARTMENT-HOME MISSIONS DIVISION T HIS Survey statement should be read in the light of the fact that it is preliminary only, and will be revised and enlarged as a result of the dis¬ cussions and recommendations of the World Survey Conference. The entire Survey as revised will early be brought together in two volumes, American and Foreign, to form the basis of the financial campaign to follow. The “Statistical Mirror” will make a third volume dealing with general church, missionary and stewardship data. INTERCHURCH WORLD MOVEMENT OF NORTH AMERICA WORLD SURVEY CONFERENCE ATLANTIC CITY JANUARY 7 to 10, 1920 PRELIMINARY Statement and Budget for Home Missions PREPARED BY SURVEY DEPARTMENT-HOME MISSIONS DIVISION CONTENTS Page Introduction . 5 Cities. .... 15 Metropolitan New York. .... 37 Town and Country. .... 49 Negro Americans . .... 67 Migrant Groups. .... 87 New Americans. .... 105 North Americans Indians. .... 119 Orientals in the United States. .... 125 AA/oar TnHip<3 . .... 137 Budget Tables. .... 147 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019 with funding from Columbia University Libraries https://archive.org/details/worldsurveyconfe00inte_4 HOME MISSIONS SURVEY TABLES 146 HOME MISSIONS HOME MISSIONS DIVISION General Budget Statement HOME MISSIONS Table I.—By Denominations and Boards Board 1919 1920 Total 5 Years 1 BAPTIST Northern, Baptist Convention American Baptist Publication Society. . $2,246,705 $30,260,861 1 50 000 2 National Baptist Convention (Colored) Church Extension Board. #50 000 3 4 Seventh Day Baptists Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society. BRETHREN . Church of the Brethren General Mission Board. 4,450 85,000 9,000 21,071 11,150 200,000 55,750 l oon nnn 5 Brethren Church General Missionary Board. fjvvvJOVv 6 CHRISTIAN . Christian Church Home Mission Board. 5fi 850 186 78n 7 Woman’s Board of Home Missions.. J OO, / oU 87 000 8 CONGREGATIONAL Congregational Churches Congregational Home Missionary Society. . . 355,000 983,000 400,000 (1) 710,000 1,280,700 600,000 (1) 3,550,000 8 34.5 856 9 Congregational Church Building Society. 10 DISCIPLES . Disciples of Christ United Christian Missionary Society.... 0,J ijjOjo 2,500,000 5,000,000 (1) 466 30(5 11 Independent State Missionary Societies. 12 EV AN UEL1 CAL Evangelical Synod of N. A. Central Board for Home Missions. 60 000 13 Church Extension. 5 non i c nnn 14 FRIENDS . Society of Friends (Orthodox) Committee on Indian Affairs. •TjUvU 6,250 9n non 33 730 13 Young Friends Board. 19,500 1 7 a nnn 16 Augustana Synod Board of Home Missions. 16 296 1 ZijUUU ei 480 17 Lutheran Free Church (Norwegian) Board of Home Missions. No definite Bu dget 2 519 56fi f21 18 METHODIST . Methodist Episcopal Church Freedmen’s Aid Society. 11 CQ7 G'tn /1\ 19 Methodist Episcopal Church, South Board of Church Extension. J*y-J 1S yJKJKJ ) 523 000 / joJU v*'/ 2 61 e nnn 20 Methodist Protestant Church Board of Home Missions. 80,000 13,120 Jiv jWU 125 OOO ,0 X J ,UVA/ 1,117,000 (4) 6A 67 C 21 Woman’s Board of Home Missions.. jvVA/ 12,925 303 750 22 Free Methodist Church of North America General Missionary Board. OijOZj 1 749 700 23 MORAVIAN . Moravian Church Board of Church Extension. 25,000 1,398,310 (6) 27 500 X,# i/j/uu 167,889 27,631,045 (8) 10 289 ooo noi 24 PRESBYTERIAN . Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. Board of Home Missions. 4 71?Q4.5 (7\ 25 Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work.. . 1,573,000 (9) 711 700 M 1\ 26 Board of Church Erection. 467,010 400,000 3,701,200(12) 9,685,760 (14) 350 OOO 27 Board of Missions for Freedmen.. / 11,/UU V. a 1/ 1400 ooo n3i 28 Woman’s Board of Home Missions.. 1 036 000 n 51 29 Independent Synods and Presbyteries... 1,400,000 1,892,342 HOME MISSIONS 147 HOME MISSIONS Table I.—By Denominations and Boards— Continued Board 1919 1920 Total 5 Years 30 31 32 33 34. Presbyterian Church in the U. S., South $1,000,000 16,000 231,407 Associate Reformed Presbyterian Synod $100,000 United Presbyterian Church $397,880 2,687,607 88'487 257,621 1,368,495 (16) 489,800 (17) 1,685,000 (18) J*± 35 36 37 'lO REFORMED Reformed Church in the U. S. 250,000 3,000,000 23jl85 61,570 25,200 149,750 UNITED BRETHREN Church of the United Brethren in Christ 150,180 813,400 135,000 500,170 2,500,850 JO UNITED EVANGELICAL CHURCH 116,063 600,500 jy AC \ UNIVERSALIST CHURCHES 4,945 10,420 61,025 1. For Women’s Department. 2. Includes $254,000 for new buildings and $1,520,000 for Schoo 3. nicfudes e $l,225,000 for new buildings and $7,600,000 for School Endowments. 4. 50 per cent, of this for new buildings. 6. Includes $286,404 for debt. .. . , , _ , , 7. Includes $1,801,900 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. ., . , , _ , r 8. Includes $10,350,000 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. . 9. Does not include $278,000 for Publication Work. 10 . Does not include $1,100,000 for Publication Work. . 11. Includes $300,000 for buildings for Board of Home Missions 12. Includes $1,400,000 for buildings for Board of Home Missions projects. 13. Includes $600,000 for school endowments. 14. Includes $4,464,960 for school endowments. 15. Includes $350,000 for new buildings. 16. Includes $500,000 for school endowments. 17. Includes $420,000 for new buildings. 18. Includes $1,250,000 for new buildings and equipment. NAMES IN CAPITALS, AS ADVENTIST, are denominational family names. Names in capitals and small capitals, as Advent Christian Church are names of particular denominations. Names which are in regular roman type and which are numbered serially are names of Boards or Societies, as: 1. American Advent Mission Society. 2. Woman’s Home and Foreign Mission Society. . HOME MISSIONS 149 HOME MISSIONS DIVISION General Budget Statement for HOME MISSIONS Table II.—By Types of Work Estimates of Denominational Boards and Societies Type of Work Amounts Required for Ap¬ proved Projects as Dis¬ closed by Field Surveys But Not Yet Covered By Denominational Budgets Total Cities. Town and Country. . Negro Americans .... New Americans. Migrant Groups. North American Indians. Spanish Speaking j£. People in the United States. Orientals in the [' United States .... Alaska. West Indies. Sunday School Extension. Recruiting and Training Workers Promotion. Administration. TOTAL 1919 3 1,409,975 1,184,098 710,827 211,730 42,400 165,934 105,983 278,587 50,460 163,458 2,000 132,024 60,305 424,082 310,652,891 * 1920 34,666,449 3,559,175 5,477,957 2,232,100 89,800 295,954 576,019 647,494 207,450 2,442,701 850,350 637,100 386,000 577,173 323,592,756 * 5 Years 331,880,513 22,966,962 31,424,855 13,768,207 679,800 1,492,360 2,679,319 2,901,802 1,374,350 10,174,489 5,959,000 3,698,500 2,950,000 3,728,835 3181,977,016 1920 325,000,000 2,584,000 5 Years 3125,000,000 16,520,000 1920 329,666,449 6,143,175 5,477,957 2,432,100 1,089,800 512,954 576,019 647,494 207,450 3,622,701 850,350 637,100 386,000 577,173 ■353,773,756 5 Years 3156,880,513 39,486,962 31,424,855 14,768,207 5,679,800 2,652,360 2,679,319 2,901,802 1,374,350 11,790,489 5,959,000 3,698,500 2,950,000 3,728,835 '3332,273,016 200,000 1,000,000 217,000 1,000,000 5,000,000 1,160,000 1,180,000 1,616,000 330,181,000 3150,296,000 * The totals include items reported in bulk but not distributed as to type of work. 150 HOME MISSIONS HOME MISSIONS DIVISION General Budget HOME Table III.—By Boards (See explanatory footnotes on first page of table ) Section I.— 1 2 3 BOARD Cities Town and Country New Americans 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1 BAPTIST Northern Baptist Convention Woman’s American Baptist Home Mis¬ sion Society.. 35,799 140,471 872,487 7,117 10,794 79,578 45,106 64,326 485,352 2 Church Extension Board. 3 Seventh Day Baptists Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society. . 4,450 11,150 74,000 55,750 370,000 4 BRETHREN Church of the Brethren General Mission Board. 51,000 120,000 600,000 31,450 850 2,000 10,000 5 Brethren Church General Missionary Board. 6 CHRISTIAN Christian Church Home Mission Board. 600 650 8,450 7 Foreign Mission Board. 8 Woman’s Board of Home Missions. 1,550 1,500 25,000 9 CONGREGATIONAL Congregational Churches American Missionary Association. 10 Congregational Home Missionary Society.. 11 Congregational Church Building Society. . 706,875 890,775 5,804,302 235,625 296,925 1,934,767 41,600 54,000 362,500 700,000 12 DISCIPLES Disciples of Christ United Christian Missionary Society. 3,012,500 120,000 2,243,500 13 independent State Missionary Societies. .. 14 EVANGELICAL Evangelical Synod of N. A. Central Board of Home Missions. 15 Immigrant Mission. 3 000 i c nnn 16 FRIENDS Society of Friends (Orthodox) Young Friends Board. 17 Committee on Indian Affairs.. 18 LUTHERAN Augustana Synod Board of Home Missions. 16 296 Cl 4R0 19 METHODIST Methodist Episcopal Church Board of Home Missions and Church Ex¬ tension. 20 Freedmen s Aid Society. 21 Methodist-Episcopal Church, South Board of Church Extension. 22 Methodist Protestant Church Board of Home Missions. 85,000 800,000 t 11,900 33,000 11,425 41,000 287,000 57,125 362,500 t 1,220 7,000 1,500 30,000 30,000 7,500 209,050 23 Woman’s Board of Home Missions. 24 Free Methodist Church of N. A. General Missionary Board. 172,000 727,750 25 MORAVIAN Moravian Church Board of Church Extension. 1,500 6,500 1,000 .... 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 HOME MISSIONS 151 Statement MISSIONS and By Types of Work Columns 1 to 8 4 Orientals in the United States 5 North American Indians 6 Negroes 7 Spanish Speaking People in United States 8 Alaska 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 7,887 14,744 96,062 16,811 21,774 148,330 44,660 77,970 507,220 23,627 38,771 628,397 7,400 7,600 45,400 - 850 2,000 10,000 850 2,00 10 JKJ 2,230 7,000 72,00 3,000 t 26,000 t t t t t t 2,000 t t i ?,occ t t t t t t 1,000 5,000 500,000 5,900 IOjGOL 29,2S6 125,000 18,500 1,000,000 1 ^2,COO 9,000 50,000 19,500 20,000 124,000 ) 134170 134,170 268,340 2,519,566 14,968 12,597,830 24,842 4,968 24,842 42,500 297,000 9,250 63,900 9,000 54,500 i . r 3,000 10,000 D . 152 HOME MISSIONS HOME MISSIONS DIVISION General Bud HOME Table III.—By Boards (See explanatory footnotes on last page of table ) Section I— 9 10 11 BOARD Hawaii West Indies Migrant Groups 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1 BAPTIST Northern Baptist Convention Woman’s American Baptist Home Mission Society. 14,046 17,606 212,394 2 Church Extension Board. 3 Seventh Day Baptists Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society. . 4 BRETHREN Church of the Brethren General Mission Board. S Brethren Church General Missionary Board. 6 CHRISTIAN Christian Church Home Mission Board. 600 2,000 15,000 7 Foreign Mission Board. 8 Woman’s Board of Home Missions. 3,000 3,000 36,000 9 CONGREGATIONAL Congregational Churches American Missionary Association. 10 Congregational Home Missionary Society.. 11 Congregational Church Building Society.. . 500 2,500 400,000 12 DISCIPLES Disciples of Christ United Christian Missionary Society. 12,000 14,000 64,000 13 independent State Missionary Societies.... 14 EVANGELICAL Evangelical Synod of N. A. Central Board of Home Missions. 15 Immigrant Mission. 16 FRIENDS Society of Friends (Orthodox) Young Friends Board. 17 Committee on Indian Affairs. 18 LUTHERAN Augustana Synod Board of Home Missions. 19 METHODIST Methodist Episcopal Church Board of Home Missions and Church Ex¬ tension . 20 Freedmen’s Aid Society. 21 Methodist Episcopal Church, South Board of Church Extension. 22 Methodist Protestant Church Board of Home Missions. 23 Woman’s Board of Home Missions. 24 Free Methodist Church of N. A. General Missionary Board. 25 MORAVIAN Moravian Church Board of Church Extension. 2,000 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 HOME MISSIONS 153 get Statement MISSIONS md by Types of Work Columns 9 to 16 12 13 14 15 16 Sunday School Extension Recruiting and Training Workers Promotion Administration Total 1919 1920 5 Years’ 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Y ears 1919 1920 5 Years 1 20,424 24,000 134,000 64,930 91,650 503,250 2,246,705 509 706 27,910,693 2 50,000 150,000 3 4,450 11,510 55,750 4 85,000 200,000 1,000,000 5 9,000 6 ....400 6,900 3,041 3,600 24,600 21,071 56,850 501,900 7 .. 18,900 81 *000 8 87,000 9 855,860 1,190,000 7,075,000 10 38,375 695,360 1,160,000 6,500,000 11 40’000 40,000 200,000 983,000 1,280,700 8*345j856 12 60,000 10,000 500,000 14,500 400,000 600,000 12,080,000 13 187^030 312,300 1,992,460 14 60,000 466,306 15 3/100 15/00 16 6,250 33,750 17 19,500 2o;ooc 124,000 18 16,296 81,480 19 134,170 134,170 268,340 20 % 2,519,566 12,597,830 21 ...... 26,150 130,750 523,000 2,615,000 V . 80,000 125,000 1,117,000 23 13,120 12^925 64j625 24 5,000 30,000 303,750 1,749,700 25 1,000 25,000 27,500 167,889 154 HOME MISSIONS HOME Table III.—By Boards and Section II.— 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 BOARD 1 Cities 2 Town and Country 3 New Americans 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years PRESBYTERIAN Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. Board of Home Missions. Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work 66,971 337,000 2,895,000 381,698 1,022,500 6,639,500 117,954 1,370,000 7,269,000 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 ’MnrjpppnH^nf Synods and Presbyteries. Presbyterian Church in the U. S. (South) Executive Committee of Home Missions.. . 25,000 80,000 725,000 245,000 569,000 3,341,000 15,000 47,000 524,000 Associate Reformed Presbyterian Synod Board of Home Missions and Church Ex- tension United Presbyterian Church Rnard of Home Missions . Roard of Preedmen’s Missions Board of Church Extension. REFORMED Reformed Church in the U. S. Board of Home Missions. Women’s Missionary Society of General Synod 125,000 3,000 31,356 93,750 327,375 225,000 3,000 74,600 363,877 11117125 1,800,000 17,600 457,190 1,819,387 25,000 7,835 15,678 31,250 121,250 75,000 8,720 37,300 121,292 413,750 700,000 54,470 228,595 606,462 10,000 36,375 20,000 124,125 150,000 UNITED BRETHREN Church of the United Brethren in Christ Home Missionary Society. Church Erection Society. independent State Associations. UNITED EVANGELICAL United Evangelical Church Board of Missions . Board of Church Extension. UNIVERSALIST Universalist Churches Women’s National Missionary Association 4,045 7,920 49,025 1,500 7,500 Line 12, col. 4 (1919), col. 6 (1919), col. 7 (1919), col. 10 (1919), col. 11 (1919), col. 13 (1919), col. 15 (1919), col. 16 (1919), (1920), (5 years) — For Women’s Department. Line 20, col. 6 (1920), col. 16 (1920)—Includes $254,000 for new buildings and $1,250,000 for school endowments. Line 20, col. 6 (5 years), col. 16 (5 years)—Includes $1,225,000 for new buildings and $7,600,000 for school endowments. Line 22, col. 16 (5 years)—50 per cent, of this for new buildings. Line 26, col. 4 (1919)—Included in Budget of Foreign Missions. Line 26, col. 16 (1919)—Includes $286,404 for debt. Line 26, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $1,801,900 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. Line 26, col. 16 (5 years)—Includes $10,350,000 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. Line 27, col. 16 (1920)—Does not include $278,000 for publication work. HOME MISSIONS 155 MISSIONS By Types of Work —Continued Columns 1 to 8 4 Orientals in the United States 5 North American Indians 6 Negroes 7 Spanish Speaking People in United States 8 Alaska 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 103,473 211,000 1,396,000 47,856 250,000 1,716 000 33,060 199,850 1,278,950 400,000 1,400,000 9,685,760 7,000 23,000 197,000 14,000 28,000 302,000 23,000 102,000 415,000 21,000 47,000 333,000 82,687 251,821 1,339,495 16,000 4,000 3 5,000 5,000 80,000 28,400 3,000 150 5,000 180 25,000 1,030 1,000 300 2,000 300 15,000 1,800 4,500 26,280 57,580 26 77 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 Line 27, col. 16 (5 years)—Does not include SI,100,000 for publication work. Line 28, col. 16 (1920)—Includes S330.000 for buildings for Board of Home Missions projects. Line 28, col. 16 (Years)—Includes Sl,400,000 for buildings, for Board of Home Missions projects. Line 30, col. 16 (1920)—Includes S600.000 for school endowments. Line 30, col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes 54,464,960 for school endowments. Line 31, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $350,000 for new buildings. Line 36, col. 6 (5 Years), col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes $500,000 for school endowments. Line 37, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $420,000 for new buildings. Line 37, col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes $1,250,000 for new buildings and equipment. ♦State organizations doing home mission work. tWork done under this head, but exact amount not ascertainable. 156 HOME MISSIONS HOME Table III.—By Boards and Section II.— 9 10 11 BOARD Hawaii West Indies Migrant Groups 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 26 27 PRESBYTERIAN Presbyterian Church in the U. S. Board of Home Missions. 132,412 925,095 4,424,095 25,000 85,000 585,000 26 Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work . 27 28 29 30 Board of Church Erection. 28 Roard of Missions for Ereedmen . 29 Woman’s Board of Home Missions. 30 3i independent Synods and Presbyteries. 31 32 Presbyterian Church in the U. S. (South) Executive Committee of Home Missions.. . 32 33 independent Synods and Presbyteries. 33 34 Associate Reformed Presbyterian Synod Board of Home Missions and Church Ex¬ tension 34 35 United Presbyterian Church Board of Home Missions. 35 36 Board of Freedmen’s Missions. 36 37 Board of Church Extension. 37 38 REFORMED Reformed Church in the U. S. Board of Home Missions. 38 39 Women’s Missionary Society of General Synod. 2,800 2,800 15,800 39 40 UNITED BRETHREN Church of the United Brethren in Christ Home Missionary Society. 40 41 Church Erection Society. 41 42 independent State Associations. 42 43 UNITED EVANGELICAL United Evangelical Church Board of Missions. 43 44 Board of Church Extension. 44 45 UNIVERSALIST Universalist Churches Women’s National Missionary Association 45 Line 12, col. 4 (1919), col. 6 (1919), col. 7 (1919), col. 10 (1919), col. 11 (1919), col. 13 (1919), col. 15 (1919), col. 16 (1919), (1920), (5 years)- For Women's Department. Line 20, col. 6 (1920), col. 16 (1920)—Includes $254,000 for new buildings and $1,250,000 for school endowments. Line 20, col. 6 (5 years), col. 16 (5 years)—Includes $1,225,000 for new buildings and $7,600,000 for school endowments. Line 22, col. 16 (5 years)—50 per cent, of this for new buildings. Line 26, col. 4 (1919)—Included in Budget of Foreign Missions. Line 26, col. 16 (1919)—Includes $286,404 for debt. Line 26, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $1,801,900 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. Line 26, col. 16 (5 years)—Includes $10,350,000 for buildings not provided for by Board of Church Erection. Line 27, col. 16 (1920)—Does not include $278,000 for publication work. HOME MISSIONS 157 MISSIONS By Types of Work —Continued Columns 9 to 16 12 Sunday School Extension 13 Recruiting and Training Workers 14 Promotion 15 Administration 16 Total 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 1919 1920 5 Years 26 46,500 207,500 1,257,500 48,305 55 000 230 000 94,500 150 000 940 000 1,398,310 4 712 945 28 731 045 27 829000 5,814,0 00. 380,000 2,120,000 310,000 2,085,000 54,000 270,000 1,573,000 10,289,000 28 50,000 55,000 307,500 467 010 711 700 3 701,200 29 400,000 1 400,000 9,685,760 30 1 036,000 6,350,000 31 1 400 000 1 892,342 11 000,000 32 25,000 27,000 157,000 375,000 923,000 6,494,000 33 5,000,000 ip 34 16,000 100,000 35 14 000 20 000 100 000 231 407 397,880 2,687,607 36 5,800 5,800 39,000 88,487 257,621 1,378,495 37 4,000 4 800 30 000 489,800 1,685,000 38 2,000 5,000 35,000 1,000 8,000 50,000 4,000 7,000 45,000 15,000 18,000 100,000 250,000 400,000 3,000,000 39 1,100 1,200 7,300 4,000 4,000 22,500 23,185 25,200 149,750 30 10,035 12,000 70,035 61,570 150,180 813,400 41 10,000 15,000 75^000 1357)00 500'l70 2,500^850 42 28,005 38,981 1,898,670 43 116,063 600,500 44 4,273 45 900 1,000 5,700 4,945 10,420 61,025 Line 27, col. 16 (5 years)—Does not include $1,100,000 for publication work. Line 28, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $330,000 for buildings for Board of Home Missions projects. Line 28, col. 16 (Years)—Includes $1,400,000 for buildings, for Board of Home Missions projects. Line 30, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $600,000 tor school endowments. Line 30, col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes $4,464,960 for school endowments. Ljne 31, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $350,000 for new buildings. Line 36, col. 6 (5 Years), col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes $500,000 for school endowments. Line 37, col. 16 (1920)—Includes $420,000 for new buildings. Line 37, col. 16 (5 Years)—Includes $1,250,000 for new buildings and equipment. *State organizations doing home mission work. tWork done under this head, but exact amount not ascertainable. \ w; i THE HOME MISSIONS SURVEY Introduction T HE fields covered by the Home Missions Survey are the United States, Alaska, Hawaii and the West Indies. By agreement with the Foreign Survey Division, the work of the foreign missionary societies operating in any of this territory is included for survey and budget making purposes in the Home Missions Division. By agreement with the American Educational Division, the schools for Negroes, mountain people, American Indians, Spanish-speaking people in the United States and the schools in Alaska, Hawaii and the West Indies are being surveyed by the Home Missions Division. By agreement with the American Religious Education Division, the information re¬ garding the Sunday School and other religious educational agencies in the local communities is being gathered by those making the survey in the Home Missions Division. By agreement with the American Hospitals and Homes Division, the approach for the survey of these institutions in Alaska, Hawaii and the West Indies is made through the representatives of the Home Missions Survey. An arrangement has been made with the American Educational Division, whereby there is a united approach to the churches involved in the study of the religious life of students at tax-supported colleges and university centers. In other numerous ways an effort is being made to coordinate and unify the making of the surveys and program among agencies interested in the same mission fields. The Home Missions Division is receiving budgets from the general home mission boards, the women’s home mission boards, the church erection boards and the freed- men’s aid societies. The Fields Branch of the Home Missions Survey Division is responsible for gathering the information and assembling the program as it affects budget items according to 8 Introduction : HOME MISSIONS the principles proposed. This Branch is divided into City, Rural, Migrant Groups, Alaska, Hawaii and West Indies sections. Another Branch called the Coordination Branch is responsible for the interpretation of the material gathered from the field as it affects the policies and programs of the different types or phases of home missions as they are usually administered by home mission agencies. This Coordination Branch is organized into the following sections: Cities, Metropolitan New York, Town and Country, Negro Americans, Migrant Groups, North American Indians, Spanish-speaking People in the United States, orientals in the United States, Hawaii, Alaska and the West Indies. It is fully expected that the survey will yield data sufficiently comprehensive to make possible the preparation of a series of volumes dealing with all of these vital problems of American church life. HOME MISSIONS SURVEY: Introduction 9 The American Survey—A National Self - Examination I. PURPOSE OF THE HOME MISSIONS SURVEY 1. To discover the unchurched areas and groups and the un-Christian factors in the social life of the United States, Alaska, Hawaii and the West Indies. 2. To aid the churches, by the process of self- examination, to estimate their own material and spiritual resources and to discover ways and means by which these resources may be developed to their highest usefulness. 3. To state an adequate program to meet the needs discovered in the survey, which program can be budgeted in terms or policies involved, leadership required and money. 4. To appraise the impact and influence of each individual church and mission station upon its own constituency and its own community in order to help it to provide for public worship, religious education and its share of community service. 5. To avoid the exhaustion possible through competitive enterprises and to eliminate the waste of over-lapping, thus planning for the most economical as well as the most efficient distribution of church forces. 6. To create a feeling of common purpose and destiny among the churches by means of a common understanding of common tasks and by helping the churches of a given community to plan their programs together. 7. To establish a more or less scientific method for the location of churches and for the deter¬ mining of their programs. II. SPIRITUAL SIGNIFICANCE The spiritual significance of this survey of the churches and home mission stations lies in the fact that it is a self-examination. No outside experts or disinterested students are to take stock of the churches. The ministers, laymen and laywomen are provided with the necessary schedules and plans of organization to secure this thorough-going investigation. III. COUNTY UNIT By taking the county as the unit in organizing the survey, it is possible 1. To cover all the territory. 2. To locate all the unchurched areas and groups. 3. To indicate all the normal community centers. 4. To associate for religious purposes the peo¬ ple who have a common social, industrial and civic life. By making the survey denominationally it would hardly be possible to achieve these ends for: 1. There are areas of the county where no denomination is at work. 2. There are groups of people unreached by any church. 3. The denominational approach sees com¬ munity need from its own angle only. IV. SCOPE AND CONTENT OF THE SURVEY An attempt will be made to study all the factors necessary for determining the program of the churches, separately and in cooperative groups. For example, in the City Section, there are the following schedules: 1. For the city as a whole. This schedule will reveal those needs of the entire city which cannot be met by any one church or group of churches. 2. For the different districts or communities in the city. By mapping those sections of the larger cities 10 Introduction : HOME MISSIONS which have a life more or less in common, and where the churches are face to face with similar problems, we discover those social units whose needs must be met by a group of churches. This schedule will reveal the common social service to be rendered by the churches. Prob¬ lems of housing, health, recreation, vice and crime, delinquency, etc., will be studied in re¬ lation to the churches. 3. For each individual church. Through this schedule, the growth and present strength of the church will be appraised. The efficiency of its organization, its property and equipment, its staff and service to the com¬ munity will be investigated. For the first time, an attempt will be made to measure the in¬ fluence of each individual church on the moral and spiritual welfare of the people of the com¬ munity. The needs of each church for property, equip¬ ment and staff, over a period of five years, will be set down, after all the local and community factors have been taken into account. 4. For a population census. This schedule has a two-fold purpose: a. To secure data for immediate use by the churches in an ingathering of members and special evangelistic efforts. b. To determine the population factors and the tendencies toward any changes in popu¬ lation which would affect the program of the churches. In the rural sections a similar scheme is pro¬ vided for each country; i.e., there are the follow¬ ing schedules: a. For the county as a whole. b. For each normal community or trading center in the county. c. For each individual church. d. For a population census. Schedules with certain necessary variations have been provided for Negro churches and communities, distinctly immigrant communi¬ ties, small mining and other industrial com¬ munities, the Mex-Americans, the orientals and the American Indians. Special studies are also being made of exceptional groups; as the lum¬ ber jacks, the migratory harvest workers and the laborers in the small fruit and canning industries. In cooperation with the American Educational Division a study will be made of the growth, present strength and future needs of the schools among the Negroes, American Indians, Mex- Americans and mountain people, together with those in Alaska, Hawaii and the West Indies. V. PROCEDURE OF THE SURVEY The above purposes are realized, for example, in a given rural county by the following procedure: 1. A county supervisor is appointed, usually one of the younger trained ministers, whose church is willing to release him temporarily for this service, and who is willing himself to do the work for the enlargement of his own knowledge and experience. His expenses for the survey are paid by the Movement. 2. A county survey council is formed represent¬ ing the best leadership among the ministers and the laymen of all the denominations having churches in the county. This council cooperates with the supervisor and passes upon the find¬ ings. 3. A map of the county is made, on which are indicated the location of all the churches, the names of the denominations, the circuit systems, the residences of the pastors, and the boundaries of each parish. This map, when completed, shows at once all of the normal church and community centers and the unevangelized areas. 4. The supervisor then proceeds to visit each community and each local church, where in consultation with the people, on the ground, the schedules are filled out. 5. After the map is completed and all informa¬ tion from the county is gathered, the county council summons representatives from all the churches in the county to the meeting at the county-seat, to which also the church officials, general and missionary, over the territory are invited. At this meeting the tabulated results of the survey are made known, the condition of HOME MISSIONS: Introduction 11 all the churches in all of the communities is discussed, and the unchurched areas and groups are allotted by common consent. As each situation is taken up, the needs are debated fully and recommendations for a five-year program are made. No recommendation is accepted unless unanimous. 6. These recommendations are later submitted to a meeting of the State Survey Council, which is officially appointed and represents the de¬ nominational missionary agencies functioning within the state. 7. Each denominational missionary superin¬ tendent is then asked to review the budget items that affect his churches and submit them if necessary to the proper society or board for approval. 8. The State Survey Council is then asked to consider and approve all of the items of the budget. Each denominational representative on the State Survey Council will be asked to affix his signature to the budget program sheet opposite the budget items of the churches of his denomination. VI. PRINCIPLES FOR MAKING A PROGRAM AND BUDGET As a guide to the denominational superintend¬ ents and local church officials in the making of a program and budget, the following principles have been discussed by the National Council of Review, a body composed of officially appointed representatives from the mission boards and societies concerned. At their re¬ quest these proposals have been submitted to all the Boards for official approval. Favorable action is being received as fast as boards are able to discuss and pass upon them. By this means it is hoped that it may be possible to get an agreement on the administration of future missionary funds in the wisest and most states¬ manlike manner. It should be noted that the Interchurch World Movement as such does not undertake any administrative action of any sort that involves any function of the duly constituted denomina¬ tional agencies. Before any item in the program is effective it must be passed upon by the de¬ nominational agency involved. The county and state councils are so organized as to provide the channels by which the recommendations of the survey reach the respective denominational agencies. 1. UNCHURCHED TERRITORY What principles should determine the allocation of unchurched territory and groups? The following have been proposed: a. The population. It is our judgment that there should not be, under ordinary circum¬ stances, more than one church for one thousand evangelical population. b. The religious preference of residents in the community as shown by the survey and the population census. c. Geographical facts. d. The ability, in men and money and super¬ vision, of the denomination to place a resident pastor. e. The equitable distribution of responsibility among all denominations. 2. DISTRIBUTION OF FORCES What factors should be taken into account in a more economical distribution of our present forces? The following procedure has been pro¬ posed : a. That the democratic principle of local self- determination be followed as far as possible. b. That, depending upon the denominational connections of the churches in a given com¬ munity, we recommend: (1.) As preferable, the formation and main¬ tenance of a single denominational church and the uniting of churches in the preferred donomination. (2.) The entire withdrawal of one church form a field and a reciprocal exchange of an equivalent opportunity in some other com¬ munity to the denomination which with¬ draws. (3.) A federation of denominational churches with the maintenance of their denominational connections. c. That the development of a given church by 12 Introduction : HOME MISSIONS an adequate program and ministry be taken into consideration. 3. BUDGET PROJECTS What projects should be admitted to the budget for missionary aid? The classification attached has been agreed to in a conference of home mission board secretaries. Principle A. Purely Missionary Responsi¬ bilities. Church projects in fields where a given church is wholly or chiefly responsible for religious and social life and can be made to meet adequately these needs along lines of worship, religious education and community service, and where adequate aid must be given on a purely mis¬ sionary basis. Principle B. Urgent Home Base Opportunity Situations Where Aid Is Necessary. Church projects upon which the community is dependent for religious and social life, which can be made to meet those needs adequately, but where local constituencies cannot provide the kind of program needed now in order to place the church within the five-year period on a basis not only self-sustaining, but able to give support to world evangelization in financial aid, spiritual life and Christian leadership. Principle C. Special Denominational Obliga¬ tions. Special projects which the denominations must undertake in order to meet their missionary obligations. THE CITIES THE CITIES The City is the Modern Miracle S OME call the city the modern “Pandora’s Box” with its traditional mixture of good and evil. Others are sure it is an evil genius spreading its baneful influences over the country, bringing ruin and disaster wherever it touches. In any event there it is—splendid, powerful, dominant. Sphinxlike, it holds its own story. But hope remains. Some day it will be lifted out of its sordidness and squalor. Its “great white ways” will become the highways of our God. The forces responsible for its growth march on with inexorable law. No attempt to sidetrack its development has ever succeeded nor can succeed. Aristotle limited the ideal city to 10,000 inhabitants. Plutarch and Cicero sought by persuasion to turn back the current of immigration from the country. Justinian tried to stop it by legal measures. The Tudors and the Stuarts issued proclamations forbidding the erection of new houses in London and enjoining the country people to return to their homes. The extension of Paris beyond certain limits was prohibited by law at various periods from 1549 to 1672. For hundreds of years efforts have been made to divert the tide that flowed to the great centers but without avail. Neither persuasion nor legislation were effective. The city has developed in spite of the wisdom of philosophers and the edicts of rulers because the growth of populations and their manner of making a living are deter¬ mined by forces over which neither kings nor philosophers have ultimate control. The great human tide which has always drifted from rural communities to the larger centers of population still continues. Boys and girls born on the countryside migrate by the thousands to the cities on reaching years of maturity despite every effort to keep them “on the farm.” Great industrial and commercial enterprises claim these young men and women, adding them to the vast reservoir of city life. These in turn, marry and rear familes, scarcely any member of which reverts to type by seeking to make a home in rural districts or small country towns. 16 Cities : HOME MISSIONS HOW CITIES HAVE GROWN The City Is a World Phenomenon y^T THE beginning of the sixteenth century Europe had only seven cities with a population of 100,000 and over. At its end there were not more i m. than fourteen. From 1700 to 1800 the number and population of great cities increased about 50 per cent., there being 21 large cities at the end of the century. Beginning with the year 1800 the growth of European cities went forward with great bounds. In fifty years the number of cities of 100,000 more than doubled. During the next fifty years, or in 1900, their number was increased to 168. Today over four-fifths of the population of the United Kingdom lives in cities. While London is probably 2,000 years old, four-fifths of its growth has been added dur¬ ing this century. Paris is more than four times as large as it was in 1800 and Petro- grad, up to the time of the war had increased nearly threefold in 75 years. Many of the cities of Asia have grown in the same proportion. Canada is a rural country but its cities have grown at an enormous rate. The vast stretches of western Canada still remain sparsely inhabited, while such cities as Toronto, Quebec, Montreal and Hamilton have added to their populations with a rapidity scarcely exceeded by that of the great cities on the American side of the border. In 1800 there were six cities in the United States with a population of 8,000 and over, as follows: Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore, Boston, Charleston and Salem. These cities had a combined population of about 200,000 or less than the total population of Portland, Oregon, which ranks twenty-eighth among the cities of the country. From 1900 to 1910 the population of the United States as a whole increased 21 per cent. The rural population increased 11.2 per cent., whereas the cities of 25,000 and over, of which there were 229, increased 55 per cent. In 1910 more than one-half the population of New York state lived in New York City, and nearly one-tenth of the total population of the United States lived in three cities—New York, Chicago and Philadelphia, while one-fourth of the entire population of the country lived on one four-hundredth of the total land area. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 17 CITIES INCREASING MORE THAN 100 PER CENT. ROM 1900 to 1910, twenty-two cities in the United States increased over 100 per cent, in their population. Though full statistics are not yet available it is safe to say that the churches have had no such high percentages of growth. CITIES INCREASING MORE THAN 100 PER CENT. FROM 1900 TO 1910 Popula- Rate of Rank City tion Increase 1910 1900-1910 . | 1 Oklahoma City, Okla... 64,205 539.7 2 Muskogee, Okla. 25,278 494.2 3 Birmingham, Ala. 132,685 245.4 4 Pasadena, Calif. 30,291 232.2 5 Los Angeles, Calif. 319,198 211.5 6 Berkeley, Calif. 40,434 206.0 7 Flint, Michigan. 38,550 194.2 8 Seattle, Wash. 237,194 194.0 9 Spokane, Wash. 104,402 183.3 10 Fort Worth, Texas. 73,312 174.7 11 Huntington, W. Va. 31,161 161.4 12 El Paso, Texas. 39,279 146.9 13 Tampa, Florida. 37,782 138.5 14 Schenectady, N. Y. 72,826 129.9 15 Portland, Oregon. 207,214 129.2 16 Oakland, Calif. 150,174 124.3 17 San Diego, Calif. 39,572 123.6 18 Tacoma, Wash. 83,743 122.0 19 Dallas, Texas. 92,104 116.0 20 Wichita, Kansas. 52,460 112.6 21 Waterloo, Iowa. 26,693 112.2 22 Jacksonville, Fla. 57,699 103.0 URBAN AND RURAL GROWTH T HE tendency of the population to move to the city is indicated by the comparisons shown in the accompanying graph. There is no doubt that today the majority of the people in the United States live in cities of 2,500 population and over. A new social and economic order has come to pass within a century. The population and interest of the country prior to the nineteenth century were almost entirely rural. It was in the home that most of the trades were carried on. Then the centralization of industries had not begun, and factories were unknown. Today, however, with the organization of labor unions, the establishment of great industries, the need for centralized labor and transportation points, cities have become a necessity of our social order. A stream of people has literally poured into these new centers of population, so that a century has witnessed almost a reversal of the proportion of people living in the rural and urban sections of our country. Only 3 per cent, of our population was urban at the begin¬ ning of the nineteenth century. Today almost half of our population is urban and it is safe to say that within a generation the greater portion of it will actually become so. Thus the influence of the city grows. In a number of the states the major portion of the population already resides in the cities, and where this is the case the city determines the policy of the state, and gives to the commonwealth its own character. T HE outcome of home missions in America in the next twenty-five years will deter¬ mine the destiny of American Protestantism, and the nation itself.—O. G. Dale. Cities : HOME MISSIONS 18 GROWTH OF CITIES OF 8,000 AND OVER T HE following table shows the develop¬ ment of places of 8,000 inhabitants and more in the United States: Census Year No. of Places Population Total Population U. S. Per Cent. Total Population 1910 778 35,726,720 91,972,266 38.8 1900 566 25,142,978 75,994,575 33.1 1890 449 18,327,987 62,247,714 29.1 1880 291 11,450,894 50,155,783 22.8 1870 226 8,071,875 38,558,371 20.9 1860 141 5,072,256 31,443,321 16.1 1850 85 2,897,586 23,191,876 12.6 1840 44 1,453,994 17,069,453 8.5 1830 26 864,509 12,856,020 6.7 1820 13 475,135 9,638,453 4.9 1810 11 366,920 7,239,881 4.9 1800 6 210,873 5,308,483 4.0 1790 6 131,472 3,929,214 3.3 The figures given furnish, almost at a glance, a significant story of the tremendously rapid development of American urban population. One is able also to see that while the number of cities housing eight thousand inhabitants and more did not increase during the decade be¬ tween 1790 and 1800, the next ten years saw this number practically doubled. From 1830, onward, this rate of increase was steadily maintained, giving in a period of only one hundred and twenty years, a total increase of 772 cities of this class with a population of 35,595,248. Most significant, however, is the fact that the rate of growth of our cities has greatly exceeded the rate of growth of our total population with the consequence that the cities have claimed a rapidly increasing proportion of our population. Seventy years ago scarcely 10 per cent, of our population was urban. Today over 40 per cent, is urban. This re¬ markable urban growth still continues, and shows no signs of abatement. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 19 CLASSES OF CITIES ACCORDING TO POPULATION T HE following table indicates the population in the several classes of communities, showing the number of places in each group of cities and their total population for 1910: Class of Places No. of Places Population Total population of the U. S. 91,972,266 Urban territory. 2,402 42,623,383 Places of 1,000,000 or more inhabitants. 3 8,501,174 Places of 500,000 to 1,000,000 inhabitants. 5 3,010,667 Places of 250,000 to 500,000 inhabitants. 11 3,948,839 Places of 100,000 to 250,000 inhabitants. 31 4,840,458 Places of 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants. 59 4,178,915 Places of 25,000 to 50,000 inhabitants. 120 4,062,763 Places of 10,000 to 25,000 inhabitants. 372 5,609,208 Places of 5,000 to 10,000 inhabitants. 629 4,364,703 Places of 2,500 to 5,000 inhabitants. 1,172 4,105,656 Rural territory. 49,348,883 Incorporated places of less than 2,500 inhabitants. 11,784 8,118,826 Other rural territory . 41,230,058 TWENTY-FIVE METROPOLITAN DISTRICTS T HERE are twenty-five metropolitan dis¬ tricts in the United States whose centers are cities containing 200,000 or more inhabi¬ tants, and whose area includes land approxi¬ mately within 10 miles of the city limits. Within these urban areas are the wealth and the poverty of the nation. Here are her ideals but also her centers of crime and social dis¬ order. At no point in the national life do right and wrong come into sharper conflict. These twenty-four metropolitan areas give rise to the great “city problems” of the United States. They are as follows: New York; Chicago; Philadelphia; Boston; Pittsburgh; St. Louis; San Francisco—Oakland; Baltimore; Cleveland; Cincinnati; Minneapolis—St. Paul; Detroit; Buffalo; Los Angeles; Milwaukee; Providence; Washington; New Orleans; Kan¬ sas City (Missouri and Kansas); Louisville; Rochester; Seattle; Indianapolis; Denver. In some cases these metropolitan districts in¬ clude other cities of considerable size. For example, in the New York metropolitan district are included Newark and Jersey City, both in New Jersey, and each of those has more than 200,000 inhabitants. Thousands of the people making their homes in these cities earn their livelihood in the city of New York. Ferry and railroad facilities make means of transit easy; so that both these large centers of population are, in effect, part of the greater city. To all intents and purposes these outlying areas have no separate or individual life. 25 METROPOLITAN DISTRICTS COMPARED WITH THE UNITED STATES IN AREA AND POPULATION THESE DISTRICTS INCLUDE CITIES OF 200,000 OR MORE, INCLUDING TERRITORY LYING WITHIN TEN MILES OF CITY LIMITS COMPARISON OF AREAS □ METROPOLITAN DISTRICTS 4,717,532 ACRES TOTAL LAND SURFACE UNITED STATES 1,900,947,200 ACRES COMPARISON OF POPULATIONS □ METROPOLITAN TOTAL POPULATION DISTRICTS UNITED STATES 22,088,331 91.972,266 ONE FOURTH OF THE POPULATION IN THE UNITED STATES LIVES ON OF THE TOTAL LAND AREA interchurch World Movement oT North America.GD175 20 Cities : HOME MISSIONS REASONS FOR THE CITIES’ GROWTH R AILWAY mileage in the United States increased from 23 miles in 1830 to 254,733 miles in 1910. The railroads drain the entire country of every- ^ thing: food, raw materials for clothing and homes, all forms of manufactur¬ ing enterprises, and men and women with which to make the finished products and carry on the commercial aspects of the city’s business. Some of these the railroad gives back to the country, but the men and women remain in the city. A second reason for the growth of the city is to be found in the invention of machinery. The day of the hand worker is gone forever. Machinery does every¬ thing—almost. Its introduction has revolutionized life for everyone, including the farmer. Machinery produced the factory with its specialization. The factory made a center of population and attracted related and other industries. The man whose labor was formerly required on the farm now finds steadier work in the city. It is much easier to become a specialist in the city and earn high wages because most of the work done in city factories is done by machinery. Hence the strong pull on the man to come to the city to learn quickly and to earn more at a steadier job than he ever had before. Whenever a factory is placed in a small town or in the open country it almost im¬ mediately introduces the elements of city life. not for the excess number of deaths due to industrial occupations and accidents it is prob¬ able that the death-rate in the modern city would be lower than it is in the country. SUPERIOR SOCIAL ADVANTAGES T HE city offers certain distinct advantages, as compared with the country, to those who desire superior educational opportunities; in the professions; in art; in music; in voca¬ tional training and even in the elementary courses. The city also provides the largest opportunity to use this education after it has been acquired. In some respects standards of living are higher in the city. There are more comforts, more luxuries, more leisure, greater variety in foods. THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE I T IS probably true that more men from the country engage in mercantile and general commercial enterprises in the city than enter shops and factories. The increase of commerce in cities has been enormous, offering attractive opportunities to young men from the country. IMPROVED SANITATION I N THE Middle Ages and the earlier centu¬ ries of modern times the cities of Europe depended almost entirely upon the influx of country people for their growth. The mortality was so high that the deaths annually equaled or exceeded the number of births. Today the death-rate in the larger cities is often as low as it is in the country. Were it HOME MISSIONS: Cities PROBLEMS OF THE CITY O VERCROWDING is one of the worst evils of our American cities. We have permitted land speculators to build our cities for us,—men who are interested in their own gain and nothing else. They have found that it pays to put up tenements and charge enormous rents for them, while nobody has been particularly interested in furnishing adequate transportation facilities. The result is the slum. Men, women and children are crowded into the closest quarters possible, creating and maintaining breeding places of immorality and disease. There are 229 cities which had in 1910 more than 25,000 inhabitants with an aggregate population of 28,453,816 31 per cent, of the entire population. While these principal cities have only about one-third of the population of the United States, they contain more than one-half of the foreign-born population. The constant percentage of foreign-born people in the United States during the past fifty years has been just about 14. In 1860 it was 13.2 per cent, of the whole; in 1870, 14.4 per cent.; in 1880, 13.3 per cent.; in 1890, 14.8 per cent.; in 1900, 13.7 per cent, and in 1910, 14.7 per cent. GO £55 The heavy lines (« ») show geographic divisions Inter church World Movement oh North America CONGESTION MAP OF THE UNITED STATES POPULATION PER SQUARE MILE, BY STATES: 191 I WTO ARIZ POPULATION PER SQUARE MILE | less than 2 18 to 45 rmru 2 « gga 45«, 90 6 to 18 90 and over Cities : HOME MISSIONS 22 The immigrant is peculiarly a problem of the city, principally because of his congestion in the city. The real problem of the church and labor today is not the poorly paid, overworked laborer. It is the high-grade, well-paid artisan. The number of these is rapidly increasing, especially in the city. PERCENTAGE OF ALL NATIVE WHITES IN THE UNITED STATES LIVING IN CITIES OF 25,000 AND OVER PERCENTAGE OF ALL FOREIGN-BORN WHITES IN THE UNITED STATES LIVING IN CITIES OF 25,000 AND OVER hterchurch World Movement of North America G.oise HOME MISSIONS: Cities 23 A study of one thousand workingmen of all kinds revealed the fact that the church is much less attractive to them than is any other “social” institution. In a vote taken among these workingmen expressing their preferences, out of sixteen different agencies found in the average city—labor unions, lodges, libraries, art galleries, movies, forums and the like, the church received the lowest vote. These workingmen are not particularly hostile to the church; they are simply indiffer¬ ent. They apparently have found in something else that which seems to satisfy their desires for social and moral development. It must not be assumed that these workingmen who are not in the church are any more immoral than the average. Furthermore the movements with which they are identified have a strong moral spirit and atmosphere, furnishing an outlet for the very highest hopes and aspiration of those who have qualities for leadership. • And yet we must not ignore the growth of radicalism among vast numbers even of the more intelligent workers. Indeed it is among the better types of workers that radicalism has its freest course. It is in the city that the agitator of social unrest has his strongest hold. Opportunity for propaganda is open on every side. Street meetings, labor union gatherings and social occasions afford opportunity for the spreading of the message of discontent which, however justified it may be under certain circumstances, is often used to foment strife and hatred. A TRANSIENT POPULATION N 1910 there were 20,255,555 families in the United States, 9,499,765 of which were in the cities, and 10,755,790 of which lived in rural districts. In the cities there were 5.9 persons to a dwelling, and in the country 4.7; but in New York (Borough of Manhattan) there was an average of 30.9 persons per dwelling. The number of persons per dwelling in 1890 was 19.9 but 1910 showed an increase of over fifty per cent. As the number of persons to a family is about the same in the country as in the city, 4.5 for the city and 4.6 for the country, the figures indicate among other things that many city homes have boarders and servants. Of all the families in the United States in 1910, 54.2 per cent, occupied rented homes and 45.8 per cent, occupied owned homes; 62.8 per cent, of those living in farm houses owned them and 37.2 per cent, rented, while of those living in other homes 38.4 per cent, owned and 61.6 per cent, rented. In New York City 88.3 per cent, of all the homes were rented, but in the Borough of Manhattan very nearly all the homes, 97.1 per cent., were rented. There are five cities in which the rented homes constituted more than four-fifths of all the homes in 1910: New York, Boston, Fall River, Cambridge and Newark, and the percentage was nearly as large in Jersey City and Providence. Home life in the city is exceedingly difficult to maintain. In 1910 there were in the United States 341,277 divorced persons, 0.5 per cent, of the entire population. In 1887, there were 27,919 divorces granted in this country and 72,062 in 1906; an increase of 61 per cent., while the population increased only 30 per cent. We have a larger 24 Cities : HOME MISSIONS percentage of divorced persons in this country than in any other country in the world with the possible exception of Japan. The number of married people in the country in 1910 was nearly half a million more than in the city; but there were 37,384 or about 20 per cent, more divorced people in the city than in the country. In the country .97 per cent, of the married people were divorced; in the city 1.25 per cent, were divorced. Another scene in the panorama of city life is the constant moving of city people from apart¬ ment to apartment. The average church in the city witnesses a “procession” of such people. Entirely new congregations must be gotten together every few years. “Family churches” are a rarity in the city. One pastor reports over 3,000 changes in membership in a thirteen- year pastorate. THE NEGRO IN INDUSTRY S INCE the last census was taken, in 1910, the tendency of the Negro to move to the city has been greatly increased largely because he has been encouraged to move from the South and enter industrial life in the cities in the North. This was because during the war large NEGROES IN THE CITIES. 1910 Negroes constitute 10.7% of entire population of the United States 25% in 27 leading cities Interchurch World Movement of North America 16.5% in cities of 25.000 and over 51% in 4 southern cities G.Dl 157 numbers of immigrants returned to their native lands and the Negro was persuaded to take their places in shops and factories in the larger cities. The entrance of the Negro into industrial life in the city has resulted in serious race riots which at one time threatened to sweep the entire country. A VIRILE POPULATION T HE ages of the people living in the city are a direct challenge to the church. The accompanying graph indicates the actual number and percentages of people of various ages who in 1910 lived in urban and rural communities. • In the United States as a whole there were many more persons in each of the age groups comprising persons under 20 years of age in the rural communities than in the cities. But in each of the age groups comprising persons from 20 to 54 years of age—the most active period of life—there were more persons in the city than in the country. Rural communities contained more persons in advanced middle age and old age. It will be remembered that 53.7 per cent, of the entire population of the United States lives in the country and 46.3 per cent, lives in the city. This means that the city is markedly strong in people of active, productive ages and has rela¬ tively fewer children and aged people. For this reason city life is more animated; there is more enterprise; more radicalism; more vice and crime; more impulsiveness generally. And these are the elements which at once make the city a force for good and for evil. The problem is how these elements are to be directed. A LARGER PROPORTION OF WOMEN C ITIES contain a larger proportion of women than does the rest of the country. Wherever there exists a considerable pre¬ dominance of one sex over the other in point of numbers there is less prospect of a well-ordered social life. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 25 In 1910 throughout the entire country there were 106 males to every 100 females; the males outnumbering the females by 2,692,288. In twenty-two of the fifty principal cities in this country the females outnumbered the males. The native whites of native parentage showed an excess of females in thirty-three of the fifty principal cities. The excess of women is really among the city-born rather than among the newcomers. Not only are relatively fewer boys than girls born in the city as compared with the country but more male children die in cities during the early months of life. It should also be remembered that women are longer lived than men because men are more generally exposed to industrial accidents and occupational diseases. It is generally assumed that women are more “religious” than men largely because there are more women in the churches and because there are more men in the penitentiaries. This has been explained by the fact that men are more virile and more robust than women, the as¬ sumption being that God penalizes men be¬ cause they are robust and virile. The fact is that God expects men to express their religion in a robust and virile fashion. More women than men are in the churches because thus far the church has given woman practically her only opportunity to express her social instincts. With the development of women’s movements, social, philanthropic and political, it may yet develop that the men inside the church will be as much disturbed about the women who are outside the church as the women are today disturbed about the men. City women will undoubtedly soon become a serious problem for the churches. ILLNESS AND DEATH RATES HE death-rates in cities as a whole are not greater than in rural fields; but it must not be forgotten that among the indus¬ trial workers the death-rate is abnormal. The death-rate among workingmen between the ages of 25 and 45 is 50 per cent, higher than it is among males of the same age in other occu¬ pations. Among the babies in the tenements it is pathetically high. There are 30,000,000 wage-earners in this coun¬ try. Most of them live in the cities. These lose annually an average of nine days each on account of illness. The wages lost amount to $500,000,000; the medical treatment, medicines and other material required during illness cost $500,000,000 more; making a total of $1,000,- 000,000 lost annually by wage-earners on ac¬ count of sickness. This is about twice the total amount given annually in normal times towards all philanthropic purposes in the United States, and was the amount required to run the federal government during the year before the world war. Sickness is the disabling cause in more than one-half the cases assisted by organized chari¬ ties. Among immigrants it is the apparent cause of poverty in nearly 40 per cent, of the cases relieved. The industrial workers in this country pay a terrible penalty to achieve our commercial and industrial prosperity. It is conservatively estimated that at least 30,000 working people are killed annually in industry; and 300,000 are seriously injured; while there are said to be 2,000,000 industrial accidents of all kinds. Such a loss must be brought to an end. 26 Cities : HOME MISSIONS Most sickness and accidents may be avoided. Contrary to the common impression, there is no iron law of mortality. It is not the city air so much as the peculiarity of city occupations that causes the higher urban mortality. THE CITY’S POOR AMONG the things which weigh down the XV hearts and shorten the lives of vast multi¬ tudes in our cities are such as these: the filthy slum; the dark tenement; the unsanitary fac¬ tory; the long hours of toil; the lack of a living wage; the back-breaking labor; the inability to pay necessary doctors’ bills in times of sickness; a pessimistic outlook upon the future; the poor and insufficient food; the lack of leisure; and the swift approach of old age. Many have almost forgotten how to smile. To laugh is a lost art. The look of care has come so often and for so long a period at a time that it is now forever stamped upon their faces. The lines are deep and hard. Many have gone through life more like animals of a lower order than as immortal souls. No hell can be worse to them than the hell in which they are now. They fear death less than they do sleep. Some indeed long for the sum¬ mons, daring not to take their own lives. What does it matter to such whether the doors of the church are closed or open. What attrac¬ tion has the flowery sermon or the polished oration. What meaning have the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man to such PERCENTAGE OF DIVORCED PEOPLE IN COUNTRY AND CITY Percentage of divorced people in city Percentage of divorced.people in country 0.9 7 % 1.25% Intorchurch World Movement of North America. CD. 159 starved souls. Where is God? they ask; and what cares man? they say. Meeting the needs of these will test the church severely in the coming days. CHILDREN OF THE TENEMENTS HAT nature starts all her children, rich and poor, physically equal is, broadly speaking, the opinion of many leading physi¬ cians. But what happens to the tenement child after its birth is quite another story. Vital statistics abundantly prove that the bur¬ den and the penalty of poverty and its accom¬ panying evils fall most heavily upon the child. Death’s scythe sweeps relentlessly through the ranks of little children. Hunger and disease hush a thousand babies’ voices. Scan carefully the faces of the little slum chil¬ dren—set, stolid faces, old beyond their years. Hold they the promise of any future good? Sometimes by sheer strength of character there emerge from among these little ones those who seem unaffected by their former surroundings and occupations. But in most cases even these carry in their bodies and in their minds the marks of those earlier years and are handi¬ capped forever. The pathetic thing about the whole situation is that there comes no realiza¬ tion of that which is missing. Life has lost its largest and fullest meaning. Crime is play to hosts of city children because for many years play was counted a crime ac¬ cording to the city ordinances. Crime is in¬ creasing in this country and juvenile crime is increasing more rapidly than adult crime, especially in the city. This does not mean that children are actually becoming more lawless in spirit or more immoral by nature. It means simply that in our great cities we have been adding to the list of crimes or misdemeanors acts which in the open country or small town are altogether legitimate. Baseball, bonfires, shouting, snowballing, throw¬ ing stones—these are usually permitted in the country; but most children who are arrested in the city are guilty of “crime” for doing these or somewhat similar acts. The consciousness that they are doing wrong when playing base- HOME MISSIONS: Cities 27 ball soon makes them indifferent to the crime of stealing apples from the fruit seller’s stand. Probably 90 per cent, of the children in our cities must use the streets for their playground and usually street play is unorganized and therefore usually unsupervised. This is always dangerous. Indiscriminate play with “the gang” in the street, and occasional association with those who are schooled in crime, lay faulty foundations for character building. Is it any wonder that some of them develop into pick¬ pockets, thugs and gunmen? GENERAL MORAL CONDITIONS HE city is getting better morally. It was never better than it is today. Proof of this is to be found in the report of the “Missionary Society for the Poor of New York and Vicinity” issued in 1817, a little over one hundred years ago. There were in the city at that time small houses crowded with from four to twelve families each; often two or three families in a room; and of “all colors.” Out of a population of 100,000 there were 1,489 licensed retail liquor dealers. Not less than six thousand “abandoned fe¬ males” added to the vice and shame. Men who throve on this dishonor kept large numbers of them practically slaves. In the seventh ward, poor and beggared beyond description, there were about two hundred and fifty saloons. Dance halls and dives with “The Way to Hell” inscribed in glaring capitals were displayed, twenty in the space of thirty or forty rods. Sunday had become to the people in this part of the city a day of idleness and drunkenness. Thousands passed on Sunday over the ferry at Corlear’s Hook to Long Island—the “Coney Island” of that day. Ignorance and wretched¬ ness of the worst sort were common. In this description the following evils are pointed out: overcrowding; the liquor business; prostitution; low dance halls; Sabbath desecra¬ tion and slum conditions. In every one of these respects the modern city has improved. The immorality of the city is now more subtle; more refined. The chief sin of the city’s popula¬ tion is not open wickedness, but indifference to moral and religious influences. It is selfish¬ ness which manifests itself in greed for gain in commerce and industry. It is lack of social responsibility which results in political corrup¬ tion. This in turn means bad social and eco¬ nomic conditions in so far as the city’s adminis¬ tration is responsible for social and economic advance. And it is in these fields that the church can and must operate, for this situation may be traced directly to lack of character and a keen sense of social and religious responsibility. The cities of America have serious moral prob¬ lems to face which must have the strict atten¬ tion of city officials and laymen. But the church must deal primarily with the great moral principles involved, applying them cour¬ ageously to the moral issues whenever they arise. RELIGIOUS LIFE AND WORK T HE greatest weakness of the average city church consists in the fact that it is con¬ ducted upon an elaborated country church program. PERCENTAGE OF ALL POPULATION OF VARIOUS AGES IN URBAN AND RURAL COMMUNITIES under *>10 14 IS to ?4 ?5 m 44 45 to 64 65 years / / * \ / / / \ / / / / / / ' / \ \ \ \ \ \ V \ / / / / / / X / \\ \\ V r / t / \ \ A \\ \\ — URBAN RURAL Infer church World Movement of North America _ G D 160 28 Cities : HOME MISSIONS Its membership and its ministry came mostly from the country; they think in the terms of the country. Their minds—so far as religious work is concerned—are of the “rural type.” They may be alert to the needs of business and in¬ dustrial life in the city but the social and religious needs of the community are thought of in the terms of the needs of the people “back home.” It has been extremely difficult for the church to amalgamate the various types of people in the city. The immigrant, the workingman, the “rural emigrant,” the financially comfortable, and many other groups that are found in the city have formed class churches, each attracting its own kind. The result is that in the average large city there are at least half a dozen dif¬ ferent types of churches. UNREACHED PEOPLE HE approach to the foreigner has been weak. We have practically confessed by our actions that the gospel which is “the power of God unto salvation to everyone” is effective for the foreigner only when it is exported through a foreign missionary society; and that it is non-effective in a Christian civilization, for when the foreigners move into a community the churches usually move out. There are many normal, genuine people of the city who are not reached by the churches. It is becoming increasingly difficult to win them. It has come to be an accepted fact that work¬ ingmen and many other groups will not go to church because they are not “spiritually- minded.” We have misinterpreted the mani¬ festations of “spirituality.” We have forgotten that Bazaleel who built the ark of the covenant was a skilful carpenter, that Samson who was a magnificent fighter; and that Peter who was a wonderful preacher, were all baptized with the same Holy Spirit of God. All received their power from Him, but each manifested that power in his own way. The result is we have failed to enlist thousands of city men and women who, living their religion in their day- by-day occupations, are not given credit for spirituality because they have never learned to use the vocabulary acquir ed by most church members in meetings held in rural fields. HAS THE CHURCH A MESSAGE? HE inactivity and silence of the church in the great industrial struggle now raging is not because the church is controlled by the capitalists but because the church has inherited the conservatism of the rural class. It is also due to the supposition that the church must remain “neutral” on these burning questions. Often it is due to the fact that the church does not understand them. The average church has been weak in the city because it has been afraid to break away from traditions. It is afraid to venture into new fields and to do its work in a different way. It has become conformed to a “type” and it has failed to follow the laws of adaptation which alone can keep it alive. NEEDY FIELDS UCCESS is usually determined by the num¬ bers added to the church on confession of faith. No account is taken of the influence of the church upon the entire community life, the fruits of which are not seen for many years, frequently being found in other neighborhoods to which church members have moved and where they have cast in their life with the local church. Hence in nearly every great American city there are deserted but needy fields; churches being maintained upon an inverse ratio as the population and needs increase. BROADER PROGRAM NLESS city churches continue to be “fountains of benevolence” for other fields, it is difficult to justify their maintenance. Those in authority should have the broadest view of the type of work which should be carried on in all types of city churches. As a matter of fact, the church has not had a sufficiently challenging program. In a study made in sixty-nine cities the ministers assem¬ bled in small conferences were asked to respond quickly to the question as to what was the supremely challenging task or ideal which they as local ministers could offer to men outside the church. Not one could give an immediate answer and very few could give any answer. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 29 FORCES AT WORK T HE constructive forces at work in the city are innumerable. Many of the agencies conducted for the social and the moral welfare of the people are justified upon the assumption that the program and the work of the church are inadequate. They profess either to be “substitutes” for the church, acknowledging the need of the religious spirit which the church is presumed to inculcate but insisting that they can propagate this spirit better than the church, thus becoming rivals of the church; or else they declare that “religion” is not at all necessary; that sociological principles properly applied can meet all the needs of city life. The point of contact with the peoples and problems discussed in this statement with which we are most concerned is the local church, through which church federa¬ tions, denominational boards, and city missionary societies must function. The handicaps of the church in the city are many, due in part to its methods. It usually depends upon a pulpit ministry instead of a parish ministry with responsi¬ bility. The preacher who can fill the pews and pay the bills has been viewed as a successful pastor and his church as a successful church. The result has been that churches have striven for these two ends and have failed primarily to serve the community. The short duration of city pastorates renders impossible a constructive program of religious activities. The city of God cannot be built in a day. The complex and intricate environment or relations of each parish cannot be understood and mastered in the average periods of city pastorates, to say nothing of forming a constructive program. Among a permanent population an itinerant minister may be acceptable but among a shifting population a permanent minister is necessary to stabilize the institutions of the church and to maintain a progressive work. The city church is handicapped by lack of funds; sometimes by debt. The city church cannot make the needed adaptations because it is controlled by a class and in the interests of a class. Hence the ministry to aliens or to groups other than those represented in the families of the church is discouraged and rendered almost impos¬ sible. The control of property is such that even the help of city societies, denomina¬ tional boards or outside agencies becomes useless so long as the trustees of the local church are unsympathetic to a larger program. Cities : HOME MISSIONS 30 D ESPITE these handicaps the local church is a potential force. There is no handicap that an intelligent understanding of the problem will not remove. Already local churches are making adaptations for a larger ministry. Seven-day-week programs are being started. Thorough-going modifications of religious edu¬ cation has been undertaken and large institu¬ tions with adequate staffs are being set up to serve the community. CHURCH EXTENSIONS AND CITY MISSION SOCIETIES ENOMINATIONAL church extension and city mission societies administer funds collected in or about the city and such funds as may be given to them by the general home mission boards. They have initiated work among the aliens and supported foreign¬ speaking workers. They have taken over abandoned properties; converted them into different types of institutional churches and have been most helpful in encouraging adapta¬ tions to city conditions. HOME MISSION BOARDS HE work and policies of the denomina¬ tional home missionary boards have not always been characterized by breadth of out¬ look so far as the city is concerned. Like the church itself they have their traditions. Al¬ though the vast missionary populations of the country are now in the cities it is probably true that the home missionary boards of the greater denominations are still spending the bulk of their funds west of the Mississippi. Only a few boards have special city departments. The average board views the problem of the city from the denominational angle. The result is that its efforts have been frequently competitive rather than cooperative. Much home missionary money has gone to bolster up the traditional rural program of the church in the city rather than to initiate and encourage work adapted to city conditions. FEDERATIONS OF CHURCHES C ITY federations of churches through comity committees have been striving to eliminate overlapping and wasteful competition among the religious forces of the city. Some excellent results have been recorded where these organizations have had the support and the backing of the churches. They have helped to smooth out the misunderstandings and con¬ flicts between churches and denominations and are coming rapidly to a place of great usefulness in helping to solve the city problem. Their influence with city missionary societies and denominational boards is resulting in a whole¬ some distribution of missionary funds and a systematic development of the missionary problems of the city. INTERDENOMINATIONAL AGENCIES NTERCHURCH cooperation is in its in¬ fancy, but it is an idea that has not firmly established itself in the practise of the Protes¬ tant churches. Most encouraging beginnings have been made and some permanent and abiding forms of cooperation have resulted. These will each make helpful contributions. City, county and state Sunday school associa¬ tions are most effective agencies in doing inter¬ church work in the field of religious education. Christian Endeavor and other young people’s societies also have organizations and are an active expression of interchurch work. The Young Men’s Christian Association and the Young Women’s Christian Association and Bible societies are other forms of cooperative agency for the city. T HE PROBLEMS of the city is the problem of the new civilization. The city paganized means civilization paganized. The city evangel¬ ized means civilization evangelized.— Strong. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 31 POLICIES AND PROGRAMS T HE rapid growth of city populations and their consequent problems make the city a mission field of a magnitude hitherto unknown. Thus far the church’s approach to this field has been haphazard and spasmodic. There has not yet been evolved a science of city missions. Certain of the great problems of the city can be met only when the Protestant churches in the city combine in a common program, unselfishly working for the glory of God and the lifting up of humanity. Rescue missions, social centers, evangelistic enterprises, some forms of work among immigrant populations, certain approaches to workingmen, open forums, the dis¬ semination of literature, and many similar methods of work may be carried on most effectively by the united Protestant forces of the city. Given a coordination of all these forces, a cooperating group of trained workers under competent leadership, wise strategy and an adequate budget, and almost any problem in the city may be solved by the church of Jesus Christ. We have been saying a great deal about the problem of “the downtown church.” We should have been talking more about “the downtown problem of the church.” The immediate and ultimate success of the downtown church depends on a continuous evangelistic message and appeal to the passing throngs and a pulpit leadership of clear and prophetic thinking on the current questions of social, economic and political interest—the religious and spiritual implications of which are too often ignored. We must spiritualize the social order, and the preacher of the gospel who stands at the center of teeming commercial and civil life is in a position of unique responsibility. The downtown church should have a modern, up-to-date building and equipment to meet the discovered needs of its varied ministry. This equipment will be adapted broadly to a program of social, recreational and evangelistic work. Only after careful local survey of the community and advice from competent specialists should the large sums necessary be expended to erect and equip the plant. The old and outworn ecclesiastical structure of a generation ago will not suffice. The church which is battling at strategic points in our American cities should have the support and sympathetic interest of the whole church. Nor should the conquest of the city be left entirely to the churches in the city. The city is a national problem. “As goes the city, so goes the nation.” 32 Cities : HOME MISSIONS THE INDUSTRIAL COMMUNITY T HE policy of setting up demonstration centers in industrial communities—with adequate leadership, equipment and budget, for the purpose of exhibiting to the church at large by free experiment the practicability of an efficient Christian program in such com¬ munities is heartily commended. The exten¬ sion of this policy is urged upon all. The promotion of conferences with employers, employees and representatives of the public to promote mutual understanding and cooperation upon a Christian basis is commended. At this time of world unrest the churches in local communities should be encouraged to open their doors for the free discussion of the prob¬ lems of our common life in which moral issues are involved. Opportunity should be given for all voices to be heard in the controversy. Work in these sections of the city must of necessity be conducted at high pressure. Every feature introduced must be as high-grade as possible. The best preacher obtainable should be secured for such fields—one who understands the daily life of the people, knows the forces which oppose the church and is able to enlist every legitimate means for securing the interest of the community. An attempt should be made to coordinate all the forces in the community which are working for righteousness, the church furnishing the inspiration and leadership for community tasks. FOREIGN-SPEAKING AREAS T HE churches have an unusual opportunity to assist in the general movement for a more complete Americanization of our country. While the entire program of the church makes for Americanization nevertheless certain ele¬ ments, such as the study of citizenship and the use of English should be emphasized. Though experience has shown the value of various modes of approach to foreign-speaking peoples—by colporter, woman worker or so- called mission, nevertheless, because of the many instances of failure due to the unseemly appear¬ ance of buildings, inadequate equipment, nar¬ row and limited programs and untrained workers, it is recommended that in every new approach to a foreign-speaking group, whether racially solid or polyglot, there be formulated at the outset a strong program of worship, religious education and social ministry with proper building, equipment and specially trained leaders and staff workers. The program shall be adequate to the needs of the situation and of a character to command attention and re¬ spect. In cases where English-speaking churches are being surrounded by foreign-speaking peoples these churches are urged to adapt their ministry to the changing conditions by a social and edu¬ cational program and a democratic depart¬ mental organization. GREAT POPULAR CENTERS N every city there are one or more centers to which everybody comes. Here crowds seek pleasure or relaxation; young people throng; restless and discontented people mingle; heartsickness and sinsickness prevail. A great popular religious enterprise should be conducted by the churches in every such center with a master of organization in charge. This project should equal in attractiveness any popular resort in the district, and be conducted upon the most liberal basis possible but with a tremendously strong spiritual atmosphere and motive dominating the entire enterprise. It should not become an institutional church in the sense that numerous organizations will be developed but rather an intensive inspirational institution. A SOCIAL MINISTRY HEN the home fails to function then the church must step in and take the place of the home in its ministry to the social life of the people. The socialized and institutional church is justi¬ fied for this reason. It must not become a substitute for the home. It should build up the home. There are neighborhoods in which so-called institutional churches are the means of untold blessing, especially to young people. HOME MISSIONS: Cities 33 Such enterprises should be well organized and be conducted by specially trained workers if the best results are to be obtained. In the cheap lodging house districts and in decadent business and residential neighbor¬ hoods in every large city are to be found men, women and children who are the victims of drink, vice, crime and poverty. Many are subnormal in mentality; many are nervous wrecks who have gone down under the industrial and social strain of the city life; many have never had a fair chance and many have wasted brilliant talents and fine oppor¬ tunities. Especially pitiable are the children of these districts. Usually from these neighborhoods the churches have removed to more favored communities. Often the churches which remain maintain a type of service and standard of worship which do not attract these unfortunate denizens of the city streets. One of the best known organizations which has arisen to challenge these desperate conditions is the rescue mission. There is an urgent necessity for a closer identification of the rescue work with organized church life. The church is now assuming responsibilities which she has too often in the past delegated to other bodies. The time has come when the church of Christ itself should assume responsi¬ bility for the rescue mission in order to secure permanency, competency, financial support and a satisfactory conservation of results. The relation of the rescue mission to the whole problem of vagrancy and the inter-relation of its city program to work among migrant groups outside the city are of utmost importance. A PROGRAM AND A METHOD 0 MEET adequately the situation in the city there should be set up at least the minimum program indicated below, with ample provision for a trained leadership in city work. A continuous survey should be maintained, scientifically noting the changes and movements in the various groups of the population; in busi¬ ness and manufacturing; in city improvements and deterioration—observing all the factors which have a direct influence upon human life. The church would not then be caught napping when its service is suddenly needed and when future church buildings and social and educa¬ tional enterprises must be located and put into operation. A continuous adaptation is called for in plans, policies and practises of local churches, city mission societies, church federations and home mission boards in anticipating the religious and social needs of communities and of the city as a whole. Programs must be based upon per¬ manent records and special surveys. A continuous campaign of publicity must be inaugurated, using daily newspapers, motion pictures, posters, the mails and any other method likely to be effective in presenting the great facts about Christianity and the church. By these means a favorable attitude toward religion may be created among all classes of men and women, making the approach of the church and all Christian institutions easier and more generally effective. ABOVE ALL—LEADERSHIP T MUST be obvious that more important than any other factor in meeting the prob¬ lems of the city is that of competent leadership. It should be a “city-minded” leadership—one which is in sympathy with the spirit of the city; and that can understand and interpret it, and is alert to every symptom of city life. It should be a leadership trained in the city; in constant touch with city life and institutions while being prepared for the direction of city churches and institutions. It should be a specialized leadership. No one man can possibly know every phase of city life and work in this day of high specialization. It should be a supervised leadership, having as directors men of the qualifications of statesmen and strategists. It must be a leadership by both sexes. Women are unusually well qualified for work in the city because the problems dealt with concern home life and because of the large numbers of young women employed in the city. . METROPOLITAN NEW YORK - •- / * ^sL - >* V xx -v • V V . . ■?- - i K _ .-3=. ^- -V- .* METROPOLITAN NEW YORK A CIRCLE with a radius of thirty miles from Times Square, two-fifths of which area is harbor, sound and sea, encloses one-eleventh of the life of the United States. New York is the greatest of all magnets. Every year Wall Street, Fifth Avenue, the Great White Way, Coney Island and the universities, attract thirty-five million strangers with money to spend and minds to be impressed. New York invariably stamps its image upon these visitors. Since the World War started New York has captured leadership in finance, music and fashions. It is also fast becoming the gigantic Good Samaritan for all the needy peoples of the world. New York is the great cosmopolite. Fill St. Louis with Russians; San Francisco with Italians; Milwaukee with Austro-Hungarians; Philadelphia with Jews; group them together in the New York metropolitan area and the sum will represent only two- thirds of the foreign-speaking peoples and their children who live in the foreign quarters and congested sections of New York. New York outranks any other city in the world in its Negro population. The New York metropolitan area constitutes the most appealing possible challenge to organized religion. Failure of the church here would be an international disaster. Success here will mean religion enlightening the world. It is a staggering responsi¬ bility and an opportunity so vast that no single denomination can venture to meet it alone. This opportunity invites a supreme devotion of thought, time, money, service and sacrifice. It calls for a cooperative effort of all church groups sharing common ideals of Christian service and citizenship. In this perilous day of fundamental reorganization the church must forget herself and seek only to serve. By wise and heroic action she must grapple with the most difficult problems of human relationship in the spirit of an open-minded, justice-loving, truth-seeking, cooperative lover of mankind. 3g Metropolitan New York : HOME MISSIONS The church can save and develop the life of American democracy as it concentrates its best upon the human factor in government and industry. Acting with the irresistible impetus of a great spiritual ideal, the church can keep old-world anarchy from drawing its bloody trail first through crowded New York and then throughout America; not by processes of force, but by showing to all oppressors, oppressed, agitators and reactionaries alike the better way of Christ. First, the church must define and agree upon its ideal for the metropolitan area cooperation. Second, all facts must be known and studied—survey. Third, the suc¬ cessive steps must be fixed—program. Fourth, each step essential to this carefully planned program must be taken in the right order strategy. Interchurch World Movement of North America STATUTE MILES 02 4 6 a n GD.I34 AS USED IN THE SURVEY OF THE INTERCHURCH WORLD MOVEMENT NEW YORK METROPOLITAN DISTRICT ax Tell HOME MISSIONS: Metropolitan New York 39 WHICH WILL CONQUER? N THE metropolitan area there are 163 incorporated cities, towns and villages with 407 additional post-office centers. ^ The total population is about nine millions, with 33 nationalities represented. The total wealth is estimated at fifty billions of dollars. There are fifteen hundred schools, with approxi¬ mately 1,200,000 children of school age. There are less than 2,000 Protestant churches. In the two central boroughs of the metropolitan area, only 40 per cent, of the churches are either entirely self-supporting or have endow¬ ments of their own. All the others receive financial aid from national, state and city denominational societies and funds. WIN THE CHILD T HE record of the last fifteen years of the New York churches and Sunday schools belonging to three leading denominations indi¬ cates an increase in church membership of CHURCH AND SUNDAY SCHOOL MEMBERSHIP 1904-1918 FOR THREE DENOMINATIONS _ ... / v _ v / \ / N 00 --------it------ 1904 ’05 '06 ’07 ’08 ’09 ’10 ’ll ’12 ’13 ’14 ’15 ’16 ’17 ’18 _CHURCH MEMBERSHIP ...SUNDAY SCHOOL MEMBERSHIP Interchurch Ubr/d Mwemenl d north America _ GO. 209 twenty-three and eight-tenths per cent., but a decrease in Sunday school membership of seventeen and nine-tenths per cent. New York contains more children under twenty years for every one thousand people than any city in the world; and more than half of them have no systematic religious education. What danger this spells for future ethics in business and professional circles; what it means in regard to social selfishness and governmental corruption is beyond the power of any man to foretell. The church must win, train and safeguard the child or the church will die and the state will crumble. The child is the life of both. COMPETE OR COOPERATE? HE church is the mother of hospitals, nursing, charities, visiting, child care, social settlements and other philanthropic and hu¬ manitarian movements. The boards of directors of the largest social service agencies are constituted almost entirely of church members. The church must not compete with her chil¬ dren. It must work through them and co¬ operate with them. Social work and social agencies of all kinds need and welcome the counsel, financial support and volunteer aid of the church. HIS map shows a typical crowding of churches in one district in the metropolitan area. There are 13 churches, representing 8 denominations. The old residential American population of this neighborhood has almost disappeared. Because of the loyalty of some older members to their church homes the in¬ creasing cost of maintenance and repair is borne by a decreasing few. The problem of this section is the amalgamation of the churches of the same denomination, or the specialization of church functions. Six struggling churches could so rearrange them¬ selves as to form two strong organizations. t ■ * - HOME MISSIONS: Metropolitan New York 41 Times Square HERE are 100 city blocks from 28th to 48th Streets and from Park Avenue to 8th Avenue. The human, though not the geographical center, of its life is Times Square. A dozen years ago this section was comparatively a village where today it is the heart of a throbbing metropolitan section. In this section there are 90 hotels with accommodations for 26,824 a day. At least 30,000 new arrivals register every week at these hotels. Allowing for changes in the semi-transient population of the 17 clubs, and the 493 rooming and boarding houses, there is a transient population of approximately 123,000 within a month. Thus, a million and a half different people dwell temporarily in this section of New York in a year's time. The more or less permanent population in this area numbers 5,464 families. The 45 theatres and 10 motion-picture houses found here have a seating capacity of over 78,000, with an approximate attendance each week of one million men, women and children who, for the time being, are trying to forget their cares and duties and are at play. As a center of social expression its like is not to be found elsewhere in America, nor indeed in the world. To serve this constituency there are two Jewish synagogues, four Roman Catholic churches, and thirteen Protestant churches, two of which are for Negroes. The total active membership of all these churches is not over 16,500, which is a little more than their seating capacity. On a given Sunday evening only 1,817 people, by actual count, were found within the Protestant churches. In the playhouses of the section, where so-called sacred concerts are given, standing room was at a premium. This region is also a center for the New Thought propaganda in the United States. The Protestant churches make their main appeal for Sunday attendance and for one added week-day evening. The motion-picture houses are open for 28 exhibitions a week, while the theatres give nine performances, including the Sunday concert. 42 Metropolitan New York : HOME MISSIONS THE TIMES SQUARE PROGRAM 0 THE full measure of their ability and equipment the churches of this area and those on its immediate edge have courageously faced the huge problems in the Times Square district. The demands of these churches for needed ad¬ ditional equipment and staff are imperative. The exceptional needs of a most exceptional population call for a greatly enlarged program to be operated under such auspices as the churches may decide, somewhat after this general plan: A PULPIT AND EDUCATIONAL CENTER T HIS pulpit would offer a seven-day-a-week opportunity for evangelism and for the public discussion of social and moral questions. It would be a metropolitan platform for the greatest religious thinkers and church leaders. As an educational center it would inform the public regarding the Christian life and the church and would attract the uninterested or prejudiced to the study and practice of Chris¬ tianity. Specialists would explain the best methods of religious education for home and school, and the best religious literature, art and music. A CHURCH HOME CENTER ECOGNIZING that loneliness leads di¬ rectly to evil and debauchery, the churches face an unparalleled opportunity for developing a great church home-center in the Times Square region. This center would be a church home or club for travelers, visitors, transients and semi¬ transients. It would contain an information office with expert service of every kind such as travel, sightseeing, shopping, legal aid, medical aid, employment and vocational advice, a read¬ ing room, a rest room, a tea room, a conversa¬ tion room and every other device which would make the stranger feel at home. A RECREATIONAL CENTER HE hours of play, when a million men, women and children every week crowd the places of amusement, are definitely character¬ forming. This center would include an audi¬ torium for illustrated lectures and moving- pictures. It would also give the church people of the metropolitan area an opportunity to express themselves in religious pageants and educational dramatics. Under right auspices and supervision it would offer such recreation as would create new standards and bring the church into a real position of leadership in the hours devoted by the people to play. SURVEY TO SERVE WENTY blocks in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, indicate the data given to every church and pastor after the mapping and tabu¬ lation of the survey. Accurate lists of the names of the people, their addresses, church membership or preference, birth-place, language of mother, length of resi¬ dence in the United States, occupation, trade union membership, war service, and whether officers of the church, are furnished. With these facts at hand, pastoral visitation is simplified. With people named and located the pastor’s efficiency is greatly multiplied. The survey also gives the pastor an opportunity to mobilize his entire congregation for com¬ munity-service. This service usually stimu¬ lates spiritual life and greatly quickens the entire church. An adequate basis for an enlarged program is presented in which added leadership and equip¬ ment are budgeted, and which by its definite¬ ness appeals at once to the business and spiritual interests of the church. HOME MISSIONS: Metropolitan New York 43 A Metropolitan Program T HE religious forces in America must recognize the metropolitan area as a mission field. The late James W. Bashford said: “New York is the greatest mission field in the world.” A continual and comprehensive study of the established agencies of the church must be made for the purpose of discovering the points which need to be strengthened to the utmost in preaching, public worship, pastoral supervision and religious education. Centers of weakness and diminishing strength will be studied for the purpose of devel¬ oping a new, modified or improved program for utilizing the valuable properties now owned by the churches, but many of which will never probably be turned to commercial uses. In the development of such a modern and timely program strong emphasis must be placed upon the fundamental character of the ministry of the church of Jesus Christ in the social, moral and intellectual life of the community. Strong, well-staffed, well-financed religious centers allocated to the different denomi¬ nations should be located in the most strategic sections of the area. These may be either good-will centers for the crowded districts, Christian social settlements, forum or health centers, or a combination of all. The Times Square plan and similar programs not so elaborate should be developed for other transient or recreational centers, as for instance Jersey City, Paterson, Newark, Brooklyn and Yonkers. An evangelistic program should be inaugurated with men and women of the highest character and ability giving their entire time to speaking for Christ both in the churches and other available places, such as labor halls, forum halls, theatres and clubs. A great outdoor evangelistic program in the summer ought likewise be organized. It would include public preaching, illustrated lectures and moving pictures. A new religious literature specially designed for the metropolitan mind must be pre¬ pared both in English and foreign languages, and its adequate distribution assured. Goodwill industries ought to be founded in at leased five centers. The purpose would be to utilize waste material which, when repaired and sold, gives employment to those handicapped physically and morally, and does so under Christian influences which help them regain their standing as useful members of society. 44 Metropolitan New York : HOME MISSIONS THE CHALLENGE! CAMPAIGN of religious publicity not only advertising church services but the message of the gospel itself, should be vigorously prosecuted. Christian forces must set up a carefully articu¬ lated program providing facilities for public worship, religious education, community ser¬ vice and Christian fellowship for the Negro populations of this area. A coordinated and well-staffed organization for religious work among the students gathered from every state and nation in what is now the greatest student center in the world must be provided. HOUSING CONDITIONS I N NO other metropolitan center in America is the proportion of rented houses and con¬ sequent transient population so great. The home which many remember as the corner¬ stone of our American democracy is rapidly passing away. There is a possible three-fold service for the church on this problem: (1) An effort to get a multitude of people back into Christian homes where their children could be brought up under the influences of the family altar; (2) The provision of dormitory or other home facilities for America’s young people who come by multiplied thousands to the metro¬ politan area. Either by utilizing some of their idle properties or by purchasing new ones, the churches could do an enormous piece of con¬ structive, conservative work for our future American leaders; (3) An attempt through as¬ sociations of rooming and boarding-house keepers to improve the standards of existing facilities in order to make the area more attrac¬ tive as well as the safest place in America for young men and young women. Cooperation should be sought with existing educational agencies for the establishment and maintenance of a national training-school for religious workers other than those for the regu¬ lar ministry. The opportunities in New York for both study and practise for those who are to be directors of community work, religious education, social and recreational work are unparalleled. r T^HE CHALLENGE of the city will only be met when the church spares no resources. HOME MISSIONS: Metropolitan New York 45 General Headquarters AN OUTSTANDING need is a church headquarters building for adequately / \ housing the seventy-five or more international, national, metropolitan 1 m and civic religious agencies now inadequately located in almost as many different offices in widely scattered buildings. It has long been a dream of the leaders of many of these agencies that an adequate and well-equipped headquarters building might be established which, in addition to the ordinary office facilities, would provide conference and committee rooms; restaurant, hospital, first-aid, rest-room and other social facilities for the hundreds of employees; a reference library of Christian literature; joint transportation, pur¬ chasing and shipping service; map, chart and lantern slide departments. Such a building would not only make it easier but far more economical for these organizations to do their particular and common tasks. Sign! W HY not sign the Emancipation Proclamation of the church for its larger life and inspiring task in New York? This is not the time for timorous doubting souls or chronic objectors. The call has sounded. The advance has begun. Through the church of Christ and by the personal sacrifice and personal service of each member this area must at any cost be won for God. For all God’s fellow-workers it is a high and holy venture of faith. - TOWN AND COUNTRY TOWN AND COUNTRY T HE rural territory which serves as the basis for this section includes all the open country and communities of under 5,000 population. Within this territory there are not less than 54,000,000 people—or half the population of the United States. A survey of town and country conditions would include a study of the field, the problems and the forces and a statement of the program proposed. A possible classification of the rural field is as follows: (a) the more favored agricul¬ tural sections; (b) the less favored agricultural sections; (c) the frontier; (d) the rural industrial communities; (e) the mountain section. The better agricultural sections include the corn belt, extending through Nebraska, Indiana and Ohio; the wheat-producing sections, including Kansas, the Dakotas, Minnesota and parts of other states; the irrigated sections, representing about 75,000,000 acres of possible development; the drainage areas, with about 20,000,000 acres, and the southeastern portion of the United States, known as the cotton belt. The increase in the country development has been around the cities, owing to the development of suburban transportation; in the mining population of southwestern Pennsylvania; in the mountains of West Virginia and Kentucky where large families are still the rule; along the southern coastal plain; northern Michigan and Minnesota and throughout most of the western half of the country especially in Oklahoma, California and Washington, in which regions the increase was due to agricultural development; and in the oil fields of Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. The decreases in rural population have occurred for the most part in the corn and somewhat in the wheat producing sections. Here prosperous farming communities have found it advantageous to consolidate smaller farms into larger ones in order to secure the full benefit of the cooperative use of machinery and of large scale produc¬ tion. Eight of the fourteen states showing decreases are Iowa, Missouri, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and Kansas. In the corn-raising communities the farms are fairly large, tending to become larger. There is considerable neighborhood cooperation and a large amount of social life. To a large degree the people are progressive and intelligent. 50 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS In the wheat-producing sections expansive cultivation predominates. Homes are necessarily widely separated and there is consequently social isolation. The intelli¬ gence is generally high and the people are fairly prosperous. In the cotton-raising sections there are either large farms or plantations with many Negro laborers operating under a manager or many small cotton farms with renters, in some cases owners. A generally low intelligence predominates among the workers and their families because of social inheritances and there are consequently backward agricultural methods in use. There is considerable social life, especially on the plantations and some cooperation between neighbor farmers. Other types of agricultural communities are devoted to fruit-raising, stock-raising, market-gardening and dairying. Country Population 1910 Darkest portions show greatest density State Number State Number State Number State Number Texas. 2,702,133 Mississippi. 1,419,434 California_... 754,758 Massachusetts... 241,049 Pennsylvania.. 2,452,483 Indiana. 1,257,584 Nebraska. 638,070 Montana. 207,447 Georgia. .•. 1,784,668 1,669,331 Michigan. Arkansas .•. 1,197,174 1,197,004 Maryland. 568,271 479,652 Idaho. ... 196,815 174,133 North Carolina. New Jersey. New Hampshire. Ohio. . . 1,649,948 1,609,804 1,603,151 1,575,826 South Carolina 1,161,208 1,106,413 1,106,002 1,091,289 Florida. 446,030 415,928 415,800 389,536 Vermont. 167,652 124,688 119,773 113,905 Tennessee. Oklahoma..... Washington.... North Dakota. Arizona.. Alabama. Iowa... Utah New York. Wisconsin. South Dakota... Connecticut. ... Kentucky-. .. 1,545,591 Louisiana. 1,050,070 918,585 899,248 Maine. 354,991 297,427 275,963 Wyoming.. 79,359 76,210 59,596 Missouri. 1,535,719 1,486,160 Kansas. Delaware. Nevada. Illinois.. Minnesota. .. . Oregon. ...._ Virginia. 1,472,109 West Virginia. 860,479 New Mexico. . 263,117 Rhode Island..., Total.. 17,956 41,229,539 HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 51 LESS FAVORED AGRICULTURAL SECTIONS T HE more sparsely settled and less favored agricultural sections include the hill land extending from the central part of Oklahoma in the northeasterly direction through Arkansas, southern Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, south¬ ern Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia and parts of Pennsylvania; and the northern pine belt extending from Minnesota through Wisconsin, Michigan, parts of New York and the New England states. This section consists largely of small isolated communities difficult of access. Poverty pre¬ vents many communities from erecting church buildings or maintaining a pastor. THE FRONTIER HE frontier section includes twelve states, namely: Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Ore¬ gon, North Dakota, Utah, Washington and Wyoming. These states with an area of 1,259,- 977 square miles had a population of only 6,458,417 in 1910—approximately five people to the square mile. Over 40,000 homestead rights were granted and 103,917 entries made in 1917. Lands privately owned tend con¬ stantly to be subdivided among new settlers. In the frontier there is a marked difference be¬ tween well established communities—such as the irrigated fruit and grain sections—and the pioneer communities. The characteristics of a frontier community are novelty, movement and uncertainty. The population is constantly changing. There is a low standard of living. Hundreds of villages have no Protestant churches. The church has little relation to present-day life. The great distances to be traveled are a drawback to co-ordinated re¬ ligious work. RURAL INDUSTRIAL COMMUNITIES HE rural industrial communities are rep¬ resented by the coal and other mining camps; fishing villages along the coast; lumber camps; small manufacturing towns—such as cotton mill towns in the Piedmont section of the South and the mill-towns of New England; vacation resort villages—some of which have a large transient population; and the large suburban population of foreign stock engaged in truck-farming near large cities. URBAN, VILLAGE AND COUNTRY POPULATION OF THE UNITED STATES 1910 The graph shows that more than half the population of the United States is in rural territory and nearly half is living in the open country. URBAN RURAL TOTAL 42 , 623,383 49 , 348,883 91 , 972,266 Interchurch World Movement or north America CDA46 The cotton mills are supplied almost wholly by white labor from the Appalachian Moun¬ tains. There are few foreigners or negroes employed. Approximately three hundred thou¬ sand people are engaged in this industry. In the main these workers live in unincorporated villages. Schools, community organizations and churches are provided for them. They have no part in elections and their power of initiative has largely atrophied. All sorts of religious “isms” have sprung up; “Holy Rollers” and similar sects flourish. Thousands of people scattered throughout the country in small settlements are getting raw materials into the market or turning them 52 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS Increase in Population Dots show comparative proportion of inward moving population State Number Per cent State Number Per cent State Number Per cent State Number Per cent Oklahoma 458,341 70.7 W. Va.... 107,380 14.3 Idaho.... 70,464 55.8 Wyoming. 26,210 49.3 Texas.... 334,390 14.1 Louisiana. 100,706 10.6 Montana. 64,377 45.0 Nebraska. 13,427 2.1 N. Dak... 167,802 67.7 New Mex. 100,203 61.5 Oregon. . . 46,069 20.0 Minnesota 8,758 1.0 Wash.... 167,324 67.3 Alabama . 96,578 6.4 Virginia. . 42,695 3.0 Utah. 8,244 7.4 Penna.. . . 138,362 6.0 Miss. 95,668 7.2 Kentucky 33,644 2.2 Maine.... 2,927 .8 California 138,152 22.4 S. Dak. . . 94,643 32.1 N. J. 31,697 7.1 Mass. 2,801 1.2 N. Car. .. 110,610 7.1 Colorado . 94,538 46.6 Arizona... 30,101 31.8 Delaware. 1,524 2.0 Arkansas. 110,215 10.1 S. Car.... 81,930 7.6 Maryland 28,100 5.2 Georgia... 108,399 6.5 Florida... 78,016 21.2 Nevada... 26,863 82.1 G REAT movements of population are taking place. A single genera¬ tion has seen the northwest increase its population tenfold. These people leave problems behind them as well as bring some with them. HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 53 Decrease in Population Dots show comparative proportion of outward moving population State Number Per cent State Number Per cent State Number Per cent State Number Per cent 152,673 12.1 Ohio. 91,498 5.3 Tennessee 10,089 .6 R. I. 2,953 14.1 Missouri.. 133^514 8.0 New York 49,231 3.0 Michigan. 9,946 .8 Conn. R039 .9 Indiana... 132,195 9.5 Vermont.. 20,909 11.1 Wisconsin 8,201 .7 Illinois. . . 112,225 7.0 N. H. 11,186 6.0 Kansas... 4,773 .5 T HE South and the Far West are drawing their “new comers” from the more populous centers of the East and central West. This means church problems in the communities deserted as well as in the new found locations. 54 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS into manufactured products. A large percent¬ age of these people are foreigners, unfamiliar with American ideals and standards, crowded together in small shacks, ignorant, poor and without an understanding of our language, customs and laws. The population is transient, especially in lumber camps and mining towns. Men are herded together in lumber camps under unsanitary conditions and without home ties or religious life. The average mining town does not last longer than 40 years and in many cases the villages are abandoned after ten or fifteen years. THE MOUNTAIN SECTION HE mountain section stretches along the southern portion of the Appalachian Moun¬ tains and extends into northern Georgia and Alabama, embracing a region of two or three million acres. Here the people have lived for the most part by hunting, fishing and growing such corn and vegetables as were absolutely needed. This elevated region is rich in timber and mineral deposits. The chief occupations are agriculture, logging and, until recently— distilling. The main features of this section’s problem are: isolation, illiteracy and arrested development due largely to the influences of too close inter¬ marriage. Housing and general living condi¬ tions are not good and result in the widespread prevalence of disease. There are few schools and churches, little knowledge of what goes on in the outside world and small interest in either local or national politics. Most of the preaching is now done by voluntary pastors, of little education and training, with a great but almost superstitious belief and faith in God. Large portions of this country have no religious services of any kind. Many of the people are so isolated that it would be impossible for them to attend worship. HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 55 Rural Problems D IFFERENCES in environment produce distinctive traits in the population. The occupations of a region are to a considerable degree determined by that region and the types of society are fixed by occupations because they determine interests, organizations, outlook and culture. Where the occupations are subject to change, the social character of the community is variable. A declining church membership and attendance at religious worship are due in part to shifting population, increasing tenancy and changing economic conditions. This decline is paradoxical; for country people are generally staid, orderly, well- intentioned and now, after fifty lean years, prosperous. But the churches are dying in so many instances and arrested in so many others that the whole condition of the rural church is moribund. The Ohio Rural Life Survey found that of 1,515 churches in 31 counties more than two-thirds were arrested or dying. Of the open country churches over three-fourths were not growing. RURAL INDUSTRIAL AMERICA ^ I-- ! „ ' ! _ i--—$ f Vv. _ — Miron OIL V///\ COAL, LIGHT DEPOSITS COAL HEAVY DEPOSITS tnterchurch World Movement of Worth America . - L -~—' ^ , • \ |||„. .t— V . S ^ .III G.D. 248. 56 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS The farmers' church is much worse off than the village church. Wherever the farmer— a workingman and investor combined in one type—touches the Protestant church he treats it with striking avoidance. One would expect the opposite. But in Ohio, the only state surveyed completely, open country churches were worse by 22 per cent, than town churches and more than twice as bad as the village church in arrested development. The workingman attends the country church less than his employer does. In Missouri attendance upon church and membership in church corresponded pretty accurately to the size of a man's farm. The small farmers—who “work out"—and the tenants were about one-half as numerous as owners among the church members and church¬ goers. In Ohio where 41 per cent, of the farms are run by tenant-farmers only 22 per cent, of them were found on the church rolls. HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 57 The country churches are small. In an arrested or diminished population a church of less than one hundred members is likely to die. Its chance of life is not more than one in three. Yet in Ohio 60 per cent, of the churches in the village and open country are of this small, hopeless membership—less than one hundred in size. In Ohio 55 per cent, of the churches have less than 75 members. HIGH RATES OF ILLEGITIMACY [ W|LL;IAMsf F tl L;T (> N ' " - LI j ET fepp i-J—pp 6,e F; • a;n rf E y,'/mY/7 I- , f i .1, 7-4 - l-'T-S r-- f"wf o:o'"b' «*»’ a' 4 ii r a'^uXa' ! I—f—r .saMa. V.y. 7 ~—f ' fsyj'ss --—!—4—;— l • j - r —j—] t 'Al'A"P 7? Y/X'.'jrss !_i : i|]! -- Fpjii-p -i-f.j-j—.44441. zpzty Tmp • 1--4-J-j-j-i- - - ■: \ ! ■ Mi; _..._ » ; i L j°i R ! .. J...L U„. o.u. i Li_Li_ i A... .__J_i_i__ _{_LL. 'P;6btase.‘ —i—i—-i- ✓[/ L JL -A ✓ . _ J • ; J • i I I I ; • 4 L •' : ! h'X'n £oc k j 4 —!—i—H—: : \ r I—:': -f‘T p vPZ — r-- r ^r-‘7 J "f—!-r~ |- J rV^ -‘f-f.l- -4-4 r^ i, L L k te.? °$r. p..L r ki«j-.{ L-.J—:— YY Zy//// ■'/'/?$' y^r —!— J ; : i | i L ‘”+“1 I : rYo^-- —4j— | PpLpLfcfrrV- IcLffLnf f [—I—l ~£— [aARjOKy / ’• . • t "kii..' r ' r Dt lAwafije * ! '• : *i " 'union ' ■- l/-' -f- -4—]—i ^4-- L .f. N .t-W--A..vi-N [e.- i F* 1—r—*■—»- -HJahJo n! i}4$.. C'dYutM B;i A lii A' _l_L s i _r=ri .■ H T®*r -U Y . t j -- jrHL ! r ; oiiTVr 1 C A j4[_PALIP;N ■ *-- y. A R; »p. h v **Fia« • r —\ 1 r^: MADfjf&H V 4f WA.P R jE N Tl> / (<■/ /' / t?', ’ t,f f ■ jttytjft i B f *P ' °ft/0 fnterchitrch World Movement of Northrf/ner/ca O.A I N TO Nrv t / 'h"i o'A.ux n b -A ’ * ‘ .-Y+- Illegitimate Births AVERAGE ANNUALRATEPER 100,000 POPULATION FOR THE YEARS 1909 AND 1910 RATE FOR STATE 43.9 LESS THAN 43.9 PER 100,000 I 43.3 TO 60 PER 100,000 61 TO 75 PER 100,000 76 TO 90 PER 100,000 110 TO 130 PER 100,000 G.D.242 58 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS NO COMMUNITY CENTERS HE rural church as a rule has failed to live up to its possibility as a community center. With a non-resident pastor people are not reached and the leadership of the church in creating and registering Christian opinion and practise in community affairs is lost. A great majority of country churches stands idle through most of the year. Considering that rural churches are generally bunched in villages and grouped in competitive areas in the open country it is evident that the places are many in which one church must depend upon only ten or twenty families. THE CIRCUIT SYSTEM V ERY few country churches receive the full time of a pastor. Ministers cross and recross one another's paths, serving two, four or even eight and ten churches. Of the 17,000 country churches of one denomination, 12,000 are without services every Sunday. Another denomination has nine-tenths of its rural churches served by absentee pastors; and three- fourths of its churches have but one service per month; while one-fourth have no Sunday school at all. In Ohio only 13 per cent, of country ministers were resident. The rest live apart from the churches. Country ministers have abandoned the idea of living near their people and by their churches. All of this indicates that in the early future we will suffer a loss of many country churches. There are not enough people to carry them. The withdrawal of ministers from the open country is paralleled by the withdrawal of other professional types. Physicians, nurses, lawyers —all have assembled themselves in villages and big towns. The professional classes that serve the farmer do not live with the farmer. INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT HE average country church is but a single¬ cell structure. At best it has but one room for church and Sunday school and probably a basement or addition for kitchen and primary department. The frequent lack of a parsonage makes it impossible to maintain a resident pastor. UNEQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF FORCES ENOMINATIONAL lines have been so tightly drawn in the country that even the economic urge of a decreasing population fails to bring the churches together. One eastern town has six churches for one hundred and fifty people and no resident minister. One well established area in an eastern state has 36 churches within a radius of six miles, while adjoining townships are almost uncared for and more than one thousand children of school age are untouched by any religious influence. UNCHURCHED AREAS UNDREDS of towns and many whole counties are without adequate churching. One town of two thousand inhabitants has had but an occasional service in ten years. One village fifteen years old, of four hundred persons, had never seen a minister until the Interchurch World Movement made a survey. Seventeen counties in the central and far west¬ ern states are reported as without any churches. Twenty-five thousand men, women and chil¬ dren in one rural industrial area in a central southeastern state are without any religious supervision. INADEQUATE PROGRAM AND SALARY VER-EMPHASIS on emotional types of religion often leads to too great depend¬ ence upon the annual revival to satisfy the religious needs of the community and to enlarge church membership. Low salaries, which discourage the best type of leadership and compel the minister to seek a better paid charge in the city. Sixty-one per cent, of the rural white ministry of one large denomination receives less than $1,000 per year. The minimum salary of a rural Y. M. C. A. secretary is $1,200. HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 59 LACK OF LEADERSHIP HE lack of a trained and effective rural leadership, for which low salaries are partly responsible is a prime source of weakness. Young men upon whom the church one called successfully are turning to other professions, where they receive a living wage. Two large denominations admit that only 10 per cent, of their rural pastors have had college and semi¬ nary training. There is a prevalent idea that denominational well-being is satisfied with the up-keep of church organizations and preaching points rather than by supplying such trained religious leadership as will arouse the rural con¬ stituency to progressive work on a self-support¬ ing basis. DECADENCE OF RURAL POPULATIONS HERE is a close relation between the decadence of country populations and the degeneration of rural stock. Rev. C. O. Gill in his book “Six Thousand Country Churches” shows that illiteracy, illegitimacy, crime and physical degeneracy correspond in their fre¬ quency to the decay of the country church and the substitution for it of an emotional, irre¬ sponsible religious type—a great danger to Protestantism and Americanism. FOREIGN-BORN FARMERS HERE is an increasing number of foreign- born farmers in New England, in the Mississippi Valley and in the farming and small- fruit sections of the Pacific Coast. The church fails to minister to them and thus the losing struggle for its existence continues. It also loses an unparalleled opportunity for evangelism and community service. A summary of the social complex presented by a single typical county is presented herewith. COUNTY 259 Area, 473 square miles; population 64 per square mile; level, rich agricultural county; chief products, cattle and grain; 67 per cent, of farms are operated by owners; no farmers’ ,PERCENTAGE OF FOREIGN-BORN FARMERS ^_ OVER 50 ’interchurch World Movement of Worth America G.D.247 HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 61 ' cooperative enterprises; approximately two- thirds of road-mileage is hard surfaced or other¬ wise improved. Social agencies: 9 dance halls, 7 moving-pic¬ ture houses, 29 pool rooms, 5 bowling alleys, 3 public libraries, 4 granges, 30 lodges, 4 bands, 7 orchestras, 1 community chorus; schools are good. II. Population, 30,400 in 1910 — practically stationary. The county seat has a population of 7,200, leaving 23,200 for the remainder of county covered by rural survey; 90 per cent, of population has lived in county over 15 years. There are nine rural trade communities; some overchurching and some underchurching. III. The churches number 63 outside the county seat. There are 13 abandoned churches, 12 of which closed during the last 3 years; 11 of the abandoned churches are in the open country; 1 in a village of 750 with 2 other churches. Resident membership of rural churches is 5,770 or 24.8 per cent, of the population; 38 churches have lost 902 members in 4 years. In one community (population 453) 15 per cent, are members of 2 churches. In community I (population 2,113) 15 per cent, are members of three churches; in community II (population 3,145) 12 per cent, are members of 6 churches; in community III (population 2,100) 5 per cent, are members of 2 churches. Rural Sunday school average attendance, 3,540—15.2 per cent, of population; no pro¬ vision for leadership training; only 8 Sunday school pupils have entered Christian work in 10 years. Other organizations: 47 for women, 4 for men, 3 for girls, 1 for boys. Thirty pastors minister to county; one-fourth of county has only 1 resident minister; re¬ mainder has 29; salaries average $1,045 a pastor; $589 a church; four pastors receive $700, $450, $364 and $45 respectively without parsonages; 12 churches have one-fourth of minister’s time; 6, one-third; 14, one-half; 4 are pastorless; 19 full-time; five pastors travel 100 miles, 55 miles, 50 miles, 40 miles and 22 miles respectively to reach their churches. IV. Needs: (1) At least 10 rural church centers with adequate plants. This would ensure proper provision for religious education, social gatherings and recreation; (2) Such a distribu¬ tion of ministers as will give the responsible churches in each community full-time resident pastors, with assistants where necessary; (3) Provision for needed modern parsonages and increased pastoral support; (4) A unified pro¬ gram to apply principles of Christianity to social, economic, educational and recreational life in every community; (5) Training confer¬ ences of pastors and laymen to provide leader¬ ship for a cooperative campaign to reach the unchurched majority. 62 Town and Country : HOME MISSIONS The Forces D ESPITE its problems, rural America is not lost to Christ. There are no less than 150,000 country churches served by an army of 50,000 rural ministers. The larger home mission boards are beginning to organize separate departments for country church work. There is an increasing number of demonstration rural church centers working on the basis of scientific surveys of their fields. These point the way to better things in worship, religious education and community service. Educational literature has been specially prepared for the rural ministry. Chairs of rural sociology are being established in some theological seminaries. Summer schools for rural leadership training are being held by several denominations. There is cooperation among the agricultural colleges, government and welfare agencies. The rural church has a great opportunity to become a community center of wide appeal and diversified usefulness. It has few if any rivals. It could, with adequate equipment and leadership, become the most influential force for religious, educational and social betterment. The rural field is comparatively free from the many alluring forms of vice and wicked¬ ness that flourish in the cities. It is poor in its provision of legitimate recreation and amusement, but it eagerly responds to these when properly provided and presented. It has been socially starved. Hence the migration of young people to the urban centers. The popularity of chautauquas and lyceums indicates the richness of the field of mental and moral endeavor which the rural church has at its doors and needs only the proper equipment and leadership to cultivate, to the great advantage of both church and people. One great advantage of rural church activities along these lines is that it associates the church with the whole life and labors of the community. Religion then takes its rightful place as the mainspring of all endeavor and serves as a helpful guide in matters relating to thought and conduct. HOME MISSIONS: Town and Country 63 Bring every family in America definitely within the scope of gospel ministration and influence. In old settled counties there are neighborhoods unreached by the church. These must be occupied. In new and growing counties of the West there are large, populated areas with no form of religious ministration. These areas are being surveyed, mapped and their needs studied in order to discover the best way to evangelize them—whether by colporter and itinerant missionary or by settled pastor and community worker. Discover and energetically promote every country church which occupies a strategic position for service. This should be done regardless of previous missionary status. Apply to all rural churches a minimum standard of efficiency. In the average case such a standard would involve a resident pastor; adequate equipment for worship, religious education and community service; regular worship and preaching; purposeful pastoral visitation; adequate financial program; organized graded Bible school; enlistment and training of local leaders; ministry to special groups—boys, men, girls, women, tenants, new Americans; adequate provision for recreation and social life; and definite cordial cooperation with other churches of the community. The claims of the rural ministry in its varied forms as a life-work should be presented with such conviction as to compel the strongest young men and women to give their lives to the up-building of rural life in America. Short-course training conferences should be for graduate instruction organized in all subjects related to highest development of the rural community and the church’s relation to it. Adequate opportunity should be given for thorough and specialized training in colleges and seminaries for men who are to spend their lives in rural church work. Cooperation should be promoted among various churches in the location of demon¬ stration centers so that there shall be at least one in every rural county. An outstanding religious periodical should be established for circulation in town and country which all the Christian agencies interested in rural Christian life would use and support. ' . H : NEGRO AMERICANS NEGRO AMERICANS O NE out of every ten people in the continental United States is a Negro. The present population is between ten and eleven millions—more than double that of 1865. The Negro population has not increased as rapidly as the white. At the time of the last census there were 56,000 more female persons than male in the total Negro population. This means that for every 1,000 women there were 989 men. Among the whites the situation was different; there were 1,068 white male persons for .every 1,000 white female. In 1910, thirteen southern states reported Negro populations of more than 200,000. In eight of them the number exceeded 600,000. These thirteen states contained six-sevenths of the Negro population of the country. There are 1,350 counties in the sixteen southern states; in 818 of them Negroes comprised one-eighth or more of the total population in 1910; while in 264, more than half the population was Negro. Fifty Years of Negro Progress 1860 1910 20,000. . .Farms Operated. . 900,000 - .Farms Owned. . 241,000 12,000. . .Homes Owned. . 500,000 2,100. . . .Business Enterprises. 45,000 90%. . .Illiteracy. 30% 100,000. . .Public School Pupils. .1,800,000 600. . .Teachers. 30,000 .Educational Endowment. .8,000,000 .In Professional Service. 60,000 .In Government Service. 24,000 .Newspapers and Periodicals. 300 68 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS F OR the past fifty years there has been a con¬ tinuous migration of Negroes northward and westward. This movement is shown by the continually increasing percentage of Negroes in certain large northern cities. Sixty years ago more than 92 per cent, of the Negroes lived in the South. According to the last census the number has decreased each decade to about 89 per cent. THE NORTHERN MIGRATION T HE report of the Department of Labor on “Negro Migration in 1916-17” sum¬ marizes the situation as follows: For a number of years it has been apparent to even the casual observer that a stream of Negroes has been flowing into the North from the border southern states. Some have been going from the lower South also, but that section has not hitherto been greatly affected. However, recent extraordinary occurrences,—the war in Europe, with the consequent shortage of labor in the north, the ravages of the boll weevil and flood conditions in the south—have set on foot a general movement of Negroes northward that is affecting the whole South. Other “causes assigned at the southern end are numerous: General dissatisfaction with con¬ ditions, ravages of boll weevil, floods, change of crop system, low wages, poor houses on plan¬ tations, poor school facilities, unsatisfactory crop settlements, rough treatment, lynching, desire for travel, labor agents, the Negro press, letters from friends in the North, and finally advice of white friends in the South where crops had failed.” THE CITY INFLUX HREE-FOURTHS of the Negro popula¬ tion is still rural. There has been, how¬ ever, a steady stream of Negroes to the cities at a rate quite comparable with the influx of whites. In 1890, less than one out of five Negroes lived in towns of 2,500 or larger. By 1910, more than 27 per cent, were living under urban conditions. At that time there were 179 cities having more than 2,500 Negro inhabi¬ tants. Forty-three of these cities contain Negro populations of over 10,000. Segregated, these people constitute Negro cities within cities. THE EFFECT OF THE WAR HE whole problem of race relationships has been greatly affected by the World War. During the few years of the great Euro¬ pean struggle the status of the Negro was com¬ pletely changed. The scarcity of labor afforded steady work at relatively high wages to all, but especially to manual laborers. Government propaganda helped to give these people a new sense of their value. Negro soldiers received the same pay and wore the same uniform as other soldiers. The Negro thus gained new standards of living and a new vision. NEGRO AND WHITE POPULATION AT EACH CENSUS: 1790-1910 MILLIONS NEGRO POPULATION ITE POPULATION Inter church World Movement of North America G.DI27A. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 69 Economic Life I N 1910 seventy-one out of every hundred Negroes (of ten years of age and over) were gainfully employed. In the south the proportion was about 87 per cent, and for the total white population, ten years of age and over, it was 51 per cent. More than half of these Negroes were engaged in agriculture and nearly half of those in agriculture were farm laborers. In 1910 out of 893,870 Negro farm laborers one-fourth of them were owners or part owners of farms. In a single decade the number of Negro farm owners increased about seventeen per cent. In the south three out of four Negro farm laborers were tenants. There is a gradual movement of Negro laborers from the unskilled to the semi-skilled and skilled occupations. In a single decade, 1900 to 1910, the number of factory workers increased 173 per cent; textile workers 283 per cent. An incomplete investigation by the Department of Labor covering 244 plants in 8 typical industries where Negroes were largely employed showed that they com¬ pared fairly well with other workers as to absenteeism during working hours, labor turnover, and quantity and quality of work done. There are special problems connected with the adjustment of colored women in industry and probably in domestic and personal service. The demands for Negro labor in the north during the World War accelerated tre¬ mendously the movement of Negroes from the south. The number has been variously estimated from 300,000 to more than 500,000. The resulting race friction and diffi¬ culties of racial cooperation imperatively call for the mediating influence of the church. Recent race riots challenge all Americans to maintain good-will, law and order. Welfare agencies, boards, women's clubs and associations have helped to secure training and industrial opportunities for Negroes in towns and cities. In many cities some of the churches, the Y. M. C. A., the Y. W. C. A., and affiliated organizations have blazed the paths showing how religious agencies may bring the principles and ideals of Jesus to bear upon the modern industrial problems confronting Negro workers in towns and cities. Churches in rural districts, notably in Virginia and Mississippi, have cooperated to improve farm conditions. 70 CONSTRUCTIVE FORCES: GOVERNMENT AGENCIES XECUTIVE departments of the federal government, especially the Department of Agriculture through its farm demonstration agents, and the Department of Labor through its Negro economics division, have done con¬ structive work for improving the efficiency and conditions of Negroes who labor in agriculture and industry. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM USTICE is the only sure basis of racial cooperation. As exponents of righteousness, Christian people have the opportunity to demonstrate to the world, by example that (1): fundamental conflicts of interest between races can be settled upon the basis of common-sense and brotherly spirit rather than upon the basis of brutal force; (2) facilities for education and training of Negro wage-earners, especially in the shop and in spare hours must be provided; (3) councils of representative citizens should be organized by the churches of the community, Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS white and colored, for the purpose of inter¬ racial discussion of the problems of white workers, Negro workers and employers; (4) employment bureaus, through which the worker may find suitable employment, may be es¬ tablished by the Negro churches; (5) coopera¬ tive buying through the Negro church might be encouraged and developed; (6) in the rural districts the churches might be a medium for landlord and tenant to come together to settle their interests on a Christian basis; (7) exten¬ sion classes should be formed to fit the Negro worker already employed for greater efficiency in his work in occupations now open and in preparation for advanced positions in the future; (8) trained community workers are needed in every town and city church to visit the places of work and the homes of Negro women who are now going through their first experiences in modern industry; (9) training in domestic science should be provided for migrant Negro women who seek employment in domestic service; (10) a thrift organization and propa¬ ganda is needed in every church to help Negroes conserve their surplus earnings for the inevitable rainy day. mmmmmm mm mzz. mmmz. vMwrn mm. mmrnfy. •mz. .f-. •" z mm V/////M wwA \y////////mm%M mmmmmm. DECENNIAL PERCENTAGE INCREASE OF THE NEGRO AND OF THE WHITE POPULATION: 1790-1910 PER CENT. 16 20 1900-1910 1890-1900 1880-1890 1870-1880 1860-1870 1860-1860 1840-1850 1830-1840 1820-1830 1810-1820 1800-1810 1790-1800 f IWHITE NEGRO Interchurch World Movement of North America S. D 127B. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 71 Housing Conditions I N NORTHERN cities—Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, New York and more than a score of others,large and small—the recent Negro migration has created acute housing conditions. Where Negroes have moved into houses which whites have vacated they usually pay higher and often excessive rents. To pay these rents the houses are crowded with lodgers, bringing physical and moral ills to the family and all concerned. In many southern cities colored people who do not own their homes are housed either in “gun-barrel” frame shanties and cottages or in tenement “arks” of a pigeon house type, with little or no sanitary facilities. Regulation about such matters as garbage collection are often inadequate, and unpaved, undrained, unpoliced streets are often the rule even in the best Negro neighborhoods. Housing conditions affect health. It has been estimated that 450,000 Negroes in the south are continuously sick, costing them $75,000,000 annually and entailing a loss in earnings of $45,000,000. It is further estimated that 600,000 Negroes will die of tuberculosis, of whom at least 150,000 could be saved by preventive measures. (Texas; PER CENT OF ILLITERATES IN THE NEGRO POPULATION: 10 YEARS OF AGE AND OVER, Less than 1 per cent ES3 "o 3 per cent ^ 3*o 5 per cent 5 to 10 per cent 10 to 15 per cent 15 to 25 per cent 25 per cent and over The heavy lines{«aa)show geographic divisions Interchurch WbrkJ Movement oT North America G a 2/9 72 FIGHT FOR DECENCY N BOTH northern and southern cities the “red light” districts, both white and colored, often touch upon or are located within the segregated Negro neighborhoods. Without adequate police provision and with frequent political connivance, respectable homes of black folk often wage battles almost single-handed and alone for protection against these dangers. The saloon has been driven from these neigh¬ borhoods, but “buffet flats”—a sort of high- class combination of gambling parlor, “blind tiger” and house of assignation—yet flourish in many cities. RURAL CABINS M ANY Negro farm-owners still live in one- room cabins. Often those who possess the means do not realize the advantages of living in good, well-built houses. The Negro plantation tenants and farm-hands must depend upon the landlord to emancipate them from the one-room cabin with the “lean- to” kitchen, without ventilation or privacy. CONSTRUCTIVE FORCES: MODEL TENEMENTS N SEVERAL northern cities—notably New York, Philadelphia and Cincinnati—model tenements have been constructed by philan¬ thropic citizens. Several large industrial cor¬ porations have built model houses and villages for Negro employees—notably in Birmingham, Ala., Maryville, Tenn., Baden, N. C., Middle- town, Ohio, and at other places. Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS HOUSING CAMPAIGNS ETTER housing campaigns have been pro¬ moted by Negro churches mainly in the rural districts of Virginia and Mississippi through joint organizations both local and state-wide. LEGISLATION EVERAL local and national agencies have done notable work investigating housing conditions and promoting legislation for better housing. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM A DJUSTMENTS of race relations involve Jty, the cooperative action of the northern whites, the southern whites and the Negroes themselves. The church might promote the building of model tenements in the cities; advocate that unsuitable dwellings be repaired or help make many houses already built suitable by repairing and remodeling; create a sentiment for better building laws and their enforcement; and lead the forces of law and order and morality to pro¬ tect respectable Negro neighborhoods from vicious elements—Negro and white. In the rural districts the churches might lead in cooperative efforts to bring the latest in¬ formation about home building to the Negro farm owner and part owner, and foster “clean¬ up” and “home beautiful” campaigns, covering such items as the whitewashing and the paint¬ ing of houses. White churches in rural districts might help greatly in this work. T HE NEGRO faces a dilemma when he migrates from his southern shack to a northern home. He pays an excessive rent, to raise which he must crowd his rooms with promiscuous lodgers, to the detriment of his health and the impairment of his morals. A northern migration holds peril for both the Negro and his white neighbors, but the odds are against the Negro, racial animosity and unfair political discrimination turning the scale against him. Only the Christian ideal of brotherhood can solve this problem for both races. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 73 Health Conditions H EALTH is the passport to race perpetuity; mortality points the finger toward health needs. Conservation of health increases both the individual and the social capacity for service in every form. In the registration area the total number of deaths in 1913 was 820,204 for whites, and 67,266 for Negroes. The death-rate per 1,000 of the population of this area was 13.7 for whites, 21.9 for Negroes. Certain preventable diseases—typhoid fever, pulmonary tuberculosis, pneumonia, Bright's disease, diarrhoea, organic heart disease and enteritis—show a decided excess of deaths among Negroes. State Number State Number State Number State Number Georgia. 952,161 914,130 100,630 52,990 California. 3,246 2,812 Nevada. 412 Mississippi.... Missouri. Massachusetts. South Dakota. 405 Alabama. 751,679 734,141 West Virginia.. Pennsylvania. . 48,793 37,586 Colorado. 2,094 1,359 Montana. 379 South Carolina. Washington. . . North Dakota. 311 North Carolina 581,868 553,029 512,878 511,185 383,744 322,582 220,083 155,025 133,020 Ohio. 29,170 24,333 23,511 20,024 17,834 16,705 11,895 5,187 4,959 Connecticut... 1,216 1,194 1,068 833 Vermont. 280 Louisiana. New Jersey.... Illinois. Wyoming. Oregon. 228 Virginia. Nebraska. Idaho. 225 Texas. New Mexico... N. Hampshire. Utah. 208 Arkansas. Kansas. Wisconsin. 759 185 Tennessee. Florida. New York. Indiana. Arizona. Minnesota. 699 566 United States.. 7,138,534 Kentucky. Maryland. Iowa. Michigan. Rhode Island.. Maine. 474 439 74 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS HOSPITALS AND PHYSICIANS N 1910 there were about 3,887 Negro physicians, surgeons and dentists and 2,433 trained nurses. There were less than ten fairly well equipped hospitals, two of which were outside the south; and about ninety other private hospitals having poor plants, inade¬ quate equipment and uncertain support. Negro physicians are usually excluded from pub¬ lic hospitals and one state medical board in recent years practically excludes them from that state. HEALTH EDUCATION DUCATIONAL propaganda on the causes and prevention of tuberculosis, typhoid, hook-worm, social diseases and other maladies have been promoted by private agencies and public authorities. Especially during the past five years the United States Public Health Service and the state, county and city boards of health have made efforts to educate Negroes along these lines. Annual “clean-up” campaigns have been con¬ ducted in city and country, north and south, by a number of cooperating organizations. HOMES FOR AGED AND CHILDREN HERE is no information available at the present time about the few orphans’ homes for Negro children and homes for Negro aged. The Interchurch World Movement survey is now locating and studying these institutions and their needs. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM 0 MEET these needs there should be provided in the next ten years 3,000 ad¬ ditional physicians and surgeons and 500 dentists; fifteen well-equipped hospitals and homes geographically distributed and health institutes in 25,000 Sunday schools, together with regular health campaigns in every church. The church might cooperate more fully with public hospitals, boards of health and physicians and with private health agencies. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 75 Recreation Situation T HERE are relatively few moving-picture theatres in Negro neighborhoods. A number of these use questionable pictures, often interspersed with vulgar vaudeville. Pool-rooms run for gain and without proper supervision are simply breeding places for gamblers. Here unwary youth with their natural craving for pleasure meet designing exploiters seeking victims. Dance halls in many cities, frequently conducted under commercial auspices, are places where all types of characters mingle. Often innocent youth plays without warning with tawdry vice and designing seducers. The need of meeting places for social intercourse and of places with equipment for indoor and outdoor games under' trained supervision is universal. The Negro’s love of music and singing has been largely left without organization and leadership—an unused power for religious and ethical culture. National holidays, picnics, bazaars and festivals have been undirected. ^PERCENTAGE NEGRO IN THE POPULATION,' fy - - BY STATES: 1910 L f ^ --- jj f f\~ / V f 1 v /r L ID AH o T~ Mont. UTAH Y/VtsS '/////. / /y// / ‘ N. DAK S- DAK. NEBR. i ^ p .. GEOGRAPHIC DIVISIONS | Less than 1 per cent. I 1 to 5 per cent. I 5 to 12 % per cent. | 12 \ to 25 per cent. I 25 to 37 ^ per cent | 37 '/i to 50 per cent 5^1 50 per cent and over church Wbr/d Movement of North America 76 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS COLOR OR RACE, NATIVITY AND PARENTAGE, BY STATES: 1910 PER CENT MAINE £ N. H. | VT. “ MASS. § r. i. CONN. 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 v ////r j m. I 77Ztf\ V///A 1 V///A m 77777, ZZ m mm&ysxy 7777c y//A m WA : ///a sss m my vM Wl LEE m /SA ui y N. Y. II N. J. s 5 PA. ^ OHIO | IND. S S ILL. | MICH. I WIS. MINN. ^ IOWA MO. SoN. DAK. *|S. DAK. 1 NEBR. KANS. DEL. MD. y D.C. | VA. 5 W. VA. 5 N. C. | S.C. GA. FLA. = KY. IgTENN. u> £ 5 5 ALA. 2 MISS. V///A 1 777/. 777, 7727\ 7777, ?ZZ 777. 7m , 7727' Tzmim 3 777/ 'm, 7777, 7///A E_1 WEST SOUTH CENTRAL *5 m, W/, m, m y//AA///^ ( m m Wa '///// m m V/A 7//a : ///a zz ZZ 777$ 'me im 'm. 'm 222 m 'm. Hi MONT. IDAHO. * WY0. 2 COLO. 1 N. MEX. * ARIZ. UTAH. NEV. y7Z\ 777 m V/S/SSS 1 V///\ m y//7 m T7~ ^688888888 ir/vy i 7m ym 7/7 m 7m 5355? m./ssj'/ i //// wz y//7 ZZ m 2721 m V/S/a zz •///A 777. 777 m 7777 , y/// m m/./ V//A 7m, 7m. 777/, 7777; //. w Am 77 //, 7//// 7//// 7m m //// zm ZZZl ZZZZL 727 ///// o WASH. G 0REG. 2 CAL. '///A '///A Y//A \ i:58 m 7ZZZM ym vm. \ 7777 , y777. \777, y777. \7t77. m w/s/ V////. Vm. V77. V7777. ATT, VSSSSS* V//A NATIVE WHITE-NATIVE PARENTAGE NATIVE WHITE-FOREIGN OR MIXED PARENTAGE FOREIGN BORN WHITE ■ NEGRO AND ALL OTHER Interchurch World Movement of North America 6 . 0.218 CONSTRUCTIVE FORCES T HE effort of the churches to meet the recreational needs of the Negro people has been very limited. One church in Massachu¬ setts, two in New York, one in Philadelphia and one in Louisville, Ky., are providing large facilities and leadership. Twelve cities have Young Men’s Christian Association buildings equipped for athletics and games. The Young Women’s Christian Association has eight buildings equipped with gymnasia; seventeen city associations have buildings equipped for leisure activities and eighteen additional recreation centers. During the World War several other national agencies opened and maintained recreation centers that demonstrated the great benefits which flow from proper supervision of recrea¬ tion. A few cities of the south have provided public playgrounds which Negro children may enjoy. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM E XPERIENCES of the World War in camps, towns and cities frequented by soldiers showed the power for good of recreational ac¬ tivities. Cooperative organizations of the churches in 179 cities for picnics, festivals, fairs, celebra¬ tions and bazaars will bear moral and spiritual fruitage. The organization of the musical genius of the Negro race will be a permanent service. Negro folk-songs and “spirituals” are the natural basis for such efforts. F ORMER Ambassador Bryce once said that the American Negro in the first thirty years of his liberation made a greater advance than was ever made by the Anglo-Saxon race in a similar period of years. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 77 Educational Conditions T HE inadequate provision for Negro education is well-known. In the south, where nearly all schools for Negroes are located, they receive only about eighteen per cent, of the total expenditure for education, although they constitute more than thirty per cent, of the population. In 1914, expenditures for Negro education from private funds were more than one-half of the total of all expenditures for Negro education. NEGRO POPULATION PERCENTAGE IN SCHOOL AND NOT IN SCHOOL OF THE NEGRO AND WHITE POPULATION 10 TO 14 YEARS OF AGE BY SECTIONS AND SOUTHERN STATES: 1910 PER CENT, NOT IN SCHOOL PER CENT. IN SCHOOL .(. I 4——- ..i:. I.,- . Imaryland * 1 t..t.,' /> r DIST. OF COLUMBIA 1 W. aEUBZZBBBXBUUtBZaKUA (VIRGIN IAl vmma [WEST VIRGIN I Aj gaiffla [NORTH CAROLINA' W//////////.V////////Y7/A- . !.. } . 'SOUTH CAROLINA* 'GEORGIA 1 /A,, ■ IFLORIDA [.V..- . iszapt: :.1.1. W///////JZ2, V////////M/M i Her church Hbr/d Movement.of North America GD.I3I. UNI TED STATES j.j.- I I T GRAND DIVISIONS THE SOUTH ■rrrrrrrrritrAr7-ss//r? THE NORTH I ' Him ..... -- THE WESTip ■SZ/S777y7yr7/77///. SOUTH ATLANTIC DIVISION | EAST SOUTH CENTRAL DIVISION TENNESSEE*" ALABAMA" MISSISSIPPI WEST SOUTH CENTRAL DIVISION LOUISIANA-ffW^ HOMA TEXAS? NEGRO white^^M 78 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS Large numbers of children and youth between the ages of six and twenty years are not in school. Buildings, equipment and the pay for teachers in elementary schools are sorely inadequate. This diagram also shows the proportion (in 1910) of white and Negro children from ten to fourteen years of age in school and not in school. Secondary education to meet the need for teachers in the elementary schools as well as secondary and higher training for those youths who should go into other professions are essential for Negro progress of all kinds. Probably one-half or more of about 30,000 Negro school teachers and professors are unprepared for their task. They need preparation through work in normal school, college and university. There is need for county teacher-training schools of secondary school grade in at least 800 of the counties in sixteen southern states having one- eighth or more Negro population. These schools should also provide adequate academic and agricultural courses of high school grade to meet country-life needs. The mission boards of denominations whose membership is white or largely white are now providing about four-fifths of the support for the higher and secondary institutions for Negro youth and the colored denominations about one-fifth. The pay of Negro teachers in both denominational and independent higher and secondary schools is more inadequate than that in the white schools. CONSTRUCTIVE FORCES: HIGHER INSTITUTIONS HE most liberal enumeration of higher institutions shows that for over ten million Negro Americans there is not more than one institution which has the equipment, endow¬ ment, students and teaching force required by the recent standard “efficient” college program adopted by the Association of American Col¬ leges. Lack of these higher institutions for Negro youth makes their opportunities for thorough college education very inadequate. Not more than thirty-six of the institutions can be reck¬ oned either A1 in the second grade of standard colleges; or A2 as institutions doing both col¬ lege and secondary work; or A3 as institutions offering some college subject. Only two insti¬ tutions offer full curricula in medicine, dentis¬ try and pharmacy, and only one has a full course law department. Probably less than two per cent, of all the colored pupils of the United States are enrolled in college and professional schools. Estimated total valuation of the property of all the private secondary and higher institutions for Negroes is less than thirty million dollars, with a total annual income of a little more than three million dollars. PERCENTAGE URBAN AND RURAL IN THE NEGRO POPULATION, BY SECTIONS: 1910, 1900 AND 1890 90 RURAL 60 30 PER CENT. 0 URBAN 30 60 90 1 I- 1 - UNITED STATES MMA Y////AY////, wa’V/My/TZn VMM VMM 7777/7 V77777 7/709007///;. 777777M7777moo77777^ THE SOUTH V/, '////s/A V77777/ 7777777, "-’ 7 ,1910 ' 7777 /. 77 m V/m 20 //// ; 'S///WKW//& J V777, '//////. ’7/7777 W7777. /////, \6bo7/77 THE NORTH . V//y ’////, W///M - '/////// '/////A 2 wm w/m VMM ■W/M, •/m 777/ V/////7 7777777 777777 3 THE WEST m '"/Vmo'W/A 777777? 777777/ V77777 7777/7) 2 r ........ ■m mwm m htercfiurtti tort] Movement of Nor/n America _ 6.QI30 HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 79 It is estimated that the higher and secondary institutions for whites in 1914 had endowment or productive funds (excluding manual training and industrial schools) of $413,943,427. The endowment or productive funds of Negro institutions (including normal and industrial schools in 1915) was estimated at $7,850,000. The white population is about ten times as large as the Negro population but has produc¬ tive educational funds nearly fifty-three times as large. Existing institutions for the training of teachers are sorely inadequate to meet the demands of over ten million Negro Americans who in 1910 had 29,727 teachers and professors. Only five states and three cities provide normal training schools for Negro teachers. SECONDARY SCHOOLS HERE are at present only 108 county training-schools for the 818 counties where Negroes made up one-eighth or more of the total population in 1910. Only a few of these are more than graded elementary schools. There are probably not more than seventy pub¬ lic high schools for Negroes in the towns and cities of the sixteen southern states. Only about forty-five of these offer four-year courses. The others range from three-year courses downward. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM HREE great policies confront those who seek to strengthen and develop strategic institutions for higher education adequate to meet the need of the Negro: (1) To adjust and increase existing educational facilities for more than ten million Negro Americans; (2) To im¬ prove the administrative direction and the quality of the teaching of these institutions so as to put them on a par with the nation’s best educational standards; (3) To bring higher in¬ stitutions into close cooperation with the ele¬ mentary and secondary schools supported by public funds so as to stimulate the extension Limit of Cotton Production Selected Plantation Area SELECTED PLANTATION AREA, BOUNDARIES OF COTTON BEL T, AND COUNTIES HAVING 50 PER CENT OR MORE OF NEGRO POPULATION: 1910 Counties in which Negroes form more than 50 per cent of the Population : 1910 Inter church Ubrtd Movement oT North America aa 220 80 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS and improvement of these public schools through which alone all the people may receive instruction. The 179 cities which had 2,500 or more Negroes in 1910, each need a well equipped high school with adequate academic, industrial and voca¬ tional courses. Summer schools and training institutes to further prepare teachers of sec¬ ondary and elementary schools are sorely needed. SECONDARY SCHOOLS HE chief needs are: (1) To provide ele¬ mentary school teachers; (2) educational facilities for those unable to attend college; (3) preparatory training for those going to uni¬ versities or higher institutions of learning. This requires now at least 300 high-grade four- year high or secondary schools with adequate academic and vocational courses. These can be developed from the substantial and important secondary schools which now exist under denominational boards or inde¬ pendent boards of trustees. At least 200 of these should be located in rural sections and provide academic and agricultural courses to the future leaders of these country communities. The building of this secondary school system must be related to the existing elementary schools in the south and to the public school authorities who control these elementary schools and who should as rapidly as possible assume adequate support and control of secondary schools. HIGHER INSTITUTIONS OR the professional leadership of more than 10,000,000 Negroes there should be pro¬ vided real university and college facilities. This is essential in order to prepare teachers for col¬ leges, secondary and vocational schools; doc¬ tors, ministers, lawyers, and other professional workers. In 1910 there were about 29,727 Negro teachers, 34,962 Negro ministers, 3,409 physicians and surgeons, 478 dentists and 7,056 others in pro¬ fessional occupations. Northern white universities will furnish some of these leaders but the immediate future calls for university facilities with medical, dental and religious departments for 8,000 students within the reach of the bulk of the Negro population in the south to furnish about 450 college teach¬ ers, about 350 medical men and about 1,200 ministers a year. Junior and senior colleges should be provided to train teachers and supervisory officers for secondary schools and to provide preliminary training for doctors, ministers and the like. The necessary facilities for training 800 such leaders per year for the next two years; 1,200 yearly during the following three years; and 4,000 to 5,000 each succeeding year are im¬ peratively needed as a conservative minimum in order to increase the supply of 60,000 pro¬ fessional people now at work and to replace poorly prepared leadership with one equipped for its difficult task. To train these leaders there are needed approxi¬ mately: (1) Three institutions of university grade with well equipped medical, religious and graduate schools; (2) ten institutions of standard college grade; (3) twenty institutions of junior college grade. The questions of content of curricula, the quali¬ fications of teachers and the life of the institu¬ tion are not within the province of this survey. The selection and location of institutions for the development of these different grades of colleges must be determined by agreement among those charged with the administration of the schools and funds. HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 81 Religious Life T HE type of building and equipment of the average Negro country church usually consists of an unpainted frame structure with rough benches, a platform and pulpit for the preacher. Preaching services are held about once or twice a month. The Sunday school in the rural Negro church usually is a summertime activity in no way adequate in program, methods, supervision or leadership for the religious education of the people. The minister is usually non-resident, often living and working at some other occupa¬ tion in a nearby city. He usually comes to the community on Saturday night or Sunday morning and leaves at the close of his Sunday labors. He is generally not equipped with adequate knowledge of the Bible, of church history, and of the duties and requirements of pastor or priest. His activity is usually confined to preaching with homely, natural eloquence and emotional fervor. Here and there men of character and training have gone into rural work as resident ministers. The effect of their work has demonstrated the need of home mission work for the Negro rural community. The financial resources of the Negro country church cannot now support a resident minister of this type. Here is a call for home mission boards to send such men to these neglected people. Trained Negro leaders are needed as business managers. The financial matters connected with a large growing church require technical knowledge and should not devolve upon the overtaxed minister. Well educated ministers trained in psychological and sociological studies, in addition to a knowledge of the Scriptures and of religion, are needed. Negro newcomers to cities require the best trained minds to guide them in ethics and religion. The people love their churches and are enthusiastic and responsive; but the churches need a complete program in order best to serve the people. The Negro has demonstrated his ability, under experienced and trusted leadership, to develop into a useful and productive citizen. But he needs the support of religion as much as, if not more, than his successful white neighbor, to steady him in the day of prosperity. 82 Negro Americans : HOME MISSIONS CONSTRUCTIVE FORCES: THE CHURCHES There are two general groupings of Negro churches: (1) The distinctly Negro denomina¬ tions, those consisting exclusively of Negro church and members; (2) Negro churches in denominations having both white and Negro members. In 1906, according to the United States Census, Negro churches had 35,160 church edifices and 4,779 parsonages. The total valuation was estimated at $60,364,043 with an indebtedness of $5,005,905. The distinctly Negro denominations held 86.8 per cent, of the Negro communicants in 1890 and 87 per cent, in 1906. THE MINISTRY N DISTINCTLY Negro denominations there were 31,624 ministers according to the 1906 Census and 34,962 in 1918 according to the Year Book of the Churches. Ministers were not reported separately for denominations hav¬ ing both white and Negro members. Due allowance should be made in the above figures because of inaccurate returns. THE CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS HE Young Men’s Christian Association has forty-five city associations of colored men; 10 of them in southern and border cities; 15 additional industrial associations connected with industrial plants; 7 international secre¬ taries; 100 local secretaries; 20,000 members and twelve standard-type buildings costing nearly $2,000,000. The Young Women’s Christian Association has forty-nine Associations and four affiliated clubs of colored women; twelve national workers and eighty-five local workers, and a membership of 23,683. PROPOSED POLICIES AND PROGRAM AMICABLE adjustment of race relations XV on the basis of justice, peace and good¬ will is an acid test for the Christian church. To this end the church must offer a full meas- PERCENT OF ALL LAND IN FARMS OF COLORED FARMERS ^OPERATED BY COLORED OWNERS, BY STATES: 1910; SOUTHERN STATES ONLY [ V^ 20 to 30 per cent ] 30 to 40 per cent The heavy fines g40 to 50 per cent _y 50 to 60 per cent 60 to 70 per cent W 70 per cent and over ■) show geographic divisions mierchurch Htrti Movement or North America GO 22/ HOME MISSIONS: Negro Americans 83 ure of practical service inspired by the principles and ideals of Jesus Christ. RELIGIOUS WORSHIP HE highest expression of both individual and group-life of Negroes is through their churches/’ Their churches are their very life-blood and through them Negroes have found their truest outlet for self expression. Whatever will help develop their churches and church life will help toward racial self-realiza¬ tion. There should be provided an adequate number of new church buildings in congested city centers equipped for worship, for religious in¬ struction, and for community service in city and country; remodeled and improved church buildings in city and country; model parsonages as demonstrations of what homes should be; continuous study of the parish and all its needs; and a community program with trained workers and supervision. PERCENTAGE URBAN AND RURAL IN THE NEGRO AND WHITE POPULATION , BY SECTIONS: 1910 Interchurch World Movement of North America __ G.DI29 RELIGIOUS EDUCATION HE imperative demand for educated minis¬ ters and other educated leaders requires twelve schools of religion strategically located in connection with the universities and colleges planned above (see educational program). In addition there are needed: (1) Ten Bible schools with practical courses in the English Bible built upon a high school education or its equiva¬ lent; (2) forty summer institutes strategically distributed throughout the United States on a cooperative denominational basis and furnish¬ ing to men now in the ministry instruction in the English Bible, practical psychological, sociological and economic subjects; (3) eighty rural conferences of three to six days’ duration at suitable seasons throughout the sixteen southern states having Negro populations; (4) similar conferences in every important city center; (5) a system of graded Sunday schools with state, district and county supervision and teacher training courses in secondary and higher institutions and in churches. DENOMINATIONS CONSISTING EXCLUSIVELY OF NEGROES Denominations U. S. Census 1906 Year Book of Churches 1918 Baptist bodies. 2,311,172 2,967,085 Methodist bodies.. . 869,710 1,117,327 Other bodies. 24,165 28,023 Total. 3,205,047 4,112,135 NEGRO MEMBERS OF DENOM¬ INATIONS HAVING WHITE AND NEGRO MEMBERS Denominations U. S. Census 1906 Year Book of Churches 1918 Baptist bodies. 43,617 Methodist bodies.. .. 312,421 Not reported Presbyterian bodies. 29,040 separately in Congregational. 11,960 Year Book of Protestant Episcopal 19,098 Churches Other bodies. 23,409 Total. 439,545 n . 1 MIGRANT GROUPS MIGRANT GROUPS M UCH of the world’s work is casual. Fully 1,500,000 men in this country are seasonal workers, traveling from place to place. The United States Census Report for 1910 showed that in the preceding year 170,000 more persons were employed in the manufacturing industries of New York state in January than in October. Such fluctuations in the demand for labor are not confined to one industry or one season. Occasionally, as in the winter of 1914-15, they became so great as to demoralize the entire labor market. But this situation is always much more aggravated in industries which are seasonal in character. This army of men constantly on the move is necessary to save our industries from disaster. It is an army composed of men of mixed origin. A good many are sons of unsuccessful farmers, or tenants who have failed to make good; others come from the city—this is especially true of the immigrants. Others are skilled mechanics who have degenerated through incompetency or vice. A study of a limited number of these migrants indicates that perhaps 25 per cent, are subnormal or mentally defective. Of 40,000 seasonal workers studied in Cali¬ fornia, about 90 per cent, proved to be unskilled and only 10 per cent, were married. Normal family life for men of this sort is absolutely impossible. The migrant follows definite paths across the country. The cycle in the middle west begins when the first recruits to the northern Texas harvest come from the southern oil and lumber camps and more especially from the southern farms, where a lack of midsummer staple crops permits an incursion into these harvest fields before fall work sets in. This migrant stream slowly moves northward, reinforced continually by “labor vacationists”—factory operatives—who come to work in these harvest fields as a rich man goes on a “loafing vacation.” Finally, when the wheat harvest of Kansas is ripe this entire army, reinforced by every available recruit, attacks one of the country’s biggest jobs, gathering one-fourth of the wheat harvest of the nation. N ATURE’S prodigality is necessarily seasonal. To harvest her diversi¬ fied and scattered bounty requires an army of 1,500,000 migrant workers. This army is unorganized, unskilled, uncared for, and is at the mercy of the radical and the exploiter. But the army itself presents a moral problem of the first magnitude which the church must help to solve. 88 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS SURVEY On the Migrant Worker’s Trail W HEAT production is a great staple industry in the United States, north of Texas, Tennessee and North Carolina and in the Pacific Coast states. Over most of this area it is raised on rather small fields and as a single feature of a diversified system of agriculture. The grain belt, on the other hand, where nearly three-fifths of the total supply is produced, is a great empire stretching from northern Texas to Canada. Here wheat is the chief product. Over much of this area it tends to exclude all other money crops. This is graphically indicated on the accompanying map and by the table of wheat acreages for 1918, appearing on this page. WINTER WHEAT REGION SEASONAL DISTRIBUTION OF TOTAL LABOR ON AN 800 ACRE WHEAT AND SUMMER FALLOW FARM WALLA WALLA, WASHINGTON SPRING WHEAT REGION SEASONAL DISTRIBUTION OF TOTAL LABOR ON A 600 ACRE GRAIN FARM NORTH DAKOTA /nterchurch Wor/c/ Movement of A/oriP dmer/ca 10 20 10 20 10 20 10 to 10 20 10 20 K) 20 10 20 10 20 FEB MAR APR MAY JUNE JULY AUG SEPT OCT GO 46 After the wheat harvest the demand for migratory workers is greatly lessened. A small number of the workers stay for the threshing in areas where the crops have been harvested. Those who follow through the harvesting operations as they move northward have to compete with new labor forces from the farms of the Northwest and Northeast and from the lumber-jacks and mine workers of northern Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan. Some of the more persistent migrant workers follow the harvesting operations far into Canada. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 89 SUMMARY OF HARVESTING CONDITIONS HE outstanding economic facts and con¬ siderations about harvesters are that there are a great number and that there is a great WHEAT ACREAGES FOR 1918 State Acreage Missouri. . . . . 3,092,000 Minnesota. . .. . 3,799,000 Texas. . . . . 892,000 Oklahoma. . . . . 2,611,000 Kansas. . . . . 7,248,000 Nebraska. . . . . 3,828,000 South Dakota. ... 3,765,000 North Dakota. . . . . 7,770,000 Total. . . . .33,005,000 range of local fluctuations in wages. This is due to the fluctuations in the supply of men. The prevalent labor agreement is full of uncer¬ tainties and opportunities for misunderstand¬ ing. Harvest work is sharply competitive. After a very short season of maximum demand it is extremely perplexing for workers to judge how long to follow it and where and when to go. It is in the nature of harvest work that there should be much time lost from weather con¬ ditions, from waits between jobs and from time consumed in traveling. MINING AND CONSTRUCTION CAMPS AS THE harvesters demobilize, one stream X"\.of men turns southwestward and seeks employment in mining and railroad construc¬ tion or in agricultural work in the sugar-beet fields and fruit areas, even going as far as the Pacific Coast. A larger number work their way south, turning to mining and lumbering or continuing agri¬ cultural work as corn pickers. Thus they move on from one field of labor to another—a restless, roving, group of workers. FRUIT INDUSTRY IN THE EAST HE Atlantic Coast states have a smaller agricultural migration. The work in this region is almost entirely fruit-picking and truck¬ farming. There is an annual movement be¬ tween the Bahama Islands and Florida, and a regular influx of mountaineers into the fruit harvest belt of the Blue Ridge Mountains; also THE “BIG” GRAIN BELT THE GRAIN BELT STATES WHEAT AV. REQUIREMENT OF WHEAT AV. REQUIREMENT OF ACREAGE 1918 MIG HARVESTERS ACREAGE 1918 MIG. HARVESTERS TEXAS 892.000 5.000 NEBRASKA 3.828.000 10-15.000 OKLAHOMA 2.61 1.000 15.000 SO. DAKOTA 3.765.000 15-20.000 KANSAS 7.748.000 60-80.000 NO. DAKOTA 7.770.000 25-30.000 MISSOURI 0092.000 - MINNESOTA 3.990.000 - ._ WHEAT ACREAGE 1909 *5.000 ACRES •50000 ACRES __ an appreciable but diminishing annual move¬ ment of Virginian Negroes into the farms of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and the truck-farms of Long Island and Connecticut where they contribute their labor to the big task of feed¬ ing our cities’ thousands. The most important of the seasonal migrants on the Atlantic Coast are those from large cities, particularly Baltimore and Philadelphia, to the berry and fruit and cannery centers of Dela¬ ware, Maryland and New Jersey. Here the succession of crops affords intermittent work over a period of four months. 90 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS A small number of skilled fruit packers start work in Florida and move northward with the crop to New Jersey. The main migratory movement in the East, however, takes place as a series of migrations within states which have a common type of agriculture. The New Jersey and Hudson Valley orchards, the cannery and truck crops of Central New York, the fruit areas bordering on Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, all use a large number of seasonal migrants. In the movement of these peoples, the existence of labor camps and the employment of women and children together with men, present dis¬ tinct problems which are quite different from those of the wheat harvest fields of the Middle West. PACIFIC COAST RACIAL PROBLEMS N CALIFORNIA the agricultural situation concerns a group of highly specialized local industries requiring an enormous amount of hand labor. The situation has been acute and the problem has been especially complicated by the influx of Orientals on the Pacific Coast. Racial animosities are keen. Both white and yellow men are employed in these occupations and very serious situations have arisen which are in some cases international in their signifi¬ cance. SHEEP-SHEARERS OF THE ROCKIES T HE Rocky Mountain region shows perhaps the most romantic example of seasonal labor in the small number of highly expert sheep shearers who follow their calling up and down the backbone of two continents. By adding South America to their territory they can find almost continuous work covering the entire year. These men, show the international nature of these migrations. Special cooperation during the war allowed seasonal workers to be interchanged between the United States, Mexico and Canada by a modification of immigration regulations. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 91 “HOMELESS, VOTELESS, JOBLESS” HE largest single group of migrant workers is found in the logging camp regions of America. These men are not generally looked upon as migrants, but from a broad point of view they must be considered in this class. As the President’s Mediation Commission puts it: Partly the rough pioneer character of the indus¬ try, but largely the failure to create a healthy social environment, has resulted in the migratory, drifting character of workers. Ninety per cent, of those in the camps are described by one of the wisest students of the problem, not too inaccurately, as “homeless, voteless and jobless.” The fact is that about 90 per cent, of them are unmarried. Their work is most intermittent, the annual labor turnover reaching the extraordinary figure of over 600 per cent. There has been a failure to make communities of these camps. It is not to be wondered, then, that in too many of these workers the instinct of workmanship is impaired. They are, or rather, have been made, disintegrating forces in society. LOCATION OF LUMBER CAMPS L UMBER operations are conducted in every j state in the union. There are five areas, however, where the lumbering industry is of prime importance: the Great Lakes region, the New England states, especially Maine, the Gulf region, the Appalachian Mountains and the Pacific Northwest. From the point of view of the church the Pacific Northwest is by far the most important district. In other regions the lumber industry is noticeably on the decline. Thus it is esti¬ mated that in the South 85 per cent, of the standing timber will be cut within eight years. In the seven states of Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico and Arizona there are more than six hundred in¬ corporated logging companies. Some compa¬ nies have ten “sides” or camps; some only one. The number of men in a camp varies from fifty to one thousand. But averaging three sides to each company and sixty men to a side, it is conservatively estimated that there are 109,000 men engaged in the logging industry in the Pacific Northwest alone. This does not take into consideration 1,700 odd mills and innumerable shingle mills located in the same region which employ over 120,000 men. BILLIONS OF BOARD FEET 1 [ Less than Vz E>>>vl Vz and over 1 » » 3 V/z » » 2 »> w 4 tt » ass fnferchurch World Movement of North America 92 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS LOGGERS HE logging camps furnish a highly special¬ ized problem. While related to more normal communities in the larger mill centers and in the growing agricultural areas which follow the cutting of the forests, the logging camps are isolated communities, consisting largely of men hidden away in the edge of the forests and moving forward into them at the rate of about three miles a year. The big mill centers present a different and distinct problem. These camps afford a specialized problem also from the fact that they are centers of an extremely radical social sentiment and propa¬ ganda. Loggers are almost solidly radical and overwhelmingly I. W. W. in convictions. The men are indoctrinated with the ideas of the “revolution.” They look upon the ministers as parasites and call them “swamp angels.” They hold that the churches are capitalistic and that there will be no church in the “revo¬ lution.” They are uncompromising in their hostility to the present ownership and operation of the lumber industry. WHY RADICALISM GROWS IN THE WOODS HE present radical strife in the lumber industry has its roots far back. It is partly a matter of an uncompromising hostility which nothing but taking over the industry will satisfy. It is as savage in its attack on craft unionism and the American Federation of Labor as upon the companies and capitalistic management. But it could never have gained such influence except for grave abuses. Before the war the relations between the men and the companies were acutely strained. The companies were ruling turbulent men with an iron hand. The industry was on a ten-hour basis, too long a stretch of work in the woods. The bunk houses were often unfit for human habitation. Wages were unsatisfactory and there was too much black-listing and locking out in addition to seasons of unemployment. The men were not allowed the slightest right to organize. The policy of the companies was to employ unmarried men and to encourage a migratory body of labor. Unfortunate abuses by employment agencies aggravated the situa¬ tion before the state took the agencies over. The worst of these abuses have now been cor¬ rected, and except for the ban on organization there is little about which labor has to complain. The men are led to believe by I. W. W. propa¬ ganda that grave wrongs are connected with the holding of big areas of forest land. They resent the fact that land which costs below $10 an acre is cut off from settlement and then held for settlers at $30 an acre. They have grown so bitter that it is impossible for them to be just. Their experience with the courts, law¬ makers and police authorities often tends to make them lose confidence in orderly procedure and to turn to syndicalism and sabotage. CANNERY WORKERS N THE fruit-and-vegetable cannery in¬ dustry the problem is more one of concen¬ tration than of geographical distribution. In the eastern states the chief crops involved are beans, peas, corn, tomatoes, cantaloupes, water¬ melons, apples, peaches, grapes, strawberries and bush fruits. These crops are raised very widely throughout the country but their chief concentration occurs along either side of Chesapeake Bay, the southern two-thirds of Delaware, the southern half of New Jersey, three or four counties in the Hudson River Valley and the New York counties bordering on Lakes Erie and Ontario. It is very difficult to estimate the number of migrant workers required in this field. Careful inquiries from growers and agricultural agents in typical counties, together with the estimates ventured by the colleges and the Department of Labor warrant a series of guesses as follows: New York.. 14,000 New Jersey. 3,500 Maryland. 3,600 Delaware. 2,350 This means that a total of more than 22,000 migrants are required to harvest the fruit and cannery crops of the eastern states. These estimates are for years of average crop yield but there are great fluctuations in the demand from year to year. In 1919, for example, the short tomato crop in Maryland and the small apple crop in New York greatly reduced the average demand for imported transient labor. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 93 CONGESTION AND BAD SANITATION HE characteristic problem which the work¬ ing conditions of the cannery group adds to the problems of work and pay found in the harvesting group is the very acute problem of housing, sanitation and morals. The housing of agricultural labor under any circumstances TOTAL VEGETABLES (EXCEPT POTATOES. SWEET POTATOES . AND YAMS 1909) ACREAGE EACH DOT REPRESENTS 500 ACRES tnterchdrch World Movement of North America and the moral effect of its working conditions upon itself and upon the farm families and com¬ munities with which it is in contact are very urgent problems. When the ordinary hired man goes to the average farm, singly or in groups of two or three, he simply shares the fortunes of the farmer’s own family. When the number of workers is too large to share the farmer’s home, the labor camp comes into existence. When the laborer cannot share the fortunes of the farmer’s family, the owner of the farm must devise some form of temporary housing to care for these migrants. In New York state alone about five hundred fruit and vegetable pickers’ camps are required, in an average year, to house the seasonal laborers. TYPES OF HOUSES IN FIELDS T HE majority of fruit pickers’ camps are simply existing outbuildings temporarily devoted to human habitation. Conditions in such quarters vary greatly. A large fruit grower frequently has a well-built bunk house near his residence, the second story of which will house two or three men per room, the first floor being used for a dining room and kitchen. Where immigrant family labor is used, one may find a long two-story tenement in the midst of an orchard housing an indeter¬ minate number of families; there is no logical separation of living quarters; no provision for individual privacy or domestic economy. An¬ other frequent type is the long one-story bunk- house, a shack in which every room opens directly out-of-doors. At worst a number of families may be housed in a barn loft without any partitions whatever dividing family sleep¬ ing quarters. Men, women and children, young people and adults, the married and the unmarried alike are compelled to live in this promiscuous manner. EFFECT OF THE WAR ON MIGRANT LABOR A LL studies based upon migratory labor as JL\. it existed before the war are now entirely unsatisfactory and are so accounted by the most competent authorities. The last three or four years have marked the elevation of the entire migratory class and the practical elimina¬ tion of the hobo. This is realized by all who stand near to the problem but it is none the less a stupendous surprise to them. What had seemed permanent and inevitable has proved to be quite subject to change with changed conditions. Investigation proves that something very radical has happened in all of the chief haunts of the migratory worker. In Kansas City, Sioux City, Chicago and Minneapolis the same story is heard: the migratory worker does not do the things he used to do, does not live as he used to live, does not make the same demands upon agencies which tried to help him. 94 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS What has happened is symbolized by the pass¬ ing of the “Bowery Bread Line” in New York City. In the well equipped “Helping Hand” building in Kansas City, most of the dormitories which used to be crowded with homeless men are now closed; many of the cheap lodging houses formerly inhabited by wandering men are abandoned. In the Salvation Army Industrial Homes, in city after city, will be found only a relatively few old and physically decrepit men. The de¬ mand for free meals and lodging for the migrant class has practically ceased. A typical state¬ ment of the case from a local standpoint is found in the 1918 report of the Lincoln Welfare Society: “In Lincoln, the non-resident single men applying for aid to the society in 1915 were 1,756; in 1917, 437; and in 1918, 136.” This cannot mean that there has been any reduction in the demand for seasonal labor; but the jobs have been so numerous and close to¬ gether that the whole begging and stealing element in the migratory class has disappeared together with many of the institutions and activities which its presence necessitated. BETTER ECONOMIC CONDITIONS HIS situation seems to reveal the funda¬ mentally economic character of the prob¬ lem. First of all, four or five years of steady work at good wages has elevated the migrant class. Coincident with this has come the development of social agencies and reforms, such as the employment service, housing and sanitary improvements and prohibition. Social pressure upward and the demand to “work or fight” both had an important influence. It is an open question, however, whether the most potent factor of all has not been the new motive for better living which has been fur¬ nished to the migrant. He has doubted, and often with reason, whether society had any decent place for him or any serious demand for his services. During the war he learned that every man was greatly needed. Even the ' peremptory “work or fight” order made him realize that he really counted in the world. Unquestionably the migrant has shown a full measure of the spirit of patriotism. The breast of many a harvest hand was spangled with Liberty Loan and Red Cross buttons and many went into the harvest work with a definite consciousness that they were serving the coun¬ try in a time of need. This has given the migrant not only a new individual motive but has put a new motive into the class as such, and a new capacity—call it class loyalty. It seems probable that the American migrant has dis¬ covered a new capacity for social organization. For many years the American Federation of Labor has attempted with very small success to ally transient workers with organized labor. There was no cohesion in the group; its or¬ ganization fell apart' like grains of sand. The “Hotels de Gink” which were organized and managed by migrants in New York City, Seattle and elsewhere during the winter of 1914 were interesting and showed a certain limited capacity for practical organization. In Seattle one migratory group took contracts for clearing land and employed its own mem¬ bers in order to tide them over the period of unemployment. THE I. W. W. T IS in the International Workers of the World, however, that migrants and un¬ skilled laborers have shown the greatest ability, persistence and capacity for organization which this class has ever developed in America. In spite of the fact that the social doctrines pro¬ fessed by this movement are abhorrent to American ideals and inimical to American in¬ stitutions, the degree of success which the I. W. W. has had in marshalling and holding the allegiance of a group which has always before been below the level of organization is an important social phenomenon. New group organization is a beginning of educa¬ tion in social action. What the I. W. W. can do, some other movement with better ideals can do and to better purpose. SUMMARIZING THE POSSIBILITIES T HE migrant labor group has come upon a new level of possibilities as a result of the war. Plenty of work at good wages has enabled HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 95 it to reach a better standard of living. Insti¬ tutional and social reform have helped it hold it. The pressure of society and the demand “to work or fight” has constituted an encourage¬ ment to the migrant, assuring him that he has some value to society and arousing him to real patriotism. It has also developed in him class loyalty and some capacity for organization. DANGER OF REACTION HESE are real and striking gains but they may easily be lost if the process which helped to create them is reversed. There is a vast permanent demand for seasonal labor. Such labor at best yields a very narrow margin of profit. It is difficult and for many it is impossible to find continuous seasonal work. The experience through which the migrant must go creates a serious inclination in him to acquire the permanent habit of seasonal labor. Most labor experts expect a return to hobo conditions. It is most important, therefore, to inquire whether at least some of the gains of the immediate past cannot be kept. Is it necessary or inevitable for the migrant labor class to slump back into previous conditions? Already there are signs which point to the fact that the migrant’s war status is declining. With the end of the war federal emergency funds which had supported the employment service were no longer available and it had its 1919 work to do with greatly reduced forces and largely upon the basis of local support. The Kenyon-Nolan bill was prepared to per¬ petuate the service in something like its war¬ time scope but the previous Congress adjourned when the measure was still in committee. The result has been that outside of Washington the federal employment offices have had to go out of existence. According to those in a position to know, this bill will never be passed by the existing Congress. The difficulties of supplying labor to meet a demand so fluctuating both as to time and numbers are obvious. Before the United States employment service was established the entire process of labor distribution was very inade¬ quate and inaccurate. Labor was misdirected as often as directed. The result was delay, discouragement, ill-health, bitter feeling and, worst of all, the fixing of the habit of casual work in a large number of workers. EXPLOITATION OF THE MIGRANT F SOCIETY has reason to fear the migrant, he certainly has greater reason to fear society. As a transient, without the backing of fixed home and community or of a well-knit organization, it is hard for him to protect him¬ self. Every agency which has anything to do with him tends to exploit him. The farmer, the private employment agencies, the railroads, the local officials and police tend to fall into an anti-social attitude towards him. The un¬ scrupulous employer uses the seasonal worker as a strike-breaker but with no intention of incorporating him permanently in his industry. The ward politician buys his vote at election for partisan ends. Thus society deals with him. Besides, there are a hoard of purely parasitic forces which prey on him. Drinking, gambling and prostitution are the forms of amusement in the lodging-house districts which he is com¬ pelled to frequent. Prohibition and a general clean-up of the cities have greatly bettered living conditions, but a large proportion of seasonal laborers are soon relieved of their savings as soon as they reach the city. Besides, gamblers and hold-up men follow the harvest work systematically and prey upon these work¬ ers. Local news items in the press of the wheat belt have shown conclusively the presence of such criminals. These forces unite to pull down men already demoralized by the conditions under which they are compelled to live. THE DRIFT TO THE CITY HE majority of casual laborers drift into our great cities during the winter months; flood our cheap lodging houses, and help to swell the long lines outside the rescue missions which give free meals to these unfortunates. The real reason for this is the fact that there is not enough work to go round in the winter time. After a man becomes accustomed to temporary employment he may refuse steady work, or any job at all for that matter. Usu¬ ally, however, he starts such a life through necessity and not through choice. 96 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS The Migrant an Economic Problem T HE Commission on Industrial Relations reporting on migrant labor in 1916 stated that there are several million migrant workers in the United States even in the best of times and that the number is increasing; that if all men wanted to work all the time, very large numbers would be idle part of the time on account of the inequality of seasonal demands; that migrant labor tends to produce a habit and a type of man unfavorable to steady employment; and that the habitual migrant is ruined economically and degraded morally. The labor market, this report points out, is unorganized, the migrant movement is controlled largely by rumor, and the search for work is practically undirected. Likewise the local control of the migrant situation is inadequate because seasonal labor is interstate and even international. It affects vast industries and often involves hundreds of thousands of workers at a time who travel over great distances. The problem, therefore, is of fundamental national importance since our more basic industries depend on labor of this character. We have already noted that living conditions of migrant labor are generally very bad; that labor camps are characteristically unsanitary and both physically and morally degrading; while the lodging houses in the city haunts of migrant workers have been no better. The problem of adequate winter employment for seasonal labor is still not remedied and the congregation in city resorts of thousands of unemployed migrants at this season is burdensome for the municipalities. There is great need to perfect the social and philanthropic agencies which must mitigate the situation. The recommendation submitted by the Commission included the development of employment agencies on a national basis such as actually took place during the war; legislation providing for cheap railroad fares for workers traveling under the direction of the public employment service; establishment of workingmen’s hotels in all large cities and suitable accommodations for transients of this class elsewhere; and finally the establishment of tramp colonies to retrain and re-educate such habitual vagrants as can be made safe for return to society, and to keep the permanently unfit from being a burden and menace to others by permanent aggregation. Outside of its efforts in the cities, the only large piece of work which the church is doing for the migrant groups is in the lumber camps. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 97 ECONOMIC PLANS OUTLINED A N INVESTIGATION by the Interchurch ^ World Movement brought out the follow¬ ing points in the field of economic reorganiza¬ tion : The evils of the migratory labor situation might be lessened by a reduction of the demand for this type of labor. Such a reduction in the grain harvest may come through a further use of labor-saving machines, through crop diversi¬ fication, which in the grain belt would require more men throughout the year and less extra help during the harvest, and through the intro¬ duction of local industries which might even up the seasonal labor in a given locality and reduce the necessity of importing short-time harvest laborers. But none of these possibilities promise any great reduction in the total demand for seasonal labor within the near future. SEQUENTIAL EMPLOYMENT HE great economic need, therefore, is to make the best of the present situation and devise the most profitable use of seasonal workers. The establishment of national se¬ quences of seasonal work would lead the worker from one job to another with the least possible loss of time. Moreover the organization of seasonal laborers is essential so that they can influence the con¬ ditions of their own employment and best secure the advantages of collective bargaining and standardized conditions of employment. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE NASMUCH as the harvest army includes a very large number of young men or others who are definitely seeking to improve their conditions, with fair hope of succeeding, it is highly important that vocational guidance be extended to the workers. About one-third of them report themselves as farmers and another third as laborers. On the agricultural side such guidance should hold before young men the opportunities for agricultural education and should present to all who are seeking a perma¬ nent place in agriculture the opportunity of securing a farm and working into farm owner¬ ship and stable citizenship. One of the outstanding results of the migratory movement is that it is now hard to get into permanent agricultural employment, and the nation ought to devise some deliberate means of assisting its people thereto. TEMPORARY BRIDGES ATHER than to suffer the burdens of inevitable winter unemployment to be visited on a large number of seasonal workers and of general unemployment in times of indus¬ trial depression, it is at least fair to question whether society would not be wiser to devise an artificial demand for labor at such times through the undertaking of such public works as the construction of national highways, the reclamation of agricultural lands, or important civic improvements. The risk of degradation through unemployment is certainly too heavy for the individual to carry alone. It might well be shared by society through some form of unemployment insurance. LEGISLATIVE RECOMMENDATIONS HE legislative and administrative measures for the amelioration of the migrant situa¬ tion as seen in the grain harvest ought to in¬ clude the passage of a bill for legally establish¬ ing and perpetuating the Employment Service, a general revision of the vagrancy laws in the light of established facts so that the legal op¬ pression of the migrant worker would cease, and further legislation perfecting all machinery for protecting common labor from fraud and injustice. Moreover there should be required liberal ex¬ tensions of sanitary law, both of general sani¬ tation and of building requirements. In conclusion, it is necessary to substitute home life for hobo life. This means making men steady through steady employment. In order to accomplish this the employer and the worker must learn to shake hands rather than fists. We should substitute constructive Christianity for “red” radicalism on the one hand and rank reactionism on the other. The issue is Christ or chaos. 98 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS Forces at Work I N THIS entire field the religious forces are scattered and handicapped. From any statesman-like viewpoint it may be said to be an untouched field. The chur ch has never attempted to deal adequately with the problem of labor migration. There have been certain notable exceptions. There are rescue missions which have been wonderfully successful in dealing with the men of this class, a striking example of which is the Union City Mission in Minneapolis. The club operated by this organization is conducted on as high a level as those run for soldiers during the war. The lodging and rooming accommodations are beyond reproach. Morgan Memorial in Boston is another model mission. This institution under the direction of E. J. Helms provides for all of the needs—physical, mental and moral— of the men of this class. Missions of this type, however, are very exceptional. The majority are characteristically under-manned and inadequately equipped. Many are painfully lacking in sanitary equipment. The worst feature is the lack of Christian cooperation between the missions. Mission competes with mission. The result is a wonderful opportunity for the “panhandler,” who is able to make the rounds” as he calls it. He goes from one mission to another getting aid from each. As there is no cooperation between them there is no possibility for one mission to know what the other organizations are doing. Another serious defect in the present system is that in many cases there is no church supervision of these missions. A few are run by certain denominations and an even larger number subsidized by them, but on the whole the majority are free-lance organizations. The result is that they are narrow in their scope and very inadequate in their service, partly due to lack of funds. What is needed is an organization to get behind these competing enterprises and bring order out of chaos. The advantage of united action is demonstrated by the efficiency of the Salvation Army. No single agency working with vagrants in our cities is as well known or as effective as the Army. It frequently follows the migrant into the small centers where it is practically the only philanthropic agency which pays any attention to him. Its methods may not approve themselves entirely to other philanthropic societies or to organized religion but it has done better than any other agency, largely because it has been nationally organized. The same sort of service with new emphasis and new social vision would revolutionize the vagrancy problem in our cities. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 99 A TYPICAL OPPORTUNITY HE forces involved are entirely inadequate. Were each of the lumber camp pastors (employed by the denominations) to visit three camps and mills a week in the Pacific North¬ west alone, they would not be able to make the rounds once in a year. The inadequacy of the church’s approach is illustrated by the conditions in Grays Harbor County, Washington. In this county, which is approximately sixty miles long by twenty miles wide, there are about 45,000 people. Of this number, only 3,000 are members of any church and yet there are 44 churches ministering to these people. In the county there are 64 log¬ ging camps, employing 5,000 men, located in the midst of primeval forests far from social, moral and religious influences. Of the 64 log¬ ging camps in the county, 56 are without religious ministrations of any sort. There are five hundred children alone so isolated that they receive no religious or educational advantages. A TYPICAL FAILURE HESE conditions cannot be blamed on the temporary nature of the logging industry. One of the townships lying in the heart of this county is the most heavily timbered piece of land in the world, containing enough timber to build a board walk one hundred feet wide around the world. This community will be permanent for genera¬ tions to come. The possibilities for service in a lumber county like Grays Harbor are limit¬ less. The equipment is ready at hand. There are recreation halls most of which were built under the excitement of the war and all of which could be easily secured for the use of the church. Some of these have been turned into storehouses by companies because there was no organization to take care of the buildings or prepare programs for the men. These halls are lighted by electricity and with very little ad¬ ditional expense could be wired for moving picture purposes. M IGRANT workers present a national problem. Their itineraries cover a wide area and they engage in a diversity of occupations. Their care must be a national concern. The peculiar needs of these necessary wanderers must be met by the Christian church. The work of competing agencies must be unified to promotel economy and efficiency in what is an otherwise expensive, because a decentralized, and in many instances a necessarily mobile organization. Specialized Christian workers must follow and minister to varied groups, just as the church followed and ministered to the soldier, in camp, on the march, at war and now in unemployment. Cooperation will eliminate the “pan-handler” in these unshepherded groups. 100 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS Policies and Programs B ESIDES the purely economic problems there is a field of voluntary activity to be found in meeting some of the immediate needs of the migrant situa¬ tion. It is best met by Christian kindness brought about through per¬ sonal contacts. It must be understood that such activities are palliative rather than preventive with respect to the problem as a whole. They must not be substituted in thought or in fact for any of the deeper-lying measures which it is the duty of enlightened public opinion to demand and of the state to work out. The World War has shown numerous examples of welfare service in which voluntary philanthropic agencies cooperated with the army. Exact methods have been devel¬ oped; a successful technique has been discovered and, most important, a strong body of Christian workers has been educated. Even the necessary equipment is at hand. All these may be capitalized for the benefit of the migrant workers. A fundamental service to be performed by the church is to provide these men with non-commercial and friendly resorts while waiting between seasons and between jobs. Almost everything which it has been necessary to do for the soldier in travel, in camp and at leisure ought to be done for the migrant worker. The methods of this welfare service will naturally have to vary from community to community. Sometimes food, shelter, recreation, reading and writing material, clinic or hospital service would need to be supplied. The direction of the service would be in the hands of the minister, chaplain or other Christian worker; and its success would be in proportion to their tact, efficiency and genuine brotherliness. The striking degree to which commercial agencies exploit the workers results in bitterness and an intense radicalism among a large section of migrant peoples. What could be more Christian than to substitute an organized movement of kindness for one of injustice. An example of this sort of service is to be found in the experiment of Mayor Gregory of Pratt, Kansas. He erected a large tent in a vacant lot opposite the Court House for the accommodation of harvest hands. It was furnished with seats, tables, writing materials, a music box, cots and bundles of straw. Men who had no money to buy meals were given work on the streets or sent out on short jobs. Mayor Gregory reports that he personally put in two weeks’ time last year handling 2,000 men at this camp. Of this number only three refused to go out to work. HOME MISSIONS: Migrant Groups 101 Farmers met the workers at the camp and organized their harvest crews. The reported cost of the total enterprise was less than $100. Ministers of Pratt visited the camp each evening and on Sundays addressed the men. A tentative working plan for the churches might be worked out upon these lines: The various religious organizations now working for migrants should cooperate. Where religious agencies at work are in a position adequately to care for the migrant problem their work should be encouraged and if necessary they should be given financial support. Where non-religious agencies are at work, such as state employment bureaus, Christian workers should be furnished to cooperate with them. In the labor markets which are being neglected, permanent welfare centers, adequately equipped and manned, should be set up. Where permanent welfare centers are not necessary, work for migrants should be conducted through the local churches which are sympathetic to the movement. If advisable, the work of these local churches should be supervised and coordinated through the services of a trained worker. “Huts” should be established to care for these groups in communities not large enough to warrant building a church, for example in the logging camps. Itinerant missionaries should visit points not sufficiently permanent to require a hut. In all this work it is important to provide for men while they are up and doing rather than down and out. A proposed program for migrant workers is presented herewith in tabulated form. 102 Migrant Groups : HOME MISSIONS Proposed Program for Migrant Workers Type of enterprise Number of workers needed How arrived at Number of enter¬ prises proposed for five-year program Months per year operated Cost per enterprise one year Cost per year en¬ tire program Cost to churches I. Units at¬ tached to employment service. 400 Actual number public em¬ ployment offices handling 1,000 men per month. 100 12 $3,000 $300,000 $150,000 II. Itinerat¬ ing units for grain har¬ vest hands. 75 Estimated number of coun¬ ties handling 1,000 harvest migrants at a given time. 50 3 800 40,000 20,000 III. Labor camp units. 5,000 Estimate based on offi¬ cially reported number and population of labor camps in New York and California. 1,000 8 1,500 1,500,000 750,000 1 IV. Units for women and children in cannery and agricultural labor camps. 1,000 Estimate based on investi¬ gation of cannery and ag¬ ricultural labor camps in New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland with California official re¬ ports. 200 3 800 160,000 80,000 ; V. City “res¬ cue” mis¬ sions. No estimate possible pre¬ vious to survey. 1 year f 5 years $ £1,000,000 £5,000,000 NEW AMERICANS NEW AMERICANS D URING the war probably a million immigrants returned to the old country. Before the war more than half as many immigrants returned to the fatherland as came to America. These immigrants became missionaries for the United States. However, the story of their experiences and their commendation or condemnation of America depended largely upon the treatment they had received at our hands—whether we were true to our promises or whether we failed to make good with those whom we invited to come here. No one can tell even approximately how many of the immigrants who are return¬ ing to the fatherland will come back to us because Europe is passing through a period of reconstruction which will probably require the assistance of every able- bodied man and woman to complete its enormous task. It may be that the home-returning immigrant will find in his reconstructed country the realization of the dream he had when he first came to America—for out of the war there may emerge a new democracy in Europe. But even though none of them should return, the United States has a serious enough problem on its hands in dealing adequately with the immigrants who remain here. The older immigration came principally from Great Britain, Ireland, Scandinavia and Germany. The “New Americans” are coming from Austria, Hungary, Italy, Russia and to some extent from the Near East. “New Americans,” for the purpose of this survey, are those who come from southern and eastern Europe and the Levant. FOREIGN-BORN POPULATION OF THE UNITED STATES 1919 Immigration, April 1910-June 1919. 5,566,000 Emigration, April 1910-June 1919. 1,909,000 Net immigration, April 1910-June 1919. 3,657,000 Foreign-born population, April 1910. 13,346,000 Total foreign-born population, June 1919. 17,003,000 106 New Americans : HOME MISSIONS The Field P ROPERLY to present a survey of new Americans will mean a study of the field itself, its problems, character and extent; an analysis of the forces at work within the field; and a statement regarding a program adequate and sufficient for the needs. One problem of the new American is distribution. He has crowded into the cities. Here he forms his “Little Italy, 1 ” his “Ghetto/’ his “Bohemian Hills”—usually retaining his native social ideas and customs. In a city like New York the problem stands out in the large. In that city the increase in population of Russians, Italians and Austro-Hungarians, for the period of ten years ending in 1910, was greater in each case than in the native population. Such an unbalanced growth is inevitably reflected in the decreased percentage of Protestant church members, now reduced to nearly 7 per cent. It is reflected in New York’s political life. Indeed, it intensifies the city’s problem in every direction and gives rise to many new phases of city life and work. PERCENTAGE OF FOREIGN-BORN WHITES AND NATIVE WHITES OF FOREIGN OR MIXED PARENTAGE BASED UPON POPULATION OF 1910 ATLANTIC OCEAN Interchurch Workl Movement or North America G.D.JBJ HOME MISSIONS: New Americans 107 ASSIMILATION T HE difficulties of assimilation grow out of the constant ratio of aliens within our pop¬ ulation, their uneven distribution throughout the country and their tendency to congregate in congested city quarters. The constancy with which alienism retains its numerical strength within our population is well shown by a few figures. Approximately 14 per cent, of the population of the United States is foreign born and it has scarcely varied in fifty years. In 1860 it was 13.2 per cent.; in 1870, 14.4 per cent.; in 1880, 13.3 per cent.; in 1890, 14.8 per cent.; in 1900, 13.7 per cent.; in 1910, 14.7 per cent. These figures are the more significant when we recall that the per¬ centages represent adults almost entirely; of the foreign-born whites in 1910 only 5.7 per cent, were below fifteen years of age. Among the native whites of native parentage 35.8 per cent, were children under fifteen years. Two-thirds of the immigrant population which formerly came to this country settled in the four states of New York, New Jersey, Pennsyl¬ vania and Massachusetts. Seventy-two per cent, of the foreigners in the United States live in cities 2,500 and over. Huddled together in foreign quarters, out of touch with the larger life of America, they be¬ come an easy prey to unscrupulous agitators. Sometimes the economic doctrines accepted abroad influence their relationships in America because they are unfamiliar with the principles of government which control this country politically. Under these circumstances the immigrant becomes a menace to the well-being of the United States. NATIONAL PRIDE T HE new American in his pride of national¬ ity presents another problem. This trait is an advantage if properly understood by Americans and if not over-emphasized by the immigrants. Americans should appreciate the fine ideals which the foreigners bring with them, and also their traditions, accomplishments and culture. On the other hand the immigrant must learn more about the real nature of the country which he has made his home and in which he hopes to establish his family, and must learn to take his place as a citizen and as a man. THE WOMAN’S LOT ANOTHER problem of the new American jLjl is found in the women of his family. The immigrant man, while limited in his con¬ tact with American life, nevertheless has cer¬ tain social opportunities which lift him out of the monotony of his toil, giving him a larger outlook upon life. The women, however, are usually confined to the four walls of their kitchens. They bring up large families of chil¬ dren, they scarcely ever see anyone outside their families and the terrible monotony of their daily lives often drives them to insanity and suicide. EUROPEAN BACKGROUND B EFORE the war, when Europe was gener¬ ally governed by an autocracy, millions of its natives fled to America to find freedom. America was to them the “promised land.” In their own country they were overshadowed by a state religion which was ritualistic and political in its character. Economically they were compelled to work for starvation wages with no hope for their future. Socially they were handicapped in that they belonged to the lower classes and the possibility of rising to the 108 New Americans : HOME MISSIONS level of the so-called upper classes was next to hopeless, no matter what their natural ability might have been. WHAT DID THEY FIND? N AMERICA they had more to eat. They wore better clothes. They had the right to vote. They had access to a free education. They were given better jobs. They found they could break through into the upper classes; for while they discovered that there were classes in America, they had the freedom to pass from one to another according to their character, general ability and per¬ sonality. But they found that there were those in this country—even among their own people—who were quite ready to exploit them. They were herded to the polls by unscrupulous politicians and voted in blocks. They were compelled to live in shacks and unsanitary camps. They found that while they earned more money in this country, their living conditions were such that often their apparent advance was a ques¬ tionable one. They were colonized by padrones and contrac¬ tors and thus shut out from contact with American life. They exchanged the country life to which they had been accustomed for the filth and degrada¬ tion of the city tenement. They were given higher wages—but not at all commensurate with the services they rendered. They were given the vote—but somehow it did not seem to affect the social conditions under which they lived. They left the cathedrals of their native lands to be invited to a bare, dirty mission hall on a side street. They were given scant welcome in the churches and were looked askance at by the members. They could not understand the diversity among HOME MISSIONS: New Americans the Christian forces in this new country, nor their jealous rivalry. MISUNDERSTOOD BY AMERICANS HERE are those in the United States who profess to despise the immigrant for various reasons. Sometimes it is assumed that the im¬ migrant comes here merely for the purpose of making what is to him a small fortune and then returning to his own country to spend this money. But it should be remembered that the immi¬ grant has honestly earned whatever he takes with him and he has left behind more than its equivalent in services rendered. These able-bodied immigrant workers have come to our country at a comparatively slight expense to the United States, equipped for service on the day they landed because their own countries spent considerable money for their education and general equipment. There are some who insist that the immigrant is bringing with him loathsome diseases; that he is the scum of the earth, and that he might better remain in the country from which he came. Such expressions are wide of the mark. 109 With the careful scrutiny given the immigrant at our ports of entry the number of totally undesirable persons has been reduced to a minimum. ILLITERACY F ROM the viewpoint of illiteracy the prob¬ lem of the new American is much more acute than of the older immigration. According to Fairchild the percentage of illiteracy in immigrants 14 years of age or over (1899 to 1909) showed the following results: Scandi¬ navians .4 per cent., Irish 2.1 per cent., Ger¬ mans 5.1 per cent. For the new immigration we have: Italians, north 11.4 per cent., south 54.2 per cent.; Hebrew 25.7 per cent., Polish 35.4 per cent., Croatian and Slovenian 36.4 per cent. While it is true that many immigrants who have come to America are illiterate it should be remembered that most of these came from small towns or rural districts where the educa¬ tional facilities are not as good as they are in the city. The most undesirable class—the criminal—comes from the city and is therefore the best educated. THE IMMIGRANT INVASION OF THE CITIES 13.000,000 FOREIGNERS IN THE UNITED STATES BOSTON CLEVELAND CHICAGO NEW YORK Iniercourco worm Moremen cf Mono