It was formerly the belief of students of family desertion that the best way to prevent desertions was to punish them quickly and severely.  It should be said that this plan has never received a fair trial on a large scale, for legal equipment has always lagged behind knowledge.  It may be true that just as a community can, within limits, regulate its death rate by what it is willing to pay, so it can by repressive measures regulate its desertion rate.  But measures that keep the would-be deserter in the home which constantly grows less of a home, simply through fear of consequences if he left it, seem hardly a desirable form of prevention from the social point of view.  It would be much better to catch the disintegrating family in whatever form of social drag-net could be devised, and deal with it individually and constructively along the lines which case work has laid down.

Is it possible, however, to recognize a “pre-desertion state?” And if so, what are the danger signals?  One case worker answers this question sententiously:  “Any influences which tend to destroy family solidarity are possible signs of desertion.”  Another writes:  “We have sometimes found it possible to recognize a ‘pre-desertion state’ in the intermittent deserter, where we know the conditions which previously led to desertion, but I doubt whether we have very often been able to note it in the case of first desertions.  In general, I should say a growing carelessness or a growing despondency as to his ability to care for his family are danger signals in the man, of which it is well to keep track.”

The conditions listed in Chapter II as “contributory factors” might in certain combinations be decided danger signals of impending desertion.  Non-support itself is, indeed, one of the most common of such signals, though a man who has dealt with hundreds of desertion cases maintained recently that the best and most hopeful type of deserter is the one who supports his family adequately up to the time of leaving home.

In the following case the items that led the case worker to suspect an approaching desertion are set down in the order stated by her.  The couple were Irish; the man had never deserted before.

    (1) He had spoken with eagerness of the wages that were being earned
    in munition plants in a city a few hours away—­said he would like to
    go to some of those munition places and see what he could make.

    (2) He was an intermittent drinker.

    (3) His work record was poor; employers said he was irregular and
    unreliable.

    (4) Visitor felt he had never earned as much as he was easily
    capable of earning and was rather indifferent to the needs of his
    family.

    (5) The woman was willing to work—­had applied for day nursery care,
    but visitor had persuaded the nursery not to accept the children.

After the visitor had stated the first two of the above items she stopped, and did not add the more significant three that followed until reminded that many workmen who drank intermittently were at that time thinking enviously of munition factory wages; and that these hardly constituted danger signals.  The cumulative effect of all five items cannot, however, be denied.