Proceedings First National Country Life Conference (address Dwight Sanderson, Secretary, Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.); “Play and recreation in rural life,” p. 95; “Religious forces for country life,” p. 83.

Jackson, Henry E., The community church (Macmillan).

Numerous “surveys” of rural communities have been made by various agencies.  Among them are those made by the Department of Church and Country Life of the Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church, 156 Fifth Ave., New York.  Extensive surveys are being made by the Inter-Church World Movement, 45 West 18th St., New York.

Bulletin No. 184 of the Agricultural Experiment Station, Iowa State Agricultural College, Ames, Iowa, contains a social survey of Orange Township, Blackhawk County, Iowa.

Write your State Agricultural College or State University for possible materials of a local character.

CHAPTER XXII

DEPENDENT, DEFECTIVE, AND DELINQUENT MEMBERS OF THE COMMUNITY

In every community there are some members who are not self-supporting and who do not contribute materially to the community’s progress (see Chapter V and Chapter xi).

WHO CONSTITUTE DEPENDENTS, DEFECTIVES, AND DELINQUENTS

The very young and the very aged come within this group.  Both are peculiarly dependent upon others, though the aged may, by thrift in earlier years, have acquired a competence with which to meet the needs of old age; and the young are expected, in later years, to compensate the community for the care they have received from others during childhood.

There are those, also, of all ages, who are incapacitated for self-support and for service by disease, or by physical or mental defects such as bodily deformities, blindness, or feeble-mindedness.  In addition, there are some who, though physically able to perform service, deliberately prey upon the community in one manner or another without giving anything in return.  The latter constitute the delinquent class, and include criminals.

RELATION OF THE FAMILY TO THE PROBLEM

Normally, the needs of those who are unable to support themselves, whether because of extreme youth or old age or because of physical or mental defects, are provided for by the family.  It frequently happens, however, that the family is unable to perform this service.  It may be entirely broken up.  Children may be left without parents, and the aged without children.  The natural supporters of the family may be stricken by disease, or by accident, or by financial misfortune.  Moreover, the proper care and treatment of many defectives require better facilities and greater skill than can be provided even by well-to-do families.  Thus a class of dependents is produced—­dependents upon the community as a whole.  They may or may not be defectives, physical or mental.  Dissipation and thriftlessness are two of the chief causes of dependency.