when they have odd jobs of any kind to be done. We are often asked about domestics, to which we reply: 'These are a self-supporting and independent class of people, who do not go through our offices. We do not supply them.' When asked why we do not take steps to train domestics, we reply that they belong to a class of people with whom we do not deal. They are usually entirely selfsupporting."

Mr. Roland C. Lincoln, chairman of one of the most active district conferences of the Boston Associated Charities, gives details of methods of dealing with out-of-work cases, details which are suggestive and stimulating to charity organization society workers :

"1. The Associated Charities of Boston [he says] does not act as an employment bureau: but the agents and visitors of its several conferences and wards do try often to get work for poor people whose cases come before them by references from various societies or people. Miss Zilpha Smith, our general secretary, is of opinion that the Associated Charities ought not to be an employment bureau or in any sense to be in competition with established employment bureaus. Thus the Associated Charities never takes up a case (individual or family) merely because out of work: there must be distress and suffering from poverty. The Associated Charities has knowledge of its cases by reference to it from a variety of sources, from the industrial aid society, from the police, from visitors, from individual strangers, from a doctor it may be, and so on. The Associated Charities Conference, or some visitor of the conference or its agent,― incidentally and as a means of relieving the distress by the best possible means; to wit, the efforts or employment of the breadwinners (father, mother, or children) — will try to find some work or some employer for the man or his family. In short, our Associated Charities believes that it should raise its needy families out of distress, but not act as a bureau for employment for anybody and everybody. So that, incidentally, the Associated Charities agent or visitor may well be the means of getting employment for an individual or a family in need. Thus in cases of distress :

'(a) Sometimes work, steady or temporary, is procured in the city. 1. By encouraging the man or woman to search for it. This a friendly visitor or the agent may do; and the spur is given in a variety of ways, according to the ability of the visitor, etc. 2. The visitor or the agent may know or may ascertain some em

ployer who will, if pressure is applied to him, consent to give the poor man or woman a job. 3. Sometimes the conference will put an advertisement in the newspapers as a want; and some visitor or member of the conference will pay for the advertisement, or the conference fund may do so.

"(b) By co-operating with or applying to some employment agency, as: (1) The Industrial Aid Society. (2) The Young Men's Christian Association. (3) The Young Women's Christian Association. (4) Boston Industrial Home (for men and women), Wayfarer's Lodge (men, temporary), Shawmut Street Temporary Home (women), Union Rescue Mission (men), Chardon Street Home (women), Hebrew Employment Bureau, German Aid Society, or some private industrial bureau.

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(c) By sending a party or family out of the city for work in country, or in a town or city where previously employed. This is done in a variety of ways: (1) Through answering advertisements. (2) Through bureaus. (3) Through friends (clergymen at times). (4) Through members of the conference, and especially through the individual efforts of a paid agent, who looks up country places and country (out of town) employers, on farms, etc.

"Breck's Agricultural Store is a large establishment that has of late years maintained a bureau, where farmers can send a list of their wants, and where persons wanting to work on the land can register.

"The several conferences have for years moved families or individuals to the country (for work), when the opportunity and situation are assured. During the last three years, when it has been so difficult to find work in cities, two ladies of our Ward VII. Conference have raised money on their own action, and as their own fund (not mingled with the ward funds). They have employed a woman agent (not as an agent of the Associated Charities), who has placed at work in the country often on farms -- one or even two families per week. This has not been a constant thing, but in those times and periods of distress when work in Boston could not be found by the poor man or family, and he or they wanted to go into the country. The conference co-operates with this agent, often referring its cases to her, and, perhaps, through its regular visitor of the family, trying to influence the persons to move. This has been a sort of special individual agency for hard times, and is recognized by

the conference as one of its many resources for application,just like any private employment bureau, only its relations are close, because the managers of the fund are members of the conference.”

MUNICIPAL EMPLOYMENT

SCHEME PROPOSED

FOR DETROIT, MICH.

BY DR. JAMES A. POST,

GENERAL SECRETARY ASSOCIATION OF CHARITIES OF DETROIT.

This organization shall be known as the Willing Workers' Aid Society.

Its purpose is the helping of those who strive to help themselves. It is not a charity.

It is not an employment agency for furnishing work at good wages.

Its underlying principle is, "No work, no pay."

It will not attempt to furnish work to those who have sufficient means or are able themselves to secure sufficient employment to get through the winter months without suffering.

The rate established for such work as may be furnished will be 12 cents per hour, and no more than six hours will be furnished one man in twenty-four hours.

Work will only be furnished on cards presented by recipients of same from contributors of cash to the fund, which shall be known as the " Willing to Work Fund"; and, to be of value, such cards must be indorsed by the secretary of the city poor commission or the Detroit Association of Charities, and presented at the office of the society by recipient within twenty-four hours after receipt of same or as soon as possible.

Appoint three trustees, entirely outside of city official life, to receive and hold on deposit in bank such contributions as shall be made to the "Willing to Work Fund" until such time as they may be drawn upon under the rules of the organization. Every con

tributor to the fund shall receive in exchange for his con tribution a ticket for every 75 cents represented by same, upon one side of which shall be printed:

WILLING TO WORK FUND.

Good for 75 cents in cash upon certificate that six hours' work has been performed therefor.

Present this at..

And on the reverse side:

Bearer gives me his name and address as below, and declares he needs employment to provide necessaries of life for himself and family.

Name.
Address

If his statement is correct, please furnish him six hours' work, and charge against my contribution to the “ Willing to Work Fund."

(Date and hours.)

Such action as may be necessary to authorize any board or commission to use such clerical help as may be necessary to co-operate with this organization, without increase of the ordinary clerical force, is hereby requested to be taken by the common council; also to permit of prompt payment of money earned in case of necessity, the same to be collected later, on vouchers, cashed for the "Willing to Work Fund."

The park and boulevard commission, the board of water commissioners, the board of public works, and the poor commission should report each morning to a central authority the number of men each can supply with something to do next day under this system. All work tickets given out by contributors to the fund should be presented to the central office within twenty-four hours by recipients or the relief thereunder shall be cancelled. On presentation of an order the work called for shall be placed according to the places booked, as follows.

Please furnish bearer..

..Commission:

hours' work, and charge to the " Willing to Work Fund." Present this ticket (or tickets) duly certified that the work has

been performed, as your voucher for payment of the roll, in connection with latter when made up and certified by the undersigned.

Then rolls, when certified and accompanied by the vouchers, will be paid from the trust fund as hereinbefore provided. The secretary shall be chosen by the board of trustees, and shall be a competent man without other employment. He shall be paid not to exceed $2 a day for actual service. There shall also be a second secretary, similarly appointed and paid, in case a headquarters be established on each side of the city divided by Woodward Avenue. After the plan has been fully matured and agreed upon, the newspapers (German and English) should publish it, and call upon those able to contribute under the rules to do so between now and Dec. 1, 1897, weekly, monthly, or in lump sums.

The trustees shall appoint a number of business men, manufacturers, and professional men as canvassers for the fund among those able to contribute; and every contributor should be furnished work tickets on December 1 to cover his aggregate contribution at that date. The fact that it takes a contribution of 75 cents to secure a six-hours' work ticket should not prevent those willing to give less than 75 cents from giving, as the smaller sums would in the aggregate do a great deal of good, and tickets covering the same may be placed by the trustees where they would do the most good.

I would suggest, as a matter of economy, that the offices at the eastern and western yards of the board of public works might be used as central headquarters for the districts on the east side of Woodward Avenue, respectively; and that, in sending men out on tickets, their work be assigned as near their homes as practicable, the fund, however, to be a general fund.

The poor commission should confine itself to aiding those too old and feeble to work, the needy sick, the poor widow who has no one to aid in the support of her family, and should not attempt to aid where there is an able-bodied earner for the family, except by tickets for the "Willing Workers' Aid Society," as in case of individuals.