Social Welfare History and Policy Midterm

Buddhism

Founded in 400 b.c, believed that even if a person follows all the rules, if they have selfish tendencies or anger, it doesn’t mean much

Greeks and Romans

Believed in love of humanity, brotherhood, love of mankind. Duty to give back to those in need

• Greeks and Romans gave daily allowances, pensions for crippled, public distribution of grain for the needy for custodial care including orphans and children whose fathers were lost in battle

Jewish Doctrines

Teach duty of giving and the right to those in need to receive

• Poverty is not a crime!

• Christianity continued the tradition of charity. Emphasising upon good deeds, loves of one's enemies, and entry into heaven through merfy and charity

Feudilsm System

Created in the eleventh century, which was a system of government in which those who possessed land estates also held political power

• Were protected by their lords or masters from against such hazards such as sickness, unemployment, and old age

• Those who did not receive this protection were helped by social, craft,and merchant guilds

Hospitals during middle ages

They merely provide medical assistance to the sick poor, but rather housed and cared for lepers, pilgrims, orphans, and old people

• Most hospitals were attached to monastrais(churches) or found along main routes of travels

Black death(Bubonic Plague)

• Occurred in 1348-49 and killed almost third of Englands population

• Henry Vlll got rid of the monasteries and other church properties, which meant the people who received land or were employed by these insituations were now forced to join the poor

Statue of Laborers Act

Created a year after the back plague in 1349 by Edward lll, which fixed maximum wages, placed travel restrictions on impotent and unemployed persons, and compelled jobless to work for any employer willing to hire them

• Able-bodied(physically healthy people) would all be forced to work in their place of residence at a rate of wages fixed by law, to stop spread of black plague

Act for the punishment of sturdy vagabonds and beggars

Was created in 1536 that made the penalties for able-bodied beggars more severe, consequences were scheduled brandings, enslavement, or execution for repeated offenses

• Gave relief to children who were begging by putting them into work and aid to poor sick people and aged as well

• Kids that were under fourteen and above the age of 5 years old got appointed to go work for masters of husbandry or given other crafts or labors to be taught. They got their living when they became of age

Elizabeth Poor laws of 1601(On Exam)

Parents were legally liable for the support of their children and grandchildren. Children were responsible for the care of their needy parents and grandparents. Funds were raised to help these three groups by taxing every householder in the parish, if they did not pay the threat of imprisonment was put upon them

• People refusing to work were whipped, branded, put in pillories/stoned or put in a house of correction

• Established three categories: able-bodied(capable of working who were involuntarily unemployed), impotent(elderly, blind, sick, and disabled), and children

• Gov gives you the minium amount of relief to prevent person from homelessness

Indoor relief(On Exam)

• Work for the family and that family house them and earn new skills(nonworthy)

• Almshouses, Poorhouses, Workhouses, etc

Outdoor Relief(On Exam)

• Assistance to the poor without requiring them to enter an institution(worthy)

• Those who needed partial/temporary aid

Worthy Children

Minimum assistance needed to live was provided to children, widows, older, individuals with disabilities or illnesses etc

Nonworthy Children

• Unemployed, homeless, unwed mothers, people with mental illnesses, able-boded”variants”, that were required to work were they were disciplined

• Husbands can only be their families providers, wives were not allowed

Mutual aid

Groups helping each other out and not relying on outside aid or sources for help

England and Europe shipped to colonial America thousands of rogues, convicts, political prisoners, beggars, vagrants, orphans, or unemployed. Most did not survive, and the ones that did reached shore ill or infirm

The Colonial Pattern Laws

Came after the Elizabeth Poor Laws which was public assistance through compulsory taxation. Towns were responsible for collecting tax money.

• Those who needed partial/temporary aid were provided with outdoor aid

• Place the poor in private homes at public expense. They would auction off the needy to the lowest bidder at town hall meetings

“Warning away”

Boston's selectman prohibited entertaining strangers in homes for more than two weeks without securing permission, if they stay longer and become a public burden they are denied permission. Those who came anyway disregarding the law, were “warned away” by the selectman, those who did not go willingly were forcibly removed out

Establishment Residency Requirements

To prove legal residancy, you had to reside in a town for three months without being asked to leave

• If you brought servants into a town, had to agree to take care of them if they ever fall ill

Apprencitship

Removing coauoer, illegitimate, or orphaned white children from their families and apprentice out if they were not learning a trade

•  Seen as good method to discipline children

Quincy Report (1820) & Yates Report (1824)

Abolition(end) of Auction System and Outdoor Relief

County Poorhouse Act 1824 in NY

Led to increase Institutional relief as primary source of Public Assistance, such as almshouses, poorhouses, and workhouses

• Beginning shift of responsibility of social welfare from parishes/towns to counties/states

Second Great awakening

A period of a series of emotional religious revivals. Time when millions of people suddenly became deeply interested in religion again after falling away from it

• George Whitefield- Was the leading figure of this, helped aid tons of black people, including slaves

• Many freed formerly enslaved people learned to read and write at this time

Mental health reform(On Exam)

•  Led by Dorothea Dix, who exposed the conditions of jails and the cruelty with which mentally ill patients in these institutions were being treated

• Originally seen as a moral/spiritual issue -God’s will/punishment, presence of demons, etc

• Mentally ill with no family to care for them, were confined to Almshouses/Poorhouses/Workhouses and/or jails

• Perception started to switch that is now seen as a medical problem-that could be treated

• Led to the rise of Institutionalized care- asylums, orphanages, juvenile detention centers, etc

Civil War(1861-1865)

• Economic differences between the north (manufacturing/industrialization) and south(economy depended on enslaved people)

• Growing abolitionist sentiment

• New Republican Party led by Abraham Lincoln

The Union

President: Abraham Lincoln and Military Leader: Ulysses S. Grant

The Confederacy

President: Jefferson Davis and Military Leader: Robert E. Lee

U.S. Sanitary Commisions(1861)(On Exam)

• Made in response due to high mortality rates for Civil War soldiers

• Private funding and was the first national public health group

• Laid groundwork for progress in public health after Civil War

• Taught proper training in sanitary science and stimulated public education

Organized Charity Movement(On exam)

• Eliminate fraud, inefficiency and devising a method of dealing with or treating poverty

• Friendly Visitors(forerunners of social workers) - looked into each case to diagnose the cause of destitution. Grant relief through investigation. Distinguish between who was worthy or unworthy of relief

Mary Richmond(On Exam)

One of the friend visitors that supported/part of the Organized Charity Movement. She believed poverty was mainly a cause of moral failure, and felt a responsibility to serve the needy

Jane Addams(On exam)

• Apart of and supported the Settlement house movement

• She believed impoverished people often perform or fake middle-class moral virtues to appease charity workers and secure necessary aid

• Didn’t look at an individuals moral pervsity, however looked a social and economic problems of why that person was suffering from homelessness

Settlement Houses(On exam)

Settlements were organized initially to be “friendly and open households,” a place where members of the privileged class could live and work as pioneers or “settlers” in poor areas of a city where social and environmental problems were great

• The goal for many of the early settlement residents was to conduct sociological observation and research

• Another goal was an opportunity to share their education and/or Christian values as a means of helping the poor and disinherited to overcome their personal handicaps

The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands (Freedmen’s Bureau)(1865-1872)(On exam)

• 1st federal welfare agency

• Goal of aiding formerly enslaved people in the transition from slavery to freedom

• Provided direct aid

• Assisted with creation of schools for African Americans

Laissez-Faire(On exam)

An economic and political doctrine advocating minimal or zero government interference in the economic affairs of individuals and society, supported by Social Darwinists that used the phrase “ survival of the fittest”

Lincoln assassinated in April 1865-at the end of the Civil War, who was his successor and what did they do?

Successor was his Vice President Andrew Johnson(Democrat/Term: 1865-1868):

• Southerner with pro-southern and pro-slavery sentiments

• Allowed Southern states back into United States

• Allowed Southern states to develop racist policies

• Refused to break up plantations and made formly enslaved people hand back their land they were given to former landowners

Thirteenth Amendment(1865)(On exam)

Abolished slavery

Fourteenth Amendment(1868)(On exam)

Required all citizens given “equal protection” under the law, all persons be accorded the protection of due processes(fair/speedy trial)

Fifteenth Amendment(1870)(On exam)

Citizens right to vote would not be denied ” On account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude

Nineteenth Amendement(1919)

Gave women right to vote

Black Codes(1865)(On exam)

Passed by southern states, designed to limit the freedom of African-Americans and ensure their availability as a cheap labor force

• Forced to sign yearly contacts, if refused, risked being arrested, fired, or unpaid labor

Jim Crow Laws(On exam)

Practices, laws, or institutions related to segregation of black people in schools, parks, libraries, drinking fountains, restrooms, buses, trains, and restaurants

• Uphled by local gov and supported by fed gov

• Created rise of KKK

• Reinforced by violence-lynching

Rise of KKK(1865)(On exam)

• Resistance group to the Republican Party’s Reconstruction era policies.

• Disrupted political participation of African-Americans through violence

• Raided lands, raped women, castrated men, lynching/burning

President Grant passed the Third Enforcement Act which did what?

• KKK Act of 1871

• Allowed military force to suppress KKK

Colonial times what child welfare was like(On exam)

• In colonial times children were seen as “mini adults” that had a duty to contribute to their family

• Orphans, unwanted children, children of poor families, children of enslaved, were “bounded” out to work by city/county

• Were approved by parents to be taken out of home to learn trade

Colonial times what child welfare was like continued(On Exam)

• Large numbers of children were left without one or both parents due to Civil War, Immigration, and/or Industrialization.

• Illness, injury, and/or death as a result of working in factories

• Poverty/Homelessness

• Child Abuse/Neglect

• Arrested for petty theft, vagrancy, begging, etc. and thrown in jail with adults

• Not enough orphanages to care for large number of children

Children’s Aid Society (CAS)(1853)(On exam)

Established by Charles Loring Brace-to address orphaned/homeless children in New York

• concerned with immigrant children

• Created trade schools, built lodging houses for homeless children, and began to tackle truancy and illiteracy

• Gained backlash from Catholic Church and poor communities

White House Conference on Children & Youth of 1909 (President Theodore Roosevelt)(On exam)

First major event in the U.S. to focus on the welfare of poor, neglected, and orphaned children. The consensus of the conference was that poverty alone should not be a reason to take children away from their families. They decided that growing up in a real family or a foster home is much better for a child than living in an institution

U.S. Children’s Bureau Bill(On exam)

Which was signed in 1912 by President William Howard Taft. A United States government office that works to protect children and help families stay safe and healthy

Until the 1930s, child labor and abusive child labor were present in the U.S

• Children worked 12hr/six days a week in extreme conditions which resulted in medical conditions and sometimes death

• Children seen “easier to control and cheap labor’ than adults

Child Welfare League of America(1920)

Established by a group of social workers and started as a group of 70 child-welfare agencies w/goal of setting standards and regulating training of child welfare workers, record keeping, and professional practice

• Wanted individual needs of children to be considered, state inspections of foster parents/placements, and provided services to families w/goal of reunification

Adoption and Safe Families Act(1997)

To shorten the length of time a child spends in foster care and speed up the process of freeing children for adoption

Family First Prevention Services Act(2018)

To help keep children safely with their families and avoid the traumatic experience of entering foster care

National Child Labor Committee forms(1904)(On exam)

 Dedicated to the abolition of exploitative child labor and the promotion of children’s rights, education, and well-being

• Advocated for the creation of the U.S. Children’s Bureau in 1912.

• Supported the Keating-Owen Act 

Keating-Owen Act (1916)(On exam)

Passed by Woodrow Wilson, the first federal law in the United States to restrict child labor

Fair Labor Standards Act(1938)(On exam)

Passed by FDR, established a national minimum wage, mandatory overtime pay, and strict limits on child labor

Child Abuse Prevention Act(1974)

Gives money and rules to states to help them prevent, find, and treat child abuse and neglect

Native American Children

• Colonial times-enslavement of native american people, including children

• Overall goal” Subjugating and assimilating American Indians and Alaska Natives”(Burea od Indian Affairs(BIA)

• The goal was to get native americans lands, colonize!

Natibe Assimilation Policies(On exam)

Laws and practices dessigned to erase the cultures, languages and social systems of specific groups

Dawess Act(1887)

• Broke up communal reservation lands and assigned individual parcels(for farming, parts of land) 

• Native American land decreased from 138 million acres of land to 48 millions acres by 1934

Indian Civilation Act(1819)

• Government residential schools

• Native americans called “savages during this time, were “uncivilized”

Indian Citizenship Act(1924)

• Another way to control natives, “if they become citizens they will be able to believe in western traditions and beliefs”

Indian Adoption Project(1958)(On Exam)

Child Welfare League-campaign for adoption of Native American children by white families

• Led by belief that “they were rescuing Indian children from unworthy families and giving them a chance for future success”

• Emphases placed on “the difference and deficiencies of Indian mothers while they elevated white motherhood as the model of virtue and sacredness”

• Continued the breakup of the Native American family and culture

• By 1968, 395 children were adopted out to non-Native American families

• Social workers were a part of this!

Indian Child Welfare Act(1978)(On exam)

Established Federal standards for the removal and placement of Native American children, and with termination of parental rights, to protect the best interests of Native American children and keep them connected to their families, communities, and Tribes

• Has to be better standards and reasons for removal of Native American children, for example not due to large families living in homes

Carlisle Indian Industrial School(1879-1918)(On Exam)

Was the first government run boarding school

• Goal was to “Kill the Indian and Save the Man”

• Civil War veteran Lt. Col. Richard Henry Prat came up with this idea

• Funded by the U.S. Government tax payers money to build 417 Native American boarding schools

• Forced families to hand over children

• Laws to forcibly remove children from native homes existed until 1980s

Rules For Native American Children-Residential Schools(On exam)

• Students were forced to cut their hair, change their names, stop speaking their Native languages, convert to Christianity, and endure harsh discipline

• Education focused on conversion to Christianity and unskilled or semi skilled labor

• Outing system-free labor for white families

• Physical, sexual, emotional, psychological and spiritual abuse

• Diseases rampant

• Death not uncommon-death rate more than 900/final burial unknown(187 at Carlisle Indian Industrial School)

Kinship care(On Exam)

When grandparents, other relatives, or close family friends raise a child full-time because the biological parents cannot safely care for them

What is/ purpose of Social Welfare?(On exam)

• Social welfare is a safety net of programs, services, and financial help

• Purpose to ensure that all people in a community can meet their basic needs and live with dignity