parental attention to the children are greatly lessened. An industrial depression resulting in the idleness of the bread winners of the family still further decreases the chances of the children for proper care. The very fact that children are brought to the attention of child-caring agencies of any kind is often evidence in itself that the parents are lacking in intelligence or efficiency in the proper care of their own children. Unfortunately we have usually to add to the lack of proper care on the part of the parents, bad housing conditions and unfavorable neighborhood surroundings.

These untoward conditions for the proper development and training of children are unfortunately not of short duration. Children are not usually made dependent, destitute, delinquent or reduced to a state of neglect in a day. It is generally a long and gradual descent downward until the family is finally so demoralized as to call for intervention on the part of some public or private child-saving agency.

From such sources as these, boys and girls come through the juvenile courts, from the almshouses, from the societies to protect children from cruelty, and from charitable associations, to be placed out in family homes by children's aid societies or cared for in institutions. Is not this statement of sources from which the children are received a sufficient and urgent reason for making use of every available facility to help to arrive at a complete knowledge of the physical, mental and moral development of the child as a basis for wise action in providing care and treatment? Some method of examination, observation and study of the child such as is made possible through the Psychological Clinic conducted by Dr. Witmer at the University of Pennsylvania is of great value in a large number of cases. It is needed to supplement and complete the physical examination of the child made by the doctor. It is only by some such method as this that we can secure the proper interpretation and understanding of many of the physical defects which the doctor notes in his examination. On the other hand, after an examination, study and observation of the child by a trained psychologist, a further examination and study of the child by a doctor in the light of what the psychologist has discovered is frequently of great help to both in their treatment of the case. Surely it is important in order to deal properly with the child to have a diagnosis made with respect to its memory, judgment, reason and general mental development. This is particularly true in view of the fact that such a large number of children dealt with by child-caring agencies are abnormal or subnormal by predisposition on account of their bad inheritance and unfavorable environment. The study and observation of children by the psychological clinic methods enables the child-helping agency to adapt its care and training to the needs of the child. It helps us to distinguish between permanent and temporary abnormalities; between characteristics of deficiency and characteristics of backwardness; and, between deficit and surplus in the mental development of the child.

Progressive children's agencies have long since recognized the value of a careful investigation by which they mean chiefly a study of the social and industrial relations of the family whose children are to be the objects of their care. There has also been a recognition to some extent of the value

of a doctor's examination of such children in order to guard against contagious disease and to protect the institution or society from receiving into its care the physically unfit. Should we not recognize the necessity of dealing with the child as a whole and considering not merely the social and industrial aspects of the family from which he comes and the more obvious physical conditions of the child, but also the finer and subtler question of his mental and moral development? Universities have already established experiment stations for the study of domestic animals and vegetation of all kinds. Bulletins of information are sent out to stock-raisers and farmers. Biology, chemistry and geology and other sciences have made some contribution toward the improvement of live stock, fruit and grain. May we not reasonably demand and expect some help toward the improvement of our methods of care and treatment of children from the psychologist, as well as from the doctor and the social worker.

THIRTEENTH ANNUAL MEETING

OF THE

American Academy of Political and Social Science

Philadelphia, April 16, and 17, 1909

It is a source of much gratification to your committee to be able to present an enthusiastic report on the proceedings of the Thirteenth Annual Meeting of the Academy. In addition to the scientific importance of the sessions, the Annual Meeting attracted members from all sections of the country. The opportunity was thus offered to members of the Academy to become acquainted with one another, a feature of much importance in the development of the spirit of co-operation within the Academy membership.

All the sessions attracted large audiences. At each meeting a distinct contribution was made to our knowledge of the important questions involved in race improvement in the United States. At the opening session the Academy enjoyed the co-operation of the Committee on Congestion of Population in New York. A special exhibit was arranged for and through the courtesy of the City Club of Philadelphia; this exhibit was hung in the rooms of the club. Mr. Benjamin C. Marsh, secretary of the committee, explained in full the significance of the charts, diagrams and pictures on Friday morning (April 16th), and at the luncheon gave an informal address on the importance of the movement.

Your committee desire to take this opportunity to express its cordial appreciation of the co-operation of the committee and especially for the contribution of Mr. Marsh to the success of the Annual Meeting.

The Academy was also fortunate in securing the co-operation of Professor Lightner Witmer, of the University of Pennsylvania, who arranged for a special psychological clinic on Saturday morning. April 17th. At this clinic Dr. Witmer dealt with "A Clinical Study and Treatment of Normal and Abnormal Development." Dr. Witmer's remarks were followed with deep interest by the members of the Academy.

The thanks of the Academy are also due to the members of the Committee on Program, the local Reception Committee, of which Mr. Samuel F. Houston was chairman; and to the Ladies' Reception Committee, of which Mrs. Charles Custis Harrison was chairman. We desire to make our acknowledgment to the University Club and the Manufacturers' Club, both of Philadelphia, for the courtesies which they extended to visiting members of the Academy. We also wish to express our obligation to Major Joseph G. Rosengarten (163)

and Mr. Stuart Wood, whose entertainment of the speakers on Friday and Saturday evenings constituted one of the most delightful social occasions of the Annual Meeting. The Academy is also under deep obligations to those who contributed to the Special Annual Meeting Fund, which the Academy must raise in order to defray the expenses of the Annual Meeting.

In addition to the formal papers contained in the proceedings, we append herewith the briefer remarks made by Mr. Marsh, and those of the presiding officers at the various sessions. Mr. Marsh said:

City planning in America may be characterized as chiefly an æsthetic development until within a few years, while the city planning of German cities is primarily social and economic. Foreign cities have standardized the conditions of housing of their working population and have attempted to enforce these standards whenever possible. This they have done through the unique system of districting the cities into zones or sections in which only buildings of a certain number of stories and covering a certain proportion of the site may be erected.

American cities have not as yet standardized housing conditions and have been prevented from enforcing building laws which they thoroughly appreciate are necessary and feasible owing to the fear that such regulations will be considered unconstitutional; since the owner of property in one part of the city, it is alleged, should be given equal right to develop his property and to secure all the income possible, as has been permitted to owners of property in the most congested parts of the city. So long as this opinion prevails it will be impossible to secure any normal development of American communities. The American law says that a city that has once permitted too intensive building is eternally committed to that policy; and that, if any change is made, it must be such as can be uniformly enforced.

The standardizing of American cities should, unquestionably, be similar to that of English cities, except, of course, the congested centers, where property rights would unquestionably be confiscated by attempting to enforce any healthy standards. In England the minimum ideal for the average workingman's family is a cheap, but well-built, house with four or five suitable rooms, together with a quarter-acre garden, or at least with a fair-sized courtyard. The site should be a healthy one and the house perfectly sanitary, welllighted, well-ventilated and well-drained. And this accommodation must be supplied at a low rental, or it will be found beyond the means of the working classes. It behooves American cities to adopt such a system at once in sections where it is possible, since every year of delay will increase the difficulty of establishing such a normal standard.

The value of abundant provision of fresh air and sunlight surrounding each house not only to lower the death rate, but to improve the general health and physique of the people, and particularly of the children, is clearly evidenced by the following figures:

In order, however, to preserve areas where working people can afford the conditions essential to their maximum efficiency, emphasis must be put upon the importance of adapting transit facilities to the development of the community. An expensive means of transit means expensive land. Expensive land means high rents. High rents mean, generally, overcrowding; and thus a vicious circle of exploitation is started.

The location of factories is, also, an important factor in the development of a community, since workingmen will not live where they will have to spend more than half an hour from the time they leave their homes until they reach their place of work. Hence, it is of the greatest importance that the city should be harmoniously developed.

At the session of Friday afternoon, April 16th, Dr. Abraham Jacobi, of New York City, presided. Dr. Jacobi spoke as follows:

If I were to present an address to the American Academy of Political and Social Science I should wish to select as my text a sentence culled from Benjamin Franklin, who declares philosophy to be useless unless it leads to some practical good. Never has anybody expressed the quintessence of individual and collective civilized life more pointedly than that shrewd and wise man. The combination of science and its practical application was never better understood and interpreted; though science was in its infancy at his time and its application limited accordingly. Since then the discovery of the globe has been going on; electricity and steam have been rendered subservient to human needs, the structure of the human body has been revealed and its normal and morbid functions have been studied; the declaration of the independence of physiology from metaphysics has been declared, so that each may find and follow its own road; industry. production, and commerce have enriched and revolutionized the world; wealth has increased to an unthoughtof degree, and the material required for universal well-being multiplied a hundred-fold; the microbic enemies of our race have been discovered and many of them conquered; the duration of life has been doubled,-and still the happiness of mankind is an unsolved problem.

That happiness depends on the conscientious application of all sorts of knowledge to the physical, intellectual, and moral wants of man. Both knowledge and general culture are slowly growing plants which Schiller said demand a blissful sky, much careful nursing, and a long number of springs.

I think I behold here one of these springs seen by the poet's eye. Men