From Mothers' Pensions to Aid to Dependent Children in the Great Plains the Course from Charity to Entitlement R

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Fall 2012 FROM MOTHERS' PENSIONS TO AID TO DEPENDENT CHILDREN IN THE GREAT PLAINS THE COURSE FROM CHARITY TO ENTITLEMENT R. Alton Lee University of Oklahoma

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R.ALTONLEE

The most important third-party movement of the 1960s. Henry Loucks of South Dakota, in American history emerged out of the one-time president of the National Farmers' social and economic chaos brewing in the Alliance and Industrial Union and chairman Great Plains in the last two decades of the of the Populist convention in Omaha in 1891, nineteenth century. The maelstrom, labeled labeled his group's primary functions as being Populism, contained a powerful, indeed a truly social, educational, financial, and political. He revolutionary message-that man was his constantly emphasized that maintaining the brother's keeper. This concept proved to have principles of Populism was more important consistent influence in America, dating from than gaining political office, and he was suc the Populists, through the Progressives and the cessful in this struggle for several elections by New Deal depression era, to the Great Society pursuing a policy in opposition to fusion with the Democrats.' Loucks lost control in 1896, though, when the Populists insisted on collaborating with the Key Words: depression, fatherless, OAS!, pensions, T. R. conference, welfare Democrats. This unity failed to coalesce suf ficiently, and William Jennings Bryan led his R. Alton Lee received his bachelor's and master's degrees party to a narrow defeat, sparking the downfall from Kansas State Teachers College and his PhD from of the Populist Party. Many of the more radical the University of Oklahoma, studying under Gilbert members joined the Socialist Party while the C. Fite. He spent his last thirty years of academic life majority returned to their previous political at the University of South Dakota, specializing in the Truman-Eisenhower administrations. Since retiring allegiances. The Progressive movement arose in 1996, he has concentrated on Kansas and South out of the ashes of Populism, and its lead Dakota history. His latest book is entitled Principle ers proceeded to enact many of the agrarian over Party, a history of the Populist movement in South reforms the People's Party had advocated.2 Dakota. A sea change in the evolution of public policy toward the poor emerged around the [GPQ 32 (Fall 2012): 261-71] turn of the century. The ancient concept,

261 262 GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY, FALL 2012

emphasized by the biblical injunction that "the vided pensions for widows, orphans, and other poor always ye will have with you" (John 12:8), dependents of slain soldiers. Then the growth convinced man over the centuries that the of urbanization and alterations in the attitudes poor were lazy or incapable, and if they could of disaffected rural components, along with not support themselves, they would have to be dissatisfaction with orphanages and objections confined to poor farms or poorhouses, out of to institutional regimentation, further affected public sight, and survive on philanthropy or this postwar thinking.4 perish. Slowly, Progressives began to empathize Different groups of reformers tried various with the children of mothers who had lost approaches to solving the problem of broken or their breadwinner husbands through deser poverty-stricken homes. Some states developed tion or death in the factory system and needed foster home programs to remove children from monetary assistance to feed their sometimes orphanages. The handling of problem children quite numerous progeny. The family financial led to the creation of juvenile courts. The fail condition was not the fault of the mother or the ure to protect children in the workplace initi children, Progressives argued, and it was in the ated the development of child labor laws and long-term interest of society that the offspring compulsory education provisions. By the turn be educated and nourished by a loving mother of the century most of these efforts focused who should always be available to care for on preserving the family. Reformers believed them. The Progressive movement subsequently children should attend school and receive spawned numerous reforms that the Populists nutritious meals, which meant preserving and had originated or would have supported. These supporting the home. The mother should main included promulgation of child labor laws tain her home to provide these benefits for her that established maximum hours, prohibited children. In addition, many juvenile judges had hazardous work conditions, and prevented concluded that the children who became "bad" poor children from being apprenticed to clean did so because their working mothers did not public restrooms in order to survive. In addi have the time to supervise or care for them.5 tion, most states imposed standards of maxi Many reformers saw mothers' pension plans mum hours and minimum wages for working as the embodiment of social insurance prin women, and "Mothers' Pensions," part of the ciples. As the Industrial Revolution made child new social welfare policy that became a precur labor less vital to the northern capitalist, the sor of Aid to Dependent Children (ADC) of home and childhood came to be seen increas the Social Security Act of 1935.3 The impact of ingly as a separate stage in the life cycle. The these changes is still felt today in the continu development of the whole child became more ing debate over the role of government in the important. Reformers began to see that the health and welfare of the people. growing numbers of poor single mothers and their children were becoming too great a burden EARLY CHANGES for private charity or the old system of public assistance. A different approach was needed.6 The change began with interest in war Women reformers who led this movement orphans dating from the Civil War. A belief sought both uplift for "the unfortunate" and a in treating children differently from adults role for themselves either as "objects of grati resulted in campaigns to remove orphans from tude or figures of authority." Unlike their male almshouses and place them in kinder institu counterparts, female reformers "needed to be tions. Schools, such as Mercer in Pennsylvania, legitimated for their public sphere activism" were established for the purpose of educating by gaining both "respect and status." As Jane destitute children of slain Union soldiers. Ohio Addams explained the settlement house move also provided food and shelter for their Civil ment in 1892, women had "a subjective neces War orphans. A national law in 1862 pro- sity" for their reform activities. The awareness

of cruelty to children in the 1870s led to an assistant, a statistician, two special agents, "placing out" children in foster care. By the and nine clerks-and thus was limited in turn of the century, this concern had evolved choosing its· investigations. Julia Lathrop, the into a desire to help retrieve these children first chief, therefore focused her bureau's activi from institutions and to assist their mothers in ties on infant mortality and birth registra caring for them.7 tion.lO Reformers increasingly concluded that pov ThE WHITE HOUSE CONFERENCE erty often was caused by inequities in society, not by personal defects of the poor, and that Societal leaders saw a definite need to help their situation was not the result of laziness but widows with children who had lost their bread of business cycles or other explainable phenom winner through death, desertion, permanent enon beyond their control. As they had done disability, prison, or other circumstances. This with other aspects of society, reformers began extension of social insurance principles spread analyzing poverty scientifically and insisting like "wildfire," as reformers, influenced by the its eradication should be approached through newly emerging public philosophy, quickly expansion of public welfare, which could com coalesced around the movement and pressed it mand the mobilization of the entire commu to enactment in state legislatures. "It promised nity. Public welfare should be professionalized to be cheap and morally uplifting, while raising and the trained professional worker's expertise no specter of dissolute male misfits lining up brought to bear to attack the source of poverty for their monthly liquor money." Besides, the through scientific social action. Families should pension costs were quite similar to the outlay not be broken up because of poverty alone. of breaking up families and institutionalizing The destitute mother, President Roosevelt the children. The movement received a great had asserted, should be assisted in keeping her stimulus from President Theodore Roosevelt's family together, by whatever means.u White House Conference on the Care of Some critics viewed Mothers' Pensions Dependent Children in 1909.8 as a design to "forestall disturbances among Roosevelt opened his conference by present unemployed and poorly paid workers during ing the economic plight of these "widows." He times of economic distress and to maintain a offered the goal of helping the mother to "keep large supply of low-paid workers during times of her own home and keep the children in it, that prosperity." Two social work historians saw the is the best thing possible for the child." The conflict as "a contest between two concepts of question of whether to make this assistance social control: traditional laissez-faire self-help available from public or private sources, he left and the .second by the emerging concept of up to the conferees. Their legacy of fourteen preventive child-saving, which sought to elimi points proved to be the foundation of several nate child labor and child prostitution and future reforms, including the highly impor improve nutritional and educational opportu tant Children's Bureau, created within the nities, and preserve families intact." "Worthy Department of Labor, and Mothers' Pensions.9 widows" might be assisted in maintaining Reformers initially had high hopes for the their homes and caring for their children with Children's Bureau, but Congress chronically regular financial support. Most of these pro underfunded it and the agency seldom func grams required the mother to be "a fit person, tioned as expected. Congress charged it with physically, mentally, and morally" to raise investigating "all matters pertaining to the her children properly. Mothers subsequently welfare" of children of all classes, "but [it] only discovered, among other things, this entailed infrequently met expectations" because of the attending church regularly. Many states that lack of financial support. It had an annual offered Mothers' Pensions did so because of budget of $25,640 to support its staff-a chief, a communal guilt feeling of responsibility for

the husband's death on the job or his failure to the widow was the recipient of sympathy, as she earn sufficient wages to provide for his family, had no control over the death of her husband. or because his death was due to preventable None but the unfeeling viewed these pensions accident. Most of these state laws gave counties as a dole but rather saw them as a payment for the choice of deciding whether or not to par services.14 ticipate. Most of the states in the Great Plains, Two major women's organizations, the at least at the beginning, tended to charge General Federation of Women's Clubs and their county courts with administering these the National Congress of Mothers, gave ines programs.12 timable assistance to the movement. These The quest for mothers' aid, or welfare to help groups were supported by a sense of "woman's raise children, raised questions that still domi influence in an emerging industrial system nate present welfare policy discussions. How that created a new social hierarchy, new social can single mothers be helped without encour conditions, and altered values." Using their aging single motherhood? Who was deserving? increasing leisure time and newfound Victorian Who should also be required to work? What mores, women sought to impose on society the if the mother and children could not survive values of home, family, and chastity that they on the small pension and the pitiful wages had long defended. These associations also she could earn? Did this pension entitle the condemned comics, cigarettes, intemperance, state to police the recipients' behavior? What and motion pictures, because they contributed is the difference between an entitlement and to the depravity of the poor and of recent charity? Does this welfare entitle the state to immigrants. IS inspect the home? Should the recipients bear Even more than the General Federation the stigma of poor relief? Could this pension of Women's Clubs, the National Congress of be considered wages for the mothers' efforts Women strove to promote the pension move to raise citizens for the state? Would these ment, endorsing the concept at its annual pensions ultimately subvert women's fallacy of convention in 1911, two years after Roosevelt's dependence upon men?13 summons. In cooperation with their local clubs, their Parent-Teacher Association (PTAs) MOTHER'S PENSIONS PROMOTED held "study" sessions, presented bills to legis latures on the subject, and lobbied for their No one wanted to make pensions too easy reforms. Members of the National Consumers for recipients to acquire. The usually meager League, who were younger, better educated, stipend forced many widows into another mar and had a higher social status, also supported riage or into peripheral areas of the economy. women's and children's social legislation, At least one-third of them were forced to including Mothers' Pensions. They formed seek employment. They cleaned houses, took special leagues or other support groups to lobby in washing, and did various types of sewing, for improvements. Individuals such as Rabbi areas typically considered "woman's work." Stephen Wise lent their considerable prestige Reformers warned that maintaining these jobs and influence to promote the legislation.l6 of breadwinner as well as being a mother was The Delineator, edited by novelist Theodore "more than the average woman could bear." If Dreiser, was a popular magazine for women, the situation continued, "the home crumbles" published by the makers of Butterick fashions. and "the physical and moral well-being of It was sold both through subscriptions and in the mother and the children is impaired and stores across the country along with Butterick seriously menaced," according to a popular patterns for women's dresses. The magazine magazine. "Even a poor home," said another, featured fashion, literature, and civic affairs "offers a better chance for the child's develop and was the third-largest women's magazine ment than an excellent institution." Usually in the nation, with a circulation of almost one

million. Editor Dreiser was most interested law for Kansas City. A few months later, juvenile in popular reforms and eagerly supported the court judge Merritt W. Pinckney convinced the concept of Mothers' PensionsP Illinois legislature to establish a broad program Journalist William Hard assumed control that was later limited to widows and citizens, of the magazine's policy column in 1911 and eliminating guardians and recent immigrants changed its emphasis from children's rights to from the program. Then a few settlement house legal rights of mothers. He established a new women, such as Jane Addams, Julie Lathrop, organization in the April 1912 issue called the and Edith and Grace Abbott, took up the Home League that was designed to activate cause. While 1912 was an off year for many women politically. In August 1912 he began state legislatures, Nebraska and South Dakota a campaign to enact pension laws for moth created a mothers' pension program during that ers in the remaining states that were without session. The floodgates opened in 1914 when them. Here he described the Mothers' Pensions forty-two legislatures convened, twenty-seven of then in existence, using as a bad example the them considered the legislation, and seventeen story of an ironworker killed on the job and a enacted some form of the scheme, including judge in the process of committing the widow's Kansas and North Dakota in 1915. Almost all seven children to various institutions. The these plans established maximum pensions per following month he urged women to join the child, defined a "proper person" in order to bean Home League, and through the Delineator he eligible mother, and required proof of "extreme would keep them posted on how the reform poverty.'; Normally, during the early twentieth was faring in their state as well as how they century, it took two decades for twenty states could assist the movement. His campaign to adopt a Progressive innovation, but forty continued through 1913 when other journals, states enacted Mothers' Pensions in less than such as Good Housekeeping and Colliers, took one decade, with Roosevelt's 1909 White House up the cause, as well as the Hearst chain of conference on children having a positive impact newspapers, led by Phoebe Hearst, who became on the movement.20 a major leader of the reform.IS In 1913 Nebraska took the route of amending The Mothers' Pensions movement went its law on juvenile courts to permit the grant hand in hand with the suffrage effort. The ing of Mothers' Pensions. The state passed a legislatures that approved the pension pro new law in 1915 allowing mothers to petition gram also endorsed women's protective labor county courts for assistance if she was "a proper legislation, child labor laws, and compulsory person" but unable to care for her children. The education. In turn, the franchise for women children would remain under her guardianship gave impetus to these reforms. Although full and she would be paid no more than ten dollars women's suffrage was not granted until 1919 in a month for each child. The law used "person" both Kansas and South Dakota, as Mark Leff to include fathers and guardians of "dependent observes, "the second decade of the twentieth and neglected children." In 1915 North Dakota century may have marked the height of politi enacted such a law as part of its Nonpartisan cal influence for women." It was in this decade League program, giving mothers of children that much women's and children's protective under fourteen no more than fifteen dollars each legislation was enacted, in addition to national month. The mother must be a "fit" person and a Prohibition. In fact, women's groups "exerted a resident of the county for one year, and she had powerful influence" on these reforms.1 9 to apply to the county court for inclusion in the The pension movement specifically began in plan. South Dakota passed its law in 1913. The 1911 with the enactment of two programs, one county courts there would administer the law in Illinois and the other in Missouri. Juvenile covering children under age fourteen. The act court judge E. E. Porterfield of Jackson County was amended in 1915 to include divorced moth persuaded the Missouri legislature to enact the ers. Both laws provided for fifteen dollars monthly

for each child under fourteen. If there were more parents of idiots, and of children otherwise than one child, the measure required seven helpless, requiring the attention of their par dollars for each younger child. The mother was ents, and are unable to provide for said chil allowed to work a maximum of one day per week. dren themselves, such annual allowance as She must be a "proper" person "morally, physi will not exceed the charge of their allowance cally, and mentally," and after a careful examina in the ordinary mode, the said board taking tion of the home, a report would be made to the the usual amount of charges in like cases as court. A closer look at the legislative process in the rule for making such allowance, ... any enacting the program in Kansas illustrates what child or children under the age of sixteen took place in most of the Great Plains agrarian years ... the mother being a widow, divorced states in establishing these social justice plans.21 ... or abandoned ... and bona fide resident First, Progressive Republicans in Kansas of the county ... and of good moral character inserted a plank in their 1912 platform. Sub and a fit person ... and is financially unable sequently, on January 13, 1915, House Bill 2 was to support such child or children. introduced in the House of Representatives. One month later it was "completely revised" to read: These Democratic legislators appeared ready and willing to require counties to support To provide for the partial support of moth numerous groups of society's poor, by approv ers whose husbands are dead or who have ing the measure 31 to 1, with 8 not voting. become permanently incapacitated for work The measure went to conference, both houses by reason of physical or mental infirmity, or approved the conference report, and Governor confined in prisons or hospitals when such Capper signed the bill on March 24, 1915.23 mothers have children under fourteen years The senate altered the house bill by moving of age, and are citizens of the United States control of the program from the county probate of America, and residents of the county in judges to the county commissioners. Pensions which application for relief is made, and would be recommended by a board of men and providing for the probationary institution, women whose decisions required approval by care, and supervision of the family for whose the county commissioners. This would permit benefit such support is provided, and provide greater privacy than would be possible with the for funds therefor.22 judges. The boards would be composed of three women, one chosen by the juvenile judge, one by Sixty-six Republicans, joined by nine the county commissioners, and one by the dis Progressives, provided Governor Arthur trict judge. Both the judge of the juvenile court Capper with "a substantial majority" in the and the chairman of the county commissioners lower house, and they passed and forwarded would be members and would serve without this bill to the forty-member senate, which pay. Pensions started at ten dollars per child the Democrats controlled by twenty-one to but could not exceed twenty-five dollars for any nineteen. The Democrats in the upper house one family. If the mother proved to be an unfit opposed Capper's program of economy in gov person, the court could order the children to ernment, and they substantially revised and be removed from her custody. Adoption of this expanded the measure to include: pension program required a majority vote in any county. Supporters of the measure insisted this The board of county commissioners may in requirement would "cripple" the program.24 their discretion allow and pay to poor persons who may become chargeable as paupers and ADMINISTERING THE LAW who are of mature years and sound mind, and how from their general character will Advocates were correct in their belief that probably be benefited thereby, and also the opponents would cripple the law. It was one

thing for the legislature to be generous to the poor with county funds, but another to make sure that the counties actually followed through on support for mothers. Governor Capper was soon inundated with complaints from mothers, written on scraps of paper with a pencil, who had been refused pensions. As the legislative session of 1917 opened, the governor informed the legislators that "most of the counties refused to pay these pensions." Capper therefore was compelled to ask them to revise the law and "make it compulsory upon the counties to pay."25 Not surprisingly, abuses occurred. In July 1917 the governor received a letter, written in pencil, from a Mrs. Cora Simpson. Her hus band, she said, had deserted, leaving her with children ages twelve, ten, and seven. Capper referred the letter to the editor of the newspa per in the town where the woman lived, the Lawrence Journal World. The editor discovered Mrs. Simpson was black and her husband was FIG. 1. Governor Arthur Capper with a young girl. formerly "a porter" in Waldham's Barber Shop Courtesy of Kansas State Historical Society. in Lawrence. The editor in turn forwarded the missive to the Social Service League. That Frank C. Price of Clark County drew up a bill organization's president talked to Mrs. Simpson that was "simplicity itself," and March 5 of that about the letter. She insisted that she did not session was devoted to mothers' pension bills write it, so he concluded the author was some "by special order of the senate." After consider one who hoped the governor would sympathize ing the house measure and others, the upper and "enclose money in his reply."26 body debated the Price bill, voting for several County commissioners often discredited amendments before accepting the proposal. the program by listing its provisions in their The senate changes came on March 8 when "pauper" fund, thus humiliating the appli they were accepted by a vote of 27 to 11, with cants. The governor's secretary responded to 2 abstaining, and the lower house accepted one mother that obtaining a mothers' pension these changes. Governor Capper signed the "ought to be a roll of honor instead of a thing bill into law that month. The statute amended discreditable to the widows." The secretary the current requirement for commissioners to empathized with the widow, noting that if her grant pensions to poor people by expanding county clerk would "do the right thing and list it to mothers with children sixteen years and your name, with others securing pensions, it younger. The county commissioners would will remove all proceedings with the pauper appoint three qualified women "to investigate class." Changes obviously were needed.27 any application" and make a recommendation A bill was introduced oil January 22, 1917, to the commissioners, who would determine and on February 7 the house of representatives the amount of the pension up to a maximum of accepted it by vote of 88 to 9, with 28 members thirty dollars monthly. The program was now abstaining. "A half dozen mothers' pension officially established in the Sunflower State.28 bills" had been introduced in that senate, "and No more than half the counties in the serious objection had been made to all." Senator United States actually provided Mothers'

Pensions before the Great Depression forced Julia Lathrop and Grace Abbott were financial revisions in the system. In addition, primarily responsible for bringing Mothers' the expenditures varied widely in those coun Pensions into the Social Security program. ties that offered them. The movement that ADC "only looked the same as mothers' aid; it spread . like wildfire across the nation seemed focused on the child and failed to include any to burn out quickly, and supporters appeared support for the mother." In addition, federal to vanish within months or a few years. The funding was set at one-fourth, not one-third, of reformers appeared more concerned about the total stipend. The discussions formulating enacting the program than in implementing it ADC centered on the mother-child separation and seeking adequate financial support to con and also on the child as "having a unique claim tinue it. The range of the state stipends in the on the state." Another difference stemmed Great Plains ran from highs of $22.93 in North from the fact that by the 1930s, social work had Dakota and $21.78 in South Dakota to lows of been separated from social reform; settlement $17.81 in Nebraska and $14.05 in Kansas. In work had "settled into a mode less of reform Louisiana, by contrast, the per capita expendi advocacy and more of service provision." ture was three cents. This was the basic chil While ADC was jointly funded by federal dren's aid program, penuriously financed and and state sources, little changed because both highly criticized, that was in effect when the entities tended to be on the stingy side. ADC Great Depression struck.29 was viewed with suspicion because taxpayers continued to look upon dependent children THE GREAT DEPRESSION with skepticism. A class double standard was also maintained. Women of higher education Apathy for the support of pensions was "supported careers, public sphere activism, and jarred by the reality of the depression and by economic independence." Mothers of ADC demagogic proposals to solve current poverty. children were relegated to "domesticity and The Social Security Act of 1935 contained economic dependence upon men."32 four parts, several of which had roots in the Viewed through the long perspective of the Progressive era. One part provided for Aid development of social work, Mothers' Pensions to Dependent Children (ADC), which the was a phase between the nineteenth-century Children's Bureau continued to press for. county poor commissioner and the New Deal's Eventually this law provided for a match Aid to Dependent Children in the Great ing grant to state programs supervised by Plains. As Roy Lubove expressed it, the pen the Social Security Board: It was "a genuine sion phase was an attempt "to transform the improvement over mothers' pensions" because old archaic county agent office of coal and gro the monthly average benefit increased nation ceries into a real department of social service ally from $22.51 in 1931 to $32.13 in 1939.30 along the lines of the charity organization soci As historian Linda Gordon expresses it, ety." Like many Progressive reforms, mothers' "mothers' aid influence did not just seep into pensions were more diligently promoted as laws ADC ... it was actively transported there by to be passed than as programs to be adequately a coherent network of welfare agitators" from funded. The strictures against helping fami the Progressive era. Many of the previous lead lies with unemployed but able-bodied fathers ers increased their national influence during denied aid to many very needy families, so the the New Deal, operating from the Children's program may also have increased the deser Bureau in Frances Perkins's Department of tion rate among fathers. But more importantly, Labor. When the depression struck, they were it helped alleviate the poverty of significant the "leading federal welfare promoters and numbers of families. It also laid the founda for better or for worse- their perspective tion for welfare as a right or entitlement, not determined the shape of ADC."3! . as a gift}3

The Great Depression sorely tested these to propose two amendments to the state con mothers' pension programs. Agricultural states, stitution to the voters. One made provision for especially South Dakota, suffered a terrible the state to supplement the role of the county second blow from devastating droughts that commissioners in providing relief for the needy. curtailed or halted most agricultural produc This change, many careful observers noted, was tion during much of the 1930s. The Dirty unnecessary because of an earlier state supreme Thirties witnessed the cessation of produc court ruling that upheld the constitutional tion of most crops on the High Plains, except power of the state to provide needed relief, a Russian thistle, which served as meager forage ruling Landon and the Republicans wished to for livestock. ignore. The other transformed the county com The Children's Bureau of the Department missioners into Boards of Social Welfare, which of Labor conducted a survey in 1931 and found would be responsible for determining eligibility that twelve of twenty-two states with no moth for relief assistance under a state office umbrella. er's pension program gave some type of aid to Modern ADC, like Mothers' Pensions before it, poor families. This was also true for five of ten suffered from a lack of popularity and support, states that made no legal provision for aid when and counties tended to economize by taking the father deserted. Thus, administrative dis advantage of this lack of public sympathy for cretion could be, and often was, made to work the "deserving poor." Kansans expressed eager for these destitute families.34 ness in ratifying these two amendments in the general election of 1936, although the legislature OLD AGE SECURITY INSURANCE CHANGES implemented the system in its next session, but the electorate consistently failed to finance it The Social Security Act came into being in adequately.35 August 1935 because New Dealers felt the need The New Deal also aided poor families to lessen the political pressure from left-wing through enactment of the food stamp plan in demagogues, such as Dr. Francis Townsend of 1939. This idea came from grocers, both whole California and Fr. Charles Coughlin of Detroit. sale and retail, and those New Dealers concerned The multidimensional law provided many with helping poor people while also reducing routes to the modernization of social welfare. agricultural surpluses. The law permitted whole It improved the federal-state unemployment salers to purchase surplus commodities and sell compensation program. It also assisted states' them to grocers who retailed them to housewives, programs to help old people with monthly pen both rich and poor. "Reliefers" could purchase sions. Also included were a tax on incomes to orange stamps for one dollar each and receive free provide funds for retirement, or what became blue stamps worth 50 percent of the orange ones. popularly known as Social Security, and a plan These stamps could then be redeemed for food to assist states in relief of their destitute, blind, products, but not alcohol, tobacco, or "luxury" and children in need of support. The latter, items. The plan sought both to provide purchas which was the replacement for the mothers' ing power for people on relief and to increase pension program, became known as Aid to agricultural income.36 Dependent Children (ADC). The national Social Security office notified CONCLUSIONS the states that a single state agency must admin ister their program, and all assistance must con The mothers' pension concept should have sist of money payments, not goods. Kansas, like played a significant role in relief during the most other states, had no machinery to operate Progressive movement. The reform rapidly such a program, so Governor Alf Landon called swept the nation, but for various reasons the a special session of the legislature in the summer concept of helping poor children failed to melt of 1936, after "the [wheat] harvest," as he put it, the hearts of taxpayers and never became pop-

© 2012 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln 270 GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY, FALL 2012 ular or supported adequately. County commis 5. Leff, "Consensus for Reform," 400. sioners seldom looked with favor on the idea, 6. Ibid., 397, 400. 7. Linda Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled: Single but it served to bridge the gap to the New Deal Mothers and the History of Welfare, 1890-1938 era when reformers enjoyed more sympathetic (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994), hearings. The county commissioners, under 44-45. new titles, continued to frown on assisting poor 8. Howard, "Sowing the Seeds," 193. children who had no financial support from 9. Leff, "Consensus for Reform," 399. their fathers. Under ADC, national sources 10. Howard, "Sowing the Seeds," 208. 11. Roy Lubove, The Struggle for Social Security, provided only one-fourth, rather than the usual 1900-1940 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh one-half, with a maximum of six dollars for the Press, 1986),95-96. first child and four dollars each for additional 12. Muriel W. Pumphrey and Ralph E. Pumphrey, children. It should be noted, however, that "The Widows' Pension Movement, 1900-1930: these dependent children were the unemploy Preventive Child Saving or Social Control?," in Social Welfare or Social Control?, ed. Walter 1. abIes that were supposed to be cared for by the Trattner (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, state, not the nation.37 1983),51,52,55. This essay was part of a presenta Inevitably, ADC took on the shortcom tion at the 1989 meeting of the Organization of ings of the previous Mothers' Pensions-low American Historians. benefit levels, middle-class behavioral norms, 13. Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled, 37-38. 14. Leff, "Consensus for Reform," 397-98. discrimination along racial and class lines, and 15. Ibid., 408. state variance of administration-even while 16. Ibid., 409-10. it served as a stepping-stone in acclimating 17. Theda Skocpol, Marjorie Abend-Wein, citizens and politicians to the concept of public Christopher Howard, and Susan Goodrich Lehman, welfare. Although the national Social Security "Women's Associations and the Enactment of Mothers' Pensions in the United States," American office required national authorization, states Political Science Review 8 (1998): 4; Gordon, Pitied could designate other direct responsibility and but Not Entitled, 57. some took advantage of this outlet. Overall, 18. Theda Skocpol, Protecting Soldiers and Mothers: though, there was a gradual upward shift from The Political Origins of Social Policy in the United States courts to state authority. Soon (1939) half the (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992),434-43. 19. Leff, "Consensus for Reform," 408. For the states required new "fitness" requirements of passage of this legislation in Kansas, see R. Alton "a suitable family home," often structured to Lee, Farmers vs. Wage Earners: Organized Labor fit their definition of behavioral requirements. in Kansas, 1860-1960 (Lincoln: University of Mothers' Pensions had supplied a bridge to the Nebraska Press, 2005), chap. 3. modern world of charity for children.38 20. Leff, "Consensus for Reform," 400-402; Skocpol et al., "Women's Associations," 687. 21. Annie G. Porritt, Laws Affecting Women and NOTES Children in the Suffrage and Non-Suffrage States, 2nd ed. New York: National Woman Suffrage 1. R. Alton Lee, Principle Over Party: The Publication, 1917. Farmers Alliance and Populism in South Dakota, 22. Kansas House of Representatives, House 1880-1900 (Pierre: South Dakota State Historical Journal, 1915, 756. Society Press, 2011), 21. 23. Homer E. Sokolofsky, Arthur Capper: Pub 2. Ibid., chap. 8. lisher, Politician, and Philanthropist (Lawrence: 3. Christopher Howard, "Sowing the Seeds University of Kansas Press, 1962),89; Kansas Senate, of 'Welfare': The Transformation of Mothers' Senate Journal, 1915, March 1915,545-46,1088. The Pensions, 1900-1940," Journal of Public Policy 4 house vote on the conference report was 86 to 4. (1992): 189. Kansas House, Journal, 1915,981. 4. Mark H. Leff, "Consensus for Reform: The 24. Topeka State]ournal, February 17, 1915. Mothers'-Pension Movement in the Progressive 25. Papers of Governor Arthur Capper, 27-08- Era," Social Service Review 47 (Spring 1973): 398; R. 07-06, box 679, folder 30a, Kansas State Historical Alton Lee, From Snake Oil to Medicine: Pioneering Society, Topeka (hereafter cited as KSHS). Public Health (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2007), 2. 26. Capper Papers, 27-08-02-06, KSHS.

27. Secretary to the Governor to "Mrs. A.M.B.," 34. Howard, "Sowing the Seeds," 199. October 26, 1916, Capper Papers, 27-08-01-06, box 35. Peter Fearon, Kansas in the Great Depression: 3, folder 140, KSHS. Work Relief, theDole, and Rehabilitation (Columbia: 28. Kansas, House Journal, 1917, 318; Kansas, University of Missouri Press, 2007), 238-39. For the Senate Journal, 1917, 644; Topeka Daily Capital, story of the amendment that permitted the state to March 6, 1917. play this role in relief, see R. Alton Lee, "[Not] a 29. Howard, "Sowing the Seeds," 202. Thin Dime: Kansas Relief Politics in the Campaign 30. Ibid., 215. See pp. 210-16 for thorough discus- of 1936," The Historian 67 (Fall 2005): 474-88. sionof ADC. 36. Rachel Louis Moran, "Consuming Relief: 31. Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled, 67. Food Stamps and the New Welfare of the New Deal," 32. Ibid., 100, 101, 107. Journal of American History 97 (March 2011): 1007-8. 33. Lubove, Struggle for Social Security, 108; Leff, 37. Fearon, Kansas in the Great Depression, 239. "Consensus for Reform," 414-15. 38. Howard, "Sowing the Seeds," 214.

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