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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2009
Half a century before Jacob Riis and Jane Addams groped for the conscience of the nation with their exposures of urban misery, a few determined citizens were already fighting the long battle to liberate the huddled wretches of the cities. In Boston some of the techniques of the later social agencies were anticipated as early as the 1830s by Joseph Tuckerman's Association of Delegates from the Benevolent Societies, but it was New York City which really pointed the way to the future. In the twenty years before the Civil War a number of bodies were founded in the city which in time became permanent welfare institutions. They were in large part the products of conditions similar to those which produced the scientific philanthropy, Social Gospel, settlement house and other social movements of the late nineteenth century, and, like those movements, they anticipated many of the attitudes of the social workers of the Progressive era. It would be a mistake to press the parallel between ante-bellum reform and social Progressivism too far, but the two phenomena shared some common characteristics. Like many Progressives, the urban reformers of the ante-bellum years tended to come from pious middle-class backgrounds, and a number of them began life as missionaries before being drawn into social work. They were a fact-finding generation, investigating social problems with an unprecedented thoroughness, energetically uncovering evidence and compiling statistics with which to open the eyes of an indifferent public. They were very conscious of the social chasm between the rich and the poor and they did what they could to bridge it.
1 The origins and histories of these bodies may be largely traced in their annual reports: AICP, First Annual Report (1845), et seq.Google Scholar; New York Prison Association (NYPA), First Report (1844), et seq.Google Scholar; New York Juvenile Asylum (NYJA), First Annual Report (1853), et seq.Google Scholar; CAS, First Annual Report (1854), et seq.Google Scholar; Incorporation of the Five Points House of Industry: Articles of Incorporation, By-Laws, and Addresses of the Trustees and Superintendent (New York, 1854)Google Scholar. See also Brandt, Lilian, Growth and Development of the AICP and COS (A Preliminary and Exploratory Review) (New York, 1942)Google Scholar; Lubove, Roy, ‘ The New York Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor: The Formative Years ’, New-York Historical Society Quarterly, 43 (07, 1959), 307–27Google Scholar; Barnard, William F., Forty Years at the Five Points: A Sketch of the Five Points House of Industry (New York, 1893)Google Scholar. The child-saving institutions have been well analysed in Hawes, Joseph M., Children in Urban Society: Juvenile Delinquency in Nineteenth-Century America (New York, 1971)Google Scholar. The evangelical origins of the AICP and the Five Points House of Industry have been splendidly illuminated in Rosenberg, Carroll Smith, Religion and the Rise of the American City: The New York City Mission Movement, 1812–1870 (Ithaca and London, 1971)Google Scholar; thus little attention has been paid to that dimension here. Rothman, David J., The Discovery of the Asylum: Social Order and Disorder in the New Republic (Boston and Toronto, 1971)Google Scholar, interestingly analyses the social functions of welfare and penal institutions in a disconcertingly fluid society.
2 The United States Review, 11 (September 1853), 207.
3 New York Times, 7 April 1860.
4 For changing conditions see Richardson, James F., The New York Police: Colonial Times to 1901 (New York, 1970), pp. 13–15 and chs. 2 and 3Google Scholar; Richards, Leonard L., Gentlemen of Property and Standing: Anti-Abolition Mobs in Jacksonian America (New York, 1970)Google Scholar; Asbury, Herbert, The Gangs of New York (New York, 1938)Google Scholar; Duffy, John, A History of Public Health in New York City, 1625–1866 (New York, 1968), pt. IIIGoogle Scholar.
5 Ernst, Robert, Immigrant Life in New York City, 1825–1863 (New York, 1949), pp. 135, 191, 193, 218Google Scholar; Miller, Douglas T., Jacksonian Aristocracy: Class and Democracy in New York, 1830–1860 (New York, 1967), p. 82Google Scholar.
6 Mohl, Raymond A., Poverty in New York, 1783–1825 (New York, 1971), pp. 91, 114Google Scholar; Annual Report of the Aims-House Commissioner … For the Year Ending 31st Dec. 1846 (New York, 1847), p. 370Google Scholar; First Annual Report of the Commissioners of Public Charities and Corrections, New York (New York, 1861), p. xxix, p. xxxivGoogle Scholar.
7 Reese, David M., Report on Infant Mortality in Large Cities, the Sources of its Increase and Means for its Diminution (Philadelphia, 1857), passimGoogle Scholar; AICP, Sixteenth Annual Report (1859), p. 26Google Scholar.
8 Harper's New Monthly Magazine (July 1856), 273.
9 For the earlier societies see Mohl, Poverty in New York, chs. 8–10, 15, and Heale, M. J., ‘ Humanitarianism in the Early Republic: The Moral Reformers of New York, 1776–1825 ’, Journal of American Studies, 2 (10 1968), 161–75CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ‘ The New York Society for the Prevention of Pauperism, 1817–1823 ’, New-York Historical Society Quarterly, 55 (04 1971), 153–76Google Scholar, and ‘ Patterns of Benevolence: Charity and Morality in Urban and Rural New York, 1790–1830 ’, Societas– A Review of Social History, 3 (Autumn 1973), 337–59Google Scholar.
10 Rosenberg, , Religion and Rise of the City, pp. 70–97, 245–7, 227–33Google Scholar, explores the origins of the AICP and of Pease's enterprise. For others see Brace, Emma (ed.), The Life of Charles Loring Brace; Chiefly told in his own letters (New York, 1894), pp. 75–9, 153Google Scholar; Filler, Louis, The Crusade Against Slavery, 1830–1860 (New York, 1963), p. 94Google Scholar.
11 AICP, Address to the Public; Constitution and By-Laws; and Visitor's Manual (New York, 1844), pp. 6–7Google Scholar; First Annual Report (1845), pp. 4–8, 17–18; AICP Circular, To the Visitors of the New York Association for the Improvement of the Condition of the Poor (1846), pp. 2–7Google Scholar; AICP Minutes, 11 (13 May 1850, 12 May 1851), in Community Service Society Archives, New York; Eighth Annual Report (1851), pp. 20–2; Ninth Annual Report (1852), pp. 38–9; Tenth Annual Report (1853), p. 31; Thirteenth Annual Report (1856), pp. 45–6; First Report of a Committee on the Sanitary Condition of the Laboring Classes in the City of New York, with Remedial Suggestions (New York, 1853), passimGoogle Scholar; Fourteenth Annual Report (1857, pp. 28–37; Hartley, Isaac S. (ed.), Memorial of Robert Milham Hartley (Utica, N.Y., 1882), p. 288Google Scholar. See also Lubove, op. cit., pp. 307–27, and Rosenberg, op. cit., pp. 245–37.
12 NYPA, First Report (1844), p. 3Google Scholar; Second Report (1846), pp. 46, 56, 65, 72–3, 118Google Scholar; Third Report (1847), 1, pp. 43–4, 87Google Scholar; 11, pp. 380–403; Fourth Report (1849), p. 40Google Scholar; Eighth Report (1853), p. 49Google Scholar; Ninth Report (1854), p. 63Google Scholar; Tenth Report (1855), pp. 132–40Google Scholar; Eleventh and Twelfth Reports (1857), p. 23Google Scholar; A Brief Statement of the Objects and Results of the Prison Association of New York, During the Seventeen Years of Its Existence (New York, 1862), pp. 3–5Google Scholar.
13 Hartley, (ed.), Memorial of Hartley, p. 211Google Scholar; Lamb, , John Dennison Russ, pp. 30–31Google Scholar; Harris, Thomas L., Juvenile Depravity and Crime in Our City (New York, 1850), p. 10 and passimGoogle Scholar; New York Daily Tribune, 26 January, 13 February 1850; NYJA, Eighth Annual Report (1860), pp. 17–18, 21–5Google Scholar; Act of Incorporation of the New York Juvenile Asylum: together with the By-Laws and Regulations (New York, 1851), passimGoogle Scholar; AICP, Tenth Annual Report (1853), Pp. 23–5Google Scholar; Laws of the State of New York (1853), ch. 185, pp. 358–60Google Scholar; NYJA, Fourth Annual Report (1856), pp. 19, 21, 26, 29Google Scholar; Fifth Annual Report(1857), P. 21Google Scholar; Sixth Annual Report (1858). p. 8Google Scholar; Eighth Annual Report (1860), pp. 197–8Google Scholar.
14 Brace, Charles L., Sketch of the Formation of the Newsboys' Lodging-House (New York, 1867), passimGoogle Scholar; CAS, First Annual Report (1854), pp. 9–10Google Scholar, Third Annual Report (1856), pp. 13, 17Google Scholar; Fourth Annual Report (1857), pp. 7, 11–17Google Scholar; Sixth Annual Report (1859), pp. 7–11Google Scholar; Brace, Charles L., The Dangerous Classes of New York, and Twenty Years' Work Among Them (New York, 1872), pp. 226–45Google Scholar. see also Langsam, Miriam Z., Children West: A History of the Placing-Out System of the New York Children's Aid Society, 1853–1890 (Madison, Wis. 1964)Google Scholar.
15 Barnard, , Forty Years at the Five Points, pp. 2, 12–20Google Scholar; Incorporation of the Five Points House of Industry, pp. 3–6; Rosenberg, , Religion and Rise of the City, pp. 234–6Google Scholar.
16 Hartley was born in England and brought up in upstate New York; Brace was the son of a Connecticut private schoolteacher; Pease had been a Massachusetts clergyman; Russ (agent of the Prison Association and later Superintendent of the Juvenile Asylum) was the son of a Massachusetts physician; Enoch C. Wines (who became agent of the Prison Association in 1862 and established an international reputation as a penologist) was born in New Jersey and brought up in Vermont. For their early lives see Hardey, (ed.), Memorial of Hartley, pp. 17–55Google Scholar; Brace, (ed.), Life of Brace, pp. 1–58Google Scholar; Barnard, , Forty Years at the Five Points, pp. 10–11Google Scholar; Lamb, , John Dennison Russ, pp. 3–12Google Scholar; entry on ‘ Wines ’ by Blake in the Dictionary of American Biography. For their views on the rich, see Hartley, Robert M., Intemperance in Cities and Large Towns; showing its physical, social, and moral effects … (New York, 1851), pp. 134, 139–40, 145Google Scholar; Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, p. 136Google Scholar, and on the agent's role, Hartley, ‘ 15 Remarks on the Qualifications of the Secretary and General Agent ’, Mr. Hartley's File of Original Documents, pp. 36–9, typescript in Community Service Society Archives, and Brace, op. cit., pp. 368, 374–5.
17 NYPA, First Report (1844), p. 33Google Scholar; AICP, Report on Sanitary Conditions, p. 24Google Scholar; Brace, , ‘ The Outcast Children ’, New York Daily Tribune 21 06 1852Google Scholar; The New Charitable Monthly, or ‘ What is Done for the Poor ’ (March 1854), p. 8.
18 AICP, Eleventh Annual Report (1854), pp. 20–1Google Scholar; Sixteenth Annual Report (1859), pp. 18–40Google Scholar; NYPA, Third Report (1847), 11, pp. 357–8Google Scholar; Fourth Report (1849), pp. 69–87Google Scholar; Tenth Report (1855), pp. 47–123Google Scholar.
19 Hartley, Robert M., An Historical, Scientific and Practical Essay on Milk (New York, (1842), pp. 107–15, 198, 218–39Google Scholar; AICP, Twenty-fifth Annual Report (1868), p. 39Google Scholar; Griscom, John H., ‘ Hygiene of New York City ’, First Report of the Committee on Public Hygiene of the American Medical Association (Philadelphia, 1849), p. 456Google Scholar; Griscom, , Sanitary Legislation, Past and Future: The Value of Sanitary Reform, and the True Principles for its Attainment (New York, 1861), p. 7Google Scholar.
20 See ibid., pp. 4–7, and NYPA, Fourth Report (1849), pp. 14–15Google Scholar; Francis, John W., Old New York; or, Reminiscences of the Past Sixty Years (New York, 1858), p. 304Google Scholar, on patronage in health, prison and hospital appointments. Also, Hartley, (ed.), Memorial of Hartley, pp. 235–6Google Scholar, and Brace, (ed.), Life of Brace, p. 70Google Scholar.
21 AICP, Ninth Annual Report (1852), p. 16Google Scholar; Seventeenth Annual Report (1860), p. 38Google Scholar.
22 For the school controversy, see Lannie, Vincent P., Public Money and Parochial Education: Bishop Hughes, Governor Seward, and the New York School Controversy (Cleveland, 1968)Google Scholar. On later Catholic suspicions, see New Charitable Monthly (July 1854), p. 83; Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, p. 234Google Scholar; Ives, Levi Silliman, Church and State Charities Compared; with special reference to the system of New York State Charities (New York, 1857), passimGoogle Scholar.
23 Brace, spoke of the ‘ spiritual lifelessness of Romanism ’, The Dangerous Classes, p. 155Google Scholar.
24 For an exploration of this theme, see Smith, Timothy L., ‘ Protestant Schooling and American Nationality, 1800–1850 ’, Journal of American History, 53 (1966–1967), 679–95CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
25 NYJA, Eighth Annual Report (1860), p. 60Google Scholar; Pease, , New York Daily Tribune, 4 10 1853Google Scholar; Ives, op. cit., pp. 33–5.
26 Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, p. 446Google Scholar.
27 AICP, Seventh Annual Report (1850), p. 21Google Scholar; Sixteenth Annual Report (1859), p. 21Google Scholar; NYPA, Tenth Report (1855), pp. 63–72Google Scholar, Eleventh and Twelth Reports (1857), p. 42Google ScholarThirteenth and Fourteenth Reports (1859), pp. 16–17Google Scholar; New Charitable Monthly (September 1854), 113.
28 Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, pp. 147, 195–7 (for industrial schools)Google Scholar; NYPA, Ninth Report (1856), pp. 40, 50–1, 154Google Scholar.
29 Report of the House of Industry and Home for the Friendless (New York, 1848), p. 13Google Scholar.
30 Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, p. 136Google Scholar.
31 AICP, Fifth Annual Report (1848), p. 23Google Scholar.
32 See Thernstrom, Stephan, Poverty and Progress: Social Mobility in a Nineteenth Century City (Cambridge, Mass., 1964)Google Scholar for suggestive ideas on the impact of mobility on the working-class. The quotations are in AICP, Fifteenth Annual Report (1858), p. 33Google Scholar; NYPA, Ninth Report (1854), p. 45Google Scholar and Fourth Report (1849), p. 172Google Scholar; Brace, , The Dangerous Classes, pp. 26 and iiGoogle Scholar.
33 AICP, Fifteenth Annual Report (1858), pp. 38, 51Google Scholar.
34 For a good analysis of post-war ieform see Mohr, James C., The Radical Republicans and Reform in New York during Reconstruction (Ithaca and London, 1973)Google Scholar.
35 Another and more comprehensive treatment of changing American values in the 1850s is John Higham's Commonwealth Fund Lecture, delivered in London in 1968, which stresses the importance of the urban environment in promoting a new search for order. See Higham, John, From Boundlessness to Consolidation: The Transformation of American Culture, 1848–1860 (Ann Arbor, 1969)Google Scholar.
