Democracy and Social Ethics | Page 2

JONES, PH.D.
*OUTLINE OF ECONOMICS.* BY RICHARD T. ELY.
*GOVERNMENT IN SWITZERLAND.* BY JOHN MARTIN
VINCENT, PH.D.
*ESSAYS IN THE MONETARY HISTORY OF THE UNITED
STATES.* BY CHARLES J. BULLOCK, PH.D.
*SOCIAL CONTROL.* BY EDWARD A. ROSS, PH.D.
*HISTORY OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN THE UNITED STATES.*
BY JESSE MACY, LL.D.
*MUNICIPAL ENGINEERING AND SANITATION.* BY M.N.
BAKER, PH.B.
*DEMOCRACY AND SOCIAL ETHICS.* BY JANE ADDAMS.
*COLONIAL GOVERNMENT.* BY PAUL S. REINSCH, PH.D.,
LL.B.
* * * * *
_IN PREPARATION._
*CUSTOM AND COMPETITION.* BY RICHARD T. ELY, PH.D.,
LL.D.
*MUNICIPAL SOCIOLOGY.* BY CHARLES ZUEBLIN.
* * * * *
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY, 66 FIFTH AVENUE.

_THE CITIZEN'S LIBRARY_
* * * * *
DEMOCRACY AND SOCIAL ETHICS
BY
JANE ADDAMS HULL-HOUSE, CHICAGO
New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON:
MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. 1902

Set up and electrotyped March, 1902. Reprinted June, September,
1902.
Norwood Press J.S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith Norwood Mass.
U.S.A.

To: M.R.S.

PREFATORY NOTE
The following pages present the substance of a course of twelve
lectures on "Democracy and Social Ethics" which have been delivered
at various colleges and university extension centres.
In putting them into the form of a book, no attempt has been made to
change the somewhat informal style used in speaking. The "we" and
"us" which originally referred to the speaker and her audience are
merely extended to possible readers.
Acknowledgment for permission to reprint is extended to The Atlantic
Monthly, The International Journal of Ethics, The American Journal of
Sociology, and to The Commons.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
PAGE INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER II

CHARITABLE EFFORT 13

CHAPTER III
FILIAL RELATIONS 71

CHAPTER IV
HOUSEHOLD ADJUSTMENT 102

CHAPTER V
INDUSTRIAL AMELIORATION 137

CHAPTER VI
EDUCATIONAL METHODS 178

CHAPTER VII
POLITICAL REFORM 221
INDEX 279

DEMOCRACY AND SOCIAL ETHICS

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
It is well to remind ourselves, from time to time, that "Ethics" is but
another word for "righteousness," that for which many men and women
of every generation have hungered and thirsted, and without which life
becomes meaningless.
Certain forms of personal righteousness have become to a majority of
the community almost automatic. It is as easy for most of us to keep

from stealing our dinners as it is to digest them, and there is quite as
much voluntary morality involved in one process as in the other. To
steal would be for us to fall sadly below the standard of habit and
expectation which makes virtue easy. In the same way we have been
carefully reared to a sense of family obligation, to be kindly and
considerate to the members of our own households, and to feel
responsible for their well-being. As the rules of conduct have become
established in regard to our self-development and our families, so they
have been in regard to limited circles of friends. If the fulfilment of
these claims were all that a righteous life required, the hunger and thirst
would be stilled for many good men and women, and the clew of right
living would lie easily in their hands.
But we all know that each generation has its own test, the
contemporaneous and current standard by which alone it can
adequately judge of its own moral achievements, and that it may not
legitimately use a previous and less vigorous test. The advanced test
must indeed include that which has already been attained; but if it
includes no more, we shall fail to go forward, thinking complacently
that we have "arrived" when in reality we have not yet started.
To attain individual morality in an age demanding social morality, to
pride one's self on the results of personal effort when the time demands
social adjustment, is utterly to fail to apprehend the situation.
It is perhaps significant that a German critic has of late reminded us
that the one test which the most authoritative and dramatic portrayal of
the Day of Judgment offers, is the social test. The stern questions are
not in regard to personal and family relations, but did ye visit the poor,
the criminal, the sick, and did ye feed the hungry?
All about us are men and women who have become unhappy in regard
to their attitude toward the social order itself; toward the dreary round
of uninteresting work, the pleasures narrowed down to those of appetite,
the declining consciousness of brain power, and the lack of mental food
which characterizes the lot of the large proportion of their
fellow-citizens. These men and women have caught a moral challenge
raised by the exigencies of contemporaneous life; some are bewildered,

others who are denied the relief which sturdy action brings are even
seeking an escape, but all are increasingly anxious concerning their
actual relations to the basic organization of society.
The test