The mothers’ aid bill in the general assembly marks a new effort in social welfare work in North Carolina. It proposes an annual appropriation of $50,000 to aid mothers who are physically and morally fitted to care for their children but are deprived of the support of their husbands. If the bill becomes law it will mean that the state is entering upon a new line of efforts in the interest of its citizens. The bill certainly has merit, and if it doesn’t become a law now, it will at some time not so very long away.
But, we wonder what is going to happen to the mothers who are not morally and physically fitted to care for their children. Are they to be left to suffer, and their children become a menace to society? Of the two classes, the mothers who are morally and physically unfitted for the responsibilities and without support, seem to us to be the ones to arouse the more pity. We haven’t seen the bill and, therefore, do not know its provisions, but without definite information about it we would judge from the meagre press reports that it is an example of the doctrine of the survival of the fittest. It would seem that the state of North Carolina intends, if the bill passes, to step in and take the children of a mother who is in every qualified, except financially, to care for them, and at the same time tell those who have handicaps other than financial that they will have to get along the best they can.
From the editorial page of the Durham Morning Herald, Sunday, February 4, 1923
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