From Poor Law to Welfare State: A History of Social Welfare in America

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More About This Book

Overview

Over twenty-five years and through five editions, Walter I. Trattner's From Poor Law to Welfare State has served as the standard text on the history of welfare policy in the United States. The only comprehensive account of American social welfare history from the colonial era to the present, the new sixth edition has been updated to include the latest developments in our society as well as trends in social welfare.

Trattner provides in-depth examination of developments in child welfare, public health, and the evolution of social work as a profession, showing how all these changes affected the treatment of the poor and needy in America. He explores the impact of public policies on social workers and other helping professions — all against the backdrop of social and intellectual trends in American history. From Poor Law to Welfare State directly addresses racism and sexism and pays special attention to the worsening problems of child abuse, neglect, and homelessness. Topics new to this sixth edition include:

  • A review of President Clinton's health-care reform and its failure, and his efforts to "end welfare as we know it"
  • Recent developments in child welfare including an expanded section on the voluntary use of children's institutions by parents in the nineteenth century, and the continued discrimination against black youth in the juvenile justice system
  • An in-depth discussion of Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein's controversial book, The Bell Curve, which provided social conservatives new weapons in their war on the black poor and social welfare in general
  • The latest information on AIDS and the reappearance of tuberculosis — and their impact on public health policy
  • A new Preface and Conclusion, and substantially updated Bibliographies

Written for students in social work and other human service professions, From Poor Law to Welfare State: A History of Social Welfare in America is also an essential resource for historians, political scientists, sociologists, and policymakers.

Editorial Reviews

Social Work
Trattner writes clearly and simply. It is a pleasure to read a book that one not only understands but that stimulates hope in the future from insights drawn from the past.

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780029327128
  • Publisher: Free Press
  • Publication date: 10/1/1989
  • Edition description: Older Edition
  • Edition number: 4
  • Pages: 400
  • Sales rank: 1,071,180
  • Product dimensions: 6.00 (w) x 9.00 (h) x 1.10 (d)

Meet the Author

Walter I. Trattner is Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

Read an Excerpt

Preface to the Sixth Edition

The first question most readers undoubtedly will ask is, why publish a new edition of From Poor Law to Welfare State at this time? While there are a number of reasons for doing so, there are two compelling, although related, answers to that question. First, the previous edition of this work ended on a rather upbeat, or optimistic, note. President Bill Clinton had just introduced his sweeping proposal to overhaul the nation's health care system, and while many questions about that undertaking remained unanswered, I wrote that "most Americans reacted favorably to the plan and looked forward to the upcoming debate over its specifics." Furthermore, to again quote from the last edition, "there seemed to be bi-partisan support, in and out of Congress, for the notion that the time had come for some sort of universal national health insurance scheme." Obviously, I was wrong, and I am glad to have the opportunity to correct myself — and to explain why I was mistaken.

Second, and closely related, I also misunderstood, or placed too much faith in, President Clinton and his commitment to helping the needy by getting to the heart of their problems — and using the federal government to help resolve them. I really believed, I am somewhat embarrassed to admit, that Clinton,

unlike his immediate predecessors, who either did not recognize the nation's social problems or refused to face up to them...certainly admits that the nation has many such problems....that it cannot afford to ignore them....and that the public sector can and should help to resolve them. Just as our colonial ancestors viewed their villages and towns as communities [I wrote] he cries out for the government again to become an instrument for the improvement of its citizens' lives, especially by providing at least a minimal level of social welfare for all of its inhabitants.

Again, I proved to be in error. Indeed, as readers already may know, or will discover from reading the "new" last chapter of this book — the title of which I changed from "Toward a New Domestic Order?" to "Looking Forward — or Backward?" — just the opposite occurred. Thanks to what is referred to as the welfare reform act of 1996, signed into law by Clinton (just prior to the upcoming presidential election) over the protests of a number of concerned citizens, the entitlement to welfare, put into place in America some sixty years ago in the midst of the Great Depression (if not earlier, during the colonial period), has been removed and replaced by the "work or starve" mentality of an earlier time.

As that measure indicates, social and economic justice is not at the top of the public agenda today. Most Americans no longer wish to entrust government with the power, and the responsibility, to help their needy fellows. Unlike Herbert Gans and a handful of other brave scholars who continue to debunk stereotypes about the poor and deplore the fact that some misguided concepts, especially that of "the underclass," have become weapons in the current war against the poor, most Americans once again blame the victim and eschew collective, as opposed to individualistic, solutions to the nation's social and economic problems; they certainly do not wish to see their tax dollars used for welfare. And by attacking the welfare system rather than the poverty problem, they have achieved their aims. And while the results of these developments are not yet clear, critics predict that more than 2.5 million citizens, including 1.2 million children, will be thrown into poverty as a result of the change; for reasons discussed in the last chapter of the book, I fear they are correct (although, of course, I hope they are not).

In any event, in addition to the changes alluded to above, I worked hard to revise the text in numerous other ways in order to clarify certain points, as needed, to update some interpretations, where appropriate, and to include new information, where useful. Rather than spell out all those changes, I especially call the readers' attention to the chapters "Child Welfare," where I inserted a good deal of additional material on recent developments in that field, and "War on the Welfare State," where I added quite a bit of material on matters of race, especially the publication of Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein's The Bell Curve (1994), and its implications for social welfare policy. Also, as in the past, I have revised and updated the bibliographies at the end of all of the chapters.

Before closing, let me again take the opportunity to thank The Free Press, especially Philip Rappaport and Caryn-Amy King, with whom I worked most closely, for bringing out a new edition of this work, for allowing me to revise the entire manuscript in any way I saw fit, and for continuing to reprint the prefaces to all the previous editions. The latter is a very costly and unusual gesture which I greatly appreciate — and which, as I pointed out in the preface to the previous edition, will be of great benefit to the readers; I therefore again urge them to read all of the prefaces.

I also wish to thank all of the scholars of American social welfare history whose works I have used, in one way or another, in revising and updating this book. Many of them are cited in the text or in the bibliographies, some are not. In addition, I again wish to thank my wife, Joan, for all of her love and support, not only during the last six months or so while I worked on revising this manuscript but during forty years of a very happy marriage, and my children Stephen, Anne, and David, to whom all of the previous editions of this work were dedicated. I am sure they will not mind if I dedicate this edition to their children, my four wonderful grandchildren who have come into the world since the last edition of this work was published, Billy and Sarah Liccione and Andy and Aaron Trattner. May they bring as much happiness and joy to their parents as their mommies and daddies brought to their "grammy" and "papa" — and may they grow up to be kind, caring, and compassionate adults.

W.I.T.

April 1998

Copyright © 1994, 1999 by Walter I. Trattner

Table of Contents

Preface to the Sixth Edition
Preface to the Fifth Edition
Preface to the Fourth Edition
Preface to the Third Edition
Preface to the Second Edition
Preface to the First Edition
Ch. 1 The Background 1
Ch. 2 Colonial America 15
Ch. 3 The Era of the American Revolution 30
Ch. 4 The Trend Toward Indoor Relief 47
Ch. 5 The Civil War and After - Scientific Charity 77
Ch. 6 Child Welfare 108
Ch. 7 The Public Health Movement 140
Ch. 8 The Settlement House Movement 163
Ch. 9 The Mental Health Movement 192
Ch. 10 Renaissance of Public Welfare 214
Ch. 11 The Quest for Professionalization 233
Ch. 12 Social Work and Welfare in the 1920s 253
Ch. 13 Depression and a New Deal 273
Ch. 14 From World War to Great Society 304
Ch. 15 A Transitional Era 337
Ch. 16 War on the Welfare State 362
Ch. 17 Looking Forward - Or Backward? 388
Index 403

First Chapter

Preface to the Sixth Edition

The first question most readers undoubtedly will ask is, why publish a new edition of From Poor Law to Welfare State at this time? While there are a number of reasons for doing so, there are two compelling, although related, answers to that question. First, the previous edition of this work ended on a rather upbeat, or optimistic, note. President Bill Clinton had just introduced his sweeping proposal to overhaul the nation's health care system, and while many questions about that undertaking remained unanswered, I wrote that "most Americans reacted favorably to the plan and looked forward to the upcoming debate over its specifics." Furthermore, to again quote from the last edition, "there seemed to be bi-partisan support, in and out of Congress, for the notion that the time had come for some sort of universal national health insurance scheme." Obviously, I was wrong, and I am glad to have the opportunity to correct myself -- and to explain why I was mistaken.

Second, and closely related, I also misunderstood, or placed too much faith in, President Clinton and his commitment to helping the needy by getting to the heart of their problems -- and using the federal government to help resolve them. I really believed, I am somewhat embarrassed to admit, that Clinton,

unlike his immediate predecessors, who either did not recognize the nation's social problems or refused to face up to them...certainly admits that the nation has many such problems....that it cannot afford to ignore them....and that the public sector can and should help to resolve them. Just as our colonial ancestors viewed their villages andtowns as communitiesed their aims. And while the results of these developments are not yet clear, critics predict that more than 2.5 million citizens, including 1.2 million children, will be thrown into poverty as a result of the change; for reasons discussed in the last chapter of the book, I fear they are correct (although, of course, I hope they are not).

In any event, in addition to the changes alluded to above, I worked hard to revise the text in numerous other ways in order to clarify certain points, as needed, to update some interpretations, where appropriate, and to include new information, where useful. Rather than spell out all those changes, I especially call the readers' attention to the chapters "Child Welfare," where I inserted a good deal of additional material on recent developments in that field, and "War on the Welfare State," where I added quite a bit of material on matters of race, especially the publication of Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein's The Bell Curve (1994), and its implications for social welfare policy. Also, as in the past, I have revised and updated the bibliographies at the end of all of the chapters.

Before closing, let me again take the opportunity to thank The Free Press, especially Philip Rappaport and Caryn-Amy King, with whom I worked most closely, for bringing out a new edition of this work, for allowing me to revise the entire manuscript in any way I saw fit, and for continuing to reprint the prefaces to all the previous editions. The latter is a very costly and unusual gesture which I greatly appreciate -- and which, as I pointed out in the preface to the previous edition, will be of great benefit to the readers; I therefore again urge them to read all of the prefaces.

I also wish to thank all of the scholars of American social welfare history whose works I have used, in one way or another, in revising and updating this book. Many of them are cited in the text or in the bibliographies, some are not. In addition, I again wish to thank my wife, Joan, for all of her love and support, not only during the last six months or so while I worked on revising this manuscript but during forty years of a very happy marriage, and my children Stephen, Anne, and David, to whom all of the previous editions of this work were dedicated. I am sure they will not mind if I dedicate this edition to their children, my four wonderful grandchildren who have come into the world since the last edition of this work was published, Billy and Sarah Liccione and Andy and Aaron Trattner. May they bring as much happiness and joy to their parents as their mommies and daddies brought to their "grammy" and "papa" -- and may they grow up to be kind, caring, and compassionate adults.

W.I.T.
April 1998

Copyright © 1994, 1999 by Walter I. Trattner

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