cooperate with the state Board. The abandonment statute is made applicable to illegitimate as well as to legitimate children. North Dakota has by legislation declared every child born out of wedlock to be legitimate and entitled to support and to education as though born in lawful wedlock. An illegitimate child born in a maternity hospital is given the surname of the father if known. The North Dakota law does not, however, provide means for over- coming some disadvantages from which children born out of wed- lock suffer and which the law declares are abolished. In 1919 regional conferences with reference to the problems of illegitimacy, held under the auspices of the U.S. Children's Bureau, agreed upon principles with reference to the illegitimacy problem which should be recommended to legislatures; in Aug. 1920, the National Confer- ence of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws appointed a com- mittee to consider legislation in this field and to prepare a model law which might be adapted by the various states to local condi- tions. The ground was thus well prepared for legislation.
Dependent Children. Massachusetts did the first important work in boarding the state's dependent children in family homes instead of in institutions for children. Since the White House Con- ference on the Care of Dependent Children in 1909 there has been a growing recognition by both private and public agencies of the importance of providing, for child 'en who must be removed from their own homes, home life as nearly normal as possible.
Although there had been an increase in institutional provision for the feeble-minded, facilities for the custody and training of the subnormal were in 1920 still inadequate in all states. A special commission in Massachusetts relative to the control, custody and treatment of defectives, criminals and misdemeanants reported to the Legislature in 1919. As a result of its recommendations laws were passed in Massachusetts providing for a census of retarded school-children, the establishment of special classes in the public schools for such children, and the registration of the feeble-minded by a Commission on Mental Diseases. By 1921 similar legislation had been adopted or was under consideration in a number of states.
Juvenile Courts. Since the first fundamental modification of court procedure relating to children was made in Illinois in 1899, every state, except Connecticut, Maine and Wyoming, has adopted so-called " juvenile-court " laws. This legislation has been fitted into the local judicial systems, so that there, are many differences not only between states but in different parts of the same state. A questionnaire study of the courts in the United States hearing children's cases, made by the U.S. Children's Bureau for the year 1918, showed 2,391 courts organized under these statutes; 1,269 of them reported a total of 140,252 cases heard during the year, including 79,946 cases of juvenile delinquency heard in 1, 088 of these courts; 37,387 cases of neglect and dependency were reported by 791 courts. From the replies received, the Bureau estimated that the number of children's cases heard annually in the juvenile courts of the United States approximates 175,000. The constitu- tionality of laws creating juvenile courts and certain general prin- ciples on which they must operate have been generally established; separate hearings, informal or chancery procedure, professional probation officers for investigation and supervisory care, deten- tion of children separate from adults, and a system of recording and filing the social as well as the legal history of each case are now recognized as necessary. During the years 1910-20 attention was centred on the working-out of these principles in actual practice. As a result there was an extension and improvement of the proba- tion service (every state except Wyoming had in 1921 legislative provision for juvenile probation); better methods were developed for gathering and recording social as well as legal facts, and coopera- tion with other agencies was increasingly effective. The practice in many places still fell far short, however, of the idea.
Miscellaneous. Certain significant tendencies of the decade 1910-20 may be noted:
(1) Provision for " mothers' " or " widows' " pensions or " funds for parents," in order that dependent children may be cared for in their own homes. The first two laws of this type were adopted almost simultaneously in Illinois and Missouri in 1911. In Illinois the legislation was sought by Judge Merritt W. Pinckney, of the Juvenile Court of Cook County (Chicago). He was moved to do this by the large number of children for whom dependency petitions were filed solely because, in his opinion, their fathers were dead or incapacitated. In 1920, 40 states and the territories of Alaska and Hawaii had passed what came to be known generally as " mothers' pension " laws. Such opposition as there was to these laws came from private relief agencies which believed, because of the general failure of public outdoor relief, that the laws would never be well administered by a public agency. In 1 8 states, among them Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin, the administration of these laws was lodged in the juvenile courts and has involved a great increase in the work of those courts. Contrary to the fears of many, the standard of work done in the administration of the mothers' pension laws by the Chicago and other courts was generally equal to that of the better private agen- cies in the same communities.
(2) Provision for medical and psychological examinations. The recognition of the physical condition of the child as a factor in delinquency came first. In 1921 23 courts, all but three in large
cities, had physicians regularly attached to the courts, while 648 courts had either private practitioners or city or county health officers make physical examinations of the children brought before the juvenile courts. The Juvenile Psychopathic Institute, with Dr. William Healy in charge, began in 1909 under private auspices the study of mental causes of delinquency in the Chicago Juvenile Court. The judge was soon convinced of the importance of having before him the information supplied by psychopathic examination of the children, and Dr. Healy's clinic was therefore taken over by .the court. Mental clinics became a part of the court organization in 13 courts; in some the mental examinations being made only in specially difficult cases, or of children suspected of being subnormal. In Boston the Judge Baker Foundation, cooperating with the juvenile court, was (1921) attempting to make a complete physical, mental and social diagnosis of the condition of most of the children who came before the court. The diagnosis was agreed upon and treatment recommended to the judge by the director of the Founda- tion after a staff conference.
(3) Enlarging the jurisdiction of the court. The first move- ment in this direction was to expand the definition of what consti- tuted a delinquent, neglected, or dependent child, so that the court should in no case be prevented, by the lack of technical jurisdic- tion, from assuming the care of a child. Mothers' pensions have already been referred to. Children's agencies were in 1921 advo- cating that juvenile courts should be given the trial of adults charged with contributing to the delinquency or dependency of children, of crimes against children, of bastardy actions, and, less generally, of cases of desertion and non-support. The " minimum standards for child welfare," adopted by the Washington and Regional Child Welfare Conferences called by the U.S. Children's Bureau in 1919, recommended that the jurisdiction of the juvenile courts should in all cases be extended to deal with adult sex offenders against chil- dren, so that the children may be protected against unnecessary publicity and further corruption in the course of the trial. The question of combining and coordinating the functions of the juvenile courts and the domestic relations courts which have been organ- ized in many places was discussed by probation officers' associa- tions and social workers generally. There was general agreement that the juvenile-court method of investigating, of giving weight to social history and special consideration to the welfare of the children concerned, is needed in the handling of the family prob- lems which come before the courts in connection with deser- tion, divorce and illegitimacy. There was no such general agreement as to whether these problems should be taken over by the juvenile court or by a family court.
(4) Curtailment of the jurisdiction of the juvenile courts. Along with the movement to increase the jurisdiction of the court there has been a movement in the opposite direction. Early enthu- siasm for the courts has given place to a more critical attitude, and it is now very frequently held that functions have been given the court that could be better performed by other agencies. Child placing and the whole problem of dependency and mothers' pen- sions are cited as administrative burdens that should not be placed on the courts. Massachusetts, the state in which the probation idea was first developed, does not use its court machinery for either of these tasks, but assigns them to public charitable agen- cies; in some states, Minnesota being perhaps the best example, elaborate administrative agencies have been developed in coopera- tion with the courts. School machinery that would make resort to the courts in the truancy cases either unnecessary or less frequent is also advocated.
(5) The appointment of a specially qualified woman to act as releree to hear the cases of delinquent girls and to make recom- mendations to the judge as to the disposition of the cases is believed to be a forward step. Many states require that a woman, usually a probation officer, must be present at the hearing of delinquent girls. Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Denver, Los Angeles and Philadelphia have women referees who regularly hear the girls' cases. In D. C. the judge of the juvenile court is a woman.
(6) Extreme decentralization in administrative authority in the various states is responsible for the great diversity often found in the same state under the same law. There is an effort to estab- lish at least minimum administrative standards by increased state supervision or control in connexion with many types of social legislation. Recent investigation has shown it is sorely needed in the juvenile court field, and standardization is being attempted through the probation service. New York and Massachusetts both have had for some time state probation commissions, which exer- cise general supervision over probation officers. Recent legislation in Alabama and North Carolina goes further in this respect.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. For further information see reports of the U.S. Children's Bureau as follows: S. P. Breckinridge and Helen R. Jeter, A Summary of Juvenile-Court Legislation (Legal Series, No. 5, 1920); Helen R. Jeter, The Chicago Juvenile Court (in press); Evelina Belden, Courts in the United States hearing Ch^ldren's Cases (Dependent, Defective and Delinquent Classes Series, No. 8, 1920); Laura A. Thompson, Laws Relating to Mothers' Pensions (Legal Series, No. 4, 1920); S. P. Breckinridge and Edith Abbott, Administration of Aid-to- Mothers' Law in Illinois (in press) ; Emma O. Lundberg and Katherine F. Lenroot, Illegitimacy as a Child-
