{
  "schema": "tga.work.v1",
  "identifier": "dresden:vol-12:organized-charities",
  "slug": "organized-charities",
  "title": "Organized Charities",
  "subtitle": "Essay.",
  "excerpt": "A pointed short essay on organized charity and its institutional failures.",
  "year": 1897,
  "volume": 12,
  "category": "Essay",
  "author": {
    "name": "Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "wikidata": "Q360326",
    "viaf": "44331023"
  },
  "isPartOf": {
    "title": "The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "edition": "Dresden Edition",
    "publisher": "C. P. Farrell",
    "year": 1900
  },
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/",
  "url": "https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/organized-charities/",
  "wordCount": 1497,
  "body": "I HAVE no great confidence in organized charities. Money is left and\nbuildings are erected and sinecures provided for a good many worthless\npeople. Those in immediate control are almost, or when they were\nappointed were almost, in want themselves, and they naturally hate other\nbeggars.\n\nThey regard persons who ask assistance as their enemies. There is an old\nstory of a tramp who begged a breakfast. After breakfast another tramp\ncame to the same place to beg his breakfast, and the first tramp with\nblows and curses drove him away, saying at the same time: \"I expect to\nget dinner here myself.\"\n\nThis is the general attitude of beggar toward beggar.\n\nAnother trouble with organized charities is the machinery, the various\nmethods they have adopted to prevent what they call fraud. They are\nexceedingly anxious that the needy, that those who ask help, who have\nbeen without fault, shall be attended to, their rule apparently being to\nassist only the unfortunate perfect.\n\nThe trouble is that Nature produces very few specimens of that kind. As\na rule, men come to want on account of their imperfections, on account\nof their ignorance, on account of their vices, and their vices are born\nof their lack of capacity, of their want of brain. In other words, they\nare failures of Nature, and the fact that they need help is not their\nown fault, but the fault of their construction, their surroundings.\n\nVery few people have the opportunity of selecting their parents, and it\nis exceedingly difficult in the matter of grandparents. Consequently,\nI do not hold people responsible for hereditary tendencies, traits and\nvices. Neither do I praise them for having hereditary virtues.\n\nA man going to one of these various charitable establishments is\ncross-examined. He must give his biography. And after he has answered\nall the supercilious, impudent questions, he is asked for references.\n\nThen the people referred to are sought out, to find whether the\nstatements made by the applicant are true. By the time the thing is\nsettled the man who asked aid has either gotten it somewhere else or\nhas, in the language of the Spiritualists, \"passed over to the other\nside.\"\n\nOf course this does not trouble the persons in charge of the organized\ncharities, because their salaries are going on.\n\nAs a rule, these charities were commenced by the best of people. Some\ngenerous, philanthropic man or woman gave a life to establish a \"home,\"\nit may be, for aged women, for orphans, for the waifs of the pavements.\n\nThese generous people, filled with the spirit of charity, raised a\nlittle money, succeeded in hiring or erecting a humble building, and the\nmoney they collected, so honestly given, they honestly used to bind up\nthe wounds and wipe away the tears of the unfortunate, and to save, if\npossible, some who had been wrecked on the rocks and reefs of crime.\n\nThen some very rich man dies who had no charity and who would not have\nleft a dollar could he have taken his money with him. This rich man, who\nhated his relatives and the people he actually knew, gives a large sum\nof money to some particular charity—not that he had any charity, but\nbecause he wanted to be remembered as a philanthropist.\n\nThen the organized charity becomes rich, and the richer the meaner, the\nricher the harder of heart and the closer of fist.\n\nNow, I believe that Trinity Church, in this city, would be called an\norganized charity. The church was started to save, if possible, a few\nsouls from eternal torment, and on the plea of saving these souls money\nwas given to the church.\n\nFinally the church became rich. It is now a landlord—has many buildings\nto rent. And if what I hear is true there is no harder landlord in the\ncity of New York.\n\nSo, I have heard it said of Dublin University, that it is about the\nhardest landlord in Ireland.\n\nI think you will find that all such institutions try to collect the very\nlast cent, and, in the name of pity, drive pity from their hearts.\n\nI think it is Shakespeare who says, \"Pity drives out pity,\" and he must\nhave had organized charities in his mind when he uttered this remark. Of\ncourse a great many really good and philanthropic people leave vast sums\nof money to charities.\n\nI find that it is sometimes very difficult to get an injured man, or one\nseized with some sudden illness, taken into a city hospital. There are\nso many rules and so many regulations, so many things necessary to be\ndone, that while the rules are being complied with the soul of the sick\nor injured man, weary of the waiting, takes its flight. And after the\nman is dead, the doctors are kind enough to certify that he died of\nheart failure.\n\nSo—in a general way—I speak of all the asylums, of all the homes for\norphans. When I see one of those buildings I feel that it is full of\npetty tyranny, of what might be called pious meanness, devout deviltry,\nwhere the object is to break the will of every recipient of public\nfavor.\n\nI may be all wrong. I hope I am. At the same time I fear that I am\nsomewhere near right.\n\nYou may take our prisons; the treatment of prisoners is often infamous.\nThe Elmira Reformatory is a worthy successor of the Inquisition, a\ndisgrace, in my judgment, to the State of New York, to the civilization\nof our day. Every little while something comes to light showing the\ncruelty, the tyranny, the meanness, of these professional distributers\nof public charity—of these professed reformers.\n\nI know that they are visited now and then by committees from the\nLegislature, and I know that the keepers of these places know when the\n\"committee\" may be expected.\n\nI know that everything is scoured and swept and burnished for the\noccasion; and I know that the poor devils that have been abused or\nwhipped or starved, fear to open their mouths, knowing that if they\ndo they may not be believed and that they will be treated afterward as\nthough they were wild beasts.\n\nI think these public institutions ought to be open to inspection at all\ntimes. I think the very best men ought to be put in control of them.\nI think only those doctors who have passed, and recently passed,\nexaminations as to their fitness, as to their intelligence and\nprofessional acquirements, ought to be put in charge.\n\nI do not think that hospitals should be places for young doctors to\npractice sawing off the arms and legs of paupers or hunting in the\nstomachs of old women for tumors. I think only the skillful, the\nexperienced, should be employed in such places. Neither do I think\nhospitals should be places where medicine is distributed by students to\nthe poor.\n\nIgnorance is a poor doctor, even for the poor, and if we pretend to be\ncharitable we ought to carry it out.\n\nI would like to see tyranny done away with in prisons, in the\nreformatories, and in all places under the government or supervision of\nthe State.\n\nI would like to have all corporal punishment abolished, and I would also\nlike to see the money that is given to charity distributed by charity\nand by intelligence. I hope all these institutions will be overhauled.\n\nI hope all places where people are pretending to take care of the poor\nand for which they collect money from the public, will be visited, and\nwill be visited unexpectedly and the truth told.\n\nIn my judgment there is some better way. I think every hospital,\nevery asylum, every home for waifs and orphans should be supported by\ntaxation, not by charity; should be under the care and control of the\nState absolutely.\n\nI do not believe in these institutions being managed by any individual\nor by any society, religious or secular, but by the State. I would no\nmore have hospitals and asylums depend on charity than I would have the\npublic school depend on voluntary contributions.\n\nI want the schools supported by taxation and to be controlled by the\nState, and I want the hospitals and asylums and charitable institutions\nfounded and controlled and carried on in the same way. Let the property\nof the State do it.\n\nLet those pay the taxes who are able. And let us do away forever with\nthe idea that to take care of the sick, of the helpless, is a charity.\nIt is not a charity. It is a duty. It is something to be done for our\nown sakes. It is no more a charity than it is to pave or light the\nstreets, no more a charity than it is to have a system of sewers.\n\nIt is all for the purpose of protecting society and of civilizing\nourselves.\n"
}