Sarah
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Somerset County Herald and Taunton Courier. Saturday 27 May 1944
Page 4 Column 5
THE UNMARRIED MOTHER
Mr. W. T. GLASS, the Public Assistance Officer for Somerset, told the annual meeting of the County Nursing Association at Bath last week how the Somerset County Council is dealing with the problem of illegitimate children. There was a breadth of view about the speech which makes it deserve wide attention and sympathetic public interest. The fact has to be faced that since the war the number of illegitimate births in the county every year has more than doubled, there were 213 in 1939 and 483 last year. Mr. GLASS explained that the policy of the County Council is that if parents of girls are unwilling to take the illegitimate child, there is an open door for it if its mother wants to have a chance to redeem herself and perhaps later on, make a happy marriage. This Mr. GLASS calls “the police of a second chance.” Humanitarian that he is, this policy of his Committee appeals very much to the Public Assistance Officer, and it represents an enlightened departure from the censorious, self-righteous judgement which has often been applied to such girls and marred their lives.
While the policy of the second chance is the right one, and, indeed, the Christian one, it needs to be accompanied by reformative efforts, or, at least, by some means of encouraging the unmarried mother to go forward on the right lines despite her handicap. The County Council can relieve her of her immediate problem, the care of the baby, but she still needs sympathy and help: and there must be no notion that the giving of a second chance will make illegitimacy easier. An official body obviously cannot deal with this purely personal and moral issue, the solution of which is necessary to the complete success of the efforts to help these girls. That is a task for voluntary bodies. Many people reading of such an official scheme as this may fear that it will tend to encourage illegitimacy. But that would be to take a wrong view of the real characters of most of these unfortunate girls. A minority, no doubt, are beyond human redemption, but the majority deserve every help from Society, and even if only one out of every hundred were helped to a happy settled life hereafter the scheme would be abundantly worth while.
Girls who have been through this experience know very well that their chance of happy marriage is very much lessened, and that however much they are helped their misfortune must shadow them for the rest of their days. The harsh attitude of so much of Victorian Society, as such men as DICKENS, GLADSTONE, and W. T. STEAD saw, was entirely wrong, both ethically and socially; it only engendered despair, hopelessness and isolation. In considering such a problem as this it is salutary to ponder the incident of the woman taken in adultery. What should be the ultimate aim in dealing with these girls? Not to conceal the consequences of illicit associations, and certainly not to abandon the victims, but to set them on the path towards a settled way of life; and the approach of forgiveness and practical help from Society is the only one that can permanently help to that end. And it is one of the hopeful signs of the times that Society should resort to this way of dealing with a very human problem. Mr. GLASS says we have advanced in our outlook. Actually the advance is, paradoxically, one of going back to a commonsense principle that was expounded two thousand years ago. A great opportunity rests with Somerset welfare and social workers to help to implement this scheme which, if is hoped, will succeed beyond the highest expectations.