CHILDREN OF THE UNFIT.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1846, 4 September 1913, Page 5

CHILDREN OF THE UNFIT.

(By MosrrapS — Snedn.' OnrramonSant,.) Auckland, September 3. In the annual report of t-ho Door of Hope (an institution which last year assisted 61 unfortunate women) presented this afternoon, stress is. laid upon tlio growing danger to the community arising from insufficient protection to the morally and montally weak. "Wo view with grave concern," stated the report, "tho increase of tho number of illegitimate children of feeble-minded mothers. This is a class that cannot bo successfully dealt with in any home, or by any known existing methods of treatment. While ordinary lunatics aro taken in charge'by the State, and placed in asylums, there is no law to safeguard tho moral lunatic whose defects and evil characteristics prevent her joining tho ranks of ordinary workers. She lives anywhere and anyhow, often in the worst moral atmosphere, and always surrounded by all that is wretched and hopeless. Theso irresponsible creatures are allowed to roam at large, producing that which is only an unspeakable danger to tho country and race. Tho Government must necessarily take over, food, educate, provide for, and protect these children of tho unfit until the age of twenty-one, when tlioy will take their nlace, and assert their power at the ballot box. and ; later on, make their influence felt with deadly grip and effect upon the legislative Chambers of the Dominion."