THE BENEVOLENT TRUST--THE VALUE OF THE COÖPERATIVE PRINCIPLE IN
GIVING
Going a step farther in the plan of making benefactions increasingly
effective which I took up in the last chapter under the title of "The
Difficult Art of Giving," I am tempted to take the opportunity to
dwell a little upon the subject of combination in charitable work,
which has been something of a hobby with me for many years.
If a combination to do business is effective in saving waste and in
getting better results, why is not combination far more important in
philanthropic work? The general idea of coöperation in giving for
education, I have felt, scored a real step in advance when Mr. Andrew
Carnegie consented to become a member of the General Education Board.
For in accepting a position in this directorate he has, it seems to
me, stamped with his approval this vital principle of coöperation in
aiding the educational institutions of our country.
I rejoice, as everybody must, in Mr. Carnegie's enthusiasm for using
his wealth for the benefit of his less fortunate fellows and I think
his devotion to his adopted land's welfare has set a striking example
for all time.
The General Education Board, of which Mr. Carnegie has now become a
member, is interesting as an example of an organization formed for the
purpose of working out, in an orderly and rather scientific way, the
problem of helping to stimulate and improve education in all parts of
our country. What this organization may eventually accomplish, of
course, no one can tell, but surely, under its present board of
directors, it will go very far. Here, again, I feel that I may speak
frankly and express my personal faith in its success, since I am not a
member of the board, and have never attended a meeting, and the work
is all done by others.
There are some other and larger plans thought out on careful and broad
lines, which I have been studying for many years, and we can see that
they are growing into definite shape. It is good to know that there
are always unselfish men, of the best calibre, to help in every large
philanthropic enterprise. One of the most satisfactory and stimulating
pieces of good fortune that has come to me is the evidence that so
many busy people are willing to turn aside from their work in pressing
fields of labour and to give their best thoughts and energies without
compensation to the work of human uplift. Doctors, clergymen, lawyers,
as well as many high-grade men of affairs, are devoting their best and
most unselfish efforts to some of the plans that we are all trying to
work out.
Take, as one example of many similar cases, Mr. Robert C. Ogden, who
for years, while devoting himself to an exacting business, still found
time, supported by wonderful enthusiasm, to give force by his own
personality to work done in difficult parts of the educational world,
particularly to improving the common school system of the South. His
efforts have been wisely directed along fundamental lines which must
produce results through the years to come.
Fortunately my children have been as earnest as I, and much more
diligent, in carefully and intelligently carrying out the work already
begun, and agree with me that at least the same energy and thought
should be expended in the proper and effective use of money when
acquired as was exerted in the earning of it.
The General Education Board has made, or is making, a careful study
of the location, aims, work, resources, administration, and
educational value, present and prospective, of the institutions of
higher learning in the United States. The board makes its
contributions, averaging something like two million dollars a year, on
the most careful comparative study of needs and opportunities
throughout the country. Its records are open to all. Many benefactors
of education are availing themselves of these disinterested inquiries,
and it is hoped that more will do so.
A large number of individuals are contributing to the support of
educational institutions in our country. To help an inefficient,
ill-located, unnecessary school is a waste. I am told by those who
have given most careful study to this problem that it is highly
probable that enough money has been squandered on unwise educational
projects to have built up a national system of higher education
adequate to our needs if the money had been properly directed to that
end. Many of the good people who bestow their beneficence on education
may well give more thought to investigating the character of the
enterprises that they are importuned to help, and this study ought to
take into account the kind of people who are responsible for their
management, their location, and the facilities supplied by other
institutions round about. A thorough examination such as this is
generally quite impossible for an individual, and he either declines
to give from lack of accurate knowledge, or he may give without due
consideration. If, however, this work of inquiry is done, and well
done, by the General Education Board, through officers of
intelligence, skill, and sympathy, trained to the work, important and
needed service is rendered. The walls of sectarian exclusiveness are
fast disappearing, as they should, and the best people are standing
shoulder to shoulder as they attack the great problems of general
uplift.
ROMAN CATHOLIC CHARITIES
Just here it occurs to me to testify to the fact that the Roman
Catholic Church, as I have observed in my experience, has advanced a
long way in this direction. I have been surprised to learn how far a
given sum of money has gone in the hands of priests and nuns, and how
really effective is their use of it. I fully appreciate the splendid
service done by other workers in the field, but I have seen the
organization of the Roman Church secure better results with a given
sum of money than other Church organizations are accustomed to secure
from the same expenditure. I speak of this merely to point the value
of the principle of organization, in which I believe so heartily. It
is unnecessary to dwell upon the centuries of experience which the
Church of Rome has gone through to perfect a great power of
organization.
Studying these problems has been a source of the greatest interest to
me. My assistants, quite distinct from any board, have an organization
of sufficient size to investigate the many requests that come to us.
This is done from the office of our committee in New York. For an
individual to attempt to keep any close watch of single cases would be
impossible. I am called upon to explain this fact many times. To read
the hundreds of letters daily received at our office would be beyond
the power of any one man, and surely, if the many good people who
write would only reflect a little, they must realize that it is
impossible for me personally to consider their applications.
The plan that we have worked out, and I hope improved upon year after
year, has been the result of experience, and I refer to it now only as
one contribution to a general subject which is of such great moment to
earnest people; and this must be my excuse for speaking so frankly.
THE APPEALS THAT COME
The reading, assorting, and investigating of the hundreds of letters
of appeal which are received daily at my office are attended to by a
department organized for this purpose. The task is not so difficult as
at first it might seem. The letters are, to be sure, of great variety,
from all sorts of people in every condition of life, and indeed, from
all parts of the world. Four-fifths of these letters are, however,
requests for money for personal use, with no other title to
consideration than that the writer would be gratified to have it.
There remain numbers of requests which all must recognize as worthy of
notice. These may be divided, roughly, as follows:
The claims of local charities. The town or city in which one lives has
a definite appeal to all its citizens, and all good neighbours will
wish to coöperate with friends and fellow townsmen. But these local
charities, hospitals, kindergartens, and the like, ought not to make
appeal outside the local communities which they serve. The burden
should be carried by the people who are on the spot and who are, or
should be, most familiar with local needs.
Then come the national and international claims. These properly appeal
especially to men of large means throughout the country, whose wealth
admits of their doing something more than assist in caring for the
local charities. There are many great national and international
philanthropic and Christian organizations that cover the whole field
of world-wide charity; and, while people of reputed wealth all receive
appeals from individual workers throughout the world for personal
assistance, the prudent and thoughtful giver will, more and more,
choose these great and responsible organizations as the medium for his
gifts and the distribution of his funds to distant fields. This has
been my custom, and the experience of every day serves only to confirm
its wisdom.
The great value of dealing with an organization which knows all the
facts, and can best decide just where the help can be applied to the
best advantage, has impressed itself upon me through the results of
long years of experience. For example, one is asked to give in a
certain field of missionary work a sum, for a definite purpose--let us
say a hospital. To comply with this request will take, say, $10,000.
It seems wise and natural to give this amount. The missionary who
wants this money is working under the direction of a strong and
capable religious denomination.
Suppose the request is referred to the manager of the board of this
denomination, and it transpires that there are many good reasons why a
new hospital is not badly needed at this point, and by a little good
management the need of this missionary can be met by another hospital
in its neighbourhood; whereas another missionary in another place has
no such possibility for any hospital facilities whatever. There is no
question that the money should be spent in the place last named. These
conditions the managers of all the mission stations know, although
perhaps the one who is giving the money never heard of them, and in my
judgment he is wise in not acting until he has consulted these men of
larger information.
It is interesting to follow the mental processes that some excellent
souls go through to cloud their consciences when they consider what
their duty actually is. For instance, one man says: "I do not believe
in giving money to street beggars." I agree with him, I do not believe
in the practice either; but that is not a reason why one should be
exempt from doing something to help the situation represented by the
street beggar. Because one does not yield to the importunities of
such people is exactly the reason one should join and uphold the
charity organization societies of one's own locality, which deal
justly and humanely with this class, separating the worthy from the
unworthy.
Another says: "I don't give to such and such a board, because I have
read that of the money given only half or less actually gets to the
person needing help." This is often not a true statement of fact, as
proved again and again, and even if it were true in part it does not
relieve the possible giver from the duty of helping to make the
organization more efficient. By no possible chance is it a valid
excuse for closing up one's pocketbook and dismissing the whole
subject from one's mind.
INSTITUTIONS AS THEY RELATE TO EACH OTHER
Surely it is wise to be careful not to duplicate effort and not to
inaugurate new charities in fields already covered, but rather to
strengthen and perfect those already at work. There is a great deal of
rivalry and a vast amount of duplication, and one of the most
difficult things in giving is to ascertain when the field is fully
covered. Many people simply consider whether the institution to which
they are giving is thoughtfully and well managed, without stopping to
discover whether the field is not already occupied by others; and for
this reason one ought not to investigate a single institution by
itself, but always in its relation to all similar institutions in the
territory. Here is a case in point:
A number of enthusiastic people had a plan for founding an orphan
asylum which was to be conducted by one of our strongest religious
denominations. The raising of the necessary funds was begun, and among
the people who were asked to subscribe was a man who always made it a
practice to study the situation carefully before committing himself to
a contribution. He asked one of the promoters of the new institution
how many beds the present asylums serving this community provided, how
efficient they were, where located, and what particular class of
institution was lacking in the community.
To none of these questions were answers forthcoming, so he had this
information gathered on his own account with the purpose of helping to
make the new plan effective. His studies revealed the fact that the
city where the new asylum was to be built was so well provided with
such institutions that there were already vastly more beds for
children than there were applicants to fill them, and that the field
was well and fully covered. These facts being presented to the
organizers of the enterprise, it was shown that no real need for such
an institution existed. I wish I might add that the scheme was
abandoned. It was not. Such charities seldom are when once the
sympathies of the worthy people, however misinformed, are heartily
enlisted.
It may be urged that doing the work in this systematic and apparently
cold-blooded way leaves out of consideration, to a large extent, the
merits of individual cases. My contention is that the organization of
work in combination should not and does not stifle the work of
individuals, but strengthens and stimulates it. The orderly
combination of philanthropic effort is growing daily, and at the same
time the spirit of broad philanthropy never was so general as it is
now.
THE CLAIM OF HIGHER EDUCATION
The giver who works out these problems for himself will, no doubt,
find many critics. So many people see the pressing needs of every-day
life that possibly they fail to realize those which are, if less
obvious, of an even larger significance--for instance, the great
claims of higher education. Ignorance is the source of a large part
of the poverty and a vast amount of the crime in the world--hence the
need of education. If we assist the highest forms of education--in
whatever field--we secure the widest influence in enlarging the
boundaries of human knowledge; for all the new facts discovered or set
in motion become the universal heritage. I think we cannot
overestimate the importance of this matter. The mere fact that most of
the great achievements in science, medicine, art, and literature are
the flower of the higher education is sufficient. Some great writer
will one day show how these things have ministered to the wants of all
the people, educated and uneducated, high and low, rich and poor, and
made life more what we all wish it to be.
The best philanthropy is constantly in search of the finalities--a
search for cause, an attempt to cure evils at their source. My
interest in the University of Chicago has been enhanced by the fact
that while it has comprehensively considered the other features of a
collegiate course, it has given so much attention to research.
DR. WILLIAM R. HARPER
The mention of this promising young institution always brings to my
mind the figure of Dr. William R. Harper, whose enthusiasm for its
work was so great that no vision of its future seemed too large.
My first meeting with Dr. Harper was at Vassar College, where one of
my daughters was a student. He used to come, as the guest of Dr. James
M. Taylor, the president, to lecture on Sundays; and as I frequently
spent week-ends there, I saw and talked much with the young professor,
then of Yale, and caught in some degree the contagion of his
enthusiasm.
When the university had been founded, and he had taken the presidency,
our great ambition was to secure the best instructors and to organize
the new institution, unhampered by traditions, according to the most
modern ideals. He raised millions of dollars among the people of
Chicago and the Middle West, and won the personal interest of their
leading citizens. Here lay his great strength, for he secured not only
their money but their loyal support and strong personal interest--the
best kind of help and coöperation. He built even better than he knew.
His lofty ideals embodied in the university awakened a deeper interest
in higher education throughout the Central West, and stirred
individuals, denominations, and legislatures to effective action. The
world will probably never realize how largely the present splendid
university system of the Central Western States is due indirectly to
the genius of this man.
With all his extraordinary power of work and his executive and
organizing ability, Dr. Harper was a man of exquisite personal charm.
We count it among the rich and delightful experiences of our home-life
that Dr. and Mrs. Harper could occasionally spend days together with
us for a brief respite from the exacting cares and responsibilities of
the university work. As a friend and companion, in daily intercourse,
no one could be more delightful than he.
It has been my good fortune to contribute at various times to the
University of Chicago, of which Dr. Harper was president, and the
newspapers not unnaturally supposed at such times that he used the
occasions of our personal association to secure these contributions.
The cartoonists used to find this a fruitful theme. They would picture
Dr. Harper as a hypnotist waving his magic spell, or would represent
him forcing his way into my inner office where I was pictured as busy
cutting coupons and from which delightful employment I incontinently
fled out of the window at sight of him; or they would represent me as
fleeing across rivers on cakes of floating ice with Dr. Harper in hot
pursuit; or perhaps he would be following close on my trail, like the
wolf in the Russian story, in inaccessible country retreats, while I
escaped only by means of the slight delays I occasioned him by now and
then dropping a million-dollar bill, which he would be obliged to stop
and pick up.
These cartoons were intended to be very amusing, and some of them
certainly did have a flavour of humour, but they were never humorous
to Dr. Harper. They were in fact a source of deep humiliation to him,
and I am sure he would, were he living, be glad to have me say, as I
now do, that during the entire period of his presidency of the
University of Chicago, he never once either wrote me a letter or asked
me personally for a dollar of money for the University of Chicago. In
the most intimate daily intercourse with him in my home, the finances
of the University of Chicago were never canvassed or discussed.
The method of procedure in this case has been substantially the same
as with all other contributions. The presentation of the needs of the
university has been made in writing by the officers of the university,
whose special duty it is to prepare its budgets and superintend its
finances. A committee of the trustees, with the president, have
annually conferred, at a fixed time, with our Department of
Benevolence, as to its needs. Their conclusions have generally been
entirely unanimous and I have found no occasion hitherto seriously to
depart from their recommendations. There have been no personal
interviews and no personal solicitations. It has been a pleasure to me
to make these contributions, but that pleasure has arisen out of the
fact that the university is located in a great centre of empire; that
it has rooted itself in the affections and interest of the people
among whom it is located; that it is doing a great and needed work--in
fine, that it has been able to attract and to justify the
contributions of its patrons East and West. It is not personal
interviews and impassioned appeals, but sound and justifying worth,
that should attract and secure the funds of philanthropy.
The people in great numbers who are constantly importuning me for
personal interviews in behalf of favourite causes err in supposing
that the interview, were it possible, is the best way, or even a good
way, of securing what they want. Our practice has been uniformly to
request applicants to state their cases tersely, but nevertheless as
fully as they think necessary, in writing. Their application is
carefully considered by very competent people chosen for this purpose.
If, thereupon, personal interviews are found desirable by our
assistants, they are invited from our office.
Written presentations form the necessary basis of investigation, of
consultation, and comparison of views between the different members of
our staff, and of the final presentation to me.
It is impossible to conduct this department of our work in any other
way. The rule requiring written presentation as against the interview
is enforced and adhered to not, as the applicant sometimes supposes,
as a cold rebuff to him, but in order to secure for his cause, if it
be a good one, the careful consideration which is its due--a
consideration that cannot be given in a mere verbal interview.
THE REASON FOR CONDITIONAL GIFTS
It is easy to do harm in giving money. To give to institutions which
should be supported by others is not the best philanthropy. Such
giving only serves to dry up the natural springs of charity.
It is highly important that every charitable institution shall have at
all times the largest possible number of current contributors. This
means that the institution shall constantly be making its appeals;
but, if these constant appeals are to be successful, the institution
is forced to do excellent work and meet real and manifest needs.
Moreover, the interest of many people affords the best assurance of
wise economy and unselfish management as well as of continued support.
We frequently make our gifts conditional on the giving of others, not
because we wish to force people to do their duty, but because we wish
in this way to root the institution in the affections of as many
people as possible who, as contributors, become personally concerned,
and thereafter may be counted on to give to the institution their
watchful interest and coöperation. Conditional gifts are often
criticized, and sometimes, it may be, by people who have not thought
the matter out fully.
Criticism which is deliberate, sober, and fair is always valuable and
it should be welcomed by all who desire progress. I have had at least
my full share of adverse criticism, but I can truly say that it has
not embittered me, nor left me with any harsh feeling against a living
soul. Nor do I wish to be critical of those whose conscientious
judgment, frankly expressed, differs from my own. No matter how noisy
the pessimists may be, we know that the world is getting better
steadily and rapidly, and that is a good thing to remember in our
moments of depression or humiliation.
THE BENEVOLENT TRUSTS
To return to the subject of the Benevolent Trusts, which is a name for
corporations to manage the business side of benefactions. The idea
needs, and to be successful must have, the help of men who have been
trained along practical lines. The best men of business should be
attracted by its possibilities for good. When it is eventually worked
out, as it will be in some form, and probably in a better one than we
can now forecast, how worthy it will be of the efforts of our ablest
men!
We shall have the best charities supported generously and adequately,
managed with scientific efficiency by the ablest men, who will gladly
he held strictly accountable to the donors of the money, not only for
the correct financing of the funds, but for the intelligent and
effective use of every penny. To-day the whole machinery of
benevolence is conducted upon more or less haphazard principles. Good
men and women are wearing out their lives to raise money to sustain
institutions which are conducted by more less or unskilled methods.
This is a tremendous waste of our best material.
We cannot afford to have great souls who are capable of doing the most
effective work slaving to raise the money. That should be a business
man's task, and he should be supreme in managing the machinery of the
expenses. The teachers, the workers, and the inspired leaders of the
people should be relieved of these pressing and belittling money
cares. They have more than enough to do in tilling their tremendous
and never fully occupied field, and they should be free from any care
which might in any wise divert them from that work.
When these Benevolent Trusts come into active being, such
organizations on broad lines will be sure to attract the brains of the
best men we have in our commercial affairs, as great business
opportunities attract them now. Our successful business men as a
class, and the exceptions only prove the truth of the assertion, have
a high standard of honour. I have sometimes been tempted to say that
our clergymen could gain by knowing the essentials of business life
better. The closer association with men of affairs would, I think,
benefit both classes. People who have had much to do with ministers
and those who hold confidential positions in our churches have at
times had surprising experiences in meeting what is sometimes
practised in the way of ecclesiastical business, because these good
men have had so little of business training in the work-a-day world.
The whole system of proper relations, whether it be in commerce, or in
the Church, or in the sciences, rests on honour. Able business men
seek to confine their dealings to people who tell the truth and keep
their promises; and the representatives of the Church, who are often
prone to attack business men as a type of what is selfish and mean,
have some great lessons to learn, and they will gladly learn them as
these two types of workers grow closer together.
The Benevolent Trusts, when they come, will raise these standards;
they will look the facts in the face; they will applaud and sustain
the effective workers and institutions; and they will uplift the
intelligent standard of good work in helping all the people chiefly to
help themselves. There are already signs that these combinations are
coming, and coming quickly, and in the directorates of these trusts
you will eventually find the flower of our American manhood, the men
who not only know how to make money, but who accept the great
responsibility of administering it wisely.
A few years ago, on the occasion of the decennial anniversary of the
University of Chicago, I was attending a university dinner, and having
been asked to speak I had jotted down a few notes.
When the time arrived to stand up and face these guests--men of worth
and position--my notes meant nothing to me. As I thought of the latent
power of good that rested with these rich and influential people I was
greatly affected. I threw down my notes and started to plead for my
Benevolent Trust plan.
"You men," I said, "are always looking forward to do something for
good causes. I know how very busy you are. You work in a treadmill
from which you see no escape. I can easily understand that you feel
that it is beyond your present power carefully to study the needs of
humanity, and that you wait to give until you have considered many
things and decided upon some course of action. Now, why not do with
what you can give to others as you do with what you want to keep for
yourself and your children: Put it into a Trust? You would not place a
fortune for your children in the hands of an inexperienced person, no
matter how good he might be. Let us be as careful with the money we
would spend for the benefit of others as if we were laying it aside
for our own family's future use. Directors carry on these affairs in
your behalf. Let us erect a foundation, a Trust, and engage directors
who will make it a life work to manage, with our personal coöperation,
this business of benevolence properly and effectively. And I beg of
you, attend to it _now_, don't wait."
I confess I felt most strongly on the subject, and I feel so now.