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Gazette Of The United States, & Philadelphia Daily Advertiser
Philadelphia, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania
What is this article about?
Following a calamity in the city, a letter urges managers of the House of Employment to diligently bind out orphans and poor children to ethical masters providing care, education, trades, and moral guidance, warning against hasty placements that harm long-term societal benefits.
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GENTLEMEN,
THE late distressing calamity which has visited our native city, has transmitted to your care, a number of Orphans and other poor children, whom it will be your duty to bind out to other persons of good character, who will feed them regularly, cloath them well, give them sufficient schooling, and teach them in useful trades and occupations, and who will moreover, use their endeavours to instruct them in the principles of religion and morality, that they may become useful members of religious and civil society.
It is expected of you to perform this important duty with great fidelity and care; and that you will never be too hasty in binding them, to save the small expence of maintaining them for a short time; for what is this to the public, in comparison to the loss it may sustain, by the injustice you may thereby do to one of its members?
If a child fail of obtaining a good trade by the neglect of his master—if his master is incapable of instructing him in his business—if his morals become tainted by the influence of a bad example—or, if by cruelty and hard usage, his young and tender limbs should be mutilated and injured—do you think the public will ever be compensated for the injury they receive, by a few pounds shillings and pence, which a too rigid oeconomy has saved? certainly, they will not.
The laws have appointed you, Gentlemen, the guardians of these little children, to protect them from all such wrongs; you are to do the parent's duty to them. On you we therefore call! and you we beseech, by all the sacredness of the great trust committed to your care, that you do not bind out one of these children, until you have a perfect knowledge of the good character of the proposed master or mistress; and we entreat you, always to prefer those, who will see that they are kept in steady employ, without exacting unreasonable labor at their hands, in a business that will afford them a prospect of obtaining by it, a decent and comfortable living.
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Letter to Editor Details
Author
A. To Z.
Recipient
To The Managers Of The House Of Employment
Main Argument
the managers must carefully bind out orphans and poor children affected by a recent calamity only to reputable masters who provide regular food, clothing, schooling, useful trades, and moral/religious instruction, prioritizing the children's long-term welfare and public interest over hasty decisions to save short-term maintenance costs.
Notable Details