PUBLIC ASSISTANCE AND PUBLIC CHARITY

Under the old régime, what is now called "Public Assistance" included several distinct departments:

• (1) that of the Hôtel-Dieu, one of the oldest hospitals in Europe, doubtless founded by the Bishop St. Landry after the epidemic of 651. It was at first directed by the canons of Notre-Dame, and after 1505 by a commission of citizens with whom Louis XIV associated, together with the Archbishop of Paris, several representatives of the Government and of the chief judiciary bodies. This department undertook the administration of the Hospital for Incurables, the Hospital of St. Louis, and that of St. Anne;
• (2) department of the General Hospital, created by Louis XIV in 1656 for the sick, the aged, children, and beggars, and with which were connected the infirmaries of Pitié, Bicêtre, the Salpètrière, Vaugirard, the foundling hospital, and that of the Holy Ghost;
• (3) several independent hospitals, e. g. Cochin Hospital, founded in 1680 by the Abbé Cochin, pastor of St-Jacques, and the Necker Hospital, established in 1779 at the initiative of Mme Necker;
• (4) the Bureau of Charity, dependent on the parishes;
• (5) the central Bureau of the Poor (grand bureau des pauvres), established under Francis I for the relief of the indigent. It was presided over and directed by the procureur général of the Parlement and levied a yearly "alms tax" on all the inhabitants of Paris. It administered the infirmary of Petites Maisons.

The Revolution effected a radical change in this system. The central Bureau des Pauvres was at first replaced by forty-eight beneficent committees (comités de bienfaisance); these were replaced in 1816 by twelve bureaux of charity, which in 1830 took the name of bureaux de bienfaisance and number twenty since 1860. While in the communes of France all the hospital departments are under an administration distinct from that of the bureau of beneficence, at Paris, in virtue of the law of 10 Jan., 1849, the General Administration of Public Assistance directs both the hospitals and the departments for relief at home. At present the Department of Public Assistance directs 31 hospitals, 14 being general hospitals, 7 special, 9 children's hospitals, and 1 insane asylum. At the laicization of the hospitals, the hospital of St. Joseph, conducted by the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, was opened in 1884 under the patronage of the Archbishop of Paris; that of Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours, in care of the Augustines, was founded by Abbé Carton, pastor of St-Pierre-de-Montrouge and bequeathed by him in 1887 to the Archbishop of Paris. The hospital of Notre-Dame-de-Perpétuel-Secours at Lavallois is conducted by the Dominican Sisters. The St-Jacques, Hahnemann, St-François, and St-Michel hospitals are also in the hands of congregations. The Villepinte Institution, in charge of the Sisters of Marie Auxiliatrice, cares for children and young women suffering from tuberculosis. The Marie-Thérèse infirmary was founded for aged or infirm priests by the wife of Châteaubriand. The Little Sisters of the Poor have nine houses in the diocese. The Brothers of St. John of God maintain a private hospital and an asylum for incurable young men. The Institution of the Ladies of Calvary, founded at Lyons in 1842 by Mme Gamier and established at Paris in 1874, is conducted by widows for the care of the cancerous, and receives into its infirmaries patients whom no other hospital will admit; it also has houses at Lyons, Marseilles, St. Etienne, and Rouen. The Little Sisters of the Assumption, nurses of the poor, who have nine houses in the diocese, stay night and day without pay in the houses of the sick poor. The same is done by the Sisters of Notre-Dame of the Rue Cassini in the homes of poor women in their confinement. Other orders for the care of the sick in their homes are the Franciscan nursing sisters (7 houses) and the Sisters Servants of the Poor (4 houses).

Among the institutions now dependent on the State, the foundation of which was formerly the glory of the Church, must be mentioned that of Quinze Vingts for the blind. As early as the eleventh century there was a confraternity for the blind; St. Louis built for it a house and a church, gave it a perpetual revenue, and decreed that the number of the Quinze Vingts (300 blind) should be maintained complete. When the king was canonized in 1297 the blind took him as their patron (see EDUCATION OF THE BLIND). The Catholic institutions of Paris for the relief of the poor and the uplifting of the labouring classes are very numerous. For the Society of St. Vincent de Paul see MISSION, CONGREGATION OF PRIESTS OF THE. The Philanthropic Society, founded in 1780 under the protection of Louis XVI, established dispensaries, economical kitchens, night shelters, and settlement houses. The Central Office of Charitable Institutions investigates the condition of workmen and the poor, and conducts employment and restoration bureaux. The Association of Ladies of Charity, established (1629) in the parish of St-Sauveur by St. Vincent de Paul for the visitation of the sick poor and reconstituted in 1840, has given rise to the Society for the Sick Poor, the Society for the Sick Poor in the Suburbs, and the Society for the Visitation of the Poor in the Hospitals. Most parishes have their organizations of charitable women who, under the pastor's supervision, distribute clothing and visit the poor. The Société de Charité Maternelle, which dates from 1784, when it was patronized by Marie Antoinette, assists married women in their confinement without regard to creed. In each quarter of Paris women visitors determine the families deserving assistance. In 1898 the society assisted 2797 women and 2853 children. The Association des Mères de Famille, founded in 1836 by Mme Badenier, assists at childbirth women who do not meet the conditions required by the Société de Charité Maternelle or who are numbered among the disreputable poor. The Œuvre des Faubourgs, through a number of women, visits 2000 families and 8000 children in the Paris suburbs. The Œuvre de la Miséricorde (Work of Mercy), founded in 1822, assists the disreputable poor. An organization founded in 1841 by Mgr Christophe, later Bishop of Soissons, helps convalescent lunatics. The objects of the Œuvre de l'Hospitalité du Travail are to offer a free temporary shelter without distinction of creed or nationality to every homeless woman or girl who has determined to work for an honourable livelihood, to employ its clients at useful tasks, to endeavour to revive the habit of working in those who have lost it, and to assist them in securing honourable employment which will also enable them to provide for the future. This organization, founded in 1881 under the direction of Sister St. Antoine, a member of the Order of Calvary, between 1881 and 1903 gave shelter to 70,240 women. In 1894 Sister St. Antoine annexed to it the Œuvre du Travail à Domicile pour les Mères de Famille (Association for procuring home-work for mothers of families) which between 1892 and 1902 assisted 7449 mothers. The Maison de Travail for men, founded in 1892 by M. de Laubespin, performs the same service for unemployed and homeless men, and is also in charge of the Sisters of Calvary.

The Catholics of Paris have taken part in the syndicate movement by the creation in 1887 of the syndicate of commercial and industrial employees, by the organization of the Aiguille (a professional association of patronesses and women employees and workers on clothing), and by the Union Centrale, made up of five professional syndicates of working-girls, business employees, seamstresses, servant girls, and nurses, with "La Ruche syndicale" as their organ. The great Society of St. Nicholas, founded in 1827 by Mgr de Bervanger and Count Victor de Noailles and directed by a staff of Catholic laymen, has four houses (Paris, Issy, Igny, and Buzenval), where it gives a professional education to boys whom it adopts as early as their eighth year. The Society of the Friends of Childhood, founded in 1828, is concerned with the education and apprenticeship of poor boys. The Ecole commerciale de Francs Bourgeois, created in 1843 by the Brothers of the Christian Schools, prepares pupils for commercial, industrial, and administrative professions. Numerous homes and restaurants for young working girls have been founded by Catholics. The Charitable Society of St. Francis Regis was founded in 1826 by M. Gassin to facilitate the religious and civil marriage of the poor of the diocese and the legitimatization of their natural children. The day-nurseries, which care for children from 15 days to 3 years of age while their mothers are employed, date from M. Marbeau's foundation in 1844. The Sisters of St. Paul have founded in the parishes of St-Vincent-de-Paul and St-Séverin a society for the relief of mothers who wish their children to remain at home. The Œuvre de l'Adoption was founded in 1859 by Abbé Maitrias to gather as many orphans as possible. Out of so many other associations, the following must be mentioned: the Association des Jeunes Economes which, under the direction of the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, uses the generous donations of a large number of young women for the apprenticing and employment of poor girls; the Society of St. Anne, founded in 1824; the Society for Abandoned Children, founded in 1803; the Society for the Adoption of Abandoned Little Girls, founded in 1879 (all concerned with finding homes for orphans); the Society of the Child Jesus, which shelters during their convalescence poor girls who have been discharged from hospitals.

There is a recent tendency towards the complete reorganization of Catholic charity in a single quarter by the centralization of all charitable departments for the development and protection of family life. For example the Fresh Air Society for Mothers and Children, founded by Mlle Chaptal in 1901, includes:

• (1) a department for the investigation of home conditions;
• (2) one for free consultations for poor mothers and their nursing children;
• (3) one for assisting mothers whose confinement takes place at home;
• (4) one for the distribution of tickets for meat, cereal, or farinaceous food for women who have been confined;
• (5) the fresh air department, which sends a number of the women of the district into the country.

The Society of Ste-Rosalie also combines a number of admirable works which perpetuate the memory of the good done in the Faubourg St-Marcel during the July Monarchy by Sister Rosalie Rendu, who worked in collaboration with Vicomte Armand de Mélun. The Working Women's Society of Our Lady of the Rosary was the nucleus of a flourishing parish in a district previously deprived of all religious help. The Union Familiale, founded at Charonne by Mlle Gahéry in 1899, has completely transformed the district; it has established a Fröbelian nursery for the small children, and receives children after school hours; since 1904 it assembles families in a family educational circle; it organizes groups of "little mothers," little girls of ten, who every Thursday take care of 3 or 4 children; it has gardening classes and a department for trousseaux, and since 1900 it has had vacation colonies, known as fresh air societies. The original congregation of the Blind Sisters of St. Paul, founded in 1851 by Abbé Juge and Anne Bergunion, looks after blind young women.

According to the report of the Abbé Fonsagrives to the Diocesan Congress of 1908, the Archdiocese of Paris has 356 Catholic patronages, of which 63 are for male pupils of the free schools, 79 for male pupils of the lay schools, 101 for female pupils of the free schools, 113 for female pupils of the lay schools. At that date lay patronages were only 245. The Society for the Patronage of Young Working Girls, founded in 1851, receives young girls after their First Communion. The Sisters of the Presentation of Tours conduct the association and society for mutual relief for young business women; the Sisters Servants of Mary and Sisters of the Cross secure situations for servants. The Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul have societies called "patronages internes", which shelter working-girls who are orphans or who live at a distance from their families. The Œuvre des Petites Préservées et le Vestiaire des Petits Prisonniers, founded in 1892 by the Comtesse de Biron, looks after the preservation of young girls discharged from prison. The Catholic International Society for the Protection of Young Women, organized at Freiburg in 1897 after the Organization of the Protestant International Union of the Friends of Young Women, in 1905 alone gave shelter to 11,919 young girls in Paris.

There is at present a great renewal in Catholic methods of charity and relief at Paris, the spirit of which is shown in the report concerning Catholic relief societies read (Aug., 1910) at the International Congress of Public and Private Relief held at Copenhagen under the presidency of President Loubet: "The great originality of Catholic relief work in recent years consists in the multiplication of works for social education. This arises more and more from the 'patriarchal' conception of these undertakings. The modern wish and tendency is to give him who suffers a share in his own relief, to give him a collaborative or directing part in the effort which is being made to assist and uplift him. Henceforth the favourite works of charity among Catholics will be those known as preventive. To prevent misery by an hygienic, domestic, professional education is the object of the founders of modern works of relief. They are concerned not only with the strife against the consequences of misery but with that against its production. Without neglecting individual alms, Catholic charity aims especially at social relief; it prefers to precede misery to prevent it, rather than to follow it to relieve it; it prefers to uplift families rather than assist them, to help them when they are stumbling rather than to raise them up when they have fallen; it prefers to help them actively to better working conditions, than to relieve passively the results of these evil conditions. All instruction imparted in organizations for Catholic youth and in the Catholic patronages of Paris is impregnated with this apparently new spirit which on closer view is seen to be merely a return to the Christian solidarity of the Middle Ages."

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