For the Lebanese Child

The government has decided to recognize the "Lebanese Branch of the International Union for Child Welfare" as an official institution of public benefit, supervising all the national institutions concerned with child welfare.

Mrs. Adelaide Richani, well known in humanitarian circles in Lebanon, explained the aims of the child welfare institution in a talk she gave over the Near East Arab Broadcasting Station, in reply to questions put to her by the respected Mr. Georges Shahla. We excerpt from her talk the following:

We have in Lebanon numerous associations concerned

with the matter of the child, urging people to the duty of caring for him and attending to him. They are distributed throughout Lebanon, though most of them are here in Beirut. The Lebanese Branch of the International Union for Child Welfare, however, differs from those associations in that it links them one to another and works to guide them and unify their efforts.

The aims of this institution are drawn from the principles set down in the world document known as the Declaration of the Rights of the Child.

Among these principles: that the child must enjoy care and protection, regardless of considerations of race, nationality, and creed.

And among them: that the child must be provided with all the means necessary to secure his physical, mental, moral, and spiritual growth.

And among them: that in times of distress and danger he must be in the forefront of those who receive aid and relief.

And among them: that the child has the right to be taught a trade by which he may earn his living when he grows up. And then, if he is put to work, he must be safeguarded against exploitation.

Last summer a world congress was held in London in which Lebanon took part, and I had the honor of representing my nation there.

This congress was among the most delightful things I have seen in my life. How I wished there had been at the congress a large number of Lebanese who take an interest in the matter of the child! It lasted a full week, and was attended by delegates from thirty-four states, as well as delegates from the Social Affairs Department of the United Nations, from the World Health Organization, UNESCO, the Food Organization, and other organizations.

The deliberations of the congress turned on the study of unified plans for the relief and care of children, on which the branches of the Union in the various parts of the world could proceed; and on the measures which governments have taken and can take to raise the standing of childhood in the whole world. The congress concluded its work by adopting important resolutions, among them:

1: The creation of a world public opinion in support of the cause of the child.

2: The unification of the ranks of the private organizations working to advance the cause of the child, the marshaling of their forces, and the creation of cooperation among them, with a view to strengthening them, developing them, and improving the work of each.

After the close of the congress I made a tour of numerous institutions, governmental and private, that concern themselves with children. They are many, and there is no room to speak of each of them. But what most caught my attention were the day nurseries for children of two years of age, reserved for the children of working mothers, who go to their work with their minds at rest about their children. And what most affected me was the guidance the teachers give by way of handicrafts, and the cinemas and libraries set aside for children, and the women social workers who attend to the stray, neglected boy. The social worker visits the homes of these children, and transfers the boy to a special school if she observes that the environment in which he lives is unwholesome... The boy is not returned to his parents until they have proved their fitness to care for him. And there are juvenile courts and reformatories for young criminals and vagrants. I attended the trial of two boys, one of them nine years old. Their offense was that they had passed through a field sown with wheat and destroyed some of it... The verdict of guilt stated that they had destroyed the crops from which the people's loaf is made... And the court sentenced the parents of the two boys to a fine of three pounds on the one and two pounds on the other...

(The Woman's Voice): And what sentence do our courts pass on those who make of their children beggars... or pickpockets of the highest order? And on those who put their children to work before the age of nine? And on those whose child, by the time he reaches his fifth year, has already learned every curse against the religions and the prophets, and against mothers, sisters, and daughters?