Changing our World: Public assistance or public humiliation?

Guest post by Dr. Bernard Evans, professor at St John's University and former member of JRLC's Executive Board. Cross-posted courtesy of the St Cloud Visitor. 

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Public assistance or public humiliation? What should be our response to persons struggling to make it in difficult economic times? The answer may seem obvious, but bills recently introduced at the Minnesota State Legislature beg the question.

Legislators are proposing new limits on who may receive public assistance, how long they may receive it, and various conditions that should come with financial aid. Some of this may be reasonable, and deserving of public discussion, but a few of the proposed changes raise ethical eyebrows. Example, to require drug testing for anyone seeking assistance from Minnesota Family Assistance Program (MFIP). One sponsor of such bills – a central Minnesota State Representative – has characterized welfare payments as feeding animals.

No one can argue against the need for accountability and making sure public funds are used for the purposes intended, and used where most needed. That applies as much to public money going to individuals and families in need as it does to car manufacturers, educational institutions, and football stadiums. But some of these bills, along with the disparaging rhetoric heard in the Minnesota Legislature, go beyond seeking reasonable accountability in the use of State public assistance money. They sound punitive and hurtful to many families suffering through this recession on inadequate income.

Catholic social teaching holds up a far different standard on responding to persons in economic need. The Second Vatican Council wrote that Christians are “obliged to come to the relief of the poor, and to do so not merely out of their superfluous goods.” (Church in the Modern World, 69) The Council repeated a saying of the early church writers: “Feed the many dying of hunger, because if you have not fed him you have killed him.”

Alright, so we may not have many people in Minnesota dying of starvation. Still, this teaching leads us to ask: How should we respond to people in need? And, whose responsibility is it to help persons struggling with poverty? The answer is both short and complex: citizens, churches and government share in this responsibility.

One of the purposes of government is to look out for people who cannot care for themselves or who may experience difficult times in meeting basic needs. Pope Leo XIII stressed that the “rulers of the State” are to promote the common good and within that “to promote in the highest degree the interests of the poor.” (Rerum Novarum, 26) We help people who are struggling so that they may again take their place in contributing to the good of society. In 1986 the U.S. Catholic Bishops made this point in Economic Justice for All. “The prime purpose of this special commitment to the poor is to enable them to become active participants in the life of society. It is to enable all persons to share in and contribute to the common good.” (88)

Again , we surely can agree that accountability and improving public assistance is a good thing. We also can recognize that we won’t all agree on the best approach to these goals. But referring to the poor as less than human is neither helpful nor respectful. Neither is it helpful to ignore basic facts: the vast majority of people in need are not involved in drugs, fraud or abuse of any kind; the increase in Minnesotans receiving public assistance has much to do with the current economic recession; most people on public assistance receive benefits for less than two years; more than half of MFIP recipients are children.

Finally, and in fairness, if we are going to demand drug tests for people receiving MFIP, why not require it for others receiving state money -- like businesses receiving state contracts, like employees of colleges and universities providing state funded student aid, like farmers receiving state agricultural money, and – most of all – like state legislators whose bills and public comments sometimes cause us to wonder.

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