In all other cases in which paternity is not voluntarily acknowledged I take the first and most important duty of the law to be the appointment of guardians. I believe that nothing else is quite so urgently needed to safeguard the fatherless little one. I do not think the illegitimate child safely can be left without supervision in the care of its mother. Those who talk here of the mother’s right to her child are being misled by sentiment. These mothers are, as a rule, incapable of giving adequate care or any form of training to their children. I would go further than this and say that, in entering into such a union with a man, and thus depriving their child of a father willing to acknowledge his fatherhood, they have proved already their unfitness for motherhood. But this is not to say that the mothers must be punished, rather it is the more necessary that they must be helped, supported, and guarded, just because of and in proportion to their weakness, _for this is the only way of salvation for the child_. And, for this reason, the law, as it affects the unmarried mother, must be made easier in its working. All artificial difficulties preventing the mother from obtaining alimony must be removed. No longer should the law make it easy for any man to escape his sexual responsibilities. It is immoral to countenance laws that make profligacy easy.
(1) The removal of the present limit of the father’s payment to “an amount not exceeding 5_s._ per week.” The alimony paid should vary according to the means and social status of the father: in all cases it should include some kind of training to enable the child to earn its own living; until that time the payments of the father should continue. And if the child should be physically or mentally deficient, so as to be unable to support itself, the father must continue his aid for all its life.
(2) A further charge should be made upon the man for the support of the mother for a period, certainly not less than one month before and three months after the birth of the child. He should be compelled to pay for a doctor and a nurse for the mother, and provide clothes for the child.
(3) The father’s responsibility should be truly recognised so that, if the mother is driven to commit any deed of violence against the child, he must be held accountable with her and punished, should he have known of her condition and refused to help her.