The story is a long and a continuing one. Two points are especially important from the point of view of this study. One is that the burden not only of her support, but of her re-education, fell ultimately upon Chicago agencies, and the cost to them is measured as it were by the inefficiency of her casual treatment at the hands of both the courts and the less competent relief agencies along the way. The other is that such varied treatment leaves its inevitable stamp of confusion and disorganization upon the life of such a family. To find American officials getting very busy over selling liquor without a license, and at the same time ignoring adultery or murder committed in an Italian home, must surely result in confusion with reference to American standards of family relationship and to the value placed on life by American officials. NEED FOR NATIONAL AGENCY Irrespective of whether the family is of the native-born or foreign-born group, the problem of the case of those in distress should not be regarded as solely a local problem. It is indeed of national importance. Poverty, sickness, illiteracy, inefficiency, incompetence, are no longer matters of peculiar concern to a locality. The causes leading to these conditions are not local; the consequences are not local. The agency that deals efficiently with them should not be entirely local. Yet at the present time there is lacking not only a national agency and a national standard; there is often lacking a state agency and a state standard.[75] In Illinois, for example, the Pauper Act is administered in some counties by precinct officials designated by county commissioners; in other counties by the township officials.[76] The Mothers' Aid law is administered in Illinois by the juvenile court, which in all counties except Cook County (Chicago) is the county court. There is no agency responsible in any way for the standardization of the work of these officials, and niggardly doles or indiscriminate relief without either adequate investigation or adequate supervision, often characterizes the work of both.[77] Not all states are in as chaotic a condition as Illinois. A few states have developed a larger measure of central control. Massachusetts, California, and New Jersey, for example, secure a certain measure of standardization in the administration of their Mothers' Aid laws by paying part of the allowances, in case the central body approves--the State Board of Charities in Massachusetts,[78] and California,[79] and the State Board of Children's Guardians in New Jersey.[80] Pennsylvania secures this by assigning to the Governor the appointment of local boards and providing central supervision, while in other cases there may be inspection, the preparation of blanks and requiring reports. A member of the State Board of Education is supervisor of the Mothers' Aid law administration in Pennsylvania.[81]