Tuckerman’s Methods
During the first year of his ministry Dr. Tuckerman reported quarterly to the American Unitarian Association, and then semi-annually. In all there were printed four of the quarterly reports and fifteen of the others. It was not his custom in these reports to confine himself to an account of his work, which usually received only a brief statement at the end; but he discussed important topics relating to the condition of the poor and their needs. His third quarterly report was devoted to a consideration of the remedies to be used for confirmed intemperance. Others of the topics upon which he reported were the condition of the poor in cities, the duties of a minister at large (a title invented by him, which he preferred to that of city or domestic missionary), the effects of poverty on the moral life of the poor, the means of relieving pauperism, the causes of poverty and the social remedies, the several classes amongst the poor and the best means of reaching each of them, the means to be employed for the recovery of those sunk in pauperism, poor laws and outdoor relief. Among the subjects he discussed incidentally, and sometimes at considerable length, were the duty of providing seats for the poor in the churches at a small rental, the employment of children, education as a means of saving children from growing up to a life of vagrancy and pauperism, the wages of the poor and how they can be increased.6 He was especially interested in the rescuing of children from ignorance and vice, and he strongly advocated the establishment of schools for the instruction of dull children and those whose education had been neglected. Through his efforts the Broad Street Infant School was established, in order to reach the younger children of the poor. In 1829 he made a careful study of the religious condition of the poor; and he found that out of a population of 55,000, which the city then contained, there were 4,200 families, or about 18,000 persons, who were not connected with any of the churches or who did not attend them with any degree of regularity. This gave him an opportunity to urge upon the public more strongly than before the importance of procuring free chapels, and a sufficient number of ministers to care for this large unchurched population. One or two ministers had labored amongst the poor before he began his work, and three or four had entered upon the same line of effort since he had done so; but these workers were too few in number to meet the large demands made upon them.
In carrying on his work, Dr. Tuckerman sought out all who were in need of his services, without distinction of nationality, color, creed, social position, or moral condition. If he gave the preference to any, it was those who were the most wretched and debased. “It is the first object of the ministry at large, never to be lost sight of,” he wrote, “and to which no other is to be preferred, as far as shall be possible to extend its offices to the poor and the poorest, to the low and the lowest, to the most friendless and most uncared for, the most miserable.”7 He recognized the individuality of the poorest and the most vicious: he sought to foster it, and to make it the basis of moral reform and social recovery.