128 THE ZEMSTVOS DURING THE WAR
Committee to take immediate measure for this purpose, pending a
final solution of the problem.”*® In the Central Committee a depart-
ment for the relief of disabled soldiers was organized, and, after
communicating with local zemstvos, prepared, with the assistance of
competent specialists, a plan of work.?® We read in this document:
(1) To restore the earning capacity of disabled men, it is necessary
to establish physico-therapeutic and orthopedic institutes. (2) To pro-
vide relief for those who have lost limbs, it is necessary: (a) to equip
workshops for the manufacture of artificial limbs, and homes for sol-
diers waiting to be provided with such limbs; (b) to open workshops in
connection with such homes for the purpose of instructing disabled men
in various trades. (3) For the care of soldiers totally disabled, it is
necessary: (a) to open asylums and (b) to board them with families
(the so-called “patronage”). (4) For the care of the disabled who re-
quire isolation and further medical treatment (the blind, the deaf and
the dumb, as well as the mentally afflicted, etc.), it is necessary to place
them in special asylums. (5) It is necessary also to organize homes for
those who have been only partly disabled.
The report goes into all the details of admission, registration,
types of hospitals and training schools, programs of general edu-
zation and training in special trades, and so on. It provides the fol-
lowing scheme for relief work among the disabled men: (1) The
Government furnishes the funds and exercises control; (2) the Un-
ion of Zemstvos has the general direction and codrdinates the work
of the zemstvo institutions for the relief of the disabled soldiers; (3)
the provincial and district zemstvo boards effect the relief of the dis-
abled through local relief committees; (4) relief committees for
small areas are to register and have direct charge of each disabled
soldier.
The recommendations of this report were unanimously approved
by the conference which took the view that “a disabled soldier has
the right to government relief, but it is the duty of society to spare
no efforts to make it effective and to place at the disposal of the dis-
abled soldier every possible means by which he may be compensated
for the loss of health and earning capacity.” Unfortunately, the
85 Izvestia (Bulletin), No. 11, pp. 7-8.
36 Report (Doklad) of Central Committee on the relief of disabled men,
pp. 1-123.
