Tread the City's Streets Again

Tread the City’s Streets Again is the first book to explore the theology and vocation of Frances Perkins, the settlement house worker who went on to lift millions of Americans out of poverty through the creation of the Social Security system. From the slums of Chicago to the brothels of Philadelphia; from the tenements of New York to the halls of power in Albany and Washington, Perkins was guided by a deeply incarnational understanding of Christianity.

Drawing heavily on her presentations as part of the St. Bede Lectures at St. Thomas, Fifth Avenue, in 1948, this book allows Perkins, mostly in her own words, to explain the theological foundations of her vocation. A lay associate of All Saints’ Sisters of the Poor, Perkins was a devout Episcopalian steeped in the Anglo-Catholic tradition. As U.S. Secretary of Labor in the New Deal, she was able to translate many of the ethical teachings of her tradition into social policy.