in Massachusetts, the law under which deserters are extradited for
abandonment is habitually spoken of as the "non-support law."

No study of which the results are available has been made to learn what
difference, if any, exists between the non-supporter who leaves home and
the one who does not. Miss Breed, in making the point that the true
analogy of the deserted family is with the non-supported family and not
with the widow and her children, says: "The deserting husband is at home
the non-supporting husband."[41]

A case reader of experience writes: "When I look back over the many
records I have read and studied, it seems to me that it is very
difficult to draw a line between desertion and non-support cases,
either in the kind of problem they present, or in the treatment of
them. Do we know enough about non-supporters who later become
deserters; and isn't it possible that every non-support case,
certainly every beginning non-support case, is a potential desertion
case?"

There is no doubt that the two groups grade imperceptibly into each
other; but of the twenty or more case workers who were consulted in the
preparation of this material, nearly all felt that the out-and-out
deserter, if he can be got hold of, is more promising material to work
with than the man who sits about the home and lets others maintain it.
They all recognize a common middle ground where the two groups merge
into each other; but they see decided differences in the two "wings" so
to speak, outside of this common ground.

Seen through their eyes, the non-supporter has less courage, initiative
and aggressiveness than the deserter. "He is less deliberately