(a) As to medical relief; and(b) Apprenticeship of children.
(a) As to medical relief; and(b) Apprenticeship of children.
(a) As to medical relief; and(b) Apprenticeship of children.
(a) As to medical relief; and
(b) Apprenticeship of children.
No other exceptions should be made. "Where cases of real hardship occur, the remedy must be applied by individual charity, a virtue for which no system of compulsory relief can or ought to be a substitute."[13]"It appears to us that this prohibition" (of outdoor relief to the able-bodied) "should come into universal operation at the end of two years,"[14]Meanwhile, it was suggested—
(a) That there should be a gradual substitution of relief in kind for money doles;[15](b) "That all who receive relief from the parish should work for the parish exclusively, as hard and for less wages than independent labourers work for individual employers."[16](c) That the able-bodied, even "of the best character," should not be offered "more than a simple subsistence. The person of bad character, if he be allowed anything, could not be allowed less."[17]
(a) That there should be a gradual substitution of relief in kind for money doles;[15]
(b) "That all who receive relief from the parish should work for the parish exclusively, as hard and for less wages than independent labourers work for individual employers."[16]
(c) That the able-bodied, even "of the best character," should not be offered "more than a simple subsistence. The person of bad character, if he be allowed anything, could not be allowed less."[17]
That these recommendations had in view only the adult able-bodied person, capable of obtaining employment for wages, is supported by the explicit statement of the Commissioners that "the outdoor relief of which we have recommended the abolition is, in general, partial relief ... at variance with the spirit of the 43rd of Elizabeth, for the framers of that Act could scarcely have intended that the overseers should 'take order for setting to work' those who have work and are engaged in work; nor could they by the words 'all persons using no ordinary and daily trade of life to get their living by' have intended to describe persons 'who do use an ordinary and daily trade of life.'"[18]
II. That the able-bodied should be offered maintenance in a workhouse. It is important to notice exactly what the Commissioners here proposed, with all the emphasis of large type. Relief to the able-bodied and their families was to be "in well-regulated workhouses (i.e. places where they may be set to work according to the spirit and intention of the 43rd of Elizabeth)."[19]
These workhouses for the able-bodied were to be separate from the buildings in which the aged and the children were accommodated; they were to be under separate officers; and were expressly not to form part of one great establishment containing other classes of paupers.[20]The character of the employment to be found for the able-bodied must also be noted, as the Commissioners made this a cardinal point. It will be remembered that the 43rd of Elizabeth directed that the overseers should obtain "a convenient stock of flax, hemp, wool, and other necessaries for the poor to work upon,"i.e.that they should "set the poor to work" on a normal productive enterprise. This principle is repeated and emphasised by the Commissioners. The employment to be found for the able-bodied "ought to be useful employment." Fictitious, artificial, or useless labour was "pernicious," and "ought to be carefully prevented.... The association of the utility of labour to both parties, the employer as well as the employed, is one which we consider it most important to preserve and strengthen; andwe deem everything mischievous whichunnecessarily gives to it a repulsive aspect. At the same time we believe that in extended districts the requisite sources of employment will be easily found. The supply of the articles consumed in workhouses and prisons would afford a large outlet for themanufactures carried on in the House."[21]They even refer with approval to outdoor employment as possible in most districts.
C.—Vagrants
With regard to vagrants, the Commissioners were convinced that they would "cease to be a burden," if they were treated like the ordinary able-bodied pauper. The difficulty was to enforce this, and they therefore recommended that the Central Authority should "be empowered and directed to frame and enforce regulations as to the relief to be afforded to vagrants and discharged prisoners."[22]
D.—Women
With regard to the treatment of women, it cannot be said that the Report of 1834 afforded much guidance to the Central Authority. Whether or not the Commissioners meant to propose the abolition of outdoor relief to the legally independent able-bodied woman is, as we have shown, indeterminate. In this Report the single independent woman is nowhere mentioned. The wife is throughout treated exactly as is the child; and it is assumed that she follows her husband, both with regard to the continuance of outdoor relief to the aged, the impotent, and the sick; and with regard to its abolition in the case of the able-bodied. Such women as entered the workhouse were apparently to be regarded as divided into only two classes; they were to be accommodated either in the building for "the aged and really impotent," or else in the House for the "able-bodied females."[23]With regard to the really baffling problems presented by the widow, the deserted wife, the wife of the absentee soldier or sailor, the wife of a husband resident in another parish or another country—in each case whether with or without dependent children—the Report is silent.
To the class of mothers of illegitimate children the Commissioners devoted much attention. The almost universal practice had been for such mothers to receive outdoor relief, the amount of which the parish was supposed to attempt to recover from the putative fathers. We do not find that the Report recommended any change in the method of relief of such paupers. Its proposal was, in effect, to put the mothers of illegitimate children in the same position as the widows with legitimate children. As already mentioned, the Commissioners nowhere state whether they recommend any change in the method of relief of such widows—unless, indeed, it could be argued that these women were to be included under the class of able-bodied. The revolutionary change which the Report proposed with regard to bastardy dealt with chargeability, not methods of relief. The Commissioners strongly recommended the exemption of the putative father from any legal obligation to reimburse the parish. "If," say the Commissioners, "our previous recommendations are adopted, a bastard will be, what Providence appears to have ordained that it should be, a burden on its mother, and where she cannot maintain it, on her parents."[24]
E.—The Children
Apart from apprenticeship, the Report deals only incidentally with children. It is assumed throughout that children go with their parents, both with regard to the continuance of outdoor relief to the aged, impotent and sick, and with regard to its abolition in the case of the able-bodied.
On one point the Report is emphatic and clear, namely, that, where children do enter the workhouse, they are to be accommodated in a separate building, under a separate superintendent, in order that they may "be educated" by "a person properly qualified to act as a schoolmaster."[25]
With regard to apprenticeship, all that the Report is—
(1) Expressly to except relief by way of apprenticeshipfrom its proposal to abolish outdoor relief to the able-bodied parent.[26]
(1) Expressly to except relief by way of apprenticeshipfrom its proposal to abolish outdoor relief to the able-bodied parent.[26]
(2) To recommend that the Central Authority should "be empowered to make such regulations" as it might think fit; and subsequently "to make a special inquiry" into the subject.[27]
(2) To recommend that the Central Authority should "be empowered to make such regulations" as it might think fit; and subsequently "to make a special inquiry" into the subject.[27]
F.—The Sick
In contradistinction to the revolutionary proposals of the Report of 1834 with regard to the able-bodied, it is extraordinary that it suggested absolutely no change with regard to the sick. The current practice was, in nearly every case, to deal with the sick by outdoor relief, with or without medical attendance.[28]The Report contains no suggestion for any alteration in this respect. When the Commissioners came to sketch out the classification of their proposed workhouse institutions, they did not include anything in the nature of a hospital.[29]This explains why the Report of 1834 does not mention any provision for indoor medical officers. Even when dealing with the able-bodied and their families, the Commissioners explicitly except medical attendance from their proposed abolition of outdoor relief.[30]
This omission of anything in the nature of proposals for indoor relief for the sick becomes the more significant when we notice that the Commissioners do allude with approval to a possible extension of institutional treatment for certain classes of defectives, such as lunatics and the blind.[31]
G.—The Aged and Impotent (or Infirm)
An almost similar absence of proposals is to be noted with regard to the aged and impotent. The current practice was to deal with these cases, as a rule, by outdoor relief. On this the Commissioners observe merely that "the outdoor relief to the impotent (using that word as comprehending all except the able-bodied and their families) is subject to less abuse.... No use can be made of the labour of the aged and sick, andthere is little room for jobbing if their pensions are paid in money. Accordingly, we find that even in places distinguished in general by the most wanton parochial profusion, the allowances to the aged and infirm are moderate."[32]The Commissioners made no proposal that outdoor relief to the aged or impotent (or infirm) should be abolished, or even curtailed.
Such "aged and really impotent" persons as were accommodated in the workhouse were to have a separate building to themselves, under a separate superintendent; expressly in order that "the old might enjoy their indulgences."[33]
Passing now to those proposals of the Report which affected paupers generally, these concern the organisation of the workhouse, emigration and relief on loan.
H.—The Workhouse
With regard to the workhouse, the whole emphasis of the Report is upon classification of the inmates according to their needs; and classification, not in separate parts of one building, but by the allocation to separate classes of entirely distinct buildings in order that there might be separate and differing treatment under distinct management.
The Commissioners state that "at least four classes are necessary:—
1. The aged and really impotent.2. The children.3. The able-bodied females.4. The able-bodied males."
1. The aged and really impotent.
2. The children.
3. The able-bodied females.
4. The able-bodied males."
"Of whom we trust the two latter will be the least numerous classes. It appears to us that both the requisite classification and the requisite superintendence may be better obtained in separate buildings than under a single roof."[34]The Commissioners were insistent that the treatment measured out to each class should differ according to its requirements, and "each class might thus receive an appropriate treatment;the old might enjoy their indulgenceswithout torment from theboisterous; the children be educated; and the able-bodied subjected to such courses of labour and discipline as will repel the indolent and vicious."[35]The need for separate buildings, under entirely different kinds of officers, with different qualifications, at different rates of payments—in contradistinction to one large building under a single officer—is emphasised again and again at different parts of the Report.[36]It was, indeed, largely in order to provide these specialised institutions that the Commissioners recommended the formation of unions, it being made a cardinal principle that the Central Authority should "assign" to the various existing workhouses thus coming under one board of guardians "separate classes of poor."[37]
It is interesting to notice that, apart from this cardinal principle of classification by separate and specialised buildings, practically the only recommendations relating to the organisation of the workhouse, which are to be found in the Report, relate either to the character of the employment to be provided in the buildings set aside for the able-bodied—which, as we have seen, was expressly to be of a normal productive character, free from repellent characteristics—or to the enactment of a maximum diet (and no minimum). "The Commissioners should be empowered to fix amaximumof the consumption per head within the workhouses, leaving to the local officers the liberty of reducing it below the maximum if they can safely do so."[38]
I.—Emigration
Without laying much stress upon emigration, the Report recommends that any vestry should be empowered to pay for it out of the poor rate, in the case of persons (apparently whether paupers or not) having settlements in the parish and willing to emigrate.[39]
J.—Relief on Loan
The Commissioners recommended "that under regulationsto be framed ... parishes be empowered to treat any relief afforded to the able-bodied, or to their families, and any expenditure in the workhouses, or otherwise incurred on their account, as a loan," to be legally recoverable. It is to be noted that this proposal is expressly limited to the "able-bodied or to their families." No definition, as usual, is given of the term able-bodied.[40]
K.—The Principles of 1834
To sum up the principles of administration recommended for adoption in the Report of 1834, omitting minor recommendations and incidental qualifications, they resolve themselves into three. The Principle of National Uniformity required that the relief afforded to each class of paupers should be uniform throughout the kingdom. The Principle of Less Eligibility demanded that the conditions of existence afforded by the relief should be less eligible to the applicant than those of the lowest grade of independent labourers. The Workhouse System was recommended on the assumption that it was the only means by which the Principle of Less Eligibility could be in practice enforced. The two latter principles were applied explicitly only to the able-bodied and their families. To them (but to them only) any other form of relief ought, it was urged, to be made unlawful.
The Act of 1834 and its Amendments
The marked feature of this period is the paucity of statutory enactment affecting relief. Only four statutes[41]contain any provisions on the subject (apart from administrative detail), and these provisions are almost entirely mere enabling clauses, permitting the Central Authority to make such rules as it thinks fit, subject to a few specified exceptions. We can extract from these exiguous provisions nothing in the nature of a policy imposed by Parliament on the Central Authority. As already mentioned, it was assumed that the Central Authority would putinto execution the proposals of the Report of 1834. Parliament contented itself with giving the Central Authority wide powers and almost unfettered discretion in the use of them.
A.—National Uniformity
Prior to 1834 there were many authorities legally entitled to order relief from the rates. The Act of 1834 made for national uniformity by confining this power, subject to certain exceptions as regards special classes, to the boards of guardians when formed; and until these were formed, to the select vestries or bodies formed under local Acts; to the exclusion, in these places, of the Justices of the Peace and the overseers. The new relief-giving local authorities were made subject to the control of a Central Authority, to be exercised by rules having the force of law.
Two of the great classes of relief were singled out for special reference in the Act. The Central Authority was expressly empowered to make "rules, orders and regulations to be observed and enforced at every workhouse."[42]The Central Authority was also expressly empowered to make "rules, etc., to regulate the relief of the able-bodied and their families."[43]With regard to all other classes of paupers (e.g.the aged and impotent; orphan and deserted children; widows and deserted wives, with their children; and the sick—unless any of these can be supposed to have been included by Parliament under the term able-bodied) the Central Authority had general powers only; the administration of all poor relief was made subject to its direction and control; and it was empowered and directed "to make rules for the management of the poor, the government of workhouses and the education of the children therein ... for the apprenticing the children of poor persons; and for the guidance and control of all guardians, vestries and parish officers so far as relates to the management or relief of the poor."[44]
B.—The Able-Bodied
It was expressly provided that relief to the able-bodied should be given only in accordance with the rules of the Central Authority. These rules might be of any kind, including (subject to exceptions) a total prohibition, then or at any future time. In the special preamble to this section, Parliament pointed to the difficulty of "an immediate and universal remedy"—doubtless referring to the proposal of the Report of 1834 that all such relief should be prohibited within two years. But Parliament gave no direction for prohibition, nor did it expressly limit the discretion of the Central Authority on the subject, beyond certain specified exceptions. These exceptions were (1) that complete discretion was reserved to the board of guardians so far as regarded the grant of food, temporary lodging or medicine "in cases of emergency," subject only to reporting their action to the Central Authority; and also, subject to the approval of the Central Authority, so far as regarded the grant of money or other relief in such cases;[45](2) that in cases of "sudden and urgent necessity" the overseer was required to give "such temporary relief as each case shall require in articles of absolute necessity but not in money";[46]and (3) that any Justice might order medical relief in case of "sudden and dangerous illness" and relief in certain cases to non-parishioners.[47]
As in the Report itself, no definition is given in the Act of what was meant by "able-bodied persons." In the special preamble, however, prefixed to this section, it is recited that it is enacted in consequence of the prevalent practice of giving relief "to persons or their families who, at the time of applying for or receiving such relief, were wholly or partially in the employment of individuals."[48]
C.—Vagrants
The Act of 1834 is silent with regard to vagrants, in accordance with the proposal of the Report of 1834 thatthose destitute persons who had hitherto been deemed vagrants should be dealt with simply as other destitute persons. It may, however, be noted that express provision was made to enable any one Justice to order temporary relief in kind to persons not settled in nor usually residing in the parish, in cases of urgent necessity, in which the overseer had refused relief.[49]
In 1842, however, it was enacted that the local authority might "prescribe a task of work to be done by any person relieved in any workhouse in return for the food and lodging afforded to such person," and (implicitly) might detain such person until the task was done; but such detention was not to exceed four hours after breakfast on the day following admission. Refusal or neglect to perform such task, or wilful damage to property, subjected the person to be deemed an idle and disorderly person within the meaning of the Vagrancy Act of 1824. This section is not expressly confined to wandering persons, but the marginal note confines it to the "occasional poor."[50]
In 1844 the Central Authority was empowered to combine parishes, in London and five other large towns, into districts for the provision of Asylums for Houseless Poor, that is to say, "asylums for the temporary relief and setting to work therein of destitute houseless poor"; to constitute Boards for such districts; with the consent of such Boards, to direct the establishment of such asylums, at the expense of the poor rates of such districts, up to a maximum of one-fifth of their whole Poor Law expenditure; and to make rules, etc., for such asylums, subject to a conscience clause and to facilities for entry by ministers of different denominations.[51]These Asylums for Houseless Poor were to be mildly penal establishments, supplementary to the workhouses, and involving detention for a term not exceeding four hours after breakfast on the day after admission; or, in the case of a person subjected to punishment for an offence committed during his stay, for any period up to twenty-four hours.[52]
D.—Women
As in the Report of 1834, so in the Act of 1834, women do not appear as a class. It is assumed that married women follow their husbands, either with regard to the continuance of outdoor relief to the aged, the impotent and the sick; or with regard to its regulation or prohibition in the case of the able-bodied.
It is, as we have shown, difficult to infer that the term "able-bodied" was meant to include any but persons ordinarily in employment at wages, or capable of such employment. Whether or not Parliament had in contemplation under this term even the adult independent woman without encumbrances seems to us doubtful. It is practically clear that the term was not intended by Parliament to apply to the widow, however able-bodied in the ordinary sense, nor to the deserted wife, the wife of the absentee sailor or soldier, or the wife of a husband resident in another parish or another country,if any of these were encumbered with young children, and so did not fall under the class of persons actually or potentially in employment at wages, cited in the preamble to the section dealing with the able-bodied.[53]If this is so, we can only infer from the Act, as from the Report, that no change in practice was then suggested. With regard to such women, at least, the discretion of the Central Authority in its "direction and control" of poor relief, and its "management of the poor," and its power to make rules "for the guidance and control of" the local authority "so far as relates to the management or relief of the poor," was unfettered.[54]
The fact that widows were not considered by Parliament to be included within the term "able-bodied persons and their families" may further be inferred from a section in the 1844 Act. This provided that the wife of a husband either (a) beyond the seas, (b) in the custody of the law, or (c) confined as a lunatic or idiot, should, notwithstanding her coverture, be treated for purposes of relief,as if she were a widow.[55]This implies that a widow was not regarded as subject to the conditions of relief to "able-bodied persons and their families."
It may be noted that relief to the child under sixteen of a widow was to be deemed relief to the mother;[56]and relief to an illegitimate child under sixteen was to be deemed relief to the mother so long as she remained unmarried or a widow.[57]Another section of the 1844 Act allowed a widow having a legitimate child dependent on her, and no illegitimate children, who at her husband's death was residing with him in a place where she had no settlement, to be granted non-resident relief.[58]
E.—Children
With certain insignificant exceptions hereinafter noticed, the only provisions with regard to children as such in the 1834 Act relate to children in the workhouse. The Central Authority was directed to make rules, etc., "for the education of the children" in the workhouse.[59]It was specially enacted that no child in a workhouse was to be educated in any creed other than that of his parent, or, if orphaned, "to which his godparents may object." Facilities for free entry of ministers of the child's own persuasion were to be accorded.[60]
In 1844 the Central Authority was expressly empowered at its discretion to combine parishes (within fifteen miles) into school districts, and to constitute boards for such school districts; and, subject to the consent of a majority of such a board, to direct the establishment of district schools at the cost of the poor rates of the district, up to a maximum of one-fifth of the total Poor Law expenditure of the district.[61]
The Central Authority was empowered to make rules for such schools, it being, however, expressly enacted: (1) that an Anglican chaplain was always to be appointed; (2) that facilities for visits by ministers of other denominations were to be given; and (3) a conscience clause was inserted.[62]Such district schools were to be for the accommodation of pauper children under sixteen, either orphans, deserted, or having parents who consented,[63]including such children from parishes outside the district.[64]
With regard to apprenticeship the law remained at first unchanged, except that the Act of 1834 empowered the Central Authority to make regulations (in significant phrase) "for the apprenticing the children of poor persons"[65]in the execution of the then existing law. This applied, not to those who were destitute or who applied for relief, but to "the children of all such whose parents shall not, by the ... churchwardens and overseers, or the greater part of them,be thought ableto keep and maintain their children."[66]
In 1835, the Merchant Shipping Act incidentally authorised local authorities to apprentice boys over thirteen, with their own consent, to the mercantile marine, whatever the distance of the port or address of the shipmaster; to pay a premium of £5; and to convey the boy to his new master by a constable.[67]
In 1842 the Parish Apprentices Act made it clear that all the previous Acts applied also to cases in which no premium had been paid.[68]
But the first substantive alteration of the law was made in 1844, when the Central Authority was expressly empowered to make regulations prescribing the duties of masters and the other conditions of apprenticeship; the power of apprenticing was confined to the boards of guardians; and the former compulsory obligation on householders to receive apprentices was abolished.[69]The class of children to be apprenticed remained unchanged.[70]
F.—The Sick
Parliament made no enactment with regard to the sick as a class; did not therefore seek to interfere with the existing practice under which the sick usually received outdoor relief; and did not even empower the Central Authority to make any regulations for the relief of the sick as such, except in so far as they were either inmates of workhouses or belonged to theindeterminate class of the "able-bodied and their families." Its only power in this connection lay in the general words placing the administration of all relief under its direction and control, and in the general authority to make rules, etc., for the guidance and control of local officers as far as related to the management or relief of the poor.[71]
The only provision relating to the sick as such was an express sanction of the existing power of any Justice to order medical relief in cases of sudden and dangerous illness without any restriction whatever.[72]
With regard to lunatics, the only provision was one in 1838, that the Justices might commit a dangerous or criminal lunatic to an asylum, at the cost of the Poor Rate.[73]
We may note a provision, declaring that relief to a blind or deaf and dumb wife or child under sixteen should not be deemed relief to the husband or the parent.[74]This apparently prevented these (together with their husbands or parents), from falling into the class of the "able-bodied and their families."
G.—The Aged and Impotent
The only provision relating to the aged and impotent as such was the express retention of the Justices' power to order outdoor relief without limit of amount or period. This was made subject to the conditions that the person should be (1) wholly unable to work, (2) entitled to relief in the union, and (3) desirous of outdoor relief; and that (4) the order should be given by two Justices "usually acting for the district," one of whom had satisfied himself of his own knowledge that the conditions were fulfilled.[75]
H.—The Workhouse
The conditions and character of the relief to be afforded by admission to the workhouse were to be subject to rules etc., which the Central Authority was empowered and directedto make.[76]The power of the Central Authority was subject to an important limitation. Any order for the building of a new workhouse was made conditional on obtaining the consent either of a majority of the guardians or of a majority of the ratepayers and owners.[77]The Central Authority could, however, without such consent, order the local authority "to enlarge or alter" any existing workhouse or building capable of being converted into a workhouse up to a limit of £50 or one-tenth of the average Poor Rate for the past three years.[78]Moreover, the local authority was not to expend on the building, alteration or enlargement of any particular workhouse (whether by way of loan or out of rate) more than the annual average of the poor rate during the three preceding years.[79]These limitations were removed, so far as regards the cost of sites in the Metropolitan Police District and the parish of Liverpool, in 1844.[80]It was also expressly provided that no person was to introduce alcoholic liquor into a workhouse without the written order of the master, under penalty of a fine not exceeding £10; nor was the master to do so save for domestic use of the officers, except in conformity with the rules.[81]Confinement beyond twenty-four hours, and the corporal punishment of adults, were expressly forbidden.[82]Notices of the law on these subjects were to be publicly displayed.[83]A conscience clause protected workhouse inmates, and they had also the right to receive visits by religious ministers of their own persuasions.[84]
I.—Emigration
The Act carried out the proposal of the Report, by enabling the ratepayers (including rated owners) to emigrate, at the expense of the poor rates, with the approval of the Central Authority, "poor persons" having settlements in the parish whether paupers or not.[85]
J.—Relief on Loan
It was enacted that any relief that the Central Authority might declare or direct to be by way of loan should be legally recoverable by the local authority, even by attachment of wages.[86]
Five years later the local authority was given power to attach Army and Navy pensions, in repayment of the cost of relief, even without such relief having been declared to be on loan.[87]
THE POOR LAW COMMISSIONERS
It had, as we have seen, been left to the Poor Law Commissioners to formulate their own policy, with the guidance of the Report of 1834. This policy is, during the ensuing thirteen years, to be found in (1) the orders issued under the Act of 1834 and subsequent statutes; (2) the circulars and other explanatory or instructional communications to the local authorities, inspectors, auditors, etc., and (3) the reports to Parliament.
Under the term "order," we include, as is customary, all the "rules, orders, and regulations" issued in pursuance of statutory powers. With whatever parts of poor relief these dealt, they had the force of law; either under the specific powers relating to workhouses,[88]or relief to the able-bodied,[89]or under the general powers authorising the Poor Law Commissioners to make "rules, orders, and regulations ... for the guidance and control of all guardians, vestries, and parish officers so far as relates to the management or relief of the poor."[90]According to the Act of 1834 some of these orders were to be "General Rules," and were not to take effect until they had been submitted to a Secretary of State, and by him laid before Parliament for forty days; and they were disallowable by the Privy Council.[91]A "General Rule" was to be "any rule ... which shall, at the time of issuing the same, be addressed ... to more than one union or to more parishes and places than one."[92]Other orders, known first as "Particular Orders," and subsequently as "Special Orders," and now simply as "Orders," were subject to no suchconditions. There was, however, no distinction between them as to validity, force of law, or sanction. It was therefore open to the Poor Law Commissioners to issue all its orders as particular or special orders by addressing them successively to separate unions or parishes, even if they were identical in their terms. For reasons explained in the Poor Law Commissioners' Report on the Further Amendment of the Poor Law, 1839, this was the course adopted.[93]No general order was issued prior to 1841.
With circulars so-called we include all explanatory or instructional communications to local authorities or to the officers of central or local authorities, or to Parliament. These, though embodying the policy of the Central Authority, had not the force of law. Moreover, as they were issued for particular emergencies, and were never withdrawn or expressly abrogated,they—unlike any unrepealed orders—must not be considered as necessarily laying down general policy for all time. Subject to consideration of this limitation, we propose to include the circulars, letters, etc., along with the general and special orders, in our analysis of the policy laid down for each of the several classes of destitute persons.
A.—The Able-Bodied
(i.)On Outdoor Relief
The ambiguity that existed, alike in the Report and in the Act of 1834, as to the meaning intended to be given to the term "the able-bodied" was, to a large extent, reflected in those documents of the Central Authority which expounded its policy with regard to the kind and conditions of relief to be given to this class. Once more there is no definition of the term able-bodied, which is used sometimes as an adjective and sometimes as a substantive. From the context it must be inferred, as we shall presently show, that the term is used in different senses in the orders relating respectively to outdoor relief and to the management of the workhouse. What proved in the event more inimical to the principle ofNational Uniformity was the fact that in the orders relating to outdoor relief to the able-bodied, there was no consistency as to whether any class of women was or was not to be included among the able-bodied. There are, as we shall presently describe, two distinct streams of regulations affecting outdoor relief to the able-bodied, one permitting such relief under conditions, culminating in the Outdoor Relief Regulation Order of 14th December, 1852 (still in force), and the other prohibiting it subject to exceptions, culminating in the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order of 21st December, 1844 (still in force). In the former series of regulations, beginning with the first orders issued in the autumn of 1834 to particular unions, the term "able-bodied" isexpressly qualified by the adjective "male"("able-bodied male persons").[94]In the other series, beginning in 1836 with the Consolidated Order for the Administration of Relief in Town Unions, the category of the "able-bodied,"if we are to go by the actual wording of the orders, clearly comprises both sexes; at first by excepting widows only from a universal rule, and presently by specifically including "every able-bodied" person, "male or female."[95]That this differing interpretation of the category of the "able-bodied and their families" was actually intended by the Central Authority in 1840, and 1844, and that it was not merely accidental, is shown by cases in which it was decided that outdoor relief to single women having illegitimate children was illegal, as being in contravention of the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order in force in those unions;[96]thus proving that, under this order, the category of "the able-bodied and their families" included independent women with children; although in the other kind of orders, contemporaneous in date, the same category included men only (and their families). This is the more puzzling, in that we find the Central Authority, in 1839 at least, regarding these very outdoor reliefprohibitory orders as practically, if not literally, applicable only to able-bodied males. In the comprehensive defence of its action, when pleading for a renewal of the Act, the Central Authority expressly describes these orders as "prohibiting outdoor relief to able-bodied male paupers"; and as having attained the object aimed at, that of destroying the allowance system or relief in aid of wages, "so far as respects able-bodied male paupers and their families."[97]
To sum up this question of definition, in one series of outdoor relief regulations applicable to the able-bodied, in force in certain unions, the category of "the able-bodied" expressly excludes independent women; in another series of regulations, in force in other unions, the category of "the able-bodied" includes such women. There is actual evidence that the Central Authority enforced these differing determinations so far as to include as among "the able-bodied" unmarried women having illegitimate children in those unions in which one set of Orders was in force. Whether it ever actually enforced this interpretation as regards single women without children is not apparent in the published documents, but would be seen from its records. The fact of variance between the two interpretations of the category of "the able-bodied" becomes important when the two series of regulations are consolidated into two orders embodying distinct policies, one or other of which is made applicable to every union in the country.
Once having determined what was included in the category of "the able-bodied," the ground becomes more clear. With regard to outdoor relief, there are the two streams of contemporaneous regulations already alluded to—the one permitting it subject to conditions, the other prohibiting it subject to exceptions.
The first series was, it is clear, regarded (at any rate down to 1842) as temporary, only "to be sanctioned as a palliative for a time, and until adequate and efficient workhouse accommodation shall be provided."[98]These regulations were, in the autumn of 1834, issued separately to certain unions pending the introduction of "properregulations";[99]but we also find them, between 1835 and 1842, included as a matter of course in orders prohibiting outdoor relief, by way of exception, but still only as providing a temporary alternative, until accommodation can be obtained for the reception of such persons in the workhouse.[100]
There was even a third series of Orders, which may perhaps be regarded as even more provisional and temporary than the first series. To various local authorities in large towns (such as Norwich), and in the Metropolitan parishes, Orders were issued from 1835 onwards, simply requiring that any outdoor relief to the able-bodied should be, to the extent of one-third[101]—sometimes to the extent of one-half[102]—"relief in kind," that is to say, in loaves of bread.[103]
It has been assumed that it was the intention of the Central Authority from the outset to replace these temporary orders permitting outdoor relief to the able-bodied by some permanent injunction substituting relief in the workhouse as the only method. But the documentary evidence indicates that the Central Authority either never entertained the idea—or else very quickly abandoned it—of issuing the Prohibitory Order to the manufacturing towns of the north. Thus, in October 1836, after nearly two years' experience, the Poor Law Commissioners, as their Assistant Commissioner reported, were disposed to leave "the contemplated workhouse system ... very much to the board of guardians, and they did not feel it necessary to lay down those strict rules that they had in some instances laid down for the government of unions in the south of England."[104]
In 1842 the Central Authority, perhaps unwittingly, took a new departure. In the northern counties there were districts for which no orders "concerning the outdoor relief of the able-bodied" had been issued. The Central Authority had failed to induce the Local Authorities to provide "adequate workhouse accommodation," and it was found that "large numbers of able-bodied persons are often suddenly thrown out of employment by the fluctuations of manufacturers" (sic).[105]To meet this situation, a new General Order was issued (the Outdoor Labour Test Order, 13th April 1842); on the ground that it was impracticable "to issue the Order prohibiting outdoor relief to able-bodied persons."[106]This order is historically of two-fold significance. It has had, as will subsequently appear, a long and continuous career of its own, in force in combination with the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order in particular unions.[107]But between 1842 and 1852, standing by itself in other unions,[108]it was the temporary embodiment of an alternative policy ofthe Central Authority. This alternative policy was, in 1852, definitely adopted by the Outdoor Relief Regulation Order (still in force), as the one permanently appropriate for the circumstances of many unions, covering a large part of England and Wales.
This policy of leaving to the discretion of the local authorities the grant of outdoor relief to the able-bodied on certain conditions was, as already mentioned, confined to men. We can find no explanation of, or reason for, the entire absence of any provision for independent women who were able-bodied. It can only be inferred that, in those districts, the Central Authority meant the unlimited discretion of the local authorities with regard to outdoor relief to able-bodied independent women to continue. The outdoor relief sanctioned for able-bodied men was strictly limited to persons who were not in employment for hire. This limitation was expressly intended to prevent the old "Rate in Aid of Wages." But it was subsequently expressly allowed that outdoor relief might be given, in respect of the particular days in a week or the particular weeks in a month during which persons were unemployed, whilst they were in remunerative employment on other days of that week, or other weeks of that month.[109]In the case of persons partially disabled, and able to earn only partial maintenance, the Poor Law Commissioners recommended that they "should be entirely supported by the guardians"—not, be it noted, by being admitted to the workhouse—but either by their being "set to work by the guardians in such manner as may be suitable to their condition," or else by their being prohibited from doing any work on their own account.[110]
It should be said that (with an exception to be hereafter noted in the case of women) the Central Authority stood rigidly on the position taken up by the 1834 Report that no regard was to be paid to character, in judging applications for relief. "If a person," said the Poor Law Commissioners in 1840, "be in a state of destitution, such person is tobe relieved, without reference to the moral character of such person. Relief from the poor rates can only lawfully be given in cases where persons are destitute of the means of support. And the fact that the destitution may have been caused by the immorality or improvidence of the party who seeks to be relieved does not alter or vary the duty of guardians to administer relief proportional to the necessity of the case."[111]
The outdoor relief, where given, had to be subject to two conditions. It was to be at least half in kind, and conditional on the recipient being set to work by the local authority, the time, mode and conditions of work being fixed by the Central Authority.
With regard to the kinds and conditions of "parish work," it was repeatedly laid down by the Central Authority that none would be sanctioned unless (a) the work was "hard," not of a kind usually performed by independent labourers or competing with them, nor "much regarded as to profitable results," strictly supervised, "of a laborious and undesirable nature in itself," and "of such a nature as to discourage applications from all who are not really necessitous"; (b) paid "less than would be paid for work of equal quantity if performed by independent labourers";[112]or as it was later stated, the payment "ought to assume the form of relief, not of wages.... A single man or a man with a wife and one child ought not to receive as much as a man with a wife and eight children."[113]
It is not explained how payment on the last principle could be made consistent with the former principles. But the intention of the Central Authority is clear. In the words quoted with approval in the circular of 1835, the parish was to be "the hardest taskmaster and the worst pay-master."[114]
An important exception was made by a separate clause in the Order providing that the guardians might depart from any of these regulations in particular instances, and thus give outdoor relief to able-bodiedmales on any conditions, subject to their reporting each such instance within fifteen days to the Central Authority, and obtaining its subsequent approval. With that approval, outdoor relief to able-bodied men, without any conditions, was lawful. The records of the Central Authority between 1842 and 1847, which have not been published, would show how frequently application was made for this approval, and whether the Central Authority pursued any definite policy in approving or disapproving the cases, or merely approved all that were reported to it.
The second series of outdoor relief regulations, beginning with the Consolidated Order for the Administration of Relief in Town Unions of 1836, and culminating in the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order of 1844 (still in force), proceeds on the basis of forbidding outdoor relief to the "able-bodied and their families." But from the outset we find a series of express exceptions made in particular Orders, gradually increasing in number and definiteness. The most numerous and the most important of these exceptions relate to women, and will be subsequently dealt with. For the male able-bodied person himself (and his family) only three exceptions were to be made. The local authority had discretion to allow him outdoor relief (a) in case of sudden and urgent necessity; (b) in case of sickness, accident, or mental infirmity in his family; or (c) for the burial of any member of his family.[115]
Another series of exceptions allowed outdoor relief to the families of able-bodied persons (a) in gaol, or otherwise in custody; (b) absent as soldiers, sailors or marines; or (c) otherwise residing outside the union.[116]
A third exception empowered the local authorities (as in the analogous case of the Outdoor Labour Test Order) to depart from these regulations in any particular instance, and thus to give outdoor relief to the able-bodied, whether men, women, or their families, on any conditions, subject to their reporting each such instance within fifteen days to the Central Authority and obtaining its subsequent approval. With that approval outdoor relief to the able-bodied, withoutany conditions, was lawful. The records of the Central Authority between 1842 and 1847 would show what policy it pursued in approving or disapproving the cases of unconditional outdoor relief to the able-bodied, which were reported by those local authorities to which this Order had been issued. What appears from the published documents is that the Central Authority, between 1835 and 1842, "in cases where this Order had been issued ... had been obliged to sanction large exceptions to its provisions."[117]
On this, among other grounds, the Central Authority in 1843 took to modifying the operation of the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Orders by supplementing them, in certain of the unions in which they were in force, by an Outdoor Labour Order, practically identical in terms with the Outdoor Labour Test Order of 1842, which we have already mentioned as being alone in force in other unions.[118]Similar Orders—in effect modifying the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order—have ever since continued to be issued to particular unions; but, from 1852 onward, in the form of applying to the particular unions concerned the Outdoor Labour Test Order of 1842, which had theretofore been issued alone.
We are now in a position to sum up the policy of the Central Authority, with regard to outdoor relief to the able-bodied, as it stood in 1847, embodied in documents applicable to three different parts of England and Wales. In thirty-two unions the Labour Test Order of 1842 was alone in force, whilst in twenty-nine others the regulations were essentially similar to this. In this part of the country the discretion of the local authorities to give outdoor relief to able-bodied independent women (as to other independent women) was unfettered by any regulation, and not directed by any instructions. Outdoor relief to able-bodied men and their families was within the discretion of the local authorities, if it was accompanied by test work by the man and subject to certain conditions. In other parts of the country, comprising 396 unions, the Prohibitory Order was alone in force, and outdoor relief to the able-bodied, whether men or women, and their families, was, withlimited and precise exceptions, prohibited; unless, in particular instances, the local authority subsequently reported it to, and got it sanctioned by, the Central Authority. In yet other parts of the country, comprising eighty-one unions, the Prohibitory Order and an Outdoor Labour Test Order were jointly in force, and outdoor relief to the able-bodied, whether men or women, and their families, was, so far as general rules went, prohibited. But such outdoor relief was lawful if it was in each case subsequently reported to, and approved by, the Central Authority; with this difference between that given to able-bodied men (and their families) and that given to independent women (and their families) that the former had to be, and the latter had not to be, accompanied by test work. This requirement of test work by the man, in certain unions, as a condition of the outdoor relief to be thus sanctioned by the Central Authority, appears at first sight to impose on those unions an additional restriction on the grant of outdoor relief, as compared with those unions in which outdoor relief could be sanctioned by the Central Authority without test work. The practical result may have been exactly the opposite. The records of the Central Authority between 1843 and 1847 would show to what extent and in what kind of cases its sanction to these cases of outdoor relief was given or refused; and whether, according to the statistics, it was not given more frequently and even as a matter of course, where test work was obligatory as a condition, as compared with cases in which test work was not required. If this was so, not only did union differ from union in the extent to which outdoor relief to the able-bodied was sanctioned by the Central Authority, but it may be that the statistics would show that in this respect, sex differed from sex—such outdoor relief being freely granted and lightly sanctioned to able-bodied men from whom test work was exacted; and sanctioned with greater stringency in the case of the able-bodied independent women from whom no such test was exacted.
(ii.)In the Workhouse
When "the able-bodied and their families" entered the workhouse, we find the Central Authority prescribing a classification altogether different from that applied to outdoor paupers. The very category of the "able-bodied and their families" disappears. It was, of course, inevitable that this should happen. In any institution, infants, boys, girls, sick and healthy adults, male and female, required different treatments. But, to the confusion of every one concerned, the Central Authority retained, for its workhouse classification, as for the entirely different classification of outdoor paupers, the same adjective of "able-bodied," without even explaining that it was here used in an altogether different sense. As usual in the documents of this period, there is no definition of the term. But whenever it occurs in the regulations affecting the workhouse, the term "able-bodied" was apparently intended by the Central Authority to denote all persons not being either children, "the aged and infirm," or "the sick." If the draughtsman of the General Consolidated Order of 1847 had been aware of the need for a definition clause, he would presumably have said that in that Order the term "able-bodied" should denote those persons above the age of childhood, and below that of "the aged," who for the time being were in the enjoyment of normal health. This class, it will be seen, differs considerably from that referred to in the preamble of the section in the 1834 Act under which outdoor relief to the able-bodied was to have been abolished; namely, persons (with their families) "who at the time of applying for or receiving such relief were wholly or partiallyin the employment of individuals."[119]The Act thus pointed to the capacity to obtain employment for hire, at any wages whatsoever, whatever may have been the state of health, as the essential characteristic of being "able-bodied." This, too, was the construction placed on the term when used in the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order, 1844, where the Central Authority expressly held that "poor persons who have frequent ailments, who are ruptured and are generally of weak constitutions" but who are "in receipt of wages"—however low such wages might be—must be treated, for outdoor relief, as being "able-bodiedpersons."[120]When such persons entered the workhouse, not merely would the several members of their families pass into different categories, but they themselves, if the doctor so decided, would, in the view of the Central Authority, on crossing the threshold, cease to be "able-bodied persons,"—and become members of the diametrically opposite category of "the sick." If such persons, without being cured, subsequently left the workhouse, we must infer that, according to the policy of the Central Authority, their characteristic of physical or mental infirmity ceased to be relevant, as they passed, on crossing the threshold, into the ranks of "able-bodied persons."
Inside the workhouse, the "able-bodied" (in the workhouse sense) are divided simply into male and female. We can find no regulations specially affecting relief to them, as apart from other inmates of the establishment, except some modifications in the amount of food allowed, or of labour exacted. As even these modifications are inextricably mixed up with the general regulations affecting all inmates, and are contained in the same long series of Orders, culminating in the General Consolidated Order of 1847, we relegate them to the subsequent section on the workhouse.
B.—Vagrants
We have seen that the policy of the Report and Act of 1834, with regard to vagrants, was to ignore them as a class, to relieve them only in the workhouse, and to deal with them exactly as with other workhouse inmates. What the Central Authority seems to have contemplated was that the strict application of the "workhouse test" would not only prevent vagrants coming on the rates at all, but that it could be used to prevent almsgiving. It was apparently with this view that the Central Authority, in 1837, sanctioned a code of regulations for the admission to the workhouse of the "casual poor," meaning "wayfarers" or homeless "persons in a state of destitution ... who ... belonged to distant parishes."[121]These regulations included admission by tickets distributed by any rate-payer, and the performance of a task of workbefore the grant of a meal.[122]In diet, discipline, and other treatment, they were to be dealt with "as the other paupers in the workhouse."[123]In other unions the regulations included the establishment of a separate vagrant ward, which was equally sanctioned by the Central Authority. A similar plan was strongly pressed on the local authorities of the Metropolis in 1838 and 1839.[124]Such vagrants must, however, if destitute, not be refused relief.[125]The Central Authority hoped that "if these arrangements be adopted ... casual almsgiving in the streets, by which vagrancy and imposture are encouraged, will be materially checked."[126]