THE PREVENTION OF DESTITUTION

[784]If guardians wish to make use of the Margate Homes for Sick Paupers, they may do so (as the Central Authority expressly informed them in 1874)by granting non-resident relief(Circular of 1874;see Local Government Chronicle, 23rd May 1874, p. 334).

[785]Local Government Chronicle, 15th October 1904, p. 1072.

[786]Local Government Board to Woodbridge Union, 26th April 1898; inLocal Government Chronicle, 14th May 1898, p. 474.

[787]Dr. E. Smith, in Twentieth Annual Report of the Poor Law Board, 1867-8, p. 43.

[788]We may gain an idea of the energy put into the provision of improved accommodation for the indoor poor since 1868, by the total capital expenditure sanctioned for workhouses, etc., by order or letter of the Central Authority. The total so sanctioned during the thirty-four years, 1835-1868, including the initial provision of workhouses after 1834, was £7,079,126 (Twenty-first Annual Report of the Poor Law Board, 1868-9, pp. 316-17), or no more than an average of £208,209 annually. For the thirty-seven years, 1869-1905, the corresponding sum was no less than £24,609,035 (Thirty-fifth Annual Report of the Local Government Board, 1905-6, p. 608), or an average of £665,109. To this must be added the expenditure of the Metropolitan Asylums Boards for Poor Law purposes only, sick asylums, district schools, etc., which in the first period of thirty-four years was only £571,401, and in the second period of thirty-seven years was £6,810,140 (Twenty-first Annual Report of the Poor Law Board, 1868-9, pp. 317-18; Thirty-fifth Annual Report of the Local Government Board, 1905-6, p. 609). The total capital outlay sanctioned by the Central Authority for Poor Law purposes during the last thirty-seven years has, therefore, amounted, on an average, to nearly £1,000,000 annually,—the amount for 1905 being £789,373—as compared with little over one-fifth of that sum in the first thirty-four years of the new Poor Law.

[789]Third Annual Report, 1873-4, pp. xxv-xxvi.

[790]Pauper Inmates Discharge and Regulation Act 1871, 34 & 35 Vic. c. 108, sec. 4.

[791]Poor Law Act, 62 & 63 Vic. c. 37, sec. 4. The guardians are not obliged to adopt these periods of detention, and if they do so, provision is made for cases of hardship by allowing them, or in the intervals between their meetings the visiting committee, to "exempt, either wholly or partially, any pauper from the operation of this section." The master of the workhouse, too, "may, if the board of guardians be not sitting or the visiting committee be not in attendance, discharge any pauper to whom this section shall apply before the expiration of any such period as aforesaid, if any circumstances shall, in his opinion, require this to be done."If a pauper escapes from the workhouse during his detention, or while an inmate refuses or neglects to work or to observe the rules, he may be prosecuted as idle and disorderly under the Vagrancy Act of 1824 (5 Geo. IV. c. 83, sec. 3); for a repetition of the offence, or for destroying or damaging his own clothes or any property of the guardians, he becomes liable to the heavier penalty of the rogue and vagabond. The same penalties attach to the wilfully giving a false name or making a false statement for the purpose of obtaining relief, and this clause has been twice revised, so that since 1876 (Divided Parishes and Poor Law Amendment Act, 39 & 40 Vic. c. 61, sec. 44) any person who so obtained relief may be proceeded against at any time while he continues to receive it, and since 1882 (Casual Poor Act, 45 & 46 Vic. c. 36, sec. 5) the provision applies equally, whether the person attempts so to obtain relief for himself or for any one else. If a pauper escapes from a workhouse or asylum while suffering from bodily disease of an infectious or contagious nature, the justice convicting him of the offence may order that he be taken back to the workhouse or asylum and kept there till cured, or otherwise lawfully discharged, and that the warrant of commitment then be put in execution.

If a pauper escapes from the workhouse during his detention, or while an inmate refuses or neglects to work or to observe the rules, he may be prosecuted as idle and disorderly under the Vagrancy Act of 1824 (5 Geo. IV. c. 83, sec. 3); for a repetition of the offence, or for destroying or damaging his own clothes or any property of the guardians, he becomes liable to the heavier penalty of the rogue and vagabond. The same penalties attach to the wilfully giving a false name or making a false statement for the purpose of obtaining relief, and this clause has been twice revised, so that since 1876 (Divided Parishes and Poor Law Amendment Act, 39 & 40 Vic. c. 61, sec. 44) any person who so obtained relief may be proceeded against at any time while he continues to receive it, and since 1882 (Casual Poor Act, 45 & 46 Vic. c. 36, sec. 5) the provision applies equally, whether the person attempts so to obtain relief for himself or for any one else. If a pauper escapes from a workhouse or asylum while suffering from bodily disease of an infectious or contagious nature, the justice convicting him of the offence may order that he be taken back to the workhouse or asylum and kept there till cured, or otherwise lawfully discharged, and that the warrant of commitment then be put in execution.

[792]Hansard, 9th May 1902, vol. 107, p. 1276.

[793]Local Government Chronicle, 21st December 1889, p. 1051. This was with the Chester Board, which refused "to allow the workhouse inmates knives and forks at dinner except on Christmas Day." The Central Authority peremptorily required them to be provided for "all the inmates."

[794]Mr. Preston-Thomas's Report, in Thirtieth Annual Report, 1900-1, p. 126.

[795]Circular on Workhouse Dietaries, 11th October 1900, in Thirtieth Annual Report, 1900-1, pp. 63-4.

[796]Local Government Board to Hackney Union, January 1877, inLocal Government Chronicle, 13th January 1877, p. 31.

[797]Special Order to Wirrall Union, 11th June 1886; Special Order to Drayton Union, 2nd September 1892. On the other hand, in 1901 the Keighley Guardians, for harvest work, were only allowed to give extra "food and drink other than fermented liquor" (Special Order to Keighley Union, 1st August 1901).

[798]Local Government Chronicle, 7th November 1903, p. 1091.

[799]Local Government Board to Hexham Union, April 1902;Local Government Chronicle, 19th April 1902, p. 413;Decisions of the Local Government Board, 1902-3, by W. A. Casson, 1904, pp. 14, 23.

[800]Local Government Chronicle, 13th June 1903, p. 577;Decisions of the Local Government Board, 1902-3, by W. A. Casson, 1904, p. 162.

[801]Memorandum of June 1895, in Twenty-fifth Annual Report, 1895-6, p. 121.

[802]Circular of 29th January 1895, inibid.p. 108.

[803]Memorandum of June 1895, inibid.p. 122.

[804]Circular of 29th January 1895, inibid.p. 111.

[805]It had been ordered already in 1886 that, as regards the bath, every person "should have the right to demand water which has not been previously used" (Minute of Instructions, Bathing of Workhouse Inmates, 2nd February 1886, in Sixteenth Annual Report, 1886-7, p. 1).

[806]Memorandum of June 1895, in Twenty-fifth Annual Report, 1895-6, p. 122.

[807]Ibid.p. 121.

[808]Workhouse Regulations (Dietaries and Accounts) Order, 1900, in Thirtieth Annual Report, 1900-1, pp. cvii. 62-72.

[809]Knight's Official Advertiser, 21st October 1871, p. 196.

[810]Thirteenth Annual Report, 1883-4, p. lii.

[811]Circular of 15th December 1892, in Twenty-second Annual Report, 1892-3, p. 43.

[812]MS. archives, Chorlton Board of Guardians, 1895, etc.;Local Government Chronicle, 11th January 1896, p. 33; 8th February 1896, p. 121.

[813]This was also permitted by letter to the Grantham Board of Guardians (Local Government Board to Grantham Union, November 1901;Local Government Chronicle, 7th December 1901, p. 1209); and doubtless to others. The Central Authority had, in fact, intimated its willingness "to consider applications" for a similar concession "from the guardians of large unions" (Local Government Board to Association of Poor Law Unions, 13th March 1901;Local Government Chronicle, 23rd March 1901, p. 295).

[814]Local Government Board to Association of Poor Law Unions, 13th March 1901;Local Government Chronicle, 23rd March 1901, p. 295. We cannot find that, down to the present day, any such permission has been given.

[815]On no account are the paupers, if allowed "milk," to be put off with "skim milk" or "scald milk"; by a decision of 1903, "milk" means always new milk (Decisions of the Local Government Board, 1902-3, by W. A. Casson, 1904, p. 11.)

[816]Memorandum on Emigration at the cost of the poor rate, inLocal Government Chronicle, 26th October 1889, pp. 884-5.

[817]In 1883-4 there were 296 persons emigrated; in 1885-6, 133 persons; between 1887 and 1898 the number fell from 301 to 12; it began to revive in 1903, when it was 66; in 1905 it was 317 (seeThirteenth, Fifteenth, Twenty-sixth, Thirty-third and Thirty-fifth Annual Reports).

[818]Mr. Long in House of Commons, 2nd March 1905 (Hansard, vol. 142, p. 184).

[819]Memorandum on Emigration, inLocal Government Chronicle, 26th October 1889, p. 885.

[820]Memorandum of April 1883; Thirteenth Annual Report, 1883-4, pp. xlvii.-xlix. 32-3; Fifteenth Annual Report, 1885-6, pp. xxxvi.-xxxvii. 61-5; Thirty-fifth Annual Report, 1905-6, p. cxxxv.

[821]Thirty-fifth Annual Report, 1905-6, p. 587.

[822]Mr. Corbett's Report of 10th August 1871. Mr. Longley repeated the suggestion (Third Annual Report, 1873-4, p. 156).

[823]Letter to Chairman of the Central Poor Law Conference, 12th May 1877, in Seventh Annual Report, p. 54.

[824]Ibid.

[825]Selections from the Correspondence of the Local Government Board, vol. ii. 1880, pp. 70, 110.

[826]Ibid.vol. i. 1880, p. 15;ibid.vol. iii. 1888, p. 271.

[827]Local Government Board to Bradfield Union, February 1893; Bradfield Union to Local Government Board, 21st March 1893; MS. archives, Bradfield Board of Guardians;The Better Administration of the Poor Law, by Sir. W. Chance, 1895, pp. 123-4.

[828]General Order of 26th April 1905, in Thirty-fifth Annual Report, 1905-6, pp. 321-2.

[829]Third Annual Report, 1873-4, pp. 126-30.

[830]Mr. Culley's Report, in Third Annual Report, 1873-4, p. 75.

[831]Minutes of Poor Law Commissioners, 1840; Poor Law Board to Mr. R. H. Paget, M.P., 5th January 1870, in Twenty-second Annual Report of the Poor Law Board, 1869-70, pp. 108-11.

[832]Selections from the Correspondence of the Local Government Board, vol. iii. 1888, p. 77.

[833]Once or twice it is mentioned by the inspectors;e.g.by Mr. Baldwyn Fleming in 1889 (Eighteenth Annual Report of the Local Government Board, 1888-9, p. 115), and again in 1891 (Twentieth Annual Report, 1890-1, p. 225).

[834]Thus, in 1901, sanction was obtained by the Bradford Guardians for the grant of non-resident relief in certain specific cases into which they had made careful inquiry. Among the cases thus accidentally reported for sanction, because they happened to be those of "non-resident paupers," were those of grants of 2s. to 6s. a week, in supplement of family incomes of 7s. to 26s. (Bradford Union to Local Government Board, 30th November 1901; MS. archives, Bradford Board of Guardians).

[835]57 & 58 Vic. c 25.

[836]Local Government Board decision inLocal Government Chronicle, 6th June 1903, p. 552.

[837]4 Edw. VII. c. 32, sec. 1 (Outdoor Relief Friendly Societies Act 1904).

[838]It was expressly held that boards of guardians may, if they think fit, pay for the maintenance of paupers in private hospitals, including "caution money" if demanded (Selections from the Correspondence of the Local Government Board, vol. ii 1883, p. 165).

[839]Or migration or emigration.

[840]Either under the Outdoor Relief Regulation Order, or under a Labour Test Order.

[841]In unions under the Prohibitory Order, also able-bodied single women.

[842]It is interesting to note that the Poor Law provision of emigration was always of this nature. The guardians were authorised to emigrate poor persons, whether in receipt of relief or not.

[843]Twenty-second Annual Report of Poor Law Board, 1869-70, p. lii.

[844]The Reports of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws and Unemployment may be had, in the official editions published by Wyman & Sons, in one volume folio for 5/6 (Cd. 4499), or in three volumes octavo for 4/- (vols. i. and ii., the Majority Report, etc., 2/3; vol. iii., the Minority Report, 1/9). A descriptive analysis of the Majority Report, by Mrs. Bernard Bosanquet, entitled "The Poor Law Report of 1909," is published by Macmillan & Co., price 2/6 cloth. The Minority Report, without footnotes or references, in large type on good paper, bound in cloth, with introductions by Sidney and Beatrice Webb, is published by Longmans, Green & Co. (vol. i., "The Break-up of the Poor Law," price 7/6; vol. ii. "The Public Organisation of the Labour Market," price 5/-). A special cheap edition of the Minority Report, alone, without introduction, footnotes, or references, is published by the National Committee to Promote the Break-up of the Poor Law, 5 & 6 Clement's Inn, London, in two volumes (price 1/-each, postage 4d.).

[845]Par. 337 of Part VI. of Majority Report.

[846]Par. 150 of Part IX. of Majority Report.

[847]Par. 609 of Part VI. of the Majority Report.

[848]Par. 420 of Part IV.; and pars. 92, 99-100 and 148a of Part IX. of Majority Report. To this principle of placing all forms of public assistance under a general Public Assistance Authority (and thus classing all the recipients as paupers) the Majority make a remarkable exception. They acquiesce, so far as England and Wales are concerned, in the proposed taking out of the Poor Law of all the various grades of the Mentally Defective—the lunatics, the idiots, the feeble-minded, and the chronically inebriate—and the treatment of this great class, amounting to 20 per cent of the present pauper host, not in respect of their destitution, but, whatever their pecuniary circumstances, in respect of their mental defect, by an authority specialising on that branch of administration.

[849]Par. 143 of Part IV. of Majority Report.

[850]"The Majority Report," by Professor Bernard Bosanquet (Sociological Review, April 1909).

[851]Ibid.

[852]The Minority Commissioners took up the discussion on this fundamental point in the Minority Report for Scotland (Cd. 4922); and we give in an appendix to the present volume (Appendix B) the detailed answer there afforded to Professor Bosanquet's argument.

[853]"It had been suggested," explained one of the signatories of the Majority Report, "that the Majority Report was a C.O.S. report from beginning to end.... The C.O.S. might be proud to feel that they had set their mark upon that report.... The idea was that, before the Public Assistance Authority undertook the cases, they should make themselves perfectly certain that charity was incapable of dealing with them, and that charity should always have the first attempt at a remedy, that charity should act as a sieve through which the cases should pass before they came to the Public Authority" (Lecture by the Rev. L. R. Phelps at Norwich,Eastern Daily Press, 30th June 1909).

[854]Majority Report, Part VII. par. 198, 236.

[855]Ibid.par. 613 of Part VI.

[856]Ibid.par. 623 of Part VI.

[857]That this interpretation is not unwarranted is shown by the explanation given by one of the signatories of the Majority Report. "Charity should be properly organised to deal with these cases.... This was the position of the Majority Report.... Their motto should not be 'Help the deserving,' but 'Help the hopeful cases,' andleave State action for that section of the community which needed the bridle, the curb, and the spurs to be disciplined" (Lecture by the Rev. L. R. Phelps at Sheffield, Sheffield Independent, 15th December 1909).

[858]"We do not recommend any alteration of the law which would ... bring within the operation of assistance from public funds classes not now legally within its operation" (Par. 4 of Part IX.).

[859]It may be objected that, in thus directing attention to the fact that it is always an individual who is attacked, not, at first, the family as a whole, we are ignoring the fact that there are, at any rate, the families to be dealt with which are now, as whole families, in a state of destitution; and that, moreover, it must be anticipated, even with uniformly good administration of the preventive services, there will be not a few families who, as "missed cases," will have slipped into family destitution, without having had their descent arrested by the preventive action above described. We suggest that each member of even such a family requires, for restoration, specialised treatment according to his or her need. The infant, the child of school age, the mentally defective, the sick, the infirm or incapacitated, the boy or girl above school age and finally the able-bodied and able-minded adult, each requires that something different should be done for him or her, ifthat individualis to be properly dealt with. The alternative, namely, to treat the family as a whole, means to place it in the General Mixed Workhouse, or merely to give it a dole of Outdoor Relief. This, indeed, is to-day the dominant practice; and as such, has been condemned by Majority and Minority alike. It must, we think, be admitted that the several members of the family, with their very different needs, cannot be wisely treated without calling in the Public Authorities specialising on those heads, such as the Education, Health, Lunacy, Pension, and Unemployment Authorities. This does not mean that the needs of the other members of the family will escape consideration. Assuming that the cause of the destitution in which the family is plunged is the sickness of the breadwinner, and that the other members of the family are all normal, the Health Authority will, if it thinks domiciliary treatment desirable, not only give the necessary medical attendance, and look after the whole family environment by its Health Visitor, but, if there is no income, will grant (subject to the statutory rules and the Council's own Bye-laws) the home aliment that is requisite for the family maintenance. Would any one suggest that the Health Committee, with its Medical Officer and its Health Visitor should be excluded from this case, or that it should be precluded from treating the case at home when the doctor reports that it can properly be so treated? If there is a mentally defective person in such a family, ought the Lunacy Authority to be kept out? If there are children of school age in it, is it wise to prevent the intervention of the Education Authority and its School Attendance Officer? It is the business of the officers of the County or Town Council—in particular the Registrar of Public Assistance whom the Minority Report proposes—to see (a) that these Authorities do not overlap, (b) that they are all consulted as regards such members of the family as come within their respective spheres of treatment. We see no need for any general Poor Law or "Public Assistance Committee" at all; unless, indeed, merely for registration and co-ordination.

[860]Here, it need hardly be said, lies the sphere for the "Guilds of Help" and "Councils of Social Welfare" which are springing up in so many towns of Great Britain, and which the proposals of the Majority Report would destroy. The "human element," so essential to all effective preventive action, can, in our judgment, be raised to a higher effectiveness, not only by its intimate association with the different departments of the public authority responsible for actually preventing the occurrence of destitution in the city, but also, at any rate in the large towns, by an improved voluntary organisation in each locality on a federal basis. Such an organisation might usefully include, in a federal union for mutual assistance, any local Health Societies, Children's Care or Apprenticeship Associations; Fresh Air Funds or Country Holiday Societies; the local charitable almshouses, hospitals, infirmaries, or convalescent homes; such orphanages, industrial schools, and such institutions for the physically or mentally defective as are available; the charitable agencies connected with the various Churches; any systematic visitors or workers among the poor; and, in fact, all the benevolent agencies in the locality concerned with those in need or in distress. A voluntary federal organisation, such as is here suggested, has already proved to be of great use, in one city after another, in (a) enlisting and allocating to specific services new recruits for personal work; (b) helping to organise, for each branch of the work of the Town or County Council its own necessary fringe of volunteer workers; (c) placing in touch with these workers and with the public officials and committees all the available voluntary institutions dealing with particular kinds of cases; (d) making representations to the Town or County Council on any point in the public service in which improvements can be effected; and (e) initiating the provision of whatever additional institutional accommodation is found to be required.

[861]See Appendix B (extract from the Minority Report for Scotland).

[862]There have, of course, been very numerous alterations of union boundaries, by the transfer of parishes or parts of parishes, which it has not been practicable to take into account.

[863]See the proviso to sec. 43 of the Divided Parishes, etc., Act 1876.

[864]The Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Law, etc., relating to Scotland is issued as Cd. 4922, price 2/8.The Minority Report for Scotlandis published separately by the Scottish National Committee to Promote the Break-up of the Poor Law (180 Hope Street, Glasgow), price 6d. net.

[865]"The Majority Report," by Professor Bernard Bosanquet, inSociological Review, April 1909 (vol. ii. No. 2).

[866]Circular of 10th March, 1906, of Local Government Board for Scotland.

[867]"With regard to this class, their case is fully dealt with in the Report of the Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-minded. If, as we hope, the recommendations of that Commission are carried into effect, a system of control over the feeble-minded will be initiated which will free the Poor Law Administration from one of its greatest difficulties. Meanwhile, we think that, as a provisional measure, the Poor Law Authorities should be given power to detain feeble-minded persons who come under their care" (Majority Report for England and Wales, Part IX. par. 151, Class II. (a)).

[868]We find merely a recommendation that powers of detention of unmarried mothers be given to the Poor Law Authority. "We think that if they can be medically certified as feeble-minded, they should be detained by a judicial warrant authorising such detention, and we approve the recommendations to that effect made by the Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-minded" (Majority Report for Scotland, Part III. ch. xii. sec. 323). In a later section of the Report, in describing the cases in which it is recommended that the Poor Law Authority should exercise powers of "detention or continuous treatment," we read that "All feeble-minded persons, whether unmarried mothers or others, should, we think, be subject to complete control on the lines laid down by the Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-minded."—Ibid.Part VII. ch. v. sec. 66. We can only infer that our colleagues wish to retain these persons in Scotland under the Poor Law Authority, and to continue to include them as paupers.

[869]Unemployment, by W. H. Beveridge, 1909.

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In this volume the authors propound a constructive policy, worked out in considerable detail, by the adoption of which they believe that the nation could, within a very few years, progressively get rid of the great bulk of the involuntary destitution in which so large a proportion of our population is now plunged. They analyse the several causes of this destitution, and show how these can severally be arrested in their operation. The extensive ravages of preventable sickness are shown to be productive, directly and indirectly, of probably half the whole mass of destitution; and the authors give us the outlines of a national campaign against sickness. The evil effects of child neglect, from infancy to adolescence, are traced in their resulting adult destitution; and the authors describe the methods of securing, from one end of the kingdom to the other, what may be called a "National Minimum" of child nurture. The dependence of destitution on feeble-mindedness and mental deficiency leads to an examination of the bearing, upon the problem, of the doctrines of Eugenics. The effects of "Sweating" and Unemployment in producing destitution are specially dealt with; and a full exposition is given of the striking plan foractually preventing the great bulk of unemployment, and for maintaining under training those whose unemployment cannot be prevented, with which the authors' names are associated. The experiments and proposals in Insurance, whether voluntary or compulsory, against sickness or against unemployment, receive elaborate analysis and criticism; and the experience both of the Friendly Societies and of the German Government is invoked to indicate in what way Insurance may safely be made use of as part of the provision for Old Age, Invalidity, Industrial Accidents, Sickness, and Involuntary Unemployment. The proper sphere of voluntary agencies in connection with the action of the public authorities, and as a part of the national campaign against destitution, is described at length. The grave social evil of the "overlapping" and duplication of relief at present resulting from the multiplicity of unco-ordinated authorities and agencies is described at some length; and proposals are made for preventing it by a Common Register. Finally, an elaborate chapter is devoted to "the Moral Factor," and a full examination is made of the direct and indirect effects on personal character and on family life, both of the present system of dealing with those who are in need, and of the proposed campaign of prevention. "The universal maintenance of a definite standard of civilised life is the joint obligation of an indissoluble partnership between the individual and the community."

In order to keep the page free from footnotes and references these are relegated to an appendix following each chapter.

CONTENTS

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A CRITICISM AND A PROPOSAL

BY SIDNEY WEBB

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This is the first volume dealing with Grants in Aid as an instrument of government. In the United Kingdom, at the present time, a sum of about thirty millions sterling is annually paid by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the various Local Governing Authorities of the Kingdom. This large subvention has important effects on Local Government which have never before been critically examined. The author's thesis is that in the Grant in Aid we have unconsciously devised an instrument of administration of extraordinary potency; and that its gradual adoption during the past three-quarters of a century has created a hierarchy of local government far superior to that of France and Germany on the one hand (termed by the author "The Bureaucratic System"); and to that of the United States on the other (which the author describes as "The Anarchy of Local Autonomy"). But the efficiency of our English system depends on the particular conditions upon which the Grants in Aid are made; and the book concludes with a detailed proposal for the complete revision, on novel principles, of all the existing subventions, and for their extension to other services. An elaborate bibliography is appended.

The book forms No. 24 of the Studies in Economics and Political Science, issued under the Editorship of the Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science.

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In this volume, the authors ofIndustrial DemocracyandEnglish Local Governmentpresent what is practically a history of the English Poor Law, so far as the policy of the central authority is concerned, from the Report of the Royal Commission of 1832-4 down to that of the Royal Commission of 1905-9. For this work they have analysed, not only the statutes, but also the bewildering array of General and Special Orders, Circulars, Minutes, Inspectors' exhortations, and unpublished letters, by means of which the Poor Law Commissioners, the Poor Law Board, and the Local Government Board have sought to direct the policy of the Boards of Guardians. No such history has before been attempted. For the first time the gradual development of policy can be traced, with regard to children, to the sick, to the aged and infirm, to vagrants, to the able-bodied, etc. The reader is enabled to watch the gradual and almost unconscious evolution, from out of the "principles of 1834," of what may be called the "principles of 1907"; being the lines of policy to which the experience of three-quarters of a century had brought the administrator, when the recent Royal Commission overhauled the subject. Two concluding chapters summarise and analyse the proposals of the Majority and Minority Reports.

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(THE PARISH AND THE COUNTY)

FROM THE REVOLUTION TO THE MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS ACT

This work, the result of eight years' research into the manuscript records of the Parish and the County all over England and Wales—from Northumberland to Cornwall, from Cardigan to Kent—combines history and description in a continuous narrative of extraordinary interest. Avoiding the questions of the origin of English local institutions, and even of their mediæval development, the authors plunge at once into a vivid description of the Parish Officers and the Vestry, Quarter Sessions and the Justices of the Peace, the Lord-Lieutenant and the High Sheriff, together with all the other authorities by which the internal administration was actually carried on. An entirely new view is presented of the social and political development of Parish Vestry and Quarter Sessions, of their relations to the Squire and the Incumbent, and of their attitude towards Parliament and the problems of their age. But the book is more than a contribution to history and political science. Practically all the counties of England and Wales, and literally hundreds of parishes, find place in this unique record of life and manners, in which are embedded not a few dramatic episodes of absorbing interest. It is a new picture of English life between 1689 and 1835 as it actually was in country and town, with graphic tracings of its results on national progress and on the social and economic problems by which we are now confronted.

CONTENTS

Introduction.

The Legal Framework of the Parish.

(a)The Area and Membership of the Parish;(b)The Officers of the Parish;(c)The Servants of the Parish;(d)The Incumbent;(e)The Parish Vestry;(f)The Parish as a Unit of Obligation.

Unorganised Parish Government.

(a)The Parish Oligarchy;(b)Government by Consent;(c)The Uncontrolled Parish Officers;(d)The Rule of the Boss;(e)The Turbulent Open Vestry.

An Extra-legal Democracy.

(a)The Organisation of the Public Meeting;(b)The Control over the Unpaid Officers;(c)A Salaried Staff;(d)The Parish Committee;(e)An Organised Democracy;(f)The Recalcitrant Minority.

The Strangling of the Parish.

(a)Eighteenth-Century Legislation;(b)The Sturges Bourne Acts;(c)The Sturges Bourne Select Vestries;(d)The Salaried Overseer;(e)The Referendum;(f)The Death of the Parish.

The Legality of the Close Vestry.

(a)The Close Vestry by Immemorial Custom;(b)The Close Vestry by Bishop's Faculty;(c)The Close Vestry by Church Building Act;(d)The Close Vestry by Local Act;(e)The Constitutions of Close Vestries.

Close Vestry Administration.

(a)Provincial Close Vestries;(b)Metropolitan Close Vestries;(c)Close Vestry Exclusiveness;(d)The Worst And The Best.

The Reform of the Close Vestry.

(a)The Assaults That Failed;(b)A London Movement;(c)Opening the Close Vestry.

Introduction.

The Legal Constitution of the County.

(a)The Area and Divisions of the County;(b)The Custos Rotulorum;(c)The Sheriff and his Court;(d)The High Constable;(e)The Coroner;(f)The Commission of the Peace;(g)County Service;(h)An Organ of National Government.

On some Anomalous County Jurisdictions, including the Counties Palatine.

The Rulers of the County.

(a)Number and Distribution of Justices; (b)The Justice of Mean Degree; (c)The Trading Justice; (d)The Court Justice; (e)The Sycophant Justice and Rural Tyrant; (f)The Mouth-piece of the Clerk; (g)The Clerical Justice; (h)The Leader of the Parish; (i)Leaders of the County; (j)The Lord-Lieutenant and the High Sheriff; (k)Class Exclusiveness.

County Administration by Justices out of Sessions.

(a)The "Single Justice"; (b)The "Double Justice"; (c)The Special Sessions; (d)Petty Sessions; (e)The Servants of the Justices; (f)The Sphere of Justices "Out of Sessions."

The Court of Quarter Sessions.

(a)The Time and Place of Meeting; (b)The Chairman of the Court; (c)The Procedure of the Court; (d)Administration by Judicial Process; (e)The Grand Jury; (f)The Hundred Jury; (g)Presentments by Constables; (h)Presentments by Justices.

The Development of an Extra-legal Constitution.

I.The County Executive.(a)The High Sheriff and his Bailiffs; (b)The High Constable; (c)The Clerk of the Peace; (d)The County Treasurer; (e)The County Surveyor; (f)Executive Makeshifts; (g)Committees of Justices.II.An Inchoate Provincial Legislature.III.An Extra-legal County Oligarchy.

I.The County Executive.

(a)The High Sheriff and his Bailiffs; (b)The High Constable; (c)The Clerk of the Peace; (d)The County Treasurer; (e)The County Surveyor; (f)Executive Makeshifts; (g)Committees of Justices.

II.An Inchoate Provincial Legislature.

III.An Extra-legal County Oligarchy.

The Reaction Against the Rulers of the County.

(a)The Breakdown of the Middlesex Bench; (b)The Lack of Justices; (c)The Restriction of Public Houses; (d)The Justices' Poor Law; (e)The Growth of County Expenditure; (f)The Severity of the Game Laws; (g)The Stopping up of Footpaths; (h)The Stripping of the Oligarchy; (i)Why the Justices Survived.

LONGMANS. GREEN & CO.

LONDON, NEW YORK, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA

WORKS BY SIDNEY AND BEATRICE WEBB

Demy 8vo, pp. viii and 858, in 2 volumes (1908). Price 25s. net.

(THE MANOR AND THE BOROUGH)

FROM THE REVOLUTION TO THE MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS ACT

In this second instalment of their English Local Government the authors apply their method of combined history and analysis to the fascinating story of the towns and the manorial communities, of which several hundreds find mention, belonging to all the counties of England and Wales. An interesting new account is given, from unpublished materials, of the organisation and development in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries of the Manor and its several Courts, with picturesque glimpses of the hitherto undescribed part played by the Jury in the common-field agriculture. But the Manor is shown to be also the starting-point for a whole series of constitutional developments, passing through grade after grade of Manorial Borough, hitherto undescribed, into the complete Municipal Corporation. This, too, is analysed and described in a way never before attempted, so as to make the strangely interesting life of the towns live before us. A special chapter is devoted to the Boroughs of Wales, in which their national peculiarities are brought out. Their extensive study of the manuscript records enable the authors to set forth the inner working of the "Municipal Democracies" that existed alongside the chartered oligarchies,with their many analogies to modern American cities; and to bring vividly to notice the conditions and limitations of successive Democratic government. There is an interesting sketch of English hierarchies of town government, chief among them being the Cinque Ports, the constitutional position of which is presented in a new light. The anomalous history of the City of Westminster is explored by the light of the unpublished archives of its peculiar municipal organisation. An altogether novel view is presented of the constitutional development of the greatest municipality of all, the Corporation of the City of London, to which no fewer than 124 pages are devoted. The work concludes with a picturesque account of the "Municipal Revolution" of 1835, and the Homeric combat of Brougham and Lyndhurst which ended in the Municipal Reform Act of 1835.

CONTENTS

Introduction.

The Lord's Court—

(a)The Lawyer's View of the Lord's Court.(b)The Court Baron.(c)The Court Leet.

The Court in Ruins—

(a)The Hierarchy of Courts.(b)The Court of the Hundred.(c)The Court of the Manor:(i.)The Bamburgh Courts.(ii.)The Court Leet of the Savoy.(iii.)The Court Leet and Court Baron of Manchester.(d)The Prevalence and Decay of the Lord's Court.

The Manorial Borough—

(a)The Village Meeting.(b)The Chartered Township.(c)The Lordless Court.(d)The Lord's Borough.(e)The Enfranchised Manorial Borough.(f)Manor and Gild.(g)Arrested Development and Decay.

The City and Borough of Westminster—

(a)Burleigh's Constitution.(b)Municipal Atrophy.

The Boroughs of Wales—

(a)Incipient Autonomy.(b)The Welsh Manorial Borough.(c)The Welsh Municipal Corporation.

The Municipal Corporation—

(a)The Instrument of Incorporation.(b)Corporate Jurisdictions.(c)Corporate Obligations.(d)The Area of the Corporation.(e)The Membership of the Corporation.(f)The Servants of the Corporation.(g)The Chief Officers of the Corporation.(h)The Head of the Corporation.(i)The Bailiffs.(j)The High Steward and the Recorder.(k)The Chamberlain and the Town Clerk.(l)The County Officers of the Municipal Corporation.(m)The Mayor's Brethren and the Mayor's Counsellors.(n)The Courts of the Corporation.(o)Courts of Civil Jurisdiction.(p)The Court Leet.(q)The Borough Court of Quarter Sessions.(r)Courts of Specialised Jurisdiction.(s)The Administrative Courts of the Municipal Corporation.(t)The Municipal Constitutions of 1689.

Municipal Disintegration—

(a)The Rise of the Corporate Magistracy.(b)The Decline of the Common Council.(c)The Establishment of New Statutory Authorities.(d)The Passing of the Freemen.(e)The Mingling of Growth and Decay.

Administration by Close Corporations—

(Penzance, Leeds, Coventry, Bristol, Leicester, and Liverpool.)

Administration by Municipal Democracies—

(Morpeth, Berwick-upon-tweed, Norwich, and Ipswich.)

The City of London—

(a)The Legal Constitution of the City.(b)The Service of the Citizen to his Ward.(c)The Precinct.(d)The Inquest of the Ward.(e)The Common Council of the Ward.(f)The Decay of Ward Government.(g)The Court of Common Hall.(h)The Court of Common Council.(i)The Court of Aldermen.(j)The Shrievalty.(k)The Right Honourable the Lord Mayor.(l)The Officers of the Corporation.(m)A Ratepayers' Democracy.

The Municipal Revolution—

(a)Towards the Revolution.(b)Instalments of Reform.(c)The Royal Commission.(d)An Alternative Judgment.(e)The Whig Bill.(f)The Municipal Corporations Act.

Index of Subjects.

Index of Authors and Other Persons.

Index of Places.

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO.

LONDON, NEW YORK, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA

SOME PRESS NOTICES OF

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