Practicable Socialism, New Series

by S. A. Barnett; Mrs. S. A. Barnett

For the purpose of this paper, I propose to divide the history of the Poor Laws into five divisions, and briefly to trace for 500 years the growth of thought which inspired their inception and directed their administration.

During the first period, from the reign of Richard II (1388) to that of Henry VII, such laws as were framed were mainly directed against vagrancy. There was no pretence that these enactments, which controlled the actions of the “valiant rogue” or “sturdy vagabond,” were instituted for the good of the individual. It was for the protection of the community that they were framed, the recognition that a man’s poverty was the result of his own fault being the root of many statutes.

Against begging severe penalties were enforced: men were forbidden to leave their own dwelling-places, and the workless wanderer met with no pity and scant justice. Later, as begging seemed but little nearer to extinction, the justices were instructed to determine definite areas in which beggars could solicit alms.

Thus was inaugurated the first effort to make each district responsible for its own poor. Persons who were caught begging outside such areas were dealt with with a severity which now seems almost incredible. For the first offence they were beaten, for the second they had their ears mutilated (so that all men could see they had thus transgressed), and for the third they were condemned to suffer “the execution of death as an enemy of the commonwealth”. Later, the further sting was added, “without benefit of clergy”.

Put briefly, these laws said, “Poverty demands punishment”.

But men could not deny that all the dependent poor were not so by choice. In the reign of Henry VIII (1536), discrimination was made between “the poor impotent sick and diseased persons not being able to work, who may be provided for, holpen, and relieved,” and “such as be lusty and able to get their living with their own hands”. For the assistance of the former, the clergy were bidden to exhort their people to give offerings into their hands so that the needy should be succoured. This began what I may call the second period, when pity scattered its ideas among the leaves of the statute book. In the reign of Edward VI (the child King), the first recognition of the duty of rescuing children appears to be the subject of an Act whereby persons were “authorized to take neglected children between five and fourteen away from their parents to be brought up in honest labour”. This was followed by the declaration that the neglect of parental duties was illegal, and punishments were specified for those who “do run away from their parishes and leave their families”.

Put briefly, these laws said, “Poverty demands pity”.

During the fifty years (1558-1603) when Elizabeth held the sceptre, important changes took place. Her realm, we read, was “exceedingly pestered” by “disorderly persons, incorrigible rogues, and sturdy beggars,” while the lamentable condition of “the poor, the lame, the sick, the impotent and decayed persons” was augmented by the suppression of the monasteries and other religious organizations which had hitherto done much to assuage their sufferings. The noble band of men, whom that great woman attracted and stimulated, faced the subject as statesmen, and the epoch-making enactment of 1601 still bears fruit in our midst. Broadly, the position of the supporters in relation to the supported was considered, and for the advantage of both it was enacted that “a stock of wool, hemp, flax, iron, and other stuff” should be bought “to be wrought by those of the needy able to labour,” so that they might maintain themselves. “Houses of correction” were established, to which any person refusing to labour was to be committed, where they were to be clothed “in convenient apparel meet for such a body to weare,” and “to be kept straitly in diet and punished from time to time”. In this Act the duty of supporting persons in “unfeigned misery” was made compulsory, power being given to tax the “froward persons” who “resisted the gentle persuasions of the justices” and “withheld of their largesse”.

Thus the system of poor rating was established, and the maintenance of the needy drifted out of the hands of the Church into the hands of the State.

Neither of the motives which had ruled action in the previous centuries was disclaimed. That the idle poor deserve punishment, and that the suffering poor demand pity, were still held to be true, but to these principles was added the new one that the State was responsible for both. In order to ease the burdens of the charitable, the idle must be compelled to support themselves, and in the almost incredible event of any one who, having this world’s goods, yet refused to be charitable, provision was made to compel him to contribute, so as to hinder injustice being done to the man who gave willingly.