Malthus tells us that his was suggested by Godwin's Inquiry, but it was really prompted by the rapid growth of pauperism which Malthus saw around him, and the proved the main influence which determined the reform of the English Poor Laws. The problem of pauperism came upon men in its most terrible form between 1795 and 1834. The following statistics will illustrate its growth:
Year Population Poor-rate
Per head of Population 1760 7,000,000
*1,250,000
or 3s. 7d. 1784 8,000,000
2,000,000
or 5s. 0d. 1803 9,216,000
4,077,000
or 8s. 11d. 1818 11,876,000 7,870,000
or 13s. 3d.
This was the highest rate ever reached. But really to understand the nature of the problem we must examine the previous history of pauperism, its causes in different periods, and the main influences which determined its increase.
Prejudices have arisen against Political Economy because it seemed to tell men to follow their self-interest and to repress their instincts of benevolence. Individual self-interest makes no provision for the poor, and to do so other motives and ideas must take its place; hence the idea that Political Economy taught that no such provision should be made. Some of the old economists did actually say that people should be allowed to die in the street. Yet Malthus, with all his hatred of the Poor Law, thought that 'the evil was now so deeply seated, and relief given by the Poor Laws so widely extended, that no man of humanity could venture to propose their immediate abolition.' The assumed cruelty of political economy arises from a mistaken conception of its province, and from that confusion of ideas to which I have before alluded, which turned economic laws into practical precepts, and refused to allow for the action of other motives by their side. What we now see to be required is not the repression of the instincts of benevolence, but their organisation. To make benevolence scientific is the great problem of the present age. Men formerly thought that the simple direct action of the benevolent instincts by means of self-denying gifts was enough to remedy the misery they deplored; now we see that not only thought but historical study is also necessary. Both to understand the nature of pauperism and to discover its effectual remedies, we must investigate its earlier history. But in doing this we should take to heart two warnings: first, not to interpret medieval statutes by modern ideas; and secondly, not to assume that the causes of pauperism have always been the same.
The history of the Poor Laws divides itself into three epochs; from 1349 to 1601, from 1601 to 1782, and from 1782 to 1834. Now, what was the nature of pauperism in medieval society, and what were then the means of relieving it? Certain characteristics are permanent in all society, and thus in medieval life as elsewhere there was a class of impotent poor, who were neither able to support themselves nor had relatives to support them. This was the only form of pauperism in the early beginnings of medieval society, and it was provided for as follows. The community was then broken up into groups - the manor, the guild, the family, the Church with its hospitals, and each group was responsible for the maintenance of all its members; by these means all classes of poor were relieved. In the towns the craft and religious guilds provided for their own members; large estates in land were given to the guilds, which 'down to the Reformation formed an organised administration of relief' ('the religious guilds were organised for the relief of distress as well as for conjoint and mutual prayer';) - while outside the guilds there were the churches, the hospitals, and the monasteries. The 'settled poor' in towns were relieved by the guilds, in the country by the lords of the manor and the beneficed clergy. 'Every manor had its constitution,' says Professor Stubbs, and, referring to manumission, he adds, 'the native lost the privilege of maintenance which he could claim of his lord.' Among what were called 'the vagrant poor' there were the professional beggars, who were scarcely then considered what we should now call paupers, and 'the valiant labourers' wandering only in search of work. Who then were the paupers? In the towns there were the craftsmen, who could not procure admission into a guild. In the country there was the small class of landless labourers nominally free. It is a great law of social development that the movement from slavery to freedom is also a movement from security to insecurity of maintenance. There is a close connection between the growth of freedom and the growth of pauperism; it is scarcely too much to say that the latter is the price we pay for the former. The first Statute that is in any sense a Poor Law was enacted at a time when the emancipation of the serfs was proceeding rapidly. This is the Statute of Labourers, made in 1349; it has nothing to do with the maintenance of the poor'. Its object was to repress their vagrancy.
This Statute has been variously interpreted. According to some, it was simply an attempt of the landowners to force the labourers to take the old wages of the times before the Plague. Others object, with Brentano, to this interpretation, and believe that it was not an instance of class legislation, but merely expressed the medieval idea that prices should be determined by what was thought reasonable and not by competition; for this same Statute regulates the prices of provisions and almost everything which was sold at the time. Probably Brentano is in the main right. It is true that the landowners did legislate with the knowledge that the Statute would be to their own advantage; but the law is none the less in harmony with all the ideas of the age. The Statute affected the labourer in two directions: it fixed his wages, and it prevented him from migrating. It was followed by the Statute of 1388, which is sometimes called the beginning of the English Poor Law. We here find the first distinction between the impotent and the able-bodied poor. This law decreed that if their neighbours would not provide for the poor, they were to seek maintenance elsewhere in the hundred; no one is considered responsible for them; it is assumed that the people of the parish will support them. Here too we catch the first glimpse of a law of settlement in the provision that no labourer or pauper shall wander out of his hundred unless he carry a letter-patent with him.
No exact date can be assigned to the growth of able-bodied pauperism. It was the result of gradual social changes, and of the inability to understand them. Medieval legislators could not grasp the necessity for the mobility of labour, nor could they see that compulsory provision for the poor was essential, though the Statute of l388 shows that the bond between lord and dependent was snapped, and security for their maintenance in this way already at an end. The Church and private charity were deemed sufficient; though it is true that laws were passed to prevent the alienation of funds destined for the poor. And with regard to the mobility of labour, we must remember that the vagrancy of the times did not imply the distress of the labourers, but their prosperity. The scarcity of labour allowed of high wages, and the vagrant labourer of the time seems never to have been satisfied, but always wandering in search of still higher wages. The stability of medieval society depended on the fixity of all its parts, as that of modern society is founded on their mobility. The Statutes afford evidence that high wages and the destruction of old ties did in fact lead to disorder, robbery and violence; and by and by we find the condition of the labourer reversed; in the next period he is a vagrant, because he cannot find work.
In the sixteenth century pauperism was becoming a really serious matter. If we ask, What were its causes then, and what the remedies proposed, we shall find that at the beginning of the century a great agrarian revolution was going on, during which pauperism largely increased. Farms were consolidated, and arable converted into pasture; in consequence, where two hundred men had lived there were now only two or three herdsmen. There was no employment for the dispossessed farmers, who became simple vagabonds, 'valiant beggars,' until later they were absorbed into the towns by the increase of trade. A main cause of the agrarian changes was the dissolution of monasteries, though it was one that acted only indirectly, by the monastic properties passing into the hands of new men who did not hesitate to evict without scruple. About the same time the prices of provisions rose through the influx of the precious metals and the debasement of the coinage. And while the prices of corn in 1541-82 rose 240 per cent as compared with the past one hundred and forty years, wages rose only 160 per cent. In this fact we discover a second great cause of the pauperism of the time; just as at the end of the eighteenth century we find wages the last to rise, and the labouring man the greatest sufferer from increased prices. As regards the growth of pauperism in towns, the main cause may be found in the confiscation of the estates of the guilds by the Protector Somerset. These guilds had been practically friendly societies, and depended for their funds upon their landed properties.
And how did statesmen then deal with these phenomena? The legislation of the age about 'vagabonds' is written in blood. The only remedy suggested was to punish the vagrant by cruel tortures-by whipping and branding. Even death was resorted to after a second or third offence; and though these penalties proved very ineffectual, the system was not abandoned till the law of 43 Elizabeth recognised that punishment had failed as a remedy. The other class of paupers, the impotent poor, had been directed by a Statute of Richard II to beg within a certain limited area; in the reigns of Edward VI and Elizabeth the necessity of compulsory provision for this class of poor slowly dawned upon men's minds. At first the churchwardens were ordered to summon meetings for the purpose of collecting alms, and overseers were appointed who 'shall gently ask and demand' of every man and woman what they of their charity will give weekly towards the relief of the poor. Mayors, head-officers, and churchwardens were to collect money in boxes 'every Sunday and holyday.' The parsons, vicar and curate, were to reason with those who would not give, and if they were not successful, the obstinate person was to be sent to the bishop, who was to 'induce and persuade him'; or by the provisions of a later law, he was to be assessed at Quarter Sessions (1562). Such was the first recognition of the principle of compulsory support, of the fact that there are men in the community whom no one will relieve. There appears upon the scene for the first time the isolated individual, a figure unknown to medieval society, but who constitutes so striking a phenomenon in the modern world. And hence springs up a new relation between the State and the individual. Since the latter is no longer a member of a compact group, the State itself has to enter into direct connection with him. Thus, by the growth at once of freedom and of poverty, the whole status of the working classes had been changed, and the problem of modern legislation came to be this: to discover how we can have a working class of free men, who shall yet find it easy to obtain sustenance; in other words, how to combine political and material freedom.
All the principles of our modern Poor Laws are found in the next Statute we have to notice, the great law of the 43rd year of Elizabeth, which drew the sharp distinction, ever since preserved, between the able-bodied and the impotent poor. The latter were to be relieved by a compulsory rate collected by the overseers, the former were to be set to work upon materials provided out of the rates; children and orphans were to be apprenticed. From this date 1601, there were no fundamental changes in the law till the end of the eighteenth century. The law of settlement, however, which sprang directly out of the Act of Elizabeth, was added; it was the first attempt to prevent the migration of labourers by other means than punishment. It began with the Statute of 1662, which allowed a pauper to obtain relief only from that parish where he had his settlement, and defined settlement as forty days' residence without interruption; but after this Statute there were constant changes in the law, leading to endless complications; and more litigation took place on this question of settlement than on any other point of the Poor Law. It was not till 1795 that the hardship of former enactments was mitigated by an Act under which no new settler could be removed until he became actually chargeable to the parish.
Two other modifications of the Act of Elizabeth require to be noticed. In 1691 the administration of relief was partially taken out of the hands of the overseers and given to the Justices of the Peace, the alleged reason being that the overseers had abused their power. Henceforth they were not allowed to relieve except by order of a Justice of the Peace, and this provision was construed into a power conferred upon the Justices to give relief independently of any application on the part of the overseers, and led, in fact, to Justices ordering relief at their own discretion. The other important change in the Poor Law was the introduction of the workhouse test in 1722. It is clear that pauperism had grown since the reign of Charles II. There are many pamphlets of the period full of suggestions as to a remedy, but the only successful idea was this of the workhouse test. Parishes were now empowered to unite and build a workhouse, and refuse relief to all who would not enter it; but the clauses for building workhouses remained inoperative, as very few parishes would adopt them.
The question remains to be asked: Why was pauperism still slowly increasing in the course of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in spite of a rise in wages, and, during the first half of the eighteenth century, a low price of corn? Enclosures and the consolidation of farms, though as yet these had been on a comparatively small scale, were partly responsible for it, as they were in an earlier century. Already, in 1727, it was said that some owners were much too eager to evict farmers and cottagers, and were punished by an increase of rates consequent on the evicted tenants sinking into pauperism. By Eden's time the practice of eviction had become general, and the connection between eviction and pauperism is an indisputable fact, though it has been overlooked by most writers. Eden's evidence again shows that pauperism was greatest where enclosures had taken place. At Winslow, for instance, enclosed in 1744 and 1766, 'the rise of the rates was chiefly ascribed to the enclosure of the common fields, which, it was said, had lessened the number of farms, and from the conversion of arable into pasture had much reduced the demand for labourers.' Again, at Kilworth-Beauchamp in Leicestershire, 'the fields being now in pasturage, the farmers had little occasion for labourers, and the poor being thereby thrown out of employment had, of course, to be supported by the parish.' Here too the evil was aggravated by the fate of the ejected farmers, who sank into the condition of labourers, and swelled the numbers of the unemployed. 'Living in a state of servile dependence on the large farmers, and having no prospect to which their hopes could reasonably look forward, their industry was checked, economy was deprived of its greatest stimulation, and their only thought was to enjoy the present moment.' Again, at Blandford, where the same consolidation of farms had been going on, Eden remarks that 'its effects, it is said, oblige small industrious farmers to turn labourers or servants, who, seeing no opening towards advancement, become regardless of futurity, spend their little wages as they receive them without reserving a pension for their old age; and, if incapacitated from working by a sickness which lasts a very short time, inevitably fall upon the parish.'
Besides the enclosure of the common-fields, and the consolidation of farms, the enclosure of the commons and wastes likewise contributed to the growth of pauperism. Arthur Young and Eden thought that commons were a cause of idleness; the labourers wasted their time in gathering sticks or grubbing furze; their pigs and cows involved perpetual disputes with their neighbours, and were a constant temptation to trespass. No doubt this was true where the common was large enough to support the poor without other occupation. But on the other hand, where the labourer was regularly employed, a small common was a great extra resource to him. Arthur Young himself mentions a case at Snettisham in Norfolk, where, when the waste was enclosed, the common rights had been preserved, and as a result of this, combined with the increased labour due to the enclosure, the poor-rates fell from 1 s. 6d. to 1 s. or 9d., while population grew from five to six hundred. He goes on to say that enclosures had generally been carried out with an utter disregard for the rights of the poor. According to Thornton, the formation of parks contributed to the general result, but I know of no evidence on this head. A further cause of pauperism, when we come to the end of the century, was the great rise in prices as compared with that in wages. In 1782 the price of corn was 53s. 9 1/4d., which was considerably higher than the average of the preceding fifty years; but in 1795 it had risen to 81s. 6d., and in the next year it was even more. The corn average from 1795 to 1805 was 81s. 2 1/2d., and from 1805 to 1815 97s. 6d. In 1800 and 1801 it reached the maximum of 127s. and 128s. 6d., which brought us nearer to a famine than we had been since the fourteenth century. Many other articles had risen too. The taxes necessitated by the debt contracted during the American war raised the prices of soap, leather, candles, etc., by one-fifth; butter and cheese rose 1 1/2d. a pound, meat 1 d. And meanwhile, 'what advance during the last ten or twelve years,' asks a writer in 1788, 'has been made in the wages of labourers? Very little indeed; in their daily labour nothing at all, either in husbandry or manufactures.' Only by piece-work could they obtain more in nominal wages. Lastly, in the towns there had come the introduction of machinery, the final establishment of the cash-nexus, and the beginning of great fluctUations in trade. In the old days the employer maintained his men when out of work, now he repudiated the responsibility; and the decline in the position of the artisan could be attributed by contemporary writers to 'the iniquitous oppressive practices of those who have the direction of them.'
Such seem to have been the causes of the growth of pauperism and of the degradation of the labourer; the single effective remedy attempted was the workhouse test, and this was abandoned in 1782. But might not landlords and farmers have done something more to check the downward course? Were there no possible remedies? One cannot help thinking the problem might have been solved by common justice in the matter of enclosures. Those who were most in favour of enclosing for the sake of agricultural improvements, like Eden and Young, yet held that, in place of his common field and pasture rights, the labourer should have had an acre, or two acres, or half an acre, as the case might be, attached to his cottage. By such compensation much misery would have been prevented. A more difficult question is, whether anything could have been done directly to relieve the stress of high prices? Burke contended that nothing could be done, that there was no necessary connection between wages and prices; and he would have left the evil to natural remedies. And, as a matter of fact, in the North where there was no artificial interference with wages, the development of mining and manufactures saved the labourer.
In the Midlands and South, where this needful stimulus was absent, the case was different; some increase in the labourer's means of subsistence was absolutely necessary here, in order that he might exist. It would have been dangerous to let things alone; and the true way to meet the difficulty would have been for the farmers to have raised wages - a course of action which they have at times adopted. But an absence alike of intelligence and generosity, and the vicious working of the Poor Laws in the midland and southern counties, prevented this. The farmers refused to recognise the claims alike of humanity and self-interest, so the justices and country gentlemen took the matter into their own hands, while the labourers threw themselves upon the Poor Law, and demanded that the parish should do what the farmers refused to do, and should supplement insufficient wages by an allowance. This was the principle which radically vitiated the old Poor Law. The farmers supported the system; they wished every man to have an allowance according to his family, and declared that 'high wages and free labour would overwhelm them.' A change had also come over the minds of the landowners as to their relation to the people. In addition to unthinking and ignorant benevolence, we can trace the growth of a sentiment which admitted an unconditional right on the part of the poor to an indefinite share in the national wealth; but the right was granted in such a way as to keep them in dependence and diminish their self-respect. Though it was increased by the panic of the French revolution, this idea of bribing the people into passiveness was not absolutely, new. It had prompted Gilbert's Act in 1782, which abolished the workhouse test, and provided work for those who were willing near their homes. It was this Tory Socialism, this principle of protection of the poor by the rich, which gave birth to the frequent use of the term 'labouring poor,' so common in the Statutes and in Adam Smith, an expression which Burke attacked as a detestable canting phrase.
The war with Napoleon gave a new impulse to this pauperising policy. Pitt and the country gentlemen wanted strong armies to fight the French, and reversed the old policy as regards checks upon population. Hitherto they had exercised control over the numbers of the labourers by refusing to build cottages; in 1771, 'an open war against cottages' had been carried on, and landlords often pulled down cottages, says Arthur Young, 'that they may never become the nests, as they are called, of beggar brats.' But now by giving extra allowance to large families, they put a premium on early marriages, and labourers were paid according to the number of their children. Further extension of the allowance system came from actual panic at home. Farmers and landowners were intimidated by the labourers: the landowners had themselves according to Malthus at once inflamed the minds of their labourers and preached to them submission. Rick-burning was frequent; at Swallowfield, in Wiltshire, the justices, 'under the influence of the panic struck by the fires, so far yielded to the importunity of the farmers as to adopt the allowance-system during the winter months.' In 1795 some Berkshire justices 'and other discreet persons' issued a proclamation, which came to be considered as a guide to all the magistrates of the South of England. They declared it to be their unanimous opinion that the state of the poor required further assistance than had been generally given them; and with this view they held it inexpedient to regulate wages according to the statutes of Elizabeth and James; they would earnestly recommend farmers and others to increase the pay of their labourers in proportion to the present price of provisions; but if the farmers refused, they would make an allowance to every poor family in proportion to its numbers. They stated what they thought necessary for a man and his wife and children, which was to be produced 'either by his own and his family's labour on an allowance from the poor-rates.' These were the beginnings of the allowance system, which under its many forms ended in thoroughly demoralising the people; it had not been long in operation before we hear the labourers described as lazy, mutinous, and imperious to the overseers. When grants in aid of wages were deemed insufficient, the men would go to a magistrate to complain, the magistrate would appeal to the humanity of the overseer, the men would add threats, and the overseer would give in. In the parish of Bancliffe ' a man was employed to look after the paupers, but they threatened to drown him, and he was obliged to withdraw.' The whole character of the people was lowered by the admission that they had a right to relief independent of work.
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