Chapter XXVII: Preface: Chap

I. WHAT THE GRANTS IN AID SEEM TO BE AND WHAT THEY REALLY ARE.

II. WHY HAVE GRANTS IN AID AT ALL?

III. HOW WE DISTRIBUTE THIRTY MILLIONS A YEAR IN GRANTS IN AID.

IV. THE GRANTS IN AID OF THE POOR LAW AUTHORITIES.

V. THE GRANTS IN AID OF THE LOCAL EDUCATION AUTHORITIES.

VI. THE LINES OF REFORM.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

INDEX.

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO.
LONDON, NEW YORK, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA

WORKS BY SIDNEY AND BEATRICE WEBB

ENGLISH POOR LAW POLICY

=Demy 8vo, pp. xiii and 379 (1910). Price 7s. 6d. net.=

In this volume, the authors of _Industrial Democracy_ and _English Local Government_ present 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but also the bewildering array of General and Special Orders, Circulars, Minutes, Inspectors' exhortations, and unpublished letters, by means of which the Poor Law Commissioners, the Poor Law Board, and the Local Government Board have sought to direct the policy of the Boards of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.

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO.
LONDON, NEW YORK, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA

WORKS BY SIDNEY AND BEATRICE WEBB

Demy 8vo, pp. xxvi and 664 (1907). Price 16s. net.

ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT
(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

THE PARISH