Chapter I: Front Matter

Transcriber’s Note:

Suspected printer’s errors have been corrected. Upper-case accents weren’t used in the original, and differences of spelling (etc.) between the different reports have been preserved.

STATEMENT
OF THE
PROVISION FOR THE POOR,
AND OF THE
CONDITION OF THE LABOURING CLASSES,
IN A CONSIDERABLE PORTION OF
AMERICA AND EUROPE.

BY
NASSAU W. SENIOR, ESQ.

BEING THE
PREFACE TO THE FOREIGN COMMUNICATIONS CONTAINED
IN THE APPENDIX TO THE POOR-LAW REPORT.

LONDON:
B. FELLOWES, LUDGATE STREET.
(_Publisher to the Poor-Law Commissioners._)

MDCCCXXXV.

LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS,
Stamford Street.

ADVERTISEMENT.

The following pages were prepared for the sole purpose of forming an introduction to the foreign communications contained in the Appendix to the Poor-Law Report. Their separate publication was not thought of until they had been nearly finished. When it was first suggested to me, I felt it to be objectionable, on account of their glaring imperfections, if considered as forming an independent work, and the impossibility of employing the little time which can be withdrawn from a profession, in the vast task of giving even an outline of the provision for the poor, and the condition of the labouring classes, in the whole of Europe and America. But the value and extent of the information which, even in their present incomplete state, they contain, and the importance of rendering it more accessible than when locked up in the folios of the Poor-Law Appendix, have overcome my objections. The only addition which I have been able to make is a translation of the French documents.

I cannot conclude without expressing my sense of the zeal and intelligence with which the inquiry has been prosecuted by his Majesty’s diplomatic Ministers and Consuls, and of the active and candid assistance which has been given by the foreign Governments.

NASSAU W. SENIOR.

_Lincoln’s Inn, June 10, 1835._

CONTENTS

Page
INTRODUCTION 1

AMERICA

Pennsylvania 13-18

Massachusetts 14-17

New Jersey 18

New York 19

EUROPE

Norway 20

Sweden 24

Russia 29

Denmark 33

Mecklenburg 44

Prussia 45

Saxony 53

Wurtemberg 53

Weinsburg House of Industry 65

Bavaria 68

Berne 74

CAUSES favourable to the Working of a Compulsory Provision 84

Hanseatic Towns

Hamburgh 95

Bremen 96

Lubeck 98

Frankfort 101

Holland 101

Poor Colonies of 109

Frederiks-Oord 110

Wateren 113

Veenhuisen 113

Ommerschans 115

Belgium and France 117

French Poor-Laws:

Hospices et Bureaux de Bienfaisance 118

Foundlings and Deserted Children 120

Mendicity and Vagrancy 122

Belgium

Monts-de-Piété 126-138

Mendicity 126

Foundlings and Deserted Children 133

Antwerp 139

Ostend 143

Gaesbeck 145

Poor Colonies 148

France 154

Havre:

Hospital 155

Bureau de Bienfaisance 156

Rouen:

Workhouse Regulations 157

Brittany 160

Loire Inférieure:

Nantes 163

Gironde:

Bourdeaux 170

Basses Pyrenées:

Bayonne 176

Bouches du Rhone:

Marseilles 178

Sardinian States:

Piedmont 181

Genoa 186

Savoy 187

Venice 189

Portugal:

Oporto 194

The Azores 196

The Canary Islands 199

Greece 201

European Turkey 203

General Absence of a Surplus Population in Countries not
affording Compulsory Relief 204

Agricultural Labourers in England.

Wages of 206

Subsistence of 208

Wages and Subsistence of Foreign Labourers.

_Vide_ Tables 210-235

Comparison between the state of the English and
Foreign Labouring Classes 236

STATEMENT OF THE PROVISION FOR THE POOR, AND THE CONDITION OF THE LABOURING CLASSES, IN A CONSIDERABLE PORTION OF AMERICA AND EUROPE.

The Commissioners appointed by His Majesty to make a diligent and full Inquiry into the practical operation of the Laws for the relief of the Poor, were restricted by the words of their Commission to England and Wales. As it was obvious, however, that much instruction might be derived from the experience of other countries, the Commissioners were authorized by Viscount Melbourne, then His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, to extend the investigation as far as might be found productive of useful results. At first they endeavoured to effect this object through their personal friends, and in this manner obtained several valuable communications. But as this source of information was likely to be soon exhausted, they requested Viscount Palmerston, then His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the Foreign Department, to obtain the assistance of the Diplomatic Body.

In compliance with this application, Viscount Palmerston, by a circular dated the 12th of August, 1833, requested each of His Majesty’s Foreign Ministers to procure and transmit, with the least possible delay, a full report of the legal provisions existing in the country in which he was resident, for the support and maintenance of the poor; of the principles on which such provision was founded; of the manner in which it was administered; of the amount and mode of raising the funds devoted to that purpose; and of the practical working and effect of the actual system, upon the comfort, character, and condition of the inhabitants.

The answers to these well-framed inquiries form a considerable portion of the contents of the following volume. They constitute, probably, the fullest collection that has ever been made of laws for the relief of the poor.

But as a subject of such extent would necessarily be treated by different persons in different manners, and various degrees of attention given to its separate branches, the Commissioners thought it advisable that a set of questions should also be circulated, which, by directing the attention of each inquirer and informant to uniform objects, would enable the influence of different systems on the welfare of the persons subjected to them to be compared.

For this purpose the following questions were drawn up:--

The following Questions apply to Customs and Institutions
whether general throughout the State, or peculiar to certain
Districts, and to Relief given:

1st. By the Voluntary Payment of Individuals or Corporate
Bodies.

2nd. By Institutions specially endowed for that purpose.

3rd. By the Government, either general or local.

4th. By any one or more of these means combined.

And you are requested to state particularly the cases (if any)
in which the person relieved has a legal claim.

QUESTIONS.

VAGRANTS.

1. To what extent and under what form does mendicity prevail in
the several districts of the country?

2. Is there any relief to persons passing through the country,
seeking work, returning to their native places, or living by
begging; and by whom afforded, and under what regulations?

DESTITUTE ABLE-BODIED.

1. To what extent and under what regulations are they, or any
part of their families, billeted or quartered on householders?

2. To what extent and under what regulations are they boarded
with individuals?

3. To what extent and under what regulations are there district
houses of industry for receiving the destitute able-bodied,
or any part of their families, and supplying them with food,
clothes, &c., and in which they are set to work?

4. To what extent and under what regulations do any religious
institutions give assistance to the destitute, by receiving
them as inmates, or by giving them alms?

5. To what extent and under what regulations is work provided
at their own dwellings for those who have trades, but do not
procure work for themselves?

6. To what extent and under what regulations is work provided
for such persons in agriculture or on public works?

7. To what extent and under what regulations are fuel,
clothing, or money, distributed to such persons or their
families; at all times of the year, or during any particular
seasons?

8. To what extent and under what regulations are they relieved
by their children being taken into schools, and fed, clothed
and educated, or apprenticed?

9. To what extent and under what regulations, and to what
degree of relationship are the relatives of the destitute
compelled to assist them with money, food, or clothing, or by
taking charge of part of their families?

10. To what extent and under what regulations are they assisted
by loans?

IMPOTENT THROUGH AGE.

1. To what extent and under what regulations are there almshouses
or other institutions for the reception of those who, through age,
are incapable of earning their subsistence?

2. To what extent and under what regulations is relief in food,
fuel, clothing, or money afforded them at their homes?

3. To what extent, and under what regulations, are they boarded
with individuals?

4. To what extent and under what regulations are they quartered
or billeted on householders?

5. To what extent and under what regulations, and to what degree
of relationship, are their relatives compelled to assist them with
money, food, or clothing, or by taking part of their families?

SICK.

1. To what extent and under what regulations are there district
institutions for the reception of the sick?

2. To what extent and under what regulations are surgical and
medical relief afforded to the poor at their own homes?

3. To what extent and under what regulations are there
institutions for affording food, fuel, clothing, or money to
the sick?

4. To what extent and under what regulations is assistance
given to lying-in women at their homes, or in public
establishments?

5. To what extent and under what regulations are there any
other modes of affording public assistance to the sick?

CHILDREN:

_Illegitimate._

1. Upon whom does the support of illegitimate children fall;
wholly upon the mothers, or wholly upon the fathers; or is the
expense distributed between them, and in what proportion, and
under what regulations?

2. To what extent and under what regulations are the relatives
of the mothers or fathers ever compelled to assist in the
maintenance of bastards?

3. To what extent and under what regulations are illegitimate
children supported at the public expense?

_Orphans, Foundlings, or Deserted Children._

4. To what extent and under what regulations are they taken
into establishments for their reception?

5. To what extent and under what regulations are they billeted
or quartered on householders?

6. To what extent and under what regulations are they boarded
with individuals?

7. To what extent and under what regulations, and to what
degree of relationship, are their relatives compelled to
support them?

CRIPPLES, DEAF AND DUMB, AND BLIND.

1. To what extent and under what regulations are there
establishments for their reception?

2. To what extent and under what regulations are they billeted
or quartered on householders?

3. To what extent and under what regulations are they boarded
with individuals?

4. To what extent and under what regulations, and to what
degree of relationship, are their relatives compelled to
support them?

IDIOTS AND LUNATICS.

1. To what extent and under what regulations are there
establishments for their reception?

2. To what extent and under what regulations are they billeted
or quartered on householders?

3. To what extent and under what regulations are they boarded
with individuals?

4. To what extent and under what regulations, and to what
degree of relationship, are their relatives compelled to
support them?

EFFECTS OF THE FOREGOING INSTITUTIONS.

You are requested to state whether the receipt, or the
expectation of relief, appears to produce any and what effect,

1st. On the industry of the labourers?

2nd. On their frugality?

3rd. On the age at which they marry?

4th. On the mutual dependence and affection of parents,
children and other relatives?

5th. What, on the whole, is the condition of the able-bodied
and self-supporting labourer of the lowest class, as compared
with the condition of the person subsisting on alms or public
charity. Is the condition of the latter, as to food and freedom
from labour more or less eligible? _See_ p. 261 and 335 of the
Poor Law Extracts.

* * * * *

You are also requested to read the accompanying volume[1],
published by the English Poor Law Commissioners, and to
state the existence of any similar mal-administration of the
charitable funds of the country in which you reside, and what
are its effects?

You are also requested to forward all the dietaries which
you can procure of prisons, workhouses, almshouses and other
institutions, with translations expressing the amounts and
quantities in English money, weights and measures, and to state
what changes (if any) are proposed in the laws or institutions
respecting relief in the country in which you reside, and on
what grounds?

* * * * *

In reply to the following Questions respecting Labourers, you
are requested to distinguish Agriculturists from Artisans, and
the Skilled from the Unskilled.

1. What is the general amount of wages of an able-bodied male
labourer, by the day, the week, the month or the year, with and
without provisions, in summer and in winter?

2. Is piece-work general?

3. What, in the whole, might an average labourer, obtaining
an average amount of employment, both in day-work and in
piece-work, expect to earn in a year, including harvest-work,
and the value of all his advantages and means of living?

4. State, as nearly as you can, the average annual expenditure
of labourers of different descriptions, specifying schooling
for children, religious teachers, &c.

5. Is there any, and what employment for women and children?

6. What can women, and children under 16, earn per week, in
summer, in winter and harvest, and how employed?

7. What, in the whole, might a labourer’s wife and four
children, aged 14, 11, 8 and 5 years respectively (the eldest
a boy), expect to earn in a year, obtaining, as in the former
case, an average amount of employment?

8. Could such a family subsist on the aggregate earnings of the
father, mother and children, and if so, on what food?

9. Could it lay by anything, and how much?

10. The average quantity of land annexed to a labourer’s
habitation?

11. What class of persons are the usual owners of labourers’
habitations?

12. The rent of labourers’ habitations, and price on sale?

13. Whether any lands let to labourers; if so, the quantity to
each, and at what rent?

14. The proportion of annual deaths to the whole population?

15. The proportion of annual births to the whole population?

16. The proportion of annual marriages to the whole population?

17. The average number of children to a marriage?

18. Proportion of legitimate to illegitimate births?

19. The proportion of children that die before the end of their
first year?

20. Proportion of children that die before the end of their
tenth year?

21. Proportion of children that die before the end of their
eighteenth year.

22. Average age of marriage, distinguishing males from females?

23. Causes by which marriages are delayed?

24. Extent to which, 1st, the unmarried; 2nd, the married, save?

25. Mode in which they invest their savings?

[1] Extracts from the information on the Administration of
the Poor Laws.

These questions, together with the volume to which they refer, of Extracts of Information on the Administration of the Poor Laws, were transmitted by Viscount Palmerston to His Majesty’s Foreign Ministers and Consuls on the 30th November, 1833.

The replies to them form the remaining contents of the following pages.

It will be perceived, therefore, that this volume contains documents of three different kinds:

1. Private Communications.

2. Diplomatic Answers to the general inquiries suggested by Viscount Palmerston’s circular of the 12th of August, 1833.

3. Diplomatic Answers to the Questions framed by the Commissioners, and contained in Viscount Palmerston’s circular of the 30th November, 1833.

Unfortunately, only a small portion of these documents had arrived when the Commissioners made their Report to His Majesty on the 20th February, 1834. The documents then received are contained in the first 115 pages of this volume, and were printed by order of the House of Commons, and delivered to Members in May, 1834. Those subsequently received were transmitted to the printers as soon as the requisite translations of those portions which were not written in English or French could be prepared. If it had been practicable to defer printing any portion until the whole was ready, they might have been much more conveniently arranged. But to this course there were two objections. First, the impossibility of ascertaining from what places documents would be received; and secondly, the difficulty of either printing within a short period so large a volume, containing so much tabular matter, or of keeping the press standing for six or seven months. The Parliamentary printers have a much larger stock of type than any other establishment, but even their resources did not enable them to keep unemployed for months the type required for many hundred closely-printed folio pages. The arrangement, therefore, of the following papers is in a great measure casual, depending much less on the nature of the documents than on the times at which they were received. The following short summary of their contents, may, it is hoped, somewhat diminish this inconvenience.

I.--The Private Communications consist of,

Page
1. Two Papers by Count Arrivabene, containing an account of the
labouring population of Gaesbeck, a village about nine miles from
Brussels (p. 1.); and a description of the state of the Poor
Colonies of Holland and Belgium in 1829 610

2. A Report, by Captain Brandreth, on the Belgian Poor Colonies,
in 1832 15

3. A Statement, by M. Ducpétiaux, of the Situation of the Belgian
Poor Colonies, in 1832 619

4. An Essay on the comparative state of the Poor in England and
France, by M. de Chateauvieux 2

5. Notes on the Administration of the Relief of the Poor in
France, by Ashurst Majendie, Esq. 34

6. A Report made by M. Gindroz to the Grand Council of the Canton
de Vaud, on Petitions for the Establishment of Almshouses 53

7. A Report by Commissioners appointed by the House of
Representatives, on the Pauper System of Massachusetts 57

8. A Report by the Secretary of State, giving an Abstract of the
Reports of the Superintendents of the Poor of the State of New
York 99

9. A Report by Commissioners appointed to draw up a Project of a
Poor Law for Norway 701

II.--The following are the answers to Viscount Palmerston’s Circular of the 12th August, 1833.

Some of these Reports were transmitted to the Commissioners without signatures. The names of the Authors have been since furnished by the Foreign Office, and are now added.

AMERICA.

1. _New York_--Report from James Buchanan, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul 109

2. _New Hampshire and Maine_--Report from J. Y. Sherwood, Esq.,
Acting British Consul 111

3. _The Floridas and Alabama_--Report from James Baker, Esq., his
Majesty’s Consul 113

4. _Louisiana_--Report from George Salkeld, Esq., ditto 115

5. _South Carolina_--Report from W. Ogilby, Esq., ditto 117

6. _Georgia_--Report from E. Molyneux, Esq., ditto 123

7. _Massachusetts_--Report from the Right Hon. Sir Charles R.
Vaughan, his Majesty’s Minister 123

8. _New Jersey_--Report from ditto 673

9. _Pennsylvania_--Report from Gilbert Robertson, Esq., his
Majesty’s Consul 135

EUROPE.

1. _Sweden_--Report from Lord Howard de Walden, his Majesty’s
Minister 343

2. _Russia_--Report from Hon. J. D. Bligh, ditto 323

3. _Prussia_--Report from Robert Abercrombie, Esq., his Majesty’s
Chargé-d’Affaires 425

4. _Wurtemberg_--Report from Sir E. C. Disbrowe, his Majesty’s
Minister 483

5. _Holland_--Report from Hon. G. S. Jerningham, his Majesty’s
Chargé-d’Affaires 571

6. _Belgium_--Report from the Right Hon. Sir R. Adair, his
Majesty’s Minister 591

7. _Switzerland_--Report from D. R. Marries, Esq., ditto 190

8. _Venice_--Report from W. T. Money, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul-General 663

III.--Answers to the Questions suggested by the Commissioners, and circulated by Viscount Palmerston on the 30th November, 1833, have been received from the following places:

AMERICA.

1. _Massachusetts_--by George Manners, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul 680

2. _New York_--by James Buchanan, Esq., ditto 156

3. _Mexico_--R. Packenham, Esq., his Majesty’s Chargé-d’Affaires 688

4. _Carthagenia de Columbia_--by J. Ayton, Esq., British
Pro-Consul 164

5. _Venezuela_--by Sir R. K. Porter, his Majesty’s Consul 161

6. _Maranham_--by John Moon, Esq., ditto 692

7. _Bahia_--John Parkinson, Esq., ditto 731

8. _Uruguay_--by T. S. Hood, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul-General 722

9. _Hayti_--by G. W. Courtenay, Esq., ditto 167

EUROPE.

1. _Norway_--by Consuls Greig and Mygind 695

2. _Sweden_--by Hon. J. H. D. Bloomfield, his Majesty’s Secretary
of Legation 372

(_a_). _Gottenburg_--by H. T. Liddell, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul 384

3. _Russia_--by Hon. J. D. Bligh, his Majesty’s Minister 330

(_a_). _Archangel_--by T. C. Hunt, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul 337

(_b_). _Courland_--by F. Kienitz, Esq., ditto 339

4. _Denmark_--by Peter Browne, Esq., his Majesty’s Secretary of
Legation 263

(_a_). _Elsinore_--by F. C. Macgregor, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul 292

5. _Hanseatic Towns:_

(_a_). _Hamburgh_--by H. Canning, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul-General 390

(_b_). _Bremen_--by G. E. Papendick, Esq., British
Vice-Consul 410

(_c_). _Lubeck_--by W. L. Behnes, Esq., ditto 415

6. _Mecklenburgh_--by G. Meyen, Esq., ditto 421

7. _Dantzig_--by Alexander Gibsone, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul 459

8. _Saxony_--by Hon. F. R. Forbes, his Majesty’s Minister 479

9. _Wurtemberg_--by Hon. W. Wellesley, Chargé-d’Affaires 507

10. _Bavaria_--by Lord Erskine, his Majesty’s Minister 554

11. _Frankfort on the Main_--by ---- Koch, Esq., his Majesty’s
Consul 564

12. _Amsterdam_--by R. Melvil, Esq., ditto 581

13. _Belgium:_

(_a_). _Antwerp and Boom_--by Baron de Hochepied Larpent, his
Majesty’s Consul 627

(_b_). _Ostend_--by G. A. Fauche, Esq., ditto 641

14. _France:_

(_a_). _Havre_--by Arch. Gordon, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul 179

(_b_). _Brest_--by A. Perrier, Esq., ditto 724

(_c_). _La Loire Inferieure_--by Henry Newman, Esq., ditto 171

(_d_). _Bourdeaux_--by T. B. G. Scott, Esq., ditto 229

(_e_). _Bayonne_--by J. V. Harvey, Esq., ditto 260

(_f_). _Marseilles_--by Alexander Turnbull, Esq., ditto 186

15. _Portugal_--by Lieut. Col. Lorell, ditto 642

16. _The Azores_--by W. H. Read, Esq., ditto 643

17. _Canary Islands_--by Richard Bartlett, Esq., ditto 686

18. _Sardinian States_--by Sir Augustus Foster, his Majesty’s
Minister 648

19. _Greece_--by E. J. Dawkins, Esq., ditto 665

(_a_). _Patras_--by G. W. Crowe, Esq., his Majesty’s Consul 668

20. _European Turkey_-- 669

It is impossible, within the limits of a Preface, to give more than a very brief outline of the large mass of information contained in this volume, respecting the provision made for the poor in America and in the Continent of Europe.

AMERICA.

It may be stated that, with respect to America, a legal provision is made for paupers in every part of the United States from which we have returns, excepting Georgia and Louisiana; and that no such provision exists in Brazil or in Hayti, or, as far as is shown by these returns, in any of the countries originally colonized by Spain.

The system in the United States was of course derived from England, and modified in consequence, not only of the local circumstances of the country, but also of the prevalence of slavery in many of the States, and of federal institutions which by recognising to a certain extent each State as an independent sovereignty, prevent the removal from one State of paupers who are natives of another. Such paupers are supported in some of the northern districts not by local assessments, but out of the general income of the State, under the name of state paupers.

The best mode of treating this description of paupers is a matter now in discussion in the United States.

The following passage in the report of the Commissioners appointed to revise the civil code of Pennsylvania, shows the inconveniences arising from the absence of a national provision for them: (pp. 139, 143.)

We may be permitted to suggest one alteration of the present
law, of considerable importance. In Massachusetts and New
York, and perhaps in some other States, paupers who have
no settlement in the State are relieved at the expense of
the State. In this commonwealth the burthen falls upon the
particular district in which the pauper may happen to be.
This often occasions considerable expense to certain counties
or places from which others are exempt. The construction of
a bridge or canal, for instance, will draw to a particular
neighbourhood a large number of labourers, many of whom may
have no settlement in the State. If disabled by sickness or
accident, they must be relieved by the township in which they
became disabled, although their labour was employed for the
benefit of the State or county, as the case may be, and not for
the benefit of the township alone. If provision were made for
the payment of the expenses incurred by the township in such
case out of the county, or perhaps the State treasury, we think
that it would be more just, and that the unhappy labourer would
be more likely to obtain adequate relief, than if left to the
scanty resources of a single township. A case which is stated
in the second volume of the Pennsylvania Reports (_Overseers v.
M’Coy_, p. 432), in which it appeared, that a person employed
as a labourer on the State Canal, and who was severely wounded
in the course of his employment, was passed from one township
to another, in consequence of the disinclination to incur
the expense of supporting him, until he died of the injury
received, shows in a strong light the inconvenience and perils
of the present system respecting casual paupers, and may serve
to excuse our calling the attention of the legislature to the
subject.

On the other hand, the Commissioners appointed to revise the poor laws of Massachusetts, after stating that the national provision in their State for the unsettled poor has existed ever since the year 1675, recommend its abolition, by arguments, a portion of which we shall extract, as affording an instructive picture of the worst forms of North American pauperism: (pp. 59, 60, 61.)

It will appear (say the Commissioners), that of the whole
number more or less assisted during the last year, that is,
of 12,331 poor, 5927 were State’s poor, and 6063 were town’s
poor; making the excess of town’s over State’s poor to have
been only 497. The proportion which, it will be perceived, that
the State’s poor bear to the town’s poor, is itself a fact
of startling interest. We have not the means of ascertaining
the actual growth of this class of the poor. But if it may
be estimated by a comparison of the State’s allowance for
them in 1792-3, the amount of which, in round numbers, was
$14,000, with the amount of the allowance twenty-seven years
afterwards, that is, in 1820, when it was $72,000, it suggests
matter for very serious consideration. So sensitive, indeed,
to the increasing weight of the burthen had the legislature
become even in 1798, when the allowance was but $27,000 that
“an Act” was passed, “specifying the kind of evidence required
to accompany accounts exhibited for the support of the poor
of the Commonwealth.” In 1821, with a view to still further
relief from the evil, the law limited its allowance to 90 cents
a week for adults, and to 50 cents for children; and again,
for the same end, it was enacted, in 1823, that “no one over
twelve, and under sixty years of age, and in good health,
should be considered a State pauper.” The allowance is now
reduced to 70 cents per week for adults, and proportionally
for children; and in the cases in which the poor of this class
have become an integral part of the population of towns, and
in which, from week to week, through protracted sickness, or
from any cause, they are for the year supported by public
bounty, the expense for them is sometimes greater than this
allowance. But this is comparatively a small proportion of
the State’s poor: far the largest part, as has been made to
appear, consists of those who are but occasionally assisted,
and, in some instances, of those of whom there seems to be good
reason to infer, from the expense accounts, that they make a
return in the product of their labour to those who have the
charge of them, which might well exonerate the Commonwealth
from any disbursements for their support. Even 70 cents a week,
therefore, or any definable allowance, we believe, has a direct
tendency to increase this class of the poor; for a charity will
not generally be very resolutely withheld, where it is known
that, if dispensed, it will soon be refunded. And we leave it
to every one to judge whether almsgiving, under the influence
of this motive, and to a single and defined class, has not a
direct tendency at once to the increase of its numbers, and to
a proportionate earnestness of importunity for it.

It is also not to be doubted, that a large proportion of this
excess of State’s poor, more or less assisted during the year,
consist of those who are called in the statements herewith
presented, “wandering or travelling poor.” The single fact
of the existence among us of this class of fellow-beings,
especially considered in connexion with the facts, that nearly
all of them are State’s poor, and that, to a great extent, they
have been made what they are by the State’s provision for them,
brings the subject before us in a bearing, in which we scarcely
know whether the call is loudest to the pity we should feel
for them, or the self-reproach with which we should recur to
the measures we have sanctioned, and which have alike enlarged
their numbers and their misery. Nor is it a matter of mere
inference from our tables, that the number is very large of
these wandering poor. To a considerable extent, and it is now
regretted that it was not to a greater extent, the inquiry was
proposed to overseers of the poor, “How many of the wandering,
or travelling poor, annually pass under your notice?” And the
answers, as will appear in the statements, were from 10 to
50, and 100 to 200. Nor is there a more abject class of our
fellow-beings to be found in our country than is this class of
the poor. Almshouses, where they are to be found, are their
inns, at which they stop for refreshment. Here they find rest,
when too much worn with fatigue to travel, and medical aid when
they are sick. And, as they choose not to labour, they leave
these stopping places, when they have regained strength to
enable them to travel, and pass from town to town, _demanding_
their portion of the State’s allowance for them as _their
right_. And from place to place they receive a portion of
this allowance, as the easiest mode of getting rid of them,
and they talk of the allowance as their “rations;” and, when
lodged for a time, from the necessity of the case, with town’s
poor, it is their boast that they, by the State’s allowance for
them, support the town’s inmates of the house. These unhappy
fellow-beings often travel with females, sometimes, but not
always their wives; while yet, in the towns in which they take
up their temporary abode, they are almost always recognized and
treated as sustaining this relation. There are exceptions, but
they are few, of almshouses in which they are not permitted
to live together. In winter they seek the towns in which they
hope for the best accommodations and the best living, and where
the smallest return will be required for what they receive.
It is painful thus to speak of these human beings, lest, in
bringing their degradation distinctly before the mind, we
should even for a moment check the commiseration which is so
strongly claimed for them. We feel bound therefore to say, that
bad as they are, they are scarcely less sinned against in the
treatment they receive, than they commit sin in the lawlessness
of their lives. Everywhere viewed, and feeling themselves to be
outcasts; possessed of nothing, except the miserable clothing
which barely covers them; accustomed to beggary, and wholly
dependent upon it; with no local attachments, except those
which grow out of the facilities which in some places they may
find for a more unrestrained indulgence than in others; with
no friendships, and neither feeling nor awakening sympathy; is
it surprising that they are debased and shameless, alternately
insolent and servile, importunate for the means of subsistence
and self-gratification, and averse from every means but that
of begging to obtain them? The peculiar attraction of these
unhappy fellow beings to our Commonwealth, and their preference
for it over the States to the south of us, we believe is to
be found in the legal provision which the State has made for
them. Your Commissioners have indeed but a small amount of
direct evidence of this; but the testimony of the chairman of
the overseers in Egrement to this fact, derived from personal
knowledge, was most unequivocal, and no doubt upon the subject
existed in the minds of the overseers in many other towns.
But shall we therefore condemn, or even severely blame, them?
Considered and treated, in almost every place, as interlopers,
strollers, vagrants; as objects of suspicion and dread, and,
too often, scarcely as human beings; the cheapest methods are
adopted of sending them from town to town, and often with the
assurance given to them that _there_, and not _here_, are
accommodations for them, and that _there_ they may enjoy the
bounty which the State has provided for them. Would such a
state of things, your Commissioners ask, have existed in our
Commonwealth, if a specific legal provision had not been made
for this class of the poor? Or, we do not hesitate to ask, if
the Government had never recognized such a class of the poor as
that of State’s poor,--and, above all, if compulsory charity,
in any form, had never been established by our laws, would
there have been a twentieth part of the wandering poor which
now exists in it, or by any means an equal proportion of poor
of any kind with that which is now dependent upon the taxes
which are raised for them? Your Commissioners think not.

Either an increase of the evils of pauperism, or a clearer perception of them, has induced most of the States during the last 10 years to make, both in their laws for the relief of the poor and in the administration of those laws, changes of great importance. They consist principally in endeavouring to avoid giving relief out of the workhouse, and in making the workhouse an abode in which none but the really destitute will continue. Compared with our own, the system is, in general, rigid.

In the detailed account of the workhouses in Massachusetts, (pages 68 to 93,) the separation of the sexes appears to be the general rule wherever local circumstances do not interfere: a rule from which exceptions are in some places made in favour of married couples. And in the returns from many of the towns it is stated that no relief is given out of the house.

The following passages from the returns from New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York, are also evidences of a general strictness of law and of administration.

By the laws of New Jersey,

The goods and chattels of any pauper applying for relief are to
be inventoried by the overseer before granting any relief, and
afterwards sold to reimburse the township, out of the proceeds,
all expenses they have been at; all sales of which by the
pauper, after he becomes chargeable, are void.[2]

The same rule prevails in Pennsylvania. When any person becomes chargeable, the overseers or directors of the poor are required to sue for and recover all his property, to be employed in defraying the expense of his subsistence.[3]

By the laws of the same State,

No person shall be entered on the poor-book of any district,
or receive relief from any overseers, before such person, or
some one in his behalf, shall have procured an order from
two magistrates of the county for the same; and in case any
overseer shall enter in the poor-book or relieve any such poor
person without such order, he shall forfeit a sum equal to the
amount or value given, unless such entry or relief shall be
approved of by two magistrates as aforesaid. (p. 142.)

Nor is the relief always given gratuitously, or the pauper always at liberty to accept and give it up as he may think fit; for by a recent enactment[4] the guardians are authorized--

To open an account with the pauper, and to charge him for his
maintenance, and credit him the value of his services; and
all idle persons who may be sent to the almshouse by any of
the said guardians, may be detained in the said house by the
board of guardians, and compelled to perform such work and
services as the said board may order and direct, until they
have compensated by their labour for the expenses incurred on
their account, unless discharged by special permission of the
board of guardians; and it shall be the duty of the said board
of guardians to furnish such person or persons as aforesaid
with sufficient work and employment, according to their
physical abilities, so that the opportunity of reimbursement
may be fully afforded: and for the more complete carrying into
effect the provisions of this law, the said board of guardians
are hereby authorized and empowered to exercise such authority
as may be necessary to compel all persons within the said
almshouse and house of employment to do and perform all such
work, labour, and services as may be assigned to them by the
said board of guardians, provided the same be not inconsistent
with the condition or ability of such person.

And whereas it frequently happens that children who have been
receiving public support for indefinite periods are claimed by
their parents when they arrive at a proper age for being bound
out, the guardians are authorized to bind out all children that
have or may receive public support, either in the almshouse
or children’s asylum, although their parents may demand their
discharge from the said institutions, unless the expenses
incurred in their support be refunded.

In New York the administration of the law is even more severe than this enactment:--

With respect to poor children, (says Mr. Buchanan,) a system
prevails in New York, which, though seemingly harsh and
unfeeling, has a very powerful influence to deter families
from resorting to the commissioners of the poor for support,
or an asylum in the establishment for the poor; namely, that
the commissioners or overseers apprentice out the children, and
disperse them to distant parts of the State; and on no account
will inform the parents where they place their children. (p.
110.)

[2] New Jersey Revised Laws, p. 679.

[3] Act of 1819, p. 155.

[4] Act of 5th March, 1828, p. 149.

EUROPE.

It appears from the returns that a legal claim to relief exists in Norway, Sweden, Russia, Denmark, Mecklenburg, Prussia, Wurtemberg, Bavaria, and the Canton de Berne; but does not exist in the Hanseatic Towns, Holland, Belgium, France, Portugal, the Sardinian States, Frankfort, Venice, Greece, or Turkey. The return from Saxony does not afford data from which the existence or non-existence of such a claim can be inferred.

The great peculiarity of the system in the North of Europe is the custom of affording relief by quartering the paupers on the landholders in the country and on householders in the towns.

NORWAY.

Consuls Greig and Mygind, the authors of the return from Norway, state, that the--

Impotent through age, cripples, and others who cannot subsist
themselves, are, in the country districts, billeted or
quartered on such of the inhabitants (house and landholders in
the parish) as have the means of providing for them. By them
they are furnished with clothing and food, and they are in
return expected to perform such light services as they can.
In the distribution, respect is had to the extent or value of
the different farms, and to the number of the indigent, which
varies greatly in different parishes. In some they have so
few poor that only one pauper falls to the lot of five or six
farms, who then take him in rotation; whilst in other parishes
they have a pauper quartered on every farm or estate all the
year round, and on the larger ones several. (p. 696.)

It is to be regretted that the information respecting the existing poor laws of Norway is not more full and precise. The return contains two projects of law, or in other words, bills, for the relief of the poor in the country and in towns, drawn up in 1832, in obedience to a government commission issued in 1829; and also the arguments of the commissioners in their support; but it does not state how far these projects have been adopted.

In treating of the modes of relief, the bill for the country states that,