The National Register. — London, England, 1817-08-11 00:00:00

*;`,k TO No. 496.—V0t. N. POLITICAL DISQUISITION. DEPORT OF THE I.ORDs' COMMITTEES ON TIIE POOR JAWS. THE Report of the Lords' Committees on the Poor Laws, presented to the House at the close of the last Session, is a document more creditable both to their industry and talents, than any we for a long time re member. The duties which they bad to perform, were of the most difficult kind ; for upon no part of our national polity, has there ever existed a greater variety of conflicting opinions, than on the Poor Laws. Ko two parties are agreed either as to the cause of the acknowledged distress under their operation, or as to the means of improvement. Mr. Whitbread and his followers, attributed the increase of pauperism to the war ; Mr. Brougham to the Orders in Council ; Sir Francis Burdett and his friends to the want of Par liAmentary Reform ; and Mr. Malthus found out that none of these was the cause, but that Nature only was to blame, in having given man the silly propensity to multiply his species ! _ _ The Lords' Report is divisible into two parts ; the first of which consists of a clear and well digested abstract of all the different Acts passed on the subject, from the 23rd of Edw. 111. to the 43rd of Eliz., when the whole of the Acts were united and consoli dated, forming that wstem, which, with some motlifi aatims, has been acted upon up to the present day. The second part consists of the Committee's opinions and observations on the causes of the present evil, and We means of relief. In looking at the first part of the Report, and tracing the present system, from its first rude form in a very early age, up to the present hour; and considering that it is the work of some of the wisest and the best of men, we cannot help feeling with the Lord's Committees that it ought not suddenly to be abandoned for the adoption of any untried theories, however ilatteriag in appearance. " prom the lapse of time, and a departure from the true spirit of the above Act, • arising frequently from the Illumine exercise of its supposed powers ' abuses base undoubtedly been introduced into the general administration of the Poor Laws of England ) but the Committee ate nevertheless de cidedly of opinion, that the general system Of these laws, in terwoven as it is with the habits of the people. ought, in the consideration of any measnres to be adopted for their melio ration and improvement, to be essentially maintained." The Report having shewn what the ancient practice was, and explained the full bearing of the existing laws, proceeds to develope the causes which have led to the present extraordinary increase of the poor. It must he obvious to any one who considers the general scope and probable view of many of the Statutes which have been enumerated, that at the period of their enactment the state of the country was extremely different from that in which it is now placed in many important instances t and that (souse optentiv, though in the opinion of the Committee the system of the Poor Laws might to he maintained, yet it must he ad. mitted that some of their previsions arc le•ss applicable, and peiliaps more difficult in the execution und:r the present circumstances, than at the time of their original establish ment. At that period, flue population of the country was chiefly ag,rienltural ; and from the tenor of some of the early laws to which reference has been made, it appears that ap prehensions occasionally ekisted of A deficiency, even in that population, for the necessary occupations of husbandry•.— 'fhe progressive increase which has since taken place in the general population of the kingdstin, and the great proportion of that population which during a long set it's of years has found a constant and advantageons employment in the occu pations of trade, handicraft, and maitillacnire, and in attend aiwe on the more opulent members of the conimuitity, (whose naiiihers have also increased in a great pi opurtionl, have pith:loved important changes in the operatiim of the Poor Lau s ; for upon the sodden failure of demand for souse of MM. manufactures which had All 1,111:: 1111011111.01 the greatest eocout ageme•nt and theemost ample 11110:111‘ of subsistence to tin poi,alafion it entire distr.•ds, the most serious di:tress has wole4l. Tile I • 4lll‘4VlCllett has been, that those ela,cs of persons upon whom the assessments are inasle fitr the never sure maititeihnsee and is, lief of the itiatiofactitrer and ariisau, when soddenly deprived of their ael . lloolllCli meat , . ilfslip• part. have, in soma• instances, been t• posed to a de-rev of pressure and (.11111)3rra.miwiet whie•lh has volt:1111y nes er been exp.: I*.toiretl to so great an extent at any former period.' • .11t 471.,1 of Eliz. ' 4 l° r.t itittr+ Our thug, Coniftitution anti it AWL, MONDAY, AUGUST 11, The above will, we think be allowed M be a more rational cause of the increase, than say of those which the political theorists have given us. Indeed it appears to be the only one, that can with any degree of reason be assigned ; and this involves the question, whether our manufactories, curried o the hight which they have been, are not a greater evil than a good. On this subject we will give an extract from a very sensible work published a few years ago entitled " Em priella's Letters." " Two causes, and only two, will rouse a peasantry to rebellion ; intollerable oppression, or religious zeal either fur the right faith or the wrong ;no other motive is powerful enough. A manufacturing poor is more easily instigated to revolt. They have no local attach ments ; the persons to whom they look up for support. they regard more with envy than respect, as men who grow rich by their labour; they know enough of what is passing in the political world to think themselves politicians ; they feel - the whole burthen ei taxation, which is not the case with the peasant. because he raises a peat part of his own food; they are aware of their own numbers, and the moral feel ings which in the peasant are only blunted, are in these men debauch. ed. A manufacturing populace is always ripe for rioting; the direc tion which this fury may take is accidental. In 1780 it ran against the Catholics; in 1790 against the dissenters. Governments who found their prosperity upon manufactures shrap upon gunpowder. " Do I then think," continues the writer. " that England is in danger of revolution? If the manufacturing system continues to be extended, increasing, as it necessarily does increase, the number, the misery, and the depravity of the poor, T believe that revolutiim inevit ably mutt come, and in its most fearful shape. That system. if it continues to increase, will more effectually tend to rmn F.righind than all the might and all the machinations of her enemies, were they ten times more formidable than they are. It communicates ,just knowledge enough to the populace to make them dangerous. and it poisons their moral's. 'rite temper of the mob has been manifested at the death of Despard, and there is no reason to suppose that it is not the same in all other great towns as in London. It will be well for England when her cities shall decrease, and her villages multiply and grow; when there shall be fewer streets and more cottages. The tendency of the present system is to convert the peasantry into poor; her policy should be to reverse this, and to convert the paw into pea santry; to increase them and to enlighten them ; for their num bers are the strength, and their knowledge is the security of states." Having pointed out, what in the opinion of the Com mittee is the cause of the present evil, the Report pro ceeds to detail the various modes which had been adopt ed in various parts of the kingdom to meliorate the dis tres3 consequent upon such a change. ;lan the course of the evidence many details are enumera ted of the actual amount and comparative Mereate of the rates in different places and at different periods t and information has been also collected of the manner us which relief is given and of the description of persons who partake of it in diff. erent parts of the kingdom. In many parishes a system has been adopted, in consegnence of the decrease in the demand for work, of employing labonren in rotation amongst the Car. mers ; and in some places this practice has beenearried to such an extent, that fewer regular labourers have been em ployed than the necessary worksin husbandry would have re quired Upon ear h 6rm : those works having been performed by ( what are called) roundsmen, at less them the usual rate of wanes. Wherever superfluous labourers have been employs ed in works, nut of absolute necessity lint which have been undertaken and executed by individuals for the sail. of afford ing relief and tarnishing , employment to those who could not otherwise have obtained it, this practice must have afforded an important though temporary relief; but is the ease refer red to, as stated in the evidence, the effect oldie system of roundsusen has been to throw upon the general rates of pa riches in which the system has prevailed, in time most direct and obvious manner, a very considerable proportion of. he wages of that labour, the charge of which ought to have oi:en defrayed by the individuals for whom it was performed " The Committee have also observed, in the emirs(' of their enquiry, that a practice which appears to have com menced at the period of scarcity in the sear 1753, and which was continued in the years WO and lAA. of making up to labourers with families the insufficiency of their simnel wazes by aid from the pour rates, has been eeI:MA.IIY continued in Many parts of the kiagdom; a practice which, though it may have prevented for souse time the raising the direct prier of Labour, has been to a certain decree alt ended with the injurious ctlect of taxing those who have ail interest in it with a proportion of the es pence." _ We are not a little surprised that their Lordships should have confined themselves to harcly psiinting out the pecuniary evil resulting from this practice. For this we conceive, in a moral point of view, to have been the greatest promoter of the evil. 'lie Agriculturists, in the years alluded to, particularly in the two last of them, were the most opulent of all the classes of Society ; ' the example of their labourers lw:teg thitipald, there fore, could not but have the worst effect:Awn those less, fortunately situated, and the poor, generally, seeing the labourers of the most wealthy, degruled to the state Of • paupers, could have little difficulty in onquering their aversion to a mule of life, which they had hitherto been taught to consider as disgraceful. Thus was the spirit of the peasantry at once broken down ; and front dependance upon parish bounty to plunder of private PRICE 9.1 A property, was an easy and palpable transition. Of the moral evil resulting from the system, the Lords, indeed,. appear to be aware, feom an observation made in another part of the Report. _ " The great increase in the amount of the rate' of late years, has arisen not only from the 4311011(.1 which have been enumerated, but from the general dopositilo to resort to that spvciet of inaintainance on account of the facility with. which it has been frequently obtained; which has testier! to weaken amongst the poor that disposition to evOuosw. which formerly existed its many parts of the country, and which it is highly desirable on iscrottur of their comfort and independence, to encourage and yevive." To this succeeds, in the Report, tte opinion of the Committee on the best mode of improving the present system, though, as they express themselves, " the ad. vanced period of the Session will, of course, preclude the possibility of any immediate alteration in the pre. sent laws." Not least among the evils of the present system is the law of settlement. By it parishes are involved its continual lawsuits, and frequently the aged and infirm are removed front the spot where the days of their vig our have been spent, to some remote district where they had obtained an accidental claim ; cut off for ever from that little society in which they were known, and cast among men the remembrance of whom time had ob liberated. "The Committee, therefore, submit to the consideration of the House. whether it might not not lie expedient to provide that evely person residing for three y ears in any parish with mit being chargeable (and who hue been employed during the above period in the said pal ish \ shall obtain a settlement ; ea that, in case that mode of settlement should be adopted after a time to he fixed, no person shall acquire. a settlement by hiring and service, or by apprenticeship; and the Committee think they may sa*ly reeominettil that no settlement shall be acquired in any parish by renting a tenement, unless it shall consist of a house or land, or of an house with land, and shall Ire held tinder one landlord and in the sante perish, at an annal bona fait rent of twenty pounds, and for; not less than one year." " The committee likewise submit, pastienlarly from the evidence which they received from Manchester and Binning hem, that a power slued(' be given to remove velum* be longing to counties not within the operat . of the pour laws, whoskall be chargeabk to anvparish, to their respect's e homes. It hue also appeared t 3 the Committee, that great advantage would arise, particularly in large parisln:s, from the appoint ment of perniament overseers and surveyors of the highways, with salaries, and from the union of email parishes for a si milar purpose, amid that it is adviseable to give a power to parishes, in certain eases, to occupy land with a view to the employment of the puor." - - - To these salutary suggestions they add that of pa rishes making periodical returns to the Magistrates of Counties, containing an account of the actual state of the purishts, and the receipts anti disbursements of mo ney on account of the Poor; which returns they sug gest should be regularly preserved, and be open for in spection. _ . The general adoptice of Savings Banls is strongly recommended, as like:y to produce that sli'rit of enter prise and independence, which alone will render the poor superior to the acceptance of parish relief: and in conclusion they urge all persons of :eight and conse. quence in their respective districts to watch over the administration of the laws relative to ths poor, and by example and direct interference to improve the general management of those around them : by these means much may be done until some legislative measure can be matured, which it is hoped will be early in the next Session. The Emperor of Russia is about to introduce, fur his domestics, liveries similar to those bf the Prince Regent, with the variation of dark green cloth instead of dark blue, with which our royal liveries are faced and turned up. Suits are now making for two Eng lish lads, who have been training daily for about two months past, at Carlton House Stables, under the di rection of the Prince Regent's principal coachman and others, to learn to ride and drive properly; and when they are in eNery respect thoroughly qualified to under take the management of horses, they will leave En- I land for St. Petersburgh, taking with them thaler their I, care certain choice and valuable horses which were* purchased by the Grand Duke during his stay here.— ' His Imperial Majesty . is having Petersburgh paved in a similar style to the streets of London. ationkt