The Sun.
London, England, 1839-08-09 00:00:00

ment was carried out ; but the Hon. Member for
Buckingham ( Sir T. Freemantle), joined with the Noble
Lord, and threw out the clause altogether. There was great
confusion in the House at the time ; and it was not until some
Hon. Members had left the House that he was aware he had
been made a teller with the Hon. Member for Buckingham,
otherwise he should have voted against him. However,
he had this admission, that with reap •ct to labourers
married before the passing of the Poor-law Amendment
Act, great hardship existed, and the the Right Hon.
Baronet, the Member for Pembroke, •admitted that if the
Poor-law Bill was intended to be carried out, ac-
cording to those orders which prevented any relief
except by taking the whole family into the workhouse, it
was impossible it could be so carried out. The Right Hon.
Baronet, the Member for Tamworth, had stated that the
whole question had better remain over, and be con-
sidered at a future time, but stated that with
regard to labourers married before the passing
of the Act, one objection to giving them relief
in the manner proposed was, that so much time had elapsed
since. But that was the very reason which urged him
( Mr. Darby) to bring forward the subject at this
time, because that argument would apply with double
force if the Bill were to continue for two years
more without any alteration.—( Hear, hear.) On
this subject he quoted the evidence of a gentleman
whose authority the Noble Lord would be inclined to
admit,
h re
e e mean
now Kay, he stated that as workhouse
conducted there existed considerable
schoolswt Dr.
difficulty in imparting to the children the elements of sound
secular, or religious knowledge, which might, however, be
overcome by a different system of management; therefore
he was right in proposing the clause as he proposed it at
present. Dr. Kay said in his evidence that imprudent
marriages had decreased in those districts in which this
law had been brought into operation, and the Noble Lord
objected to his clause that in his opinion it would be likely
to lead to a return to the old system. He did not think the
Noble Lord had any right to make such an objection to his
clause, because it would not encourage imprudent marriages,
but only went to remove that which the Noble Lord himself
had admitted to be a hardship. This clause wou!cl render
it necessary that inquiries should be instituted as to the
time when the parties were married ; this would necessarily
lead to other inquiries, so that no relief would be adminis-
tered without a previous inquiry into the circumstances of
the family. Having had the admission of the Noble Lord
that the law as it now stood in this respect inflicted a hard-
ship, and having heard the Right Honourable Baronet
the Member for Pembroke admit that if this part of the
law had been fully acted on in his part of the coun-
try, it would have been impossible to put the law
in force, he was at a loss to understand the grounds upon
which his clause was opposed. The principle of the Act
was to prevent persons entering into imprudent marriages,
and there was nothing in the clause which he proposed to
contravene that principle. If this clause should be
negatived he supposed the Noble and Learned Lord
would introduce his own clause, as he had admitted
that after the decision the House had come to
on this subject something ought to be done. If the clause
should be carried, the Noble Lord might perhaps propose
to put off the Bill to another Session. To this be should
not object ; but he trusted that it would be carried. He
bad never made any use of this question for the
purposes of agitation ; on the contrary, he had always
warned the working classes against such proceedings; but he
thought this clause was likely to do good, by showing that
the House was willing to attend to what the Noble Lord
himself had admitted to be a hardship. He would con-
clude by moving the clause of which he had given notice.
Mr. BURROUG HE S seconded the motion.
Captain HAMILTON (as we understood) said he felt
bound to vote for the clause moved by the Hon. Member
for East Sussex. He was Chairman of one of the very
largest Unions in the country—there were eighteen ex
officio guardians, and thirty-eight elected ones—and a large
majority of the Board were in favour of a measure of
that kind. The clause did not make it imperative
upon the guardians to grant relief, it merely gave them a
power to do so, and to do that directly, which nine in ten
of the Boards of Guardians throughout the country bad
done during the last two winters indirectly.—( Hear, hear.)
He was one who had always given great credit to the
Government fir the introduction of the Poor-law
Amendment Bill; it was introduced without the slightest re-
gard to party feelings ; yet still there were many amendments
necessary, and the clause now proposed was one of them.
Thank God they had now got rid of the bastardy clauses.
They were unfair in the highest degree for they made the
ratepayer pay in his purse, and the fair sex in their per-
sons.—( A laugh.) He understood, however, the Bas-
tardy Bill would be reported that night, and there would
be an end to that unfair part of the Bill, and he was glad of
it, and he trusted not only that the present clause would
be agreed to but others also.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL entertained all the objections
to this clause which he had formerly urged. It was totally
at variance with the intentions of the Act. One strong
reason against it was that this Bill was not an alteration,
but a continuance of the Act ; another strong objection to it
was that it might lay down rules with regard to the relief
of the Poor which had not been sanctioned by the Legis-
lature. It might be supposed by those who were favour-
able to out-door relief that if this clause should pass, the
Legislature would for the first time be giving a sanc-
tion to that principle, for the effect of the
clause would be, that if there were a number
of labourers to whom it was not convenient to give suffi-
cient wages, they might give 103. in wages and 4s. out of
the rates. This was a mischievous principle which he
considered to be favoured by this proposal.-4 Hear, hear.)
The proposition before the House took an exception with
regard to persona married before the enactment of the Poor-
law Amendment Act, and the law itself would be exposed
to peril by the admission of such a principle generally.--
( Hear, hear.) Although labourers married before the
passing of the Act, and who had been accustomed
to relief, might have suffered considerable hardship,
yet the House must consider the situation in which
they would be placed, as compared with others in
different Unions throughout the country. There would
be one labourer having part of his wages supplied by the pa-
rish, and another having no such payment, it would strike
the labourers there would be an advantage given to one man
over the other, and it would strike the employers that if they
employed one man they could have his labour for 10s. the
other 4s. being paid by the parish, whilst if they employed
another labourer they would be obliged to pay him
the whole of his earnings as wages, and it would
then be said why should not labourers married since 1834 be
put on the same footing as others ? This was the danger
which would arise from the adoption of the clause.
Another question was as to the exercise of power by the
Commissioners. There was an order in respect to widows.
Widows with more than one child (so we understood the
Noble Lord, who was rather indistinct upon this point),
and in all cases widows within six months of their widow-
hood, might have relief, therefore as to them no alteration
was necessary. As to able•bodied labourers he found that
they had no objection in cases where it was represented
to them by the guardians that it was their wish to give
relief to able bodied labourers with large families, and to
admit one or two children into the workhouse. The Com-
missioners had no objection to relax their rule so far, and
he thought it was of great importance that the relaxation
should rather come from the Commissioners than be adopted
as a principle of law, for otherwise the authority
of the Commissioners would be greatly weakened. As
next year the whole matter would have to be discussed, it
would be doubly unadvisable to take this latter course.
Every thing had been done by the Commissioners, but to
this clause he thought there would be great objection.
Mr. DA RBY said that he had known an instanee where
a child had been admitted into the workhouse, the As-
sistant Commissioner had ordered him to be taken out.
Lord GRANVILLE SOMERSET said he had
been at first inclined to support the motion, and the
concluding observations of the Noble Lord rendered
him more eager to do so, for he frankly declared
that he had no confidence in the Commissioners--( Hear,
bear, hear)—and that opinion had been conscientiously
formed after mature consideration. Ho had watched
the proceeedings of the Commissioners as they had
come under his notice, and he had seen much in their ad-
ministration of their powers, as to out-door relief, of which
he could not approve. Under these circumstances, he
wished the Legislature to step in, more especially
for the relief of those individuals who had in-
volved themselves, perhaps unfortunately, in the
embarrassments of marriage under the old system. He
saw nothing in the order to which the Noble Lord had
alluded which could at all satisfy him as to the propriety
of leaving the matter in the hands of the Commissioners.
They had already altered the rules in different
Unions, and what was to prevent them from altering the
orders which had been laid on the table of the
House? Indeed he had no reason to suppose those
orders were now applicable to every Union. He
believed there were several Unions to which the
proposed relaxation did not apply, and he would
ask upon what principle a relaxation was to be admitted in
one district and denied in another? And when the Noble
Lord talked of this clause being unequal in its opera-
tion, and making parties satisfied, he would ask the
Noble Lord whether the dissatisfaction would not be
equal when in one parish the rule was relaxed, and
in another, not far distant, strictly enforced?-( Hear,
hear.) What confidence would the poor have that their
cases were impartially considered? What reliance would
they place in the discretionary legislation of the
Commissioners? What was it his Hon. Friend proposed ?
—that relief should be given to able-bodied labourers
married before the passing
of the new Poor-law Act. He
( Lord G. Somerset) at once avowed that he did not think
this went far enough ; he would be willing to push it fur-
ther. He saw no argument why the relief extended to
parties married before the Act, should not be extended to
parties married after the Act. But if he could not
get relief to all he wished he must be content to give relief
to all he could, and if this were carried it would not pre-
clude gentlemen who thought with him from extending the
mitigation hereafter still farther, though be hoped he should
not see such a series of—manceuvres he was going to call them
—but he would only say, divisions, which had taken place
the other night, when parties voted backwards and forwards
in the most unaccountable manner.—( Hear, hear.) As to
any heart-burnings or jealousies which would be created by
the operation of this clause, let it be recollected that by
the Noble Lord's own account these would be settled
by a general measure of amendment next Session.
It was evident that the Committee which sat last year on
this subject, after duly considering the case of widows,
were anxious that they should receive relief in a
most liberal manner.—( Hear, hear.) The reason
why he had given this notice was that he was afraid
the opinion of the Noble Lord would be sufficient to pro-
cure the rejection of the proposition of his Hon. Friend,
but it did not follow that therefore his proposition should be
rejected ; and in order that it might not be so, he had taken
it as near as possible in the Noble Lord's own words, and
ho therefore hoped that even if the Noble Lord should
succeed in securing the rejection of the proposition of his
I Hon Friend, et he would extend his protection to
his proposition. He should certainly be glad to see the
power of the Commissioners in some respects lessened,
and more authority given tq the Hoards of guardians, who
had in many instances eiipseased their anxiety tq have
power to relax the stringency of the law.
Lord FL lOT although he could not agree in the
censure which hPil been cast upon the Board of Consmig.