The 1834 Report
The proposals of the Commissioners of 1834 were either formal “recommendations,” exceptionally displayed in prominent type, or suggestions scattered among the pages which purport to summarise the evidence. For instance, the famous “principle” that the situation of the pauper should not be made “really or apparently so eligible as the situation of the independent labourer of the lowest class” is not a “recommendation,” but occurs only as an assertion in the course of an argument.6 We have therefore included, in the following statement of “the principles of 1834,” all dogmatic assertions of this nature, as well as the formal recommendations.
The most revolutionary principle of the Report of 1834—the fundamental basis alike of the Act of 1834 and of the policy of the Central Authority—was that of national uniformity in the treatment of each class of destitute persons. It was this principle that was in most marked contrast with the previous practice, under which each parish or union had pursued its own Poor Law policy. It was this principle that furnished the ground for the very existence of a Central Authority. The Commissioners recommended that there should be uniformity in the administration of relief in the different parts of the country, in order—
(a) To reduce the “perpetual shifting” from parish to parish;
(b) To prevent discontent among paupers; and
(c) To bring the management more effectually under the control of Parliament.7
For this among other reasons the recommendation seemed to the Commissioners to follow, “as a necessary consequence, that the Legislature should divest the local authorities of all discretionary power in the administration of relief.”8 But they did not put this recommendation into large type. What they put into large type was the recommendation that there should be a Central Authority to control the administration, directed to frame and enforce regulations, “as far as may be practicable... uniform throughout the country.”9
It is to be noted that the uniformity proposed by the Commissioners was a geographical uniformity in the treatment of particular classes of paupers, both indoor and outdoor, in different places, not an identical treatment of all paupers, or of all the paupers in any one place. We shall deal presently with their varying recommendations with regard to particular classes. But in two categories they proposed a further uniformity, a uniformity in the treatment of different individuals in a class. They emphatically pointed out that any attempt to discriminate according to merit, in the award of outdoor relief, is dangerous and likely to lead to fraud.10 This proposed further uniformity of treatment among individuals in a class, it will be seen, is expressly limited to the amount to be given as outdoor relief. It is not repeated in that part of the Report which deals with classification in institutions, nor does it apply to the decision as to whether or not outdoor relief should be given at all. A further uniformity recommended by the Commissioners was that of identity of treatment of the able-bodied, whether deserving or undeserving. To this we shall refer in connection with the able-bodied. It is to be noted that the Commissioners do not explicitly apply it to any but the able-bodied.11
Apart from a few stray suggestions, it might almost be said that the Report of 1834 was entirely directed to the treatment of the adult able-bodied labourer, with the family dependent on him. Let us take, for example, the famous principle, already referred to, that the situation of “the individual relieved shall not,” on the whole, “be made really or apparently so eligible as the situation of the independent labourer of the lowest class.” This proposal, characterised as “the first and most essential of all conditions,” occurs, as a dogmatic assertion, in the discussion of the remedial measures to be applied to the able-bodied.12 It cannot be said to be clear from the Report whether the Commissioners wished this principle to be understood as applicable to the relief of any persons other than adult able-bodied wage-earners and their families. It is followed by forty-four pages of argument and illustration relating exclusively to the able-bodied wage-earner. These are summed up in a sentence at p. 279 (“If the vital evil of the system, relief to the able-bodied on terms more eligible than regular industry”), which points to the same limitation. The principle is not reasserted when the Commissioners, in quite other parts of their Report, make their few recommendations with regard to the aged, the sick, and the orphan poor. We have failed, indeed, even to satisfy ourselves from the context whether the Commissioners had in their minds the case of the adult able-bodied woman without a husband. Though there is no phrase or definition excluding the independent female wage-earner from the term “able-bodied,” the Commissioners frequently use this term as applicable to men only; and nowhere do they mention, in recommendation or by way of illustration, under the category of able-bodied, the independent woman worker.
When we pass to recommendations explicitly restricted to the able-bodied, we are left in the same uncertainty as to what the term includes. No definition of able-bodied occurs in the Report. From the course of the argument throughout and all the illustrations from the evidence, we infer that the Commissioners had exclusively in view the adult man capable of obtaining employment in the labour market at any wage whatsoever, together with his wife and children under sixteen dependent on him. It is important to notice this ambiguity in the Report of 1834, because it explains a similar ambiguity in the subsequent policy of Parliament and the Central Authority.
Assuming that we understand what classes of persons were intended by the Commissioners to be included under the term able-bodied, the proposals of the Report of 1834 are clear and peremptory:
I. That outdoor relief to the able-bodied and their families should be discontinued; except—
(a) As to medical relief; and
(b) Apprenticeship of children.
No other exceptions should be made. “Where cases of real hardship occur, the remedy must be applied by individual charity, a virtue for which no system of compulsory relief can or ought to be a substitute.”13 “It appears to us that this prohibition” (of outdoor relief to the able-bodied) “should come into universal operation at the end of two years,”14 Meanwhile, it was suggested—
(a) That there should be a gradual substitution of relief in kind for money doles;15
(b) “That all who receive relief from the parish should work for the parish exclusively, as hard and for less wages than independent labourers work for individual employers.”16
(c) That the able-bodied, even “of the best character,” should not be offered “more than a simple subsistence. The person of bad character, if he be allowed anything, could not be allowed less.”17
That these recommendations had in view only the adult able-bodied person, capable of obtaining employment for wages, is supported by the explicit statement of the Commissioners that “the outdoor relief of which we have recommended the abolition is, in general, partial relief... at variance with the spirit of the 43rd of Elizabeth, for the framers of that Act could scarcely have intended that the overseers should ‘take order for setting to work’ those who have work and are engaged in work; nor could they by the words ‘all persons using no ordinary and daily trade of life to get their living by’ have intended to describe persons ‘who do use an ordinary and daily trade of life.’”18
II. That the able-bodied should be offered maintenance in a workhouse. It is important to notice exactly what the Commissioners here proposed, with all the emphasis of large type. Relief to the able-bodied and their families was to be “in well-regulated workhouses (i.e. places where they may be set to work according to the spirit and intention of the 43rd of Elizabeth).” 19
These workhouses for the able-bodied were to be separate from the buildings in which the aged and the children were accommodated; they were to be under separate officers; and were expressly not to form part of one great establishment containing other classes of paupers.20 The character of the employment to be found for the able-bodied must also be noted, as the Commissioners made this a cardinal point. It will be remembered that the 43rd of Elizabeth directed that the overseers should obtain “a convenient stock of flax, hemp, wool, and other necessaries for the poor to work upon,” i.e. that they should “set the poor to work” on a normal productive enterprise. This principle is repeated and emphasised by the Commissioners. The employment to be found for the able-bodied “ought to be useful employment.” Fictitious, artificial, or useless labour was “pernicious,” and “ought to be carefully prevented.... The association of the utility of labour to both parties, the employer as well as the employed, is one which we consider it most important to preserve and strengthen; and we deem everything mischievous which unnecessarily gives to it a repulsive aspect. At the same time we believe that in extended districts the requisite sources of employment will be easily found. The supply of the articles consumed in workhouses and prisons would afford a large outlet for the manufactures carried on in the House.” 21 They even refer with approval to outdoor employment as possible in most districts.
With regard to vagrants, the Commissioners were convinced that they would “cease to be a burden,” if they were treated like the ordinary able-bodied pauper. The difficulty was to enforce this, and they therefore recommended that the Central Authority should “be empowered and directed to frame and enforce regulations as to the relief to be afforded to vagrants and discharged prisoners.” 22
With regard to the treatment of women, it cannot be said that the Report of 1834 afforded much guidance to the Central Authority. Whether or not the Commissioners meant to propose the abolition of outdoor relief to the legally independent able-bodied woman is, as we have shown, indeterminate. In this Report the single independent woman is nowhere mentioned. The wife is throughout treated exactly as is the child; and it is assumed that she follows her husband, both with regard to the continuance of outdoor relief to the aged, the impotent, and the sick; and with regard to its abolition in the case of the able-bodied. Such women as entered the workhouse were apparently to be regarded as divided into only two classes; they were to be accommodated either in the building for “the aged and really impotent,” or else in the House for the “able-bodied females.” 23 With regard to the really baffling problems presented by the widow, the deserted wife, the wife of the absentee soldier or sailor, the wife of a husband resident in another parish or another country—in each case whether with or without dependent children—the Report is silent.
To the class of mothers of illegitimate children the Commissioners devoted much attention. The almost universal practice had been for such mothers to receive outdoor relief, the amount of which the parish was supposed to attempt to recover from the putative fathers. We do not find that the Report recommended any change in the method of relief of such paupers. Its proposal was, in effect, to put the mothers of illegitimate children in the same position as the widows with legitimate children. As already mentioned, the Commissioners nowhere state whether they recommend any change in the method of relief of such widows—unless, indeed, it could be argued that these women were to be included under the class of able-bodied. The revolutionary change which the Report proposed with regard to bastardy dealt with chargeability, not methods of relief. The Commissioners strongly recommended the exemption of the putative father from any legal obligation to reimburse the parish. “If,” say the Commissioners, “our previous recommendations are adopted, a bastard will be, what Providence appears to have ordained that it should be, a burden on its mother, and where she cannot maintain it, on her parents.” 24
Apart from apprenticeship, the Report deals only incidentally with children. It is assumed throughout that children go with their parents, both with regard to the continuance of outdoor relief to the aged, impotent and sick, and with regard to its abolition in the case of the able-bodied.
On one point the Report is emphatic and clear, namely, that, where children do enter the workhouse, they are to be accommodated in a separate building, under a separate superintendent, in order that they may “be educated” by “a person properly qualified to act as a schoolmaster.” 25
With regard to apprenticeship, all that the Report is—
(1) Expressly to except relief by way of apprenticeship from its proposal to abolish outdoor relief to the able-bodied parent.26
(2) To recommend that the Central Authority should “be empowered to make such regulations” as it might think fit; and subsequently “to make a special inquiry” into the subject.27
In contradistinction to the revolutionary proposals of the Report of 1834 with regard to the able-bodied, it is extraordinary that it suggested absolutely no change with regard to the sick. The current practice was, in nearly every case, to deal with the sick by outdoor relief, with or without medical attendance.28 The Report contains no suggestion for any alteration in this respect. When the Commissioners came to sketch out the classification of their proposed workhouse institutions, they did not include anything in the nature of a hospital.29 This explains why the Report of 1834 does not mention any provision for indoor medical officers. Even when dealing with the able-bodied and their families, the Commissioners explicitly except medical attendance from their proposed abolition of outdoor relief.30
This omission of anything in the nature of proposals for indoor relief for the sick becomes the more significant when we notice that the Commissioners do allude with approval to a possible extension of institutional treatment for certain classes of defectives, such as lunatics and the blind.31
G.—The Aged and Impotent (or Infirm)
An almost similar absence of proposals is to be noted with regard to the aged and impotent. The current practice was to deal with these cases, as a rule, by outdoor relief. On this the Commissioners observe merely that “the outdoor relief to the impotent (using that word as comprehending all except the able-bodied and their families) is subject to less abuse.... No use can be made of the labour of the aged and sick, and there is little room for jobbing if their pensions are paid in money. Accordingly, we find that even in places distinguished in general by the most wanton parochial profusion, the allowances to the aged and infirm are moderate.” 32 The Commissioners made no proposal that outdoor relief to the aged or impotent (or infirm) should be abolished, or even curtailed.
Such “aged and really impotent” persons as were accommodated in the workhouse were to have a separate building to themselves, under a separate superintendent; expressly in order that “the old might enjoy their indulgences.” 33
Passing now to those proposals of the Report which affected paupers generally, these concern the organisation of the workhouse, emigration and relief on loan.
With regard to the workhouse, the whole emphasis of the Report is upon classification of the inmates according to their needs; and classification, not in separate parts of one building, but by the allocation to separate classes of entirely distinct buildings in order that there might be separate and differing treatment under distinct management.
The Commissioners state that “at least four classes are necessary:—
1. The aged and really impotent.
2. The children.
3. The able-bodied females.
4. The able-bodied males.”
“Of whom we trust the two latter will be the least numerous classes. It appears to us that both the requisite classification and the requisite superintendence may be better obtained in separate buildings than under a single roof.” 34 The Commissioners were insistent that the treatment measured out to each class should differ according to its requirements, and “each class might thus receive an appropriate treatment; the old might enjoy their indulgences without torment from the boisterous; the children be educated; and the able-bodied subjected to such courses of labour and discipline as will repel the indolent and vicious.” 35 The need for separate buildings, under entirely different kinds of officers, with different qualifications, at different rates of payments—in contradistinction to one large building under a single officer—is emphasised again and again at different parts of the Report.36 It was, indeed, largely in order to provide these specialised institutions that the Commissioners recommended the formation of unions, it being made a cardinal principle that the Central Authority should “assign” to the various existing workhouses thus coming under one board of guardians “separate classes of poor.” 37
It is interesting to notice that, apart from this cardinal principle of classification by separate and specialised buildings, practically the only recommendations relating to the organisation of the workhouse, which are to be found in the Report, relate either to the character of the employment to be provided in the buildings set aside for the able-bodied—which, as we have seen, was expressly to be of a normal productive character, free from repellent characteristics—or to the enactment of a maximum diet (and no minimum). “The Commissioners should be empowered to fix a maximum of the consumption per head within the workhouses, leaving to the local officers the liberty of reducing it below the maximum if they can safely do so.” 38
Without laying much stress upon emigration, the Report recommends that any vestry should be empowered to pay for it out of the poor rate, in the case of persons (apparently whether paupers or not) having settlements in the parish and willing to emigrate.39
The Commissioners recommended “that under regulations to be framed... parishes be empowered to treat any relief afforded to the able-bodied, or to their families, and any expenditure in the workhouses, or otherwise incurred on their account, as a loan,” to be legally recoverable. It is to be noted that this proposal is expressly limited to the “able-bodied or to their families.” No definition, as usual, is given of the term able-bodied.40
To sum up the principles of administration recommended for adoption in the Report of 1834, omitting minor recommendations and incidental qualifications, they resolve themselves into three. The Principle of National Uniformity required that the relief afforded to each class of paupers should be uniform throughout the kingdom. The Principle of Less Eligibility demanded that the conditions of existence afforded by the relief should be less eligible to the applicant than those of the lowest grade of independent labourers. The Workhouse System was recommended on the assumption that it was the only means by which the Principle of Less Eligibility could be in practice enforced. The two latter principles were applied explicitly only to the able-bodied and their families. To them (but to them only) any other form of relief ought, it was urged, to be made unlawful.