A History of the English Poor Law, Vol. 1 of 2: In Connexion With the Legislation and Other Circumstances Affecting the Condition of the People (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from A History of the English Poor Law, Vol. 1 of 2: In Connexion With the Legislation and Other Circumstances Affecting the Condition of the People

Sixty-five years ago the imperative necessity of Poor Law reform in this country forced itself upon the attention of statesmen. A faulty system had been allowed to work without safeguard or restriction, and it had fully and fairly worked itself out. The warning was upon the wall in very large letters; the national character was at stake; and the permanent welfare of England was probably in no less danger from bad Poor Laws than it had been from Napoleon Buonaparte.

Fortunately the subject had not been made a party question. Fortunately, too, the very magnitude of the evil tended to disclose the causes of it, so that there coexisted several conditions favourable to prompt and successful treatment, - a pressing danger, an easy diagnosis, and a legislature ready to be swayed by Reason, if Reason could find a mouthpiece. Such was the state of things when the Whigs took the business in hand.

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