A. POOR LAWS. But In the statute 12 Rich. II. (1388) we first find mention of the "impotent poor," who are directed to remain and abide in certain places; either those in which they were at the time of the proclamation of the statute, or the places in which they were born. no provision is made for their maintenance. Indeed, during the Roman Catholic times, begging was allowed on the part of the impotent poor, who were chiefly supported by the abbeys, convents, and other religious establishments. Thus, even so late as 1530, just before the breach with Rome, the statute 22 Hen. VIII., c. 10, which inflicts severe punishment on sturdy vagabonds and valiant beggars "being whole and mighty in body," allows the aged and impotent poor to beg and live off alms, provided they confined themselves to certain districts; and they received a letter authorizing them to beg within those limits. The chief object in all the early enactments upon pauperism was to restrain vagrancy. The first act for the relief of the impotent poor was passed in 1535 (27 Hen. VIII., c. 25), by which collections were ordered to be made in the parishes for their support. But by the same statute incorrigible vagrancy is, on a third conviction, made felony, with the penalty of death. The dissolution of the religious houses in that reign had the effect both of increasing the number of vagabonds and beggars, and of diminish ing their means of support. The increase of pauperism is shown by several severe statutes on the subject passed in the short reign of Edward VI. But, at the same time, provision was made for the relief of the poor; and the voluntary collections, such as had been first ordered under 27 Hen. VIII., c. 25, were by a long series of statutes almost insensibly converted into compulsory asseISments. At length, by the 43 Eliz., c. 2 (1601), compulsory assessment for the relief of the poor was fully established, and this statute was till recent times the text-book of the English poor-law. The overseers of each parish were directed by this statute to raise by taxation the necessary sums "for providing a sufficient stock of flax, hemp, wool, and other ware or stuff, to set the poor on work, and also competent sums for relief of lame, blind, old, and. impotent persons, and for putting out children as apprentices." The justices were empowered to send to prison all persons who would not work, and to assess all persons of sufficient means for the relief of their children and parents. Power was given to the parish officers to build, at the expense of the parish, poorhouses for the reception of the impotent poor only. These are the chief provisions of this celebrated statute. Work-houses were first established in 1722 by 9 Geo. I., c. 7. They were not at first intended so much as a refuge for the poor, or as a test by which real desti CHAP. XXXIV. NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 757 seems to have much declined in England toward the end of the reign of Henry VIII. and in that of Edward VI., which was probably in some degree owing to the great change of property consequent on the dissolution of the abbeys and religious houses. Thus the statute 25 Hen. VIII., c. 2, positively forbids the exportation of corn; and the statute 5 and 6 Edw. VI., c. 5, entitled "An Act for the Maintenance and Increase of Tillage and Corn," attempted to make the cultivation of corn compulsory, by exacting a fine of 58., payable by each parish on every acre of land in each deficient in tillage when compared with the quantity that had been tilled at any period after the accession of Henry VIII. tution might be discerned, but, as their name implies, with a view to derive profit from the labors of the poor. The work-houses were in fact a kind of manufactories carried on at the risk of the poor-rate; and though they at first diminished the cost of relief, they ultimately increased it, by pauperizing the independent laborer. In the reign of George II the amount expended in relief was under three fourths of a million. In 1775 it amounted to £1,720,000. From that period it went on rapidly increasing, and in 1818 it reached its maximum of nearly £8,000,000. This large fund was subject to great abuses of administration, which begot habits of improvidence among the poor by encouraging early marriages, etc. Laborers' wages were frequently paid in part from it; and thus a portion of the farmer's labor was done at the expense of the parish. At length, in 1832, a commission was appointed to inquire into the practical operation of the poorlaws. In February, 1834, they made their report, and a bill founded upon it, the Poor Law Amendment Act, was soon afterward introduced by Lord Althorp, and received the royal assent August 14, 1834. By this act, all bodies charged with the relief of the poor are placed under the control of a central board of three commissioners, who are to make rules and regulations, binding upon the local boards. One important power given to them is that of uniting several parishes for the purpose of a more economical adminRegulations were also made respecting the istration. The system of paying wages out home trade in corn; and in the reign of of the poor-rate is abolished; and, except in Elizabeth it was made an offense under the extreme cases, to be determined by the com- name of engrossing, and punishable with immissioners, relief is only given to the able-prisonment or the pillory, to buy corn in one bodied poor within the work-house. After this period, in the face of a rapidly-increasing population, the sums expended have rapidly diminished. On this subject see Sir G. Nicholls' Hist. of the English Poor Law, 2 vols. 8vo; Porter's Progress of the Nation, sect. i., ch. 4; and the article PAUPERISM in the Penny Cyclopædia. B. CORN LAWS. The act of Hen. VIII. forbidding the exportation of corn was repealed in the reign of Mary; but the price at which exportation was allowed was gradually raised, till in 1670 it was enacted that wheat might always be exported as long as it was under 538. 4d. a quarter. At the same time heavy import duties were imposed; and the design of the Legislature seems to have been to keep wheat at an average of about 538. 4d. Nay, in 1689 the landowners obtained the payment of a bounty of 58. per quarter on the exportation of wheat when the price did not exceed 489., and on other grain in proportion. These bounties were not repealed by law till 1815, though they had been for some time virtually inoperative. market in order to sell it in another. The act 15 Chas. II., c. 7, legalized engrossing when the price of wheat did not exceed 488. Till a very recent period engrossing continued to be regarded by public opinion as a heinous offense, and even Lord Kenyon violently denounced from the bench a cornfactor accused of it. By a bill of 1773 importation was allowed at the nominal duty of 6d. whenever the price of wheat should be above 488. Subsequently, in 1791 and 1804, this price was raised to 54s. and 63s.; and in 1815 the importation of wheat for home consumption was der S08., and other corn in proportion. Various modifications were introduced between that time and 1829, when the principle of a graduated duty or sliding scale was introduced; the duty, when the price was 628., being 248. 8d., and gradually diminishing as the price advanced, till at 738. and upward it fell to 18. The operation of the principle, however, was found to be inconvenient and unsalutary; and at length, by Peel's bill of 1846, of which an account has been given in the text, the trade in corn was ultimately left entirely free. See the article CORN in the Penny Cyclopædia. The earliest enactments on this subject were to forbid the exportation of corn, while its importation was freely admitted; but in later times the policy of the Legislature was altogether different. The first statute ex-positively forbidden when the price was untant on corn is the 34 Edw. III., c. 20 (1360), which forbids its exportation, except to cortain places where it was necessary to the king's interest, and to be named by him. At a later period, in the reigns of Richard II. and Henry VI., we find this policy reversed, and liberty given to export to any places; though subject, in the latter reign, to restriction in case the price of corn reached 68. 8d. the quarter for wheat. Since no attempt was made to prevent the importation of corn, we may infer that it was produced in England as cheap, or cheaper, than in neighboring countries. In the reign of Edward IV. we find the first protective law in favor of the agriculturist, importation of corn being forbidden by 3 Edw. IV., c. 2, unless the price of wheat exceeded 68. 8d. the quarter. But, from some cause or another, agriculture C. NAVIGATION LAWS. The first Navigation Act was introduced by Whitelock in the time of the Commonwealth (1651), and was intended as a blow to Dutch commerce; but the act which till very recently formed the foundation of our commercial system in this respect was the 12 Chas. II., c. 18. By this act it was provided that no goods should be imported into England from Asia, Africa, or America, except in an English-built ship, navigated by an English master, and having at least three fourths of its crew English. With regard to Europe, goods imported into England from any European state in a foreign ship were subject to a higher rate of duty than if imported in an English one. The first deviation from this act arose from the treaty of Ghent with the United States of America in 1815. The States, soon after the establishment of their independence, had retaliated on England by a navigation-law similar to her own; but this restrictive system was mutually found to be so inconvenient and unprofitable, that it was abandoned at the period mentioned, and the ships of the two countries placed reciprocally on the same footing. With this exception, all the provisions of the act were maintained till 1822, when Mr. Wallace, president of the Board of Trade, introduced five bills effecting various important relaxations. The provisions respecting Asia, Africa, and America were repealed, and also that clause which forbade foreign goods to be brought into England from Europe in a foreign ship, except direct from the place of production, and in ships belonging to the country of production. Certain enumerated goods were also allowed to be brought from any port in Europe in ships belonging to the port of shipment; and Dutch ships, which by the Navigation Act were forbidden to enter English ports with cargo, were placed on the same footing as those of other nations. Other relaxations were made in favor of our West India colonies. In the following year, the Prussians having notified that unless some relaxation were made in favor of their ships heavy retaliatory duties would be imposed on English ships entering their ports, Mr. Huskisson, now at the head of the Board of Trade, introduced what are called the Reciprocity Acts (4 Geo. IV., c. 77, and 5 Geo. IV., c. 1), by which the king was authorized to permit, by order in council, the importation and exportation of goods in foreign vessels at the same duties as those imported in British vessels were liable to, in the case of those countries that should levy no discriminating duties on goods imported in British vessels; and the vessels themselves of such countries were to pay no higher tonnage duties than were chargeable on British vessels. On the other hand, power was given to impose additional duties on the goods and shipping of those countries which should levy higher duties on British vessels than on their own. Under these acts treaties of reciprocity were concluded with most of the principal nations of the world. But in 1849, in the ministry of Lord John Russell, and on the motion of Mr. Labouchere, the navigation-laws were entirely repealed.-See Porter's Progress of the Nation, sect. iii., ch. 9. D. AUTHORITIES FOR THE PERIOD COMPRISED IN BOOK VI. The principal authorities for the reigns of William III. and Anne are, Bishop Burnett's History of his Own Times; Evelyn's Diary; Principal Carstairs' State Letters and Papers; Macpherson's Original Papers (1688-1714); Macpherson's Hist. of Great Britain from the Restoration to the House of Hanover; Harris, Hist. of Life and Reign of William III.; Coxe, Correspondence of the Duke of Shrewsbury with King William; Bolingbroke's Letters and Correspondence; Somerville's Political Transactions from Restoration to end of William III.; Mémoires du Duc de Berwick; Ker of Kersland's Memoirs of Secret Transactions; Boyer's Annals of the Reign of Queen Anne; Lockhart's Memoirs and Commentaries on the Affairs of Scotland; Coxe, Memoirs and Correspondence of the Duke of Marlborough; The Letters and Dispatches of John, Duke of Marlborough, 1702-1712, edited by General Sir G. Murray; Swift's Four last Years of the Reign of Queen Anne; Somerville's Hist. of Great Britain during the reign of Queen Anne. It would be quite impossible within the limits of this work to recite all the works that might be used for the Georgian era, and we shall therefore content ourselves with indicating a few of the principal ones; Coxe, Memoirs of Sir Robert Walpole; idem. Memoirs of the Pelham Administration; Dr. Wm. King's Anecdotes of his Own Times (relating to the Pretender Charles Edward); Bubb Doddington's Diary (1749–1761); Orford (H. Walpole), Mem. of last Ten Years of George II.; Memoirs of Reign of King George III.; the Annual Register (commencing 1758); Lord Mahon's Hist. of England, from Peace of Utrecht to Peace of Versailles, 1783; Adolphus, Hist. of George III.; Craik and M'Farlane's Pictorial History during Reign of George III.; H. Martineau, History of England during Thirty Years' Peace, etc. |