100% satisfaction guarantee Immediately available after payment Both online and in PDF No strings attached
logo-home
Summary Chapter 3: Paupers and Pauperism, FULL NOTES £10.96   Add to cart

Summary

Summary Chapter 3: Paupers and Pauperism, FULL NOTES

 2 views  0 purchase

Chapter 3 FULL NOTES Sections: -The organisation of the parish-based relief system -The problem of the ‘able-bodied pauper’: -Outdoor relief systems - Speenhamland, Roundsman and the Labour Rate -Indoor relief in poorhouses, workhouses and houses of correction -The impact ...

[Show more]

Preview 2 out of 6  pages

  • October 23, 2024
  • 6
  • 2022/2023
  • Summary
All documents for this subject (22)
avatar-seller
audreyyuen
Chapter 3: Paupers and Pauperism, 1780-1832

The organisation of the parish-based relief system:
● Parish officials set Poor Rate, eligible/not, how much, indoor/outdoor
● unpaid+non-profesh (local farmers/respectable householders)
● overseers of the poor+churchwardens appointed annually by local
justices of peace (JPs) - tyrannical / settle old scores
● 1500 parish England+Wales - local needs, community →humane
● poor harvests → intolerable burden on locally raised finances
● Elizabethan PL → relief seeker returned to birthplace to get it (or if not
known - to place where lived for year +/ last parish didn’t break law)
● post-Settlement Act 1662, by birth/marriage/apprenticeship/
inheritance
● Removal Act 1795 prevented strangers removed unless applied 4 relief
- true attempt to provide clearly defined legal settlement/criteria for
removal

The problem of the ‘able-bodied pauper’:
● Soc writers/reformers poverty necessary; fear → work; indigence bad
● Cat: deserving = no fault of own+worthy of help eg. old, sick, child;
undeserving = poverty result of perceived moral failure eg. drunk/prost
● Overseers exploit system - common 4 magistrates to enquire closely
into pauper’s background+ circumstances b4 agree to parish app 4
removal of pauper fam -> freq→ pre-printed forms (apps for removal)
● Settlement Laws →control migrant pop + burden of providing for poor
won’t overwhelm parishes (parish property owners elected overseers →
keep Poor Rate low) - not applied consistently always / differed by
place
● squabbling, prevaricating and litigation between overseers of diff
parishes
● Local vestry minutes freq recorded fortunes of pauper fam+
manoeuvrings of overseers as paupers shunted back and forth across
parish boundaries
● Settlement Laws can’t prevent mobile pop→ growing cities late
18th/early 19th - magistrates couldn’t keep up w/ issue+carry out
settlement orders

, Outdoor relief systems - Speenhamland, Roundsman and the Labour Rate:
● Outdoor (able-bodied in homes) easy to administer + flexible - needed
due to cyclical unemp/ illness of breadwinner; Bad harvests +
Napoleonic Wars -> Lagging wages + higher food prices -> mass
starvation
● National solutions (incl raising of wages to lift families out of poverty +
national poor law budget) proposed by MP Whitbread+ PM William Pitt
barely debated in Commons (mostly employer, wage-paying
landowners) → flexible allowance system preferred (parishes topped
up low wages)
● widely used Speenhamland system: subsidized low wages thru rs
between bread price and no. of dependants in fam - noncash relief incl
flour; inconsistent since some parish consider each child while others
didn’t increase relief given until more than certain no. of child in fam
● Speenhamland widely popular south/east Brit → slack times during
agri yr -> seasonal unemp common but late 18th/early 19th worsened
by loss of cottage indus + lack of allotments for grow veg + loss of
common land cuz enclosures; rarely used in rural areas in north
(livestock farming→ full emp); never got legal backing, often
abandoned/crazy modified → overseers struggled w/ changing econ
conds after 1815
● Roundsman: work found for able-bodied even if too many paupers for
work available -> laborers in rotation to local farmers -> wages paid
partly by farmer/parish (ticket system) -> overseer made up diff from
poor rates after employer paid pauper; problem: proportion of
Roundsman’s wage paid by parish increased as farmers took
advantage
● Labour Rate: agreement between parishioners→ labour rate+ Poor
Rate; ratepayers who employed paupers+ paid them at parish-set rate
exempt from paying poor rates into general fund; those who didn’t had
to pay diff between wages they were paying and going rate into Poor
Rate “pot” -> PREVENTS Roundsman abuse; by 1832, ⅕ parishes
Labour Rate
Indoor relief in poorhouses, workhouses and houses of correction
● OG aim: impotent looked after in poorhouses, able-bodied work in WH,
if refused work, punished in house of correction, pauper child
apprenticed to trade to self-support → system not cost effective for

The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:

Guaranteed quality through customer reviews

Guaranteed quality through customer reviews

Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.

Quick and easy check-out

Quick and easy check-out

You can quickly pay through credit card for the summaries. There is no membership needed.

Focus on what matters

Focus on what matters

Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!

Frequently asked questions

What do I get when I buy this document?

You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.

Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?

Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.

Who am I buying these notes from?

Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller audreyyuen. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.

Will I be stuck with a subscription?

No, you only buy these notes for £10.96. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.

Can Stuvia be trusted?

4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)

67474 documents were sold in the last 30 days

Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy revision notes and other study material for 14 years now

Start selling
£10.96
  • (0)
  Add to cart