THE POOR LAW REPORT OF 1909.*
THOUGH the public may not yet have realised the fact, we have reached a crisis in our national development, and that crisis is marked by the Report of the Poor Law Commission of 1909. If the British people can be made to appreciate the nature of the majority Report, and will act upon that Report, we may still save the nation from the progressive pauperisation and demoralisation of our present system,—a system in fact, if not in name, of State Socialism. If, on the other hand, we neglect the warnings set forth by the Com- mission and plunge still further into the slough of Socialistic pauperism, as must infallibly be the result of adopting the recommendations of the minority Report, we shall soon reach even a lower depth than the nation reached in 1834. But who will dare to say that we shall be able a second time to save ourselves as by fire from the fate that history shows has always overtaken pauperised and Socialistic States P The two books of which the names are to be found at the foot of this column, 'Mrs. l3osanq net's admirable summary explaining the defects of the present Poor Law system and the principal recommendations of the Commission, and Miss Lome's An Englishman's Castle, a volume of essays founded on practical experience of work among the poor, deserve the most earnest attention of every man who cares for his country, and who is anxious ter see her people happy and independent,—free citizens of a free nation instead of slaves and paupers. The wider public cannot be expected to read the vast Blue-book containing the Report of the Commission. They will, however, get the spirit of the majority Report in Mrs. Bosanquet's concise and statesman- like review. They will find in Miss Loa. ne's pages a human document which supplies the concrete instances demanded to enforce the general principles laid down by Mrs. Bosanquet. It is a pure accident that the two books have appeared together, and yet one is so exactly complementary of the other that it is difficult not to feel that the genius of accident determined to strike a shrewd blow against the cult of pauperism. The man who, as he reads Mrs. Boaanquet's peges, may be inclined to say: "This all sounds very true and very convincing, but after all it is perhaps only theory, and will not stand the test of practice," has only to open Miss Loane's book to find the support of fact and practical experience which he desires. For example, Mrs. Bosanquet • • (I) The Poor Law Report of 1909. By Ireton Boaanquet. London Macmillan ,e.nd Co. 13e. 64. not. I—(2) An Bnelionnan's Castle. By M. Loano. London Edward Arnold. Les.]
tells us that a specially painful development of the present day which was brought to the knowledge of the Commis- sion was the growing reluctance of relatives to asaist one another, and more especially of children to maintain and nurse their parents,—a destruction of the natural affections through the Poor Law and State action which, it will be remembered, filled the minds of the Commissioners of 1834 with a kindred dismay. Miss Loane's book, though she is by no means a pessimist in regard to the poor, is full of luciferous facts that bear on this point, and she draws with a vigorous hand the destruction of the home under our schemes of so-called "social reform." "The home where one cannot be born, cannot play, cannot learn, cannot be ill, cannot grow old, cannot die, is not worthy to be called a home."
Though the two books we are noticing are alike in the spirit in which they approach the problem of poverty and in the conclusions at which they arrive, there is a point of difference which is well worth remarking. Mrs. Bosanquet, though in the past she has had plenty of first-hand experience of the
poor, on the present occasion deals chiefly with the abstract side of the question. Miss Loane, though a woman well read and of clear and vigorous intellect, approaches it almost wholly from the practical side, and refers every conclusion which she reaches to the test of personal experience in town streets or village homes. Her book might almost be described as a record of her "cases," interspersed with the morals to be drawn from them. In view of these facts, one might expect that the practical worker would be inclined to make somewhat more concessions in the direction of State action
than the writer whose prime business was with the science and theory of the subject. Such is the almost universal
contrast between the man of scientific principles and the man on the spot. Yet, strange as it may seem, the very reverse is the case. Though Mrs. Bosanquet is in theory willing to make some small concessions to the advocates of State action, Miss Loans will hardly make any. So strongly impressed has she been by the terrible demoralisation caused by teaching men to rely, not upon themselves, but upon the enervating aid of the State, that she strikes at every plea for so-called "social reform." For example, Miss Loane, speaking, as it were, from the very bedsides of the aged poor, is the most determined opponent of old-age pensions whom we have ever encountered. Her opposition is not that of the politician or the financier, but of one deeply concerned with the moral and material welfare of the poor. But, after all, this difference, though interesting and significant, is a small one. Both writers agree, and here we also are in agreement, with the memorable declaration of the Poor Law Commissioners of 1834 that the moral evils of pauperisation are infinitely greater than the material. The Commissioners of 1834, it may be remembered, quoted with approval the testimony of one of their Sub- Commissioners, who declared that when he embarked upon his inquiries he was almost wholly concerned with the
economic perils of the unreformed Poor Law. He had not been at work for many weeks before lie realised that they sank into absolute insignificance compared with the moral evils of the system.
If we were asked to compress into a single phrase the lesson of the two books we are reviewing, we should give it in that inspiring line to be found in a poem of Beaumont and Fletcher: "A man is his own star." Again and again these books drive home this lesson, and show how very little the State, with all its effort, can do for the moral, or even the economic, salvation of a man or woman. Success —we use the word as meaning triumph in the moral quite as
much as in the material battle—for the poor comes from things over which the State has no control. Look' at these two pictures provided by Miss Loans :— " I knew a London girl who when she wont to service at the age of fifteen had never worn gloves, or a collar, or possessed even a fractional interest in an umbrella. Her wardrobe was tied up in a single paper parcel so light in weight that a yard of frayed twine hold it together, and she did not own a box or bag of any description. Within two years she jingled a bunch of keys and had an account at the savings bank. At twenty-two she married with a trousseau. that filled three trunks, all her house-linen and a nest egg of seventeen pounds. At twenty-six, when her husband had rather less than thirty shillings a week, her house was what the neighbours called 'a perfect picture.' rhis young woman had a friend who mile from a home greatly superior to hers, and remained in service till she was twenty-four, when she married with, nothing to her name' but a tawdry. ill-fittiug wedding dross, and even that had been bought with money seat four thousand miles by a former mistress, together with a letter kindly bidding her spend it 'on a comfortable armchair for your pretty little sitting room.' The husband, who was nearly thirty, had not saved a farthing, and they had. t6 go into furnished lodgings. By the time the baby came the man was out of work, and although it was for the first time, and did not last more than six weeks, it would have been a case of starvation or the workhouse if the ant had not come to the rescue of the grasshoppers. Working class ants are generally too scrupulously delicate to lecture those whom they food, but this was a peculiarly strong minded specimen, and she soon had them camping out in a single room, bare except for the bed that she lent them, and engaged in 'getting together a few sticks of furniture' with the money saved on the difference in rent. As a result, matters look far more hopeful for the moderately repentant grasshoppers than they did a year ago, and it is possible that, badly checked as they are by their false start, they may yet become the possessors of a comfortable home and of that small amount of capital without which it must always be at the mercy of every gust of adverse fortune."
Mrs. Bosanquet in her book never fails to keep before her readers that the essential object is to attack poverty at its source, and thus to atop the manufacture of paupers which is now perpetually going on. One of the greatest causes of pauperism is ill-health, and, again, one of the greatest causes of ill-health is slum life. Yet, strange as it may seem, the State spends millions a year in what we can only describe as subsidising the slums. Mrs. Bosanquet shows us how outdoor relief, which is a most flourishing department in the great pauper factory run by the State, goes to subsidise the slums and slum life. The ordinary Board of Guardians when they grant outdoor relief take no heed as to the kind of homes into which the money goes, or of the conditions which are maintained by its expenditure. Yet in practice this outdoor relief often goes to homes, or rafter houses, which are bywords for filth and misery, and in which children are brought up under conditions of immorality, cruelty, and dirt beyond description. The rates are thus grants in aid of all that is vile and horrible. Mrs. Bossuquet's book shows that, on the whole, our Poor Law system has been more successful, or perhaps we should say less unsuccessful, in its dealings with children than with any other class. Nevertheless, in spite of this comparative success one cannot, as one reads her scrupulously fair record, fail to realise what a poor, wretched, and inefficient thing State action is in the matter of bringing up children. The best State action can never be an efficient substitute for the family, for the care of mother and father, and the mutual aid of brothers and sisters.
In a previous issue we set forth in detail and commented upon the recommendations of the Poor Law Commission as regards future action. We will only say here that Mrs. Bosanquet puts those recommendations in an exceptionally readable form, and one which should prove quite easy for the ordinary mind to master. Her book, though it contains only some two hundred and fifty pages of big print, gives not only an outline of the proposals, but the chief grounds on which those proposals are made. Before we conclude our notice we should like to quote a story told by Miss Loane, though we mean to apply it in a sense very different from hers. A little girl of four years was heard repeatedly murmuring a long word. Her father, thinking to please her, told her the meaning of it. She burst into tears. At last, with her mother's assistance, the father learned the reason of her grief. "It was my word that I put myself to sleep with, and now you've spoilt it." Has not the British public for years been exactly in the position of this little girl P For the past ten or fifteen years they have been putting themselves to sleep with certain words of which they do not really understand the meaning. The phrase used to be "humanising the Poor Law." Now they have got another which promises to be equally soporific in its effects because equally unintelligible to those who use it. The new phrase is "social reform." It is the business of all who want to prevent the nation putting itself to sleep with an unintelligible phrase to do their beat to break the charm by an explanation. The books of Mrs. Bosanquet and Miss Loane explain what .the blessed words ",social reform" as used by the party politician really mean,—namely, the pauperisation of the .nation. Let us sincerely trust that they will in the end spoil it for that great big baby, the public, and that it will no
longer be able to put itself to sleep therewith. "Social ,reform" sounds magnificent, and is made for many people all
the more attractive by the feet that it involves the sacrifice of
money. Yet,-tranalated into action, it Must infallibly mean the moral and materiel injury of the poor.
Poverty is a moral evil, and can only be reached by a moral cure. That is the long and short of the Poor Law problem. It is only another facet of the truth that the wealth of a country consists, not in its mines and minerals or other natural advantages, but in the energy and enterprise of its citizens. Energy and enterprise are, however, the prerogatives of free and independent men, and never can belong to those who are supported out of the common purse of the State. Where the State is the universal Providence, the energy and enterprise of its citizens sink to zero. Look at the latest concrete proof of this truth. Only the other day the State established publie workshops for poor women which were organised by able and enthusiastic social philanthropists, and therefore started under the best possible auspices. Yet what was the result P They cost the State roughly £15,000, and the worth of the work which was turned out in them could not be placed higher than £6,000. Thus there was a loss to the State of not less than £9,000. As a matter of fact, the loss was very much greater, because the estimate that the work turned out by the publics workshops was worth £6,000 was merely a valuer's estimate. The value of the work, tried by the test— the only teat worth having—of what people would give for it, appeared to be practically nil. Nobody would give anything for the goods in the open market. The story of the stoneyard of the St. Olave's Union, which is to be found on p. 104 of Mrs. Bosanquet's book, is equally illuminative. There the Guardians spent £17,000 in getting stone broken by paupers. When the accounts were made up the broken stone had cost 27 per ton, whereas 5s. or less is the market price for broken stone ! As was pointed out years ago by a great economist and Poor Law reformer, Nassau Senior, the results of pauper, slave, and convict labour are the same all the world over. The cost is enormous, and the value of the product derisory.
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