OFFICIAL ENFORCEMENT OF TILE DISTINCTION BETWEEN VAGRANCY AND DESTITUTION.

[Copy of a Minute of the Poor-law Board.] The Board have received representations from every part of England and Wales respecting the continual and rapid increase of vagrancy. After making due al- lowance for the influence of circumstances that have created temporary distress, it is impossible to come to any other conclusion than that the system which has of late years been adopted in the relief of casual poor has been the principal cause of the extension of vagrancy. It is not difficult to see that a regular provision of food and lodging at the public expense, for every person who chooses to demand them at any place, must diminish the risks and privations of a vagrant life, and tempts resort to it on the part of many who would otherwise have been deterred from adopting it. Experience has shown that the roughness of the lodging and coarse- ness of the fare provided, while they inflict undesirable hardship on the really meritorious and destitute wayfarer, do not counterbalance the inducements which the certainty of sustenance and shelter holds out to the dishonest vagrant. The task of work prescribed, and found useful where it had been properly applied, hart, from its being only occasionally enforced, exercised no general influence as a test; and the laws against vagrancy and disorderly conduct have failed to produce the effect of repression. The Board are unable to suggest any additional test or punish- ment that shall prevent the abuse of relief inaiscriminately extended to ever, stranger who may represent himself as destitute. A sound and vigilant discri- mination in respect of the objects of relief, and the steady refusal of aid to all who are not ascertained to be in a state of destitution, are obviously the most effectual remedies against the continued increase of vagrancy and mendicancy. The power of exercising this discrimination is vested by law in the Boards of Guardians and their Officers. On them rests the responsibility of exercising it effectually. The Boards of Guardians, as they represent those who suffer from the evil, must seek the remedy principally in their own vigilance and energy. They can expect little help from Parliament, when no material increase of their priment power appears to be requisite; nor can they be supplied by this Board with any rules of action that can relieve them from the obligation, or prescribe to them the precise mode of exercising that discretion which is and mast be left entirely to the local authorities in each case. The Guardians must therefore encounter the responsibilities of their position, and intrust the business of ad- ministering relief to Officers who shall possess sufficient discrimination to distin- guish those whose urgent destitution gives them a claim to relief from those who throw themselves habitually on public charity because it is extended to all who choose to ask it. It is equally the duty of those Officers to relieve the destitute

and to repel the impostor; and it would appear to require no more than ordinary intelligence and care to avoid erring seriously in either direction. The Poor-law Board cannot by general rules supply the place of that discrimination which will in every individual case be required from those who have to administer relief.

But they think that, without prescribing any strict rules to be followed in every case, they can make their general experience serviceable by offering some sugges- tions as to the principles on which relief should be administered to the wandering poor. There is obviously a wide distinction between those who are temporarily and 'unavoidably in distress, and the habitual tramp or vagrant who simulates desti- tution; and one of the worst results of the present undiscriminating treatment of

all who are commonly denominated "casuals," is, that some of the most fitting objects of public charity are subjected to the discomforts that were intended to

repel the worthless. Among all the unfortunate there are none whose destitution is more unquestionable, and whose hard lot presents stronger claims to sympa- thy, than the widow and orphan, deprived, at a distance from home, of their natural supporter, and the artisan or labourer who is seeking the employment of which accidental circumstances have suddenly deprived him. Yet, under the present system, such persons as these either share the discomforts, the filth, the turbulence, and the demoralizing fellowship of the thief, the mendicant, and the prostitute, who crowd the vagrant wards of the workhouses, or are compelled to brave the inclemency of the weather and the pains of hunger, by reason of their unconquerable aversion to such companionship. It would not appear to be difficult to establish a system by which this deserving class of persons might be furnished with such evidence of their character and cir- cumstances as might afford a fair presumption of the truth of their plea of des- titution. A wayfarer of this class might, at the place where the cause of destitu- tion occurs, be enabled, by those who are cognizant of it, to obtain a certificate from some proper authority, setting forth his name, the cause of destitution, and the object and destination of his journey. On his presenting this certificate at any

workhouse, the Master, on finding that it was satisfactory—that the applicant was on the road to his destination, and that he was without money or other

means—might at once admit him, and supply him with the usual accommoda- tion of the inmates. In this way the honest but destitute wayfarer, possessed of such credentials, would obtain the advantage of being admitted into the work- louse without reference to the Relieving Officer, and abio of receiving better ac- commodation than that at present afforded to him in the vagrant ward. Those certificates would doubtless be open to abuse from forgery and per- sonation. But as they would be granted only for a particular route, and a ne-

cessarily limited period, the facilities for such abuse would be less than those which existed under a somewhat similar system in former times; and, with the agency of the present improved class of Poor-law Officers, additional precautions might readily be devised. At any rate, this mode, however defective, would sup- ply far better securities against imposture than the present system of indiscrinn nate relief.

With such means of distinguishing the class of wayfarers, who would be fur- nished with presumptive evidence of the truth of their plea of destitution, the Board are of opinion that a different course should be pursued with the other kinds of va- grants. It would be advisable that the Masters of Workhouses should be directed by the Guardians to refuse admission to persons not having such certificate, with- out an order from the Relieving Officer or Overseer. Of course, an exception must also be made in the case of persons labouring under sickness, or extreme feeble.. ness from want of food. In such cases, where it might appear that any delay

would be attended with serious consequences to life or health, the necessary relief when sought at the workhouse should be at once afforded therein. But with these exceptions, all applicants should be referred to the Relieving Officer; who should inquire and decide as to the necessity of relief as well in the instance of vagrants as of other poor, and grant or refuse it according to the necessity of each case.

With respect the applicants that will thus come before him, the Relieving Officer will have to exercise his judgment as to the truth of their assertions of

Zestitution, and to ascertain, by searching them whether they possess any means of supplying their own necessities. He will not be likely to err in judging from their appearance whether they are suffering from want of food. He will take

care that women and children, the old and infirm, and those who, without abso-

lutely serious disease present an enfeebled or sickly appearance, are supplied with -necessary food and shelter. As a general rule, he would be right in refusing relief to able-bodied and healthy men; though in inclement weather he might afford 'them shelter' if really destitute of the means of procuring it for themselves. His nudes would necessarily make him acquainted with the persons of the habitual vagrants; and to these it would be his duty to refuse relief except in case of evi- dent and urgent necessity.

A plan which has been adopted with success in some towns in different parts of England, is that of employing a trustworthy officer of the Local Police as As- sistant Relieving Officer for Vagrants. As the habitual vagrant has generally

rendered himself amenable to the law by criminal acts, he dreads being con- fronted with the Police; and the effect of this arrangement, where it has been

adopted, is said to have produced the speedy disappearance of the greater pro- portion of the usual applicants. In all cases it has greatly diminished the num- ber of vagrants applying for relief; and the presence of an authority capable of enforcing order has checked their usual insolence and turbulence. If Parliament should sanction the provisions contained in a bill now before it, whereby the relief of vagrancy is made a Union charge, one of the great practical difficulties that

have stood in the way of a general adoption of such an arrangement would be removed. Wherever there exists an efficient County or Borough Police, the Board would be glad to sanction such an arrangement, as well as to authorize the reception of vagrants in a building altogether apart from the workhouse.

Such are the general suggestions which the Board have to offer for the considera- tion of the Guardians; and by the adoption of which they hope that the evil now so loudly complained of may be greatly mitigated. It is very desirable that, on a subject which may be said to have rather a general than a local bearing, there should be a certain uniformity of action throughout England. At the same time, the Board will be happy to cooperate in any sound and practicable plan for attain- ing the same object, which may be deemed by those who have to administer the law to be best suited to their particular localities. The Board cannot close this minute without again impressing on Boards of Guardians the absolute necessity of discriminating, by inquiry and investigation,

between real and simulated destitution. This is no principle of partial applica- bility or incomplete obligation. It is the undoubted principle of the law which equally requires the grant of relief to the destitute and prohibits the misapplication Cl' the public fund to those who are not destitute. It was found necessary by the late Poor-law Commissioners at one time to re-

mind the various Unions and their officers of the responsibility which would be incurred by refusing relief where it was required. The present state of things renders it necessary that this Board should now impress on them the grievous mischiefs that mast arise, and the responsibilities that may be incurred, by a too ready distribution of relief to tramps and vagrants not entitled to it. Boards of Guardians and their Officers may in their attempts to restore a more wise and just system be subjected to some obloquy from prejudices, that confound poverty with profligacy. They will, however, be supported by the consciousness of dis- charging their duty to those whose funds they have to administer, as well as to the deserving poor, and of resisting the extension of a most pernicious and for- midable abuse. They may confidently reckon on the support of a public opinion which the present state of things has aroused and enlightened; and those who are responsible to the Poor-law' Board may feel assured that, while no instance of neglect or harshness to the poor will be tolerated, they may look to the Board for a candid construction of their acts and motives, and for a hearty and steadfast ,support of those who shall exert themselves to guard from the grasp of imposture that fund which should be sacred to the necessities of the poor.

' CHARLE.8 BULL513- President.

Poor-law Board, Somerset House, 4th August 180.