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Paternalism, the Magistracy and Poor Relief in England, 1795–1834

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Peter Dunkley
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When men in the early nineteenth century appealed to the landed proprietors of England to accept their “paternal responsibilities”, they gave voice to the conviction that gentry behavior had special relevance for the question of social discipline. Conservatives, especially, adhered to the view that subordination and the hierarchy of ranks resting upon it constituted the fountainhead of social cohesion. But at the same time, reliance on this concept of social organization involved the governors in various commitments to their subordinates, for ultimately the cohesiveness of the social order seemed dependent upon the operation of reciprocal obligations. The place of these imperatives in rural relationships arose from, and contributed to, a tradition that saw the subsistence and well-being of the entire community to be dependent upon the social responsibilities of and the connections between the different degrees of interest within the agricultural economy. A characteristic anxiety of the conservative of the period was that the economic individualism of a rising urban and industrial society promised to undermine the social accountability of each component of the social order; this presaged the disintegration of society because the “chain of connexion” between the rich and the poor would thereby be broken. The implication was that the intrusion of self-interest, economic or otherwise, threatened a structure of interdependency and mutual respect and concern between ranks. It appeared, then, that the most serious danger to society would certainly come at that point when the landowners of England — the rulers of what still seemed an essentially rural world — abandoned their paternalist traditions and opted for indolence, indifference, or the allures of commercial farming.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 24 , Issue 3 , December 1979 , pp. 371 - 397
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1979

References

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37 Report on Labourers' Wages, p. 35.

38 Report on Abie-Bodied Persons, p. 5. Since the justices acted most often in petty sessions, such limitations were not usually relevant in any event.

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67 Nine asserted that there would be no change. Many more parishes than this actually answered the question, but their comments are irrelevant to the matter under consideration here.

68 Brundage, “The English Poor Law of 1834”, loc. cit., p. 407; id., “A Reply”, loc. cit., p. 348.

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80 Report on Labourers' Wages, p. 40.

81 For all of above, First Annual Report, pp. 4–6.

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83 See, e.g., Luton Union: William Rudd, Overseer, to Poor Law Commissioners, n.d. [c. 24 September 1834], Ministry of Health Papers 12/96, Public Record Office; Biggleswade Union: F. Smith, Assistant Overseer, to id., 4 March 1835, MH 12/55; Amphill Union: George Smith to id., 25 September 1834, MH 12/1.

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86 Amphill Union: Amphill Petty Sessions (signed by 5 JPs) to the Commissioners, 11 September 1834, MH 12/1. See also Woburn Union: John Green to id., 30 September 1834, MH 12/126; Amphill Union: Rev. James Beard, JP, to id., 2 May 1835, MH 12/1.

87 Woburn Union: Russell to Lewis, 21 November 1834.

88 Bedford Union: Lord Tavistock to Lord John Russell, 10 November 1834, MH 12/21. As we have seen, the government had not in fact prematurely introduced the act into Bedfordshire; the overseers had implemented a harsher policy on their own initiative.

89 Bedford Union: Lord John Russell to Edwin Chadwick, 12 November 1834, MH 12/21.

90 D. G. Adey to the Commissioners, 14 November 1834, MH 32/5.

91 Report on Labourers' Wages, p. 57.

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97 Ibid., pp. lOOd, 178d, 253d, 413d, 477d, 586d.

98 See ibid., pp. 165d, 219d. Charles Savill Onley, JP, of Stisted Hall, Essex, claimed that “this opinion is corroborated by those of many respectable Magistrates with whom I have conversed on the subject”. Ibid., p. 187d.

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105 See Bedford Union; Livins to the Commissioners, 24 October 1834, for a description of prompt magisterial action against local overseers when more than 200 laborers appealed to the bench en masse.

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