Friendly Societies, State Action, and the Poor-law. 177 
the expenditure, rather than levying a share of the revenue on 
property, the value of which is sooner or later affected by that of 
the land. 
The student of the Poor-laws will notice that considerable 
departures from the principle of the relief of destitution, without 
reference to any other condition of the applicant, have from 
time to time been made. Hence some confusion in the adminis- 
tration of the laws of relief might be expected to arise, inde- 
pendently of local mismanagement. It is, indeed, no wonder 
that the objects of the care of the law have suffered, and that 
they have done what they could to get hold of the moneys of 
the rate, and make the best of their opportunities. 
Poverty is no crime, nor is there" any degradation in relieving 
men of honest and industrious habits, who are reduced to want. 
Such claims occur at times, and the unfortunate paupers are 
within their rights in demanding relief. In the same way, the 
worthless fellow who has reduced his wife and children to 
beggary, is equally within his right in claiming assistance. To 
relieve both and to ask no questions is the theory of the law, but 
there is a certain latitude permitted to the Guardians of the Poor 
in dealing with such applicants. The difficulty is how to relieve 
them, while they do not at the same time encourage pauperism 
and improperly swell the charges to the rate. A firm adminis- 
tration of the law of relief on the part of the Guardians and the 
Justices at Petty Sessions will do much to repress attempts at 
rate-plunder, and lessen, if it does not remove, the disposition to 
make them. But any radical defect in the law itself should be 
amended, and one has to record with regret that the remarks * 
of the Commission relating to the mischief of the Compounding 
Acts have not met with the attention from the Legislature 
which they deserve. The convenience of the collectors of the 
rate appears to be thought of greater importance than any possible 
mischief to the poor. It is again necessary to describe the 
working of a law which is injurious to more classes than the 
cottagers of this country. For the convenience of collecting 
the poor-rates and other rates by the same process, the owner 
of these tenements is allowed facilities, by means of which he 
* " Nor has recent legislation been free from a mistake equally dangerous. 
By the Small Tenements Act, and the Poor Kate Assessment of 1869, owners 
of houses below a certain value are, in certain circumstances, rated instead of the 
occupiers. The latter therefore soon become indifferent to the amount of the rate, 
when they no longer feel its variation ; and next, regarding it not as paid by 
Ihcm, but as a fuud for their ultimate maintenance paid by the richer classes, 
they do not care to raise themselves above burthening it. . . . We think that in 
the interest of providence, as well as of economy, it is much to be regretted that 
so comparatively small a proportion of the people should be directly interested in 
the amount of local burthens." — Eeport, vol. iv. p. 190. Ciiap. vi. " On the Con- 
nection between the Poor Law and Friendly Societies." 
VOL. XVIII.— S. S. N 
