80 
Post-Office Insurance for Labourers. 
" Eesults of this unnatural law are plainly and sadly traceable in the 
brutality of husbands towards their wives and families, in the relaxation of 
family ties, in the unfilial and undutiful conduct of the son who will leave 
his widowed mother to end her days in the workhouse, and will refuse, unless 
compelled by law, to contribute a farthing towards her maintenance. It is 
true that the Act makes a distinction between able-bodied married people, and 
married people who are infirm from age or other cause. With respect to the 
former, if there is good reason why a man crushed by adversity, and not by 
vice, should desire the consolation of his wife, instead of being compelled to 
separate at the time when mutual support is most needed ; if it is true that 
the anguish of being parted is but keener in the female mind — then let us not 
continue, for the sake of a neat system of regulating the inmates of the Union 
house, to augment the distress of the poor by such forced separation." With 
regard to the permission for infiiin married people to live together, we believe 
that it is seldom, if ever, carried into practice. How can we hope for moral 
and social advancement among the poor so long as our regulations are opposed 
to those which God has ordained for the good of mankind ? The mischief 
extends far beyond its immediate victims : it affects the mass of labourers, by 
degrading in their eyes the bond of matrimony, and impairing the influences 
of family affection. And will it be seriously maintained th it the labouring 
classes are the only sufferers V " 
III. As to the third point, it is only necessary that the Board 
should carefully set the law in motion, and in this respect the 
rule adopted by the Guardians of the Union of Upton-on-Severn 
should, I think, be generally used. It was stated at the recent 
Conference of Chairmen and Vice-Chairmen of Guardians held 
in London, Earl of Lichfield in the chair, by Sir Henry Lambert, 
a member of the Upton Board, that " they had done all they could 
in the way of investigation, and he knew pretty well the condition 
of nearly every one in the Union. Where applicants had relatives 
or friends able to support them, they were, if necessary, brought 
before the magistrates, and whether the application succeeded or 
failed it had a beneficial effect, seeing that at least it compelled those 
who toere legally liable to support relatives to explain publicly in 
court why they did not do so." I was sorry to hear from the same 
speaker that in other important respects the Poor Law was so 
badly administered in that Union. It is, however, no matter of 
surprise when the official members of that Board appear with two 
or three exceptions, to take no part in the management ! " In the 
report recently made public of the " Poor Law system of Elber- 
feld," the Prussian law, " which imposes the obligation of 
supporting relatives in a much wider sense than docs our statute 
of Elizabeth," is stated to be rigidly enforced.* " Nowhere is 
the legal obligation of supporting relations, especially the duty 
of cliildren to contribute to the support of parents, more rigidly 
enforced than in Elberfeld. ... A person who is by law liable 
to contribute to the support of a relation, and, being able, 
* Report to the Right Hou, J. Stansfehl, by A. Doyle, Esq., Poor Law Inspector. 
