An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of

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The Wealth of Nations

ments obstructs even that of common labour. It may be worth while

to give some account of the rise, progress, and present state of this

disorder, the greatest, perhaps, of any in the police of England.

When, by the destruction of monasteries, the poor had been

deprived of the charity of those religious houses, after some other

ineffectual attempts for their relief, it was enacted, by the 43d of

Elizabeth, c. 2. that every parish should be bound to provide for

its own poor, and that overseers of the poor should be annually

appointed, who, with the church-wardens, should raise, by a par-

ish rate, competent sums for this purpose.

By this statute, the necessity of providing for their own poor

was indispensably imposed upon every parish. Who were to be

considered as the poor of each parish became, therefore, a ques-

tion of some importance. This question, after some variation, was

at last determined by the 13th and 14th of Charles II. when it was

enacted, that forty days undisturbed residence should gain any

person a settlement in any parish; but that within that time it

should be lawful for two justices of the peace, upon complaint

made by the church-wardens or overseers of the poor, to remove

any new inhabitant to the parish where he was last legally settled;

unless he either rented a tenement of ten pounds a-year, or could

give such security for the discharge of the parish where he was

then living, as those justices should judge sufficient.

Some frauds, it is said, were committed in consequence of this

statute; parish officers sometime’s bribing their own poor to go

clandestinely to another parish, and, by keeping themselves con-

cealed for forty days, to gain a settlement there, to the discharge of

that to which they properly belonged. It was enacted, therefore,

by the 1st of James II. that the forty days undisturbed residence of

any person necessary to gain a settlement, should be accounted

only from the time of his delivering notice, in writing, of the place

of his abode and the number of his family, to one of the church-

wardens or overseers of the parish where he came to dwell.

But parish officers, it seems, were not always more honest with

regard to their own than they had been with regard to other par-

ishes, and sometimes connived at such intrusions, receiving the

notice, and taking no proper steps in consequence of it. As every

person in a parish, therefore, was supposed to have an interest to

prevent as much as possible their being burdened by such intrud-

ers, it was further enacted by the 3rd of William III. that the forty

days residence should be accounted only from the publication of

such notice in writing on Sunday in the church, immediately after

divine service.

“After all,” says Doctor Burn, “this kind of settlement, by con-

tinuing forty days after publication of notice in writing, is very

seldom obtained; and the design of the acts is not so much for

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Adam Smith

gaining of settlements, as for the avoiding of them by persons

coming into a parish clandestinely, for the giving of notice is only

putting a force upon the parish to remove. But if a person’s situa-

tion is such, that it is doubtful whether he is actually removable or

not, he shall, by giving of notice, compel the parish either to allow

him a settlement uncontested, by suffering him to continue forty

days, or by removing him to try the right.”

This statute, therefore, rendered it almost impracticable for a

poor man to gain a new settlement in the old way, by forty days

inhabitancy. But that it might not appear to preclude altogether

the common people of one’ parish from ever establishing them-

selves with security in another, it appointed four other ways by

which a settlement might be gained without any notice delivered

or published. The first was, by being taxed to parish rates and

paying them; the second, by being elected into an annual parish

office, and serving in it a year; the third, by serving an apprentice-

ship in the parish; the fourth, by being hired into service there for

a year, and continuing in the same service during the whole of it.

Nobody can gain a settlement by either of the two first ways, but

by the public deed of the whole parish, who are too well aware of

the consequences to adopt any new-comer, who has nothing but

his labour to support him, either by taxing him to parish rates, or

by electing him into a parish office.

No married man can well gain any settlement in either of the

two last ways. An apprentice is scarce ever married; and it is

expressly enacted, that no married servant shall gain any settle-

ment by being hired for a year. The principal effect of introduc-

ing settlement by service, has been to put out in a great measure

the old fashion of hiring for a year; which before had been so

customary in England, that even at this day, if no particular term

is agreed upon, the law intends that every servant is hired for a

year. But masters are not always willing to give their servants a

settlement by hiring them in this manner; and servants are not

always willing to be so hired, because, as every last settlement

discharges all the foregoing, they might thereby lose their origi-

nal settlement in the places of their nativity, the habitation of

their parents and relations.

No independent workman, it is evident, whether labourer or

artificer, is likely to gain any new settlement, either by apprentice-

ship or by service. When such a person, therefore, carried his in-

dustry to a new parish, he was liable to be removed, how healthy

and industrious soever, at the caprice of any churchwarden or over-

seer, unless he either rented a tenement of ten pounds a-year, a

thing impossible for one who has nothing but his labour to live

by, or could give such security for the discharge of the parish as

two justices of the peace should judge sufficient.

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