![]() and if all the collateral expenses were included, he did not doubt that they would be little short of 100,000 l. but by a return made to the House, it would appear that in 1820, that expense was increased to 58,605 l. Colquhoun, it appeared that the expense incurred for passing vagrants in the year 1806 was 15,000 l. In the very able work on Indigence, published by that enlightened and accurate magistrate, the late Mr. ![]() To show how this branch had increased, he would mention only one fact. Among other items by which the latter had been considerably increased, was that of the passing and maintaining of vagrants. It was notorious that the county rates had of late years increased to a very great extent in every part of the kingdom, and it was equally notorious that the great burthen of them fell upon the already distressed agriculturists for, by several decisions in the courts of law, it seemed now settled, that money lent on interest on mortgage, or vested in the funds, was not liable to poor or county rates. The subject, he observed, was of very considerable importance, whether considered in a moral or pecuniary point of view. As the first full-length study of vagrancy law and practice in the eighteenth century, this book will constitute an essential item in any collection of books on the old poor law.Rose pursuant to the notice which he had given respecting the Vagrant Laws. This analysis reveals the principal causes of the vagrancy problems and the misfit between the law and social reality, with particular emphasis on the impact of wars and immigration from Ireland and Scotland. By detailed reference to cases of individual vagrants, the book also shows what sorts of people were dealt with under vagrancy law, what happened to them, and how and why the justices discriminated between the unfortunate and the criminal elements among them. Using the Quarter Sessions records of six counties: Westmorland, Cambridgeshire, Dorset, Hampshire, Lancashire and Middlesex, the book is able to give the first account of vagrancy law in provincial England, rather than focusing on metropolitan areas, thus also demonstrating the tensions between parishes, justices and counties over the use of law and its financial impact. ![]() It explores how vagrancy law was used and to what effect, how it was extended and adapted to plug gaps in both poor law provision and in dealing with petty crime not covered by statute law, and how law and practice intersected with social reality. Focusing on the 1744 Vagrant Act, the study traces how and why the law evolved, from 1700 when vagrancy was first made a county charge, and what changes followed in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It shows how settlement law and poor law provision failed to address both the changing demographic situation and the impact of wars, leaving significant numbers without support. Drawing on extensive archival research and in-depth study of both statute law and local administrative records, this book examines the complexities of vagrancy law and the realities of its practice during the long eighteenth century. In eighteenth-century England, the law surrounding vagrancy was complicated, and practice stood in complex relationship to law. ![]()
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