after, (though a fubfequent nomination will be valid ) by two juftices dwelling near the parish. They must be fubstantial householders, and fo expreffed to be in the appointment of the juftices " (23).

THEIR office and duty, according to the fame ftatute, are principally thefe: firft, to raife competent fums for the neceflary relief of the poor, impotent, old, blind, and fuch other, being poor and not able to work: and fecondly, to provide work for fuch as are able, and cannot otherwife get employment: but this latter part of their duty, which, according to the wise regulations of that falutary ftatute, fhould go hand in hand with the other, is now moft fhamefully neglected, However, for thefe joint purpofes, they are impowered to 361 make and levy rates upon the feveral inhabitants of the parish, by the fame act of parliament; which has been farther explained and enforced by feveral fubfequent flatutes.

THE two great objects of this ftatute feem to have been, 1. To relieve the impotent poor, and them only. 2. To find employment for fuch as are able to work; and this principally by providing ftocks of raw materials to be worked up at their feparate homes, instead of accumulating all the poor in one common work-houfe; a practice which puts the fober and diligent upon a level (in point of their earnings) with 2 Lord Raym. 1394.

m Stra. 1123.

(23) It is declared by the ftatute, that the church-wardens of every parish shall be overfeers of the poor; befides these the juftices may appoint two, three, or four, but not more, of the inhabitants overfeers for each parish. (1 Burr. 446.) But if a parish is divided into townships, and is fo large, that fome townfhips cannot reap the benefit intended by the 43 of Elizabeth, in that cafe, feparate overfeers may be appointed for fuch townships, under the 13 & 14 Car. II. c. 12. Wherever there is a conftable, there is a township. T. R. 374.

A won an may be appointed an overfeer of the ftantial householder. 2T.R. 395.

poor, if a fub

thofe

those who are diffolute and idle, depreffes the laudable emulation of domeftic industry and neatnefs, and destroys all endearing family connexions, the only felicity of the indigent. Whereas, if none were relieved but thofe who are incapable to get their livings, and that in proportion to their incapacity; if no children were removed from their parents, but fuch as are brought up in rags and idleness; and if every poor man and his family were regularly furnifhed with cm ́ployment, and allowed the whole profits of their labour;-a spirit of bufy cheerfulness would foon diffafe itself through every cottage; work would become eafy and habitual, when abfolutely neceffary for daily fubfiftence; and the peafant would go through his talk without a murmur, if affured that he and his children (when incapable of work through infancy, age, or infirmity) would then, and then only, be entitled to fupport from his opulent neighbours.

THIS appears to have been the plan of the ftatute of queen Elizabeth; in which the only defect was confining the management of the poor to fmall, parochial, districts; which are frequently incapable of furnishing proper work, or providing an able director. However, the laborious poor were then at liberty to feck employment wherever it was to be had: none being cbliged to refide in the places of their fettlement, but fuch as were unable or unwilling to work; and those places of fettlement being only fuch where they were born, or had made their abode, originally for three years, [362] and afterwards (in the cafe of vagabonds) for one year only P.

AFTER the reftoration a very different plan was adopted, which has rendered the employment of the poor more diffi cult, by authorizing the subdivision of parishes; has greatly increased their number, by confining them all to their refpective districts; has given birth to the intricacy of our poorlaws, by multiplying and rendering more eafy the methods of gaining fettlements; and, in confequence, has created an infinity of expenfive law-fuits between contending neighbour

Stat. 19 Hen. VII. c. 12. 1 Edw. WI. c. 3. 3 Edw. VI. c. 16. 14 Eliz.

C. S.

P Stat. 39 Eliz. c. 4.
Hh 4

hoods,

Book I. hoods, concerning thofe fettlements and removals. By the ftatute 13 & 14 Car. II. c. 12. a legal fettlement was declared to be gained by birth; or by inhabitancy, apprenticeship, or fervice, for forty days: within which period all intruders were made removable from any parish by two juftices of the peace, unless they settled in a tenement of the annual value of 101. The frauds, naturally consequent upon this provifion, which gave a fettlement by fo fhort a refidence, produced the statute 1 Jac. II. c. 17. which directed notice in writing to be delivered to the parish officers, before a settlement could be gained by fuch refidence. Subfequent provisions allowed other circumftances of notoriety to be equivalent to fuch notice given; and thofe circumstances have from time to time been altered, enlarged, or restrained, whenever the experience of new inconveniencies, arifing daily from new regulations, fuggefted the neceffity of a remedy. And the doctrine of certificates was invented, by way of counterpoise, to restrain a man and his family from acquiring a new fettlement by any length of refidence, whatever, unless in two particular excepted cafes; which makes parishes very cautious of giving such certificates, and of courfe confines the poor at home, where frequently no adequate employment can be had (24).

(24) By 13 & 14 Car. II. c. 12. all perfons who are likely to become chargeable, unless they rent a tenement of the yearly value of 10. may be removed to the places where they are legally fettled. This ftatute was certainly a great infringement of magna charta and the liberty of the subject; as nothing can be more cruel or impolitic, than to prevent a perfon from refiding in that fituation where, by his industry and occupation, he can beft procure a competent provifion for himself and his family. To alleviate, in fome degree, the hardship and inconvenience introduced by that ftatute, the legislature has provided by the 8 & 9 W. III, c. 30. that if the major part of the overfeers of any parish or township will grant a certificate under their hands and feals, attested by two witneffes, and allowed and subscribed by two justices, acknowledging a person and his family therein specified, to have a legal fettlement in their parish or township, fuch perfon may afterwards go into any parish; and having delivered this certificate to the parish

officers,

THE law of fettlements may be therefore now reduced to

the following general heads; or, a settlement in a parish may

be acquired, 1. By birth; for, wherever a child is first known [ 363 ] to be, that is always prima facie the place of fettlement, until fome other can be fhewn. This is also generally the place of fettlement of a baftard child'; for a baftard having in the eye of the law no father, cannot be referred to his fettlement, as other children may'. But, in legitimate children, though the place of birth be prima facie the fettlement, yet it is not conclufively fo; for there are, 2. Settlements by parentage, being the fettlement of one's father or mother: all legitimate children being really fettled in the parish where their parents are fettled, until they get a new fettlement for them

officers, neither he nor his family are removable from thence till they are actually chargeable. But as the object of the certificate was to prevent him from bringing any incumbrance upon the parifh where he is thus permitted to refide, by the 9 & 10 W. III. c. 11. he is restrained from gaining a fettlement where he lives under the protection of the certificate by any means whatever, except by renting a tenement of the yearly value of 10l. and by a refidence in the parifh for forty days, or by executing an annual office. But befides these two cafes mentioned in the act, it has been held, that a certificate perfon may gain a settlement by refiding upon (or having in the parish where he refides) any eftate whatever of his own, provided, if it has been actually purchased by him, he has bona fide paid 30l. for it. Str. 163. 1193. Burr. S. C. 220. A certificate is conclufive upon the parish granting it, with respect to the parish to which it is granted or first delivered; but it is not fo with regard to other parishes; for though it will be prima facie evidence against the parish granting it, yet it may be repelled by other evidence; and they may be permitted to fhew, that they gave it under a mistake, and in their own wrong. 4 T. R. 251.

A certificate extends to children born after it is granted, but not to the grandchildren of the pater-familias. 4 T. R. 797.

BOOK I. felves (25). A new fettlement may be acquired feveral ways; as, 3. By marriage. For a woman, marrying a man that is settled in another parish, changes her own fettlement: the law not permitting the feparation of husband and wife 1. But if the man has no fettlement, her's is fufpended during his life, if he remains in England and is able to maintain her; but in his abfence, or after his death, or during (perhaps) his inability, the may be removed to her old fettle-ment" (26). The other methods of acquiring fettlements in any parish are all reducible to this one, of forty days reficience therein: but this forty days refidence (which is construed to be lodging or lying there) must not be by fraud, or stealth, or in any clandeftine manner; but made notorious, by one or u Foley. 249. 251, 252. Bur. Sett. C. 370

Salk. 528. 2 Lord Raym, 1473t Stra. 544.

(25) If the parents acquire a new fettlement, the children alfo follow, and belong to the last fettlement of the father, or after the death of the father, to the laft fettlement of the mother, till they are emancipated or become independent of their father's cr mother's family, and in that case they have that fettlement which their parent had at the time of emancipation.

This is a very indefinite word, and it is no wonder that several cafes have arifen upon the interpretation of it. Lord Kenyon feems to have given as full and as juft an explication of it, as it will admit, in obferving, that "the cafes of emancipation have "always been decided on the circumftances either of the fon's being twenty-one, or married, or having contracted a relation, "which was inconfiftent with the idea of his being in a fubordinate fituation in his father's family." 3 T. R. 356.

(26) In the absence or after the death of the husband, in that cafe the wife and her children may be removed to her maiden fettlement; but it feems fully determined that they cannot be fepa rated or removed from the husband. (Bur. S. C. 813. 1 Stra. 544.) The confequence is, that the whole family muft be fupported as cafual poor in the parish where they may happen to want relief. In the removal of a wife or a widow, it is fufficient in the firit inftance to prove her maiden fettlement. Cald. 39. 236.

other