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Outdoor Relief in Philadelphia, 1800-1854
| Article
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10062 |
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Section : |
MODERN THOUGHT
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| Issue
Date : |
4 / 1986 |
5,437 Words |
| Author
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Priscilla Ferguson Clement
Priscilla Ferguson Clement is professor of history at
Pennsylvania State University--Delaware County Campus. She is
the author of Welfare and the Poor in the Nineteenth-Century
City: Philadelphia, 1800-1854. |
From the last half of the eighteenth century to the present, the form of public assistance most likely to come under attack and be curtailed is aid provided to the poor in their own community and home. In the past, this form of welfare was called outdoor relief, or aid to the indigent outside of the almshouse. Under this rubric, fell a plethora of relief programs, including regular cash subsidies or pensions, work relief, free medical assistance, and relief in kind (clothes, food, and wood). Although all forms of outdoor aid have been at one time or another criticized, the most unpopular has been cash aid. Principally during economic downturns, such as those in the 1760s and 1820s, it was castigated for promoting both fraud and pauperism. Its critics conveniently ignored the virtual helplessness of its recipients--women and children. By the 1840s in Philadelphia, cash aid was so discredited and so entangled in bureaucratic red tape that it was rarely granted. Instead, medical and fuel aid came increasingly into vogue. They permitted officials to be at one and the same time, frugal (these forms of aid were relatively cheap) and philanthropic (thousands could receive an occasional visit from a physician or be given a load of wood). Yet, medical and fuel aid also permitted officials a measure of social control over the poor, since these forms of aid could not be abused in the way cash relief could.
Before the 1828 poor law, indigent Philadelphians applied for all forms of outdoor relief to the guardians of the poor, who, in their respective neighborhoods, acted as stewards of the impoverished. A poor person who desired public aid could approach a guardian directly in his home. (The names and addresses of welfare officials were published periodically in newspapers and city directories.) If the guardian denied assistance, the indigent applicant could appear before a regular meeting of the board to appeal the decision. By 1805, many of the poor made their initial requests for aid to the entire board. This procedure may have seemed simpler, because outdoor guardians changed so frequently, but the time and place of their meetings did not. Some guardians probably preferred this system, too, because they found it comforting to have the advice of colleagues when determining who was worthy of aid and who was not. In any case, guardians had personal contact with the poor--they saw and spoke to the indigent in their districts and at their meetings.
Of course, officials did not give aid indiscriminately; they only assisted those who specifically requested relief and willingly answered questions about their personal worth. It worked to the advantage of the destitute individual if she or he presented a letter of recommendation
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