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2. Local Improvements And Centralization In Nineteenth-Century England

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Robert M. Gutchen
Robert M. Gutchen
Affiliation:
Long Island University, New York
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Extract

By the middle years of the nineteenth century, Englishmen were in full revolt against the principle of centralization. Parliament's experiments in centralized administration had almost all ended in failure. A powerful and independent Poor Law Commission had given way, in 1847, to a more timid Poor Law Board under ministerial and parliamentary control. A strong Board of Health, ruled by that uncompromising centralizer and bureaucrat, Edwin Chadwick, was sheared of a large part of its influence when, in 1854, the government decided to release Chadwick from their employment. The Times responded to this event with a jubilant leader article which announced that, ‘If there is such a thing as a political certainty among us, it is that nothing autocratic can exist in this country.... Mr Chadwick and Dr Southwood Smith, have been deposed, and we prefer to take our chance of cholera and the rest than be bullied into health’.

Type
Communications
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 4 , Issue 1 , March 1961 , pp. 85 - 96
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1961

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References

1 The Times, 1 Aug. 1854.

2 Hodder, Edwin, The Life and Work of the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, popular edn. (1887), 145–6.Google Scholar

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6 The Times, 9 Sept. 1858.

7 Hansard, T. C. [Parliamentary Debates of Great Britain], 3rd series 1858, CXLIX, 2095.Google Scholar

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9 5 & 6 Will. IV, c. 76.

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11 Parochial Assessments Act, 1836, 6 & 7 Will. IV, c. 96; County Rates Act, 1852, 15 & 16 Vic, c. 81; Union Assessments Committee Act, 1862, 25 & 26 Vic, c. 103.

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14 10 & 11 Vic, c. 34.

15 Ibid. c. 14.

16 Ibid. c. 89.

17 9 & 10 Vic, c. 106.

18 Ibid. c. 96.

19 11 & 12 Vic, c. 63; for full acounts of the background and the working of this act see Finer, Samuel E., The Life and Times of Sir Edwin Chadwick (1952), and Lewis (above, n. 3, p. 85). Other public general acts might here be mentioned: Lighting and Watching Act, 1833, 3 & 4 Will. IV, c. 90; Baths and Wash-houses Acts, 1846, 9 & 10 Vic, c. 74, and 1847, 10 & 11 Vic, c. 61.Google Scholar

20 In emergencies, however, in case of any threat of a ‘formidable’ epidemic disease, and after such an outbreak had been declared to exist by an Order in Council, the General Board did have power to enforce their regulations by prosecuting uncomplying local authorities under the Nuisances Removal and Diseases Prevention Acts, 1848, 11 & 12 Vic, c. 123, and 1849, 12 & 13 Vic, c.111.

21 17 & 18 Vic, c. 95.

22 21 & 22 Vic, c. 98.

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26 H.O. 45/O.S. 7575/17, memorandum by Henry Thring, 21 Nov. 1865.

27 18 & 19 Vic, c. 121.

28 28 & 29 Vic, c. 75.

29 Lord Robert Montague in the debate on the River Waters Protection Bill, Hansard, 1865, CLXXVII, 1330. Another aspect of the development of uniformity during the nineteenth century is the gradual shift from the random procedure of indictment and trial initiated by individuals, to the removal of grievances by the direct action of administrative officials on the basis of powers delegated to them by statute. This question merits further study.

30 Parliamentary Papers, 1872, XXVIII, xliv-xlv.Google Scholar

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34 The Times, 11 August 1866.

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43 Ibid. 266–81. The places are: Wetheringsett, Suffolk; Southover, Sussex; Brentwood, Essex; Sudbury, Suffolk; Hillmorton, Warwick; Epping, Essex; Barnard Castle, Durham.

44 Ibid. 266—72. Precisely from whom, and on what terms, the money was borrowed is not stated.

45 Ibid. 275–7.

46 [Public Record Office, Ministry of Health Papers] M.H. 13/217, draft letter of Tom Taylor to C. J. Tower, 14 April 1858.

47 Ibid. Charles Lewis Jr. to S. H. Walpole, 28 Jan. 1867, a copy of which is in Arnold Taylor's Report on Brentwood, 16 Aug. 1867. The ‘clean’ party has been described by inspector Alfred Dickens, in 1858, as consisting of ‘the most respectable inhabitants’ of Brentwood who showed ‘an intelligence superior to those who have signed Mr Tower's resolution’ against the adoption of the Public Health Act. Mr Tower, a leader of the ‘dirty’ party, was the owner of cottage property which needed considerable improvements; ibid. Report of Alfred Dickens, 2 March 1858. In 1870 Arnold Taylor reported that the ‘majority of the ratepayers, especially those of the smaller class, are opposed to all proper sanitary improvements...’; ibid. Report of Arnold Taylor, 18 Aug. 1870.

48 Ibid. Arnold Taylor's Report on Brentwood, 16 Aug. 1867.

49 30 & 31 Vic, c. 113, sec 2.

50 32 & 33 Vic, c. 100.

51 M.H. 13/217, Minute by Arnold Taylor, Dec. 1870; Russ and Minns to Tom Taylor, 21 Jan. 1871.

52 Ibid. W. W. Willink to Tom Taylor, 8 April 1871.

53 Ibid. Russ and Minns to Tom Taylor, 14 Aug. 1871.

54 McDonagh, Oliver, ‘The Nineteenth-century Revolution in Government: An Appraisal’, Hist. J. I, 1 (1958), 52–67CrossRefGoogle Scholar. McDonagh points out that Bentham's influence on administration can only be traced through the activities of his immediate disciples. But see Parris, Henry, ‘The Nineteenth-century Revolution in Government. A Reappraisal Reappraised’, Hist. J. III, 1 (1960), 17–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

55 Cannan, 132ff.

56 Parliamentary Papers, 1871, XXXV, ‘Second Report of the Royal Sanitary Commission: Minutes of Evidence’, question 9758.Google Scholar

57 Parliamentary Papers, 1872, XXVIII, xlviii-xlix. In the consolidating Public Health Act of 1875, the principles of section 49 were re-enacted, but the Local Government Board was given the choice of appointing a person, or of enforcing its orders by mandamus; 38 & 39 Vic, c. 55, secs. 299–302.Google Scholar

58 Brebner, John Bartlett, ‘Laissez faire and State Intervention in Nineteenth Century Britain’, .J. Econ. Hist.: Suppl. VIII (1948), 59–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

59 Anon, ., ‘Centralisation’, Edinburgh Rev. CXV (April 1862), 347–8.Google Scholar

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61 Mill, John Stuart, Representative Government, Everyman's Library (1931), 357–8Google Scholar. See also Brodrick, George C., ‘Local Government in England’, Cobden Club Essays: Local Government and Taxation (1875), 83. Brodrick asserted that the assumption of local administration by the central government ‘is admissible only where the whole nation is interested in the due performance of the local duty’.Google Scholar