Poor Law

Children.

Poor relief officials were originally responsible for all public care given to dependent children, but this function was taken away from them in all but a few States, chiefly during the years following 1900. The inefficiency of almshouse care and the inadequate care given by poor law officials to children, resulted in the establishment of new agencies for the care of dependent children, such as county boards of child welfare, boards of chil dren's guardians, county children's courts, county children's homes, or a State institution. In all except a few States, the poor relief officials came to have practically no responsibility for chil dren cared for away from their families.

Special Types of Assistance.

The inadequacies of the poor relief system also gave rise to statutory provision for special types of assistance, now commonly called categorical assistance, usually administered by other than poor law officials. These types in cluded assistance to veterans, widows' pensions or mother's aid, and assistance to the blind and the aged. Relief to war veterans was the earliest type of special assistance. The first State statute providing mother's aid, now known as aid to dependent children, was passed in 1911. Major development in the field of assistance to the blind began in 1910. A law providing for old age assistance was passed in 1914, but was declared unconstitutional; the next such statute was enacted in 1923. By 1930, there had been sub stantial growth in all of the special types of assistance.

Poor Law Administration.

Faulty administration was un doubtedly the chief weakness of the poor relief system in every State. In only a few States was there any evidence of public in terest in poor law reform. Instead, the tendency had been to transfer poor relief functions to agencies caring for special groups of dependents. Some changes made in State laws were in the direc tion of establishing the county as the unit of administration, as for example, the new poor law passed in Pennsylvania in 1925 and the public welfare law passed in New York State in 1929. The New York public welfare law, replacing a statute which had not been significantly changed for a hundred years, embodied the modern philosophy which was to mark later legislation in the relief field.

Great changes in the relief structure of the United States oc curred in the decade following 193o. The depression beginning in 1929, and the ensuing unemployment, brought on a volume of relief need with which existing poor law systems were utterly unable to cope. Not only was this magnitude of need entirely

beyond the possibility of local units of Government to finance, the nature of the problem itself had significantly changed. Previously the group aided by poor officials comprised mainly the unem ployable; the new group, on the other hand, was constituted principally of people out of work who were able and wanted to work. New administrative systems and procedures had to be established, and the deterrent philosophy underlying the poor law had to give way to a more constructive method of public assistance. This is strikingly apparent in the relief field, but other forms of care such as almshouse care and care of children away from their own homes have continued with relatively little change during this period.

Emergency Unemployment Relief and Federal Partici pation in Relief.—Beginning in 1931, States enacted emergency unemployment relief laws usually with the purpose of providing State funds for relief. In general, these laws supplemented and broadened poor laws, or temporarily superseded them. In some States, the emergency unemployment relief program was separate from the established outdoor relief system; in other States, the two programs were integrated from the outset. By 1933, legisla tion had been enacted in nearly three-quarters of the States which provided some system for emergency unemployment relief. In many States the systems included a program of work relief where by needy persons were provided for by wages earned on relief projects.

A major step in the public welfare history of the country was taken with the entrance of the Federal Government as a partici pant in the relief problem. This occurred first in 1932, when funds were loaned to States and local governmental units for the relief of the unemployed. It continued, more significantly and on a wider scale, with the establishment of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration in 1933, authorized to make outright grants to States for relief purposes. Work programs financed by Federal, State, and local funds came to play a large part in the general relief program, and it was roughly calculated that about 50% of persons in need were cared for through work relief. Relief stand ards were quite generally raised through financial participation of the Federal Government and some degree of Federal supervision or control.