kmen powerless to protect themselves against the oppression of
the capitalist employer. Parliament was more than once pressed to meet
the high price of bread and the distress of the agricultural poor by
fixing a minimum for wages. Pitt, a disciple of Adam Smith, would not
consent to such a measure, and his opposition was fatal to it. He was
deeply sensible of the distress of the poor, and, in 1795, brought in a
bill for the amendment of the poor law. It contained some startling
provisions of a socialistic character, was adversely criticised by
Bentham and others, and was quietly dropped.

In 1760 the law of 1723, empowering overseers of the poor to refuse
relief to those who would not enter the workhouse, was still in force.
It seems to have been administered strictly, and it kept down the rates.
As society became more humane, it revolted against so harsh a method of
dealing with distress. A permissive act of 1783, called after its
promoter, Gilbert's act, contained along with some wholesome provisions
others that were foolish and harmful; it enabled parishes to form unions
and adopt a system under which able-bodied men were not allowed to enter
the workhouse; they were to work in the district and have their wages
supplemented from the rates. The administration of the act was committed
to the magistrates and guardians in place of the overseers. A
considerable relaxation of the law of settlement in 1795 was just and
beneficial. In the same year the pernicious principle of supplementing
wages from the rates was carried to its full extent. By that time the
decay of domestic spinning and the rise in the price of food were
causing much distress in Berkshire. At a meeting of justices at
Speenhamland in that county it was resolved to grant allowances to all
poor men and their families--so much a head according to the price of
the gallon loaf. This system was generally adopted, and was strengthened
by an act of 1795 abolishing the workhouse test. As a means of tiding
over a merely temporary crisis, as indeed it was intended by its authors
to be, it would have done no harm. Unfortunately, it lasted for many
years and had disastrous consequences; it rapidly raised the rates, and
helped to crush the small farmers who, though they employed no labour,
were forced to pay towards the maintenance of the labourers employed by
their richer neighbours; it kept wages from rising, encouraged
thriftless marriages and dissolute living, discour