FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER POOR-LAWS OF MASSACHUSETTS AND NEW YORK WITH APPENDICES CONTAINING THE UNITED STATES IMMIGRATION AND CONTRACT-LABOR LAWS A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTIES OF THE GRADUATE DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL ECONOMY BY JOHN CUMMINGS, PH.D. REPRINTED FROM PUBLICATIONS OF THE AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION, PUBLISHED FOR THE AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION BY MACMILLAN & COMPANY NEW YORK LONDON: SWAN SONNENSCHEIN & CO. PREFACE. The poor-laws of any single state cannot be adequately considered apart from the laws of other and especially of adjacent states. For general purposes, however, it is not necessary to go into a detailed account of the laws of every state; this would lead to wearisome repetition. It may be said in general that the states have followed the example either of Massachusetts or of New York in their poor-relief legislation; that is, they have adopted either the town or the county system. The historical development of poor-relief legislation in Massachusetts and New York is presented as typical of that development in other states as well. The history and experience of these two states is perhaps richer and more instructive than that of any others. They have had to face difficulties from an early period which have scarcely begun to make themselves felt even now in newer states removed from the sea-board; especially with regard to immigration. New York as the port whence immigrants spread all over the country has had to deal with a floating class of foreign paupers, and with problems connected therewith peculiar to this state alone. The complications which enter into interstate relations, owing to the diversity of laws in the several states, have received peculiar exemplification in the relations existing between Massachusetts and New York. Differences in the conditions of settlement in the two states have led to strained relations between their administrative officers. So long as the laws of settlement in one state are made without reference to the laws of (RECAP) JUN 2. 1903 174039 = cop. 3 other-especially of contiguous-states, their administration must be attended with confusion and conflict; and this has been demonstrated in the case of Massachusetts and New York, where the laws of settlement have developed upon quite diverse principles. Until recently a settlement once gained in Massachusetts could never be lost. It has been the boast of the commonwealth that every drop of Massachusetts blood carried with it settlement; so that the great-grandchildren of parents once settled in the commonwealth might be sent back from other states or countries into Massachusetts for support. The conditions of gaining settlement were, however, as will be pointed out, so severe that a large portion of the population never acquired it. In New York, on the other hand, settlement could be acquired on short residence in one place. It was also easily lost when one left the state, being annulled by an absence of one year. In the administration of these laws confusion was inevitable. The poor-relief officers of New York acted on the assumption that the laws in Massachusetts were similar to those in their own state; the Massachusetts officials acted on the converse assumption. A person in distress turning up in New York, who had lived in some Massachusetts town long enough to acquire settlement, under New York laws would be turned over to Massachusetts. According to Massachusetts laws, however, the person returned would not be a legitimate charge upon the commonwealth. On the other hand, Massachusetts officials, acting on the assumption that a person who had once gained a settlement in New York must always retain it, would return to New York indigent persons whose claim to support had according to New York laws expired. Another source of confusion and ill-feeling has lain in the difference of policy pursued in the transportation of indigent persons to their places of residence or settlement outside the state. The Massachusetts state board has held that the jurisdiction of the state's officers ceased at the state line, and accordingly that the poor-relief officers have performed their full duty by transporting persons outside the state line, leaving the officials of adjoining states to defray charges of transport across their respective territories. As it happens, this strict interpretation of the state's jurisdiction has borne rather heavily on New York. Many lines of transportation into Massachusetts from the west and south passed through New York. Persons entering on these lines and becoming chargeable, though they might never have resided in New York a day, would be started in their return journey to some western or southern state, carried over the state line and dropped in New York, on the assumption that New York officials would "pass on." New York could not retaliate since there were no states east of Massachusetts from which immigration into New York took place. Naturally, therefore, New York objected to the policy, insisting that its own practice be followed, and that indigent persons be sent the whole of the distance to their destination wherever that might be. pass on." Still another source of discord has existed between these two states. Immigrants bound for Massachusetts have landed in considerable numbers at the port of New York. Whenever such persons have become chargeable they have been sent back to New York. This was done for a time in accordance with an agreement entered into in 1869, between the Massachusetts alien commissioners and the New York commissioner of charities and correction. By this agreement immigrants entering New York through the port of Boston were returned to Bos |