English Legal History and its Materials

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StatuteofLabourers 9 - 23 Oct 2014 - Main.FrancisWhite
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Palmer goes into great detail on how the massive depopulation during the Black Death led to the passage the Statute of Labourers and how it was used to force the able bodied of the lower classes to work and set maximum wages and prices. (Chapter 3 pg. 14-27) According to Wikipedia the law was not repealed until 1863.
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    • Between 1760 and 1810, sixty-three new capital offenses are created, primarily for property crimes. [62] These included: stealing shipwrecked goods (1753, actually), breaking into a building to steal or destroy linen (1764), food rioting, destroying a mill (1769), and forging bank notes. [63].
    • Quite frequently though, death sentences were commuted to transportation. [64].
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    • "The critics of the law argued that the gibbets and corpses paradoxically weakened enforcement of the law: rather than terrifying criminals, the death penalty terrified prosecutors and juries, who feared committing judicial murder on the capital statutes. [65].
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    • "The critics of the law argued that the gibbets and corpses paradoxically weakened enforcement of the law: rather than terrifying criminals, the death penalty terrified prosecutors and juries, who feared committing judicial murder on the capital statutes." [65].
 
    • Really, it looks like the legal system functioned as a reactionary, and not extraordinarily effective, tool, during a period of major social and economic change--both the poor law and the criminal law were routinely amended in unsuccessful attempts at controlling the poor.
    • Further consideration relationship between criminal law and "poor law."
    • specific details of 1834 Poor Law Amendment?

Revision 9r9 - 23 Oct 2014 - 14:48:27 - FrancisWhite
Revision 8r8 - 23 Oct 2014 - 05:39:37 - FrancisWhite
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