Such was the commissioners’ final Report on the condition of the Irish poor and the means for its amelioration, the substance and general import of which I have endeavoured to give with the fulness and completeness the importance of the subject demanded. The Report was not however signed by all the commissioners. Three of their body withheld their signature, and recorded their “reasons for dissenting from the principle of raising funds for the relief of the poor by the voluntary system, as recommended in the Report.”[67] The ‘Reasons’ are set forth in thirteen propositions, the most material of which are the following.
These were Dr. Vignoles, J. W. S. Naper Esq., and Lord Killeen.
“Because—in the lamentably distressed state of the Irish poor, any system of relief to be effectual must be comprehensive, uniform, and prompt; whilst the very constitution of voluntary associations proclaims that their operations must be tardy; and circumstanced as Ireland is in the distribution of her population, must be partial and precarious.
“Because—it is notorious that many contributions, in name voluntary, are frequently obligations of the severest character. The pressure of such a tax must be unequal. The class least removed from want, would furnish as it now does, the largest number of contributors, and to the greatest amount; whilst the wealthier classes, resident as well as absentee, would in a great measure be exempted from the liability of contributing in proportion to their wealth, or even from contributing at all.
“Because—viewing the peculiar state of society in Ireland, the extent to which religious zeal prevails, as well as the influence it must exercise, we consider the difficulties attendant on the raising of a voluntary fund in the first instance, and of an impartial distribution of relief in the next, all but insurmountable.
“Because—the mendicity institutions of Dublin, Limerick, Newry, Birr, Sligo, Waterford and Londonderry, as well as the voluntary poor’s fund established in some of the rural districts, afford strong proofs of the inefficiency of the support afforded to these institutions; for although they have not totally failed, yet their subscriptions are falling off, and they are by no means adequate to the relief of the objects they contemplate.