Poor laws were repeatedly strengthened to punish threats to family-based welfare

Evidence

The early American colonies imported the poor laws virtually verbatim and they were later incorporated into state legal systems during the early American Republic. These laws were continually reinvigorated and embellished to adapt to what we might call periodic episodes of sexual revolution. That is, at each historical juncture where the legal obligations of family were somehow weakened or threatened by the generalization of divorce, the waning importance of marriage, or the liberation of slaves who had never been married, the poor laws would be reinforced to punish those who threatened to transfer the costs of their welfare onto the state. As divorce became more common in the nineteenth century, the poor laws were modified to require post-divorce child support. When slaves were enfranchised in the 1860s, they were immediately encouraged to enter formal marriages and were subsequently subject to new legal rules of family support and mutual dependence. In many instances, those who failed to comply with family responsibility rules of economic obligation were subject to criminal sanctions such as forced labor or imprisonment. The poor laws helped the state to contain the costs of evolving sexual mores by imposing marital and familial support as an economic obligation. — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 217

Categorization

• SEED: Angle: tracing the ‘family responsibility’ doctrine as a recurring moral-economic lever — from Elizabethan poor laws through post-Emancipation marriage compulsion to modern workfare.
• XREF: Connects to critiques of the two-parent/marriage-focused welfare discourse and to discussions of the racialized policing of Black families. — connects to: Family responsibility for welfare traces to the Elizabethan poor laws of 1601 — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 216; Decades of neoliberal reform reinstated the family as first-line welfare provider — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 260; Neoliberal family duty rhetoric derives from Elizabethan poor law logic — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 922 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Neoliberal family duty rhetoric derives from Elizabethan poor law logic #expands (0.85) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 922
• Family responsibility for welfare traces to the Elizabethan poor laws of 1601 #expands (0.80) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 216
• Decades of neoliberal reform reinstated the family as first-line welfare provider #expands (0.78) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 260
• Reagan’s California welfare reform enacted neoliberal family-responsibility policies #exemplifies (0.75) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 242
• Neoliberal welfare reform aimed to convert natural family charity into legal duty #expands (0.75) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 241