Genre:

News-Commentary

Subjects:

Utilitarianism, Class, Disease, Health, Crime, Morality, Politics

    Begins by noting Gathorne Gathorne-Hardy's assurances that 'Local Self-Government' would be put on trial if it could be shown to be causing 'inhumanity' to sick paupers, but insists that Gathorne-Hardy and John Bull disagree about the 'mode of trial'. Proceeds to note several cases of cruelty brought against Bumble for inhumanity to sick workhouse paupers. (The reference is to the parish beadle Bumble in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist.) Reveals that in a recent trial of a poor law union guardian, the public jury found him guilty of 'grossest inhumanity'. Criticises Gathorne-Hardy's proposal to have juries of Bumbles deciding cases of Bumbles, a situation that it expects will result in the acquittal and 'whitewashing' of the guardians. Presents an extract from the trial of a Shoreditch poor law guardian accused of severe misconduct towards a sick pauper, and considers the trial of this guardian by his colleagues to be a 'farce'. Urges that Mr Punch calls for 'a new trial' in the Shoreditch inquiry, a trial in which Bumbles would take no part except as witnesses or as the accused.