ABSTRACT
The history of the development of social welfare in the US had much in common, in the early years, with that of Britain. In fact, early provision drew to a considerable extent on the precedent of the British Poor Law. Both countries were dealing with the same social and economic transformation: from a predominantly agricultural economy to a manufacturing economy based on wage labour, with the creation in the process of a destitute population. The transition happened more rapidly in the States, and the internal situation was more complex-both administratively, and in terms of regional and ethnic variation. Many of the same debates were pursued in the US as in Britain, but the two systems of public relief which emerged differ in more than detail, and in ways that have implications both for the notion of social citizenship and for the concept of the underclass.
