Gazette Of The United States, & Philadelphia Daily Advertiser

No. I.

To the Managers

Of the Alms-House & House of Employ.

GENTLEMEN,

I HAVE seen your annual account to the 25th of last month, in Fenno's paper of the 12th instant, and will make a few remarks upon it, which I submit to your consideration.

Previous to doing this, I will observe, that in your account No. I. there is an error of forty five pounds, occasioned by your crediting the manufacturing account with only three hundred and thirty eight pounds three pence for goods consumed in the house, which credit ought to be three hundred and eighty three pounds, three pence, if your account No. 3 is right, to which I request your attention,

At first view I thought it might be a typographical error, but on calling both accounts up I find it is not so—how the mistake escaped the scrutinizing eye of the Mayor, two Aldermen, and three Justices. I cannot tell, but so it appears, and that all of them have passed the account as examined, approved and allowed.

Having given you credit for this forty five pounds, the balance, which you state to be the profits of the manufactory will be eighty seven pounds six shillings and four pence. Admitting this to be the true sum, I will leave your general accounts for receipts and expenditures to be the subject of future investigation, and proceed to state by whom this money is earned.

By your account No. 3. the paupers in the house are six hundred and five, of whom one hundred and fifty three are children—I will throw them all out of the question, because they do not work—The result is, there remains two hundred and twenty six men, and two hundred and twenty seven women, the profits of whose labor together in the whole year is but four shillings each.

I acknowledge that very large allowance ought to be made for the situation of many of your paupers, but still I cannot resolve it to my own satisfaction, that four hundred and fifty three grown people, who are all provided at the public expense with board,cloathing, fuel and every necessary article of life. should not earn four shillings each a year, when an individual laborer can earn twice as much in one day.

If, however, you can satisfy your fellow-citizens on this subject, it will be proper to do it; for many of them begin to grow uneasy about the poor tax, and consider it as an almost insupportable burthen. They felt it so last year, and they are likely to feel it so this year, in which I am told sixty two thousand dollars are assessed for the poor tax alone.

Enormous as this is, I believe they will pay it willingly, if they are not convinced that good oeconomy is observed in the expenditure of their money, and that a reasonable share of labor is exacted from all those who can work, in due proportion to their ability and strength—but if you apply their taxes to improper uses, and turn the Alms-House and House of Employ, which was designed for the convenient and comfortable accommodation of the infirm and superannuated poor of the city and districts, as well as to encourage industry in those who are willing to do work, if they could get it, into a nursery for idle itinerants, you may expect, notwithstanding the regard we entertain for your characters, that we shall complain with justice, and say the institution instead of being a public benefit, is become a disgrace to the city.