What is family responsibility? And what is the relevance of the poor law tradition to the history of American social welfare? The principle of family responsibility for welfare has deep roots in the British and North American traditions of public relief and can be traced back to the Elizabethan poor laws of 1601, where it is stated that “the father and grandfather, and the mother and grandmother, and the children of every poor, old, blind, lame and important person, or other person not able to work, being of a sufficient ability, shall, at their own charges, relieve and maintain every such poor person.” The poor laws distinguished between the impotent poor, unable to work and eligible for care in an almshouse; the able-bodied poor, who must be compelled to work in a poorhouse; and the idle poor or vagrants, who could be imprisoned or confined in a House of Correction. But before any recourse to forced labor or incarceration could be activated, all three of these populations were subject to the principle of familial responsibility. In other words, before the parish took any action, family members would be compelled to provide as much support as they could.

Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, loc. 216