How the Founding Fathers Proposed Helping the Poor

Charity, James Madison observed, has no place in the legislative responsibilities of the government.

The American Founders were arguably the most impressive generation of men ever assembled. While many historians have extolled their brilliance, fewer have noted a different quality they shared: character.

“Honor mattered because character mattered. And character mattered because the fate of the American experiment with republican government still required virtuous leaders to survive,” the historian Joseph Ellis noted in Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation.

Because of this rare combination of character and brilliance, I often look to the Founders to inform my own perspective on matters of importance. One issue that concerned them was an issue that still very much concerns us today: poverty.

George Washington, Ben Franklin, and others shared thoughts on how best to assist the poor, and I’ve collected some of their reflections. One item you’ll not find on this list, I’ll point out, is a proposal to create a massive federal program to alleviate poverty and help this in need. Many may see this as evidence of their cruelty, but I believe it actually speaks to their wisdom.

This does not mean, however, that the Founders didn’t support freely giving to those in need. They did, they simply understand that forced charity is not charity at all, and many suspected such efforts would be counterproductive.

Below are seven observations that I believe are particularly noteworthy.

1. “I am for doing good to the poor, but…I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.”

-Benjamin Franklin, 1766 (On the Price of Corn and Management of the Poor)

2. “The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.”

-James Madison, Jan. 10, 1794 (speech before the House of Representatives)

3. “Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.”

– Thomas Jefferson, 1787 (Notes on the State of Virginia)

4. “Let your heart feel for the afflictions and distress of everyone, and let your hand give in proportion to your purse.”

– George Washington, Jan. 15, 1783 (letter to Bushrod Washington)

5. “Having been poor is no shame, but being ashamed of it, is.”

– Benjamin Franklin, 1749 (Poor Richard’s Almanac)

6. “I deem it the duty of every man to devote a certain proportion of his income for charitable purposes…. However disposed the mind may feel to unlimited good, our means having limits, we are necessarily circumscribed by them.”

– Thomas Jefferson, 1806 (letter to Drs. Rogers and Slaughter)

7. “Repeal that [welfare] law, and you will soon see a change in their manners. St. Monday and St. Tuesday, will soon cease to be holidays. Six days shalt thou labor, though one of the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them.”

-Benjamin Franklin, May 9, 1753 (letter to Collinson)