
That question can’t be answered correctly without a historical understanding of poverty and homelessness in the United States.
The Birth of a Nation:
European vagrancy laws came to the American British colonies in the 16th century and were codified into the legal systems of the United States. These laws made it a crime to be idle, immoral, drunk, lewd, or suspicious in public. The lack of a fixed dwelling automatically caused suspicion and was not tolerated in most communities.
New York City opened the first poor house in 1734, which served as a vagrancy center, mental health facility, and jail. By the 1850s, most major cities had provided shelter at local police stations for vagrants.
The term “homeless” was first used in the 1870s to describe the wandering “tramps” crossing the country in search of work. The concern was that these mostly young men had lost all desire for domestic life and stayed on the move with no aim or home. The term “hobo” replaced the word tramp in the 1880s to soften the negative image.
The Team at Hand Up Housing
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