apeuro dbq on the poor

The Europeans between the 1450’s and 1700’s held many negative attitudes towards the poor themselves and the idlers who they believed were a menace to society. Also during this time period the Europeans had many responses like in England where they put them in poorhouses or tried to heal them or in others places where they tried to give them alms.
During this time period many Europeans held negative attitudes toward helping the poor due to the idle and lazy who go around begging as if they are poor. Emperor Charles V in a royal decree wrote how indiscriminately giving alms will result in idleness which is the root of all evils (Document 4). Emperor Charles V has the POV of an emperor who sees that the idle are mooching off of his people and are taking away money from those who really are poor and can’t find jobs. He believes that these idle people left their occupations and have began to beg and sell their daughters to vice instead of going into honest work because they see how easy it is to beg for money. In France, the town council of Rouen had so much distaste for the idle that they were planning to expel them from the city due to their harmfulness to the general public (Document 5). The council of Rouen’s POV is that of the leaders of the town that see the idle are hurting the honest laborers who actually work for their money and don’t go around begging for money while actually having the ability to do work because the idles are taking advantage of the honest worker’s kindness. Cardinal Richelieu who was a royal councilor is unofficially stated as saying that he believed that due to the vagabonds begging for alms, they are taking bread from the deserving poor and he believes that rules should be established which would confine and feed the poor and make the able bodied do public works (Document 8). The of POV of Cardinal Richelieu is that of a high church official who sees the idle are taking from the deserving poor and that the government needs to find