“The only thing they turn their hands to is false beggary !”

Forcible removal as an institution for determent of the undesirables

Abstract

Authorities, since time immemorial, have had a dislike for the poor, although the rich cannot exist without them. The question that has always seemed to crop up is, who is obliged to care for them and what rights do they have. It is an issue that has occupied the minds of regional and police authorities from the 16th century onwards and the legal aspects of which became increasingly more regulated with the advent of legal absolutism. With it, the forcible relocation of the poor and other marginalised segments of the population back to the place or municipality of their birth also became more regulated. In Austria-Hungary, the forcible removals and relocations carried out by the police, previously regulated by various and numerous laws and decrees, were governed by the State Law passed in 1871. Furthermore, the Provincial Law of 1873 appointed the municipalities in which relocation stations were located as authorities with jurisdiction through referral of legislative powers for all matters pertaining to relocation. One of these municipalities was also located in Kranj, where the preserved archival material includes, amongst other things, the complete expulsion protocols for 1876-1881 as well as other expulsion-related material which shows how these forcible removals proceeded, who the relocated persons were and where they came from, as well as details such as the cost and organisation of such proceedings.