Spokane Judge Rejects a Cut-Rate Pauper Burial Contract
A county deal that paid a premium on each pauper's grave is struck down as against public policy—even after another bidder offered to bury the dead for a penny apiece.
Judge Moore has made a decision to the effect that the contract recently made by the commissioners of Spokane County with an undertaking company for the burial of the county paupers, whereby the undertaking company was to pay the county a premium for each body buried, is not good, for the reason that such a contract is against public policy, conflicts with the wants, instincts and sentiments of the people, and is repugnant to the morals of the time. The plaintiff in the suit offered to bury the corpses for 1 cent apiece, but the judge decided that such a contract was equally opposed to public policy.
“Such a contract is against public policy, conflicts with the wants, instincts and sentiments of the people, and is repugnant to the morals of the time.”
Public burial of the indigent was then, as now, a test of civic decency. The judge's language about public policy and moral sentiment anticipates modern fights over privatizing services for the poor—and over who bears the cost of a dignified death.
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