E. Higgs, A CUCKOO IN THE NEST - THE ORIGINS OF CIVIL REGISTRATION AND STATE MEDICAL STATISTICS IN ENGLAND AND WALES, Continuity and change, 11, 1996, pp. 115
The history of the establishment of civil registration and of the Gene
ral Register Office in England and Wales under the 1836 Registration A
ct has tended to be written in terms of religion and medical science.
This article argues, however, that it is more helpful to see these dev
elopments primarily in terms of the registering of property rights, an
d that early-nineteenth-century debates with respect to welfare provis
ion for the poor also played a crucial role. This explains some import
ant features of the demographic and medical data published in the Annu
al Reports of the Registrar General.