Sanitary districts were established in England and Wales in 1875 and in Ireland in 1878. The districts were of two types, based on existing structures:

• Urban sanitary districts in towns with existing local government bodies
• Rural sanitary districts in the remaining rural areas of poor law unions.

Each district was governed by a sanitary authority and was responsible for various public health matters such as providing clean drinking water, sewers, street cleaning, and clearing slum housing.

In England and Wales, both rural and urban sanitary districts were replaced in 1894 by the Local Government Act 1894 by the more general rural districts and urban districts. A similar reform was carried out in Ireland in 1899 by the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898.

England and Wales[link]

Sanitary districts were formed under the terms of the Public Health Acts 1873 and 1875. Instead of creating new divisions, existing authorities were given additional responsibilities.

Urban sanitary districts were formed in any municipal borough governed under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, in any Improvement Commissioners District formed by private act of parliament, and in any Local Government District formed under the Public Health Act 1848 or Local Government Act 1858.

The existing governing body of the town (municipal corporation, improvement commissioners or local board of health) was designated as the urban sanitary authority.

When sanitary districts were formed there were approximately 225 boroughs, 575 local government districts and 50 improvement commissioners districts designated as urban sanitary districts. Over the next nineteen years the number changed: more urban sanitary districts were formed as towns adopted legislation forming local boards and as additional boroughs were incorporated; over the same period numerous urban sanitary districts were absorbed into expanding boroughs.

Rural sanitary districts were formed in all areas without a town government. They followed the boundaries of existing poor law unions formed in 1837, less the areas of urban sanitary districts. Any subsequent change in the area of the union also changed the sanitary district. At the time of abolition in 1894, there were 572 rural sanitary districts.

The rural sanitary authority consisted of the existing poor law guardians for the rural parishes involved.

The Local Government Act 1894 brought an end to sanitary districts in England and Wales. In boroughs, the sanitary authority was merged into the corporation. All other urban sanitary districts were renamed as urban districts, governed by an urban district council. Rural sanitary districts were replaced by rural districts, for the first time with a directly elected council. It was a requirement that whenever possible a rural district should be within a single administrative county, which led to many districts being split into smaller areas along county lines. A few rural districts with parishes in two or three different counties persisted until the 1930s.

The Local Government Act 1972 made district councils, London borough councils, the City of London Corporation, and Inner Temple and Middle Temple be the sanitary authorities.

Ireland[link]

A system of sanitary districts was established in Ireland by the Public Health (Ireland) Act 1878, modelled on that in England and Wales.

Urban sanitary districts were established in the following categories of towns:

• The City of Dublin
• Boroughs governed under the Municipal Corporations (Ireland) Act 1840
• Towns having Town Commissioners and a population exceeding 6,000
• Townships with Town Commissioners under private acts of parliament

The existing corporation or commissioners became the urban sanitary authority. The Local Government Board of Ireland, created by the same act, could designate other towns with commissioners as urban sanitary districts.

Rural sanitary districts were formed in the same way as those in England and Wales, and with similar rural sanitary authorities.

The sanitary districts were abolished in 1899, under the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898, being merged in boroughs, or forming urban and rural districts. A large number of the rural sanitary districts were broken up into smaller rural districts along county lines, often taking the name of the sanitary district followed by a number - for instance, Ballyshannon rural sanitary district was split into Ballyshannon No. 1, Ballyshannon No. 2 and Ballyshannon No. 3 rural districts in Counties Donegal, Fermanagh and Leitrim respectively.

Scotland[link]

Sanitary districts were not formed in Scotland. By the Public Health (Scotland) Act 1867 public health duties were given to the town councils, commissioners or trustees of burghs, and to parochial boards. In 1890 the public health duties of parochial boards were allocated to the newly created county councils, administered by district committees.

See also[link]

• List of sanitary districts in Buckinghamshire
• List of sanitary districts in Dorset
• List of sanitary districts in Middlesex

Sources[link]

• Local Government Areas 1834 - 1945, V D Lipman, Oxford, 1949
• Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England (2 vols.) F A Youngs, London, 1991
• Public Health Act 1873 (35 & 36 Vict. c.79)
• Public Health Act 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c.55)
• Public Health (Ireland) Act 1878 (41 & 42 Vict. c.52)

References[link]

• http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/types/status_page.jsp?unit_status=RSD

The word asshole, a variant of arsehole, which is still prevalent in British and Australian English, is a vulgar to describe the anus, often pejoratively used to refer to people.

History[link]

The word arse in English derives from the Germanic root *arsaz, which originated from the Proto-Indo-European root *ors — meaning buttocks or backside.^[1] The combined form arsehole is first attested from 1500 in its literal use to refer to the anus. The metaphorical use of the word to refer to the worst place in a region, e.g., "the arsehole of the world") is first attested in print in 1865; the use to refer to a contemptible person is first attested in 1933.^[2] In the ninth chapter of his 1945 autobiography, Black Boy, Richard Wright quotes a snippet of verse that uses the term: "All these white folks dressed so fine / Their ass-holes smell just like mine ...". Its first appearance as an insult term in a newspaper indexed by Google News is in 1965.^[3] As with other vulgarities, these uses of the word may have been common in oral speech for some time before their first print appearances. By the 1970s, Hustler magazine featured people they did not like as "Asshole of the Month."^[4] In 1972, Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers recorded his song "Pablo Picasso," which includes the line "Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole."

Until the early 1990s, the word was considered one of a number of words that could not be uttered on commercial television in the United States. Comedian Andrew Dice Clay caused a major shock when he uttered the word during a televised MTV awards show in 1989.^[5] However, there were PG-13 and R rated films in the 1980s that featured use of the word, such as the R-rated The Terminator (1984), the PG-13-rated National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989), and the PG-rated Back to the Future (1985). By 1994, however, vulgarity had become more acceptable, and the word was featured in dialog on the long-running television series NYPD Blue, though it has yet to become anything close to commonplace on network TV. In some broadcast edits (such as the syndication airings of South Park), the word is partially bleeped out — ironically, as "assh—", with the profane half of the word intact.

Semantics[link]

The word is mainly used as a vulgarity, generally to describe people who are viewed as stupid or incompetent or detestable.^[6]

This word or its literal translation is found in colloquial speech in a number of cultures (in both English and other languages).^[7] This is because it describes an organ of elimination that is considered a taboo region (since it belongs to the intimate parts) of the body in many societies.^[8]

The English word ass (meaning donkey, a cognate of its zoological name Equus asinus) may also be used as a term of contempt, referring to a silly or stupid person. In the United States, and, to a lesser degree, in Canada, the words arse and ass have become synonymous; however, in the rest of the English-speaking world, ass still only refers to the donkey, rather than the arse (buttocks). It is worth noting that speakers of some varieties of English "drop their Rs" before consonants, leading to a pronunciation of arse that is quite similar to ass.^[9]

Political usage[link]

In 2000, during a Labor Day event, then candidate George W. Bush made an off-hand remark to his running mate, Dick Cheney, that New York Times reporter Adam Clymer was a "major league asshole." The gaffe was caught on microphone and led to a political advertisement chiding Bush for "using expletives ... in front of a crowd of families," produced for Democratic opponent Al Gore.^[10]

In February 2004, American media reported that during a rally of supporters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called Bush "an asshole" for believing his aides in supporting a coup against Chavez in 2002.^[11] The word in the original Spanish was "pendejo", and in news coverage the word was widely, though incorrectly, translated as "asshole"; the meaning of the word varies substantially in Latin America, and in Venezuela its meaning is closer to "fool".^[12] The following year, in September, Nightline host Ted Koppel said to Chavez on national television, "I'm going to perhaps shock you a little, but these are your words. You called President Bush an asshole," to which Chavez replied, "I've said various things about him. I don't know if I actually used that word."^[13]

See also[link]

• Arse
• The No Asshole Rule
• Sexual Slang
• Profanity

References[link]