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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
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Title
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A peep behind the scenes on a board of guardians: the brutality of the poor-law system
Description
An account of the resource
Edition: 4th ed.
Place of publication: Keighley
Collation: 32 p. ; 22 cm.
Series title: Pamphlets for the People
Series number: 4
Notes: Stamp for 'Social Democratic Federation, Socialist Centre, Brighton' on front cover. Other pamphlets in the series by the same author listed inside back cover. Donated by Olivia and Robert Temple, December 2017. Deals with the personal experiences of the author as a Guardian with the treatment of people in workhouses.
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Glyde, G.A.
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Wadsworth & Co., The Rydal Press
Date
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[n.d.]
Identifier
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G5524
Subject
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Poverty
Social problems
Socialism
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (A peep behind the scenes on a board of guardians: the brutality of the poor-law system), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
Language
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English
Homeless People
Poor Laws-Great Britain
Poverty-Great Britain
Socialism
Workhouses-Great Britain
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46d261da6bc1eeeac9252622c15b274b
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Text
PRICE ONE PENNY.
JL F L H .A
FOR
S O CIA LISM:
BY
J . L. MAHON.
Delivered in
the course
AMONGST
THE
of a
MINERS
Socialist Campaign
ON
STRIKE
IN
Northumberland, 1877.
“ AS LONG AS OUB CIVILIZATION IS BASED UPON PROPERTY OUR BICHES
WILL LEAVE US SICK, THEBE WILL BE BITTERNESS IN OUB LAUGHTER AND
OUB WINE WILL BURN IN OUB MOUTH.
ONLY THAT GOOD PROFITS WHICH
WE CAN TASTE WITH ALL DOORS OPEN AND WHICH SERVES ALL MEN.”—
Emerson
Published at the “ Commonweal” Office :
13, Farringdon Road, London, E.C
J. Beall, Printer, Stationer, &c., St. Andrew’s Street.
1887.
�“ I ask you to think with me that the worst which can
happen to us is to endure tamely the evils which we see, that
no trouble or turmoil is so bad as that; that the necessary
destruction which reconstruction bears with it must be taken
calmly ; that everywhere—in State, in Church, in the house
hold—we must be resolute to endure no tyranny, accept no
lie, quail before no fear, although they may come before us
disguised as piety, duty, or affection, as useful opportunity and
good nature, as prudence or kindness.”—William Morris.
“ The ivorld in a commercial society belongs to the
capitalists, the share of oiunership which each man pos
sesses being his capital.
In order that wealth may be
produced .... toorkmen and horses must till the
land; the sun must shine and the rain must fall upon the
field, when the seed will sprout and grow; bees must per
form the operation necessary to the fertilization of the
flower, when the fruit will form and swell; birds must
join in the work by destroying the noxious insects which
would otherwise destroy the harvest; and so on. When all
is done some of the agents claim a share of the product;
the men and cattle must be fed; the birds make good their
right to share the wealth which their labour, as much as
that of the men and horses, has produced; and even the
earth demands a part as seed for the next crop. After
all the deductions are made, which the harshness of nature
renders necessary, the balance belongs to the capitalist.
To him it is a matter of indifference what natural agents
are instrumental in the production of his wealth, and the
labour of men does not, in his estimation, differ generically
from that of birds or horses, and is more important only
because the men are the phenomena over xohich he has most
control........................... He groups together all the agents
(including the workmen) that have co-operated in the pro
duction of his wealth as elements of the efficiency of his
capital, and measures the result of all their energies by the
rate of profit he obtains.’'—Communal and Commercial
Economy.—JOHN CARRUTHERS.
�A PLEA FOR SOCIALISM
Fellow- Workmen,
I am sure that an appeal to you for a fair hearing is
unnecessary. Socialism no longer meets with the jeers and
abuse that assailed it, from workmen as well as others, only
a few years ago. Discontent is just now so deep and general
amongst the working-class, and the exponents of Socialism
have worked so hard and enthusiastically in their cause that
a respectful and sympathetic hearing is given them by people
of all kinds all over the country. But, having cast off your
prejudice see also that you put away all misunderstandings.
Socialists are often accused of holding opinions which they
are constantly preaching against, of wishing to bring about
things which they are even now trying to abolish. It is said
they wish to make an equal division of all wealth, bring all
men to one dull level, put every man’s affairs at the mercy of
State officials, make the sober support the drunken and the
industrious work for the thriftless, stamp out individuality,
abolish all incentive to invention, and to bring about these
things by hanging every man with a decent coat on his back.
Everything that malignity, jealousy, and sheer stupidity
could string together has been said against the Socialists.
Well, we don’t grumble. We know the way all great reform
ers since the time of Christ have been received ; kicks and
cuffs, and good chances of crucifiction or hanging in the end.
But we take it all as a compliment to the goodness and
usefulness of our principles.
Ike need for Socialism. The chief cause of the great spread
of Socialism of late is the dissatisfaction felt by all classes
with things as they are and the evident uselessness of all other
proposed remedies. England yearly grows richer, yet her
working-men and women are practically as bad off as ever
''
�A Plea
for
Socialism.
they were. Our power of making goods gets greater every
year, but we have not yet found a way of supplying the wants
of those who make them. Food, clothes, houses and all the
needs of life and happiness are here at our hand in abundance,
at our hand also is the means of making ten times more than
we have, and yet the workers who make these things are living
in wretchedness, squalor, and semi-starvation. Many boast
of the power, fame, and grandeur of the British Empire, but
few notice that in the lowest depths of social life, in the shims
and the back streets, is an ever growing mass of people with
out hope in life, for life to them means a fierce scramble ever
getting fiercer; a miserable subsistence ever getting more
miserable. These people have no respect for Society, for
Society has no respect for them. “ Law and order’' is to them
only a fancy name for the power that keeps them in the mire.
They hate the law and they hate society, and their hatred is
just. They are too many to be ignored, too strong to be
despised, too much wronged to bear good will to those in
power. Their ranks are recruited from the working-class
every year : and some prolonged depression of trade may see
them powerful enough to put Law at defiance ; as indeed they
were during the early months of 1886. Civilization ! Pro
gress ! National Greatness !—mockery and humbug while
those who make the wealth are ever in want and in fear of
want, and those who neither toil nor spin live in luxury.
People feel the evil of all this and they see nothing in the
ordinary proposals to undo it. The Socialists have, as is
generally admitted, brought forward the most consistent and
satisfactory criticism of the present system of society, and
from the same line of thought the real remedy must likewise
come.
Toryism, Liberalism, and Radicalism. Out of all our party
fighting we don’t seem to get much benefit. The working
class are gradually losing faith in the political parties of all
shades. Toryism is a dead horse—not even worth a kiok.
Tliberalism has always meant, and Liberals have always worked
for, the interests of trade and commerce, under the idea, no
doubt, that the welfare of the people could best be served in
that way. But every day makes it plainer that the whole
object of modern commerce is to enslave and cheat the
people. That trade is carried on solely for the profit of the
�Political Parties.
5
capitalists, whose chief aim is to increase profits by decreasing
wages. The Liberals have posed as the friends of the people
on questions of merely political importance. But on any
question affecting the “ rights” of property—such as the
factory acts, or adulteration acts—-some of the best Liberals
were the workmen’s worst enemies. It is now plain to most
workmen that there is nothing to choose between Liberals and
Tories, but that the bitter opposition of both may be expected.
Then what of the Radical party ? But where is it I Wander
ing about after a dozen leaders, chasing fifty fads, but having
no policy to give to the people which will excite their
enthusiasm or better their condition. A more hazy, indefinite,
muddled-up party never existed than the latter day Radicals.
Their chief function has been to blacken the boots of the
Whigs, and except that now and then we hear a little murmur
ing, their function has been well fulfilled. The days of
popularity for the Liberal party are now over. They are on
the high road to perdition ; in going there they will kick the
Tories in front of them, and drag most of the Radicals, as
usual, at their coat tails.
The Socialists spend a good
deal of energy in trying to win over the Radical workmen,
and this energy is well spent. In the Liberal agitations hither
to the Whig Dukes and cotton Lords have given the money
while the Radical workmen have furnished the enthusiasm.
The Socialist cause will gain by detaching these enthusiasts
from the false friends of the people and using their powers
for a better purpose. The reason why I attack Liberalism
and Radicalism more than Toryism is because many people
believe in them, while no one believes in Toryism at all.
The official Tories believe least of all in their own principles,
for when in office they masquerade in Liberal garments—
which shows at once their duplicity and their depraved taste.
In my opinion both political parties are humbugs, and the
only difference between the Liberals and the Tories is that
the Liberals are the most ingenious humbugs of the two.
Labour Representation. Great things were expected if we
got workmen into Parliament but very little has been realized.
There are plenty of rich men in the House of Commons who
are far more outspoken and independent than the Labour
members. We, as workmen, ought to be thoroughly ashamed
of the way we are represented. A few limpid lisping weak-
�6
A Plea
for
Socialism.
lings, who always truckle to the party chiefs, who never yet
distinguished themselves by standing out sturdily for the
interests of labour—who indeed have either forgotten or never
knew what the interests of labour mean. A poor spiritless
lot are they ! The best of them seem to have mistaken their
business. They are grubbing away at “ Employers’ Liability
Acts” as if legislation of that kind would by itself achieve
much for the workers. In the Parliament of 1886 we had
twelve Labour M.P.’s
Our twelve apostles ! At that time
the unemployed were rioting, so keen and widespread was
their distress, all over the country. But our apostles did not
like to disturb the arrangements of the Liberal Government.
Labour was in bad straits : but, for a whole session its
apostles sat sucking their thumbs and said never a word. In
Northumberland during the strike, which began in February,
1887, the suffering and distress was very keen. The men
were trying to resist an attempt to reduce wages which were
already at starvation point. Surely the Labour M.P.’s might
have used their position as members of Parliament to draw
attention to the state of their constituents : had Northumber
land been a county in Ireland, the House of Commons would
have been ringing with the tale of the miners’ wrongs. No
better illustration of the miserable incompetency of the
labour M.P.’s could be brought forward. Had they possessed
the least spark of vigour and sturdiness, the country would
not have been in darkness as to the condition of their con
stituents.
•
■
'
If Labourers are to be sent to
Parliament why make them middle-class men by paying them
from T6 to £10 per week ? A workman in Parliament ought
to get the wages of a London artisan and be enabled to live
in the same standard of comfort. He should go there to work
and not be ashamed of the object of his mission. Instead of
that his first move is to ape the costume and manners of the
cultured drones amongst whom he sits. The whole spirit and
object of mere “Labour representation” is mistaken. The no
tion that having “ labourers” in Parliament will do much good
is a very silly and artificial one. Working-men are no better
than other men, and middle-class men are no worse. It is
some definate principle or ideal that must be taken up by the
working-class before it can achieve anything. The Labour
Representation movement has nothing definate in it. It
�The root
of the difficulty.
7
simply wants to get workmen into Parliament—not to do any
thing in particular, just to loaf about, and look dignified, and
turn lick-spittles to the Liberal party when occasion demands.
This vague, hazy, scatter-brained policy will never do any
service or any credit to the working-class. Representatives
of this kind will be only half supported by workmen and de
spised by upper class politicians. Let us resolve on a definate purpose and push that forward. Use Parliament as a
platform if you will, but educate the people tp a clear under
standing of what your aim and their aim should be. When
you have cleared away some of the ignorance of the people—
and that is the real obstacle to their progress—then a strong
fighting party can be organized and there will be every chance
of winning : at present with no particular object and no en
deavour to find one, with nothing but a muddled-up notion of
doing something, sometime, somehow; failure and ignominy
are certain.
The root of the difficulty. Now, in my opinion the error
of the various political parties I have referred to is that they
skim over the surface of these great problems. They are
afraid or unable to go to the root of the matter and point
out the cause of poverty. It is a paltry superficial kind of
reasoning which tells us that the industrious are well-to-do,
and the idle and thriftless poverty-stricken. I have no wish
to gloss over the failings of working people, or to excuse their
sins on the plea that the rich sin also and more heavily. But
I think there is something mean and hypocritical about those
who continually denounce the faults of the poor while they
leave the rich man’s crimes unassailed. Let us denounce
intemperance, idleness, thriftlessness wherever we may find
*
it; but let us be unsparingly impartial: let neither fame nor
rank save the wrong-doer from the reprobation of his fellows.
The faults of the rich do not excuse the faults of the poor,
but they are often the cause of them. It is luxury that makes
penury necessary. It is waste on one hand that entails
scrimping and starving on the other. It is the legalised lazi
ness amongst the rich that sets the example of loafing and
* It is strange to see how this term, thrift, is misused. Thrift means
making the best use of what you have. It does not mean selfish grabbing of
all you can get, nor a crazy hoarding of things you can never use. Still less
does it mean (as some sentimental moralists would have us believe) cowardly
contentment with less than you are entitled to.
�8
A Plea
for
Socialism.
flunkeyism to the poor. It is because the rich man shirks his
share of the world’s work that the poor man is overworked.
And what is the cause of nine-tenths of the vice and callous
ness of the working-men ? The long, dreary, and depressing
toil they have to endure when in employment; the feverish
anxiety about to-morrow’s food, and the future of their child
ren when in the ranks of the unemployed. To most workmen
life is an uninteresting past, a joyless present, and a hopeless
future. The root of the great social question is that modern
society treats the workmen as machines and the capitalists as
lords of civilization. In a civilized society the capitalist
is master of the land and minerals which no man made ;
of the machinery which includes within it the toil and
skill of countless generations; of the vast stores of wealth
which all (except the capitalists) have helped to accumu
late ; in short all the resources of civilization—which,
without exception, are the produce of work—belong to
one class. The only thing the capitalist, as such, does
is to keep a firm grip of these things and never spend
five shillings without a reasonable certainty of getting
ten, fifteen, or twenty in return. Civilization is a huge
arrangement for heaping up profit, and whatsoever will not
bring profit to the holder of capital is prohibited by the laws
of trade and commerce ; it is stigmatized as a thing that
“won’t pay” (no matter how much good it may do) and
banished from the business of life, and the world is thought
lucky if some philanthropist or faddiBt take it up instead.
Are we Slaves ? The pet delusion of the British working
man is that he is free. How he came by this delusion, and
why he sticks to it, I don’t know. It is interesting to notice
that the British workman’s “patriotism” and fondness for
proclaiming his independence varies with the rate of his
wages and the security of his employment. At £2 per week
he is sure that he is not a slave, and “never, never” will
be ; at £1 he is doubtful about the reality of his freedom ; at
12s. he curses the British Empire and says, wisely, though
not elegantly, that his freedom is a fraud. Now, what is a
slave ? One who is compelled to work for somebody
else.
In this, the real sense, the working-class of every
civilised country are slaves. They work and all the result
goes to the capitalist and upper class ; they get back a few
�The old slavery
and the new.
9
shillings to keep them alive, for that is all their wages
amount to. They are forced to work for the upper class,
while the upper class does nothing for them, and therefore
they are slaves. If the miner produces coal for the money
lord, and the money-lord does nothing for the miner, then
surely the miner is a slave. Every man who lives without
doing useful work is enslaving some other people. It is
work that keeps society going. Every man who eats bread,
lives in a house, or burns coal is using the fruits of labour.
Unless he renders some useful service to the baker, the
builder, or the miner he is stealing from them and making
them his slaves. A civilised society includes two main
classes:—Workers and idlers, producers and thieves, slaves
and slave-owners. The workers do everything for themselves,
and support the other class besides. The upper class do
nothing for themselves, and nothing for any-body else, so they
are thieves and slave drivers. Not that they are individually
conscious of stealing or oppressing, or should be individually
punished for it. But the harm done is the same whether
they are conscious or not. Besides, every sensible man
ought to think of where his dinner comes from, and to reflect
that somebody must have earned it; and that if he did not
earn it he must have stolen it.
The old slavery and the new. It is true that one man
cannot call another his property as he would a horse or a
dog, but does this make any essential difference ? The
reason why men were once owned like cattle was simply
that their labour might be used for their master’s benefit.
Well, if their labour is still taken from them, even without
the institution of private property in human flesh and blood,
the result is the same. The capitalist does not to-day own
the workman, but he owns the means by which only the
workman can live ; and he says to him, “ You cannot labour
without using the land and the capital; these things are
under my control, and I shall only allow you to use them on
condition that you take a bare living out of the produce of
your own labour, and that you hand over to me all the
balance over and above that.” The capitalist manages to
■enforce these terms. Nine-tenths of the modern workmen
are mere slaves, getting enough each pay-day to keep them
in bread till the next. In one respect they are worse off
�10
A Plea
for
Socialism.
than the olden slaves. When the employer has no further
need for their services, he turns them adrift in the streets
to find a crust as best they can; in olden times the slave
owner, out of self-interest, always took care to feed and
clothe his human property. In spite of all our boasting
of freedom the position of the civilised workman may be
summed up thus : He is allowed to earn his own living
only when his labour will also yield a profit to supply the
middle and upper classes with a living for nothing ; he gets
only a small part of what he earns ; he is dependent upon
others for the chance of working at all; and when he cannot
be made an instrument of profit-grinding he is cast amongst
the unemployed, and from thence too often he drifts to the
gaol, the workhouse, or the lunatic asylum.
The Slave Market and the Labour Market.
A closer
examination of the old and the new slavery will show still
stronger points of resemblance. In olden times there was a
slave market, to which men were driven in gangs, goaded on
by the lash of the slave driver. When they got there, they
were sold at auction, like cattle, to the highest bidder. Now
there is a labour market, at which human labour is bought
and sold like other goods. The people have no alternative
but to go and sell their labour, and they go obediently and
docilely, and as long as the system lasts they must do so.
Brute force is discarded, but the force of circumstances work
to the capitalists’ interests instead. The slave driver’s whip
is only to be found in the museum, but the whip of hunger
does the same work, and it bites as cruelly. But what is the
difference when they get to the market ? In olden times
they were put up to auction and knocked down to the highest
bidder ; now they are compelled to compete against each
other and are knocked down to the lowest bidder. From
this competition for employment a strange and horrid light
is thrown on the working of the capitalist system. The
master takes advantage of the men’s misfortunes, and uses
the unemployed to force down the wages of those in work.
In short, slavery is still the basis of our social organisation.
Our chains ud to be ugly black iron ; we saw them and
e
*
abhorred them. Now they are finely polished and painted,
and we think them ornaments and hug them ; but they are
as strong as ever, and when the times of distress come we
�Conquer
the cupboard.
11
feel them gnawing and chafing us. We cannot be free
while able, useful, and willing workmen starve in a land
made wealthy by their own labour. Our freedom is an
elaborate and ingenious hypocrisy while thousands are
denied the chance to earn their bread in their own country;
and while the whole working-class is only allowed to labour
on condition that it will hand over the largest part of the
result to the idle, useless, and vicious upper class.
Conquer the Cupboard. The powei’ lies in the hands of
the moneyed class, because they have the land and the
capital completely in their control. The workers dare not
till the soil of their own country, although thousands of acres
of it are lying waste, unless they can produce a heavy rent
for the landlord as well as a living for themselves. The
factories also are closed and the machinery stopped in many
districts. Here comes the narrow selfishness of the present
system. The men who own the land and capital do not wish
to use it themselves, and indeed could not. They simply
have the power to prevent others from using these things,
and they use that power to extort enormous profits from the
workers. Let us compare society to an ordinary household.
Imagine a family in which the father and several sons were
the bread-winners, and the mother and several daughters
housekeepers. Suppose they have a cupboard in which the
food and other means of life are stored. This cupboard
should be under the care of the housewife. But let us
imagine that a stranger, who has done nothing to help in the
work of the household, forces his way in, fixes a patent
lock to the cupboard, and says to the household, “ In future
this part of the house shall be under my charge. I shall
always be ready to open it when you have anything to
put in, but when you want any supplies I shall dole out
just as much as I think is good for you. While you are
filling the cupboard you shall get enough to keep you, and
enable you to go on working, but no more. When the cup
board is full you must stop working, and eating too, and you
will be known as ‘ tramps ’ and the ‘ unemployed.’ ” Now,
this family might fancy itself free ; it might meet in the
back-parlour and sing paeans in praise of the grand system it
lived under; it might also pass Bills and give each of its
members a vote, or a dozen votes ; but as long as the
�12
A Plea
fok
Socialism.
stranger held the key of that cupboard he would be master
of the situation, and the inmates one and all would be mere
slaves of his. This is a fair simile of what England and
every other civilised land is to-day. The workmen are filling
the cupboard of the country, but the key is held by men who
do none of the labour. While filling it they get a subsistence
wage—seldom more—and when it is filled to overflowing
there is a glut (a trade depression), and the men who filled
the cupboard must go hungry and homeless because it is too
full. Yes, this is why we starve in the midst of abundance,
and the first duty of the working-class is to make good its
claim to the fruits of its labour : it must conquer the cup
board.
The Socialist proposal is to take the land and capital
from the private individuals who now unrighteously own
them, and put them under the control of the community,
and use them for the benefit of the workers. Capital must
be the handmaid of labour, not its master. The resources
of civilization must be used to benefit the people, not to
grind profit out of them, as now. The aim of society must
be to so dispose of the labour and resources of the com
munity as to secure a fair living to all who labour for it.
Socialism is based on the principle that as all society is
maintained by labour, all should do a fair share of it. The
bread we eat, the houses we live in, and the coals we burn
are all produced by labour. If we use these things, we
ought to produce them, or do some useful service to those
who do. If we use these things, and live in idleness, we
are stealing them. All we eat and drink and wear is made
by labour, and if we eat without labouring we are stealing
from some one else who has laboured. We should all do
our fair share of the world’s work ! No man is too good
to toil for his living; no man is so bad that he should be
cheated out of his living when he has toiled for it.
The Defence of Property.
Whenever this doctrine of
Socialism is stated a certain class of people cry out “ Confis
cation !” “ You want to take men’s savings from them !”
“You want the drunken and thrtftless kept at the expense of
the industrious and careful I” All these parrot cries totally
ignore the fact that to-day the thriftless are living on the
�Property
and
Co-operation.
18
industrious, and that the whole string of evils they charge us
with trying to bring about are here already, and we are
trying to abolish them. When we attack the capitalists our
opponents never defend the proper culprit: they bring up
the workman with £100 saved, and try to turn prejudice
against us by alledging that this would be confiscated. But
the difference between a large capitalist and a workman with
a savings bank account is very great and quite clear. The
workman has earned his small capital; the other has not.
Of course the taking of interest is wrong, no matter to what
extent it may be carried. It must, also, be borne in mind
that in dispossessing the landlord and capitalist we are not
taking from them anything that they wish to use. We simply
deprive them of the power of making others work for them.
It is curious to notice how strong the blind greed for property
is in the minds of those who have only a little. It is not the
Baring or the Rothschild who is most bitter against Socialism.
The kind of man who is fiercest in defence of the rights of
property is the small shopkeeper who, perhaps, is £100 in
debt. The silly scramble of modern days has frightfully
narrowed mens’ notions of the real aim and pleasures of life.
If the rich were to-morrow deprived of all the property they
wrongfully hold, and set to work under decent circumstances
for their living, it would be the best thing that ever happened
to them. The true nobility a man can attain is by making
himself useful to his fellows, and this distinction would be
placed within reach of everybody by Socialism.
The Co-operative Movement. 'The easiest line of thought
towards Socialism is by considering what the Co-operative
movement has done. Had anyone suggested thirty years
ago that this movement would accomplish the revolution that
it has in such a space of time, and by such humble agents,
he would have been laughed at as a fool, or jeered at as an
Utopian—just as Socialists are laughed and jeered at now.
But by steady patient work a great change has been brought
about, the petty shopkeeping class has been greatly lessened,
an enormous amount of labour saved, and the process of
distribution greatly simplified. But still the biggest part of
the work has been left untouched. Distributive co-operation
shows the workman the best and wisest way to spend his
wages—once he has got them. Important as this is, the
�14
A Plea
for
Socialism.
question of how to get a just wage, or any wage at all, is still
more important ; but co-operation at present cannot touch
this question. Here Socialism steps in to finish what Co
operation began. Indeed Socialism is but the full and
genuine development of co-operation. We have introdoced
Co-operation to the shop and the store ; now we must extend
it to the mine, the factory, and the farm.
Is it practicable ? Great difficulties lie in the way of
Socialism, and much hard earnest work will be needed to
bring it about. These difficulties are not due to Socialism
being very Utopian, or very incomprehensible. Socialism is
merely the application of common sense and justice to social
order, but justice and common sense are strange and un
known in these days, when veiled fraud and oppression reign
supreme. Socialism would be simpler and easier to work, so
far as the mere industrial arrangements are concerned, than
the present system. Indeed we should try to make
society as simple in its mechanism and our own lives as
unpretentious as may be. The greatest curse of the present
system is its unnecessary complexity of organisation, and the
conflicting interests which Economists pretend are in har
mony. The first step towards Socialism is to make
Socialists ; to get together a great organisation of all who
accept the principle. Different schools of Socialists may
suggest different ways of realising the new society, but
their differing in that respect is a hopeful sign, as it
shows diversity and even some originality of thought. All
Socialists agree that the principles of competition and
monopoly now holding sway should be done away with, and
superseded by a general and thorough-going co-operation.
In fact we want a nation in which there are neither
masters nor servants, but where all are fellow-workers. A
solid combination of the Socialist movement could bring
a tremendous power to bear on the politics of this country.
That power should be used, not so much in bringing to pass
petty measures, as in forcing the hand of the upper class.
The futility of compromise. There is a class of wellintentioned reformers who are puzzling themselves to find
a way of benefiting the poor without interfering with the
rich. It is self-evident that this is a fruitless endeavour.
�The
future of
Socialism.
15
The robbery of the poor by the rich is the first aim of
capitalist production.It may be wrong
for the poor to
rob the rich ; it maynearly be as wrong for the rich to
rob each other; but for the rich to rob the poor is the
most abominable of all systems. There can be no peace
between the two classes. The poor must cast off the
leeches which are draining the life’s blood from them.
The rich are really parasites on the workers. The dis
tinctions of class must be abolished, for they only mean
the right of the rich to rob and the duty of the poor to
submit. But, although no peace can be between them, a
peaceable settlement might be effected. The rich should
be told by the toilers, “ Now, you have lived a long time
at our expense, and we find that it is bad for both of
us—it wearies you with elegant and enforced idleness, and
it burdens us with overwork. We don’t want to hurt you
for your past misdeeds, because for the most part you
were unconscious of the evil you were doing, but you
must do different in future. Those of you who are
entirely useless, and most of you are, so we fear, we will
keep in moderate comfort. We will give work to those
of you who are able and willing to do it (and that is
more than you gave us') ; a training to those who are
willing and not able ; and the gaol or the lunatic asylum
to those who are able and not willing.” These are the
only terms on which this antagonism can be settled. It
is nearly 2,000 years since St. Paul said, “ He that will
not work, neither shall he eatand surely it is time we
put the principle into operation.
The future of the Socialist party. Everything points to the
rapid growth of the Socialist party in this country. It lays
definite principles before the people, and though these, as
they require some independent thought and enthusiasm, may
take some time to win acceptance, they make a deep and
lasting impression where they do take hold. As time goes on
and the difficulty and hardships which the present system im
poses on the workers are more keenly felt, they will find out
how shallow and ineffective is the hand-to-mouth policy of the
ordinary politician. Times are coming when plain honest
words and upright action will be needed to save the country
from the horrors of a revolt of miserable and desperate people.
�16
A Plea
for
Socialism.
That revolution will come upon us, there can be no doubt.
Its shadow is already cast over us. Socialists do not wish to
make or to carrse a revolution: they only wish to point out
that revolution, bred of the misery and inherent injustice of
the present system, is inevitable. If the people are left un
organised and ignorant, revolution may well seem a terror to
all men. But we look to the coming change. We are pre
paring to. meet it with a combined and intelligent people, a
people wise enough to know their rights, strong enough to
enforce them, and disciplined enough to guard them. We
are carrying a message of hope to the poor, of comfort to the
outcast, of joy to the desolate. We bid them lay aside
despair, to take courage, and gather strength, for the time is
at hand when, with enlightenment and determination, they
may end for ever the folly, and crime, and misery in which
their lives are now spent, and realise a noble, fraternal, social
life, with labour, leisure, and liberty for all; a life in which
we shall have
“ Man without a master, and earth without a strife,
And every soul rejoicing in the sweet and bitter of life.”
Single copies of this
address on receipt
sale or distribution
50 copies 3/-; one
THE
pamphlet will be sent to any
of threehalf-pence. Parcels for
at cheaper rates : ioo copies, 5/-;
dozen copies post free 1/-
“COMMONWEAL, ”
Official Journal of the Socialist League.
A thorough-going weekly labour paper : contains a re
view of the labour struggle and Socialist movement
throughout the world; criticism on current political
events; revolutionary poetry; review of books on the
labour question ; and articles on science, art, history,
and political economy in their bearing on labour
questions.
ONE PENNY WEEKLY.
�
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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A plea for socialism : delivered in the course of a socialist campaign amongst the miners on strike in Northumberland, 1877
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Mahon, J. L.
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Advertisement for the "Commonweal", the Official Journal of the Socialist League, on end page. Printed by J. Beale, St. Andrew's Street, Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
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The "Commonweal"
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1887
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T467
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Socialism
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Text
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English
Addresses
Miners
Northumberland
Socialism
Speeches
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Text
A
'■
, .
.
■ \
SUMMARY
OF THE
PRINCIPLES OF SOCIALISM
Written for the Democratic Federation,
BY
H» M, Hyndman
and
William Morris,
LONDON!
THE MODERN
13
AND 14,
PRESS,
PATERNOSTER
1884.
ROW, E.C.
��A SUMMARY
OF THE
PRINCIPLES OF SOCIALISM.
O OCIALISM, as a social and political system, depends
altogether upon the history of mankind for a record
of its growth in the past, and bases its future upon a
knowledge of that history in so far as it can be accura
tely traced up to the present time. The groundwork
of the whole theory is, that from the earliest period of
their existence human beings have been guided by the
power they possessed over the forces of nature to
supply the wants arising as individual members of any
society.
Thus Socialism rests upon political economy in its
widest sense—that is, upon the manner in which wealth
is produced and distributed by those who form part of
society at a given time. Slavery, for instance, arose
when men had reached such a point in the progress
of the race that each labourer could produce by his
work for a day, a week, a month, or a year more than
was needed to keep him in health during that period.
Then captives in war, instead of being killed, were
enslaved, and the fruits of their labour, over and above
their necesssary food, were taken by the conquering
tribe; for though slavery arose in the nomadic state the
�earliest form of co-operation and ownership was by a
tribe; and in the tribal relations common property was
the rule alike in the soil and in the produce of labour.
As this common property broke up owing to the pro
gress of the economical forms, the growth of exchange,
the superiority of individuals or families in war or in
the chase, classes or castes were gradually formed, resting
in the first instance upon a necessary division of labour,
though often existing, as in village communities, where a
modified form of common property was still the rule.
Thence,again,institutions developed through custom and
law; religion sanctifying what had previously been found
to be on the whole necessary or expedient. These
institutions, though arising from the material power of
man over nature, had in turn a great influence upon the
manner in which that power was used, and appeared
as the conservative side of human development con
flicting with the progressive or revolutionary side,
which necessarily follows upon the improvement and
adaptation of the methods of producing food and wealth.
From this essential and constant antagonism arises the
conflict between classes in every civilisation of which
we have any knowledge; and upon the struggles due
to this conflict all progress has hitherto depended.
A slight consideration will serve to show that this
is the true explanation of the growth of mankind. The
first object of every animal, man included, is to feed
itself and its offspring ; and man began in the nomadic
state by feeding upon fruits and berries. That the
growth from the early brutish habits upwards to the
taming of beasts and ordered agriculture was the
process, not of thousands but of millions of years, is
�5
now admitted by all scientific writers on the records of
primeval man. But the need for food was followed by
the need for clothing, for warmth, for shelter; and each
of these wants corresponded in turn with changing forms
of social life as they were gratified. The whole, in fact,
moved in one piece as the economical forms developed :
the nomadic life of the woods and plains ; the common
property of the tribe or clan scanty and insufficient;
the more confined area of operations as agriculture
became an increasing business; the struggle with neigh
bouring tribes about rights of pasture or to obtain
coveted spoils; the earlier or later introduction of slavery
in place of wholesale slaughter of captives; the develop
ment of division of labour and exchange slowly break
ing up the common property ; the institution of private
property in land, rendered necessary by the simul
taneous improvements in agriculture; the increase of
individual wealth, as cultivation and division of
labour progressed on a larger scale, due to money
usury and slave-ownership ; the construction of classes
representing divergent interests; the struggle between
the various classes and those above them; the enormous
development of the slave class and the poorer citizens
in Greece and still more in Rome; the gradual forma
tion of customs, laws, religions growing out of these
ever-changing, ever-progressing, economical forms; the
constant appeals of the privileged orders to these cus
toms, laws, and religious doctrines as the wisdom of
the past not to be rudely shaken by the new-fangled,
subversive theories of revolutionists, who were them
selves but the unconscious exponents of such inevitable
modifications — a careful study of each link in the
�6
chain of this long development, will show clearly how
man in society has been the result of ages on ages of
slow growth, in which the individual is lost in utter
insignificance, and special inventions such as fire, the
wheel, the mining, smelting, and working of metals,
become manifestly but the inevitable results of the social
state which produces them.
Leaving on one side the civilisations of Egypt and
Eastern Asia, important as they are to a knowledge of our
social growth—for only seventy generations of thirty
years each take us back to a period when Britain was
practically unknown, and Roman civilisation was in its
infancy—it is sufficient to deal briefly with the decay of
the Roman Empire, the feudal institutions which
sprang up on its overthrow, and, more in detail, with
the special circumstances which have influenced the
progress of the people of Western Europe to the existing
capitalist rule. The fact that the ancient civilisations
of Greece and Rome were supported by open and
acknowledged slavery of the mass of the producing class,
renders all comparison of democracy, in the modern
sense, with the so-called democracies of Greek or
Roman society utterly futile. The economical and
social conditions are entirely different.
Those Greek republics, which have so often been the
theme for adulation on the part of democratic orators,
poets, and artists, were themselves but close oligarchies;
and the slave-class below was the basis of the whole
super-structure alike at Athens, Corinth, and Sparta.
The very numbers of the slaves show how completely the
social arrangement was accepted as inevitable ; for at
Athens there were at least 120,000 slaves’ to 20,000
�7
citizens, while at Corinth the slaves at one period
numbered 460,000. Moreover, economical causes hav
ing produced slavery, force was long little needed to
maintain the supremacy of the upper classes, who
could carry on their own warfare among themselves
almost undisturbed by fears of a slave revolt. In Rome
the same forms appeared in rather different clothing,
though in both the slaves were often learned, highlytrained men, widely different from the ignorant human
machines whom we are accustomed to associate in our
minds with the word slaves. In Rome, the insurrections
of the slaves were more numerous and more formidable
than in Greece. But, in this case, too, the conflicts
between the various sections of the privileged classes
were almost undisturbed, if we except the great insur
rection of Spartacus, by the efforts at enfranchisement
on the part of the slaves, who rarely timed their risings
well and were massacred wholesale in Italy and Sicily
at comparatively little cost of life to their masters.
Early in the record the slave-industry, controlled by
the powerful landlord-capitalists of Rome and the other
great cities of the Empire, began to crush out and even
to enslave the small freeholders who had arisen on the
break up of the tribes, or who belonged to conquered
nations. Their independent work, with a few slaves
around them, could make no head against the enormous
production for gain which their large competitors carried
on. The Licinian Law, and the agitations of the Gracchi
were meant to protect the vigorous yeomen from forcible
and still more from economical expropriation. But the
movement was too strong to be resisted. Large pro
perties grew steadily larger, and these great farms
�8
ruined not only Italy but other portions of the empire.
The soil, though rich, was exhausted in the course of
generations by ceaseless over-cropping for profit alone;
the slave class of the country supported a useless and
very numerous slave class in the towns ; and the con
dition of the poor, free, Roman citizen became so
bad that economically it could scarcely be worse.
Thus, the prosperity of the whole empire was steadily
sapped, and some regions have scarcely recovered the
process unto this day. The Eastern Provinces, which
had a history of their own even throughout the period
of Roman domination, suffered less than the rest,
whilst they provided the great proprietors of the metro
polis with their luxuries, and thus regained in part by
commerce what they lost by tribute.
The whole system of production and exchange was
such that mercenary armies were needed to replace the
old independent military service. Rome followed in
the path of Carthage. Slowly the economical forms
changed, and afterwards the social and political.
From what seemed to contemporary observers the
most dangerous or most worthless portions of the exist
ing civilisation, a new life arose and progress followed.
Out of the rottenness of the Roman Empire of the
West, the slaves within and the barbarians from with
out formed the nucleus of another society. The spread of
a new revolutionary Asiatic creed, with a higher morality
than the popular forms of Paganism, was accompanied
throughout the empire by a rising spirit among the
slave class which provided its earliest converts, and
the barbarian invaders, driven onwards probably by
the exhaustion of their own sources of food supply found
�that the inhabitants of the territories they overran
almost welcomed them. The downfall of the Roman
Empire of the West was, in short, due to the necessary
growth of fresh forces below, which took the place of
worn-out forms that hampered the advance.
Thenceforward slavery in its old form faded into
modern serfdom; and Catholicism, true to its origin,
strove to uproot both, whilst maintaining an equality of
conditions at the start within its own body. Organised
Christianity exercised, in some sense, as a religion, the
power which had belonged to Rome as a centre of
empire.
In Western Europe, through the long
period of the so-called dark ages—so hard to under
stand even by the full light of modern scientific
research—new methods of production and exchange
were taking the place of the old, new relations were
being established between men as individuals, and men
as classes. The decay of the Roman roads shut off the
new communities to a great extent from one another,
as the disbandment of the legions loosened the bonds of
authority; a new art and a new literature grew up in
each country, founded doubtless on the old, but fresh
and vigorous indeed compared with the bastard work
of servile copyists, which well reflected the degradation
of Greek as well as of Roman civilisation; new laws and
new customs necessarily grew out of the changed con
ditions, notwithstanding the partial influence of the
Roman codes. Above all there was the new religion,
which, rising triumphant over the old pagan creeds, had
nevertheless adopted, perforce, the old pagan ceremo
nial and the old pagan festivities; in the same way
that the serfs and domestic retainers, though holding
�far different relations to their superiors from those of
the slaves to their masters, still used the agricultural
implements and handled almost the same primitive
machines as the slave class, who were, so to say, their
economical ancestors.
Instead of the combined landlord and capitalist con
trolling tens, hundreds, or thousands of toilers on his
estate through a bailiff, we have the disruption again
of village communities of free men—traces of which can
be found in all European countries to this day—develop
ing into a system of serfdom where the serfs were bound
to the soil, but bound also by direct personal relations
to their masters. So, too, as these changes acted and
reacted new class-struggles took the place of the old.
Oppressors and oppressed, dominant and servile, lord
and burgher, master and craftsman, seigneur and serf,
stood in antagonism, as mankind were feeling their way
to a wider economical development. Centuries of dis
integration and reconstruction were needed to bring
forth the complete feudal system ; and the earliest
development of modern trade and commerce took place
on the shores of that great inland sea which for ages
was the cradle of western civilisation. Venice, Genoa,
Pisa, followed in the footsteps of Tyre, Corinth, and
Carthage. Rome, instead of being the metropolis of a
great empire, became the head-quarters of a religious
organisation which exercised an influence that reached
the uttermost parts of the western world.
That the influence of the Catholic Church was, in
the main, used in the interest of the people against the
dominant classes can scarcely now be disputed ; nor
that the equality of conditions to start with in the
�II
organisation itself was one of the great causes of its
extraordinary success throughout the so-called dark ages.
Catholicism, in its best period, raised one continuous
protest against serfdom and usury, as early Christianity,
in its best form, had denounced slavery and usury too. But the economical tendencies were too strong for any.
protest to be much regarded at first. Divison of labour,,
and the structure of society thence resulting, at a time.
when the powers of man over nature were still limited,
gave power and importance to the warrior caste and
the priestly caste over the mere hinds and handicrafts
men. Yet, even in the earliest period of feudalism, the
risings of the trading class, and with them at times the
peasants and artizans, against the nobles and territorial
clergy, were neither few nor far between. The engage
ment of the knight and his retainers to defend the
agriculturists, handicraftsmen, and traders who
clustered round the fortress of which he was the lord,
led to demands on his side which the burghers and their
people resented. In Italy, in Germany, in France, and
in England, the great nobles and their feudatories were
in time confronted by municipalities with privileges
granted in return for services rendered, and the great
cities of Flanders and Western Germany almost rivalled
the Italian Republics in the influence they manifested
of town over country which then first began to be felt in
its modern form. The definite struggle between the
nobility and the bourgeoisie, therefore, took shape at the
same time, though assuming different aspects, in different
countries.
On, the other hand, the unorganised risings of the
peasantry, such as the Peasants’ War in England, the
�12
great insurrections of the J acquerie in France, and of the
serfs in Germany, were the attempts of the proletariat
of the middle-ages to obtain some improvement in their
lot apart from the traders, whose position was of course
very different. The serf of the middle-ages shows but
as a sorry figure, indeed, in all countries, as compared
with that splendid chivalry, whose resplendent armour
and noble individual prowess have been the theme of so
much glorification. Yet, for centuries, these despised
churls provided in the form of food and wares, furnished
by the number of days’ work due to their lord for
nothing, the means of providing all the magnificence
which decked out the baron, the abbot, and the
fair ladies of the court. Everywhere, however, at the
height of the feudal domination, the handicraftsman,
more especially at the later period which preceded its
disruption, was a free man. The contrast between
the position of such a man or the yeoman, and the
villeins, was most striking in every respect. The
latter were mere chattels: the former were independent
men; more independent perhaps in England than the
people as a body have ever been economically, socially,
and politically, at any other period of our history.
For in England—and this it is which renders our
own country the most fitting field for the study of
modern development — the enfranchisement of the
peasantry and their settlement upon the land as free
yeomen, took place at a much earlier date than in any
other nation. These yeomen were in fact the main
stay of England for several hundred years, and their
influence can be traced in our national history long
before the enfranchisement of the serfs as a body. The
�great risings, however, of the fourteenth century,
secured for the mass of our people that freedom and
well-being which made common Englishmen for at
least two centuries the envy of Europe. Serfdom was
almost entirely done away, men were masters of them
selves, their land, and their labour. Labourers and
craftsmen were alike well-paid, well-fed people, who
were not only in possession of the land which they
might occupy and till, but were also entitled to rights of
pasturage over large tracts of common land, since robbed
from their descendants by the meanness of an usurping
class who made laws in their own favour to sanctify
pillage.
England, far more densely peopled at that time than
is generally supposed, was in fact inhabited by perhaps
the most vigorous, freedom-loving set of men the world
ever saw, who, having shaken themselves free from
the slavery of the feudal system, were still untrammelled
by the worse slavery of commercialism and capital.
The economical forms, the methods of production, were
the direct cause of this universal well-being and sturdy
independence. Instead of men working under the con
trol of the landlord or the landlord-capitalist as slaves
or serfs for the sake of wealth and profit for their
owners, the yeomen were owners themselves of their
own means of production, and produced for the use of
the family, only paying a portion of such production as
tithes, or dues, or taxes. Rent, in the sense of a com
petition price paid for the occupation of land, was at
this period almost unknown'in Northern and Western
Europe as well as in these islands.
Production therefore being carried on for use, though
�i4
i
only in primitive fashion with small implements adapted to
individual handling, most of the products being consumed
or worked up into rude manufactures on the farm itself,
only the superfluity after the yeoman and his family
were well-fed and well-clothed came into exchange.
And this exchange itself, like the production, was carried
on by the individual. Craftsmen were economically as
independent as the yeomen and free-labourers, though
laws were early made (happily for many generations
without effect) to limit their powers of combination, and
to keep down the rates of wages which either they or
the agricultural labourers could command. They also
were in control of their means of production, and what
they made was the result of their own labour on raw
materials, which they in turn exchanged for other goods
made by men as free as themselves, or were paid for by
the lord or the abbot. Still the relations were in the
main personal, and not pecuniary, still a man who
earned wages for a day was by no means forced to
compete with his neighbour for hire by an employer as
a wage-earner all his life through.
The trade guilds which in the first instance were
thoroughly democratic in their constitution, protected
the craftsmen against unregulated competition, or from
the attempt to oppress them in any way. Moreover, as
it was easy then for a labourer to obtain a patch of
land, and to remove himself wholly or in part from the
.wage-earners, so a journeyman apprentice starting in
life as a mere worker could and generally did attain to
the dignity of a master craftsman in mature age. The
amount of capital to be amassed ere a man could work
for himself was so small that no serious barrier was
�placed between the journeyman and independence;
besides, the arrangements of the guilds were such that
wherever a craftsmen wandered he was received as a
brother of his particular craft. Although also the rest
of Europe was behind England in the settlement of the
people on the soil, the craft-guilds were even more
important in the Low Countries and part of Germany
in the Middle Ages than in England. Thus it should
appear that in the record of the feudal development the
period reached in each country when the peasant was a
free man working for himself upon the land, and the
craftsman was likewise a free man master of his own
means of production represents the time of greatest
individual prosperity for the people.
England, where this independence was on the whole
earliest developed, presented on this very account a
marked contrast to France where the risings of the
Jacquerie had not resulted so well for the people as our
Own peasant insurrections. In Germany and Italy the
rural population was much behind the townspeople
though in Spain, the early communal forms being there
retained, the peasants were better off. The really
important point is that, under such conditions of pro
duction as those described, where the means of pro
duction are at the disposal of the individual, who also
controls the exchange of the superfluity, perfect
economical freedom, as well as political freedom or
freedom before the law, is possible and indeed cannot be
avoided. Men then had something worth fighting for at
home and abroad, and were quite ready to spend theii" own
blood and their own money in fighting for a cause which
they held to be their own. Vicarious sacrifice of the
�i6
lives of mercenary troops and posterity’s money was
nowise to their minds; they took note that such
methods of warfare were at once cowardly and mean.
The Church as a collective body supplemented the
needs of this thoroughly individualist society. The
services rendered by the monasteries, priories, and
nunneries to the people in the shape of constant em
ployment on their estates, of almsgiving, maintenance of
hospitals, schools, inns, maintenance of roads, have been
systematically depreciated by middle-class historians;
but these semi-socialist bodies were of the highest
value in the economy of the middle-ages, more especially
in England, and the lands which they held were used
and their revenues applied in such manner that during
their most flourishing period the noblest institutions
were kept up by their aid. Permanent pauperism was un
known, and vagrancy was charitably restrained so long
as these institutions were in existence. The services
rendered by them in the direction of art and letters it is
needless to recount.
But at the risk of being compelled to repeat later
what is urged here, it is well to consider at this point
the effect which the full development of the individual
man and his power over his own tools, materials, and
the objects he worked upon, had upon art. The
ordinary opinion seems to be that art is bred and sus
tained by the luxury resulting from the present state of
society, with its monstrous contrasts of riches and
poverty. A very brief survey will be enough to show
the falsity of this notion. The slave-served society of
the classical peoples intellectual and highly-refined but
simple in life, and free, in Greece at any rate, from what
�*7
is now called luxury, looked upon art as a necessity,
and found no serious obstacle in the way of surrounding
the daily life of man with beauty. The rigid caste
system of the feudal hierarchy kept up the most vio
lent arbitrary distinctions between classes, but had no
temptation to extend those distinctions to the minds and
imaginations of men, and no means whereby it could
do so. Thus the artificer was left free to express, ac
cording to his capacity, the ideas which he shared with
the noble, developing as a class a hereditary skill and
dexterity in the handling of the simple tools of the time.
Under the craft-gilds of the latter middle-ages the
industrial arts were divided rigidly into corporations,
but inside those corporations division of labour was
yet in its infancy; so that each fully instructed crafts
man was master of his own handicraft, and was by all
surrounding circumstances encouraged to be an artist
whose labour could not be wholly irksome to him. By
this means the taste and knowledge of what art was
then possible were spread widely among the people and
became instinctive in them, so that all manufactured
articles as it were grew beautiful in the unobtrusive and
effortless way that the works of nature grow. The
result of five centuries of this popular art is obvious in
the outburst of splendid genius which lit up the days of
the Italian Renaissance: the strange rapidity with
which that splendour faded as commercialism advanced
is proof enough that this great period of art was
born not of dawning commercialism but of the freedom
of the intelligence of labour from the crushing weight
of the competition market, a freedom which it enjoyed
throughout the middle-ages.
G
�i8
The exquisite armour of the knights , their swords
and lances of perfect temper, the splendid and often
humorous decorations of the stone and wood-work in
the cathedrals, churches and abbeys, the illuminations
of the missals, the paintings of the time, the manner in
which beautiful designs and tracery nestled even in
places where it might be thought that the human eye
could rarely or never reach, nay, even such frag
ments of ordinary domestic furniture and utensils as
have been preserved, all show that the art of the
middle Ages, like the art of Greece, was something loved
and cherished and made perfect for its own sake, that
beauty welled up unbidden from the spontaneous flow
of the ideas of the time. But just at this period of the
fullest individual perfection the necessities of com
petition, arising out of economical changes in the
conditions of labour which have yet to be traced,
gradually turned the workman from the mediaeval artist
craftsman into the mere artisan of the capitalist sys
tem, and almost entirely destroyed the attractiveness of
his labour ; so that when about the end of the 17th
century the work-shop system of labour which had
pushed out the gild system was struggling to perfect its
speciality, the division of labour namely, wherein the
unit of labour is not a single workman but a group, it
found the romance, the soul, both of the higher and the
decorative arts, gone though the commonplace or
body of them still existed.
How then was the artist-craftsman thus turned into
a mere artisan ? How did the competition arise in such
shape that not free rivalry in the creation of beauty but
fierce antagonism in the greed for gain became the rule of
�19
production ? Once more the economical forms changed
and destruction of the old society was the inevitable
result.
As the feudal system was introduced into different
European countries at different periods, as again
the gradual conversion of serfs into free yeomen
and lifeholders was by no means simultaneous in every
nation, as further the formation of the craft-gilds
varied, so the decay and final disruption of the feudal
system took place at widely separated periods of time.
In England the end of the wars of the Roses saw the
commencement of this rapid disintegration. During
those wars the barons had largely increased the numbers
of their retainers, and had thus impoverished them
selves ; the people as a whole standing aloof from the
bootless and bloody Civil War between the houses of
York and Lancaster. Many of the ancient nobility
were utterly exterminated in the course of the struggle ;
and the successors to their estates, when peace was
finally proclaimed on the accession of Henry VII.,
carried on a process, which had begun even earlier, of
turning out their now useless retainers to shift for
themselves. These people formed the first set of
vagrants and wandering bands, who without house,
home, land or any recognised position in, or claim upon
society, roamed through the country in search of labour
and food. The monasteries, however, were still in full
organisation and provided to a large extent for these
wanderers.
But at the same time pressure was brought to bear
upon the innumerable small farmers and yeomen, common land was ruthlessly enclosed, and the nobles
51
/
�20
adopted every conceivable device to enrich themselves
at the expense of those who had a better title to the
land than they had. Hence more vagrants, more
homeless and a manifest decay in the real strength of
the kingdom. Here again the reasons of the change
were economical. The nobles wanted money to pay
the debts which they had incurred during the wars,
and also to maintain themselves at Court which they
now more regularly frequented; just at this time too
the Flanders market afforded a most profitable outlet
for wool. Hence it was advantageous for the land
holders in every way to remove men and substitute
sheep ; since pasture farming, needed fewer hands than
arable and sheep paid better than human beings. This
process of expropriation therefore' went relentlessly on
during the whole of the latter part of the sixteenth
century in spite of numerous statutes against such
action and the never-ceasing protests of men like More,
Latimer, &c., against the mischief that was being
done. Thus by degrees a landless class was being
formed with no property beyond the bare force of labour
in. their bodies; and these people were slowly driven
into the towns where they formed the germ of our
modern city proletariat.
The breakdown of the feudal system led in almost
every country to the establishment of a despotism,
and England formed no exception to the rule. . Henry
VIII. and Thomas Cromwell answer closely enough
. to Louis XIII. and Richelieu. It was the object of
king and minister alike that the crown should be
. supreme, and to a large extent they succeeded in
attaining it: though Cromwell, less dexterous than the
�31
French minister, lost his own head after having
removed the heads of so many others.
But the
Reformation and the consequent downfal of the monas
teries were the most important events in English
history between the Peasant’s War and the great
industrial revolution at the end of the eighteenth
century. The Reformation in Germany was as far
from being a movement of the people as it was in
England; in France also the Protestants were as little
representative of peasantry as the Catholic nobles.
Luther himself, that fierce champion of individualism,
was a bitter opponent of the peasants in their risings
against the nobles. In fact the Reformation every
where, though partly directed against undoubted
abuses in the church, was a thorough middle-class
movement representing fully middle-class aspirations
for individual aggrandisement here and hereafter.
. In England the king was shrewd enough to put him
self at its head knowing that more solid gain was to be
had by the plunder of the church than by maintaining a
resolute attitude as Defender of a Faith that gave him
nothing and took much. Thus the monasteries were
destroyed, and the king was enabled to reconcile the
barons to this pillage by giving them a good share of
the plunder of the lands of the church and the people.
Nearly one-half of the land of England, which had up
to this time been used to a large extent for public
purposes, now became the property of a number of
nobles and courtiers who recognised little or no duty of
trusteeship, and who even allowed the public roads
which the monks had kept up to go to ruin, as they
suffered the magnificent abbeys to decay or be turned
�22
into quarries for building materials. Henceforth the
people of England had no hold upon their own land;
and all the duties which the monks and nuns had filled
in the economy of the middle-ages fell into abeyance
and were left unperformed. As to the inhabitants of the
monasteries, the monks and nuns, friars and sisters who
were turned out of their houses, they joined the army
of miserable vagrants now yearly increasing on the
public highways. With no means of earning a liveli
hood, they and the discharged retainers, the expropri
ated yeomen and the discharged hinds, were a neverceasing source of annoyance to the classes which had
driven them out to starve ; whilst the very abolition of
the monasteries, which intensified the mischief, deprived
these poor people of their last hope of succour.
Such was the pressure on the peasantry, owing to the
enclosures, the robberies of commons, and the seizure of
the Church Lands, that m spite of the infamous atrocities
wreaked upon all disturbers of order and upon the
wretched vagrants themselves, who were hanged and
disembowelled, tortured and flogged in batches, there
were a whole series of insurrections after the sup
pression of the monasteries, some of which were supported
by the well-to-do, and even, as in the case of the insurrec
tion of the Northern Earls, by the nobles themselves.
The new system of production for profit and constant
competition for wages, involving though it did progress,
in the sense of producing more wealth with fewer
hands, by the division of labour and co-operation, was
thus not introduced without a frightful and bloody class
struggle on the part of the people to maintain their old
individual independence. The risings were put down
�23
with frightful cruelty, however, and the laws against
vagrants who were forced to wander by the changed
conditions of agriculture, were harsher than ever
under the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the monarch
whose reign is supposed to embrace the most glorious
period of English history.
It is worthy of remark also that during the
whole Of the sixteenth century the attempts made
to stop the uprooting of the people from the soil by
law were absolutely unavailing.
The class now
gaining power in the country, namely the landlords
with bailiffs, and the large farmers, who both regarded
the land only as a means of making gain, rode rough
shod over the enactments of Parliament in favour of the
poor; though they took care to give full force to all
those which tended in any way to strengthen their own
power. The same with the rising bourgeoisie, who
rapidly gained influence under Elizabeth, and used it
as far as possible to remove those restrictions upon
usury, and laws in favour of the labourers, which in
the middle-age polity had balanced the futile statutes
against combination. By the end of the sixteenth
•century consequently all was ready in our country for
the gradual formation of a competitive wage-slave class
divorced from the soil and deprived of the means of
production, which class must therefore be in a growing
•degree at the mercy of the classes that possessed the
land and the capital.
The increasing amount of capital also needed for
success in business as the markets grew, and the town
supplied not only the country but foreign lands,
gradually broke down the democratic constitution of
/
�24
the trade-gilds. It was no longer a matter of course
for a capable apprentice and journeyman to become in
due time master of the craft. On the contrary, the
minority, the capitalist masters, exercised increasing
authority within the gild and turned its machinery to
the disadvantage of the poorer members.
Thus,
between the landless proletariat, which was being
created by social and economical oppression, and the
landlords letting land for money-rentals in place of the
old feudal services due to the nobles, the middle or
capitalist class, the bourgeoisie, was growing up, whose
bitter antagonism to the landlords has been carried on,
as the necessary result of economical progress, even to
our own day. Farmers who farmed for profit, and.
merchants and manufacturers who employed their men
to gain a profit from their competitive labour, quite
replaced the simpler economy of the middle ages,
when nearly all were farming or producing for direct
use.
During this period of fearful suffering for the mass
of the people, when the foundations of our modern
capitalist society were laid, the greatest and most
sudden development of commerce ever seen on the
planet took place, and international production and
exchange gradually overshadowed the old national
markets and methods of working up home products.
The discovery of America and of the new route round the
Cape to India and China, the conquest of Mexico and
Peru, the conquest of Asia Minor by the Ottoman
Turks, all took place within two generations.
A
new world of adventure, a new world of thought, were
opened up before mankind. A flood of the precious
�25
metals was poured into Europe from America giving in
many ways increased power to the trading and profit
making class, and increasing the accumulation of
capital. The spoils of Mexico and Peru, the wealth ol.
all kinds gained by commerce, forced on the develop
ment at headlong speed. Spain was ruined by the
very circumstances which gave her strength. The
Italian cities lost their commercial supremacy from this
time forward, owing in part to the decay of Asia
Minor and the breakdown of the overland connection .
with the East, following upon the Turkish rule, and
partly to the change in the relative importance of the
trade to America and the West Indies. In consequence
England, France, Spain, Portugal, and the Low
Countries became the chief competitors for the com
merce of the world, Venice lending her spare capital to
the Dutch at good rates of interest, thus encouraging
the very competition that must eventually ruin her.
Hence arose the commercial wars and commercial
rivalries of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, in
which Spain at the first had every apparent advan
tage.
Meanwhile in England feudalism had been com
pletely destroyed as a system, and commercialism was
being substituted. Keeping pace with the change in ■
the forms of production, progress in all directions
helped on the new development. The spread of
printing destroyed the monopoly of letters which had
been enjoyed by the clergy and the learned of high'
rank ; the application of gunpowder to war rendered
the common man-at-arms the superior of the most
gorgeously equipped knight. Thus the increase of
t-
�26
general knowledge sapped superstition, and the
musket swept away the last relics of warrior chivalry.
As the markets expanded also, the results of these
great changes in every direction became more and more
apparent. The miserable state of the internal com
munications forced Englishmen more and more into
foreign commerce, which was rendered exceptionally
profitable, not only by the discovery of new markets
that gave great returns to the trader, but also by the
useful adjuncts of piracy and slavery. To keep pace with
this growth of commerce wider organisation of labour
was needed, and, therefore, as already stated, the group
of workmen toiling under the superintendence of
the master, with a more and more regulated
division of labour, supplanted the old handi
craft.
Workshops grew larger and larger, small
factories were formed in certain trades. The workmen
ceased to own any portion of their own product: that, as
a whole, went into the hand of the employer who paid for
a part of its value in wages ; in the same way the agri
cultural labourer ceased to have any interest in the
crops which he raised: they, too belonged to the far
mer, subject to a deduction, for rent to the landlord;
and the labourer also received a part of the value of
his labour in wages. Production had become or was
rapidly becoming social: appropriation and exchange
remained under the control of the individual.
During the whole of the seventeenth and the first
half of the eighteenth century this process went on.
Organised handicraft, factory industry, and house
industry, were still to be seen together. A good many
yeomen remained in some districts, but they were becom-
�ing continually less numerous; though the agricul
tural regions were still much more populous than the
towns, and so remained until the end of the eighteenth
century. On every side commerce was the one prevail
ing object, and to that all was subordinated. Religion
naturally adapted itself to the tone of the time; and the
Protestantism of England became what it has ever since
remained—essentially a creed for the successful trafficker
in wares or in souls.
All through Europe the system of to-day in credit,
competition, and national rivalry was practically
established, and the era of foreign conquest and
colonial empire began.
But still the conflict
of the middle-class against the king and the landed
aristocracy loomed ahead. Wise sovereigns had shown
true policy in yielding to and even in fostering the grow
ing power. Others, perhaps more upright but certainly
less dexterous, precipitated the struggle. In England it
first took shape in serious organised warfare. The
bloody civil war of the seventeenth century was clearly
a, struggle between the ideas of divine right and land
owner supremacy on the one side, against the sanctity of
profit and freedom for the middle-class on the other.
The economical victory already gained in the counting
house was but confirmed in the field; and the reign of
Cromwell served as an introduction to the thorough
middle-class rule of William III.
From this time forward the question was merely
how long it would take for the middle-class to
establish in outward seeming that supremacy which,
in regard to production, they had already to a large
extent secured. Their power was still somewhat
�28
hampered by the relics of the old middle-age
restrictions even after the accession Of William ol
Orange and the House of Brunswick had virtually pro
claimed that capitalism, with its debt funded for
payment by posterity, its standing mercenary army,
and its worldwide international production and
exchange, had become master of the economical, and, in
the strict sense, social field. But division of labour
was carried farther and farther, trade and commerce
developed exceedingly, the settlements in America and
the factories in India helped on the growth, until in the
eighteenth century, the period had manifestly arrived
fpr yet another development which would enable the
productive forces to supply the ever-growing market.
Prior to this new manifestation of the powers of man
over nature and of the method in which, under such
social conditions, as now existed, these powers were
turned to the sole advantage of a class, the condition of
the English worker was better than it had been at any
period since the fifteenth century. His wages both in
town and country bore a higher ratio to the cost of
living than at any intermediate time. Agriculture had
recovered in some degree from the depression of the.
sixteenth century, owing to the demand for cereals in
the growing comercial cities; and the artisan, under the.?
division of labour and the group system of factory pro-,
due <. ion, was in a more favourable position than he had
been when home competition was more severe and
foreign markets were less open.
In France, on the contrary, the peasantry had not
gained ground against the barons to nearly the same,
extent, nor were the bourgeoisie nearly so advanced in
�29
their political struggle as the corresponding classes in
England. Though the serfs had to some degree been
settled upon the land, the oppression of the nobles and
the pressure of taxation, owing to the wars of
Louis XIV., ground down the poor to a level wholly
unknown on this side of the Channel. Moreover, the
rush of speculation and commercialism produced a far
more rapid and complete deterioration of the character
of the whole upper classes in Paris, and in France
generally, than it did in London and England.
' Thus at the end of the eighteenth century France was
fully prepared for a political and social, England was
more ready for an industrial, revolution. The ideas of the
time were much the same in both countries ; but whereas
our middle-class had taken order with their king and his
aristocrats in the seventeenth century, and capital had
secured its firm foothold at that time alike in town and
country, France had yet to pass through a whole series
of events parallel to what had already taken place here
generations before. The English Revolution, the
American War of Independence, stirring the minds of
the middle-class and the people, the utter degradation of
the French nobility by the scenes in the Rue Quincampoix occasioned by their endeavours to make gain out
of Law’s Mississippi scheme and similar ventures, the
destruction of faith in the prevailing religion among the
educated by Voltaire and Rousseau, and the Encyclopae
dists, the prevailing misery among the entire population,
which was totally disregarded by the nobles and the
court, were factors that all tended relentlessly to a
political overthrow.
.
. ’ .
The change in the conditions of the time had not
�30
been recognised. Those economical and social dis
placements which had already prepared the revolution
in the body of society had passed unheeded; and
thus the French Revolution, which was clearly
predicted by a few careful observers, came upon
the world at large as a surprise. It was a rising against
a tyranny alike corrupt, mean, and obsolete. Its
influence spread rapidly at first and, coming after the
noble American Declaration of Independence, produced
a great effect in every European country, not least in
England. That glorious struggle for Liberty, Equality,
and Fraternity, which began in 1789, that temporary
alliance of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat,
though it gave rise to some splendid episodes for
the people, ended in victory for the bourgeoisie
alone. The really great names of the French revo
lution have, of course, been honoured by middle
class abuse. Napoleon, the hero of reaction, used the
enthusiasm born of revolution to spread his self
seeking imperialism through Europe, and enabled
reactionists in other countries to pose as the champions
of national freedom.
The effect of the great revolutionary war upon Eng
land, and the increased power which the long conflict
placed in the hands of the aristocratic and capitalist
classes, was most disastrous from every point of view.
Political progress was thrown back nearly a century,
social reforms were indefinitely postponed, and the
new industrial forces went almost without heed or pro
test into the hands of the profit-making class. And
these industrial forces were of a magnitude, and pro
duced effects the like of which had never been seen in
�3i
the world before. As the great geographical and mer
cantile discoveries at the end of the sixteenth century,
with the rapid development of shipping, ended by
giving England the control of commerce ; so the great
inventions at the end of the eighteenth century resulted
in giving this country the lead in industry. But the
effect upon the people was terrible almost from the
beginning. At first a few benefited by the increased
powers of production alike in labouring on the land and
with respect to working up raw materials.; and the initial
steps were taken towards the formation of an aristocracy
of labour to protect, by means of secret societies,
the interests of the skilled artisans. But the power of
machinery soon broke down these earlier combinations.
The cottage industry was ere long completely de
stroyed. In every branch of trade the development
became so extraordinary that nothing but a constant
supply of fresh hands to work the machines, and in turn
an improvement of machines to restrain the demands of
the hands could keep pace with the growing markets
opened by the increasing cheapness of production.
Competition took another great stride in advance.
Poor Irishmen, driven from their own country by land
lord rascality and oppression, came in to compete at the
lowest standard of life with the already impoverished
Englishmen. Towns grew in magnitude with amazing
rapidity as steam and greater knowledge of the use
of water power increased the size of the factories and
the number of, men, women, and children who could
work under the control of one employer. From being
an agricultural country England in the course of fifty
or sixty years became essentially a country of great.
�32
cities with a proletariat under the control of the capitalist
class in a worse condition (this all official reports show)
than any slave class of ancient times had ever lived in.
For ere long the capitalist class, now almost at the
height of its economical power, had swept away entirely
the restrictions imposed by the middle-age polity.
Freedom of contract between the pauper and the
plutocrat, unrestrained competition between men and
women in order that they might be able to get enough
out of the product of their labour merely to keep body
and soul together, wholesale slaughter of children by
overwork and insufficient nourishment in unhealthy,
overheated factories and ill-ventilated mines—the whole
system was based upon never-ending oppression of the
most horrible kind. Wages fell in proportion to the
cost of living at the very time when enormous fortunes
were being accumulated in the cotton, wool, silk, iron,
and other industries. Women and children were
brought in to reduce the wages of their own fathers and
brothers by competing for under-pay.
The legislature, under the direct control of the
classes interested in maintaining this atrocious slavery
under the guise of freedom, refused at first even to
bring in laws to prevent babes from three to nine years
of age from being worked fourteen,fifteen, sixteen hours
a day. Capital had full swing in every direction and
ground down the body of the people into a hopeless
degradation from which they have never yet emerged.
Risings there were from time to time in the earlier part
of this century against this fearful oppression brought
about by sheer greed for gain. But they were all unsuc
cessful, and not until the half of the century had passed
�33
away were any effective laws enacted, at the instance
of such men as Robert Owen, to check the capitalist
class in their furious haste to be rich at the expense of
the men, women, and children, whom they robbed
wholesale of their labour and ruined in their health.
For now man was slave to the machine, no longer a
free agent in any sense. Division of labour in the
workshop faded into the great factory industry ; and
machines, as they were introduced, served not to
benefit the community and lessen the amount of
labour needed to produce wealth but absolutely
to increase the hours of labour, to degrade the workers
more and more, and, by frequently throwing hands out into
street, gradually to form a fringe of labour, ever on the
verge of pauperism—ready to take the lowest wages,
even when an impetus to trade rendered the capitalist
class anxious for more hands. This introduction of
machinery, this complete domination of the capitalist
class and sweeping expropriation of the labour of the
workers, piled up the wealth for the few which enabled
us to come out triumphant from the great war.
But whence came the wealth thus accumulated by
the few out of the labour of others—by the capitalist
farmers in the country, by the capitalist factory owners
and loiterers in the towns ? Out of the excessive
labour of the workers who were hopelessly divorced from
the means of production, and were compelled to sell their
labour-force to the capitalist for the lowest subsistence
wages. The economical law of such competition
among the workers as that which has gone on in
England since the end of the eighteenth century, is
admitted by the capitalists, and their fuglemen, the
D
�political economists, themselves. The one object of
production being production for profit, the capitalist
of course buys the labour-force which the needy
worker is driven to sell at the lowest possible price in
wages. This price, it is now agreed, corresponds on
the average to the social needs represented by the
standard of life in the class to which the seller of the
labour-force belongs. At times the wages may, and do,
fall far below this level of necessary subsistence, at
other times combination among the workers, or a period
of exceptionally prosperous trade, may temporarily raise
them above this level. But the tendency is always as
stated ; nor does the existence of an aristocracy of
labour modify the truth of the proposition. But when the
capitalist, whether a farmer or a factory-lord, has
bought the destitute worker’s labour-force on the
market, he does so with the intention of applying it to
the growing of his crops, or to the manufacture of the
raw materials which he has purchased at their market
value. Labour-force embodied in commodities, the
cost of production or re-production, that is, of articlesreckoned useful in the social conditions of the time, is
the basis and measure of their average exchange-value
when brought forward for exchange. In the first two or
three hours of the day’s work, however, the labouring class
whose labour-force is thus purchased, refund to the em
ploying class the full value ofthe wages which they receive
in return for the whole day’s work. But the entire
product of the day’s work, or the week’s work, or the
month’s work, or the year’s work, is at the control of
the capitalist who thus appropriates two-thirds or three
quarters of the labourers’ work without paying for it.
�35
In the factory, that is to say, and to an ever increas
ing degree on the farm, the labourers work as a portion
of an association ; their labour is socialised in the
highest degree. But both their products and the
exchange of their products are at the disposal of
individuals who compete with one another for gain
above, as the workers compete against one another for
bare subsistence below.
Here then are the two main features of our modern
system of production for profit. First. The labourers on
the average replace the value of their wages for the
capitalist class in the first few hours of their day’s work ;
the exchange value of the goods produced in the remaining
hours of the day’s work constitutes so much embodied
labour which is unpaid; and this unpaid labour so
embodied in articles of utility, the capitalist class, the
factory owners, the farmers, the bankers, the brokers,
the shopkeepers, and their hangers-on the landlords,
divide among themselves in the shape of profits,
interests, discounts, commissions, rent, &c. Second.
The other feature is the antagonism between the
socialised method of production and the individualised
system of exchange. This brings about unmitigated
anarchy in the shape of a world-wide crisis every ten
years, which throws labourers out of work when they
are as anxious to toil for subsistence as ever they were;
and piles up quantities of goods which these very
labourers are eager to buy, but which owing to the
crisis they cannot earn the means of purchasing,
because the capitalist class will not employ them unless
a profit is to be made, and this profit is rendered
impossible by the very glut of the goods. Such crises
�3^
have now occurred every ten years since 1825, and
owing to these, men and women have been continually
thrown out of work and flung into misery from no fault
whatever of their own.
The introduction of fresh machines is similarly against
workers, tending as it does to increased uncertainty of
employment and to reduce skilled workers to a lower class.
Thus the tendency is to produce not merely a destitute
proletariat forced to remain as a class wage-slaves to
their m isters, body-slaves to the machine, their life long;
but also a fringe of labour employed at scant wages
in “ good times,” thrown into pauperism and starvation
in bad. Hence freedom of contract between those who
have no means of production, and those who have a
monoply of them, simply involves the most terrible
economical tyranny the world has yet seen : the surplus
value provided under this illusory freedom out of unpaid
labour enables the idle classes and their dependants to
live in luxury at the expense of persistent overwork and
misery for the producers themselves.
Thus individual exchange uncontrolled by thought of
collective advantage brings about fearful anarchy in
every direction, which is a satire indeed upon the
middle-class cuckoo cry of “order, order.”
Children are ill-nurtured and underfed, women are
worked to within a few hours of pregnancy, the condi
tions of existence for the mass of the people are such
that health, happiness, and morality are impossible, and
still the capitalist class and their champions, the political
economists, tell us that such is the inevitable outcome of
our mock civilisation. Nor is there any real standard
of honour among the competitors for wealth themselves.
�37
Having robbed the labourers wholesale of their labour,
they proceed to rob one another by underselling, adulter
ation and fraud. As a general result of the system mere
pecuniary relations are paramount. How to make money
is the be-all and end-all of this ruinous system of com
petitive production for profit. Love, honour, ability,
beauty, all are in the market—going, going, going, gone 1
knocked down to the highest bidder.
Art! that necessarily fades under such conditions ;
and machine-work, literally and figuratively, is the pro
duct of the time. This has been gradually brought about
through the operation of the economical forms whose
development has been briefly traced.
Throughout
the 18th century the idea that the making of goods is
the end and aim of manufacture still struggled, with
ever-increasing feebleness, against the real view of
capitalism, that manufacture has no essential aim
save profit for the capitalist-class, and mere occu
pation for the workman: occupation, that is, daily
leisureless labour with no pretence to attractiveness in
it, rewarded by a livelihood whose standard is forced
down by competition, to the lowest point which will be
endured without active discontent.
This view is accepted as a matter past discussion by
the fully-developed capitalism of the 19th century which
has in its turn supplanted the workshop, with its groups
of workmen each skilled in a narrow round of labour,
by the factory with its machines tended by women
and children or by a mere labourer of whom neither
skill nor intelligence is necessarily required. This
system withits unavoidable consequence that the greater
and (commercially) more important part of the wares it
�38
produces are made for the consumption of poor
and degraded people without leisure or taste wherewith
to discern beauty, without money or labour to
pay for excellence of workmanship—this system makes
labour so repulsive and burdensome that art, in the long
run, is impossible under it. Instead of the pleasant,
intellectual, fruitful labour of the middle-ages, we have
the barren, hideous drudgery of the factory and the
cotton-mill. While it lasts all the ordinary surround
ings of life must of necessity be ugly and brutal, and
’ what of art is left for a time, depending as it does, not on
' its own life, but on the memory of past days of glory
" and beauty, must be produced by men of exceptional
' gifts, living isolated amidst the ugliness and brutality of
' their own time and protesting against the spirit of their
own age. Thus the capitalist system threatens to dry
up the very springs of all art, that is, of the external
beauty of life, and to reduce the world to a state of
barbarism.
The proletariat, however, as already remarked, were
not crushed into this helplessness in England without
having struggled against the meanest tyranny that ever
oppressed them. From the end of the last century, when
Trade Societies were established throughout the king
dom, vainly endeavouring to make head against the
steadily growing power of capital, the working classes
kept up an increasing agitation in favour of a more
reasonable lot for themselves and their children.
Another serious class fight had begun. What the
workers saw was this: — that the introduction of
machinery, though it might give wealth to the capitalist
class and to the country at large, brought with it for them
�39
^starvation and intolerable misery, owing to the displace
ment of the old methods and the competition of the
labour of women and children with that of grown men.
During the first three-quarters of the eighteenth cen
tury also the people, as we have seen, were on the whole
better off, their wages would buy them more and better
food and raiment than for two centuries before. Con
sequently the pressure being sudden was more severely
felt and more vigorously resisted than it is to-day. The
'workers saw that the unregulated introduction of
machines meant for them ruin; as Sir James Steuart,
the famous economist, plainly stated it must, ten years
before the publication of “The Wealth of Nations.”
They, therefore, in the first place attacked the machines
themselves ; and bands of workpeople under the name of
Luddites destroyed machinery in many industrial centres,
with the impression that thus they were striking
heavy blows at the real enemy. As a matter of course
their adversaries were not the inert machines, which
"only produced more wealth at the cost of less and less
expenditure of human labour, but the class appropria
tion of these improvements which gave to the labourers,
owing to competition among themselves for employment,
a less and less proportionate share of the wealth
created.
For the cheapening of the products did not benefit
the workers as a class. It only enabled them to take a
lower average wage in times of pressure without ab
solute starvation; whilst the uncertainty arising from
constant improvements and the competition of their
own families rendered their position even worse than
the mere amount of wages for long hours and excessive
�40
overwork would betoken. Thus the very circumstances
which should have bettered their condition and rendered
their life more easy, actually pressed them down to a
K ,< lower standard of existence.
Not until 1802 was any step taken to recognise even
that children were overworked, and the Act then
passed was wholly abortive. In 1814 the capitalist
class even succeeded in removing the last vestige of the
old restrictions notwithstanding the overwhelming array
of petitions from the workers against any such action.
At this time it must be remembered that all combina
tions among the workers to raise wages, or to strike for
any reason whatsoever, were illegal. Soon afterwards
the great war came to an end which had so much
strengthened the power of the landowners, farmers and
capitalists, at the expense of the people; and with its
termination, and the consequent collapse of the fic
titious prosperity created for certain classes, came a
period of even greater pressure upon the people. From
1817 to 1848 was therefore one of almost continuous
turmoil. The middle-class were striving to secure their
complete control over the House of Commons by a
limited extension of the suffrage, and a disfranchise
ment of rotten boroughs; the wage-earners were
combining in all directions to obtain the suffrage for
their class, but also to relieve themselves from the
hideous economical injustice they suffered under.
Riots in the towns and rick-burnings in the country
were frequent.
The time of the fiercest struggle was shortly after the
enaction of the Reform Bill of 1832. Then the effect
of the New Poor Law, the constant immigration from
�41
Ireland owing to economical causes due to landlord
oppression, and the continuous operation of capitalism,
produced such distress that from 1835 to 1842 the country
was described by a careful foreign observer as in a state
of permanent revolt. Now it was that a portion of the
middle-class made common caus with the workers in
their agitation; that the Trade Unionists free to com
bine since 1824, acted in concert to a great extent
with the rank and file of labourers; and that utopian
Socialism, in the shape of schemes for the nationalisa
tion of the land, inherited from Spence and others, as
well as Robert Owen’s plans of co-operation, began to
be recognised as a definite school.
The Trade Unionists at this time were the advanced
guard of the working class party ; and although, early
in the day, the sense of superiority to the unskilled
workers began to show itself among the members, much
of the success which was obtained could never have
been got without their aid. Thus the gradual enaction
and enforcement of Factory Acts, in favour of the
restriction of the labour of women and children within
more reasonable limits as to the number of hours worked,
the rights of free meeting and a free press, were
obtained owing in large part to the steady organised
support given by the Trade Unionists to these mea
sures. In the chartist agitation also which was a
decided movement of the proletariat against the
landlord and capitalist class many Trade Unionists
took an active share, as also in the serious risings
which occurred in Wales, Manchester, Birmingham,
Nottingham and elsewhere.
But for the counter-agitation got up by the capitalists
�42
in favour of Free Trade in corn it is even possible that
the Chartists and Socialists together might have
■achieved, at any rate, a temporary success for the cause
of the people. As it was the Corn Law League drawing
the people off on a false scent—for all can see nowadays
that cheap food meant little more than increased profits
for the capitalist class—the leaders were left almost
without followers; and though in 1848 the renewed stir
on the Continent of Europe gave the workers in this
country every encouragement and an exceptional
opportunity, they failed to resuscitate the energetic
movement of 1842. In fact almost the only great result of
all the long series of agitations for the benefit of the
workers was the final settlement and consolidation in
1852 of the Factory Act of 1847.
' .
But 1848 on the Continent of Europe was a far more
important date than in England. Then first, it may be
said, since Babceufs conspiracy in 1796,—for the
Days of July ” in 1830 in Paris or the outbreak at
Lyons in 1834.were comparatively trifling—did the pro
letariat again show that it had interests which were not
pnly not in accord with, but diametrically hostile to
the interests of the middle class. All over Europe
scientific, as distinguished from mere utopian, Socialism
now began to be felt beneath the efforts for
national independence.
The famous Communist
Manifesto of Marx and Engels which first formulated
in a distinct shape the great truth of the inevitable
Struggle of classes so long as classes exist, the agitations
of Blanqui and the theories of Louis Blanc, Ledru
Rollin, &c., all pointed to an international combination of
' the workers in the interests of the labouring class
�43
which should have a far wider, nobler and more
beneficial influence than endeavours, however glorious,
for mere national independence. It was Socialism as
an organised force based upon the sure ground of
science and political economy which frightened the
statesmen of all countries far more than any idea of
mere national movements in which class gradations
Would still be maintained.
The time was not yet. The middle class triumphed
not only in England but in every European country, the
thousands who fell fighting for the people in Paris died
vainly for the time, and the bourgeoisie gladly supported
order ” under President, King, or Emperor, which
ensured the butchery of the champions of the proletariat
and made them certain of the continuance of the
universal reign of production for profit and the conse
quent wage-slavery of the mass of the producers in all
lands. From 1848 onwards, however, Socialism itself,
international, organised Socialism, has been a moral,
intellectual and physical force to be counted with in all
the councils of Europe. Thenceforward the leaders of
■the proletariat of the world could feel assured that when
the time was ripe for action they had an unshakable
scientific foundation on which to build, to which indeed
each year has added another layer of solid theory and
fact combined.
England, unfortunately, the country where the struggle
between the workers and the capitalists first took an
organised and manifest shape, now, to all appearance,
fell behind. The working classes of England, owing to
the enormous expansion of foreign markets, to the fact
that this country was the first in the field with improved
�44
, .’*
K
machinery and highly socialised factories, to the earlier
development of railways here than elsewhere, to the Free
Trade Policy which kept the necessary standard of life
cheap, to emigration which took off the more energetic
political leaders of the people and afforded a further out
let for goods, to the stagnation of the Trade Unions
which, when they had got what the higher grade of
workers needed most, cared little or nothing for the
welfare of the other classes of labour—the workers of
England, we say, fell behind in their efforts for the
enfranchisement of their class and have been content
since 1848 with that moderation in their requirements
and that bated breath method of urging their simplest
demands which naturally find favour with their Capi
talist masters.
During the thirty-five years which have passed, how
ever, since 1848, wealth in England has increased far
beyond all previous computation or imagination. From all
quarters of the globe the profits ofthe world-market have
been poured into the lap of our merchants and Capitalists.
The landlords also , have gained in rents, but in a very
trifling degree compared with the gain ofthe trading class.
The income tax returns alone show that the increase in
assessable incomes has been from ^275,000,000 in 1848
to nearly £600,000,000 in 1882. The total of realised
wealth seems incredible, being given, by an official
statist, at over £8,500,000,000. In every direction this
expansion of wealth is to be observed. The rich quarters
of our cities have spread beyond all bounds ; numerous
and populous lounger towns have sprung up around our
coasts, where the indolent wealthy may conveniently kill
time in healthy uselessness; the standard of living among
�the middle-class is so high that their chief diseases arise
from gluttony or drink.
Yet at this very time official returns prove conclusively
that vast masses of our countrymen are living on the
very verge of starvation ; that much of the factory popu
lation is undergoing steady physical deterioration ; that
the agricultural labourers rarely get enough food to keep
them clear of diseases arising from insufficient nourish
ment ; while such is the housing of the wage-earners
in our great cities and in our country districts that even
the leading partisans of our political factions at length
have awakened to the fact that civilisation for the poor
has been impossible for nearly two generations under
these conditions, and that some steps ought really to be
taken to remedy so monstrous an evil. Drink, debauchery,
vice, crime inevitably arise under such conditions. For
indigestion arising from bad food, cold arising from insuf
ficient firing,depression arising from unhealthy air and lack
of amusement, necessarily drive the poor to the public
house ; while even the sober have had, too often, no edu
cation which should fit them for the full enjoyment of life.
And drunken and sober, virtuous and vicious—if they
can be called vicious who are steeped in immorality from
their very babyhood—are all subject to never-ceasing
uncertainty of earning a livelihood, due to the constant
introduction of fresh machines over which they have no
control, or to the great commercial crises which come
more frequently and last for a longer time at each recur
rence. There is therefore complete anarchy of life and
anarchy of production around us. Order exists, morality
exists, comfort, happiness, education, as a whole, exist
only for the class which has the means of production, at
�46
the expense of the class which supplies the labour-force
that produces wealth.
The total income of the country is ^1,300,000,000 ; of
this the producers receive ^300,000,000 in wages ; and
of these wages they pay back one-fifth to one-third to the
landlord and capitalist class in rent, apart from the
amount they refund in profits on retail and adulterated
goods. The producers live on the average one-half the
number of years the comfortable classes live. The total
amount of property owned by 220,000 families is nearly
/’6,ooo,ooo,oou, whilst millions are living on insufficient
food and 4,500,000 persons receive charitable relief in
England and Wales alone, in one shape or another,
during the course of the year. The land of England is
practically owned by 30,000 people against 30,000,000
and 8,000 landowners in Great Britain and Ireland
receive no less than ^"35,000,000 a year in rents. Such
plain facts as these are sufficient of themselves to show
the anarchy of what we call civilisation. There have
been no fewer than six commercial crises since the
beginning of the century to crush the workers, not count
ing the Lancashire cotton famine due to the American
Civil War. Meanwhile commercial war—competition
in cheapness, that is, adulteration to make great profits,
and attacks upon helpless people to open up new
markets—has been going on all round.
Yet in the face of all this a certain school still contend
that thei e is no class robbery; that there should be no
class antagonism; that the blessings of peace and
eternal money-getting for all would be ever with us if only
our people—our producing people—would cease to have
any families at all. What is it produces value ?—labour
�applied to natural objects. What is it produces sur
plus value, and thus provides profit, interest, rent,
commissions, &c.—labour applied to natural objects under
the control of the capitalist class who take all the
value produced less the mere average subsistence wages
of the labourer. Yet to provide more wealth we are to
cut off the supply of labour by breeding no labourers.
This foolish Malthusian craze is itself bred of our
anarchical competitive system; and those who are
smitten with it cannot see that the power of man over
nature is such that, if his labour were properly organised,
he would produce in food or its equivalent at least four
times more than the amount of wealth which he would
require, if he lived in absolute comfort, provided he
worked only six hours a day. Were machinery properly
applied, far less than two hours labour a day for each
male above twenty-one would suffice for all to live in
comfort, if none lived in excessive luxury on the labour
of others. As it is, about one-fourth of our adult
population are engaged in actual useful production, often
with inferior machinery, yet the total income is
£1,300 ,000,000 a year.
That the power of man over nature increases in a
far more rapid ratio in all progressive societies than the
increase of population ; that the well-to-do—such as all
would be in an organised Socialist community—breed,
slowly, the poor fast; that the supposed law of dimin
ishing returns to capital (which means in one shape and
another labour) expended on the soil is demonstrably
false ; that England alone could profitably produce food
enough to feed its present population, the return
increasing with each improvement in agriculture ; that
�48
North America by itself would still export enormous
quantities of food after all its inhabitants were well fed
even if it had 800,000,000 inhabitants: these are facts
and estimates of the very highest agricultural and
economical authorities which ought finally to dispose of
the so-called Malthusian theory, even if the supposed
necessity of fictitiously limiting the number of producers
were not on the face of it an absurdity where idlers
who eat enormously and produce not at all form the
majority ofthe population.
From 1848 to 1864 there was little sign of Socialist
movement of an international character, and although
Lassalle’s vigorous agitation in Germany which began
in 1862 produced a great effect in that country no
serious attempt was made to organise a general com
bination of Socialists until two years later.
In
November 1864 a meeting was held in London which
laid the foundation of the International Working Men’s
Association. Karl Marx was the brain of the move
ment which soon spread to every civilised country and
occasioned grave uneasiness to the courts and cabinets
of Europe. The International in effect proclaimed the
“ Solidarity ” of interest between the workers of all
nations, and called upon them to unite in order to
obtain control of the means of production, including the
land, in every country; its leaders declared also
that the war between classes in each state was the real
matter of importance to the labouring class, which every
where suffered from the oppression of the classes above;
that therefore they should sink national differences in a
great international struggle for the emancipation of the
�49
workers. These ideas obtained more ready acceptance
in Germany than elsewhere as might have been
expected from the superior education of the German
working classes and from the fact that the heads of the
movement were Germans; but up to the date of the
declaration of war between France and Germany
the International bid fair to become a most important
body, and to combine the proletariat in a really formid
able movement all over Europe.
When the war was over Paris found that though she
had got rid of the Emperor with his gang of profession
al gamblers and prostitutes, France was to be handed
to the exploitation of a reactionist Republic. The
Parisians, therefore, resenting this mean substitution,
made an attempt to secure perfect commercial indepen
dence before admitting the troops from without. The
movement was at first necessarily in middle-class hands,
and the Socialists of Paris were warned by the leaders
of the International that as a simultaneous rising in
Berlin, Vienna, Madrid, &c., had been impossible to
arrange, failure was certain. The French Socialists were
incensed at this prediction and set to work to discredit
its authors. But, when the Commune had once been
set on foot, it soon became clear that Paris was
destined to be the scene of another bloody but again for
the time, fruitless campaign of the proletariat against
the bourgeoisie. Yet the champions of that class alone
showed unfaltering resolution and dauntless courage
in the face of danger and in the face of death.
Paris was to a large extent injured by the attacks of
the troops, and partly by the action of the beaten forces
of the insurgents ; but the horrors of the cold-blooded
E
�So
massacre which followed, the infamous misdeeds of the
Versailles troops, with such monsters as Gallifet at
their head, and the fearful scenes on the plain of Satory
have effaced almost all memory of the errors of the
vanquished. Once more “ order *’ rose in place of the
best government for the many that Paris had ever seen.
Throughout the world to-day the remembrance of that
fearful struggle and defeat strengthens the determination
of the real leaders of the proletariat revolution.
From that date forward organised Socialism has
made way against many difficulties, the apathy of
Englishmen having largely contributed to check any
real re-commencement of the international movement.
But of late years a change has taken place and the
rapidly growing influence of the Democratic Federation
shows that an avowed Socialist propaganda of an
international character has at last taken root in this
country.
What we have to face now is a bitter class antagon
ism between the classes who own the means of
production which they use to enslave their fellows to
those means of production and the labourers who are
thus economically and socially enslaved. With these
labourers must be numbered a large portion of the lowest
middle-class who practically depend upon and are a
portion of the proletariat, certain of the intellectual
proletariat, clerks, &c., who are learning how they are
being exploited themselves by their employers, and the
domestic servants, whose servile, degraded position will
be felt more and more as education spreads. Here is
the last class antagonism, which indeed is world-wide—
the antagonism between the slaves of the machine, the
�mere social engines for producing surplus value and
contributing to luxury, against the capitalist class and
their hangers-on, the landlords. All other antagonisms,,
complicated as they were, have now faded into this
one simple unmistakeable hostility of clearly defined
inimical interests between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie.
Proletariat production—capitalist appropriation:
workers make—traders take. Socialised production ;
individual exchange. Work in concert: exchange at
war. Supremacy of town: subservience of country.
Overcrowded cities: empty fields.
Such are the
briefest possible statements of the economical and
social forms which result in our present anarchy, not
for one class alone, though that suffers far the most, but
for all. And the system as a whole, is now world-wide,,
though in different shapes. Capital dominates the
planet, acts irrespective of all nationalities, grabs itsprofits irrespective of all creeds and conditions:
capital is international, unsectarian, destitute of regard,
for humanity or religion. The proletariat must learn
from the system which they have to overthrow to be
equally indifferent to class, creed or colour, religion or
nationality, so long as the individuals sink their
personal objects in a resolute endeavour against the
common enemy. Unite ! for this we educate, to this,
end we agitate, to achieve a certain victory for all we
organise. Unite ! Unite ! Unite !
But we are all only working in a great economical
movement, which we can help in some degree to
advance or retard, but which will proceed whatever we
do to push on or to hinder. The very conditions o£
�52
production are bringing about changes in spite of the
efforts of the capitalist class themselves. It has been
found necessary to use the power of the State more and
more to check the unbridled greed of the classes who
confiscate labour. Even the middle-class debating club
at Westminster, which passes muster as the English
House of Commons, has found itself compelled by the
exigencies of the case to interpose between the employers
and their wage-slaves, between the Irish landlords and
their serfs, between adulterating poisoners and their
victims. The domain of laissez-faire, the hideous realm
of mis-rule, has been invaded year by year by the State,
controlled though it is by the oppressing classes,
because some steps were absolutely essential to save the
mass of the population from utter physical, moral and
intellectual deteroriation. Education Acts, Irish Land
Acts, Employers’ Liability Acts, Factory Acts, Artisans’
Dwellings Acts, these and others, are direct evidence of
the tendency to limit that unrestrained free contract so
dear to the capitalist slave-driver of modern times.
They are but half-way measures at best. What more
could they be when enacted, administered and applied
by the very classes which, according to the debased
estimate of the aims and pleasures of life commonly held
among those classes themselves, have most to lose by a
thorough reorganisation ? But their very appearance
•on the Statute Book proves that the era of middle
class rule, and the period of working class apathy are
alike coming to an end.
The fear of pressure from without of a threatening
kind leads the luxurious classes to try to negotiate.
Bankrupt of ideas, destitute of principles, their one
�53
endeavour is to compromise on favourable terms. But
for us no compromise is possible which shall carry with
it the continuance of the present misery.
Yet again we see the power of the State extending.
It organises as well as orders, developes as well as
restrains. This too in despite of huckster economy and
huckster economists, whose principal professors are
forced to eat their own words as administrators and to
stultify their teaching as thinkers by sheer pressure of
the course of events. At this hour the State is by far
the largest employer of labour in the kingdom. The
Post Office, the Telegraphs, the Parcels Post, the State
Banks, the Arsenals, the Dockyards, the Clothing
Establishments, the Army and Navy, are all managed
by the State, and administered by State officials, who
organise the labour below. The objection to the system
is not inefficiency nor even extravagance, but the fact
that those who labour are brought into competition
with the lowest wages outside; and that the profits of
their production or distribution are used by the State
to reduce the taxation which has to be paid by the
middle class.
But in this direction lies the best prospect for reform
and re-organisation without bloodshed. The Railways,
the Shipping Companies, the great Machine Factories,
are even now ready to be handled by the State through
their present officials, but under the direct control of
the producing class (which will comprise the whole
community) and without the endeavour to exact a
profit at the expense of the overwork of the em
ployes as is at present the case. Shareholders and
factory lords have no more power, as assuredly they
�54
have no more right, than landlords to keep back that
organisation of the labour of all, for the benefit of
all, which is the only possible outlet from our pre
sent anarchical system of production for profit and
never-ending round of commercial crises, due to the
revolt of the socialised method of production against
the individualised form of exchange.
When a glut of goods exists on one hand, and men
■eager for those goods and anxious to work stand idle
and foodless on the other, when these two factors of
well-being cannot be brought together because of the
necessity to produce for profit which the very glut
itself prevents, surely anarchy in production and exchange
has been driven to the last ditch of absurdity. When
hundreds of thousands of children are brought into the
world under such conditions that good food, good
health, good education, are for them impossible, the
essential foundations though all three are of true
morality and sound citizenship in later life, surely here
too the anarchy in our commonest social relations is
clearly manifested. When also we look around at the
complete divison between classes, their utter ignorance
of what one another think and feel, the incapacity of
men and women of different classes to sit comfortably
at the same meal table, though of the same race,
language and creed, here, even apart from the necessary
antagonism of economical interests, the social anarchy
which the middle-classes call order once more stares us
in the face.
After these instances of disintegration and disorder,
the ugliness, waste, and adulteration seem comparatively
trifling. Yet so long as competitive commerce and
�55
production for profit continue, based upon wage
slavery below, no change for the better can be
wrought. As capitalism saps :all healthy social
relations and reduces even the closest connection
between the sexes to a mere question of bargain and
sale, so it threatens to destroy the springs of all art, that
is of the external beauty of life, and to reduce the
world to a state of barbarism ; a threat which can only
be met by the demands of social order for the com
munising of exchange and the means of production,
so that labour may be freed from the merely useless
toil in which it is to a large extent at present employed,
so that while machinery is used for performing labour
repulsive to men, the intelligence of the workmen may
be made available for the higher needs of the community,
so that the greater and better part of productive labour
may become a voluntary, reasonable and pleasureable
exercise of the human faculties, instead of a compulsory,
degrading and unhappy struggle for existence, human
in nothing save its suffering, the tragedy of the battle
against starvation.
How then would individuality, that unceasing cry
of the bore and the dullard, be stunted by a
system which should leave full play to the highest
faculties of every man in return for trifling, pleasant
social labour, nay, which should develope those facul
ties for all classes far more than they are developed
to-day ? Under such a system, where mankind
collectively controlled their means of production, with
•machinery ever improving by the genius of their fellows,
but used for instead of against the mass of the human
race, men would at length be really free in every sense
�56
economical, social, and political, save that they
would no longer possess the freedom to enslave and
embrute their fellow men. Individuality is crushed to
day in every direction. The poor slave to the machine,
the overworked hind or domestic drudge have no time
for individuality, no strength left for their own education
or development. Under our present system there is no
individuality for the mass of mankind.
For re-construction and re-organisation, therefore, we
Socialists continually strive, looking to the completest
physical, moral and intellectual development of every
human being as the highest form of the social state, as
the best and truest happiness for every individual and for
every class, where, as none need overwork, so none
shall be able to force others to work for their profit.
And this is Utopian ! Nay; it was utopian perhaps, when
the powers of man over nature were trifling compared
with what they are to-day, and mere division of labour
almost necessarily involved the formation of castes and
classes. But now steam, electricity, the forces growing
daily under our hand, render equality a necessity unless
barbarism and bootless destruction are to come upon
us in our very midst. For as ideas grow, as education
spreads, so does the knowledge of how to turn the
increasing powers of devastation to account increase
among the needy and the oppressed. Gunpowder
helped to sweep away feudalism with all its beauty and
all its chivalry, when new forms arose from the decay of
the old; now far stronger explosives are arrayed
against capitalism; while the ideas of the time are as
rife with revolution as they were when feudalism fell.
To avoid alike the crushing anarchy of to-day and the
�57
fierce anarchy of to-morrow, we strive to help forward
the workers to the control of the State, as the only means
whereby such hideous trouble can be avoided, and
production and exchange can be organised for the
benefit of the country at large. Thus, therefore, we
propose that all should have the vote ; not that the vote
will free them from economical oppression, but because
in this way alone is a peaceable issue possible for the
possessing classes. It is better for them to yield to the
vote of organised numbers than to the victory of even
organised force.
What then are our objects at this hour ? Some of
them we have already stated. We can but point the
road that we believe will be travelled in the near future.
To assert definitely that this or that step must be taken
at any given time would be directly contrary to our
general principles, which depend for their full develop
ment upon the reasoning action ot the class still to be
set free. Forms of government, political devices, party
arrangements, the devious tricks of faction, we contemn
as useless or denounce as harmful. The only end
to be sought in the organisation and representation of
the people is the domination by the people of all
social forces now and in the future. We claim then the
land for the people, that the soil of our country with
whatever is useful or beautiful in or upon it, should no
longer be held by a small minority for their aggrandise
ment and greed, but that it should be owned by all for
all collectively, to be occupied, cultivated, enjoyed,
mined or built over as the majority of the people shall see
fit to ordain. That the economical forms are not yet
fully ready for the completest development of agricul-
�58
rural management is no reason why a handful of persons
should draw vast revenues from a monopoly fraudulently
seized from their countrymen ; still less why the land in
towns, and the minerals below the land in country should
be held for the benefit of the few.
But Socialists have no factious prejudices, and are
influenced by no jealousies of a clique. We call there
fore also for the immediate management and ownership
of the railways by the State, so that the inland
communications of the country may be under the control
of the people at large, and carried on for their benefit,
regard being had to the full remuneration of the labour
of all who are engaged in the work of transport. Here
is no difficulty beyond the prejudice born of a flagitious
monopoly, wrongfully granted by the landlord and
capitalist House of Commons in favour of the capitalist
class. Labour made the railways, and living labour is
confiscated daily to pay interest to the labour of the
dead. It would be far better and easier for the State as
the organised representative of a thorough democratic
community to manage the railways through the present
paid officials than to leave them under the control of a
coterie of political and social adventurers, who use their
railways to serve their politics, and their politics to serve
their railways.
As with railways so with shipping. There the whole
economical forms are ready, in the same way, for
immediate management by the State, and the transfer,
could be arranged almost without a hitch. With mines,
factories, and workshops more direct interest by the
workers engaged in them would be needed, but as
education extends, and the habit of economical collective
�59
freedom grows, it will be as easy for the labourers to
choose their own superintendents, and apply the best
machinery, as it is for the capitalist to choose and use
them to-day. The inventor, the organiser, the manager
are not the people who sweep off the bulk of the surplus
value made by labour as it is, but the idle, useless
capitalists who sit at home and appropriate other men’s
work by means of social conventions which they them
selves have formulated, and they themselves give effect
to by force of law.
Similarly the handling of money and credit must neces
sarily be carried on in future for the advantage of the com
munity at large. National banks, national credit establish
ments, State and Communal centres of distribution for
the purchase and exchange of goods will supplant and
take over the huge enterprises for the gain of a class
which now exercise such enormous influence, and accu
mulate such vast profits under protection of the
middle-class State. As production is inevitably social,
exchange must be social too. Simply as a steppingstone to the attainment of this State organisation of
production and exchange do we advocate the heaviest
cumulative taxation rising upon all incomes derived
from trade or business, as well as upon those drawn
from the land. Only by collective superintendence of
production and exchange, only by the scientific organi
sation of labour at home and supply of markets abroad,
can our present anarchy be put an end to, and a better
system be allowed to grow up. Removal and recon
struction must go on together, and at the same time.
The very existence and increase of Companies, the very
development of State management now going on, point out
�II
6o
'
clearly the lines of necessary progress: with the com
plete organisation of democracy the State, in its present
meaning of class predominance, necessarily disappears.
But this is confiscation. Far from it, it is restitution.
Those who cry for compensation for past robbery, and
shriek confiscation because the right to rob in future is
challenged, should bear in mind that the men and
women whom we would compensate are those who are
now stumbling half-clothed and half-fed from a pauper
cradle to a pauper grave, in order that capitalists and
landlords may live in luxury and excess. The dead have
passed beyond compensation : it will be well if the
living do not call for vengeance on their behalf. Our first
principle as Socialists is that all should be well-fed, wellhoused, well-educated. For this object we urge forward
the Revolution which our enemies hysterically shriek at,
and frantically try to dam back. But we mean wrong
to none. Rather would we claim the aid of such of
the luxurious classes as are willing, so long as they have
still enough and to spare, to forego the frightful privilege
of feeding fat upon the wretchedness of others. Good
housing for all cannot be got if greed is to organise the
new arrangements: good food and physical, mental,
and moral education for all classes cannot be obtained
if factitious superiority and harmful social distinctions
are to be kept up.
Therefore, we say once more this is a class war ; we
know it; we are preparing for it; we rejoice at its near
approach. We mean to break down competition, and
to substitute universal organisation and co-operation.
There lie around us the necessary methods: they need
but to be applied. But there are many difficulties and
�6i
dangers, the power of wealth is great, the unscrupulous
ness of property knows no bounds ? We are well aware
of this : we see and do not shrink from the inevitable
struggle.
But the numbers over against us, the
hosts who may be bribed to fight for their oppressors,
even to their own hurt; there are thousands, perhaps
millions, of such men ? There are. We know that too.
But in a cause like ours, we refuse to recognise difficulties, with such misery around us we cannot stop to
calculate forces, with such a future before us we will
never count heads.
The Revolution is prepared in the womb of society, it
needs but one strenous and organised effort to manifest
the new period in legal and acknowledged shape to the
world. To attempt to return to the old forms of
individual production, would be at the same reactionary
and anarchical. We cannot, if we would, so put back the
hands upon the dial of human development. It is nowise
desirable we should. The increased power of man
over nature is gained by co-operation, by social machinery,
by associated labour, by skilfully concerted work. This
has been due to countless ages of growth and develop
ment, involving often the most horrible oppression, but
ever producing more wealth with less labour. We
inherit the results of this long martyrdom of man to the
forms of production and exchange. It is for us to
take hold of and use these improvements for the
enfranchisement of the people, and for the establish
ment of happiness and organised contentment for man
kind. We in England have arrived at the completest
economical development. Our example therefore, will
guide and encourage the world. All over the planet the
�62
same ideas are abroad. In Germany, France, Scandi
navia, Russia, Italy, Spain, far away in the ancient
empires of Asia, as well as in America, and the other
flourishing Colonies of our days, the labourers stretch out
their hands to one another for help, co-operation and
encouragement in the struggle which manifestly draws
near. Confident in their cause the Socialists alone of
modern parties can march steadily forward in inter
national comity, to the assurance of victory for all.
Thus then, based upon science and political economy,
rejoicing in the beauty of an enfranchised art, with our
social creed as our only religion—the scientific organi
sation of labour, and the universal brotherhood of man
we appeal to men and women of all classes, all creeds
and all nationalities to join us in the struggle wherein
none can fail, to prepare for themselves, and for their
children a nobler, higher lot than has hitherto been
theirs, and to pass on to countless generations that joy,
that beauty and that perfect contentment which can
arise from true Socialism alone.
Signed the Executive Committee of the Democratic Federation.
Herbert Burrows.
R. D. Butler.
H. H. Champion,
Hon. Secretary.
W. J. Clark,
Lecture Secretary.
H. A. Fuller.
H. M. Hyndman,
Chairman.
J. L. JOYNES.
Tom. S. Lemon.
James Macdonald.
William Morris,
Hon. Treasurer
James F. Murray.
H. Quelch.
A. Scheu.
Helen Taylor.
John E. Williams.
�THE MODERN PRESS.
16 pp., Crown 8-vo., in wrapper.
SOCIALISM
versus
SMITHISM,
An open letter from H. M. Hyndman to Samuel Smith,
M. P. for Liverpool.
PRICE TWOPENCE.
*** A reply to an attack by Mr. Smith on “ Socialism made
"Plain,” the manifesto issued by the Democratic Federation..
THE NEW BOOK OF KINGS,
By j. Morrison Davidson.
Price 6d.
Henry George says:—" It would be a great thing if it could be scattered
broadcast over England by hundreds of thousands.”
“ Vivacious and trenchant. . . . Is calculated to open the eyes of
people who now worship monarchy as a fetish."—London Echo.
Monthly, Price One Shilling
“TO-DAY,”
THE
SOCIALIST
MAGAZINE.
Amongst the Contributors are
H. M. HYNDMAN,
STEPNIAK,
WILLIAM MORRIS,
W. HARRISON RILEY,
ELEANOR MARX,
EDWARD CARPENTER,
MICHAEL DAVITT,
E. B. AVELING,
PAUL LAFARGUE,
VERA SASSULITCH,
E. BELFORT BAX,
REV. S. D. HEADLAM,
J. L. JOYNES,
WILLIAM ARCHER,
Win. LIEBKNECHT,
&c., &c.
THE ADVENTURES OF A TOURIST IN IRELAND.
By J. L. Joynes.
Second Edition. (Reduced to) Is.
SOCIALISM AND SLAVERY,
A Reply to Mr. Herbert Spencer’s Article on “The Coming
Slavery,” by H. M. Hyndman. Price 6d.
13 and 14, Paternoster Row, London, E.C.
�THE MODERN PRESS.
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(A RBEITER-PROGRA MM}
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Translated hy EDWARD PETERS (late of the Madras Civil Service)
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A Reply to Mr. Herbert Spencer
ON
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“Out of thine own mouth will I condemn thee.”
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�
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A summary of the principles of socialism: written for the Democratic Federation
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Hyndman, Henry Mayers [1842-1921]
Morris, William
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 62, [2] p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Publisher's advertisements on unnumbered pages at the end. Written for the Democratic Federation.
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The Modern Press
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1884
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Socialism
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Socialism
Socialism-Europe
Socialism-Great Britain
William Morris
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Text
AGAINST SOCIALISM.
BY
HUMANITA8.”
Author of “ Is God the First Cause? ”, “ Follies of the Lord’s Prayer Exposed ”,
Thoughts on Heaven”, “Jacob the Wrestler”, “Mr. Bradlaugh and the Oaths
Question ”, “ How the British House of Commons treated Charles Bradlaugh, M.P.”,
“ Charles Bradlaugh and the Irish Nation ”, “ Socialism a Curse ”, “A Fish in Labor ;
or, Jonah and the Whale ”, “ God: Being also a Brief Statement of Arguments
Against Agnosticism”, etc.
LONDON:
FREETHOUGHT
PUBLISHING
63 FLEET STREET, E.C.
1 8 8 9.
PRICE
ONE
PENNY.
COMPANY,
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY ANNIE BESANT AND CHARLES BRADLAUGH,
63
FLEET STREET, E.C.
r
�AGAINST SOCIALISM.
[The following remarks were originally written in the form of a
letter, which, however, I did not dispatch, coming to the conclusion
that it might be useful as a small pamphlet against Socialism. This
must be my plea for its brevity, and also for what may be deemed its
somewhat fragmentary character.]
Since writing my pamphlet against Socialism1 (now nearly
six years ago), which partook of the nature of a reply
to Dr. E. B. Aveling, my mind has, if anything, been
strengthened in the belief that State Socialism would
really be a curse rather than a blessing.
I think the larger half of those who adopt Socialism
do. so. without examining it, and also without carefully
weighing the theories put forward by leading Socialists.
I do not doubt for a moment that these theories are
sincerely and honorably held by their principal exponents.
I am confident such is the case in some instances. But I
do not think the subject is sufficiently weighed and understood by the majority of those who throw up their caps in
favor of it. The possibility of My Lord having, in some
dim and indescribable manner, to share his riches with
the ordinary hard-working — and often out-of-work —
journeyman, is doubtless a very taking bait to dangle
before the latter. I am here leaving out of the question
the very large leaven of those who are not hard-working,
but who hope to profit by any change, quite regardless as
to whether it be for the better of for the worse.
But if the ordinary working man, who is tickled by this
delusion, looks below the surface he will see that it would
not only not work, but that it is simply madness to dream
Cq1 <la®oc^a^sm a f-'urse-”
Price 3d.
Freethought Publishing
�4
AGAINST SOCIALISM.
of its ever coming about. He will find that his salvation
lies in the direction of Co-operation, rather than in that of
confiscation. For my own part, I believe that, although
the movement may do some harm—perhaps much harm—
its ultimate and complete adoption is simply an impossi
bility.
State Socialism means State serfdom, and State espionage
carried into every act and effort of one’s life. It means
the complete annihilation of each individual’s individuality ;
and, if enacted to-morrow, would by sheer necessity be
ignored the day after. I believe the advocates themselves
would, if successful, find the condition of affairs they had
brought about so intolerable as to compel them to be
amongst the first to undo their own work. Some of them,
at least, could not by their very nature sink themselves to
the necessary State level which would be demanded by
what they themselves had set up. Some few there might
be willing to sink themselves for what they thought to be
the general good; but it is expecting too much of human
nature to suppose that the bulk of the brightest, best, and
fittest would submerge themselves in the slough of medio
crity and inferiority at the bidding of a State (by which I
mean the executive for the time being) composed of those
who, despite the Socialistic government regulations, had,
by their individuality, come to the top.
Practically, I think Socialists hold, in common with
most of us, that it is the duty of the State to guarantee each
individual in the free and safe enjoyment of what he may,
by his superior industry, thrift, and intelligence, earn. This
at least is what they profess to desire; and it is possible
that the main difference between us consists in the method
adopted to attain that end. Whilst giving them credit for
sincerity, I hold that Socialism would not only not do this,
but would actually make its being done impossible. It
would squeeze, or try to squeeze, all down to a kind of
worse than State mediocrity, and thus rob each of his
individual merits. If it did not do this, but allowed each
to possess what he individually earned or produced, there
is an end of Socialism, because it would then be allowing
individual accumulation of capital, which it is its particular
mission to destroy.
It would seem to me that the very essence of Socialism
is that an individual (or even a voluntary company formed
of individuals) must not possess what he earns either by
�AGAINST SOCIALISM.
5
brain, sinew, or actual moral worth, because one man will,
by the greater exercise of these, earn ten-fold what another
will. And this always strikes me as being strangely at
variance with the great Socialistic complaint, that the
workman does not receive what he is justly entitled to do.
I am bound to admit that in many cases he does not; but
will Socialism give it to him ? Will robbing the intelli
gent, the industrious, and the better man, by levelling
him down to the standard of the worser, give it him?
And bear in mind that if you reduced the profits of the
employer to the level of the average wage of the workmen,
you would still have the question of extra merit, and con
sequent extra worth, of the men themselves to deal with ;
so that robbing the employer of the fruits of the position
to which he had possibly slaved and toiled would not settle
the injustice as between the workmen. The fact would
still remain that all men are not equal : they are not
equally wise, industrious, virtuous; nor are they equally
fit in any respect whatever. Equality before the law is
good, but it does not mean that all are equal in worth,
either intellectually, morally, or even commercially, and
no government stamp can make them so. Keeping this
in mind, I do not see how robbing one man to balance
another can be just or reasonable, whether that man be
a duke, capitalist, government official, working man, or
man in any other position.
If Socialism will not permit me to possess the fruits of
my brain, and enterprise; of my sobriety, and greater
application, where is the freedom—not to mention the
right ? [I would here remark that I am not forgetting
the duty of the individual to the State, and to the general
well-being.] But if, on the other hand, Socialism will
allow me such possession, which means the possession of
individual property—and you cannot logically draw the
line between a trinket and a mansion—what becomes of
it ? You are admitting the very principle that your
Socialism is set up to kill; and bear in mind that whether
you admit the principle or not, it will live; and rightly
live. Nature herself will not allow even a government to
command : Thus much shalt thou earn, produce, or possess,
and no more ; or if thou producest more, thou shalt give
it up, and go back to the level of the less active and
deserving mass thou hast left behind. If a government
could do this, and so deprive the more energetic and better
�6
AGAINST SOCIALISM.
man of the fruits of his greater energy—and with them
.the incentive to that energy—it would at the same time be
encouraging the mass to depend not upon their own efforts,
but upon the efforts of others ; thus inducing and helping
all—as per Socialistic law—to be indolent rather than
otherwise.
“ Open your mouth and shut your eyes, and see what the
State will send you ”, is not a wise doctrine to preach.
The large heap of money shared all round, with Jack’s
notion of sharing it over again as occasion may require, is
however, although the very backbone of Socialism, too
absurd for any practical purpose, or for serious considera
tion. Of course it is held that Socialism does not mean
anything of the sort: but when explained (?) this is found
to be what is really meant; because the moment you dis
card it, you are landed in individual accumulation.
I am aware that Socialism is held to be not yet thoroughly
defined: but 1 believe it to be undefinable ; and that the
more you endeavor to define it, the more unworkable you
find it. Imagine for instance the arts and sciences being
worked upon a kind of huge out-door relief system, the
products not belonging to the producers, but to the State I
Do you suppose you could by process of law—I am not
asking ought you to do so—but could you make the great
painter, inventor, sculptor, musician, engineer, physician,
etc., etc., satisfied with the same remuneration as you
would give to the railway porter, or the stable man ?
Indeed, the intrigue, the red-tapeism, the discontent and
rebellion which would be certain to form part of the ques
tion as to which should become the stable boy, and which
the engineer or philosopher, is something ludicrous to
picture. The phrenologist might possibly be brought into
requisition with some advantage; but not all the State
paid (?) phrenologists, nor Government Boards that ever
existed, or will exist, could make the great of brain, and
the great of power, (in every calling)—mostly begot of
perseverance and application—satisfied to be placed upon
a par with the mass. The thing is simply a joke. The
idea of finding sufficient reward—plus a “ leather medal ”
—in the knowledge of having served mankind, shorn of all
other and more substantial considerations, is nothing better
than twaddle, and practically all, even including Socialists
themselves, proclaim it to be so.
�AGAINST SOCIALISM.
7
But if you do propose to remunerate the great and
meritorious in something like proportion to their work, or
services rendered to the State; might they spend or put
such remuneration to further use, with an eye to immediate
comfort, or to — perchance — future interest 2 Or would
they be compelled to simply sit upon it, not even daring
to hatch it into 2^ per cents. ? Perhaps a method of
rewarding extra merit might be found in a system of
awarding dummy medals—or, if really valuable, accom
panied by criminal consequences in case of the recipient
converting them into money or other valuables.
For my own part I regard Socialism as the cry of the
poorer and less able—and, alas ! larger—half of humanity
—and I might go so far as to say : the worse half—
against its own poverty and wretchedness. And it is
this wretchedness, together with the hope of being able
to remedy it, which constitutes the strength of the Social
istic craze, and commands the sympathy and support of
many to whom the merits of the scheme, as a means to an
end, would certainly fail to appeal.
Let us by all means do what in us lies : let us legislate
with a view to reducing poverty and its consequent suffer
ings ; but let us not do it at the expense of the liberty and
the commonest rights of the people themselves.
What we want is reform, not serfdom. We want an
extension of individual liberty ; greater freedom of contract
in the matter of the sale and transfer of land ; fewer
restrictions upon trade, commerce, markets, etc.; the re
adjustment of financial matters, with a view to a more
equitable mode of taxation. These and many other changes
calculated to directly benefit the working man, we un
doubtedly require ; but we do not require a retrograde
movement into primitive (now called scientific) Socialism.
The science which shall thin some down and thicken
others up to some kind of State regulation standard,
making all good boys and girls, each being satisfied with
the government dole, and also satisfied with that station
and calling in life which it pleaseth—not God in this
instance, but the State—to place them, is yet to be dis
covered. The ism, whether Socialistic or other, would
have to be very scientific indeed to prevent the eagle from
soaring and the race-horse from outstripping the ass. And
it would be very mad to attempt to legislate in that
direction.
�8
AGAINST SOCIALISM.
But Socialism, whilst endeavoring to bring some down,
would also necessarily have to prevent others from rising.
It is in principle quite as adverse to a small capital as to a
large one. The ability to produce wealth would be of no
use; the main incentive to thrift and effort would be
removed. Under the Socialistic regime individual possession
of valuables of any kind whatever would be impossible.
This is denied, because the idea is too ridiculous on the
face it for standing-room; but the denial is simply a
repudiation of the thing in behalf of which it is made.
If Socialism should ever reign, our very language would
have to be reconstructed: I, mine, and me, with all that
belongs to them and is understood by then^ would have
to be erased from our grammars as well as from our
institutions; and every explanation offered by Socialists
against this view is, though not so intended, essentially
an argument against the feasibility of Socialism.
Perhaps one of the worst features of Socialism is, that
it would create a gigantic swarm of State officials, whose
duty it would be to “inspect”, i.e, pry into the private
business of every individual in the State, to such an extent
as would be insufferable to any people claiming, in the
smallest sense of the word, to be free. Nay, I doubt if
there could be, such a thing as private business ; it would
all have to be public, with a Government detective in
every shop, house, or factory. It would be State vassalage,
pure and simple.
It might, I think, be safely prophesied that should we
ever “ evolve ” into State Socialism, we should speedily
evolve out of it again. Therein lies some consolation.
And, as I have remarked, some of the leading Socialist
luminaries would be the first to attract and draw the
smaller fry into the outward course. These leaders are in
some notable instances, and for this they deserve honor,
the very personification of self-help, self-assertion, and
self-reliance. It is true their great individuality is in
direct opposition to the principle of Socialism, and is so
far inconsistent with their creed ; but should that creed
ever be generally and practically adopted, it would at
once either kill or convert them into anti-Socialists.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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Against socialism, by "Humanitas"
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Ball, William Platt [1844-1917]
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 8 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Shows signs of having been detached from bound volume. Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
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1889
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Socialism
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (Against socialism, by "Humanitas"), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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NSS
Socialism
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Text
Price One Penny.
NOW SUFFFRING FIVE YEARS* IMPRISONMENT UNDER
THE
FRENCH REPUBLIC FOR ADVOCATING THE
CAUSE OF THE PEOPLE.
Translated by H. M. Hyndman. Reprinted from “TO-DAY" (Monthly 3d.).
1885.
Published at The Modern Press, 13, Paternoster Row, E.C.
T T is to the young that I wish to address myself to-day. Let the
-L old—I mean of course the old in heart and mind—lay the
pamphlet down therefore without tiring their eyes in reading what
will tell them nothing.
I assume that you are about eighteen or twenty years of age ;
that you have finished your apprenticeship or your studies; that
you are just entering on life. I take it for granted that you have a
mind free from the superstition which your teachers have sought to
force upon you ; that you don’t fear the devil and that you do not go
to hear parsons and ministers rant. More, that you are not one of
the fops, sad products of a society in decay, who display their
well-cut trousers and their monkey faces in the park and who even
at their early age have only an insatiable longing for pleasure at
any price. ... I assume on the contrary that you have a
warm heart and for this reason I talk to you.
A first question, I know, occurs to you—you have often asked
yourself—“ What am I going to be ? ” In fact when a man is
young he understands that after having studied a trade or a science
for several years—at the cost of society, mark—he has not done
this in order that he should make use of his acquirements as instru
ments of plunder for his own gain, and he must be depraved
indeed and utterly cankered by vice, who has not dreamed that one
day he would apply his intelligence, his abilities, his knowledge to
help on the enfranchisement of those who to-day grovel in misery
and in ignorance.
You are one of those who has had such a vision, are you not ?
Very well, let us see what you must do to make your dream a
reality.
I do not know in what rank you were born. Perhaps, favoured
�2
by fortune, you have turned your attention to the study of science;
you are to be a doctor, a barrister, a man of letters, or a scientific
man ; a wide field opens up before you ; you enter upon life with
extensive knowledge, with a trained intelligence ; or, on the other
hand, you are, perhaps, only an honest artisan whose knowledge
of science is limited by the little that you have learnt at school;
but you have had the advantage of learning at first hand what
a life of exhausting toil is the lot of the worker of our time.
I stop at the first supposition, to return afterwards to the second ",
I assume then that you have received a scientific education. Let
us suppose that you intend to be a—doctor.
To-morrow a man in corduroys will come to fetch you to see a
sick woman. He will lead you into one of those alleys where the
opposite neighbours can almost shake hands over the heads of the
passers-by ; you ascend into a foul atmosphere by the flickering
light of a little ill-trimmed lamp ; you climb two, three, four, five
flights of filthy stairs and in a dark, cold room you find the sick
woman, lying on a pallet covered with dirty rags. Pale, livid
children, shivering under their scanty garments, gaze at you with
their big eyes wide open. The husband has worked all his life
twelve or thirteen hours a-day at no matter what; now he has
been out of work for three months. To be out of employ is not
rare in his trade; it happens every year, periodically; but,
formerly, when he was out of work his wife went out as a char
woman—perhaps to wash your shirts—at the rate of fifteen-pence
a-day ; but now she has been bedridden for two months and misery
glares upon the family in all its squalid hideousness.
What will you prescribe for the sick woman, doctor ? you who
have seen at a glance that the cause of her illness is general
anaemia, want of good food, lack of fresh air ? Say a good beef
steak every day ? a little exercise in the country ? a dry and wellventilated bed-room ? What irony ! If she could have afforded
it this would have all have been done long since without waiting
for your advice I
If you have a good heart, a frank address, an honest face, the
family will tell you many things. They will tell you that the woman
on the other side of the partition, who coughs a cough which tears
your heart, is a poor ironer; that a flight of stairs lower down
all the children have the fever ; that the washerwoman who occu
pies the ground floor will not live to see the spring, and that in the
house next door things are still worse.
What will you say to all these sick people ? Recommend them
generous diet, change of air, less exhausting toil. . . . You
only wish you could, but you daren’t, and you go out heartbroken
with a curse on your lips.
The next day, as you still brood over the fate of the dwellers in
this dog-hutch, your partner tells you that yesterday a footman
came to fetch him, this time in a carriage. It was for the owner of
a fine house, for a lady worn out with sleepless nights, who devotes
all her life to dressing, visits, balls, and squabbles with a stupid
husband. Your friend has prescribed for her a less preposterous
habit of life, a less heating diet, walks in the fresh air, an even
temperament and, in order to make up in some measure for the
want of useful work, a little gymnastic exercise in her bedroom.
�3
The one is dying because she has never had enough food nor
enough rest in her whole life ; the other pines because she has never
known what work is since she was born.
If you are one of those miserable natures who adapt themselves
to anything, who at the sight of the most revolting spectacles
console themselves with a gentle sigh and a glass of sherry, then
you will gradually become used to these contrasts and the nature
of the beast favouring your endeavours, your sole idea will be to
lift yourself into the ranks of the pleasure-seekers, so that you may
never again find yourself among the wretched. But if you are a
Man, if every sentiment is translated in your case into an action of
the will, if, in you, the beast has not crushed the intelligent being,
then you will return home one day saying to yourself, “ No, it is
unjust; this must not go on so any longer. It is not enough to
cure diseases, we must prevent them. A little good living and
intellectual development would score off our lists half the patients
and half the diseases. Throw physic to the dogs! Air, good diet,
less crushing toil,—that is how we must begin. Without this, the
whole profession of a doctor is nothing but trickery and humbug.”
That very day you will understand Socialism. You will wish
to know it thoroughly and if altruism is not a word devoid of
significance for you, if you apply to the study of the social question
the rigid induction of the natural philosopher you will end by
finding yourself in our ranks, and you will work, as we work, to
bring about the Social Revolution.
But perhaps you will say, “ Mere practical business may go to
the devil! I will devote myself to pure science ; I will be an
astronomer, a physiologist, a chemist. Such work a 5 that always
bears fruit, if only for future generations.”
Let us first try to understand what you seek in devoting your
self to science. Is it only the pleasure—doubtless immense—
which we derive from the study of nature and the exercise of our
intellectual faculties ? In that case I ask you in what respect does
the philosopher, who pursues science in order that he may pass his
life pleasantly to himself, differ from that drunkard there, who only
seeks for the immediate gratification that gin affords him ? The
philosopher has, past all question, chosen his enjoyment more
wisely, since it affords him a pleasure far deeper and more lasting
than that of the toper. But that is all! Both one and the other
have the same selfish end in view, personal gratification.
But no, you have no wish to lead this selfish life. By working
at science you mean to work for humanity, and that is the idea
which will guide you in your investigations.
A charming illusion ! Which of us has not hugged it for a
moment when giving himself up for the first time to science ?
But then, if you are really thinking about humanity, if you look
to the good of mankind in your studies, a formidable objection rises
before you ; for, however little you may have of the critical spirit,
you must at once note that in dur society of to-day science is only
an appendage to luxury which serves to render life pleasanter for
the few, but remains absolutely inaccessible to the bulk of mankind.
�4
Now more than a century has passed since science laid down
sound propositions as to the origin of the universe, but how many
have mastered them or possess the really scientific spirit of
criticism ? A few thousands at the outside, who are lost in the
midst of hundreds of millions still steeped in prejudices and super
stitions worthy of savages, who are consequently ever ready to serve
as puppets for religious impostors.
Or, to go a step further, let us glance at what science has done
to establish rational foundations for physical and moral health.
Science tells us how we ought to live in order to preserve the health
q£ our own bodies, how to maintain in good conditions of existence
the crowded masses of our population. But does not all the vast
amount of work done in these two directions remain a dead letter
in our books ? We know it does. And why ?—Because science
to-day exists only for a handful of privileged persons, because
social inequality which divides society into two classes—the wage
slaves and the grabbers of capital—renders all its teachings as to
the conditions of a rational existence only the bitterest irony to
nine-tenths of mankind.
I could give plenty more examples, but I stop short : only go
outside Faust’s closet, whose windows, darkened by dust, scarce let
the light of heaven glimmer on its shelves full of books, look round,
and at each step you will find fresh proof in support of this view.
It is now no longer a question of accumulating scientific truths
and discoveries. We need above everything to spread the truths
already mastered by science, to make them part of our daily life,
to render them common property. We have to order things so
that all, so that the mass of mankind, may be capable of understand
ing and applying them ; we have to make science no longer a luxury
but the foundation of every man’s life. This is what justice demands.
I go farther: I say that the interests of science itself lie m the
same direction. Science only makes real progress when a new
truth finds a soil already prepared to receive it. The theory of the
mechanical origin of heat, though enunciated in the last century in
the same terms that Hirn and Clausius formulate it to-day, re
mained for eighty years buried in the Academical Records until
such time as knowledge of physics had spread widely enough to
create a public capable of accepting it. Three generations had to
go by before the ideas of Erasmus Darwin on the variation ot
species could be favourably received from his grandson, and that
they should be admitted by academical philosophers, not without
pressure from public opinion even then. The philosopher, like the
poet or artist, is always the product of the society m which he
moves and teaches.
...
,
,
But, if you are imbued with these ideas, you will understand
that it is above all important to bring about a radical change in
this state of affairs, which to-day condemns the philosopher to be
crammed with scientific truths, and almost the whole of the rest of
human beings to remain what they were five, ten centuries ago,
that is to say in the state of slaves and machines, incapable ot
mastering established truths. And the day when you are imbued
with wide, deep, humane and profoundly scientific trutn, tha ay
you will lose your taste for pure science. You will set to work to
�5
find out the means to effect this transformation, and if you bring to
your investigations the impartiality which has guided you in your
Scientific researches you will of necessity adopt the cause of
Socialism ; you will make an end of sophisms and you will come
amongst us ; weary of working to procure pleasures for this small
group, which already has such a large share of them, you will place
your information and your devotion at the service of the oppressed.
And be sure that then the feeling of duty accomplished, and of
a real accord established between your sentiments and your
actions, you will find powers in yourself of whose existence you
»ever even dreamed. When, too, one day—it is not far distant in
any case, saving the presence of our professors—when one day, I
say, the change for which you are working shall have been brought
about, then, deriving new forces from collective scientific work, and
from the powerful help of armies of labourers who will come to
place their energies at its service, science will take a new bound
forward, in comparison with which the slow progress of to-day will
appear the simple exercises of tyros.
Then you will enjoy science ; that pleasure will be a pleasure for
all.
If you have finished reading law and are about to be called to
the Bar, perhaps you too have some illusions as to your future
activity—I assume that you are one of the nobler spirits, that you
know what altruism means. Perhaps you think “ To devote my
life to an unceasing and vigorous struggle against all injustice ! To
apply my whole faculties to bringing about the triumph of law, the
public expression of supreme justice—can any career be nobler? ”
and you begin the real work of life confident in yourself and in the
profession you have chosen.
Very well: let us turn to any page of the Law Reports and see
what actual life will tell you.
Here we have a rich landowner; he demands the eviction of a
cottier tenant who has not paid his rent. From the legal point of
view the case is beyond dispute ; since the poor farmer can’t pay,
out he must go. But if we look into the facts we shall learn some
thing like this. The landlord has squandered his rents persistently
in rollicking pleasure; the tenant has worked hard all day and
■every day. The landlord has done nothing to improve his estate,
nevertheless its value has trebled in fifty years owing to the rise in
price of land due to the construction of a railway, to the making of
new highroads, to the draining of a marsh, to the enclosure and
cultivation of waste lands; but the tenant who has contributed
largely towards this increase has ruined himself; he fell into the
hands of usurers and, head over ears in debt, he can no longer pay
the landlord. The law, always on the side of property, is quite
clear : the landlord is in the right. But you, whose feeling of
justice has not yet been stifled by legal fictions, what will you do ?
Will you contend that the farmer ought to be turned out upon the
high road ?—for that is what the law ordains—or will you urge that
the landlord should pay back to the farmer the whole of the increase
of value in his property which is due to the farmer’s labour ?—this
is what equity decrees. Which side will you take ? for the law and
against justice ? or for justice and against the law?
�W"
6
Or when workmen have gone out on strike against a master
without notice, which side will you take then ? The side of the
law, that is to say the part of the master who, taking advantage of
a period of crisis, has made outrageous profits ? or against the law,
but on the side of the workers who received during the whole time
only 2s. a day as wages, and saw their wives and children fade
away before their eyes? Will you stand up for that piece of
chicanery which consists in affirming “ freedom of contract ” ? Or
will you uphold equity, according to which a contract entered into
between a man who has dined well and the man who sells his
labour for bare subsistence, between the strong and the weak, is
not a contract.
Take another case. Here in London a man was loitering near
a butcher’s shop. He stole a beefsteak and ran off with it.
Arrested and questioned, it turns out that he is an artisan out of
work, and that he and his family have had nothing to eat for four
days. The butcher is asked to let the man off, but he is all for the
triumph of justice ! He prosecutes, and the man is sentenced to
six months’ imprisonment. Blind Themis so wills it! Does not
your conscience revolt against the law and against society when
you hear similar judgments pronounced every day ?
Or again, will you call for the enforcement of the law against this
man who, badly brought up and ill-used from his childhood, has
arrived at man’s estate without having heard one sympathetic word,
and completes his career by murdering his neighbour in order to
rob him of a shilling ? Will you demand his execution, or—worse
still—that he should be imprisoned for twenty years, when you know
very well that he is rather a madman than a criminal, and, in any
case, that his crime is the fault of our entire society ?
Will you claim that these weavers should be thrown into prison
who in a moment of desperation have set fire to a mill ? That this
man who shot at a crowned murderer should be imprisoned for
life ? That these insurgents should be shot down who plant the
flag of the future on the barricades ?—no, a thousand times no !
If you reason instead of repeating what is taught you; if you
analyse the law and strip off those cloudy fictions with which it
has been draped in order to conceal its real origin, which is the
right of the stronger, and its substance, which has ever been the
consecration of all the tyrannies handed down to mankind through
its long and bloody history; when you have comprehended this,
your contempt for the law will be profound indeed. You will
understand that to remain the servant of the written law is to place
yourself every day in opposition to the law of conscience, and to
make a bargain on the wrong side ; and since this struggle cannot
go on for ever you will either silence your conscience and become
a scoundrel, or you will break with tradition, and you will work
with us for the utter destruction of all this injustice, economical,
social, and political.
But then you will be a Socialist, you will be a Revolutionist.
. And you, young engineer, you who dream of improving the lot
of the workers by the application of science to industry,—what a
sad disappointment, what terrible disillusions await you ! You
devote the youthful energy of your mind to working out the scheme
�7
of a railway which, running along the brink of precipices anti
burrowing into the very heart of mountains of granite, will bind,
together two countries which nature has separated. But, once at
work, you see whole regiments of workers decimated by privations
and sickness in this dark tunnel, you see others of them returning
home carrying with them may be a few pence and the undoubted
seeds of consumption, you see human corpses—the results of
a grovelling greed—as landmarks along each yard of your road, and,
when the railway is finished, you see lastly that it becomes the
highway for the artillery of an invading army. . . .
You have given up the prime of your youth to perfect an in
vention which will facilitate production, and, after many experi
ments, many sleepless nights, you are at length master of this
valuable discovery. You make use of it and the result surpasses
your expectations. Ten, twenty thousand men are thrown
out upon the streets ! Those who remain, most of them children,
will be reduced to mere machines I Three, four, ten masters will
make their fortunes and will drink deep on the strength of it. . . .
Is this your dream ?
. , ,
,
.u <Finally, you study recent industrial advances and you see that
the sempstress has gained nothing, absolutely nothing, by the in
vention of the sewing machine; that the labourer m the bt.
Gothard tunnel dies of ankylostoma, notwithstanding diamond
drills • that the mason and the day labourer are out of work just
as before at the foot of the Giffard lifts—and, if you discuss social
problems with the same independence of spirit which has guided
you in your mechanical investigations, you necessarily come to the
conclusion that under the domination of private property and
wage-slavery, every new invention, far from increasing the well
being of the worker, only makes his slavery heavier, his labour
more degrading, the periods of slack work more frequent, the crisis
sharper, and that the man who already has every conceivable
pleasure for himself is the only one who profits by it.
.
What will you do when you have once come to this conclusion .
—either you will begin by silencing your conscience by sophisms ;
then one fine day you will bid farewell to the honest dreams of
your youth and you will try to obtain, for yourself, what commands
pleasure and enjoyment—you will then go over into the camp of
the exploiters. Or if you have a tender heart, you will say to
yourself
“ No, this is not the time for inventions. Let us work
first to transform the domain of production ; when private property
is put an end to, then each new advance in industry will be made
for the benefit of all mankind ; and this mass of workers, mere
machines as they are to-day, will then become thinking beings who
apply to industry their intelligence, strengthened by study and
skilled in manual labour, and thus mechanical progress will take
a bound forward which will carry out in fifty years what nowa
days we cannot even dream of.
And what shall I say to the schoolmaster—not to the man who
looks upon his profession as a wearisome business, but to him who
when surrounded by a joyous band of young pickles feels exhilarated
by their cheery looks, and in the midst of their happy laughter,and
who tries to plant in their little heads those ideas of humanity
which he cherished himself when he was young.
�8
Often I see that you are sad and I know what it is that makes
you knit your brows. This very day, your favourite pupil, who is
not very well up in Latin it is true, but who has none the less an
excellent heart, recited the story of William Tell with so much
vigour! his eyes sparkled, he seemed to wish to stab all tyrants
there and then ; he gave with such fire the passionate lines of
Schiller:—
Before the slave when he breaks his chain,
Before the free man tremble not.
But when he returned home, his mother, his father, his uncle,
sharply rebuked him for want of respect to the minister or the
rural policeman ; they held forth to him by the hour on “ prudence,
respect for authority, submission to his betters ”, till he put Schiller
aside in order to read “ Self-Help.”
And then only yesterday you were told that your best pupils have
all turned out badly ; the one does nothing but dream of becoming
an officer ; another in league with his master robs the workers of
their slender wages ; and you, who had such hopes of these young
people, you now brood over the sad contrast between your ideal
and life as it is.
You still brood over it ! then I foresee that in two years at the
outside, after having suffered disappointment after disappointment,
you will lay your favourite authors on the shelf, and you will end
by saying that Tell was no doubt a very honest fellow, but after all
a trifle cracked, that poetry is a first-rate thing for the fireside,
especially when a man has been teaching the rule-of-three all day
long, but still poets are always in the clouds and their views have
nothing to do with the life of to-day, nor with the next visit of the
Inspector of Schools. . . .
Or, on the other hand, the dreams of your youth will become the
firm convictions of your mature age. You will wish to have wide,
human education for all, in school and out of school; and, seeing
that this is impossible in existing conditions, you will attack
the very foundations of bourgeois society. Then, discharged,
as you will be by the Education Department, you will leave
your school and come among us and be of us; you will tell men of
riper years but of smaller attainments than yourself, how enticing
knowledge is, what mankind ought to be, nay what we could be.
You will come and work with Socialists for the complete trans
formation of the existing system, will strive side by side with us to
attain true equality, real fraternity, never-ending liberty for the
world.
Lastly you, young artist, sculptor, painter, poet, musician, do
you not observe that the sacred fire which inspired your prede
cessors is wanting in the men of to-day ? that art is commonplace
and mediocrity reigns supreme ?
Could it be otherwise ? The delight of having re-discovered the
ancient world, of having bathed afresh in the springs of nature
which created the master-pieces of the Renaissance no longer
exists for the art of our time ; the revolutionary ideal has left it
cold until now, and, failing an ideal, our art fancies that it has
found one in realism when it painfully photographs in colours the
dewdrop on the leaf of a plan# imitates the muscles in the leg of a
�9
eow, or describes minutely in prose and in verse the suffocating
filth of a sewer, the boudoir of a whore of high degree.
“ But, if this is so, what is to be done ? ” you say.—If, I reply,
the sacred fire that you say you possess is nothi ng better than a
smoking wick, then you will go on doing as you have done, and
your art will speedily degenerate into the trade of decorator of
tradesmen’s shops, of a purveyor of libretti to third-rate operettas
and tales for Christmas Annuals—most of you are already running
down that grade with a fine head of steam on.
....
But, if your heart really beats in unison with that of humanity,
if like a true poet you have an ear for Life, then, gazing out upon this
sea of sorrow whose tide sweeps up around you, face to face with
these people dying of hunger, in the presence of these corpses piled
up in the mines, and these mutilated bodies lying in heaps on the
barricades, looking on these long lines of exiles who are going to
bury themselves in the snows of Siberia and in the marshes of
tropical islands, in full view of this desperate battle which is
being fought, amid the cries of pain from the conquered and the
orgies of the victors, of heroism in conflict with cowardice, of
noble determination and contemptible cunning—you cannot re
main neutral: you will come and take the side of the oppressed
because you know that the beautiful, the sublime, the spirit of life
itself are on the side of those who fight for light, for humanity, for
justice!
You stop me at last!
“ What the devil!” you say. “ But if abstract science is a luxury
and the practice of medicine mere chicane ; if law spells injustice
and mechanical invention is but a means of robbery; if the school,
at variance with the wisdom of the practical man,” is sure to be
overcome, and art without the revolutionary idea can only de
generate, what remains for me to do ?”
Well, I will tell you.
A vast and most enthralling task ; a work in which your actions
will be in complete harmony with your conscience, an undertaking
capable of rousing the noblest and most vigorous natures.
What work ?—I will now tell you.
It rests with you either to palter continually with your con
science, and in the end to say one fine day “ Perish humanity,
provided I can have plenty of pleasures and enjoy them to the full,
so long as the people are foolish enough to let me.” Or, once
more the inevitable alternative, to take part with the Socialists
and work with them for the complete transformation of society.
Such is the irrefragable consequence of the analysis we have gone
through. That is the logical conclusion which every intelligent
man must perforce arrive at, provided that he reasons honestly
about what passes around him, and discards the sophisms which
his bourgeois education and the interested views of those about
him whisper in his ear.
This conclusion once arrived at, the question, “ What is to be
done ?” is naturally put.
The answer is easy.
Leave this environment in which you are placed and where it is
the fashion to say that the people are nothing but a lot of brutes,
Come among these people—and the answer will come of itself.
�IO
You will see that everywhere, in England as well as in France,
in Germany as well as in Italy, in Russia as well as in the United
States, everywhere where there is a privileged and an oppressed
class, there is a tremendous work going on in the midst of the
working-class, whose object is to break down for ever the slavery
enforced by the capitalist feudality and to lay the foundation of a.
society established on the basis of justice and equality. It is
no longer enough for the man of the people to-day to pour forth
his complaints in one of these songs whose melody breaks your
heart, such as were sung by the serfs of the eighteenth century
and are still sung by the Slav peasant; he labours with his
fellow-toilers for his enfranchisement, with the knowledge of
what he is doing and against every obstacle put in his way.
His thoughts are constantly exercised in considering what
should be done in order that life, instead of being a curse for threefourths of mankind, may be a real enjoyment for all. He takes up
the hardest problems of sociology and tries to solve them by his
good sense, his spirit of observation, his hard experience. In order
to come to an understanding with others as miserable as himself,
he seeks to form groups, to organise. He forms societies, main
tained with difficulty by small contributions ; he tries to make
terms with his fellows beyond the frontier, and he prepares the
day when wars between peoples shall be impossible far better than
the frothy philanthropists who now potter with the fad of universal
peace. In order to know what his brothers are doing, to have a
closer connection with them, to elaborate his ideas and pass them
round, he maintains—but at the price of what privations, what
ceaseless efforts!—his working press. At length when the hour
has come he rises, and reddening the pavements and the barricades
with his blood, he bounds forward to conquer those liberties which
the rich and powerful will afterwards know how to corrupt and to
turn against him again.
What an unending series of efforts ! what an incessant struggle !
What a toil perpetually begun afresh; sometimes to fill up the
gaps occasioned by desertion—the result of weariness, corruption,
prosecutions ; sometimes to rally the broken forces decimated by
fusillades and cold-blooded butchery I at another time to recom
mence the studies sternly broken off by wholesale slaughter.
The newspapers are set on foot by men who have been obliged
to force from society scraps of knowledge by depriving themselves
of sleep and food ; the agitation is kept up by halfpence deducted
from the amount needed to get the barest necessaries of life ; and
all this under the constant dread of seeing his family reduced to
the most fearful misery, as soon as the master learns that “ his
workman, his slave, is tainted with Socialism.”
This is what you will see if you go among the people._
And in this endless struggle how often has not the toiler vainly
asked, as he stumbled under the weight of his burden :
“ Where,
TAUGHT AT
then,
are these
OUR EXPENSE ?
young
THESE
CLOTHED WHILE THEY STUDIED ?
people
who have
YOUTHS WHOM
WE
FED
been
AND
WHERE ARE THOSE FOR WHOM,
�II
OUR
BENT
BACKS
DOUBLE
BENEATH
BURDENS
OUR
OUR
AND
BELLIES EMPTY, WE HAVE BUILT THESE HOUSES, THESE COLLEGES,
THESE LECTURE-ROOMS, THESE MUSEUMS ?
FOR
WHOSE
BENEFIT
PRINTED THESE
read
?
Where
POSSESS
ITSELF IS
THE
WITH
WE,
FINE
are
OUR
BOOKS, MOST
they,
SCIENCE
NOT WORTH
OF
these
WORN
FACES, HAVE
WE CANNOT
OF WHICH
professors
MANKIND, AND
A RARE
WHERE ARE THE MEN
PALE,
WHOM
FOR
MEN WHO ARE EVER SPEAKING IN PRAISE OF LIBERTY,
THINK TO CHAMPION OUR
BENEATH THEIR FEET ?
FREEDOM, TRAMPLED AS
WHERE
THE
WHOLE
WITH TEARS
FIND
GANG
IN
OF
THEIR
THEMSELVES
HYPOCRITES WHO
EYES BUT WHO
AMONG
US
HELPING
ARE THE
AND
NEVER
IT IS EACH DAY
ARE THEY, THESE
POETS, THESE PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS?
to
HUMANITY
WHERE
CATERPILLAR ?
EVEN
claim
who
WRITERS AND
WHERE IN A WORD IS
SPEAK
OF
NEVER, BY
US
IN
THE
PEOPLE
ANY
CHANCE,
OUR
LABORIOUS
WORK ?”
Where are they, indeed ?
Why, some are taking their ease with the most cowardly in
difference; others, the majority, despise the “dirty mob,” and are
ready to pounce upon them if they dare touch one of their
privileges.
Now and then, it is true, a young man comes among us who*
dreams of drums and barricades, and seeks sensational scenes;
but he deserts the cause of the people as soon as he perceives that
the road to the barricade is long, that the work is heavy, and that
the crowns of laurel to be won in this campaign are inter
mingled with thorns. Generally these are ambitious schemers out
of work, who having failed in their first efforts, try in this way to
cajole people out of their votes, but who a little later will be the
first to denounce them, when the people wish to apply the
principles which they themselves have professed ; perhaps will
even be ready to turn artillery and Gatlings upon them if they dare
to move before they, the heads of the movement, give the signal.
Add mean insult, haughty contempt, cowardly calumny from
the great majority, and you know what the people may expect
now-a-days from most of the youth of the upper and middle classes
in the way of help towards the social evolution.
But then you ask, “ What shall we do ? ” When there is every
thing to be done I When a whole army of young people would
find plenty to employ the entire vigour of their youthful energy, the
full force of their intelligence and their talents to help the people
in the vast enterprise they have undertaken 1
What shall we do ? Listen.
You lovers of pure science, if you are imbued with the principles
of Socialism, if you have understood the real meaning of the revo
lution which is even now knocking at the door, don’t you see that
all science has to be recast in order to place it in harmony with the
new principles; that it is your business to accomplish in this field
�12
;,
a revolution far greater than that which was accomplisnea m every
branch of science during the eighteenth century ? Don’t you under
stand that history—which to-day is an old wife’s tale about great
kings, great statesinen and great parliaments—that history itself
has to be written from the point of view of the people, from the
point of view of work done by the masses in the long evolutions of
mankind ? That social economy—which to-day is merely the
sanctification of capitalist robbery—has to be worked out afresh as
well in its fundamental principles as in its innumerable applica
tions ? That anthropology, sociology, ethics must be completely
recast, and that the very natural sciences themselves, regarded
from another point of view, must undergo a profound modification,
alike in regard to the conception of natural phenomena and with
respect to the method of exposition.
Very well, then. Set to work I Place your abilities at the com
mand of the good cause. Especially help us with your clear logic
to combat prejudice and to lay by your synthesis the foundations
of a better organisation ; yet more, teach us to apply in our daily
arguments the fearlessness of true scientific investigation, and show
us, as your predecessors did, how men dare sacrifice even life itself
for the triumph of the truth.
You, doctors, who have learnt Socialism by a bitter experience,
never weary of telling us to-day, to-morrow, in season and out of
season, that humanity itself hurries onward to decay if men remain
in the present conditions of existence and of work ; that all your
medicaments must be powerless against disease while the majority
of mankind vegetate in conditions absolutely contrary to those
which science tells us are healthful; that it is the causes of disease
which must be uprooted, and what is necessary to remove them.
Come with your scalpel and dissect for us with an unerring
hand this society of ours hastening to putrefaction. Tell us what
a rational existence should and might be. Insist, as true surgeons,
that a gangrenous limb must be amputated when it may poison the
whole body.
You, who have worked at the application of science to industry,
come and tell us frankly what has been the outcome of your dis
coveries. Convince those who dare not march boldly towards the
future, what new inventions the knowledge we have already acquired
carries in its womb, what industry could do under better conditions,
what man might easily produce if he produced always with a view
to enhance his own production.
You poets, painters, sculptors, musicians, if you understand your
true mission and the very interests of art itseli, come with us.
Place your pen, your pencil, your chisel, your ideas at the service
of the revolution. Figure forth to us, in your eloquent style or
your impressive pictures, the heroic struggles of the people against
their oppressors ; fire the hearts of our youth with that glorious
revolutionary enthusiasm which inflamed the souls of our ancestors ;
tell women what a noble career is that of a husband who devotes
his life to the great cause of social emancipation. Show the people
how hideous is their actual life, and place our hand on the causes
of its ugliness; tell us what a rational life would be if it did not
encounter at every step the follies and the ignominies of our pre
sent social order.
�J3
Lastly, all of you who possess knowledge, talent, capacity,
industry, if you have a spark of sympathy in your nature, come,
you and your companions, come and place your services at the
disposal of those who most need them. And remember, if you do
come, that you come not as masters, but as comrades in the
struggle ; that you come not to govern but to gain strength for
yourselves in a new life which sweeps upwards to the conquest of
the future; that you come less to teach than to grasp the aspira
tions of the many : to divine them, to give them shape, and then to
work, without rest and without haste, with all the fire of youth and
all the judgment of age, to realise them in actual life—then and
then only will you lead a complete, a noble, a rational existence.
Then you will see that your every effort on this path bears with it
fruit in abundance, and this sublime harmony once established
between your actions and the dictates of your conscience, will give
you powers which you never dreamt lay dormant in yourselves.
The never-ceasing struggle for truth, justice, and equality
among the people, whose gratitude you will earn—what nobler
career can the youth of all nations desire than this ?
It has taken me long to show you of the well-to-do classes that
in view of the dilemma which life presents to you, you will be
forced, if courageous and sincere, to come and work side by side
with Socialists, and champion in their ranks the cause of the social
revolution. And yet how simple this truth is after all I But when
one is speaking to those who have suffered from the effects of
bourgeois surroundings, how many sophisms must be combated !
how many prejudices overcome ! how many interested objections
pushed aside 1
It is easy to be brief to-day in addressing you, the youth of the
people. The very pressure of events impels you to become Social
ists, however little you may have the courage to reason and to act.
To rise from the ranks of the working people, and not devote
oneself to bringing about the triumph of Socialism, is to miscon
ceive the real interests at stake, to give up the cause and the true
historic mission.
Do you remember the time, when still a mere lad, you went
down one winter’s day to play in your dark court ? The cold
nipped your shoulders through your thm clothes, and the mud
worked into your worn-out shoes. Even then when you saw
chubby children richly clad pass in the distance, looking at you
with an air of contempt—you knew right well that these imps,
dressed up to the nines, were not the equals of yourself and your
comrades, either in intelligence, common sense, or energy. But,
later, when you were forced to shut yourself up in a filthy
factory from five or six o’clock in the morning, to remain twelve
hours on end close to a whirling machine, and, a machine yourself,
forced to follow day after day for whole years in succession its
movements with their relentless throbbing—during all this time
they, the others, were going quietly to be taught at fine schools, at
academies, at the universities. And now these same children, less
intelligent, but better taught than you, and become your masters,
are enjoying all the pleasures of life, and all the advantages of
civilisation—and you ? What sort of lot awaits you ?
�T4
You return to little, dark, damp lodgings where five or six
human beings pig together within a few square feet; where your
mother, sick of life, aged by care rather than in years, offers you
dry bread and potatoes as your only food, washed down by a
blackish fluid called, in irony, tea ; and to distract your thoughts
you have ever the same never-ending question, “ How shall I be
able to pay the baker to-morrow, and the landlord the day after ? ”
What! must you drag cn the same weary existence as your
father and mother for thirty or forty years ? Must you toil your
life long to procure for others all the pleasures of well-being, of
knowledge, of art, and keep for yourself only the eternal anxiety
as to whether you can get a bit of bread ? Will you for ever give
up all that makes life so beautiful, to devote yourself to providing
every luxury for a handful of idlers ? Will you wear yourself out
with toil and have in return only trouble, if not misery, when hard
times—the fearful hard times—come upon you ? Is this what you
long for in life ?
Perhaps you will give up ? Seeing no way out of your con
dition whatever, maybe you say to yourself, “ Whole generations
have undergone the same lot, and I, who can alter nothing in the
matter, I must submit also ! Let us work on then and endeavour
to live as well as we can ! ”
Very well. In that case life itself will take pains to enlighten
you.
One day a crisis comes, one of those crises which are no longer
mere passing phenomena, as they were a while ago, but a crisis
which destroys a whole industry, which plunges thousands of
workers into misery, which crushes whole families. You struggle
like the rest against the calamity. But you will soon see how your
wife, your child, your friend, little by little succumb to privations,
fade away under your very eyes, and for sheer want of food, for
lack of care and medical assistance, they end their days on the
pauper’s stretcher, while the life of the rich sweeps past in joyous
crowds through the streets of the great city gleaming in the sun
light—utterly careless and indifferent to the dying cries of those
who perish.
Then you will understand how utterly revolting this society is ;
you will reflect upon the causes of this crisis, and your examina
tion will go to the very depths of this abomination which puts
millions of human beings at the mercy of the brutal greed of a
handful of useless triflers ; then you will understand that Socialists
are right when they say that our present society can be, that it
must be, reorganised from top to bottom.
To pass from general crises to your particular case, one day when
your master tries by a new reduction of wages to squeeze out of
you a few more sous in order to increase his fortune still further,
you will protest; but he will haughtily answer, “ Go and eat grass,
if you will not work at the price I offer.” Then you will under
stand that your master not only tries to shear you like a sheep, but
that he looks upon you as an inferior kind of animal altogether;
that not content with holding you in his relentless grip by means
of the wage-system, he is further anxious to make you a slave in
every respect. Then you will either bow down before him, you
�IC
will give up the feeling of human dignity, and you will end by
suffering every possible humiliation. Or the blood will rush to
your head, you will shudder at the hideous slope on which you are
slipping down, you will retort, and, turned out workless on the
street, you will understand how right Socialists are when they say
“ Revolt 1 rise against this economical slavery, for that is the
cause of all slavery.” Then you will come and take your place in
the ranks of the Socialists, and you will work with them, for the
complete destruction of all slavery,—economical, social and
political.
Some day again you will learn the story of that charming young
girl whose brisk gait, frank manners, and cheerful conversation •
you so lovingly admired. After having struggled for years and
years against misery, she left her native village for the metropolis.
There she knew right well that the struggle for existence must be
hard, but she hoped at least to be able to gain her living honestly.
Well, now you know what has been her fate. Courted by the son
of some capitalist she allowed herself to be enticed by his fine
words, she gave herself up to him with all the passion of youth,
only to see herself abandoned with a baby in her arms. Ever
courageous she never ceased to struggle on ; but she broke down
in this unequal strife against cold and hunger, and she ended her
days in one of the hospitals, no one knows which........................................
What will you do ? Once more there are two courses open to
you. Either you will push aside the whole unpleasant reminiscence
with some stupid phrase :—“ She wasn’t the first and won’t be
the last,” you will say; perhaps, some evening, you will be heard in
a public room, in company with other beasts like yourself, out
raging the young girl’s memory by some dirty stories ; or, on the
other hand, your remembrance of the past will touch your heart;
you will try to meet the wretched seducer to denounce him to his
face ; you will reflect upon the causes of these events which recur
every day, and you will comprehend that they will never cease, so
long as society is divided into two camps, on one side the wretched
and on the other the lazy—the jugglers with fine phrases and
bestial lusts. You will understand that it is high time to bridge
over this gulf of separation, and you will rush to place yourself
among the Socialists.
And you, woman of the people, has this tale left you cold and
unmoved ? While caressing the pretty head of that child who
nestles close to you, do you never think about the lot that awaits
him, if the present social conditions are not changed ? Do you
never reflect on the future awaiting your young sister, and all your
own children ? Do you wish that your sons, they too, should
vegetate as your father vegetated, with no other care than how to
get his daily bread, with no other pleasure than that of the gin
palace ? Do you want your husband, your lads, to be ever at the
mercy of the first comer who has inherited from his father a capital
to exploit them with ? Are you anxious that they should always
remain slaves of a master, food for powder, mere dung wherewith
to manure the pasture-lands of the rich expropriator ?
Nay, never ; a thousand times no ! I know right well that your
blood has boiled when you have heard that your husbands after
4C
�16 '
they entered on a strike, full of fire and determination, have ended
by accepting, hat in hand, the conditions dictated by the bloated
bourgeois in a tone of haughty contempt! I know that you have
admired those Spanish women who in a popular rising presented
their breasts to the bayonets of the soldiery in the front ranks ot
the insurrectionists ! I am certain that you mention with rever
ence the name of the woman who lodged a bullet in the chest of
that ruffianly official who dared to outrage a Socialist prisoner in
his cell. And I am confident that your heart beat faster when you
read how the women of the people in Paris gathered under a rain
of shells to encourage “ their men ” to heroic action.
All this, I say, I have no doubt about, and that is why I cannot
question that you also, you will end by joining those who work for
the conquest of the future.
Every one of you then, honest young folks, men and women,
peasants, labourers, artisans and soldiers, you will understand
what are your rights and you will come along with us ; you will
come in order to work with your brethren in the preparation of
that Revolution which sweeping away every vestige of slavery,
tearing the fetters asunder, breaking with the old worn-out traditions
and opening to all mankind a new and wider scope of joyous ex
istence, shall at length establish true Liberty, real Equality, un
grudging Fraternity throughout human society; work with all%
work for all—the full enjoyment of the fruits of their labour, the
complete development of all their faculties ; a rational, human and
happy life !
Don’t let anyone tell us that we—but a small band—are too
weak to attain unto the magnificent end at which we aim.
Count and see how many of us there are who suffer this in
justice.
We peasants who work for others and who mumble the straw
while our master eats the wheat, we by ourselves are millions of
men ; so numerous are we that we alone form the mass of the
people.
We workers who weave silks and velvets in order that we may
be clothed in rags, we, too, are a great multitude ; and when the
clang of the factories permits us a moment’s repose, we overflow
the streets and squares like the sea in a spring tide.
We soldiers who are driven along to the word of command, or
by blows, we who receive the bullets for which our officers get
crosses and pensions, we, too, poor fools who have hitherto known
no better than to shoot our brothers, why we have only to make a
right-about-face towards these plumed and decorated personages
who are so good as to command us, to see a ghastly pallor over
spread their faces.
Ay, all of us together, we who suffer and are insulted daily, we
are a multitude whom no man can number, we are the ocean that
can embrace and swallow up all else.
When we have but the will to do it, that very moment will
Justice be done: that very instant the tyrants of the earth shall
bite the dust.
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envelope.
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An appeal to the young
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Kropotkin, Petr Alekseevich [1842-1921]
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 23 cm.
Series number: no. 6
Notes: Stamp on title page: 'South Place Chapel Finsbury, Lending Library'. Reprinted from 'To-Day'. At the time of publication the author was serving "five years' imprisonment under the French Republic for advocating the cause of the people" [Title page].
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1885
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Socialism
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Hyndman, H. M. (Henry Mayers) (tr)
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Peter Kropotkin
Socialism
Young people
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AN EXAMINATION OF SOCIALISM
By HILAIRE BELLOC, M.P?
Socialism is a political theory according to which
people would be happier and better if the means of
production—that is, the land of a country and its
buildings, ships, machines, rails, &c.—belonged to the
Government instead of belonging, as they now mainly
do, to private citizens and private corporations.
That is the only exclusive meaning of Socialism.
All the other wobbly ideas that have been tacked
on to it by its enemies or its friends—that it is
“ atheistic,” or that it involves sexual “ immorality,”
that it is “ progressive,” that it is “ Christian ”—have
nothing to do with the one proposition which alone
distinguishes it from all other policies.
A Socialist State need be neither more democratic
nor less democratic than the present state of affairs.
A State in which all the means of production were
owned by the Government might be under a despot
or under an aristocracy, or it might be managed as
a democracy. However it was managed it would be
1 Reprinted by permission from 'die St. George's Review and
revised by the author.
�2
An Examination of Socialism
a Socialistic State if the means of production were
owned and controlled by Government.
Socialism does not in its essence imply that nobody
should own anything.
There is no reason why a
man in a Socialist State should not own a great
quantity of things for his own private enjoyment.
The only thing that would be denied to private
ownership would be something commonly used or
usable as a means of production ; something which,
when one part of the community owns it and the
other part does not, permits the owning part to live
upon the labour of the non-owning part. A man in a
Socialistic State would be allowed to own ornaments
and purely personal possessions such as pictures and
furniture, watches, and even productive machines
should they be used for his own enjoyment alone ;
but he would not be allowed a share, large or small,
in a factory, or a shop, or a railroad, or a commercial
steamship, or a piece of land (to be used for profit),
except that share which he might be said to own as
a member of the community whose Government owned
and controlled all these things.
Again, a State could be Socialistic and yet have very
different degrees of enjoyment among its citizens. The
Government might reward men according to merit,
distributing very unequally the wealth produced by
labour applied to the capital and land it owned. The
Government might give large amounts of the good
things to a few people whom it thought deserved
them, and very little to the mass of mankind whom
it might think so wicked as not to deserve them. It
might make an unequal distribution by giving high
rewards to the talented, the good organizers and the
�An Examination of Socialism
3
good managers, in order to secure efficiency of produc
tion, and very little to the general mass of labourers.
It might act purely by caprice, giving large amounts
to its favourites and small amounts to the rest of the
community. , It might (as many confusedly think that
it must') distribute to each according to his need ; it
might make a rigidly equal distribution to each family
in the community according to the age and number of
its members. Whatever form the distribution took,
whether there were great differences between the
amounts distributed or exact equality in them, whether
the distribution were determined by competition in
talent or by caprice, or by the sense of human equality,
the State would still be a Socialistic State if the means
of production were owned and controlled by the
Government.
This is the main point to seize ; for it is in this, and
in this alone, that Socialism differs from other political
theories.
It is certain that, whatever may have happened in
other parts of the world, our ancestors here in Western
Europe never had anything of the kind. There was
plenty of co-operative production in the Middle Ages ;
there was plenty of common land (as there still is)
side by side with land privately owned. There existed
for a short time a legal fiction, which still theoreti
cally survives, that the land of the country ultimately
belonged to the Crown ; but in practice no Socialistic
State can be discovered in. the past history of men
of our own blood. Many have thought to discover it,
and guessed it to be present in certain ill-understood
and very obscure primitive customs, but the evidence in
favour of this kind of guesswork was never strong
�4
An Examination of Socialism
enough to convince a close critic of evidence, and,
as research proceeds, gets weaker every day.
The proposal, then, which is the Socialist proposal,
to convert all private property in the means of produc
tion—that is, in the factories, machines, land, houses,
&c.—into Government property is a novel proposal.
It is a proposal to do something quite new and as yet
untried by men of our descent with our inherited tradi
tions and instincts and ways of looking at things. Why
has so revolutionary a proposal been made, and what
arguments can be brought forward in its favour ?
This revolutionary proposal has been made because
the present state of society is in itself a novel one,
suffering from evils new in the history of our country,
and, for that matter, of the world ; and the arguments
in favour of it—the arguments, that is, by which it is
attempted to prove that England would be a better
and a happier country under Socialism, are many and
strong. As things now are in England, a small propor
tion of the inhabitants of the country possess by far the
greater part of the means of production. It is very
difficult to obtain exact figures, and all general state
ments made in this connection must be received with
caution. But I think the following general state
ment is not very wide of the mark, though, of course,
it does not pretend to be rigidly accurate. I think one
may say that less than two hundred families at the
very most control one-quarter of our means of produc
tion. Another quarter is in the hands of perhaps
two thousand families at the most. And the remain
ing half (unless we are to include properties so
small that they hardly count as capital) cannot at
the utmost be made to include as much as a
�An Examination of Socialism
5
sixteenth of the whole community. The rest consist
of families working for a wage, and unlikely, save in
exceptional individual instances, to be anything other
than wage-earners, either now or in the future. Side
by side with this concentration of ownership in few
hands you have a highly competitive system of pro
duction under which security of employment is at its
minimum. Thus a great and an increasing proportion
of the population—so it is maintained—has no share
in the permanent wealth of the country, and can only
enjoy what it does on condition of continual labour
for others who own that permanent wealth ; while the
workers, though not perhaps becoming actually poorer,
are becoming relatively poorer compared with the
owning classes, and with all this they are less and less
secure of permanent employment as trade competition
extends over a wider and wider area of the world’s
surface. A good crop of some product on the other
side of the globe may suddenly throw out of employ
ment any number of men employed here in the pro
duction of a similar article. The cessation of demand
for something produced by us, but consumed by people
whom we have never seen, in India or in China, may
suddenly destroy the livelihood of a whole group of
artizans in England. Every progress even, every new
invention, tends to bring into the experience of some
group of labouring men a period of insecurity at the
best, and at the worst of acute distress. Meanwhile
there is a constant tendency for property to amalgamate
still further, there is a constant tendency for the big
business to swallow up the small one, and it is the
main Socialist argument that if we leave things as they
are we shall end in a state of society where quite a
�6
An Examination of Socialism
small number of exceedingly rich men will control the
destinies of all the rest of their fellows. It will, more
over (they say), be a state of society in which competi
tion for employment will always maintain the average
earnings of the labouring class at an exceedingly low
level, and the power of enjoyment of the mass of the
community will be miserably small compared with the
power of enjoyment of the few owners who control it.
It is to avoid a consummation of this kind that
Socialists propose the fundamental transformation of
our social system, towards which transformation they
are working with such enthusiasm and conviction.
Now let us look at another aspect of the matter, and
consider certain consequences that would follow upon
Socialism were it ever brought into being.
In the first place, no man in a Socialistic State would
be what we now call free. This is a proposition very
hotly denied by many Socialists, because they believe
it to be an unfair and a misleading one ; but no clear
thinker can deny it, and by far the best arguments used
in this connection by the clearest thinkers upon the
Socialistic side are to the effect that, though the citizen
in a Socialist State would not be “ free ” in the sense in
which an old independent owner of land and capital
used to be, he would be much freer than the mass
of the population is to-day. Before returning to that,
however, it is well to repeat the first and fundamental
objection to the Socialist solution of our modern diffi
culties. No man under a Socialist State would be what
we call free. He could not exercise his will as to where
he should go, what he should consume, what he should
do with his time, to what activities he should direct his
energies.
�An Examination of Socialism
7
There is a rather muddle-headed habit, but a com
mon one, present not only in Socialist discussion but in
most other political discussion, which may be briefly
described as trying to have your cake and eat it too.
Men like to believe that some ideal of theirs would have
all the advantages inherent to itself, and also the advan
tages in contradiction with its very nature. All men
love individual freedom—even such a remnant of it as
the modern artizan may claim is very dear, and the
threat of losing it is a serious one. It is, therefore, not
surprising that those who see in Socialism the only
remedy for the appalling evils which .we suffer to-day
try to reconcile that remedy with individual freedom.
But consider for a moment how impossible such a re
conciliation is. A man in a factory under a master may,
if he choose, leave that factory and look for work else
where. If he prefer, for the sake of security, to remain
in that one employment, he is in many things at the
disposal of his master’s will during the hours of his
labour. He cannot go to the manager or to the master
and say : “ I don’t like this job ; I feel inclined for that
other one. Be good enough to give it me.” At least
he can go and say it, and perhaps in certain cases if he
shows large aptitude for the new job and is able to
convince his master of. it, or if he finds a special favour
extended to him, that liberty of choice will be conceded;
but it is obvious that it could not be universal. You
could not have every employee in Mr. Jones’s mill saying
exactly what he would do and for how long he would
do it, or choosing his job according to his private
inclination. So far liberty is already largely restricted
by the industrial system, and the rich man is far freer
than the poor one. But now go a step further. Work
�8
An Examination of Socialism
is done, and the man goes out into the street. He
thinks he will have a glass of beer ; but all the public
houses in the neighbourhood are owned by Mr. Jones
just as much as the mill is, and Mr. Jones will or will
not let him drink, according as he sees fit. He goes
home, and, finding something not suitable to him in his
present house, he decides to move into another which
has caught his fancy, and which is more convenient to
him for some reason. He finds, to his astonishment,
that not only is Mr. Jones the owner of his present
house, but of the other house too ; and can deny him
the faculty of exchanging his old residence for the new
one. He thinks he will use part of his wages to get a
pair of boots ; but he can only get boots of the sort
provided by Mr. Jones, and Mr. Jones can allow him
to have a new pair, or not, just as he thinks fit. He
will go to a music-hall. He finds that Mr. Jones owns
that, too, and decides on his entertainment. Wherever
he turns, all the things he desires to get, all the places
in which he desires to move and to have his being,
belong to the same man as owned the mill where his
working hours were spent, and wherever he goes, no
matter how far afield, this omnipotent being is every
where the owner and controller, not, indeed, of his
person, but of the food by which his person remains
alive, and of the shelter by which he remains alive,
and of every recreation or necessity relative to his
being.
Now Mr. Jones is, under Socialist conditions, the
Government; and to the loss of freedom which every
man feels during those hours which he gives as a wage
earner to the capitalist who employs him must be added,
under a Socialist system, a similar loss of freedom in all
�An Examination of Socialism
g
the other hours of his life. There is no way out of
that truth.
To this criticism the Socialist has an answer. The
answer is as follows : “ I admit that the ownership of
all the means of production by the Government would
be a bad thing, if it were used despotically, as such
ownership is now used by individual owners. But I
would never tolerate a Socialist ideal unless that ideal
ir.sluded democratic management.”
Note at this point that the two ideas of Government
ownership and democracy have no connection. We
have all of us met Socialists who were not in the least
democratic, and it is perfectly easy to be a Socialist
and a most rabid anti-democrat, especially if you are
keener on people being made to do whatever you think
is good for them than you are upon their being free
to choose between good and evil. Still, it must be
admitted that the desire for Socialism, springing as
it nearly always does in hearts powerfully affected by
the misery of the people, is usually associated with a
democratic ideal of government; and most Socialists
will say to you : “ The man will not be free as regards
the Government, but since he will, as a citizen, be the
master of the Government, he will be really just as free
as the most independent owner is to-day, and much
more free than the ordinary wage-earner is to-day. He
will be able to make or unmake the regulations which
shall control his life.”
The critic of Socialism at once replies that this will
not be the case. A man voting as one of many thou
sands or millions is quite a different thing from a man
enjoying elastic and immediate personal control every
moment over his own actions. No one would be so
�io
An Examination of Socialism
insane as to say that the actions of a modern Govern
ment, on however democratic a base, are invariably
consonant with the will of the great majority of its
citizens. Most people would say that usually the
actions of the Government were out of touch with
the will of the great majority of the people. This,
they would say, was true even of the very limited
sphere of Government to-day, and of the very slow
and imperfect action which it can take in quite a few
matters. Those who believe this to be true even of
Government as it is cannot believe that Socialism, no
matter how democratic the political system with which
it was combined, would give freedom of action even to
the majority of citizens.
The critic of Socialism asks a further question : What
about the minority ? Either you must have a constitu
tion where nothing can be done without an overwhelm
ing majority, in which case you would be perpetually
coming to a deadlock, or else you must work by
ordinary majorities, in which case you would be per
petually creating hearty and intolerable discontent in
large minorities opposed to you. Further, this system
of majority voting, even if it worked, could only apply
to the very large decisions of life. In all the innumer
able minor details that make up our circumstances we
should necessarily be in the hands of officials. I am
not saying that would be a bad thing, or that it would
be worse than the state of affairs that exists now for
most of our citizens. I am only pointing out that this
is an absolutely inevitable result of Socialism, and a
result that cannot be avoided save by a process of
confusion of thought: by trying to believe that a thing
can both be and not be at the same time. Nor has
�An Examination of Socialism
11
any one ever been able to show how so clear and
obvious a resultant of the Socialist system could possibly
be avoided.
The next criticism offered to Socialism is of a more
subtle and profound kind, but is none the less very
real. As Socialism would destroy what we call free
dom, so it would destroy what we call the satisfaction
of the desire for property. Now here two very im
portant arguments used by Socialists against their
opponents must be immediately noted.
First, they say, under present conditions the vast
mass of our fellow-citizens cannot satisfy that human
desire for property in so far as it exists • their whole
efforts are directed—and God knows under what an
anxious strain of body and mind !—to satisfy the bare
necessities of human appetite—the necessary food,
and clothing, and house room. They would, under
a Socialistic State, if it were democratically managed,
own, not indeed any of the means of production, but
far, far more of the enjoyable permanent possessions
of life than they do to-day. This is perfectly true, and
all that the critic of Socialism can set against it is a
repetition of the undoubted truth just stated—namely,
that under a Socialist State the desire for property
which can now in theory be satisfied by all, and is in
practice satisfied by some, would not be satisfied by any
if private property in land and the means of production
were abolished.
But even to this the Socialist has a second and a very
strong reply. He can say: “The desire for property
does not exist very strongly in the case of land and of
machinery. The desire to have these things is only a
desire to be what is called ‘ rich ’—that is, to be able to
�12
An Examination of Socialism
exchange the product of land and capital so owned
against daily enjoyments. The desire is not for the
things themselves, for the land itself, or for the
machinery itself ; and those things which a man really
does desire to own, the things which are part of his
permanent possessions, and with which he is constantly
in contact, and out of which he obtains a permanent
enjoyment because he is their owner, those things—his
books, his furniture, his ornaments, his pictures, perhaps
even a little plot of land (if he promises to produce
nothing for sale with it)—he could possess under the
Socialist State; and then everybody would have
such personal possessions, whereas now very few
do.”
There is but one reply to this very powerful conten
tion, which is that, as a fact, men do desire to own
land and the means of production, and to own them
absolutely, not only in order that they may be what is
called “ rich ”—that is, that they may command passing
enjoyments—but for the pleasure and consequences
of owning the things themselves, and that for the
following reasons :
First, that you cannot distinguish between the desire
of ownership in a thing according to whether that thing
is productive or not. It is true the interest which a
man takes in a share of a business is not the same as the
interest he takes in a particular instrument which he
himself handles and uses. Still, it is a personal interest,
and not a mere crude sense of superior opportunity for
enjoyment. This is particularly the case with regard
to land, which arouses the most powerful sentiment of
affection and interest in the possessor, quite inde
pendently of whether it is cultivated for profit or
�An Examination oj Socialism
13
not, and quite independently of the amount in which
it is owned.
Secondly, this general desire to own is connected
with certain human consequences which have nothing
to do with whether the thing owned is capable of
exploiting the labour of others or not. Of one of these
human consequefices, economic freedom, mention has
been made above. Another well worth noting, and
closely attached to it, is the preservation of personal
honour. Where few own, the mass who do not own
at all are under a perpetual necessity to abase them
selves in a number of little details. That is why
industrial societies fight so badly compared with
societies of peasant proprietors. The mass of the
population gets trained to the sacrifice of honour; it
gets used to being ordered about by the capitalist,,
and partially loses its manhood. If there were but
one capitalist, the State, this evil would certainly be
exaggerated. Men might be better fed, better clothed,
and materially much happier ; they might be brighter
in spirits, better companions, and healthier men all
round, but they would necessarily have lost all power
of expression for the sentiment known as personal
honour; they would have one absolute master, all
forms of personal seclusion from whom would be im-'
possible. This, when it is stated in the midst of modern
evils, appears a very small point; but those who
have passed by compulsion from a higher to a lower
standard of personal honour can testify how vital a
point is that honour in the scheme of human happiness.
It must, however, finally be asked of the man who
criticizes the Socialist proposal: “ If you will not
accept this positive and clear remedy for the in
�i4
An Examination of Socialism
tolerable conditions of modern industrial society, what
alternative have you ? ”
It is as though a man suffering from a bad limb were
to hesitate to have it amputated, and the surgeon were
to say to him : “If you will not let me cut it off, what
other course do you propose to pursue in order to
be cured ? ”
•
This question is a strong and insistent one; it
is the root question of the whole affair, and it requires
reply ; for any one who pretends that the present con
dition of society in England is tolerable, or has even
the least chance of enduring, is of a mental calibre
worthy rather of what is called “ practical politics ”
than of serious and vital discussion. Let us see,
then, what the answer is which the serious opponents
of Socialism (not the politicians, for they do not count)
make to its demand.
What they say is, that if you could make a society
in which the greater part of citizens owned capital
and land in small quantities, that society would be
happy and secure. They say (as every one must) that
such a subdivision is quite possible with regard to
land; but they also believe it to be possible with regard
to shares in industrial concerns. When they are told
that a high division of this sort would necessarily
and soon drift again into a congested state of owner
ship, with a few great capitalists on the one hand
and a wretched proletariat upon the other, they answer
that, as a matter of fact, in the past, when property
was thus well divided, it did not drift into that con
dition, but that the highly divided state of property
was kept secure for centuries by public opinion trans
lating itself into laws and customs, by a method of
�An Examination of Socialism
15
guilds, of mutual societies, by an almost religious feel
ing of the obligation not to transgress certain limits
of competition, &c. When they are told that a State
in which property was highly divided would involve
more personal responsibility and personal anxiety than
would the Socialist State, they freely admit this, but
they add that such responsibilities and anxieties are
natural to freedom in any shape and are the price
one must pay for it.
Consider carefully this alternative theory. It is
valuable because—First, it is the only possible alter
native ; secondly, because it is one which has hardly
entered into the consciousness of English people.
So few English people have ever owned anything
during the last few generations that the idea of highly
divided capital is not present as a social experience. It
is hardly an historic memory. Nevertheless, it remains
with English people, just as much as with any other
Europeans, an instinctive ideal. And I repeat, between
that ideal of highly divided capital and Socialist collec
tivism there is no possible third ideal ; we must go one
way or the other. Every reform, every little tinkering
and futile Bill which people maunder through in the
House of Commons necessarily tends one way or the
other.
The whole contention of the future in Europe lies
between these two theories. On the one hand you have
the Socialist theory, the one remedy and the only remedy
seriously discussed in the industrial societies which have
ultimately grown out of the religious schism of the
sixteenth century—that is, the industrial societies of
North Germany, of the Northern United States, and
especially of England and the lowlands of Scotland.
�i6
An Examination of Socialism
On the other hand, you have the Catholic societies
whose ultimate appetite is for a state of highly
divided property, working in a complex and probably,
at last, in a co-operative manner. That is certainly the
way the Irish natioii is going. The Irish people—
unlike the aliens of the North—have steadily refused to
turn themselves into a proletariat, whether in the
modern industrial phase or in preparation for the final
Socialistic phase. The Irish are determined to own.
The same solution appeals to the great mass of the French
people (with the exception of certain plague spots such
as the mining and spinning districts of the North),
and the interest of all our debates in the near future
in Western or European society will lie, I think, in the
victory of one or other of these two ideals—the
Socialist ideal, in which the diseased industrial world
will attempt to heal itself upon lines consonant with
its existing nature ; the ideal of widely-diffused owner
ship, in which the healthier and older world, which has
survived outside the modern industrial system, proposes
to build up its new life, until it can see its way to
basing an intensive production upon highly divided
individual property.
Which of the two systems will win no one can say.
The Socialists, of course, do the most prophesying :
but then they have grown out of that Biblical enthusiasm
in religion and philosophy to which prophecy is native.
But prophecy has always Been worthless in human
affairs, save where it regarded transcendental things.
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY.
U.—Dec., 1908.
�
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An examination of socialism
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Belloc, Hilaire [1870-1953]
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Notes: Reprinted by permission from the St. George's Review and revised by the author.
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Socialism and Religion
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Az
CAPITAL AND LABOUR;
THEIR
RIGHTS AND DUTIES:
A ^RETROSPECT
OF THE
TAILORS’ LABOUR AGENCY
^jonUnir:
WILLIAM FREEMAN, 102, FLEET STREET.
1861.
�T. e* vr? »VP CO., Iirst-XTSK ASB GSSEXKL PSSTSSSj,
�[CAPITAL AND LABOUR;
THEIli
RIGHTS AND DUTIES.
Ten years’ experience, and the signal success of the “Tailors’
Labour Agency,” may j ustify a few words of self-gratulation, and
warrant a simple statement of past achievement and future
expectancy. To look back upon the hindrances which have
obstructed us, the encouragements which have cheered us, and the
accomplishment of many of our purposes, will be a retrospect not
unpleasing to ourselves, and may have something of profit in it
for others. We would like to speak with diffidence on a subject
on which there is not entire unanimity of opinion, and while we
admit that in carrying out our views we may not always have
done the fitting thing at the fittest time, yet we are confident
that our purpose has been a good and a righteous one, and we
still cling to it hopefully and unflinchingly, thankful for the
(measure of success which has attended our efforts, and in no
degree dismayed by thajloubts and scepticism of well-tried friends,
or the ill-disguised hostility of mistaken opponents.
It were well, perhaps, that working men generally were better
acquainted with the science of political economy, a science which
has, in the main, established itself on principles of commercial
and social soundness; though some of its expounders have driven
their dogmas so hard and heartlessly, that many have been justi
fied in their aversion to the investigating those principles upon
which much of their welfare depends. Money, and how to get
it, has become of far greater importance than labour and how to
live by it; and while the working classes deem themselves
excluded from the sentiments and sympathies which make life
�4
cheerful and useful, the opinion is entertained by many that it is
the interest and desire of the high and the wealthy to oppress
the poor and the lowly; that position, power, and influence are
^associated only with the possession of money—that it is the
■destiny of the worker to work on for the enrichment of those
that employ him—and that while capital is increasing in the
hands of a few, and one class advancing in opulence and
living in luxury, there is another and far larger class whose labour
•can barely find them subsistencej who are living continually
•on the verge of pauperism, into which they drift at last,
leaving the like hopeless toil and cheerless prospects as the
“heritage of woe” which the working man bequeaths to his
'children.
This view of the matter is rather gloomy, and is certainly to
some extent erroneous, but any one who has mixed considerably
with our working population, our average working men, neither
those who are leading vicious lives, nor those whose vocation is
dubious and uncertain, must be aware of much in their condition
that is unsatisfactory, and even perilous. With all our national
greatness, our freedom of commerce, our vast achievements in
science, and the growing intelligence among all classes, it surely
■cannot be that the claims of society, the progress of business, or
•even the spirit of competition itself requires that our millions of
workers, who are the right arm of our strength, and our bulwark
-of defence, should be crushed in their struggle for bread; that the
body should be exhausted by daily toil till the mind become
paralysed, and the moral nature be overborne by physical wants
and necessities, rendering the higher aims, enjoyments, and even
duties of life a bitter mockery, and a stern impossibility. If
this be the fate of labour—if there are laws inexorable in their
■demand, and unyielding in their requirements, which assert this
•condition to be inevitable—then is the fate a hard one indeed.
But we do not believe it
There are some men whom much political economy has made
’unreasonable and unfeeling, who would not deny that in many
•trades the workmen may be inadequately remunerated, and in
■some scarcely remunerated at all, but they would leave all that
�5
alone. ’’These things, they think, will ultimately adjust themselves by some laws of their own, and any meddlesome inter
ference with their operation they earnestly deprecate. Such mem
opposed any interference with the employment of children of'
tender years in factories, and of women in coal mines, and they
would rather support the working man from the poor-rates, as a.
pauper, than countenance any effort by which the wages of'
labour might bejkept above starvation point. They cannot deny
the right of the working class to combine to fix the price of their
labour, but according to them this is never done at the right
time, nor in the right way; and if hostilities are provoked between
Lcapital and labour, capital generally contrives, by calling to its
aid some extreme maxims in political economy, to get the best
in the conflict.
This has come to be considered by a large class of operatives
as more owing to the power of the moneyed interest than
to any inherent justness of the cause in the question at issue,,
and antagonisms have thereby been provoked and embittered
to the manifest detriment of both parties in the conflict.
But, after all that can be said, money has a power—will always,
have a power—as the representative of accumulated savings, and
the engine by which commercial enterprise is set in motion, and
labour made productive; and working men would have long er©
now seen their true interests in relation to capital, but for the
selfishness of a certain class of employers who look upon
their workmen only as the means of money-getting for them
selves, who think that to be rich is the best thing, and Ke next,
best thing to appear to be rich; whose political faith is that
“ Poverty is disgraceful, and hard cash covers a multitude of
sins,”—whose regard for the workers is dictated by the same
consideration which makes them oil then machinery—who view
them only physically and socially, and overlook those moral
relations which are the bond of a common humanity, and the only
means by which a people may become happy and virtuous. We
are no unqualified adinirers of Trades’ Unions, on the principles
by which they have hitherto been conducted; and speaking as
working men ourselves—whom, perhaps, fortunate circumstances*
�6
and somewhat of an aptitude for business have raised a shade
above the merest operative—we deplore the errors into which
they have led those connected with them, and the deep suffer
ing which their unwise counsels have often produced; but we do
say that it will be a happy day for this country when the millions
of those who sweat and toil, shall have intelligence and union
enough among themselves, to combine for securing the same con
sideration for their labour, as the capitalist can secure for his
money; and by prudent, well-regulated lives, promote those
measures of social progress, which shall give them a power in the
■commonwealth to which they have never yet attained.
These views are not mere sentimentalities. Some of the
sternest of political economists have put forth opinions to the
same effect. Adam Smith, in his Wealth of Nations, asks :—
“ Is an improvement in the circumstances of the lower ranks of
the people to be regarded as an advantage, or as an inconveniency to society?” “The answer,” he continues, “seems
at first abundantly plain. Servants, labourers, and workmen of
different kinds, make up by far the greater part of every great
political society. But what improves the circumstances of the
greater part can never be regarded as any inconveniency to the
whole. No society can surely be flourishing and happy of which
the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable. It
is but equity, besides, that they who feed, clothe, and lodge the
whole body of the people, should have such a share of the
produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well
fed, clothed, and lodged.”
Mr. M’Culloch, in his Principles of Political Economy, says:—
“ The best interests of society require that the rate of wages
should be elevated as high as possible; that a taste for the
comforts, luxuries, and enjoyments of human life should be
widely diffused, and, if possible, interwoven with national
habits and prejudices. Very low wages, by rendering it im
possible for any increased exertions to obtain any consider
able increase of comforts and enjoyments, effectually hinders
them from being made, and is, of all others, the most powerful
cause of that idleness and apathy that contents itself with what
�7
•can barely continue animal existence.” Again, in his Principles
of Population he has this remark :—“ I really cannot conceive
•anything much more detestable than the idea of knowingly con
demning the labourers of Great Britain to rags and wretched
ness, for the purpose of selling a few more broadcloths and
■calicos.”
Dr. Wade, too, in Iris History of the Middle and Working
Classes, says:—I am .a great admirer of political economy,
but do not implicitly adopt all its dogmas. National happi
ness is more important than national wTealth very unequally
■apportioned. Repudiating witlheontempt the idea that the rich
are in a conspiracy against the poor, and that they do not ■wish
to improve their condition; still, I think, that in all fiscal and
•domestic measures the maxim should be acted upon, that it is
'better a hundred persons live comfortably than one luxuriantly. High wages are, therefore, more important than high
profits •, it is better—should they ever be at issue—the people
•should be happy than foreign trade prosperous. It is less an
evil that the minority should undergo a privation of the luxuries,
<than the majority of the necessaries of life.”
With respect to the feeling which ought to obtain between
employers and the employed, a writer in a late number of the
Quarterly Review has the following :—il Employers ought not
to stand too strongly upon their rights, nor entrench themselves
too exclusively within the circle of their own. order. Frankness
and cordiality will win working men’s hearts, and a ready
explanation will often remove misgivings and dissatisfaction.
Were there more trust, and greater sympathy between classes,
there would be less disposition to turn out on the part of men,
and a more accommodating spirit on the part of masters.”
And so, in organising and conducting the “ Tailors’ Labour
Agency,” it has not been our aim to propound any new scheme
of a societary or communistic kind, or any involved or abstruse
doctrines; but, believing that practice was more at fault than
principle, we have sought to deal with old facts and sub
sisting relations, and taking the ordinary intercourse and arrange
ments between the employer and the employed, endeavouring
�8
to rear o-ut of that, a scheme of co-operation which should
enhance the interests of the workmen, while it promoted the
success of the business which gave them employment. For it
is certain, that even in tailoring, depreciated and maligned
though it be, there is as much scope for excellence in taste and
skill, as in occupations of a more artistic kind; and were a body
of workmen got together, stimulated and encouraged by an em
ployer, bound to him by some tie more enduring than the precarious one of here to-day and away to-morrow, were they
sufficiently educated in mind and eye, and fully alive to the.
importance of earning and sustaining a reputation for superior
workmanship, why, a business, steady, certain, and amply remu
nerative, would reward their application and industry, realise
for them what the life of a competent honest artisan ought
to be, and surround them with manifold comforts and enjoy-J
ments to which a large number of working men are too often
strangers.
Fair wages for the worker we therefore hold to be of the
first importance, necessary as a matter of policy and justice,
demanded by the rights of labour, and enforced by the duties of
capital. There may be some law of supply and demand which-,
would appear to take it out of the category of ordinary obliga
tions, but justice and fair dealing are amenable to a higher law,,
and will not be set aside by arithmetical figures, or mathematical,
definitions. The supposed existence of a law in our social
economics, by which every relation in life is defined with
mathematical precision, has a tendency to destroy that sympathy
and kindliness of feeling, which should be for the interest of all
classes, and produce a cold and hard exaction on the part of
those, who, making haste to be rich, seek to increase their
profits out of the wages which labour ought to receive. The
man of contracted and ungenerous nature, who is dead to the
sympathies of his kind, and has never been raised above himself'
by one wave of impassioned feeling, seizes with avidity upon an
argument, or seeming argument, by which his selfishness may
be dignified with the name of prudence, shrewdness, or common
sense ; in this mood of self-complacency he is regardless and
�9
Indifferent about the misery, the want, and wretchedness, the
debasement which under-paid labour produces among the
numerous class of workers whose interests and well-being are
vitally important to the community.
It is reported that a member of a tailoring firm in this metro
polis has lately purchased, a landed estate at a cost of nearly
■£30,000. For making a coat, known by the name of “ Oxonian,”
that firm pays its workmen six shillings. The time required for
making such a garment, is about two days, and the price paid for
making it by most other houses in the trade is ten shillings. Now,
would not a portion of that £30,000 distributed among the workmen in increased wages, and expended by them on bread and meat,
On better clothing, better house accommodation, and more suitable
furniture, on the education of their children, and surrounding
them with happier, healthier influences, have been a greater social
benefit than one man rising to speedy affluence, and becoming
the ancestor of a landed proprietary ? It is, no doubt, necessary
that wealth should be accumulated, and very necessary that
there should be security for retaining it when it has been
Btauired; but surely it is more worthy, more noble, more honest
to be content with small gains, that labour may have its
Equivalent, that the working man may stand erect with a sense
of manhood and self-respect about him, than by taking advantage
of a supposed redundancy in the population, and pitting the
labour of one man against another, seek to extract from that
labour the means of sudden wealth, while those who produce
it are compelled to feel that increasing labour and decreasing
pay are a condition of slavery, most real and degrading.
It is a question for politicians how far the franchise may be ex
tended to the working classes ; but it is miserable trifling, and
Something more, for those to whom capital has given a power over
labour, and who use that power solely for tffigir own aggrandisement, to contend that working men cannot be the safe custodians
of power, and ought not to be entrusted with it. The working
classes, no doubt, have their vices, many of them arising from
want of sympathy and encouragement in the numerous
■difficulties that beset them, but we question if they are worse
�10
than the extreme selfishness manifested by many of their
employers, which has separated interests which ought to have
been in harmony with each other, creating and fostering asper
ities which have occasionally threatened to disturb the peace
of society, and have been at all times the source of much angry
feeling. There is nothing in the relation which ought to.
subsist between the employer and the employed that implies a
right on the one side to domineer, or a duty on the other to be
over-obsequious, and it is certain that a kindly consideration and
regard on the part of the one would produce a respectful attach
ment on the part of the other, and make the situation of both
much more agreeable.
At all events, it would appear that some such principles^
sincerely entertained, and honestly avowed, are in unison with
the feelings and sympathies of many thoughtful and reflecting
men, as evinced by the magnitude of our business, (Appendix A,)
and the increasing power and influence, which, in various ways, it
has been able to put forth; and this second report of our proceed
ings is issued in answer to inquiries which reach us from many
quarters, and which we hope will remove some misapprehension,,
and impart some information as to the exact position we have
taken up.
The origin and conduct of “ The Tailors’ Labour Agency ”
does not rest upon the purely benevolent or philanthropic
idea; we might rather describe it as the result of a mind
speculative and theoretical, flitting about somewhat vagrantlyand restlessly in quest of a social system free from the extremes
of affluence and indigence, which make such a wide gulph
in the present aspect of society, and then in utter disappoint
ment settling down upon the old system, and in the sphere
which seemed to open itself up to us, resolved that the men whose
labour we had to purchase, should, by a commingling of interests,
a gentle compulsion, and a genial intercourse, be helped to wipe
away the reproach that their order is more indifferent to the
duties of life, and less capable of discharging them, than those
in other classes of society. “ The Tailors’ Labour Agency,” then,
is simply a proprietary establishment, conducted like any other-
�11
"business for the benefit of its promoter, but recognising in
various ways the duties which capital owes to labour, and com
bining several projects, which, while seeking our own interest,
may conduce also to the interests of those with whom we are
associated. Let us state these a little in detail:—
1st—The system of employment, and its remuneration.
2nd.—Means for the intellectual improvement of the workmen.
• 3rd.—Provision for the education of their children.
THE SYSTEM OF EMPLOYMENT, AND ITS REMUNERATION.
The condition of the working tailor has been for some years
greatly deteriorating. Various reasons have been assigned for
this decadence. Some have traced it to the strike of 1834, which
disorganised the trade societies, and introduced a number of
women into the employment; others have attributed it to the
excessive competition in the show shops, the “sweating” system,
or the employment of middlemen, and the consequent giving out
of the work to be done upon the premises of the workmen.
These have undoubtedly been great evils. With the sweater,
and those who work under him, one cannot associate the idea of
respectability, comfort, decency, or any of the homely virtues
which are the stamina of domestic felicity. This home-working,
in its worst iorm, has got the name of “sweating,” because a
scheming and unscrupulous middleman interposes between the
employer and his workmen, and, by means, more iniquitous than
any truck system, contrives to get the most of their earnings
into his own pocket. He feeds and lodges them, after a sort,
and the miserable abode in which they work, and sleep, and eat,
is redolent of odours neither pleasant nor wholesome ; it is in
truth, a cheerless, hopeless, miserable life, alternating between
excessive working and excessive drinking, a life physically
debilitating, and morally debasing, and folk which, what
ever he may think of it, the employer who perpetuates it is
morally responsible.
Several years ago, the iniquities of the practice were ex
posed in the columns of the Morning Chronicle; and sub
sequently Mr. Kingsley, in his “Alton Locke” drew a fearful
�12
picture of a “sweaters’ den,” somewhat over coloured, per
haps, but in the main, painfully true; and yet the evil will
continue while it saves money to the employers, and while
gentlemen, inconsiderate and unthinking about the matter, are
content to have their garments made up under circumstances
which, could they but sec them in the process of manufacture,
they'would recoil from wearing.
We determined, as far as we were concerned, to lay the axe*
to the root of this great evil, and to restore the workman’s home
to that comfort which the undivided attention of a tidy house
wife seldom fails to give it. We have, therefore, our workshops
on our own premises, built with all the requisites for convenience,
cleanliness and healthfulness, which the most eminent skill could
suggest, and our men come to work and return to their homes
with the same regularity that artisans in other trades do, or that
is done by men holding situations in mercantile or trading houses ;
nor can we refrain from saying that, as a body, -whether as regards
character, conduct, or respectability of appearance, they are a
sample of the honest, intelligent working-class of this country,
of which any employer might feel proud (Appendix B).
Why, then, is the pernicious system of home working continued ?
Well, you see a workshop is rather an expensive affair. Besides the
cost of erection, the implements of trade, and the usual wear and
tear, there is a considerable item for certain sewing trimmings,
which the employer who gives his work out, generally makes
the men find for themselves ; and besides, if a man is at work on
your premises, it is necessary that at the end of the week, when
you put his wages in his hand, they should be in some measure
adequate to the support of himself and family; and hence, in
the case of home working, in its least objectionable form, where
a man takes out only as much work as he can execute himself,
the scanty earnings of the man have to be supplemented by the
aid of wife and children, to the manifest neglect of other duties,
which are not so claimant perhaps as the bread and butter
question, but which are very important nevertheless. In fact,
it does seem socially to be of great importance, that a working
man’s employment should take him out into the world, to undergo
�13
a discipline by conflict and contact with others, which very
discipline makes all the more a man of him, and to find the
home a retreat and relaxation from the turmoil and cares of a
working life, rather than making that home the arena of every
conflicting element, the scene of jarring and discord, a place
rather to be dreaded and escaped from than longed for and
enjoyed. And we find respectable Workmen to hold pretty
' much the same opinion; for, although nearly all the men in our
employ had previously worked at home, we can recollect only
one or two cases where men have left us to return to their former
practice.
But then, of course, the 'wages must be fair honest wages, as
between master and man, fair too as compared with those of
workmen in other trades, and fair in relation to the ordinary
necessities of a working man and his family. We do not enter
upon any crotchets on the wages question; we disclaim any idea
of fixing a standard of wages, or of influencing the labour
market; we simply avow our design to carry on our business
upon certain principles, and that of helping to sustain the value
©f our workmen’s labour is one of them. It is true, that
indirectly we should like to see this influencing' others ; indeed,
it has already done so, for we have maife-it necessary for men
who never dreamt of such a thing before, in seeking the suffrages
of the public, to profess that they pay good wages to their work
men ; we can only say that we hope their workmen will see to
it, that they practice what they profess.
The wages in the tailoring trade has now been for many years
paid by the piece. What is technically called a “log ” is agreed
upon, that is a certain number of hours for every description of
garment, and the wages fixed at so much per hour ; the higher
priced houses pay at the rate of sixpence per hour, we pay fivepence ; the lower priced houses adopt the more convenient plan
of saying, “ Here is a certain garment, the price for making it is
so much, and you find your own trimmings.” According to our
k “log” the calculation is that a man of average ability shall earn
306'. per week, or 5s. per day of 12 hours, which is a journeyman
tailor’s day ; and we have found that calculation a very fair one
�14
for the workmen, clever men will considerably exceed it, and slow
men will hardly get up to it, but it is such that ordinary men arenot overtasked to accomplish. And then, having a large demand’
for made up goods, we are enabled during the periodical depres
sion in the trade, by replacing the stock sold in the busy season,,
to keep up pretty fairly the earnings of our workmen, so that wehave no need to discharge any of our people in the slack season,
but would rather have them attached to our establishment, as
much as the workman of any factory in a provincial town ; indeed
we would wish to displace the migratory habits of the journeyman
tailor, by a desire to fix himself down in a locality, and acquire
those influences and opportunities which are necessary to the
proper up-bringing of a family, and attaining a social position
which may give life a purpose, and enjoyment a reality.
In this matter of wages too, we are anxious that the public
should be satisfied as well as the workmen. There are many per
sons keenly alive to the principle of buying in the cheapest market,
who don’t desire their articles lessened in price at the expenseof the workman who manufactures them. We know that at the
time that public attention was directed to the distressed condition
of the needle women, there were many gentlemen who said, that
they bought their shirts at respectable shops, and gave a fair
price for them, and then were not sure after all that they were
not produced at the cost of the poor suffering sempstress. The
price for making every article that leaves our premises is vouched
by the signature and address of the workman who made it,
(Appendix C,) so that should any doubt exist about our pro
fessions, it is open to an easy solution. We are anxious to say,
too, that in being thus explicit upon this subject, we are taking
no credit for excessive generosity ; we are quite satisfied that the
course we have adopted has been conducive to our own interests,,
and moreover, the several schemes which we have in operation
for the benefit of our workmen, rest for their success on thebasis of fair remuneration to the worker.
�15
Means for
the
Intellectual Improvement of the
Workmen.
f The question of the day is said to be social progress, and a very
perplexing and undefinable sort of question it is. In its general
acceptation it is held to have reference to the respectable work
ing class, and to the indescribable working class, which is not so
respectable. As a theory, it involves a problem which it is difficult
to solve, while it has the merit of instituting agencies, and
enlisting sympathies, which have had a genial influence on a
class which is not “ working.” The well-to-do people, and the
scantily-supplied people, have become better acquainted with
each other, and there is no doubt that the advantages of their
intercourse have been reciprocal. It is avowed on all hands that
the working class has made great progress during the last thirty
years. Their intelligence, thoughtfulness, and provident habits,.
have well nigh extinguished the occupation of the agitator and
the stump orator; they are more disposed and better qualified to
investigate those subjects which have a bearing upon their own
interests, and less inclined to take their opinions on trust from
any man or set of men. The Press has undoubtedly exerted a
great influence to this end. Mr. Charles Knight, the Messrs.
Chambers, of Edinburgh, and John Cassell, have been the
knirveyors of a literature which was not poprdar, but which has
held on its way, and done its work, to the almost extinction of'
the diluted trash which used to be the current literature at the
poor man’s table. Literary institutions, too, have not been all
the failures they are sometimes said to be. In provincial towns
especially they have been the centre of attraction for youthful,
sardent, and inquiring minds, and stimulated now by the Society
of Arts and its annual examinations, they promise to be of’
increasing interest and usefulness.
And yet the subject of adult instruction for working men
is very difficult, if not discouraging. With but few opportunities
for the acquisition of knowledge systematically, with habits
formed, and tastes acquired, which make it necessary to unlearn
much, before much can be learned ; the utmost one can hope to-
�16
do, is to impart something of a relish for intellectual enjoyment,
and, by a little training, accustom, the mind to reflecting and
reasoning, so as to direct the judgment to right conclusions
on those important subjects with which it is necessary to be well
acquainted; an education, too,which can cast an en lightenment
upon the conscience, and quicken the moral as well as the
intellectual faculties ; in fact, such an education for the working
classes as will make them better as working men, rather than
induce a desire to be something better than working men.
When we erected our Hall, eight years ago, it was intended
chiefly as a day school for our workmen’s children, with a kind
of vague design, that it should be sometimes used by the men
for discussing topics in which they took an interest, or for
hearing lectures on both sides of a debatable subject, that they
might form their opinions for themselves. A little after
reflection convinced us that something more than this would be
necessary, and therefore we took means to organise for ourselves
a regular Literary Institute, with its Lectures, Classes, Readingroom, and Library, and such other adjuncts as experience might,
show to be needful. The premises which are occupied by our
Institution havebeenfound to be well adapted for our purpose, and
we are now recognised as the “ Tailors’ Labour Agency Literary
Institute,” in union with the Society of Arts.
Although as yet we can point rather to means than to results,
still, our Institution has in various ways exercised a wholesome
influence, and in some cases has effected a decidedly educational
improvement. Our classes have been Arithmetic and English
Grammar, English History, Literature and Biography, Music and
Erench. The number of persons in our employ is about 110,
who are members of the Institution, and the attendance at the
•classes has fluctuated from 10 to 40, those for English History,
and Literature and Biography, being the most popular. Our
Lectures have necessarily been of a miscellaneous sort, but the
Lecturers have been men of high attainments, who have attracted
large audiences, and done some measure of good. In our Library
and Reading-room we are amply provided with the means of
passing our evenings in an interesting and profitable way;
�17
and experience has deepened our conviction, that could we
get our people more disposed to avail themselves of such
advantages, much good in every way would come out of it.
Working men have many arguments, which cannot easily
be set aside, for seeking enjoyment of a different kind; it is
only, after all, a small per centage of their number who have
the taste or desire for the acquisition of knowledge for its
own sake, or who would make any sacrifice for a course of
mental training, which does not promise them a present good
pow and then a man will start out from among the rest in
pursuit of some subject which has arrested his attention, and if
he has the courage to apply himself to it, and the resolution to
persevere in the application, his intellectual faculties get
quickened, and by intercourse with others who are like-minded,
he gets “ a little knowledge,” which opens up to him a new life
and prospects, affording him sources of pleasure which the
illiterate can neither understand nor enjoy. Such a man be
comes a power among other men : the salt which in a great
measure has preserved the working classes, has been the intelli-gent, self-taught men who have sprung up among themselves—
the “ little leaven ” which may yet help to leaven the whole
mass.
We have often said that we would stand by our Institution
while there were six men interested in it and likely to be pro
fited by it. We have been frequently disappointed of large re
sults, but we know that it has been to some a haven where they
have found solace and shelter, and we would rather go on hoping
ever, than abandon the principles which have sustained us
hitherto, or lose faith in the efficacy of working and waiting for
an outcome of our labours.
PROVISION FOR THE EDUCATION OF THEIR CHILDREN.
It was not because we supposed that there was any deficiency
in the means of education in our neighbourhood that we opened
a day-school in connection with our Institution—we have seve
ral excellent public schools and many private ones; but we
thought that a school, supported by our own people conjointly,
�18
attached to their own Institution, and to some extent under their
own management, would have for them a greater interest than any
school of which they had a knowledge only hy common report.
We thought, too, that from various causes the attendance of the
children would be more regular, and longer continued than at an
ordinary school; and, that as our members were all acquainted
with the schoolmaster, whose interests and sympathies were with
them, who conducts an adult class among themselves, and is
editor of a manuscript journal, to which they are contributors,
he would be more accessible, if they needed to consult him on
matters affecting the education and habits of their children, than
an entire stranger would be. In all these respects we thought
rightly. Whatever difficulties we may have had about adult
instruction, we have had few, if any, with the children—our
school has been the most encouraging feature in our enterprise,
•and we would respectfully ask those interested in the cause of
•education to pay it a visit, assured that half-an-hour would con'
vince them that this experiment, so interesting to ourselves, has
not been altogether fruitless. The number of scholars vary from
70 to 80, boys and girls, some of them being the children of
neighbours who have sought admission to the school, and been
received at a fee of 6<7. per week. The instruction given includes
the ordinary branches, with history, geography, and social eco
nomy. In addition, the girls are taught plain, useful needlework,
with some little fancy affairs included. Some of the lads whom
we have trained have now entered upon the business of life with
every promise of success, and others, ■who have been with us five
or six years, are preparing to follow them. For the especial use
of those we intend to have evening classes twice a week, for the
study of such subjects as may be most useful to them, and to
keep up that pleasant intercourse to which we have looked for
ward as one of the results of the educational efforts w’e have been
making at our Institution.
May we here add, deferentially, a kind of practical solution of
the much vexed question of voluntary education and state
paid education ?
If every trading firm, employing a large
number of workmen, were to build a school-room as a matter of
�19
course, as they build their workshops, and encourage their men
to provide duly for the education of their children, it would do
the “ State some service,” and might save somewhat in the
expense of the machinery by which enthusiastic educationists
seek to establish their theory of voluntary education.
We have now a few words to say respecting the pecuniary
resources by which these various schemes are sustained. Apart
altogether from the business premises, and on the1 other side of
the way, we have two houses, in one of which is the hall and
committee room, library, class and chess rooms, with warm
baths on the basement beneath^ ThA enlargement and altera
tions necessary in this part of thfe j/r'einfises cost'krver £1,000.
In the other house running parallel with the hall, and of the
same extent, is the workshop, large enough for 80 men, and
which with its conveniences, cost £800. The burrent expenses
of the Institution are defrayed by a charge upoit 'Ofc member
of 6tZ. on every twenty shillings of wages he barns. Thus, a
man earning thirty shillings a week, would have to pay 9d.,
and for this he would be entitled to all the benefits of the
Institution, and to school instruction for all his children, what
ever their number may be. Then, again, we 'hive a weekly
penny paid to the library fund, which is expended on books,
and in supplying the reading room with newspapers, magazines,
&c.; these pennies usually amount to about £20 yearly.
We will put this matter in a form which will be readily
understood, and we are the more anxious to do so because it
will appear that while an Institution like ours may need to be
helped a little during its infancy, it is sure to become self
-supporting, and able to walk alone.
Income.
Per Centage on Wages ...
Letting Hall ...
...
...
Extra Scholars
...
...
Library Pennies
...
...
Rooms let at top of House
...£150
45
...
...
35
...
20
...
...
18
...
...
£268
�20
Expenditure.
Bent and Taxes
School Master and Mistress
Books and Newspapers
Lighting and Warming
Lectures, &c.
Cleaning and Attendance
Bepairs and Sundries
...
... £70
102
...
20
25
10
20
...
10
£257
We ought to remark that the sum set down for Lectures is
only the incidental expenses connected therewith, the Lecturers
sympathising with our objects, having given their services gra
tuitously. This was a necessity which cannot continue. The
source of our income is an expansive one, and will grow with the
growth of our business, and the small surplus we have now, will
soon become a fund out of which we can pay for the services of
eminent Lecturers, and enable us to make Lectures a feature of
our Institution, and a boon to the neighbourhood. We feel
bound in this place to record our obligations for very valuable
services, to the Bev. F. D. Maurice, the Bev. Sydney Turner, the
Bev. Paxton Hood, the Bev. G. Bogers, the Bev. D. Thomas,
Messrs. Henry Vincent, Appleby, Liggins, J. C. Plumptre, Gearey,
Edevain, &c., and for wise counsel and generous encouragement
we have been indebted to many whose names and labours have
long been associated with the progress of education and the social,
well-being of the people.
We hope that we have set forth what will sufficiently indicatethe theory and practice of the “ Tailors’ Labour Agency,” and
that the one will not be considered altogether visionary, nor the
other quite unfruitful of results. It has certainly been our aim
to make the worker more satisfied with his condition, by making'
that condition more worthy of his satisfaction. It is true that
our sphere is but limited, but within that sphere, we would like
to become an influence for good to those around us, convinced,
that wherever such an influence has been put forth zealously and
disinterestedly, benefit has never failed to ensue. It is a trite
�21
remark, but we believe it to be true, that the present times are
-auspicious for working men putting forth their strength, and
rising to the true dignity of that position which they are destined
yet to occupy. “ On all hands we see a stir and movement in
the public mind which is becoming more alive to the necessity
of social ameliorations. Evils which forty years ago would never
have been the subject of remark, are now examined with a care
that betokens a wide spread intelligence and philanthropy.
Every well considered measure, brought forward in a right spirit,
not only does good in itself, but makes it easier to do more good.
Difficulties which appear insuperable, doubts which cannot now
be solved, vanish of themselves when we grapple boldly with the
-duty which lies nearest at hand. The evils of society, as of the
individual, are of our own creation, and are already half con-quered when we look them in the face. No society ever yet
perished which had the will to save itself. It is only where
the will is so enervated, that a, community had rather shut its
-eyes to the dangers which menace it, than make the necessary
■•sacrifices to avert them, that its situation is desperate. Let
every one who in his public or private capacity can do anything
to relieve misery, to combat evil, to assert right, to redress wrong,
-do it with his whole heart and soul, and trust to God for the
result.”
Newington Causeway,
May, 1861.
�22
APPENDIX.
(A)
The amount paid in wages, in each of the last
will show the progress of the business :—
1854 ...............
...
... £3952
1855
...
... 4035
...
1856 ...............
...
4086
...
1857
...3494
...
1858 .
...
4171
1859
..
...
...4976
1860 ............... 4 d if’
...
6709
seven years-*
19 2
0 51
2
2 9j
11 3
11 6.
10 a
(B)
The following extract, from the “ Conditions on which theWorkmen are employed at the Agency,” will illustrate the
kind of connection we seek to establish between them and our
selves :—
“ 5. The first three months’ employment on the establishment will he
probationary. After that time, no Workman will be liable to immediate
discharge ; but, in case of negligence, imperfect work, or any impropriety
of conduct, the Foreman may suspend till the charge be investigated by
the Manager, the Foreman, and any one of his fellow-workmen whom the
offending party may nominate : and, if dismissal should be the result of
such investigation, that Workman shall not, under any circumstances, be
again employed on the Establishment.
“ 6. A decided preference will always be given to those who are careful
and industrious in their habits, and clean and orderly in their appearance.
It is, therefore, earnestly desired that the Workmen cultivate habits of per
sonal and domestic cleanliness ; as it is the avowed design of the Agency,
through its entire proceedings, to make connection with it uncomfortableand uncongenial to men of irregular habits and confirmed intemperance.”
�23
We may mention, also, that for several years we have had an
Annual Holiday ; on which occasion our premises are entirely
closed; and the Workmen, with their Wives, are conveyed, by
railway, some twenty or thirty miles in the country, where an,
ample Dinner and abundant rational enjoyments are provided
for them. We have, also, a Christmas Soiree, at our own Hall,
when Tea, Coffee, and a Vocal and Instrumental Concert are the
entertainments for the evening, These re-unions have had the
happiest effects amongst us, and are always anticipated with
pleasure and enjoyed with propriety.
(C)
DUNN’S TAILORS’ LABOUR AGENCY,
12, 13 and 14, NEWINGTON CAUSEWAY.
WORKSHOPS—39 and 40, Bridge House Place, Opposite.
For Mr_______ ____________________________ No________
Price of Garments_____________________________________
Wages-----------------hours, at five pence per hour.
This form of Ticket is intended to verify the amount of Wages paid to
the workman, and will accompany every garment, with the maker’s signa
ture and private address for inquiry.
A®" The Wages are calculated at 5s. a Day of Twelve Hours.
Printed by P. Grant & C'O., Red Lion Square, HoILorn.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Title
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Capital and labour; their rights and duties: a retrospect of the Tailors' Labour Agency
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 23 p. ; 20 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by F. Grant & Co., Red Lion Square, Holborn.
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William Freeman
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1861
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G5212
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Labour Movement
Working conditions
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[Unknown]
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Text
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English
Capitalism
Conway Tracts
Labour Movement
Socialism
Wages
Working Classes
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Text
Co-operati
WITH REFERENCES TO THE
EXPERIMENT OF LEGLAIRE.
A LECTURE
Given
at the
Hall
of
Science, Sheffield, Sunday, March i8th, 1883.
BY
EDWARD CARPENTER.
SECOND EDITION.
PRICE ONE
PENNY.
Published at
THE MODERN PRESS, 13, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.
1886.
�........... . ''WWxWWWsMWsis^^
BY THE
SAME
AUTHOR.
Towards Democracy. New edition, with numerous
added Poems, crown 8vo, cloth. 260 pp. Price 2s. 6d.
“ A book whose power will certainly make it known.”—
Dublin University Review.
“ Truly ‘ mystic, wonderful ’—like nothing so much as a
nightmare after too earnest a study of the Koran!”—
Graphic.
“ Its plan includes a poetical appeal to the different
nationalities of the world, a sketch of the characteristic
features of England and English towns, and all kinds of
industrial work, finally a series of dramatic pictures whose
vividness and beauty seem magical.”—Cambridge Review.
Modern Science: a Criticism. Crown 8vo, paper, 76
pp. Price is.
Modern Money-Lending ; or, the Meaning of Divi
dends. A Pamphlet. Price 2d. Second edition.
England’s Ipeal. Price 2d.
John Heywood, Deansgate
11,
and Ridgefield, Manchester;
Paternoster Buildings, London.
and
ALSO
Social Progress and Individual Effort.
from To-Day. Price id.
Reprinted
Desirable Mansions : A Tract. Reprinted, with a few
alterations, from Progress, June, 1885. Price id.
THE MODERN PRESS, 13, Paternoster Row, London, E.C.
For popular pamphlets on all political, social, and
economical subjects, apply to The Modern Press, or send
stamped envelope for catalogue.
�CO-OPERATIVE PRODUCTION.
R. CHAIRMAN AND FRIENDS,—The widespread presen
timent of Change which hovers like a cloud over our modern
world—and which makes us feel that our present social and
political forms, our customs, our religions even, are in a state
of Transition, that they are not permanent but are leading forward to
something perhaps more permanent in the future—this presentiment of
Change, Isay, is in nothing.more strongly felt than in the relations of
Capital and Labour. These relations are in the present day so
monstrous, so unnatural, so productive of manifold evil and suffering
that it is felt to be impossible that they should continue; the only question
is—To what new form will they give place ?
At this vast problem what may be called Underground Europe is
working—that Europe which though it is comparatively unrepresented
in our governments, though it is almost unexpressed in our newspapers,
though it is ignored by the higher forms of society, is really the great
undercurrent of our modern life, and the source from which the forms of
the future will spring. Nihilists in Russia, socialists in Germany,
communists in the United States and in France, landleaguers in Ireland,
and in every place those who favour the welfare of the People, are
essentially—however different their modes of work and the ground which
they cover—working at this same problem: the problem, namely, how to
enfranchise Labour, how to give it its just and equal rights in the face
of Capital, and how to bring it face to face and into direct contact with
the Land—the source of all production.
Certainly you will all agree that nothing can be more desperate than
the present evil. Every man who has done honest work knows, that
such work is a pleasure—one of the greatest pleasures in life. If it was
pronounced as a curse upon Adam that “ in the sweat of his brow he
should eat bread,” yet we must conclude that the force of evolution
acting through centuries has adapted man to his environment in that
respect! For there is no doubt now that Labour, under right conditions,
is a blessing and not a curse. In fact, to use your skill and your
strength in producing that which is beneficial to yourself and to others,
to look back afterwards on the work of your own hands, to see that as
far as may be it has been well done, that it will serve its time and the
purpose for which it was intended—these things in themselves cannot
but be a pleasure. When we consider moreover that a large part of
�I
4
L
life must always be given to Labour, it becomes obvious to us that if
such labour might not be pleasurable Life would indeed be a poor thing,,
and the question “ Is life worth living” really worth asking.
But it does not surely require a great effort of imagination to picture
■ to ourselves a state of things in which this idea should be realised. It
does not, I say, require a great effort to picture to ourselves an Island
say—in some far sea—where the inhabitants favoured by a genial soil
and climate are able to produce for themselves all that is necessary for
their subsistence. Blessed with a tolerably contented disposition and
simple tastes these good people find that their wants are few and that
a few hours’ labour a day are amply sufficient to provide them collectively
with all they need. Not being therefore hurried in their work they are
able to do it thoroughly well and to enjoy all the more in consequence
the doing of it. And not being hurried they are able to see to it that
the conditions under which they work are favorable to health, both of
body and soul—that they are neither painful nor degrading. On the
contrary each man as he rises in the morning looks forward with agree
able sentiments to the labour of the day, and a fair amount of neigh
borliness and mutual helpfulness among the inhabitants contribute to
make this Island a pleasant scene of harmonious and peaceful activity.
It does not, I say, require a very exaggerated effort of the imagination
to picture such a state of affairs. Nor have I the least doubt that in its
main outlines it has been realised over and over again in the past, that
it is realised in the present day in many parts of the globe.
Well, Great Britain is an island. It enjoys, whatever its detractors
may say, a fair climate—the best perhaps for open air work in the world
—and a varied and productive soil. Yet glance over this land to-day,
and what a contrast to the picture I have just drawn !
Go into any factory in Sheffield: and what do you see ? I will tell
you. You see depressed gloomy faces, pallid features, stunted sickly
forms—on all sides dirt, and thick polluted air—you see scrambling
hurried work, badly done, deceptively done, you see deception and
jealousy between man and man, you see deception and hatred between
workman and employer. I ask you, is it possible that there can be any
pleasure in work here ? It is impossible. Not long ago I was in a
nailmaker’s shop in Sheffield—they were making horse nails, 2^ inches
long or so. The operation requires some little skill. The nailmaker
takes his rod heated from the fire and hammers it on an anvil, till he
has drawn the end out into a long point; with two or three blows on a
certain part of the anvil he fashions the head, and with a couple more
blows with another instrument he severs the nail from the rod, and
casts it on a heap with others, returning the rod to the fire and taking
out another already heated in its place. You would not perhaps think
a minute too much for this operation. Probably it is not, to perform it
well. But if the nailmaker were to make only one nail a minute he
would not be able to earn sufficient to support himself and family. He
therefore makes one in half a minute. By dint of scrambling through
his work and not being very particular how it is done he finds he can
just manage this. A thousand times a day does this wretched man
hurry through this one operation—and this is the labour of his life, day
after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year. I
ask you, what sort of scramble is this to form the life of a human being ?
What sort of training is this for body and soul ? Whither does it natu
rally tend—but to the beershop ?
�5
. Many of you are familiar with the interior of filecutters’ shops in this
neighbourhood. You know that the file-cutter sits on a high stool,
bending with cramped spine and contracted chest over a bench on
which his file is bedded—in lead. The poisonous lead-dust flies all
about the shop. In his hand he holds a hammer, sometimes 71bs. or
81bs. in weight, with which by repeated blows on a chisel held between
the thumb and fingers of the left hand he cuts the teeth of the file. The
trade is soon learnt; it is not well paid ; women often work at it. To
make a living you must cut from fifty thousand to one hundred and
fifty thousand teeth a day, each with a sharp blow of your hammer.
There is no variety, or change; each blow is like the last. What
wonder if to the evils of a cramped contracted body, and lead poisoning,
are added frequent paralysis of the thumb and wrist of the left hand,
which holds the chisel, and sometimes also I believe of the other arm
and shoulder. And this is the life to which a whole useful section of the
community is condemned, to which it partly condemns itself. Yet there
is nothing necessarily evil in file-cutting. The conditions might be
improved, and the monotony of the work obviated by seeing to it that
each man took part in the other processes of making, tempering and
hardening, or even in some quite different branch of industry.
Let me take another instance. An important branch in carriage
works is the painting. The coachpainters’ shop is large, roomy and well
lighted; in it a number of painters are at work on various carriages.
On entering you are met by a stifling atmosphere laden with the warm
poison-smell of paints and varnishes. You wonder that a man can do
a single day’s work in such a place; you do not wonder that his life is
shortened, and disease rapidly induced by continuance in it. But why
is there no ventilation ? There are plenty of windows—why is there
not one open ? Because if one window were open ever so little, even
only enough to provide air for one man—or if a system of ventilation
were organised (as might easily be done) to supply the whole shop on
the most approved principles—still, even with all care, a little dust—
not much, but a little—would be sure to get in. And for this little dust
many men must be sacrificed. In order that grand people may drive
about in carriages stainless of any speck, other people (not so grand,
but possibly more useful) must spend their lives under conditions which
take all heart and enjoyment out of their labour, and which threaten
them continually with disease and premature death. Mind, there is
no one who thinks more of perfect and stainless work than I do; and I
would be the last to encourage bad and slovenly work. But surely the
cost at which these carriages are painted is rather too great.
Meanwhile the Capitalist—we have spoken of the Laborer—does the
Capitalist have any pleasure in his work, does he encourage good work ?
On the contrary he winks at the bad so long as it sells. That is his
one standard. Nor do I blame him—for he is engaged in a tremendous
battle, a fratricidal battle in which every other consideration must be
sacrificed.
What a curious spectacle is this ! When we organise a military force,
it has a duty to fulfil. Its captains have to lead it against the common
enemy and drive him from our shores. So when a nation organises a
great industrial army, it has a duty to fulfil. What is that ? It has to
win for the nation those products of toil which are necessary for its use;
it has to drive the common enemies of Poverty and Hunger from that
�6
nation’s shores. What should we say if in that other army the captains
instead of allying themselves against the invader, turned their regiments
on each other and engaged in a fierce and fratricidal battle? Yet
this is exactly what our captains of Industry do—using their forces to
hurt and hinder each other in every possible way, and absolutely allying
themselves with Poverty and Hunger as their friends—since it is these
that force the workers to accept lowest wages.
To carry out this warfare, they go to enormous expense—all wasted.
For this, hundreds of thousands of pounds spent in advertisements—all
wasted; for this, the labour of thousands of commercial travellers—all
wasted ; for whatever one firm gains by its advertisements, its travellers,
another firm inevitably loses. For this, rubbishy articles poured out
upon the market, all wasted, cast away almost as soon as bought; for
this, wages rammed down to the lowest pittance which will support life.
It is a fight for life or death that the Capitalist is engaged in, and for
this all honour, all justice and equity, every sentiment of pity, gentleness,
common humanity even, must be sacrificed.
Meanwhile some one makes a great discovery. Some capitalist,
more ingenious and less scrupulous than his fellows, makes the discovery
that he can carry on his firm almost, practically speaking, without
paying any wages. He finds that with the aid of machinery and one
or two experienced workman as overlookers, he can for the rest get on
by employing only boys and girls. These receive a merely nominal
wage for their work. As apprentices (the boys at least) they are sup
posed, in consideration of the low wage, to be taught the trade. But,
as you know in the present day, they are not taught. Instead of being
carried on through all the operations of the trade, a boy is taught one
operation, and kept to that. It is quickly learnt; his work thus is most
remunerative to the employer; his employer, in fact, steals the extra
advantage ; the boy loses it. He grows up; and at the age of 21, when
he should know his trade well, he is an untaught and crippled work
man ; and then—when he should in increased wages be reaping the
fruits of his years of apprenticeship—he is turned away to make room
for another boy in his place!
Delightful, is it not ? The ingenious Grinder of bodies and souls can
now produce an article at less cost than before ; he can undersell other
Capitalists; and they, willing or not, are forced to adopt the same
treacherous and wicked practices as he. Such is the result of our
present wretched system of Production which, as far as I can see,
leaves no choice to humane and just-minded Capitalists (of whom there
are many) but to level them down to the standard of the most unscru
pulous and degraded among their body.
What a spectacle does all this present ? Half-taught boys and girls
doing half the work of the country—scrambling through it amid dirt and
ill-health; vast mud-floods of rubbish poured out over the land,
adulteration and deception in everything; capitalists flying at each
others throats, intent only to maim and slay; shareholders screaming
for dividends, regardless how they are got; able-bodied men and women
on tramp up and down the country, unable to obtain employment—
complaints of insufficient work in every direction—and all the while
the LAND—the source of all production—staring them in the face,
half-cultivated, undrained, uncared for, reverting to ruin and to
waste !
�7
From this iniserable picture let us turn to something more hopefuL
That such a state of things should continue is impossible. It is suffi
cient to say that it must not and it shall not be.
Underground Europe, as I have said, is working at this vast problem
—has been working at it for some time. There have been many trials
already,-for the establishment of a better system, many failures, many
successes too. But we must not expect so great a matter to be worked
out all at once. The revolution of the Industrial organisation of
Society may perhaps take centuries to complete itself. When Nature
creates a new species among the animals it appears that she throws out
thousands of tentative forms before one arises that is fitted to survive
and supplant the old; and so when it is a question of a new form of
Society shall we not expect that there shall be many tentatives, many
failures, a long period of evolution, before the forms (be they one or
many) of the future are finally produced and established ?
It is not my purpose, however, in the present lecture, to present you
with anything like a history of men’s efforts, so far, in this direction.
One of the first steps towards the organisation of Industry is Co
operation ; and I desire now, out of many, successful experiments in
Co-operation, to single out just one—one that has been talked about a
good deal lately—that namely of Leclaire—as an example for our
encouragement and instruction, and to show (what cannot now be
doubted) that success in this direction is abundantly possible.
*
Leclaire was born—of poor parentage—in the year 1801, in Central
France. His father was a shoemaker, but Leclaire did not learn the
trade. He received but a poor education, and to the end of his life was
not a good scholar. At the age of 17 he left home to try his fortune in
Paris, and there after a time became apprenticed to a house painter.
He got on well, saved a little money, married when he was 22, and at
the age of 26 was able to set up in business for himself.
He struck out boldly from the first. Leclaire had a “ royal ” mind—
straight and true. From the first he went on the principle of good
wages and good work. He determined that all the work connected with
his firm should be thoroughly well done, and to arrive at this he saw it
was necessary to employ good workmen well paid. He did so, and the
result justified his expectations. He became known and sought out.
The Government officials employed him, and by the year 1835 he had
realised a neat little fortune.
It was then that he actually (is it not surprising ?) set himself to solve
the problem of Co-operation. Finding that he had amply sufficient for
his own wants and those of his small household (for he had no children)
he actually, instead of spending the rest of his life in the accumulation
of more (to him) useless money, set about trying to better the condition
of the men connected with his firm. And I must say it surprises me to
think that out of the hundreds and thousands of capitalists who at one
time or another have been similarly situated to Leclaire, there have
been so few—so very few—to whom it has occurred to follow a similar
course. Let us however do all honour to his noble wife who instead of
drawing him back, as so many would have done, with all manner of
* Not that, as I think, isolated co-operative ventures can be durable in a society
whose very atmosphere is Competition. Unless the network of such enterprise extends
till it covers practically the whole nation, co-operation will be in great danger of
dying out again.
�petty and domestic doubts, urged him generously forward, and was to
the end his trusted and helpful counsellor in his great enterprise.
The form in which the problem presented itself to him is expressed in
the following paragraph.
*
“ ‘ I asked myself,’ said Leclaire, ‘could a
workman in our business by putting more heart into his work produce
in the same lapse of time—i.e. a day—a surplus of work equivalent to
the value of an hour’s pay,
6d. ? Could he, besides, save 2^d. a
day by avoiding all waste of materials entrusted to him, and by taking
greater care of his tools ?’ Every one would answer he could. Well
then, if a single workman could arrive at the result of realising for the
benefit of the concern an additional 8^d. a day, in 300 working days
that would amount to a gain of £to 4s. 2d. per man, or upwards of
^3,000 a year in a business like Leclaire’s, which at that time employed
300 men on the average. Here would be a handsome profit to be
shared with his men, and gained as it were out of nothing.’ ”f
In 1838 then Leclaire took his first step in this direction by estab
lishing what he called a Mutual Help Association. This was practically
a benefit club (with a subscription of is. 8d. a month) which provided
not only medical attendance but reading rooms and educational facilities,
and ultimately became in its corporate capacity a partner in the firm.
In 1840 Leclaire held a meeting of workmen interested in the subject,
to discuss certain plans of Co-operation, and in 1842 another meeting
was organized for carrying these into practice; but this latter was
vetoed by the Police, who thought they scented Socialism somewhat
strongly 1 Leclaire however, who saw it was necessary above all things
to convince his workmen that his scheme was practical, took a bag of
gold one day containing ^475 and divided it among a number, 44, of his
workmen who were in favour of his plans. In the next year, 1843,
calculating again on the basis of his profits for the year, he divided
/490 among 44 men. The effect was irresistible. In 1844 there was
^788 to divide amongst 82, and from that time forward large bonuses
were every year divided, the average value of these during the last
decade, 1870-80, having been as much as 15 per cent on the total wages
earned.
It was about the year 1842 that Leclaire also published some pam
phlets on the Tricks of the Trade. Having determined that all the work of
his firm should be thoroughly good and honest, and seeing that in that
case it would have to compete at a disadvantage with much dishonest
and superficial work commonly done, he set himself about to expose
some of the false practices current in his trade (as they are current in
every trade) yet which were then unknown to the general public. Was
* Quoted from Mr. W. H. Hall’s pamphlet on Leclaire, published by the Centra
Co-operative Board, Manchester.
t “The 500 employes of a Newark (New Jersey) firm which does a large business in
the manufacture of fertilizers were pleasantly surprised the other day by the distribution
among them of sums of money, ranging from 1,000 dollars for the three most responsible
to 7 dollars for the lowest grade of labourers. The money represented a certain per
centage of the earnings during 1882, which the firm decided a year ago to divide
among their hands annually thereafter, according to the skill and value of their labour.
Alfred and Edwin Lister, who compose this firm, are canny Scotchman, and they adopt
this system from motives of business quite as much as from philanthropic impulses,
believing that their employes will do enough better work to make up for the sum
required if they know that they are virtually sharers in the profits of the manufacture.
The only wonder is that more of our shrewd business men do not appreciate the wisdom
of such a policy.”—Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, Feb. 3rd., 1883. New York.
�9
ever such a thing done before by a man engaged in business ? Imagine
the sensation it produced, and the indignation of his competitors in the
same trade—who attacked him in return with all manner of calumnious
accusations, and doubtless were the cause of police interference with
his plans !
There was another point to which Leclaire turned his attention, and
which must not be passed over. He saw with grief the exceedingly
injurious effect which the white of lead used in painting had upon his
workmen. He could not rest till he had investigated the subject.
With the aid of a chemist he went into it thoroughly, and the result
was the discovery of a similar preparation, the white of zinc, which is
perfectly innocuous, and which Leclaire substituted for the other
thenceforward throughout his firm. Now I think I hear some one
saying, “ Ah, but the white of zinc is not so good, is not so durable, as
the white of lead ! ” Well, that is just the point that I want to face.
I do not know enough of the subject to have any opinion of my own.
Perhaps someone here can supply some practical information. But let
us suppose that the white of zinc is not so durable, let us suppose
*
that with this preparation a house has to be painted, say, once in four
years, to once in five the other way, still the question in my mind is
whether for the sake of this gain we have any right to sacrifice a whole
useful class of the community, to shorten their lives and to render their
daily work penal and repulsive to them. Or, rather, there is no question
about it in my mind. Nor does there seem to have been any question
in Leclaire’s, for he banished the poisonous material; and it is reported,
I am glad to say, that in Paris the white of zinc is now used in 75 per
cent, of house painting jobs.
Thus for many years Leclaire kept on working at and elaborating his
scheme of Co-operation. He granted large subventions to the Mutual
Help Association, and in i860 made its capital up to ^4,000. This was
equivalent to making the men, corporately, shareholders in the business ;
for the Mutual Help Association received 5 per cent, on its capital
invested in the concern. Of the remaining annual profits, 20 per cent,
went to the Mutual Help Association, 30 per cent, was divided indi
vidually among the men, and 50 per cent, went to Leclaire and the
other partners.In 1865 Leclaire sustained a great blow in the death of his wife.
Weary of the turmoil of the great city he retired for repose to the
village of Herblay, a few miles west of Paris. But he was not destined
to rest long. He was made Mayor, and becoming interested in
philanthropic schemes in his new neighbourhood—amongst which was
one of agricultural co-operation—he worked harder than ever.
His object now with regard to the Paris business was to teach the
firm to go on of itself, without his supervision ; and, in fact, in 1869,
he retired—all but in name.
In this year the final organisation was drawn up, and deeds of
incorporation were signed. Printed lists of questions had been sent
round to all the workmen, the two hundred answers that had been sent
* As a matter of fact the contrary seems to be the case. For Mr. Sedley Taylor, in
his article on Leclaire in the Nineteenth Century, for September, 1880, writes as follows .
—‘‘I am assured by M. Marquot that the white of zinc, now exclusively used by the
house, is not only perfectly innocuous to the painters, but that work executed with it is
both fresher and more durable than that done with the old deleterious ingredient.”
�IO
up had been analysed and reported on, and the final scheme was
approved at a general meeting.
It was as follows.
The kernel of the constitution was a
body of workmen (it numbered 122 in 1880) chosen by their fellows,
on account of their superior character, education and skill, to
be the governing body of the concern. It was called the noyau, and
candidates for admission to it had to be between the ages of 25 and 40
at the time of election. The advantages of belonging to this body were
higher pay, and prior claim to employment in slack times ; the duties
consisted in the election of foremen and of the general managers, and in
the trial (by a committee) of all cases of misconduct. The noyau was
thus, it will be seen, the supreme power in the firm—whose constitu
tion was (and is) therefore thoroughly democratic. Yet it is most im
portant to observe that the two managing partners once elected were
unfettered in the business work actually committed to them—a most
wise arrangement, without which the democratic tendencies would pro
bably have brought about their own ruin.
The Capital was at this time fixed at ^16,000; of which Leclaire
owned ^4,000, M. Defourneaux, the acting manager, ^4,000, and the
M. H. A. ^8,000. There was a first charge on the whole profits of 10
per cent, for a reserve fund, and 5 per cent, for interest on Capital ; of
the remainder, 25 per cent, was to go to the acting manager, 50 per
cent, to the officials and workmen individually, and 25 per cent, to the
Mutual Help Association.
For the rest I will finish these few words about Leclaire’s experi
ment by a quotation from Mr. Hall’s excellent pamphlet—to which I
am so largely indebted.
"Id July, 1872, the day before his death, Leclaire wrote to M. Defourneaux, ‘All
who have grown old with me have been more or less martyrs to me, but you espec
ially have had most to suffer from my exactions in respect of the changes and modifi
cations I found it necessary to introduce into the management of the business. There
fore, for you I shall entertain feelings of the liveliest gratitude all my life, and beyond
the grave, if possible. I beseech you take care of yourself, and think of those who will
still long have great need of you. Until sound learning shall have replaced ignorance
amongst the masses, until the disinherited shall have strength to raise themselves to us,
we must hold out a hand to them. Otherwise the rooted antagonism between the
suffering classes and the more fortunate will never cease.”
" On July 13, 1872, Leclaire passed away, having enjoyed the rare felicity of seeing
the dreams of his youth realised in his old age. He left a private fortune of ^48,000,
an inconsiderable amount to what he might have left had money, instead of menmaking, been his object in life...................
" For some years before his death, Leclaire was permitted the gratification of seeing
not a few of the pensioners of the firm in the enjoyment of the retiring income of i,ooof.,
or ^40, which enabled some of them to end their days, like himself, in a country retreat.
“ His business in no way suffered by his death, as it had been the preoccupation of
his declining years to provide that it should not. On the contrary, it went on steadily
increasing. In the year 1877, five years after Leclaire’s death, as many as 984 work
men shared in the profits, of whom 450 on an average were at work at one time. In
that year a trifle under ^40,000 was paid in wages. Altogether, since 1842, /8o,ooo
has been divided as the men’s share of the profits. On September 1, 1877, the capital
of the firm had increased to /4O,394, and the business done in that year to /8o,ooo.
In 1868 the Mutual Aid Society possessed a capital of /i 3,000, ^8,000 of which was
invested in the firm. Its capital has since considerably increased, and in 1877 it had
depending on it twenty-four pensioners, receiving a yearly pension of /40 each, and
eleven widows, pensions of /20.
“The principle of the election of the managing partners by the general assembly of
the noyau is found to work admirably.
“ In 1872, M. Redouly was unanimously chosen to succeed Leclaire, and in 1875 M.
Marquot, with a single dissentient voice, was elected in the place of M. Defourneaux,
who unhappily followed Leclaire to the grave within three years.
�II
“ From his death-bed, Leclaire sent this last message to his men, ‘ that he exhorts
them to remember constantly that in working for the business, they not only work to
improve their own condition, but that they set a noble example, and that this reflection
ought to be an incessant encouragement to them to do their duty thoroughly, since by
so doing they contribute to the enfranchisement of those who have nothing but their
labour to live by.’ "
In conclusion, let me say a few words by way of moral. I
have taken just this one instance of Co-operation out of many
that I might have taken. I might have taken other instances
where the thing has been started and carried on from the capi
talist side, so to speak; and I might have taken instances where
the workmen have joined together and with little or no Capital
to begin with have yet succeeded in founding prosperous and even
wealthy corporations. But I thought it would be better in the present
lecture to keep to one example ; and the example of Leclaire has the
advantage of having been lately brought before the public more than
once, and of affording some good lessons.
In the first place I would say to you, Do not be discouraged in this
matter by the finger of scorn. Remember that Leclaire took 30 years
to work out his experiment, and that every good thing is of slow
growth ; and do not be discouraged if now and then your enemies can
point to a case in which Co-operative production has failed. In France,
I believe I may say, there are at least a hundred successful Co-opera
tive firms at the present moment; but on this side of the Channel we
seem to be slower in taking the matter up. New ideas always make
slow work amongst us; we are suspicious of them. Then we English
are very independent; we like each to go our own way, and are not
ready to join with others in any movement; and this individualism—•
though a valuable quality in its way—hinders united action. Another
thing against us is that the Press—being almost entirely in the hands
of the Capitalist class, and representing the views and feelings of that
class—has consistently, and for many years done everything in its
power to throw cold water on the co-operative movement and to
represent it as of no importance. Still, these are only obstacles,
which have to be overcome, and which perhaps when overcome will
render the interests of labour in this country all the more solid and
united. All we have got to do is to determine that they shall be over
come—and then they will be. For the present let us consider what
lessons are to be drawn from the case we have before us.
The first principle which underlies Leclaire’s work seems to me
plainly to lie in that passage which I quoted from Mr. Hall’s pamphlet,
in which Leclaire asks himself whether men working under a system
of mutual help and confidence would produce more than they would
under a system of mutual division and jealousy. The question answers
itself in asking. Mutual helpfulness and trust underlie our human life ;
they are planted deep in the human breast ; if we would help on Co
operation one of the first things (perhaps the first thing) we should do
is to help to spread abroad these principles of life. Let no man call
this a merely sentimental matter. If these things are sentiments they
are the sentiments which create society. The wonderful monuments
of civilization,—great nations, cities, telegraphs, railroads, the huge
machinery of commerce—are but so many expressions of that which is
eternal here—in the human breast—the desire and the need of man
for dependence on his fellow man; and the cry for Co-operation to-day
�12
is only another effort forwards in the long line which man has travelled
since first he came to be a social animal. Remember always and
always that these desires and needs, though hidden, are really, far more
than laws and governments, the agents which construct and create our
social life as it is; and neither be ashamed to confess them nor be
inclined to pass them over as of little importance because they are not
tangible or measurable.
The second principle which underlay Leclaire’s work is illustrated by
the pamphlet he wrote on the ‘ tricks of the trade.’ It is the principle
of honest work. Leclaire had to compete with bad ; but he was farseeing enough to be sure that if his labours were to be of permanent
value, they must be founded on good work. He was determined that they
should be so. The result proved that he was right. And we may be
sure that if a new industrial system is to supplant the wretched chaos
(it cannot be called a system) of to-day, it must be founded on the prin
ciple of good work, and on no other. It is impossible that a system
founded on dishonest and bad work can succeed. Yet so corrupted
are our modes of thought in the present day that this idea is unfamiliar
to most people, and it is generally supposed that the badness or good
ness of work is merely a question (like everything else) of Supply and
|f
Demand—to be dismissed as soon as those deities are satisfied.
Let me, on this point, borrow a word from Mr. Ruskin. He says
(that every class of the community has a duty to fulfil towards the
community at large. The soldier for instance has a duty—it is to
defend his country. The schoolmaster has a duty—it is to teach the
young. Both these parties receive due payment for their services, but
that fact does not modify the nature of the work they are bound to fulfil.
The merchant (and with him the tradesman and artizan) has a duty to
fulfil. What is it ? It is to supply the nation with good things in the
way of material produce—with goods, not with evils. What should we
think of the schoolmaster who taught lies to his children, or of the
soldier who ran away in the time of the nation’s danger—and what do
we think of the merchant who allows himself to supply the community
with bad, dishonest and useless articles ?
It is no good. Until the industrial classes of this country shall have
got back to the notion that they have a duty to the community at large
—which they are bound to fulfil, at times even at the cost of personal
loss—it is impossible that any good thing can come from them, it is
impossible that any saving and redeeming faith can spread amongst
them. No sophistry of Political Economy, no babble about Supply
and Demand, can ever get over this point, or make what is essentially
a lie into a fair and reasonable thing. Nor can any industrial organisa
tion of the future find a permanent foundation in any principle other
than that of good and honest work.
There is another point. I have said that no man can enjoy doing bad
work. If we are to make work an enjoyable thing in the future we must
(if for that reason alone) see to it that our work is good and thorough.
And if, for a time, such work should bring a less return, a less material
advantage, in consequence, still I maintain it would bring us more real
advantage, more enjoyment and content, than the money we so lose.
The third principle which, to my mind, emerges from a study of
Leclaire’s work lies in that affair about the white of zinc. It is the
question of men versus commodities. There is such a rage for cheap
�13
commodities in the present day—and a superficial view of Political
Economy has so fostered it—that it seems to be the prevalent idea that
the main glory and advancement of a nation is to get its commodities,
its crops, plentiful and cheap. Wherein it is forgotten that there is one
commodity, one crop, which in importance entirely surpasses all the
others, and on account of which only, in fact, the others are of value—
I mean the crop of men and women over a country. Leclaire struck
at the root of this matter. He said the community had no right to
sacrifice its producers, their health and well-being, for the sake of the
mere cheapness of the article produced. And any one who looks calmly
at the matter must agree with him.
But steam with its marvellous and unprecedented power of production has for the time made us maniacs on this subject. We are deluged
with commodities. “ Cheap and nasty and plenty of them ” is our motto.
What if the kettle bottom comes out shortly after we have bought it.
“ Oh ! but it is so cheap, what can you expect ? ” Chairs give way when
we sit upon them, shirts wear out, our houses tumble about our ears.
“ Oh ! but they are so cheap—we can soon get new ones ! ”
So we can, and so we do. Buying to-day and throwing away
to-morrow we go on till our houses are choked with useless lumber,
and our towns are laid upon a foundation of old boots and salmon tins 1
And there sitting on the top of this our rubbish heap of civilisation we
congratulate ourselves, crowing to the other nations, and sending forth
our missionaries and our soldiers to improve into our likeness the very
savages who have more dignity than us.
Meanwhile shall we not rather ask, before we congratulate ourselves
so freely, at what cost to the souls and bodies of men have these cheap
goods been won ? When we buy a file for the price of an old song, and
six boxes of matches for a penny, shall we not first, before we glorify
their cheapness, enquire how it is they are so cheap ? And if we find
that to produce this result men and women have been pinned down in
squalor and wretchedness till the divine image in them has been blurred
almost past recognition, if for this backs have been bowed and eyes
grown dim, and all belief in human or divine goodness has gradually
faded away—shall we not rather be ashamed to have bought things at
such a price ? Shall we not rather turn and cleanse first this Augaean
dung-heap of our own iniquities, before we dare to improve others, or
presume for a moment to think ourselves worthy of imitation ?
At the bottom of this whole matter, as I think, lies (what lies at the
bottom of so many things) the question of Ideals. If we look into our
own minds we shall, I think, generally find that there in the depths,
consciously or not, lurks some figure : some personage or character that
we have met, heard of, read of; whom we admire, envy, or desire to be
like. This is our ideal. It shapes, for the time being, our actions, our
lives.
At the root of a nation’s life, similarly, there lurks an ideal, which
does perhaps more than anything else to shape its growth. What has
been England’s Ideal for the last 20 or 30 years ? Shall I tell you ? It
can be said in two words. To get on. What does to get on mean ? It
means if you live in a cottage to get on to live in a house with a bay
window ; if you live in a house with a bay window to get on to live in
one with a drawing-room and dining-room ; if you live in a house with
a. drawing-room and dining-room, to add a coach-house and stables;
1
�J4
11 .
|/
finally perhaps to land yourself in solitary grandeur in the midst of a
large park. Now I have nothing to say against this ideal—if it amuses
or pleases any one to take these successive steps I have no objection to
offer, and it would be the merest impertinence in me to do so—provided
that in following out this plan of life you do not trample on the heads
of other people. But if you do so, if in order to mount to your
grand station in life it is necessary to kick some one else into the ditch,
then I say simply that we shall have to stop your little game.
There was a time doubtless when this ideal of material rank and
grandeur was rightful and in place. In the old Feudal society, which
depended so much for its stability on gradations of class and caste, it
was perhaps necessary that this kind of worship of class-position should
exist. And in that time it was practically impossible for a person to
pass over from one class to another—so that the feeling did not disturb
the relations of classes, but rather gave those relations intensity. But
in the present day the invention of steam and the vast development of
mercantile movement and machinery have entirely broken down these
old class barriers—they have let loose the demon of worldly advance
ment—and the consequence is that the last 20 or 30 years in England
have witnessed a spectacle—than which if you were to go all round the
savage nations of the world I doubt if you could witness anything more
degrading and disgusting— the spectacle of a whole nation (or nearly
all of it) occupied in scrambling insanely up into high places of display
and lucre over the tops of each other’s heads! It is in fact the break
down, it is nothing more or less than the decay and putrefaction of
Feudalism ; it is a process inevitable, and the stench and mephitic
vapour that arise from it are I suppose no more than natural; but it is
a process which, one must hope, will not last long—will soon give place
to something more hopeful and organic.
And in truth here and there, it seems to me, there are signs (like
grass in spring) of a new life, a new ideal, arising out of the ground: an
ideal which, as I think, is destined to be the central life of a new age of
the world, and to inspire for centuries new forms of society at least as
permanent fruitful and important as those old forms of Feudalism
which are now passing away.
What is this new Ideal ? It differs from the old one in this—its aim
is not human grandeur, but human equality ; it does not consist in seeking
to be above others, but to be with and of them. This Ideal does not
require for its satisfaction that a man should occupy a grand position in
the world, that he should be the centre of many eyes, or that he should
have acquired wealth, power, learning even ; on the contrary, it looks
for its material, and finds it, in just the ordinary surroundings of
human life. It sees in ordinary men and women, toiling, suffering,
enjoying, the materials of heroes and heroines equal to all in history ; it
sees in some old woman sitting by her cottage door the equal of all the
kings and queens that have ever lived ; it beholds the ever sacred face
of our common humanity looking forth from the troubled and wandering
eyes of the crazy and insane. This Ideal is not one which from the
nature of the case can only be realised by the few; it does not turn a
high light on just one small class or section and condemn the common
crowd to obscurity and contempt. On the contrary it takes the life of
the masses—the ordinary human life as in its main outlines it has been
and seems likely to be—and proclaims that this is in effect as worthy,
1
�J5
as great and dignified, as any form of life can be; perhaps after all best
of all. It says—This ordinary life is essentially grand, delightful and
enjoyable, and it shall be made actually so. We are going henceforth
to make the common occupations honorable and enviable. We will
have it so that the gardening, baking, carpentering, file-cutting, nail
making shall be a pleasure and an honour to work at. We will insist
that the conditions under which all these trades are carried on are
compatible with justice, health and self-respect. We will show in our
selves that the simplest life is as good as any, that we are not ashamed
of it—and we will so adorn it that the rich and idle shall enviously
leave their sofas and saloons and come and join hands with us in it. ,
This is the drift of the new Ideal that 1 think I see springing up
around us. We cannot all be Leclaires, but we can all, I believe, help
forward the true cause of Co-operation (which in its essence is no other
than the emancipation and redemption of Labour) by nourishing and
cherishing this Ideal within us. There is many a hero to-day in the
work-shop who despite the jeers of his fellow-workmen and the solicit
ations of his employer still does honest and good work, because his soul
abhors the bad. There is many an heroic mother in her cottage home
who by gentleness and persuasion, courage and self-respect, casts a
grace and brightness over the meanest of her occupations, and converts
her little household into a Paradise. I ask you above all things to be
practical—not merely to talk about schemes, but to act out in daily life
these principles which underlie and precede the ripening of schemes ;
above all to have done, in thought, word or deed, with this ancient
sham of fleeing from manual labour, of despising or pretending to
despise it. If you thus create the raw material of Co-operation you
need not doubt I think but what the finished product—which you so
desire—will swiftly appear among you.
I
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Co-operative production with references to the experiment of Leclaire: a lecture given at the Hall of Science, Sheffield, Sunday, March 18th, 1883
Description
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Edition: 2nd ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 15 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: Other works by the same author listed on title page verso. Publisher's list on unnumbered page at the end.
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Carpenter, Edward [1844-1929]
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The Modern Press
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1886
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Co-operative Movement
Socialism
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Co-operative Movement
Socialism
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Desirable Mansions:
A
TRACT
Reprinted, with a few alterations, from “Progress, June, 1883.
By
EDWARD CARPENTER.
THIRD EDITION
PRICE
ONE
PENNY.
Published by
THE MODERN PRESS, 13, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
1887.
�BY
THE
SAME
AUTHOR.
Towards Democracy. New edition, with numerous
added Poems, crown 8vo, cloth, 260 pp. Price 2s. 6d
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nightmare after too earnest a study of the Koran! ”—
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“ Its plan includes a poetical appeal to the different
nationalities of the world, a sketch of the characteristic
features of England and English towns, and all kinds of
industrial work, finally a series of dramatic pictures whose
vividness and beauty seem magical.” — Cambridge Review.
Modern Science : a Criticism.
pp. Price is.
Crown 8vo, paper, 7.6
Modern Money-Lending; or, the Meaning of DividendsA Pamphlet. Price 2d. Second edition.
England’s Ideal.
Price 2d.
John Heywood, Deansgate and Ridgefield’ Manchester:
11, Paternoster Buildings, London.
and
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from To-day. Price id.
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THE MODERN PRESS, 13, Paternoster Row, London, E.C.
For popular pamphlets on all political, social and,
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stamped envelope for catalogue.
�DESIRABLE MANSIONS
FTER all, why should we rail against the rich ? I
think if anything they should be pitied. In nine
cases out of ten it is not a man’s fault.
He is
born in the lap of luxury, he grows up surrounded
by absurd and impossible ideas about life, the innumerable
chains of habit and circumstance tighten upon him, and when
the time comes that he would escape, he finds he cannot. He
is condemned to flop up and down in his cage for the re
mainder of his days—a spectacle of boredom, and a warning
to gods and men.
I go into the houses of the rich. In the drawing-room I
see chill weary faces, peaked features of ill-health ; down
stairs and in the kitchen I meet with rosy smiles, kissable
cheeks, and hear sounds of song and laughter. What is this ?
Is it possible that the real human beings live with Jeames
below-stairs!
Often as I pass and see in suburb or country some “ desir
able mansion ” rising from the ground, I think : That man is
building a prison for himself. So it is—a prison. I would
rather spend a calendar month in Clerkenwell or Holloway
than I would in that desirable mansion. A young lady that
I knew, and who lived in such a mansion, used with her sisters
to teach a class of factory girls. Every now and again one
of the girls would say, “ Eh, Miss, how I would like to be a
grand lady like you ! ” Then she would answer, “ Yes, but
you know you wouldn’t be able to do everthing you liked ; for
instance, you wouldn’t be allowed to go out walking when
�4
you liked.” “ Eh, dear I ” they would say to one another,
“ she is not allowed to go out walking when she likes—she is
not allowed to go out walking when she likes ! ”
Certainly you are not allowed to go out walking when you
like. Reader, did you ever spend a day within those desirable
walls ? I have, many. I wake up in the morning. It is fine
and bright. I think to myself: I will have a pleasant stroll
before breakfast. Yes—man proposes. It is all very well to
meditate a morning walk, but where O where are my clothes ?
I cannot very well go out without them. What can have be
come of them ? Suddenly it occurs to me: James, honest
soul, has taken them away to brush. Good. I wait. Nothing
happens. I ring the bell. James appears. “ My clothes,
James.” “Yes, sir.” Again I wait—an intolerable time.
At last the familiar jacket and trousers appear. Good. Now
*
I can go out. Not so fast—where are your boots ? Boots,
good gracious, I had forgotten them. Heaven knows where
they are—I don’t. Probably fifty yards away. I creep
downstairs. All is quiet. The servants are evidently at
breakfast. It would be madness to hope to get boots brushed
at such a moment. I would like to clean them myself. In
fact I am fond of cleaning my own boots: the exercise is
pleasant, and besides it is just such a little bit of menial
work as I would rather do for myself than have others
do for me; but, as I said before, one cannot do what
one likes. In the first place, in this house where one is
fifty yards away from everything one wants I have not
the faintest idea where my boots are, or the means and instru
ments of blacking them ; in the second place an even more
fatal objection is that if I did succeed in committing this deed
of darkness the consequent uproar in the house would be per
fectly indescribable. The outrage on propriety would not
only shock the feelings of the world below-stairs, but it would
put to confusion the master of the house, upset the whole
domestic machinery, create unpleasant qualms in the minds
* A friend tells me that once, to revenge himself for this sort of trifling,
he concealed his nether garment under the mattrass and then, in the
morning, slyly watched the footman as he vainly sought round the room
for it. The consequence however was that he fell very much in the esti
mation of the latter, who doubtless thought that, like Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John, his master’s visitor •' had gone to bed with his breeches
on.”
�5
of the other guests, and possibly make me feel that I had
better not have lived. Accordingly, I abandon the idea of my
pleasant stroll. It is not worth such a sacrifice. The birds
are singing outside, the flowers are gay in the morning sun —
but it must not be. Within, in the sitting-rooms, chaos reigns.
Chairs and tables are piled in cheerful confusion upon one
another, carpets are partially strewn with tea-leaves. To
read a book or write an aimless letter to some one (the usual
resource of people in desirable mansions) is clearly impossible;
to do anything in the way of house-work is forbidden—it
being well understood in such places that one may do any
thing except what is useful.
There remains nothing but to
beat a retreat to my chamber again—put my hands in my
pockets and whistle at the open window.
“ Who was that I heard whistling so early this morning ? ”
says my kindly old host at breakfast. “ O, it was you, was
it ? I expect now you’re an early riser ; get up at seven, take
a walk before breakfast; that sort of thing—eh ? ” “Yes, when
I can,” I reply with ambiguous intent. “ Well, I call that
wonderful,” says an elderly matron—not likely, as far as ap
pearances go, to be accused of a similar practice—“ such
energy, you know.” “ What a strong constitution you must
have to be able to stand it! ” remarks a charming young lady
on whom it has not yet dawned that the vast majority of
human kind have their breakfast before half-past nine.
This is not a good beginning to the day ; but the rest is like
unto it. I find that there are certain things to be done—a
certain code of things that you may do, a certain way of doing
them, a certain way of putting your knife and fork on your
plate. When you come down to dinner in the evening you
must put on what the Yankees call a claw-hammer coat. It
is not certain, (and that is just the grisly part of it) what
would happen if you did not do this. In some societies
evidently such a casualty has never been contemplated. I
have heard people seriously discussing—in cases where the
required article was missing—what could be done, where one
might be borrowed, &c.—but clearly it did not occur to them
that anyone could dine in his natural clothes. Sometimes,
when in a fashionable church, I have wondered whether
it would be possible to worship God in a flannel shirt—
but I suppose that to go out to a dinner party in such a
�6
costume would be even more unthinkable. As I said
before, you are in prison. Submit to the prison rules,
and it is all right—attempt to go beyond them, and you
are visited with condign punishment. The rules have
no sense, but that does not matter (possibly some ot
them had sense once, but it must have been a very long time
ago); the people are good people, no better nor worse in
themselves than the real workers, the real hands and hearts
of the world; but they are condemned to banishment from
the world, condemned into the prison houses of futility. The
stream of human life goes past them as they gaze wearily
upon it through their plate-glass windows; the great Mother’s
breasts of our common Humanity, with all its toils and suf
ferings and mighty joys, are withheld from them. Dimly al
last I think I understand why it is their faces are so chill and
sad, their unnourished lives so unhealthy and over-sensitive.
Truly, if I could pity anyone, I would them.
By the side of the road there stands a little girl, crying ;
she has lost her way. It is very cold, and she looks pinched
and starved. “ Come in, my little girl, and sit by my cottage
fire, and you’ll soon get warm; and I’ll see if I can't find you
a bit of something to eat before you go on . . . Eh 1 dear !
how stupid I am—I quite forgot. I am sorry 1 can’t ask
you in, but I am living in a desirable mansion now—and
though we are very sorry for you, yet you see we could hardly
have you into our house, for your dirty little boots would
make a dreadful mess of our carpets, and we should have to
dust the chairs after you had sat upon them, and you see Mrs.
Vavasour might happen to come in, and she would think it
so very odd ; and I know cook can’t bear beggars, and, O
dear ! I’m so sorry for you—and here’s a penny, and I hope
you’ll get home safely.”
The stream of human life goes past. When a rich man
builds himself a prison, he puts up all these fences to shut
the world out—to shut himself in. If he can he builds far back
from the high road. In the front of his house he has a bound
less polite lawn, with polite flower beds, afar from vulgarpeople
and animals. Rows of polite servants attend upon him; and there
within of inanity and politeness he dies. Of what human
life really consists in he has little idea. He has not the
faintest notion of what is necessary for human life or happi
�7
ness. Sometimes with an indistinct vision of accumulated
evil, he says: “ Poor So-and-so, he has only ^200 a year to
keep his wife and family on ! ” No wonder his own daughters
dedicate themselves to “ good works.” They go out with the
curate and visit at neighbouring cottages. Their visits have
little appreciable effect on the people, but are a great benefit
to themselves and the curate. They observe, for the first
time, how life is carried on ; they see the operations of scrub
bing and cooking (removed in their own houses afar from
mortal polite eye) ; perhaps they behold a mother actually
suckling her own babe, and learn that such things are pos
sible ; finally, they “ wonder ” how “ those .people ” live, and
to them their wonder (like the fear of God) is the beginning of
wisdom. The lord of the mansion sits on the magisterial
bench or strides about his fields, and lumps together all who
are not in a similar position to himself as the “ lower
classes.” After dinner in the evening, if the conversation
turns on politics, he and his compeers discuss the importance
of keeping the said lower classes in order, or the best method
of “ raising ” them out of the ignorance and disorder in which
they are supposed to wallow. And during the conversation
it will be noticed that it is by everyone tacitly allowed and
understood, and is, in fact, the very foundation of the whole
argument, that the speakers themselves belong to an educated
class, while the mass of the people are uneducated. Yet this
is exactly the reverse of the truth—for they themselves
belong to an ill-educated class, and the mass of the people
are, by the very nature of the case, the better educated of
the two.
In fact, the education of the one set of people (and it is a
great pity that it should be so) consists almost entirely in the
study of books. That is very useful in its way, and if pro
perly balanced with other things; but it is hardly necessary
to point out that books only deal with phantoms and shadows
of reality. The education of the world at large, and the real
education, lies, and must always lie, in dealing with the
things themselves. To put it shortly (as it has been put
before), one man learns to spell a “ spade,” to write it, to
rhyme it, to translate it into French and Latin—possibly,
like Wordsworth, to address a sonnet to it—the other man
learns to use it. Is there any comparison between the two ?
�8
Now is it not curious that those good people sitting round
their dinner table in the desirable mansion, or listening to a
little music in the drawing-room, should actually be so
ignorant of the world, and what goes on in it, as to think, and
honestly believe, that they are, par excellence, the educated
people in it ? * Does it ever occur to them, I often think, to
inquire who made all the elegant and costly objects with
which they are surrounded ? Does it ever occur to them, as
they tacitly assume the inferiority of the working classes, to
think of the table itself across which they speak—how beauti
fully fitted, veneered, polished ; the cloth which lies upon it,
and the weaving of it; the chairs and other furniture, so light
and yet so strong, each requiring the skill of years to make ;
the silver, the glass, the steel, the tempering, hardening,
grinding, fitting, riveting ; the lace and damask curtains, the
wonderful machinery, the care, the delicate touch, adroit
manipulation ? the piano 1 the very house itself in which they
spend their days ! Is there one, I say, who we will not say
could make even the smallest part, but who even has the
faintest idea how one of these things is.made, where it is
made, who makes it ? Not one. All the care, the loving
thought, the artistic design, the conscientious workmanship
that have been expended, and are daily expended, on these
things and the like of them—go past them unrecognised,
unacknowledged. The great hymn of human labour over the
earth is to them an idle song. There, in the midst of all
these beautiful products of toil and ingenuity, possessing but
not enjoying, futile they sit, and fancy themselves educated—
fit to rule. I have heard of a fly that sat stinging upon the
hindquarters of a horse, and fancied that without it the cart
would not go. Fancied so, I say, until the great beast
whisked its tail, and after that it fancied nothing more.
Doi put these things in a strong light? May be, I do; but I put
them faithfully as I have seen them, and as I see them daily.
* “ . . . . People who roll about in their fine equipages scarcely
knowing what to do with themselves or what ails them, and some of whom
occasionally run to such places as ours to have their carriage linings or
cushions altered, or to know if they *can be altered as they don't feel quite
1
comfortable.' I often think ‘ God help them,’ for no one else can. . .
I insert this extract just to show how these things are regarded from
the side which does not usually find expression. It is from a letter written
by an elderly and gentle-hearted man, employed in a carriage factory.
�9
I do not suppose that riches are an evil in themselves. I do
not suppose that anything is an evil in itself. I know that
even in the midst of all these shackles and impediments,
that wonderfulest of things, the human soul, may work out
its own salvation ; and well I know that there are no condi
tions or circumstances of human life, nor any profession from
a king to a prostitute, that may not become to it the gateway of
freedom and immortality. But I daily see people setting this
standard of well-to-do respectability before them, daily more
and more hastening forth in quest of desirable mansions to
dwell in ; and I cannot but wonder whether they realise what
it is they seek ; I cannot lend my voice to swell the chorus
of encouragement. Here are the clean facts. Choose for
yourselves. That is all.
Respectability ! Heavy-browed and hunch-backed word '
Once innocent and light-hearted as any other word, why now
in thy middle age art thou become so gloomy and saturnine ?
Is it that thou art responsible for the murder of the innocents ?
Respectability! Vision of clean hands and blameless dress—
why dost thou now appear in the form of a ghoul before me ?
I confess that the sight of a dirty hand is dear to me. It
warms my heart with all manner of good hopes and promises.
Often and long have I thought about this matter, and in all
good faith I must say that I fail to see how hands always
clean are compatible with honesty. This is no play upon
words. I fail to see how in the long run, any man that
takes his share in the work of the world can keep his hands
in this desirable state.
How ? The answer is obvious enough—leave others to do
the dirty work. Good ! Let it be so ; let it be granted that
others shall do the scrubbing and baking, the digging, the
fishing, the breaking of horses, the carpentering, build
ing, smithing, and the myriad other jobs that have to be
done, and you at the pinnacle of all this pyramid of work,
above all, keep your hands clean. We shouting to you from
below, exhort you—At all costs, keep your hands cle‘an !
Think how important it is, while the great ships have to be
got into harbour, that your nails should be blameless ! Think
if by any accident you were to do a real good piece of work,
and get your hands thoroughly grimed over it, unwashable
for a week, what confusion would ensue to yourself and
�IO
friends ! Think O think of your clients, or of the next
dinner party, and earnestly and prayerfully resolve that
such a fall may never be yours. Seek, we pray you, some
secure work—some legal, clerical, official, capitalist, or land
owning business, safe from the dread stain of dirty hands,
whatever other dirt it may bring with it—some thoroughly
gentlemanly profession, marking you clearly off from the
vulgar and general masses, and the blessing of heaven
go with you !
Shut yourself off from the great stream of human life,
from the great sources of physical and moral health ; ignore
the common labour by which you live, show clearly your
contempt for it, your dislike of it, and then ask others to do
it for you ; turn aside from nature, divorce yourself from the
living breathing heart of the nation; and then you will have
done, what the governing classes of England to-day have
done, have given full directions to your own heart and brain
how to shrivel and starve and die.
Man is made to work with his hands. This is a fact which
cannot be got over. From this central fact he cannot travel
far. I don’t care whether it is an individual or a class, the
life which is far removed from this becomes corrupt, shrivelled,
and diseased. You may explain it how you like, but it is so.
Administrative work has to be done in a nation as well as
productive work ; but it must be done by men accustomed to
manual labour, who have the healthy decision and primitive
authentic judgment which comes of that, else it cannot be
done well. In the new form of society which is slowly
advancing upon us, this will be felt more than now. The
higher the position of trust a man occupies the more will it
be thought important that, at some period of his life, he
should have been thoroughly inured to manual work ; this
not only on account of the physical and moral robustness
implied by it, but equally because it will be seen to be im
possible for any one, without this experience of what is the
very flesh and blood of national life, to promote the good
health of the nation, or to understand the conditions under
which the people live whom he has to serve.
But to return to the sorrows of the well-to-do—and care
that sits on the crupper of wealth.
This is a world-old and
well-worn subject. Yet, possibly, some of its truisms may
�II
bear repeating. A clergyman, preaching once on the trials
of life, turned first to his rich friends and bade them call to
mind, one by one, the sorrows and sufferings of the poor;
then, turning to his “ poorer brethren,” he exhorted them
also not to forget that the rich man had his afflictions—with
which they should sympathise—amongst which afflictions,
growing chiefly out of their much money, he reckoned “ last,
but not least, the difficulty of finding for it an investment
which should be profitable and also secure 1 ” It has been
generally supposed that the poorer brethren failed to sym
pathise with this form of suffering.
But it is a very real one. What cares, what anxieties,
what yellow and blue fits, what sleepless nights, dance at
tendance on the worshiper in the great Temple of Stocks !
The capricious deity that dwells there has to be appeased by
ceaseless offerings. Usury ! crookfaced idol, loathed, yet
grovelled to by half the world, whose name is an abomination
to speak openly, yet whose secret rites are practised by
thousands who revile thy name, what spell of gloom and
bilious misery dost thou cast over thy worshipers! Is it
possible that the ancient curse has not yet lost its effect:
that to acquire interest on money and to acquire interest in
life are not the same thing ; that they are positively not com
patible with each other; that to fly from one’s just share of
labour in the world, in order to live upon the hard-earned
profits of others, is not, and cannot come to good ? Is it
possible, I say, reader, that there is a moral law in the world
facing us quite calmly in every transaction of our lives by
which it must be so—by which cowardice and sham cannot
breed anything else for us but gloom and bilious misery ? In
this age which rushes to stocks—to debenture, preference,
consolidated, and ordinary stocks, to shares, bonds, coupons,
dividends—-not even refusing scrip when it can get it—does
it ever occur to us to consider what it all means ?—to con
sider that all the money so gained is taken from some one
else ; that what we have not earned cannot possibly be ours,
except by gift, or (shall I say it ?) theft ? How can it then
come with a blessing ? How can we not but think of the
railway operatives, the porters, managers, clerks, superin
tendents, drivers, stokers, platelayers, carriage - washers,
navvies, out of whose just earnings (and from no other
�12
source) our dividends are taken ? ■ Let alone honesty—what,
surely, does our pride say to this ? Is it possible that this
frantic dividend-dance of the present day is like a dance of
dancers dancing without any music—an aimless incoherent
impossible dance, weltering down at last to idiocy and
oblivion ?
Curious, is it not, that this subject (of dividends) is never
mentioned before said wage-receiving classes ? I have often
noticed that. When James enters the room, or Jeffery comes
to look at the gas-fittings, the babble of stocks dies faintly
away, as if ashamed of itself? and while a man will, without
reserve, allude to his professional salary, he is generally as
secret concerning his share-gotten gains as ladies are said to
be about their age.
But, as I said at first, these things are not generally a
man’s fault. They are the product of the circumstances in
which he is born. From his childhood he is trained osten
sibly in the fear of God, but really in the fear of money. The
*
whole tenor of the conversation which he hears round him,
and his early teaching, tend to impress upon him the awful
dangers of not having enough. Strange that it never occurs
to parents of this class to teach their children how little they
can live upon, and be happy (but perhaps they do not know).
Hence, the child of the poor man—even in these adverse
times—grows up with some independence of mind, for he
knows that if at any time he can obtain £50 or ^100
a year by the work of his hands, he will be able to bring
up a little family; while the son of a rich man in the
midst of a family income of fifty times ^50, learns to tremble
slavishly at the prospect of the future ; dark hints of the
workhouse are whispered in his ears ; father and mother,
school-teachers and friends, join in pressing him into a pro
fession which he hates—stultifying his whole life—because it
will lead to ^500, or even ^1,000 a year in course of
time. This is the great test, the sure criterion between
two paths: which will lead to more money? The youth* Or as Mr. Locker has it,
They eat and drink and scheme and plod,
And go to church on Sunday;
For many are afraid of God,
And more of Mrs. Grundy.
�i3
ful tender conscience soon comes to look upon it as a
duty, and the acquisition of large dividends as part of the
serious work of life. Then come true the words of the
preacher: he realises with painful clearness the difficulty of
finding investments which shall be profitable and also secure;
circulars, reports, newspaper-cuttings, and warning letters
flow in upon him, sleepless nights are followed by anxious
days, telegrams and railway journeys succeed each other.
But the game goes on : the income gets bigger, and the fear
of the workhouse looms closer ! Friendsand relations also,
have shares. Some get married and others die. Hence
trustee-ships and executor-ships, increasing in number year
by year, coil upon coil; solicitors hover around on all sides,
jungles of legal red tape have to be waded through, chancery
looms up with its “ obscene birds ” upon the horizon, and
the hapless boy, now an old man before his time, with
snatched meals and care-lined brow, goes to and fro like an
automaton—a walking testimony to his own words that
“ the days of his happiness are long gone past.” Before
God, I would rather with pick and shovel dig a yearlong
drain beneath the open sky, breathing freely, than I would
live in this jungle of idiotic duties and thin-lipped respect
abilities that money breeds. Why the devil should the days
of your happiness be gone past, except that you have lived a
life to stultify the whole natural man in you ? Do you think
that happiness is a little flash-in-the-pan when you are eighteen,
and that is all ? Do you not know that expanding age, like a
flower, lifts itself ever into a more and more exquisite sun
light of happiness—to which Death, serene and beautiful,
comes only at the last with the touch of perfected assurance ?
Do you not know that the whole effort of Nature in you is
towards this happiness, if you could only abandon yourself,
and for one child-like moment have faith in your own mother ?
But she knows it, and watches you, half amused, run after
your little “ securities,” knowing surely that you must at
length return to her.
But wherein the affluent classes suffer most in the present
day perhaps is the matter of health. Into that heaven it is
indeed hard for a rich man to enter. Here again the whole
tradition of his life is against him. If there is one thing
that appears to me more certain than another it is, as I have
�partly said before, that no individual or class can travel far
from the native life of the race without becoming shrivelled,
corrupt, diseased—without suffering, in fact. By the native
life I mean the life of those (always the vast majority of
human kind) who live and support themselves in direct
contact with Nature.
*
To rise early, to be mostly in the
open air, to do some amount of physical labour, to eat clean
and simple food, are necessary and aboriginal conditions of
the life of our race, and they are necessary and aboriginal
conditions of health. The doctor who does not start from
these as .the basis of his prescriptions does not know his
work. The modern money-lender, man of stocks, or what
ever you call him, and his family, live in the continual
violation of these conditions. They get up late, are mostly
indoors, do little or no physical work, and take quantities of
rich and greasy food and stimulants, such as would exhaust
the stomach of a strong man, but which to them, in their
already enervated state, are simply fatal. Hence a long
catalogue of evils, ever branching into more. Hence dys
pepsia, nerves, liver, sexual degeneracies, and general de
pression of vitality ; a gloomy train, but whose drawn
features you will recognise if you peep into almost anyone of
those desirable mansions of which I have spoken. A terrible
symptom of our well-to-do (?) modern life is this want of
health, and one which presses for serious attention. There
is only one remedy for it; but that remedy is a sure one—
the return (or advance) to a simpler mode of existence.
What is the upshot of all this? There was a time when
the rich man had duties attending his wealth. The lord or
baron was a petty king, and had kingly responsibilities as
well as power. The Sir Roger, of Addison’s time, was the
succeeding type of landlord. And even to the present day
there lingers, here and there, a country squire who fulfils that
* It must be noticed that the working masses of our great towns do not
by any means fulfil this condition. Thrust down into squalor by the very
effort of others climbing to luxury, the unnaturalness and misery of their
lives is the direct counterpart and inseparable accompaniment of the un
naturalness of the lives of the rich. That the great masses of our popula
tion to-day are in this unhealthy state does not however disprove the
statement in the text—i.e., that the vast majority of mankind must live in
direct contact with Nature—rather it would indicate that the present
conditions can only be of brief duration.
�j
M
fl! IUHM
15
now antiquated ideal of kindly condescension and patronage.
But the modern rush of steam-engines, and the creation of
an enormous class of wealthy folk, living on stocks, have
completely subverted the old order. It has let loose on
society a horde of wolves !—a horde of people who have no
duties attaching to their mode of life, no responsibility.
They roam hither and thither, seeking whom and what they
may devour. Personally I have no objection to criminals,
and think them quite as good as myself. But, Talk of
criminal classes—can there be a doubt that the criminal
classes, par excellence, in our modern society, are this horde of
stock and share-mongers ? If to be a criminal is to be an
enemy of society, then they are such. For their mode of
life is founded on the principle of taking without giving, of
claiming without earning—as much as that of any common
thief. It is in vain to try and make amends for this by
charity organisations and unpaid magistracies. The cure
must go deeper. It is no good trying to set straight the roof
and chimneys, when the whole foundation is aslant. These
good people are not boarded and lodged at Her Majesty’s
pleasure, but the Eternal Justice, unslumbering, causes them
to build prisons (as I have said) for themselves-—plagues
them with ill-health and divers unseen evils— and will and
must plague them, till such time as they shall abandon the im
possible task they have set themselves, and return to the
paths of reason.
The whole foundation is aslant—and aslip, as anyone may
see who looks. In short, it is an age of transition. No
mortal power could make durable a Society founded on
Usury—universal and boundless usury. The very words
scream at each other. The baron has passed away; and the
landlord is passing. They each had their duties, and while
they fulfilled them served their time well and faithfully.
The shareholder has no duties, and is miserable, and will
remain so till the final landslip, when the foundations having
completely given way, he will crawl forth out of the ruins of
his desirable mansion into the life and light of a new day.
Less oracular than this I dare not be!
As I have
said before there is no conceivable condition of life in
which the human soul may not find the materials of its
surpassing deliverance from evil and mortality. And I for
�one would not, if I had the power, cramp human life into
the exhibition of one universal routine. If anyone desires to
be rich, if anyone desires to gradually shut himself off from
the world, to build walls and fences, to live in a house where
it is impossible to get a breath of fresh air without going
through half a dozen doors, and to be the prisoner of his
own servants; if he desires it so that when he walks down
the street he cannot whistle or sing, or shout across the road
to a friend, or sit upon a doorstep when tired, or take off his
coat if it be hot, but must wear certain particular clothes in
a certain particular way, and be on such pins and needles as
to what he may or may not do, that he is right glad when he
gets back again to his own prison walls ; if he loves trustee
ships and Egyptian Bonds, and visits from the lawyer, and
feels glad when he finds a letter from the High Court of
Chancery on his breakfast table, and experiences in attend
ing to all these things that satisfaction which comes of all
honest work ; if he feels renovated and braced by lying in
bed of a morning, and by eating feast dinners every day, and
by carefully abstaining from any bodily labour ; if dyspepsia,
and gout, and biliousness, and distress of nerves are not
otherwise than grateful to him ; and if he can obtain all
these things without doing grievous wrong to others, by all
means let him have them.
Only for those who do not know what they desire I would
lift up the red flag of warning. Only of that vast and ever
vaster horde which to-day (chiefly, I cannot but think, in
ignorance) rushes to Stocks, would I ask a moment’s pause,
and to look at the bare facts, If these words should come
to the eye of such an one I would pray him to think for a
moment—to glance at this great enthroned Wrong in its
dungeon palace (notffhe less a wrong because the laws coun
tenance and encourage it)—to listen for the cry of the home
less many, trodden under foot, a yearly sacrifice to it—to
watch the self-inflicted sufferings of its worshipers, the
ennui, the depression, the unlovely faces of ill-health, to
observe the falsehood on which it is founded, and therefore
the falsehood, the futility, the unbelief in God or Man which
spring out of it—and to turn away, determined, as far as in
him lies, to worship in that Dagon-house no longer.
�
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Desirable mansions : a tract
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7 4 OS
THE TEXT-BOOK OF DEMOCRACY.
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
BY
H. M. HYNDMAN.
DEDICATED TO THE DEMOCRATIC AND WORKING MENS
CLUBS OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.
Mention:
E. W. ALLEN,
4,
AVE
MARIA
LANE,
1881.
\_All rights reserved.^
E.C.
�8
g' nr
�PREFACE TO CHEAP EDITION.
DURING the past three months I have been fre
quently asked by working men and working women
to publish a cheap edition of this little work. This I
have now done at a price which will bring it within
reach of all. The cordial reception accorded to the
first edition by the producing classes, whose interests
it was written to serve, leads me to hope that the
plain statement of the wrongs under which they
suffer may induce them to combine for their own
cause.
H. M. H.
September 12th, 1881.
io, Devonshire Street, Portland Place,
London, W.
�PREFACE.
In this changeful period, when the minds of men are
much troubled about the future, and many seem
doubtful whither we are bound, I have attempted
to suggest for the Democratic party in this country
a clear and definite policy. The views expressed in
this little work do not, I am aware, accord with the
commonly received politics and economy of the day.
Holding, as I do, strong opinions as to the capacity
of the great English-speaking democracies to take
the lead in the social reorganization of the future,
I think it right to state them, and to show at the
same time how seriously the working people suffer
under our present landlord and capitalist system.
From the luxurious classes, as a whole, I expect
little support. They have plenty of writers ready to
champion their cause. To the people alone I appeal,
and their approval will be my reward.
It was for the Democratic Federation that I
originally wrote this book, and I present to its
members the first copies to-day.
For the ideas and much of the matter contained in
Chapters II. and III., I am indebted to the work of
a great thinker and original writer, which will, I trust,
shortly be made accessible to the majority of my
countrymen.
H. M. H.
June Zth, 1881.
io, Devonshire Street, Portland Place,
London, W.
�CONTENTS.
PAGE
Introduction .
. ’.................................................................................................................... i
CHAPTER I.
.7
..............................................................
The Land
CHAPTER II.
........... 32
Labour
CHAPTER III.
Capital
.
65
.................................................................
CHAPTER IV.
Organization...................................................................................
CHAPTER V.
Ireland............................................................................................ ....
CHAPTER VI.
Indta....................................................................... e
.
. 131
CHAPTER VII.
The Colonies.................................................................................. 132
CHAPTER VIII.
Foreign Affairs......................................................................... 169
Conclusion
• 193
�■» ”>J '•
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
INTRODUCTION.
It is impossible to survey our modern society without
at once seeing that there is something seriously amiss
in the conditions of our every-day life. All may
indeed lament the inequalities around them, the
wasted wealth and excessive luxury of the rich, the
infinite misery and degradation of the poor. So clear
is the mischief which results from causes apparently
beyond control, that now and then a paroxysm of
self-reproach seizes upon the comfortable classes, and
they try some new-fangled scheme of charity to
remedy the ills which, for the moment, they think
must be due to them. But this temporary feeling is
very short-lived. The conditions of human existence
are said to be unchangeable by collective, far less by
individual, action, and religion is often called in to
justify the let-alone policy which is so far the most
convenient to the well-to-do.
Possibly, however, a change is at hand. In Eng
land as elsewhere, ideas in these days move fast. That
disgust with both the political parties in the State
which has long been felt by the more intelligent of
B
�2
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
the working-class—that rooted impression that men in
broadcloth, no matter how they label themselves,
are banded together, in spite of their pledges at the
polls, to keep the men in fustian from their fair share
of the enjoyments of life, is spreading now from the
abler men to the less far-sighted. More and more
clear is it becoming to our people that their interest
in politics is something which, if fully understood, lies
far deeper than that of their daily or weekly wage.
“ We working men,” said one, “ shall never know our
real interest in politics till the mother teaches the
truth about them to her childand this phrase by
itself happily shows that a very different view of the
duty of the community to all is growing up from that
indifference and sluggishness which have hitherto
checked progress. How could it be otherwise ? Is
it conceivable that the men who make the wealth of
the country will permanently be satisfied with a sys
tem which shuts them out for ever from all interest
in their own land ? that they will be content to live
from hand to mouth on the strength of mere phrases,
and that they will always consent to be deprived of
their due share of representation ? They are indeed
shortsighted who so suppose. Now therefore it be
comes necessary that people of all classes who desire
that our existing society should be peacefully modified
should be content to examine, a little more deeply
than heretofore, into the present state of things.
This, so far as the wealthy are concerned, from the
most selfish point of view ; for there is nothing here
in the eternal fitness of things. The evolution of
mankind will not stand still, in order that landowners
�INTRODUCTION.
3
and capitalists may continue their present leisurely
existence, or that the well-to-do generally may regard
the sufferings of the toilers as of small account. Such
poverty as now exists is not an inseparable accom
paniment of human society ; neither is such excessive
concentration of wealth an incentive to human pro
gress. The gospel of greed and selfishness, of cor
ruption and competition, now proclaimed as the only
means of social salvation, is seen to be false in its
principles, and baneful in its results. This furious
development of wealth, on which we sometimes con
gratulate ourselves, has done little to elevate, and
much to lower, the tone even of the classes which
have benefited by it. What has it done for the
working class ? Never at any period in our history
were the many who work and the few who live upon
their labour so wide apart, socially and politically, as
they are to-day ; ’’never—and this is becoming in
itself serious—has there been such a general sensation
of uneasiness without any immediate cause.
Yet who can wonder that uneasiness there should
be ? Political reforms have done very little for our
people. Periods of flash prosperity, speedily followed
by depression which pinches and starves even the best
artisan class ; education progressing so slowly that
still another generation will be suffered to grow up
instructed enough only to be ignorant ; overcrowded
insanitary dwellings permitted to continue, and paid
for at an exorbitant price because this is to the benefit
of the classes who trade upon the necessities of their
fellows ; vast monopolies encouraged and overwork
scarcely checked,—here we have the boasted freedom
B 2
�4
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
of the latter half of the nineteenth century. The very
champions of free trade as the universal panacea are
themselves driven to confess that, true though their
theory is, it has not produced the social effect they
predicted.1 The rich have grown richer ; but the poor
—their condition is but little bettered, and relatively
has gone back. Our civilization is in many respects
but an organized hypocrisy, filming over as ulcerous
places below as ever disgraced the worst periods of
past history. But there is something more than
hypocrisy or indifference to account for the crying
evils of our great cities, and the miserable poverty and
bad lodgment which degrade our agricultural popu
lation. More general causes than any which individuals
can right, are at work. Private enterprise has been
tried and found wanting : laissez-faire has had its day.
Slowly the nation is learning that the old hack argu
ments of “ supply and demand,” “ freedom of con
tract,” “ infringement of individual liberty/’ are but
so many bulwarks of vested interests, which inflict
misery on the present, and deterioration on the next,
generation, in the name of a pseudo-science of govern1 Two professors of the straitest sect of economic orthodoxy,
Mr. Henry Fawcett and Mr. Thorold Rogers, are of the same
opinion on this point. Free trade is undeniably true in theory,
but they agree that it has benefited the poor very little in
comparison with the enormous wealth it has given to the rich.
Free Trade lowers the price of the necessaries of life ; but it also
keeps wages lower than they otherwise would be. It would be easy
to show that the working'classes owe all the improvement that has
been made in their condition, not to free trade, but to combination
among themselves, and to legislation carried directly in the
teeth of the most violent opposition from the leaders of the
free trade party.
�introduction.
5
merit. Bad as is the education of the majority of
Englishmen compared with what it ought to be, they
have learnt enough to be dissatisfied with arrange
ments which, when more ignorant, they might have
accepted as inevitable. Of the sufferings which the
real producers of this great industrial community
undergo, the comfortable classes hear but little. They
barely talk of their troubles to their most intimate
friends. The natural inclination of Englishmen is to
bear in silence. Hitherto many have found consola
tion in religion, which held out to them the prospect
of happiness hereafter in return for sorrow and misery
here. That resource is now failing, and the bolder
spirits—it is useless to blink plain truths—openly
deride those “ drafts on eternity ” which they say are
issued solely in the interest of employers and rich
men. Their own ills nevertheless they may bear:
that they will consent to hand on the same lot to their
children is very unlikely. The day for private charity
and galling patronage is at an end ; the time for com
bination and political action in redress of social wrongs
is at hand.
Such changes as are needed may be gradual, but
they must be rapid. In England, fortunately, we have
a long political history to lead up to our natural
development, the growth of a great nation such as
ours has its effect on all portions of the people.
Patriotism is part of our heritage ; self-restraint neces
sarily comes from the exercise of political power.
Even the poorest are ready to accept the assurance of
real reform, rather than listen to those who would
urge them to resort in desperation to violent change.
�6
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
Yet these reforms must in the end be far more
thorough than the enthusiasts of compromise, and the
fanatics of moderation are ready to admit. Hitherto
there has been patience, because all have hoped for
the best. But longer delay is not only harmful but
dangerous. We are ready enough to talk about
justice to others. Greeks, Slavs, Bulgars, Boers,
Negroes, are ever appealing to our sense of what is
due to the oppressed. Let the people of these islands,
without despising others, now be just to themselves.
If the theories now gaining ground all over the
Continent, as well as here with us, are to be met peace
fully, and turned to the advantage of all, the necessary
change of front can no longer be delayed. The State,
as the organized common-sense of public opinion,
must step in, regardless of greed or prejudice, to regu
late that nominal individual freedom which simply
strengthens the domination of the few. Thus only
shall the England of whose past we all are proud, and
of whose future all are confident, clear herself from
that shortsighted system which now stunts the physi
cal and intellectual growth of the great majority, knit
together the great democracies near and far under our
flag, and deal out to our dependencies a full measure
of that justice which alone can secure for us and for
ours the leadership in the social reorganization
which will be our greatest claim to respect and
remembrance from countless generations of the human
race.
�THE LAND.
7
CHAPTER I.
THE LAND.
POSSESSION of the land is a matter of such supreme
importance to the liberty and well-being of Englishmen,
that the only marvel is not that there should be a
growing agitation on the subject to-day, but that the
nation should ever have been content to bear patiently
the monopoly which has been created during the
past 300 years. It affords indeed a strange commen
tary upon the history of human progress, that we
have to look back more than 400 years to the period
when the mass of the people of these islands were
in their most prosperous and wholesome condition.
In those middle ages which our school-books still
speak of as days of darkness and ignorance, the
great body of Englishmen were far better off in every
way than they are now. The men who fought in the
French wars, and held their own against every Conti
nental army, were sober, hardworking yeomen and
life-holders, who were ready to pay for their victories
out of their own pockets, instead of saddling their
descendants with a perpetual mortgage in the shape
of a huge national debt. They owned the soil and
lived out of it, and having secured for themselves
�8
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
power at home and freedom by their own firesides,
they kept them.
The fifteenth century was the golden age of agri
cultural England. Villenage had disappeared ; the
country—far more populous at that time than is
commonly supposed—was occupied and cultivated by
free men, who tilled their own lands, subject only to
light dues payable to feudal superiors. Such daylabourers as there were, lived in perfect freedom,
owned plots of land themselves, and shared in the
enormous common land which then lay free and open
to all. Landless, houseless families were almost
unknown, permanent pauperism was undreamt of.
The feudal lords who maintained around them crowds
of retainers were at this time merely the heads of a
free, prosperous society, which recognized them as their
natural leaders alike in war and peace. Notwith
standing, or rather by reason of the great subdivision
of land, the wealth of the bulk of the people was
extraordinary. They were their own masters, and
could speak their own minds freely to all ; the
degrading servility of the agricultural labourer of to
day had not appeared to take the place of the
thraldom of the old serfs. No description ever given
of any people shows a more prosperous set of men
than the Englishmen of that time. Their sturdy
freedom was based upon property and good living.
“ The King of England cannot alter the laws or
make new ones without the express consent of the
whole kingdom in Parliament assembled. Every
inhabitant is at his liberty fully to use and enjoy
whatever his farm produceth, the fruits of the earth,
�THE LAND.
9
the increase of his flock, and the like ; all the improve
ment he makes, whether by his own proper industry
or of those he retains in his service, are his own to
use and to enjoy without the let, interruption, or denial
of any. If he be in any wise injured or oppressed,
he shall have amends and satisfactions against the
party offending. Hence it is that the inhabitants
are rich in gold, silver, and in all the necessaries and
conveniences of life. They drink no water, unless at
certain times, and by the way of doing penance.
They are fed in great abundance with all sorts of
flesh and fish, of which they have plenty everywhere;
they are clothed throughout in good woollens ; their
bedding and other furniture in their houses are of
wool, and that in great store. They are also pro
vided with all other sorts of household goods, and
necessary implements for husbandry.
Every one
according to his rank hath all things which conduce to
make life easy and happy.” This was merrie England,
in short—merrie, that is, for Englishmen as a whole,
not merely for the landlords and capitalists at the
top, who live in ease on the fruits of their labour.
For a day-labourer, a plain, unskilled hand—with his
geese, and sheep, and cow on the common—could then
get something for his day’s work. That of course is
the real test of the comfort and well-being of the
mass of the people, at all periods and under all
governments —what food and what clothing a man
can get for so many days’ work.
A common day-labourer, then, in the fifteenth century
could earn a fat sheep by four days’ work, a fat ox
by twenty days’ work, and a fat hog two years old by
�IO
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
twelve days’ work. Clothing he could obtain on at
least equally good terms. His own labour for others
and on his own plot supplied him and his family well
with all “ the necessaries and conveniences of life?’
Those even of the poorer sort lived upon beef, pork,
veal, and mutton every day. There is no dispute
about this. There are the recorded lists of prices for
food, drink, and raiment, the rates paid in parish after
parish for unskilled labour. Men so different as
Cobbett and Fawcett, Thornton and Rogers, are all
agreed on these points. They are of one mind, that
the working agriculturist of the fifteenth century was
a well-to-do free man.
How do our present agricultural labourers figure in
comparison ? How much of such fare as that given
above are hired labourers on ten and twelve shillings
a week likely to get, and what sort of houses do they
too often inhabit ? We all can judge of that, even if
the reports of Agricultural Commissions were not at
hand to tell us. The agricultural labourer of to-day is
a mere pauper beside his ancestor of 400 years ago, who
probably owned the land out of which the landowner
and the farmer now permit his descendant to work
a scanty subsistence which barely enables him to taste
meat once a month. His wages are shameful and his
cottage a disgrace. What is the reason then of all
this increasing penury, accompanied in rural districts
by an astounding decrease of population ? Unques
tionably the entire removal of the people from the land
is the chief cause of the mischief. Those yeomen and
free farmers, and fat well-fed labourers, who secured
for us those liberties which of late years have been
�THE LAND.
11
made such surprisingly little use ofwere turned out, and
the history of how it was done, and how our present
hand-to-mouth population was formed, is not a plea
sant tale. The mass of men have now no real freedom
either in country or town, because the land has been
taken by the great landholders and never yet restored
to the nation at large. Thus the sense of property,
of ownership, individual or collective, is done away.
From our own land still comes the bulk of the
wealth of the country, the food, the ores, the coal, which
enable us to hold our own, and get a return from other
parts of the world. But the workers who do this for
England have no part nor lot in their country of to
day. They own nothing but their bare right to compete
with their fellows in the labour-market. Who can
fail in such circumstances to recall these stirring
words ? “ Freedom is not an empty sound ; it is not
an abstract idea ; it is not a thing that nobody can
feel. It means, and it means nothing else, the full
and quiet enjoyment of your own property. If you
have not this—if this be not well secured to you, you
may call yourself what you will, but you are a slave.
Now our forefathers took special care upon this car
dinal point.
They suffered neither- kings nor
parliaments to touch their property without cause
clearly shown. They did not read newspapers, they
did not talk about debates, they had no taste for
‘ mental enjoyments but they thought hunger and
thirst great evils, and they never suffered anybody to
put them on cold potatoes and water. They looked
upon bare bones and rags as indubitable marks of
slavery; and they never failed to resist any attempt
�12
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
to affix these marks upon them.” And we too hold
much the same opinions, we too regard pauperism
and destitution as disgraces to a free country. But
unfortunately this generation, and others before it,
have grown up to think such “ indubitable marks of
slavery ” unavoidable, and hold that land should
rightfully belong in perpetuity to the handful of men
who drove the mass of the population from the soil,
or who bought from the descendants of those who
did. But the life of a nation like ours outlasts all
such temporary troubles ; its rights, though long in
abeyance, are never done away. The truth that the
land of England belongs to the people of England is
coming home to men of all classes ; and the best proof
that our existing system will no longer be borne
with contentment is that the historical wrong which
has been done is daily more and more considered.
That revolution which supplied England with a
bountiful succession of paupers, and laid the founda
tion of landlordism in the country, and of capitalism
in the towns commenced in the last quarter of the
fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth.
After the wars of the Roses had impoverished the
nobility, the dismissalof numerous baronial households
launched upon the country a whole horde of landless
people, without house or home. These unfortunates
had no place whatever in society as it then existed,
and became at once mere vagrants and competitors for
all sorts of chance employments. But for the
monasteries and other religious establishments their
condition would have been far worse than it was.
Even these outcasts, however, might have been
�THE LAND.
13
gradually absorbed; but about the same time the great
nobles, who were at variance with the crown and the
parliament, set to work to restore their fortunes by
turning out the peasant owners, who under the feudal
law had at least as good a title as their own to their
holdings. Such raids were followed up by encroach
ments on the common lands, which the labourers
depended upon for depasturing their animals. Ac
companying these robberies also was a steady conver
sion of arable land into pasture, on the ground that
more was to be gained by feeding sheep than men
—a contention which has of late been put forward
also in Scotland, Ireland, and in newly-settled coun
tries. To compete profitably in the wool-markets of
Flanders was more important than to maintain a race
of independent peasant farmers.
These changes worked a deplorable deterioration in
the condition of the mass of the people. The number
of the agricultural population who could find employ
ment in the old way rapidly lessened. Even now,
with our improved methods of cultivation, and laboursaving machinery, arable land will employ more than
twice as many men as pasture—and raise more beasts,
for that matter, as well. But in those days the pro
portion was probably far larger. At any rate, numbers
were thrown out of employment in that way. So
serious did all this become that Henry VII. and his
Parliament made constant efforts to check the
rapacious and harmful action of the barons ; but un
fortunately to little purpose. The people were more
and more interfered with, and depopulating enclosures
were going on regularly. Laws were even framed of
�14
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
the most stringent character to prevent ejection of
the peasants and the destruction of their houses. All
without effect. The landless class still increased, and
more and more people became dependent on others
for support. Henry VII., a great though penurious
monarch, saw clearly that the welfare of the mass of
his subjects, not the inordinate wealth and aggran
dizement of the few, constituted the real strength
of his kingdom, however much he might attempt to
fleece them by monopolies out of part of their sub
stance. He was anxious therefore to keep the land
in the hands of the small owners, who were really the
bone and sinew of the country. Even the daylabourer received consideration, and was secured by
the laws four acres of land to his cottage. But the
process of expropriation went relentlessly on not
withstanding, and had already produced a serious
effect.
But the confiscation of the lands of the monasteries,
and priories, and nunneries, at the time of the
Reformation, was a far graver blow to the welfare of
the people. Carried out with a shameless disregard
for the rights and privileges of the people, by the most
violent and despotic monarch who ever sat on the
English throne, this was the greatest injury inflicted
on the poor which our history records. The property
of the Catholic Church, though not always well
administered, was in reality at the service of the poor
and needy. Whatever might be urged against abbots
and friars, pauperism was then unknown. The celibate
parish priests had small expenses, and the land they
held was held, it may almost be said, in trust for the
�THE LAND.
15
people. The yeomen and labourers on their estates,
never disturbed or interfered with from generation to
generation, were a prosperous, vigorous folk. Besides,
the service of the Church was almost the only career,
except successful murder, by which a poor lad might
in those days rise to the highest dignities of the State.
Prelates and monks were founders of our noblest
schools of learning. They were, however, swept away,
their goods seized, and the lands taken from the people,
to be held by the king or given to his favourites. Parlia
ment then, as later, was bribed to sanction illegal and
improper action, by which many of its members largely
profited. King and barons were once more knit together
in that happy participation in plunder which has been
the surest bond of union between monarchs and
aristocrats all over the world. Thus the poor who
had ever obtained ready relief from the Church, the
wayfarers who could always find food and shelter in
the religious houses, the children of the people who
repaired to the convent for guidance and teaching,
were deprived at one fell swoop of alms, shelter, and
schools.
When, however, the monasteries were thus
destroyed, and their lands confiscated for the benefit
of the King and the aristocracy, not only was almost
the last hold of the English people on their own soil
torn off, but the monks and nuns, priests and friars,
were turned loose upon the world to swell the ranks
of the have-nots. The shiftless hand-to-mouth class
thus grew with fearful rapidity. The whole country was
overrun with loafers and vagrants, deprived of the
means of living by no fault of their own. Not even
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
the most atrocious laws could keep them within limits,
though they drove them into the towns, and into the
power of the shopkeeping class, now gaining strength.
Paupers being thus numerous, in the 43rd year of
Elizabeth—who had resumed all the confiscated lands
—a Poor Law was passed ; and from that time to this
pauperism has formed as integral a portion of our
social constitution as the aristocracy who created the
necessity for the law. How could it be otherwise?
The landed rights of the many had been sacrificed to
the greed of the few; and confiscation, really put in
force to bolster up luxury and selfishness, was carried
on in the name of religion.
Between the fifteenth and the beginning of the
seventeenth century the whole face of England had
been changed. In place of well-being, contentmenf,
and general prosperity, as described by Fortescue?
depression and misery had become the common lot of
the people who owned no land. The mere wage-earner
took the place of the labouring, petty farmer—a man
at the mercy of his employer. For the fine old
yeoman class fell more and more into decrepitude,
and the downfall of the ecclesiastical property pre
ceded their own final ruin by but a short interval.
Yet even so late as the end of the seventeenth cen
tury eighty per cent, of the population of England
was still purely agricultural. By the middle of the
eighteenth century there was scarcely a yeoman of the
old type left in a county.
The Stuarts were bad enough, but William III. was
worse than any of his immediate predecessors. This
great Whig hero treated England as if he had con?
�The
land.
17
quered it in respect to all he could lay hands upon,
and gave away lands he had no right whatever to
dispose of to his thick-headed and greedy Dutch
followers. Their descendants prey upon us to this
hour, though, with the exception of Lord William
Bentinck, not a single one of them has been of the
slightest genuine service to the State whose land they
have seized, or has illustrated our history even by a
crime. All this long series of robberies from the
people, helped on by economical causes, ended in an
aggregation of property and influence in a few hands
to an extent never before equalled.
It was followed by an enclosure of the common
lands of a character even more nefarious. Parliament,
made up almost exclusively of landowners, and in no
sense whatever representative of the mass of the
people, framed bill after bill for the enclosure of the
commons, which alone were left to show that the soil
of England had formerly been looked upon as the
property of the great majority. No man, not a land
lord, can read through the records of this disgraceful
pillage even now without a feeling of furious bitter
ness. Nothing more shameful is told in the long tale
of class greed than this of the seizure of the common
lands by the upper and middle classes of Great
Britain. To deprive the people of their last vestige of
independent holding, and thus to force all to become
mere hand-to-mouth wage-earners at the mercy of the
growing capitalist class, such was the practical effect
of these private enactments, conceived in iniquity, and
executed in injustice. For up to so recent a date as
1845 these enclosures were done by private bill, and
c
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
of course exclusively in private interest. There was
no public discussion whatever ; rich men who coveted
a few thousand acres of common which belonged
to their poorer neighbours, simply laid hands upon
them and added them to their estate. Fierce pro
tests were often made in the neighbourhood, but they
were invariably unavailing. In the course of 150
years, between 1700 and 1845, no fewer than 7,000,000
acres of public land, and probably a great deal more,
were enclosed by the landowners of England in
Parliament assembled, without one halfpenny of real
compensation ever having been made to the public
whose rights were thus ridden over. At that time, be
it remarked, the people of England—but shabbily
represented now—had practically no voice in public
affairs at all, and such a man as Sir Robert Walpole
just “ ran the machine ” in the sole interest of his class,
for all the world like a Pennsylvanian log-roller or
wire-puller of our own day. Not even scraps of those
great and valuable common lands remain in some
districts to remind the English people of the robberies
that have been committed upon them.
Even since the introduction of public bills to regu
late these enclosures matters were, until quite lately,
very little better. A wealthy landgrabber would
purchase land all round a common, and then stealthily
get it enclosed on some shallow pretext. This
occurred over and over again. The hard fight which
such a body as the Corporation of the City of London
had to wage in order to keep for the people of
London what remnant there is of Epping Forest,
shows the pertinacity with which individual selfishness
�THE LAND.
19
works on. Conservatives and Liberals who stand up
for the ancient and indefeasible rights of property at
the expense of others should look into these things.
The very people who ate up the whole country away
from their countrymen and make land a monopoly,
cry out fiercely that they are being ill-used and
robbed when an attempt is made to reassert some
small portion of the rights of the nation over that
which is, and always has been, the property of the
nation—the land of England. What sort of title have
many of them to their lands ? Let them answer who
made the laws which gave the eternal right to harm
the people. Why, they themselves and their fathers
before them. None other. The owners of the land
had no voice ; violence, wrong, and fraud weigh still
upon the country. But there need be no fear for
those who profited by these encroachments. The
people are never unjust, even in their own interest:
they pay to get back their simplest rights.
The effect of this seizure of the commons upon the
rural population has been most sad. Their condition,
never very flourishing since they were deprived of
individual ownership, became yet worse. But I will
quote a calm writer, who is fully convinced of the
beneficial effects of supply and demand, and freedom
of contract:—“ Many of the descendants of those who
once possessed valuable rights of common are agricul
tural labourers, to whose miserable condition allusion
has already been made. Our rural population has
been deprived of that which once gave a most impor
tant addition to their income. The common often
enabled them to keep some poultry, a pig, and a cow.
C 2
�20
ENGLAND FOR ALE
Many villages may now be traversed, and not a single
labourer can be found possessing a head of poultry;
few even keep a pig, and not one in 10,000 has a cow.
What is the result of this ? The labourer does not
live as he did 100 years since; he and his family
seldom taste meat, and his children suffer cruelly from
the difficulty he has in obtaining milk for them.”
This, indeed, is a matter of common consent. The
agricultural labourer is far worse off than his fore
fathers. But if the people have, been deprived of
their commons, so also have their plots of ground to
their ill-drained, overcrowded cottages disappeared.
They make them too “independent.” No property,
low diet, a pretence of education, and enforced servility
to their “ betters ”—that was the way to bring down
the “ proud peasantry ” from their high looks of the
fifteenth century to the abasement of a ten-shilling-aweek agricultural labourer, ever begging for some
dole out of the fruits of his own labour to be given
back to him, from the Hall, the Rectory, or the poor
house. This kept him “ in that state of life ” which
the Church Catechism enjoins upon the lowly. No
agricultural labourer, it needs hardly be said, has ever
yet sat in the House of Commons to represent the
wrongs of his class.
These unfortunate families, deprived of their own
land and ousted from their common lands, became, as
we have seen, fair game for the most abominable
legislation. The laws against vagrants and men out
of work were ferocious and brutal, to a degree scarcely
to be credited until they were actually revived in
America the othei' day. By these means they came
�THE LAND.
21
into the towns, where, refused the right to combine,
and wholly destitute of means, they were delivered
over to a form of tyranny the more trying from its
being carried on under the name of freedom. The
very idea that the unfortunate had a definite interest
in the country was done away. The poor were only
not criminal. And this feeling grew among the
dominant class with the growth of that shopkeeper
spirit which has been paramount with English parties,
to the almost entire exclusion of any sense of justice
to the bulk of the community. The few landowners
of genuine old family who still remain, and who, one
would have thought, would look back with pride to
the times when their ancestors were the leaders of
well-to-do free men, have been as bad as the rest.
They have thought that their duties, such as they
were, began and ended with their tenantry. If the
labourers received a small pittance in charity after
having worked their lives through on starvation
wages, that was as much as they could expect. The
eternal law of supply and demand justified meat once
a fortnight, and short commons all the year round.
There stood the workhouse: what more could the
people want ?
But now what has been the outcome to us of to-day
of all these uncompensated expropriations in Eng
land—of the ducal razzias like those of the Dukes
of Sutherland and Argyll in Scotland (the latter
worthy peer naturally standing out with his fellow
Liberal of Lansdowne in favour of the perpetuation
of serfdom in Ireland)—what do we of the present
generation derive from all this long succession of
�22
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
past iniquities ? Nothing is easier than to sum it all
up. We have then a great body of landowners, 2000
of whom alone hold actually 38,000,000 acres of our
land in estates of over 5000 acres each, the total
agricultural rental of this vast domain being not less
than 25,000,000/. annually. The whole of the agricul
tural land in the kingdom is practically owned by
less than 30,000 persons ; and not all the systematic
fudging resorted to in the Landlord’s Return, known
as the <l New Doomsday Book,” has been able to
shake that fact out of the minds of the people of
England. In that book Lord Overstone—formerly
Mr. Jones, a banker of enormous wealth, who turned
landgrabber after the manner of his kind—the Duke
of Buccleuch, and the Duke of Devonshire are put
forward as thirty-three different owners. This is only
a specimen of how the truth is blinked and covered
up by those who are interested in hiding it away from
their countrymen. And this monstrous monopoly the
landowners, and the big capitalists who hope to be
landowners, and their friends and relations the lawyers,
who live upon the complications of the laws they
themselves have formulated, are now striving to per
petuate.
Not to speak of the injurious consequences politi
cally of such a concentration of excessive wealth and
power in a few hands, the economical drawbacks stare
us in the face. Men who own half-a-dozen large pro
perties in several different counties must be permanent
absentees from some of them. They take the rents
and spend them elsewhere, being themselves the
heaviest of all the burdens on the land. The majority
�THE LAND.
23
of landowners cannot do justice to the land they have
taken even in their own narrowest sense. Cumbered
up with mortgages, settlements, rent-charges, heaven
knows what, they are in no case to face a great fall
in rents, to encounter competition from without, or to
bring to bear that skill, labour and personal attention
now essential to success in agriculture. The sacred
trinity of landlord, capitalist-farmer, and agricultural
labourer has broken up. The labourer can be screwed
no lower, the farmer has had enough of giving his
capital to the landlord as rent. American “ wheat
centres” have proved clearly that landlords are not an
essential element in English agricultural production.
A great change is therefore at hand. Agricultural ex
perts aver with confidence that if the land of England
were properly handled, if sufficient labour and manure
were applied, we could profitably produce twice the
quantity of food we do from the existing cultivated
acreage. What stops us ? Unquestionably that de
termination of landowners to bold on to their false
idea of greatness, and to those miserable customs of
settlement and entail which will necessarily be put an
end to as a wider and more useful method of dealing
with our soil opens up before us. Happily the land
lords are themselves beginning to feel the pinch, and
may lead the way in the reforms which have now
become essential. If they don’t it is no great matter ;
for sooner or later the people of England mean to
have back the land, and the sooner the better for the
interest of the landlords themselves.
For let it be remembered that the dominant classes
have done more than take the land ; by their Parlia
�24
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
ments they have actually shuffled on to the shoulders
of the mass of the people nearly all the taxes and
obligations which formerly came out of their rents as
a portion for the State and the poor. Laws enacted
by men for their own benefit in direct contravention
of the tenure on which the lands were originally taken
have no binding force whatsoever on posterity. Yet
the landowners of Great Britain were formerly subject
to a land-tax of four shillings in the pound on their
assessment. This they have whittled away almost to
nothing, and now the land-tax under their skilful
manipulation, produces but 1,074,919/., instead of
18,802,337/. as it ought. That is to say, the landowners
of Great Britain put into their pockets a sum of little
less than 18,000,000/., which, but for their own self
gratifying ordinances would, according to the old laws
of this kingdom, have gone into the treasury of the
country at large. No wonder that our privileged
classes and their hangers-on howl “confiscation/
“ communism,” “ socialism,” and words more English
and less nice, when any fearless man begins to rake
up the history of their “ sacrifices ” to patriotism.
True patriots they ; for be it understood
They robb’d their country for their country’s good 1
But this is not all either. Agricultural property is
well enough in its way, but the mines, all that under
lies the soil has fallen also into the grip of the small
minority, and it is impossible to get a bill through
Parliament which will even compel the owners to
protect the lives of the men who work in them. The
miners should know their place, and have power to
�THE LAND.
“ contract out of the Act.” What matters the risk of
loss of life ? Then the urban properties, again, with
their vast unearned increment of rent, and the power
given to individuals to obstruct improvements whilst
they benefit by the expenditure of the public money
or railroads carried through by the decision of Parlia
ment. What, in the name of all that is reasonable,
have Grosvenors or Bentincks done for England
that they and theirs should interfere for ever with
the management of London, and pocket increasing
rents which, if exacted at all, should go to the munici
pality which must shortly be created for this great
metropolis, and benefit the whole community ? Is it
well that millions should be spent on the Thames
embankment, for instance, and that landowners should
pocket thousands a year by the improvement of their
property ? These are points which come home to all,
and must, ere long, force on a change. Such enormous
revenues as those which were squandered in digging
catacombs in Welbeck Park, or laid out in providing
Westminster with a dukedom, ought not to be at the
unrestrained disposal of any single family. For no
idea whatever of duty is attached to these great pos
sessions ; and artisans’ dwellings, or a market, in a
fashionable locality might “damage the property,”
and so are warned off.
How is it that the landowners themselves, or such
at least as come fairly by their property, do not see
that their political future depends upon recognizing
the vast changes going on beneath them, and
endeavour to associate themselves with the future of
their country ? Their object, one would think, would
�26
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
necessarily be to meet and guide that flow of demo
cratic opinion which manifestly precedes a new social
evolution. To stand on the brink and wring their
hands in dismay is both cowardly and foolish. For
in a small, densely-peopled country like ours the
whole hangs together—land in country and land in
towns, mines, communications, all go to make up the
complicated system under which we live.
But agricultural land of necessity stands first. Mr.
Clare Read, the farmer, says that all will come right,
and that twenty-five years or so hence the territorial
grandee will rise again to the enjoyment of his unearned
increment, the farmer shall be a man of wealth and
substance, and the agricultural labourer—well, what
tenant-farmer ever thinks about him ? Landlord-made
laws must undergo revision in the interests of the
landlords themselves, but far more for the sake of the
mass of their countrymen now dissociated altogether
from the land. It is humiliating to look back fifty
years, and note how little has been done since the
able band of democratic writers, headed by Cobbett,
first forcibly pointed out the historical injuries from
which Englishmen are still suffering. As it was
yesterday, so it is to-day; but so shall it not be
to-morrow. The importance of the Land Question
in England is now fully understood by the inhabitants
of the counties as well as of the towns, and up to a
certain point a vast majority will combine to over
throw the existing system, which lies like a dead
weight upon it.
When we come to the direction in which changes
should be made, however, the widest differences arise.
�THE LAND.
Some seem to imagine that mere free trade in land,
even without the plan of compulsory subdivision,
would bring about the planting of the people on the
land ; others look upon the removal of settlement and
entail as only preliminary to nationalisation, in the
sense that by limitation of the right of inheritance
and compulsory purchase at a valuation, the State,
the county, or the municipality should come into the
possession of all land within a calculable period. All
depends upon what we desire to bring about. Many
ardent reformers look forward to the day when English
farmers shall hold their ten, twenty, fifty-acre farms,
interspersed with larger holdings, as in former times.
Is this to be done? Can we thus put back the
clock 400 years ? It would scarcely seem so ; yet on
the whole it should appear that small farmers who
depend chiefly on their own labour for their return
have suffered less in all parts of the country, and have
been readier to pay rent, than the large. In America
also, the unincumbered farmer holding no large extent
of land fared on the whole better than his wealthier
neighbour, who was growing not for produce so much
as for profit.
The main object necessarily is to get as much out
of the land as possible, and at the same time to
secure the agricultural labourer, and those of the
townspeople who take to the land, a fair return for
their labour, and a prospect of obtaining possession
of land if they desire to do so. Evidently the labourer
and the townsman will gain nothing by giving the
farmers in England fixity of tenure, nor by freetrade in land. All evidence goes to show, however,
�28
ENGLAND FOL ALL.
that even under present conditions the more secure the
tenure, in an increasing ratio up to freehold, the
better on the whole the farming, until the limit of
acreage is reached where the owner thinks he can afford
to lie by and make an income by letting to others.
But the present tenants would be no better employers
as owners, or tenants on a permanent settlement, than
they are now; the agricultural labourer who really does
the work would still get his ten and twelve shillings
a week, his cottage would be equally destitute
of garden. On the other hand, if the capitalists
came in, does their behaviour in the large cities make
us very hopeful of what would take place under their
management in the country ? These are difficulties
which-at once arise in any scheme of individual im
provement. Even the virtual limitation of the amount
of land which may be held by any individual by means
of cumulative taxation—the only fair taxation by the
way—might not give the labourer on the land that
independence which would enable him to hold his
own. What the better, in short, would the mass of
the population be for any of the reforms proposed ?
Granting that twofold would be produced, would the
labourers or the urban population get a greater share
of it ? No doubt the diminution of the absurd social
influence attaching to the ownership of land would have
a great effect in lowering its value to a mere idler, espe
cially if the game laws are speedily repealed. But all
this does not help the man who does the work for ten
and twelve shillings a week to get some fair portion
of the fruits of his labour—to secure a decent home, a
plot of ground, least of all a small farm. What is
�tltE LAND.
being done for Ireland, then, ought on a larger scale
to be done here; though unfortunately want of educa
tion and knowledge cripples the present generation,
and they have been more completely uprooted from
the soil than even the Irish.
We are manifestly here, as elsewhere, in a transi
tion period. The stage of dominant landlordism is
passing away rapidly—that of State management, or
co-operation in the interest of all, has apparently
not been reached. Granting therefore that the com
pletes! reforms of the land laws, in the shape of abo
lition of settlement and entail, complete subdivision,
simplified registration, mortgage made illegal, and so
forth, have been carried, much will remain to be done.
Private enterprise cannot satisfactorily deal with the
many important changes to be made. Benevolent
investments at five per cent, are, in American parlance,
“ a fraud.” What a miserable hand-to-mouth creature
the agricultural labourer is to-day we know. Let, then,
that point be borne in mind in all reforms, that until
the labourer is placed in a position where he is really
able to contract freely, either by combination, or by
State assistance in the shape of permanent leases of
land, subject to disturbance only for bad culture
or non-payment of fair rent, no great change
will ever be made in his condition for the better.
For this too is for the interest of all. The titles
of English landlords are none so good that they can
afford any longer to run the risk of the cry, “ The
Land for the People/’ Hitherto powers of expropria
tion and interference have been used solely in the in
terest of the upper and middle classes, who hold the
�3°
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
control. Ere long a similar process will be demanded
by the great majority in their favour, though not with
equal injustice.
As stepping-stones to further development, the
following reforms may be demanded at once :—
Reform of the law of settlement and entail, putting
an end to the existing system altogether.
Compulsory registration of title, so as to make
transfer of land as easy as it is in America.
Extension of the powers of local bodies to acquire
land for all purposes and to lease it in small portions.
Compensated expropriation of property-owners in
large cities.1
No confiscation or revenge for the forced removal
of the people from the land is asked for. But the
unborn have no rights, and the nation has always
both the power and the right to take any land at a
fair valuation. By immediate limitation of the right
of inheritance, and an application of the power of
purchase, the State or the local authority would
speedily come into possession of land, which could be
used for the common interest, and some comfort and
security obtained for those who at present have neither.
No longer then should the agriculturist be per
manently kept away from possession of the soil; no
1 “ Nationalisation” of the land is, of course, the only logical
outcome of any thorough suggestions for reform; but this,
unless accompanied by nationalisation of railways and of
capital, would be of little use to the mass of the workers of the
country. Meanwhile, however, the only safe course is to work
in the direction of steadily restricting the rights of private
property in land.
�THE LAND.
3i
longer should the dweller in the city feel that, happen
what might, he could never leave the street or alley.
Hitherto the State has been regarded as an enemy :
the time is coming when all will be ready to recognize
that its friendly influence is needed to prevent serious
trouble, and to lead the way to a happier period.
That the landowners of England should join in a re
solute endeavour to remedy the mischiefs which affect
them in common with the rest of the population is
apparently too much to expect. True, their interest
lies in this direction. To stir up class hatred is easy
enough, when, in spite of all sentimental talk and
useless charity, the men who work see that nothing is
really done which will permanently benefit them. A
higher ideal than mere selfishness may indeed be held
up, but if reforms are to be peaceful those who are
rich and powerful must lead the way. Of this truer
patriotism there is at present no sign among those
who claim to be the “natural leaders” of the people.
�32
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
CHAPTER II.
LABOUR.
In every civilized society the main point to be con
sidered is the manner in which labour is applied to
production, and the share of his own labour which in
one shape or another the labourer gets in return. The
ancient historical civilizations were chiefly built upon
slavery. Here the labourer, his force of labour, and the
material on which he expended it, all belonged to the
master ; and the wealth of the latter might almost be
gauged by the number of slaves he possessed, though
only a portion of them would be actually employed in
the work of production. This employment of slave
labour renders any comparison between the state of
society then and now almost futile; but the condition of
the poor freemen in Rome and Athens, constantly ex
posed to the competition of slave-labour if they desired
to work themselves, resembled that of the mean whites
in the Southern States before the Civil War. The
peasant proprietor, or the member of a village com
munity, holds again a totally different position from
that of the slave or the labourer of modern times.
The peasant proprietor, or the craftsman owning his
own tools and able to obtain his own materials, is
master of himself, of his means of production, and of
�LABOUR.
33
his produce, even though he may have to pay a por
tion of the latter to a feudal chief or rajah. In both
cases, that of individual proprietorship and that of
ownership in common of the produce'of a community,
there may be and generally is perfect freedom, save
the restrictions which arise from the necessity of pro
ducing sufficient for the social necessaries of life.
It is quite possible that a man and his family may
live on the produce of their own farm, carry on the
simple operations of manufacture necessary to clothe
them, and rarely have the need to exchange anything
which they possess for the work of others. A good
harvest, or a favourable season with cattle, will repre
sent so much extra wealth, which will provide against
bad times, or enable the little household to devote more
labour to increase of comfort. With a village com
munity the necessity for exchange may arise less
often ; for these units of civilization comprise within
themselves the means of providing all the ordinary
needs, and some even of the luxuries of life. It is to
the interest of the whole family or village community
that all should be well nourished and strong for the
daily duty ; it is also advisable that a certain provision
should be made against the prospect of bad seasons.
Civilization, therefore, presupposes great forethought
in its earlier stages, or it would soon fall back again
to the condition of the Paraguayans, who ate the seed
given them by the missionaries. But all the wealth
thus produced by the work of individuals or com
munities is clearly due to labour; and that is not
wealth which is not recognized as an object of utility
in the social conditions of the time.
D
�34
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
The great majority of economists before and since
Adam Smith have agreed that labour is the source of
value. “The real price of everything,” says Adam
Smith himself, “what everything really costs to the
man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of
acquiring it. What everything is really worth to the
man who has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of
it or exchange it for something else, is the toil and
trouble which it can save to himself, and which it can
impose on other people. Labour was the first price
—the original purchase-money that was paid for all
things. In that early and rude state of society which
precedes both the accumulation of stock and the
appropriation of land, the proportion between the
quantities of labour necessary for acquiring different
objects seems to be the only circumstance which can
afford any rule for exchanging them for one another.
If among a nation of hunters, for example, it usually
costs twice the labour to kill a beaver which it does
to kill a deer, one beaver would naturally be worth,
or exchange for, two deer. It is natural that what is
usually the produce of two days’ or two hours’
labour should be worth double of what is usually
the produce of one day’s or one hour’s labour.”
“ That this,” adds Ricardo, “ is really the foundation
of the exchangeable value of all things, excepting those
which cannot be increased by human industry, is a
doctrine of the utmost importance in political
economy. If the quantity of labour realized in com
modities regulate their exchangeable value, every
increase of the quantity of labour must augment the
value of that commodity on which it is exercised, as
�LABOUR.
35
every diminution must lower it.” This labour, of
course, includes the work necessary to replace the
wear and tear of.tools and machinery, as well as the
labour which is actually expended on and realized in
the commodities. Every useful article produced by
labour has two values, its value in use alone, and its
value in exchange. Its value in use is developed only
by being used and consumed : its value in exchange
consists in obtaining other useful articles in its
place.
Water, air, virgin soil, &c., are useful, but by them
selves they constitute no value. A man may also
expend his labour on useful articles which never
become commodities or goods for exchange. These
may be destined simply for his own use, and never
for exchange. In all countries, however, where the
capitalist system of production prevails, wealth
appears in the shape of an accumulation of com
modities or merchandise. Those products of human
labour devoted to natural objects are exchanged
according to the average quantity of human labour
expended in producing them. If wheat and axes are
exchanged in definite proportions, they are thus
bartered with reference to the common element in
each, by virtue of which an equality between them is
established. This is the quantity of human labour
expended in bringing them forward for exchange. So
many days of average labour embodied in one article
of utility, are equal to so many days of average
labour embodied in another article of utility. Thus
then the general rule is, that labour is the basis of
value, and quantity of labour the measure of value of
D 2
�36
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
commodities, or social values for the use of others, all
the world over.1
Say that a coat is worth twice as much as ten yards
of cloth. The coat is useful and satisfies a particular
want. Two kinds or qualities of labour are embodied
in it—that of the tailor who made the coat, and that
of the weaver who wove the cloth. So far as its use
fulness is concerned also, it makes no difference
whether the tailor wears it or his customer. Now as
to its value. The coat is assumed to be worth twice
as much as the ten yards of cloth—worth that is,
twenty yards of cloth. In point of value coat and
cloth are but expressions of labour itself. Thus
the coat is worth twice as much as the cloth, because
the cloth contains only half as much human
labour; and it needs twice the quantity of labour to
produce the coat complete, cloth and all, as to pro
duce the cloth alone. Reduce the quantity of labour
needed to make a coat by one half, and two coats are
only worth what one was before. Double the quantity
of labour needed to make a coat, and one coat is
worth what two were before. In the same way, “ if a
piece of cloth be now of the value of two pieces of
linen, and if, in ten years hence, the ordinary value of
a piece of cloth should be four pieces of linen, we may
1 Professor Stanley Jevons has convinced himself that labour
has no influence on value. Utility is the sole source of value.
Labour, supply, utility—such is the progression. This is not
the place to discuss this theory, which is of course turned to ac
count at once by capitalists. The cloud of differentiations and
metaphysics which Mr. Jevons throws up as he goes along does
not, however, obscure the fact that without labour there would be
no value at all.
�LABOUR.
37
safely conclude that either more labour is required to
make the cloth, or less to make the linen, or that
both causes have operated.” Thus then, no matter
whether the productive power of average human
labour in producing any article of utility—and utility
is, of course, an essential element of exchangeable
value—is increased or diminished, the same length of
labour, or the same quantity of labour, always repre
sents the same value. But of course, if the labour is
more productive, more values in use are obtained in
a given time, and if less productive, less: only the
value for exchange remains unaltered.
But the above illustrations are easily extended.
When a coat is said to be worth twice as much as
ten yards of cloth, or worth, that is, twenty yards of
cloth, this means, as has been said, that the quantity
of human labour contained in the one is equal to, or
expressed in, the quantity of human labour contained
in the other. So with other articles of utility. A coat
may likewise be equal in value to ten pounds of tea,
or to half a ton of iron, or to a quarter of wheat, or to
two ounces of gold ; all these products of human
labour being also equal in value to twenty yards of
cloth, and varying in exchangeable value in propor
tion to the amount of labour embodied in them ;
the simple meaning of the equality being that the
tea, the iron, the wheat, the gold, and the cloth, repre
sent, each and all, the same quantity of labour in the
several amounts of commodities.
But it so happens that it has been found convenient
for ages to express this general form of value in one
particular commodity. This in nowise changes the
�3?
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
fundamental proposition that labour is the basis of
value, and quantity of labour its measure. The only
further result is, that the coat, the ten pounds of tea,
the half a ton of iron, the quarter of wheat, the
twenty yards of cloth, are all equal in value, not only
to one another, but to the two ounces of gold, which
henceforward are taken as a meaure of value for
them all and become money. When commodities
now are valued, they are valued with reference to the
gold, which forms not only a real but an ideal valua
tion. It is not the money which enables the com
modities to be valued. Far otherwise. It is because
all commodities represent realized human labour
already expended on natural objects, thus producing
articles of utility, that their relative value is conse
quently measureable by one another, and that they
can all be valued together in one special commodity.
This last becomes money, and is a measure for them
all, though, like the rest, its value consists in the fact
that it represents the expenditure of human labour.
But money is not only a convenient measure of
value, but also a means of putting commodities in
circulation. A commodity is exchanged for its
equivalent in money, and then again the money is ex
changed for another commodity. In order to promote
a circulation of commodities there must be a sufficiency
of money, or the representative of money in some form
of currency, to avoid congestion. To bring about the
regular interchange of articles of utility in civilized life,
such a change of commodities for money, and again
into commodities, being the rule. This fact formed
the basis of the theory of the celebrated Law, who
�LABOUR.
39
desired to substitute for gold and silver, which cost
labour to produce, and yet are in themselves of little
utility, paper certificates of labour expended, which
would cost nothing, and yet serve the purposes of cur
rency. Without however, entering upon the pheno
mena connected with money, it is now clear that in
all exchangeable value the human labour expended is
the basis of the value of commodities, and the quantity
of human labour the measure.
There is, of course, nothing new in all this. That
natural objects are of no value unless human labour is
expended on them is a truth as old as the world.
That labour is the real basis, not only of value but of
all civilized society, needs no elaborate demonstration
at this time of day. Yet it is precisely from this
generally admitted but little regarded truth that
consequences follow of the highest importance to our
modern society. Here come in those “ differences
of value,” those strange manipulations of the worth of
commodities, which go to the root of all business.
A merchant has a sum of money, say a hundred
pounds sterling. Therewith he buys on the market
say a hundred pounds’ worth of cotton. So far
the exchange may be perfectly fair and exact. The
merchant has given his labour as expressed in a
hundred pounds sterling for another man’s labour as
embodied in a mass of cotton. But, having bought,
hs goes away and sells his purchased cotton to an
other person for 110Z., making, as it is said, 10Z. by the
transaction. . His 100Z. was turned into its equivalent
in merchandise, and then appeared again as 110Z.
Not only is the original sum replaced, but more is
�40
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
added, and the merchant’s money becomes capital.
The merchant buys not for himself, or to work up for
the use of others, but merely to sell the cotton again
at an enhanced price. This is something very
different from the use of money as the measure of
the value of commodities, or as the means of facili
tating exchange. It is commercial capital, which its
owner takes upon the market for the purpose of
increasing it. Money to start with; then, after a
longer or a shorter interval, more money—that, leaving
out the intermediate process of buying the cotton, is
the process. But the amount of value in circulation
at any given moment—that is, the quantity of human
labour on the average embodied in commodities—
cannot increase of itself. If a merchant has in his
possession a commodity whose value is expressed
in money by 10Z., this value can only be increased
absolutely, and made say nZ., by the addition of
more labour to the labour-value represented in the
first instance—as by making a coat of cloth. The
coat is worth more than the cloth, but the value of
the cloth remains the same. Thus then all conditions
remaining the same, the owner of the money to start
with must buy a piece of merchandise at its exact value,
and sell it again for what it is worth, and yet have at
the end more value than he had at the beginning.
Now the problem begins to take shape.
The increase of value by which money becomes
more money and is turned into capital, obviously
cannot arise from the money itself. It follows then
that the conversion of money into merchandise, and
then of that same merchandise into more money, is
�LABO UR.
4i
due to the merchandise. But how ? Commodities
can no more increase their own exchangeable value
than money. In order to obtain an additional ex
changeable value from a commodity a sort of mer
chandise must be found which possesses the remark
able quality of being itself the source of exchangeable
value, so that to consume it would be to obtain that
labour-force embodied in value, and consequently to
create value.
Now it so happens that the capitalist in embryo
does find on the market a purchaseable commodity
endowed with this specific virtue. This is called
labour, or force of labour. Under that name is com
prised the entire capacities, physical and intellectual,
which exist in the body of a man, and which he
must set in motion in order to produce articles of
utility. Evidently the force of labour cannot present
itself on the market for sale, unless it is offered by
its owner; he must be able to dispose of it—that is,
be the free owner of his labour, of the force of his
own body. The moneyed man and he meet on the
market; one buys, and the other sells, and both are
quits. But the owner of this labour-force must only
sell it for a definite time ; if he sells it for an indefi
nite time, from being a merchant, he himself, his force
of labour and all, becomes a mere commodity. He
is a slave or serf at the command of his master as a
chattel. The essential condition for the capitalist
to be able to buy the force of labour is, that the
owner of the labour instead of being able to keep
himself by work on his own land, or to sell goods on
which he has himself expended his labour, should be
�42
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
obliged to sell the labour-force in his body pure and
simple. A man in order to sell goods of his own
making, must of course command the means of pro
duction—tools, raw material, &c. Then he is master
of his own labour, an independent man; he has the
means of exchanging his own labour as embodied in
useful articles for other men’s labour also embodied
in useful articles upon equal terms. But in order
that money should be converted into capital the
workman himself must be free in a very different
sense ; not only must he be ready to sell his labour as
a commodity, but further, he must be free—so very
free that he has nothing else in the world but his
power of labour to sell—that he should be completely
destitute of the means of realizing his own force of
labour in commodities by himself, having neither tools,
nor land, nor raw materials wherewith to do so.
How does this free labourer thus find himself on
the market, ready to enter into free contract ? That
does not concern the owner of the money, who looks
upon the labour-market as a mere branch of the rest
of the market for commodities, and governed by the
same laws. The appearance of this destitute labourer
there is nevertheless, as has been seen, the outcome
of a long series of economical evolutions and revolu
tions extending over centuries. Driven from the
land, deprived of the possibility of earning a living,
the mass of the people find themselves concentrated
in the towns. Nature most assuredly does not turn
out possessors of money or goods on the one side,
and ownersof their pure labour-force, and nothing else,
on the other; nor is such a social state common to
�LABOUR.
43
most periods of history. So long, for example, as the
produce of labour is used to supply the needs of the
labourer, it does not, as has been seen, become mer
chandise ; in the same way, the production and cir
culation of commodities may take place under many
forms of society. It is not so with capital; that only
makes its appearance when that part of the wealth
of a country which is employed in production, con
sisting of food, clothing, tools, raw materials, ma
chinery, &c., necessary to give effect to labour, is
found in the hands of an owner, who meets on the
market the destitute free labourer come thither to
sell his labour.
Capital then forms an epoch in social production.
What, however, is this force of labour, which the
free owner of it comes on to the market to sell ?
Clearly it is a human force,physical, moral, intellectual,
which requires certain material, food, and clothing and
lodging—all at the command of the moneyed man,
and not of the labourer—to keep it in order and
supplied, so that the waste of one day may be made
good, and it may return with equal vigour the next.
These necessaries vary, of course, with different
climates, and with different degrees of civilization ;
but in any given country and period the average
needs of the labourers are known. Nor is this fact
altered by the other fact that, as pointed out by Mill,
a series of circumstances may reduce the standard of
supposed necessaries. The amount of average neces
saries thus ascertained is called by Ricardo, the
“ natural price of labour,” and is “ that price which is
necessary to enable the labourers one with another to
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subsist, and to perpetuate their race without either
increase or diminution.” In this way we have that
amount of average daily necessaries which will
maintain the present race of destitute bargainers, and
provide them with equally destitute successors.
Assume then that the cost of this amount of daily
foods, the natural price of human labour comprised
in the necessaries for existence for the twenty-four
hours—representing by rights only the quantity of
human labour expended in their production—is six
hours’ work. Half a day’s average work is needed
then to reproduce the average amount of labour-force
expended. Take this at three shillings as expressed
in money. Then the owner of the labour who sells
its work for six hours at three shillings, sells it for its
exact value. “ It is when the market price of labour
exceeds its natural price that the condition of the
labourer is flourishing and happy—that he has it in
his power to command a greater proportion of the
necessaries and enjoyments of life. When the market
price of labour is below its natural price, the condition
of the labourers is most wretched; then poverty
deprives them of comforts which custom renders
absolute necessaries.” So far Ricardo again. But the
natural price of labour reaches its minimum when it
is reduced to the value of the means of subsistence
physiologically indispensable. When it falls to this
minimum, the price has reached a level below the
value of the labour-force, which then only just
maintains itself without immediate deterioration.
For example, a man who sells his labour for just
enough to keep himself and his family without
�LABOUR.
45
making any provision for old age, or future ill-health
from which he may suffer, is clearly going down hill.
The natural price of his labour has not in this case
taken a sufficiently wide range,
When also the capitalist buys the labour, it is the
owner of that labour who sells on credit. He advances
his labour to the capitalist; the capitalist advances
nothing to him without having been previously
paid for it. In every country where the capitalist
system prevails, the labourer is only paid after he
has worked for a certain period—a week, a fortnight,
a month—on credit. This enables the capitalist to
“turn round.” If the employer fails, the labourers
suffer: they are not paid; for the labour has been
sold beforehand, and duly delivered by the expenditure
of force from the labourer’s body. An illustration of
this occurred not long since in the great strike of
colliers in the north against the masters, who wished
to make their men break the law by contracting out
of the Employers’ Liability Act. Once out on strike
they insisted most strongly upon the reduction of the
length of the advance of their labour to the capitalist,
from the fortnight to the week. This point they
carried. Fortnightly or monthly wages are a hardship
to the labourer, which, like many others, can only be
removed by resolute combination ; for that value in
use which the owner of the labour advances to the
buyer, only shows itself in employment. And this
consumption of force of labour produces, not only
commodities, but surplus value besides. Everything
else needed for the purposes of production—raw
materials, machinery, &c.—have been bought by the
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capitalist at their actual value, and paid for at their
actual price. It is labour only, the labour-force of
human beings, from which he derives his surplus value.
Out of this, his last purchase, bought on credit, the
capitalist makes his capital breed. This labour, bought
in the open market, and realized in the commodity—
this it is which gives the capitalist the additional
value he hungers for.
Now we begin to see how it comes about that 10Z.
turns into i iZ., that 100Z. swells into 110Z., without
additional value. Now, too, the admirable working
of “ freedom of contract ” and “ supply and demand ”
in our modern society appears. Hear, too, William
Cobbettfora moment: “ To those who labour, we who
labour not with our hands owe all that we eat and
drink and wear, all that shades us by day and that
shelters us by night, all the means of enjoying
health and pleasure ; and therefore if we possess talent
for the task, we are ungrateful or cowardly, or both, if
we omit any effort within our power to prevent them
from being slaves. What is a slave ? For let us not
be amused by a name. A slave is in the first place
a man who has no property; and property means
something that he has, and that nobody can take
from him without his leave or consent. A slave has
no property in his labour ; and any man who is com
pelled to give up the fruit of his labour to another at
the arbitrary will of that other, has no property in his
labour, and is therefore a slave, whether the fruit of
his labour be taken from him directly or indirectly.
If it be said that he gives up the fruit of his labour
by his own will, and that it is not forced from
�LABOUR.
47
him, I answer, To be sure he may avoid eating and
drinking, and may go naked ; but then he must die ;
and on this condition, and this condition only, can he
refuse to give up the fruit of his labour. ‘ Die,
wretch, or surrender as much of your income or the
fruit of your labour as your masters choose to take.’ ”
To return. The working man who has sold his
labour works, of course, under the control of the capi
talist to whom his labour thus belongs, and whose
object it is that he should work hard and continuously.
Besides, the product in which his force of labour is
embodied is the property of the capitalist, and in no
sense that of the labourer. The capitalist merely pays
him his wages, just as he would pay for the hire of a
horse or a mule. Then the employer applies the
human merchandise he has thus bought to his raw
materials and machinery. The result is a value in
use to be passed on to others ; and not only such
value, but a surplus value for the capitalist himself,
derived from this purchased labour.
Take, for example, cotton yarns. The capitalist
buys, say, ten pounds of raw cotton for I ox In that
price there is already expressed the average labour
needed for the production, transport, and marketing
of the raw cotton. Now put the wear and tear of the
spindles, machinery, &c., in working up the raw
material into yarn at 2s. If a piece of gold of the
value of 12s. is the output of twenty-four hours’work,
it follows that there are, apart from the labour in the
factory, two full days of work (at the assumed natural
rate of 3x for six hours’ work) embodied in the yarn.
This accounts for the original labour needed to raise
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and transport the raw cotton, as well as the labour
needed to replace the wear and tear.
It has already been assumed that the workman
must give six hours’ labour in order to earn 3^., the
natural price of his labour required to supply him
socially with his absolute necessaries. Now assume
further that it takes six hours’ labour to turn ten
pounds of cotton into ten pounds of yarn ; then the
workman has added to the raw cotton a value of 3s1.,
a half-a-day’s work. So at the end the ten pounds
of yarn contain altogether two days and a half of
labour; raw cotton and wear and tear of spindles
stand for two days ; and half-a-day has been absorbed
by the cotton in the process of spinning. This quan
tity of labour is therefore reckoned in a piece of gold
of the value of 15^.; that is to say, the price of the
yarn worked up from the cotton is ix. 6d. a pound.
Here obviously is no gain to the capitalist. His raw
material, his wear and tear of machinery, his wages
paid for the labour which he has purchased, eat up
the whole of the capital advanced, and yet the ten
pounds of yarn only fetch ij-. 6d. a pound, which is
the value of the average quantity of labour contained
in it. This shows no profit whatever, much to the
horror of the capitalist if he stopped there.
But the employer has bought the labourer’s whole
day’s work upon the market. He can make him work
therefore not merely the six hours required to produce
the return of the 3^. paid, but twelve hours—a day’s
work. Now if six hours’ work produces ten pounds
of yarn from ten pounds of cotton, twelve hours’ work
will give twenty pounds of yarn from twenty pounds
�LABOUR.
49
of cotton. These twenty pounds of yarn will thus con
tain five days’ labour, of which four are contained in the
raw cotton and the wear and tear of machinery and
spindles, and one day is absorbed by the yarn during
the process of spinning. The expression in money
then of these five days’ work is 30^. That, therefore,
is the price of the twenty pounds of yarn, Thus the
yarn is sold now as it was before at ij1. 6d. a pound.
But the sum of the values of the merchandise (includ
ing labour in the factory) embodied in the yarn does
not exceed 27 s.; that is to say, 2OJ. for the raw cotton,
4j. for the wear and tear, and 3s. for the labour in
the factory. The value of the product has therefore
increased. The 27s. have become 30J. Those 27s.
advanced by the capitalist have begotten a surplus
value of 3^., and the trick is done. The capitalist
has used a certain amount of another man’s labour
for his own behoof without paying for it, and the trick
is done at that man’s expense. That free labour
which is sold in the open market enables the capital
ist to sell the twenty pounds of yarn he has made
at the regular price of Ij. 6d. a pound, and, neverthe
less, to increase his capital by 3^. on the output of
twenty pounds. Labour thus used is the origin of
surplus value, and all’s well.
Once more it is permissible to look back to the ioZ.
made into 11Z., to the 100Z. swollen into 110Z. The iZ.
like the 10Z. is obtained from that free labour which is
bound to be sold for less than its worth, in order that its
possessor may continue to keep body and soul together.
And the surplus value so produced the capitalist, the
merchant, the shopkeeper, divide among themselves.
E
�50
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In existing conditions of agricultural production,
the agricultural labourer in the same way provides
on his part the surplus value which the landowner,
the rent-charger, the farmer, the mortgagee, divide, in
the shape of rent, settlement, profit on capital, and
interest on money lent. The labourer himself, earning
his low to I2w a week, is the man upon whom all
these worthy people live, though they do so in a more
indirect manner than the capitalists of the large
towns, and have perhaps a trifle more conscience left
to appeal to.
Capital itself, however, is divided into two parts,
that w’hich is used to buy machinery and means of
production, and that which is expended on labour.
The former portion is constant, and is simply repro
duced without increase, the latter is variable, and is
that which produces surplus value. Ordinarily the
rate of surplus value is calculated on the total amount
of capital employed, constant and variable, and is
dubbed profit on capital. But this is wholly
incorrect. The rate of surplus value produced, the
proportion of labour turned to account by the
capitalist, should be reckoned only on the amount of
capital advanced to pay the owner of that labour
the natural price of his labour. What now is the pro
portion which the necessary labour for this purpose
bears to the extra labour which is used for the benefit
of the capitalist alone ?
Nothing will illustrate this so clearly as actual
figures taken from the regular operations of a factory.
A mill with 10,000 spindles spins yarn No. 32 with
American cotton, and produces every week a pound
�LABOUR.
5i
of yarn to the spindle. The waste of the cotton
amounts to six per cent. Therefore 10,600 pounds of
cotton are each week converted into 10,000 pounds of
yarn, and 600 pounds of waste. In April, 1871, this
cotton cost 7|</. a pound, and consequently 342Z. were
paid for the 10,600 pounds, in round figures. The
10,000 spindles, including the spinning machines and
the engine, cost io,oooZ.; their wear and tear amounts
to ten per cent., or 1000Z. a year, or 20Z. a week. The
ground-rent is 300Z. a year, or 6Z. a week. Coal, gas,
oil, &c., cost 4Z. ioj. every week; the total weekly
expenses in constant value amounting to 378Z.
The wages of the hands are 52Z. a week ; the price
of the yarn at I2|</. a pound for 10,000 pounds is
510Z. The additional value produced each week is
consequently 510Z. —378Z., or 132Z. Now deduct the
variable capital, the wages of the hands, or 52Z., and
there remains a surplus value of 80Z. Here the rate of
surplus value is therefore as 80Z. to 52Z., or upwards of
153 per cent. That is to say, for an average day’s
work of ten hours the necessary labour is but four
hours, and the extra labour six hours ; or, the labourer
works four hours for himself, and six for other
people, who divide his extra work among them.
And yet how unreasonable that the “hand,” silly
fellow, should object to this division of his extra and
unpaid for labour, and fancy that somehow somebody
has got the better of him. Fool that he is, let him
listen to the voice of the preacher and the political
economist:—“ What you need, my weary, povertystricken, Christian brother, is not to get back your
own extra labour, which you have expended, in the
E 2
�52
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form of money or goods for your own use. That is—
believe us, who are your true friends—robbery of the
capitalists. You, my good man, should be thrifty,
abstinent, saving, economical, and still go on steadily
providing extra labour for others, until you in turn
cease to be a labourer, turn capitalist, and extort extra
labour yourself.”
What, however is this day’s work, necessary labour
and extra labour together, which the capitalist buys
on the market ? Obviously there must be some
limit to it. A man can’t work twenty-four hours
on end every day in the week, that is clear. But the
limits of the day’s work are very elastic. We find
ten hours, twelve hours, fourteen, sixteen, even
eighteen hours, given as the amount of a day’s work.
And this limit, however loose already, capitalists, from
the shirt-sweaters up to the railway companies, are
always striving to extend. They invoke the sacred
laws of supply and demand and freedom of contract,
to sanction an amount of daily toil which leaves a
man or a woman utterly exhausted at its close, which
weakens health, reduces vitality, and hands on a
broken constitution to the progeny. And all for what?
In order to swell that surplus value which “ society ”
depends upon for its excessive luxury and continuous
laziness. “But,” say the labourers when adjured not
to endanger society, “ that is all very well; but society
is shamefully wronging us. It is society which, having
entire command of the police and military forces of
the country, enables the capitalist class thus to violate
every law of exchange with impunity. These are
they who pay us only one-half or one-third or one-
�LABOUR.
53
quarter of the real value of our day’s work. They
then are the people who are endangering' society, of
which we form by far the most important part—not
the working men, who ask only that their labour
should not be taken for nothing.”
There is a comparison at hand which philanthro
pizing capitalists—and there are many of them—will
understand, if they do not appreciate. Under the old
system of corvee a man was obliged to give say one
day’s work in the week, or at most two, to his feudal
lord without any payment. Such a man, though he
had the remaining five or six days wholly to himself,
was thought little better than a slave. Nor was he.
English capitalists would, of all men, subscribe largely
to relieve human beings from continuing in such a
shameful and degraded position. But here at home,
we have men, women, and children, who are obliged
to give four, five, six hours a day to the capitalist for
nothing, and yet are thought free. A factory hand
who, as in the instance given above, provides six
hours a day of extra labour, makes the capitalist a
present of three days’ work in the week for nothing.
He gives, in fact, three times as much labour for no
thing in the week to his employer, as the serf who
works one day in the week under corvee is obliged to
offer in unpaid labour to his lord. . But in the one case,
under the system of daily or weekly wages, the neces
sary labour and the extra labour are lumped to
gether as so much paid-for labour ; in the other, they
are divided. Thus the forced, extra, unpaid labour
for the capitalist—the industrial corvee—escapes
notice, though it is three times greater than the other,
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and the capitalist is thrice as heavy a master as the
feudal lord.
Moreover, the capitalist class has ever been on the
look-out to increase the hours of labour beyond
measure, in order that they may obtain more extra
labour, and thus secure more surplus value. We in
England have had sad experience of the baneful
effects upon the working population of the neverceasing endeavours to increase the number of working
hours. The reports of the Factory Inspectors up to
a comparatively recent date, are positively filled to
overflowing with instances of the efforts made by the
capitalists to crowd extra labour on men, on women,
and, above all, on children. A little is filched from
the meal times ; the mill is opened a trifle earlier, closed
something later, than the prescribed hour. Always
this persistent scheming for extra labour.2 Not only
up to the passing of the Factory Acts, but ever since,
the same tendency has been relentlessly displayed.
Free Trade, by reducing the natural price of labour,
increased the profit of capitalists and the number of
hours on which they could depend for the production
of surplus value. Women and children have, of course,
suffered fearfully. They were used up as so much
2 Mr. Watherston, a jeweller, who has grown rich on other
men’s labour, wrote not long ago to the Economist to complain
of the miserably short hours of work Englishmen now have.
They must work more, or trade—his profits, he meant—would
suffer. Of course this was the very man for the capitalist party.
They got him at once as chairman of the Westminster caucus.
How long will working men be gulled by landlords and capitalists
into providing them with more unpaid labour, under the pretence
of improving trade ?
�LABOUR.
55
food for surplus value, without the slightest regard to
humanity, or to the interest of the country at large.
The average age of the working classes was fearfully
shortened by the excessive toil. The cotton industry
of Lancashire alone in ninety years, or three genera
tions of ordinary men, devoured nine generations of
work-people. What mattered that to the manu
facturers ? There were more where they came from.
The poor bargainers reproduce themselves, and sup
ply and demand goes merrily on as before. The
Factory Acts themselves, still by no means so stringent
nor so rigidly administered as they ought to be, were
carried against the bitterest opposition of the capi
talist class, because the nation had gradually roused
itself to the truth that the whole population was
rapidly deteriorating, owing to the systematic
overwork of women and children. There are even
still economists of liberal views, who hold that women
in particular ought to be allowed to work in factories
as long as they choose, and that the State has no right
to interfere to protect the coming generation. Argu
ment after argument is put forward also that longer
hours than those to which the Trade Unions have
happily reduced the working day are essential, because
otherwise capitalists cannot compete with foreign
nations.3
3 To show how impossible it is for the capitalist class to shake
themselves clear of the prejudices in which they have been
brought up, it is almost enough to say that Mr. Bright—a man
surely distinguished foi- his humanity in general concerns—
opposed the Factory Acts, which may fairly be regarded as the
most beneficent measures of this century, with all his might ;
that when President of the Board of Trade he declared that
�56
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There is, unfortunately, no need to go back to the
horrible details contained in the Health Reports of
a few years ago, as to the condition of the working
classes, whilst wealth is being piled up by their labour
all round them. In spite of a little permissive legis
lation—well-intended, but by no means effectual—
things are almost as bad to-day. Some there are of
course who, rejoicing in the fact that our population has
consumed on the average ‘ooi lb. per head more of
bacon in the last ten years, or '002 lb. per head more
adulteration was a legitimate form of competition ; and that to
this hour he cannot see that interference with freedom of con
tract as between the capitalist and the labourer may be abso
lutely essential in the interests of the community at large. Sir
Thomas Brassey, as Professor Cairnes has pointed out, could
not understand that a reduction of profits might be quite as
desirable as a reduction of wages. It is amusing, too, to see
Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, a capitalist who has taken 700,000/.
out of the working classes by extra labour, and owns a rigid
monopoly, posing as a leader of the democracy. Doubtless
they all think themselves thoroughly in earnest; but how can
hunters after surplus value, men who are every day engaged in
putting wages at a lower level than they ought to be in order
to enhance their own profits from unpaid labour, really lead or
benefit them by pretending to lead, the working class ? The
Liberal benches in the House of Commons at this very time
are closely packed with plutocrats, who have made all their
wealth, and mean to make more, out of the unpaid labour of
their own countrymen. The Conservative benches seat a grow
ing proportion of men of the like kidney. What wonder that
working men who really understand what is going on around
them, almost despair of success in carrying measures which are
absolutely essential to the welfare of their class, when the power
of capitalism is increasing in every direction, when there is not
a single daily newspaper in existence which represents their
interests or advocates their claims, and when only three of their
class sit in Parliament ?
�LABOUR.
57
cheese, decline to look to that portion of the people
who bring down the average.
Such a speech as that delivered by the Bishop of
Manchester in June, 1880, ought to awaken the nation
to the mischief which is still being done. He, worthy
man, wrings his hands in despair at the state of affairs
in his own diocese. People living in the most mise
rable poverty, from which there seems no escape.
Misery, filth, starvation, overcrowding, followed by
inevitable deterioration. Sadness and hopelessness
brood over the streets, and alleys, and cellars, he has
explored. What can education do with children
living in such conditions as those which he has so
graphically described ? The men and the women
work hard enough when they can get the chance—
work endless hours too—do enough in short to feed,
and lodge, and clothe themselves in comfort. Yet in
Manchester and Salford, in Stockport and Altrincham,
in Oldham and Macclesfield, throughout the whole of
these great- industrial districts, thousands on thou
sands of labourers exist in good times in squalor, whilst
bad times drive them at once to the wall. Dr.
Fraser himself had shown a few years before what the
condition of the agricultural labourer was in this
respect, how hard he too works, how little he gets,
how foully he is lodged in many cases. Even orthodox
economists show further how farmers and manufac
turers alike combine to keep down the rate of wages to
the bare natural price, or below it, whilst exacting the
longest possible hours of toil.
Admitting that in some respects matters have
improved, owing to the determination of the working
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classes no longer to submit to such neglect and
oppression as of old, the very last report of the
Factory Inspectors shows how much remains to be
done, and how little machinery there is to do it. The
long weary struggle which has been carried on by the
working class, without even proper representation,
against laissez-faire, political economy, and selfish
ideas of freedom, seems still far from being successful.
A mere list of the provisions of the Factory Acts to
restrict tyranny by the masters and injury resulting
to the hands, proves conclusively that, but for State
intervention a condition of slavery of the worst kind
would exist now, as it did forty years ago. Meals for
instance are not allowed nowto be taken in rooms where
the atmosphere is poisonous, and some restrictions are
even imposed upon keeping men, women, and children
employed in the poisonous atmosphere. In Bradford, a
city which has long lived in the full and rather greasy
odour of Liberal sanctity, the wool-sorting has for years
been carried on in such a manner as directly to involve
the loss of the lives of many of the hands. Not a single
improvement did the capitalists—Mr. Coercion-Act
Forster is a Bradford man—introduce, till forced to do so
bylaw, and by public opinion following upon the verdict
of coroners’ juries as to the infamous state of things
which brought about the death of the wool-sorters.
Children still go to work full time in the collieries when
they are twelve years old, though in factories they,
fortunately, may not do so until they are thirteen or
fourteen. The parents, eager to get their children’s
wages, take advantage of this, and the capitalist
colliery owner of course is always ready to employ
�LABOUR.
59
cheap child-labour for his engines or other pur
poses.
In the dangerous trades great improvements have
been made by the Factory Acts, but still it is evident
far more stringent inspection and regulation is
required. In the brickworks we read of a girl carry
ing to and fro eleven tons of clay in the day for 2s.
a day. Brickmaking, to which women are wholly
unsuited, fell into their hands, we are told, “ because
masters at one time got wages down very low”—•
wanted to work women on the cheap in fact. In the
great cotton and iron industries years must still
elapse before the people recover from the deteriorating
effects of unrestricted competition. The best factories
and ironworks are not yet controlled sufficiently in
the interest of the men, women, and children who
work in them. But those who wish to understand
what capitalism is capable of, and what is its natural
bent, should read the reports of the factory inspectors,
Messrs. Lakeman and Gould, on the sweating system
at the East End of London, and the dens in which
the unfortunate milliners and dressmakers work at
the West End. “Workshops,” says Inspector Lake
man, “are generally small, over-crowded, very dirty,
overheated, badly ventilated ; and when half a dozen
gas burners are alight for five or six hours in a
twelve-feet square room, one can imagine that the
term ‘ sweater ’ is not inappropriate. ... So gigantic
has the sweating system become, so rapid the produc
tion (for the division of labour is strictly carried out),
so varied are the wants of each occupier, that one
despairs of making any impresssion upon these people
�6o
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
except by compulsion.
They are bound to a system
which excludes freedom, and from long habit it seems
impossible to move them out of it. Now when we
see a cloth coat made, lined, braided by hand, the
silk and thread found by sweater, all for 2s. ^d., and
if the total number be not returned to the clothier
completed by the time specified, then a fine of six
pence (I have seen one shilling) levied for each gar
ment, one cannot wonder at the desire of the sweater
to keep his team late at night to complete his task.”
Coats are sometimes “(finished in this style,” however,
as low as 2s. id. “NTcien one thinks that there are
about 18,000 to 20,000 people toiling at this one trade
of making ready-made clothing, can we wonder at
beholding the palace-like premises of merchant
tailors who can advertise garments at a very low
price, which to them is the cost of material, and say
2s. id. for the making of a coat? It does not require
much depth of reasoning to judge where the profit
comes from.”4 No, worthy Mr. Inspector, it does not.
The profit of the merchant tailor, like the profit of
his noble allies the cotton lords and the wool factors,
comes out of the unpaid labour of others, whom he
throws upon the streets when they have served his turn
of providing surplus value according to the universal
law of supply and demand and freedom of contract.
But again ; hear Mr. Inspector Gould :—“ There is,
however, one branch of work, giving employment to
4 Lord Salisbury spoke at the Merchant Tailors’ Hall not long
since, of the absurdity of “ plate-hunger.” It seemed more ridicu
lous to his aristocratic mind than even the earth-hunger of the
Irish. Had he by chance a Conservative sweat er at his elbow ?
�LABOUR.
61
thousands of girls and women, which, although
entirely harmless in itself, is yet, unfortunately, solely
by reason of the conditions under which it is carried
on, a typically unhealthy business, I need hardly
say that I refer to the making of all articles of ladies’
clothing, and principally to the dressmaking section
of the trade. Of the thousands of young and delicate
girls who are engaged in trying to earn a bare sub
sistence in a deleterious atmosphere, no one can tell
how many go down in the struggle. No statistics
can be formed of the percentage of deaths, of enfeebled
constitutions, of the amount of disease engendered in
the first instance by the deadly atmosphere of the
workrooms in second and third class establishments
devoted to the dressmaking and ladies’ clothing trade
in the West End of London. I know of no class of
female workers whose vital interests are so entirely
neglected, and who labour under such disadvantageous
conditions, as the unlucky victims of the dressmaking
industry. Nothing is more surprising than to hear
the advocates of ‘ women’s rights ’ of both sexes, in
full knowledge apparently of the hardships undergone
by the very class whose battle they profess to fight,
cry out for absolute liberty of action to all females
employed in labour ! ” Evidently Mr. Gould is quite
ignorant of the real bigotry of the advocates of free
dom, and had better look to himself. In the shops
themselves things are little better. Men and women
are kept at work from thirteen to fourteen hours a
day for five days in the week, and for sixteen hours
on the sixth day.
As to the accommodation of the labouring class,
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out of whose unpaid toil the capitalist makes his
profit and society waxes fat, the Reports on Artisans’
Dwellings, give deplorable facts. Two and three
families pigged together into one or two small rooms ;
streets of houses torn down for improvements, and
their occupiers forced to crowd in upon the already
overcrowded streets adjoining. This is the rule through
out all our great cities. London is no worse than Glas
gow, nor Glasgow worse than Birmingham, Bradford,
Leeds, Manchester, or Newcastle. The latter city,
indeed, is perhaps the worst of all in this respect in
comparison to its population.
Hitherto the mere
Permissive Acts to remedy this state of things have
been almost useless. Yet the homes of the poor are
not cheap; they are dear. Cubic space for cubic
space, the dens of the East and West End cost
more than the mansions of the rich, who have good
air, good light, plentiful supply of water, and all that’s
needed for healthy existence. Those who provide
them with all these benefits are left to take care of
themselves. No compulsion: that would be too
serious. What ? force the municipalities to tear down
foul, unhealthy dwellings, at the expense of the rich,
and build up proper accommodation for the poor ?
“ Never,” say the ratepayers ; “that would touch us :
it is communism, confiscation, the overturn of society.”
We are now in a brief cycle of rising prosperity for
the moneyed and manufacturing class. Now is their
opportunity to endeavour to remedy in their turn
some of the mischiefs below and around them. They
justly denounce the selfishness of landlords ; let them,
too, look at home. But the working class should rely
�LABOUR.
63
on their own power and peaceful strength—they must
trust to themselves alone.
To them, then, I say
All wealth is produced
by labour, and goods exchange in proportion to
the quantity of human labour which is embodied in
them. Between the workers of all civilized coun
tries there is no real difference: they create the
wealth and produce the food, and, under proper
conditions, all would live in moderation all would
have enough.
But landowners, capitalists, mer
chants, money-lenders, have possessed themselves
of the land, of the machinery, of the currency, of the
credit.
They therefore compel the workers to
labour long and live hardly for their benefit; they
take of the time, and the life, and the labour of their
fellows for nothing. Those who own the soil, and
those who manufacture—those who live on interest, and
those who trade on differences of value, live alike in
luxury and in idleness out of the sweat and the misery
of others. They, therefore, are the enemies of the great
mass of the people, to be overcome by voluntary
combination and peaceful endeavour. You, then,
who produce the wealth in every country, consider
where you stand ; you, men who have seen your homes
broken up, your health destroyed, have beheld your
wives and children fade away under the tyranny
of capitalism, stop and think. Let all who are made
poor and miserable for the advantage of others, take
heed to themselves. And having thus considered,
thus thought, and thus looked at home, stretch out
your hands, now powerless, to the workers of the
world as your friends, and begin a new and better
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
social epoch for humanity. Working men and
working women of Great Britain and Ireland, who now
toil and suffer that others may be lazy and rich—
Unite I Working men and working women of Europe
and America, who now rejoice in the gleam of a
transient prosperity, only to be cast into deeper
despair on the next stagnation—Unite ! Unite ! In
union alone is safety and happiness for the future, as
in difference and selfishness have been danger and
misery in the past. Therefore, once more, working
men and working women, ye who live hardly to day,
to pass on sadness and poverty to your children to
morrow, Unite! Unite! Unite!
�CAPITAL.
CHAPTER HI.
CAPITAL.
Capital is the produce ofpast labour devoted to present
production. “ The wealth which has been accumu
lated with the object of assisting production, is termed
capital; and therefore the capital of the country is
the wealth which is not immediately consumed unproductively, and which may consequently be devoted
to assist the further production?’ Capital is in fact
the saving of past labour, for the special purpose of
increasing the future store. Undoubtedly capital
originally may have been acquired by saving or by
inheritance, though that is only pushing the accumu
lation a step further back; and the grain pits of Northern
India, the yam barrows and tabu cocoa-nut groves
of Polynesia, the stores of the Mexican aborigines,
represent early and useful forms of capital. “ No
thing,” says Mr. Fawcett, “ more distinctly marks the
superiority of man over the brute creation than the
prudent foresight wrhich causes an adequate provision
to be made for the future. The more civilized men
are, the more is this foresight shown. Civilized men
anticipate with keen perception the wants of the
future. To provide against the contingencies of the
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
future, engrosses perhaps the too anxious care of the
nation.”
In these sentences Mr. Fawcett expresses far too
favourable a view of the foresight of the present gene
ration of civilized men. Never perhaps since civiliza
tion was first seen on the planet, have so many human
beings been passing through life at the same time
on insufficient food, as at the present moment. Nothing,
indeed, is more striking than, the want of foresight
displayed under our present capitalist system of
production. Whichever quarter of the globe we look
to, we see the future entirely disregarded. We in
England, for example, a vast industrial community,
are content to base our supplies more and more upon
countries thousands of miles from our shores. America,
which affords us our chief quantity of food, is using up
wheat centre after wheat centre in a fashion similar
to that not long since in vogue in South Australia ;
forests, which can perhaps never be replaced, are
swept away, in every direction, to the permanent injury
of the climate. In England, manure to the value
of at least 25,000,000/. a year, is sent down into the
sea, though our soil is deteriorating for want of it.
Foresight, therefore, in any extended sense, cannot cer
tainly be claimed for our existing civilization, unless the
Romans showed foresight when they worked out the
Campagna to ruin, and destroyed the future of Sicily
by their exactions. What capital has done for India
I shall show later on ; what it would do, if left unre
strained, for our own people has been seen, in part, in
the last chapter. But granting that the capital which
begins work is the result of past frugality on the part
�CAPITAL.
of some hard-working man with a keen eye to the
good of his species, as well as to his own immediate
interest, what is the next capital, and the next, and
the next, which rolls up so rapidly in this island of
ours ? Let us go back to the great cotton industry
once more, and look about us there.
A man has a capital of say io,oooZ., inherited from his
thrifty parent, who bequeathed if to him after a long
life of usefulness, with many prayers that he would
make it fructify. He does. Four-fifths he devotes
to buying machinery, raw cotton, &c., and one-fifth he
expends in wages. Every year he produces 240,000
pounds of cotton yarn of the value of I2,oooZ. His
io,oooZ. has been reproduced, and his surplus value
is in the 40,000 pounds of yarn, which are sold for
the sum of 20O0Z. This 2000Z. of surplus value forms
a new capital, which, when set to work in like manner,
will produce in its turn a surplus value of 400Z.—and
so on, and so on, as may seem convenient to the
capitalist. The original IO,OOOZ. came from the pious
parent, but the history of the new capital of the
2000Z., of the 400Z. &c., stares us in the face. It is
simply surplus value, other people’s unpaid extra
labour, capitalized. The means of production in
which this additional extra labour is embodied, as
well as the means which support it, are only portions
of the tribute levied every year from the working
class by the capitalist class. It is, of course, per
fectly in accordance with the economical laws which
govern the production of commodities, and with the
ever sacred rights of property which follow thereupon.
Nevertheless there are the following results
F 2
�68
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
1. That the product belongs to the capitalist, and
not to the producer.
2. That the value of this product includes both the
value of the capital and the surplus value, which costs
the workmen labour, but the capitalist whose lawful
property it becomes, nothing.
3. That the labourer has kept up his force of labour
• and can sell it again on the market, if he is lucky
enough to find a buyer.
Thus capital rolls up by crystallizing unpaid labour
in the hands of the capitalist.
That the general position of the modern labourer
in dealing with his master the capitalist is bad
enough, has been shown only too clearly. Whenever
the Government slackens its intervention for a
moment, even with existing Factory Acts in full
force, the employers, as a class, strive their utmost to
extend the hours of labour, and thus to get more
unpaid work out of their hands. Not the slightest
regard is paid to the health or well-being of the men,
women, and children whose lives are used up thus
lelentlessly ; the truck system, which filches wages, is
resorted to wherever possible; and adulteration has
become the rule rather than the exception in trade.
To increase the rate of surplus value produced per
head employed is of course a great gain ; the average
amount of profit on the variable capital used is at once
increased likewise. Who can wonder then that having
the control of the powers of the country, and the recog
nized political economists as their submissive fuglemen,
the capitalist class should so long have ridden rough
shod over the working class in the name of freedom ?
�CAPITAL.
69
In considering, however, the origin of the capitalist
system, it becomes clear that without a minimum
amount of variable capital wherewith to pay wages,
that mode of production cannot begin. A man
who works for himself alone, need work only the
eight hours which we may assume to be required, on
the average, to provide him with the necessaries of
subsistence. He would need then only the means of
production for his eight hours’ work; whilst the
capitalist, who makes him work an extra four hours,
needs an additional sum of money to provide the
means of production for those four hours. Moreover,
the capitalist, even if he lived no better than the
workmen he employed, would have to keep two of
them at work for twelve hours a day, in order that he
himself might have the necessaries of life in idleness.
Even so there would be no surplus wealth. So that,
according to this calculation, the lazy capitalist, in
order to be able to live without work even twice as
well as his workmen, and turn into capital half the
surplus value produced, must advance eight times the
amount of capital required for a single independent
■workman, though only four hands will be employed
in producing surplus value. This done, capital at
once becomes master of the situation. The workman
no longer turns the means of production to account,
but they turn him to account, and work up his force
of labour into surplus value to an extent which has
never been brought about under any system of forced
labour known to history.
The history of the development of capitalist pro
duction, from simple cooperation and manufacture up
�?o
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
to the present preponderance of the great machine
industries, shows an enormous growth of wealth for
the capitalist class, combined with steady pressure
upon the labourer to produce more surplus value by
low wages and overwork. At first the true capitalist
method scarcely makes head; but when once labourers
are collected together in one building, to do separate
tasks at the bidding of an employer, they cease to be
separate individuals, and become an organism, bound
to exercise their collective capacity in accordance
with the rules of capital. Here comes in that minute
division of manual labour, so advantageous to pro
duction, which has been described with so much
enthusiasm by many economists. The object of the
collection of the labourers together was, of course, to
cheapen the production of merchandise. The extra
ability which the workman derives from devoting his
attention to one operation instead of to several, the
time saved by the juxta-position of the labourers, &c.,
all tell in favour of the capitalist, whose interest is
henceforth exclusively consulted. For the labourer
has already become a mere tool. He no longer pro
duces commodities himself, as he did before, but
embodies his work in bits of commodities, or in help
ing to make a complete commodity, only valuable
when put together. To carry on perpetually one petty
operation in a complicated whole, working day in and
day out to produce surplus value for the capitalist by a
series of purely mechanical operations, such is the la
bourer’s portion in this system of manufacture. He still
seems to be an independent agent working with his own
tools, but this is precisely what in reality he is not.
�CAPITAL.
71
Glass-making, watch-making, pin-making, and other
trades, are still to a great extent conducted on this
transition method, and afford illustrations of what was
not long since general. Whilst then the social division
of labour, with or without the exchange of commodi
ties, belongs to the economical forms of most various
societies, the manufacturing division of labour is the
special creation of the capitalist system of production.
The workshop is in fact a machine, of which the parts
are human beings. Dissociate the individuals from
the machine as a whole, and they become almost as
useless as a crank, a pin, or an eccentric, detached
from a steam-engine. The labourer, to start with,
sells his force of labour to capital because he is desti
tute of the means of production himself; now his
labour has become absolutely useless unless it is sold.
He can work henceforth to advantage only in the
workshop of the capitalist. It is also the tendency of
manufacture thus conducted to employ more and more
hands as capital accumulates and the minimum of
capital needed to commence, increases.
This sort of co-operation was a historical necessity,
in order to convert isolated labour into social work.
It begins about the middle of the sixteenth century,
and lasts to the latter half of the eighteenth century,
as the chief method of production in capitalist coun
tries. During the whole of this period, and far on into
the nineteenth century, the most atrocious laws were
enacted by the small minority of the population who
owned the Houses of Parliament against the increase
of wages, or any combination on the part of the
working classes to secure for themselves justice and
�72
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
consideration. Capitalists might combine at their
pleasure; employers might break their contract at
will; but, woe betide those unlucky workmen who
thought that freedom meant the right to strike to get
better wages, or to step out of a contract which im
perilled their health. For them the prison, flogging,
branding, forced labour at the filthiest tasks. But
for the capitalist ?—he went on his way rejoicing, with
more and yet more of other men’s labour at his mercy,
and in due course of time he “ founded a family/’
figured as an Abolitionist, and died in the odour of
sanctity.
Steam machinery gave a new turn to the screw
which pressed down the working class, and began
those periods of inflation and stagnation, of over-pro
duction and depression, which many have come to
regard as inevitable accompaniments of all produc
tion. The machine sprang naturally out of manu
facture, but the use of steam as a motive power gave
it a development in many directions which could
never have been obtained in any other way. At first
sight it would appear that machines must of necessity
improve the lot of the bulk of mankind—that as they
so vastly enhance the productive power of human
labour, men would be relieved from excessive drudgery,
and yet wealth would abound more than at any pre
vious period.
This was the view of the ancients. Aristotle fore
saw that slavery could be done away if machines were
invented ; and others have dreamed of a state of society
where, by their help, the history of the people should
cease to be one of perpetual poverty and degradation.
�CAPITAL,
73
As machines save labour alike in agriculture and in
working up the raw material, there is nothing neces
sarily chimerical in such ideas. But capital has
stepped in and taken order with these vain imaginings.
The riches due to machinery have gone to the
few: the many have become mere slaves to the
machine. For that is the result : human beings no
longer make use of their implements ; they themselves
are made to serve the machine.
The machine of course, though it increases the pro
ductive power of the human labour employed, adds
no more value to the commodity produced than the
wear and tear during the process of work. But
the first effect of its introdi tion is to bring into com
petition with adult male 1 our that of women and
children, who could, and do, serve machines as well as
the superior force of the men, and serve also to reduce
their wages—the main object of the capitalist. But
another advantage is afforded by the machine to the
employer. We have seen that the profit of the
capitalist depends upon the amount of unpaid labour
he can exact from the free workman. In ordinary
circumstances this can only be increased by the
lengthening of the hours of labour. But by the aid of
machines the labour can be intensified as well as pro
longed. Thus a man may produce the necessary
amount of labour-value in a shorter period, and leave
a larger portion of the working day as surplus value
to his employer, by an improvement in machinery
which renders the labour rapid and severe. Ever
since the law stepped in to shorten the hours of labour
for women and children, and men combined to shorten
�74
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
their own hours, the endeavour to intensify labour by
increasing the rapidity of machines has been unceas
ing. This has produced in the cotton and silk factories
a state of nervous excitement among the workers
which has greatly augmented the proportion of chest
complaints. Twelve hours’ work are now compressed
into ten hours. This work, too, is of the most monoto
nous, uninteresting character. In return for that ex
hausting labour the working classes as a body suffer as
the Bishop of Manchester has described.
But the effect of the introduction of new machines
of greatly improved capacity, used not for the benefit
of the whole community, but primarily for that of the
dominant class, has a far more serious influence upon
the working class than even the competition of women
and children which it admits of, or the intensity of
labour which results therefrom. A new labour-saving
machine means so much labour thrown upon the
market without the means of earning subsistence. This
effect of improved machinery is admitted by Ricardo,
who, after having previously held the contrary opinion,
satisfied himself “ that the substitution of machinery
for human labour is often very injurious to the class
of labourers.” This view is taken less clearly by
Macculloch, and Mill, and Fawcett; but they con
tend that the compensations are rapid, and in the end
beneficial. The labouring classes, according to them,
are therefore benefited, not injured, by the introduction
of improved machinery in every case. The labourers
whom the machine displaces are nevertheless thrown
upon the market, where they certainly increase the
amount of labour available for the capitalist. This is
�CAPITAL.
75
-in itself a terrible matter for them all. But the amount
of capital invested in the machine ceases also to be
available for wages ; and if the machine works up an
increased amount of raw material with far fewer hands,
the constant capital is clearly greatly augmented at
the expense of the variable, or that which is imme
diately available for the payment of wages. The
men thus thrown out of work are good for very little
in other employments, and consequently fall to a lower
grade. If they get fresh work in the same trade, that is
owing to the introduction of some new capital, not cer
tainly to that which is already locked up in the machine,
and employed in obtaining food for it in the shape of
raw materials. The machine itself has nothing to do
with the sad effect produced. The result of its em
ployment is that the product is cheaper and more
abundant than ever before ; yet the workman is thrown
aside into penury, and the capitalist pursues his
triumphant career. For this temporary inconvenience
is now of perpetual recurrence ; and the fate of the
miserable hand-loom weavers of India, starved in the
interests of Manchester manufacturers, is reproduced
in a milder form among the English labourers whose
interests these very cotton-lords were pretending to
serve. The necessary influence of the machine under
present conditions is to place the labourers at an
increasing disadvantage—a disadvantage which they
can never overcome, save by political and social com
binations and rearrangements, carried out with stead
fastness and zeal for at least a generation.
For this brings the question home to that miserable
see-saw of inflation and depression to that sad con
�76
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
dition of the mass of the labouring poor in the evergrowing population of our great cities, to which
reference has so often been made. “ Oh yes,” say the
followers of Malthus, by no means confined to Mr.
Bradlaugh and Mrs. Besant, " but this over-population
is ‘at the root of the whole mischief. If only the
working class would keep itself under restraint, and
not breed at such a terrible pace, they would at once
raise their wages by the .eternal law of supply and
demand. They have to thank their own early mar
riages and excessive birth-rate for much of their
present misery.”
Is this so ? The evidence is really all the other
way. There is nothing whatever to show that these
islands are overpeopled [in proportion to the wealth
that is being accumulated. Very much the contrary.
The population of Great Britain and Ireland has
doubled in the last seventy years. It is now increas
ing at the rate of about one-and-a-half per cent, in
every ten years. But the riches, the income, the accu
mulations of the country, are they increasing at a less
rate so that abstention from marriage and Malthusian
devices are so essential ? Why, it is notorious to all
that our wealth .has increased out of all calculable
proportion to our population during the present cen
tury. The whole world is laid under contribution, to
furnish additional wealth for the exported savings of
unpaid labour made by the comfortable classes here
at home. English capital brings back its return from
all quarters of the globe ; whilst in these islands, the
comparison between what was and what is, can
scarcely be expressed in sober language. Nay, even
�CAPITAL.
77
during this late period of prolonged depression, when
the hard, rough men of the iron districts, as well as
the distressed cotton-spinners and miners, were
declaring that they would not go into the workhouse,
and yet could not “ clem ” for another winter—even
in those hardest of hard times, it was calculated by
an expert that in addition to ordinary investments,
which were going on all the time, no less than
250,000,000/. were watching the opportunity to belaid
out to a profit when, to use the cant phrase, business
once more recovered. Whilst population is now
increasing at the rate of one-and-a-half per cent, in
every ten years, capital, and wealth squandered in
luxury, are rolling up at the rate of ten, twenty, thirty
per cent, per annum.
A few figures will make this quite clear. Taking
the years 1848 and 1878, the period of one generation
since last there was an agitation in favour of justice
to the multitude, we find that the total gross annual
value of property and profits assessed to Income
Tax in Great Britain and Ireland—about half the
actual gross annual value, or less—was in round
figures 275,000,000/. in 1848, against 578,000,000/., in
1878, or an increase on assessmentfor income alone of up
wards of 110 per cent, in the thirty years. A truly enor
mous increase. Yet the total population in 1848 was
28,000,000, as against nearly 34,000,000 in 1878.
Here, then in the United Kingdom, an increase of
the annual assessed income of no per cent, or of
303,000,000/., since 1848, was accompanied by an
increase in the population of only 6,000,000, or at the
rate of less than twenty per cent, in the thirty years.
�78
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
What fatal nonsense then is it to talk of over
population in such a case as this. If the increased
capital had been used for the benefit of all, then
these extra 6,000,000, as well as the 28,000,000, would
have been living in comfort, health, and well-being
—well-housed, well-clothed, well-fed, well-educated.
The over-population which the Malthusians think to
check by their wrong and mistaken methods, is due
to the special system of production under which we
groan, and will continue so long as, and no longer
than, it is brought under restraint for the advantage
of all. It is the deprivation of the means of selling
their labour on fair terms that does the mischief to
the mass of the population. Let the people remem
ber, that if no one were overworked in this free land
of ours, there would not at this moment be hands
enough in the country to carry on its business—that
if only one-half of the livers in luxury and idleness
on the excessive labour of others turned to some
higher ideal of patriotism, there would be plenty for
all. It is not the population that crowds on the
means of subsistence, but the concentration of the
produce of their toil in so few hands, that is obnoxious ;
though the way out to a better and fairer distribution
is not so simple as some of the easy handlers of the
complicated machinery of our modern society would
imagine.
This over-population then, which occasions such
sad scenes in times of depression, and is ever close at
hand in the flushest days of trade, is not actual but
relative, and is directly due to the employment of
machines and the growing proportion of constant to
�CAPITAL.
79
variable capital. Natural causes—great famines in the
East, serious wars in Europe, short harvests at home,
may aggravate the depression, as sloth and unthrifti
ness add to the misfortunes of the working class. But
such decennial crises as those now observable date
from the present century, and owe their development
to the circumstances stated.
The reproduction of capital necessarily carries with
it the simultaneous reproduction of the source of sur
plus value—force of labour. Accumulation of capital
involves at the same time increase of the mere wage
earning class. The payment of wages presupposes
that a certain amount of labour is given for nothing.
Wages, therefore, can only rise because there is an
increase of capital in excess of the labour offered. The
rise of wages and consequent diminution of unpaid
labour do not mean that the domain of capitalism
is restricted : small profits only necessitate bigger
capitals, and the workman sees in the wealth of his
master his only hope of safety. The ordinary expla
nation is either that the rise in the rate of wages
retards the accumulation of capital in comparison
to the labour on offer, and then wages fall to the
level which suits the views of capital; or on the
other hand, wages are low, and then the amount of
capital seeking employment in comparison to the
labour on offer is excessive, causing wages to rise.
Thus the see-saw goes on. Now an excess of
capital arising from accelerated accumulation, which
renders the labour on offer insufficient and raises its
price; again a slackened accumulation makes the
labour on offer relatively excessive and reduces its
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price. AU this has nothing to do with the increase
or decrease of population, but may occur, and does
occur, when the population is stationary.
The real law however of capitalist production is this :
—The relation between the accumulation of capital and
the rate of wages is only a relation between unpaid
labour converted into capital and the overplus of
paid labour that this additional capital needs in order
to set to work. This then is not a relation between
two matters quite independent of one another—that
is to say,"on the one side the magnitude of the capital,
on the other the number of the working population ;
but a relation only betzveen the paid and the unpaid
labour of the same working population. If the quantity
of unpaid labour which the working class supplies
and the capitalist class accumulates increases with
sufficient rapidity for its conversion into additional
capital to necessitate an extraordinary addition to
the quantity of paid labour, wages rise.
Other
things remaining the same, unpaid labour diminishes
in proportion. So soon, however, as this diminu
tion reaches the point when the extra labour which
furnishes the additional capital is no longer forth
coming in the usual quantity, a reaction ensues.
A less part of the return is converted into capital,
and the rise of wages is checked. Thus—and this is
the point of most serious import to the working
classes of this country—the price of labour can never
rise except between limits which leave quite untouched
the groundwork of the capitalist system and ensure the
reproduction of capital on a progressive scale. Never
then until the working class shake thertfcelves clear
�CAPITAL.
81
of the notion that a mere rise of wages is all they
have to strive for, will they be able to control the
capitalist class. The labourer is really the slave of his
own production in existing economical conditions.
For, as has been stated more than once, the demand
for labour is occasioned, not by the actual amount of
capital but by that of its variable portion, which alone
employs labour. But the magnitude of this portion
relatively to the whole is constantly decreasing. At
times, however, the conversion of variable into con
stant capital is less felt, machines are introduced
less frequently. Then there arises that greater demand
for labour which under ordinary conditions follows
upon the accumulation of capital. Yet at the very
moment when the number of the workmen employed
by the capital reaches its maximum, there is such a
glut of produce that at the slightest check in disposing
of the goods the whole social machinery seems to
come to a dead stop, the discharge of workmen comes
suddenly on a vast scale and in
violent manner,
and the very upset forces capitalists to excessive
efforts to economize labour. Improved machinery is
introduced again, and the wheel works round.
Thus the tendency of our system of production and
the increasing accumulation of capital, is to increase
at the same time the amount of the over-population
relatively to the means of employment. An indus
trial army of reserve is maintained of increasing
dimensions, ever at the disposal of capital, ready
to be absorbed during times of expansion, only to
be thrown back in periods of collapse. Only under
the control of the great industrial movement of our
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time, does the production of a superfluous population
become a definite means for the development of
wealth. During periods of stagnation -this industrial
army of reserve presses on the army in active employ
ment to reStrain its demands, when at length comes
the period of [over-production and great apparent
prosperity. Thus, then, the law according to which
an ever-increasing mass of riches can be produced
with a less and still lessening expenditure of human
force—this law which enables man as a social being
to produce more and more with less labour, is turned
by our capitalist system—where the means of pro
duction are not at the service of the labourer, but the
labourer at the mercy of his means of production—
directly to his disadvantage. As a direct consequence,
the more power and resources placed at the command
of labour, and the greater the competition of labourers
for means of employment, the more precarious be
comes the condition of the wage-earner, and his op
portunities of selling his labour. The productive
population is always increasing in a more rapid ratio
than the capital has need of it,
All recent events do but serve to exhibit the general
truth of this in more striking shape. Look at the
movement of population ; take note of the operation
of strikes ; observe the world-wide effect of crises at
the present time : how the numbers of those who live
from hand to mouth, or minister as domestic servants
to the luxuries of the comfortable classes, grow in
proportion to the rest of the population ; how the
strikes invariably fail on a falling market, and often
leave the workmen in a worse condition than they
�CAPITAL.
S3
were before they began; how, when a crisis begins
in Vienna it is felt at once through the world, to the
United States, and we see, even in that great territory
3,000,000 of tramps, without house or home, wander
ing through the country, exposed to the most furious
laws enacted by the well-to-do, and waiting till capi
tal shall be good enough to employ them again, and
again turn them adrift; how we ourselves discovered
that the capitalized unpaid labour taken from our peo
ple to lend to rotten States, like San Domingo, Hon
duras, Paraguay, and Peru, had merely brought about
here at home a fictitious industrial prosperity, to be
followed by the longest, and for the mass of the
working people the most trying, crisis known in re
cent times ; how—but it is needless to go further ; the
facts, the bare hard facts, condemn unceasingly our
unregulated system of capitalist production, which,
based solely on selfishness and gratifying greed, takes
no account of the morrow, nor any note whatever of
the mischief inflicted on the human race. Where the
State has interfered to control and change the bale
ful conditions of life for the mass of our countrymen,
there, and there alone, has some little good been done.
What then, say the let-alone school, would you
stop the operation of machinery, throw back the evo
lution of the race, and return to the natural savage
for a reorganization of modern society ? They who
ask such questions are as silly as those who think
all attempts to change our social organization must
be necessarily traced to the French Revolution, and
that those who, like myself, are determined to modify
existing political and social conditions, must wish and
G 2
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strive for a general overturn. It is not so. But the
working of capital is essentially immoral. It moves on
irrespective of all human considerations, save the
accumulation of wealth and the provision for ease
and luxury. For fifty years England has been under
the domination of the classes who live and trade upon
unpaid labour. Surely it is high time that those
people who provide it should be heard in their turn
as to the system which weighs them down. To
expect that the nation will at once abandon its idea
of fancied individual freedom in favour of a real col
lective freedom which shall consult and care for the
interests of all, is a chimera. But seeing, as we
cannot but see, the plain economical basis of so much
of the misery all deplore, is it not reasonable that
more rapid steps should be made in the direction of
general improvement ? So far all the sacrifices have
been made by the working class. What they in
their turn may rightfully demand at once as reason
able and practicable remedies for some portion of their
ills, are i1—
1. A curtailment of the hours of labour, eight hours
being the working day.
2. Free and compulsory education in its widest sense.
3. A compulsory construction by the municipalities
and county assemblies of fitting dwellings for the
working classes, including a good and free supply of
light, air, and water, and garden-ground where possible.
1 I need scarcely say that personally I should welcome far
more stringent reforms, but the very people who suffer most
under present economical conditions are not prepared to change
them completely.
�CAPITAL.
85
4. Really cheap transport, so that artisans may
live at a distance from their work without incurring
heavy expenditure.
Such social reforms would produce an effect more
speedily than might be supposed ; and the expenditure
would be far more than repaid to the community at
large by the increased physical strength, the superior
intelligence and morality, and the greatly enhanced
patriotism, in its best sense, of the mass of the com
munity. That these changes would check the fearful
crises consequent upon the capitalist system of pro
duction is nowise probable; but they would lead the
way gradually to a better system, when all might enter
more fully upon their duties to the whole country.
Men who are now deprived of the fruits of their
labour, who live under bad social conditions, who are
forced to resort to scamped work and adulterated
manufacture in order that their employers may make
a profit, would feel very differently if for their honest
labour embodied in sound goods they could obtain a
rightful return themselves. The magic of property
would then be felt in the general as well as the
individual improvement. That industry will always
have the better of laziness, that thrift must be more
beneficial than extravagance, are truths which no
political or social changes can shake. But as we
stand, our laws and customs are directly calculated to
foster excessive wealth on the one side and miserable
poverty on the other. What wonder that the people
should begin to ask themselves the why and the
wherefore of all this disparity between the men who
work and those who use them ? None are more
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ready to pay for mental toil than those who work
with their hands, none more ready to give up a por
tion of their labour for the benefit of their fellows.
Nov/, however, the perpetual conflict of wages, the
strife with capital, where the possibility of final
success is pushed farther and farther into the distance,
necessarily blunts that feeling of national greatness in
the best sense which does so much to sweep away,
even as it is, the meanness engendered by mere nar
rowness and greed. Those who are never certain of
continuous employment, and have little time left for
education, might well be pardoned if they thought
only of their own selfish interests. That in the mass
they do not do so, is the best hope for the future.
But in coming changes it behoves us to be careful,
lest, in getting rid of the excessive influence of one
dominant class, we do but strengthen the power of a
meaner and a worse one in its place. If possession
of land—as all reformers agree—should be regulated
in the interests of the country in time to come, so also
must capital, machinery, and the national highways.
Conservatism has come to mean the dominance of
landowners : Liberalism has been degraded to the
service of capitalists. There is little perhaps to choose ;
but for the people it is to the full as important in the
future that capital should be controlled as the land.
Mere destruction for its own sake is not in accordance
with the views of Englishmen. To pull down a system,
however bad, they must see that something is ready to
take its place. The infinite mischiefs of capitalism must
be removed as a better method of production grows up
from below. We have sad experience that our so-
�CAPITAL.
87
called individual liberty means too often only the
development of monopoly and the tyranny of wealth.
But that faculty of organization, that ingenuity in
turning science and invention to account, may as well
be used in the service of the many as to the selfish
gratification of personal desires. There is room enough
for the use of the highest powers, without the perpetual
money-getting now in the ascendant. No man can
live out of the current of his age ; but it is time that a
higher ideal were placed before the nation, and that the
common sense of the community at large should save
the next generation from the power of oppression
now accorded to a system which developes in those
who handle it neither foresight, patriotism, nor honesty.
The very tendency of capital itself renders this essen
tial. Each year sees it rolling up into larger and
larger masses. The great joint-stock enterprises, where
enormous capital is obtained from many contributors,
gradually crush out smaller houses ; large emporiums
undersell small; large factories dwarf smaller. With
this increase too, the personal relation between em
ployers and employed ceases, and powerful corpora
tions begin to assert themselves as a political influence
solely for selfish ends, and with the cold persistence
and disregard for human interests which such asso
ciations invariably display. England, the greatest
capitalist country, may well show the world how to
take order with this dangerous growth which threatens
to overshadow human progress, and regulate without
injustice those purely selfish motives which hitherto
have been looked to as the sole hope of advance in
civilization.
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CHAPTER IV.
ORGANIZATION.
Now does any one imagine that with our present
restricted suffrage we are likely to carry in town or
country the social changes absolutely essential for the
well-being of the majority, or to reorganize our
political machinery in a workable shape within a
reasonable time ? Those who think thus must be of
a very sanguine disposition. When in history did
classes who hold property and power give up any
portion of their valuable and lucrative monopolies until
they saw clearly that surrender would be less harmful
than defeat ? The natural inclination of so-called
Conservatism is to make a dead stand against all
reform ; only now and then does a man arise in any
country who can persuade the people in possession
that, if they wish to avoid an overturn, they must have
a distinct constructive policy of their own.
Yet it is true that mere extension of the suffrage by
itself does not suffice to bring about much beneficial
change. In France manhood suffrage imposed upon
the people the rule of Napoleon III., with his gang of
gamblers and political thimble-riggers for twenty years.
The master may have meant well enough in his way,
but his men and their mistresses looked upon France
�ORGANIZATION.
89
as their fair prey. In Germany, as we see, universal
suffrage has not prevented Prince Bismarck from
maintaining the dominance of military Junkerdom
over a well-educated and, in the main, peaceful people.
In America the injurious influence of great capitalists
is severely felt, though there the people have the
power to put an end to their tyranny at once by com
bination at the polls. Even here in England we may
observe the same slow action on the part of voters
to bring forward social grievances. Wonders, for
instance, were looked for from the Reform Bill of
1832. It would be quite amusing, if it were not a
little sad, to read in the writers of the first quarter of
this century what changes for the better would be made
so soon as rotten boroughs were swept away, and the
power of aristocrats shaken. Yet, all this enthusiasm
notwithstanding, fourteen years elapsed before even
the Corn Laws were repealed—and that was a capi
talist not a working-class measure, inasmuch as cheap
food kept wages lower ; and the Factory Acts were
not passed, in a shape to be of any service, for sixteen
years. Then, too, the man who did more than any
other to force them on the legislature, in the face of
the interested opposition of the capitalists, was a non
political aristocrat, the present Lord Shaftesbury.
So with the Reform Bill of 1867, which in the eyes
of such a man as Mr. Lowe involved nothing short
of revolution. What great measures for the advantage
of the community at large have yet resulted from that ?
Ireland, no doubt, has secured some attention; and
the School Boards have commenced the work of educa
tion ; but on the whole it is surprising how little has
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been achieved in fourteen years. Still, it is impossible
to doubt that pressure from without would assume a
very different shape if every man in the British Islands
not a felon were entitled to"a vote. It is fair to assume
that no further change is pressed on now with vigour,
because the mass of the present voters have got all
they want.
For though it is the fashion to say that the Reform
Bill of 1867 gave power to the democracy, there is little
evidence of that as yet. To this day the working
class is outvoted by the shopkeeping class ; and the
preposterous absurdity of three-cornered constitu
encies has been foisted on us by political theorists,
to make matters worse. The extension of the borough
franchise to the counties will, no doubt, make a
difference to theagricultural labourer, and facilitate the
dealing with the land ; but that only puts the increas
ing working class in the towns at a greater relative
disadvantage. Manhood or adult suffrage is really
the only logical outcome of any arguments in favour
of the extension of the suffrage at all. Those who
make the wealth of the country have the right, if any
body has, to vote as to how it should be governed.
Drawbacks to such an extension there are, of course;
and elsewhere, as has been already remarked, mere
universal suffrage has not secured the social advance
ment which might have been hoped for. But unless
those who suffer most under present arrangements
have at least the means of putting forward repre
sentatives definitely pledged beforehand to redress
their grievances, the very motive power for reform is
lacking alike in Parliament and in local assemblies.
�ORGANIZA TION.
9i
We are now in a vicious circle. Shut men out from
voting, and a minority unjustly controls the country:
give the vote to all, and there is the risk of whole
sale corruption, as well as that ignorance should
become the ultimate court of appeal.
What probability is there, however, that, under any
circumstances,Tree compulsory education to remedy
this ignorance—or the enactment that bribery shall be
felony, to put a stop to corruption—will be carried in
our existing Parliament with the present suffrage ?
The idea is by no means confined to the Conserva
tives that universal education must involve a very
inconvenient growth of independence, which will ren
der men and women disinclined to supply menial
positions in the old-fashioned way. Possibly, too, the
workers of the community would begin to inquire into
the reasons of the present excessive disparity of wealth,
which would be more inconvenient still. School
Boards are already too expensive for some. The con
tention that really complete free education is the duty
of the State for the protection of the common interest,
is looked upon as little short of socialism by the
w’ell-to-do, who of course wish their children to start
lightly handicapped with a good education in the race
of life. The old hierarchical notions indeed still go
on, and people who have to fill the lower stations ought
in the opinion of many of the well-to-do to be mere
animals, without too much knowledge to make them
anxious for higher things. In this matter England
is still far behind countries which in respect of
political intelligence and political training are greatly
our inferiors. We who have hitherto led the way
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in so many European improvements, need not surely
look any longer across the sea to find that Frenchmen
and Germans have more share in the government of
their country than ourselves. More than ever important
is it then, as the first step towards the organization of
democracy, that all who add to the wealth of the coun
try shall have a voice in ordering how taxation should
be levied and spent. Manhood or adult suffrage could
alone supply the power to carry out genuine reform.
But other mere mechanical changes are needed at
the same time. That a Parliament should last six
years without a dissolution, has been found to be a
matter of serious inconvenience to the State at large.
Men who know that they are irremovable for so long
a period trust to national forgetfulness to cover up
their blunders. Many instances could be given of
this calculation, and its effects upon the course of
public business. Triennial Parliaments, or, better still,
a retirement of one-third of the members each year,
would keep the House of Commons thoroughly in har
mony with the constituencies, and quicken the general
interest in political affairs. Equal electoral districts
necessarily follow upon manhood or adult suffrage.
Any other arrangement would inevitably bring about
in a new form that injustice which we wish to get rid
of. The right of all to a vote once conceded, no man
can claim a greater share in representation than
another.
In the same way payment of all election expenses,
whether parliamentary or municipal, out of the public
funds, is essential. Wealth has already far too much
influence, without making political life almost im
�ORGANIZATION. •
93
possible to the poor man, and especially to the work
ing class. Why should a man be called upon to pay
a large fine in order to fill a public office for which his
countrymen think him qualified ? The working class
can never hope to be fairly represented till this has
been carried at the least. In the same way, pay
ment of members is but justice. Unpaid work as a
whole is bad work, done as a rule for social aggran
dizement, personal advancement, or the like. A re
presentative ought to feel that he is the servant of
the State, quite open to form his own judgment, but
still as much a part of the general executive as any
Minister. Moreover, this mere money business must
act as a drawback, or almost as exclusive, to poor
men. Few can afford to throw their whole time into the
House of Commons work on Committees, &c., with
out remuneration. Those who do, have generally
contrived as a body—landlords, capitalists, railway
directors, &c.—to reimburse themselves handsomely at
the expense of the country at large.
These four points therefore are imperatively needed
as the means towards a better organization :—
Manhood or Adult Suffrage.
Triennial or Annual Parliaments.
Equal Electoral Districts.
Payment of Members and especially of all Election
Expenses, out of public funds.
They are but means to an end; yet it is humi
liating to remember that they were demanded in
1848 by a powerful organization, and now here we
are in 1881 still without them. Englishmen have
lost pluck under middle-class rule. The influence
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
of the perpetual money-getting seems to have exer
cised a weakening effect’ on every portion of the
body politic. Nowadays, any sturdy demand for
plain rights is styled revolutionary ; and a sort of cant
patter-song of moderation is chanted by both parties,
who on all these matters are practically at one. It
does one good at such times to breathe the free bluff
air of downright agitation, when men call a spade a
spade, and a trimmer a useless flabby creature, to be
thrown into the political gutter as soon as may be.
For the definite issue we are now debating has been
led up to for at least three generations. The shock
of the Revolution in France enabled the upper and
middle classes here to set back reforms till our day
which were recognized as essential in a far different
state of things by such a man as Lord Chatham. Now
we see on every side nations beginning to govern
themselves wholly for the sake of the people. That
government of the people by the people of which
noble Abraham Lincoln spoke on the battle-field of
Gettysburg as the cause for which men fell there, is
the cause which we have yet to fight out peacefully
here.
For at this present moment, whilst we are discussing
the expediency of this or that step, a process of cen
tralization and decentralization is going forward,
which, unless we take means to understand and take
advantage of it, will land us all in administrative
anarchy. Universal suffrage, giving vent to direct
personal interest, but harmonized and consolidated
into a general effort for the public good, must be the
basis of that new social and political period on which we
�ORGANIZA TION.
95
are now entering. By itself it can do nothing ; but it
is surely possible, at our stage of political development,
to combine the full satisfaction of the wishes of the
people, and the improvement of their social position,
with the ideal of a great country leading European
development by virtue of true sagacity and healthy
vigour. It is such an ideal of public advantage that
can alone stimulate men to sacrifice their individual
crotchets to attain a great end.
To stand still is out of the question. Parliament,
as every one can see, no longer holds the position in
public esteem, or is able to carry on its work, as it did.
How far the House of Lords and the House of Com
mons may require remodelling is a point on which
men differ. That great changes are needed, alb are
agreed. The House of Lords stands only by reason
of its past. Many hesitate to attack it, as the City
hesitated to remove Temple Bar. It is antiquated
and cumbrous, and unquestionably blocks the way 5
but there are still historical associations which induce
men to shrink from a definite agitation for its over
throw. Besides, it is at the present time the best
debating club of its kind in Europe. There, on great
occasions, the traditions of oratory, which are begin
ning to fade from the House of Commons, may still
be found as a living force. But it is sad to see so
much ability fired into the air. Their lordships only
exchange their ordinary attitude of wrell-bred indif
ference and drowsiness for a more active interest when
some reactionary motion has to be affirmed to no
purpose.
Young men who grow up in that dull
atmosphere early acquire an apparent consciousness
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
of their own uselessness. Why should they longer
suffer, poor fellows, from this hereditary boredom ? It
would be charitable to relieve them from so false a
position as that which they now hold. A closer con
tact with the moving forces of English political life
might perhaps develope in some of them a worthy
ambition to lead, instead of languidly attempting to
dam back, the current of their time. This at any
rate is certain, that the time is rapidly passing away
when a caucus of territorial magnates can play at
being superior creatures to their fellow-countrymen,
and amuse themselves by retarding legislation which
the mass of Englishmen have decided upon.
To sweep away any institution altogether is, how
ever, scarcely our English way. So long as it can be
advantageously modified we cling to the old form.
That the hereditary principle must be done away with
as an anachronism and an absurdity would be ad
mitted by thousands, who would still wish to have a
second chamber—not to interfere with or hamper the
direct representatives of democracy, but to maintain a
continuity in general policy which such a body as a
reformed House of Commons could scarcely command.
Here, of course, is the great difficulty of our party
system of Government, and it can never be lessened
save by the formation of some great consultative
assembly, in which representatives of all portions of
our great commonwealth and dependencies find a seat*
It may be that the American Senate, devised by men
who had thoroughly studied the dangers of waves of
popular excitement, is too powerful a body for us to
wish to constitute a similar check upon the Lower
�ORGANIZATION.
97
House ; for the Senate in the United States, owing to
its method of election, the personal reputation of its
members, and the authority accorded, is the powerful
House ; whilst with us, if parliamentary government is
maintained in its present shape, the House of Commons
can scarcely fail to be supreme. The danger of dead
locks here, however, would not be nearly so great as
in our colonies, where the power of the purse is divided.
What we need in place of the House of Lords is a
Great Council for the public discussion and revision of
treaties, the maintenance of a constant survey of our
foreign relations—which will be greatly facilitated
when the present system of secret diplomacy is put an
end to—and a regulation of the policy towards our
great colonies and dependencies, in conjunction with
direct representatives from them. These duties are
now not performed at all; during the last twenty
years we have had but too many occasions to lament
that lack of continuity in our policy which at times
makes us the laughing-stock of the world. Such a great
consultative and deliberative council might worthily
take the place which the House of Lords held when it
was really a power in the State. Now it is merely a
nuisance ; and the sooner a change is made which shall
bring the second chamber once more into a useful
sphere of existence, the better for the stability of the
Constitution in its best sense. Such a modification,
indeed, though radical to start with, would be highly
conservative in the best sense in the long-run. The
abler men would probably welcome a change which
whilst, as we see in France, it makes no great difference
in their social distinction—for certain classes cling to
H
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
ancient lineage as something to worship—freed their
hands and enabled them to enter into the real poli
tical strife of the day without restraint.
The future of the House of Commons is a very
different matter. At the present time, partly by its
own fault, and partly by the force of circumstances,
that noble historical assembly has also lost influence
with the people, because it has grasped at more power
than it can conveniently handle, and is far too slow
to suggest any reform of itself. Did any body of men,
by the way, ever reform themselves ? That is really
the difficulty we are at present in. There is no power
outside the House of Commons to reform the House of
Commons ; to hear some members talk, one might
suppose it was still the collective wisdom of the nation.
Such scenes, however, as those which occurred with
regard to the Irish members, the voting on the Brad
laugh oath, and the hopeless block of legislation—
occasioned not so much by obstruction, though there
has been a great deal of that without the justification
which the Irish members could claim on the
Coercion Bill, as by the endless flood of conversational
small talk which men of no special knowledge or
ability seem to think they owe to their constituencies—•
have gradually convinced the country that a complete
change in the functions of Parliament can alone right
the existing state of things.
Neither manhood suffrage nor the reform of methods
of election will put an end to obstruction, check
silly garrulity, or remove the excessive business with
which the House of Commons is cumbered. And here
we come to a point at which much difference of opinion
�ORGANIZA TION.
99
must necessarily arise. That greater powers should be
given to local assemblies to deal with many matters
which now come before the House of Commons, may
be admitted without dispute ; but howfar the authority
of these local assemblies should extend is a matter of
difference. Irishmen demand home rule, or even
separation ; Scotchmen and Welshmen have as yet no
such anxiety to obtain parliaments to themselves. But
with manhood suffrage in full force, it is clear that the
rights of the people will be far more completely pro
tected than they are at present, and that power could
be more safely handed over to local authorities.
National and Federal parliaments, desirable as they
are, can scarcely be organized till there is a more
active demand for them. The Irish do make the
demand, and the possibility of fairly meeting it
without actual disruption of the Empire is a pressing
question at this moment.
In England, Scotland, and Wales, however, the
county, the municipality, the township, are old wellunderstood divisions, and to them, under one or other
of the numerous schemes which have been before
the public, might be handed over jurisdiction in
respect of many matters on which the House of
Commons has at present to be consulted. Local
representative assemblies, properly elected to transact
the rapidly growing business of the whole population,
would take an amount of petty work off Parliament,
with which it ought never to have been saddled. All
this, of course, will shortly be attempted ; and with
the power of the democracy brought to bear for the
collective adyantage, the old local bodies will be
H 2
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
invigorated with fresh life. County assemblies and
municipal boards will then perhaps cease to be, as
they so often are now, mere inefficient and corrupt
vestries. It is unreasonable that the House of
Commons should undertake to settle what these
local bodies could equally well arrange for themselves.
A wide scheme of decentralization, carried out with a
view to interesting the whole population in their local
business, would but serve to strengthen the House of
Commons for dealing with affairs now pushed aside by
less important matters to the injury of the whole com
munity, and raise again the character of its debates.
It is remarkable, indeed, that as wealth, power, and
political influence have been concentrated in the
hands of the upper and middle classes local vigour has
to a certain extent died down. In the future the
municipalities, as we can already see, will have far wider
duties to undertake than those which they perform at
present. Lighting, water, artisans’ dwellings—these,
instead of being left to individual companies will be
undertaken by the local bodies, as also the providing
of public parks and recreation-grounds. When full
power is vested in such corporations and county
boards to take what land is needed at a valuation for
the purpose either of building or of granting per
manent leases for agricultural purposes, a far greater
amount of interest will attach to the improvement of
the management, and men of a superior character will
be anxious to take part in the business. All such
decentralization, in the sense that these bodies are
given great powers without applying to Parliament, will
also act in the direction of peaceful development, and
�ORGANIZA T10N.
IOI
give the working classes that impetus towards social
improvement by their own energy which is so mani
festly necessary.
At the same time, though municipal and local
business may form a good training for local adminis
tration, it by no means follows that a good vestryman
or aiderman makes a good member of Parliament
when obligations beyond the range of a three months’
bill are under discussion. It is remarkable indeed
that in such matters working men, who literally do
not know whether their present week’s wage will be
continued the next, have a far wider idea of their
duties, and take a much higher view of the position
which a great country like ours ought to assume
in its dealings with its dependencies and foreign
powers, than mere mercantile men. The latter are
far too apt to consider everything from the pounds,
shillings, and pence point of view. Will such a
policy increase immediately the national turn over ?
then it is excellent. Will it involve doubtful expen
diture for a great moral principle, or serious political
agitation for a great future national benefit? such a
proposal must of necessity be unsound. This sort of
reasoning is well enough up to a certain point, and the
kind of intelligence which developes it—Lord Derby
probably has that sort of capacity to the highest
degree of any man living—is most careful to secure
economy in local affairs; but where business of
national or imperial importance is involved, such
counsellors are feeble and dangerous.
Now as in the management of general municipal
improvements and county affairs of all kinds, local
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energy, and even, in the wide sense, personal objects
ought to be allowed free play, so in these more general
concerns, where the necessity for a greater centraliza
tion is manifestly increasing, a reformed House of
Commons should exercise far more direct control,
delegating its authority, as at the present time, to a
great officer of State and his department.
All can see quite plainly that in certain matters
management by the State is essential to efficiency. It
is perhaps a question whether the post and telegraphs
ought to be worked at a profit; but no one doubts
nowadays that the business is on the whole better and
more cheaply done than if it were in private hands.
Blunders are made, no doubt; but mistakes are
easily complained of and remedied. Obviously the
railways must sooner or later follow the same course.
This is one of the reasons why local business should
be removed from Parliament. It destroys the sense
of perspective for members to have constantly to
adjudicate on petty private bills, when matters of
really great national concern ought to be continually
before them. Nothing more shortsighted was ever
done by an English Parliament—middle-class busi
ness men, too, let us remember—than the turning
over of the great new highways of the country to
monopolists for ever. This is what has been—nay,
what is being, done to the permanent and growing
disadvantage of the whole community. No idea
seems to have entered the minds of our worthy rulers
that this handing over in perpetuity was as mischievous
a piece of folly as ever was perpetrated.
We Englishmen often jeer at Frenchmen for their
�ORGANIZATION.
fondness for paternal rule ; and we certainly should
not submit for a week to many of the restrictions on
individual liberty which Republican France bears
without a murmur. Their tariff also we regard as
injurious, and many of their arrangements as mistaken.
Yet they were shrewd enough to see that to saddle
coming generations with payments to private investors
was a grave injury to the nation and a sacrifice of
public property. As a result, within fifty or sixty
years France will be relieved entirely of her national
debt by the falling in of the railways, or transport at
cost will be secured to the community. Now that is
business; that is foresight for a people. Such an
advantage we cannot secure, save by some great
change in the right of inheritance or by purchase.
The present system cannot be allowed to go on for
ever. That the labour of succeeding generations should
be eternally handicapped by payments to the labour
of the dead, is too preposterous. If turnpikes have
been found to be an intolerable nuisance, and fees for
bridges have been done away, it is scarcely probable
that we shall much longer put up with a system of
railway management so entirely opposed to the
interests of the mass of the people, as well as of the
trading class, as that which now we suffer from. We
are a long-suffering people, but we shall never stand
that.
This question of monopolies is rapidly coming to
the front. The old notion that competition would
always come in to serve the community, has proved
wholly fallacious. Combination has in many instances
perhaps in most, defeated the calculations of the legis
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lature ; and the power of the great companies to fight
off those whom they consider intruders, has been
exercised without any scruple whatever. All the
recent evidence tends in the same direction. The
railway companies treat their customers as if the
public had been specially created by some beneficent
providence for these monopolists to prey upon and
get interest for shareholders. This view is natural
enough ; and we see in America that the system is
carried yet further. Monopolies granted by the State
are made the means of fleecing the community.
Thus once more we have the illusory freedom of con
tract. The House of Commons, as representative of the
people, allows a monopoly to be created, and then this
monopoly is used to the public detriment. Unfortu
nately, the remedy is not so easy as might appear.
The total price of the railways at present quo
tations would exceed i ,000,000,oooZ., and he would
be a bold financier who should propose to increase the
national debt by that sum at the present time. But pri
vate interests cannot be allowed to stand permanently
in the way of the community at large. The right
of interference has never been disputed. If the House
of Commons had not been full of representatives of
the Railway interest, steps would long since have been
taken by the Government to secure for Englishmen at
large far greater advantage in return for the monopoly
granted. It is plain, for example, that the State
could construct a railroad from London say to Liver
pool or Manchester, at a very much less cost than
the capitalized value of either of the existing lines.
If the stockholders have not taken this fact into account,
�ORGANIZATION.
io5
that is their own look-out. No Parliament nor any
succession of Parliaments, could guarantee a mono
poly against another company that showed good cause
for the construction of a line ; still less could it be
assured against the State. Consequently when it
becomes necessary, as it shortly must, to acquire the
railways, no such absurd estimate of value need be
made as in the case of the London water com
panies. Our tendency has been as the nation to show
ourselves too considerate of so-called vested interests,
simply because the classes which hold those vested
interests have had the entire control in every way—
to assume, indeed, when the State has to deal with
them that some exceptional price must be paid. This
is quite incorrect. When the decision is come to that
for the national interest the railways should be ac
quired, it would be perfectly fair to purchase at a
valuation, without any reference whatever to a future
monopoly-value, which does not and could not exist
against the country at large. A special issue of ter
minable annuities might be made to cover the whole
matter. But without entering on details, it is clear
that the recent arbitrary action of Railway Companies,
especially towards the working classes, will, ere long,
bring this whole question to a climax.1
That State management would pay, there is very
little doubt. Improved organization would produce
1 The infamous overwork of their servants by the Railway
Companies as recently exposed, is alone enough to call for im
mediate State interference. The brutal greed of corporations
was never exhibited in a more shameless form at the expense of
both the men and the public.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
a profit by the reduction of working expenses. But
far more important than any idea of profit, is the
prospect, under proper direction,”of cheapening trans
port, and securing for the working-classes really cheap
travel in the neighbourhood of large cities. It is
scarcely too much to say that sixpenny weekly
tickets, available for any distance within ten miles,
coupled with a well-regulated system of artisans’
dwellings, erected by the muncipality and let at
rents to cover cost of construction, would completely
change the whole life of our great cities, reducing rents
for unwholesome tenements, and gradually leading to
a better condition in every respect. It is also by no
means certain that the suggestion made by a Civil En
gineer that a one shilling fare should apply to the whole
United Kingdom, would not, in some modified form,
prove as great a success as the penny post. In any
case it is manifest that the Railways are the national
highways, that in regard to the transfer of both goods
and passengers they work for the shareholders and
not for the community, and that consequently the busiof the country is carried on at a growing disadvantage.
Besides, the land and the railways are inseparably
bound up together, and those who talk about
“nationalising” the one without touching the other,
overlook a most important feature in thewholebusiness.
The chief objection to the acquirement of the railways
even on terms which might seem highly advantageous
from a financial point of view, would doubtless be
the danger of increasing the power of the Government
by the formation of so vast a bureaucracy. But this
ought to involve no political danger, with full pub-
�ORGANIZA TION.
107
licity and a distinct removal of the railways from the
sphere of State patronage. Certainly the fear of what
might happen in this way ought not to keep back the
country from laying hands upon a set of corporations
whose directors work their influence with the most
perfect selfishness, using their railroads to help their
politics, and their politics to help their railroads.
That sort of see-saw is quite as objectionable as any
bureaucratic taint. With the advance of democracy,
and the reference of all questions to the people, it has
become more and more clear that the Civil Service,
as a profession, should be kept clear of politics
and party. Where this is not done all sorts of mis
chief creep in ; where it is, and full publicity is main
tained—an essential point too—there the organization
is a great gain to all. The right of representation
of grievances by State officials must of course be fully
secured.
Railways, then, like the control of mines, factories,
and workshops, must be placed under the State—the
former for management, the latter for supervision.
These are matters which affect the entire national
welfare, and can only be adequately dealt with by
national ordinance. Manifestly rivers, canals, and
drainage, fall under the same head. The neglect of
these as a matter of national importance is really
most astonishing. At present our rivers—dhe water
shed and drinking source of the whole country—are
treated as municipalities, or even as individuals, think
fit. This too, though the urban population, as the
late census clearly shows, is increasing in density
almost to the danger-point. Decentralization in this
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
matter is really ruinous to the public interest. Drain
age works are carried out, sewage and refuse of the
most unpleasant nature are disposed of, without much
reference to the effect which the action of one town
or one owner may produce in other directions. No
doubt there are bye-laws and statutes, but they have
never been properly put in force. The injury already
done by this separatist system is enormous. For the
future, therefore, all arrangements affecting rivers or
canals should be under the management of a public
department, specially constituted to take in the bear
ings of the whole subject, whilst leaving to the county
assemblies, local boards, municipalities, and even
township vestries, the fullest powers of carrying out
their own projects within the limits that concern only
themselves.
As the powers of these local bodies to acquire land
and other property can scarcely fail to be largely in
creased in the near future and their rights to make
improvements extended, it is the more essential that
to start with the due position of the central authority
should be clearly defined, secured, and strengthened.
Of the existing departments, or the proposal to create
a Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, it is need
less to speak here; that is a mere matter of conveni
ence in separating functions now combined. But in
all such matters the tendency towards the simul
taneous operation of causes which tend to centraliza
tion, as well as those which invite the strengthening of
local forces, ought not to be neglected. To create
social or political machinery is beyond the power of
assemblies or autocrats ; to take care that the natural
growth of a nation should be fostered instead of
�ORGANIZATION.
109
hindered is the true function of a statesman. Surely
it is reasonable to foresee that the existing fierce
competition will in many directions besides that of
railroads develope into combination, and thus gradually
be turned to the advantage of all.
There is no need to fear the crushing of individuality
in all this. Rather will there gradually rise up a higher
individuality, when each can look to his own develop
ment as contributing to the advancement of all.
But the success of any movement depends upon the
mass of the people, and the readiness of those who
ought already to have voting power to press forward
earnestly the interests of themselves and their chil
dren. Nothing can be done unless the people are
prepared to organize their forces. Here, however, are
what seem the natural reforms demanded for the
organization of the great democracy on which the
future of England depends :—Manhood or adult suffrage, with the other electoral
reforms already specified.
The reform of the House of Lords into a Great
Council, in which our colonies and dependencies
should be fully represented.
The restriction of the House of Commons as a
whole to dealing with national questions ; the arrange
ment of great committees, &c., being adjusted to the
changed conditions.
A great increase of power to be given to county
boards and municipal councils, to purchase land for
public use, &c.,so that even without federal parliaments
all matters affecting separate districts could be dealt
with locally, subject to the general law.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
The entire system of national railways to be pur
chased ■ at a valuation, by annuities secured on the
railways, and managed by a State department in the
interest of the mass of the community.
A department to be formed dealing more directly
with the main watercourses, canals, and forestry than
any now in existence.
An extension of the Factory and Mines Acts, and
inspection of shipping, so as to constitute the State
more completely the protector of men and women
who under freedom of contract are, bound unfairly
to risk their lives and their health to get a bare
subsistence.
To these may be added the social reforms previously
advocated:—
Free compulsory education for all.
Eight hours to be the working day.
Compulsory erection of artisans’ dwellings by muni
cipalities and county assemblies in place of unhealthy
houses or dwellings removed for improvements.
Cheap trains, at the rate of sixpence for a weekly
ticket, on all lines within ten or fifteen miles of a
great city.
By these means centralization and decentralization
would have free play to work themselves out ; a great
pressure would be removed from our historical assem
blies—both of which would be strengthened by a
reduction of numbers and a more direct representa
tion of the mass of the people and the interests of the
whole empire.
Those who suppose that democracy tends to dis
organization and anarchy quite misread the signs of
�ORGANIZATION.
hi
the times. Wherever educated democracy has the
freest play, precisely there will be found the most
complete organization, both in public and in private
affairs. The danger arises, if at all, from the opposite
quarter. But Englishmen have clearly begun to see
that in this direction only can their further develop
ment go on. The aristocracy had their day; in
1832 their power was shaken, to be gradually sapped
up to the present time. They have chosen to throw in
their lot with the bourgeoisie, and to trade on the
necessities of the labourer with them. For fifty years
we have experienced middle-class rule: that is
tottering to its fall, with no record but selfishness in
home affairs. Now comes the turn of England at large
as represented by the men who are really the England
of to-day. It is for them to see that their future is
worthy of the greatness of their country, ensuring the
physical and moral welfare of all by organization and
self-sacrifice.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
CHAPTER V.
IRELAND.
It is perhaps the most telling commentary upon our
government of Ireland, that in dealing with the affairs
of that island English statesmen are still obliged to
proceed in every respect upon the separate system.
Ireland has been an integral portion of the United
Kingdom for eighty years, and yet we have at this
time more than 30,000 troops and 12,000 constabulary
occupied in keeping down a serious rebellion. This, at
any rate, is the contention of the people immediately
responsible for that law and order to secure which
a Liberal Ministry has been content to override the
first guarantee of all liberty, and to proclaim the
capital of the country in a state of siege. There is,
perhaps, no need for the mass of Englishmen to take
special blame to themselves for the harm which has
been done. They are scarcely responsible for a
policy over which [as a mass they have exercised
no real control. Yet it is impossible to compare
what has happened with Ireland to that which has
taken place in regard to Alsace and Lorraine, or
Savoy and Nice, without being compelled to acknow
ledge that in all that relates to a subject people they
manage these matters better in France. Reforms in
�IRELAND.
ii3
Ireland—political, religious, economical, social—have
in every case been delayed, until they have ceased
to be boons to the people ; pressure from without has
been waited for in every instance, until it took an
explosive shape; and men who to start with were
ready to welcome moderate measures, have been
driven to combine on an almost revolutionary pro
gramme, from sheer hopelessness of obtaining justice
in any other way.
There is no need to go back to the history of cen
turies of misgovernment to account for what we see
to-day. Doubtless the wrongs of the past have done
much to embitter the relations between two coun
tries which ought to be at one; but enough has
occurred within the lifetime of the present genera
tion to account for that sad state of affairs which
politicians of all parties deplore and all ought to
strive to remedy. In Ireland, as in England and
Scotland, the people have been deprived of the pos
session of their own land in favour of a small minority.
Such manufactures as existed having been destroyed
long since by English legislation, and Ireland not
producing iron and coal to a profitable extent, the
men have been unable to seek in the cities the work
which their brothers in destitution across the chan
nel were enabled to obtain. Hence arose that earth
hunger which enabled landowners to exact rackrents, and left the people to multiply on poor food,
nearer and ever nearer to the limit of starvation.
Foreign conquest and absenteeism have aggravated
the mischief politically and economically. Difference
of race and religion rendered grave social ills more
I
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
difficult to deal with. But the great catastrophe
of 1847 ought to have opened our eyes to some por
tion of the truth—ought to have shown the people of
England that here we nad an exceptional problem to
deal with, and that such dominance as had been esta
blished was discreditable to the rulers and ruinous to
the ruled.
That fearful famine formed the starting-point of
the modern history of Ireland. It had been predicted
by men of very different views and capacities. It
came, as such cataclysms sometimes do come, in its
worst possible shape, and was followed up by revolu
tionary legislation which all can now see was most,
unfortunate. Instead of accepting the wise recom
mendations of the Devon Commission-—made, be it
remembered, three years before the famine—or the
still wiser advice of Lord Beaconsfield, given about
the same time, but latei* so unfortunately withdrawn
—full rights were given to landlords, new and old,. to
uproot the population, tear down their miserable
dwellings, and hurry them across the Atlantic, famine
fever wearing out their bodies, and fury at such in
justice and tyranny rankling in their minds. Who
that has read through the details of that miserable
time, when men, women, and children were turned
out of their holdings,—as they are now being turned
out, though happily in far fewer numbers—to wander
in starvation and misery along the highways, can
wonder that a generation has grown up in Ireland and
in the United States which regards with inextinguish
able hatred England and all that belongs to her ?
The very Encumbered Estates Act, a most valu-
�IRELAND.
ii5
able measure in itself if carefully carried out,
forced the lands of ancient proprietors who under
stood the people, not into the control of the State,
which would have acted with some consideration, but
into the hands of foreign speculators, who bought at
a low price with the express purpose of raising the
rents upon the tenants. An absenteeism was thus
created worse than that which had existed before. In
the end, doubtless, good came out of evil for those
who were left; but twenty-four years elapsed before
any effort was made on the part of the Imperial
Parliament to secure to the mass of the people of
Ireland some portion of the benefits which even the
Devon Commission had urged.
All this while, over the greater part of Ireland a
purely agricultural community had no security of
tenure of any sort or kind, and the church of the
small minority was kept up at the expense of those
who were of a different creed. Irishmen, who in the
United States did an amount of hard work which
almost reconciled the not very sympathetic Americans
to their gregarious habits in the cities, and their
religious belief, so hostile to the Puritanism which
even sceptics in that great country still consider it
prudent to affect—Irishmen, who in our colonies,
notwithstanding many defects, have brought them
selves to the front by their industry, were accused in
their own country of idleness and indifference, because,
after centuries of misrule, they could see no object
in giving their masters their labour for nothing.
That was really the fact. All accounts agree that
wherever in Ireland a man has a permanent tenure of
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
a fair piece of land, in the great majority of cases he
works as hard as an Indian ryot or French peasant
proprietor. It is absurd, of course, to deny the in
fluence of race and climate; none would contend
that a Saxon and an Irishman have the same quali
ties. But the remarkable feature in the whole matter
is, that the descendants of Saxons have been just as
much opposed, and more violent in showing their
opposition to the landlord-made legislation, as the
Irish themselves. Nor have they been one whit
more industrious than their Celtic neighbours. The
descendants of Cromwell’s soldiery, though more
turbulent under injustice, have not been any more
inclined to give the fruits of their labour to
their landlords than the Catholics around them.
But wherever tenant-right has been introduced-and
fairly held to, there, notwithstanding the fact that
economical disturbances — American competition,
slackened demand for store beasts in England and
Scotland, no requirement for casual Irish labour
in the summer—have affected the whole island,
there peace and quiet have in the main pre
vailed.
As a mere matter of national business it would have
been cheap to have given the tenants a permanent
hold upon the soil, even if the landlords had been
compensated beyond the value of what they parted
with. The cost of the maintenance of a large army
and a great constabulary in Ireland cannot well be
estimated in actual money. Many considerations are
involved. But in any case, have we the right to pre
vent 5,500,000 people from settling their own local
�IRELAND.
117
business in their own way ? Surely there is not
an Englishman of either party who does not feel
that our present attitude is somewhat hypocritical.
It may be that Irishmen if left to themselves would
not make the best possible settlement of their own
affairs ; but are English landlords qualified to judge
of the matter for them any better ? They have
hitherto constituted the ultimate court of appeal.
When we speak of the unfairness of Irish juries in
agrarian cases, let us at least remember the persistent
unfairness of the great English jury of legislators on
this question of life or death to the people of Ireland.
Even when the House of Commons has been willing
to give in, the House of Lords has stood by their own
class; and here, in the last quarter of the nineteenth
century, we have as honest and patriotic a man as
ever lived, hotheaded and furious though he be, taken
and put in gaol, though also a member of Parliament,
for having denounced, and urged his countrymen to
resist, a most tyrannous system of evictions. And let
us bear this in mind, that unfortunately the immense
majority of the Liberal party were highly delighted
at the arrest of Mr. Dillon, and cheered like madmen
at the arrest of Mr. Davitt.
The history of the last few months of panic and
misgovernment in Ireland is worth consideration by
all who hold that justice and freedom are worth some
thing in themselves, aside from the question whether
a party chooses to throw them over or not. What
has occurred since July of last year is alone enough
to prove conclusively that no country could be peace
able under such a rule as we have inflicted upon the
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
people of Ireland. Steady despotism would be far
preferable to such miserable incapacity and vacillation
as have been exhibited.
For here is what has taken place. Last year, after
Ireland had suffered from a period of severe privation,
which fell upon the small tenant-farmers and the
labourers with redoubled severity owing to their
being unable to obtain work in England, the landlords
—or rather a few of the baser sort—began to evict their
tenantry. Hunger and sense of injustice combined
made men desperate. The Land Bill of 1870, though
by no means a satisfactory measure, had given a
tenant a certain claim to compensation for disturb
ance in all cases save non-payment of rent. If evicted
for not paying his rent, however, this right to com
pensation was gone, and he went out upon the high
roads a pauper, with the workhouse as his only
refuge. This eviction, therefore, was felt to be a
greater hardship than any previous eviction, because
it was not only harsh, but in the view of the tenant
unjust. Good landlords, of course, were considerate
in Ireland as elsewhere : people like Lord Lansdowne,
whose idea of landed property necessarily involved
serfdom and servility (as he was good enough to
inform the Americans, of all people in the world,
through the Chicago TriJmne), were naturally eager
not to lose the advantage of any misfortune among
their tenantry. That few should have acted in this
contemptible fashion gives no conception of the alarm
produced. Not a very large proportion of tenants
in the year are rack-rented ; but that proportion acts
as a damper upon thousands of others in improving
�IRELAND.
119
their farms, and prevents them from making the
best of their labour.
These evictions, then, having begun, and going on
in an increasing ratio, the Government boldly and
rightly introduced a Bill of the most carefully-guarded
character, to prevent downright oppression and
tyranny from being brought to bear. That Bill, after
some of the most bitter discussions in the House of
Commons and in the press ever known, wras passed
by a considerable majority, the Prime Minister
making himself prominent of course in its champion
ship, and saying, what recent events have proved only
too clearly to be the truth, that if it were not passed
we should be within a measureable distance of civil
war. This, be it remembered also, took place after
the Government had declined to renew the Peace
Preservation Act, on the express ground that it was
.contrary to the principles of liberty and Liberalism.
Very well. What followed was not only probable but
certain. The House of Lords, seeing the whole right
of eviction when contrary to common interest jeopar
dized by the measure, threw out the Bill. The
Government—that is the opinion of all parties in
Ireland—winked at the agitation which followed.
That agitation was, in view of what had passed,
justifiable and righteous, and was carried on, when
once the Land League had obiained a hold upon the
people, with surprisingly little bloodshed or bad action.
A vast agrarian strike was organized—not against all
rent, but against rent above a certain valuation.
There were also rattenings and boycottings, where
men took land from which tenants had been evicted.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
Many things, no doubt, were done, and are being done
now, most obnoxious to Englishmen : the injuries to
cattle in particular are dastardly in the extreme.
Gradually, as evictions went on, and help was received
from sympathizers in America, temper rose, and the
feeling—mingled with that race and religious hatred
which is the worst feature of all, because the least
capable of yielding to reason—became very bitter.
But what has it been after all ? A trifle beside the
agitations of 1848 and 1833, and to be met—that was
the just contention of the Government and the Liberal
party—not by repression, but by reform. “ Force is
no remedy,” said Mr. Bright, strong as he always has
been on this Irish question ; and there was not a
genuine liberal Englishman in the country who would
not have stood behind those words. And force has
been no remedy—has only aggravated the whole
mischief. But what comes now ? The Cabinet
having been summoned in hot haste in December,
decided that in these days we must deal with popular
grievances, even when exaggerated, by reason and
argument, and not by bullets and buckshot—and
separated without calling Parliament together. A
little while and Mr. Forster again comes over, with
woe-begone visage, and Parliament is summoned. A
Coercion Act and Arms Act become law, at what a
strain to our whole system of parliamentary govern
ment we perhaps yet scarcely know. Members of
the House of Commons, acting no doubt very provokingly, but still entirely within their rights, are
silenced and ejected; and Ireland is put under a
suspensive state of siege.
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121
Thus the very Government which had declared that
evictions of a certain kind were most unjust, and must
be restrained, put in the hands of the landlords as
complete a machinery of eviction as they had ever
possessed, and backed it up by pouring troops into the
country. And evictions soon multiplied. Men,
women, and children were turned out under circum
stances which reproduced here in England would
have brought about an insurrection.
What ? Let us for once use plain language about
these things. Has a Government, have any number
of landlords, sitting in Parliament to represent a
dominant caste, the right to turn a man, his wife, and
children, out into the bitter air of January, because,
poor devil, there had been a famine, and he could not
pay his rent ? I say No. Last year the vast majority
of the House of Commons said No ; and if the ques
tion were fairly put to them I believe the vast
majority of Englishmen to-day would say No. Ire
land, it is true, cannot hope to resist successfully such
shameful oppression, but why should English work
ing men sanction and support action which, if applied
to themselves, they would rise against ? The truth
is, and this will shortly become apparent to all, the
tenant-farmers and labourers of Ireland are fighting
the battle of the working-classes of England in
relation to the land, and get far less support than
they ought to get on grounds where they are both
agreed. This, at least, is certain, that unless the
Land League had been formed, and the Irish had
stood together in a great economical movement, no
such Land Bill as that of 1881 would have been
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
brought before the English House of Commons at
■all. The Land League, whether it be called com
munistic, nationalistic, or what not, brought the first
genuine attempt yet made at reform within the range
of practical politics, and must be maintained to give
it effect.
The facts in relation to Irish land have been made
known to all by means of the propaganda which they
carried on. There are but 12,000 landowners in all
Ireland, and 1000 of them own two-thirds of the island.
One fourth of these landowners are permanent absen
tees, who take their rents to the amount of millions
sterling out of the country, and spend them elsewhere.
And yet six-sevenths of the population have to derive
their subsistence from the land, and naturally enough
compete against one another to such an extent as to
raise rents to a high figure. Say the theorists, Irishmen
are too fond of land, are too much given to agricul
ture. .This is quite absurd. In the. United/States
the Americans make precisely the opposite complaint.
They say that the Irish are too much addicted to
crowding into the cities; and ‘so they undoubtedly
are,. But iruJreland they stick to the land, for the
best of all possible reasons, that there is nothing else
for them to get a living out of; and as arable land is
being continually turned into pasture by the large
landowners and large farmers, there is less and less
employment for them as labourers, and less and less
land which they can take up to feed themselves and
their, families upon. Noone disputes the sad condi
tion of a vast proportion of the tenant farmers who
hold under fifteen acres, which amount to more than
�IRELAND.
123
half the whole 500,000. Those who drag out a
miserable existence in Mayo and Connemara, would
be no better off if they held their patches in fee.
Migration and emigration are the only possible
remedies for these people.
But here, as in England, the first step is to get the
land out of the hands of the large proprietors, and
enable the people of Ireland to work out their own
social difficulties. The great main drainage works
which some reformers clamour for, cannot possibly
be carried out for the benefit of the landowners, whose
properties would be improved; neither can reclama
tion go on without some regard to economical and
physical conditions. The tendency of bog to revert
to bog is as well-known in Scotland as in Ireland.
That Ireland is in itself a poor country has lately
been disputed, and with good reason. It is not a
poor country, but a poor people, that we have to deal
with. In Ireland, to take the same comparison as
was made in the case of England, the population has
decreased nearly 3,000,000 in thirty years, and the
assessment to income-tax has grown by 15,000,000/.
annually. Moreover, the deposits in the banks point
in the same direction. Ireland itself, therefore, has
become far richer in the last generation, but the dis
tribution of that wealth is so faulty that a year of bad
crops means little short of famine to a large population.
Happily, the Act of 1881 accepts principles which
have hitherto been scouted as communistic. The
distinct object which underlies the economical
clauses is to secure to a portion at least of the
population that right to the fruits of their labour,
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
of which they have hitherto been deprived by land
lords under the name of freedom of contract. Why
is it that peasant proprietorship has, on the whole,
been beneficial where people have been settled on the
soil ? Surely because in this way alone could a man
and his family, in our existing system of society, be
secure of the fruits of his own labour. In every other
case, where the poor man wishes to obtain employment
he is deprived of a portion of his produce for the benefit
of others. Unquestionably the Liberal Government
has made a great step forward when it recognizes in
a definite measure that freedom of contract, where the
force is all on one side, may, and in many cases must
mean, injustice and tyranny.
But to suppose that any Land Act, however care
fully drawn—that any courts, however impartial—will
settle the Irish question, is to assume far more than
the facts warrant. Nothing was more noteworthy than
the disposition of the tenant-farmers all over the
country to sink their differences in view of the agita
tion for a mitigated form of the three F’s, which will
probably break down—or a peasant proprietorship,
which will involve the pressure of the gombeen man.
This latter point is worth a moment’s consideration.
India is, it is true, different in many ways from
Ireland ; but there the right of eviction by the money
lender has been found more dangerous and objec
tionable than eviction by any other method. Should
not restriction be placed on mortgage and bill of sale
here, too, if we desire to prevent similar expropria
tions from taking place, and giving rise to a dis
tinctly socialist agitation, whicly could not be dealt
�IRELAND.
125
with under present conditions ? But the Land Act
as it has passed constitutes such an enormous advance
upon what seemed possible even a few months ago,
that Irishmen would be foolish indeed not to make
as much of it as they can. To secure the tenants in
their holdings, to obtain assistance in settling a
peasant proprietory on the land, and help for emigra
tion and migration, are steps towards that pacification
which full patience alone can bring about. But for
the shameful and silly Coercion Act a hope might
have arisen, not of a settlement of all Irish difficulties
—such impatience to get rid of the natural troubles
of administration argues weakness and incapacity—
but of a better understanding between the English
and the Irish peoples.
That, little as it may seem to be so at this moment,
has really been the outcome of the agitation. For
the first time in recent Irish history, a vast number
of Englishmen of all classes have felt that wrong was
being done in their name when the common rights of
the United Kingdom were suspended in deference to
the clamour of an interested and panic-stricken
minority. Even the race hatred and the jealousy of
keen competitors in the labour-market have been to a
certain extent laid aside in view of the fact that
injustice was being done. Had the Irish managed
their own case better, and kept religious differences
altogether out of sight when a political end was in
view, this understanding between the democracy of
the two countries might have already progressed even
farther than it has. There need be no real differ
ence. There is room enough and to spare for the
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
workers of both races under a better system than that
which has hitherto found favour. We are, let us
hope, approaching the time when we shall endeavour
to rule in all cases with the consent of the majority—
when the highest aim of every statesman will be to
reconcile all to a beneficial union, in which every
member is contented and free.
That many grievances still remain unredressed
even now that the Land Act has been passed,
is unfortunately but too certain. That absurd
playing at Viceroyalty in Dublin, with an English
Chief Secretary, and a worn-out bureaucracy at
the Castle, would aggravate a less touchy people
than the Irish. What do they want with a Viceroy
and underlings, any more than the Scotch ? Why
should Irishmen more than Scotchmen be shut out
from the management of their own affairs ? “ They
hate you, it is said, and long to drive you out.” Has
any reason for love been given ? At least let us
wait to see whether a definite alliance between the
English and Irish democracies be not possible, before
continuing to support such methods as have hitherto
been favoured. Local administration there must be.
The management of local business in Ireland as a
whole must henceforth be carried on by Irishmen, if
there is to be any success at all. That process of
decentralization which must go on in Scotland, Wales,
and England, is applicable to Ireland too. There,
more than here even, the railway, and drainage, and
road systems need to be under one great administra
tion. Let them in Heaven's name try their hand
with manhood suffrage, at the improvement of their
�IRELAND.
127
own country ; leave them the task of carrying out the
detail of the reforms they have rightly forced us to
adopt.
This at least we must all admit; that we cannot
continue parliamentary government if we are per
sistently to run counter to the opinions of the
majority of 5,000,000 of people represented in our
own House of Commons. It is because separation
would be injurious to both countries, as mutual under
standing would be beneficial, that Irishmen should at
length be granted fair play and self-government. Take
the absentees, for instance. They are not dealt with ;
and yet no man can hold that absenteeism is not a<
serious drawback to Irish prosperity. Such a question
concerns the whole country most seriously ; but their
compulsory expropriation or a heavy exceptional tax
ation—which commended itself even to Lord George.
Bentinck—has not been suggested by the Govern
ment. The labourers also have to be considered. It
is true that the fullest justice to .the. farmers does not
directly benefit them, though the well-being of one
class might slowly re-act upon the other. Here again
is encountered, in a less complicated shape, the same
problem that is met with in England—how to benefit
the real workers on the soil at the same time that
the most is made of the land. The 500,000 tenant
farmers of Ireland form, however, a very different pro
portion of the entire population, as well as of the agri
cultural population, from that which a similar class
does here with us. To improve their condition with
out injustice to others, if this can be done, is already
much gained.
................
...\ 1 .
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
There is no reason however, why we should stop
there. Men who know that they are secure of posses
sion are always ready to reclaim land, and might well
be given the option of taking part in such reclamation,
or in being assisted to obtain farms in English colonies.
Let us not, however, lose sight of the principles in
volved in all such proposals. We recognize thereby
that the State is responsible for the removal of the
causes which can be proved to lead to the wretched
poverty of the mass of the people. We are entering
plainly upon the path of restriction of selfish compe
tition, because, under certain conditions it has failed
in agriculture as it has in other directions. Hitherto in
Ireland brute force—the brute force of the people of
England—has stood behind the dominant class, ready
to maintain their views of a political economy which
mighthave been invented in the interest of monopolists.
A peaceful revolution has to be brought about, and the
first step has been taken.- Those, however, who con
tend that the modification of the land laws of Ireland
must extend to England have right on their side.
It is impossible any longer to use two sets of argu
ments on the two sides of the Irish Channel. Now,
therefore, that fixity of tenure, purchase of property,
reclamation of land, assisted emigration, and main
drainage, have been accepted for Ireland, we are not
far__we could not be far—from the consideration of
similar proposals for England and Scotland.
But even supposing the land question in a fair way of
settlement, an Irish Parliament with local administra
tion set on foot, there remain the race and religious
hatreds to consider. These of course are difficulties
�129
IRELAND.
of a very different character from any which Acts of
Parliament can touch. How can Celts and Saxons,
Catholics and Protestants, live together in unity ? Yet
such things have been ; at this moment the leader of
the irreconcileable Irish party is neither an Irishman
nor a Catholic. Leave the Irish liberty to arrange their
own business, and they will find out some way
of getting on with one another, when the injustice
complained of for centuries has been remedied.
Ireland has been conquered by arms from generation
to generation ; it remains for us to conquer finally
by justice, magnanimity and consideration.
Many of the noblest names in English history and
literature are those of Irishmen ; the Irish party in the
House of Commons to-day contains men of ability
out of all proportion to its numbers ; the two most
distinguished of our younger generals are Irishmen
by birth. Would it not be well, then, for all to con
sider whether, everr. at the cost of some sacrifice of
consistency, and some forgetfulness of past domina
tion, the loyalty of such a people could be secured,
by a freedom which is yet reconcilable with common
action ? The national feeling now running so high in
Ireland could find as full an outlet in the British
Empire as that of Scotland, when once it is under
stood that supremacy is no longer claimed in the
interests of a small minority, but to give satisfaction
to the high ideals of empire and greatness which a
petty island like Ireland, overshadowed perpetually
by English power, could never attain. A complete
agreement between England and Ireland will be
possible only when the people of both countries can
K
�130
ENGLAND FOE ALL.
control their own policy, and secure at home and
abroad that the benefit of the many, not the gain
of the few, should be the end.
The refusal of the Government to release the
“ suspects ” imprisoned without evidence of guilt or
trial for assumed offences, and the maintenance of
the infamous Coercion Act and Arms Act, have
shown that Liberals cannot govern Ireland without
resort to despotic methods. When men like Mr.
Gladstone, Mr. Forster, Mr. Bright, and Mr. Cham
berlain compel Radicals to support such a disgraceful
rule of informers and sub-inspectors of police as that
now in force in Ireland, the end cannot be far off.
I for one have no feeling but contempt for those
sham Liberals and pseudo-Radicals who prate of
freedom and practise despotism. Legislative inde
pendence for Ireland is a necessity if we Englishmen
are to continue Parliamentary Government.
�INDIA.
CHAPTER VI.
INDIA.
If Ireland, a little island close to our own shores, its
people speaking our language, sharing our civilization
and religion, with all its problems lying, as it were, in
the hollow of our hand and open to inspection with
the naked eye—if, after centuries of absolute rule over
the inhabitants, we are beginning to confess that the
matter is well-nigh too hard for us, and look to enlist
ing Irishmen in the government of their own country
as our only hope of success in the future—if, I say, this
little business has plagued us so sore, what are we to
think of the task of ruling 200,000,000 of people, of
totally different race, language, civilization, and creeds,
thousands of miles away from England, by means of
900 young gentlemen who do not set foot in
the country till they are over twenty years of age,
and work without the slightest help from the natives
in the higher branches of administration ? Yet this is
what we, the English people, are now trying to do in
India; and with such unfortunate results to the inhabi
tants, that it is absolutely essential that the great mass
of the community, on whose shoulders now. rests the
weight of this vast empire, should take the matter into
their own hands. This, indeed, is now the only hope__
�132
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
that the English people will see the mischief that is
being done, and insist that neither vested interests nor
regard for individual reputations shall longer stand in
the way of absolutely essential reforms.
No man can read the history of our early conquests
in India without a strange admixture of feeling.
Deeds of the noblest heroism and determination are
found side by side with the records of such meanness,
cruelty, and greed, that at times we doubt whether it
is possible that qualities so different should have
belonged to the same race. A mere merchant com
pany, humbly suing for permission to trade, grew into
power and influence in spite of themselves, till they
became of necessity the heirs of the Great Mogul, and
the conquerors of the rising Mahratta confederation ;
their clerks and supercargoes, their shopmen and
peddlers, figured forth before the world as warriors,
statesmen, and administrators. Whilst the king and
the aristocracy were losing, by sheer ignorance and
incompetence, the noblest inheritance across the
Atlantic that ever fell to the lot of any nation, ordi
nary Englishmen were conquering an empire just in
the way of everyday business, which, had it been
properly managed, would in some degree have com
pensated for that monstrous blunder. A great and
ancient civilization had fallen under their control, and
it needed but a right comprehension of its tendencies
to lead the people on, with little of change, to a wider
and a higher development, which should have been to
the advantage of all. This was the idea of some of
the nobler spirits, who saw clearly that a growth of
thousands of years equid not suddenly be twisted in
�INDIA.
133
accordance with foreign notions without grave danger
of injury to rulers and ruled. To raise the tone of the
native Governments to the best native standard, slowly
introducing the leaven of Western ideas into the
administration without altering the form of society or
pursuing the fatal policy of complete annexation —this was the view of men who had, unfortunately,
too little weight as against more vehement coun
sellors.
The East India Company itself, however, protested
constantly against the violent methods of its own
servants; but the inexorable necessity of paying
interest had, very early in its history, a most
baneful influence upon the system pursued by us
in India. Annexation became the rule; and even
forty or fifty years ago the natives of India had begun
to discuss the effect of the drain of produce to England
consequent upon the multitudes of fortunes made by
Englishmen and withdrawn on their leaving. The
nabobs who returned after shaking the pagoda-tree,
represented so much wealth taken out of India, which
was never returned. Nevertheless, the rule of the
East India Company was on the whole economical.
It was soon found out that countries governed by
foreigners, in which the old native system had been
broken down, seemed somehow not to have the
elasticity and power of recovery for which India had
been celebrated for centuries. India, the administra
tors in Leadenhall Street discovered was a poor
country, not to be treated as if untold wealth could
be taken for the asking without harming the people.
To enter upon the beneficial changes made in native
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
usages, the noble work of Sleeman in uprooting the
Thugs, of Outram in settling the Bheels, of Edwardes
on the Indus border, or, on a wider field, the reforms
adopted by Lord William Bentinck, would be to extend
this chapter far beyond the limits of this little work.
Natives of India know well that had Englishmen
confined their efforts to such objects as these nothing
but good would have come of their rule. To this
day the government of the old East India Company,
in those countries where good native customs were
respected and the people not worried, is looked back
to with regard and even affection. Men who went
out to India as mere boys got to know the people, and
loved them ; they made their homes in the country,
and returning but rarely to England, held a very
different position from that of their successors of
to-day.
Asia is the land of long memories, and those who
treat its people with justice, firmness, and consideration
pass on their legacy of good feeling to the next gene
ration. All who read the writings of Metcalfe, Shore,
Malcolm, Mountstuart Elphinstone, Henry Lawrence,
Meadows Taylor, or Sleeman, will find that below
the surface there is a constant undercurrent of regret
at the needless Europeanization which they see going
on. And the natives of India have ever been most
easily led by men who, whilst combatting their faults,
were not above appreciating their good qualities,
even when they have shown themselves rigorous and
exacting. Thus it happened that, notwithstanding
many great errors, and a gradual impoverishment,
which was then scarcely perceived, the agricultural
�INDIA.
135
population of British India—fully three-fourths of
that vast population—was loyal to the rule of the
great Company when Lord Dalhousie was appointed
Governor-General. It was the mission of this arbi
trary bigot to overthrow all the best traditions of
our rule in India, to shock every native idea of jus
tice or good faith, to commence that course of un
scrupulous annexation and wholesale Europeanization
from which our Empire is now suffering, and to lead
up by his policy to one of the most serious rebel
lions that ever shook the power of any Government.
The great Mutiny of 1857 was the direct outcome of
Lord Dalhousie’s headlong career of violence and
chicanery. How the rebellion was put down, and
what marvellous vigour and tenacity our countrymen
showed in resisting the attack of their own trained
soldiery, assisted in the more recently annexed terri
tory by the people themselves, are matters of history.
It was again a story of marvellous capacity chequered
by grave mistakes.
Peace was at length restored ; the rule of the East
India Company came to an end ; and with the as
sumption of the government by the Crown the
English people became directly responsible for the
beneficent management of their own great dependency.
Throughout the fierce conflict which was waged the
sympathy of the mass of the people was with us
rather than with the mutineers. If it had not been,
we could not possibly have overcome the rebellion.
Here, then, if ever in history, was an opportunity for
the governing race. It lay with Englishmen to ac•cept the better portion of the system which had been
�136
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
superseded, and to retain the goodwill of the people
by light taxation and consideration of their ancient
customs.
Unfortunately a different course was adopted. At
first all went well. Lord Canning, to his eternal
honour, kept his head in panic-stricken Calcutta, and
refused to allow millions to be treated with cruelty
and injustice because a few infamous ruffians had
been guilty of horrible, never-to-be-forgotten outrages.
The Queen’s Proclamation of 1858 was an admir
able document, rightly called the Great Charter of
India. Princes and people looked forward to a
period when all the advantages which had been
secured to them by the Company—peace, order,
freedom from exaction—should be combined with
a gradual preparation for self-government and a
careful reorganization of native rule under English
guidance. But it was not to be. The word went
forth from high quarters that India had been neg
lected, that what she stood in need of was English
capital, at five per cent, guaranteed interest paid
half-yearly—and English energy, at very high sala
ries paid quarterly. India, in fact, became the out
let for the savings of the upper and middle classes
■and an opening for their sons. Now began the
reign of capital in good earnest and with it a pres
sure of taxation, an increase of famines, a deteriora
tion of the soil, and an impoverishment of the mass
of the people unprecedented in the long history of
India.
But the administration comes first. In this, one
fatal principle has been followed out for the last three-
�INDIA.
137
and-twenty years. Wherever room could be found
for a European, he has been chosen in place of a
native. Even in the judicial department, where the
natives have greatly distinguished themselves, none
of the highly-paid posts are open to them—although
at a lower salary, and with less important positions,
they try cases involving quite as grave issues as those
tried by the Europeans. The extent to which this
employment of Europeans has been carried in every
department, surpasses belief. Young natives are
educated in the colleges for the highest class of ad
ministrative work, but no prizes are ever open to
them. They receive the compliments of the Chan
cellor of the University, who is perhaps also the
Governor of the Presidency, on their ability—and
then they find themselves ousted by a number of
Englishmen from posts in which they might fairly
hope to serve their country.
Now this has been very far worse under the Crown
than it ever was in the Company’s time. In the
Public Works Department alone, the European esta
blishment actually cost 2,300,000/., a year or two ago ;
this too, though the natives of India are specially apt
at engineering, and all the great irrigation works in the
country of any real value have been built by natives,
or constructed by Europeans on native principles.
Where these have been abandoned the grossest
blunders have been made, and millions of acres of land
ruined. Time after time requests have been put forward
by the people of India, through the only channel open to
them, that the total amount paid in salaries to Euro
peans in India should be published, but this has never
�138
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
been done. The effect of this excessive employment
of Englishmen is most serious in everyway. Millions
sterling every year which might go to the people of
the country are taken by foreigners, who, though
honest enough, and in some respects more capable
than natives, yet really devour the substance of the
people whose country they no doubt wish to benefit.
More than this, in addition to the salaries they re
ceive in the country, and spend on luxuries which a
native would rarely dream of, or the savings which
they bear away to England when they depart, every
European who leaves Government employment re
ceives a pension, which likewise is so much paid by
India to Englishmen out of the country. But there,
is a further objection still. By this enormous mass of
snperincumbent Europeans, who fill every office of
importance in a country inhabited by 200,000,000
people, those who might be in training for self-govern
ment, and who in time might be able to carry on our
best methods without their drawbacks, are turned
into a disaffected class. These men see their country,
as they think, ruined in the interest of foreigners who
have less and less sympathy with the people they
rule.
Europeanization is stunting all natural growth in
India, and this with less and less excuse every day ;
for civilians and others no longer live in India as they
used to do, rarely make real friends of the people,
and are perpetually moved about from post to post or
come home on furlough. But they equally prevent
any change of system ; and on their return to England
they form, with some few noble exceptions, a com
�INDIA.
139
pact body, opposed both by interest and tradition
to any real justice to India.
Now if this administration were on the whole succesful, it would not even then outweigh the enormous
economical drawbacks involved. As, however, it is
a failure in almost every branch, and we are now
obliged to go back in sheer desperation to some modi
fied form of the old native laws, surely no longer ought
we to hesitate to make a definite change. For take
even our civil courts ; these we were confident could not
fail to be successful. What has occurred ? They are
a complete curse to the people, bringing about endless
litigation, and involving gross injustice to the poor,
owing to their expense. Our land laws : these are
found to be utterly ruinous, not in one part of India
alone but in many, driving the cultivators first into
the hands of the money-lenders and then into gaol.
Our educational system : of that it is needless to
speak. So far, it is practically non-existent, save for
the well-to-do. Our public works—but these come
under another head more conveniently. Now all these
objections to our existing methods are made, not by
outsiders, but by tried and trained official Englishmen,
who having been appointed to account for the mis
chiefs which have arisen, speak plainly of the baneful
effects of our blunders, and themselves suggest a re
version to native plans, which we had discarded before
as unsuited to the people. It is painful to read their
confession that somehow our system does not work,
and yet to find that the very men who honestly admit
this are averse from the only possible remedy.
For now comes the most serious part of the matter.
�140
England fol all.
India is a poor country. We have been trying to
enrich her, and this is how we have done it. In 1856,
a year before the mutiny, the sum of 23,000,000/. was
taken from the people of India for the purposes of
government; in 1880, twenty-four years after, no less
a sum than 68,000,000/. was taken from them for the
same purpose. Has India, then, become so much
richer in the quarter of a century ? There is no evi
dence to that effect; much the other way. We know
from official reports and official protests that, light as
the taxation may seem to us, it is heavier than the
people of India can bear. Any increase would be—I
know no authority to the contrary of that—politically
dangerous. The salt tax—levied, bear in mind, to
the tune of 700 per cent, ad valorem—interferes with
the consumption of that necessary of life most
seriously; whilst no less a man than the late Lord
Lawrence thought the murrains among the cattle
which have been so frequent of late years were, in
part at least, due to the want of salt owing to its ex
cessive price.
But there is graver evidence than the death of cattle,
the ever-increasing spread of famines, and consequent
death of men. Famines are far more frequent than
they were. In the last twenty-three years there have
been not fewer than six serious famines, which have
swept away millions of the people, and millions of
cattle too. The last great famines—those of Bombay
and Madras, and the North-West Provinces—were
something terrible ; not fewer certainly than 7,000,000
of people died of starvation and famine-fever between
1876 and 1879 in those provinces. This is the worst
�INDIA.
141
famine of which there is any record whatever ; and it
occurred, not in the India of old time, with difficult
communications, tottering Governments, indifferent
and careless administrations, but in the India of to
day, with a powerful Central Government, with rail
roads and highways, canals and irrigation works—to
say nothing of money freely poured forth to save
these people from their dreadful fate. But this was
an exceptional affair, it may be said ; there was some
phenomenal drought all over the country ; the rains
ceased, the whole land was barren. Drought no doubt
there was, but by no means of inordinate severity, and
this alone would not have accounted for the fearful
mortality. Nowadays, sad to say, our people—the
greater part of the 200,000,000 we are responsible for
—are living nearer, and ever nearer, to the limit of
starvation ; thus what in happier periods would
have been a scarcity, now deepens into a serious
famine. The main causes for this miserable state
of things are not far to seek.
The total net revenue of the Government of India
raised from the many and various races under our rule
does not exceed 38,000,000/. a year, after making de
ductions for the cost of collection. This revenue so
raised cannot safely be increased : the mass of the
people are, as has been said, taxed up to the hilt.
But year after year we take out of the country agricul
tural produce to the amount of 20,000,000/ at the very
lowest estimate, to bring to us here in England, in
order to pay interest, pensions, and home charges, for
which there is no commercial return.
Now just think for a moment what this means. It
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
means that this very year we Englishmen are taking
from the people of India, for European rule and the
use of European capital, more than we have ever taken:
it means that this amounts to more than the total
land revenue of all British India—to more than half
the net income from all sources as calculated above.
Yet India is a poor country—a very poor country, as
Indian officials tell us. And this is how we “ develope ”
it. We drain away from the country that produce
which might be so beneficially employed by our fel
low-subjects ; and then we beat our breasts when famine
comes, and call out to Providence to wipe off those
spots on the sun which somehow or other do all the
mischief.
What cowardly pretence is this. The truth lies open
to all. We are ruining India because our upper and
middle classes will persist in exacting from its people
agricultural produce to pay interest, home charges,
and pensions. No country in the world, not blessed
with virgin soil of exceptional fertility, could possibly
stand such a drain without exhaustion. The real
effect of this drain once fully grasped, all talk even
about the uncertain opium revenue, about the grinding
salt tax, about the mischievous licence and stamp tax,
becomes idle; for by this constant demand we are
draining away the very life-blood of our people.
What would Englishmen say if the whole agricultural
rent of the country went over to France every year,
because we had French prefects in every county, and
French money had built our railroads and excavated
our canals? Yet the agricultural rent of England is
a mere fleabite in comparison with the drain from
�INDIA.
143
India, the relative wealth of the two countries being
taken into account.
“ But then,” say investors, “ the railroads, the canals,
have increased the wealth of India; we must have
interest from our money, no matter how many are
starved every now and then to pay us. To argue
otherwise would be communism, confiscation again. It
is absurd to forego interest to keep people alive.”
Well, have the railroads increased the wealth of India ?
are the numberless foreigners employed a burden or
the reverse? The matter really requires little con
sideration. Railroads do but transport wealth from
one point to another more conveniently than common
roads. They themselves, make no wealth, neither do
they add to that already in existence. Those who
find the capital deduct a certain proportion of the
produce transferred for the payment of working
expenses and interest. Now if this proportion of
produce remains in the country, and is paid to
natives, it is still at hand to feed the people; but if it
is loaded on board ships, as jute, cotton, or indigo,
and sent to a foreign country to pay interest on capital
[which as we have seen, means the wages of past
(unpaid) labour, now owned by those who neither toil
nor spin], then so much wealth is taken clean out of
that country, never to reappear Jor to return to fer
tilize the soil. There are new colonies, no doubt,
which can afford to pay this toll to foreigners, because
the application of labour to virgin soil is exceedingly
profitable, though even in that case the drain is often
more injurious than it seems at the time. But in the
case of India the result is disastrous from the first.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
Interest is taken away, and Europeans are paid high
salaries, alike in famine and in plenty, in drought
and in flood. - Moreover, much more than 20,000,000/.
have been thus paid away under the guarantee which
have never been earned at all. Losing railways
have consequently been made profitable investments
to home capitalists by the truly beneficent interven
tion of their own Government. Railways therefore in
India, worked by Europeans at a high salary, and
paying interest on the money borrowed by sending
agricultural produce out of the country, are very
different from railways here with us in England.
This has now been acknowledged. Borrowing out of
India is seen to be most injurious ; and yet the country
is getting deeper and ever deeper into debt for public
works, and the exhausting drain is being increased
by the employment of more Europeans.
The truth is that, built with the best possible in
tentions, the public works of India are a burden on
the people. Eager to enrich the country and yet to
derive advantage from it, our proceedings for the last
three-and-twenty years have been harmful and ruin
ous in the highest degree. This is no secret. The
most important officials at the India Office know it
well. The fearful effect of the drain from India has
been the subject of more than one grave confidential
memorandum, as well as of protests from Indian
Finance Ministers, who, however, could not see them
selves that the construction of unremunerative public
works out of borrowed money was ruinous. But such
is capitalism—selfishness so ingrained that five per
cent, per annum cannot possibly be wrong, though
�INDIA.
U5
millions may starve because it must be punctually
paid. We have lent nearly 25.0,000,000/. to India,
and must have our return, though the people had no
voice whatever in the borrowing, and now begin to feel
only too sadly that their substance is being taken
from them, they scarcely know how.
But this drain must be stanched; the taxation must
be lowered ; more natives must be employed. Eng
land, in short, must rise to the level of her great respon
sibilities, and take order with the ex-officials who
pour forth optimist harangues in praise of their own
administrative capacity.
For hear what all agricultual experts say. With one accord Mr. Buck, Mr.
Harman, and Mr. Robertson declare that the soil of
India is undergoing steady and permanent deteriora
tion—that it will support fewer men and fewer bullocks
as years pass by. Mr. Robertson puts the deteriora
tion at not less than thirty per cent, in thirty years.
Thirty per cent, less produce per acre in thirty years !
Who can wonder? The produce of the earth is
taken away to be brought over here, to an increasing
extent, and there is now less manure than ever to put
into the soil. At the same time the destruction of
the forests for railway sleepers and fuel has, as in the
United States and Australia, most seriously affected
the climate for the worse. Drought and floods alter
nate in districts where formerly the rainfall was
beneficial and equable. Such is the foresight of
capital in India—the care of our civilization of to-day
for the civilization of the human beings of to-morrow.
From all provinces comes the same sad cry. From
the North-West and from Oude, from Bombay as well
L
�146
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
as from Madras, from large tracts of Bengal, and
even from the Punjab, one mournful story is heard ;
the land does not, as of old bring forth of its abun
dance ; there is no blessing on the crops in our day.
A deteriorated race of men, an inferior description of
bullocks, bear witness to the truth of what they say.
So serious did all this seem, so fearful was the
famine period of 1876-79, that Mr. James Caird was
sent out to India as a Special Famine Commissioner,
with the ready consent of both parties in the State, to
examine, as the ablest English agricultural expert, into
the condition of our noble dependency. He returned
to tell us that unless we change our system a great
catastrophe is inevitable.
Catastrophe is easily
written, but Mr. Caird evidently used the word in no
light sense. After an elaborate investigation of the
state of things, he too came to the conclusion that
the soil of India is deteriorating, whilst the popula
tion is increasing in certain districts, so that the
people live in perpetual semi-starvation. The very
next famine period may therefore bring with it an
economical cataclysm beside which even the great
Irish destruction will sink into insignificance. Mr.
Irwin prepares us in Oude for similar fearful
trouble ; Mr. Connell from the North-West Provinces
takes up the tale. But Mr. Caird’s earnest protest
has, so far, produced no effect; so what should they
avail ? Even Mr. W. W. Hunter, the DirectorGeneral of Indian Statistics, and a year ago advo
cate of the interests of the Indian bureaucracy
and capitalists at home, even he, alarmed at last
by his own very inaccurate figures, tells us that at
�INDIA.
J47
least 40,000,000 of the people for whose welfare we
are responsible—100,000,000 would be nearer the
mark—are going through life on insufficient food.
Nay, more ; he shows that the Mogul Emperors raised
far more than twice the revenue we now get out of
India, for six generations, without exhausting the
country, whilst we who drain away the produce can
not take our present revenue without a great risk of
collapse. By the side of this drain, and the conse
quent deterioration of the soil, helped on by denuda
tion, all the rest of our blunders, great as they are, are
mere child’s-play. Another famine period is even now
approaching, no preparations have been made to meet
it, and how far the inordinate cost of the Afghan wars
has crippled our Indian exchequer is not even yet
fully known.
Thus on every side the prospect is gloomy and
overcast, and in' the opinion of the ablest observers
we are drawing nearer and nearer to an almost
overwhelming disaster. Year after year we take
from India agricultural produce which she cannot
spare, because we are masters of the country, and,
paying ourselves handsomely all round, leave those
who depend upon us for safety to perish from want;
Whilst we are disputing about the defence of the
empire we ourselves are preparing its ruin, only to
learn the truth too late: the knocking will come
through the darkness from without—the murder
within will be done. Let then the sun of English
justice arise and shine—outshine all the glories of the
East; let a message of mercy, whose wings are as
silver wings and her feathers as gold, go forth from
L 2
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ENGLAND FOR ALL
the people of England to the many races and nations
under their rule, saying to all that, though they have
ills of their own to suffer from and endless sorrows to
bear, they would not that others should be made
poorer or more miserable for them. So"] as death
shall close our eyelids in never-ending slumber, we
may feel that countless millions have some share of
happiness which but for us they would have lacked,
some joy and contentment which but for us they
never would have known.
For the alternative course lies open before us once
more. There are in India, as in Ireland and at home,
two policies, the one of mock freedom and real op
pression, the other of beneficent government and steady
progress. Strange that having tried both methods in
India, we should as a nation stick to the failure and
discard the success. Wherever native administration
has had free play under gentle European guidance,
there we have seen prosperity and contentment
spring up and endure. In Travancore and Baroda,
in Mysore and Hyderabad, wherever English influence
has been confined to supporting upright native rule,
the change has been marvellous for the better, though
the tendency even then is to interfere too much by
the introduction of Western ideas. Still it is not Euro
pean administration that is necessarily ruinous : that
we have seen in numerous instances. It is not that
public works are not highly beneficial. But when
European agency and public works are alike over
done ; when foreign soldiers and foreign systems are
imposed upon the population to an extent which
savours of the very fanaticism of so-called improve
�INDIA.
14
ment, then, as we see, the result is starvation, ruin,
and death, a famine-stricken people, and an exhausted
soil.
The recent return of Mysore to native administra
tion after fifty years of European rule is, we may
hope, of good omen for the future. Our task now is
to cut down the European establishments in every
possible way—to curtail the home charges, even if we
have to reduce the rate of interest arbitrarily by one
half and take some portion of the pensions on to our
own shoulders. This money that is now taken is not
ours, and no native has ever voted a single rupee of it
to us. The enormous expense of the European army
must likewise be curtailed, and a very different policy
from that of suspicion and hauteur adopted towards
the native princes. We have, in fact, to prepare the
many peoples of India for self-government, by a pro
cess of decentralization, by building up the old States
again wherever possible, and by removing the crowd
of Europeans who now eat out the prosperity of the
country. Let any man consider. No such system as
that which we now foster could by any possibility
succeed. The old Mogul rulers were wrong-headed
enough in many ways, but they were not such fools
as to think they could govern India from Samarcand
and in accordance with Mussulman prejudice, or that
they could dispense with the assistance of the able
Hindoo administrators in the management of their
provinces. Akber was perhaps the greatest monarch
that the East ever produced, yet he relied—and as the
event showed, wisely relied—upon the noble rajah
Toder Mull to reorganise his finances, With us
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
Toder Mull, the most masterly financier beyond all
comparison that has ever had control of the Indian
exchequer, would have been “ a damned, nigger
accountant, who would keep writing to the papers.”
Such incapacity to appreciate the abilities of our own
subjects, let us remember—such eagerness to crush
down rather than to raise up—such sad indifference to
the ruin being wrought in our own territory, when
close at hand countries equally under our control, but
managed by natives, are flourishing and prosperous—
such strange determination not to understand, I say,
will gain us but a doubtful reputation for foresight
with those who come after, even if it do not involve
ourselves in ruin.
But if, on the other hand, we resolve to make the
necessary changes at once, and to restore to the
natives, in some degree at least, the control of their
own Governments and their own property, then India
may more than repay us for our sympathy and good
will. There, directly or indirectly under our rule, are
250,000,000 of the human race, who, weary as they are
of waiting for fair treatment, would recognize with
joyous loyalty a determined effort to relieve them
from the excessive pressure of foreign government,
and the ruinous drain for foreign payments, which
now impoverish them more and more. This assuredly
is no party question ; but those who profit by India’s
ruin will scarcely of their own motion make the sacri
fices needful to restore her prosperity. It is to
the mass of Englishmen, then, to the great democracy
of this country, that the peoples of India must now
appeal for justice. Represented fairly here at home,
�INDIA.
151
they might hope to secure their long-delayed heading,
and with that hearing consideration for their wrongs.
Here too, I say once more, the right course is that
which is best also for our own people. Let the people
of India but grow in wealth, as they would under any
fair conditions of existence,'with but slight supervision
from us, and the exchange of their products for ours
would be far more advantageous than the continuous
impoverishment which disenables them from making
purchases. On every ground, therefore, of humanity,
morality, self-interest, future credit, and ordinary
common sense, we ought not longer to postpone the
necessary reorganization. But our present parlia
mentary system has proved quite inadequate to cope
with this great crisis. If India is to be retained at all,
she must have a direct voice in her own administra
tion, as well in England as in India.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
CHAPTER VII.
THE COLONIES.
There is happily one portion of our empire which is
almost entirely free from the political difficulties we
encounter elsewhere. The drawbacks to our great self
governed colonies are common to our age and civiliza
tion ; their advantages are peculiar to themselves.
Notwithstanding the mistakes of both political parties
in dealing with South Africa—mistakes which have,
to a great extent, overclouded the prospect in that par
ticular region—the colonies are, and will remain, the
chief mainstay of Anglo-Saxon dominion outside these
islands, when India has returned to native rule, and
our other dependencies are held rather as a duty than
as contributing to our power. With them, indeed,
and the United States, lies 'the future expansion of
our race. For although the Americans were driven
into hostility more than a century ago, we may still
hope that in time to come the great English-speaking
democracies of England, Australia, and North
America, may find ground for a common under
standing, which will enable them to secure peace
and justice throughout the civilized world, by the
overwhelming force they could array against any
�THE COLONIES.
153
aggressor- This, however, is for the moment no
more than a pleasant vision.
The possibility of a closer connexion with our
colonies is an immediate practical business. On this
point too, fortunately, men who differ most widely on
other questions are often agreed. Taught by the
disastrous result of the attempt to tyrannize over the
North American colonists, we have carried the doc
trine of self-government almost further than the
colonists themselves wished.
Not content with
granting them the most complete home rule, we have
at times repulsed their advances towards a closer
union, and, on the other hand, wronged our poorer
classes by handing over the entire administration of
an almost limitless unoccupied territory to the handful
of people who first settled there. But even so the
result is surely in marked contrast to our relations with
Ireland. No portion of our dominions are so loyal to
the British connexion at this very time, none so
anxious that England should rightfully maintain her
position in the world, as the colonists. Left to solve
their own social and political problems, they turn
naturally to the mother country to keep alive the
1 “ Blood is thicker than water,’’ said Admiral Farragut when
he stood by our sailors in the China seas. Years later, after
the grand old man had been the soul of the Northern navy
during the Civil War, he was in port in the Mediterranean with
his wooden flagship. A fleet of British ironclads was there at
the same time. As he weighed anchor and sailed out to sea,
the English ships also left their moorings and made two lines
for him to pass through. The compliment was wholly unlookedfor, but it thoroughly expressed the feelings of the nation to
wards that noble seanian.
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ideal of a greater political action than any which can
be hoped for from mere separation and local ambition.
And this feeling grows even at the time when absen
tees are being denounced, and the power of demo
cracy gains ground each day. There, as at home,
centralization and decentralization are working them
selves out; though, by the mistake of not maintaining
a federal union, great difficulties are now encountered
in bringing together colonies which ought never to
have lost the common tie, even on matters which
could manifestly be handled best by all collectively.
There can be no greater contrast between the
relation which Canada now bears to the United
Kingdom than that of the North American colonies,
when they fought for independence. In that case we
insisted upon the right to tax without permitting the
colonists the right of representation. Now we have
given Canada not only self-government, but the right
to impose almost prohibitive duties on our own goods.
That this need not have occurred had a better under
standing been kept up with the colonists, and freetrade, when commenced, enacted as the law for all
self-governed portions of the empire, we can scarcely
doubt. The history of Canada, however, since the
separation of the American colonies, is creditable to
her and to the home country. At first sight it would
have seemed impossible that the French colonies of
Lower Canada, conquered by a people with whom
their nation was at perpetual war, should ever have
come to be loyal to the English Crown. But the
consideration shown for their language, creed, and
customs, the steady determination not to interfere
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155
with their local rule, gradually won over the French
settlers, until at the present time they are as devoted
to the British connexion as any portion of the popu
lation of English descent. Troubles at times there
have been with the English colonists, and rather more
than forty years ago a rebellion was threatened.
Yet all settled down ; and now it seems that the
Dominion of Canada has before her as fine a career
in the future as the more energetic democracy on the
other side of the border. That the withdrawal of
our troops was brought about in a most unmannerly
fashion, and in such wise as to offend the best in
stincts of the Canadians—that also Lord Carnarvon’s
plan of federation was premature, and carried by
doubtful means, have not changed the sentiments of
the colonists towards the mother country.
Incorporation with the United States would leave
less of freedom for natural expansion than there is at
present under England’s light rule. A race of sturdy
sober-going men and women have grown up in that
rude Canadian climate, who will carry on the best
traditions of English Government side by side with
the great Republic. There, in the great expanse of
the Far West, lies an opening for those who, in the
coming changes here at home, may think they see
their way to a wider field, still under the name and
in connexion with the old country. In Canada, even
more than in the United States, the natural inclina
tion of our race for the sea manifests itself. The
4,000,000 who make up the Dominion of Canada own
the fourth largest mercantile marine in the world.
As, also, the new continental railroad is pushed forward
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
to the Pacific slope, the splendid region of British
Columbia will be opened up to colonization, and yet
another connexion made with the English colonies in
the South Pacific.
Nor, when the distance by sea is spoken of, and
the impossibility of a permanent connexion insisted
upon, should we forget that Canada and the other
colonies of the Atlantic slope are nearer to us to-day
than Aberdeen or Cork were a century ago. Canada
is now wholly self-supporting, costs the people of
England not one farthing of expenditure, whilst the
increasing power of democracy would find a help and
offer valuable assistance to a similar growth with us
at home. The Dominion will, we may hope, as
time passes on, bind together closer the various set
tlements. Already the Parliament at Ottawa—sitting
in the finest block of buildings on the American con
tinent—worthily represents the Federal Union of a
magnificent group of peoples. Let them also find
representation here in England, and thus'bring to bear
upon all international arrangements the ever-increas
ing force of a united democracy of English-speaking
peoples. At the crisis of the Eastern question when
it seemed as if England might be involved in conti
nental warfare, the Canadians were not slow to offer
their assistance in a cause where their own interests
were in no way involved. Surely it is for the great
mass of the people of England to hold out their hands
in fellowship to those who wish nothing better than
to work together on the same lines for the strengthen
ing and improvement of all. There is something in
great ideas which vivifies and enlarges the national
�THE COLONIES.
*57
imagination. We here at home have indeed much to
carry out ere we can achieve our own full government
of ourselves, or place ourselves on the same level
which the Canadians have already happily attained
to in many respects. Reason the more that we should
endeavour to make common cause in the direction of
further progress.
But if this applies to Canada, still more true is it of
the Australian colonies and New Zealand. These
colonies are the growth of the present generation.
In the last thirty years they have sprung up from
mere settlements to be great and prosperous commu
nities. In Australia—Victoria and New South Wales,
South Australia, Queensland, and West Australia,
form a group of states unsurpassed in any part of
the world for energy, enterprise, and growing con
sideration for the education and well-being of the
rising generation. That the distribution of wealth is
here also sadly faulty is indeed too certain. In Mel
bourne and Sydney, cities large out of all proportion
to the population engaged in agriculture or mining,
the contrast between the wealth of the few and the
poverty of the many, is at times very serious. Here,
too, is felt the alternation of inflation and stagnation
consequent upon our capitalist system, and the large
capitalists, either English or native, are gradually
acquiring excessive preponderance. But the possi
bility of a man taking himself out of the wage-earning
class is, of course, as in Canada and the United States,
far greater than in England. The abundance of
virgin soil, the rapid increase of wealth in proportion
to the population, keep wages at a higher level than
�I58
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
in old countries. Both politically and socially, how
ever, the Australian colonies are passing through a
phase in their history which is of the highest impor
tance, and corresponds to similar changes here at home.
In purely political matters the democracy is increas
ing in strength day by day ; but unfortunately these
colonies have not, until of late years, had anything
to compare to the admirable school system of America
which should bring the whole population within
reach of education. This, however, is being remedied ;
and in Victoria, the most democratic colony of all, the
people are beginning to learn that a sober combina
tion to deal with existing difficulties—which may well
perplex the ablest statesman—is in the long-run better
for the interests of all than a hasty agitation which
overthrows confidence in present arrangements with
out substituting anything in their place. Those who
fasten their attention on Victoria, and declaim against
the folly of a democracy because it favours protection,
conveniently forgot that New South Wales, where
the people are equally masters, is in favour of free
trade, and South Australia shows a growing tendency
in the same direction. Nothing, indeed, is more
absurd than to gauge the political intelligence of a
country by such a test. If protection can keep up
the relative wages of the mass of the working people
above the level which they will obtain under free
trade, then beyond all question protection is, on the
whole, the policy best suited to the welfare of the
mass of that community. Theorists who reason as if
the only object of all human society were to make the
�THE COLONIES.
159
rich richer and the poor poorer would, of course, not
admit even that.
But it may be reasonably allowed as absurd that
colonies founded by men of the same nation, and
living under the same government, in the same terri
tory, should deliberately set up tariffs against one
another, and against the mother country. This is
what we see in Australia, and it shows clearly how
important a better understanding is between the
various colonies on matters which concern the in
terests of all. The difficulty of bringing about a
federation in Australia, even on this simple matter of
customs, seems insuperable. Time after time have re
presentatives met, but on each occasion have separated
without coming to any definite arrangement. Local
interests and local ambitions shut out the view of the
general advantage which would be gained by a closer
understanding. But the completion of a railroad
between Sydney and Melbourne, and the rapid ex
tension of the other Australian railways, must bring
this question again to the front. It may be that the
solution will be found in that wider federation which,
without in any way sacrificing the local administration,
may bring about the full representation of Australia
in a general council where the interests of all will be
fully considered. There are, in these days, many
matters which can be better settled when dealt with
as a whole than when regarded piecemeal, and few
can doubt that such enterprises as the railways and
public works of Australia could be better and more
cheaply handled together than separately.
�i6d
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
In these Australian colonies also, and particularly
in New Zealand, may be seen the system of State
management carried out under the most democratic
form of government.
Railways, posts, telegraphs,
public works, schools, public lands, are all entirely
under the control of the bureaux appointed by the
State, and managed by a responsible Minister.
Where the appointments also are kept clear of poli
tical influence, the system works well. There are
temptations to grave jobbery, doubtless, but they are
kept under restraint by universal publicity; and the
mass of the population have abundant opportunities
of making themselves felt. A graver danger than
any arising from over-officialism is that of over
borrowing from the mother country. In New Zealand
especially this danger is very great. Not only is the
Government largely pledged to pay the produce of
the 400,000. colonists to home lenders, but the settlers
themselves have pledged their resources to an enor
mous extent to English capitalists. These vast pay
ments out of the country for money borrowed can
scarcely go on for ever. Labour expended on virgin
soil will no doubt produce enormously; but slack times
come even there, and the difficulties which we have
seen in India will be reproduced on a smaller scale. This
vast tribute, in the shape of interest on money lent,
which the English colonists have to transmit out of
their labour to the mother country, is one of the
least pleasant features of the colonial connexion.
It may be that under a better arrangement the
colonists in all our great free-governed dependencies
will be able to combine with the mother country for
�THE COLONIES.
the more adequate development of their magnificent
territories, in the interest of the whole of the federated
portions of our empire. In their temperate climate,
and with their unrivalled soil—in Canada, Australia,
Tasmania, and New Zealand—millions on millions
of our race might find happiness and comfort, which
would re-act upon the welfare of our people at home.
As our home arrangements undergo modification, we
ought to carry with us the people of the colonies in
aiding to bring about, without disturbance or blood
shed, a more equitable distribution of wealth than
that which now we see. Those who desire to leave
our shores to try a fresh life in another country,
might then feel sure, not of the coddling of a maternal
government, but of assistance, encouragement, and
capital, where now all these are lacking. The great
disparity between the sexes in England in one direc
tion, and in the colonies in the other, alone shows
how faultily the present arrangements have worked.
It is with a view to bringing about a more com
plete understanding on all such questions, a regulation
of the mere laissez-faire system which up till now has
found favour, that a nearer connexion is so essen
tial. Friendly democracies can always help each
other. They have no real ground of mutual distrust.
But when we see in the United States such misery as
that produced by the late stagnation ; when we know
that in New South Wales, Victoria, and New Zealand,
men were thrown out of work and clamouring for
employment, though millions of unoccupied fertile
land lay at their disposal all round them, then it
becomes more clearly apparent than ever how misM
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
chievous is the system which refuses to make the
most of such enormous advantages, and supposes that
stagnation and depression are really inevitable
because those who hold the capital choose to make
it so.
It tis because social matters are kept so carefully
in the background, and the real producers of wealth,
whether in England, Ireland, or abroad, are shut out
from comparing notes on matters which so nearly
concern them, that these serious errors are made.
Even as it is the colonies, with their marvellous power
of recovery, have been our best customers, and have
enabled the English working class at home to pass
through the long period of crisis with less of pressure
than would otherwise have been felt. Here, even in
business, where sentiment is said to have no play,
we find the trade follows the flag—that men prefer to
deal with their own people. Surely those who are
in favour of a unity of all peoples, who hold that in
the near future the men who have hitherto worked
for others will see that in common action lies the hope
for humanity, cannot fail ere long to understand that
the first step towards this great end must be a closer
and yet closer union of peoples of the same race, lan
guage, and political traditions, working together for
the good of all portions of that noble federation.
Leaving freedom to all, and enforcing none—holding
up before us a high ideal in which all may share and
all may find full development—thus, and thus only,
shall we gather them in.
But it is not merely in relation to their own indi
vidual interests that it would be of the highest impor
�THE COLONIES.
163
tance that our great democratic communities beyond
the sea should be represented. Difficulties affecting
all "portions of the empire have to be considered,
which can never obtain proper attention save by the
personal discussion of those who have a direct interest
in their wise settlement. The questions of tariff and
trade have already been spoken of. No complete
arrangements on these heads can possibly be arrived
at so long as the hide-bound bureaucrats of the
Colonial Office, with their encrusted traditions of
meddling and muddling, have full swing. Only when
men see for themselves that local selfishness can
fitly be merged in a greater and more enlightened
common interest, will they abandon ideas which they
have adopted almost as an evidence of free judgment.
A Customs Union of the British Empire will be the
outcome of the representation of our colonies in the
Great Council which will take the place of our present
worn-out second chamber. Or it may be even that
we shall follow the French system, and invite colonies
to send representatives to the popular House, when
local business has been properly handed over to local
authorities. Whichever course may be adopted,
there is a growing opinion, both in the colonies and
in England, that in such representation lies the true
solution of many problems which now seem most
thorny. A complete Union thus brought about could
scarcely fail to have a peaceful influence on the whole
civilized world. Such an overwhelming combination
of naval strength as could then be relied upon,
could be made by no conceivable alliance of despotic
powers.
M 2
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
This, however, brings us at once to the question of
general defence, which is now being discussed by a
Royal Commission. On that Commission the colonies
are inadequately represented, yet it is of the last
importance that they should enter completely into
any plans that may be suggested. For on the due
ordering of our Imperial defences, and the security of
our lines of communication, can we alone depend for
maintaining in time of trouble that connexion with
our countrymen across the sea, and for the certainty
of obtaining our food supplies, which are essential not
only to our influence but to our safety. These
matters have been sadly neglected under the happygo-lucky regime of the past twenty or thirty years.
Men who are always looking to throw off what they
call the “ burden of empire,” regardless of the help
and encouragement we can obtain in coming political
changes from the democracies of our own race, natu
rally looked askance at any measures which should
tend to unite and not to separate, to bring together
and not to drive away. It is well that at this par
ticular time another view should be taken. By a
careful organization of our resources, and a judicious
strengthening of the many ports we possess, it would
be made quite impossible for any enemy or enemies
to interfere seriously with our affairs even in time of
war, whilst the denunciation of the Declaration of
Paris would make us more powerful than we ever
were before. In these days coal and coaling-stations,
the opportunity to go into port and refit at all times,
are essential. And these advantages we possess to
such an extent, that it may almost be said that all
�THE COLONIES.
165
the rest of the world together could not rival us. In
the Atlantic and Pacific, in European waters and
the China seas, from the Cape of Good Hope to Cape
Horn, and from the British islands to Australia and
India, we hold a chain of posts which will enable us
to exercise at the fitting moment an almost over
whelming pressure, if in time of peace we take
the means to prepare for any difficulty.
Halifax
and Vancouver’s Island, Bermuda and the Falkland
Islands, Gibraltar, Malta, and Aden, Sydney, Mel
bourne, King George’s Sound, and Auckland, to say
nothing of the Indian ports, and scarcely less valu
able possessions elsewhere, such as Hong-Kong, Fiji,
and the Mauritius, constitute an array of maritime
citadels which, maintained in proper defence by our
ourselves and our colonies, must, in conjunction with
a fleet proportioned to our maritime interests, render
future naval war against us almost impossible. Nor
should we hold or exercise this truly enormous power
for our own selfish advantage. English ports are
open to the ships of all nations without let or hind
rance ; we throw open to the world the advantages we
possess, asking nothing in return. Here, then, when
fully represented, our colonists may fairly take their
share in arranging with us the defence of the common
interest, and organizing the national defence.
Still more necessary, however, is colonial help in
considering the bearing of treaties which we may
negotiate with foreign powers, or the action which
the colonists themselves may take in their own interest.
At present there is no special consideration given to
the effect which may be produced on our existing
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
artificial system by any fresh arrangement so far as
it affects colonies or colonists, and our greatest de
pendency counts for still less in such matters ; whilst
as to the colonists themselves, it is sufficient to note
their action with regard to the Chinese to recognize
at once that questions may arise which can only be
dealt with from the point of view of general interest.
This Chinese question is indeed one which by itself
needs the gravest consideration, as a political, social,
and international problem of the greatest difficulty.
Here we are in fact threatened with a conflict of races
and civilization, the like of which has never yet been
seen on the face of the planet. China has awakened
from her long sleep of centuries, and is fast breaking
from her isolation, and entering into the full stream
of the political and social life of our times. What the
results of this may be no man can foretell. A people
who have been civilized for ages, who yet retain vigour,
capacity, and physical qualities whose bearing on the
future we do not yet fully understand, are now absorb
ing the newest truths of Western investigators. The
effect upon us so far has been to bring the industrious
Chinese, with their ideas of individualism only modi
fied by their secret societies, into direct competition
with our own colonists. There are thousands on
thousands of Chinamen under our rule in the East
alone, and as workmen and merchants they are most
formidable rivals. But with the emigration to the freegoverned colonies and America a new feature begins.
Our colonists positively will not put up with them, any
more than the Americans will. At this very time the
people of British Columbia, as well as the colonies of
�THE COLONIES.
167
Australia, have decided to keep out the Chinese.
They are to our modern industrial colonies what
shells are at sea—missiles to be kept out, at any cost
to theory or beauty of design. But the result is at
once seen to be serious. It is the recognition of a per
turbing element in all calculations—of an incapacity
on the part of our race to face a nation of protec
tionists who regard themselves as mere passers-by in
every country they enter. That our colonists should
have the right to tax every Chinaman who lands,
surely carries with it the right of Chinese to tax every
Englishman who lands in China. As our relations
with China grow, and these points come more promi
nently forward, the absolute necessity for some general
understanding will become apparent. Perhaps ere
another generation has passed away the question of
our relation to China will completely dwarf all others
in importance. Meantime the commercial connexion
between Australia and Asia is rapidly growing ; and
in view of the unfitness of the northern portion of that
great island-continent for colonization by men of our
race, it is even possible that immigrants from India
or China may find place in that vast unpeopled
region.
These, however, are the possibilities of the future.
What most concerns us now is, to lay the foundation
of a cordial understanding between all portions of our
great colonial empire—to bring together on the wider
field of a wide-reaching policy of the commonwealth
those who in their own several spheres, are striving to
bring about a better social and political system than
that which now presses upon all portions of the empire,
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
though less in the colonies than elsewhere. The
natural and wholesome pride of a Canadian, an
Australian, or a New Zealander in the growing great
ness of his country, need in no way be irreconcilable
with a deep love for the old home, and a yet higher
pride in sharing in a general improvement which shall
embrace and welcome all. The Anglo-Saxon race,
which has shown the world how to reconcile freedom
and order with steady progress, can by combination
and determined effort secure for themselves and their
children the leadership in the social changes and re
forms which are close at hand. Those great demo
cracies of English-speaking peoples, who now have
complete control over their own affairs, will find that
in permanent union with the more ancient democracy
of England lies the best hope of securing the fullest
development in the future.
�FOREIGN AFFAIR'S.
CHAPTER VIII.
FOREIGN
AFFAIRS.
The relation which England should bear to the
nations of the Continent of Europe, and the action
which ought to be taken in reference to foreign policy
generally, would be very summarily settled by one
party among us. Non-intervention is their sole idea
of the management of such affairs. Let others do
what they like to or with one another, we will severely
mind our own business, look after our trade, and,
secure behind the silver streak, amass money—for the
comfortable classes of course—to our hearts’ content.
Thus the individual selfishness, upon which they are
content to rely absolutely for all management at
home, is fitly supplemented by a still more thorough
collective selfishness applied to affairs abroad.
Capital is timid, it is said, peace is our greatest interest,
intervention means, sooner or later, war or threat of war.
A soldier or a sailor therefore, in the opinion of these
gentlemen, ought to be scouted as a pariah, though,
as all save fanatics can see, our army and navy are
as natural portions of our industrial organism in the
present state of international morality and economi
cal development, as our custom-house or excise.
Only stand aside, such is the argument, and no one
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
will harm you. A purely trading power will arouse
no jealousies ; and Europe will see in England a
country which, in the plenitude of its strength, steps
aside from all save commercial transactions, and is
content to figure simply as a pattern to others. Now,
few would doubt that if all were like-minded in this
matter—if the lion of greed could indeed lie down with
the lamb of wealth outside him, that here is the true in
dustrial future for the human race. But we are, alas !
far from such a happy state of things. No nation
in existing conditions can thus safely boycott itself,
without grave risk of being boycotted, or perhaps
preyed upon, by others. And we, of all countries in
the world, are the least capable of secluding ourselves,
and enriching ourselves whilst others look on. Our
flag floats on every sea ; our trade competes with every
nation ; our absolutely necessary supplies, without
which we should starve, come to us from far and near.1
A commercial country owning such extended terri
tory is more open to attack than any other; and even on
the ground of simple selfishness, some alliances should
be made, and some preparations maintained against
danger. But there are higher reasons even than
those of expediency for taking part in the politics
of the world. A great country has moral duties, as a
man has moral duties ; and these are not confined to
simple business relations and trading for gain. We
are, or might be, the leaders and protectors of free
1 We have ordinarily less than three weeks’ supply of food at
hand. A naval combination which could blockade our ports
for a fortnight, could starve us out. Two powers, acting to
gether, could even now have a stronger fleet in the Channel than
we could command.
�FOREIGN AFFA IRS.
171
dom, independence, and true liberty in Europe, as
we were in the time of the Great Protector Our
power, properly organized, and wielded with the con
sent of a united people, may suffice at no distant
date to turn the scale in that great struggle between
militarism and industrialism, between tyranny and
freedom, perhaps between barbarism and civilization,
now threatening on the continent. To stand aloof
finally when such issues as these are being debated
is not, as I venture to think, the nature of my coun
trymen. They have often fought in times gone by to
save others from foreign domination ; it maybe that
in the near future a still greater task will be theirs.
The history of the modern connexion of England
with continental affairs, may be said to begin with the
accession of William III. That long policy of secret
negotiations carried on by Elizabeth with the Pro
testant populations of Europe, had involved us in
war with Spain ; the policy of the Stuarts had, after
Cromwell’s short and glorious period of supremacy,
made England subservient to France. But these
wars and alliances had really as little to do with the
events which followed, as the old wars in France
under the Plantagenets. With William III., however,
began that bitter rivalry with France which thencefor
ward became the mainspring of English foreign policy
for at least five generations. Rivalry no doubt ex
isted between Englishmen and Frenchmen when the
Prince of Orange came to the throne, but thencefor
ward it spread from the people to the Governments,
and the fierce struggle which followed spread to all
quarters of the globe. William III., in fact, began a
settled policy of interference in European State poli
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
tics in the interest of Holland and Germany, as
distinct from any cause which called us to take the
field on our own account. As a consequence we were
driven to fight foreign battles by means of subsidies
and mercenary troops, instead of trusting to our
power at sea, where lies our real strength.
For, strange to say, it never occurred to either the
Plantagenets, the Tudors, or the Stuarts that it would
redound to our credit and influence to carry on cam
paigns on land with German soldiers at England’s
expense. William III., however, commenced the
system, because it aided the policy of his own country
laid down by himself—that of persistent opposition
to Louis XIV. and the French. The result has been a
crushing load of debt, permanently imposed for
foreign objects on the English people.
For the
House of Brunswick, confirmed and greatly extended
the mischievous policy introduced by the Dutch king,
and henceforth England became the citadel of German
resistance to French attacks upon Germany. We no
longer had a continental policy of our own ; every
step taken had reference to the relations and intrigues
of other Powers, who came to look upon England and
English Ministers as necessary supports of a system
of international war and jealousy, with which, as a
matter of fact, the English people had nothing what
ever to do. The unquestioned facts that we fought
bravely, won battle after battle, and acquired some
magnificent colonies, are mere incidents of this State
system which blind us to the true bearing of the
policy itself.
Had not the Dutch and German elements become
paramount in the guidance of our foreign relations,
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
173
there was no such necessary antagonism to France
as has been pretended. Lord Chatham himself, whose
management of our external affairs was the wonder of
Europe, wras vehemently opposed to the “ German
War,” which, having once commenced, not even his
genius could clear us from. Thus England was
dragged along at the heels of Frederick II. the most
unscrupulous adventurer who ever made a kingdom out
of a province, and we of to-day have the privilege of
paying, in the shape of interest on the national debt,
for the position which Prussia holds in Europe. This
went on, notwithstanding protests from patriotic men
against this ruinous squandering of the resources of
the country, until the time of the French Revolution,
when our antagonism to France, already pronounced
enough, was still further aggravated by the calculated
panic of the governing and well-to-do classes. With
the internal affairs of France we had no concern; and
the mass of the people of England sympathized with
the men who had overturned the meanest, and at the
same time most galling tyranny that could oppress
an agricultural people. The loss of the American
Colonies, when Germans and Indians were used to
shoot down and scalp men who were fighting for their
rights, had opened the eyes of the poorer classes to
the real bearing of the vicious mercenary system. A
magnificent heritage had been lost, because the men
at the head of affairs set aside the advice of English
men like Chatham and Burke, to pander to the pre
judices of a German king and the aristocrats around
him. France had now learnt something from America ;
and there was more admiration than ill-feeling to
begin with on our side of the Channel.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
But in all this the rulers of that day saw—and
rightly saw—a grave danger to themselves. The
rupture with France was made unavoidable by the
counsel and support extended to her invaders. Once
involved in the anti-revolutionary fever, nothing was
easier than to inflame still further the national rivalry,
until for nearly a generation the very name of French
man became obnoxious to English ears, and children
grew up to be men believing that only by the de
struction of France could England be made secure.
The astounding career of Napoleon I., and the state
craft of his reactionary empire, gave our policy a
further push forward in the same direction. England
became the rallying-point of resistance to a military
usurper, who evidently aimed at the dominance of
Europe.
His answers to our persistent hostilities took the
shape of a threat of invasion, and a continental
blockade against English goods. The first of these
two measures became hopeless after Nelson’s crowning
victory at Trafalgar. The second was rendered futile
—though the fact is not generally known—by the
friendly policy of the Ottoman Empire. The remark
able geographical configuration of that State gave us
an advantage which Napoleon was unable to over
come. The Turks opened their numerous ports, and
Europe was flooded with smuggled English goods.
Thereupon the blockade became useless ; Power after
Power withdrew from the league, and we were relieved
from further anxiety in regard to the most dangerous
plan of campaign ever formulated against us. As a
natural sequence of our long opposition to France,
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
175
we were driven more and more into alliance with the
despotic powers of Europe. Those armies which
overthrew Napoleon, were as much intended for re
pression at home as to repel the foreign invader ; and
Europe was prepared by the Treaty of Vienna for the
supremacy of the Holy Alliance. The great name
associated with all this policy is that of Castlereagh,
who bound us hand and foot to Russia, and made us
little better than a hanger-on to the Holy Alliance
itself. Thus for thirty years England was linked on the
continent of Europe with powers whose very existence
depended upon the denial of freedom to the peoples.
Upon this phase followed a modification rather than
a change of policy. The extravagant pretensions of
the Holy Alliance with reference to Spain, and the
absurd claim of its members to regulate the internal
affairs of every kingdom of Europe, brought about
the policy of which Canning became the chief ex
ponent. This was the support of constitutionalism in
Europe, as equally opposed to autocracy and to
revolution. It was an attempt to trim between two
irreconcilable opposites. Canning himself called into
existence that remarkable New World to redress the
• balance of the Old which, since it first came above the
political horizon in the House of Commons, has been
wholly incapable of balancing even itself. The rest
of the policy had as little solid foundation as this
famous outburst. Constitutionalism did not thrive, in
spite of English protection; and we gradually drifted
into a defence of what appeared our most tangible,
interest—that of the overland route to India.
Canning was followed by Palmerston and Russell.
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ENGLAND FOR ALL.
The episode of Navarino, which weakened Turkey
without constituting a strong Greece, was merely a
prelude to a definite championship of the integrity
and independence of the Ottoman Empire, involving
Lord Palmerston’s Syrian policy, and eventually leading
up to the Crimean War. Jealousy of France, and
desire to maintain the balance of power, still had a
great influence. But capitalism was now beginning
to assert its sway, and plain Whig principles meant
compromise at home and selfishness abroad. There
was not even the violent old Toryism of Pitt and
Castlereagh to rouse opposition or stir enthusiasm.
The shake of 1848 brought the weakness of this
whole system into clear relief. Unpleasant people,
who thought a dungeon smelt quite as dank under
“moderate constitutionalism, ” as when kept exclu
sively at the service of autocrats, gave the constitu
tionalists many awkward misgivings. London at this
time naturally became the headquarters of the consti
tutional monarchs, and the metropolitan bankers the
custodians of their savings. We, however, in the
struggle which followed, neither gained nor deserved
the gratitude of either party. Opposed to auto
cracy, we showed a friendship for Hungary, which
the horror of our middle classes for real revolution
quickly induced us to betray. Matters were worse
with Venice, Sardinia, and Sicily, when England
deliberately abandoned people who had been in
duced by surreptitious assurances to rely upon her
for assistance. “ England wishes only for peace,”
Pasini wrote, bitterly, to Manin ; and that summed up,
not perhaps Lord Palmerston’s own policy, but the
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
177
policy of the capitalist class, now gaining power
rapidly, and to which all Foreign Ministers have since
been forced in some way to bow down.
But here, nevertheless, lay the true line for Eng
land. In 1848 she could have placed herself at the
head of the enfranchised peoples of Europe, and lent
her unrivalled naval power to support those who, with
her assistance, could not have been subdued. The time
however, was not ripe for so bold a policy; the
dreaded principles of revolution were once more
abroad. Chartism at home was affiliated to the
accursed thing. So, without absolutely allying our
selves with the oppressors, Great Britain saw without
regret the re-establishment of autocracy, which to
her self-seeking merchants was so far preferable to the
rule of the people. Thus the general result of our
moral support of constitutionalism and Liberal prin
ciples was the firm re-establishment of despotism in
Europe. At this period too was shown fully that
absolute agreement between Russia and Prussia
which has been the key to continental policy since
1821. Russia came forward in 1848 as the protector
of despotism in every country.
Germany and
Austria were completely under her thumb. Every
petty princeling whose throne had been pulled from
under him, stretched out his hands in prayer to the
deity of St. Petersburg to set him up straight again ;
and Nicholas, to do him justice, did his king-making
in fine old barbaric style. So long as these small fry,
from the King of Prussia downward, obeyed his
Imperial behests, and abstained from all tampering
with liberalism or revolution he was content to support
N
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.ENGLAND FOR ALL.
them for the mere gratification of the thing. The
Power which held Poland could not afford that either
freedom or the rights of nationalities should be dis
cussed in her neighbourhood. It was a revival of the
policy of the early portion of the century, in a more
pronounced shape. An armed barbarism lent its aid
to all the reactionary influences in Europe, and
Liberal England was content to stand aloof and wish
well to the oppressed nationalities, without raising a
hand to help them. Plad a more far-seeing plan
been adopted, the Crimean War, with its unfortunate
alliance with the Second Empire in France might
have been unnecessary.
Turkey was saved from Russia by that war, at the
expense of thousands of lives and a hundred millions
of money to this country. But for twenty years,
though the Liberal party was almost continuously in
office, no steps whatever were taken to reorganize the
Ottoman Empire, or to help the better elements to
organize themselves, whilst we lent the corrupt clique
of Pashas at Constantinople tens of millions, which
were squandered in corruption and debauchery. The
close of the Crimean War, however, was signalized by
a treaty, which could only have been reasonably
accepted by us if we had been defeated instead of vic
torious. Hampered by our alliance with the Govern
ment, and not with the people of France, we were con
strained to make peace practically on the terms which
suited our ally. A step also was taken, without any
reference to the people of England, by the two English
Plenipotentiaries, which sacrificed the only important
weapon that an essentially naval power like ourselves
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
179
has in a continental war. The history of the deplor
able surrender is even yet not fully know ; its effect
we shall only feel when we are again opposed—as we
may be at any moment opposed—by a European
coalition directed against us.
During the long wars with France under the
Republic and Napoleon we held one great advantage,
but for which we could scarcely have faced the com
bination which that great genius contrived to work up
against us. This went by the name of Maritime
Rights. Supreme on the ocean, and able to cover the
seas with a swarm of privateers, the carrying trade of
the world was at our mercy. The Right of Search was
the point on which this power hinged. This meant
that if neutral vessels were carrying our enemies’
goods, we had the right, whether contraband of war
or not, to stop those vessels and confiscate those
goods. Thus we could rely upon our real arm, that
which is given us by our geographical position and the
hereditary capacity of our men—the knowledge and
mastery of the sea. Time after time when the for
tunes of the country had seemed at the lowest ebb,
this power sufficed to turn the tide in our favour.
Its possession made us a valuable ally to the most
powerful continental state ; whilst, as we have seen,
with the friendly connivance of Turkey it enabled us
to break up the famous continental blockade against
our goods. Naturally this unequalled weapon, for a
country of such wealth as ours, had been envied us by
the continent ever since we began to use it, and con
stant efforts had been made by our rivals and enemies
to deprive us of it. Up to the date of the Congress
N 2
�i go
ENGLAND DOR all.
of Paris, however, all such pretensions had been
scouted by English statesmen as absolutely inadmis
sible, and ruinous to our country. Nothing to the
contrary of this had or has ever been shown. The
cry of “ free ships, free goods,” had been raised by
those who wished the downfall of England’s influence ;
for once admitted, it reduced our fighting power to
nothing.
All these facts notwithstanding, Lord Clarendon and
Lord Cowley, acting in that spirit of the pure trading
interest which had then become really paramount in
English foreign politics, gave up by the Declaration
of Paris, without argument, debate, or proper authority,
those maritime rights which could alone enable the
growing democracy of these islands to exercise due
weight and influence in Europe. No such sacrifice has
ever been made by any country. That we should
permanently adhere to it is incredible. The United
States was guilty of no such folly. Her statesmen
declined to give up privateering, except under pro
visions which they knew would not be accepted.
No long period can elapse before this whole question
is again brought forward. When it is, the people of
England should never cease to recall the fact that their
position in the world awakens the jealousies of other
nations, that these are the days of violent aggression
and secret combinations, and that the weapon, the
only weapon which nature has placed in our hands
wherewith with perfect freedom to face and overcome
the military despotisms of Europe, is that of being able
Jo dominate the commerce of the globe.
Soon after the Treaty of Paris, the Indian Mutiny
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS,
181
broke out. It ended in the handing over of India to
the Government of the Crown. The effect of the com
quest of India upon our foreign policy has been two
fold. First, the direct necessity of taking certain
strong places on the route to our great dependency,
and our alliance with the Porte. From England to
the East we hold a chain of posts which are essential
to the safety of our communications, but which render
us liable as time goes by to the maintenance con
stantly in the Mediterranean of a fleet at least equal to
that of France and Italy combined. Secondly, our
hold upon India has greatly increased our timidity in
championing any great cause, and has turned our
attention from the sea, where our real strength lies, to
the land, on which our national aversion from conscrip
tion must always make us fight at a disadvantage.
In India England is perforce a great military power;
and this, which is wholly at variance with our tradi
tions—for, as has been well said, we are a warlike, but
not a military people—tinges the whole current of our
foreign policy. Indian policy on more than one occa
sion has taken precedence of English ; Asiatic ideas
have had too great influence ; we have, in short, what
with fear of invasion, and dread of a rising in India
itself consequent upon misfortune in Europe, lost all
sense of proportion in considering the external rela
tion of such a country as ours. Asiatic politics must
inevitably enter largely into our calculations merely on
the ground of our commercial interests ; but India,
with its 60,000 European troops, is, as at present
governed, a source of increasing weakness to the
people of these islands, who may find themselves
�182
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
seriously hampered at a great national crisis by the
necessity for protecting their countrymen in Hindostan. This will become more clear now that
our frontier all but marches with that of a great and
troublous military power. India, consequently, will
prove a more disturbing element in our foreign policy
of the future than it has been in the past.
With the Treaty of Paris, however, England may be
said to have entered practically on the stage of per
manent non-intervention in continental affairs. Our
efforts to preserve peace when it was once understood
that under no circumstances whatever would we go
to war, became futile and even ludicrous. This was
apparent with regard to the French campaign against
Austria. Had we proclaimed our intention of siding
with either party, war would not have been declared.
But the establishment of the independence of Italy,
by French arms first, and by Garibaldi’s expedition
afterwards, met with the cordial sympathy of the
great mass of Englishman. Though the upper classes
still clung to the Austrian alliance, the people were
more clear-sighted, whilst Cavour’s happy moderation
reassured the middle class. Thus, all rejoiced at the
rise of Italy into a great power, and the extra
ordinary reception accorded to Garibaldi by the
democracy of London, gave evidence that the real
feeling of Englishmen is with the peoples of the
continent, and needs but a proper occasion to mani
fest itself in full force. The contest between the
North and the South in America, brought this truth
into stronger relief. Once more the upper and middle
classes, as in 1848 and 1859, linked themselves with
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
183
the side of reaction, and that side, unfortunately for
their credit and influence, was this time the weaker.
Nothing finer is recorded than the behaviour of the
Lancashire operatives during that awful period of con
tinuous want. The capitalists who employed them
showed no such real perception of the truth, and their
selfishness appeared in protesting against any scheme
which might remove the hands, and thus perhaps
raise wages on the return of trade. That by the way.
The fact that the working class saw that the issue lay
between freedom and despotism, and clung to their
opinion under every discouragement, is evidence of
a capacity which needs but education and organiza
tion to have a deep effect in other fields of foreign
policy.
The hare-brained French expedition to Mexico
was the outcome of the American Civil War, and this
eventually brought the French Empire to destruction.
For no sooner was the shameless attack upon Denmark
by Prussia and Austria at an end—when German in
fluence again appeared in our counsels—than the two
great Powers who took part in that act of brigandage
fell out themselves. The cooler-headed brigand fell
upon his neighbour, and by the victory of Sadowa the
supremacy of Germany was gained by Prussia. Here,
of course, was an end of all international law. Thence
forward we have been living in an epoch of wrong and
robbery. France, crippled by the Mexican campaign,
could not afford to help Austria against Prussia and
Italy—merely, in fact, displaying her weakness to
a watchful enemy. England counted for nothing
in all this, and the only benefit which accrued to the
�184
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
peoples from the bloodshed and treachery was the
annexation of Venice by Italy. The extension of
the power of military Junker-ridden Prussia over the
pacific old Bund could only be viewed with satisfaction
by those who, whilst pretending to be Liberals, secretly
sympathize with brute force so long as it is organized
against the mass of mankind. In any case Prussia,
still closely allied with Russia, became the first Power
in Europe, and the next move was merely a matter
of time and opportunity.
By the year 1870 England had not only ceased
to have a continental policy, but she positively
had not the least idea of what was going on. It is
really alarming, especially at a time like the present,
to note the depth of ignorance in the English Foreign
Office eleven years ago. At the very moment when
the Frederick the Great of modern diplomatic Ger
many had made up his mind to strike France once
for all, and had contrived to “ localize ” the war after
his favourite fashion by arrangements with Russia
and Italy, our Foreign Office had come to the con
clusion that no elements of war so much as remained
in Western Europe at all. France was easily over
thrown ; and England, unfortunately for our credit
and our interests, refused to help the Republic which
rose upon the ruins of the Empire. Then, if the
phrase ever meant anything, was the time to show
the meaning of a real balance of power. France had
been beaten ; the Empire, with its wretched array of
stock-jobbers and intriguers, had been swept away.
So far we had no right to interfere; but the people
of France were in nowise responsible for the errors of
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
185
Napoleon ; and a bold policy would have rallied Italy
and Austria at once to our side, to prevent a brave
nation from being crushed. That course was not
adopted, and any remonstrance met with insolence from
the German Government. Our position became indeed
that for which our non-interventionists had striven.
Of course further plots could be carried on inde
pendently of any consideration for the only Power
in Europe which has no real interest except in fair
play to the peoples.
It is needless to pass through the long and troubled
period which began with the Austrian imperial intrigues
in Bosnia and the Herzegovina, the Servian War, and
can scarcely be said to have ended with the Treaty
of Berlin. That a whole scheme was laid down for
the partition of the Ottoman Empire by the renewed
Holy Alliance, is clear. Russia, Germany, and
Austria had each their portions assigned, whilst the
advantages to be received by France and England
were doubtless considered ; perhaps the latter might
be content with nothing at all. The Bulgarian
atrocities helped Russia to carry out her part of the
programme, though the weakness engendered by the
war has certainly not been repaid by the advantages
she has as yet secured. England’s part in the business
has again been most unsatisfactory. A war in Europe
was avoided ; but a war in Asia was begun, which
has saddled our impoverished dependency with a
fearful expenditure. By showing, however, even a
moderately bold front in Europe, the Conservative
Government proved conclusively the influence which
England could exert, if only casting aside all lust for
�186
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
territory, and all underhand intrigue, she stood once
more with clean hands before the world as the reso
lute champion of justice and freedom, honesty and pub
lic faith. Then she could rally to her side the alliances
of the future, beside which the possession of Cyprus,
or even the control of Constantinople and Asia Minor
would seem mean and contemptible. But the result of
the game of brag which the last Government played
was not creditable. Instead of holding forth a plain,
intelligible policy to Englishmen, and appealing to
them to stand by even a downright Tory self-assertion,
there was a mixture of trimming and secrecy, of com
promise and timidity, which spoke of divided counsels
and irresolute minds. The people of England there
fore refused to go “ blind ” into a business which com
bined secret agreements abroad with the threat of
reaction in Ireland and at home. These, happily, are
the days of democracy, publicity, and open speech.
The statesman who is ambitious to lead England in
such times must take the people into his confidence,
and convince them that he is using their influence and
their power not ‘merely for selfish national interests,
but for the best interests of Europe and the world.
That the result of our secret diplomacy and party
foreign policy has not yet been fully seen is plain
enough. Non-intervention to start with, and secret
bargaining to end with, have landed us in a very un
enviable position. The nation refused to countersign
the policy of the Conservative Government, and the
Liberals came in with the promise of a special under
standing with France and perfect openness to the
country. France has so far dissembled her love for
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
187
the Liberal administration that she has kicked our
Foreign Secretary downstairs at three bounds. Greece,
the Commercial Treaty, and Tunis, are evidences of
the perfect entente cordiale which exists. The last
coup was the worst of all, for it came after assurances
of the most solemn nature that nothing whatever was
meant. Can we be surprised ? A policy of pure
selfishness has ended in our complete isolation. The
behaviour of France is shameful, and contrary to her
best interest. Granted. The treatment which we
have received in the matter would in different times
have led to a rupture of friendly relations between
the two countries. But at this moment we cannot
rely upon a single ally on the continent; and for all
we know, arrangements may be contemplated which
would occasion us very grave uneasiness.
For those who talk of non-intervention forget that
we have entered into definite guarantees, which the
least bellicose among us could not wish to shirk.
The overthrow of international law, which is pretty
complete now, would be fully accomplished indeed,
if England were to withdraw from her defence of
liberal little Belgium. We have had of late very
valuable experience as to what the concert of Europe
amounts to when booty is in the wind. It is more
than probable that the redistribution of territory
and power, which began in 1866, will not be con
fined to Eastern Europe. Should we desire, then, to
see the same sort of morality, which is good enough
for Turks, applied to Dutch, Belgians, and Swiss ?
The idea that justice influences either republics or
empires in these days had better be laid aside for the
�188
ENGLAND FOR ALL,
present as the figment that it is. A power which
could act as France has acted about Tunis, would
have small scruple in using similar tactics nearer
home.
But even more important to us than any bargaining
which may be going on, is the general aspect of
European affairs. We see four, not to say five, great
Powers absolutely bowed down with the weight of
their military expenditure ; whilst the great country
which in 1848 acted as the guardian of autocracy
in Europe, hovers between bankruptcy and revo
lution. Whatever else may be doubtful, this is past
all question, neither Germany nor Austria can per
manently bear the strain of the tremendous armaments
now kept up. For these armaments not only exhaust
the resources of the several countries, but prepare the
ground for internal revolution of the most serious
character. It is not Russia alone which is honey
combed with secret societies and festering disaffection.
There, indeed, the situation is graver than elsewhere.
Over-taxation, the drain of produce to Western
Europe, the influence of capitalism, and the break up
of the Mir coming at a time of serious famine, have
produced a state of affairs throughout the Empire
which would probably lead to revolution in one shape
or another, if the Nihilists had never been heard of.
That extraordinary conspiracy is but the natural out
come of a still more remarkable condition below.
Western civilization, with all its paraphernalia of
stockjobbing, corruption, and extravagance, has been
imposed on a country but just emerging from
barbarism, Almost anything may occur in such cif’
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
cumstances. The murder of the late Czar shocked
Europe : but the cruelties which led up to that crime
were really even more shocking than'the revenge. More
people were swept off to Siberia without trial by the
benevolent Alexander II. than ever found their way
thither within an equal period during the worst days
of the reign of Nicholas. Now there is another Czar,
who lives in constant fear for his life; and the recent
changes seem to betoken a continuance of autocratic
rule at home, combined possibly with a renewal of
aggression abroad. Men live as in expectation of an
earthquake; and the attacks upon the Jews and other
money-lenders in Southern Russia look like the pre
monitory shocks.
If the disturbances do begin in earnest in Russia,
they are almost certain to lap over into other
countries. Already the grave social issues involved
in the existing capitalist system as applied to agri
culture and business are being debated with increasing
earnestness all over Europe. In Germany the party
of the Social Democrats has gained strength of late
years to a surprising extent, notwithstanding the
pressure of similar laws to those which we are now
applying with such great success in Ireland. Con
scription does but give the disaffected more confidence;
and as they see that peaceful agitation is considered
a crime, the propaganda might easily assume a more
dangerous shape. A military system like that of
Germany carries with it the certainty of its own
destruction at no distant date. All Prince Bismarck’s
unscrupulous energy will not suffice to stop the
current of ideas which show men how and why they
�190
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
are robbed and oppressed.' In Austria the agrarian
difficulty is assuming daily a graver aspect. Nor is it
the less serious because the people have not as yet
dissociated the agitation from religion or loyalty.
They scarcely understand themselves how it is that
capitalism and difference of value impoverish them.
In France a party holding similar views to that of the
Labour party in Germany, has been formed, and they
alone have had the courage to protest against the
attack on Tunis, as contrary to the interest and the
true sense of morality of the French people.
How far these various socialist bodies in Russia,
Germany, Austria, France, and Italy, would act
together in any general programme may be doubtful.
But these organizations—consisting almost exclu
sively of working men—alone seem to have grasped
the truth that the people of the various countries have
nothing to expect from war but loss and suffering ;
consequently they alone are prepared to consider
existing difficulties with a view to their peaceful
settlement. Men who hold that their class is under
going suffering and misery because the workers of
all nations are not sufficiently at one, will not be
likely to foment those national hatreds which are in
variably turned to the aggrandisement of individuals.
But this rising feeling of democracy, this growing dis
inclination of the men who work to be handled any
longer for the advantage of emperors, aristocrats or
even bond-buyers, is viewed with very uneasy eyes by
the military powers of Europe. It is not the
assassination of the- late Czar, or threats against the
present, which are drawing together “ saviours of
�FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
191
society on the continent. They see that, let affairs
in Russia take what turn they may, another and more
serious ’48 movement is going on below the surface,
which they wish beforehand to encounter and defeat.
Hence the attempts to bring about some understand
ing with reference to the surrender of political re
fugees, and the demands which have been made, or
will be made, upon us.
Now arises an important question for us English
men—and especially for those of the working classes
—to decide. Will they in the coming struggle
between militarism and democracy lend their aid in
any way to the former, or even stand aloof and see
the peoples of Europe repressed as they were a gene
ration since ? I judge not. Jealousy of this or that
nation there may be for a time, and French vanity
and unfortunate spread-eagleism may render all
combinations in Western Europe impossible. But
with the rising feeling of democracy here at home,
any understanding with reaction as in old days would
be ruinous to the party which attempted it, as any
effort to convert us into a military power may be
fatal to our existing system of government. As time
has passed on, it has become more and more clear
that in the direction of the national inclination of the
great majority of Englishmen lies at the same time
the most advantageous policy for England. Lying
apart from the continent of Europe, and practically
free from the risk of invasion, we can not only
shelter men who are driven from their country for
mere political offences, but we can rightfully stand
forth at the critical moment on behalf of those who at
�ENGLAND FOR ALL.
present think that England must necessarily range
herself on the side of a conservatism which has come
to be revolutionary. Each nation, doubtless, must
work out its own social troubles ; but a combination
of despotisms can only be met and overcome by a
combination of peoples. The true alliances for
England in the future are the democracies of Europe,
and her real strength is on the sea.
�CONCLUSION.
193
CONCLUSION.
THUS in every direction the policy of the demo
cracy is clear and well-defined. Freedom, social
reorganization, thorough unity at home, justice, selfgovernment, and consideration for our colonies and
dependencies, and a warm friendship and ready assis
tance for the oppressed peoples abroad,—such is the
work we are called upon to begin and carry out.
Democracy, which the so-called “ governing classes ”
jeer at as anarchy, incapacity, and self-seeking, means
a close federation, first, of our own people and next
of the workers of the civilized world. This is a policy
not of to-day or of to-morrow, now to be taken up
and again to be laid aside ; it is an undertaking in
which each can continuously bear his share, and
hand on the certainty of success to his fellow.
The current of events will help on the cause of the
people. Within the past generation greater changes
have been wrought than in centuries of human exis
tence before. For the first time in the history of
mankind the whole earth is at our feet. Railways,
telegraphs, steam communications, have but just
begun to exercise an influence. Education and in
tercourse are breaking down the barriers of ages.
The men who do the work of the world are learning
from one another how it is that the poor and the
o
�194
ENGLAND FOR ALL.
miserable, the unfortunate and the weak, suffer and
fall by the wayside. In our own country, which has
led the way to the new stage of social development,
all can see that the lot of the many is sad, whilst the
few are rich and luxurious far beyond what is bene
ficial even to them. Our action in redress of these
inequalities and better ordering of our affairs will
guide and encourage the world. We, perhaps, alone
among the peoples can carry out with peace, order,
and contentment those changes which continental
revolutionists have sought through anarchy and
bloodshed. Religion, which should have helped in
this striving for a happier period, has suffered the
rich and powerful to twist its teachings to their own
account. Now, therefore, is the time, in the face of
difficulties and dangers which threaten from many
quarters, for Englishmen of all classes,’ creeds, and
conditions to push aside the petty bickerings of
faction or the degrading influence of mere selfish
interests, to the end that by sympathy and fellowfeeling for their own and for others they may hold
up a nobler ideal to mankind. Such an ideal is not
unreal or impracticable. Not as yet of course can we
hope to realize more than a portion of that for which
we strive. But if only we are true to one another, and
stand together in the fight, the brightness of the future
is ours—the day before us and the night behind. So,
when those who come after look back to these islands
as we now look back to Athens or Palestine, they shall
say,—“ This was glory—this true domination ; these
men builded on eternal foundations their might,
majesty, dominion, and power.”
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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England for all
Creator
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Hyndman, Henry Mayers [1842-1921]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: [4], 194 p. ; 19 cm.
Series title: Text-book of Democracy
Notes: Dedicated to the Democratic and Working Men's Clubs of Great Britain and Ireland.
Publisher
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E. W. Allen
Date
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1881
Identifier
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T405
Subject
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Democracy
Socialism
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (England for all), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Democracy
Marxian Economics
Social change
Socialism