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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
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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
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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*
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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
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•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
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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-
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"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
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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
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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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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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Capital and labour; their rights and duties: a retrospect of the Tailors' Labour Agency
Description
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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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Capitalism
Conway Tracts
Labour Movement
Socialism
Wages
Working Classes
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Text
LABOURS PRAYER.
BY C. BBADLAUGH.
“ Give us thisday our daily bread ” is the entreaty addressed
by the tiller of the soil to the “ Otr Father,” who has pro
mised to answer prayer. And what answer cometh from
heaven to this the bread winner’s petition? Walk amongst
the cotton workers of Lancashire, the clothweavers of
Yorkshire, the Durham pit men, the Staffordshire puddlers,
the Cornish miners, the London dock labourers, go any
where where hands are roughened with toil, where foreheads
are bedewed with sweat of work, and see the Lord’s res
ponse to the prayer, the fatlrer’s answer to his children!
The only bread they get is the bread they take; in their
hard struggle for life-sustenance, the loaves come but
slowly, and heaven adds not a crust, even though the
worker be hungry, when he rises from his toil-won meal.
Not even the sight of pale faced wife, and thin forms of
half starved infants can move to generosity the Ruler of
the world. The labourer may pray, but, if work be scant
and wages low, he pines to death while praying. His
prayer gives no relief, and misery’s answer is the mocking
echo to his demand.
It is said by many a pious tongue that God helps the
poor; the wretchedness of some of their hovel houses, found,
alas ! too often in the suburbs of our wealthiest cities, grimy,
black, squalid, and miserable; the threadbare raggedness of
their garments ; the unwholesomeness of the food they eat;
the poisoned air they breathe in their narrow wynds and
filthy alleys; all these tell how much God helps the poor.
Do you want to see how God helps the poor ? go into any
police court when some little child-thief is brought up for
�2
labour’s prayer.
hearing; see him shoeless, with ragged trousers, thread»
bare, grimy, vest, hardly hanging to his poor body, shirt
that seems as though it never could have been white, skin
dull brown with dirt, hair innocent of comb or brush, eye
ignorantly, sullenly-defiant, yet downcast; born poor, born
wretched, born in ignorance, educated amongst criminals,
crime the atmosphere in which he moved ; and society, his
nurse and creator, is now virtuously aghast at the depra
vity of this its own neglected nursling, and a poor creature
whom God alone hath helped. Go where the weakly wife
in a narrow room huddles herself and little children day after
day : and where the husband crowds in to lie down at night:
they are poor and honest, but their honesty bars not the
approach of disease, fever, sorrow, death—God helps not
the line of health to their poor wan cheeks. Go to the
country workhouse in which is temporarily housed the
worn out farm labourer, who, while strength enough re
mained, starved through weary years with wife and several
children on eight shillings per week—it is thus God helps
the poor. And the poor are taught to pray for a continu
ance of this help, and to be thankful and content to pray
that to-morrow may be like to-day, thankful that yester
day was no worse than it was, and content to-day is as
good as it is. Are there many repining at their miseries,
the preacher, with gracious intonation, answers rebukingly
that God, in his wisdom, has sent these troubles upon them
as chastisement for their sins. So, says the church, all are
sinners, rich as well as poor, but rich sinners feel the
chastising rod is laid more lightly on their backs than it
is upon those of their meaner brethren. Week-day and
Sunday it is the same contrast; one wears fustian, the
other broadcloth, one prepares for heaven in the velvet
cushioned pew, the other on the wooden benches of the
free seats. In heaven it will be different—all there above
are to wear crowns of gold and fine linen, and, therefore,
here below the poor man is to be satisfied with the state of
life into which it has pleased God to call him. The pastor
who tells him this, looks upon the labourer as an inferior
�LABOUR. S PRAYER.
S
animal, and the labourer by force of habit regards the great
landowner and peer, who patronises his endeavours, as a
being of a superior order. Is there no new form of prayer
that labour might be taught to utter, no other power to
■which his petition might be addressed ? Prayer to the un
known for aid gives no strength to the prayer. In each
beseeching, he loses dignity and self-reliance, he trusts to
he knows not what, for an answer which cometh, he knows
■not when, and mayhap may never come at all. Let labour
pray in the future in another fashion and at another altar.
Let labourer pray to labourer that each may know labour’s
rights, and be able to fulfil labour’s duties. The size of
the loaf of daily bread must depend on the amount of the
daily wages, and the labourer must pray for better wages.
But his prayer must take the form of earnest, educated en
deavour to obtain the result desired. Let workmen, in
stead of praying to God in their distress, ask one another
why are wages low? how can wages be raised? can we
raise our own wages? having raised them, can we keep
them fixed at the sum desired ? what causes produce a rise
and fall in wages ? are high wages beneficial to the labourer ?
These are questions the pulpit has no concern with. The
reverend pastor will tell you that the “ wages of sin is death,”
and will rail against “filthy lucrebut he has no incli
nation for answering the queries here propounded. Why
are wages low? Wages are low because the wage-winners
crowd too closely. W ages are low because too many seek
to share one fund. Wages are lower still because the
. ’abourer fights against unfair odds; the laws of the country
overriding the laws of humanity, have been enacted with
out the labourer’s consent, although his obedience to them
is enforced. The fund is unfairly distributed as well as
too widely divided. Statutes are gradually being modified,
and the working man may hope for ampler justice from the
employer in the immediate future than was possible in
the past, but high and healthy wages depend on the work
ing man himself. Wages can be raised by the working
classes exereising a moderate degree of caution in increase
�4
LABOUR’S PRAYER.
ing their numbers. Wages must increase when capital in
creases more rapidly than population, and it is the duty of
the working man, therefore, to take every reasonable pre
caution to check the increase of population, and to accelerate
the augmentation of capital.
Can working-men, by combination, permanently raise the
rate of wages ? One gentleman presiding at a meeting of
the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science
for the discussion of the labour question, very fairly said,
“ It is not in the power of the men alone, or of the masters
alone, or of both combined, to say what shall be the amount
of wages at any particular time in any trade or country.
The men and the masters are, at most, competitors for the
division at a certain rate, of a certain fund, provided by
[themselves and] others—that is, by the consumers. If that
fund is small, no device can make the rate of profit or rate
of wages higher.” This is in theory quite correct, if it
means that no device can make the total divisible greater
than it is, but not if it refers to the increase of profit or
wages by partial distribution. In practice, although it is
true that if the fund be small and the seekers to share it
be many, the quotient to each must be necessarily very
small, yet it is also true that a few of the competitors—i.e.t
the capitalists, may and do absorb for their portions of
profits an improper and unfairly large amount, thus still
further reducing the wretchedly small pittance in any case
receivable by the mass of labourers. It is warmly con
tended that the capitalist and labourer contend for division
of the fund appropriable in fair and open field; that the
capitalist has his money to employ, the man his labour to
sell ; that if workmen are in excess of the capitalist’s
requirements, so that the labourer has to supplicate for
employment, wages cannot rise, and will probably fall; but
that if, on the contrary, capital has need to invite additional
labourers, then wages must rise. That is the law of supply
and demand brought prominently forward. In great part
this is true, but it is not true that capital and labour com
pete in fair and open field, any more than it is true that a<
�labour’s prayer.
yron-elad war vessel, with heavy ordnance, would compete
in fair field with a wooden frigate, equipped with the
materiel in use thirty years ago. Capital is gold-plated,
and carries too many guns for unprotected labour. The
intelligent capitalist makes the laws affecting master and
servant, which the uneducated labourer must obey, but has
no effective voice to alter. The capitalist forms the govern
ment of the country, which in turn protects capital against
labour; this government the labourer must sustain, and
dares not modify. The capitalist does combine, and has
combined, and the result of this combination has been an
unfair appropriation of the divisible fund. Why should
not the labourer combine also ? The answer is truly that
no combination of workmen can increase the rate of wages,
if at the same time the number of labourers increases more
rapidly than the capital out of which their wages must be
paid. But the men may combine to instruct one another
in the laws of political economy; they may combine to
apply their knowledge of those laws to the contracts be
tween employer and employed. They may combine to
compel the repeal of unjust enactments under which an un
fair distribution of the labour fund is not only possible,
but certain. Organisations of labourers are, therefore, wise
and necessary: the object of such organisations should be
the permanent elevation and enfranchisement of the mem
bers. No combination of workmen, which merely dictates
a temporary cessation from labour, can ultimately and per
manently benefit the labourer; while it certainly imme
diately injures him and deteriorates his condition, making
his home wretched, his family paupers. Nor can even co
operative combination, praiseworthy as it certainly is, to
procure for the labourer a larger share of the profits of his
labour, permanently benefit him, except in so far that
temporarily alleviating his condition, and giving him lei
sure for study, it enables him to educate himself: unless,
at the same time, the co-operator is conscious that the in
crease or reduction in the amount of wages depends entirely
on the ratio of relation preserved between population and
�labour’s prayer.
its means of subsistence, the former always having a tendency to increase more rapidly than the latter. It is with
the problem of too many mouths for too little bread that
the labourer has really to deal: if he must pray, it should
be for more bread and for fewer mouths. The answer often
given by the workman himself to the advocate of Malthusian
views is, that the world is wide enough for all, that there
are fields yet tfnploughed broad enough to bear more corn
than man at present could eat, and that there is neither too
little food, nor are there too many mouths ; that there is, in
fact, none of that over-population with which it is sought
to affright the working-man. Over-population in the sense
that the whole world is too full to contain its habitants, or
that it will ever become too full to contain them, is certainly
a fallacy, but over-population is a lamentable truth in its
relative sense. We find evidences of over-population in
every old country of the world. The test of over-population
is the existence of povei’ty, squalor, wretchedness, disease,
ignorance, misery, and crime. Low rate of wages, and food
dear, here you have two certain indices of relative over
population. Wages depending on the demand for and
supply of labourers, wherever wages are low it is a certain
sign that there are too many candidates for employment in
that phase of the labour market. The increased cost of
pioduction of food, and its consequent higher price, also
mark that the cultivation has been forced by the numbers
of the people to descend to less productive soils. Poverty
is the test and result of over-population.
It is not against some possible increase of their numbers,
which may produce possibly greater affliction, that the
working men are entreated to agitate. It is against the
_ existing evils which afflict their ranks, evils alleged by
sound students of political economy to have already resulted
from inattention to the population question, that the ener
gies of the people are sought to be directed. The operation
. the law of population has been for centuries entirely
agnoie by those who have felt its adverse influence most
severely. It is only during the last thirty years that any
�labour’s prayer.
pf the working classes have turned their attention to the
question; and only during the last few years that it has
been to any extent discussed amongst them. Yet all the
prayers that labour ever uttered since the first breath of
human life, have not availed so much for human happiness
as will the earnest examination by one generation of this,;
the greatest of all social questions, the root of all political
problems, the foundation of all civil progress. Poor—man
must be wretched. Poor—he must be ignorant. Poor—
he must be criminal: and poor he must be till the cause
of poverty has been ascertained by the poor man himself,
and its cure planned by .the poor man’s brain, and effected
by the poor man’s hand
Outside his own rank none can save the poor. Others
may show him the abyss, b ut he must avoid its dangerous
brink himself. Others may point out to him the chasm,
but he must build his own bridge over. Labour’s prayer
must be to labour’s head for help from labour’s hand to
strike the blow that severs labour’s chain, and terminates
the too long era of labour’s suffering.
During the last few years our daily papers, and various
periodicals, magazines, and reviews have been more fre
quently, and much less partially, devoted than of old to the
discussion of questions relating to the labourer’s condition,
and the means of ameliorating it. In the Legislative As
sembly debates have taken place which would have been
impossible fifty years since. Works on political economy
are now more easily within the reach of the working man
than they were some few years ago. People’s editions are
now published of treatises on political economy which half
a century back the people were unable to read. It is now
possible for the labourer, and it is the labourer’s duty, to
make himself master of the laws which govern the produc
tion and distribution of wealth. Undoubtedly there is
much grievous wrong in the mode of distribution of wealth,
by which the evils that afflict the poorest strugglers are
often specially and tenfold aggravated. The monopoly of
land, the serf state of th$ labourer, are points requiring
�iiABOtritsr PAAYEte.
energetic agitation. The grave and real question is, ho^S
ever, that which lies at the root of all, the increase of
wealth as against the increase of those whom it subsists.
The leaders of the great trades’ unions of the country, if
hey really desire to permanently increase the happiness of
the classes amongst whom they exercise influence, can
speedily promote this object by encouraging their members
to discuss freely the relations of labour to capital; not
moving in one groove, as if labour and capital were neces
sarily antagonistic, and that therefore labour must always
have rough-armed hand to protect itself from the attacks
of capital; but, taking new ground, to inquire if labour and
capital are bound to each other by any and what ties, ascer
taining if the share of the labourer in the capital fund
depends, except so far as affected by inequality in distribu
tion, on the proportion between the number of labourers and
the amount of the fund. The discussing, examining, and
dealing generally with these topics, would necessarily
compel the working man to a more correct appreciation of
his position.
Any such doctrine as that ‘ ‘ the poor shall never cease
out of the landor that we are to be content with the
station in life into which it has pleased God to call us ; or
that we are to ask and we shall receive, must no longer
avail. Schiller most effectively answers the advocates of
prayer—
“ Help, Lord, help ! Look with pity down!
A paternoster pray;
What God does, that is justly done,
His grace endures for aye.”
u Oh, mother! empty mockery,
God hath not justly dealt by me:
Have I not begged and prayed in vain;
What boots it now to pray again ?”
Labour’s only and effective prayer must be in life action
for its own redemption ; action founded on thought, crude
thought, and sometimes erring at first, but ultimately
developed into useful thinking, by much patient experi
menting for the right and true*
�
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Victorian Blogging
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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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Labour's prayer
Creator
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Bradlaugh, Charles [1833-1891]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 8 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Date of publication from the Selection of Bradlaugh's political pamphlets / John Saville (New York: 1970).
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Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant
Date
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[1865]
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N097
G5678
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Labour
Social problems
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Text
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English
Labour Movement-England-History-19th Century
Wages
Working Classes
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Text
gA<
PRICE ONE PENNY.
BY
KARL
MARX.
Translated by J. L. JOYNES,
Author of “ADVENTURES OF A TOURIST IN IRELAND,”
“ THE
SOCIALIST CATECHISM,” “ SOCIALIST RHYMES.”
NEW AND CHEAPER EDITION.
(<»(
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® ® -A E Y
LU
THE MODERN PRESS, 13,
Paternoster Row, London,
E.CE
Agent for U.S.A., W. L. Rosenberg, 261, East Tenth St., New York City.
1886.
�THE
SOCIAL-DEMOCRATILFEDERATION.
OBJECT.
The Establishment of a Free Condition of Society based on the prin
ciple of Political Equality, with Equal Social Rights for all and the
complete Emancipation of Labour.
PROGRAMME.
1. All Officers or Administrators to be elected by Equal Direct Adult
Suffrage, and to be paid by the Community.
2. Legislation by the People, in such wise that no project of Law
shall become legally binding till accepted by the Majority of the People.
3. The Abolition of a Standing Army, and the Establishment of a
National Citizen Force; the People to decide on Peace or War.
4. All Education, higher no less than elementary, to be Free, Com
pulsory, Secular, and Industrial for all alike.
5. The Administration of Justice to be Free and Gratuitous for all
Members of Society.
6. The Land with all the Mines, Railways and other Means of Tran
sit, to be declared and treated as Collective or Common Property.
7. Ireland and all other parts of the Empire to have Legislative
Independence.
8. The Production of Wealth to be regulated by Society in the com
mon interest of all its Members.
9. The Means of Production, Distribution and Exchange to be
declared and treated as Collective or Common Property.
As measures called for to palliate the evils of our existing society the
Social-Democratic Federation urges for immediate adoption :—
The Compulsory Construction of healthy artizan’s and agricultural
labourers’ dwellings in proportion to the population, such dwellings to
be let at rents to cover the cost of construction and maintenance alone.
Free Compulsory Education for all classes, together with the provision
of at least one wholesome meal a day in each school.
Eight Hours or less to be the normal working day in all trades.
Cumulative Taxation upon all incomes above a fixed minimum not
exceeding ^300 a year.
State Appropriation of Railways, with or without compensation.
The establishment of National Banks, which shall absorb all private
institutions that derive a profit from operations in money or credit.
Rapid Extinction of the National Debt.
Nationalisation of the Land, and organisation of agricultural and
industrial armies under State control on Co-operative principles.
As means for the peaceable attainment of these objects the SocialDemocratic Federation advocates :
Adult Suffrage. Annual Parliaments. Proportional Represen
Payment of Members ; and Official Expenses of Election
out of the Rates.
Abolition of the House of Lords and all
Hereditary Authorities.
Disestablishment and Disendowment
of all State Churches.
tation.
Membership of Branches of the Federation is open to all who agree
with its objects, and subscribe One Penny per week.
Those ready to form Branches should communicate with the
Secretary, Social-Democratic Federation, Bridge House, Blackfriars, E.C.
�WAGE-LABOUR AND CAPITAL.
What are wages, and, how are they determined. ?
±* we were to ask the labourers, “ How much wages do you get ? ” one
would reply, “ I get a couple of shillings a day from my employer ; ”
another, “I get half-a-crown,” and so on. According to the differen
trades to which they belong, they would name different sums of
money which they receive from their particular employers, either for
working for a certain length of time, or for performing a certain
piece of work ; for example, either for weaving an ell of cloth, or for setting up a
certain amount of type, But in spite of this difference in their statements there
is one point in which they would all agree : their wages are the amount of money
which their employer pays them either for working a certain length of time, or
for a certain amount of work done.
Thus their employer buys their work formoney. For money they sell their
■ work to him. With the same sum for which the employer has bought their
work, as for instance, with a couple of shillings, he might have bought four
pounds of sugar, or a proportionate amount of any other wares, The two shil
lings with which he buys the four pounds of sugar, is the price of four pounds of
sugar. The two shillings with which he buys labour for twelve hours, is the
price of twelve hours’ work. Work is therefore as much a commodity as sugar,
neither more nor less, only they measure the former by the clock, the latter by
the scales.
The labourersexchange their own commodity with their employers’—work for
money ; and this exchange takes place according to a fixed proportion. So much
money for so much work. For twelve hours’ weaving, two shillings. And do not
these two shillings represent two shillings’ worth of all other commodities ? Thus
the labourer has, in fact, exchanged his own commodity—work, with all kinds of
orher commodities, and that in a fixed proportion. His employer in giving him
two shillings, has given him so much meat, so much clothing, so much fuel, light,
and so on, in exchange for his day’s work. The two shillings, therefore, express
the proportion in which his work is exchanged with other commodities—the
exchange-value of his work; and the exchange-value of any commodity expressed
in money is called its price. Wage is, therefore, only another name for the
price of work—for the price of this peculiar piece of property which can have no
local habitation at all except in human flesh and blood.
Take the case of any workman, a weaver for instance. The employer supplies
him with thread and loom. The weaver sets to work, and the thread is turned
into cloth. The employer takes possession of the cloth and sells it, say for twenty
shillings. Does the weaver receive as wages a share in the cloth—in the twenty
shillings—in the product of his labour ? By no means. The weaver receives his
wages long before the product is sold. The employer does not, therefore, pay his
wages with the money he will get for the cloth, but with money previously pro
vided. Loom and thread are not the weaver’s produce, since they are supplied
by the employer, and no more are the commodities which he receives in exchange
fer his own commodity, or in other words, for his work, It is possible that the
employer finds no purchaser for his cloth. It may be that by its sale he does not
recover even the wages he has paid. It may be that in comparison with the
weaver’s wages he made a great bargain by its sale. But all this has nothing
whatever to do with the weaver. The employer purchases the weaver's labour
with a part of his available property—of his capital—in exactly the same way as
he has with another part of his property bought the raw material—the thread—
and the instrument of labour—the loom. As soon as he has made these pur
chases—and he reckons among them the purchase of the labour necessary to the
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production of the cloth—he proceeds to produce it by means of the raw material
and the instruments which belong to him. Among these last is, of course,
reckoned our worthy weaver, who has as little share in the product, or in the
price of the product, as the loom itself.
Wages, therefore, are not the worker’s share of the commodities which he has
produced. Wages are the share of commodities previously produced, with
which the employer purchases a certain amount of productive labour.
Labour is, therefore, a commodity which its owner the wage worker sells to
capital. Why does he sell it ? In order to live.
But labour is the peculiar expression of the energy of the labourer’s life.
And this energy he sells to another party, in order to secure for himself the
means of living. For him, therefore, his energy is nothing but a means of ensur
ing his own existence. He works to live. He does not count the work itself as a
part of his life, rather is it a sacrifice of his life. It is a commodity which he has
made over to another party. Neither is its product the aim of his activity. What
he produces for himself is not the silk he weaves, nor the place that he builds, nor
the gold that ne digs from out the mine. What he produces for himself is his
wage ; and silk, gold, and palaces are transformed for him into a certain quantity
of means of existence—a cotton shirt, some copper coins, and a lodging in a
cellar. And what of the labourer, who for twelve hours weaves, spins, bores,
turns, builds, shovels, breaks stones, carries loads, and so on ? Does his twelve
hours’ weaving, spinning, boring, turning, building, shovelling, and stone-breaking
represent the active expression of his life? On the contrary. Life begins for
him exactly where this activity of his ceases—at his meals, on the public-house
bench, in his bed. His twelve hours’ work has no meaning for him as weaving,
spinning, boring, etc., but only as earnings whereby he may obtain his meals, his
seat in the public-house, his bed. If the silkworm’s object in spinning were to
prolong its existence as a caterpillar, it would be a perfect example of a wage
worker.
Labour was not always a commodity. Labour was not always wage-work, that
is, a marketable commodity. The slave does not sell his labour to the slave
owner. The slave along with his labour is sold once for all to his owner. He
is a commodity which can pass from the hand of one owner to that of another.
He himself is a commodity, but his labour is not his commodity. The serf sells
only a portion of his labour. He does not receive his wages from the owner of
the soil; rather the owner of the soil receives a tribute from him. The serf be
longs to the soil, and to the lord of the soil he brings its fruits. The free labourer,
on the other hand, sells himself, and that by fractions. From day to day he sells
by auction eight, ten, twelve, fifteen hours of his life to the highest bidder—to
the owner of the raw material, the instruments of work, and the means of life;
that is, to the employer. The labourer himself belongs neither to an owner nor
to the soil : but eight, ten, twelve, fifteen hours of his daily life belong to the man
who buys them. The labourer leaves the employer to whom he has hired him
self whenever he pleases; and the employer discharges him whenever he thinks
fit; either as soon as he ceases to make a profit out of him, or fails to get so
high a profit as he requires. But the labourer, whose only source of earning is
the sale of his labour, cannot leave the whole class of his purchasers, that is, the
capitalist class, without renouncing his own existence. He does not belong to
this or that particular employer, but he does belong to the employing class;
and more than that, it is his business to find an employer ; that is, among this
employing class it is his business to discover his own particular purchaser.
Before going more closely into the relations between capital and wage-work, it
will be well to give a brief survey of those general relations which are taken into
consideration in determining the amount of wages.
As we have seen, wages are the price of a certain commodity—labour. Wages
are thus determined by the same law which regulates the'price of any other
commodity.
Thereupon the question arises, how is the price of a commodity determined ?
By what means is the price of a commodity determined ?
By means of competition between buyers and sellers, and the relation between
supply and demand—offer and desire. And this competition by which the price
of an article is fixed, is three-fold.
The same commodity is offered in the market by various sellers. Whoever
offers the greatest advantage to purchasers is certain to drive the other sellers off
the field, and secure for himself the greatest sale. The sellers, therefore, fight for
the sale and the market among themselves. Everyone of them wants to sell,
and does his best to sell much, and if possible to become the only seller. There
�$
5
fore each outbids the other in cheapness, and a competition takes place among
the sellers which lowers the price of the goods they offer.
But a competition also goes on among the purchasers, which on their side
raises the price of the goods offered.
Finally there arises a competition between buyers and sellers; the one set
want to buy as cheap as possible, the other to sell as dear as possible. The result
of this competition between buyers and sellers will depend upon the relations of
the two previous aspects of the competition ; that is, upon whether the compe
tition in the ranks of the buyers or that in those of the sellers is the keener.
Business thus leads two opposing armies into the field, and each of them again
presents the aspect of a battle in its own ranks between its own soldiers. That
army whose troops are least mauled by one another carries off the victory over
the opposing host.
.
Let us suppose that there are a hundred bales of cotton in the market, and at
the same time buyers in -want of a thousand bales. In this case the demand is
greater than the supply. The competition between the buyers will therefore be
intense • each of them will do his best to get hold of all the hundred bales of
cotton ’ This example is no arbitrary supposition. In the history of the trade
we have experienced periods of failure of the cotton plant, when particular com
panies of capitalists have endeavoured to purchase, not only a hundred bales of
cotton but the whole stock of cotton in the world. Therefore, in the case sup
posed ’ each buyer will try to beat the others out of the field by offering a pro
portionately higher price for the cotton. The cotton-sellers, perceiving the troops
of the hostile host in violent combat with one another, and being perfectly secure
as to the sale of all their hundred bales, will take very good care not to begin
squabbling among themselves in order to depress the price at the very moment
when their adversaries are emulating each other ;in the process of screwing it
higher up. Peace is therefore suddenly proclaimed in the army of the sellers.
They present a united front to the purchaser, and fold their arms in philosophic
content ■ and their claims would be absolutely boundless if it were not that the
offers of even the most pressing and eager of the buyers must always have some
definite limit.
Thus if the supply of a commodity is not so great as the demand tor it, the
competition between the buyers waxes.
Result; A more or less important rise
in the price of goods.
.
As a rule the converse case is of commoner occurrence, producing an opposite
result. Large excess of supply over demand ; desperate competition among the
sellers; dearth of purchasers ; forced sale of goods dirt cheap.
But what is the meaning of the rise and fall in price ? What is the meaning
of higher price or lower price ? A grain of sand is high when examined through
a microscope, and a tower is low when compared with a mountain. And if price
is determined by the relation between supply and demand, how is the relation
between supply and demand itself determined ?
.
.
Let us turn to the first worthy citizen we meet. . He will not take an instant
to consider but like a second Alexander the Great will cut the metaphysical knot
by the help of his multiplication table. “ If the production of the goods which
I sell” he will tell us, “has cost me /ioo, and I get pro by their sale—within
the year you understand—that’s what I call a sound, honest, reasonable profit.
But if I make £120 or £130 by the sale, that is a higher profit; and if I were to
get a good Z200, that would be an exceptional, an enormous profit.” What is it
then that serves our citizen as to the measure of his profit ? The cost of pro
duction of his goods. If he receives in exchange for them an amount of other
goods whose production has cost less, he has lost by his bargain. If he receives
an amount whose production has cost more, he has gained. And he reckons the
rise and fall of his profit by the number of degrees at which it stands with refer
ence to his zero—the cost of production.
_
We have now seen how the changing proportion between supply and demaud
Ji
produces the rise and fall of prices, making them at one time high at another
low. If through failure in the supply, or exceptional increase in the demand,
an important rise in the price of a commodity takes place, then the price of
another commodity must have fallen ; for,, of course, the price of a commodity
only expresses in money the proportion in which other commodities can be
exchanged with it. For instance, if the price of a yard of silk rises from five |to
six shillings, the price of silver has fallen in comparison with silk ; and in the
same way the price of all other commodities which remain at their old prices has
fallen if compared with silk. We have to give a larger quantity of them m
exchange in order to obtain the same quantity of silk. Aud what is the result ot
H
�6
a rise in the price of a commodity ? A mass of capital is thrown into that flourish
ing branch of business, and the immigration of capital into the province of the
privileged business will last until the ordinary level of profits is attained; or
rather, until the price of the products sinks through overproduction.
Conversely, if the price of a commodity falls below the cost of its production,
capital will be withdrawn from the production of this commodity. Except in
the case of a branch of industry which has become obsolete and is therefore
doomed to disappear, the result of this flight of capital will be that the production
cf this commodity, and therefore its supply, will continually dwindle until it
corresponds to the demand; and thus its price rises again to the level of the cost
of its production ; or rather, until the supply has fallen below the demand ; that
is, until its price has again risen above its cost of production ; for the price of
any commodity is always either above or below its cost of production.
We see then how it is that capital is always immigrating and emigrating, from
the province of one industry into that of another. It is high prices that bring
about an excessive immigration, and low prices an excess of emigration.
We might show from another point of view how not only the supply, but
also the demand is determined by the cost of production ; _but this would lead us
too far from our present subject.
We have just seen how the fluctuations of supply and demand always reduce
the price of a commodity to its cost of production. It is true that the precise
price of a commodity is always either above or below its cost of production;
but the rise and fall reciprocally balance each other, so within a certain period,
if the ebb and flow of the business are reckoned up together, commodities are
exchanged with one another in accordance with their cost of production ; and
thus their cost of production determines their price.
The determination of price by cost of production is not to be understood
in the sense of the economists. The economists declare that the average price
of commodities is equal to the cost of production ; this, according to them, is a
law. The anarchical movements in which the rise is compensated by the fall,
and the fall by the rise, they ascribe to chance. With just as good a right as
this, which the other economists assume, we might consider the fluctuations as
the law, and ascribe the fixing of price by cost of production to chance. But if
we look closely, we see that it is precisely these fluctuations, although they bring
the most terrible desolation in their train and shake the fabric of bourgeois
society like earthquakes, it is precisely these fluctuations which in their course
determine price by cost of production. In the totality of this disorderly move
ment is to be found its order. Throughout these alternating movements, in the
course of this industrial anarchy, competition, as it were, cancels one excess by
means of another.
We gather, therefore, that the price of a commodity is determined by its
cost of production, in such manner that the periods in which the price of this
commodity rises above its cost of production are compensated by the periods in
which it sinks below this cost, and conversely. Of course this does not hold
good for one single particular product of an industry, but only for that entire
branch of industry. So also it does not hold good for a particular manufacturer,
but only for the entire industrial class.
The determination of price by cost of production is the same thing as its
determination by the duration of the labour which is required for the manu
facture of a commodity; for cost of production may be divided into (i) raw
material and implements, that is, products of industry whose manufacture has
cost a certain number of days’ work, and which therefore represents a certain
duration of labour, and (2) actual labour, which is measured by its duration.
Now the same general laws, which universally regulate the price of com
modities, regulate, of course, wages, the price of labour.
Wages will rise and fall in accordance with the proportion between demand
and supply, that is, in accordance with the conditions of the competition between
capitalists as buyers, and labourers as sellers of labour. The fluctuations of
wages correspond in general with the fluctuations in the price of commodities.
Within these fluctuations the price of labour is regulated by its cost of production,
that is, by the duration of labour which is required in order to produce this
commodity, labour.
Now what is the cost of production of labour itself?
It is the cost required for the production of a labourer and for,his maintenance
as a labourer.
The shorter the time requisite for instruction in any labour, the less is the
labourer's cost of production, and the lower are his wages, the price of his work
�7
In those branches of industry which scarcely require any oeriod of apprenticeship,
and where the mere bodily existence of the labourer is sufficient, the requisite
cost of his production and maintenance are almost limited to the cost of the
commodities which are requisite to keep him alive, The price of his labour is
therefore determined by the price of the bare necessaries of his existence.
Here, however, another consideration comes in. The manufacturer, who
reckons up his expenses of production and determines accordingly the price of
the product, takes into account the wear and tear of the machinery. If a
machine costs him /ioo and wears itself out in ten years, he adds £10 a-year to
the price of his goods, in order to replace the worn-out machine by a new one
when the ten years are up. In the same way we must reckon in the cost of pro
duction of simple labour the cost of its propagation ; so that the race of labourers
may be put in a position to multiply and to replace the worn-out workers by new
ones. Thus the wear and tear of the labourer must be taken into account just
as much as the wear and tear of the machine.
Thus the cost of the production of simple labour amounts to
cost of the
labourer’s subsistence and propagation, and the price of this cost determines his
wages. When we speak of wages we mean the minimum of wages. This mini
mum of wages holds good, just as does the determination by the cost of pro
duction of the price of commodities in general, not for the particular individual,
but for the species.
Individual labourers, indeed millions of them, do not
receive enough to enable them to subsist and propagate; but the wages of the
whole working class with all their fluctuations are nicely adjusted to this minimum.
Now that we are grounded on these general laws which govern wages just as
much as the price of any other commodity, we can examine our subject more
exactly,
“Capital consists of raw material, implements of labour, and all kinds of
means of subsistence, which are used for the production of new implements and
new means of subsistence. All these factors of capital are created by labour,
are products of labour, are stored-up labour. Stored-up labour which serves as
the means of new production is capital.”
So say the economists.
What is a negro slave ? A human creature of the black race. The one
definition is just as valuable as the other.
A negro is a negro. In certain conditions he is transformed into a slave.
A spinning-jenny is a machine for spinning cotton. Only in certain conditions is
it transformed into capital. When torn away from these conditions, it is just as
little capital as gold is money in the abstract, or sugar the price of sugar. In
the work of production men do not stand in relation to nature alone. They
only produce when they work together in a certain way, and mutually exchange
their different kinds of energy. In order to produce, they mutually enter upon
certain relations and conditions, and it is only by means of these relations and
conditions that .their relation to nature is defined, and production becomes
possible.
These social relations upon which the producers mutnally enter, the terms
upon which they exchange their energies and take their share in the collective
act of production, will of course differ according to the character of the means
of production. With the invention of firearms as implements of warfare the
whole organisation of the army was of necessity altered ; and with the alteration
in the relations through which individuals form an army, and are enabled to
work together as an army, there was a simultaneous alteration in the relations of
armies to one another.
Thus with the change in the social relations by means of which individuals,
produce, that is, in the social relations of production, and with the alteration and
development of the material means of production, the powers of production arealso transformed, The relations of production collectively form those social
relations which we call a society, and a society with definite degrees of historical
development, a society with an appropriate and distinctive character. Ancient
society, feudal society, bourgeois society, are instances of this collective result of
the relations of production, each of which marks out an important step in the
historical development of mankind.
Now capital also is a social condition of production. It is a bourgeois condition
of production, a condition of the production of a bourgeois society. Are not the
means of subsistence, the implements of labour, and the raw material, of which
capital consists, the results of definite social relations ; were they not produced
and stored up under certain social conditions ? Will they not be used for further
production under certain social conditions ? And is it not just this definite social
�8
character which transforms into capital that product which serves for further
production ?
Capital does not consist of means of subsistence, implements of labour, and
raw material alone, nor only of material products; it consists just as much of
■exchange-values. All the products of which it consists are commodities. Thus
capital is not merely the sum of material products ; it is a sum of commodities,
of exchange-values, of social quantities.
Capital remains unchanged if we substitute cotton for wool, rice for corn,
and steamers for railways; provided only that the cotton, the rice, the steamers
—the bodily form of capital—have the same exchange value, the same price, as
the wool, the corn, the railways, in which it formerly embodied itself, The
bodily form of capital may change continually, while the capital itself undergoes
not the slightest alteration.
But though all capital is a sum of commodities, that is, of exchange-values,
it is not every sum of commodities, of exchange-values, that is capital.
Every sum of exchange-values is an exchange-value. For instance, a house
worth a thousand pounds is an exchange-value of a thousand pounds. A penny
worth of paper is the sum of the exchange-values of a hundred-hundreths of a
penny. Products which may be mutually exchanged are commodities. The
definite proportion in which they are exchangeable forms their exchange-value,
or, expressed in money, their price. The amount of these products can do
nothing to alter their definition as being commodities, or as representing an
■exchange-value, or as having a certain price. Whether a tree is large or small, it
remains a tree. Whether we exchange iron for other wares in ounces or in
hundredweights, that makes no difference in its character as a commodity
possessing exchange-value. According to its amount it is a commodity of more
■or less worth, with a higher or lower price.
How then can a sum of commodities, of exchange-values, become capital ?
By maintaining and multiplying itself as an independent social power, that
is, as the power of a portion of society, by means of its exchange for direct, living
labour. Capital necessarily pre-supposes the existence of a class which possesses
nothing but labour-force.
It is the lordship of past, stored-up, realised labour over actual, living labour
that transforms the stored-up labour into capital.
Capital does not consist in the fact that stored-up labour is used by living labour
as a means to further production. It consists in the fact that living labours serves
as the means whereby stored-up labour may maintain and multiply its own
■exchange-value.
What is it that takes place in the exchange between capital and wage-work ?
The labourer receives in exchange for his labour the means of subsistence ;
but the capitalist receives in exchange for the means of subsistence labour, the
productive energy of the labourer, the creative force whereby the labourer not
only replaces what he consumes, but also gives to the stored-up labour a greater
value than it had before. The labourer receives from the capitalist a share of
the previously provided means of subsistence. To what use does he put
these means of subsistence ?
He uses them for immediate consump
tion. But as soon as I consume my means of subsistence, they disappear
and are irrecoverably lost to me; it therefore becomes necessary that I should
employ the time during which these means keep me alive in order to produce
new means of subsistence ; so that during their consumption I may provide by
my labour new value in the place of that which thus disappears. But it is just
this grand reproductive power which the labourer has to bargain away to capital
in exchange for the means of subsistence which he receives. To him therefore it
is entirely lost.
Let us take an example. A farmer gives his day-labourer two shillings a
day. For this two shillings he works throughout the day on the farmer’s field,
and so secures him a return of four shillings. The farmer does not merely get
the value which he had advanced to the day-labourer replaced ; he doubles it.
He has thus spent or consumed the two shillings which he gave to the daylabourer in a fruitful and productive fashion. He has bought for his two shil
lings just that labour and force of the day-labourer which produces fruits of the
earth of twice the value, and turns two shillings into four. The day-labourer on
the other hand receives in place of his productive force, which he has just bar
gained away to the farmer, two shillings: and these he exchanges for means of
subsistence ; which means of subsistence he proceeds with more or less speed to
consume. The two shillings have thus been consumed in double fashion ; pro
ductively for capital, since they have been exchanged for the labour-force which
�produced the four shillings; unproductively for the labourer, since they have
been exchanged for means of subsistence which have disappeared for ever,
and whose value he can only recover by repeating the same bargain with tha
farmer. Thus capital presupposes wage-labour, and wage-labour presupposes
capital. They condition one another ; and each brings the other into play.
Does a labourer in a cotton factory produce merely cotton ? No, he produces
capital. He produces value which serves afresh to command his own labour,
and to create new value by its means.
Capital can only increase when it is exchanged for labour, when it calls
wage-labour into existence. Wage-labour can only be exchanged for capital
by augmenting capital and strengthening the power whose slave it is. An
increase of capital is therefore an increase of the proletariat, that is, of the
labouring class.
The interests of the capitalist and the labourer are therefore identical, assert
the bourgeoisie and their economists, And, in fact, so they are ! The labourer
perishes if capital does not employ him. Capital perishes if it does not exploit
labour ; and in order to exploit it, it must buy it. The faster the capital devoted
to production—the productive capital—increases, and the more successfully the
industry is carried on, the richer do the bourgeoisie become, the better does
business go, the more labourers does the capitalist require, and the dearer does
the labourer sell himself.
Thus the indispensable condition of the labourer’s securing a tolerable posi
tion is the speediest possible growth of productive capital.
But what is the meaning of the increase of productive capital ? The increase
of the power of stored-up labour over living labour. The increase of the dominion
of the bourgeoisie over the labouring class. As fast as wage-labour creates its
own antagonist and its own master in the dominating power of capital, the
means of employment, that is, of subsistence, flow back to it from its antagonist;
but only on the condition that it is itself transformed afresh into a portion of
capital, and becomes the lever whereby the increase of capital may be again
hugely accelerated.
Thus the statement that the interests of capital and labour are identical comes
to mean merely this : capital and wage-labour are the two terms of one and the
same proportion. The one conditions the other, just in the same way that the
usurer and the borrower condition each other mutually.
So long as the wage-labourer remains a wage-labourer, his lot in life is
dependent upon capital. That is the exact meaning of the famous community of
interests between capital and labour.
The increase of capital is attended by an increase in the amount of wage
labour and in the number of wage-labourers; or, in other words, the dominion of
capital is spread over a larger number of individuals. And, to give the most
fortunate event possible, with the increase of productive capital there is an
increase in the demand for labour. And thus wages, the price of labour, will rise.
A house may be large or small: but as long as the surrounding houses are
equally small, it satisfies all social expectations as a dwelling place. But let a
palace arise by the side of this small house, and it shrinks from a house into a
hut. The smallness of the house now gives it to be understood that its occupant
has either very small pretentions or none at all; and however high it may shoot
up with the progress of civilisation, if the neighbouring palace shoots up also in
the same or in greater proportion, the occupant of the comparatively small house
will always find himself more uncomfortable, more discontented, more confined
within his four walls.
A notable advance in the amount paid as wages brings about a rapid increase
of productive capital. The rapid increase of productive capital calls forth just as
rapid an increase in wealth, luxury, social wants, and social comforts. Therefore,
although the comforts of the labourer have risen, the social satisfaction which
they give has fallen in comparison'jwith^these'augmented comforts of the capitalist
which are unattainable for the labourer, and in comparison with the general
development of comforts. Our wants and their satisfaction have their origin
in society; we therefore measure them in their relation to society, and not in
relation to the objects which satisfy them. Since their nature is social, it is
therefore relative.
As a rule then, wages are not determined merely by the amount of commo
dities for which they may be exchanged. They depend upon various relations.
What the labourer immediately receives for his labour is a certain sum
of money. Are wages determined merely by this money price ?
In the sixteenth century the gold and silver in circulation in Europe was
�IO
augmented in consequence of the discovery of America. The value of gold and
silver fell, therefore, in proportion to other commodities. The labourers received
for their labour the same amount of silver coin as before. The money price of
their labour remained the same, and yet their wages had fallen, for in exchange
for the same sum of silver they obtained a smaller quantity of other commo
dities. This was one of the circumstances which furthered the increase of
capital and the rise of the bourgeoisie in the sixteenth century.
Let us take another case. In the winter of 1847, in consequence of a failure
in the crops, there was an important increase in the price of the indispensable
means of subsistence, corn, meat, butter, cheese, and so on, We will suppose
that the labourers still received the same sum of money for their labour as
before. Had not their wages fallen then ? Of course they had. For the same
amount of money they received in exchange less bread, meat, etc. ; and their
wages had fallen, not because the value of silver had diminished, but because the
value of the means of subsistence had increased.
Let us finally suppose that the money price of labour remains the same,
while in consequence of the employment of new machinery, or on account of a
good season, or for some similar reason, there is a fall in the price of all agri
cultural and manufactured goods. For the same amount of money the labourers
can now buy more commodities of all kinds. Their wages have therefore risen,
just because their money price has not changed.
The money price of labour, the nominal amount of wages, does not there
fore fall together with the real wages, that is, with the amount of commodities
that may practically be obtained in exchange for the wages. Therefore if we
speak of the rise and fall of wages, the money price of labour, or the nominal
wage, is not the only thing which we must keep in view.
But neither the nominal wages, that is, the amount of money for which the
labourer sells himself to the employer, nor yet the real wages, that is, the amount
of commodities which he can buy for this money, exhaust the relations which are
comprehended in the term wages.
For the meaning of the word is chiefly determined by its relation to the gain
or profit of the employer—it is a proportionate and relative expression.
The real wage expresses the price of labour in relation to the price of other
commodities; the relative wage, on the contrary, expresses the price of direct
labour in relation to that of stored-up labour, the relative value of wage-labour
and capital, the proportionate value of capitalist and labourer.
Real wages may remain the same, or they may even rise, and yet the relative
wages may none the less have fallen. Let us assume, for example, that the price
of all the means of subsistence has fallen by two-thirds, while a day’s wages have
only fallen one-third, as for instance, from three shillings to two. Although the
labourer has a larger amount of commodities at his disposal for two shillings
than he had before for three, yet his wages are nevertheless diminished in pro
portion to the capitalist’s gain. The capitalist’s profit—the manufacturer's, for
instance—has been augmented by a shilling, since for the smaller sum of exchange
value which he pays to the labourer, the labourer has to produce a larger sum of
exchange-value than he did before. The value of capital is raised in proportion
to the value of labour. The division of social wealth between capital and labour
has become more disproportionate. The capitalist commands a larger amount
of labour with the same amount of capital. The power of the capitalist class
over the labouring class is increased; the social position of the labourer has
deteriorated, and is depressed another degree below that of the capitalist.
What then is the general law which determines the rise and fall of wages and
profit in their reciprocal relation ?
They stand in inverse proportion to one another. Capital's exchange-value,
profit, rises in the same proportion in which the exchange-value of labour, wages,
sinks; and conversely. The rise in profit is exactly measured by the fall in
wages, and the fall in profit by the rise in wages.
The objection may perhaps be made that the capitalist may have gained a
profit by advantageous exchange of his products with other capitalists, or by a
rise in the demand for his goods, whether in consequence of the opening of new
markets, or of a greater demand in the old markets; that the profit of the capi
talist may thus increase by means of over-reaching another capitalist, indepen
dently of the rise and fall of wages and the exchange-value of labour ; or that rhe
profit of the capitalist may also rise through an improvement in the implements
of labour, a new application of natural forces, and so on.
But it must nevertheless be admitted that the result remains the same,
although it is brought about in a different way. The capitalist has acquired a
�11
larger amount of exchange-value with the same amount of labour, without having
had to pay a higher price for the labour on that account; that is to say, a lower
price has been paid for the labour in proportion to the nett profit which it yields
to the capitalist.
Besides we must remember that in spite of the fluctuations in the price of com
modities, the average price of each commodity—the proportion in. which it
exchanges for other commodities—is determined by its cost of production. The
over-reaching and tricks that go on within the capitalist class therefore neces
sarily cancel one another. Improvements in machinery, and new applications of
natural forces to the service of production, enable them to turn out in a given
time with the same amount of labour and capital a larger quantity of products,
but by no means a larger quantity of exchange-value. If by the application of
the spinning-jenny I han turn out twice as much thread in an hour as I could
before its invention, for instance, a hundred pounds instead of fifty, that is
because the cost of production has been halved, or because at the same cost I
can turn out double the amount of products.
Finally in whatsoever proportion the capitalist classes—the bourgeoisie—
whether of one country or of the market of the whole world—-share among them
selves the nett profits of production, the total amount of these nett profits always
consists merely of the amount by which, taking all in all, direct labour has been
increased by means of stored-up labour. This sum total increases, therefore, in
the proportion in which labour augments capital; that is, in the proportion in
which profit rises as compared with wages.
Thus we see that even if we confine ourselves to the relation between capital
and wage-labour, the interests of capital are in direct antagonism to the interests
of wage-labour.
A rapid increase of capital is equal to a rapid increase of profits. Profits
can only make a rapid increase, if the exchange-value of labour—the relative
wage—makes an equally rapid decline. The relative wage may decline, although
the actual wage rises along with the nominal wage, or money price of labour; if
only it does not rise in the same proportion as profit. For instance, if when trade
is good, wages rise five per cent., and profits on the other hand thirty per cent.,
then the proportional or relative wage has not increased but declined.
Thus if the receipts of the labourer increase with the rapid advance of
capital, yet at the same time there is a widening of the social gulf which separates
the labourer from the capitalist, and also an increase in the power of capital
over labour and in the dependence of labour upon capital.
The meaning of the statement that the labourer has an interest in the rapid
increase of capital is merely this; the faster the labourer increases his master s
dominion, the richer will be the crumbs that he will get from his table; and the
greater the number of labourers that can be employed and called into existence,
the greater will be the number of slaves of which capital will be the owner.
We have thus seen that even the most fortunate event for the working class,
the speediest possible increase of capital, however much it may improve the
material condition of the labourer, cannot abolish the opposition between his
interests and those of the bourgeois or capitalist class. Profit and wages remain
just as much as ever in inverse proportion.
When capital is increasing fast, wages may rise, but the profits of capita
will rise much faster. The actual position of the labourer has improved, but. it
is at the expense of his social position. The social gulf which separates him
from the capitalist has widened.
Finally, the meaning of fortunate conditions for wage-labour, and of the
quickest possible increase of productive capital, is merely this; the faster the
working classes enlarge and extend the hostile power that dominates over them,
the better will be the conditions under which they will be allowed to labour for
the further increase of bourgeois dominion and for the wider extension of the
power of capital, and thus contentedly to forge for themselves the golden chains
by which the bourgeois drags them in its train.
But are the increase of productive capital and the rise of wages so indis
solubly connected as the bourgeois economists assert? We can hardly believe
that the fatter capital becomes, the more will its slave be pampered. The
bourgeoisie is too much enlightened, and keeps its accounts much too carefully,
to care for that privilege of the feudal nobility, the ostentation of splendour in
its retinue. The very conditions of bourgeois existence compel it to keep careful
accounts.
We must therefore enquire more closely into the effect which the increase
of productive capital has upon wages.
�12
With the general increase of the productive capital of a bourgeois society a
manifold accumulation of labour-force takes place. The capitalists increase in
number and in power. The increase in the number of capitalists increases the
competition between capitalists. Their increased power gives them the means
of leading into the industrial battle-field mightier armies of labourers furnished
with gigantic implements of war.
The one capitalist can only succeed in driving the other off the field and
taking possession of his capital by selling his wares at a cheaper rate. In order
to sell more cheaply without ruining himself, he must produce more cheaply, that
is, he must heighten as much as possible the productiveness of labour, But the
most effective way of making labour more productive is by means of a more
complete division of labour, or by the more extended use and continual improve
ment of machinery. The more numerous the departments into which labour is
divided, and the more gigantic the scale in which machinery is introduced, in so
much the greater proportion does the cost of production decline, and so much
the more fruitful is the labour. Thus arises a manifold rivalry among capitalists
with the object of increasing the subdivision of labour and machinery, and
keeping up the utmost possible progressive rate of exploitation.
Now if by means of a greater subdivision of labour, by the employment and
improvement of new machines, or by the more skilful and profitable use of the
forces of nature, a capitalist has discovered the means of producing a larger
amount of commodities than his competitors with the same amount of labour ;
whether it be stored-up labour or direct—if he can, for instance, spin a com
plete yard of cotton in the same time that his competitors take to spin half-ayard—how will this capitalist proceed to act ?
He might go on selling half-a-yard at its former market price.; but that
would not have the effect of driving his opponents out.of the field and increasing
his own sale. But the need of increasing his sale has increased in the same pro
portion as his production. The more effective and more expensive means of pro
duction which he has called into existence enable him, of course, to sell his wares
cheaper, but they also compel him to sell more wares and to secure a much
larger market for them. Our capitalist will therefore proceed to sell his half-ayard of cotton cheaper than his competitors.
The capitalist will not, however, sell his complete yard so cheaply as his
competitors sell the half, although its entire production does not cost him more
than the production of half costs the others. For in that case he would gain
nothing, but would only get back the cost of its productioa. The contingent
increase in his receipts would result from his having set in motion a larger
capital, but not from having made his capital more profitable than that of the
others. Besides he gains the end he is aiming at, if he prices his goods a slight
percentage lower than his competitors. He drives them off the field, and wrests
from them at any rate a portion of their sale, if only he undersells them. And
finally we must remember that the price current always stands either above or
below the cost of production, according as the sale of a commodity is transacted
at a favourable or unfavourable period of business. According as the.market
price of a yard of cloth is above or below its former cost of production, the
percentage will alter in which the capitalist who has employed the new and
profitable means of production exceeds in its sale the actual cost of its production
to him.
.
. .
But our capitalist does not find his privilege very lasting. Other rival
capitalists introduce with more or less rapidity the same machines and the same
subdivision of labour; and this introduction becomes general, until the price of
the yard of cloth is reduced not only below its old, but below its new cost of
production.
. .
.
,
Thus the capitalists find themselves relatively m the same position in which
they stood before the introduction, of the new means of production ; and if they
are by these means enabled to offer twice the product for the same price, they
now find themselves compelled to offer the doubled amount for less than the old
price. From the standpoint of these new means of production the old game
begins anew There is greater subdivision of labour, more machinery, and a
more rapid progress in the exploitation of both. Whereupon competition brings
about the same reaction against this result.
.
Thus we see how the manner and means of production are . continually
renewed and revolutionised ; and how the division of labour necessarily brings in
its train a greater division of labour ; the introduction of machinery, a still larger
introduction; and the rapidity of progress in the efficiency of labour, a still
greater rapidity of progress.
�I3
'Khat is the law which continually drives bourgeois paaduction out of its old
track, and compels capital to intensify the productive powers of labour for the
very reason that it has already intensified them—the law that allows it no rest,
but for ever whispers in its ear the words, “ Quick March ! ”
This is no other law than that which, cancelling the priodical fluctuations of
business, necessarily identifies the price of a commodity with its cost of pro
duction.
However powerful are the means of production which a particular capitalist
may bring into the field, competition will make their adoption general; and the
moment it becomes general, the sole result of the greater fruitfulness of his
capital is that he must now for the same price offer ten, twenty, a hundred times
as much as before. But as he must dispose of perhaps a thousand times as
much, in order to outweigh the decrease in the selling price by the larger pro
portion of products sold; since a larger sale has now become necessary, not
only to gain a large profit, but also to replace the cost of production ; and the
implements of production, as we have seen get more expensive ; and since this
larger sale has become a vital question, not only for him, but also for his rivals,
the old strife continues with all the greater violence, in proportion as the pre
viously discovered means of production are more fruitful. Thus the subdivision
of labour and the employment of new machinery, take a fresh start, and proceed
with still greater rapidity.
And thus, whatever be the power of the means or production employed,
competition does its best to rob capital of the golden fruit which it produces, by
reducing the price of commodities to their cost of production ; and as fast as
their production is cheapened, compelling by a despotic law the larger supply of
cheaper products to be offered at the former price. Thus the capitalist will have
won nothing by his exertions beyond the obligation to produce faster than before,
and an enhancement of the difficulty of employing his capital to advantage.
While competition continually persecutes him with its law of the cost of pro
duction, and turns against himself every weapon which he forges against his
rivals, the capitalist continually tries, to cheat competition by incessantly intro
ducing further division of labour, and replacing the old machines by new ones,
which, though more expensive, produce more cheaply ; instead of waiting till
competition has rendered them obsolete.
Let us now look at this feverish agitation as it affects the market of the whole
world, and we shall understand how the increase, accumulation, and concentra
tion of capital bring in their train an uninterrupted and extreme subdivision of
labour, always advancing with gigantic strides of progress, and a continual em
ployment of new machinery together with improvement of the old.
But how do these circumstances, inseparable as they are from the increase
of productive capital, affect the determination of the amount of wages ?
The greater division of labour enables one labourer to do the work of five,
ten, twenty : it therefore multiplies the competition among labourers five, ten or
twenty times. The labourers do not only compete when one sells himself
cheaper than another ; they also compete when one does the work of five, ten, or
twenty ; and the division of labour which capital introduces and continually in
creases, compels the labourers to enter into this kind of competition with one
another.
.
.
. .
Further \ in the same proportion in which the division of labour is increased)
the labour itself is simplified. The special skill of the labourer becomes worthless.
It is changed into a monotonous and uniform power production, which can give
play neither to bodily nor to intellectual elasticity. Its labour becomes acccessible
to everybody. Competitors therefore throng into it from all sides; and besides
we must remember that the more simple and easily learnt the labour is, and the
less it costs a man to make himself master of it, so much the lower must its
wages sink ; since they are determined, like the price of every other commodity,
by its cost of production.
Therefore exactly as the labour becomes more unsatisfactory and unpleasant,,
in that verv proportion competition iucreases and wages decline. The labourer
does his best to maintain the rate of his wages by performing more labour,
whether by working for a greater number of hours, or by working harder in the
same-time. Thus, driven by necessity, he himself increases the evil ot the
subdivision of labour. So the result is this : the more he labours, the less reward
he receives for it; and that for this simple reason—that he competes against his.
fellow-workmen, and thus compels them to compete against him, and to offer
their labour on as wretched conditions as he does; and that he thus in the last
result competes against himself as a member of the working class.
�*4
Machinery has th^same effect, but in a much greater degree. It supplants
skilled labourers by unskilled, men by women, adults by children ; where it is
newly introduced, it throws the hand-labourers upon the streets in crowds ; and
where it is perfected or replaced by later improvements and more inventions, dis
cards them by slightly slower degrees. We have sketched above in hasty outlines
the industrial war of capitalists with one another; and this war has this pecu
liarity, that its battles are won less by means of enlisting than of discharging its
industrial recruits, The generals or capitalists vie with one another as to who can dis
pense with the greatest number of his soldiers.
The economists repeatedly assure us that the labourers who are rendered
superfluous by the machines find new branches of employment.
They have not the hardihood directly to assert that the labourers who are
discharged enter upon the new branches of labour. The facts cry out too loud
against such a lie as this. They only declare that for other divisions of the
labouring class, as for instance, for the rising generation of labourers who were
just ready to enter upon the defunct branch of industry, new means of employ
ment will open out. Of course that is a great satisfaction for the dismissed
labourers. The worshipful capitalists will not find their fresh supply of exploit
able flesh and blood run short, and will let the dead bury their dead. This is
indeed a consolation with which the bourgeois comfort themselves rather than the
labourers. If the whole class of wage-labourers were annihilated by the
machines, how shocking that would be for capital, which without wage-labour
ceases to act as capital at all.
But let us suppose that those who are directly driven out of their employment
by machinery, and also all those of the rising generation who were expecting
employment in the same line, find some new employment. Does any one imagine
that this will be as highly paid as that which they have lost ? Such an idea would
be in direct contradiction to all the laws of economy. We have already seen that
the modern form of industry always tends to the displacement of the more complex
and the higher kinds of employment, by those which are more simple and
subordinate.
How then could a crowd of labourers, who are thrown out of one branch of
industry by machinery, find refuge in another, without having to content them
selves with a lower position and worse pay ?
The labourers who are employed in the manufacture of machinery itself have
been instanced as an exception. As soon as a desire arises and a demand begins
in an industry for more machinery, it is said that there must necessarily be an
increase in the number of machines, and therefore in the manufacture of machines,
and therefore in the employment of labourers in this manufacture; and the
labourers who are employed in this branch of industry will be skilled, and indeed
even educated labourers.
Ever since the year 1840 this contention, which even before that time was
only half true, has lost all its specious colour. For the machines which are em
ployed in the manufacture of machinery have been quite as numerous as those
used in the manufacture of cotton ; and the labourers who are employed in pro
ducing machines, instead of being highly educated, have only been able toplay
the part of utterly unskilled machines themselves.
But in the place of the man who has been dismissed by the machine perhaps
three children and one woman are employed to work it, And was it not neces
sary before that the man’s wages should suffice for the support of his wife and
his children ? Was not the minimum of wages necessarily sufficient for the
maintenance and propagation of the race of labourers ? There is no difference,
except that now the lives of four times as many labourers as before are used up in
order to secure the support of one labourer’s family.
To repeat our deductions; the faster productive capital increases, the more
does the division of labour and the employment of machinery extend. The more
the division of labour and the employment of machinery extend, so much the
more does competition increase among the labourers, and so much the more do
their average wages dwindle.
And, besides, the labouring class is recruited from the higher strata of
society ; or else there falls headlong into it a crowd of small manufacturers and
small proprietors, who thenceforth have nothing better to do than to stretch out
their arms by the side of those of the labourers. And thus the forest of arms
outstretched by those who are entreating for work becomes ever denser and the
arms themselves grow ever leaner.
That the small manufacturer cannot survive in a contest, whose first condi
tion is production on a continually increasing scale, that is, that he cannot be at
once both a large and a small manufacturer, is self-evident.
�*
That the interest on capital declines in the same promotion as the amount
of capital increases and extends, and that therefore the small capitalist can no
longer live on bis interest, but must join th# ranks of the workers andjincrease
the number oftfce proletariat,—all this requires no further exemplificatlpn.
Finally, in the projWtion in which the capitalists are compelledby the causes
here sketched out to exploit on an even increasing scale yet more giga^ftic
means of production, and with that object to set in motion all the iMfrisprin^s
of credit, in the same proportion is there an increase of those earthquakes
wherein the business world can only secure its own existence by the sajMyficaof ap
portion of its wealth, its products, and even its powers of production to the gods
of the world below—in a word, crises increase. They become at once more
frequent and more violent; because in the same proportion in which the amount
of production, and therefore the demand for an extension of the market, increases,
the market of the world continually contracts, and ever fewer markets remain to
be exploited; since every previous crisis has added to the commerce of the world
a market which was not known before, or had before been only superficially ex
ploited by commerce. But capital not only lives upon labour. Like a lord, at
once distinguished and barbarous, it drags with it to the grave the corpses of its
slaves and whole hecatombs of labourers who perish in the crisis. Thus we see
that if capital increases fast, competition among the labourers increases still
faster, that is, the means of employment and subsistence decline in proportion at
a Stillmore rapid rate; and yet, none the less the most fortunate conditions for
wage labour lie in the speedy increase of capital
All who are interested, in these sub
jects should, read.
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�
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Wage-labour and capital
Description
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Edition: New and cheaper ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 15, [1] p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: Information on the Social-Democratic Federation on p. [2]. Publisher's list on p. 15 and unnumbered page at the end.
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Marx, Karl [1818-1883]
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The Modern Press
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1886
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Joynes, J.L. (James Leigh) (tr)
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Socialism
Labour
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Capitalism
Karl Marx
Marxian Economics
Marxism
Wages
Working Classes
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Text
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
t-eovi e-
i~e v/i
WORK AND PAY.
�M .m tffM .IT H IM W ................
'
�WORK AND PAY:
OR,
PRINCIPLES OF INDUSTRIAL ECONOMY.
IN KING’S COLLEGE, LONDON.
WITH
REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION-
ON COMBINATIONS OF LABOURERS AND CAPITALISTS.
By LEONE LEVI, F.S.A., F.S.S.,
PROFESSOR OF THE PRINCIPLES OF COMMERCE AND COMMERCIAL LAW IN KING S
COLLEGE, LONDON ; DOCTOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY ; AND OF
LINCOLN’S INN, BARRISTER-AT-LAW.
STRAHAN AND CO., LIMITED,
34, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.
1877.
The right of translation is reserved.^
�Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Printers, London & Aylesbury.
�TO
SAMUEL MORLEY, ESQ., M.P.
Dear Sir,—
These lectures are the outcome of the Bristol Meeting
of the British Association, when the report of its Committee on
Combinations of Capitalists and Labourers was read and dis
cussed. And they owe their delivery to your earnest desire to
have the important questions at issue between masters and men
treated in a calm spirit and in an impartial manner. I do not
jay claim to the enunciation of any new theories, or to any
novelty in argument. What I have advanced is nothing more
than what the well-established principles of political economy,
recognised alike in their essentials by British and foreign
economists, have taught us.
Your desire and mine is that the relations between capital and
labour be placed on a sound and equitable basis, and I earnestly
trust that the effort now made to bring the principles of economic
science and the interests and aspirations of the working classes
into direct contact and possible harmony may have a beneficial
influence on the well-being of the people.
Believe me, dear Sir, yours very faithfully,
LEONE LEVI.
5,
Crown Office Row, Temple,
March, 1877.
��CONTENTS
RAGE
LECTURE
I. WORK AND WORKERS............................................................ I
II. THE DIVISION . OF LABOUR AND THE WONDERS OF
MACHINERY............................................................................... 17
III. USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY............................................... 33
IV. THE REWARD OF LABOUR..........................................................49
V. TRADE UNIONS.............................................................................. 67
VI. STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS
.
.
VIII.
.
.
.85
.
.
VII. BUDGETS OF THE WORKINGCLASSES
.96
SAVINGS BANKS AND OTHER INVESTMENTS OF THE
WORKING CLASSES.................................................................. HI
APPENDIX.
(a)
cost of living in 1839, 1849, i859>
1&75 ,
• 129
.
.
. 130
(c) BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES .
.
. 131
(b) wages
in 1839, 1849, 1859, 1873
(D) REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THEBRITISH
ASSOCIATION.................................................................. 137
��I.
WORK AND WORKERS.
If I venture to come before you, in this great centre of labour,
to discuss some of those questions connected with “Work
and Pay ” which so often give occasion to quarrels and diffi
culties, it is in the full consciousness that the proper solution
of economic problems depends not only on the right con
ception of abstract theories and principles, but on their being
regarded side by side with the realities of life. I do not pre
tend to be a philosopher, but I would like to be a practical
economist. If I am able to state to you what I consider the
dictates of economic science on the questions before us, you
may also be able to point out to me how such dictates are found
to work in practical life. In any case, should I be unable to
carry conviction into your mind, should you see reason to object
to any principles I may lay before you, I hope you will not refuse
giving due heed to the lessons and warnings of a science which is
essentially connected with the progress and wealth of the nation.
It is cheering to know that we are all wanted in this wide
world ; that all of us have a purpose to accomplish, and that, if
we have only the will to exercise them, our faculties need not lie
dormant, or languish. To me, and to all of us, constituted as
we are, it is a real pleasure to work. I delight in a tableful of
papers. I do not sympathize with the sentiment, dolce far
niente; I rather believe in the adage, “Amind at rest is a
mind unblest.” With our powers of thought and imaginaI
�2
WORK AND- WORKERS.
tion, and with our capacity of invention, construction, and
intercourse, we must be active in order to be happy. The use
of such expressions as “ condemned to labour,” or the “ task of
labour,” or the calling of labour of any kind “ servile,” whilst
we enjoy full freedom of labour, betokens simple ignorance of its
dignity and utility. Sometimes, indeed, we may be disappointed
at the result of our labour. Occasionally, it may be, thorns
and thistles spring where we expected luxuriant fruitfulness
and beauty. But what then ? The necessity to meet our daily
wants, and even our failure to accomplish the object of our
aspirations, often prove a salutary incentive to strengthen and
refine the powers and faculties with which we are endowed.
One thing is absolutely certain, that without labour nothing is
produced. The sun, water, fire, wind, gravitation, magnetism,
the vital forces of animals, the vegetative forces of the soil, the
duration, resistance, and ductility of metals, whatever active
or inert forces may exist, if left to themselves they will not
exist for us, and will be quite indifferent to our happiness. That
they may serve us, they must be turned to our service; that they
may be able to produce, they must be directed in the work of
production. Though they exist independently of us, as agents
of production, they exist only by human industry.
"... Nature lives by labour ;
Beast, bird, air, fire, the Heavens and rolling world,
All live by action ; nothing lives at rest,
But death and ruin! ” *
We often speak of the working classes as a distinct body
of persons upon whom mainly fall the work and toil of life.
What a blunder ! We are all workers. Every one of us, from
the Queen on the throne to the humblest of her subjects, has a
place to fill and a work to do. Some are labouring in directing
and administering the affairs of the State. They are the
Ministers of State, the Governors of Colonies, the whole Civil
* Dyer.
�WORK AND WORKERS.
Service. Some are engaged in extracting the fruit of the soil,
in appropriating, adapting, converting, shaping matter to our
convenience. They work the land. They are busy with animal
and vegetable substances and minerals. Many are fulfilling
various offices for man—curing diseases, teaching youth, pre
serving peace, defending right, punishing wrong, and in a
thousand ways upholding the great structure of human society.
Some work in the field, some in workshops, some in the
mines, and some on the sea. Some labour with the hand,
some with the head, and some with both. Yes, we are all
workers. Strictly speaking, we may not be all producers of
wealth; all labour being, economically speaking, unproductive
which ends in immediate enjoyment without tending to any
increase of permanent stock, or not having for its result a
material product. Yet we can scarcely say that no labour is
valuable which is not immediately employed in the production
of material riches. The genius which enlightens, the religion
which comforts, the justice which preserves, the sciences and
arts which improve and charm our existence, are indirectly, if
not in a direct manner, as truly productive as commerce, which
affords us the enjoyment of the produce and labour of other
countries; as agriculture, which extracts the fruit special to
each soil; and as manufactures, which transform the raw produce
of different countries into articles adapted to the taste and
wants of the opulent, as well as of the masses of the people.
Few, indeed, who truly fulfil the mission to which they are
called, who labour in the sphere a,nd condition in which they are
placed, and who exercise the faculties and talents with which
they are endowed, can be said to be unproductive in this great
laboratory. The whole nation is practically working together
as a great co-operative society, under the very best division of
labour; all the more perfect since it is natural and spontaneous.
Let us perform our part well, and we need not fear but our
labour will be useful.
Ashamed of working ?—
�4
WORK AND WORKERS.
“ Work, work ! be not afraid,
Look labour boldly in the face;
Take up the hammer or the spade,
And blush not for your humble place.
There’s glory in the shuttle’s song,
There’s triumph in the anvil’s stroke,
There’s merit in the grave and strong,
Who dig the mine or fell the oak.
The wind disturbs the sleeping lake,
And bids it ripple pure and fresh,
It moves the grain boughs till they make
Grand music in their leafy mesh.”
I have often wondered at the power of endurance of the
human frame when engaged in some of the most arduous tasks
of manual labour. It must be hard to be continually lifting
enormous weights, to deal with such substances as iron and
steel, to stand the heat of a fiery furnace, or to work for hours
in the very bowels of the earth. But do not imagine that those
who labour with the head have a much lighter work. The head
ache, the excited nerve, the sleepless eye, of the man of letters
are as irksome and injurious to life as the undue exercise of our
physical energies. An agricultural labourer, working in the
open air with mind and heart perfectly at ease, has a greater
expectancy of life than a solicitor or a physician. The distinc
tion, moreover, between manual and intellectual labour is no
ldnger so marked as it once was. It is ungenerous to assume
that the manual labourer employs no skill, for what labour is
there which does not need skill and judgment ? What are the
wonderful results of machinery, those exquisite examples of
handicraft at our Kensington Museum, but so many monuments
of the talent and dexterity of those who are engaged in socalled manual labour ? Among the labouring classes there is a
wonderful and endless variety of talent and skill. Between the
Michael Angelos employed by a Bond Street goldsmith, and the
common labourer employed in the East and West India Docks,
the gradations are most numerous. We speak of a million of
�WORK AND WORKERS
5
men engaged in agricultural work, of half a million in the
building trade, of a third of a million employed in the textile
manufacture, and of a third more in tailoring and shoemaking.
But really these different descriptions of workmen divide them
selves into as many classes as they have special skill and
capacity. Together, they cultivate during the yea 47,000,000
acres of land, rear 32,000,000 sheep and 10,000,000 cattle, ex
tract some ^65,000,000 worth of minerals, produce goods for
export to the extent of ^200,000,000, and bring into existence
ever so many commodities and utilities needed for the susten
ance, comforts, and luxuries of the inhabitants of all countries.
But to what extent each individual labourer assists in this work
it would be difficult to say. I fear the difference is in many
cases enormous.
It is well indeed to remember what are the conditions for
the efficient discharge of duties in the work of production. To
my mind, first and foremost amongst such conditions is energy,
or the possession of a good strong will to work ; for with in
dolence and carelessness no work is done, no wealth is pro
duced. There must be steady and persevering labour, and an
energetic and willing mind to overcome the difficulties which
Nature presents. An impulsive and transient effort is not
sufficient. How far it is true that six Englishmen can do as
much work as eight Belgians or Frenchmen, I do not know;
but to be able to do a certain amount of work, and to give
oneself in earnest to do it, are two distinct things. There is
such a thing, let it be remembered, as idling away our time
whilst we profess to work, as laying 500 bricks in a day when
1000 might easily be laid, as giving five blows to strike a tree-nail
when three ought to be sufficient. A day’s work means a day
of continuous, energetic work—a day in which as much work
is done as can possibly be done, a day in which our powers
and talents are employed in full active service, when the work
is gone through thoroughly, speedily, earnestly. To pretend to
�6
WORK AND WORKERS.
be working when you are wasting your time in idle talk, is to
defraud your master of the value of your service. To make a
show of work is a very different thing from doing real work.
Then there is another consideration. How many days in the
year do you work ? An Irishman’s year used to be 200 days,
instead of at least 300 ; for he had 52 Sundays, 52 market-days,
a fair in each month, half a day a week for a funeral, and some
13 days in the year as saints’-days and birthdays. What a
waste ! “ Alas for that workman who takes all the Mondays
for pastime and idleness, who keeps fairs and wakes, or who
deliberately neglects the work which a bountiful Providence
set before him ! Miserable is he who slumbers on in idleness.
Miserable the workman who sleeps before the hour of his rest,
or who sits down in the shadow whilst his brethren work in
the sun.” * There is enough of forced idleness and slack time
in every occupation, without aggravating the evil by wilful
neglect. “To live really,” said Mr. Smiles, “is to act energeti
cally. Life is a battle to be fought valiantly. Inspired by high
and honourable resolve, a man must stand to his post, and die
there, if need be. Like the old Danish hero, his determination
should be to dare nobly, to will strongly, and never falter in the
path of duty.”
" Let us go forth, and resolutely dare
With sweat of brow to toil our little day;
And if a tear fall on the task of care,
Brush it not by 1”
The national characteristics of each country are sure to be
reflected in the work performed by its people. Her Majesty’s
Secretaries of Legation reported of the French that there is
much instability in their manner of work; that the workmen are
most competent when it suits their fancy to display their skill, but
that, as a rule, they do not work steadily. Of the Germans, that
their work is well performed, but that their chief fault is slowness
and indifference as to time in completing their task. Thequality
* Tynman.
�WORK AND WORKERS.
1
of the work in Italy is not to be despised, but the workmen
require a great amount of watching, their conscience not being
at all sensitive. Of the Swiss, they say that, as a rule, they are
competent for their work, and that they do take an interest in
it. The work of the Dutch is sound and good, but it has not
the polish and finish of the English. The Russians, the Secretary
of Legation reports, seem utterly indifferent as to the quality
of their labour. They take no pride in their work, and require
the most constant supervision. The Turks perform their work
roughly, rudely, and incompletely. The Argentines turn out a
rough and unfinished work. And our friends in the United
States have many short cuts for arriving at what may not be
quite equal to the article turned out in the English workshop.
Rare are the instances where absolute praise is awarded for
energy, where it can be said with truth that the labourers do
really take a pride in their work, and throw their character
into it. What reports are the Secretaries of Foreign Legations
in England sending out to their Governments as regards work
in this country? Is there good foundation for the complaint of
the deterioration of work in many branches of British labour ?
Nearly one hundred years ago, a German writer described the
Englishman as the best workman in the world ; for he worked
so as to satisfy his own mind, and always gave his work that
degree of perfection which he had learnt to appreciate and
attain. As the Frenchman sought to enhance the value of his
manufactures by all kinds of external ornament, so the English
man sought to give his productions in exactitude, usefulness,
and durability a less fleeting worth. Has this important encomium
been forfeited? I do not think so, whatever may be said to the
contrary. As a matter of fact it is seen in the cotton industry
that an English labourer is able to superintend 74 spindles,
whilst a German can at most [superintend 35, a Russian 28,
and a Frenchman 14. Physically and intellectually, the British
workman is better than he ever was. I doubt, indeed, if he has
�8
AND WORKERS.
a rival in his capacity for continuous exertion ; and if there be
reason to lament his disposition to obey with perfect discipline
the mandates of such associations as undertake to protect his
rights, we should not forget that it is that same disposition that
best fits the British workman for taking his place in the modern
organization of labour, where every human hand has work
assigned, the value of which depends on the relation it bears toa great whole.
I am persuaded, however, that the exercise of energy in work
depends in a great measure on the possession of strength and
health ; for it is impossible to work well unless we are in health
and comfort. The body must be in full vigour, the vital energies'
must be elastic and fresh, the mental faculties must be quick
and active, ere we can give ourselves to patient and persevering
labour. Viewed in this aspect, every measure of sanitary reform
has a direct economic value. How can you expect hard-working-
men and women where the very air is tainted by the most noxious
gases ? Liverpool, Manchester, and Salford, said Dr. Farr, are
at the head of a mournful cohort of unhealthy districts which
call aloud for healers. It is not the water, nor the food,
nor the absence of food, nor the clothing that produce the
mischief, but it is the heedless admixture of tallow-chandlery
and slaughter-houses, and the vitiated atmosphere from the
black outpourings from innumerable chimneys, that make the
Manchester artisan pale, sallow, and unhealthy, and that make his
children grow pale, thin, and listless. Many of our workmen,
moreover, have to meet dangers peculiar to their occupations..
They are liable to suffer from exposure to dust and other foreign
substances, from exposure to noxious gases and heated and im
pure air, from mechanical concussions, from peculiar postures of
body, and from excessive exertion. In the manufacture of artificial
flowers or wall-paper with emerald-green, the workers are in
danger of slow poisoning from arsenic. A dozen leaves from
a lady’s head-dress were found to contain ten grains of white
�WORK AND WORKERS.
9
arsenic. Those who have to do with phosphorous are exposed
to its fumes, which produce jaw disease and bronchitic affections.
The workers in lead are exposed to lead-poisoning, and those
who work with mercury to mercurial poisoning ; whilst builders,,
miners, fishermen, and seamen are in special danger of sudden
death from falls, explosions, or storms. Domestic servants,
always at home, comparatively at ease as respects the necessaries
of life, may be supposed to have a good expectancy of life ; yet
carpenters and even metal-workers have better prospects of great
age than they.
But, as I have just hinted, quite apart from dangers of this
nature, other risks follow many of our workmen in their homes.
Born, many of them, in the midst of comparative privations,
living often in low, dingy, uncomfortable houses, how hard it
is for them to maintain anything like freshness and vivacity.
The rents of houses are certainly dear, and they often absorb a
good portion of their weekly wages. Yet I apprehend that a
comparatively high house-rent might be really a good investment,
should it prevent, as it is sure to do, the slow deterioration of
health, the lowered vitality of enjoyment, and the long series of
evils arising from overcrowding. Room to breathe is wanted
everywhere. Much good will, I hope, result from the recent
Act for facilitating the improvement of the dwellings of the
working classes ; and good work is done in London by such
associations as the Metropolitan Association for Improving
the Dwellings of the Industrious Classes, the Improved Indus
trial Dwellings Company, and many other kindred societies.
But all such efforts need the co-operation of the labouringclasses themselves. How much an individual is justified in
spending in house-rent it is difficult to say, circumstances
varying so much. Ten per cent, of the income is, I believe,
generally devoted to house-rent by the middle classes, whether
by paying that proportion for a whole house, or by paying more
and recovering a portion by sub-letting. But ten per cent, of
�IO
AND WORKERS.
the working Oman’s wages, viz., three or four shillings a week
on an income of thirty shillings to forty shillings, is hardly
enough for sufficient accommodation for even a moderate
family. Supposing, therefore, that twelve per cent, be required,
or even fifteen per cent., better far to economise in other
items of expenditure than to live in a house smaller than we
require. In the economic management of a limited income
the first thought should be an airy, wholesome, cheerful
house—a real home for every inmate of the household.
Need I say that there may be a house without a home?
A house where father, mother, and children, some even of
tender age, are absent from six in the morning to six or seven
at night, can scarcely be called a home. Where mothers
cease to nurse their children, and leave them to the tender
mercies of servants, or deposit them at the Creches, there must
of necessity be a frightful mortality of children, a grievous de
generation of the race, and a total absence of moral education.
And when, late in the evening, father, mother, and children
meet together, more as strangers than as members of a common
household, often in the only room they possess, empty and
cheerless, what comfort can they expect ? Alas ! cleanliness in
such a case is out of the question. The fire is out; the food is
not ready; the children’s clothing falls into rags ; and, worse
than all, father and brothers, disgusted, take refuge at the
nearest public-house. I know nothing more essential, both in
a social and economic aspect, than a happy home. “ Home 1
If any of you working men have not got a home yet, resolve,
and tell your wife of your good resolution, to get, to make it at
almost any sacrifice. She will aid it all she can. Her step will
be lighter and her hand will be busier all day, expecting the
comfortable evening at home when you return. Household
affairs will have been well attended to. A place for everything,
and everything in its place, will, like some good genius, have
made even an humble home the scene of neatness, arrange-
�WORK AND WORKERS.
ii
ment, and taste. The table will be ready at the fireside ; the
loaf will be one of that order which says, by its appearance, You
may cut and come again. The cups and saucers will be waiting
for supplies. The kettle will be singing; and the children,
happy with fresh air and exercise, will be smiling in their glad
anticipation of that evening meal when father is at home, and
of the pleasant reading afterwards.” *
In matters of food and drink, I imagine, the British labourer
is better off than the labourers of any other country. Meat is
indeed dear, yet not dearer than in New York or Paris ; whilst
bread is decidedly cheaper, vegetables are abundant, and fish
plentiful. And the people are doing full justice to such bounties.
What a change in the quantities of foreign commodities con
sumed during the last thirty years 1 In 1844, there were ijj lbs.
of tea per head consumed in the United Kingdom; in 1875,
4'44 lbs. In 1844, f lb. of foreign butter ; in 1875, 4’92 lbs. In
1844, scarcely anything of foreign bacon and hams was con
sumed; in 1875, 8-26 lbs. per head. And, whilst the home pro
duction of wheat and flour is as large as ever, the consumption
of wheat and flour of foreign countries increased from iyjlbs., in
1844, to 197 lbs. per head in 1875. How many who are now able
to eat wheaten bread, were thirty years ago content with rye
bread ! and how many who never saw butcher meat from
week to week, now enjoy it every day I Surely we may rejoice
that by a wise legislation the door has been opened for the
importation of the necessaries of life from every part of the
globe ; and that, as a result of the same and of other favourable
circumstances, whereas the number of paupers, including indoor
and outdoor, in 1849 was in the proportion of 573 per cent, of the
population, in 1875 it was only 3’11 per cent. These are facts of
unmistakable importance as regards the well-being of the people.
An important element in the maintenance of health is cer
tainly the duration of labour; but how many hours a day a
* Helps.
�12
WORK AND WORKERS.
workman may safely work in any industry without injury to
his health must depend not only on the age and constitution of
the worker, but on the kind of labour and the spirit with which
the work is performed. I cannot say that, personally, I have
much sympathy with any excessive indulgence for rest; for I
am myself a great worker, having been often at my work sixteen
or eighteen hours a day-—not occasionally, but for weeks to
gether ; nor do I feel the slightest inconvenience from it. Yet
it must be allowed that labour saved is not lost; and that unless
we husband our strength, we stand a good risk of losing it
altogether. I fully approve, therefore, of the legislation respect
ing labour in factories, which limits the number of hours of
work to women and children. But let us not carry the matter
too far. Remember, that even an hour a day extended over say
5,000,000 workpeople, working 300 days in the year, means a
loss of 150,000,000 days a year. Doubtless such loss may be
recovered by increased energy on the part of the workers, and
by the introduction of improved ’machinery. As a matter of
fact, at no time has England produced more than at present,
notwithstanding the extension of the factory laws, and the widely
diffused adoption of shorter hours. But is that a reason why
we should indulge in idleness, beyond what is requisite for
health and moderate enjoyment ?
Hitherto I have dwelt on energy, physical strength, and
health. It is necessary that I should add education as one of
the very first conditions for the efficient discharge of duties
in the work of production. Never was the saying, “ Knowledge
is power,” more truly applicable than at present. Compare the
value of skilled and unskilled labour. The demand for com
paratively unskilled labour may be as great as ever, but the
reward of skilled labour is certainly much greater. It is no new
discovery, though it has, of late, acquired greater prominence,
that in the work of production to sturdy will, patient endurance,
and strong hands, we must add some knowledge of science, a
�WORK AND WORKERS.
13
cultivated mind, and a refined taste. Education and science
must no longer remain the ornament and luxury of the few—
they must become the necessary endowment of the many, if we
will succeed in the great arena of industrial competition.
To what but to science does England owe her great achieve
ments ? Mechanical and chemical science have revolutionized
the productive power of the country. It was but yesterday,
comparatively, that in the coal beneath our feet we found a
primary source of colour which makes England almost inde
pendent of the most costly dyewoods hitherto consumed in’the
ornamentation of the textile fabrics. Yet, with all our dis
coveries, and all our advantages, here we are but little in
advance of other countries, and our only hope of maintaining
our position depends on the success which we may yet attain
in fathoming the inexhaustible secrets of Nature, on the increase
in the number of patient yet ardent votaries of science, and
still more, on the diffusion of education and scientific knowledge,
among the great body of labourers. With the progress of
civilization and refinement all over the world, it is no longer
sufficient now to be able to produce what is cheap and
plentiful, or objects adapted to the common wants of the
masses. If England is to keep her place as the greatest manu
facturing country in the world, we must endeavour, by the
cultivation of the science of the perception of beauty, and by
paying proper attention to the fine arts, to produce articles
suitable to every state of civilization.
Much has been said, of late, on technical education, by
which we understand the teaching of those sciences which
are useful in industrial pursuits. Is it not a sound principle
that the designer should know something of drawing, the
dyer something of chemistry, the miner of geology and
mineralogy? The chairmaker, the tailor, the bootmaker, the
hatter, the coachmaker, and even the pastrycook, all requiresome knowledge of form.
All honour then to the London
�14
WORK AND WORKERS.
School Board for introducing drawing m their scheme of
Elementary Education.
How few, indeed, are at all ac
quainted with the scientific principles of their labour. An
order comes for cloth of a particular shade of colour. How
few can tell, beforehand, precisely, what manipulation will
give it to a nicety ! And if there be one in an establishment
endowed with such knowledge, probably because he stumbled
into it, he is deemed the possessor of a great mystery.
But
why should it be so ? Science need neither be a mystery nor a
monopoly. Its pages are open to all, and let us not think that
its meaning is hid or incomprehensible to the common under
standing With the simplicity of language ordinarily used, and
the constant appeal to real facts by visible demonstrations and
illustrations, the acquisition of scientific knowledge has been
rendered wonderfully easy.
Apart- from intellectual powers, however, I own great par
tiality for the moral. It seems to me that we must elevate, not
the mind only, but the taste and affections of the people, if we
wish to realize true progress. With such huge conglomerations
of people as we have in this metropolis and in our manufactur
ing towns, quite away from the beauties of nature, we do need
museums and galleries to educate the sense of the beautiful.
What a power on our imagination have the common prints
and representations which adorn our walls! What an effect the
ornaments which cover our mantelpieces ! Nor should we
forget that more important even than the cultivation of the
taste and the affections is the possession of good morals and
simple piety. To secure a good reward, the labourer must not
only have a good physical frame, and a proper aptitude for
labour, but those qualities which create confidence and animate
trust. Unless a labourer is worthy of confidence, it is impos
sible that he can be regularly employed. And what is; it that
. creates confidence? Sober and steady conduct, truthfulness
and purity of character, conscientiousness and strict regar
�WORK AND WORKERS.
i5
to duty ; in short, an abiding sense of the responsibility of
our calling.
The requisites of production, John Stuart Mill said, are
two—labour and appropriate natural objects. Certain lands
are more favoured than others in natural productiveness. The
climate has great influence in promoting vegetation, and in
making the people hearty and robust. Numerous external in
fluences, physical, economical, political, and social, determine
more or less the success of labour. Taking it all in all, England
is highly favoured as a field of human labour. Geographically,
she is splendidly situated, on all sides open to communica
tion with all the world.
Her climate is most temperate.
Coal and iron are sources of immense wealth. Her manufac
turing industry is wonderfully developed. The commercial
spirit of her people quite boundless. Her political organization,
based on personal freedom to move, to speak, to meet, well nigh
perfect. Her economical policy is immensely superior to that
of almost any other nation. Can we wonder that her people
are tranquil, that the Queen reigns supreme in the heart of the
nation, and that wealth is increasing at an enormous ratio ?
Where can you find a better field of labour than in
England ? Go to France, and you have no freedom of action
and a constant dread of revolution. Go to Russia, and you
meet despotism all rampant. Go to the United States, and you
find that better wages are scarcely equivalent to the higher cost
of living. Go to any of the British Colonies, and you must be
prepared to work harder far than you are doing in this country,
and to bid adieu to every association and to all the pleasures of
civilized life.
Nowhere, indeed, is labour more appreciated,
nay, I might say more ennobled, than in this country, and no
where is an ampler field afforded for its application.
But if labour is honoured, is the labourer receiving due con
sideration? Are his trials and difficulties taken into account?
Are his wants as a man and a citizen properly recognised ?
�AND WORKERS.
Alas ! I fear not. On the contrary, there is far too ready a
disposition to regard the labourers as a class as ignorant,
wasteful, drunken, idle, and criminal. But where is the evi
dence for such a charge ? In the number signing the marriage
register with marks there is a vast improvement. The Savingsbanks and Building Societies testify that the labouring classes
have saved large sums in recent years. The yearly amount
of production in the kingdom tells us that they have not been
altogether idle ; and if they drink more, or it may be are more
amenable to its consequences than they formerly were, probably
through better police administration, of crime, especially of the
heavier character, they are certainly less guilty. They might
be better, and so we all should be. But let us not indulge in
sweeping condemnations of whole classes of the people. They
are not true, and their effect is most injurious.
In the new organization of labour incident to production on
a large scale, there is abundant scope for the display, by both
masters and men, of those qualities which are essential for the
maintenance of peace and concord. Let the master recognise,
fully and unreservedly, the free position of the workman, and
his absolute right to improve his condition. Let him see that
labour be carried on under conditions, as favourable as possible,
to the preservation of human health and vigour. Let him pro
mote, as far as in him lies, provident habits and intellectual
improvement among his labourers. Let him manifest a per
sonal sympathetic interest in their behalf. Let the master
do all this, and we shall also witness among workmen an in
creasing earnestness and energy in the execution of their work,
a greater interest in the success of production, and a better
disposition to apply all their forces, physical, intellectual, and
moral, towards the surmounting of those obstacles which hinder
and retard the economic progress of the nation.
�II.
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND THE WONDERS OF
MACHINERY.
Within this century, within the recollection of many living
among us, one of the greatest of economic revolutions has taken
place, the consequence of which has far exceeded any human
expectation. It is the substitute of collective for individual
labour, of factory for home industry, and of mechanical for
human labour.
Time was when the weaver was both the-:
capitalist and the labourer ; when the linen weaver cultivated
the flax, heckled it, spun it into yarn, wove it, and sold the web
at the linen market. There was no division of labour in those
days. The producer gloried in his independence. He was his.
own master. He did all the work himself. But production
proceeded slowly in that fashion. And so the capitalist came
to the rescue by supplying the weaver with the material, and
paying him a given sum on the delivery of a given quantity ot
finished cloth. As yet, the loom belonged to the weaver; and if
he had no loom of his own, he worked at a loom belonging to<
some other weaver, in which case he was the journeyman, and
the weaver at whose loom he worked was the master weaver.
But, in time, the loom itself was supplied by the capitalist or
manufacturer; and then the journeyman, free from the master
weaver, came into direct relation with the manufacturer. This
is the system of home industry which existed in this country
2
�i8
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
for a considerable time, certainly till as late as the end of the
last century. And this is the system which obtains to a con
siderable extent in Russia at the present time. Employed in
the actual work of agriculture only a portion of the year, the
Russian farmer spends the remainder in weaving and bleaching.
The home system of industry has been passing away so
rapidly from this country that we are apt to connect all manu
facture with x the machinery and steam power in use in the
Lancashire cotton industry. But it is not so. And I venture
to say that by far the largest amount of production in the north
of Europe, in Asia, and Africa, and largely in America also,
consists of home-made goods, which, though dearer in price,
are in the end cheaper far than the trashy prints, and some
of the highly-sized calicoes and other inferior descriptions of
Manchester goods. The battle of the hand-loom against the
power-loom, of home industry against factory labour, is not yet
quite ended, for in not a few industries, especially in Nottingham
and Leicester, hand-loom weavers are numerous. But of the
final issue of the conflict who can doubt ? In truth, young men
o not take to the old and almost effete system. What remains
of it is carried on by old people, and for those descriptions of
labour only where the hand can work with more dexterity than
the machine itself. But how soon is machinery overtaking
every obstacle 1 And what a change has taken place in the
divorcement of manufacture from agriculture, in the creation
of great cities of labour, in the mode of producing on a
large scale, in the division of labour, and the introduction
of machinery!
From the moment the manufacturing system acquired a
sufficient importance to stand by itself, from the moment the
requirements of manufacture necessitated concurrence and co
operation in the various pursuits necessary for the same, the
manufacturers were compelled to emigrate from the farm
house and the sequestered village, and to constitute themselves
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
into distinct communities. Both industries are indeed inter
dependent. Agriculture gains from the existence of a thriving
manufacturing industry, and is the better for its products.
Manufactures depend upon a prosperous agriculture for a sufciency of food and provision. But the two industries are not
■capable of being prosecuted in like manner. Agriculture does
not admit of the same concentration of labour, of the same
■division of employment, and of the same constancy of labour.
Even steam-power can only be employed in agriculture under
less advantageous circumstances than in manufactures. The
experience of every nation abundantly proves that the more
absolute is the separation between the two industries, the better
■each may be developed in its own manner and fashion. Would,
indeed, that the agricultural could copy a little more from the
manufacturing industry than it appears to be doing ! How
much it has to learn in dealing with diversities of soil, in the
reclamation of waste lands, in the introduction of machines and
implements of husbandry, in the use of manure, and above all
in the economy of labour and the application of scientific prin
ciples in the management of farms ! Some writers used to
•distinguish agriculture from industry, the one being intent
upon the extraction of produce from the soil, the other upon the
shaping, converting, or manufacturing what nature supplies.
But it is not so. Agriculture and manufactures are both indus
tries requiring alike labour, skill, capital. In England, the
divorce is indeed complete ; but they had better look keenly to
one another, and each draw from the other the lessons which it
needs.
Look at Lancashire, the first county which inaugurated the
great change. See how coal and iron have superseded turf
and corn. Behold those illumined factories, with more (windows
than in Italian palaces, and smoking chimneys taller than
Egyptian obelisks. Everywhere you find monuments of in
domitable energy. All you see indicates the march of modern
�20
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
progress. Enter for a moment one of those numerous factories,,
behold the ranks of thousands of operatives all steadily working,
behold how every minute of time, every yard of space, every
practised eye, every dexterous finger, every active mind, is at
high-pressure service. There are no lumber attics nor lumber
cellars ; everything seems cut out for the work, and the work for
it. And what can be more wonderful than those factories far
the manufacture of machines ? Listen to the deafening din.
What power has mind over matter ! What metamorphoses can
human industry perform ! One hundred years ago, Manchester
had only 1,600 inhabitants. Now, with Salford, she has 500,000..
Three hundred years ago, Liverpool was only a fishing hamlet,,
with 138 inhabitants ; now she has 527>°°°. Whilst Westmore
land, a purely agricultural county, has 771 acres to one person,
Lancashire has only 0-43 acres to one person. In 1861, the town
population of England was in the proportion of twenty-four per
cent, of the whole. In 1871, her town population had increased
to such an extent that it constituted fifty-six per cent, of the
whole. The very meaning of the word town has changed.
Whilst in olden times it meant a tract of land enjoyed by a
community, though there might not be a single house in it; in
modern times it has come to signify a place with a multitude of
houses, built side by side, and standing in streets, rows, or
lanes, all as like one another as possible,— the very personation,
of the Coketown of the inimitable Dickens.
Shall we lament the change from the primitive industrial
organization of former days to the complex, and, in many ways,,
the artificial combination of the present time? Is England
the better or the worse for the change? Have the working
classes been injured or benefited by it ? Could we return to the
agricultural system if we would ? And would we return to it if
we could ? Compare the state of England a hundred years ago
and now, by any test you please, socially, politically, and morally,
in education, wealth, power, population, agriculture, and mann-
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
21
factures. Nothing has been stationary. On every side we note
change, progress, improvement.
There are evils connected
with the agglomeration of many people within fixed boundaries,
for where ignorance, vice, crime, exists, oh how contagious it be
comes ! And yet, if you compare the moral condition of the
agricultural and manufacturing districts, you will find that the
latter are by no means inferior to the former, for if there is
an army of evil-doers in our great cities, there are also many
regiments of those who do well. Call the present organization
of labour artificial, capitalistic, or by any title you please, yet
the fact remains that not only is it the inevitable result of
science, civilization, and economic progress, and therefore it
is of no use whatever grumbling about it, but it is on the whole
beneficial to the well-being of the people, an element of strength
and power to the nation at large.
Steam, whose power dwarfs the fabled feats of Grecian
prodigy, has not only torn asunder the manufacturing from
the agricultural industry, but has centred industrial labour
within large buildings and great factories. When human force
was the only motive power, work could as advantageously be
performed in the solitary chamber as in great centres of popu
lation ; but when a force greater than human was discovered,
which far exceeded the energies of any single individual, which
needed no rest, which could be transported anywhere, and
which could be regulated at discretion,—isolated working gave
place to factory labour, and production on a small scale was
immediately superseded by production on a large scale. Of
course, factory labour has its own evils,—but what human
system is free from them ? With a motive power at hand
capable of continuing without intermission, the temptation was
too strong to use human labour as unsparingly. The compara
tively light labour required to assist the machinery, prompted
the employment of women and children; and their strength, by
too long hours of employment, was taxed beyond measure. And
�22
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
so the Legislature had to interfere, in the way of fixing the
number of hours that women and children should be allowed to
work, of taking care that the education of such children shall
not be altogether neglected, of compelling proper precautionsagainst accidents from machinery, of providing for the health
of the workers, and of securing by the right of inspection
scrupulous compliance with the prescribed regulations. And
thankful we may be that the provisions of such laws have been
extended and strengthened, for we do need the protection of
the law against abuse of power, whether by masters or by men.
Apart, however, from such abuses which the law has set itself
to rectify, there is a great principle involved in the present
system of producing on a large scale of very wide reach and
application. Do we not see large farms, large shops, large jointstock companies, and large enterprises, fast superseding small
farms, small shops, small partnerships, and small enterprises ?'
And why? Simply because the expense of management and
the labour of administration do not increase in proportion to the
extension of the undertaking; because expensive machinery may
be more advantageously employed; and because greater economy
of power and administration is thereby obtained. In a largefactory, moreover, the master can exercise more supeiwision of
labour, can have more command over the detail of the work.
And the result is more production, more wealth. The more
united the forces, the greater the momentum.
And what shall I say of the division of labour, which produc
tion on a large scale permits ? Adam Smith has well noted the
increase of dexterity in every particular workman, the saving of
time spent in passing from one species of work to another, and
the happy contrivances for facilitating and abridging laboui
which such division of labour suggests and permits. Nothing, in
deed, is more natural, and yet nothing is more wonderful in the
present organization of labour, than the symmetry of its appor
tionment, the careful regard to the adaptation of the work to the
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
23
worker. But little consideration suffices to convince us that
the surest way to acquire a thorough knowledge of anything is
to concentrate our thoughts, and to devote our energies almost
exclusively upon the one thing before us. No science could be
cultivated with any hope of success, were it not that special
men give themselves to the innumerable researches which are
required for their development. The physician, the chemist,,
the botanist, the mineralogist, the astronomer, each takes upon,
himself the study of special phenomena in nature. Sir David.
Brewster made optics his special study; Professor Owen devoted
himself to fossils; Professor Liebig to organic chemistry
Professor Tyndal to light; Professor Huxley to physiology..
Mr. Glaisher made his experiments on balloon ascents; Dr.
Carpenter made observations on oceanic circulation. The
principle of the division of labour with a view to the greater
concentration of mental energies is of wide application, and,,
wherever applied, it of necessity leads to the greater efficiency
and economy of labour. How natural the division of labour
between agriculture, manufacture, and commerce ! How conso
nant with the laws of nature the preference given in different
countries to special industries 1 What is international commerce
but the result of an extended division of labour ? Of course the
division of labour is limited by the power of exchange. One
may confine himself to one specific branch of industry which
may satisfy one kind of wants only, provided on the one hand
he can find purchasers enough of that commodity as to render
it worth his while producing nothing else, and provided also
there are others ready to satisfy all the other wants. An ex
tended division of labour demands a large and varied con
sumption. In little villages where the consumption of groceries
is limited, the grocer is also the haberdasher, the stationer, the
innkeeper. In London we have shops for certain specific classes
of articles, and no more. But wherever the division of labour
can be advantageously adopted, it is certain to be attended with
�24
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
advantage, at least in an economic aspect. And yet, that too
has its evil, for it has certainly a tendency to concentrate the
mind too consecutively to one operation, and it may have the
effect of weakening a man’s power, and make him become a
mere machine. What fertility of invention, what independence
of thought can you expect from a man who is required to do
but one thing—say, to watch a pair of wheels, or to walk three
steps forward and three steps backwards—throughout his life
time? He will doubtless do that work more perfectly, more
quickly, more economically, but the monotony and the same
ness of the operation, and the want of excitement attending it,
are sure to take away any spirit he might have.
Alas 1 nothing pleases us. Undivided work is very unpro
ductive, too divided work is prejudicial to the human under
standing. I am not ignorant of, and we cannot ignore or deny,
the evils of the present organization of industry; but is it of
any use to complain of them ? Let us the rather strive to
neutralize what is prejudicial, and set into motion remedies and
influences which shall bring good out of evil. Let the church
and the school be active in their work of moral and intellectual
instruction. Let science and philanthropy devise good work
able plans for the well-being of the masses of people huddled
together in places unfit for human habitation. And if the
family circle has still to be broken by the employment of
women and children in factories, let us at least do our utmost
to check vice, waste, luxury, extravagance, betting, gambling,
drunkenness, and the license and wretchedness which meet us
on every side—the result, to a large extent, of a vicious social
system.
If it is to Watt and his wonderful engine that we owe the
use of the new motive power, steam, it is to Arkwright, Har
greaves, Crompton, and many more illustrious inventors and
discoverers, that we owe our machines and instruments for regu
lating the action of force. There is an intimate relation between
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
25
the division of labour and machinery. If, on the one hand, it is
the steam engine and machinery that have rendered division
of labour possible, it is to the division of labour that we owe
the large increase of machinery, The change wrought by
machinery is something wonderful, A woman habituated to
knit can make 80 stitches a minute. By the use of the circular
loom, she can now make 480,000 stitches a minute, showing
an increase of 6,000 times the quantity. To make by hand
all the yarn spun in England in one year, by the use of the
self-acting mule, carrying 1,000 spindles, viz., 1,000 threads
at the time, we would require 100,000,000 of men. I have just
spoken of knitting; but see what is done by the sewing machine.
To make a shirt by the hand it takes at least fourteen hours ; by
the machine, less than two hours. A pair of trousers cannot
be done by the hand in less than five hours; by the machine
it may be done in one. A woman’s chemise, which by the
hand would take ten hours and a half, may be completed by
the machine—ay, ornamented—in one hour. This is indeed
the era of machines. We have the calculating machine and
the electric machine. Hats are made by machinery, and so
are opera-glasses. There is a machine to mould the mortar,
a machine to make cigarettes, and a machine to make neck
cravats. There are machines for measuring the wind, the
evaporation, and the rain; machines for measuring the in
tensity and velocity of light; an instrument for measuring the
interval between the appearance of the flash and the arrival
of the sound; an instrument for measuring the pressure of the
atmosphere, and an instrument for measuring the ten-thousandth
part of an inch.
The machine is simple when it transmits
force in a direct manner; it is composite when it is composed
of so many organs all combined and acting together in the
transmission of force. But whether simple or complex, in
whatever form or description, as a machine, an instrument,
or a tool, their uniform tendency has been to take from the
�26
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
human hand some of the most drudgery work, to produce
largely, to bring within the reach of the lowest classes many
articles which were once rarities and luxuries. Machinery
has lightened human labour of the most irksome tasks, and
opened up to man the widest field for the exercise of his in
tellectual faculties. At one time it was muscular force that
performed most of our work. Now, it is art, it is design, it
is intellect. It is labour just the same, it is true, but it is
nobler, higher, and more befitting our place and destinies.,
more in keeping with our aspirations and ambition. Only
let workmen have sufficient dexterity in passing from one
kind of labour to another, and the introduction of machinery
is certain to prove a blessing, not a curse. But, alas ! it is that
capacity that is sometimes wanting.
Time was when inventions were the products of simple
vagaries, or freaks of the imagination, of ignorant pretenders or
mere charlatans. How to make a wheel turn by itself, and to
get at perpetual motion ; how to clean and keep bright the skin
and flesh so as to preserve it in its perfect state ; how to make
upon the Thames a floating garden of pleasure, with trees,,
flowers, and fountains, and all in the midst of the stream
where it is most rapid;—these were secrets and inventions of
former days which contributed but little to the well-being of
the people. Happily, the inventions, machines, and instru
ments of the present day are of a more utilitarian and sober
caste, and they have immensely augmented, not only the
wealth, but the comfort and the intelligence of the whole
nation—ay, of the whole world. And who are the inventors ?
In many cases our working men themselves, and, strange
to say, those very men who have to perform daily the same
monotonous work, to repeat over and over again the operation
of the same single member of a complicated whole. Yes,
our working men, our artizans, are often able to suggest im
provements in manufacture, and short cuts in workmanship,
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
27
which economise labour, and are of immense value to the pro
ducers. Would that they were justly rewarded! A working man
who has brain enough to invent a new article, or to use a new
process, has a full right to the fruits of his labour, and to be
rewarded for the product of his brain ; and I am glad to know
that sometimes, though not always, they do get the benefit of
their inventions, either in an increased salary, or in a portion of
the profits. Do not imagine, however, that the profits of an
invention can go to any considerable extent into the pockets of the
inventor, for the success of the invention depends often less on
the fact of the invention itself, than on the appliances, energy,
and capital employed in carrying it into practice. I should be
glad if the cost of a patent were greatly reduced, in order to
enable our working men to patent inventions for themselves even
before they communicate them to their own employers ; but oh
how often the most sanguine hopes are placed on worthless inven
tions, how soon they are superseded, how often they prove more
costly than they are worth ! On the whole, the profession of an
inventor is a profitless one, and it is this among other things
that has more than once suggested the expediency of abolish
ing the Patent Laws altogether.
That machinery has immensely benefited production, and
that it has placed a new engine of success in the hands of the
producer, is beyond doubt, for though still depending upon
labour, the machine enables the producer to spare a great
number of labourers, whilst it immensely economises the cost of
production. Once let him have a machine that will do the work
of a thousand men, with only ten persons attending to it, and he
is in a position to distance far any other manufacturer who
wholly depends on human labour. How often indeed a persist
ence on the part of the labourer in asking higher wages than
the business could afford, or demands of conditions of labour
incompatible with its success, or the refusal to perform certain
acts, or to allow other labourers to be introduced for their
�28
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
performance, have driven our manufacturers to introduce
machinery !
But how has machinery affected the working classes? An
inventor once proposed to Colbert, the great minister of Louis
XIV. of France, a machine which would do the work of ten
men. “ I am anxious,” said the minister, “ that men should be
able to live honestly by their work, and you propose to me to
take the work out of their hands. Take the invention, if you
please, somewhere else.” Statesmen are often as ignorant of
economic questions as the least among us, and just as when
railways were projected all manner of apprehensions were enter
tained lest horses, cattle, and carriages should cease to be
required, so when machines were introduced into any branch
of industry, the first thought was, Well, labourers will no longer
be wanted in it. But has it been so ? Calculate the number
employed in the occupation of transport and conveyance before
and since the adoption of the railway system,—the number
employed in the cotton manufacture, or any other textile
industry, before and since the introduction of machinery,—the
number employed in printing, copying, and publishing, before
and since the invention of the printing machine. The first
introduction of machinery may indeed displace and diminish
for a while the employment of labour, may perchance take
labour out of the hands of persons otherwise not able to take
another employment, and create the need of another class of
labourers altogether; but if it has taken labour from ten
persons, it has provided labour for a thousand. How does it
work? A yard of calico made by hand costs two shillings,
made by machinery it may cost fourpence. At two shillings a
yard, few buy it ; at fourpence a yard, multitudes are glad to
avail themselves of it. Cheapness promotes consumption : the
article which hitherto was used by the higher classes only, is
now to be seen in the hand of the labouring classes as well.
As’the demand increases, so production increases, and to such
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
■29
an extent, that although the number of labourers now employed
in the production of calico may be immensely less in proportion
to a given quantity of calico, the total number required for
the millions of yards now used greatly exceeds the number
engaged when the whole work was performed without any
aid of machinery.
And so as regards wages. Doubtless
a manufacturer who has to pay for the use of an invention and
for the cost and maintenance of the machinery, and who needs
only a few labourers able to perform some mechanical act,
might be tempted to take advantage of his position and to
offer less wages. But if the cost of production and the mainte
nance of the machinery are more than replaced by the profits
arising from increasing production, will not a large portion of
those profits, in one way or another, fall on the labouring classes ?
And if to wrork the machinery, in the production of immensely
larger quantities, the manufacturer requires more labourers than
ever he did in the palmy days of hand labour, where will be his
greater independence ? No, no ! Machinery may have decreased,
in some cases, the rates of wages, but it has in all cases increased
the total earnings of the labouring classes. It may have taken
labour out of some, impoverished a few, done injury here and
there, but it has given more labour to the community at large,
and has added immensely to the resources of the artisans
and labouring classes all the world over. M. Bastiat, in his.
excellent work on “ What is Seen and What is not Seen in.
Political Economy,” illustrated.the operation of machinery on
human labour in his usual spirited manner. “Jacque Bonhomme,” he said, “ had two francs, which he was in the habit of
paying to two workmen whom he employed. Suddenly, how
ever, having found out the means of abridging the work by
half, he discharged one workman, and so saved one franc.
Upon this, the ignorant is ready to exclaim, 1 See how misery
follows civilization! See how fatal is freedom to equality 1
The human mind has made a conquest, and immediately a
�3o *
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR AND
workman, falls into pauperism. Even if Jacque Bonhomme
should continue to employ the two workmen, he will only give
them half a franc each, for they will compete one with another,
and they will offer their labour for half the money.’ But it is
not so, since both the premises and the conclusions are false.
Behind the half of this phenomenon which is seen, there is
another half which is not seen ; for what does Jacque Bonhomme
do with the other franc, which he saved ? He employs it in
another work, and whilst the same work is done for one franc
by one workman which formerly required two to do it, extra
work is done with the other franc, which employs the other also.
The two workmen are as much employed as ever, but double
work is done, and so the invention has procured a gratuitous
benefit.”
The introduction of machinery should never be used as a
threat against the demands of labourers. It is mean to i esort to
such an expedient in order to frighten the labourers to acquiesce
in the conditions offered. But remember, machinery is of great
utility to production, and manufacturers may be compelled to
introduce it for the salvation, possibly, of the whole industry.
See what is taking place now in the watch manufacture of
Switzerland. Hitherto watchmaking at Geneva has been almost
entirely a hand-work industry.
But Switzerland stands in
danger of losing the industry altogether, since Germany and
America have learnt to make watches and clocks by machinery.
There is a certain protection, after all, against the sudden intro
duction of machinery in the fact that it is very costly, that it
requires great capital, that manufacturers are very unwilling to
alter their usual course of business, and that, in reality, in some
industries the hand has some advantage over the machine,
though machinery is now becoming so perfect and automatic
that it is impossible to say what it cannot accomplish. It
has been complained that the use of machinery often leads to
over-production, and to gluts of merchandize, which redounds
�THE WONDERS OF MACHINERY.
31
against the well-being of the masses especially by alternations of
great activity and great depression. But a large production of
articles of general use is always attended by increasing cheap
ness, and increasing cheapness most assuredly leads to an
enlarged demand, which soon absorbs any surplus production.
Machine and tool making has become' an important industry.
In x851 it employed in England and Wales 48,000 persons ; in
1861, 117,000; and in 1871, 175,000. In 1851 our exports of
steam engines, and other kinds, amounted to ,£1,168,000; in
I^75> to £4,213,000. We export engines and machinery to
every part of the world. Any one is now at liberty to order from
the British workshop the most complex and the finest piece of
machinery that can possibly be invented. It may be said, What
folly it is to injure ourselves by enabling foreign manufacturers
to obtain an advantage which is exclusively our owp ! True,
England has superior facilities for the manufacture of machinery
in her abundance of coal and iron, but the power of inventive
ness is not confined within the British shores. In 1824, the
Americans were considered as thirty years behind England, and
France was the only country which could be said to rival
England in the making of machinery. Since then, however,
and for many years past, foreign countries have made won
derful progress. As well attempt to shut up all the avenues
of science and knowledge as to secrete from public gaze the
discoveries and inventions which benefit industry and manu
facture.
It is well to realize that many of the primary conditions
necessary to the development of manufacturing industry are
no longer exclusively enjoyed by any country, and it would be
folly for the British manufacturer to remain content and tran
quil, as if he needed to dread no competition, and as if he
could be sure to continue to enjoy the practical monopoly of
the markets of the world.. Greater command over capital,
the possession of mineral resources almost boundless in extent
�32
THE DIVISION OF LABOUR, ETC.
and productiveness, greater commercial sagacity and power of
enterprise, have hitherto kept and may yet keep Britain on a
position of eminence above all her competitors; but in every
one of these elements, France, Germany, Switzerland, and the
United States are striving to advance; and with the most
powerful machinery within the reach of every one, who can
say how soon, from eager competitors, they may become for
midable rivals? It would be a great mistake indeed on the
part of our manufacturers^ to imagine that their only hope to
preserve their supremacy rests in their being able to keep the
wages of labour low. I have no faith in any plan which
begins by starving the labourer. The essentials of real pro
gress must ever consist in increasing power of production, in
greater adaptiveness of our manufactures to the wants of the
masses of the people at home and abroad, and in greater
skill and advancement in the arts and sciences. Emulate
other nations in their efforts to combine beauty with usefulness,
elegance with solidity. Let nothing discourage the investment
of capital in industry. Furbish your intellect to achieve greater
wonders than were ever yet imagined. Let Capital and Labour
march hand in hand, and England need not fear being out
done, however keen the contest, however close the issue.
�III.
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
On the sea-coast of Sicily there was once a wild, lawless,
gigantic race, who, with one eye in the middle of their forehead,
but with strong hands, were constantly employed in forging
thunderbolts for Jupiter. And in this island of Britain, there
are many sons of the sturdy Saxon race who, with two eyes
and both wide open, are constantly forging capital, not for
Jupiter, but for the whole world. A disposition to labour, to
save, and to accumulate ; a growing conviction that wealth is
power, whatever knowledge may be; a keen relish of the
comforts of life, which wealth to a large extent provides ; a
decided aptitude for commerce, industry, and enterprise ; con
fidence in the public institutions of the country; and a firm
reliance on the impartial administration of justice,—these, to
gether with those wonderful inventions and discoveries which
have so enlarged the range and utility of human labour, have
rendered Britain the great storehouse of capital, and at this
moment borrowers from every nation are for ever coming to
this modern Egypt, to buy capital of the living J osephs,—the
Bank of England, the Rothschilds, the Barings, and many
others who keep the keys of the coveted granary. An enviable
position this for England to occupy. The taunt of contempt
once expressed by the title La Nation Boutiquiere (the shop
keeping nation), only betokens the sentiment of jealousy which
3
�34
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
♦
France once felt for this new power in the hands of England.
But if England has got riches, it is because she has been
industrious. If the broad acres of old England have become
more luxurious and productive, if her mineral stores have become
a source of perennial wealth, if her cities are full of people, and
her manufacturing industry has become the wonder of all nations,
it is simply because English labour and English perseverance
have combated valorously with the obstacles presented by
nature. What is the ocean to the daring British manner?
Boldly to the depths of the earth the British miner will
venture, fearing nothing. Nature’s inexhaustible riches and
powers have all along animated the British discoverer to make
unknown sacrifices. And so the British have thriven.
We might suppose that by this time every country would
have become rich. With an old civilization, an immense
population, untold resources, and varied opportunities, what
is it that hindered the accumulation of wealth, and kept
nearly every state in a condition of poverty? Alas! the
work of destruction has been even more effective than the
work of production. The warlike policy of the Roman Empire
was not favourable to the production of wealth. . In the
Middle Ages, whatever was achieved by the thriving cities was
more than destroyed by the injurious influence of feudalism and
barbarism.
Insecurity of person and property discouraged
accumulation. Monopoly diverted the streams of wealth into
narrow channels. Vicious fiscal systems often corroded the
very sources of wealth. The Thirty Years’ War, the Seven
Years’ War, and the French War, brought desolation into every
home, and destroyed, not only all that had theretofore been
produced, but even the produce of years to come, Can we
wonder that under such circumstances but little or nothing
was accumulated ? Cast a glance beyond Europe. In Asia
there has been much hoarding of wealth, but no accumulation
and no workable capital. India has been rather the absorbent
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
35
than the producer of capital. Africa is as yet destitute both
of wealth and capital. And America, the land of promise for
capital, is still, comparatively speaking, a new country, where
the means of investment are always greater than the available
resources for the same. There is no end of openings all over
the world for the disposal of British capital; and for the interest
of the great mass of our population we may well desire that,
whatever the competition, British industry and commerce may
ever prove the safest and the most advantageous investment of
British capital.
Does it seem an easy thing to you to accumulate capital?
Look around. See the vast numbers of persons who find it hard
enough to get their daily bread, and to make the two ends meet.
See the vast numbers earning a good income, yet spending it as
fast as it comes, and never thinking of saving a farthing, far less
of accumulating any capital. Think of the numbers who strive
hard to save, but who, after succeeding for a time, are compelled
to give up the attempt from sickness, misfortune, or losses.
Think of the vicissitudes of trade, changes of fashion, and new
inventions which from time to time disconcert the best conceived
plan. What violent efforts, and what sudden collapses, what
heaving and subsiding, what flow and ebb of fortune, do we wit
ness ! How many try, how few succeed ! It is easy compara
tively to accumulate after a good foundation has been laid ;
but how hard it is to lay that foundation. What judgment,
what decision of will, what disposition to economise, there must
exist to have the slightest chance of success. Doubtless the
present division of property is not all that could be wished.
The laws of primogeniture and entail favour the accumulation
of wealth, at least in land, in comparatively few hands.
Those rich enough to pay income tax on any amount of
profits of trade and industry are only about 16 for every
1000 of the population of Great Britain, and of these much
less than one in 1,000 (0'65) pay on incomes amounting to
�36
USE OF CAPITAL iN INDUSTRY.
^1,000, and upward, per annum. Yet the number of capitalists
might be immensely greater were there more thrift, more com
mon prudence, and more practical wisdom among the people.
I do not speak of the working classes only, but of the middle
and higher classes quite as much, or more. Would that they
had the wisdom to lay by something for a rainy day when they
have a chance of doing so ! Would that they used and not
abused the means which Providence places within their reach !
Realize, I pray you, what capital really is, and what a useful
commodity it is to every nation. Generally speaking, capital
is that portion of an individual’s or of a nation’s wealth which
is applied to reproduction. All property becomes capital so
soon as it, or the value received from it, is set apart for pro
ductive employment. By dint of industry, a shilling to-day,
a pound to-morrow, you gather ^ioo. You resolve to have
a home of your own, and to employ ^25 in furnishing
it, and with the ^75 remaining you determine to set up
a shop. You have got, indeed, ZIO° of your own, but only
^75 of capital.
Just as wealth, in its economic mean
ing, consists of all those things, and those things only,
which are transferable, limited in supply, and directly or
indirectly productive of value, so capital, which is part of that
wealth, must bear the same characteristic. There are many
things most valuable in themselves, which are not, in their strict
economic sense, capital. Capital does not include the instru
ments furnished by nature, without our aid. The water of the
sea, the air we breathe, are not capital, unless, indeed, by labour
we enclose a portion of the sea, or introduce the air into a
building. Capital consists of those things which are created,
and which were previously accumulated by man. To be capital,
moreover, the possession must be a material object, and capable
of transfer. The skill of an artist, the genius of a composer, the
wisdom of a statesman, the talent of a man of letters, the health
and strength of a labourer, are doubtless so many valuable
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
37
endowments to their respective possessors, but they are not of.
a material character, and cannot be transferred. If English
statesmen could transfer a little of their wisdom to the French ;
if British labourers could endow their confreres in France with
a little of their strength and steadiness of purpose; if French
artizans could pass over to British artizans part of their fertility
of invention, and their quickness of perception, what a market
there would be for them all! But these personal endowments
cannot be sold or bought, and, therefore, they do not corrie
within the meaning of the word capital.
I do not know what we should do without capital.
The
riches of nature are profusely scattered, some on the surface
and some on the very bowels of the earth; and human labour is
required to make them subservient to the many uses for which
they are adapted.
Few things are the spontaneous, unaided
gifts of nature, requiring no exertion for their production.
Nature offers its powers and its products.
Industry and
labour discover their latent utility, and surmount the diffi
culties of obtaining such products, and of giving them their
requisite modification.
‘' I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,
Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ;
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses, and white eglantine.” *
Yet who is ignorant of the wonders of gardening ? What
triumphs of skill do we see in a streak, a tint, a shade
secured by the morning care, the evening caution, and the
vigilance of days bestowed by the diligent horticulturist.
Even labour, however, cannot always act singly. It needs
the aid of tools, implements, and machines. There are in the
United Kingdom immense tracts of cultivable land. Will it
do simply to employ any number of men or women to till, to
plough, to sow, to reap? No. The farmer must erect the
* Shakspeare.
�38
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
steadings. He must clear and drain. He must eradicate noxious
weeds, must make the road, the bank, the fence, the bridge.
He must purchase guano or some other fertilizer. He must have
a sufficient number of live stock. He must have the grubber, the
roller, the harrow, the rake, the reaping machine, the thrashing
machine ; ay, even the steam plough, and the steam engine, if
he can afford it. How can these be obtained, unless there be
something left of previous accumulation whereby to get them ?
Now that something is—Capital. The labourers in the act of
producing must be fed and clothed.
From whom can they
expect their sustenance but from the capitalist ? The very first
use of capital, therefore, is to provide such commodities as are
employed in producing wealth and in supplying the fund neces
sary for supporting labour.
Capital is used in all manner of ways for purposes of repro
duction. We often see our manufacturers intentionally destroy
ing it, in order to obtain the effects which are the direct
consequences of its destruction ; as, for example, they consume
coal in the furnace that they may produce iron. They are
content to see capital used up little by little as in machinery,
or consent to vary its very kind by manufacturing, or shaping
it in new forms, as in the case of cotton, wool, or other raw
material.
Subject certain quantities of cotton and wool to
certain processes ; destroy, in fact, their identity, and you obtain
in their stead shirts, drawers, gloves, shawls, stockings, hose.
Subject wool and woollen yarn to other processes, and you have
Brussels carpets, tapestry, velvets, felt, blankets, beaveis,
flannel, coverlets, etc. Capital is given away in wages as
reward for labour. It is employed in providing, extracting,
or producing materials, as in agriculture, mining, fisheries,
manufactures. It is invested in roads, railways, shipping. But
in whatever way it is employed, capital is the spring, the mover
of labour, and scarcely any work can be accomplished without
t. The greater, indeed, the amount of capital accumulated, the
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
39
larger the amount of work executed. What egregious folly it is
to call capital the natural foe of labour, and the capitalist the
jealous rival of labour. Instead of being an incubus on the
energies of the labourer, or the weight that crushes him down,
capital is the very prop and stay of labour, it is the indispensable
means of all employment, and of all reward of labour.
But there is a difference in the method of employing capital.
On a closer examination of what is required for production, in
the very instances already given, you will find that part of the
capital is employed in works of a permanent character, and part
for temporary and fluctuating purposes. If you wish to establish
a cotton mill, you must needs build the factory and purchase the
machinery ; if you will construct iron works, you must have the
furnaces ; if you will give yourself to agriculture, you must im
prove the land. Now capital so employed cannot be withdrawn
at pleasure. It is for all practical purposes sunk; and all you
may derive from it is a yearly rent or interest. This is techni
cally called fixed capital. But to work the factory, to produce
iron, to cultivate grain or fruit, you must get the raw material,
pay wages, buy the seed, and provide for the thousand require
ments of the business. And this is circulating or floating capital.
The fixed capital of the hunter consists of his gun and dog;
the floating, of powder and shot. The boat and net are the
fixed capital of the fisherman; any food in the boat is the float
ing. The warehouse is the fixed capital of the trader, and so
are his weights or machines ; his stock in trade and effects are
his floating capital. There is this further difference between
fixed and circulating capital, that whilst the fixed always re
mains, the circulating is always spent. You buy land for a
railway, that land remains. You pay money in wages, it goes.
Do not imagine, however, that what is termed fixed capital is
absolutely fixed or indestructible, or that what is termed float
ing is really lost. In truth, the fixed capital, unless renewed,
is in time completely lost. The floating, though temporarily
�40
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
departing, always returns. That the whole floating capital em
ployed, together with a certain amount of profits, shall return,
is the whole aim of the capitalist. Alas if it does not return !
And remember, too, that as all fixed capital must come originally
from the operation of circulating capital, and must be fed by it,
—no factory, no machine being obtainable except by first pro
viding, and afterwards sustaining, labour,—so no fixed capital
can, by any possible means, give a revenue except by the use
of circulating capital; for what is the use of building the factory,
or purchasing a piece of land, unless you are able and prepared
to manufacture cotton or woollen, or to cultivate the ground ?
At home and abroad, wherever this wonderful element, capital,
is distributed, it is employed as floating and as fixed in certain
proportions, not always precisely the same, but still pretty well
balanced. In truth, it is quite a misadventure when either form
takes an undue share of public attention. Suppose, for instance
the construction of public works should require the conversion
of any considerable part of floating into fixed capital, and what
follows ? There will be much less left for the general wants of
trade and ordinary purposes of manufacture, and serious incon
venience may ensue from it.
I wish I could give you some idea of the extraordinary sums
of capital required to carry on the industries of this country.
There are in the United Kingdom some 47,000,000 acres of
land under cultivation, on which farmers sometimes invest
y^'io or ^15 per acre. Allow ^5 10s. per acre on the average,
and you have ^258,000,000 required for agriculture. We have
a large number of industries whose very existence depends
on the constant flow of capital. Some ^80,000,000 sterling
are required for the cotton manufacture; some ^40,000,000
for the woollen; some ^30,000,000 for the iron industry ;
some £70,000,000 for our mercantile marine. Just imagine the
amount required to carry on the foreign trade of the country
--those distant trades, especially, with Australia, India, China,
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
4i
and Japan, which do not allow of quick returns. As many
as ^600,000,000 of capital are invested in our railways, and
I cannot tell you how much has been invested by British
capitalists in public undertakings for water, gas, and docks, in
banking and insurance, and in a hundred other objects at home
and abroad. Yes, abroad also ; for immense sums of capital
are constantly going out from Britain to every part of the
world, to fructify the soil of native industry, to fill waste places,
and to construct great public works. And what a drain is
caused by foreign loans, that new, and in many respects novel,
species of gambling of the present day. Scarcely a year passes
but we have princes and potentates, wealthy states and puny
republics, knocking at the door of the British Stock Exchange
for a new loan. At this moment, a large portion of the debt of
most states in the world, probably ^300,000,000, and more, is
due to British capitalists. This is the way in which capital
is employed. It will not do to keep capital idle, for idleness is
sure to bring about its own punishment. Take it into your head
that you will not work, and of course you get no wages. That
is your well-deserved punishment.
Let capital be kept idle,
and it will bring no interest. That is its punishment. It would
be interesting to know in what proportion capital is employed
respectively in British industry, commerce, and shipping, and
foreign enterprises and loans. I wTill not venture on bold esti
mates, but what is it that determines what specific investment
shall be preferred? Nothing else than what offers the best ad
vantage. It is the same with large as with small transactions.
A fourth or a half per annum per cent, will turn the scale,
whether I will buy American or British funded securities. One
or two per cent, will determine whether agriculture or manufac
tures shall be preferred. It is wonderful what a little difference
often turns the scale, But, mind you, it makes all the differ
ence to those who are to participate in the benefit arising from
the employment of capital, how capital is eventually invested.
�42
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
There is a great difference, for instance, in the various
proportions in which capital is distributed among the several
agents of production even as between different industries. It
has been calculated in France, that for every hundred francs
produced, fifteen go in labour, fifty-five in materials, and the
remainder in the maintenance of fixed capital, fuel, adminis
tration, and profits. According to the census of the United
States for 1870, out of $100 produced, eighteen go in labour,
fifty-six in raw materials, and the rest in interest and ad
ministration.
What are the proportions in England it is
difficult to say, but all industries are not alike. In industries
where the material is of no great value, the proportion
falling on labour for wages may even exceed the proportion
required for the material. But there are industries of just
the reverse character, where the value of the material far
exceeds every other element in the cost of production. In
the production of flour, which is only a process in the further
utilization of wheat, in calico-printing, bleaching, and dyeing,
in the reduction of gold and silver, in the refining of sugar,
the proportion of the produce falling on wages is comparatively
small, in some cases four, six, and eight per cent., and no more.
In the production of hardwares, glass wares, furniture, cotton
goods, bricks, and ship-building, the proportion of the product
falling on labour ranges from twenty to thirty per cent. I have
often been struck at the incongruity exhibited by a man constantly
touching gold and silver, silk or woollen, of the finest description,
yet he himself poor and half-starving. Walk to Spitalfields,
and see the poor silk weaver: he is manufacturing some magni
ficent velvet, or some splendid moire antique; he must be a
‘trusty man, for he is trusted with the material in his own home ;
he must have considerable knowledge of his work, and he must
be at great expense in the maintenance of the loom, and even in
house rent, for he must have as much space and light as he can.
Ask what are his wages, and he will tell you that he has the
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
43
poorest wages, often not better than a common labourer can
earn. Go to a cotton factory, and you see men and women
apparently simply watching a machine, or performing some
mechanical act, now taking a lump of cotton from one place
to another, and again replacing a single thread on the spindle.
Ask what is their earning, and you will find that they get
handsome wages.
Why this difference ? In the one case
the raw material is very dear, and takes away considerable
part of the produce; in the other it is very cheap, and
leaves a good share to be divided among the workers. The
dearer the raw material, whether ordinarily or exceptionally, the
worse for the labourer and the manufacturer, for often in the
difficulty of obtaining the full price the only alternative left is
to work at reduced wages and profits. Happily, in England,
the great bulk of our manufactures are the products of raw
materials of comparatively little value. Whilst France is the
home of the silk manufacture, England is the seat of the cotton
and iron industries. It will not do, however, to say we should
pick and choose the industries which give the best return to
labour. Whatever is most beneficial to capital must also be
equally beneficial to labour, and you may be sure of this, that
the watchful eye of the capitalist will ever be on the outlook
to make a good selection for his investments.
It is difficult to say what we should most dread, either an
unlimited growth of capital, or any sudden stoppage of accumu
lation ; for an unlimited growth would inevitably be followed by
a diminution of profit, and a consequent discouragement of
industry; and a diminution of capital would have results still
more disastrous. As yet, we are -thankful to say, there is no
danger either of the one or of the other. Capital is growing in
England at an enormous ratio. But the demand for capital both
at home and abroad is greater than ever. Nor is it a bad thing,
after all, that some of our surplus should find its way abroad.
John Stuart Mill attributed to the perpetual overflow of capital
�44
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
to colonies or to foreign countries, to seek higher profits than
can be obtained at home, the principal cause by which the
decline of profits in England has been arrested. This, he said,
has a twofold operation. “ In the first place, it does what a fire,
or an inundation, or a commercial crisis, would have done ;—it
carries off a part of the increase of capital from which the
reduction of profits proceeds. Secondly, the capital so carried
off is not lost, but is chiefly employed either in founding colonies,
which become large exporters of cheap agricultural produce, or
in extending, and perhaps improving, the agriculture of older
communities. It is to the emigration of English capital, that we
have chiefly to look for keeping up a supply of cheap food and
cheap materials of clothing, proportioned to the increase of our
population : thus enabling an increasing capital to find employ
ment in the country, without reduction of profits, in producing
manufactured articles with which to pay for this supply of raw
produce. Thus, the exportation of capital is an agent of great
efficacy in extending the field of employment for that which
remains ; and it may be said truly, that up to a certain point,
the more capital we send away the more we shall possess and
be able to retain at home.” Fear not, indeed, the exportation
of capital, so long as it goes to fertilize the land, to create
new means of transport, to animate industry, and to strengthen
and invigorate labour in America, India, Australia, or any part
of the world. But fear such exportation when it goes to act as
the sinews of war, when it is to be employed for destruction,
and not for production, Better far to sink capital into the
deep, than to lend it to any power in Europe—ay, to the British
Government itself—for the support of a warlike policy in any
quarter, and for any purpose whatever.
It is good, after all, to be able to say that, however selfish
and materialistic it may seem at first sight, political economy
has this redeeming characteristic, that it does not teach us to
hide our light under a bushel, to keep what we have to ourselves
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
45
and for ourselves. If you have gathered capital, let it out; do
not keep it in your pocket, nor hide it in an old stocking.
If you have any talent, let it shine. Use it liberally for your
selves and for others. I remember reading a happy illustration
of the principle in question as applied to literary pursuits in
“Excelsior,” a charming publication, edited by the late Dr.
Hamilton. “An earnest mind,” he said, “is not a bucket, but
a fountain; and as good thoughts flow out, better thoughts flow
in. Good thoughts are gregarious. The bright image or spark
ling aphorism, the gold or silver of capital,—fear not to give it
wing, for, lured by its decoy, thoughts of sublimer range and
sunnier pinion will be sure to descend and gather round it. As
you scatter, you’ll increase. And it is in this way that, whilst
many a thought that might have enriched the world has been
buried in a sullen and monastic spirit, like a crock of gold in
a coffin, the good idea of a frank and forth-spoken man gets
currency, and after being improved to the advantage of thou
sands, has returned to its originator with usury. It has been
lent, and so it has not been lost; it has been communicated,
and so it has been preserved ; it has circulated, and so it has
increased.”
We should all remember that, in one sense or another, we are
all capitalists. In an economic sense, labour is an element
distinct from capital. But in a better sense—for it is the sense
of common experience—we stand much more on a level. We are
all labourers, and all capitalists. Taking the working classes
at two-thirds of the entire population, and assuming an average
weekly aggregate earning of thirty shillings for each family of 4'50
persons, the entire income of the working classes will amount
to ^400,000,000 per annum, probably quite as much as the
income of all the middle and higher classes together. You, the
working classes, destitute of all capital, a class distinct from the
capitalists ? What folly ! Multiply that earning of yours at ten
years’ purchase, and your property in your labour income from
�46
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
all sources is worth ^4,000,000,000. Away with all jealousy
between Labour and Capital ! We are all interested in each
other’s welfare : on the success of the capitalist your income
depends ; and on your welfare and happiness, the capitalist’s
chief strength must ever rest.
Moralists have often been led to decry the all-absorbing eager
ness of the present age in the pursuit of wealth, and fears have
been expressed lest the love of money should engross far too much
the heart and mind of the nation,—lest, instead of seeking wealth
as an instrument for the purchase of ease and enjoyment, both
the ease and the enjoyment of a whole life should be rendered
up a sacrifice to its shrine,—lest, instead of its being desired as a
minister of gratification to the appetites of nature, it should bring
nature itself into bondage, robbing her of all her simple delights,
pouring wormwood into the current of her feelings, making that
man sad who ought to be cheerful. Well might Matthew Henry
say, “ There is a burden of care in getting riches ; fear in keep
ing them ; temptation in using them ; guilt in abusing them;
sorrow in losing them ; and a burden of account at last to be
given up concerning them.”
But let us not ignore or forget the many benefits derived from
wealth ; and whilst we condemn an excessive devotion to its
pursuit, let us be ready to acknowledge that the acquisition of
wealth is good in itself as the reward of well-directed labour, of
industry, frugality, and economy. And look at the results !
What power of attraction, what magic influence, does capital
possess ! What wonders does it achieve ! Behold the embodi
ments of capital in our halls and palaces, docks and warehouses,
factories and workshops, railways and canals, parks and plea
sure grounds. What a mighty power is capital, even in politics !
Three millions of British sovereigns haye silenced the grumbling
of the Americans for the concession of belligerent rights to the
Confederate States, and the raids of the Alabama and other
privateers on American shipping. Four millions of hard sove-
�USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
47
reigns have procured to England an interest in the Suez Canal.
What is it that renders Britain so influential in the council of
the nations ? What is it that placed this nation, once so ob
scure, in the foremost place in civilization and science ? Whence,
but by the expenditure of much treasure, has Britain been
rendered the healthy and courted resort of princes and nobles
from all countries ? Look around, and see what wealth is
capable of performing,—what monuments it has raised,—what
agencies it has called into activity,—what encouragement it
has afforded to science, art, and discoveries. What but wealth
has procured for Britain those store-houses of knowledge which
enrich our museums and galleries ? And what but the exist
ence of a class in the full enjoyment of ease and wealth has
given to the nation the immense benefit of a large number of
men who, with refined taste and enlarged views, can give them
selves to those higher objects which foster civilization and
science ? It is the glory of England that she possesses so
many men of position and wealth, who, eschewing the tempta
tion of ease and luxury, are thankful if they are selected to
preside over our hospitals, to take their share in the maintenance
of order and justice, to devote themselves to legislation, to take
an active part in the laborious task of our School Boards.
Many are the examples of liberality, moreover, which redeem
wealth from the charge of sordid avarice or cold unconcern for
human suffering. The names of George Moore and George
Peabody, of Samuel Morley and the Baroness Coutts, are
household words in the national catalogue of benefactors :—
“Those are great souls, who touch’d with warmth divine,
Give gold a price, and teach its beams to shine ;
All hoarded pleasures they repute a load,
Nor think their wealth their own, till well bestow’d.”
And let any cry of distress be heard, do we not see at once a
flow of liberality to mitigate its pressure ? Yes ! let wealth
continue to diffuse blessings such as these, and what a crop of
�^g
USE OF CAPITAL IN INDUSTRY.
beneficence will be gathered !
How much misery will be alle
viated ! What amount of ignorance will be removed 1. What
high purposes will be served 1 In the work of production and
distribution of wealth, most of us are immediately interested.
Let us be thankful for the measure of prosperity this work of
ours procures for us. Let us remember that, whether rich or
poor in gold and silver, it is always in our power to possess the
godlike happiness of doing good, to be benefactors to others,
and to have a perpetual spring of peace and joy in ourselves.
�IV.
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
Are the working classes at this moment receiving such wages as
they are entitled to have ? Do they participate fully and justly in
the produce of their labour ? Do they get a just reward for the
work they perform ? These are the questions before us this
evening ; and certainly I know of no other social theme which
has called forth more continuous, more keen, and more interest
ing controversy. We all know that labour is indispensable for
production, that it must be performed with energy, health, and
intelligence, that it is economised by machinery, and rendered
more productive by the division of labour,—and that, as a whole,
labour is exercised in England under circumstances, physical,
economical, and political, far superior to those of many other
countries. Now let us bring labour face to face with capital, that
element so much dreaded for its power and influence, yet without
which labour cannot proceed. On the one hand, we have the
labourer hard at work in the business of life j on the other, the
capitalist, bringing to the help of labour the fruit of his saving, yet
trying to economise it, and to render it as useful as possible.
Labourers both they are, the labourer and the capitalist, because
all capital is the fruit of labour—saved, not wasted, and em
ployed in reproduction. Whilst, however, there lie before us
the two parties in the great conflict, ever at issue, ever jealous
of one another, and now and again coming to an open struggle,
4
�5°
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
let us keep in mind that the two great factors in the determina
tion of the reward of labour, are not capital and labour, but the
producers on the one hand, as including both labour and capital,
and the consumers on the other. On what condition can the
interests of all parties be satisfactorily established, and any
seeming divergence reconciled ?
I do not know how far you are prepared to give heed to what
economists have to say on a question which so touches your
interest to the quick. I have heard the science charged with
being cold and unsympathetic, yet I believe that its dictates
ought to be listened to with attention, for Adam Smith and
John Stuart Mill, Jean Baptiste Say and Michel Chevalier, did
not give their oracles as from the gods, but as the result of
induction from ascertained facts. And whence the immense
accumulation of wealth within the last quarter of a century,
in which the labouring classes have so much participated,
but from the recognition of the principles of economic science
and the practical application of their dictates to national
legislation ?
The machinery of production and distribution is much more
complicated than we are apt to imagine, for it extends back
to the manifold operations connected with the production and
acquisition of the raw materials, tools, and factories, and reaches
far and away, through manifold ramifications, till the produce
finds its way into the hands of the consumer. In a primitive
state of society, a labourer may easily cut a tree and build a
hut for himself, or work on the virgin soil and draw from it a
scanty subsistence ; but it is not so in the present advanced
civilization. The raw materials come from the most distant
regions. The tools, machines, and instruments are the pro
ducts of exquisite skill. The motive power is no longer the
running steam or the rushing wind.
How extensive, how
systematic, how economically adapted everything must be ere
a labourer can enter into his labour! What scheming, what
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
Si
.organization, what foresight are required in the master in the
conduct of all his operations 1 What a number of agents !
How many are the instrumentalities required to bring the pro
duce within the reach of the consumer, in towns and hamlets,
at home and abroad ! Travel among the Exquimaux or the
Hottentots, penetrate Asia or America, visit the Fair of Nijni
Novgorod, and the bazaars at Constantinople, and everywhere
you find British goods. How came they there? What toil,
what expenditure to bring them there ! How much of the pro
duce of such goods falls into the hands of the producer in
England, and how much is divided and subdivided among the
merchants and traders, carriers and shipmasters, agents and
brokers, engaged in their transmission, who can say ?
Nor is it easy to ascertain how the net amount which eventually
falls into the hands of the producer should be distributed
between the master and the workmen, the capitalist and the
labourer. Deeply interested alike in the results of production,
interdependent on one another for its success, we might fancy
they might easily agree to act jointly in a kind of partnership.
But can the labourer wait till the article is completed and sold,
to divide the proceeds with the capitalist ? Can he work on
the chance that the article may be sold or prove profitable ?
Better for him, in most cases, to receive something prompt and
certain, than a larger sum at a distant time, and contingent on
the success of the enterprise. Nor would such an agreement
answer the interest of the master, for he must look to the best
time for selling his merchandize, and he cannot expose himself
to the pressure of the labourers, or to the danger of disagree
ment. Better for them both to substitute for such an uncertain
issue, which might in the end prove satisfactory to neither party,
the contract of wages, or the purchase and sale of certain labour
for a certain renumeration, the workmen consenting to have
their share of the profits, whatever they be, or their chance
of profit or loss, commuted into a fixed payment. Only let it
�'52
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
be understood that in entering into such a contract the parties
agree on the mutual recognition of property in capital and
labour, and on the absolute freedom on the part of both, the one
to demand, and the other to give, whatever their respective
interests may dictate.
The business of production is one requiring extreme nicety
of calculation. To accept a contract for the building of a
house, to undertake the working of a mill, or to rent a farm,
are alike operations the success of which depends on the
careful estimate of receipts and expenditure. We often speak
of the master as the capitalist, but the capital he requires is a
commodity having a market value, and the cost of which he
must take into account. You wish to establish a cotton mill.
the mill itself may cost you some ^30,000 in land’ bulld'
ings, steam-engines, gas-works, warehouses, and all the fixed
requisites, besides a per centage per annum for repair and
dilapidation. Beyond this, as much capital will be required
for the machinery; and to that, too, a still larger per centage
per annum must be added for wear and tear, and renewal
when worked out. Then you need capital to purchase cotton
and stock for carrying on the trade. You have the insurance
to pay, and the expense of taxes, engines, horses, the weekly
contengencies of oil, tallow, etc.; and the most important
item, the interest of all this capital, which varies from time
to time from 2| to io per cent, per annum. Add now, the
wages of labour, and the remuneration due to the master for
the labour and talent required in the administration—talent
often of a very high order,—and you can form a fair estimate of
the cost of the article produced. But can the manufacturer
count upon recovering the whole of his cost from the consumer ?
Ultimately, indeed, the value of any article is regulated by the
cost of production, whatever that be ; but is there no probability
that the competition between the producers within the same or
in different countries, or the inability of the consumers, may
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
53
compel the producer to sell at prices lower than he had calcu
lated. And if so, the cost of capital and other commodities being
the same, must not the master, if he is to continue to produce,
lower the wages of labour and be content to do himself with
less remuneration ?
It is objected, that before thinking of lowering the wages, the
master should see whether some economy might not be effected
in the expense of distribution, which often absorbs so large a
portion of the produce of an article. It is possible that some
economy may be effected in this direction, but in this matter
the producer is often helpless, the business of production
being quite distinct from that of distribution. Do not imagine
that it would be economy if the producer should attempt to
take into his own hands the business of distribution, for would
he not require double the number of agents, a corresponding
increase in the amount of capital, and double the amount of
profits? But allowing the necessity of lowering both profits
and wages, it is asserted that it must still remain at the
option of the workman whether he will sell his labour at the
lower rates. No one can certainly question the right of the
workman to act on his own judgment in the matter. All I
venture to assert is that the master may be compelled by the
circumstances of trade to offer to his workmen less wages for
the future than he was wont to give for the past. If they will
not accept such lower wages, the master cannot help it, but the
chances are that if they insist on refusing the offer production
may be thereby suspended, for surely the master may be credited
for using the best means in his power to carry on his business,
not only without interruption, but in peace and harmony with
his men, if he can possibly do so.
The motive power which prompts a master in accepting a
contract for the building of a house, in undertaking the working
of a mill, or the renting of a farm, is doubtless profit. It is
with a view to profit that he emplo- s his own capital, and
�54
the reward of labour.
Whatever additional capital may be required in his business ;
and it is with a view to profit that he employs his labourers.
To succeed the master must seek to economise the use of
every element which affects the cost of the produce ; must
choose the best market for it; must endeavour to maintain his
productive power, and avoid any break or interruption of work.
But do you think that it is the interest of the employer to starve
his labourers ? I venture to say, the employer is fully conscious
of the fact that those whom he employs, must be able to live
by their work, that they must educate their children, and they
must have a share of relaxation and enjoyment, without which
life becomes a burden. The master cannot forget that the
best way to make his labourers work well is to pay them well,
or as well as the state of business permits, to keep them happy
and cheerful, strong and healthy ; and he knows, too, full well,
that if he will deal justly by his labourers, they will neither neg
lect their work nor be disaffected, they will neither complain nor
be disposed to strike. Only, the master cannot always control
the course of the market, and he may be compelled to lower the
wages and reduce his profits, lest by keeping the cost of pro
duction too high, he should become unable to compete with the
foreign producers, or to meet the ability of the consumers, and
so lose his custom altogether.
‘ Where is the guarantee, however, that the employer will act
fairly in such calculations ? What if his intentions be solely to
force the labourers to accept lower wages with a view to the
retention of higher profits? What if the statements of bad
trade, or restricted demand, or increasing competition, should
be purposely exaggerated for the same end ? What, m short,
if the wages offered are not justified by the state of the market ?
I fully admit the possibility of such circumstances, and I think
that where there has been between masters and men a long
course of dealings, the men have a moral right to expect from
the master an open and frank statement of the position of the
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
55
business, and of the reasons which necessitate an alteration of
the terms of their contract, before he summarily announces a
reduction of wages. In any case, he should remember that he
has to deal with his labourers as with free men, and that they
will exercise their judgment to accept or not, as they please, the
wages offered. And be sure of this, that if the competition
'among labourers is certain to prove favourable to the employer
in keeping the wages low, the freedom of the labourers,
and an extensive field of labour in the colonies and America,
enable the labourers to resist any attempt of his to lower
wages unduly, and to prevent them falling below what is just
and necessary.
There is, indeed, a minimum below which wages can never
go. Much labour has been expended in ascertaining what
that minimum is, or what is the intrinsic value of labour at
any time ; and it has been said that, as the intrinsic value of
anything is regulated by the cost of production, so the intrinsic
value of labour is ultimately governed by the cost of subsistence
of the labourer and his family. However large the competition
among labourers, the wages can never fall below the cost of
bare living, for the simple reason that if the labourer cannot
live in one occupation, he will leave it and choose another ; and
if he is not able for any other, he will emigrate. This, then, is
the natural or necessary rate of wages, and it is variable ac
cording to the cost of articles of food and clothing, and must
also differ at different times and in different countries. Let it
be established, for instance, that the cost of living in England,
including food, drink, clothing, and house-rent, has increased
twenty per cent, within the last twenty years, and the natural or
intrinsic value of labour must of necessity have risen in similar
proportions.* And must not the intrinsic value of labour be
higher in England, where the labourer eats wheaten bread
* See Appendix A.
�56
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
and butcher’s meat daily, than in China, where a labourer is
content and able to live almost exclusively on rice ?
Happily, this minimum of wages is scarcely ever touched, but
there are industries where the profits of production are extremely
low, and where the competition among labourers is extreme.
Who has not heard of the pitiful cases of the silk weavers and
throwsters, of the needlewomen and kid-glove stitchers, of the
stocking and glove weavers, of the farm and dock labourers ? It
does seem miserable pay to offer z^d. for embroidering a skirt
two or three yards wide, even with the sewing machine. Who has
not felt pain, sorrow, and I may say indignation, when reading
those plaintive words of Hood :
“ With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread—
Stitch ! stitch 1 stitch 1
In poverty, hunger, and dirt;
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
She sang the ‘ Song of the Shirt.'
Work, work, work—
Till the brain begins to swim !
Work, work, work—
Till the eyes are heavy and dim 1
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Band, and gusset, and seam—
Till over the buttons I fall asleep,
And sew them on in a dream !”
But what is the cause of such low wages ? Some say,
nothing else but the competition among producers to sell their
products sufficiently cheap to attract custom. But pay higher
wages, and immediately a rise on the price of such articles must
be made, which will lessen proportionally their consumption,
and check likewise production. Do not say that the consumers
would pay more if they could not get such articles so cheap.
Probably a great number will, but a large number will abstain
�7HE REWARD OF LABOUR.
57
rom consuming them. The consumption of articles of necessity,
as well as of luxury, is alike governed by the price. Add a
penny to the cost of a single shirt, or to that of a pound of tea,
or a halfpenny to the price of sugar or a loaf of bread, and at
once the consumption is sure to diminish in exact proportion.
And what will be the consequence ? A reduction of production
means a less demand for labour ; and many who are now
obtaining a scanty livelihood, may, instead of getting more,
be doomed to get nothing at all. The wages of agricultural
labour are low, but remember that in most cases the labour is
purely manual, and that the supply of simply manual labour is
always superabundant. Mr. Malthus exhibited with great force
the disagreeable fact, that, whilst the population is capable of
increasing at a geometrical ratio, such as 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, and so
forth, the means of subsistence only increase at an arithmetical
ratio such as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. Doubtless, a proper restraint in
the matter of matrimony, and prudence as regards the increase
of our families, might check the excess of labourers, and so tend
to keep wages above their minimum, but we cannot trust on so
much wisdom on the part of the people, and so our only hope
must lie in the vast fields of emigration ever open for our super
abundant population. As an evidence that supply and demand of
labour regulate the wages compare Devon and Northumberland.
In Devon the wages are, say, I2j. a week ; in Northumberland,
20j. But in Devon the supply of labour is far in excess of the
demand; in Northumberland, with the demand for coal-mining
and with Newcastle at hand, full of industries absorbing any
quantity of labour, labour is ever scarce. What is it that lowers
so much the wages in the manufacturing districts but the con
stant influx of agricultural labourers ? As Mr. Cobden tersely put
it, when two workmen run after one master, the wages will fall;
and when two masters run after a workman, the wages are
certain to rise.
There are industries, however,—and I am happy to say they
�58
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
include almost every branch of the artisan population,—where
the wages are not pressed down by excessive supply of labour,
and where fair wages ought to obtain. To be remunerative the
wages ought to provide the workman not only the cost of living
to himself and his family in the locality where the workman
must live,-—in London, if his work be there, or in a provincial
town, if his labour be there,—but also the cost and maintenance
of his tools, the recovery of the cost of his apprenticeship,
some provision for old age and infirmity, and an insurance
against the perils of sudden or early death, especially in those
occupations which are essentially injurious to health. And
some difference should be made, too, for the agreeableness or
disagreeableness of the work. But all these items are repre
sented in the relative wages of different classes of artisans.
What is included in the price of an article, in a certain rate of
wages of labour, in the course of exchange between one country
and another, or in the rate of interest on capital, it is often
extremely difficult to analyse. The Bank rate is, say, 3^ per
cent. In what proportions are included in that rate the value
of capital proper, the commission and expense of the trans
action, and the insurance of the risk ? And so as regard wages.
How much, for instance, of the ninepence per hour goes to meet
the relation of supply and demand of masons or carpenters, the
cost of their tools, and any of the other considerations named ?
Such analyses are not easily made, yet depend upon it the wages
or the price represents the aggregate of all the items which
enter into their value at the time.
It should be remembered that whilst the labourer calculates
what he receives in relation to the compensation he expects for
his work and toil, the employer calculates what he gives in
relation to the amount of work performed for him in return ;
for the same amount of wages may produce twice as much
labour where the labourer is sturdier in strength, and really in
earnest in his work, than where the labourer is weak and
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
59
indolent. And is there not a difference in the power of labour
between the stalwart Northumbrian and the weakly Devonian ?
A greater amount of labour will be performed in a summer
than in a winter’s day, in countries where the people are less
given to enjoyments than in those where pleasure seems
the first and most attractive pursuit. Let us suppose that in
France, Austria, or any other country, a manufacturer should
require twice the number of hands, twice as large a building to
contain the hands, twice as many clerks and bookkeepers and
Overlookers to look after them, and twice as many tools as he
would to do the same quantity of work in England, must he
not pay such labourers less there than he would here? The
rate of wages may be lower in France than in England, and yet
the amount of wages paid for a given quantity of work may be
more in France than in England. “ Profits,” said Mr. Ricardo,
“ depend on wages,—not on nominal but real wages ; not on the
number of pounds that may be annually paid to the labourers,
but on the number of days’ work necessary to obtain those
pounds.”
By whichever standard the rate of wages may be estimated,
the question really at issue between masters and men is whether
or not what is now paid in the shape of wages is just, or below
what is really due to the share taken by labour in production.
There is no concealing the fact that in the mind of many of
our workmen there is a lurking idea that the immense fortunes
amassed by our producers and traders are more or less the
result of an unequal division of the profits of production, and
that they could pay considerably more wages, but they will not.
That indeed, they say, is the real secret of low wages. Only, they
try to cover it under the pretext of the doctrine of the wages or
labour fund. But what is this theory ? According to the econo
mists, the doctrine is simply this : that wages, by an irresistible
law, depend on the demand and supply of labour, and can in no
circumstances be either more or less than what will distribute the
�6o
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
existing wage fund among the existing number of competitors for
the same,—the demand for labour consisting of the whole circu
lating capital of the country, including what is paid in wages
for unproductive labour ; the supply, the whole labouring popu
lation. If the supply is in excess of what the capital can at
present employ, wages must fall. If the labourers are all
employed, and there is a surplus of capital still unused, wages
will rise.
This is the wage-fund theory upon which Mr.
Thornton broke lance with John Stuart Mill. If the question
be asked, Is there such a thing as a wage fund, in the sense
here implied ? exists there any fixed amount which is neither
more nor less than what is destined to be expended in wages ?
Mr. Thornton boldly declares that the supposed barrier to the
expansion of wages as indicated by this theory is a shadow, and
not a reality, for besides the original capital which the employer
invests in the business, there are the growing profits which may
also be used in wages. Mr. Mill, in his review of Mr. Thornton’s
work on “ Labour and its Claims,” in the Fortnightly Review, so
far admitted that there is no law of nature making it impossible
for wages to rise to the point of absorbing not only the funds
which the employer had intended to devote to the carrying on
his business, but the whole of what he allows for his private
expenses beyond the necessaries of life. But, said Mr. Mill,
there is a limit nevertheless, and that limit to the rise of wages
is the practical consideration how much would ruin the employer,
or drive him to abandon his business. In short, just as wages
may be too low, so as to impair the working power of the
labourer, so they may be too high, so as to leave no profit; and
just as excessively low wages will drive the labourer to emigrate,
so unduly high wages will drive capital out of the business.
How far the assumption is correct that employers are
amassing large profits, I am not prepared to say. The under
standing is, that the return of seven per cent, on the capital
invested is a pie, and it cannot be considered excessive when
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
6l
we consider the dangers and vicissitudes of commerce. See
what losses are incurred by bankruptcy. During the last six
years, from 1870 to 1875, the total amount of liabilities of estates
liquidated by bankruptcy, by arrangement, or composition with
creditors, was Ziioj759?ooo> and the total amount of assets
^32,607,000, showing an actual loss to creditors of £78,152,000,
or in the proportion of Z^?000,000 Per annum; and this,
remember, irrespective of the cost of bankruptcy, which in
many cases absorbs nearly the whole of the assets. Suppose,
however, good fortune should favour any branch of production,
and unusual profits be realised, will there not' be a sudden rush
of capital for investment in the same ? For a time, the greedy
employer may pocket large profits, but as soon as fresh capital
is invested, competition causes a larger share of the same to fall
on the labourer, and wages rise, till the rates of profits and the
rates of wages are brought to their normal level. The relation
of profits to wages is often wrongly apprehended. It is an error
to suppose that large profits are the results of low wages, and
low profits the results of high wages. Although an increase of
capital has the tendency to lower the profits, and to increase
wages, the same increase of capital also tends to render labour
more profitable, and to increase the amount of production, which
in turn maintains a high rate of profits. See the operation of
machinery on wages. The investment of capital in machinery
enables the workman to produce tenfold more than he was able
to produce by the hand ; and in proportion as he increases his
productive power, so his earnings increase. A workman at
Bristol said that the extra production of machinery ought to
be divided by masters and workmen.
And so they are, in
certain proportions.
Before 1842, said Mr. Ashworth, the
operative spinner’s wages for the production of 20 lb. of yarn
70’s, on a pair of mules of 400 spindles each, was 43-. yd. (or 2fd.
per lb.), and at this rate his net earnings amounted to about
20s. per week. In 1859, with the improvements effected in the
�62
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
spinning mule, by which each machine carries 800 spindles,
the same workman, with a little extra assistance by piecers
(boys), could earn 30J. icvf. per week net, although the amount he
received in wages for 20 lb. of yarn was reduced from 4s. ^d. to
3J. ii%d. or 2'36d, per pound. Compare the actual earnings of
spinners and others employed in the cotton industry during
the last forty years : they show an increase of 30 or 50 per
cent., besides a considerable reduction in the number of hours
of labour.*
The reason why the employer amasses a larger amount of
wealth in proportion than the labourer, will be found, not in
any usurpation of the share of profits which may belong to
workmen, for that, after all, is a matter of simple contract, but
in the fact that whilst the labourer receives only the proper
remuneration of his labour, the employer not only gets higher
remuneration for his skill, because of a higher order, but also
the profit of his capital, or an annual sum of profit on the
aggregate accumulation of all his savings for years past ;—to
say nothing of the immense advantage of production on a large
scale which the possession of large capital enables the master
to realize, and of his chances of large profits from sudden
changes in the value of produce, to be placed, however,
against the chance of equally sudden losses, the result either of
unusual skill and good fortune, or of sad miscalculations and
blunders.
The wages of labour, the profits of merchants and bankers,
the earnings of men of letters, of barristers and doctors, the
salaries of civil servants, and even the incomes of bishops and
clergymen, are not, I apprehend, so uniformly balanced as we
might wish. Doubtless, the progress of freedom, the extended
knowledge of the use of capital, the progress of division of
labour, the facilities of communication, and the advanced conSee Appendix B.
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
63
dition of certain industries, may tend to the greater equalization
of wages. But such equalization can never supersede the essen
tial difference of earnings of any number of persons, the natural
consequence of greater or less amount of skill, greater or less
amount of energy, health, or special capacities, and of relative
advantage of position for the exercise of certain industries. To
suppose the possibility of any uniformity of wages, irrespective
of such differences of skill, knowledge, industry, and character,
is to imagine that equal enjoyment may be had as the return
for unequal efforts, abilities, and sacrifices. Upon the relative
merits of the payment of wages, by the day or hour, or by socalled piece-work, little need be said. The contract of labour
is doubtless not so many hours, but so much labour for so much
money ; and it should be a matter of simple convenience to both
parties which of the two systems should be preferable. Honestly
performed, and as honestly inspected, piece-work appears to
me to contain the elements of perfect fairness, though payment
by the day may stimulate greater attention to solidity and finish
of workmanship.
I will not venture to assert that present wages are satis
factory. Taking the wages of builders in the metropolis at
9<£ per hour, they may appear sufficiently liberal. But are all
builders earning as much ? How many get no more than
per hour ? How little are the building labourers earning ! Nor
do such wages continue uninterrupted during the year : for at
least two months of the year many of them remain in forced idle
ness. True, the rates of wages are higher now than they were,
but the cost of living has increased also, whilst the standard
of living is altogether altered.
Must they not pay more now
for the education of their children ? Can they do without their
newspapers ? Must they not travel from their homes to their
works ? And ought they not to have their due relaxation on
Bank holidays, at Christmas, and Whitsuntide ? Many items of
expenditure, once deemed extravagant, are now become almost
�64
I
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
as imperative as the necessaries of life. And if the imperial
taxes are higher, are not the local rates greatly increased ? There
are features at work which leave much to be desired in the
economics of the labouring classes. The sudden emancipation
of youth from all family control, and the consequent waste of
recourses which a family purse would avoid, are a decided evil.
The large proportion of married women employed in the textile
industries, is a sad element in the social system. Let the man be
the bread-winner, and the woman attend to household duties.
That is Nature’s rule ; but instead of this, all home comforts are
sacrificed for recruiting the scanty wages of the men, certain to
be destroyed by mismanagement. Happy indeed would it be
for the manufacturing districts of England were every married
woman having a family prohibited working in any factory, for
it is contrary to the course of all nature that mothers should
have to deposit their nurslings with some friend or neighbour,
or perhaps in some institution established for that purpose,
whilst they go out to work for the family living.*
Better wages, and better use of wages, we must still desire.
Think not that higher wages will restrain industry, for the
economic condition of the masses all over ,the world is im
mensely improved, and their means of purchase are decidedly
enlarged. Low wages are the concomitant of declining, not of
prosperous industries. It has been said that high wages engender
idleness and dissipation. I do not agree with such a proposi
tion. Idleness and dissipation are more frequently the conse
quence of misery and want of strength than of comfort, health,
and vigour. A sudden increase of means may, for a time, lead
to extravagance, but let it consolidate itself into a regular income,
and it is sure to create love of property, a desire of acquisition,
and a sense of self-esteem,—the best safeguards against waste and
dissipation. Charge not the recent rise of wages for the un* See Report of Robert Baker, Esq., Factory Inspector, 31st October,
1873, p. 120.
�THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
65
happy condition of large numbers of the labouring classes.
Charge the same, the rather, on the want of education, on the
employment of women and children in factories, and on the
many evils incident to our present, in many respects, artificial
organization of society.
For all the progress achieved during the last half century
in the economic condition of the people, let us be thankful.
What a change in the mode of living from the time of Queen
Elizabeth, when, while the gentlemen provided themselves with
sufficiency of wheat for their own table, their households and
poor neighbours were content with rice or barley, or in time of
dearth with bread made either of beans, peas, or oats. And
we are cleverer, too, as to the true sources of better wages.
Bitter experience has more than proved that war cannot improve
the condition of the labouring classes, for whatever hinders or
interrupts the production of wealth, whatever discourages the
investment of capital, must of necessity reduce employment and
lower wages. True, a sudden demand of men for the army and
navy may cause a temporary diminution of competition among
labourers; but while production is well-nigh suspended, and the
unproductive expenditure excessive, the resources of the people
are sure to suffer. The attempt to .regulate wages by law has been
tried and failed, as might have been well expected. An artificial
barrier of prohibitions and import duties has been tried as a means
to foster the productive power of the nation, but what is the use
of producing, when the people cannot consume ? The fictitious
and dangerous experiment of supplementing wages by poor relief
has also been tried, and abandoned as Communistic in principle,
and economically most mischievous. A better era, a sounder
policy, has been at last inaugurated, and wealth has increased at
a rapid pace. Have the labouring classes profited by the happy
change to the full extent in their power ? Workmen, it is for
you to answer. Are you desirous to improve your condition, to
become yourselves capitalists ? It is quite within your reach, for
5
�66
THE REWARD OF LABOUR.
wages are the parent of all capital. Only, learn to be thrifty.
Beware of little expenses, and you will soon amass capital which
will enable you from labourers to become employers ; employers,
I hope, the more able to deal kindly and justly with your men
because you have yourselves occasionally had reason to com
plain of your own employers.
�V.
TRADE UNIONS.
The tree is known by its fruit. You cannot expect roses from
thorns. And from a legislation which deliberately robbed the
working man of the only true patrimony he possessed—his
labour by compelling him to work at such wages as the master
chose to pay, by one degree only removed from the state of
slavery, where both the slave and his work are the property of
the master j from a legislation which consigned to the common
gaol any one who attempted to improve his wages, and doomed
to the pillory any one who dared attempt to conspire, cove
nant, or promise, with or to any other, that he should not do
certain works but at certain rates, and should not work but
at certain hours and time, you could expect nothing else but
secret societies acting in the most arbitrary manner, dis
countenancing any record of their proceedings, having their
most stringent laws unwritten, and their most significant usages
unrecorded, whose committees were practically irresponsible,
whose threats were not expressed but understood, and whose
punishments were carried out, not in broad daylight, but by in
visible hands. Happily, we may say, the age of secret societies
is now gone by. We have no sympathy for the Templars or the
Jesuits, the Red Cross or the Carbonari, and though we laugh at
the Pope putting Freemasonry in the Syllabus—for we know it
�68
TRADE UNIONS.
not to be any conspiracy against Government and religion, but
a fraternity for the practice of mutual charity, protection, and
assistance—we rejoice to know also that secret societies need no
longer exist, and should have no place in the political, social, or
economical condition of the nation.
There are a few, but very few, who profess to regard capitalists,
as a class, with suspicion, and who account for their existence
simply as an historical accident, owing its birth, perhaps, to
the fact of all nations having begun in slavery. Incapable
of accounting for the fact that for every hundred persons ninetysix are working people and four capitalists, such enthusiasts
are prepared, like Caspar Rauchbilder, a kind of philosophic
sugar-baker, to put society into a cauldron, secure a perfect
vacuum by relieving it of all prejudices and all property, and
from the ashes make a filter, through which this selfish age
shall pass, and emerge a new moral world. But the great
mass of members of our Trade Societies are not such foolish
dreamers. If they fail at all, they fail in contemplating capital
as something to a certain extent antagonistic to labour,—in
striving not for a maximum of production, but for the maxi
mum share of a given amount of production, in endeavouring to
secure for labour the largest share of a product, which is, to
say the least, the joint result of capital and labour. But what
ever be the object, workmen have a perfect right to combine,
and seek such ends as are lawful, in the way they best prefer.
The right to combine with others in order to secure a common
benefit is, I believe, a sacred one, not a whit less sacred
than that of individual liberty; and I rejoice that all laws
against combinations have long ago been abolished. Nay, I
go further ; I believe that the formation of Trade Societies,
within proper limits, is perfectly justifiable, and may be even to
some extent beneficial, for I sympathise with the condition of
many of our workmen, who seldom come into direct contact
with their employers, or who have to deal with masters too
�TRADE UNIONS.
much hardened in the old system of ruling with the iron rod to
be able fully to recognise the higher aspirations of our workmen.
Only, let me say to such societies, and more particularly to
their leaders, that great as is the power of association, it cannot
be all-supreme ; and undoubted as is their utility, there are
rights and privileges which must be likewise guarded and pro
tected. Individual independence, and the right of isolated
action, are quite as essential as the right of association, and no
one ought to be called to abdicate such rights in deference to
-those of the association. Whilst asserting their right to act
in a corporate capacity, they must not ignore the right of those
who prefer to act by themselves and for themselves. What
ever be the proportion of Trade Unionists to the total number
■of workers in any branch of industry, this is not a case where
■the majority can bind the minority, simply because by no act
of theirs, as in a case of partnership, can non-unionists be said
to have delegated to unionists any power to interfere with their
rights and independence.
Much do I deplore any contest between labour and capital.
It is ominous to find, on the one hand, a National Federation
■of Associated Employers established with a view “ to secure,
through the continuance of existing laws and the enactment of
new ones, complete freedom of labour, protection to capital, and
the true interests of national industry,” with their excellent organ
Capital and. Labourj and, on the other, “ a Federation of Trade
Unions,” recently organized, or about to be organized, in view
“ that struggles between capital and labour will probably be con
ducted in future on a far more gigantic scale than we have hitherto
witnessed, with the Beehive, now the Industrial Review, also ably
conducted as their organ. What can we expect from two such
antagonistic forces set in battle array but quarrels and conflicts ?
What better justification could Trade Societies have for their ex
istence than the very fact of such associations among the masters?
The masters justify their unions by the necessity of self-defence.
�70
TRADE UNIONS.
But what other plea is put forth by Trade Unions but selfdefence ? Whether or not the regulations which bind the masters
associations substantially differ from those of Trade Unions is
of less importance than the fact itself, that those who may be
supposed to be more intelligent, and better acquainted with
economic laws, find that union is strength for them as well as
for others, and that instead of resting on the working of economic
laws, they endeavour by united action to offer an effective resist
ance to the claims of labour.
But can labour effectively contend with capital ? Here effec
tive strength does not depend on mere numbers. What though
the proletaires be ninety-six and the capitalists only four in a
hundred? True, labour is property, and capital is property.
But what is the value of labour as property unless employed
by capital ? As well have a Raphael in the Sandwich Islands
as have ninety-six labourers without the four capitalists. And
is not this superabundance of labour a constant source of
weakness ? Even if you succeed in regulating the supply of
labour in this country, can you attempt to do so in foreign
countries ? True, capital can do nothing without labour, but
neither can labour do anything without capital. To both
capital and labour I should say, by all means use your power
and energy in maintaining your rights ; but avoid any resort to
strikes, or the final arbitrement of war, which is sure to destroy
the very spoil you are striving to possess.
Well organized as many of the Trade Societies are, I cannot
help thinking that their constitution is defective, in supposing a
greater equality of capacities and skill in their members than
human experience justifies us in expecting, a greater amount of
intelligence and prescience in their councils or committees than
they can lay title to possess, and in assuming greater authority
to compel obedience to their rules than is consistent with the
nature of a perfectly voluntary society. The members are sup
posed to be, every one, able to earn the average wages which
�TRADE UNIONS.
U-
the trade gives, or the minimum wages which the Union deter
mines, the test of that ability being found in either five years’
apprenticeship or five years’ work in the trade, or the testimony
of any member who may have worked with the candidate.
Are such tests invariably reliable ? Intelligent workmanship is,
I imagine, the result of qualities and circumstances not always
acquired by apprenticeship, nor are many years’ work in a busi
ness a sure guarantee for ability; whilst the testimony which will
satisfy the committee of a Union may not be such as will satisfy
an employer. Within an apparent uniformity of qualifications
there may be an essential diversity of merit. Hundreds of gen
tlemen are called to the bar every year by the Inns of Court
under the same regulations. Can it be said that they are all
equally gifted ? A uniform wage obtains among privates in the
army, but that continues so long only as they are idling in the
barracks, a mass of inert force. Let them be in active service,
and immediately individual valour will show that they are not
a band of uniform automatic machines.
The executive councils or committees are called to fulfil duties
of a most difficult and delicate character. Their efforts are to
secure a fair and reasonable remuneration for labour, to maintain
a fair rate of wages, to provide the means of legally resisting
unnecessary reductions in the price of work, and to allow no en
croachment on the peculiar privileges of the trade. But is it an
easy work to determine what is a fair rate of wages, what is a
reasonable remuneration, when a reduction may be successfully
resisted, or when no such resistance should be attempted ? The
members of council or committees are themselves workmen.
They do not pretend to be guided by the theories or maxims of
political economists. Naturally in favour of high wages and
short hours, are they such impartial judges as to be able duly to
appreciate the real circumstances of the case before acting in any
emergency? True, they are guided by the periodical reports of
the state of trade and wages from every part of the kingdom ;
�72
TRADE UNIONS.
but these very facts are only the exponent of phenomena which
require a deep and extended range of observation on conditions
and circumstances not within the reach of every one. Far be it
from me to detract from the intelligence and practical knowledge
of the councils of such trade unions. I give them full credit for
an earnest desire to form sound opinions on the questions before
them, and to urge the same for acceptance by fair, open, and
peaceful means. Only, it is not in their power to regulate
economical phenomena, and they cannot prevent their action.
The societies are supported by entrance fees, by weekly or
monthly fees, and by fines. Failing to pay the proper contribu
tion, absenting oneself from a quarterly or a special meeting,
mentioning any club transactions to outsiders, omitting to make
a proper report, and performing many more such acts and trans
actions, are visited with fines; whilst a still more hostile system
of ostracism may be resorted to where perfect obedience is not
secured by fines. But is it desirable to enforce obedience among
a large number of men on matters which touch very nearly the
mode of earning a livelihood ? Doubtless the constitution of such
societies empowers the committees to determine the policy to
be pursued, and there would be an end of all authority if it
were left optional with the members to accept or not the de
cision of their committees ; yet the very fact that large sums are
annually collected by means of fines indicates the frequent resort
to compulsion, on every account to be deprecated. On the whole,
I cannot help thinking that a more elastic system would operate
better, and prove in the end even more efficient than the present
stringent method of action.
The principal objects which Trade Unions have in view are
the regulation of the supply of labour and the supervision of the
rate of wages. By controlling the labour of their own members,
by endeavouring to equalize the supply of labour all over the
country, by regulating and restricting the admission of appren
tices, by hindering the employment of boy and woman labour, and
�TRADE UNIONS.
73
by putting obstacles to the employment of non-unionists, the
Trade Societies hope to maintain a monopoly of labour, and
thereby to reduce that competition among labourers which is so
formidable a barrier to the rise of wages. Nay, more; in the
hope of spreading the work among as large a number of members
as possible, they prohibit working overtime. But rules such as
these contravene some of the first maxims of legal rights,
besides being clearly opposed to sound economy. The mutual
rights and duties arising from the contract of labour are simple
and direct—so much labour for so much reward. The master
has a right to employ his labourers or not as he pleases. The
labourer may consent to work or not as he likes. What right
has either to interfere with the free action of the other in any
matter concerning their respective businesses ? The objection
to overtime is justified by the plea that it is essential for any
labourer overburdened with hard work to have time left for in
struction and recreation, and that it is a grievous evil to protract
labour beyond what nature seems to suggest. But to lay down
any general rule, that no man shall labour beyond a certain
number of hours on each day, is to deprive the young and strong
•of the best opportunity they may have of making hay whilst
health and vigour last. It seems very philanthropic to limit the
work of the over-employed that some work may be left for the
unemployed. But it is, I fear, the law of society, that wealth and
employment are not equally distributed. Aptitude for labour is
not a common gift, and if we neglect the work which Providence
places within our reach, it by no means follows that it will be
given to those less fortunate than ourselves.
Apart, however, from any legal or social considerations, what
are the economic effects of any effort to monopolize or regulate
labour ? Are they not to cripple production, which in turn
must react on wages ? Every hour you take from your daily
labour is so much deducted from the profits of production, all
the fixed capital being to that extent rendered less productive.
�74
TRADE UNIONS.
The fewer labourers are at work the less will be produced,
unless new machinery comes to take their place. Whenever
adult labour is employed where boys and women would besufficient, so much encouragement is given to a waste of forces,
which will render production less profitable. But can you pre
vent an increase of labourers in a profitable industry ? High
wages are certain to be attractive. An agricultural labourer in
the receipt of 15^. a week will be too glad to apprentice his son
to an engineer, in the expectation of getting 305-. or 40^. a week.
And it is against all natural and economic law to attempt to
hinder a process so simple and necessary. There is, indeed, a
necessary monopoly of talent which we cannot abolish. The
few actors, musicians, painters, barristers, and doctors, who
may possess learning and skill far excelling those of the masses
of their competitors ; the few workmen absolutely superior to
others in the perfection of their bodily organs, in the dexterity
of their hands and motions, and in the skill with which they
execute their task, must, of necessity, have a natural monopoly
of the work which may be offered. And they are sure to enjoy
the benefit of that monopoly in a larger remuneration than is
obtained by their competitors, as a fair compensation for ser
vices conferred in the work of production. But to pretend to
establish any monopoly whereby labourers, strong or weak,
skilful or ignorant, shall derive an equal remuneration, and
to entertain any expectation that such higher remuneration
may be derived from diminished production—these are wild
notions, which no true economic principle will sanction.
On the question whether or not Trade Unions can exercise
any influence on wages, I am prepared to make some conces
sions. Wherever wages are in any measure governed by
custom, as to some extent in agriculture, a Trade Society
may shake off that dull sloth and produce a sudden improve
ment. Wherever the labourers are in a position so low and
dejected as to be under the necessity of working for wages not
�TRADE UNIONS.
75
sufficient to pay for the simple cost of living, as in the case of
the needlewomen, a Trade Society may, by granting temporary
help with a view to resistance, operate some reform of wages,
though with the almost certain result of either lessening pro
duction, and so causing a diminution of employment, or of
stimulating machinery.. Wherever, moreover, the rate of profit
is larger than is necessary to provide for the interest of capital,
and a legitimate remuneration for the employer’s services, a
Trade Society may, by a vigilant supervision, operate upon the
margin which may exist between the rate of wages and the rate
of profits below which all production would cease, and in all
probability succeed in securing part of the same for labour,
unless defeated either by the competition of labourers among
themselves, or by foreign competition. In the former case,
however, wages will remain low, though the profits may be
high ; and in the latter, wages will fall, and the profits decline
also, or, at most, remain stationary. Under any circumstance
the advantage derived by Trade Unions can only be temporary,
for supply and demand are sure to assert their sway. Shake
off the custom if you can, and yet if there be seven persons
available to one hundred acres, where four are amply sufficient
for agricultural purposes, the competition among the seven
to get the employment which can only be had by four will be
sure to keep wages low. Enhance by artificial combination
the wages in any one business, or in any one district, yet, unless
that rise is supported by increased savings, and by the sub
stantial accumulation of capital, it will not, it cannot be sus
tained. But suppose the employer should secure for himself a
large amount of profits out of what would be due to the em
ployees, or by keeping wages unduly low, what can he do with
such profits but employ them to render them productive ? See
how it works practically. In i860, the exports of the produce
and manufactures of the United Kingdom were valued at
^136,000,000, and the profits assessed to income tax under
�76
TRADE UNIONS.
Schedule D were declared at ^95,000,000.
But trade has
been very prosperous ever since, and the result has been that in
1874 the amount of profits so assessed to income tax amounted
to ^197,000,000, showing an increase of ^102,000,000, which
you may say went all to the masters, since few or no workmen
pay income tax. But wait a little. How was that extra amount
of profits gained but by increased production? During that
period the amount of exports of British produce rose from
^136,000,000 in i860 to ^223,000,000 in 1874. And from that
increased production workmen got increased wages. Allow
that 20 per cent, of the total amount of produce go in wages,
and upon the ^87,000,000 of extra production for exports only,
at least £ 17,000,000 more per annum must have been divided
among labourers in wages. In truth, the excess of profits must
in all, or in part, sooner or later find its way among the people,
and that is the best possible guarantee for an equitable distri
bution of profits among employers and employed.
Trade Unions endeavour to operate on wages by fixing the
lowest rate and by determining that all their members shall
earn at least that low rate. It is not easy, however, to say
what the lowest rate of wages should be under any circum
stances. You observe the state of the market, that it is buoyant;
the number of orders, which appear numerous. You notice a
certain amount of eagerness among the employers in pursuing
their operations. And as everything seems to denote activity
and progress you say wages must rise. But do not misunder
stand high prices for large profits, for a high price may be the
result of pure speculation, to be soon followed by a great re
action; or the result of increased cost of the raw materials,
which may render production even less remunerative. In truth,
it is not possible to fix what the wages should be, any more than
you can fix what shall be the price of any article or the rate of
interest, and any haphazard way of determining what the lowest
rate of wages ought to be, apart from what is produced by
�TRADE UNIONS.
77
the relation of supply and demand, must be uncertain and un
satisfactory. It is somewhat discomforting to feel that we can
do comparatively so little for ourselves, that we cannot secure
a rise, cannot prevent a fall, and must in a manner stand still.
Only depend upon it, economical laws do not stand still, and
they will operate quite irrespective of our action.
It has been urged by Trade Unionists that they do not
demand any uniformity of wages, but that they only fix the rate
under which no member of the Union shall work. Give such
of them as deserve it as much more as you please, but none
shall work for less. What, however, if what you lay down as
the minimum, employers should regard as the maximum ? Give
to the least capable the maximum wages, and what more can the
most capable earn ? Again, it is said it is to protect labour against
the pernicious system of competition by tender, that labourers
must insist upon a uniform minimum rate ; but on what principle
can the labourers make themselves the guardians of the public
interests ?
Weak as is generally the power of Trade Unions with reference
to the determination of the lowest rate of wages, still more doubtful
is the possibility of their being able to maintain any uniformity in
the wages and earnings of their members. If there be no such
thing as uniformity of talent, skill, judgment, strength, vigour,
will, or of anything that constitutes and regulates our real power
to act upon matter, how can there be such a thing as a uniformity
in the value of the part taken by any number of men in the
production of any article? There is no such thing as an
average ability, for what is an average but an ideal abstract
and imaginary medium of an equal distribution of all the
inequalities among individuals of a series ? We say the average
temperature of England is 50° Fahrenheit, but that is made up
of constant changes from day to day, varying from 38° to 71 °.
And so it is with the average life of a man, or the average loss
of ships, or the like. The great value of an average rests in the
�78
TRADE UNIONS.
indication it gives of the medium of the range in those
variations, but that does not destroy their existence. In matter
of labour, though you may form a fair idea of the average
strength and capacity of any number of labourers, that does not
affect the fact of their possessing some more and some less of
those faculties which are required in production, and which con
stitute the very basis and conditions of the earning of wages.
In the engineering trade, the classification of wages with refer
ence to skill must be carried on to a high point, it having been
given in evidence before the Royal Commissioners on Trade
Unions, that in an establishment of more than 900 men there
were as many as 267 rates of wages earned. The introduction
of machinery may have reduced the great extremes, many of
those feats of force and skill which at one time placed one work
man so much above another being now done by machinery.
Yet there is room enough left for the display of superior personal
ability, strength, and judgment, and to attempt to enforce any
ideal uniformity in wages is as unsound in principle as it is
mischievous in practice.
Partly with a view to uniformity of wages, and partly also as
a means of defence against the masters’ attempts to reduce
wages, some Trade Societies have resisted what is called pay
ment by piecework. The different systems of payment of wages,
by time as by the day or hour, or by piecework as according
to results, or by a combination of the two as by time with
relation to so much work done, are respectively adapted to
different descriptions of labour. For the performance of labour
requiring great exactitude and patient attention, payment by
time is probably the best. For the performance of work ad
mitting of great swiftness of operation, payment by piecework
appears fair for the workman and just to the employer ; whilst
for the execution of work demanding both precision of execution
and economy of time, the combined system seems the best
adapted. In any case there can be no doubt that payment by
�TRADE UNIONS.
79
result is the least fallible test of the value of labour, whilst it is
the only mode by which patient labour and superior intelligence
can raise itself above the surrounding level of low mediocrity.
It is alleged against piecework that it incites the worker to work
longer hours than is good for him, that it tempts him to hurry
over the work, and leave it imperfectly finished ; that it is often
abused by the master appointing middle men, or piece-masters,
to fix the price arbitrarily ; that it is used by the master to
■cut down the wages to the minimum, thus preventing the
labourer from deriving any corresponding benefit from his
greater labour and exertion. Far be it from me to justify any
such practices. I admit that the system may be greatly abused
by both masters and workmen. I allow that unprincipled men
may use it as a snare, rather than as a fair mode of rewarding
labour. And I cannot too strongly condemn any attempt on
the part of either to make it the vehicle of fraud and usurpation.
But as to the objections that piecework is a system by which
the weakest always goes to the wall, or that it incites the labourer
to work too much, or that it gives an advantage to the skilful
over the unskilful, I fear that, practically hard as such objec
tions may prove in some cases, they are but futile in this matterof-fact world. A paternal government, be it by societies or by
the State, can never be advantageous, and you cannot inflict a
deeper injury on any number of people than by taking from them
the right to utilize their forces and energies to the maximum of
their power. It is the great recommendation of piecework that
it is conducive to a better reward of skill, strength, and energy,
that it affords the best possible encouragement to improvement
in workmanship, and that it is a beneficial instrument to the in
crease of the productive power of the nation. Some difficulty,
however, does doubtless exist in the adoption of the piecework
system in different industries. Taking as our guide the two prin
ciples already enunciated, that whilst on the one hand the contract
•of labour is not so many hours in a day, but so much work for so
�8o
TRADE UNIONS.
much money ; and on the other, that the wages themselves are
a commutation of something certain and fixed for the uncertain
share which might fall on the workman of the result of produc
tion,—it is evident that whilst piecework affords the best test
of the real amount of work performed, as a basis for the reward
of wages, it still fails in this, that it does not produce that
certainty of earning which the workman very justly appreciates.
In the cotton manufacture, in printing, and in many other
industries, where the work to be done is generally uniform, thevalue of piecework may be estimated with nearly as much
correctness as day-work. But in other industries, especially in
engineering works, where each article is different from the
other, no such certainty can possibly exist. In the printing and
cotton industries, the price of the work is arrived at from ex
tensive experience, by a committee of masters and men. In
such engineering works as I have mentioned, the price named
is simply what the foreman thinks will be a fair remuneration..
To my mind, the method of gauging wages by the actual work
done, however technically just, is not always practicable, and
to force piecework on unwilling labourers, and to provoke a
strike upon that question, is conduct which can scarcely be
justified. If masters and men are to work harmoniously, piece
work must be held out, wherever there is any doubt on the
matter, as an inducement for greater exertion, and not as a hardand-fast rule for the payment of ordinary wages.
It would be interesting to ascertain how far Trade Unions
have proved themselves beneficial to the labouring classes in
the matter of wages. During the last twenty years, all prices,,
salaries, and wages have risen considerably. The salaries of
clerks at the Bank of England and in every house of trade,,
the salaries of assistants in wholesale warehouses and work
shops, are all higher. In consideration that the cost of livingis dearer, and that a higher standard of living has been intro
duced, more remuneration has been asked and granted in every
�81
TRADE UNIONS.
occupation. But is not this owing to the immense addition to
the supply of the precious metals, the largely increased trade, the
-enormous augmentation of capital ? What else but these cir
cumstances have provided for such increase of wages, prices, and
•salaries ? Trade Unions may have clamoured for higher wages
in certain branches of industry. But if masons and carpenters,
•engineers and ironworkers, protected by Trade Unions, have
realized a handsome rise, so have agricultural labourers, and
especially domestic servants, realized it without any Trade
Unions. Simply left to the tender mercies of the law of supply
and demand, a cook and housekeeper who twenty years ago
was well paid at ^16, now cannot be had for ^25 to ^30. See
what supply and demand do in agricultural labour. Take six
purely agricultural counties, such as Devon, Dorset, Wilts,
Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridge, and six agricultural and
industrial counties, such as Cheshire, Lancashire, the West
Riding of Yorkshire, Durham, Kent, and Monmouthshire. The
average wages of agricultural labourers, and the earnings especi
ally by piece-labour, wherever introduced, have risen everywhere,
in consequence of the increasing amount of capital invested in
agriculture ; but whilst the wages in the purely agricultural
counties have risen 15 per cent., those in the agricultural and
industrial counties, from the simple competition in the demand
for labour, have risen 30 to 40 per cent. Making every allow
ance for special cases, it is absurd to imagine that Trade Unions
have been the main instruments in bringing so much additional
wealth into the lap of the working classes. If by constant vigilance
on the relation of wages to profits, they have caused, in certain
instances, a distribution of any excess at an earlier date than
might otherwise have taken place, it is quite possible that the
sudden rise of wages consequent upon it may have been as
rapidly followed by a reaction. And we well know that frequent
oscillations of wages and uncertainty of earnings are more an
•evil than a boon to the working population. Nor should it be
6
�82
TRADE UNIONS.
forgotten that an employer, who may have for some time been
producing at a loss, has a right to retrieve his position by securing
somewhat more liberal profits for a certain period, before he can
risk to establish a more equitable level between profits and wages.
The employer’s object in production is profit, and unless he has
a fair prospect of reasonable profits, we cannot expect that he
will continue to employ his capital or to engage his services in
the business.
Fears have been expressed, that Trade Unions, by harassing
the employers with constant demands, by thwarting the
operation of supply and demand, and by placing restrictions
on the freedom of labour, have discouraged production, and
placed the industries of the country in danger of foreign
competition. But the statistics of trade do not corroborate any
such fear. During recent years production has proceeded at an
enormous scale, whether through the extension of mechanical
agency and steam-power, which has been enormous, or by the
larger adoption of production on a large scale, or by an
actual increase of manual labour. Nor is foreign competition
more formidable now than ever it was.
An increase of
exports from ^136,000,000 in i860 to ^223,000,000 in 1875,
an increase in the quantity of coals produced from 80,000,000
tons in i860 to 132,000,000 tons in 1875, an increase in the
tonnage of shipping belonging to the United Kingdom from
4,600,000 tons to 6,152,000 tons in 1875, are facts which do
not indicate that the British workman has been idle during
the last fifteen years. And what do we find with respect to
the relative increase of the productive power of different
countries ? Compare the exports of Britain with the exports
of other countries, and you will find that British exports
have increased fully in proportion to those of other countries.
Taking the entire amount of exports of seven principal
countries, viz., France, Belgium, Holland, Italy, Austria, the
United States, and the United Kingdom in i860 and 1873, you
�TRADE UNIONS.
S3
will see that the proportion of British exports to the whole
was 37 per cent, in i860, and 37 per cent, in 1874. Nor can
we take the total exports of such countries as a guide to the
great question of danger from foreign competition. Comparing
the exports of manufactured goods, such as cotton, linen, silk,
woollen, from Britain and France in the years 1861 and 1874, it
appears that whilst the exports from the United Kingdom in
creased at the rate of 64 per cent., the exports from France in
creased at the rate of 60 per cent. Since then, I am sorry to
say, the exports from the United Kingdom have been decreasing ;
but trade has been depressed in nearly every country,—the neces
sary reaction from many years of unusual buoyancy.
Trade Unions have been charged with having contributed
to the deterioration of the character of British workmen, by
making them more quarrelsome, more selfish, and more guided
by a spirit of antagonism towards employers than heretofore.
But I doubt the truth of such sweeping charges. In so far as
Trade Unions are concerned, they doubtless consist mostly of
skilled artisans who compare favourably with the great mass
of the labouring classes; whilst as societies they manifest a
degree of organization and a power of management of no mean
order. It must be allowed also that the demonstrations of Trade
Unionists, and the conduct of workmen during any strike at
the present time, contrast favourably with similar exhibitions in
times past. We hear of no incendiarism, no outrage, no riotous
assemblage. The practices at Sheffield were utterly disowned
by the great body of workmen, and though we still hear of
picketing and coercion of different kinds, which the committees
of trade societies would do well to repress as acts of true
cowardice, I am not prepared to join in the cry that our work
men are worse than other people. In the universal progress of
society our workmen have not lagged behind. If they are a
little more quarrelsome than we would like them to be, it is
because they wish to lift themselves up in the scale of society,
�84
TRADE UNIONS.
and because they see the need of protecting their interests,
which were too often heretofore held at nought or trodden
under foot.
Upon the action of trade societies on their benefit funds, I have
scarcely time to touch. For my part, I deeply regret that the
high purposes of a benefit society should be mixed up with the
contentious questions of restraints of trade. I can conceive of
nothing more important than that money laid aside for sick
ness and burials, for widows and orphans, should be perfectly
secure from danger of being swamped up by any warfare with
employers. The best service Trade Unions can render to the
labouring population is to inculcate habits of thrift, and to check
as far as in them lies the evil of intemperance. Let our Trade
Unions abandon the advocacy of theories which are contrary to
sound economy. Let them adopt a spirit of harmony and
conciliation. Let them cease to make war against capital,
which is the necessary handmaid of labour. Let them use only
such means as the law permits, and society sanctions, for the
protection of the just rights of workmen. Let them lead the
mass of labourers in the way of solid progress, and they will
render themselves the benefactors of the people, and be
acknowledged as the friends and trusted helpers of both
capital and labour.
�VI.
STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
That masters and men engaged in industries of a most com
plex character, so often disturbed by the introduction of new
methods and machinery, having much in common, yet each
striving for their own distinct interests, should at times find it
difficult to avoid disagreements, is not, after all, a matter to
cause much surprise. The marvel rather is, that such conflicts
occur so seldom, in comparison with the immense number of
employers and employed, and that when they do occur, they
exercise, comparatively, so small an influence on the general
industry of the country.
What gives to such dissensions any degree of importance is
the dire effect they have on the large number of persons thereby
affected,—the consequence of the modern organization of labour.
A passenger ship has often been compared to a floating village,
and so a mill, or a factory, gathers around itself a complete
community, every inhabitant of which depends on the unin
terrupted progress of the special industry. Let the factory or
the iron work be in full activity, and you see hundreds of
families , rejoicing in plenty, dwelling-houses neatly furnished,
tradesmen and artificers all earning sufficient incomes, and if
the employer be a Sir Titus Salt, or a Sir Francis Crossley,
you will find in such communities the church and the school,
�86
STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
reading-rooms and savings-banks, the club, and many other
institutions which contribute to the moral and intellectual
advancement of the labouring population. But let a dissension
occur, and a strike or lock-out be resolved upon, and what a
sudden blight falls on the whole prospect, what dejection, what
sufferings 1 Here the full loaf is replaced by the half loaf, there
are poverty and sickness, everywhere an idleness which makes
one sad.
A strike, or the joint action on the part of a body of workmen
or persons employed in any department of business, by which
each and all refuse to work except under certain prescribed
conditions, often with the means of sustenance, or some
approximate equivalent to the loss of wages thereby incurred,
provided for by a common fund, is war, which, as Lord Bacon
defined, is “ the highest trial of right.” And a grave responsi
bility rests on those who resort to such a step on any ground
not clearly justifiable, who rush into it before exhausting every
means of conciliation, and who are not ready to withdraw from
it at any moment when a fair compromise can be effected.
That a war may be just, at least in diplomatic language (for
I doubt the possibility of the justice or moral lawfulness of an
act which carries with it so much carnage and destruction), it
must at least be dictated by the necessity of defending ab
solute rights, and be the very last expedient which a nation can
resort to.
" Force is at best
A fearful thing e’en in a righteous cause.
God only helps when man can help no more.”
Strikes have arisen for the purpose of securing higher wages,
for resisting a fall of wages, for opposing or preventing the
introduction of machinery, for obtaining a reduction of the
hours of labour, for resisting any addition to the number of
apprentices. They have been waged against the employment
of non-unionists, against contract work, against piece-work and
�STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
«7
overtime, or to secure overtime beginning earlier. Only the
other day there was a strike in London in consequence of
the employment of plasterers to do a kind of work which the
bricklayers thought they were themselves entitled to do. And
in another case, a printing office lost some of its best members
for the sole reason that the masters accepted in their em
ployment one who had not a full certificate of apprenticeship,
though as able as any of the rest. By what criterion shall
we judge of the justice of such a course where there is no
inalienable right to depart from? The labourer has a right
to his wages, but the rate of wages is a matter of contract, and
depends more on the operation of economic laws than on the
will of the master. Where is the right of the labourer to prevent
any economy of labour by machinery ? On what principle can
he oppose the employment of non-unionists? The right to
resist, and the rectitude of the cause for which resistance is
made, are two distinct things.
An impression seems to exist among our workmen that it is
advantageous to them to show that they are in earnest in
resisting any attempt on the part of masters to ignore their just
rights, and that whether they gain or not the object in view in
the particular instance, they are enabled by such resistance to
secure better terms for the future. A strike, say they, is the
only remedy we have in our own hands. What else can we do ?
What, if masters, strong as a money power, presuming on our
weakness, are found to set aside all considerations of moral
duty, to stretch unduly the laws of economic science, and to
impose conditions which we cannot accept,—what other course
can we pursue but refuse to work at their terms, or, in short, to
strike ? Against such considerations, however, be mindful, I
pray you, to place the immediate sacrifices you thereby inflict
on yourselves, the injury you cause to large multitudes who
can ill spare any cessation of labour, the disorganization of the
industry, the hatred and rancour engendered in your relations
�88
STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS.
with your employers, the chance of failure in the struggle, the
want of security as to the maintenance of your success should
you be so fortunate as to obtain what you strive for, the loss of
wages, the loss and waste of funds the fruit of years of labour
and privations, the injury to theSnation at large ; for remember
that trade is a plant of tender growth, it requires sun and soil
and fine seasons to make it thrive and flourish. It will not
grow like the palm-tree, which with the more weight and
pressure rises the more.” Ere you strike, I pray you, count the
cost. The present dispute in the cotton trade, for instance, is
fraught with danger. Whatever reason there may be for re
vising the standard list, that is no excuse for a strike, especially in
mills where no ground of complaint really exists. Nor have the
masters any justification for a general lock-out simply because
a few workmen in certain mills have unhappily taken such an
objectionable course. I cannot expect that anything I may
say will influence materially the progress of the dispute. But,,
if a word of mine can reach the contending parties, most
earnestly would I urge on the workmen on strike, at once toreturn to their work, on the assurance that a' committee from
both masters and men will be appointed to inquire into the
whole matter and forthwith remove any just ground of com
plaint. And on the masters I would urge not to commit them
selves to joint action in the matter, or to anything like a
general lock-out, which would be the cause of so much trouble
and misery. Ere you resort to a measure so disastrous as to
shut the door of your factories to thousands of innocent labourers,
I pray you, I beseech of you, count the cost.
Before a war is finally resorted to among nations, diplomacy
generally uses its best endeavours to prevent the sad catastrophe,
and certainly no step should be omitted to prevent a strike.
The rules of many Trade Unions prescribe that in case of
dispute, a deputation of two or more members shall wait
on the employer and endeavour to come to an amicable
�STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
89
arrangement; that the men shall first reason the matter with
their employers; that no strike be resorted to without an
attempt having first been made to settle the matter of con
tention between employers and employed by an amicable
negotiation ; and that where a grievance exists, the labourers
shall, in the first place, solicit their employer or foreman for
relief from the same. Now it is only fair to expect from the
masters that they should follow a similar course, for I do not
think it would be beneath their dignity to descend a little and
reason with their workmen on the ground of dispute between
them. How much misgiving, how much prejudice would be saved,
if masters only condescended to reason with their men, not as
so many hands in their service, but as men, working with and
for them ! When masters give sudden notice of a reduction of
wages, without saying why and under what circumstances, the
men are under the necessity of taking an immediate course,
and having had no previous consultation, or time to deliberate^
they cannot help assuming a position of resistance not easily
altered by subsequent action. It is an unfortunate consequence
of the present organization of labour, or of production on a
large scale, that the employers do not deal with the men
individually, and that they are therefore called to act together
in a kind of combination. But that should not prevent a full
mutual understanding of the matter in question. 'Only, if a
deputation be sent to the masters, let it be composed of the
most trusted members in their employment. In the choice of
an ambassador, care is always taken to send one whose pre
sence shall be acceptable at the Court to which he is to be ac
credited, and similar care should be exercised in the selection
of those who are to represent the wishes and views of the
workmen to their masters. Avoid by all means all causes of
irritation at a time when you engage in negotiations requiring
for their solution mutual forbearance and mutual sympathy.
Whatever be the issue of such direct negotiations, care should
�9°
STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
be taken to allow time to work its own good, influence of better
counsel and more ripened judgment. A disposition to strike is
incident to the association of working men smarting under a
sense of wrong. When large numbers have a common griev
ance, a spirit of opposition is speedily engendered, and it is
well if they have not it in their power to act on the impulse of
the moment.
It has been said that Trade Unions encourage workmen to
resistance. Doubtless the feeling that they have such societies
at their back may render workmen less afraid of the issue, but,
on the other hand, an organized society, acting upon rules, must
also introduce an increased sense of order, subordination, and
reflection. Many of such Unions reserve in their own hands the
right of deciding whether a strike should be sanctioned or not.
Some of their rules perscribe that no strike shall be con
sidered legal without the consent of the majority of the lodges,
to all of whom information of any movement has to be sent;
that when a strike for an advance of wages is contemplated by
any lodge, the secretary is to report the same to the Central
Committee, showing the number that would be out, the number
of payable members, the state of trade, and the position of the
Society in the neighbourhood ; that should an attempt be
made unnecessarily to reduce the wages of any of the members,
or to increase their hours of labour unjustly, they shall first
solicit relief from their employers, and afterwards apply to the
president or secretary of their branch, who shall call a com
mittee, or general meeting to inquire into the case ; and that
should the members of any branch leave their employment
without having first obtained the sanction of the Executive
Committee, such members shall not be entitled to the allowance
provided in case of oppression. Would it not be desirable that
the rules of the different Unions on such an important matter
should be more uniform than they appear to be ? I see no
reason why Trade Unions should not operate most favourably
�STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
9i
in matters of strikes, and when we consider that part of the
funds entrusted to them is expended in the maintenance of
persons on strike, surely it becomes their interest to reduce the
demand for such purposes to the minimum possible.
When a strike has, unhappily, commenced, it is too much
to expect the maintenance of much courtesy between the parties,
and many are the circumstances which tend to increase the
bitterness arising from such a forced suspension of labour.
The time when the strike happens is often most inconvenient,
for advantage is taken of a brisk trade to insist on a rise of
wages, just when the employer is, so to say, at the mercy of the
employed. What if the work in operation was contracted for
on the basis of existing wages ? What if the contractor under
took, under penalties of a heavy character, to complete the work
'within a limited time ? What if the season be towards the close,
and the opportunity of fulfilling the engagement fast hastening
away ? Two persons are engaged in a partnership at will, the
condition being that either can retire when he pleases. Can
either leave at an inopportune moment, when difficult questions
are in suspense, when hazardous contracts are pending ? And
ought there not to be in the relation between masters and
men, as far as is possible and is otherwise applicable, the same
sense and practice of equity as we expect between partners
in trade ? A strike occurs, and in the plenitude of your right
you take your tools and go. Can you compel others to follow
your course ? Can you object to others coming to take your
place? You may wish to force your master to make the con
cession you demand, and you may regret seeing your efforts
frustrated by the avidity of others to grasp the chance of em
ployment on any condition ; but remember, you have no right to
interfere, and if you proceed to violence of any kind, even if it
be a slight assault, if you indulge in such threats as will convey
to the mind of such other parties that you will bring any form of
evil upon them, either in their person, property, or reputation,
�92
STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS.
with the intent of forcing them to act otherwise than you wish,,
or if you intimidate them by any deed or word which hnight
create fear, or if you molest them or obstruct them in the
exercise of their rights,—in either of such cases you commit a
wrong which may expose you to criminal proceedings.
A reference to past strikes is not very encouraging as totheir good results to workmen. In 1834 the workmen in the
Staffordshire potteries struck for an advance of wages, and
after fifteen weeks the masters yielded. Elated by their suc
cess, however, the men thought they could demand more, and
so two years after they struck for a diminution in the hours of
labour and a restriction in the number of apprentices. But the
masters were not so ready now to make concessions. They
united together, and they decided to suspend their manufacture
whenever the workmen struck to any master. And the strike
was an utter failure, though it cost the men ,£188,000. What
was gained on the previous occasion was more than lost only
two years after. In 1853 a great strike took place at Preston
for higher wages, which were unconditionally demanded. The
masters made some concessions, but these were indignantly
refused. So the mills were closed, 18,000 Jiands were rendered
inoperative, and after a lengthened struggle, in which the men
sPent Z100,000, submission became unavoidable. A few strikes
have proved successful, but many more have utterly failed.
Not many years ago seven distinct strikes took place in
Lancashire, every one of them unsuccessful. They involved
a loss of employment to 38,000 hands. They lasted a long
time one thirty weeks, another fifty weeks—and together they
produced a loss in wages of ,£757,000 ; and if you add to that
sum the profits on capital, and the subscriptions, at | of the
wages, the total loss exceeded £^1,000,000. In the recent un
happy strike in South Wales nearly 120,000 workers stood out
against a reduction of wages, and upwards of £3,000,000 in
wages was actually lost in the contest.
Did they succeed ?
�STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
93
l?ar from it. They refused, to accept a reduction of ten per
■cent., yet eventually they were compelled by the force of events
-f-0 re-enter work at a reduction of I21> per. cent. ! Suppose,
however, you do succeed in the contest. Remember that you
will have to work a long time at the higher wages before you
■can recover what you have lost by forfeiting the entire amount
week by week. Suppose you strike for 5^. more wages, or for
more in every pound. Dr. Watt made a calculation to show
in how long a time you will get back what you had before. A
week is two per cent, of a working year, or two per cent, of
the wage of one year. Let the strike succeed, and you will
require
year, at the increased rate, to make up for 1
month’s wages lost j 3v years to make up for 2 months
wages lost ; 4-t years to make up for 3 months wages lost ,
94 years to make up for 6 months’ wages lost; and 20 years
to make up for 12 months’ wages lost.
Do not think that the money distributed by the Trade
Societies during the strike goes to diminish the loss of the
persons on strike, for the money so consumed is the saving of
former labour, which might go towards further production. It
is one of the most unfortunate results of a strike, that funds
gained by toil and prudence are expended so fruitlessly in
times of forced idleness. During a strike you not only lose
what you might otherwise earn, but expend what you had
amassed. Nor is the loss confined to the workmen. The
employer is certainly as great a sufferer, for a strike may not
only rob him of his trade for the time being, but may. make
him lose the custom which he possesses, and the labour of men
of skill well versed in the peculiar work he has on hand,
never probably to be replaced, and probably affect also his
permanent power to produce as economically as heretofore.
If the strike be for higher wages when the condition of the
trade or of the nation cannot bear it, either the community will
suffer from the increased cost of the article produced, or else
�94
STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
it may cause the introduction of machinery. A strike may
have the effect of equalizing wages. An industry badly paid
may, by a strike, attract to itself part of the wages which fall
to another; but no equalization of wages can possibly be
equivalent to the production of capital, which alone can support
an increase of wages. If the strike be against the introduc
tion of machinery, it may be the means of the trade being
transplanted to other places. It was probably an exaggeration,,
some years ago, when it was asserted that the frequent strikes
of shipwrights’on the Thames caused shipbuilding to leave the
Thames for the Clyde and the i yne ; the real reason being that
iron shipbuilding found a more natural home where iron and
coals were immediately available. Yet it is no exaggeration to
say that an industry distracted and rendered unproductive in
one quarter may take wing and find rest in another. I have,,
indeed, proved in my previous lecture that up to 1873 at least
the trade and industry of England had not suffered from the
many disturbances which have taken place,—at least, not to any
material extent,—and that foreign competition had not till then
gamed upon British industry. But what has not yet been may
still be. The danger remains, though it may not be imminent.
I doubt the possibility of our ever reaching a time when there
shall be no strikes, for just in proportion as our labouring
population rises to the consciousness of its power, and seeks to
participate in a higher degree in the profits of production, so
the struggle between capital and labour may be expected to be
more frequent. But may we not expect that, side by side with
this, a greater disposition may also be engendered to remove
sources of quarrel, to soften their asperity when they do arise,
and to settle disputes by arbitration and conciliation ? Must
force ever reign ? Is the arbitrement of the sword befitting our
character and position in life. The legislature has done
whatever it could possibly do to provide for the adoption of
more peaceful means. A refusal to leave a matter of dispute to
�STRIKES AND LOCK-OUTS.
95
arbitration betokens either haughtiness and arrogance, or
weakness.
I do not think that the appointment of one or
more strangers as arbitrators, be they lords, lawyers, or phi
lanthropists, is a desirable method, for their decision can, at
best, be a simple compromise of the immediate ground of dis
pute ; it will never be able to regulate the subsequent action of
the parties, and will be certain to leave one of the contending
parties dissatisfied with the result. A conciliation board, on
the other hand, within the establishment itself, composed of an
equal number of masters and men, with a neutral umpire, ah
of them having a perfect acquaintance, not only with the case
in point, but with the bearing of the question generally upon
production, and upon the comfort of working as concerning both
masters and men, and each of them possessing the full con
fidence of the parties interested, is sure to give a verdict
entitled to respect and assent. But let it be fully remembered
that it is the essence of arbitration or conciliation that you
commit the matter in dispute to the decision of other parties,,
and that you thereby incur an obligation to abide by their
verdict, whether it may go in your favour or against you,—
provided, of course, the arbitrators or the board confine them
selves strictly to the matter submitted to them. How far any
national board of arbitration may be advantageously established,
seems to me very doubtful. The first essential to success in any
effort for the prevention of disputes, or their early settlement, is
the possession of a conciliatory spirit, and a ready disposition
to consider the rights and interests of both sides. Let that
spirit prevail within the establishment among both masters and
men, and there will be no difficulty in arriving at an equitable
and satisfactory settlement of any disputes, however formidable
they may appear.
�VII.
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
About twenty years ago, a work was published in France, by
M. Le Play, the superintendent of the Paris International Ex
hibition, entitled “ Studies on the Labour, the Domestic Life, and
theMoral Condition of the Working Population of Europe,” giving
accurate and minute details, from actual fact, of all the money
received and expended during one year, by a certain number of
families of the working population in every country in Europe;
the income including the wages of the head of the family, as
well as of the mother and children, counting the actual number
of days they were at work, as well as any income from a garden
or parcel of land, rent of house or field, produce of pasture,
pig, sheep, or from any pension, funds, interest, and any miscel
laneous or accidental sources ; the expenditure divided into
expenses for food and drink, for house, fire, and light, for cloth
ing, for moral, educational, or religious purposes, for taxes,
recreation, or debt. And most interesting it is to compare the
habits of the different people, and the effects of temperature,
climate, race, and religion, on the description and quantity ot
food and drink used, the nature of their amusements, and the
amount devoted to the cause of charity and beneficence. I
imagine, however, that if a similar work were attempted regarding
the various classes of labourers in England, if, instead of com-
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
97
paring the French andthe Russian, the German and the Italian,
the Spanish, Turkish, and Greek labourers, with the English,
the Scotch, and the Irish, we had before us the real income and
expenditure of any number of families in England from among
the agricultural, the manufacturing, and the industrial classes,
in town and country, and in the metropolis, we would find
the same diversity of results, the same strange anomalies, and
the same gulf in the different traits of manner and character,
as can be found among them in any part of the world.
How, then, can I venture to give you the budgets of the working
classes ? Of what guidance can the income and expenditure of
one family of five be to the income and expenditure of another
family of ten ? What is there in common between a bachelor
living in lodgings and a young couple with two babies, and it may
be with a mother or father to keep ? The ways of life are very
different; so much depends on the surroundings of the family, on
the mode in which the parties have been brought up, the character,
the education, the state of health, and a vast variety of circum
stances, that, really, every household is a world of itself. Home
is the Englishman's castle—impregnable and inaccessible ; who
can assail it ? No ; my object is not to pry into matters which
are happily beyond the public gaze, but rather to lay before you
the value and importance of simply taking a good account of
what we are actually receiving, and what we are actually spend
ing, during the whole of a long year. You are aware that one
of the most important evenings of the Session in Parliament is
the evening when the Chancellor of the Exchequer makes his
financial statement j that is, when he reviews all the circum
stances connected with the income and expenditure of the State
during the preceding year, investigates the condition and pros
pects of the nation as respects the future, communicates his
calculations of the probable income and expenditure for the
year to come, and declares whether the burthens upon the
people are to be increased or diminished. This statement is
7
�98
*
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
familiarly known as the Budget, and it is regarded with the
greatest possible interest by the whole nation. Now if this is
a good practice for the State, would it not be an excellent practice
for private individuals also ! The large questions that have
engaged our attention in the previous lectures are most impor
tant. A knowledge of the economic laws which govern the rate
of wages is most interesting and valuable. Still more important,
however, in any case, is it to come home to ourselves, and to
consider whether our own annual income is fully equal to our
expenditure, whether every item of income of every member of
the family is duly gathered, accounted for, and properly utilized,
and whether the expenditure is, in every respect, moderate,
legitimate, and kept within proper control. “ Gear is easier got
than guided.” Have you ever tried to keep a diary? The
difficulty of persevering in it is immense. You require habits
of order and method not often possessed. Carefully to note
down what we are doing, and what happens to us every day, is
as difficult as to register all the money that comes and goes.
Merchants, who make all their payments by cheques, and who
draw all their current money by cheques on their bankers, have
a ready means of ascertaining what they get and expend during
the year. But those who have not the luxury of a banker must
keep a little book for themselves ; and it is wonderful how useful
and interesting it becomes in course of time for a comparison
with the past and a check for the future. Let your wife begin
to put down what she expends, and you begin to put down what
you expend,-—and what a monitor such a record will prove !
The pay of the labourer is his wages, but his earnings will
comprise also the produce of labour from any other industry
at spare hours, any allowance from any society, and the fruit of
any money or property he or any member of his family may have
at the savings bank, building society, trade society, or other
wise. The pay itself may consist either in money or in kind,
or in both ; and where clothing, board, or lodging is given, the
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
99
money value of the same ought to be taken into account. A
sailor who gets 6oj., or 70s., and sometimes 90s., per month,
must remember that during the whole time of his engagement
he is fed and lodged on board. An agricultural labourer often
gets very little money wages. But in Northumberland the
wages include an allowance of corn for a cow or pig, house and
garden, coals, etc. A hind’s poll in Scotland comprises a given
quantity of oats, barley, peas, and land enough for potato plant
ing. In Devonshire, besides the money wage, there is the allow
ance of cider, and a labourer has a cottage for £1, with a patch
of land, from which he can get vegetables for the whole year for
the entire family, and enough to feed a pig, which again becomes
a source of income. A domestic servant gets from ^10 to ^30 a
year, in money, besides board and lodging, which, in London at
least, are equivalent to as much again. In the occupations I have
noted, the combination of payment in money and kind is not
only indispensable, but really advantageous to the labourers. In
calculating the amount of earnings, therefore, do not forget the
value of the advantages you obtain from your employment over
and above the weekly or monthly wages in money.
Where, moreover, there are more earners than one in a family,
where the wife, or sons, or daughters, earn also money, and bring
it into the common purse, that must be calculated also.' I
imagine sons and daughters do not bring to their fathers and
mothers all they earn, or anything like it. Would that they did 1
A very large portion of the earnings of the younger members of
the whole working population is, I fear, utterly wasted, simply be
cause it never reaches the home treasury. The practice of either
father or children allotting any portion of their wages to the
wife or mother for their food, keeping the rest for themselves,
and throwing on the poor mother the burden of making the two
ends meet, is wrong in principle. The boarding system is wrong
when applied to the family. Oh for a return to the patriarchal
system of united and not divided interest! There are thousands
�IOO
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
of families of working people in England where the aggregate
earnings would amount to ^3 or £4 a week, but where no account
is taken of a great portion of the same. I am not exaggerating
when I say that in very many cases fully one-fourth of the
income of the family is, in this way, utterly squandered, leading
to no result, giving no comfort, and only going in waste,
drunkenness, and vice. It is the same, unfortunately, in the
country as in towns. The agricultural villages, which have been
greatly multiplied since the introduction of machinery into agri
culture, are the absorbent of most of the earnings of many hard
working agricultural labourers. The public-house, the music
hall, and other places of amusement, waste away many an income
which could maintain a family in honour and comfort.
In order to make the income and the expenditure meet, there
are only two ways: one is, to increase the income; the other
is, to diminish the expenditure. Don’t you be deceived into
any expectation that you may increase your income by any
other means than by hard work. Don’t you be so foolish as to
renounce any income now in the hope that by renouncing it
to-day, you may get more to-morrow. Get what you can, and
keep what you have, is the way to get rich. Don’t you trifle
with any penny you may get, simply trusting on the continuance
of health and work to earn more. Trust in Providence ? Yes,
but never forget the duty of using rightful means. There is one
source of income, moreover, which we should scorn to resort to,
unless under the direst necessity, and that is, the poor rate. I
am strongly of opinion that the poor law in England is most
destructive to the industry, forethought, and honesty of the
labourers. What more degrading than using the parish doctor
both for birth and death ? What more lowering than the
workhouse? What more inconsistent with political economy
than the supporting, by public rates, of able-bodied labourers ?
It is a noble axiom, that none shall die of hunger,—that the
wealth of the rich shall supply the necessities of the poor. But
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
IOI
it is communistic in essence, and in practice most mischievous.
The subject is a very difficult one, and a change from a system
which has been so long in use might be attended with hardship ;
but it is for the working classes to say how long a compulsory
charity shall be allowed to enervate the very vitals of their
character and independence. They manage poor relief better
in other countries. In Sweden, every able-bodied person is
expected to maintain himself, his wife, and children, as a legal
obligation. In France, there is no legal claim for support.
“ When the virtue of charity ceases to be private,” said M.
Thiers, “ and becomes collective, it ceases to be a virtue, and it
becomes a dangerous compulsion.” In Belgium, the classic land
of pauperism, there is no poor rate. The legal provision for the
support of the poor consists in the donations of the public, vested
in, and administered by, the civil authorities. In Elberfeld there
is a right to relief, but outdoor relief is entrusted to overseers, and
every person applying for help must show that he cannot exist
without it. In Italy there is no legal provision for the support of
the poor. Comparing the proportion of pauperism to population,
England may seem to stand better than any other country; but
remember, the amount of charity in England, over and beyond
any provision of the poor law, is far in excess of what is given
abroad. Look at the report of the Charity Commissioners. See
how much is spent and squandered in every parish. See what
is passing through the poor box in every police office in the
metropolis. The public support of the sick, the lame, the blind,
the old, and the helpless infant, is a duty; but it is a disgrace
in any one who earns enough and, it may be, to spare, to abandon
an old father or mother, a wife or a child, to the miserable
pittance of the parish. It is a shame and a crime, by extrava
gance and waste, to throw our burden off our shoulders. Burden,
did I say ? There is no sweeter joy, no pleasanter duty, than
to contribute to the well-being of our dear ones, our friends, and
our kindred.
�102
BUDGETS OB THE WORKING CLASSES.
It is time, however, to turn to the other side of the account—
the expenditure. There is a well-known saying fitly applicable
to our subject—“ Cut your coat according to your cloth.”
Measure your expenditure by your income. It is a most un
fortunate practice of our Chancellor of the Exchequer, in
making up the financial statement of the nation, that he does
exactly the reverse, by measuring the public income by the public
expenditure. But he can do that, because he has a whole nation
to fall upon, by compulsory taxation. Not so the private
individual. You and I have no other resource than what we
earn; and we must, of necessity, measure our ekpenditure
by that, and by nothing else whatever. In any case, under no
circumstances, allow yourselves to fall into debt, for it is the
certain source of ruin. “Out of debt out of danger.” A very
large number of the plaints brought before the county courts
consist of sums not exceeding 4°r., and many are for sums not
exceeding ij. It is impossible to exaggerate the burden, the
aggravation, the misery, and the dependence of a man who
gets into the habit of purchasing what he requires, often, it may
be, in excess of what he needs, but with the consciousness of
not having the wherewithal to pay for it. “ Cut your coat ac
cording to your cloth.” Never give out what does not come in.
Avoid, above all, shop debt ; for you pay very dear for it, in
exorbitant prices of all you purchase.
I do hope Mr. Bass
will succeed in his effort to abolish imprisonment for debt, as
a discouragement to shops to sell on credit, for then prices would
sink to the scale of cash prices, and shopkeepers would get rid
of a great deal of care. Have the money before you spend it,
and you will be sure to economise it to the very best.
" Ken when to spend, and when to spare,
And when to buy, and you’ll ne'er be bare,”
The expenditure of a working man’s family cannot differ very
much from the expenditure of a person of the middle classes,
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
103
except in this, that the proportion of what is spent in necessaries,
comforts, or luxuries must vary according to the amount of
income. With 5 or. or 6or. a week, you may devote some
portion to the comforts or even the luxuries of life. With 20J.
a week, you may be thankful if you can provide for the neces
saries of life. Our absolute wants usually consist of bread,
flour, vegetables, meat, butter, sugar, tea, and milk ; house-rent,
fire and light, clothing, and the education of children. These
are the necessaries of life. The comforts of life consist, pro
bably, in an extensive use of these very things, plus spices and
condiments, newspaper and omnibus, church and charity,
an excursion, and some insurance for the future. And the
luxuries may consist of tobacco and drink, frivolities, pots
of flowers, keeping of birds, etc. But are we all agreed in
such a classification as this ? Time was when white bread
was a luxury ; now it is an article of common use, as a neces
sary of life. Meat is necessary, but is it necessary to eat it
every day ? And is there not a material difference between
purchasing a prime joint and other portions equally if not
more nutritious ? Clothing is necessary, but what clothing ?
Are bonnets with feathers and flowers necessary ? Are twenty
yards necessary for a dress ? N eed we all dress in silk attire ?
Whether an article of use is to be classed among the neces
saries, comforts, or luxuries of life depends in a great measure
on the standard by which we are guided, on the ideal we form
for ourselves of our own wants.
Looking over a large number of budgets in the work already
■quoted on European labourers, in returns kindly sent to me
direct by several workmen, and in the reports of the Secre
taries of Legation on the industrial condition of the working
classes abroad,* the conclusion I arrive at of a legitimate
appropriation of wages is somewhat as follows : 60 per cent.
* See Appendix B.
�104
BUDGETS OF THE WOEKTNG CLASSES.
is required for food and drink ■ 12 per cent, for'rent and taxes •
10 per cent, for clothing; 6 per cent, for fire and;[light; 1 peicent. for newspapers, omnibus, or travelling;' 4 per cent, for
church, education, and charity; 2 per cent, for amusementsand 5 per cent, for savings. In other words, for every pound of
wages the expense would be-12.. for food and drink; 2s.
for
lodgmg; 3d. forfiring and light; 2s. for clothing; 2ff. for omnibus
and newspaper ; t,. 6d. for church, education, and charity •
for amusements; and u. for saving in any insurance company
or benefit club. But this takes no account of the doctor’s bill
nor of slack time, and it would be only fair that some economy
should be made in either of the items to meet these possible
if not unavoidable, drawbacks. Nor are drink and tobacco’
specially calculated, for the cost of a reasonable quantity of beer
should certainly be included in the 12J. for food and drink
and the cost of the tobacco should be included in the expense
for amusement,-if, by any construction of language, smoking
can be considered an amusement. As a general rule, the neces
saries of life should be first provided ; and whatever excess may
remam may go towards the comforts of life; but, under any cir
cumstance, leave something for saving. It may be kind to be
liberal, and to be anxious to make every member of the family,
day by day, as comfortable as your means allow; but it is
kinder far to provide something for the almost inevitable con
tingency of sickness, want of work, or old age, when you, that
are now the strength and support of the family, are com
pelled sadly to put all work aside, or when any member of your
family, from disease or otherwise, may have to draw more on
your resources than you are able to provide.
Need I say that a considerable economy may be effected in
our. every-day expenditure without abridging in the slightest
manner our means of subsistence and comfort ? You buy | of
an ounce of the best tea, and you are charged fff.—equivalent to
4s- per pound. Buy J pound for cash, and you may get the same
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
105
tea at the rate of y. or 2s. 6d. per pound. Is there not much
waste in our cooking ? Is there not wanton waste in many of our
household arrangements ? A penny here and a penny there, and
soon shillings and pounds vanish. It is, however, impossible,
when we come to details such as these, not to place in the very
foremost rank of waste a very considerable portion of what is
spent in drink. Am I wrong in supposing that a person earning
30^. a week will spend 3^. in drink, that being considered a
moderate allowance for dinner and supper ? Am I exaggerating
when I say that in a very large number of cases that pro
portion is far, far exceeded, the amount so expended often being
more than 25 or 30 per cent, of the income ? What is the use
of reasoning on economy in little matters with such a drain
as this? What can the poor wife do with the very small
amount entrusted to her for housekeeping? And how often
does a dissipated husband make a dissipated wife ! What a
wretched example for children ! What a source of vice and
crime drunkenness is proving over the whole country! I am
not in favour of the so-called Permissive Bill, because it would
introduce strife in parishes, and because I think it would, at
best, be of partial application, and might be applied just
where it is least needed.
Nor can I say that we should
lightly interfere with any legitimate business, or with the
common rights of the people.
If there is a demand, the
supply will most assuredly be forthcoming somehow or other.
No, the reform must begin with ourselves. Reasons of duty,
reasons of self-respect, reasons of education, must impel us
to remove this source of scandal, at any rate, from our own
shoulder, and by our exhortation, and by our example, strive to
blot it out from the escutcheon of England. When I last
visited Liverpool I was attracted by the cocoa-shops established
in the immediate centre of the dock and sea-faring population,
and there I got a mug of cocoa for \d. and a scone for ^d.—both
excellent and satisfying. Take that in the morning, and you
�io6
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES
will find it an excellent preservative against any craving for
strong drink. All honour to Mr. Lockhart for his noble efforts
in that direction. Would that we had such cocoa-shops in
London! Would that public-houses without drink, and public
coffee and working men’s clubs,, were multiplied, for I am sure
there is ample room, and an imperious need, for extensive
efforts in improving the morals of the people in this one direc
tion. I do not trust much in the power of an Act of Parliament
to make people temperate. But I do trust in a sound and
wholesome public opinion, and I appeal to you to create it by
your hearty, spontaneous, and energetic example and action.
Who will help in this glorious enterprise? Do not wait for
great opportunities. Begin at once, and at home. In Mr.
Smiles’ excellent work on Thrift there is a story illustrative of
the influence of example in this matter which is worth re
peating :—
“A calico printer in Manchester was persuaded by his wife,
on their wedding-day, to allow her two half-pints of ale a day,
as her share. He rather winced at the bargain, for, though a
drinker himself, he would have preferred a perfectly sober wife.
They both worked hard, and he, poor man, was seldom out of
the public-house as soon as the factory was closed. She had
her daily pint, and he, perhaps, had his two or three quarts,
and neither interfered with the other, except that, at odd times,
she succeeded, by dint of one little gentle artifice or another,
to win him home an hour or two earlier at night, and now and
then to spend an entire evening in his own home. They had
been married a year, and on the morning of their wedding
anniversary the husband looked askance at her neat and
comely person, with some shade of remorse, as he said, ‘ Mary,
we’ve had no holiday since we were wed ; and, only that I have
not a penny in the world, we’d take a jaunt down to the village
to see thee mother.’
Would’st like to go, John ?’ said she, softly, between a smile
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
and a tear, so glad to hear him speak so kindly,
io7
so like old
times. £ If thee’d like to go, John, I’ll stand treat.’
“ £ Thou stand treat! ’ said he, with half a sneer : £ has’t got a
fortune, wench?’
« £ Nay,’ said she, £ but I’ve gotten the pint o’ ale.’
“ £ Gotten what ? ’ said he.
“ £ The pint o’ ale,’ said she.
“ John still didn’t understand her, till the faithful creature
reached down an old stocking from under a loose brick up the
chimney, and counted* over her daily pint of ale, in the shape
of three hundred and sixty-five threepences, or ^4 4-y* 6^-, and
put them into his hand, exclaiming, £ Thou shalt have thee
holiday, J ohn 1 ’
“John was ashamed, astonished, conscience-stricken, charmed,
and wouldn’t touch it. £Hasn’t thee had thy share? Then
I’ll ha’ no more ! ’ he said. He kept his word. They kept theii
wedding day with mother, and the wife’s little capital was the
nucleus of a series of frugal investments, that ultimately swelled
out into a shop, a factory, a warehouse, a country seat, a carriage,
and perhaps a Liverpool mayor.”
In England, the working classes have not much reason to
complain that their taxes are too heavy. That every subject
of the kingdom should, in proportion to his means, contribute his
quota to the general taxation is a principle of finance universally
admitted.
As members of the commonwealth, we are all,
though certainly in different degrees, interested in securing its
preservation and advancement. The poorest among us feels
an interest, if not pride, in the honour and glory of his fatherland. In truth, we should regard the national expenditure in
the light of an insurance, and the payment of the premuim as
a common duty and privilege. During the last thirty years,
however, nearly every step in the reform of the Budget has
been in the direction of lessening the taxes which pressed on
the necessaries of life, and of increasing the taxes affecting
�10S
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
wealth, industries, and, especially, luxuries. Taxes on sugar, tea,
co ee, corn, and on a vast number of imported articles have
been greatly reduced, or remitted altogether; and in their stead
stamp duties, income tax, land tax, probate duties, and duties on
spirits malt, wine, and tobacco have been newly imposed or in
creased. And what is the result? Of the taxes affecting wealth
and industry, amounting in all to
000,000, the working
classes do not pay more than half a million. Of taxes on ne
cessaries they may pay probably £2,500,ooo-the greater part on
tea. But of the taxes on luxuries, including spirits, malt, and to
bacco, the working classes pay their full quota in some£23,ooo,ooo
a year. But this large sum of taxation, borne by the working
classes under this head, is entirely voluntary. Give up drinking,
give up tobacco, and you avoid nearly every farthing of taxation.
owhere, probably, are the working classes treated with more
consideration than in England. What a pity that greater advan
tage is not taken of this wonderful exemption ! As it is, no tax
of any consequence is paid by the working classes, except in
t e slight addition caused by the duties on the cost of their
spirits, malt liquor, or narcotics ; and no one would grumble if
these taxes were considerably increased.
I have ventured to give what might be deemed a legiti
mate distribution of the expenditure of our working classes
Now, look at the results. I have estimated the total annual
wages and earnings of the working classes at the large amount
o £400,000,000, including money and money’s worth ; but take
no account of money’s worth, and assume only £300,000,000
in hard cash as falling into the hands of our working classes.
And on the proportion given, the money should go in the following
shapes : £180,000,000 would be expended on food and drink;
£36,000,000 in rent; £6,000,000 in firing and light; £30,000,000
m clothing; £3,000,000 in newspapers, omnibuses, and rail
way travelling, £12,000,000 in church, education, and
charity; £6,000,000 in amusements; whilst £15,000,000 would
�BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES. '
109
be reserved, for savings. But is the money so expended ?
Let us see. We may fairly assume that the ,£180,000,000 is
fully expended in food. The £36,000,000 laid down for house
rent tallies, so far, with the census report of 1871, showing
that the rental of houses under ,£20 had an estimated
aggregate annual value of ^32;000?000, Fire and light will
cost quite as much as I have estimated. The amount given for
clothing is, I fear, rather below than above the amount annually
expended. And so, probably, the amount given for amusements
and other items. But as for the ^12,000,000 expended in church,
education, and charity, and ,£15,000,000 reserved for saving,
alas ! where are they ? No, my calculations are fallacious in
two distinct items. Instead of the 60 per cent, given for food
covering the amount expended in drink, that item, to the ex
tent of fully 15 per cent, of the whole income, or £45,000,000,
and also 2 per cent, or £6,000,000 for tobacco, or, in all,
,£51,000,000, must be added as a separate and additional ex
penditure. But if this large amount is really so expended, as
is, unhappily, most likely to be the fact, if it is not indeed
greatly exceeded, what remains for church, education, and
charity, or for savings, or for any other rational purpose ?
Positively nothing. The little saved—probably £3,000,000 or
,£4,000,000 a year—as indicated in the annual increase of the
amount in the savings banks, friendly and building societies,
co-operative societies, etc., is the fruit of the economies of some
families, too few in number to constitute any perceptible
percentage in the whole number of the working population of
the country.
Now this I consider a very lamentable result of the budgets
of the working classes. What wonder if debt and pauperism
be rampant? What surprise can it cause that days of
sunshine and prosperity are so soon followed by dark,’ dark
days of misery and wretchedness ? I hope I may be wrong in
my calculations.
But if I am not, as I fear is not the case, it
�no
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
may not be in vain that I have called your attention to the
subject.
In discoursing upon the budgets of the working
classes, it would be wrong to ignore the thousand cases of
real, unmistakable hardship. That there is real poverty in
the land, that there is suffering, want, and misadventure, who
can ignore? The difficulties of the poor, their valour and
fortitude in bearing with and mastering them, are best known
to those who come most intimately in contact with them.
Their charitable disposition towards their friends in trouble,
their self-sacrifice, their heroism in labour, have been depicted
by the most masterly hands. But I am now speaking to the
great mass of our working men and women, and I say, if you
will avoid falling into the deep mire of calamities, if you will
maintain yourselves in comfort, honour, and self-reliance, look to
your budget, and endeavour so to economise your income that
you may have always enough and to spare.
�VIII.
SAVINGS BANKS AND OTHER INVESTMENTS OF THE
WORKING CLASSES.
The drift of all my Lectures has been—Look well into your
estate. Large economies depend upon little economies. If
you must be liberal in some kind of expense, do try to save in
some other. If you will be plentiful in diet, be at least saving
in drink. Let not your candle burn at both ends. By all
means, try to save. But how ? By putting aside whatever is
not absolutely indispensable for present want, in order that you
may make a reserve for unforeseen eventualities. And be not
ashamed to save. Call it not penury, miserliness, niggardliness,
and the like. A disposition to save for the future, a prescience
of, and a preparation for, what is to come, are just what place
us above the brute. Savages are not thrifty. They live from
day to day.
It is prudence that prompts us to save, and
wisdom that regulates the amount of our savings. It is modera
tion which enables us to realize any saving, and intelligence
which enables us to render it fruitful. And what are prudence,
wisdom, moderation, and intelligence, but the offspring of
civilization and morals? To have no thought for the morrow,
to have no regard for the welfare of friends and relatives, to
make no provision for old age and sickness, to indulge in
waste while the sun shines, never reflecting that after summer
�112
SA TINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
comes winter, are not consistent with our moral duties and
obligations. Is it a true picture of the English what Mr.
Smiles said, that though they are a diligent, hard-working, and
generally self-reliant race, they are not yet sufficiently educated
to be temperate, provident, and foreseeing; that they live for
the present, and are too regardless of the coming time ; that
though industrious, they are improvident—though money-making
they are spendthrift. I would fain believe that the future is too
highly drawn, for, certainly, there is no nation of the world that
puts aside so much wealth from year to year as England. What
is it but thrift that renders this country able to accumulate
capital at such an enormous ratio ? Ask the merchant and the
manufacturer, and they will tell you that they must and do
strain every nerve to increase their capital. The State, it is true,
has no reserve in the Tower to meet any possible contingency of
war as France had, prior to the Napoleonic wars, in the palace
of the Tuileries. We make no account of the blessing of water
when it rains in abundance. We have no public granaries for
the storing of the surplus of prosperous harvest years. Yet
production and saving must be far in excess of our expenditure,
or else how could wealth increase so fast ? No, there is much
saving going on in England, but the effort is made compara
tively by the few. How often do we see calculations, almost
fabulous, of what good could be done if we would only put
aside what is superfluous or wasteful! What number of churches
and schools, of museums and palaces, of parks and gardens,
could be built and provided with the expenses now allotted to
the army and navy, or the sum devoted to the interest of the
national debt, or the amount expended in drink, or any other
luxuries. Alas I alas! the dreams of the reformer are not so
easily realized.
The first step in the way of saving is to spend well.
You
save one pound. Spend it on some evening classes to learn
drawing or mechanics, arithmetic or French, whatever may be
�SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
113
most useful to you. Remember, we are never too old to learn.
Better late than never. You save another pound. Buy Cassell’s
Popular or Technical Educator. Spend it in, or set it aside to
wards, a new set of tools for your employment. • Lay it out, in short,
in what may be useful to you in improving your fitness for work,
in enabling you to raise yourself and earn better wages. Howmuch has been set aside in tools and implements by our work
ing classes it would be difficult to estimate. A joiner’s tools
may be worth £10, and more, but unhappily with the introduc
tion of machinery the labourer is no longer called to provide
himself with tools and implements, and so this form of saving is
rather diminishing than increasing. Well prepared for your
work, look to your house. By all means let it be comfortable,
cheerful, and well furnished. Mr. Mundella noticed the great
demand for pianofortes and other musical instruments for work
ing men’s houses. Do not indulge in luxuries, but do take a
pride in having a pretty house, a full house, and a comfortable
home. Am I wrong in taking ^10 each, at least, as the
value of furniture in the 3,500,000 houses tenanted by working
people? If so, then some ^35,000,000 or ^40,000,000 must
have been set aside by them in this form.
Under no circumstances, I pray you, keep your money in
your pockets, for it may not be long there. The coin is round,
and it rolls away swiftly. Temptations are strong. The shops
are inviting. If you keep your money loose, you may not have
the fortitude to resist the attraction to spend it amiss. So put
it aside. And where ? Not inside an old stocking, not under a
brick, but at the savings bank. The savings banks only com
menced with the opening of the present century. In 1798,
a Miss Priscilla Wakefield founded a bank at Tottenham, for
receiving the savings of workwomen and female domestic ser
vants. In 1799, an offer was made by the Rev. Joseph Smith,
of Wendover, to receive any part of the savings of the people in
his parish every Sunday evening, during the summer, and to
8
�H4
SA CLEGS OR THE WOREiimG CLASSES.
repay them at Christmas, with the addition of one-third of the
whole amount deposited, as a bounty; and in 1810, the Rev.
Henry Duncan founded the Parish Bank Friendly Society at
Ruthwell. These were the days of small things, but institutions
of this nature soon multiplied, and so a Bill was introduced in
the House of Commons by Mr. Whitbread to make use of the
Post Office machinery for the purpose of receiving and repaying
the savings of the people, though matters were not ripe for that
step. However, in 1817 the first Act was passed upon the subject,
authorising the formation of savings banks for the purpose of
receiving deposits of money for the benefit of the persons de
positing, allowing the same to accumulate at compound interest,
and to return the whole, or any part of the same, to depositors,
after deducting the necessary expense of management, but
deriving no profit from the transaction. The limit of the de
posits was set at ^100 for the first year, and /50 for every year
following, and the interest allowed to depositors was 4 per cent,
net; the Commissioners for the Reduction of the National Debt
paying the trustees for the amount invested with them, at the rate
of 3d. per day for every ^100, producing an interest of ^4 iu. 3^.
Some change was made in the limits of deposits in 1824, reducing
it to ^30 for the first year, and ^30 for the subsequent ones; the
whole not to exceed ^150, and interest to cease when principal
and interest amounted to ^200,—as at present. But money
having become less valuable, in 1844 the interest to depositors
was reduced to ^3 os. iod. per cent, per annum. And how
great has been the success of such measures ! In 1817, on the
first formation of these banks, the amount due to depositors
was^^ooo. In 1831, the amount rose to ^15,000,000, and
thirty years after, in-1861, it reached £42,000,000. By that
time, however, the proposal to make use of the Post Office for
facilitating the employment of the savings of the people acquired
more force from the failure of some savings banks, whilst the
eagerness shown by the people in France in responding to the
�SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
115
appeal of Napoleon III. for one loan after another, with full
confidence in their national securities, commended the use of
the Post Office as an instrument for multiplying the means of
depositing the savings of the people all over the country, as
alike convenient and advantageous. So the suggestion years
before made by Mr. Whitbread was taken up in earnest. And
in i860 Mr. Gladstone laid before the House of Commons a
plan which became the basis of the pi esent system. For a
short time, the old savings banks somewhat suffered from the
presence of these fresh competitors, but they speedily recovered,
and now whilst the Trustees Savings Banks have an amount as
large as ever, or ^42,000,000, the Post Office Banks, so suddenly
sprung up, have already in hand ^25,000,000—making in all
^67,000,000.
This amount is supposed to represent, at least to a large ex
tent, the savings of the labouring classes. There is no means,
however, of ascertaining the classes of persons to whom such
deposits really belong. The probability is that not an incon
siderable portion of such savings belongs to the middle classes,
who need such instruments of saving quite as much as the
working classes. If we take two-thirds of the whole amount
as belonging to the working classes, the sum to their credit
would be ^45,000,000. Nor is this all, for there are a large
multitude of small savings banks connected with Sunday
schools, churches, and other societies, which are of great value,
and which would be found to have together a handsome sum.
The present Post Office Savings Banks fail in their not being
open in the evening, particularly on Fridays and Saturdays,
in their not receiving less than one shilling at a time, and in
their limiting the deposits to ^3° a year. The Society of Aits
and the Provident Knowledge Society represented these wants
to the Postmaster-General, and whilst he consented to open the
banks in the evening, at least gradually, he objected to the
diminution of deposits to less than ij. on the ground of expense-
�u6
SAJHNGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
As it is, every transaction of a depositor, whether he pays in
or draws out money, costs the State nearly 6d. Let the de
posit be i^„ and for each transaction the cost may be ij.
To the objection against the limits of £3o, the Postmaster
said that it was necessary to maintain it on account of
expense, and also for the purpose of keeping clear of com
petition with the ordinary business of bankers. Meanwhile,
however, the National Penny Bank has been founded, in which
our friend Mr. Hamilton Hoare takes a deep interest. It is
open in the evening. It has school branches and workshop
branches, and it is perfectly safe. Patronise it with your pennies,
Do not imagine, indeed, that every penny or pound once de
posited at the savings banks is allowed to remain there. Far,
far from it. It is an advantage certainly of the savings bank
that you have no trouble in taking out whatever you need, but
remember the pith and marrow of the transaction is to keep the
money there. Once taken out, unless, indeed, for the purpose
of a better investment, and it is done. Look at the accounts for
1875, for England only. During that year the old Trustees
Savings Bank received /6,656,000, and actually paid out
^7?O49?OO°? or more than they got. True, some of that money
has possibly been transferred to the Post Office Savings Banks,
and there we find that they received in the year .£8,779,000,
and paid back £6,864,000. But, certainly, it is not satisfactory
that, with receipts amounting in all to upwards of £i5,ooo,oooj
the amount left, or saved, in all the savings banks in one year,
was only £1,5 22,000. Just imagine how many must have tried to
save something, and how few have been able to manage it. How
many must have started with a good resolution, how few were
strong enough to keep to it. And how many must have used
the savings banks simply for a temporary convenience, probably
till Christmas or Whitsuntide, or till the want or the fancy
came to buy something. Thankful, indeed, we may be that
so much has been gathered, and that such a substantial sum
�OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
H7
as /45 000,000, or thereabout, remains there on account of the
nrkino- classes Only remember, it is the accumulation of very
- a matter of fact, if we compare the deposrts
per head of the population in 18S1 and .874, - find tha he
smallest per centage increase has been m England
Whilst^
England the increase was at the rate of 53 pei
•>
it was 175 per cent., and in Scotland 200 per cent.
In connection with savings banks I pray you to remember that
by allowing 3 per cent, per annum the nation loses a large sum
of money every year* The Post Office Savings Banks allow only
per cent., and I venture to say that with the present low
value of money it will not be long before the Trustees Savings
Banks will have to revise their system, unless they obta
greater freedom in the choice of investments. In France, the
savings banks invest their funds in landed and other real pro
perty^ well as in the public funds. In Belgium, they even dis
count bills. InHolland,theylendonmortgages. Needlsaytha
in the United Kingdom all the deposits are invested in the Bntis
funds 7 Whether or not greater latitude might be allowed in the
investments consistently with sufficient security, .s a question for
grave consideration. Comparing the savings bank system in
England and other countries, it would appear that England stands
far ahead, in Europe at least. In 1874, m England and Wales,
the savings banks had £2 yn 8<Z. per head, Scotland £1 1 w.
Ireland nr., France gs. toil., Holland Jr. 4rf, Austria 36s. yi.,
Germany 3^., Switzerland 84s., Italy r6r. 6.. While Great
Britain had 9,436 depositors for every 100,000 persons, Switzer
land had 20,3m, and France only 5,600. But, for purposes of
comparison, you must take into account other faculties of invest
ments, and the habits of the people. The workmg people 0
France and Belgium are less venturesome than those of Englan .
* On the 20th November, 1876, the deficiency from the amount of the liabilitS of tie Government, and the value of the securities held by the Com
missioners for the Reduction of the National Debt, amounted to £a,5^,727
�H8
0^
l^OA^VG CLASSES.
They prefer becoming rentieres, or fundholders, to having money
at their disposal at the savings bank, and still more they like a
plot of ground which they may call their own. The subdivision
o and in France certainly favours this, and the Frenchman
e lghts m it. In England land is not to be had. The funds
o not present much facility for investment. Whilst in England
no m°re than 228,696 persons are entitled to various amounts
of dividends on the several kinds of stock in the public funds, in
rance the number of fundholders is given at 5,500,000. It is
safety and physical grasp of the property that mostly attract
the Frenchman. The Englishman is quite prepared to hazard a
ittle more for profit. After all, the savings banks offer no suffi
cient compensation. All they do is to keep for you any sum
of money you please, paying you as high a rate of interest as
and indeed more than, money is worth in this great storehouse
of capital.
Next to having some ready money always available in case
of need, we do well if we can make provision to secure some
help m case of sickness, or special contingencies ■ and here come
to our aid the many friendly societies. In the savings banks
e depositor’s capital remains his own, he has full freedom to
use it howsoever he likes, and can withdraw it whenever he
likes. In a friendly society the capital of the members con
stitutes a common fund; the investor is understood to devote the
amount to the object of the society, and he can get the fund
back only on the happening of certain events. The purposes
of friendly societies are very varied. They relieve members in
sickness and old age ; they furnish proper medicine and medical
attendance; they provide members with assistance when tra
velling in search of employment; they assist them when in
istress ; they provide a sum on the death of members for their
widows and children; and they defray the expense of burialcomplete list of such societies in every part of the kingdom
would show how extensively the spirit of association is in opera-
�SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
tion First is the Manchester Unity of Odd Fellows Next is
the Ancient Order of Fore^XtXVd" ReZite
Zpeyran“ FrieX' sXyZ for its motto, “ We will drink
LX for Jonadab the son of Rechab our father commanded
"Z Ye shall drink no wine, neither ye nor your sons, fo
ever.” Besides these, and among many others we ha«t e^
c*
a »
TJparts of Oak Benefit Society?
Dreids” “The Loyal Order of Ancient Shepherds,” “The Order
golden Fleece,” “ The Stat of the E-t,” and many mu,
numberin'* together one million and a quarter of members Aft
heTe come the burial societies, with another milhon mid hatf of
members. Then the societies
ZdLiXs ” aL
Sisters ” the “ Comforting Sisters,” the United Siste ,
Xe Daughters of Temperance.” The Scottish Societies go
by the names of “ The Humane,” “ The Protector,
Accord” “The Thistle” Ireland has her Emerald Isle T
bne So’ciety,” the “ Adam and Eve Tontine,” the “ St. DommiP
“St Ignatius,”“St. Joseph,” andmany more. Besides the frien y
societE proper, there are the trade unions, which are friendly
societies and something more ; the industrial an provi en
societies, constituted for carrying on trade ; the loan socie i
and co-operative societies, which have of late made wonderfu
progress. These friendly societies have been ivi e
y
commissioners into seventeen classes. And even these byno
means exhaust all the varieties of societies thus formed. A
y
all solvent? Can they be all recommended? Their object is,
doubtless, good, their intention excellent. But do they Kt e
proper precautions in their investments of money. Do they t
sufficient account of the rate of mortality in the different emp oyments. Are the returns they give reliable ? Should W society
of this character be allowed to meet at public-houses
I
hone the Act recently passed may eventually afford sufficient
guarantees for the 4,000,000 members interested in sue
�120
SA™rCS OF THE WORIawG CLASSES.
societies, having together about g'to,000,000 or ZI2 000 000
"aXa‘
°f thCir
ove^xx:: xx xxxsfrom bWers’
yourseives with such societies, XXXXZXX
are registered, those whose accounts are properly audited and
ose which can produce real certificates that they are sound
solvent, and safe.*
ouna’
.. °.f friendl>'societies th= most useful, when properly used are
«
certa-n
AXr
"r ; “d theSC
”gSa° yiS
"’1WSe
te™inatin»’
F“Xbe
J- °r Peil°dlcal sums> "’h>oh accumulate till the
ate sufficient to give a stipulated sum to each member
When the whole is divided amongst them. The members of
funds
sue societies may have the amount of their share in anticipation
by allowing a large discount,-not all, however, but such as by a’
sort of auction, bid the highest sum of discount, the repayment
bemg secured by mortgages on real or household property The
P-mnent societies do not disso.ve upon the completion of the
ares In a termmatmg society a person must either become
member at the time the'society is established or else pay a
rge amount of back subscriptions. In a permanent, one mac
become a member at any time. In a terminating, one does not
now ow ong he has to continue his payments, and how much
ay withdraw. In a permanent, he does. Together they
have a capital of some ^2,000,000, of which perhaps ,£8,000,000
may belong to the working classes. Are building societies advantageous as an investment for the working classes ? Are they
sa^e.
toperly conducted, a building society ought to be safe,
FrieJdlySodetv^n1305^ tHat
Government shou’d establish a National
the PostOffice Savin*s Banks;
of the causes and d ° t
%
X
abS6nCe °f any reliable data
cost of management n nd°th
]iaMity to decePtion2 the
meats
&
’
he dlfficulty of securing the continuance of pay-
�SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
121
for it invests its funds in houses and other real property, and
it ought to be able to calculate exactly what its funds at com
pound interest are likely to produce. And as for conveni
ence, I can conceive no investment more attractive than one
which may enable you in a comparativly few years to have a
house of your own. In London, indeed, the distance between
your house and your work, the expense of living in the suburbs,
and the uncertainty of remaining long in any employment m
any locality, may prove an obstacle to the purchase of a house,
but I cannot conceive a more mischievous disposition m any
family than that of being continually shifting from place to
place. “A rolling stone gathers no moss.” What waste is the
expense of removing ! What unfixedness of habits '. What
discouragement to beautify your house—to make it a home.
Stay still, my friends. And by all means if you can, buy a house
for yourselves. It is the best and most profitable expenditure
you can possibly make.
The building society will provide you with a house to dwell
in. The friendly society will see that in sickness you have a
doctor, and that on your death you may have a decent burial.
But what of the friends you must leave behind? For any
security to them, you must have recourse to the provident
principle of life insurance. Based on the fixedness of the law
of nature, which not only lays a bound to our natural life, but
seems to indicate what proportion of any given number of
human beings is likely to die, at every age, the life insurer
is ready to take upon himself the obligation to pay a certain
amount to your friends and relatives whenever you may die,
be it to-morrow or fifty years hence, provided you engage to
pay, and do actually pay, every year, as long as you live, a fixed
annual premium. Suppose you have a wife and children, and
you are anxious that when you die they shall not remain pemless. If you are thirty years of age you will have to pay, say,
£2 is. 6d. per annum to secure ^100 at death for your friends.
�122
SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
But mind you—and this is a hard measure in life insurancethat if you do miss a single year, you lose all you have put in.
er, say, ten years, you may surrender the policy to the Office
and get some allowance for what you have paid. But not be
fore But can workmen engage to make annual payments, and
an they be sure of continuing them ? This is indeed the difficu ty, or the collection of weekly payments is very costly, and
hitherto, where insurance has been tried among working men, the
proportion of lapses is very large. It is certainly an advantage,
in life insurance, that it compels you to make some self-sacrifice
nay, to make a very hard struggle every year, somehow, to pay
the premium; for the longer you pay it the safer is the policy.
ou are not likely to grudge paying the premium, because you
wish for yourself length of days, whatever it may cost. And the
insurance company will be glad if you live very long, if you be
come a very centenarian, for then it will get the premium out of
you twice or three times over. But workmen having uncertain
employments have great difficulty to meet the demands of life
insurance. Nevertheless, 1 do wish life insurance could be ex
tended among the labouring classes, for it is of great comfort
and benefit, and the upper and middle classes use it largely, up
wards of £300,000,000 being insured upon their lives, upon which
they pay more than £ 10,000,000 per annum in premium. The
Government has provided for the granting of Government
annuities and insurance in connection with the Post Office ; and
there if you only succeed in paying the premium for five years,
you will be entitled, if you wish to discontinue it, to the sur
render value. But the working classes do not seem to have taken
much advantage of the plan. Founded as far back as 1865, con
tracts have been entered into for the purpose by the Post Office,
for less than £300,000. Insurance companies do not come to
you. You must go to them. If you do decide upon insuring, take
care to choose the safest office ; for valuable as life insurance is,
it should not be forgotten that’the actual solvency of the com-
�SAWINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
123
puny depends on the accuracy of the data upon which it carries
on its business, on the rate of mortality which they
™
the rate of interest which they are able to realize,. an
portion of income from premium which they are able tc. reserve
for future expenses and profits. Inthe words of Messrs. Malcolm
and Hamilton, who have reported on the accounts o insurance
companies, “taking insurance business as it ex
country, where adequate premiums are charged, and live
selected with care, the public cannot be misled if, when seek
ing an office in which to effect an insurance, they select one
which transacts its business at a small percentage of wor mg
cost, and does not anticipate its profits.”
. .
I have mentioned among the friendly societies, the co
operative societies, both for distribution and production. Co
operative societies may be regarded as a means of invest
ment, and as a mode of securing a more liberal reward for
labour. It is not indeed put forth that either co-operative
societies or industrial partnerships can supersede effectua ly, or
in any important degree, the present relation of capital an
labour, as by far the simplest and capable of the wides
application, yet it is conceived that by affording grea er
encouragement to save, and ampler opportunities tor the
profitable use of such savings, many who at present have
other prospect than that of remaining m a condition of com
parative dependence, may eventually become possessed of a
small capital. How to give to the consumer direct access o
the producer ; how to give to the immediate producer, that ,
labour, direct access to capital, either directly, by an antecede»
act of aggregate saving on the part of the producer himself or
mediately, by crediting the immediate producer or labourer with
the necessary capital,-these are the objects which co-operation
seeks to obtain. Co-operative societies have been formed or
distribution and production, and even for credit. The con
ception is certainly simple and practical. Here are a hundre
�■24
SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
men goring yearly’ Say< Z4° each> at Ieast> of commodities,
which if bought wholesale will cost no more than £3o Form
a co-operative society to buy direct such provisions from the
producer, and the profit which the retailers would have gained
Will form a substantial economy to the consumers. Or let the
price of the commodities consumed remain as they would be if
so
y retailers, and let the profits accumulate in the hands of
such society; and you will have, by degree, a handsome capital
belonging to such members, which may be employed in prouction. And thus, from a co-operative society for distribution
you may easily rise to a co-operative society for production’
Here are a thousand operatives, each having a small savinoGather them savings together to form the capital. Let the con
tributors be themselves the operatives, and the combination
will seem perfect. But how should the relative rights of capital
and labour be adjusted ? The workman, as a capitalist, has an
interest m increasing, as much as possible, the profits of the
establishment, but as a workman he is still more interested in
securing a liberal rate of wages. Here an antagonism of
interests is sure to follow, and it is a great question whether the
problem admits of a satisfactory solution. But I have supposed
t e existence of capital in the hands of the labourers. What
if they have no such capital? Can they be credited with it ?
What security can they offer? Shall we ask the State to lend
capital to such labourers if the capitalists will not incur the
usk ? The idea is in itself preposterous.
Take, however, the most probable case, where labourers have
on y a very small capital. Shall we encourage them to em
ploy their savings in co-operative societies for production ? A
arge portion of the success which attends commercial operations
is the result of the skill and shrewdness of those who engage in
them. Capital is an important element, but the capacity to
know when and where to buy and to sell, and the possession of
a spirit of adventure balanced by prudence and caution, are
�12'5
SA RINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
elements of enormous value in securing success. Can working
men lay claim to such knowledge and foresight
If they
have to depend upon others for the management of such
dertakings, is there no danger of their falling into the hands
of designers and schemers, who will soon squander
savings?
e 1
Of the many"^“^X'CeTXcceeded.
1
t chas are for distribution-as grocers, drapers, and proven
dealers—have succeeded exceedingly well, scarcely anyt formed
for productive purposes can show any real gam.
Whils the
Rochdale Equitable Pioneers-as grocers, provision dea e ,
drapers, tailors-realized a goodly sum, the Rochdale card manu
facture realized nothing, and so in a number of instances. The
recent abandonment of the principle of industrial partner^.by
Messrs. Briggs has been exceedingly disappomtmg to the fnends
“ co-operatfon ; and so also has the breakdown of the Ouseburn
Engine Works, of the Shirland Colliery, and the Industnal Ba
in Newcastle. To my mind, there is no royal road to.wealth
The workman must, in some measure, become a capitalist
before he can seek to become a co-operator with the capitalist
in industrial enterprise. And when he has amassed a ittb sum
let him take care what he does with it. In these d y , P
duction on a small scale has no chance of success m competition
with production on a large scale. Great enterprises, w,th la ge
capital, are carried on at much less expense, and can always
command greater facilities. Lay you a solid foundation for your
advancement in a substratum of real capital, foster >t bypru
deuce and foresight, increase it by legitimate means, and yo
may depend upon it that in Z/«t? you will have the surest sa eguard for independence and improvement.
§ The introduction of limited liability in joint stock compam
has opened for the working classes the avenues_ to commercial operations to any extent. All you require is capital,
�^6
SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
and this capital you must gather, little by little, by hard labour
and, it may be, by continuous toil and hardship. Gentlemen it
requires some amount of heroism to set aside any fragment’of
our present income for our future wants, to deprive ourselves
it may be, of needed comforts that we may provide for con
tingencies at present, at least, beyond our ken. But it is worth
doing. A pound to-day and another to-morrow. Now five
pounds and anon ten—it is astonishing how soon the sum grows
if you are only careful. But be you extra cautious how you’
invest your savings, for the more labour we have to give to
the acquisition of small incomes and the accumulation of small
savings, the more incumbent it becomes on us to be on our
guard, lest we should lose it all by carelessness or misemployment. Trust not on the Government to protect you. Keep your
eyes open, and mind what you are about, for once you lose what
you have got, it is extremely difficult to get it again. After all
it is not much we want. Strive for more, but be content with
your lot.
Man s rich with little, were his judgments true ;
Nature is frugal, and her wants are few :
Those few wants answer’d, bring sincere delights ;
But fools create themselves new appetites.”
But, my friends, is it only money that we should seek after?
Are there not treasures of knowledge, treasures of benefaction,
treasures of inward joys and happiness, that we may aspire to
obtain ? Must we all strike the same path ? Have we all the
same talents ? Have we all the same opportunities ? Thirtytwo years ago, a comparative youth came to England, from the
centre of Italy, unknowing and unknown. He had but one talent
—not that of the Universities, either of Oxford or Cambridge,
Pisa or Bologna ; not that of riches, or of fame ; but one com
mon to all—an open eye and an open mind, with perseverance in
duty, and hope and faith to cheer him in his path. He planted
that talent in the British soil, and there it lodged summer and
�SAVINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
127
winter, and winter and summer, giving little signs of life; but
it was growing, and it gave fruit in the establishment of a
Chamber of Commerce in Liverpool, in a work on the Com
mercial Law of the World, and another on the History of Britis
Commerce. And that talent is still growing, and has made its
possessor a barrister-at-law, a member of not a few scientific
societies, and the Professor of the Principles of Commerce
and Commercial Law in King’s College, London ;-the very
one who has now the honour and the pleasure of addressing to
you these Lectures. If you could trace the antecedents of many
of those who are now great, how often would you find that it is
not fortune, or birth, or estate, that produces our best men, but
labour, perseverance, force of will. Read Smiles’ “ Self-made
Men ; ” and you will find that Hargreaves and Crompton were
artiza’ns, and Arkwright a barber. That Telford and Hugh Miller
were stonemasons, and Trevithick amechanic. That Lord Tenterden the judge, and Turner the painter, were both sons of barbers.
That Inigo Jones the architect, and Hunter who discovered
the circulation of the blood, were carpenters. That Cardinal
Wolsey and Defoe were sons of butchers ; that the immorta
John Bunyan was a tinker, and Herschel the astronomer a
bandsman. That James Watt was the son of an instrument
maker, and Faraday the son of a blacksmith ; that Newton’s
father was a yeoman, with a small farm worth iia 6^. a year ;
and Milton the son of a scrivener. That Pope and Southey were
sons of linendrapers, and Shakspeare the son of a butcher
and grazier. That Lord Eldon was the son of a Newcastle coal
fitter and LordJSt. Leonard the son of a barber, who began life
as an errand boy. AU honour to them I Strive you to be like
them.
“ Lives of great men all remind us,
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time ;
�128
SA VINGS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate ;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labour and to wait.’’
Let our occupation be high or low in public estimation,
he is a great man who, by high character and self-mastery,
by culture and industry, by application and perseverance,
secures for himself a true individuality ; and who, with powers
fully developed, and faculties duly expanded, uses whatever
talent he may possess to the glory of God, and to the benefit
of his fellow-creatures.
�appendix a.
Statement of the weekly expenditure, in 1859, of a family consistm«
wife, and three children, whose total wages averaged th'rtV
P
week, as compared with the cost of the same arttclesm 875,>8^ and
|> 1839.—“ Progress of Manchester,” by D. Chadwick, Brit.sh Assomation
1861, revised by Dr. Watts.
|
Articles.
Expenditure in
i875-
Expenditure in
1849.
Expenditure in
1859.
Expenditure in
i
|(I.) Bread, Flour, and
Meal.
S|8 41b. loaves (32 lbs.) .. 6 Id. per 41bs.
IL a peck of meal........... is. 10d.pr.pk.
||l a doz. (6 lbs.) of flour is. lod. pr.dz.
6d. per 4lbs.
is.6d. perpk.
1s.10d.pr.dz.
5Jd. per 41b.
is.8d. perpk.
is.8d. per dz.
5
4
2
I
81- 7 I. per lb
4 9
4
oj
2
O
0
9
6
4
3
xs.4d. per lb. 0
8
0
3
6
8Jd. per 41b.
is-4d. perpk.
2S.4d. per dz.
(II.) Butchers’ Meat
and Bacon,
;lbs. of butchers' meat 8'd. per lb.
dbs. of bacon ................
6Jd. per lb. .
(III.) Potatoes, Milk,
and Vegetables.
2 score of potatoes .... is. per score
7 quarts of milk ............ 4d. per qt. .
Vegetables ....................
tl
is. per score
3d. per qt. ..
I
;. per score
1. per qt. ..
is. per score
3d. per qt...
;. 4d. per lb.
5. 4d. ,,
2S. per lb.
(IV.) Groceries, Coals,
etc.
Jib. of coffee
Jib. of tea ....
31bs. of sugar
albs, of rice ..
1 lb. butter.. ..
21bs. of treacle
rjlbs. of soap
Coals................
Candles...........
xs. id. per lb
I
I
0
I
0
5
6
0
6
6
Rent, taxes, and water
Clothing .........................
Sundries .........................
I
0
0
II
I
.
4
3
2
9
Totals
• 30
0
0
5*
sJ
0
�APFENDIX.
130
AVERAGE WEEKLY EARNINGS OF THE COTTON OPERATIVES.
Week of 69
1839
s. d.
Steam-engine tenders
24 0
Warehousemen .... 18 0
Carding stretchers
7 0
Strippers, young men, women, and
girls....................................... 11 0
Overlookers....................................... 25 0
Spinners on self-acting Winders,
Males
.
.
.
. 16 0
Piecers, women and young men 8 0
Overlookers ..... 20 0
Reeling Throttle, reelers, women 9 0
Warpers
..... 22 0
Sizers............................................... 23 0
Doubling, Doublers, women.
7 0
Overlookers...................................... 24 0
Agricultural—
Devon
Somerset.
Cheshire .
Durham .
i860.
Per week.
8s. to 12s.
12s. ,, 14s.
15s.
15s. to 20s.
Builders—
Masons .
hours.
1849
s. d.
28 0
20 0
7 6
12
28
0
0
14
28
0
0
19
32
18
0
0
0
6
0
0
6
0
20
10
26
0
0
0
6
0
0
0
0
25
16
9
22
9
22
23
7
25
18555s. per day.
1850.
Per month.
Seamen, London—
Mediterranean
.
45s.
...
.
50s.
...
North America
East India and China 40s.
Australia
40s.
Week of 60 hours.
1873
1859
s. d.
s. d.
32 o
30 0
26 o
22 0
12 o
8 0
...
...
9
23
25
9
28
...
30
12
26
30
12
32
o
o
o
o
o
6
o
6
o
1872.
Per week.
9s. to 12s.
13s. ,, 20s.
16s. 6d.
17s. to 20s.
1876.
96. per hour.
...
...
...
...
1874.
Per month.
70s. to 80s. ... 80s. to 90s.
80s. „ 95s. ... 85s. „ 95s.
60s. „ 65s. ... 80s. „ 85s
70s.
�APPENDIX.
APPENDIX B.
BUDGETS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.
Great Britain.
(From the “ Times," November Vjih, 1872.)
Weekly Expenses of a Farm Labourer in 1872 in East Sussex :—
Per week.
£ s. d.
£, s. d.
0 7 0
7 gallons of flour
.
.
0 i 4
1 lb. butter
.
.
0 0 4
2 oz. tea *
.
.
.
.
.
0 0 7
2 lb. sugar *
.
.
0 1 3
2 lb. cheese
,
.
0 0 3i
Milk
....
.
.
0 O 2
1 lb. soap
.
.
0 O I
Soda and blue .
.
.
0 0 10J
i| lb. candles .
.
.
0 O 7
Schooling
.
.
0 0 3
Cotton and mustard
•
•
0 I 0
Washing and mangling .
.
.
0 2 0
Rent
....
0 15 10
Extra expenses per annum :—
£> s. d.
Benefit club .
Boots
....
Clothes ....
Tools ....
Faggots ....
Extra food in hop drying
1
O IO
4
0
0
0
0
0
12
4
2
I
0
2
7
4
14
0
4
0
equal to 0 3 0
o 18 10
�132
APPENDIX.
Income and Expenditure of a Tobacco Spinner in Edinburgh, the Family
consisting of Six Persons. Income: Father, 25s.; Boy in the Telegraph
Service, 6s.—total, 31s.
Expenditure :—
£
Bread, 361b. ; meat, 4Mb. ; flour, 71b. ;
rice, ilb. ; potatoes, 10J lb ; sugar,*
51b ; tea, * Jib. ; coffee, * Jib. ; butter,
0
i|lb.......................................................
Beer,* 4 pints; spirits nil; tobacco,*
0
302.........................................................
House rent ......
0
Coal and gas...................................
0
Clothing............................................
0
Taxes....................................................
0
vhurch or chapel, 4d. ; amusements,
rd.; benefit club, is. id. ; doctors
bill, and sundries, 2s. 6d.
0
Zr
16 6
0
2 4
8
I
4 0
0 34
2
4 0
IO
94
Per cent.
Taxes.
54
s. d.
0 6
6
7
6
13
I
I
9
0 34
13
IOO
64
2
Income and Expenditure of a Printer, Single Man, living in London.
Income £1 16s. od. a-week :—
z s. d.
Bread, i21b. ; meat, 41b. ; flour, 41b. ;
potatoes, 81b.; sugar,* ilb.; tea,* 202.;
coffee,* 2oz. ; butter, iooz.
Beer,* 14 pints ; spirits, * 1 quartern ;
tobacco,* 40Z........................................
House rent...................................
Coal and gas......
Clothin
......
Church, amusements, laundress .
Per cent.
0 9 8
4i
0 3
■0 5 0
0 2 6
0 I 6
0 2 6
0 2 6
21
1 4
Z*
3
8
Taxes.
II
6
II
IO
IOO
1
7
�APPENDIX.
*33
France.
{From Lord Brabazon s Report, vFjz, p. 45.)
Average. Expenditure of a Married Day Labourer’s Family, consisting of
Father, Mother, and Three Children, with a Collective Income of
£24 is. 7d.
£. s. d. Per cent.
Bread,* vegetables, meat,* milk, salt
59
13 15 7
6
I 7 2
Wine* beer,* and cider* ....
I 13 7
7
Lodging* (tax on doors and windows) .
I
5
5 8
Firing*....................................................
I
0 4 6
Taxes....................................................
16
3 12 9
Clothing*....................................................
6
I
5 9
Other expenses............................................
£23
5 0
IOO
Prussia.
{Dr. Engel’s Table.}
Percentage of the Expenditure of the Family of
A Working Man with A Man of Middle A Person n easy circum
stances with
Class with
an income of
an income from Z 9° an income from ZrS0
from
to Z 220 a year.
Z45 to Zoo a year.
to ZI2° a year.
Per cent.
. 62
Subsistence
. 16
Clothing .
.
. 12
Lodging .
Firing and lighting 5
Education, public
.
. 2
worship
Legal protection
. 1
Care of Health
. 1
Comfort, mental and
bodily recreation 1
IOO
Per cent.
55
18
12
5
3’5
2
2
i’5
IOO
Per cent.
50
18
12
5
5'5
3
3
3‘5i
TOO
�134
APPENDIX.
Netherlands.
(Mr, Locock's Report, 1871, p. 351.)
Weekly Expenses of a Mason, with a Wife and Two Children :—
Bread,* butter, milk, sugar,*
coffee,* suet, flour, potatoes,
Per cent.
s. d.
greens, meal, salt, bacon, oil,
II 11
tobacco,* soap,* etc.
53
2 0
House rent
9
6
I 3
Firing*
....
2 1
Clothing * .
.
.
9
Sundries ....
• 5 3
23
22 6
.
100
Switzerland (Bale).
(dZ. Gould's Report, 1872, p. 366.)
Yearly Expenditure of a Working Man’s Family :—
Bread, coffee, chicory, milk, potatoes, butter, oil, meat, vege£ s.
tables ....
29 6
Rent...................................
IO 8
Wood
....
4 0
Taxes
....
0 6
Clothing ....
6 0
Sick Fund
0 16
d.
2
O
O
5
0
0
50 16 7
Per cent.
57
.
20
8
.
0
.
12
3
.
100
Russia.
Annual Expenditure of a Peasant Family, consisting of Father and Son, Two
Brothers, and a Third Young Man, in the Province of Novgorod :—
(Consul Michel's Report on Land Tenure, p. 63.)
z * d.
8o| bush, rye from the land, 361b. fish, 1
sack wheat, 2.88 bush, buckwheat, salt ...
30 o
Dress,* boots, etc.
.
.
.
.
.
2 13 4
Taxes, Imperial and Provincial, at 3 roubles
per male .......
1 4
Village priest
.
.
.
.
.
o
�APPENDIX.
135
(Consul Gregnon's Report, 1871, p. 54.)
Estimated Expenditure for a Single Man, Factory Hand, for a
d.
Day’s Living in Riga
3 lbs, Russ, rye bread, at 2A copecks
si
1 lb. Russ, meat
....
3k
Coffee,* sugar, and milk.................................................. 12
Potatoes.............................................................................02
Butter........................................................................ ......
Herrings...............................................................................
Barley meal..............................................
.
. ok
10
To the above must be added lodging, capitation-tax, clothing, and per
sonal expenses.
(Consul Campbell's Report, 1872, p. 312.)
A Manufactory Workman’s Monthly Expenditure at Helsingfors
s. d.
£ s. d.
Food,
24 to30 marks .
. o 19 o to 1 3 9
Fuel,
2 ,, 2j „
.
. o 1 7 „ o 2 o
Lodging, 10,, 12 ,,
.
.080,, 096
Clothing,* 10 ,, 12J ,,
.
. o 7 o ,, o 9 6
1 15 7
2 4 9
United States (Pennsylvania).
(Mr. Consul Kortright’s Report, 1871, p. 921.)
Weekly Cost of Living of Two Parents and Three Children
in Philadelphia:—
Bread, flour, meat, butter, cheese,
Per cent.
sugar,* milk, coffee,* tea,*
£ s. d.
fish, salt, eggs, potatoes,
I 8 6 .
fruit
.
.
,
.
.
■
54
. 24
0 13 0
Rent............................................
6
0 3 3 •
Light * and Fire
.
.
0 7 5 •
Clothing *
....
■
14
0 0 4! •
Taxes...................................
•
2
0 0 9J
Other Expenses
2 13 3
100
�136
APPENDIX.
United States.
(From the Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of the Statistics of Labour.}
Percentage of the Expenditure of the Family of a Working Man
with an income—
From ^60
ZI2O
/150
Above
Z90
Average
to Z90. to/'lCO. to/150. to ^zso. ^250.
Per cent. Per cent. Per cent. Per cent. Per cent. Per cent.
Subsistence.
. 64
60
63
56
5t
58
Clothing
10-5
19
14
• 7
74
15
Rent .
. 20
15
16
14
i5'5
17
Fuel
. 6
6
6
6
5
6
Sundry Expenses 3
6
6
10
6
5
—
----------■
----- IOO
IOO
IOO
IOO
IOO
IOO
�APPENDIX.
137
APPENDIX C.
Report of the Committee of the British Association for the
Advancement of Science, on Combinations of Capital and
Labour. Lord Houghton, D.C.L., F.R.S. (chairman); Jacob
Behrens, Esq.; Thomas Brassey, Esq., M.P.; Frank P.
Fellows, Esq.; Archibald Hamilton, Esq.; Professor Leone
Levi; A. J. Mundella, Esq., M.P.; Wm. Newmarch, Esq.,
F.R.S.; Lord O’Hagan; R. J. Inglis Palgrave, Esq.; Professcr
Thorold Rogers. Submitted by Professor Leone Levi, and
ordered to be printed and laid before the Association.
Your Committee appointed to inquire into the economic effects
of Combinations of labourers or capitalists, and into the laws of
Economic science bearing on the principles on which such
Combinations are founded, have already stated in their preli
minary Report made last year, the course they have thought
to take in order to ascertain the exact views held by both
employers and employed on the subject in question. Although
the general objects of such Combinations, whether of capitalists
or labourers, are well known, both from the written rules, which
bind them together, and from the action taken from time to
time, your Committee have deemed it desirable to come into
personal contact with some representative men from both classes,
with a view of finding whether they do now stand by the rules
of their Unions, and how far they are prepared to defend them.
And for that purpose, your Committee resolved to hold a con
sultative private conference of employers and employed m the
presence of the members of the. Committee, where they might
discuss the questions involved in the resolution of the British
Association, and with a view of reporting thereon to the same.
The points more especially inquired into were the following :—
1 st. What determines the minimum rate of wages ?
2nd. Can that minimum rate be uniform in any trade, and
can that uniformity be enforced ?
3rd. Is Combination capable of affecting the rate of wages,
whether in favour of employers or employed ?
�138
APPENDIX.
4th. Can an artificial restriction of labour or of capital be
economically right or beneficial under any circumstances?
For the discussion of these questions your Committee had
the advantage of bringing together a deputation from the
National Federation of Associated Employers of Labour, in
cluding Messrs. R. R. Jackson, M. A. Brown, H. R. Greg,
Joseph Simpson, J. A. Marshall, R. Hannen, and Henry Whit
worth. As representing labour : Messrs. Henry Broadhurst,
Daniel Guile, George Howell, Loyd Jones, George Potter, and
Robert Newton; Mr. Macdonald, M.P., and Mr. Burt, M.P.,
having been prevented from attending. And on the part of
your Committee there were Lord Houghton, Professor Rogers,
Mr. Samuel Brown, Mr. W. A. Hamilton, Mr. Frank Fellows,
and Professor Leone Levi.
Many are the works and documents bearing on the questions
at issue. Of an official character we have the Report of the
Royal Commission appointed “ to inquire into and report upon
he organization and rules of Trade Unions and other associa
tions, whether of workmen and employers and to inquire into
and report on the effects produced by such Trade Unions and
associations on the workmen and employers and on the relations
between workmen and employers and on the trade and industry
of the country.” Of an unofficial character we have the Report
of the Committee of the Social Science Association “on the
objects and constitution of Trade Societies, with their effects
upon wages and upon the industry and commerce of the country.”
Of special works we have the late lamented Professor Cairnes’
“ Leading Principles of Political Economy,” Mr. Thomas
Brassey’s “Work and Wages,” and Professor Leone Levi’s
“Wages and Earnings of the Working Classes.”
The chief functions of Combinations, whether of Capital or
Labour, being to operate on wages, your Committee were
anxious to ascertain by what criterion the parties interested
ordinarily judge of the sufficiency or insufficiency of existing
wages. The first test of the sufficiency of wages is the re
lation they bear to the cost of the necessaries of life. “The
minimum of wages,” said Prof. Rogers, “ is the barest possible
amount upon which a workman can be maintained ; that
which, under the most unfavourable circumstances, a man is
able to obtain.” But the minimum thus estimated can only be,
and is, submitted to under circumstances of extreme necessity.
“ I believe the minimum rate of wages,” said one of the repre
sentatives of labour, “ is that which, under the worst circum
stances, the worst workman gets from the worst master.” We
cannot, therefore, take the minimum rates so considered as a
proper basis for the sufficiency of wages. How far insufficient
wages in relation to the cost of living in the U nited Kingdom is
�APPENDIX.
139
a cause of the large emigration which is taking place fiom year
to year it is not possible to establish ; * but, doubtless the pros
pect held out in the distant Colonies and in the United States
of America of considerable improvement has been for some
time past and still is a strong inducement. to those m receipt of
insufficient wages in this country to emigrate to other lands
Your Committee are desirous to point out in connection with
this question that not only has the cost of some of the principal
necessaries of life greatly risen within the last twenty years but
that in consequence of the general increase of comfort and
luxury many articles of food, drink, and dress must now be
counted as necessaries which some years ago were far beyond
the reach of the labouring classes ; whilst house rent, especiallyadapted for the labouring classes, is considerably dearer. If,
therefore, the cost of living be taken as a guide to he rate of
wages, it would not be enough to take into account the cost of
the mere necessaries of life. A higher standard of living having
been established, it would be indispensable to compare the
wages of labour to such higher standard. Your Committee are
not satisfied, however, that it is possible to regulate wages
according to the scale of comfort or luxury which may be
introduced among the people, and are compelled to assert that
it is an utter fallacy to imagine that wages will rise or fall m
relation to the cost which such supposed necessaries or indul
gences may entail.
.
,
A better test of the sufficiency of wages is the relation they
bear to the state of the labour market; and tested by that
standard the minimum rate of wages which workmen are at
any time prepared to accept is the least which they think they
are entitled to have under existing circumstances, the 1 rade
Unions guiding them, as to the state of trade and the value of
labour at the time. Unfortunately, however, what workmen
think themselves entitled to have does not always correspond
with what employers find themselves able to grant. Primarily
the wages of labour are'determined, by the. amount of capital
available for the purpose of wages in relation to the number
of labourers competing for the same. But the amount ot
capital employed in any industry is itself governed by con
siderations of the relation of the cost of production to the
market price of the produce—that is, to the price which the
.consumer is able or willing to give for the same : the cost of
production including the cost of materials, the value ot capital,
the cost of superintendence, and the wages of labour.
* The average number of emigrants in the last ten years from the United
Kingdom, from 1862 to 1873, was 239,000 per annum. In 1873, the total
number was 310,612, and in 1874, 241, 014. The emigration to the United
States decreased from 233,073 in 1873, to 148,161 in 1874.
�140
APPENDIX.
Objection has been taken at the Conference to this method
for arriving at the rate of wages ; and it was urged that instead
of taking the price of the article produced, or the interest of
the consumer, as the basis of the calculation, the first ingredient
in the cost of the article should be the price to be paid to the
workman in producing it. But a serious consideration will
show that the employer cannot ignore what the consumer can
or will pay any more than the share which the value of capital,
the cost of superintendence, and the cost of the materials have
upon the cost of production ; for he must cease producing
altogether if he cannot both meet the ability of the consumer
to purchase his article and successfully compete with the
producers of other countries. Your Committee think that it is
not in the power of the employer to control the proportion of
the different elements in the cost of production, each of them
being governed by circumstances peculiar to itself. The value
of Capital, as well as the value of the raw materials, is regu
lated by the law of supply and demand, not only in this
country, but in the principal markets of the world. The cost
of superintendence and the wages of labour are likewise governed
by the relation of the amount of capital to the number seeking
to share in the different employments. The employed say,
“'We must have certain wages. We care for nothing else.
Labour is our property. We set our value upon it. If you
will have our labour you must pay what we ask for it. And
if such wages should require a rise in the market price, let the
consumer pay it.” What however, if the consumer will not
or cannot pay sufficient price to enable the employer to pay
such wages ? What, if he can get the article cheaper else
where ? Must not production cease if there be no market ?
And where will be the wages if there be no production? Nor
should it be forgotten that a general rise of wages producing
an increase of the cost of all the commodities of life reacts on
the masses of the people, and thus far neutralizes the benefit
of higher wages.
Disagreements between employers and employed are often
produced on the subject of wages by the fact that all the
elements of the case are not within the cognizance of both
parties ; experience showing that in making a demand for an
advance of wages, or for resisting a fall, workmen are of
necessity groping in the dark as to the real circumstances of
the case. One of the chief advantages supposed to result from’
the organization of Trade Unions is the competency of their
leaders to give solid and practical advice to those interested,
as to the condition of the labour market; and we have no
doubt that this duty is in the main honestly performed, but it is
very much to expect that such leaders should universally possess
�APPENDIX.
141
laive and liberal views enough to vindicate the exercise of their
enormous power, and such constant and accurate knowledge
of the multiple facts of the case as would enable them to
exercise an almost infallible authority. On the other hand,
were it possible for employers, who are not in the dark in such
matters, to make known to their own workmen the grounds of
the action they propose taking before the resolve is carried
into execution, your Committee are convinced that many
disputes would be avoided, and much of the jealousy which
now exists between the parties would be removed. The recent
lock-out in South Wales illustrated the need of such a course.
Had the facts which Lord Aberdare elicited from the principal
colliery firms in Glamorganshire been made known previous
to or simultaneously with the notice of a fall, it is a question
whether such a widespread calamity would have occurred.
It is perhaps a natural but unfortunate circumstance that
employers are seldom found to take the initiative in allowing
a rise in wages when the state of the market permits it as they
are in case of a fall, and spontaneously to offer what they must
sooner or later be compelled to grant. A more prompt and
politic course on their part in this matter would go far to
neutralise the hostile action of Trade Unions.
Your Committee were anxious to ascertain how far is it in
the mind of the employed that the employers obtain for them
selves too large a share of profits at their expense. Your Com
mittee were assured that no such doubts are entertained, though
cases were produced supporting such suspicions by reference to
the time of the great rise in the price of coals in 1873, when
workmen’s wages did not, in the opinion of the representatives
of labour, rise to anything like the proportion of the masters’
profits.* Your Committee admit that in cases of great oscilla
tions in prices, the share participated either by the employers
in the shape of profits, or by the employed in the shape of
wages, may be for a time greater or less than their normal
distribution would justify. And it is possible that some portions
of these extra profits may be unproductively spent or so em
ployed as not to benefit the parties more immediately _ con
cerned, and even used in totally alien speculations. Yet, in the
main, the working classes must receive in one way or another,
a considerable advantage from them, there being .no doubt that
the largest portion of such extra profits will be reinvested in the
* Mr. Halliday’s evidence before the Committee of the House of
Commons on coals, was that, though the custom was to give to work
men a portion of any rise of prices in the shape of increasing wages,
the proportion being an additional 2d. a day for every 10L a ton, the
rise in wages was often id. per ton only and sometimes nothing, whilst
when the price rose ar. 6d. to 55. a ton the wages were only increased 3^.
a day.
�142
APPENDIX.
ordinary industries of the country. In the end, however, wages
and profits will be divided among the producers in proper pro
portions, and if at any time profits or wages should be larger
than they ought to be, we may be quite sure that ere long the
competition of capitalists will tend either to the lowering of
prices or the raising of wages so as to make profits and wages
gravitate towards each other.
Immediately allied to the question of the determination of a
minimum of wages is that of their uniformity. In the opinion
of many Trade Unions, all workmen of average ability in any
trade should earn the same wages, the average ability of each
man being understood to have been determined in advance by
the fact of his being admitted as a member of the Union. But
a man is subject to no examination, and is generally admitted
upon the testimony of those who have worked with him, whose
evidence must frequently be fallacious and insufficient. Nor
does it appear that the rejection is absolutely certain even if
the applicant should not be deemed a man of average ability,
the acceptance or rejection of the party being always optional
with the lodge to which he is introduced. Your Committee are
therefore not satisfied that any guarantees exist that every
member of a Union is able to earn a fair day’s wages for a
fair day’s work ; and they cannot, therefore, agree in the pro
position that all workmen should be entitled to uniform wages
on the ground of uniform ability. But another reason has been
alleged for the uniformity of wages—which is still less tenable
than the former—viz., a supposed uniformity of production in
dependent of skill. The right of the workman to a uniform
standard of wages was stated to be the production of an article
which, though demanding less skill to perform, is of equal
utility and is proportionally as profitable to the employer.
Your Committee must, however, entirely demur to the principle
that, in the apportionment of wages, no account should be
taken of the skill brought to bear on the execution of the task,
since a system of that nature would act as a premium on in
feriority of workmanship. Again, by another test should the
right of each individual to earn certain wages be determined,
and that is by his productive capacity. Professor Levi asked
whether that was taken into account when the workman was
assumed to be of average ability ; and the answer was that the
amount of production depended largely upon the skill. “ The
more skilful a man is the more he will produce.” But whilst, in
so far as this answer was correct, it contradicted the principle
embodied in the preceding test, the answer itself did not take
sufficiently into account that skill is not the only element in
effectiveness of labour. There are qualities of mind, judgment,
and even of heart, disposition, and of moral character, which
�APPENDIX.
143
go far to increase or diminish the efficiency of labour ; and of
such qualities the employer is, of necessity, a far better judge
than any Union can be. That under ordinary circumstances
wages in any trade should tend to uniformity is quite possible.
The facility of communication and the extension of intercourse
of necessity equalise prices and wages : but any attempt to
compel uniformity of wages among any large number of men
of varied capacity must of necessity prove a source of dis
appointment. Much, again, may be said in favour of a common
standard of wages in any industry, as avoiding the embarrass
ment necessarily encountered in any attempt to adjust the
rate to the exact worth of each individual. Yet it is impossible
to ignore the fact that, whilst a uniform rate is sure to operate
unjustly in favour of persons who may be wanting in fairness
of dealing or capacity for workmanship, in the nature of things
it is almost incapable to exist over a wide area, having regard
to the varieties in the prices of fuel, carriage, house accommo
dation, or of the means of livelihood, as well as in the cost of
raw materials and in the processes employed as affecting the
rate of production of each individual. On the whole, your
Committee find that an absolute uniformity in the rate of wages
in any trade, though to a certain extent convenient, is neither
just nor practicable, whilst any effort to compel uniformity in
the amount of earnings of any number of individuals must
prove fallacious and wrong as an illegitimate interference with
the rights of industry.
A still more important question in connection with the subject
is how far Combination of any kind can affect permanently or
temporarily the rate of wages. Upon this, as might be ex
pected, the most divergent opinions are held by the repre
sentatives of Capital and Labour. The employers of labour,
standing on the solid principles of political economy, deny that
Combinations can under any circumstances affect the rates of
wages, at least in any permanent manner. The argument
adduced being that if workmen are entitled to higher wages
they are sure to get them, since, under the law of supply and
demand, whenever it is found that profits trench unduly upon
wages fresh capital is sure to be introduced, which provides for
the raising of wages. The employed, on the other hand, con
fidently appeal to past experience, and point out the fact that
almost every increase of wages has been due to the action of
Trade Unions. They say that without Combination workmen
cannot secure the market price for their labour, but are to a
certain extent at the mercy of their employers. That in trades
where one establishment employs a large number of workmen
the employers can discharge a single workman with compara
tively slight inconvenience, while the workman loses his whole
�144
APPENDIX.
means of subsistence. That without the machinery of Com
bination the workmen, being dependent upon their daily work
for their daily bread, cannot hold on for a market.
Your Committee are not prepared to deny that Combinations
can render useful service in matters of wages; but they think
that it is impossible for them to frustrate or alter the operations
of the laws of supply and demand, and thereby to affect per
manently the rates of wages. Combination may hasten the
action of those laws which would undoubtedly, though perhaps
more slowly, operate their own results. The limited power of
Combinations is in effect admitted by the workmen themselves.
“We do not say,” said one of the workmen’s representatives,
“ that Trade Unions can absolutely interfere with supply and
demand, because, when trade is very bad, they cannot obtain
the standard ; when it is good they easily raise the standard.
What they do is, they enable workmen sooner to strike at the
right time for a general advance. They get the advance sooner
than if they were an undisciplined mob, having no common
understanding. And when trade is receding, the common
understanding enables workmen to resist the pressure put upon
them by their employers. It helps them in both ways, and the
workmen find they can act together beneficially.” The ground
here taken by the working-men is not at variance with sound
economic principles. But there is yet another way in which
Trade Unions may prove useful, and that is by rendering wages
more sensitive to the action of the state of the market, and so
preventing the influence of custom to stand in the way of the
operation of supply and demand ; for there are such occupa
tions, as agriculture, where custom often exercises imperious
rule even upon wages. As has been well said by M. Batbie,
Wages do not change unless the causes for the change exercise
a strong influence. If the conditions of supply and demand do
not undergo a great change, wages continue the same by the
simple force of custom. The variations of wages are not like
those of a thermometer, where the least clouds are marked,
where one can read the smallest changes of temperature. They
may rather be compared to those bodies which do not become
heated except under the action of an elevated temperature, and
remain quite insensible to the slight modifications of the atmo
sphere. Until a great perturbation takes place in the conditions
of supply and demand, no one would think of changing the rate
of wages.” * After making every allowance your Committee
cannot admit that Combinations have any power either to raise
permanently the rate of wages or to prevent their fall when the
conditions of trade require the same, as recent experience abun* See M. Batbie's article on "Salaries in Bloek's Dictionnaire de la
Politique."
�APPENDIX.
145
dantly shows, and, whilst admitting that Combinations may be
beneficial in accelerating the action of economic laws, your
Committee cannot be blind to the fact that they produce a
state of irritation and discontent which often interferes with
the progress of production.
Limited as is the power of Combinations to affect the rates
of wages, still more limited is their power to affect materially the
progress of productive industry. The Royal Commission on
Trade Unions reported that it was extremely difficult to deter
mine how far Unions have impeded the development of trade,
whether by simply raising prices or by diverting trade from cer
tain districts, or from this to foreign countries. The representa
tives of capital at the conference alluded to, endeavoured to
prove that certain branches of trade have permanently been
injured by the Unions. Whether the fact can be established or
not, it is undeniable that British trade has enormously increased
within the last twenty years, and that the exports of manufac
tured goods are on a larger scale now than they were at any
former period.*
What is perhaps most objectionable in Combinations of labour
is the method they often pursue in order to operate on the rates
of wages ; for they are not content with making a collective de
mand on employers for a rise, but endeavour to force it, or resist
a fall, by restricting the supply of labour and increasing the need
of it. One such method, explained at the Conference, seems to
your Committee peculiarly objectionable. A representative of
Labour said that when depression of trade comes, by means
of associated funds the men are able to say to the surplus
labourers, “ Stand on one side—you are not wanted for the time
being. If you go on with your labour at half-price, it will not
mend the trade; we will not let you become a drug on the
market, putting every other man down, but we will sustain you.”
In three years, your Committee were informed, over £100,000
was thus paid for unemployed labour, in the hope that undue
fall in wages would be prevented by keeping labourers out of
* The following were the quantities of some of the principal articles of
British produce and manufacture exported from the United Kingdom in
1854 and 1874 ;—
Coal and Coke ...
Copper
Cotton Yarn
Cotton Manufacture
Iron
...............
Worsted Manufacture
1854
tons 4,309,000
cwts. 274,000
lbs. 147,128,000
yds. 1,692,899,000
tons 1,175,000
yds. 133,600,000
Increase
per cent.
1874
13,927,000
709,000
220,599,000
3,606,639,000
2,487,000
261,000,000
223
159
49
”3
112
71
The total value of British produce exported increased from £135,891,000
in i860 to £239,558,000 in 1874 or at the rate of 76 per cent.
IO
�146
APPENDIX.
the market. Your Committee are of opinion that the artificial
prevention of a fall of wages when such a fall is necessary and
inevitable, is economically wrong, and can only have the effect of
still more injuring the condition of workmen, since by so doing
they only throw hindrances in the way of production, which is
the parent of all wages. Equally objectionable in your Com
mittee’s opinion, as interfering with the freedom of labour and
with the general economy of production, is every regulation of
such Trade Unions that excludes from employment in the trades
all who have not been regularly apprenticed, or any rule which
should set a limit to the number of apprentices. Professor
Cairnes, commenting on the monopoly thus advocated by Trade
Unions, said, “ It is a monopoly, moreover, founded on no prin
ciple either of moral desert or of industrial efficiency, but simply
on chance or arbitrary selection ; and which, therefore, cannot
but exert a demoralizing influence on all who come within its
scope—in all its aspects presenting an. ungracious contrast to all
that is best and most generous in the spirit of modern demo
cracy.”
The only other question on which your Committee will report
is whether an artificial restriction of labour, or of capital, can
under any circumstances be economically right or beneficial. It
is, indeed, scarcely necessary to say that any restriction of
Labour or of Capital, having the effect of limiting production,
must of necessity prove injurious. Yet it may be a point for
consideration whether under certain circumstances it may not be
better for either Labour or Capital to submit to the evil of re
striction in order to avoid a still greater evil, of producing at a
loss, or working at rates of wages not sufficiently remunerative.
The labourers justify their proceedings in this respect by refer
ence to the practice of producers. One of the representatives of
labour, speaking on this subject, said :—“No doubt there.is not
a working man in Lancashire who would not say that limitation
was an injury. Generally that there should be the largest pos
sible production in a given time is no doubt a true law, but every
trade must regulate that according to its own necessities. The
ironmaster blows out his furnaces when an increased production
would injure; the cotton manufacturer runs his manufactory short
time ; and the labourer limits the production.” There is little or
no difference in the relative position of Capital and Labour as
respects their need of continuous production. Primarily, both
employer and employed alike depend upon production as the
only source for profits and wages. Whilst the employers have
the maximun interest in producing as much as possible, from the
fact that the fixed capital which they cannot withdraw would lie
dormant and unproductive while the forge or mill is silent, the
employed find it thier interest to aid in such production inas-
�APPENDIX.
147
much as they depend upon it for their means of subsistence.
The argument of the employed against a proposal for a reduction
of wages is expressed in the words, “ If you have too much of an
article in the market and you cannot sell, I would rather limit
the quantity in your hands than aggravate the evil and take less
money for it.” But by refusing to work when the employer is
able or willing to continue producing, or by not submitting him
self to accept lower wages when the inevitable law of supply
and demand compels the same, the employed only aggravates
his own position, whilst he places the employer in a still worse
strait; the certain consequence of the withdrawal of labour being
to discourage production, to enhance the cost, and to increase
the difficulty of foreign competition—injurious alike to the pro
ducer and to the whole community.
A frequent source of contention between employers and
employed is the mode of paying wages—viz., by time, such as
by the day or hour, or by piecework. There appears to be no
uniform practice on the subject. While in some branches of
industry the rule is to pay wages by piecework, in other branches
the rule is to pay by time—the reason probably being that whilst
in some branches it is easy to establish a scale of prices at
which the work is to be paid for, in other branches such a scale
could not easily be framed. In so far as the method of pay
ment can be considered to affect production, it seems to your
Committee that whilst payment by piecework is likely to pro
mote quantity of production, payment by time is more likely
to promote precision of execution. Your Committee cannot
believe what has often been alleged, that payment by piecework
is often offered to conceal any reduction of wages. If honestly
acted upon on either side, payment by piecework has, in the
opinion of your Committee, all the elements of fair justice. But
the question in any case is not of sufficient importance to justify
a breach of the friendly relation which should exist between
Capital and Labour. When either party has any decided prefer
ence for one system, it seems advisable that the other party
accept the same.
The economic effects of Strikes and Lock-outs are well known,
and it matters but little which party in the contest in the end
may prove successful. In recent years Strikes and Lock-outs
have occurred among coal and iron miners, the building trade,
engineers, the cotton trade, ship-builders, and most of the trades
and industries of the country, each and all of which have caused
serious losses on the community at large. In the opinion of
your Committee a well-devised system of conciliation is the only
proper and legitimate method of solving labour disputes. And
your Committee cannot too strongly express their sense of the
grave responsibility which rests on either employers or em-
�148
APPENDIX.
ployed when, regardless of consequences, they resort to a step
so vexatious and destructive as a strike or lock-out.
Your Committee are of opinion that the British Association
will confer a lasting benefit if, on its pilgrimage in the principal
industrial towns in the United Kingdom, it will seize every
opportunity for the enunciation of sound lessons of political
economy on the questions in agitation between employers and
employed. It.was suggested to your Committee that workmen
should be admitted to the meetings of Section F at a reduced
rate, and they commend the proposal to the consideration of
the Council. Your Committee would also recommend to the
Council to urge on Her Majesty’s Government the importance
of promoting, as far as possible, the study of political economy,,
and especially of those branches of industrial economy which
most intimately concern the industry, manufactures, and com
merce of the country. Your Committee have learned with
pleasure that the Cobden Club are prepared to offer some
encouragement for the teaching of political economy to the
labouring classes, and your Committee would suggest that the
Chambers of Commerce might advantageously take similar
means in the great centres of commerce and manufacture. In
the opinion of your Committee, a proper sense of the necessity
and utility of continuous labour, an earnest desire for the
achievement of excellence in wTorkmanship in every branch 01
industry, and a keen and lively interest on the part of one and
all to promote national prosperity, are the best safeguards against
the continuance of those disturbances between Capital and
Labour which have of late become of such hindrance to success
ful production. In the great contest which Britain has to wage
with other industrial nations, it is the interest of both masters
and men to be very careful, lest by raising the prices of British
produce and manufacture too high they should no longer be able
to carry the palm in the arena of international competition.
Your Committee regret the death of their much-esteemed
member, Mr. Samuel Brown, who took an active part in the
proceedings. Professor Fawcett, M.P., was unable to act.
But your Committee have pleasure in reporting that the Right
Hon. Lord O’Hagan, Mr. Thomas Brassey, M.P., and Mr. A. J.
Mundella, M.P., were added to the Committee.
LEONE LEVI,
Secretary.
Augusty 1875.
�INDEX
Agricultural Industry, condi
tion for progress of, 19
Arbitration -versus Strikes, 94
British Workman, characteristics
of, 7
— productive power of, 8
Butter, consumption of, in 1844 and
1875, 11
Bacon, consumption of, in 1844 and
1875, 11
Building Societies, object of, 120
— permanent and terminating, 120
Competition, foreign effects of
machinery on, 32
Capital, production in England of,
33
— causes which arrested the growth
of, 34
, .
— difficulty of accumulating, 35
— obstacles to the diffusion of, 35
— what is ? 36
— amount employed of, 41
— what determines the investment
of, 41
— proportions of, distributed in
production, 42
— stoppage of, accumulation of, 43
— consumption of, 44
•— exportation of, 44
— abuse of, 46
— relation of, to labour, 49
— distribution of, between masters
and men, 51
— and labour, partnership of, 51
Capitalists, how regarded, 68
Combinations, Old Laws on, 67
Co-operative Societies, for produc
tion and distribution, 123
Co-operative Societies, advantages
of, 124
Day's work, what is it? 5
Division of labour, advantages of, 23
— disadvantages of, 24
Drunkenness, means of surmount
ing, 105
Drink, amount expended in, 109
Education, necessary for produc
tion, 12
— technical, advantages of, 13
England as a field of labour, 15
Employers’ calculation of wages, 52
— duties towards employed, 54
— profits, 60
— risks of, 61
— power to amass wealth, 62
Earnings, of workmen, sources of, 99
— collective, what, 100
Expenditure of workmen, distribu
tion of, 103
— economy in, 104
Earnings of workmen, total amount
of, 108
Expenditure of workmen, total
amount of, 108
French workman, characteristics
of, 6
Food and drink, consumption of, in
England, n
— expenditure of workmen in, 104
Firing and lighting, expenditure cf
workmen in, 104
Friendly Societies, objects of, 118
— amount invested in, 119
German
of, 6
workman,
characteristics
�150
INDEX.
Health necessary for production, 8
Houses, healthiness of, 9
— high rents of, 9
Home, advantages of, 10
Home industry, condition of, 18
Hand loom and power loom, 18
Italian workman, characteristics
of, 7
Insurance (life), benefits of, 121
— amount insured, 122
— Government, 122
Labour, pleasures of, 1
— necessity of, 2
— value of, 3
— productive and unproductive, 3
— manual and mental, 4
— condition for the efficient dis
charge of, 5
— dangers attending, 8
— duration of, 12
— skilled and unskilled, 12
— division of, 22
— need of capital to, 37
— reward of, 49
— relation of, to capital, 49
— supply and demand of regu
lating, 57
— difficulties of, in contending
wages with capital, 70
Lancashire, progress of, 19
Liverpool, increase of, 20
Labourers capitalists, 45
Morals an element in production, 14
Manufacture, divorcement of, from
agriculture, 19
Manchester, increase of, 20
Machinery, advantages of, 25
— character of, 26
■—■ effects of, 27
— relations of, to wages, 30, 61
— exports of, 31
Minimum wages, limits to, 85
Natural powers, utility of labour to,
37
r ,
Needlewomen, low wages of, 56
Overtime, action of Trade Unions
on, 73
Pauperism, rate of, in 1849 and
1875.- 11
Production on a large scale, advan
tages of, 22
— machinery of, 50
—• requirements for, 52
— cost of, 52
Population, increase of, effect of, on
wages, 57
Piecework, payment by, 78
Pay, what, 98
Poor Law, effects of, 100
— in Sweden, 101
— France, 101
— Belgium, 101
— Eberfeld, 101
Post Office Savings Banks, amount
in, 114
Swiss Workman, characteristic
of, 7
Steam-power, advantages of, 21
Strikes and lock-outs, chances of, 85
— what, 86
— causes of, 86
— supposed advantages of, 87
— means to avoid, 88
— how promoted by Trade Unions,
90
— circumstances attending, 91
— effects of, 85
— cost of, 92
— losses caused by, 93
— arbitration or conciliation, 'versus,
94
Saving, duty of all respecting, 112
— first steps in, 112
Savings Banks, history of, 113
— amount invested in, 115
— post office and trustees, 116
— amount per head in England and
Wales, 117
— Scotland, 117
— Ireland, 117
— France, 117
— Holland, 117
— Belgium, 117
— Austria, 117
— Germany, 117
— Switzerland, 117
Tea, consumption of, in 1844 and
1875, 11
Trade Unions, limits of usefulness
of, 68
— limits of rights of, 69
— constitutional defects of, 70
— membership of, 71
�INDEX.
Trades Unions, councils of, 71
— fees in. 72
— objects of, 72
— monopoly of, 72
— objection of, to overtime, 73
— operation of, on wages, 74
— effects of, on foreign competi
tion, 82
— effects of, on the character of
workmen, 83
— and benefit funds. 84
— rules of, respecting strikes, 88
Tobacco, expenditure of workmen
in, 104
Taxation, effects of, on workmen,
108
Workmen, united labour and pro
duction of, 5
— difference of skill among, 5
Wheat and wheat flour, consump
tion of, in 1844 and 1875, 11
Wealth, benefits of. 46
Wages, what are, 51
— relation of, to profits, 53
Workman, interest of employer in,
54 ,
Wages, lowering of, 54
— minimum rate of what, 55
— of artisans, 58
— what are the elements of, 58
— cost of, 58
Wage-fund, theory of, 60
Wages, effects of machinery on, 61
— uniformity of, 62, 71
— use of, 64
— effect of war on, 65
— attempt to regulate by law, 65
— effects of prohibition tariffs on,
65
— effects of Poor Law on, 65
— how affected by Trades Unions,
76
Working-classes, Budgets of, 96
Wages in money and in kind, 99
Workmen, taxes affecting, 107
Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Printers, London & Aylesbury.
��
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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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Work and pay; or, principles of industrial economy. Two courses of lectures delivered to working men in King's College, London. With report of the Committee of the British Association on Combinations of Labourers and Capitalists
Creator
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Levi, Leone [1821-1888]
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 151 p. ; 20 cm.
Notes: Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Includes bibliographical references and index. Printed by Hazell, Watson & Visey, London and Aylesbury. Appendix A: Statement of the weekly expenditure of a family ...whose total wages averaged thirty shillings per week ... B: Budgets of the Working Classes. C: Report of the Committee of the British Association for the Advancement of Science and Combinations of Capital and Labour.
Publisher
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Strahan and Co., Limited
Date
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1877
Identifier
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N438
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Labour
Industry
Trade Unions
Rights
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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 (Work and pay; or, principles of industrial economy. Two courses of lectures delivered to working men in King's College, London. With report of the Committee of the British Association on Combinations of Labourers and Capitalists), 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
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Industrial Organisation (Economic Theory)
NSS
Trades Unions
Wages
Work
Working Class-Great Britain