LABOR
AND
LAW
BY
CHARLES
BRADLAUGH
WITH
MEMOIR
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LONDON
R. FORDER
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LABOR & LAW
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Charles Bradlaugh
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VERITAS
LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
MURIDUS UNUM
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TUEBOR
OF THE
QUERIS-PENINSULAM AMCENAM
CIRCUMSPICE
KUVAJI HJARI DEJANJ
1903)
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UNIV
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LABOR AND LAW.
•
BY
CHARLES BRADLAUGH.
J
With a Memoir and Two Portraits.
LONDON:
R. FORDER, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
1 8 9 1.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY A. BONNER, 34 BOUVERIE STREET,
FLEET STREET, E.C.
Ry. Set
Harding
،،
9-5·47
59657
PREFACE.
on
MR. BRADLAUGH was busily engaged on his book
Labor and Law" at the time he was seized
by his fatal illness; and it was among the subjects
which oftenest occupied his mind till he became
unconscious. In addition to the chapters published,
he had contemplated three on "Eight Hours in
Mines," "Friendly Societies Legislation," and "Emi-
gration and Immigration." The latter two, for which
he had studied much, would have been specially
important, but he has left no notes for them which
can be utilised. There have been added, however,
three papers by him on "Force or Conciliation in
Labor Disputes," "Socialism in Europe," and "A
Starved Government Department," all of which may
fitly come under the general title "Labor and Law.”
These papers appeared respectively in the Universal
Review, Subjects of the Day, and the New Review, to
the proprietors of which thanks are due for the
permission to republish. Some passages in these
Con
b 2
}
iv
PREFACE.
}
articles which Mr. Bradlaugh had embodied in the
chapters of " Labor and Law" have been deleted.
Of the two photographs in this volume, one was
taken about 1880, before the Parliamentary struggle,
the other last year. They tell their own story.
April, 1891.
Portrait (1880).
Preface
Memoir
Portrait (1890).
LABOR AND LAW-
""
""
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"1
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CONTENTS.
Chapter i-Why the Book is Written
:
:
!!
:
Force or Conciliation in Labor Disputes?
Socialism in Europe
A Starved Government Department...
INDEX
:
..
··
ii What the Legislature can do; what it has
done; what it ought to do
iii What has been done by Legislation in
Foreign Countries, and the Results
iv-Hours of Labor
v-Employers' Liability Act, 1880
:
:
...
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}
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:.
6:0
...
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ta
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iii
vii
I
29
61
85
125
141
161
193
207
MEMOIR.
MEMOIR.
AN adequate Life of Mr. Bradlaugh, it is to be
hoped, will ere long be compiled. Meantime,
a short memoir, covering his life to the close,
will probably be acceptable to many of the readers
of the volume now issued.
The facts as to his early life are perhaps
now among the best known concerning him, by
reason of the strong impression made by the
story of his early expulsion from home, under
clerical pressure. Doubtless this episode, exclu-
sively regarded, lends itself to one or two false
inferences. Charles Bradlaugh, the elder, was
not a bad father, though he was unfortunate in
his regimen. A poor solicitor's clerk, he had to
work very hard to support his family; and some
genial qualities which his son inherited and
developed had in him to struggle against hard
conditions of life. He seems even to have had
literary tastes, and to have contributed sketches,
stories, and articles to the London Mirror; and
X
MEMOIR.
his son liked to remember how he and his father
had in common a passionate love of fishing, in
gratification of which the elder would often get
up at
three in the morning and walk from
Hackney to Temple Mills on the river Lea.
Beyond this trait, we know little of the heredity
of the man we have lately lost. The family
genealogy has not yet been traced, though this
ought not to be difficult, considering the remark-
able rarity of the name. Apart from his family,
it does not occur in the London Directory; and
I do not hear of it anywhere else. But at Kelsall
Church, Suffolk, there is a monumental brass
which names
names a Dorothy Bradlaugh alias Jacob,
as the wife of a 66
gent." who died in 1605; and
at Saxfield Church in the same county there is
a stone with a shield which has "the arms of
Bradlaugh alias Jacob ". I have heard Mr.
Bradlaugh say that he thought his family might
be of Irish origin; and the form of the name.
encourages this view; but he professed no certainty
on the subject; and seeing that at Saxfield there
is another stone for "Nicholas Bradley alias
Jacob ", who died in 1628, it would seem that
the two forms of the name are at least equally
English in their recent history. His mother's
name was Trimby. She seems, from the testimony
MEMOIR.
xi
of others of the family, to have been a woman
of firm and even hard character, though of her
too her son spoke not unfilially.
Born on 26th September, 1833, Charles
Bradlaugh was seven years old before he was
sent to a National School in Abbey Street,
Bethnal Green; and all his formal schooling
was comprised between that beginning and his
eleventh year.
In this period the family lived
successively in Bacchus Walk, in Bird Cage Walk,
in Elizabeth Street, and at 13 Warner Place,
Hackney, always poorly, the father having been
unable to keep the second house mentioned,
where he had a large garden, which he eagerly
cultivated.
The son's recollections began to be precise
from about his tenth year, when he discovered
among his father's books a copy of Cobbett's
"Political Gridiron ". About this time too he
bought a copy of the "Charter for one half-
penny, without however developing enough enthu-
siasm for the cause to make him abandon his
favorite games of private theatricals and sham
fights, conducted with paper figures and rows of
old steel nibs. His having to leave school at
eleven points to continued poverty in the family,
though he was not sent to work for a living till
>>
#
xii
MEMOIR.
he was twelve. Then he was made errand boy
in the office of his father's employer; after two
years of which occupation he became wharf clerk
and cashier to a firm of coal merchants. About
this time it was that the Chartist movement
woke in him the beginning of political ideas,
ideals, convictions, and purposes; and life began
for him in earnest.
Freethinkers recognise that those who were ear-
nest as Christians make the best converts, not on
the score of their old ethics, which they have for
the most part to unlearn, but simply because
earnestness is a virtue of temperament. The boy
Charles Bradlaugh was so much in earnest in his
boyish piety that his Church of England pastor,
the Rev. Mr. Packer of St. Peter's, Hackney
Road, made him a Sunday School teacher. It
was in the course of an attempt by the rev.
gentleman to prepare a few of his best Bible-class
pupils for a show-off before the Bishop, at confir-
mation, that the too intelligent Charles was set to
study specially the thirty-nine articles and the
Gospels. About the year 1848, ere Strauss was
translated, it must have taken a very vigorous
intelligence, in an English boy, to conceive that
there could be such a thing as a discrepancy
between religion and common sense. In current
MEMOIR.
xiii
literature there was practically no hint of rational-
ism beyond the non-committal bluster of Carlyle,
which would be unknown to the common people;
and the defiant propaganda of the other Carlile,
then dead, would be a mere horror for all save
an audacious few. But the young Bradlaugh had
in him that which a consistent Theism, one
would think, should regard as something good
rather than bad, the capacity, namely, to think out
old doctrine afresh for himself; and his first step
was to see some of the contradictions of the faith.
Nowadays, when "the Church", that elusive
abstraction, has seen the need of a modus vivendi
between its income and its creed, such cases are
sought to be treated by systems of accommodation
which compare not unfavorably with the Neo-
Platonist vindications of Pagan mythology. But
the Rev. Mr. Packer belonged to the Golden Age
which began with the French Revolution, the age
in which all "infidel objections" had been for the
last time "triumphantly answered" by Paley and
Bishop Watson; and he took what was then felt
to be the common-sense course of suspending the
boy for three months from his office of teacher,
and writing a severe letter about him to his parents.
The boy, still perfectly loyal in the main to his
trying creed, began to spend his Sunday after-
xiv
MEMOIR.
*
noons in the then open ground of Bonner's Fields,
one of the sites of that world of open-air
Sunday declamation and discussion which strikes
foreigners as so remarkable a feature in the life
of our large towns. There he began bravely to
debate, boy as he was, in defence of the faith in
which he had been bred, so far as he still felt he
could defend it. The end, for his at once acute
and candid intelligence, came soon. In 1849 he
engaged in a public discussion with a Freethinker
on the " Inspiration of the Bible", and, finding
himself worsted, took the singular course of owning
it. Probably, like, so many others, he remained
for some time a Theist after giving up revelation
but for him it would be at all times impossible to
assimilate the doctrine that a religion of delusions.
is divinely ordained for human education, and that
those are the wise who are able to co-operate in
the divine strategy.
;
It was at this stage, aged sixteen, that he
again approached Mr. Packer in all good faith,
avowing the new heresy of teetotalism, and naïvely
asking the reverend gentleman to read Robert
Taylor's "Diegesis". And then it was that, on
a consultation with the boy's father and em-
ployers, Mr. Packer informed him that he was
allowed three days to "change his opinions or lose
F
MEMOIR.
XV
his situation". Always generous in his estimates
of his enemies, Bradlaugh in later life came to the
opinion that the threat was only meant to terrify
him, and that it would not have been enforced if
he had simply held on, neither recanting nor re-
coiling. But it was not in his nature to evade a
menace; and he took his elders at their word, and
left situation and home on the third day. The
key-note of his life had been struck.
It will be plain here, however, to the common-
sense of laymen, that Bradlaugh was certain to be-
come a Freethinker whatever Mr. Packer did; and
seldom have the English clergy of all orders been
more grotesque than in their recent protestations
against the priestly tyranny which, as they think,
turned a great potential Christian into an Atheist.
Let us be just even to the Packers, though the
prototype, as it happens, later developed his policy
to the extent of alleging, in a published letter,
that Bradlaugh was nineteen when he
he "joined
himself to a set of infidels (the Carliles) who
came into my district", and "by so doing incensed
his father to a great degree"; adding that he,
Mr. Packer, had nothing to do with turning the
"On the contrary", he says,
young man out.
"I endeavored to reclaim the young man and to
pacify his father."
The facts were that the boy
{
xvi
MEMOIR.
left home when he was a little over sixteen; that
a little over a year afterwards he joined the army;
and that from that time till he was over twenty
he remained there. The usual fatality of eccle-
siastical history, here manifested, has been got rid
of by one apologist in the usual way, by the
remark that Mr. Packer only "made a mistake
of a few months in Mr. Bradlaugh's age at the
time when he left Mr. Packer's parish "; and
doubtless this will become the orthodox record.
Mr. Bradlaugh's first pamphlet, however, pub-
lished in 1850, suffices to establish the main facts.
That pamphlet is undated, and there has been
some difficulty in fixing the year of issue, but it
must have been 1850. In 1861 Mr. Bradlaugh
dedicated to Mr. Packer his volume "The Bible:
What it is", in the following terms:-
66
Sir,-To you, twelve years since, I dedicated my first
pamphlet, and again to you I dedicate this volume, and this
because, but for you, I might never have advanced so far in the
path of Freethought.
When I first inquired, you (then my pastor), as a thoroughly
orthodox clergyman, rebuked my earliest efforts at inquiry,
and divided me from a kind father, and from a home in
which I had been well-if not fondly-treated. Your course
has incited me to increased exertion, and your last unworthy
and unprovoked action towards myself (I refer to your men-
dacious letter to the Rev. Brewin Grant, B.A.), induces me
again to address you publicly, and to dedicate to you the
following commentary.
MEMOIR.
xvii
When I do better things I will dedicate to some
worthy man.
>>
more
The "mendacious letter" was that above quoted.
(
If the "twelve years since" be literally exact,
the pamphlet must have been published in 1849.
In 1873, however, in a short autobiography written
at the request of many friends, before leaving for
America, Mr. Bradlaugh says, still going by memory,
and without documentary guides, "I wrote my first
pamphlet, A Few Words on the Christian's
Creed,' about the middle of 1850". The "twelve
years since" of 1861, therefore, should be "over
eleven years since". But this makes it certain
that the boy was not seventeen years old when
Mr. Packer drove him from home, for the
1850 pamphlet, of which one copy has lately been
found, is dedicated to the same gentleman, on the
score of "the misfortunes which I owe to your
officious interference". On the back of this early
publication is the announcement: "In the Press,
and will be published about the Middle of October,
16 pages, Price One Penny. CHRISTIANITY A DELU-
By C. Bradlaugh, Jun." Supposing the
first pamphlet to be issued in August, Mr. Packer's
stroke of policy would be placed some little time
earlier, probably in the winter of 1849, as Mr.
Headingley's biography states.
SION.
C
xviii
MEMOIR.
As Mr. Bradlaugh had thus erred "a few
months" about his dates, it might be charitably
supposed that Mr. Packer's error of a few years
was the lapse of a mind used to the large margins
of ancient chronology, were it not for the express
denial of any interference. That denial, sufficiently
rebutted by the 1850 pamphlet, as well as by the
testimony of survivors, passes the bounds of pardon-
able infirmity.
Mr. Bradlaugh, it will be noted, felt in 1861
that, but for Mr. Packer's menace, he "might never
have advanced so far in the path of Freethought ".
That is quite probable; but it is another thing to
say, as Mr. Headingley somewhat thoughtlessly
does, that "had the Rev. Mr. Packer shown a
little more self-control and discretion Bradlaugh
might never have been a Freethinker". The boy
began Freethinking as soon as he began carefully
to read the Articles and the Gospels; and to most
of those who knew the man it is inconceivable
that he could under any circumstances have
developed into orthodoxy. His master quality
was a fiery rectitude, which only in matters of
action involving human welfare was in any degree
subordinated to his keen worldly sagacity. Had
he been allowed to grow up as so many others
have done, he might, perhaps, have devoted himself
MEMOIR.
xix
more to making his fortune than to proclaiming his
beliefs; but he must needs have become a Rational-
ist: and in view of the many inducements he had
to embrace some other and less unpopular philo-
sophy than the specifically Atheistic, and his
inability to the last to find any other tenable.
position, it is safe to say that whatever his worldly
position might have been-and, if his youth had
gone smoothly, it might have been that of a great
awyer-he must needs have become an Atheist.
The chances are, then (to use a somewhat irrational
way of speaking), that in any case he would have
been something of an Atheistic propagandist; and
when I reflect how chivalrous, how combative was
his nature, especially in his strenuous prime, and
how essentially he was an orator, I cannot but think
that he would in any case have found his way
to the front of the Freethought battle; and that
what Mr. Packer did in playing his evil part was
only to precipitate the beginning of the career on
which Bradlaugh must inevitably have entered.
Indeed his action was the ostensible cause of Brad-
laugh's enlistment in the army, which was, prob-
ably, a great advantage to the victim, inasmuch
as his army life built up for him a very powerful
physique, which afterwards counted for a great
deal.
C 2
XX
MEMOIR.
This is not the place to deal at any further
length with the clerical view, developed from Mr.
Headingley's, that Charles Bradlaugh might have
been a zealous Christian if only he had been
kindly treated in his youth, or later. Scores
of "liberal" clergymen have each, with touching
simplicity, indicated the conviction that if only
the Atheist had been privileged to meet him in
earlier days he would have been kept to the right
path. They too, good gentlemen, have "had their
doubts " ; but between special Providence and
individual force of mind they got over them; and
what they could do, an able man like Bradlaugh
might have been (by God's help) enabled to
do. I must content myself with saying that
these thinkers miscalculate. The upshot of your
doubts concerning the Christian religion depends.
on the amount of intelligence which you have
to doubt with; and the great majority of the
reverend and unreverend gentlemen who deplore
or contemn Charles Bradlaugh's Atheism are
visibly incompetent to have argued coherently
with him on religious matters for half-an-hour.
Men whose religion is a mixture of hysteria and
second-hand fallacy will always be able to look
down on reason and science; and they may in
this case be left to do so.
MEMOIR.
xxi
The story of Bradlaugh's boyish struggles to
make a living has often been told, and will be
found in some detail in Mr. Headingley's Life.
He was sheltered, first by Mr. B. B. Jones, a
kind old Chartist, later by Mrs. Sharples Carlile
-the excellent woman who, bravely uniting herself
with Richard Carlile when he was able to allot
a good maintenance to the wife from whom he
separated on account of her bitter opposition to
his views, cheered him steadfastly in his long
battle, and indomitably maintained herself and
her three children after his death. They were
extremely poor; and the boy guest fell in love.
with one of the daughters, Hypatia-desperately
and vainly, but also transiently. Quite recently,
the facts have been falsified into an infamous
libel on the entire Carlile family and their boy
guest, by one of those persons who find this the
most congenial way of vindicating Christianity
against scepticism. It has to be borne in mind
that such pious calumny followed Charles Brad-
laugh his whole life through.
In these early days of not quite unhappy
hardship, the young
the young Freethinker zealously laid
the foundations of the exact knowledge that was
to fit him for his life's work as a debater. From
a friend of the Carliles he learned French, with
·
MEMOIR.
>
xxii
the girls; and even at this early age he began
to study Hebrew, Greek, and Arabic. Only in
French and Hebrew did he finally reach com-
petence" a little Hebrew and an imperfect
smattering of other tongues was his own modest
account of his studies-but in both Greek and
Arabic he acquired considerable command of
vocabulary. He had much of the constitution
of the scholar: great patience over textual study
and comparison, tireless industry, an excellent
memory, and an innate love of exactitude; and
with a scholarly training he might have done
great things in that field. As it was, only his
immense energy enabled him to achieve what he did.
Even at this early age, too, he had acquired
much of his faculty in public speaking. A course
of mobs, says Emerson, is a capital training for
the orator.
It was a main part of Bradlaugh's
preparation. Between open-air and indoor lecturing
and debating he soon acquired fluency and self-
possession; and the 1850 pamphlet, crude as it
necessarily was, is yet as much more intellectual in
its crudity than the common run of open-air
preaching as is ripe philosophy compared with an
average Bampton lecture. He must have been a
redoubtable antagonist, even in his boyhood, tena-
cious, resourceful, overpowering. Already, too, he
""
↓
MEMOIR.
xxiii
was an ardent politician, taking part in all the
London gatherings held on behalf of the Poles
and Hungarians, themes which moved him to the
execution of a good deal of verse, which I under-
stand to have been frightful.
To his great delight at that time, the chair was
taken for him in one of those early lectures in
October 1850, by Mr. George Jacob Holyoake,
whose brother Austin was already his friend; and
one copy of the little handbill issued on this occa-
sion, accidentally preserved by Mr. Holyoake, ranks
with the copy of his first pamphlet as a date-docu-
ment for his biography. But lecturing was not yet
to bring him a living. "I got very poor," he tells
in his scanty autobiography, "and at that time was
also very proud. A subscription offered me by a
few Freethinkers shocked me, and awakened me
to a sense of my poverty; so, telling no one where
I was going, I went away, and on the 17th of
December, 1850, was after some difficulty enlisted
in the 7th Dragoon Guards." He had been in
debt to the extent of £4 15s., and a bounty of
£6 10s. was offered to recruits for the East India
Service, which sufficed to clear off all he owed.
This, too, was typical. All through his life he had
to shape his course to the paying off of debts, toil
as he would.
xxiv
MEMOIR.
The "difficulty" in the enlistment was made
by the attempt of cavalry and infantry recruiting
serjeants to "swop" men.
swop" men. Bradlaugh characteris-
tically protested, and in the end was allowed to
choose his regiment. Even in the act of crossing
the channel to Ireland, the gaunt hobbledehoy
recruit contrived to establish an ascendancy over
his fellows. They began, in his sick stage, by
playing football with his silk hat, and making
missiles of his Greek and Arabic dictionaries. But
when the Captain, after employing the recruits to
move the cargo during a storm, on a promise of
a distributed £5, sought to compromise by a few
half-crowns to the foremost men, the champion
of popular rights asserted himself in a broadside
of fiery eloquence, to which the astonished captain
succumbed; and the orator became the hero of
the hour. In barracks, the course of things was
similar. With more than usual difficulty he mas-
tered riding and fencing under the pitiless barrack-
tuition; and soon he established himself by a
successful fight with a bully. Mrs. Besant has
told the story' as I have heard him tell it.
He won by main force, not "science" falsely so-
'You are bound to go down if 'Leaves
called.
66
¹ In the Review of Reviews, March, 1890.
MEMOIR.
XXV
hits you", was the general verdict; "but you're
a fool if you get in the way of his fists." Still,
the fists served; and "Leaves", so-called on the
combined strength of his ardent teetotalism and
his constant reading, became the most popular
man in the regiment.
In Mrs. Besant's bright sketch and in Mr.
Headingley's book will be found various stories of
his army life. One that they do not tell is of his
experience at Donnybrook Fair. The regiment was
quartered near that historic village; and when Fair
time came near the peasantry circulated a well-
planned taunt to the effect that the men of the
Seventh would be afraid to present themselves on
the great day. The Seventh acted accordingly.
Sixteen picked men got a day's leave—and shille-
laghs. "I was the shortest of the sixteen," said
Bradlaugh on the one occasion on which, at dinner,
in my hearing, with some humorous qualms,
he related the episode; and he stood 6 feet 1 inches.
The sixteen just "fought through"; and their
arms and legs were black for many weeks, though
their heads, light as they clearly were, did not
suffer seriously. The ladies at dinner, Mrs. Besant in
particular, protested warmly against the "brutality"
of the entire proceedings. "Ah", he sighed, with
imperfect penitence, "I couldn't do it now." In
xxvi
MEMOIR.
the last talk I had with him before I saw him
on his death-bed, we spoke of the Home Rule
strife in Ireland, and of Mr. Davitt's exploit of
hewing his way through the crowd of enemies,
with his single arm and stick, at a recent meeting.
On my remarking that shillelagh-fighting must
be rather desperate when you have not
have not a left
arm to guard with, he laughingly suggested,
recalling Donnybrook, that to set up a tendency
to erisypelas in the arm was perhaps as dangerous
as a broken head.
It was in his army days that Bradlaugh met
James Thomson, who was later to publish "The
City of Dreadful Night" in his journal, the National
Reformer. Thomson was regimental schoolmaster,
and he found in Bradlaugh an intellectual com-
panion. The latter, I understand, suffered much
persecution from one of his officers, and Thomson's
friendship restrained him, perhaps, from some
violent courses. They used to talk together at
nights while the trooper was on sentry duty; and
the talk ranged far.
Among the innumerable misrepresentations of
the facts of Bradlaugh's life, is a statement by
his "Evangelist" brother (who has recently figured
in a notable case of literary larceny) to the effect
that his discharge from the Army was procured by
MEMOIR.
xxvii
his mother and sisters. The facts are that one sister
wanted to do so after his father's death in 1852;
and that he was eager to return to bear the family
burden; but that only a legacy which came to
the family on the death of an aunt, in the summer
of 1853, enabled him to buy himself out. Of
this legacy the portion applied on his behalf was
ultimately repaid to his mother, who had not
favored his sister's proposal to buy his discharge.
Another Christian myth tells that he bought out
to escape service in the Crimea. The date may
here suffice as answer.
He had to begin the world entirely anew.
Tall trooper as he was, he took a post as "errand-
boy" in a lawyer's office at ten shillings a week,
sticking at nothing in the struggle to help the old
home, to which now he brought a cheery brightness.
it had little known. In this employ he rose to be
managing clerk, vigorously carrying on all the while
his Freethought propaganda under the nom de guerre
of "Iconoclast", which he used till 1868, to "avoid
in some degree the efforts which were made to
ruin me", he has explained. As it was, only a
very liberal-minded master, in the England of
those days, would have consented to keep a clerk
who carried on, even pseudonymously, such work
as Bradlaugh did. Like Raleigh, he "could labor
踪
​MEMOIR.
xxviii
terribly"; and through all his public life he is to
be found doing, in his own person, the work of
three energetic men. One who knew him in his
prime, and for years worked with him, has testified:
"In private he was a most genial and entertaining
friend the only drawback was his incessant de-
votion to work. He was always writing or studying,
even at meals. He seemed to be unable to spare
a moment for recreation-a game of billiards or
draughts being the sum total; and even while these
were in progress he would inquire what I was going
to do in my next article.
If ever man lived
with more anxieties and more industry, I have yet
to learn his name. He studied and knew something
of almost everything, and his memory seemed never
to fail him."
But it was not only constant toil that he took
upon himself in working out his mission. To carry
on a Freethought propaganda throughout England
thirty years ago meant more than hard work: it
meant ferocious and riotous opposition, and obloquy
of a kind that to-day is difficult to realise. Some
of his early lecturing experiences, recounted by
Mr. Headingley, cannot now be paralleled. Thus
at Wigan he was mobbed; the windows were
broken while he lectured; a local clergyman led
an assault on the door, when the hall was full, the
MEMOIR.
xxix
rev. gentleman's secretary forced himself through a
window; lime was thrown in; and water was poured
down through the ventilators. After the lecture he
was mobbed and insulted; and when, at great risk,
he got to his hotel, the landlady proposed to turn
him out. On a second visit to the same town,
though the lecture passed off without riot, he was
furiously mobbed afterwards, and narrowly missed
injury from brickbats. At Norwich, he was hooted
and stoned. At Guernsey, after posting his own
bills, he had to let in the crowd gratis, and was
bombarded in the lecture hall, and menaced after-
wards pretty much as at Wigan; only luck com-
bined with intrepidity carrying him off safely. At
Dumfries the hall was stoned and the lamps out-
side smashed; and again he had a narrow escape
from the pietists afterwards. At Burnley the meet-
ing was broken up by a riot, stated to have been
led by Methodists. But this was not a man to be
deterred by violence or menace. I suppose he had
a certain unconfessed enjoyment in his battles,
which he always took light-heartedly, and which
he always won. After a riot, he went again, till
he had an enthusiastic audience. Wherever he
went, he made Freethinkers; and Burnley, where
thirty years ago he was swept from the platform
by a mob of Christians, has been the first town to
XXX
MEMOIR.
make a systematic subscription towards the paying
off of the debentures of the Freethought Publish-
ing Company, which remained as a charge on his
estate.
It is notable that the riotous opposition to the
Freethought lecturer was generally led or instigated
by "well-dressed persons". It is such persons
who now excuse the injustice put upon him by the
plea that he had shocked Christians, and wounded
their feelings by the manner of his advocacy.
Now, the fact is that Freethought advocacy in
general, but his in particular, has never been nearly
so careless of opponents' susceptibilities as has
ordinary orthodox treatment of Freethought. For
many generations that has been in chief part a
process of mere insult, vituperation, and slander.
"Iconoclast," in his fieriest days, was a reasoner,
a critic, dealing little even in invective, where
invective was very justifiable.
What constitutes a
wound to the feelings of orthodoxy may be gathered
from a passage quoted by Mr. Headingley from
the report of a petty law case, tried in 1860, in
which the plaintiff, an Atheist lady, was non-suited
on the score of her opinions.
"The Judge: You don't believe in any human responsi-
bility for telling a lie?
Witness: Yes.
MEMOIR.
xxxi
His Honor Except to society?
Witness: No.
His Honor: Do you believe in a God who can punish
you for telling a lie?
Witness: No.
His Honor: Then I cannot hear you.
I nonsuit the
plaintiff, with costs of defendant's advocate. If people will
insult public opinion in a court of justice they must take the con-
sequences."
A judge cannot now work iniquity in that fashion;
the Evidence Further Amendment Act won in
1870, by Bradlaugh after a prolonged struggle
which loaded him with debt- and finally the
Oaths Act, 1888, protect
1888, protect Atheist suitors and
witnesses from injustice, and to some extent
from judicial insult. But the spirit which
denounces courteous rationalism as an insult to
public opinion, still survives. The mobs of a
generation ago prepared to stone the
stone the Atheist
before they heard a word of what he had to say:
the orthodox historians of the present decide
that the Atheist brought it all on himself. One
of the latest samples of that judicial method is
supplied by the Cape Argus, which describes Mr.
Bradlaugh's manner of advocacy as coarse and
offensive, and goes on to cite the old "watch"
myth-the story of his having held his watch in
his hand and publicly defied God to strike him
dead in ten minutes. This story was told of
xxxii
MEMOIR.
•
}
other and earlier Freethinkers; and the Cape
Argus expressly admits that it is a fiction, but
gives the story as "well illustrating the popular
opinion of the man". Yet this is the sole proof
given by the journalist in support of his charge
of coarseness and offensiveness. To those who
repeat the other formula as to his being a mere
puller-down, he gave his own dignified answer as
long ago as 1863. "I have attacked the Bible;
but never the letter alone; the Church, but never
have I confined myself to a mere assault on its
practices. I have deemed that I attacked theology
best in asserting most the fulness of humanity.
I have regarded iconoclastism as a means, not as
an end. The work is weary, but the end is well."
Like all his English predecessors in the popular
Freethought movement, Bradlaugh was no less active
in political than in anti-theological work. He lec-
tured for Garibaldi, and, while himself burdened with
unjust debts, collected for him a hundred guineas.
He even went to Italy, partly on business, partly to
help the patriots, and he carried away from Naples,
a few days after Bomba's fall, a packet of letters,
which he had to preserve from the Papal gendarmes
by presenting his revolver when they sought to rifle
his baggage on the steamer. He revered Mazzini,
for whom he often worked, and for whom, he has
MEMOIR.
xxxiii
been heard to say he would have died. One of his
earliest proceedings in Northampton, which he first
visited in 1859, was to do battle with a clergyman
who sold up parishioners' goods for church rates.
In 1855 he had won much popular favor by his
bearing on the occasion of the attempt to prevent a
popular meeting in Hyde Park against the Sunday
Trading Bill; and in 1866 he was especially pro-
minent in the Reform demonstration in the course
of which the Hyde Park railings were thrown down.
That episode was not of his making. At a Trafalgar
Square mass meeting, prohibited and then permitted,
he was a leading speaker; and when the Executive
prohibited a mass meeting in Hyde Park he per-
suaded the Reform League to disobey. He was not
the responsible organiser, but obeyed, with military
precision, the orders of his superiors; and when the
railings went down he drew off a large part of the
crowd to Trafalgar Square, where speeches were
made in due form. For such occasions he was
eminently fit. Opposition which discomfited ordinary
leaders found in him a fighter not limited to the
resources of an effete civilisation. A cabman, for
instance, had a guinea given him to drive through
a Reform procession. Bradlaugh “took such order
that the horse went down one street with a few frag-
ments while the bulk of the cab, in other fragments,
d
""
xxxiv
MEMOIR.
1
went down another.
Coal-sellers were paid to block
a street with their waggon, and their coal promptly
paved a large part of the neighborhood. They were
only too glad to get leave to drive off. And on one
of those "demonstration " days Bradlaugh rode his
horse up the steps of Trafalgar Square and beat off
with his whip a gang of roughs who were using as
missiles a quantity of flints which, with or without
official forethought, had been piled there. He had
not ridden a horse since his army days; and the man
who supplied his charger, a powerful and fiery animal,
warned him that he would probably fall off. He
thought so too, till the stones were flying and he
charged up the steps. Then he recovered his army
seat.
But these episodes were only the embellishments
of an educative political work which was done by
hundreds of lectures, in scores of towns. And the
Reform agitation was only part of his work. His
Impeachment of the House of Brunswick " remains
to show what in his youth he sought and hoped to
do for Republicanism in England. He was deeply
implicated in the Fenian movement, as will be more
fully told when his Life is written. But while in that
case he was disposed to join in an appeal to force,
his predominant passion was always the legal rectifi-
cation of law, and the legal redress of illegality.
66
MEMOIR.
XXXV
When he took to force, it was with the law on his
side. When a rascal entrapped some working men
into building a hall on freehold ground, without
any deed to secure them in possession, and then
claimed it as his own, Bradlaugh directed them to
take it down and carry away the materials, which
they did. In 1872, when others had been prosecuted
under Mr. Ayrton's Hyde Park regulations, Bradlaugh
held a meeting and challenged prosecution, but it did
not come. Kept out of a hall he had duly hired at
Huddersfield, he broke into it; and he defeated the
lawyer who prosecuted him, as he defeated the per-
secuting authorities of Devonport. And for the best
part of his public life he was fighting the Government
upon one point or another. By legal resistance he
reformed the law as to the evidence of unbelievers;
by legal resistance he broke down the embargo laid
on cheap journals by the enforcement of heavy
sureties against the publication of blasphemy and
sedition. These are old stories now; but it will not
readily be forgotten how he vindicated at once the
right of a constituency to return the representative of
its choice, and the right of an Atheist to sit in the
English House of Commons.
His legal performances were the result of a genius
for lawyering, developed by many years of practical
legal work. For some four years he was in the office
d?
xxxvi
MEMOIR.
4
of Mr. Rogers, part of that time as managing clerk;
and his experiences in that capacity alone, including
as they did the personal capture, on one occasion,
of a criminal, would fill a chapter. But he was
unlucky even in his legal career. He could not
become a barrister, by reason of the rule that
prevents the student from following any other
occupation. In 1857 he left Mr. Rogers to be
articled to another solicitor named Harvey, who
soon fell into money difficulties in which Bradlaugh
was seriously involved. Then he had rheumatic
fever, after recovering from which he devoted three
years to lecturing in the provinces. Again, in
1861, he articled himself to Mr. Leverson, a
solicitor of Radical opinions, with whom he worked
for two years.
In 1863, however, again suffering
from ill health, he withdrew not only from the
law but from the editorship of the National Re-
former, which he had established in 1860. He
took to "business," but was not finally successful
in that either. "I have great faculties," he once.
said to me, "for making money;
and great
faculties for losing it." Once, as a financier, he
was intrusted with the negotiation of a loan for
the city of Pisa, with some of whose authorities
he had become acquainted in some of his various
journeys to Italy. His percentage, small in name,
MEMOIR.
xxxvii
was to be considerable in total, on a loan of
£750,000. He duly arranged
arranged matters with а
certain London financier, who thereupon sent off
a clerk to Pisa to offer the money at a fraction
less than Bradlaugh was to get, provided he got
the whole commission. Bradlaugh, however, had
been secured in the conduct of the transaction
up to a given date. He instantly went to Roths-
child, who allowed no commission, and put the
loan in their hands. The other financier thus got
nothing; but so did Bradlaugh.
More and more he gravitated towards politics,
never, however, dropping his Secularism. As the
boundless energies of his youth began to show their
limits, he addressed himself more and more circum-
spectly to the fulfilment of his high ambitions, per-
fectly determined, however, never to forego his advo-
cacy of right reason in religion, cost what it might.
In 1868 he fought his first election contest at North-
ampton, and was heavily beaten. The mass of the
people had seemed to be wholly with him; but a
rival candidate, supported by Mr. Gladstone, easily
secured the majority of the middle-class votes against
the Atheist, who was vilified as might have been
expected. At this time he was loaded with debts
from his lawsuits, some against libellers and swindlers
who went bankrupt when beaten, some in resistance
-
xxxviii
MEMOIR.
to tyrannous prosecutions and oppressive laws. Earn-
ing £1,000 a year by his lectures, he lived in three-
and-sixpenny lodgings in the East End, while his
wife and daughters lived in the country. Even when
he did get his damages in a libel case he always, on
principle, gave them to charities; and the Masonic
Boys' School in particular has received hundreds of
pounds from him in that way, small as were the
sums which juries usually allowed him. He vindi-
cated his love of justice at a heavy price, being
indeed a Quixotically generous man in many things.
A clergyman published against him a vile personal
libel, and had to pay £100 damages. The rev.
gentleman thereupon made an abject appeal to
the man he had slandered, not to publish. his name;
and Bradlaugh kept this promise to the last, though
the clergyman, who was a leading contributor to the
Rock, continued through that medium to attack him.
These libel-suits of his, be it remembered, were
not those of a litigious man. He contemptuously
ignored the great majority of the calumnies against
him, and only dealt with those which specially
tended to injure his influence, such as the ever-
popular "Watch story" and the repeated allegations
that he left his wife and children chargeable to
the parish. He had larger ambitions than that
charged against him by stupid people, of " acquiring
MEMOIR.
xxxix
notoriety". In 1870 he organised and addressed a
series of great meetings in London and the pro-
vinces, leading Positivists like Dr. Congreve and
Professor Beesly helping him, in protest against the
throwing of English influence into the scale against.
struggling France. For this service, which changed
the attitude of the English Government, he was
warmly thanked by the Republican Government at
Tours, by M. Tissot, the French Chargé d'Affaires
in England, and by other leading Frenchmen. Still
he would not trim his sails for French any more
than for English popularity; and his intimacies
with M. de Girardin, whom he greatly esteemed,
and Prince Jerome, whom he personally liked,
won him some Republican and Communist ill-will.
While M. Thiers was fighting the Commune, he
proposed to attempt a personal negotiation between
the belligerents; but the Thiers Government turned
him back at Calais; and perhaps his entirely non-
Communist republicanism would, in any case, have
turned the infuriated Commune against him then,
as it did many of the exiles afterwards.
At this time his own hopes for an English
Republic ran high. When the nation was celebrat-
ing with strange self-prostration its pious gratitude
for the recovery of the Prince of Wales, holding a
national thanksgiving service in St. Paul's, Bradlaugh
xl
MEMOIR.
held a meeting of protest against the assumption
that these were the things which a great nation
should count as its greatest blessings. His "Im-
peachment of the House of Brunswick", published
about this time, was a relevant attack on a royalism
which rests the maintenance of monarchy on
personal devotion to a house that, with but a
few exceptions, has been little worthy of personal
esteem. In 1873 was held the Republican Con-
ference at Birmingham; and from that Conference
he went to Spain to express its sympathy with Spain
in its struggle to establish a Republic. He was
officially received by Senor Castelar, that nugatory
rhetorician, who has since Bradlaugh's death emitted
a senile attack on his Atheism and Malthusianism,
and has given an account of the visit which is con-
victed of falsehood at half-a-dozen points by the
records of the time. It has been told how Bradlaugh
offered to go with fifty horsemen and shoot the
traitorous Carlist General in the north; but Cicero-
Castelar, who has told how much he was afraid of
the English ambassador, was not the man for such
measures. In his speech at the Madrid banquet
given in his honor, Bradlaugh expressed a hope that
England might be a Republic within twenty years,
but that in any case it would be established in
peace.
Latterly he was content to put the date later; look-
1
MEMOIR.
xli
ing to the consummation, however, as the present heir
to the throne is understood to do, as a question of
a generation at most. I have heard him say he
thought he could establish a Republic if he had half
a million of money. But of all men he knew best
that the decisive ending of monarchy must be a
matter of thorough national deliberation.
After the Spanish journey, made in the cause
of Republicanism, came one to the United States,
made with a view to paying off his heavy debts
by the proceeds of a lecturing tour. This was a
great success, personal and pecuniary, despite the
financial panic prevailing at the time, which drove
his first lecture - agent to shoot himself: but he
had to stop short, break his engagements, and
pay heavy damages, in order to come back and
contest Northampton in the election precipitated
by Mr. Gladstone's sudden dissolution of Parlia-
ment. He was still able to clear off 1,000 of
debts; but he was too late for the election, and
in his absence was again defeated.
Next year,
on the death of the then sitting member, he again
fought the seat, a Liberal and a Conservative also
standing. The Conservative got in with 2,171
votes; the Liberal had 1,836, and Bradlaugh
1,766, his highest poll hitherto. The waiting for
this contest had postponed a second American
xlii
MEMOIR.
journey; but that was now made, with fair pecuniary
results, though with much exhaustion to the lecturer;
and in 1875 a third visit to the States, during
which he incurred much bitter religious hostility,
was cut short by a severe illness
severe illness-pleurisy and
typhoid—which very nearly proved fatal. Recover-
ing from this, but with much shaken strength, he
had to abandon unfulfilled engagements to the
extent of losing £1,300. From this time, I believe,
his physique was definitely weakened, powerful
though it remained, and terrible as were the
demands yet to be made on it.
After the illness came on another great fight,
in which however he did not stand alone,
anxiously as he wished to do so. The authorities,
with strictly British imbecility, decided to prose-
cute the sellers of the pamphlet entitled "The
Fruits of Philosophy", by Dr. Charles Knowlton,
an American physician. For thirty years it had
been on sale, doing a considerable measure of
good by putting in the hands of the poor the
physiological knowledge which would suffice to
save them from having the over-large families that
so fearfully abound among the English people, and
which account for over fifty per cent of the existing
misery, and a terrible proportion of the death-rate.
Mrs. Besant, who had been associated with him in
MEMOIR.
xliit
the publication and sale of this pamphlet, insisted
with extraordinary courage on taking her trial with
him. The story of the case is given in full in the
published report. Suffice it here to state the upshot,
which was that the respectable jury, while entirely
exonerating the defendants from any corrupt motive,
found the book to be technically an obscene publi-
cation. The Judge, the late Lord Cockburn,
showed marked goodwill; and if the defendants
had only promised not to re-issue the book, they
would have gone out scot-free. This promise
they refused to give, and sentence of six months'
imprisonment and £200 fine was passed. This
sentence, however, was appealed against, and
broken down on a technical point; and once more
Bradlaugh had triumphed over persecution. Mrs.
Besant wrote a new pamphlet, "The Law of
Population", abreast of social and physiological
science; and of this there have been circulated a
hundred copies for every one sold of Knowlton's.
It is now in its 170th thousand; and more than
double the number have been sold in the United
States. But all that the partners could have
anticipated, of odium and insult, when they decided
to defend the right of publishing physiological
knowledge to the poor, has been more than fulfilled
since. The vulgar and essentially profligate aver-
xliv
MEMOIR.
sion to the scientific treatment of the population
question was one of the great factors in the subse-
quent denial of political justice to Bradlaugh; and
only three years ago an infamous libel on Mrs.
Besant by a Church of England priest found a
defender of more than professional zeal in Sir
Edward Clarke, and a judge of more than judicial
lenity in the late Baron Huddleston.
The jury
disagreeing, she got no redress whatever.
Still toiling constantly as journalist, . lecturer,
debater, Bradlaugh had in 1876 one stroke of luck.
Mr. Turberville or Blackmore, brother of the
novelist, died leaving a will in Bradlaugh's favor;
and though the existence of other wills set up
many counter claims, he received by compromise
£2,500. This served to pay off the bulk of his
debts; and an easier life seemed opening up for
him, signalised to begin with by his removal from
his poor lodging in Turner Street to a roomier
but still very simple one in Circus Road, N.W.,
where he had one large room sufficient to hold
his library.
But immeasurable strife was still
before him. In 1876 he had his worst experience
of physical hostility. With Mr. Auberon Herbert
he convoked an open-air meeting in protest
against the Turcophile spirit, and at the close
of this his party was attacked by a mob of
MEMOIR.
xlv
Jingo roughs, some of them pugilists, some of
them armed with metal bludgeons as against the
short batons carried by the peace party, who had
expected to be assailed. The assault had been
deliberately planned, and I have heard Bradlaugh
say that he afterwards obtained the names of the
Tories who paid and instigated the roughs. He
himself was momentarily borne down in the
struggle, and a murderous rain of blows fell upon
his upraised arm, showing him the nature of the
plan laid. In another minute he was
on his
feet, and in succession he struck five blows which,
to the best of his own belief, sent five men to
St. George's Hospital. One of his own friends.
wildly attempted, with the most chivalrous inten-
tions, to seize Bradlaugh's baton, and got a
broken head for his pains. But the sequel for
Bradlaugh himself was a terrible attack of
erisypelas in the left arm, which was probably
predisposed in that way by the old Donnybrook
experience. His life was in serious danger; but
once more the great physique pulled through.
It was not his last physical struggle, though;
and the greatest of all his moral struggles was
yet to come.
-
In 1880, twelve years after his first appeal to
the electors of Northampton, he was elected along
xlvi
MEMOIR.
with Mr. Labouchere. After all that religious
hate could do-and it went to shocking lengths
of calumny-he had built up for himself
devoted party, the majority of
majority of the Liberal-
the
Radicals of the constituency. Very reluctantly,
the Whig and pietist section, many of whom
hesitated between the Atheist Republican and
a Tory, consented under the stress of the general
election excitement to an arrangement by which
some other Radical should become joint candi-
date with Bradlaugh. Mr. Labouchere did so,
and the colleagues were elected, Mr. Labouchere
getting 4,158 votes, and Mr. Bradlaugh 3,827, as
against 3,152 and 2,826 given for the Conser-
vative candidates. Mr. Labouchere's larger poll
represented, then and later, the unconquerable ill-
will of the Whig-pietists, who refused to split
their votes as Bradlaugh's men did, though their
unfairness at times came near driving the latter
to decide to plump for their own man. Had
they done so Mr. Labouchere would have been
at best second on the poll, if he were not thrown
.out. As it was, the long sought-for victory was
a great triumph; but the worst of the price was
yet to be paid.
Mr. Labouchere has told how, on the day of
the assembling of the Parliament of 1880, his
•
a
MEMOIR.
xlvii
colleague told him he proposed to make affirma-
tion of allegiance instead of taking the oath,
because he thought the former the more decorous
course. And he had every reason to think he
could do so safely, for the Liberal legal advisers
had said so. It fell out otherwise; and as the
manifold details of the five years' Parliamentary
struggle have grown confused in the memories of
most, I here reprint a brief record which was
drawn up for the Star on the occasion of the
motion made by Dr. Hunter on Bradlaugh's be-
half, just before the latter's death, for the ex-
punging from the House's Journals of the old
resolutions of exclusion.
"On May 3, 1880, when Mr. Bradlaugh handed to the Clerk
of the House a written paper claiming the right to affirm under
the law, the trouble began. A common statement is that he
◄ refused to take the oath,' and 'obtruded his opinions' on the
House. Neither of these things happened then or at any other
time. The Speaker, being in doubt, asked Mr. Bradlaugh to
withdraw; and Lord F. Cavendish, seconded by Sir Stafford
Northcote, moved the appointment of a Committee of Inquiry,
which was agreed to, though a week after, on its being formally
moved, there were seventy-four votes against to 171 for it. On
May 20th the Committee reported that persons entitled to affirm
in courts of justice under the Evidence Amendment Acts were
not legally entitled to affirm in the House, this view being come
to only on the casting vote of the chairman, Mr. Walpole. Mr.
Bradlaugh then publicly intimated that while the oath included
words which to him were meaningless, so that it would have
been an act of hypocrisy on his part to take it voluntarily if
another course were open to him, he should now take the oath,
xlviii
MEMOIR.
holding himself bound, not by the words of asseveration, but by
the explicit affirmation. On the 21st he went to the table, amid
uproar, to be sworn. Sir H. D. Wolff objecting, the Speaker
again requested Mr. Bradlaugh to withdraw, going on to admit,
however, that he knew of no precedent for refusing the oath to
a member offering to take it. Sir Henry moved that refusal be
made, on the score, not only of the member's Atheism, but of his
'Impeachment of the House of Brunswick'; and Alderman
Fowler seconded. Gladstone and Bright spoke powerfully on
the other side in the long and fierce debate which ensued, and
which, after several adjournments, ended in the appointment of
another Committee, this time to report whether Mr. Bradlaugh
was entitled to take the oath. On June 16th, this Committee
reported that the taking of an oath by Mr. Bradlaugh would not
be a genuine swearing in the meaning of the law; but recom-
mended, by a majority of four, that after all he be allowed to
affirm, and that his right be afterwards tested by action at law.
"Over a motion by Mr. Labouchere to this end, there was
another long debate, Sir Hardinge Giffard and Alderman Fowler
moving a resolution refusing both oath and affirmation. Finally,
Jews and Nonconformists and Parnellites helping the Tories,
the motion was defeated by 275 to 230.
6
“The situation is edifying, when one looks back on it. It
was first decided that Mr. Bradlaugh could not legally affirm
in the House, though he had frequently affirmed in the Courts.
But the law allowing affirmation in the Courts, being apparently
framed to prevent dishonest Christians from evading the oath,
puts upon unbelievers the virtual insult of making the judge
technically but ambiguously decide that an oath would not be
binding' on their conscience. When, therefore, Mr. Bradlaugh
gave his evidence to the effect that he had affirmed in the law
Courts, he was held to have admitted that he satisfied judges
that an oath 'would not be binding on his conscience'. There-
fore, though he clearly explained that that was only a legal
technicality, and that an oath was as binding on his conscience
as an affirmation, he must not be allowed to take the oath,
though everybody knew that various unbelievers then sitting
in the House had done so. The law then clearly ought to be
MEMOIR.
xlix
altered, but the majority would not alter it. On this basis
of unabashed iniquity, a Christian legislature stood for five
years.
"All the same, Mr. Bradlaugh again came forward, and was
allowed to make his first great speech at the bar; but a rescind-
ing motion was defeated. Requested to leave the House, he
respectfully refused, because the order was illegal. Gladstone,
then Premier and leader of the House, refused to help the
majority out of the fix in which they had placed themselves;
and on the motion of Northcote, after much uproar, the offender
was 'committed to the Clock Tower', from which he had just to
be released unconditionally. Mr. Gladstone later moved as
a standing order that members be allowed to affirm at their
choice; and this was carried by 303 to 249; whereupon Mr.
Bradlaugh made affirmation of allegiance, took his seat, and
voted. Immediately he was sued for penalties, as having voted
illegally, by Clarke, the tool of Mr. Newdegate. Insults all the
while rained in from all sides on the member, his family, and
his friends; and among others the Rev. Mr. Voysey pronounced
the action of Northampton disgraceful, and praised the speeches
urging the Atheist's exclusion; while Sir John Hay brutally
insulted Mrs. Besant, Mr. Bradlaugh's partner.
"At length, in 1881, the action of Clarke v. Bradlaugh was
decided against the defendant, who again lost on appeal.
Bradlaugh's seat was thus vacated, and he again stood for
Northampton, to be again elected after a desperate struggle.
Again he came to the table to take the oath, and again, on
a division, he was prevented. Removed by the Sergeant
again and again to the bar, he again and again returned to
the table, till the House adjourned; and again next day he
presented himself, till it was arranged that the Government
should give facilities' or do something themselves. The
Ministerial Oaths Act making no progress, Mr. Bradlaugh
appealed to the country, and again, on August 3rd, 1881, he
presented himself at the House, this time to be violently seized
at the very door and ejected by fourteen policemen and ushers,
a crowd of members looking on, many of them delightedly.
Standing on the steps, hatless, with his clothes torn, he might,
C
1
MEMOIR.
T
it is said, by one word, have set his host of exasperated followers
wrecking the House. The word was not spoken. The im-
mediate result of the outrage, perpetrated by the House on
its lawfully elected member, was for him a severe attack of
erisypelas in the arms. [On this occasion as before, his life
was in danger, and still more seriously so. Only a complete
withdrawal from London, and the most anxious nursing, pre-
vented a summary ending of all troubles.]
(6
Again, next year, on the assembling of Parliament, the
unsubduable member presented himself, and made his third
speech at the Bar; and again the majority refused to let him
swear or sit. A few days later, Mr. Gladstone professing to
have no policy, Mr. Bradlaugh took the strategic step of ad-
ministering the oath to himself and sitting down. Again he
was expelled; again he was elected for Northampton, on the
largest poll yet reached. Still the House decreed his exclusion;
though over a thousand petitions, with a quarter of a million
signatures, had been presented in his favor. On May 3rd,
1883, the third anniversary of his appearance in the House,
the Government Oaths Act Amendment Bill was lost by three
votes; and next day Bradlaugh was once more refused, by a
majority of 106, the right to vote. While all this battle was
being fought, the Conservatives had further sought, though
vainly, to convict him of blasphemy in respect of selling the
prosecuted Freethinker. On the other hand, he had won in
the Lords, on appeal, his action against Newdegate for
'maintenance' of Clarke; and Newdegate, it is known, had
to sell some of his best timber to meet the accumulated mass
of costs.
"The rest of the story is soon told. On 9th February, 1884,
Mr. Bradlaugh again administered the oath to himself and
voted and was again expelled. He then accepted the Chiltern
Hundreds, and was yet again triumphantly returned for North-
ampton. Denied justice throughout the Parliament of 1880-1885,
he was allowed by the new Speaker, on the assembling of the
first Parliament of 1886, to take the oath and sit, the Speaker
firmly refusing to let any protest or question be interposed, and
thus virtually pronouncing his predecessor's policy illegal.
MEMOIR.
li
Later, Mr. Bradlaugh carried his Affirmation Bill and put
matters on a safe, legal footing."
The press in general has told within the last
few weeks how the long denied right of serving
his country in Parliament was turned to account
by the junior member for Northampton, from 1886
onwards. At once his enormous energy-enormous
still, after all his battles-gave him importance.
in the House's work; and, what was even more
surprising to those who had not known the man,
his abundant geniality soon
geniality soon made him popular,
especially among the Conservatives, who had not
the uneasiness that still weighed upon so many
Liberals, of having the indomitable Atheist for a
colleague. New Conservative members assured
him of their contrition for the past iniquities of
their party; and one of these deprecated an
allusion by Bradlaugh in the House to what he
had undergone at the hands
the hands of the "consti-
tutional" party. Others remonstrated with him on
his impolitic proclamation of his Atheism. "Good
God! Bradlaugh," said one tolerant gentleman, in
the warmth of his friendly concern, "What does
it matter whether there's a God or not!" Among
his bitterest opponents, in his struggle for ad-
mission, had been the Parnellite party. Their
and their leader's cue was to oppose, however
-
ดว
lii
MEMOIR.
iniquitously, the man whom the priests hated, and
against whom Cardinal Manning wrote articles.
which Freethinkers will not soon forget. The
course taken was the more shameful inasmuch as
Bradlaugh had always been one of the warmest
advocates of Irish freedom. He had not only
been a collaborator with the leading Fenians, but
had continued all along to be an avowed Home
Ruler, and had spoken eloquently again and again
on the Nationalist side. All this had been ignored
at the command of cardinals and priests. During
his brief tenure of his seat in 1881, Bradlaugh
had vigorously moved the rejection of the Coercion
Act when Mr. Parnell was otherwise engaged.
This too was ignored, and one or two votes given
by him on minor issues were published to the
Irish people, with an abundance of sheer inven-
tion, by way of justifying the Nationalist party's
tactics. When, however, on the raising of the
Home Rule issue by Mr. Gladstone, Bradlaugh
held to the position he had always taken up, one
leading Nationalist met him in the House, in the
orthodox manner, with the greeting:
"You are
the best Christian of us all, Mr. Bradlaugh ".
So rapidly did he bring to bear his great acquired
power of work, that already in 1887 he personally
carried through the House his Truck Act, besides
MEMOIR.
liii
((
securing on his single initiative the appointment
of two Select Committees, on Perpetual Pensions
and the Interference of Peers in Elections, as well
as of the Royal Commission on Market Rights and
Tolls. The summary of the press was that it
had been Bradlaugh's session". Since then,
besides carrying his Affirmation Bill in 1888, he
did an infinity of miscellaneous work on various
Committees of inquiry, on the Grand Committee
of Law, and on the Vaccination Commission, besides
carrying on a continuous series of questions on
behalf of India, to whose service he now devoted
an ever-increasing amount of time. Among his
many minor good deeds was a successful appeal
to the Scotch Office to take up the preservation
of the Clyde Lochs from pollution. And in the
very first year of his unmolested sitting, 1886, he
had secured the establishment of the Labor Bureau.
But all this work was done at a fearful cost. We
have seen how, in the period of his greatest strength,
he had to spend his energy in paying off debts
incurred by him through persecution, through pious
scoundrelism (as in the case of the debtor who
evaded payment on the score that an Atheist could
not legally sue, and who, after three years' litigation,
became bankrupt, leaving the victor saddled with all
his costs), and through chivalrous determination to
liv
MEMOIR.
fight the battle of Freethought and free speech in his
own person at any cost, whenever or wherever the
push came. At the age of forty-three, before the
trial for publishing the Knowlton pamphlet, he had
got rid of most of his burdens. But that was all.
He had been wholly unable to save; and when in
1877 he and Mrs. Besant established the Free-
thought Publishing Company in advantageous pre-
mises, they had to borrow the necessary capital on
debentures. This debt again might have been paid
off by their earnings; but the Parliamentary struggle
made that impossible. Not only were all earnings
swallowed up in the desperate battle for bare justice;
but that battle itself employed the greater part of
Bradlaugh's energy, and during the manifold lawsuits.
involved he could not even earn anything. The
Freethought party, poor as it mostly is, helped him
loyally with subscription after subscription. Poor
men and women did without their tobacco and their
single glass of beer a day to send help to "the lad",
as many of them always called him, in memory of his
early appearance. But the costs grew faster than
poor men's help could, and when he finally took his
seat, he sat under a new debt of several thousands
of pounds, besides the debt on his business partner-
ship. And the more work he did in the House, the
less time and strength had he left for earning money.
MEMOIR.
lv
His work in the House, as he did it, was alone
too much for even a strong man.
The five years
struggle, as his friends recognised, had made him an
old man; but the terrible and continuous strain of
the night hours, added to undiminished daily work,
carried on the process even more effectively; and I
remember how startled I was at the change wrought
in him by one hard session, in part of which I had
not seen him. Whether he got to bed at ten or at
three, he rose all the same at seven, and took up the
day's toil, which to the last generally included the
giving of gratis legal advice to some poor folk, very
often not even Freethinkers. We do not pay our mem-
bers of Parliament; and he, with his intense absorp-
tion in his political work, had to earn his living all the
while, and meet the interest on the capital of a busi-
ness to which he could finally give almost no personal
attention, as well as pay a heavy annuity to a relative.
In 1888, he was SO harassed by financial
difficulties that he spoke of resigning his seat;
and the mention of this by Mr. Stead, in the
Pall Mall Gazette, with a generous appeal, greatly
to that gentleman's honor, resulted in an exten-
sive subscription to clear off the remains of his law
debts. The sum realised sufficed to discharge these,
and yield nearly £1,000 towards his other burdens;
and he now cheerfully looked forward to winning
lvi
MEMOIR.
some ultimate ease. But the relief had come too
late. He worked as hard as ever, while less able
to work; and the death in 1888 of his daughter
Alice, his home companion, struck sorely an
already sore-strained heart.
No physique could stand such a life. Often
did he confess that he had "burned the candle
at both ends and in the middle"; and now and
then he would contrive to snatch a day's fishing,
which always had such a recuperating effect that
it was plain he might have lived long had his life
been easier. In his surviving daughter's memory
he never had so much as one week's holiday till
within the last half-dozen years. In that time
he has had several short spells at Loch Long,
where, giving himself up with his invariable
energy to the business in hand, he would fish
from morn till eve, rowed about by his fisher-
man-landlord, and making baskets unapproached
in the local records of rod-fishing. But the
balance could not be maintained; and near the
end of 1889 he was struck down with an illness
which took him very close to death, a primary
phase, I believe, of the Bright's disease which
finally killed him. A voyage to India was pre-
scribed; and he went, in time to appear at the
Congress of the year, where he made one short
MEMOIR.
lvii
1
but deeply impressive speech, and received an
extraordinary ovation from the thousands of dele-
gates who had already learned to look to him as
the champion of the Indian peoples in the Eng-
lish Parliament. He came home visibly improved;
but not a few of us felt that he would never
regain his old strength. A susceptibility to painful
emotion in addressing meetings of his old followers
had grown somewhat on him in late years, and
was now more marked than ever. The vascular
system continued to run down. Yet his work
never slackened. Unable to lecture as before, he
wrote many articles for reviews and magazines-
a kind of work not open to him ten years ago,
when the editor of the Nineteenth Century would
not even let him reply in its pages to the attack
of Cardinal Manning. Even in the middle of
last year he accepted a challenge to debate from
Mr. Hyndman, and did it in St. James's Hall
-putting on himself an injurious strain rather
than even seem to flinch in his political
course. A fishing-holiday in the recess had its
usual refreshing effect; but only a continuous re-
gimen could now save him; and the only town
exercise for which he had any inclination he
could not get, not being able to afford a horse.
Seeing him at Christmas last, when about to
lviii
MEMOIR.
leave town
town for
for some time, I had heavy fore-
bodings, which were only too soon fulfilled. In
the second week of January his increasing weakness
had become too serious to be longer fought
against, and the friendly doctor who was called in had
to insist on his taking to bed. He never rose from
it. A few days afterwards I had my last talk
with him. He was absolutely cheerful, perfectly
prepared for the worst, to the likelihood of which
he briefly alluded, with entire serenity. The great
brain was still vigorous; even the resonant voice
was there; though the breathing showed the terrible
trouble at the heart. We discussed several things,
in particular the position of his motion for the
expunging of the old Commons' resolutions of
exclusion; and the small chance there was of
his being able to
to move it. "It would make
rather a fine suicide," he said with a smile,
"if I were to drop in the attempt.'
By this
time there was, for us friends, little or no hope,
and the end came very quickly. He was able
to have the great satisfaction of knowing that his
motion was taken charge of by Dr. Hunter; but
he never knew how triumphantly it was carried.
Of these last days the story has been touchingly
and sufficiently told by his daughter.'
¹ National Reformer, February 8th.
ها
"}
MEMOIR.
lix
In
On 30th January he died, aged 57; and we
buried him at Woking on the 3rd February. The
concourse of mourners—who, in compliance with
the announcement of his own wishes in these
matters, wore no mourning- was SO great as
almost to exceed the resources of the railway
company. It was an extraordinary gathering.
Costermongers and members of Parliament, Hindus,
soldiers, clergymen, might all be
all be seen in the
throng, which included hundreds of women.
accordance with his express wish, there was
kind of service or speaking. And when all was
over, and the multitude, after some hours of wait-
ing, was thought to have dispersed, having filed
past the grave, the small group of immediate
friends, on going for a last look, found that the
grave was only gradually being filled up by a
devoted band, who had taken the shovels from
the grave-diggers, and one by one threw in each
his single quota, silently covering up,
"Each for his brother the hushed
Heart, and the limitless dreams,
With a little gift of sand."
no.
I will not attempt here to expound the political
philosophy of the author of the following pages.
His positions on specific
on specific questions are well
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MEMOIR.
one
known, and some of them are
are here fully set
forth; but they do not readily adapt themselves
to any
of the abstract systems in vogue.
A few years ago I heard him say that he could
not accept the à priori theories and cut-and-dry
schemes of either the extreme Individualists or
the Socialists; he found himself in a society
conditioned by many heterogenous laws and usages,
and he proposed to legislate for that society in
view of its structure and symptoms. Perhaps
since then he may
may have moved nearer pure
theoretic Individualism, under the stress of repul-
sion to the facile fashionable Socialism; but in
legislative practice he stood substantially where
he did thirty years ago, as his writings can abun-
dantly prove.
At no time of his life did he
affect to accept the formulas of Socialism; and
Mrs. Besant, who has latterly done so, has testified
Į that he never moved from his main positions,
either one way or the other. I may here repeat
what I have said on that head elsewhere.
،،
Nothing could be more foolish at best, or baser at worst,
than the pretence made by so many pseudo-Socialists that he
had slackened in his devotion to the great cause of democracy.
So unreasoning can men be, that this assertion has been made
even in cold blood on the strength of the fact that he opposed
a universal Eight Hours Law (he approved of such or approx-
imate limitation of labour in the public service, and on
railways, as State-conferred monopolies). On that head I
MEMOIR.
lxi
f
quite agreed with him; and I have no hesitation in saying.
that not a few Socialists who have gone with the crowd for
popularity's sake know perfectly that Mr. Bradlaugh was
economically right, and that the measure now clamored
for would be an empty gift were it won. Further, I may
be permitted to say for him what he would not say for
himself, that his staunch adherence to the name of Indi-
vidualist put him under the disadvantage of dissociating
him in the eyes of many from some of his own latest
services to the workers. The Labour Bureau is not, in
the ordinary Individualist view, an Individualist institution :
the Truck Act was a departure from the doctrines of
Individualist economics; and the campaign for free and
municipalised markets also outwent the strict Individualist
position. Let me not be misunderstood; he was an Individ-
ualist in the best sense of the word; but he never on
dogmatic grounds refused to contemplate corporate action
that was practicable, really beneficial, and unattended by
social demoralisation. His Bill for the Compulsory Cultivation
of Land was the one practical attempt in current politics to
introduce in a measure the principle of Land Nationalisation
(Socialisation), though he did not call himself a Land
Nationaliser."
-L
This view is perhaps more impartial than might
be supposed. I have a belief which he did not
share in an ultimate Socialism as the highest
ideal; and a desire which he did not share for
certain steps towards that end; but I have never
been able to disguise from myself his immense
superiority in practical sagacity and executive
fitness to the leading advocates of Socialistic
measures.
What all reasonably fair critics must admit is
lxii
MEMOIR.
the constant reasonableness and temperance of his
writing in these papers. In his battling life and
his compulsive eloquence he frequently recals
Lassalle; but he is typically English in his practic-
ality of method, as compared with the great
Socialist, to say nothing of their difference of
doctrine. Bradlaugh was essentially a legist; in
a law court he was essentially a lawyer, at the
opposite pole from the passionate orator that
thundered down the judges who demurred to long
declamations from Schiller. And no one can say
of this volume what even a friendly biographer is
constrained to say of Lassalle's reply to Schulze-
Delitzsch: "The tone is undignified, and at times.
The work has not undeservedly earned
the title of Schimpfwerk, for it teems with abuse
where, above all things, the soberest argument is
desirable". There is one matter, however, in which
the two great "agitators" stand about equally
entitled to honor; they neither of them
stooped to flatter the democracy which they as-
pired to lead; and the Englishman would have
counted that for much to the German, for, while
he valued wisdom, he loved courage. Lassalle's
impeachments of the workers to whom he appealed
were frequent: Bradlaugh perhaps impeached even
oftener, for he dealt with more issues; but what
coarse.
ever
MEMOIR.
lxiii
needed most courage of all was to fight openly
and stedfastly against specious schemes that caught
the fancy of the masses, and were preferred by
them to more useful but less attractive measures.
That he has done in the following pages, by which
he had been willing to stand or fall as a demo-
cratic politician; and if there is any truth in the
familiar claim that the great English idiosyncracy
is a love of fair play, this posthumous volume will
lose him no love among those for whom he wrought
so long and so hard.
JOHN M. Robertson.

Photographed by Messrs. Elliott and Fry, London.
UNIV
OF
MICH
LABOR AND LAW.
CHAPTER I.
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
THE excuse, if not the justification, for this small volume may
be found (1) in the numerous resolutions asking for legislative
action passed at the Trades Union Congress held in Liverpool
in September last; (2) in the legislative proposals now standing
on the Order Book of the House of Commons; (3) in the ex-
pressions, in and out of Parliament, of men claiming high
position in the councils of the nation; (4) in the disposition mani-
fested by members of the present House of Commons and by
candidates for parliamentary honors to pledge themselves to
legislative projects for the regulation of adult labor, under
pressure of an active section of the electorate; (5) in the
admittedly enormous power now possessed by the working
classes, should they happen to be united, of determining in the
majority of contested elections who shall be the successful
candidate; (6) in the new attitude taken by journalists of
repute and influence in supporting legislative regulation of the
conditions of adult labor.
The following are the material resolutions affecting legisla-
tion, without any of the speeches except such portions as are
necessary to explain amendments, extracted from the authorised
B
2
LABOR AND LAW.
report of the Liverpool Trades Union Congress, at which
congress, Mr. Wilson, M.P., Chairman of the Standing
Orders Committee, stated that 311 societies were represented
by 457 delegates. According to the list the numbers
represented would stand at 1,810,191 ; but Mr. Wilson stated
that the Committee "had analysed the federations and separate
organisations, and considered the federations would represent
340,000, so that approximately the number of people repre-
sented was 1,470,191". After careful examination of the list of
societies represented prefixed to the Congress report, I am
inclined to think that the number is still too high; but, in any
case, the representation was greatly in excess of that at Dundee
in 1889. It may be noted according to Mr. John Burnett's
third report on Trades Unions for 1889 (C-5,808, p. 1), that at
the close of 1887, the latest period to which the Chief Registrar's
reports were then available, 288 Trades Unions were on his
list, of which 203, with 356,416 members, made returns. In
1889, in reply to requests from Mr. Burnett, only 104 societies
made returns to the Board of Trade; these for 1888 had 373,904
members. Several of the 104 were unregistered societies. Mr.
Burnett considered these 104 unions to represent not more
than "one-third or one-fourth of the Trades Unions of the
Kingdom", but to "include among them those which are
largest and most important".
1. Mr. JOHN INGLIS (Glasgow) moved :
"That this Congress views with some degree of satisfaction that
in their recent Bill [Employers' Liability Bill] the Government
indicated a slight desire to favor the views put forward by the
last Congress with reference to the power of employers to con-
tract themselves out of their liability; but this Congress emphatically
reaffirms its previous declaration that no measure of legislation
this question will be satisfactory to the industrial classes
in this country which does not abolish the law of common em-
on
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
3
ployment; to restrain the privilege hitherto enjoyed by employers
to contract out of their liability; and to have removed all limitation
or restriction relative to the amount of compensation workmen
may be entitled to; and the Parliamentary Committee are hereby
instructed to introduce a Bill embracing the foregoing."
، ،
Mr. J. KEIR HARDIE (Cumnock) said that while the Govern-
ment made some alterations they still retained the objectionable
-contracting out clauses, He did not want to leave the Govern-
ment under the impression that 450 members of that Congress
could be taken in by so little concession, and he would move
the omission of the words of the motion down to "liability:
but," the resolution thus to begin with the words "The Con-
gress emphatically reaffirms ", etc.
Mr. HATTON (London) suggested the substitution of the word
prohibit" instead of "restrain ”.
These alterations were accepted, and the resolution, as
curtailed and strengthened, was adopted unanimously.
[The only clause relating to contracting out in the Govern-
ment Bill was clause 3, which it is scarcely accurate to describe
as "a contracting out clause ". It was really a clause in
limitation of the common law right of contract. The Congress
members hardly seem to have comprehended that if the doctrine
of common employment should be abolished there would be
no necessity for, and no reason for, an Employers' Liability
Act. This general question of employers' liability will be found
more fully treated later in this volume.]
2. Mr. JAMES SMITH (Middlesbrough) moved:
"That it is highly desirable further to amend the Coroners' Juries
Act; to make it imperative upon the authorities to endeavor always
to summon jurymen, whose calling is of such a nature as will enable
them to thoroughly understand the circumstances of the case."
Mr. J. KEIR HARDIE moved to add the words "And in
B 2
4
LABOR AND LAW.
order to effect this, each juryman whose services are engaged
shall be entitled to his wages and outlays for the time he is so
engaged". This was also accepted.
Mr. HOLLINGS (Bradford) proposed as an addition to the
resolution-" And shall be paid for their services according to
the rate of wages of their trade". This was accepted by Mr.
Smith, and the resolution was carried.
[There is no doubt that the whole of our Jury Laws require
consolidation and considerable amendment. Master Erle has.
his careful work on "The Jury
fully drawn attention to this in
Laws and their Amendment".
I
I
am unaware of
am unaware of any Coroners'
Juries Act. The "Coroners' Act, 1887", 50 and 51 Vict., cap.
71, sec. 1, provides that the coroner shall summon "not less.
than twelve, nor more than twenty-three good and lawful men".
Presumably, under sec. 25, the local authority might authorise
the coroner to make a payment to the jury, but no payment
is in terms authorised by the Act. Mr. Atherley-Jones, in his
"Miners' Handy Book", p. 53, states "that in some places
the authorities have allowed a fee to be paid ". The Coal
Mines Regulation Act, 1887, 50 and 51 Vict., cap. 58, sec. 48,
sub-sec. 7, enacts that
"Any person having a personal interest in, or employed in, or in the
management of, the mine in which the explosion or accident occurred,
shall not be qualified to serve on the jury empanelled on the inquest;
and it shall be the duty of the constable or other officer not to summon
any person disqualified under this provision, and it shall be the duty
of the coroner not to allow any such person to be sworn or to sit on
the jury."
Two questions are raised by the resolution, one of "choice,
not chance", in the selection of the jury; the other, the payment
of jurors. The first point is not easy of enactment; the second
might be by a fixed sum per juror for each case, but it could
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
5
scarcely vary according to the trade or profession of each
juryman.]
3. (a) Mr. SHIPTON moved :—
"That this Congress condemns the system of contracting by
schedule adopted by the Government and other public bodies, as it
conduces to low wages, scamped work, and inferior materials, which
are pernicious to the public interest. The Parliamentary Committee
is hereby instructed to take such steps as may be most effective to
secure the insertion of a clause in all contracts prohibiting sub-letting:
that no contract shall be given to any firm that does not pay to all its
workpeople the recognised trade union rates of wages in the respective
localities where any work may be done, either by those directly
employed by Government and municipalities, or contractors taking
contracts from these bodies; also demands that where the factory
clause is inserted and violated the penalty shall be rigidly enforced."
This was carried almost unanimously.
4. (a) Mr. HOLMES (Leicester) moved, on behalf of Mr.
Birtwistle-
"That this Congress, whilst gratefully recognising the reform which
has recently been effected by the appointment as factory inspectors of
men having a practical acquaintance with the conditions of factory
life, regrets that as yet no steps have been taken by Her Majesty's
Government to give effect to the repeated and pressing demands of
previous Congresses for a considerable addition to the staff of factory
inspectors."
Mr. LYONS (London) moved as an amendment that the word
"technical" be also inserted in addition to "practical".
Miss WHITE urged the desirability of having women in-
spectors.
Mr. HOLMES signified his willingness to accept his lady
friend's suggestion.
The resolution, with the addenda suggested by Mr. Lyons
and the lady representatives incorporated, was carried.
a. These propositions do not necessarily imply legislative interference, but
are closely connected with such proposed intervention.
LABOR AND LAW.
K
j
6
5. Mr. A. WILKIE (Newcastle) moved:
That, in order to secure the greater safety of life and property at
sea, it be a special instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to use
their best endeavors to procure in any Shipping Bill that may be
introduced in the House a clause giving effect to that recommendation
of the Royal Commission on the Loss of Life and Property at Sea—
'That a competent professional examination should be required for the
rating of shipwrights (ship carpenters) '—so that all such, before being
allowed to proceed to sea in that capacity, must produce a certificate
of competency. And that the use and wont custom of the trade shall
be legalised by all vessels being required by law to carry one or more
shipwrights."
((
Mr. CHANDLER (Manchester) moved, as an amendment, the
addition of the words:
That, in any efforts they may put forth to give effect to the fore-
going resolution, the Parliamentary Committee shall take care that no
clause is inserted in any Shipping Bill that will debar ship joiners
engaging as ship carpenters, providing they can pass a qualifying
examination."
The amendment received 93 votes, and the resolution, which
was carried, III votes.
6. Mr. J. SWIFT moved:
"That this Congress regrets no favorable opportunity presented'
itself during the past session of Parliament to debate the Bill having
for its object the future examination of persons in charge of steam
engines or boilers, and the granting of certificates as to their practical
fitness for such a duty. That the Parliamentary Committee be
instructed to arrange for the reintroduction of this Bill next session;
and should any other Bill be introduced relating to steam engines or
boilers, that an effort be made to have included the principle of
examination and granting of certificates as to the practical fitness of
all persons placed in charge of steam engines or boilers."
Carried unanimously.
7. Mr. ToYN (Saltburn-by-the-Sea) moved:
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, the present method of
appointing magistrates as persons possessing a certain amount of real
property is unfair and detrimental to the interests of the working
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
7
classes, as it practically prevents the appointment of working men,
and considers that the time has come when such qualification should
be abolished, and instructs the Parliamentary Committee to use its
best endeavor to bring about this much-needed reform as quickly as
possible."
Carried unanimously.
[County Justices in England and Wales must, by 18 Geo. II,
cap. 20, sec. I, have a freehold, copyhold, or customary
estate for life, or for some greater estate, or an estate for some
long term of years determinable upon one or more life or lives,
or for a certain term orginally created for twenty-one years or
more, in lands, tenements, or hereditaments in England or
Wales, of the clear yearly value of £100 over and above what
will discharge all incumbrances, and above all rents and charges
payable out of it; or must be entitled to the immediate rever-
sion or remainder of lands, tenements, or hereditaments leased
for one, two, or three lives, or for any term of years determin-
able upon one, two, or three lives, upon renewed rents of the
clear value of £300 (see Woodward v. Watts, 22 "Law Journal"
(N. S.), M. C. 149; 2 E. and B. 452).
There are persons who may be justices within the counties
for which they act officially without qualification by estate, such
as county court judges (9 and 10 Vict., cap. 95, sec. 21), the vice-
warden of the stannaries of Cornwall and Devon (18 and 19 Vict.,
cap. 32, sec. 29), and the police magistrates of the metropolis
(2 and 3 Vict., cap. 71, sec. 1; 11 and 12 Vict., cap. 42, sec. 31).
By 28 and 29 Vict., cap. 124, sec. 5, the Superintendents of Her
Majesty's Dockyards are in all places justices of the peace in
respect of all offences specified in the Act, and of all matters
relating to Her Majesty's Naval Service, and the stores, pro-
visions, and accounts thereof.
In boroughs within the Municipal Corporations Act the
8
LABOR AND LAW.
magistrates are not required to possess any pecuniary qualifi-
cation (sec. 101), but they must reside in the borough or within
seven miles of it (sec. 98), or occupy a house, shop, warehouse, or
other premises within the borough (24 and 25 Vict., cap. 75,
sec. 3). The council of the borough may resolve to have a
salaried police magistrate or magistrates, upon which Her
Majesty will appoint a qualified barrister-at-law for that office
(5 and 6 Will. IV, cap. 76, sec. 99).
There is no statutory qualification now required for county
justices in Ireland (but see Nun and Walsh, "Irish Justices",
p. 3, and 18 Henry VI, cap. 11, secs. 1 and 2), and it is expressly
enacted that no qualification in estate shall be necessary for
Irish borough magistrates.]
8. Mr. J. H. WILSON (Sunderland) moved :
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to
draft a Bill for the reconstruction of courts of inquiry into the loss
of vessels, and such Bill to provide for the appointment of seamen
as members of such courts of inquiry.”
Carried unanimously.
9. Mr. J. H. WILSON (Sunderland) moved :
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to
draft an amendment to the 253rd section of the Merchant Shipping
Act (which enacts that a seaman, for desertion abroad, forfeits all
clothes, effects, wages, and emoluments which he may earn on any
vessel he may join abroad, until his first arrival in the United King-
dom) to the effect that seamen shall not forfeit their clothes, effects,
wages, and emoluments, as provided by the said section."
Carried unanimously.
10. Mr. HARFORD (London) moved:
"That this Congress, recognising the benefits derived by the ap-
pointment of practical workmen as factory inspectors, instructs the
Parliamentary Committee to press upon the Government the necessity
of further extending the principle to railways.”
Carried unanimously.
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
9
II. (a) Mr. QUELCH (London) moved:
"That, in view of the scamping and sweating which past experience
has shown to be inseparable from the system of contract in connexion
with public work, this Congress is of opinion that all such work should
be done by the public administrative bodies themselves, wtthout any
contractor; or, in any case where this cannot be done, and where a
contract is felt to be necessary, such contract should be entered into
directly with the workmen's associations, without the intervention of
any middleman.”
The motion was adopted.
12. Mrs. HUTCHINSON (London) moved—
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, no amendment of the Fac-
tory and Workshop Act would be satisfactory which did not include
the extension of that Act to laundries."
Mr. DAVIS moved the following addendum, which was
accepted :-
"And to all trades where work is carried on by the employment
of women."
The motion, as enlarged, was carried.
13. Mr. P. H. HOLMES (East Lancashire) moved-
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to
endeavor to effect such a change in the Employer and Workman Act,
1875, as to cause section II to apply to male adults in the same
manner as it does to females, young persons, and children."
Mr. J. KEIR HARDIE moved this addendum-
"And, further, that the said section II shall be extended so as to
include payments for materials necessary to the carrying on of the
work, or for necessary conveniences for the workers."
Which was accepted, and the resolution carried.
[As Messrs. Holmes and Hardie, and the Congress which
adopted their joint proposal, seem to have somewhat misap-
prehended the common law and the limitation of it by the
section referred to, it may be as well to state this clearly.
10
LABOR AND LAW.
#
13
K
11
"
Section II of the Employers and Workmen's Act, 1875,
enacts:
"That in case of a child, young person, or woman subject to the
provisions of the Factory Acts, 1833 to 1874 [now consolidated by
41 and 42 Victoria, cap. xvi] any forfeiture on the ground of absence
or leaving work shall not be deducted from or set off against a claim
for wages or other sum due for work done before such absence or
leaving work, except to the amount of damage (if any) which the
employer may have sustained by reason of leaving such work."
Sub-Section I of Section 3 enacts that in "any dispute between
an employer and workman arising out of or incidental to their
relation as such",
"It [the County Court or Court of Summary Jurisdiction] may adjust
and set off the one against the other all such claims on the part of
either the employer or of the workman, arising out of or incidental to
the relation between them, as the Court may find to be subsisting,
whether such claims are liquidated or unliquidated, and are for wages,
damages, or otherwise".
Mr. Holmes apparently not only wishes to modify this sub-
section, but also to change the law under which, in certain
cases, wages are forfeited by absence of employee without the
agreed notice having been given. Mr. Keir Hardie may mean
that "materials
(C
or necessary conveniences for the workers
supplied by the employers are not to be considered by the
County Court or Justices in deciding any dispute. Or, he may
wish to repeal the exceptions in the Truck Acts (see Section 23,
1 and 2 William, 14, cap. 37. Cutts v. Ward, 2 Q. B., 357) and
to make illegal any charges whatever for materials or necessary
convenience. In either view his addendum is ambiguous and
uncertain. The law as to forfeiture of wage is laid down in the
following cases.
Walsh v. Walley, 2 Q. B. 367, 43 "Law Journal", Q. B.
102, where a weaver was employed as weekly servant, his
"}
99.
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
II
•
wages being regulated by the number of pieces woven and.
delivered. These wages were ascertained and fixed at noon on
Thursday in each week, but were not paid until the next
Saturday. By rules embodied in the contract of hiring, the
workmen were required to give, before leaving, fourteen days'
notice at the time of booking up on Thursday, and there was a
rule: "Persons leaving without notice will forfeit all wages.
due". On a Thursday the sum earned by the weaver in the
preceding week was ascertained and fixed at 13s. He com-
menced another week on the afternoon of the same day, and
worked during the morning of Friday, and earned 7s. He left
during the forenoon of Friday, without having given notice.—
Held, that he had forfeited, by leaving before the Saturday, the
wages due on the Saturday, as well as the wages earned between
noon of Thursday and Friday.
Saunders v. Whittle, 24 "Weekly Reporter", 406; 33 "Law
Times" (N.S.), 816. A painter was hired by the week, his wages
to be 7d. per hour, payable every Saturday at noon. The full
week consisted of fifty-four and a-half hours; overtime was paid
for at the same rate. A week's notice from either party was
required. He left the service at noon on Friday, before the
week was up, and without giving any notice, having worked,
including overtime, fifty-seven hours.-Held, that he was not.
entitled to recover his wages for the current week of his leaving.
service.
Gregson v. Watson, 34 "Law Times" (N.S.), 143. A factory
winder was paid every Saturday for the number of sets she had
wound off during the week ending on the preceding Wednesday.
One of the rules of the factory in which she worked was, that
fourteen days' notice in writing was required, previously to
leaving the employment, such notice to be given on a Thursday;.
12
LABOR AND LAW.
and all persons leaving without notice to forfeit the whole of the
wages to which they would have otherwise been entitled, and
also to be proceeded against according to law. She earned
35. 7d. on the first two days of one week of her employment,
was absent with leave on Saturday, did not return, and wholly
left the service without leave on Monday. In an action by her
for 3s. 7d. earned, the County Court judge held that hers was a
weekly hiring, and that although her master's damage by reason
of her absence was only 3s., she could not recover anything
under the Employers and Workmen Act, 1875.-Held, that
notwithstanding the fortnight's notice required, the facts justified
the finding that the service was weekly; that she had no claim
for wages or other sum due for work, and that the County Court
judge was right.
Warburton v. Heyworth. 6 Q. B. D., 1. A woman
weaver employed at a mill with rules that no person should
leave without giving fourteen days' previous notice, such notice
to be given on a Saturday; and that any person leaving without
having given such notice should "forfeit all wage then due,
earned or unpaid ". She was paid by the piece, and all work
done was booked up at three o'clock every Wednesday after-
noon and paid for on the following Saturday, all work booked
after three o'clock on the Wednesday being carried forward
to the following week. She left the mill before three o'clock
on a Wednesday afternoon without giving the required notice
having previously carried in and booked certain work which
she had completed. On the following Saturday, her application
for payment of the wages due at the time she left, was refused
on the ground that they were forfeited under the above rules.
No claim was made by the employer for damages.-Held that
the facts did not show weekly hiring at weekly wages, but
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
13.
showed that the price for the work done and booked when the
weaver left on the Wednesday, was then earned and due, though
not then payable, and the same would have been forfeited under
the above rules, but that as there was no damage, and the
weaver was a woman subject to the Factory Acts, she was
protected by the above Section 11 of the Employers and Work-
men Act, 1875, and could not be deprived of what she had so
earned.]
14. Mr. TAIT (Glasgow), on behalf of Mr. J. M. Jack,
moved-
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to take
such steps as may appear necessary to assimilate the law of Scotland
to that of England in the case of accidental death.”
The resolution was seconded, and after being amended by
incorporating an addition to the effect that its purport extend
to inquiries into accidental deaths in Scotland, was unanimously
passed.
15. Mr. JOHN GARDNER (Cardiff) moved—
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to draft
an amendment to the 243rd section of the Merchant Shipping Act, for
the abolition of imprisonment of seamen, without the option of a fine,
for breaches of the said Act relating to discipline."
Carried unanimously.
16. (a) Mr. J. BAKER (London Firewood Cutters) moved:
"This Congress strongly protests against all parochial bodies using
pauper labor to the detriment of the firewood-cutting trade, it having
been most conclusively proved that such labor is carried on at a loss
to the ratepayers, and we call upon the Parliamentary Committee to
use their influence with the Local Government Board with a view to
stopping this unfair system.”
The resolution, having been extended so as to forbid the
employment of pauper labor generally by public bodies, was
unanimously adopted.
14
LABOR AND LAW.
17. Mr. J. CRONIN (Scotland) moved:
"That we instruct the Parliamentary Committee to abolish clause 7
of the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, and to amend such
other clauses as are dangerous to the liberties of the working classes."
Carried unanimously.
[Section 7 of the 38 and 39 Vict., cap. 86, here referred to,
.enacts:
(C
Every person who, with a view to compel any other person to
abstain from doing or to do any act which such other person has a
legal right to do or abstain from doing, wrongfully and without legal
authority,-
"(1) Uses violence to or intimidates such other person or his wife
or children, or injures his property; or
"(2) Persistently follows such other person about from place to
place; or
CC
'(3) Hides any tools, clothes, or other property owned or used by
such other person, or deprives him of or hinders him in the use
thereof; or
"(4) Watches or besets the house or other place where such other
person resides, or works, or carries on business, or happens to be, or
the approach to such house or place; or
((
'(5) Follows such other person with two or more other persons in
a disorderly manner in or through any street or road, shall on con-
viction thereof by a court of summary jurisdiction, or on indictment
as hereinafter mentioned, be liable either to pay a penalty not exceed-
ing twenty pounds, or to be imprisoned for a term not exceeding three
months, with or without hard labor.
(
Attending at or near the house or place where a person resides,
or works, or carries on business, or happens to be, or the approach to
such house or place in order merely to obtain or communicate informa-
tion, shall not be deemed a watching or besetting within the meaning
of this section.”]
18. (a) Mr. QUELCH (London) proposed :
"That this Congress condemns the practice of foreign crews work-
ing with ship workers in loading and discharging cargo, as not being
tolerated on the part of English crews in foreign ports, and as being
unjust as well as dangerous to the landsmen employed in this work.”
The proposition was at once adopted.
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
15
?
19. Captain Luccock moved:
"That the Parliamentary Committee be instructed to draft a Bill
prohibiting shipowning magistrates and magistrates interested in ship-
ping from adjudicating upon cases wherein a seaman may be concerned
in the alleged breach of any section of the Merchant Shipping Act."
Carried without dissent.
20. Mr. HOBSON moved:
"That it is of the highest importance in the interests of honest
trading that an international convention should be entered into with
such foreign countries as are willing to adopt the principles of the
Merchandise Marks Act; and that this Congress is of opinion that
Her Majesty's Government should avail themselves of every oppor-
tunity to secure such international arrangement as will prevent the
sale of falsely-marked merchandise in all countries that are parties to
the convention, and hereby instruct the Parliamentary Committee to
take steps to bring the matter before the attention of Her Majesty's
Government and the people's House of Commons."
Carried unanimously.
21. Mr. G. J. MARKS moved:
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, the time has arrived when
steps should be taken to reduce the working hours in all trades to
eight per day, or a maximum of forty-eight hours per week; and
while recognising the power and influence of trade organisations, it is
of opinion that the speediest and best method to obtain this reduction
for the workers generally is by parliamentary enactment. The
Congress therefore instructs the Parliamentary Committee to take
immediate steps for the furtherance of this object.”
Mr. PATTERSON (Durham) handed up the following amend-
ment:
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, it is of the utmost
importance that an eight hours day should be secured at once by such
trades as may desire it, or for whom it may be made to apply, without
injury to the workmen employed in such trades; further, it considers
that to relegate this important question to the Imperial Parliament,
which is necessarily, from its position, antagonistic to the rights of
labor, will only indefinitely delay this much-needed reform.”
16
LABOR AND LAW.
The Congress after debate voted on Mr. Patterson's amend-
ment, with the following result:-
For the amendment
Against
For the resolution
Against......
Majority against ....
The CHAIRMAN refused to allow another amendment, which
was proposed and seconded, to be put, as no notice had been
given to the Standing Orders Committee. There had been a
second amendment (but it was now withdrawn) of which notice
had been given.
The original resolution was then put to the vote, when the
figures were :-
...
..
……………
•
173
181
...
8
193
155
Majority
38
[It is credibly stated that amongst the majority in each of
these divisions were the dock laborers' delegates, and that the
societies these delegates represented have since resolved that
a limitation of eight hours per day ought not to be legally or
otherwise applied to them. It should be noted that by
addendum to resolution 33 the employers are proposed to
be held liable even if the offence of working beyond the limit
be committed without their consent.
Mr. Fenwick, M.P., who was elected Secretary to the Par-
liamentary Committee, is reported in the Newcastle Leader,
November 3rd, as saying on this point at Walker Colliery
that
"he wanted to put before them some facts as revealed in the vote
given in the recent Congress on the question of the general Eight
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
17
Hours. He knew that many delegates who were present at the
Congress, and who claimed to be members or leaders of the new
Trades Unionism, professed to derive much pleasure and satisfaction
from the character of that vote. But it seemed to him that after
careful examination those who made such professions were thankful
for small mercies. (Laughter and applause.) Now, there were 457
delegates accredited to the Conference-193 of those delegates voted
in favor of that proposal; 155 voted against it, the majority, therefore,
in favor of the resolution being 38. But there were 109 delegates who
did not vote—who either had not made up their minds on that question
or who did not consider it to be of such pressing or immediate impor-
tance as to justify them in registering their votes either for or against
it. So that when they considered the narrowness of the majority, and
that there were 109 who refused to record their votes, he thought he
was quite justified in saying that those who professed to get great
satisfaction out of it were thankful indeed for small mercies. (Applause.)
That was not all. The dock laborers of London were largely repre-
sented on the Congress, and each one voted in favor of that resolution
for the general Eight Hours. What followed? Immediately following
the Congress at Liverpool the dockers had a Congress extending over
several days in London, and naturally they considered that question
of the Eight Hours in its direct bearing in relation to their own trades.
What was the result? After full and careful deliberation on the
question, they declared by the majority of their votes that so far as
their trade is concerned the question is impracticable. (Hear, hear,
and applause.) Yet the delegates representing the dockers in the
Liverpool Congress to a man voted in favor of that resolution. When
they considered all those facts, and the narrowness of the majority at
the Congress, in his opinion the vote was a very unsatisfactory one
indeed, and from it it was impossible for them to ascertain what was
the true sense and feeling of the united trades of the country in
relation to a general Eight Hours day."
No Bill has been presented by any member on behalf of the
Parliamentary Committee, but a Bill has been introduced by
Mr. Cunninghame Graham, M.P. The question will be found
fully treated in Chapters II, III, and IV.]
22. Mr. STUART UTTLEY moved :
"That this Congress approves of the principles laid down in the
Bill drawn up and submitted to Parliament by Messrs. Broadhurst,
с
18
LABOR AND LAW.
Fenwick, and Coleridge, as amending the Merchandise Marks Act,
1887; and that the Parliamentary Committee be instructed to use
every means in their power to get the Bill passed into law."
The motion was agreed to.
23. Mr. J. HOLLINGS moved :
"That, seeing the evils of the sweating system are so enormous and
widespread, this Congress deeply regrets, after snch an extensive
inquiry by the Lords' Committee, nothing has been done by them
to try to reduce the misery and the sufferings of those affected thereby;
and we instruct the Parliamentary Committee to bring all the influence
possible to bear on members of the House of Commons, with the object
of obtaining beneficial legislation."
Carried without opposition.
24. Mr. J. H. WILSON moved:
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to draft
an amendment to the Merchant Shipping Act, 1854, section 231, sub-sec-
tions 1 and 2, which, as they now stand, only allow 72 cubic feet of space
for each seaman on board ships, this Congress being of opinion that
such space is totally inadequate and recommends that such amend-
ment should provide for a space of not less than 150 cubic feet; and
also to provide that all store rooms and paint lockers shall be kept
apart from the men's accommodation."
:
The resolution was agreed to unanimously.
25. Mr. LEWIS LYONS (London) moved:
"That it be an instruction to the next Parliamentary Committee to
bring the following before the Government of the day :-Any person
who desires to open a factory or workshop must give notice to the
Chief Inspector of Factories, at the same time to furnish particulars of
that branch of industry which is intended to be carried on, a plan of
construction and interior arrangements of the establishment, and of
the number of workpeople to be employed."
Mr. PARNELL (London) moved as an addendum :
"That on receipt of a notice from a person desirous of opening a
factory or workshop, the Chief Inspector of Factories shall, within six
days of the receipt of such notice, cause a sanitary and technical
inspector to visit such place and see whether the place was sufficiently
lighted, had proper sanitary arrangements, and was adequately venti-
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
19
lated in proportion to the number of persons employed, and in all cases
there shall not be less than 600 cubic feet of space provided for each
person employed.”
Mr. KING (London) moved as an amendment that the last
three lines of the resolution, from the word "on", should be
deleted, as he held that it was impossible for a man before he
commenced business to say exactly how many workpeople he
was going to employ.
Mr. Lyons signified his willingness to accept both the
addendum and the amendment, as the former would answer
the original purpose of the resolution.
The resolution as amended was carried unanimously.
26. Mr. J. H. WILSON moved:
“That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to
support the Merchant Shipping Act (No. 2 Bill), prohibiting deck
loading, and also regulating the carrying of cattle on board ships
which Bill was introduced at the end of last session of Parliament, and
will be re-introduced next session.”
Carried unanimously.
27. Mr. JOHN KEYWOOD (Nottingham) moved :
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, it is important that provision
should forthwith be made for the establishment and equipment of
evening continuation schools, in which the children of the working
classes may obtain efficient instruction in elementary science, drawing,
and other useful subjects calculated to benefit them in daily associa-
tions of life; and it calls upon the Government to bring in a measure
to provide the necessary accommodation and requisite educational
appliances in order that the full advantage of the New Code, the
Technical Education Act, and the Science and Art Classes, now so
numerous in various industrial centres, may be secured to the Artisan
and laboring classes throughout the country."
Carried unanimously.
28. Captain LUCCOCK moved:
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to draft
a Bill to be submitted to Parliament, providing that all persons (officers
C 2
20
LABOR AND LAW.
杂
​or otherwise) who may at any time be called upon to take charge of
any vessel or vessels shall hold a certificate of competency or service
from the Board of Trade, which shall only be obtained by examination,
and also that no vessel under a burden tonnage of 400 be allowed to
proceed to sea unless a certificated second mate is carried therein, and
that none other than certificated men shall have charge of any watch
on board a ship or steamer."
Mr. H. FRIEND moved:
“That the words 'engaged in foreign trade' be placed after the word
' vessels'. In supporting the amendment he dwelt upon the injustice
which would accrue to boatswains and sailors if the resolution was
applied to home-trade 'vessels'. It was the only chance men in the
forecastle had of raising their positions."
The Resolution was carried by 32 to 17.
29. Mr. Toм MANN moved:
"Whereas the ever-changing methods of manufacture affect large
numbers of workers adversely, by throwing them out of employment,
without compensation for loss of situation, and whereas these persons
are in many instances driven to destitution, crime, and pauperism:
Resolved, that this Congress is of opinion that power should at once
be granted to each Municipality or County Council to establish work-
shops and factories under municipal control, where such persons shall
be put to useful employment, and that it be an instruction to the
Parliamentary Committee to at once take the matter in hand."
The addition "that trade union wages be paid" was ac-
cepted, and the motion was passed.
30. Mr. T. M'CARTY (London) moved:
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee that it
is expedient that a law be passed to prohibit employers of labor or
any others in the United Kingdom contracting for the hire of labor
outside the United Kingdom, and that it be an offence punishable with
imprisonment to import into this country any labor so contracted for.”
Carried.
31 a. Mr. ISAAC EVANS (Wales) moved:
"That this Congress is fully convinced that the time has arrived
when an additional number of sub-inspectors of mines should be
appointed, seeing that the present number is far inadequate to carry
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
21
!
out the hazardous duties now imposed upon them; and, further, that
such sub-inspectors should be appointed from the ranks of practical
miners."
Mr. ROBINSON moved an addendum to the effect that in no
case should a sub-inspector be appointed who was not the holder
of a first-class certificate of competency. This was accepted,
and the resolution carried.
32. Mr. T. ANDERTON moved :
"That, in the opinion of this Congress, the registration of plumbers
should be made compulsory, and that the number of Sanitary Inspectors
should be largely increased by the appointment of duly qualified men,
such as plumbers, possessing the R.P.C. certificate."
Mr. DAVIES (Manchester) moved as an amendment that the
words "and that the number of sanitary inspectors should be
largely increased by the appointment of duly qualified men,
such as plumbers possessing the R.P.C. certificate," be deleted.
The amendment was lost, and the original resolution carried.
(6
33. Mr. D. HOLMES (Burnley) moved:
'That, inasmuch as the rate of wages paid to the workpeople
employed in the textile industries is regulated by the kind, quality, and
amount of work performed, and as the Act does not provide for the
workpeople being supplied with the particulars and details of such
work when given to them, that it be an instruction to the Parliamentary
Committee to obtain such an alteration in the Factory Acts, as to
compel every employer to supply to the workpeople the particulars
and description of the work, so as to enable the workpeople to ascer-
tain the amount of wages due to them."
Miss TAYLOR (Glasgow) moved as an amendment that the
words should be added-
Konta
"And also, that employers be held responsible for illegal hours
worked by their employees whether they consent or not.”
The resolution, with the addendum tacked on, was then
carried by 117 against 3 votes for the resolution alone.
}
22
LABOB AND LAW.
34. Mr. JOHN CALLOW moved :
"That this Congress be impressed that, on account of there being
so many cellars (or underground) workshops connected with various
trades, it be deemed necessary that there should be some measure
adopted for a better system of lighting and ventilating them, since
want of daylight and ventilation is so detrimental to the constitution of
the operative."
Mr. QUELCH (London) moved as an amendment-
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to pre-
pare a Bill for the prohibition of the employment of workpeople in
underground workshops or cellars, (where this is not rendered abso-
lutely necessary by the nature of the business) to provide, where such
underground workshops are so rendered necessary, for a more thorough
system of lighting and ventilation.
The resolution as amended was adopted.
35. Mr. PARNELL (London) moved:
“That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to do
their utmost to bring about an extension of the Merchandise Marks
Act, so that it shall apply to home manufacturers as well as to goods
made abroad."
He explained the course adopted in his own particular trade,
condemning the system in vogue of transacting work in sweating
dens, and the deceit practised by large firms in selling articles
which, as a matter of fact, were not made by the firm at all.
He thought that every manufacturer of an article should be
allowed to stamp on the article manufactured, who actually did
the work, and for whom it was done.
Carried.
36. Mr. WHITFIELD moved :
"That it be an instruction to the Parliamentary Committee to
assist, support, and use all legitimate means in furthering the Miners"
Eight Hours Bill, now waiting an opportunity for discussion in
Parliament, which is backed by Mr. Pickard, M.P., Mr. C. Graham,
M.P., Mr. Phillips, M.P., Mr. W. Abraham, M.P., and other members."
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
23
Mr. JOHNSON (Dublin) moved an amendment:
“That in the opinion of this Congress it is undesirable to relegate
to Parliament the power of fixing the hours that adults should work in
mines, believing that our interests can be best promoted by reserving
to ourselves the liberty of taking such action at any time that we are
of opinion it is prudent and opportune to take."
The VICE-CHAIRMAN, who was presiding, said that this
amendment was quite out of order.
The previous question was put, and carried by a large
majority.
[The Bill to Restrict Labor in Mines to Eight Hours per
day, prepared and brought in this Session by Mr. William
Abraham, Mr. Pickard, Mr. Randell, Mr. Cunninghame
Graham, Mr. Phillips, Mr. Cremer, Mr. Jacoby, Mr. Spencer
Balfour, Mr. Samuel Evans, Mr. Alfred Thomas, Mr. Arthur
Acland, Mr. Pritchard Morgan, and Mr. Conybeare, recites as
preamble that “it is expedient to limit the hours of work under-
ground of persons employed in mines". It has only three
clauses:
"1. This Act may be cited as the Miners' (Hours of Work) Act,
1891.
"2. A person shall not, in any one day of twenty-four hours, be
employed underground in any mine for a period exceeding eight hours
from the time of his leaving the surface of the ground to the time of
his ascent thereto, except in case of accident.
"3. Any employer, or the agent of any employer, employing or per-
mitting to be employed any person in contravention of this enactment,
shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding forty shillings for each offence,
to be recovered in the same manner in which any penalty under the
Acts relating to factories and workshops is recoverable."
It is limited to underground employment, but the above-
ground. men will be affected by it indirectly. It reckons the
time from bank to bank. It is silent as to shifts. Unless the
system of working is changed in Wales it will there mean one
24
LABOR AND LAW.
f
1
shift only. It makes the employer or his agent liable for 40s.
for each person employed on each occasion of the employment.
It imposes no penalty on the men.
Last year, according to the figures handed in by Mr. Dale at
Berlin, there were employed in mines in general in this kingdom
above ground men and boys, 121,970; women and girls, 5,680.
Underground: men and boys, 465,006; total, 592,656. Of these
57,711 were employed in metalliferous mines and coke works.
There remain 534,945 persons employed in coal mines. Above
ground: from 12 to 13 years of age, 228 boys, 2 girls; from 13
to 16 years of age, 8,729 boys, 503 girls; 83,151 men, 3,630
women; total, 96,043. Below ground: Boys from 12 to 16 years
of age, 42,045; men, 396,730; "from below 12 years of age
transitionary measure 117 boys (International Labor Con-
ference, Berlin, C 6042). Work in the interior of mines is for-
bidden to male children under 12 years of age and to females of
any age (Coal Mines Regulation Act, 1887, sec. 4). Boys above
12 are not allowed to work underground more than 54 hours a
week, or more than 10 hours a day bank to bank.]
37. Mr. W. PARNELL (London) moved:
By
>>
"That the Parliamentary Committee be instructed to take such
steps as may be necessary to extend the Truck Acts of 1821 and 1887,
so as to prevent employers from charging women and girls employed
by them in factories and workshops for the materials they are compelled
to use, such as thread, needles, etc.; and, also, to prevent them charging
for hot water to make their tea, for cleaning the workrooms, and any
such payments weich tend to reduce the present abominable low rate
of wages they now pay them.”
An addendum was accepted "that it be illegal to charge for
steam or other motive power ".
The motion was adopted.
[The Truck Acts are 1 and 2 Will. IV, caps. 37 and 50, and
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
25
I
51 Vict., cap. 46. As to the hosiery trade only 37 and 38 Vict.,
.cap. 48. There are special enactments as to wages within the
stannaries in 50 and 51 Vict., cap. 43, secs. 11, 12, 13 and 14;
and as to wages in coal, ironstone, shale, and fireclay mines in
50 and 51 Vict., cap. 58, secs. II and 12. As to payment of wages
in public houses 46 and 47 Vict., cap. 83, Metalliferous Mines
Act, 1872. Difficulties have been found in enforcing the Truck
Acts, because, though section 9 of the 1 and 2 Will. IV, cap. 37,
makes the penalty for a first offence "not exceeding £10 nor less
than £5", the magistrates, under the 42 and 43 Vict., cap. 49,
sec. 4, when the defendant is convicted of a first offence, can
and do reduce the fine to a merely nominal amount. Convic-
tions for second and third offences are found unobtainable in
practice within the specified time limits. The following decision
of the Queen's Bench Division, unreported, but for the notes of
which I am indebted to the courtesy of the Treasury solicitor,
has prevented the Treasury from proceeding with prosecutions
in cases where fines are deducted from the wages:
Redgrave v. Kelly, May 16, 1889. Justices Matthew and Grantham.
Redgrave, factory inspector v. Gould. Defendant, a confectioner,!
employing girls at 3s. and 4s. per week, fined them 2d. for spoiling
goods, and 2d. for spoiling goods and being impudent.
Justice Matthew: "I am of opinion, in this case, that the magistrate
was right, and that our judgment must therefore be for the respondent,
in his absence. The learned magistrate did not think it necessary to
hear the respondent on the application before him, and we agree with
him in that also. Now the question really depends on the construc-
tion of section 3 of the Truck Act; and in dealing with the Truck Act
we must endeavor to ascertain at what evils the Truck Act was intended
to strike. I do not know where those evils are better described than in the
judgment of Baron Bramwell, in the case in the 31st Law Journal. He
says: In order to see to what the protection of the Act extends it is
necessary to see what are the mischiefs to be guarded against; the
mischiefs of what is called the Truck system. They seem to me three,
the first two being in principle the same. First, an employer of labor
26
LABOR AND LAW.
ܚܕ
f
may engage a man to work for him with a promise of apparently fair
wages, partly or all in goods, and then cheat him by giving him
inferior goods or goods over-charged; secondly, he may engage him
with a promise of fair wages, and then cheat him in the payment by
insisting on his taking goods inferior or over-charged as before;
thirdly, he may supply the man with goods beyond his wages, get him
into his debt, and then have an injurious control over him.' Section 3.
of the Act which we have to construe runs in this way: 'That the en-
tire amount of the wages earned by, or payable to, any artificer in any
of the trades hereinafter enumerated, in respect of any labor by him
done in any such trade, shall be actually paid to such artificer in the
current coin of this realm and not otherwise, and every payment made
to any such artificer by his employer of, or in respect of, any wages by
the delivering to him of goods, or otherwise than in the current coin
aforesaid, except as hereinafter mentioned, shall be and is hereby
declared illegal null and void'. What was meant was to prohibit pay-
ment otherwise than by money, not non-payment; and the whole argu-
ment of Mr. Danckwerts has been directed to show that payment
otherwise than by coin of the realm included non-payment. So that,
according to his argument, if an employer at the end of a week chose
to say to a man he employed: I am not going to pay you any more
wages, an offence would have been committed within the meaning of
the Truck Act. It seems to me that there is no foundation whatever
for the argument. The cases referred to really do not affirm any such
extraordinary conclusion; they were all cases in every one of which
an equivalent of some sort was alleged to be given for the balance of
wages withheld.
What is Mr. Danckwerts driven from the facts.
stated in the case to argue. It appears that what the employer did in
this case was to fine three persons in his employment for, as he con-
sidered, breaches of their duty. Louisa Donovan was fined 2d. for
spoiling a paste brush and for badly doing her work of wrapping the
goods manufactured by the respondent, and Annie Lewis was fined 2d.
for spoiling a tray of work and being impudent. In order to get within
the shelter of the authorities Mr. Danckwerts has to show that there is
something in the nature of payment by goods, and in that sense payment
otherwise than in coin of the realm, and he says we ought to construe
these statements and facts in the case in this way, we ought to hold
that the transaction with Louisa Donovan was of this sort that she
was paid in spoilt goods, and that subsequently the spoilt goods were
taken from her and a deduction of 2d. made from the price. On that
principle of construction it seems to apply to the other case too; but
when one comes to deal with the construction of impudence, I did not
WHY THE BOOK IS WRITTEN.
27
understand him to show that impudence was in any way analogous to
spoilt goods, which is what the cases refer to, directing that it shall not
be treated as payment. Really the case is so plain and so clear that
one is almost ashamed to give any reasons for the decision.
It is only
necessary to look at the Act of Parliament and to see it, to hold that
non-payment of wages by an employer is not yet subject to any Act
which involves the penalties imposed by the Truck Act; the appeal
therefore must be dismissed."
The following recent case is also unreported:
Gould v. Haynes. Nov. 29, 1889. Lord Chief Justice Coleridge
and Lord Justice Bowen. Gould v. Haynes, Inspector of Factories.
Defendant said to John Watts: "Mobey, you have had some beer and
port wine, I'll sub you 4s. to pay it" (the account was 3s. 10d.).
Haynes handed four separate shillings to Watts.
Lord Coleridge: "We both think that we might as well repeal the
Truck Act, as refuse to convict in a case of this sort. It is perfectly
plain the thing is done for the purpose of evading the Truck Act."]
38. On the motion of Mr. R. C. ROBERTSON it was agreed—
"That this Congress instruct the Parliamentary Committee to intro-
duce a Bill amending the present Mines Regulation Act, that in any
district of a mine where more than twenty persons are employed at one
time, there shall be at least two roads of not less than four feet wide
and four feet high, separated at all parts by not less than ten yards of
strata or solid building, and such roads shall be available for ingress
and egress, and shall be regularly examined and reported upon by a
competent person."
"That this Congress instruct the Parliamentary Committee to
introduce a Bill amending the present Mines Regulation Act, for
giving power to workmen to appoint any person to inspect the mines
periodically on their behalf; and in all cases of accidents, that
facilities shall be given any two persons appointed by the miners
employed in the mine in which such may occur, or by the relatives of
those killed or injured."
"That this Congress instruct the Parliamentary Committee to
introduce a Bill amending the present Mines Regulation Act, providing
that the second shaft or outlet made compulsory under the Act shall
be daily inspected by a competent person, and shall at all times, while
men are employed in the mine, have an efficient appliance for with-
drawing the men in case of the other shaft being unfit to be used for
the purpose."
-28
LABOR AND LAW.
1
¿
+
}
}
?
39. Mr. WOODFIELD moved :
"That this Congress regards with surprise the action of the
'Government, in recently withholding from trade unions the privilege
of depositing their money in the Post-office Savings Banks after
enjoying such privilege for over a quarter of a century: it further calls
upon Parliament to pass a measure according to trade unions the
same right of depositing their funds without limit, as is accorded to
friendly and other provident societies under the Savings Banks Acts.
In the event of the Government refusing to bring in a Bill, the Parlia-
mentary Committee is hereby instructed to introduce a measure in the
next Session of Parliament, to secure equal treatment for trade
societies, on the same basis as other societies, providing provident
benefits in their rules in the same office, by the same official of the
Government."
Carried unanimously.
·
40. Mr. JOHN INGLIS moved:
"That the Trade Union Acts of 1872 and 1876 having extended the
protection of the law to the funds of trade unions, it be an instruction
to the Parliamentary Committee to take the necessary steps to compel
the public prosecutors in Scotland to carry out the provisions of these
Acts, when they are called upon to do so by the accredited repre-
sentatives of such trade unions."
Carried.
41. Mr. BRENNAN moved:
"This Congress is of opinion that the Merchant Shipping Act
should be so amended as to make it illegal for sailors to discharge the
·cargo from the vessels they navigate.”
The resolution, having been made international, was
agreed to.
CHAPTER II.
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO; WHAT IT HAS DONE;-
WHAT IT OUGHT TO DO.
I WAS much struck by the eloquent declaration of the Hon..
Bernard Coleridge, made at the great Sheffield meeting of the
National Liberal Federation, on November 21st, as to the
province of the Legislature in relation to social ills. Respect-
fully disagreeing with him, I desire to clearly state my own
position. I submit that the Legislature ought not to directly
limit the freedom of the adult except in matters of crime, or
in matters which, being less or other than crime, are clearly
injurious to the life, health, or property of other members of
the community. I admit that-in a country like our own, with
its patchwork statutory maze in which the legislator may well
be bewildered-it is impossible sometimes, difficult often, to
limit legislation by the strict application of the principles
advanced in this chapter. The country, its social institutions
and customs, its laws, its habits, are the slow outgrowth of
conflict between Roman, Saxon, Danish and Norman mould-
ings of aboriginal tradition. Our progress has usually been
compromise. Our nineteenth century legislation has nearly
always been in the nature of concession to demand, rather than
an assertion of duty.
Though dissenting from most of his conclusions, I accept in
each case the issue as stated by the Rev. W. Cunningham
1
( 29 )
30
LABOR AND LAW.
¿
("Politics and Economics," p. 134): "To what extent may
we interfere with individual liberty in this particular case? To
say that the case is exceptional gives us no real help; we want
to know how we are to act here, not merely to be told that the
case is an unusual one. And, to discriminate rightly in this
matter, we must go back to the very root of the matter, and
trace the relations of the State with individual citizens."
Though I take exception to his doctrine (p. 139) that "we
cannot lay down any rules as to what kind of things should
be done by the State and what kind of things should be left
to individuals", I concede that a hard and fast line is difficult.
to draw "between the sphere of State control and that of
individual judgment ", and I admit that in a very large number
of cases "both factors are at work
""
Excepting physical and economic limitations, Parliament is
competent for any and every statute it chooses to enact:
constitutionally, there is no limit whatever to its power. In
this country the Legislature is supreme. We have no written
constitution, such as exists in the United States of America,
limiting the authority and jurisdiction of the Legislature. We
have no tribunal with the right-possessed by the Supreme
Court of the United States—to declare that any statute is null
and void because unconstitutional. The constitution of Great
Britain and Ireland for the time being is the totality of the
common law and statute law of the Kingdom. A new Act
conflicting with part, or contrary to the whole, of the hitherto
existing law, is not unconstitutional. It simply amends,
modifies, abrogates, or enlarges what was theretofore the
constitution.
A good working doctrine for statesmen should be to endeavor
to mould conduct by the development of sound public opinion,
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
31
rather than by the enactment and operation of penal laws.
Especially should the Legislature be careful not to profess to do
that for the worker which it is reasonably possible for him to
do for himself without the aid of, or without the undue pressure
of, the law. A duty enforced by others is seldom as well
performed as a duty affirmed by the doer. The results are
better from the willing hammerman's work than from the slave
at the anvil fearing the overlooker's lash. In self-regarding
matters, social reforms, and domestic concerns, the motto for
law makers should be "the most self-reliant liberty, the least
statutory restriction or compulsion ".
I therefore submit that Parliament ought not to legislate on
matters on which the people are, or reasonably ought to be,
able to protect themselves. It ought not to enact what people
shall do or shall not do in respect to self-regarding matters on
which the people can fairly decide for themselves. In respect
to social reforms and domestic concerns the duty of Parliament
is to interfere as little as possible, and only for the purpose of
protecting health, life, or property, and preventing acts which
are in the nature of crimes. Parliament should do nothing
to lessen that spirit of self-reliance which makes society pro-
gressive wherever it prevails.
P
The function of the Legislature, and of the executive author-
ised by the legislature, should be the preservation of internal
peace, the removal of all legal restrictions which hinder equality
of opportunity, the protection of each individual against the
criminal acts of other individuals, and the protection of all
citizens against foreign enemies. It should encourage and,
where possible, facilitate individual activity and initiative.
A point scarcely sufficiently considered by workmen is that
the claim made by them on Parliament to regulate the condi-
32
LABOR AND LAW.
λ
}
4.
tions of adult labor by shortening hours and augmenting wage,
involves the admission and assertion that it is the right and
duty of the Legislature to exercise authority on such matters
That is, it involves the affirmation of the right and duty of
Parliament to lengthen the hours of labor and to reduce wage
in any particular industry if and when it shall think fit. As
it is usually contended by the advocates of an Eight Hours
limit by law that labor is utterly unrepresented in one
Chamber, and is in a wretched minority in the other House,
this is at least a dangerous position in which they desire to
place their clients.
It is perfectly true, as will be presently shown, that the
Factory Acts and the mining legislation for women, children,
and young persons, have indirectly limited the freedom of the
adult worker, and that sanitary legislation has had similar
indirect effect; but as to the factory legislation, the adult male
is only so affected because both employer and employed find
that, in numerous industries, it is less costly and more con-
venient in certain departments to employ women, young
persons, and children. If the adult male could as profitably
work without these minors and women, the Factory Acts would
not in any way control his hours of labor. Mr. C. E. Bousfield
told the Commission on the Depression of Trade (6336):
"We
do employ the shift system sometimes, but we can at night
only employ men, and it is rather a costly operation for us,
because our day work is mostly done by women ".
Experience of past legislation may somewhat help our
judgment as to the results of interference with adult labor.
Enactments prescribing conditions under which men might
or must work have always proved ineffectual, although these
date back at least five and a half centuries. The Statutes of
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
33
Laborers, 25 Edward III (1350), fixed the wage per day, per
piece, per harvest, or per term, of agricultural laborers, masons,
plasterers, and other artificers and skilled craftsmen; they
fixed the charge for making shoes, and imposed imprisonment
on men seeking employment out of their own countries. They
failed, and further enactment was tried.
“ 34 Edward III, cap. 9. It is accorded in this present Parliament
that the Statute of Laborers of old times made shall stand in all
points except the pecuniar peine, which from henceforth is accorded,
that the laborers shall not be punished by fine and ransome. And it
is assented, that the said statute shall be enforced in punishment of
laborers in the form following-that is to say, That the Lords of towns
may take and imprison them by fifteen days if they will not justify
themselves; and then to send them to the next gaol, there to abide
till they will justify them by the form of the statute, and that the
sheriff, jaylor, or other minister shall not let them to mainprize nor
bail, and if he do, he shall pay to the King £10, and to the party
100 shillings, nor that the sheriff, jaylor, or other minister, shall take
any fee nor porterage of prison, nor at his entring, nor at his going
out, upon the same pain. And that as well carpenters and masons
be comprised of this ordinance as all other laborers, servants, and
artificers. And that the carpenters and masons take from henceforth
wages by the day, and not by the week, nor in other manner. And
that the chief masters of carpenters and masons take 4d. by the day,
and the others 3d. or 2d. according as they be worth. And that all
alliances and covins of masons and carpenters, and congregations,
chapters, ordinances, and others betwixt them made, or to be made,
shall be from henceforth void and wholly annulled, so that every
mason and carpenter, of what condition he be, shall be compelled by
his master to whom he serveth, to do every work that to him per-
taineth to do, or of free stone or of rough stone. And also every
carpenter in his degree.
CC
34 Edward III, cap. 10. Item, of laborers and artificers, that
absent them out of their services in another town or another county,
the party shall have the suit before the justices, and that the sheriff
take him at the first day, as is contained in the statute, if he be found,
and do of him execution as afore is said, and if he return, that he is
not found, he shall have an exigend at the first day, and the same
pursue 'till he be outlawed, and after the outlawry a writ of the same
justices shall be sent to every sheriff of England, that the party will
D
34
LABOR AND LAW.
RUCT
sue to take him, and to send him to the sheriff of the county where he
is outlawed, and when he shall be there brought, he shall have there
imprisonment till he will justify himself, and have made gree to the
party, and nevertheless for the falsity he shall be burnt in the fore-
head with an iron made and formed to this letter F in token of falsity,
if the party grieved the same will sue."
In 1388, by 12 Richard II, caps. 3, 4, and 5, any workman
quitting his hundred without permission under the King's seal,
was liable to imprisonment; penalties were imposed for giving
or taking more than a fixed rate of wages, and it was enacted
that if any one was employed as a servant in husbandry until
twelve years of age, he should so continue all his life. It had
been previously enacted in that reign, 1 Richard II, that no
villein should be permitted to withdraw himself from the service.
of his lord. In 1416, 4 Henry V, cap. 4, it was enacted that
the penalties imposed by 12 Richard II, for receiving
too high wages by servants in husbandry, laborers, and
artificers, should be imposed on the wage-receivers only. In
1423, by 2 Henry VI, cap. 14, further powers were given to
justices, to punish with imprisonment all masons, carpenters,
tilers, thakkers, and daubers, who asked for unreasonable
wages.
In 1426, the justices, by 8 Henry VI, cap. 3, were em-
powered to fix by proclamation the rate of wages of artificers,
workmen, and servants in husbandry, with power to arrest
and examine any workman suspected of receiving higher wage,
and to imprison such workmen as received such higher wage.
The 23 Henry VI, cap. 12 (1444), fixed the wages of carpenters,
masons, and other artificers, at 3d. per day with food and
drink, and 4d. per day without food and drink, and authorised
the committal to prison of any one who would not work at
the wages fixed. In 1463, 3 Edward IV, it was enacted what
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
35
clothes might or might not be worn by laborers and others.
In the next years, laws followed regulating the work of
shoemakers, harness, and pattern makers; while in the 3 & 4
Henry VII, the prices of cloths, hats, and bonnets, and other
manufactured articles, were fixed by statute. Every one of
these laws failed in turn; additional laws gave increased
penal powers, and these too failed. The statute-book is full
of enactments through the succeeding reigns, all directed to
the regulation of labor and the wages which the artificer,
husbandman, or servant, might receive.
In 1562, the 5 Elizabeth, cap. 4, repealed all previous
enactments. It recited that
66
'although there remayne and stande in force prtly a greate nomber
of actes and statutes concerning the reteyning departing wages
borders of apprentices, servantes, and laborers, as well
as in
husbandrye as in divers other artes, mysteries, and occupations, yet
ptly for thimperfeccon and contrarietie that ys founde and doe appeare
in sundrye of the said lawes and for the varietie and nomber of them,
and chiefly for that the wages and allowances, lymytted and rated in
many of the said statutes, are in dyvers places to small,"
therefore all preceding statutes were repealed, and in order to
"banishe idleness, advance husbandrye, and yeelde unto the hired
pson both in the time of scarsitee and in the tyme of plentye a
convenient proporcon of wages,”
317
fresh enactments were made. Justices of the peace and magis-
trates of cities and burghs were empowered to fix prices of work
and rates of wages for artificers, laborers, and craftsmen. [This
was repealed by 53 George III, cap. 40.] Persons were for-
bidden to be
66
retayned, hired, or taken into service, by any meanes or color, to
woorcke for any lesse tyme or term then for one hole yere in any of
the scyences, craftes, mysteries, or artes of clothiers, wollen cloth
weavers, tuckers, fullers, clothworkers, sheremen, dyers, hosyers,
D 2
36
LABOR AND LAW.
Anderboek, "Ben" 46"},"3. A
****
¿
taylours, shoomakers, tanners, pewterers, bakers, bruers, gloovers,.
cutlers, smythes, farrours, curryers, sadlers, spurryers, turners,
cappers, hatmakers or feltemakers, bowyers, fietchers, arrowhead-
makers, buldiers, cookes, or millers."
[This provision was repealed in great part by 49 George III,
cap. 109.] Every pson between thage of 12 yeres and the age
of 60 yeres" not being lawfully
((
"reteyned, nor apprentice wth any fisherman or maryner haunting the
seas, nor being in service wth any kyddyer or carryor of any corne,
grayne, or meale, for provision of the citie of London, nor withe any
husbondman in husbandrie, nor in any citie, towne corporate, or
market towne, in any of thartes or sciences, lymitted or appointed by
this estatute to have or take apprentices, nor being reteyned by the
yere or half the yere at the least, for the digging, seking, finding,
getting, melting, fining, woorking, tryeng, making of any sylver, tynne,
leade, iron, copper, stone, sea cole, stone cole, moore cole, or chock
cole, nor being occupied in or aboute the making of any glasse, nor
being a gentleman borne, nor being a student or scoler in any of the
universities, or in any scoole,”
was compellable to serve as an agricultural laborer, and the
following enactment fixed the hours of labor :
"All artificers and laborers being hired for wages by the daye or week
shall betwext the myddest of the monethes of Marche and September,
bee and continue at theyr woorck, at or before five of the clock in the
morning, and continue at woorck and not departe untyll betwext seven
and eight of the clocke at night, except yt bee in the tyme of breake-
fast, dynner, or drincking, the wch tymes at the most shall not exceede
above two houres and a half in the daye, that is to saye, at every
drincking one half houre, for his dinner one houre, and for his sleape
when hee is allowed to sleape, the wch is from the midst of May to the
mydst of August, half an houre at the most, and at breakfaste one
halfe houre; and all the said artificers and laborers, betwen the midst
of September and the mydst of Marche, shalbe and continue at their
woorck from the spring of the day in the morning untill the night of the
same daye."
Large powers were given to apprehend workmen going into
other shires to seek employment. Artificers refusing to work as
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, etf.
37
•
agricultural laborers in harvest time were to be put in the
stocks. A score of other provisions, with these, all fell into?
disuse; and finally, by 38 and 39 Vict., cap. 86, the remains
of this law of Elizabeth were swept away.
So far as I am aware, the last case which ever came before
the Court of King's Bench in relation to the fixing of wages
by the magistrates may be found in 14 East, 395, Rex
v. Justices of Kent. A petition had been presented by the
working millers of Kent to the Justices in Quarter Sessions
praying them to fix their wages pursuant to 5 Elizabeth,
cap. 4. The Sessions declined on the ground of want of
jurisdiction, whereupon the Attorney-General moved for a
mandamus, which was unanimously granted, the Court relying
on 1 James I, cap. 6. One of the arguments used by counsel
was "that the policy of the State was against the extension
of such a power, which placed the ignorant and the idle upon
a level with the expert and the industrious".
Some very
curious cases arising on enforcement of the Statutes are
collected in Viner's Abridgment, "Master and Servant ",
I. N. S. and U.
As Baernreither puts it, this old legislation was the work of
those whose "ultimate object was to compel the population to
work; they regarded the labor of the lower classes as indis-
pensable to public order, and it was simply a consequence of
this view, which, as is well known, was carried out in England
with great severity, that neglect to work, the breach of contract,
was treated as a breach of public order, as an offence, involving
criminal punishment. This view was maintained in English
legislation for a remarkably long time, and its last traces were
not abolished until the Act of 1875."
W. Clarke ("Fabian Essays", pp. 75-77) gives a partial
38
LABOR AND LAW.
Katuni makt, NVÝ*
A
ACT
6
but interesting presentment of the newer lines of industrial
legislation.
The ablest and fullest general statement of the effect of
recent legislation I have yet seen is that given by the Rev. W..
Cunningham, in Book 2 of his "Politics and Economics "..
Though disagreeing very strongly with the attitude Mr.
Cunningham takes, it is mere justice to note the thoroughness.
and carefulness of his work.
Mr. Howell, in his "Conflicts of Capital and Labor", cap. 2,
Part II, pp. 71-83, has collected illustrations of trades "subject
to statute", and on pp. 427-429 has given a list of modern
statutes affecting labor; but it will be sufficient for my purpose
here to refer to the repealing schedule to the Factory and
Workshops Act, 1878, 41 and 42 Vict., cap. 16, the Act
to consolidate and amend the law relating to factories and
workshops. This schedule shows distinctly the lines taken in
modern times by the Legislature, of protection for children and
young persons, of protection for adult women, of care for life,
limb, and the public health. In the Factory and Workshops
Act, 1878, these lines are strictly observed. The consolidating
and amending Act was itself the outcome of the Royal Com-
mission appointed in 1875, and which made its report in 1876.
As very frequent reference is made to English factory
legislation by those who advocate statutory interference with
the conditions regulating adult labor, it may be well for the
narrative of such legislation to refer also to Von Plener, and
Baernreither. The first collects, in his little work on "English
Factory Legislation", a careful and reliable summary of the
history of the development and working of such legislation
down to 1871. Baernreither, in his admirable volume on
English Associations of Working Men", carries this history
66
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
39
further in his section on the legislative and administrative
action of the State. He says (p. 100): "The Government in
England has directly intervened in two ways in the develop-
ment of the working classes: on the one hand, by creating
new and important departments for the protection of the work-
man; and, on the other,, by giving a new legal meaning to
the contract of service. The first object was attained by the
Factory Acts, and by analogous codifications of the law
respecting the mining industry and shipping. The second
object was attained by a series of Acts reforming the status
of the workman in regard to the civil and criminal law." And
he affirms (p. 101) that "it cannot be doubted that this legis-
lative development has increased to an extraordinary extent the
power directly exercised by the State in respect of the relations
between the employer and employed, and that the successful
results exhibited thereby have contributed more than anything
else to modify the views entertained in England respecting
'State interference'. There is no branch of English legislation
that penetrates more deeply into the domain of private rights,
but also none the justice and necessity of which at the present
day has been more universally admitted by all those whose
interests it affects."
I venture to suggest that it is in our sanitary legislation,
outside all question of employer and employed, that there has
been what Dr. Baernreither would describe as legislation
penetrating most "deeply into the domain of private right ".
This has been sought to be justified, and, where jus-
tifiable, can only be justified by the protection of the
health of the community at large. The factory and
workshop legislation in favor of young persons and children
has similar argument in its favor. I do not think the
40
LABOR AND LAW.
*
C
legislation as to women can be so justified, except by those who
regard women as unable to protect themselves in the struggle
for existence.
Noting the limitations of the hours of labor in the cases of
children, younger persons, and women, Baernreither observes
(p. 103): "The persons thus specially protected by the Act
have become the regulators of the hours of work in general;
for, although legislation in England has consistently avoided
any regulation of those hours for grown-up men, the 'normal
day's work' so strictly adhered to in the case of children, young
persons, and women, indirectly affects all factories and workshops
where men are employed together with the protected persons”.
I suggest that any fixing of a limit to either hours or wage,
whether the limit be fixed as a maximum or as a minimum,
tends to make the time or amount fixed the ordinary time or
amount-that is, the minimum becomes the maximum, and
vice versâ.
The Right Hon. A. J. Mundella, in his introduction to Von
Plener, says: "An argument which is freely advanced against
the interference of the State with the relations of capital and
labor is that it tends to undermine the independence and self-
reliance of the class which it seeks to protect, and teaches them
to look to the State rather than to their own exertions to
remedy evils requiring redress. My answer to this is that the
factory operatives of Lancashire and Yorkshire have made
greater advances in self-reliance and independence during the
past fifty years than any other class of English operatives.
Building and Benefit Societies, Co-operative Associations, both
for distribution and production, have taken their rise and
flourish amongst them on a scale of magnitude unknown in
any other part of the United Kingdom."
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
4I
"
I am not aware that there is the slightest evidence that
the introduction, foundation, and development of either
building societies, benefit societies, or co-operative societies,
has been in any way connected with, or resultant from, the
interference of the State "with the relations of capital and
labor ". Without in any fashion desiring to detract from
the character for independence and self-reliance, deservedly
awarded to Lancashire and Yorkshire men, I could claim as
high a character for the shoemaking population of Northampton-
shire, and for a considerable proportion of the Tyneside men.
I doubt if any town has been improved so much by building
societies during the past thirty years as Northampton has been;
but I venture to say, with some positiveness, that such im-
provement has no connexion whatever with any "interference
of the State in the relations of capital and labor ".
Cardinal Manning, who had been understood in a letter
published at Liège, and in some other utterances, to go a very
long way in legal regulation of industry, partly explains his
position in a letter dated November 25th, 1890, in which he
writes: "It seems to me that the 'eight hours day' is becoming
clearer. Nobody can wish for a law if the matter can be settled
permanently by consent. It is contrary to our whole system
to do by law what men can do for themselves; but a small
dissentient minority might hinder a great consenting majority.
A permissive Bill would meet this case, and a consent
established this year might be upset next year, unless it had
legal validity. As to overtime some provision might be
made, but it is an exception which ought not to prevent
the rule being made. The case of shop assistants and the
railway and tram men shows the need of a legal rule and
responsibility."
42
LABOR AND LAW.
But does this mean that if the matter cannot be settled.
by consent the dissentients are by statute to be made criminals?
Does Cardinal Manning really believe that, if the overwhelming
majority of the men had agreed on any course as to their
own labor, they could be prevented from carrying it out by
"a small dissentient minority"? And what is meant by a
permissive Bill, with a consent, to be in force one year and
upset the next unless it had legal validity? Does Cardinal
Manning seriously think that trade once lost can be easily
regained? The present Lord Brassey, in an address delivered
in 1873 to the Social Science Association, Norwich, says (p. 29):.
"It must be remembered that when the course of trade has
been changed, and consumers, alarmed by the high prices in
our markets, have been taught to look for their supplies in
another, the position once lost is not easily regained". With
reference to the overlong hours worked by railway employees,
I submit that—as the railway companies require Parliamentary
authority and work under a practical monopoly-it would not
be unreasonable to enact that the unduly long employment of
guards, enginedrivers, signalmen, and the like, should be prima
facie evidence of criminal negligence on the part of the acting
directors and high officials, and of negligence importing civil
liability on the part of the railway company, in case of injury
directly or indirectly arising on an occasion when persons were
so unduly employed.
LETTER, IT AP
Mr. Sydney Webb, in the "Fabian Essays", p. 47, says:.
"The theorists who denounce the taking by the Community
into its own hands of the organisation of its own labor as a
thing economically unclean, repugnant to the sturdy indi-
vidual independence of Englishmen, and as yet outside the
sphere of practical politics, seldom have the least suspicion
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, etc.
43.
" and he
of the extent to which it has already been carried;
then gives a fairly long list of matters in which the State or
local authority is concerned in trade or manufacture. So far
as a monopoly is necessary to the conduct of a business—of
road, as in the case of railroad or telegraph; or of supply,..
with right to interfere with public convenience, as in the case
of gas and water-there is much to be said for such a business.
being conducted by the local authority where the monopoly
is local, or by the State where the monopoly is wider.
each case the exploitation is only possible under statutory
authority. But none of these cases justify the further inter-
ference of the State in what is called "the organisation of
labor", and which interference now deliberately proposes the
fixing by law of the maximum hours of daily work, and of the
minimum rate of pay.
Sir Charles Dilke says on this (New Review, July, 1890, p. 5):
ܐ
"The mere fact that the State has not hitherto directly interfered
in the regulation of the hours of male adult labor possesses more
importance for writers than for the electorate (a). The State has
practically interfered already by shortening the hours of women's
labor and of child labor, upon which in many industries the hours
of male labor depend (b). The passing of the Factory Acts is known
to have been opposed by many Liberals as respected in their day as
are those Liberal leaders who now oppose legislation. Those laws
were opposed at the time on the ground that the State was only
nominally, and not really, confining its action to women and children.
"It was pointed out in Parliament, and with truth, that factories of
many kinds would have to work short hours-short hours for men as
well as for women and children-if the laws were passed; but there
was added to this statement the prophecy that trade would in conse-
quence leave Great Britain and go elsewhere. In spite of those
objections the Bills were passed by Parliament and came into force,
and the statements of their opponents proved true, so far as the
shortening of the hours of men's labor went. Nevertheless, trade did
not leave us, and, on the contrary, British trade and manufactures
never so triumphantly showed their superiority over the trade and
Tak
In
#m
-44
LABOR AND LAW.
manufactures of the Continent as during the years which followed the
passing of the Factory Acts (c). Mr. Bradlaugh, who is opposed to
legislative interference, is as hostile to it in the case of women as
in the case of men. When extensions of the Factory Acts as regarded
women were proposed, Mr. Fawcett opposed them on the ground that
there was no real distinction to be drawn between women's labor and
men's labor. He was right. It is true that children can be made to
labor, but it is not true, as a general rule, that women are compelled
to labor in Great Britain. As regards the majority of women workers
the only compulsion is want of food, or the desire to obtain wages
in order to spend them upon their families, a kind of compulsion which
has its action also upon men. There is no sufficient distinction to be
drawn between the cases of men and women: but that argument, used
without avail to prevent the extension of the provisions of the Factory
Acts concerning women's labor, is now made use of in the contrary
sense to justify the extension of the Acts to men's labor too."
I venture to add to this the following notes:
(a) Surely the fact that the Legislature has not so inter-
fered with adult male labor ought to have weight with legis-
lators as well as with writers. At least the burden of
proof rests on those who propose to change our lines of
legislation.
(b) This argument has already been dealt with. The
interference has been on the sole ground that women and
children were unable to protect themselves, and that inter-
ference was necessary in the interests of public health.
(c) It is true that in industries where this country had
the advantage in coal and iron, in main d'œuvre, or in improved
machinery, this has been the case; but there are now few if
-any instances in which this country has such clear advantage.
It is also clear that, if not because of such legislation, yet most
certainly since its passing, certain industries have been
seriously injured.
It is hardly fair for Sir Charles Dilke to omit from con-
sideration the fact that during the past twenty years the
•
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
45
The
1
さ
​VERE KYON
position of this country has entirely changed with reference
to the control of raw materials, iron, lead, and copper, and
has also enormously modified in reference to coal.
In 1870
our total imports of iron-ores from foreign countries amounted
to 208,300 tons; in 1884 we imported 3,153,000 tons. In 1870
Great Britain was the largest lead producer in the world; in
1884 she had fallen far below Germany, and only produced
one-third of the quantity produced by the United States. In
copper ore the mines of England and Wales furnish, year by
year, a lessening quantity of the world's constantly increasing
consumption.
In 1870 the coal output of Great Britain exceeded that of
the whole world; to-day this is no longer true, and not only
are new coalfields being opened out in every part of the globe,
but in Russia and America an oil-fuel has been utilised of
which we are entirely destitute, in the natural advantage of
which it is probable India and China will share.
The improved machinery; the special main d'œuvre and.
enterprise for which this country was famous forty years ago,
as the almost sole possessor in various industries, are now
more or less the common property of the whole civilised
world: where we keep in advance, it is only by arduous and
continued effort. We are no longer the workshop of the world;
we are only one amongst many.
In such industries as flax spinning, where no improvement.
has been effected in machinery, England and Scotland have
lost ground as compared with Germany and Bohemia.
A well-informed friend, on whom I can thoroughly rely, writes.
me that "The decay of the flax industry in Leeds district is
entirely owing to German competition. I can say from my
own experience that my trade in flax and hemp yarns and
46
LABOR AND LAW.
twines, which used to be done almost exclusively by purchase
in Leeds, is now done almost as exclusively in Bohemia.
The goods are not only cheaper-they are very much better
in quality, and in workmanship and finish no English house
I know could touch them; they are also always dependably
the same."
1
Flax spinning, some forty years since, was an industry in
the Leeds district giving employment to some 15,000 persons.
It has, however, entirely died out in that district, and has, it
is alleged, passed to the foreigner in consequence, among
other things, of the operation of factory legislation. Mr. R.
H. Reade, one of the York Street Flax Spinning Company,
Belfast, who appeared unacquainted with the English industry,
gave evidence before the Royal Commission on the Depression
of Trade and Industry (7012-7016) that the machinery used
in flax spinning is practically the same as it was prior to the
reduction of hours; that he considered the reduction of hours
to have operated unfavorably in reducing production. He
said: "I myself took some pains to compare the amount of
production after the reduction of hours with the amount
I was
produced before the change in the hours of labor.
inclined to think that the reduction of production would not
be in the same ratio as the reduction in the hours of labor,
but I found it was exactly in the same ratio." In England and
Scotland the flax industry has been gradually reduced in a
much greater ratio than in Ireland, while "in Germany and
Bohemia the trade has been progressing very rapidly". Mr.
Reade attributed this to cheaper raw material, cheaper labor,
and longer hours of labor.
The Flax Supply Association of Belfast, replying to the
Royal Commission on the depression of Trade (Second Report,
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, etc.
47
P. 410) stated: "Foreign competition is reducing prices and
injuring our trade, and this competition is rapidly increasing.
The excessive hours of labor give the foreign manufacturer a
great advantage."
In the textile industries the margin of profit has in late
years been considerably lessened by the advances made in
countries beyond the seas.
In the United Kingdom no less than 1,084,631 persons are
engaged in textile industries, of whom 428,082 are males; of
these 40,538 are boys, half timers: 656,549 are females, of
whom 45,941 are girls, half timers. The hours of working
for adults and full timers are fifty-six and a-half hours per
week. It is needless to say that cotton is the most important
of our textile industries. It is alleged by an official repre-
sentative of the cotton workers that the effect of reducing
the weekly hours from fifty-six and a-half to forty-eight, leaving
wage at its present rate, would be to reduce the wages eleven
per cent.
As the operatives cannot without great hardship
bear such a reduction, can the rate of wage be materially in-
creased and can the spindles be driven at higher rate of speed
so as to ensure equal product in the lesser hours?
In the evidence taken by the Board of Trade in the Railway
Rates Inquiry, Mr. Alderman Emmott, of Oldham, representing
the United Cotton Spinners' Association, which with about
£100,000,000 capital owns about 30,000,000 spindles and uses
about 550,000 tons of cotton in the year, stated that the
return on capital in recent years had been most inadequate;
that in the competition with foreign countries the English
cotton spinners found it difficult enough to hold their own;
and that over the last twelve or thirteen years the average
returns of limited companies in Oldham had been very little
•
48
LABOR AND LAW.
¿
over three per cent. Mr. Samuel Andrews, representing the
Oldham Master Cotton Spinners, giving evidence on the same
inquiry, said: "In 1884 there were nearly 43,000,000 spindles
in the cotton trade of the United Kingdom. In 1889 they had
only increased 500,000. Now our competitors outside in the
same time have exactly increased their spindles 3,000,000.
They have increased actually at six times the rate our cotton
trade has increased at." Before the Royal Commission on the
Depression of Trade (4289) the same witness stated that in 1876
the number of spindles outside Great Britain was 30,000,000;
in 1885 it was 38,000,000, an increase of 8,000,000 spindles.
These figures slightly differ from, and require comparison with,
the paper furnished by the Oldham Cotton Spinners' Associa-
tion to the Royal Commission on Trade Depression, given on
page 423 of the Second Report; and allowance must be made
for the fact that the home spindles, running at a higher rate
of speed, turned out a greater weight of yarn per spindle. I am,
however, reliably informed that some mills now at full work
in Russia, having the latest inventions in machinery, fully
compete with this country in weight per spindle. It appears.
(p. 433) that the three per cent mentioned by Mr. Emmott was
an average taken over nine years, 1877 to 1885, the companies.
having mostly new machinery and producing at the least
possible cost, but using about half loan capital, on which five
per cent interest was paid.
The Oldham Master Cotton Spinners say (p. 426):
"We estimate the capital in the whole of the cotton trade, in 1876,
at £70,000,000; in 1871, it was estimated at £87,000,000; in 1876, at
£90,000,000; and in 1885, at £100,000,000. This latter item is thus
divided:-Spinning, £55,000,000; Weaving, £20,000,000; Printing, etc.,
£5,000,000; and Manchester, £20,000,000; Liverpool not being in-
cluded in the above estimate.
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
49
+
"The quantity of labor employed has not increased proportionally
with the number of spindles and the number of looms. In 1874, it
was estimated that the cotton trade found employment for 479,515
workpeople. Of these, about 130,000 would be engaged in cotton
spinning, including winders, reelers and other subsidiary hands.
In 1885, the number of workpeople was 504,069; the number in
the spinning department being about 150,000, including the above
branches. While the spindles have increased nearly 7 per cent.,
workpeople employed have only increased 5 per cent."
They add:
"We are not of opinion that changes in the hours of labor in
Great Britain have greatly affected the condition of our trade, as we
appear to be turning out as much work in the shortened hours of
labor as we did before the passing of the Ten Hours' Bill. This is
chiefly owing to the great improvements in machinery. At the same
time, from returns received from many of our Continental and other
rivals, we find that their production per spindle is very much greater
than it is possible for our spindles to accomplish under present
conditions, owing to the greater number of hours worked in those
countries; and this ought to be a very serious consideration in dealing
with the question of the hours of labor in England."
On March 12th, 1890, Mr. Samuel Andrews, in a letter to
the Oldham Chronicle, so far as Oldham is concerned, brought
the statement of average profit down to the end of 1889, giving
the figures carefully year by year for 1885-89, on limited
companies with £6,750,000 capital, of which loan capital
£3,250,000 received four and a-quarter per cent, and share
capital £3,500,000, an average of three and three-quarters per
cent. The stock-takings in Oldham up to the end of August, 1890,
appear to show a much larger average profit on the eight months.
In a paper on Fifty Years' Cotton Trade", read before the
British Association at Manchester, in 1887, the same gentleman
carefully examines the whole question; and, if his statements
are accurate, which it seems to me can scarcely be doubted,
then two things are clear. (1) That the net profit to the
spinner and manufacturer (omitting exceptional cases) is, on
E
((
50
LABOR AND LAW.
1
the average of the last twenty years, less than he could get if
it were possible for him to invest his money in fairly good
debentures. (2) That, while the cotton trade has to rely
chiefly for its continuance on foreign markets, the competing
ability in nearly all those markets is rapidly increasing.
Further, I think it is certain that any legislative action which
increased the cost of home production would sorely cripple this
important industry.
It is alleged by the workmen that glass manufacture and
carpenters' and joiners' work have also suffered severely from
cheaper foreign manufactures. A similar allegation is made as
to paper by the manufacturers. This, however, only seems.
verified so far as loss of profit is concerned. The Northern
Counties Coachmakers' Association say (2nd Report Royal
Commission on Depression of Trade, p. 422): "France, Spain,
Italy, Germany, Russia, and other European countries formerly
imported the majority of the carriages built in England for
foreign markets. At present France and Austria are supplying
the demand."
The Sunderland Chamber of Commerce, in a Special Report
on the Glass Bottle Trade (1st Report Royal Commission on
Depression of Trade, p. 111), state that:
"Ten years ago 36 bottle houses were at work in the district,
whereas now only 14 are working. By the 22 bottle houses being
thrown out of work, wages to the extent of £50,000 to £60,000 per
annum have been lost to the district. It is worthy of note that this
trade has gone out of the kingdom, and the work is now executed
abroad."
Another trade which has died out in the past twenty-five
years is the Coventry and Congleton Ribbon trade. Gold,
silver, and metal beating is alleged to be an industry which
began to die out twenty-five years ago, and is gradually
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
51
decreasing in this country whilst increasing abroad. In 1864
we imported 6,625,300 leaves; in 1885 we imported 79,867,650.
The Gold and Silver Metal Beaters, in their statement to
the Royal Commission, explaining how their trade has died out
under foreign competition (Second Report, Appendix, Part II,
p. 69), say:
“Foreign gold leaf, of their so-called best quality, being sold at
40s. per thousand leaves, it follows that 100,000 would realise £200.
The best quality of English gold leaf cannot be profitably manu-
factured under 50s. per thousand leaves."
The Leather Trade Association says (Second Report Royal
Commission on Depression of Trade, pp. 412-13):
"From the Continent we get large quantities of high-class goods,
dressed calf-skins, calf kids, moroccos, glove kid and all the finer
classes. All these goods are distinctly our own industry, and they
displace just that amount of English make. This is not peculiar to
London, but to every county in the United Kingdom. Had the centre
of production shifted to other places outside, no remarks would have
been necessary, but that is not the case. Take Bristol as an illustra-
tion: there we find the production of heavy sole leather reduced to
a very low ebb compared with what it was in 1870. Take the
currying branch for the same place, and contrast the present small
production with the very large trade done there formerly. This has
not gone to other centres, as Leeds, for instance, for there was always
a large currying trade carried on there. All our small towns had their
tan yards and currying shops, often more than one, and employing a
good number of hands, now almost all closed. There is a tendency
to centralise trade now beyond a doubt, but foreign production has
prevented this with us."
"American leather was a thing
unknown here a few years since; on the contrary, we supplied them
largely."
Vlad
Mr. J. W. Sparrow, of Beckminster (Wolverhampton),
formerly a Staffordshire iron-master and coal-owner in a large
way of business, urges that, in consequence of the factory and
mining legislation affecting juvenile labor, and the consequent
increase in the cost of production of pig-iron, a large amount
F 2
52
LABOR AND LAW.
f
of the iron trade which existed in South Staffordshire thirty
years since has been lost to that district. The greatest number
of furnaces ever in blast at one time in South Staffordshire
was in 1857, when 153 were in work, and the coal, ironstone,
and limestone were raised in the county. Now there are only
thirty-three furnaces in work, and tap cinder is used with raw
Northampton ore and about one-eighth North Staffordshire
ironstone. With the better class of iron some Ulverstone
Hematite is added. Mr. Sparrow, in a letter to the Midland
Counties Express (24th July, 1884), says: "My firm were at one
time the largest producers of native ironstone in South Stafford-
shire, and now we do not get a single ton; our pumping
engines, four in number, could not be kept at work. They
cost £4,000 a year to keep them at work, but when the profits
fell to zero, and below it, there was no fund available to
work them, and the ironstone mines were drowned out and
abandoned." I do not feel quite sure that Mr. Sparrow gives
quite sufficient weight to other causes, as the development of
pits nearer ports; but, as he speaks with knowledge and
evident sincerity, I give his statement, especially as it is
material when to other hostile causes it is proposed to add
a statutory increased cost of production. He says that prior
to 1873 the ironstone pits of South Staffordshire furnished
about 1,000,000 tons of native ironstone, that these are all
closed by the stoppage of pumps which it did not pay under
the eight hours' limit to keep going, and that consequent on
this has been the blowing out, since 1873, of at least seventy
blast furnaces. From the position in South Staffordshire there
was ten per cent cost of carriage to port; and Mr. Sparrow
reckons the increased cost in consequence of the lesser
production on the reduced hours of labor as from twelve and
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
53
a-half per cent to fifteen per cent. Whether or not perfectly
justified in so strongly attributing his inability to compete to
the reduced hours of labor, it is an illustration that Sir Charles
Dilke should make some qualification to the statement (c), p. 44•
It is noteworthy that Mr. Sparrow, owning his mines, had not
rent or royalty charges, and, having ample pecuniary means,
was not an interest-payer on borrowed capital.
Whether accurate or inaccurate, there was a strong con.
currence of opinion expressed in 1886 by the various coalowners
as to the effect of legislation in increasing cost of production.
The Northumberland Coal Trade Association and the Durham
Coal Trade Association use almost the same language
(Second Report Royal Commission on Depression of Trade,
pp. 420-1).
"The Mines Act of 1872, which shortened the hours of boys'
labor, and which began to operate in 1873, together with the dis-
position on the part of the men to restrict their work, partly with a
view of enjoying the good wages which accompanied the prosperous
second period, and partly with the idea that their restriction would
still further force up prices and wages, and prolong the general
prosperity, led to a very large expenditure of capital, together with
an extension of collieries and additional employment of labor, which
was soon followed by a reaction, from the effects of which the trade
has never recovered; and although there has been lately much less.
restriction on the part of the men, and their wages have more nearly
approached those of the normal period, yet the change has not been
of sufficient importance to place the trade in a position to meet the
greatly increased competition which has resulted from their former
action."
The South Lancashire and Cheshire Coal Association agree
(p. 416) that "the immediate effect of the Mines Act was a
lessened production and an increased cost".
It may not be out of place on the point of foreign competi-
tion to quote from the Report of the Royal Commission a
54
LABOR AND LAW.
paragraph on which all the Commissioners, save one, completely
concurred:
"The increasing severity of this competition both in our home and
in neutral markets is especially noticeable in the case of Germany. A
reference to the reports from abroad will show that in every quarter
of the world the perseverance and enterprise of the Germans are
making themselves felt. In the actual production of commodities we
have now few, if any, advantages over them; and in a knowledge of
the markets of the world, a desire to accommodate themselves to local
tastes and idiosyncracies, a determination to obtain a footing wherever
they can, and a tenacity in maintaining it, they appear to be gaining
ground upon us."
I do not suggest that the volume of our industries has
decreased since the initiation of factory, mining, and sanitary
legislation. On the contrary, it has increased even more
largely than our increase of population; but I suggest that
the margin of profit has lessened in the huge majority of cases;
that several minor industries have already fallen behind in the
contest with foreign nations; and that in the staple industries
of our country we only keep in front with great difficulty, and
that in most of those industries other countries are acquiring
facilities which once were almost solely ours. I believe that
the advantage of the legislation in facilitating a general higher
standard of comfort has been indubitable; but I desire the
people to understand, and legislators to remember, that this
higher standard has been purchased. I believe that disease
and crime have each been lessened by our sanitary and educa-
tional legislation, and I do not suggest we have paid too high
a price for these great advantages; but I do want people and
legislators alike to understand that undue legal intermeddling
may paralyse our efforts and arrest our progress. The swimmer
needs clear stream, not weedy trammel.
It is alleged by the advocates of the statutory limitation of
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
55
the hours of labor that there is, at present, overwork in all
industries, or at any rate in most industries; that such over-
work is seriously injurious to health, and has resulted in an
increased death-rate. While agreeing that in some industries
and occupations men work exceedingly long hours, I do not
admit that this is true either of all industries or of most
occupations. There is clear evidence that the average hours
of labor in this country are shorter in most industries than
they were fifty years ago; and that the lesser hours and
improved conditions of labor have resulted from mutual con-
cessions between employers and employed, and from the efforts
of the workers, usually led by organised combinations. The
overwhelming preponderance of evidence in the statements
furnished by workmen themselves, in the appendices to the
Royal Commission on Depression of Trade, is to the effect that
the lessened hours of labor-gained when what is called the
nine hours' movement took effect-are generally observed
throughout the trades to which the nine hours per day applied.
Vital statistics show, throughout the community, a decreasing
average death-rate and less disease. It is most desirable that
the shortest hours of labor should be worked in every industry,
consistent, on the one hand, with the profitable conduct of the
business, and, on the other, with full provision for the wage-
earner and those dependent upon him. The burden is, there-
fore, on any person seeking to obtain an enactment to limit the
hours of labor, to show that in the bulk of industries there is
general injury to life requiring such enactment, and either that
there is now a sufficient margin of profit to do this without risk
of ruin to the business, or that there is a certainty that, despite
the reduction of the hours of labor, the production and conse-
quent profit would be otherwise maintained.
Such a case
•
56
LABOR AND LAW.
¦
should be capable of proof by clear and exact evidence, taken
carefully, and subject to the test of cross-examination, or, in
default, the Legislature are not justified in taking what may be
an irremediable step.
It is proposed to make general statutory directions in lieu
and stead of separate labor contracts, at any rate as to hours of
labor, and to make the breach of the statute a quasi-criminal
offence. This, so far as I understand any of the legislative
proposals, is equivalent to going back several centuries in
legislative experiment, whilst disregarding the clear lesson the
history of those centuries affords. Conditions of labor, and
rates of wage, were formerly fixed by law as against the
person employed. It is now proposed, in the alleged interest
of the wage-earners, to fix by statute the hours of labor at one
limit for all industries. The London Daily Chronicle, in an
editorial on June 6th, 1890, advocates such legislation in these
words :-" At all events, the eight hours day, which has been in
full fruition in the Province of Victoria for twenty-five years
with the best possible results, cannot be regarded by any but
the merest' freedom-of-contract' fanatics as other than a safe
and salutary remedial experiment ". But in the colony of
Victoria there is no legal limitation of the hours of working.
The limitation has been obtained by conciliatory methods, not
by force of law. The conditions of industrial life in Victoria
differ considerably from our own.
The number of wage-earners
is limited. Immigration of poor workers is discouraged; pro-
tective duties prevail; and there is little export of manufactured
goods. Nay, the statute law is to be even further invoked.
An advanced Whig, Mr. G. W. E. Russell, affirms that "the
question whether Parliament can properly interfere with the
hours of labor, with the importation of foreign workmen,
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
57
perhaps even with the rate of wages, will assuredly have to
be faced in the not distant future, and in order to secure its
right solution we shall have need of quite another set of leaders
than Adam Smith or Mr. Mill".
Undue prolongation of either physical or mental labor must
tend to the deterioration of those overworked. At least
equally vital is the augmentation of wage. The evils attendant
on insufficient wage are too well known to need recapitulation.
Poor food, insufficient nourishment, disease, squalid homes,
unhealthy and immoral life surroundings in overcrowded dwell-
ings! into all these and much more may low wage be trans-
lated. Poverty has prostitution, crime, and sickness for its
campfollowers. But will any sane man pretend that any
statute will have force enough to generally convert low wage
into high wage, or overwork into moderate toil? The editor
of the London Daily Chronicle, in the article just quoted, seems
to think so, for he says:
"The eight hours working day demanded by the vast Hyde Park
concourse recently, it is hoped, will go a long way to abolish the
unemployed the capitalists' army of reserve '-thus enabling the
workers to contract with employers on more equal terms, and to
secure a larger share of the general produce. And we believe the
expectation is, so far, not economically unreasonable.”
That is, the workers will produce less in eight hours, and,
to sustain the rate of production, more workers must be em-
ployed. But either the present workers for the lesser hours
are to receive a lesser wage, or the cost of production must
be materially increased. Ought it to be within the competence
of Parliament, by an Eight Hours' Act, arbitrarily either to
lessen the wage, or to increase to the consumer the cost of
the article produced? If it be true that, say in textile indus-
tries, additional employment is to be given, then either double
2
58
LABOR AND LAW.
a
shifts must be worked, or additional plant must be added,
larger mills being required. Ought Parliament to run the risk
of annihilating some industry, the margin of profit in which
will not permit this considerable increase of fixed capital? Old
trades unionism sought the highest wage and shortest work
period in each industry. New trades unionism seems rather
1
to claim uniformity of work-period and of wage in all industries.
One measure of hours may be a very unequal pressure of toil
in diverse occupations, and if the work be piecework, may even
involve very unequal produce by, and payment to, workers in
the same industry. Coal miners are paid by weight, and where
the coal is easy to get, or if the worker is very adroit, five
and a half hours may win higher remuneration to the coal-
hewer, and greater produce for the coal owner, than where the
coal has to be won in a longer shift, from a harder bargain, or
by a less able miner. In work where men are paid by the
hour, any reduction of the hours worked must mean less wage,
unless the rate paid per hour is increased. In piecework there
are many cases in which increased skill and diligence on the
part of the workman may fully make up for reduced hours; in
some departments of labor this might not be possible. These
varying points can hardly be settled in the heat of Parlia-
mentary debate, and can only be effectively considered by
boards or councils in which workers and employers, having
special knowledge, meet and discuss in conciliatory fashion
the conditions of the labor they best understand.
Mr. Cunningham says (" Politics and Economics", p. 145):
"But if public opinion holds that the employers in a certain
industry overwork their hands, there is a strong case for enforcing
a restriction to such hours as public opinion deems fair. Nor need
we discuss whether other persons are more oppressed or not; if
the public believes that this class is oppressed, and that from the
ނ .
t
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE CAN DO, ETC.
59*
conditions of labor it is possible to draw an enactment which shall
remedy the oppression, the existence of greater hardships in some
other department is no real argument against it.”
There is a great deal in an "if"; but how is the judgment
of public opinion to be ascertained by the Legislature? How
is it to be known if the public opinion is well-informed? Are
the employers and employed to be heard as witnesses on the
subject before legislation is adopted? And why should the
"public belief" be conclusive? If evidence be contrary to
the expressed belief, what then? Sometimes, too, the expres-
sion of public belief is not a complete index to the actual
belief of the majority of the public. The public belief in the
Claimant was at one time, at least, as strongly expressed as
any other public belief in this country; but this, it is now clear,
would scarcely have warranted a statutory declaration in favor
of his claims. The "public belief" even formally expressed by
monster petitions to the House of Commons, is not always
conclusive. Public opinion may, temporarily at any rate, be
adroitly manipulated.
CHAPTER III.
WHAT HAS BEEN DONE BY LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN
COUNTRIES, AND THE RESULTS.
As many conflicting statements had been made as to the laws
affecting the hours of adult labor in foreign countries, and
the result of such legislation, on May 16, 1889, I moved,
and with the assent of the Government carried, an address
for a return "showing the laws enacted affecting the hours
of adult labor in Europe, and in the United States of America,
with the actual hours now worked in the several countries,
and such information as is attainable as to the enforcement
or otherwise of such laws". The return, C 5866, gives reports
from her Majesty's representatives in twenty-four countries of
Europe, and also in the United States of America. In Austria,
a law of June 21, 1884, enacts that in mines the duration of
a shift is not to exceed twelve hours, and the actual working
time during the same, ten hours. There is power for the
Minister of Agriculture to make exception for mines in the
High Alps, provided the working hours do not exceed sixty
actual working hours per week, and in cases of extraordinary
character or pressing necessity, there is further power to
allow a limited prolongation of the shift. In the case of
factory workers, by the law of March 8, 1885, the hours of
labor are limited to eleven out of twenty-four, exclusive of
the periods of rest. In various industries the hours of
( 61 )
62
LABOR AND LAW.
working have been extended by ministerial ordinance. Thus
in spinning mills twelve hours work is permitted; in silk manu-
factories thirteen hours; and in certain other works, twelve hour
shifts; women are not to be employed in night work, nor for
four weeks after confinement; but the report of the Inspector
of Industries for 1888, states that this restriction as to women
is very generally infringed and is difficult to enforce. The
limit as to factories and mines is strictly observed, but by
ministerial ordinance twelve hours is permitted in spinning
mills, and thirteen hours in silk manufactories. In Hungary
there is no limit to the hours of adult labor, except that the
day must not begin before 5 A.M., or continue after 9 P.M.,
but in factories where the work goes on at night, the owner
is obliged to arrange relief for the night hands. The shortest
hours worked in Hungary are in the tobacco factories, and
vary from eight to ten hours per day, exclusive of two hours
prescribed for rest. The next class includes those factories.
where the day's work lasts ten, ten and a-half, and eleven
hours. In mills, paper manufactories, blast furnaces, foundries,
brick and porcelain kilns, the hours of labor are twelve for
each shift. The change of shifts for those working one week
by night work and the next week by day is usually managed
by the men working consecutively for twenty-four hours. The
longest hours are in glass factories, viz., from twelve to fifteen,
but there are hours of rest between shifts, and the period of
actual work does not generally exceed seventy hours per
week. Twenty-five per cent of the manufactories supplied with
machinery for continuous work, that is two hundred and thirty-
seven establishments, work on Sundays. In France it was
decreed on September 9, 1848, that "the working man's day
in manufactories and mills shall not exceed twelve hours of
AT PL-
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
63
effective labor"; but on May 17, 1851, a decree was issued
declaring that the
"limit of twelve hours established for the working day of men and
women in factories shall not apply to stokers, firemen, or watchmen in
factories, to men in charge of furnaces, drying stoves, or boilers, to
persons employed in sponging (décatissage), or in the manufacture of
glue, or in soap boiling, milling, printing, and lithographing, or in
casting, refining, tinning, and galvanising metals, or making projectiles
of war.
"Similar exceptions are extended to the cleaning of machinery
after working hours, or to any action required to be taken in case of
accidents to motors, boilers, machinery, or buildings, or, in general,
in case of any accidents whatsoever.
In respect of certain occupations, an additional hour is conceded
to persons paid to wash and stretch stuffs in dyeing and bleaching
works, or in manufactures of indienne (gauze).
"Two additional hours are granted in sugar mills and refineries
and chemical works.
"A similar privilege to men in dyeing, or printing, or sizing, or
pressing works is conceded, on the express understanding that the
hours in excess of twelve shall only be allowed during one hundred
and twenty days a year, and only if application has been previously
made and granted, on the intercession of a Mayor, by the Depart-
mental Prefect.
"A decree of the 31st January, 1866, gives an additional hour to
workmen in silk spinneries, confining the privilege to sixty days within
the four months of May, June, July, aud August.
"On the 25th November, 1885, a circular was issued by the Govern-
ment communicating an exact definition of the works to which the
Law of 1848 should apply. It was laid down that the limit of twelve
hours of work per diem was not to be imposed where power was used
by hand, but confined to such manufactures and mills only as were
moved by machinery by day or machinery in motion day and night
without extinction of fires. No workshops (ateliers) were to come under
the clauses of the Act that did not employ more than twenty hands
in any one shed.
"A decree of the 3rd April, 1889, exempts from the observance of
the Law of 1848 laborers employed on any works executed by order
of the Government in the interest of the national safety and defence."
Even with strict inspection it has been found that the law
64
LABOR AND LAW.
is powerless, "except where the men themselves report the
breach of it". This initiative by the workmen is rare, and the
law is stated to be constantly evaded. Mr. J. A. Crowe reports
that "As a rule, it may be said Frenchmen in factories are
present at least fourteen hours out of every twenty-four in the
shops. On the other hand, there is nothing to prevent
manufacturers from working short time if they like."
M. Louis Blanc, in a letter to the Social Science Committee
(1860), page 590, states "that the first demand urged by the
working men of Paris, the day after the Revolution of 1848,
was the shortening of the hours of labor. A general meeting,
summoned by myself, was held at the Luxembourg. The
question, having been brought under the consideration both of
the employers and the workmen, was calmly discussed and
the majority of employers having yielded of their own accord
to the workmen's request, the consequence was the issue by
the Provisional Government of a decree shortening the hours
of labor from eleven to ten in Paris, and from twelve to eleven
in the Provinces. This decree was issued on March 2nd, 1848,
but was abrogated as soon as the reactionists got. the upper
hand, that is, in September, 1848, when it was enacted that
the day's work in factories should not exceed twelve hours,
which was a milder form of expressing that it could last twelve
hours."
The Economiste Français (quoted Board of Trade Journal,
December, 1890, p. 687) says:—
“A Parliamentary Commission was some time ago appointed in
France to examine questions relating to the regulation of labor. This
inquiry, carried out by means of questions addressed to all workmen,
has been confined to Paris and the department of the Seine. The
Commission has up to the present received 24,043 replies emanating
from different workmen or from workmen's unions.
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
65
"Statistics have been drawn up from these replies for four groups
of Parisian industries representing 9,116 workmen, distributed in each
branch of industry as follows:-
"Metallurgy, 2,946; building trades, 3,222; wood industry, 1.606;
clothing, etc., 1,342.
"The most important replies for the present purpose are those
which deal with the limitation of the working day, the present method
of payment, and the present duration of the working day.
"In reply to the question as to whether the length of the working
day should be fixed by law, 6,715, or 74'4 per cent, are in the affirma-
tive, and 2,331, or 25.6 per cent, negative.
"The 6,715 workmen in favor of limitation by law are distributed
according to the duration claimed by them as follows:-
(6
Day of eight hours, 2,734; day of eight hours with overtime, 685;\
nine hours, 683; ten hours, 2,585; eleven hours, 49; twelve hours and
more, 49.
(C
If, instead of taking the 6,715 in favor of limitation by law, the
whole of the 9,116 workmen who have replied to the questions are
taken into account, the following figures are arrived at :-
"Hostile to any limitation by law, 2,331, or 25.6 per cent; in favor
of eight hours without overtime, 2,734, or 30 per cent; eight hours
with overtime, 685, or 7.5 per cent; nine, ten, eleven, or twelve hours
with overtime, 800, or 8.8 per cent.
"The 9,116 workmen consulted on the subject of the present dura-
tion of the working day are divided as follows:-
"118, or 1.3 per cent, work eight hours; 547, or six per cent, work
nine hours; 5,798, or 64°3 per cent, work ten hours; 1,625, or 18 per
cent, work eleven hours; 924, or 10°2 per cent, work twelve hours and
more.
(6
66
As regards mode of payment the following figures are given :-
"Paid by the hour, 5,147, or 56.5 per cent; by the day, 1,731, or 19
per cent; by piecework, 2,058, or 22.6 per cent; by the month, 158,
or 17 per cent.
"With regard to idle periods, the 9,116 workmen are thus dis-
tributed :-
Having no unemployed periods, 1,630, or 17'9 per cent.
Having an idle period of two months and under, 1,340, or 14*7
"C
per cent.
"Of three months, 2,221, or 24'3 per cent.
Of four months, 1,813, or 20 per cent.
"Of five months and more, 1,572, or 17.2 per cent.
find
F
66
LABOR AND LAW.
"With respect to weekly rest, the following proportions are
found :-
(C
Having regularly a day of rest per week, 5,153, or 57 per cent.
"Not having regularly a day of rest per week, 2,308, or 25˚5 per
cent.
"Not having a day regularly, but a half-day, 1,572, or 174 per
cent.
"Builders' workmen form the majority of the two latter categories,
but they have also the longest slack season.
"As regards the consultation of the workmen's unions on the
subject of the limitation by law of the working day, it is stated that of
the 171 unions which have replied, 154 are in favor of limitation, 15
against, and 2 not pronounced.
"The 154 unions in favor of limitation are classed as follows:-
Day of eight hours without overtime, 82; with overtime, 22.
((
'Day of nine hours without overtime, 3; with overtime, 3.
Day of ten hours without overtime, 21; with overtime, 17.
"Six give no opinion on this point.
"The Commission intends to extend the same statistical enquiries
to all the industries of Paris, and afterwards to those of the province."
((
"(
It is stated in the Times of January 15th that the Com-
mission met, and received the replies to its circulars. Fifty-
four out of sixty-four Chambers of Commerce condemn any
legislation on hours of labor, as also do twenty-five out of
thirty-two consultative chambers, fifty-five out of ninety-five
conseils de prud'hommes, 201 out of 235 employers' unions, and ten
out of twelve mixed unions. Of 410 workmen's unions, thirty-
eight are against legislation, 186 advocate eight hours without
overtime, forty-eight eight hours with overtime, thirteen nine
hours with or without overtime, and forty-three ten hours.
In Switzerland, by article 11, Federal Factory Law, 1877,
"the duration of a normal working day must not exceed eleven
hours, and on Saturdays and public holidays it shall be
reduced to ten hours". This does not apply to men or married
women above eighteen in "accessory works which ought to
precede or follow the labor of manufacture". Night-work is
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
67
only permissible as an exception, and with full consent of the
workmen. "Regular night-work may, however, take place in
such branches of manufacture as by their nature require un-
interrupted work."
It is, however, in the United States that we get the most
numerous State laws affecting adult labor. The New York Act,
1870, makes eight hours a legal day's work for all except farm
laborers or domestics, but overwork for extra compensation is
permitted. The official report of the Bureau of Labor, 1885,
showed that this law had been practically disregarded, except
in those trades where a strong union existed, and such organiza-
tions did not need the law. Act, 1886, makes it a misdeanour,
in a city of over 500,000 inhabitants, to employ any one on
tramways or elevated railways for more than twelve consecutive
hours, with one half hour for dinner; and by Act, 1887, this was
reduced to ten hours in cities of 100,000 and over.
In nearly
all trades in New York State, the employees work nine hours per
day except on Saturday, when eight hours is the rule. In New
Jersey the only Act affecting the hours of adult labor is one of
1887, limiting the hours of railroad and tramway servants to
twelve consecutive hours. A large proportion of those engaged
in industrial occupations work over sixty hours per week; those in
the building and some other trades fifty-four or fifty three hours
per week. Rhode Island has one statute, declaring ten hours a
legal day's work. Connecticut has one Act, making eight hours
a lawful day's work "unless otherwise agreed"; but the State
Commissioner of Labor Statistics reports that with but very few
exceptions the work is ten hours per day.
"In many factories the employees work more than ten hours for
five days, and make a shorter day of Saturday, to bring the hours of
the week to sixty. The exceptions to sixty hours per week are in
industries like paper manufactories, where the machinery runs con-
F 2
68
LABOR AND LAW.
tinuously day and night, and two sets of hands are employed, each set
working twelve hours."
In Maryland in 1872 a ten hours day was enacted for
workmen in the State tobacco warehouses; in 1886 a ten hours
day was enacted for miners, and a twelve hours day for street-
car and horse-railway drivers. There was an eight hours
movement organised in 1886, which may be said to have been
a failure, except that in some trades there was a reduction to
nine hours per day, ten hours being the ordinary actual working
day. Pennsylvania has a law declaring eight hours a legal day,
but permitting overtime. Most trades work more than the
eight hours. In the State of Michigan it is enacted that all
work beyond ten hours per day shall be paid for as overtime.
Indiana, on March 6, 1889, enacted an eight hours day, but
permitted overtime. Georgia in 1885 enacted that the working
day should be from sunrise to sunset, with allowance for meals.
In Maine the law makes ten hours the legal working day,
"unless the contract stipulates for a longer time". Florida
in 1874 enacted ten hours of labor as a legal day's work,
provided there was no written contract for a less or greater
number of hours, and without such written contract work in
excess of ten hours was to be paid for as overtime. California
has an eight hours limit for a day's work, unless it is otherwise
expressly stipulated, and a specific limit for eight hours as a
legal day in State works; but this is "nearly invariably evaded
by employing the men engaged on State works by the hour, and
paying at so much per hour". The organised trades work
chiefly nine and ten hours by time work or piecework; the
unorganised twelve hours or longer.
Under the Revised Statutes of the United States, 2nd
edition, 1878, cap. 43, section 3738, laborers employed on
•
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
69
Government works, in navy yards, etc., are restricted to eight
hours a day.
The following, from the 1889 Report of the Massachusetts
Bureau of Statistics of Labor, is the more pregnant with
meaning when it is borne in mind that the State of Massa-
chusetts was the first to undertake to legislate in regulation
of the hours of adult labor.
“The predominant question of interest to manual workers is, at
present, the shortening of the working day. Legislation in this direc-
tion, whether it be expedient or not, is persistently asked for both in
this country and abroad; and, either through legislation or without it,
the tendency seems to be toward shorter working time in the near
future.
(C
'Legislation in the United States upon such matters frequently
originates in a single State, and is gradually extended to others. This
was the case with the ten hours law in Massachusetts. But legisla-
tion, while confined to a single State, may work great injury to
industrial enterprises which must meet competition arising in other
States wherein different conditions prevail. In such cases it is not
capital alone, nor chiefly, that suffers. The mobility of capital is
to-day in excess of the mobility of labor. If diverted from Massa-
chusetts it may find ready employment in the South and West. In
many of our industries competition within the so-called home market
is severely felt, and Massachusetts capital is even now going elsewhere.
The interests of both capital and labor lie in maintaining our industrial
position, and therefore it happens that, aside from theories as to
whether or not this subject is properly within the province of legisla-
tion, the matter is surrounded with difficulties."
For all industries in Massachusetts the average longest
time for male adults is 10:39 hours per day, and the average
shortest time 9.15 hours per day. There are only two small
industries in which the average shortest time is below nine
hours per day. Ten hours per day is the length of the normal
working day for adult males in 82.06 per cent of all manu-
facturing and mechanical industries in the State.
That the laws in the United States limiting hours of labor
1
70
LABOR AND LAW.
have achieved very little, is shown by the introductory remarks
on the hours of labor in Vol. XX of the tenth Census of the
United States of America.
The United States Census reporter, giving the percentages.
of hours worked for the quinquennial period, from 1830 to 1880,
adds:
"The small percentage reported under the eight-hour period will
be noticed. Notwithstanding the agitation in favor of eight hours as
a day's work, the percentage of the total number reporting this as the
period of daily labor in 1880 is even less, by a small fraction, than in
1830. This does not indicate that the hours of labor have not
decreased since 1830. Indeed, the table shows the contrary, there
having been a marked increase in the ten-hour period, and a marked
decrease in the twelve to thirteen and thirteen to fourteen-hour periods
between 1830 and 1880, as will be seen by the following tabulation.
of the percentages of the different hours of labor for the years 1830-
and 1880:—

HOURS OF LABOR.
8 to 9
9 to 10
IO to II
II to 12
12 to 13
13 to 14
PERCENTAGE IN 1830.
5'4
13.5
29'7
5'4
32.5
13'5
PERCENTAGE IN 1880.
5°1
8.8
56.6
9.6
14.6
2.3
"The number reporting the hours of labor as ten to eleven
increased from 29.7 per cent in 1830 to 59.6 per cent in 1880, more
than double, while those reporting twelve to thirteen decreased from
32.5 per cent to 14.6 per cent, and those reporting thirteen to fourteen
decreased from 13.5 per cent to 2.3 per cent."
By the third annual report of the New York Bureau of
Statistics of Labor for the year 1885, it is pretty clear that the
trades in which the eight hours limit is observed are few, and
only those in which strong Unions exist, and the Chief Com- .
missioner reports: "The conditions of trade are such that it is
almost fruitless to attempt to adopt short hours in one State,
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
71
and neglect to do so in others". Witness after witness,
according to this report, showed that the mere eight hours'
law was of little avail. Henry Emrich, cabinetmaker, said:
"An eight hours law will only be of any effect through the
action of the organisations themselves," and he added: "The
only way to secure short hours is by combination in a par-
ticular trade where it is desired". A witness, an engineer,
testified: "The State of Massachusetts passed a ten hours law;
and we know that work was driven out of Massachusetts into
Rhode Island". This witness, who was in favor of a compulsory
eight hours law throughout the United States, was also in favor
of the State feeding his family, "if the pay for eight hours
was insufficient to maintain them". W. McClelland, in favor
of short hours, said: "When our union is strong enough we
can bring these things into practice ourselves ", and he added:
"Here is the eight hours law, and you will find letter-carriers
working ten and eleven hours; what is the use of it?" A
moulder testified: "We have got too many laws for the
working man, but they are like the statuary in Central Park
-dead". "I have more faith in labor organisation than I
have in law.” A harness-maker testified "that the Union
had shortened the hours of labor without legislation ", but the
men worked ten hours a day, despite that the eight hours
law had existed fifteen years. Another witness, a brass-
worker, testified strongly in favor of an eight hours law, but
said: "I do not think it could be enforced, but I think the
moral influence of such a law, and the enforcing it on the
State workers, would influence the others by the force of
example ". Edward Conkling, a painter, testified "that the
reduction of hours could be better brought about by organi-
sation than legislation", adding: "The stonecutters have
!
72
LABOR AND LAW.
proved that; President Grant said that it was impossible
to enforce the eight hours law; the stonecutters enforced
it by their organisation. Edward Farrell, plumber, testified
that in his judgment organised labor would more certainly
bring about the reduction of hours than the passage of any
law by the Legislature.
John A. Kavanagh, printer, testified: "I would make
eight hours a legal day's work, but if a man wants to work
fifteen hours a day I wouldn't prevent him from doing it if
he wanted to.
""
Q. In your judgment can a reduction of the hours of
labor be better secured by legislation or by organisation of
labor?
A. By organisation of labor.
Q. You think that would be the best way to accomplish it?
A. I think that is the only way to accomplish it; I don't
think it can be done by legislation."
Hermann Gutstadt, cigar maker, testified :-
Q. "Do you think the hours of labor can be shortened
by legislation?
A. I do not; not effectively. I believe that the hours
of labor can only be effectively regulated by labor organisa-
tions. The State is nearly powerless. For instance, we
have an eight hours law on the statute-book never enforced.
Q. You don't think it would be advisable to recommend
more legislation on that subject?
A. I do not think it would be of any use to place a law
upon the statute-book which cannot very well be enforced
by the State."
In the Report of the same New York Bureau for 1886 the
Hon. C. F. Peck, the Commissioner, says (p. 655): "Both in
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
73
t
the District of Columbia and in this State the working day of
labor has been fixed at eight hours, which is applied to
Government and State works, and is affirmed by some persons
to be the legal length of a working day where no hours are
stipulated, though this may be very well questioned if a
distinct and well-understood trade usage can be shown to
exist and to be within the cognizance of both parties. The
reduction of the hours of labor to limits consistent with honest
work and self-improvement has passed into an accepted propo-
sition, the only question being where to draw the line.
The greatest difficulty in its (an eight hours day's) way is the
continuous profitable use of machinery. Every hour's stoppage
of machinery is not merely a loss to the investor of capital, but
also a loss of product to the community. Suggestions have
been made, more or
or less practicable, for overcoming this
objection. For present purposes, however, and in the existing
state of public opinion, we may consider eight hours' as put
on one side until a more advanced stage, the term 'short hours'
being adopted in its place." Speaking of the May Day
demonstration in the City of New York in favor of eight
hours, the Hon. Mr. Peck reports (p. 658): "The trades were
dealt with in detail; the several employers met their employees
and reasoned over the matter. The state and condition of the
several trades were discussed, reasons were rendered for and
against change, and satisfactory adjustments were made either
by compromise or by showing that change was inexpedient, if
not impossible. It was to the honor and credit of the reformers
that many of them in demanding eight hours were willing to
accept a reduction of wages. They were contending for a
principle. But when they realised that the time was not ripe
for the change, they settled, some on old time and old pay,
,
74
LABOR AND LAW.
some to old time with an advance, many to nine hours and old
pay. There was no system in the general return to work, each
trade acting for itself. The workers had the good sense to see
that the day had not arrived for such a sweeping change, and
that the vast variety of interests involved in the relations of
the trades and callings of a whole community could not be
equalised and harmonised suddenly. It must take place by an
evolution, not by a single impulsive act. The eight hours day
theory is not abandoned; it is only relegated to the perhaps
not distant future."
"The bakers," Mr. Peck reports,
may be mentioned as
a striking instance of specific reforms effected. They have
been successful in obtaining a great reconstruction. Their
hours, ranging from fourteen to the whole twenty-four, have
been reduced to from ten to fourteen, the long hours being, in
some cases, an exigency of the trade."
The Fifth Annual Report of the New York Labour
Bureau, 1887, contains the following passage, significant in
face of the fact that the eight hours law had been on the
statute-book for seventeen years:-
(C
"Strikes for the regulation of hours of labor during the past year
have not been as frequent as formerly. The collapse of the nine-hour-
movement in May, 1885, seems to have had a deterring effect upon the
movement, and the attempts to reduce hours of labor during the past
year were confined to special industries, such as waiters and bakers,
with a few others. The half-holiday movement seems to have received
its strength from a tacit understanding on the part of the employers,
who were willing to adapt themselves to a changed condition of
affairs."
In Wisconsin, Section 1,729, Revised Statutes, enacts that:-
"In all engagements to labor in any manufacturing or mechanical
business, where there is no express contract to the contrary, a day's
work shall consist of eight hours, and all engagements or contracts for
da
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNtries.
75
labor in such cases shall be so construed, but this shall not apply to
any contract for labor by the week, month, or year."
Federal legislation on an eight hours basis dates back
to June 25th, 1868, so far as Government works are con-
cerned. In the Fourth Biennial Report of the Illinois Labour
Bureau, the Hon. J. S. Lord, in his able statement of the
progress of the eight hours movement, remarks:
66
'May 19th, 1869, and again May 11th, 1872, President Grant issued
proclamations calling attention to the provisions of this law and
directing that no reduction should be made in the pay on account of
the reduction in the hours of labor of those coming within the purview
of the Act. Subsequently, May 18th, 1872, Congress passed an Act
securing to all workmen, laborers, and mechanics in the employ of the
Government between June 25th, 1868, and May 19th, 1869, full pay
on a basis of a regular day of eight hours, the period covered being
that between the passage of the Act and the date of President Grant's
first proclamation on the subject. Notwithstanding the obvious intent
of Congress to comply with the wishes expressed in the petitions of
those who urged the passage of this law, the heads of departments
held that in failing to repeal an Act of July 16th, 1862, requiring the
wages of employees in the navy yards to conform to those in private
establishments, Congress had merely established the length of a day's
work for the Government, and that they were bound to pay pro rata
the same wages as those paid in private employment. This view was
sustained both by Attorney-General Evarts and Attorney-General
Hoar, so that the effect of the law has been simply to reduce the
earning opportunity of the Government employee by 20 per cent."
The following countries have no laws affecting the hours of
adult labor-viz., Bavaria and Belgium (where there is a
proposal to limit to twelve hours the working day for women).
In 1886 the Labor Commission of Belgium reported:
"With regard to the limitation of the hours of adult male labor,
the Commission disapprove generally of the intervention of the Legis-
lature, on the ground that any such action would infringe the existing
freedom of work; exceptionally, however, as in the case of unhealthy
trades, the law can and ought to protect the life and health of the
work people."
76
LABOR AND LAW.
Mr. Martin Gosselin, of the British Legation, reports:
"The evidence given before the Royal Commission on Labor
shows that there is a great difference as to the hours of labor exacted
in the different trades and callings. In the mining districts the average
day's labor is twelve hours, but women are often employed thirteen
and even fourteen hours at loading trucks and other similar heavy
work. At Dour it was stated in evidence that women and girls went
down into the mine at 5 a.m., and only came up at 9 and sometimes as
late as 11 o'clock at night; the Director, who admitted the truth of
this assertion, declared that the mine in question was quite an ex-
ceptional case. The workings lying very deep, it was necessary to make
a long stay underground; but the hands were not working all these
seventeen hours, and a liberal time was given below ground for meals
and rest.
"At Ghent the day's labor is generally of twelve hours' duration,
with no night or Sunday work; but the dock laborers complained of
being sometimes kept two nights consecutively out of bed. The
cabinet-makers, both at Ghent and Brussels, asserted that they have
often to work seventeen hours a day.
"It came out in evidence that railway guards are sometimes on
duty for fifteen and even nineteen and a-half hours at a stretch; and
the Brussels tramway drivers are at work from fifteen to seventeen
hours daily, with a rest of only one and a-half hours at noon.
The brewers appear to be a hard-worked trade, their time varying
from ten to seventeen hours a day, and often half-a-day on
Sundays. Brickmakers work during the summer months sixteen
hours a day.
"In the sugar refineries the average hours are from twelve to
thirteen for men, and from nine to ten for women.
"In the Campine district the summer hours are from twelve to
thirteen a day, in winter not more than eight.
"The cases enumerated above have been selected from the more
hardly-worked trades; as a rule, I should be inclined to give eleven
hours as the average day's labor in the majority of trades in
Belgium."
In Denmark, Germany, Greece, Hesse Darmstadt, and the
Duchy of Baden, the medium duration of labor is from ten to
twelve hours; and where the work is continuous the hours of
each shift are from ten to eleven and a half. The United
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
77
States Agent at Cologne reports (Board of Trade Journal,
November, 1890, p. 568):—
"The duration of an average shift in the Upper Silesian coal mines
is eight hours for 10 per cent of the workmen, ten hours for 33 per
cent of the workmen, and twelve hours by the remaining 57 per cent,
including the pit descent and ascent; in the Lower Silesian coal
mines, eight hours for 12 per cent of the workmen, and ten hours by
88 per cent, including the pit ascent and descent. In the district of
Dortmund, eight hours for all the workmen, but not including the pit
descent and ascent; in the Saarbrucken district (Government mines)
eight hours for all the workmen, not including the pit descent and
ascent; in Aachen district, nine and a-half hours by all the workmen,
including the pit ascent and descent."
Although the differences are not great, it is right to point out
that, according to the official Mining Gazette, published by the
Prussian Board of Trade, the durations of the shifts were:
((
Upper Silesian coal mines—11 per cent of the workers, 8 hours;
37 per cent, 10 hours; 52 per cent, 12 hours. Inclusive of the time
required for the entry into and the going out of the pit.
Lower Silesian coal mines-10 per cent of the workers, 8 hours;
90 per cent, 10 hours. Halle brown coal mines, 11 hours; Halle
copper mines, 9 hours; Halle salt mines, 8 hours; Harz iron ore
mines, 10 hours; Westphalian coal mines, 8 hours; Saarbrucken coal
mines, 8 hours. Exclusive of the time required for the entry into and
getting out of the pit.
"Aachen coal mines, 9 hours, inclusive of entry and getting out of
the pit.
"Rhenish iron ore mines, 81, 83, and 91 hours.
"The duration of the shifts for workers above ground was, in
general, between ten and twelve hours, inclusive of the usual pauses."
In Italy, Montenegro, the Netherlands, and Portugal, the general
rule is to work from sunrise to sunset, modified in some trades.
so as to be, summer, 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., winter, 7.30 a.m. to
5 p.m. In the building trade and in field labor the hours in
summer are from 4.30 or 5 a.m. to 7 p.m., from two to three
hours' rest being allowed in the middle of the day; and from
78
LABOR AND LAW.
7.30 a.m. to 5 p.m. in winter, with a shorter interval of rest.
In the report of the Consul-General for Italy on the Industries
of the province of Florence (C-6206), it is stated that
“the daily hours of labor in the principal factories are usually ten net,
though in some cases they may be eleven. Work is not as a rule
carried on on Sundays. In the railway workshops work, in summer,
commences at 6 a.m., lasting till 11 a.m., and is resumed at 1 p.m. till
6 p.m. In winter the hours are from 7 a.m. till noon, and from 1.30 to
6.30 p.m." "It often happens," the Report continues, "that the daily
wages are fixed at low rates, but the hands are able to earn more,
working at so much per hour or by piece-work, on the basis of the fixed
rates of pay."
In Roumania and Russia the hours vary considerably in dif-
ferent industries. In Saxe-Coburg Gotha and Saxony the
normal work day is from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., or deducting meal
intervals, eleven hours of actual work.
The Dresden curtain mills work continuously (pauses ex-
cepted) through the twenty-four hours, thus: first gang, 7 to
12 a.m.; second gang, 1 to 6 p.m.; first gang again, 7 to
12 p.m.; second gang again, I to 6 a.m. Here, then, the
effective work period is ten hours. Night shifts also occur in
the State mining works, in paper mills, printing establishments,
and glass works.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden, in his most interesting and
valuable report on the Industrial condition of Wurtemberg,
dated August 6th, 1890 (C. 6205-20), founded chiefly on the
report of Herr Von Diefenbach, inspector of factories, says—
"The principal endeavors and aims of the working classes at
present are undoubtedly being directed towards shortening the hours
of labor, and very often towards increasing the wages at the same
time. The employers, however, point to the fact that wages in
Wurtemberg are considerably higher than they are in North Germany,
where the lower price of coal also gives the manufacturers a great
advantage over their southern competitors.
"Herr von Diefenbach remarks in this connexion that, having for
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
79
many years been convinced that the reduction of the hours of labor in
textile factories, to a maximum of eleven a day, would be an immense
benefit to the workpeople, he addressed a circular in this sense to the
manufacturers last summer. He dwelt in this circular particularly on
the fact that in England, as a rule, only fifty-six hours' work were
required in the week, whereas his proposal would still allow sixty-six
in Wurtemberg, and also to the fact that it had heen repeatedly found
in factories where the shorter hours had been introduced that nearly
as much work, and of a better quality, was done in eleven hours as in
twelve hours or more. He was convinced that, with a fair trial,
manufacturers would find that they really incurred no loss whatever
from the change.
"The results of the circular on the whole were satisfactory. A very
great number of factories ceased to work more than eleven hours a
day. A certain number replied that already they only worked eleven,
and, in a few cases, ten hours a day. A few objected to the reduction
on the ground that it ought to be accompanied by a corresponding
reduction in wages, to which the workpeople would not consent; while
a certain number of industries, such as silk spinners and weavers, and
some linen and cotton factories, answered, either that they had so
many orders on hand that a reduction of the hours at the present
moment would entail a considerable increase in the amount of wages
paid for overtime, or else that the Belgian and Italian competition, in
which countries it was asserted that yet longer hours were usual in these
industries, made it impossible for them to reduce their hours of work.
"The agitation for the fixing of a minimum wage has, as a rule,
originated with the less competent or less industrious hands. These
people are apparently unable to realise the fact that they generally
make their position worse instead of better under this system. This
has recently been found to be the case in Stuttgart, both by the
printers, who for some time have had a minimum wage fixed, and now
also by the bookbinders. They find that the men who have the
greatest difficulty in obtaining regular employment now are the weak
and less competent hands, the very men who clamored most to have a
minimum wage fixed. When the trades are fully occupied they
perhaps receive a little more pay; but naturally enough, when trade is
slack, the employers will only take on the most competent men."
Servia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and, in the United States of
America, the States of Delaware, Virginia, Ohio, North and
South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Texas, Arkansas, Louis-
iana, Mississippi, Nevada, Oregon, and the territories of
80
LABOR AND LAW.
Washington, Idaho, Utah, and Arizona have no legislation
affecting the hours of adult labour.
We have no official information as to the Australian
colonies. The Agent-General for Victoria, Sir Graham Berry,
wrote (Fortnightly Review, March 1890, p. 454):
"In Victoria, where eight hours is the measure of a day's toil with
a very large majority of the trades, it has been established by the
exertions and organisation of the men themselves, assisted by intelli-
gent and earnest leaders, and aided no doubt by the favorable position
labor occupies in that colony. In certain measures recently passed
dealing with national railways and private tramways, Parliament has
inserted certain conditions amounting to a recognition of the custom.
Eight hours is now considered the charter of the organised trades, and
is not likely to be interfered with. In fact, I doubt if the slightest wish
exists in the minds of employers to do so. It is scarcely necessary for
me to say that it has proved a great boon to the many, without in any
way injuring any. I may add, it is the opinion of many well able to
judge, that as much work is done in the reduced time as before, and
that the quality of it is better.
1
"The chief reason why legislative sanction is not more energeti-
cally sought is the conviction that it is scarcely needed. The principle
has twice been endorsed in the Assembly; but the Bill based upon it
was lost in the Council."
The Agent-General for South Australia, Sir Arthur Blyth,
wrote:-
"There is an annual celebration in South Australia of the day when
the eight-hours system came into vogue. And last Session a Bill was
introduced into the local Parliament to give legal effect to the practice.
This Bill did not become law, because of the early prorogation. I
enclose you a copy of it, as it was introduced.
"HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY.]
[As laid on the table, read a first time, and ordered to be printed,
August 8th, 1889.]
'1889.
666
666
No. 19.
"A BILL for an Act to define the proper duration of a Day's
Labor.
[
]
"WHEREAS it is desirable for the general welfare of the community
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIEs.
81
that the hours of daily labor should be such that workmen may have a
reasonable time at their own disposal for recreation, mental culture,
and the performance of social and civil duties: And whereas it would
be conducive to this end to declare by law the proper duration of a
day's labor-Be it therefore Enacted by the Governor of the Province
of South Australia, with the advice and consent of the Legislative
Council and House of Assembly of the said province, in this present
Parliament assembled, as follows:
"1. This Act may be cited as "The Eight Hours Act of 1889 ".
"""2. In this Act the term "workman means any person employed
in manual labor, which term includes the work done by mechanics,
handicraftsmen, artisans, journeymen, miners, engineers, firemen, rail-
way servants, sailors, and other persons employed in ships or vessels
when in port, and all other persons working with their hands at any
kind of work except as herein expressly excepted, but does not include
the work of sailors when the ship or vessel is under weigh, or on a
voyage, or the work of domestic servants, or the work of persons
employed in ships or vessels to do similar work to that of domestic
servants: The term "employer " includes any agent or servant of an
employer who is entrusted with the duty of supervision or of engaging
or discharging servants.
""
"3. Whenever in any contract of hiring, whether verbal or in
writing, reference is made to a day's labor, or it is stipulated that the
rate of payment for labor shall be calculated at a fixed price for a
day's labor, or calculated by reference to a day's labor, such day's
labor shall be taken to be labor for eight hours, and shall also, unless
otherwise expressed, be taken to be labor between the hours of seven
in the morning and six in the evening.
66 6
4. Whenever in any contract of hiring, provision is intended to
be made for the work of any workman being continued for more than
eight hours in any one day, it shall be necessary that a special
stipulation be made with regard thereto, and that a special rate of
payment for all time beyond the first eight hours be fixed by contract.
"‘5. Except in case of a contract made as prescribed by the last
preceding section, and then only in accordance with its provisions,
it shall not be lawful for any employer to require any workman to
work without his own consent for more than eight hours in any one
day; and, except as aforesaid, no employer shall dismiss a workman
by reason of his refusal to work for a longer period than eight hours
in any one day. Any employer who offends against the provisions
of this section shall be liable to a penalty of Five Pounds.'”
G
82
LABOR AND LAW.
The Agent-General for New South Wales, Sir Saul Samuel,
wrote:
"that there is, at present, no law in the Colony regulating the hours
of labor, but the eight hours as a day's work has been established by
custom. It was first introduced in private establishments by pressure
of the working-classes, and subsequently it was adopted by the Govern-
ment in their railway and other workshops. It is gradually spreading,
and so far as I am able to say, is working satisfactorily. In a number
of instances overtime is allowed and paid for. Workmen, too, are
in many instances paid by the hour, and not by the day."
Sir Charles Dilke, in his "Problems of Greater Britain,"
vol. ii, p. 285, states that in the Australasian colonies, the eight
hours day is all but universal. It is clear, however, there are
some exceptions. On June 6th, 1890, a statement was pub-
lished in the Adelaide Express, by the delegate of the Sydney
Wharf Labourers' Union, from which it appeared that their
fixed hours are fifty-six per week, and that even after these
hours they voluntarily work overtime; and in the Reporter of
June 20th, 1890, there is a leading article complaining that men
and women are engaged in the tailoring work "from early morn
till dewy eve". Bearing on this point, it should be observed that
the Bill quoted by Sir A. Blyth, introduced into the South
Australian Assembly, proposed to enact that a longer period
than eight hours, or overtime, might be worked if mutually
agreed between employer and employed. In New South Wales,
where the eight hours a day is customary, overtime is allowed.
and paid for, and the workman is frequently engaged and
paid by the hour, and not by the day. But in no case would
Australasian eight-hour customs, even if invariable, be con-
clusive. The local circumstances differ so much from those
at home. In Australia the laboring population is very limited
in number; assisted immigration of poor workers is dis-
LEGISLATION IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
83
couraged; protective duties prevail; and there is little or no
export of manufactured goods. To this it may be added
that, the prices of all manufactured products being very high,
the nominal wage must be measured by its purchasing power.
At home, on the contrary, we have an over-abundant labour
supply; industries must protect themselves by offering superior
inducements to consumers, and our export trade is the chief
reliance for the consumption of our industrial products.
G 2
CHAPTER IV.
HOURS OF LABOR.
I AM in favor of the shortest possible hours of labor being
worked in each industry. The measure of possibility is the
profitable conduct of the industry. The shortest number of
hours possible in any industry ought to be known to, and in
any case should be most easily ascertainable by, the employers
and employed engaged in such industry. If co-operative pro-
ductive undertakings existed in every branch of industry, then
the workpeople would have in their own hands the means of
ascertaining the shortest number of hours during which it was
necessary to carry on an establishment and yet secure a profit.
Even lacking such co-operative production, the respective hours
of labor in each industry should be settled in conciliatory
conference between the representatives of the employers and
of the employed. Those specially engaged in an industry.
have knowledge as to the character of the employment, which
Parliament does not possess, and which can only be ascer-
tained by searching and exhaustive inquiry. An industry is
profitably conducted when the realised produce recoups (1) the
cost of raw material, (2) wage and other working expenses,
(3) when it provides for the deterioration of fixed capital,
and (4) furnishes a surplus sufficient to attract capital and
energy to such a business. The surplus sufficient to attract
will vary with the ascertained risk of the undertaking. Unless
( 85 )
86
LABOR AND LAW.
a higher rate of profit can be reasonably expected to be
secured by the capitalist employing his capital in a given
industry, subject to the risks of that industry, than can be
obtained for the same capital, almost without risk, by invest-
ment in Government or equivalent securities, it is certain
that the fear of possible loss will deter investors. As against
the ordinary risks of industrial enterprise, the reasonable
hope of a larger profit than can be got from Consols is
required to induce investment. The more risky the cha-
racter of the industry, the higher the rate of profit which
will be looked for. Anything which tends to render com-
mensurate profit highly improbable will make capitalists
hesitate. If legislation should ever render profit impossible
in any manufacture, those having capital already engaged
would, so far as possible, withdraw the movable capital, and
abandon fixed capital, by stopping the works. Ordinary
industrial experience amply proves that, whenever changed
conditions have demonstrated similar permanent consequences,
the possessors of capital have always so acted. That is, if
an industry cannot be conducted profitably in any locality,
it will not be conducted there at all. It is of course true
that the capitalist will, and does, face temporary loss in the
hope of larger permanent profit, and that where large
capital is engaged in a business, it may be often carried
on without profit for a considerable period, in the hope of
better times. But once let the capitalist be satisfied that
profit can never be realised, and he certainly will neither
embark in the venture nor continue therein any capital he
can withdraw. Workmen with capital are especially sensi-
tive and hesitant as to employing their savings at their
own risk in industries which they understand. This is
<
HOURS OF LABOR.
87
M
shown in the slowness with which they engage in CO-
operative production, or even participate in profit-sharing
enterprises. The great organisations of working men prefer
small, safe interest for their accumulated funds, to the enor-
mous profits which, it was suggested by Lord Randolph
Churchill, from his place in Parliament, are usually made
by the capitalist class, and which, therefore, provide a
sufficient margin for loss resulting from legislation. There
are some persons who seriously advocate that ordinary in-
dustries might, though profitless, be conducted by the State,
in order to provide employment for everyone able to work;
but on the assumption that such industries did not realise
profit, the proposal bristles with absurdities too gross for
serious discussion. A business which had ceased to be profit-
able to individuals could hardly, under any conceivable cir-
cumstances, be conducted by the Government without larger
expenditure. The loss could only be met by taxation,
thus permanently reducing the wage of the whole com-
munity.
It it quite impossible to consider any limitation of the
hours of labor, without also considering it as a question of
wages. In a very large number of industries the worker is
paid by the piece, or by the hour. In all such cases а
mere statutory reduction of the hours of labor must be a
reduction of the individual wage.
There has recently been considerable outcry against wage
labor from many of those who are most prominent in
advocating an eight hours legal limit. There are only two
ways of looking at the question: one, in which the laborer
alone, or in co-operation with others, works for himself,
and, on the sale of the product of his labor, gets the whole
88
LABOR AND LAW.
of the difference between his outlay and the price realised;
the other, in which he gets a price or purchase-money for
his labor without reference to the realised result of the
product to which his labor has been applied. A modifica-
tion of the first view is possible in what is called profit-
sharing, which would differ from co-operative production in
this that whereas in co-operative production the co-operator
finds labor and capital in equal or unequal proportions,
in profit-sharing the capital is usually found by those who
take the direction of the undertaking, and who usually pay
to the laborer at least a subsistence wage until profit is
realised.
-
I believe strongly in co-operative production, and in a
lesser degree in profit-sharing; but at present only a very few
workmen share my faith in either, so that, for good or ill,
the wage system is-just now, at any rate-a necessity.
Workmen, as a rule, cannot wait until profit is realised,
especially if the product has to be sold or exchanged a long
way off, and at an uncertain time. Even those who have
some economies do not care to take the risk of no profit
being realised, or the risk that the profit may be only
small. They prefer to sell their labor out and out; the
purchase-money is the wage. The employer-purchaser has
to risk loss as well as to strive for profit. I have always
been an advocate for the highest possible wage. High wage
is followed and accompanied by a higher standard of comfort,
and higher morality. I read that public speakers claim for
the workmen a "fair share of what is produced, but none -
of them give the necessary data for calculating that share.
I suggest that a reasonably higher wage should (1) ensure
life to the worker and those dependent on him. By "life
--
""
""
HOURS OF LABOR.
89
I mean the highest average standard of comfort then possible {
to the class to which the worker belongs. (2) There should
be beyond this a surplus to enable the worker, by reasonable
thrift, to make provision against sickness, accident, loss of
employment from slackness of trade, or other reason, and
against old age. The thrift is best as associated thrift for
sickness, accident, and slack trade, because in each of these
cases there are matters not only beyond the workers' control,
but also in the highest degree uncertain, and in which
association averages the risk and renders the benefit more
certain. I shall say a special word on these heads when
touching on Friendly Societies legislation. On accidents
happening to workmen in the course of their employment,
I shall write further in dealing with the Employers' Liability
Act. (3) The wage should be earned in such a daily period,
as to secure reasonable leisure to the worker. I have always
maintained that leisure, in excess of mere sleep, rest, and nourish-
ment periods, is necessary for the physical and mental well-
being of the worker. If it be alleged that there is any industry
in which it is impossible to pay such a wage, I answer, then
it must be an industry in which no large fortunes can be or
ought to be amassed. If the laborers cannot win life in an
industry, none ought to be able to secure luxury in that
industry. If it be contended that there are many industries
in a nation in which such a wage is not paid, then I answer
that such a nation should not permit itself the costly luxuries
of huge naval and military establishments, and should even be
sparing in Royal and Ecclesiastical splendors. To determine
whether a wage is high or low to the employer, regard must
be had to the produce results of the laborer. Sir Lowthian
Bell says, in his statement prepared for the Royal Com-
90
LABOR AND LAW.
mission on the Depression of Trade (Appendix 2nd Report,
P. 341):-
"If the amount of work cited as performed by the Durham
colliers is compared with that of the French pitmen, already given,
it will be seen that the former is much in excess of the latter. Part
of this is due to the difference between the two seams of coal in which
the men were working, but I am strongly of opinion that the superior
results of the English miner must be ascribed, in a great measure, to
his better pay and better living."
That is, the larger money amount paid to the English miner
was not actually a more costly wage. From the standpoint
of the worker, high and low wage must be estimated with due
regard to the average standard of comfort prevalent amongst
the class receiving the wage, and to the comparative cost of
the necessaries of life; that is, as compared with the cost of
like necessaries to workers in similiar industries in other
countries, or perhaps even in other counties. In his address.
to the Hull Church Congress, the Lord Bishop of Durham
said labor's reward should "be measured, not by the necessities.
of the indigent, but by its actual value as contributing to the
wealth of the community;" and he declared that "wage-labor,.
though it appears to be an inevitable step in the evolution
of society, is as little fitted to represent finally or adequately
the connection of man with man in the production of wealth,
as at earlier times slavery or serfdom". Except in co-operative
production, there are no means to which exception may not
be taken of measuring "actual value "; and as long as the
men will not generally enterprise co-operative production, a
wage system is the only one possible. The ordinary workman
requires subsistence for himself and family, and if he is to live
reasonably it is necessary that the subsistence money should
be fairly certain, and paid at short, regular periods. The profit
HOURS OF LABOR.
91.
on production varies in amount and in period of realisation;
the bulk of workmen cannot possibly wait for the realisation.
The doubt as to what, if anything, would be realised, would
be highly harassing, and thus demoralising, to the worker with
no means to bear a loss. In profit-sharing works, wage might
stand as a minimum subsistence advance, to be followed, on
ascertainment and realisation of value and product, by further
payment of agreed proportion of profit, or, in the event of loss,
by repayment of part of the wage already advanced. This
loss in the case of very poor workmen would certainly be quite
impossible, and in ordinary cases would be attended with
discomfort. The amount realised often depends on the method
of realisation; and as the laborer could hardly exercise effective
voice as to the country in which a market should be sought,
or the freight paid, or the date of realisation, it seems hardly
fair to make him sharer in a loss in which these elements
might be the chief factors. Industries vary so exceedingly
in their character, and even in similiar industries the conditions
as to accessibility of raw material, carriage of product, and
other matters are so different, that one hard and fast line for
all industries seems absolutely impossible. Any attempt to
limit to eight hours, the daily period during which an industry
might be lawfully carried on, would be fatal to very many
industrial establishments in this country. This last declaration
is of course limited to prohibition of more than one shift of
eight hours. I agree with an expression by Sir T. H. Farrer
that, "In cases when a general limit of eight hours is desirable,
there are forces at work independent of legislation, which will,
at any rate as a general rule, bring it about. In cases where
such a limit is not desirable it would be mischievous and
tyrannical to enforce it by law."
92
LABOR AND LAW.
*
I have already noted that it is impossible to separate the
question of the hours of labor from the wage question. Mr.
John Burns is reported in the East London Observer, Nov. 11th,
as having said: "To working men, however, the greatest and
most important personal question of the day was the adop-
tion by Parliament of a maximum working day of eight hours,
and the fixing by law also of a minimum rate of wage, which
would admit of a decent livelihood for the worker. He advo-
cated the eight hours day by legal enactment as the easiest
and simplest method by which they could attain their end.
Trade union effort, to be successful in obtaining an eight
hours day, meant a general strike-meant, in fact, civil war.”"
In the discussion at the Miners' International Conference held
in May, 1890, at Jolimont, Belgium, Mr. Johnson, a delegate
from Durham, asked the supporters of the proposal to fix
by law the hours of labor "whether they were also in favor
of the State interfering in the matter of wages. It seemed
to him just as legitimate for the State to interfere with the
one as with the other. The necessary shifting condition of
wages was a natural corollary to any interference with the
hours of labor." M. Cotte, delegate from the Loire, answered
that "of course wages must be regulated by the State".
Mr. Sidney Webb ("Fabian Essays", p. 54) proposes such
an "extension of the Factory Acts" as will "raise universally
the standard of comfort, by obtaining the general recognition
of a minimum wage and a maximum working day".¹ One
effect of enforcing a minimum wage by law would be that the
1
¹ [The passage cited is part of a programme quoted by Mr. Webb from
the Star newspaper of 8th August, 1888, and endorsed by him. Mr. Webb
describes his extract as representing "the current Radical programme",
which is certainly inaccurate.-ED.]
HOURS OF LABOR.
93
employer would, whilst he had a choice of workers, pass by
all whom he deemed incapable of earning that minimum.
The young worker not yet thoroughly efficient, and the old
worker who had lost some of his efficiency, would have to
stand aside. Each might be willing to receive a sum equi-
valent to his ability, though a lesser wage than the minimum;
but the employer would be legally unable to make this com-
promise. To enable any one to form a reasonable judgment
as to the fairest possible hours of labor per day in any
industry, knowledge is required (1) of vital statistics, to throw
light on character of work as affecting life and health;
(2) cost of raw material; (3) cost of production, and how
varying with quantity produced, and situation of works as
affecting cost of transport; (4) proportion of wage to cost of
production. It must here be remembered that nominal high
wage does not always mean an actual high cost, nor does
nominal low wage necessarily mean low cost of production.
The quantity and quality of production have in each case to be
considered. (5) The price of the result produced. Where the
produce is largely exported, then also the differing prices in
foreign markets. Where the continuation of the industry on
its present scale is wholly or mainly dependent on foreign
demand, it is also necessary to know the possible facilities
of production in each purchasing country, and in other countries
which might compete.
It would be needful to distinguish between industries in
which larger production per hour would be possible, through
extra human effort, if the hours worked were fewer, and where
such extra production would need extra and improved
machinery, or where no extra production would be probable
without, or even with, increased plant. Estimates should be
*94
LABOR AND LAW.
at least attempted of the lessened production consequent on
shorter hours, if one shift, or of the increased cost for the
same production if more persons were employed, or of the
reduced wage for the lesser hours worked. Careful statistics.
would be required of the varying proportion of wage to cost
of production in each industry. Partial information on some
few of these points is obtainable: (1) in coal mining, from
the reports of the evidence taken in, arbitrations on wage
disputes; (2) in coal and metalliferous mines, from the
evidence taken by the Royal Commission now sitting to
inquire into Royalties; (3) from the railway returns; (4) generally
in the evidence and appendices reported by the Royal Com-
mission on the Depression of Trade, and from the reports of
mine and factory inspectors. To get effective general in-
formation a statutory commission would be necessary; the
powers of a Royal Commission are insufficient; the dura-
tion of a select committee is limited to the Session in which
it is appointed.
The difficulty of judging accurately on such industrial ques-
tions is shown by an examination of the evidence in the first
report of the Royal Commission on Mining Royalties, and
my debate with Mr. Hyndman on "The Eight Hours
Question" (p. 27). Mr. Hyndman stated the cost of production
of coal at the pit's mouth, at the present time, through the
mining districts, at Is. to 2s. per ton, and said that it was
sold at 8s. or gs. By the evidence submitted to the Royal
Commission, it appears that prices vary very much in different
counties and for different qualities of coal. Mr. R. O. Lamb,
chairman of the Northumberland coal-owners (300), estimated
that about 52 per cent of the price went to the labor cost of
coal; and stated (354 and 355) that during a period of depres-
•
HOURS OF LABOR.
95
sion, in one colliery for eight years and in another for fourteen
years, the collieries were worked without any profit being
made by the capitalist. The average net selling price taken
on all coal for the two counties of Northumberland and
Durham, in February, 1888, was 4s. 3°40d., and in November,
1889, 5s. 9.68d. (379); the highest price of round coal alone was
135. Mr. Lamb mentioned (400) that there is now no steam
coal sent from the Tyne to Holland "in consequence of the
cheaper German coal". In July, 1890, the price of a ton of
coal at the pit's mouth in Northumberland was, I believe,
roughly 7s. 10d. per ton; of this wages, not including officers'
salaries, were about 4s. 6d. Mr. W. H. Hedley, chief viewer
at the Consett Collieries, stated (833) that the proportion of
the price of a ton of coal at the pit's mouth received by the
miner as wage "varies considerably; but from about 50 to
60 per cent. will cover the ground". Mr. Marshall Nicholson,
representing the West Yorkshire Coalowners' Association, was
asked (1292), "What percentage of the price would you say
goes in wages to the labor employed about the mines?' He
answered, "That is very difficult to say, because the amount
of wage depends so much upon so many considerations in
every mine; you might give a figure for one mine that would
not apply to another. In some cases it would be 60 per
cent, in some less, in some more." It seems clear that
this percentage must not be held to apply to such years as
1873 to 1876. Mr. J. D. Ellis, chairman of the South York-
shire Coalowners' Association, averaged the actual cost of labor
in that district at from 2s. 6d. to 3s. per ton (1460). Captain
W. B. Harrison, chairman of the Cannock Chase Coalowners'
Association, fixed the proportion of wages at from 50 to 60
per cent of the price.
96
LABOR AND LAW.
Some very specific evidence was given by Mr. Alfred
Hewlett, managing director of the Wigan Coal and Iron
Company (2729-2743). In seven pits for Arley Mine Coal,
in the six months ending 30th June, 1880, the average price
was 4s. 11'3d. per ton; the wage cost was 2s. 112d. per ton.
For the half year ending 31st December, 1889, the average
price of the same coal was 6s. 5.1d. per ton; the wage cost
was 3s. 5.8d. per ton. On the first figures there was a loss.
to the Colliery, on the second a profit. At the same dates,
in 1880, Yard Mine Coal average price was 4s. 10.3d., wage
cost 25. 10.8d.; in 1889, price 6s. 7.5d., wage cost 3s. 8.8d.
From the evidence of J. D. Kendell (2580), on wages in the
Hematite Iron Trade, Cumberland, in
in " "an average case
which would really represent the majority of the mines in
the district, at 9s. (price) you have got 40 per cent in wages";
"at 10s. 6d., 35 per cent in wages; "at 12s., 33 per cent
in wages;" "at 18s., 24 per cent in wages" (2641). "The
men who get the ore are paid by the ton--so much per ton.
For doing the other work, driving stone drifts, and so forth,
they are paid by the fathom."
Mr. W. Kellett, manager of the Barrow Hematite Iron
and Steel Company (3280), stated that in their mines "the
total labor cost varies from 52 to 64 per cent of the cost of
production", and that this was based (3288) on data extend-
ing over a considerable period, and the variations between
one mine and another.
These estimates and actual figures of price and wage were
not challenged by any cross-examination, though mine-workers
as well as mine-owners are represented on the Commission.
Mr. J. Price, the general manager of the Palmer Ship-
building Company at Jarrow, before the Royal Commission
""
HOURS OF LABOR.
97
on the depression of trade, giving a variety of exact figures
of wages paid in this country and in Germany, mentions
(10,988) that in 1862 the proportion of the cost of labor to
the cost of production on engines was 23 per cent; in
1886 it was 30 per cent. The twentieth report (1889)
of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor, was
specially devoted to the relation of wages to the cost of pro-
duction. The report says (p. 3):-
>
"Two lines of inquiry present themselves. First, the determina-
tion of the share of product which falls to labor in distinction from
the share retained by capital; and, second, the relation which labor
cost bears to the total cost of the product, as shown by the proportion
which wages bear to the other elements of cost. The first inquiry
would involve the question of profits, and would take, as its basis,
the selling price of the product, separating this price into the various
factors which compose it; such, for instance, as wages (labor's share),
and profits and interest (capital's share). The second phase of the
subject deals only with the actual cost to the manufacturer, eliminates
profits, and determines what part of that cost is due to labor, repre-
sented by wages, and what to raw material and other necessary
expenses. These two phases of the subject involve different and
entirely distinct problems. In fact, one line of investigation concerns
the distribution of wealth, while the other deals entirely with its
production. It is with the second and simpler investigation, which
properly precedes the other, that the present Part deals. The
question it asks and answers, in 1,615 specified instances, is, What
relation does the cost of labor bear to the cost of the product
as it lies completed in the manufacturer's hand? From the
manufacturer's standpoint the inquiry relates to outlay, not to
income; that is, it does not deal with profits. From the work.
man's standpoint it determines the share he has contributed to
the product, and for which he has been remunerated in the form
of wages."
As shown by the report, the percentage of wages to the
cost of production, in Massachusetts, varies enormously in
different industries; for example, in the following (p. 79) the
percentage of wages is high, viz.-clocks and watches, 77'06
H
98
LABOR AND LAW.
per cent; concrete walks, paving, etc., 71.22 per cent; earthen
plaster and stoneware, 66'09 per cent; glass, 61.76 per
cent; models and patterns, 61.51 per cent; brick, tiles, and
sewer pipe, 56.71 per cent; stone, 56.47 per cent; fancy
articles, 56.65 per cent; crayons, pencils, crucibles, etc., 54.71
per cent; salt, 52.23 per cent; toys and games, 5174 per
cent; and cooking, lighting, and heating apparatus, 51°24
per cent.
These are either industries in which a high degree
of technical skill is required, or in which the raw material is
a crude substance of relatively low cost. Industries with low
percentages of labor cost are-Chemical preparations, com-
pounded, 9.27 per cent; cordage and twine, 13.97 per cent;
fertilisers, 8.57 per cent; food preparations, 12:44 per cent;
glue, isinglass, and starch, 14'97 per cent; hair work (animal
and human), 12.19 per cent; leather, 14:38 per cent; liquors,
malt, distilled and fermented, 13:46 per cent; oils and illumina-
ting fluids, 5'92 per cent; polishes and dressing, II'Io per
cent; tallow candles, soap and grease, 9 per cent. These
are industries in which the raw material is itself a manufactured
article involving labor in its production. I need hardly add
that the ascertained percentage of wage to cost in similar
industries would vary exceedingly in other States of the Union,
and all the percentages might differ from those in this
country.
It is alleged that if an eight hours day could be enforced
in all industries, employment would be at once provided for
thousands who are out of work. If this be true, unless double
or treble shifts are permitted, increased hands would, in most
cases, also mean increased plant and enlarged buildings;
and unless these were accompanied with increased products,
it would mean largely-increased cost of production. But the
HOURS OF LABOR.
99
mass of the unemployed are unskilled laborers; and if it be
true that the enforcement of an eight hours law would call for
more skilled men, it is certain that these could not be readily
got from the ranks of the unskilled, but would be possibly
attracted from other countries where wage was less. Nor
would the prohibition of the importation of foreign workmen
meet the difficulty. To convert a man of mature age from an
unskilled into a skilled workman is in some trades an extremely
difficult and slow process. Foreign consumers would hardly
be likely to wait for the things they needed; it is not
even certain that home consumers would
home consumers would not prefer, in
lieu of waiting, to import from abroad the articles they
required.
I agree with Professor J. E. C. Monro, of Owens College,
Manchester, in his paper on "The Probable Effects of a
General Reduction in the Hours of Labor", "that the
reduction in hours will not necessarily lessen the number of
the unemployed, inasmuch as it will not increase the purchasing
power of the consumer, and will not affect the chief causes of
poverty incident to our present organisation of industry; that
the position of the chronic unemployed or residuum will not
be materially improved; that in so far as additional laborers
are employed to maintain the net produce, it will be at the
expense of other workers, if the net produce remains the same
but the number of producers increases. It is necessary to
point out, that arguments which may be urged against a
general though unequal reduction of hours, do not apply with
the same force to a reduction of hours in a particular trade
that may be the subject of special economic surroundings.
Before venturing to express an opinion on the desirability of
reducing hours in a given industry, e.g., in mining, the econo-
H 2
100
LABOR AND LAW.
mist will require to investigate these surroundings in order to
estimate what loss, if any, will occur, and on whom such loss.
will fall. But even if there be a loss in a particular industry,
or a national loss, it may be more than made good to the nation.
by the beneficial effects on the working classes of greater
leisure."
In some season trades there are regular periods of overtime
and of slackness, the workers on the whole year averaging a
fair subsistence; but if more than eight hours be forbidden to
any workman in any one day, extra men and their families
will be drawn to the town in the busy season, to add to the
numbers of those who for some weeks in the year are unable
to earn their livelihood.
How is such an industry as the Cycle Industry at Coventry
to be considered, in a bill limiting the hours to eight per day?
Workmen are engaged and paid by the piece and by the hour.
The hours per week vary exceedingly in different months of
the year. In March, April, and May slight overtime is worked;
in June, July, and August long overtime prevails; in November
and December, great slackness; and in January and February,
moderate employment. An eight hours limit would mean that
for three months of the year extra hands must be brought
into the town or the work would go elsewhere. If the extra
hands could be obtained for the three or four months of
high pressure, they would add to the pressure of unemployed
in all the Coventry industries, during the remainder of
the year.
As the workers are paid by the piece or hour,
eight hours legal limit would
would mean a reduction in the
normal time of about six hours' pay per week; in the very
busiest time it would mean a reduction of four to six hours'
pay per day.
+
HOURS OF LABOR.
ΙΟΙ
How would eight hours legal limit per day affect the Metro-
politan Cabdrivers, roughly about 16,000 in number, and with
whose work a considerable number of persons are associated?
I am informed that there are about 2,000 men who drive their
own cabs in London, and that about 10,000 cabs are let out by
cab-owners to drivers. Are the small men to be prevented from
driving their own cabs more than eight hours per day? If
not, why not? Or, as they have no employers except their
fares, will a person who hires a cab which has been already
at work seven and a half hours be liable to prosecution if he
knowingly keep it out another hour? How is a cabman's
eight hours to be reckoned? He may have waited two or three
hours on the rank without a fare. If such a waiting period
is not to be reckoned, how is the cabmaster to know, if
the cab be kept out beyond eight hours, whether or not
he is liable to penalty? I have examined some accounts of
drivers and small cabmasters, and the margin is very small
for the cabmaster, the average earning very poor indeed for
cabby.
It is gravely contended ("Physiology of Industry," by A. F.
Mummery and J. F. Hobson) that "any legal restriction of
the hours of labor, provided it be accompanied by absolute
prohibition of imported labor ", would be in the interest of the
workman, because "the effect of a law fixing the maximum
hours of labor at eight per diem, instead of, say, ten, would
be the same, as far as wages are concerned, as a law which
expelled from the community four-fifths of the available
laborers. Since each laborer will now only produce four-fifths
of what he produced before (setting aside the vexed question
of the effect of shorter hours on the quality of labor), five
laborers are now required where four were previously, and
102
LABOR AND LAW.
looking at the lowest kind of work, we must conclude that
each of the five laborers has to be paid the same amount of
wages as each of the four was paid before." But in this
case it is clear that the cost of production must be increased;
first, by the increased twenty per cent of increased wages
in that cost; and next by the increased proportion of cost
of plant where it was impossible to fit in a one-fifth addition
of human labor to the previous machinery so as to maintain
equal production, or impossible without extra expenditure to
provide room for the twenty per cent of additional workers.
Messrs. Mummery and Hobson, having evidently some glim-
mering of this, go on to say: "It is however necessary to bear
in mind that an eight hours bill must be universal. If other-
wise (unless the nation enacting it isolated itself from all other
nations by tariffs) the competition of other nations would
undersell the eight hours nation, ruin its capitalists, and so
reduce the quantity of labor demanded as to force either a
general emigration of the laborers, the repeal of the law, or
its systematic and general evasion." It may be added that
a nation chiefly depending on an export trade could not isolate
itself from all other nations by tariffs, nor is it certain that
any universal regulation of the mere hours of labor, or of labor
and wage, can ever come within the range of practical politics.
Messrs. Mummery and Hobson proceed :-
"Assuming, however, that the eight hours labor law is universal
and that there is under-consumption, the increased sum paid to
laborers as demand for the use of labor will be deducted from the
total of retail profits. Or, to put it otherwise, the increased number
of laborers required for certain of the stages of production will be
withdrawn from the number unnecessarily engaged (directly or
indirectly) in retailing. Whilst, therefore, the total of production will
not be affected, the aggregate of labor actually exerted will be reduced
in the proportion of ten to eight. In any period of full demand it is
HOURS OF LABOR.
103
evident that the aggregate produced would be reduced; in all such
periods, therefore, it would be desirable to relax any limits that might
be imposed restricting the hours of labor, unless it appeared that
the advantages of increased leisure more than counterbalanced the
loss of wages which in such periods would result."
Applied to this country, this means that there is a sufficient
net retail profit out of which the increased cost of production
can be deducted; or that the distributors of produce are to
cease to act as distributors. Undoubtedly, something is being
done by co-operation to diminish the cost of distribution, but
if the retail traders are to understand that an eight hours bill
is a proposal for their legal extinction, they will hardly be
enamoured of eight hours a day by law. Messrs. Mummery and
Hobson's suggestions that the law should contain provisoes
for relaxing the restrictions, without suggesting by whom the
relaxation is to be authorised, or by whom "increased leisure'
is to be balanced against diminished food, are really undeserving
serious answer. The difficulties in the way of international
legislation regulating the hours of labor even for Europe are
enormous. The obstacles to universal legislation on such a
subject seem insurmountable. The diversities of racial charac-
teristics and life conditions; the pressure of population on
subsistence; the varying standards of comfort and costs of
necessaries of life; the accessibility, quantity, and quality, of
certain fuels, metals, and minerals;
minerals; water as means of
carriage or power; distance from markets by road, rail, or
ocean; cost of freights and other charges; the question
whether military service is compulsory, and to what extent
enforced—these and other considerations have to be weighed;
and national prejudices and hostilities have to be over-
come.
It is argued that shortened hours of labor are not incon-
104
LABOR AND LAW.
sistent with increased production, for that in many industries
the less fatigued worker is capable of a higher effort during the
shorter number of hours. My answer to that is, well and
good; where the shortened labor period is certainly beneficial
to the men, and not unfairly injurious to the employer, it ought
to be obtainable, without serious difficulty, by mutual agree-
ment. But, it is retorted, some bad employers and many needy
workmen not belonging to unions will not take part in the
mutual agreement, and the law is needed to coerce these. I
rejoin that employers and men alike look to profit and comfort;
and if it be shown that they can make as much profit and wage
in the lesser hours, they will need no coercing. If the coercing
is to mean less total earnings to the laborer coerced, it is in-
defensible. Where, as in many industries, the labor is associated
with machinery, you will need improved machinery to increase
production. It is claimed that the shortening the hours of
labor would not decrease individual wage; if it did not so
reduce wage, then it must admittedly increase the ccst of
production, unless corresponding increase of products resulted.
No evidence is presented of any such probable, or even pos-
sible, increase of production in all industries, or even in the
main industries, on which the great export trade of this country
is dependent.
It is clear that some, at least, of the advocates of a com-
pulsory eight hours day do not think that the same production
can be effected in the lesser number of hours, for one prominent
advocate argues that "It would diminish competition for
employment, because in order to keep up the present production
the greater part, if not the whole, of the unemployed would be
pressed into work". If the wage of the present workers is not
reduced with the hours of working, then it is clear, on this
HOURS OF LABOR.
105
argument, that the cost of production will be materially in-
creased in all industries to which it applies.
The Boston Herald (Mass., U.S.A.) states the question
thus:
M
"C
Assuming that a community of 100,000 workers can produce in a
day, by the labor of ten hours, wealth to the amount of 380,000 dollars,
then if their labor is cut down to eight hours a day, they must either
work harder or more skilfully in the shorter period, or there will be
one-fifth less of wealth to divide among those interested in its pro-
duction. There is no way of getting over this. At the present time
the wages earned are paid, and the capitalist receives his returns from
the gross sum of production. If this sum is cut down in any way, a
loss is inevitable either on the side of the capitalist or wage-earner, or
on both sides. While five dollars divided among five men will give
each one dollar apiece, there is no process of arithmetic by which
four dollars divided among five men will produce the same
result."
Assuming that to do the same work in eight hours that
was formerly done in ten hours it would be necessary to employ
250 as against 200 previously employed, and that thus there
will be fewer unemployed; also that the extra cost of plant
and larger buildings is borne by the employer out of profits,
and that the ten men are paid the exact sum that
the eight men formerly received as wage; then an eight
hours law will mean that the workman now earning £1
will in future earn only 16s., as well as the enforced
reduction of the employers' profit to the extent of the extra
cost.
It is urged that the claim for a compulsory eight hours day
is general; but how is that shown? Most certainly it is not
made out by the vote of the Liverpool Trades Congress,
where the proposal was at first carried only by a majority of
eight, and on a division on the main question by thirty-eight.
**
LABOR AND LAW.
1
106
If these numbers were real, the dissentient minority was
very large. But in truth a considerable number of the very
men who at Liverpool, as dock laborers' delegates, voted for
eight hours by law, returning to London, voted that eight
hours should not apply to them (vide p. 16). It is said that
English workmen in open public meeting insist on an eight
hours law; but I should like to know the questions submitted
to such meetings. If men are asked, Will you like to work
less time for the same wage you now receive? they are nearly
sure to say yes. If men are asked, Would you like men who
are now unemployed to be employed? they are nearly sure
to say yes. If they are asked, Will you work fewer hours for
less wage? their reply will probably be that they do not even
now earn as much as they wish. It is true that there is
great protest against overtime, but it is generally as justifying
a demand for higher wage for the extra hours worked. The
speakers in favor of eight hours legal limit do not explain to
working men that if they have been thrown out of employ-
ment for a week or two by illness, bad trade, or other cause,
there must be no making up by any overtime if the oppor-
tunity arises. The sick man may have drawn sick pay whilst
ill, but such sick pay is usually less than his ordinary wage,
and the house expenses during illness are mostly heavier.
Debt has arisen, and the law is to forbid him to earn extra
that he may pay his debt. This is so monstrous that it hardly
needs stating.
Mr. Hyndman contended in the debate with myself (p. 8)
that a general eight hours law should be enforced in all indus-
tries, because "if you take the condition of the workmen and
workwomen, their physical strength is being deteriorated by the
present system. The height and chest measurement of recruits.
HOURS OF LABOR.
107
has fallen markedly since Her Majesty ascended the throne.
Anyone who is acquainted with the manufacturing districts, as I
have been since I was a boy, must see not only in the reports of
certifying surgeons and sanitary inspectors, but from his own
experience and under his own eye he can see perfectly what
deterioration is going on." This is almost too absurd for
refutation, but is a kind of argument used by men who ought
to know better. If the working classes have deteriorated
physically during the present reign, which I do not believe, and
if the deterioration is really the result of the hours of labor, it
must be because those hours of labor have been shortened,
which is grotesque. The replies from workmen, and from
employers alike, to the schedules sent out by the Royal Com-
mission on Depression of Trade, are conclusive that, in nearly
every industry, the hours of labor per day are less than they
were even twenty-five or thirty years since, far less than they
were at the commencement of the present reign. In 1837 the
artizan's normal working day was at least ten hours for the
whole six days. Forty years ago it was reduced in the building
trades to nine hours, and soon after a Saturday half-holiday was
won. The lowering of the standard for recruits arises rather
because it is no longer so easy to collect men from the agricul-
tural districts as it used to be. There is an indisposition to
enter the military service.
Mr. John Burns, writing in the Speaker, May 24th, 1890,
says:
CC
Singular though it may appear to some, our danger is not in the
foreigner working his people long hours, and paying them low wages-
which the fear of revolution is rendering impossible—but in his going
further than England in the direction of shorter hours and better
wages, and, in doing so, using the same weapons against us that we
108
LABOR AND LAW.
have used successfully against him. This is strikingly shown by the
fact that America, with its better conditions, is becoming the successful
competitor against all others in the manufacture of machinery, tools,
and in other industries. The nation to fear is the one with the best
machinery, high speeds, which utilises waste products, whose workers
are technically and artistically educated-results impossible to pro-
duce where long hours and low wages prevail. The bogey of foreign
competition has been dispelled by international communication, and
the result is international combination for a maximum working day,
and ultimately for a minimum wage. This will be secured concurrently
by all, and though foreign competition will not thereby be abolished
(I am sorry to say), it will be put universally on a higher level. One
nation may slightly lead; I want that honor to be England's. Hence-
forth the highly paid operative with leisure, and a higher standard of
comfort, and consequently greater powers of consumption, will be,
both as a producer and a consumer, the most profitable to the com-
munity. Is it not clear that anything tending to raise the tram slave
or the tailor to the level of the miner or engineer must really benefit
every trader and manufacturer in the kingdom? Even supposing that
in some trades foreign competition may affect us prejudicially—and
then only if the movement is not international, which is not possible—
an increased home trade in our domestic industries, caused through
reduced hours absorbing the workless, would more than equal the
foreign trade that might in a few cases be lost."
I cannot find the slightest evidence in any important
industry that the foreigner works his people shorter hours
than are worked in this kingdom, or pays better wages than
paid here.
Mr. Burns does not condescend to details, so I
can only traverse his general allegation. The reference to
America is inaccurate, if it means more than that with human
labor dear, the dwellers in the United States have excelled
in some kinds of labor-saving machinery. I see no sufficient
evidence of an international combination either for a
"maximum working day" or for a "minimum wage". Inter-
national associations of working men have from time to time
HOURS OF LABOR.
109
been projected, but it is not easy to maintain them. The
grievances of each nation differ, their standards of comfort
vary, their aspirations often invoke national hostility. An
international combination, to mean anything, must be one to
which employers and merchants would have to be party as
well as the employed. In France the proletariat who take
part in such movements loudly declare war without com-
promise à la classe bourgeoise. Mr. Burns himself, unless mis-
reported, occasionally uses language against the capitalist
classes entirely inconsistent with any possible combination,
either local or international. I find that there is in this country
a generally higher standard of comfort than formerly existed;
and I desire to raise it. I hope in some little things to
have already done this, and trust with others aiding to do
more; but I do not believe that this can be effected by Parlia-
ment going back to the methods long since abandoned, when
it fixed the hours of labor and the rate of wage.
It is a little curious that Mr. Burns, in another article, in the
Daily Graphic of May 3rd, 1890, after urging that
(
the balance of advantage always has and will rest with those
countries that pay higher wages and work shorter hours, and which,
as a consequence of both, employ more and better machinery, and get
more efficient, because more intelligent, labor,”
goes on to declare that:
"in one industry only is there any fear of foreign competition, and
that only if England alone (which is not probable, as the movement
is international) adopts the eight hours day. And in that industry the
competition is not from Massachusetts, where the men demand eight
hours, but from our Crown colony-India-where the mills are owned
by English capitalists, who are only able to undersell Lancashire,
where they also have mills, because they work the Indian men,
women, and children, twelve, fourteen, sixteen, and eighteen hours
per day seven days per week.”
IIO
LABOR AND LAW.
The two declarations seem in flat contradiction, and I only
reproduce them because I note that they have since figured
in election speeches as though they were harmonious pro-
positions.
So far as I am aware, only one daring attempt has been
made by any advocate of a compulsory limitation of the hours
of labor to state the estimated consequent increased cost, and to
show how it was to be provided.
"The margin of profit on coal, iron, engineering, chemicals, rail-
ways, trams, gas, and water-works, employing about two million men,
is sufficiently high for a 15 per cent reduction in working hours, and
the corresponding absorption from the ranks of the workless to the
workers."
I have no means of knowing whether or not this 15 per cent
is a pure blind guess at an estimated increased cost, or whether
it is predicated of one, or of how many industries, or whether it
is meant as an average of all. Surely some tabulated statement
is needed. If Mr. Burns means anything he means that the
average profit in the whole of the industries he names is not less
than 171 per cent, for if 15 per cent be taken off, the remaining
profit should not be less than may be got on the lowest paying
Government stock.
But take railways, alone accounting for £876,595,000
of invested capital: here the average interest is 4.32 per
cent.
The General Report of the Board of Trade, 1890, states
that
"the average rate computed as having been paid upon the total
capital last year was 4.32 per cent, and that this rate has not been
exceeded since 1883, when the average was 4'41 per cent, whilst in
1886 it was as low as 4'08 per cent ".
The same report says:
HOURS
III
OF
LABOR.
}
Nil
Not above 1 per cent
Above 1 and not over 2 per cent
2
3
3
4
4
5
5
6
6
""
""
""
RATE OF INTEREST OR DIVIDEND.
""
""
""
""
""
""
"The following Table is a statement of the rates of interest or dividend paid on the different descriptions of Capital
in 1889, and the amount at each rate :—
""
7
8
9
IO
12
...
""
""
""
""
35
""
""
""
""
""
Total
??
""
""
""
1:3
99
""
""
99
""
..
...
་
8
9
IO
12
13
...
..
""
""
""
""
""
""
""
""
""
""
..
•.•
...
...
:
···
··
ORDINARY.
Amount of Capital.
Per cent
of
Total.
179,534
326,229,558
13.6
0.8
O'I
GUARANTEed.
O'I
Amount of Capital.
£
60,920
16,500
101,180
2,000
50,000
Per
Per cent
of
Total.
'100'0 98,036,515
O'I
£
44,487,435
2,640,187
417.365
0.9
O'I
131 901
1,377,403
o'6
7,461,880
2,885,299
37,397,172 11'4
25,001,997 7.7 55,094,383 56°2 158,819,481 69.2 161,118,427
55,576,419 17.0
38,591,952 39'4
66,142,891 20.3 4,119,580 4'2
52,576,786
22.9
52,107,138
3,294,104
1,671,070
20,645,462
6.3
67,413,652
20.7
3,509,510
I'I
350,000
O'O
O'I
I
PREFERENTIAL.
00
00
Amount of Capital.
£
12,577,808
370,000
215,990
Per cent
of
Total.
13,540
5.5
0'2
1'4
0'0
LOANS AND DEBENTURE
STOCK.
Amount of Capital.
ΟΙ
£
II,200
165,000
100'0 229,410,112 1000 222,918,981
Per cent
of
Total.
0*2*
ΟΙ
3.3
72.3
23.4
0'7
00
100'0

II2
LABOR AND LAW.
I do not know if the omission of the textile industries is inten-
tional; the evidence most clearly does not show any such average
as 17 per cent. Is it not monstrous to suppose that English or
Scotch capitalists would lend their money to India or our
Colonies for, say, 4 per cent, if they could be reasonably sure of
realising more than four times that average profit in home
industries? And yet recklessness such as this passes for
argument.
In addition to vague propositions, varying from the one shift
of eight hours in mines, advocated by Mr. W. Abraham, M.P.
for the Rhondda, to more than one shift in the textile industries,
advocated by the late Stephen Mason, two Bills have been
circulated through the country, one promoted by the Social
Democratic Federation, the other by the Fabian Society.
When I debated with Mr. Hyndman he proposed:
"That the enactment by law of eight hours a day, or forty-eight
hours a week, as the maximum amount of work for adults in all fac-
tories, mines, workshops, and businesses conducted for profit, will prove
a valuable palliative of our present industrial anarchy.”
I applied for the text of the law intended in the proposition,
and, after some difficulty, it was furnished as follows:
A BILL entitled an Act to limit the hours of labor to eight hours a
day:
1. This Act may be cited as the Eight Hours of Labor Act, 1890.
2. This Act shall come into operation on the first day of January,
1891.
3. In all contracts for the hire of labor or the employment of
personal service in any capacity whatever, a day shall be deemed
to mean a period not exceeding eight working hours, and a week
shall be deemed to mean a maximum period of forty-eight working
hours.
4. No person employed under the Crown in the United Kingdom,
in any department of the public service, or in any Arsenal, Small
Arms Factory, Dockyard, Clothing Establishment, or other industrial
HOURS OF LABOR.
113
business, or by any County Council, Municipal Corporation, Vestry,
Local Sanitary Authority, School Board, Guardians of the Poor, Dock
or Harbor Trustees, District Council, Improvement Commissioners,
Commissioners of Police, Commissioners of Sewers, of Public Libra-
ries, or Baths and Wash-houses, or by any other Public Administrative
Authority, shall, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, be
employed for a longer period than eight working hours in any one day,
or for more than forty-eight working hours in any one week.
Any public officer or public functionary ordering or requiring any
person in public employment to remain at work for a period in excess
of eight working hours in any one day, or forty-eight hours in any one
week, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, shall be liable
to a fine of not less than fifty pounds for each such contravention of
the provisions of this section, on conviction thereof: and one half of
all fines so imposed shall be paid over, without any deduction what-
soever, to the person or persons directly or indirectly affected by such
contravention, whose action and evidence shall be the means of bring-
ing home such offence to the perpetrator.
5. No person shall be employed by any railway company for a
longer period than eight working hours in any one day, or forty-eight
working hours in any one week, except in case of special unforeseen
emergency.
The general manager of any railway company employing, or per-
mitting to be employed, any person in contravention of this section,
shall be liable on conviction thereof to a fine of not less than fifty
pounds for each such contravention, and one half of all fines so im-
posed shall be paid over without any deduction whatsoever to the
person or persons directly or indirectly affected, whose action and
evidence shall be the means of bringing home such offence to the
perpetrator.
6. No person shall be employed on any line of tramways, omni-
buses, cars, wagons or vehicles used for the transportation of goods.
or persons, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, for a
longer period than eight working hours in any one day or forty-
eight working hours in any one week.
The general manager or manager of any company or firm, or
any firm, or any individual employer, employing or permitting to
be employed any person in contravention of this section shall be
liable on conviction thereof to a fine of not less than fifty pounds
for each such contravention, and one half of all fines so imposed
shall be paid over without any deduction whatsoever to the
person or persons directly or indirectly affected whose action and
114
LABOR AND LAW.
evidence shall be the means of bringing home such offence to the
perpetrator.
7. No person shall be employed underground for hire in any
mine for a longer period than eight working hours in any one day
or more than forty-eight working hours in any one week except
in case of special unforeseen emergency.
The period of employment under ground in a mine shall for
the purpose of this section be deemed to be the whole period from
the time of leaving the surface of the ground to descend the mine to
the time of returning to the surface of the ground after cessation of
work.
The manager of any mine employing or permitting to be employed
any person in contravention of this section shall be liable on con-
viction thereof to a fine of not less than one hundred pounds for
each such contravention, and one-half of all fines so imposed shall be
paid over without any deduction whatsoever to the person or persons
directly or indirectly affected whose action and evidence shall be the
means of bringing home the offence to the perpetrator.
8. No person shall be employed in any factories, workshops,
laundries or other industrial businesses conducted for profit for a
longer period than eight working hours in any one day or forty-eight
working hours in any one week except in case of special unforeseen
emergency.
Any employer or manager employing or permitting to be employed
any person in contravention of this section shall on conviction be
liable to a fine of not less than fifty pounds for each such contra-
vention, and one-half of all fines so imposed shall be paid over
without any deduction whatsoever to the person or persons directly
or indirectly affected whose action and evidence shall be the means of
bringing home such offence to the perpetrator.
9. No person shall be employed to serve behind the counter or
elsewhere in shops, co-operative stores, or magazines or warehouses,
for the sale of goods by retail or otherwise, or shall be employed to
serve behind bars to sell intoxicating or other drinks or to purvey food
or other refreshments for a longer period than eight working hours
in any one day or forty-eight working hours in any one week, except
in case of special unforeseen emergency.
Any employer or manager employing or permitting to be employed
any person in contravention of this section shall on conviction thereof
be liable to a fine of not less than fifty pounds for each such contra-
vention, and one-half of all fines so imposed shall be paid over
without any deduction whatsoever to the person or persons directly
HOURS OF LABOR.
115
or indirectly affected, whose action and evidence shall be the means
of bringing home such offence to the perpetrator.
10. No domestic servant shall be employed in any club or in any
hotel, lodging house, house or flat let in apartments, or other place in
which accommodation or food is provided for payment, for more than
eight working hours in any one day or more than forty-eight working
hours in any one week, except in case of special unforeseen emergency.
Any employer, steward, or manager employing and permitting to
be employed any person in contravention of this section shall on
conviction be liable to a fine of not less than fifty pounds for each
such contravention, and one-half of all fines so imposed shall be paid
without any deduction whatsoever to the person or persons directly or
indirectly affected, whose action and evidence shall be the means of
bringing home such offence to the perpetrator.
11. No person shall be employed in agricultural labor for hire for a
longer period than eight working hours in any one day or more than
forty-eight working hours in any one week, except in case of special
unforeseen emergency.
Any farmer, fruit or flower grower, market gardener, or other
agriculturist employing or causing to be employed any person in con-
travention of this section shall be liable on conviction to a fine of
not less than fifty pounds for each such contravention, and one-half of
all fines so imposed shall be paid over without any deduction what-
soever to the person or persons directly or indirectly affected, whose
action and evidence shall be the means of bringing home such offence
to the perpetrator.
12. In the cases of special unforeseen emergency referred to in the
above sections arising, each person who shall by reason of such
emergency work beyond the period of eight working hours a day or
forty-eight working hours a week therein enacted shall be entitled to
receive and shall receive from the individual, firm, or company
employing him double the rate of wages per hour that has been paid
during the normal working period, for each hour of such overtime so
worked, notwithstanding any stipulation or contract implied or
expressed to the contrary.
The second Bill has been drafted by the Political Com-
mittee of the Fabian Society with the object of embodying
in precise and Parliamentary terms their demands for the
democratic regulation of industry. They say:
"Their aim has been, first, to supply both advocates and opponents
I 2
116
LABOR AND LAW.
of the limitation of the working day with a model of an Eight Hours
Bill.
“The Bill, accordingly, is divided into two parts. The first, which
is concerned exclusively with the regulation of hours, is largely (like the
second) a development and amendment of laws already in force. But
while it enacts a limitation of hours in certain employments already
regulated by the State, and enables such limitation to be imposed in
all privileged undertakings and monopolies, it undertakes no more,
with regard to other employments, than to guarantee to the workers
the power to enforce a similar restriction, without the need of any
further law-making, as soon as they shall themselves desire to do
so."
They add:
"No uniform Act of Parliament can deal with all occupations; and
this Bill, if it became the law of England, would not itself secure an
eight hours day for every worker."
The model Bill is as follows:
A Bill entitled an Act to amend the Factory and Workshop Act,.
1878, and to prevent excessive hours of labor.
PRELIMINARY.
1. This Act may be cited as the Hours of Labor Act, 1889; and
shall, except as regards the sixth section, be read and construed as
one with the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, and the Acts amending
the same.
2. This Act shall come into operation on the 1st January, 1890.
PART I.
The Normal Day and Week.
3. In contracts for the hire of labor or the employment of personal
service in any capacity, a day shall, unless otherwise specified, be
deemed to mean a period of eight working hours, and a week shall be
deemed to mean a period of forty-eight working hours.
For Government Servants.
4. No person employed under the Crown in the United Kingdom in
any department of the public service, other than military or naval, or
by any county council, municipal corporation, vestry, local sanitary
authority, school board, board of guardians of the poor, dock or harbor
HOURS OF LABOR.
117
trustees, district board of works, district council, improvement com-
missioners, commissioners of sewers, of public libraries, or of baths
and wash-houses, or by any other public administrative authority,
shall, except in case of special unforeseen emergency, be employed for
a longer period than eight hours in any one day, nor for more than
forty-eight hours in any one week; provided that in cases of public
emergency a Secretary of State shall have power, by order published
in the London Gazette, to suspend, for such employments and for such
period as may be specified in such order, the operation of this section.
Any public officer ordering or requiring any person in public
employment to remain at work for a period in excess of either of
those herein specified, except in case of special unforeseen emergency,
shall be liable to a fine not exceeding ten pounds.
Any public authority, or the principal officer of any department of
the public service, employing or permitting to be employed by reason
of special unforeseen emergency, any person in excess of either of the
periods herein specified, shall report the fact within seven days to a
Secretary of State, and a complete list of such cases shall be laid
before both Houses of Parliament once in each year.
For Railway Servants.
5. No person employed wholly or mainly to work railway signals
or points shall be employed continuously for more than eight hours,
nor for more than forty-eight hours in any one week.
No person employed as engine driver, fireman, guard, or wholly
or mainly in shunting, on any railway, shall be employed continuously
for more than twelve hours, nor for more than forty-eight hours in any
one week.
The General Manager of any railway company employing or per-
mitting to be employed any person in contravention of this section
shall be liable on conviction thereof to a fine not exceeding one hundred
pounds for each such contravention.
Provided that in any case in which the employment of persons to
work railway signals or points, or as engine drivers, firemen, or guards,
or in shunting, for longer periods than is permitted by this section is
rendered by reason of some special and unforeseen emergency neces-
sary for the public safety, it shall be lawful for a Secretary of State, on
a report made within seven days by the General Manager or Secretary
of the Railway Company acting in contravention of this section, to
direct that no legal proceedings shall be taken in the case of the parti-
cular contravention so reported.
A list of the cases in which any such direction has been issued by a
118
LABOR AND LAW.
Secretary of State under this section shall be laid before both Houses
of Parliament once in each year.
For Miners.
6. No person shall be employed under ground for hire in any mine
for a longer period than eight hours in any one day, nor than forty-eight
hours in any one week.
The period of employment under ground in a mine shall, for the
purpose of this section, be deemed to be the whole period from the
time of leaving the surface of the ground to descend the mine, to the
time of return to the surface of the ground after cessation of work.
The manager of any mine employing or permitting to be employed
any person in contravention of this section, shall, on conviction
thereof, be liable to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds for each
such contravention.
In any case in which, through accident or other unforeseen
emergency, any person may be employed underground for a longer
period than is prescribed by this section, a special report may, within
seven days thereof, be made to a Secretary of State by the manager of
the mine, and a Secretary of State may, if he thinks fit, thereupon
direct that no prosecution shall be instituted in respect of the parti-
cular offence so reported.
A list of the cases in which such direction has been issued by a
Secretary of State under this section shall be laid before both Houses
of Parliament once in each year.
This section shall be read as one with, and be deemed to be in-
corporated in, the Coal Mines Regulation Act, 1887, and the Metal-
liferous Mines Act, 1872.
By Trade Option.
7. Where it is proved to the satisfaction of a Secretary of State
that a majority of the persons employed throughout the United
Kingdom in any one trade or occupation are in favor of the maximum
hours of labor per week in that trade or occupation being fixed by
law, or, if already so fixed, being altered by law, he may by order
made under this part of the Act declare a maximum number of hours
per day or per week for such trade or occupation, and after the ex-
piration of three months from the date of publication of such order
any person employed in contravention thereof shall be deemed to
be employed in contravention of this Act, and the person so employing
him or permitting him to be so employed shall be liable on conviction
thereof to a fine not exceeding ten pounds for each such contravention.
HOURS OF LABOR.
119
A Secretary of State shall have power, in order to satisfy himself
of the desire of the persons employed in any trade or occupation as
aforesaid, to cause a public inquiry to be held in the principal district
or districts in which such trade or occupation is carried on, or to
cause a poll to be taken of the persons employed in such trade or
occupation, or to take such other means as he may deem fit.
For the purpose of this section, persons employed in any trade or
occupation shall be taken to mean all persons employed for hire, or
actually performing labor in any capacity, in such trade or occupation,
whether already subject to the provisions of the Factory and Work-
shop Act, 1878, or of this Act, or not.
No order made in pursuance of this section shall declare a
maximum number of hours of labor per week in excess of sixty nor
fewer than forty-five.
It shall be the duty of a Secretary of State to institute an inquiry,
in such manner as he may deem fit, with a view to the consideration
of the expediency of making an order under this part of the Act, in
each of the following cases, viz.:—
(a) Whenever he shall have reason to believe that excessive
hours of labor prevail in any trade or occupation.
(b) Whenever he shall be requested to do so by the Committee
or other Executive body of any duly registered trades
union, or, in the case of there being no duly registered
trades union in the trade or occupation in respect of
which the application is made, by the committee or
other executive body of any trades council, trades union
congress, or other association or federation of trades.
unions.
Provided that a Secretary of State shall not, except for special reasons
approved by him, institute any such inquiry within a period of twelve
months from the date of the holding of any previous enquiry in respect
of the same trade or occupation.
By Local Option for Monopolies.
8. The Council for the Administrative County of London, and else-
where the sanitary authority, shall have power to make, and from time
to time to amend, bye-laws restricting the hours of labor of persons
employed for hire in or in connexion with any docks, harbors, tram-
ways, telephones, markets, establishments for the supply of electric
light, or of electric or hydraulic power, gasworks and waterworks,
within the area under its jurisdiction, whether owned by a public
authority or not.
120
LABOR AND LAW.
Any bye-laws made in pursuance of this section shall be submitted
for confirmation to a Secretary of State, and shall, when confirmed by
him, be deemed to be incorporated in this Act: provided that no such
bye-law shall fix a maximum number of hours of labor in excess of
sixty nor fewer than forty-five per week.
In all New Enterprises Under Parliamentary Powers.
9. No person or company, other than those to whom section 5 or 6
of this Act is applicable, hereafter obtaining statutory powers or
privileges of any description by private or local Act of Parliament
shall employ any person for hire for more than forty-eight hours in
any one week, and this section shall be deemed to be incorporated in
every subsequent private or local Act of Parliament granting statutory
powers or privileges of any description to any such person or company
that employs labor of any description for hire, and to apply to all
the operations of the said person or company under statutory powers
or privileges, whether by that or any other Act.
Any person, or the principal manager or other chief officer of any
company, employing or allowing to be employed any person in con-
travention of this section shall be liable to a fine not exceeding one
hundred pounds for each such contravention.
For Young Persons.
10. No child or young person under fifteen years of age shall be
employed for hire in any trade or occupation whatsoever for more
than five hours in any one day, nor for more than thirty hours in any
one week.
The provisions of sections 12, 14, 16, and 23 to 25, inclusive, of
the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, relating to children employed in
factories or workshops, shall apply also to children and to young
persons under fifteen years of age, employed for hire in any trade or
occupation whatsoever; and such young persons shall, for the pur-
poses of the Elementary Eduction Acts and the Technical Education
Act, 1889, be deemed to be children of school age.
Section 26 of the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, is hereby
repealed.
PART II.
II. The Council for the Administrativè County of London, and
elsewhere the sanitary authority, shall have power, if deemed neces-
sary, for the proper enforcement of the laws relating to the employ-
HOURS OF LABOR.
121
ment of labor or to public health, to make and from time to time
amend, bye-laws providing for any of the following objects, viz.:
(1) The compulsory registration of all premises in which persons
are employed for hire, otherwise than exclusively in
domestic service.
(2) The inspection of all such premises by any medical officer
of health, sanitary officer, or any inspector either ap-
pointed under any Act relating to the employment of
labor, or specially for the purpose.
(3) The prevention of overcrowding in all premises in which
persons are employed for hire.
(4) The provision of proper sanitary arrangements in such
premises.
(5) The prevention of excessive hours of labor in occupations in
which the provisions of Part I of this Act may not be
applicable or effective.
(6) The prevention of public injury or inconvenience in con-
nexion with the employment of labor in or about docks,
harbors, rivers, tramways, telephones, establishments for
electric lighting or for the supply of electric or hydraulic
power, gasworks and waterworks.
Any bye-laws made in pursuance of this section shall be submitted
for confirmation to a Secretary of State, and shall, when confirmed by
him, be deemed to be incorporated in this Act.
The Council for the Administrative County of London and else-
where the sanitary authority, shall have power to appoint local in-
spectors, clerks and servants for the enforcement of any such bye-laws,
and any inspector so appointed shall possess the same rights and
powers as an inspector under any of the Acts relating to the employ-
ment of labor.
12. It shall be the duty of the occupier of any factory or workshop
in which any labor whatsoever is employed for hire, to specify in a
notice affixed in a prominent position in the workshop or factory the
time of beginning and quitting work on each day of the week, the
times allowed for meals, and, if children or young persons under
fifteen are employed, whether they are employed on the system of
morning or afternoon sets or of alternate days.
A copy of every such notice and of every alteration thereof shall
be sent by post in a registered letter or delivered by the employer to
an inspector within seven days of its publication, and shall be open to
122
LABOR AND LAW.
inspection at the Home Office by any person at any time when that
office is open for official business.
A factory or workshop in which no such notice is affixed as herein
specified, shall be deemed not to be kept in conformity with this Act.
Provided that nothing in this section shall affect the provisions of
section 19 of the Factory and Workshop Act relating to the employ-
ment of women or children.
13. Notwithstanding anything contained in the sections 61 and 93
of the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, such provisions of that Act,
and of any Acts amending the same, as relate to the cleanliness, or to
the freedom from effluvia, or to the overcrowding, or ventilation of a
factory or workshop, or to the sending notice of accidents, shall apply
to all workshops other than those specified in clause (a) of section 61
of the said Act.
14. No child under twelve years of age shall be employed for hire,
in any capacity or for any period, in any trade or occupation what-
soever, except as provided in section 3 of the Prevention of Cruelty to
Children Act, 1889, which shall apply to children under twelve years of
age; and, except as therein provided, any parent causing or per-
mitting his or her child under twelve years of age to be employed for
hire, and any person employing such child for hire shall be guilty of a
misdemeanor.
15. No person under sixteen years of age shall be employed for hire
in any of the occupations or places specified in the First Schedule to
the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878; but nothing in this section
shall be deemed to permit the employment in such occupations or
places of young persons over sixteen years of age where such employ-
ment is now prohibited.
16. Where it appears to an inspector under this or any other Act
or local bye-law relating to the employment of labor, that any act,
neglect or default, by any person whatsoever, in or in connexion with
any place in which any person is employed for hire, is punishable or
remediable under the laws relating to public health, it shall be the
duty of the inspector himself, without reference to any local authority,
to take such action as he may deem fit for the purpose of enforcing the
law, and every such inspector shall possess all rights or powers of
instituting legal proceedings for this purpose which are or may be
possessed by any sanitary authority, sanitary officer, or medical officer
of health.
Provided that nothing in this section shall relieve any sanitary
authority or officer of such authority from any duty in connexion with
the law relating to public health.
HOURS OF LABOR.
123
17. The provisions of section 7 of the Factory and Workshop
Act, 1878, shall apply to any vat, pan, or other structure which is so
dangerous as to be likely to be a cause of bodily injury to any person
employed in the factory or workshop, whether a child or young person,
or not.
18. Notwithstanding anything contained in the 17th section of the
Factory and Workshop Act Amendment Act of 1883, an inspector shall
be required and empowered to inspect all bakehouses in which persons
are employed for hire, and shall, concurrently with the officers of the
sanitary authority, possess for the purpose of enforcing the provisions
of any of the laws relating to public health, the same rights and
powers as they at any time possess.
19. The provisions of the Factory and Workshop Act, 1878, and of
this Act shall apply to any laundry in which persons are employed for
hire, and in which washing is performed for payment for persons other
than those resident in the premises on which it is situated.
20. It shall be the duty of every inspector appointed under any Act
relating to the employment of labor to execute and procure the
enforcement also of the Truck Act, 1831, the Shop Hours Regulation
Act, 1886, and the Prevention of Cruelty to Children Act, 1889; and
any rights or powers possessed by such inspectors under any Act
shall be deemed to be possessed and to apply for the purposes of the
execution and enforcement of all the aforesaid Acts.
21. It is hereby declared that women are eligible to be appointed
inspectors, clerks, and servants for the execution of this or any other
Act relating to the employment of labor, upon the same terms and
subject to the same disqualifications as men.
CHAPTER V.
EMPLOYERS'
LIABILITY
ACT,
1880.
(See resolution of Liverpool Trades Congress, No. 1, p. 2.)
THE need for any special legislation in relation to liability of
employers for injuries suffered by workmen in the course of
their employment, arises from an exception, judicially declared
to exist in the common law, whenever the person injured
and the person causing the injury are in the common employ-
ment of the person sued. (See full statement of law and
practice in Mr. Pitt Lewis's 4th edition of "County Court
Practice", vol. 2, chap. 5, pp. 238-267: also part 2, pp. 78 to
242, of Report of New Jersey Bureau of Labor and Industries,
1888.) Ordinarily, at common law, an employer is liable to
every person-other than a person in his employ-to whom
injury has been caused by one of his servants, provided
that such injury was caused by the servant whilst acting within
the scope of his employment. For instance, a railway com-
pany has recently been held not to be liable to a stranger
for the act of one of its servants who, returning home in a
railway train, after his work had finished, left open the door
of a carriage and thus caused injury to a passenger in
a passing train. Under what is known as the doctrine of
"common employment" it was held that an employer, although
liable to the rest of the world, was not liable to one of his own
servants for injuries sustained in the course of his daily work
(125)
126
LABOR AND LAW.
by the act of another servant. The injured workman was
deemed to have accepted the risk of such an injury as an
incident of his engagement.
In 1880 an Act, 43 and 44 Vict. cap. 42 (Employers'
Liability Act, 1880), was passed to restrict the employers'
defence under the doctrine of "common employment"; and
the statutory amendments thus made to the common law were
useful to the workman and were hardly injurious to the
employer. The Act was limited in its operation to the end
of the Session following, 31st Dec., 1881, but has been since
continued from year to year by the Expiring Laws Continuance
Acts. The change effected by the Employers' Liability Act, 1880,
(see Weblin v. Bullard, 17 Law Reports, 2 BD, 122) was not
so great as is apparently sometimes believed by the men them-
selves. Prior to 1880 an employed person might have sued
his employer (1) for injuries sustained by reason of the
negligence of the employer. The employer might have escaped
by proving contributory negligence on the part of the workman
injured. This is unchanged by the Employers' Liability Act,
1880. The employed person could scarcely ever maintain an
action (2) for injuries sustained by reason of the negligence
of a fellow servant acting within the scope of his employment,
or (3) for injuries sustained by reason of the employer having
provided defective or dangerous implements or plant. This,
because the employer had two defences on the judicially
declared implied contract of service. (a) That in the con-
tract of service the employed person impliedly contracted to
take upon himself, as one of the obvious risks of any trade,
all risk arising from the negligence of his fellow-workmen—
in other words, a workman entering into a contract of service
must ipso facto be considered to have contemplated and included
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
127
as an element the possibility of personal injury from the
negligence of others in the same employment, and so, pro-
viding his employer took all reasonable care to select com-
petent fellow-workmen, to have precluded himself from seeking
legal redress in case of personal injury, the master being able
to set up the contract of service itself as a sufficient answer to
any such claim. This is the defence of "Common Employ-
ment". (b) That in making the contract of service the work-
man impliedly contracted to take upon himself the known
risks attendant upon his employment. Thus, where plant or
machinery was in an obviously dangerous condition at the
time of making the contract of service, or became so subse-
quently, without remonstrance on the part of the employed
person of a kind sufficient to negative the theory of his
acquiescence in the danger, the law considered the danger
itself to be an element in the contract, and that by entering
into it the employed person wittingly took all risk upon him-
self. It did not, therefore, permit him to obtain redress from
his employer in case of injury.
Section 1 of the Employers' Liability Act, 1880, gave the
workman the same right of compensation and remedies against
the employer as if the workman had not been a workman of, nor
in the service of the employer, nor engaged in his work. As in
the case, therefore, of an action by a stranger, it is still open to
an employer to set up in answer to such claims a denial of the
negligence, or to prove contributory negligence on the part of
the workman suing: and, in addition to these, he has the special
statutory defence given by the Act (section 2, sub-section 3),
which prevents the workman recovering in any case where
he knew of the defect or negligence which caused his injury,
and failed within a reasonable time to give information thereof
128
LABOR AND LAW.
to the employer, or some person superior to himself in the
service of the employer, unless he was aware that the employer
or such superior already knew of the defect or negligence in
question.
On the part of the men the desire soon arose for the amend-
ment of the Act in certain details, as well as for its being made
permanent. It did not extend sufficiently to all workmen; it
did not include seamen. The enabling clauses of the Act of
1880 had been found defective, and had been clogged with con-
ditions as to notice of injury and of action and amount of
damage recoverable, which were deemed to have operated
harshly in many cases.
In 1886 a Bill was introduced on behalf of the workmen by
Messrs. Burt, Broadhurst, Joicey, Haldane, and Lockwood,
which proposed to re-enact and make permanent the Act of
1880; to prohibit future contracting out; to provide that in
determining compensation to the workman the Court might,
amongst other things, take into consideration any payment
made by the employer to any insurance fund to the extent to
which the workman had thereon actually received compensa-
tion; to forbid removal to the superior Court unless amount
claimed exceeded £100; to give the Court power to dispense
with notice of injury in the event of the employer having know-
ledge of the injury within six weeks, or of there being reasonable
excuse for the omission of the notice. A Bill was also intro-
duced by Mr. Arthur O'Connor, going further than the Trades
Union Bill, in that it proposed to render void contracts already
made to escape the provisions of the Act.
On the 23rd February, 1886, Mr. Burt's Bill was read a
second time, and referred to a Select Committee, which was
also empowered to enquire into the operation of the Employers'
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
129
Liability Act, 1880; and on the 11th March Mr. Arthur
O'Connor's Bill was also referred to the same Committee, of
which Sir Thomas (now Lord) Brassey was chairman. This
Committee sat on eighteen days, and “examined employers and
workmen engaged in the leading industries, shipowners, seamen
and fishermen, and legal witnesses of experience". By this
evidence "a general concurrence of opinion was expressed as to
the advantages which the workmen have derived from the
existing Act. The apprehensions as to its possible results in
provoking litigation and imposing heavy charges upon em-
ployers" were shown "to have proved groundless, while a
useful stimulus had been given to the establishment of provident
funds and associations, in many cases liberally supported by
employers". The Committee unanimously resolved that "the
operation of the Act of 1880 has been attended with no hard-
ship to the employers, whilst it has been of great benefit to the
workmen, and it is desirable that such Act should, with certain
amendments, be renewed and made permanent”.
The gravest matter of difficulty in connexion with the
Employers' Liability Act, 1880, arises on the question of con-
tracting out of its operation. That is, of the abandonment by
the person employed of the advantages secured him by the Act.
It was alleged, and, as I think, amply proved, before the Select
Committee of 1886, that many thousands of men had been com-
pelled to contract out of the Act by fear of losing their employ-
ment, or by the entering into such an abandoning contract being
made the condition of granting employment. Two proposals
were made, one by myself against all contracting out, which on
a division was negatived; the other was a compromise proposal
needing some explanation. The members of the Committee.
were almost unanimous in considering that a man, perhaps poor
K
130
LABOR AND LAW.
and hungry, ought not to be placed by his necessities in the
unfair position of being compelled to give up the whole benefit
of the Act of 1880; the Committee therefore recommended that
"No contract or agreement made or entered into with a work-
man shall be a bar or constitute any defence to an action for the
recovery under this Act of compensation for any injury, unless
on entering into or making such contract or agreement, there
was other consideration than that of such workman being taken
into or continued in the employ of the defendant ".
In the Bill introduced by the Home Secretary in 1888,
clause 3 dealt with this question, and as amended, after dis-
cussion in Grand Committee, stood as follows:
1. Any contract made after the commencement of this Act,
whereby a workman deprives himself of any right under this Act,
shall be void, unless made in pursuance of a request, in writing, from
every such workman with whom the contract is to be made, and unless
it is made in consideration of such undertaking by the employer as
hereinafter mentioned, and that undertaking is duly fulfilled.
2. The undertaking shall be to make, so long as the workman con-
tinues in his employment, an adequate contribution towards such
insurance as hereinafter mentioned of the workman, or, in case of
death, his representatives against every accident occurring in the
course of his employment, and to make good to the workman, or, in
case of death, his representatives, any sum which becomes payable in
respect of the insurance, but which is not paid.
3. The insurance shall be to such amount and on such conditions
as will insure to the workman or, in case of death, his representatives,
a benefit equivalent to the compensation recoverable under this Act.
4. If any question arises whether an undertaking by an employer
sufficiently complies with the requirements of this section, evidence
that a similar undertaking has or has not been accepted as sufficient
by persons employed under similar circumstances or in the same class
of employment shall be admissible as evidence of the sufficiency or
insufficiency of the undertaking.
5. On the application of a workman in any coal mine, metalliferous
mine, factory, or workshop, or of his employer, one of Her Majesty's
principal Secretaries of State, and on the application of a workman in
+
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
131
any other employment, or of his employer, the Board of Trade, may
consider and decide whether a contract made or proposed to be made
between the workman and his employer whereby the workman
deprives himself of any right under this Act, is made, or proposed to
be made, on such consideration as in this section mentioned, and if
the Secretary of State or Board of Trade decide and certify that the
contract is so made, or is proposed to be so made, then not only that
contract, but contracts in similar terms with other workmen engaged
under the same employer or his successor in business and in a similar
employment under similar circumstances, shall, without further proof,
be deemed to have been made on such consideration as in this section
mentioned.
6. The compensation payable in pursuance of the insurance may
be either a capital sum or an annual or other periodical payment to
the person injured or his representatives.
7. In this section the expression "employer" shall include any
person liable to pay compensation under the last proceeding section.
This clause, although it practically prevented all contracting
out, unless the workman was protected by an insurance against
the consequences of every accident arising in the course of the
employment, was so strongly objected to by the labor repre-
sentatives in the House of Commons that it had to be
abandoned. It was claimed that contracting out ought to be
altogether prohibited. The Select Committee had taken such
evidence as led to the belief that only a very small percentage
of the accidents which happened were such that an action
would lie against the employer either at common law or under
the Act. Many men are injured in consequence of either pure
accident, that is accident arising so as not to involve any legal
liability on any one to make good the injury; or in which the
cause of accident is doubtful, or in which, as in explosions in
mines, the character of the accident often destroys the
evidence as to the manner of its arising; or in which there is
such contributory negligence on the part of the sufferer as
deprives him of remedy at law; and the Select Committee
K 2
132
LABOR AND LAW.
believed that a contract which provided certain relief against
all accidents however occurring would be beneficial to the men.
The representatives of the workmen, however, say that they
will not accept this view, and Parliament ought not to enforce
it on unwilling men. The difficulty in the way of prohibiting
contracting out, if it is to affect existing contracts, is that there
are already contracts, as in the case of the London and North-
Western Railway Company, to which thousands of men are
parties, which it is alleged would have to be rescinded if
prohibitory legislation be resorted to. The labor representa-
tives objected that the insurance scheme was bad in principle;
that they desired to secure increased safety for life and limb
amongst the workers rather than to obtain pecuniary com-
pensation for an injury which had actually happened. It is
obvious that no statute defining employers' liability can secure
such personal safety for the workman. The most that can be
done by such enactment is to make the negligence of the
employer a crime, punishing it by fine and imprisonment or
by giving civil remedy for damages where no such remedy
at present exists. No one as yet suggests that an employer
should be prosecuted as a criminal except for criminal acts:
for these the employer is already responsible, and with these
the Employers' Liability Act has nothing to do. Its enact-
ments are not even needed to enable recovery of damage for
any personal negligence or misdoing of the employer. For
such the remedy exists already at common law.
One advantage of insurance over mere legal remedy is that
even when the workman obtains judgment he does not always
realise the amount. This is especially so in trades where there
are small masters. I note a case in the April, 1890, Report of the
Amalgamated Society of Carpenters, where an injured workman
A
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
133
obtained a verdict for £100 damages and £27 5s. costs, but in
consequence of the bankruptcy of the builder who was sued,
only realised a dividend of 24d. in the £1. Another ad-
vantage of insurance is that it provides a certain resource
in that numerous class of cases where contributory negligence
on the part of the injured workman bars his right to recover
in an action.
It was alleged in the debate on the Bill in 1888, that where
employers have insured against their liability under the Act
there has been greater carelessness and more accidents; and
I understood Mr. Fenwick, in debate on the Bill, to try to
prove this by figures which, he alleged, showed that where
employers had contracted out of the Act the loss of life was
greater than where the Act was in force. This argument is,
in any case, confusing. If employers have nakedly contracted
out of the Act, then they do not need to insure, and in fact
do not insure, themselves against liability under the Act, for
they have no such liability. When employers insure them-
selves with a great company against damages possibly accruing
from liability under the Act, it is when they have not contracted
themselves out. It was contended at the Bradford Trades
Union Congress ("Authorised Report, Trades Union Con-
gress, 1888," p. 21), and also in the House of Commons, that
insurance by an employer against his liabilities under the Act
ought not to be allowed; but no attempt to prevent insurance
of this kind was ever proposed by the Trades Union Bill of
1886.
The cases of mutual funds contributed to in agreed pro-
portions by both employers and employed, to provide for
specified payments against every kind of accident, stand on
quite a different footing from mere insurances against liability
134
LABOR AND LAW.
under the Act. But even here it is urged that "an employer
who contributes by regular instalments to an accident or death
fund has no inducement to take extra care to ensure the safety
of his workmen. Whether there be few accidents or many,
his outlay is the same." On this, Mr. A. M. Chance, who
was examined before the Select Committee, writes to the
Times, under date December 8th, 1888:
"One strong argument against sanctioning such contracts seems
to be that masters will be less careful, and that accidents will be
more frequent at works where such friendly arrangements are in
force. In my evidence before the Select Committee in 1886 (see pages
350 to 359 of the report), I endeavored to combat this view, and the
figures which I now submit, for a still longer period, tend to still
further strengthen my opinion as to the advantages thus accruing to
the workpeople themselves by diminishing the number of serious
accidents. At these works, where some 650 men find regular employ-
ment, during the nine years 1872 to 1880 inclusive seven deaths
occurred from accidents.
"On the 1st of January, 1881, the provident accident scheme
which I framed came into operation, and during the eight years com-
mencing 1881 I rejoice to say that we have not had one single fatal
accident. This immunity from serious accidents I largely attribute to
the greater care and vigilance exercised by the men themselves, in
consequence of the interest which our scheme throws upon them.”
Mr. Ruegg, a counsel of great experience in cases under
the Act of 1880, and who was called by Mr. A. O'Connor,
said: "I think that any good insurance scheme contributed
to by the employers and workmen is far better for the work-
men than their chance of recovering damages under the
Employers' Liability Act”.
In order to ascertain how far the Employers' Liability Act
of 1880 really affected this question of improved safety to life
and limb, comparison should, if possible, be made in all indus-
tries in specified districts prior to 1880, and in those districts
after its passing, distinguishing where the Act was in operation
G
→
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
135
and where there had been contracting out. Comparisons
between different mining districts may be wholly misleading
in consequence of the difference in the dangerous character of
the seams and methods of working. A practical and most
intelligent miner furnished me with a tabulated statement com-
piled from the yearly official reports of the Inspectors of Mines,
which are published as Parliamentary papers, and showing the
percentage of loss of life in the very districts referred to by Mr.
Fenwick, in the House of Commons, for the seven years imme-
diately preceding the operation of the Act, and for the seven
years since it has been in operation, and also showing the
figures for the four years named by Mr. Fenwick; and so far
from proving Mr. Fenwick's contention, it is shown in both
cases that there has been a greater improvement in the districts
where the men contracted out of the Act than where the Act
was allowed to remain in full force. These figures seem to
show exactly the opposite of Mr. Fenwick's contention, and,
read by the light of the evidence taken before the Select Com-
mittee, show that the mutual funds have been accompanied with
increased safety to the men. Nos. 1 and 2 of the following
tables are for the districts in which the Act is in full operation.
Nos. 3 and 4 are for districts where contracting out of the Act
has prevailed.
NUMBER OF PERSONS EMPLOYED PER LIFE LOST.
No. 1.—Northumberland, Cumberland, and North Durham :
1881
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879
1880
:
:
·
..
...
:
:
..
722
686
696
727
890
716
834
1882
1883
1884
1885
1886
1887
...
:
•
740
672
691
793
582
938
769
Average-753
Average-740°71
1.6 more lives lost than before the introduction of the Act.
136
LABOR AND LAW.
No. 2.-South Durham, Westmoreland, and North Riding of
Yorkshire :
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879
1880
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879
1880
...
..
...
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879
1880
:
No. 3.-West Lancashire and North Wales:
1881
1882
1883
1884
1885
1886
1887
:
...
..
...
...
Average-626*57
Average-649
3.5 fewer lives lost than before the Act came into operation.
:
710
709
728
570
610
823
236
No. 4.-South Wales:
:
380
349
348
318
128
407
443
1881
1882
1883
1884
1885
1886
1887
384
404
396
367
357
346
208
··
•
1881
1882
1883
1884
1885
1886
1887
··
...
Average-339°28
Average-430*28
26.8 fewer lives lost during the last seven years than in the previous
seven years.
··
...
:
...
..
:
:
:
605
305
801
:
744
708
622
758
:
262
426
502
460
428
449
485
402
379
325
349
275
391
319
Average-351'71
Average-348°57
o'g more lives lost than in the seven years previous to the introduc-
tion of the Act.
The result for the four years selected by Mr. Fenwick, that is, com-
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
137
paring four years before the passing of the Act with the last four years
under the Act, is as follows:
No. 1 District, where Act is in operation
No. 2 District, where Act is in operation.
No. 3 District, where men contracted
out of the Act ...
No. 4 District, where men contracted
out of the Act ...
..
··
••
Percentage reduc-
tion in loss of
life.
··
26%
40'5%
5°2%
Mr. George Lamb Campbell, secretary to the Central Asso-
ciation for dealing with distress caused by mining accidents, gave
most important evidence before the Select Committee of 1886
on this point. He presented tables (pp. 529-30, 31 of Report)
showing death by fatal accident, disablement cases, and the
number of miners' permanent societies which in 1886 had, and
the number which then had not, contracted out of the Act and
in answer to questions 3496-7 he stated that the North Wales
district, in which the whole of the miners were contracted out of
the Act by an arrangement of a permanent fund, "shows the
lowest rate of disablement accidents in the kingdom, and that
this rate has been steadily decreasing since the Employers'
Liability Act came into operation". This evidence gains in
importance when taken in connexion with the quotation from
the letter of Mr. Chance.
Increase in
loss of life.
27%
Strong objection was taken to the opportunity given by the
Bill for employers and workmen to submit the fairness of the
mutual insurance contract to the decision of a Government
official; but to whom would it be fair to submit such contract
for a decision? If you say that it must be left in each case to a
judge and jury, then you are confronted by the workmen's just
complaint that even where they recover damages heavy extra
costs go to the attorney; and you are also met by the declaration
138
LABOR AND LAW.
of the employer that even where he is held to be right he is, from
the poverty of the workman, unable to recover.
I quite admit
that the subject is one of great delicacy and difficulty in its
treatment.
In the Government Bill of 1890, of which the second reading
was not moved, the following clause was substituted for the
clause 3 just quoted:
"3. No contract made after the commencement of this Act, whereby
a workman deprives himself of any right under this Act, shall consti-
tute a defence to an action brought for the recovery of compensation
under this Act, unless it is made in pursuance of a request in writing
from the workman with whom such contract is to be made, and unless
it is made for a valuable and substantial consideration, which is, in the
opinion of the Court before which such action is tried, a reasonable
consideration for the workman so depriving himself of rights under
this Act, and is other than the consideration of entering upon or
remaining in the employment."
This amended clause did not satisfy the labor representa-
tives, and to me was even more objectionable, as involving
possible litigation in every case. I therefore gave notice of
my intention to move as an amendment to the second reading:
“That, in the opinion of this House, it ought not to be a defence in
any action for damages for injuries sustained in the course of any
employment that the matter out of which injury arose was caused by
the wrong doing or negligence of one who was, together with the
person suing, in the common employment of the defendant.”
If this proposal were adopted, a short Bill of one clause
would give it effect, and there would then be no necessity to-
make permanent or amend the Employers' Liability Act, 1880.
Workmen would have precisely the same rights as everyone
else, and could make what arrangements to them seemed wise
to provide against the consequences of injury.
If the very strong language reported as used at the recent
meeting of the Miners' Federation, presided over by Mr. B..
EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY ACT, 1880.
1395
Pickard, M.P., be any real index to the feelings of the men,
any reasonable compromise is impossible; surely, then, it is
better to sweep away the exception to the Common Law which
made compromise legislation necessary. The Trades Union.
Congress asks for the abolition of the doctrine of common em-
ployment, so that on this there is possible common ground.
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN
LABOR DISPUTES?
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR
DISPUTES?
THERE are some forms of force which almost all men unani-
mously reject as of application in controversies between
employed and employers; there are other force-methods towards
which even competent advisers of workmen and capitalists are
still inclined to turn a little too readily. Such forms of the
application of sheer brute force as were not uncommon forty
years ago, on the part of the men engaged in some of the
roughest occupations, have, in this country, nearly died out,
since the legislation of trade combinations has gradually
substituted open union action, and the force of a better
educated opinion. When difference arises between the labor
seller and the labor purchaser, the strike on the one hand, and
the lock-out on the other, are applications of force which,
though less frequent than in older and harder times, still occur
far too often, and are advocated much too readily. The
combined employers discuss the advisability of a general lock-
out in a particular trade, and the workmen poll as to a strike
with almost the same unconcern as military men who prepare for
a bombardment or military expedition.
The menaces of strike and of lock-out are war notes, and the
consequences which accompany and follow the putting the
threat in action are war consequences, alike destructive and
( 143 )
144
LABOR AND LAW.
demoralising in effect, reaching far beyond the ranks of those
immediately engaged in the struggle, and enduring for mischief
long after the particular strike or lock-out has terminated.
There is, of course, also the difficulty, that when a strike or
lock-out has commenced, it is comparatively easy for the
hungrier unemployed or their less reflective sympathisers, to
slide into force demonstrations, when what is conceived to be
fair suasion has been disregarded. The advocacy of a general
strike in all industries throughout the whole of Europe, at a
date next year, and the reception of such advocacy with
applause, from the majority of those to whom the proposal was
addressed, makes it needful that, so far as possible, workmen
should individually be appealed to, and reasoned with, as to the
terrible consequences to themselves, their wives and families,
necessarily consequent on any such action. In strikes limited to
one industry, or to one district, and conducted by an organised
union, the men on strike have never been able to subsist on
their own funds, but are partly assisted by the help of grants.
from men working in other districts and in other industries;
partly by subscriptions from the general public; and partly by
credit given for food by the local tradespeople. The conse-
quences of a general strike in all industries even when limited
to the metropolitan area, as was proposed by Mr. John Burns
during the great dock strike, would have been most awful in
its hardships on the poor; but a general strike throughout
all Britain, or throughout Europe, cannot be conceived as
enduring for many days without provoking a social convulsion.
I venture to hope that the utter thoughtlessness or wicked
perversity which tries to ensure such a general strike, will find
itself powerless against the better sense of the large majority of
the workers.
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
145
Mr. Gladstone, in a recent paper on the rights and responsi-
bilities of labor, notes that the history of strikes [in this country]
has been characterised by many changes, all in the right direc-
tion. "They are more rarely marked by violent attempts of
intemperate individuals to coerce the minority who do not join
them." In the wise opening speech, delivered at Jolimont,
by Mr. Thomas Burt, M.P., as President of the International
Miners' Congress, the same keynote was most temperately
struck. "Let the workmen everywhere demand and insist
upon free speech and the right of combination. Let them
trust to the reasonableness of their cause; let them regard as
their greatest enemies, in whatever guise of friendship they
come, those who counselled intimidation, violence, and outrage.
Such advice was not only imprudent and suicidal, but in a free
country it was wicked and criminal in the extreme."
Concurring as to the general progress that had been made,
Mr. Henry Crompton wrote in 1876, "Doubtless there are
parts of England and certain trades in which the relations
between employers and employed are as bad now as was ever
the case.
There are trades in which the most brutal savagery
is still the rule." It is to be hoped, however, that the
working of the Education Act of 1870 has done something,
during the period since that was written, to modify the state
of things here deplored. It is scarcely of good omen that, at
the Miners' International Congress, a few Englishmen and
Scotchmen joined with their continental co-workers in advocat-
ing an international strike in all mines, to take place on the
1st of May, 1891. The proposition for such a strike, made by a
Scotch delegate, was not adopted, but it can hardly be said
to have been disapproved by the majority present, especially
as an International Congress was decided on for April 1891,
L
146
LABOR AND LAW.
at which the delegates are to be prepared to vote for or
against a general strike. Happily no such movement can
now be justified by misinformation or excused by ignorance.
Valuable information is being published from time to time,
in the Foreign Office Miscellaneous Series, on the labor agita-
tion and recent strikes throughout the various countries of
Europe. These papers show clearly that in Germany, France,
Italy, and Belgium, the dissatisfied workers have, in many
cases, allowed themselves to be very readily incited to displays.
of physical force which have been put down by use of the
military. The labor agitation, in certain continental States,
is in this respect disadvantageously distinguished from the
movement of skilled labor in these islands. It is distinguished
further by the fact that the right of association in Germany
is surrounded by such difficulties, that the simple election of
delegates to an International Congress, or the mere subscription
to defray the travelling expenses of a delegate, is treated as a
criminal offence. In Austria, nearly all workmen's associations
may be made the subject of prosecution. In France and Italy
the old fear of the "International" is embodied in penal
statutes; while Germany has the bad pre-eminence of being
quick in using force against discontented labor, and thus pro-
vokes force in reply. Prince Bismarck thus justifies his policy
of repression. "Working men", he is alleged to have said,
<< are insatiable in their demands. It is no use attempting
to solve the labor question by listening to them and striving to
satisfy them, because God has not implanted in them the
faculty of contentment."
I am not one of those who believe that contentment under
wrong, or under unwholesome and vicious life-conditions, is a
desirable state for any one, whether worker or employer. This
Force OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
147
is not a theological paper, and it is needless, therefore, to
discuss Prince Bismarck's curious implication that God having
left working men without "the faculty of contentment ",
governments may and ought to at least enforce sullen acquies-
cence. A recent Times editorial pictured the German
delegates as answering the advocates of conciliation and the
attainment of better conditions by means of organisation, by
saying: "Our experience is different. We are only here by a
stratagem, and we are liable to be fined or sent to prison for
coming. If we can induce the State to help us, we shall get
what we want. If we attempt to help ourselves, we shall
expose ourselves to the risk of being shot down for striking,
or sent to prison for illegal combination."
Amongst the items of labor legislation passed, or about to
be passed, by the German Reichstag, as the result of the recent
Labor Conference in Berlin, are the prohibition of employment
of children under twelve years of age, the limitation to five-and-
a-half hours per day in the case of children under fourteen ;
eight-and-a-half for young persons between fourteen and sixteen ;
protection for older youths against night and Sunday labor;
prohibition of work to women for a month after confinement,
and special hours for the sex; prohibition of all industries
hurtful to health; and the supervision by experienced Govern-
ment inspectors of mines, factories, etc. At Halle, the other
day, an assembly of members of the Reichstag also declared
that it was the duty of all workmen to consider themselves
.comrades, with right to equality of wage and work.
One point of common pressure on the Continent, as well
as at home, is in the largely-increased military expenditure,
the chief burden of which falling on the worker, thereby reduces
the purchasing power of his wage. Although, from the absence
L 2
148
LABOR AND LAW.
of the conscription in Great Britain, the pressure is less onerous,
its gravity even at home may be appreciated by those who
attend to the tremendous augmentation of our army and navy
expenditure. For the current year it is £38,323,433, that is,
it is now three times what it was in the first year of the
present reign, when £12,716,897 was the total cost of army,
navy, and ordnance. Another grave increase is in local taxation,
though here it may be urged that the worker receives value in
improved sanitary conditions, and a higher state of comfort.
Although it is true that landlord and small shopkeeper come
most in direct contact with the tax-gatherer, it is equally true
that the tax is recouped to these by the labor seller in increased
house-rent, and in the increased price paid for the necessaries.
of life. That is to say, the burden rests where it can go no
lower.
Whilst the right, alike of employer and employed, to
determine any contract of employment in the manner provided
by the original contract cannot be reasonably denied, even
though that may involve sudden cessation of work, the
consequences are possibly so disastrous to the worker, that
neither strike nor lock-out should be resorted to until every
possibility of conciliation has been exhausted. The enforce-
ment of the conditions of an existing labor contract is still
attended with possible imprisonment, as against the worker,
under 30 and 31 Vict., cap. 141; for although the penalty is.
fine for employer and employed, imprisonment follows where
there are not sufficient goods to distrain for the fine and costs,
and it is rare indeed that the employer can be the imprisoned
person. This is an inequality difficult to remedy, but it is an
inequality attaching to the breach of no other voluntary contract
between individuals. Ordinary breach of contract is only
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
149
attended with judgment for civil damages, and imprisonment
for debt is abolished, except where the defendant has means
and will not pay. Speaking generally, strikes are suicidal and
lock-outs are murderous, inasmuch as the labor for sale is a
perishable commodity, and its purchase-money is the only
reliable provision for the laborer and his family. Once the
hour or day has passed away, so much of a saleable commodity
is entirely lost, and from any increase of future wage this lost
labor value is a certain deduction. The unemployed laborer
can only exist, during the strike or lock-out, by consuming
previous individual savings, by exhausting his personal credit
with the local tradesmen, or by living on the strike allowance
provided by the Union, that fund being made up out of the
previous earnings of himself and fellows. Sometimes he is
aided by donations from other Unions, and by donations from
the general public, or by being subsisted by voluntary charity,
perhaps by himself or members of his family becoming charge-
able to the parish, or by a mixture of all these sources.
When
the strike is successful, there is a long list of goods in pawn;
debt at the grocery and baker's shop; money drawn out from
the savings bank, co-operative store, or building society:
children's clothing in sore condition, to set off against the
success achieved. During the enforced idleness, with home
comforts diminished, the public house affords an assembling
place and a momentary relief, but the remedy sometimes
becomes a chronic disease. Wife and children suffer per-
manently from every prolonged strike. One of the most
successful strikes of modern times is the great Dock strike, and
yet any one closely examining the condition of the population
specially affected, will find many distinct evidences of continu-
ing misery, and will not always be so clear as to the permanent
150
LABOR AND LAW.
good results. This is a successful strike; but what shall be said.
of the recent unsuccessful Dock strike at Liverpool, where tens
of thousands were reduced to starvation, in order that a victory
might be claimed by Union officials? A barren victory it
would have been had it been achieved. My conclusion is
therefore distinctly against strikes, as exhibitions of force often
most disastrous to the workers, and at best as of doubtful
benefit. The only form of strike against employers which, if
not immediately beneficial to the men, must at any rate be
usefully educational, is where the men unite together to exploit
for themselves the special industries with which they are
familiar. As Henry Crompton states it in his work on Industrial
Conciliation," the only industrial scheme which really threatens
the existence of the employer class is that of co-operative
production". In co-operative production experiments, the men
would learn at their own cost, and for their own profit, how far
wage might be augmented, to what point the hours of labor
might be lessened, and what capital it was necessary to provide,
The
consistently with the maintenance of each industry.
regulations for the preservation of health, and for the avoidance
of possibilities of accident in working would, in co-operative
production all be within the control of the men themselves. It
must be conceded that up to the present, pure co-operative
production has made comparatively small headway in this
country, nor does there appear any great disposition to advocate
it amongst those who most strongly denounce the too greedy
appropriation by capitalists of the results of labor.
The Co-operative Annual, whilst showing an astounding
progress during the past thirty years in the sphere of co-opera-
tive distribution, has but a scant record for co-operative
production, though the twain seem so nearly allied. There are
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
151
some limited liability companies, especially in Lancashire and
Yorkshire, which go very close to co-operative production,
shares being held by the men who are workers in the mills; but
in these all the workers are not shareholders, nor are all the
shareholders workers. These limited liability companies seldom
give any share of profit to the worker beyond his ordinary wage.
Mr. E. O. Greening, in 1885, stated at the Industrial
Remuneration Conference that at Oldham, where the dividends
were declared solely on shares, speculative buying and selling
of the nature of Stock Exchange gambling had been practised
to a very large extent, the rise and fall in the price of shares
causing "panics, during which many of the workers through
fear, improvidence, or misfortune, lose their shares".
" So
extensively", says Mr. Greening, "is this done, that in the
Oldham Mills not more than two per cent of the shares in any
one mill are now held by the workers in that mill."
Lord Brassey, too, in a paper read at the same Conference,
stated that "to work as a member of a co-operative association
demands higher moral qualities than are required either in
employers or workmen, in the more usual industrial relations,”
and he urged that "the co-operative plan is not adapted to
trades exposed to the uncertainties inseparable from agriculture.
We have seen," he said,
he said, "how spasmodic and fitful are the
profits in mining and in the iron manufacture. Even in the textile
industries, where the conditions vary less from year to year, a
fair average cannot be taken over a period of less than ten
years. These are not conditions which are suitable to men
accustomed to receive the whole of their earnings as weekly
wages."
The United States Consul-General at Frankfort recently
reported to his Government 678 co-operative productive
•
:
LABOR AND LAW.
152
1.
societies in Germany, 146 of which are industrial and 532
agricultural.
→
A form of conciliatory effort to increase the remuneration of
the worker may be found in profit-sharing, though, at the
Industrial Conference, Mr. John Burns stated that he "regarded
profit-sharing as nothing less than a delusive bait on the part of
capitalists to goad the worker on to greater intensity of toil".
Up to the present time profit-sharing has made even less
progress in this country than has co-operative production, and
the reason for this will be clear if Professor Beesly in the
following words accurately states the English presentment:
"The profit-sharing capitalist said in effect to his workmen :
The profit I have been in the habit of taking I still intend
to take. I mean to stick to it, and to use it for my own
advantage. I do not intend to let you have any share of it,
direct or indirect; nor do I mean to put by a reserve fund
to enable me to keep up your wages in bad times. But I tell
you what I will do: if you like to work harder, and take more
care of my tools and my materials, and so create an additional
profit, then I am willing to allow you, not the whole of the
additional profit, but a portion of it."" I venture to suggest
that Professor Beesly here took a bad form of profit-sharing,
and that it is the better side with which it is most desirable to
familiarise the mind of the wage-earner.
The famous cases of Jean Godin and of Leclaire in France,
clearly showed that there were other and better forms of profit-
sharing than this which Professor Beesly rightly denounced.
I agree that to make profit-sharing real, there must be "give"
as well as "take", and that at present it is easier and wiser
for the capitalist to "give" out of something already acquired.
The application of a force which used to be frequently
(
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
153
applied in old times against workers, is now being energetically
advocated and clamored for by many workers against employers,
and the principle of such application is accepted by persons
looked to as leaders of great parties-I mean the force of penal
law.
Lord Randolph Churchill declares that he is "distinctly
inclined to prefer the advantages of State interference to the
dangers which may arise owing to a great national struggle ",
such as was shadowed forth by the coal-miners when threaten-
ing to lay all the pits idle if their claims were not conceded.
Lord Randolph Churchill did not express any opinion as to
what kind of State interference was to be exercised if Parlia-
ment and the Executive Government happened to take a view
hostile to the claims of the men. The assumption seems to
be that Parliament will only act in accordance with the wishes
of the wage-earners, but what if it goes the other way? Is
military force to be used to compel the men to submit to a
limitation of hours, or rate of wage, disagreeable to them?
It is nonsense to suppose, when thousands or hundreds of
thousands of workmen are involved in a labor dispute, that it
would be possible to enforce ordinary summary process against
such huge numbers. Lord Randolph Churchill, addressing the
miners' delegates, said that he regarded their argument as
indisputable, when they contended that they had a right to call
on Parliament to give effect to what they desired in the limita-
tion of the hours of labor. But suppose the desires of men
employed in one industry to conflict, or to be imagined as
conflicting, with the interests of men employed in some other
industry, is the right to call on Parliament to go with those
who can command the most votes?
Lord Dunraven told the miners on the same occasion that
154
LABOR AND LAW.
he thinks that State interference, to regulate the hours that
adult men shall work, can be justified on the ground that the
laws now in force forbid Sunday labor, and that if the number
of days a man shall work may be limited by law, so also may
be limited the number of hours in which the man shall work
in any one day. He agrees that it is difficult to disassociate
the question of limiting the hours of labor in one occupation,
as mining, from the larger and more general question of limiting
hours of labor in other trades or in all trades. It is assumed
by Lords Dunraven and Randolph Churchill, and by the miners.
who addressed them, that the only method by which limitation
of hours of labor can be secured is, either by force of statutes.
or by force of strikes. Mr. Pickard, one of the most energetic
amongst mining leaders, says, "We are quite aware that we
could establish eight hours a day in the course of a month
throughout the country at present: that is, if the owners were
willing to concede the matter. But if, on the other hand,
they did not, and we determined to push for eight hours.
by trades union effort, we should lay the whole of the collieries.
in the United Kingdom idle, and the very gentlemen who
are now advising us to go in for trades union effort would
be the very first to condemn us for conspiring to bring
about the object we have in view in that way." But
have trades unions now no other way than that of strikes of
settling a dispute as to conditions of labor?
The report
of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, claiming to have
140,000 members in the unions connected with the Federation,
made a serious declaration to the Jolimont Congress bearing on
this very point, i.e., "This Federation does not approve of
sliding scales, boards of arbitration and conciliation, as at
present understood and practised where they are now in opera-
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTES?
155.
tion". This would seem to be a condemnation, alike of all
voluntary, as well as of the statutory attempts, hitherto made to
settle differences between labor and capital by conciliatory
methods. If there were any reason for believing that this
disapproval was a judgment well considered and given after full
discussion, by direction of the bulk of the men, then it would be
clear that, at any rate amongst the federated miners, the
disposition was towards force rather than towards conciliation in
future labor disputes. There are three statutes already on the
statute-book relating to conciliation and arbitration.
The 30
and 31 Vict. cap. 105, renders possible the establishment of
Councils of Conciliation, and the 35 and 36 Vict., cap. 46
(amending the 5 Geo. iv, cap. 96), provides for Boards of
Arbitration. If the employers and employed in any trade
desired to have any dispute or difference as to hours, wages,
or other conditions of labor, decided between them, so that the
decision should be capable of enforcement, one or other of the
statutes above referred to was intended to provide the means of
obtaining that decision. No advantage has yet been taken of
these statutes: they are a dead letter. To use the words of
Sir M. Hicks-Beach, the men have preferred managing their
own affairs without the help of the law. Why have not those
who ask for further enactments at least tried to avail themselves.
of the existing laws? Mr. Crompton answered rightly when
he said that "the opinion of both employers and employed,
confirmed by experience, is against legal, and in favor of
voluntary, arbitration outside the law". A précis of the new law
establishing arbitration courts for settling labor disputes in
Germany, is given in the Board of Trade Journal for March, 1890.
The new legislation is a development of the former industrial
code, under which local arbitration courts, composed equally of
156
LABOR AND LAW.
employers and employed, might be established to decide all
disputes arising between masters and workmen, with regard to
questions relating to their employment. Now the central
provincial authorities can compel the establishment of such
courts, and their decision is made final.
Apparently the English miners do not regard the hours of
labor as matter either for friendly voluntary arbitrament, or fit
for decision by compulsory arbitration under the statutes just
referred to.
In the particular case of the eight hours statutory limit for
miners, it is not only the employers, but also the dissident
employed, whom it is specifically sought to coerce by law, and
this would probably turn out to be true in other occupations.
Mr. Pickard admits that the miners of Northumberland and
Durham are not in accord with those he represents, in the
demand for statutory regulation of the hours of labor, and he
fears that in some cases such a law would increase rather than
diminish the working hours in his trade. But if men may
legislate against their fellow workmen, may those having the
majority in Parliament legislate against all others on such
points? I object to legal force being used against adults, either
for the levelling up, or for levelling down, in matter of hours,
wage, or rate of production.
There is a very wide and growing difference in the views of
trades unionists as to efficient action in cases of labor disputes.
The older trades-unionism sought, and those who adhere to it
still seek, to effect its objects by conciliation, by arbitrament, by
give and take. This trades-unionism has my heartfelt support.
Each trade is found dealing with its own grievances, and
asserting its own claims, though receiving help from, and in
turn giving assistance to, the other trades as emergencies arise.
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUtes?
157
145
From the newer trades-unionism there is a declaration that the
old organisations and their conductors have failed, and the aid
of the law is said to be required to compel submission from the
employers where concession cannot be voluntarily obtained.
General declarations in favor of "less work and more money
in all employments, are substituted for specific grievances of
overwork and underpay in particular industries. With the
newer trades-unionism there is more unrest, less forethought,
more dash, and less steady work.
Under the old trades union methods, the leaders in a labor
dispute were generally men belonging to, and who had worked
at, the particular industry in which the difference arose, and
were mostly the trusted officers of the trade organisation. In
the newer developments, there are the names, constantly
repeated, of men not in any way connected with the trade of
the specific workers who are complaining; and sometimes the
names recurringly prominent are those of men whose means of
existence seem rather increased by the aggravation of differences
between employer and employed, than by the amicable settle-
ment of disputes.
""
Arbitration and conciliation between workmen and employers
become more really effective as the men are better organised
and as the trades organisations acquire large accumulated funds.
The officers of the trades unions, popularly chosen, and fairly,
though not too highly, remunerated, are able to ascertain the
condition of the trade, the demand for employment, and the
possible profits realised by the employer, more easily and more
accurately than is possible for the individual workman. In
conducting an arbitration, their arguments have the weight of
the numbers they represent. The fact that the funds of the
union must be dissipated in a strike, usually makes the
158
LABOR AND LAW.
↓
responsible heads of the union undesirous to embark in a trial
of strength, so onerous to their financial resources, until all
other means have failed. At present it is only a minority of
the workers in any trade who are members of the union. The
large majority of skilled and unskilled laborers stand outside
their several trade organisations, though reaping some of the
benefits accruing from the organised effort to secure to labor
the earliest advantage from good times.
The new organisations of unskilled laborers, whilst for many
reasons highly desirable, stand on a somewhat different footing
from the trades unions, properly so-called, which were, and are,
associations claiming a monopoly of special crafts for their own
members. These trades unions are, in a certain sense, the
successors of the whole guilds, except that the members usually
remain in the ranks of the employed, and less frequently rise
into employers. The employer too, is such by virtue of his
capital and trading knowledge, and it is the exception when he
has passed through the stages of apprentice, journeyman, and
master in the craft. Unless the unions of unskilled laborers
are held together by ably contrived benefit funds, it is extremely
doubtful whether they can be maintained, as continuing
organisations, for any lengthy period. As a rule the members
will be more unmanageable than in associations of skilled
artisans, and from the fact of their acceptance of casual labor,
will be evidently men who are less able to earn a livelihood and
far less capable of sustained thrift. It is to the support and
development of these unions of unskilled labor that true philan-
From those ranks our
thropists should direct their efforts.
criminal and pauper classes are mainly recruited.
Several of the advocates of legislative interference with
adult labor, base their claim on the ground that concessions
FORCE OR CONCILIATION IN LABOR DISPUTes?
159
won by the unions in prosperous times have often been
abandoned or taken away during periods of depression. This
phase of the question was clearly stated by Mr. Brassey in his
chapter on courts of conciliation; he looked to education to
develop the usefulness of such tribunals, regarding them as
more likely to prevent quarrels from arising, than to adjust real
quarrels once existing. He held, as I hold, that the constant
meeting of employers and representatives of the operatives
at the same table must naturally facilitate peaceful negotiation,
where a desire for peace exists on both sides. With constant
discussion, coming events will cast their shadows before, and
disputes are not likely suddenly to arise. I look for solution of
labor difficulties to conciliatory converse in which wage-earners
and wage-payers are often brought together, rather than to the
force of law standing between and keeping them apart.
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
M
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
In considering Continental Socialism and the probable conduct
of Continental Socialists in any possible European crisis, the
reader must bear in mind the terrible burden which labor has
to-day to bear in order to defray the ever increasing charges
of the enormous military army, maintained by each of the
great European powers. He must add, in most countries, the
incessant pressure of huge national indebtedness, so terribly
augmented during the past thirty years, and of which the
interest has to be paid by the exertions of national industry.
He must recollect that in most European countries all Socialistic
organisations have been met by repressive laws of exceeding
harshness and of most irritating oppressiveness. He must
recognise, as distinguishing European from British agitation,
that nearly the whole male population of the Continent is
trained and accustomed to the use of arms. Governments
which boast their military resources ought also to appreciate
the danger to themselves, in any revolutionary movement, result-
ing from the acquaintance of the whole population with the use
of arms. A feature which must not be disregarded in estimating
the action of Socialists, as distinguished from their theorising,
is the habit of blind reverence of the Russian for his Czar,
and in a lesser degree the obedience of the German to the head
of the Empire. In France the pre-revolutionary idolatry of the
( 163 )
M 2
164
LABOR AND LAW.
French for their King has gone; but the desire for a strong
government too often finds expression even from the lips of
some of the most advanced politicians.
Holding, as I do, the view that the present armed peace in
Europe is as oppressive and, because of its chronic burden,
almost as demoralising as any conceivable war; that Italy well.
illustrates the crushing pressure of military burdens; and that
Russia presents to us in its most brutal forms the constant
struggle between desperate force and merciless rule-I am
compelled to judge modern European Socialism in connexion
with that which to me seems inevitable at no distant date, and
which has threatened Europe for the past dozen years at least,
viz., a huge European war or a terrible European revolution.
The war menace is in turn between nearly all the countries of
Europe; the seeds of revolution are separately germinating in
each State. As a difficulty in the path of international
Socialism, or of any international effort requiring the sustained
concurrence of the industrial classes, it may be pointed out how
easily the passions of French workmen are inflamed against
Italians, and how readily Germans and Frenchmen are induced
to indulge in hostile demonstrations against each other. It has
been claimed on the other hand by Socialist advocates that the
growing solidarity of European workmen has prevented artisans
from one country being imported by employers during strike
disputes; the Trades Unions claim this action as belonging to
them, and not at all to be attributed to Socialist principles.
It is not easy to determine between these claims, though it
must be conceded that during the past twenty years the most
active of the workmen's associations on the Continent have
been more or less avowedly Socialistic. M. de Laveleye regards
it as due to the avowed or occult propaganda of the Inter-
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
165
national Working Men's Association that Socialism has invaded
the various countries of the world; but I doubt his judgment
on this head, especially when he advances as illustration that
the workmen of London in 1871 applauded or excused the
crimes associated with the Commune of Paris. I remember
dealing very strongly in 1871 with the whole subject of the
incendiary fires which followed the siege of Paris by the
Versailles troops. I think I shall be accurate in saying that,
though great consideration was manifested for the population of
Paris, starved and maddened during the previous winter siege.
by the Germans, there were comparatively few amongst English
workmen who extended any sympathy to those misguided men
who, associated with Felix Pyat, gave way to the promptings
of mad vengeance, and indulged in wanton destruction of the
public buildings of Paris. Socialism had its apostles in Europe
full fifty years prior to the foundation of the International
Working Men's Association: it had even in England a far more
active propaganda sixty years ago than can be claimed for it
to-day.
With Socialism prominent in professorial theories in Italy;
with the State Socialism used by Bismarck, ever at war as he
has been with the Socialists, and which State Socialism is now
advanced from the Imperial throne itself—even if we do not see
Socialism everywhere, it cannot be disregarded as a vital factor
in modern politics. Besides, there is the very grave danger that
the Church of Rome, mighty even in this its latter-day weak-
ness, and perhaps because of its weakness, may use Socialism
with the democracy as a means to endeavor to win back
through the people the temporal power which, even with the
aid of monarchs, it has been unable to retain.
The origins of the Socialisms of to-day are to be found in
166
LABOR AND LAW.
France during the last quarter of the eighteenth century, and
in Germany within the past half century. I will take them in
order of date, which is not, however, coincident with that of
logical merit.
The earliest phases of French Socialism found echo in
England between 1815 and 1848, and had our co-operative
associations for permanent beneficial results-despite the com-
plete failure in these islands of every attempt to reduce theory
to practice on purely Socialistic lines. Nor, indeed, have the
transatlantic experiments in French Socialism been much more.
successful.
It was in 1795-6 that Babœuf, Maréchal, and others planned
an insurrection against the French Directory in order to estab-
lish a Communistic Republic. Baboeuf proclaimed that happi-
ness consisted in equality, and that this equality was inconsistent
with the existence of any one man more rich or more powerful'
than his fellows. That this doctrine reduced to practice might
enforce a very dead level of inferiority was not unforeseen by
its promulgators. "Let all arts perish, if need be," declared
the Manifesto of the Equals, "provided we obtain real
equality." Babœuf sought to initiate his Communism by force,
and, being answered by the force he invoked, paid with his life
the penalty of failure. Etienne Cabet, a Communist of more
peaceful tendency, endeavored to practice Communism on
pacific lines, but, finding no room for his experiments in France,
sought to establish his community in the more sparsely popu-
lated New World. The experiment has not been an utter
failure, but is by no means such a success as to encourage
imitators. The members were at first held together by personal
devotion to their founder, but have of late years, and since
Cabet's death, divided into two communities, from each of
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
167
which there have been serious withdrawals; and from the
original and continuing smallness of these communities it may
be urged that the sense of personal property was never entirely
lost, and is now kept alive with much distinctness. Cabet
preached a Democratic Republic, tending to absolute equality,
with community of goods and labor.
A little later than Babœuf, and earlier than Cabet, came the
semi-socialistic propaganda of Saint Simon, which sought to
substitute state property for private property, but which
rejected equal distribution of the products of labor. The Saint
Simonians, in 1830, declared "that each one should rank accord-
ing to his capacity and be rewarded according to his works".
They have, as a body, been harmless advocates of theories for a
far-off Utopia. Charles Fourier was another instance of the
Socialist who trusted solely to pacific reasoning; and though
some of his philosophy is very wild, he deserves mention because.
one of the most practical and successful associations of capital
and labor was that founded at Guise by one of Fourier's ardent
disciples-the late Jean Godin. Godin, a man of some wealth,
engaged in iron and other industries, established at Guise the
Familistère, in which some of Fourier's views were reduced to
successful practice, at the cost, however, of disregarding many
points which Fourier urged as essential.
The first govern-
mental partial recognition of Socialism in France was in 1848,
when, under Louis Blanc, the right was conceded of the
laborers to demand work from the Government, if they were
unable otherwise to find employment. National workshops
were established, which Louis Blanc desired should gradually
absorb and displace all private industries. The experiments
were never fairly tried, and of course failed; they were opposed
from without and hardly sustained from within. It is improb-
168
LABOR AND LAW.
able that they would in any case have realized the dreams of
their patron. When Louis Blanc returned from his long exile.
he found himself regarded as retrograde by the apostles of a
more extreme application of Socialistic theories.
French Socialists may to-day be roughly classed as Anar-
chists and Collectivists; these again being subdivided sometimes
by mere personal differences. Under the Anarchists I include
those who still adhere to the memory of Blanqui, and who are
simply Irreconcilables, in any case without any great influence
for good. The Anarchists were brought into prominence by
the great trial at Lyons in 1883, their most illustrious name
being that of Elisée Reclus, chiefly known in this country by his
work as a geographer. In a joint declaration of principles,
signed by the forty-seven Anarchists tried at Lyons, and read
in court, the following passages will be found :—
"We wish liberty, that is to say, we demand for every human
being the right and the means of doing that which pleases him, and of
doing only that which pleases him: to satisfy integrally all his wants,
without any other limits than natural impossibilities, and the wants of
neighbors equally to be respected. We wish liberty, and we believe
its existence incompatible with the existence of any power whatsoever,
whatever its origin and form-whether it be elected or imposed,
monarchical or republican-whether inspired by divine right or by
popular right, by anointment or universal suffrage-the best govern-
ments are the worst. The evil in other terms, in the eyes of the
Anarchists, does not reside in one form of government more than in
another, it is in the idea of government itself, in the principle of
authority. The substitution, in a word, in human relations of free
contract perpetually revisable and dissoluble is our ideal.”
Elisée Reclus, answering for himself and co-workers the
question, “Why are we Anarchists?" urges, "We are revolu-
tionary because we desire justice, and injustice reigns every-
where triumphant." After giving illustrations, he says, "All this
appears to us infamous; we desire to change it; and against
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
169
·
""
injustice we appeal to the revolution; he affirms that,
"Never in history has any progress, either partial or general,
been accomplished by pacific evolution; it has always been
effected by sudden revolution;" and he winds up with the
passionate declaration that, "as long as wrong endures, the
anarchist Communists will remain permanently revolutionists”.
Some of the actual Socialists now prominent in France,
adopt the doctrines of Proudhon, who, vaguely affirming that
Socialism is every aspiration towards the amelioration of society,
declared that property is theft, and that property-holders are
thieves; and, coupling this with bitter denunciation of the
bourgeoisie, the extremer disciples occasionally resort to exhibi-
tions of criminal violence, as in the use of explosives in labor
contests. It is not, however, right to hold the main body of
Socialists responsible for such outrages. M. de Laveleye well
remarks that the red spectre haunts the imagination; and those
who are easily frightened see revoluntionary Socialism every-
where. At the present moment France, at peace, pays out of
its agriculture and manufactures no less than £80,000,000 per
year in making provision against war in the future, and as
payment of the charges created by war in the recent past; it is
hardly wonderful, then, that as labor troubles arise, there is also
a disposition manifested to shake off such a terrible deadweight
on present industry.
In the Chamber of Deputies a Socialist group has been
formed, consisting of Messrs. Boyer, Baudin, Couturier,
Cluseret, Ferroul, Franconie, Lacluze, Theson, and Thurier,
which group not merely refused to receive into its ranks, but
denounced as a possibilist, the working-man deputy, J. B.
Dumay, whose maiden speech in the debate on the Government
match monopoly produced a considerable impression. There
*
170
LABOR AND LAW.
are other and more philosophical Socialists with seats in the
Chamber, who would probably be no more acceptable to the
above group.
It is, perhaps, hardly fair to put to the debit of even Anar-
chistic Socialism the language used by Louise Michel and her
co-workers, but it is worth notice that, at a crowded meeting of
Anarchist and Revolutionary Socialists recently held in Paris,
Mdlle. Louise Michel declared, amidst enthusiastic applause,
that, "it was not by mere scribbling that despots could be got
rid of, but with dynamite;" that herself and friends "would not
be over careful of their skins," and would leave the Government
(C
no choice but Cayenne or the firing-party". Since then, M.
Weil, editor of an Anarchist journal-Le Père Peinard-has been
convicted of publishing articles expressly encouraging the
pillage of large drapery warehouses and the murder of "financial
and banking vultures". The speech of M. Weil in his own
defence was hardly that of a sane man: claiming that he was a
revolutionist and anarchist, whose object was to secure for the
people a better state of things than now existed, he justified
general destruction and slaughter in effecting the change
sought.
At Troyes, towards the close of last year, an association
declaring itself specifically Revolutionary Socialist, publicly
claimed the right to summarily put an end to private property,
and to produce social equality by revolution. It advocated
class war, without compromise, between the workmen and “la
classe bourgeoise". Although a small association, it is a fair type.
of others frequently to be met with in the industrial centres of
France.
It is not therefore without gravity that during the last few
years the Socialists have taken prominent and active part in
¡
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
171
the labor struggles in France. In that country, and indeed
throughout Europe, they have done this by initiating strikes
of workmen against employers; and they appear, in more than
one instance, to have even promoted the strike without them-
selves being connected with the industry in which the dispute
arose, and without regard to the possibilities of success or
failure; it is further regrettable that they appear often to have
encouraged the resort to intimidation and violence, in order to-
compel unwilling workmen to join in the movement. This state
of things was especially noticeable on the occasion of the strike
of the colliers of the Loire, in the autumn of 1888, when
M. Bazly, who had himself been one of the leading spirits in
the previous strikes at Anzin and Decazeville, went personally
to the pits near St. Etienne, and, forseeing the failure of the
strike, did his best to dissuade the men from throwing up their
employment. He warned the strike leaders that the strike
would end in nothing save disaster, since two-thirds of the
colliers were not in its favor; he strongly deprecated the
intimidation attempted, and he ridiculed the cry "la mine aux
mineurs," which had been raised by the Socialist leaders to
encourage the men to come out on strike. The Socialists, in
various places, met and denounced M. Bazly as a traitor, but
his forebodings were too well founded, and the strike ended disas-
trously for the men. In England, Socialists quite unconnected
with coal mining were prominent in urging the Northumberland
miners to strike, and for months previously to strikes in other
occupations similar cases have been noticeable. In Germany,
in the Dortmund district, in May, 1889, certain Socialists, not
pitmen, who took a leading part in the earliest stages of the
strike, urged that the laboring classes must wage war against
capital as their natural and bitter enemy; and to induce the
172
LABOR AND LAW.
men to come out, they professed that large sums of money were
on the way from Hamburg, England, France, and Switzerland,
to assist the strikers. At the instigation of some of the more
misguided, attempts were made at two or three collieries to
destroy some of the plant, and troops being brought on the
scene several lives were lost. It may be asserted that Socialist,
as distinguished from Trade, organizations essentially differ on
this question of strikes. The Trades' organizations, wishful
for peace and remunerative employment, seek compromise
rather than war; the Socialist associations regard the strike
as embittering the relations between employer and employed,
and giving facilities to the Socialist propaganda.
Gronlund on this very point says frankly enough, that "it
is of course to the discontented wage workers that the Socialists
can appeal with the greatest chance of success, because it is
to them that the rankest injustice is being done"; and he
claims that "the Socialist alone lays bare that injustice".
Men, who like myself, regard Socialism as the neutralization
of the highest individual effort, cannot help feeling that the
toiler in hunger and squalor is more disposed to listen to the
impassioned tones of the one who paints most vividly the con-
trast between his wretchedness and the millionaire's luxury,
than to the less moving story of the other, who shows how
the average happiness of the worker has augmented through
long generations of patient endeavor.
By the statistical report on strikes in France for the eleven
years ending in 1885, it appears that there had been 804 strikes
of French workmen during that period; of which full details
are given in 700 cases. It is curious that while forty-six strikes
were in favor of a reduction of the hours of labor, thirteen were
declared by the men in opposition to a reduction of the working
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
173
hours proposed by the employers. 216,662 workmen were un-
employed through these strikes, or an average of 19,700 per
year; and, as a total in the eleven years, the workmen lost
5,509,367 days' employment. 106 of the strikes succeeded, in
120 instances both sides gave way, and in 427 cases the men
failed.
M
Since the Franco-Prussian war the state of the French
workmen has been one of constant pressure.
The cost of living
is far higher in all the great cities, the pressure of the conscrip-
tion more acute. For ten years or so much was endured in the
hope of la revanche. A special feeling of hostility prevailed
against German workmen and the German nation; and though
he would be a bold man who ventured to assert that this
enmity has died out, it is certain that the Frenchman bears
less patiently than heretofore the cost of the tremendous arma-
ments with which Republican France has prepared itself for
another struggle with Imperial Germany.
The dry figures tell their own sad story. In 1852 the
national indebtedness of France was £220,647,872; in 1887, it
had risen to £867,950,000. The worst feature is, that the debt
of France has risen by no less than £30,000,000 since 1876-
that is, the debt has increased quite apart from the liquidation
of the war liabilities. The annual naval and military expendi-
ture of France is now £36,539,560; in 1875, it was under
£30,000,000. The increase in the French Budget of 1890 is
mainly attributable to additional expenditure in the War
department. It will be seen that, adding together the ordinary
and extraordinary budgets, the Ministry of War figures for
£28,413,630, and the Ministry for Marine £8,125,930. The
annual charges for the national debt, including terminable
annuities and interest on the floating debt, amount to
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LABOR AND LAW.
£43,900,800. The great hope against Socialism in France
consists in the fact that not only is the land divided amongst
a very large number of small proprietors, but that, in 1889, no
less than 6,492,000 persons, or about one in six of the popula-
tion, had deposits in saving banks amounting to £120,000,000.
There is in Belgium a school advocating what is described
by its professors as Rational Socialism, its organ being a
monthly review, la Philosophie de l'Avenir, which is edited by
M. Frederic Borde, a disciple of the late M. Colins, who, about
forty years ago, occupied the position which would now be
defined as that of Possibilist Collectivist. Colins advocated the
gradual nationalization of the land. M. Borde, in a letter
addressed to the President of the Berlin International Labor
Conference, maintains that the cause of poverty is the aliena-
tion of the land, and that to destroy pauperism it is necessary
to make the ownership of land collective property. Dr. A.
de Potter is prominently associated with M. Borde, and the
tenor of the propaganda of these gentlemen and their co-workers
is purely educational. La Société Nouvelle represents, perhaps, a
slightly more advanced phase of national Socialism. MM. Jules
and Ferdinand Brouez, Dr. A. Loin, and Dr. C. de Paepe are
amongst its most prominent contributors. Belgian Socialism,
so far as it can be judged from an English standpoint, may be
dismissed from the consideration of this essay, which is intended
to be limited to the consideration of Socialism in connexion
with possible European revolution, or with war, precipitated by
some reckless statesman with intent to avert such a revolution.
Last summer the Belgian Socialists presented to the Paris
Congress, by their delegate, M. Defnet, a piteous report of the
miserable condition of the Belgian workman, who, it was
alleged, worked thirteen to fourteen hours per day, with an
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
175
average wage of one franc per day, and one-third at least of the
population being obliged to resort to the bureau de bienfaisance.
Even allowing for some disposition to strongly color the report,
the state of things must, as a whole, be almost unendurable.
Some labor laws, the need of which were stated in the report,
have been since passed by the Belgian Chamber.
In Holland, the Socialist movement has been led for some
years by Domela Nieuwenhuis, a most earnest and upright man,
editor of the Recht voor Allen, and now a member of the second
chamber of the States-General. He has been the object of
more than one government prosecution, and has a widely-
extended popularity. A most remarkable event occurred on
the 24th November last, when, with the authorization of the
local civil and religious authorities, Domela Nieuwenhuis, from
the pulpit of the Reformed Church of the parish of St. Anne,
Frisia, delivered an address in favor of Socialism, to some
2,000 persons of all classes who crowded every corner of the
church. Even opponents listened with rapt attention to his
earnest pleading. Nieuwenhuis impressed me exceedingly
when I met him a few years ago in Amsterdam: he has all
the devotion of an enthusiastic missionary, and would be
capable of dying for those he led.
There is in Denmark a certain amount of Socialistic movement,
and at the January elections to the Folkething three avowed
Socialists were successful, of whom two obtained seats for Copen-
hagen. The leader is M. Holm, and his Socialism is certainly not
of a revolutionary character. There has recently been a sharp
division amongst Danish Socialists; the more extreme section,
represented by the Arbeijderen, having been, by formal vote,
excluded from the Socialist working-men's party, whose organ
is the Socialdemokraten.
176
LABOR AND LAW.
In Italy Socialism is in its acute stages; the breakdown
from continued and increasing financial deficit seems only a
question of time; the expenses, chiefly military, have been in
the past eight years increased by £13,500,000, as against an
increased receipt from taxation of £8,500,000. During 1888-89
the tendency has been decreased revenue, in consequence of
reduced receipts from taxes on various articles of consumption.
The certain increase of expenditure already sanctioned for the
next few years is, for 1890-91, £2,200,000; 1891-92, £3,240,000;
1892-93, £4,400,000; 1893-94, £5,200,000. In 1861 the na-
tional indebtedness of Italy was about £120,000,000; it is
now £520,000,000. It is estimated that the provincial and
communal indebtedness of Italy is about £43,000,000; while
the debt on private mortgages of land amounts to upwards of
£310,000,000. The ordinary military and naval expenditure
of Italy, on a peace footing, not including the special credits,
is roughly about 455,500,000 lire. The general distress amongst
the Italian peasantry is of most serious character. Thousands
attempt to escape by emigration, and many of the unfortunate
emigrants leave their country in an utterly destitute condi-
tion. In 1886, the number of emigrants was 167,829; in 1887,
215,665; in 1888 the number had increased to 290,336, and was
still larger during the past year. Amongst small tradesmen the
number of insolvencies is constantly increasing. Many of the
emigrants having met with a shocking fate in South America,
whither they have chiefly gone, severe measures have been
taken by the Italian Government against the emigration agents,
who have deceived large numbers of Irish and Belgians as well
as these unfortunate Italians. But to check the tide of emigra-
tion is to swell the human ocean at home, and the authorities
at the Quirinal may, at any moment, have to face what is
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
177
C
denounced as Socialist anarchy, but which is really the revolt
against suffering become unendurable. In a letter recently
published by the Italian deputy, Signor Giovanni Faldella, he
states that "Whoever lives in the rural districts must find
himself in daily contact with the most horrible misery"; that
garbage of all kinds is eaten; and that if an animal dies from
disease, great care has to be taken by the authorities to prevent
the peasantry from disinterring and eating the carcase. Signor
Andrea Costa, the working printer, and a few other advocates
of Socialism, are members of the Italian Parliament. The
danger is, however, too great to be averted by the slow
amelioration possible by any legislation. The military burden
of Italy is beyond bearing; and a Socialism which promises
food to the starving, naturally finds willing auditors. The
undue sensitiveness to criticism recently manifested by Signor
Crispi, and his consequent expulsion of certain foreign corre-
spondents from Rome, arises from his knowledge of the facts
here urged. The correspondent of L'Independarce Belge had
stated that the best paid agricultural laborers in Lombardy
last year earned 6d. per day in winter, 8d. in summer, and that
the others only earned from 4d. to 5d. per day.
Signor Costa was, with three fellow Socialists, recently con-
demned to fine and three years' imprisonment, on the charge of
having resisted the police when dispersing a meeting in memory
of Oberdank. Lazzari, and several other Socialists, have been
prosecuted and imprisoned for making speeches in favor of
strikes; and Sergio de Cosmo has been criminally indicted for a
pamphlet entitled, Misery and Revolution,' of which, it is
alleged, many thousands of copies have been circulated by
Socialist advocates amongst the starving peasantry. A publica-
tion with the title Hunger Congress,' which was in the course
N
،
178
LABOR AND LAW.
of printing at Turin, was seized by the police, and the type
broken up.
Modern Socialism was imported into Austria from Prussia,
and whilst at first spreading much more rapidly in the Austrian
Empire, has usually been advocated with less violence than
in other parts of Europe. Notwithstanding this comparative
moderation, the Viennese Government has always regarded
the Socialism of the International Working Men's Association
as in the highest degree dangerous to the State, and the
Ministry showed especial alarm some twenty years ago when
Austrian and South German delegates attending the Eisenach
Congress formed the chief supporters of the German Social
Democratic Labor Organization.
The official organ of Austrian Socialism was, until recently,
Die Gleichheit: but this journal has succumbed under numerous
fines inflicted by the Government, and in consequence of the
imprisonment of its editor, Dr. Adler. It advocated Com-
munistic Socialism, and has been replaced by a weekly at
Vienna, the Arbeiter-Zeitung, the chief contributor to which
journal is Herr Kautsky, a very learned man, and a most able
exponent of the Socialist theories of the Marx school. The
Austrian Government has prohibited the passage through the
post or the importation of 230 home and foreign journals
suspected of Socialism.
In Austria, where nearly every socialistic organization has
been the subject of prosecution, Socialism is really the expres-
sion of intense misery consequent on acute poverty. Starvation,
bordering on famine, is officially reported as prevalent at the
present time amongst the Galician peasantry. It is hardly
wonderful therefore that a Peasants' Union has been formed
to agitate against the large landholders. In the coal districts
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
179
of Moravia and Silesia there is a great strike now proceeding,
and fatal results have followed collision between the military
and the workmen. This strike is only one of a numerous series
prevailing for the past three years. The Times correspondent
writes:-"There is great restlessness among the laboring classes
just now throughout Austria. Scarcely a day passes without
more or less serious demonstrations in one of the provincial
-capitals or industrial centres."
Though the military expenditure of Austro-Hungary does
not seem so disastrous in its oppressiveness as that of its
neighbors on either side, it still shows a serious increase
during the past ten years, being about £8,500,000 in 1889, as
against a little over £6,000,000 in 1879, these sums being
exclusive of the sum of £1,200,000 for Honveds charged on
the Hungarian budget. Austrian finance, however, mostly
shows an annual deficit, and the industrial population complain
bitterly of the pressure of fiscal burdens, which are considerably
heightened by the charges of the public debt, which in 1879
involved an annual expenditure of £9,650,000, since increased
to £12,436,000. The total imperial debt of Austro-Hungary is
a little over £305,000,000, which shows an increase of nearly
seventy millions sterling since 1876.
Although the names of Bakounine and Krapotkin have
sometimes been prominent in connexion with French Revolu-
tionary Socialism, and Prince Krapotkin has not concealed his
desire to familiarize Frenchmen with the use of the terrible
weapons which chemical science places within the reach of the
very weakest, I am inclined to doubt whether the theory of
Socialism has much influence amongst the peasants in Russia.
The movement to-day called Nihilist is not Socialist: it is the
reaction of despair against brute force. Its crimes are begotten
N 2
180
LABOR AND LAW.
of the chronic criminality in the rulers, on which such lurid
light has just been thrown by the revelations from Siberia,
and with which, during the past few years, we have been
familiarized in England, by the writings of Stepniak and
Tikhomirov.
Stepniak described the present Nihilist movement as initiated
about twenty years ago, "by a set of young enthusiasts of
socialistic creed," and adds that "now under the influence of
internal causes, and the great spread of disaffection in the
country, it is tending to transform itself into a vast patriotic
revolutionary party, composed of people of various shades of
opinion, united in a common effort to destroy a tyranny ob-
noxious to all". It is true that the programme of the Narodnaia
Volia party declares that "only on socialistic grounds humanity
can become the embodiment of freedom", but this is a little
vague, and the declaration of "immediate purpose" is much
more distinct, i.e., "the liberation of the nation from the oppres-
sion of the present state by making a political revolution with
the object of transferring the supreme power into the hands of
the nation". Only two of the articles of the programme are
necessarily socialistic, viz., "Nationalization of the Land:
Series of measures tending to transfer the possession of fabrics
to workmen ". Indeed the second might be affected by co-opera-
tion, or by the extension of the limited liability principle. Some
of the articles of the programme appear to be non-socialistic,
or, at any rate, quite consistent with private property in capital.
To outsiders, the Russian mir with its communal tenure of
the soil, and its almost despotic control of the private life of its
members, seemed already of a socialistic character, but whether
a relic of the Socialism of barbarism, or a first-fruit of a
Socialism of civilization, is not so easy to determine. There
•
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
181
are two kinds of peasant landholders; the Tchetvertniks, who
hold their land as private personal property, the quantity being
determined by a complicated process of division yielding very
unequal results; and the mir, in which the lots of land of each
citizen are equal, the amount of land varying in proportion to
the number of male inhabitants. The possessor only enjoys the
use of his lot, he has no power to alienate. It is said that the
institution of the miv is gaining ground. The large number of
works and factories belonging to the State might be regarded
as favorable to State Socialism, but the miserable condition of
those employed, shows at least that State control of industry is
possible without real benefit to the workers. The chief industry
of Russia is agriculture; the major part of that industry is in
the hands of the peasants, who, since 1861-by the terms of the
statute of emancipation from serfdom-have paid the nobles a
sum estimated at 800,000,000 roubles for the redeeming of the
land then assigned to the peasants. The Government took the
payments from the peasants, giving bonds for a much lesser
amount to the nobles. Our Foreign Office report for the
current year shows, that "having at their command a suddenly
and unexpectedly realized capital, a large proportion of the
Russian nobility soon squandered their fortunes". Of the lands
remaining nearly forty per cent are now mortgaged. And the
Foreign Office report states that the borrowers having con-
tinually failed to pay the interest due, "mortgages have been
necessarily foreclosed and an immense number of estates have
been thrown on the market. Land is now in many provinces
almost unsaleable, for there is no capital available for its
purchase; the peasants have none, the nobility have none; and
by recent legislation the Jew and the foreigner have been
debarred from purchasing in the most important western pro-
182
LABOR AND LAW.
vinces." It is alleged by Tikhomirov, that the land assigned to
the peasants in 1861 was inferior in quality, and less in quantity
than they had been led to expect; that the holding was fettered
with harassing restrictions, and that the peasant was over-
whelmed with taxation. "Poor and riddled with debts, the
peasant cannot make any improvement in his land; he is
obliged to cultivate it anyhow." It is not difficult to under-
stand how the cry "Land and Liberty" has found favor with
the Russian peasant. It is probable that in the great towns, a
sort of anarchic Socialism is popular with the more educated
talkers and writers, but the discontent is against the crushing
functionary rule of which the Czar is the head.
Stepniak, who speaks of the Russian peasants as a very
patient, all-enduring race, cowed by traditional subjection,
says "they are moreover, quite isolated. No separate pea-
sant rising has any chance of victory, and no simultaneous
rising is possible. They rise out of sheer despair when they
cannot bear any more, when their condition is such that they
have either to die from hunger and misery, or to take the law
into their own hands."
-
Bakounine, who has always been labelled as a typical
Nihilist, wrote, "Communism I abhor, because it is the nega-
tion of liberty. I abhor it because it concentrates all the
strength of society in the State, and squanders that strength.
in its service." Bakounine was essentially a revolutionary;
twelve years of imprisonment and Siberian exile bore fruit in
his declaration which, "admitting no other activity than that
of destruction," recognised poison and the poniard amongst the
forms in which such activity ought to express itself.
Whilst a peasant revolution in Russia seems possible in the
present state of misery, often approaching famine, and whilst
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
183
agrarian crimes have certainly been on the increase during the
past decade, Stepniak, who writes with knowledge, says—" the
revolution of to-day is a town revolution, and is quickly ap-
proaching". Still, a serious revolution might be possible in
Russia without necessarily extending into Europe proper; to
me the danger is that the Czar by fear, or the Czar's advisers
by design, may use, or be driven to use, the huge military
force in war, as a means of evading the pressure of impending
revolution, and of distracting the national mind by the raising
of so-called national questions; a policy in which the rulers of
civilized and uncivilized countries have alike proved apt.
Stepniak is of opinion that Russian revolution will affect the
whole of Central Europe, but he considers that "a vast union
of self-governing states and provinces is the only form in which
a free Russia can mould herself". I venture to doubt whether
there is sufficient evidence for the probable, or even possible,
sudden creation of such "a free Russian federation as Step-
niak hopes for.
C
Georg Brandes, in 1888, pictured the present condition of
Russia as "the product of a reaction now twenty five years old,
constantly fortified anew by insurrections and attempts at as-
sassination," and accepting this view many educational ex-
periences seem likely to precede "a free Russian federation ".
M. de Cyon, in his recent paper on France and Russia, com-
plains that the representatives of the Czar received no invitation
to the labor conference convened by the German Emperor at
Berlin.
}}
Russia's acute difficulty, as that of Italy, is in the desperate
state of her finances. Her public debt to the 1st January,
1889, was £719,232,000, an increase of no less than £317,000,000
during the past twenty years. Her annual expenditure for
184
LABOR AND LAW.
1888-9 was £89,516,000; in 1871 it was less than £50,000,000.
Of this, in 1871, war and marine expenditure on peace footing
figured for about £18,400,000.
The war expenditure of Russia for 1890, stated in paper
roubles, of which the exchange value is officially fixed at 22°33
pence per rouble, is 222,041,314; the marine expenditure is
39,193,553. Mr. Law, our attaché at St. Petersburg, notes that
the greatest increase on the military budget during the last
five years is to be found this year, exceeding that of 1889 by
6,500,000 roubles. He adds that "Russia is determined not
to be left behind in the costly European military competition".
The Socialism of Germany I regard as the most dangerous
to the peace of Europe, partly because it is the most logical,
partly because it has during the past twenty-five years been
kept down with an iron hand, chiefly perhaps because first
Prince Bismarck, and now the Emperor, have in turn shown
that they regard State Socialism as practicable. Germans
are now educated enough to suffer much from adverse life
conditions, and the military training of the huge majority will
render them so dangerous in any revolutionary social movement
that it was always possible that a masterful ruler like Bismarck
might have given the nation the excitement of war to divert
the masses from too near an approach to revolution. What the
Emperor will do, or can do, it is very hard to say. If rumor
does not do him injustice he thinks that it is possible to fix the
rate of wages by imperial decree-a task as feasible as that of
hindering the incoming tide by planting Canute's chair on the
beach. No less than thirty-five Social Democrats, returned by
a larger number of voters than that commanded by any other
political party, have seats in the present Reichstag, so that the
parliamentary expression of Socialism ought to be full, especially
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
185
as many of those elected are men of eminent ability. A dozen
years of repressive anti-Socialist legislation have brought about
this triumph. In Saxony, where the law has been most oppres-
sive, the Socialist success has been greatest. In January of
last year, at a bye-election for the Reichstag, the burgomaster
of Offenburg placarded the following announcement :-" Who-
ever votes for the Socialist candidate, Adolphe Geck, will be
liable to a fine of 1,000 marks or six months' imprisonment ".
In 1884, when the parliamentary representation was much more
scanty, the remarkable writer using the nom de plume of Comte
Paul Vasili truly said of the German Socialists in the then
Reichstag: "Never did a political party better defend a des-
perate cause, never did a mere handful of men give proof of
more indomitable courage and virile energy". Having a most
difficult position to sustain in the German Parliament, Herr
Bebel and his friends have shown a firmness, an independence,
an ability and persistence worthy of high praise.
It is not easy to judge the German Socialists by their con-
duct in exile, for the judicial revelations from Switzerland have
made clear that in that country at any rate the German police have
not hesitated to employ agents provocateurs, who, pretending to be
exiles, tried to draw the unfortunates with whom they came
in contact into plots and projects of dynamite and incen-
diarism.
The actual leaders of German Socialism during the recent
elections were Bebel, Grillenberger, Liebknecht, Meister, and
Singer. Their calm attitude helped to preserve the peace
despite great provocation, and showed a sense of the enor-
mously augmented voting power behind them. It was the
first occasion on which the electoral body had been able with
reasonable freedom to pronounce its judgment against the
LABOR AND LAW.
186
anti-Socialist laws, and nearly 1,400,000 voters on the 20th
February polled for Socialist candidates, being an increase of
upwards of 600,000 votes since 1887, and an increase of more
than 800,000 votes since 1884. These votes of February, 1890,
were the popular answer to the recent great government prose-
cution of more than eighty Socialists, including the deputies
Bebel, Grillenberger, Schumacher, and Harm. The trial of
these men at Elberfeld lasted some twenty-seven sittings, 468
witnesses being examined; forty-three of the accused were
acquitted, including Bebel, Grillenberger, and Schumacher.
Their parliamentary colleague Harm, less fortunate than they,
was sentenced to six months' imprisonment, and the remainder
to various terms of imprisonment ranging from eighteen months.
to fifteen days. The chief charge against all the accused was
of being members of a secret Socialist organization.
The
answer, most eloquently and clearly put by Bebel, was that
everything had been done openly and publicly, without either
mystery or secrecy; they admitted frankly their Socialism and
denied the charges of secret conspiracy. The worst feature of
this long trial was the clear proof that German police agents.
had, with the knowledge of high officials, themselves endea-
vored to incite to the commission of crimes of violence. What
the rulers do in militarizing the whole of the German people
tends to make the poorer peasant-soldier a ready disciple of the
doctrine that he is entitled to use force in order to avenge
wrong or to redress injustice.
The recent action of the Emperor William on labor ques-
tions is said to be inspired by the State-Socialist Hintzpeter,
who is a disciple of Rodbertus, the father of modern German
Socialism. But who can say how long the inspiration will
endure? The Emperor is described as of a fiery temperament,
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
187
which manifests itself in unreasoning flashes, in mystic thought,
in bizarre conceptions, and in general impulses; a temperament
which, however, the least obstacle transforms into ebullient.
rage. Will William II, when he finds that rescripts are not
four-leaved shamrocks, patiently persevere in a good intention
of labor amelioration, or will he try the sabre where the pen
has been blurred or hindered? Professor Ely describes Karl
Rodbertus "as one of the ablest Socialists who ever lived
and as "perhaps the best representative of pure theoretical
Socialism". Rodbertus was a member of the National Assem--
bly in 1848, and of the Prussian Legislature in 1849. He was,
for a brief period, Minister of Education, and would probably
be regarded to-day as too retrograde by the bulk of the German
Socialists. He taught that there were three stages in economic
development. In the first, private property in human beings
existed as slavery, serfdom, and vassalage.
In the second,
private property in capital was a social institution. In the
third, private property in income was alone to be allowed. He
did not, however, propose any summary or immediate pro-
hibition of private property in land or capital, but spoke of the
abolition of pauperism by Socialistic methods as the work of
centuries.
""
>
Whilst Rodbertus would have relied on gradual and slow
progress, the communistic party which grew up was more im-
patient, and declared that its aims could "only be attained by a
violent overthrow of the existing social order". Nor is this
matter for surprise; the hungry cannot wait, the oppressed with
knowledge of power will not wait, for an amelioration of life
conditions which may benefit their great grandchildren, but
does not at once bring food or comfort to themselves. Those
now suffering are not content to tunnel the mountain which
188
LABOR AND LAW.
F
bars the path; they prefer to try to blow it up, even at the risk
of being crushed by the falling débris. A prominent German
politician is credited with the declaration "that bread and corn
are dearer in Germany than anywhere else in the world". No
wonder if those in need of food and with scant means, or with
none at all, listen with eager ears to the most extreme and most
violent Socialist advocacy. There is one point on which Rod-
bertus wrote with great distinctness, namely, the hours of labor.
The term normal working day does not mean with him a legally
determined number of hours per day. He expressly says that
the expectation that such a normal day will protect the laborers
from the greed of their employers and secure them fair wages
is entirely without foundation. He regards the legal limitation
of the period of labor, in the case of adult males, as impractic-
able and indefensible. He maintains that the State has no
right to say to a free man "You shall work no more than so
many hours daily". Probably Rodbertus would find few sup-
porters amongst the German Socialist leaders of the present
day.
The philosophic Socialism of Rodbertus was temporarily
lost sight of in the popular Socialism of Ferdinand Lassalle,
whose force and influence were dissipated in the wars which,
despite the International Peace Congresses, succeeded each
other in Europe with terrible rapidity, until Prussia had won
for its king the Imperial Crown, and Germans had been
dazzled with an unity welded on the battlefield, and either
needing, or at any rate having, constant increase of armed
force to sustain it. To secure the military service serious
difficulties were raised against emigration; men who might
have found content in the Western Prairies, were retained
to be discontented in the shadow of Berlin.
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
189
More logical, though less popular, than Lassalle, Karl Marx
stands as the exponent of revolutionary Collectivism in his.
declaration of war against the bourgeoisie. In his attempts at
the international organization of Socialism Marx signally failed;
but as a German his influence has been enormous amongst
his own countrymen, and his name has, during the past seven
years, been used in England as though his grave had been a
fertile garden for the growth of his views on capital and labor.
There is no space in this paper for the discussion of his
theories of value, which are most pressed on this country by
men who understand them least. All I am concerned to note
here is his inspiration of the German social revolutionary
movement, of which many of the active workers have never-
theless devoted themselves more to peace and reform than to
the war of classes, of which Marx sounded the advance.
The outspoken declarations of Bebel, Liebknecht, and
Frohme, in the late Reichstag, against the militarism of the
Empire, and especially the remarkably eloquent protest of
Bebel, offered in the name of German workmen, against
war and annexation, gain additional force from the recent
re-election of these orators of the people. I firmly believe
that if the laws which prohibit Socialists from speech publica-
tion and association were all repealed, a more moderate
tendency in politics would be the natural outcome of German
general education.
In the case of Germany figures are fearfully eloquent. In
1883-4 the Imperial expenditure was £29,363,000, in 1888-9
it had increased to over £60,000,000. Of these in 1883-4
the army and navy cost about £20,250,000; in 1888-9
this sum had augmented to nearly £39,000,000.
Germany had practically no Imperial debt; in 1887 the
In 1873,
190
LABOR AND LAW.
debt of the Empire had grown to £33,727,000, and it has since
increased.
International Socialism would have but small influence in
Europe, but for the foolish action of the several Governments,
who drive into exile, chiefly into Switzerland, the most active
spirits, who are thus thrown together in moods of despair, and
in desire of revenge. Those who go to the new world leave
behind them their native troubles, and, seeking life in the trans-
atlantic territories in which they settle, there utilise their energy
in the struggle for happier existence. Those who are unable,
or unwilling, to go further than the cantons of the Swiss
Federation, are near enough to hear the repeated cries of
their oppressed countrymen, and have little to divert them
from the work of conspiracy against the rulers who have given
personal cause for hate. It is about eleven years since, that
at the Socialist Congress at Wyden, Switzerland, it was
resolved to erase from the programme the limitation of proceed-
ing by legal means. Prince Bismarck, and those who in other
Governments had copied him, had made work for legal reforms
almost impracticable. The exiles resolved to meet force by
force, the sword of the State was answered with the poniard
or the pistol, or, worse still, by dynamite or other explosive.
As the advocacy of such means could seldom be open, secret
conspiracy involved traitorous betrayal. Police spies to track
out criminal endeavor were sometimes the first to incite the
plot or to furnish the pecuniary means of mischief to the
plotters. Taken at the best, these Socialists in exile are very
dangerous, for they are very earnest; to use the words of
Laurence Gronlund, they "aim at revolution and care not a jot
about reforms ".
Two international Socialist Congresses were held at the
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE.
191
same time in Paris last year; one, called "Marxist", was
attended by eighty-two German delegates; at the other,
described as "Possibilist", not a single German delegate
was present. An unsuccessful attempt was made, on the initia-
tive of Signor Costa, to amalgamate the two Congresses.
Delegates were present from Belgium, Holland, Poland, Italy,
Austro-Hungary, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, and Switzerland,
as well as from England and the United States.
Of Spanish Socialism I have said nothing in this paper.
In speech it is chiefly of the Anarchist type, as exemplified
at a meeting held at Valencia on April 21st, when a meeting
of some two thousand persons, stated to be of the middle and
working-classes, unanimously declared in favor of a social
revolution which should sweep away the capitalists and the
privileged classes.
May-Day throughout Europe has passed with sufficient of
general demonstration to give cause for most serious thought,
though without the uprising feared in Austria, or the mischief
publicly threatened in France. Under the Republic of M.
Carnot there have been wholesale arrests in Paris, and it is
not easy to believe that they have all been necessary. Under
the Austro-Hungarian Empire in Vienna, where shopkeepers
and merchants seemed utterly panic-stricken, great military
preparations were made to meet a movement of anticipated
grave revolt.
Did the authorities and middle class alike
deceive themselves, or were the intending rioters overawed?
Throughout the German Empire there has been, on the whole,
a moderation, due, perhaps to consciousness of great strength,
and though some of the gatherings were not as large as
anticipated the universality of the manifestations has been
remarkable. Amongst the Italians and the Dutch some repres-
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LABOR AND LAW.
sion, but as a rule, fairly good order. In Spain a little more
friction, and the state of siege proclaimed in Barcelona. The
only thing very clear is that the avowed Socialists, without
any commanding leaders, have managed to utilise hunger
needs to an extent of concurrent action throughout Europe
pregnant with warning to all who wish for peaceful progress.
1
1
A STARVED GOVERNMENT
DEPARTMENT.
O
A STARVED GOVERNMENT
DEPARTMENT.
WHEN lecturing in the United States, in the winters of 1873
to 1876, I was much impressed by the steps which had then
been taken by some of the State Governments to ensure,
through a department called the "Bureau of Labor Statistics",
the collection of all statistics directly and indirectly relating to
labor, and I watched carefully as State after State (and ulti-
mately the Federal Government) adopted more efficient methods
for procuring and publishing such statistics. I determined to
introduce like methods in this country, and one of the earliest
successes I obtained in the House of Commons was immediately
after the close of my Parliamentary struggle, when, on March
2nd, 1886, I induced the House to unanimously assent to a
resolution that immediate steps should be taken to ensure, in
this country, the full and accurate collection and publication of
labor statistics. In my speech to the House I detailed what,
in my opinion, such statistics might specify, i.e. :—
1. The character, and number of each character, of the various
industries of the United Kingdom, number of persons and amount of
capital employed in each, specifying when any of these industries are
increasing or diminishing, and why, and whether any special industry
is limited to any particular locality, and the reasons, if known, for such
local limitation.
2. The hazardous nature or otherwise of each class of industry
( 195 )
O 2
196
LABOR AND LAW.
with the results to life, limb, and general health and habits of life in
each industry, giving also particulars as to laborers' dwellings, and
whether held from employers, and on what conditions.
3. Showing how many cases of exploitation in each industry by
limited liability companies or other corporations with their subscribed
and actually paid-up capital, and profit, and loss, distinguishing cases
where workers to any extent share profits.
4. The minimum, maximum, and average amounts of capital
embarked in each industry, distinguishing fixed and floating capital,
the raw material used, the gross wages paid, the value of manu-
factures produced, and the gross and net profit.
5. The individual wages paid in each industry, distinguishing men,
women, boys, and girls, and specifying highest, lowest, and average
wage; also showing whether wage paid weekly or at longer periods.
and in the latter case, whether companies' shops exist; also showing the
longest, shortest, and average number of hours worked per day, and
the industries in which there is both night and day work; and showing
the average duration of employment in each industry during each
year, and showing the cost and nature of living, including rent,
food, clothing, necessaries, and luxuries: specifying the cases: (1) in
which the earnings of individuals and of families, where more than
one individual was wage-earner in a family, were large enough to
leave a surplus beyond fair subsistence; (2) in which the family has
subsisted without incurring debt or receiving poor-law relief; (3) in
which the earnings did not equal the cost of subsistence. Showing
what trades and friendly societies exist in connexion with various
industries, with the amount of subscriptions and accumulated capital
of each, with annual amounts spent in strikes, sick, and other relief,
&c., and whether such societies are registered under the Friendly
Societies Acts; number of unionists and non-unionists in each trade;
comparative states of trades in which unions exist extensively as
against those having no unions; amount of savings' banks deposits,
and occupation of depositors.
6. Statistics of other countries where any, and in which, similar in-
dustries are carried on, with similar details where ascertainable.
I then thought, and still think, that the whole of the above
details would be most useful in preventing and diminishing
labor strife. The existence of reliable returns would prevent
the acceptance of exaggerated and misleading statements. In
industries where joint boards or councils of conciliation exist
•
A STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARTment.
197
such statistics would be helpful as illustrating possibly com-
peting manufactures. The Right Hon. A. J. Mundella, who
was then President of the Board of Trade, took a warm interest
in the matter, and appointed Mr. John Burnett, who had been
for many years a respected trades union official, to the newly-
created office of Labor Correspondent of the Labor Statistical
Department of the Board of Trade, of which department Mr.
Giffen fittingly took charge; but, in consequence of Mr. Glad-
stone's defeat on the Irish question, the further control of
initiatory steps passed into the hands of Lord Stanley of
Preston, who was also very favorable to the project, but found
difficulty in getting the Treasury to go to the extent required.
In August, 1886, a memorandum (Parliamentary Paper 48,
Session 2), was prepared by Mr. Giffen, whose well-known
work has always tended in the direction of providing accurate
statistics, outlining what the Board of Trade ultimately pro-
posed to do; and although this was much less than I had asked,
the scheme was still so substantial that I gladly accepted it.
This memorandum stated that the Government proposed :—
1. To collect and arrange the statistics relating to wages which
have been published in Parliamentary Blue-books during the last fifty
or sixty years, with the addition of some prominent and authentic
unofficial statistics which have been published from time to time, or
which may be easily procurable, so as to furnish a tolerably complete
picture of the progress of the community in respect of the earnings of
the wages-receiving classes during the period in question.
2. To supplement these statistics by similar statistics regarding
foreign countries which have been published from time to time in the
reports of her Majesty's Secretaries of Legation and Consuls, or
which the Board of Trade may be able to compile from the official
publications of foreign Governments in their possession, with the
assistance to some extent of unofficial records containing authentic
data.
3. To collect and arrange similar statistics relating to the savings
and general conditions of the same classes, the prices of commodities,
198
LABOR AND LAW.
and other matters in which the masses of the community are vitally
interested.
4. To make immediate arrangements for obtaining from time to
time, in future, a fuller record of wages, with special reference to
hours of labor, slackness or abundance of employment, and the pro-
portion of the wages-receiving classes at each rate of wage or earnings,
than has yet been procured in this country, and for the regular collec-
tion and publication of such statistics from time to time.
}
5. To collect and arrange statistics as to prices, production, cost
of living, and other matters, which could either be embodied in the
volume containing a record of wages, or be published separately, as
may be found convenient. The same with an annual summary
relating to wages, prices, &c., in foreign countries.
It will be expedient [it was added] in the course of this work to
publish numerous papers containing information of immediate prac-
tical use to those interested, and the Board of Trade propose to issue
such papers, as well as annual reports and statistical volumes.
+
Unfortunately, the performance has fallen very far short of
the promise, and it is alleged that this is because the Treasury,
which is lavish when dealing with the War Office or Admiralty,
starves the Labor Department. Personally, I found in the
three successive Presidents of the Board of Trade, from Sir
H. G. Calcraft, and from Mr. Giffen, the most kindly disposi-
tion to extend the work.
Clause I of the above memorandum was partly carried out
in 1887 by the presentation of Parliamentary Paper C. 5,172,
giving in Part I particulars of wages paid in a considerable
number of industries between 1832 and 1853, and in Part 2
giving like particulars for a larger number of industries for
some of the years between 1855 and 1883. To be more than
historically useful, or available in the avoidance or settlement
of labor disputes, these details should be published frequently,
and should be much more complete and more methodically
tabulated than was done in this paper. In reference to the
textile trades, two Parliamentary Papers (C. 5,807 in 1889
A STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT.
199
and C. 6,161 in 1890) give the numbers of men, women, boys,
and girls employed, the hours worked, and the rates of wages
paid in those industries on October 1st, 1886. It is to be
noted that the Department, in August, 1889, pleads as excuse
for its long delay in presenting these papers "the absence
of a sufficient staff to execute the work", and in July, 1890,
Mr. Giffen again laments "the inadequacy of the staff". What
has been done for the textile trades up to October 1st, 1886,
should have been done for all industries, and there should be
no hesitancy in providing sufficient clerical assistance for this
purpose. The cost would be slight compared with the money
voted for torpedoes, and the result would be that, if labor war
were not averted, the fighters, at any rate, would not strike in
the dark. There ought to be no real difficulty on the part of a
properly equipped department in making such returns annually,
and in publishing them at latest within six months of the date
to which they are made up. It is true that some valuable but
irregular and insufficient information may, on many of the
points covered by Nos. 1, 2, and 3 of the Memorandum, be
incidentally found in the Commercial series of Parliamentary
Papers, and in the Board of Trade Journal, ably edited and
published monthly. Working men have seldom the opportu-
nity to make troublesome searches; the information should
be made easily accessible. The only regular publication of
the Labor Statistical Department is the annual one intituled
Statistical Tables and Report on Trades Unions, of which three have
appeared: C. 5,104, 1887; C. 5,505, 1888; and C. 5,808, 1889.
These, to me, are very disappointing papers, as showing the
very small extent to which even the skilled and organised
workmen, who are now on so many topics asking for State
interference on their behalf, are disposed to help the Executive
200
LABOR AND LAW.
with the information necessary for wise action. In 1887, only
eighteen trades unions furnished Mr. Burnett with materials.
for his report, although he made requests to 150 unions for
such information. There were then 252 such unions actually
registered as friendly societies, though only 187 of these made
the returns required by law. In 1888, like application was
made by Mr. Burnett to 312 trades unions, but 207 of these
societies gave no information, many of them not even con-
descending to acknowledge the receipt of the request. Of the
105 unions whose officers did answer, several of the replies
were "not available for publication on account of their
incompleteness", and the report issued by the department
dealt only with eighty-seven trades societies. In 1889, the
number reported on was increased to 104 societies, with
373,904 members, but these are stated to represent only one-
third or one-fourth of the known societies, and, if the recent
Liverpool Congress estimate be accurate, include much less.
than one-fourth of the total membership.
Whilst I am very hesitant as to adopting the American
labor legislation, which, at any rate in many States, makes
the supply of such statistical information compulsory under
penalty, I venture to hope that trade societies availing them-
selves of the provisions of the Friendly Societies Acts may
be required to make the requisite returns to the Labor Corre-
spondent of the Board of Trade as a condition of their being
kept on the register. There has been a marked improvement
in the quantity and quality of each of Mr. Burnett's yearly
reports on trade unions. He tells us that in the more im-
portant cases he has made special efforts to obtain statistics,
but plaintively records "that these endeavors have met with
very
limited success".
A STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT.
201
t
An attempt of most praiseworthy character was made to
collect returns of the expenditure and income of working men
in various industries, and the result is given in Parliamentary
Paper C. 5,861, 1889. Inquiry schedules were sent out to
selected workmen and to trade union officials, also to the
..
Alas!
officers of co-operative associations.
'Very few of
the forms sent to co-operators have been returned." In fact,
to 730 inquiries which were sent out in 1887 to all parts of
the kingdom, only thirty-six answers in all were received,
and two of these proved too imperfect for use. Six replies
were given by miners, five of these from one county, Northum-
berland; five by joiners; eight by engineers; two by shoe-
makers; three by lithographic printers; two by agricultural
laborers; two by clerks; and six as follows: spring-knife
cutler, cord cutter, weaver, general laborer, stoker, and engine-
tender. Such a return, embracing a fair proportion of our
national industries, would be almost invaluable; but thirty-four
instances afford a basis much too slight for any effective conclu-
sions. It seems to me that a year and a half was far too
long a period to occupy in analysing and tabulating these
thirty-four returns. Mr. Burnett pleads that "the department
has been so much occupied with procuring statistics of money,
wages, trades unions, strikes, and other matters that it has
not been possible to do more". My reply is, then make the
department stronger. I have some reason for believing that
communications in this direction are now taking place between
Sir M. Hicks-Beach and the Treasury, which I trust may be
favorable: in any case it will be my duty to press this upon
Parliament on its reassembling. The only paper yet presented
to Parliament under heading No. 2 of the Board of Trade
Memorandum was in 1888, C. 5269, extracted from the report
202
LABOR AND LAW.
of a Royal Commission appointed in 1886 in Belgium to inquire
as to the condition of Belgian workmen, their wages, and
recent fluctuations in the industries in which they were
engaged. Numerous miscellaneous notices have, however, from
time to time, appeared in the monthly issues of the Board of
Trade Journal. Such notices for 1886, 1887, and 1888, are
catalogued in Parliamentary Paper 433, 1888, and form part
of the official memorandum explaining the progress made by
the Board of Trade towards carrying out the resolution of
the House of Commons of March 2nd, 1886. For 1889 and
the present year, search must be made through the Board of
Trade Journal, the recent numbers of which are richer in
information than their predecessors. Surely on the back of
one of Mr. Burnett's periodical trade union reports an index
catalogue might be given to these and to all other official
publications containing labor information within the scope of
the Board of Trade Memorandum, drawn up by Mr. Giffen
in August 1886. Some of the consular and diplomatic reports
contain matter of the very highest value alike to employer and
employed, but it requires skilled guidance to know where to
look for it. It should be part of the duty of the Labor Corre-
spondent to regularly point out, for the benefit of workmen,
where these important statements may be found. In merest
justice to the Labor Statistical Department it should be men-
tioned that, in addition to the papers above referred to, there
were published in 1887 a memorandum on the immigration of
foreigners (No. 112), and a report on sweating in East London
(No. 331); in 1888 there was a report on sweating in Leeds (C.
5513), and also a report on the condition of nailmakers and small
chain makers (No. 385). Some applications were made across.
the floor of the House for a cheap issue of this last paper at one-
A STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARtment.
203
penny, but the real demand for it was so slight that, when I
obtained the permission of the Board of Trade for anyone to re-
print who chose, no one could be found willing to take the risk.
The return (C. 5,866) moved for by myself in 1889 as to the laws
in Europe and America affecting the hours of adult labor, and
the enforcement or otherwise of those laws, was laid on the
table by the Foreign Office as a command paper. The return
(No 284, 1890) moved for by Mr. Provand, of the average
number of hours and days worked in mines, was presented
by the Home Office. I suggest that all labor information
should go through the Labor Department of the Board of
Trade.
The bulky volume issued by the Department of the Interior
of the United States in 1886 (Vol. XX of the tenth census),
being a report on the statistics of wages in manufacturing
industries, with supplementary reports on the average retail
cost of the necessaries of life, and on trade societies and strikes.
and lock-outs, shows what has been done in this direction in
the Census Office at Washington. This census work is supple-
mented by the full annual reports made by the commissioners
and chiefs of labor bureaus of the several States of Massa-
chusetts, established 1869; Pennsylvania, 1872; Missouri, 1876;
Ohio, 1877; New Jersey, 1878; Illinois, 1879; Indiana, 1880;
New York, California, Michigan, and Wisconsin, all 1883;
Iowa and Maryland, 1884; Kansas and Connecticut, 1885;
North Carolina, Maine, Minnesota, Colorado, and Rhode
Island, 1887. Similar bureaus have also been advocated in
other States of the Union, but I have as yet no official informa-
tion as to their establishment. A Federal Labor Bureau was
established at Washington in 1885, under the Hon. Carroll D.
Wright, the father of the American labor statistical movement.
V
P
204
LABOR AND LAW.
That the independent statistical investigations of the various
States may be as thorough and as wisely conducted as possible,
the chiefs of the respective labor bureaus, besides continually
corresponding, meet each year in national convention. The
first such meeting was held at Columbus, Ohio, in 1883. From
the report of the address delivered by Mr. C. D. Wright,
president of the fifth annual convention held in 1887 at Madi-
son, Wisconsin, I take a few words, weighty because of the
high repute and long experience of the speaker. "I believe
most emphatically," he said, "that the bureaus of statistics of
labor can furnish the necessary elements for the solution of
some of the great social and industrial problems that are press-
ing upon the people," and he added: "Nearly all the great
questions which affect the people in their mutual relations must
either be settled, or receive great primary aid in settlement,
through statistical efforts. The European statistician, trained
in the schools for his work, skilled by his experience for the
very best accomplishments, has not yet devoted much attention
to the line of investigations which are specifically the province
of our bureaus. He has devoted himself to the movements of
population, to the statistics of life; but he has not yet gone into
the vital questions which grow out of the progress of industrial
organisation he has not had the facilities of Governmental
protection and stimulation, nor has he had the benefit of the
great intelligence of the masses which comes from free educa-
tional custom. These give American bureaus of labor an
advantage over Governmental bureaus of statistics of European
States." Surely there is no reason why our Transatlantic
cousins should keep this advantage over us. Surely employer
and employed alike, throughout Great Britain and Ireland, will
second any earnest effort to outvie the results obtained even in
:
A STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARtment.
205
Massachusetts. I complain that at the Board of Trade the
collection of labor statistics has been starved.
In December, 1888, Mr. Giffen officially stated that the
provision for the department was insufficient, both as to junior
and superior officers. I assert that it is insufficient still. Mr.
Giffen in 1888 reported that the Labor Correspondent had
served in other official capacities, which had much occupied his
time. I submit that his whole time should be devoted to this
department, and that he should have proper clerical assistance.
In an appendix to Mr. Giffen's 1888 memorandum, the
Board of Trade added, as if with its approval, an extract from
the views of Professor Richmond Smith, of Columbia College,
New York, on the methods and principles to be applied in
dealing with labor statistics in the census. As public opinion
has not pressed, nay, has scarcely backed, the Board of Trade,
so far as the general census of 1891 is concerned, and as the
Board of Trade vote was taken this year after half-past one on
a late August morning, in an almost empty House, I venture
through these pages to appeal to politicians, without distinction
of party, that the Labor Statistical Department of Great
Britain may be sustained at least as efficiently as is the Labor
Bureau of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Ignorance of
facts and figures can be of no service to either capitalist or
laborer, and as the Liverpool Trades Congress has directed
its Parliamentary Committee to submit to the House of Com-
mons more than one point of vital importance for the proper
consideration of which such statistics must be helpful, I trust
that this alone may give force to my appeal.
Abraham, W., M.P., on Shifts in Mines
Accidental Deaths in Scotland, Resolution as to
Agriculture and Legislation
Agriculture, Chief Industry of Russia
Anarchists and Collectivists
Anarchist Manifesto of 1883
Arbitration, Boards of
Courts in Germany
Austria, Hours of Labor in
INDEX.
Socialism in….
Military Burdens of
..
:
"}
··
Babouf..
Baernreither
Bakounine and Revolutionary Socialism
Bavaria and Belgium, their Labor Laws
Bebel, Herr, and the Socialistic movement in Germany
Bureau de Bienfaisance
Bureaus of Labor Statistics
Beesly, Professor, on Profit Sharing
Belgian Workmen, Condition of
Berlin Conference, Reference to
Berry, Sir Graham, on Eight Hours in Victoria
Bismarckian theory of " Contentment
Blanc, Louis, and the Labor Decree of 1848
Blyth, Sir Arthur, on Labor Legislation for Australia
Bousfield, C. E., on Depression of Trade
Boards of Conciliation
:
··
Brandes, Georg, on Russia and the Russian Peasant
Brassey, Lord, on State Interference
:
:
:
Bradlaugh, Charles, and his work with Labor Statistics
Bramwell, Baron, and Truck Act
:
On Co-operation..
Breach of Contract and English Law
Brennan, Mr., moves Resolution re Merchant Shipping Act
Building Societies, Benefit of
··
:
:
:
:
•
:
:
·
..
PAGES.
112
154, 155
155
61, 62
13
115
181
168
168
178, 179, 191
179
166
37-40
179, 182
75
185, 186, 189
152
174, 202
24, 147
80
..
146, 147
64, 167, 168
So, 82
32
58, 155, 159, 196
195, 196, 197, 198
..
• 40, 41
175
196, 203, 204, 205.
Burnett, John, Labor Correspondent, Board of Trade, on Trade
Unions, and Statistics ..
25
183
42
151
37, 148
28
197, 200, 201
207
P
208
}
INDEX.
Burns, John, on Eight Hours
On Great Dock Strike
On Profit Sharing..
Burt, T., M.P., Bill of
Speech at Jolimont
..
:
Common Employment
Cab Drivers and Limit of Hours
Cabet, Etienne, and Communism
California, Hours of Labor in
Callow, John, on Ventilation of Underground Workshops
Campbell, G. L., on Mining Accidents
Capital in Cotton Trade
In Railways
..
Cattle on Board Ship
Certificates of Competency, Resolution as to
Chance, Mr. A. M., on Contracting out
Churchill, Lord R., on Profits
On State Interference
··
..
Church, The, and Socialism
Civil and Criminal Status of Workmen
Clarke, W., on Industrial Legislation
Coal Mines Regulation Act
Output in Great Britain
Hewers
Labor Cost of
Coleridge, Hon. B., and National Liberal Federation
Coleridge, Lord, and Truck Act
Collection of Labor Statistics (Home and Colonial)
Combination v. State Control in American Labor
in Victoria
..
:
Doctrine of..
··
:
•
:
:
:
:
..
··
:
• •
•
Common Law
Commune of Paris
Conflicts of Capital and Labor
Connecticut, Hours of Labor in
Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, Resolution as to..
Continuation Schools
PAGES.
92, 107, 109, 110
:
· •
..
Contracts of Hiring and Service
by Government and Municipalities, Resolution as to
Contracting Out, Clauses and Objections as to
Co-operative Production ..
Coroner's Jury Act, Resolution as to and Criticism of
Costa, Signor
Cotte, M., on Wage and State Interference..
:
:
:
ΙΟΙ
166, 167
68
..
137
47, 48
IIO, III
· ·
•
144
152
128
145
19
20, 21
134, 137
87
153, 154
165
22
·
+5, 58
58
94, 95, 96
29
27
195, 198
• •
125, 127, 139
9, 30, 125, 131, 132, 139
165
38
67
39
37
4, 118
:
71
80
2
19
11, 39, 126, 127, 131, 148
5
14
2, 3, 127-137
85, 88, 90, 150, 151
3, 4
191
92
INDEX.
209
Cotton Spinning ..
Countries without Labor Legislation
Coventry Ribbon Trade, Decay of..
Crispi, Signor
Crompton, Henry, on Relations of Employer and Employed
Crowe, J. A., on Factories in France
Cunningham, Rev. W.,
Cycle Industry
Cyon, M. de
..
Danckwerts, Mr., and Truck Act..
Danish Socialism
Depression of Trade, Commission on
Dilke, Sir Charles, on Labor Legislation
Distress of Italian Peasantry
Dock Laborers' objection to Eight Hours
Domestic Servants and Eight Hours
Dunraven, Lord, and State Interference
Durham, Bishop of, on Wage-labor
:
Eight Hours Bill (Miners), Resolution as to
Of Mr. Hyndman
Of Fabian Society
:
··
Employers and Workmen's Act, 1875
English Associations of Working Men
Erle, T. W., on Jury Laws
European War and European Revolution
Evans, Isaac, on Sub-inspectors in Mines
:
:
:
··
:
**
:
..
Economiste Français on Labor in France
Economic argument against a general Reduction of Hours of Labor
Educational Value of Strikes
:
··
26
175
32, 45, 48, 50, 51, 53, 90, 107
43, 53, S2
176, 177
.. 16, 17
115
:
:
:
:
··
··
Eight Hours in all trades, Resolution as to
Eight Hours, Reference to 15, 17, 41, 56, 57, 58, 80, 81, 82, 91, 92, 98,
100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 109, 112, 123,
Elementary Education Act
Elizabeth, Labor legislation in reign of
Ellis, J. D., on Labor Cost
Emigration and the Italian peasantry
Emmatt, Mr. Alderman, on Cotton Spinning
:
50
177
145, 150, 155
64
29, 30, 38, 58
100
183
:
:
112-115
95
176
47
Employers' Liability Bill-Resolution at Liverpool Congress
2, 3
Contracting out of
128
Ref. to pp. 89, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136,
137, 138, 139-
9, 10-13
:
PAGES.
47-50
79, 80
:
:
:
154
90
154, 156
120, 145
.. 36, 37
64
99
150
22
112
15
38
4
164
20
P 2
210
INDEX.
Fabian Essays
Factory Inspectors, Resolution for addition of
Also on Railways
Women Inspectors
..
Factory Inspection, Resolution as to
Fixing of wage
Factory Act, Resolution as to
Indirect results of
Flax Spinning
Decay of
To Laundries and all Trades
where women are employed
Workmen as Inspectors
Notice given to in case of new premises, &c.
Bill relating to
References to
Factory and Workshop Act
Farrer, Sir T. H., on Labor Legislation
Federal Factory Law, Switzerland
Federal Labor Bureau, Washington
Fenwick, C., on Eight Hours vote
Firewood Cutting in Workhouses..
Florida, Hours of Labor in
Of hours or wage
C
•
FORCE OR CONCILIATION..
Forfeiture of Wage, Instances of
Fourier, Ch., and his disciples
France, Hours of Labor in
·
··
Free Russian Federation ..
Free Speech and Socialism in Germany
Friendly Societies
Friendly Societies Act
Function of Legislature
·
:
Ratio of production to shortened hours
:
·
··
:
:
•
:
:
:
:
:
:
Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hours of Labor in
Germany, Socialism in
:
Military burden of
Emperor of, and Socialism
German Police Agents and the Socialist trials
Giffen, Mr., and Board of Trade
:
:
..
:
..
:
:
:
:
:
:
Foreign crews not to load or unload
14
Foreign Conpetition
47, 48, 50, 51, 53, 54, 69, 93, 108, 109
Foreign Legislation 58, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 74,
75, 80-83, 87, 147
IO, II
167
62, 63, 64
183
189.
89, 200
196, 200
31
PAGES.
.. 37, 42
5
8
..
•
.
•
5
•
• 9, 123
:
•
21
32, 39, 40,
39, 43, 44
9, 38, 116, 120, 122, 123
33, 37, 92, 93.
40, 55, 63, 92, 93, 99, Ioo, IOI
9.
8.
203
.. 16, 17, 133, 135
13
18
18.
121
..
91
66.
··
68
45.
143-159
46.
46.
68, 76
184, 185-190
186, 188, 189, 190
186, 187
186
197, 198, 199, 202, 205.
INDEX.
211
Gladstone, Rt. Hon. W. E., on Rights and Responsibilities of Labor
Glass Bottle Trade, decay of
Godin, Jean, and the Familistère
Gold and Metal beating, decay of
Gosselin, Martin, on Hours of Labor
Great Dock Strike, The
Greening, Mr. E. O., on Co-operative production
Gronlund, Laurence, on the Socialistic propaganda
"
Imprisonment of Socialists
Industries injured by Legislation
Industrial Conciliation
Hedley, W. H., on cost of Coal Production
Harrison, W. B.
Hicks-Beach, Sir M., on Arbitration in Labor Disputes
in reference to a Starved Government Department
Hintzpeter and State Socialism
Holmes, D., on Work and Wage, Textile Industries
Hours of Labor
}}
04
10
Decay and Foreign Competition
International Combination, meaning of
International Miners' Congress
International " The
Iron Trade, alleged Decay of
Italian Socialism and the Military burden
Labor Conference, The
Laborers, Statutes of
Labor Representation
:
">
..
95
95
155
201
186
21
Į 15, 40, 43, 46, 47, 49, 55, 56, 58, 61-83, 85, 86, 87,
( 91, 92, 93, 99—123, 153, 154, 156, 172, 173, 188, 203
Howell, Mr., on Trades "subject to Statute'
38
Hungary, Hours of Labor in
62
Hunger Congress "
Hyndman, Mr., and Eight Hours Debate
:
..
"
..
·
:
:
Johnson, Mr., and Miners' Conference
Jones, Atherley, on Jurors
Journalistic attitude on Legislative Interference
Journalistic Socialism
Juries, Coroners'
Jury Laws
Disqualification under Coal Mines Regulation Act
:
:
:
Kendell, J. D. and Kellett, W., on Cost of Production
Krapotkin, Prince, and Revolutionary Socialism
:
:
:
:
:
:
•
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
: :
:
PAGES.
145
50
152, 167
..
51
76
144, 149
151
172, 190
:
:
177
94, 106
177, 185, 186
44, 49, 52
150
46, 50, 51, 54
109
145
146, 165, 178
52
176, 177
:
:
:
92
4
I
170
3
4
4
96
179
147
.. 32, 33
32
212
Labor Statistics, Austria ..
America
France
Denmark
Germany
Greece
Switzerland
Baden
Hesse Darmstadt
Italy
..
Montenegro
Portugal
Netherlands
Saxony
Dresden
..
:
:
:
: :
•
:
··
Russia and Roumania
Saxe Coburg Gotha
INDEX.
and the Board of Trade
lack of returns from Trade Societies..
Lamb, R. O., and Labor cost of Coal
Lassalle, Ferdinand, and Popular Socialism
Lavelaye, M. de, and the "International," &c.
Law as to Forfeiture of Wage
..
•
Leather Trade, decay of
Legislation for Labor in Foreign Countries, results of
Legislation v. Private Right
Legislature, Limit and Power of
in Relation to Social Ills
Functions of ..
as Affecting Cost of Production
Liebknecht and the Elections to the Reichstag
Limit of hours or wage, effects of ..
Liverpool Trades Union Congress..
··
Employers' Liability
Coroners' Juries
Fair contracts
Factory Inspectors
Professional examination of Shipwrights
:
:
Steam engines and boilers
Magistrates' qualification.
on Eight hours
reference to Trade Societies
Local Option, for Monopolies and hours of Labor
Local Taxation
Lord, Hon. J. S., on Eight Hours movement
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
.. 67, 75
63, 65, 66
76
76
76
66
:
:
76
76
77
77
77
77
77
77
77
77
195, 196, 197
200, 201
:
:
:
:
:
··
· 94, 95
188, 189
164, 165, 169
IO
39
.. 29, 75
29
31
53, 58
185, 189
40, 58, 87, 91, 92, 93
I
51
61, 69, 81
:
..
2, 3, 125
3
5
5
6
6
6
:
:
PAGES.
61
:
:
:
105
200, 205
119
148
75
..
:
:
INDEX.
213
Lowthian Bell, Sir, on wages
Luccock, Captain, resolution as to Certificates of Competency
4
14
Manifesto of the Equals "
166
Manning Cardinal, on regulation of Industry
4I
Margin of Profit
54, 58
189
Marx, Karl, Revolutionary collectivism and the "International "
Massachusetts, legislation in State of
69, 71, 97, 98, 203
M'Carty, T., Resolution as to Penal Restrictions on Importation of
Foreign Labor
Magistrates, Appointment of Working Men as, Resolution as to
Mann, T., Resolution as to Establishment of Workshops and Factories
under Municipal Control
Mason, S., on Shifts in Textile Industry
May-Day" in Europe, 1891
Memorandum of Board of Trade re Wages and Industrial Condition of
the Working Classes..
Merchandise Marks Act, and the International Convention
Amendment of
••
··
Metal Beating, &c., Decay of
Metalliferous Mines Act, Reference to
..
••
··
Shipowning Magistrates not to Adjudicate
Amendment of sec. 231 as to Space for Seamen
Prohibiting Deck Loading and Regulating the
carrying of Cattle
•
15
15
22
Extension of
Merchant Shipping Act, Resolution against Forfeiture by Seamen Deserting S
Abolition of Imprisonment for Breaches of
Discipline
:
Mines Regulation Act
Misery and Revolution
Monro, Professor, on Hours of Labor
Mundella, Right Hon. A. J., on State Interference
On Labor Statistics
D
:
:
:
C
:
·
Michel, Louise
170
57
Military Expenditure a Burden on Labor 147, 148, 164, 173, 174, 176, 179, 189
Mill, J. S., Reference to
Mine Inspectors, Resolution as to
Miners International Conference
Mines and Miners
20
:
··
:
PAGES.
89
19
20
6
20
112
191
197
Shifts
Statistics as to
Roads in Mines
27
Inspection of
20, 27
[See also under Eight Hours, Foreign Legislation, &c.]
..
13
15
IS
19
i, 50, 51
25, 118
92, 145, 154
22, 23, 114, 118
23, 76, 77
24, 135, 136
. 27.53
177
99
40
197
214
INDEX.
Municipal Workshops, Resolution as to
National Workshops in France in 1848
New Code, Reference to ..
Nihilism the Reaction of Despair
Nieuwenhuis, Domela, Character of
Oldham Cotton Spinners
Old and New Trades Unionism
Origins of Modern Socialism
Overtime Wage
Output of Coal in Great Britain
Paepe, Dr. C. de, and Rational Socialism
Parisian Industries
Parnell, W., Resolution as to Truck Acts
Pauper Labor, Resolution as to
Payment of Jurors
Peasants' Union in Galicia
Price, J., on Wages
Production in Industry
Profit Sharing
Progress and Legislation
Prohibition of Foreign Labor
Provand, Mr., and Labor Return
Proudhon and his followers
..
:
··
..
Peck, Hon. C. F., on Labor Legislation
Pickard, Mr. B. (see under Employers' Liability Act)
Plumbers, Registration of
Prevention of Cruelty to Children Act
•
:
..
:
Parliamentary Papers relative to Wages, Labor, &c. 197, 198, 199, 200,
.
:
••
:
Railway Rates Inquiry and Cotton Spinning
Guards, Hours of
:
Servants and Legislation.
Reade, R. H. (see "Flax Spinning ")
Reclus, Elisée, and the Anarchist Manifesto
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Queen's Bench Division Cases
Quelch, J., Amendment re Underground Workshops..
Objection to Foreign Crews
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Public Opinion and Parliamentary Action
Physical Deterioration of Workmen
'Physiology of Industry," reference to
Prince Bismarck on "Contentment" and the Labor Question
on State Socialism
Pyat, M. Félix, and the Commune
:
:
:
:
..
:
:
:
:
:
19
179, 180, 181
175
123
. 96, 97
93, 94, 97, 101-105
87, 88, 91, 152
29
20, 99
203
169
59
106, 107
IOI
146, 147
184, 190
165
:
58,156-159
165, 166
115
45
PAGES.
20
167
:
48
201, 202, 203
24
13
178
72
154, 156
21
..
174
65
..
25
22
14
47
76
113, 117, 132
46
16
INDEX.
215
Regulation of Adult Labor
Reichstag, The German, and Labor Legislation
Socialist Members in
Reports on Trades Unions 1887-1889
on American Labor
··
··
Return on Capital in Cotton Trade
Revolutionary Socialism
Richmond-Smith, Prof., Views on, Census and Labor Statistics
Risk and Profit in Industrial Enterprise
Kodbertus, Karl, the founder of modern German Socialism
His Economic Theories
Ruegg, Mr., on Insurance to Workmen
Rules embodied in Contract for Hiring
Russell, G. W. E., and Hours of Labor
Russian Peasant, The, and the Mir
Russia's Financial Difficulty
•
Sanitary Legislation
Science and Art Classes, resolution as to
Seamen as members of Courts of inquiry
Shifts, in Mines ..
Shipton, G., on fair contracts
Shipwrights, resolution as to
Shop Hours Regulation Act
Smith, Adam, reference to
..
··
·
Smith, J, moves resolution Coroners' Juries
Socialist Congresses
Social ills and legislation..
SOCIALISM IN EUROPE
Socialist party in the Paris Chamber
in Italian Parliament
Saint Simon, and the St. Simonians
Sanitary Inspection of factories, etc., Resolution as to
Increase of
•
•
•
•
Spanish Socialism
Stannaries of Cornwall and Devon..
STARVED GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT, A
State Control and the Individual
State Interference (see under " Eight Hours")
State Socialism
··
:
:
..
··
..
..
:
:
:
:
··
:
..
•
··
31
147
184, 185, 186, 189.
2
:.67—75
47,48
166, 168, 169, 170, 171
205
85, 86, 88
186
187
134
II
56
180, 181, 182, 183
183, 184
..
♪ •
:
:
167
18, 19
21, 121, 122, 123
39, 54
19
8
61, 62, 76, 77. 78
5
:
Statutes of Laborers
Statutes (various), referred to
Steam engines and boilers, persons in charge of, resolution as to
Stepniak and the Nihilistic movement
Strikes and their consequences
:
• ·
··
·
PAGES..
··
•
6
123
57
3
190, 191
29
··
30.
31, 39, 40, 41, 153. 193
165, 181, 184
32, 33, 34
33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 148, 155
6
163-192
169, 170
177
191
7.25
195--205
180-183
143. 144, 148, 149, 150, 171
216
INDEX.
Strikes and Socialism
Sweating system, resolution as to
Taylor, Miss, amendment re Textile Industries
Thrift
Technical Education Act, reference and resolution as to
Textile Industries, details of work ..
margin of profits, &c.
hours of working
workers engaged in
interest on capital
Trade option and Eight Hours
Tramway drivers, hours of
Legislation affecting
Trades Union v. Socialistic organization
..
··
Trades Unions returns
Trades Union Congress, societies represented at Liverpool
•.
Resolutions
passed, also
Trades Unions Acts of 1872 and 1876
and Post Office Savings Bank
Trades Unionism, New and Old
Truck Acts, exceptions in
Resolution as to
Reference to
Underground Workshops, Ventilation of
Employment in
Unions of Unskilled Labor
United States Labor Laws
Unskilled Labor and Eight Hours ..
··
Vane, Lord, on Industry in Wurtemburg
Ventilation of Factories
Victoria, Eight Hours Day
Vital Statistics, Evidence of
Von Plener
• •
•
•
··
Wage, Law as to Forfeiture of
Fixing of
Penal Enactments as to
Augmentation of
High and Low and State Interference
and Cost of Production
:
:
•
··
··
··
..
:
•
·
·
•
•
··
PAGES.
171, 197
18
•
··
•
45-50
47, 79
47
II2
IIS
76
113, 119
37--44
•
ΣΙ
89, 158
19
21
•
D
200
2-28
139
28
28
58, 156, 157
IO
2
24
25, 26, 27
22
158
67, 68, 203, 204, 205
09
··
22
78
18
56, 80
FO
34, 92, 93, 105
33, 34, 36
57
87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92
93-97, 102-105
55, 93
38
INDEX.
217
Webb, Sidney (see "Fabian Essays")
Wright, Hon. Carroll D., the father of the American Labor Statistical
Movement
Women, Children, and Young Persons, Protection of
Employment of in Mines
in Austrian Factories
••
ERRATUM.
Inspectors in Factories, Desirability of
Woodfield, Mr., moves Resolution, Trades Unions and Post Office
Savings Bank
Workmen, Increased Power of
Wurtemburg, Industrial Condition of
Page 174, twelfth line from bottom of page, for
"rational ".
38, 40, 43, 120, 121, 122, 147
24, 76
62
3. 123
··
44
•
··
JAGES
203, 204
..
92
28
I
78
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