Recent Developments in European Thought Part 13

a.s.sociation to monopolies of distribution such as tramways, water, electricity, and gas.

The State was altogether hostile to the growth of the Trade Union. The Charter of Emanc.i.p.ation, won by the guile of Francis Place in 1824, was severely curtailed in 1825. Huskisson[68] depicted in lurid terms the tyranny of a military trades unionism, 'representing a systematic union of the workers of many different trades'. It was a 'kind of federal republic', whose mischievous operations, if not checked, would keep the commercial cla.s.ses 'in constant anxiety and fear about their interests and property'. Arnold, of Rugby, a decade later wrote of them in the same strain: 'you have heard, I doubt not, of the trades unions; a fearful engine of mischief, ready to riot or a.s.sa.s.sinate; and I see no counteracting power.'[69]

The counteracting power was their own weakness. The early militancy burnt itself out, and was succeeded at the turn of the century by a 'New Spirit and a New Model'. The new spirit was anti-militant, and the new model was a trade union representing the _elite_ of the skilled trades.

The Amalgamated Society of Engineers was founded in 1850 and served as a model to the Carpenters, Tailors, Compositors, Iron-founders, Brick-layers, and others. The Trades Unions were now respectable, and in 1867 the State recognized the fact.

The period of collectivism is denoted by the growth of the Labour Party in Parliament, and the increasing part played by the State in industrial disputes and the regulation of wages. The nationalization of railways and the nationalization of mines are burning questions.

4. In all the movements we have described, the spiritual stimulus, the initial drive, and the solid successes have been provided by voluntary a.s.sociation. The State has not been the pioneer of social reform. Such a notion is the mirage of politicians. It has merely registered the insistent demands of organized voluntary effort or given legal recognition to accomplished facts. This is the distinctive note of English social development in the nineteenth century.

FOR REFERENCE

Dicey, _Law and Opinion_.

Robinson, _The Spirit of a.s.sociation_.

Hovell, _The Chartist Movement_.

Sombart (tr. Epstein), _Socialism and the Socialist Movement_.

[Cd. 9236], _Report of Committee on Trusts_.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 20: From the writer's forthcoming book _Life and Labour in the Nineteenth Century_, to be published by the Cambridge University Press.]

[Footnote 21: Tooke and Newmarch, _History of Prices_, v. 356.]

[Footnote 22: _Commons Committee on Emigration_, 1827, Q. 1761.]

[Footnote 23: _Commons Committee on the Condition of Labourers employed in the Construction of Railways_, 1846, Q. 866.]

[Footnote 24: Ibid., Q. 217.]

[Footnote 25: Ibid., Q. 897.]

[Footnote 26: Ibid., Q. 733.]

[Footnote 27: Ibid., Q. 193.]

[Footnote 28: Ibid., Qs. 869-78.]

[Footnote 29: _Report of Poor Law Commissioners on the Employment of Women and Children in Agriculture_ (1843), pp. 20, 25.]

[Footnote 30: Ibid., pp. 299-300.]

[Footnote 31: _Report of Commissioners on the Employment of Young Persons in Agriculture_, p. 64.]

[Footnote 32: Dr. Cook Taylor, Letter to the _Morning Chronicle_, dated from Rossendale Forest (Lancashire), June 20, 1842.]

[Footnote 33: _Rural Rides_, i. 219.]

[Footnote 34: _Poor Law Commission of 1834_, Appendix.]

[Footnote 35: _Hand-loom Weavers' Commission, Final Report, 1841_, p.

18.]

[Footnote 36: _Hand-loom Weavers' Commission, a.s.sistant-Commissioner's Report, 1840_, Part IV, pp. 76-81.]

[Footnote 37: _Second Annual Report of the Poor Law Commissioners_, 1836.]

[Footnote 38: _Hand-loom Weavers' Commission, a.s.sistant-Commissioner's Report_, Part III, p. 551.]

[Footnote 39: _Anti-bread Tax Circular_, No. 91, June 16, 1842.]

[Footnote 40: _First Report of the Factory Commissioners_, 1833, p. 27.]

[Footnote 41: _Report of Commissioner on the Condition of the Framework Knitters_ (1845), p. 109.]

[Footnote 42: Ibid., p. 115.]

[Footnote 43: William Felkin, _History of the Machine-wrought Hosiery and Lace Manufactures_ (1867), p. 458.]

[Footnote 44: _Evidence before the Truck Commissioners_ (1871), Q.

37,500.]

[Footnote 45: Pamphlet of 1825, p. 14.]

[Footnote 46: _Home Office Papers_, 40, Letter from R.J. Blewitt, Esq., M.P., November 6, 1839.]

[Footnote 47: Richard Fynes, _Miners of Northumberland and Durham_, p.

72.]

[Footnote 48: John Wilson, _History of the Durham Miners' a.s.sociation_ (1870-1904), p. 40.]

[Footnote 49: _Report of Commissioner on the State of the Mining Population_ (1846).]

[Footnote 50: These pamphlets are in the British Museum.]

[Footnote 51: _Report of Commissioner on the State of the Mining Population_ (1850).]

[Footnote 52: Ibid. (1852).]

[Footnote 53: _Royal Commission, First Report_ (_Mines_), p. 27.]

[Footnote 54: Ibid., p. 21.]