Thirty years ago, the dread of impending evils agitated not a few breasts throughout England. Instinctive fear of change, justified as it seemed by outbursts of popular violence, conjured up visions of the anarchy which would follow the passing of a Reform Bill. In scattered farm-houses there was chronic terror, lest those newly endowed with political power should in some way filch all the profits obtained by rearing cattle and growing corn. The occupants of halls and manors spoke of ten-pound householders almost as though they formed an army of spoilers, threatening to overrun and devastate the property of landholders. Among townspeople there were some who interpreted the abolition of old corruptions into the establishment of mob-government; which they thought equivalent to spoliation. And even in Parliament, such alarms found occasional utterance: as, for instance, through the mouth of Sir Robert Inglis, who hinted that the national debt would not improbably be repudiated if the proposed measure became law.
There may perhaps be a few who regard the now pending change in the representation with similar dread—who think {359} that artizans and others of their grade are prepared, when the power is given to them, to lay hands on property. We presume, however, that such irrational alarmists form but a small percentage of the nation. Not only throughout the Liberal party, but among the Conservatives, there exists a much fairer estimate of the popular character than is implied by anticipations of so gloomy a kind. Many of the upper and middle classes are conscious of the fact that, if critically compared, the average conduct of the wealthy would not be found to differ very widely in rectitude from that of the poor. Making due allowance for differences in the kinds and degrees of temptations to which they are exposed, the respective grades of society are tolerably uniform in their morals. That disregard of the rights of property which, among the people at large, shows itself in the direct form of petty thefts, shows itself among their richer neighbours in various indirect forms, which are scarcely less flagitious and often much more detrimental to fellow-citizens. Traders, wholesale and retail, commit countless dishonesties, ranging from adulteration and short measure up to fraudulent bankruptcy—dishonesties of which we sketched out some of the ramifications in a late article on “The Morals of Trade.” The trickeries of the turf; the bribery of electors; the non-payment of tradesmen’s bills; the jobbing in railway-shares; the obtainment of exorbitant prices for land from railway-companies; the corruption that attends the getting of private bills through Parliament—these, and other such illustrations, show that the unconscientiousness of the upper class, manifested though it is in different forms, is not less than that of the lower class: bears as great a ratio to the size of the class, and, if traced to its ultimate results, produces evils as great if not greater.
And if the facts prove that in uprightness of intentions there is little to choose between one class of the community and another, an extension of the franchise cannot rationally {360} be opposed on the ground that property would be directly endangered. There is no more reason to suppose that the mass of artizans and labourers would use political power with conscious injustice to their richer neighbours, than there is reason to suppose that their richer neighbours now consciously commit legal injustices against artizans and labourers.
What, then, is the danger to be apprehended? If land, and houses, and railways, and funds, and property of all other kinds, would be held with no less security than now, why need there be any fears that the franchise would be misused? What are the misuses of it which are rationally to be anticipated?
The ways in which those to be endowed with political power are likely to abuse it, may be inferred from the ways in which political power has been abused by those who have possessed it.
What general trait has characterized the rule of the classes hitherto dominant? These classes have not habitually sought their own direct advantage at the expense of other classes; but their measures have nevertheless frequently been such as were indirectly advantageous to themselves. Voluntary self-sacrifice has been the exception. The rule has been so to legislate as to preserve private interests from injury; whether public interests were injured or not. Though, in equity, a landlord has no greater claim on a defaulting tenant than any other creditor; yet landlords, having formed the majority of the legislature, have made laws giving them power to recover rent in anticipation of other creditors. Though the duties payable to government on the transfer of property to heirs and legatees, might justly have been made to fall more heavily on the wealthy than on the comparatively poor, and on real property rather than on personal property; yet the reverse arrangement was enacted and long maintained, and is even still partially in force. Rights of presentation to places in the Church, {361} obtained however completely in violation of the spirit of the law, are yet tenaciously defended, with little or no regard to the welfare of those for whom the Church ostensibly exists. Were it not accounted for by the bias of personal interests, it would be impossible to explain the fact that, on the question of protection to agriculture, the landed classes and their dependents were ranged against the other classes: the same evidence being open to both. And if there needs a still stronger illustration, we have it in the opposition made to the repeal of the Corn-Laws by the established clergy. Though, by their office, preachers of justice and mercy—though constantly occupied in condemning selfishness and holding up a supreme example of self-sacrifice; yet so swayed were they by those temporal interests which they thought endangered, that they offered to this proposed change an almost uniform resistance. Out of some ten thousand ex officio friends of the poor and needy, there was but one (the Rev. Thomas Spencer), who took an active part in abolishing this tax imposed on the people’s bread for the maintenance of landlords’ rents.
Such are a few of the ways in which, in modern times, those who have the power seek their own benefit at the expense of the rest. It is in analogous ways that we must expect any section of the community which may be made predominant by a political change, to sacrifice the welfare of other sections to its own. While we do not see reason to think that the lower classes are intrinsically less conscientious than the upper classes, we do not see reason to think that they are more conscientious. Holding, as we do, that in each society and in each age, the morality is, on the average, the same throughout all ranks; it seems to us clear that if the rich, when they have the opportunity, make laws which unduly favour themselves, the poor, if their power was in excess, will do the like in similar ways and to a similar extent. Without knowingly enacting injustice, they will be unconsciously biased by personal {362} considerations; and our legislation will err as much in a new direction as it has hitherto done in the old.
This abstract conclusion we shall find confirmed on contemplating the feelings and opinions current among artizans and labourers. What the working classes now wish done, indicates what they would be likely to do, if a reform in the representation made them preponderate. Judging from their prevailing sentiments, they would doubtless do, or aid in doing, many things which it is desirable to have done. Such a question as that of Church-rates would have been settled long ago had the franchise been wider. Any great increase of popular influence, would go far to rectify the present inequitable relation of the established religious sect to the rest of the community. And other remnants of class-legislation would be swept away. But besides ideas likely to eventuate in changes which we should regard as beneficial, the working classes entertain ideas that could not be realized without gross injustice to other classes and ultimate injury to themselves. There is among them a prevailing enmity towards capitalists. The fallacy that machinery acts to their damage, is still widely spread, both among rural labourers and the inhabitants of towns. And they show a wish, not only to dictate how long per day men shall work, but to regulate all the relations between employers and employed. Let us briefly consider the evidence of this.
When, adding another to the countless errors which it has taught the people, the Legislature, by passing the Ten-Hours-Bill, asserted that it is the duty of the State to limit the duration of labour, there naturally arose among the working classes the desire for further ameliorations to be secured in the same way. First came the formidable strike of the Amalgamated Engineers. The rules of this body aim to restrict the supply of labour in various ways. No member is allowed to work more than a fixed number of hours per week; nor for less than a fixed rate of wages. {363} No man is admitted into the trade who has not “earned a right by probationary servitude.” There is a strict registration; which is secured by fines on any one who neglects to notify his marriage, removal, or change of service. The council decides, without appeal, on all the affairs, individual and general, of the body. How tyrannical are the regulations may be judged from the fact, that members are punished for divulging anything concerning the society’s business; for censuring one another; for vindicating the conduct of those fined, etc. And their own unity of action having been secured by these coercive measures, the Amalgamated Engineers made a prolonged effort to impose on their employers, sundry restrictions which they supposed would be beneficial to themselves. More recently, we have seen similar objects worked for by similar means during the strike of the Operative Builders. In one of their early manifestoes, this body of men contended that they had “an equal right to share with other workers, that large amount of public sympathy which is now being so widely extended in the direction of shortening the hours of labour:” thus showing at once their delusion and its source. Believing, as they had been taught by an Act of Parliament to believe, that the relation between the quantity of labour given and the wages received, is not a natural but an artificial one; they demanded that while the wages remained the same, the hours should be reduced from ten to nine. They recommended their employers so to make their future contracts, as to allow for this diminished day’s work: saying they were “so sanguine as to consider the consummation of their desire inevitable:” a polite way of hinting that their employers must succumb to the irresistible power of their organization. Referring to the threat of the master-builders to close their works, they warned them against “the responsibility of causing the public disaster” thus indicated. And when the breach finally took place, the {364} Unionists set in action the approved appliances for bringing masters to terms; and would have succeeded had it not been that their antagonists, believing that concessions would be ruinous, made a united resistance. During several previous years, master-builders had been yielding to various extravagant demands, of which those recently made were a further development. Had they assented to the diminished day’s work, and abolished systematic overtime, as they were required to do, there is no reason to suppose the dictation would have ended. Success would have presently led to still more exacting requirements; and future years would have witnessed further extensions of this mischievous meddling between capital and labour.
Perhaps the completest illustration of the industrial regulations which find favour with artizans, is supplied by the Printers’ Union. With the exception of those engaged in The Times office, and in one other large establishment, the proprietors of which successfully resisted the combination, the compositors, pressmen, etc., throughout the kingdom, form a society which controls all the relations between employers and employed. There is a fixed price for setting up type—so much per thousand letters: no master can give less; no compositor being allowed by the Union to work for less. There are established rates for press-work; and established numbers less than which you cannot have printed without paying for work that is not done. The scale rises by what are called “tokens” of 250; and if but 50 copies are required, the charge is the same as for printing 250; or if 300 are wanted, payment must be made for 500. Besides regulating prices and modes of charging to their own advantage, in these and other ways, the members of the Union restrict competition by limiting the number of apprentices brought into the business. So well organized is this combination that the masters are obliged to succumb. An infraction of the rules in any {365} printing-office leads to a strike of the men; and as this is supported by the Union at large, the employer has to yield.