[365]Report of Special Committee, 1869.
[366]The National Association of United Trades continued, as we have already seen, in nominal existence until 1860 or 1861, but after 1852 it sank to a membership of a few thousands, and played practically no part in the Trade Union world.
[367]Times, June to December 1853.
[368]A more detailed account of these developments will be found in The Co-operative Movement in Great Britain(1891; second edition, 1893), by Beatrice Potter (Mrs. Sidney Webb); Co-operative Production, by Benjamin Jones, 1894; and in the Report of the Fabian Research Department on Co-operative Production, published as a supplement to The New Statesman, February 14, 1914.
[369]Address of the Executive Council of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers to their Fellow-Workmen, 1855.
[370]See The Strikes, their Extent, Evils, and Remedy, being a Description of the General Movement of the Mass of the Building Operatives throughout the United Kingdom, by Vindex (1853), 56 pp. One consequence of this renewed outburst of strikes was the appointment in 1858 by the newly formed National Association for the Promotion of Social Science of a Committee to inquire into trade societies and disputes. This inquiry, conducted by able and zealous investigators, resulted in 1860 in the publication of a volume which contains the best collection of Trade Union material and the most impartial account of Trade Union action that has ever been issued. As a source of history and economic illustration this Report on Trade Societies and Strikes(1860, 651 pp.) is far superior to the Parliamentary Blue Books of 1824, 1825, 1838, and 1867-68. Among the contributors were Godfrey Lushington (afterwards Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department), J. M. Ludlow (afterwards Registrar of Friendly Societies), Thomas (afterwards Judge) Hughes, Q.C., Mr. G. Shaw-Lefevre (afterwards Lord Eversley), F. D. Longe, and Frank Hill. The Committee was presided over by the late Sir James Kay-Shuttleworth, and amongst its other members may be mentioned W. E. Forster, Henry Fawcett, R. H. Hutton, Rev. F. D. Maurice, Dr. William Farr, and one Trade Union secretary, T. J. Dunning, of the London Bookbinders.
[371]See the account of it in Labour Legislation, Labour Movements, and Labour Leaders, by G. Howell, 1902.
[372]Prof. E. S. Beesly, Fortnightly Review, 1867.
CHAPTER V
THE JUNTA AND THEIR ALLIES