The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1871-01-07 00:00:00

THE LONDON DEMOCRATS AND THE

EDUCATION BOARD
On Monday evening the various sections of London
demeerate held a remarkable gathering at the Hole-in-
the-Wall, Kirby-street, I iatton•garden, to celebrate.
with feasting, speech-making, and other ityous ob.
eervancee, the return of Mr. Lucraft to the London
School Board. Mr. Oilest., the late "labour" candi-
date for Southwark, presided, and among those present
were many well-known niemhere of the organizations
which have existed since tne Reform League agita-
tions.
After the dinner the chairman said they had met
to celebrate a successful elf iirt on the part of the
writing classes of Fit:wintry in a most serious con, est
—that of the London School Board election, when
they succeeded in returnieg the only representative
of labour returned hi coder and judge respecting the
e. ucation to be given to the future generations of Lon-
doners. It was a matter for reflection, he said, that
no other working man had been sent to that B iard
from other parts of London; but still the degree of
PII,C+IOI attained was something which could not
have been foreseen even at no distant date. He pie.
ceedeel to speak of Mr. Lucraft's consistent politiml life
for a time extending over a quarter of a century, and
Mr. Liter:ooe find action on the School Board, in op-
toeing a paid chairmanship. beheld up to the admira-
tion if his hearers in contrast to the general action of
the Holies of Commons in such matters. He said with
some pride and amid cheers that Mica Garnet and Pro-
feeeor Huxley adepted the same views as Mr. Literate.
It was a laudable ambition on the part of Mr. Lucraft
to serve his fellows on the School Board, and in con.
clusiop, the sp. aker said the working classes ought to
be in the position not only to return Mr. Lucraft him-
sit at the next election, but some other real working
mee as well.,
' Mr. Lucraft, on rising to speak, was received with
loud and continued cheers. After some general re-
marks, be said the success attained in returning him
to the Board was mainly to be attributed to the work-
ing men themselves. Ile felt the great resp,nsibility
of the position he had attained, for he knew that if he
madea slip it would redound not only on him alone, but
on the whole working classes. Ile had no right, there.
Ire, to be careless, seeing the interests at stake, and he
would do all in his power to tnahle the working classes
to say that their representative wag no disgrace to
them. There was work for half-a-dozen working men to
do on that Board, as, for instance, when the officers
leer: proposed, it was mid that a gentleman could riot
live for less than I:1,000 a year in London, and this
even when £BOO a year was proposed as that otf -ter's
salary; but nohoels thought of the messenger at 25g- a
week, and it never seemed to strike any of those who
were so anxious about the £l,OOO a year for the clerk
whether a messenger could live at all on his 255. a week.
(A laugh, and "Hear, hear.") Those who adopted the
ealary f or the messenger did so because m ssenger could
be obtained at that price, and he held that they should
rwlopt the same plau for thegentleman (Hear.) T hie r arly
feature of the Board showed that there was a necessity
for workingclass representatives to point out the true
wants and the position of the class in all questions
in which they were interested, as they were interested
in all that concerned Englishmen. Taking the Board
as a whole, he said it was a capital Board, and he
had no doubt much good weuid come of it. For
his own part, be said, though some ed the working
drones were against compulsion, not knowing how the
children were to live, the Education Act must be en-
b deed, It was semetimes pointed out to him that
Prussia, as an e bleated notion, was not a free one;
bet he held that England, which had won her
freedom, notwithstanding the waut of education among
her manses, would not be likely to forego that freedom
when better cultured, and he declared that no one
living could estimate the advantages which the working
classes of the country would reap from the labours of
the Beard. He advised the working classes not to
allow their success to end with his election, but to
strive to elect representatives to Pardament, to muni.
eipal Boards, and sueth like bodies. After other remarks
h‘ said, amid loud cheers, that one work which the
School Board must undertake was to look into the
charities left for education.
_.- .

0 her speeches followed, and Mr. Osborne, in speak-
ing on behalf of the Reform party in this district, said
a new agitation was on the point of starting, for the
people were determined to have manhood suffrage.
Mr. Roberts and Mr. Davies were among the other
speaktre.