The Press.
London, England, 1853-07-23 00:00:00

WORKING-MEN'S STRIKES, AND THEIR

REMEDY.
IF it be an irrational thing that two gentlemen
should shoot at one another with pistols by
way of proving their own and disproving each
other's veracity (and on that point society
seems agreed), not much more can be said in
favour of the prevalent fashion of settling dis-
putes between employer and employed in the
manufacturing and mercantile world. A mill-
owner or contractor offers two shillings a day
for some particular kind of work ; the me-
chanic thinks himself entitled to half-a-crown ;
no compromise can be effected ; a trial of
strength ensues ; and the problem, " What
shall be the rate of wages for a certain kind
of labour in a certain locality ?" is decided
according as the master or the workman hap-
pens to suffer least by a compulsory and pro-
tracted suspension of business. The rationale
of the arrangement is, that both are supposed
to be in the meanwhile looking out in all
quarters, the one for employment, the other
for men willing to accept it. And where the
strike is on a small scale, and affects only a
few people, this may really be the case. But
in those instances where general union exists
among all who follow a particular occupation
within a large tract of country, or where, as
sometimes happens, the movement is or-
ganised throughout England, no such easy
solution offers. The question then becomes
one, not of reason, but of force. If the me-
chanic or artisan has saved nothing, he must
soon give in. If his wages have been high
and himself prudent he may carry on the
blockade for weeks, though at the cost of
losing, probably, whatever he may have laid
up as a provision for sickness or old age. The
employer. no doubt. pays dearly for vic-
tory, but he generally gains it in the .end.
Setting aside the absurd law (now in process
of being repealed) which prohibited meetings
of workmen for the purpose of raising their
wages, while conceding to the masters 1► cot-

JULY 23, 1853.

responding privilege, it is certain that the
former have rarely the opportunity of combin-
ing with effect. A very few dissentients suffice
to spoil their market. Detach a few, and you
disorganise all. In any movement requiring
entire union, the chances of success are in an
inverse ratio to the number of persons eon
cerned. Where multitudes attempt to co-
operate, competition is usually too strong for
combination. The interest of the individual
is more powerful than the interest of the class.
On this head a full statistical detail, showing
the proportion of successful to unsuccessful
strikes, would be exceedingly useful.
We arc led to these reflections by the
appearance of a pamphlet by " Viudex,"
professing to describe the present con-
dition of the labour market among build-
ing operatives. From this work—manifestly
the genuine production of an artisan, turgid in
style and discursive iu substance, but authentic
as a statement of facts—we learn little beyond
the existence of a general dissatisfaction with
the actual rates of remuneration. Such a
state of things appears neither unnatural nor
objectionable. It results simply from what
we all see and feel—the effects of Australian
emigration, cheap food, and the deficiency of
Irish labour. And accordingly, favoured by
circumstances, the strike of the last few
months has been generally, though not uni-
formly, successful. In most instances the
masters have given way. In others, where the
demands made were obviously unreasonable,
a fair compromise has been effected. But
these happy results have followed from cir-
cumstances exceptional rather than common,
and the continuance of which cannot fairly be
counted upon. The question remains—" By
what means shall the operative secure for him-
self, under all circumstances, not merely such
remuneration as he may be able to extort from
the employer, but such as shall suffice to sup-
ply him with the ordinary requirements of
life?"
Three remedies suggest themselves :-
1. Facility of locomotion is the primary
condition of operative independence. In a
material sense this facility at present exists.
But, legally and socially, the law of settlement
acts as an obstruction to the free interchange
of labour between various parts of the country.
The removal of this law is therefore likely to
be the first demand of the mechanic. While
it continues in force, a uniform scale of wages
throughout England cannot be expected.
2. To carry out this uniformity, a more com-
plete organisation among working membees of
the same trade is indispensable. The legal
obstacle to such organisation, long obsolete
hi practice, is now about to be formally done
away. The rest must be left to time and to
the exertions of the more enlightened opera-
tives, which will probably not be wanting.
3. The principle of operative association,
not yet developed iu this country, but which
flourishes in ranee and America, will at no
distant period affect the position of the em-
ployer. We do not refer to any Socialistic or
Communistic theories ; nor to any form, how-
ever plausible, of parliamentary interference.
Parliament, in such matters, has no right to
meddle, except for the protection of women
and children, who are assumed not to be free
agents. Men must be left to fix their hours
of working and their rates of pay as best they
can. The association of which we speak is
that of labourers, themselves in some small
degree capitalists, and either whole or part
proprietors in the undertaking which they
carry on. The details of such a plan cannot
be here discussed : suffice it that they have
been tried in practice and found to answer.
Mr. MILL, in his admirable chapter entitled
• The Probable Future of the Labouring
Classes,"* has embodied the results both of
experience and theory on this subject. The
creation of such a class of working capitalists
—living links between the employer and em-
ployed—would indeed go fitr to justify the
seeming paradox of Lord JOHN RUSSELL, and
render democracy conservative. No reform
is more needed ; for nowhere is the line be-
tween poverty and wealth more sharply drawn
than where it divides the millowner from the
mill hand—the bourgeois from the prolitaire.

* " Principles of Political Economy," b. lv., c. T.

THE PRESS.

THE INFLUX OF GOLD—ITS
PHENOMENA IN FRANCE.
THE ECOXOttua in a recent number took issue
with the PRESS upon the question of an inver-
sion in the relative values of silver and gold,
consequent upon the unprecedented influx of
the latter metal into Europe ; and left the im-
pression on the taunts of its readers that, so
far front there being an extraordinary abundance
of gold either in England or France, the stock
in both countries "has been gradually
" for nearly twelve months:" in England
from 21400.000/. to 17,700,000/., and in Prouty
from rhea/ 14,500,000/. to about 10,000,000/4 so
" that in the two great capitals of Western
" Europe bullion has suffered a reduction Of
" about 9,000,0001. in loss titan a year." What-
ever may have been the fact as to the rise or
fall of the deposits of gold in the flank of
France, recent events have demonstrated that
throughout the Empire the demand for gold
is altogether without precedent; and the late
advices, so far from treating this subject in
the buoyant spirit of the Eeononiist,take a very
different view of the facts, and, looking
forward into the future, draw a much less
agreeable inference us to their probable eon-
sequenees.
Whilst in the United Kingdom silver is a
legal tender only for sums under forty
in France, on the contrary, silver and gold are
equally legalised, or, as it is more tersely de-
scribed, theirs is a " double standard," whilst
we are limited to a single one.
But with this apparent facility the financiers
of France have been taken entirely aback by
the discovery that—such is the unparalleled
demand for gold—the operation of coining at
the Hotel des Monnaiea has been proceeding at
the rate of one million francs per day! an issue
which, in one single year, would exceed by one
half the entire collective gold coinage of the
eighteen years reign of Louis I'muers: ; and
would surpass by sixfold that of the reign of
CHARLES X. ! In short, the Journal des lkbats
very, properly treats this great fact as an
evidence that gohl is rapidly superseding silver as
the circulating inalium of France, a result which,
it (Oda, the country should not contemplate
with dissatisfaction, if it were not that gold is
threatened with a depreciation equally alarming
and imminent.
This inference it sustains on the demonstra-
ble ground that the relative values of silver and
gold, calculated on the previous production of
each, have been altogether inverted by the
prodigious influx of the latter metal, whilst the
accustomed yield of the former has been
scarcely, if at all, affected. At the commence-
ment of the present century the annual pro-
duction of gold was, in round numbers, muter
800,000 ounces troy. This had been tripled
even before the discoveries in California and
Australia. It is now four times greater than
in 1848, and ten times greater than in 'slat ;
and it goes on perpetually reduplicating. The
writer in the .Debats confesses his bewilder-
ment in the contemplation of the possible
results of a phenomenon, foreboding, in
his opinion, the utter confusion of comtneree,
which is only to 1w averted by some as yet
Immature(' expedients, to he suggested by fiscal
and economical science.
The expedient thus obscurely alluded to has
been elsewhere explained to imply the " the
" demonetising of gold," and the taking refuge in
silver as a single standard for the currency of
France.
We hold that such a resort would be tanta-
mount to fiscal suicide. Why should Franee
restrict herself to pay in one metal when she
has two at her option? The simple course is
to leave the existing system as it is, permit-
ting public convenience to consult for its own
interests, by selecting as the medium of its
settlements that one of the two metals which
circumstances may designate as the most
suitable.
Meanwhile, one result is obvious and inevi-
table. It will be impossible for France, whilst

the present influx of gold continues, to keep
the silver for her own circulation when a profit
can be Made by carrying it elsewhere, at an
enhanced rate of exchange. Mid, so long as
the Bank of Fnince tint replace the effituc of
silver by the influx of gold, commercial eonti-
(knee will experience no shock, and commer-
cial honour will remain inviolate.
Besides, the peculiar position of France, as
regards the balance of trade, renders it indis-
pensable for her to retain gold as a legal
1 ender :—else, how are the United Kingdom, the
U 'tiled States. anti Australia to make their
payments ter the exeess of Freneh exports
which now find their way to these countries,
and for which the imports in return are far
from furnishing an equivalent:
The exports of Franc© in 1811 were close
upon a 5,000.000/. sterling ; her imports were
but 414,000,000/. Take away the power to pay
the difference in gold, and mark the emtvulmunt
that must follow. From (treat Britain alone
our exports of specie to France have been, in--
1 s IN
1519
IWO
4,00,000
suppose that Funny, in her panic at. the
sudden distortion of her currency, were to in-
sist, on the payment of this balance in silver,—it
would amount to an abatallte disruption of our
eommereial intercourse.
We can conceive nothing more mischievous
to our own interests, as well as destructive of
those of France anti other countries, than that,
in her pilule tweletioned by phenomena so
little anticipated, she should resort to expe-
dients such as have been hinted at. anti which,
in removing a SllpllOSed illeollVelailellee, would
inflict a substantial and a permanent injury.

IRISH EDUCATION.
Err any Irish tourist who takes an interest
in education knock at the door of one of those
substantial stout, buildings near the roadside
or in a village, the I►usy hum of voices from
which, even without the inscription above,
tells him it is a " national school:. and inquire
into the instruction given. Ho will find a
number of poorly-clad but quick and bright-
eyed children answering eagerly and with in-
telligence questions asked by himself or their
muster—very ready at figures, and perhaps
far advanced in geometry. Suppose him to
be in the south of Ireland, and to ask the usual
question. " How do you manage about reli-
gious instruction ?" he will almost certainly
hear front a monkish dominie, " This is at Ca-
tholic school ;" and find that, in fact, all the
tenets and practices of the Romish Church
are ineulcat ed daily. Should ho make similar
inquiries in the north, he will learn, in a harsher
brogue, that the school is under the minister,
and the religious instruction ultra-lh•esbyterian.
A few schools (about 150 out of 1,100) he may
find Church of England. "Strange," he thinks
to himself, "I heard a great deal of this 'mixed
system,' and Lord John is fond of holding
forth thereupon; but here I find all the meets
neat as imported,' anti have been fi►r years
taxed for the support of Roman Catholic and
Presbyterian schools because they are ealled
national. This looks ve►y like extorting money
under false pretences. If the Hoverument
think right to pay for teaching the Roman
Catholic religion, why do they not honestly
say so, and lay aside this flimsy pretext of a
' mixed system'?"
The national schools in Ireland am not Om
they pretend to be, and are more ►aid more every
year, under resolutions of the Board permitted
by the tiovernment, departing from their ori-
ginal foundation. Thene are priests' schools,
and Presbyterian schools, and Church of Eng-
land schools, but no national schools. Let us
look hank a little.
To educate the Roman Catholic population
of Ireland became, after the passing of the
Emaneipation Act, a matter of unavoidable
necessity. Ignorance, superstition, and bigotry

I'

1

268

could not safely be entrusted with power, and,
in the case of Ireland, this ignorance brought
a superstitious people into abject slavery under
the domination of an uneducated priesthood.
To raise the people intellectually up to or
above their priests was the only mode of con-
ferring upon them a power of free political
action. Any education is perhaps, in so ex-
treme a case, better than none ; for, by stimu-
lating thought and giving a eapability of in-
quiry wherever there is an inclination for it,
the barren soil is at least broken up and pre-
pared to receive seed. Though the necessity
of education in Ireland was obvious, the diffi-
culties which stood in the way of any general
system seemed almost insurmountable, and
Lord DERBY.B scheme was as bold in the face
of great opposition as it has been finind effec-
tive wherever honestly worked out. The great
obstacle lay, as might be expected, in religious
differences.
Had the decision been left to the leaders of
the sects, separate grants to be used in antago-
nist senses would alone have found favour,
and to obtain these they have been struggling
ever since the system commenced. But, how-
ever agreeable to many this adjustment might
be, it could expect no favour from a statesman
whose object was to assuage the violence of
factions and the bitterness of religious animosi-
ties. A compromise upon some ground where
as many as possible could be got to meet—to
expect all were hopeless—was therefore the
plan clearly seen by Lord DERBY, and deve-
loped in what is now commonly called the
mixed system. According to this, children of
all religious denominations were to be assem
bled under the same teacher, and receive
together as much secular and religious educa-
tion as was possible. Small the amount of the
latter undoubtedly was, for bigotry soon takes
fright ; still it was the very keystone of the
system " that the religious instruction should,
to a certain extent, be imparted during the
hours of combined education."
The importance of this principle cannot be
overestimated. It taught at an impressible
age the great truth so often forgotten, that
there is a common groundwork of our faith
which may yield fruits of holiness if not made
the battle-tell of sects. The noble truths
which they learned together as boys would be
less likely to be used as war cries of religious
feuds in manhood. Ditferences of opinion
would be found compatible with friendship
and respect ; and, instead of parties in Ireland
always dividing, they might sometimes com-
bine for the common good, or at least agree to
differ without acrimony or
The importance of the recent resolution of
the Board of National Education does not rest
upon the character of the books excluded from
use during the hours of simultaneous instruc
tion, so we have not thought it necessary to
dwell upon their eontents. The object and
necessary result of it is to render any religious
instruction, except of a sectarian character,
impossible in the schools : to obtain this end,
Presbyterian intolerance leagued with Papal
bigotry, and the result is, that they have
secured that which was fought against by all libe-
ral men, and have rendered it necessary for the
ablest men at the Board either to resign or to
consent to administer a totally different system
under the old name.

OCEAN PENNY POSTADE OFFERED BY PRIVATE
ENTERPRISE..--A few months ago Lord Aberdeen
stated to a large and influential deputation that if
any of their number connected with the shipping in-
terest were willing to convoy letters across the ocean
under the fourpenny charge, for which the Govern-
ment proposed to perform the transit service be-
tween
Great Britain and its colonies, he was sure
the Post-office would gladly accept the offer. And
since that declaration Lord Canning has intimated
the intention of the 6oviTliment to put up the con-
veyance of the mails to some of the colonies to the
competition of private enterprise. These official
statements have been widely published in the United
States, and have elicited from a new steam-packet
company in New York, called the Glasgow and
New York Steam Ship Company, an offer to con-
vey any quantity of mail-bags at the rate of one
penny sterling per letter. The company expect to
have vessels enough to enable them to establish a
fortnightly !Ailing from each side a the Atlantic,

THE PRESS.

WHAT IS FREE TRADE?
Dear Mr. Press,—l hear from all sides, " Why
rake up the ashes of the dead ?" "Why disturb the
now peaceful ghost of Protection?" "Why blunt
your antiquated arrows against the solid bulwarks of
free trade?" "Why attempt feebly to renew a fight
finished conclusively ?" " Free trade is now an ac-
complished fact—not in the sense of accomplished
villain—but it is un fait accompli."
I'm not raking up the ashes of the dead—Truth
cannot die—and, whether Protection is truth or no,
it cannot be pronounced dead, so long as foreign
butter (so much desired in quantity by a large party
in this country) pays half-a-crown per cwt. more im-
port duty than the same article from the colonies ;
and so long as Messrs. Bright and Cobden's Man-
chester friends maintain for their fabrics a protected
preserve in our colonial markets.
Truth is neither dead, nor antiquated ; it is im
mortal, and always in season ; and, like genius, it
"repeats itself, and repeats itself, and is ever new."
Ay, and it never has signed, and never can sign, an
abdication of its right to assert, reassert, and main-
tain its sovereignty. A few regiments of human
heroes may be routed; the royal general never quits
the field.
But, surely, he is not to be accounted an enemy to
free trade who merely inquires where it is to be seen,
and what it is, in a friendly way ?
I cannot see free trade at present, and I hardly
understand the principles of those who profess them
selves to be its exclusive friends. But lam a sincere
lover of freedom in all things ; and, therefore, an ad-
mirer of all those safeguards for freedom which are
essential to its existence to healthful growth in this

evil world.
When the millennium arrives, and we owe no man
anything individually or nationally—when everybody
will be peacefully inclined—then taxation will be
nearly, if not actually, at Zero ; and then the sword
will be turned into a pruning-hook. Then all
speech and all writing will be good and agreeable,
and free trade will participate in the universal free-
dom, and all mankind, in one brotherhood, will plea-
santly labour for the common good. This I believe.
Till then we must have armies, navies, magistrates,
and police, and we must pay for these necessaries.
Till then parents must protect their own children,
and rulers guard and protect their own people.
The only question among rational Protectionists
to honest Free Traders is, how shall we manage the
burdens on British industry, so as to foster trade and
prepare the way for progressive freedom ? "In vitium
ducit culpae fuga si caret arti." Let us see whether
such caution is now aimed at. For the present I am,
dear Mr. Press, yours respectfully,
A WOULD-BE CONSISTENT FREE TRA.DER.

CONSTANTINOPLE.—The Councillor of Legation,
Baron Schlaissing, who proceeded to his post by
the way of the Danube, had a conference with
Prince Gortschakoff relative to the entry of steamers
in the Black Sea.
DECISION OF THE TURKISH ULEMAS.—III Turkey
the corporation of the Ulemas, at whose head is the
Mufti, or Schisch ul Islam, occupies an important
place. not only as chief interpreter of the Koran, but
also in its opinion on state acts and state duties.
If any subject is brought before the tribunal of the
Ulemas, the Sultan and the Divan have to abide by
it. It is stated that the Ulemas have declared that
the Russian ultimatum and ultimatissimiim are in-
admissible, as they are incompatible with the Koran.
The last decision of the Mufti (Arif Ackmet Bei
Effendy), which the Ministers received with their
arms crossed on the breast, was that pas sage of the
Koran, " Heaven declares that war is the best and
holiest remedy of the faithful against the infidels."
ROME.—The Pope is about to publish a new bull,
on mixed marriages between Catholics and Pro
testants, more stringent than hitherto.
DARKSTADT.—The importation of clandestine wea-
pons, stilettos, &c., by working men, has hem pro-
hibited here.
WARSAW.—The Emperor is expected to arrive here
in a few days.
IIERMANSTADT,-OMCI Pacha has concentrated his
troops between Nicopali and Rustschuk. On the
opposite bank of the Danube, at Giurgiewo, are 8,000
Russian troops.

The new harbour at Holyhead is now continually
affording shelter to large numbers of vessels which run in
for protection, the works being far advanced. When com-
pleted it will form the largest harbour of refuge in the
kingdom. An area of 31(1 acres is being enclosed by a
breakwater three quarters of a mile in length, with a sea
pier :LOW feet in length. and depth of water upwards of
thirty feet. Millions of tons of stone have been deposited
to formthe foreshore and la eakwater,and the daily delivet y
iutu the sea has been at the Me of 4:000 tons.