The Sun.
London, England, 1840-12-14 00:00:00

CHAR,TISM.

THE WORKING CLASSES.—CAUSES OF
DISSATISFACTION.
(FROM A CORRESPONDENT.)
We stated on Monday that " the intrinsic state of the
working classes, and their relative position to the other de-
partments of the population, arc ominously impot taut, and
indicative of inevitable organic changes in the political in-
stitutions of the country." We enti•Jat general attention
to this topic; becath c, however, it may be overlooked in
the warfare of party interests, however unfrequently it may
ba obtruded upon the thoughts of the luxurious and wealthy
—however seldom it may gain the passing regard of our
statesmen—however it may fail to arrest the investigation
even of our enlightened political economists, it is beyond
all comparison the most momentous which can possibly be
submitted to the public mind. If there be " the question
of questions," this, indubitably, is THE SUBJECT Or sue-

JECTS.
We hear continually of the Tory party, the Whig party,
and the Radical party, as constituting the three great sub.
divisions or sections of the public world; but there is a
fourth party in the course of formation, which, in
numbers, in energy, and consequently in influence,
will rapidly become formidable and gigantic, and
which, it we may use the phrase, will effect a complete re-
volution in the political geography of the empire. Who-
ever refers to the proofs we adduced in our last article on
this subject, of the self-separation of the operative classes
from the other classes of the country, of their growing
union among themselves, and of their rapid advance in
moral and intellectual power, will be at no loss to perceive
our meaning in the preceding assertion. It is true that
the elements are only now subsiding into consistency after
a long period of almost chaotic confusion; it is true that the
machinery is also beginning to work after much grating at-
trition and disorder ; but the fact is not the less certain, the
result is not the less unavoidable.
Let us be clearly understood before we proceed. We
mean neither to censure nor to defend the principles en-
tertained by the working classes, or the spirit they dis-
play ; our object is, to the best of our ability, to exhibit to
the country facts which have never yet been appreciated,
but whose imminent importance we cannot overrate.
Through the whole body of the working classes. there
exists a deep, pervading, ineradicable dissatisfaction with
the principles and administration of Government.
To attempt to invalidate this assertion by referring
to what are called Operative Conservative Associations, is
ridiculous. From the meetings of such Associations,
often concocted and conducted by parsons—if supported by
operatives, only by such who arc regarded as renegades,
vomited forth from the body to which they belong—where
odious bigotry, whining cant, and oily hypocrisy, are ex •
hibited in juxta.position, and where the very worst species
of bribery is profusely administered by pandering to the
lowest animal propensities, the working etasses turn away
with loathing, aversion, and disgust. And our gentry of
the Tory Press, who so readily promulgate the acts of
these Associations, and bcsiaver their promoters and con-
ductors, will soon find that they have provoked where they
professed to please, and that they have bitterly exasperated
where they have pretended to improve.
The dissatisfaction to which we have alluded will be ac-
knowledged by till who know anything of the beating of the
popular pulse, the working of the popular mind.
What arc the causes of this dissatisfaction ? \'e shall
endeavour to answer the inquiry; we shall attempt to probe
the evil to its core. .
class; from the
The first cause of this dissatisfaction is to be found not
merely in the exclusion of the workin,
elective franchise, but in the irritating,° the unjust, the in-
sulting reasons which have been assitedp in parliament,
fporrofithi
profligate
eeplaTiothno. u
glttl t
bheas basis
and by a certain portion of the political
bress, both. Whig
been vociferated.
athnedyTaorery,"
of the social cone were more corrupt and. the body.
t. than its apex, and
the moral purity of our m
would be defiled if brought intoos immaculate aristocracyn
of our " unwashed" artizans. theyAc.ontac t withre gt,b
ignorant !"
as though at any hour in any'stire%t o Birmingham, or
Manchester, si non-
eve could not find men among the
represented " who, in the field of fair argument, were ca-
pable of knocking on the head- a corresponding number,
either of our hereditary legislators or of the wise men of
St. Stephen's. Again, they are " turbulent" Tins ob•
jection precisely corresponds with the outcry raised by our