The Sun.
London, England, 1844-03-16 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, MARCH 16, 1844.

jesty's Government. Did the Noble Lord mean to pro-
pose a better mode of employment for those children ?
The evidence taken before the Parliamentary Commit-
tee showed that thousands of children were picked up in
the streets by the police as lost.—(Hear, hear.) Let
them look to the reports respecting the employment of
shirtmakers and milliners.—(Hear, hear.) If they in-
terfered with employment in mills and factories, they
must interfere with employment in the dressmakers-
room and in Printing-house-square.—(Hear, hear, and a
laugh.) They would be required to legislate for the
number of hours which men were to labour upon the
printing of a newspaper.—(Hear, and a laugh.) He
thought that they ought well to consider all these things
before they attempted to legislate.—(Hear, hear.) He
was sorry that he did not see the Right Hon. Member
for Newark in his place ; but he hoped that the Right
Hon. Gentleman would acknowledge that he found the
condition of the working classes in the manufacturing
districts better than he expected.—(Hear.) Much as
had been said of the Arcadian happiness and innocence
of the agricultural districts, it was placed upon record
in the returns made to the House, that many of those who
had migrated from the agricultural districts to the
manufacturing declared that they would prefer trans•
portation to being compelled to return to agriculture.—
(Cheers.) The Hon. Gentleman concluded by reading
an extract from the report of Mr. Senior, who stated
that the manufacturing population were in a better con-
dition, moral and physical, than the agricultural, and
the superiority was most striking in the girls.—(Much
cheering and laughter.)

Mr. STUART WORTLEY hoped the House would
separate the question from party and irritating ques-
tions. He thought that it was the duty of the Legis-
lature to protect those who could not protect themselves.
He believed that they might take further steps in this
matter without injury to the manufacturing interest.
His Right Hon. Friend said that he entertained great
objection to legislating at all in reference to adults. He
thought his Right Hon. Friend should have been the
last person to urge that objection, since he himself pro-
posed to legislate in reference to females, including
adults. He also argued that the effect of any public
step of this kind would be to increase machinery. Even
if this should be the case he did not know that they would
be inflicting any great injury on the parties concerned.
The probability was that in proportion as machinery
was improved would there be an increased demand for
manufactures, and, therefore, increased employment; but
even if the demand was somewhat less than before,
he still maintained that the workpeople would not be
without compensation for this evil. His Right Hon.
Friend spoke of the lowering of wages as a most serious
objection to the proposed step. Why, in an interview
which his Right Hon. Friend had had with most intel-
ligent persons of that class to which the Bill would
chiefly apply, he had been assured that even if it appeared
likely that there would be some reduction in wages, the
workpeople were ready to encounter any such risk, be-
lieving that they would be repaid by the relief which
would be thus given to them, morally and physically.
Two years since it was stated, in the petition of 300
mill-owners of the West Riding, that no necessity what-
ever existed for the present number of hours. lie could
not but express his regret that his Right Hon. Friend
had thought it his duty to oppose this proposal.
The population emptged in factories had a right to
ask, that the labouißwhich was bestowed should not be
continued through a longer period than was necessary.
What that period was, he would not profess to say, but
considering the state of society in the manufacturing
districts, and considering the equity of this claim, he
firmly believed that much time would not elapse before the
Government and Parliament would arrive at the conclu-
sion,that increased protection was peremptorily demanded.
Mr. WARD said no man in that House had listened
to the Noble Lord who had introduced the motion more
than himself, and he was certainly bound to say that all
his feelings and all his sympathies were in favour of the
course which he had proposed.—(Hear, hear.) But
when he came to weigh the consequences of that
course when he looked, not merely at that
class whose interests the Noble Lord was ad-
vocating, but to the interests of the whole
population of this country, he thought they could not
admit the principle of interference to the extent which
the Noble Lord carried it, without incurring the great-
est responsibility, both as regarded the general interests
of the country and the welfare of the manufacturing
classes. It was perfectly impossible to listen to
the arguments of the Noble Lord, and follow
him through that course of misery and degrada-
tion, which he had traced, spreading over so
large a portion of their population, without wishing that
it were in the power of that House to apply a remedy
to the existing evils.—(Hear, hear.) But would any
one say that they could apply a remedy ?—(Hear,
hear.) Would any one say that it might not most
seriously aggravate the evils which they wished to
cure ?—(Hear, hear.) Why, the Noble Lord's argu-
ment, if it were good for anything, was an argu-
ment against the whole manufacturing system, and
not merely an argument to change twelve hours into ten.
Would a ten hours' Bill restore the women to those do-
mestic duties, their absence from which the Noble Lord
so feelingly deplored ? Wouldlt restore the mother to
her children ? Would it enable her to perform those
maternal duties, the neglect of which the Noble Lord
said was now the cause of so much illness, as well as
immorality ? Would it stop the deterioration of the
race ? And then, if they interfered with one class of
manufactures, how could they deny the duty
of interfering with all ? He could show the
Noble Lord ten thousand times worse cases than
those which he had pointed out. He could show
him, among his own constituents, one branch of industry
which absolutely limited life to a certain period. Yet
these persons also were forced into such employment,
and consoled themselves for the temporary disad-
vantages which they suffered by the almost certain
result.—(Hear, hear.) Yet this was one of the sub-
jects upon which the Honourable Member who had
just addressed the House exhorted gentlemen on his side
to abstain from entering upon—he entreated them not
to enter upon what he called a party and irritating sub-
subject.—(Hear, hear.) Why, it was not because it was
a party and irritating subject, it was because it was a
part of a great commercial question that the subject was
introduced. It would be very easy to turn that discus-
sion into a corn-law debate. He did not wish to in-
troduce that subject, but he had a right to
ask, what was the cause of the pressure which
compelled people to submit to such hardships ? No man
would sacrifice his wife and children without a necessity
for it—without such a necessity as overrode all those
feelings which were as strongly implanted in the breasts
of the working population, as in those of any Members of
much natural affection—as great a desire to retain wo-
mantha I t
no
hu
es House.—(Cheers.)
domestic( Chee r s .) He believed that there was as
circle, and to do justice to the off-
spring of marriages among the working classes, as
among themselves.—(Hear, hear.) Yet such was the
state of society, that they found men driven to
things which, when they came to reflect upon their con-
sequences, struck them as almost criminal, and as blots
in their social system.—(Hear, hear.) He did not see
how they were to cure this evil by passing an Act to re-
strict the hours of labour. They enacted poverty by
law, and then endeavoured to remove the consequences of
their legislation by limiting the period of employment.
Yet they told him that it was not fair to allude to the
corn-laws, because it was a party and irritating sub-
ject. The corn-laws did affect materially the field of
labour, and it was upon the permanent demand for la-
bour that the remuneration of labour and, consequently,
the comforts of the operative classes, depended.
Sir JAMES GRAHAM—That is the whole question
at issue.—(Hear.)

Mr. WARD resumed—lt was perfectly impossible to
deny that the manufacturing classes were most injuriously
affected by the operation of the corn-laws; that, in fact,
they were the main cause of that very degradation which
the Noble Lord was seeking to remove.—(Cheers.)
The Noble Lord said that even his motives had been
doubted. He thought from his look at the time he pos-
sibly alluded to what he (Mr. Ward) had said
out of that House, and as he would not say anything
elsewhere which • he was not prepared to re-
iterate in that House, he begged to repeat what he
had before stated. lie admitted the beautiful humanity,
the touching sensibility of the Noble Lord's character;
bat he maintained that he shrank from going to the
bottom of the evil, that he was rather dealing with the
symptoms than the disease itself.—(Hear, hear.) His
opinion was that the Noble Lord's proposal was not a
remedy for the evil which he pointedout.—(Hear, hear.)
He perfectly agreed with the Right Hon. Gentleman the
Secretary of State for the Home Department, that the
first operation of the proposed alteration would be an
operation upon wages. He firmly believed that when
they had a pressure of difficulty in sustaining life, and a
demand for employment in almost every branch of in-
dustry, wages would first be affected, and that though
free in name they would not be free indeed, be-
cause the capitalist could command labour upon
almost any terms. If they forced the manufacturer
to forego his profits, they would sharpen competition by
tying him down as regarded labour. They must look,
not at what was said in that House, but at what was said
out of it by those who were favourable to the Noble Lord.
What was said at the meeting which took place at Leeds?
Dr. Hook, the vicar of Leeds, attended that meeting,
and what was his view of the Ten Hours' Bill ?—(Hear,
hear.) It was certainly a view most desirable to be
accomplished, because it would relieve women from all
employment. Would to God, he would say, they could
do so. Dr. Hook said that the business of women was
to make their homes comfortable.—(Hear, hear.) All
that was very well ; but when he was told by Dr. Hook
and Mr. Oastler that for every evil this Bill was a
panacea, he thought he was entitled to ask whether the
Noble Lord had made out that such was the case?—
(Hear, hear.) He could not agree with the Noble Lord
that this Bill was calculated to effect the objects intended,
and he must, therefore, oppose the course he proposed to
adopt.
Lord F. EGERTON would vote for the motion of his
Noble Friend, believing that if carried it would be pro-
ductive of great good. Ho had not arrived at this de-
termination without great consideration, and nothing
that had been said that night had altered his opinion.—
(Hear.) The observations that had fallen from his
lion. Friend, the Member for Sheffield, appeared to him
to be subject to this observation—that they would go to
the principle of non-interference in the subject. The
principle might be most properly adopted in Many
cases, but it was most wisely departed from in the pre-
sent case. He thought that the Hon. Member for Man-
chester, on the authority of a friend of his, had drawn
rather too strong a picture with respect to factories.
His Right lion. Friend, the Secretary of State for the
Home Department, had opposed this motion with great
ability, and upon strong grounds. lie had stated that a
diminution of wages might, and probably would, be the
consequence of the measure.—(Hear, hear.) He thought
their present interference with factory labour was far
from satisfactory, and he was disposed to think the di-
minution of wages which might follow would be miti-
gated by the comforts that would be felt by the opera-
_ tires at the close of their day's work. The Noble Lord,