The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1852-01-27 00:00:00

A FEW WORDS TO THE ENGINEERS

A CASE of great hardship was noticed in the news-
papers last week, yet we do not see what alternative
the masters had. Some of the engineers of this
town were turned out of employment because they
would not disconnect themselves with a society
which has done much mischief and threatened
more, although it was alleged that their connexion
with it was only of the kind of a benefit society.
This is sufficient to show the impolicy of uniting
two distinct elements, party combination and the
business of insurance. Many well-disposed men
would be glad to take advantage of the latter, but
have no sympathy with the former. There is the
advantage, it is true, of cheaper management,
when one committee can carry out all the objects;
but, besides a disadvantage of this kind, the funds
are frittered away by the support of vicious idle-
ness, and frequently endangered by want of prin-
ciple and insufficient control.
It seems to be forgotten, too, that combinations
may take place among more than workmen. The
employers may unite, and what then ? Aye, what
then ? Starvation is bad enough, then comes
humiliation, then the terrible consciousness of
utter defeat, and that each must seek another
market for his labour, as he has been superseded.
Many a man engages in such combinations with-
out any evil design, but he becomes part of a great
system, which, like fire or water, is a good servant
but a bad master. He ascends a locomotive to
carry him more rapidly to his destination ; but, not
understanding the regulation of the power, he is
destroyed.
The combination in Ireland presents strong fea-
tures of identity with that in England, though
each has its special points. In Ireland, land is the
subject on which the many would make their own
laws; in England it is machinery and labour. In
both, a temporal advantage is sought, but it is
bound up with illegal principles and practices.
When a private code is at variance with the laws of
the land, its punishments of course are private ;
and hence we have the secret assassination of the
one country, represented in the other by vitriol
throwing, physical outrage, destruction of mills,
engines, and lives. Let the principles only be car-
ried out, and a reign of terror similar to that which
has long been known on the other side of the
channel will be introduced here.

There is a singular inconsistency in working men
endeavouring to establish restrictive regulations,
showing us how selfishness blinds the understand-
ing. In their name and by their aid the battle of
the Anti-corn Law League was fought; and the
right even of nations was denied to interfere be-
tween the buyer and seller. The progress of
knowledge, they said, has shown that the attempt
to fix the price of a loaf by act of parliament, or
to settle the value of a sheep, was always a failure;
and none are so ready in their appeals to these facts,
real or imaginary, as ordinary workmen. Now, in
the name of truth and honesty, let us carry out
some principle; let us have several sets of restric-
tive laws, not one ; or, if we must be free traders,
let it be throughout. But we protest against this
perpetual antagonism of principle and practice.
"A big loaf" was long the cry, and they possess
the advantage of it ; then why bolster up the labour
market with artificial rules, instead of allowing it
to regulate itself by the known principle of supply
and demand.

Hitherto it has been usual for property to em-
ploy labour, but of late years there has been a
movement in order to effect a change, so that
labour shall employ property. In other words,
workmen were to combine, to form a large com-
pany with small shares, and to reap the profits
which are swallowed up in numerous cases, as they
say, by a single man. The result of these co-ope-
rative associations is anything but promising; in
the majority of cases they have been broken up by
the suspicions and jealousies of the members, and
the funds have been lost. It is easy to exclaim
against capitalists, but what is to be done without
them ? Is the beggary of the disturbed districts
of Ireland to be preferred, where capital is kept
away ? Have Englishmen never read the old fable
of. the stomach and limbs, which converted the
grumbling Roman citizens in half an hour, and
brought them back in peace from Mount Sacer
to the city ? On the subject of the co-operative
associations, the workmen ought to read one of
the Messrs. Chambers' recent issue of cheap tracts.
It is from the pen of Mr. Thomas Hogg, late secre-
tary to the Union of Mechanics' Institutions in
Lancashire and Cheshire, and presents what Wal-
ter Gerard discovered in the census tables, " very
instructive reading."