The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1852-04-20 00:00:00

LIFE B tiANC

The Company likewise assure Lives on any of the &Jowl=
ontingencies; viz.:--
For the WHOLE CONTINUANCE OF LIFs
cease after a LIMITED NUMZEE
For a Sum to be payable at ag
PREMIUMS ON

The
Premtums to
ANNUAL PAYMENTS.
GO, or at death.
CREW r.

A PORTION OF THE PREMIUMS MAY REMAIN ON
CREDIT, OR ASSURANCES MAY BE EFFECTED IN
VARIOUS WAYS, NOT ENUMERATED, TO MEET THE
CONVENIENCE OF THE PARTY MAKING THE ASSUR-
ANCE.-,----•._~___~_...,_., _

Branch gill include the following, vi
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'IOOERATE PRE-
THE

lUMS, LARGE PART/ CI ^AT ION OF PROFITS By
38 URED, SMALL CHARGE FOR MANAGEMENT. &C
The usual Commission allowed to Solicito7-
Pees to Dlcklic4ll4krm go likewi •

granted by this Com

PERCY M. DOVE, Alanager.

MR. BRAMLEY-MOORE'S ANNIHILATION
OF MR. CARDWELL.

MR. CARDWELL, like many other clever men,
committed A MISTAKE, when he attempted, before
his motley audience at the Amphitheatre, to over-
whelm so able and determined an opponent as Mr.
BRAMLEY-MOORE with his garbled statistics. It
went down for the time with such an audience; the
thing was done in a flashy style; but it was a
mistake, we repeat; and Mr. CARDWELL will
acknowledge it, when he has before him the report
of the splendid meeting held in our Concert-hall
last night. After the triumphant exposure which
he has provoked from Mr. BRAMLEY-MOORE of
his trickery,his duplicity, and the shamelessness with
which he avowed and gloried in having deceived the
constituency of this town, in what position, we ask,
is he now placed, in seeking once more to be re-
turned as their member ? Upon what portion of the

constituency is his chief reliance ? Upon the Iris]
Romanist faction. He stands before us the deser

ter of every pledge, the betrayer of every interest
which he was elected to defend and to uphold ; the
bond slave of his Holiness the Pope, and of the
Propaganda of Rome ! We wish him joy of his
proud position; hut, if he wishes ever again to
occupy a seat in the British House of Commons, it
must be as a nominee of the Defence Society, for
some Irish borough ; and! we should recommend
him forthwith to cultivate for that purpose the

friendship and patronage of his Reverence PAUL
CULLEN. Mr. CARDWELL has no longer a chance
of deceiving Liverpool. The report of the meeting
will be found in our third page.

A FEW WORDS TO THE WORKING CLASSES
ON THE COMING STRUGGLE.

THE argument most insisted upon by the Free-
trade party is the alleged prosperity of the working
classes. Landowners and farmers, they are ready
to admit, are suffering—a little. But the agricul-
tural labourer is growing fat and happy upon his
cheap loaf. The merchant has been losing by his
transactions of late ; the shipowner is all but a
ruined man; the colonial proprietor has lost two-
thirds of his property ; and even the shopkeeper
class, complain of diminished profits and ruinous
competition. But the working classes—the men
employed by these suffering parties—are said to be
living in luxury. The manufacturer is the last
class whose suffering a free-trader will admit.
Even the manufacturer has complained of late,
however, of declining profits, and diminished de-
mand for the products of his spindles and his
looms. But, then, we are told triumphantly, that
he has still kept on producing, and employing
labour; and the weavers and mill operatives in
every manufacturing town are therefore enjoying
the very highest prosperity. If this were not so, it
is asked by the London Times—
" Why do you see street after street, nay, whole sub-
urbs, rise up as by magic from the green sward, from the
stubble of last year's harvest, from the hill side, from the
heathery skirts of the moor. under the very shade of the
ancient oaks ? Why do you see cottages run up for la-
bouring men with a comfort and an elegance unknown to
the last generation; with good drainage, and pure water,
abundant and almost free ? Why are there flowering
plants, and worked muslin blinds in all the windows, new
furniture in every room, and the young families within
well clothed, blooming, playful, and happy ?"

Arcadian picture! pleasing emanation of the ima-
ginative genius of the painter! We, alas! who live
in the vicinity of manufacturing towns, and are in the
habit of seeing them en deshabille, would be accused
of drawing too much upon the credulity of the
public, if we asked them to believe in all these
" flowering plants," and "worked muslin blinds,"
and " blooming (!), playful, and irappy"—factory
children!

We are prepared, however, to admit the exist-
ence of considerable prosperity amongst the ope-
rative classes in most of our manufacturing towns.
Whilst employment is constant, and wages are
kept up, these classes must be in a position to
'command more of the comforts of life. But where
are the other prosperous working classes ? There
are certainly none in Liverpool; and we know not
where to find them. Are those connected with the
building trades—masons, joiners, plasterers—well
employed at present, or have they been at any
time within the past five years.? Are the workers
in iron—the smiths, founders, moulders, and ma-
chinists—well employed ? They are not; nor are
our ship-carpenters, or any other large class of
handicraftsmen. The ruder trades, and unskilled
labourers, in this and other towns, are notoriously
suffering from the pressure upon the market for
employment of the dispossessed Irish and agricul-
tural labourers. There are thousands of able-
bodied men to be found every day in the streets of
our large towns, :willing to undertake any menial
job for the price of a meal; men who rise every
morning from their wretched beds in overcrowded
hovels, with no certainty before them as to where
that meal is to come from ; and this class has in-
creased, and is still fearfully increasing. In the
case of such men, the Freetrader may point to the
,large loaf, and ask,—Howwould your condition be,
if its size were diminished one-half-i And the
appeal would very likely be successful; but it
would be dishonest, because it left out of view the
important question, by what agency were they
reduced to their present condition of "precarious
dependence upon chance for the privilege of being
permitted to earn the price of that loaf. The same
appeal might be successful, if made to the wretched
slopworker and the poor sempstrees ; and it would
be dishonest for the same reason.

Bat turn to the case of the skilled labourer, the
artisan class.. This class, if in constant employ-
ment, are assuredly reaping the benefit, at present,
of the cheapness of food and clothing. We say
at present; for they must not shut their eyes to
the fact that, whilst every other class is called upon
to make sacrifices, and the necessaries and com-
forts of life are greatly cheapened, the present rate
of wages cannot be kept up. Nor is continuous
employment at all likely to be preserved by them.
The struggle has to come, and is coming fast, for
cheaper labour; and in that struggle the employers
will inevitably be the victors. Let our working
classes take to their hearts the lesson, which has
just [been read to them in the case of the recent
contest between the masters and men engaged in
the engineering trades. That contest was not one
in which the question of wages was directly raised,
but it was clearly involved in it; and the result has
shown that, in these trades, the skill required in
which is of the highest order, there is an. amount of
competing labour.in the market sufficient to enable
the employers ultimately to dictate their own terms
both as to shop regulations and wages. Our
working classes are surely intelligent enough to
see that the classes above them, who are being im-
poverished in order to bring about cheapness in the
necessaries and comforts of life; the landowner,
who has to yield up a portion of his rental; the
farmer, who has to toil for a diminished return;
the shipowner, who has to submit to reduced
freights ; and the shopkeeper, who is driven by
competition to sell for reduced profits, will insist