The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1905-07-22
Grade Guilds In the
Golden Tge Of Labor
BY JOHN ]. BEALlN.
superintendent IN. ~ State Free Employment
Bureau,
Continued from Last Week.


plundered and enslaved by rulers whose sworn duty
it was to protect and foster. The natural dignity
of man outraged. License takes the place of lib
erty. The working people are reduced to the vest
servitude Perjury and want everywhere in evi-
dence, and paupers filing the land. The story of
the nations degradation, beginning with the reign
of Henry VIII. sinks to the foulest depths of in
fanny under Elizabeth. Were the English people
to be treated by an invading enemy as they were
by their lawful soveregns, it would even then
merit severe condemnation.
The immediate consequence was that she (the
laborer lost his insurance, also the funds destined
to support him during the period of his youth and
age when work is not open to the imperfect powers
of youth and has become impossible to the en-
feebled powers of age. Nor is the extent of the
loss which the working classes suffered by the con-
fscaton of the guilds lands to be estimated by the
value which was set upon the capital fund, as we
may sec from the enormous amount to which these
funds have increased in London. where they were
spared; for it is admitted that most of the guilds
corporate estates of the city and are compa-
MES of re-Reformation origin.
'The estates of the guilds in country towns
might have nearly reached the value of London
property belonging to the companies, but they
would hardly have been entirely perverted from
their original objects they have been in the CITY,
and would have remained i'll some degree at least
to fulfill the original purposes of the donors"-
Rogers work and Wages"
Work of Devastation.
The wiping out of the monasteries and the
granting of the monastic lands to courters changed
the whole order of things and brought into vogue
a new system of landlordism. 1t is to be borne in
mind that up to now the rents collected from the
tenants on ecclesiastical property were not the
property of the abbot to do with as he liked He
was but the steward or caretaker But now the
rents collected became the private property of the
new landlords to have and to hold-to do with as
they liked.
Over two million acres of land were thus con-
tscated, the consequences of which were first of ALL
that rentswent up, in addition to which there was
imposed on the people the necessity of maintain
ing some kind of schools, which schools were here
tofore supported out of the rents paid by the ten
ants on the abbey land. An additional hardship
was imposed on the agricultural laborers Their
right of commonage (the privilege of grazing
COW on the village common) was denied them, and
the common also became the property of the par
ties who were endowed by the crown with Church
property that had been confscated.
debased currency raised the prices of COM
modities, are told by good authorities, $50 per
cent; while, the other hand, wages remained
stationary and in good many instances depreci-
ated, thus reducing the people to a condition of
beggary. This was. the condition of things under
Edward VI. 1t gradually became worse, and I'M
der the operation of the statute of aborers passed
IN the fifth year of Elizabeth, the assizes Judges in
their respective MISUNDERSTANDING the wages of
working people, The judges, we are told, did their
best to get labor at the lowest possible wage rate
And, mark you from the decision of the Judges
rendered on the question of settlement of wages
the wage-earner had no appeal. Therold Rogers
calls this statute infamous, and declares its pur-
pose to be as follows: Cd To break up combina-
tons of laborers; % to supply an adequate ma
chlnery of control by limiting the right of appren-
lceshlp; CD to make the peasant laborer the re-
slduum of all other labor" In other words to
forcibly increase the supply of agricultural labor
ers and thus have the supply greater than the de
mGnd This would naturally keep the wage rate at
the lowest possible figure. SO low was the wage
paid such laborers that they could not live OH it.
ann the resources had to be augmented by having
recourse to the poor rates just then established
During Eizabeth's reign from 1541 to 1901,
there were passed twelve distinct acts of parlia-
ment for the relief of the working people The
horrible condition of the people at this period can
be traced directly to four causes namely: Con
hscatlon of the guilds and monasteres debased
currency, increase in the cost of commodities and
Elizabeth's Statutes of Laborers
The necessity for the enactment of the poor
laws can be traced directly to the crimes commit
ted against the people by Henry VIII, Edward
VI: and Elizabeth, which crimes were the robbery
OF the people by the sovereign and mobiles so that
what was once the property of the whole people
became the private property of debased rulers and
their nobility There was no necessity for the en-
actment of the poor laws. One statute alone would
have accomplished the purpose: statute of resti-
tuition, under which stolen property would be re-
turned to its legitimate owners and the rights
guaranteed under the Magma Charta which in
cluded return to the plain people of the rights
and privileges they enjoyed under the trade guilds
But lnaslnuch as the head of nearly every one of
the ruling families had shared in the plumber of
the monasteries and guilds, it was asking almost
too much of human nature to expect the passage of
such law Their position was somewhat anal
ogous to that of prisoner tried for the theft of
sheep IN one of the western states. The crime was
clearly proven, and yet the jury acquitted the prs
oner at the bar One of the prisoners friends
asked him how he came TO be acquitted and with
a smile he said "Why, every member of the Jury
had a piece of the sheep" The English "landed
gentry" had tasted of the feshpots of Egypt. and
would not part with them.
1t Is for the reader to determine whether the
working people of England Jared better under the
caretaklng of the Church "by law established or
under the monks of Old
Education Then.
lit Is common opinion, but l believe, com
mon error, that education in the sense of reading
and writing, was hardly ever acquired out of the
ranks OF the clergy. i cannot, account for tha NM;