345 



THE OPERATIVES' PARLIAMENT. 



THE combination of any set of men to obtain for themselves exclu- 

 sive advantages to the manifest detriment of other classes of the com- 

 munity, is opposed to the first principle of our constitution, and is an 

 unjust infringement upon the rights of society. It was to crush this 

 unjustifiable assumption of power in the aristocracy that the people of 

 England called so long and loudly for reform,, and, in the height of 

 their indignation, preferred risking all the horrors of revolution to the 

 longer endurance of such a system ; and yet this very system this 

 iniquitous monopoly of profit is about to be adopted by those very 

 men, who but a short time since, co-operating with their countrymen, 

 all but took up arms for its suppression. The former was a political 

 monopoly a monopoly of the power and resources of the country : 

 that of which we are about to speak is of a different description, but 

 equally unprincipled in its formation and tyrannical in its effects. 

 The " Trades' Unions" are spreading themselves over the face of the 

 country like a miasma, paralyzing the energies of commerce, and 

 destroying its very vitality speculation. They are conceived in the 

 very worst species of Tory tyranny, and are the more dangerous be- 

 cause a majority of their members, guided by an interested few, 

 falsely imagine they are resisting oppression rather than becoming 

 themselves oppressors. And yet none that read their acts or watch 

 their operations can refuse to acknowledge the despotic principle on 

 which they are founded, and, as the natural result, the disgraceful pro- 

 ceedings of which they have been guilty. Entire districts have been 

 placed under the ban of these self-constituted bodies invested capi- 

 tal has been rendered useless buildings have been allowed to decay 

 thousands have been reduced to destitution, and the result has fre- 

 quently been the invention of machinery to supersede the necessity 

 of such capricious labourers, or the withdrawal of capital and trade 

 to other districts. 



In few cases have the effects of combinators been successful to 

 themselves. Manufacturers have not been able to take orders in con- 

 sequence of their inability to procure hands but on their own terms 

 trade has thus been dreadfully injured, and, in the end, after under- 

 going the extremity of distress, these misguided men have been glad 

 to return to work at reduced wages. But the atrocious feature in 

 this system is the tyrannical laws which they enact, and the dis- 

 graceful means they employ to enforce them. It may easily be sup- 

 posed that out of the immense number of operatives which the 

 manufacturers of this country employ, there are thousands of strong, 

 minded sensible men who are aware that the prices of labour must 

 be guided by the fluctuation of trade, and that any attempt to force 

 wages, when the prices of goods are low, must recoil upon themselves. 

 This class of persons would take the rough with the smooth, and 

 would go hand in hand with the manufacturers for their mutual ad- 

 vantage. But no ; this system would not suit the Unionists. They 



M.M. No. 100. 2 Y 



