TRADE- UNIONS 29 



or what ought to be the rights of trade-unions, taking for our 

 guide the interest of the community and the laws of positive 

 morality. 



Writers who admit that unions do and can raise wages, rarely 

 contend that any legal restriction should be put on what they 

 call the ri-jlit to combine for the purpose of raising wages. Even 

 the Quarterly, before venturing to recommend the abolition of 

 unions, undertakes to prove that they do not benefit the work- 

 man by increasing his pay. Workmen generally hold the most 

 decided belief that they have a right to combine with this ob- 

 ject. So they have, while the law remains unaltered, but (we 

 are almost afraid to write such heresy) they do not come into 

 the world clothed with any natural right to combine, and the 

 utility of these combinations to the nation is not so clear as 

 they think. Granting that the law forces no man to sell his 

 labour except on such terms as suit him (with exceptions which 

 do not vitiate the reasoning), it does not follow that the law 

 must and ought to grant a right of combination. How that 

 poor word ' right ' is misused ! It is perhaps hopeless to try to 

 explain in a few words to those who do not know it already, 

 that a ' right ' has any other meaning than something which 

 is thought nice by the person using the word. We will, how- 

 ever, quote a passage from Mr. Austin's work on the Province 

 of Jurisprudence : 



Every right supposes a duty incumbent on a party or parties 

 other than the party entitled. Through the imposition of that 

 corresponding duty, the right was conferred. Through the continu- 

 ance of that corresponding duty, the right continues to exist. If 

 that corresponding duty be the creature of a law imperative, the 

 right is a right properly so called. If that corresponding duty be 

 the creature of a law improper, the right is styled a right by an 

 analogical extension of the term. Consequently, a right existing 

 through a duty imposed by the law of God, or a right existing 

 through a duty imposed by positive law, is a right properly so 

 called. Where the duty is the creature of a positive moral rule, the 

 nature of the corresponding right depends upon the nature of the 

 rule. If the rule imposing the duty be a law imperative and proper, 

 the right is a right properly so called. If the rule imposing the 

 duty be a law set by opinion, the right is styled a right through an 

 analogical extension of the term. Rights conferred by the law of 



