trttrr Ill Aitar.
8, Old-square, Lincoln's Inn, July 19, 1861.
have this morning received the enclosed letter from the Professor of Political Economy at Oxford. It seems to me, having regard to the position and known ability of the writer, a very remark- able and hopeful sign of the times. As yours is the only first-class paper which has tried to put the case fairly before the public, may I ask you to publish it ? I am, yours truly, THOS. HUGHES.
Kinghani, July 18, 1861.
address myself to you,. as your name appears first of those appended to that able and temperate statement on behalf of the builders on strike, which appeared in some of the papers on Monday last, and which certainly deserved more notice from the public and the press than it appears to have received. I can hardly hope that anything which I can say will make a deeper impression, but I will not refrain from making my own humble protest against the con- temptuous injustice with which claims, to a great extent reasonable, and proceeding from a very important section of the community have been treated by the leading journals, by the Times more especially:
On the merits of the strike, as it regards the amount of wages, I have nothing more to say than that the increase in the price of the necessaries of life, coupled with the great demand for labour at this time, would seem, prinui fiscie, to justify some rise in wages; and this the masters appear to admit by consenting to give the same wages as before for half a day's less work in the week which it is probable they would not have done if the workmen had not com- bined to ask for it. I say this incidentally, as people are too apt to forget that a rise in wages, however strong the reason for it, is rarely, if ever, the spontaneous act of the employers, but is always— or almost always—the result of a combined demand by the workmen, whether that combination has an organized form or not; for a workman will not give up an employment at which he gets anything like reasonable wages, on the refusal of the employer to increase them, unless he has- first ascertained, by conversation with his fel- lows, that there is no equally qualified labourer ready to take his- place on the old terms. Workmen, however, are very much in the dark as to what their wages should be. They are very apt to be mistaken in their demands;- and even- success—at least, a temporary success—does not necessarily prove that they are in the right. The "hour question" is a much Oilier one, and it is on this point that a great wrong has been done to the workmen, both by the act af the master and the judgment of the public.
It has been repeatedly said—and by some who ought to know better—that payment by the hour is a concession to the workmen ; that the effect of it is to leave it to the workman to fix the duration of his own labour; and if we trusted to the language of the papers, we shbuld suppose that a workman who wished to earn a moderate income upon easy terms might come to his work at eight o'clock and leave it at four. Nothing is further, either from the purpose or from the effect of the so-called concession. Its effect is—and such probably was its-purpose—to leave the "minimum" of the hours of labour as it was before, and. to remove all restrictions on the maxi- mum, especially the restriction which touched' the pockets of the' master—that, namely, which added fifty per cent, to the rate of wages or "overtime"
The number of hours of labour is a point on which the labourer is at least far morel competent to decide than the amount of his wages ; and it is a point upon which the interest of' the- general public coincides- mther with that of the workman than with that of the master. For it is the interest of the workmen, as a body, that the work should be so divided. as to afford employment for all, for in that way they are more able to stand out tba wages, there being no reserve, or but a. slight reserve, of workmen out of employ for the
master to fall back upon. But it is clearly the interest of the master to have such a reserve ; and if that reserve is kept for him by the public in the condition of paupers, so much the better. Now it is clearly the interest of the State, on the ground of security as well as economy, that all its subjects should be employed. It seems, therefore, that associations of workmen for regulating the hours of labour are deserving of encouragement in reference to their immediate object ; and further, it might be convenient in times of trouble, which are perhaps not so far off as many think, that we should be able to act upon the mind of the working classes, through, leaders and advisers in whom they trust, than that we should have to deal directly, and it may be forcibly, with their tumultuous masses. I have seen, therefore, with much regret, that the Government should have thrown its weight into the masters' scale, by giving them in one instance the use of its own workmen—that is, of workmen paid by the public, partly out of the taxes levied from the very men against whom they are brought into the field. The Government is not a private individual, and has no right to act as if it were ; at any rate, after this act of favour to the master, it can hardly refuse, unless it means openly and avowedly to take a side in the dispute, to do as much for the workman. Let it release the contractors for the Exhibition buildings from their contract, and offer the work to the men of the building trade upon the same terms as to hours and pay which they had before the strike, and sub- ject to the same regulation as the workmen are who are employed in our dockyards. Government can build a house, if it chooses to do so, just as easily as it can build a ship. If they don't choose to do so, it is that they are not willing to do as much for the workman as they have already done for the master. I dare say that in the present state of public opinion, I may, as Professor of Political Economy in the University of Oxford, incur some obloquy for writing this letter, if at least it be known or noticed at all. Whatever that obloquy be, I am willing to bear it, and as a further proof of my interest in what I believe to be upon the whole a just cause, I enclose you a cheque for 5/. as my subscription to-the fund for the builders upon strike. Yours truly,
CHARLES NEATE.
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