LABOUR IN THE BUILDING TRADE.*
FOR many reasons this book is worthy of careful consideration ; it is one of those straws which show the direction of great winds. But " straw " is a word which demands an immediate apology. For this is a large volume of almost five hundred pages, it is a beautiful bit of printing, and both in its literary style and its matter it is quite a distinguished piece of work. The Committee of the National Federation of Building Trade Operatives commissioned Mr. Postgate to write the history of the Trade Unions of their Trade, in somewhat the same manner that the Medici engaged artists to paint pictures and write poems. To find the Trade Unions as patrons of liter- ature is a happy and healthy sign. Mr. Postgate and his printers have rewarded their patrons by a very handsome and scholarly work. It is, moreover, a book of great interest to the world at large. The history of the hard-pressed opera- tives of the building trade would not strike one, at the first glance, as likely to possess much attraction for the passing stranger. But Mr. Postgate has handled his material with real skill ; he has woven his picture of men and figures with a very vital thread of warm humanity ; his Trade Union leaders have the conviction of living creatures and not historical dummies.
The book is much more than a trade record ; it is a history of the labouring classes during the nineteenth century. By confining the facts to the one trade the scope is not really (Continued on page 428.) • The Builders' History. By H. W. Postgate. London : The Labour PublIstdo; Co. ins. Bd. net.]
restricted, but rather increased in vividness, giving space for more details and fewer of the vague generalizations which are typical of most history books. The story of the helplessness of the workers and of their struggle for the repeal of the Combinations Acts (which had been passed by the callous younger Pitt and that philanthropic humbug, Wilberforce) is told by an impartial statement of the facts. There is no need for Mr. Postgate to play the partisan : the facts are sufficient in themselves. The amazing words of Sir John Silvester (" Bloody Black Jack "), when convicting for a trade " conspiracy," would bring a blush to the cheek of any Tory who respects the dignity of his class.
But perhaps the chief value of this book is its proof that the most recent methods of the Labour world are all old ; the federated unions, the productive Guild, political action, and the communists' class-passion ; one -and all they have been tried—and found wanting. Though Mr. Postgate never seems to forget that he is here the impartial scholar and unbiassed recorder, there are indications that he is per- sonally in favour of an " extreme " policy. If this be a fair deduction, one can only say that his impartial facts are against his theories. For he gives no evidence that violence of action or speech or " class-war " has led to any permanent s dvance of the Labour cause ; indeed, his book itself proves that many of Labour's most powerful leaders have come from the capitalist class.
Strangely enough, the writer of this book (clear headed though he appears) does not directly mention the most import- ant deduction from all this history of Labour.which he has so truthfully recorded. The workers have been too wholly engrossed in the political and administrative machinery of their unions. The account Mr. Postgate gives of the attempt to found a Grand National Consolidated Trade Union, in 1833, and even a National Building Guild, is most illuminating on this point. The agitators did all they possibly could to get unity of action among the workers, by means of closer federation, and so on ; they even decided to form schools for the teaching of science. They did everything—except con- sider the best and most businesslike way of building houses This precent book, like most other Labour propaganda, has failed to insist on this all-important part of the problem. When a Trade Union Committee can be the wise patron of such a scholarly work as this book is, one suspects that it will soon draw the inevitable deductions. It will read the most admirable " friendly declaration " issued by the Opera- tive Builders' Union in 1833 (reprinted as an appendix to this book), and learn that there is little to add in the way of theory. The suspicion may then arise that the best way of succeeding in the ambition to control the building trade is to concentrate on the very practical problem of building houses better and more economically than anyone else. Many general economic results will follow that basic fact. In short, it is remarkable that this history of the Builders says practically nothing
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