Strange scenes seem to be going on in Blackburn. There
have been almost daily riots there between the Orangemen and the Liberals, and now the Tory millowners are attempting coercion as decidedly as landlords ever did. According to accounts from several sources, "Radical" workmen are dismissed by wholesale from the mills, and their wives and daughters beaten, insulted, and thrust out of the mill doors. The excuse offered by the men con- cerned in these outrages is that they want no "friends of the Radicals," and by the masters that they "cannot interfere "among their hands. An aggregate meeting of all Liberal employers has been summoned, and large subscriptions will be raised to prosecute -the offenders, but the occasion requires even more decisive measures. This is just one of thos3 instances in which the Trade Unions might interfere with effect, not for this or that party, but on behalf et the workmen's political freedom. Four or five hundred actions for assault, conspiracy to assault, and unjust dismissal, costs paid by the Unions, would soon put a stop to such proceedings.
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