among individuals, may be defined to be a concert or agreement to bring about a certain result or object. In political economy the term is employed to designate an agreement or union among work-people to effect an increase of wages, or some modification of the terms or conditions under which they are engaged; and as this is a subject of much practical importance, we shall examine it a little in detail.

It was the practice of the legislature, subsequently to the reign of Edward I., to interfere respecting the stipulations in the contracts between masters and servants. And its deliberations being in most cases guided by the advice of the masters, it was natural that it should interfere rather to promote their particular interests, than that it might treat both parties with the same even-handed and impartial justice. But the gradual though slow dissemination of more enlarged principles of public economy having impressed all classes with a conviction of the general impolicy of such interference, it has latterly been rarely practised. The experience of nearly 500 years has shown that, while every attempt to set a maximum on the price of labour is oppressive and injurious to the workmen, it is of no real advantage to their employers; for it has been found that workmen have invariably become more persevering, sober, and industrious, according as their freedom

has been extended, and as they have been relieved from the vexatious restraints to which they were formerly subjected.

But though the legislature has long ceased to dictate the terms on which masters should buy and workmen sell their labour, a set of laws were of late much extended, and were very frequently acted upon, by which workmen were severely punished for combining together to raise their wages, or to oppose their reduction. These laws had their origin in a dark and barbarous period. The dreadful plague that desolated England, in common with most other countries of Europe, in 1348 and 1349, having destroyed great numbers of the labouring poor, a greater competition took place for the services of those who survived, who, in consequence, obtained much higher wages. Parliament, however, instead of leaving this temporary rise of wages to which the poor had an unquestionable right, to be modified by the increase of population it would have occasioned, passed in 1350, the famous act (25th Edward III., cap. 1) for regulating wages. This statute directed that labourers should serve for such wages as were common in the districts in which they resided previously to the pestilence. But, as this gave rise to a great deal of cavilling, a statute was passed two years after, fixing the specific amount of the wages to be given to reapers, mowers, haymakers, thrashers, &c., and to the more common and important classes of artificers. A variety of subsequent acts were passed, to enforce compliance with the regulations in the statute of wages, of the spirit of which some idea may be formed from the fact of its having been made felony, by a statute passed in 1425 (3d Henry VI., cap. 1), for masons to confederate or combine together to raise their wages above the statutory rate. And though this barbarous law has long ceased to be acted upon, it was not effaced from the statute-book till 1824, and may be considered as the parent stock from which the statute against combinations was derived.

This statute (39th and 40th Geo. III., cap. 103), after declaring all combinations to obtain an advance of wages to be unlawful, went on to enact, that workmen who should enter into a combination, either verbal or in writing, to obtain an advance of wages, to lessen the hours or time of working, to decrease the quantity of work, to persuade, intimidate, or, by money or otherwise, endeavour to prevail on other workmen not to accept employment; or who should, for the purpose of obtaining an advance of wages, endeavour to intimidate or prevail on any person to leave his employment, or to prevent any person employing him; or who, being hired, should, without any just or reasonable cause, refuse to work with other workmen, such workmen should, on the oath or oaths of one or more credible witnesses, before any two justices of the peace, within three calendar months after the offence had been committed, be committed to and confined in the common jail within their jurisdiction, for any time not exceeding three calendar months; or, at the discretion of such justices, should be committed to some house of correction within the same jurisdiction, there to remain, and be kept at hard labour, for any time not exceeding two calendar months.

The extreme severity of this enactment must strike every one. Justices of the peace belong to the order of masters; and, however respectable individually, they generally possess a full share of the peculiar feelings and prejudices of their class. To invest two of them with the power of imprisoning workmen for three months without the intervention of a jury, was certainly intrusting them with an authority very liable to be abused, and which, if it were to be exercised at all, should have been placed in hands less likely to act under a bias. The workmen could, it is true, appeal to the quarter sessions; but as this was only an appeal from one set of justices to another, it was of little importance. There were a variety of other clauses, discharging all workmen from attending any meeting for the purpose of combining, from contributing to defray the expenses incurred by persons acting contrary to this act, and compelling offenders to give evidence, &c., &c., under the above-mentioned penalties. Combinations were, also, punishable at common law as a misdemeanor.

Such being the law, it may be supposed, perhaps, that no combination would be able to exist or be thought of. But, in point of fact, the law had quite another effect. It prevented open and avowed combinations; but it could not, and did not, prevent those of a secret, and, consequently, dangerous character. And though numberless attempts were made to enforce the law, and workmen were very often imprisoned for combining to raise wages, the practice of combination became all but universal, and frequently led to acts of an atrocious description. In consequence a very strong feeling began to grow up, which was not confined to the work-people, but extended to a large number of the masters, that the combination laws did more harm than good. In unison with this feeling a committee of the House of Commons was appointed in 1824 to inquire into the operation of the laws for preventing combinations among workmen, and for preventing their emigration, and the exportation of machinery. This committee collected a great deal of evidence on these subjects. And the impression made by it, and by the growing conviction of the impolicy of the combination laws, was such that a bill for their repeal, introduced by Mr Hume, the chairman of the committee, was soon afterwards carried through both houses, and passed into a statute.

But this statute having been found to be defective, another was passed in the course of the following year, the 6th Geo. IV., cap. 129, now the regulating statute on the subject. It legitimates meetings and agreements, whether verbal or written, for regulating the rate of wages and the hours of working. But, at the same time, it very properly imposes a penalty of three months' imprisonment on all attempts, whether by threats or violence, to hinder work-people not belonging to the combination from working on such terms as they may think proper, or to induce them to join the combination, or any club or association for dictating to their masters. A subsequent statute, 9th Geo. IV., cap. 31, makes assaults arising out of a combination to raise wages punishable by hard labour as well as imprisonment.

At present, therefore, combinations to raise wages or limit the hours of labour are perfectly legal, if they be unaccompanied by threats or violence. These measures have not, however, had all the effect which many of their supporters anticipated. And it must be admitted that the workmen have in many instances discovered a refractory and turbulent disposition, and that there is hardly a branch of industry in which they have not resorted to strikes, and entered into combinations to raise wages, and to dictate to their masters the mode in which they should be employed. But though much to be regretted, this, after all, is only what might have been fairly expected. Great stress had long been laid, in the public estimation, on the efficacy of the combination laws. The workmen had been punished for entering into combinations, because it was supposed that they might thereby force up wages to an undue elevation; and when such notions, though false and unfounded, were embodied in the statute book and proclaimed from the bench, it need not excite surprise that they were credited by the work-people. Nothing, indeed, could be more natural than that the latter, when they were

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1 See the Rates in Sir F. M. Eden's State of the Poor, vol. I., p. 33. emancipated from the restraints of the law, should endeavour to avail themselves of what was supposed to be the powerful resource of combination. It should also be borne in mind that a large number of individuals began immediately to perceive that, whatever might be their influence in other respects, combinations might be turned to good account by those by whom they were organized and managed. But apart from the peculiar interests of such parties, it was but reasonable to suppose that for a while at least combinations would be in high favour with the working-classes; and that nothing but experience would suffice to convince them of their generally ruinous tendency.

Although, however, we regret and condemn many of the proceedings of the workmen, we are very far from thinking that they form any valid reason either for the revival of the Combination Act, or for the enactment of any similar statute.

Nothing can apparently be more reasonable than that workmen should be allowed freely to combine or associate together, for the purpose of adjusting the terms on which they will sell their labour. Wages, like every thing else, should always be left to be regulated by the fair and free competition of the parties in the market, without being interfered with by the legislature. "The property," says Adam Smith, "which every man has in his own labour, as it is the original foundation of all other property, so it is the most sacred and inviolable. The patrimony of a poor man lies in the strength and dexterity of his hands; and to hinder him from employing this strength and dexterity in what manner he thinks proper, without injury to his neighbours, is a plain violation of the most sacred property." But workmen are not allowed freely to dispose of their labour, if they be prevented from concerting with each other the terms on which they will sell it. Capacity to labour is to the poor what stock is to the capitalists. Now a hundred or a thousand capitalists may form themselves into a company, or combination, take all their measures in common, and dispose of their property as they may, in their collective capacity, judge most advantageous for their interests.—And why should not a hundred or a thousand labourers be allowed to do the same by their stock? Of all the varieties of property which a man can possess, the faculties of his mind and the powers of his body are most particularly his own. And to fetter him in the mode in which he is to exercise or dispose of these faculties and powers, is a manifest encroachment on the most inviolable of all rights, and can be justified only by an overwhelming necessity.

It is easy, however, to show that, in point of fact, no such necessity ever did or can exist. The wages of any set of workmen who enter into a combination for the purpose of raising them must be either—1st, below the natural and proper rate of wages in the branch of industry to which they belong; or, 2d, they must be coincident with that rate, or above it. Now, it is clear that, in the first case, or when wages are depressed below their natural level, the claim of the workmen for an advance is fair and reasonable: and it would obviously be unjust and oppressive to prevent them from adopting any measure, not injurious to the rights of others, which they may think best fitted to render their claim effectual. But a voluntary combination among workmen is certainly in no respect injurious to any right of their masters. It is a contradiction to pretend that masters have any right or title to the services of free workmen in the event of the latter not choosing to accept the price offered them for their labour. And as the existence of a combination to procure a rise of wages shows that they have not so chosen, and is a proof of the want of all concord and agreement between the parties, so it is also a proof that the workmen are fairly entitled to enter into it; and that, however injurious their proceedings may be to themselves, they do not encroach on the privileges or rights of others. Not only, therefore, is a voluntary combination, unaccompanied by violence, a fair exercise of the right of judging for themselves on the part of workmen, but when it is entered into for the purpose of raising wages that are unduly depressed, its object is proper and desirable. Few masters willingly consent to raise wages; and the claim of one or a few individuals for an advance of wages is likely to be disregarded so long as their fellows continue to work at the old rates. It is only when the whole or the greater part of the workmen belonging to a particular master or department of industry combine together, or when they act in that simultaneous manner which is equivalent to a combination, and refuse to continue to work without receiving an increase of wages, that it becomes the immediate interest of the masters to comply with their demand. And hence it is obvious, that without the existence either of an open and avowed, or of a tacit and real combination, workmen would not be able to obtain a rise of wages by their own exertions, but would be left to depend on the competition of their masters.

It is, however, abundantly certain that this competition will always raise wages that have been unduly depressed. And it was from not adverting to this fact, that the influence of the combination laws in depressing wages was so very greatly exaggerated. If the wages paid to the labourers in a particular employment be improperly reduced, the capitalists who carry it on obviously gain the whole amount of this reduction over and above the common and ordinary rate of profit obtained by the capitalists who carry on other employments. But a discrepancy of this kind cannot be of long continuance. Additional capital immediately begins to be attracted to the department where wages are low and profits high; and its owners are obliged, in order to obtain labourers, to offer them higher wages. It is clear, therefore, that if wages be unduly reduced in any branch of industry, they will be raised to their proper level, without any effort on the part of the workmen, by the competition of the capitalists. And looking generally at the various employments carried on in the country, we do not believe that the combination laws had any sensible influence over the average and usual rate of wages. That they occasionally kept them at a lower rate in some very confined businesses than they would otherwise have sunk to, may be true; though for that very reason they must have equally elevated them in others. This, however, is no good reason why the workmen engaged in employments in which wages happen from any cause to be unduly depressed, should be prohibited from adopting the only means in their power of doing themselves justice. When they are allowed freely to combine, their combination may occasion an immediate rise of wages; but when their combination is prevented, more or less time must always elapse before the high profits caused by the undue reduction of wages become generally known, and consequently before capital can be attracted from other businesses. And hence it is clear, that every attempt to prevent combination in such cases as this, is neither more nor less than an attempt to hinder workmen from making use of the only means by which their wages can be speedily and effectually raised to their just level. It is committing injustice in behalf of the strong, at the expense of the weaker party.

We admit that the object of the second class of voluntary combinations, or of those which take place when the wages of the combining workmen are already equal to or above their natural and proper rate, is improper and unreasonable. Still, however, it is easy to see that there is no more cause for the interference of the legislature in this case than in the former. There is no good reason why workmen should not, like the possessors of every other valuable and desirable article, be allowed to set whatever price they please upon their labour. If they combine to raise wages beyond their natural limits, or to enforce vexatious or improper condi- tions in regard to their employment, it is all but certain that their combination will be unsuccessful. It may be taken for granted, that the masters will resist any really improper demand; and the slightest glance at the relative condition of the parties must satisfy every one that, supposing them to be in earnest in their opposition, they can hardly fail to succeed in defeating it. The workmen always suffer more from a strike than the masters. It is indeed true, as Adam Smith has observed, that in the long run they are as necessary to their masters as their masters are to them. But this necessity is far from being so immediate. The stock and credit of the master are in almost every instance much greater than the stock and credit of his labourers; and he is, therefore, able to maintain himself for a much longer time without their labour, than they can maintain themselves without his wages. In old-settled and fully-peopled countries, wages are seldom so high as to enable labourers to accumulate any considerable stock; and though the scanty funds of those engaged in strikes are frequently eked out by contributions from the work-people in other businesses, and in other parts of the kingdom, the combination never fails, provided the masters do not give way, to break to pieces.

It is also evident, that when workmen enter into a combination to enforce an unreasonable demand, or to raise wages that are already up to the common level, they can gain nothing, but must lose by entering into other employments to which they have not been bred; while it is equally evident that a small extra sum will be sufficient to entice other labourers to the business they have left. All the great departments of industry have so many closely allied branches, that a workman who is instructed in any of them can, without much training or difficulty, apply himself to some of the others. And thus the workmen who enter into the combination will not only fail of their object, and be obliged to return to their work, but, owing to the influx of other labourers into their business during the strike, they will probably be compelled to accept of a lower rate of wages than they previously enjoyed.

Many extensive combinations have been broken up by the masters acting on this principle, or by their bringing work-people from other districts, or other businesses, to supply the place of those in the combination. At first, these work-people may not be so skilful or expert as those who have seceded; but these deficiencies soon become insensible, and are more than compensated by the greater command the masters have over the new hands, who, it is commonly stipulated, shall not enter into any union or association with other workmen for the purpose of raising wages, regulating the hours of work, &c.

The combination of the coal miners of the north in 1844, when about 40,000 hands struck for a modification of the conditions under which they had previously been employed and an advance of wages, though one of the most formidable that has hitherto existed, was defeated in the way now mentioned. It was carefully organized, and had, when it began operations, a reserve fund of about £24,000, besides receiving subscriptions from trades' unions in most parts of the country. But the coal-owners determined not to give way, and made every exertion to bring miners and other labourers from Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, to supply the place of those who had seceded. The result justified the wisdom of their determination; for the turn-outs, after an obstinate strike of from four to five months' duration, in which they exhausted every resource, and suffered the greatest privations, were compelled to abandon every one of their pretensions, and to beg to be allowed to resume their employment, under the same regulations as formerly, at their old, and in some cases even at lower wages. And this, with but few exceptions, is the ordinary result of the best organized combinations.

The substitution of machinery for manual labour has done more perhaps than anything else to put down combinations in manufacturing employments. And though injurious to the work-people, combinations for an improper purpose are sometimes advantageous, by the stimulus they give to the improvement of machinery. In corroboration of this statement, it is only necessary to refer to the machines for wool-combing, mule-spinning, and others of the same kind, which were invented and introduced to emancipate the masters from the dictation of unions, and the unreasonable demands and proceedings of the wool-combers, cotton-spinners, &c. They have been completely successful; and have, in truth, not only rendered these employments comparatively independent of combinations, but have materially improved and cheapened the products of the manufactures into which they have been introduced.

Even in the rare cases in which workmen from some peculiar circumstances, such as their employers having entered into extensive contracts to be completed within specified periods, have succeeded in obtaining an improper advance of wages, it has uniformly in the end been injurious to them. This result is brought about in various ways—by the high wages attracting too many labourers to the business, by the various expenses attendant on a combination, which make a heavy deduction from the wages of those engaged in it, by the demand for the articles being checked or lessened by the greater cost of their production, and so forth. Nothing, indeed, but the merest ignorance could make it be supposed that wages could be really increased by such proceedings. They depend on a principle which they cannot affect, that is, on the proportion between capital and population; and cannot be increased except by the increase of the former as compared with the latter.

For these reasons, we think it is impossible that any one, who will calmly consider the subject, should resist coming to the conclusion, that a combination for an improper object, or to raise wages above their proper level, must cure itself, or that it must necessarily bring its own chastisement along with it. In some instances, strikes have been entered into from hostile feelings against obnoxious masters; and not unfrequently the workmen are seduced into them by the artful representations of agitators in whom they place undeserved confidence, and who make them the means of advancing their own selfish ends, without caring for the misery they may entail on their dupes. But, in the majority of cases, a strike can hardly fail, under ordinary circumstances, to be a subject of the most serious concern to workmen who have either forethought or experience. And the privations to which it unavoidably exposes them form a strong presumption that they are honestly impressed with a conviction that the advance of wages which they claim is fair and reasonable, and that the strike has been forced upon them by the improper resistance of the masters. Even in those cases in which wages are notoriously depressed below their proper level, workmen will, if they consult their own interests, be shy about striking, and will resort to it only as a last resource. Such a proceeding instantly deprives them, and those that are dependent on their exertions, of their accustomed means of subsistence. In the event of their masters delaying, for any considerable period, to come to an accommodation, they are obliged, from inability to support themselves, to depend for a while on the grudging and stinted contributions of others; and when this humiliating resource is exhausted, they must return to the business they have left, or else engage in employments to which they have not been bred, and which are not congenial to their habits. It is not, therefore, easy to suppose that workmen, when they become acquainted with the real effects of combinations, will rashly enter into them, and proceed to a strike for the purpose of obtaining unreasonable or exorbitant wages. But if they should be at any time foolish enough to do so, their efforts will, no doubt, be ineffectual; and besides exposing themselves to great temporary hardship and distress, they will in the end have to accept the terms dictated by their masters.

But notwithstanding the dear-bought experience of their generally injurious influence, strikes and combinations to raise wages have seldom been so prevalent as in the past year, 1853. They seem to have originated in a variety of circumstances; partly and principally, perhaps, in the diminution of the supply of labour, occasioned by the extraordinary emigration to Australia and the United States, and partly in the increase of the exports, and the exaggerated statements put forth in relation to the profits of the manufacturers. There can, indeed, be no doubt that these circumstances warranted an increase of wages; and they have, in truth, been materially increased during the last three or four years. But we need not be surprised that this increase has not satisfied the excited expectations of the work-people, and that they have entered, in various places, into strikes and combinations to force up wages to a still higher elevation. The probability, however, seems to be that they will be unsuccessful. But however the struggle may terminate, it is doubtful, despite the heavy losses and privations the workmen have entailed upon themselves, whether their proceedings will be generally injurious to the masters. Consentaneously with the Preston strike, which involved the cessation from work of several thousand hands, a stagnation began to take place in several departments of the cotton trade; and the manufacturers, supposing the strike had not occurred, would have been obliged to diminish the rate of production, either by working at short hours, or by shutting up some of their works. And hence the strike, though injurious to the particular masters whose workmen entirely withdrew from their employment, was in the mean time advantageous to the others. It removed some of their competitors from the field; and effected that reduction in the supply of goods which, otherwise, could only have been brought about by a general agreement among the manufacturers.

When, therefore, the work-people employed in the cotton, woollen, or other departments of industry, in any particular town or district, combine to force up wages or to reduce the hours of work, they should recollect that they are not the only persons engaged in the employment. It is most likely carried on in many other places. And it is plain that nothing could be more advantageous to the employers in Manchester, than that their competitors in Preston, Oldham, &c., should be crippled, or that they should have the whole market to themselves. And thus it is that the folly and obstinacy of the work-people in one part of the country, though injurious to their employers, and ruinous, perhaps, to themselves, may, notwithstanding, redound to the advantage of the employers in other quarters.

But suppose that a combination is not confined to a single district, that it is general, that it embraces all, or nearly all, the work-people employed in one or other of the great departments of industry. This is the most favourable position in which the work-people can be placed for carrying their point; and yet, if the advance of wages which they claim be one to which they are not fairly entitled, the extension of the combination will make it only the more disastrous to themselves. In cases of this sort, instead of the works in a particular district being shut, they are closed over the whole kingdom; so that our foreign competitors on the Continent and America have the entire market to themselves, and are enriched, and their business extended, by the depression and infatuation of their rivals. This is a very serious consideration; and one which the work-people should never lose sight of.

The latter should also bear in mind, when they engage in strikes and combinations to force up wages, that capital is not bound to any peculiar locality. Manufactures have been driven, in more than one instance, from one part of this country to another, through the disorderly and turbulent conduct of the work-people.

The silk trade of Paisley, Macclesfield, and Manchester, owes its rise to the proceedings of the unionists of Spitalfields. A similar cause forced a part of the carpet trade of Kidderminster to Kilmarnock, annihilated the blanket trade of Kilkenny, and the ship-building trade of Dublin; and has most seriously injured the last-mentioned branch of industry in Liverpool. Several villages in the vicinity of Leeds are indebted for their manufacturing importance to the outrageous proceedings of the work-people in that town. But the mischief may go farther than this. Strikes and combinations, on a great scale, like those at present (March 1854) existing, though they may not drive capital from the north to the south, or vice versa, may force it to another country. No doubt there is generally a considerable disinclination to employ capital abroad. But that disinclination has its limits, and may be overcome either by the temptation of greater profits, or by the desire to emancipate oneself from the dictation of work-people, or rather of the agitators by whom their proceedings are usually directed. The extent to which English capital is vested in the stocks, and in the railways, and other public works, of the United States, France, and other foreign countries, shows that it is by no means so difficult as is often supposed to overcome the reluctance to employ capital in foreign investments. And the more intimate the intercourse becomes among different nations, the more will this reluctance be diminished. These circumstances should not be forgotten by those who are contemplating strikes and combinations. It must not be imagined that this is the only country in which manufacturing industry may be successfully prosecuted. Many parts of Prussia, Saxony, Switzerland, and France, have extensive and flourishing manufactures. And we do not know anything half so likely to stimulate their industry, and to make their competition still more dangerous than at present, as the strikes and combinations so frequent in England. They not only paralyze the proceedings of our manufacturers, but they tempt them to become partners in foreign houses, to construct mills on the Rhine or the Seine, rather than on the Irwell or the Clyde, and to carry abroad their machinery and their best workmen. And we are sorry to have to say that these are not speculative or eventual circumstances. They are being realized at this very moment (1853–54). Whoever may be the really blamable parties, the felo de se proceedings at present carried on threaten to inflict the same sort of injury on the trade and manufactures of the United Kingdom that the bigotry of Louis XIV. inflicted on those of France.

It appears from the authentic statements published by Messrs Du Fay and Co. of Manchester,2 whom there are no higher authorities on such subjects, that the demand for raw cotton in 1853 increased 7½ per cent. in Germany, Russia, and Holland, while it fell off 1½ per cent. in Great Britain. This startling fact is accounted for as follows, by the gentlemen referred to—

"The decreased consumption of cotton in this country has been caused by strikes for higher wages, at a time when the general state of trade and other circumstances did not warrant the advance. But whilst the consumption of cotton has decreased here, it has increased in America and other

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1 This anticipation has been fully realized. The Preston and other strikes have terminated, after much loss and the endurance of great hardships by the workmen, by their agreeing to accept the terms offered at the outset by the masters.

2 Circular, 1st February 1854. countries, and will, we can assure our friends, still further increase, if the turn-outs do not speedily cease. It has, perhaps, never been sufficiently considered by the industrious classes of this and neighbouring districts, that they are raising a competition to the masters and to themselves elsewhere, by persisting in the dangerous course which they now pursue. The capacity for production in different parts of the world, at competing prices, is very nicely balanced; and this country possesses now very few advantages over rival manufacturing countries. If an article is for any length of time neglected here, or not produced in sufficient quantities, it will be manufactured in other countries; and a trade once transferred is not easily recovered. This view of the disadvantages of the present strikes and labour question has not, as far as we are aware, been brought home to those most interested in it; we should, indeed, be glad to have it in our power to convince both masters and men of the importance of considering the subject in this light, in order to bring their disputes to a speedy end, and thus to prevent serious injuries to the entire trade of this country."

This is the worst view that can be taken of the influence of strikes and combinations; and the desire to obviate it would, if anything could, warrant the interference of government for their suppression. But the grand principle of the freedom of industry must not be infringed upon. We must take it with its disadvantages as well as its advantages; and trust, as we may safely do, to experience, and the good sense and better training of the masters and work-people, to lessen the former and to increase the latter. Even if it were conceded that it might be expedient for government to interfere to put down combinations to raise wages above their proper level, or to frame improper regulations in regard to the employment of work-people, the concession would be of no real value to the apologists of combination laws; for the result of the combination is, in fact, the only certain test by which we can pronounce whether the advance of wages claimed by the workmen and the regulations proposed by them were fair and reasonable or the reverse. If government were to refer to the masters for information on the subject, they would, most likely, be told that the best founded claim for a rise of wages was unjust and ill-founded; and if, on the other hand, they were to refer to the workmen, who have as good a right to be consulted as the others, the most exorbitant and unreasonable demand would be said to be moderate and proper, and such as could not be equitably refused. It is only by the fair and free competition of the parties in the market, that we discover which of these opposite and contradictory assertions is most consistent with truth. There neither are, nor is it in the nature of things that there can be, any other means of coming to a correct conclusion on the subject. If the workmen be in the right, they will, as they ought, succeed in their object; if they be wrong, they will be defeated, and the injury they will do to themselves will render them more cautious about again embarking in a similar struggle. Enlighten all parties as much as you possibly can with regard to the circumstances which determine the rate of wages and the condition of the labouring classes, and with regard also to the state of industry here and elsewhere. But when this has been done you had better stop. The interference of government in the decision of questions between masters and their work-people can be productive only of evil. Having no means of informing themselves of the real merits of the case, its agents must, if they act at all, necessarily act blindly and capriciously. And even if they had such information, it would be undesirable for them to interfere, it being abundantly certain that every combination for an improper object will be more easily and effectually put down without their assistance than with it.

The great evil of the combination laws consisted, as already observed, in the mistaken notions respecting their influence which they generated in the minds both of workmen and masters. They taught them to believe that there was one measure of justice for the rich, and another for the poor. They consequently set the interests and the feelings of these great classes in direct opposition to each other, and did more to engender hatred between the different orders of society—to render the masters despotic and capricious, and the workmen idle, turbulent, and depraved—than can easily be imagined by those not pretty intimately acquainted with the former state of society in the manufacturing districts. Instead of putting down combinations, they rendered them universal, and gave them a dangerous character. For the fair and open, though frequently foolish and extravagant, proceedings of men endeavouring to advance themselves in society, and to sell their labour at the highest price, the combination laws gave us nocturnal meetings, private cabals, and oaths of secrecy. There was not a workman to be found who did not consider it a bounden duty to embrace every opportunity of acting in the teeth of their most positive enactments. And all the means which the intelligence, the cunning, and the privations of workmen could suggest, for defeating and thwarting their operation, were resorted to from a conviction of their partiality and unfairness.

At the period now referred to, instances of violence, sometimes ending in assassination, were anything but uncommon. In 1812, for example, Mr Horsfall, an eminent manufacturer, was waylaid and shot by a band of assassins congregated for the purpose, and several mills were at the same time attacked and destroyed. In the end the combination was suppressed, but not till seventeen of the combined workmen had been executed at York. How much soever we may regret several of the late strikes, they have happily few features in common with those under the old combination laws. No man's life or property has been imperilled, and the proceedings of the work-people have been characterized by a decorum and abstinence from threats and violence that reflect on them the highest credit. The advance they have already made would seem to warrant the conclusion that they must, at no very distant period, discover that no combination, whether with or without violence can raise wages above the impassable level to which the competition of the masters is sure to elevate them.

It appears, therefore, on every ground both of justice and expediency, that the repeal of the combination laws was a wise and salutary measure. Until that event, the terms of the contract between masters and workmen could not be said to be adjusted, as it always ought to be, on the principle of free and unrestrained competition. We readily allow that combinations of workmen and of masters may be, and, indeed, frequently are, formed for the accomplishment of improper objects. But it is quite clear that these combinations will, when let alone, inevitably cure themselves; and that the efforts of government to suppress them, besides being uncalled for and unnecessary, would be oppressive and unjust. Every individual who is not a slave is entitled to demand any price for his labour that he thinks proper. And if one individual may do this, may not fifty, or five thousand, demand the same price? A criminal act cannot be generated by the mere multiplication of acts that are perfectly innocent. We are not to confound the power and the right to set a price on labour with the reasonableness of that price. It is the business of those who buy labour, and not of government, to decide whether the price set on it is reasonable or not. If they think it is unreasonable they may, and they certainly will, refuse to buy it, or to hire the workmen; and as the latter cannot long subsist without employment, necessity will oblige them to moderate their demands.

It will be observed, that the observations we have now made apply exclusively to the justice and policy of attempting to prevent voluntary combinations among workmen; and we trust they will not be understood as being intended to countenance in the slightest degree the attempts that are sometimes made by combined workmen forcibly to prevent others from working except on the conditions they have fixed for the guidance of their own conduct. Every such attempt is an obvious breach of the peace; and if not repressed by prompt and suitable punishment, would be subversive not only of the freedom of industry, but of the national welfare. The reason that combinations among numerous bodies are rarely injurious is, that the motives which individuals have to break off from the combination are so numerous and powerful, that it can seldom be maintained for any considerable period. But if those who adhere to combinations were to be allowed to maltreat and obstruct those who secede from them, this principle would be subverted, and combinations might become so very injurious as to require the interference of the legislature for their suppression. This, therefore, does not really seem to be a case in which there is much room for doubt or difference of opinion. It is plain, that we must either reduce the workmen to a servile condition, or authorize them to refuse to work, or to sell their labour, except under such conditions as they may choose to specify. But when they are allowed this much, they are allowed all they are entitled to; and if they go one step further—if they attempt to carry their point by violence, either towards their masters or their fellow-workmen—they are guilty of an offence that strikes at the foundations of the manufacturing and commercial prosperity of the country, and which no government can or ought to tolerate. It is indispensable that that system of intimidation which the workmen in some places have endeavoured to organize should, at all hazards, be effectually put down. And to secure this object, every practicable means should be adopted for facilitating the prosecution, speedy conviction, and punishment of those who are guilty of obstructing and intimidating others.

These remarks proceed from no unfriendly feeling towards the workmen, but from a desire to do them service. It is the extreme of folly to suppose that any combination can maintain wages at an artificial elevation. It is not on the dangerous and generally ruinous resource of combination, but on the forethought, industry, and frugality of workpeople, that their wages, and their condition as individuals, must always depend. If they attempt, by adding violence to combinations, to force wages up to an artificial level, one of two things will follow; they will either draw down on themselves the vengeance of the law, or they will bring about their permanent degradation by forcing the transfer of that capital, from which alone they derive their subsistence, to other businesses, or to countries where it will be better protected. (See Treatise on the Circumstances which determine the Rate of Wages, and the Condition of the Labouring Classes, by the author of this article.) (J. R. M.)

in Mathematics, the union of numbers or of quantities in every possible way; or the variation or alteration of any number of quantities or other things in all the different manners possible. See Mathematics, and Probability.