FINAL DELIBERATION.
The spirits of the people were sunk, not only by poverty, but by a more
bitter disappointment than had attended any former strike. The
Combination Laws having formerly been the great object of dread and
hatred, it had been too hastily supposed that the repeal of these laws
would give all that was wanted; whereas the repeal only left the people
free to make the best bargain they could for their labour, without its
having any thing to do with the grounds of the bargain. The repeal could
not increase the supply of capital, or diminish the supply of labour; it
could not therefore affect the rate of wages.
One more event was looked to with hope; the arrival of the delegates who
had travelled in search of support. They had remitted money as they had
received it, and the remittances had fallen off much of late; but it was
still hoped that the messengers might bring such assurances of sympathy
and support, as might justify the people in holding out a little longer.
These men, who returned nearly all at the same time, were met some miles
out on the road, greeted with cheers, carried to the Committee-room, and
with difficulty left alone with the Committee to tell their business.
These men brought advice and intelligence so various as might have
perplexed the most discerning and prudent of all managers of public
affairs. There were exhortations from some places to hold out to the
very last shilling; and from others to retreat, while retreat could be
managed with honour. Some distant friends gave them a kindly warning to
look for no more contributions from that quarter; and others were sorry
to send so little at present, but hoped to raise such and such sums
before they should be much wanted. Some sent word that it had always
been a bad case which they could not in conscience support, while so
many more promising needed help; others declared that if ever there was
a righteous cause, this was it, and that they should brand with the name
of traitor the first who quailed. While the members of the Committee
sighed and inquired of one another what they were to think of such
opposite advice, and each delegate was vehement in urging the superior
value of that which he brought, Allen proposed that they should abide by
the advice of the London delegates, who had been in communication with
persons who understood more of the matter in hand, than any who occupied
a less central situation. All agreed to this, and the consideration of
the matter was deferred till the next morning, when the delegates were
expected to have arrived from London.
Every member of the Committee was in his place the next morning, and the
expected messengers appeared at the foot of the table, and delivered in
their report, which was brief enough. Their London friends believed
their strike to be in a hopeless condition, and advised their making the
best terms they could with their masters, without any further waste of
time and capital. Not that all combinations were disapproved of by their
London advisers; there were cases in which such union was highly
desirable, cases of especial grievance from multiplication of
apprentices, or from unfair methods of measuring work, or from gross
inequality of wages, &c.; but for a general and permanent rise of wages,
no strike could ultimately prevail, where there was a permanent
proportion of unemployed labour in the market. A proportion of three per
cent. of unemployed labour must destroy their chance against the
masters.
“Just what Wentworth told us,” observed a committee-man. “Pray did you
inquire whether it is possible to get a rate of wages settled by law?”
“Of course, as we were instructed so to do; and the answer is what you
probably expect,—that unless the law could determine the amount of
capital, and the supply of labour, it cannot regulate wages. The law
might as well order how much beef every man shall eat for his daily
dinner, without having any power to supply cattle. If there be not
cattle enough, men cannot have law beef. If there be not capital enough,
men cannot have law wages.”
“Besides,” observed the other delegate, “wages-laws involve the same
absurdity as the combination laws we are so glad to have got rid of.
Every man who is not a slave has a right to ask a price for his labour;
and if one man has this right, so have fifty or fifty thousand. What is
an innocent act in itself, cannot be made guilt by being done by
numbers; and if Government treats it as guilt, Government treats those
who do it as slaves. Government then interferes where it has no
business. This was the argument in the case of the combination laws, and
it holds in this case too: Government is neither buyer nor seller, and
has nothing to do with the bargain; and having nothing to do with it,
could neither pass a just wages-law, nor enforce it when passed, any
more than in the case of the combination laws, which we all know to have
been unjust and perpetually evaded.”
As it was now clear that the turn-out must come to a speedy end, the
committee decided to waste no more time in discussion, but to proceed to
immediate action. Allen begged to produce the accounts, which were
balanced up to the present day, and the sight of which would, he
thought, quicken their determination to let all get work who could. He
had for some time found it difficult to get a hearing on the subject of
the accounts, as his brethren were bent on holding out, and would listen
to nothing which opposed their wishes; but they were now completely
roused. “How much have we left?” was their first question.
“Left!” exclaimed Allen. “You know I have been telling you for this
fortnight past that we are deficient 70_l._, without reckoning the bills
for advertisements, which had not then come in, and which, I am sorry to
say, swell the amount considerably.”
This declaration was received with murmurs, and on the part of some,
with loud declarations that there must have been mistake or bad
management.
Allen passed his hand over his forehead, while enduring the bitter pang
caused by this outcry; but he recovered himself instantly.
“There are the accounts,” he said. “See for yourselves whether there has
been any mistake, and bring home to me, if you can, your charge of bad
management. You pressed the task upon me in the first instance against
my will; you referred it to my disinterestedness to resume it, when,
fearing that I had lost the confidence of the people, I would have
resigned it. At your call, I have done my best, and—this is my reward!”
There was a cry of “Shame, shame!” and two or three friends rose in turn
to say for Allen what he was too modest to say for himself; that the
unthankful office had been repeatedly forced upon him, because there was
no other man who could discharge it so well; that he had never been
detected in a mistake, never found in the rear of his business, never
accepting fee or reward, never—
This eulogium was interrupted by objections. He _had_ erred in involving
the Union with the editor of a newspaper, who now unexpectedly brought
an enormous charge for the insertion of notices, intelligence, &c.,
which it had been supposed he was glad to print gratuitously. Allen
_had_ also claimed fee and reward in a way which, to say the best of it,
was shabby.
Allen calmly related the facts of the transaction with the editor,
leaving it to his judges to decide whether the misunderstanding arose
from carelessness on his part, or from some other cause. As to the other
charge, what fee or reward had he taken?
“The clothes, the clothes!” was the cry. “To send for them privately to
sell, after pretending to give them back in the face of the people. Fie!
Shabby!”
Allen looked on his thread-bare dress with a smile, supposing this a
mistake which a moment would clear up. He went to the press belonging to
the committee, where the clothes had been deposited, and flung open the
doors. He looked very naturally surprised at their having disappeared,
and turned round with an open countenance to say,
“I see how it is. Some dishonest person has used my name to obtain
possession of the clothes. I give you my word of honour that I have
never seen the clothes, or known that they were not here, since the hour
that I gave them back in the face of the people.”
All believed him, and some had consideration enough to command silence
by gesture; but before it could take effect, the fact was out, that
Allen’s own wife was the “dishonest person.” While he silently walked to
the window, and there hid his face in his hands, his friends called on
business which attracted attention from him. It was pay-day, and what
was to be done? What funds were in hand?
Allen returned to his seat to answer this question; and, as all were
just now disposed to do as he pleased, he carried his point of honesty,
and obtained authority to lessen the allowance one-half, and give advice
to every applicant to attend the afternoon meeting for the purpose of
voting for the dissolution of the strike.
Of these applicants, some were glad, and some were sorry to receive the
advice of the paymaster; but there was a much greater unity of opinion
about the reduction of the allowance. Some murmured, some clamoured,
some silently wept, some sighed in resignation; but all felt it a great
hardship, and wondered what was to become of them either way, if it was
true, as Mr. Wentworth had said, that the wages-fund of the masters and
the Union-fund of the men were wasting away together. Some were ready
with bad news for Allen in return for that which he offered to them.
“You will be worst off, after all, Allen; for there is not a master that
will give you work.”
“Did you hear, Allen, what Elliott said about you? He hopes you will go
to him for work, that he may have the pleasure of refusing you.”
“Mortimer has got a promise out of his cowardly partner, that he will
not let you set foot on the premises, Allen, on account of the part you
have taken.”
“They say, Allen, that you are a marked man in Manchester, and that no
master in any trade will take you in among his men. What do you think of
doing, I wonder?”
This question Allen could not have answered if he had wished it. It was
again put to him by his wife, who waited for him in the street to tell
him through her tears all the evil-bodings which a succession of Job’s
comforters had been pouring into her ears since the news of the probable
dissolution of the strike had got wind. “What do you think of doing, I
wonder?” was still the burden of her wail.
“Do you know that man?” replied her husband, pointing to a wasted and
decrepit man who was selling matches; “that man was once a well-paid
spinner. He lost his health in his employment, and now, at forty years
of age, is selling matches from door to door. He has submitted to God’s
will. I too will submit to sell matches, if it be God’s will that I
should lose my good name as innocently as that man has lost his health.”
“I told you how it would be. I told you—” cried Mary.
“I too foresaw it, Mary, and prepared myself for much;—but not for all.”
He reproached her no further for the injury she had done to his good
name than by declaring his unalterable will that not an article should
be purchased by her beyond a bare supply of daily food till the clothes
were bought back again and restored to the Committee, or their full
value, if they could not be recovered.
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