THE" WORKING-MAN."

Southland Times, Issue 716, 28 August 1867, Page 3

THE" WORKING-MAN."

(Prom the " Westminster Review " for ; January, 1867.) Never having slandered or flattered the working man, we are free to speak the truth about him. And the simple truth is that he is neither better nor worse than his fellows whose lot appears ; to be easier, but whose troubles are as; great as his. He lives in a different kind of r house, he dresses in a different style, his language is fashioned on other models than find favor in the eyes of richer men. It may be that he envies those whom he | is taught to regard as his " betters ;" it is too common for the latter to look down upon him. Both, however, have this in common — that, while the working man firmly believes in errors which all economists have devoted volumes to controvert, the rich man believes in other errors which the masters of economic science strive, but in vain, to explode. According to the working man, the laws of supply and demand do not affect the labor market; he thinks it possible to fix his own terms with his employer without reducing the employers fair profits, and without detriment to his own and his children's interests. He cannot credit the fact that an artificial rate of wages can be maintained for a time only, that even his labor may be bought too dearly. He does not know, and will not believe that the price paid for labor must," like water, find its own level, and that the standard is not an English but an European one. In short, the working man is a sceptic about' the" truths of political economy. His motto is a "fair day's wage for a fair day's work ;" but he cannot understand that the proportion between the amount of wage and the length of the working day is beyond his power to alter. Mistakes as gross, but different in kind, are made by the richer men who treat the workers as their inferiors. The most common of these errors is to consider that the wealth of England, and the facilities accorded to the capitalists for getting rich, can be increased by printing an indefinite number of bank notes. The most injurious error is to suppose that the employer's duty consists in giving his hands their wages without, concerning himself to redress their grievances. He knows the laws of political economy as they are set forth in books, but he is ignorant of the part he can play in making those laws press lightly on the persons they most directly affect. If, instead of meeting complaints about low wages with a "curt refusal to raise them, the employer were to combine with his workers in schemes for co-operative in-' dustries whereby direct incentives would be held out to them to feel that the gain of the one was for the : advantage of the other, we should hear less than we do about deplorable strikes which mulct workmen and employers alike, and we might see the dissolution of the trade unions, which are as detrimental to the labor market aa is a large standing army to a country. The greatest misfortune of working men is not their relation to their employers, but the mistaken estimate they have formed as to. their position in the country. They are of opinion that society is divided into drones and: workers ; that they are the workers and other people the drones. Part of this misunderstanding arises from the unhappy epithet of working men. The antithesis to workers .is idle, and. the workers are naturally led to suppose that those who do not toil with their hands are idlers. It is improbable that any working man who recently heard one of his comrades denounce Lord Derby because he could translate Homer, yet could neither blow a bottle or weave a stocking, thought the sarcasm pointless. Not one of the so-called friends of the working classes ever impresses upon them the uniformity between intellectual and manual labor, or that it may be even more truly laborious, in the strict physical sense to translate the " Iliad," than to build a house or rivet a boiler. Indeed, it was not long since a large meeting of working men was told in impassioned words that the great engineering, agricultural, and architectural triumphs which England has achieved during the past few years have been wholly due to the working classes. Who can wonder if, when sweeping statements of this kind are made, the working men should be vain of their power, and should underestimate the value of the co-operation they have received ? Next in absurdity to the phrase " working men " is the title which some peers and commoners assume, of •'friends of the working men." ' The only parallel we can think of is the assumption made by the buyers of pictures or books who style themselves the "patrons" of art and literature. Now we protest as ..strongly against the men of means and education setting themselves up as the working men's friends, protectors, or Shepherds, as we should against the workers arrogating the title of their employers' superiors. All these have a practical meaning which is fraught with deplorable consequences. " A feeling of class antagonism is 'kept alive, a check ia put to the diffusion. 6i the great and

' pregnant-tra.th-that4he-well-being-of--th€ country depends, on the interest of every man being promoted by the rich and the poor alike. Every one ought to be; a worker: that is, ought to contribute, as tar as in him lies, to the stock of human happiness. That this -truth is not better known and more generally acted upon we attribute to the undue influence which ; one class of the community has so long exercised over the other. .We desire to see the poor state their grievances, not as suppliants, but as equals in the eye of the Constitution. "We wish harmony to be established between every section of the "community. If this cannot be accomplished without England being converted into a. democracy, 1 then let democratic institutions, based on the principles we have already indicated, be established in England. .