[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.")
Sia,—Among the many able and thoughtful letters on this subject that have appeared in the Spectator, I have not seen any that have touched upon one view of the case, which I think you will consider of sufficient importance to secure a place in your impartial paper.
I refer to the argument first used by Mr. Thornton in his in- teresting work " On labour," that the reason of the extremely low wages which generally prevail in agricultural districts, is the absence of the usual elements by which the full market value of any article is ascertained and obtained.
The agricultural labourer is, as a general rule, compelled by his isolation and poverty to sell his labour at once, and to the first bidder, in fact, it is what we may call "an unreserved sale." I will now quote Mr. Thornton's words.
" Imagine the situation of a merchant who could not afford to wait for a customer, but was obliged to accept, for a cargo of corn or sugar, the best offer he could get from the first customers that presented themselves ; or imagine a tradesman obliged to clear his shop in 24 hours. The nearest approach to it is the sale of a bankrupt's stock literally at a ' tremendous sacrifice.' " Such has been the position of the agricultural labourer ; unable from poverty, ignorance, and the parochial laws to go in quest of higher wages, and having no reserve fund to enable him to refuse the barest pittance on which he could just support himself and his family. Thus have agricultural wages become an expression for the measure of the lowest possibility of existence.
Nothing can alter such a state of things but union, which would enable these labourers, by the existence of a reserve fund, to make the ordinary mercantile terms for the sale of their:only commodity, labour, without which the ordinary truisms about the unfailing action of the laws of supply and demand are to a great extent fallacious.
Now let us look at the position of the Clergy from this point of view. Admitting Mr. Thornton's argument, they must at once see that union is the only means-by which their poorer parishioners can obtain the legitimate reward of their toil, the market price of their merchandise. I do not say, for I do not think, that they should act as leaders in this movement, but they would render the coming revolution more easy and less hostile if they would accustom the farmer and landowner class to regard such Unions as legitimate and right (at all events as not wrong), and were to countenance any orderly movement of this kind among the labourers, seeking to guide in reasonable channels a spirit which it is impossible to repress.
Above all, let them be indefatigable advocates of better cottages, money wages, purer morals, temperance, and education, so that when the higher wages do come, they may come to benefit in every way a virtuous and intelligent peasantry, instead of going (as some predict) to swell the receipts of the publican and exciseman. —I am, Sir, &c.,
Wellington, Somerset, October 20. CHAS. H. Fox.
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