votes—a conclusion as to which, we may remark in passing,
whom • the daily papers combine to make the hero or the all history is against them,—and confident that the votes are personage of the hour. But the risk of a Judge being theirs—which, except in Great Britain, is not the case, the placed in a false position of this kind is daily increasing. voting power belonging mainly to small freeholders, —they It is, therefore, specially important that Judges of the are determined to see if they cannot improve their position present day should be able to bear, not only with fortitude, through legislative action. They are still doubtful about but with tact and prescience, the outcry which may break settling wages by law, because the community, wanting, out if one of them deals out even-handed justice to a Lord for instance, cheap coals or cheap rates of transit, might whom the public regard as a bad man, and whom they settle wages to the men's detriment—as is actually the therefore consider ought not to be allowed to come out of case in the Army and Nary—but they are nearly unani- Court without punishment of some kind or other, no matter mous about reducing the hours of work. They all, in what are the particular circumstances which have brought every country of Western Europe, complain that they are him in. Cases of this kind demand that not only should overworked, and all want the Legislature to fix a maxi- right be done, but that it should be done in the right mum of time beyond which labour, or at all events asso- way ; and here the man of power and. brain stands a ciated labour, shall be illegal unless justified by some better chance of turning the difficulty than the judicial necessity or danger demonstrable to a mixed tribunal of non-entity, who is almost certain, by some foolish speech, overseers and workmen. Their orators often cover up or by some equally foolish silence, to prejudice his office in this demand with a cloud of words, but when clearly the public eye. formulated this is their mean;ng, which, with much No better example of the qualities which ought to win adroitness, they apply first of all to work paid for judicial office and judicial promotion can be found than out of taxes, and work done by Companies in possession those which belong to Lord Hannen. To say that as of legal monopolies. In the former case, the employers a Judge he is just and impartial, is not enough, for have, as they think, a bottomless purse ; and in the that, we are glad to think, may be said of every Judge on latter, it seems reasonable that, where legal privileges the Bench. In addition to these qualities, the absence of are granted, the use made of those privileges should -which would have meant disgrace, he possesses powers of be legally controlled. The demand, however, extends mind and character which are exactly those demanded to all associated labour except the agricultural—the by his office. Lord Hannen has always shown himself, in labourers outside England not daring to fight the free- the best sense of the word, a man of the world. Not a holders—and the public everywhere may make up its mind superficial cynic or a disillusioned critic of human action, that it cannot too soon clear its thoughts as to its decision. but one of those men of the world who, in Byron's phrase, The question will not anywhere wait ten years ; in " know the world like men,"—a man, that is, who is England it will probably govern the next Election ; and it capable of looking deep into human motives, and, through will cause as deep a cleavage between parties as any4ues- experience and observation, of giving them their proper tion which modern society has debated. The cleavage need value. The man of the world who knows the world like not be like previous cleavages, for there is no reason a man, is one who knows it thoroughly, who does not whatever why Conservatives should care, as Conservatives, flinch from giving things their true names, and who makes to resist such legislation ; but we may rely on it that it will use of no mental evasions to hide from his own eyes facts exist, that there will be huge bodies of men contending that are personally repellent, or that do not coincide with that freedom involves the right to work at will, and bodies some preconceived view. He is, in fact, the man of large as large who will argue that hunger is a conscription, and knowledge, the man capable of the sympathy of compre- that the moment civilisation in its true sense is endangered, hension as well as of the sympathy of approbation, who that conscription must be restrained and regularised by understands as clearly that of which he disapproves as the will of the community exposed to it. that of which he approves. Lord Hannen has this gift, the So far as the privileged Companies are concerned, and supreme gift for the Judge, and one which is seldom pos- their trains at the mercy of engine-drivers and signalmen, dazed by hours like those, than they have to leave THE HOURS QUESTION. them at the mercy of the blind. The men's advocates a Trade-Union secretary, that is a confession as to the impartiality of the State which has for us a gratifying side. Be that as it may, however, it is clear that on rail- ways, at all events, Parliament has notonly a right, but is morally bound to control the hours of labour, and we rejoice to see that the principle was admitted by both parties. There was, in fact, no difference except as to methods, and that is not radical, for Mr. Channing acknowledged, just as fully as the Board of Trade, that he was not quite clear as to the best scheme to be adopted. Neither are we, except that we feel assured that there must be a maximum time, not to be departed from without an inquiry, and that there must, in some shape or another, be created a State Inspector of Hours. Nobody else will be impartial enough, or take the necessary trouble. Directors and shareholders may make up their minds that this is coming, and prepare for the necessary expense, which will not be so great as they think, bad labour never proving cheap, and may be made up for in a hundred ways, lower fares for the multitude being, as we conceive, in all probability one of them.
The discussion will not rest here, however, and as it advances, we shall all get on very dangerous ground, where our guides, at all events, ought to be very certain of their way. A general Hours Bill might ruin a dozen trades in a year, or produce an insurrection of entire classes, or, which the Unions would not like at all, compel Parliament to save great industries by fixing rates of wages as low as the hours worked, We confess we believe that the employers and the Unions and the workers can together organise a much more elastic system than the community can, and are unable to see why a natural and beneficial liberty of that sort should be taken away. We all acknowledge in free men inherent rights of some sort—at least, if we do not, we do not know what freedom means, or where the moral ha,sis of democracy is to be sought—and certainly one would say that the right to overwork oneself a little must .be numbered among them. The rigid unionists answer, we know, that the overworker is not overworking himself, but the neighbour next him ; but surely that argu- ment is nonsense, or rather, proves a great deal too much. The real cause of low wages in any country is the presence of more people anxious for dinners, than work out of which dinners may be earned. Has the sufficiency of workers therefore a right to say to the overplus of workers Leave the country for America, or Greenland, or Heaven, as you will, but leave you must' ? That cruel edict is the logical outcome of that apparently philanthropic argument ; and the logic, as regards Chinamen, is in America and Australia embodied in actual law. Still, though this opinion seems to ourselves absolutely sound, we can see clearly that great bodies of workmen have for the moment lost their belief in liberty, that they are eager to establish a tyranny over hours of some kind, and that it is practically indispensable for every statesman in the country to think the question out, and if possible arrive at a decision, as, for example, we all understand Mr. Morley to have done., Is there, to begin with, any compromise of any sort possible ? That question has not been asked yet, because there has been no voting, but it will be asked by a multitude of voices before the next General Election is done. There may be many schemes tolerable alike to the Union men and to sound economists, but we can think as yet of but one which is even plausible. It may be within the right of the State to say that civilisation requires on sanitary grounds a certain limi- tation of even voluntary labour—millions of us think, that about the compulsory Sunday holiday, which, if Union men only knew it, is their strongest precedent—and therefore to fix a maximum, say sixty hours a week, which shall not be exceeded without good cause shown, That maximum would no doubt prevent many isolated cases of oppression, and so abolish the rare hardships which influence opinion, and it would not perceptibly diminish industry. But then, has any working community nerve enough and self-restraint enough to fix that maximum at a reasonable figure ? We doubt it greatly, remembering always a kindred example in the region of pure economics. There is always a point up to which, in every State, inconvertible ,paper money may be relied on to remain at par ; but the states- man who, except in extremity, used that resource would be a madman, for the limit would, to an absolute certainty, be immediately exceeded. There are certain things, like public lotteries, which might be very useful in a population of sages, but which no com- munity ever yet known has been able to trust itself with without perceptible deterioration. In the same way, we fear that if the State fixed a maximiim of hours per week as the largest amount of toil consistent with the general health of the community, the Union men would accept the principle, and fight incessantly for a reduction of the time. Still, that would be a working compromise, and it is the necessity of thinking out the subject as if it were one on which compromises must be found that we are trying to urge to-day.
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