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Leader (1850-1860), 1st February 1851, Edition Country of 2, Page 4, THE EDINBURGH REVIEW ON " CHRISTIAN SOCI...

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      100 . Ql%T &-*&***« [Saturday,

      100 . QL % t & - *&***« [ Saturday ,

      Deportation Of Children To Bermuda. An O...

      DEPORTATION OF CHILDREN TO BERMUDA . An official investigation was opened before Mr . Richard Hall , the Metropolitan Poor-law Inspector , on Wednesday , into the circumstances attendant on the recent deportation of pauper children from the parish of St . Pancras to Bermuda . A number of witnesses were examined , who stated that previously to the children being sent out , every enquiry was made as to their futme care and prospects , which was perfectly satisfactory . In each case the consent of the children and their parents had been obtainedand many had been anxious to go who were

      , refused permission . No pressing whatever had been sued . The children who had gone out were very happy in the colony , and frequently spoke of the kind treatment of the directors . They were all in situations , and doing well in the families of the middling and higher classes residing there . The last batch of children , two adult girls , ten girls , and nine boys , sailed on the 16 th of October . They were all engaged before they left England , and Captain Burrows saw them all in their places and settled before he returned to England . The general arrangements of the vessel were of the first order . Several

      letters were read from the boys , stating that they had no regret at having gone out to Bermuda . Mr . Hall , who had conducted his enquiry with a reference to the most minute particulars , then went over the house , and examined personally many of the children in the schools , all of whom expressed themselves anxious to go abroad .

      The Sailors' Strike. The Strike Amongst ...

      THE SAILORS' STRIKE . The strike amongst the seamen , which broke out in Sunderland on Monday week , and which now extends from Blyth to Whitby , threatens to be of more serious consequence , and a greater hindrance to the trade and commerce of the district , than was at first anticipated . Involved with the demand for ¦ wages is a fixed and determined opposition on the part of the men to the Mercantile Marine Act , and the shipping-offices established under that act . The grievances complained of are —first , the registerticket , which they consider a badge of slavery , distinguishing them from other working men of the country . Second , the shipping-offices and shippingmiusters , each seaman going a foreign voyage having to sign articles before a shipping-master , and be

      discharged before the same functionary . The owner of the vessel paying something less than 10 s . for each 100 tons of his vessel , according to size and measurement , the crew having , in repayment of those sums , to pay the mate and carpenter 2 s . 6 d . each time of signing articles and being discharged , and an ordinary seaman , Is . This the seamen , and shipowners too , consider an oppressive tax . on their labour . It more especially affects the sejtraen of these northern ports , inasmuch as many of the foreign voyages , to Hamburgh , France , and Hblland especially , are just about equivalent to a London voyage , on which thore is no shipping-master's tax . The interference by the Board of Trade with what the sailors call " their domestic arrangements on board ship " are exceedingly obnoxious to the seafaring population .

      The shipping-offices are at present a dead letter , as the men will not enter them to sign articles , or be discharged ; and at present a number of vessels are detained in port on account of the men refusing to go on shore to the shipping-office . On Monday the clerks belonging to the shipping-oflices on the Tyne went on board a number of foreign-going ships and got the crews to sign articles . Otherwise the vessels would have had to lie in port . The great bulk of the vessels in the port of Tyne lie at Shields , and considerable uneasiness has been felt in that large seaport town , occasioned by the number of men walking about out of employment . Large meetings of the seamen are held every day , but no violence has been done , except on Friday and Saturday . On the former day a mob of three hundred men attacked the bhipping-ollice at North Shields , and put a stop to the business transacting in it , causing some

      cantains and crews that were coming there to sign articles to fly for their lives . On Saturday night twenty men went on board the Commerce , collier , ready for eea , and the crow having signed articles for under wages ordered them ashore . Upon the carpenter refusing to comply with their demand ho was hauled up from below and roughly handled . On Monday the Mayor and magistrates of Tynemouth , in anticipation of u large open-air meeting thut was called by the seamen to bo held on the Now Quay that evening , brought down eighty armed

      policemen from NewcoHtle , and took possession of tho square , the policemen driving oflf tho seamen who were lounging about the quay at tho point of the cutlass . The Kcuiiu'ii of tho town , about u thousand , met in tho assembly-rooms , and the evening passed off without any <] inturbaneo . in the event of a riot , the military was ready at ten minutes' notice . The Mayor of Tyneinouth has written to the Admiralty to send a wur-steainer down to the Tyne , to protect tho shipping . Thoro aro not less than between 0000 and 7000 men on strike at tho present moment .

      The Edinburgh Review On " Christian Soci...

      THE EDINBURGH REVIEW ON " CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM . " Mr . Kinosley ' s Reply . To the Editor of the Morning Chronicle . Eversley Kectory , Jan , 24 . Sir , —In your notice of the first article in the last Edinburgh Review , you hinted an opinion that the writer of it had not been perfectly just to the " English Socialists , " who are therein denounced . I should not think of asking for any of your space to expose the different misrepresentations in that article , in as far as they bear on the great questions of labour and capital , but as the writer has attributed certain opinions to Professor Maurice and to me which we bave always disclaimed , and never more distinctly and pointedly than in the publications from which the charge is deduced , I may , perhaps , ask your permission to contradict a few of the statements which are most directly at variance with fact . I am the more anxious to do so in your Journal , because we both feel great gratitude to you for the light which you have thrown on the condition of the labouring poor . First , then , the reviewer has founded on a single passage in a tract of mine , in which I attack the notions of those economists who maintain competition to be the great law of the universe , and who persist in trying to solve , by the canons of their own science , moral and anthropological problems u tterly foreign to its sphere , the assertion that it is our practice and rule to revile political economy . This charge is not only not true , but the direct reverse of the truth . In letters , addressed to working men , whose prejudices against political economists are very strong , I have expressed my conviction of the necessity of diligently studying all that they have written , arguing that no social movement can pros per which violates any of

      those economic laws which they have discovered , and that we cannot hope to arrive at any clearer light on social points , if we do rfot avail ourselves of that which we possess already . In my Alton Locke I have referred more than once , with the most heartfelt admiration , to Mr . John Mill ' s great work ; especially , if my memory serves me right , to the very chapter which the reviewer quotes for the purpose of demolishing our supposed conclusions . Professor Maurice has never , for the last twenty years , as far as either he or his friends are aware , spoken a word in disparagement of political economy , or of any who have contributed to the elucidation of its principles ; and on a very recent occasion , whpn he delivered a lecture on the motives which led us

      to promote the establishment of working men ' s associations , he pointed out the gross injustice of identifying political economy with the idolatry of competition . Mr . Herman Merivale , formerly professor of political economy in the University of Oxford , attended that lecture , and may be quoted , if need be , as a witness for the truth of this assertion . Secondly . —The reviewer says that we wish to call ourselves " Communists . " If he had read a single one of the tracts upon which alone any knowledge of our principles can be founded , he would have" Been that , instead of choosing the name , we have carefully avoided it—not

      only because its associations are offensive , but because it expresses exactly what we are not , and what , an he is shown in a passage of Proudhon , which he somewhat naively quotes , we cannot be . If his quoting that passage means anything , it must mean thu—that we , as Socialists , believe the sanctity of family life to be the germ of all society , as indeed we do ; and that this leads necessarily to a firm respect for monarchy , as indoed it does in our case ; but that Communism , because it begins by denying family life , is alone consistent with that modern " coalition in which each is retained by tho law of self-interest , " of which he proclaims himself the champion , with which assertion also we most fully agree .

      For we have asserted , and now assert again , that a most horrible and hateful form of Communism exists alreudy in this country ; that it is proved to exist , not only by your articles , but by the evidence of factory commissioners and Government statistics ; that we at tribute the growth of this Communism to the present system ; that there is no object which we seek eo earnestly as the restoration of that domestic lif « which threatens to become extinct among English labourers . When , then , the reviewer , acquitting us ( in terms ) of aiming at the more atrocious results which are connected with the word Communism , evidently wishes that they should be associated" with our names and acts in the mind a of his readers , we answer by boldly charging on

      him that which he only insinuates against us—by averting , on the authority of his own quotation from tho " BaRaciouB" Proudhon , that his doctrinm , and mil ours , are th <> ones which lead to tins destruction of property , monarchy , and family life . Thirdly . —He says that we " deny that slow improvements or gradual ameliorations will meet the wants of society . " Professor MauriO distinctly suid , in the only tract of his which the reviewer 1 ms noticod , that wo look to nothing else : that we have no faith in great schemes ,

      and only invite individuals to take part in the humblest and most cautious efforts on the very smallest scale . Fourthly . —He says that we wish to introduce "the antagonistic and regenerative principle of association into society , " in order that we might " remodel" it . On the contrary , we have said repeatedly , trjat the cooperative principle is the principle of society already ; that . all great achievements have been , the fruit of it . Professor Maurice told a meeting of working m . en in Manchester , three weeks ago , that they owed their machines , their manufactures , their oity itself to cooperation—that it is not a new principle , b » t the eldest of all .

      Fifthly . —The reviewer charges us with appealing to feelings and rejecting seienee . I apprehend the very words " organizatio of labour" are an answer to the complaint . Our science , or the science of Socialists generally , may be very bad , but any one who has ever read a line of any Socialist's knows that his temptation is to set too much , not too little , store by science . The exposure of evils which exist we call statements of faots . If the reviewer chooses to call them " sentiments" he is welcome to do so . He is the innovator in the use of language , not we . We have protested again and again—Alton Locke is full of protests ~ -against the sentimentalism of bestowing all help upon the outcasts of society , and next to none upon its aetual working members— -a sentimentalfsm rendered inevitable by the present system , which for that reason especially we abominate .

      Sixthly . —He insinuates that we seek for the realization of the future of the working classes by a recurrence to ruediwval errors . Whence he deduces such an assertion I am at a loss to conceive . For myself , I have as great a dislike to medievalism in political as I have in ecclesiastical matters ; and Professor Maurice , in the very tract of his which the r eviewer attacks , attributes M . de Montalembert ' s dislike of Socialism to his mediaeval tastes , and points out the absurdity of trying to seek for the future of the working classes by a recurrence to them .

      Lastly . —He insinuates that we would "induce the working men to rely on external aid for objects which must be achieved by themselves , if they are achieved at all , and to seek their emancipation in a change of circumstances or social arrangements rather than in * change of character and . conduct . " I affirm this charge to be utterly unfounded . Professor Maurice has written more than one tract for the purpose of combatting directly the latter error ; and the whole moral of Alton Locke from beginning to end , is directed against the former one . Nay , the whole autobiography of one of the characters is devoted to exposing the fallacy of " Coningsbyisra , " or the

      system which would make the poor feudal dependants on the exertions and bounty of the rich . The working men at least can testify that our great aim throughout has been to show them , that they " roust achieve all great ends for themselves , emd not rely upon external aid "—that" they can hope for no change of circumstances and social arrangements except by a change of character and conduct . " Instead of wishing the labourer to depend more upon his employer , our complaint has been that he already depends on him too much ; and the only great change in the relation of rich and poor which we wish to see carried out , is one which , as Mr . John Mill has perfectly expressed it , " shall entitle the labourer to hire the capital which he requires , instead of , as at present , the

      capitalist hiring the labourer . The reviewer says that it no pleasure to him to break butterflies on the wheel . Of course it is not ; but if he has felt compelled by a stern sense of duty to undertake that ignominious office , he should , for his own sake , depart , even in his treatment of butterflies , from the habits of fairness and veracity which are expected of gentlemen . —I am , Sir , your obedient servant , ClIABLBS KlNOSWBT , Jun .

      The Queen Dowager's Annuityin The Court ...

      THE QUEEN DOWAGER'S ANNUITYIn the Court of Queen ' s Bench , on Monday , question relating to the late Queen Dowager s an nuity was again brought under discussion . A riiie had been obtained by Lord Brougham , as one ot tm executors of Queon Adelaide , calling upon the J * or «» of tho Treasury to bIiowt causo why a mandanius should not be ' iasued commanding them to pay *• > ; executors the amount of tho annuity due tor tii quarter ending the 30 th day of Docember , 184 J . A ' £ 100000 to the « ttecn

      the act granting an annuity of , Dowager , the payment wus ordered to bo made the four most usual days of payment in the yet , that is to say , the 31 st of March , the 30 th ot J" » ; the 30 th of September , and tho 29 th of J > 6 ccinl ) . ' (; The King died on tho 20 th of June , 1837 , ana tm . first quarter ' s annuity was paid on tho 30 th <> t ' ¦ ainc month , on the ground that there could t > o * apportionment of the quarter . Tho Queen DoWftf , died on , . the 2 nd of December , 1 B 4 U , and it wan «> - tended , on tho part of hor executors , that she w ontitlod to the whole amount for tho quarter enan h December 30 th , or , at least to an apportionment

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 1, 1851, page 4, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_01021851/page/4/