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perism and mendicancy , and to the sanitary and social condition of the people . " 3 . That poor-law administration would be greatly amended , and union-expenditure proportionally diminished , by any measures which might more clearly distinguish between destitution arising from misfortune and that which is traceable to vice or indolence , and which , in lieu of all out-door relief , except in casual emergencies , might provide for the salutary supervision and maintenance of all permanent paupers , and for the entire employment of the partially-disabled , and of children in remunerative occupations—that is to say , for the disreputable in the workhouses , for the reputable , if superannuated , in district hospitals or almshouses , under the resident superintendence of the relieving officers ; if partially disabled or children , in Government industrial
establishments , receiving inmates at a reduced scale of charges , upon the solicitation of boards of guardians . " Two objections are commonly advanced against reproductive employment , that the pauper ought not to compete with the independent labourer ; and that there is no work for him excepting by such competition . The objection to competition in this shape , is a curious sample of imperfect Socialism . Both the objections are fallacious when thoroughly examined ; but , bearing them in mind , we have asked whether there is work to which spare labour might be applied in Bedford or in Cheshire ? Unquestionably there is . In Bedford there are various local improvements which might not " pay " any individual speculator , but would give ample
return for labour , and be highly beneficial to the community . Our Cheshire friend suggests , that the clearing of Delmere Forest would render that tract far more profitable than it is now , would open a wide scope for able-bodied labour , and , instead of creating any competition with the independent workmen , such a plan would render public labour available in extending the field for the independent . The same suggestion is applicable to the New Forest , in Hampshire , and to Epping Forrest , in Essex—great fields of public work , which might be introduced into two districts now rotted to the very foundation of society by the canker of pauperism in its worst form—a pauperized state of the Whole labouring population .
There is , however , no part of the country where similar ideas and similar facilities will not be found . At the present moment we are only noting the instances which come before us in the current week , and which illustrate the incessant and rapid growth of opinions all tending to the one point—reconstruction of the Poor Law , most especially by the industrial employment of the able bodied , in order to lay the foundation for retrieving and reorganizing the labour of the countrv .
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ARMY REFORM . Tn e United Service Gazette has been good enough to criticize "The Army" clauses of the Chartist programme with much ability and force . In spite of all the objections urged by the military critic to the Chartist scheme , he does not deny , nor can he deny , that there are great and manifold evils in our army organization . The Chartist proposal may contain blunders ; but while both soldier and officer endure truly serious grievances , and while the military journals not unnaturally shrink from outspeaking on such subjects , it cannot be a matter of surprise that lay journals should take up the question . The United Service Gazette admits that the
" abolition of promotion by purchase would be an excellent thing in the British army under the present constitution ; " while it properly objects to promotion by set gradation as the remedy . But it will be time enough to fall foul of the Chartists , and their notions on army reform , when the military authorities have remedied the admitted evils . For example , will our contemporary help us to remedy the grievance to which " Civis" in the Times so justly directs public attention for the hundredth repetition— " Barrack accommodation for married soldiers" ? " When soldiers arc in barrackh , the military authorities usually aHHign a room to every twelve or twenty men . This room nerve * these twelve or twenty men for their boardroom by day and their dormitory by night .
" Into this room one of these above-mentioned men , marrying w »» " I''" ™ - ' llI 1 < 1 «» . i ° yinK the in ( lu'K <> I 1 ( f ; (> t matrimony on account , of bin respectability , is allowed to introduce bin wile , who ( with her offspring ) ih hIho permitted the exquisite , privilege of keeping every nig ht of her life in an apartment with from twelve to twenty < Initfoon , or foot , HoldieiH , an the cane may be , separated from them only liya thin linen curtain . " Chilean il Him gout . One may , I think , fairly lee . l nurp . i . se that t ! iene , respectable men nre able to find any wives at all—I Hiiy nothing about rcHpcct / ible oneH . A cam- hitH jiiflt been mentioned to me . in which one of this privileged oIiihh ban a wlfo and two daughter , aged respectively fifteen and eighteen , living in the above mariner . "
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1 ) <) A It I ) J , A \ V 1 I , 1 . K () A 1 , . O . vk of the . moBt dangerous practices of Parliament is that of delegating —to the Lords of the Treamiry and to other ( jiovernment functionaries—the power of legiHlating by orders in council , or proclamation , which giveH the Government denpotic power . Another evil is that of prohibiting the public from putting the law in force , by enacting that the Attorney-( ieneral only nhnll have the power of enforcing those
lawn which 1 urlianient . enacts . Thin given the Biibstance of legislation to the Attorney-UeiK'ral . fto it jh that , the Stump-oilicc haH consolidated the di'Hpotism under which the prewH now existn . Thus it in contrary to luw for any peYHOUB to puhlmh events or occurrence ** without the newNpaper Htanip ; but . it . being impossible to force so entire a nupprcHnion , a law wuh formed by which the Attorney- ( General only is allowed to enforce thiH act . The consequence ih , that the Board at the
Stumii-oflicea board being a thing without a soul—allow such papers to exist as they please , and events and occurrences are recorded in more unstamped than stamped newspapers ; but whilst they abstain from giving political events and occurences the Stamp-office is quiet . If they assume to give political instruction they are sued for penalties . The necessary effect of . such a system is oppressive . It is impossible to estimate the extent of a suppressive law . No one can estimate the good that would result from an unborn thought . . . , But we have now one means of estimating the effect of suppressive systems . When Rowland Hill commenced his agitation against suppressive postage , the letters that went through the Post-office annually were about eighty-eight millions . Since the penny postage , letters through the Post-office have more than quadrupled , so that here were more than three thoughts suppressed out of every four . Let us reflect that every practical good that is , was once theory—was born of thought ; and then consider how the thoughts floating among the masses are prevented from germination , and we may form some faint idea of the extent of suppjjession produced by this hateful law .
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CHARTISM IN THE MOUTH OF WHIGGISM . All Europe knows that the Globe is the sole Whiff organ in the London press : we noticed lately its entrance into the discussion of Universal Suffrage ; and , in the number for Tuesday last , we find the following remarkable passage . The writer has been contrasting the freedom of England , and its consequent safety , with the ill contrived despotism of Austria and Naples , and their consequent danger : — " Our Italian visitors would see with astonishment the security to persons and property enforced by a trading and labouring class that governed at , d taxed itself , and whose voluntary liberality has this year raised an edifice which would have staggered a dozen Chancellors of the Exchequer . Even those elements of our society over which some advocates might feel inclined to throw a
veil , will bear a favourable comparison with the corresponding features in despotic countries . Even the class whose cry for the full franchise is being forced upon us as one of the m <> st perilous problems of our day , find that already their real share in Government is proportioned to the elevation in sobriety , frugality , and capacity for organization . We were told the other < iay , for example , that the Chartists of the Potteries had the election of guardians in iheir own hands . The Parliamentary election for Bury is in a similar manner almost entirely at the disposal of the unenfranchised class . And , to give an idea of the unselfish aims prevalent among our working men , we were assured the other day by a most intelligent observer , that no achievement would give the Government of the day greater popularity among the Chartist body , than the news that English influence had obtained the enlargement of Kossuth . "
We sincerely estimate this ciinilour at its full value , the more since we verily believe that the statement here made will be positive information to ninny readers of the Whig journalist ; so easy is it to nurse special ignorance in the best informed classes and countries .
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WHY I ) O YOU DO IT r Evi : n the Driver of the Highbury Omnibus perceives the anomalies of your competitive and quasi free-trade system . Yes ; the man who handles the ribbons of the hack team which draws the "Favourites" —he sees that you have no distinct and inviolable princip le of action as the basis of society . You command him to widen his omnibus—why ? Because a narrow omnibus is an inconvenience to the public . He aptly replies : " Why do you interfere with my private property ? Is not private property sacred ? " " Oh ! you forget , " rejoins the plethoric champion of order and competition on the box seat , " that your narrow omnibuses interfere with the comfort
of the public , and especially with the knees of the ladies . My sense of modesty revolts at the idea , much more the fact , of bringing ; my knees in contact with the 4 limbs ' of a lady in a public vehicle ! L 5 * sides , I might as well sometimes sit in a vice ! " City people hold these arguments , and City authorities direct that omnibuses shall be tit ) long and ho broad ; and yet City people object that the state should be made so long and so broad as to admit of nil sitting down without pressing each other ' s
knees , treading on ouch other ' s ) corns , or grinding each other ' s iiohch . Competition , where compatible with the gains of capital—but public control and limitation of the rights and Hacrt'ilness of property , where competition and the " sacred ri g hts " interfere with public omnibusriding comfort . Hence , omnibuses 112 inchi-H long , and Parliamentary trains at a penny a mile , in direct violation of the rights of property and the principle of competition .
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May 3 , 1851 . ] ftg ^ & * a * . * - *? 415
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THE WAR AT NOTTING-HILL . Civilization is gradually enlarging its boundaries , but not without resistance , inch by inch , from retreating barbarism . Sometimes the frontier in contest is a moral one , as between bigotry and freedom ; sometimes it is the overt , material , geographical boundary , as at the Cape of Good Hope , between Englishmen and Caffrarian , or at Notting-hill , between London of 1851 and benighted England of 1581 . The condition of this campaign country is not generally known .
The Park is hard by , with its collected specimens of Art and Industry from all Nations ; Kensington Gardens extend to the very ground , smoothed with the last touches of cultivated taste , blooming with the loveliest contributions selected by botanic science from the arboretum of the world ; workmen are finishing off the perfection , by executing the improvement which John Claudiu 3 Loudon demanded years ago , in substituting an iron rail and ( we suppose ) a hedge in lieu of the dead wall on the north side , just while the Woods and Forests , Arcadian spirits , are introducing the titled centaurs from the opposite .
Old Barbarism stands unmoved , upon his own ground . The " Potteries , " long the eyesore of the rural parts abutting on Bayswater , are imrnoveable . The Potteries were once the scene of industry , feeding upon the native clay in the lowlands between Bayswater and Kensal - green ; but that primitive occupation has long died out , and now the Potteries are . a vast Piggery , both in the metaphorical and the literal sense of the word . They are the city-metropolitan to a rugged , swampy , broken ,
dirty desert , stretching parallel to the nearest and most captivating parts of Notting-hill ; under every bush and every tree , you may encounter an incubus from that mysterious city of the desert—but you would rather not experience such encounter . The region is blasted , not blessed , by those horrid harbingers of civilization , brickfields ; by " shells , " not of the sad sea wave , nor of the rustic nut , but of unfinished houses ; and by the spirits that haunt such places—gnomes and ghouls , not unknown to the police .
The contending powers confront each other with equal hardihood . St . John's Church steeple stands forth , like an advanced and consecrated banner , into the very midst of the accursed desert ; the Rookery keeps its ground right opposite to the new Palace Gardens . New houses advance in orderly columns against the enemy ; but the Piggery maintains its Pound in the very heart of Notting-hill , olira Kensington Gravel Pitts . The noisome antiquity lies hy the side of the Turnpike , —that barricade of . Barbarism against the march of Civilization ' s cavalry . In vain does Albert Tavern
establish an outpost of public meeting and conviviality , when that inexorable pike bars the approach of cab or carriage . '" ' Will I drive at the pike , yer honour ? " used to be the Irish postilion ' s query to the traveller . By all means drive at the pike ; and assuredly it shall fall , or he finished back . " Notting-hill is coming forward , " but more vigorously than it did in the cause of Hungary ; for its Austria is nearer home . Notting-hill is rousing itself , Bayswater feels that it must awake , arise , &c , and Kensington is buckling on its armour . Let the leaders of the old regime look out for a
brisker campaign this spring : we warn them that there will be attacks on their boasted outpoststhe sanguinary pound , where they reek their bloodyminded wills ou poor starving poneys : the Turnpike , accursed of omnibus and cab ; the Piggery , the Rookery , and all thai ; howling waste which stretches from the vale of Westbourne to the Bush of Shepherd , yea , even to the North Pole and the Land of Ob .
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Ml ! N ' fl TlIKOKIKH AND DuSlKKft . —Pllll to pieces tt inan ' H theory of thingH , and you will find it based un « factH collected at the suggestion of his denirei * . A tier ) 1 passion eoiiHiinieH all evidenccn oppo « ed to its gratification , and , tuning fo ^ fthfr ' thrmtf ihHt utrvc ith purpose , cantN them into weapons by which to > achi < Jv < v itt > end . There is no deed bo vicioun but what , tho . actor make * for hlnim-lf nn excuse , ro juntlfy ; and , If ttter de * d" fo ' tiff Ml repeated , « uoh exous * bccUMioft a cin * dM-8 pt * 4 er ' * iSociat Statics . - J , - > ¦¦ . ¦ ¦ :
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Leader (1850-1860), May 3, 1851, page 415, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1881/page/11/
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