A Short History of the Modern British Working-class Movement |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
18th century activities agitation Amalgamated ANTI-CORN LAW LEAGUE basis of industry became become began blacklegging Bramley BRITISH WORKING-CLASS MOVEMENT capital capitalist class capitalist production carried coachmakers combinations commodity Corn Laws craft craft-organisation craft-unions craftsmen demands division of labour duction dustrial economic power effective employers engaged existence extent factor favour Federation fight force form of organisation Free Trade friendly benefits Government Grand National growth hand handicraft immediate increasing number industrial organisation INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION Industrial Union joiners Labour Party labour-power Lancashire leaders Liberal machinery manufacturers masters membership ment method militant Miners MODERN BRITISH WORKING-CLASS modern worker modern working-class National Guilds League National Union operation organisation by industry Parliament political action political power progress railway companies railway-workers railwaymen re-organisation realised reform repeal result revival Robert Owen sections social Socialist society South Wales coalfield specialised strike struggle Syndicalists tion trade unions Trades Union Congress wage-labour wages workmen
Popular passages
Page 114 - As soon as there is no longer any social class to be held in subjection; as soon as class rule, and the individual struggle for existence based upon our present anarchy in production, with the collisions and excesses arising from these, are removed, nothing more remains to be repressed, and a special repressive force, a state, is no longer necessary.
Page 12 - The misery hardly finds a parallel in the history of commerce. The bones of the cotton-weavers are bleaching the plains of India.
Page 13 - ... a violent encroachment like that of an avalanche in its intensity and extent All bounds of morals and nature, age and sex, day and night, were broken down.
Page 38 - points ' were : (1) Manhood suffrage; (2) equal electoral districts; (3) vote by ballot; (4) annual parliaments ; (5) abolition of property qualification for members of the House of Commons ; and (6) payment of members of parliament for their services. The programme thus drawn up was received with enthusiasm.
Page 12 - History discloses no tragedy more horrible than the gradual extinction of the English hand-loom weavers, an extinction that was spread over several decades, and finally sealed in 1838.
Page 21 - in its majestic equality forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep in the streets and to...
Page 74 - Snowden, at this time temporarily hot for thoroughgoing, class-conscious independence-and-damn-the-consequences, wrote bluntly that if the Labour Party Executive had endorsed a second Labour candidate for Leicester, it would have jeopardised the seats of four-fifths of the present Labour Members. It is no use putting forward every reason except the true one. The present Labour representation in Parliament is there mainly by the good-will of the Liberals, and it will disappear when that goodwill is...
Page 83 - The most important fusion of recent date is that of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, the General Railway Workers' Union and the United Pointsmen and Signalmen's Society, which have recently combined to form the National Union of Railwaymen.
Page 42 - ... working-men. It swore in trusty retainers as special constables (the German merchants in Manchester took part in this ceremony, and marched in an entirely superfluous manner through the city with their cigars in their mouths and thick truncheons in their hands). It gave the command to fire upon the crowd in Preston, so that the unintentional revolt of the people stood all at once face to face, not only with the whole military power of the Government, but with the whole property-holding class...
Page 25 - They wanted food and clothing ; the best workmen could not find employment, or were obliged to apply to charitable distributions of food to eke out their existence. The large farmer was reduced to a small farmer, the small farmer was becoming a labourer, and the labourer was becoming a pauper.