The Industrial Revolution

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1027928145

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-159926

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Cunningham, William http://d-nb.info/gnd/128907487

Title:: The Industrial Revolution

Place of publication:: Cambridge

Publisher:: The University Press

Year of publication:: 1922

Scope:: xxii S., S. 404-886

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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A.D. 1776 --1850. 18 well as that of women under- round, ma 6 yy stem of State in- spection vas rgantsed. Fhe con- ditions in which labourers 'sved 306 LAISSEZ FAIRE inderground work of women and girls was to cease absolutely within a specified time, which it was hoped might allow for heir obtaining employment in other callings’. There were also careful provisions with regard to the prevention of accidents; and the period of apprenticeship was defined so as to avoid the recurrence of that practical bondage which was once so common in Scotland? In this way the exercise of constant State supervision, both in regard to factories and mines, came to be recognised as desirable, with a view to securing the welfare of the labour- ing population. There was no conscious abandonment of the principles of laissez faire. The advocates of interference were content to maintain that they were dealing with ex- ceptional cases. Still the recognition of the fact that there were exceptions, which demanded special treatment, brought about an important new development in practice. The exclusion of women and mere children from mines became so complete, that the excuse of legislating on their behalf could no longer be maintained. The inspectors of mines were as a matter of fact chiefly concerned in enforcing laws and suggesting improvements in the conditions under which work was done by adult men. 272. The State had done a great deal for improving the conditions in which the operatives worked before any neces- sity was felt for legislating in regard to the homes in which they lived. It was at the centres of the cotton manufacture that the difficulty first attracted attention, and it came into prominence, not as a sign of poverty? but as presenting a 1 5 and 6 Vict. ¢. 99. 2 Reports, 1844, xv1. 9. See above, p. 531. 8 It is most remarkable to find that public attention was still forced to the old, rather than to the new social difficulties, in regard to the whole question of poor relief. The insuperable problems of our time seem to be those connected with great cities,—with great masses of men huddled together, where there are aone of the middle and upper classes to attend to the ordinary machinery of government in the widest sense of the word. So far as the Poor Law Com. missioners of 1834 are concerned these difficulties might scarcely have existed. That they did exist and were very real we know from other sources. Dr Chalmers had endeavoured to organise a system of relief in Glasgow, which should be given on grounds of charity, and which should not have the demoralising effects of the aid that could be claimed as a matter of right (Christian and Civic Economy of Large Towns, 11. pp. 225—865: Political Economy, Works, xx. 400). He was not apparently aware that the legal relief, which he denounced, had been, as a matter of fact, the outgrowth of a system of voluntary and charitable assistance, such as

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