COTTON WEAVERS AND WAGES ASSESSMENT 635 
increase the production, as the weavers worked longer hours 45, ti 
in the hope of -making up the old rate of income?; and they 
were forced into deeper and deeper misery. As was to be proved 
” . 4 ¥ tive; 
expected, the small masters, who were not in a substantial ineffective 
position, were chiefly to blame for cutting prices lower and 
lower; many of the employers would have been willing to 
see some method adopted for fixing a minimum wage for the 
weavers, and gave in their adhesion to the policy which was 
advocated by the men? The workmen had been unsuccessful 
in getting the Arbitration Act amended so as to meet their 
expectations’, and in 1808 an attempt was made to induce 
Parliament to fix a statutory minimum for weavers’ wages. 
The feeling of the House was decidedly against such a 
measure, however; though the appeal of the Lancashire and the 
. . . weavers 
weavers was 80 piteous that it could not be ignored alto- gemanded 
gether. A Select Committee took evidence on the subject, 
and reported very decidedly against the proposal as im- 
practicable and likely to aggravate the distress. At length 
in 1812 the weavers discovered that there was no need to 
agitate for fresh legislation, as the law of the land already 
provided all that they asked for. They appealed to the an Shsage- 
. . . s ment 0, 
magistrates in Quarter Sessions to have the Elizabethan Act their wage 
‘ der t. 
for the assessment of wages put into effect; but the only “iy pf 
result was that the subject came once more under the notice 1963 
of Parliament®, and Lord Sidmouth proceeded to move for 
+ Reports, ete., 1808, mm. 119. 
! Many of the mill-owners as well as the hands would have welcomed it. 
“¢Do you know whether the head Manufacturers of Bolton are desirous of this 
minimam ?’ ¢The head manufacturers in general are. Mr Sudell told me he 
wished it might take place, and he should call a meeting in Blackburn about it; 
the smaller Manufacturers in our town in general have petitioned for it; there are 
very few who have objected to it'.” Reports, Misc. 1808, m. 119. See also pp. 98, 
108, and Petition, Commons Journals, LXIV. 95. 
8 The amending Act of 1804 (44 Geo. IIL. c. 87) was no more successful than 
the original measure. 
¢ The project was again mooted in 1835 as a remedy for the distress among the 
cotton-weavers. It was advocated by Mr John Fielden. Select Committee on 
Hand-Loom Weavers, Reports, etc. 1835, xm. p. 81, questions 43, 45, 46. 
5 The change in the tone of parliamentary discussion is very noticeable, if we 
compare the debate in 1795 on Mr Whitehead’s bill for fixing a minimum wage, 
which was read a second time nem. con. and was sympathetically criticised by Fox 
(Parl. Hist. xxx. 700), with that on the cotton weavers’ Bill in 1808. Mr Rose 
bimself, in introducing the Bill, indicated his dissent from its principles and 
excused bimself on the ground that he was acting “in compliance with the wishes