In the first half of the 19th century the British Parliament enacted a large number of bills intended to improve the working conditions in the nation’s factories, mills, and mines. In 1847 a measure was passed that prevented women and children from working more than ten hours a day. There was a fierce debate in Parliament prior to its passage, one that reflected the larger political struggle occurring in Great Britain between the more established landowners and the rising and influential manufacturing class. The former supported the bill, and the latter opposed it. The leading spokesman for the opposition was John Bright, who advanced the argument that Parliament should refrain from interference in such matters as the manufacturers themselves would certainly take the lead in reforming the conditions in the factories, mills, and mines. The following is a description of John Bright’s approach in addressing his fellow members of Parliament on the issue.
No one (the speaker said) would accuse him of a want of sympathy with the working classes; but this he would tell the House, that if they went on, at the bidding of the working classes, to legislate against the capitalists, they would find a very different feeling engendered among the latter towards the operatives, from which they now exhibited____ (In his own factory)
They had a large infant school, together with a reading room and news room, and a school for adults, where the workmen attended after working hours. They had also a person employed, at a very considerable expense, who devoted his whole time to investigating the concerns of the workmen, and who was a kind of missionary among them. Not a few hundreds of pounds per annum were expended in promoting in this manner the interests of the workmen, and that, too, wholly independent of any act of the legislature. This was the case at many other wealthy factories; but he would warn the House that if they now armed the workmen against the capitalists by fixing by law ten hours, or any other number of hours for the duration of labor, and thus interfered with the established custom of the kingdom, he believed it would be impossible that the feeling which hitherto existed on the part of the manufacturers towards the operatives would continue, should the workmen think that by coming to that House they could fix the time of work and the amount of wages. He thought, if such a result took place, that it would be the duty of the manufacturers—nay, that it would be absolutely necessary for them—to take such steps as would prevent the ruin from coming upon them which must result from the passing of this measure.
He would not detain the House further; but believing, as he did in his heart, that this proposition was most injurious and destructive to the best interests of the country; believing that it was contrary to all the principles of sound legislation, that it was a delusion practiced upon the working classes, that it was advocated by those who had no knowledge of the economy of manufactures; believing that it was one of the worst measures ever passed in the shape of an act of the legislature, and that, demands alike of the workmen and of the masters would compel them to retrace the steps they had taken; believing this, he felt compelled to give the motion for the second reading of this bill his most strenuous opposition.
Source: Hansard, Parliamentary Debates (3rd series), LXXXIX, as quoted in Robinson & Beard, Readings in Modern European History, Vol. II (New York: Ginn & Company, 1909), 285-286.
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