"Not only,"

should be the subject of arbitration. says the "Sheffield Independent," "would they concede nothing of the 15 per cent. but they repelled a suggestion for arbitration with something in their manner almost brusque." We had hoped for better things, and had reason for our hope, as Mr. C. Markham occupied the chair on this occasion.' Disappointments must recur again and again. It would indeed be foolish to expect strikes or the causes of strikes to cease at once or in any other way than by slow degrees. The principal fact after all is, the gradual introduction into this great trade and among the colliers in so many different parts of the country of the idea of justice, and the strong wish to settle disputes without recourse being had to strikes on the one side or lock-outs on the other.

1 Since this was written the dispute terminated by the employers offering to accept 10 per cent. reduction, and to refer the remaining 5 per cent. to arbitration, or to accept 121 per cent. reduction as a settlement. This latter offer was accepted by the men. Efforts have also been made to establish a board of conciliation.

CHAPTER VI.

ARBITRATION IN OTHER INDUSTRIES.

HE English working classes have given the most favourable reception to the proposals for courts and boards of arbitration or conciliation. Wherever representatives of the working classes have met together, and the subject of arbitration has been brought forward, favourable resolutions have been passed with remarkable unanimity and enthusiasm. On no other subject has there been so hearty a response. Mr. George Odger, to the great value' of whose life and influence upon the industrial progress I am glad to bear witness, introduced the subject of arbitration to a large representative meeting that was held at Sheffield in the year

1866. He said that "With the principles of strikes he had no sympathy, but he looked upon them as a sad necessity-as a two-edged instrument, which was dangerous to use, and which ought to be avoided. Strikes were to the social world what wars were to the political world. They became crimes, unless they were prompted by absolute necessity." This view has steadily been growing among the workmen, who have been taught to look to peaceable and just settlements of the labour questions. None know better than the advocates of arbitration and conciliation, that the success of their efforts is due to the teaching and guidance of men like Mr. Odger, who have preached and prepared the way for peace.

We have come to the conclusion that permanent boards, either of arbitration or conciliation, are not possible unless the operatives are united together in some form of permanently established organization, without which there is no guarantee that the men will abide by the decisions of the board; and that the system has the best chance of success when the employers are also associated

together. In examining the conditions of some other industries, we are naturally led to the consideration of those trades in which there are highly organized associations of employers and employed, and yet no board established,-where there has been arbitration but only in an exceptional and unsystematic way.

In the preceding chapters the reader may have noticed that the industries treated of have been local in character. There are, in fact, two great divisions of human industry. One, the more general, which consists principally of the manufacture of the instruments, machinery, and buildings used in other industries, and where the operatives are necessarily scattered over the country, and not collected into groups. In the other, each trade tends to group itself in certain localities, and, therefore, includes mining operations, as well as the more special and complicated industries, as the textile manufactures, shoemaking, pottery, cutlery, etc. Where the operatives are locally united, the board forms an institution in their midst, working under their eyes, influencing them

Is a

in their opinions and actions, itself subject to their criticism and judgment. This is not so with the more general trades, whose work consists in the manufacture of the tools and plant used in the special trades. Steam-engines and engineers are wanted in all trades everywhere. Carpenters, bricklayers, painters, masons, plasterers, moulders, etc., do not admit of local aggregation: they are scattered all over the kingdom. Can the conciliation principle apply to such trades? board practicable among them? The difficulty is more clearly seen when we come to consider how the principle could be applied to large engineering manufacture, or to steel works, like those at Sheffield. It cannot be supposed that a local Sheffield board for steel manufacture could possibly settle wages for a trade union like that of the iron moulders, extending all over England and Wales, and even to Ireland.

The Iron Moulders.

Besides this, the very strength and success of some unions constitute a difficulty of itself.

H

The