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204 ©ft* ULtntttX* [Saturday,
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SOCIALISM. Systematic Socialists separat...
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NEGRO EDUCATION. Another of those painfu...
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PROTECTIONIST RESOURCES. It would seem t...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Emigration And " Surplus Labour." Among ...
stant employment at good wages ; the class immediately above them is not in a much better condition . Every business as well as every trade is overstocked with competitors , eagerly struggling to keep themselves from falling into that horrible gulf of poverty and destitution into which they see so many of their neighbours falling . The writer in the Daily News believes that all this want of employment and excessive competition will rapidly disappear , under the benignant auspices of free trade , which , "by extending our commerce will enable a much denser population to inhabit
the country . " But what ground is there for believing that any probable extension of commerce , or any other immediately available measure , will do anything more , at the very utmost , than find work for the rapid increase of population which is constantly going on ? We can see none , and , therefore , we feel persuaded that if Government is still to act on the same laissezfaire policy as it has hitherto done , we shall have the same chronic state of pauperism as at present , the same overcrowded condition of the labour market , the same deadly competition with all its attendant evils , economical , social , and moral . We do not say that emigration is a sufficient cure for all these evils , or that it
ought to be rightly regarded as a sure " cure" for any evil ; but viewing it as the readiest means of removing the worst , and of putting us in the way of extrication from those which remain , it is the most effective tool in the hands of Government , and officials must hold themselves responsible for neglecting to make the most of it . Had Mr . Charles Buller lived a few years longer we might have seen some attempts to organize a comprehensive scheme for the cure of involuntary idleness at home on the part of some 200 , 000 ablebodied paupers , by means of reproductive labour in home colonies , with provision for enabling the classes who are least wanted here to find a brisk
demand for their labour in our transmarine colonies , where they would instantly become our best customers for British manufactures . Unfortunately , however , the doctrine of Laissez-faire still reigns paramount in the minds of Free-traders , and , therefore , they encourage the stand-still policy of Government on this question as on many others . Among the middle classes , also , the same paralyzing doctrine holds dominion . It is only through the active movement of the working class that we
can look for the exercise of any healthy influence upon Government in this direction . The working men are gradually beginning to see that National Education — Industrial Schools — Reproductive Labour for Paupers—and a truly National Emigration Scheme , are the first links in that chain by which they are destined , at no distant period , we trust , to be raised from their present wretched state of misery and placed in that position which they ought to occupy .
204 ©Ft* Ultntttx* [Saturday,
204 © ft * ULtntttX * [ Saturday ,
Socialism. Systematic Socialists Separat...
SOCIALISM . Systematic Socialists separate from us on this cardinal point : —That , whereas they pretend to be able , on a given day , to change society and set their scheme in operation , we proclaim not a system , but a doctrine , which , if taken up by all the thoughtful intellects of the country , must work its way , and call forth the arrangements capable of satisfying the progressive wants of their day . We by no means wish to force upon men a system they repel ; nor do we desire Governments to turn
exper imentalists . We wish to give the People the power of developing a system of their own . Society is a growth , not a transplantation . Those who oppose Socialism—as well as those who oppose progress in every shape—take advantage of this admission , that society is a growth , to recommend a rigorous abstinence from all radical changes . " ( . Jently , " they say , " step by step , let us go slowly and sure , but do not quit the beaten track ; do not seek elsewhere for assistance . " They believe that all we desire will come , if we do but give it time . To these well-meaning
plausibilities we put three questions : —Would any gradual ¦ improvement of the art of writing have led to the invention of printing , or have superseded its necessity ? Would any modifications of the old stagecoach have given us the railway ? And if the introduction of a new forcev a new element , is necessary to constitute any great change in the arts , upon what ground do you deny the necessity in politics ? Now , cooperation is to political economy the vow element which the moveable types of Johannes Faust were to the art of writing , or what steam-power is to horse-power . Take that force , study its nature , its applications , and its varieties ,
and you will change society by " gradual improvements . " Among the advantages of such a position as that assumed by the header is this inestimable advantage , that we force earnest thinkers , who would treat socialist systems with contempt , to look at the doctrine steadily ; and , as we saw last week in Mr . Newman ' s thoughtful letter in our Open Council , whenever such intellects do consider the subject , they inevitably fall more or less into Socialist views . Mr . Newman says he dares not call
himself a Socialist . But that is because with Socialism he connects certain ideas of violence and tyranny . Yet to our minds it is quite clear that the tendencies of his political creed are Socialist ; and no one has contributed more effectivel y to the discussion than he who shows that the Socialist doctrine is to be applied to partnership of industry , the extension of family ties , and the formation of associated villages . These ideas are the application of the associative principle to the development of society out of existing institutions .
Negro Education. Another Of Those Painfu...
NEGRO EDUCATION . Another of those painful exhibitions of spurious philanthropy for which England , is so famous , took place on Monday last , when a ^ multitude of ladies and gentlemen assembled in Willis ' s Rooms , in aid of the " Society forPromotingthe Early Education and Improvement of the Children of Negroes and of People of Colour in the British West Indies . " There is more than absurdity in this white-kidglove system of evangelizing the heathen . There is worse than folly in this " Mission to the
Negroes . " While hundreds and thousands of our fellow-subjects are living in the grossest habits of vice and bestiality , —while diseases , which our care could prevent , decimate the poor , and every filthy custom and foul usage stamps out the very likeness of humanity from their souls , —while debauching influences , which need but a vigorous wish from the upper classes to be cleared away , are heaped up thick and rank about them—like wild beasts penned out from an alien race—while the condition of our own people is a shame and a curse to our land
—" ladies and gentlemen" weep over the ignorance of the negroes , and money flows that the heathen may be christianized . l ) oes it never occur to these sentimental advocates of universal love , that near at home—close by their sides—polluting the atmosphere which they breathe so delicately , and poisoning the blood that supplies the very heart of society—does it never occur to them that they have lefttheirproper worklyinguntouched while they thus chase a phantom and pursue an idea ? Are there no mothers living in physical and moral filth such
as cannot be spoken of ? Are there no children young and impressionable , growing up in an Augean stable of vice and brutality which no one attempts to cleanse ? Are there no men sinking down for want of help to the lowest depths of degradation ? Are Englishmen all virtuous , and English homes all perfect , that such sympathy should be lavished on the negroes ? Well may the angels weep at the fantastic tricks of man ! Well may it be said that the way of the rich man is perilous j for the criminal neglect of his duties , and the self-blinding adoption of chimeras instead , has ever been his condemnation and his sin . It may
be answered that the neglect of one duty does not qualify the neglect of another ; that because thousands of our people are left in entire ignorance , and because every rational effort to educate them is multiplied by prejudice and bigotry , the negroes of the West Indies also ought not to be so disregarded , and that being subjects of the empire they demanded the privileges of their country . All this may be said , and with some show of truth . On other grounds , then , we will argue against this absurd society and others of like nature , showingthe utter futility of the means by which it attempts to work out a great law .
Christianity was the product of an advanced state of civilization . Imperfect truly , but still advancing beyond its predecessor . The bloodthirstiness of the Jewish ritual was exchanged for the milder laws of a loving nature ; while a still later development spiritualised those simple social decrees which Christ gave out . The metaphysics of Saint Paul , and the platonic rhapsodies of Saint John , were alike evolved from the material core of the Sermon on the Mount . Fearlessly , then , we assert that men in the low state of intellectual
development of the negroes are not fitted to receive the abstract and refined dogmas essential to Christianity in the correct clerical sense of that word , though not perhaps in the equivocating sense
in which the word is now so abundantly employed . Still less so when we remember the characters of the Christians who have su bdued them , and the class of moral vices and physical diseases which they have bequeathed . The most obtuse among these negroes may well understand the stress laid by the Europeans on faith in Christ —faith without works according to some , faith proved by works according to others , but , in all , faith only as the leader to eternal salvation . For he cannot but see both the necessity and the
policy of some purely intellectual process , which shall annul the positive evil of their lives . For himself , simple , ignorant , and innocent , he does no wrong that he knows to be wrong , and he cannot , therefore , understand the use of a dogmatic salvation for himself . Besides , the intellectual organization of a race must first be developed before it is possible to engraft anything of an intellectual doctrine on it . This is not to be done b y mere instructive education , or by teaching a spiritual creed . Practical arts , social improvements , the stout
administration of mild laws , the inculcation , by the influence of example and the moral pressure of superiority , of a purer code of morals — all this would civilize the negroes , but not the distribution of Bibles , or the insisting on a spiritual faith as the only guarantee of good . The newspaper report of this meeting says that the room was " numerously attended by ladies . " It may sound uncharitable , but we venture to assert that nine-tenths of these dilettanti protectresses of the negroes perfectly ignore the condition of
their own poor—pass by a hovel with disdainsweep over the pathway of a fallen sister with contempt—avoid the misery and crime at home that clamour for " salvation . " We repudiate the false philanthropy that passes over St . Giles ' s to expatiate in Timbuctoo ; we reject the superstition that places all races in such equal rank as to make a like teaching efficacious in the same degree , and we pronounce ourselves inimical to the display of false feeling and the promulgation of pernicious errors which " fashionable" missions and
Exeterhall meetings inculcate as the divine law . But there is a reason for this preference of the remote to the near , —a reason with more vice in it than might be supposed from the aspect of trifling on the surface . To improve the condition of the people is a task glorious , but difficult and hazardous , because the perplexities of the process are great and the consequences momentous . Holiday philanthropists are better pleased with the glory if they can have it without the difficulty or hazard . To attempt the civilization of the people at home involves at least these two perilous responsibilities
it ought to be made effectual , which demands immense strength and will in the reformer ; and if effectual , the people may grow too strong for charity—not an agreeable idea to the charitable of the kid-glove school . The remoter field offers these peculiar advantages : the very remoteness is an excuse for being ineffectual ; and even , if by chance the reformers were to incur the responsibility of unexpected effectualness , there will not be much to fear in London from the dark demagogues of the Antilles . Timid charity , therefore , will always incline to expend its zeal upon the distant—offering its succour to wild want with a long pole .
Protectionist Resources. It Would Seem T...
PROTECTIONIST RESOURCES . It would seem that the Protectionists are fain to confess their weakness , in some districts that ought to own their predominancy , by resorting to the lowest kind of warfare . A correspondent in Cambridgeshire informs us that in his district the Protectionist leaders are endeavouring to induce the farmers to adopt a system of exclusive trading : — " Farmers must not purchase goods of a Free-trader ; nay , if the shopkeeper be neutral , if he
be not loud in his demonstrations in favour of protection he is a doomed man . But , further still , the farmer is not to deal with a tradesman who takes in a free-trade journal ! A regular crusade is preached against the opposition press . Public-house keepers are warned , upon pain of losing the farmers' custom , not to take m the Independent Press ; a paper suspected of free-trade predilections , which advocates the readjustment of rents and the reduction of taxation as a recompense to the
tenant-farmer for the loss of protection , and , in consequence , is viewed with great disfavour by the ' leaders , who are chiefly of the landlord class . Then , again , there has been an attempt to reduce the salaries of public officers , to a most vexatious amount , in order to ' meet the times . ' The board of guardians of the Ely Union had voted a considerable reduction in the salaries of their officers which , however , the Poor-law board very properly refused to ratify . It is hinted that this blow was aimed at their clerk , who is a
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 25, 1850, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_25051850/page/12/
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