8 Trade Union Structure
judgment of the middle-aged will make up for any deficiency on the part of the young." ' In some cases, indeed, the members of the committee were actually chosen by the officers. Thus in the ancient society of Journeymen Paper- makers, where each " Grand Division " had its committee of eight members, it was provided that " to prevent imposition part of the committee shall be changed every three months, by four old members going out and four new ones coming in ; also a chairman shall be chosen to keep good order, which chairman, with the clerk, shall nominate the four new members which shall succeed the four old ones." ^ ' ^The early trade club was thus a democracy of the most rudimentary type, free alike from permanently differentiated officials, executive council, or representative assembly. The general meeting strove itself to transact all the business, and grudgingly delegated any of its functions either to officers or to committees. When this delegation ■ could no longer be avoided, the expedients of rotation and short periods of service were used " to prevent im- position " or any undue influence by particular members. In this earliest type of Trade Union democracy we find, in Ifaqt, the most childlike faith not only that "all men are l^qual," but also that " what concerns all should be decided by all."
It is obvious that this form of democracy was compatible only with the smallest possible amount of business. But it was, in our opinion, not so much the growth of the financial and secretarial transactions of the unions, as the exigencies of
• MS. Minutes of the London Society of Journeymen Curriers, January 1843.
' Rules and Articles to be observed by the Journeymen Papermakers throughout iB«^/a»</(i823), Appendix 18 to Report on Combination Laws, 1825, p. 56. The only Trade Union in which this example still prevails is that of the Flint Glass Makers, where the rules until lately gave the secretary " the power to nominate a central committee (open to the objection of the trade), in whose hands the executive power of the society shall be vested from year to year."—Rules and Regulations of the National Flint Glass Makers' Sick and Friendly Society (Man- chester, 1890). This has lately been modified, in so far that seven members are now elected, the central secretary nominating four " from the district in which he resides, but open to the objection of the trade."—Rule 67 (Rules, reprinted with additions, Manchester, 1893).
Primitive Democracy g
their warfare with the employers, that first led to a departure from this simple ideal. Th e legal an d social persecutionr^fo^ which Trade Unionists were subject, at any rate up to 1824, made secrecy and promptitude absolutely necessary for sue- 1 cessful operations ; and accordingly at all critical times we find the direction of affairs passing out of the hands of the general meeting into those of a responsible, if not a repre- sentative, committee. Thus the London Tailors, whose militant combinations between 1720 and 1834 repeatedly attracted the attention of Parliament,^ had practically two constitutions, one for peace and one for war. In quiet times, the society was made up of little autonomous general meet- ings of the kind described above at the thirty " houses of call " in London and Westminster. The organisation for war, as set forth in 1 8 1 8 by Francis Place, was very different : " Each house of call has a deputy, who on particular occasions is chosen by a kind of tacit consent, frequently without its being known to a very large majority who is chosen. The deputies form a committee, and they again choose, in a somewhat similar way, a very small committee, in whom, on very particular occasions, all power resides, from whom all orders proceed, and whose commands are implicitly obeyed ; and on no occasion has it ever been known that their commands have exceeded the necessity of the occasion, or that they have wandered in the least from the purpose for which it was understood they were appointed. So perfect indeed is the organisation, and so well has it been carried into effect, that no complaint has ever been heard ; with so much simplicity and with so great certainty does the whole business appear to be conducted that the great body of journeymen rather acquiesce than assist in any way in it." ^ Again, the protracted legal proceedings of the Scottish Hand-
1 See the interesting Se/eci Documents illustrating the History of Trade Unionism: I. The Tailoring Trade, edited by F. W. Galton (London, 1896), being one of the " Studies " published by the London School of Economics and Political Science.
The Gorgon, No. 20, 3rd October 1818, reprinted in The Tailoring Trade
by F. W. Galton, pp. 153, 154-
VOL. I - B 2
lo Trade Union Structure
loom Weavers, ending in the great struggle when 30,000 looms from Carlisle to Aberdeen struck on a single day (lOth November 1 8 1 2), were conducted by an autocratic com- mittee of five, sitting in Glasgow, and periodically summoning from all the districts delegates who carried back to their constituents orders which were implicitly obeyed.^ | Before the repeal of the Combination Laws in 1824, the enlfployers in all the organised trades complained bitterly of these " self- appointed" committees, and made repeated attempts to scatter them by prosecutions for combination or conspiracy! To this constant danger of prosecution may be ascribed some of the mysteiy which surrounds the actual constitution" of these tribunals gout .their appearance on the scene when- ever"an emergency calle^ ioi strong action was a necessary consequence of the failure of the clubs to provide any con- stitutional authority of a representative characteni
So far we have dealt principally with trade clubs confined to particular towns or districts. When, in any trade, these local clubs united to form a federal union, or when one of them enrolled members in other towns, government by a j general meeting of " the trade," or of all the members, became impracticable.^ Nowadays some kind of representa-
1 Evidence before the House of Commons Committee on Artisans and Machinery, 1824, especially that of Richmond.
A branch of a national union is still governed by the members in general
meeting assembled ; and for this and other reasons, it is customary for several separate branches to be established in large towns where the number of members becomes greater than can easily be accommodated in a single branch meeting- place. Such branches usually send delegates to a district committee, which thus becomes the real governing authority of the town or district. But in certain unions the idea of direct government by an aggregate meeting of the trade still so far prevails that, even in so large a centre as London, resort is had to huge mass meetings. Thus the London Society of Compositors will occasionally summon its ten thousand members to meet in council to decide, in an excited mass meeting, the question of peace or war with their employers. And the National Union of Boot and Shoe Operatives, which in its federal constitution adopts a large measure of representative institutions, still retains in its local organisation the aggregate meeting of the trade as the supreme governing body for the district. The Shoemakers of London or Leicester frequently hold meetings at which the attendance is numbered by thousands, with results that are occasionally calamitous to the union. Thus, when in 1891 the men of a certain London firm had impetuously left their work contrary to the agreement made by the union with
Primitive Democracy 1 1
tive institutions would seem to have been inevitable at this stage. But it is significant to notice how slowly, reluctantly, and incompletely the Trade Unionists have incorporated ir their constitutions what is often regarded as the specifically Anglo-Saxon form of democracy—the elected representative! assembly, appointing and controlling a standing executive. Until the present generation, no Trade Union had ever formed its constitution on this model. It is true that in the early days we hear of^ meetings of delegates from local ^
the employers, their branch called a mass meeting of the whole body of /the London members (seven thousand attending), which, after refusing even to hear the union officials, decided to support the recalcitrant strikers, with the result that the employers " locked out " the whole trade. (^Monthly Report of the National Union of Boot and Shoe Operatives, November 1 891.) In 1893 the union executive found it necessary to summon at Leicester a special delegate meeting of the whole society to sit in judgment on the London members who had decided, at a mass meeting, to withdraw from- the national agreement to submit to arbitration. The circular calling the delegate meeting