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THE HISTORYOF TRADE UNIONISM
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THE HISTORY OF TRADEUNIONISM:
BY SIDNEYAND BEATRICE WEBB
(REVISED EDITION, EXTENDEDTO 1920).
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.
39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK
BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS
1920
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INTRODUCTION TO THE EDITIONOF 1920
The thirty years that have elapsed since 1890, down towhich date we brought the first edition of this book, havebeen momentous in the history of British Trade Unionism.The Trade Union Movement, which then included scarcely20 per cent of the adult male manual-working wage-earners,now includes over 60 per cent. Its legal and constitutionalstatus, which was then indefinite and precarious, has nowbeen explicitly defined and embodied in precise and absolutelyexpressed statutes. Its internal organisation hasbeen, in many cases, officially adopted as part of themachinery of public administration. Most important ofall, it has equipped itself with an entirely new politicalorganisation, extending throughout the whole of GreatBritain, inspired by large ideas embodied in a comprehensiveprogramme of Social Reconstruction, which has alreadyachieved the position of “His Majesty’s Opposition,” andnow makes a bid for that of “His Majesty’s Government.”So great an advance within a single generation makes thehistorical account of Trade Union development down to1920 equivalent to a new book.
We have taken the opportunity to revise, and at somepoints to amplify, our description of the origin and earlystruggles of Trade Unionism in this country. We havenaturally examined the new material that has been madeaccessible during the past quarter of a century, in order to[Pg vi]incorporate in our work whatever has thus been added topublic knowledge. But we have not found it necessaryto make any but trifling changes in our original interpretationof the historical development. The Home Officepapers are now available in the Public Record Office forthe troubled period at the beginning of the nineteenthcentury; and these, together with the researches of ProfessorGeorge Unwin, Mr. and Mrs. Hammond, ProfessorGraham Wallas, Mr. Mark Hovell, and Mr. M. Beer, haveenabled us both to verify and to amplify our statements atcertain points. For the recent history of Trade Unionismwe have found most useful the collections and knowledgeof the Labour Research Department, established in 1913;and we gratefully acknowledge the assistance in facts,suggestions, and criticisms that we have had from Mr.G. D. H. Cole and Mr. R. Page Arnot. We owe thanks,also, to Miss Ivy Schmidt for unwearied assistance inresearch.
The reader must not expect to find, in this historicalvolume, either an analysis of Trade Union organisation,policy, and methods, or any judgement upon the validity ofits assumptions, its economic achievements, or its limitations.On these things we have written at great length, and veryexplicitly, in our Industrial Democracy, and in other booksdescribed in the pages at the end of this volume, to wh