ive pounds.
Mr. Huskisson rightly asked whether this amercement of five pounds,
and this subscription of one shilling a week to the funds of the
association, which every member was called upon to pay and contribute,
would not produce to each of the parties, if placed in a saving-bank,
far more beneficial and advantageous results? and whether there were
not, among these combinations, men anxious for the enjoyment of the
power and distinction which they considered the attainment of certain
posts would confer upon them? With reference to Mr. Hume's act, he
declared that when he looked at the way in which it was worded, and the
artful misconstruction that might be put upon it by those who best
knew how to mislead and deceive the men who had engaged in these
combinations, he was not surprised that the associators should consider
themselves to be warranted in their proceedings under that act. It
repealed all former statutes, and then enacted that no proceedings at
common law should be had by reason of any combinations or conspiracies
of workmen formerly punishable under those repealed statutes. Without
imputing to the framers of the bill the slightest idea that any
misapprehensions could be entertained of its enactments, he did not
doubt that a great portion of the associated and combined workmen in the
country did actually believe, that so far from violating the law, its
second section proved that they were only pursuing a course strictly
conformable to the legislature. It declared that "journeymen, workmen,
and other persons who shall hereafter enter into any combination to
obtain higher rates of wages, &c, or to regulate the mode of carrying
on any manufacture, trade, or business, or the management thereof, shall
not be subject or liable to any indictment or prosecution for a criminal
conspiracy or combination, or to any other proceeding or punishment
whatever, or under the common statute law." "Would not," Mr. Huskisson
asked, "any person, on reading this sentence, suppose it was something
fit and commendable for workmen to conspire together to regulate and
control the management of any manufacture?" In conclusion, he said, that
under this act, the plotting together for the destruction of machinery,
and even threatening life or property were no longer any criminal
offence; and that he considered the existing law was not adequate to put
down an evil which was increasing to a formidable extent: not the evil
of committing the