so.

FACTORY BILL.

During the former session, Mr. Sadleir had introduced a bill for
shortening and regulating the employment of children of certain ages in
cotton and other factories, and protecting them against maltreatment, to
which it was alleged they had long been exposed. Evidence had been taken
regarding the subject matter of the bill before a committee of the
house of commons, and in this session a similar measure to that of Mr.
Sadleir's was introduced by Lord Ashley. The bill was opposed by the
great body of the manufacturing capitalists, many of whom had been sent
into the house by the reform act, and who possessed powerful interest
out of it. Mr. Patten moved an address to the king to name a royal
commission, for the purpose of collecting evidence anew, founding his
motion on the ground that the evidence taken before the committee was
partial, defective, and untrue. Lord Ashley, and others, contended that
this motion was not only uncalled for, but would be detrimental: fresh
inquiry was needless, inasmuch as the house was in a condition to
legislate on the subject, not only in consequence of the information
obtained from the committee of last year, but also of that furnished by
the other house of parliament. Mr. Patten's motion was negatived, and
the bill was read a second time; and then ministers, alarmed at the
probable success of a measure which, as it stood, would seriously
interfere with the manufacturers of the country, arrayed themselves
more openly against it. Lord Althorp opposed the motion for going into
committee, and moved, "That the bill be referred to a select committee,
with this instruction--that the committee should make provision in said
bill, that no children who had not entered into their fourteenth year
should be allowed to work for more than eight hours a-day; and that in
the intervals of their labour, care should be taken for their education,
and that inspection of the mills should take place, in order to secure
the operation of the above provisions." This motion was rejected,
and Lord Ashley's bill was carried into committee, by one hundred and
sixty-four to one hundred and forty-one. Government, however, did not
give up its opposition. The bill had adopted ten hours as the maximum of
labour daily, which extended to all persons under eighteen years of age;
and when the second clause, which involved the principle, was moved in
committee, Lord Althorp opposed it. He proposed as a