‘The Workmen’s Victory’?
‘The Workmen’s Victory’?
The unexpected loss of the Liberal Party in the general election of 1874 was not due more to the active hostility of the trade unionists than to the sullen abstention of the nonconformists in Britain. Neither factor is now thought to have been decisive in the Liberal defeat. After the election, some observers pointed to a trend among Conservative Party candidates to pledge themselves to the Trades Union Congress programme. However, the parliamentary majority of the new Conservative administration was founded not upon numerous undertakings to appease the unionists, but if anything on an inclination to resist them. This chapter discusses the creation of the Cockburn commission to make recommendations regarding the Criminal Law Amendment Act, the Master and Servant Act, and the law of conspiracy; the Conservatives' concession to organized labour by amending a number of labour laws in favor of trade unions, and the withdrawal of the criminal law from the bargaining between organized workers and employers.
Keywords: Britain, election, Liberal Party, Conservative Party, trade unions, law of conspiracy, criminal law, labour laws, Cockburn commission
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
