Directions: The growth of factories had wide-ranging effects on the political life of Great Britain in the 17th and 18th centuries. The primary source documents below describe some of the most important of those changes, including the workers’ push for rights, the government’s reluctance to grant those rights and the growth of communism. First, read the primary source document. Then summarize the information contained in the document and note its significance – how does it help answer the unit’s essential question. Finally, note whether the document describes a benefit of the IR or a cost of the IR.
Title and Description
Document
Summary/Significance
Cost or Benefit?
Why?
“At St. Peter’s Field,” 1819.
When the working men of Manchester gathered to demand the right to vote, the British cavalry rushed in to break up the meeting. Journalist
Richard Carlile gives his version of events.
A little before noon…the first reformer began to
arrive…with banners that bore the inscriptions...“Annual Parliaments,” “Universal Suffrage,” Vote by Ballot…” [Then] the cavalry advanced toward the area in a brisk trot…and drew their swords and brandished them in the air…
A cry rose among the military, “Have at their flags!” and they dashed down those dispersed in the field, cutting to right and left to get at them…numbers of men were trampled under the feet of men and horses; many, both men and women, were cut down by sabers; several…were slain on the spot. The whole number of persons amounted to between 300 and 400.
“Spencer’s Speech to the House of Commons,” 1832
Although John Charles Spencer supported some reforms for child
laborers, in a speech to the House of Commons he explained why he was against limiting their work day to 10 hours.
I am of the opinion that the effect [of limiting the work day] … must necessarily be a fall in the rate of wages, or, what is more probable, that children would cease to be employed at all in factories…Would a measure which would prevent children from obtaining any employment in factories be not more injurious than beneficial to the laboring classes?
As long as we have a manufacturing population in the kingdom it will be impossible to render their occupation as wholesome as that of agricultural labourers…This is an evil that cannot be remedied…We have got a manufacturing population, and it must be employed. Any measure which shall have the effect of diminishing the means of employment to labourers…will produce extensive misery.