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LABOUR
AND THE
POPULAR WELFARE
LABOUR
AND THE
POPULAR WELFARE
BY
W. H. MALLOCK
AUTHOR OF ‘IS LIFE WORTH LIVING?’ ‘SOCIAL EQUALITY,’ ETC.
SIXTH THOUSAND
LONDON
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK
1895
PREFACE TO NEW EDITION
In republishing this work at a low price, Iwish to reiterate emphatically what is said of itin the opening chapter,—namely, that any clearheadedRadical, as distinct from the NewUnionist, the Socialistic dreamer, and theAgitator, will find nothing in it to jar againsthis sympathies, or to conflict with his opinions,any more than the most strenuous Conservativewill. If the word “party” is used in itsusual sense, this is a volume absolutely freefrom any party bias.
It has, however, since its first publication,some nine months ago, been attacked continually,not by Socialistic writers only (whoseattack was natural), but by Radicals also,[vi]who, apparently quite mistaking the drift ofit, have done their best to detect in it flaws,fallacies, and inaccuracies. As any work likethe present, whose aim is essentially practical,is worse than useless unless the reader is ableto feel confidence in it, let me say a fewwords as to the degree of confidence whichis claimed, after nine months of criticism,for the facts and arguments set forth in thefollowing pages.
Let the reader emphasise in his mind thedivision between facts and arguments, forthey stand on a different footing. In estimatingthe truth of any general arguments,the final appeal is to the common sense ofthe reader. The reader is himself the judgeof them; and the moment he understandsand assents to them, they belong to himselfas much as they ever did to the writer. Onthe other hand, the historical facts, or statistics,by which arguments are