Workmen's Unions Properly Constituted: Their Advantages.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 43, 31 July 1891, Page 9

Workmen's Unions Properly Constituted: Their Advantages.

In the last place — employers and workmen may themselves effect much in the matter of which We treat, by means of those institutions and organisations which afford opportune assistance to those in need, and which draw the two orders more closely together. Among these may be enumerated : Societies for mutual help ; various foundations established by private persons for providing for the workman, and for his widow or his orphans, in sudden calamity, in sickness, and in the event of death ; and what are called "patronages" or institutions for the care of boys and girls, for young people, and also for those of more mature age. The most important of all are Workmen's Associations ; for these virtually include all the rest. History attests what excellent results were effected by the Artificers Guilds' of a former day. They were the means not only of many advantages to the workmen, but in no small degree of the advancement of arV 4 as numerous monuments remain to prove. Such associations. should be adapted to the requirements of the age in which we live — an age of greater instruction, of different customs, and of

more numerous requirements in daily life. It is gratifying to know that there are actually in existence not a few Societies of this nature, consisting either of workmen alone or of workmen and employers together ; but it were greatly to be desired that they should multiply and become more effective. We have spoken of them more than once ; but it will be well to explain here how much they are needed, to show that they exist by their own right, and to enter into their organisation and then work. The experience of his own weakness urges man to call in help from without. We read in the pages of Holy Writ : It is better that two should be together than one ; for they have the advantage of their society. If one fall he shall be supported by the other. Woe to hint that is alone, for when he falleth he hath none to lift him up.* And further : A brother that is helped by his brother is like a strong city.f It is this natural impulse which unites men in civil society ; and it is this also which makes them band themselves together in associations of citizens with citizen ; associations which, it is true, cannot be called societies in the complete sense of the word, but which are societies nevertheless. These lesser societies and the society which constitutes the State differ in many things, because their immediate purpose and end is different. Civil society exists for the common good, and therefore is concerned with the interests of all in general, and with individual interests in their due place and proportion. Hence it is called public society, because by its means, as St. Thomas of Aquin says, Men communicate with one another in the setting up of a commonwealth^. But the societies which are formed in the bosom of the State are called private, and justly so, because their immediate purpose is the private advantage of the associates. Now a private society, says St. Thomas again, is one which is formed for the purpose of carrying out private business ; as when two or three enter into a partnership with the view of trading in conjunction.^ Particular societies, then, although they exist within the State, and are each a part of the State, nevertheless cannot be prohibited by the State absolutely and as such. For to enter into " society " of this kind is the natural right of man ; and the State must protect natural rights, not destroy them ; and if it forbids its citizens to form associations, it contradicts the very principle of its own existence ; for both they and it exist in virtue of the same principle, viz., the natural propensity of man to live in society.