Keir Hardie (1889)
Source: Scottish Labour Party Leaflets No.1, An Eight-Hour Day, by J. Keir Hardie
Note: The pamphlet is undated, but the content is very close to the speech given by Keir Hardie at the Paris Congress of the 2nd International in 1889.
Transcribed: by Graham Seaman for MIA, August 2026
That an eight-hour working day would be a good thing is not disputed by any one, but many who believe in the thing itself object to having it secured by Act of Parliament. It is right and proper, they say, for Parliament to legislate for defenceless women and helpless children, but men ought to be able to regulate their hours of labour for themselves without calling in the aid of the State. Now, if the fixing of the hours of labour was a power possessed by the men, this reasoning would be valid enough, but, owing to the chaos now prevailing in our industrial affairs, the power to regulate the hours of labour is vested solely with the employing class. Besides, what is Parliament that we should not ask it to pass an Eight-Hour Bill? Do not all good democrats say that Parliament is the servant of the people? and if this be so what possible harm can there be in invoking its aid to help in securing a thing good in itself! It is quite true that if Parliament has the power to shorten the day’s work, it also has the power to lengthen it; but it is also true that since Parliament has the power to safeguard the sale of poisons, and make sanitary regulations for the protection of “adult males,” it has also power to order that people should be poisoned by adulterated food, or killed by bad drainage; and if ever a majority of people should decree that the day’s labour should be twelve hours, then, by all means, let them have their way, but don’t let us refuse to ask our own servant to do us a good turn, lest our grandsons should ask it to do them an evil.
It is estimated that one million able-bodied men are out of work in the United Kingdom. These men are not idle because of drunkeness or laziness, but because they cannot find employment. If they were taken on, a million of those now in work would require to be dismissed to make room for them. An Eight Hour Bill would find employment for every man of these. Then those who are in work, work far too long hours. About railways, tramways, ironworks, and the like, the men work on an average 12 hours a day, though, in some individual cases, the “day” extends to 16 hours out of every 24. It is impossible for these men to be good citizens, and in their interests, as men, and the interest of the State as a whole, an Eight Hour Bill is imperatively demanded.
The most virulent opponents of an Eight-Hour Bill are the officials of our leading Trades Unions. It is perhaps natural for these men, judging from the past, to imagine that the power of the Trade organisations alone is sufficient to bring about an eight-hour day; and if ninety per cent. of the workers were organised, this might be so. But out of every one hundred workers in Great Britain not more than ten are members of any Trades Union, and the proportion is steadily decreasing. Trades Unions have more than enough to do in looking after the wage-rate and the interest of the members generally, without fighting the hours question. What the Trade Union leaders seem to fail to recognize is that the conditions of to-day are altogether different from those of twenty years ago. Machinery is daily becoming more potent, and the individual capitalist, with a paternal interest in his workers, is now nearly as rare as the mastodon. We have the cruel, soulless factory system, with its Companies, Trusts, and Combinations, the only concern of the shareholder being the securing of a dividend which can be obtained without landing the receiver in jail.
The great bogey which never fails is that of foreign competition. Fortunately, it has been used so often, that we are grown familiar with it. It no longer frightens us as it used to do. It has been held up in the face of every reform ever attempted in the interest of the workers, —not only the “adult males,” but also the helpless children, When the late Earl Shaftesbury was pleading for the little white slaves of mine and factory, it was used then; it was used in connection with the Factory Acts, the Mines Acts, the Employers’ Liability Act, and every other similar proposal. The early Trade Unionists had to face it also. No matter how mild or moderate the measure, if it aimed at ameliorating the lot of the worker, the dismal prophets never failed to warn us that it would kill or injure our foreign trade. Not only have these croakings been falsified, but on every hand it is admitted, the more we have humanised our industrial relations, the more powerful has the British workman become. All over the Continent of Europe the hours of labour are heing reduced, especially in Germany, our keenest competitor. The agitation for an Eight Hour Bill is much more advanced on the continent than it is here, and there is no danger of our being far ahead of other nations with the measure. But (and we had as well face the fact) it is neither possible nor desirable that Britain should continue to be the workshop of the world. Let us by all means do our share of the world’s work; but it is time the British workman entered his protest against being the hewer of wood and drawer of water to all the naked and semi-civilized tribes of the world. British competition is what makes long hours possible on the Continent. Tt is not the workman's interest that is in danger, but the dividends of the idle, useless, and mischievous stock-broker and middleman. It will be to the honour of the working-men of this country if, instead of foolishly trying to undersell every other nation in its own market they set the world an example of how to live a human life, having something of joy in it. An eight-hours day would not, on the whole, decrease production, as labour saved is not lost; and the workman who puts his heart into eight hours work is worth far more to the world than the drudge who toils wearily on without heart or hope for ten or eleven. Statistics prove that as the hours of labour have decreased, production has increased, and that to-day, in the matter of production, the British workman is far ahead of his keenest competitor.
An eight-hour day would find employment for every able-bodied man in the country for some years to come. We don’t put it forward as a permanent solution of the unemployed problem—to finally rid us of it—something other and far more drastic than an Eight-Hour Bill will be necessary, But it would be a present relief, and that would give us time to mature our proposals for the future. It would have a powerful effect, too, on the rate of wages At present, when a worker produces sixty shillings worth of wealth, he only gets twenty shillings for it, the remaining forty going to the "Upper Classes." The reason why his proportion is so small is because there are always two men seeking one job. If there was only one man for the job, the man would be master of the situation. At present he has to take what wages the "Master" offers, or otherwise starve. Even if we paid the same rate of wages for 8 hours as is being paid for the hours now worked, it would only reduce profits by one per cent. or thereby. Is the British workman to be kept out of this boon to enable his employer to maintain that “law of God” embodied in 5 per cent! What is called “bad trade,” but what is in reality bad distribution of the wealth produced, bas become almost chronic. Pharaoh had seven fat kine with which to feed the seven lean ones; now-a-days we have seven years of trade depression, one of revival, one of inflation, one of decline, and then again seven-of depression. An Eight-Hour Bill would do something to distribute the work more evenly, and thereby prevent the terrible havoc which dull trade makes with the mental powers and physique of the people.
That an eight hour day would benefit the workers all round is thus clearly demonstrated. It would give more time to rest, recreation, and improvement. It would give steadier work and better pay, and enable the worker to get rid of some of the parasites that fatten off his misery. How, then, is it to be obtained ? The Unions are practically powerless in the matter, and the only resource is Parliament. Probably it will be won in sections, first for miners and those engaged in unhealthy and dangerous occupations; for Government and Municipal employees; and for all workmen employed by concerns worked under charter or concession from the State—e.g., railways, tramways, canals, waterworks, gasworks, etc. From these it will rapidly spread to other industries, Then, when its good results are seen and felt, our statesmen and economists will discover that they have all along been in favour of the principle, inasmuch as its application will be fraught with so much blessing. We advocate it for its own sake; but also, and if possible more so, because it carries with it the principle that it is the duty of the State to organize the industry of the nation in the interest of the workers. If at every election the workers will force this question on the attention of candidates, and resolutely refuse to vote for the man who will not promise to support the principle here enunciated, it will come sooner than many imgine. Some selfish workmen will oppose it, but that is no argument against it, as all legislation is a restraint on tho selfish instincts of some class in the community. The liberty of the individual is a specious cry which means nothing when used in this connection. A man can only use his freedom so long as he is not doing so to the injury of someone else; but if four men work twelve hours a day, and thereby keep two men out of work who would be employed if the hours worked were eight per day, then the natural rights of the two to earn a living are greater than the selfish rights of the four. The Scottish Labour Party will at all times lend a hand to those who seek to force the acceptance of an Eight Hour Bill on an unwilling candidate for Parliamentary or Municipal honours.
“THE LABOUR LEADER,” edited by Mr. Keir Hardie, Organ of the Scottish Labour Party, and devoted exclusively to the interests of labour. Monthly, One Penny. Yearly Subscription, Post Free, 1s 6d. Order of your News-agent, or direct from the Publishing Office, Labour Leader, Cumnock, Ayrshire, N.B.
Hon. President, R. B. CUNNINGHAME-GRAHAM M.P.
Hon. Vice-presidents, Dr. CLARK, M.P., JOHN FERGUSON, Esq.
Chairman, J. SHAW MAXWELL
Vice-Chairman, DUNCAN McPHERSON
Treasurer, GEO. MITCHELL, 26 Burgher Street, Parkhead.
Secretary, J. KEIR HARDIE, Cumnock, Ayrshire,
OBJECTS—To educate the Electors and secure the return to Parliament and all elected bodies of working-men and others pledged to an Eight Hour Bill, and such other measures as will put an end to poverty, by securing to the worker the whole of the wealth produced by him. Copies of the programme on application.
Those wishing for information, or willing to assist in forming Branches, should write to the Secretary.