[Footnote 176-11: "They have no notion of contenting themselves with an equal voice in the settlement of labor questions; they tell us plainly that what they aspire to is to control the destinies of labor, ... to dictate, to be able to arrange the conditions of employment at their own discretion." (_Thornton_, III, ch. 1.) The membership of the English trades-unions was estimated, at the Manchester Congress, June, 1868, at 500,000 by some, and at 800,000 by others. _Brentano_, II, 310, speaks of 960,000. Since 1830, there have been frequent endeavors to effect a great combination, with special organizations of the different trades. During recent years, there have been even beginnings of an international organization, although in Germany, for instance, at the end of 1874, there were 345 trades-unions, with a membership of over 21,000. (_M. Hirsch._) A formal theory of workmen's unions to culminate in popular representation, in _Dühring_, Arbeit und Kapital, 1866, especially, p. 233; while the American _Walker_ accuses all such combinations, which used compulsion on any one, of moral high treason against republican institutions. (Science of Wealth, 272.)] [Footnote 176-12: The former view, for instance, of _Harriet Martineau_, "The tendence of strikes and sticks to produce low wages" (1834) is now unconditionally shared only by few. When _Sterling_ says that the momentary success of a strike is followed by a two-fold reaction which restores the natural equilibrium, viz.: increase of the number of workmen and decrease of capital (Journal des Econ., 1870, 192), he overlooks not only the length of the transition time which would certainly be possible here, but also that an altered standard of life of the workmen prevents the former, and one of the capitalists the latter. The _Count of Paris_ and _Thornton_ do not doubt that the elevation of the condition of the English working classes, as proved by _Ludlow_ and _Jones_, is to be ascribed, in part, to the effect of the trades-unions. Many of the unions work against the intemperance and quarrelsomeness of their members. The people's charter of 1835, came from the London "workingmen's association."] [Footnote 176-13: On the great utility of the arbitration courts between masters and workingmen, by which the struggle for wages is terminated in a peaceable manner and without any interruption of work, see _Schäffle_, Kapitalismus and Socialismus, 659. More minutely in _Thornton_, III., ch. 5. _Faucher_, Vierteljahrsschr., 1869, III, 302, calls attention to the fact that such "boards" may be abused to oppress small manufacturers.] SECTION CLXXVII. WAGES-POLICY.--STRIKES AND THE STATE.