writer of the once famous Political Letters, a Radical of some repute, was appointed editor. Hetherington was publisher. The capital was to be raised by subscriptions amongst the trade societies and similar associations. The paper was issued for the first time on Sunday, January 27, 1839. It was very badly managed, and as an experiment in voluntary associated enterprise it was a failure. It cost sixpence, which was more than working people could afford to pay, and it was too sober to appeal to the mass of Chartists to whom the language of the Northern Star was more intelligible. Carpenter was a poor editor, and the management was careless. The paper never paid its way and was sold early in 1840.[1]
The immediate purpose of the London Working Men's Association was the formation of an organised body of working-class opinion. It was first necessary to build good foundations which could hold out through long agitations. Hence the foundation of Working Men's Associations and the precautions suggested in the choice of members. The next step was to furnish a programme and the materials for propaganda. Hence the pamphlets all urging the foundation of a distinct working-class party which should rival and ultimately overthrow the two historic "capitalistic" parties. So far so good. Unfortunately, however, the materials for building up the party were but poor. The Associations throughout the country were not up to the standard of the London Association; their members were men of less understanding and were easily carried away by the excitement around them. The organised trade societies, which form so strong an element, with their funds and organisation, in the modern Labour Party, came but little into the movement. Finally, when the Birmingham and the northern agitations threatened to break up the scheme altogether, the London Working Men's Association admitted them, violent, unorganised, and undisciplined as they were, and so created a party which was certainly big, but was not the sound, organised, and orderly party which they had planned. After 1839 the London Working Men's Association virtually ceases to influence the Chartist movement. It had done its work, and though it was still in existence in 1847, it was never in its later years any more than a backstairs organisation.
- ↑ Additional MSS. 27,821, p. 22; 34,245 A, p. 398. Letters in Place Collection, vol. 66, at Hendon.
