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12THE NATfree trade investment association.Tliis association, although not ostensibly a part of the operations of the Anti-Corn Law League, is under the management of some of its most eminent advocates. The success of a similar society, established at Manchester, in which between 4,000 and 5,000 shares have been taken in an unprecedentedly short period, induced the projectors of the Free Trade Investment Association to make a similar experiment in London, which it is to be hoped will be attended with as favorable results.This association differs from ordinary Building Societies in its object being avowedly political. It seeks to counteract the evils of the Chandos clause in the Reform Bill, by extending the old Saxon fraucliise of the fortv-shilling freeholds. Its aim avowedly is to create an enlightened and independent country constituency, to counteract the influence of those feudal appendages to the estat es of the Lords and Squires of England—the •£50 tenants-at-will, one main condition of whose tenure for centuries has been their doing suit and service at the poll by voting for their lord s nominee; which nominee thereupon coolly walks into the House of Commons, and by virtue of the fiction of law waggishly calls himself “ a county representative.” There is a reflex influence in the working of Building and Investment Societies. The professed object of nearly every one of these institutions is the improvement of the social condition of the middling and working classes, but this cannot be effected without at the same time producing their elevation in the political scale. The Free Trade Investment Association seeks to give men the county franchise, but by the very act necessarily improves their social condition, hy putting them in possession of portions of the land—small though they be—-of the country in which they dwell, but to which they had heretofore no more legal right than the Esquimaux or the Caffre. There is no doubt that building and investment societies are now exercising a silent but powerful influence in transferring political power from the hands of an insignificant but insolent oligarchy into those of the masses whom they' have so long trodden under foot. The people of this country are in the condition of men who (by their own laches perhaps) have suffered their estates to become alienated, and themselves to be sold into social and political slavery; but there are now sure and certain signs of an approaching year of jubilee, in which the personal bondage will be terminated, and the estates revert to their rightful possessors. This grand consummation, we hesitate not to say, will be brought about in no small degree by the instrumentality of building and investment societies; which, by converting the working classes from mere dependents upon the will of a haughty and dominant aristocracy into the legal and peaceable possessors of “ property,” gives them that which, according to our present conventional usages, alone entitles men to be regarded as having any “ stake in the country.” Elements are at work which must inevitably produce a great social and political revolution. Let the agency at present in operation—and there is every appearance of its power being increased a thousand-fold—be continued for twenty years longer, and it will virtually effect the repeal of the unnatural law of primogeniture and entail; and we have reason to expect that the same beneficial consequences will ensue to England, as have resulted to France, from the abolition of that measure. Mr. Sidney Smith, in a recent address on behalf of the Free Trade Investment Association, at the London Mechanics Institution, very forcibly pointed out the injurious influence of this law, and the happy consequences of its abrogation in France, by a reference to the fact, that, since the above alteration, the landed proprietary in that country have increased to upwards of 6,000,000, while in England the soil is divided between not more than 25,000 individuals, out of a population of 27,000,000. The wealth of England may surpass that of any country which ever existed, but with such an unequal and iniquitous distribution, the multitudes must ever be subject to the will of the few, and the rights of labour can never receive their just demands.The duration of the Free Trade Investment Association is calculated at eleven years, at 10s. per month subscription. The redemption fee and the system of bidding for shares are retained, and in almost every respect, the old system of building societies has been adhered to. In a society whose avowed object is political enfranchisement, it is to be regretted that a plan was not adopted giving greater advantage to borrowers desirous of purchasing freeholds. It is, however, highly satisfactory to find the sub-j ect of building and investment societies taken up by a vast national organization, having such extensive machinery at its command, and which machinery has already been proved so extremely efficient. Whatever opinion may be formed of the merits or demerits of Free Trade principles, one thing must be conceded, that the League has set a noble example to the world of the power of principle, organization, and perseverance—a lesson which, it is trusted, will not be lost upon the working classes of this country. Under the management of such men as those whose names appear in the direction of the Free Trade Investment Association, not-nothstanding any slight deficiency in the plan, the blessings of building and investment societies may be carried throughout the length and breadth of the land.tbenleionfoofTHE NATIONAL BUILDING SOCIETY.On Tuesday evening last a highly respectable, numerous, and intelligent meeting assembled, pursuant to public announcement, at the London Tavern, Bishopsgate Street, to hear the principles on which the above society was based.The chair was taken by Mr. E. A. Masterman.The worthy chairman opened the business of the evening hy con-irratulatimr the Snoietv Oil bavino- so numerous ami resneetaTile ■, at.pecl(wlt;nilbereidusodereianbytinaboufeacoitodr:henomi]mi]theas 'sevperspethaintithisofin spurhinbelisocigivimigmistheto IperrecithisindwoiIMa-befi ans' Tin A sliaiA Coi: Sloi nui froiancIaddJonmilof ttowpanto (Ch,cipFnbrcfireto;bigtheciaitoCViipreentis c
Newspaper Details
London National Record of Builldindg Societies
London, Middlesex, GB
Sat, Mar 14, 1846
Page 12
Full Page
Clipped by
Christopher F.
USA 21 Nov 2024
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