Scarica 19th Century England: Political Reforms & Social Movements - Struggle for Democracy & Work e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! 1830 the first Reform Bill extended the right to vote to the upper middle class, and they abolished the corn law. These reforms were based on property. The exclusion of the majority people from parliament cost the rise of Chartist movement in 1838 (the member calls the Chartist). The chartist took their name from their document called ‘’ the people’s chart”. In this document they asked for: e Thevote for all man ® Thesecret vote ® Theannual election of parliament ® The payment of the MPs = members of parliament ® A more equal distribution of the seats. These requests were considered too progressive, same members were arrested because the chartists threatened a general strike. The movement was disbanded in 1848, but it was very important for the democratic development of the country and it led to the Second Reform Bill in 1867 which extended the vote to the lower middle class and to the works of the industries. In 1871 the trade unions became legal. In 1844 the Third Reform Bill extended the vote to the farmers and the miners. We have the vote for all man over 31. In 1918 could vote women over 31. In 1928 man and women over 21 could vote, and now the workers have a represent in parliament. In 1900 the labor party was founded, and it defend the right of workers. The upper middle class was aware of the wide social gap between themself and the workers. They were different to problem for two reasons. Following the puritan tradition of the previously century they fought that poverty was a crime, the result of laziness, because in their opinion poor people didn’t od their best to improve their living condition. The second reason was related to the materialistic mentality of the time. They consider the situation as temporary and the price to pay for wealth as a matter of fact they believed in technological progress and they were sure that soon even the poor people would benefit of it as it had appended to them. In 1834 the parliament passed the poor law, which established the open of workhouses, places where the poor children and the poor people were sent when they didn’t have enough money to survive. In the workhouses they worked very hard in exchange for very little food and lodging. In the opinion of the upper middle class they were an attempt to solve the problem of poverty, but they were a formof exploitation. In the Victorian age the attitude towards children was particularly ambiguous. The children belonged to reach family were considered a hope for the future and for this reason they were well educated and well looked after. They have private tutor at home but when they were old enough, they were sent to very expensive boarding school. The little girls were educated at home to became good wife and to take care of the families. Unfortunately, the children belonging to the poor family couldn’t be educated because they had to go to work to help their families. They worked in fields and they were employed as miners and chimney sweepers. The children workers in the miners had a seriously problem to their back because they were bent in very narrow tunnels, the children employed as chimney sweepers ere 4 or 5 years old and they were often injured. The children who works in the miners had a problem at lung. 1847 > children under 10 were forbidden to work in the miners 1817 > the working hours for children were reduce to 10 hour a day 1870 > parliament passed the education Act which made primary education compulsory. (AIl those laws were passed to try to improve the situation).
