The Northern Coal-Owners and the Opposition to the Coal Mines Act of 1842

Abstract

“Never have I seen such a display of selfishness, frigidity to every human sentiment, such ready and happy self-delusion”, wrote Lord Ashley of the opposition to his coal-mines bill in the House of Lords. Historians have tended to confirm Ashley's judgement, and agreed that the motives of the Northern coal-owners in opposing the bill were inspired by simple self-interest, a desire to preserve their right to dispose of their pits, and the men, women and children in them, as they saw fit. It would, of course, be naive to suggest that the Northern coal-owners were not self-interested, but it is perhaps worth analysing the nature of that self-interest, which was not, as the simple and usual dismissal of it would suggest, merely an assertion of proprietorial rights.