Richard Jennings

“ Ritchie's time was almost wholly absorbed by the business of the firm, of which he soon became a partner. His offices lay in the East End of London, and he thus enjoyed opportunities of studying conditions of life among the poorer classes. He interested himself in politics, adopting a toryism which was from the first of a 'progressive' type. In 1874 he was elected in the conservative interest member for the great working-class constituency of the Tower Hamlets amid the tory reaction which followed Gladstone's first administration. ”

“ Soon afterwards Ritchie undertook an elaborate and complicated Factory and Workshop Act which, in its 163 clauses and seven schedules, consolidated and amended the whole of the Factory-Acts since 1878. Another useful Act, the Youthful Offenders Act, provided that in some instances young offenders on remand should be committed to the charge of some responsible person, instead of being sent either to prison or to the workhouse ”

“ Chamberlain's retirement been announced to Ritchie, the ground for his own resignation at the moment would have been removed. Mr. Balfour replied in later speeches that he and the majority of the cabinet inclined to some kind of change in the fiscal system, and that Ritchie and his free trade colleagues were in opposition on that point to the majority; that Mr. Chamberlain had already threatened resignation if preference were excluded from the official programme of the government, to which it was not admitted ”

“ He declined to be (see Parliamentary Debates, 4th series, vol. 123) 'a party to a policy which, in my opinion would be detrimental to both the country and the colonies.' Ritchie's budget received the royal assent without alteration on 30 June. ”

“ The growth of fatal or serious accidents amongst railway servants (1896-8) led Ritchie to procure the appointment of a royal commission of inquiry, with the result that he passed in 1900 the Railway Employment (Prevention of Accidents) Act, which dealt fully with the means of increased protection. Ritchie's Companies Act of 26 June 1900, which was practically a bill passed by a select committee of the House of Commons appointed in 1894 {Parliamentary Debates, vol. ”

“ These clauses, which embodied the principle of compensation for interference with public houses, and so recognised a legal vested interest on the part of the licence-holder, were warmly contested by the temperance party, and, after considerable discussion, they were dropped (June 12) . ”

“ With his resignation and his public explanation Ritchie's public life ceased, though in the sessions of 1904 and 1905 he spoke more than once in the House of Commons in support of free trade principles. On 10 Feb. 1905 he suffered a severe blow in the death of his wife after forty-seven years of mutual attachment and happiness. It is doubtful if he recovered from the shock. The resignation of Mr. Balfour's government came on 17 Dec. 1905, and five days later Ritchie was raised to the peerage as Baron Ritchie of Dundee, of Welders, Chalfont St. ”

“ Chamberlain's verbal announcements of resignation had been frequent in the heat of controversy and were not taken seriously. After the withdrawal of Ritchie and his friends the prime minister's pronouncements leant more decisively to the side of the tariff reformers, with the result that the duke of Devonshire parted from him on 2 October. On 19 Oct. 1903 at Croydon, on 18 November at Thornton Heath, and finally at Croydon on 2 December, Ritchie defended his attitude throughout the fiscal controversy. ‘So far as Mr. Balfour's policy of retaliation is concerned he had never said ... ”

“ The result was a recommendation in favour of the abolition of the continental bounties by means of an international agreement. The inquiry began a campaign against the economic system which was exemplified in the policy of sugar-bounties. Ritchie followed up the question in the next parliament and found himself in conflict with Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, then president of the board of trade and an advocate of free imports. Many years later, in a speech at Tynemouth (21 Oct. 1903) , when both Ritchie's and Mr. Chamberlain's views of free trade had undergone a reversal, Mr. ”