Silk and cotton manufacture
led the way in using new machinery because they were recently
imported industries so not bound down by tradition and legal
restraint. Yarn production so improved that weavers became very
prosperous. Cards with metal teeth were challenging the use of
wood and horn cards with thistles in carding wool. Merchants who
traveled all over the world and saw new selling opportunities and
therefore kept encouraging the manufacturers to increase their
production and improve their methods. Factory owners united to
present suggestions to Parliament.
Manufacturing broke loose from traditional confines in several
ways. To avoid the monopolistic confines of chartered towns, many
entrepreneurs set up new industries in Birmingham or Manchester,
which grew enormously. Manchester had no municipal corporation and
was still under the jurisdiction of a manor court. It sent no
representative to the House of Commons. All over the country the
Justices of the Peace had largely ceased regulating wages,
especially in the newer industries such as cotton, where
apprenticeship was optional. Apprenticeship lapsed in many
industries, excepting the older crafts. Several legal decisions
had declared seven years practice of a trade as good as an
apprenticeship.
Apprentices still lived in their masters' houses and were still
treated as family members. The regulations of the Cutlers' Company
remained in force as its masters used their great manual skill to
make cutlery in their own homes with the help of their children
and apprentices.
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