This is too good not to share:
Two of my favourite things in one poem/tweet.
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In todays world, it would be about the Post Office, energy companies, water companies, schools, hospitals etc.
At the time, the enclosure act was one of the biggest crimes against the people of this country.
The full poem:
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from off the goose
The law demands that we atone
When we take things we do not own
But leaves the lords and ladies fine
Who take things that are yours and mine
The poor and wretched don’t escape
If they conspire the law to break
This must be so but they endure
Those who conspire to make the law
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
And geese will still a common lack
Till they go and steal it back
[Seventeenth century protest against English enclosures]
Variations
They hang the man and flog the woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
Yet let the greater villain loose
That steals the common from the goose
The law doth punish man or woman
That steals the goose from off the common
But lets the greater felon loose
That steals the common from the goose
The law locks up the hapless felon
who steals the goose from off the common
but lets the greater felon loose
who steals the common from the goose
The fault is great in man or woman
Who steals a goose from off a common
But what can plead that man’s excuse
Who steals a common from a goose
[In The Tickler Magazine 1 February 1821]
Thanks
There are more verses for this:
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from the goose.
The law demands that we atone
When we take things we do not own
But leaves the lords and ladies fine
Who takes things that are yours and mine.
The poor and wretched don’t escape
If they conspire the law to break;
This must be so but they endure
Those who conspire to make the law.
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
And geese will still a common lack
Till they go and steal it back.
https://www.onthecommons.org/magazine/%E2%80%9Cstealing-common-goose%E2%80%9D/index.html
It’s cute… but on this blog it’ll be a dog-whistle to the “Tax is Theft” brigade.
But “steals the common from the goose” – class :o)
Indeed. All property is theft…except?
18th century justice warrior
This was the first part of my O level social and economic history course in 1961
I was to teach it later. The enclosures enabled farming to be much more productive so ‘surplus labour’ was created and was available for the new industries -mines, iron and steel, textile mills and other factories.
The new land lords used their wealth to invest in international trade, industry and banking. The power of landed interest enacted the Corn Laws which so oppressed the poor in the early19th century. They played a part in the Irish Famine -they were repealed after the deaths in Ireland. The opposition to them was headed by ‘new money’- the industrialists who became the new ruling class ( but intermarrying with the landowners) but increasingly they had to play second string to the financiers. For the last 100 years the City’s interests have trumped those of industry. High interest rates to protect the exchange value of the pound resulted in the ‘stop-go’ policies which meant our industries fell behind those in Europe-in many cases.
The lesson is the power is always shifting. The rise of the billionaire class has echos of the over mighty subjects of the late Middle Ages. I am not sure where it is going. It would be nice to think it is going to the people-democracy.
Finance is useful servant but a bad master.
IMHO our politics should be to bring finance under democratic control for the common good. Those who live to steal must be stopped. Then no one needs to steal to live.
Whats sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.