ABSTRACT
First published in The Examiner, X, 14 September 1817, pp. 577–8. Owen’s amended plan is quoted on pp. 578–9, and the second meeting at which Owen spoke is described in the 24 August 1817 Examiner, pp. 535-6. For Robert Owen’s biography, see Biographical Directory. Owen was already famous at this point for his innovative policies at his New Lanark cotton mills. With the end of the Napoleonic wars and the economic collapse that followed, Owen became convinced that thoroughgoing economic reform was needed, and he came out against the factory system, competition and the private ownership of property; while his earlier plans had called upon the wealthy to take care of the poor, he now urged the creation of voluntary collectives. When a parliamentary committee on the poor law refused to allow him to address them, he decided to take his plans directly to the people. He published letters in the papers on 30 July, 9 August and 10 August, then circulated thirty thousand copies of these pieces. He addressed large meetings on 14 and 21 August, but at the second one, discussed here, he was asked his religious views; his statement that religion and the priesthood had in fact been used to oppress the people (which, Hunt notes, is similar to positions held by Shelley) was not well received. Hunt opens with a description of a picnic in the fields undertaken by his group, an event he claims to be connected with his political discussion; he perhaps suggests that his communal group is a model for the kind of community Owen hopes to create.
