Thomas Mackay (1849 – 1912) was a British
wine
Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are m ...
merchant and
classical liberal
Classical liberalism is a political tradition and a branch of liberalism that advocates free market and laissez-faire economics; civil liberties under the rule of law with especial emphasis on individual autonomy, limited government, econom ...
.
Life
Mackay, the son of a colonel, was born in
Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...
and educated at
Glenalmond
Glenalmond or Glen Almond ( gd, Gleann Amain) is a glen which stretches for several miles to the west of the city of Perth in Perth and Kinross, Scotland and down which the River Almond flows. The upper half of the glen runs through mountainou ...
. He matriculated at
New College, Oxford in 1868, graduating B.A. in 1873; he entered the
Inner Temple
The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as the Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court and is a professional associations for barristers and judges. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and ...
in 1871. He was
called to the bar in 1879 but left to enter the wine trade because he felt that he was not earning enough to support his wife and family. He retired ten years later in order to campaign for liberalism.
He criticised
old age pensions
A pension (, from Latin ''pensiō'', "payment") is a fund into which a sum of money is added during an employee's employment years and from which payments are drawn to support the person's retirement from work in the form of periodic payments ...
because he believed they would harm character and advocated reducing "the encouragement to
pauperism
Pauperism (Lat. ''pauper'', poor) is poverty or generally the state of being poor, or particularly the condition of being a "pauper", i.e. receiving relief administered under the English Poor Laws. From this, pauperism can also be more generally ...
held out by our present system of out-door relief" by restoring independence. Also, Mackay did not favour a compromise between individualism and socialism: "Those who talk of compromise seem not to realize that the knell of the period of compromise has sounded...We are falling under a tyranny more absolute and unrelenting than anything the world has ever seen".
[Taylor, p. 183.]
Publications
*''The English Poor'' (1889).
*(editor), ''A Plea for Liberty'' (1891).
*"The Joining of Issues", ''Economic Review'', 1 (1891), pp. 194–202.
*"People's Banks", ''National Review'', 22 (1894), pp. 634–47.
*"Empiricism in Politics", ''National Review'', 25 (1895), pp. 790–803.
*"Old Age Pensions", ''Quarterly Review'', 182 (1895), pp. 254–80.
*"Politicians and the Poor Law", ''Fortnightly Review'', 57 (1895), p. 408.
*''Methods of Social Reform: Essays Critical and Constructive'' (1896).
*''The State and Charity'' (1898).
*''History of the English Poor Law'' with
Sir George Nicholls (1899
Vol.III From 1834 to the Present Time
*''Public Relief of the Poor Law: Six Letters'' (1901).
* 'The Mandible' (1902)
Notes
Further reading
*J. W. Mason, "Thomas Mackay: The Anti-Socialist Philosophy of the Charity Organisation Society," in Kenneth D. Brown (ed.), ''Essays in Anti-Labour History: Responses to the Rise of Labour in Britain'' (London: Macmillan, 1974), pp. 290–316.
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Mackay, Thomas
1849 births
1912 deaths
Alumni of New College, Oxford
British classical liberals
People educated at Glenalmond College