Well-Tempered Power: “A Cultural Achievement of Universal Significance”

When I was still young, and so a long time ago, a remarkable controversy erupted over a book by the eminent British historian, ex-communist, unorthodox Marxist, and peace activist, E. P. Thompson.The work, Whigs and Hunters, 1 was a close reconstruction, from masses of fragmentary evidence, of the origins, social meaning, and significance of the so-called Black Act passed by the United Kingdom Parliament in 1723.The Whigs of the title governed Britain for much of the eighteenth century, the hunters were mainly forest dwellers and farm labourers who caught game and caused other disturbances in parks and forests owned by the King, nobles and gentry.The "Black" of the Act referred to the blackface camouflage used by these hunters/poachers ("Blacks") on the job, and the Act "at a blow" created around fifty new capital offences.It provided, Thompson writes, "a versatile armoury of death apt to the repression of various forms of social disturbance." 2 As one might expect from one of the most distinguished Marxist historians of his generation, Thompson revealed ways in which this and other laws were made and used by the government and those whose interests, particularly economic interests, they 