183 years ago today, on May 2, 1842 (March 22, 1842), the British Charter Movement broke out. Britain was the first country to have a bourgeois revolution and an industrial revolution. In the 19th century, it was called the "factory of the world". For many years in this country famous for its practice of "parliamentary democracy", only those who paid high income taxes had the right to vote, and the vast majority of workers were excluded from the gates of parliament. On May 2, 1842, the streets of London were crowded with people. A huge army of workers came to the House of Commons of Parliament, and the head of the National Association of Chartist presented the second petition of the National Chartist to the House of Commons. The petition read: "Your Honorable House, as far as its present composition is concerned, is neither elected by the people nor ruled by the people. It serves only the interests of the few, and ignores the poverty, misery, and desires of the many.... "The petition also states that in England," the rulers are extravagant, and the ruled suffer and starve. "For example, Queen Victoria's daily income is £164, 17 shillings and 60 pence, and her husband Prince Albert's daily income is £104 and 20 shillings, while millions of workers earn only two or three pence per day. The petitioners argue that the abolition of a certain monopoly will not free the working people from poverty until the people have power, and that after the people have power, all monopolies and all forms of oppression should cease. By "monopoly", the petitioners mean the monopoly of voting rights and paper money, of machines and land, of press and religious privileges.... This petition, signed by 3 million (about half of all adult men in England), again demanded that the People's Charter be made into law. The People's Charter was a petition to Parliament in 1837 by the London Working Men's Association. It proposed that all men over the age of 21 should have universal suffrage, that elections should be held in secret, that property eligibility restrictions for parliamentary candidates should be abolished, and that Congress should hold re-elections every year to distribute constituencies equally. The following May, when this petition was published, it became known as the People's Charter, and in 1839 it was signed by 1.25 million people. In July 1840, the representatives of the Chartists from all over the country met in Manchester and proclaimed the establishment of the National Chartist Association. Its purpose was to "bring about a complete reform of the House of Commons, so that the House of Commons can fully and faithfully represent all the people of the United Kingdom", and in order to "achieve this end, it is only appropriate to use peaceful and legal means". The Association has hundreds of chapters all over the country, and members are required to pay membership fees. It was the germ of the first workers' party in modern times. In 1848, the Chartist movement rose again under the impetus of the revolutionary storms on the European continent. The third national petition went on to argue that labor is the only source of all wealth, and that workers have priority over the fruits of their labor. The people are the only source of power. 1.97 million people signed the petition. The workers of London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Glasgow and other cities held huge demonstrations. On April 10, the delegates of the Third National Congress of the Chartists drove to Parliament in four sets of ornate carriages. On the way, they were suppressed by the gendarmerie. Congress refused to accept the petition. Then the government ordered the dissolution of the National Association of Chartists. Lenin described the British Chartist movement as "the first broad, truly mass, and political proletarian revolutionary movement in the world." The Chartist movement marked the beginning of the British proletariat's entry into history as an independent political force, and opened the prelude to the struggle for political power against the bourgeoisie.