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them just to apply a little of their alarm to this subject; and he would ask them whether there were not just as solid grounds for that alarm about the effects which might follow the rejection of these petitions; it was, unfortunately, too much the fashion to cry up the distresses and the forbearance of the artisans alone, forgetting the claims of the more scattered, and no less meritorious, peasantryto fear the resentments of the one, because they were a more organized and more collected community than the other, who were more thinly spread over a larger surface. Unless their feelings were to be falsified, and themselves to be lessened in the eyes of the country, he thought that honourable gentlemen ought to consider what had occurred last night as a solemn discussion of the merits of a question, which was now sought to be got rid of without one tittle of argument beyond what had been endeavoured to be then sustained.

Notwithstanding the strength of this appeal, the fate of the question was from the first decided. The opponents of agricultural inquiry had mustered their strength, and Mr Robinson's limitation was voted by 251, while there were against it only 108, a considerably smaller number than had voted the night before for general inquiry. The possibility of any important change in the corn laws was thus evaded. Before the close of the session, the committee presented a report, which will be found in the Appendix, but upon which no legis

lative measure was founded.

The commerce of Great Britain oc

cupied also, during this session, a large share of public attention. Those lights of political economy, which had shone so bright towards the close of the last century, and seemed to be guiding the nations into a more enlarged and liberal system, had of late

been greatly dimmed. The doctrines which proved liberty to be essential to commercial prosperity, were not indeed absolutely denied, but they were represented as unfit for the purposes of practical regulation. The deadly enmities which reigned among the members of the European commonwealth, had led each into the habit of considering an injury done to another as equivalent to a benefit obtained for itself. Cool reflection and severe experience were now fast opening the eyes of the British public. Not only was it now generally admitted, that nations would gain most by freely opening their ports to each other; but it was even recognized, that though one side denied this reciprocity, the other would consult its advantage in not retaliating. Petitions from the cities of London and of Glasgow were laid before the House of Commons, in which the most liberal sentiments were expressed upon these subjects. It was in the House of Lords, however, that the discussion was carried on upon the most extended scale, being introduced by Lord Lansdowne, a nobleman early imbued with profound principles of commercial economy. On moving on the 26th of May for a committee of the Lords to inquire into the subject, he entered at large into the improvements of which it might be susceptible. He meant to confine the proposition he had to make, to the appointment of a committee on the foreign trade of the country. He had chosen this course, because he was convinced that any more extensive inquiry would only open an arena, into which every chivalrous political economist would hasten to take his stand; into which every theory would be introduced, and where every opposing interest would have found a field of combat. In any committee of general inquiry, useful discussion would be impracticable,

endless contests would arise, and inquiries would be pursued without leading to any result. Nothing, however, could be farther from his intention, than to favour any one class or pursuit in preference to another. This indeed was impracticable, in consequence of the intimate mutual dependence between them. The experience of the last ten years could not be thrown away on their lordships, and he trusted it would not on the country. In the year 1815, they had seen the distress of the agricultural body visited on the other interests of the community. They had afterwards found the distress of the manufacturing interest visited on the growers of corn and the raisers of every kind of agricultural produce. From these alternate visitations, who could fail to see that the order of nature had linked together all the interests of men in society? Commerce and manufactures had made the country what it was, and by them it must be maintained in the rank to which it had been raised. No axiom was more true than this that it was by growing what the territory of a country could grow most cheaply, and by receiving from other countries what it could not produce except at too great an expense, that the greatest degree of happiness was to be communicated to the greatest extent of population. He was aware that the question could not be considered in a mere abstract manner; that there were many prejudices to be removed, and many conflicting interests to be reconciled, before any improvement could be effected. Nations had been expending their capital instead of their revenue, and a numerous population had been called into existence by a demand for labour which no longer existed. The most obvious remedy was to create a demand for our labour and our manufactures; and the most obvious mode

of creating that demand, was to enccurage and to extend our foreign trade by removing some of those restrictions by which it was shackled. In looking towards such a relaxation, two things ought to be taken into consideration by their lordships: first, the necessity of raising our revenue; and, secondly, the justice and expediency of consulting those interests which were vested in our existing trade, on the faith of the continuance of the regulations under which it was now carried on. But those things were not to be lost sight of-they ought not to prevent changes which higher interests and a wiser policy demanded. They ought, in short, to recollect that liberty of trade should be the rule, and restraint only the exception. He would first of all venture to say, that there ought to be no prohibitory duties, as such—that where a manufacture could not be carried on, or a production raised, but under the protection of a prohibitory duty, that manufacture or that produce must be brought to market at a loss. The name of strict prohibition might therefore in commerce be got rid of altogether; but he did not see the same objection to protecting duties. He would even suggest a certain relaxation in the navigation laws, though not such as could justly give rise to any jealousy. He would propose to allow produce from all parts of Europe to be imported, without making it necessary that it should be altogether in English-built ships, or in ships belonging to the nation whence the produce comes. At present a vessel which had taken part of its cargo in a French port, and which afterwards had proceeded to a Flemish port for the remainder, could not enter a British port. All that he would propose would be to allow such a vessel to make good its assortment in different ports in Europe, and still to

have the right of entering this country. He would make one exception to this relaxation of the navigation laws-he would not allow the importation of colonial produce in this manner. The third point to which he would advert, was one of no inconsiderable importance in itself, and of still greater consequence from the principle which it involved-he meant an entire freedom of the transit trade. Whatever brought the foreign merchant to this country, and made it a general mart-a depot for the merchandise of the world, which might be done consistently with the levying of a small duty, was valuable to our trade, and enriched the industrious population of our ports. Such freedom of transit allowed of assortment of cargoes for foreign markets, and thus extended our trade in general. A duty of 15 per cent on the importation of foreign linens, was, during the war, thought necessary to protect the linen manufactures of Ireland. No injury resulted from that arrangement while we engrossed the commerce of the world; but now the case was altered, and many who were interested in the linen manufacture of Ireland, thought a relaxation of the transit duty advisable. If we refused to admit German linen without the payment of a transit duty, the foreigner would rather go to Germany for the article; he would then either pay the duty which we imposed, or take a less valuable article as a substitute; and as linen might be a necessary article in the assortment of his cargo, this duty would drive him away altogether, even when desirous of obtaining other articles which our soil or industry could supply. He now came to a point which involved important interests he meant the state of the trade with the north of Europe, and the duties imposed on the importation of timber from that quarter. The mea

sure was expressly of a temporary nature, and was necessarily to be brought under review in March next. The interests now vested in the timber-trade to our North-American colonies, grew out of what was considered as a temporary arrangement, and had of course no security against a change which the general interests of the nation might require. The American merchants represent, that, from the length and difficulty of the voyage to North America, the larger part of the value of the timber thence imported consists of freight; and that the mere circumstance of the proximity of the northern ports of Europe, by enabling ships to repeat their voyages frequently in the course of a year, would reduce the number of British vessels employed in the timber-trade to one-third. They therefore said, that whereas it was expedient that they should be employed— and whereas they could not be so employed if they procure timber where it is cheapest and best-they therefore should import it of the worst quality, and from the greatest distance. And let their lordships consider what the article was that was thus to be raised in price, while it was deteriorated in quality. It was the raw material of our houses, of our bridges, of our canals, and of our shipping itself; and so inconsistent were the petitioners, that they asked to continue duties which increased the expense of their own trade. Suppose it were proposed, on the same plea, to bring our cotton from the East Indies, instead of importing from America, he did not see on what grounds those could resist such a proposition who argued that we ought to import our timber from Canada rather than from Norway. The committee would consider how much of the duty might be taken off the timber from the north, and what regulations might be adopt

ed to reserve to Canada the supply of masts, for which its timber was peculiarly fitted. It deserved serious consideration how much more we paid for the timber from Canada than we should pay for that from the north of Europe. By a calculation which he had made, the difference was not less than 500,000l. annually for the whole country, and in the port of London alone 100,000l. had been paid on account of this prohibitory duty. He would now advert to another subject of great importance-the state of our trade with France, and particularly in the article of wine. Their lord ships must know that a duty of 1431. 18s. was imposed upon the tun of French wine, while only 951. was imposed upon Spanish and Portuguese wines. There had been a falling off in the duty in the last year of 220,000l. Now, although the government of France was not disposed to enter into any commercial treaty, or to make any liberal arrangement for receiving our manufactures in exchange for their wine, he would not allow but that some change should be made in our present trade with that country. What he had said with regard to the wines of France, would apply likewise to its silks and if our own manufacturers in silk were to suffer temporarily by a removal of the prohibitory duties, this was a case in which he would willingly agree to a large parliamentary grant for the purpose of indemnity. He now came to a subject which, with whatever difficulties it might be surrounded, had at least this advantage, that it would relieve and benefit the shipping interest. It would be impossible for their lordships not to recollect and to apply the fact, that from one of the largest, most fertile, and most populous portions of the globe, that immense space which lay between Africa and America, the general British merchant was excluded. From

the time that he doubled Cape Horn, or the Cape of Good Hope, he found his commercial operations cramped, and his enterprize restrained; not by the nature of the country, for it was rich and adapted to commerce; not by the indisposition of the people to trade, for they were numerous, industrious, and disposed to exchange their productions for ours; not by the difficulties of the seas, for, by the tradewinds and the monsoons, navigation was easy and secure; but he was pursued, and all his schemes defeated, by the statute-book. If the private trade were perfectly unrestricted, much smaller vessels might be employed, and many merchants would engage in it who could not fit out a ship of 500 tons burden. There existed many nations perfectly accessible to smaller vessels, who were now never visited. They composed a population of upward of 70,000,000; and he would beg leave to read a passage from a book lately published, (Mr Crawford's History of the Indian Archipelago) shewing the facilities for commerce in the Eastern seas, the great wealth which they offered, and the little trade that was now carried on in them. He was the more disposed to be sanguine in these expectations, when he contemplated the benefits which had arisen from a free trade in the only quarter where it had yet been permitted. Their lordships would recollect that six years ago, when the trade to the East Indies was not open, there was no independent British tonnage on the other side of the Cape of Good Hope. At present he was happy to inform them that there were in the Eastern seas 20,000 tons of shipping in the service of the East India Company, but 61,000 in the service of the free trade. The free trade employed 4720 British seamen, whilst the trade of the East India Company employed only 2550 of them. Yet it was a pecu

liar hardship, that in countries where the British had established an unprecedented power, and where they exercised an uncontrolled dominion, an American should be at liberty to carry on a trade in which it was not allow ed to an Englishman to engage. The trade to which he alluded was the exportation of tea, which he understood was more than ten to one in favour of the American merchant: nor was this at all surprising; for he not only derived a benefit from the liberty which he possessed of assorting his cargo when and where he pleased; but also from the liberty which he enjoyed of supplying France, Holland, and other parts of the continent, with that commodity, tea, which the East India Company did not choose to do themselves, and would not allow any of their fellow-countrymen to do for them. So fully was he convinced of the inexpediency of such a restriction, that nothing could induce him to believe that the East India Company would not, if applied to, allow Englishmen to supply France, and Holland, and Germany, with tea from Canton, as readily as she allowed American merchants to do so. He was not prepared to say that the British Government ought to exert its influence to procure the immediate independence of South America-by no means: but he was prepared to say, that, considering the manner in which the trade of its subjects had increased at Buenos Ayres, where it was liable to no restrictions during the years 1810, 1811, and 1812-considering that since the latter of these periods it had even increased there to a twofold amount, and that similar results had taken place in every other part of that great continent where British manufactures had been introduced, it was bound by every tie of feeling and of interest to cement the connexion which already subsisted between the

inhabitants of the two countries, by the utmost good faith, kindness, and liberality. To cement that connexion would not be a difficult task for this country, as there was none better calculated to inspire the South Americans with sentiments of respect and affection. It was only necessary that we should repeal the restrictions under which we had hitherto guarded our intercourse with them, and stand before them as a country ready to receive their produce on the most favourable terms. And why should they not repeal these restrictions? Their lordships, he was sure, were well aware that, in the year previous to the commencement of the unfortunate war which terminated in the establishment of American independence, our exports to the United States did not amount to more than 3,000,000l.; whereas at present they amounted to no less a sum than thirty millions. This was the consequence of free trade. The noble marquis then strongly urged the cultivation of friendly relations with Ireland, as there was no country better fitted to give employment to our capital, and become a great consumer of our manufactured goods. Though he was not very sanguine in his expectations of immediate relief to the present distress of the country, he could not, with the feelings which he entertained regarding British enterprize, British skill, and British ingenuity, abandon the hope of ultimate relief to our distressed situation, whilst there was any part of the globe unexplored, or only partially explored, to which our trade could penetrate. Our merchants, if they were now oppressed with the difficulties which he had before described, were not, however, deprived of that high character, that good faith, and that persevering industry, which had always distinguished them.

The Earl of Liverpool, in rising to

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