The Press. — London, England, 1858-04-17 00:00:00

366 can, without consideration of its neighbours. There are many trades very profitable to the employers, such as shirtmaking under our London contractors, but which only exist by the aid of a large mass of misery amongst the workers. If it could be demon strated that such trades were of no value save to a few employers, and that they resulted in misery and pauperism to the nation, as tending to collect and perpetuate helpless people, the Legislature would have as much right to pro hibit it as it has to prohibit the propagation of the smallpox or other disorders ; and some have said that the general cotton trade comes under this category, inasmuch as it tends to the growth of unhealthy creatures, deteriorating the stock and race of the English people, and threatening them at last with permanent The nation has aright to say that it will not permit its stock and staple to be deteriorated. The happiness of a community depends on the general health of its members, on their power to labour, on their skill, and on their strength to defend their natal soil against enemies. Now, it is well known that we can not get soldiers out of our cotton-mill popula tion ; they are not of the right staple. The mill owners are strong and stout enough, but they do not go for soldiers—they prefer profits ; and the processes they resort to to get pro fits in difficult times are not such as to elevate their moral sense. We have heard of a mill owner rebuking his foreman in bad times for not making fines enough on tho workmen. On the foreman replying that the work was all well done, and there was no pretext for fining, the owner's reply was, " I must find a foreman " who can make fines, for all my profits come "from fines." This system of mulcting the wages-sheet is practically a system of slavery, a contrivance to keep people at low wages, analogous to that of the Scottish West India planter, who, when prices were low, invented the plan of feeding the negroes on " fish wib one yeye ;" splittin*.the ration herring into two sepat ate meals. The fear of a dearth of cotton has led Man chester men to speculate on the possibility of eking out the supply of American cotton with East Indian. It is known that any amount of cotton can be had from India, providing only roads can be obtained. But it does not seem to have occurred to the millowners that there are other things in India besides cotton; there is coal in abundance, and also iron. But there is also another matter as important as both of these—the delicate-fingered work people in any quantity, who can spin and weave cotton in any quantity, provided only that the mills and machinery be put up ; and there is no need to build the mills in many stories, as at Manchester. They may be built like MARSHALL'S flax-mill at Leeds, on the surface, with a roof of any thickness, to keep out surplus heat. Now, if the cotton be grown in India, it will not be very long before some Manchester millowners will transplant there the steam engine and machinery to the aid of the indigenous Indian labourers. The Indians are:our fellow•subjects ; they rebel simply because they can get no work to do but soldiering, and they are a staple of in exhaustible wealth so soon as they can be set to work. In the olden time they made cotton cloth at Calicut and elsewhere at a penny a day. They would gladly do it now at three pence per day ; for their food in the warm climate is far less costly than in England, and there needs no artificial warming in Indian mills. How, therefore, can Lancashire or Yorkshiso or Scotland compete with Indian labour, being respectively as eighteenpence and threepence, .opposing all other circumstances to be equal? It is obvious that the same pro cess which gave India the monopoly of cotton working in former times, and which she lost by the balance struck in favour of the English mill system, will restore the monopoly to India if ever she attains to the possession of mills of her own. It is among the possible things that Cotton Lancashire should cease to exist. There is a greater thing behind—lron Lancashire. The cotton trade is an exotic—a rapid growth that never boasted a firm foundation. The iron trade is indigenous; it existed before the Corrtspontlnct. IN ()lAN GOVERNMENT. TO THE EDITOR OF "THE PRESS." Sir,—lt was my intention to have asked your per mission to follow up the remarks contained in my two letters which you have already published, by the suggestion in a third of some specific propositions for giving effect to the principles I have advanced, as indispensable for the good government of India. But the various manifestations of hostility to both the bills now before Parliament, in which my own judgment decidedly concurred, led me to the conclusion, that if any practical benefit was to be effected by suggestions from a private source—which I am sensible many will consider pre sumptuous, and some may deem impertinent, but to which I am impelled by conscientious feeling alone— that object was more likely to be attained by an en. deavour to keep the public mind fixed on great principles, than by distracting and confusing atten tion in the 'multiplication of propositions of detail, which I felt bad been already unwisely put forward before a determination had been taken on the principles themselves. I had consequently prepared a letter in which T not only urged the propriety of the withdrawal of both bills, but strongly recom mended that, following the precedent of 1813, "Resolutions " should be submitted to the House of Commons, the decision on which should become the basis for legislation on this momentous subject. In short, I advised the very same course that Lord John Russell has since taken, and supported it by the very same arguments. The adoption of that course however by Lord John, and the discussions to which it has given rise, have placed the question in a new light, and induced me to substitute a different letter. It is certain that public opinion will, after all, now decide the issue be• tween the principles involved in the affirmation of prerogative doctrines and Ministerial power, cloaked under the flimsy guise of a pretended but im practicable responsibility on the one band, and on the other the assertion of the really constitutional right of the people to representative institutions, effectual control over the Executive Government, and just participation in the power and patronage of the State. This, divesting the question of all the pe dantry and technicality under which intriguing poli ticians delight in obscuring the truth, will be the substantial issue on which battle must be joined ; and it. becomes therefore of the last importance that, anticipating the struggle, public attention should be forcibly and clearly drawn to the facts and reason ings, the consideration of which can alone lead to a sound conclusion. Passing by, then, all minor points of detail, it seems plain that the fundamental questions which Parliament will he called on to determine, under whatever form they may be submitted, will be—Shall India be governed through the agency of a Council, absolutely invested with all the substantial powers requisite for good government, and only controlled in their exercise by strictly constitutional checks?— Or shall the government be in real fact handed over to the Crown, shielded from actual responsibility by the sham of a mere consultative Council, the off spring of Ministerial patronage, and the pliant instru ment of changing Ministerial policy or caprice ? Lord Palmerston, by his bill rendering the Council nominative and depriving it of all practical power, affirms the latter proposition. Lord Derby's bill, admitting the great constitutional principle of repre sentation and election(though too imperfect to accom plish its end), would, if its principle were boldly vindicated, establish and confirm the former. Which will the good sense and the patriotism of English men prefer? Absolutism or Representative Govern. ment ? I perceive the Times evades these questions, by declaring that the course of proceeding by " Resolu tions" is " unprecedented," and the admission of the representative principle " utterly unconstitutional." Let us examine these pleas in succession. And first as to the absence of precedent. Unable to ignore that of 1813, the Times asserts that there is no similarity between the two cases—the adoption of Resolutions in 1813 being for the purpose of "carrying out a simple and admitted principle while the object at present is the forming a measure "embracing a variety of principl es ." N ow surely this antithesis, instead of negativing the similarity, affords an argument a fortiori for following the precedent. Resolutions are never adopted by the House of Commons iu connection with legislation, except for the affirmation of priuciples to be subse. quently embodied in laws. If, then, in 1813 it was right to affirm by Resolution a simple and acknow. ledged principle, surely it must be infinitely more proper that the same course should be taken in reference to a measure embracing many and dis puted principles. Moreover, it seems undeniable that if this description of the present measure be correct, it is only by Resolutions that Parliament can possibly legislate without absurdity. The second reading of a bill is for the admitted purpose of de ciding on its principle, and on that only; the discus. sion of details is in that stage inadmissible. If, then, a measure includes many principles, how is the house to determine as to the reception or rejection ? It may approve a portion of them, and disapprove others. How is the question to be submitted on them separately, when the only admissible question is, shall the bill be read a second time or not Pro. ceediog by Resolutions, this difficulty is obviated. Eazh in succession is discussed and decided on ; and the "variety of principles" settled, a bill is intro duced founded on the whole settlement. Having thus disposed of the objection that pro. ceeding by Resolutions is " unprecedentee," and demonstrated that it is not only not " against com mon sense," as the Times asserts, bat that itis the only course common sense would dictate, I proceed to grapple with the objection 'that the introduction of the elective principle into the formation of the Council " offends against the first principles of the British Constitution." In making this assertion,the Times wholly ignores the anomalous circumstances which surround and control the determination of a form of government for India. If it were possible to adhere strictly to constitutional principles, it would surely not be con tended that it would be consistent to hand over to the Crown the entire administration of Indian affairs, with all its enormous power and patronage, through the agency of a Minister, aided, but not controlled, by a Council to be nominated wholly by the Sovereign, as Lord Palmerston proposes by his bill, which the Times defends. Again, can it be for a moment urged that the powers so long exercised by the Directors of the East India Company, under the sanction of British law, are not accordant with the principles of the Constitution ? Yet these are the very powers to be simply transferred to the new governing authority, and if so transferred to tho Crown, as proposed by Lord Palmerston's bill, the Times can discover in them nothing unconstitutional. The truth is, that if it were possible to adhere to the principles of the Constitution, direct representative institutions would be given to India, as they have been given to Australia, to Canada, to Jamaica, to every one of our important colonial possessions. But though this is impossible, the impossibility constitutes no reason why the leading constitutional principles, which we so value and cherish at home, should not be followed as far as differing circumstances will permit, in establishing regulations for the government of India. Of these principles, one of the most, perhaps the most, valuable is justly held to be that of representation ; and if it can be shown, as in my first letter I endeavoured to show, that its application to Indian government is practicable and safe, I maintain that its adoption is in strictest harmony with the spirit of the British Constitution, and claims the support of every friend of popular rights, and of every opponent of official intrigue, corruption, and monopoly. I trust. therefore, chat the Resolutions the Government will pro p os e will distinctly and boldly assert that principle; and I s in satisfied that if then driven by factious combinsti on to appeal to tho people, the hustings will vindicate what party intrigue in the House of Commons rosy defeat, and ate 180 millions of our fellow -country men in the East may have a reasonable chance of being governed in the spirit of those institutions which have conferred on the people of this favoured land so large a portion of security, prosperity, liberty, and happiness.—l am, sir, your faithful and obedient servant, Orin Romsxus. Reigate, April 15, 1858. ~r 1 THE PRESS, APRIL 17, 1858. cotton trade, and will remain when cotton is forgotten. It will furnish manly men to our armies when need be. and furnish them with iron weapons. It will help to furnish agricul• Lure with its future tools, and laugh at its one idea'd Cobdens of the past time. This island of ours, laden with old heroic traditions, is not a mere workshop of calico. It is an island of men fitted to do men's work in the old heroic fashion, now as ever. It is de stined under PROVIDENCE to become yet more essential to the world's work; to teach new things to humanity, to set forth many more lessons like this of cotton working, and to leave its teaching when its pupils have become skilled. We look forward to the time when all that is squalid in Manchester and Leeds and Glasgow shall disappear and be no more, and the ruddy glow of English health shall proclaim that English manhood is once more in the ascendant therein.