The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-05-01 00:00:00

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THURSDAY, MAY 1, 1856

WHAT the shipowners and merchants of Liver-
pool and the North have done, to provoke the
hostility of the House of Commons, and the
wrath of the Board of Trade, would puzzle Lord
PALMERSTON or Mr. LOWE to explain. That guilt
lies somewhere, or that some unpardonable offence
has been given, is .0
quite certain. The P.-
aitßitstoN policy is centralisation in its most

perfect sense. In

raunities the m

—their own money !

whose liberality of sentiment towards the com-
mercial classes, only as far back as the
last general election, positively knew no
bounds ! It would scarcely have been safe for
a person to have hinted, in the presence of
candidates for Senatorial honours in 1852, at the
possibility of a shipowner being ignorant of his own
affairs, or a mercantile man being blind to his real
interest. Four years have wonderfully altered the
opinion of the Legislature. The owners of
millions of tons of the noblest shipping in the
world are now set down as so many self-devouring
sharks, or incorrigible blockheads.
Such was Mr. CARDWELL'S opinion when he
prepared his Mercantile Marine Bill, and the
same idea appears to have been enter-
tained by Lord STANLEY of Alderley,
and Mr. LOWE, since they have been
directing the affairs of the Board of Trade. With
this, as a governing principle, we may leave the
country at large to deal. But why Liverpool
should be selected as the only sea port in this
commercial Arcadia of ours, which is to be
besieged by arbitrary Legislators, Ministerial
boards, and spoilation committees, who have
nothing else to talk about or employ their time,
does seem most strange. Happily for ourselves
our sins are purely political, while the
world testifies to our spirit in commerce
and all England to our industry and growth
in trade. And yet, to be snubbed for our sins by
novices in office, who know nothing of our virtues,
is, verily, a most intolerable hardship. If we are
to have commercial inquisitors, let them be men
who will look to both sides of a question.
Enforcing rigid obedience to an Act of Parliament,
and carrying on pi'actically the mercantile marine
business of this, or any equally large port, are two
very different things. A Local Marine Board, if
they are to give effect to law in any place which is
visited by up .vards of 4,000,000 tons of shipping
annually, must necessarily be allowed some slight
discretion. They ought to be able to say how
many clerks they want, and to tell when any one
of their staff is unequal:to the duties of his office—
what efficient officers ought to receive as salary.
The Board of Trade, pooh ! pooh ! all this.
They will do as they please. The shipowners and
weather-beaten mariners have only to pay their
fees, the one to get his ships safely into port, the
other for his right to plough the ocean ! Such is
modern legislation when stripped of Whig romance,
and party masquerade. Every one has to
pay, but a single voice rules. Local Dues
have been raised for local purpoSes only hitherto.
Now, however, they are handed over to the
Government. If the 3,0001. surplus income of the
Liverpool Board was left in the hands of the
collectors, they being the payees, the probability
is, that the Dues from which that sum is derived
would be reduced, either in favour of the ship-
owner or the mariner; but, as it is, no local
reforms can take place, no matter how just or
urgent they may be. This ought to be
sufficient as an antepast of what all the
juggling of the centralisation advocates will
bring about. The Board of Trade will sweep away
all Local Boards, ride over Dock Trustees, and
Town Councils, whilst Mr. LOWE will take under
his special guardianship " the greatest of all cor-
" porations—the community at large." But we do
trust most sincerely that the shipowners and every
other class, who still believe local self-government
to be the first Constitutional right of every free
citizen, will oppose the centralisation mongers
before it is too late.

The Local Marine Board of Liverpool have
acted both patriotically and wisely in resign-
ing an office which they could not fill without
surrendering their self-respect, and all those
civil rights, which the British merchant ana
subject claims as their lawful inheritance.
The present Ministry, as well as their immediate
predecessors- of perishable memory, were fore-
warned as to what the practical effect of their tam-
pering with strictly commercial institutions would
be, and now they may be told with equal truth
what their unjustifiable interference with
the rights of property, and the prin-
ciples of local self-government, will lead to.
Liverpool has been selected as the great martyr of
the centralising Charlatans, but all other corporate
towns, and boards of the smallest hamlets through-
out the country, are doomed to the same usurpa-
tion of civil rights and confiscation of property.
The magnificence of the design is only beginning
to develope itself in all its statesman-like grandeur ;
and we are rejoiced to find that the
Liverpool Shipowners' Association have taken
up the cause of their brethren of the Local Marine
Board. The Association met yesterday and adopted
a series of spirited resolutions, which will be found
in another column.

THE LOCAL MARINE BOARD

MEETING OF THE SHIPOWNERS' ASSOCIATION.