The Sun.
London, England, 1839-01-22 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE 1;ITBLIC- JOURNA.I S

Before we enter upon an attempt to answer the Standard
on the subject of the Corn-laws, we must be allowed to offer
our excellent Contemporary a little friendly advice. Let him
carefully examine the quotations which the Ministerial writers
make, as well as the figures they produce, and not get into
a passion about nothing. We give this advice in consequence
of the very hard names (there would not be much difficulty in
calling harder ones on the other side) which the Standard
yesterday bestowed upon those who are opposed to the Corn-
laws, and that, too, on grounds that justified no such language.
The quotation or representation which the Ministerial print
makes from Mr. M'Culloch, and which has so disturbed the
equanimity of our Contemporary, is not fairly made, and it stops
short of the explanation which Mr. Mt Culloch and other writers
have clseWhere given respecting the disposal of that part of the
Corn-law tax, which does net go into the p }elects of
the agriculturists, but is taken from the pockets of the auhlie.
. Our Contemporary also should recollect that we, and, as we
believe, all other orthodox opponents of the Corn-laws, are
so fur from entertaining any hostility to the landowners, that
one of our main points is that the repeal of the Corn-laws
still he bent ficial, not injurious to to the landlords. We shall
have some amicable wrestling with our Contemporary on this
pon:t anon ; for the present, let us content ourselves with
telling him how the quotation that has so misled him into
anger should have been given :—" Attempts have son.etinas
been made to estimate the pecuniary but den uhich the re-
strictions on importation entail in ordinary years upon a
country. This, however, is a subject with respect to
which it is not possible to obtain any very accurate
data. But, supposing the total quantity of corn annually
produced in Great Britain and Ireland to amount to
52,000,000 quarters, every shilling that is added to
its price by the Corn-laws, is equivalent to a tax on
corn of 2,600,000/. ; and estimating the average rise on all
sorts of grain at 7s. a quarter, the total sum will be
18,200,000/. So great a quantity of corn is. however, con-
sumed by the agriculturists themselves as food, in seed, the
keep of horses, &c., that not more than a half, perhaps, of
the whole quantity produced is brought to market. If we are
nearly right in this hypothesis, and in the previous estimates,
it will follow that the restrictions cost the'classes not engaged
in agriculture no less than 0,100,000/., exclusive of their
own pernicious consequences. Of this sum, a fifth, probably,
or 1,800,000/., msy go to the landlords as rent ; and this is
all that the agriculturists can be said to gain by the system,
for the additional price received by the farmer on that portion
of the produce exclusive of rent is no more than the ordi-
nary return for his capital and labour. His profits, indeed,
instead of being increased by thin system, are realty
diminished by it (for proofs of this, see the note on
Corn-laws, in my edition of the Wealth of Nations, vol. iv.,
pp. 358-361); and though the rents of the landlords be,
nominally at least, somewhat increased by it, it is, notwith-
standing, abundantly certain that it is anything but advan-
tageous to them. It would require a far larger sum to halanec
the injury which fluctuations of price occasion to their tenants,
and the damage done to their estates by ever-cropping when
prices are high, than all that is derived from the restric-
tions." The Standard defies his Ministerial opponent to
tell how that part cf the money raised which does not go into
the pockets of the landlords is disposed of, if it go not
" to maintain the farmers, yeomanry, arid agricultural 13-
bowers." The Ministerial writer will, we suppose, answer
for himself. We tell our Contemporary that esen if the
" balance of the payment," as he terms it, went into
the pockets of landlords, instead of being distributed
as he supposes it is, we should feel that we had much
less reason to complain than we have now ; but it is, in fact,
wasted, totally lost to tl e country, by mewls of the ruinous
system adot tcd for forcing corn where the nature of the s
gives evidence that grass only should be grown. They atate not
" madmen," but men of experience and skill, that desire to
alter this system. They who ask whether it is from " our
spectre-peopled manufacturing districts that our fleets and
armies can be manned," and who, while they put this question,
refuse to put flesh up in the bones of these spectres by denying
them cheap bread, seem much more like persons who have
lost their wits. We will not ask, as our Contemporary would
ask (if we may judge from what he said yesterday),
whether such persons " exceed in hardness of heart or
thickness of head ;" but we hope they rejoice in
the latter, if there be anything in the Standard's
monition of what may he dreaded from " the agri-
cultural peasantry when driven to despair,"—because the
" clubs" with which the Standard arms them will most assur-
edly descend, if at all, upon the he ids of those who refuse
them cheap bread, not upon the heads of men who are striving.
to fill their bellies at the easiest rate. But our Contemporary has
. not lost his temper with us, and we shall not lose our temper
with him. We have a score to clear off with him, and we beg
his pardon for remaining in his debt since yesterday. It is true
that we merely alluded in our article of Saturday to the im-
proved tillage of Ireland and Scotland. Our object in this was
to suggest an alleviation of the Standard's fears of our being
thrown on our own resources in the event of a war. The Stan-
dard thinks this improved tillage too important a matter to be
treated obiter—and so do we ; but neither that occasion nor the
present afforded, or affords the opportunity of going fully into it.
Our Contemporary, however, asks—" If the improved tillage of
Scotland and Ireland has more than kept pace with the in-
crease of population, from a term when, as experience has
shown, the corn of the United Kingdom was sufficient fur its
support, what need then of foreign corn ! If it has not, then
the home produce is relatively less than it was during the
war—a bad argument for still further diminishing it, and fall.
inn, back, in the event of war, upon an inadequate source of
supply." We readily answer, that the tillage of Ireland has
more than kept pace with the increase of population ; and we
beg to add, that that part of the United Kingdom is not yet
half cultivated. This ought to be an answer to the fears our
Contemporary expresses ; and if there be anything in his ques-
tion, " what need of foreign corn ?" he is clearly answered,
pro vice, by " what need of fear of foreign corn ?"
The question, " what need of foreign corn ?" involves the
whole question, and cannot be disposed of, as our Con-
temporary would say, " obiter." At the risk, however, of
being thought by the Standard to speak riddles, we will add
that the admission of foreign corn would prevent those fluctua-
tions in prices which have caused nearly all the misery that
the agricultural interest has periodically endured for the last
18 or 20 years. Our Contemporary then observes—" The
Times next proceeds to ask why is it more prudent or more
necessary to maintain now the agricultural system that was
permitted during the war than to keep up our naval and mili-
tary force at the war point?" We must respectfully observe
that this is an erroneous analogy. A naval arid military esta-
blishment is but the development of the strength of a country,
not the source of that strength." We very respectfully insist
that the analogy is not erroneous; that both are developments
of the strength of a country, though useless and unwise
developments of strength ; for both would show how
great burdens, albeit unnecessary burdens, the country
could be made to bear in the one case,—has been
made to bear in the other. The burdens imposed by the
Corn-laws are nMmore the source of strength than the num-
ber of lashes inflicted by a cat-o'-nine-tails enables the sufferer
to hear them. There is the development of endurance in
both cases—nothing more. Again, the Standard complains
that we were guilty of an erroneous analogy when we said that
if it were necessary for a nation's independence that it should
have the means of self-support, it must have the means of self-
support in every thing else as well as in raising corn. The
Standard insists that there is a difference bete eon corn and
other produce, and we are sure our Contemporary thinks so,
for otherwise he could not entertain the opinions he expresses
on the subject of the Corn-larva. He says that corn cannot be
dispensed with. Who talks about dispensing with cern ?
One would suppose, from the tone of our Contemporary, that
the opponents of the Corn-laws had a scheme for taking
away the land itself as well as the protecting duty on corn ;
that we can have no war which is not a war with the whole
world, or at least a war against an enemy so powerful that our
navy could not convoy vessels laden with corn in safety to our
ports. Are we to legislate in all times for such improbable
contingencies as these ? Surely not—especially when we
know that for a time at least cern may be dispensed with, and
that "an acre of potatoes will feed double the number of indi-
viduals that can be fed from an acre of wheat." We should
he sorry to see potato diet substituted for corn diet; but in the
case supposed by the Standard, that might happen without
great inconvenience ; and under any state of things short
of an actual blockade of the island there would be no dif-
ficulty in procuring as much corn a 3 we pleased. Lastly, the
Standard says—a' The sentence which our Contemporary
quotes from Lord Grenville is a remarkable sample of that
species of empty eloquence which grew into fashion among
the followers and admirers of Mr. Pitt—the imitators employ-
ing, as it were, the shells of the sonorous sentences of their
great model, without a particle of their substance. 'at con-
he the consumer of corn to the produce of his own country is
to refuse to ourselves the benefit of that provision which Pro-
vidence itself has made for equalizing to man the varia-
tions of climates and of seasons.' Such propositions are
false if they cannot be generalized,--that is, if the
suppressed premises be not capable of universal appli.
cation. In this case the suppressed premise is, that we ought
not in any case to refuse • the benefit of that provision which
Providence itself has made for equalizing to man the varia-
tions of climates and of seasons.' Now, ap;lly this to menu-
factut er, and you must extinguish all protecting duties_apply
it to commerce, and what becomes of your navigation acts—
apply it to national defence, and your armies must be filled by
foreign mercenaries, your navy manned by Swedes, Portu-
guese, Negroes, and Lascars. Such is the value of Lord
Grenville's well-roundod dictum." The dill Ile of our Contem-
porary to Lord Grenville and other followers and admirers of
Mr. Pitt (which we are at a loss to understand) appears to
have rendered him less logical than usual here. We deny
that there is in the passage from Lord Grenville's pen any such
suppressed premise as that " we ought not in any case to re-
fuse the benefit of that provision which Providence itself has
made for equalizing to man the variations of climates and
seasons." A distinguished essayist has said—" The happiest
climate does riot produce all things ; and it was so ordered that
one part of the earth should want the product of another for
uniting mankind in a general correspondence and good under-
standing.' Will our Contemporary be so good as to tell us
what is the suppressed premise in this sentence ; and whether,
when we are told "to take the goods the Gods provide us,"
we must turn a deaf ear to the advice, unless we can at all
times take all the goods the Gods provide us? As to our ex-
tinguishing "all protecting duties," that is precisely what
we desire for protection in such cases means injustice,
—it is the taking from one class to give to another
class : but by our Contemporary's leave we will keep
our own soldiers and sailors until we can employ our population
more profitably in other occupations. We can produce men
as easily as Sweden, Portugal, &c., and we shall be able to
feed and clothe them better when the Corn-laws are removed.
We have left ourselves neither time nor space to attempt an
answer to the Standard's question, " What is to become of