The Sun.
London, England, 1849-07-03 00:00:00

authority of a professor of political economy, a gentleman
who, holding a high official situation, and possessing very
great ability and a very schooled intellect, has been
allowed to generalize upon a greater quantity of data
connected with rural life than any other gentleman living.
I allude to the Tithe Commissioner, Professor Jones. He is
a high authority, and I do not know that this question
has ever been put with greater neatness and felicity than in
his work upon rent. He there lays it down, that what are
called the "agricultural classes," after reserving from their
produce all that is necessary for their own consumption, have
left for barter with the non-agricultural classes of the coun-
try a sum equivalent to 100,000,0001. sterling. I should
think that is not an exaggerated estimate, for it is much
under many popular estimates. Professor Jones then says,
that in times of what are called "agricultural distress," at
periods when the farmers are scared with losses, it is a very
easy, a very common, and an almost imperceptible thing
for them to diminish their cost of production by diminishing
the quantity of labour employed, so as to reduce their cost
efacoduction 25 per cent. ; and, as he observes, the natural
consequence in a short time is, that their production is also
reduced in value to the same amount, and they have then to
bring into the market to barter with the non-agriculturists
only 75,000,0001. instead of 100,000,000/. Now, if that be
a correct description of Professor Jones, let us view the pre-
sent state of the agricultural classes of the country with the
light of his intelligence, and see what must be the effect
upon the social state of what is called the agricul ural in-
terest. It appears from the reports of the Poor Law Cout-
missioners that the average price of wheat for the last 10
A, .
y m
ears is something under 695. a quarter-1 think 595,
7t appears from the latest return I have seen that I e
thel
average price of wheat in England at the present moments
445. 61 ob-
serve, being a reduction of 26 per cent, Now, let me
that we are always well supplied with statistics as to
our foreign trade. We can, with attention, research, and
study, form generally a very accurate idea as to the circuit
ofour commerce; but we have no details whatever—no
statistics—as to our home trade. ( Hear, hear.) It is,
therefore, only in such calculations as I am referring to that
we have anything to guide use Professor Jones, then, cal-
culates upon a reduction in produce of 25 per cent.—there
being only 75,000,0001. instead of 100,000,000/., sent into the
market for barter between the agricultural and the non-
agricultural classes. I have shown you that there is at this
moment a depreciation of 26 per cent. in the value of agricul-
tural produce. Well, what is taking place in England?
Why that diminution of the home market of which we have
heard so much ' • the withdrawal or disappearance of
5,000,0001. sterling, one-half the amount of your foreign
trade, which under ordinary circumstances would have been
circulating in the country.—(Hear, hear.) It is this which
has already paralyzed the agricultural towns of this country
—ay, more than that, which has been loading this great and
wealthy metropolis with embarrassment and ruin.—
(Hear, hear.) That is the second great cause to
which I attribute this deterioration in the condition of the
people of England,—which has diminished the means of ern-
ployment of the great mass of the labouring population at a
fair rate of profitable wages, and which has made the
amount of ablebedied paupers in this country increase be-
tween 1846 and the present time 74 per cent. What conso-
lation have we under this depreciation in price—under this
diminution of our home market? I am not going to offer you
any argument of my own ; but I wish to refer to an authen-
tic table which I trust Hon. Gentlemen opposite may deem
worthy of their notice. I have before me a table prepared
by the Poor Law Commissioners, showing the prices of
wheat in the seven years in which it was highest, and the
seven years in which it was lowest in England, and it ap-
pears from that return that a larger amount was expended
in the support of the poor in the seven years when wheat
was lowest than when it was highest by upwards of
200,000/.—( Hear, hear.) Nor must it be forgotten, as the
Commissioners remark, that the sum of money expended
when provisions were lowest represents a much larger
amount of relief afforded to the poor than when prices were
high.—( Hear, hear.) The year in which the price of wheat
was highest were 1839, 1840, 1841, 1848, 1842, 1847, and
1838 ; and the years when the price was lowest were 1836,
1835, 1845, 1844, 1837, 1846, and 1843. I have shown you the
effect the diminution of your foreign trade has had upon the
people, and the little hope you have of increasing the profits
of that trade. I will now show you what effect has been pro-
duced upon the condition of the people by the fall in your
home market. The Poor-law Commissioners in their report
for 1848 attribute the increase of pauperism to manufactur-
ing' depression and to emigration into England from Ire-
land. Now why, I ask, has
there been emigration from Ire-
land to England? Has it been the consequence of that par-
tial.famine of which we have heard so much, or is it not
rather the result of the policy which the Government as-
sumed in conseque• ce of that famine ?—(Hear, hear.) What
Was
the position of the Government with respect to Ireland
when the hapless state of that country was placed before
tic, Ish eyms i
c?iaTn he patient was in a state of exhaustion, and the
had recourse to a system of depletion.—(A laugh.)
Instead of stemulating.the industry of the country by the
sanction of the State instead of grappling with the question
theof emigration, which was then singularly
insiiiingiustlearrlyaoppooorrtlraew—aslol
Government did
icileg„enediously exhaustive in its character that it has suc-
ceeded in resolving society there into its original
elements.— (Hear, hear.) They called upon the proprietors
of
sacrifices, while only a short time
before they had deprived
the property of Ireland of the sin est market for its produce.
---(Hear.) I say that it was the duty of the Government,
in. consequence of the state of Ireland, to have encountered
the question of emigration. I say so, because as statesmen
they ought to have known it was impossible to evade that
question; that it must arise, whatever might be the opinion
of the Cabinet. And what has happened in Ireland? The
question has arisen, but instead of a Government emigra-
tion, you have had a spontaneous emigration. Instead of
an emigration which, by the aid of the State, would have
sent a great portion of paupers to a rich land, which they
might have cultivated, eou have had a spontaneous emi-
gration of those who left their country because they were
determined to save what they possessed.—(Hear, hear.)
Three years ago Ireland was like a poor man struggling
against entering the workhouse. It is now a content pauper.
Its demoralization is complete, and the very individual
who three years ago would have accepted a very little aid
to •proceed to Canada er to Australia now looks upon him-
self for life as the recipient of a Government dole, and has
lost all that self-reliance which it has been avowedly the
object of our legislation to create. Why, then, has there
been this emigration from Ireland? In my opinion it has
been owing to the inconsistent and feeble policy of her Ma-
jesty's Ministers.—(Hear, hear.) That is the third reason
why the pauperism of England has increased—why there
has been a deterioration in the state of this nation. I have
sketched, with more brevity than so solemn a subject re-
cjuired, the internal condition of the country as regards its
loreign trade, its agricultural condition, and the state of
I.wreland ; but when your foreign commerce was declining,
Ireland hen ur agricultural interest was severely injured, when
was so misgoverned that she was pouring her paupers
into Liverpool like some wild nation that appeared at the
fall of the Homan empire, are you surprised at the conse-
quences that have occurred? But let me ask what has been
the conduct of the Ministers amid all these wide-spread cala-
mities and ulmost universal suffering? What has been their
conduct in she management of their finances? Did they
prepare for the coining storm ? They were left with a
well-tilled Exechequer. Taey supplied Ireland by loans, and
therefore that was not a reascn why the Exchequer should
be emptied. They met Parliament only a year ago in the
midst of all those European convulsions of which we have
heard so much, in the midst of the consequences of those
rash commercial speculations which they stimulated by their
legislation, in the midst of the disasters of Ireland, and did
they then come forward with any proposition at all conso-
nant with our depressed and embarrassed state? Increased
expenditure was the• proposition placed before the House,
and, strange to say, increased taxation was the remedy. No
Hon. Gentleman can have forgotten the financial campaigns
of last year. The Hon. Member for Montrose (Mr. Hume),
who has given notice of au amendment for to-night, be-
longs to the school which prophecies the increased prosperity
of England. He is the leader of those prophets of statis-
tical celebrity who foretell the future renovation of the
country.--(Hear, hear, and laughter.) It is he who told
us, independently of the great profits we were to receive
from the enlarged markets of the world that were to be
opened to us, we were to acquire by sober domestic economy
at least 2,000,000/. a week by the repeal of the corn-laws.
Why, Sir, the Hon. Gentleman ought to be ashamed
of himself—(Laughter)—to come forward with his petty
savings, his cheese-paring policy, after the visions of El Do-
rado in which he then indulged. I have not got the Hon.
Member's amendment in my hands at the present moment;
buti its very language is a verdict against the system which
he
s supporting.—(Hear, hear.) How does the Hon. Mem-
ber describe those great changes of which he is the ardent
ssutpetorter, and which were to accomplish such vast and in •
aneous benefit? Why, he says that he once thought
thatn they had a tendency in his opinion—dropping the delu-
'girace%th gentleness, and parting from his errors with that
(Laughlteramiability which always characterizes him—
he thinks)—to improve the country ; but at the same time
financial reform a safer Bard than any further
,expe.riments in what he calls free trade.—(Hear, hear, and
'augnter.) N
men who (Y.,we are told by those Honourable Gentle-
that we mast Promised unbounded prosperity from that system
forsooth, because we do not support them in their plans.
courage us Joefoseen of their schemes certainly does not en-
they had
succeeded
their example —(Hear, hear)—and if
in their former measures we might have
vtitietweld tphreoitutresent propositions with more favour.—( Hear.)
Gentlemen on thaif Finst my
lion. Friend opposite holding
nch up as the advocates of extravagant
expenditure;n for I e
agree with my lamented friend Lord il.
Bek in the statement he made to the House of Com-
mons, that if the
adopting, he sh ly persisted in the measures they were
diture to the amount of
on d support a reduction in all public expen-
Let this amount twenty-five per cent.—(Hear, hear.)
is House and those out of the House decide on persist•
ing in those eche
merel raes, and I shall support that reduction, not
(Cheers.) I matter of duty but as a matter of necessity.—
succeeded. ya: rlot acknowledge that your schemes have
such I hay,brought them forward as experiments; as
analyzed and criticised them ; and as experi-
ments onlYacycoeutvindicate them and defend them. I will not
agree to
are called
ac
ecionin them as what, to use the slang of the day,
great body of thefacts;firmlyjoin people will ultimately repudiate them.—
Islent until the
. is precipit t d
• doom of t • in your plans of retrench-
it. his great country is sealed—until
change _ a e into that course which would
rate a first-rat
. state
the rePublie,_( H e monarchy into a second-
ear, hear.) let ow I have examined
second-
inter
°I the nation as regards free trade, its agricultural
eaed
on state of Ireland, the of the policy pro-
f spirit
and the by the Govern
teynehenslif the ernpiTe
Ana conduct , Government with regard to that country,
hey thle Government with regard to the
into a lu_hlherited vf • have shown that the surplus which
nen. -le..lacieney
of aanverted, under their management,
by the iennttleizen that similar amount; and I need not remind
tration ufetrliarenee
of
the deficiency was only terminated
state of our ceolocintry, (Ruse of Commons in the adminis-
colonial relation Mes? ~,„.1-:-tear, hear.) What, too, 13 the
a measure since _ a since 17,6 change has taken place in our
gul e, betore the * ? The Government introduced
ate the ind Y were
re-
the e
se astry of our well warm in their seats to
authti°rrilt, consequence of that seefiar colonies. What has been
colunic_,Y—one well acquaintsure, according to the highest
d •
With flea" who for fort with the labour of those
tine a sacred cause f y years, has connected himself
_ strone free o alltl.Blav
According t' trader mean
tey, being at the same
prejudice,
but his his
opinion_ Sir Stephen Lushington ?
mittee of ut. contained • not an old oue—not a musty
found in this Rouse in evidence given before a Com-
the but a few days aeo, and to be
accordifirst
with ing to his • report of the Slaver' Committee
respect to opinion the Y '
our coloni the „war
Str 0. es•—He fiear•dutieshas
given the deathblow to
twined greythewith re,pect*? What, too, is the language of
Planters of e blue-book just the he goveins, con-
of
hodarnaica have befbarrived? He says that the
measurelesstof ruin
rethem the blank prospect
10e Sir s• Luse
Government hear.) Thus the first great
8 to the al Ington, of givinuas had the effect, according
Sus
of slave trade; ; and ft the greatest possible stimu-
live couutry 'eS at this in appears before us that the
•,e.,,.a50 carried on exactly theclinent exported from their na-
st se are signior,: all the nersiaomnse as when the slave trade
‘,l4l;t:laulus of the
8...nt factsthe ruinf Europe.—( Hear, hear.)
ich tha p. lIKVe trade 11 of your colonies and the
-°P le of E *"-- ear h
nalsaid prep) Is that a policy
lug red to sanction, or