The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-04 00:00:00

and out of these only forty or fifty were successful.
Such a system must entail great expense ; and yet,
after having uodergana that expense, other parties
might step in and ava:l themselves of their labours, by
fattening on any pattern which they might think likely
to be successful ; and a1..1 that without having incurred
the slightest risk. Those competitors might afterwards
come and endeaiour to outbid them in the m aket.
But that was not the whole case. The copyist tti:gbt
bring the design into discredit by presenting it in an in-
ferior form, and on inferior goods.—(Hear, hear.) That
had exactly the same effect on the original design as
the mawkish imitations of Byron and of Scott had on
the works of those writers. It tended to disgust the
public with the original productions. France had ad-
vantages which this country had not, and that might,
combined with an extended copyright, give them further
advantages still ; but if they exposed the original
designers to such gross injustice as that which had been
pointed out, might not, he would ask, its continuance
be a great impediment to the improvement and the ad-
vancement of the arts of design ? They withheld en-
couragement to ability and skill when they permitted
parties to take advantage of that skill and ability, end
to enter into competition with it. By granting as ex-
tended copyright, however, he did not think they
would be interfering with free competition. What he
would say was, let them have free competition—
permit the competitor to produce a design
equal to that with which he is competing,
but great injustice would be done to the original de-
signer, if he was left exposed as he was by the present
law. He should vote for the second reading of the Bi 1,
but at the same time he could not disguise from himself
the effect it might have upon manufacturers in this
country. He should not hold his opinions conclusive
upon the extent of the protection that ought to be
given ; but what he should discuss was the question,
that if there was to be a copyright, it should be effica-
cious. To make it so, he thought the time should be
extended, but the extension of that time was a matter
of too much importance to be discussed then. Care
should be taken that that time should not be too long,
because if it were it might prejudice the British manu-
facturer. He thought, however, that the giving of time
merely for the purpose of making experiments, would
be open to great objection. Ho thought that they
should make up their minds as to the extent of the
time to which the term should be prolonged.
Mr. WARBURTON would vote for the second
reading of the 13,11, because he agreed with the Right
Hon. Baronet in the reasonableness of the end pro-
posed—namely, to give reward to the inventor, and at
the same time to protect the manufacturer. When
they came to consider the details of that Bill, two
great difficulties would arise. One Lad been already

pointed out, natnely, the great litigation which it would
cause. By not proposing a cheap mode of trying the
issue they lost the object for which the patent was
granted, for the wealthy manufacturer would be able to
tyrannise over the smaller ; the litter would in a general
way be compelled to withdraw from the contest. lc
therefore, they did not provide a cheap and expedi•
tious Court before which the parties could go, they
really did nothing ; and unless he saw such a remedy
provided, he should oppose the Bill of the Hon. Gen-
tleman in all its stages. But another difficulty arose
out of the very nature of the subject to be protected.
This manufacture had existed and been growing for
the last forty or fifty years. In the case of chemical
or mechanical inventions, they had records of all the
originals from time immemorial. But, in the preseat
case, no such records existed. They ought, therefore,
to begin by giving one or two years, to enable parties to
register a.I patterns existing, or invented in past time,
in order to ascertain whether any pa-ticular pattern
was or was not original. The case was t'IC same as if
they were then, for the first time, seeking to establish
patents for chemical and mechanical inventions, without
having any record of what had been done in past time.
The greatest difficulty, therefore, in the present case,
arose out of the subject to which it was proposed to give
patent rights. They had no record of the inventions
for the last forty or fifty years. How then was the
Maim of the alleged inventor to be established ?
( Hear, hear.) There should be a record to which the
Judges could refer in case of dispute. But there was
yet another difficulty arising out of this Bill. Whiht it
prohibited English manufacturers in this country front
copying a foreign, there was nothing to prohibit a
foreign manufacturer from copying an English patent.
—( Hear, hear.) 1 t appeared to him (Mr.Warburton)
indispensable, in order to carry out the principle, that
there should. be an international copyright.—(Hear,
near.) He would, on another occasion, examine sepa-
rately the clauses of the Right Hon. Gentleman's Bill,
but it appeared to him that the difficultie3 which he hat
stated deserved the serious consideration of the House.
The Right Hon. Baronet stated that the principle had
peen already conceded, and, therefore, that they ought
not to resist coins into Committee. He (Mr. WO
did not resist their going into Committee, but he should
not admit the force of the Right Hon. Baronet's argu-
meets, because he had in the next sentence admitted
that the present measure was wholly inoperative.
Lord F. EGE RTON thought the details of the mea-
sure could be much better discussed in Comrnittae, but
he would make one observation on a remark of the
Hon. Member for Mancheste7, who stated that Scot-
land and Ireland were in favour of the measure, while
Lancashire, according to the inference he drew, was
opposed to it. Now, it appeared to him that a majo-
rity of the respectable manufacturers of Manchester
and other districts of Lancashire were in favour of
some protection to that department of their trade.
Mr. GREG explained.

Mr. L ABOUC HERE said it w.ts itnpos3ib:e to re id
the evidence that had been taken before the Committee
on the subject without coming to the conclusion that
great injustice was done to those parties
who had invested their capital and energies
in the invention of new designs, from the
absence of all protection. He th,,uglit it
was the duty of the Government to aff.rd both
protection and encouragement to those parties, by the
establishment of Schools of Design, and by Legisittive
protection.—(He ir, hear.) On these grounds he
thought a case had been made out for extlndlng the
period of protection for the Copyright of Designs ; at the
same time he saw many inconveniences and difficulties
which such a step would be likely to create. He made
especially a reference to their export trade. It was ad-
mitted that great diversity of opinion existed on the
subject among the manufacturers of Manchester.
Such being the case, they were naturally fearful of
going too far, and he thought it would be better that
the House should rather err upon the safe side. He
therefore was very unwilling to extend the period of
copyright beyond six months.—(Chrers.) He was
willing that the Bill should go into Committee, and
there he had no doubt it would be found that its ma-
chinery might easily be put into play. He holm 1 in
the Committee that his Right Hon. Prield would be
able to convince the House that six months would be
the prope- period.

Mr. HUME was much astonished to hear the Right
Hon. Gentleman talk in language which he had thought
exploded—he did not expect tbat he would again hear
any one in that House talk of Government protecting
trade and the exports of the country. It was natural
that the French should beat us, for their people were
used from their infancy to the study of pictures and
statues, while our population were refused admission
into 'Westminster Abbey or the Royal Academy with-
out putting their hand into their pockets ; the poor
could not do this, and the consequence was they were
shut out from all chance of improving their . taste.
Should we then complain of our inferiority in producing
designs for those fabrics when ne shut out from ail
means of improving their taste the middle as well as
the lower classes of the community ? We were looking
to a remedy from the wrong quarter. Every time it had
been attempted to foster manufactures by protection, that
attempt failed more or less. The system of protection or
monopoly never was attended with soy successful result.
He particularly remembered one thee which struck him
as remarkable. An Act of Parliament had been passed
to encourage the use of buckles, a-md in less thaw five
badTrad
Years after the passing of that Act the use of buckles
el t ohgaed rightly
t be re ased.
stated
tThehat
it Presidentwasqnaonft
itthye
more
ertdh
than
anything else which extended our calico trade, and
that arose from
thecircumstance of the three months'
that our manufactures a deadacturcs
l prospered protection beinn.
letter. It was on that account
a intendedte to
taonexistd from the pe-
riod at which it w
as they had. If a reala Prot to so great an extent
site
hesitation
.calieo
atthwen in
e
manufactures, he (Mr. Hume) had n
saying that we never would have commanded
tensive foreign trade which we now possessed. Ile-
could not understand the distinction which had been
drawn by the Hon. Gentleman (Mr. Warburton) be-
tween copyright in books and copyright in pasterns.
He (Mr. Hume) would entreat the House, before they
decided hastily on the matter, to attend to the argu.
ments advanced on the subject by the Hon. Member
for Manchester. Every fact stated by the Hon. Mem.
her went to show the pernicious tendency of the BEll
now sought to be raised. He (Mr. Hume) would op-
pose the second reading of the Bill ; and he trusted the
llousT would not retrace the steps it had been so lately
taking of doing away with monopoly and patronage, by
now sanctioning so great an absurdity as an attempt to
improve manufactures by a system of protection. 1-1 e
agreed with his Hon. Friend ( Mr. Warburton) that the
details could never be carried out, and on that ground
he would vote against the second reading of the Bill.
Mr. E WART said he believed that in the Commit•
tee the copyright was agreed to by only a majority of
one.—(No, no.)
• •

Mr. E. TENNENT bad been appealed to, and he
could assure the Hon. Member that the decision was
come to by a majority of six to three.
Mr. EWA RT believed that the real principle was
decided by the casting vote of the Chairman. He was
opposed to the Bill, because he feared that if it became
the law 01 the land they would shut themselves out
from being the great suppliers of the wort'. He thought
national taste was only to be improved by education,
and a free entrance into places where works of art were
exhibited. He was of opinion that the whole subject
should be gone into, and that they should not legislate