The Sun.
London, England, 1841-11-11 00:00:00

wages, we must add a word or two on the means
of limiting the distress caused by a change in
employment consequent on a change of ma-
chinery. That distress we must, however,
remark, must at all times be much in-
creased by any and every law which limits
the supply of the means of subsistence,
and overstocks every employment with hands or
candidates. The displaced people can, under
those circumstances, find no other employment.
and the low conditiori to which the body of the
labourers are reduced and kept, allows them no
time to turn round, or to deliberate, or to learn a
new occupation. They must at once find another
employment, or the, extreme poverty, which is
the rule of their lives in a community in which
the land is all appropriated, and the power of
making laws is in the hands of the landlords,
crushes them with an iron necessity, and makes the
change which might not otherwise be injurious,
utterly ruinous. The postmasters, for example,
who have been displaced by the use of railroads,
are injured people; perhaps their place in the
scale of society is lowered, but they are not
ruined and starved. Their sufferings, though
great, are trifling compared to those of the
handloom-weavers, who are starved outright.
Thus the general pressure of the population on
a limited supply of the means of subsistence, the
result of Corn-laws, makes the changes which
are brought about by invention and improve-
ment utterly disa»troua to those whom the inven-
tions displace.

The fact that such changes do cause great dis-
tress, has been known for upwards of 200 years,
when the copyists at Paris, and other places, re-
sisted the introduction of printing, because it
deprived them of work; but no Legislature has
thought of providing a remedy. Were a land-
lord aggrieved by a railroad being made through
his property—were a clergyman exposed to a
small diminution of income by ceasing to bury
people in his monopoly of consecrated ground—
were a place abolished as useless, the Legislature
would take care to provide compensation for place-
holder, priest, and landowner; but when a
great body of handloom-weavers or buckle-
makers are thrown out of employment, by
a change of fashion or improvement in ma-
chinery, those who had monopolised the land and
had the power of making laws, told them to trust
to themselves, and refused them any relief. The
same principle ought to have been followed both
for landowner and labourer, and the invention
which took away the employment of the one,
should have been made to provide him compen-
sation, as it was made to provide compensation
for the land it took from the other. So much
consideration, however, for the landowners' slaves
was not to be expected, and all kinds of artisans
have been left to struggle against such changes
as they could, while they were loaded with the
landowners' heavy shackles. A Legislature in
which their interests were represented would
probably empower a Judge or appoint a Commis-
sion to give, upon a fair view of the case, a rea-
sonable compensation to all those who might be
injured by successive social improvements.
They benefit the whole community through
all time; their authors only get a small share of
the general advantages, and therefore the in-
surance or compensation, or whatever it might
be called, if any were necessary, when all
trades and occupations were free, should be
paid by the whole community. It could better
afford to give 1,000,0001. to the hand-loom wea-
vers than 10,0001. a year to the heir of a Lord
Chief Justice of the King's Bench. The ter-
rible manner,, however, in which the law-making
landlords have wholly neglected to provide for
the evils which fall on the industrial part of the
community, must convince every man that on this
very useful and important part of economic le-
gislation, nothing good can be anticipated from
our present Legislature.

We believe there is not a man in this wide
empire who has ever considered the question of
municipal government but is firmly convinced
that about one-half of the revenues of the city of
London would suffice, if properly husbanded,
for the municipal expenses of the entire metro-
polis. The corporation is renowned, time out of
mind, for guzzling and corruption. A part of its
income at present, out of which it provides civic
feasts, and makes presents to ♦ery worthless
statesmen, is derived from a heavy tax on coals,
which falls with great severity on the poor. All
the shivering wretches of the metropolis are
mulcted of firing that the civic functionaries may
make their pasteboard shows, and feast on turtle.
To old civic hospitality, provided by the contri-
butions of the Aldermen and Mayor, out of their
own wealth, we make no objection ; but hospi-
tality paid for by a tax on the fuel of the inhabi-
tants is an offence against policy and morals.
Such, however, is not the opinion of Lord Chan-
cellor LYNDHURST, who is reported to have said
at the LORD MAYOR'S dinner—

I witness with pleasure your ancient ceremonies ; I
rejoice to see you surrounded by your own insignia ;
above all, I rejoice to see that you still continue to pos-
sess that extensive property which you have always so
liberally and so bountifully administered.—(Cheers.) I
further rejoice that you still retain those important privi-
leges, the claim to which we have this day recorded in
Westminster Hall--privileges which you have upon so
many occasions used for the advancement and support of
the great principles of our Constitution.—(Loud cheers,)
There was a period when, indeed, I despaired of these
things ; but tE e storm has blown over, and you have sur-
vived its effects.

A more open and undisguised defence of cor-
ruption was never made. It tells us, that as
long as Lord LYNDHURST is Chancellor there
shall be no reform of the corporation of London,
The people freeze that Aldermen may guzzle;
and the LORD CHANCELLOR praises this as boun-
tifully administering property. That is a speci-
men of Tory morality. When such are the
sentiments of the keeper of the conscience of
the State, what can the nation expect from a
Tory A dmin;stration ? The corporation of London
needs reform as much as did the corporation of
Dublin ; but the Ministers, whose duty it is to
effect it, rejoice that all its abuses have escaped,
to keep a Tory Administration in countenance,
and giye it strength. The LORD HIGH CHAN-
CELLOR avows his partiality for oppression and
injustice.

The Commission issued by the direction of Sir
ROBERT PEEL, to inquire concerning the conso-
lidation of the revenue offices, is now published
and runs thus :

WHITEHALL, Nov. 9.—Her Majesty has been pleased
to appoint the Right Hon Granville Charles Henry
Somerset, (commonly called Lord Granville Charles
Henry Somerset), the Right Hon. William Ewart Glad-
stone, William Bingham Baring, Esq. (commonly called
the Hon. William Bingham Baring), James Milnes Gas-
hell, Esq., and Alexander Pringle, Esq., to be her Ma-
jesty's Commissioners for conducting and inquiry into
the details of the establishments of the several depart-
ments of Customs, Excise, and Stamps and Taxes, with
a view of ascertaining whether the existing establish-
ments :we more than adequate to the efficient discharge
of their several duties, and whether arrangements can be
safely made, consistently with the due collection of the
revenue, for diminishing the expense of them, and to re-
lieve the trade and commerce of the country from any
inconvenient delay.

So far as this goes, it deserves praise; but it is
something like inquiring how a gentleman's es-
tablishment can be reduced when his house is
on fire. The people complain, not the mer-
chants, (for they are as yet comparatively well
off); and the Tories propose to give relief, not to
the people, but the merchants. They chiefly
will be benefited by the " trade and commerce
of the country being relieved from inconvenient
delay." They will rejoice in greater facilities
for dispatching business at the Custom-house.
We do not grudge them all the convenience
they can receive : we say, in fact, that every ob-
stacle put in the way of transacting their busi-
ness, which is not indispensible for the collec-
tion of the revenue, ought to be removed. The
revenue, in truth, is collected to protect com-
merce as well as other portions of industry, and
when collecting it injures commerce, its purpose
is lost sight of.
At the same time, considering how much the
mercantile classes in London, Liverpool, and
other places have stood aloof from the anti-
bread tax agitation, how little they have done to
aid the bulk of the people in procuring redress,