The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-02 00:00:00

prosperity; and I cannot help thinking that if we did di-
minish the agricultural prosperity of this country—if we
did disturb the application of capital to land, so far from
increasing the demand for our manufactures, we might
be affecting the home trade, and only adding to the pri-
vations and sufferings of those who live by manufactur-
ing labour.—(Near, hear.) It is by a careful considera-
tion of those causes that I have come to the conclusion
that we are not so called on, and that I do think it of
such immense importance that we should make our-
selves, as far as we can consistently with the mainte-
nance of a moderate price, independent of foreign
supply.—(Cheers.) It is on this account, seeing how
rapidly the skill in agriculture had increased ; seeing
that, according to the admission of Mr. 31`Culloch, that
prices are falling, and yet that we have been enabled to
support 7,000,000 of people by our own produce more
than we supported twenty years ago, that I am induced
to come with him to the conclusion that a prudent states-
man would pause before he disturbed the principle of the
existing Corn-law—that Corn-law which, when you have
abundance at home, excludes foreign corn from competi-
tion; but which, when prices rise, admits foreign corn
witout a duty.—(Cheers.) I say that system was a
manifest advantage over the other, because I do not be-
lieve it would be possible, when corn did rise to a height
which would-subject the people of this country to great
privations, to continue to levy the duty of Bs. on foreign
corn.

From Sir ROBERT PEEL, then, the suffering
and starving workmen, and the decaying manu-
facturers, have nothing whatever to hope. He is
thoroughly convinced that their distress is only
temporary, and that the Corn-laws, so far from
having any part in causing it, have encouraged
the application of capital to land, and laid the
foundations of our national prosperity. It is not
in our power to point out exactly the desires
which have suggested to the Right Hon. Baro-
net's mind so many arguments in favour of the
present system ; but we are at liberty to conjec-
ture that his wishes to be at.the head of the
county gentlemen, and to preserve his right to a
share of:the bread-tax, which he or his father
Wright, wheft they bought Drayton Manor,
have I?eeh the prolific parents of more delusive
arguments than we have supposed it possible
even fot the brains of Sir ROBERT PEEL to
furnish.

The country, says Sir ROBERT, in great ex-
ultation, seizing hold of Mr. M'CuLLocu's
statement, has grown food under the protec-
tive system for seven millions more persons,
since 1820, than before existed. Seven mil-
lions is about one-fourth of the whole popu-
lation, from which it follows that since 1820
the productions of agriculture have increased
one-fourth under the protective system. But
what, in the same period, has been the increase
of manufacturing productions, which not only
have not had the advantage of any protective
system, but have been obliged, by the tax on
corn, to contribute to the prosperity of agricul-
turists? Why, Sir ROBERT PEEL in the same
speech, and we will not go beyond it to find mate-
rials to expose its fallacies, showed that in the ten
years only, between 1830 and 1840, our exports
had increased from 38,000,0001. to 53,000,0001.
or more than one-third, and that in the same
periods our imports had increased from
46,000,000/. to 62,000,0001., or more than one-
fourth. But these are only indications of the
vast increase of our manufacturing wealth. The
agriculturists have, throughout the period, re-
ceived an ample reward for all their productions.
If we were to say, therefore, that while the pro-
ductions of protected agriculture have increased
one-fourth since 1820, the productions of unpro-
tected and even oppressed manufacture have in-
creased four-fold, we should not be far wide of
the mark. It is clear, therefore, that the pro-
tection cannot be the cause of the increase, for
it has been greater in that branch of industry
which has been unprotected.

In the paragraph, too, quoted from Mr. MACUL-.
LOCH, it is asserted that the increased produc-
tions of agriculture have taken place with falling
prices,
,while the intention of the law was to
keep the prices from falling. The mode, there-
fore, in which the Legislature intended the law
to operate, and encourage the application of ca-
pital to land, was never realised. It is well known
that between 182'2 and 1828 the price of corn
never reached the price at which importation
was allowed ; so that the views of the Legislature
were completely falsified. If the protection af-
forded to agriculture has been, as supposed by
Sir ROBERT PEEL, the cause of the national
prosperity, it is clear that' the Legislature did
good by mistake, for it meant, to the year
1828, to keep the price of wheat up to 80s., while
in fact it fell to below 60s.

The plain explanation of all this-increase, both
in manufactures and agriculture, is that there is
in human nature an irrepressible spring'pf pros-
perity. Mankind have a tendency to increase,
and each generation strives to improve on the
condition of its predecessor. Hence a continual
extension of arts and a continual increase of
wealth. Government, and so-called protective
laws, cannot wholly dry up this spring, but they
can do nothing to make it flow with increased
force beyond securing to each man the enjoy-
ment of his own property. This natural spring of
prosperity has overflowed the land with an inge-
nious, industrious population, who, both by their
wants and their produce, have stimulated the appli-
cation of capital to land, of which the result is the
increase of one-fourth of our agricultural produc-
tions. The Corn-law, which takes away the
property of the industrious manufacturer and the
industrious consumer, to give something more to
the idle owner of rent, has had no more to do
with increasing the prosperity it has been unable
to destroy than the basket and the ballast at-
tached to a balloon have to do with raising it in
the atmosphere. The power within it enables
it to carry them aloft, but they impede its
flight.
Unless protection and no protection have the
same effects—unless high price stimulates the
increase of agricultural production, and
low price stimulates the increase of ma-
nufacturing production—unless a law which
has only operated by mistake has caused
national prosperity—unless legislation can mul-
tiply the people and extend arts and knowledge,
Sir R. PEEL has made out no case for the Corn-
laws, by merely showing that, in conjunction
with them, there has been an increase of the
national wealth. Since 1820, the increase of crime,
according to the statistical returns, has been
greater than the increase of the people; and it
is far more rational, though Sir R. PEEL
will not
accept that as a consequence of his protective
system, to ascribe the increase of crime, than
the increase of
people and of produce, to a law
the very essence of
in order to enrich the
eisidlteo. rob the indus-
trious

Since the commencement of
shoutstot of the Tory
faction on the progress of th
the week we have
been quite stunned with
the
generalmad
thjoy, a
election
.
e
They seem to be absolutelyton •
sorry should we be to disturb their hilarity (fornd
they have been in a state of starvation for the
last eleven years, and deserve pity rather than
reproach); but for their own sakes, as well as for
the interest of the great body of the people, it
may be proper to ask, what cause they have for
rejoicing? All that they .have gained in the
great metropolitan boroughs is only one Member.
Capt. Rous succeeded in Westminster entirely
from the apathy of the electors towards their
Members in the last Parliament; the race in the
City, notwithstanding all the powerful interests
arrayed against the Liberal candidates, was a
dead heat; in Greenwich and Marylebone the
Tories have been shamefully defeated; in Fins-
bury neither Saint TooxE, nor any other of his
tribe, durst face the heathens DUNCOMBE and
WAKLEY ; and in the Tower Hamlets, though
three candidates (foolishly, we must say) divided
the Liberal interest in favour of the rejected
of Worcester, ROBINSON had more than
2,000 voters fewer than Fox. Are these causes
for rejoicing? We have the returns already of
between 200 and 300 Members, and our Evening
Tory Contemporary, who boasted that Sir Ro-
BERT PEEL, in 1835, would have carried the
Speakership and the Address but for the melan-
choly accident which befel some of his sup-
porters who were " snowed up," and never
were heard of, only claims ten of a majority at
present, intentionally, as usual, falsifying the re-