The Sun.
London, England, 1841-09-30 00:00:00

THE CORN LAWS
AND COMMERCIAL REFORM.

PUBLIC MEETING AT LEEDS.

A public meeting of the inhabitants of Leeds, con
vened by William Smith, Esq.,. Mayor, on the presanta.
Lion of a numerously and respectably signed requisition,
including the names of the leading merchants, nr.nufac-
turers and tradesmen of the town, was held in tlia Cloth-
on Monday last, for the purpose of forward.
ing a loyal and dutiful address to the Queen, praying her
Majesty not to prorogue Parliament until the laws re-
stricting the trade in human food shall have undergone
full consideration ; and also to petition Parliament for
the total repeal of those laws.-- Upwards of 5,000 per-
sons were present, and, with the exception of some slight
opposition by the Chartists, a snore orderly and attentive
meeting was never held in Leeds.
Mr. Alderman JOHN GOODMAN was elected Chairman
of the meeting.
HAMER STANSFIELD, Esq., came forward to move the
first resolution, and was received with loud and repeated
cheers. He said, remember the great struggle at issue
is between these two classes-4ietween the producers of
wealth and the landed poseessors of it. The producer
wishes to have the fair value of his labour, that he may
live. The fowls of the air, the fishes of the sea, and the wild
beasts of the forest can all provide for themselves; so also
can man in a savage state, and why not man in a civi-
lized state ? Does civilization necessarily bring along
with it starvation ? Impossible. The cause, then, is
not in civilization, but in those barbarous laws which
would disgrace even the savage state. The landed pro-
prietors of wealth are getting more than the fair value
cif their property, by an unjust law, made by themselves,
and they are determined to keep it, be their tifle to it
good or bad.—(lfear, hear.) What says the Duke of
Richmond ? "If the measure for an eight shillings'
duty pass, we shall be obliged to lower our rents. Rather
than do this we have turned out the 'Ministers who pro-
posed it, and will turn out their successors too, should
they presume to touch our rents by any similar measure."
Rent, rent, they must have. What say the country
squires among themselves ? The Conservative exclaims
to the Liberal, as I know for a fact—" What a foal you
are to zupport an alteration in the Corn-laws ; you will
lower your rents two hundred or three hundred pounds
a-year."—(llear, hear.) Did they never give it a
thought, I asked, whether they had a just title to this
extra two hundred or three hundred pounds ? Not
they, faith, was the reply ; they had, got it, and they
would keep it, right or wrong. Gentlemen, that is
Conservatism. What other meaning have the writings
and speeches of the leaders of the Conservative party
than plainly this, that they have allowed the manufac-
turing population to increase too rapidly, to become too
powerful. and that they must be- reduced by one means
or another within manageable bounds. Am I then,
wrong in saying that the aristocracy are the adversaries
of the industrious classes.—(Loud cries of " No, no.")
Sir Robert Peel, in his speech, alluded in sympathising
terms to one of this independent class who was found
dead under his loom from starvation; but what has he
done for this class ? Though the contest which now
shakes the country is between the working_ classes and
the aristocracy, the one class represented by these
starved weavers, and the other by the Duke of Bucking-
ham, what does this self-styled physician ? He gives
words of sympathy to the poor man's class, and place and
profit to the Duke.—(Hear, hear.)'' He is a physician
indeed'( who, now that he has pocketed the fee, and
though the case is one not admitting of delay, refuses to
give any prescription at all.—(Hear, hear.) I know only
of one medical character that he can be compared to (and
I beg the pardon of that class for the simile), and that
is the doctor of the regiment.-(Hear, hear.) Part
of his duty is to stand by, with his watch in his hand,
whilst the poor delinquent, who is tied up to the hal-
berds, is having the flesh peeled from his back by the
humane laws of this most Christian country, and every
now and then the doctor feels his pulse, and pronounces
whether nature can bear any more.—(Shame.) The na-
tion is this poor sufferer—the nation has been and still is
on the rack—a bad harvest would render the torture in-
tolerable—the rainy days were the lashes on the back, and
lean imagine Sir R. Peel consulting the barometer instead
of his watch, to ascertain whether the people would bear
any more. Let him beware; these meetings are the
throbbings of the nation's pulse, and indicate a feverish
and dangerous state. Has he, and have the privileged
classes of this country forgotten the horrors of the
French Revolution, and their causes ? Are they aware
how very similar the circumstances are which are now
in operation in this country, and what were they ? Fi-
nancial difficulties arising from the wars and extravagan-
cies'of previous reigns, and the refusal of the aristocracy
to bear their share of the burdens. How stands it in
this country ? We have a much treater debt, arising
from the wars and ex travagancies of previous reigns, and
the aristocracy not only paying no taxes, but taxing the
people hesideafor their awn bnefiLfur_the _extra_ price_
they obtain for their corn by their own unjust law exo-
ieratea them from all taxation, and leaves them some-
thing in pocket besides.—(Hear, hear, and cheers.)
Louis XVL was a kind-hearted Monarch, and most
anxious for the welfare and happiness of his people, but
was opposed in his benevolent intention by the privileged
!lave we not the same state of things hero ?
)ur beloved Queen, anxious for the happiness of her
people, taking their part against the privileged classes,
tnd yet thwarted in her designs and exertions by the
Monopolists.—(Hear, hear.) The first minister under
Louis XVI. who ventured to grapple with them was
Turgot, who proposed sundry edicts, one of which was, a
free commerce in grain—mark that. Another was, the re-
moval of the salt tax ; a third, that the aristocracy should
bear their share of keeping the high roads in order.
But the circumstances altogether are so marvellously
similar, that I cannot refrain giving you a short quota-
tion from the " Lectures on the French Revolution," by
Professer Smyth, a work that ought to be the daily study
of every Conservative. " The fact was, that the privi-
leged orders were exempted to a certain degree from the
taxes to which the rest of the country was exposed.
Now, unless they could be brought to bear their part, no
real relief could be afforded. The accumulated deficit,
the annual deficit, were each too great. Of all this
Target seems to have been well aware. He had an-
aeunced himself as decidedly of opinion that an impost
must be fairly and equally levied upon proprietors of
every description ; and certainly this was a dectrine
perfectly right and just. What mepness in the privi-
leged orders to resist it ; what selfishness—what guilt—
and what folly, particularly when .the country had evi-
dently begun to inquire and think 1 What truth so ob-
vious as this, that nothing can be secure that is not
agreeable to the moral feelings of mankind. The King
proposes the six edicts of Turgot, which I have men-
tioned, to the Parliaments. The privileged orders are in
those edicts only required to contribute like the rest of '
the community to the repairs of the roads, nothing
snore ; but no, the edicts are resisted by the Parlia-
ments ; the privileged orders had taken the alarm, and
the result of the whole is, that the patriotic Minister
is dismissed, and the edicts gradually forgotten."
Is not this precisely the game that has been played here.
Our Ministers and their measures both dismissed. Let
the aristocracy learn by heart the following comment of
2rofessor Smyth:—" The conduct of the privileged or-
derg on this occasion must for ever be held up to man-
'cind as an example of the selfish blindness of which all
inch orders are capable ; they would not concede in
:ime. Animated by no one generous or patriotic feeling
chat can he mentioned, they would not concede, and they,
and everything that they loved and honoured, were con-
iequently buried in one common destruction. But they
saw not their danger ; let others, then, take warning!"
ft may be thought that, in calling attention to the pain-
ful period of the French Revolution, that I am seeking
to excite the people.—(No, no.) Ido wish to excite
them, but not to physical force ; that man is either a
rool or a traitor to the best interests of his fellow-crea-
tures who dreams of such a thing, and in me, either as an '
individual or a magistrate, he will find his bitterest oppo-
aent.—(Hear, hear.) But I wish to excite the minds of
he working classes to think, and to understand the real
causes of their sufferings, and to take every constitutional
means of removing them. Mr. Stansfield then moved the
following resolution:—
" 1. 'That great and increasing distress has been ex-
perienced during the last four years by the mercantile
and manufacturing classes of the woollen district of
which Leeds is the centre ; that the condition of the
vorkmen engaged in the various branches of its staple
:rade has been greatly deteriorated, from the combined
operation of a lessened employment for labour, a lower
rate of remuneration for it, and the high price of all
the necessaries of life, and more especially of flour and
meat ; that the merchants have experienced unparalleled
and in many cases ruinous losses, from the frequent and
'arge fluctuations in the value of manufactured goods,
Ind the frightful amount of insolvency which has taken
',dace amongst the retail traders of the nation ; and that
the manufacturers have suffered in a still greater degree
than the merchants, because they have had to bear the
loss arising from the partial employment of their ma-
chinery and the consequent inadequate return upon
their sunk capital, in addition to those arising from ex-
treme variations in the price of the raw material and
the bankruptcy of their customers."
PETER FAIRBAIRN, Esq., seconded the resolution.
The CHAIRMAN put the resolution; which was carried,
only five or six hands being Vild up against it.
Mr. Wsr. WEST came forward to move the next reso-
lution, and was.received with cheers. He said he would
detain them but a very few moments. He had to move
a resolution, which he had read with attention, and in
which he entirely concurred, for otherwise no persuasion
could have induced him, as a mere matter of form, to
propose to the thousands gathered before bins, to assert
that which he did not himself first believe.—(Cheers.)
Mr. West read the following resolution

" 2. That this meeting is clearly of opinion that the
distress experienced in' this district, and generally
throughout the manufacturing districts of the empire, is
mainly attributable to the restrictive laws, falsely called
protection, on the import and export of food and manu-
factures, and particularly the Corn and Provision laws_.
laws which exist for the solo and unjust advantage of
one section of tho nation—aggravate the effects of defi-
cient harvests, and prevent the farmer from deriving any
benefit from productive ones, practically deny the
right
of the -people to exchange the produce of their industry
for the food and productions of other nations—restrict a
rapidly increasing population to the comparatively sta-
tionary supply of food raised from our own soil, thereby