The Sun.
London, England, 1851-09-05 00:00:00

P..."--
FREE TRADE IN IRELAND.
The following most gratifying and important state-
ment appears in the Northern Whig of Saturday,
showing the steady progress of Belfast under the
operation of free trade, and the tendency to improve-
pent in other parts of Ireland :
'' Whilst English shipowners have been grumbling,
here and there, against the operation of the re-
cent changes in the navigation-laws, and proving to
their own satisfaction, in the teeth of facts, that they
were being ruined with miraculous celerity, it is
pleasant to see Belfast looking calmly on and smiling
its contempt of this angry vehemence of the Protec-
tionists and their allies of the shipping interest. And
this is a fact which is quite as remarkable as it is
pleasant. Belfast is deeply interested in the whole
question, and must, more keenly than, perhaps, any
other place, feel the injury or advantage, as the case
Islay be, arising from the alterations that the Legisla-
ture has effected. Old established ports, long crowded
with shipping engaged in the British and foreign trade.
ports whose reputation has been made, and which can
rest confidently on the strength of their position and
the advantages it gives them over new competitors
—may bear, without trembling, a shock that would
annihilate the resources of less favoured localities.
And for this reason it was that Belfast was and is pre-
eminently obnoxious to the operations of any change of
the character to which we allude. But under the
new system Belfast has flourished even more re-
markably than under the old. The modification of
the navigation-laws has not blighted its early
growth. It is stronger now than ever, like some
hardy tree that the sharp but healthful frost of
spring purifies instead of withering, and, instead
of destroying, only stregthens. Belfast has
not complained of the change—she does not mouth
her terror at the competition of the foreigner. His
cheap-built vessels, and all the other good things he
is said to possess, are no bugbear to frighten her
from her wits, when she contemplates her own young
strength, and feels conscious of the vast resources of
indusy, energy, and practical intelligence that lie
within her. It has been often flung in our face,
that we in Ireland can do nothing without calling
for help. Again and again has it been hurled at the
people of this country, as a reproachful taunt, that, for
every step they take motuproprio—of their own will and
energy—they look for two strong pushes from the
hands of the Government. Much as may be said
against us, this taunt is, after all, a childish, lying
charge. 'Ve may take credit to ourselves, in
this case at least, that whilst English shipowners
yowled and grumbled when our harbours were
thrown open to the vessels of the foreigner, few, if
any, complaints were addressed to the Legislature by
ports in Ireland. And we may claim, as a tribute to
that industry and enterprise which our neighbours
have refused to acknowledge, the confession that,
spite of a change more calculated to
o injure us than
any other part of the empire, while Belfast, facile
princeps, has run gloriously ahead, Dublin, Cork, and
Limerick, too, and Galway, have given signs of new
spirit and vigour, that promise highly for what they
will achieve when their strength develops itself under
increased exertion.
si In former articles, respecting the growth of our
town, we showed how its manufactures prosper under
free trade. We are able now to complete the picture
by demenitrating the progress its commerce has
made under the same system. And, whilst we
do this, we need hardly say that it would be
very . difficult indeed to prove that, whilst our
trade, and commerce, and manufactures, are thus
flourishing, our agricultural interests can be said
to suffer from the change. That man must be
gifted with a very extraordinary imagination, who
can look on a town like ours, with its mills crowded,
and in busy operation, its quays thickly lined with
shipping, its artisans remuneratively employed, its
shopkeepera driving a brisk trade—and then fancy to
himself the surrounding agricultural districts poor
and miserable, bankrupt in fortune, idle and hopeless,
and robbed of all stimulus to honest industry. And yet
the readerewho may be tempted to smile at this picture,
should bear in mind that this is the sort of raving
that the Protectionists have for a long time been en-
deavouring to force down our throats, with a thorough
disregard of our eyes and ears. Cotton manufac-
turers and mill-owners, they say, may be making
fortunes at the expense of the rest of the community,
but most emphatically the rural districts are ruined,
and agriculture is going to the dogs. However, we
have only to say, that if the agriculturists fare under
the corn-laws as the shipowners fare under the
repeal of the navigation laws, we have very little
commisseration for their present lot, and very
little fear for their future condition. By the
returns published at the close of the year 1348, it
appeared that the total tonnage of sailing vessels then
registered in the port amounted to something more
than 72,000 tons. Our readers will remember that it
was only in the following session of Parliament Mr.
Labouchore introduced his Bill for the repeal of the
navigation-laws ; and the most sanguine might have
been prepared for some immediate temporary check.
But let us see what the result has been. On the Ist of
January, 1849, there was a tonnage of 53,335 tons
of sailing craft registered for Belfast, engaged in its
foreign trade, and 18,827 tons in the coasting trade.
At the end of that year, after the new laws had been
for some tirna in force, the foreign shipping was found
to have been increased by 700 tons, whilst in the
coasting there was a decrease of over 200 tons. Now,
surely, if any injury could have resulted from the
change of legislation, it would have fallen on the
foreign trade, where only competition could have been
looked for. But here, instead of loss, there has been
an increase ; the only falling off, and that little more
than 1 per cent., has been in the coasting trade, a
result which may be accounted for on grounds that
by no means argue disadvantage to our commerce.
e Well, on the Ist of January, 1850, the foreign
trade shipping, belonging to this port, amounted to
something more than 54,000 tons, and the shipping
in the coasting trade to about 18,600, making a total
of over 72,600 tons. A later return was made in
May of this year, of which we cannot give the exact
particular, but from which it appeared that the
general registered tonnage of the port amounted to
73,400 tons. This return did not probably extend
beyond the Ist of January, but it evidenced a steady
increase; and if we could carry the returns up to the
present moment, we doubt‘not a still more marked in-
crease would be found ; for causes have been ope-
rating this year of a character calculated to give fresh
impulse to our commerce, and more than usual signs
of activity have been shown in the shipping interests.
Bat these facts prove that our trade is steadily in-
creasing in the most important points, and with the
most important countries, such as the United States,
the West Indies, South America, and other places.
It may be worth mentioning, too, that the returns in
some instances, whilst exhibiting a large increase in
tonnage, shot; a decrease in the number of ships—a
fact interesting, in so far as it shows that increasing
trade enables our shipowners to replace their old craft
by a larger and superior class of vessels. The
growth of our foreign trade, it will be remarked, has
been exceedingly rapid, a great increase having
taken place in the course of a few years. Besides
this, we have had some thirty steamers, with a ton-
nage of over seven thousand seven hundred tons,
plying bet Ween our pert and Glasgow, Fleetwood,
IDublin, Liverpool, London, and other places, and
forming a very prominent element in the constitution
of our mercantile marine.
"All the items here set forth embrace the increase
that took place in the shipping of the port from Jan.,
1850, to Jan., 1851. How our trade and commerce
have grown during the last seven months we have no
regularly arranged and authentic data to show; but
all who have noted the course of business during
these months will require little argument to persuade
them to believe that, in this department, as in all the
other sources of her wealth, Belfast has been grow-
ing more powerful as her opportunities became more
extensive; and we doubt not that the returns, next
January, will show a very remarkable and very gra-
tifying improvement.
"Here, then, ere some simple facts for those who
mourn so dolorously about the evil effects of free
trade to ponder soberly upon. Whilst the official
returns, published by the Board of Trade, show that
the kingdom generally is in a prosperous state—that
more ships are engaged in the home and foreign trade
than in former years—that all branches of industry
are affording more general employment to the work-
ing classes—that the exports of manufactures are
largely increased—and that the comforts of life are
more. Widely diffused—it is gratifying to us to turn
wfrohmolethT
jesnait
d eneral accounts of the condition of the
Kingdom, and point to Belfast as a case
of circumstantialGovernment reports,evidence confirmatory of the
more valuable than all the prat-
ing that tho wlsole set—one and all—of the ' farmers'
friends' have given utterance to since Sir Robert
Peel laid his demolishing hand on the monstrous en-
actments that had : long n
() g workedxtile mischief to the
;
textile country, for the supposed advantage of a class.
"Our manufactures
fabricsof the hbauvneibil
humbler
till hundreds of thousands
classes, in this northern province, gain from them the
means of subsiatence—an iron trade has
sprung up
in our town that circulat es amongstthoiutssa.ar,na artisans a
yearly revenue of well nigh eighty
pounds
—other branches of industry have grown in like
proportion—the. shipping and commerce of the port
have shot ahead with marvellous celerity—our traders
e 1, and shopkeepers do a rapid and remunerative bend_
' •siie'gs‘ Moat new streets are springing up around es,
';'• • 1114 -
t tta ud country make interchange of reciprocal
advatia''se. and all this has gone on—hear it, Pro-
tectionists- d farmers' friends—under the very heat
'-and 4-ker-4.: he terrible free-trade regime, with our
eten-
agyietiltee' unprotected and our shipowners un-
, ,a7 stoia n the much-dreaded competition of the
e.; -‘-fekei Yes, peace, order, and contentment are
Ai iereerg daily more consolidated under free trade;
to et tupt a return to the old state of things would
be to plunge the kiegdoin into a bloody servile war."