The Sun.
London, England, 1844-03-11 00:00:00

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LONDON, MINIS,MARCH 11, 1844.

The proeeedings at a meeting; on Wednesday Ta.s f,-of
tenant-fariners, merchants; arid tradesmen of Har-
leston, in tbecounty of. Suffolk, held at the 'Scan Inn,
in that te*n,' and -convened `tier the purpose; of peti-
tioning Parliament to repeal the_ duties on foreign
corn and malt, and in'favotrr of free Wide, generally;
were; with some trifling exceptions!, werthy of the in-.
telligence, good senSe, and spirit of one of the most
important agricultural distrieti'in F.ngland. 'ate
disposed to notice & affair, the„`,raiher: because 'the
scope which the address of the respebted chaitman
embraced was remarkable for the novelty; of some of
its view's, in combination with a. demand, for corn,
law repeal, • and the4SohndnesS 'and 'iaiiteity of the
opinions avowed with ..regard to the operation of our
system 'of currency, past and present: Desiring
to say, so 'Much, any sort, off' Offence to the
agricultural bodies of this kingdoin, we must own
that, in general, their notions iipoti the theory of our
monetary arrangements ty, no means square with
those which we-have formed upon the' results. of 16ng
and attentive observation. ~,,But thePhairinan of the
Harleston meeting-enunciated 'some -propo-sitions on
-these subjects, highWimportant iir flietnselves, and tO'
us not the less intei4tizig, becauSe of their coinci-
dence with those which, from time to time, we have
advocated. This 'gentleman, iNir, 1.1. L. Tiirion, of
StarderstOn, a landowner of station and considerable
property in tire' neighbourhood, reminded the meet-
ing that if the corn-lawS were really beneficial, as had
been contended, to those iintfiedjately interested,'
they must be so to himself.: But .was for their
entire repeal ;, believing that• , they now were,
and had, almost altvazs, been, injUrions to the tenant•
farmers, and ttieir' labourers.. lie 'proceeded to il-
lustrate this important point by some statistical de-
tails, very well digested and. very'rnneh to the, purpose.'
At the same' time, and with a becoming and manly
ingenuousness (which we could wish to see exten-
sively imitated at oih:er meetings, whether of societies
for the protection of,.k4ritiSy-agrieulture, Or of their
opponents), he said thit ivas far froth thinking that.
the repeal of these laws...mould produce very cheap
corn, as the Anti-Corri-law_ League assumed itat it
would do. lie went so far as to state that the League
"had much injured the cause of repeal and of, free
trade by holding out that hop." Ira his opinion the effect
would rather be " to prodhce greater uniformity be,-.
tween French and English Er'c,_ and .also' greater
regularitY." tegr`eite-dr:tCoof,th4t " both ma:-
nufacturers.:and landowners are too selfish and one-
sided in their vieWsOf thiS qnestion."
There is much of grave truth in .all this. If the
fact is to be deplored, it is not the less essential that,
like other disagreeable testimonies of truth, it should
be deliberately heard and considered. For our own
parts, we have so recently and so often urged the
claims of those most important, but mostineglected
classes—the producing labourers and artisans, who
are the great sufferers in this squabble of contending
interests, by reason of cruelly diminished wages and
exorbitantly increased demands on their working hours;
and by the almost absorption of the needful " intervals

for food and rest ;",--that we are_compelled ta,qoninrr
in this -grave imPutation of selfishness upon both

those classes of capitalists alluded to. The Chairman

next developed the results upon the scale ofrents and

upon the prices of corn, which had been realized under

the various corn-laws pass6d fromlBos to the present
time. And first, as to the period from 1805 to 1815.
Between 1805 and 1814 the price of corn never fell
so low as 665. the quarter (the ".pivot price" of Mr.
Bosmores Act of 1815), and consequently the trade
Was free; and, yvt,-notwithstanding that thetigni,s4