The Sun.
London, England, 1844-11-25 00:00:00

be told that this is very unconstitutional, if it is not
illegal—that is, that we should be adding to the con-
stituency of the country. Why, what does Sir Robert
Peel say ? " Register, register, register;" and we are
about taking his athice.—(Loud applause.) But
you cannot register, register, register, till you have
obtained a qualification to be put upon the register.
Now, the very plan that he proposed for increasing
his strength, and the strength of his motley party in
the polling-booth, is the plan we propose in our case;
but we do not endeavour or intend to do that which
the monopolist lords and squires have done; that is,
not to make fictitious, to put spurious and fictitious
rotes upon the register.—(Hear.) We have no conve-
nient gamekeepers, orpark lodgekeepers, whom we can
cram on—no sons, or brothers, or nephews of farmers,
whom we can compel to register, and to swear
that they are partners, if necessary, when they are no
more partners than I am.—(Applause.) What I say
is this—lay out 401. or 501. in property which will
bring you in 4/. or 51. a year, and get yourselves
upon the county register, and have a vote. Now, I
was not born and bred a lawyer ; but I will defy all
the lawyers in the land, including Mr. Smith, the
Irish Attorney-General—(Loud laughter)—to prove
that there's any illegality in a man buying a freehold
property that will give him a vote, along with in-
terest for his money.—(Applause.) Whether it is
constitutional or unconstitutional I don't profess ex-
actly to understand ; for I never yet knew anything
good in this country got—whether it was abolishing
the old boroughmongering system, or getting rid of
Catholic disabilities, or of the Test and Corporation
Acts, or abolishing the hanging of people for a matter
of five shillings—(Loud applause)—l never knew
anything good of that kind accomplished in the shape
of reform, but there was one party in the State—
that party who used to be led on by the venerable
Lord Eldon—who were always sure to get out their
white pocket handkerchiefs, begin a crying, and de-
clare
that if that measure passed, the Constitution
would be irretrievably ruined.—(Loud applause.)
Now, I don't profess to know what is constitutional;
but if there be anything unconstitutional in becoming
a county voter, I think, as there happen to be already
a great many 40s. freeholders, the constitution has
been pretty much tried in that point already.—(Ap-
plause.) But I would guard you against supposing
that there is anything like trick, or manoeuvre, or
anything savouring of finesse, in endeavouring to
increase the voters on the register. It is in accord-
ance with the spirit as well as with the letter of the
law that men should aim at becoming voters. Why
is 40s. mentioned, and not 101., as it is, unhappily, in
Ireland and Scotland ? Why, because it is considered
that a man, having the intelligence, and the spirit,
and the desire to possess 40s. a year of interest for an
investment, will be a prudent, careful, thoughtful
man, who will be likely to send proper representa-
tives ; and, therefore the qualification is fixed at that
amount.---(Applause.) It holds out an invitation to
every man who has the means to qualify himself, and
become a voter for representatives in Parliament.
And I cannot Imagine anything more calculated to
do good to that honest and large class of operatives
who cannot afford to live in a 10/. house,
and who yet ought not to be excluded from
the franchise—l cannot imagine anything more
calculated to raise them as a class in their
own estimation (and you cannot raise a
man unless by raising him in his own
estimation), than by inducing and persuading
as many of them as possible to possess
themselves of the county franchise, by investing
their savings in a freehold purchase.—(Applause.)
You thus do good not only to those who are encou•
raged to save money with such a prospect, but to a
large class besides, amongst whom you scatter men
who have themselves obtained a vote, and who will
act as missionaries in trying to induce those with
with whom they work—stimulating them by example
and by a spirit of rivalry—also to become free-
holders, and therby have a vote in the representation
of the country.—(Applause.) In every point of view,
then, we see nothing. but good to result from the
movement we have now undertaken ; I look upon it
with the greatest interest, because I think we have
tapped a new vein, as it were, in this agitation, one
that I am sure will be productive of the best possible
results, not only to our agitation (for many things
want doing besides corn-law repeal, and others will
do here no doubt better than we have been able to do
this), but I see the greatest advantage to arise from
increasing the basis of our representative system, by
giving us many additional voters, and particularly by
those whose desire of being enfranchised will induce
them to lay by a share of their earnings, in order that
they may obtain the necessary qualification. Gentle-
men, I don't think I need to say more on the subject
to convince you, for I understand you are already
convinced, and that a very large number are
already prepared to obtain the qnalification.
I don't think I need to say anything on the
progress of our cause, or as it regards the main ar-
gumentsl,in connexion with our question. You know
we have rather changed the aspect of affairs in this
country; manufactures are now up in in this draw-
well ; the bucket of the farmers is going down
empty, and ours is coming up a little more full. We
are in a sort of intermittent fever in this country;
the ague is at one extremity to-day, the cold shiver
at the other extremity to-morrow.—(Hear, hear.)
And this is the natural result of a system which
sets the laws of nature at defiance. But bear this
in mind : whilst your spindles are at work, if report
speaks truly, profitably at work just now, there
is that going on in the agricultural districts which
will assuredly bring those spindles in a short
time to a stand-still, or make them revolve with little
profit. You hear at agricultural meetings of the
want of employment for the labourers ; and the
farmers cannot employ them because they have not
money to pay them. Why cannot they employ and
pay them ? They have had a good harvest ; every
body admits that they have had a most splendidscrop ;
and when they have been favoured by nature with
an abundant harvest, how is it they cannot afford to
employ their labourers and go on cultivating ? Simply
for this reason—they have taken their land at a rent
calculated at 565. or 60s. a quarter, and they are now
selling it in the country places at about 425. per
quarter.—(Applause.) But in those places where
the farmers have taken their land on a corn rent—
that is to say, to pay so many quarters of corn for
their rent, whatever the price of wheat may be, as the
farmers in a great part of Scotland are doing, and on
Lord Radnor's estates :in Wiltshire—very much to
that nobleman's credit—they are doing very well in-
deed, and making more money than when wheat was
high. I have got here a letter from a leading farmer
in Haddingtonshire, a district of the Scotch Lothians,
where farming is carried to such perfection, and he
tells me that the farmers were never doing better in
Haddingtonshire, where they 'pay rent in proportion
to their produce—that is to say, if a man engages to
pay two hundred quarters of wheat as rent for two
hundred acres of land, if wheat is 50s. a quarter, he
pays 5001., if it is 40s. he pays only 400/.; and thus
it makes no difference to him whether his produce is
high or low, only there is this advantage, he always
must prosper when wheat is low, and he is able to
pay his labourers better after a good harvest than
when corn is dear.—(Applause.) What does this
prove ? That all the distress of the farmers in the
south of England arises from their having
been foolish enough to engage to pay rents
calculated upon wheat at 60s. a quarter, while
they only get 425. for it. And all that
you hear about the malt-tax, and other devices
that the farmers are apt to run after, is just
merely a pretence to keep these poor farmers amused,
and prevent them inquiring into the subject of rent.
—(Applause.) But, mark me ; if the farmers are
distressed, they cannot be cultivating their land.
You hear of forty labourers in one parish trooping
off to the union workhouse.—(Hear, hear.) Another
case is where an unfortunate suicide occurred the
other day, in the parish of Byslip, which contains
700 acres, and where there are only 100 men em-
ployed, at Bs. or 10s. a week. Suppose it is 10s.
this only amounts to 50/. a week, or 2,5001. a year, of
wages paid upon 700 acres of land. Why the
smallest of your individual concerns pay about as
much wages as that parish of 700 acres. Do you
suppose that land can be well cultivated ? No ; there
can be neither proper ploughing, harrowing, nor
sowing going on. And what will be the conse-
quence ? Just the same as has always ensued. In
three years after an abundant crap, without an ex-
ception, I believe, since 1815, when this system of
corn-laws began, we have had a reaction, or some-
thing like a famine ; and you have the seeds of that
scarcity sowing now. It will come as assuredly as
we exist; and when it does come, in consequence of
the increase of the population,• and the extension of
your mills (for they are building mills elsewhere as
well as at Rochdale), you will be caught with a
severer check, a much greater amount of suffering
and disaster than you have ever been before. Now,
this is the motive why you should work while you
have the sunshine, and not neglect the present oppor-
tunity —(Applause)—and I am glad to know that in
good seasons or in bad seasons, in prosperity or in
adversity, the people of Rochdale are always true to
this as to other sound principles, and that you at least
are determined, if your exertions can avert it, that
the system of corn• laws shall not continue to bring
upon this district those heavy disasters which only
within the last three or four years it has been our
misery to undergo. The Hon. Gentleman sat down
amidst enthusiastic cheering.
Wicrasst BROWN, Esq. (late candidate for the re-
presentation
upon,presen taant,ilo nr e
coefi v
ed
South
with Lancashire),
late next
enthusiasm. w
dire e give
called
an extract from his speech. During his
canvas,
he stated, on several occasions, some facts regarding
the commercial position of this country with the
United States of America, and with their permission
he would now further allude to the subject. In
1805, 1806, and ISO 7, our exports to that country
were nearly 8,000,0001. per annum. The popula-
tion of that country was then six millions. It was

--- ...
nearly one-third of the whole export trade-47*
kingdom, if we took the official value. Emhat
orders in council, and other deerces, interrripte
trade for several years after that; and in 1815 t
those abominable corn-laws, which were Bail 'i,
tin, us out of the best markets of the woeli4;" ndi
I.____
inducing retaliation, were a positive injiiry- t
to the manufacturers of this country hirsfte tear,;.
ties fur whose protection and advantage they Were
I designed.—(Applause.) Looking at the intercourse
of this country with the United States from 1833 to
1837, he found that our exports had increased from
7,900,0001. to 8,400,0001., while in the succeeding five
years it had fallen to 6,467,0861., and in the succeed-
ing year (1842) to 3,528,000/.—(Hear, hear.) And
when he told the meeting that our corn-laws, and our
heavy duties on tobacco and timber, had induced them
to retaliate, by encouraging manufactures at home, so
that it had been recently ascertaieed, on the authority
of statistics collected by Government itself, that those.
home manufactures amounted to 50,000,C0e1. sterling
per annum, and that they had engaged at work nu
less than 2,585 fulling mills, and 1,420 woollen ma-
nufactories, it would be seen to what an extent we
had been injured by our unwise and insane protective
policy.-- (Hear, hear.) But the markets of the United
States would not have been long limited to even this
population ; the population there was increasing at
the rate of 35 per cent., and ere the end of a century
would probably be equal to about 100 millions; and
these were people we should not have sacrificed our
trade with, when the only obstacle to their continuing
to deal with us was the condition that we should take
in payment that which alone they were able to pay
with.—(Hear, hear.) He might give them some idea
of what our trade with the States might ultimately
have reached, when he told them that one of its rivers
alone (the Mississippi), with its tributaries and
streams, had a shore to which our goods might have
been carried of upwards of 58,000 miles.—(Hear.)
And did the landed interest pretend that our trade
with that country would nut have promoted their
prosperity ? Why, commerce had made them what
they were—(Hear, hear) —and upon what principle
would they argue that its further prosperity would
work to their injury? It might be interesting to
consider what a people under prosperous circum-
stances could consume of agricultural produce, and
he found it stated that the consumption of the people
of the United States amounted to about 27 bushels of
grain per head, with five bushels of potatoes, while
the consumption of this country was only 16 bushels
of grain, with a proportionate amount of potatoes.—
(Hear, hear.) The landowners fell into the error of
supposing. that the consumption of the people was a
fixed quantity; the example of the United States
showed that the consumption of a people in food, as
well as in other things, was in proportion to their
means.—(Hear, hear.) He 'found that the total
number of houses in the United States was 1,300,000,
while in England we had 849,147—n0t half the
quantity in proportion to the population. lie denied
the argument of the monopolists, that as we relaxed
in our restrictions on commerce other countries would
adopt a more stringent course, and as evidence he
would point to the opinion expressed by the Prussian
Minister on the subject, and to that 9f Mr. Adding-
ton, the American Minister; and even if Mr. C)2y,
who was in favour of the ietaliative'system, were
elected President, he much doubted if he would be
able to carry out his object —(Hear„, hear.)
Mr. Bemire, M.P., was received with most vehe-
ment cheering. After it had subsided, he said,
amongst other things, the passing of the ,eform, Bill
did little or nothing to promote the rePeal of the corn-
law. After that Bill passed, Lord Melbourne
,him-
self declared that no Ministry could touch the 'corn-
laws without settling its own doom ; and from the
experience me have had since we may be quite sure
that what he said was perfectly correct. But the
scene seems altogether to have changed now. We
' have no sense of hopelessness now ; everything around
us betokens that we are corning to the end of our
labours.—(Applause.) We find accessions to our
ranks every day, every hour, and defections from the
ranks of our opponents; and we, who formerly thirst
scarcely raise our voices in favour of this great prin-
ciple of industry, now find that there is no intelligent
man in the country who upholds any opposite prin-
ciple, except upon some ground of temporary expedi-
ency. Political questions such as those which oc-
cupied the minds of this people some twelve or fifteen
years ago, are of that exciting character as rather to
drive the people from contemplating, with all the at-
tention which they deserve, questions of an econo-
mical character ; and yet it may be asserted, without
fear of contradiction, that on questions of political
economy the existence and the prosperity of this
country depend. We may have a government main-
taining order—that I hold to be its first duty—and
distributing justice with somewhat of impartiality to
all the people ; that I hold to be also a very high and
important duty of a government ; but we must have
a government also which understands questions of
political economy, and those principles which serve
to preserve the national industry free; or, whatever
be the theory of the Constitution, it is utterly impos-
sible that we should advance and be permanently pros-
perous.—(Loud applause.) Now we must bear in
mind that the tyrannies of this age are not of the
same character as those which existed in ages lhat
are past. Our forefathers had to contend sword in
hand for the liberties which they possessed ; they
were aitacked by the sword, and they defended them-
selves by the sword; and many liberties, no doubt,
they preserved, which, under the circumstances, per-
haps, could not have been otherwise secured. Bar-
barous ages had barbarous means of action. In this
age, however, wrong and bloodshed are, to some ex-
tent, avoided, and we have tyranny corning before us
in another shape, feebler as it becomes older; but if
feebler much more subtle.—(Applause.) We have
tyranny, cunning plausible, deceitful, insidious,
through the means of Acts of Parliament ; and, under
the pretence of benefiting a people, the most precious
of the national rights are invaded.--(Applause.) Now,
our grievances are, for the most part, of a class that
may be termed economical. "SN e shall have other
questions to settle, doubtless, when the corn-law
question is disposed of; but there is no question in
which the people of this country have so immediate
and direct a concern as in the question of that trade.
—(Hear, hear.) There are other public questions in
some degree affecting the liberty of the subject, or
the liberty of conscience, but they are not actually
questions of that concernment that you cannot live
until they are settled ; but this is one, without the
settlement of which a large proportion of the people
are pauperised and pressed down, so that from a
vast multitude of persons you can receive almost
no assistance in the battle you are waging with
those above you for other rights of which you are de•
prived.—(Applause.) The existence of monopolie
and the unfair distribution of the national imposts,
appear to me to be those evils with which we have
more to do than with anything else. We have liberty
in this country equalling the liberty of all other
countries in some respects. We have the liberty o
thought ; we are free to speak, free to write, free to
meet to discuss all questions of national importance,
and we may agitate and combine, and, by all peaceable
means, force the Government into the views which
we entertain. But though we have all this liberty—
a liberty which few nations possess to so great an ex-
tent—we have not that very first and the foundation
of all liberty, the liberty to work freely and to enjoy
in security and unplundered the fruits of our own
labour.—(Applause.) And what is the most extra-
irdinary part of the business, we have been argued
into the belief that this very infraction of our liber-
ties was a benefit conferred upon us by a paternal and
protective Government. There can be no doubt that
nwltitudes of people in this country have believed that
the protective principle had something in it likely to
increase national and individual benefit ; and the
same belief is in operation now to some extent. We
are not to suppose that the men who are in favour of
the corn-law are necessarily dishonest men. I believe
there are landlords so extraordinarily stupid as still
to believe the corn-law is beneficial to the land,
and not injurious to manufactures—(Applause)—
and it would be hard for me to assert that all the persons
in our town—and there a few of them, middle-class
men and manufacturers—who support this protective
system, are dishonest in their views. I believe many
of them are honest in what they do; but I believe
they cannot be honest and intelligent if they support
a law so wicked and mischievous as this.—(Applause.)
But amongst the working classes this principle is
now held to a very great extent ; and there are found
in all towns of the kingdom combinations to exclude
their own order from certain privileges, in certain
trades ; and there are many regulations which, how-
ever m
oreso injuriousto
the totrade
labourersand to
thmtehe
themselves. 'I of labour,
are
mention as a circumstance arising from the very
mistake
crept into the code
by which protec-
tive ts
iaz e
statutesspiri t, the
an very carne
and
enactments h
of this and every other country.—(Applause.) I be-
lieve no man has ever yet been able to assign any
cause for the late period of depression but the recur-
rence of bad harvests, and the existence of a corn-law
preventing us from removing the evil effects of those
bad harvests.—(Applause. We have trade now cona?
paratively prosperous ; for a period there has been a
better profit to manufacturers generally, and far more
employment and considerably better wages for the
workmen ; and I have no doubt whatever, if the shop-
keepers of this town were to meet together and com-
pare notes, they would find universally that, contraat-
ing their business now with what it was three years
ago, other circumstances being the same, their busil
ness had greatly improved, and that they had fewer
debts in their books than they had at that period.
—(Applause) I was speaking the other day with
a gentleman who lives, or is often engaged in
pusiness, in a part of this town where he has the op-
portunity of seeing people passing to and from a large
establishment for the sale of furniture ; and he said
he had noticed, for some months past, an amount i f
business going on at that shop and warehouse which
he had not seen for years before. We all know that

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