The Sun.
London, England, 1844-06-27 00:00:00

only get the mttrket value of his land. If they were re-
duced to continental prices, would they not be compelled
to adopt the motinental system of the proprietors culti-
s wing their own estates sithout the intervention of the
tenant farmer ? Now, as to the poor man, for whom so
touch was slid in that House, and so little was done—
(Hear, hear)----he believed that he was better off with

high prices and high wages, than low prices and low
ges. Ile believed also that the object of the League
was to reduce wages to the continental level, arid quoted
a pa .sage from a speech of the Hon. .Member for Wol-
verhampton to bear him out in the assertion.—(Mr. Vil-
liers denied the correctness of the report.) In that case
he would retract it ; bat the Hon. Member for Birming-
ham had made a declaration to the same effect. Ile did
not think that the corn-laws could be said to be detri-
mental to trade and commerce, when it was stated by
the free traders themselves, that in the last forty years
the manufactures of the country had realised enough to
purchase the fee-simple of the whole land of the king-
dom. Other nations, too, had seen the advantage of the
protective system,and were mare extensively adopting it.
Mr. WARD said they ought to express their obliga-
tions to the Noble Lord for having brought back the
debase to something like its proper object ; for as to
spending two hours in reviewing all that had been said
and done by the Anti-Corn-law League, he considered
it a mere evasion of the main question, of how these laws
bore upon the interest of the community. If the Hon.
Member for North Lancashire had come forward a
two lvemon'h ago, and charged the League with being a
seditious body, it might havo been open to him to have
done so ; but for him to do so now, holding the position
of the President of the Publishing Council o
the Agricultural Protection Societies, which had
used the same .means as the League, with the ex-
ception of the great talent which that body brought
to the question, he thought was rather out of place.
Those societies were now copying, though at a very
humble distance, the efforts of the League. Now, as to
the question itself, if he could believe, according to- the
Noble Lord, that there was a regular sliding-scale be-
tween the landlord and the tenant, and that the land-
lord always reduced his rent in proportion to the price
of corn ,he would concede that to he just. But they
never heard of anything but miserable abatements of five,
six, or ten per cent. The tenant tool: the farm in the
expectation of making a rent according to the price pro-
mised by the corn-laws, which those laws were not able
to secure to him. The Right Hon. Baronet had not been
able to secure to the farmers the minimum price of 565.
promised by the sliding-scale.—(No, no.) lle contended
that if he did not make an actual promise, he did a
virtual oue, and that promise had not been kep'. The
Noble Lord alluded to the interests of the poor man,
about which so much was said in that House, and so
little dene. God knew that was true enough. But
where were those who called themselves the friends of
the poor to-night.. They shrank from this discussion.
Where were those who, when they were dealing with
the interests of others, raetised a cheap humanity at
other pop'e's expense.--(Hear, hear.) Where was the
Noble _Led, the Member for Dorsetshire ? 'Where were
all the " young England " party? They were all repre-
sented by the solitary gentleman (Mr. P. Borthwick)
• who had the peculiar distinction of being the only man
in the House who could be found to second the amend-
meet moved to the resolution before the House, and he
must do the Hon. Member the justice to say that he
never saw a man more unwillingly dragged into a
dilemma. He thought too, it was to the credit of the
liouse, that no allusion had been made throughout the
debate, to that amendment, except by the Right Hon.
President of the Board of Trade, who said that where it
could be proved one man had been thrown out of work
by mechinery, he would show a hundred families main-
tained in comfort by it. But where were all those who,
when they were dealing with other people's property,
used such loud language about zeal and care for the poor
man ? Had they all had time to get sober like the Hon.
Member for Nottinghamshire? He could conceive nothing
more contemptible than the position they would henceforth
occupy in public opinion. He totally denied what had
been stated by the Noble Lord as to prices and wages.
A position more untenable, and more unfounded than
that of wages being regulated by prices, he had never
heard. In many parts of the country wages were lower
than they were five years ago. The farmers were not
responsible fur this ; there were more persons pressing
on them for employment, and consequently there was
less money to be divided among them. And he would
take this opportunity of alluding to a practice adopted
in Suffolk, against which he, as an old supporter of the
poor-law in that House, must strongly protest,
that was the introduction of another test besides
the workhouse test, before giving a man a right to
relief. It was the intention of the law that
the workhouse text should be the only one.
That was generally understood in 1833, but it appeared
that in the county of Suffolk a certificate was required
that a man could not obtain work. The Noble Lord had
said that commerce had flourished even when the corn-
laws were more stringent than they were at present. It
was a bold assertion that the corn-laws could in any way
tend to promote commerce ; but the Noble Lord was one
of a clique, and bold assertions of this kind were always
received with favour by gentlemen opposite. Why, it
was well known that every Government found it difficult
to make commercial treaties with other countries in con-

sequence of those laws. The correspondence which had
taken place between the Noble Lord and the Secretary
for Foreign Aff►irs with the Government of Prussia
proved that.—(llear, hear.) lie should like to know
what advant?ge it was to the Noble Lord to pay double
for his sugar. But he supported the sugar duties in order
that the corn-laws might be protected ; for there
was an implicit contract that one interest was to

support the other. The Right Hon. Gentleman the Pre-
sident of the Board of Trade e as fond of abstract princi-
ples. lie declared that he regarded dear bread as the
greatest of public calamities, while in the same breath he
said that the admission of 160,000 quarters of corn, at a
duty of 17s. was a proof of the admirable working of the
present law. The Right Hon. Gentleman, at the head
of the Government also dealt in abstract assertions, of
which, if he performed but the tithe, he, and the band of
free-traders by whom he was surrounded, would most
gladly follow him. He would prefer him ten times to
his Noble Friend the Member for London, who was the
type. of the fixed duty. Should the Right Hon. Baronet
have any further quarrels with his party, the free-
traders would most gladly accept of him for their
leader.—(Laughter.) The Noble Lord upheld the
principle of a fixed duty. The Right lion. Baronet ad-
kered to no principle at all. The Noble Lord hinted
that when they came to a compromise, Hon. Gentlemen
men opposite would find him a most convenient person.
No doubt a fixed duty would be preferable to a sliding-
scale, but if the Right Hon. Baronet could get rid
of the drag chains by which he was encumbered, and
work out a pinion of that large theory
which he put into such a comprehensive shape before
the country, there was no person whom he (Mr.
Ward) would like so well to follow, because the Riglit
Hon. Baronet made a great deal of a bad cause, and if
he only set himself seriously to carry out the principles
which he knew to be right, his eloquence would carry
everything before him; but when the Hon. Member for
Somerset said he now depended on the Government, and
when, after praising the manliness and straightforward-
ness of the speech of the Hon. Gentleman the President
of the Bond of Trade, which he (Mr. Ward) never
before heard were characteristics of that Right Hon.
Gentleman's speeches—(A laugh)—he said he hoped
they would engage in a new compact with the Govern-
ment, the Right Hon. Gentleman actually got excited
on the subject, and put himself out of his ordinary calm
course to cheer the appeal made to him. He had asked
for a fair trial, and he believed the Right Hon. Gentle-
man intended to give the law a fair trial. What was a fair
trial? Was it ore, two, three, five, or ten years ?
He did not believe the Right Hon. Gentleman, the Pre-
sident of the Board of Trade, would have made the
speech they had heard from him last night were it not
for the rain which had fallen, and which had, in some
degree, removed the fears for the harvest. Was the
country to undergo all the misery and suffering of two
or three bad harvests before they had—he would not
say convinced the Right Hon. Baronet, because he was
convinced, as he (Mr. Ward) was—but before he could,
with as &cent a regard for consistency as possible, re-
verse his mode of action? The Right Hon. Gentleman
would then tell Hon. Gentlemen opposite' that the time
was come when it was impossible to 'resist any longer
the general demand for the repeal of the corn-laws. He
knew that at present the advocates for a repeal of the
corn-laws were labouring under a disadvantage, because
there was no scarcity of provisions, and there was no
great deficiency of work. But that was a bad state of
legislation which depended on the state of the weather.
—(Hear.) This was a landlord, and not a tenant question.
There was never anything so bolstered up is this Pro -
Corn law League. The first association was got up by a.
landlord, Mr. Tower of Essex. It was the landlords
who raised the fund to support it. He did not believe
that in a single county the tenants had originated
any movement. It would be wiser—more honourable,
and more profitable, for Hon. Gentlemen opposite to
look at this question fairly and openly, instead of staving
off the evil hour by a large majority of votes, without
convincing any being that they had a single sound argue.
meat upon which to take their stand.—(Cheers.)
Sir J. TROLLOPE said he did not intend to speak
upon this motion, were it not that the Hon. Gentleman
who spoke last asserted the Pro-Corn-law Society had
c. pied the Anti-Corn-law League in everything but
their talents. They did not copy it in interferir
with the elections. One of the fundamental rules of
the Society with which he was connected was not in.
anyway to interfere with the elective franchise, there..
fore that part of the statement of the Hon. Gentleman
was not founded in fact. He also denied the statement
of the Hon'. Gentleman that the Pro. Corn-law Asso-
ciation was repudiated by the tenants of the country
On the contrary, it was originated by the tenants theme.
selves ; at least, that was the case in the county which
he represented. The principle of the Anti-Corn-law
League was an aggressive one—their's was a defensive
one. They were not jealous of the Anti-Corn-las
League ; they simply wished to stand on the protective
system as regarded themselves.—(Hear, hear, from the
Opposition.) One good result which followed from the
Anti-Corn-law League was, that they taught the land.
lords to know their own strength, and they did rot
mean to lose it. The Hon. Gentleman then referred to
the agricultural improvements which had taken place be
the county of Lincoln, and said that if the poor in the
county of Suffolk were employed, and their wages
raised, they would hear no more of incendiary fires.-.e.
(Hear, hear.) The Hon. Member for Sussex mons..
mended capital punishments to put a stop to those in.
cendiaries. He (Sir J. Trollope) hoped that such •
course would never again be resorted to.—(Hear, hear.)
If the corn-laws were repealed all the land must be re•
stored to a state of pasture, and it would afford main•
\tenanco only to shepherds, and the labouring classes
would be ruined.
Mr. M. GIBSON said that in investigating the mode
in which the society for maintaining the corn-laws end
the society for abolishing them had originated, they had
been led away from the real question, which was, what
was the benefit supposed to be conferred upon the coin