The Sun.
London, England, 1842-02-15 00:00:00

in Parliament assembled,

The Petition of the Church and Congregation worshipping at
Ebenezer Chapel, Steelhouse-lane, Birmingham ;
Humbly showeth,—That your petitioners beg to state, that,
in their opinion, the agricultural interest is of vast importance
to the prosperity of the British nation, but as what is morally
wrong cannot be politically right, they are decidedly of opinion
that to attempt to support that interest by any indirect taxation
on the commercial interests of the kingdom is no less impolitic
than unjust, and necessarily calculated to injure rather than
promote it.
Your petitioners therefore pray Tour Honourable House at
once to repeal all laws which tend to enhance the price of bread,
and for the following reasons :

I. Such laws are based on injustice, as the following state-
ment will prove .
The Cern-laws, and indeed all laws, which tend to enhance
the price of provisions are a tax, not on wealth but on poverty,
and the tax becomes oppressive in an exact ratio to the de-
grees of a man's poverty.
This is evident from the following scale of calculation.
Assuming that the tax raises the price of a loaf from sixpence
to eightpence, every consumer of such a loaf pays a tax of two-
pence.
A man has a family, consisting of six members, who consume
one loaf a day, his income is one guinea, two, five, ten, fifty.
His neighbour has also six in his family ; but as they have no
meat, or fish, or eggs to eat, no ale or wine to drink, they will
consume two loaves a day. This man's income is three shil-
lings, two shillings, or eighteen.penee a day. Thus, while the
rich man, whose income is fifty guineas a day, pays only two-
pence as his quota of the tax, the poor man who has only
eighteen-pence a day pays fourpence.
Your petitioners, therefore, solemnly protest against a law
which is based on such unjust and iniquitous principles, and
now appeal to your Honourable House, and ask whether you
can reasonably expect the great mass of our labouring popu-
lation to remain contented with such a scheme of legislation.
2. Such laws, by their practical operation, inflict such a
vast amount of suffering on the great masses of the people,
while they tend, at the same time, to increase the wealth of
the affluent. The rich landlord, whose rent is raised by the
operation of the Corn-laws, can afford to indulge his appetite
with all the luxuries which the most remote countries can
supply; but this indulgence is gratified by entailing the most
appalling suffering on the poor. They are doomed to a con-
dition of half starvation in the land of abundance. They
wander about the streets telling their tale of woe, or remain
within their dreary habitations pouring forth their lamentations
in tones too agonizing to disclose. Thousands and tens of
thousands are not half fed, and while they are compelled to
devote all their money to purchame food, they are all left with-
out a sufficiency of clothing, of fuel, and of all the other com-
forts of life.

3. Such laws tend to promote universal discontent, and, un-
less repealed, will cause the suffering poor to long for some or-
ganic cnange in the political constitution of the country. The
suffering poor know that many of the aristocracy are dissatisfied
with the laws ; that the late Government and their' gracious
Queen wished to effect a change in these unjust and cruel
laws ; that some of the members of the present Administration
have, by their speeches and pamphlets, protested against these
laws as the primary cause of national suffering ; that the manu-
facturers, tradesmen, and especially that the patriotic Dissent-
ing ministers of the country, denounce these laws as in opposi-
tion to the laws of God as laid down in the Scriptures ; and to
suppose, while they know this accumulating amount of dissatis-
faction is daily increasing amongst the classes above them, that
they will patiently submit to their sufferings without cherishing
feelings hostile to the Government, which could, but which
neglects, to relieve them, would beno less childish than absurd.
Your petitioners, therefore, hope that your Honourable
House will take the subject of an early and entire repeal of
these unjust laws into your serious consideration.
And your petitioners will ever pray.
Mr:C. WOOD presented several similar petitions frum
congregations in the town of Halifax.
Mr. DENISTOUN presented 128 petitions from Glas-
gow and other places, one of, which bore 54,658 signa-
tures.—(Hear, hear.) That petition denounced the
measure of. the Government as an insult to the country,
and in that he cordially agreed with thein.—(Hear, hear.)
The petitioners, however, had no hope of any beneficial
remedy from the House as at present constituted.
Mr. BROTHERTON presented 14 petitions from places
in Lancashire and Cheshire, for a total repeal of the Corn-
laws. The petitioners viewed with astonishment and
indignation the attempt made by the Government to
impose upon the common sense of the people by their
proposition respecting those laws.—(Cheers.)
Mr. GRANTLEY BERKELEY presented several
ley; Caine, and
!Similar petitions from Kendal- and other places were
poethtietii.opnisacteostihne
Gsinomuceesetfte'erschtirfr Dure
presented by 'Mr. G. W. Wood, Mr. Carter, and an Hon.
Member ivhose name we did not learn.
COLONEL CONOLLY presented a petition from
Donegal praying for an alteration of the laws affecting
the laws relating to Presbyterian marriages.
Sir G. STRICKLAND presented a petition from
Preston, signed by 16,800 persons, praying that those
unjust laws might be struck out of the statute-book, be-
cause they defeated the benevolent intentions of Provi-
dence. The Hon. Member also presented a petition from the
Mayor, Aldermen,
and Burgesses of the borough of Pres-
ton ; and one frOm Fleetwood, in Lancashire; and 26
from different parts of the WeSt Riding of Yorshire, to
the same effect.
Mr. EWAItT presented a petition from 28,000 of the
inhabitants of Edinburgh; also from the inhabitants of
Preston in Lancashire ; from Forfarshire ; from the
borough of Selkirk, from a Congregational Church as-
sembling. in Fife ; 13 from different families in Wigram,
and one from the inhabitants, all praying for a repeal of
the Corn-laws.
Mr. H. BERKELEY presented 47 petitions from 47
different trades in the city of Bristol, praying for It repeal
Of the Corn-lawsi also from 17,799 inhabitants of the
cif and 'county of Bristol to the same effect. •
Nr.3IIINER GIBSON presented a .petition from