The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-05-04 00:00:00

says—

" We think our Liverpool contemporary tries to prove too
much when he maintains, that inland bonding will be Nu-
rious to Liverpool, without conferring any benefit on Man-
chester. If, as he suggests, the Manchester manufacturer
finds that he is worse served at home Man in Liverpool, he
will very soon cease to buy at home, and the privilege of bond-
ing at Manchester will become a dead letter. Whatever the
editor of the Standard may think of our manufacturers and
dealers, we assure him that they have no affection for buying
in disadvantageous markets; and therefore unless the pri-
vilege now sought for should prove beneficial to them, our
Liverpoolfriends need not fear any injury to their interests."
Thus, as we have said, the inland bonding bill comes,
after all, to be, ex confesso, a mere tentative effort, got
up for the gratification of the curious, and sought for
just to give certain factory proprietors of Manchester
an opportunity of ascertaining whether they may not
be able to combine in their own persons the various
professions of merchant and manufacturer, broker and
principal, and sweep the profits and remuneration of
all and each into their own coffers. This is just the
scheme, and in this laudable attempt to serve them-
selves, they think it quite a hardship that any body
should disturb them, and esteem it, we should suppose,
a particular condescension to Liverpool to inform us
that " if the experiment should FAIL," we shall, in that
case, " have nothing to fear." Well, really that is a
consolation ! Thank you, good sirs. We pick up this
crumb of comfort, and esteem it quite a. favour at your
hands. But we beg to ask, is this a sufficient ground
to apply to parliament upon ? Will parliament be jus-
tified in disturbing the existing law, and all those mul-
tiplied relations that have grown up from, and prospered
in connection with it, merely to favour a speculation
of this sort ?

"But if it fails," says a chosen champion of the
change, " don't imagine that our knowing people here
will persevere in the use of a disadvantageous market ;
by no means; in that case they will return again to the
ancient way." Just so ; but in the mean time, will
no injury be inflicted upon others while the experiment
is in the course of probation ? We. say, yea, very great ;
and we add, therefore, that it would be quite monstrous
in the legislature to pass a law so fraught with mischief
in various points of view, merely to gratify parties who
themselves acknowledge that the scheme is at best but
a doubtful experiment.

" Unless the privilege now sought should prove
beneficial to them, (i. e., the Manchester experimen-
talists,) our Liverpool friends need not fear any injury
to their interests." But if it should prove beneficial to
the Man chesterians—what then ? Why then, of course,
their " Liverpool friends" must experience the injury,
and pocket the affront. But we ask, why should the
legislature give this needless preference to Manchester,
and inflict so much admitted injury upon Liverpool ?
Is it because the representation of Manchester is
Liberal, and that of Liverpool Conservative ? Is it

upon this principle, and with this reference, that favours
are to be bestowed, and fines inflicted on different
localities, by the collective wisdom of the nation ? A
proposition so monstrous will not, we know, be openly
asserted ; we would not say, however, that it would
not on that account be the less near to being secretly
acted upon. The question is, we affirm, being worked
at this moment as a party one, and a liberal interest is
largely engaged in the conducting of it. It behoves
Conservatives, then, to meet this policy, and coun-
teract it

And surely the Conservatives of Liverpool

never undertook any cause more consistent with their
designation and principles than this which is so closely
connected with the commercial prosperity and interests
of the town. They have been greatly too remiss
hitherto ; but we believe there is yet time to permit a
strong exhibition of their sentiments being of avail,
and we would earnestly recommend them to make it
without delay.
But we must not omit to mention, that our Manches-

ter contemporary is quite merry at our supposition of
Liverpool having any vested interest in this matter.
"What vested interest," he says, " the aggregation of
buildings which men call Liverpool, can have in this or in
any other matter, we do not distinctly comprehend. If the
Standard means, that particular brokers and merchants and
warehouse-owners there residing have a vested interest, we
can comprehend, though we do by no means agree with him.
Liverpool may be very- "properly the handmaid of Man-
chester;" but we altogether deny, that Manchester is bound
to retain her handmaids any longer than their services are
required. London was once, as regarded the trade to China,
literally the handmaid of Liverpool; she .bmded the tea;
but we have no recollection of our Liverpool friends standing
up for the vested interests of London."
That Manchester is not bound to "retain her hand-
maids any longer than their services are required" we

but that Liverpool I

no vested interest

in that system by which her merchants, and other in-
habitants, were induced largely to direct their capital
and devote their time to certain objects, and which,
with the abolition of that system, would in a great mea-

sure cease to exist for their benefit, is what we deny,
and what we should conceive any impartial tribunal

vould rule in our favour

Our contemporary's allusion to the China monopoly
will not afford him the least support. That monopoly
was taken from the East India Company, not that it
might be shared merely with Liverpool, or Bristol, or

Glasgow, or any other port, but that the community at
large might obtain an important article of consumption

at a reduced price. The removal of the monopoly wag
intended as a boon to the kingdom, and if all the advan-

tares contemplated have not followed, some unques-
tionably have. But is there any pretext—any decent
excuse of this kind set up in the case of this inland
bonding bill ? How are the people—how is the com-
munity at large to be served by depriving Liverpool of
her natural or acquired advantages, and transferring,

or attempting to transfer them to some inland town ?
Who will gain by that ? Will Manchester goods be
lowered in price to the consumer by reason of that
piece of transmutation ? No ; not one twentieth part
of a farthing in the bale. It is altogether an affair of
the factory ; the community at large has no interest in
it. The question then comes simply to this—is a posi-
tive injury to be done to one place on the very remote
chance of some contingent good being done to another,
or some few in it, without even the pretence of any
general result beneficial to the community being looked
for ? We submit that there is but one answer to this
question, and that any other involves palpable unsound-
ness in theory, and gross injustice in action.

Our disgraced and discomfited ministry has resorted
o a base expedient, which has excited for the moment
o much surprise and indignation thatithe settled feel-
ng of the country has not yet had time to utter itself.
hey feel that their ship is sinking, and they care not

what they throw overboard in their undissembled ter-
ror and desperate effort to lighten it. Their defeat of

Thursday exhibits their miserable weakness without
,he possibility of disguise. Ther Irish Registration
3111, on which they have existed, or rather endeavoured

since the commencement of the
ession, is now gone to the tomb of all the Capulets.

o escape extinction,

['heir humiliation is as palpable as it is painful, and
he question in every body's mouth is, or was, what will
hey do now ? Will they resign ? But no ; that, in-
deed, will be the last sign they will ever make. They
have the anti-corn-law sedition yet to feed. The corn
duties remain to be repealed, and why should these
faithful, fast-sticking ministers resign, whilst they have
that card to play ? This is surely an admirable sop
for Cerberus ; and if it fails, have they not annual par-
meats and vote by ballot yet to give away, or pro-
And, failing these, they have still in reserve
universal suffrage, or some other incredible thing, no
mattter how revolutionary or abominable, so as it would

mise ?

afford them something to promise and another quarter
in office. The head of the coterie has declared, and
the declaration is on record, that to repeal the corn
duties would be madness ; nor have his party hitherto
given any intimation that they had the most distant
notion of yielding to the clamour on this head. But

necessity is a severe task-master. It did not then
" rain minorities" so thick and fast upon them, nor
was disgrace altogether so familiar with them as it is
now. Desperate cases require desperate remedies, and
now the malady has arrived at that stage when these
appliances must be had recourse to. But will they
effect a cure ? We are perfectly confident that they
will not. The people are sick of the O'Connell-Whigs,
and will not be gulled by the base and unprincipled
stratagem which they have just put in operation.
Whiggery is unpopular, and nothing can save its down-
fall. We shall take another opportunity fully to justify
these several allegations.

As to the budget we have only to observe, that it
affords another melancholy proof of the desperate
shifts to which these reckless incapables are driven.
Not only are our colonies sacrificed, but religion and
morality are outraged by the ways and means to which
they have resorted, to catch at revenue and supply de-
ficiencies. Admirable moralists ! Excellent patriGts !
Skilful managers ! Incomparable ministers !