The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-05-25 00:00:00

SLAVE-LABOUR SUGAR

140 THE EDITOR OF 11IE MORNING POST.
B'lll,—After an unprecedented waste of time, most of it oc-
cupied by ministers and their supporters in needless repeti-
tions, this debate of eight nights' duration in the House of
Commons has at last terminated in the signal defeat of the
leading measure of this most precious budget, " the intro-
duction of foreign slave labour grown sugar into the con-
sumption of this country," a fate which 1 believe is certain
to attend the remaining portions of it, should it be perse-

vered in

Were the object of this novel debate not of a most serious

and vital character, we might be amused by the ingenious

manner in which it has heeri defended—we might for the mo-
ment be led to forget that we have other colonies, foreign

possessions, public debt, or public faith, to protect—we might
have been induced to conclude that those countries whose

produce they were anxious we should consume in preferenee
to our own, had a choice of cheaper and better markets than
ours, to which if they pleased (should we put them out of
humour) they could resort, and draw from them the supplies
of manufactured goods, and that they were in a mind to give

up all other sources of supply, provided we would abandon
our colonies, and give a preference to their produce. Whilst
ministers promulgated these new theoretical doctrines, they

would delude by attempting to seduce us to believe that if we
admitted foreign sugar here with that of our colonies, con-
sumers would be found for both, that every tea-drinker would
take a double portion of sugar with it, that our manufactu-
rers would thus preserve their present certain market for
their goods which these colonies and possessions afford, and
add to the additional (imaginary) consumption of others over

which we have no control ; forgetting that those countries
are already our customers, although we do not consume their
slave labour sugar, because they can here supply their wants
with better goods on lower terms than they can anywhere
else, thus, without intending it, realising the favourite doc-
trine of these ultra free-treders, " by buying at the cheapest
market." But I trust we are not to be so misled and deluded
by theories that are unsupported by facts, that our past ex-
perience, united with the position which this country occu-
pies, leads us to believe are as impracticable in application,
as they are dangerous, and would prove ruinous, were they
to be acted on.

In our colonies and foreign possessions our manufacturers
possess markets for their goods of great magnitude that are
regularly increasing in extent, that are secured to them by
the control of possession and of mutual interest, and that
know no limit to their increase but the want of increased
means to pay for them ; that they afford us ample supplies of
the most important descriptions of produce, and particularly
of sugar, this bone of contention ; that if their resources were
fully drawn forth, those of India and Australia alone are
known to be capable of supplying us with cotton and wool
sufficient for all our wants, and, therefore, the employment
of our people, so as to render us independent, were it neces-
sary, of foreign production, at the same time taking payment
with certainty for ALL in our home mane factures. Are not
these, then, advantages and resources such as no other country
possesses—are they not an object of envy and jealousy to
others—are they not sources of strength, of power, of pros-
perity, and of wealth—do they not afford a field for creating
and extending still more the employment of British shipping,
the increase of British seamen, that, in time of need, man
our wooden walls, the investment of British capital with
safety and with profit ? I ask, then, is it by putting to ha-
zard, if not by the entire abandonment, of these resources
that we are now called upon to substitute for them theoretical
principles of what is called " free trade," to substitute for
them a foreign connection over which we can have no con-
trol, a connection that would be no longer adhered to (if we
may judge from experience), than suited the interests or con-
venience of the parties (bear witness our trade with Java),
whilst at the same time, and without such or any sacrifice
from us, they already happen to possess, through our means,
the other markets for their produce, the payment for which
they take from us in our goods, and will continue to do so as
long as we can supply them of better quality and on lower
terms than they can have them elsewhere, and no longer,
whether we eat their slave-labour sugar, or sell it to others,
whatever tales of fancy may be told on the contrary, since
such is " human nature," whose laws are like those of the
Medes and Persians, not given to change ? Let us, then, ad-
here to the counsels of common sense and past experience ;
with such guides we are not to be induced to attempt build-
ing castles in the air by the clever and ingenious but theore-
tical speeches of Lords Palmerston and John Russell—let
us call to mind the old adage, and act upon it, since "a bird
in the hand is worth two in the bush."
It is certainly amusing to see the cleverness with which
ministers would shift from their own shoulders to that of
parliament the responsibility that attaches to their absurd
measure of introducing foreign coffee into consumption here
through circuitous and expensive intermediate British ports,
as if they were ashamed of their measures, and were desirous
to conceal them from public view ! If a supply of foreign
coffee, the fruit of slave labour, was for a time really wanted
here, though only for a short time, as growing sources of Bri-
tish supply from India will soon render it abundant, why
not admit the direct import from the places of growth ? And
if it had been thought advisable to increase the cost, why
not have done it by further additional duty, in place of load-
ing the article with unnecessary additional freight, insurance,
commissions, landing, and reloading charges at these inter-
mediate ports? But this was a discovery, a stretch of po-
licy, reserved to be discovered by our present sapient mini-
sters, and the result has, I have been informed and believe,
been productive of the most ruinous results to many of the
unfortunate adventurers who were induced to emerge in
this trade. The quantity of foreign coffee thus imported
during the last year, has, I understand, amounted to double
the annual consumption here ; the market has thus been
glutted , and the price reduced one-third, tothe loss and dis-
may of those interested : and thus affords a practical illus-
tration that such would be the fate of our planters, as well
as of the speculators iu foreign sugars, were the measures of
government to be adopted ; but they have, fortunately for all,
been defeated.
Another of these measures of the present government was
to permit foreign sugar refined here, to be exported for the
supply of our colonies, to the exclusion of the British, which
was formerly protected by a small bounty that was included
in the drawback on exportation when refined, but of which
their policy has deprived the refiner, and thus compels him
either to abandon his manufacture, or resort to the sugar of
slave labour. Yet, ministers, " turning their backs upon
themselves," and repudiating their own acts, endeavour to
bolster up an argument founded upon it in favour of their
proposition to admit foreign slave sugar for consumption
here.
This brings me to another branch of their defence ; that is,
justifying the admission of slave-labour sugar for our con-
sumption, because that other produce so admitted and con-
sumed is produced by the same means. Now, let us examine
the facts of the case. This country has made considerable
sacrifices to put down slavery, with success in our own colo-
nies, with failure and disappointment everywhere else. De-
sirous to effect this object, from motives alike disinterested,
humane, and honourable, it never was professed that in order
to do so we would not consume any of the productions of
slave labour with which we could not be supplied from other
sources, and that were necessary for the employment of our
people, and the supply of the ordinary wants of the country.
Had the principle been pushed to this extent, every one
must be satisfied it would have been fruitless and vain in-
flicting injury, here without tending to suppress slavery else-
where. Such has hitherto been the usage, and to which we
have always found it necessary to conform, but the case with
ministers is of a very different character. After making va-
rious efforts ,to suppress the foreign slave trade, made at a
great national expense of life and treasure, they turn round
and tell us, it is a failure, the case is hopeles, and therefore
they will avail themselves of the fruits of slavery for the pur-
poses of trade and revenue, by opening a new market for the
sale and consumption of slave-labour sugar, thus giving di-
rect encouragement to that which they have spent so much
life, money, and time, in vainly endeavouring to put down,
whilst at the same time they tell us they are continuing to
exert themselves in endeavouring to influence other countries
to unite with us by treaty or by force to suppress it; thus, in
the fulness of inconsistency, blowing hot and cold in the
same breath. We do not, we cannot, expect to extinguish
slavery by our own means alone ; but that is not a reason
why we should not, as hitherto, continue to consume such ar-
tielessas are the fruit of it, whilst they are necessary for the
support and employment of the people, and that we cannot
at present be supplied with from other sources, or that we
should now lend ourselves to promote and extend a system
which all unite in condemning, where no necessity whatever
exists for doing so, by the introduction of slave sugar here,
whilst we have abundance that is the fruit of free labour, the
produce of our own colonies and possessions, to supply our
consumption, which has the additional recommendation of
being paid for with our manufactures.
To sell our manufactures in the Brazils, it is necessary to
take payment in the produce of the country. We do not
consume their sugar because we have ample supplies of our
own, which, coming from a purer source, as well as for the
reasons previously stated, we prefer; but that is no reason
why we should not receive and sell their sugar to others who
do not object to consume it ; and if by refining it previously
we can obtain a more beneficial price, I can see no good
reason why we should not avail ourselves of the superior
means we possess for doing so. It can be of no importance to
us whether they use it in a refined or unrefined state, nor
does this measure in the least degree appear to me to bear on
the general question, or to justify the measures the govern-
ment proposed to have adopted although they endeavoured
to draw such a conclusion from it.—l am, sir,
Your obedient servant,
JOHN GLADSTONE.
Carlton-gardens, May 19, 1841.