The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-06-18 00:00:00

PAD Vubitrations.

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" PROSPER THE ART,"
Composed by GEORGE HARGREAVES,
THE WORDS BY
Brother JAMES STONEHOUSE,
of Lodge No. 615, Chester,
and dedicated, by special permission, to his Royal Highness
the Duke of SUSSEX, Most Worshipful Grand Master of
Free and Accepted Masons in England

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WORKS _THE4::I?`I._ EYE AND EAR,

TO THE ELECTORS OF SOUTH LANCASHIRE.
GENTLEMEN,—Being now on the eve of a dissolution
of parliament, and having to restore into your hands the
trust which you did me the honour to confide to my care, it
becomes my duty to inform you, that I again intend to solicit
your suffrages, and to offer myself for the third time as a
candidate for the representation of South Lancashire.
Since I have held the distinguished situation of being one
of your members, I have on several occasions explained to
you my political opinions, and I will only say of them gene-
rally, that they remain unchanged • but at this moment,
when the country has been so reckle ly agitated by the plans
of financial and commercial cha , proposed by a govern-
ment having neither the power the intention of carrying
them into effect, it is right th I should more particularly
allude to them.
With respect to the corn-laws, I approve of the principle
of the graduated scale of the present laws, and, should any
new modification of them on that principle be brought for-
ward, would give it my most serious consideration ; but to the
proposed alteration to a fixed duty, I am adverse, as I think
it will lead to the ruin of our agricultural population, without
even benefitting the manufacturing classes. It will tend to
make this country dependent upon foreign countries for the
supply of corn, which, in time of great scarcity, either at
home or abroad, will be at a higher price to the consumer
than under the existing law.
An immense body of agricultural labourers, being thrown
out of employment, will seek it in manufacturing districts,
and thereby produce a great reduction in the wages of all the
working classes, by the competition arising out of surplus
labour ; and even allowing the price of bread to be cheaper,
which is very doubtful, the fall in the price of bread will not
be in proportion to the fall of the amount of wages.
I cannot, therefore, but consider the plan of a fixed duty
on corn as delusive.
I think the opportunity has been singularly ill-chosen for
the alteration of the corn duties, as our West Indian colonies
are just beginning to recover their energies after the great
and successful experiment of Negro emancipation, and when,
both from them and from our East Indian possessions, a
more abundane supply of free-grown sugar is in every suc-
cessive year to be expected.
The government having given so little information as to
the benefits to be derived from the alteration of the timber
duties, and it being apparent that our Canadian trade and
shipping interests would sustain great injury by the alteration,
I need only say I am opposed to the plan as suggested by
the government.
I am not adverse to a careful revision of the import duties
by a strong and capable government possessing the confi-
dence of the country ; but I look with distrust upon the
schemes of a ministry who bring forward such extensive
changes in our commercial relations, with the sole view of
creating temporary popularity in their favour, and of endea-
vouring by agitation to gain a few more votes at the ensuing
elections, to prop up their weak and tottering administration.
Having principally alluded to the most engrossing topics
of the present day, I pass over others on which my opinions
are, I believe, pretty well understood, and beg to assure you
that my time and services are again at your disposal, should
it be your pleasure for a third time to intrust me to your
important interests.—l remain, gentlemen, your obedient,
humble servant,

R. BOOTLE WILBRAHAM

TO THE ELECTORS OF SOUTH LANCASHIRE
GENTLEMEN,
THE occasion being at hand when you will be called upon.
to exercise your privilege in the election of., your repre-
sentatives, I consider it my duty respectfully to present
myself to your notice as a Candidate for the onourable post
to which 1 have twice been elevated by majority of your
suffrages.
On those former occasions I hay d to address you on
subjects of general policy, on whi my opinions are un-
changed, and I have no reason to presume that yours have
undergone alteration. On such it would be idle now to
detain you, and improper to do so with any purpose of di.
verting your attention from topics of superior interest, at
the moment on which you have a right to know my opinions.
I am opposed to a total repeal of duties on the importation
of corn ; though, not speaking with the authority of a minis-
ter of the crown, I do not affix the character of madness or
criminality to those with whom I differ on this point. I
believe, however, that confusion and transfer of property,
amounting to a social revolution, would be the consequences
of that measure; that its best success would be some exten-
sion of our manufacturing establishments unattended with
any real improvement in the condition of the operative, but
accompanied by great risk to him from dependance on foreign
nations for supply, and by a disturbance of the home market,
which would confirm and extend the distress under which he
now labours.
Such a measure, however, I would, on the best considera-
tion I can give the subject, adopt, in preference to the fixed
duty now proposed by government, which, taking into ac-
count all the circumstances of its introduction, I consider
an indirect but certain mode of effecting total repeal. I do
not believe, or mean to insinuate, that it is advocated by
Lord John Russell with this view or intention ; and I am
well aware that it holds out a prospect of certain advantages,
which have conciliated towards it the opinions of many per-
sons of weight and authority, who have no object in view
but the good of the community. Believing however, that
to the agriculturists its protection would be delusive, that as
a compromise between parties who suppose their interest to
be conflicting, it would be inefficacious for any purpose of
peace or conciliation ; that it would lead to periodical colli-
sions with the people, which no intervention could allay, and
no authority resist; and that it would break down under the
first pressure of a deficient harvest, I, at least, could not be
among its honest supporters.
To a full, careful, and dispassionate revision of the present
system of fluctuating duty, I have not only no objection,
but I think the time is arrived when such revision is required.
I have observed and read too much of the prophecies of the
ablest men, on extensive measures of political economy, not
to entertain with doubt predictions of exact results. I may
hope, however, that by the application of experience, and
the exertion of the best undsrstandings, modifications of the
present scale may be adopted, which may remedy the main
evils complained of as its concomitants, without the substi-
tution of greater. In all discussions of the subject, when-
ever doubt may arise, whenever authorities may be nicely
balanced, I shall feel it my duty to act as I may conjecture
those who hold the converse of my position in the country
will act. I presume that the man who is in the centre of a
strictly rural population, will look to its wishes and apparent
interests. I shall do likewise ; and if he looks to his ricks,
I shall look to my chimneys and those of my neighbours.
With respect to the other proposals of government, on
sugar I have stated in parliament my estimate of the extent
of the relief proposed by government to the consumer, and
my reasons for not accepting it. I have seen no reason to
retract my calculation, or alter my opinion. Timber appears,
by consent of ministers, to have slipped through a hole in the
budget.
1 believe the poor-law, in many of its leading provisions,
unsited to South Lancashire, and uncalled for by the pre-
existing state of the administration of relief to the poor in
that part of the kingdom. This subject is one which has
been condemned as unfit for discussion in parliament at a
moment of expected dissolution. lam unable to understand
the practical distinction thus drawn by Lord John Russell
between the poor-law and the corn-law. It is true, as he
has stated, that in the one case details were under the con-
sideration of the house, in the other it might be the object of
ministers to limit the discussion to principles ; but the at-
tempt at such limitation would have been vain. The princi-
ples on which the government advocate a fixed duty on corn
were perfectly well known through former discussions, and
I know now why the virtue and sincerity of members about
to face their constituents should be more distrusted on the
one subject than the other.
I consider a revision of our commercial tariff a task worthy
of a strong and united government, and by such a government
I hope to see it undertaken.
An address of this description is necessarily but a slight
summary of topics of leading interest at the moment. I have
confined myself to one object, that of giving you the means
of judging whether, on the score of my opinions on subjects
which have grown into recent importance, you have reason
to withhold the confidence you have twice reposed in me. I
might have contrived to obscure or postpone the enunciation
of those opinions under the smoke of an attack on the conduct
i and proceedings of a government to which I am opposed ;
but I have thought it fairer not to mix up the exposition of
any own views with reflections on the views or conduct of
others.

I am ready, if called upon, for controversy on these mat-
ters, in its proper time and place. In one respect, perhaps,
I may enter at a disadvantage into the strife of parties. Bo-
dily infirmity, with pain and exhaustion in its train, cannot
confer the wisdom of age ; but I sensibly feel that it may
produce an indifference to the ordinary prizes and rewards of
political contention, which age itself does not always inculcate.
I have no ambititon left but that of carrying with me to re-
tirement, or elsewhere, the consciousness that I have not
neglected a legitimate occasion of serving the community in
which I live. Twice you have afforded me what seemed to
me that occasion. It is now at your discretion to withdraw
or reimpose the obligation under which your confidence and
support have laid me. Proud of that confidence as hitherto
enjoyed, and with a grateful recollection of that support
which no time or circumstance can obliterate, I respectfully
wait your decision.—l remain, Gentlemen, your obedient,
humble Servant, FRANCIS EGERTON.