New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1870-02-16

can consider intelligently such q serious thing as
emigrating. When he has got the information he
probably has not got the money, for want of which
his information and his conviction are no prac-
teal help to him. One object of the Emigration
SOcieties-which they have in common with the
various Colonial agencies in LOndon-is to supply
the information. Another is to supply the money, or
what is equivalent to moneyfree passage to Austria
liza or to America The existence Of the difficulties for
which emigration on q great scale is proposed rs q
remedy, nobody denies. That emigration Is suit
able remedy is getting to be generally conceded.
That it would be cheaper to pay for emigration than
to support great pauper class at home Is demon
strated by figures All this being granted the work
of the emigration societies might be easy but it has
not proved easy; and there are, of course reasons
for the opposition to it that exists.
doubt whether Capital is IN favor OF Emigration.
Capital wants cheap Labor, and though as rule the
moneyed class does not take broad views 1t always
includes men who do take broad views. 1t scarcely
needs q broad view TO see that Labor must become
dearer as il becomes scarcer and that in proportion
as the laborng class thins by emigration. wages will
rise Needless TO say, Capital does not want wages
to rise. and there are, therefore, many great en-
ployers who oppose emigration
At the first glance it would seem if the capital
invested in Land must, equally with the capital i'll
vested in manufactures, resist any movement which
tends TO raise wages. Land pays a less percentage
on the capital invested in it than anything else 1t
can less afford to reduce its income by conceding
higher wages to the mseraby paid tilers of the SOIL
But there is another consideration beginning 10
operate on the minds of great landowners. The
agitation in Ireland raised il long since in the minds
of Irish landowners and has kept it before their
eyes. You may say it is Just beginning to make its
way In England The millions who are excluded
from the soil, who occupy it only by permission,
and who can never hope to own, under the existing
system an acre of ground, are beginning to ask by
what right they are excluded, and what
is the title by which few thousands
of men in England claim to exercise and do
exercise, monopoly in the land. As Mr. Bright said
of the Lords so it may belsaid of the landowners
that they are not very wise-and if the landowners
are not all Lords, at least the Lords all land
owners Not very wise. perhaps; but they have a
kind of dumb instinct which leads them to appre-
bend storm. Some of them feel that their danger
will be lessened. at any rate postponed, if the
number of the landlcss can be diminished. With "A
worthy of Artemus Ward. they pro-
pose TO diminish the number by giving them not
any part of their own estates in England, but
else in Canada or Australia They are
very willing to see inquiring men exported beyond
the seas. For every ship load that quits England
there are so many less claimants to English land.
Knowing something about the strength of the feel
ing in the working classes in respect to land was
none the less surprised to find it expressed and
adopted by such a man as Mr.. Samuel Morley. / do
not mean that he lacks sympathy with the working
and poorer classes On the contrary. Mr.. Morley is
man known all over England for his philanthropy.
But he belongs Co the capitalist class and is
man ia that class With the aristo-
cratic landed class would think of identifying
him, yet everybody must have felt a certain amaze
ment to hear from him sentiments which the Tory
press will hasten to denounce as agraran. They
would be much worse to keep quiet. For what does
Mr.. Morley say? I've, are told that there
were millions of acres Of unWcupied land in
Canada, in Australia. and in the United
States. But am one OF those who believe that there
are also millions of unoccuped acres in England"
And that there might be mistake about his mean
ng he added That is a large question. know,
but il is question the consideration of which cannot
be much longer delayed" Mr. Morley is a member
IF Parliament. ! hope he will say much in the
House Mr. r. 4. Taylor the member for Leicester
said as much and more the other day in speech to
MS constituents Nobody doubts that he is ready to
stir the question in Parliament; but M Taylor has
he misfortune 70 Dc considered a Radical, which is
almost as fatal IN England as it in America
10 be called an AbolitOnist. But there is in Paria
mout a small body of men ready TO start even in that
treat land-OWning body the same questions for En-
gland which are already far Oh their way to all
answer for Ireland. DO You wonder that in snch
cloud already gathering in the
.ky-the land-owning class favOrs emigration II
NAV well favor it. though the immediate effect
should be- what it cannot be, to double the wages Of
aborcrs on every estate in every county in England.
What have said will show clearly enough that
there are two aspects to the emigration question
one phlantlmopc. tho other political Mr. Morley
looks to il as means Of relieving Immediately great
distress that cannot he relieved otherwise. The men
whose objects are political do not ALI 90 to emiTa-
ton meetings. much less make speeches, but ven
ture TO predict that when the application comes, as
it soon will for legislative aid Ito a great scheme,
such men will not be found voting against giving
public money. Just now the fashionable phrase is
Imperial policy and the peopng of the colonies is
To be urged on the ground that it Will strengthen
the Empire of Great Britain i'll the remote quarters
Of the globe Ii is even possible that this cOnsdcra-
ton NAV attract attention in Parliament where
nothing is so difficult at present as to get hearing
ON any subject that any part of the Empire
living outside of the two little islands which obsruct
navigation between the North Atlantic ED German
Oceans.
common object in promoting emigra-
ton. Unhapply there has already sprung mp be-
tween them kind of rivalry, if not ill-will. Yet
both contemplate great plans both look to State ald,
and tbere il more than work enough for both II would
not be too much to say that the feeling among null
titudes of English workmen amounts almost 10 de-
spair. At home they can nothing before them
but the workhouse. am not speaking OF q class OF
idle or ignorant artisans of whom there are always
some who look to public support as a natural ana