XLII. 1846. be, and which will be, associated with the success of those CHAP. measures, is the name of a man who, acting, I believe, from pure and disinterested motives, has advocated their cause with untiring energy, and by appeals to reason, enforced by an eloquence the more to be admired that it was unaffected and unadorned-the name that ought to be, and will be associated with them, is that of Richard Cobden. 85. 'I shall now close the address which it has been my duty to make, thanking the house sincerely for the Concluded. favour with which they have listened to this my last address in my official capacity. Within a few hours the power I have held for five years will have passed into the hands of another. I say it without repining, and with a more lively recollection of the support I have received than the opposition I have encountered. I shall, I fear, leave office with a name severely censured by many honourable men, who, on public principle, deeply lament the severance of party ties, not from any selfish or interested motive, but because they believe fidelity to party, and the existence of great parties, to be powerful instruments of good government. I shall surrender power, severely censured by many honourable men, who, from no interested motives, have adhered to the principles of Protection, because they looked upon them as important to the welfare and interests of the country. I shall leave a name execrated by every monopolist, who, professing honourable opinions, would maintain protection for his own individual benefit. But it may be that I shall be sometimes remembered with goodwill in those places which are the abodes of men whose lot it is to labour and earn their daily bread by the sweat of their brow; in such places, perhaps, my name may be remem- 1 Parl. Deb. bered with expressions of goodwill, when those who in- lxxxvii. habit them recruit their exhausted strength with abun- Ann. Reg. dant and untaxed food, the sweeter because no longer 159. leavened with a sense of injustice." 1 1054, 1056; 1846, 157, CHAP. XLII. 1846. 86. on his free trade mea sures. These were manly words and noble sentiments, bearing the signet-mark of earnestness and sincerity, and worthy of a great minister taking for the last time the Reflections leave of the government of a great people. Yet must the truth of history take something from the brilliancy of the picture, and present the measures which he introduced, and which occasioned his fall, not in the impassioned words of earnest oratory, but in the sober guise of experienced truth. Such a survey will take nothing from the estimate which justice must ever form of the sincerity of the motives and the disinterestedness of the feelings by which the course was actuated, but add much to the difficulties with which its expedience is surrounded. 87. turn to the From what has been said, it is evident that the quesWas a re- tion, whether the permanent repeal of the Corn Laws, Corn Laws, when carried through by Sir R. Peel in 1846, was or famine was was not justifiable on the reasons which he assigned, prac depends entirely on the point, whether or not it was after the ticable? possible, after a temporary suspension of those laws, to have reverted to them when the danger had blown over. There may be difference of opinion on the question whether the potato rot in 1845-6 was so formidable in Ireland as to have rendered necessary the temporary suspension of the import duties; but there can be none whatever, that in the succeeding year the evil had extended to such a degree, and acquired such dimensions, as rendered an entire suspension of all import duties, at least for the time, indispensable. The real question, therefore, is, whether this temporary suspension rendered a lasting repeal unavoidable? Sir R. Peel maintains it did, because, he says, the nation having once tasted of the blessings of free trade in grain, would never go back to Protection; though he admitted there was no cry for repeal then among the working classes, and an entire want of excitement on the subject among them. There does not appear to be any ground for this opinion. The XLII. 1846. sliding-scale had repeatedly, during the last fifteen years, CHAP. reduced the import duties to 1s., especially in 1841, when wheat was at 80s. ; but no difficulty whatever had been experienced in enforcing the enhanced duties when prices fell. In former times, temporary suspensions of the Corn Laws, to meet temporary scarcities, had repeatedly taken place, and on their termination no difficulty had been felt in reverting to the protective duties.* This reason, therefore, put forward by the Premier for making the change permanent, in consequence of a passing calamity, was obviously ill founded. Whether or not the alteration had become unavoidable from a different cause-viz. the growing preponderance in the legislature, as framed by the Reform Bill, of the commercial interests over the agricultural-is a very different question, open to much more variety of opinion, but which, however strongly felt in secret, was not in public put forward as a justification of the lasting change. 88. of scarcity the bill was ward. In truth, long before the Corn-Law Repeal Bill had passed into a law, not only was the necessity of any The danger change after the lapse of years, so far as it arose from had passed any real or supposed scarcity, passed away, but the away before terrors even of immediate want were found to have been brought forextremely exaggerated. So early as 13th January, before the bill was introduced into Parliament, the Duke of Wellington had called Sir R. Peel's attention to the important fact, that the price of potatoes in Ireland at that period was only 6d. a cut. dearer than the average * " In December 1756 Parliament met, and passed an Act discontinuing, for a limited period, the importation duties. In 1767 wheat was at 57s. 4d., and the first act of the session was one allowing the importation of wheat and wheat-flour, oats and oatmeal, rye and rye-meal, into this kingdom, for a limited period, free of duty. At those periods importation was prohibited when wheat was below 57s. 4d., and from that to 80s. it was admissible at a duty of 8s. In 1791 a change in the import duties took place, and in 1793 an Act passed permitting the importation of wheat and flour at the low duties. In 1795 an Act was passed permitting, for a limited time, the importation of corn free of duty; and the same was done in 1799, the price being then 69s."-— Sir R. PEEL'S Cabinet Memorandum, Nov. 29, 1846; Memoirs, ii. 189, 190. XLII. 1846. CHAP. of the eight preceding years—a state of things inconsistent, not merely with famine, but even serious scarcity.* Dr Lyon Playfair, and the Commissioners sent over to inquire into the subject in November preceding, had reported that half the crop had perished; but though this was the case in some districts, it was far from being so generally. Wheat fell in January from 60s., which it had reached at the height of the panic, to 55s. ; and the judicious measures adopted by Government for the introduction of Indian corn produced so abundant a supply, that even in June following, always the most trying time in Ireland, the local authorities reported " that there is still abundance of provisions in the country; the markets, considering all things, are well supplied and reasonable; and the forethought and wise measures of Government with regard to the Indian meal are daily producing their desired effects. The coming crops look favourably, and promise more than an average harvest. A continuance of this system of relief for the next six weeks or two months will ward off the distress, famine, and destitution at one time so much apprehended."1 It is evident, therefore, that the apprehensions entertained of a general scarcity, even of potatoes, had been unfounded; and the crop of oats everywhere had been immense. This state of things was quite consistent with very great distress, loudly calling for Government interposition in particular places; but that was not because food, on the whole, was awanting, but because, the produce of their little possessions Peel's Me- having failed, the people had no money to buy it.2 The 304, 306. remedy for this was not a prospective and remote repeal of the Corn Laws, but an immediate impulse to the 1 Colonel O'Donnell to the Mili tary Secre tary, Dub lin, June 15, 1846; Peel's Mem. ii. 304. moirs, ii. * "In eight years, from 1838 to 1846, the price of potatoes in Dublin markets has varied from 3s. to 4s. per cwt.; the average prices for eight years being 3s. 6d. per cwt. The price at Christmas 1845 was 4s. the cwt., not quite 6d. the cwt. above the average price for the eight years from 1838. This is worthy of attention."-DUKE OF WELLINGTON to SIR R. PEEL, Jan. 13, 1846; Peel's Memoirs, ii. 264. wages of labour by Government employment, and when CHAP. this was afforded, entire relief was experienced.* XLII. 1846. 89. reasons for Laws. If, from the reasons of immediate necessity put forward in support of the repeal of the Corn Laws, we pass to the Durable more durable reasons founded on the state of the public the repeal of mind on the subject, and the strength of the monied and the Corn manufacturing interest in the House of Commons, we shall see much stronger reasons to consider it as a measure which could not be much longer delayed by any Government. In truth, the demand for it arose from the silent change of time; and the existence of that demand was an indication that the time had arrived when nature intended · it should be granted. The very riches of Great Britain, which had grown up during a century and a half of protection, had raised the wages of labour so much in it, owing to the affluence of money from all quarters of the globe, that the manufacturers felt the necessity of some lasting reduction of wages, to enable them to compete with foreign artisans either in the foreign or the home market. The inhabitants of towns, whose gains had been seriously diminished by the monetary policy of Government, sighed for the comparatively cheap supplies of food enjoyed by the inhabitants of poorer foreign states. That very monetary policy, and the system of free trade introduced along with it, had been a part of the great design of cheapening everything, intended to obviate the effects of the accumulation of wealth in a particular State, and the final burdens with which such accumulation is invariably, after a time, attended. To these consuming classes, whose interests were directly adverse to those of the producing, the *" In many places, in the interval between seed-time and hay-harvest, a more than ordinary distress is felt by the cottars, especially in remote districts. In many places the want has been already anticipated, and met by the management of relief committees in donations, and the employment of the poor at public works. Where such arrangements have been made, crime has decreased, and the relief and advantages to the poor have been incalculable."-Col. O'DONNELL to Military Secretary, Dublin, June 15, 1846; Peel's Memoirs, ii. 305. |