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CHAP. XXXVIII.

1841. 41.

Such was the weakness of Ministers that they were obliged to temporise with various measures which they had very recently denounced in the most unmeasured New Re- terms. Lord Melbourne had declared in Parliament for Ireland, that the project of repealing the Union was little better and its fate. than high treason, and the idea of repealing the Corn

form Bill

Laws absolute insanity; but with both measures Ministers, to avoid ruin, were obliged to temporise. To conciliate O'Connell and the Irish Catholic members, who composed the majority which retained them in power, they brought forward a bill for the registration of voters in Ireland, the purport of which was, under the name of a mere regulation, to introduce a new Reform Bill, greatly extending the constituency, by making a rating at five pounds to the poor-rate confer the parliamentary suffrage. This was in effect a new Reform Bill reducing the suffrage one half, and as such it threatened the most dangerous consequences, especially in a country agitated by the cry for repeal of the Union. Accordingly it was resisted by Sir R. Peel with the whole strength of the Conservative party. The result was, that it was carried in the Commons only by a majority of five, the numbers being 299 to 294. This small majority was justly considered as fatal to the bill; and the final fate of the measure proved that it was scarcely less so to the Administration. In committee, Ministers were obliged to agree to an amendment proposed by Lord Howick which raised the qualification to £8, "a change which," Sir R. Peel observed, "disentitled them to the confidence of the Ann. Reg, house or the country." In effect, Ministers lost credit Doubleday essentially by the conduct pursued in regard to this bill with both parties-with the one side of the house by bringing it in, with the other for substantially abandoning it when introduced.1

1841, 54-59;

ii. 302, 303;

Parl. Deb.

lvii. 1072, 1223.

It was now evident to all the world that the Whig Ministry were doomed, and that it was only a question

XXXVIII.

1841.

1841.

of time when their tenure of office should come to an end. CHAP. As a last resource, Lord John Russell gave notice that on the 31st May he would move for a committee of the 42. whole house to consider the acts of Parliament relating The Whig budget. to the importation of grain-the very thing which, in the May 18, preceding session, he had opposed, and which Lord Melbourne had declared to be the greatest insanity which could enter into the human head. The discussion of this motion, however, and the development of the grounds on which it was now to be supported by Government, was prevented by the turn which Parliament took before the day originally fixed for its discussion came on. The state of the finances had become so pressing, from the serious chasm occasioned by the penny postage and the decline of several branches of the revenue from the general distress, that it was indispensable, at all hazards, to make an attempt to fill it up. Yet was this no easy matter; for how ready soever all parties might be to repeal taxes, it was more than doubtful whether any of them would consent to lay them on again. At the same time, any increase to the direct taxes was sure to be to the last degree unpopular, and resisted with the utmost obstinacy, especially by the Conservative party. Pressed by so many difficulties, the Government endeavoured to steer a middle course, which, as usual in such cases, displeased all parties and conciliated none. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in opening the budget, admitted that the deficit for the ensuing year would amount to £2,421,000; and this deficit he proposed to make up by reverting to the principles of the former Whig budget which had been so unceremoniously disposed of in 1831. His proposal was to raise the duty on colonial timber from 10s. to 20s. a load, and reduce that on Baltic timber from 55s. a load to 50s.; and to leave the duty on colonial sugar at its present amount of 24s. a cwt., but to lower the duty on foreign sugar from 63s. to 36s. From

XXXVIII.

1841.

CHAP. these sources, owing to the increased consumption, he calculated on an increase of revenue to the extent of £1,300,000. The balance of the deficiency was to be made up by a fixed duty of 8s. a quarter on foreign wheat; rye, 5s.; barley, 4s. 6d.; and oats, 3s. 6d.while the deficiency of £1,800,000 in the last year was to be provided for by the issue of exchequer bills to Parl. Deb. the extent of £800,000, and appropriating, on the re1307; Ann. sponsibility of Government, £750,000 invested in the 90, 93, 97. public securities in the name of the trustees of savings' banks.1

Ivii. 1295,

Reg. 1841,

43.

lost on a

It

It may well be conceived what a sensation the anWhich is nouncement of this budget, so eminently favourable to division. foreign and injurious to domestic industry, produced in 1841. the House and the country. The interests thus threatened were too strong, and had too long been protected by the legislature, to yield without a violent struggle. began, accordingly, the moment the budget was nounced, and soon convulsed the country from end to end. The West India merchants and proprietors met in London, Liverpool, and Glasgow; the Canadian timber merchants, in Bristol and Liverpool; the landed interest, in their several county towns. Universally the budget was condemned in the most unmeasured terms; and such was the clamour raised that before the vote was taken it was evident that Ministers would be in a minority. Yet was the result even more decisive than had been anticipated; for on a division on Parl. Deb. the proposed reduction of the duties on sugar, which was Ann. Reg. first taken after the debate had lasted eight nights, they 115. were left in a minority of 36, the numbers being 317 to 281.2

Iviii. 667;

1841, 107,

The arguments on this all-important question, being the same as those of which a summary will be given in the great debate on Free Trade in a subsequent chapter, need not be here recapitulated. But some observations

which fell from the Conservative leaders, who both then CHAP.

XXXVIII

and afterwards took so important a part in that question, 1841.

44.

argument

deserve to be recorded. Sir R. Peel said: "Even though no questions of timber or corn had been mixed Sir R. Peel's with that of sugar, I would have voted against the intro- against the duction of slave-grown sugar into the English market, budget. not upon the abstract ground that conscience would forbid all commerce in the produce of slave labour, but upon a consideration of the social and moral condition of the West India people under the experiment now in progress. If the personal interests of the planters alone were taken into consideration, the house might possibly expect them to sacrifice those interests to the public advantage. But much higher interests were at stake in the moral and social condition of the people in that part of the empire where we had recently made the most hazardous, and, I rejoice to admit, the most successful experiment in the annals of the world. But it is impossible to foretell what may be the consequences of that step, if we take the new step of introducing sugar made by slave labour into the market of this country. A sufficient quantity of sugar for home consumption may be obtained from the East and West Indies and the Mauritius, without resorting to the slave colonies. New articles of remittance should be encouraged from India, for its inhabitants have suffered severely from the unrestricted admission of English manufactures. . . . After such fearful examples, I am unable to perceive the paramount obligations of those free-trade doctrines which now demand a preference to the slave labour of Cuba and Brazil over the free industry of the East Indies. The great experiment of the extinction of slavery should be fully and fairly tried; but this can never be done unless we give the free labour of our own colonies the exclusive preference over the slave establishments of other states.

VOL. VI.

2 E

СНАР. XXXVIII.

1841. 45.

"The principle of Free Trade announced on the other side is, that, without reference to any other considerations, we should go to the cheapest market. If that is Continued. to be acted upon as a universal rule, without reference to time and circumstances, I can only say I cannot concur in it. Without contesting the principle in reference to countries-if it were possible to conceive such— in which no previous relations existed, in a country of such complicated relations as this, of such extensive empire and immense trade, the rigid application of such a principle would involve us in inextricable confusion. Consistently with this principle, we should go to the cheapest market for corn and timber, and every other commodity. How is this reconcilable with the duty of Ss. a quarter, still proposed to be levied on imported wheat, and 20s. a load on imported foreign timber? The propriety of the change on the timber duties cannot be judged of till the details are furnished from Canada. The principles I now maintain are those of Mr Huskisson, and on which I and my colleagues, when in office, have always proceeded.*

46.

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Notwithstanding the forcible combination which has Continued. been formed against the Corn Laws-notwithstanding the declarations, that either the total repeal or the substitution of a fixed duty for the present scale is the inevitable result of the agitation which is now going forward-I do not hesitate to adhere to the opinion which I expressed last year, and now again declare, that my preference is decidedly in favour of a graduated scale to any fixed duty. I prefer the principle

* Mr Huskisson said in 1828: "An honourable gentleman had spoken in favour of a fixed duty on grain: abstractly that might look well in theory; but when we regard the circumstances of the country and the wants of the people, we must see the impossibility of adopting such a principle. If a high permanent duty were imposed, then in seasons of scarcity the poor would be exposed to sufferings, the infliction of which no claim to protection on the part of the corn-growers would ever justify. I said in 1815, and I say again, that nothing can be more dangerous than a reliance of this country on foreign nations for food."-Parl. Deb. xlviii. 635.

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