Nor would he quarrel with the general propositions contained in the third division of Lord J. Russell's speech; but to the application which he had made of those propositions he did object. Lord J. Russell had been very shy of stating what particular plan he had in view; he had kept his scheme involved in a good deal of mystery. On his own principles, he ought not to have caused by this Motion a new disturbance of a question so often agitated. Under the existing Corn-law, provisions were extremely cheap, and speculation had been materially checked. He entered into some statements of figures, showing that the importation had been much less unequal in the last year than it had been in the years preceding. Nor could the new law be complained of as having operated unfavourably with reference to revenue. Then, if the law had not failed in any of these respects, the case stood, as between that law and the proposal of a fixed duty, just where it had stood last year, when the noble Lord's motion for a fixed duty was rejected by the House. He spoke with indignation of the vulgar and violent cry that this was a question of rents a question caused by the cupidity of the landlords. Surely that highly honourable and generous class were as well entitled to be spared from such an imputation as the manufacturers from the charge that they agitate against the Corn-laws only to lower the wages of their workmen. He protested against the constant renewal of uneasiness in the country, by successive motions of this kind in Parliament. It was unjust not to give a fair trial to the existing

suppose that experience would lay any ground for departing from it. He believed that the agriculturists in general, though dissatisfied with present prices, were not dissatisfied with the present law. Considering the course of former legislation, and the necessity of maintaining a due protection to invested capital and existing labour, he trusted that the House would resist this Motion.

The principal speakers who followed were Mr. Labouchere, Sir W. Clay and Mr. Aglionby, advocating a moderate fixed duty. Mr. Hume, Mr. Ewart, and Mr. C. Villiers standing out for total repeal. Sir R. Peel brought up the rear of opponents to the Motion. He sarcastically approved of Lord John Russell's concealment of his details until going into Committee, as a disclosure might produce a sudden explosion, that the mover would find very inconvenient. His fixed duty was to be removable by the Crown in bad seasons. To apply his Regentstreet simile, Lord J. Russell admitted that his own structure would not bear rain, and if he got into Committee he would find that it would not bear criticism. Sir Robert Peel made much of the conflict of opinion on the opposite side; and, repeating some of Mr. Gladstone's arguments, he averred that if wheat had fallen from 61s. to 52s., chiefly in consequence of the abundant harvest, the price of oats had varied less in the last six months than at any former period. He did not propose the present law as one absolutely final, but as one to be maintained until experience, facts and evidence, proved that it ought to be relin

was a

"reckless" speculator, he was made so by the law. When Regent-street was first built, somebody said "It may be a very fine street; but there are two things it won't bear bad weather and criticism." That was just the case with the sliding-scale.

It

was no good argument for a Cornlaw in 1843, that you had a Cornlaw under Charles II. or William III.: the whole policy of those times, on all other articles as well as on corn, was to maintain prohibitory duties, but at the present day that policy had, in respect of all other articles, undergone a complete reversal; and yet we now kept up a higher rate of duty upon corn than had existed when prohibition was the general and established rule: we were actually applying a system of increased restriction to an increased population. But what he chiefly complained of was the present uncertainty, so injurious to the agricultural classes; he would quote Mr. Webster, and say, do one thing or the other, let us either be warm or cool,' which transatlantic doctrine would find many sympa. thisers here. He now arrived at his third point-the principle on which a duty should be imposed. If a duty was imposed on any article for revenue, it was not only not unreasonable, but it was simply just, that the foreign as well as the home producer of that article should pay that duty; otherwise you would be violating the principle of free-trade, in favour of the foreigner against the home trader. So, too, if the agriculturists could make out their allegation of burdens peculiar to the land, a countervailing protection to them

trade. He was, therefore, disinclined to lay down the broad principle of total abolition; he would prefer a moderate fixed duty; but if the House would consent to go into committee, the mode of compromise might best be considered there. He had seen and read enough of the history of great questions to be satisfied that it was often wisest to avoid, by some fair compromise, the enforcement of extreme opinions-witness the cases of the slave-trade and of the Roman Catholic disabilities. He admitted that when prices should rise to 80s. or even 70s., you must remit your duty; but such a case would be very rare; for the importers would generally bring in their grain at an earlier period, and so as to prevent that extreme rise.

He was not solicitous to claim reputation for his party as the founders of the free-trade principle; the legislation of the country showed that they already had titles enough to the people's confidence, from the days of the Habeas Corpus and the Bill of Rights to those of the Reform Act, and the Act for the Abolition of Slavery. He was quite content, therefore, to see the principles of free-trade carried to their fit extent by a Ministry in which he and his friends had no share.

Mr. W. E. Gladstone rose to answer Lord J. Russell's Speech, and oppose the Motion. Adverting to the noble Lord's division of his subject, he said that on the first of his topics, the case of the agriculturists, there was no necessity for any present occupation of the time of the House, as no proposal was before it for returning to the state of law which the agri

Nor would he quarrel with the general propositions contained in the third division of Lord J. Russell's speech; but to the application which he had made of those propositions he did object. Lord J. Russell had been very shy of stating what particular plan he had in view; he had kept his scheme involved in a good deal of mystery. On his own principles, he ought not to have caused by this Motion a new disturbance of a question so often agitated. Under the existing Corn-law, provisions were extremely cheap, and speculation had been materially checked. He entered into some statements of figures, showing that the importation had been much less unequal in the last year than it had been in the years preceding. Nor could the new law be complained of as having operated unfavourably with reference to revenue. Then, if the law had not failed in any of these respects, the case stood, as between that law and the proposal of a fixed duty, just where it had stood last year, when the noble Lord's motion for a fixed duty was rejected by the House. He spoke with indignation of the vulgar and violent cry that this was a question of rents a question caused by the cupidity of the landlords. Surely that highly honourable and generous class were as well entitled to be spared from such an imputation as the manufacturers from the charge that they agitate against the Corn-laws only to lower the of their workmen. He protested against the constant renewal of uneasiness in the country, by successive motions of this kind in Parliament. It was unjust not to give a fair trial to the existing

wages

suppose that experience would lay any ground for departing from it. He believed that the agriculturists in general, though dissatisfied with present prices, were not dissatisfied with the present law. Considering the course of former legislation, and the necessity of maintaining a due protection to invested capital and existing labour, he trusted that the House would resist this Motion.

The principal speakers who followed were Mr. Labouchere, Sir W. Clay and Mr. Aglionby, advocating a moderate fixed duty. Mr. Hume, Mr. Ewart, and Mr. C. Villiers standing out for total repeal. Sir R. Peel brought up the rear of opponents to the Motion. He sarcastically approved of Lord John Russell's concealment of his details until going into Committee, as a disclosure might produce a sudden explosion, that the mover would find very inconvenient. His fixed duty was to be removable by the Crown in bad seasons. To apply his Regentstreet simile, Lord J. Russell admitted that his own structure would not bear rain, and if he got into Committee he would find that it would not bear criticism. Sir Robert Peel made much of the conflict of opinion on the opposite side; and, repeating some of Mr. Gladstone's arguments, he averred that if wheat had fallen from 61s. to 52s., chiefly in consequence of the abundant harvest, the price of oats had varied less in the last six months than at any former period. He did not propose the present law as one absolutely final, but as one to be maintained until experience, facts and evidence, proved that it ought to be relin

convenience and danger in constant alterations of laws of the kind.

The House divided

For the Motion, 145; against, 244; Ministerial majority, 99.

Previously, however, to the debate last referred to, a Measure partially affecting the operation of the Corn-laws had been proposed in the House of Commons by the Secretary for the Colonies. The object of Lord Stanley's proposition was a reduction of the duties payable on corn imported into the United Kingdom from Canada. The expectation of this Measure had created a good deal of uneasiness among the agriculturists, it having been represented by some parties as a design on the part of the Ministers to break in upon the protective principle of the Corn-laws, and let in corn through a back door, to the detriment of the English producer. In some parts of the country, accordingly, a good deal of sensitiveness and even distrust had been excited towards the Ministry with respect to this Measure; the topic was much discussed at agricultural meetings, and some members of Parliament who usually supported the Government, declared themselves hostile to the plan. The following were the resolutions proposed by Lord Stanley in a speech of much ability, in which he laboured to disabuse the public mind of some prevailing misconceptions as to the tendency and probable effect of his proposals:

Resolved, that on the 12th day of October, 1842, an act was passed by the Legislative Council and Legislative Assembly of the province of Canada, and reserved by the Governor-General for the

pleasure, imposing a duty of 3s. sterling money of Great Britain on each Imperial quarter of wheat imported into Canada, except from the United Kingdom or any of Her Majesty's possessions, and being the growth and produce thereof.

"That the said act recites, that it was passed in the confident belief and expectation, that, upon the imposition of a duty upon foreign wheat imported into the province, Her Majesty would be graciously pleased to recommend to Parliament the removal or reduction of the duties on wheat and wheat-flour imported into the said United Kingdom from Canada.

"That, in consideration of the duty so imposed by the said act of the Legislature of Canada, it is expedient to provide that, if Her Majesty shall be pleased to give her sanction to the said act, the duties imposed upon wheat and wheat-flour imported into the United Kingdom from Canada should be reduced.

"That, during the continuance of the said duty, in lieu of the duties now payable upon wheat and wheat-flour imported into the United Kingdom from Canada, under an Act past in the last session of Parliament, entitled 'An Act to Amend the Laws for the Importation of Corn,' there shall be levied and paid the duties following-viz.

"For every quarter of wheat, 1s. "For every barrel of wheatmeal or flour, being 196 pounds, a duty equal in amount to the duty payable on 38 gallons of wheat."

Lord Stanley prefaced his arguments in support of these resolutions by saying, that greatly exaggerated notions of the Mea

and, except for the direct promise conveyed to Canada in a former session, he would not, in the present sensitive state of the agricultural interest, have brought for ward at all a question tending to create uneasiness among them. He brought it forward now, not as a measure of free-trade-not as a means of facilitating the admission of foreign corn into this country, for it could have no such effectbut as a boon to Canada, which she had reason to expect, and of which the refusal would be highly injurious to her interests and feelings. His proposal was, not to let American wheat into England, but to let into England Canadian wheat and flour ground in Canada, from whatever growth it might be manufactured, at reduced duties. That was in accordance with the broad principle of the Navigation Act "that all manufactured goods shall shall be deemed to be the produce of the country in which they are manufactured;" and in that way, ostrich feathers dressed in France were deemed French produce, though, of course, not so in fact. Some had talked of this as a measure for letting wheaten produce into England through a Canadian "back door;" but this back-door had been open these fifteen years-ever since the Corn-law of 1828; and the effect of the present Measure was to take a toll of 3s. at that door, instead of allowing all wheat to pass through it into Canada, as at present, duty free. On wheat direct from the United States, the duty would remain unaltered. Lord Stanley argued that the imposition of what was tantamount to a fixed duty of 4s. on wheat from Canada would not be incon

The

foreign corn since already the duty on Canadian corn, although the scale extended from 1s. to 5s., only oscillated between 2s. and 3s., the sliding scale being there inapplicable; while in the other case the oscillation was to the extent of 20s., so that no fair average could be struck. Would the duty be levied in Canada? for he admitted, that if not, that would be a strong argument against his Measure. He described the geographical character of the boundary, and showed the physical impracticability of smuggling so bulky an article as corn to any great extent from America into Canada; and if it were attempted on the boundary, it would be met by persons interested in preventing it; it would be as difficult as to smuggle wheat into Kent or Sussex, whole quantity of wheaten produce which, within the entire period of the last thirteen years, had come into this country from Canada, either in the shape of wheat or of flour, was only 1,153,000 quarters, being about 90,000 per annum; and this under a state of law which imposed no duty at all upon American wheat entering Canada. He quoted some observations published in an Ohio paper upon this intended Measure of the British Government, to the effect that the American corn-grower would not be enabled by means of it to bring his produce to England. He advocated this Measure, therefore, not as a free-trade proposal for letting in American corn, but as a proposal for the benefit of our Canadian fellow subjects, just emerged from a civil war, just consolidated into one province, and confiding with a friendly spirit in the disposition of the Mother