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CHAPTER II.

Sir Robert Peel explains his great Scheme of proposed Measures for the Relaxation of Duties on the 27th of January-His able and comprehensive Speech on that occasion-Reception of the Scheme, and comments of various Members upon it--Strong opposition is declared by some of the usual Supporters of the Government-Further discussion is adjourned to the 9th of February-Mr. P. Miles moves an Amendment that the House go into Committee on that Day Six Months, which is seconded by Sir W. Heathcote-The Debate is carried on by repeated Adjournments for Twelve Nights - Forty-eight Members speak in favour of Free Trade, and Fifty-five on the side of Protection-Speeches of Lord Sandon, Lord John Russell, Sir Robert Inglis, Mr. Sidney Herbert, Mr. Stafford O'Brien, Mr. Sharman Crawford, the Marquis of Granby, Lord Worsley, Sir James Graham, Mr. Thomas Baring, Viscount Morpeth, Mr. M. Gaskell, Mr. Roebuck, Sir Howard Douglas, Mr. W. Miles, Sir Robert Peel, Lord John Manners, Mr. Bright, Mr. Disraeli, Mr. Cardwell, Mr. Thomas Duncombe, Sir Thomas Acland, Sir George Clerk, Mr. Beckett Denison, Mr. Villiers, Mr. Cobden, and Lord George Bentinck-On a Division the Motion of Sir Robert Peel is carried, the Amendment of Mr. P. Miles being rejected by 337 against 240.

N the 27th of January, Sir Robert Peel, in accordance with his notice, detailed in the House of Commons his great scheme of commercial and financial policy. He commenced his speech on this occasion by observing, that in pursuance of the recommendation of the Speech from the Throne, he was about to call upon the House to review the duties which applied to so many articles, the produce and manufacture of other countries. He would proceed on the assumption contained in Her Majesty's Speech, that the repeal of prohibitory and the relaxation of protective duties was in itself a

wise policy-that protective duties, abstractedly and in principle, were open to objection-and that, though the policy of them might in some cases be defended, it must always be on some special ground of national interest, or of justice towards individuals. He was also about to act on the assumption that, during the last three years, there had been an increased productiveness in the revenue, notwithstanding a large remission of taxation; that there had been an increased demand for labour; and that there had also been increased competence, comfort, contentment, and peace among the

population. In advising the continued application of those principles, which had produced such salutary results, and which had already been sanctioned by the House, he was not inclined to disregard the necessity of main taining public credit unimpaired; and he was therefore prepared to act with forbearance, in order that he might not prejudice in any respect the permanent interests of the country. It was possible that, owing to the numerous and various interests which his present proposition would affect, an impression might arise that his scheme was a rash one, and ought to be discouraged. If such should be the opinion of the partisans of protection, nothing would be more easy for them than to meet him on an early night with a resolution that protection to domestic industry was in itself a good, and that the principle of it ought to be sanctioned by the House. It might, on the other hand, be the conclusion of the House-considering all the difficulties of this question, and the nature of the contest which had long existed, and would long continue to exist, if there were not a satisfactory adjustment of itthat his proposition, extensive as it was, ought to be accepted as a whole, though there might be objections in detail to parts of it. If that should be the conclusion of the House, he should have confidence in his ultimate success; but, if not, the sooner its disapprobation was expressed, the better for all parties. The great principle of the relaxation of protective duties he was not going to apply to any one particular interest; on the contrary, he asked all the interests of the country-manufacturing, commercial, and agricultural-to

make the sacrifice, if it were one, of their protection to the common good. Of late years, the whole tariff had been submitted to the review of the House. In 1842 he had proposed, and in 1845 he had carried out, to a very large extent, a plan for remitting the duties on the raw materials constituting the elements of manufacture. There was, at this moment, scarcely a duty on the raw material imported from foreign countries which we had not abandoned. He had, therefore, a right to call on the manufacturer to relinquish the protection of which he was now in possession. The only two articles of raw material now subject to duty were tallow and timber. He intended to reduce the duty on tallow from 3s. 2d. to 1s. 6d. a cwt., and to make a gradual reduction on timber till it reached a point at which it would remain fixed, and which he would definitely describe on a future day. Having given the manufacturers free access to every raw material of manufacture, he called upon such of them as were engaged in making up the three articles, wool, linen, and cotton, which formed the clothing of the country, to give a proof of the sincerity of their con victions by relinquishing the protection which was now given to the articles of their manufacture. He made this call upon them the more confidently, because it was the manufacturing, and not the agricultural interest, which first called on the Government for protecting duties. He then stated that he intended to relinquish all duties upon the importation of the coarser articles of manufactures in wool, linen, and cotton, and to reduce the duties on linen and woollen goods of a finer quality from 20 to 10 per cent. At present there

was a duty on silk, which was called 30 per cent., but which was often higher. He proposed to adopt a new principle in the levying of that duty, which was now an encouragement to the smuggler, and not to the British manufacturer, and to impose a duty of 15 per cent., instead of 30, for every 1001. value of silk. The right honourable Baronet then described at great length the reduction of duties which he intended to make upon the importation of paper-hangings, manufactured metals, dressed hides, boots, shoes, hats, straw-plat, carriages, candles, soap, brandy, geneva, sugar, and various other articles; and then proceeded to review the articles connected with agriculture on which import duties were levied. He proposed to reduce the duty on all seeds to 5s. per cwt. Indian corn or maize, which was of such importance in the fattening of cattle, he proposed in future to introduce duty free. In removing that duty he was not depriving agriculture of any protection, but absolutely conferring a benefit upon it. He also proposed that buckwheat, and maize, and buckwheat flour, should be admitted duty free. If any gentleman would ascertain the price which had been recently paid by farmers for linseed-cake and rapecake, they would agree with him that the removal of the duty on maize was not a disservice to the agricultural interest. The right honourable Baronet then described the reduction of duty which he intended to propose on the importation of foreign butter, cheese, hops, and cured fish, stating that in each case the duty would be reduced to half its present amount. On all articles of agricultural produce which constituted food as distinct

from corn, he proposed an immediate repeal of duty. Every kind of vegetable and animal food would be admitted at once free of duty. All animals from foreign countries would also be introduced on the same terms. He then proceeded to describe the nature of his proposal with respect to the importation of foreign corn: he had already stated that he intended to exempt some articles now included in the Corn Laws, as maize, from duty altogether. It might, therefore, be as well for him to inform the House at once, that though he did not intend to propose the immediate repeal of the Corn Laws, yet, in the hope of making a final adjustment of the question, and for the sake of giving time for adjustment to the agricultural interest, he did intend to propose that their continuance should only be temporary. The bill which he should, therefore, introduce on this subject would contain an enactment that, after a certain date, grain of all kinds should come in duty free. He proposed, however, that a considerable reduction should be made at once in the existing amount of duty, and that the duty so reduced should be limited in its continuance to three years. His bill would contain a provision that at that period, when the change would be least felt-namely, on the 1st of February, 1849-oats, barley, rye, and wheat, should be only liable to that mere nominal duty which he intended to apply to maize, for the purpose of procuring statistical returns of the quantity imported. The main question, then, for the House to consider was this

what is to be the intermediate state of the law? He proposed that there should be an enactment for three years to this effect, that

till the 1st of February, 1849, the following duties should be levied on all wheat imported into this country from foreign ports. Whenever the average price of wheat should be under 488. a quarter in this country, the duty should be 10s. a quarter; that above 48s. and under 49s., it should be 9s. a quarter; that above 49s. and under 50s., it should be 8s. a quarter; and so on till the price reached 54s. a quarter, when he intended to impose an invariable duty of 4s. a quarter. The enactments which he proposed for all other descriptions of grain would follow the scale of duties upon wheat; but he referred the House for the details of them to certain papers which he would have printed to lay before them. There would, therefore, be levied on wheat at its present price a duty of 4s., instead of the present duty of 16s. a quarter; and every other grain taken out of bond for consumption in the home market would be liable to little more than a nominal duty. Such was the arrangement for the adjustment of this great question which Her Majesty's Government now offered to the House. He intended to accompany that arrangement with other provisions, calculated, he would not say to give compensation to, but to advance the interest of that portion of the community which would be called upon to relinquish protection, with which he was himself more particularly connected, and in the welfare of which the prosperity of England was deeply involved. He then reviewed some of the burdens which fell on the land, and which he thought capable of alleviation by useful reforms, and not by transferring them to other parties. First among these burdens he placed the highway rates. They were at pre

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sent administered by 16,000 local authorities distributed throughout the country. Nothing could be more defective than that a highway which united several distinct parishes should not be under the control of one board, but should be under the control of every distinct parish through which it ran. In each parish there was a different surveyor of the high roads. system led of necessity to a lax expenditure, and to very bad reparation of the roads. He proposed to compel parishes to unite themselves into districts for the repair of the roads. Those districts would be generally the same with the Poor Law unions, and thus the high roads would be under the control of 600 instead of 16,000 different authorities. Another of the burdens grievously, and he thought justly complained of by the agricultural interest, arose out of the law of settlement. Under that law, during manufacturing prosperity, the rural population was encouraged to migrate to the manufacturing towns. The peasant thus migrating consumed the prime of his life, and gave all the advantage of his strength to the manufacturers. A revulsion took place in trade, and manufactures ceased to prosper. The individual was then sent back to the rural district, and was thus transferred to a new home, where he is unable to obtain a livelihood, from being unused to rural employments. the purpose of not merely relieving the land from a burden, but of also protecting an indigent man from injustice, Government intended to propose that the power of removability should be taken away in the case of every labouring man who had had a five years' industrial residence in any manufacturing town.

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He likewise proposed that the children of any person, or the children of his wife, legitimate or illegitimate, under sixteen, residing with the father or mother, and the wife of any person, should not be removed where the removal of the person himself was prohibited. Further, he proposed that no widow residing with her husband at the time of his death should be removable for twelve months after his death from the parish in which he resided at the time; and, lastly, that no order of removal should be taken out on the ground of chargebility shown to have been occasioned by accident or sickness, unless the removing magistrates should be satisfied that the effects of the accident or sickness are such as to be permanent and incurable. Here, again, by alteration of the law a great social advantage would be obtained, and the agricultural interest would be relieved from a great burden. He then approached another matter, in which he proposed, without any loss to any other interest, a great advantage to the agricultural interest. There was a natural dread in that interest of a very formidable competition on the cessation of its present protection. It was impossible to deny that agricultural science was yet in its infancy; and he, therefore, proposed that the State should give facilities to the improvement of agricultural skill and industry. The Duke of Richmond had collected a mass of interesting evidence to show the great capability of improvement which was inherent to all kinds of land. benefit might be effected by increased draining. Mr. Pusey had proposed several schemes for the improvement of land; but great difficulties occurred, especially VOL. LXXXVIII.

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among the owners of entailed estates, in raising the funds to carry them into execution. Government proposed that the credit of the State should be employed in enabling those improvements to be made. An advance of Exchequer Bills should be made by way of loan for the purpose of agricultural improvement, security being of course taken to protect the country against loss. The right hon. baronet, after describing at some length the mode in which these advances were to be made and repaid, concluded by stating that that was another plan by which he hoped to enable the agricultural interest to meet competition with the foreign grower. With respect to the local burdens pressing on the agriculturist, he must declare at once that he could not advise any alteration in the mode of the assessment of the poor-rates. It had been said that they were a charge upon the land, and that there should be an alteration in the mode of the levy. In point of fact they were not a charge upon the land. The opposition was between real and personal property. It was real property upon which the poor-rate was levied, as on mines, houses, lands and manufactories. If the poor-rates were a charge for general objects, it would be just to make personal property contribute; but they were a local charge, and personal property could not be called on for contribution without establishing an inquisition into every man's affairs, which, for the minute objects of a poor-rate raised to relieve local distress, would not be tolerated. The rate on personal property had been abandoned because it could not be levied; and therefore he was not [D]

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