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Maps, piataa. charts, etc.. may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Thoaa too large to be entirely Included in one expoaura are filmed beginning in the upper left hand comer, left to right and top to bottom, aa many framea aa required. The following diagrams illuatrata the method: Laa cartaa. planchea. tableaux, ate. peuvent 4tre filmte A dee taux de rMuction diffirents. Lorsque le document «it trop grand pour itra raproduit en un saul clichA. il est fiimA i partir da I'angla sup4rieur gcuche, do gauche i droite. at da haut en baa. en prenant la nombre d'imagaa n^caaaaira. Laa diagrammea suivants IMuatrant la m^thoda. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 Il OUR U. d'$, FREE TRADE POLICY EXAMINED WITH RESPECT TO ITS REAL BEARING UPON NATIVE INDUSTRY, OUR COLONIAL SY8T1M, AND THE INSTITUTIONS AND ULTIMAtfi DESTINIES or % THE NATION. ■A BZ A LIVERPOOL MERCHANT. LONDON! j • WHITTAKER & CO.. AVE MARIA LANK ; LIVERPOOL: LACE AND ADDISON. AND W. GRAPH.. ^ 1846. / i wtM- •O. smmnmm mmmt tt mm m^mi^ie^'VSSUS^sr: ERRATUM. Page 9, liue 21, for fj^portation, read importation. V. \ /. ^ "^^ S ^^ayj FREE TRADE AND NATIONAL AND COLONIAL INDUSTRY. Wflen th3 astounding measures of Sir Robert Peel's government were first promulgated to the world, the entire British nation seemed to reel under a sense of their gigantic importance. The Free Trader himself stood aghast at the prospect of that great experiment be-ng tried, for the successful result of which he had so ardently and con- fidently pledged himself i whilst those, whose study and boast it had been to " walk in the ligh^ of the constitution," and to be guided by the experience of the past, saw in those measures the surges of a social revolution advancing to overwhelm the time-honoured institutions, the religion, the laws, and the liberties of this great empire. * " The boldest held their breatL, For a time." ^e exciting strife of party stepped in to allay the national ferment We lost Bight for a moment of our sense of the perilous character of the measures, in our detestation of the glaring inconsistency andapostacy of the minister who had propounded them. After a while we heard the Mguments, which, coming from the lips of agitators steeped in selfishness and hostile t> the permanency of aU that the nation re- vered of Its "old ways" and cherished interests, had stirred up our anger and disgust, repeated in bland accents by statesmen to whom we had been accustomed to look as the safe and able guardians of our common weal. We thought that we were about to * J u" *° untried course of polisy diametrically opposed to that under which this empire had progressed in greatness, in wealth, in industry, and in social comfort ; and we had a confused and linger- ing trust that, much as we might dislike the change and despise the motives of its authors, our country's destinies were confided to the hands of men who w-^uld bear them through the ordeal to which they were about to be submitted, without material injury being suf- fered to approach any interest which we had valued, or any institu- tion which we had loved. We began to persuade ourselves that the change had become imperative upon us; and that its character would be mitigated in danger by its being brought forward under the auspices of Conservative rulers. Thanks to the few consistent men, " amongst the faithless faith- ful only tuund," who have stood firm in defence of the country's tro« l^di^z interests and m opposition to our temporary blindness— thanks more- over tothechance, ansmg out of thestate of Ireland, whichhas aflForded us breathing time to reflect upon the tendency of those measures and to extncate ourselves from the state of bewilderment into which their first promulgation precipitated us— we are now capable of approaching them, with some hope of arriving at a just conclusion, w^th respect to their probable efl^ect upon the national prosperity We are getting nd of the absurd thought that there is only me course of safety l^t open to us. We are discovering that the des- tinies of this mighty empire are not indissolubly connected with the extent of rottenness to be found amongst our potatoes. The elabor- ately detailed statistical facts, got up by philosophers, as to the condition of this esculent, are ceasing to fright us from our proprie- V I Z^'^'"'f- "O'^/PProacli the consideration of the question, whether the policy of Great Britain is to be determined by the accident of the condition of a root, which affords the staple support to the most depressed only of her population, or whether it is to be dictated by considerations of permanent interest and of justica. We have time to pause and to ask ourselves whether it is absolutely necessary that, to meet a temporary emergency, we must break through those wholesome rules of national policy, which have served us tor centunes, and, m the absence of positive proof to the contrary, which we do not see, might serve us for centuries to come. We dare now, and happily we have had leisure, to lay aside the conventional deference which we have been accustomed to pay to Statesmen and to Farty Leaders ; and, upon a question so largely affecting the interests and the social position of every individual in this great empire, to think for ourselves-in a word, to look our probable position, under the operation of the measures proposed to our ac- ceptance, fully and fairly in the face. It is my object, in the following pages, to endeavour to assist my fellow-countrymen m arriving at a just conclusion of the enquiry to which their happily awakened reason is now addressing itself. I wish to ask— not what miserable motives, what debasing and selfish considerations of party, have urged a conservative Ministry to embark m the work of carrying out these measures— but to examine cooUy. and I hope I shall be able to do so impartially, their tendency, as regards the various interests of this great empire. Jii the performance of this task I ask the reader to take nothing of mine for granted. I claim from him no faith in any mere opinion which in the course of that task, I may express. Whatever I state 1 shall endeavour to prove, from the best evidence within my reach and when I state that I have no motives to influence me beyond those. wmch any honourable man may fairly acknowledge— no motives beyond an earnest desire to see the good of my country and the true interest of my fellow-countrymen of every class pro-' moted I trust I may be acquitted of the possible charge o'f intrusion : and that what I have to offer to the pubUc may receive a candid consideration. The pleAs put forward in behalf of the measures, now offered to Lot a S . /f "*'^"' .*•■' T?"°"« ' *°'J «<►«»« «f them are S^/nJ^^ °!w'*°'^' " ,^ "^^ *^«* ^« have arrived at that duce«ufficientfood for our population; and that we muat call in not the occasional, but the constant, aid of the foreign agriculturist I must confess that I doubt this fact, and the consequent^ces^Sy insisted upon. The production of the soil of tWs^ Wdom h2 been shown to be capable of vast increase. The very pJSwho urge us to embark m the race of agricultural competSoradmit the trVl".I'/^Jf ?V *^^ *^ ""^'^ agriculturist aLwA^I^^ ^^frotn that competitton. We possess, moreover, in our Colonies fertile soils of vast extent, tilled by British industry, which uS a just and wise treatment by the Mother Country, would rapidly be ma condition to supply bread stuffs and other food, no^oKr Great Bntain but for the whole of Europe. The lapse of half-S! dozen years, the withdrawal of that frenzied agitation, directed against na^ve anl colonial agriculture, which depresses hfsSrit, II h ^^^^"^T i ^^°«" '"S*S^^ ^° it' ^°fre ,Jo40, 1841, and 1842, 1840, and to £/7,38ro23Tn 1842 hf^r*^"^ declined to £51,406,430 in' wheat flour in those ykrsw^ a maxii^ imimrtation of foreign wh^t and former'occasion; that there Ts a /reat dfff-- »«°* ^*^'°*^'- ' House on a ruKeth^^-sTg^r^^^^^ restrictionsonb^oths,S iSiscletherris a .'n"T'^ '" '}' ^^^«°°« ''^ neous exchange of the productions of each other. ''°-«-^*«"«'^« ^"'^ contempon.- fn },» fiJ^""*!°° ?^ ?' .''''^*''^ °^ manufacturing labour I conceive minfst.1? "™^' *^' immediate, and the inevitable result Tthe ministenal measures, or of any measures, which tend to divert i- d^istry from other branches of employment, and to direc? iUoward: manufactunng pursuits. The immediate connexion of he PnW labour with the pnce of food I do not choose at present to dScusf Rri pT "^"S *" *^''°^ ^' °^"b°««i altogether and^eaveSi; most of thli?!^^^^^^ and whig.radi!al allies JomXtht most ot their elaborately and cunning y selected fisures and d«fo 'Inhere IS a natural tendency towards decline rthewaees^^^^^^^ aU manufacturing pursuits.' The experience orthelaltfs vS™ n nearly every branch of manufactures has borne witness to tKct imountT^td'*. "^'^^^^ ^' .^*^^^°8^y W'^rent fC tL money amount paid to each operative for his week's labour- butwhert this 18 so It must be borne in mind that the same oj rarive now .^^11 10 perfo'iuB three and even four tipw the work which he did for the BBme remuneration 20 years ago. Where the cotton spinner formerly attenaed to 600 spindles only, he attends now to 2400. Where the power-loom weaver was only able to attend to one loom, he attends now to two and even three, and these working at increased speeds. *n every branch of manufactures, human labour we find is being year by year more economised, and the productive power of the mere machine enormously increased. The obvious resulfof this feature in our manufacturing system w to dimmish its power of providing for the employment of the people m proportion to the increased amount of manufactures pro- dnced. For instance we imported from the United States, to be worked up into yarn and goods, in 1822, cotton to the extent of 329,906 bales. In 1845 we imported upwards of four times that amount, or 1,499,600 bales. Now, will in/ man assert that in the latter year the cotton tiade of the kingdom aJBTorded profitable em- ployment to four times ' .e number of operatives, or paid four times the wages that it did in the former ? Certainly no man would be so hardy. But if this cannot be said of the gross amount of the cotton manufacture, including of course that most valuable portion of it, consisting of the finest and fully perfected fabrics consumed m the home market, far less can it be said of the coarse and low- priced fabrics which principally compose our foreign trade. In 1841 we exported 366,946,452 yards of plain calicoes. In 1842 we exported 366,040,519, whilst in 1843 our exports of the same fabric sprung up to 520,041,635 yards, and last year they were 613,138,645 yards. Did our hand-loom and power-loom weavers increase in the ratio of 61 to 36 between 1845 and 1841, or did they increase in the ratio of 52 to 36 between 1842 and 1843? They did- no such thing. We heard of no extensive migration from the agricultural to the manufacturing districts in those years. There was a sudden expansion of the demand ; but the manufac- turing districts were able to meet it without any material addition to their existing stock of labour. Such » further increase of exports as is predicted as the result of Free Trade I admit may produce such an increased demand for labour as mr.y for a while check the downward tendency of wages. But mark the changed circumstances into which the nation will have fallen! We shall have reduced the reward of agricultural industry. We shall have diminished the temptation to increased agricultural enterprize, for I hold with Sir Howard Douglas that "it seems a strange proposition, and one contrary to all experience, that the way to encourage the production of articles of any kind is to expose that branch of industry to unequal competition." By the 8ame process we shall have checked emigration to our colonies ? and thus thrown an additional number of bauds upon the home labour market. These must of necessity press into the manufac- turing districts for employment; and political economists tell us that It is the proportion of the supply to the demand for any commodity which regulates its price. We know what was the eflFect tration succe ded^ manufacturing pros- induced the effort to " equaUe » afthf^^^ prospenty which had w^h agricultural mc:ZtLr':' %7^::iZ\T^^^ official scources how manv nf flm *»„ ^u "ever yei neara trom Plate the orded through which £ laWuring c!mm,"uri,Th,;T be made to paaa irith considerable eouanimiiv "T.""""'? ". """ «o they have held out to hfm durirthis con e.t ^"^i^^"'^"*^ .^Wch zl .''tte'prtir,jreL''\r b?"'T« '"^ ;••• '"''"^^^^^^^^ !f • I 1 a i '^^^ a § r i 12 clag»es. There is a mind whose secret workings and deep communings with itself the world does not seem to heed ; there is a voice whose fearftil accents in all their strength and power the world has not yet heard— the mind and the voice of the working population throughout Christendom, burdened beyond the power of further endurance, and asking on every hand, where the region of righteous resistance begins ? If governments take not good heed, this mind and voice will one day give utterance to the sense of wrong unjustly inflicted in forms and ways that will shake from their foundations all the existing institutions of the earth. The doctrine that the only true capital is labour, however specious and unsound in its application, is gaming fa-st hold of the minds of the masses. The claim of the workman to eat the fruits of the earth— to partake of the gifts of God— to be warm and to be clothed— to be fed when he is hungry, and to be sheltered from the storm, in fair return for the toil of his arm and the sweat of his brow, is daily making itself heard in accents that cannot be mistaken. A commmiisme of inte- rests— of indignation at the infliction of past wrongs— of determination to resist fresh oppressions, is binding the labouring classes of all lands into one powerful fraternity. To meet this growing confederacy is by far the most difficult task of the statesman in the present day ; for it is by far the most fearful and dangerous element with which he has had yet to deal. A strike amongst the manufacturing work-people against re- duction of wages, following a measure which was to postpone ihe period of such reduction almost indefinitely, will be a very different affair to those strikes — fearful enough in their result — which have taken place in past time^. It will be a final struggle on the part of the labourer for his future position in the social fabric. We have no further delusive dreams of mitigation of his sufferings, by the supply of cheaper means of supporting existence, to hold up before his eyes. He will say now—" I mvst have a security that I can live by my labour, or I must experiment as I please upon those institu- tions which practically place me in the position of a machine, and not of a h iman being with wants which eat into the life and lacerate both the body and the soul." The character of such experiments, from such a source, I need not dilate upon. Such results must follow from any measures which rendeV us per- manently dependent upon other countries for food, and displace that home industry by which our supply of food has been accustomed to be produced. We cannot give our money to the Foreigner and to the British fanner at the same time. If we enable the former to con- sume more extensively our products, we lessen proportionately the power of the home grower to consume. It is a transfer, which we make, of customers who take the amount of their whole earnings from the British manuf;- -turer for those who will only take a portion of the value which they supply. But in viewing the possible and too probable results of this mea- sure upon our aggregate commerce, we have to look to a far wider field than is presented within the limits of Great Britain herself. Grant even that the British farmer may be able to maintain himself under the competition to which we are about to expose him. Say that we shall be in a position to absorb, in manufacturing employ- ment, the dispossessed labour of our agricultural population. Say that by the application of capital and science to the impmved culti- vation of our soil we enable the British farmer to maintain his posi- tion in the social fabric, and to emerge successful from his struggle 13 with the Foreigner. We have another country— Ireland— whirh on Jhe !.n ,ll 'n;."™"!" capacity of earning by their labour which wp11\"'-''^ supporting existence; to whom that bread which we are cheapening is a forbidden luxury; who are utterlv X the m!arrj"''"''t.^P"V^^ '"™ ^^^'^^ *^3^ S^«^ °^"«t take away thev W A ^"''J*'" *^' ^'"^'h^'* "»«al of potatoes upon which Su Iv to n? ^ '^' r^^^f ^^''""^ «f ^^^^ ^«"W h''^ contributed learfully to urge on the reduction of its price in our own manu- Snf ith t.. ^r '?" ""'l ^ P^P '^^^^«" «f eightTSiorZ Uven,ool\»h ? struggling with its native populafion for bread. toTrShmen n T^^^'u l"^^ "^"^ ^^^ remuneration afforded i Jj^f if\ ""PP^ying the British markets with food and you fhe^ dS not^r"'' v^"'" ^'^^"^ "^" ""^ ^« "^-t-t to laSourTr o culS-S? tV. \7 '*""°* '^^^ "f '^' application of capital has no rnSl -'"fl'^"^ agriculture to maintain itself. Ireland has no capital save its labour. You cannot point to your system of TJnA 1 f™'"^ ^' '^^''^^^^ «f ^«i"g carried out theVo. To c^a^e a lot irZ"" 'T' r'^P^P"^^^ ' ""^o«' I^^^-"d has ever been Peers™chief Sir l/. ^r'^fft""- I* has been Sir Robert t-eei s chief difficulty. And, before concluding upon the adoption Isde^S'Tor^'^r^^"''^ P^^^*^«" ough?to^ecefvee7ecial 3o^ent tnir T.^^^\\'''' 'T'''''' '^''' "^ manufacturing ffoTynnipK? [ ?^ '*^^"'" '^r''^^ '■^""^ »he cultivation of the sou. Your cheap loaf cannot enable you to procure labour cheaner here, as it n.ay ia our own manufacturing districts. Fo two centune« he' raroTZl'^'"" '".'^^" '"'^" ^^^''^"^ than has :Sd whicrks nPnS ? •"^' '" ^^^V^'^ ^"^"^^^3^' «^«" the root upon winch Its people subsist ; yet, where are the manufactures or the Tares bTonV' '"'?"'>. ' ^^" «^^' ^ ^^e resul^f^h se' BrTh F^i. .'""''!-^°'u^''* country-her separation from the exTrSefoTerhersoiL '■^^^^^"^"^'^ «^ ^^e hold whi?h British capital But we must carry our observations still further, vast Coloninl 1^'*''°*!^'^' ""^ ^^^' '''" ^'■"^'"S "p around us a Tt o.?8-CatedT.r''~'^f ^'''^' ?^ •* g"-^^* ^'^"^"y «f kindred luxu,^ 7f r« 1 '"''y "'''""' producing every necessary and every common mother. We have bound these rising nations to us— such arm'':" bv tTf T ^'^ ^""^^-7"°* «« ^-^ ^y the force of ou fnZ'trv of h • ""*'"«\°". t^^a'^ds them of that' protection to the SorlnZ^ Iv k' PT^"*^""' ^^"•'^ "at>^« subjects have enjoyed, of rtlVVl''-''""'^ '*^f "«* ^ P"l«« °f the political or social b^ody brin^n. £"'" '"" '^r^ •" P**'"' «^ •^^•'t in pleasure, without QuarKt Z * .^y^P^thetic reply from our fellow'-subjects in every ?here " Ittfer f 1 fli ?"^4^*^«°t .k1«"ou8 successes in India :-i8 iSs aTnnLt n ^''^ ^'^L^^ ^^""«^«' ^ planter in the West imlies, a trapper m Oregon, a farmer at the Cape or in Australia who, on reading the Gazette, containing the desp. r),.. which record "ttmrntm "'"• liii II '(ii'-imf-^- ^ 'a- J^ >~>- 14 M them, will uot exclaim — " God be thanked ?" These Colonies are our children — selfish and short sighted men may say expensive ones. We have given them our laws, our language, and our religion. We have given them the most enterprizing spirits of all ranks amongst our population, who find, in the scope, which they furnish, for industry and ability — afield in these Colonies which the mother country has ceased to present. We have made them our out-posts in the great battle of commerce and of civilization, which we are waging with the world. And well have they fulfilled their trust. Nobly have they vindi cated to the world the claims of British men to pre-eminence ic arms, in arts, and in commerce. It is by their aid that Great Britain is no longer a petty island — the Ultima Thule of the ancients — but has become a great power, able and worthy to control the destinies of surrounding nations, and in a position to defy, as she has defied, their combined hostility. To our Colonial Empire we owe the growth of the Naval power of Great Britain and its supre- n cy in every sea. In whatever quarter of the globe the honest enterprize of the British subject is unjustly thwarted, his liberties invaded, or the national honour insulted, it is from our Colonial Stations that the blow is struck in their defence. From our East Indian empire we overawe the rapacity and repress the turbulence of the states with which we are surrounded in that hemisphere, and protect a commerce unappreciable in its value to our Home indus- try. From Canada our arms can reach the most sensitive part of the American Republic. Our West Indian possessions aff'ord us & point d'appui for the maintenance of our trading and other relations with the South American Continent ; whilst other smaller dependencies, which, however, we have the right to regard as the seedlings of future tributary empires, at present afford us friendly harbours and succour in carrying on our vast commerce with the nations of the wt Id. By every ir lligent mind, which contemplates the com- manding position aich Great Britain occupies, as a power and as a trading people, its source is discerned in our colonial system. To cripple us here has been tlie object of every hostile effort which has been directed against us. Upon this point an able writer — Mr. Bliss, on the Colonial system — remarks : — " During two centuries that policy has been in operation, and within that period hag created a larger and richer empire than Rome acquired in seven ; and as the present age would judge the opinion of any Roman senator, had Rome produced, or history preserved the conceit, that the greatness of his country was not in consequence of its military policy, but in spite of it, so, probably, will posterity esteem the British statesman who affirms, that the wealth and greatness of this empire are in spite, not in consequence, of the Colonial system. But it was, in fact, from 1806 that the Colonial system, which had been intermitted during the war, was restored, after the hostilities waged by some countries against the intercourse with the British dominions, and renounced the commerce of the sea. The intercourse between the northern nnd southern Colonies immediately re- la vived. War with Prussia had preceded this, war with Denmark followed ; aud onf f^f ^^f y/4^'*''*'^' ^""^^^^ extension of the Continental system through- fK * •» ^^^ "^ Europe, caused such embarrassment and dismay in thia country that Its Mmisters seem to have resolved never again to suffer it to depend upon precarious sources of supply for articles of the first necessity. To the Contin^n- tal system of France, and the non-intercourse of America, was opposed the Co- lomal system of Great Britain ; and it discomfited both." But we must come down from the consideration of the question in this aspect. We have to consider, not vhat the Colonies have done for the greatness of England, but the more sordid question what they have done for her commerce, and how far they have been, and are, more valuable io us than neutral markets. Bound to us by natural ties, protected by our arms, and their industry tavoured in our markets, it is but natural to suppose that the Colonies should have afforded a preference, in their fiscal policy, for the pro- ducts of the mother country. They have done so. The British manufacturer, in consequence, has found in their markets a second Mome Market. ^ Commercially speaking, as well as politically, they have been a portion of Great Britain itself— clothed by native industry and, so far as protective duties could bring about such a result, resorting to the British market for every necessary, and even tor the luxuries of life. The Colonial buyer in any of our marts of commerce is regarded as n natural tributary to our commerce. We look upon him as one bound to us— who cannot help himself— who 18 naturally and necessarUy our customer, however we may treat him. We look upon him as one of the same family with ourselves • ^"° ^'^ }\ ^^' ""'i^'" the existing system. He taxes himself, by a ditterertial duty m favour of our products, to become so. He says to other countries,-" I will only consume your produce upon the same terms as I should do if, instead of being located upon the banks of the Indus or the St. Lawrence, I was stiU breathing my native air upon the margin of the Mersey or the Clyde." In eveir respect, m his eyes, the product of British industry {%& protected as well as a preferred, article. Let the industry of other countries compete with ns in neutral markets ; let the linens of Germany and Russia, the hosiery of Saxony, the silks of France, or the heavy cottons of the United Stales, be open to his acceptance ; the answer of the Bntish Colonist, given by the fiscal policy which he adopts, ot protection to the industry of the country from which he has sprung, 18 that he looks upon his British fellow-countrymen as those alone whom he is bound, by nature and by policy, to employ &% administrators to his wants and sharers of his prosperity. The following table, compiled from official sources, will prove the existence of this feeling of natural dependence, and show, as its. result, that in the leading articles of our expo.t ^ lo, the consump- tion of our Colonial possessions in proportion to their population approximates closely to the consumption of our home population, whilst foreign countries— and especially those whose industry we are about to encourage in preference to that of the British subject, or the Colonist- consumes to a limited amount, in proportion to their population : — wib^ 16 17 But on other grounds the value of these possessions as instn, ments for (he extension of its commerce, has been mt mSt' absorbing the surplus labour and enterorize of onJ^«^. ♦ • earned out with him to distant and benighted lands W create everywhere new wants and new markets for the producfs of BSLh Zntrmoreo^r W ,r °T '° "'"■ ""^ Colonial «t.bl»h. rSljT • !,• 'j^ ""^ P'o'solion which their proximilv has afforded to mdmdual enterprize, hare enabled us siSlv tTeitend our commerce into ucighbouring countries, not suWect to ^°r ^. and to carry there the same wants «nd l.=k;.. „v V '". "'-' ."""■ duced into llhose which acknZedge our sway ^^ ""^ """'' ^°*'^- That a system such as this which we possess in our colonies-a system, the source as we 1 of our national sreRtn^^T«^L cial prosperity, ought to be sedulotir L^ed fr tC^^ wil dispute. It is assumed, however, hat we caTen^oyftsTdval^^^^^ to their present extent, under a system of Free Trade thatTE' after we have withdrawn the protection whirwe 't'at p^^^^^^^^^^ articles of Colonial consumption, we shall either bf able toSn the Colomes themselves as British possessions, affordinVustUl a fiscal preference for our products, although we no loS Xd to S trm'Xr^ltt y Te lailt ISle T '" t^^ '^".^^^^'^"^ ^'°- T^-..,ble taKc. of Mr. Bum,, of Manchester. frSm ;Mch Te to™ are diuwi!, we liare an authentic record, which no other ?r.df possesses ; and secondly, because the oule;, for the ^option oj £ present measures, ha. come loudest from th'e p^Efc. engCd in ,hU u: m\ <8 branch of manufacture. By a reference to "Burns' Commercial lilance for the past year, the following will be found to have been the f-^Sf*" ^ .. ® t*o leading articles of the Cotton manufacture:— Wain Calicoes" and " Printed and Dyed Calicoes," in 1841 and 184.) respectively, to the under-mentioned Colonial markets. ! Should remark that, in common with Mr. Buchanan, I include China, although not strictly a Colonial market, partly from its intimate connexion with our East India trade, and the influence which our Jiast Indian possessions afford us in maintaining our relations with that country, but chiefly from the fact of the return of 1841 in- cluding the exports to both markets. _".^M9?H9''_f'"""5"*/JoOD3 TO THE COLONIKS. Calicoes Plain. 184). 1845. British West Indies British Nth. Aiiier. Cape of Good Ho|)e. India \ & China/ New Holland yards. 9,8,'J1,2«0 7,737,332 2,008,352 11 3,462,664 985,823 Total Yards. . I 134,045,431 yards. 16,987,142 II, .580,586 3,394,241 fl66,946,5RJ \ 1106,490,275 / 3,961,699 Calicoes Printed and Dyed, 184! . T845. yards. 9,774,290 10,703,415 1,904,239 22,540,756 997,092 309,360,506 45,920,322 yards. 20,729,641 13,362,173 3,520,302 26,08.'»,13« 2,.5.36,4I3 3,850,891 70,081,538 The total exports of " Calicoes plain" to all countries in the tw^ years, Mr. Burn sets down as follows :— 1841. 1845. Total « Calicoes Plain" to all countries 306,946,452 yds. 6KM38;6r5 yds. To Co/on.«, as above 134,045,4 31 „ 309,360,506 „ Balance, Exports to other countries. . . . yds. 232,901,021 303,778,139 Thus in 1841 our Colonial trade in this stnnle article of Cotton manufacture was to our trade with the rest of the world as 134 to 232 millions of yards, o^ tfw'fn in^ ^^M-^ ""^.'"'l^- , '° ^?^^' ^"^^^^^ ^^^ f^^er was to the latter as <*u» todOd millions, the Colonies having thus become greater consumers than the wHole of our other vmrkets ! In the articles of " Dyed and Printed Calicoes" the proportions stand thus •- 1841. 1845. Total "dyed and printed Calicoes" to all countries. . 278^748^5 yds. ™"" ilitto to Colonies 45,920,422 „ 310,850,697 yds. 70,081,5.58 „ Balance, E.xports to other countries. . . . yds. 232,827,053 240,769,1.39 Thus in 1841 the proportion of the Colonial consumption, of this most import- L J roQo^^n"'^''''"''"^ ff brics to the consumption of the rest of the world was ^otn^n Mr'"'""'' '>''^Z'¥oneJi/th, whifst in 1846 the proportion was a« 70 to 9^0 millions, or upwards of two sevenths. In introducing the above, Mr. Buchanan remarks— »,o2'*%* ^ ""^^ ""' ^l accused of selecting unfair data with respect to the Cotton Sin"!!^/-®™foh*'"^' °^ ""^ '°*''' «'^'^'" °f y^n •« manufactured cotton ?^^ "r'*^ '« 194,080,4!»()lb8., leaving oni; thlLirJ a'' •" fi "'herwise accounted for, as entering into the production of in/vff "^ miscellaneous fabrics, of which, however, the Colonies take a fair and yearly.,norea,sing share. The total vnltK of manufactured cotton poods ex- 19 ported in 1845, not inclurling cotton yarn and thread, is Isfimated by the game authoruy at ^1«,182 445: of this amounP, the valie of the u„dermentio3 thtr ^»!^?^^' "P * 13,676,279. The fallacy of quoting, in such an enquiry m S fl'afr k *^f f i"?"^'!!' «":««P«''ti'e of the sort of goods exported, is ewm- phfied by the fact tW, of the other great branch of our cotton exports tot 1845- onW £RMrWZT«T\''^ '" «>"£*< to 131,937,935 lbs.,'^andin value to only ^6,596, 897-an article upon which the least amount of industry is em- ployed, and which is consequently least profitable to us as a nationi nearly- ' ^7°;S' r'' V "Pr*"^^ "^ 90,000,000 lbs. went to those corn-growing countries of the Continent, whose almost worthless commerce with us, we are thus Li,**"- "jf*""^'' P^«fe"'n(? to the valuable trade in finished goods, of u>aU labour ,s the great component; part provided by our own Colonies and he Home finH/l,»?^.*" !T'''? ^\Burn'» Commercial G/anc^, for the past year I find the following to have been the exports of the two leadina articles of the cotton manufactures :-' Plain Calicoes,'' aSd " Printed and DyeV^ScLs," in 184? ?W • 'i '!f'P/^^u"'^'y{.u° ^^^ "Ddernoted Colonial markets. I should remark that 1 include China, although not strictly a Colonial market, partly from it" in- timate connexion with our East Indian trade, and the influence which Tur E^t Svf^^™fh?f°?'I''.K "'!""'T'^'°'"»'" ''^'*"°'^ ^i'h that country; but chiefly from the fact of the returns for 1841 including the. export to both markets." I might have added greatly to the weight of this statement of facts and figures, if I had treated as Colonial markets those military stations-as Malta, Gibraltar, &c.-which, as neutral markets, of which we assume the control, afford us so material an aid in our commerce with strictly Foreign markets. The result, however, is amply sufficient for my purpose. That one half of the exports of the leading branch of the national industry goes to Colonial markets, 18 a tact sufficient to adduce, and which may well incline thinkinjr men, who seek not the temporary meed of applause given to success- tul party mitnoeuvring, to pause before entering into an experiment which may place m peril the vast national benefit derived. Clearly this evidence shews that Great Britain, under her Colonial system 18 rapidly gaining a position of independence of the world. She has, in that system alone, without courting the trade of other countries by hazardous concessions, a market whose rapid growth promises shortly to absorb the products of an industry not artificially stimulated. She has "ample scope and verge enough" for any ordinary commercial ambition. She has, under the sway of the British sceptre, countries producing all that her utmost wants can require— affording homes to the adventurous and enterprisine of her children, and a profitable commerce and remunerating industry to those who still rest beneath her parental wing ; and itTs difficult to see any limit to the consuming power of those countries, or to their abiljty to feed the enterprise of the British people It 18 not however the Cotton Trade alone which is thus reabine so vast a benefit from our Colonial Trade. That benefit is diffused throughout the whole frame-work of the National industry It enters alike the work-shop of the hardwareman of Birmingham, the cutler of Sheffield, the clothier of Yorkshire, our iron works our foundnes, our salt works, and descends into our various mines. Upon all these branches of industry the Colonies are yeariy bestow- ing increased and increasing benefits. To all they aF^ --» markets which no hostile effort, by any of the numerous Foreigi rem who I i. mMima.1% .n-BtacaaEm^:^-,,^ j^^^ '""-—-- -rvL 20 envy us our comiSercial greatnesH, can circumscribe. They are, in a word, the life-blood of our greatness — the great and natural feeders of our industrial prosperity. BXPORTS TO AI.I, COONTBIB8 IN 1844, AND AVBRAOB OF SiX YbaR8 FROM ^ 1839 TO 1844. TheAveragei are taktnfrom Appendix to Mc. CuUoch't Edition/or 1844. COUNTRIES. Russia Sweden Norway . . ^ Denmark ; Prussia ■. Germany Holland Belgium France Portugal proper 1 Aiores, V ....... Madeira, J Spain and Balearic Islands Gibraltar Italy and Islands Malta Turkey & Continental Greece E. I.Co's Territories & Ceylon China Brit. North Amer. Colonies! West Indies United States Brazil Sundries 1844. Gross Exports in 1844, to Foreign Parts i£'a,l 28,936 108,47» 152,834 286,679 50i5,384 6,151,528 3,131,970 1,471,251 3,656,259 1,242,423 509,307 1,(M9,567 3,569,240 200,009 3,291,404 7,095,666 2,305,617 3,070,801 2,451,477 7,938,079 3,413,538 AVRRAOE OP 6 YrS. 1839 @ 1844. j£'I,8l6,I34 146,363 119,407 313,973 359,179 5,799,993 3,476,818 1,063,925 3,060,593 Proportion OF 1000. .34.646 2.793 3.278 4.063 6.853 110.649 66.326 30.396 50.755 5,939,479 1,101,053 3,666,374 3,998,486 6,283,544 3,357,266 113.306 32.100 50.866 57.301 119.869 44.969 ^£■58,584,293 ^53,419,926 1,000 Thus, whilst to all countries — The gross shipments in 1844 were ^sg 504 oqa The average, 1839 to 1844, was ■.■;.■. 62,'4^,'916 Sliowing an increase of 11 jj per cent .*6,164,366 .Tlie shipments to British America were, in 1844 i£'3.070 861 The average, 1839 to 1844, was 2,686,'374 Showing an increase of 15 l-6th per cent je'404,487 A similar increase in the proportion of their imports to our en- tire foreign trade, will be seen to have taken place in our other Colonies. A most important feature moreover in the Colonial Trade of this kingdom is the fact, that it employs almost exclusively British Ship- ping. To illustrate this fact, a valuable compilation, made by Mr Court, the able Secretary of the Under-writers' Association of Li- verpool, enables me to give the following, as the experience of the jrear 1845, so far as that port is concerned. To enable the reader to institute a comparison beween the Shipping employed in our Colonial and in our purely Foreign Trade I give the data of the two separately • and append those which may be considered to relate to enterprize either purely native or arising out of our Colonial facilities :— They are, in a Eitural feeders SARS FROM 'or 1844. Proportion OF 1000. a.792 a.378 4.088 6.859 110.045 06.336 20.396 50.755 1)3.306 23.160 50.866 57.201 119.8ri9 44.969 1,000 584,293 (19,916 164,366 )70,861 i66,.374 104,487 I to our en- 1 our other rade of this itish Ship- ide by Mr. tion of Li- 'Dce of the e reader to ur Colonial leparately ; enterprize 31 CUABANOM OWT OF THU PoRT OF LlVRRFOOL TO COU>NIAL POMI FOR THK YBAR 1845. Demeran , HallflK Jamaica Maranham , Miramichi , New Brunswick Newfoundland , , Nova Scotia , Quebec East Indies, China, 8cc., Mobile .; Total Ships. VESSELS. TONS. 1 BRITISH. FOREION. BRITISH. FORBION. 43 none. 13,386 none. 56 none. 33,068 none. 51 none. 13,898 none. 19 none. 7,839 none. 33 none. 10,860 none. 106 1 55,927 1,010 63 1 9,099 185 90 none. 5,333 none. 331 none. 85,145 none. 338 4 133,390 2,298 39 33 31,018 13,529 1,078 39 486,863 17,003 To the same ports in 1843, I find that the clearances from Liver- pool were, of Bntish vessels 781, against 1078 in 1845; Foreijm !o!f o^o •• ^^^ tonnage was, of British vessels 328,754, against 486.863 in 1845 ; and of Foreign 2663. The total clearances fi-om Liverpool to all Countries was, in 1845, of British vessels 2860, and foreign 12.S2 ; and the amounts of tonnage were— British 895,198- Foreign 469,.S87, the Colonies therefore employing upwards of one half of the whole tonnage of the port. The same results, I have no doubt, would be shewn by similar returns from all the western ports —Glasgow, Bnstol, &c., whilst the shipping trade of the Thames will approximate to them. The folloiinng will shew the amount of employment to our ship- ping afforded by a few of those Foreign markets, for the trade of which our various Colonial possessions and stations afford us facili- ties and protection. Cl..,ARAN0B8 OUT OF THE PORT OF LiVBHPOOL TO QUASI-CoLONIAL PORT» FOR THE YEAR 1845. Africa Pernambuco Uabia Gibraltar LaOuayra Malta River Plate Santa Martha Vera Cruz West Coast of South America. ToTAi, Ships. VESSELS. TONS. BRITISH. FOHEION. BRITISH. FOREION. 93 9 35,431 967 20 1 5,175 268 34 1 8,147 326 34 1 3,607 70 18 a 2,763 347 38 3 5,297 114 45 I 10,290 213 13 none. 1,786 none. IS none. 2,597 none. 100 3 33,307 515 400 31 ^ .. 97,400 3,590 At very little trouble, and with perfect fairness, I could have extended the above statement. I shall, however, leave it as it is, and proceed to lay before the reader a very different picture, shewing the extent to which our shipping is employed by those countries in favour of whose products Parliament is now legislating. And, first. "c?^ r awMI mi V'-^^^"-:-.r' "- ■bn^U 32 let us direct onwelves to the United States. In 1845 the clearances trom Liverpool for the following American ports were :— VESSELS. BRITISH. Boaton I Charleston . . , Baltimore .., New Orleans. New York . . . Philadelphia . ToTAt. 6 in none. 74 30 1 FORBION BRITISH 1? 76 30 IS 106 193 44 463 TONS. a,3A5 8,055 none. 51,169 17,783 153 FORBION. 43,140 14,857 7,945 «6.76a 1461469 36,05.1 79,417 305,329 ^e following statistics, derived from returns (part of 4, section A. of Revenue and Commerce, 1844,) recently presented to the Houses of Parliament by command of her Majesty, exhibit similar results, as regards the shipping of the whole kingdom ; shewing that m aU our dealings with the Foreigner hitherto, the British stiipowner has received the minimum of employment and remu- neration, whilst our Colonists have strictly and fully paid their debt of graUtude to this and every class of the British nation. In 1844 we have the following as the total arrivals in Great Britain from Fo^ VeueU. Sailor*. Tonnage. fritUh 19,6o, Foreign 9,608 Total 29,295 195,728 76,091 271,819 3,647,463 or 72 2-9ths per cent. 1.^.138 „ 37 7-9 5,049,601 100 «Sa V *?if «a«»e year we had the following arrivals from our British North American Colonies alone. ^**^- *'«"<>'•». Tonnage. ™ * .'^\ , ^'^ 789,410 21 q Mftf^ these Colonies alone, therefore, employed about 21 9-14ths per cent, of the whole amount of our British shipmnff v.^rv'JS'* '^^•■^'^' ^■'' '"'''■ °^ ^"*i«^ ^^^ Foreign together S VetseU. Sailor*. Tonnage. Total.. .948 19,327 544,930 100 We thus imported the bulk of our produce and the raw materials of manufacture from that country in ^,«mc«« ships, worked by Jmencan crews whilst the whole of our importations from Britisl tt UnTteTs^irf ' *-^ ^"'^' *^*>^'«^ •' ^«' trade «Jj;]t m^e of tW P.t '"^ ^ ' ''"'^ "' T^^i ^° ^"^""^ °^ '^' commercial marine ot that Per vs;r as w; i be shown by the following table given on the autho...t. U .k .nited States Almanac forTs"! :- Gross Imports to SOth i „„ ... June, 1844, (12 mos.) / 1>».*35,035 @ 4 dols. 84 cts. is ^22,403,933 17.1 By Foreign Ships 14.260,362 ., „ 2,946,355 15.8 or ,3 1-7 ^ ct. Ihe tonnage, it will be seen, is not given, but the money value is the clearances TONS. SH. FORBION. M5 »5 ne. 69 r83 55 43,140 14,857 7,945 «6.765 146,469 a6,053 17 305,329 of 4, section ented to the ichibit similar •m ; shewing , the British t and remu- id their debt a. In 1844, ain/rom Fo- per cent. 8 from our oyed about h shipping, •gether. A the United «r cent. V materials worked by om Brituih utwards to ;ommercial ving table, 846 :— 13 1-7 ^ ct. ey value is 23 27'rq";S.'?'"*^'/H'^u''^°''''' ^^''^ ^^"« ''«'«»«° -hips formed 27 7-9th8 per cent, of the tonnage inwards to Great Britain the Foreign arrivals into the States only amount to 13 l-7th pTcent Their own tonnage therefore carries 86 6-7ths of all thfim^u /r«« abroad. From Great Britain herself nearly the whole of S importations are caraed in American bottoms, our own ships going out to the rottou ports almost invariably in ballast, or with a freight httle more ixrauuerative. .mo. ncigui Nor! J T^J'-*"''n°''.°"' ^°^T''} ^^*^^' ^^« import of timber from our ?v 5 V ^hTrS S"^"'"''' "'^''^ '' ""^"^^^^ ^''^ ""^'^ destruction E Rritiir J • ^^''^^•Peasiires, an amount of employment is created for British shipping, the value of which to the nation is almost inan preciable, whilst the foreign timber which we are about rsubstTtl houlZ ^^TK^'^/rP''"".' *' "Z'^'^^y exclusively conveyed in foreign bottoms. The following data, furnished by Mr. Aldermln J. BramW f^l k'- "'^t'T'' "^^'**" ^^^"'■P"^^ ^^^'^ Committee, in aHwe speech in the Town Council upon Dock affairs, conveys a striking lesson with respect to the value of the timber trade of British America to the shipping interest of that town. ♦„ ,o ''i*'^ T't^ ^f * '^'■y elaborate document, which it would take too much tima Fo ?tfa^ inVi? '.?""'" '^,' ^'''^' °f '' f°' '■^^ information oMheCouncT ^ h, 1, ""* i"'^*'"^'! t? a gentleman with whose accuracy every one is acquaint^ • om'^tSrstatren? if l'' ""'"'"• . ' T" «"« y°" *^« results fromTsSsTS kTo^ I- l'**®'"«°'> ," '3 necessary to observe, all vessels bringinK anv caT^o timW%r, '' *?,f ^'"'led. The number of vessels exclusively ernKd lag. timber trade, and their tonnage, beginning with the year 1833, were m folWs* BRITISH AMERICA. YEAR. 1838., 1839. . 1840.. 1841.. 1843.. 1843. . 1844.. 1845.. VESSELS. .305. .230... . 318. . . . 165. . . .311... .453. TONNAOK. .160.415... .170,591... . 133,400. . . .174,948... . 91,179... .154,518... .189,414... .239,854... BALTIC. VESSELS. ...72... ...68... ...48... . . . 40. . . ..61. ..51. 113. TONNAQB. .22,788 . 17,415 .14,000 .11,923 . 11,339 . 17,253 ■ 14,144 .33,792 li IJ^ !.,""" "" ^^*u' "^^^^ ^^^ *™^" t^ade was said to have commenced Its decime, there were then 418 vessels, of 202,471 tons; and in 1846 ?he enormous number of 566 vessels, of 273,646 tons. Now, this aK will show he m Liverpool. There has been an extraordinary increase in several descriotions of timber. I will just notice the Mahogany trade, to which attentTon wHirected and particular accommodation afforde^d, some four or five years Z, b^theS Committee. The number of logs imported since 1838 is as follows : In 1838 there were in qio in— In 1839 there were „'?if'*'8*' In 1840 there were \'^,\ " In 1841 there were k'i^ " In 1842 there were ?'?S " In 1843 there were L'im " In 1344 there were ;;.; il'S^ " In 1845 there were iiiiii.'.i.iss.'sw " I will now give you, for the last four or five veare ' the 'inore^e for all deserin. tions of timber in pieces and feet. I will take you back to 1838^^ ^ In 1838 there were i5.nno.nnn in I..O.. 1.11V1C weie iKnnnnnn In 1841 there were 16,000,000 ■■JiJiat^jK 4 24 Mr. BAT3B0NE asked whether these were pieces P Mr, MooRB.— They are plecea and feet, by string or scale measure. In cal- lipers, they would be about fifteen per cent, more : In 1842 there were 9,000,000 In J8-t3 there were 17,000,000 In 1844 there were »t,0()0,000 In 1845 there were 88,000,000 We have here a vast and increasing source of employment for that great producer of the nation's power, its commercial marine, which we are about to transfer from the British Colonist and shipowner to the foreigner. For every shilling of the timber thus imported from our Colonies, the products of British industry aro returned, whilst the Baltic, whence we draw our supplies of foreign timber, takes the minimum amount of our exports and employs almost exclusively foreign shipping. The Danish, the Swedish, or the Nor- wegian vessels which come to us timber-laden, do not take return cargoes of British products to their own country. Their usual des- tination and cargo is to South America, or the Brazils, with a cargo of salt, or in ballast, bringing back to the continent of Europe sugars, which might otherwise furnish freights for British shipping. We are thus building up a marine power for those countries which, with our present policy, will shortly enable them to cope, as mari- time nations, witli Great Britain herself. In all human probability then— judging from past experience- looking closely at the usual determination of human action, and weighing its incentives— what must be the effect of our present policy upotf the connexions at present existing between these valu- able possessions and the mother country ? Bear in mind the tie of interest which now binds iliem — protection of British products by the Colonial consumer, and corresponding protection of Colonial products by the British consumer. This bargain — this basis of our mutual relations — the British Legislature is proposing to annul. We are throwing our Colonial Empire— a part of it in its infancy — npou its own resources. We are taking from it the most material advantages of its connexion witli us ; and leaving with it the burthen — for such it must become — of our friendship and relation- ship. What tie is left ? The tie of blood is a weak one. What is toprevent these Colonies seeking other alliances and other fricnd»hip8 amongst the great family of nations 1 What is to prevent them "setting up for themselves" and becoming independent states? There are men, and even legislators, amongst ourselves, who are ready to concede that this should, under any circumstances, be their course. But suppose that they do not go this length — suppose that they merely say to us, "You have thrown us from you as children ; you have divorced us from the great family from which we spring ; you have made us aliens by your legis- lation ; and, at least, you ought to allow us to shift for ourselves ; to exercise the privilege, which you have claimed, as based upon un- erring wisdom, to buy iu the cheapest market, and sell in the dear- est. We cannot, in justice, resist such an appeal. It is too unmis- takeably reasonable. We are bound to say to our Colonies, and they 25 sure. In cal- unmis- wiU insiBt upon their right to the concession, " take your own raea- sures for the advancement of the industry of your population Form your own contracts for the regulation of your commercial in- tercourse with other countries. For ourselves, we have no longer a nghi to ask for more than that amount of preference in your markets for our commodities which, under your new relations, you may find it your interest to afford us." This, undoubtedly, must be the immediate course nf a portion, at least, of our Colonies. Special circumstances may bind some of them to us for a few years to come : India, because we have a hold upon the ownership of its soil ; our infant possessions, because they are as yet unable to protect themselves from external aggression ; our military stations, because they exit.t only as connected with the armed power of Great Britain, may maintain their present posi- tion in relation to us for awhile. But even this cannot last long • and we much doubt whether the proposal for the termination of the conuex;on will not come from the manufacturing interests of Great Britain herself. Let our Colonies pursue the course which, in strict justice, they are entitled to do, and we shall very shortly have some niember of the British senate, backed by no inconsiderable number of the British people, enquiring, " for what do we tax ourselves to retain Canada from the grasp of the American Republic, or the Bri- tish West Indies from throwing themselves into the same protectina arms v "^ ** Most ably this portion of the subject was treated by the honourable member for Liverpool, in his speech in the House of Commons on the 1 2th of February : — I have often imagined -and it was for this that I moved for, and obtained the order of this House, for the extenj.ive returns which are now preparinR, namel-. the various colonial tariffs and commercial relations at present subsisting between all the Colonies of the Empire and the mother country, and between the Colonies theinselves-that it might rejiUy be possible to treat Colonies like counties of the country, not only in direct trade with the United Kingdom, but in commercial intercourse with each other, by free trade among ourselves, under a reasonable moderate degree of protection from without, and so resolve the United Kingdom and all her Colonies and po.ssessions, into a commercial union such as might defy all rivalry, and defeat all combinations. Then might colonization proceed on a gigaiitic scale-then might British capital animate British labour, on British soil tor British objects, throughout the extended dominions of the British Empire. Such an union IS the United States of America-a confederation of sovereign htates league, together for commercial and political purposes, with the most perfect free trade within, and a stringent protection from without: and sitrnallv. surely, has that commercial treaty succeeded and flourished. Such an union, too IS the German Customs' League: and it has succeeded to an extent that reallv IS, m so short a time, miraculous. But free trade~the extinction of the protec- tive principle-the repeal of the differential duties-would at once convert all our Colonies, in a commercial sense, into as many independent States. The colonial consumer of British productions would then be released from his part of the com- pact-that of dealing m preference, with their British producer; and the British consumer of such art cles as the Colonies produce, absofved from hisj each party would be free to buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest market. I defy any PoLSal / "^P"rK^ « ■.-r'i'' "' ^i"'? "^'»"'^' ""* ^^ " ''^'"»> dissolution of thi Colonial svstem. fhe British flag miglit still fly for a time, where Hound British S L»K .,"" "' J" ^"""'^ f^'t "^ ^^^ ^"""'"l- '^''« ^''••'"'"s ^ould regard it still with the veneration to winch it is entitled. Our navies might still guard I : t L f i| 26 their coaats and waters, and our troops hold roiJitary possession "f their lands • but then would come the question of the economists, in debates on the Navv Army, and Ordnance Estimates, what is the use of Colonies? They eonsumi pot, as of old, the productions of the United Kingdom in any greater deVee tha^ If tuey were Foreign States; we no longer consider and triat the Colonies « domestic sources essential for the supply of the materials of our manufacturing industry and the elements of our maritime power ; and it will be difficult to answer that economical argument, when, moreover, we shall have dii>--arded our Colonies, f-.r considerations of a wretched pecuniary economy, and sacrificed national objects, and high destinies, to the minor, and the comparatively mean calculations of speculative wealth. I have said what the eflFect of free trade must be on the Canada Corn Bill. What will be the effect of the extinSbn of pro^ec. tion, when fully earned out, on the British North American timber trade PI ^f"!.n''l^ !• ^ °! 'f*^ '"fsP'opo^edJn this new Tariff, but of the total abolition of all differential duties, which must be the result of this measure. When this IS carried out with respect to sugars, what is to become of the British West Indies ? How will they be effected by free trade in sugar ? for the nerfeet extinction must be carried out to the extent even of admitting slave-produced sugar, as already demanded, and as we have already done slave-produced cotton What is to become of the coffees of Ceylon— and what of British India -that boundless space, in which, in the valley of the Ganges alone, sugar sufficient for the supply of the whole world might be produced .3 g-^rsumcient tor That our empire in British America, at least, will adopt the ex- treme step of transfering its allegiance from us, and entering into intimate relations with the United States, if not even becoming a portion of that republic, has already resolved itself into a moral certainty. In the sympathizing movement of 1837 and 1838, this course was only staved oflF by the resolved loyalty of the population of thfl Upper Province of Canada, allied to us by the tie of protection which we then afforded to their agricultural industry. W6 are dis- solving this alliance. The tie is no longer to exist ; and we have the following assurance, from the lips of a loyal and patriotic man- Mr. Isaac Buchanan— well acquainted with the temper and feelings of British America from which he has recently returned— that thatim- tant Colony, for its own sake, will and must, as the result of the passing of Sir Robert Peel's measures, ^eek other relations than those which she now possesses with this country. Mr. Buchanan says, in a letter addressed to the members of the British Parliament : ' It is clear that the Colonies of British America and the West Indies will be the first we shall lose, the interests of both now leading them to become members of the American union. Take for instance the case of Canada. Can any one for a moment doubt that, as soon as it is known on the other side of the Atlantic that Canadian wheat has no longer any protection in England the Canadians will at once insist on the repeal of Mr. Gladstone's Act, which fflvea protection in the Colonies to British manufactures P Nine-tenths of the Canada trade will thereupon go to the markets of New York and Boston. The overburthened people of England will, in their turn, bejtin to feel that they are going to the expense of defending a Colony which has ceased to be of any use to the empire, as consuming its manufactures, or emplouine its satltrs find shipping. r y s "' And any hint from England of a desire for separation will be cheerfully re- sponded to by the people of Canada, who will be writhing under the feeling that England has dtshonourably broken promises of protection to Canadian wheat and timber, made by every ministry from the timber panic of 1808 downwards, and will have got their eyes open to the fact that (as there remains no longer any. the slightest bond of interest between Canada and the mother country) w reason can 27 ^ giyen why the Canadians should risk their lives and properties in dpfpn,1Jn» ^f|^sar:r^ :^^*s.rirt:^'i?fr3-^^ marke 8 of the United states. The republic, however, will not S^eTr^^ ^^l^^T^^lcl^r^'^f ''°?°'''''"" ^'" ''^'^ *° be' oonsummafed bef^eet «>JST.LmtdraS;'. '^°«''"' wishes It or not, Canada wUl certainly cut her That such a course is the reasonable course— the only course which sensible men should adopt-needs little proof. Our Canadian *J^Jj^9land They are not so much Colonies as Counties of Great Ifntam. The ocean dmdes us from them, and that is all. In fnl if%-"v," °''- *' '" '"l^"^"?' ^" ''*«''^' tl^^y are 0/ M,_a part of invS^? /"'P'n',P'-'^?'"''"^ for us more important tasks than any other of our Colonial possessions ; and, whilst doing this, re- paying ua amply for all our efforts in behalf of their liberties and their prospenty Through them we hang upon the skirts of the American republic. Through them alone we can insist that we are not isolated from a share m the commerce of a continent. Tariffs r/nlv'7 ' P'^'^T,'' f ^""^ '"^"^^'•y f^«"^ participating in the 3 L l"7 ^""'^"^ ' ^"* ^ settlement in that world, with a vast frontier, which no customs regulations are sufficient to guard wiU ensure to us consideration and concessions, which no other instru- mentality could gain for us. To perpetuate this connexion, however, the tie must be one of mutual interest. British America, if no r„rtr'S'1 ""^ ^^^ '^"^,°^ * protecting mother, will not re- mam the child of an unnatural step-mother. In a word— and I am borne out in the assertion-Canada is only ours so long as she is treated ^ a portion of the great family, of which Britain is the head and finds her advantage in that connexion and relationship, Ihat such 18 the view taken by the people of the United States themselves, the follow ng remarks, from a recent number of the New York Herald, will show : — The intelligence from Canada is beginning to be of a verv interesUn,, character. The Provincial Parliament began Us session on the 20th instan? iCir^ ^^ f T^^ ^'°"' *''*•' »°^ «"^^">'"- Genera^t^e Earl CathcS ' d.«ft ^- /T'P' "f'he proposed tariff of Sir Robert Peel, there wa^rBreat dea ot dissatisfaction manifested towards it in the Canada^. It wLthouX woui&or''''""f *'"'■ •'""'^^ "" K^'^''^' 'he Western part o^ the Unked Stats wouU receive such an impetus,- as to affect, in a material degree, the commercial UnitKa'tr'"^ """"'"* "*■ '"""''''' ""^^ ^'^""'"''"^ emig^atL the^rtothj It certainly did not require much sagacity or farsightedness to arrive at this conclusion nor to perceive that it would be a means of hasfeZ>fft/raZeluon id fawrtlirfi' n ''""''• "'"''^ '""« '""' t''*-' '""ral effect Jour ins Uutbns and laws, will finally consummate. Hut Sir Robert PppI f»U ♦l.o\.ffll„V J ?? powerful pressure at home, and was obliged to go wit . U ,t he coi dlt tem i^' Tust Tn'heLt^ro':: Th-"" '° -"^ -/''- "- conmiercial s^Lm," 1 ho gh' 1 must, in the nature of things, assist to hasten an event which he would deplore. I may say, too, that Canada has a right to feel peculiarly grieved, Hmta fl W.IIUP ■'«"* i '/h 28 and even insulted and mocked, by our present policy. Three years ago, by our Canadian corn bill, we said to her that her relationship to U3 was to be perpetuaL We recognised her expressly as a member of our family, by our Canadian corn bill. We encouraged her to enter upon great works, to facilitate her connexion with us. We tempted her to expend millions in improving and cheapening her communications with the Atlantic; and thus cheapening her pro- ducts m our own markets, and at the same time affording facilities for the introduction of British products into hers. We have led her to incur a large debt for this purpose. We have forestalled her resources for years to come ; and, at least, the duty is incumbent upon us, and it is a poor tribute to justice, although nevertheless not one contemplated by Sir Robert Peel's measure, to take upon our- selves the burthen which the Canadas, relying upon our good faith, and the consistency of our rule, have imposed upon themselves. It may be said that our trade with British America is nothing compared with the trade which we carry on with neutral markets ; that it is a small fractional part of our aggregate trade with the world. Here again I must quote from the returns (so far as the cotton trade is concerned), with whk'i Mr. Buchanan's publications have furnished me ; and, in doing so, I may add a remark or two which that gentleman, in any of his publications which I have seen has not recognised. * It is assumed by the advocates of Sir Robert Peel's measures that our trade with the United States is more worthy of being cul- tivated than our trade with British America. I give here, from the Commercial Glance of Mr. Burn», the statistics of our cotton trade with both countries for the years 1841 and 1845, by which it will be seen that whilst tLe United States, aided, nn doubt, by their own native pvoducers of manufactured fabrics of cotton, havt been retrograding in the amount of their purchases from this country, our British American possessions have increased in more than an equal ratio as consumers : — Comparative View of Exports to United States ano British America. " Plain Calicoes" to United States, in 1841 11.957,053 yds. Ditto to British America 7 757 332 Balance in favor of United States in 1841 yds. 4,199,721 " Calicoes, printed and dyed" to United States in 1841 26,025,281 yds. Ditto ditto to British America 10,703,415 yds! Balance in/avov of United States in 1841 yds. 15,321, 866- " Plain Calicoes" to I'nited States in 1845 12,412,981 yds Ditto to British America ■.'.■.■.■.■ n'm',6S6 „ " Balance in favor of United States only yds. 832,395 " Printed and dyed Calicoes" to United States »nl845 13,097,851 yds. Ditto ditto to British America 13,362,1 73 Balance in favor »f British America in 1845. . . . yds. 2(U.32'J tniiead qf 1 .a21,866 yards against in 1841 I ^ ' I shall perhaps be told by the cotton manufacturer that he has 29 no objection to resign his part oi the consideration which these colonies and the mother-country extend to each other as the basis of the connexion; that he expects still to be able to command the Canadian market by the cheapness of his goods. In every sense he will find this a woful mistake. To what extent is he at present able Hn-f-i^'^.^r his coarse and low priced fabrics of cotton into the UnitedStates? To a very limited one. America protects rigidly those manufactures which her own growing skill and enterprise can pro- duce ; and many she has almost ceased to import at all. Her coarse woollens, tor the consumption of her agricultural population and the working classes m her towns, she can manufacture for herself Year by year she is becoming more self-dependent for every article of use or comfort, for the production of which highly skilled labour 18 no required. Let British America therefore once adopt the step of allying herself with the United States ; and her market for these articles becomes closed to us. She will supply herself from the United States, with every article which the present ' almost pro- hibitory Tariff of that republic shuts out from the consumptioS of Its own citizens* I may be told, however that when we have opened our markets to the timber and corn of foreign countries, they wiU consume more largely of our manufactured goods. Past experience certainly does not warrant the assumption. In 1844 the reduction of the duty upon Baltic timber from 55s. to 258. came into operation; and I find the foUowing to havo been the result with respect to the export of the staple manufactures of cotton— plain caUcoes and printed calicoes— into the following countries : — r « PLAIN COTTONS. COUNTRIES. Denmark yds, Prussia ', Russia .' ." Sweden and Norway .'. " 1843. 444,377 1,568 1,050,533 710,458 1844. 839,366 3,206 901,985 886,993 1845. 467,912 1,248 823,577 755,941 PRINTED COTTONS. Denmark yds Prussia Russia ' I Sweden and Nor^vay '. '. |,' 542,665 851 60,651 603,031 395,803 660 231,779 585,385 285,064 5,510 160,908 619,674 There is no evidence hero of these countries becoming greater S /Zn *;' ^^ °"' ^^''""«- Yet we took last year of Foreign tmber 642,000 loads against 351,000 loads in 184 1 -thus almrstttinff our consumption of that article, and at the same t^me thrown^ away a large amount of revenue. growing HhpSl^'f ^""a^^ ^^'\*'? ^" particular will not meet our suicidal hberahty by reducing their Tariff and thus destroying that g cat r-"l 1 "?^ \"^'''^^ ^'"""g^* ^'''^^^ population, whicl she has so edulous y laboured to erect, we have the following significant Z nouncement m a late uumber of the New York He?al| emarkfug 30 upon the changes proposed in this country, the news of which had just reached America by the Steamer of the 4th of February :— "We can never carry into operation such a liberal commercial policy as Great untam. Our tanfiFmust be continued at a revenue standard. The bulk of the revenue for the support of the general government, is derived from duties upon Joreign imports, and to that source we must ever look for supplies. We could not establish an income tax, or any direct tax, for the support of government ; and rlH!^"'^^'*^"''^^'-^-^''" the Circumstances, is to remove^ll unnecessary res notions from our tanft laws, and levy a duty upon imports merely for revenue. Ihis IS all any foreign government can expect, and it is as far as we can go.— Ihe tajilf act now under consideration of the Committee of Ways and Means is «n?i^ ?."P°n ^\t '^"^"u"^, «t»°daid, as near aa such a standard can be antici- pated. It will rather go below that point than exceed it ; and we think it possible that alterations, and we fear additions, may be required in the rate of duty upon many items, to bring it up to the proper level. The a,l valorem principle, applied to ail articles, is an experiment, and its operation is a matterof much uncertainty.." That public opinion in the United States is in favour of protection to native industry, independently of revenue necessities, will be made suflftciently apparent by some extracts from recent numbers ol Hunt's New York Magazine, which I have given in an Appendix. Nor has the Home consumer derived the benefit of the reduction which has thus transferred so large a portion of the supply of timber from the British Colonist to the Foreign grower, and of freights from the British to the Foreign shipowner and sailor. The follow- ing extract from the admirable speech of Lord George Bentinck, of March 20th, in the debate upon the present measures, is sufficient to settle this question in the negative : — " The Government it was said, by its reduction of duty had prevented the price of American timber from rising to an enormous amount. In 1842 he (Lord G Bentinck) and others who represented he Ship-owner's interest warned the Ea'l of Ripon that the reduction then proposed in the differential duties would either go clean into the pockets of the Baltic growers, or else would greatly injure the Canadian trade ; ana now the House should hear how Canadian timber had b-en somewhat reduced in price but the larger part of the remission of duty had gone into the hands of Foreigners. It appeared by a list of invoice prices furnished to him by Mr. Kankin of Liverpool, a member of one of the greatest American houses that the price of Red Pine in Canada in 1839 and 1840 was 9d. a foot; in 1841 9^. The year 1842 ought to be omitted. It was a year of entire stagnation of trade and supplied no criteriim. The mean price then for the three years pre- ceding 1842 was 9Jd. afoot; for the three years since 1842 it was 7M The price of yellow pine was 4fd. before the reduction of differential duties, and it fell to 4id. afterwards -a depreciation of ten per cent. Now turn to the price of Baltic timber ; and here he should have the pleasure not only of quoting from the writings of a Cabinet Minister, but of one who sets such value on what he had written and said that rather than contradict it by his conduct in the House he resigned his seat in the Cabinet. Mr. Gladstone (hear, bear,) in his pamphlet written in 1845, to shew the great advantage the consumer had gained by the reduction of duties, said that another year would be necessary fully to shew the benefit of those alterations, but stated that already he had ascertained from trust- worthy sources of information that the price of Dantzig or Memel timber in the London market had fallen from .£6 12s. Gd., a load to £4 8s. 9d. since 308. of the duty had been taken off; that shewed a reduction of £1 3. 2d. leaving 6s. 3d. (the rest of the aOs) to go into the pockets of the foreign producer. The year had now exp-red which Mr. Gladstone required ; and it appeared from Prince's price current (probably the same authority as he took) that in January 1846 the price varied from £4 iOs. to £6, (hear hear,) and yet Ministers were refusing to reduce excise duties, which were paid by British consumers, and limiting them- 31 seiveg to the reduction of customs duties on articles which compete with our own productions or those of ou,- Colonies (hear.) But Mr. Gladstone took also the L,iverpool market and stated that the price of Dantzic fir, common and middling sold there m January 1841 varied from 26id. to 27d. per foot ; in 1842 the mean price was 25d. and in 1845 it was 20id. In 1846 it appeared by a Liverpool trade circular that it had risen to 23d. and 24d. But the result was that out of rf08. duty remitted in 1842 the foreign grower put 24s. 9d. into his pocket, and the consumer got a reduction of only Ss. 2^. per load. (Hear hear.) It miRht be said that the trade of the Canadas had nevertheless enormously increased: but that had not arisen from any reduction of duties but from the great demand tor timber for Railways; and not on, Railway the less would have been con- structed If the differential duties had remained as before So far as increase of consumption was concerned, consequent upon the reduction of the duty, that re- duction had proved an unmitigated loss; and but for the increased consumption caused by the great Railway speculation, for which Her Majesty's Minister would hardly take credit, the Canadas would have suflFered grievously in their vXpOFtSa The industry of the Empire and of the Colonist has therefore been doubly sacrificed by the operations of the change of 1842. We have checked a trade which employed exclusively British labour and shipping, and is paid for chiefly by the products of the British artizan, for one which employs exclusively Foreign labour and ship- ping, and not only refuses to take our manufactures in return, but pockets the largest share of the duty, which we remitted to encourage it to do so, and denies us the cheapness for which we contracted ! That the population of British America is already seriously alarmed at the position in which the proposed measures of Goverament threaten to place them is clear from the advices and journals received by the Halifax mail steamer, a few days ago arrived ; and the feeling is evidently shared by the Governor General of Canada himself. In his speech at the opening of the Canadian parliament, on the 20th ulto., Lord Cathcart thus indicated his first impressions, at least, upon the subject : — The laat intelligence from the Mother Country indicates a most important change in the commercial policy of the Empire. I had previously taken occasion to press upon Her Majesty's Government a due consideration of the effect that any contemplated alteration might have on the interests of Canada. But until we have a fuller exposition of the projected scheme, which a few days will probably bring to us, it would be premature to anticipate that the claims vf this Province to a Just measure of protection had been overlooked. I am not at all inclined to believe that the Despatch of Mr. Gladstone, in reply to the communication of the Governor General, has altered his previous views, or is calculated to allay the aggravated feelings of the Canadian people. The Colonial Secretary in the despatch in question, which is dated from Downing-street, on the 3rd March, and went out to Canada by the Packet of the 4th, some- what too plainly indicates that the policy of Great Britain is henceforth to be determined upon irrespective of Colonial interests. He says : — " The interests of Canada have occupied the place to which they are justly entitled in the deliberations of Her Majesty's Government upon this important subject, and upon others which are akin to it. At the same time I need hardly point out to your Lordship, that there are matters in xvhhh considerations imme- "^e^BP" ""^mmmm "ir i 82 llf^rih. •" i , ".'^ °' *° "Muftcturer at home for a ohean vm of the L2 ? ' ■" "" '■'f "' '"' •"<""» declaration on t£ injury bemginffloted upon CanadUn inlerSt by the^^eSment ot Her population. With respect to her corn, Mr. Gladstone says :Z intoVo^r^^itZ'^iitlt^^^^ 'f Cr''* -» have to enter when no longer coleveTh7^y^rT^oLfA^^'''.^ """^ .^"^^g^ '° t^'^ rivalry, to make the effort wYthout^ some^Idvan IL«^^' .'"' ^'','* '''! ^'" "°' ^^ ''^"^'^ «» light taxation; the Stance Lha,^^^^^^^^^ . Among them I reckon theconstructionandTmp oveLntof her i^^ ^"^'-^ '-'^^'^ ^^"^ ^"'^^ '° gularand steady course of trTdew^hVhU^? communications ; her more re- to importation, and? on hat acclnfio "i'n ^? 'T **"ff' «" favourable reciprocal comm3rceoutwids-Triir«/°'^^'^"^ 'l°'''°» *" encourage her settled one of some standLi^wifh«lM;<. ^^' ""'^ ^'^'^^ ^'^ ''^^^ become a while any regulareSi^e^rlf^^c^^^^^^^^ Sr^ SfuT^f '''-'' ^'^ P— atttJn'din^grsS'^uSnrt: pT Molit 'JarSLrryt^fglTdToteta^^^ ^'^^^"'^^^^ ^l -"'P^'^ -'•> consider that Me M.iw o/^X/L L^/l f "^ °° "^^ other hand, I expense, and ., 1 must assume, navfgated wihCufl'Vurand^^al^^^^^^^^ nf l^}'f 'K'"''''^^ TV''' ^^'"^^ *° «^^e^ that a portion at least W w' ^t'^tage/^hich Canada is here said to enjoy over the S?rc^ecto?,^^T"''"° longer exists; and that.'at'aS'events Sa?SrofZ. ♦"'"''"y"^*"^''^"^™"^ ^'' agriculturists, a gr^at many of the existing arrangements of her commerce wiU also figutrpl^^^^^ '^^^^ following statements ^nd ngures prepared for a Montreal journal by a gentleman in New York, intimaely connected with the trade, very materiaJvweakel the force of the Colonial Secretary's fond anticipations :- ttry, and with 33 Exportation of Flour to Liveepool via Montreal and New York, UNDER Present Corn Laws of Great Britain. Duty on United States Wheat, floured in Canada, per barrel. . . a" s' 5 6 ^5^arf "er1,"'?.'",''*^°".°' ^'^'^'^ P>-«dice, for the next three IV^babie difference in freight from the'WM^^ 2 3 ^ 9 3 Balance in favour of New York as the shipping port 7^ «nnrfT?il^*'*°.*'-^ '" *'»^'":°[*^'« city, will hold good during the three^Tars fixed B^r^Tafn t^ r"""^?"" °^ the retnaining protection under the corn laws of Great Britain and the continuance of the present rate of tolls on our public works." nf P'r,;[!.n^^^ ul^P"?:*vV*^.'''';^^y^*'"*' ttepresent protection in the corn laws JumtZ l^-""^^ \^ abolished, there will be an increLed exportation of bread- stuflFsfrom this port, a^ we should draw that trade from Canada, to a greater extent than yet realized. The reduction of tolls on our public works is lile'y to proceed more rapidly than on those of Canada, and we shall, therefore, be bitter able to control this trade in a few years hence, than we are now. Under the contemplated equalization of duties in Great Britain upon Canadian^d American flour, shipments can be made as annexed :— American Exportation of Flour to Liverpool, via New York and Montreal. Freight, per barrel, from Toronto to Oswego .... n t' S°- !l<»- Oswego to New York ■.■.'.'.■.■.■. a a Do. do. New York to Liverpool i r Average rate of insurance, (1 per cent.) .'.'.'.'.'.'.'," o 3 Cost of transport from Toronto to Liverpool, via New York 6~3 Freight, per barrel, from Toronto to Kingston. . . . n~k ^0- do- Kingston to Montreal ■.;;■.■; V S uo. do. Montreal to Liverpool ± r Average rate of insurance, (2 per cent.)...... '.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'. o 6 7~3 f»r ^oT?'^'^T• ^J'al^nce in favour of that city of two shillings per b^rel. So ZZ */*''l"' breadstuffs between Great Britain and North America icon^ oerned, under the present formation of the corn-laws, and under an equal zation of duties of Canadian and American flour, it is pretty evident that thebukofU Sed La matT.r''o^''V^'' "''/""^ ^TT''^' ^"^^ *° ^^^^ extent it will be earned, is a matter of much uncertainty and doubt." With respect to the alleged "many advantages" which the shipping of British North America enjoys over that of the United States, upon which Mr. Gladstone depends to prevent this di- version of our commerce from the St. Lawrence to New York, and from Bntish bottoms to those of the RepubUc, I cannot see where those advantages he. It is true that the shipping of British America 18 constructed at less expense ; but then it can only be said to have paying cargoes one way. A vessel, which has brought to New York a valuable cargo of dry goode, can afford to returnrcorn laden, to Ixreat Britain at less rates than even a cheaper ship, which has come out almost in ballast, can sail from Montreal or Quebec with — =" t«a=vuuc, X suspcxi, win una inis delusive argument mtim J mm 34 slip from beneath his feet ; and especially so when, by the present measures, the British Government has withdrawn the temptation to emigrants to settle in Canada, and directed the surplu )opulation of this country to the western states of the American' union, as attording them equal, if not superior, fields for their enterprize and industry. It is well known that a large portion of our shipping employed in the trade with British America goes out with emigrants to those settlements ; and, when we take away this remunerating employment for the outward voyage, the freight homewards must be a seriously increased one. With respect to the timber trade of Canada, the same despatch says : — *^ "Not only are they fthe government) free from the apprehension that the pro- posed remission of 10s. per load on foreign timber and J 28. on foreiKn deals will cause a contraction of the trade from British North America, but they are sin- guine in the anticipation that that trade will continue, notwithstanding the pro- posed change, to extend itself." ' "-auumg lue pro A differential duty of 15s., proposed, as "upon the average neariy covering the difference between freights from the Baltic and those from British North America to Great Britain," he apprehends will preserve to us this trade ; and he argues, that as importation ot Canadian Timber has increased under the measure of 1842 so it will continue to increase when a further amount of protection shall have been withdrawn. Candour, however, ought to have induced him, before holding out this unstable argument to the Colonist, to have reminded him of the fact, that very special circumstances, most tavourab e to the developement of the Timber consumption of Great lintain, have been in operation since 1843. The progress of RaU- way construction, the increased general prosperity of the country, and other concurrent causes (amongst the rest the fact of the Baltic grower having himself appropriated the remitted duty, and rendered his timber comparatively dearer than Canadian) have supported the Uritish grower in the competition to which the measure of 1842 submitted him. Let these special circumstances cease to operate and It is by no means a certainty that, even with his present pro- tection, the Canadian may not have a period of suffering before him Keduce that protection, however, to 15s. from 248., its present amount, and the ruin of this branch of colonial industry is certain. The lumberers of that Colony will not, like the serfs of the northern Juropean countries, work for a minimum amount of remuneration. Kender their employment unprofitable and they betake themselves at once to tlieir farms ; their timber ceases to employ our shipping, our sailors, and their own saw-mills, and to pay for British manufactures. Under the proposed duty (the freight from the Baltic being about 178. per load against 38s. from British America) the Baltic grower wUl have a protecting duty of six shillings per load (or the difference of freight of 21s. less the duty of ISs.) over the Canadian; and thus, if the quality of the article furnished us by the latter were as good and its cost as little at Quebec as tliat of the former at Memel or Dantzic, the trade must be a losing one and be abandoned. The ^W JX ZZL p ill "' 35 Colonist obviously cannot support himself with less than 21s. as the diflferential duty, even at the present relative prices of the different descriptions of timber in the British market. The effect upon our commerce with the Canadas of their ceasing to be a colony may be judged of by the following statistics, which again I borrow from Mr. Buchanan's letters : — " The trade of America when our Calony in 1769 employed, on an average of three years, 1078 ships and 28,910 seamen, and the value of the goods taken from Great Britain was £3,370,000; the export of the colony being £3,924,606. " The population of the United States is now nearly ten times what it then was, without any great permanent increase in our exports to America (causes, oyer which we had no control, brought them down Inthe year 1842 to £3,628,107)." " I cannot better finish off this statement than by repeating that, while the trade of British America and the West Indies,stated in 1843 to be only £14,000,000 employed 2900 shipsof 970,000 tons, and 60,000 seamen, our trade with the United States, estimated at 22,000,000 (three-fifths being imports of raw cotton, &c.), is carried in 350 ships, of 233,000 tons ; and the import from China, amounting to £6,000,000, is brought in 84 ships of 39,712 tons." I observe that the Morning Chronicle sneers at the notion that our Canadian population regard the progress of our Free Trade policy with any feelings of alarm ; and quotes the opinions, with respect to it, of Mr. Papineau, of all persons in the world. I must say that I was quite prepared for this. I know that we have not as yet had conveyed to us the feelings of the parties most inte- rested in the question — the agricultural residents of the upper province. The next packet will bring us the expression of the feelings of this class of our Canadian population. In the meantime, Sir Robert Peel may quote his Montreal advices, which I take to be of much the same value as the statistical tables upon which he wishes us to place such implicit reliance ; and with respect to which I shall have a few words to say before I conclude. In direct opposition, however, to the representations of the Morning Chronicle, as to the feeling with which these measures were viewed in Canada, I quote a very contrary statement from his own Washington correspondent : — A good deal of restlessness has been exhibited in Canada since the announce- ment of Sir R. Peel's new commercial policy reached the regions of the Saint Lawrence. Many of the loyally dispuscd begin to fear the effect wliich the new comdnercial relations which England is likely to contract with the United States may have upon the connection between the colony and the mother country ; whilst others, who do not attach so much value to British connection, regard the repeal of the corn laws in England as the first step towards the peaceable establishment of an independent government in Canada. " With Free Trade, what can England now want with colonies P" is now often asked both here and in the British pro- vinces. It is very evident that the Canadians, generally, must cordially dislike the great feature of Sir R. Peek's new commercial policy. The timber interest which is predominant in Lower Canada, is very uneasy, whilst, in the upper province, the mill owners and the forwarders are amongst the loudest of the croakers. That both of these latter will sufi'er by the English ports being thrown open for grain to all the world is very obvious, when it is considered that the one had all the grinding, whilst the other had all the inland carriage, of the large quantity of American wheat which found its way into the English market by the St. Lawrence, under the very convenient discrimination of the Canada corn bill. Wealthy associations have been formed, and extensive mills have been built, for 1 III X- MMH mm ■^■'--::a..ar:nE..::; UHi !l lif ^f 36 the express and exclusive par ,iose of grinding American wheat, and then sending It to the home market as colonial produce, with the colonial brand upon it. The shares in these establishments are fast tending to discount, and their permanent depreciation is certain upon the success of the present movement in England. The Canadians are also beginning to speculate upon the cui bono of the gigantic system of internal improvement, for the completion of which, within the last quarter of a century, the colonial resources have been drained, the imperial treasury has been drawn upon, the province has been burdened with a heavy debt, and the credit of the mother country pledged to some extent for its redemp- tion. The very least that the Canadians expect, if their carrying trade is de- stroyed, is that the home government will relieve them of the burden with which the Rideau Canal has so long pressed upon the provincial exchequer. And I may add the following letter which appeared in the Liverpool S.nndard of the 21st April, and conies, I am assured, from a gentle- man in Upper Canada of extensive experience as a merchant, and most guarded and cautious in the formation and expression of his opinions : — "The abolition of all protection on Canadian or Colonial produce in Britain will, ere long, produce a change in the feelings of the Colonists, and, it may be in the mother country also. If the Colonists have no protection, they will seek to buy where they can best please themselves ; and the bond of mutual interest which at present binds them to Britain will be loosened, and in time entirely broken ; and the time will come when it becomes no longer the intorest of Britain to retain the connexion. That time will be very much hastened by the late changes, and it becomes us to inquire whether we would continue in business in Canada either as an independent country or as a state of the union ; for it would not surprise me if the present generation even have to ask themselves such a question." The Free Trader, who still looks forward to enjoying the Trade of our Canadian possessions, does not sufficiently bear in mind the nature of that trade. He knows that the merchant of Montreal or Quebec buys largely of British manufactures, and pays for them — how 1 By the very articles — Corn and Timber — for which we are about to transfer our demand to the United States and continental Europe. The basis of all trade is barter in some shape ; and that of Canada is peculiarly one of barter. The agriculturist of the Upper State exchanges his wheat, his beef, or his pork with the storekeeper for the manufactured products of Manchester, Glasgow, Birmingham and Sheffield. The lumberer exchanges his labour for the same articles. The storekeeper goes through the same operation with the merchant, and the merchant with the home manufacturer and the home consumer. Canada has nothing to give us for our goods but her timber and her agricultural products. Refuse to take these — render colonial agriculture an unprofitable pursuit — destroy her timber trade — and Canada ceases to consume. The result is inevitable. I can imagine, indeed, a modification of the present measures and remedial steps within the reach of the government which might materially lighten the heavy blow which, in their present naked state, they threaten to deal against the industry of British America and, through it, against the greatness of the British Empire itself. A moderate fixed duty upon Foreign mm sav H°, "*• "ve*^ '■•" ^er quarter — would assist the Colonist in sustaining that blow. England might also be nobly generous, and relieve Canada of the interest of * ^||pW fg«Fai ■tlflttffrTMlUL, ., 37 her debt, contracted mainly upon the faith of the British markets being kept open to the produce of its industry. If he wTshes to retain the employment provided for her shipping in theslposses Z:; "l^ P-'n''? ''' r^^"S into the Z± of the Ed States, she will a once throw open, toll free, the St. Lawrence S, U T, * '^""^'^ '^' unhappily take none of these sleps- should she surrender herself implicitly to the blind eadi^^^r of theonsts and pander to the selfishness of a race of men whose God IS gold-to whom associations the most holy, tiertL most roT.'n ™^T"^«, *^«, ^o.t hallowed, are no more regard d Tan rotten sticks-the doom of these noble Colonies, I tfel assured 8 fixed and a people allied to us closely by relationship byri Igion, by community of language and of feeling, will be%.-7cip ated into the embrace of republicanism, and be driven to job with ..Lfr^''"''' ^'t'^"' "^ '^'' United States in the indu Igendof CT/:^"l^p'''^t°r'^^*^^^^^ mother ^ The fate of the British West Indies is, by the carrying out of these measures as certainly sealed as is that of our BriUsh American possessions. With difiiculty these colonies, so yaluaWe to 0^607 merce, have sustained themselves under the effects of the dirnSn of protection to which they have been submitted. Hundreds of escates, once yielding a fair return for the enterprize and Sal en- gaged in their cultivation, are now unprofitable, or nearly so to the^r owners We were in hopes that the planters there S by the application of increased skill and capital to the soil Tnd he means ukSt''^'^ them of procuring an iLreased supply of labour ha^ ultima ely recovered a portion, at least, of their prosperity ThU hope, however, the hand of government is about 7dash* to the ground. The planter knows he cannot compete with foieSn slave SrSe'st?' '^"^ T^'" ^'■'''' '^^' every^successful eSS he makes to improve his existing position serves only as an invi7a ion to the home government to deal a fresh blow against him he wm cease from the effort in despair. A great consumingtlony Zse con merce employs almost exclusively British industry and Bridsh shin ping, will sink into insignificance, or seek new alliances wkh con- tries whose legislation will do its industry justice. A risirnatLn of coloured freemen, by whose aid we might have prfarthe"li4 of nlle bf °" "f ^Christianity over an cnL contin^i u lap^cS able by any European pioneer, as the lamentable results of past efforts have shown, will be suffered to relapse into thelndo enceS . u ;^ ,^ .*^'^ valuable nature of the commerce which theso proscribed Colonies bring, at this moment, to the Sr country ' 1.1.1--'!""" '^^"^^'^ '^' ^'^•■Se and increase,, imports o^Sh i^ig; c^unirier^ri^T" "'"^ ^^^^ ''^'' ^^^ ''^v-'^^ ^^'^^ ■MM asm 38 their ruin ; and compare the rate of their increased consumption of these fabrics with that of the United States, the favourite market, it would seem, with the otton manufacturer — Comparative View of Exports to United States and British West Indies. " Plain Cnlicoes" to United States in 1841 11,957,053 yds. Ditto to British West Indies 9,831,280 „ Balance m favor of United States yds. 2,125,773 " Plain Calicoes" to United States i« 1845 12,412,981 yds. Ditto to British West Indies 16,987,142 „ Balance infacor of British West Indies in 1845. . . . yds. 4,574,861 instead o/2,125,773 j/ards against in 1841. " Calicoes, printed and dyed" to United States in 1841 26,025,281 yds. Ditto ditto to British West Indies 9,774,720 „ Balance in favor of United Statts in 1841 yds. 16,250,561 " Calicoes, printed and dyed" to United States in 1845 13,097,851 yds. Ditto ditto to British West Indies 20,729,641 „ Balance infamr of British West Indies in 1845 yds. 7,631,790 instead of 16,250,501 AGAINST in 1841 1 1 We lose the British West Indies inevitably by the passing of these measures ; and mark the result. The grasping hand of the American republic clutches them by its favourite mode of annex- ation ; and thus annihilates, at a blow, the supremacy of the power and the commerce of Great Britain in a whole hemisphere. With the American flag flying from the summit of the Government House at Jamaica, and the Bermudas under her rule, what can resist that republic in its efforts to command the commerce of those seas ? Before proceeding further let me address myself to a matter \*hich, I humbly conceive, is an important one, and ought to be "ery maturely weighed before either branch of the Legislature arrives rtt a conclusion with respect to the proposed measures of Govern- ment. We have been in the habit of seeing Ministers, when pro- mulgating their views with respect to any measure, fortifying them- selves by official tables, from which they have quoted as if coming from unerring authority, i'eason might err. Men of business experience might place* confidence in facts and figures which had come before their own observation. But let a return from the Board of Trade, or any other board, tell us that right is wrong — that black is white — that loss is profit, or profit is loss — and we are to believe the assertion implicitly, the evitlcncc of our own senses and pockets notwithstanding. Wc have had the necessity of these very measures, and the working of past legislation in the same direction proved (!) to us upon such authority. Sir Robert Peel is nothing unless he is statistical. With four and twenty hours' notice he would convince you — if yon rotild believe him — by statistical returns, that you were insane, or even that more dilHcult matter to gulp down, that he was a consistent statesman. The proceedings in the House of Commons on the 2l8t of April have, however, happily relieved the nation of this hallucination ; and I notice the fact, as bearing upna the cor- rectness of some data with n-spcct to the timber trade contained in J v.. 39 a speech of Lord George Bentiuck, from wbinh I have Quoted above. In that very speech his lordship complained of the t ^y manner in which a motion of his for some returns, as to the dect upon the price of timber of the measures of 1842, had been responded to; and proceeded to give, from other sources, the data, which I have already quoted, shewing that the benefit, of the reduction of duty had not gone into the pocket of the consumer. The return in question came out a week ago, establishing a contrary result. Well, what is the upshot 'I Why, that Sir Robert is compelled to acknow- ledge that he is in error, and to confess the most glaring incompe- tence in the authority which he has been accustomed to quote from so triumphantly ! The question was as to the 'price of timber. The answer of the compiler of the false return is — but I must quote it entire : — '^ April 21. " Sir, — In answer to your requisition, calling on me to state in what depart- ment the error in the return of the values on Memel and Canadian timber arose, I have to regret to state that it w^as in the landing surveyor's department. The nature of the mistal(e is, that the prices were necessarily taken from the Prices Current, which are not official Customs' documents, but a mercantile list, in which some of the values quoted include the duties, whilst others do not. The heading of the space containing the values — viz. ' value in bond,' led to the error; it applied only to the upper half of the column, not to that part in which these prices were entered ; and this distinction was not observed. I have to ex- press my regret at this error, and to remain, Sir, " Your most obedient Servant, " E. Cimlwell, Esq. M. Stuet." I am far from wishing that this unhappy Mr. Sturt should be held up as failing in the fultilment of his duty. He only fulfilled it too well. The Premier wanted a return, shewing that the country had obtained cheapness in Foreign Timber to the extent of the duty remitted ; and he got it. Unfortunately the Error(?) was found out. What reliance after this can we place in Statistical Documents ? But let me come to the most material question — the bearing of these measures upon the future position which this country is to hold amongst nations, and their effect upon her social condition and the maintenance in their integrity of those institutions which have contributed to build up and, through ages to come, would have guaranteed her greatness. Taking our views as to the operation of these measures frm the Free Trader himself; admitting, for the moment, their entire success in producing the effect anticipated from them ; it is clear that wo are about to create a new order of things — to redistribute the inlluence and power of the various classes aud interests of society, as at present constituted — in fact to reduce the nation to the position of one dependent upon the accidents of fo- reign supply and demand not so much for its food as for the reward of that industry, by the successful exercise of which its food is to be purchased. We are about to lessen the present influence in the constitution of the owner and the tiller of the soil, and throw a pre- ponderating amouut iiun the hnnns or the maBscs congregated in our mniiufacturing towns, whose unwieldy number we are to increase I . ( iiiliiiriiii I M Bwl lii i 40 beyond calculation. The result, I predict without fear, must be a rapid march towards democratic rule ; and the overthrow of every institution, hitherto associated with and laaintained by the aristocratic element in our mixed constitution. What is the cha- racter and leaning of those masses in the present day ? It is towards levelhng measures ; the five points of the Charter, and the right of the labourer to dictate terms to his employer. What is the knoivn bias of the very men whose agitation has brought upon the nation the proposal, by a Conservative Ministry, of these measures ? It is towards the destruction of aristocracy, tlie removal of the church as a recognized and protected pillar of the country's greatness and happiness, and the establishment of a new order of things, in which there is to be only a mass of defenceless and disaffected labour at one extremity and overgrown capital at the other,— no middle state— no place of rest or pause. Throw out of order for but a moment such a social fabric as this, and who dai-es to contemplate the result ? Who can tell us with certainty in what frantic eflbrts the passions or the despair of a million of men thrown idle by any derangement of the machinery of our commerce may not be tempted to expend Itself? We have the calamity which resulted from the Chartist insurrection of 1839 within our recollection. We have the manu- facturing riots of 1842 before us. We have seen Manchester itself for four and twenty hours in possession of a turbulent mob ; and when we have created a dozen Manchesters— when we have thrown an additional million of our population into dependence upon the accidents of commerce, the mercy of capital, their own caprices, or the guidance of demagogues, what have we to stand between the institutions of the country and their fury. I see in the carrying out of these measures the carrying out of a social revolution, and the transfer of political power from those who now hold it into the hands of a demoralized and disaffected demo- cracy. There is no retarding influence to check such a consumma- tion. The experience of all history shows that countries situated as Great Britain must be under such a system nave ever progressed towards democratic rule and ultimate anarchy. I may be mistaken ; but if GO, the past has been all a mistake, or human nature is no longer what it was. But it is necessity, we are told, which is plunging us into this course. We are bound to the wheels of a relentless machine, which must crush us if we resist its impetuous moving. We have, Sir Robert Peel informs us, only to decid this question, "shall we progress or shall we turn back." I answer him, " shew us that such progress, brought about by such means, is one towards the in- creased greatness of the nation, and the increased happiness of the people, and we will resign ourselves into your guiding ; but, if you cannot, we are content to go back into the old ways of our fathers,. and to cling to the shelter of those institutions luulor which wc have become the great people that we are." Sir Robert Peel points to Ireland as the spur of necessity which is goading him on. I point to one vast Colonial Empire as the safety valve which is to 41 ofwwf ^I'.yi '^^"''^'^- ."^^ ^""* t^« "»i"i°° q'^^rters more ot wheat yearly he says, and employment and the means to IVt SfnT-r, 'r' '" the starving Llions of the s'ter Lie FnT n„/ w . ^T'''^ ^' ?' «*'h^ti°'^ °^ th^ dUemma. You have in Canada West a territory the most fertile in the world canable of irbSVelrT -^"'«-;b'^; t--ty millions ofTdditionKoS' la^d t?s J iT'"^'"™\P°P"^"*i«^°f I^^l^"d and of Eng- land and Scotland to carry their industry there: and for evenr thP irinl r *^"' ^°'''' y''^ *'''^^*'^ i^^^^^^^'i employment for the British ar<'.zan, and increased food for the British people You may withdraw your Coercion Bill for Ireland. You may dispense Math eleemosynary doles of maize. You may withdraw your amTes of pohcemen, and dispense with your staff of bailiffs. procCserv^Js £V "'^f' ^^' ^''\ '^ "'^^^'^■°« ««^''/ '"^i^rest which JZd bmd them round you: and who can foresee the majestic power and greatness which you will erect for this people. Go onTn your present course. Throw from you your^olonies ; dep ess your native mdus ry ; ruin your commercial marine; mA^XlolrZ Wli* ''■*■ [' ■ eaE: 'Cj'v :^e,^ ,^ m APPENDIX. ,1 The following extracts, from an article on the Photect' , e Svstkm, in Hunfa New York Merchants^ Magazine, will give a very correct idea of the view of the Americans, on the subject of Free Trade : — " The Protective System originated with tlie mother country, and was interwoven even with our Colonial existence. When, therefore, we separated from Great Britain, we adopted the same policy, and turned tliat system, which England had employed for her special heneflt, to our own account. This system has grown up with us, and is essential not only to our prosperity, but to our independence as a nation. We might as well dis- pense with our fleets and our armies, recall cur foreign ministers and consuls, annul all treaties with foreign powers, and repeal all laws in relation to navigation and commerce, as yield the principle of protecting our own industry against the policy of other nations. We might, in fact, as well give up our national existence, as yield the great principle on which that existence is founded, and without wliicli our independence could not be maintained." " The cottons and woollens manufactuiwl in the country, constitute but a small part of the aggregate product of our manufactures ; and many of the smaller species of our manufactures, our household productions, require protection luite as much as the larger establishments, engaged in the cotton and woollen business. Out there is no propriety in considering this as a policy relating to the manufacturers alone. Tlie question is, not whether a few men shall be raised to opulence, but wliether the nation shall be indepen- dent : not whether manufactures shall be built up, but whether industry shall be encou- raged and rewarded. The merchant, the navigator, the inechauic, the artisan, the farmer, the day labourer, as well as the manufacturer, has each an interest in this policy. Tl- ise • who go down to the sea in ships, and do business in the mighty deep,' and those ' whose ploughshare turns the stubborn soil ;' the adventurous pioneer in the western wilderness, and the humble mechanic, wherever his lot may be cast ; these have as deep an interest in the American system as the inanufactm-er in the Eastern States, as we shall attempt to show hereafter." " Labour is the great source of wealth and prosnirity ; and that system of policy which stimulates industry, and gives to the labourer the rewurd of his toil, is best adapted to the wants of the country. The protective system is pureh' lieinoc.atic in its tendency. It fosters industry, and enables the poor man, who has no capital, but his own labour, no surplus but what is found in his own sinews, to acquire a competency to support and educate his family. It is designed not for the few, but for the many ; and though it will be productive of the common good, its peculiar blessings nill fall upon the labouring classes." "Iftrade will regulate itself, why do the wisest and uost prosperous governments make laws in favor and support of their trade? Why docs ihe British Parliament employ so much time and pains in regulating tlieir trade, so as to render Its advaiitoges particu- larly useful to their own nation ? Why so preposterous as to abide by and enforce their boasted navigation act ? But so far is trade from regulating itself, that it continually needs the help of the legislation of every country as a nursing rather. If wo Americans do not choose to regulate it, it will regulate us, till we have not a farthing left in our hands. Unless we shortly regulate and correct the abuses of our trade, by lopping off its useless branches and establishing manufactures, we shall be corrected, perhaps, even to our very destruction. The mechanics hope that the legislature will afford them that protection they are entitled to ; for, as the present hateful system of triK/f and scarcity of cash, occa- sions numbers of them to want employment, though they are able and ready to furnish many articles which are at present imported, they conceive that duties ought to be laid on certain imported articles, in such a manner as to place American manufactures on the same footinj; as the manufactures of Europe, and enable them to procure bread and sup- port for their families." "These evils proceed from a want of one supreme controlling power in these States. They will be done away by adopting the present torm of (government. It will have energy and power to regulate your trade and commerce— to enforce the execution of your im- posts, duties, and customs. Instead of the trade of this cointry being carried on in foreign bottoms, our ports will be crowded with our own ships, and we shall hecome car- riers/or Europe. Heavy duties will be laid on ail foreign articles which can be niaiiurac- turc(l in this country, and bounties will be granted on the exportation of commodities: the manufactories of our country will flourish; our mechanics will lift their heads, and rise to opulence and wealth." •Wt 'Jl ft_ 43 " These extracts are full to tlie purpose for which we have made them. Thev shew m. {he^nr^U^T'^'i^A "•'"*' "* 'Y »""« «f t^ "''"l"*"" "^ ""^ constitution tT.e p^p7eZTrea nf tfp rn^^P "-^ ?'"■"■ '""""factures, and regarded that protection as one oUhe elements of the commercial pwer. These writers speak of ' refulatine trade, so as to encoiiraire our manufactures i'^and when they complain of the decline of tlfe mam facturinR inteJesU they will ascribe it to some defect in the commercial arrangementsof the statel." ' ron3?n«^TJ""**f 1^ the House, consisting of three, one of whom was a member of the " Wp inn'.nT^r'* *" ?'*'i,"'*'' ^°.^^ President, ir which are these remarkable words : 7re entitled tnlP^n.inr" '" "l^ «?"t™«»? **"»* agriculture, commerce, and manufactures, are entitled to leinsative protection." This ad(rre8s, contaning this full avowal of the doctrine of protection to manufactures, was unanimously adopted. nhvin,r'^ffl?''.yif^ "^ sustaining our own interests, and fostering our own industry, is so obvious, that little need be said upon the subject, further than to answer some of the pnncipa objections which have been made against this policy. But before we consider these objections, It may be well to take a passmg notice o/ the doctrine of 'Free Trade^ h„.'=iii*J".-'^''^'„*'"'er*^?"* '*??."''*'' some degree of confidence. And what is tin's «n,f ?.»"*""" ""{ ^T V/^"^ " '* I"*"""* anything that is intelligible, it means tliat all duties on imports should be removed , and that all laws and treaties wfiich secure any ?„^?.?iiF 1° ""■■ ""'ii commerce and shipping over that of other nations, should be ^2r«o t„ loi"!"*"'?'''''^'"! ''uct.nne goes on the ground that an American Congress should hf »^lvnJ»£f '*^''p*^°'' 'i^ American people, and legislate for the world. I do not say that i.r?„.^?o?-^' f ^l^ ^^''^ avow this, or that this is their des-jm ; but I do say that their Ee the prIcticalTesIjit »"""'""' '*^ ^''^^ "'"''<' "''''"^^ °«* ♦" their full extent, such would " But there is a sort of looseness in the phrase ' Fr^-e Trade', which renders this dis- nl.lnn'lw '.".:''■''''""»• . ^I'P a'lvo''''*«^''^♦'"« '•"'^^'"n* do not tell us with sufficient pre- •rZ rri^^.Jl7 T"JJ.''^ m" ^^"T- M *''^y •"«"" *•»"* «'« ^''"I'd take off all restrict o.is wpThn?,^^.?.?^^^'"''^''^"*'""' "5*'°"" 1^ ^'' T'Ot. »t is one thing; but if they mean that th1„„ u » ♦! towards those nations which will reciprocate the favour, it is quite another I? R^H„o?" »''^ •','"■"1'' 'i"'**. 'l^'P'y » *™'''' "'•>''=•» '» mutually beneficial, or it must not. If It does not imply a trade that is mutually unrestricted and mutually beneficial, that is a good reason for rejecting it. I have not made snlficient proficiency in the science of political non-resistance, to advocate a system of trade which enriches other nations bv impoverishing us. I cannot consent to open our jwrts, duty free, to those nations which throw every embarrassment m the wav of our commerce. My tiolitical creed does not require me to love other nations better than my own. Hut if Free Trade implies a trade mutually advantageous, I am willing to adopt it ; but this can never be done by takinic oflT all commercial restrictions. If the trade is to be mutually beneficial, it must not onlv imply a reciprocity m commercial regulations, but a similarity in condition." " We, as a nation, are peculiarly situated. We are 8eparate..<^ i " ' Average Prices, per week, of the Hand-loom Weavers in Europe, including the Weavf. i of Silk, Cation, Ltnen, atul Woollen, in all their varieties, e- ' ,»- i<* brard. Great Britain i . ^y^^ France .7 ^ ' Switzerland 5 Belgium [[W '.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'. 6 "I Austria 3 q Saxony '..'.'.['.'.'.'.['.'.'.'.['.2 i " Tliese are the average prices given for adult male labourers, female labour being from 30 to 80 per cent. less. Here is a picture of foreign labour in 1840. But, low as these prices are, it appears by a Report to Parliament, in 1841, that the prices had fallen at least 10 or 12 per cent, from the preceding year. We a«k again, whether the friends of Free 1 rade, who profess to be the friends of the people, are desirous of seeing the free, indepen- dent labourers of this country brought down to the European standard— to the miserable pittance of eight or ten pence a day? A greater evil could not be inflicted on our citizens —a more withering calamity could not befall our country. The wealth of a nation consists principally m the labour of its citizens ; and, as a general thing, there can be no surer test of national prosperity, than the price that labour will command." "Tlus objection to our argument for protection, drawn from the low price of labour in foreign countries, is founded on the principle, that sound political economy requires that a nation should, at all times, and under all circumstances, allow its citizens to buy where they can buy cheapest, and sell where they can obtain the highest price. But, plausible as this doctrine, may appear, it is far from being sound. In time of war, when our commerce is obstructed, a citizen might buy cheapest of the enemy, and, in return, dispose of his products to them at the higliest price. But even the advocates of Free Trade would not contend for this. They would admit that such a trade should be res- trained for public considerations— /or purposes of state. Now, ths very principle which would justify restraint in this case, will justify a protective tariff. Public considerations justify the one as much as the other. If it be proper, in time of war, to interdict a trade which might be profitable to some of our citizens, it may be equally proper in time of peace. Our government is instituted for the benefit of the people in peace as much as in war ; and public consideration should have a controlling influence at one period as much as at another. " Again, this doctrine would be as fatal to our shipping as to our manufacturing interest. If it be at all times wise to purchase at the cheapest market, it would also be wise to employ the cheapest carriers." "It is with a nation as with an individual— the market where he can buy cheapest is not always the best, even in a pecuniar point of view. It may be good policy in an in- dividual to buy at the dearest market— it may be nearest at hand, or it may be the best market at which he can sell his products. The cheapest market for purchase may require payment in specie, while a dearer market may receive other commodities in payment. The cotton manufacturers at the north might purchase their cotton in India, as they undoubtedly would to some extent, if the duty on cotton were taken off; and they might find it profitable to themselves, especially as they could buy cheaper, and at the same time open to some extent a new market for their fabrics; but as this would injure the home market for the cotton-grower at the south, the injury inflicted upon the planting states would be greater than the benefits obtained by the northern manufacturer. For reasons of state, a preference should be given to domestic cotton. The northern manufacturer who consumes one hundrerl bales of cotton grown in this country, not only gives employ indirectly to those who labour to produce that article, but he gives employ to those who raise the meat and grain which the laborer consumes while raising the cotton ; whereas the manufacturer who consumes one hundred bales of cotton raised in India, encourages foreign instead of domestic industry. In the former case, the profits of the entire business are kept in the countiy; while, in the latter, half of the profits accrue to fo- reigners. The same remarks may be made upon other manufactured articles. He who patronizes domestic manufactures, creates a home market, and so encourages our own industry. The people ofTonessee, for example, by wearing American cottons, even if they should cost a trifle more than the foreign fabric, would thereby not only promote the interest of the country, but their own. By patronizing the domestic manufacture, they not only prevent a greater competition in the production of their great staples, corn and wheat, but, by sustaining the manufacturer, they incre"ae the demand for their own pro- ducts. The southern planter, while growing his cotton, and the northern manufacturer, while converting it into cloth, are both living upon the corn and wheat of Tenessee ; or, which is practically the same thing, on the corn and wheat of some other state, whose bread stuff comes in competition with their own. But if they wear the fabric of British looms, made of cotton grown in India, they lose all these advantages." " If wc adopt the policy of procuring every thing abroad, because it can be obtained cheaper, we shall in a short time find our industry paralyse ' " 4, " » Pork, 2 cents pertb " % " » Ham and Bacon, 3 cents per tb.' .■■'■' " ?o " " Cheese, 9 cents per It) ... ' " ,?, " " Butter, 5 cents per tb .. " i, " » Lard, 3 cents per It) ... . " ?! " » Potatoes, 9 cents per bushel' .■.'.■ " ^ " » Hour, 1 doll. 25 c. per bbl " o? '• Wheat, 25 cents per bushel ....'...' " ^ " " ScTu,^\' ''riirmucrh%"!:^ithan'i:s^^^ we, in this estimate, a.ioptKe doctriL Tlnti Liff ^'I"'''"'''^'* '"^'•^''=*-. N"'*'^'' ''■"ve .nereased the price to tlie amount of the dnvffwf o'3''"j 5"?, supposed that the duty prices, we should have swellc" wr cent .^^ JL^?- ^^"""^^"i B^l """^^ "^ estimating that these duties are unavail . ^ these arti^lpc^iin" """"l ''l?''^'"- . ^ "^""^ " « said mistake. These articles have been im,Srf«?- I ^1'^'^'* "" protection ; but this is a great tive years to the amount%fraHT2,.;^^'f,'oll"rntll?"*'^' "" "" «^^"'«^' ''' »'>^"«'t They are not Tnemief noi^ve^n ri'i^ls' bullSte'f?ie",J^r'»^^"''''H """^ '^' "SriculturUt. scale, manufactures 4d agriculture are on v,ftw«n^^^ » Viewed on a large and liberal tern of national industry T and what(.vPr?rnVi=f^?"' departments of the same great sys- perity to the other. T&yll^rTrl^ef.lT^^^iZ^''^^^^^^^^ «- P-- A nmr^kT?n"f i^^'irv'tu^htSUuict" at' JTome'^'fi' *!"^ ""'^* ^•'^»*'^>«' '» «-«nr respect, market. The (iouiund is conftnift «nri i„T ' '» "Iways more sure than any forwgn niarket is always uncXin .SuXis^tharoneT^^^ "^S"' ''^'''I'^' ^^^ f"™!" of flour to dispose of annuill^amlthef looked to ^)l^fH"•.^•''*^' ^'^ ^^'^ ^""^^^ niarketwoulddependupon hecro sin^^^rmlP w.S^^^^ ^"''"" *^"'' « market. That tinent, England wouUl take tat 50 (i5) I,,^r??u . ^^^'^n/'ie crop was good upon the Con- want 150,000 barrels. Wiough her annnnl l,n,^^ ""^Y"' *'"■ I^P "'"^ «'«"•*' ^^<^ would average, yet it wouKl fluSe tVonT 50 SJo^'To "50 55) njm,*" "^'^ ^''''^^'' °" "n farmer could make no calculationnow Wi, Jhp,:?^" .-,1! ''^ •'*^^'' circumstances, the upon contingencies which he 3d nM o« , l ZJ" ^°^- iPi'^ uncertainty, depending him, and puraly/.e his et b rts i utlet thf. in^.P%?„?' T''^^ ,''*"S like an incubus upon created by ■manufactures and thp f,fr,»:in\. ^^ '?'! ''^P?"'> "PO" ^^<^ ''ome marfcet. that there are ITO .Sons emnloved n J^^n.lJ^pi""*'' '""'■ ^u^"* certainty. He knows of flour each ; nndX knows thaRL erons on f hf pS ""^ '.•?"* *''^y-,?'" "»"* « ''"'•'•el connexion wi h the demand hpre Hmip.PfKp the eastern continent will have little or no .legree of certainty, how much to Fow- and bern'.'rip^nT''' "« "^"T?- ^^i a good redouble, .,nd he w^l'l realize a greate-Zifit from hi! IaZ,r^ I """"''''*' ^^ "1"«*'T >^i» hat much depends upon the certainiy'^Df a market • and Lnf Th'^ practical man knows it must be seen, at once, that the hnmn moJlJpt if ' """• ''^<"n,th's glance at the subject, difference between "he foreign and home mnrkPt wm^.fhp Im? "'"", *''? '""r^S"- »"* this' case of hostilities with a great X ime Mwer like ol/t Ir Ifi^'^^'i; 'Ji.*™" ""^ """'• !•» were with her or any other forVim IinHnn irwn, ,i i. • ""^'t"'"' whether our commerce foreign market would fail tS co, shteratfnn« «lmw ".n.^?" <'esree cut off, so that the ket must, after all, be tW farmers" SffiP,^^^^^^^ that the home mar- reliance in war." mriners chief dependence-his market in peace, and his only fallacies ihlrttl*''l'i:re'a!?eadVsS^^^^^ i^'" "l'^''^**''" <^'»> "« more mcrce, IS injurious to It." i'"">.y wmtn nrst treated, and still sustains com- reflned'Iiat"flffthet't;'of:irce\ds'''p^^ be imported in its reflners to import the brown suKarwhi if A,pv,^.P,? .'^^ sugar, induces the sugar- MIC the rpKourcPg of the c.mtntrv." '"J"'^''" "V stimulating the industry and develop. snfli:h^„'^t:i;^;;;:v'tlm{'im^SAion■;;nt^^ "'^ •'»■>' «>•«•■ "•••'•"-omnd -ts raising the pri.e of the J^^^^-^^^c!;!.!:'"' V± Kn^: iJ^lI^^rfeiS™ >«~-..^ gffiiMI0ttm ■HiMHii 46 at ftll ; in others, only for a short period ; and if, in other cases, it does produce a pernia- nent increase of price, that is more than compensated for in the stimulus which this sys- tem eives to industry, in the home market which it creates, and in the general prosperity which it produces." " We are in favour of the protective system, because we believe it is calculated to pro- mote the interest of our country, and our whole country. We believe that there is no one question of national policy in wnich the people have so aeep an interest, as the one we have been considering. We are in favour of it, because it will promote the interest of the manufacturers, and save from ruin the 300,000,000 dollars of capital invested in that use- ful department of human industry. We are in favour of it, because we regard it as essen- tial to agriculture, that great and paramount interest, which is the foundation of every other. But, above all, we are in fuvour of the protective system, because it promotes the interest of the labourers of the country. This, afte ', is the interest which requires most protection. The rich man can rely upon his nion< tor his support. If the times are hard, nis money becomes more valuable, as it will command a better interest, and furnish liim more of tne comforts and luxuries of life. But to the poor man, the labourer, who has no capital but his ability to toil— to such a one a prostration of business is absolute ruin. Now, as the protective policy is calculated to revive business, and give the labourer the due reward to his toil, we regard it as the poor man's system— as his rightAil inheritance. " This system has already done much for the poor man. There is no article of clothing which goes into the consumption of the poor man's family so extensively as cottons in various forms ; and this jpolicy has reducet the price of common cotton cloth more than three quarters. Those shirtings which ir 1816 would cost thirty cents per yard can now be purchased for six cents : and other cottons have fallen nearly in the same proportion. We commend this to the special consideration of those who eat their bi'ead in tne sweat of their brow, who constitute the great mass of the people. " We say, in conclusion, that Congress not only possesses the power to laj jj.otective duties, but the good of the country demands the exercise of this power. So thought the ' father of his country'— so thought the patriots and sages of the revolution. And shall the mere theorists of this day, with their refined closet-dreams, lead us from t'le natha which our fathers have trod, and which experience has shown us to be the paths of wis- dom and prosperity? " Every feeling of national honour, every dictate of patriotism, everr interest in the country, cries out against it." Lace and Addison, Printem, 4, North Crescent, Liverpool. ki '-.^ reduce a pemm- I which this sys- neral proaperuy JciUated to pro- ; there is no one the one we have interest of the ited in that uge- [fard it as essen- dation of every it promotes the wliich requires If the times are !st, and fiirnish e labourer, who ness is absolute ive the labourer -as his rightful tide of clothing y as cottons in :Ioth more than yard can now ime proportion. in tne sweat of ola> j..otective So thought *he ion. Ani shall from t'iie paths le paths of wis- interest in the tool. . siwwiiiiiiiii