§ LORD BEAUMONTgave notice that, on Monday next, he should present a petition to their Lordships, complaining of the injury which the petitioners suffered in consequence of their uncertainty as to the intentions of Her Majesty's Government with regard to the importation of foreign corn; and, in presenting that petition, he should avail himself of the opportunity to ask the noble Earl at the head of the Administration, whether or not it was the intention of Her Majesty's Government to recommend to Parliament any alteration in the present policy with reference to the importation of foreign corn as soon as the opinion of the country could be taken, and another Parliament assembled?
§ The EARL of ESSEXwould venture to detain their Lordships a few moments, while he expressed his regret that indisposition on the evening when the noble Earl at the head of Her Majesty's Government stated his views and intentions to the House prevented him from then saying how cordially he agreed with what fell from the noble Earl near him (the Earl of Aberdeen), when he declared in so frank and straightforward a manner how entirely unchanged were his opinions in regard to the commercial policy transmitted to us by that great and eminent man Sir Robert Peel. The noble Earl, on that occasion, expressed his belief, that few or none of those who then followed the standard of the right hon. Baronet had since changed their opinions on that subject. He (Lord Essex), for himself, at least, could truly aver that such was the case—that the opinions he had at that time deliberately adopted, he had not since seen reason to 941 repent of or to recall. On the contrary, with the noble Earl, he believed many benefits had arisen from the adoption of that policy—many as regarded agriculture, many more as regarded the country at large. And, although be frankly admitted that those benefits had not been unaccompanied by much distress and anxiety, yet he believed that had arisen, not so much from those measures themselves, as from the not unnatural alarm and uncertainty dependent on such a great and extensive change; and also from other causes, which he would not then detain the House by dwelling upon. In regard to all general questions he would most gladly give his humble and most disinterested support to Her Majesty's Government, as he would to any Government be it Whig or Tory, whenever he felt he could do so with perfect and entire satisfaction to himself. When he could not do so, he should, as he had hitherto done, as freely withhold it. Most gladly would be give it to a Government in any measures they might bring forward for the relief of the agricultural interest, by removing from them or alleviating any of those burdens which might be proved to press unduly or exclusively on them. Most firmly, most constantly, would he oppose them, should they endeavour (which he prayed Heaven they might not) to reimpose any duties on corn, now or at any future time, be they great or small, whether under the name of revenue, or under that of protection. The time was, he believed, when a small fixed duty, had it been accepted, would have been beneficial to all parties, and scarcely injurious to any. That time he thought was in retrievably past, and any such attempt now, I by keeping men's minds in a disturbed and unsettled state, could only tend to mischief, and to neutralise or indefinitely to postpone the full measure of those benefits which he conscientiously believed bad arisen, and would continue to arise, from the adoption of a liberal commercial policy and the abolition of the corn laws.