§ Mr. Wallacebrought up the report of the committee appointed to inquire into the state of our foreign trade. The hon. gentleman, in moving that the report be laid on the table, hoped the House would suffer him to make a few observations. He meant briefly to state the extent to which the committee had gone, and the objects to which they had chiefly directed their attention. Gentlemen would recollect that, in the former part of the session, many petitions were received from commercial districts, particularly one from a large and respectable body of merchants of the city of London, which had been presented by an hon. member (Mr. Baring), who usually sat on the other side of the House; and who, he was assured, would have been this day in his place, had he not been detained in the country by a very severe domestic calamity. Those petitions stated the general commercial distress which prevailed, without pointing out any immediate remedy for that distress. And, indeed, considering the state of our connexion with foreign countries, and the nature of the commercial system which had so long prevailed, it would be vain, he feared, to expect any immediate 546 remedy. With respect to the soundness of the principle contained in those petitions—with respect to the necessity of throwing open the channels of trade as widely as possible—no doubt could be entertained. No person could deny that commerce ought to be rendered as free and unshackled as circumstances would allow; but he regretted that this principle could not, from various causes, be acted on to the extent which many individuals desired. The committee had not been able to enter so fully into the subject as they could have wished, in consequence of the late period of the session at which it was referred to them. They had, therefore, chiefly selected those points which appeared to them not the most important, but the most general in their application to this great principle—namely,that all restriction on trade, of whatsoever nature, was an evil, only to be justified by some great political expediency; and, where such expediency was not clear and manifest, that the restriction ought to be removed, as far as it could be done, consistently with the good faith of the country, pledged by treaties with foreign states, or by compacts with its own subjects, or with reference to the protection due to different branches of trade that might have grown up under the existing system, and which protection could not be suddenly withdrawn without great injustice. Gentlemen knew that what were usually called the Navigation Laws contained the regulations by which the commerce of this country was governed, both in respect to Europe and the rest of the world. With respect to Africa and America, all goods, the produce of those climes, must be brought here directly and exclusively in British ships. With respect to Europe, its commodities might be introduced either in British vessels or in the vessels of those states in which the article was produced, with the exception of Germany and the Netherlands—certain articles, the produce of those countries, not being allowed to be imported under any circumstances whatever. These restrictions did not, however, appear to the committee to be founded on any just principle of expediency or necessity. The sum, therefore, of their recommendation on this head was, that the Navigation Laws should be so far relaxed as to permit all articles to be imported from all parts of the world, provided such importation took place in British ships. The next point to which 547 they turned their attention was the warehousing system. That system was at present limited to the admission of certain articles. If, however, this country were meant to be the great emporium and the great mart of the world, it was impossible, if such were the view of the legislature, that too wide an extent could be given to the system of warehousing. Their recommendation on this second head was, I that all goods, the produce of all countries, manufactured or unmanufactured, should be permitted to be freely imported and exported, except to our colonies, with as little inconvenience to the merchant as possible. There was, however, an exception of one article—he meant linen—which was so excepted from the general rule on account of a political rather than a commercial view of the subject. He would not now enter into the reasons that induced the committee to recommend those deviations from the existing system. When legislative measures, founded on the views of the question taken by the committee, were introduced, that would be the period to go into a minute detail, for the purpose of showing the reasons on which these recommendations are founded. One evil, which appeared to the committee to be of the greatest magnitude, and which required the serious attention of the House, was the extraordinary multiplication and complexity of the laws by which commerce was affected. Gentlemen would conceive the extent of this evil when he informed them, that he had seen it stated in a pamphlet published in 1815, that the number of laws relative to mercantile transactions amounted at that time to 1,500, of which 1,100 were in full and almost daily operation. To these, in the last five years, many additions had been made; and what the number was at present he could not take upon himself to say. When gentlemen considered that the slightest deviation from the law often subjected the ship and cargo to forfeiture, they would see the embarrassment which this evil created to the merchant, and the restraint under which it placed commercial enterprise. The committee were likewise of opinion, that the alterations which they had thought fit to suggest ought to be made gradually, with great caution, and a due regard to the interests which having grown up under the present system, were placed under the protection of the good faith of the country. It would be perhaps some time 548 before the benefits of those alterations would be perceived; but that was the price which the country was to pay for adhering so long to the present bad and defective system. The recommendations which the committee had suggested might appear to some individuals not to have gone far enough, nor to have embraced as many points as they had previously expected; but he would beg those gentlemen to consider that the recommendations which they had already made were of no slight or unimportant nature. The importance of them would be considerably enhanced, if hon. gentlemen would look upon them as the first and most material step of this country to a departure from the course of restrictive policy which its legislature had hitherto pursued, and to the establishment of a more enlarged and liberal policy towards foreign states than any which had yet prevailed. It had long been a reproach to us among foreign nations, that our mercantile system was so full of restrictions against them, that they were compelled, in self-defence, to impose similar restrictions against us. He trusted, however, that would be so no more, and if we should be still compelled to continue any of our present restrictions, either from the pressure of taxation, our compacts with foreign nations or with our own countrymen, or from any other cause whatsoever, it would be understood that we did so from a principle of justice—that it was a sacrifice to our sense of duty, that it was a matter not of option but necessity, and not caused by any ideas on our part of promoting our own commercial interests by it; and whatever might be the exclusion or restrictions which foreign states might think it expedient to put upon trade, they would no longer have the opportunity of justifying themselves by saying, "Such is the example, and such the conduct, of England." The hon. member then moved that this report be laid upon the table, and sat down amid considerable cheerings from both sides of the House.
§ Ordered to lie on the table.