SUGAR DUTIES.

HC Deb 10 June 1844 vol 75 cc423-68

On the question that the Speaker do leave the Chair for the House to go into Committee upon the Sugar Duties Bill,

Mr. James

said, he hoped the House would indulge him with its attention for a short time, whilst he addressed a few observations to them previous to going into Committee upon the Sugar Duties Bill. He was, unfortunately, one of those persons called West India proprietors, and he was not so through any fault of his own. He was a West India proprietor because, somewhere about a century since, an ancestor of his, relying on the faith of the Government of that day, did invest a considerable amount of capital in the purchase of a West India estate in the island of Jamaica; and he did so, perhaps, under the impression that future Governments would not interfere to injure, much less to utterly destroy, the value of that property. He proposed to avail himself of that opportunity to state to the House some facts connected with the position in which the West India proprietors were now placed, and in doing so he should state his conviction that only a few Members of that House were acquainted with the facts of the case as regarded the West India proprietors, or the unfortunate condition in which the West India proprietors now found themselves. He was the more desirous that the Members of that House should be made acquainted with the condition in which the West India proprietors were placed, for he was satisfied that if they were acquainted with that condition, they would not interfere to make that condition more truly deplorable than it was at present. He would, therefore, exemplify that condition by stating shortly the facts of his own case, and he should at the outset remark, that his was a peculiarly favourable case as regarded the cultivation of West India property. He was one of those who enjoyed considerable advantages as a West India proprietor, so far as related to the management of property in the West Indies; for he had a son residing on his estate in Jamaica who was perfectly acquainted with business, and who had been brought up in a merchant's office in Liverpool; and, in addition to that, he had an overseer of great experience in the management of such property. He had no mortgages on his property, and he had no necessity to employ a merchant for its disposal at a cost of 2½ per cent. He had, in fact, only brokers' commission to pay; and notwithstanding all these advantages, how did he find himself? For the last three years, on an average, the price of every pound weight of sugar to him, including its production and transit, was 4d., and to that was added a tax of 3d. per lb. imposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer when it arrived in this country, making 1d. per lb. the cost of the sugar to him. Now, how much did the House think he sold that sugar for? He sold it for 6½.d per lb., as an average price for the last three years. Thus he lost a halfpenny per lb., on an average of all the sugar sold for the last three years on his account, which was an average loss of 500l. upon every 100 hogsheads of sugar, and that loss was upon pro- perty which, in the times when slavery-was permitted in the West Indies, produced 3,000l. per annum profit; and half that amount during the period when the apprenticeship system existed. That diminution of the value of his property took place, notwithstanding all his exertions to cause economical production. He had done everything possible to diminish the cost of production on his property in the West Indies. He had sent out the most improved ploughs to diminish labour; he had, in fact, economised labour as far as was possible, and had used every means in his power to render the cultivation cheap; was it not monstrous that, under such circumstances, a tax of cent. per cent. should be enforced by the Government on sugar; and that another West India produce, namely, rum, should be subjected to a tax of 400 per cent.? It was now proposed to take off the prohibitory duties on foreign sugar, and yet, whilst giving such an advantage to the producer of foreign sugar, they retained the prohibitory duty on West India rum. Let it not be forgotten that such heavy taxes upon West India produce were imposed by Mr. Pitt as war taxes. The Minister who introduced them proposed them as taxes only intended for a time of war, and they were imposed with the understanding that they were to be taken off when peace returned; yet what, he would ask, was the situation of West India property with respect to them now at the end of nearly thirty years of peace? The taxes were precisely the same as when they were introduced as war taxes. They had indeed, heard a great deal about Parliament having voted a sum of twenty millions to the owners of West India property, but he could tell the House that the sum which had been voted was small indeed, compared with the loss of property on the part of the West India planters. How, he asked, would landed proprietors feel in that House if his hon. Friends near him succeeded in obtaining a total repeal of the Corn Laws? How would they feel if a measure were carried which many well experienced persons believed was calculated to ruin the landed interest? He did not participate in that view of the effect of the repeal of the Corn Laws, but many persons who were well acquainted with the condition of the landed interest were of opinion that such an effect would follow the repeal of the Corn Laws; and if such a measure were carried, he would ask the landed interest, how they should like, in such an event, to see the hon. Member for Stockport propose to give them a composition of two shillings, or two shillings and sixpence in the pound, such as had been given to the West India planters? Their slave property had been taken from them, and they got in return half-a-crown in the pound; in addition to which, every impediment was thrown in the way of their exertion to obtain free labour to cultivate their estates. It was asked, if they lost by the cultivation of their estates, why not abandon that cultivation? He would tell the House why he and others, who had property elsewhere, did not abandon the cultivation of their estates. They did not abandon it, because they relied on the justice and sympathy of hon. Members in that House; and he hoped they would not find that they leaned upon a broken reed. He hoped those who were in the same boat with them would feel that their interests might some day be attacked in the same manner, and therefore that they would throw the shield of their protection over the West India planters. The West India proprietors had been most cruelly and unjustly treated—they had been treated worse than ever the slaves had been treated by the West India planters in the worst times of slavery. At all times they gave them a sufficiency of good and wholesome food. What had been done to those who depended on property in the West Indies for their support? Widows and orphans had been driven to the greatest distress, the bread had been taken from them, and they had been driven to destitution. No class of persons Were more cruelly treated, because they were helpless and powerless in that House. But if instead of being powerless as they were in that House, they had been a powerful body, like the agricultural interest or the manufacturing interest, would they have been so treated? The right hon. Baronet at the head of Her Majesty's Government had expressed himself, in 1841, forcibly on the subject which was now again before them. He said on that occasion, Sir, my conviction mainly rests on a consideration of the state of the West Indies, and of the progress of the great experiment of Slave Emancipation in these Colonies. I do not ask you to continue this exclusion for the purpose of supporting the interests of individual West India proprietors; I forget their individual interests in the much higher considerations that are involved in this question. I look to the moral and social condition of that part of your empire in which you have re- cently made the greatest, the most hazardous, and as I admit with cordial satisfaction, the most successful experiment which has ever been made in civilized society. And can I conceal from myself what may be the consequence, if at this time, when society in these Colonies is staggering under the shock of that experiment, you take a step which may decide for ever that sugar shall no longer be produced at a profit by free-labour in those Colonies. It was said by some that the change in the opinions of the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government had been effected by the influence of the Anti-West Indian feelings of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade. Whether this were the case or not, he could not tell, but if it were not so, he could not account for the alteration in the views of the First Lord of the Treasury, otherwise than by supposing that he had become so thorough a free-trader as to be ready to sell his consistency in the dearest market, in order to buy popularity in the cheapest. He was sorry the West India interest had lost the advocacy of the right hon. Gentleman, and he could not help also regretting to find them opposed now by his noble Friend, the Member for the City of London. He must say, that the proposition of his noble Friend to admit slave sugar at only a differential duty of 10s. was a most extraordinary one as coming from him. What would be the effect of such a regulation? It must be to give a great additional stimulus to slavery and the Slave Trade, for the abolition of which we had expended not only twenty millions, but hundreds of millions. It could have no other effect. Let us have one thing or the other—either free-labour sugar or slave-labour sugar. He complained that it was an injustice to bring forward such a proposition as that of his noble Friend, and not at the same time to call for a repeal of the Emancipation Act. If we were to have slave-labour sugar, let the Emancipation Act be repealed; but to ruin our own Colonies, after the expenditure of so much money, and to give all the profit to slave countries, was a system of legislation which he could not comprehend. He did not hesitate to say, that our course of legislation on this subject was calculated to make us the laughing-stock of every other nation in the world. If the House was not disposed to legislate so as to do the West India interest any service, let it at least not proceed so as to do them further injury. The proposition of the hon. Member for Bristol was a good one as far as it went, and he hoped and trusted it would be carried, as it would not entail upon the Colonies the injury which the other propositions were calculated to inflict, and would in some degree benefit the public; but if the House wished largely to benefit the people of England, and do them a true service, it could be effected only in one way, namely, by diminishing the cost of production in our Colonies, and greatly reducing the tax. Let them give the West India colonists plenty of free-labour, and let the tax upon colonial sugar be reduced from 24s. to 12s. Thus would ample justice be done to the West Indians, while an important benefit would be conferred upon the people of England, at the same time the Treasury would suffer no loss, but on the contrary, he was persuaded, that before any lengthened period should have elapsed, the revenue would gain by the greatly increased consumption of the article, which would take place consequent upon the reduction. He begged pardon of the House for having spoken at such length, which he had done for the sake of others rather than his own, for he had learned to look upon the cause of the West India proprietors as hopeless.

Mr. Ewart

said, his hon. Friend the Member for Cumberland had indulged in some personal charges against him. He had charged him with having made certain rash and extravagant calculations, but his hon. Friend did not recollect that these very propositions had been adopted year after year, and that the present proposition, although he did not approve of it, had been made several years ago, and that the Amendment of the noble Lord had also been proposed four or five years ago, and, therefore, when his hon. Friend accused him of having made rash and extravagant calculations, he must be allowed to say that statement was unsupported by fact. His hon. Friend had dwelt upon the sufferings of the class with which he was connected. He commiserated the case of the West India proprietors. He had no enmity to them or any other body of men; but while his hon. Friend complained of their sufferings, he totally forgot to say one word in behalf of the people of this country; and be maintained that the commerce, the manufactures, nay even the subsistence of the people of this country, were impaired by the duties which his hon. Friend was endeavouring to retain for the benefit of a class who had been already compensated. He con- tended, therefore, that his hon. Friend appeared in Court not as plaintiff, but as defendant. He was, indeed, much surprised at the eloquence with which his hon. Friend called upon the monopolists to come to his aid. It showed how much the garrison must be reduced when it was obliged, to call in such allies. Was it true, then, that those who defended the Corn Laws were coming down to support the sister monopoly of sugar on the summons of his hon. Friend the Member for Cumberland? There was a want of skill, as well as of impartiality, in that appeal on such an occasion, from which he thought his hon. Friend would wisely have abstained. His hon. Friend should not have made common cause with the corn monopolists, but should have been content to rely upon the justice of his own cause. His hon. Friend had attacked the right hon. Baronet the First Lord of the Treasury on the score of inconsistency. It was easy to rake up former declarations of opinion from the political mausoleum to be used as weapons of offence; but he said that a Minister was bound to move on with the course of public feeling, and as far as he had observed, the right hon. Gentleman had shown great sagacity and wisdom in the measures he proposed with that view. The question which he had now to raise before the House was, whether we were to continue the system of differential duties at a positive loss to the whole country? That was the simple question at issue, and it was accompanied by another—whether, by abolishing monopoly, we should increase our commerce, and augment the demand for our manufactures, and procure better and cheaper subsistence for the people of this country? Upon this point he should argue the case, and also upon these two collateral questions, whether the change which he proposed would be ultimately so injurious to the planters themselves, and so favourable to slavery as some Gentlemen contended? He looked forward to a very great reduction in the duty on sugar finally, for he held that it ought to be reduced so low as to place the article within the consumption of the poorer classes. Until Parliament did this, it really did nothing. Let the amount be reduced to what it was before the war, in the year 1790, when it was only 12s. 4d. the cwt., and he had no doubt the produce of the duty would soon be fourfold. The Chancellor of the Ex- chequer was well aware that under the existing law, the use of sugar was prohibited in distillation, and it could be shown that if it were allowed to be used in that manufacture as well as in the breweries of the country, in which it could be extensively used, it would be productive of the greatest benefit, as sugar would be a beneficial substitute for malt, and a large quantity of grain would thus be left at liberty to go out for the consumption of the people. Here, then, were two manufactures, which in case of a reduction of the duty on sugar, would be the means of materially benefiting the revenue. But there was a yet more important point of view in which the question should be regarded. It might be laid down as an axiom now in political economy, that the real consumers in any country were the labouring classes. It had been lately shown before a Committee of that House, and to the knowledge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that in the article of tobacco nineteen-twentieths were consumed by the working classes, and if the duty on sugar were reduced to a proper proportion, the consumption of that article might be expected to increase in as great a proportion as that of tobacco. In order to effect that, however, it had been almost proved that it must be reduced so low as to allow of the article being sold for 4d. a pound. It appeared from authentic calculations, that while the wealthier classes consumed sixty or seventy pounds per head per annum, the poorer classes did not consume above seven pounds, and this was owing entirely to the duty; but if there was one part of the country where this difference was peculiarly observable, it was unfortunately Ireland; for while in England the average consumption was twenty-one lbs. per head, in Ireland it was only seven lbs. Another evil of the high duty was, that it led not only to an adulteration of the article itself, but to adulteration of the adulteration. He believed, and he thought the Chancellor of the Exchequer believed, that not only was coffee adulterated with chicory, but the chicory with which it was adulterated, was itself adulterated. The first step towards a removal of those evils would be to abolish our discriminating; duties, to adopt sound and honest principles of legislation, and no longer to maintain those monopolies which ought to have been abandoned long ago. The hon. Member for Cumberland talked of destroying the planters; but the most honest course with respect to any class of men, was to let them know the truth. To this consummation must the West-India proprietors come at last. The baseless fabric which they had so long maintained must at length give way, and they would act well and wisely to conform to circumstances, and to assist the free-traders in effecting measures which would ultimately conduce to their own benefit, instead of endeavouring still to maintain this barrier against the general good. His hon. Friend (the Member for Cumberland) knew that though this fabric might be maintained for a few years, it must be only for a few years longer; and that it was as certain as any commercial change that had ever occurred, that in a short time all discriminating duties must disappear; and he thought it would be a wiser course for his hon. Friend to enter into a compromise with those who saw the justice and the necessity of that change, and were desirous of turning it as much as possible to the advantage of all parties. He (Mr. Ewart) felt, that while the House proposed in the present year to reduce the duty from 30s. to 20s., it should be prepared in three years hence to come to a determination to abolish the discriminating duty altogether, as unjust to the planters themselves as well as to the commerce of the country. The West-India monopolists were in a false position. The free-traders wished to extricate them, and he hoped the planters would assist them by endeavouring to extricate themselves. He thought he might justly call the attention of the House to that which appeared to be in a great degree forgotten, namely, to the state of our foreign trade as compared with the colonial. On an examination of the returns it would be seen that the foreign trade had kept increasing in a much more rapid ratio than the colonial, and that ought to convince the Government that they ought to encourage the extension of the foreign trade, and not fall back upon the antiquated and obsolete policy of propping up what were falsely called protective colonial monopolies. Let them extend commerce, and gradually unshackle the West-India planter from all the fetters called protection, but in reality restriction, by which he appeared to be assisted, but had in reality so long been bound. He asked the House to look, not only at England, but at foreign countries, and they would find that those places which kept up their colonial trade were falling off; but those which extended their commerce with the world were prospering. Look at Liverpool, and at Bristol, which latter was bent upon fostering the colonial system, while Liverpool extended its commerce with the world, and particularly with the United States. See how Bristol was declining, and how immeasurably Liverpool had increased, and was increasing. Look again at Bordeaux, where, from its adherence to colonial policy, commerce was declining, and the inhabitants complaining and comparing it with Havre, the Liverpool of France, which had risen on foreign commerce, and was now a flourishing and rising town. These causes were instances of the wisdom of extending foreign policy, instead of maintaining a monopolising colonial system. But he should be told that by extending our commerce in sugar we should be sure to increase slavery. Whatever opinions he might be supposed to have formerly entertained, he had, by a mature consideration of the subject, arrived at the conclusion, that however desirable it was to distinguish between the produce of free-labour and slave-labour, it was almost impossible to do so; and that the only way was to allow both to compete openly in the markets of the world, in the confidence that the good cause of freedom must eventually prevail. He had no doubt that the energies of freedom would enable the free labourer successfully to compete with the exacted labour of the slave in the production of this commodity. Did not the experience of every day furnish examples of this? Were we not obliged to make laws to stimulate and extend labour in our Colonies, while the tendency of our legislation was to limit and suspend labour at home? He had always looked upon commerce as the great emancipator. By throwing open our commerce with all parts of the world we should be more likely to put an end to slavery than by any enactments which that House could frame. Open the markets of the world and free labour might boldly enter into competition with slave labour. His hon. Friend complained, and justly, that there was a deficiency of labour in the West Indies. The planters had a right, after what had been done to the introduction of labour, as far as it could be introduced with justice; and if it were not done by the Government, it ought to be by some private act of legislation. He wished to give the West-India labour, free trade, and fall and fair competition, for he was convinced that the energies of the West Indies would never be developed unless they had full and fair competition. Equalization of duties would alone force the West-Indians into the market of competition, which was the true source of prosperity. Let the planters, like the agriculturists, bestir themselves—let them shake themselves, and ascertain whether they could not by their capital, their skill, and their energy, compete with other producers in the markets of the world; for whatever skill, energy, or perseverance they might possess, it would be unproductive until it entered into full and fair competition. His hon. Friend had said, " give us time;" but, then, he feared they might wait long enough before the West Indian would be disposed to say, "We are now ready to agree to the proposed change." He asked his hon. Friend the Member for Weymouth what time it was that he proposed to take? In order, however, to bring this matter distinctly and at once to issue, he would that evening propose that there be an equalization of the duties. It was his opinion that if they desired to do justice to the commerce of the country, they would follow out the general system of reduction of duties. They ought to follow the principle which had been commenced in their Tariff. What they had to do, fully to develop the commerce of the country, was to cheapen subsistence, and to have a large reduction of duties on all those articles which were necessary to the sustenance of the people. It was with this conviction that he now proposed as an amendment, "that it is expedient that the duties on Foreign and Colonial sugar should be equalized."

The Chancellor of the Exchequer

had before now stated his opinions with respect to this proposition of the hon. Member, a proposition that was found to be so contrary to the feeling of Parliament, that he did not deem it to be necessary again to renew a discussion with regard to it; and he must say that, after hearing the opinions of the hon. Gentleman opposite, in support of his proposition, he could not find that the hon. Gentleman had urged any thing novel on the present occasion. So far, in his opinion, from the hon. Gen- tleman's speech having strengthened his views, he thought, from a careful attention to that speech, that it afforded additional reasons for giving it the opposition with which it was now intended to meet it. The hon. Gentleman had told them of the reasons that had urged him on a former occasion to argue in favour of the admission of free-grown sugar—the hon. Member was then acting in conformity with the opinions of Mr. Sturge—and was then altogether wrong in his views, however eloquently he had urged them. But the hon. Gentleman had now argued for a large reduction of duties, irrespective of slavery which, he conceived, was totally different from the hon. Gentleman's former motion. It might be of the greatest advantage to have a reduction of duties on articles of prime necessity. He himself had never broached any contrary principle; but so far as these duties were necessary to the purposes of the revenue of the country—and no Government could, he conceived, ever consent to a reduction of duties calculated to impair the revenues of the country—beyond that he assured the hon. Gentleman he felt not the slightest inclination to differ in opinion from the hon. Gentleman's opinion on this point. The argument as to coffee was the same as that on sugar. He thought their wise course was, when interests had grown up under a system of protection, that it was essential, as far as it could be done consistently with the interests of the community at large, to continue to give a fair protection to those interests, because that could not be withdrawn without involving those interests in ruin, and with them the interests of the country.

Mr. Hume

wished his hon. Friend to withdraw his Motion, which might come on after others had been disposed of, and a division could be taken much better then than at the present moment. There was no one more anxious than he was to have cheap sugar; but he was also anxious to do justice to those who had been placed in an embarrassing situation by means of the legislation of this country. He wished to enable our Colonies to compete with others. He was not for asking a man to run whilst his legs were tied. They had so treated the Colonies, that there never yet was a fair trial between them and countries where slave-labour prevailed. Let them give a fair field to those in the Colonies whose interests were involved, and then, but not till then, could they judge of the result. It was on that account he asked his hon. Friend not to press his Motion to a division at that moment.

Mr. Labouchere

stated that it was his intention to vote against the Motion now, as he had voted against a similar Motion on a former occasion; and this because he did not think it just to equalise the duties between foreign and colonial sugars. At the same time, he did not think that it would be proper to separate the discussion from the division, and he, therefore, thought it would be better to divide upon it at once.

Mr. Milner Gibson

wished, he said, to ask the Government what claims the West India interests had on the British public— what it was that justified the Government in impeding the trade and manufactures of the country? Hon. Gentlemen sitting in that House represented different interests. He represented a particular interest; and he asked the Government not to discourage the interest that he represented. He! asked of them, on the contrary, to take off the restrictions that pressed upon the industry that he represented. The Government might reply to him, that there were other parties in the West Indies, and there were some restrictions on their interests. But what answer was that to him? What claim had these Gentlemen on the manufacturers, that they should benefit by the restrictions that others suffered? The Government might tell him they would not discourage the West India interests. Very well, he said, let them not discourage the manufacturing interests. His hon. Friend the Member for Montrose was for disposing of this Motion in rather a summary manner; but before that was done, he had a right to claim from Her Majesty's Government the explanation as to what was the ground for these discriminating duties. He might admit that there were grievances endured by their West India Colonies; he might be ready to redress those grievances; but it did not follow that he should support that system of protection now contended for as the means of redress. He did not know that protection was the proper way to meet the claims of the West India interest on the British public. He had never yet heard a statement from the Government to show how it was that they calculated this claim, and then turned it into a 10s. differential duty. In taking up the present Bill, he found that it was a Bill to grant to Her Majesty certain duties for the service of 1844. There was not therein one word of protection to West Indian proprietors. Therefore it was, that he thought he had a right to ask, what was the principle by which they were able to link the West India interest with a mere vote of supply. He did not wish to throw any obstacle in the way of a vote of supply necessary for the service of the country; but all he asked, as one of the representatives of the country, was for a plain, straightforward explanation as to how it was, that the interests of the West India Colonies were made to interfere with the trade and commerce of the country—how it was, that it justified the Government in putting on a discriminating duty which was disadvantageous to the interest he represented, and prevented it from carrying on commercial transactions with Brazil and Cuba, and other places? He had, he must say, the greatest respect for the talents and acquirements of the President of the Board of Trade, but still he thought it would puzzle that right hon. Gentleman to show, if a protecting duty were necessary for the West India interest, how that necessity was less this year by the amount of the duty than it was last year. How was the claim of the West India interest altered in the two years? If the West India interest had a just claim, how did it come to be converted into a pecuniary consideration, and the pecuniary consideration into a particular amount of duty, and how that duty was less one year than another? If the West India interest had this claim, how did the claim come to be altered? Was it the wants of the community that had altered it? If the West India interest had a just claim, then the Government was not justified in foregoing that claim for other considerations with which the claim had nothing to do. He must say, that these points being unexplained, looked as if those who sustained the claims of which they had heard had no confidence in the justice of their cause, but it seemed rather as if they were trying to get as much as they could out of the British public. But then it might be said, that great as were the claims of that interest, the claims of the British public were greater. He said, if the West India Interest had claims, let the British public know what they were. Let that interest, if the claim were a just one, be compensated; and he was sure that no Gentle- man who was a supporter of free-trade would say otherwise. When the President of the Board of Trade, then, talked of meeting the wants of the community, his answer was, that they did not desire to have an officer of the Customs to estimate them; but to let the public judge of their own wants. He felt that he was justified in calling upon the President of the Board of Trade to let them know how it was he came to propose this differential duty of 10s.? What was the reasoning that led him to suppose that 10s. per cwt. on sugar was the measure of the disadvantage which the West India interest laboured under? As to the other branch of the question—the preventing the people from eating slave-grown sugar, as a mode of preventing slavery and the slave-trade, this, he thought, was not the most fitting moment for discussing it. He admitted that the continuance of the differential duty would keep the article at such a price as not to enable the British consumer to use any other than free-labour sugar. The reduction would be about five-eighths of a penny in the pound. Trade with the different countries of the world was so linked together, that they would find it impossible to carry on any trade without either directly or indirectly encouraging slavery. Considering the question in all its bearings, he must say that there was something too transparent in the veil that concealed their pretences. He could not give them credit for being actuated with the desire of putting down the Slave Trade by these means, because they were not calculated to promote the object which it was said by the Government they had in view. He emphatically appealed to the President of the Board of Trade, to state to them precisely what were the grievances of the West India interest that must be compensated by a differential duty.

Mr. Villiers

thought too much credit was given to the ignorance or indifference of the people on this important subject by Her Majesty's Government; by the course they pursued, they appeared to imagine they could safely treat his hon. Friend's Motion with contempt. They did not deign to reply to it. [Sir R. Peel: The Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke.] Yes; the Chancellor of the Exchequer said something, but those who heard him must have seen it was only to prevent his hon. Friend from thinking that anything personally discourteous was intended to him by no reply being given to his speech; and he did think that there was nothing in the character of the Motion, and nothing in the position of his hon. Friend as Member for Manchester who had just spoken, representing the interests of that great borough, that could justify this silence on the part of the Government. He agreed with his Friend that the public required some explanation of the principle of this enormous tax upon the comforts of the people. A very valuable paper, the Economist, treating on these subjects, was published weekly, in which a precise calculation was made as to what the country at large, and this metropolis in particular, paid every week in order to maintain this monopoly. The calculation had not been disputed, and it was there proved that the metropolis paid 5,800l. a week, and the country about 70,500l. Now this was a heavy tax to be paid by the people, and some reason should be assigned for its being paid at all; and certainly the principle on which it was adjusted should be given, and it should be met in some other way than silence or contempt. The public also desired to know with what results this vast tax had been attended. They would want to know whether it had produced a loyal, contented, prosperous body of colonists, and whether any great advantage was jeopardised by its discontinuance. Only four years ago the Government of the day proposed to suspend the constitution of the chief of these Colonies on account of its open resistance and disaffection to the mother country. To-night his hon. Friend the Member for Cumberland, as one of that interest, had spoken out. What did he tell us? Why, that the worst picture that he could paint of the sufferings, ill-usage, and misery of the negro slave in former days would only depict the present condition and treatment of the West India proprietors. That was the result of protection—that was the gratitude for all the people of this country had suffered. What was the story they heard in every direction from the same parties? Why, that they were ruined, destitute, beyond redemption. That was what further sacrifice on the part of the English people was required for — that was the fruit of protection'—that followed from relying on duties, instead of the energy, skill, and enterprise called forth by competition. His hon. Friend had given them a sad account of the price he got for his sugar, only 6½d. a lb., and complained of the cruelty of the Legislature, and that the interest of the West Indians was abandoned by its friends. His hon. Friend seemed to think that the protection proposed was of no use, and said he had no friends. He had really a great respect for his hon. Friend, but be wished he could prove that he had no friends, for the support given to this measure certainly looked as if they were as many as before. His hon. Friend seemed to think it conclusive against any reduction of duty, when he told the House how little his sugar fetched. Did not his hon. Friend see that just as good an argument might be used against any improvement; and that if a retail grocer got into this House he would have as good an argument against a railroad bill because it drew off customers from some old road (hat went through the town where he kept his shop. His hon. Friend, however, showed he was ruined already. His hon. Friend's Motion was called an extravagant one. Now let him tell the House that it was only what was proposed, recommended, and supported by all the leading men who took part in the antislavery movement—by those who knew the West Indies well—who knew all the waste and sacrifice, and loss incident to slavery—who had perfect faith in free-labour, as being cheaper than slave-labour, and who saw as much advantage, economically, in emancipating the slaves, as in the benevolent view they had in their object. They considered, indeed, that the experiment could hardly be fairly made, unless the principle of competition was brought fully to bear upon the property of those islands. It was upon that they relied for all the improvement that was needed in the agriculture of those countries by which the land could be made more productive. The proposition that his hon. Friend made, was the same that was made by Mr. Cropper, and supported by Mr. Macaulay and the late Mr. Stephen, and recommended by ail the great and true friends of emancipation. Mr. Cropper had written a pamphlet in 1823, recommending a duty of 30s. on all sugars, whether produced in Cuba, in Siam, or Brazil, or India; and he confidently asserted in this work, that, if anybody would examine the question, they would see that free-trade was the only means of abolishing slavery, and thereby the Slave Trade; and he adopted again these views in 1833 in another tract that he published. He believed he was perfectly right; and by skill and good management, under the influence of competition, those properties might be made much more productive than they had been under slavery or with protection. They were told that a great experiment was being made, and that they must do nothing farther at present. He contended that the great experiment had been made, and had succeeded, which was, whether a slave population could be safely converted into a free community; and it was proved not only to be possible, but had succeeded perfectly; and the other experiment was, whether our West India affairs could not be brought within the principles of regular commerce. The great Movers against slavery always had in view the abolition of monopoly to give the experiment of free labour a fair trial; that bad not been made yet owing to these protective duties, and the result was, that by some the emancipation was deemed a failure, as if emancipation had been ever deemed as a substitute for good legislation, or as a sudden cure for disadvantages peculiar to any Colony. The agriculture of those Colonies was extremely defective, and the management was extremely bad which could be traced to neglect of agents and absence from the Colony of a party really interested — it was hard, however, to ascribe that to freedom which might be found equally bad wherever monopoly prevailed. His hon. Friend the Member for Cumberland gave a most pitiable account of his property, and other gentlemen did the same; but they should remember that was the case on the side of those who condemned monopoly. He was bound to say, however, that he thought there was great exaggeration in what was said of the utter ruin and destruction of these Colonies. Gentlemen who made these statements received them from their agents, who often had not the interest of the proprietor at heart, and they were frightened by them into abandoning their estates, either to throw more labour into the market for other estates, or to enable those agents or their friends to become the purchasers, and the agents or their friends became the purchasers. Besides, what was the case with one estate was not also the case with another. There were varieties of soil there, and varieties of management, and he believed in Jamaica that while some estates were doing well, others might be as bad as they were described. He was much amused the other day in reading the account of a discussion in the assembly at Jamaica on a memorial to this country which it was contemplated to send here to make known the deplorable state of the Colony; several speakers descanted long and loudly on the utter ruin and destruction which had involved the property of the island, and the utter hopelessness of their case was especially dwelt upon. At last one gentleman rose, and with great candour and discretion, questioned the propriety of sending such a picture of the result of the past system, for he said the party who are clamouring for cheap sugar, will surely say if this is all that has been gained by protection and dear sugar, why have we been made to suffer—these people cannot be worse off if justice is done us. And said this gentleman farther, as it is not true that we are in this state, it is particularly unwise to represent ourselves so—whatever doubt however might exist as to the state of the proprietor, all parties were agreed that the experiment as regarded the negro had answered well, that he was happy, and had no disposition to return to savage life. In short this experiment was described by the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government, as having had wonderful success. What was said also of the distress on one island did not apply to another — some were doing well, and were able to compete with any part of the world, which of course depended upon the proportion which the people bore to the labour required. The case of Antigua was in point; Mr. Gurney, when he wrote his book, stated that the produce of that island had nearly doubled in six years. [An hon. Member: " I don't believe him."] He was, however, thought to be a credible witness whenever Gentlemen wanted to quote him for their own purposes. He did believe him, however, for the population there was comparatively dense, and there had been no difficulty in getting labour there. He had, however, great misgiving of the loose kind of evidence that was given by interested parties in this House on the subject of these Colonies. He had no evidence whatever before him that the proprietors were en- titled to any such compensation as the tax on the people that they were about now to continue, and certainly they knew nothing of its being properly adjusted to the necessities of the case. The people knew only that they had paid a heavy sum to redeem the slaves, and they learn from their own servants at the Board of Trade, a statement which has never been contradicted, that since that sum was paid a sacrifice equal to 3,000,000l. a year has been exacted from them as further compensation for the emancipation of slaves already paid for. His hon. Friend who had preceded him had suggested that it was not fitting at this time to discuss this new principle in commercial legislation which this measure recognised, and which made their fiscal and economical arrangements dependent on the institutions of foreign states. He, however, entirely agreed with all that had fallen from his Friends upon this and other occasions, respecting the inconvenience, inconsistency, and insincerity of such a plea for monopoly. It was impossible to reflect upon its fanciful application without laughter; allowing freedom in the commerce of every article produced by slave labour save one, which many Members in the House, and influential persons out of it, were interested in excluding. Why, the fact was, it tended greatly to destroy the moral effect of the emancipation act throughout the world—the grounds for suspecting the motives in this case were so strong. No human being believed there was any sincerity in it; utterly disregarding the principle as they did whenever it was inconvenient to apply it. It had been properly observed the other night, that we had commerce and friendly relations with people of every description, every religion, and having the most savage and barbarous institutions, and that no interest being in question to preclude the intercourse, nothing was heard here of these laws or customs. They were properly anxious to suppress the Slave Trade in a particular part of the world, but they seemed to disregard it in other places; for instance, the Slave Trade was carried on in the east of Africa as well as the west, attended, as it was said, with every horror, every barbarity, every revolting feature that belonged to the "middle passage," of which so much had been heard, with this difference perhaps that the Egyptian Slave Trade was carried on openly, avowedly, and with the authority of the Pacha, or sovereign power of that country. According to Sir Fowell Buxton, no less than 50,000 human beings annually were stolen from the place of their birth and brought to the markets in Egypt and exposed openly for sale, and the trade was carried on with the assistance of the Pacha's troops. [Dr. Bowring: "No."] Well, it is so stated in Sir Fowell Buxton's work, and also in a book published a few years since at Paris by a Comte de la Trobe, who actually witnessed the people starting for what he calls the "Chasse aux Negres," and had his information from a person who had attended the capture and horrid treatment of the slaves in their passage from Nubia to Cairo, when hundreds die from fatigue and ill usage. This goes on every year, the whole traffic being more nefarious and cruel than what occurs on the west coast of Africa, for the negroes are taken from their villages where they are at peace: yet this is a country that we have the most friendly relations with, whose sovereign we call an old and faithful ally, and to preserve the integrity of whose Empire we were ready to go to war, and indeed did spend a million the other day for that purpose; and it should be remembered that the trade is not carried on for so innocent a purpose as working in the cane-field, but many of the slaves are devoted to other less worthy purposes. The whole world are aware of all this inconsistency, the people out of doors know these things, and they treat with utter disrespect the notion that their privation is founded upon any great national view of humanity. Indeed, this plea of the slavery of other countries as a ground for monopoly in this country, he considered a very dangerous one, with the view to the continuance of that evil for it was quite clear that while the plea was deemed sufficient to maintain the monopoly here, the monopolists had no desire to see it removed. They knew what influence they had over every Government in this country, who would therefore not be very zealous in persuading other nations to abolish it. However the plain question now before the House was that which his hon. Friend had sought in vain to be answered, namely, why the people were to pay 10s. more for their sugar to the West India proprietors than to other people. Surely an attempt will be made by the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Board of Trade, to explain this to the country. Let him only remember the startling fact stated by Mr. Porter, that two years ago we paid five millions more for sugar than we need have done had we bought it on the Continent; and that as our manufactures exported to the West Indies, only amount in value to 4,000,000l., they might have given the West Indians all those manufactures and have been 1,000,000l. in pocket had they been allowed to buy the sugar where it was sold cheapest. It was under these circumstances, and in the absence of any satisfactory reason for continuing this protection, that he should vote for his hon. Friend's Motion.

Mr. Gladstone

said, that he intended no disrespect to the hon. Mover of the Amendment by not having risen before to state the arguments upon which the Government rested their policy in the present matter; but that policy having been on former occasions already so fully explained he felt that he might possibly be guilty of some disrespect to the House if he had reason to repeat arguments with which they might be supposed to be so familiar. He had no objection, however, to state briefly the principal grounds upon which the policy of the Government in regard to the Sugar Duties was based. They were, first, that the principle of protection was that by which our customs' laws had always been more or less regulated; and, secondly, that the West Indies had all along enjoyed this protection, and that it had been generally conceded to them by this House. Whilst applying the principle of protection, generally, he thought that the West Indian was the last interest which should be exposed to free competition, and for this reason, that at the present moment they were suffering from great scarcity of labour. The hon. Member for Wolverhampton said, that there was a great deal of information upon this subject abroad. Was the hon. Gentleman's speech to be taken as an illustration of the extent and quality of this information? The hon. Gentleman referred to the opinion of Mr. Cropper in 1823, upon the Sugar Duties; but the hon. Gentleman did not seem to be aware of this great distinction between the case then and now —that there neither existed free labour nor monopoly to the sugar grower. The hon. Gentleman had also referred to the statements of Mr. Gurney, who wrote, he believed, three or four years ago, in reference to the produce of the island of Antigua. But the hon. Gentleman was not, perhaps, aware of Returns made within the last four days, which gave a very different result from that stated by the hon. Gentleman. From these Returns it appeared, that the average exports of the island of Antigua during the last four years of slavery, were 176,000 cwts., whilst that of the four years of free labour, from 1839 to 1843, was 166,000 cwts.

Mr. C. P. Villiers

explained. Of course, the statements of Mr. Gurney applied to the period at which they were written; and it appeared that the average produce of Antigua during the six years ending 1833 was 129,000 cwts., whilst that of the six years ending 1839, was 222,000 cwts., being very nearly double as he had slated.

Lord Stanley

read Returns to show that the average produce of Antigua during the last six years of free labour ending 1843, was less than that of the last six years of slavery.

Mr. Cobden

said, that such was his opinion of the principle involved in this question, that he felt convinced that if any opposition would bind itself together upon the basis of such a principle, no Government could long successfully resist them. The right hon. Gentleman, the President of the Board of Trade, had shrank from meeting the question, and it was not until he had been actually forced into it that he would say a word upon the subject. And even then, the right hon. Gentleman had endeavoured to evade the important bearings of the case, by flying off at some supposed inaccuracies of Mr. Gurney. The right hon. Gentleman said, that the claim of the West Indians to this monopoly rested upon the ground, that they had always enjoyed it without opposition. Why, if they were to go to such an argument as this, there was no existing monopoly, or abuse of any kind, which might not be defended with equal reason. The second ground of the right hon. Gentleman was, that the principle of protection entered into all the commercial and fiscal regulations of the country. He denied, for one, that the manufacturers of this country had had any share in this protection—nor did he seek it for them. All the manufacturers asked was to be left alone; and he, for one, would not accept protection if it were offered to him. Though the right hon. Gentleman opposite had avoided entering into the merits of this question, he (Mr. Cobden) would, with permission of the House, briefly lay bare the principle upon which this monopoly rested, and its effect. The information might have its effect elsewhere, though it did not in this House. The Government proposed, in brief, that the West India proprietors should receive 10s. per cwt. for the sugar more than the growers of any other part of the world; 10s. per cwt. more than they could get in any other part of the world. This was equivalent to a tax of two millions per year, upon the people of England, and for whom, and on what grounds? Because the West India proprietors were in distress, and could not cultivate their estates. This might be a very good plea for a farmer to appease a body of creditors, or as an appeal to the generosity of private friends; but it was not a ground to come to the country and ask them to mate the West Indian estates profitable to their owners at the expense of the working people of this country. But what was the benefit of this monopoly to the working coloured population of the West Indies? The white population of the West Indies amounted only to about a tenth of the population; yet the landed proprietors cried out still for the importation of more labourers. What effect would this protection have upon these labourers? In England there was a cry raised by the landowner of protection for the labourers as the result of their own monopoly. But how was the case in the West Indies? There was an hon. and gallant Gentleman in the House who would be able to tell them that the negro labourer was now receiving 2s. a day wages, whereas, formerly, he only received 6s. and 7s. a week; and yet the landed proprietors were only now waiting for the importation of a horde of savages from Africa, China, or elsewhere, to be enabled to reduce those wages, so that the labourer would not profit by this monopoly after all. Then what other ground was there upon which this monopoly could be claimed? Was it on account of peculiar burthens? No. They had no army to support, they had no excise, no stamps or taxes, and upon what ground this monopoly could be maintained he was at a loss to imagine. Some hon. Gentlemen complained plaintively of their own distresses and their losses, complaints which had only been equalled by the complaint of a noble Duke in another place, who mourned over the loss of 2,000l. in the sale of his fish. But there was a time when, no man would have dared to have risen in this House to make a claim on the ground of a monopoly. There was a time when, in this House, a most stringent resolution was passed against monopolists. In the Journals of the House of Commons in 1640 were these entries— Upon the question that all projectors and monopolists whatsoever, or that have any share, or lately have had any share in any monopolies, or that do receive, or lately have received, any benefit from any monopoly, or that have procured any warrant or command, for the restraint or molesting of any that have refused to conform themselves to any such proclamations or projects, are disabled by order of this House from sitting in this House; and if any man here knows any monopolist, that he shall nominate him. That any Member of this House who is a monopolist or projector, shall repair to Mr. Speaker that a new warrant may issue forth; or otherwise that he shall be dealt with as with a stranger that hath no power to sit here. Resolved, upon this question, that the word 'unlawful' should be joined to the word 'monopolist.' This order was resolved upon the question with one unanimous vote. On the 12th November, 1640, it was resolved— That if any man here knows any projector or monopolist, that he should name him."— [Committee appointed to inquire into the matter.] On the 21st January following he found that— Mr. Perd reports from the Committee for monopolists these four cases following. And upon his report it was Resolved—That Mr. William Sandys is within the order made against monopolists, and not fit nor ought to sit as a Member in this House of Parliament, and that a warrant issue forth under Mr. Speaker's hand to the Clerk of the Crown for a new writ for electing of another Member to serve for the town of Evesham in his stead. Resolved—Upon the question that Sir J. Jacob is a monopolist in the business of tobacco, and within the order against monopolists, and ought not to sit as a Member of this House (and a new writ was ordered for Rye, in Sussex). Resolved—That Mr. Thomas Webb is interested in the monopoly concerning the scaling of bone-lace, and within the order of this House made against monopolists, and ought not to sit as a Member in this House this Parliament (and a new writ was ordered—place not named). Resolved—That Mr. Edmund Windham is a monopolist and within the order made against monopolists (and a new writ was ordered for Bridgwater). Now he wanted to know the distinction— the difference in operation—(constitutionally he knew very well what it was) between a monopoly granted by Charles I. to a creature of his court, and a monopoly granted by Parliament to any body of men, in opposition to the interests of the public at large? It might be said that in 1640 the times were troublesome. True; but why were they so? In every motion, in every debate recorded of the period, they found this question of monopoly put forth as the prominent grievance, restricting the trade and comforts of the people, and being a great hardship upon the people generally. That was the complaint now, and he defied the Government and the upholders of the monopolies of the present day to show him the difference between the monopoly in sugar, which his hon. Friend (Mr. James) as he thought, unwisely maintained, and the monopoly in tobacco in the time of Charles I. Where was the difference so far as the people were concerned? They could not compensate his constituents for the loss they sustained from the monopoly in sugar, by giving them any monopoly in return. They could give them no quid pro quo in wages from what they took from them in the high price they were now made to pay for their sugar. It was admitted on all sides, that they could not legislate to increase or keep up the rate of wages: therefore, in increasing the prices to the labourer of the articles of consumption, they inflicted a grievous injustice upon the whole labouring classes. It would, he knew, be useless to call for a vote against monopoly there, where the great majority were monopolists, though the abolition of the monopoly could be proved to be advantageous to those by whom it was possessed. He did not stand there in support of the Amendment of his hon. Friend, because he thought that if the equalization of the duties were carried, some injury to the West India interest would result. He would tell his hon. Friend (Mr. James), that, in his opinion, the West India planters would best consult their own interest by uniting with the free traders in demanding a very low rate of duty on the import of sugar, equal throughout the whole world. He believed that an equal duty of 16s., or even 14s., a cwt., would in the course of a few years produce as much to the revenue as the present rate of duties produced, while it would give an impulse to the trade of the West Indies and place it upon a sound bottom; capital and intellect (which was, he feared, as much required as anything else) would flow in, and that prosperity which, under a system of protection, those Colonies looked for in vain, would, under a system of free competition, result. The present condition of the West Indies was known and admitted, and what was the prospect under the new measure of protection which was now proposed? The right hon. the President of the Board of Trade had told the House that the present was nothing more than a transition measure. He knew that very well—the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman was not necessary to convince the House that this could not be a final measure, but merely one of transition. The question now was not as to 1s. of duty more or less, but it was a question between monopoly and no monopoly. There could be no settlement, no quiet in the matter, until the system of differential duties was abolished. The great party out of the House, which he and his hon. Friends represented, called for "no monopoly;" in the House, however, they had a large majority in favour of monopoly, but that party in the House, who advocated a smaller amount of protection than now existed, were, in his opinion, the best friends of monopoly. As he had said, the question out of doors was simply between monopoly and no monopoly, and upon which side was the preponderance of public opinion there could be no doubt. What did the petitions which had been presented to the House upon the subject say? They had one petition from the important town of Leeds, with 25,000 signatures, praying for the reduction and equalization of the duty on sugar. Year after year they had had petitions sent up to them from Manchester, declaring the opinion of the inhabitants of that town in favour of the equalization of the Sugar Duties. They had also received a petition from the Brazilian merchants of Liverpool in favour of a modified measure; but that body had since broken up in consequence of the difference amongst its Members as to that measure— the majority of them preferring to dissolve the body rather than petition again for a modified duty. He would call upon his hon. Friend near him to bear these things in mind, and join with the free traders in demanding a low equalised duty. What the free traders wanted was free trade in all things—not here only, but in the Colonies also—they demanded not differential duties, which they held to be alike injurious to those for whose benefit they were imposed, as to the people by whom they were to be paid; but low equal duties. Let, then, his hon. Friend join with him, and he would find that the West India interest would be better off in the hands of the free traders than while they were thus made the shuttlecock of political parties, and were bandied about from one to the other on the floor of that House.

Mr. P. M. Stewart

said, the arguments advanced by his hon. Friend the Member for Stockport might be sound, according to his hon. Friend's school of political economy, but he did not think they would accord with the spirit of fair play which characterised the English nation generally. His hon. Friend had urged that the West India planters were few and weak—the inference being that, therefore, they should be dealt with according to the interests of that economy of which he was the advocate. The West India Colonies were the victims of the legislature of this country, and were it not for the particular system we had introduced, those Colonies would have been as regardless of differential duties, or of any amount of protection the Imperial Legislature might choose to continue to them, as the people of Manchester. But what was the hon. Member for Stockport's principle of free trade? Was it to place one man who was relieved from certain burthens, in competition with another who was still subject to them? The hon. Member had given notice of a Motion for the appointment of a Committee to ascertain what were the peculiar burthens upon land in this country; and had admitted that if it could be shown that they were obnoxious to such burthens, to that extent he would admit that the landed interest was entitled to protection. Now he said, let them give him a Committee to enquire into the especial burthens which fell upon the West India interest, and he believed he could prove their existence even to the satisfaction of the hon. Member himself. Was it a principle of free trade to place a colony without labour in competition with those countries where the supply of labour was unlimited? When the hon. Member for Manchester asked the Government on what principle they continued a protective duty, one would have thought that the present proposal was to continue the old. prohibitory duty of 63s. instead of an advance towards the accomplishment of the object of the free traders themselves, by modifying the duty to 34s.; and by the amendment which would be moved in Committee by the hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. Miles) he hoped it would be modified still more. The Legislature at first had proceeded, in regard to the West India Colonies, upon the principle of encouraging their cultivation by slave labour, and prevented the emancipation of slaves; then they took it into their heads (very properly he admitted) to emancipate the slaves, and to compensate the colonists for the loss; but how was that compensation settled? They had heard much of the munificent grant of 20,000,000l. (and he admitted it was munificent); but that was by no means a sufficient compensation for property which, as estimated by the valuers of the Government, amounted to 100,000,000l.; but, in addition to the 20,000,000l., they instituted a term of apprenticeship, which was also to go as part of the compensation due to the planters. It, however, was soon urged that they should not stop in the progress of emancipation, and the apprenticeship was abolished, and then, while the 20,000 000l. proved to be only 17,000,000l. in actual payment, the twelve years apprenticeship turned out to be only six. It must also be recollected that when the Emancipation Act was passed, the House of Commons promised to encourage by every means in its power, and to provide facilities for the substitution of free labour for slave labour; that was, in fact, the point on which the cultivation of the estates depended, but up to this time no progress had been made in removing the restrictions upon the introduction of free labourers into the Colonies. Without labour the Colonies could do nothing—give them labour, and the power of production would be tested, and the exports would decide the question of differential duties.

Mr. Bright

thought if ever the protective system had been proved to be rotten and useless, it had been so in this case of the Sugar Duties—limiting, as they did, the supply of the article to the people, restricting the trade of the country, reducing the wages of labour and the comforts of the working classes, and risking the imposition of a heavy tariff of duties on our manufactures by the Brazils, which would in all probability destroy all that remained of our trade with that empire; and while this system was maintained to keep up high prices for the benefit of the West India interest, at the expense of the people of this country, they found that instead of conducing to the prosperity of the Colonies, it was tending to their progressive ruin. Perhaps there was never a time when the condition of these Colonies was more deplorable than now, after having for so long enjoyed the utmost amount of protection which the Legislature could give them. They found that the system of cultivation in the Colonies was bad—that there was great uncertainty, great want of capital, and a considerable and increasing deterioration in the value of property, arising in some measure from the uncertainty of the tenure of the protection which the Colonies still possessed. Under these circumstances a change was necessary, and the Government, who had entered office upon the principle of protection, found it necessary to reduce the amount of differential duty; but the change was not such as would bring about any alteration in the position of the Colonies. With a protective duty of 10s., the planters would still cling to the broken reed, and depend upon the unjust and pernicious monopoly which would yet remain to them, instead of to their own exertions. By the proposed change the West Indies would receive perhaps one million less of protection; but they would still want the great stimulus of free competition? It had been urged that there was a scarcity of labour in the West Indies. Admitting that it was so, he would ask was there any scarcity of labour in the East Indies and the Island of the Mauritius? If the only argument for the continuance of monopoly in the West Indies was the scarcity of labour, that surely would not apply to the case of the East Indies and the Mauritius. It was but a few nights ago that the right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer said, in speaking of the East India planters, that they had a soil highly productive, easily cultivated, cheap labour, and great facilities of transit to this country; if that was their position, on what pretence was the House of Commons now to be called upon to give them a protection of 10s.? He thought he could suggest a plan which would suit the views of the right hon. the President of the Board of Trade and the West India planters, while it would relieve the people of this country from the necessity of paying this differential duty in the case of East India produce. In 1843 he found the quantity of West India sugar imported was 2,503,577 cwts., which at 10s. a cwt. differential duty, would produce, as protection, 1,251,788l. In the same year the imports from the East Indies and the Mauritius were 1,578,875 cwts., which, at 10s. a cwt., would give a protective duty of 789,437l. Now, according to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, the object of the Government was, to give the people of England a better supply of sugar, or rather an ample supply, ample enough possibly for the right hon. Gentleman's own table, but not for the wants of the poor of this country. The object was, to give more sugar to the people here and to pay, at the same time, to the West India Colonies 1,251,788l. If that payment were necessary (and that was a question which he should be glad to have an opportunity of going into) on the ground of deficiency of labour, he should propose that it should be paid, if paid at all, and any other especial burthens existed, by a Vote of the House. The country would thus save upon the East India and Mauritius sugar 789,437l. a-year, and, considering the state of our finances, and the difficulties and embarrassments under which some trades and manufactures were labouring in regard to duties—as the cotton duties, for instance— he thought that money might be employed much more beneficially than in paying it to the East India and Mauritius planters, who had all the advantage which the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed, without even the shadow of a claim to it. In regard to the corn monopoly it had been urged that the interest of the tenant farmer and the agricultural labourer required its continuance; but even this argument, futile as it was, could not be advanced in support of the sugar monopoly. They could not say that the protection here was for the benefit of the tenant farmer, for there were no tenant fanners; and as to the condition of the labourer, the avowed object of the planters was to obtain an immigration of labourers into the Colonies, for the purpose of reducing the wages of labour. The question, he knew, was one of a majority of votes against the interest of the people and those principles of commerce which both sides had admitted to be sound. The noble Lord the Member for London had used the arguments of free trade when he expressed a desire to see all the nations of the earth united together in one common brotherhood, but had maintained at the same time that there ought to be a differential duty as against the Brazils of 40 per cent. Did the noble Lord think that the imposition of such a duty would unite us in one common brotherhood with the Brazils and Spanish Colonies? He could wish that the noble Lord would show a disposition to adhere in practice to those principles which he acknowledged in the abstract to be true, but at which he unfortunately always faltered when he should proceed to carry them into effect. He thought those hon. Gentlemen who were favourable to restricting the hours of factory labour by legislative interference, with the view of increasing the enjoyments of the poor, could do no less than vote for his hon. Friend's Motion, which, while it left them free as to the hours of labour, proposed to remove those restrictions which the law of monopoly had imposed upon their comforts and power of consumption.

Mr. Bernal

regretted the protraction of the debate, but it was not his fault or the fault of those who had preceded him. The House had been waiting in the expectation of a more detailed debate upon the Motion of the hon. Member, but some how or other they had been drawn nolens volens into a somewhat lengthened discussion upon the more general question of free trade, in the course of which taunts and insinuations had been cast upon the West India interest which it could not be expected those who were connected with that interest could pass by in silence. He had heard on various occasions the hon. Member for Durham (Mr. Bright) advert to the case of the West India proprietors, and again to-night he had cast upon them an insinuation. the point of which, though it might have escaped the House, had not passed unnoticed by him. The hon. Member had insinuated that they desired an immigration of labourers into the West India Colonies, with the view of beating down the wages of labour, and reducing the condition of the labourer there. But if he was not mistaken, the hon. Member had on various occasions been the advocate of the great principle of immigration in regard to the West Indies. Then where was the hon. Gentleman's consistency, when he insinuated that the object of the proprietors was to reduce wages and the condition of the unfortunate labourers—thus prejudging, as it were, the case of the equally unfortunate West India proprietor. He had nothing to find fault with in the manner in which the hon. Member for Stockport had argued, though in some things he differed from him. He (Mr. Bernal) did not stand there as the advocate of monopoly, but merely to state his case as one of a body—and because that body was weak in itself, and inefficient in its advocates, that was no reason why he should be beaten down and trodden to earth because he was a West India proprietor. The hon. Member for Durham had referred to the planters as men in an anomalous position. He had told them they had no tenants whose interests they were anxious to uphold, and had also taunted them with a desire to lower the wages of labour. In 1834, when emancipation was passed, the system of apprenticeship was established as a part of the compensation to be given to the owners, and what he complained of was, that that system had been abolished without the necessary steps of precaution, which should have preceded it, being taken. The West Indies were not prepared for the suddenness of the step. This country attempted to do what could only be done by the slow and certain lapse of time. Was the condition of serfdom abolished here all at once, or was it the effect of time? Why the change was brought about gradually, one statute after another preparing the public mind for its being effected. But in the West Indies they were required to do away with the state of vassalage almost all at once. They were required to adapt the black population to another and a quite different order of things; and when they were unable at once to effect all this, the mother country turned round on them in 1838, and said that the [apprenticeship should summarily cease. Accordingly, the apprenticeship was terminated, and six years after the free system had been in operation, it was stated that it had been attended with complete success. He agreed, that the experiment had been to a certain degree successful. No set of people, emerging from bondage to freedom could have conducted themselves with greater moderation, temperance, and a more respectful observance of the laws, than had done the black population of Jamaica. So far the experiment had been successful, and so far no West India proprietor in his senses would ever dream of returning to the old system. But as far as the cultivation of most of the West India Islands went, he maintained that the experiment of emancipation had not been successful. It was as he had foreseen and predicted beforehand—no revolt had broken out—no atrocities had been committed—but there had been a time of silent and negative resistance. The West India population had facilities for keeping from labour which our working classes did not possess. The nature of the climate rendered the former independent. His food grew spontaneously, and he wanted little clothing or firing. Could they, under these circumstances, expect that a population just emerging from slavery, would set themselves very steadily and perseveringly to work? The fact was, that the West India proprietors could not obtain a very regular supply of labour. The system of cultivation was rather complicated, and a continuity of labour was required. The negroes, however, would frequently only turn out three or four days in the week, and that even in the very essential time of the year. What, then, were the West India proprietors to do? The labourers were quite independent of them. He had seen forty or fifty of them attending church mounted on their ponies. Now, how were they to deal with these people? They had not a population dense enough to render those who did work dependent upon employment. They had ground of their own to labour upon, and they availed themselves of it. He had pressed upon the attention of the managers, the propriety of adopting the system of contract labour, but they told him that they would hurry contract labour over to be paid, and get back to their own grounds as soon as possible. What then, he repeated was he to do? He could not, like Cadmus, raise up files upon files of industrial population. He wished he could. But they were, unfortunately, not able by moral or political maxims, to conjure up a state of things in a few years in the West Indies, which in this country, it took centuries to effect. With respect to the compensation said to have been granted to the West India proprietors, it was either compensation or it was not. He believed, that it was the latter. A sum of 300l. was no compensation for 5.000l. or 6,000l. Indeed, on the whole, he was sorry that the West Indian body had accepted the compensation money, for it had been of very little real benefit to them. He thought, indeed, that the offer of compensation was little better than a trap, into which he was surprised that the clear-sighted mercantile community should have fallen. The hon. Member for Stockport had asserted that the adoption of a principle admitting un- limited competition, would have the effect of improving the system of agriculture, and putting a stop to absenteeism. As to the latter, many proprietors of West India estates had recently visited their properties, but he was sorry to say that these visits had been productive of evil rather than of good; and as to the improvements of the agricultural system in use, the hon. Members should have been aware that that had been going on for some time, and that every year new and improved machinery was being introduced into employment. But, again, the hon. Member for Stockport had referred to certain entries in old Journals of the House relative to the expulsion of projectors and monopolists. He did not know in which his hon. Friend ranked him; but this he did know, that bad as in many respects were the days of Charles II., that the general belief then was, that the colonial interests were identified with those of the public, and that, in fact, our Empire was mainly supported upon the pillars of colonial greatness. He was afraid that the end of that belief was at hand—that people were beginning to think that the Colonies ought to be treated as it was once proposed to treat Ireland—that they should be sunk in the sea, and that they should have free trade with all the world, without thinking of the Colonies or their interests. In describing the condition of the West India proprietors, he had told them nothing but the truth. He had exaggerated nothing, and he did believe that he exaggerated nothing, when he said that the great body of West India proprietors would be very glad to get rid of their estates then upon anything like reasonable terms. He had abstained on previous similar occasions from voting upon this subject, as the motives which influenced him might have been misconstrued—and he should pursue a like course at present. Mr. Roebuck could not help feeling that men's opinions might be governed very much by their own peculiar interests; and it seemed to him that if he look the hon. Member for Weymouth as the advocate of the West India interest, he should take him in his true character. Before he touched at all upon the arguments of the hon. Gentleman, he would endeavour to bring before the House the question at issue—which was this: there was a commodity that entered largely into the comforts and habits of the community, viz., sugar, which could be derived from a large surface of the globe. From one part, it might be derived at an expense very small, and persons in this country might be enabled to use a large quantity of it; but here he might venture to inquire how it was that the poor people of this country should be unable to reap the benefit of their own labour, and what was to prevent them from obtaining that at a cheap rate? —What was the objection made by his hon. Friend? He made a distinction of two classes of persons, whom he described in very gloomy terms—first, the people of England; and second, those who were now distinguished by the term of "the West Indians." He described the people of England as poor and suffering, and he pointed to them as persons labouring hard to obtain a pitiful subsistence— as persons deprived of fuel, warm clothing, and food, and he then pointed to the favoured people of that country from which this particular article of sugar was drawn. And how did he describe them? Let him call attention to that class of persons who stood between the people of England and their desires. The hon. Member had described the large bulk of inhabitants of the West Indies as being persons who could with little labour, from the advantages of the climate and the favourable soil, produce that which the people of this country desired—they had all the comforts and luxuries of life. No; there was another class with which the hon. Gentleman peculiarly sympathised— a class small and insignificant as compared with the population of the West Indies— the English absentee proprietors. The hon. Gentleman described this class as bankrupts in fortune, as unable to maintain the position in which they had been accustomed to move, as unable to continue those luxurious habits in which they had been wont to indulge; and he contended that the poor impoverished people of England should be taxed for the benefit of this small, impoverished, and bankrupt class of absentee proprietors. The poor people of England, who were ground down, as the hon. Gentleman had said, by peculiar restrictive laws, who were rendered almost incapable of maintaining existence, asked one boon, among others, in order to soften and ameliorate their condition; but between the people and the accomplishment of their desire there interposed this bankrupt class, which, now claimed the commiseration of the House. Now, he (Mr. Roebuck) would venture to describe this bankrupt class—these West India proprietors. He asserted that they were no proprietors at all. The estates of these very men were mortgaged. [Mr. Bernal—"not all of them."] He would say, "Yes." But it was said, this class of persons was not represented in that House. The assertion reminded him of the description once given by a facetious Member of that House of a suit in Chancery. The individual to to whom he alluded said, that if you engaged in a Chancery suit, it was something like passing your hands over the keys of a harpsichord—up jumped twenty keys represented by so many lawyers. This was the case in that House whenever the interests of the West India proprietors were touched upon—up jumped twenty hon. Members at once to undertake their defence. The West India proprietors an unrepresented class! What, were they an unrepresented class in comparison with their real importance in the community? Why, if they were represented proportionately to their importance in the community, a fraction of a Member would be more than they really deserved. In this case the interest of the people of England was placed in competition with those of the West India proprietors; and the hon. Member for Weymouth (Mr. Bernal) had asserted that the proprietors had been forced into their present position by the people of this country. Now he was prepared to argue with the hon. Gentleman, that so far from this being the case, those who had undertaken to be dealers in sugar in the West India Colonies had, from time to time, come to that House, demanding from it and from the people of England protection for their nefarious trade. They were the persons who had in every possible way fostered the Slave Trade—who had induced that House to countenance that nefarious and abominable traffic—and who, so far from being dragged into their present position, had been the inciters and promoters of the whole mischief. He would defy the hon. Gentleman, or any one else, to refute these assertions. Perhaps the hon. Member for Oxford would answer him; but he begged to remind that hon. Gentleman that he knew something of Colonial history. Let that hon. Gentleman prove, if he could, that the people of England, uncon- nected as they were with the West India trade, had of themselves proposed to place any portion of the population of this country in the West India Islands, or to foster the Slave Trade. He could trace the progress of the Slave Trade from the time of Sir John Hawkins downwards; and he could show the House that a small band of adventurers, having taken possession of the West India Islands, and finding difficulty in obtaining a supply of labour, followed the example which had been set them by the importation of Africans into Spain, and afterwards introduced this nefarious trade into our North American Colonies, and spread the devastating plague throughout that continent. This was not done by the people of England in their collective capacity; it was done by individual adventurers, who, he conceived, had no reason now to complain of their fate. When the people of England saw the mischievous and nefarious nature of this trade, they interfered; and how? Did they vindicate for the slave his natural and ordinary position? Did they claim his liberty without payment or compensation to the men who had deprived him of his natural right? No. The people of this country gave compensation to the slave proprietors. But the hon. Member for Weymouth said, that that compensation was very insufficient and inadequate. What, would it be asserted now, that the compensation given was not most ample and magnificent? He asserted that it was magnificent, that it was exorbitant, and that, if the proprietors had been compelled to prove their loss, they would not have received the tithe of what had been awarded them in the shape of compensation. Now, what was the wish of the people? It was this—the commodity of sugar was one which obtained enormous consumption in this country; if it were furnished from the cheapest markets, an equal duty being paid on the produce of all portions of the globe at the present prices, the people of this country would be furnished with an ample supply of sugar, and the State would derive an enormous revenue from this source. But what prevented the accomplishment of the people's wish? Why, the hon. Member for Weymouth stepped in and said, "In times past we were led to adopt a system which was mischievous alike to you and to us; you offered us compensation; you bought our slaves; but you did not give us a fit com- pensation, and therefore for all time to come, the people of England must be taxed in order to benefit the small body of West India proprietors." Now was a proposal of this nature consistent with common sense? He was at a loss to conceive how his hon. Friend had arrived at this conclusion. The hon. Gentleman had commenced by describing, very accurately, the situation of the people of this country; he had said they were a very miserable people. The truth of that assertion he (Mr. Roebuck) was ready to acknowledge. But the hon. Gentleman then gave a very remarkable description of the condition of the labourers in the West Indies. The hon. Gentleman said, that they only worked three days in the week, and that they rode on horseback to the fairs. [Mr. Bernal—"to the chapels."] Well, then, to chapel. The hon. Member described them as being well clothed, well fed, and well housed. It was evident, therefore, that the large body of people in our West India Colonies — the free black population—were in extremely happy and comfortable circumstances. The hon. Gentleman in alluding to the great revolution effected in the West Indies by the measure of Emancipation, had expressed his surprise that no revolt had marked the sudden change which that measure effected. He thought this fact showed that the nature of that change was fully understood by the parties by whom it was proposed. The people were to be prepared for freedom by the interposition of apprenticeship and of the whip. [Lord Stanley: "No, no."] He believed that the whip might be used under the sanction of the magistrate. This intermediate state, this system of apprenticeship, was at length ended and what was the consequence? The hon. Member for Weymouth said the people would not work. Well, but were they not well fed, well clothed, and well housed? were they not happy? "Yes," said the hon. Gentleman, "but there are certain proprietors in this country," absentees, living, perhaps, in Grosvenor-street, or Wilton-place— "who have been accustomed to occupy a particular position in society, but who, in consequence of the labourers refusing to work, are unable to maintain that position." He believed a similar complaint was made on one occasion by an hon. Gentleman opposite with reference to the Corn Laws. How was it that the hon. Member for Weymouth who advocated free trade in corn, maintained that the same principles should not be applied to the trade in sugar? Was the House prepared to regard personal feelings and interests in a question of this nature, putting out of view the interests of the great body of the people? Would they legislate after this fashion, because a West India proprietor said that though the labouring population of those islands were happy, the proprietors themselves were unable to maintain the position they had hitherto occupied? [Mr. Bernal: "Hear, hear."] He saw this argument was a barbed shaft, and gave some pain to the hon. Member. If he had drawn his shaft against the hon. Member for Kent, that hon. Gentleman might have cried "Hear, hear," in another sense. The great doctrine of free trade ought to bear down all partial affections. The principle of buying in the cheapest market, and of selling in the dearest, should be adopted as their motto in commercial transactions; and they should not be induced by any petty party personal considerations to deviate from that great principle. He considered the question of unrestricted trade in sugar was more important even than that of free trade in corn; for he believed that if they had a free trade in sugar to-morrow, the importation of that article would far exceed in quantity and in value any importations of grain which might be anticipated if they had a free trade in that commodity. He considered that any one who opposed free trade in sugar was as much an enemy to the principles of Free Trade as that body which was designated "the corn-growing aristocracy of this country." He considered that the West India Islands had been most fatal appendages to this great Empire,—they had done us no service,—they had been the means of occasioning dreadful wars and fearful commotions,—they had put us to immense expense, and had given us nothing in requital. He believed, that if, to-morrow, by some accidental vicissitude, those Islands disappeared from the face of the earth, as far as England was concerned, however much she might mourn the loss human nature would sustain, she would not lose one jot of her strength, not one penny of her wealth, not one instrument of her power. He could not for an instant yield up his understanding to that extravagant pretence which endeavoured to draw a distinction between slave-grown sugar and that which was not slave-grown. But every one who knew how cotton was introduced into this country,—every one who was acquainted with the condition of America and of Africa, must be convinced that these pretences were urged to satisfy a craving appetite for something like vulgar popularity. Those pretences were, however, like shadows, false and fleeting; and the people of England would hereafter discover that the great principles of Free Trade would, in the end, be most beneficial to them and to the world at large, by extending commerce and civilization to every portion of the globe, by uniting and knitting together the various portions of this habitable world in the great bonds of interest, and thereby ameliorating the condition of all by rendering it the interest and happiness of all to be in constant peace and amity one with another.

Viscount Sandon

should not at this stage of the debate have risen to address the House on the question under its consideration, if it had not been for the language used by the hon. and learned Member for Bath. If he thought with that hon. and learned Member that the Colonial part of the British Empire was a burthen to this country—if he considered with the hon. and learned Member that those Colonies did not contribute to the strength and prosperity of the Empire, he might agree with the expediency, if not with the justice, of the hon. and learned Member's observations. But first, with regard to the expediency. The hon. and learned Member for Bath talked of the West India Colonies as a burthen to this country. Has that hon. and learned Member forgotten the great advantages which the manufacturing interest of this country derived from our Colonial possessions? Did not the consumption of British manufactures in the West India Colonies alone amount to nearly three millions per annum? They heard much of the importance of the Brazils in relation to the trade and commerce of Great Britain. On purely commercial grounds, he would ask, why they were to he more highly estimated than the West India Colonies, which took more of our produce, and of whose markets we were secure? Why were the West India proprietors so lightly talked of in reference to this question? Had not the West India proprietors formerly contributed three mil- lions annually towards the support of this country? Was an annual tribute, as it were, to that amount spent within this country, of no importance? If he concurred in the opinion that these Colonies were a burthen on this country, he might agree in the expediency; but he still could not concur in the justice of the course proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Bath. Was the magnificent 20,000,000l. which had been so much talked of, and which was granted as compensation to the holders of slaves in the West Indies on the passing of the Slave Trade Emancipation Act—was it a real compensation to those who received it? Let the House look at the facts of the case. Compensation, to be compensation, must leave parties where it finds them—must replace parties in their original condition. Have the twenty millions done that? Did they not know that the West India proprietors who received that money have been ruined since its receipt? Has that compensation left the West India proprietors as it found them? It was no compensation to the West India proprietors at all. Most of the hon. Members who heard him had some acquaintances connected with the West India Colonies. He asked them if those estates, which yielded them incomes before the passing of the Emancipation Act, produced any at that moment? Why, what was the fact with regard to the present state of West India property? In one parish in Jamaica he had heard of no less than eighteen estates having been thrown up and abandoned. Was this compensation? Passing however the consideration of justice to individuals—looking at the question with reference to the proposed reduction of the duty on sugar, he thought that no course would be so pernicious and so shortsighted as that which would have the effect of sacrificing the West India Colonies. What was the quantity of sugar derived from the West India Colonies in proportion to the whole European supply? Why, one-sixth. They should consider that in the West India Colonies they had a large estate upon the other side of the Atlantic, and it was their duty to do their best to carry it through the great difficulties with which they had to contend. Whether they wished to have cheap sugar, or to make a real step towards the extinction of the Slave Trade, they were bound to assist the Colonies in the present struggle, to remove their difficulties by doing all in their power to afford the West Indies a supply of free- labour. If they wished to promote the interests of the negro, and to extinguish slavery in other parts of the world, they should be careful to he able to show that the experiment of Emancipation had succeeded in their own West India Colonies, and not only to remove every obstruction which existed in the way of obtaining a supply of free-labourers, but to give every facility and encouragement to it which the State could lend. The hon. and learned Member for Bath had taunted the West India proprietors with having promoted and encouraged the nefarious traffic in slaves. If the hon. and learned Member had been more accurately informed he would have known that the Slave Trade was forced upon the West Indies. The hon. and learned Member who talked so loudly of the nefarious traffic in slaves would persuade the House to pursue a course which would give encouragement, activity, and permanency to the Slave Trade all over the world. Did the hon. and learned Member for Bath not know, that if the Resolution of the hon. Member for Dumfries was carried, the immediate and inevitable result would be to give an impetus to the Slave Trade? With regard to the proposition of the Government itself, he regretted that it had introduced the distinction between slave and free-grown sugar into our Custom House regulations; he found it could not practically be maintained; and unless the Government took early and efficient steps to encourage the growth of sugar in our own Colonies, it could not be denied that they must, by exhausting the produce of sugar in the countries which produce it by free labour, pro tanto give encouragement to slave-grown sugar. He could not avoid again referring to the question of emigration. They were now about to prepare some scheme by which free-labour would be allowed to be introduced from the East to the West Indies; let them at the same time, extend to the West Indies the boon which had been granted to the Canadas. Let them lend to those Colonies as they had to Canada, the advantage of the credit of the mother country. Without some such help, the proferred permission would he unavailing, neither funds nor enterprize would be found to undertake so large an outlay in the present condition of the Colonies. An emigration on a large scale conducted under the sanction of the Government, and supported by the credit of the Government, could alone secure to the British consumer the advantage of a cheap and abundant supply of sugar without encouragement to the Slave Trade. Save the West India proprietors from ruin, and preserve these great and important Colonies to the Empire.

Mr. Warburton

would not hare addressed the House if it had not been for the proposition just made for raising a loan in this country for the West India Colonies. Looking at the former magnificent grant to these Colonies, and the manner in which it had been received, he was not disposed to sanction the proposal just made by the hon. Member for Liverpool. He wished to know distinctly upon what grounds the Motion of the hon. Member for Dumfries was opposed. He looked to the admission of the hon. Member for Cumberland and the hon. Member for Weymouth that under the protection of a differential duty, the West India Colonies were in a state of penury and destitution. If such was a fact, to what state would those Colonies be reduced by the proposition of the Government! They could not, according to their own admission be in a worse state. Let the House then, extend to these Colonies the advantages which would result from a free trade in sugar. The arguments of the hon. Member for Dumfries established that the Colonies would be benefitted by the adoption of the Motion which he had proposed to the House. He hoped that the Government would be induced to extend the principles of free trade to this article of commerce, as great advantages would result from the adoption of such a course.

Mr. Maclean

observed, that some of the hon. Members, more particularly the hon. and learned Member for Bath, it would seem, from the line of argument they had adopted, were not aware that the origin of the West India trade and its growth from the year 1668 to the year 1780 was strictly attributable to the encouragement given to the parties engaged in it by the Parliament of England; and so much of popularity had it enjoyed at home, that in Charles the Second's time the King's own brother, the Duke of York, had put himself at the head of a company, the principal object of which was to supply the colonists with slave-labour. They too had, it would appear, yet to learn that so far from the colonists desiring this, they had formally protested against it, and, appealing to the Government at home to prevent its continuance, they were informed by the British Government that the interests of the colonists would be injured if that supply of labour were suffered to be cut off. It appeared, therefore, that this was no fault of theirs. At present, the colonists were in a state of great distress, and unless the Legislature extended protection to their staple trade they must infallibly be ruined. Under such circumstances, they had a strong claim for protection both from the Government and the Legislature. From the great commercial importance of the West-India Colonies to this country, and the property embarked by British subjects in the trade of those Colonies, he must entirely dissent from the opinion expressed by his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Roebuck) that if they were represented in proportion to their importance to the community, the fraction of a Member in that House would be more than they deserved. His hon. and learned Friend in making that observation had forgotten what he had advanced in the debate upon Canada during the period of popular excitement there—namely, that Canada, though a Colony, was as much an integral portion of Great Britain as an English county. Let his hon. and learned Friend apply the same principle to the West Indies as to Canada, and mete out equal justice to those Colonies, and then let him assert, if he could, that so large a portion of the Empire as the West Indies would be adequately represented by the fraction of a Member. He confessed he should like to know what the proposition of his hon. and learned Friend implied. Did it mean that we were to have a perfectly free-trade in sugar with all nations growing it? Was this meant as an indirect way gently to let down the West India Colonies? If so, he could understand it, and pretty nearly anticipate what might be expected to follow at home; for he could not help thinking the protection afforded hitherto by the Legislature to the sugar Colonies came within the same category as that which they still thought as fitting to give to labour at home. There could hardly be any proposition more clear in his mind than that in respect to our own grown corn it ought to enjoy protection. But if they were, as had been so strongly urged to-night, to let down the West India interest, and permit the free import of foreign sugar, or even at the same rate of duty as sugar from our own Colonies, what must be the presumption of what might be effected in respect to another important interest now enjoying protection? Did not the proposition excite in the minds of the friends of the agricultural interest some anticipatory fears that they would shortly be called upon, by reasoning just as plausible, to remove the protection given to our farming interest, and admit a free trade in corn? If it was to be so, in his opinion, it would be better that the country should know it at once. If this country was not dependent on trade—if ships, colonies, and commerce were not necessities for us—if colonies meant nothing but free-trade, then most men in this country had been under a great delusion. He trusted, therefore, that the Government would take an early opportunity of stating what steps they were prepared to take, and, particularly, that if the son of the British labourer should be induced to take his labour to those Colonies, he would go there under the ægis of British protection, and not find that he had gone out to till a soil which could not remunerate him because the produce of a more grateful soil was admitted to this country on advantageous terms to compete with the produce of his labour. He was opposed to the Motion of the hon. Member.

The House divided on the question that the words proposed to be left out stand part of the question. Ayes 259; Noes 56: Majority 203.

List of the AYES.
Acland, Sir T. D.	Berkeley, hon. G. F.
Acland, T. D.	Blackstone, W. S.
A'Court, Capt.	Blakemore, R.
Acton, Col.	Bodkin, W. H.
Adderley, C. B.	Boldero, H. G.
Ainsworth, P.	Borthwick, P.
Alford, Visct.	Botfield, B.
Allix, J. P.	Bowles, Adm.
Antrobus, E.	Boyd, J.
Arbuthnott, hon. H.	Bradshaw, J.
Arkwright, G.	Bramston, T. W.
Baillie, Col.	Broadley, H.
Baillie, H. J.	Browne, hon. W.
Baird, W.	Brownrigg, J. S.
Barclay, D.	Buckley, E.
Baring, hon. W. B.	Buller, C.
Baring, rt. hn. F. T.	Campbell, J. H.
Baring, T.	Cardwell, E.
Barnard, E. G.	Cavendish, hn. C. C.
Barrington, Visct.	Cavendish, hn. G. H.
Baskerville, T. B. M.	Chapman, A.
Bateson, T.	Chelsea, Visct.
Beckett, W.	Chetwode, Sir J.
Benett, J.	Christopher, R. A.
Bentinck, Lord G.	Clayton, R. R.
Berkeley, hon. Capt.	Clerk, Sir G.

Clive, hon. R. H.	Hamilton, C. J. B.
Cockburn, rt. hn. Sir G.	Hampden, R.
Codrington, Sir W.	Harcourt, G. G.
Colebrooke, Sir T. E.	Hardy, J.
Collett, W. R.	Harris, hon. Capt.
Colquhoun, J. C.	Hayes, Sir E.
Colvile, C. R.	Heathcote, Sir W.
Compton, H. O.	Heneage, G. H. W.
Corry, rt. hon. H.	Henley, J. W.
Courtenay, Lord	Hepburn, Sir T. B.
Cripps, W.	Hobhouse, rt. hn. Sir J.
Curteis, H. B.	Hodgson, R.
Darby, G.	Hogg, J. W.
Davies, D. A. S.	Hope, hon. C.
Dawnay, hon. W. H.	Hope, G. W.
Denison, W. J.	Howard, hn. C.W. G.
Denison, J. E.	Howard, Lord
Denison, E. B.	Howard, hn. E. G. G.
D'Eyncourt, rt. hn. C. T.	Hume, J.
Dickinson, F. H.	Humphery, Ald.
Disraeli, B.	Hussey, A.
Douglas, Sir H.	Hussey, T.
Douglas, Sir C. E.	Hutt, W.
Douglas, J. D. S.	Inglis, Sir R. H.
Dowdeswell, W.	Irton, S.
Drummond, H. H.	Irving, J.
Duff, J.	James, W.
Duncombe, hon. A.	James, Sir W. C.
Duncombe, hon. O.	Jermyn, Earl
Dundas, D.	Jocelyn, Visct.
Du Pre, C. G.	Johnstone, Sir J.
East, J. B.	Jones, Capt.
Eaton, R. J.	Kirk, P.
Egerton, W. T.	Knatchbull, rt. hn. Sir E.
Egerton, Sir P.	Labouchere, rt. hn. H.
Egerton, Lord F.	Lascelles, hon. W. S.
Eliot, Lord	Lawson, A.
Emlyn, Visct.	Legh, G. C.
Entwisle, W.	Lennox, Lord A.
Escott, B.	Leveson, Lord
Estcourt, T. G. B.	Liddell, hon. H. T.
Feilden, W.	Lincoln, Earl of
Ferrand, W. B.	Lockhart, W.
Fitzmaurice, hon. W.	Long, W.
Flower, Sir J.	Lygon, hon. Gen.
Forbes, W.	McGeachy, F. A.
Forman, T. S.	Mackenzie, W. F.
Fox, S. L.	Maclean, D.
Fremantle, rt. hn. Sir T.	McNeill, D.
Fuller, A. E.	Mahon, Visct.
Gardner, J. D.	Mangles, R. D.
Gaskell, J. Milnes	Manners, Lord J.
Gladstone, rt. hn. W. E.	Marjoribanks, S.
Gladstone, Capt.	Marsham, Visct.
Glynne, Sir S. R.	Martin, C. W.
Gordon, hon. Capt.	Masterman, J.
Gore, M.	Meynell, Capt.
Gore, W. R. O.	Mildmay, H. St. J.
Goulburn, rt. hon. H.	Miles, P. W. S.
Graham, rt. hon. Sir J.	Miles, W.
Greenall, P.	Mordaunt, Sir J.
Greenaway, C.	Morgan, O.
Greene, T.	Morris, D.
Grimstone, Visct.	Mundy, E. M.
Grogan, E.	Newdegate, C. N.
Grosvenor, Lord R.	Newport, Visct.
Hale, R. B.	Newry, Visct.

Nicholl, rt. hon. J.	Smollett, A.
Norreys, Lord	Somerset, Lord G.
Northland, Visct.	Stanley, Lord
O'Brien, A. S.	Stanley, E.
Ogle, S. C. H.	Stewart, P. M.
Paget, Col.	Stewart, J.
Palmer, R.	Stuart, W. V.
Palmer, G.	Stuart, H.
Palmerston, Vist.	Sutton, hon. H. M.
Patten, J. W.	Talbot, C. R. M.
Peel, rt. hn. Sir R.	Tennent, J. E.
Peel, J.	Thesiger, Sir F.
Pennant, hon. Col.	Tollemache, hn. F. J.
Plumptre, J. P.	Tollemache, J.
Pringle, A.	Towneley, J.
Protheroe, E.	Trench, Sir F. W.
Pusey, P.	Trevor, hon. G. R.
Rashleigh, W.	Trollope, Sir J.
Reid, Sir J. R.	Turnor, C.
Richards, R.	Vane, Lord H.
Rolleston, Col.	Verner, Col.
Round, C. G.	Waddington, H. S.
Round, J.	Wall, C. B.
Rous, hon. Capt.	Walsh, Sir J. B.
Rushbrooke, Col.	Welby, G. E.
Russell, Lord J.	Whitmore, T. C.
Ryder, hon. G. D.	Wood, C.
Sandon, Visct.	Wood, Col. T.
Seymour, Lord	Worsley, Lord
Shaw, rt. hon. F.	Wortley, hn. J. S.
Shelburne, Earl of	Wortley, hn. J. S.
Sheppard, T.	Wrightson, W. B.
Sibthorp, Col.	Wyndham, Col. C.
Smith, A.	Wynn, rt. hn. C. W. W.
Smith, J. A.	Yorke, hon. E. T.
Smith, rt. hon. R. V.	TELLERS.
Smyth, Sir H.	Young, J.
Smythe, hon. G.	Baring, H.

List of the NOES.
Archbold, R.	Mitcalfe, H.
Berkeley, hon. C.	Mitchell, T. A.
Bouverie, hon. E. P.	Morrison, Gen.
Bowring, Dr.	Murray, A.
Bright, J.	Napier, Sir C.
Brotherton, J.	O'Conor, Don
Busfield, W.	Pattison, J.
Clive, E. B.	Pechell, Capt.
Cobden, R.	Philips, M.
Collett, J.	Plumridge, Capt.
Crawford, W. S.	Ricardo, J. L.
Dalmeny, Lord	Rice, E. R.
Dashwood, G. H.	Roebuck, J. A.
Dennistoun, J.	Scholefield, J.
Duncan, Visct.	Scrope, G. P.
Duncan, G.	Seale, Sir J. H.
Duncombe, T.	Stansfield, W. R. C.
Elphinstone, H.	Stock, Mr. Serj.
Fielden, J.	Strickland, Sir G.
Fitzroy, Lord C.	Strutt, E.
Gisborne, T.	Thornely, T.
Granger, T. C.	Trelawny, J. S.
Johnson, Gen.	Villiers, hon. C.
Leader, J. T.	Wakley, T.
Marsland, H.	Walker, R.
Martin, J.	Wallace, R.

Warburton, H.
Ward, H. G.	TELLERS.
Wawn, J. T.	Ewart, W.
Yorke, H. R.	Gibson, T. M.

The House resumed, Committee to sit again.