tention to the fact that this was the reme-
dy proposed when famine was expected.
Now what was meant by famine? It only
meant, in reality, that food would become
comparatively scarce, and less accessible
to a greater number of people than be-
fore; but for this evil every party in the
House of Commons considered in last
October that the remedy was to suspend
the Corn Law!
There was no doubt,
then, that this would meet the evils of a
scarcity of food, and prevent the people
from starving, or resorting to coarser
food; but if this is the remedy for food
being too dear for a few more people than
usual, why, he asked, was it not the
remedy for the millions who are usually
deprived of good and wholesome food on
account of its dearness? It was appre-
hended from a scarcity in England, that
perhaps one or two million would find it
difficult to get good food; but that is ha-
bitually the case in Ireland. Why is not
the remedy then which is good in this case
for England to be deemed also good for Ire-
land, suffering as she does habitually from
the same malady? When the Government,
then, sees that we have to expect periodical
scarcity in this country, and as the people
increase, that we have to expect we shall
be obliged constantly to suspend the Corn
Law, what is it but wisdom and justice to
all concerned, to remove altogether the
barrier to a regular and plentiful supply,
and dissipate the delusion under which
those who depend on its continuance have
ever been placed? It was for this reason
that he considered the Ministerial mea-

place on this question, there was no fact, no argument, no opinion that he had ever stated in support of the question that was not now recognised as true, or that he had reason to retract. They had been admitted to be sound by the measure itself before the House, and the arguments by which it had been supported; but above all, by their having, during the long and dreary debates of this Session, received no answer or refutation from the Gentlemen opposite. It had been shown how the law had failed in all its pretences of advantage, and how it had verified every prediction of mischief which would follow from it. Gentlemen opposite could have no better proof of their failure than the fact that the more they had spoken the more time they had wasted, the more they had alienated their partisans from them; and while there was no vestige of panic or alarm at the measure out of doors, there was as little interest taken in their proceedings against it within the House. There was one circumstance elicited during the debate that had shown the hollowness of all that had been said in favour of the law, and of the little reliance to be placed on it by its friends. He meant the admission that every party in the House would have been willing, upon the apprehended deficiency of food last October, to suspend the Corn Law, and to have considered that the cure for scarcity was to abolish the protection to agriculture-the law which was to produce plenty, and to save the country from scarcity. Yes! the whole House, it seems, deemed the remedy for a deficiency of food, was to abolish the Corn Law. He thought this was a most instructive circum-sure an honest one, founded on all the evistance, and could not be repeated too often, to show the value of protection; for, in the first place, he asked how this was to be justified to the farmers, who were promised protection against foreign competition? They were told that they could be protected consistently with the welfare of the community, and that they might rely upon its continuance. But how was it more just to them to suspend the law than to repeal it entirely? They are of course less prepared for it just after the harvest than at any other time; and if any loss was to follow from it, it would have been the farmers alone, and no one else, at that time, that would have felt it. Again, if this was the proper remedy last year, who can say it will not be equally required this year? And if the farmer must be subject in future to this suspension of the law, where was the worth of protection to him? But he asked at

dence and experience which this country has had offered of its necessity, and one which promises nothing but advantage to the people. It was honestly intended; and Ministers have therefore had the advantage of being able to argue and defend it honestly, which they have done. Had it been founded on the notion that a tax or toll of ten or twenty per cent upon the entry of an article into this country could be imposed, without raising its cost to the consumer, or had it given any sanction to the fancy that a fixed impediment to commerce would not limit the supply because that impediment was fixed, and not fluctuating-or had it proceeded on the principle that food could be wisely taxed for revenue in this country, after the experience they had that whatever raised the price of food impairs the other sources of revenue, it would have been deemed a

fraudulent and delusive measure, and would | Bowles, Adm.
have failed to obtain the requisite support
for its success. The measure has, how-
ever, wisely recognised the failure of the
experiment of having a Corn Law at all in
this country, and provided for its total
abolition. The country was therefore un-
der a deep obligation to the Government
for the measure; and if there was any-
thing that could enhance that obligation,
it was the spirit, ability, and firmness
with which it had been supported; and
now he asked those hon. Gentlemen oppo-
site to pause before they proclaimed them-
selves to the country, and transmitted their
names to posterity, as having to the last
endeavoured to withhold from the people
the unquestionable right, the undoubted
privilege and great advantage, of carrying
the fruits of their industry to the highest
market, and of allowing them the freest
access to the bounties which Providence,
through the industry of other nations, had
provided for them. Let them reflect before
they vote, that the law of which they are
so tenacious has been discredited by all
experience, denounced by every intelligent
authority, and has, upon facts undisputed,
because they are indisputable, been shown
to have brought upon the poorest of our
fellow creatures as much misery, affliction,
destitution, and crime as was ever produced
by any pestilence or calamity with which
the country was visited. Let them pause
then, he said, before they offer to the
country and posterity no other or better
testimony of their efforts in public life than
that of endeavouring to withhold from
them a great advantage, and to perpetuate
on the poor an enormous wrong.

now

On the Question, that the word “ stand part of the Question, the House divided:-Ayes 327; Noes 229: jority 98.

Bowring, Dr.
Boyd, J.
Bridgeman R.
Bright, J.
Brocklehurst, J.
Brotherton, J.
Browne, R. D.
Browne, hon. W.
Bruce, Lord E.
Buckley, E.
Bulkeley, Sir R. B. W.
Buller, C.
Butler, hon. Col.
Busfeild, W.
Butler, P. S.
Byng, G.
Byng, rt. hon. G. S.
Cardwell, E.
Carnegie, hon. Capt.
Carew, hon. R. S.
Cavendish, hon. C. C.
Cavendish, hon. G. H.
Chapman, B.
Christie, W. D.
Chichester, Lord J. L.
Clay, Sir W.
Clerk, rt. hon. Sir G.
Clive, hon. R. H.
Cockburn, rt. hn. Sir G.
Cobden, R.
Colebrooke, Sir T. E.
Collett, J.
Collins, W.
Copeland, Ald.
Cowper, hon. W. F.
Corry, rt. hon. II.
Craig, W. G.
Crawford, W. S.
Cripps, W.
Curteis, H. B.
Currie, R.
Dalmeny, Lord
Dalrymple, Capt.
Damer, hon. Col.
Dashwood, G. H.
Denison, J. E.
Dennistoun, J.

Ferguson, Col.

Ferguson, Sir R. A.
Fitzroy, hon. II.
Fitzroy, Lord C.

Fitzwilliam, hon. G. W.

Fleetwood, Sir P. II.

Flower, Sir J.
Forster, M.
Fox, C. R.
Gibson, T. M.
Gill, T.
Gisborne, T.
Glynne, Sir S. R.
Godson, R.
Gore, M.
Gore, hon. R.

Goulburn, rt. hon. H.
Graham, rt. hon. Sir J.
Granger, T. C.
Greene, T.

Gregory, W. II.
Grey, rt. hon. Sir G.
Grimsditch, T.

Grosvenor, Lord R.
Guest, Sir J.
Hall, Sir B.

Hallyburton, LordJ.F.G.
Hamilton, W. G.

Hamilton, Lord C.

Hanmer, Sir J.

Hastie, A.

Hatton, Capt. Villiers

Ilawes, B.
Hay, Sir A. L.
Hayter, W. G.
Heathcoat, J.
Herbert, rt. hon. S.
Heron, Sir R.
Hervey, Lord A.

Hill, Lord M.

Hindley, C.

Hobhouse, rt. hn. Sir J.

D'Eyncourt, rt. hn. C. T. Hogg, J. W.

Dickinson, F. H.

Divett, E.

Ma

Douglas, Sir C. E.
Douro, Marq. of
Drummond, H. H.

Hollond, R.

Hope, G. W.

Horsman, E.

Howard, hon. C. W. G.
Howard, hon. J. K.
Howard, hon. E. G. G.
Howard, P. H.
Howard, Sir R.

Hughes, W. B.

Hume, J.

Humphery, Ald.

Ilutt, W.

James, W.
James, Sir W. C.
Jermyn, Earl

Jervis, J.

Jocelyn, Visct.

Johnson, Gen.

Johnstone, Sir J.

Johnstone, H.

Kelly, Sir F.

Labouchere, rt. hon. II.

Lambton, H.

Langston, J. II.

THE MINORITY-NOES 231.

Total.

107
82

2

2

8

8

2

2

13

14

2

10

10

1

1

English counties
English boroughs
English universities

Welsh counties
Welsh boroughs

Irish counties

Irish boroughs
Irish universities
Scotch counties...
Scotch boroughs
Isle of Wight

...

...

2

2

1

231

2

658

HOUSE OF LORDS,

Monday, May 18, 1846.

MINUTES.] PUBLIC BILLS-1. Corn Importation.
24. Election Notices (Ireland).

PETITIONS PRESENTED. By the Bishop of London, from
Cambridge, and other places, for the Better Observance of
the Sabbath, and for the Prevention of the Sale of Intoxi-
cating Liquors on that Day.-By Earl Fitzwilliam, and
several other noble Lords, from an immense number of
places, against the Charitable Trusts Bill.

CORN IMPORTATION BILL.

The DUKE of WELLINGTON moved that the Corn Importation Bill be read a First Time.

The DUKE of RICHMOND: My Lords, it is not my intention on the present occasion to go into the whole merits of the question before your Lordships, nor to dilate upon the danger to be apprehended to the country from a repeal of the present Corn Law; but, my Lords, I cannot permit the Bill to be read even a first time without entering my protest against it, and making a few observations upon its principle. My Lords, I contend that Sir R. Peel was not warranted in proposing this measure, nor justified by the exigency he assumed in abandoning, as he has done, all protection to British industry; he who had advocated so eloquently and so unanswerably, as regards argument, for so Total. many years, and who, moreover, with a large majority of the House of Commons, was returned in 1841 to support that advocacy. My Lords, I believe it to be a 10 thing impossible that the measure can be laid upon the Table of your Lordships' House, without the violation of promises and the breaking of pledges. I, for one, my Lords, am very sorry to see, at the present day, that a great distinction is attempted to be drawn between public honour and private honour. Sir R. Peel is a man who bears a most unexceptionable character in private life-he is a man whose word is

232 560

328

7

3

18

11

2

20

161203

374

281