"A great error exists in the impression now very commonly entertained in regard to national division of labour, and which owes its origin to the English school of political economists, whose system is throughout based upon the idea of making England 'the workshop of the world,' than which nothing could be less natural. By that school it is taught that some nations are fitted for manufactures and others for the labours of agriculture; and that the latter are largely benefited by being compelled to employ themselves in the one pursuit, making all their exchanges at a distance, thus contributing their share to the maintenance of the system of 'ships, colonies, and commerce.' The whole basis of their system isconversionandexchange, and not production,yet neither makes any addition to the amount of things to be exchanged. It is the great boast of their system that the exchangers are so numerous and the producers so few; and the more rapid the increase in the proportion which the former bear to the latter, the more rapid is supposed to be the advance towards perfect prosperity. Converters and exchangers, however, must live, and they must live out of the labour of others; and if three, five, or ten persons are to live on the product of one, it must follow that all will obtain but a small allowance of the necessaries and comforts of life, as is seen to be the case. The agricultural labourer of England often receives but eight shillings a-week, being the price of a bushel and a half of wheat."Were it asserted that some nations were fitted to be growers of wheat and others grinders of it, or that some were fitted for cutting down trees, and others for sawing them into lumber, it would be regarded as the height of absurdity, yet it would not be more absurd than that which is daily asserted in regard to the conversion of cotton into cloth, and implicitly believed by tens of thousands even of our countrymen. The loom is as appropriate and necessary an aid to the labours of the planter as is the grist-mill to those of the farmer. The furnace is as necessary and as appropriate an aid to the labours of both planter and farmer as is the saw-mill; and those who are compelled to dispense with the proximity of the producer of iron labour are subjected to as much disadvantage as are those who are unable to obtain the aid of the saw-mill and the miller. The loom and the anvil are, like the plough and the harrow, but small machines, naturally attracted by the great machine, the earth; and when so attracted all work together in harmony, and men become rich, and prosperous, and happy. When, on the contrary, from any disturbing cause, the attraction is in the opposite direction, and the small machines are enabled to compel the products of the great machine to follow them, the land invariably becomes poor, and men become poor and miserable, as is the case with Ireland."
"A great error exists in the impression now very commonly entertained in regard to national division of labour, and which owes its origin to the English school of political economists, whose system is throughout based upon the idea of making England 'the workshop of the world,' than which nothing could be less natural. By that school it is taught that some nations are fitted for manufactures and others for the labours of agriculture; and that the latter are largely benefited by being compelled to employ themselves in the one pursuit, making all their exchanges at a distance, thus contributing their share to the maintenance of the system of 'ships, colonies, and commerce.' The whole basis of their system isconversionandexchange, and not production,yet neither makes any addition to the amount of things to be exchanged. It is the great boast of their system that the exchangers are so numerous and the producers so few; and the more rapid the increase in the proportion which the former bear to the latter, the more rapid is supposed to be the advance towards perfect prosperity. Converters and exchangers, however, must live, and they must live out of the labour of others; and if three, five, or ten persons are to live on the product of one, it must follow that all will obtain but a small allowance of the necessaries and comforts of life, as is seen to be the case. The agricultural labourer of England often receives but eight shillings a-week, being the price of a bushel and a half of wheat.
"Were it asserted that some nations were fitted to be growers of wheat and others grinders of it, or that some were fitted for cutting down trees, and others for sawing them into lumber, it would be regarded as the height of absurdity, yet it would not be more absurd than that which is daily asserted in regard to the conversion of cotton into cloth, and implicitly believed by tens of thousands even of our countrymen. The loom is as appropriate and necessary an aid to the labours of the planter as is the grist-mill to those of the farmer. The furnace is as necessary and as appropriate an aid to the labours of both planter and farmer as is the saw-mill; and those who are compelled to dispense with the proximity of the producer of iron labour are subjected to as much disadvantage as are those who are unable to obtain the aid of the saw-mill and the miller. The loom and the anvil are, like the plough and the harrow, but small machines, naturally attracted by the great machine, the earth; and when so attracted all work together in harmony, and men become rich, and prosperous, and happy. When, on the contrary, from any disturbing cause, the attraction is in the opposite direction, and the small machines are enabled to compel the products of the great machine to follow them, the land invariably becomes poor, and men become poor and miserable, as is the case with Ireland."
In short, the American system is, to stimulate production by creating a ready market at home, and, as the best means of creating that market, to encourage the conversion of the raw material within the United States, by laying on a protective duty on articles of foreign manufacture. The British system now is, to discourage home production, and to sacrifice everything for the desperate chance of maintaining an unnatural and fortuitous monopoly of conversion, not of our own raw material only, but of that of other countries. In the attempt to secure this exceedingly precarious advantage—which, be it remembered, does not conduce to the prosperity of the great majority of the nation—our rulers and politicians have deliberately resolved that agriculture shall be rendered unprofitable; and that the bulk of our artisans, who can look to the home market only, shall henceforward be left unprotected from the competition of the whole world. It needs little sagacity to predict which system is based upon sound principles; or which, being so based, must ultimately prevail. Our economists never seem to regard the body of British producers (who, as a class, are very slightly interested in the matter of exports) in the light of important consumers. If they did so, they could not, unless smitten by judicial blindness, fail to perceive that, by crippling their means, and displacing their labour, they are in effect ruining the home market, upon which, notoriously, two-thirds even of the converters depend. The stability of every state must depend upon its production, not upon its powers of conversion. The one is real and permanent, the other liable to be disturbed and annihilated by many external causes. A country which produces largely, even though it may not have within it the means of adequate conversion, is always in a healthy state. Not only the power, but the actual source of wealth is there; and, as years roll on, and capital accumulates, the subsidiary process of conversion becomes more and more developed, not to the injury of the producer—but to his great and even incalculable advantage.
The natural power of the production of Great Britain, as compared with other states, is not very high. Its insular position, and the variableness of its climate, renders the quality of our harvests uncertain; but that uncertainty is perhaps compensated, on the average, by our superior agriculture, and the vast pains, labour, and capital which have been expended on the tillage of our land. Our meadows,downs, and hill pastures have, however, been most valuable to us in furnishing a better quality of wool than can elsewhere be obtained in Europe—an advantage which our forefathers perceived and wisely availed themselves of—for, as early as the reign of Edward III., manufacturers from Hainault were brought into this country by the advice of Queen Philippa, and laid the foundation of the most prosperous, healthy, and legitimate trade which we possess. Ever since, the woollen manufacture has been inseparably connected with the interests of the British soil. Few luxuries, or even such articles of luxury as are now considered necessaries, can be grown in Great Britain. For wine our climate is unsuited; but there is nothing whatever to prevent us—except a system which calls itself, though it is not, Free Trade—from growing the coarser kinds of tobacco, and from establishing manufactories of sugar from beet-root. Our stock of minerals is great—almost inexhaustible—and to this fact we must look for our singular pre-eminence during so many years in Europe. Our unlimited supply of coal and iron gave us an advantage which no other European nation possessed—it was, in fact, virtually a monopoly—and upon that we built our claim to become the workshop of the world. Nor was the claim in any degree a preposterous one. That singular monopoly of minerals—for such it seemed—gave us the actual power, if judiciously used, of controlling the process of conversion, not only here, but elsewhere throughout the globe. Manual labour, it mattered not what was the distance, had no chance at all against the triumphs of machinery; and hence our commerce extended itself far and wide, to savage as well as civilised nations, and our arms were used to force a market where it could not otherwise be obtained. This, if not our strength, was undoubtedly the cause of our supremacy, and even of our extended colonisation; and as we obtained command of a raw material of foreign growth, so did we adapt our machinery to convert it into fabrics for the world.
It is by no means a pleasant matter to recur to certain particulars in our commercial and manufacturing history. We found the East Indies in the possession of a considerable manufacture of cotton, the producer and the converter being there reciprocally dependant.Thatwe have stopped, the object being to compel the Hindustani to receive his clothing direct from Manchester. And we have succeeded so far that, last year, our exports to Hindostan were so great, that, by lumping them in the general account, our statists were able to furnish what appeared to many a convincing argument in favour of Free Trade, though in reality it had nothing to do with that question.But at what costhave these operations been made on India? Simply at this, that, whilst destroying the native manufacture, we have also curtailed the production of the raw material. Of the rapid diminution in its amount let the following figures tell:—
IMPORT OF COTTON FROM INDIA TO ENGLAND.
But raw material we must have, else our machinery is of no use. We have had so long a monopoly of cotton-spinning that we have accustomed ourselves, spite of nature, and spite of fact, to believe that our whole destiny was that of cotton-spinning. We ignore all history in favour of that particular shrub; and, pinning our faith to export tables—concocted by the weakest and most contemptible of charlatans—we make no hesitation in avowing that the prosperity and destiny of Great Britain is indissolubly entwined with our monopoly of cotton twist! That would be simply laughable, if we had not absolutely legislated on, and committed ourselves to that theory. We stand just now, in the face both of Europe and America—we know not whether we ought to exclude the other quarters of the globe—in the most ridiculous possible position. Our economists are permitted to say to them—"Send us your raw material, and we shall be proud and happy to work it up for you. Don't be at the pains or the cost of rearing manufactories for yourselves. Thatwould entail upon you, not only a great deal of trouble, but a vast expenditure of capital, which you had much better lay out in improving your extra soil, and in bringing it to good cultivation. We can promise you a ready market here. Our proprietors and farmers are unquestionably heavily burdened by taxation, but they must submit to the popular will; or, if they choose to dissent, they may sell off their stock and emigrate to your country, where doubtless they will prove valuable acquisitions. You, we are well aware, are able to provide us with food cheaper than they can do it; and cheapness is all we look to. We shall even do more for you. We agree to admit to our market, at merely nominal duties, all your small articles of manufacture. You may undersell and annihilate, if you can, our glovers, hatters, shoemakers, glass-blowers, and fifty others—only do not interfere with the larger branches, and, above all, do not touch our monopoly of cotton."
It is now obvious, and we believe generally acknowledged by those who have most practical knowledge of the subject, that the monopoly is broken up. America is seriously addressing herself to the task of applying her lately discovered stores of coal and iron to practical use; and, as we shall presently have occasion to show, she has no need to train workmen for that purpose, since the great emigration from this country supplies her with practised hands. That her rivalry will be of the most formidable description there can be no matter of doubt, for she will still be able to retain command of the raw material, and, retaining that, to regulate the price of cotton and cotton goods at New Orleans, instead of permitting Liverpool or Manchester to dictate authoritatively to the world. Whether the Manchester Chamber, finding their last move utterly abortive in securing monopoly, may succeed in rearing up plantations of cotton elsewhere than in America, is a point upon which we cannot speak with any degree of certainty. That they are alarmed, and deeply alarmed, at the prospect before them is evident, not only from the representations made in Parliament, and the desponding tone of their organs, but from the experiments which they have instituted for the purpose of ascertaining whether some other vegetable product may not be used as a substitute for cotton. Even if they were successful in one or other, or in both of their inquiries, it seems clear to us that they never can hope to regain their former ascendency. They must be exposed to the competition not only of America, but of the Confederation of the Zollverein, which now receives from the United States a large and increasing supply of raw material. The following table will show the extreme rapidity in the growth of that consumption:—
Although it never can be agreeable to know that any important branch of trade in this country is retrograding or falling into decay, we cannot affect to feel much sympathy with the cotton manufacturers, and that for several reasons. In the first place, their trade was a factitious one, not founded upon or tending in any degree to promote the real production of Great Britain, but avowedly rendering us dependant to a dangerous degree upon foreign supplies. Secondly, there can be no doubt that our demand for the raw material has had the effect of perpetuating slavery in the southern states of America. And, lastly, we cannot forget that we owe all our present difficulties to the machinations of men connected with the cotton manufacture. The doctrine that the strength of Britain lay in its powers of conversion, not in its powers of production, originated with them; and in their selfish eagerness to maintain a monopoly, even then in a precarious position, they made no scruple of sacrificing every interest which stood in their way.Our readers cannot fall to recollect the arguments which were employed by the champions and leaders of the League. America, whether as an example or an ally, was never out of their mouths. We were to spin for America, weave for America, do everything in short for her which the power of machinery could achieve. America, on the other hand, was to forego all idea of interfering with our industrial pursuits, in the way of encouraging her own children to become manufacturing rivals, and was to apply herself solely to the production of raw material, cotton, corn and provisions, wherewith the whole of us were to be fed. Our statesmen acted on this faith, assured us that we had but to show the example, and reciprocity must immediately be established, and opened the British ports without any condition whatever. The consequence was an influx of corn and provisions far greater than they expected, which at once annihilated agricultural profits in Great Britain, and is rapidly annihilating agriculture itself in Ireland. We were told to take comfort, because the very amount of the importations showed that it could not be continued; and yet it is continued up to the present day, and prices remain at a point which, even according to the estimate of the Free-traders, is not only unremunerative, but so injurious to the grower that he must lose by the process of cultivation. The actual labourer was the last sufferer, but he is suffering now, and his future prospects are most miserable and revolting. The smaller branches of manufacture, and the multitudes of artisans employed in these, have felt grievously the effect of lowered tariffs, and, even still more, the competition which has been engendered by the amount of displaced labour. Our large towns are the natural receptacles for those who have been driven from the villages, on account of sheer lack of employment; and ever and anon philanthropists are made to shudder by the tales of woe, and want, and fearful deprivation, which are forced upon the public ear. And yet few of them appear to have traced the evil to its source, which lies simply in the legislative discouragement of production, for the sake of a system of conversion which can offer no means adequate to the wants and numbers of the competing population.
Our exports, when we deduct the value of the raw material, constitute in reality an insignificant item in the account of our annual creation of wealth. The greatness and prosperity of Britain never did, and never will, depend upon the amount of her foreign trade, though that is now regarded by our statistical quack-doctors as the sole criterion. What we must depend upon is the home trade, and that can only be prosperous by maintaining the value of production. For how else, save from production, are the labouring population, or indeed any of us, high or low, rich or poor, as we may call ourselves, to be maintained? All of us derive our subsistence from the earth, and beyond what is reaped or redeemed from its bosom we have nothing. If, for example, there is no market for iron, the furnaces will be blown out, and the ores left unworked; if there is no market for agricultural produce—that is, a remunerative market—the fields will be left untilled. What, then, becomes of the converters?—for whom do they work?—or how do they acquire the wherewithal to purchase the food which the foreigner may chance to send them? Let Ireland answer. That unhappy island is at this moment paying the last penalties of Free Trade. It stands before us as a beacon and warning of what we must expect, and cannot avoid, if we continue to discourage production, in the insane hope of thereby stimulating conversion; and perhaps we cannot do better than quote an American opinion as to the cause of its wretchedness and ruin:—
"With this vast increase in the importation from abroad has come the ruin of the people of Ireland. Deprived of manufactures and commerce, her people were driven to live by agriculture alone, and she was enabled to drag on a miserable existence, so long as her neighbour was content to make some compensation for the loss of labour, by paying her for her products higher prices than those at which they might have been elsewhere purchased. With the repeal of the Corn Laws that resource has failed; and the result is a state of poverty, wretchedness, and famine, that has compelled theestablishment of a system which obliges the landowner to maintain the people, whether they work or not; and thus is one of the conditions of slavery re-established in that unhappy country. From being a great exporter of food, she has now become a large importer. The great market for Indian corn is Ireland—a country in which the production of food is almost the sole occupation of the people. The value of labour in food throughout a population of eight millions, is thus rapidly decreasing."
"With this vast increase in the importation from abroad has come the ruin of the people of Ireland. Deprived of manufactures and commerce, her people were driven to live by agriculture alone, and she was enabled to drag on a miserable existence, so long as her neighbour was content to make some compensation for the loss of labour, by paying her for her products higher prices than those at which they might have been elsewhere purchased. With the repeal of the Corn Laws that resource has failed; and the result is a state of poverty, wretchedness, and famine, that has compelled theestablishment of a system which obliges the landowner to maintain the people, whether they work or not; and thus is one of the conditions of slavery re-established in that unhappy country. From being a great exporter of food, she has now become a large importer. The great market for Indian corn is Ireland—a country in which the production of food is almost the sole occupation of the people. The value of labour in food throughout a population of eight millions, is thus rapidly decreasing."
To every word of this we subscribe, and we beg to say, further, that this is not the only instance. A large portion of Scotland has been absolutely pauperised by Free Trade. The condition of the western Highlands and Islands is most appalling; and unless Ministers and members of Parliament are prepared to do their duty to the children of the soil, they are utterly and execrably unworthy of the trust which has been committed to their charge. It is with a feeling nearly akin to loathing that we peruse accounts of Brobdignag glass-houses, and sham exhibitions of the industry of nations, reared at an enormous cost, when we know that the men who ought to be the producers of our national wealth—and who might be so, were they not made the victims of a heartless and senseless system—are being driven in hundreds from their hearths and homes, and cast upon the wide world, without a roof to shelter them, or a rag to give them covering!
All this, and more—for every day brings its fresh tale of woe and wretchedness—is the consequence of free imports. And how stands the account the other way? Where is the counterbalancing advantage? It may be that the ruin and prostration of Ireland and the Highlands is no great loss to the indwellers of the towns, the men of the factories and counting-houses. It may be that they are not at all affected by such misery, or that they care to listen to it, notwithstanding that the victims are in the sight of God as valuable beings as themselves. It may be that, in consequence of such suffering, or rather by creating it, they have derived some advantage large enough to compensate for the havoc, by enabling them to give a livelihood to thousands who would otherwise have been unemployed and destitute. If so, where is it? Has America reciprocated?
No! and America will not.
America laughs at the whole crew of Manchester conspirators with sovereign and undisguised contempt. She wants nothing from them—she will take nothing from them. Secure in her own position, and possessing within herself every requisite for greatness, and—what is more—for the happiness and welfare of her children, she regards with scorn the attempted compromise of the crippled converters, and, while she rejects their offer, gives them a burning rebuke for their treachery to their native land.
So far from discouraging her manufactures, she intends to protect them; so far from concealing her mineral wealth, she has resolved to develop that to the utmost—judging, and rightly judging, that it is alone through the "harmony of interests" that a nation can be truly prosperous.
Her rebuke, as contained in the documents before us, which we firmly believe convey the sentiments of the wisest men of the Union, is perhaps the most poignant that ever was cast in the teeth of a civilised and Christian community. It resolves itself into this:—
"You, producers, mechanics, and artisans of Great Britain, who are deprived of your labour, which is your only heritage, for the sake of a few men, who will neither take your produce nor avail themselves of your skill, come to us. We require hands to till our savannahs, to excavate our ores, to work at the furnaces, to weave, and to spin. Labour with us is not as in your country. The producer shall not be sacrificed for the sake of the converter, or the converter subjected to the precarious mercy of the producer of another land. Here, at least, you will find an entire harmony of interests. Foreign customers you need seek none, for every requisite of life is secured to you in return for your labour."
And, lest it should be thought that we are putting words into the mouth of the Americans without authority, we shall presently have occasion toquote from the remarkable work before us.
The repeal of the Corn Laws, and of the duties levied on provisions, have enormously, as we all know, increased the exports of America. The following tables will show their amount, and, in the case of provisions, the increase since the lowered tariffs came into operation.
AMOUNT OF AMERICAN EXPORTS OF GRAIN AND PROVISIONS.
Grain and Flour.
Provisions.
Now, if the doctrine of the Free-traders is a true one, it will follow that the imports of America must be on a scale corresponding to the magnitude of the exports. If that be so, the fact will be evident on the face of their revenue accounts. We turn to these, and find the following results:—
CUSTOMS REVENUE FROM THE IMPORTS TO THE UNITED STATES.
How, then, and in what shape, were these enormous exportations of grain and provisions paid for? Not certainly in goods, for if that were so, a corresponding increase would be apparent in the revenue accounts. The answer is quite short—in gold, and in that commodity which ought to be regarded as far more valuable than gold—MAN.
It is a fact of no small interest, that the ship-owning corn-merchants have willingly sold grain in Liverpool for less than they could have got for it in the States, in order to insure the return cargo—that which they find so profitable—emigrants. Mr Blain, who was engaged for many years by the Jews of London and Germany in valuing the growing crops of America, gives the following account of this apparently unreasonable process:—"The shipowners of America are making much money by carrying emigrants to the States: they are now extensive corn-merchants, and are buying largely at very low prices, it being better to carry wheat across the Atlantic, and sell it at 2s. per quarter less than it cost, than buy ballast, which is very dear in the American seaports."[31]Steam, too, is now about to be applied in furtherance of this traffic, and we read of magnificent steamers built expressly for the corn and emigrant trade between New York and Liverpool. By the way, with freights at 6d. a barrel of flour, (the rate in September 1849,) equivalent to 1s. per quarter of wheat, what becomes of the once favourite sophism, that the Atlantic afforded a natural protection of at least 10s. to the English farmer? Nor should it be forgotten that the American farmer finds it his plain interest thus to part with his surplus production, procuring in return that of which he stands so much in need—labour; and the vast emigration from the western states to California has rendered European labour more valuable and welcome to him than ever.
"We imported last year," says Mr Carey, "about three hundred thousandpersons. Estimating their consumption of food at twenty cents per day for each, there was thus made a market on the land for the products of the land to the extent oftwenty millions of dollars. This transportation required the constant employment of two hundred and fifty thousand tons of shipping, and ships carried freight to Europe at very low rates, because certain of obtaining valuable return cargoes. The farmer thus obtained a large home market, and the power of exporting cheaply to the foreign one; and to the conjoined operation of these two causes is due the fact, that wheat and flour have continued so high in price."We may now, I think, understand many curious facts now passing before our eyes. Food is so abundant in Russia, that it is wasted, and yet among the large exporters of food to Great Britain is this country, in which it sells at a price almost as high as in Liverpool, and now even higher. The produce of Russia has to bear all the charges out and home, and the consequence is that the producer remains poor, and makes no roads; and thus the cost of transportation, internal and external, continues, and must continue great. The farmer of the United States sends his produce to market cheap, because the return cargo, being chiefly man, is valuable, and the space it occupies is great. He therefore grows rich, and makes roads and canals, and builds steamboats; and thus is the cost of transportation, internal and external, so far diminished, that the difference in the price of a barrel of flour in Pittsburgh and in Liverpool is, when we look at the distance, almost inconceivably small."The bulk of the trade of Canada is outwards; and the consequence is that outward freights are high, while our imports of men and other valuable commodities keep them low with us; and therefore it is that the cost of transporting wheat and flour from our side of the line is so much lower than from the other, that both now pass through New York on their way to Liverpool. Hence it is that there has arisen so vehement a desire for commercial reciprocity, and even for annexation. The protective system has thus not only the effect of bringing consumers to take their places by the side of the producer, facilitating the consumption on the land of the products of the land, and facilitating also the exportation of the surplus to foreign markets by diminishing outward freights, but the further one of producing among our neighbours a strong desire for the establishment of the same perfect freedom of trade that now exists among the several states, by becoming themselves a part of the Union. Protection, therefore, tends to the increase of commerce, and the establishment of Free Trade; while the British system tends everywhere to the destruction of commerce, and to the production of a necessity for restriction."We see, thus, that if we desire to secure the command of that which is falsely termed 'the great grain-market of the world,' it is to be effected by the adoption of such measures as will secure valuable return freights. The most costly and the most valuable of all are men; the least so are pig-iron and coal. The more of the latter we import, the larger will be our surplus of food, the higher will be the outward freight, internal and external, the greater will be the waste, and the poorer will be the farmer. The more of the former we import, the smaller will be our surplus of food, the lower will be the outward freights, and the more numerous will be the commodities that can go to Europe, to be given in exchange for luxuries that now we cannot purchase."
"We imported last year," says Mr Carey, "about three hundred thousandpersons. Estimating their consumption of food at twenty cents per day for each, there was thus made a market on the land for the products of the land to the extent oftwenty millions of dollars. This transportation required the constant employment of two hundred and fifty thousand tons of shipping, and ships carried freight to Europe at very low rates, because certain of obtaining valuable return cargoes. The farmer thus obtained a large home market, and the power of exporting cheaply to the foreign one; and to the conjoined operation of these two causes is due the fact, that wheat and flour have continued so high in price.
"We may now, I think, understand many curious facts now passing before our eyes. Food is so abundant in Russia, that it is wasted, and yet among the large exporters of food to Great Britain is this country, in which it sells at a price almost as high as in Liverpool, and now even higher. The produce of Russia has to bear all the charges out and home, and the consequence is that the producer remains poor, and makes no roads; and thus the cost of transportation, internal and external, continues, and must continue great. The farmer of the United States sends his produce to market cheap, because the return cargo, being chiefly man, is valuable, and the space it occupies is great. He therefore grows rich, and makes roads and canals, and builds steamboats; and thus is the cost of transportation, internal and external, so far diminished, that the difference in the price of a barrel of flour in Pittsburgh and in Liverpool is, when we look at the distance, almost inconceivably small.
"The bulk of the trade of Canada is outwards; and the consequence is that outward freights are high, while our imports of men and other valuable commodities keep them low with us; and therefore it is that the cost of transporting wheat and flour from our side of the line is so much lower than from the other, that both now pass through New York on their way to Liverpool. Hence it is that there has arisen so vehement a desire for commercial reciprocity, and even for annexation. The protective system has thus not only the effect of bringing consumers to take their places by the side of the producer, facilitating the consumption on the land of the products of the land, and facilitating also the exportation of the surplus to foreign markets by diminishing outward freights, but the further one of producing among our neighbours a strong desire for the establishment of the same perfect freedom of trade that now exists among the several states, by becoming themselves a part of the Union. Protection, therefore, tends to the increase of commerce, and the establishment of Free Trade; while the British system tends everywhere to the destruction of commerce, and to the production of a necessity for restriction.
"We see, thus, that if we desire to secure the command of that which is falsely termed 'the great grain-market of the world,' it is to be effected by the adoption of such measures as will secure valuable return freights. The most costly and the most valuable of all are men; the least so are pig-iron and coal. The more of the latter we import, the larger will be our surplus of food, the higher will be the outward freight, internal and external, the greater will be the waste, and the poorer will be the farmer. The more of the former we import, the smaller will be our surplus of food, the lower will be the outward freights, and the more numerous will be the commodities that can go to Europe, to be given in exchange for luxuries that now we cannot purchase."
So much for the American views of reciprocity. Secured by her system of tariffs, which she is now about to heighten, against the effects of foreign competition, America is resolutely bent on availing herself to the utmost of all the vast natural resources which she possesses, and to render herself wholly independent of the conversion of foreign countries. By following such a course she must, as her population increases, grow in greatness and in might, as must every nation wherein labour is estimated and cherished according to its proper value, and the rights of the domestic producer and workman guarded with untiring vigilance.
One word as to the prospects of the British farmer. We know from undoubted authority that in many parts of the United States, for example Ottawa, excellent land may be purchased for £1 an acre, broken up for 7s., burdened by no poor nor county rates, and unconscious of the presence of the tax-gatherer. Land such as this can, indeed, afford to produce corn at an almost nominal price—ballast for the ships that shall bring back the overweighted and ruined yeomen and peasants of England to New York and New Orleans! But, vast as the immigration has been, the production of food has greatly outstripped it; and as fresh tracts of virgin land are, yearby year, brought into cultivation, and internal communications opened or improved, we see no reason whatever to believe that the export of grain to England will diminish, or the price of that grain be enhanced. Let our readers bear in mind the wonderful development of the mining and manufacturing resources of America, to which we have just directed their attention, and then see how, in spite of, or far rather concurrently with that, the production of food also increased. We again quote fromThe Harmony of Interests. How great was the increase may be seen by the following comparison of the returns under the census of 1840, and the Patent Office Estimates for 1847:—
Showing an increase of not less than 40 per cent in 7 years, during which the population only advanced 23 per cent.
How much of this surplus produce may be expected to find its way into the English market, we do not pretend accurately to foretell; but when we find that, without the inducement of an unrestricted access to it, in 1846 America was able to raise her exports of grain to thirteen millions of bushels, from six millions in 1845; and in 1847, with only the preparation of a year, to twenty-six millions, we think Lord Fitzwilliam is quite justified in taking it for granted that the price of corn in England will not rise above its present ruinous average. Attempts, no doubt, will be made to show that the emigration to California has deprived the Western States of the labour that is required to raise these enormous crops. Our answer is, that 300,000 souls were added by immigration to the population of the United States in 1849; and that our own emigration returns for 1850 show that the tide from England is flowing in that direction with unabated force. So last year, when the great and unexpected import of French flour was adding to the depression, and stimulating the complaints of the English agriculturists, the Free Import authorities explained it away as a forced unnatural importation which must speedily cease, as France was an importing, and not an exporting, county, and the price of corn there was naturally higher than in England; and yet we learn from the same organ of public opinion which favoured us in the summer with this satisfactory explanation of the French importations, that in the month of November last, the prices of wheat, flour, and bread were all much higher in London than in Paris. In its City article of November 14th, appeared the following comparison of the present prices of wheat, flour, and bread, in London and Paris:—
"The highest price of wheat of the first quality in Paris is 24 francs per 1½ hectolitres, which is equal to 36s. 8d. per quarter; and the highest price of white wheat of the first quality, in London, being 48s. per quarter, it follows that wheat is 307⁄8per cent dearer in London than in Paris. The highest quotation of flour of the first quality in Paris is 29 francs 95 cents the 100 kilogrammes, which is equal to 29s. 11d. per sack of 280 lb. English; and the highest quotation of flour in the London market being 40s. per sack, it follows that flour is about 335⁄8per cent dearer in London than in Paris. The price of bread of the first quality in Paris is 27 cents per kilogramme, which is equal to 45⁄8per 4 lb. loaf English weight; and the price of bread in London, at the full-priced shops, being 61⁄2d. per 4 lb., it follows that bread is 401⁄2per cent dearer in London than in Paris."
"The highest price of wheat of the first quality in Paris is 24 francs per 1½ hectolitres, which is equal to 36s. 8d. per quarter; and the highest price of white wheat of the first quality, in London, being 48s. per quarter, it follows that wheat is 307⁄8per cent dearer in London than in Paris. The highest quotation of flour of the first quality in Paris is 29 francs 95 cents the 100 kilogrammes, which is equal to 29s. 11d. per sack of 280 lb. English; and the highest quotation of flour in the London market being 40s. per sack, it follows that flour is about 335⁄8per cent dearer in London than in Paris. The price of bread of the first quality in Paris is 27 cents per kilogramme, which is equal to 45⁄8per 4 lb. loaf English weight; and the price of bread in London, at the full-priced shops, being 61⁄2d. per 4 lb., it follows that bread is 401⁄2per cent dearer in London than in Paris."
We apprehend that a difference of thirty or forty per cent is sufficient to tempt the French corn-grower, or miller, into the higher-priced market which lies so conveniently open to him; and thus from the model republic of the Old, no less than from the model republic of the New World, must the English farmer expect to see for the future those supplies of grain and flour pouring in, which shall prevent his produce procuring a remunerating price. To complete the picture, it should not be forgotten that both these exporting countries impose considerable duties on theimportation of grain and flour, and thus afford us a perfect specimen of that reciprocity which all Liberal governments and free nations were so anxious to establish, according to our sapient rulers, in 1846.
We do not think that we need add any further argument to what has been already said. Our antagonists, the Free-traders, have been allowed—what they required and what was fair—time for the working of their experiment. Ample time has been granted, and we now see that it has failed in every particular. They said that it would induce reciprocity; it has induced higher opposing tariffs. They said it would secure for Great Britain the manufacturing custom of the world; on the contrary, foreign manufactories are springing up with unexampled rapidity. They said it would increase the demand for iron; it has prostrated it. They said it would give full employment to all our labouring population; it has displaced labour, and driven our working men by hundreds of thousands to emigrate. They said it could not attract such an importation of foreign grain and provisions, as permanently to beat down prices in this country below the remunerating level; it has already brought such an influx of these articles, that the grower of grain is impoverished, and the breeder of cattle ruined. They said it would be the commencement of a new era of prosperity to Ireland; it has laid it utterly desolate!
Are we, then, obstinately to persevere in a course of policy so evidently obnoxious and detrimental? Are we still to crush down labour for an end which is now proved to be impossible of attainment; and to tell the working classes, that because our rulers have made a false step, they and theirs must submit to descend into the hideous gulf of pauperism? These are questions for the nation to consider—questions of unparalleled magnitude, both for the present and the coming time. If we are not so to persevere in our folly, there is no alternative left but to build up our commercial system anew upon wiser and sounder principles. It cannot be expected that we shall ever again possess a monopoly of the manufactures of the world. We must be contented with that share which our skill, and energy, and undeniable resources can command; and if we wish still to retain possession of the vast Colonial Empire which has long been our pride and boast, we must foster, stimulate, and protect the industry of the colonists as sedulously and anxiously as our own.
After all, we may possibly, at no very distant period of time, have reason to be thankful that the experiment has been made, notwithstanding all the misery and loss which have accompanied the trial. For, if anything could have broken down the free independent spirit of Great Britain, and rendered it callous and listless to external aggression or insult, no better method could be found than the complete adoption of a system which must have made us perpetually subservient to the wants of other nations, doing their work to order, and receiving wages in return. In order to emancipate ourselves from this state of threatened Helotism—the state which the disciples of the Manchester school regard as the most enviable upon earth—we must attempt to re-establish perfect harmony and mutual co-operation amongst all the interests of Britain, to give productive labour its proper place and pre-eminence, and, since we cannot secure for convertive labour the command of foreign markets, to take care that, in the home market, it is not exposed to any undue or unfair competition. We hold by this proposition, well understood and energetically supported in America, that "when a nation makes a market at home for nearly all its products, other nations have to come and seek what they require, and pay the highest price; and that, when it does not make a market at home, markets must be sought abroad, and then sales must be made at the lowest prices." If this be true, it will follow that the way to sell at the highest prices, and to buy at the lowest, is to buy and sell at home.
FOOTNOTES:[29]The Harmony of Interests, Agricultural, Manufacturing, and Commercial.Skinner, Philadelphia.[30]President's Message, November 1850.[31]Liverpool Mail, Nov. 2, 1850.
[29]The Harmony of Interests, Agricultural, Manufacturing, and Commercial.Skinner, Philadelphia.
[29]The Harmony of Interests, Agricultural, Manufacturing, and Commercial.Skinner, Philadelphia.
[30]President's Message, November 1850.
[30]President's Message, November 1850.
[31]Liverpool Mail, Nov. 2, 1850.
[31]Liverpool Mail, Nov. 2, 1850.
Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh.
Transcriber's Notes:Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors in the prose were corrected.Punctuation normalized.Archaic, colloquial, and non-standard spellings retained as printed.Egregious errors were corrected in the poetry.
Transcriber's Notes:
Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors in the prose were corrected.
Punctuation normalized.
Archaic, colloquial, and non-standard spellings retained as printed.
Egregious errors were corrected in the poetry.