necessarily partake of the nature of an the people should understand what is the abstract proposition. I admire the ex- measure of doctrine of protection put fortreme generosity of the right hon. Gentle- ward at a time when it is just as impossible man, who, having announced-and most to restore protection as to repeal the Bill of properly announced, and I give him full Rights, or to reconstitute the Heptarchy. credit for it-his intention of immediately We want no abstract Motions, such as submitting his commercial and financial the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor views and plans to the House, recommends of the Exchequer appears to desire, to to the hon. Member for Wolverhampton to establish this proposition. We want to meet his measure, of a practical and finan- set the public mind at ease by the solemn cial character, with the proposal of an ab- and uniform acceptance on the part of this stract resolution but I hope we shall not House of the measures of free trade which be drawn away from the purpose which have been already adopted by Parliament, was essentially contemplated by the consti- and likewise by a declaration that future tuencies of the country in returning us to measures bearing on trade and bearing on this House, and by Her Majesty in dissolv- finance shall be framed in consistency with ing the Parliament, by any abstract propo- the principles that have guided our recent sitions whatever. If you ask me what the legislation on those subjects. I do not call people want, it is the full, final, and solemn such a declaration an abstract resolution. sanction by Parliament of the system of free I call it laying down a rule of conduct; trade. They want that the party which is and it is a rule of conduct which, in my now responsible for the conduct of public opinion, the interests of this country reaffairs, shall, once for all, declare its views quire should at once be established beyond on this subject. When we consider that the reach of further doubt or cavil. Is it for six years past the controversy of free unreasonable that we should be anxious on trade has not only entered into but dis- this subject? I think not, for we cannot turbed the whole political action of our re- forget the composition of the Government. presentative system, when we consider the We cannot forget the declaration which uncertainty connected with it, when we have been made by various members of consider the maturity which public opinion that Government as to protection and free has now attained with regard to the con- trade. I will go at once to the case of my troversy it is not too much to ask that right hon. Friend opposite, the man who, now at least, after so much waste of the of all others, has shown the greatest public time, after Ministries overturned, courage and maintained the greatest conand parties disorganised, they should now sistency in adhering to what he thinks make up their minds on the issue defined right principles, I mean my right hon. by the First Minister of the Crown in Friend the Member for Lincolnshire (Mr. February, 1851, and place the question Christopher). Did my right hon. Friend of free trade high and dry on the shore, hear the speech of the Chancellor of the where the tide of political party strife could Exchequer, in which that right hon. Gentleno longer reach it. Not that I think there man said that there was one thing, at least, is any doubt about the permanency of any categorically declared in the Speech from of the great measures which have been the Throne, and that this was, that unreadopted by Parliament in the sense of free- stricted competition was from henseforth trade system. My firm belief is, and has to be the rule of commercial policy of this ever been, that since July, 1846, the re- country? If he heard that speech, what turn of the Corn Laws has been, not a mere construction does he put upon the exposi difficulty, but an impossibility; and I have tion of the right hon. Gentleman? I will ever thought it a great misfortune for the advert to the recent declaration of my right country that a great party in this House, hon. Friend to his constituents, and ask, containing many men of the highest honour what we are to consider the force and effect and the highest intelligence-a party re- of that declaration, not taking merely its presenting some of the most valuable and words and expressions, but its whole spirit essential elements of which a constitutional and tenor? They cannot be mistaken. system is rightly framed-should stand to- My right hon. Friend says "I am here gether on the basis of objects, the attain- to maintain unchanged all those opinions of ment of which has become beyond the financial and commercial policy which for power of man to carry. I feel that this the last twenty-five years I have mainis an evil which should be put an end to tained." Do not let my right hon. Friend on the one hand, and that, on the other, think that I should represent it as an of

fence for a man not to adhere pertinaciously the discussion of secondary and incidental to an opinion. I am in no condition, I questions-questions of the form, and time, have no right, to taunt any man for a change and manner of proceeding lose sight of of opinion. Like other men, I inherited in the great end we have in view; and that, respect to this question the traditions of a whether before the Motion of the right party. When I came to examine these hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Extraditions for myself, I found them give chequer, or after it, we reserve to ourselves way under me, and I abandoned them. the liberty of putting into clear words, at But my right hon. Friend says, he adheres a future day, the principles we entertain in to the opinions he has held for the last case his measures should not afford a suffitwenty-five years; and what one desires to ciently practical exposition of our sentiknow is, how, as a Member of the Governments; whatever decision may be come to, ment, he receives the declaration now made by the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer. I ask nothing from the Government which is dishonourable to them, personally or politically. I want no professions of internal conversion to free-trade principles. I ask no man's abstract opinions about protection, which is now a matter of past history, any more than I want to know his opinion about Jacobitism; but what I want is this, that those who now hold power in this country-who exercise the influence which belongs to the administration of public affairs-who represent this great country in the face of foreign Powers and of the world-I ask that these persons shall be persons who have definitively, unequivocally, and finally abandoned the idea of proposing a return to protective policy. More I do not feel bound to ask; with less, it seems to me, this House cannot honourably be content. But I am sure my right hon. Friend will feel that we are placed in a position of difficulty, if we are to understand that the Government is formed on a principle under which it is competent to the leader of the House of Commons to say that unrestricted competition is from henceforward to be the rule of our commercial policy, while one of his colleagues, sitting by his side, is to tell us, as he told his constituents elsewhere, that he was a Member of the Government, in order to defend there the principles he had always advocated out of office, and to use his influence to procure the reincorporation of those principles into our commercial code. Sir, my hope is, that whatever decision may be come to by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton as to the resolution to which he has adverted-whether he shall think, or whether he shall not think, that the necessity for that resolution is at the present moment obviated by the declaration of the Government, that their propositions will be immediately laid before the country-whatever decision he may come to in that respect, I trust that this House will never, in VOL. CXXIII. [THIRD SERIES.]

or whatever course may be followed, on any question of this nature, I trust that this House will recollect (and that, too, wholly without reference to party combination, which, important as it is, is far less important in my mind than the great issue which we are now discussing) that the country will justly expect of us that we should remember the peculiar circumstances to which we owe our birth, and the especial object for which we have been sent here. I trust that we shall rest content with nothing that is open to argument, and construction, and inference, this way and that way; that we shall not rest content with a paragraph which, instead of settling the question, itself stands in need of glosses and interpretation; but that we shall have it stated in plain English, intelligible to every class of the community, beyond the reach of cavil or dispute, not at the present moment only, but at other times which may come, when a portion of this House might find it convenient to revive the question of protection, that we shall have it stated in language, I say, which shall for the present time, and shall for all time, give an assurance to the people of England that there is no party in the State prepared to defraud or to deprive them of the inestimable boon which has by the legislation of late years been conferred upon them; which boon, so conferred upon them, has not only conduced with other causes, but which has been the main and great cause of the present prosperity of the country, and which, in increasing the prosperity of the country, has spread abroad a satisfaction, a contentment, a confidence in the spirit of Parliament, a firm attachment to our institutions, and has strengthened the foundations of that Throne from which Her Majesty to-day addressed us.

MR. NEWDEGATE begged to tell the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone), in reply to his question, that, as an independent Member of that House, he did not intend to move an Amendment upon the Address,

E

and that he did not believe that any inde- | Gentleman the Member for the University pendent Member on his side of the House of Oxford (Mr. Gladstone), he should not would do so; and further, that so far as he have ventured, after all that had taken (Mr. Newdegate) was aware of the deter- place that evening, to intrude himself on mination of those societies which had been the attention of the House with any oborganised for the promotion of the great servations. But his right hon. Friend had cause of procuring justice to native in- addressed himself to him (Mr. Christopher) dustry, it was their resolve-be the de- in a manner so pointed and personal, that ciarations of Her Majesty's Government he felt it would not be consistent with his what they might-that until the Govern- position and character in that House were ment had submitted their commercial and he to refrain from making a few brief refinancial measures to the consideration marks on that portion of the right hon. of the Commons of England, they would Gentleman's speech which related to himnot pronounce any opinion upon the policy self. He could not suppose that the right or upon the conduct of Her Majesty's hon. Gentleman could have meant to imGovernment. This they considered no pute to him that he would venture to exmore than just; and, although it might press, in the presence of his constituents, suit the tactics of the Opposition to try to opinions which he would not be perfectly force the Protectionist body from their de- prepared to uphold in that House. In adtermination, and to arrive at a decision dressing his constituents during the last upon the abstract merits of the protective contest in which he was engaged, he had system, as contradistinguished from unre- invariably expressed his conscientious opinstricted competition, he could tell hon. ion with regard to the injustice done to Gentlemen opposite that they would fail in the agricultural interest by the repeal of the attempt to move the Protectionist body the corn laws, and by all the proceedings from their position. There were some that accompanied that repeal. He told minds so constituted that they were never them that his opinions on that subject reat ease unless they rested upon some arbi-mained entirely unchanged; but at the trary dogma; and he believed that the in- same time he warned his constituents that tellect of the right hon. Member for Ox-it did not depend upon the opinion of any ford was one of these; but he could assure that right hon. Gentleman, and those who had preceded him in the debate, that it was as utterly beyond the power of Parliament to establish any arbitrary rule which should for ever hereafter bind the people of this country, as for them to mort-principle of our commercial policy; and gage the intellect of posterity. Be the when his right hon. Friend taunted him with decision of that House what it might, they expressing opinions at variance with those could not abdicate for the people of this uttered by the Chancellor of the Exchecountry, now or hereafter, their claim that quer, and the noble Earl at the head of the legislation of the country, financial or the Government, he would take leave to commercial, should be adapted to meet the assure his right hon. Friend (Mr. Gladexigencies and conveniences of their in-stone) that he should ever be found predustry according to the changing require-pared, upon fitting occasions, to maintain ments of the age, whenever the people should decide upon enforcing that right. He had no more to add than to say, that he believed he expressed the opinion of the protective societies of the kingdom when he stated that they were determined to await the announcement of the policy of the Government, and that they did so in the full confidence that the measures to be propounded would, as far as possible, meet the just requirements of all the interests of the country.

individual Member of the Government, but rather upon the opinion of the country at large, expressed through their representatives in that House, whether the principle of unrestricted competition or of protection was to prevail as to the governing

the opinions which he had always entertained with regard to this subject; opinions which he had always fearlessly expressed since he had had the honour of a seat in that House. But, if he found that the people, being appealed to for their decision on two successive occasions, had, on two successive occasions given a verdict which proved that the doctrines he had heretofore advocated were not in accordance with the feelings of the majority of the country, he should feel himself bound to bow to the MR. CHRISTOPHER said, that if it decision of the country thus unequivocally had not been for the pointed allusion that expressed-[Laughter]-and in spite of had been made to him by the right hon. the taunts of his right hon. Friend and of

MR. BERNAL OSBORNE said, it seemed to be generally admitted on both sides of the House that the debate on the Queen's Speech was to be a sort of shake hands preparatory to the great political conflicts which were to ensue; that the lion of Montrose was to lie down with the lamb of North Essex, and that nothing was to be said, but that they were to welcome every paragraph of the Speech with a loyalty which bordered, he might say, upon servility. In a constitutional point of view, he thought it was a pity that the course which was adopted in 1849 and 1850 had not been practised now. If he remembered rightly, the right hon. Gentleman who now deprecated any interruption to the harmony which prevailed in that happy family," and who had attained to the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, owing to the advocacy of the doctrines of Protection, upon that occasion moved an Amendment upon the Address, for an inquiry into the burdens upon agriculture. That Amendment, after a night's discussion, the right hon. Gentleman did not think it prudent to press to a division; but

66

the cheers of the benches opposite, he be- and that he was prepared to defend himlieved it the safer and more constitutional self on a fitting opportunity against any practice to adopt a course of this kind, accusations that might be made against when the country had solemnly pronounced him for deserting the constituency which its verdict; and in this opinion he was he represented. strengthened and encouraged by the example of the right hon. Gentleman himself, who had bowed to the decision of the country on the question of Parliamentary reform and other subjects. He (Mr. Christopher) as an individual, still entertained the same opinion, that the policy of Sir Robert Peel, in proposing the repeal of the corn laws was not a wise one; but at the same time that he held this opinion he might be clearly sensible that the state of public feeling might render it impossible to return to the principle of protection. What he had said to his constituents was this-and he had never swerved from itthat if the country should decide against the recurrence to protective principles, Her Majesty's Government would come forward and propose some system with respect to the taxation as a measure of relief to the agricultural interest. This was what he had said; and he trusted that, upon a future occasion, when the proposals of the Government should be discussed, he would again have an opportunity of defending himself from such accusations. His only motive for rising on the present occasion was, to prevent any impression prevailing in 1850 another right hon. Gentleman, in the House that he had acted in an un- who he supposed would give in his adheworthy manner towards those whom he sion to free trade that evening-he meant had the honour of representing. With the present President of the Poor Law regard to his own position in connexion Commission-also moved an Amendment with the Government, he had no hesitation in saying that he accepted office under the Administration of his noble Friend from a sincere conviction that, of all statesmen in the country, the noble Lord now at the head of the Administration was the most fitted, from his admitted talents, position, and high principle, to conduct the affairs of a great empire. He had, however, told his noble Friend when he accepted office, that although he felt deeply gratified at the honour of becoming a Member of his Administration, still that he was prepared to place the office he held entirely at his disposal, whenever his noble Friend could strengthen his Administration by the introduction of another more qualified person. In conclusion, he had only to observe that, after what had taken place, he would never be the person to sow discord among the great party with which he had been connected, under the leadership of the late Lord George Bentinck;

to the Address upon agricultural burdens; and he had greater faith in his principles upon that occasion than his right hon. Leader, for he pressed his Amendment to a division, in which he was disgracefully beaten. He (Mr. B. Osborne) merely alluded to this in order that new Members might dispel from their minds the notion that it was not a constitutional proceeding on the part of the House, when they felt an objection to a paragraph in the Speech, to move an Amendment to the Address; and he thought they would have better done their duty to the country, and advanced the interests of free trade, if they had at that, the earliest opportunity, moved an Amendment upon that paragraph in the Address which had been dictated by the genius of rigmarole, and traced by the hand of mystification. If the right hon. Gentleman wished to tell the House and the country that he had given in his adhesion to free trade, and the Cabinet had

gone along with him, what was the occa- the very manly course adopted by the right sion for that studiously evasive and decep- hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the tive paragraph? Would any Englishman Duchy of Lancaster, and bow to the dewhen he read the papers in the morning cision of the country. He had nothing to be able to gather more from that para- say to that graceful bow which the right graph, so carefully worded to delude Gentle- hon. Gentleman had made to the decision men on both sides of the House, and to give of the country, except that he thought he no information, than that the whole ques- would have consulted his own position and tion of free trade was reopened in this his high character, of which he had told country? It might be very well for the them, better, if he had made that bow in right hon. the Secretary of State for the the days of Sir Robert Peel, and had not Home Department to tell them, in smooth waited until he himself came into office. and dulcet accents, that the policy of free He knew that office was no object to the trade was not to be reversed; but how did right hon. Gentleman. He knew that he he reconcile that with his speech before had been dragged into this by the mishis two-and-twenty electors at Midhurst-chievous love of party; but still he must or whatever the number might be-when he told them that crime and poor-rates were inversely increasing with the practice of free trade? If the policy of free trade were not to be reversed, as the right hon. Gentleman now with "bated breath" assured them, why had it not been distinctly stated in the Speech from the Throne? Why did not the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who had screwed up his courage to many points, take his physic like a man-why make so many gulps in swallowing this free-trade potion? Why did the right hon. Gentleman, who was the genius and soul of his Cabinet, condescend to be tied together with a bundle of incompetent marquesses and men who were at least questionable as to their principles, however honourable they might be in other respects? Why did he not say, "I am a free-trader; I hunted Sir Robert Peel to his grave; I maligned Sir Robert Peel; but I see that I committed a grievous error, and I am now a free-trader?" Don't let them talk in a vague manner about the spirit of chivalry in the heart of the noble Lord at the head of the Cabinet. Why did the noble Lord in 1846 stand by in the presence of that great man whom he might designate the "Wellington of peace, and listen to those bitter and envenomed attacks which were levelled, not only against the priuciple of free trade, but against the person of Sir Robert Peel? For himself, he stated at once that he had no confidence in the chivalry or high principle of the leader of the Administration; and sorry was he to add that he had no great trust in the sincerity of the creator of the party who sat in the House of Commons. He must congratulate the House upon the course of the debate. He had no doubt that in a short time every one of the hon. Gentlemen opposite would take

bear the imputations which would be made by persons out of that House, who would regret that he had delayed until the eleventh hour making his bow to the decision of the country. The paragraph with reference to free trade imperatively called upon the leaders of the Opposition to decide at once. When the measures of 1846 were passed, they had no notion of compensation to any interest. He denied that injury had been inflicted on any interest, and he denied that compensation should be paid to any interest for the robbery which it had committed on the public for so many years. He was surprised that hon. Gentleman had not seen it in that light. It might be desirable, as an object of party tact, to delay this question; but he was convinced that it would have been better for the country to have met this insidious and evasive paragraph by an Amendment upon the very first opportunity. So much for the doctrine of free trade. As to what was looming in the future," as to the bottled problems that they were by and by to see enunciated, he would say nothing on the present occasion. But he would warn the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate), and he would warn the country Gentlemen generally (of whom so much had been said in 1846 and 1847), that the Chancellor of the Exchequer might, after all, turn out to be the Flying Dutchman of the agricultural party; that the right hon. Gentleman having led them on so far-and he begged the farmers of England to mark this-that, having led them on so far for no other object but to elevate himself, would probably be found to have been deluding them once more on the subject of protection. [Cries of "No!"] Aye, but "Yes." He was not using his own language: he was giving them a paraphrase of the language which

66