the country, which, as they are the source whence land derives its value, may by their withdrawal effect a serious depreciation in land that will be aggravated by the burdens consequent on maintaining an unoccupied people. But allowing the energy and enterprise of the nation to have full scope, what people could be more fortunately circumstanced than those who own the soil of this country? For what, then, are our land-owners jeoparding all this? For what are they imperilling all the institutions so favourable to themselves; losing the esteem of their fellow-countrymen ; making all men politicians; and driving the middle and working classes to think that they are misrepresented and defrauded, and that the present system is maintained simply for the benefit of a class? It all seems to be for the vain hope of giving to their estates by artificial means a value that natural circumstances would give them in a tenfold degree.

The only ground on which they can rest for keeping their bad land in cultivation-the ground that it gives employment to the poor, is no argument for the Corn Laws: it is only a reason why some provision should be made for the existing generation of poor who are so dependent. For to keep these ( bad lands for ever in cultivation is to rear for ever a class of men with interests adverse to the com

munity. And this applies equally to the occupiers of the land, a generation of whom may have come into existence since the last Corn Laws were passed who would otherwise have occupied themselves, or

who would have employed their land differently but for the continuance of these Laws.

The continuance of the monastic institutions might have been, and probably was urged upon the same ground as the Corn Laws: namely, that they provided for the poor; but if so, the plea was unheeded except so far as it led to our public provision for the poor.

However, even if greater consideration for an interest affected by an improvement is required in one case more than in another, this is no ground for the continuance of a bad land system; though it may, possibly, be for compensation or for some special provision which the transition might require. But I contend that there is no such case here with respect to the poor; for the Corn Laws do not provide the poor with employment in the agricultural districts. It has been shown in the analysis of the last Census that but for the town and the manufacturing districts 350,000 people would have been left in the Agricultural Market who could not have been supported and who would have dragged down the rest to the lowest level.

I will no longer try the patience of Hon. Members; but I will leave to my many friends on this question to supply what I have omitted in developing the case to the House.

I have attempted to show that under the present circumstances of this country there cannot be any advantage in the Corn Laws and that there is not any pretext for them; that there is now a deficient

supply of food for the people; that but for these Laws the people have the means of procuring an ample supply, and that obstructed by them they are suffering the severest privations; that commerce is impeded; that employment is withheld; and that, identified as it is with the ability to consume, our Revenue is yearly declining. On these grounds I beg to move, That the duties on corn do now cease and determine.

When I say now,' I mean to mark the coincidence of my opinions with those of the petitioners to this House who pray to be instantly relieved from the operation of the Corn Laws; though, of course, if it can be shown that the public would suffer in any way from the immediate removal of restrictive duties, we are neither so foolish nor so bigoted as still to insist upon this taking place; nor if it can be shown that greater good could be derived from their gradual than from their immediate abolition should we reject the benefit. But at this time, and considering the unreasonable attitude assumed by those who profit by the Corn Laws, I think the people quite right to call for their entire and immediate abolition; and unless any clear, certain, and definite evil can be pointed out as likely to result from it, I hope that those who are for total Repeal will not shrink from supporting my Motion.

XI.

HOUSE OF COMMONS, April 18, 1842.

When the Budget for 1842 was brought forward the Revenue fell short of the expenditure for the current year by two millions and a half, and showed a deficiency of upwards of ten millions for the previous six years. Sir Robert Peel's financial scheme to meet this state of affairs was a new departure. The distress in the country and the depression in trade were no longer due to foreign wars, joint-stock banks, and such like. The Ministerial policy openly admitted them to have been caused by restrictive laws operating on our Foreign Trade: commercial reform alone could effect their removal; and the price to be paid for the remedy was an Income Tax of 7d. in the pound. The Budget of 1842, at a first glance, might almost have been taken for a Free Trade Budget; but though the reform it inaugurated comprised the reduction of import duties and the removal of restrictions upon no less than seven hundred and fifty articles, embracing almost the whole range of the tariff, there were two fatal exceptions-corn and sugar: the great scheme of financial reform commenced with the egregious omission of the duties on corn, the real root of all the misery and suffering of the people, and the ever increasing depression of trade. Lord J. Russell moved an Amendment condemnatory of the Income Tax, which after a debate of four days was rejected on April 13 by a vote of 308 to 202. The debate on the Amendment, proposing that the Bill should be read on that day six months, during which Mr. Villiers made the following speech, took place on April 18. The Motion was lost by 285 to 188.

THE Right Hon. Baronet's speech is, I think, in one respect the most important speech that he has made since he announced his financial scheme; for it has done what his former speeches have left undone it has given the public some insight into what his general views and intentions are with regard to the peculiar tax that he is about to impose on the country.

His scheme has been so ingeniously contrived and his speeches have been so cleverly composed that up to this moment he has succeeded in leaving many, and particularly those who are opposed to him, in doubt as to the course they should pursue.

There are many, and I am among the number, who are far from satisfied with the justice of our present system of taxation, who think that it is oppressive to the poor and partial to the rich and who are strongly in favour of transferring from poverty to property the burdens of the State. There are many who see nothing to approve in the particular purpose of this tax and the occasion selected for its imposition, but who yet think that it is the recognition of a sound principle as regards taxation, and that it will be wise to endure its inconvenience with the view to its general application ultimately-always assuming, however, that this is the view taken by the Right Hon. Baronet, and that he is alive to the evils of which we complain, and is not wanting in will to apply the remedy.

The speech that we have just heard will dissipate this illusion at once and enlighten the country as to the Right Hon. Baronet's views of the object of a property tax. Called upon to-night to vindicate his consistency in opposing a property tax in 1833, the Right Hon. Baronet candidly tells us that the ground of his opposition then was one that he would maintain now; that a property tax, in lieu of the indirect taxes that exist now and of which the people complain, is one that the Right