the late elections had, moreover, basely, and with every vulgar art, endeavoured to gain favour by condemning the Poor-law which their leader had supported, and their leader had not dared to rebuke them. Such were the merits of the two contending parties. The Tories would now rule, for they represented the majority; it was the majority indeed of the constituencies, not of the people; but that was the fault of the Ministers, who would not invest the people with elective power. He then reviewed certain parts of the foreign policy of the Government. He condemned the war with China, and declared his entire approval of the conduct pursued by the American government in the affair of M'Leod, upon which he entered into a long disquisition.

Mr. Muntz said a few words in explanation of his own views, as to the effect of Corn-laws upon wages.

Mr. Ewart moved an adjourn ment, on which the gallery was cleared for a division, but the House finally adjourned without dividing.

The adjourned debate was begun by Mr. Ewart, who began by complaining that sympathy was not enough for the people; they asked for bread, and must not be put off with a stone. He admitted that the constituencies had decided against the existing Government, and that it must now therefore make way for a new Ministry; but he expected that Sir Robert Peel, as in the case of the Roman Catholic question, would himself do the very thing he had resisted, and, like Shakspeare's apothecary, excuse himself by saying, "my poverty, but not my will, consents." The rest of Mr. Ewart's speech VOL. LXXXIII.

was an extended disquisition upon those general principles of political economy, on which the doctrines of free-trade are founded.

Captain Hamilton desired to recall the House to the real question, which was that of confidence in the Ministry. Mr. Hume in the debate on the confidence question in the late Parliament, had cautioned him and other members as to the account they would have to give to their constituents. In this Mr. Hume must have much miscalculated the opinions of the electors, else, why was he not here?

Mr. Ward admitted, that the election of the member who had moved the amendment was a great triumph to his party, but thought it also one of the greatest mistakes which had been made by the people. Members seemed to have two sets of opinions--one for the hustings, and one for the House. The mover had presented himself to the West Riding as the champion of the Corn-laws, but in his speech to this House he had taken no notice whatever of that subject. There was another matter which he did notice that of the Appropriation clause and its abandonment by the Whigs-a bold argument from a supporter of that statesman who had so signally abandoned his own opinions on the other great Irish question, the Roman Catholic Relief Bill. For his own part, he blamed both Lord John Russell and Sir Robert Peel for not having resigned at once, rather than submit to take a course opposed to their former declarations, and both of them had suffered for the mistake. The harvest would soon neutralize the efforts of the new majority. His accounts led him to anticipate a woeful deficiency, which would be seriously aggrava[N]

ted by a few more such days as that which had just closed. (Cries of "No.") Such at least were his accounts; perhaps they varied with each man's political wishes. (Cheers from the Opposition.) He did not wish to make the weather a party question, but he would have the House remember that four millions sterling in gold must go out of the country to purchase the supply which would be wanted. He then went on to argue for the principle of a fixed duty, as against that of a sliding-scale. The result of the present system was an extensive decay in the manufacturing districts. There were now in Sheffield 2,000 unoccupied houses, which had been tenanted when first he knew them. The circumstances of the country would not be improved by the expensive measure of Church-extension, nor was much good to be expected on the subject of the Poor-law from a leader whose supporters had gone so far at their elections in vituperation of its principle. For Ireland, he saw much to regret, and nothing to rejoice at, in the change of policy now at hand; most of the principal members of the Conservative party were even personally committed against the Irish people. Considerations like these should lead the House to pause before they voted the transfer of power to such hands.

Mr. C. J. M. Sutton said, that just as the Members of that House were bound to prove themselves qualified for their seats, so ought the Ministers of the Crown to substantiate their qualifications for their offices. He would not now detain the House upon the question of the Address, but he would take the liberty of asking Lord John Russell to what he had alluded in

saying, on the late election of the Speaker, that he had been induced to oppose in 1835 the re-election of Sir C. Manners Sutton on the ground of his personal conduct.

Lord John Russell answered, that as Sir Robert Peel had referred the course taken in 1835 solely to the principle then affirmed, that the Speaker's opinions ought to be those of the majority of the House, he had thought it right to explain that he had himself proceeded, partly at least, on another ground: which was, that Sir C. M. Sutton, then Speaker of a House of Commons containing a large majority of members favourable to Lord Melbourne's Government, had attended Privy Councils held for the purpose of transferring the powers of the State to the party of the minority. He acquitted Sir C. M. Sutton of any intentional disrespect to the House in attending those Councils, but he regarded such attendance as an error of judgment sufficient to exclude him from the chair.

Dr. Bowring enlarged upon the present suffering of the manufacturing poor, and ascribed it to the present state of the Corn-laws. He represented the impossibility of preserving our foreign commerce without great legislative altera. tions, and warned the House that it must either go forward toward liberalism, or backward toward perdition.

Mr. Patrick Stewart denied that the question of Confidence in the Ministry was the only proper matter of this debate. Representing a great Scotch county, where distress prevailed among the agricultural as well as among the manufacturing classes, he would contend for the principle of free-trade advanced by the Ministerial Bud

As a colonial proprietor, he hailed the system now proposed, which went, for the first time, to treat the British colonists simply as British subjects. He contended for a fixed duty on corn in preference to a sliding-scale. Ministers had been blamed for agitation upon this subject, but it was a subject on which he thought agitation fully justifiable, and which, being agitated, was properly made the ground of a dissolution. He censured the language held the preceding night by Mr. Roebuck on the case of M'Leod, and declared his opinion, that whatever harm should be done to M'Leod, was done to the British nation. And he equally differed from Mr. Roebuck on the question with the Chinese, who ought, in his judgment, to be made to pay for every pound of the opium seized. It would be fair to give credit to the Ministers not only for their conduct in these matters, but for the beneficial legislation of several years past-for the Reform Acts, the Corporation Acts, the Poor-laws, the Tithe Act, the Registration of Births, the changes of the Criminal Laws, and the union of the Canadas. With respect to their Budget, it had many merits, but certainly not that of originality: for its leading features would be found in a pamphlet attributed to Sir James Graham, on Corn and Currency, which had gone through four editions. He hoped that Sir James, when he returned to office, would return to his old opinions. After some pleasantries in reference to Sir Robert Peel's sketch of a Chancellor of the Exchequer fishing for a Budget, he concluded with a declaration that he would not rest by day or by night from worrying his opponents to carry

out the principles for which he had now been contending.

Mr. Sharman Crawford denied the existing Corn-laws to be for the advantage of the agricultural interest in general. They benefitted the landlords only, not the tenants, nor the labourers. He found fault with some omissions in the Address, but declined to support the amendment.

He

Mr. Cobden thought that if gentlemen on the other side did not choose to answer the speeches in favour of the Address, that was no reason why the friends of the Budget should not do their duty by stating their opinions. would express his own hostility to the taxes upon food, upon the subsistence of honest, struggling, working people. It pressed upon them in an infinitely heavier proportion than on the rich, for the family of a man worth 20,0002. a year scarcely consumed more bread than the family of the poorest labourer.

It was alleged on behalf of the Corn-laws that they protected the labourer-that the object of the manufacturers in seeking a repeal of the Corn-laws was to effect a reduction in the labourers wages. No: the real object of the manufacturers was to increase trade; that would increase the demand for labour, and with the demand the wages of labour must also be increased. There was no connexion between a high price of food and a high price of labour, except perhaps in agricultural districts, where the stipend of the labourer in dear seasons received some addition, as matter of charity. The reports produced at the recent conference of ministers at Manchester exhibited a lamentable account of the diminution in the people's means

were now praying in their respective places of worship, that the hearts of the legislature might be turned. If it was criminal to steal a man and make him work for nothing, it was equally criminal to steal from a free man the fair reward of his labour, and the House should beware how it enlisted in such a cause the teachers of religion. This was surely a subject that might claim priority over a question, whether a gentleman on one side or a gentleman on the other should be a Minister of the Crown. He would quote a passage from Mr. Huskisson in order that the real opinions of that statesman might be more accurately known, that Sir Robert Peel might not fancy he wore Mr. Huskisson's mantle, when in fact he was but putting on his cast-off garments. The passage in question went to show that the repeal of the Cornlaws would not necessarily injure the landed interest. It was happy for the country that no Ministers could go on without money, and money they could not have, except in a prosperous state of the mercantile and manufacturing classes.

Mr. H. Baillie expressed his belief that the distress of the people was rather to be attributed to the increase of machinery: if he thought it was owing to the Corn-laws, he would vote for their repeal.

Mr. Brotherton advocated an opposite view.

Mr. H. Grattan said, that at no one election in Ireland had there been any expression of determination to maintain the Corn-laws-a sign that the Irish would make great personal sacrifices to show their disapprobation of the threatened change of Ministry. It was not respectful to the Crown to say

that you would give no answer to its Message until it should have dismissed its messengers. The party opposite boasted of their majority; it had been returned by bribery, it had been returned by intimidation. He called on Sir Robert Peel to keep his followers in order; but apprehended that the right honourable Baronet, like Acteon, was likely to be eaten up by his own hounds. Mr. Grattan complained of irregularities at several elections, and of the employment of military, with an enthusiasm and energy which occasioned a good deal of cheering and laughter. At one election, said he, an officer stated, that apprehending a riot, he had ordered out "Justice to Ireland;" and being asked what he meant by justice to Ireland, he answered, "A sixpounder." The party who were now declaring war against Ireland had better beware of America. He would not fight the battle of such a party against an American, or any other external invasion. He censured the ingratitude of the English people to the Whig Ministry, and trusted that his own countrymen would ever be united in the cause of civil and religious freedom.

After a few words from Lord Worsley and Mr. Hastie, the debate was again adjourned on the motion of Lord Sandon.

Lord Sandon, who opened the adjourned debate on the following evening, began by contending that the question of free-trade was not that upon which Parliament was sent to the country; for if a single defeat were a sufficient motive for the dissolution, the Ministers had often had that motive before. was the distinct condemnation implied in the vote of want of confidence which really obliged the

It

Ministers to dissolve, and that therefore was the question actually submitted to the country. Speaking for himself, he could truly say that he appealed to his constituents to know whether they approved of the Government's Irish Administration, of their conduct with respect to the Church, and the distribution of patronage and magisterial appointments: questions more deeply and permanently affecting the interests of men than the questions whether a slidingscale should be preferred to a fixed duty, and whether Brazil sugar should be admitted at one time or another; and the verdict of the people was given on these questions. He believed, indeed, that it also intimated that the people were not satisfied with the propositions of Government; though he did not mean to say, that in returning him, who preferred the sliding duty to the fixed duty, they expressed any opinion on that point; yet he did believe, that they gave the negative to the proposition of Ministers for the total abolition of the Corn-laws. They might be, and he believed they were, divided on the mode and degree of protection; but he believed that the great majority were entirely united on the principle that domestic and colonial produce were entitled to protection. He was not insensible to the sufferings of the people, but he thought that the question of measures like these could be more safely intrusted to others than the present Ministry. Lord Sandon pointed with satisfaction to the fact that the price of sugar was still low showing, contrary to the predictions of the opposite party in the debate on the Sugar duties, that there was an increased supply from the West Indies.

Mr. M. Gibson expressed his disbelief that Lord Sandon really represented the opinions of Liverpool, but being admonished by the Speaker that it was irregular to make such an assertion respecting a Member of Parliament, he qualified what he had said on that point. He then complained of the doubt and uncertainty in which the country was left as to the policy intended to be pursued by Sir Robert Peel on his succeeding to the Government, which, he said, were much more likely to produce those injurious effects upon trade and commerce which were imputed to Ministerial agitation. He referred to the declaration of the Duke of Richmond in the House of Lords, that if the new Minister should attempt to introduce anything like the measures of the Whig Government, the landed interest would drive him from power. He, Mr. Gibson, however could not believe that the right honourable Baronet, if he came into office, would abandon that sound principle which he had so emphatically laid down at the time of introducing the Roman Catholic Relief Bill-that of yielding to the pressure of the times, and conceding when no longer able to resist. Surely he could not shut his eyes to the fact, that at the present moment, such was the state of our commercial interests, so great was the distress and difficulty of obtaining employment for the labouring classes, and such was the spirit of discontent and disaffection growing up in the country, that he would be unable to resist the repeal of the Corn-laws, and the relaxation of our commercial code. Gibson cited the testimony of an American gentleman, Mr. Curtis, to show that the chief thing sought

Mr.