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full share of the evil? And if the city of London must be affected with that which pressed heavily on the great mass of the community, why should not the corporate body of that city be permitted to lay their case before their lordships by counsel and witnesses at their bar? It would be but a waste of time, therefore, to argue, that even if the city of London could be exempted from the direct and immediate consequences of the measure, they had clearly an interest to support it, on the ground that whatever was deeply felt in other quarters of the kingdom, must be deeply felt in London. The measure now in contemplation, as the petitioners conceived, would be deeply felt all over the nation, and still more deeply felt in the metropolis. As far as his researches had gone, then, he repeated that he did not know of the existence of so perverse a rule as that petitioners should not be heard for their interests merely because their interests happened to be the same with those of the mass of the community. But if there had existed so strange a regulation as that a petitioner should not be heard, because another happened to have the same interest in the question, the petitioners here had a peculiar and local interest that no measure should pass without inquiry, the immediate effect of which would be to enhance the price of that which formed the basis of the subsistence of the great mass of the population. Suppose for a moment, that there were some foundation for the theory, that the effect of this measure would ultimately be to reduce the price of corn; yet it ought to be considered, that this future good must be brought about by the infliction of a present evil. Surely, then, these petitioners had a right to come before their lordships, and state the information which it might be peculiarly in their power to give as to the extent of the evil, and the manner in which it would operate on the manufacturing and commercial industry of the city of London, and the rest of the community. Supposing that the theory of the supporters of the Bill were as sound as he believed it to be fallacious, it was surely of some consequence, even in that view of the subject, that their lordships should be apprised of the full extent of the evil or inconvenience which for a time at least must be the result of the proposed regulation; and it was important, too, that they should be heard as to those facts which might justify or destroy

the hopes of those future benefits which their lordships expected the country to derive from it. It had not been said in their lordships House, he trusted it would not be said there, that those who petitioned against the measure were incapable of forming an accurate opinion upon the question. It would be paying a false compliment to Parliament to say, that great additional light on the subject had not been gained from without. For his own part, he confessed that he bad derived much information from the publications which had appeared; and he believed that if Parliament had been called upon to legislate on the subject at the time when the matter was first mentioned, they would have done so with infinitely less knowledge on both sides than they now had. The application now made to their lordships was, that the petitioners might be heard in this particular stage of the measure, when the information which they should be able to give their lordships would bear more immediately and directly on the question. If any one imagined that it was so peculiarly the pro vince of Parliament to consider what were the general principles of commerce upon which they ought to legislate, that they would disdain to receive any information from without; yet, on certain particular points, the corporation of London might be able to furnish information, which it would be impossible for their lordships to obtain in any other manger— points of which the importance was admitted, and with respect to which the reports of their committees would supply them very inadequately with the means of knowledge. The first point was this :that perhaps the petitioners might be enabled to furnish their lordships with evidence both of fact and experience as to those particulars on which the supporters of the measure rested their cause; he said evidence of fact and experience; he spoke not of opinion, though the report of their committee shewed in every page that the opinions of the witnesses had been asked, and properly asked. But supposing no opinions were to be asked from these petitioners, their lordships might derive most important evidence from facts and experience as to what had been the past operation of those laws which had been considered as similar to that which it was now proposed to enact. They might inform their lordships whether it had been found that the

discouragement of importation had pro- | war, permanent in time of peace-if,
duced no inconvenience in the metro-
polis. It had been asserted, that the ex-
perience of the early part of the last
century afforded a strong argument in
favour of a similar system for the present
day. That was a point which rested
partly on experience of the past, and
partly on the opinions of men supposed
to be peculiarly qualified to come to an
accurate conclusion on the subject; and
no doubt the opinions of such men ought
to be asked, and received with respect
and attention. But though they were to
refuse to listen to the opinions of these
petitioners, would their lordships refuse
to hear them state facts, which it was
most material for their lordships to know,
before they finally decided a question of
this magnitude? The period to which he
had adverted was not so remote as to
render it impossible to bring forward facts
relating to it as connected with this
system. The latter period, from 1766 to
the present time, was certainly not too
remote. With respect to that at least,
many important facts might be communi-
cated; and could their lordships refuse to
listen to them? In considering how the
laws on this subject had operated, in en-
couraging or discouraging importation,
how far the average price corresponded
with the natural price of corn, with other
matters most important to be ascertained
to what could their lordships resort but
the evidence of facts and experience?
It had been said, that though there was
no necessity at present to legislate on this
subject, the measure would be productive
of much good at a future period. On
what ground did that opinion rest? If it
rested on the dearness of grain during the
last twenty years, how could they know
whether this was a good ground to rest
upon, without an examination of facts?
It surely ought to be shown, that the
dearness of corn was owing to the bad
effects of the principle acted upon during
the period in question. If the inconve-
nience was serious and lamentable, their
lordships ought to inquire whether the
evil had resulted from the check imposed
by the war upon importation, or from the
supposed discouragement of agriculture.
If it should appear that the dearness
of corn had been the effect of the difficul-
ties thrown in the way of importation, it
would be then for their lordships to con-
sider whether they ought to render that
inconvenience which arose from a state of

indeed, they were to have peace. Sup-
pose it were conceded that it was a wise
system of legislation to encourage one
species of industry at the expense of
others, in opposition to the common sense
of mankind; was it expedient to adopt a
permanent system, a system calculated
to operate for twenty years on this the
most important of all subjects, in a situa
tion in which nothing else was permanent,
when they knew not whether they were
to have peace or war; or even, if they
were to enjoy the blessings of peace,
when they knew not in what condition
matters were likely to settle and rest?
To legislate on such a subject, under such
circumstances, was, he must say, very
little becoming the wisdom and dignity
of Parliament. On the subject of the
manner in which the average price was
calculated, he should not attempt to add
any thing to what had been said by a
noble friend of his; but he must advert
to the answer given by another noble
friend, that this average price of 80s.
was not the result of minute inquiry, and
careful and certain calculation, but founded
upon an arbitrary guess. Good God,
what an expression, when applied to such
a subject as this!-an arbitrary guess from
the opinions of a few witnesses, without
proof or calculation. Half a dozen wit-
nesses had given their opinions as to what
appeared to them to be a proper price,
and the average was struck out of these
opinions. But their lordships were bound
to be satisfied by some strong proof as to
what was the proper average with relation
to the present price and the generat
quantity now raised. It was idle to ask
any particular farmer at what price he
could raise corn. It depended on the
county, on the parish, on the nature of
the farm, and the nature of the different
kinds of land on the same farm. With
respect to the witnesses who had given
their opinions respecting the price at
which corn could be raised, those opi-
nions always had a reference to the time
at which the question was asked, and the
charges of cultivation at that particular
period. All the witnesses, either directly
or indirectly, so qualified their opinions.
If, then, the time was so studiously
taken into account in giving these opi-
nions, where was the proof that be-
cause 80s. might be a proper average at
one period, it was therefore a proper
average price now? If the charges of

capital, British or otherwise, was directed to foreign manufactures, what means they had of fuel, what skill of machinery. He believed, in the latter point at least, there was no deficiency in what was called our rival nation. Philosophically speaking, he could not desire that a knowledge of mechanics should belong only to one nation. The great question was, would you refuse to inquire into the allegations of the petitioners coming forward to prove that their allegations were founded? His lordship then moved, "that the petitioners be permitted to give evidence, and to be heard by counsel at the bar of the House."

cultivation were diminished, why should not a lower average answer the purpose? They had now on their table, among other valuable information, a table of charges, and he defied any man to examine that table, without being convinced from the nature of the charges, that they must be very much reduced by the diminution in the price of corn. This proved the necessity, if they meant to fix the proper average, of much more minute and accurate information, and for that reason they ought not to legislate on such general grounds. He deprecated any interference whatever; but if the average had been named before with reference to the charges of cultivation at the time, why did they not now proceed on the same principle? Lord Grenville then proceeded to speak of the assize. On that subject he had been told, that under the present system 80 shillings for corn would make the loaf 16d. A noble earl (Liverpool) denied that, and seemed to think he could support his denial by proof-[hear!] Well, then, why not allow of the matter's being tried by proof at the bar? Bread was now 112d. the quartern loaf, and the average at 63s. It was hard to conceive, that if the average rose to 80s. bread would not be more than a shilling. All this was matter of proof. The pressure on manufactures was to be examined; that was also matter of proof, and on those things evidence was adducible. It was expedient to look carefully into the effect of the price of bread on the rate of labour, and that again on the dearness of manufactures, as influencing their reception in the foreign market. He had some time since received a table, stating this inquiry in a particular point of view. He had desired the idea to be enlarged, and believed he should have received the improved table from the person in question, but for the hurry of the Bill. He had, however, this day, on coming to the House, received from another person, a table of the nature he mentioned: he had not had time to make himself master of it, but it doubtless contained much important information. This ought not to be excluded from their lordships means of knowledge. The table gave the alterations of the value of bread for twenty-six years, with the contemporary alterations in the cheapness of manufactures. A noble earl (Liverpool) had said that our superiority in manufactures depended on our capital, fuel, and machinery. Inquiry might be directed to shew how much VOL. XXX.)

The Lord Chancellor said, that in every view of the present question as connected with the petitioners, and as involving manufacturing interests, he was inclined to attribute to it great importance: but in all its views, he must speak his fair opinion upon it; and he should speak that without considering the consequences to which he might be subjected, and to which, indeed, he had been subjected long before this discussion. In this free country, God forbid that any reasonable petition should not be received: God forbid that any should be rejected with disdain. The House would, in himself, hear a man who had lived through the most trying times of the country; and he would declare that he had always seen the petitions of the subject received with attention by that House, and their merits then decided on by the judgment of that House alone, They could recur to no other standard. The House, must be the final judge, and on its own discretion too. It was the only true and constitutional mode: but if that mode were once given up, from that moment the country was given up; but that moment, he for one, would not wish to survive. It was to him of no consideration whether the Bill was to serve the manufacturing or the agricultural interest

to satisfy him, its benefits must be general. Of the language that had been used on this subject, he could not help saying, though without allusion to whom it might have been used, or without pointing to this House, or the other, or the City, that that language was not calculated in general to work the ends of a true and solid deliberation. From all this, heats and disturbance must arise. As to petitions, it was the practice of the House to attend to them, but not to such a degree as to paralyse its judgment. There were points on which it would allow of no interference; (R)

pose, that the Legislature could ever have sanctioned practices so directly subversive of its main uses. If one petition, complaining generally of a principle, was to be listened to, why not listen to all that might be offered? He would turn to the noble lord himself: no man possessed a larger share of parliamentary experience, and he would ask him, had he ever met with a fact of the kind to sustain his present application? Had he been able to prop it up with a single precedent? As to himself, he had sat on that woolsack 13 years, and he would not be fit to sit an hour longer there, if he could not decide this. His experience necessarily furnished him with the history of a multitude of bills and petitions, and he had never seen one received when it did not turn on particular injuries received. General interests, in which the whole community had an equal share, were not suffered to come into those petitions. As to the phrase of rejecting the petition, or any petition, with disdain, it expressed no idea of his; but he could not allow himself, in matters of right, to distinguish between corporation and corporation, or corporation and individual. He considered every man coming to that bar as a respectable Briton, and to be relieved as far as its rules might allow. Now, if the petition was not to be sustained on authority and precedent, on what was it to be sustained? He must give his negative to the motion. To support the rules of the House, was actually to support the constitution, of which they were among the safeguards.

and this was done without infringing the rights of the subject. No petitions, for instance, were allowed on Tax Bills: as to the Corn Bill, the House must decide on their own judgment. The majorities on it were greater than he had ever seen; and after this declared sense of the House, how could he persuade himself that the noble lord was not acting against his better judgment? How could the city of London be heard by counsel against the Bill? It was against the rules of the House. He would suppose nothing of the past session, nothing of the present, but that this was the second reading-and that the city of London petitioned. The rules and practices of the House were against the petitions being received. These rules and practices, the lex et consuetudo parliamenti, were among the safeguards of the constitution, and they could not be violated with impunity. He said nothing of this from disregard of the City. He had a great respect for it as a body, much regard for many of its members: he had received much attention from it. But to all petitions in the same spirit and substance as the petition of the City, he must oppose the rules of the House. He knew that the number of petitions against the Bill was almost unexampled. The number of petitions for it was yet nearly as numerous; the signatures were not indeed as many, but that might be owing to obvious causes. But the point on which his consent must turn was, whether the petition on the table complained of certain and specific injuries. Did it point out what manufacturers would suffer; did it speak in the name of the injured individuals? No; he could find nothing but opinions upon the general principle of the Bill. If this was allowed as a sufficient claim for the hearing of counsel, why must not Bristol be heard,-why must not Birmingham, why not Cheltenham,-why not, in fact, every town in the kingdom? [The duke of Gloucester here expressed some dissent.] "The noble duke," said the Lord Chancellor, "cries, Hear! I wish he would hear, and I now tell him, that as I think all petitioners equal, I know all peers to be so." He then proceeded-If they were to hear the petitions of the City against agriculture, why not hear those of agriculture in turn? Their bar might be thus perpetually occupied by debating upon general principles. The greater occupations and duties of the House must be at an end. It was impossible to sup

Earl Grey could not help feeling considerable surprise at the speech which he had just heard. The matter of it was most new to him, and the agitation under which it had been delivered made it still more peculiar. But he must, however, reluctantly, advert to the address made to a noble duke near him. That noble person had been told, that all peers were equal. Certainly, whatever might be the cause of the declaration, there was no man in that House who stood less in need of it: those who had the honour of being in habits of intercourse with that noble person, were fully acquainted with that truth; and there was perhaps no peer among their lordships in whom the consciousness of high rank was less obvious and obtrusive. The noble lord had disputed the petition on the ground of its generality. He said he would consider the Bill as one, then before their lord

borious class of the city. But this peti

was coupled by direct reference with the former, and it came to their lordships bar asking to be heard by counsel to the complaints already detailed. He could conceive nothing that came more within the rules of the House. But was the practice to be actually adopted of narrowing the entrance of the subject's complaints? He should conceive this an unhappy innovation indeed. He felt the advantage of a liberal reception of those appeals almost as important to the House as to the complainant. Like the poet's mercy-" It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes." The exercise of the right of petitioning, prevented the bursting forth of those desperate dissensions which often produced convulsions under despotic governments; and on no subject should their lordships show themselves more ready to listen to the complaints of the people, than on that which related to their subsistence.

ships for the first time. The value of this concession was nothing. The petition must not be taken alone; the injuries tioners might in any stage of the Bill were distinctly stated in a petition of the desire to be heard. That noble lord had Mayor, Aldermen, and Common-council, said, that if one city had a right to be in March. It stated, that raising the heard by counsel, so had all the rest. price of bread raised the expense of maNo doubt of it. So they all had. If Lon-nufacturing labour. The present petition don had a right, so had Bristol. It was perfectly certain, that if they had a right to complain, they had a right to be heard. He was told, that thus the House would be overcome with petitions: but was this incapable of remedy? Was it not possible to tell the petitioners that the matter of their petitions had been already determined, and that it was not necessary to examine into them further? But was there no instance of evidence being given and counsel heard on a petition on the general principle? Two years ago, had not counsel been heard on the Orders in Council? The question had been then indeed driven to a painful extremity, one which no friend to the country could contemplate, without regret at the train of measures which drove it on. But then the principle was the general one of in jury to the commercial prosperity of the country, and evidence was brought to confirm it. But, as to the favourite argument of the noble lord, was he to be told The Earl of Liverpool would confine that it was a good answer to the city of himself strictly to the question now before London-we cannot hear you, because the House; which was, not whether the Bristol has as good a right to be heard as petition of the city of London should be you have? But the petition did actually received, but whether the petitioners come within the limits of the noble lord. should be heard by counsel in support One of its clauses turned on the assize of of the allegations it contained. His obbread; which, by diminishing the loaf, jection to this was founded on a principle was now in the light of an injury, and as from which the House never departed, such suitable for the relief of parliament. namely, that they would not hear partiThere was no doubt that regulation in cular parties on a question of general such matters had a tendency to lower the legislation. A departure from this rule, quantity; and here was an injury to be in the present instance, would justify and removed, or at least examined into. This authorise a similar application from every was an immediate concern of the copora individual in the country, whatever his tion of London. There was another point condition or degree, who thought his of view, important also. The corporation interests affected by the present measure. fixed the assize. It was asserted that the This, it was obvious, would lead to endless quartern loaf would rise to 16d. It was delay; and on this ground of policy it a matter of moment to them to prove that was that the House would not hear indiviif injury was done here, it was by the as- duals on their special interests, when a size laws, and not by their management measure of general policy was before them. of it. But who were the petitioners? The present Bill affected the whole counThe corporation of the city of London. try; it proposed no separate regulation Had they no special interest? Un- for the city of London; and he was condoubtedly they had, and that in three vinced that if the House were to go on ways as consumers, as men interested hearing evidence, and listening to counsel in the common prosperity of the country, for ten years to come, they would hear and as masters of that multitude of me- precisely the same arguments as had been chanics and artificers that formed the la- already urged. The whole subject had

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