It had been weakened also by the following considerations, which were in a great degree new elements in forming a judgment on this vital matter.
The general repeal of prohibitory duties, and the recent application of the principles of free trade to almost all articles of import from abroad, made the Corn Laws the object of more searching scrutiny and more invidious comment, and narrowed the ground on which their defence could be maintained.
Among the articles of foreign import prohibited up to the year 1842, and then admitted at low rates of duty, were some important articles of agricultural produce, salted and fresh meat, oxen, sheep, cows, etc. You probably recollect the panic which this admission caused—the forced sale of stock, the prophecies that it would be impossible to compete with the foreign grazier, and that meat would be reduced to threepence a pound. Five years have passed since this great change in the law took place, and your own experience will enable you to judge whether the panic was well founded, and whether the prophecies have been fulfilled.
The complete failure of these prophecies had naturally had its effect on public opinion with regard to the probable consequences of a free intercourse in other articles of agricultural produce.
There was another circumstance still more calculated to diminish apprehensions as to the risk of opening the corn market of this country to foreign competition. There has appeared of late years a tendency to increase in the consumption of articles of subsistence much more rapid than the increase in the population. It is difficult, if not impossible, on account of the absence of statistical information, to measure accurately that increase in the case of articles of first necessity, such as corn and meat; but it may be inferred from the relative consumption at different periods of articles in respect to which the comparison can be instituted.
The following is an account of some of the principal articles entered for home consumption in the years 1841 and 1846 respectively:
| Articles. | 1841. | 1846. | ||
| Cocoa | 1,930,764 | lbs. | 2,962,327 | lbs. |
| Coffee | 28,420,980 | lbs. | 36,781,391 | lbs. |
| Currants | 190,071 | cwts. | 359,315 | cwts. |
| Rice | 245,887 | cwts. | 466,961 | cwts. |
| Pepper | 2,750,790 | lbs. | 3,297,431 | lbs. |
| Sugar | 4,065,971 | cwts. | 5,231,845 | cwts. |
| Molasses | 402,422 | cwts. | 582,665 | cwts. |
| Tea | 36,681,877 | lbs. | 46,728,208 | lbs. |
| Tobacco and Snuff | 22,308,385 | lbs. | 27,001,908 | lbs. |
| Brandy | 1,165,137 | gallons | 1,515,954 | gallons |
| Geneva | 15,404 | gallons | 40,211 | gallons |
| British Spirits | 20,642,333 | gallons | 23,122,581 | gallons |
| Malt, charged with duty | 36,164,448 | bushels | 41,979,000 | bushels |
Surely it is impossible to refer to this comparative table without being forcibly struck by the rapid increase in the consumption of the articles which it embraces. Can there be a doubt that if the consumption of articles of a secondary necessity has been thus advancing, the consumption of articles of first necessity—of meat and of bread, for instance—has been making at least an equally rapid progress?
During the greater part of the period included in the return, from the middle of 1842 to the end of 1846, the free trade measures have been in operation. They have been in operation, therefore—concurrently, at least—with these evidences of the increasing ease and comfort of the people. Other causes have no doubt contributed to that ease and comfort; but even if the whole effect be assigned to those other causes—to railway enterprise or anything else—it does not affect my present argument. If there be from any cause a tendency to the consumption of articles of the first necessity much more rapid than the increase of population, the responsibility of undertaking to regulate the supply of food by legislative restraints, and the difficulty of maintaining these restraints in the event of any sudden check to prosperity or increased price of subsistence, will be greatly augmented; while, on the other hand, the danger to be apprehended from foreign competition is materially lessened.
It was from the combined influence of these various considerations—from diminished confidence in the necessity or advantage of protection; from the increasing difficulty of resisting the application to articles of food of those principles which had been gradually applied to so many other articles; from the result of the experiment made with regard to cattle and meat in 1842; from the evidences of rapidly increasing consumption; from the aggravation of every other difficulty in the maintenance of the Corn Laws by the fact of their suspension on the first real pressure—it was from the combined influence of such considerations that I came to the conclusion that the attempt to maintain those laws inviolate after their suspension would be impolitic, that the struggle for their maintenance would assume a new character, and that no advantage to be gained by success could counterbalance the consequences of failure, or even the evils attending protracted conflict.