History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 3 (of 4)

by W. S. Lindsay

CHAPTER XIV.

Further returns of the Board of Trade, and address of the Shipowners’ Society to the electors, 13th April, 1859—Shipowners’ meeting in London—Character of the speeches at it—Mr. Lindsay proposes an amendment—Effect of the war between France and Austria—Mr. Lindsay moves for an inquiry into the burdens on the Shipping Interest, 31st January, 1860—Report of the Committee thereon—Views with regard to foreign countries—The Netherlands—The United States—Generally unsatisfactory state of the intercourse with foreign nations—The present depression beyond the influence of Government—General results of Steamers versus Sailing Vessels—The Committee resists the plan of re-imposing restrictions on the Colonial Trade—Difficulty of enforcing reciprocity—Want of energy on the part of the English Foreign Office—Rights of belligerents—Privateering abolished in Europe; America, however, declining to accept this proposal—Views of the Committee thereon, and on the liability of Merchant Shipping—Burden of light dues—Pilotage Charges made by local authorities now, generally, abolished, as well as those of the Stade dues—The report of 1860, generally, accepted by the Mercantile Marine—Magnificent English Merchant Sailing vessels, 1859-1872—The Thermopylæ—Sir Lancelot and others—Americans completely outstripped—Equal increase in the number as well as the excellence of English shipping—Results of the Free-trade policy.

Besides the statistical returns supplied by the Board of Trade on their report on the memorial of the Shipowners to her Majesty, this Board, on the 25th February, 1859, published further returns which were seized upon by the Shipowners’ Association, and made the basis for an energetic manifesto addressed to the constituencies of the United Kingdom at the general election in the spring of 1859.[195]

Further returns of the Board of Trade,

and address of the Shipowners’ Society to the electors, April 13, 1859.

The returns in question consisted of five statements, including the period from 1834 to 1858. They are too voluminous to be given here, but it was clear from them that, if the increase of the entrances and clearances of British ships at the ports of the United Kingdom, since the repeal of the Navigation Laws, had been 3,221,767, the increase of foreign ships on the other hand amounted to 5,083,826 tons. To these leading facts, the Shipowners’ Association, triumphantly, referred the different constituencies, and, although British ships in the eight years over which these returns extended, had increased to a far greater extent than they had in any similar previous period, the Association pointed to the still greater increase of foreign shipping, and implored the electors of the leading maritime ports to send such representatives to the new Parliament, who would be exponents of the opinions they sought to perpetuate; and who would save British Shipowners from the certain ruin in their opinion awaiting them, as was so clearly demonstrated by the “appalling” number of foreign ships frequenting our ports. Pertinaciously adhering in this celebrated manifesto to their extreme Protectionist principles, they now reasserted with confidence, and with a brazen front the more astonishing, after what they had previously admitted, every doctrine that had proved to be fallacious, every “fact” which had long since been shown to have had its origin in the regions of fancy or fiction, every appeal to be saved from ruin as baseless as the shepherd’s wolf cry, and every theory as visionary as their own fears; by such means, hoping to revive a system, which the Legislature and every class of the community, except themselves, had pronounced to be neither wise, just, nor beneficial. But, with these principles patent to the whole world, fully confirmed, too, as they were, by the extraordinary success resulting from the repeal of the Navigation Laws, they kept harping on the one string, that foreign shipping entering and clearing from our ports had, since that period, increased in a greater ratio than our own, and this one fact produced to a large extent the desired effect on the maritime portions of the constituencies.

It was vain to tell them that, under the new policy, we had increased our shipping to an extent far beyond what had been hitherto accomplished; or that the nation at large, by obtaining all it required from foreign nations at materially reduced rates, was greatly and proportionately benefited by the change. Nor was it of any use to show that our exports and imports, and, consequently, the general wealth of the country, had already increased far beyond the most sanguine hopes of even the Free-traders. To attempt to prove to a maritime constituency that the more intercourse we had with other countries the better it would be for us, and that the impoverishment of our neighbours by restrictive laws was not the best means of enriching ourselves, was then a mere waste of time, and all such arguments were, at too many of our seaports, only received with scorn and ridicule. At all such places, the one fact I have named carried the day. Among various other seaport representatives who held Free-trade principles, I lost my seat for the Tynemouth boroughs; at least, I found such a phalanx of Shipowners arrayed against me, that I should have had a great struggle to retain it.[196] However, within a week, I found another seat at Sunderland, and, though the bulk of the Shipowners there, too, were opposed to my views, I was returned over my Conservative opponent (the late George Hudson) by a very large majority.[197] But it fared, otherwise, with many better men who lost their seats and did not find others.

The one fact in the Shipowners’ manifesto, apparently, strengthened their cause in Parliament. I say apparently, because though the new men were pledged to vote for the removal of all “grievances” in the shape of peculiar and special burdens and for “reciprocity,” whatever that might mean, I question if any one of them would have voted for a reversion of our policy. It was idle to talk about it. “Protection to native industry” was gone, and gone for ever! England had adopted a policy which can never be reversed. But the General Shipowners’ Society of London, elated with success, resolved to make one more determined effort to, at least, restore the Colonial trade to the vessels of Great Britain, and to induce Parliament to recommend her Majesty in Council to exclude from our carrying trade the vessels of those nations which did not reciprocate.

Shipowners’ meeting in London.

With these objects in view, they invited to their aid delegates from all the seaports in the kingdom, and every person of influence in and out of Parliament likely to aid their cause. Another public meeting was held in the London Tavern, at which Mr. R. W. Crawford, one of the members for the City, took the chair. I had, unexpectedly, received an invitation to attend, which I accepted, as the question to be discussed, apart from my duty to my constituents, was one in which I had a large personal interest. Knowing, however, that few persons in the vast assembly which had been got together agreed with the view I entertained, I took my seat, almost out of sight, in the rear of the platform. The meeting was, indeed, one of a most influential character. Many men were there whose cheque for 10,000l. would have passed as freely as a 5l. note, and whose hale and ruddy countenances did not at all betoken that they were on “the road to ruin.” Perhaps it was malicious on the part of the ‘Times’ to describe the meeting “as the largest collection of political and commercial fossils which could be got together in these adverse days for political antiquarianism;” but it is quite true that their views, generally, so far as they could be comprehended, were certainly of an antiquarian character.