"The hon. gentleman talked of the universal feeling in support of his views; whereas for a long time past there had been no petitions complaining of the price of food, or of any difficulty in purchasing it; and his (Mr. Christopher's) belief was, that the working classes, whom the honourable gentleman so ably put himself forward as the advocate of in this matter, would, if they were consulted, reply that they were perfectly satisfied with the Corn Law as it at present stood. (Hear, hear.) He should himself be the last man in the house to oppose the motion, did he conceive that it would produce the results which the honourable gentleman anticipated, but he entirely differed from the honourable gentleman in the matter. One object of the late Corn Law had been to prevent excessive fluctuations of prices, and the subsequent returns showed that, under the operation of the measure, there had been less fluctuations in pride than at any former period."
The repeal of those laws, he said, would not be attended with the beneficial results which Mr. Villiers anticipated; for no reciprocity in foreign countries had followed any of the other relaxations which we had recently made in our tariff. There was no risk of our population suffering any privation, or of our manufacturers sustaining any loss from the want of exchange and intercourse with foreign states owing to the operation of these laws, as an immense amount of corn had been imported into the country during the last two years, under the existing duties, and a corresponding amount of manufactures had been exported to pay for it.
Mr. Mitchell expressed his intention of supporting the motion, although he had previously gone only the length of supporting a motion for fixed duty. He showed that the Zollverein had been instituted in consequence of our Corn Laws, and that, owing to the Zollverein, which operated almost as a prohibition on our manufactures, we could not get corn from Prussia unless we paid for it in bullion. That bullion was in consequence withdrawn from our circulation; and, as soon as that was done, the Bank was compelled to put on the screw for its own protection. That depressed the price of our manufactures, and aggravated the distress which was likely to prevail from other
