170
MR. COBDEN'S SPEECH.
Mr. Cobden commenced his speech by saying that the motion might more properly have been brought forward by some county member, but he did not feel that he was precluded from taking a prominent part in a question affecting the interests of farmers and farm labourers, for whom he felt a strong sympathy. He went on to state what he would prove before the committee:—
"I will not bring forward a single witness before that committee who shall not be a tenant farmer, or a landed proprietor, and they shall be persons eminent for their reputation as practical agriculturists. The opinion which I shall hold on entering the committee is, that, 'protection,' as it is called, instead of being beneficial, is delusive and injurious to the tenant farmers; and that opinion I shall be prepared to sustain by the evidence of tennant farmers themselves. I wish it to be understood I do not admit that what is called protection to agriculturists has ever been any protection at all to them; on the contrary, I hold that its only effect has been to mislead them. This has been denied both in this House and out of doors. I have recently read over again the evidence taken before the committees which sat previous to the passing of the Corn Law of 1815, and I leave it to any man to say whether it was not contended at that time that sufficient protection could not be given to the agriculturists, unless they got 80s. & quarter for wheat. I wish to remind the hon. member for Wiltshire (Mr. Bennett) that he gave it as his opinion, before the committee of 1814, that wheat could not be grown in this country unless the farmers got 90s. a quarter, or 12s. a bushel for it, while now he is supporting a minister who only proposes to give the farmers 56s, a quarter, and confesses he cannot guarantee even that. It has been denied that this house has ever promised to guarantee prices for their produce to the farmers. Now, what was the custom of the country from the passing of the Corn Law in 1815? Why, I will bring old men before the committee who will state that farmers valued their farms from that time by a computation of wheat being at 80s, a quarter. I can also prove that agricultural societies which met in 1821 passed resolutions declaring that they were deceived by the act of 1815, that they had taken farms calculating upon selling wheat at 80s, while, in fact, it had fallen to little more than 50s. In the committee which sat in 1836 witnesses stated that they had been deceived in the price of their turn; and I ask whether, at the present moment, rents are not fixed rather with reference to certain acts that were passed than the intrinsic worth of the farms? In consequence of the alteration that was made in the Corn Law in 1812, the rent of farms has been
