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    Feb 11, 1860. J The 127

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    THE TREATY.' /^l ONTRAB-T to what Was in...

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    THE' COMING PARLIAMENTARY STRUGGLE. . TH...

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    Feb 11, 1860. J The 127

    Feb 11 , 1860 . J The 127

    The Treaty.' /^L Ontrab-T To What Was In...

    THE TREATY . ' /^ l ONTRAB-T to what Was intended , the Commercial Treaty V > with France Ms been published .-several days before the Chancellor pf tie Exchequer has been able to make his financial statement for the year . The public ciiriosity has thus been prematurely gratified , to the detriment of ministers , and the proportionate advantage of Opposition . No doubt it is a bore to have the taste of the pill in your mouth , even for a short time before you have currant jelly ; but so it is , and there is no help for it now . Perhaps , upon the whole , Mr : Gladstone may have no great cause to . " complain ; for whatever may have been the disappointment felt at what the treaty does not contain , time has

    been given for it to pass away , before the many consolations of the Budget have been revealed . Without adverting to the latter , it may not be amiss to consider the specific merits and demerits of the former . The Budget may or may . not be adopted by Parliament , in part or in the whole . Whig Governments have never shown themselves immovably obstinate in refusing to remodel their measures of finance . It seems , indeed , to be one of their traditions , that a mere money question , a matter , of a few millions more or less , to the vulgar tax-paying ; community can ever be fairly considered a point of honour Avith them . Lord Altiioii p the most , popular of Whig Chancellors of the

    , Exchequer , did riot mind coming down to the House on a Monday , and telling it to rub out of its recollection all he had said on * the Friday before about what he should want to meet the current outgoings of the year , as in ' point of fact he had quite forgotten the beer duties ., Sir Ciiaules Wood , another of our heaven-born financiers , was never indeed known to-admit himself wrong in any of his calculations : but sooner than resign we know that he agreed to take hack his Budget three times , in one session . Mr . Gladstone has'indeed been brought up in a different school , and might possibly evince less -pliancy ; yet there are those who believe that the additional week afforded

    him for reflection , after the warning division on Mr . Wise s motion , was not altogether thrown , away ; . and that in the intervals of gargling for that not inopportune sorethroat , many minor points were reconsidered , But the terms of the treaty with Prance having once been agreed to between the two Governments , cannot be so easily modified . Such , as they are they must stand . ' for the present , and we must make up our minds to make the best of them , for we do not suppose that even Lord Beuby , rash as he is , would like to accept the

    responsibility of repudiating what has been done as the joint act of the two Governments / Friendship with France , after such repudiation , would of course be at an end ; and when those who have been friends abruptly cease to be so , we know pretty well how they , usually regard each other . Without rescinding the treaty , however , its details may fairly be criticised ; and as in point of fact we know that they are certain to be so , and from different points of view , it becomes our duty to set before our readers the principal grounds of the exceptions about to be taken .

    , It is said with truth , that to bind ourselves for a term of years not to impose duties for revenue on articles like brandy and wine beyond a certain fixed amount , and not to impose any duties whatever on the various fabrics of silk , wool , leather , jewellery , lace , paper , & c , in many of which our . French neighbours exec ] , is improvident as a matter of finance , and contrary to principle as regards free trade . Mr . Gladstone contends that , fiscally , we shall lose nothing in the long run by either the abatement " or abolition . He believes that foreign wine and spirits will be

    consumed to an additional extent , sufficient to reimburse the Treasury for what it is about to forego in high duties ; and he contends that articles of manufacture which compete with similar products of our own , ought under no circumstances to form the objects of taxation when brought from abroad , inasmuch as they cannot do so without becomingl , tho objects of protective duties . We own that , in our opinion , it is easier to defend the provisions of tlve treaty in both respects on wholly different ground . Mr . Gladstone will not be able to convince pluiy folks easily that the class which is to . have the benefit of

    cheapened cognac and claret will benr exclusively the burthen of making good the temporary loss Hint all agree must be incurred in trying the experiment ; and when it was determined that wo should go bargaining about mutual reductions with our friends on the othor side of the channel , we must say wo think it is a pity that the only cessions wo should have required from them were in favQiiv of those great and flourishing interests that need no further help , while alj the concessions made by us appear to have , been in favour of articles of comparative luxury , whim , or show , Manchester and , Leeds , Staffordshire rind . Warwickshire werq already busy , and Jikoly to bo so , The mining and manufacturing interests , generally , have seldom indeed been in a more prosperous state . They are , no doubt , highly pleased at the proposed change , and no one ought to grudge

    them the advantage it is likely to bring . But we are bound to acknowledge as impartial jurors , whose verdict as between the classes must be given without fear , favour , or affection , that another great interest had a paramount claim to the care of our Government in tlieir dealings with France . We need hardly say that we allude to the Shipping- interest , just now seriously dep ressed , and at all times deserving the peculiar consideration of the rulers of this country . The differential duties on British vessels entering French ports from any third country , are most injurious to our commercial marine' It is one thing to propose retaliating duties here on French vessels , and it is quite another

    thing When negotiating a Free Trade Treaty to allow this odious and oppressive system to remain intact . We do not wish to impute to ministers forgetfulness of the interests of their country in this matter , but we must give utterance to our regret that if they made the demand for equalized tonnage dues ,. they were not more firm in insisting upon them . Our fops might very well have been left to pay sixpenee a pair more for their glove & , and our fine ladies a few shillings a yard more for their velvet and lace , if something more nearly approaching to common justice had been extorted for our mercantile marine engaged in the carrying trade from distant parts of the world . We treat French vessels as we treat our own ; why should not France

    reciprocate our cosmopolitan ; liberality ? But , as we have said , we much prefer to rest the defence of the new commercial treaty on other grounds . It is a great political fact , —a fact worth ten times the utmost fiscal loss its enemies charge to its dcbit ,---and that not only morally speaking , but in monies numbered ; . , Already it lias caused the army and navy estimates for the year , as they were originally framed , to be cut ' down very materially . But , bearing in recollection that we are not yet emerged from a military fever , following a national ague of ' unexampled intensity , it cannot be supposed that we shall see at the first blush all ' -the good effects that arc . likely to

    t'lisue in . this . respect . Every year , moreover , will inevitably increase the number of those in each country the , rate of whose profits and wages will in future depend upon the preservation of peace . . The Chancellor of the Exchequer declares that within a very limited time , the experiment he thus proposes to make will , by ' its financial results , vindicate itself ,: We say , whether it does so or not , we shall be large gainers thereby ; and that , taking into account eahnly the whole of the consequences , were the whole of the revenue , permanently lost \ ybich is now about to be temporarily given up , the treaty would be worth the money .

    The' Coming Parliamentary Struggle. . Th...

    THE' COMING PARLIAMENTARY STRUGGLE . . THE battle of the Budget is certain to engross public , attention during the coining , week , to the exclusion of all other subjects of a political nature , llival systems of finance and abstract economic theories will furnish forth the weapons of the fray : but weapons are one tiling , and the motives which impel men to seek them out arid use them are another . An egotistic crotcheteer like Lord Oveustone , or a savings-bonk squire bewitched with the notion that he was born , sixty years since , to

    be a finance minister , like Sir Hexky Willougiihv , infty really take an interest in the questions at issue for sake of their intrinsic merits ! . But as neither of them has so much as a Saxciio IUnza to follow him , they ' may , with some half-dozen other arithmetical knights-errant , be allowed to do their solitary tiltings on the flank of the armies to which they do not property belong , without further consideration or notice . . The bulk of the forces engaged on either side arm for the fight in no visionary or romantic mood . The various leaders they follow are

    stimulated in the main by the passion for power , which , though it degenerates sometimes into factious spite or cupidity , is not always ignoble . We hate sentimcntalism in politics , and therefore we eschew the stale hypocrisy oi' beliovirig that Lord PaUikiiston is actuated only by seltVforgotful patriotism , and that Lord DiiiusY is too rich and ' highborn to care for otfice , save to oblige the Queen and to promote the public good . We believe nothing of out of Bedlam who docs

    the kind , nnd wo do not know any man . On the contrary , we know , and as we knyw we think it far bettor to say , that Whigs and Tories arc animated mainly by tlita desire they never couse to deny but never ecaso to foul , of beating ono another at the gainc 6 f parliamentary ascondaney . Of course there arc shades of difference in the keomiuss of personal appetite , and corresponding varieties in tha-xoul which individuals display in the contest . Mr . Disraeli may bo excused for being more

    impatient for docisivc victory than Lord Stanley , who has a longer life before hhn , and who cum bettor afford to abide tho charitor of accidents , The rig ht lion , member for Dupku has had quite enough of the manna of the wilderness , and would Jiko puce more to spend a summer in the promised land of pomir , were ifc only to mako sure of a city of refugo boyond Jordan . Sir John Pakinqtou and Sir Edwaiid IU . 'lwkr would liknuncom-

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 11, 1860, page 3, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11021860/page/3/