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am : the ¦ ' ¦^ E; r A.p;E-^: ; ' ; . ¦•...
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— HJ'vfriix itP'V
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. ~ ___. SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1852.
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pnblit Iffflirs.
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There is nothing so revolutionary, becau...
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HOW TO REALIZE PROTECTION. " The problem...
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THE FEAST OP EAGLES. Seated on the tribu...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Am : The ¦ ' ¦^ E; R A.P;E-^: ; ' ; . ¦•...
am : the ¦ ' ¦^ E ; A . p ; E- ^ : ' ; . ¦• : - . ; . ; , . ^^ r ; 'E S ^ WB » Afe : ;"
— Hj'vfriix Itp'v
— HJ ' vfriix itP'V
. ~ ___. Saturday, May 15, 1852.
. ~ ___ . SATURDAY , MAY 15 , 1852 .
Pnblit Iffflirs.
pnblit Iffflirs .
There Is Nothing So Revolutionary, Becau...
There is nothing so revolutionary , because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to keep things fixed "when all the world is by the very law of its creation in eternal progress , —Db . Arnold .
How To Realize Protection. " The Problem...
HOW TO REALIZE PROTECTION . " The problem which every Government has to solve , " said Lord Derby at the Mansion-house dinner , * ' is , how to reconcile apparently conflicting interests , so as to give no undue advantage to one class of our fellow-citizens over another ;" " the whole system , of our constitution , " he said afterwards , " is one great compromise ; " and this was said as elucidating certain references to the benefit conferred by recent changes of commercial policy upon consumers ; while - ' sight must not be lost , " added Lord Derby , of "those large classes , which , unconnected with , commerce , are yet an element of our strength as producers , though they are also consumers . " Lord Derby therefore contemplates some compromises between producers and consumers . The object is a just one , —at least the object intended by Lord Derby ; for the object stated by him is not very intelligible . A real statesman will not feel a primary interest either in producers or consumers ; but in the human beings , be they either the one or the other , without distinction ; and the interests of human beings are identical in
production and consumption , which are but different stages in the same process . Lord Derby , however * has overlooked the important fact , that recent commercial reforms—for reforms they are —did not deal so much with the interests of producers or consumers , as with the interests of exchangers . The freedom which was introduced into our tariff was not freedom of production or consumption , but of trade . Now the only direct and legitimate incentive to trade is the love of lucre : trade will do nothing for the consumer , b
unless the consumer will oner a pront as onus in the transaction ; it will do anything for a profit . It will bestow boundless energies on the working of a jewelled toy , which luxury makes a " well paid employment ; " it slights and neglects agriculture , the essential business of industry , because it is not a well paid employment . Trade therefore little cares to serve the interests of producers any more than of consumers : it wilfnot distribute industry according to the vital wants of the people ; it will not obtain markets for the producers of the most needful articles .
It will only " supply the wants" of society in so far as those wants happen to meet the interests of trade . Bethnal-green and Paisley , large tracts of Nottinghamshire and Lancashire , nay , of Dorsetshire and Wiltshire , want more food ; foodgrowing Dorset and Wiltshire , Somerset and Warwickshire , want more consumers ; but froo trade does little to enable either side to meet the other . It might bo done , however , with immense gain to both sides . Protection , assuming that free trade suffices for
the consumer , professes to benefit the producerat the expense of the consumer ; and Lord Derby assumes that the compromise is inevitable . The assumption is a mistake : the consumer is interested in the largest production ; the producer in the largest consumption ; and the country is interested in . the substantial welfare of all , call them how you will . Protection which attempts to benefit the producer by limiting . production , violates every law of material welfare and progress , and permanently subserves no interest . The object is to bring consumer and producer into sincorer relations with each other ; and that is
quite possible . m Wo have before us a curious circular , given us by a friend , and issued by a tradesman in one of tfio suburbs , professing to Supply dairy produce direct from Somersetshire . Tho document is interesting to us , because we are awaro that in that very county of Somersetshire , a notion has spontaneously sprung tip among the farmers ,
that the object of Protection mig ht in some way be attained if they could establish conamunica ^ tions direct with customers in the ^ towns . This notion has arisen amongy men in no degree bookishly inclined , wholly innocent of any " Socialistic" ideas , arid ; in fact , totally remote from theory of every kind . There is , however , strong practical ground for their notion . The market is at present embarrassedj not only by competition in the ordinary sense of the word , but also by another species , not so generally taken into
account . Suck regulation of industry as does accrue directs its attention less to production than to exchange ; which , as we have repeatedly shown , is not the primary and essential branch of industry , but only a secondary and auxiliary branch . The notion , therefore , is , not of multiplying products , but of obtaining " employment ;" and great is the effort to " obtain employment " out of every article produced and conveyed to market , lumbers try to have a hand in it . Not a cabbage comes up to market but what twenty
people endeavour to lend a hand in sowing , picking , or carrying it . Politico-cecononiically , it may be said that each one of those persons is trying to take a share of said cabbage to his own maw . To the " consumer" the effect is virtually an enhancement of price ; and in truth competition , which incites men to snatch at a share of employment upon a limited amount of production , instead of multiplying products ,
proportionately increases the cost of production , is one element of the high prices that " rule" in England for the simplest products of the soil . * Believed of this superfluous " employment , " such articles would at once become * cheaper : they would also not be clipped and adulterated by the way , if , as the farmers of Somersetshire have been thinking , consumers and producers were brought into direet relation with each othet .
Now that relation would be established , if the tradesman in the London suburb were to give his customers the names and addresses of his Somersetshire producers ; and to those producers the names and addresses of his suburban customers . He would not need to be afraid that he would be superseded by direct dealing ; since he preoccupies the post which any such , dealing would render necessary , and fulfils the duties , we dare to say , as ooconomically a 3 possible . The two classes for which he is the intermediary would then obtain the guarantee which each desires : the consumer would know that he was obtaining the genuine product of Somersetshire ; the Somersetshire farmer would know that he had a certain connexion for whom to work .
This relation is in part established by the People ' s Mill at Leeds , with its 3500 proprietors , each of 11 . share . Here tkeidealer and consumer are one : the dealer has no interest except to obtain genuine goods ; and the mill has a registered corps of customers , pledged by their own stake in it to deal with the establishment . If the organization suggested by Mr . George Pelsant Dawson , of Osgodby , in Yorkshire , were established—an organization of agricultural producers dealing collectively—and it were to deal with le
organizations in towns like that of the Peop ' s Mill , the whole chain of needful relations , from the producer to the consumer , would be established—tho consumer would be obtaining certified articles ; the producer would be working for a certain market ; and the intermediary would be working in his vocation without risk or uncertainty . We havo already mentioned a plan by which this process might be adapted to tne proprietary system , by means of subscribers , who would contribute to the capital of a dealer , and receive in return a right of visit to hie warehouses or books —exactly the relation of tho individual
shareholders to tho People's Mill . For example , a brewer in actual working might admit a number of his customers , as subscribers of a small fixed sum , to view his works ; in such case , the subscribers would obtain a guarantee for the genuine quality , just price , and general fair-dealing of the brewer * tho brewer would obtain a proportionate access to hip capital , and a certain number ' of customers pledged to deal with him ; a mutual guarantee , abolishing reciprocally tho two grand uncertainties which are tho curso of tho dealer or * To certain roady oluoofcions by tho Old School political-ffliconomiHtB , lot ub obHorvo , that tho high prioo cannot bo duo to labour , when that is cheap ; nor to rent , when lands aro compotod for ; nor to " limited field of production , " while lands aro but half cultivated . .
producer ^ arid the consumer . : This ^ plant is no longer a , merematter of theory , but has actually been adopted by a new brewery company already at work in . the metropolis ; , with everyprospect of success . And the principle , most easily traced in some simple avocation , is equally applicable to the most complicated . It wotilcf , for instance enable any number of smaller capitalists engaged
m tne outntting or Imendraperytradeto unite with each other and their customers , and thus to make stand against the destructibn which otherwise awaits them at the hands of the mammoth , capitalists . It would enable capitalists , in more than one branch of the woollen trade , to escape from the competition which even a very limited number of competitors cannot mitigate , and in which the destruction of one or the other becomes a mere question of time .
It is by encouraging such applications as this , by removing the impediments , that the prin ciple ot Concert would enable any real statesman , capable of seizing the opportunity of the day , to reconcile the interest of consumer and producer , and to effectuate that which Protection promised without performing ; it would enable any great statesman , desirous of benefiting the producer ,
and especially the agricultural producer , to give relief , although Protection is justly condemned past recall . Qne step is made in that direction by Mr . Disraeli , when he indicates the probability that Government , reversing the order of its predecessors , will afford facilities for organization of the working classes , enabling them to concert together for tne pronaotiori of their own interests . It is a step towards the true Protection .
The Feast Op Eagles. Seated On The Tribu...
THE FEAST OP EAGLES . Seated on the tribune in the midst of that vast scene built of human beings ,- ^ that scene which would defy the resources of the Grand opera even in its palmiest days , and presents to the world for a brief hour a reality such as John Martin might imagine—exalted in the midst of that picture painted with _ the human race for its pigments , sat Louis Napoleon , a silent and a thoughtful man ; and he reflected . An altar was there ; for he gives back the first place to religion—¦ perchance leBt it stab him in the back . An altar , high arid shining , admirably " got up , " with rich carpeting , paint , gilding , adroit lath and plaster . Altars , he must have thought , can be made of lath and plaster as well as marble . Carpet bag , dressing case , and altar—modern improvements have made all these conveniences of rank portable . The clergy approach the portable altar , true as the needle to the poleas the vulture to the carrion .
, Eight hundred strong , headed by the Archbishop of Paris , successor to the Archbishop who lost his life in wildly trying to reconcile Ms countrymen . This one , after some qualms of conscience , sides with the stronger party ; a safer course . They take their stand on the upper steps ot ine altar , the eagle-bearing Colonels below 5 , , " below is strength , and all above is grace , lney bless the eagles of the Imperial Presidency ; as thev before blessed the tricolour of the itel / ^ —
Lllt 3 V UU 1 UXU U 1 CDOCU JULV u * » vy-w -- „ public , —as they had blessed the tricolour ot Wis the Citizen King , ^ -as they had . blessed the lilied flag of the Restoration , —aei they naa blessed the eagles of the Empire militant , - ** they had blessed the old white banner ot tne earlier Bourbons . —as they had , We 8 fl « d / bl r" " flamme . A useful and a ductile craft ! potentates must have a blessing-machme . in ^« order , and Louis Napoleon saw that it ww »
The eagles , as thoroughly saturated with blessing by an eight-hundred P ^ A . P ° r \^ Btria two-beaked eagles of most legitimate Austria , are given to the Emperor , who gives theml toi Colonels , representing the army ; and ttx ° tT _ nels " swear to defend them to t » ° »™ whito they had sworn to the tricolour , and totitoj ^ flag of Henry tho Fourth , and . to th ^ lt ^ ho Soldiors always will swear to defend them tctw , i 4 . u ,. ru « 4- / vTrA « (* + i , nTrt mn . v be : an « p ^* ' . i
it does add flanieth % to the tenacity with wto ^ a soldier will clutch his standard ! A ub class those colour-receiving Colonels . ty Under the thunder of the artillery , * ° * J ! m thousand human beings were massed « na ^ . Bhalled in . tho background or that . PjffJ ^ , seventy thousand men dressed to lose tneir ^ _ eonality in tho mass ; trained to aofc in * ^ trained , bent , spurred , checked , to oxfloi o t enco ; trained to trust in that alone ; pa ^
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 15, 1852, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_15051852/page/12/
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