A given number agreeing to the foregoing recommendations, and desire a remedy, such as can be obtained by immediate application and give beneficial relief, that every such individual member pay two weeks in advance of 64d. per week as contributions; and in addition, every member in employ, and during such employ, to pay in as loan only 1s. every week, to be returned in value of stock or material, when he may be thrown out of employ. This would enable the society to get possession of all kinds of materials, and stock of every description. The sixpence to pay wages only every week; the halfpenny to pay for the rent of land only, which being sufficient for all the unemployed members to carry on such operations coupled with the trades as to keep in full employment, and prevent any fraud upon the society. Experience suggests itself the only permanent way of benefitting the working classes is by employing the unemployed. It is therefore desirable for all trades and callings now to unite and effect this desirable and all-important object; and as the agricultural department being the most depressed, it requires a small contribution of 64d. per week from each member to establish it, we, your Committee recommend that to every 100 members one acre would be sufficient at first to effect the object, and taken as near London as possible, or any other large and populous town. Sir,-The above are calmly considered and decided upon, and I have no doubt, as your publication takes these important subjects under their immediate care, and receives their best attention. They are the sincere productions of plain working men, and believed to be such as would relieve all classes, useful classes of society, and place them beyond those pressing and immediate evils which must befall us. In looking around us and seeing the land forsaken and becoming in a state of barrenness, there is room for a reflecting mind. I am, Sir, Your sincere and obedient Servant, [We insert letters of this kind to shew to what mode of relief the working classes themselves lean.-ED.] AGRICULTURE, MANUFACTURES, AND TRADE. WE insert a part of a speech upon these topics by Thomas Doubleday, Esq. of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, at a late reform dinner at South Shields. After a few introductory remarks, Mr. Doubleday said:-We all know that the present dreadful state of affairs comes by the pressure of taxes, and that these taxes are principally caused by the debt. In his observations upon the situation of the great leading interests of the country, Mr. Ingham has been constrained to make admissions so important as to prove all he has not admitted. He has seen, to use his own style, a paper entitled"—(loud laughter)—aye, entitled," that is the phrase, a report of the select committee upon the present state of agriculture." (loud applause.) This paper, so entitled, he has read, and he is constrained to admit the overwhelming force of the horrible evidence there given before that very committee. He admits that the doom of the landlords is sealed, and that, unless some great change takes place, they and their families may go to the workhouse, and give "all the parks and manors that they had" to that monied aristocracy my friend Mr. Larkin has just alluded to. Mr. Ingham has also admitted the great and overwhelming ruin that is overtaking another great interest, one in which every man here has some part, the shipping interest. (cheers.) The distress of the ship-owners he could not deny, living as he does, amongst you. But, having admitted this, where do you think the Hon. gentleman finds cause for rejoicing? In the state of manufactures and trade! (laughter.) Now, my friends, had this been a point of law, I should have deferred to Mr. Ingham at once-but, in point of trade, I shall do no such thing. I am a merchant and manufacturer, and I say, without hesitation, that in Mr. Ingham's assertions on this point, there is as much ignorance of facts, and consequent misrepresentation of truth, as ever was put into so small a space. fallen together; as the capital in the hands (loud cheers.) Prosperity! I shall tell Mr. A given number agreeing to the foregoing recommendations, and desire a remedy, such as can be obtained by immediate application and give beneficial relief, that every such individual member pay two weeks in advance of 64d. per week as contributions; and in addition, every member in employ, and during such employ, to pay in as loan only 1s. every week, to be returned in value of stock or material, when he may be thrown out of employ. This would enable the society to get possession of all kinds of materials, and stock of every description. The sixpence to pay wages only every week; the halfpenny to pay for the rent of land only, which being sufficient for all the unemployed members to carry on such operations coupled with the trades as to keep in full employment, and prevent any fraud upon the society. Experience suggests itself the only permanent way of benefitting the working classes is by employing the unemployed. It is therefore desirable for all trades and callings now to unite and effect this desirable and all-important object; and as the agricultural department being the most depressed, it requires a small contribution of 64d. per week from each member to establish it, we, your Committee recommend that to every 100 members one acre would be sufficient at first to effect the object, and taken as near London as possible, or any other large and populous town. Sir,--The above are calmly considered and decided upon, and I have no doubt, as your publication takes these important subjects under their immediate care, and receives their best attention. They are the sincere productions of plain working men, and believed to be such as would relieve all classes, useful classes of society, and place them beyond those pressing and immediate evils which must befall us. In looking around us and seeing the land forsaken and becoming in a state of barrenness, there is room I am, Sir, for a reflecting mind. Your sincere and obedient Servant, HENRY TEPPER. AGRICULTURE, MANUFACTURES, AND TRADE. We insert a part of a speech upon these topics by Thomas Doubleday, Esq. of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, at a late reform dinner at South Shields. After a few introductory remarks, Mr. Doubleday said:— -We all know that the present dreadful state of affairs comes by the pressure of taxes, and that these taxes are principally caused by the debt. In his observations upon the situation of the great leading interests of the country, Mr. Ingham has been constrained to make admissions so important as to prove all he has not admitted. He has seen, to use his own style, a paper entitled"—(loud laughter)—aye, entitled," ," that is the phrase, "a report of the select committee upon the present state of agriculture." (loud applause.) This psper, so entitled, he has read, and he is constrained to admit the overwhelming force of the horrible evidence there given before that very committee. He admits that the doom of the landlords is sealed, and that, unless some great change takes place, they and their families may go to the workhouse, and give "all the parks and manors that they had" to that monied aristocracy my friend Mr. Larkin has just alluded to. Mr. Ingham has also admitted the great and overwhelming ruin that is overtaking another great interest, one in which every man here has some part, the shipping interest. (cheers.) The distress of the ship-owners he could not deny, living as he does, amongst you. But, having admitted this, where do you think the Hon. gentleman finds cause for rejoicing? In the state of manufactures and trade! (laughter.) Now, my friends, had this been a point of law, I should have deferred to Mr. Ingham at once-but, in point of trade, I shall do no such thing. I am a merchant and manufacturer, and I say, without hesitation, that in Mr. Ingham's assertions on this point, there is as much ignorance of [We insert letters of this kind to shew to what facts, and consequent misrepresentation of mode of relief the working classes themselves lean.-ED.] truth, as ever was put into so small a space. (loud cheers.) Prosperity! I shall tell Mr. fallen together; as the capital in the hands depressed by the employment of all manner far better qualified to speak here than I am, of lies, fables, exaggeration, and mystification. There has been a great drought or a hurricane, or an immense loss at sea, or a failure of crops, or a mildew, or a murrain amongst cattle; and thus the hoax is carried on. Amidst all this lying, "capitalists" that is to say, the men whose money (obtained probably by loan and contract mongering) Banker Lloyd and Banker Gurney "cannot employ at two per cent." are induced to try their luck. Thus is the game prolonged. Men destitute of profits in the regular course of trade, by a lucky hit, make a sum, and save themselves. Thus the loss is divided, and falls into various hands; but loss it still is, for I am persuaded-nay, to a certain extent, I know-that imported merchandise is too often sold to the actual consumer at less than its cost; and this your representative calls prosperity! He and I differ in the meaning of words, if this be prosperity. I now turn to a subject in which all here are interested-shipping; and upon that subject I shall give you my plain opinions, right or wrong. The great depression of shipping I know; it is obvious, terrible, and lamentable. I, like other merchants, employ ships, and I know the freights are not adequately paid for; neither could we afford it if they were, pray mark that! (applause.)-but let me tell you, that those who ascribe all this to the repeal of the Old Restrictive Navigation Laws are utterly mistaken. This repeal, commonly called the reciprocity system, was, in truth, forced upon Lord Liverpool and Huskisson; with- plause.) If you want confusion and revolu out this the manufactures of England must have come to the ground, and your ships, instead of having plenty to do without proper pay, would have had no employment nor any pay at all. This, believe me, is the truth. (applause.) All, my friends, that the Reciprocity Acts have done, is to bring British and foreign ships into competition, and the British ships have sunk under it-but, why have they sunk? Tell me that, Mr. Ingham; tell me that, my friends. I will tell you, and I will tell you in the words of a man, Mr. John Diston Powles, of London, a man full of knowledge on this subject-(cheers.) himself long a shipowner, and conversant with shipping all his life. (cheers.) Mr. Powles, being asked by the Committee of Enquiry if the expenditure of the country, that is to say, the taxes, were reduced to something like those of other nations, would British Ships fear competition? answered. "I should fear no competition !" words that ought to be written in gold. Here then, gentlemen, is the cause of all your misery, the debt and the taxes. Tell those who seek to cheat you by saying, the direct taxes on articles employed in shipping are not immense-tell them this; tell them that into the composition of a ship enter wood, iron, copper, hemp, flax; into her storage, beef, biscuit, water, and beer-tell them that the man who fells or brings the wood, the man who shapes it and puts it together-tell them, the man who digs the copper and iron ore, the man who smelts it, the man who fashions it, the man who brings the hemp and flax, the man who weaves them, the man who twists them-tell them, the man who feeds the beef, the man who kills and salts it, the man who fetches the water, the man who brews the beer, all pay taxes; and some part of these taxes they must lay on your unfor tunate vessel, or be ruined, a load to sink a navy !" Thus, gentlemen, are we all,— you along with us-all suffering from the same cause, the enormous taxes. Join us, then, in seeking their repeal. (great ap tion continue them, for, I tell you unhesitatingly, that if they be continued, revolution must and will take place. What is to be the fate of our country no man can tellwhether she is to be saved or to perish we cannot tell-but in the darkest crisis let this be our consolation, that we, at all events, have done our duty; that we have in every instance withstood her tyrants, and without remission advocated those measures in which alone rest our salvation. (great cheering.) -(Birmingham Journal, Feb, 1.) |