The Home Market is the best.

The greatest difficulty is experienced by our manufacturers in exporting their manufactures.  In some countries there is a total prohibition of them; in others there is an extremely high duty; and in all there is much competition and jealousy.  The Government, in every one of those foreign countries, seems to do everything in its power to prevent the sale of British manufactures.  I am convinced, if we went to the Continent, and purchased all the corn in Poland, not an additional article should we be able to force into France, Germany, Prussia, or Russia, If the merchants of this country were allowed freely to purchase grain, foreign subjects would get as much for their corn as they possibly could; but their rulers would not allow a single article of our manufactures to be imported in consequence of our being obliged to buy, or in return for our buying the grain of those countries.  There is, undoubtedly, a certain quantity of manufactures in this country more than the population itself can consume, which it would be very desirable to get rid of.  But, my Lords, is it exactly true, that taking foreign corn would have the effect of enabling other countries to purchase them?  And even if such were the case, what are we to do with our own corn?

Now, my Lords, if the buying corn of the Pole, the Russian, or the Prussian, enable them to give high prices for our manufactures, why do not you give the same advantages to those nearer home?  For my own part, I believe, after all, that the home market is our best resource, and that there we dispose of the greatest proportion of our manufactured articles.  It has, and I think with truth, been stated, that two-thirds of the whole quantity of our manufactures are disposed of in this country.  The whole of our woollen and the whole of our silk manufactures are consumed here; and of iron and other manufactures, a very considerable portion.  I ask, then, if such profits are to be derived from an exchange with a foreign market, why do you not cultivate the home, which is admitted to be decidedly the best market of all.  I think the more this matter is discussed, the more will the country see that the interests of one class of the community involve the interests of all.  We are not to look merely to the interests of the cotton manufacturers, or of the iron manufacturers.  That which we are bound to consider is the benefit of all; and, in my opinion, the common good will be most effectually secured, by getting the greatest quantity of provisions for the whole community,—­by giving a proper remuneration to those who produce such provisions,—­and thus encouraging them to do that which is most beneficial to the community at large.

March 29, 1830.

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How far the principle of Equitable Adjustment should be carried.