ditions which were arising, and of pure theory were combined
cannot of course be distinguished. All were present. Besides this
there is always a large number of persons in the community who would
be primarily benefited by a change, and who therefore take the
initiative or exercise a special pressure in favor of it.

The Navigation Acts began to go to pieces in 1796, when the old rule
restricting importations from America, Asia, and Africa to British
vessels was withdrawn in favor of the United States; in 1811 the same
permission to send goods to England in other than British vessels was
given to Brazil, and in 1822 to the Spanish-American countries. The
whole subject was investigated by a Parliamentary Commission in 1820,
at the request of the London Chamber of Commerce, and a policy of
withdrawal from control determined upon. In 1823 a measure was passed
by which the crown was empowered to form reciprocity treaties with any
other country so far as shipping was concerned, and agreements were
immediately entered into with Prussia, Denmark, Hamburg, Sweden, and
within the next twenty years with most other important countries. The
old laws of 1660 were repealed in 1826, and a freer system
substituted, while in 1849 the Navigation Acts were abolished
altogether. In the meantime the monopoly of the old regulated
companies was being withdrawn, the India trade being thrown open in
1813 and given up entirely by the Company in 1833. Gradually the
commerce of England and of all the English colonies was opened equally
to the vessels of all nations.

A beginning of removal of the import and export duties, which had been
laid for the purpose of encouraging or discouraging or otherwise
influencing certain lines of production or trade, was made in a
commercial treaty entered into by Pitt with France in 1786. The work
was seriously taken up again in 1824 and 1825 by Mr. Huskisson, and in
1842 by Sir Robert Peel. In 1845 the duty was removed from four
hundred and thirty articles, partly raw materials, partly
manufactures. But the most serious struggle in the movement for free
trade was that for the repeal of the corn laws. A new law had been
passed at the close of the Napoleonic wars in 1815, by which the
importation of wheat was forbidden so long as the prevailing price was
not above ten shillings a bushel. This was in pursuance of the old
traditional policy of encouraging the production of grain in order
that England might be at lea