e policy of these countries was questionable in
point of personal freedom; but the sugar of Porto Rico was excluded,
because our conscience was shocked at the notion that some part of
it might have been produced by slaves. But what was thus forbidden
directly, was allowed circuitously; we were willing to refine and
export this slave-grown sugar, and to take the hemp and tallow of
Russia in its stead, which seemed to be an easy way of letting down
our consciences. This savoured of hypocrisy. If the United States were
permitted to send us their sugars, which they would do to the extent of
50,000 tons per annum, they would take slave-grown sugar into their own
consumption to the same extent; and to that whole extent, therefore,
would give encouragement to slave-grown sugar. No implicit faith,
moreover, was to be placed in the certificates of the Americans. Messrs.
Gladstone and Baring defended the government measure; and Messrs.
Hume, Labouchere, and M. P. Stewart opposed it. On a division Lord
John Russell's amendment was negatived by one hundred and ninety-seven
against one hundred and twenty-eight. A few days afterwards, a bill
founded on the chancellor of the exchequer's resolutions was brought
in, and was read a second time without discussion. But the most critical
crisis for ministers had yet to be encountered. On the 14th of June, the
house having resolved itself into committee on the sugar-duties bill,
Mr. P. Miles objected to the change proposed by ministers in the old
amount of protection as a measure which was not expedient, and not final
in its settlement; wherefore he moved as an amendment, "That, from the
10th of November next, the duty on British colonial sugar should be.
20s.; on the sugars of China, Java, and Manilla, 30s.; with a duty
of 34s. upon the foreign sugars, when imported at a certain degree of
refinement, and with an addition, as usual, of five per cent, upon the
whole." This amendment was seconded by Mr. H. Baillie, who described the
measure of government as causing general dissatisfaction; and asserted
that, while it violated the principle of refusing encouragement to
the foreign slave-trade, it gave but partial advantages to the British
people. A long discussion took place, in which many members took part;
and on a division government was defeated by a majority of two hundred
and forty-one against two hundred and twenty-one. The committee then
adjourned to the 17th; on which day Sir Robert Peel