Speeches of John Bright, M.P., on the American question

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SPEECHES

OF

JOHN BRIGHT, M. P.

AMERICAN QUESTION.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION

By FRANK MOORE.

W^

BOSTON :

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.

1865.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by Frank Moore,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern
District of New York.

University Press : Welch, Bigelow, & Co..
Cambridge.

CONTENTS.

Page
Introduction v

Extract from a Speech delivered at a Meeting at
Rochdale, to promote the Election of John Cheet-
ham, Esq. for the Southern Division of the County of
Lancaster, August I, 1861 I

Speech at a Dinner at Rochdale, December 4, 1861.
Delivered during the Excitement caused by the Seizure
of Mason and Slidell on Board the " Trent " Steamer . 8

Speech at Birmingham, December 18, 1862 ... 68

Speech on Slavery and Secession, delivered at Roch-
dale, at a Meeting held for the Purpose of passing a
Resolution of Thanks to the American Subscribers in
aid of the unemployed Work-People of Lancashire,
February 3, 1863 130

The Struggle in America in Relation to the Work-
ingmen of Britain : Address at a Meeting of the
Trades' Unions of London in St. James's Hall, March
26, 1863. With the Resolutions and Address to Presi-
dent Lincoln 170

Speech at the London Tavern, June 16, 1863, at a
Meeting held under the Auspices of the Emancipation
Society, to hear from M. D. Conway, of Eastern Vir-
ginia, an Address on the War in America . . .194

Speech in the House of Commons, on Mr. Roebuck's
Motion for Recognition of the Southern Confederacy,
June 30, 1863 . 221

iv Contents.

Conclusion of a Speech at a Meeting at Rochdale,
November 24, 1863, held to enable Mr. Cobden to meet
his Constituents 256

Extract from a Speech at the Town Hall, Bir-
mingham, January 26, 1 864 261

Speech on the Canadian Fortifications, delivered in

the House of Commons, March 23, 1865 . . . 265.

INTRODUCTION

John Bright, one of the most active, intel-
ligent, and liberal of those in Europe who
have become identified with the recent his-
tory of events in America, was born on
the 16th of November, 1811, at Greenbank,
Rochdale, England, the residence of his
father, Jacob Bright, a cotton spinner and
manufacturer. He received an ordinary
school education, and at the age of fifteen
was placed in the counting-house of his
father, to be instructed in the details and
management of the business, — destined to
become his by inheritance, his elder brother
having died at an early age. To the ac-
quirement of this knowledge he earnestly
devoted himself until 1835, when he found

vi Introduction.

time to enlarge his sphere of observation and
study by a visit to the Continent, where he
passed several months, extending his travels
through Egypt and the Holy Land.

Three years later, in 1838, he entered
upon his public career, as a member of the
Anti-Corn-Law League. In this organization
he became intimately associated with Kich-
ard Cobden, and with him labored in the
cause of political reform with such zeal and
persistence that the result thus achieved has
passed into history. He astonished and de-
lighted those by whom he was surrounded
with the clearness of his political views,
which were developed with remarkable per-
spicuity and advocated with all the powers
of a splendid eloquence. "While Mr. Cob-
den lent his calm and unanswerable logic to
the cause," says a contemporary, " Mr. Bright
gave it the impetus of zeal and passion. The
one sapped the foundations of economic er-
ror, the other battered at its walls. The one
convinced his opponents, the other carried

Introduction. vii

them away captive \ and both rendered such
efficient service as to make it difficult to say
which was the most useful or the most pow-
erful. Public meetings were held in every
part of the British kingdom ; newspapers
were established in the interest of the agita-
tion ; wherever there was a possibility of
success, the country was deluged with pam-
phlets ; eminent men entered the ranks, but
towering high above them all were the
names of Cobden and Bright. The speeches
of the latter were of the most effective de-
scription, and thoroughly English in manner
as well as in phraseology. Powerful and
impassioned, he so won his auditors that
even those who opposed his theories were
compelled to admire his genius."

The League lost no opportunity to ad-
vance the interests of so able a champion,
and in 1843, a vacancy having occurred, Mr.
Bright contested the representation of the
city of Durham in Parliament. In this first
attempt he was defeated, but in the same

viii Introduction.

year, his opponent having been unseated for
bribery, he was successful, and entered the
House of Commons, where he again joined
hands with Mr. Cobden, who had been re-
turned for Stockport two years earlier.

Mr. Bright was a Kadical and Free Trade
Reformer, attached to no political party, but
willing to support either, provided their prin-
ciples and measures were " founded upon the
wants of the country and the rights of the
people." The leading object of his political
life, however, was the repeal of the Corn
Laws. He continued to represent Durham
until after the attainment of this object, and
the consequent establishment of the Free
Trade policy of the British empire.

Soon after this, Mr. Bright became the
candidate for Manchester, and, although
many were opposed to his claims, he was
triumphantly elected by a coalition of the
Free Trade and the Ultra-Liberal parties.
From this time his activity in Parliament
and on the platform was varied and con-
tinuous.

Introduction. ix

In the House of Commons he proposed
the application of the principle of Free
Trade to transactions in land, as a remedy
for the suffering and oppression which pro-
duced the Irish famine. He pleaded unsuc-
cessfully for the appointment of a Royal
Commission to investigate the condition of
affairs in India, and in 1849 he was appoint-
ed a member of the Select Committee of the
House of Commons on Official Salaries. He
co-operated with Mr. Cobden in his financial
reform movement; and in 1851 he became
identified with the party in Parliament who
desired to censure Lord Palmerston for his
conduct towards the government of Greece
hi the matter of the claims of Don Pacifico.
During the next year he assisted at the re-
ception of Kossuth by the Liberals at Man-
chester.

At the general election which followed the
reorganization of the Anti-Corn-Law League,
Mr. Bright, notwithstanding a strenuous op-
position, was re-elected by a considerable

x Introduction.

majority. He continued in Parliament until
1857, when, owing to his course in reference
to Lord Palmerston and the Chinese War,
he lost his seat. But his absence from Par-
liament was of short duration, as in the
autumn of the same year he was returned as
the representative from Birmingham. Dur-
ing the years 1858 and 1859, he made a
tour of the Provinces, and published an elab-
orate scheme of changes in the representa-
tive system of Great Britain. In 1860 he
lent his ardent support to the Eeform Bill
introduced into the House of Commons by
Lord John Russell.

Mr. Bright was ever a sincere friend to
the United States, and often bestowed un-
stinted praise upon the institutions of this
country. A zealous advocate of freedom
and the education of the people, he clearly
saw the advantages to be derived from free
labor, and rightly estimated the vast bene-
fits arising from public schools. At the
breaking out of the Southern Rebellion, fore-

Introduction. xi

seeing that the contest was not alone for the
perpetuation of liberal institutions and the
maintenance of the government, but that it
was to be the death-struggle between Free-
dom and Slavery, he unhesitatingly and un-
reservedly sided with the North, and was
largely instrumental in presenting the Union
cause in its true light to the government
and the people of Great Britain.

Extensively engaged in the manufacture
of cotton, — with his business seriously affect-
ed, therefore, by the limited supply of that
staple, — he was yet too thoroughly attached
to principles he had early espoused and had
always supported, to give any countenance
to those who strove to entangle the two
nations in a war tending to advance the in-
terests of the South. " If all other tongues
are silent," said he, "mine shall speak for
that policy which gives hope to the bonds-
men of the South, and which tends to gen-
erous thoughts and generous words and
generous deeds between the two great na-

xii Introduction.

tions who speak the English language, and
from their origin are alike entitled to the
English name."

During the suffering and consequent ex-
citement in Lancashire, occasioned by the
stopping of the mills, Mr. Bright addressed
numerous meetings of workingmen, and, in a
series of masterly and convincing speeches,
thoroughly refuted the statements of South-
ern sympathizers, and re-established the
kindly feelings which found expression in
the "Address of the Trades' Unions and
Workingmen of England to President Lin-
coln." It will not be out of place to ask
attention to the opinions of Mr. Bright upon
the production of cotton, embodied in these
addresses. The result of years of practical
experience and careful observation, these
expositions of the views of one who dis-
cusses the subject, not only in its relations
to his particular business, but in its multi-
form bearings upon free labor, upon the so-
cial advancement of the workingman, and its

Introduction. xiii

political significance to a great nation, de-
serve the careful consideration of merchants
and statesmen.

During; the darkest hours of the Kebel-
Hon Mr. Bright remained hopeful, believing
that the destinies of the Republic were in
the hands of God. Addressing the working-
men in February, 1863, he says : —

"I advise you not to believe in the ' de-
struction ' of the American nation. If facts
should happen by any chance to force you
to believe it, don't commit the crime of

wishing it From the very outburst

of this great convulsion, I have had but one
hope and one faith, and it was this : that
the result of this stupendous strife might
be to make freedom the heritage forever of
a whole continent, and that the grandeur
and the prosperity of the American Union
might never be impaired."

And in June, 1863, after the disaster at
Chancellorsville, and before the success at
Gettysburg, he closes a speech, in reply to

xiv Introduction,

Mr. Koebuck's motion for the recognition of
the Southern Confederacy, in these words :
"We know the cause of this revolt, its pur-
poses and its aims. Those who made it
have not left us in darkness respecting their
intentions, but what they are to accomplish

is still hidden from our sight Whether

it will give freedom to the race which white
men have trampled in the dust, or whether
the issue will purify a nation steeped in
crime in connection with its conduct to that
race, is known only to the Supreme. In
his hand are alike the breath of man and
the life of states. I am willing to commit
to Him the issue of this dreaded contest ;
but I implore of Him, and I beseech this
House, that my country may lift nor hand
nor voice in aid of the most stupendous act
of guilt that history has recorded in the
annals of mankind."

The course of Mr. Bright, in Parliament
and among the people, on the great ques-
tions in American politics, demands the grat-

Introduction. xv

itude of civilized nations. Firmly grounded
in the principles of right and justice, he
has never deviated from the path which
his ripe judgment led him to choose at
the commencement of the Rebellion; and
future generations of Americans will re-
member his exertions in their behalf with
the deepest affection and regard, while his
honesty and persistence in the great cause
of human rights will call down upon him
the admiration of the liberty-loving men
of all lands.

The Speeches embraced in the following
pages were revised and corrected by Mr.
Bright, and they are now presented to the
American public with his approbation.

New York, June, 1865.

JOHN BRIGHT

ON THE AMERICAN QUESTION.

Extract from a Speech delivered at a Meeting at Rochdale,
to promote the Election of John Cheetham, Esq. for the
Southern Division of the County of Lancaster, August 1,
1861.

Mr. Bright said : —

I think that, just now, if you can find a
man who on questions of great state policy
agrees with us, at the same time having a
deep personal interest in this great cotton
question, and having paid so much attention
to it as Mr. Cheetham has, — I think there is
a double reason why he should receive the
votes and have the confidence of this division
of the county. (Cheers.) Now, is this cotton
question a great question or not ? I met a
spinner to-day, — he does not five in Koch-
dale, though I met him here, — and I asked

2 John Bright

him what he thought about it ; and he said,
"Well, I think cotton will come somehow."
(Laughter.) And I find that there is that
kind of answer to be had from three out
of four of all the spinners that you ask.
They know that in past times, when cotton
has risen fifty or eighty per cent, or some
extravagant rise, something has come, — the
rate of interest has been raised, or there
has been a commercial panic from some
cause or other, and down the price has gone ;
and when everybody said, " There would be
no cotton at Christmas," there proved a
very considerable stock at Christmas. And
so they say now.

I don't in the least deny that it will be
so; all I assert is, that this particular case
is new, that we have never had a war in
the United States between different sec-
tions of that country, affecting the produc-
tion of cotton before ; and it is not fair, or
wise, but rather childish than otherwise, to
argue from past events, which were not a

on the American Question. 3

bit like this, of the event which is now pass-
ing before our eyes. They say, " It is quite
true there is a civil war in America, but it
will blow over : there will be a compromise ;
or the English government will break the
blockade." Now recollect what breaking
the blockade means. It means a war with
the United States ; and I don't think that
it would be cheap to break the blockade
at the cost of a war with the United States.
I think that the cost of a war with the
United States would give probably half
wages, for a very considerable time, to those
persons in Lancashire who would be out of
work if there was no cotton, to say nothing
at all of the manifest injustice and wrong
against all international law, that a legal
and effective blockade should be interfered
with by another country.

It is not exactly the business of this meet-
ing, but my opinion is, that the safety of the
product on which this county depends rests
far more on the success of the Washington

4 John Bright

government than upon its failure; and I
believe nothing could be more monstrous
than for us, who are not very averse to war
ourselves, to set up for critics, carping, cavil-
ling critics, of what the "Washington govern-
ment is doing. I saw a letter the other day
from an Englishman, resident for twenty-five
years in Philadelphia, a merchant there, and
a very prosperous merchant. He said, "I
prefer the institutions of this country (the
United States) very much to yours in Eng-
land " ; but he says also, u If it be once ad-
mitted that here we have no country and no
government, but that any portion of these
United States can break off from the central
government whenever it pleases, then it is
time for me to pack up what I have, and to
go somewhere where there is a country and
a government."

Well, that is the pith of this question. Do
you suppose that, if Lancashire and York-
shire thought that they would break off from
the United Kingdom, those newspapers which

on the American Question. 5

are now preaching every kind of modera-
tion to the government of Washington would
advise the government in London to allow
these two comities to set up a special gov-
ernment for themselves ? When the people
in Ireland wished to secede, was it proposed
in London that they should be allowed to
secede peaceably ? Nothing of the kind. I
am not going to defend what is taking place
in a country that is well able to defend itself.
But I advise you, and I advise the people
of England, to abstain from applying to the
United States doctrines and principles which
we never apply to our own case. At any
rate, they have never fought "for the bal-
ance of power" in Europe. They have
never fought to keep up a decaying empire.
They have never squandered the money of
their people in such phantom expeditions
as we have been engaged in. And now at
this moment, when you are told that they
are going to be ruined by their vast expendi-
ture, the sum that they are now going to

6 John Bright

raise in the great emergency of this griev-
ous war is no greater than what we raise
every year during a time of peace. (Loud
cheers.) They say that they are not going
to liberate slaves. No- the object of the
Washington government is to maintain their
own Constitution, and to act legally, as it
permits and requires.

No man is more in favor of peace than
I am ; no man has denounced war more than
I have, probably, in this country ; few men,
in their public life, have suffered more oblo-
quy— I had almost said, more indignity —
in consequence of it. But I cannot, for the
life of me, see, upon any of those principles
upon which states are governed now, — I
say nothing of the literal word of the New
Testament, — I cannot see how the state of
affairs in America, with regard to the United
States government, could have been differ-
ent from what it is at this moment. We
had a heptarchy in this country, and it was
thought to be a good thing to get rid of it,

on the American Question. 7

and to have a united nation. If the thirty-
three or thirty-four States of the American
Union can break off whenever they like, I
can see nothing but disaster and confusion
throughout the whole of that continent. I
say that the war, be it successful or not,
be it Christian or not, be it wise or not,
is a war to sustain the government and to
sustain the authority of a great nation ; and
that the people of England, if they are true
to their own sympathies, to their own his-
tory, and to their own great act of 1834,
to which reference has already been made,
will have no sympathy with those who wish
to build up a great empire on the perpetr
ual bondage of millions of their fellow-men.
(Loud cheers.)

John Bright

SPEECH AT A DINNER AT ROCHDALE,

DECEMBEE 4, 1861.

Delivered during the Excitement caused by the Seizure of
Mason and Slidell on Board the " Trent " Steamer.

Mr. Bright, who was received with tumultu-
ous cheering and waving of handkerchiefs,
rose and said : —

When the gentlemen who invited me to
this dinner called upon me, I felt their kind-
ness very sensibly, and now I am deeply grate-
ful to my friends around me, and to you all,
for the abundant manifestations of kindness
with which I have been received to-night. I
am, as you all know, surrounded at this mo-
ment by my neighbors and friends, (Hear !
Hear !) and I may say with the utmost truth,
that I value the good opinions of those who
now hear my voice far beyond the opinions
of any equal number of the inhabitants of this

on the American Question. 9

country selected from any other portion of it.
You have, by this act of kindness that you
have shown me, given proof that in the main
you do not disapprove of my course and labors,
— (Cheers,) — that at least you are willing to
express an opinion that the motives by which
I have been actuated have been honest and
honorable to myself, and that that course has
not been entirely without service to my coun-
try. (Applause.) Coming to this meeting,
or to any similar meeting, I always find that
the subjects for discussion appear too many,
and far more than it is possible to treat. In
these times in which we live, by the influence
of the telegraph, and the steamboat, and the
railroad, and the multiplication of newspapers,
we seem continually to stand as on the top
of an exceeding high mountain, from which
we behold all the kingdoms of the earth and
all the glory of them, — unhappily, also, not
only their glory, but their crimes, and their
follies, and their calamities.

Seven years ago, our eyes were turned with

10 John Bright

anxious expectation to a remote corner of
Europe, where five nations were contending
in bloody strife for an object which possibly
hardly one of them comprehended, and, if they
did comprehend it, which all sensible men
amongst them must have known to be abso-
lutely impracticable. Four years ago, we
were looking still farther to the East, where
there was a gigantic revolt in a great de-
pendency of the British Crown, arising mainly
from gross neglect, and from the incapacity
of England, up to that moment, to govern the
country which it had known how to conquer.
Two years ago, we looked south, to the plains
of Lombardy, and saw a great strife there, in
which every man in England took a strong
interest; — (Hear ! Hear !) — and we have wel-
comed, as the result of that strife, the addition
of a great kingdom to the list of European
states. (Cheers.) Now, our eyes are turned
in a contrary direction, and we look to the
West. There we see a struggle in progress
of the very highest interest to England and

on the American Question. 11

to humanity at large. We see there a nation
whom I shall call the Transatlantic English
nation, — (Hear ! Hear !) — tne inheritor and
partaker of all the historic glories of this
country. We see it torn with intestine broils,
and suffering from calamities from which for
more than a century past — in fact, for more
than two centuries past — this country has
been exempt. That struggle is of especial
interest to us. We remember the description
which one of our great poets gives of Eome, —

" Lone mother of dead empires."

But England is the living mother of great
nations on the American and on the Austra-
lian continents, which promise to endow the
world with all our knowledge and all our civ-
ilization, and even something more than the
freedom she herself enjoys. (Cheers.)

Eighty-five years ago, at the time when
some of our oldest townsmen were very little
children, there were, on the North American
continent, Colonies, mainly of Englishmen, con-

12 John Bright

taining about three millions of souls. These
Colonies we have seen a year ago constituting
the United States of North America, and com-
prising a population of no less than thirty
millions of souls. We know that in agricul-
ture and manufactures, with the exception
of this kingdom, there is no country in the
world which in these arts may be placed in
advance of the United States. (Applause.)
With regard to inventions, I believe, within
the last thirty years, we have received more
useful inventions from the United States than
we have received from all the other countries
of the earth. (Hear ! Hear !) In that country
there are probably ten times as many miles
of telegraph as there are in this country, and
there are at least five or six times as many
miles of railway. The tonnage of its shipping
is at least equal to ours, if it does not exceed
ours. The prisons of that country — for, even
in countries the most favored, prisons are
needful — have been models for other na-
tions of the earth ; and many European gov-

on the American Question. 13

ernments have sent missions at different times
to inquire into the admirable system of edu-
cation so universally adopted in their free
schools throughout the Northern States.

If I were to speak of this country hi a re-
ligious aspect, I should say that, considering
the short space of time to which their his-
tory goes back, there is nothing on the face
of the earth besides, and never has been, to
equal the magnificent arrangement of church-
es and ministers, and of all the appliances
which are thought necessary for a nation to
teach Christianity and morality to its people.
(Cheers.) Besides all this, when I state that
for many years past the annual public expen-
diture of the government of that country has
been somewhere between £10,000,000 and
£15,000,000, 1 need not perhaps say further,
that there has always existed amongst all the
population an amount of comfort and pros-
perity and abounding plenty such as I believe
no other country in the world, in any age, has
displayed. (Applause.)

14 John Bright

This is a very fine, but a very true picture ;
yet it has another side to which I must ad-
vert. There has been one great feature in
that country, one great contrast, which has
been pointed to by all who have commented
upon the United States as a feature of danger
and contrast calculated to give pain. You
have had in that country the utmost liberty
to the white man, and bondage and degrada-
tion to the black man. Now. rely upon it,
that wherever Christianity lives and flourishes,
there must grow up from it necessarily a con-
science hostile to any oppression and to any
wrong; and therefore, from the hour when
the United States Constitution was formed, so
long as it left there this great evil, — then
comparatively small, but now so great, — it
left there seeds of that which an American
statesman has so happily described, of that
"irrepressible conflict" of which now the
whole world is the witness. It has been a
common thing for men disposed to carp at
the United States to point at this blot upon

on the American Question. 15

their fair fame, and to compare it with the
boasted declaration of freedom in their deed
and Declaration of Independence. But we
must recollect who sowed this seed of trouble,
and how and by whom it has been cherished.

Without dwelling upon this stain any
longer, I should like to read to you a para-
graph from the instructions, supposed to be
given to the Virginia delegates to Congress,
in the month of August, 1774, by Mr. Jeffer-
son, who was perhaps the ablest man the
United States had produced up to that time,
and who was then actively engaged in its
affairs, and afterwards for two periods filled
the office of President. He represents this
very Slave State, — the State of Virginia, —
and he says : —

" For the most trifling reasons, and some-
times for no conceivable reason at all, his
Majesty has rejected laws of the most salu-
tary tendency. The abolition of domestic
slavery is the great object of desire in those
Colonies where it was unhappily introduced

16 John Bright

in their infant state. But previous to the
enfranchisement of the slaves we have, it is
necessary to exclude all further importations
from Africa. Yet our repeated attempts to
effect this by prohibition, and by imposing
duties which might amount to prohibition,
have hitherto been defeated by his Majesty's
negative, — thus preferring the immediate
advantages of a few British corsairs to the
lasting interests of the American States, and
to the rights of human nature, deeply wound-
ed by this infamous practice."

I read this merely to show that, two years
before the Declaration of Independence was
signed, Mr. Jefferson, acting on behalf of those
he represented in Virginia, read that protest
against the course of the English government
which prevented the Colonists abolishing the
slave-trade, preparatory to the abolition of
slavery itself.

Well, the United States Constitution left
the slave question for every State to manage
for itself. It was a question too difficult to

on the American Question. 17

settle then, and apparently every man had
the hope and belief that in a few years slavery
in itself would become extinct. Then there
happened a great event in the annals of man-
ufactures and commerce. It was discovered
that in those States that article which we in
this county now so much depend on could
be produced of the best quality necessary for
manufacture, and at a moderate price. From
that day to this the growth of cotton has
increased there, and its consumption has in-
creased here, and a value which no man
dreamed of when Jefferson wrote that paper
has been given the slave and to slave indus-
try. Thus it has grown up to that gigantic
institution which now threatens either its own
overthrow or the overthrow of that which is
a million times more valuable, — the United
States of America. (Cheers.)

The crisis to which we have arrived, — I
say " we," for after all we are nearly as much
interested as if I was making this speech in
the city of Boston or the city of New York, —

18 John Bright

the crisis, I say, which has now arrived, was
inevitable. I say that the conscience of the
North, never satisfied with the institution of
slavery, was constantly urging some men for-
ward to take a more extreme view of the
question ; and there grew up naturally a sec-
tion — it may be not a very numerous one
— in favor of the abolition of slavery. A
great and powerful party resolved at least
upon a restraint and a control of slavery, so
that it should not extend beyond the States
and the area which it now occupies. But, if
we look at the government of the United
States almost ever since the formation of the
Union, we shall find the Southern power has
been mostly dominant there. If we take thir-
ty-six years after the formation of the present
Constitution, — I think about 1787, — we shall
find that for thirty-two of those years every
President was a Southern man; and if we
take the period from 1828 until 1860, we
shall find on every election for President the
South voted in the majority.

on the American Question. 19

We know what an election is in the United
States for President of the Republic. There
is a most extensive suffrage, and there is the
ballot-box. The members of the House of
Representatives are elected by the same suf-
frage, and generally they are elected at the
same time. It is thus therefore almost inev-
itable that the House of Representatives is
in accord in public policy with the President
for the time being. Every four years there
springs from the vote created by the whole
people a President over that great nation. I
think the world offers no finer spectacle than
this ; it offers no higher dignity ; and there
is no greater object of ambition on the politi-
cal stage on which men are permitted to
move. You may point, if you will, to heredi-
tary rulers, to crowns coming down through
successive generations of the same family, to
thrones based on prescription or on conquest,
to sceptres wielded over veteran legions and
subject realms, — but to my mind there is
nothing so worthy of reverence and obedi-

20 John Bright

ence, and nothing more sacred, than the au-
thority of the freely chosen by the majority
of a great and free people (applause) ; and
if there be on earth and amongst men any
right divine to govern, surely it rests with a
ruler so chosen and so appointed. (Kenewed
applause.)

Last year the ceremony of this great elec-
tion was gone through, and the South, which
had been so long successful, found itself de-
feated. That defeat was followed instantly
by secession, and insurrection, and war. In
the multitude of articles which have been
before us in the newspapers within the last
few months, I have no doubt you have seen
it stated, as I have seen it, .that this question
was very much like that upon which the Colo-
nies originally revolted against the Crown of
England. It is amazing how little some news-
paper writers know, or how little they think
you know. ("Hear !" and laughter.) When
the war of independence was begun in
America, ninety years ago, there were no

on the American Question. 21

representatives there at all. The question
then was, whether a ministry in Downing
Street, and a corrupt and borough-monger-
ing Parliament, should continue to impose
taxes upon three millions of English sub-
jects, who had left their native shores and
established themselves in North America-
But now the question is not the want of
representation, because, as is perfectly noto-
rious, the South is not only represented, but
is represented in excess ; for, in distributing
the number of representatives, which is done
every ten years, three out of every five
slaves are counted as freemen, and the num-
ber of representatives from the Slave States
is consequently so much greater than if the
freemen, the white men only, were counted.
From this cause the Southern States have
twenty members more in the House of Rep-
resentatives than they would have if the
members were apportioned on the same prin-
ciple as in the Northern Free States. There-
fore you will see at once that there is no

22 John Bright

comparison between the state of things when
the Colonies revolted, and the state of things
now, when this wicked insurrection has
broken out.

There is another cause which is some-
times in England assigned for this great mis-
fortune, which is, the protective theories in
operation in the Union, and the maintenance
of a high tariff. It happens with regard to
that, unfortunately, that no American, cer-
tainly no one I ever met with, attributed the
disasters of the Union to that cause. It is
an argument made use of by ignorant Eng-
lishmen, but never by informed Americans.
(Hear! Hear!) I have already shown you
that the South, during almost the whole
existence of the Union, has been dominant
at Washington ; and during that period the
tariff has existed, and there has been no
general dissatisfaction with it. Occasionally,
there can be no doubt, their tariff was higher
than was thought just or reasonable or ne-
cessary by some of the States of the South.

on the American Question. 23

But the first act of the United States which
levies duties upon imports, passed imme-
diately after the Union was formed, recites
that a It is necessary for the encouragement
and protection of manufactures to levy the
duties which follow"; and during the war
with England from 1812 to 1815, the people
of the United States had to pay for all the
articles they brought from Europe many
times over the natural cost of those articles,
on account of the interruption to the traffic
by the English nation.

When the war was over, it was felt by
everybody desirable that they should en-
courage manufacturers in their own coun-
try; and seeing that England at the precise
moment was passing a law to prevent any
wheat coming from America until wheat in
England had risen to the price of 84s. per
quarter, we may be quite satisfied that the
doctrine of protection originally entertained
did not find less favor at the close of the
war in 1815. (Hear! Hear!)

24 John Bright

There is one remarkable point with re-
gard to this matter which should not be
forgotten. Twelve months ago, at the meet-
ing of the Congress of the United States,
on the first Monday in December, — when
the Congress met, you recollect that there
were various propositions of compromise,
committee meetings of various kinds to try
and devise some mode of settling the ques-
tion between the North and the South, so
that disunion might not go on, — though
I read carefully everything published in the
English papers from the United States on
the subject, I do not recollect that in a
single instance the question of the tariff was
referred to, or any change proposed or sug-
gested in the matter as likely to have any
effect whatever upon the question of Seces-
sion.

There is another point, that whatever
might be the influence of the tariff upon
the United States, it is as pernicious to the
West as it is to the South; and further,

on the American Question. 25

that Louisiana, which is a Southern State
and a seceded State, has always voted along
with Pennsylvania until last year in favor of
protection, — protection for its sugar, whilst
Pennsylvania wished protection for its coal
and iron. But if the tariff was onerous and
grievous,, was that any reason for this great
insurrection ? Was there ever a country
that had a tariff, especially in the article of
food, more onerous and more cruel than that
which we had in this country twenty years
ago ? (Cheers.) We did not secede. We
did not rebel. What we did was to raise
money for the purpose of distributing among
all the people perfect information upon the
question ; and many men, as you know, de-
voted all their labors, for several years, to
teach the great and wise doctrine of free
trade to the people of England. (Cheers.)
Why, the price of a single gunboat, the
equipment of a single regiment, the garri-
soning of a single fort, the cessation of their
trade for a single day, cost more than it

26 John Bright

would have cost to have spread among all
the intelligent people of the United States
the most complete statement of the whole
case; and the West and South could easily
have revised, or, if need had been, have re-
pealed the tariff altogether. (Cheers.)

The question is a very different and a far
more grave question. It is a question of
slavery, — (Cheers,) — and for thirty years it
has constantly been coming to the surface,
disturbing social life, and overthrowing al-
most all political harmony in the working
of the United States. (Cheers.) In the
North there is no secession ; there is no col-
lision. These disturbances and this insur-
rection are found wholly in the South and
in the Slave States; and therefore I think
that the man who says otherwise, who con-
tends that it is the tariff, or anything what-
soever else than slavery, is either himself
deceived or endeavors to deceive others.
(Cheers.) The object of the South is this,
to escape from the majority who wish to

on the American Question. 27

limit the area of slavery. (Hear! Hear!)
They wish to found a Slave State freed from
the influence and the opinions of freedom.
The Free States in the North now stand be-
fore the world the advocates and defenders
of freedom and civilization. The Slave States
offer themselves for the recognition of a
Christian nation, based upon the foundation,
the unchangeable foundation in their eyes,
of slavery and barbarism. (Cheers.)

I will not discuss the guilt of the men
who, ministers of a great nation only last
year, conspired to overthrow it. I will not
point out or recapitulate the statements of
the fraudulent manner in which they dis-
posed of the funds in the national exchequer.
I will not point out by name any of the men,
in this conspiracy, whom history will desig-
nate by titles they would not like to hear ;
but I say that slavery has sought to break
up the most free government in the world,
and to found a new state, in the nineteenth
century, whose corner-stone is the perpetual

28 John Bright

bondage of millions of men. (Loud ap-
plause.)

Well now, having thus described what ap-
pears to me briefly the literal truth of this
matter, what is the course that England
would be expected to pursue ? We should
be neutral so far as regards mingling in the
strife. (Cheers.) We were neutral in the
strife in Italy ; but we were not neutral in
opinion or sympathy; and we know per-
fectly well that throughout the whole of
Italy at this moment there is a feeling that,
though no shot was fired from an English
ship, and though no English soldier trod
their soil, yet still the opinion of England
was potent in Europe, and did much for the
creation of the Italian kingdom. (Cheers.)

Well, with regard to the United States,
you know how much we hate slavery, — that
is, awhile ago we thought we knew ; that we
have given twenty millions sterling, — a mil-
lion a year, or nearly so, of taxes forever, —
to free eight hundred thousand slaves in the

on the American Question. 29

English colonies. We knew, or thought we
knew, how much we were in love with free
government everywhere, although it might
not take precisely the same form as our
own government. We were for free gov-
ernment in Italy; we were for free govern-
ment in Switzerland; and we were for free
government, even under a' republican form,
in the United States of America; and with
all this, every man would have said that
England would wish the American Union to
be prosperous and eternal.

Now, suppose we turn our eyes to the East,
to the empire of Russia, for a moment. In
Russia, as you all know,, there has been
one of the most important and magnificent
changes of policy ever seen in any country.
Within the last year or two, the present
Emperor of Russia, following the wishes of
his father, has insisted upon the abolition of
serfdom in that empire; and twenty-three
millions of human beings, lately serfs, little
better than real slaves, have been raised to

30 John Bright

the ranks of freedom. (Cheers.) Now, sup-
pose that the millions of the serfs of Russia
had been chiefly in the South of Russia. We
hear of the nobles of Russia, to whom those
serfs belonged in a great measure, that they
have been hostile to this change ; and there
has been some danger that the peace of that
empire might be disturbed during the change.
Suppose these nobles, for the purpose of
maintaining in perpetuity the serfdom of
Russia, and barring out twenty-three mil-
lions of your fellow-creatures from the rights
of freedom, had established a great and
secret conspiracy, and that they had risen
in great and dangerous insurrection against
the Russian government, — I say that you,
the people of England, although seven years
ago you were in mortal combat with the
Russians in the South of Europe, — I believe
at this moment you would have prayed
Heaven in all sincerity and fervor to give
strength to the arm and success to the great
wishes of the Emperor, and that the vile

on the American Question. 31

and atrocious insurrection might be sup-
pressed. (Cheers.)

Well, but let us look a little at what has
been said and done in this country since the
period when Parliament rose at the beginning
of August. There have been two speeches
to which I wish to refer, and in terms of ap-
probation. The Duke of Argyll, a member
of the present government, — and, though I
have not the smallest personal acquaintance
with him, I am free to say that I believe
him one of the most intelligent and liberal
of his order, — the Duke of Argyll made a
speech which was fair and friendly to the
government of the United States. Lord
Stanley, only a fortnight ago I think, made
a speech which it is impossible to read with-
out remarking the thought, the liberality,
and the wisdom by which it is distinguished.
He doubted, it is true, whether the Union
could be restored. A man need not be hos-
tile, and must not necessarily be unfriendly,
to doubt that or the contrary ; but he spoke

32 John Bright

with fairness and friendliness of the gov-
ernment of the United States ; and he said
that they were right and justifiable in the
course they took; and he gave a piece of
advice, — which is now more important than
at the moment when it was given, — that,
amid the various incidents and accidents of
a struggle of this nature, it became a people
like this to be very moderate, very calm,
and to avoid getting into any feeling of
irritation, which sometimes arises, and some-
times leads to danger. (Hear ! Hear !)

I mention these two speeches as from
Englishmen of great distinction in this coun-
try, speeches which I believe will have a
beneficial effect on the other side of the
Atlantic. (Cheers.) Lord John Kussell, in
the House of Commons, during the last ses-
sion, made a speech too, in which he rebuked
the impertinence of a young member of the
House who had spoken about the bursting
of the a bubble republic." It was a speech
worthy of the best days of Lord John Eussell.

on the American Question. 33

(Cheers.) But at a later period he spoke
at Newcastle on an occasion something like
this, when the inhabitants, or some portion
of the inhabitants, of the town invited him
to a public dinner. He described the contest
in words something like this, — I speak from
memory only: The North is contending for
empire, the South for independence. Did
he mean contending for empire, as England
when making some fresh conquest in India?
If he meant that, what he said was not true.
(Cheers.) But I recollect Lord John Kussell,
some years ago, in the House of Commons,
on an occasion when I made some observa-
tion as to the unreasonable expenditure of
our colonies, and said that the people of
England should not be taxed to defray ex-
penses which the colonies themselves were
well able to bear, turned to me with a
sharpness which was not necessary, and said,
"The honorable member has no objection
to make a great empire into a small one;
but I have." (Cheers.) Perhaps if he had

2* c

34 John Bright

lived in the United States, if he was a mem-
ber of the Senate or the House of Kepre-
sentatives there, he would doubt whether
it was his duty to consent at once to the
destruction of a great country by separation,
it may be into two hostile camps, or whether
he would not try all the means which were
open to him, and would be open to the gov-
ernment, to avert so unlooked for and so
dire a calamity. (Cheers.)

There are other speeches that have been
made. I will not refer to them by any quo-
tation, — I will not out of pity to some of the
men who uttered them. (Laughter.) I will
not bring their names even before you, to
give them an endurance which I hope they
will not otherwise obtain. I leave them in
the obscurity which they so richly merit.
But you know as well as I do, that, of all
the speeches made since the end of the last
session of Parliament by public men, by poli-
ticians, the majority of them have either
displayed a strange ignorance of American

on the American Question. 35

affairs, or a stranger absence of that cordiality
and friendship which, I maintain, our Ameri-
can kinsmen have a right to look for at our
hands.

And if we part from the speakers and turn
to the writers, what do we find there ? We
find that which is reputed abroad, and has
hitherto been believed in at home, as the
most powerful representative of English opin-
ion, — at least of the richer classes, — we find
in that particular newspaper there has not
been since Mr. Lincoln took office, in March
last, as President of the United States, one
fair and honorable and friendly article on
American affairs in the columns of that pa-
per. (Cheers.) Some of you, I dare say, read
it ; but, fortunately, every district is now so
admirably supplied with local newspapers,
that I trust in all time to come the people
of England will drink of purer streams nearer
home, — (Cheers,) — and not of those streams
which are muddled by party feeling and po-
litical intrigue, and by many motives that

36 John Bright

tend to anything rather than the enlighten-
ment and advantage of the people. (Cheers.)
It is said, — that very paper has said over and
over again, — " Why this war ? Why not sep-
arate peaceably ? Why this fratricidal strife ? "
I hope it is equally averse to fratricidal strife
in other districts ; for if it be true that God
made of one blood all the families of man to
dwell on the face of all the earth, it must be
fratricidal strife whether we are slaughter-
ing Russians in the Crimea or bombarding
towns on the sea-coast of the United States.
(Cheers.)

Now no one will expect that I should stand
forward as the advocate of war, or as the de-
fender of that great sum of all crimes which
is involved in war. But when we are discuss-
ing a question of this nature, it is only fair
that we should discuss it upon principles which
are acknowledged not only in the country
where the strife is being carried on, but are
universally acknowledged in this country.
When I discussed the Russian war, seven or

on the American Question. 37

eight years ago, I always disavowed it, on
principles which were avowed by the gov-
ernment and people of England, and I took
my facts from the blue-books presented to
Parliament. (Cheers.) I take the liberty,
then, of doing that in this case ; and I say
that, looking at the principles avowed in
England, and at its policy, there is no man,
who is not absolutely a non-resistant in every
sense, who can fairly challenge the conduct
of the American government in this war.
(Loud cheers.) It would be a curious thing to
find that the party in this country which on
every public question is in favor of war at
any cost, when they come to speak of the du-
ty of the government of the United States, is
in favor "of peace at any price." (Laughter.)
I want to know whether it has ever been
admitted by politicians, or statesmen, or peo-
ple, that a great nation can be broken up at
any time by any particular section of any
part of that nation. It has been tried oc-
casionally in Ireland, and if it had succeeded

38 John Bright

history would have said that it was with very-
good cause. But if anybody tried now to
get up a secession or insurrection in Ireland,
— and it would be infinitely less disturbing to
everything than the secession in the United
States, because there is a boundary which
nobody can dispute, — I am quite sure the
Times would have its "special correspond-
ent," and would describe with all the glee
and exultation in the world the manner in
which the Irish insurrectionists were cut
down and made an end of. (Cheers.)

Let any man try in this country to re-
store the heptarchy, do you think that any
portion of the people would think that the
thing could be tolerated for a moment?
But if you would look at a map of the Unit-
ed States, you would see there is no coun-
try in the world probably, at this moment,
where any plan of separation between the
North and the South, as far as the question
of boundary is concerned, is so surrounded
with insurmountable difficulties. For exam-

on the American Question. 39

pie, Maryland is a Slave State; but Mary-
land, by a large majority, voted for the
Union. Kentucky is a Slave State, one of
the finest in the Union, and containing a
fine people; Kentucky has voted for the
Union, but has been invaded from the
South. Missouri is a Slave State ; but Mis-
souri has not seceded, and has been invaded
by the South, and there is a secession party
in that State. There are parts of Virginia
which have formed themselves into a new
State, resolved to adhere to the North; and
there is no doubt a considerable Northern
and Union feeling in the State of Tennes-
see. I have no doubt there is in every other
State. In fact, I am not sure that there is
not now within sound of my voice a citi-
zen of the State of Alabama, who would
tell you that there the question of seces-
sion has never been put to the vote; and
that there are great numbers of men, rea-
sonable and thoughtful and just men, in
that State, who entirely deplore the condi-
tion of things there existing.

40 John Bright

Then, what would you do with all those
States, and with what we may call the
loyal portion of the people of those States ?
Would you allow them to be dragooned
into this insurrection, and into the forma-
tion or the becoming parts of a new State,
to which they themselves are hostile ? And
what would you do with the city of Wash-
ington? Washington is in a Slave State.
Would anybody have advised that President
Lincoln and his Cabinet, with all the mem-
bers of Congress, of the House of Kepre-
sentatives and the Senate, from the North,
with their wives and children, and every-
body else who was not positively in favor
of the South, should have set off on their
melancholy pilgrimage northwards, leaving
that capital, hallowed to them by such asso-
ciations, — having its name even from the fa-
ther of their country, — leaving Washington
to the South, because Washington is situ-
ated in a Slave State?

Again, what do you say to the Mississippi

on the American Question. 41

River, as you see it upon the map, the "fa-
ther of waters," rolling that gigantic stream
to the ocean? Do you think that the fifty
millions which one day will occupy the
banks of that river northward, will ever
consent that that great stream should roll
through a foreign, and it may be a hostile
State ? And more, there are four millions
of negroes in subjection. For them the
American Union is directly responsible.
They are not Secessionists; they are now,
as they always were, not citizens nor sub-
jects, but legally under the care and power
of the government of the United States.
Would you consent that these should be
delivered up to the tender mercies of their
task-masters, the defenders of slavery as an
everlasting institution? (Cheers.)

Well, if all had been surrendered without
a struggle, what then? What would the
writers in this newspaper and other news-
papers have said? If a bare rock in your
empire, that would not keep a goat — a sin-

42 John Bright

gle goat — alive, be touched by any foreign
power, the whole empire is roused to resist-
ance ; and if there be, from accident or pas-
sion, the smallest insult to your flag, what
do your newspaper writers say upon the
subject, and what is said in all your towns
and upon all your exchanges? I will tell
you what they would have said if the gov-
ernment of the Northern States had taken
their insidious and dishonest advice. They
would have said the great Republic was a
failure, that democracy had murdered patri-
otism, that history afforded no example of
such meanness and of such cowardice; and
they would have heaped unmeasured oblo-
quy and contempt upon the people and
government who had taken that course.
(Loud cheers.)

Well, they tell you, these candid friends
of the United States, — they tell you that all
freedom is gone; that the Habeas Corpus
Act, if they ever had one, is known no
longer; and that any man may be arrested

on the American Question. 43

at the dictum of the President or of the
Secretary of State. Well, but in 1848 you
recollect, many of you, that there was a
small insurrection in Ireland. It was an
absurd thing altogether ; but what was done
then? I saw, in one night, in the House
of Commons, a bill for the suspension of
the Habeas Corpus Act passed through all
its stages. What more did I see? I saw
a bill brought in by the Whig government
of that day, Lord John Russell being the
premier, which made speaking against the
government and against the crown — which
up to that time had been sedition — which
proposed to make it felony ; and it was only
by the greatest exertions of a few of the
members that that act, in that particular,
was limited to a period of two years. In
the same session a bill was brought in called
an Alien Bill, which enabled the Home Sec-
retary to take any foreigner whatsoever,
not being a naturalized Englishman, and in
twenty-four hours to send him out of the

44 John Bright

country. Although a man might have com-
mitted no crime, this might be done to him,
apparently only on suspicion.

But suppose that an insurgent army had
been so near to London that you could see
its outposts from every suburb of London
what then do you think would have been
the regard of the government of Great
Britain for personal liberty, if it interfered
with the necessities, and, as they might
think, the salvation of the state? I recol-
lect, in 1848, when the Habeas Corpus Act
was suspended, that a number of persons
in Liverpool, men there of position and of
wealth, presented a petition to the House
of Commons, praying — what? That the
Habeas Corpus Act should not be suspend-
ed? No. They were not content with
its suspension in Ireland; but they prayed
the House of Commons to extend that sus-
pension to Liverpool. (Laughter.) I recol-
lect that at that time — and I am sure
my friend Mr. Wilson will bear me out in

on the American Question, 45

what I say — the Mayor of Liverpool tele-
graphed with the Mayor of Manchester, and
that messages were sent on to London
nearly every hour. The Mayor of Man-
chester heard from the Mayor of Liverpool
that certain Irishmen in Liverpool, conspir-
ators, or fellow-conspirators with those in
Ireland, were going to burn the cotton
warehouses in Liverpool and the cotton
mills of Lancashire. (Laughter.) And I
read that petition. I took it from the table
of the House of Commons, and read it, and
I handed it over to a statesman of great
eminence, who has been but just removed
from us, — I refer to Sir James Graham, —
(Hear ! Hear !) — a man not second to any in
the House of Commons for his knowledge of
affairs and for his great capacity, — I handed
to him this petition. He read it; and after
he had read it, he rose from his seat, and
laid it upon the table with a gesture of ab-
horrence and disgust. (Loud cheers.) Now
that was a petition from the town of Liver-

46 John Bright

pool, in which some persons have been mak-
ing themselves very ridiculous of late by
reason of their conduct. (Hear ! Hear !)

There is one more point. It has been
said, "How much better it would be" —
not for the United States, but — "for us,
that these States should be divided." I rec-
ollect meeting a gentleman in Bond Street
one day before the session was over. He
was a rich man, and one whose voice is
very much heard in the House of Com-
mons; but his voice is not heard there
when he is on his legs, but when he is
cheering other speakers (laughter); and he
said to me : * After all, this is a sad busi-
ness about the United States; but still I
think it is very much better that they
should be split up. In twenty years," or
in fifty years, I forget which it was, "they
will be so powerful that they will bully all
Europe." And a distinguished member of
the House of Commons, — distinguished
there by his eloquence, distinguished more

on the American Question. 47

by his many writings, — I mean Sir Edward
Bulwer Lytton, — he did not exactly ex-
press a hope, but he ventured on some-
thing like a prediction, that the time would
come when there would be, I don't know
how many, but as many independent States
in America as you can count upon your
fingers.

There cannot be a meaner motive than
this I am speaking of, in forming a judg-
ment on this question, — that it is "bet-
ter for us" — for whom? the people of
England, or the government of England ? —
that the United States should be severed,
and that that continent should be as the
continent of Europe is, in many states, and
subject to all the contentions and disasters
which have accompanied the history of the
states of Europe. (Applause.) I should say
that, if a man had a great heart within
him, he would rather look forward to the
day when, from that point of land which
is habitable nearest to the Pole, to the

48 John Bright

shores of the great Gulf, the whole of that
vast continent might become one great con-
federation of States, — without a great army,
and without a great navy, — not mixing it-
self up with the entanglements of Europe-
an politics, — without a custom-house inside,
through the whole length and breadth of
its territory, — and with freedom every-
where, equality everywhere, law every-
where, peace everywhere, — such a con-
federation would afford at least some hope
that man is not forsaken of Heaven, and
that the future of our race might be bet-
ter than the past. (Loud cheers.)

It is a common observation, that our
friends in America are very irritable. Well,
I think it is very likely, of a considerable
number of them, to be quite true. Our
friends in America are involved in a great
struggle. There is nothing like it before in
their or in any history. No country in the
world was ever more entitled, in my opin-
ion, to the sympathy and the forbearance

on the American Question. 49

of all friendly nations, than are the Unit-
ed States at this moment. (Hear! Hear!)
They have there some newspapers that are
no wiser than ours. (Laughter.) They
have there some papers, or one at least,
which, up to the election of Mr. Lincoln,
were his bitterest and most unrelenting
foes, who, when the war broke out, and
it was not safe to take the line of South-
ern support, were obliged to turn round
and to support the prevalent opinion of
the country. But they undertook to serve
the South in another way, and that was by
exaggerating every difficulty, and misstat-
ing every fact, if so doing could serve their
object of creating distrust between the peo-
ple of the Northern States and the people
of this United Kingdom. (Hear ! hear !) If
the Times in this country has done all
that it could do to poison the minds of the
people of England, and to irritate the minds
of the people of America, the New York
Herald, I am sorry to say, has done, I think,

50 John Bright

all that it could, or all that it dared to do,
to provoke mischief between the govern-
ment in Washington and the government
in London.

Now there is one thing which I must
state that I think they have a solid reason
to complain of; and I am very sorry to
have to mention it, because it blames our
present foreign minister, against whom I
am not anxious to say a word, and, recol-
lecting his speech in the House of Com-
mons, I should be slow to conclude that he
had any feeling hostile to the United States
government. You recollect that during the
session, — it was on the 14th of May, — a
proclamation came out which acknowledged
the South as a belligerent power, and pro-
claimed the neutrality of England. A little
time before that, I forget how many days,
Mr. Dallas, the late Minister from the Unit-
ed States, had left London for Liverpool
and America. He did not wish to under-
take any affairs for this government, by

on the American Question. 51

which he was not appointed, — I mean that
of President Lincoln, — and he left what
had to be done to his successor, who was
on his way, and whose arrival was daily
expected. Mr. Adams, the present Minister
from the United States, is a man who, if
he lived in England, you would say was of
one of the noblest families of the country.
His father and his grandfather were Presi-
dents of the United States. His grand-
father was one of the great men who
achieved the independence of the United
States. There is no family in that country
having more claims upon what I should
call the veneration and the affection of the
people than the family of Mr. Adams.

Mr. Adams came to this country. He
arrived in London on the night of the 13th
May. On the 14th, that proclamation was
issued. It was known that he was coming ;
but he was not consulted ; the proclamation
was not delayed for a day, although there
was nothing pressed, and he might have

52 John Bright

been notified about it. If communications
of a friendly nature had taken place with
him and with the American government,
they could have found no fault with this
step, because it was, perhaps, inevitable^
before the struggle had proceeded far, that
this proclamation would be issued. But I
have the best reasons for knowing that
there is no single thing that has happened
during the course of these events which
has created more surprise, more irritation,
and more distrust in the United States,
with respect to this country, than the fact
that that proclamation was not delayed one
single day, until the Minister from America
could come here, and until it could be done
with his consent, or at least his concurrence,
and in that friendly manner that would
have avoided all the unpleasantness which
has occurred. (Hear!)

Now I am obliged to say, — and I say
it with the utmost pain, — that without this
country doing things that were hostile to

on the American Question. 53

the North, and without expressing affection
for slavery, and, outwardly and openly,
hatred for the Union, — I say that there
has not been seen that friendly and cordial
neutrality which, if I had been a citizen of
the United States, I should have expected;
and I say further, that, if there has existed
considerable irritation at that, it must be
taken as a measure of the high apprecia-
tion which the people of those States place
upon the opinion of the people of England.
(Hear! Hear!) If I had been addressing
this audience ten days ago, so far as I know,
I should have said just what I have said
now; and although, by an untoward event,
circumstances are somewhat, even considera-
bly, altered, yet I have thought it desirable
to make this statement, with a view, so far
as I am able to do it, to improve the opinion
in England, and to assuage them if there be
any feelings of irritation in America, so that
no further difficulties may arise in the pro-
gress of this unhappy strife. (Hear ! Hear !)

54 John Bright

But there has occurred an event which
was announced to us only a week ago,
which is one of great importance, and it
may be one of some peril. (Hear! hear!)
It is asserted that what is called "interna-
tional law" has been broken by the .seizure
of the Southern Commissioners on board an
English trading steamer by a steamer of
war of the United States. Now, what is
maritime law? You have heard that the
opinions of the law officers of the Crown
are in favor of this view of the case, —
that the law has been broken. I am not
at all going to say that it has not. It would
be imprudent in me to set my opinion on a
legal question which I have only partially
examined, against their opinion on the same
question, which I presume they have care-
fully examined. But this I say, that mari-
time law is not to be found in an act of
Parliament, — it is not in so many clauses.
You know that it is difficult to find the
law. I can ask the Mayor, or any magis-

on the American Question. 55

trate around me, whether it is not very diffi-
cult to find the law, — even when you have
found the act of Parliament, and found the
clause. (Laughter.) But when you have
no act of Parliament, and no clause, you
may imagine that the case is still more dif-
ficult. (Hear! Hear!)

Now, maritime law, or interna'tional law,
consists of opinions and precedents for the
most part, and it is very unsettled. The
opinions are the opinions of men of differ-
ent countries, given at different times; and
the precedents are not always like each
other. The law is very unsettled, and, for
the most part, I believe it to be exceed-
ingly bad. Now, in past times, as you
know from the histories you read, this coun-
try has been a fighting country; we have
been belligerents, and, as belligerents, we
have carried maritime law, by our own pow-
erful hand, to a pitch that has been very
oppressive to foreign, and peculiarly to neu-
tral nations. Well, now, for the first time

56 John Bright

unhappily, — almost for the first time in our
history for the last two hundred years, — we
are not belligerents, but neutrals; and we
are more disposed to take, perhaps, rather
a different view of maritime and interna-
tional law.

Now, the act which has been committed
by the American steamer, in my opinion,
whether it was illegal or not, was both im-
politic and bad. That is my opinion. I
think it may turn out, and is almost cer-
tain, that, so far as the taking of those men
from that ship was concerned, it was wholly
unknown to, and unauthorized by, the Amer-
ican government. And if the American
government believe, on the opinion of their
law officers, that the act is illegal, I have
no doubt they will make fitting reparation;
for there is no government in the world
that has so strenuously insisted upon modi-
fications of international law, and been so
anxious to be guided always by the most
moderate and merciful interpretation of that
law.

on the American Question. 57

Now, our great advisers of the Times
newspaper have been persuading people
that this is merely one of a series of acts
which denote the determination of the
Washington government to pick a quarrel
with the people of England. Did you ever
know anybody who was not very near dead
drunk, who, having as much upon his hands
as he could manage, would offer to fight
anybody about him? (Prolonged laughter
and cheering.) Do you believe that the
United States government, presided over by
President Lincoln, so constitutional in all his
acts, so moderate as he has been, — repre-
senting at this moment that great party in
the United States, happily now in the ascen-
dency, which has always been especially in
favor of peace, and especially friendly to
England, — do you believe that that gov-
ernment, having upon its hands now an
insurrection of the most formidable charac-
ter in the South, would invite the armies

and the fleets of England to combine with
3*

58 John Bright

that insurrection, and, it might be, to ren-
der it impossible that the Union should
ever again be restored? (Loud cheers.) I
say, that single statement, whether it came
from a public writer or a public speaker, is
enough to stamp him forever with the char-
acter of being an insidious enemy of both
countries. (Cheers.)

Well, now, what have we seen during the
last week? People have not been, I am
told, — I have not seen much of it, — quite
as calm as sensible men should be. Here is
a question of law. I will undertake to say,
that when you have from the United States
government — if they think the act legal
— a statement of their view of the case,
they will show you that, fifty or sixty years
ago, during the wars of that time, there
were scores of cases that were at least as
bad as this, and some infinitely worse. And
if it were not so late to-night, and I am not
anxious now to go into the question further,
I could easily place before you cases of

on the American Question. 59

wonderful outrage committed by us when
we were at war, and for many of which, I
am afraid, little or no reparation was offered.
But let us bear this in mind, that during
this struggle incidents and accidents will
happen. Bear in mind the advice of Lord
Stanley, so opportune and so judicious. Do
not let your newspapers, or your public
speakers, or any man, take you off your
guard, and bring you into that frame of
mind under which your government, if it
desires war, may be driven to engage in it ;
for one may be as fatal and as evil as the
other.

What can be now more monstrous than
that we, as we call ourselves to some extent,
an educated, a moral, and a Christian na-
tion,— at a moment when an accident of
this kind occurs, before we have made a
representation to the American government,
before we have heard a word from there in
reply, — should be all up in arms, every
sword leaping from its scabbard, and every

60 John Bright

man looking about for his pistols and his
blunderbusses? (Cheers.) I think the con-
duct pursued — and I have no doubt it is
pursued by a certain class in America just
the same — is much more the conduct of
savages, than of Christian and civilized men.
No, let us be calm. (Hear! Hear!) You
recollect how we were dragged into the
Russian war, — "drifted" into it? (Cheers.)
You know that I, at least, have not upon
my head any of the guilt of that fearful
war. (Hear ! Hear !) You know that it cost
one hundred millions of money to this coun-
try; that it cost at least the lives of forty
thousand Englishmen ; that it disturbed your
trade; that it nearly doubled the armies
of Europe; that it placed the relations of
Europe on a much less peaceful footing than
before ; and that it did not effect one single
thing of all those that it was promised to
effect. (Cheers.)

I recollect speaking on this subject, within
the last two years, to a man whose name I

on the American Question. 61

have already mentioned, Sir James Graham,
in the House of Commons. He was a minis-
ter at the time of that war. He was remind-
ing me of a severe onslaught which I had
made upon him and Lord Palmerston for at-
tending a dinner of the Eeform Club, when
Sir Charles Napier was appointed to the com-
mand of the Baltic fleet; and he remarked,
" What a severe thrashing " — (laughter) — I
had given them in the House of Commons !
I said, " Sir James, tell me candidly, did you
not deserve it ? " He said, " Well, you were
entirely right about that war; we were en-
tirely wrong, and we never should have
gone into it." (Loud cheers.) And this is
exactly what everybody will say, if you go
into a war about this business, when it is
over. When your sailors and soldiers, so
many of them as may be slaughtered, are
gone to their last account ; when your taxes
are increased, your business permanently —
it may be — injured; and when embittered
feelings for generations have ' been created

62 John Bright

between America and England, — then your
statesmen will tell you that "we ought not
to have gone into the war." (Cheers.)

But they will very likely say, as many
of them tell me, "What could we do in the
frenzy of the public mind ? " Let them not
add to the frenzy, — (Hear! Hear!) — and
let us be careful that nobody drives us into
that frenzy. Remembering the past, remem-
bering at this moment the perils of a
friendly people, and seeing the difficulties
by which they are surrounded, let us, I en-
treat of you, see if there be any real mod-
eration in the people of England, and if
magnanimity, so often to be found amongst
individuals, is absolutely wanting in a great
nation. (Great cheering.)

Now, government may discuss this mat-
ter, — they may arrange it, — they may ar-
bitrate it. I have received here, since I
came into the room, a despatch from a friend
of mine in London, referring to this matter.
I believe some portion of it is in the papers

on the American Question. 63

this evening, but I have not seen them.
But he states that General Scott, whom
you know by name, who has come over from
America to France, being in a bad state of
health, — the general lately of the American
army, and a man of a reputation in that
country not second hardly to that which
the Duke of Wellington held during his life-
time in this country, — General Scott has
written a letter on the American difficulty.
He denies that the Cabinet of "Washington
had ordered the seizure of the Southern
Commissioners, even if under a neutral flag.
The question of legal right involved in the
seizure, the General thinks a very narrow
ground on which to force a quarrel with the
United States. As to Messrs. Slidell and
Mason being or not being contraband, the
General answers for it, that, if Mr. Seward
cannot convince Earl Kussell that they bore
that character, Earl Kussell will be able
to convince Mr. Seward that they did not.
He pledges himself that, if this govern-

64 John Bright

ment cordially agree with that of the United
States in establishing the immunity of neu-
trals from the oppressive right of search and
seizure on suspicion, the Cabinet of Wash-
ington will not hesitate to purchase so great
a boon to peaceful trading-vessels. (Great
cheering.)

Now then, before I sit down, let me ask
you what is this people, about which so
many men in England at this moment are
writing, and speaking, and thinking, with
harshness, I think with injustice, if not with
great bitterness? Two centuries ago, mul-
titudes of the people of this country found
a refuge on the North American continent,
escaping from the tyranny of the Stuarts,
and from the bigotry of Laud. Many noble
spirits from our country made great experi-
ments in favor of human freedom on that
continent. Bancroft, the great historian of
his own country, has said, in his own graphic
and emphatic language, a The history of the
colonization of America is the history of the

on the American Question. 65

crimes of Europe." (Hear! Hear!) From
that time down to our own period, Amer-
ica has admitted the wanderers from every
clime. Since 1815, a time which many here
remember, and which is within my lifetime,
more than three millions of persons have
emigrated from the United Kingdom to the
United States. During the fifteen years
from 1845 or 1846 to 1859 or 1860, — a time
so recent that we all remember the most
trivial circumstances that have happened in
that time, — during those fifteen years more
than two million three hundred and twenty
thousand persons left the shores of the Unit-
ed Kingdom as emigrants for the States of
North America.

At this very moment, then, there are mil-
lions in the United States who personally,
or whose immediate parents, have at one
time been citizens of this country, and per-
haps known to some of the oldest of those
whom I have now the honor of addressing.
They found a home in the Far West; they

66 John Bright

subdued the wilderness; they met with
plenty there, which was not afforded them
in their native country; and they became
a great people. There may be persons in
England who are jealous of those States.
There may be men who dislike democracy,
and who hate a republic ; there may be
even those whose sympathies warm towards
the slave oligarchy of the South. But of
this I am certain, that only misrepresenta-
tion the most gross or calumny the most
wicked can sever the tie which unites the
great mass of the people of this country
with their friends and brethren beyond the
Atlantic. (Loud cheers.)

Now, whether the Union will be restored
or not, or the South achieve an unhonored
independence or not, I know not, and I pre-
dict not. But this I think I know, — that
in a few years, a very few years, the twenty
millions of freemen in the North will be
thirty millions, or even fifty millions, — a
population equal to or exceeding that of

on the American Question. 67

this kingdom. (Hear! Hear!) When that
time comes, I pray that it may not be said
amongst them, that, in the darkest hour of
their country's trials, England, the land of
their fathers, looked on with icy coldness
and saw unmoved the perils and calamities
of their children. (Cheers.) As for me, I
have but this to say : I am one in this audi-
ence, and but one in the citizenship of this
country; but if all other tongues are silent,
mine shall speak for that policy which gives
hope to the bondsmen of the South, and
which tends to generous thoughts, and gen-
erous words, and generous deeds, between
the two great nations who speak the English
language, and from their origin are alike
entitled to the English name. (Loud cheers ;
during which the honorable member re-
sumed his seat, having spoken for an hour
and forty minutes.)

68 John Bright

SPEECH AT BIRMINGHAM,

DECEMBER 18, 1862.

Mr. Bright rose, and was received with
the most hearty and prolonged applause.
He said: —

Gentlemen, I am afraid that there was a
little excitement during a part of my honor-
able colleague's speech, which was hardly
favorable to that impartial consideration of
great questions to which he appealed.
(Hear! Hear!) He began by referring to
a question, — or, I might say, to two ques-
tions, for it was one great question in two
parts, — which at this moment occupies the
mind, and, I think, must afflict the heart
of every thoughtful man in this country, —
(Hear! Hear!) — the calamity which has
fallen upon the county from which I come,
and the strife which is astonishing the world,
on the other side of the Atlantic.

on the American Question. 69

I shall not enter into details with regard
to that calamity, because you have had
already, I believe, meetings in this town,
many details have been published, contribu-
tions of a generous character have been
made, and you are doing — and especially,
if I am rightly informed, are your artisans
doing — their duty with regard to the unfor-
tunate condition of the population amongst
which I live. (Cheers.) But this I may
state in a sentence, that the greatest, proba-
bly the most prosperous, manufacturing in-
dustry that this country or the world has
ever seen, has been suddenly and unexpectr
edly stricken down, but by a blow which has
not been unforeseen or unforetold. (Hear!
Hear!) Nearly five hundred thousand per-
sons,— men, women, and children, — at this
moment, are saved from the utmost extremes
of famine, not a few of them from death,
by the contributions which they are receiv-
ing from all parts of the country. (Cheers.)
I will not attempt here an elaborate eulogy

70 John Bright

of the generosity of the givers, nor will I
endeavor to paint the patience and the grati-
tude of those who suffer and receive ; but I
believe the conduct of the country, with
regard to this great misfortune, is an honor
to all classes and to every section of this
people. (Cheers.)

Some have remarked that there is perfect
order where there has been so much anxiety
and suffering. I believe there is scarcely a
thoughtful man in Lancashire who will not
admit that one great cause of the patience
and good conduct of the people, besides
the fact that they knew so much is being
done for them, is to be found in the exten-
sive information they possess, and which
of late years, and now more than ever, has
been communicated to them through the
instrumentality of an untaxed press. (Loud
cheers.) Noble lords who have recently
spoken, official men, and public men, have
taken upon them to tell the people of Lan-
cashire that nobody is to blame, and that

on the American Question. 71

in point of fact, if it had not been for a
family quarrel in that dreadful Kepublic,
everything would have gone on perfectly
smoothly, and not a word could have been
said against anybody. (Laughter.)

Now, if you will allow me, I should like
to examine for a few minutes whether this
be true. (Hear! Hear!) If you read the
papers with regard to this question, you will
find that, barring whatever chance there
may be of our again soon receiving a sup-
ply of cotton from America, the hopes of
the whole country are directed to India.
Our government of India is not one of to-
day. It is a government that has lasted
as long as the government of the United
States, and it has had far more insurrec-
tions and secessions, — (cheers,) — not one
of which, I suppose some in this meeting
must regret, has been recognized by our
government or by France. (Cheers.) Our
government in India has existed for a hun-
dred years in some portion of the country

72 John Bright

where cotton is a staple produce of the land.
But we have had under the name of a gov-
ernment what I have always described as
a piratical joint-stock company, — (laughter
and cheers,) — beginning with Lord Clive,
and ending, as I now hope it has ended,
with Lord Dalhousie. (Laughter.) And un-
der that government I will undertake to
say that it was not in nature that you could
have such improvement of that country as
should ever give you a fan supply of cot-
ton. (Cheers.)

Up to the year 1814, the whole trade of
India was a monopoly of the East India
Company. They took everything there that
went there ; they brought everything back
that came here; they did whatsoever they
pleased in the territories under then rule.
I have here an extract from a report of a
member of Council in India, Mr. Richards,
published in the year 1812. He reports to
the Court of Directors, that the whole cot-
ton produce of the district was taken, with-

on the American Question. 73

out leaving any portion of the avowed
share of the Ryots, that is, the cultivators,
at their own free disposal ; and he says that
they are not suffered to know what they
shall get for it until after it has been far
removed from their reach and from the
country by exportation coastwise to Bom-
bay; and he says further, that the Com-
pany's servants fixed the prices from ten to
thirty per cent under the general market
rate in the districts that were not under
the Company's rule. During the three years
before the Company's monopoly was abol-
ished, in 1814, the whole cotton that we re-
ceived from India, I quote from the brokers'
returns from Liverpool, was only 17,000
bales ; in the three years afterwards, owing,
no doubt, partly to the great increase in
price, we received 551,000 bales, during
which same three years the United States
only sent us 611,000. Thus you see that
in 1817, 1818, and 1819, more than forty
years ago, the quantity we received from

74 John Bright

India was close upon, and in the year 1818
it actually exceeded, that which we received
from the United States.

Well, now I come down to the year 1832,
and I have then the report of another mem-
ber of Council, and beg every workingman
here, every man who is told that there is
nobody to blame, to listen to one or two
extracts from the report. Mr. Warden,
member of the Council, gave evidence in
1832 that the money-tax levied on Surat
cotton was 56 rupees per candy, leaving
the grower only 24 rupees, or rather less
than f c?. per pound. In 1846 there was so
great a decay of the cotton-trade of West-
ern India, that a committee was appointed
in Bombay, partly of members of the Cham-
ber of Commerce and partly of servants of
the government, and they made a report in
which they stated that from every candy
of cotton, — a candy is 7cwt. 7841bs., —
costing 80 rupees, which is 160 shillings in
Bombay, the government had taken 48 ru-

on the American Question. 75

pees as land-tax and sea-duty, leaving only
32 rupees, or less than \d. per pound, to
be divided among all parties, from the Bom-
bay seller to the Surat grower. (Cheers.)

In 1847 I was in the House of Commons,
and I brought forward a proposition for a
select committee to inquire into this whole
question; for in that year Lancashire was
on the verge of the calamity that has now
overtaken it; cotton was very scarce, for
hundreds of the mills were working short
time, and many were closed altogether.
That committee reported that, in all the
districts of Bombay and Madras where cot-
ton was cultivated, and generally over those
agricultural regions, the people were in a
condition of the most abject and degraded
pauperism; and I will ask you whether it
is possible for a people in that condition to
produce anything great, or anything good,
or anything constant, which the world re-
quires? (No! No!)

It is not to be wondered at that the quality

76 John Bright

of the cotton should be bad, — so bad that
it is illustrated by an anecdote which a very
excellent man of the Methodist body told
me the other day. He said that at a prayer-
meeting, not more than a dozen miles from
where I live, one of the ministers was deep
in supplication to the Supreme ; he detailed,
no doubt, a great many things which he
thought they were in want of, and amongst
the rest, a supply of cotton for the famish-
ing people in that district. When he prayed
for cotton, some man with a keen sense of
what he had suffered, in response, exclaimed,
"0 Lord! but not Surat." (Laughter.)

Now, my argument is this, and my asser-
tion is this, that the growth of cotton in
India, — the growth of an article which was
native and common in India before Amer-
ica was discovered by Europeans, — that the
growth of that article has been systemati-
cally injured, strangled, and destroyed by
the stupid and wicked policy of the Indian
government. (Cheers.)

on the American Question. 77

I saw, the other day, a letter from a gen-
tleman as well acquainted with Indian af-
fairs, perhaps, as any man in India, — a let-
ter written to a member of the Madras
Government, — in which he stated his firm
opinion that, if it had not been for the Bom-
bay Committee in 1846, and for my com-
mittee in 1848, there would not have been
any cotton sent from India at this moment
to be worked up in Lancashire. Now, in
1846, the quantity of cotton coming from
India had fallen to 94,000 bales. How has
it increased since then? In 1859 it had
reached 509,000 bales; in 1860, 562,000
bales; and last year, owing to the extraor-
dinary high price, it had reached 986,000
bales, and I suppose this year will be about
the same as last year.

I think, in justification of myself and of
some of those with whom I have acted, I
am entitled to ask your time for a few mo-
ments, to show you what has been not so
much done as attempted to be done to im-

78 John Bright

prove this state of things; and what has
been the systematic opposition that we have
had to contend with. In the year 1847, I
moved for that committee, in a speech from
which I shall read one short extract. I said
that a We ought not to forget that the whole
of the cotton grown in America is produced
by slave labor, and this, I think, all will ad-
mit,— that, no matter as to the period in
which slavery may have existed, abolished
it will ultimately be, either by peaceable
means or by violent means. Whether it
comes to an end by peaceable means or oth-
erwise, there will in all probability be an
interruption to the production of cotton, and
the calamity which must in consequence fall
upon a part of the American Union will be
felt throughout the manufacturing districts
of this country." (Cheers.)

The committee was not refused; — gov-
ernments do not always refuse committees;
they don't much fear them on matters of
this kind ; they put as many men on as the

on the American Question. 79

mover of the committee does, and some-
times more, and they often consider a com-
mittee, as my honorable colleague will tell
you, rather a convenient way of burying
an unpleasant question, at least for another
session. The committee sat during the ses-
sion of 1848, and it made a report from
which I shall quote, not an extract, but the
sense of an extract. The evidence was very
extensive, very complete, and entirely con-
demnatory of the whole system of the In-
dian government with regard to the land
and agricultural produce, and one might
have hoped that something would have
arisen from it, and probably something has
arisen from it, but so slowly that you have
no fruit, — nothing on which you can calcu-
late, even up to this hour.

Well, in 1850, as nothing more was done,
I thought it time to take another step,
and I gave notice of a motion for the ap-
pointment of a Eoyal Commission to go to
India for the express purpose of ascertain-

80 John Bright

ing the truth of this matter. I moved,
"That a Koyal Commission proceed to India
to inquire into the obstacles which prevent
the increased growth of cotton in India, and
to report upon any circumstance which may
injuriously affect the economical and indus-
trial condition of the native population, be-
ing cultivators of the soil, within the Pres-
idencies of Madras and Bombay."

Now I shall read you one extract from
my speech on that occasion, which refers
to this question of peril in America. I said,
"But there is another point, that, whilst
the production of cotton in the United
States results from slave labor, whether we
approve of any particular mode of abolish-
ing slavery in any country or not, we are
all convinced that it will be impossible in
any country, and most of all in America,
to keep between two and three millions of
the population permanently in a state of
bondage. By whatever means that system
is to be abolished, whether by insurrec-

on the American Question. 81

tionr — which I would deplore, — or by
some great measure of justice from the
government, — one thing is certain, that the
production of cotton must be interfered
with for a considerable time after such an
event has taken place • and it may happen
that the greatest measure of freedom that
has ever been conceded may be a meas-
ure the consequence of which will inflict
mischief upon the greatest industrial pur-
suit that engages the labor of the opera-
tive population of this country." (Cheers.)
Now, it was not likely the government
could pay much attention to this, for at
that precise moment the Foreign Office —
then presided over by Lord Palmerston —
was engaged with an English fleet in the
waters of Greece, in collecting a bad debt,
— (a laugh,) — for one Don Pacifico, a
Jew who made a fraudulent demand on
the Greek government for injuries said to
have been committed upon him in Greece.
Notwithstanding this, I called upon Lord

82 John Bright

John Russell, who was then the Prime Min-
ister and asked him whether he would
grant the commission I was going to move
for. I will say this for him, he appeared
to agree with me, that it was a reasonable
thing. I believe he saw the peril, and that
my proposition was a proper one, but he
said he wished he could communicate with
Lord Dalhousie. But it was in the month
of June, and he could not do that, and
hear from him again before the close of
the session. He told me that Sir John
Hobhouse, then President of the India
Board, was very much against it ; and I an-
swered, " Doubtless he is, because he speaks
as the mouthpiece of the East India Com-
pany, against whom I am bringing this in-
quiry."

"Well, my proposition came before the
House, and, as some of you may recollect,
it was opposed by the President of the In-
dia Board, and the Commission was conse-
quently not granted. I had seen Sir Rob-

on the American Question. 83

ert Peel, — this was only ten days before
his death, — I had seen Sir Kobert Peel,
acquainted as he was with Lancashire in-
terests, and had endeavored to enlist him
in my support. He cordially and entirely
approved of my motion, and he remained
in the House during the whole of the time
I was speaking; but when Sir John Hob-
house rose to resist the motion, and he
found the government would not consent
to it, he then left his seat, and left the
House. The night after, or two nights
after, he met me in the lobby; and he
said he thought it was but right he should
explain why he left the House after the
conversation he had held with me on this
question before. He said he had hoped
the government would agree to the mo-
tion, but when he found they would not,
his position was so delicate with regard to
them and his own old party, that he was
most anxious that nothing should induce him,
unless under the pressure of some great ex-

84 John Bright

tremity, to appear even to oppose them
on any matter before the House. There-
fore, from a very delicate sense of honor
he did not say what I am sure he would
have been glad to have said, and the propo-
sition did not receive from him that help
which, if it had received it, would have sur-
mounted all obstacles.

To show the sort of men who are made
ministers, — (laughter,) — Sir John Hob-
house had on these occasions always a
speech of the same sort. He said this:
"With respect to the peculiar urgency of
the time, he could not say the honorable
gentleman had made out his case; for he
found that the importation of cotton from
all countries showed an immense increase
during the last three years." Why, we
know that the importation of cotton has
shown an "immense increase" almost every
three years for the last fifty years. (Hear!
Hear! and a laugh.) But it was because
that increase was entirely, or nearly so, from

• on the American Question. 85

one source, and that source one of extreme
peril, that I asked for the inquiry for which
I moved. (Cheers.) He said he had a let-
ter — and he shook it at me in his hand —
from the Secretary of the Commercial Asso-
ciation of Manchester, in which the direc-
tors of that body declared by special reso-
lution that my proposition was not neces-
sary, that an inquiry might do harm, and
that they were abundantly satisfied with
everything that these Lords of Leadenhall
Street were doing. He said, "Such was the
letter of the Secretary of the Association,
and it was a complete answer to the hon-
orable gentleman who had brought forward
this motion."

At this moment one of these gentlemen
to whom I have referred, then President of
the Board of Control, Governor of India,
author, as he told a committee on which I
sat, of the * Affghan war, is now decorated
with a Norman title, — for our masters even
after a lapse of eight hundred years ape

86 John Bright

the Norman style, — sits in the House of
Peers, and legislates for you, having neg-
lected in regard to India every great duty
which appertained to his high office, —
(tremendous applause,) — and to show that
it is not only cabinets and monarchs who
thus distribute honors and rewards, the
President of that Commercial Association
through whose instigation that letter was
written is now one of the representatives
of Manchester, the great centre of that
manufacture whose very foundation is now
crumbling into ruin. (Eenewed cheering.)
But I was not, although discouraged, baf-
fled. I went down to the Chamber of Com-
merce in Manchester, and along with Mr.
Bazley, then the President of the Chamber,
I believe, and Mr. Ashworth, who is now
the President of that Chamber, and many
others, we determined to have a Commis-
sion of Inquiry of our own. We raised a
subscription of more than £ 2,000 ; we se-
lected a gentleman, — Mr. Alexander Mac-

on the American Question, 87

kay, the author of one of the very best
books ever written by an Englishman up-
on America, "The Western World," — and
we invited him to become our Commis-
sioner, and, unfortunately for him, he ac-
cepted the office. He went to India, he
made many inquiries, he wrote many inter-
esting reports, but, like many others who
go to India, his health declined; he re-
turned from Bombay, but he did not live
to reach home.

We were greatly disappointed at this on
public grounds, besides our regret for the
loss of one of so much private worth. Some
of us, Mr. Baziey particularly, undertook the
charge of publishing these reports, and a
friend of Mr. Mackay's, now no longer liv-
ing, undertook the editorship of them, and
they were published in a volume called
" Western India " ; and that volume received
such circulation as a work of that nature is
likely to have. (Hear! Hear!)

Well, now, in 1853 there came the propo-

88 John Bright

sition for the renewal of the East India
Company's charter. I opposed that to the
utmost of my power in the House of Com-
mons, — (loud cheers,) — and some of you
will recollect I came down here with Mr.
Danby Seymour, the member for Poole, a
gentleman well acquainted with Indian af-
fairs, and attended a meeting in this very
hall, to denounce the policy of conferring
the government of that great country for
another twenty years upon a company
which had so entirely neglected every duty
belonging to it except one, — the duty of
collecting the taxes. (Much laughter and
cheers.) In 1854, Colonel Cotton — now Sir
Arthur Cotton, one of the most distinguished
engineers in India — came down to Man-
chester. We had a meeting at the Town
Hall, and he gave an address on the subject
of opening the Godavery River, in order
that it might form a mode of transit, cheap
and expeditious, from the cotton districts to
the north of that river ; and it was proposed

on the American Question. 89

to form a joint stock company to do it,
but unfortunately the Russian war came on
and disturbed all commercial projects, and
made it impossible to raise money for any
— as some might call it — speculative pur-
pose, like that of opening an Indian river.

Well, in 1857 there came the mutiny.
What did our rulers do then? Sir Charles
Wood, in 1853, had made a speech five
hours long, most of it bolstering up the gov-
ernment of the East India Company. In
1858, — at the opening of the session in
1858, I think, — the government brought
in a bill to abolish that Company, and to
establish a new form of government for
India. That was exactly what we asked
them to do in 1853 ; but, as in everything
else, nothing is done until there comes an
overwhelming calamity, when the most ob-
tuse and perverse is driven from his posi-
tion. (Applause.) In 1858 that bill passed,
under the auspices of Lord Stanley. It was
not a bill such as I think Lord Stanley ap-

90 John Bright

proved when he was not a minister; it was
not a bill such as I believe he would have
brought in if he had had power in the
House and the Cabinet to have brought in
a better bill. It abolished the East India
Company, established a new Council, and
left things to a great extent much in the
same state as they were.

During the discussion of that bill, I made
a speech on Indian affairs, which I believe
goes to the root of the matter. I protested
then as now against any notion of govern-
ing one hundred and fifty millions of peo-
ple— twenty different nations, with twenty
different languages — from a little coterie of
rulers in the city of Calcutta. (Cheers.) I
proposed that the country should be divided
into four or ^.Ye separate, and, as regards
each other, independent presidencies of
equal rank, with a governor and council in
each, and each government corresponding
with, and dependent upon, and responsible
to, a Secretary of State in this country.

on the American Question. 91

(Loud cries of " Hear ! Hear ! " and cheers.)
I am of opinion that if such a government
were established, one in each Presidency,
and if there was a first-class engineer, with
an efficient staff, whose business should be
to determine what public works should be
carried on, some by the government and
some by private companies, — I believe that
ten years of such judicious labors would
work an entire revolution in the condition
of India- and if it had been done when I
first began to move in this question, I have
not the smallest doubt we might have had
at this moment any quantity of cotton what-
ever that the mills of Lancashire require.
(Great cheering.)

Well, after this, I am afraid some of my
friends may think, and my opponents will
say, that it is very egotistical in me to have
entered into these details. (Cries of "No!
No ! ") But I think, after this recapitula-
tion, I am at liberty to say I am guiltless
of that calamity which has fallen upon us.

92 John Bright

(Tremendous applause.) And I may men-
tion that some friends of mine — Mr. John
Dickinson, now Chairman of the India Ke-
form Association, Mr. Bazley, one of the
members for Manchester, Mr. Ashworth, the
President of the Chamber of Commerce of
Manchester, and Mr. John Benjamin Smith,
the member for Stockport — present them-
selves at this moment to my eyes as those
who have been largely instrumental in call-
ing the attention of Parliament and of the
country to this great question of the reform
of our government of India. (Cheers.)

But I have been asked twenty, fifty times
during the last twelve months, "Why don't
you come out and say something? Why
can't you tell us something in this time of
our great need?" Well, I reply, "I told
you something when telling was of use ; all
I can say now is this, or nearly all, that a
hundred years of crime against the negro
in America, and a hundred years of crime
against the docile natives of our Indian em-

on the American Question. 93

pire, are not to be washed away by the
penitence and the suffering of an hour."
(Great cheering.)

But what is our position? for you who
are subscribing your money here have a
right to know. I believe the quantity of
cotton in the United States is at this mo-
ment much less than many people here
believe, and that it is in no condition to be
forwarded and exported. And I suspect
that it is far more probable than otherwise,
notwithstanding some of the, I should say,
strange theories of my honorable colleague,
that there never will again be in America
a crop of cotton grown by slave labor.
(Great cheering.) You will understand, —
I hope so at least, — that I am not under-
taking the office of prophet, I am not pre-
dicting; I know that everything which is
not absolutely impossible may happen, and
therefore things may happen wholly differ-
ent to the course which appears to me
likely. But I say, taking the facts as they

94 John Bright

are before us, — with that most limited vis-
ion which is given to mortals, — the high
probability is that there will never be an-
other crop considerable or of avail in our
manufactories from slave labor in the United
States. (Renewed cheers.)

We read the American papers, or the quo-
tations from them in our own papers, but I
believe we can form no adequate concep-
tion of the disorganization and chaos that
now prevail throughout a great portion of
the Southern States \ it is natural to a state
of war under the circumstances of society
in that region. But then we may be asked,
What are our sources of supply, putting
aside India? There is the colony of
Queensland, where enthusiastic persons tell
you cotton can be grown worth 3s. a pound.
True enough; but when labor is probably
worth 10s. a day, I am not sure you are
likely to get any large supply of that mate-
rial we so much want, at a rate so cheap
that we shall be likely to use it. (Hear !

on the American Question. 95

Hear !) Africa is pointed to by a very zeal-
ous friend of mine ; but Africa is a land of
savages mostly, and with its climate so much
against European constitutions, I should not
encourage the hope that any great relief at
any early period can be had from that con-
tinent. (Hear ! Hear !) Egypt will send us
30,000 or 40,000 more bales than last year;
in all probability Syria and Brazil, with
these high prices, will increase their pro-
duction to some considerable extent; but I
hold that there is no country at present
from which you can derive any very large
supply, except you can get it from your own
dependencies in India. (Cheers.) Now if
there be no more cotton to be grown for
two, or three, or four years in America, for
our supply, we shall require, considering the
smallness of the bales and the loss in work-
ing up the cotton, — we shall require nearly
6,000,000 of additional bales to be supplied
from some source.

Now I want to put to you one question.

96 John Bright

It has taken the United States twenty years,
from 1840 up to I860, to increase their
growth of cotton from 2,000,000 of bales to
4,000,000. How long will it take any other
country, with comparatively little capital,
with a thousand disadvantages which Amer-
ica did not suffer from, — how long will it
take any other country, or all other coun-
tries, to give us 5,000,000 or 6,000,000 ad-
ditional bales of cotton? (Hear! Hear!)
There is one stimulus, — the only one that I
know of; and although I have not recom-
mended it to the government, and I know
not precisely what sacrifice it would entail,
yet I shall mention it, and I do it on the
authority of a gentleman to whom I have
before referred, who is thoroughly acquainted
with Indian agriculture, and who, himself
and his father, have been land-owners and
cultivators in India for sixty years. He says
there is only one mode by which you can
rapidly stimulate the growth of cotton in
India, except that stimulus coming from the

on the American Question. 97

high prices for the time being, — he says
that, if the government would make a public
declaration that for five years they would
exempt from land tax all land which during
that time shall grow cotton, there would be
the most extraordinary increase in the
growth of that article which has ever been
seen in regard to any branch of agriculture
in the world. (Much applause.)

I don't know how far that would act, but
I believe the stimulus would be enormous, —
the loss to the government in revenue would
be something, but the deliverance to the
industry of Lancashire, if it succeeded, as
my friend thinks, would, of course, be
speedy, and perhaps complete. Short of
this, I look upon the restoration of the pros-
perity of Lancashire as distant, — most re-
mote. I believe this misfortune will entail
ruin upon the whole working population,
and that it will gradually engulf the smaller
traders and those possessing the least capi-
tal. I don't say it will, because, as I have

98 John Bright

said, what is not impossible may happen, —
but it may for years make the whole fac-
tory property of Lancashire almost entirely
worthless. (Loud cries of "Hear! Hear!")
Well, this is a very dismal look-out for a
great many persons in this country; but it
comes, as I have said, — it comes from that
utter neglect of our opportunities and our
duties which has distinguished the govern-
ment of India. (Applause.)

Now, sir, before I sit down I shall ask you
to listen to me for a few moments on the
other branch of this great question, which
refers to that sad tragedy which is passing
before our eyes in the United States of
America. (Hear! Hear!) I shall not, in
consequence of anything you have heard
from my honorable friend, conceal from you
any of the opinions which I hold, and which
I proposed to lay before you if he had not
spoken. (Hear! Hear!) Having given to
him, notwithstanding some diversity of opin-
ion, a fair and candid hearing, I presume

on the American Question. 99

that I shall receive the same favor from
those who may differ from me. (Hear!
Hear !) If I had known that my honorable
friend was going to make an elaborate
speech on this occasion, one of two things
I should have done. I should either have
prepared myself entirely to answer him, or
I should have decided not to attend a meet-
ing where there could by any possibility of
chance have been anything like discord be-
tween so many — his friends and my friends
— in this room.

Since I have been member for Birming-
ham, Mr. Scholefield has treated me with the
kindness of a brother. (Applause.) Noth-
ing could possibly be more generous and
more disinterested in every way than his
conduct towards me during these several
years, and therefore I would much rather —
far rather — that I lost any mere opportu-
nity like this of speaking on this question,
than I would have come here and appeared
to be at variance with him. But I am hap-

100 John Bright

py to say that this great question does not
depend upon the opinion of any man in
Birmingham, or in England, or anywhere
else. (Cheers.) And therefore I could —
anxious always, unless imperative duty re-
quires to avoid even a semblance of differ-
ence — I could with a clear conscience have
abstained from coming to and speaking at
this meeting.

But I observe that my honorable friend
endeavored to avoid committing himself to
what is called a sympathy with the South.
He takes a political view of this great ques-
tion,— is disposed to deal with the matter
as he would have dealt with the case of a
colony of Spain or Portugal revolting in
South America, or Greece revolting from
Turkey. I should like to state here what I
once stated to an eminent American. He
asked me if I could give him an idea of the
course of public opinion in this country from
the moment we heard of the secession of
the Cotton States; and I endeavored to

on the American Question. 101

trace it in this way, — and I ask you to say
whether it is a fair and full description.

I said, — and my honorable friend has
admitted that, — that when the revolt or
secession was first announced, people here
were generally against the South. (Hear!
Hear!) Nobody thought then that the
South had any cause for breaking up the
integrity of that great nation. Their opin-
ion was, and what people said, according to
their different politics, in this country was,
"They have a government which is mild,
and not in any degree oppressive; they
have not what some people love very much,
and what some people dislike, — they have
not a costly monarchy, and an aristocracy,
creating and living on patronage. They
have not an expensive foreign policy; a
great army; a great navy; and they have
no suffering millions to be discontented and
endeavoring to overthrow their government ;
— all of which things have been said against
governments in this country and in Europe

102 John Bright

a hundred times within our own hearing,"
— and therefore, they said, "Why should
these men revolt?"

But for a moment the Washington gov-
ernment appeared paralyzed. It had no
army and navy; everybody was traitor to
it. It was paralyzed and apparently help-
less; and in the hour when the government
was transferred from President Buchanan to
President Lincoln, many people — such was
the unprepared state of the North, such
was the apparent paralysis of everything
there — thought there would be no war;
and men shook hands with each other pleas-
antly, and congratulated themselves that the
disaster of a great strife, and the mischief
to our own trade, might be avoided. That
was the opinion at that moment, so far as I
can recollect, and could gather at the time,
with my opportunities of gathering such
opinion. They thought the North would
acquiesce in the rending of the Kepublic,
and that there would be no war.

on the American Question. 103

Well, but there was another reason. They
were told by certain public writers in this
country that the contest was entirely hope-
less, as they have been told lately by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer. (Laughter.)
I am very happy that, though the Chancel-
lor of the Exchequer is able to decide to a
penny what shall be the amount of taxes
to meet public expenditure in England, he
cannot decide what shall be the fate of a
whole continent. (Hear! Hear!) It was
said that the contest was hopeless, and why
should the North continue a contest at so
much loss of blood and treasure, and so
great a loss to the commerce of the whole
world. If a man thought — if a man be-
lieved in his heart that the contest was
absolutely hopeless, — no man in this coun-
try had probably any right to form a posi-
tive opinion one way or the other, — but if
he had formed that opinion, he might think,
"Well, the North can never be successful;
it would be much better that they should

104 John Bright

not carry on the war at all; and therefore
I am rather glad that the South should have
success, for by that the war will be the
sooner put an end to." I think that was a
feeling that was abroad. (Hear! Hear!)

Now I am of opinion that, if we judge a
foreign nation in the circumstances in which
we find America, we ought to apply it to
our own principles. My honorable friend
has referred, I think, to the question of the
Trent. I was not here last year, but I heard
of a meeting, — I read in the papers of a
meeting held in reference to that affair in
this very hall, and that there was a great
diversity of opinion. But the majority were
supposed to indorse the policy of the gov-
ernment in maldng a great demonstration
of force. And I think I read that at least
one minister of religion took that view from
this platform. (Hear! Hear!) I am not
complaining of it. But I say that if you
thought when the American captain, even
if he had acted under the commands of his

on the American Question. 105

government, which he had not, had taken
two men most injurious and hostile to his
country from the deck of an English ship,
— if you thought that on that ground you
were justified in going to war with the Re-
public of North America, then I say you
ought not to be very nice in judging what
America should do in circumstances much
more onerous than those in which you were
placed. (Cheers.)

Now, take as an illustration the Eock of
Gibraltar. Many of you have been there,
I dare say. I have ; and among the things
that interested me were the monkeys on the
top of it, — (laughter,) — and a good many
people at the bottom, who were living on
English taxes. (Renewed laughter.) Well,
the Rock of Gibraltar was taken and re-
tained by this country when we were not
at war with Spain, and it was retained con-
trary to every moral and honorable code.
(A voice, "No! No!") No doubt the gen-
tleman below is much better acquainted

106 John Bright

with the history of it than I am, — (loud
laughter,) — but I may suggest to him that
very likely we have read two different his-
tories. (Eenewed laughter.) But I will let
this pass, and I will assume that it came
into the possession of England in the most
honorable way, which is, I suppose, by regu-
lar and acknowledged national warfare.

Suppose, at this moment, you heard, or
the English government heard, that Spain
was equipping expeditions, by land and sea,
for the purpose of retaking that fortress
and rock. Now, although it is not of the
slightest advantage to any Englishman liv-
ing, excepting to those who have pensions
and occupations upon it ; although every
government knows it, and although more
than one government has been anxious to
give it up, and I hope this government will
send my friend, Mr. Cobden, to Madrid, with
an offer that Gibraltar shall be ceded to
Spain, as being of no use to this country,
and only embittering, as statesmen have

on the American Question. 107

admitted, the relations between Spain and
England, (if he were to go to Madrid with
an offer of the Rock of Gibraltar, I believe
he might have a commercial treaty with
Spain, that would admit every English man-
ufacture and every article of English pro-
duce into that country at a duty of not
more than ten per cent), — (Applause,) — I
say, don't you think that, if you heard Spain
was about to retake that useless rock, mus-
tering her legions and her fleets, the Eng-
lish government would combine all the power
of this country to resist it? (Applause.)

If that be so, then I think — seeing that
there was a fair election two years ago,
and that President Lincoln was fairly and
honestly elected — that when the Southern
leaders met at Montgomery in Alabama,
on the 6th of March, and authorized the
raising of a hundred thousand men, and
when, on the 15th of April, they attacked
Fort Sumter, — not a fort of South Caro-
lina, but a fort of the Union, — then, upon

108 John Bright

all the principles that Englishmen and Eng-
lish governments have ever acted upon, Pres-
ident Lincoln was justified in calling out
seventy-five thousand men, — which was his
first call, — for the purpose of maintaining
the integrity of that nation, which was the
main purpose of the oath which he had
taken at his election. (Loud cheers.)

Now I shall not go into a long argument
upon this question, for the reason that a
year ago I said what I thought it necessary
to say upon it, and because I believe the
question is in the hand, not of my honor-
able friend, nor in that of Lord Palmerston,
nor in that even of President Lincoln, but
it is in the hand of the Supreme Ruler, who
is bringing about one of those great trans-
actions in history which men often will not
regard when it is passing before them, but
which they look back upon with awe and
astonishment some years after they are past.
(Loud cheers.) So I shall content myself
with asking one or two questions. I shall

on the American Question. 109

not discuss the question whether the North
is making war for the Constitution, or mak-
ing war for the abolition of slavery.

If you come to a matter of sympathy
with the South, or recognition of the South,
or mediation or intervention for the benefit
of the South, you should consider what are
the ends of the South. (Hear! Hear!)
Surely the United States government is a
government at amity with this country. Its
Minister is in London, — a man honorable
by family, as you know, in America, his
father and his grandfather having held the
office of President of the Kepublic. You
have your own Minister just returned to
Washington. Is this hypocrisy? Are you,
because you can cavil at certain things
which the North, the United States govern-
ment, has done, or has not done, — are you
eagerly to throw the influence of your opin-
ion into a movement which is to dismember
the great Kepublic? ("No! No!")

Is there a man here that doubts for a mo-

110 John Bright

ment that the object of the war on the part
of the South, — they began the war, — (Ap-
plause,) — that the object of the war on the
part of the South is to maintain the bondage
of four millions of human beings? (Cries
of " No ! No ! " overwhelmed by tremendous
cheering.) That is only a small part of it.
The further object is to perpetuate forever
the bondage of all the posterity of those
four millions of slaves. (Prolonged cheer-
ing, mingled with some dissentient voices.)
You will hear that I am not in a condition
to contest vigorously anything that may be
opposed, for I am suffering, as nearly every-
body is, from the state of the weather, and
a hoarseness that somewhat hinders me in
speaking. I could quote their own docu-
ments till twelve o'clock in proof of what I
say; and if I found a man who denied,
upon the evidence that had been offered, I
would not offend him, or trouble myself by
trying further to convince him. (Hear!
Hear!)

on the American Question. Ill

The object is, that a handful of white men
on that continent shall lord it over countless
millions of blacks, made black by the very
hand that made us white. (Prolonged ap-
plause.) The object is, that they should
have the power to breed negroes, to work
negroes, to lash negroes, to chain negroes,
to buy and sell negroes, to deny them the
commonest ties of family, or to break their
hearts by rending them at their pleasure,
to close their mental eye to but a glimpse
of that knowledge which separates us from
the brute, — for in their laws it is criminal
and penal to teach the negro to read, — to
seal from their hearts the book of our re-
ligion, and to make chattels and things of
men and women and children. (Loud and
prolonged cheers.)

Now I want to ask whether this is to be
the foundation, as it is proposed, of a new
slave empire, and whether it is intended
that on this audacious and infernal basis
England's new ally is to be built up. (Ee-

112 John Bright

newed cheers, and cries of "No.") It has
been said that Greece was recognized, and
that other countries had been recognized.
Why Greece was not recognized till after
they had fought Turkey for six years, —
(Hear ! Hear !) — and the republics of South
America, some of them, till they had fought
the mother country for a score of years.
France did not recognize the United States
of America till some, I think, six years, five
certainly, after the beginning of the War of
Independence, and even then it was re-
ceived as a declaration of war by the Eng-
lish government. (Applause.) I want to
know who they are who speak eagerly in
favor of England becoming the ally and
friend of this great conspiracy against hu-
man nature. (Loud cheers.)

Now I should have no kind of objection
to recognize a country because it was a
country that held slaves, — to recognize the
United States, or to be in amity with it.
The question of slavery there, and in Cuba,

on the American Question. 113

and in Brazil, is, as far as respects the pres-
ent generation, an accident, and it would be
monstrous that we should object to trade
with, and have political relations with a
country, merely because it happened to have
within its borders the institution of slavery,
hateful as that institution is. But in this
case it is a new state intending to set itself
up on the sole basis of slavery. (Cries of
u ^t0 i » « n0 j » wnicn were drowned in
cheers.) Slavery is blasphemously set up
to be its chief corner-stone.

I have heard that there are ministers of
state who are in favor of the South ; that
there are members of the aristocracy who
are terrified at the shadow of the Great Ee-
public ; that there are rich men on our com-
mercial exchanges, depraved, it may be, with
their riches, and thriving unwholesomely
within the atmosphere of a privileged class ;
that there are conductors of the public press
who would barter the rights of millions of
their fellow-creatures that they might bask

114 John Bright

in the smiles of the great. (Mingled appro-
bation and disapprobation.)

But I know that there are ministers of
state who do not wish that this insurrection
should break up the American nation; that
there are members of our aristocracy who
are not afraid of the shadow of the Eepub-
lic ; that there are rich men, many, who are
not depraved by their riches ; and that there
are public writers of eminence and honor,
who will not barter human rights for the
patronage of the great. But most of all,
and before all, I believe, — I am sure it is
true in Lancashire, where the workingmen
have seen themselves coming down from
prosperity to ruin, from independence to a
subsistence on charity, — I say that I be-
lieve that the unenfranchised but not hope-
less millions of this country will never sym-
pathize with a revolt which is intended to
destroy the liberty of a continent, and to
build on its ruins a mighty fabric of human
bondage. (Prolonged cheers.)

on the American Question. 115

When I speak to gentlemen in private
upon this matter, and hear their own candid
opinion, — I mean those who differ from me
on this matter, — they generally end by say-
ing that the Bepublic is too great and too
powerful, and that it is better for us — ►
not "us," meaning you, but the governing
classes, and the governing policy of Eng-
land— that it should be broken up. But
we will suppose that we are in New York
or Boston, and are discussing England; and
if any one there were to say that England
has grown too big, — not in the thirty-one
millions that it has in its own island, but in
the one hundred and fifty millions it has in
Asia, and nobody knows how many millions
in every other part of the globe, — and
surely an American might fairly say that
he has not covered the ocean with fleets of
force, or left the bones of his citizens to
blanch on a hundred European battle-fields,
— he could say, and a thousand times more
fairly say, that England was great and pow-

116 John Bright

erful, and that it would be perilous for the
world that she should be so great. (Ap-
plause.)

But bear in mind that every declaration
of this kind, whether from an Englishman
who professes to be strictly English, or from
an American strictly American, or from a
Frenchman strictly French, whether he talks
in a proud and arrogant strain, and says that
Britannia rules the waves, or whether, as an
American, he speaks of "manifest destiny,"
and of all creation adoring the "stars and
stripes," or a Frenchman who thinks that
the eagles of that nation, having once over-
run Europe, may possibly have a right to
repeat the experiment, — I say all these
ideas and all that language are to be con-
demned. It is not truly patriotic; it is not
rational; it is not moral. Then, I say, if
any man wishes that Eepublic to be severed
on that ground, in my opinion he is only
doing what tends to keep alive jealousies
which in his hand will never die; and if

on the American Question. 117

they do not die, for anything I see, wars
must be eternal.

But then I shall be told that the North
do not like us at all. In fact, we have heard
it to-night. It is not at all necessary that
they should like us. (Laughter.) If an
American be in this room to-night, will he
think he likes my honorable friend? But
if the North does not like England, does
anybody believe the South does? It does
not appear to me to be a question of liking
or disliking. Everybody knows that when
the South was in power, — and it has been
in power for the last fifty years, — every-
body knows that hostility to this country,
wherever it existed in America, was cher-
ished and stimulated to the utmost degree
by some of those very men who are now
leaders of this very insurrection.

My honorable friend read a passage about
the Alabama. I undertake to say that he
is not acquainted with the facts about the
Alabama. (Laughter.) That he will admit,

118 John Bright

I think. (Renewed laughter.) The govern-
ment of this country, have admitted that the
building of the Alabama, and her sailing
from the Mersey, was a violation of inter-
national law. In America they say, and
they say here, that the Alabama is a ship
of war; that she was built in the Mersey;
that she was built, it is said, and I have rea-
son to believe it, by a member of the Brit-
ish Parliament; that she is furnished with
guns of English manufacture and produce;
that she is sailed almost entirely by Eng-
lishmen; and that these facts were repre-
sented, as I know they were represented,
to the collector of customs in Liverpool,
who pooh-poohed them, and said there was
nothing in them. He was requested to send
the facts up to London to the Customs' au-
thorities, and their solicitor, not a very wise
man, but probably in favor of breaking up
the Republic, did not think them of much
consequence ; but afterwards the opinion of
an eminent counsel, Mr. Collier, the member

on the American Question. 119

for Plymouth, was taken, and he stated dis-
tinctly that what was being done in Liver-
pool was a direct infringement of the For-
eign Enlistment Act, and that the Customs'
authorities of Liverpool would be respon-
sible for anything that happened in conse-
quence.

When this opinion was taken to the For-
eign Office the Foreign Office was a little
astonished and a little troubled; and after
they had consulted their own law officers,
whose opinions agreed with that of Mr. Col-
lier, they did what government officers gen-
erally do, and as promptly, — a telegraphic
message went down to Liverpool to order
that this vessel should be arrested, and she
happened to sail an hour or two before the
message arrived. (Laughter.) She has never
been into a Confederate port, — they have not
got any ports; she hoists the English flag
when she wants to come alongside a ship;
she sets a ship on fire in the night, and
when, seeing fire, another ship bears down

120 John Bright

to lend help, she seizes it, and pillages and
burns it. I think that, if we were citizens
of New York, it would require a little more
calmness than is shown in this country to
look at all this as if it was a matter with
which we had no concern. And therefore
I do not so much blame the words that
have been said in America in reference to
that question. (Hear! Hear!)

But they do not know in America so
much as we know, — the whole truth about
public opinion here. There are ministers
in our Cabinet as resolved to be no traitors
to freedom, on this question, as I am; and
there are members of the English aristoc-
racy, and in the very highest rank as I
know for a certainty, who hold the same
opinion. (Applause.) They do not know
in America — at least there has been no in-
dication of it until the advices that have
come to hand within the last two days —
what is the opinion of the great body of
the working classes in England. There has

on the American Question. 121

been every effort that money and malice
could use to stimulate in Lancashire, amongst
the suffering population, an expression of
opinion in favor of the Slave States. They
have not been able to get it. (Loud cheers.)
And I honor that population for their fidel-
ity to principles and to freedom, and I say
that the course they have taken ought to
atone in the minds of the people of the
United States for miles of leading articles,
written by the London press, — by men who
would barter every human right, — that
they might serve the party with which they
are associated.

But now I shall ask you one other ques-
tion before I sit down, — How comes it that
on the Continent there is not a liberal news-
paper, nor a liberal politician, that durst say,
or ever thought of saying, a word in favor
of this portentous and monstrous shape
which now asks to be received into the
family of nations? Take the great Italian
minister, Count Cavour. You read some

122 John Bright

time ago in the papers part of a despatch
which he wrote on the question of Amer-
ica, — he had no difficulty in deciding. Ask
Garibaldi. (Cheers.) Is there in Europe a
more disinterested and generous friend of
freedom than Garibaldi? (Cheers, and "No!
No!") Ask that illustrious Hungarian, to
whose marvellous eloquence you once lis-
tened in this hall. Will he tell you that
slavery had nothing to do with it, and that
the slaveholders of the South would lib-
erate the negroes sooner than the North
through the instrumentality of the war?
(Cheers.) Ask Yictor Hugo, the poet of
freedom, — the exponent, may I not call
him, of the yearnings of all mankind for
a better time. Ask any man in Europe
who opens his lips for freedom, — who dips
his pen in ink that he may indite a sen-
tence for freedom, — whoever has a sympa-
thy for freedom warm in his own heart, —
ask him, — he will have no difficulty in tell-
ing you on which side your sympathies
should lie. (Cheers.)

on the American Question, 123

Only a few days ago a German merchant
in Manchester was speaking to a friend of
mine, and said he had recently travelled
all through Germany. He said, "I am so
surprised, — I don't find one man in favor
of the South." That is not true of Ger-
many only, it is true of all the world ex-
cept this island, famed for freedom, in which
we dwell. I will tell you what is the rea-
son. Our London press is mainly in the
hands of certain ruling West End classes;
it acts and writes in favor of those classes.
I will tell you what they mean. One of
the most eminent statesmen in this coun-
try,— one who has rendered the greatest
services to the country, though, I must say,
not in an official capacity, in which men
very seldom confer such great advantages
upon the country, — he told me twice, at
an interval of several months, "I had no
idea how much influence the example of
that Kepublic was having upon opinion here,
until I discovered the universal congratula-

124 John Bright

tion that the Republic was likely to be
broken up."

But, sir, the Free States are the home of
the workingman. Now, I speak to work-
ingmen particularly at this moment. Do
you know that in fifteen years two million
five hundred thousand persons, men, women,
and children, have left the United Kingdom
to find a home in the Free States of Amer-
ica? That is a population equal to eight
great cities of the size of Birmingham.
What would you think of eight Birming-
hams being transplanted from this country
and set down in the United States ? Speak-
ing generally, every man of these two and a
half millions is in a position of much higher
comfort and prosperity than he would have
been if he had remained in this country.
I say it is the home of the workingman;
as one of her poets has recently said,

" For her free latch-string never was drawn in
Against the poorest child of Adam's kin."

(Great cheering.) And there, there are no

on the American Question. 125

six millions of grown men — I speak of the
Free States — excluded from the Constitu-
tion of their country and their electoral fran-
chise; there, there is a free Church, —
(Cheers,) — a free school, free land, a free
vote, and a free career for the child of the
humblest born in the land. (Eenewed
cheers.) My countrymen who work for
your living, remember this; there will be
one wild shriek of freedom to startle all
mankind, if that American Kepublic should
be overthrown. (Applause.)

Now for one moment let us lift ourselves,
if we can, above the narrow circle in which
we are all too apt to live, and think ; let us
put ourselves on an historical eminence, and
judge this matter fairly. Slavery has been,
as we all know, the huge, foul blot upon
the fame of the American Kepublic ; it is a
hideous outrage against human right and
against Divine law; but the pride, the pas-
sion of man, will not permit its peaceable
extinction; the slave-owners of our colo-

126 John Bright

nies, if they had been strong enough, would
have revolted too. I believe there was no
mode short of a miracle more stupendous
than any recorded in Holy Writ that could
in our time, or in a century, have brought
about the abolition of slavery in America,
but the suicide which the South has com-
mitted and the war which it has commenced.
(Cheers.)

Sir, it is a measureless calamity, — this
war. I said the Russian war was a measure-
less calamity, and yet many of your leaders
and friends told you that was a just war to
maintain the integrity of Turkey, some
thousands of miles off. Surely the integ-
rity of your own country at your own doors
must be worth as much as the integrity of
Turkey. (Hear! Hear!) Is not this war
the penalty which inexorable justice exacts
from America, North and South, for the
enormous guilt of cherishing that frightful
iniquity of slavery for the last eighty years ?
I do not blame any man here who thinks

on the American Question. 127

the cause of the North hopeless, and the
restoration of the Union impossible. It may
be hopeless; the restoration may be impos-
sible. You have the authority of the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer on that point.
(Laughter.) The Chancellor, as a speaker,
is not surpassed by any man in England ;
but unfortunately he made use of expres-
sions in the North of England, — now, I
suppose, nearly three months ago, — and he
seems to have been engaged during the
whole succeeding three months in trying to
make people understand what he meant.
(Laughter.) But this is obvious, — that he
believes the cause of the North to be hope-
less ; that their enterprise cannot succeed.

Well, he is quite welcome to that opinion,
and so is anybody else. I do not hold the
opinion ; but the facts are before us all, and,
as far as we can discard passion and sym-
pathy, we are all equally at liberty to form
our own opinion. But what I do blame is
this. I blame men who are eager to admit

128 John Bright

into the family of nations a state which
offers itself to you as based upon a princi-
ple, I will undertake to say, more odious
and more blasphemous than was ever here-
tofore dreamed of in Christian or Pagan, in
civilized or in savage times. (Loud cheers.)
The leaders of this revolt propose this mon-
strous thing, — that over a territory forty
times as large as England the blight and
curse of slavery shall be forever perpetu-
ated.

I cannot believe, myself, in such a fate
befalling that fair land, stricken as it now
is with the ravages of war. (Cheering.) I
cannot believe that civilization in its jour-
ney with the sun will sink into endless night
to gratify the ambition of the leaders of this
revolt, who seek to

" Wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind."

(Enthusiastic applause.) I have a far other
and far brighter vision before my gaze.
(Renewed cheering.) It may be but a vis-

on the American Question. 129

ion, but I will cherish it. I see one vast
confederation stretching from the frozen
North in unbroken line to the glowing
South, and from the wild billows of the
Atlantic westward to the calmer waters of
the Pacific main, — and I see one people,
and one law, and one language, and one
faith, and, over all that wide continent, the
home of freedom, and a refuge for the op-
pressed of every race and of every clime.

(The honorable gentleman resumed his
seat amid an enthusiastic burst of cheer-
ing.)

6*

130 John Bright

SPEECH ON SLAVERY AND SECES-
SION.

A public meeting of the inhabitants of
Rochdale was held in the Public Hall, Baillie
Street, February 3, 1863, for the purpose of
passing a resolution of thanks to the Ameri-
can subscribers in aid of the unemployed
work-people of Lancashire. The meeting
was convened by the Mayor, in accordance
with a requisition signed by one hundred
and seventy-six persons. The hall and gal-
leries were crowded with an audience antici-
pating a speech from Mr. Bright, who, on
entering with the Mayor, was greeted with
loud cheering.

The Mayor, on taking the chair, said he
could conceive of no occasion when, as chief
magistrate, he could take the chair with

on the American Question. 131

greater pleasure ; and he did not think that
his occupancy of the position of Mayor
should preclude him from the expression of
his private opinions. (Hear!) The object
of the meeting had his entire sympathy.
(Cheers.) They looked to the events trans-
piring in the Free States of America with the
greatest interest, and, in some respects, with
profound and solemn awe. Their desire was
to show that they appreciated the practical
proof of sympathy shown towards our suf-
fering population in the noble gift that
freighted the George Griswold, and which
gave a contradiction to the calumnies ut-
tered against the North by a portion of the
people of this country. This act of the mer-
chants of New York gave the lie to these
vile statements alleging hatred to England.
He was proud of this meeting, and of the
presence of their illustrious townsman, Mr.
Bright. (Cheers.)

Mr. Henry Kelsall moved the following
resolution : —

132 John Bright

" That the inhabitants of Rochdale, in public meeting
assembled, the Mayor of the borough in the chair, do
heartily thank the merchants of New York, and other
citizens of the United States of America, who have gen-
erously contributed to the relief of the distress now so
prevalent in this country ; and they regard the supplies
sent by the George Griswold and other ships as a proof
of the Christian kindness and brotherly feeling of the
people of the United States. They also take this occa-
sion to express their earnest desire that peace may soon
prevail on the American continent ; and they will espe-
cially rejoice if that peace be accompanied by the Union
re-established, with freedom secured to every man of
every color within its vast dominion."

It would, he said, manifest great ingrati-
tude if they did not suitably acknowledge
this generous gift. It would be well if free-
dom, which was the birthright of every man,
could be obtained without this bloodshed,
and certainly he thought that the money
spent upon the war would have been well
applied to purchasing freedom for the slaves.
(Hear! Hear!)

Alderman Thomas Ashworth had great

on the American Question. 133

pleasure in seconding the motion, and ex-
pressed a hope that all the acts of our gov-
ernment would give as much satisfaction as
the command to honor the good laden ship
as she entered the Mersey. (Hear!)

Mr. Bright, M. P., on being requested to
support the resolution, was greeted with re-
peated plaudits. The honorable member
said : —

Mr. Mayor, and fellow-townsmen, I feel as
if we were in our places to-night, — (Hear !)
— for we are met for the purpose of consider-
ing, and, I doubt not, of agreeing to a reso-
lution expressive of our sense of the gener-
osity of the merchants of New York, and
other citizens of the United States, who
have, in the midst of so many troubles and
such great sacrifices, contributed to the re-
lief of that appalling distress which has pre-
vailed, and does still prevail, in this country.

I regard this transmission of assistance
from the United States as a proof that the

134 John Bright

world moves onward in the direction of a
better time. (Hear !) It is an evidence that,
whatever may be the faults of ambitious
men, and sometimes, may I not say, the
crimes of governments, the peoples are draw-
ing together, and beginning to learn that it
never was intended that they should be hos-
tile to each other, but that every nation
should take a brotherly interest in every
other nation in the world. (Cheers.) There
has been, as we all know, not a little jealousy
between some portions of the people of this
country and some portions of the people
of the United States. Perhaps the jealousy
has existed more on this side. I think it
has found more expression here, probably
through the means of the public press, than
has been the case with them. I am not
alluding now to the last two years, but as
long as most of us have been readers of
newspapers and observers of what has passed
around us.

The establishment of independence, eighty

on the American Question. 135

years ago, the war of 1812, it may be occa-
sionally the pre sump tuousness and the arro-
gance of a growing and prosperous nation on
the other side of the Atlantic, — these things
have stimulated ill-feeling and jealousy here,
which have often found expression in lan-
guage not of the very kindest character.
But why should there be this jealousy be-
tween these two nations ? Mr. Ashworth has
said, and said very truly, " Are they not our
own people ? " I should think, as an English-
man, that to see that people so numerous, so
powerful, so great in so many ways, should
be to us a cause, not of envy or of fear, but
rather of glory and rejoicing. (Hear !)

I have never visited the United States,
but I can understand the pleasure with
which an Englishman lands in a country
three thousand miles off, and finds that
every man he meets speaks his own lan-
guage. (Hear !) I recollect some years ago
reading a most amusing speech delivered by
a Suffolk country gentleman, at a Suffolk

136 John Bright

agricultural dinner, I think it was, and I do
not believe the speeches of Suffolk country
gentlemen at Suffolk agricultural meetings
are generally very amusing. (Laughter.) But
this was a very amusing speech. This gen-
tleman had travelled ; he had been in the
United States, and being intelligent enough
to admire much that he saw there, he gave
to his audience a description of some things
that he had seen and observed ; but that
which seemed to delight him most was this,
that when he stepped from the steamer on
to the quay at New York, he said, " I found
that everybody spoke Suffolk." (Laughter.)
Now if anybody from this neighborhood
should visit New York, I am afraid that he
will not find everybody speaking Lancashire.
(Laughter.) Our dialect, as you know, is
vanishing into the past. It will be preserved
to future times partly in the works of Tim
Bobbin, — (laughter,) — but in a very much
better and more instructive form in the ad-
mirable writings of one of my oldest and

on the American Question. 137

most valued friends, who is now, I suspect,
upon this platform. (Cheers.) But if we
should not find the people of New York
speaking Lancashire, we should find them
speaking English. (Cheers.) And if we fol-
lowed a little further, and asked them what
they read, we should find that they read all
the books that we read that are worth read-
ing, and a good many of their own, some of
which have not yet reached us ; that there
are probably more readers in the United
States of Milton, and Shakespeare, and Dry-
den, and Pope, and Byron, and Wordsworth,
and Tennyson, than are to be found in this
country; because, I think, it will probably
be admitted by everybody who understands
the facts of both countries, that, out of the
twenty millions of population in the Free
States of America, there are more persons
who can read well than there are in the
thirty millions of population of Great Britain
and Ireland. (Hear !)

Well, if we leave their literature and turn

138 John Bright

to their laws, we shall find that their laws
have the same basis as ours, and that many
of the great and memorable judgments of
our greatest judges and lawyers are of high
authority with them. If we come to that
priceless possession which we have perhaps
more clearly established than any other peo-
ple in Europe, that of personal freedom, we
shall find that in the Free States of America
personal freedom is as much known, as well
established, as fully appreciated, and as com-
pletely enjoyed as it is now in this country.
And if we come to the form of their govern-
ment, we shall find that it is in its principle,
in its essence, not very dissimilar from that
which our Constitution professes in this king-
dom. The difference is this, that our Consti-
tution has never yet been fully enjoyed by
the people ; the House in which forty-eight
hours hence I may be sitting is not as full
and fair and free a representation of the
people, as is the House of Representatives
that assembles at Washington. (Cheers.)

on the American Question. 139

But, if there be differences, are there not
great points of agreement, and are there any
of these differences that justify us or them
in regarding either nation as foreign or
hostile ?

Now, the people of Europe owe much
more than they are often aware of to the
Constitution of the United States of America,
and to the existence of that great republic.
The United States have been in point of fact
an ark of refuge to the people of Europe
fleeing from the storms and the revolutions
of the old continent. (Hear !) They have
been, as far as the artisans and laboring pop-
ulation of this country are concerned, a life-
boat to them ; and they have saved hundreds
of thousands of men and of families from dis-
astrous shipwreck. (Hear !) The existence
of that free country and free government
has had a prodigious influence upon freedom
in Europe and in England ; and if you could
have before you a chart of the condition of
Europe when the United States became a

140 John Bright

nation, and another chart of the condition of
Europe now, you would see the difference,
the enormous stride which has been made in
Europe ; and you may rely upon it that not
a little of it has been occasioned by the in-
fluence of the great example of that country,
free in its political institutions beyond all
other countries, and yet maintaining its
course in peace, preserving order, and con-
ferring upon all its people a degree of pros-
perity which in these old countries is not
yet known. (Cheers.)

I should like now to speak specially to
the workingmen who are here, who have no
capital but their skill and their industry and
their bodily strength. In fifteen years, from
1845 to 1860, — and this is a fact which I
stated in this room more than a year ago,
when speaking on the question of America,
but it is a fact which every workingman
ought to have in his mind always when he
is considering what America is, — in fifteen
years there have emigrated to the United

on the American Question. 141

States from Great Britain and Ireland not
less than two million four hundred thousand
persons. (Hear ! Hear !) Millions are easily
spoken, not easily counted, with great diffi-
culty comprehended ; but the twenty-four
hundred thousand persons that I have de-
scribed means a population equal to not less
than sixty towns, every one of them of the
size and population of Kochdale. (Hear !)
And every one of these men who have emi-
grated, as he crossed the Atlantic, — if he
went by steam, a fortnight, and if he went
by sails, only a month or five weeks, — found
himself in a country where to his senses a
vast revolution had taken place, compre-
hending all that men anticipate from any
kind of revolution that shall advance politi-
cal and social equality in their own land, —
a revolution which commenced in the War of
Independence, which has been going on, and
which has been confirmed by all that has
transpired in subsequent years.

He does not find that he belongs to what

142 John Bright

is called the K lower classes " ; he is not shut
out from any of the rights of citizenship ; he
is admitted to the full enjoyment of all polit-
ical privileges, as far as they are extended to
any portion of the population ; and he has
there advantages which the people of this
country have not yet gained, because we are
but gradually making our way out of the
darkness and the errors and the tyrannies of
past ages. (Hear !) But in America he finds
the land not cursed with feudalism, — (Hear !)

— it is free to every man to buy and sell
and possess and transmit. (Hear !) He finds
in the town in which he lives that the
noblest buildings are the school-houses to
which his children are freely admitted.
(Hear !) And among those twenty millions,

— for I am now confining my observations
to the Free States, — the son of every man
has easy admission to school, has fair oppor-
tunity for improvement, and, if God has
gifted him with power of head and of heart,
there is nothing of usefulness, nothing of

on the American Question. 143

greatness, nothing of success, in that country,
to which he may not fairly aspire.

And, sir, this makes a difference between
that country and this, on which I must say
another word. One of the most painful
things to my mind to be seen in England is
this, that amongst the great body of those
classes which earn their living by their daily
labor, — it is particularly observable in the
agricultural districts, and it is too much to be
observed even in our districts, — there is an
absence of that hope which every man ought
to have in his soul that there is for him, if
he be industrious and frugal, a comforta-
ble independence as he advances in life.
(Cheers.) In the United States that hope
prevails everywhere, because everywhere
there is an open career; there is no privi-
leged class ; there is complete education ex-
tended to all, and every man feels that he
was not born to be in penury and in suf-
fering, but that by his honest efforts there
is no point in the social ladder to which

144 John Bright

c

he may not fairly hope to raise himseE
(Cheers.)

Well, looking at all this, — and I have but
touched on some very prominent points, —
I should say that it offers to us every mo-
tive, not for fear, not for jealousy, not for
hatred, but rather for admiration, gratitude,
and friendship. (Cheers.) I am persuaded
of this as much as I am of anything that I
know or believe, that the more perfect the
friendship that is established between the
people of England and the free people of
America, the more you will find your path
of progress here made easy for you, and the
more will social and political liberty advance
amongst us. (Loud cheers, and a little inter-
ruption, from the very crowded state of the
room, respecting which Mr. Bright remarked,
" Our Public Hall is not big enough.")

But this country which I have been in
part describing is now the scene of one of
the greatest calamities that can afflict man-
kind. (Hear !) After seventy years of almost

on the American Question. 145

uninterrupted peace, that country has be-
come the scene of a war more gigantic, per-
haps, than any that we have any record of
with regard to any other nation, or any
other people ; for the scene of this warfare
is so extended as to reach in distance almost
across Europe. At this very moment mili-
tary operations are being undertaken at
points as distant from each other as Madrid
is distant from Moscow. But this great
strife cannot have arisen amongst an edu-
cated and intelligent people without some
great and overruling cause. Let us for a
moment examine that cause, and let us ask
ourselves whether it is possible at such a
time to stand neutral in regard to the con-
tending parties, and to refuse our sympathy
to one or the other of them. (Hear ! Hear !)
I find men sometimes who profess a strict
neutrality ; they wish neither the one thing
nor the other. This arises either from the
fact that they are profoundly ignorant with
regard to this matter, — (Hear !) — or else

146 John Bright

that they sympathize with the South, but
are rather ashamed to admit it. (Cheers,
and laughter.)

There are two questions concerned in this
struggle ; hitherto, generally, one has only
been discussed. There is the question
whether negro slavery shall continue to
be adopted amongst Christian nations, or
whether it shall be entirely abolished.
(Hear!) Because, bear in mind that if the
result of the struggle that is now proceeding
in America should abolish slavery within the
territories of the United States, then soon
after slavery in Brazil, and slavery in Cuba,
will also fall. (Hear !) I was speaking the
other day to a gentleman, well acquainted
with Cuban affairs; he is often in the habit
of seeing persons who come from Cuba to
this country on business; and I asked him
what his Cuban friends said of what was
going on in America. He said, " They speak
of it with the greatest apprehension ; all the
property of Cuba," he said, "is based on

on the American Question. 147

slavery ; and they say that if slavery comes
to an end in America, as they believe it
will, through this war, slavery will have a
very short life in Cuba." Therefore, the
question that is being now tried is not
merely whether four millions of slaves in
America shall be free, but whether the vast
number of slaves (I know not the number)
in Cuba and Brazil shall also be liberated.
(Hear!)

But there is another question besides that
of the negro, and which to you whom I am
now addressing is scarcely less important. I
say that the question of freedom to men of
all races is deeply involved in this great
strife in the United States. (Cheers.) I said
I wanted the workingmen of this audience
to listen to my statement, because it is to
them I particularly wish to address myself.
I say, that not only is the question of negro
slavery concerned in this struggle, but, if we
are to take the opinion of leading writers
and men in the Southern States of America,

148 John Bright

the freedom of white men is not safe in their
hands. (Hear !) Now, I will not trouble you
with pages of extracts which would confirm
all that I am about to say, but I shall read
you two or three short ones that will explain
exactly what I mean.

The city of Richmond, as you know, is the
capital of what is called the Southern Con-
federacy. In that city a newspaper is pub-
lished, called the Richmond Examiner, which
is one of the most able, and perhaps about
the most influential, paper published in the
Slave States. Listen to what the Richmond
Examiner says : — " The experiment of uni-
versal liberty has failed. The evils of free
society are insufferable. Free society in the
long run is impracticable ; it is everywhere
starving, demoralizing, and insurrectionary.
Policy and humanity alike forbid the exten-
sion of its evils to new peoples and to com-
ing generations ; and therefore free society
must fall and give way to a slave society, —
a social system old as the world, universal as
man."

on the American Question. 149

Well, on another occasion, the same paper
treats this subject in this way. The writer
says: "Hitherto the defence of slavery has
encountered great difficulties, because its
apologists stopped half-way. They confined
the defence of slavery to negro slavery
alone, abandoning the principle of slavery,
and admitting that every other form of slav-
ery was wrong. Now the line of defence is
changed. The South maintains that slavery
is just, natural, and necessary, and that it
does not depend on the difference of com-
plexions." (Cries of " Shame ! ")

But following up this is an extract from a
speech by a Mr. Cobb, who is an eminent
man in Southern politics and in Southern
opinion. He says : " There is, perhaps, no
solution of the great problem of reconciling
the interests of labor and capital, so as to
protect each from the encroachments and
oppressions of the other, so simple and
effective as negro slavery. By making
the laborer himself capital, the conflict

150 John Bright

ceases, and the interests become identical."
(Shame !)

Now, I do not know whether there is any
workingman here who does not fully or
partly realize the meaning of those extracts.
They mean this, that if a man in this neigh-
borhood,— (for they pity us very much in
our benighted condition as regards capital
and labor, and they have an admirable way
in their view of putting an end to strikes,) —
they say that, if a man in this neighborhood
had ten thousand pounds sterling in a cotton
or woollen factory, and he employed a hun-
dred men, women, and children, that instead
of paying them whatever wages had been
agreed upon, allowing them to go to the
other side of the town, and work where they
liked, or to move to another county, or to
emigrate to America, or to have any kind of
will or wish whatever with regard to their
own disposal, that they should be to him
capital, just the same as the horses are in
his stable ; that he should sell the husband

on the American Question. 151

South, — "South" in America means some-
thing very dreadful to the negro, — that
they should sell the wife if they liked, that
they should sell the children, that, in point
of fact, they should do whatsoever they liked
with them, and that, if any one of them
resisted any punishment which the master
chose to inflict, the master should be held
justified if he beat his slaves to death ; and
that not one of those men should have the
power to give evidence in any court of jus-
tice, in any case, against a white man, how-
ever much he might have suffered from that
white man. (Hear!)

Now you will observe that this most im-
portant paper in the South writes for that
principle, and this eminent Southern politi-
cian indorses it, and thinks it a cure for all
the evils which exist in the Old World, and in
the Northern and Free States ; and there is
not a paper in the South, nor is there a man
as eminent or more eminent than Mr. Cobb,
who has dared to write or speak in condem-

152 John Bright

nation of the atrocity of that language.
(Hear !) I believe this great strife to have
had its origin in an infamous conspiracy
against the rights of human nature. (Hear !)
Those principles, which they distinctly avow
and proclaim, are not to be found, as far as I
know, in the pages of any heathen writer of
old times, nor are they to be discovered in
the teachings or the practice of savage na-
tions in our times. It is the doctrine of
devils, and not of men (Hear ! Hear !) ; and
all mankind should shudder at the enormity
of the guilt which the leaders of this conspir-
acy have brought upon that country. (Loud
applause.)

Now, let us look at two or three facts,
which I take to be very remarkable, on the
surface of the case, but which there are men
in this country, and I am told they may be
found even in this town, who altogether
ignore and deny. The war was not com-
menced by those to whom your resolution
refers ; it was commenced by the South ;

on the American Question. 153

they rebelled against the majority. It was
not a rebellion against a monarchy, or an
aristocracy, or some other form of govern-
ment which has its hold upon people, some-
times by services, but often from tradition;
but it was against a government of their
own, and a compact of their own, that they
violently rebelled, and for the expressed and
avowed purpose of maintaining the institu-
tion of slavery, and for the purpose, not dis-
avowed, of reopening the slave-trade, and, as
these extracts show, if their principles should
be fully carried out, of making bondage uni-
versal among all classes of laborers and arti-
sans. When I say that their object was to
reopen the slave-trade, do not for a moment
imagine that I am overstating the case
against them. They argue, with a perfect
logic, that, if slavery was right, the slave-
trade could not be wrong ; if the slave-trade
be wrong, slavery cannot be right ; and that
if it be lawful and moral to go to the State
of Virginia and buy a slave for two thousand

154 John Bright

dollars, and take him to Louisiana, it would
not be wrong to go to Africa, and buy a
slave for fifty dollars, and take him to Loui-
siana. That was their argument ; it is an
argument to this day, and is an argument
that in my opinion no man can controvert;
and the lawful existence of slavery is as a
matter of course to be followed, and would
be followed, wherever there was the power,
by the reopening of the traffic in negroes
from Africa. (Hear !)

That is not all these people have done.
Eeference has been made, in the resolution
and in the speeches, to the distress which
prevails in this district, and you are told, and
have been told over and over again, that all
this distress has arisen from the blockade of
the ports of the Southern States. There is
at least one great port from which in past
times two millions of bales of cotton a year
have found their way to Europe, — the port
of New Orleans, — which is blockaded ; and
the United States government has pro-

on the American Question. 155

claimed that any cotton that is sent from
the interior to New Orleans for shipment,
although it belongs to persons in arms
against the government, shall yet be per-
mitted to go to Europe, and they shall re-
ceive unmolested the proceeds of the sale of
that cotton. But still the cotton does not
come. The reason why it does not come is
not because it would do harm to the United
States government for it to come, or that it
would in any way assist the United States
government in carrying on the war. The
reason that it does not come is, because its
being kept back is supposed to be a way of
influencing public opinion in England, and
the course of the English government in
reference to the American war. (Cheers.)
They burn the cotton that they may injure
us, and they injure us because they think
that we cannot live even for a year without
their cotton ; and that to get it we should
send ships of war, break the blockade, make
war upon the North, and assist the slave-

156 John Bright

owners to maintain, or to obtain, tHeir inde-
pendence.

Now, with regard to the question of Amer-
ican cotton, one or two extracts will be suffi-
cient ; but I would give you a whole pam-
phlet of them if it were necessary. Mr.
Mann, an eminent person in the State of
Georgia, says : " With the failure of the cotr
ton, England fails. Stop her supply of South-
ern slave-grown cotton, and her factories
stop, her commerce stops, the healthful
normal circulation of her life-blood stops."
Again he says : " In one year from the stop-
page of England's supply of Southern slave-
grown cotton, the Chartists would be in all
her streets and fields, revolution would be
rampant throughout the island, and nothing
that is would exist." He also says, address-
ing an audience : " Why, sirs, British lords
hold their lands, British bishops hold their
revenues, Victoria holds her sceptre, by the
grace of cotton, as surely as by the grace of
God." (Roars of laughter.) Senator Wig-

on the American Question. 157

fall says, " If we stop the supply of cotton
for one week, England would be starving.
(Laughter.) Queen Victoria's crown would
not stand on her head one week, if the sup-
ply of cotton was stopped ; nor would her
head stand on her shoulders." (Repeated
laughter.) Mr. Stephens, who is the Vice-
President of the Southern Confederacy, says :
a There will be revolution in Europe, there
will be starvation there ; our cotton is the
element that will do it." (Loud laughter.)

Now, I am not stating the mere result of
any discovery of my own, but it would be
impossible to read the papers of the South,
or the speeches made in the South, before,
and at the time of, and after the secession,
without seeing that the universal opinion
there was, that the stoppage of the supply of
cotton would be our instantaneous ruin, and
that if they could only lay hold of it, keep it
back in the country, or burn it, so that it
never could be used, that then the people of
Lancashire, merchants, manufacturers, and

158 John Bright

operatives in mills, — everybody dependent
upon this vast industry, — would immedi-
ately arise and protest against the English
government abstaining for one moment from
recognition of the South and war with the
North, and a resolution to do the utmost that
we could to create a Southern slave inde-
pendent republic. (Cheers.)

And these very men who have been wish-
ing to drag us into a war that would have
covered us with everlasting infamy, — (loud
cheers,) — they have sent their envoys to
this country, Mr. Yancey, and Mr. Mann (I
don't know whether or not the same Mr.
Mann to whom I have been referring), and
Mr. Mason, the author of the Fugitive Slave
Law. (Hear ! Hear !) And these men have
been in this country ; one of them, I believe,
is here now, envoys sent to be friends with
the Queen of England, to be received at her
court, and to make friends with the great
men in London. They come, — I have seen
them under the gallery of the House of

on the American Question. 159

Commons, and members of the House shak-
ing hands with them and congratulating
them if there has been some military success
on their side, and receiving them as if they
were here from the most honorable govern-
ment, and with the most honorable mission.
Why, the thing which they have broken off
from the United States to maintain, is felony
by your law. (Cheers.) They are not only
slave owners, slave buyers and sellers, but
that which out of Pandemonium itself never
before was conceived of, — they are slave
breeders for the slave market ; and these
men have come to your country, and are to
be met with at elegant tables in London, and
are in fast friendship with some of your pub-
He men, and are constantly found in some of
your newspaper offices ; and they are here
to ask Englishmen — Englishmen with a his-
tory for freedom — to join hands with their
atrocious conspiracy. (Prolonged and re-
peated cheering.)

I regret more than I have words to ex-

160 John Bright

if

press this painful fact, that of all the coun-
tries in Europe this country is the only one
which has men in it who are willing to take
active steps in favor of this intended slave
government. We supply the ships ; we sup-
ply the arms, the munitions of war ; we give
aid and comfort to this foulest of all crimes.
Englishmen only do it. In the newspapers
I believe you have not seen a single state-
ment that any French, or Belgian, or Dutch,
or Russian ship has been engaged in, or
seized whilst attempting to violate the block-
ade, and to carry arms to the South. (Cheers.)
They are English liberal newspapers only,
which support this stupendous iniquity. —
They are English statesmen only, who pro-
fess to be liberal, who have said a word in
favor of the authors of this now-enacting
revolution in America.

The other day, not a week since, a mem-
ber of the present government, — he is not a
statesman, — he is the son of a great states-
man, — (Hear !) — and occupies the position

on the American Question. 161

of Secretary for Ireland, — he dared to say to
an English audience that he wished the Ke-
public to be divided, (hisses,) and that the
South should become an independent state.
Why, if that island which — I suppose in
punishment for some of its offences — has
been committed to his care, — (laughter, and
cheers,) — if that island were to attempt to
secede, not to set up a slave kingdom, but a
kingdom more free than it has ever yet
been, the government of which he is a mem-
ber would sack its cities and drench its soil
with blood before they would allow this
kingdom to be established. (Immense cheer-
ing ; and a voice, " Bright forever ! " fol-
lowed by renewed cheering.)

But the workingmen of England, and I
will say it too for the great body of the
middle classes of England, they have not
been wrong upon this great question. As
for you, — men laboring from morn till night
that you may honorably and honestly main-
tain your families, and the independence

162 John Bright

of your households, — you are too slowly
emerging from a condition of things far from
independent, — far from free, — for you to
have sympathy with this fearful crime which
I have been describing. (Cheers.) You
come, as it were, from bonds yourselves, and
you can sympathize with them who are still
in bondage. (Cheers.)

See that meeting that was held in Man-
chester a month ago, in the Free Trade Hall,
of five thousand or six thousand men. See
the address which they there carried unani-
mously to the President of the United States.
See that meeting held the other night in
Exeter Hall, in London ; that vast room, the
greatest room, I suppose, in the Metropolis,
filled so much that its overflowings filled
another large room in the same building,
and when that was full, the further over-
flowings filled the street ; and in both rooms,
and in the street, speeches were made on
this great question. But what is said by the
writers in this infamous Southern press in

on the American Question. 163

this country with regard to that meeting ?
Who was there ? "A gentleman who had
written a novel, and two or three Dissenting
ministers."

Well, I shall not attempt any defence of
those gentlemen. What they do, they do
openly, in the face of day ; and if they utter
sentiments on this question, it is from a pub-
lic platform, with thousands of their country-
men gazing into their faces. These men
who slander them write behind a mask, —
(Hear !) — and, what is more, they dare not
tell in the open day that which they write in
the columns of their journal. (Cheers.) But
if it be true, now, that there is nothing in
the writer of a successful novel, or in two
or three pious and noble-minded Dissenting
ministers, to collect a great audience, what
does it prove, if there was a great audience ?
It only proves that they were not collected
by the reputation of any orator who was
expected to address them, but by their
cordial and ardent sympathy for the great

164 John Bright

cause which was laid before them. (Loud
cheers.)

Everybody now that I meet says to me,
"Public opinion seems to have undergone a
considerable change." (Laughter.) The fact
is, people don't know very much about
America. They are learning more every
day. They have been greatly misled by
what are called u the best public instructors."
(Laughter.) Jefferson, who was one of the
greatest men that the United States have
produced, said that newspapers should be
divided into four compartments, in one of
them they should print the true ; in the
next, the probable ; in the third, the possi-
ble ; and in the fourth, the lies. (Laughter,
and cheers.) With regard to some of
these newspapers, I incline to think, as
far as their leading columns go, that an
equal division of space would be found
very inconvenient, — (loud cheers,) — and
that the last-named compartment, when
dealing with American questions, would

on the American Question. 165

have to be at least four times as large as
the first. (Cheers.)

Coming back to the question of this war :
I admit, of course, — everybody must admit,
— that we are not responsible for it, for its
commencement, or for the manner in which
it is carried out ; nor can we be very clearly,
or in any considerable degree, responsible for
its result. But there is one thing which we
are responsible for, and that is for our sym-
pathies, for the manner in which we regard
it, and for the tone which we take when we
discuss it. What shall we say, then, with re-
gard to it? On which side shall we stand?
I don't believe it is possible to be strictly,
coldly neutral. The question at issue is too
great, the contest is too grand in the eye
of the world. It is impossible for any man,
who can have an opinion worth anything on
any question, not to have some kind of an
opinion on the question of this war. I am
not ashamed of my opinion, or of the sym-
pathy which I feel, and have over and over

166 John Bright

again expressed, on the side of the free
North. I cannot understand how any man
witnessing what is enacting on the American
continent can employ himself with small
cavils against the free people of the North,
and close his eye entirely to the enormity
of the purposes of the South. I cannot un-
derstand how any Englishman, who in past
years has been accustomed to say that
" there was one foul blot upon the fair fame
of the American Republic," can now express
any sympathy for those who would perpet-
uate and extend that blot. And, more, if we
profess to be, though it be with imperfect
and faltering steps, the followers of Him who
declared it to be his Divine mission a to heal
the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance
to the captives and recovering of sight to
the blind, to set at liberty them that are
bruised," — must we not reject with indigna-
tion and scorn the proffered alliance and
friendship with a power based on human
bondage, and which contemplates the over-

on the American Question. 167

throw and the extinction of the dearest
rights of the most helpless of mankind?
(Cheers.)

If we are the friends of freedom, — per-
sonal and political, — and we all profess to be
that, and most of us, more or less, are striv-
ing after it more completely for our country,
— how can we withhold our sympathy from
a government and a people amongst whom
white men have always been free, and who
are now offering an equal freedom to the
black ? I advise you not to believe in the
"destruction" of the American nation. If
facts should happen by any chance to force
you to believe it, don't commit the crime of
wishing it. (Cheers.) I don't blame men
who draw different conclusions from mine
from the facts, and who believe that the res-
toration of the Union is impossible. We can
only use our own sense more or less as we
may have it upon the facts before us. But I
blame those men that wish for such a catas-
trophe. For myself, I have never despaired,

168 John Bright

and I will not despair. In the language of
one of our old poets, who wrote, I think,
more than three hundred years ago, I will
not despair, —

" For I have seen a ship in haven fall,
After the storm had broke both mast and shroud."

From the very outburst of this great convul-
sion, I have had but one hope and one faith,
and it was this : that the result of this stu-
pendous strife might be to make freedom
the heritage forever of a whole continent,
and that the grandeur and the prosperity of
the American Union might never be im-
paired. (The honorable member resumed
his seat amid enthusiastic cheering.)

The first resolution was then submitted to
the meeting, and carried amidst great ap-
plause.

Mr. Alderman Livsey next moved : —

That a copy of the foregoing resolution be signed by
the Mayor, and be forwarded to the Chairman of the
New York Relief Committee.

on the American Question. 169

Mr. J. Petrie, Jr., in seconding this resolu-
tion, remarked that he felt it no small honor
to be permitted to take part in the pro-
ceedings of this meeting. Mr. Bright in
less than forty-eight hours would take his
place in the House of Commons, and he
would be able to bear testimony to the
enthusiasm, unity, and determination of the
inhabitants of Rochdale in reference to the
American struggle. (Cheers.)

The resolution was carried with acclama-
tion.

Mr. Alderman Healey proposed a vote of
thanks to the Mayor for so ably filling the
chair. The motion was seconded by Mr. R
Hurst, and passed.

Before the meeting separated, three cheers
were given for Mr. Bright, and followed by
hearty cheers for Mr. Lincoln.

170 John Bright

THE STRUGGLE IN AMERICA

IN RELATION TO THE WORKINGMEN OF
BRITAIN.

Address at a Meeting of the Trades' Unions of London in
St. James's Hall, March 26, 1863, with the Resolutions and
Address to President Lincoln.

A meeting convened by the Trades' Unions
of London took place on the 26th ultimo, at
St. James's Hall, Piccadilly, for the purpose
of expressing sympathy with the Northern
States of America hi the present struggle,
and a belief that their success would lead to
the speedy emancipation of the negro race.
Whatever might otherwise have been the
case, the announcement that the honorable
member for Birmingham would take the
chair was sufficient to account for an at-
tendance so numerous as to tax the power
of accommodation of the vast hall to the
utmost extent.

on the American Question. 171

Among those present on the platform
were Mr. Stansfeld, M. P., Mr. Lawson, M. P.,
Mr. John Stuart Mill, Mr. P. A. Taylor, M. P.,
Kev. Newman Hall, Professor Beesly, etc.

Mr. Bright, on making his appearance, was
hailed with loud and long-continued cheer-
ing, which was renewed on his rising to com-
mence the business of the evening. The
honorable gentleman, who was suffering from
a severe cold, spoke as follows : —

When the committee did me the honor to
ask me to attend this meeting to-night and
to take the chair, I felt that I was not at lib-
erty to refuse, for I considered that there
was something remarkable in the character
of this meeting ; and I need not tell you that
the cause which we are assembled to discuss
is one which excites my warmest sympathies.
(Cheers.) This meeting is remarkable, inas-
much as it is not what is commonly called a
public meeting, but it is a meeting, as you
have seen by the announcements and adver-

172 John Bright

tisements by which it has been called — it is
a meeting of members of Trades' Unions and
Trades' Societies in London. The members
of these societies have not usually stepped
out from their ordinary business to take part
in meetings of this kind on public questions.
The subject which we have met to discuss
is one of surpassing interest, — which excites
at this moment, and has excited for two
years past, the attention and the astonish-
ment of the civilized world. We see a coun-
try which for many years — during the life-
time of the oldest amongst us — has been
the most peaceful, and prosperous, and most
free, amongst the great nations of the earth,
— (Hear ! Hear !) — we see it plunged at
once into the midst of a sanguinary revolu-
tion, whose proportions are so gigantic as to
dwarf all other revolutionary records and
events of which we have any knowledge.
But I do not wonder at this revolution. No
man can read the history of the United
States from the time when they ceased to be

on the American Question. 173

dependent Colonies of England, without dis-
covering that at the birth of that great Re-
public there was sown the seed of its disso-
lution, or at least of its extreme peril; and
the infant giant in its cradle may be said to
have been rocked under the shadow of the
cypress, which is the symbol of mortality and
the tomb. (Cheers.)

Colonial weakness, when face to face with
British strength, made it impossible to put
an end to slavery, or to establish a republic
free from slavery. To meet England, it was
necessary to be united, and to be united it
was necessary to tolerate slavery ; and from
that hour to this, — at least to a period with-
in the last two or three years, — the love of
the Union and the patriotism of the Ameri-
can people have induced them constantly to
make concessions to slavery, because they
knew that when they ceased to make these
concessions they ran the peril of that dis-
ruption which has now arrived ; and they
dreaded the destruction of their country

174 John Bright

even more than they hated the evil of slav-
ery. (Hear !) But these concessions failed,
as I believe concessions to evil always do
fail. These concessions failed to secure
safety in that Union. There were principles
at war which were wholly irreconcilable.
The South, as you know, for fifty years has
been engaged in building fresh ramparts by
which it may defend its institutions. The
North has been growing yearly greater in
freedom; and though the conflict might be
postponed, it was obviously inevitable.

In our day, then, that which the statesmen
of America had hoped permanently to post-
pone has arrived. The great trial is now
going on in the sight of the world, and the
verdict upon this great question must at last
be rendered. But how much is at stake ?
Some men in this country, some writers, treat
it as if, after all, it was no great matter that
had caused this contest in the United States.
I say that a whole continent is at stake.
(Cheers.) It is not a question of boundary;

on the American Question. 175

it is not a question of tariff ; it is not a
question o'f supremacy of party, or even of
the condition of four millions of negroes.
(Cheers.) It is more than that. It is a
question of a whole continent, with its teem-
ing millions, and what shall be their present
and their future fate. (Cheers.) It is for
these millions freedom or slavery, education
or ignorance, light or darkness, Christian mo-
rality, ever widening and all-blessing in its
influence, or an overshadowing and all-blast-
ing guilt. (Cheers.)

There are men, good men, who say that
we in England, who are opposed to war,
should take no public part in this great
question. Only yesterday I received from a
friend of mine, whose fidelity I honor, a let-
ter, in which he asked me whether I thought,
with the views which he supposed I enter-
tain on the question of war, it was fitting
that I should appear at such a meeting as
this. It is not our war ; we did not make it.
We deeply lament it. (Hear !) It is not in

176 . John Bright

our power to bring it to a close ; but I know
not that we are called upon to shut our eyes
and to close our hearts to the great issues
which are depending upon it. Now we are
meeting to ask one another some questions.
Has England any opinion with regard to this
American question ? Has England any sym-
pathy, on one side or the other, with either
party in this great struggle ? But, to come
nearer, I would ask whether this meeting has
any opinion upon it, and whether our sym-
pathies have been stirred in relation to it ?
It is true, to this meeting not many rich, not
many noble, have been called. It is a meet-
ing composed of artisans and workingmen of
the city of London, — men whose labor, in
combination with capital and directing skill,
has built this great city, and has made Eng-
land great. (Hear ! and cheers.) I address
myself to these men. I ask them, — I ask
you, — have you any special interest in this
contest ?

Privilege thinks it has a great interest in

on the American Question. 177

it, and every morning, with blatant voice, it
comes into your streets and curses the Amer-
ican Republic. (Cheers.) Privilege has be-
held an afflicting spectacle for many years
past. It has beheld thirty millions of men,
happy and prosperous, without emperor,
(cheers,) without king, (cheers,) without the
surroundings of a court, (cheers,) without
nobles, except such as are made by emi-
nence in intellect and virtue, (cheers,)
without state bishops and state priests, —

" Sole venders of the lore which works salvation," —

without great armies and great navies, with-
out great debt and without great taxes.
(Hear!) Privilege has shuddered at what
might happen to old Europe if this grand
experiment should succeed. (Cheers.) But
you, the workers, — you, striving after a bet-
ter time, — you, struggling upwards towards
the light, with slow and painful steps, — you
have no cause to look with jealousy upon a
country which, amongst all the great nations

8* L

178 John Bright

of the globe, is that one where labor has met
with the highest honor, and where it has
reaped its greatest reward. (Cheers.) Are
you aware of the fact, that in fifteen years,
which is but as yesterday when it is past,
two and a half millions of your countrymen
have found a home in the United States, —
(Hear !) — that a population equal nearly,
if not quite, to the population of this great
city — itself equal to no mean kingdom —
has emigrated from these shores ? In the
United States there has been, as you know,
an open door for every man, — (Hear!) —
and millions have entered into it, and have
found rest.

Now, take the two sections of the country
which are engaged in this fearful struggle.
In the one, labor is honored more than else-
where in the world ; there, more than in any
other country, men rise to competence and
independence ; a career is open ; the pursuit
of happiness is not hopelessly thwarted by
the law. In the other section of that coun-

on the American Question. 179

try, labor is not only not honored, but it is
degraded. (Hear! Hear!) The laborer is
made a chattel. He is no more his own than
the horse that drags an omnibus through the
next street ; nor is his wife, nor is his child,
nor is anything that is his, his own. (Hear!)
And if you have not heard the astounding
statement, it may be as well for a moment to
refer to it, — that it is not black men only
who should be slaves. Only to-day, I read
from one of the Southern papers a statement
that — " Slavery in the Jewish times was not
the slavery of negroes; and therefore, if
you confine slavery to negroes, you lose
your sheet-anchor, which is the Bible argu-
ment in favor of slavery." (Hear!)

I think nothing can be more fitting for
the discussion of the members of the Trade
Societies of London. You in your Trade
Societies help each other when you are sick,
or if you meet with accidents. You do
many kind acts amongst each other. You
have other business also ; you have to main-

180 John Bright

tain what you believe to be the just rights
of industry and of your separate trades ; and
sometimes, as you know, you do things
which many people do not approve, and
which, probably, when you come to think
more coolly of them, you may even doubt
the wisdom of yourselves. That is only say-
ing that you are not immaculate, and that
your wisdom, like the wisdom of other
classes, is not absolutely perfect. But they
have in the Southern States a specific for all
the differences between capital and labor.
They say, " Make the laborer capital ; the
free system in Europe is a rotten system ;
let us get rid of that, and make all the labor-
ers as much capital and as much the prop-
erty of the capitalist and employer as the
capitalist's cattle and horses are property,
and then the whole system will move with
that perfect ease and harmony which the
world admires so much in the Southern
States of America." (Cheers and laughter.)
I believe there never was a question sub-

on the American Question. 181

mitted to the public opinion of the world
which it was more becoming the working-
men and members of Trades' Unions and
Trade Societies of every kind in this coun-
try fully to consider, than this great ques-
tion. (Hear !)

But there may be some in this room, and
there are some who say to me, " But what is
to become of our trade ? What is to become
of the capitalist and the laborer of Lanca-
shire ? " I am not sure that much of the cap-
ital of Lancashire will not be ruined. I am
not sure that very large numbers of its popu-
lation will not have to remove to seek other
employment, either in this or some other
country. I am not one of those who under-
rate this great calamity. On the contrary, I
have scarcely met with any man, — not more
than half a dozen, — since this distress in our
county began, who has been willing to meas-
ure the magnitude of this calamity according
to the scale with which I have viewed it.

But let us examine this question. The

182 John Bright

distress of Lancashire comes from failure of
supply of cotton. The failure of the supply
of cotton comes from the war in the United
States. The war in the United States has
originated in the effort of the slaveholders
of that country to break up what they them-
selves admit to be the freest and best gov-
ernment that ever existed, for the sole pur-
pose of making perpetual the institution of
slavery. (Cheers.) But if the South began
the war, and created all the mischief, does it
look reasonable that we should pat them on
the back, and be their friends ? (No! No!)
If they have destroyed cotton, or withheld
it, shall we therefore take them to our
bosoms ?

I have a letter written by an agent in the
city of Nashville, who had been accustomed
to buy cotton there before the war, and who
returned there immediately after that city
came into the possession of the Northern
forces. He began his trade, and cotton came
in. Not Union planters only, but Secession

on the American Question. 183

planters, began to bring in the produce of
their plantations, and he had a fair chance
of re-establishing his business ; but the mo-
ment this was discovered by the command-
ers of the Southern forces at some distance
from the city, then they issued the most per-
emptory orders that every boat-load of cot-
ton on the rivers, every wagon-load upon the
roads, and every car-load upon the railroads,
that was leaving any plantations for the pur-
poses of sale, should be immediately de-
stroyed. The result was, that the cotton
trade was at once again put an end to, and
I believe only to a very small extent has it
been reopened, even to this hour.

Then take the state of New Orleans,
which, as you know, has been now for many
months in the possession of the Northern
forces. The Northern commanders there had
issued announcements that any cotton sent
down to New Orleans for exportation, even
though it came from the most resolved
friends of secession in the district, should

184 John Bright

still be safe. It might be purchased to ship
to Europe, and the proceeds of that cotton
might be returned, and the trade be re-
opened. But you have not found cotton
come down to New Orleans, although its
coming there under those terms would be of
no advantage, particularly to the North. It
has been withheld with this single object,
to create in the manufacturing districts of
France and England a state of suffering that
might at last become unbearable, and thus
compel the government, in spite of all that
international law may teach, in spite of all
that morality may enjoin upon them, to take
sides with the South, and go to war with the
North for the sake of liberating whatever
cotton there is now in the plantations of the
Secession States. (Hear !)

At this moment, such of you as read the
city articles of the daily papers will see that
a loan has been contracted for in the city, to
the amount of three millions sterling, on be-
half of the Southern Confederacy. (Shame !)

on the American Question, 185

It is not brought into the market by any
firm with an English name ; but I am sorry
to be obliged to believe that many English-
men have taken portions of that loan. Now
the one great object of that loan is this, to
pay in this country for vessels which are
being built, — Alabamas, — from which it is
hoped that so much irritation will arise in
the minds of the people of the Northern
States, that England may be dragged into
war to take sides with the South and with
slavery. (Hear !) The South was naturally
hostile to England, because England was hos-
tile to slavery. Now the great hope of the
insurrection has been from the beginning,
that Englishmen would not have fortitude
to bear the calamities which it has brought
upon us ; but by some trick or by some acci-
dent we might be brought into a war with
the North, and therefore give strength to the
South. (Hear! Hear!)

I should hope that this question is now so
plain that most Englishmen must understand

186 John Bright

it ; and least of all do I expect that the six
millions of men in the United Kingdom who
are not enfranchised have any donbt upon it.
Their instincts are always in the main right,
and if they get the facts and information, I
can rely on their influence being put in the
right scale. I wish I could state what would
be as satisfactory to myself with regard to
some others. There may be men outside,
there are men sitting amongst your legisla-
tors, who will build and equip corsair ships —
(Hear ! Hear !) — to prey upon the commerce
of a friendly power, — who will disregard the
laws and honor of their county, — who will
trample on the proclamation of their sov-
ereign,— and who, for the sake of the glitter-
ing profit which sometimes waits on crime,
are content to cover themselves with ever-
lasting infamy. There may be men, too, —
rich men, — in this city of London, who will
buy in the slave-owners' loan, and who, for
the chance of more gain than honest deal-
ing will afford them, will help a conspiracy

on the American Question. 187

whose fundamental institution, whose corner-
stone, is declared to be felony, and infamous
by the statutes of their country. (Cheers.)

I speak not to those men, — I leave them
to their conscience in that hour which com-
eth to all of us, when conscience speaks
and the soul is no longer deaf to her voice.
I speak to you, the workingmen of London,
the representatives, as you are here to-night,
of the feelings and the interests of the mil-
lions who cannot hear my voice. (Cheers.)
I wish you to be true to yourselves. Dynas-
ties may fail, aristocracies may perish, privi-
lege will vanish into the dim past ; but you,
your children, and your children's children
will remain, and from you the English people
will be continued to succeeding generations.

You wish the freedom of your country.
You wish it for yourselves. You strive for it
in many ways. Do not then give the hand
of fellowship to the worst foes of freedom
that the world has ever seen, and do not, I
beseech you, bring down a curse upon your

188 John Bright

cause which no after penitence can ever lift
from it. (Cheers.) You will not do this.
(Cries of Never !) I have faith in you. Im-
partial history will tell that, when your
statesmen were hostile or coldly neutral,
when many of your rich men were corrupt,
when your press — which ought to have in-
structed and defended — was mainly written
to betray, the fate of a continent and of its
vast population being in peril, you clung to
freedom with an unfaltering trust that God
in his infinite mercy will yet make it the
heritage of all his children. (Loud cheers.)

Mr. Howell, a bricklayer, then proposed
the first resolution, which was as follows : —

" That the attempt of the American slave-owners to
break up the Union, in which their liberties and consti-
tutional rights had never been interfered with, is destruc-
tive of the first principles of political society, and that
this meeting regards with indignation the conduct of these
public men, capitalists and journalists in this country,
who have abetted the cause of the Confederates ; and,
further, that the government of this country, in permit-

on the American Question. 189

ting the pirate ship Alabama to leave Liverpool, was
guilty of negligence, and has failed in its duty to a
friendly nation."

Mr. Rodgers, a shoemaker, and Mr. Mantz,
a compositor, seconded it, after which it was
put to the meeting, and carried unanimously.

Mr. W. R. Cremer, a joiner, moved, Profes-
sor Beesly seconded, and Mr. Conolly, a ma-
son, supported the second resolution, which
was to the following effect : —

" That we altogether repudiate the statements that the
war now raging in America is the result of republican
or democratic institutions, but rather do we believe that
the liberty arising out of such institutions has made it
impossible for slavery longer to exist there ; and we fur-
ther believe, that, should the South be successful in set-
ting up a government founded on human slavery, to rec-
ognize such a government would be to take a step back-
wards in civilization ; and we declare that we will use our
utmost efforts to prevent the recognition of any govern-
ment founded on such a monstrous iniquity. And we
hereby tender our thanks to the President, government,
and people of the Northern States for the firmness they
have displayed, and the sacrifices they have made to re-

190 John Bright

store the Union, and to consolidate the liberty of the Re-
public ; and as the cause of labor and liberty is one all
over the world, we bid them God speed in their glorious
work of emancipation."

This being put to the meeting, was also
carried unanimously.

The following address to President Lin-
coln, embodying these views, was then unan-
imously adopted, with the understanding
that a committee of the Trades' Unions
should present it to Mr. Adams, the United
States Minister, for transmission to Washing-
ton.

" To Abraham Lincoln,

President of the United States of America.

" Honored Sir: — A portion of the British press, led
by the infamous Times, an arrogant aristocracy, and some
of the moneyed classes of this country, having misrepre-
sented the wishes and feelings of its people with regard
to the lamentable contest between two portions of the
great Republic, of which you are the legal and constitu-
tional chief, — we, the Trades' Unionists and workingmen
of London, in public meeting assembled, desire to assure
you and the people of the Northern and loyal States of

on the American Question. 191

America, that our earnest and heartfelt sympathies are
with you in the arduous struggle you are maintaining in
the cause of human freedom. We indignantly protest
against the assertion that the people of England wish for
the success of the Southern States in their diabolical
attempt to establish a separate government on the basis
of human slavery. However much a liberty-hating aris-
tocracy and an unscrupulous moneyocracy may desire
the consummation of such a crime, we, the workingmen
of London, view it with abhorrence.

" We know that slavery in America must have an indi-
rect but real tendency to degrade and depress labor in
this country also, and for this, if for no higher reason, we
should refuse our sympathy to this infamous Rebellion.
The history of our race has been the story of a long-con-
tinued struggle for freedom ; and we prize too highly the
liberties bequeathed us by our fathers to desecrate their
memories by descending to associate with the conspirators
who seek to sink the producers of human necessaries and
human wealth into soulless beasts. Though we have felt
proud of our country, of the freedom won for its children,
by the sacrifices and the blood of our fathers, yet have
we ever turned with glowing admiration to your great
Republic, where a higher political and social freedom has
been generally established ; but we have always regretted
that its citizens, our brothers in the great Anglo-Saxon
family, should have allowed the foul stain of negro sla-

192 John Bright

very to remain a black spot on their otherwise noble
institutions.

" "When you, sir, were elected chief magistrate of the
great American Republic, we hoped for the inauguration
of a policy which should cause slavery to disappear from
the soil of the United States, and we have not been dis-
appointed. Though surrounded by difficulties, though
trammelled by enactments made during the ascendency
of the slave-owners, you have struck off the shackles from
the poor slaves of Columbia ; you have welcomed as
men, as equals under God, the colored peoples of Hayti
and Liberia, and by your Proclamation, issued on the
first day of this year, and the plans you have laid before
Congress, you have opened the gates of freedom to the
millions of our negro brothers who have been deprived
of their manhood by the infernal laws which have so long
disgraced the civilization of America.

" We believe that the endeavors already made by you
are only intimations of your earnest intentions to carry
out to completion the grand and holy work you have
begun, and we pray you to go on unfalteringly, undaunt-
edly, never pausing until the vivifying sun of liberty shall
warm the blood and inspire the soul of every man who
breathes the air of your great Republic. Be assured
that, in following out this noble course, our earnest, our
active sympathies will be with you, and that, like our
brothers in Lancashire, whose distress called forth your

on the American Question. 193

generous help in this your own time of difficulty, we
would rather perish than band ourselves in unholy alli-
ance with the South and slavery.

" May you and your compatriots be crowned with vic-
tory ; and may the future see the people of England and
their brothers of America marching shoulder to shoulder
determinedly forward, the pioneers of human progress,
the champions of universal liberty."

A vote of thanks to the chairman brought
the proceedings to a close.

194 John Bright

SPEECH AT THE LONDON TAVEKN,

JUNE 16, 1863.

On the evening of June 16, 1863, a densely
crowded public meeting, under the auspices
of the Emancipation Society, was held at the
London Tavern, to hear from M. D. Conway,
Esq., of Eastern Virginia, an address on the
war in America. Mr. Bright, M. P., presided.
Mr. Bright spoke as follows : —
I presume that, from the advertisements
by which the meeting has been convened,
you are, as I am, acquainted with the fact,
that the principal object of the meeting is
not to listen to me, but to a gentleman
whose claim upon your attention is such as
no Englishman can pretend to have in con-
nection with the question which is before us
to-night. Mr. Conway, who will address you
when I sit down, is not an Englishman, but

on the American Question. 195

an American ; and he is not only an Ameri-
can, but lie is of the State of Virginia ; and he
is not only of the State of Virginia, but he is
of one of the eminent families of that State,
connected as it has been, unhappily, with an
institution which just now forms the great
subject of controversy in the United States.
I shall not undertake, in the presence of
Mr. Conway, to say what might be interest-
ing to you to hear, and truthful for me to
utter in his praise ; but I will read an extract
from a letter which was written by William
Lloyd Garrison, — (cheers,) — the apostle of
abolition in the United States, to my friend,
George Thompson, — (cheers,) — the apostle
of abolition in England. (Hear ! Hear !) The
letter is dated —

"Boston, April 10th, 1863.
" You are such an attentive reader of the Liberator
and the Standard, that the name and services of the
bearer of this, Mr. Moncure D. Conway, author of ' The
Golden Hour ' and ' The Rejected Stone,' &c, must be
familiar to you, so that he will need no special introduc-
tion. Allied by birth and relationship to the first fami-

196 John Bright

lies in Virginia, the son of a prominent slaveholder,
brought up in the midst of slavery and all its pernicious
influences, classically educated, he has for several years
past been the brave, outspoken, fervid advocate of the
Antislavery cause, bringing to it all of Southern fire, res-
olution, energy, and persistency ; and consequently has
made himself an exile from his native home and Com-
monwealth for an indefinite period, though as true to the
honor, safety, wealth, and progress of Virginia ' as the
needle to the pole.' You well know how to appreciate
such a moral hero, and he will rejoice to make your
personal acquaintance.

"WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON."

If I might add one other sentence with
regard to Mr. Conway, I should tell you the
sad and distressing fact, presented ever to
his own mind and memory, that his father,
and I believe two of his brothers, and almost
all the men of his blood relationship, are at
this moment in the Southern armies. I
need not, therefore, tell you the depth and
the strength of the conviction against sla-
very which could have led him to the line
of conduct which he has pursued for many

on the American Question. 197

years past with regard to that question.
(Cheers.)

I come then with you to listen to Mr. Con-
way ; but before I give place to him, perhaps
I shall not trespass beyond my duty in
making some observations upon the subject
which now occupies the attention of all men
in this country. (Loud cheers.)

If we look back a little over two years, —
two years and a half, — when the question
of secession was first raised in a practical
shape, I think we shall be able to remember
that, when the news first arrived in England,
there was but one opinion with regard to it,

— that every man condemned the folly and
the wickedness of the South, — (Hear ! Hear !)

— and protested against their plea that they
had any just grievance which justified them
in revolt, — and every man hoped that some
mode might be discovered by which the ter-
rible calamity of war might be avoided.

For a time many thought that there would
have been no war. Whilst the reins were

198 John Bright

slipping from the hands — the too feeble
hands — of Mr. Buchanan, into the grasp of
President Lincoln, — (loud cheers,) — there
was a moment when men thought that we
were about to see the wonderful example of
a great question, which in all other countries
would have involved a war, settled perhaps
by moderation, — some moderation on one
side, and some concession on the other; and
so long as men believed that there would be
no war, so long everybody condemned the
South. We were afraid of a war in America,
because we knew that one of the great in-
dustries of our country depended upon the
continuous reception of its raw material from
the Southern States. But it was a folly —
it was a gross absurdity — for any man to be-
lieve, with the history of the world before
him, that the people of the Northern States,
twenty millions, with their free government,
would for one moment sit down satisfied
with the dismemberment of their country,
and make no answer to the war which had

on the American Question. 199

been commenced by the South. (Great
cheering.)

I speak not in justification of war. I am
only treating this question upon principles
which are almost universally acknowledged
throughout the world, and by an overwhelm-
ing majority even of those men who accept
the Christian religion, — and it is only upon
those principles, so almost universally ac-
knowledged, and acknowledged as much in
this country as anywhere else, — it is only
just that we should judge the United States
upon the principles upon which we in this
country would be likely to act.

But the North did not yield to the dis-
memberment of their country, and they did
not allow a conspiracy of Southern politicians
and slaveholders to seize their forts and arse-
nals without preparing for resistance ; and
then, when the people of England found that
the North were about to resist, and the war
was inevitable, they turned their eyes from
the South, which was the beginner of the

200 John Bright

war, and looked to the North, saying that, if
the North would not resist, there could be no
war, — (laughter,) — and that we should get
our cotton, and trade would go on as before ;
and therefore, from that hour to this, not a
few persons in this country, who at first con-
demned the South, have been incessant in
their condemnation of the North.

Now, I believe this is a fair statement of
the feeling which prevailed when the first
news of secession arrived, and of the change
of opinion which took place in a few weeks,
when it was found that, by the resolution of
the North to maintain the integrity of their
country, war, and civil war, was unavoidable.
The trade interests of the country affected
our opinion; and I fear did then prevent,
and has since prevented, our doing justice to
the people of the North. (Hear ! Hear ! and
cheers.)

Now I am going to transport you, in mind,
to Lancashire, and the interests of Lanca-
shire, which, after all, are the interests of the

on the American Question. 201

whole United Kingdom, and clearly of not a
few in this metropolis. Now, what was the
condition of our greatest manufacturing in-
dustry before the war, and before secession
had been practically attempted ? It was this :
that almost ninety per cent of all our cotton
came from the Southern States of the Amer-
ican Union, and was, at least nine tenths of
it, the produce of the uncompensated labor
of the negro.

Everybody knew that we were carrying
on a prodigious industry upon a most inse-
cure foundation ; and it was the commonest
thing in the world for men who were discuss-
ing the present and the future of the cot-
ton trade, whether in Parliament or out of it,
to point to the existence of slavery in the
United States of America as the dangerous
thing in connection with that great trade ;
and it was one of the reasons which stimu-
lated me on several occasions to urge upon
the government of this country to improve

the government of India, — (cheers,) — and
9*

202 John Bright

to give us a chance of receiving a considers
ble portion of our supply from India, so that
we might not be left in absolute want when
the calamity occurred, which all thoughtful
men knew must some day come, in the Unit-
ed States.

Now, I maintain that with your supply
of cotton mainly from the Southern States,
raised by slave labor, two things are indispu-
table : first, that your supply must always be
insufficient ; and second, that it must always
be insecure. Perhaps many of you are not
aware that in the United States — I am
speaking of the Slave States, and the cotton-
growing States — the quantity of land which
is cultivated in cotton is a mere garden, a
mere plot, in comparison with the whole of
the cotton region. I speak from the author-
ity of a report lately presented to the Boston
Chamber of Commerce, containing much im-
portant information on this question ; and I
believe that the whole acreage, or the whole
breadth of the land on which cotton is grown

on the American Question. 203

in America, does not exceed ten thousand
square miles, — that is, a space one hundred
miles long and one hundred miles broad, or
the size of two of our largest counties in
England ; but the land of the ten chief cotton-
producing States is sixty times as much as
that, being, I believe, about twelve times the
size of England and Wales.

It cannot be, therefore, because there has
not been land enough that we have not in
former years had cotton enough ; it cannot
be that there has not been a demand for the
produce of the land, for the demand has con-
stantly outstripped the supply ; it has not
been because the price has not been suffi-
cient, for, as is well known, the price has
been much higher of late years, and the
profit to the planter much greater ; and yet,
notwithstanding the land and the demand,
and the price, and the profit, the supply of
cotton has not been sufficient for the wants
of the spinners and the manufacturers of the
world, and for the wants of civilization.

204 John Bright

The particular facts with regard to this I
need not, perhaps, enter into ; but I find, if I
compare the prices of cotton in Liverpool
from 1856 to 1860 with the prices from
1841 to 1845, that every pound of cotton
from America and sold in Liverpool fetched
in the last five years more than twenty per
cent more than it did in the former iiye
years, notwithstanding that we were every
year in greater difficulties through finding
our supply of cotton insufficient.

Now, what was the reason that we did not
get enough ? It was because there was not
labor enough in the Southern States. You
see every day in the newspapers that there
are four millions of slaves, but of those four
millions of slaves some are growing tobacco,
some rice, and some sugar; a very large
number are employed in domestic servitude,
and a large number in factories, mechanical
operations, and business in towns ; and there
remain only about one million negroes, or
only one quarter of the whole number, who

on the American Question. 205

are regularly engaged in the cultivation of
cotton.

Now, you will see that the production of
cotton and its continued increase must de-
pend upon the constantly increasing produc-
tiveness of the labor of those one million of
negroes, and on the natural increase of popu-
lation from them. Well, the increase of the
population of the slaves in the United States
is rather less than two and a half per cent
per annum, and the increase on the million
will be about twenty-five thousand a year;
and the increased production of cotton from
that increased amount of labor consisting
of twenty-five thousand more negroes every
year will probably never exceed — I believe
it has not reached — one hundred and fifty
thousand bales per annum. The exact facts
with regard to this are these : that in the
ten years from 1841 to 1850 the average
crop was 2,173,000 bales, and in the ten
years from 1851 to 1860 it was 3,252,000,
being an increase of 1,079,000 bales in the

206 John Bright

ten years, or only about 100,000 bales of in-
crease per annum.

Now, I think I have shown that the in-
crease of production must depend upon the
increase of labor, because every other ele-
ment is in abundance, — soil, climate, and so
forth. (A Voice : a How about sugar ? ") A
gentleman asks about sugar. If in any par-
ticular year there was an extravagant profit
upon cotton, there might be, and there prob-
ably would be, some abstraction of labor
from the cultivation of tobacco, and rice, and
sugar, in order to apply it to cotton, and a
larger temporary increase of growth might
take place ; but I have given you the facts
with regard to the last twenty years, and I
think you will see that my statement is cor-
rect. (Cheers.)

Now, can this be remedied under slavery ?
(No ! No !) I will show you how it cannot.
And first of all, everybody who is acquainted
with American affairs knows that there is
not very much migration of the population

on the American Question. 207

of the Northern States into the Southern
States to engage in the ordinary occupations
of agricultural labor. Labor is not honor-
able and is not honored in the South, —
(Hear! Hear!) — and therefore free labor-
ers from the North are not likely to go
South. Again, of all the emigration from
this country, — amounting, as it did, in the fif-
teen years from 1846 to 1860, to two million
five hundred thousand persons, being equal
to the whole of the population of this great
city, — a mere trifle went South and settled
there to pursue the occupation of agricul-
ture ; they remained in the North, where
labor is honorable and honored.

Whence, then, could the planters of the
South receive their increasing labor? Only
from the slave-ship and the coast of Africa.
But, fortunately for the world, the United
States government has never yet become so
prostrate under the heel of the slave-owner
as to consent to the reopening of the slave-
trade. (Loud cheers.) Therefore the South-

208 John Bright

era planter was in this unfortunate position :
he could not tempt, perhaps he did not want,
free laborers from the North ; he could not
tempt, perhaps he did not want, free laborers
from Europe ; and if he did want, he was not
permitted to fetch slave labor from Africa.
Well, that being so, we arrive at this conclu-
sion,— that whilst the cultivation of cotton
was performed by slave labor, you were shut
up for your hope of increased growth to the
small increase that was possible with the in-
crease of two and a half per cent per annum
in the population of the slaves, about one
million in number, that have been regularly
employed in the cultivation of cotton.

Then, if the growth was thus insufficient,
— and I as one connected with the trade can
speak very clearly upon that point, — (Hear !
Hear!) — I ask you whether the production
and the supply were not necessarily insecure
by reason of the institution of slavery ? It
was perilous with the Union. In this coun-
try we made one mistake in our forecast of

on the American Question. 209

this question ; we did not believe that the
South would commit suicide ; we thought it
possible that the slaves might revolt. They
might revolt, but their subjugation was inev-
itable, because the whole power of the Union
was pledged to the maintenance of order in
every part of its dominions.

But if there be men who think that the
cotton trade would be safer if the South were
an independent state, with slavery estab-
lished there in permanence, these greatly
mistake, — (Hear ! Hear !) — because what-
ever was the danger of revolt in the South-
ern States whilst the Union was complete,
the possibility of revolt and the possibility
of success would be surely greatly increased,
if the North were separate from the South,
and the negro had only his Southern master,
and not the Northern power, to contend
against. (Cheers.)

But I believe there is little danger of
revolt, and no possibility of success. When
the revolt took place in the island of St. Do-

210 John Bright

mingo, the blacks were far superior in num-
bers to the whites. In the Southern States
it is not so, and ignorant, degraded, without
organization, without arms, and scarcely with
any faint hope of freedom forever, except
the enthusiastic one which they have when
they believe that God will some day stretch
out his arm for their deliverance, — (loud
cheers,) — I say that, under these circum-
stances, to my mind, there was no reasonable
expectation of revolt, and there was no ex-
pectation whatever of success in any attempt
to gain their liberty by force of arms.

But now we are in a different position.
Slavery itself has chosen its own issue, and
has chosen its own field. Slavery — and
when I say slavery, I mean the slave power

— has not trusted to the future ; but it has
rushed into the battle-field to settle this
great question ; and having chosen war, it is
from day to day sinking to inevitable ruin
under it. (Cheers.) Now, if we are agreed

— and I am keeping you still to Lancashire

on the American Question. 211

and to its interests for a moment longer —
that this vast industry, with all its interests
of capital and labor, has been standing on a
menacing volcano, is it not possible that
hereafter it may be placed upon a rock
which nothing can disturb ? (Cheers.)

Imagine, what of course some people will
say one has no right to imagine, — imagine
the war over, the Union restored, — (Hear!
Hear!) — and slavery abolished, — (cheers,)
— does any man suppose that there would
be in the South one single negro fewer than
there are at present ? On the contrary, I be-
lieve there would be more. I believe there
is many a negro in the Northern States, and
even in Canada, who, if the lash, and the
chain, and the branding-iron, and the despot-
ism against which even he dared not com-
plain, were abolished forever, would turn his
face to the sunny lands of the South, and
would find himself happier and more useful
there than he can be in a more northern
clime.

212 John Bright

More than this, there would be a migra-
tion from the North to the South. You do
not suppose that those beautiful States, those
regions than which earth offers nothing to
man more fertile and more lovely, are
shunned by the enterprising population of
the North because they like the rigors of a
Northern winter and the greater changeable-
ness of the Northern seasons ? Once abolish
slavery in the South, and the whole of the
country will be open to the enterprise and
to the industry of all. (Cheers.) And more
than that, when you find that, only the other
day, not fewer than four thousand emigrants,
most of them from the United Kingdom,
landed in one day in the city of New York,
do you suppose that all those men would go
north and west at once ? Would not some
of them turn their faces southward, and seek
the clime of the sun, which is so grateful to
all men, and where they would find a soil
more fertile, rivers more abundant, and ev-
erything that Nature offers more profusely

on the American Question. 213

given, but from which they are now shut out
by the accursed power which slavery exerts ?
(Cheers.) Why, with freedom you would
have a gradual filling up of the wildernesses
of the Southern States ; you would have
there, not population only, but capital, and
industry, and roads, and schools, and every-
thing which tends to produce growth, and
wealth, and prosperity. (Loud applause.)

Now, I maintain — and I believe my opin-
ion will be supported by all those men who
are most conversant with American affairs — .
that, with slavery abolished, with freedom
firmly established in the South, you would
find in ten years to come a rapid increase in
the growth of cotton ; and not only would its
growth be rapid, but its permanent increase
would be secure.

I said that I was interested in this great
question of cotton. I come from the midst
of the great cotton industry of Lancashire iy
much the largest portion of anything I have
in the world depends upon it ; not a little of

214 John Bright

it is now utterly valueless, under the contin-
uance of this war. My neighbors by thou-
sands and scores of thousands are suffering,
more or less, as I am suffering ; and many of
them, as you know, — more than a quarter
of a million of them, — have been driven from
a subsistence gained by their honorable labor
to the extremest poverty, and to a depend-
ence upon the charity of their fellow-coun-
trymen. My interest is the interest of all
the population.

My interest is against a mere enthusiasm,
a mere sentiment, a mere visionary fancy of
freedom as against slavery. I am speaking
now as a matter of business. I am glad
when matters of business go straight with
matters of high sentiment and morality, —
(Hear ! Hear !) — but from this platform I de-
clare my solemn conviction that there is no
greater enemy to Lancashire, to its capital
and to its labor, than the man who wishes
the cotton agriculture of the Southern States
to be continued under slave labor. (Loud
cheers.)

on the American Question. 215

Now, one word more upon another branch
of the question, and I have done. I would
turn for a moment from commerce to poli-
tics. I believe that our true commercial in-
terests in this country are very much in har-
mony with what I think ought to be our
true political sympathies. There is no peo-
ple in the world, I think, that more fully and
entirely accepts the theory that one nation
acts very much upon the character and upon
the career of another, than England ; for our
newspapers and our statesmen, our writers
and our speakers of every class, are con-
stantly telling us of the wonderful influence
which English constitutional government and
English freedom have on the position and
career of every nation in Europe. I am not
about to deny that some such influence, and
occasionally, I believe, a beneficent influence,
is thus exerted- but if we exert any influ-
ence upon Europe, — and we pride ourselves
upon it, — perhaps it will not be a humilia-
tion to admit that we feel some influence ex-

216 John Bright

erted upon us by the great American Repub-
lic. American freedom acts upon England,
and there is nothing that is better known, at
the west end of this great city, — (Hear !
Hear!) — from which I have just come, —
than the influence that has been, and noth-
ing more feared than the influence that may
be, exerted by the United States upon this
country.

I left the House of Commons at seven
o'clock, about to proceed to what is called
a discussion on the ballot. (" Hear ! Hear ! "
and laughter.) There is not generally much
discussion, because the whole question really
is conceded ; there is no practical argument
to be made against the ballot, — (Hear !
Hear !) — or, if there be a practical argument,
it is one that the opponents of the ballot
dare not use. (Cheers.) But if you see in
the United States that in the elections which
took place a few months ago in several
States, under the ballot, returns were made
which were very hostile to the existing gov-

on the American Question. 217

ernment, and that the popular will was freely
expressed, and expressed in the face of a
government that has six hundred thousand
or eight hundred thousand men in the field,
— and if you use that as an argument here, —
they wish that the United States were so far
off that we could not hear anything about
them, because it might unhappily come to
pass that the people of England should think
that that which saved voters in America
from the fear of individual oppression, or, if
such a thing were there possible, from the
fear of government dictation, might have
precisely the same, and an equally beneficial
effect, if applied in this country. (Cheers.)

We all of us know that there has been a
great effect produced in England by the ca-
reer of the United States. An emigration
of three millions or four millions of persons
from the United Kingdom, during the last
forty years, has bound us to them by hun-
dreds and thousands of family ties, — (Hear !

Hear !) — and therefore it follows that what-
10

218 John Bright

ever there is that is good, and whatever
there is that is free, that we have not, we
know something abont it, and gradually may
begin to wish for, and some day may insist
upon having. (Loud cheers.)

And when I speak of " us," I mean the
people of this country. When I am assert-
ing this fact that the people of England have
a great interest in the well-being of the
American Republic, I mean the people of
England. I do not speak of the wearers of
crowns or of coronets in matters of this kind,
— (Hear ! Hear !) — but of the twenty mil-
lions of people in this country who live on
their labor, and who, having no votes, are not
counted in our political census, but without
whom there could be no British nation at all.
(Loud cheers.) I say that these have an in-
terest, almost as great and direct as though
they were living in Massachusetts or New
York, in the tremendous struggle for free-
dom which is now shaking the whole North-
ern population. (Cheers.)

on the American Question. 219

During the last two years there has been
much said, and much written, and some
things done in this country, which are calcu-
lated to gain us the hate of both sections of
the American Union. I believe that a course
of policy might have been taken by the Eng-
lish press, and by the English government,
and by what are called the influential classes
in England, that would have bound them to
our hearts and to their hearts. I speak of
the twenty millions of the Free North. I
believe we might have been so thoroughly
united with the people, that all remembrance
of the war of the Revolution and of the war
of 1812 would have been obliterated, and we
should have been in heart and spirit for all
time forth but one nation.

I can only hope that, as time passes, and
our people become better informed, — (Hear !
Hear!) — they will be more just, and that
ill-feeling of every kind will pass away ; that
in future all that love freedom here will
hold converse with all that love freedom

220 John Bright

there, and that the two nations, separated as
they are by the ocean, come as they are, not-
withstanding, of one stock, may be in future
time united in soul, and may make together
every possible effort for the advancement of
the liberties and the happiness of mankind.
(Prolonged and enthusiastic applause.)

on the American Question, 221

SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF
COMMONS,

ON MR. ROEBUCK'S MOTION FOR RECOGNITION
OF THE SOUTHERN CONFEDERACY,

JUNE 30, 1863.

Mr. Bright said: — I will not attempt to
follow the noble lord in the labored attack
which he has made upon the treasury bench,
for these two reasons : that he did not appear
to me very much to understand what it was
he was charging them with; and, again, I
am not in the habit of defending gentlemen
who sit on that bench. (Laughter.) I will
address myself to the question before the
House, which I think the House generally
feels to be very important, although I am
quite satisfied that they don't feel it to be
a practical one. (Hear ! Hear !) Neither do
I think that the House will be disposed to
take any course in support of the honorable

222 John Bright

gentleman who introduced the resolution
now before us. (Hear! Hear!)

We sometimes are engaged in discussions,
and have great difficulty to know what we
are about ; but the honorable gentleman left
us in no kind of doubt when he sat down.
(Hear! Hear!) He proposed a resolution,
in words which, under certain circumstan-
ces and addressed to certain parties, might
end in offensive or injurious consequences.
(Hear! Hear!) Taken in connection with
his character — (laughter) — and with the
speech he has made to-night, and with the
speech he has recently made elsewhere on
this subject, I would say that he would have
come to about the same conclusion if he
proposed to address the Crown inviting the
Queen to declare war against the United
States of America. (Hear !) The Chancel-
lor of the Exchequer, who is supposed not to
be very zealous in the particular line of opin-
ion that I have adopted, — (" Hear ! Hear ! "
and a laugh,) — addressed the honorable gen-

on the American Question. 223

tleman in the smoothest language possible,
but still he was obliged to charge him with
the tone of bitter hostility which marked his
speech. (Hear !)

On a recent occasion the honorable mem-
ber addressed some members of his constitu-
ency, — I don't mean his last speech, I mean
the speech in August, last year, — in which
he entered upon a course of prophecy which,
like most prophecies in our day, does not
happen to come true. But he said then
what he said to-night, that the American
people and government were overbearing.
He did not tell them in the least, that the
government of the United States had, almost
during the whole of his lifetime, been con-
ducted by his friends of the South. He said
that, if they were divided, they would not be
able to bully the whole world ; and he made
use of these expressions : " The North will
never be our friends ; of the South you can
make friends, — they are Englishmen, — they
are not the scum and refuse of the world."
(Hear! Hear!)

224 John Bright

Mr. Roebuck: Allow me to correct that
statement. What I said I now state to the
House, that the men of the South were Eng-
lishmen, but that the army of the North was
composed of the scum of Europe.

Mr. Bright : I take, of course, that expla-
nation of the honorable and learned gentle-
man, with this explanation from me, that
there is not, so far as I can find, any mention
near that paragraph, and I think there is not
in the speech a single word, about the army.
(Hear! Hear!)

Mr. Roebuck : I assure you I said that.

Mr. Bright : Then I take it for granted
that the honorable and learned gentleman
said that, or that if he said what I have read
he greatly regrets it. (" Hear ! " and laugh-
ter.)

Mr. Roebuck: No, I did not say it.
(Laughter.)

Mr. Bright : The honorable and learned
gentleman in his resolution speaks of other
powers. Well, he has unceremoniously got

on the American Question. 225

rid of all the powers but France, and he
comes here to-night with a story of an inter-
view with a man whom he describes as the
great ruler of France, — tells us a conversa-
tion, — asks us to accept the lead of the Em-
peror of the French on, I will undertake
to say, one of the greatest questions that
ever was submitted to the British Parlia-
ment. (Cheers.) But it is not long since
the honorable and learned gentleman held
very different language. (Loud cheers.) I
recollect in this House, only about two years
ago, that the honorable and learned gentle-
man said : a I hope I may be permitted to
express in respectful terms my opinion, even
though it should affect so great a poten-
tate as the Emperor of the French. I have
no faith in the Emperor of the French."
(Cheers, and laughter.) On another occa-
sion the honorable and learned gentleman
said, — not, I believe, in this House, — a I am
still of opinion that we have nothing but ani-
mosity and bad faith to look for from the
10* o

226 John Bright

French Emperor." (Laughter, and cheers.)
And he went on to say that still, though he
had been laughed at, he adopted the patriotic
character of " Tear-'em," and was still at his
post. (Great laughter.)

Well then, sir, when the honorable and
learned gentleman came back, I think from
his expedition to Cherbourg, does the House
recollect the language he used on that occa-
sion, — language which, if it expressed the
sentiments which he felt, at least I think he
might have been content to have withheld.
If I am not mistaken, referring to the salu-
tation between the Emperor of the French
and the Queen of these kingdoms, he said,
"When I saw his perjured lips touch that
hallowed cheek." (Hear ! Hear !) And now,
sir, the honorable and learned gentleman has
been to Paris, introduced there by the honor-
able member for Sunderland, — (laughter,) —
and he has become as it were in the palace
of the French Emperor a co-conspirator with
him to drag this country into a policy which

on the American Question. 227

I maintain is as hostile to its interests as it
would be degrading to its honor. (Cheers.)

But then the high contracting parties, I
suspect, are not agreed, — (a laugh,) — be-
cause I will say this in justice to the French
Emperor, that there has never come from
him in public, nor from any one of his minis-
ters, nor is there anything to be found in
what they have written, that is tinctured in
the smallest degree with that bitter hostility
which the honorable and learned gentleman
has constantly exhibited to the United States
of America and their people. (Hear! Hear!)
France, if not wise in this matter, is at least
not unfriendly. The honorable and learned
member, in my opinion, — indeed I am sure,
— is not friendly, and I believe he is not
wise. (Laughter.)

But now, on this subject, without speaking
disrespectfully of that great potentate who
has taken the honorable and learned gentle-
man into his confidence, I must say that
the Emperor runs the risk of being far too

228 John Bright

much represented in this House. (Laughter.)
We have got two — I will not call them en-
voys extraordinary, but most extraordinary.
(Loud laughter.) And, if report speaks true,
even they are not all. The honorable mem-
ber for King's County (Mr. Hennessy) — I
don't see him in his place — came back the
other day from Paris, and there were whis-
pers about that he had seen the great ruler
of France, and that he could tell everybody
in the most confidential manner that the
Emperor was ready to make a spring at
Russia for the sake of delivering Poland, and
that he only waited for a word from the
Prime Minister of England. (Laughter and
"Hear! Hear!")

Well, I don't understand the policy of the
Emperor, if these new ministers of his tell the
truth. For, sir, if one gentleman says that
he is about to make war with Eussia, and
another that he is about to make war with
America, I am disposed to look at what
he is already doing. I find that he is hold-

on the American Question. 229

ing Rome against the opinion of all Italy.
("No!" and loud cheers.) He is conquer-
ing Mexico by painful steps, every footstep
marked by devastation and blood. He is
warring, in some desultory manner, it may
be, in China, and for aught I know he may
be about to do it in Japan. Well, I say that,
if he is to engage in dismembering the
greatest Eastern Empire and the great West-
era Republic, he has a greater ambition than
Louis XIV., a greater daring than the first
of his name ; and that, if he endeavors to
grasp these great transactions, his dynasty
will fall and be buried in the ruins of his
own ambition. (Hear ! Hear !)

I can say only one sentence upon the
question to which the noble lord has directed
so much attention. I understand that we
have not heard all the story from Paris, and
further, that it is not at all remarkable, see-
ing that the secret has been confided to two
persons, that we have not heard it correctly.
(Hear! Hear!) I saw my honorable friend,

230 John Bright

the member for Sunderland, near me, and his
face underwent remarkable contortions dur-
ing the speech of the honorable and learned
gentleman, and I felt perfectly satisfied that
he did not agree with what his colleague was
saying. (Hear ! Hear !) I am told there is
in existence a little memorandum which con-
tains an account of what was said and done
at that interview 5 and before the discussion
closes we shall no doubt have that memoran-
dum produced, and from it know how far
those two gentlemen are agreed.

I now come to the proposition which the
honorable and learned gentleman has sub-
mitted to the House, and which he has al-
ready submitted to a meeting of his constitu-
ents at Sheffield. At that meeting, on the
27th of May, the honorable and learned gen-
tleman used these words : " What I have to
consider is, what are the interests of Eng-
land : what are for her interests I believe to
be for the interests of the world." Now, leav-
ing out of consideration the latter part of

on the American Question. 231

that statement, if the honorable and learned
gentleman will keep to the first part of it,
then what we have now to consider in this
question is, what is for the interest of Eng-
land. But the honorable and learned gentle-
man has put it in a way to-night almost as
offensive as he did before at Sheffield, and
has said that the United States would not
bully the world if they were divided and
subdivided ; for he went so far as to contem-
plate division into more than two indepen-
dent sections. Well, I say that the whole
of the case rests upon a miserable jealousy
of the United States, or on what I may
term a base fear. (Hear ! Hear !) It is a
fear which appears to me just as ground-
less as any of those panics by which the hon-
orable and learned gentleman has helped to
frighten the country.

There never was a state in the world
which was less capable of aggression with re-
gard to Europe than the United States of
America. (Hear! Hear!) I speak of its

232 John Bright

government, of its confederation, of the pe-
culiarities of its organization ; for the House
will agree with me, that nothing is more pe-
culiar than the fact of the enormous power
which the separate States, both of the North
and South, exercise upon the policy and
course of the country. I will undertake to
say, that, unless in a question of overwhelm-
ing magnitude, which would be able to unite
any people, it would be utterly hopeless to
expect that all the States of the American
Union would join together to support the
central government in any plan of aggression
on England or any other country of Europe.
(Hear! Hear!)

Besides, nothing can be more certain than
this, that the government which is now in
power, and the party which have elected Mr.
Lincoln to office, is a moral and peaceable
party, which has been above all things anx-
ious to cultivate the best possible state of
feeling with regard to England. (Hear !
Hear !) The honorable and learned gentle-

on the American Question. 233

man of all men ought not to entertain this
fear of United States aggression, for he is
always boasting of his readiness to come into
the field himself. (" Hear ! " and laughter.)
I grant that it would be a great necessity
indeed which would justify a conscription in
calling out the honorable and learned gen-
tleman, — (loud laughter,) — but I say he
ought to consider well before he spreads
those alarms among the people. For the
sake of this miserable jealousy, and that he
may help to break up a friendly nation, he
would depart from the usages of nations, and
create an everlasting breach between the
people of England and the people of the
United States of America. (Hear! Hear!)
He would do more ; and notwithstanding
what he has said to-night, I may put this as
my strongest argument against his case, —
he would throw the weight of England into
the scale in favor of the cause of slavery.
(Cheers.)

I want to show the honorable and learned

234 John Bright

gentleman that England is not interested in
the course he proposes we should take ;
and when I speak of interests, I mean the
commercial interests, the political interests,
and the moral interests of the country. And
first, with regard to the supply of cotton, in
which the noble lord, the member for Stam-
ford, takes such a prodigious interest. I must
explain to the noble lord that I know a little
about cotton. I happen to have been en-
gaged in that business, — not all my life, for
the noble lord has seen me here for twenty
years, — but my interests have been in it ;
and at this moment the firm of which I am a
member have no less than six mills, which
have been at a stand for nearly a year, ow-
ing to the impossibility of working under the
present conditions of the supply of cotton. I
live among a people who live by this trade ;
and there is no man in England who has a
more direct interest in it than I have. Be-
fore the war, the supply of cotton was little
and costly, and every year it was becoming

on the American Question. 235

more costly, for the supply did not keep pace
with the demand.

The point that I am going to argue is
this : I believe that the war that is now
raging in America is more likely to abolish
slavery than not, and more likely to abolish
it than any other thing that can be proposed
in the world. I regret very much that the
pride and passion of men are such as to jus-
tify me in making this statement. The sup-
ply of cotton under slavery must always be
insecure. The House felt so in past years ;
for at my recommendation they appointed a
committee, and but for a foolish minister
they would have appointed a special commis-
sion to India at my request, — (laughter,) —
and I feel the more regret that they did not
do so. Is there any gentleman in this House
who will not agree with me in this, — that it
would be far better for our great Lancashire
industry that our supply of cotton should be
grown by free labor rather than by slave
labor? (Hear!)

236 John Bright

Before the war, the whole number of ne-
groes engaged in the production of cotton
was about one million, — that is, about a
fourth of the whole of the negroes in the
Slave States. The annual increase in the
number of negroes growing cotton was about
twenty-five thousand, — only two and a half
per cent. It was impossible for the Southern
States to keep up their growth of sugar, rice,
tobacco, and their ordinary slave productions,
and at the same time to increase the growth
of cotton more than at a rate corresponding
with the annual increase of negroes. There-
fore you will find that the quantity of cotton
grown, taking ten years together, increased
at the rate of about one hundred thousand
bales a year. But that was nothing like the
quantity which we required. That supply
could not be increased, because the South did
not cultivate more than probably one and a
half per cent of the land which was capable
of cultivation for cotton.

The great bulk of the land in the South-

on the American Question. 237

ern States is uncultivated. Ten thousand
square miles are appropriated to the cultiva-
tion of cotton; but there are six hundred
thousand square miles, or sixty times as
much land, which is capable of being culti-
vated for cotton. It was, however, impossi-
ble that that land should be so cultivated,
because, although you had climate and sun,
you had not labor. The institution of slavery
forbade free-labor men in the North to come
to the South ; and every emigrant that land-
ed in New York from Europe knew that the
Slave States were no States for him, and
therefore he went North or West. The laws
of the United States, the sentiments of Eu-
rope and of the world, being against any
opening of the slave-trade, the planters of
the South were shut up, and the annual in-
crease in the supply of cotton could increase
only in the same proportion as the annual in-
crease in the number of their negroes.

There is only one other point with regard
to that matter which is worth mentioning.

238 John Bright

The honorable and learned gentleman, the
member for Sheffield, will understand it, al-
though on some points he seems to be pecu-
liarly dark. (Laughter.) If a planter in the
Southern States wanted to grow one thou-
sand bales of cotton a year, he would require
about two hundred negroes. Taking them
at five hundred dollars, or one hundred
pounds each, which is not more than half the
price of a first-class hand, the cost of the two
hundred would be twenty thousand pounds.
To grow one thousand bales of cotton a year
you require not only to get hold of an estate,
machinery, tools, and other things neces-
sary to carry on the cotton-growing business,
but you must find a capital of twenty thou-
sand pounds to buy the actual laborers by
whom the plantation is to be worked ; and
therefore, as every gentleman will see at
once, this great trade, to a large extent, was
shut up in the hands of men who were re-
quired to be richer than would be necessary
if slavery did not exist.

on the American Question. 239

Thus the plantation business to a large ex-
tent became a monopoly, and therefore even
in that direction the production of cotton
was constantly limited and controlled. I was
speaking to a gentleman the other day from
Mississippi. I believe no man in America or
in England is more acquainted with the facts
of this case. He has been for many years a
Senator from the State of Mississippi. He
told me that every one of these facts was
true, and he said, " I have no doubt whatever
that in ten years after freedom in the South,
or after freedom in conjunction with the
North, the production of cotton would be
doubled, and €otton would be forwarded to
the consumers of the world at a much less
price than we have had it for many years
past."

I shall turn for a moment to the political
interest, to which the honorable and learned
gentleman paid much more attention than to
the commercial. The more I consider the
course of this war, the more I come to the

240 John Bright

conclusion that it is improbable in future
that the United States will be broken into
separate republics. I do not come to the
conclusion that the North will conquer the
South. But I think the conclusion to which
I am more disposed to come now than at
any time since the breaking out of the war
is this, — that if a separation should occur for
a time, still the interest, the sympathies, the
sentiments, the necessities of the whole con-
tinent, and its ambition also, as honorable
gentlemen mentioned, which seems to some
people to be a necessity, render it highly
probable that the continent would still
be united under one central goverment.
(Hear!) I may be quite mistaken. I do
not express that opinion with any more con-
fidence than honorable gentlemen have ex-
pressed theirs in favor of a permanent disso-
lution ; but now is not this possible, — that
the Union may be again formed on the basis
of the South ? There are persons who think
that possible. I hope it is not, but we cannot
say that it is absolutely impossible.

on the American Question. 241

Is it not possible that the Northern gov-
ernment might be beaten in their military
operations ? Is it not possible that, by their
own incapacity, they might be humiliated be-
fore their own people ? and is it not even pos-
sible that that party which you please to call
the Peace party in the North, but which is in
no sense a peace party, should unite with
the South, and that the Union should be
reconstituted on the basis of the Southern
opinions and of the Southern social system ?
Is it not possible, for example, that the
Southern people, and those in their favor,
should appeal to the Irish population of
America against the negroes, between whom
there has been little sympathy and little re-
spect,— and is it not possible they should
appeal to the commercial classes of the
North, — and the rich commercial classes in
all countries, who, from the uncertainty of
their possessions and the fluctuation of their
interests, are rendered always timid and al-
most always corrupt, — (cheers and laughter,)
11 p

242 John Bright

— is it not possible, I say, that they might
prefer the union of their whole country upon
the basis of the South, rather than that
union which many members of this House
look upon with so much apprehension ?

If that should ever take place, — but I be-
lieve, with my honorable friend below me,
(Mr. Forster,) in the moral government of
the world, and therefore I cannot believe
that it will take place, — but if it were to
take place, with their great armies, and with
their great navy, and their almost unlimited
power, they might offer to drive England out
of Canada, France out of Mexico, and what-
ever nations are interested in them out of
the islands of the West Indies ; and you
might then have a great state built upon
slavery and war, instead of that free state to
which I look, built up upon an educated
people, upon general freedom, and upon mo-
rality in government. (Loud cheers.)

Now there is one more point to which the
honorable and learned gentleman will forgive

on the American Question. 243

me if I allude, — he does not appear to me
to think it of great importance, — and that
is, the morality of this question. The right
honorable gentleman, the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, and the honorable gentleman
who spoke from the bench behind, — and I
think the noble lord, if I am not mistaken, —
referred to the carnage which is occasioned
by this lamentable strife. (Hear! Hear!)
Well, carnage, I presume, is the accompani-
ment of all war. Two years ago the press
of London laughed very much — if I may
use such a term of the newspapers — at the
battles of the United States, in which nobody
was killed and few were hurt. There was a
time when I stood up in this House, and
pointed out the dreadful horrors of war. (An
ironical cheer.) There was a war waged by
this country in the Crimea ; and the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, with an uneasy con-
science, is constantly striving to defend that
struggle. That war — for it lasted about
the same time that the American war has

244 John Bright

lasted — at least destroyed as many lives as
are estimated to have been destroyed in the
United States. ("Hear! Hear!" and "No!
No ! ")

My honorable friend, the member for Mon-
trose, — who, I think, is not in the House, —
made a speech in Scotland some time last
year, in which he gave the numbers which
were lost by Eussia in that war. (Hear!
Hear!) An honorable friend near me ob-
serves, that some people don't reckon the
Russians for anything. (Hear! Hear!) I
say, if you will add the Russians to the Eng-
lish, and the two to the French, and the
three to the Sardinians, and the four to the
Turks, that more lives were lost in the inva-
sion of the Crimea, in the two years that it
lasted, than have been lost now in the Amer-
ican war. (Cries of " Hear ! Hear ! ") That
is no defence of the carnage of the American
war at all ; but let honorable gentlemen bear
in mind that, when I protested against the
carnage in the Crimea, — for an object which

on the American Question. 245

few could comprehend and nobody can fairly
explain, — I was told that I was actuated by
a morbid sentimentality. Well, if I was con-
verted, and if I view the mortality in war
with less horror than I did then, it must be
attributed to the arguments of honorable
gentlemen opposite, and on the Treasury
bench ; but the fact is, I view this carnage
just as I viewed that, with only this differ-
ence, that while our soldiers perished three
thousand miles from home in a worthless and
indefensible cause, these men were on their
own soil, and every man of them knew for
what he enlisted and for what purpose he
was to fight. (Hear! Hear!)

Now, I will ask the right honorable gentle-
man, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and
those who are of opinion with him on this
question of slaughter in the American war,
— a slaughter which I hope there is no hon-
orable member here, and no person out of
this House, that does not in his calm mo-
ments look upon with grief and horror, —

246 John Bright

(Hear ! Hear !) — to consider what was the
state of things before the war. It was this,

— that every year in the Slave States of
America there were one hundred and fifty
thousand children born into the world, —
born with the badge and the doom of slavery,

— born to the liability by law, and by cus-
tom, and by the devilish cupidity of man, —
(« Oh ! Oh ! " and loud cheers,) — to the lash
and to the chain and to the branding-iron,
and to be taken from their families and car-
ried they know not where. (Loud cheers.)

I want to know whether you feel as I feel
upon this question. When I can get down
to my home from this House, I find half a
dozen little children playing upon my hearth.
(Cheers and laughter.) How many members
are there who can say with me, that the most
innocent, the most pure, the most holy joy
which in their past years they have felt, or in
their future years they have hoped for, has
not arisen from contact and association with
our precious children ? (Loud cheers.) Well,

on the American Question. 247

then, if that be so, — if, when the hand of
death takes one of those flowers from our
dwelling, our heart is overwhelmed with
sorrow and our household is covered with
gloom, — what would it be if our children
were brought up to this infernal system, —
one hundred and fifty thousand of them
.every year brought into the world in these
Slave States, amongst these "gentlemen,"
amongst this " chivalry," amongst these men
that we can make our friends.

Do you forget the thousand-fold griefs and
the countless agonies which belonged to the
silent conflict of slavery before the war be-
gan ? (" Hear ! Hear ! " and cheers.) It is
all very well for the honorable and learned
gentleman to tell me, to tell this House, —
he won't tell the country with any satisfac-
tion to it, — that slavery, after all, is not so
bad a thing. The brother of my honorable
friend, the member for South Durham, told
me that in North Carolina he himself saw a
woman whose every child, ten in number,

248 John Bright

had been sold when they grew up to that
age at which they would fetch a price to
their master. (Cheers.)

I have not heard a word to-night of an-
other question, — which is the Proclamation
of the President of the United States. The
honorable and learned gentleman spoke
somewhere in the country, and he had not
the magnanimity to abstain from a state-
ment which I was going to say he must have
known had no real weight. I can make all
allowance for the passion, — and I was going
to say the malice, — but I will say the ill-will
of the honorable and learned gentleman ; but
I make no allowance for hi& ignorance. I
make no allowance for that, because if he is
ignorant it is his own fault, for God has given
him an intellect which ought to keep him
from ignorance on a question of this magni-
tude. I now take that Proclamation. What
do you propose to do ? You propose by your
resolution, to help the South, if possible, to
gain and sustain its independence. (Hear !)

on the American Question. 249

Nobody doubts that. The honorable and
learned gentleman will not deny it. But
what becomes of the Proclamation ? I should
like to ask any lawyer in what light we
stand as regards that Proclamation? To us
there is only one country in what was called
the United States, — there is only one Presi-
dent, — there is only one general Legislature,
there is only one law ; and if that Proclama-
tion be lawful anywhere, — (" Hear ! " from
Mr. Koebuck,) — we are not in a condition to
deny its legality, because at present we know
no President Davis, nor do we know the men
who are about him. We have our consuls in
the South, but recognizing only one Legisla-
ture, one President, one law. So far as we
are concerned, that Proclamation is a legal
and effective document.

I want to know, to ask you, the House of
Commons, whether you have turned back to
your own proceedings in 1834, and traced
the praises which have been lavished upon

you for thirty years by the great and
11*

250 John Bright

good men of other countries, — (cheers,) —
and whether, after what you did at that
time, you believe that you will meet the
views of the thoughtful, moral, and religious
people of England, when you propose to re-
mit to slavery three milhons of negroes in
the Southern States, who in our views, and
regarding the Proclamation of the only Presi-
dent of the United States as a legal docu-
ment, are certainly and to all intents and
purposes free. (" Oh ! ") The honorable and
learned gentleman may say "Oh!" and shake
his head lightly, and chuckle at this. He has
managed to get rid of all those feelings un-
der which all men, black and white, like to
be free. He has talked of the cant and hy-
pocrisy of these men. Was Wilberforce, was
Clarkson, was Buxton, — I might run over
the whole list, — were these men hypocrites,
and had they nothing about them but cant ?
(Cheers.)

I could state something about the family
of my honorable friend below me (Mr. Fors-

on the American Question. 251

ter), which I almost fear to state in his pres-
ence ; but his reverend father — a man un-
surpassed in character, not equalled by many
in intellect, and approached by few in ser-
vice — laid down his life in a Slave State in
America, while carrying to the governors and
legislatures of every Slave State the protest
of himself and his sect against the enormity
of that odious system.

In conclusion, sir, I have only this to say,
— that I wish to take of this question a gen-
erous view, — a view, I say, generous with
regard to the people with whom we are in
amity, whose Minister we receive here, and
who receive our Minister in Washington.
We see that the government of the United
States has for two years past been con-
tending for its life, and we know that it is
contending necessarily for human freedom.
That government affords the remarkable ex-
ample — offered for the first time in the his-
tory of the world — of a great government
coming forward as the organized defender of

252 John Bright

law, freedom, and equality. (" Oh ! " and
cheers.)

Surely honorable gentlemen opposite can-
not be so ill-informed as to say, that the
revolt of the Southern States is in favor of
freedom and equality. In Europe often, and
in some parts of America, when there has
been insurrection, it has been of the suffering
generally against the oppressor, and rarely
has it been found, and not more commonly
in our history than in the history of any
other country, that the government has
stepped forward as the organized defender
of freedom, — of the wide and general free-
dom of those under their rule. With such a
government, in such a contest, with such a
foe, the honorable and learned gentleman,
the member for Sheffield, who professes to
be more an Englishman than most English-
men, asks us to throw into the scale against
them the weight of the hostility of England.

I have not said a word with regard to
what may happen to England if we go into

on the American Question. 253

war with the United States. It will be a
war on the ocean, — every ship that belongs
to the two nations will, as far as possible, be
swept from the seas ; but when the troubles
in America are over, — be they ended by res-
toration of the Union, or by separation, —
that great and free people, the most instruct-
ed in the world, — (loud cries of " No ! ") —
there is not an American to be found in the
New England States who cannot read and
write, and there are not three men in one
hundred in the whole Northern States who
cannot read and write, — (cheers,) — and
those who cannot read and write are those
who have recently come from Europe, —
(laughter,) — I say the most instructed peo-
ple in the world, and the most wealthy, — if
you take the distribution of wealth among
the whole people, — you will leave in their
hearts a wound which probably a century
may not heal, and the posterity of some of
those who now hear my voice may look back
with amazement, and I will say with lamen-

254 John Bright

tation, at the course which was taken by the
honorable and learned gentleman, and by
such honorable members as may choose to
follow his leading. (No! No!) I suppose
the honorable gentlemen who cry "No !" will
admit that we sometimes suffer from some
errors of our ancestors. (Hear! Hear!)
There are few persons who will not admit
that, if their fathers had been wiser, their
children would have been happier. (Hear!
Hear!)

We know the cause of this revolt, its pur-
poses, and its aims. (Hear!) Those who
made it have not left us in darkness respect-
ing their intentions, — (Hear ! Hear !) — but
what they are to accomplish is still hidden
from our sight ; and I will abstain now, as I
have always abstained with regard to it, from
predicting what is to come. (Hear ! Hear !)
I know what I hope for, — and what I shall
rejoice in, — but I know nothing' of future
facts that will enable me to express a confi-
dent opinion. (Hear ! Hear !) Whether it

on the American Question. 255

will give freedom to the race which white
men have trampled in the dust, or whether
the issue will purify a nation steeped in
crime in connection with its conduct to that
race, is known only to the Supreme. (Hear !
Hear!) In His hands are alike the breath
of man and the life of states. I am willing
to commit to Him the issue of this dreaded
contest ; but I implore of Him, and I beseech
this House, that my country may lift nor
hand nor voice in aid of the most stupendous
act of guilt that history has recorded in the
annals of mankind. (Loud cheers, amidst
which the honorable gentleman resumed his
seat.)

256 John Bright

CONCLUSION OF A SPEECH AT A
MEETING AT KOCHDALE,

NOVEMBER 24, 1863.

This Meeting was held to enable Mr. Cobden to meet his
Constituents, and Mr. Bright, as one of his Constituents,
was present at it.

After speaking on the question of Parlia-
mentary Keform, Mr. Bright said : —

But there is one point of this question to
which I must refer before I sit down, and
that is, that the enemies of popular right and
power have been pointing everybody to the
dreadful proof which is afforded in America,
that an extended suffrage is to be shunned
as the most calamitous thing possible to a
country.

Now I must refer to the speeches that
have dealt with this question in this manner,
or to newspapers which have so treated
it. I believe now that a great many people

on the American Question. 257

in this country are beginning to see that
those who have been misleading them for
the last two or three years have been either
profoundly dishonest or profoundly ignorant.
(Cheers.) If I am to give my opinion upon
it, I should say that that which has taken
place in America within the last three years
affords the most triumphant answer to the
charges of this kind. Now let us see the
government of the United States. We will
speak now, — I might say a good deal in
favor of the States of the South even, —
but we will speak of the Free States in the
North; they have a suffrage that you al-
most call here a manhood suffrage ; there
are frequent elections, vote by ballot, and
ten, twenty, and a hundred thousand vote
at an election.

Well, will anybody deny now that the
government at Washington, as regards its
own people, is the strongest government in
the world, at this hour ? (Cheers.) And for
this simple reason, that it is based on the

Q

258 John Bright

will, and the good-will, of an instructed peo-
ple. (Cheers.) Look at its power. I am
not now discussing why it is, or the cause
which is developing this power, but power
is the thing which men regard in these old
countries, and which they ascribe mainly to
these European institutions. But look at
the power which the United States have de-
veloped. They have brought more men into
the field, built more ships for their navy,
they have shown greater resources, than any
nation in Europe is capable of. Look at the
order which has prevailed. Their elections,
at which, as you see by the papers, fifty
thousand, or one hundred thousand, or a
quarter of a million persons voted, in a given
State, are conducted with less disorder than
you have seen lately in three of the smallest
boroughs in England, — (Hear !) — Barnsta-
ple, Windsor, and Andover. (Laughter and
cheers.) Look at their industry. Notwith-
standing this terrific struggle, their agricul-
ture, their manufactures and commerce, pro-

on the American Question. 259

ceed with an uninterrupted success, and they
are ruled by a President, not chosen, it
is true, from some worn-out royal or no-
ble blood, — (Hear!) — but from the people,
and whose truthfulness and spotless honor
have gained him universal praise. (Loud
cheers.)

The country that has been vilified through
half the organs of the press in England dur-
ing the last three years, and has been pointed
out, too, as an example to be shunned by
many of your statesmen, — that country, now
in mortal strife, affords a haven and a home
for multitudes flying from the burdens and
the neglect of the old governments of Eu-
rope. (Cheers.) And when this mortal strife
is over, when peace is restored, when slavery
is destroyed, when the Union is cemented
afresh, — for I would say, in the language of
one of her own poets, addressing his country,

" The grave 's not dug where traitor hands shall lay
In fearful haste thy murdered corse away," —

(loud cheers,) — then Europe and England

260 John Bright

may learn that an instructed democracy is
the surest foundation of government, and
that education and freedom are the only
sources of true greatness and true happiness
among any people.

on the American Question. 261

EXTEACT FROM A SPEECH AT THE
TOWN-HALL, BIRMINGHAM,

JANUARY 26, 1864.

Mr. Bright said: — There is one other
question to which my honorable colleague
has devoted a considerable portion of his
speech. He said, and I believe it, that a
year ago he felt it a painful thing to stand
here to avow opinions contrary to those of
many of his friends, and contrary to those
which I had avowed before. Well, I told
you then how painful a thing it was for me to
stand up and to controvert on this platform
any of the statements which he had made.

I came here to-night intending to say no
single word as to the question between North
and South in the United States. My opinion
is, that the unanimous judgment of the peo-
ple of England, so far as that is ever shown

262 John Bright

upon any public question, is in favor of the
course which her Majesty's government have
publicly declared it to be their intention to
pursue. (Loud cheers.) I believe that my
honorable friend is mistaken in the view he
takes of the meaning, and of the result, of
what he calls the recognition of the South.
(Cheers.) I have seen it stated by authority,
North as well as South, and by authority
which I may term English, and by authority
from France, that, in the present condition
of that quarrel, recognition, by all the usages
of nations, must necessarily lead to some-
thing more. Therefore, although there were
no question of slavery, — even though it
were simply a political revolt, and there
were no special moral question connected
with it, — I believe, looking to the past usages
of this country with regard to the rebellion
of the Greeks against Turkey, and with re-
gard to the revolt of the colonies of South
America against Spain, — I am persuaded
that it can be demonstrated that those cases

on the American Question. 263

afford no support whatever to the argument
that we are permitted now to recognize the
South, and that, if such recognition did take
place now, it could only exasperate still more
the terrible strife which exists on the North
American continent. ( Cheers.)

Now I am myself of opinion, as I have
been from the first, that the people of .Amer-
ica, so numerous, so powerful, so instructed,
so capable in every way, will settle the diffi-
culties of that continent without asking the
old countries of Europe to take any share
in them. (Cheers.) I believe that, in the
providence of the Supreme, the slaveholder,
untaught and unteachable by fact or argu-
ment or Christian precept, has been permit-
ted to commit, I '11 not call it the crime, but
the act of suicide. (Loud cheers.) Whether
President Lincoln be in favor of abolition,
whether the North are unanimous against
slavery, whatever may be said or thought
with regard to the transactions on that con-
tinent, he must be deaf and blind, and worse

264 John Bright

than deaf and blind, who does not perceive
that, through the instrumentality of this
strife, that most odious and most intolerable
offence against man and against Heaven, the
slavery of the South, — (tremendous cheers,)

— the bondage of four millions of our fellow-
creatures, is coming to a certain and rapid
end. (Renewed cheering.)

Sir, I will say of this question, that I
look forward to the time when I shall stand
upon this platform with my honorable col-
league, and when he will join me, — for he
is honest and frank enough to do that, —
(cheers,) — when he will join with me in re-
joicing that there does not breathe a slave
on the North American continent, — (cheers,)

— that the Union has been completely re-
stored. (Cheers.) And no less will he re-
joice that England did not, in the remotest
manner, by a word or breath, or the raising
of a finger, do one single thing to promote
the atrocious object of the leaders of this
accursed insurrection. (Loud cheers.)

on the American Question. 265

SPEECH ON THE CANADIAN FORTI-
FICATIONS,

DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS,
MARCH 23, 1865.

Mr. Bright remarked : — I shall ask the
attention of the House for only a few mo-
ments. If the honorable member (Mr. Ben-
tinck) divides, I shall go into the same lobby
with him. (Cheers and laughter.) I am
afraid that, in making that announcement, I
shall excite some little alarm in the mind of
the honorable gentleman. (A laugh.) I
wish, therefore, to say, that I shall not go
into the lobby agreeing with him in many
of the statements he has made. The right
honorable gentleman (Mr. Disraeli) said, that
he approached the military question with
great diffidence, and I was very glad to
see any signs of diffidence in that quarter.
(Much laughter.) After that explanation,

12

266 John Bright

he asked the House with a triumphant air
whether there is any difficulty in defending
a frontier of one thousand or fifteen hun-
dred miles, and whether the practicability of
doing so is a new doctrine in warfare. But
one thousand or fifteen hundred miles of
frontier to defend at the centre of your
power, is one thing ; but at three thousand
or four thousand miles from the centre,
it is an entirely different thing. (Hear!
Hear !) I venture to say, that there is not a
man in this House, or a sensible man out of
it, who, apart from the consideration of this
vote, or some special circumstances attending
it, believes that the people of this country
could attempt a successful defence of the
frontier of Canada against the whole power
of the United States. I said the other night,
that I hoped we should not now talk folly,
and hereafter, in the endeavor to be consist-
ent, act folly. We all know perfectly well,
that we are talking folly when we say that
the government of this country would send

on the American Question. 267

either ships or men to make an effectual
defence of Canada against the power of the
United States, supposing war to break out.
Understand, I am not in the least a believer
in the probability of war, but I will discuss
the question for one moment as if war were
possible. I suppose some men in this House
think it probable. But if it be possible or
probable, and if you have to look this diffi-
culty in the face, there is no extrication from
it but in the neutrality or independence of
Canada.

I agree with those members who say
that it is the duty of a great empire to de-
fend every portion of it. I admit that, as a
general proposition, though honorable gentle-
men opposite, and some on this side, do not
apply that rule to the United States. But,
admitting that rule, and supposing that we
are at all points unprepared for such a catas-
trophe, may we not, as reasonable men, look
ahead, and try if it be not possible to escape
from it? (An honorable member, — "Kun

268 John Bright

away ? " ) No, not by running away, though
there are many circumstances in which brave
men run away ; and you may get into diffi-
culty on this Canadian question, which may
make you look back and wish that you had
run away a good time ago. (Laughter.) I
object to this vote on a ground which, I be-
lieve, has not been raised by any member
in the present discussion. I am not going to
say, that the expenditure of fifty thousand
pounds is a matter of great consequence to
this country, that the expenditure of this
money in the proposed way will be taken as
a menace by the United States. I do not
think that that can be fairly said ; for whether
building fortifications at Quebec be useless or
not, that proceeding is not likely to enable
the Canadians to overrun the State of New
York. ("Hear!" and a laugh.) The United
States, I think will have no right to complain
of this expenditure. The utmost it can do
will be to show them that some portions, and
perhaps the government, of this country have

on the American Question. 269

some little distrust of them, and so far it may
do injury. I complain of the expenditure
and the policy announced by the Colonial
Secretary, on a ground which I thought
ought to have been urged by the noble lord,
the member for Wick, who is a sort of half-
Canadian. He made a speech which I lis-
tened to with great pleasure, and told the
House what some of us, perhaps, did not
know before ; but if I had been connected, as
he is, with Canada, I would have addressed
the House from a Canadian point of view.

What is it that the member for Oxford
says? He states, in reference to the ex-
penditure for the proposed fortifications, that>
though a portion of the expenditure is to be
borne by us, the main portion is to be borne
by Canada ; but I venture to tell him, that, if
there shall be any occasion to defend Canada
at all, it will not arise from anything Can-
ada does, but from what England does ; and
therefore I protest against the doctrine that
the Cabinet in London may get into difficul-

270 John Bright

ties, and ultimately into war, with the Cabi-
net at Washington, — and because Canada
lies adjacent to the United States, and conse-
quently may become the great battle-field,
that this United Kingdom has a right to call
on Canada for the main portion of that ex-
penditure. (Hear !) Who has asked you to
spend fifty thousand pounds, and the hun-
dreds of thousands which may be supposed
to follow, but which perhaps Parliament may
be indisposed hereafter to grant ? What is
the proportion which Canada is to bear ? If
we are to spend two hundred thousand
pounds at Quebec, is Canada to spend four
hundred thousand pounds at Montreal? If
Canada is to spend double of whatever we
may spend, is it not obvious that every Ca-
nadian will ask himself what is the advantage
of the connection between Canada and Eng-
land?

Every Canadian knows perfectly well, and
nobody better than the noble lord the mem-
ber for Wick, that there is no more prospect

on the American Question. 271

of a war between Canada and the United
States alone, than between the Empire of
France and the Isle of Man ; if that is so,
why should the Canadians be taxed be-
yond all reason, as the Colonial Secretary
proposes to tax them, for a policy not Cana-
dian, and for a calamity which, if ever it
occurs, must occur from some transactions
between England and the United States?
There are gentlemen here who know a good
deal of Canada, and I see behind me one
who knows perfectly well what is the condi-
tion of the Canadian finances. We complain
that Canada levies higher duties on British
manufactures than the United States did be-
fore the present war, and much higher than
France does. But when we complain to
Canada of this, and say it is very unpleasant
usage from a part of our empire, the Ca-
nadians reply that their expenditure is so
much, and their debt, with the interest on it,
so much, and that they are obliged to levy
these heavy duties. If the Canadian finances

272 John Bright

are in the unfortunate position described, —
if the credit of Canada is not very great in
the market of this country, and if you see
what are the difficulties of the Canadians
during a period of peace, — consider what
will be their difficulties if the doctrine of the
Colonial Secretary be carried out, and that,
whatever expenditure is necessary for the
defence of Canada, while we bear a portion,
the main part must be borne by Canada.

We must then come to the inevitable con-
clusion, that every Canadian will say, "We
are close alongside of a great nation; our
parent state is three thousand miles away ;
there are litigious, and there may be even
warlike people, in both nations, and they
may occasion the calamity of a great war;
we are peaceable people, having no foreign
politics, happily; we may be involved in war,
and while the great cities of Great Britain
are not touched by a single shell, nor one of
its fields ravaged, not a city or a village in
this Canada in which we live but will be lia-

on the American Question. 273

ble to the ravages of war on the part of our
powerful neighbor." Therefore the Canadi-
ans will say, unless they are unlike all other
Englishmen, who appear to have more sense
the farther they go from their own country,
— (laughter,) — that it would be better for
Canada to be disentangled from the politics
of England, and to assume the position of an
independent state.

I suspect from what has been stated by
official gentlemen in the present govern-
ment, and in previous governments, that
there is no objection to the independence
of Canada whenever Canada may wish it
I have been glad to hear those statements,
because I think they mark an extraordi-
nary progress in sound opinions in this coun-
try. I recollect the noble lord at the head
of the Foreign Office being very angry in
this House at the idea of making a great
empire less; but a great empire, territo-
rially, may be lessened without its power
and authority in the world being diminished.

12* B

274 John Bright

(Hear ! Hear !) I believe if Canada now, by
a friendly separation from this country, be-
came an independent state, choosing its own
form of government, — monarchical, if it
liked a monarchy, or republican, if it pre-
ferred a republic, — it would not be less
friendly to England, and its tariff would not
be more adverse to our manufactures than
now. In the case of a war with America,
Canada would then be a neutral country;
and the population would be in a state of
greater security. Not that I think there is
any fear of war, but the government admit
that it may occur by their attempt to obtain
money for these fortifications. I object,
therefore, to this vote, not on that account,
nor even because it causes some distrust, or
may cause it, in the United States, although
that might be some reason ; but I object to
it mainly because I think we are commencing
a policy which we shall either have to aban-
don, because Canada will not submit to it, or
else which will bring upon Canada a burden

on the American Question. 275

in the shape of fortification expenditure, that
will make her more and more dissatisfied
with this country, and that will lead rapidly
to her separation from us. I don't object to
that separation in the least; I believe it
would be better for us, and better for her.
But I think that, of all the misfortunes which
could happen between us and Canada, this
would be the greatest, that her separation
should take place after a period of irritation
and estrangement, and that we should have
on that continent to meet another element
in some degree hostile to this country.

I am sorry, sir, that the noble lord at the
head of the government, and his colleagues,
have taken this course ; but it appears to me
to be wonderfully like almost everything
which the government does. It is a govern-
ment apparently of two parts, the one part
pulling one way and the other part pulling
another, and the result generally is something
which does not please anybody, or produce
any good effect in any direction. (" Hear !

276 John Bright

Hear ! " and a laugh.) They now propose a
scheme which has just enough in it to create
distrust and irritation, enough to make it
in some degree injurious, and they don't do
enough to accomplish any of the objects for
which, according to their statements, the
proposition is made. (Hear ! Hear !) Some-
body asked the other night whether the
Administration was to rule, or the House of
Commons. Well, I suspect from the course
of the debates, that on this occasion the Ad-
ministration will be allowed to rule. We are
accustomed to say that the government sug-
gests a thing on its own responsibility, and
therefore we will allow them to do it. But
the fact is, that the government knows no
more of this matter than any other dozen
gentlemen in this House. (Hear!) They
are not a bit more competent to form an
opinion upon it. They throw it down on the
table, and ask us to discuss and vote it.

I should be happy to find the House disre-
garding all the intimations that war is likely,

on the American Question. 277

anxious not to urge Canada into incurring
an expenditure which she will not bear, and
which, if she will not bear, must end in one of
two things, — either in throwing of the whole
burden upon us, or the breaking up, perhaps
suddenly and in anger, of the connection be-
tween us and that colony, making our future
relations with her most unsatisfactory. I
don't place much reliance on the speech of
the right honorable member for Bucking-
hamshire, not because he cannot judge of
the question just as well as I or any one of
us can do, but because I notice that in mat-
ters of this kind gentlemen on that (the Op-
position) bench, whatever may have been
their animosities towards the gentlemen on
this (the Treasury) bench on other ques-
tions, shake hands. They may tell you that
they have no connection with the House
over the way, — (a laugh,) — but the fact is,
their connection is most intimate. (Hear!
Hear !) And if the right honorable member
for Buckinghamshire were now sitting on

278 The American Question.

the Treasury bench, and the noble Viscount
were sitting opposite to him, the noble
Viscount, I have no doubt, would give him
the very same support as he now receives
from the right honorable gentleman. (Hear !
Hear !)

This seems to me a question so plain,
so much on the surface, appealing so much
to our common sense, having in it such
great issues for the future, that I am per-
suaded it is the duty of the House of Com-
mons on this occasion to take the matter
out of the hands of the executive govern-
ment, and to determine that, with regard to
the future policy of Canada, we will not our-
selves expend the money of the English tax-
payers, and not force upon the tax-payers of
Canada a burden which, I am satisfied, they
will not long continue to bear. (Hear!
Hear !)

Cambridge : Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co.

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