spoken, declared to him that they had no idea that the Resolution passed under the Act of last year would not have the effect which was now sought to be given to it. No doubt the House had a right to convert a Resolution into a Standing Order, but there was this peculiarity about the particular Resolution in question, that the House had received it embodied in an Act of Parliament, and therefore it was doubtful whether that Resolution could be converted into a Standing Order without the assent of the House of Lords, and whether a Jew taking his seat under a Standing Order made by the sole authority of the House of Commons would not be subject to pains and penalties. His best justification for introducing the measure was the Amendment of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire.

MR. NEWDEGATE said, he had no objection to withdraw that part of the Amendment which stated that his Resolution should be a Standing Order of the House.

MR. WALPOLE said that, when the question was last year before the House he expressed a strong opinion, and he retained it still, that if the Jews were to be admitted to seats in Parliament, it would be better that they should be admitted openly and directly, than that the question should be left open to consideration, and to the constant discussions that would follow upon it. Now he owned that he thought they had got into great difficulties by the Act of last Session. He agreed with the right hon. Member for Morpeth (Sir George Grey) that it was not by any means clear what was the force of the Act of Parliament with respect to the Resolutions made under it. It was by no means clear to what extent they might be carried, whether beyond a Session or even beyond a Parliament. His own impression was, that the Amendment of his hon. Friend (Mr. Newdegate) would be extremely inconvenient; because, if it were agreed to, the House would lay itself open to the objection which had been urged by the right hon. Baronet opposite (Sir George Grey), that a hon. Member was entitled to take his seat as soon as he had been elected. He thought it would have been better to pass a Sessional Resolution at the beginning of every Session. But in point of fact there was so much difficulty about the question, that he would suggest to the hon. Member for Finsbury, as the best mode of getting out of it, that without going again to the other House of Parlia

ment, and instead of pressing his Motion for leave to introduce a Bill, he should refer the matter to a Select Committee, to consider the best mode of carrying the Act of Parliament into effect. They would then have a Report from hon. Members of different parties in the House who would have considered the measure fully and maturely; and thus they would be in a much better position to arrive at a decision on the subject.

MR. NEWDEGATE said, that if he was to understand that Her Majesty's Goverument and the House generally were willing to adopt the proposal just made by his right hon. Friend, he should be very happy to waive his own opinion, in deference to that of the House, and withdraw his Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

LORD JOHN MANNERS said, he thought that the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) was one to which the House might, with propriety, accede. The Government hoped, therefore, that the hon. Member for Finsbury would not be indisposed to listen favourably to the suggestion.

MR. T. DUNCOMBE said, he had listened with much pleasure to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Cambridge University (Mr. Walpole), because of its conciliatory tone, and thought the course proposed by him very likely to lead to a satisfactory settlement. He should therefore have no objection to withdraw his Bill, on the understanding that the right hon. Gentleman would move for the appointment of a Committee. [Mr. WALPOLE: Hear, hear!] Well, then, he placed the matter in the hands of the right hon. Gentleman, feeling sure that from the experience which he had had of the right hon. Gentleman, as a Member of Committees, the inquiry would be fairly and properly conducted.

MR. WALPOLE said, he would now move, as an Amendment to the original Motion, that the question be referred to a Select Committee to consider and to report as to the best mode of carrying the Act of last Session into effect.

Amendment proposed

"To leave out from the word 'That' to the end

of the Question, in order to add the words 'a Select Committee be appointed to consider and report to the House on the best mode of carrying into effect the provisions of the Act 21 & 22 Vict. c. 49, to provide for the Relief of Her Majesty's Subjects professing the Jewish Religion,' instead thereof."

who had given a cordial support to that measure, he certainly did not feel it his duty to object to that clause, because he felt that when British shipowners were ex

Select Committee appointed

"To consider and report to the House on the best mode of carrying into effect the provisions of the Act 21 & 22 Vict. c. 49, to provide for the Relief of Her Majesty's Subjects professing the Jewish Religion."

COLONIAL AND FOREIGN WOOD.

RESOLUTION.

MR. MITCHELL said he rose to move a Resolution to the effect that it was the opinion of the House that the duties on foreign and colonial wood should be repealed. Considering the uncertain state of the revenue at the present moment, he did not propose by his Resolution to ask the House for the repeal of the duties on wood this year or at any definite period. What he wished the House to do was, to express its abstract opinion as to these duties and on the expediency of repealing them as soon as the state of the revenue would render such a measure possible. To show how the question stood he would give the House a short historical summary of the gradual reduction of those articles. In 1841, and for a considerable time previous, the duty on foreign wood had stood at 55s. per load, and that on colonial 20s. Wood was one of the three great articles a change in the duties on which was proposed by the noble Lord the Member for the City of London in 1841. He need not say that that proposal was unsuccessful. In 1842 Sir R. Peel brought in his celebrated budget, in which he proposed that the duties on foreign timber should be reduced to 30s. in 1842, and to 25s. in 1843. The duty on colonial timber he brought down at once to the merely nominal sum of 1s. a load. On that occasion Sir Robert said, that if there was an article on which a reduction of duty would be a benefit to the people, it was wood. The impost remained unaltered at this amount until 1845, when, in the budget accompanying the total repeal of the Corn Laws, Sir R. Peel proposed that the duties upon foreign wood should be reduced to 20s. a load in 1846, and to 15s. a load in 1847. This state of things continued until 1850, when the repeal of the Navigation Laws relieved from duty the manufactured article of shipping. As one

He

were entitled in turn to buy their ships in the cheapest market. But then they were left with this anomaly, that while the manufactured article was admitted free of duty, the raw material was left burdened with a heavy one. The consequence was, that in 1850 he (Mr. Mitchell) brought forward a proposal for allowing ships to be built in bond. The right hon. Member for Halifax (Sir C. Wood,) who was then Chancellor of the Exchequer, declined to deal with the subject at that time, in consequence of the state of the revenue, and on account of the great difficulty which a system of drawbacks would entail, but he promised to consider the question at a subsequent period, and in conformity with that promise the right hon. Gentleman in 1851 proposed and carried a reduction of the duties on foreign wood of from 15s. to 7s. 6d. a load upon hewn, and from 20s. to 10s. a load upon sawn timber. That was the point at which the duty at present stood. Now, what had been the effect of this reduction in stimulating the importation and consumption of wood in this country? Prior to 1843 the annual imports of wood somewhat exceeded 1,100,000 loads. would not trouble the House with the amount in each year up to 1857, but in that year the wood imported was 2,494,964 loads. In this quantity he had included both hewn and sawn timber. The importation, therefore, had nearly doubled in the fourteen years from 1843 to 1857, during which the reduction of the duty was made. He was bound to admit that there had been a falling off in 1858, but that might be accounted for by the crisis in the preceding year in this country. The timber trade was always the last to feel a commercial crisis, and it was also the last to recover from it; but he had no doubt that the small falling off in 1858 would be abundantly made up in the present year. It would be seen that colonial timber had experienced a considerable reduction in the amount of protection afforded to it; but there had nevertheless been no falling off in the colonial trade. In 1857 the quantity of wood imported from our Colonies exceeded the total quantity of our imports, foreign, and colonial, in 1842. He (Mr. Mitchell) objected to the continuance of the timber duties on four grounds-First,

be produced by the falling in of the terminable annuities, he thought he might very fairly venture to ask the House to pronounce the continuance of the duty undesirable.

MR. FENWICK said, he rose to second the Resolution, and in doing so he would beg to call the attention of the House to the words of it, and to point out that it contained nothing to pledge hon. Members, should they assent to it, to the repeal of the duty at the present moment, or indeed to do so at any particular time. All it called upon the House to do was to affirm the general principle, namely, that the timber duties were unjust both in principle and practice. Neither his hon. Friend nor himself was anxious that the remission of the duties should take place at a time which would be injurious to the public service. It had been recognized over and over again that a tax on the raw material ought not to exist if it could be possibly prevented. That principle had been carried out so far as it concerned cotton, wool, and other things-timber alone was the exception. Upon those grounds it was perfectly fair to ask the House to ratify the Resolution. His constituents had a special interest in its repeal as they were more largely engaged in shipbuilding than any others in the country; for on the Wear there was more shipbuilding than in almost all the rest of the kingdom. Two years since the shipbuilders on the Wear turned out 60 per cent more ships than the whole of England did a few years ago; and that showed that the port of Sunderland and the interests of his constituents were largely concerned in the fate of this question. There was a duty on imported timber of from 10 to 25 per cent, but at the same time ships built in the Baltic and in Canada were permitted to be brought to this country and sold without any duty being charged at all. Such a system interfered to prevent shipbuilding in the north of England, and operated most injuriously upon the shipbuilding interest generally. It was well known that Canadian timber was not so good for ordinary purposes as Baltic timber, but the duty on Canadian timber being only 1s. a load, whilst on Baltic it was 7s. 6d. and 10s., an inducement was offered to use an inferior article, and the consequence was that a great number of houses had been built of timber which was not fit for the purpose. Her Majesty's present Government were generally supposed to have a special lean

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ing in favour of the shipping interest; but that impression could no longer prevail if they should resist that fair and reasonable Motion. With these few remarks he begged to second the Resolution.

Motion made, and Question proposed"That it is the opinion of this House, that the Duties on Foreign and Colonial Wood should be repealed.”

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE said, that when he first saw the Resolution on the paper it appeared to him to be one which was aimed at the immediate remission of a very important item in the revenue of the country. It seemed, however, from what had fallen from the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken, that it did not necessarily bear that construction; but he could not help thinking that a mere abstract Motion, calling upon hon. Members to express an opinion as to the expediency of taking a certain course at some future time, and under some possible circumstances, was one which was more suited to the proceedings of a debating society than to the deliberations of the House of Commons. If, therefore, the Resolution under discussion were agreed to, it must, he thought, be regarded as pledging the House to a repeal of the duties in question, if not immediately, at all events at no distant period. Now, it was, he believed, an established rule in the conduct of its proceedings that the House should first vote the Supplies necessary to be granted to Her Majesty, and should afterwards resolve itself into a Committee of Ways and Means, to decide upon the mode in which those Supplies were to be raised. usual course was to wait for the Estimates, and after hearing from the recognized authority on those matters-the Chancellor of the Exchequer-an account of the state of the finances of the country, then to consider the relations between income and expenditure, and what were the most proper taxes for reduction or remission if such could be made. But this Motion was made before half the Estimates had been laid before the House, when only a single vote had been taken in supply, and without any reference to the comparative claims of other articles to be released from taxation if such a course was possible. It must be borne in mind that the produce of these duties was no less last year than £564,000, which was too large an amount to give up at a moment's notice. At all events, it was necessary that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when he came to make his

The