The Letters of Gracchus on the East India Question 2
A calm and temperate observer, who scrupulously weighs the force and
merits of this reasoning, will naturally be forced into so much
scepticism as to doubt, whether there may not be some _other reasons_,
besides the safety of the Empire, which may induce the East India
Company to stand so firm for the condition of bringing all the import
Indian trade _into the Port of London_? Whether there may not be some
reasons, of a _narrower_ sphere than those of the interests of the
Empire? In searching for such reasons, it will occur to him, that the
Port of London is the seat of the Company's immediate and separate
interests; and he will shrewdly suspect, that those interests are the
_real_, while those of the Empire are made the _ostensible_, motive for
so vigorous a resistance. When he reflects, _that it is proposed to
leave the Company in the undisturbed possession of all the power of
Government over the Indian Empire, which they have hitherto enjoyed;
that they are to remain possessed, as heretofore, of the exclusive trade
to China, from whence four-fifths of their commercial profit is
derived_; that they themselves have virtually admitted the falsity of
the theoretical mischiefs, foretold as the certain results of an
out-port trade, by having agreed to concede that trade, to the extent
required by Government; that they equally allow, an import trade for the
merchants of the out-ports; but make their resistance upon the single
point, that the import trade should be all brought together into their
own warehouses, and should be disposed of in their own sales in
Leadenhall Street: when he combines all these considerations, he will
think that he plainly discovers, that the interests of the Empire at
large are not quite so much involved in the question as they proclaim;
and that, if any interests are more pressingly calculated than others,
it must be their own, and not the Public's. If their interests are to be
affected by the measure, let them fairly state it, and show the extent;
but let them not endeavour to defend them covertly, under an artful and
factious allegation of _the ruin of the British Constitution_. And if
they really do apprehend that the Constitution would be endangered, let
them not hazard such consequences by their own proceedings. Let them not
come forward as advocates for the preservation of the Empire, if their
rhetoric is to sink into a threat, of "_shutting up the great shop of
the India House."_
It may be well to call to the recollection of the East India Company,
that they owe their present state to an assertion of those very rights
to open trade which have now been brought forward; for, when the first,
or London East India Company had experienced certain disappointments and
failures, various adventurers came forward with claims similar to those
which have been alleged by the merchants of the present day, and
obtained an incorporation, to the prejudice of the old Company; and
although the old, or London East India Company, afterwards effected an
union with the new, or English East India Company, and with them gave
origin to the present Company, yet the UNITED EAST INDIA COMPANY should
not forget, how much the activity of the Indian trade was stimulated by
the assertion of the rights of their predecessors, _to participate in
the trade which had been granted exclusively to a former Company_.
GRACCHUS.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The _rights and pretensions_ of the Company are fully considered in
the Tenth Letter.
[2] Considerations on the Danger of laying open the Trade with India and
China, p. 13.
[3] Ibid. p. 18.
LETTER II.
_Wednesday, January 13, 1813._
It is a distinguishing character appertaining to Britons, to express
forcibly their feelings, whenever they think they discover any
disposition to encroach upon their rights. It is not therefore to be
wondered at, that the communication of the papers, on the subject of the
East India Company's Charter, which was made by the Directors to the
Proprietors, on the 5th instant, should have produced the effect which
was then manifested; of an almost unanimous disposition, to support the
Directors in their resistance of a measure, which, at the time, was
regarded as an invasion, on the part of the Government, of the
established rights of the East India Company.
But now that the momentary ebullition of that spirit has had time to
subside, and to give place to cool and sober reflection, it may not be
unacceptable to the Proprietors at large to look calmly and attentively
into the subject; and to examine its bearings on their own substantial
interests.
It must be manifest to every man, who will only refer to the accounts
which have been published in the Reports of the Select Committee of the
House of Commons, that, from the magnitude of the Company's debt, it
would be impossible to calculate the time at which the Proprietors could
contemplate any augmentation of their present dividends of 10½ per
cent.; even though the Charter, instead of being within one year of its
expiration, had an extended period of twenty years to operate.
It is equally manifest, from the correspondence of the Court of
Directors with Government, that, in agreeing to the proposition of
opening the Export Trade to the out-ports of the United Kingdom, they
were free from any apprehension, that the continuance of the present
dividend could be endangered by their conceding that point. And,
therefore, although the Proprietors were precluded from entertaining any
reasonable expectation of _an increase_ to their dividends, they were
perfectly warranted to consider the continuance of that which they now
receive, as free from any hazard, in consequence of the extension
proposed to be granted to the Export Trade.
Whether they may remain in the same confidence, under _all_ existing
circumstances, is a question which the Proprietors are now earnestly
solicited to examine. The point at issue (if I may apply that __EXPRESSION__
to a case, in which the Company are upon the disadvantageous ground of
petitioning for the renewal of a privilege, now about to expire) is,
whether the ships which shall be permitted to clear out from the
out-ports of the United Kingdom, ought to be allowed to return to any
given description of those ports, or whether they should all be
compelled to enter at the Port of London? And upon _this point_ is made
to hinge a question, which may affect (not the _British Empire and
Constitution_, but) the main interest of the Proprietors, namely, _their
dividends_. For no man can be so inconsiderately sanguine as to suppose,
that the Company, under the present pressure of their pecuniary
embarrassments, (whatever may have been the causes from whence they have
arisen;) embarrassments proceeding from a debt, in India and in England,
of _more than forty-two millions_; nearly four millions of which are in
accepted bills on England, which will shortly become due, and for the
payment of which there are not funds at the India House; no man can be
so inconsiderately sanguine as to suppose, that the dividend may not
become a little precarious, under such circumstances. It must be evident
to the most superficial observer, that the credit of the Company with
the Public can only be sustained by the prompt and liberal aid of
Parliament; and it will hardly be maintained, that it is a _propitious_
mode of soliciting that aid, to connect with the solicitation an avowed
determination to oppose a measure, which Government represent it to be
their duty to recommend to Parliament, for the general benefit of the
community; a measure, founded on, and growing out of, the principle of
the Charter of 1793, which first opened the private trade between India
and this country; the provisions respecting which trade have been
progressively extended at subsequent periods, and of which trade the
Public will now call for a further enlargement and participation, as a
just and necessary qualification to the proposed renewal of the
Company's Charter.
The City of London, indeed, is _now_ an exception, and apparently a very
weighty one, to this general call; but it will lose much of that weight
with the Public, and must fall into the scale of an interested party,
when it is recollected, that so long as the question between the Company
and the Public was, whether the commerce with India should remain a
strict monopoly, or whether a participation in it should be granted to
individuals, under the restriction of importing to London the
commercial interest of the metropolis was powerfully incited against the
Company; and that, to that great commercial interest, supported by the
weight of Mr. Dundas's opinion, and to the more enlarged view which Lord
Wellesley took of the subject, the extension that has hitherto been
given to the private trade with India is to be attributed. The
experience of twelve years has now proved, that both India and the
parent state have greatly benefited by that extension; and it has
followed, as a necessary consequence of that experience, that the active
and intelligent merchants of the other large ports of the United
Kingdom, have urged their fair pretensions, to be admitted to a share in
the profits of that widely diffused trade; by sending their merchandise
from their own ports, and by receiving the returning cargoes into their
own warehouses, in those ports.
A reference to the printed papers (as has already been signified) will
show, that the Court of Directors were prevailed upon to concede _the
first_ of those points, but that they have been immoveable with respect
to _the second_; although their own commercial knowledge must have made
it evident to them, that the concession of the first, that is, _a free
export_, would be nugatory, unless supported by the benefit arising from
the _freedom of import_; which is not only in the proportion of four to
one in amount to the export, but is requisite to give that unity to the
concern, without which great commercial establishments cannot be kept
up.
Such is the state of the question, or, as it has been called, by some
strange perversion of ideas, the _negotiation_, between the Company, as
applicants for a renewal of their Charter which is about to expire, and
the Government, through whose aid it is to be solicited, or at least,
without whose concurrence it is certainly very questionable, whether
they would be able to obtain it. These are the circumstances, under
which the affairs of the East India Company must necessarily, and
speedily, be brought forward, for the consideration of Parliament. Can
it, then, be considered an exaggerated view of the hazards of such a
situation, to suppose, that some guardian of the public purse may deem
it requisite to inquire, whether the application for pecuniary aid from
Parliament ought not to be preceded by a substantial proof, not of
concession, for they have in fact nothing to concede, but of something
like accommodation on the part of the Proprietors? And in that event,
might it not be questioned, whether, since the dividend of 10 per cent.
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