Page:Karl Marx - The Poverty of Philosophy - (tr. Harry Quelch) - 1913.djvu/218

 APPENDIX 211

on corn, we shall import cheaper corn from abroad. Then we shall reduce wages at the very time when they are rising in the countries where we get our corn. Thus in addition to the advantages which we already enjoy we shali have lower wages, and with all these advantages, we shall easily force the Continent to buy of us.”

But now the farmers and agricultural laborers join in the discussion.

“And what, pray,is to become of us? Are we to help in passing a sentence of death upon agriculture, when we get our living by it? Are we to let the soil be torn from beneath our feet?”

For all answer the Anti-Corn Law League contented itself with offering prizes for the three best essays upon the wholesome influence of the Repeal of the Corn Laws on English agriculture.

These prizes were carried off by Messrs. Hope, Morse, and Greg, whose essays were distributed by thousands throughout the agricultural districts. One of the prize essayists devotes himself to proving that neither the tenant farmer nor the agricultural laborer would lose by the repeal of the Corn Laws, and that the landlord alone would lose.

“The English tenant farmer,” he exclaims, “need not fear repeal, because no other country can produce such good corn so cheaply as England. Thus, even if the price of corn fell, it would not hurt you, because this fall would only affect rent, which would go down, while the profit of capital and the wages of labor ‘would remain stationary.”

The second prize essayist, Mr. Morse, maintains, on the contrary, that the price of corn will rise in consequence of repeal. He is at infinite pains to prove that protective