Page:Vindication of a fixed duty on corn.djvu/28

22 of the Danzic prices for the same years, it will be seen that the introduction of foreign corn at a duty of 10s., while it arrested the march of famine through the land, could not have prevented the average rise in price which has occurred under the present law, although it would have equalized the pressure which ever will result from deficiency at home.

The greatest difficulty, however, in the way of a fixed duty is the supposed impossibility of maintaining it when prices rise: the assumed reason being, that, if maintained, it "would starve the artisan."

Were corn, like tea and sugar, an article solely of foreign growth, its price upon the entire consumption of the country would clearly be enhanced by the exact amount of the import duty; again, were foreign corn purchased in bond by the British consumer, the remission of an expected duty would reduce by as much the cost of the quantity so purchased. But neither of these positions is applicable to corn. Corn is an article of which by far the greater portion must be grown in this country; and the quantity required for our consumption, beyond our own produce, will be alone imported and alone subjected to a duty. Now, if the deficiency of our own crops were so great that the price of wheat rose to 90s. per quarter, and that