Popular Petitioning and the Corn Laws, 1833–46

Bibliographic Data

ID9738760
AuthorsHenry Miller (0000-0002-4894-5631)
Year2012
Volume127
Issue527
Pages882-919
Publication date2012-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe English Historical Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0013-8266 • E-ISSN: 1477-4534
PublisherOxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1093/ehr/ces073
OpenAlexW2335357863
LanguageEN
Citations received11

I  , Arthur Anderson, a London merchant who hailed from the Shetland Islands, petitioned the House of Commons for the repeal of the corn laws -the statutes which regulated the importation and exportation of cereals, and imposed duties on foreign corn to protect domestic agriculture.Th e Islands were in ' a state of great backwardness ' compared to other areas of the country.On account of their geographical position, soil and climate, the Islanders ' food supply was precarious; Anderson estimated that during the previous season , two-thirds of the population, or , people, had been partly or wholly without the means of subsistence.Th e Islanders ' ability to obtain suffi cient food was dependent upon exchanging their fi sh for corn and other foodstuff s from elsewhere.Th e corn laws, Anderson argued, were an injurious restriction of trade that prevented the inhabitants from obtaining food in the cheapest market and from profi tably trading fi sh, which they had in abundance.Anderson, later a member of the Anti-Corn Law League, and Liberal MP for Orkney and Shetland between  and , coupled his demand for repeal with a package of other policies designed to promote the economic development of the islands. 1 As was customary, Anderson ' s petition closed with a prayer, summarising the petition ' s contents before fi nishing with ' And your petitioner, &c ' , before the petitioner ' s name.Th e themes of Anderson ' s prayer were supported by a petition from the Island ' s inhabitants in the same year, and another in . 2 Th e case of the Shetlands may perhaps be an unusual example, but nonetheless suggests how a study of petitions can reveal support for repeal of the corn laws far from the League ' s Lancashire heartland, and the ways in which such support was grounded in local contexts, including political traditions, economic interests and geography.Recent scholarship, by Howe in particular, has reinstated the importance of the League, but has moved the focus away from the question of whether the pressure group directly infl uenced Sir

Political science · American Constitutional Law and Politics · European Political History Analysis · Historical Economic and Social Studies · Law

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