WEDGWOOD JOSIAH: (1730-1795) Wedgwood fights against the Irish Resolutions ´ which certainly bear too hard at ...

WEDGWOOD JOSIAH: (1730-1795) Wedgwood fights against the Irish Resolutions ´ which certainly bear too hard at present upon the British manufacturer´

WEDGWOOD JOSIAH: (1730-1795) English potter, entrepreneur and prominent slavery abolitionist. A rare L.S., Josiah Wedgwood, Chairman (of the General Chamber of Manufacturers of Great Britain), one page, folio, Great George Street (London), 6th June 1785, to James Hebden. Wedgwood writes, in full, ´I take the liberty of inclosing a copy of the Reolutions printed so as to shew what is omitted of the original ten Resolutions, and what has been added to them, & how they now stand in the House of Lords. From the first days debate in the house of Lords upon these Resolutions we may, according to appearances, promise ourselves a more impartial hearing than we have hitherto met with; and that their L[ordshi]ps will if applied to, modify some of the resolutions, which certainly bear too hard at present upon the British manufacturer. Indeed it is too evident, that whatever may be the object wished for by government in this treaty, the manufacturing interest is to be the sacrifice and price for that object. The committee will be glad to know if you wish them to continue their communications to you upon any future occasions. They will be glad to receive your instructions in this respect, as they would avoid being either troublesome or expensive where their correspondence may not be acceptable´. Accompanied by the (now detached) address leaf, incorporating a postscript to the verso by Wedgwood, and signed by him in the third person, ´Be so good to present this to Mr. Clapham with Mr. Wedgwood´s compliments´, and also dated at Great George Street, 6th June 1785, in his hand. The address panel to the recto appears to be in the hand of William Eden, 1st Baron Auckland, and signed (´Free, Wm. Eden´) by him to the lower left corner of the panel. Some light age wear and minor staining, most evident to the address leaf which also has a small area of paper loss caused by the original breaking of the seal. About VG

In January 1785 Thomas Walker, a cotton merchant and political radical, and one of his associates were brought before the Committee on Trade and Foreign Plantations and questioned concerning Irish relations, in an effort to secure from them, without their knowledge of the object of the questioning, statements which would commit them to the policy later presented to the public in the form of the Irish Resolutions. Walker and his associate were later repeatedly confronted with quotations from their statements, and cross-examined, and treated in a manner which was characterised by a member of parliament as ´most scandalous´. By such methods the government defeated its own ends with respect to the Irish Resolutions as well as the cotton tax. Manchester manufacturers were needlessly embittered, and were forced to associate the government´s fiscal policy at home with its commercial policy toward Ireland. The Irish question, ever a thorn in the side, was rendered acutely piercing in the case of William Pitt´s government (1783-85). Pitt, recognising Ireland´s newly acquired legislative independence, was at once confronted with the problem of economic reorganisation. His policy, formulated in the so-called Irish Resolutions or Propositions, came from the Irish parliament for consideration in the English House of Commons in February 1785. According to Pitt´s own interpretation, his policy embraced two ´capital points´, namely, the admission of Ireland to participation in England´s colonial and foreign trade (with certain restrictions) and the mutual reduction of tariffs on manufactured goods to the rate in that kingdom where existing duties were the lower. The Irish Resolutions, like the cotton tax, encountered the fierce hostility of the newer manufacturers. Pitt himself, in his private letter of 6th January 1785, to the Duke of Rutland, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, quite frankly admitted the probability of the shifting to Ireland of certain English industries in consequence of the Resolutions. The most important of the various arguments urged against the Irish Resolutions by the manufacturers was the contrast in the tax policies of the two kingdoms. Pitt himself admitted the force of the argument, first in private, and at length in consenting to the modification of the cotton tax. The vital connection between the Irish Resolutions and the question of taxation, particularly the excise laws, was set forth in the resolutions of Manchester manufacturers on 11th April 1785. Out of this situation, which gave to the manufacturers a feeling of common interest, arose the General Chamber of Manufacturers of Great Britain. This organisation was not limited to the new capitalistic manufacturers, but the initiative and the moving force were with them. The new capitalistic industries consisted in the main of three groups: Wedgwood´s Staffordshire potteries; the iron foundries and plants about Birmingham; and the manufacturing and printing of cotton centering at Manchester. The part played by Josiah Wedgwood seems to have been the result of his hostility to the Irish Resolutions. On 21st February 1785, he wrote to Matthew Boulton, saying that he intended to recommend the organisation of ´a Committee of Delegates from all the manufacturing places of England and Scotland to meet and sit in London all the time the Irish commercial affairs are pending´ and he was not without hope that such a body would be useful ´upon others as well as the present occasion´. Results were soon manifest. On 12th March, it was reported that ´manufacturers are assembling´ at London from various parts of the kingdom. A meeting had already been held in London, at the London Tavern, on 7th March. During the succeeding week, a committee was appointed, with Wedgwood as chairman. On 12th March this committee met and issued a call for another general meeting for 14th March. At the meeting convened on the 14th, there was organised a definite body to be called the Chamber of Manufacturers of Great Britain, and to consist of ´each member of a commercial committee, being a manufacturer´. It was resolved unanimously that the society ´do not cease with the present business´. At the various meetings of the Chamber, the chairmanship was held by different men. The chairman of the meeting of 14th March was Wedgwood, who, though not a member of the aristocracy, was nevertheless invested with a respectability denied to the more ´vulgar´ and less artistic textile manufacturers. The committee recommended that the Chamber promote, by means of circular letters and in other ways, the organisation of local bodies of manufacturers, whose common interests should find expression in the central body. To distinguish the local chambers from the national organisation, it was recommended that the word ´general´ be prefixed to the title of the Chamber. The committee´s recommendations were unanimously adopted. It was decided, also, that the body should be a permanent organisation. As a result of the organised activities of the manufacturers in opposition to the Irish Resolutions and the cotton tax, a flood of more than sixty petitions deluged the House of Commons - petitions usually representing large groups of manufacturers, very similar in content, and commonly denouncing the English system of taxation as well as the proposed readjustment of Irish relations. The government first yielded on the excise issue. On 10th May a bill was passed repealing the more obnoxious features of the law of 1784. The cotton manufacturers continued, nevertheless, in opposition, in company with the other members of the General Chamber, and Pitt again yielded by introducing the Resolutions in a new form, including many modifications demanded by the manufacturers. Immediately thereafter the General Chamber held a general meeting and resolved to notify its constituents and ask them to petition for further delay. Then followed a second deluge of petitions, conforming closely to the recommendations of the General Chamber. Although Pitt secured the adoption of the revised Resolutions, the revision itself was a virtual defeat at home and the cause of the not unexpected rejection of the entire plan in Ireland. Thus ended in defeat, at the hands of the General Chamber of Manufacturers, a policy which had engaged the utmost power of the minister, and which had been regarded by him as vital to himself and to the empire. (extracts from The Rise of the Great Manufacturers in England 1760-1790 by Witt Bowden, 1919).

William Eden (1745-1814) 1st Baron Auckland. British diplomat and politician who served as Chief Secretary for Ireland 1780-82 and also served as an Envoy to France from 1785-87 (on a mission dealing with commerce).

Provenance: Formerly part of the collection of Ray Rawlins, author of The Guinness Book of World Autographs (1977) and bearing his small circular Collection label neatly affixed to the lower corner of the address leaf. Indeed, the signature on the present letter was used as a facsimile in The Guinness Book of World Autographs. The letter was also offered by Sotheby´s in their sale of the Rawlins Collection on 2nd, 3rd & 4th June 1980 (lot 873).