8 APRIL 1843, Page 12

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

THE OPIUM-TRADE.

" IT has no smell," said VESPASIAN, holding out a denarius to his son, who was remonstrating against the nasty tax by which it had been raised. " The rupees are good honest coin," says the Anglo- Indian Government when reproached with being a partner in the opium-smuggling to China. Both are in the right in so far as the respectability of the pieces of money are concerned ; and yet the characters of both, especially the more modern reasoner, have suffered from their financial policy.

As a matter of mere profit and loss, it is always bad economy in a government to keep any branch of agriculture, trade, or manu- facture, in its own hands. Government has other business to attend to, and cannot keep the same sharp eye upon outlay and income, and the correct keeping of accounts, that the private spe- culator is made to do by his own interest. Government manufac- tures and traffic are always less profitable and less productive than those of private individuals. The greater the productiveness and profit of any branch of industry, the more is the wealth of the whole community, the property of the whole nation, increased. It is therefore, in a mere economical point of view, always better that trade and manufacture should be left to private enterprise, and the money which Government requires raised by taxation, than that it should derive revenue from monopolies. For this reason, the Government of India ought long ago to have taken measures for substituting a fair and equitable system of taxation in lieu of its monopolies of opium and salt.

But the argument against a Government's dabbling in trade is immensely increased when any shadow of discredit attaches to the branch of business it takes in hand. The great source of strength to every government is its character ; men are most obedient to those for whom they feel most respect. Every suspicion thrown upon a government's integrity or moral purity weakens it. Now the opium-trade is not a respectable one. Even in India, it is on a par in this respect with the furnishing of spirits to dram-shops and gin-palaces in this country. There are, doubtless, many most respectable people among us who earn their livelihood not only by supplying but by keeping gin-palaces ; but every one feels that they are respectable in spite of their profession, and that it is a questionable one. It would be no discredit to a Dissenting clergy- man with a slender income to keep a school or even be concerned in a book-shop ; but what would be said if he were to open a dram- shop ? The Government of India, by taking upon it the part of wholesale furnisher to the dram-shops (opium-shops) within its dominions, places itself in the position of a poor clergyman who should keep a tippling-house. Many biting sarcasms were launched against the French Government of the Restoration for raising money by duties on licences to gaming-house-keepers and ladies of pleasure,—a tax the proceeds of which are said to have been appropriately expended in 'supporting the censorship of the press : but the Indian Government goes a step beyond that of France—it pockets the profits of supplying the dealers in im- morality with their stock in trade. When we look to China, the bad consequences of the Indian Go- vernment retaining a monopoly of opium become still more obvious. It reduces the Government to the level not merely of the keepers of dram-shops, but to that of smugglers of illicit spirits. It adds to the reproach of ministering to all the irregularities to which intoxication is a provocative, that of encouraging the lawless and violent habits of the dealers in contraband. To return to our former illustration, a smuggling government is as equivocal a cha- racter as a smuggling parson would be. And as in this case the im- morality is greater, so is the danger. The government of any country has a right to punish those who break its laws, if it can catch them, and confiscate their property engaged in the contraband trade ; and what is punishment in the case of a government against private individuals, is war in the case of government against go- vernment.

It is not necessary to enter into the questions whether national intemperance can be diminished by laws intended to prohibit the production and sale of intoxicating materials, and whether smug- gling can be put down by mere preventive force. And equally irrelevant is any medical inquiry as to the comparative noxiousness of opium and spirituous liquors when taken habitually or to excess. Here is a commodity which, no doubt, is used pretty extensively in medicine, but which is used still more extensively as a means of producing intoxication, and of which it is known that by far the greater part is consumed in the latter form, and is the object of a great smuggling-trade. Is it creditable, is it safe, for the Indian Government to continue the principal manufacturer and vender of such a commodity ? Both moral and economical considerations combine to demon- strate the propriety of the Company's Government adopting mea- sures for abolishing its monopolies with the least possible delay, and substituting for them some equitable system of taxation as a source of revenue.

The question of the opium-monopoly had better be left to the Court of Directors ; but the arrangements respecting the opium- trade at Hong-kong are the concern of the Imperial Government. Its duty seems clear enough. In that recent acquisition, as at Singapore, the rule ought to be perfect freedom, of trade : the Government ought neither to protect nor to discourage any branch of trade. But all rules have exceptions. Opium is a commo- dity the use of which as a drug is limited ; opium is a commodity

the importation of which is prohibited by the Chinese Government; opium is a commodity the demand for which in those regions is mainly if not entirely confined to China. The quantity of opium imported into Hong-kong will soon show whether it is for the proper supply of that settlement, or whether it is deposited there as an advantageous situation from which to smuggle it into China. The British Government is not bound to act as the preventive ser- vice or coast-guard of the Chinese empire; but still less is it bound to be the auxiliary of those who systematically and habitu- ally break the laws of China. The duty of the British Govern- ment is to stand really neutral—neither to catch the smugglers nor assist them. And to this end, it ought to prevent the island of Hong-kong from being made a rendezvous of the opium-smug- glers. We do not believe, with some, that the importation of Bri- tish manufactures into China will necessarily increase if the opium- trade be suppressed : it does not appear to be a strictly logical in- ference that a man must purchase woollens if he cannot get opium. Men buy to obtain something they desire—not, like children at a fair, merely because they wish to spend their money. We are quite prepared to find that any obstruction placed in the way of the opium-trade must to some extent curtail our dealings with China. This, however, is not a question of trade, but of morals and national faith.