Memorandum of Mr. Gladstone 1 [With Annotations by John Bright], 3–9 October 1871; The Political Correspondence of Mr. Gladstone and Lord Granville Correspondence, 1868–1876

France, which has been engaged from 1860 to 1870 in making Treaties of Commerce which involved a considerable approach from the former system towards freedom of trade, announces her intention to obtain if she can the abandonment of these treaties by consent of the Powers with which they have been made. France being divided between Protectionists & Free Traders, people made themselves parties in her internal controversies by promoting a measure which evidently tended to help onward the cause of one of these parties, & to depress that of the other. At the instance of the French Government, the authors made an elaborate investigation of their duties on manufactured tobacco, & reduced them from rates almost prohibitory to those of simple equivalents, on the basis of a strict equality of trade as between British & Foreign manufacture.