LAISSEZ FAIRE 
to supply us with employment for capital and labour at 
home. Thus, employment for capital and labour would be 
increased in two places and two ways at the same time; 
abroad, in the Colonies, by the removal of capital and people 
to fresh fields of production; at home, by the extension of 
markets, or the importation of food and raw materials.” 
His views These enthusiasts for colonisation were more successful in 
0 their analysis of existing conditions than in their practical 
efforts in regard to the planting of new lands. The promoters 
of new enterprises were obliged to oppose the traditional 
policy of the Colonial Office, and they are hardly to be 
blamed for the defects of schemes which had only given a 
partial embodiment to their views. They regarded economic 
considerations as of primary importance in connection with 
colonisation, but they did not neglect political and social 
points as well. In 1830 they established a society for pro- 
moting systematic colonisation ; from that time onwards they 
were increasingly successful in obtaining public attention. 
They failed to get their principles thoroughly and consist- 
ently applied in any region, but they were able to introduce 
important modifications in the plans that were carried out 
with regard to South Australia?; and Wakefield had a large 
share in promoting the Company which colonised New 
Zealand’. They had to insist once more on the common- 
sense principles which had been set forth by John Smith in 
regard to Virginia. They held that a serious wrong had 
been done in the preceding half-century, since emigration 
had been for the most part the mere deportation of convicts* 
and paupers, instead of the systematic planting of a civilised 
community. It may, however, be doubted whether any 
other means of securing the migration of a white population 
360 
1 Wakefield, Art of Colonisation, 91. 
! Jenks, History of the Australian Colonies, 129. $ 1b. 172. 
i The transportation of convicts chiefly to the southern States had gone on till 
the Declaration of Independence, at the rate of about 500 a year (Egerton, op. cit. 
262). A Parliamentary Committee was appointed on the subject in 1779, and 
» statute e@powering the King in Council to create Convict Settlements was 
passed in 1783 (24 Geo. IIL. c. 65). Another Committee on Transportation was 
appointed in 1837, and reported against the continuance of the system (Reports, 
1838, xxiI. 46), which was still retained in New South Wales, Van Diemens 
Land. Bermuda, and Norfolk Island.