They propose no encroachments upon civil liberty, no extension of executive authority, no rash subversion of ancient institutions, no relinquishment … - Robert Peel

[Famine-stricken districts in Ireland] would require some better consolation than the doctrine of Adam Smith on the true Principles of demand and supply and the danger of Government interference.

The accounts from Ireland of the potato crop, confirmed as they are by your high authority, are very alarming. We must consider whether it is possible by legislation, or by the exercise of prerogative, to apply a remedy to the great evil with which we are threatened. The application of such remedy involves considerations of the utmost magnitude. The remedy is the removal of all impediments to the import of all kinds of human food—that is, the total and absolute repeal for ever of all duties on all articles of subsistence.

I believe that on the general principle of free-trade there is now no great difference of opinion, and that all agree in the general rule that we should purchase in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest.