The Press. — London, England, 1854-01-21 00:00:00

IR ~r r 50 port of the present Cabinet has been inspired by their reliance upon its Peelite element? To what portion or clique of its constituent members will they next look for a breakwater against the tide of aggressive democracy? Not to Sir W. MOLZSWORTH,—though more rationally to him than to Lord Jona RUSSELL, or to the Whigs of his school. It were even better to trust to Sir JAMES GRAHAM, who solemnly declared at Carlisle that he would scorn to belong to Lord AsEnDEEN's Cabinet, or to enter any Cabinet, unless he knew it to be determined to pass " a large measure of Reform." Trust even him, in preference to the orator of Perth—the distrusted of all parties—the teacher, who promulgated it as an axiomatic truth, that there was no party or interest left in the three kingdoms which could offer a more prosperous resistance to democratic progress than a turnpike-gate could oppose to the rush of an express train on a railway. Ho and his Peelite colleagues are the true political " factors " to whom all principles are but articles in the market of mutable popularity. Borough disfranchise ment, county degradation, ballot, five-pound franchise—anything, to support those who have surrendered party, and who depend on chance,—every man for his own principles, if ho be not obstinate in acting en them, and office for all ;—these are the results to which Coalition tends, and which this Staffordshire election is about to make manifest. In this county the Marquis of ANGLESEY, Lord WARD, Lord WROTTESLEY, and others who have a stake, without seeming to know it, in the struggle preparing for England, might, if they had pleased, have united with gentlemen whose interests are identical with theirs, and an easy and honourable victory was secure. But it is preferable that one of their own order should be lent as an offensive weapon to the Coalition, and the consequence is that, as Coalition candidate, he is condemned to pro itiate their Radical supporters by pledging himself to the ballot, to the extension of the county franchise to 101. householders, and, compendiously, in fine, to the forthcoming "large measure." We know not whether Lord PAGET himself is elated with his position, but he may boast that, at the meeting held at Wednesbury last Monday week, he was thus patronised by Mr. GEACH, M.P. for Coventry. This gentleman, who was chairman of the meeting, "had no objection to Lord PAGET "because he belonged to an aristocratic family. "(Rear,hear.) They were very glad to associate " with the aristocracy,—very glad to avail " themselves of their services." By this testi mony Lord PAGET was commended to consti tuents who, for the large measure promised, and the larger expected, avail themselves equally of the Ministry of Lord ABERDEEN. The conclusion is obvious. Through the medium of the Coalition a section of the road aristocracy of England is made the atspaw of democratic plottings. Lord PAL stiasi oN is not a squeamish politician, yet the large measure was too large even for him. His Peelite colleagues had no such scruples; they were prepared for that ; they are pre pared for more than he would submit to ; and possibly they arse prepared for more than they have yet ventured to propose. Can they now any longer pretend that they have made party obsolete by calling it ob solete? Is the democratic party obsolete? or is it a party the pressure of which is evident in Staffordshire, and of which the triumph is preparing at the Council Board of England ? You may throw aside your arms, your organi sation, and your principles, and pronounce all principles, and all defence of them, an anachronism ; but the Heruli have not done this with their arms and their organisation, and the Heruli are at the gates. Yon cannot stifle by inflated jargon the struggles of society, or avert the perils which threaten the stability of empire. THE OXFORD ELECTION. WE are generally informed as to Ole proceed ings which have been, and may be, taken with reference to the vacant representation of Oxford University ; and we are better in formed as to the movement of certain sections THE PRESS. of its constituency than it would be welcome to them to imagine. At the same time, we have reason to know that it would be pre mature to make any statement whatever as to the course which it may be thought ad visable to adopt. The outlying members with whom we sympathise may rely that vigilant measures for their interests are being taken by tried and experienced friends in Oxford and in London, who are in constant communi cation. These friends are prepared for any issue which may be imposed upon them, though it will be most grateful to them to find that their duty coincides with their desire not to disturb unnecessarily the peace of the University. " THE MANCHESTER SCHOOL" AND THE STRIKES. AT the annual meeting of the Manchester Commercial Association, the President, Mr. ASPINALL TURNER, delivered an address which, as an exposition of the views of " the Man chester school," deserves to be rescued from the oblivion of a mere report. After an inci dental allusion to the genius of Dr. BOWRINO, and an inferential suggestion that he should (in consequence, we presume, of the immi nence of war) be appointed to the command of the fortress of Gibraltar, Mr. A. TURNER at once plunged boldly into the subject of the strikes and the lock-outs, or, as he justly described it, " the civil war going on between " masters and operatives " in Lancashire, the heart and centre of the labour and capital of England. His words were generally mild, and, therefore, unlike those which ordinarily flow from the lips of the Manchester orators. We missed the pert, positive dogmatism of Mr. COBDEN : we looked in vain for the boisterous acrimony that pervades the speeches of his gentle twin-brother BRIGHT. But, though breathing honeyed words, the spirit of the ancient League was there. Kindling as he recounted the triumphs of the past, in predict ing future conquests Mr. AsriNALL TURNER was betrayed into a momentary and, under the circumstances, venial lapse. Bursting into a boast at once reminiscent and prophe tic, he threatens that, as Manchester had " put down " royal tyranny and aristocratic tyranny, so it would also deal with the tyranny of democracy. Here we have an involuntary avowal of the policy of the " school " of which Messrs. COBDEN and BRIGHT are the leaders. The Crown is in England supreme—then diminish the royal power. The aristocracy stands before us—sweep it from our path. Working men agitate—crush them to the earth. Thus forewarned, it will be, indeed, the fault of the threatened if they permit the vaunting assailant to accomplish his aims. What England would be if Manchester pre dominated we may in some measure imagine from the present condition of Rochdale, where Mr. BRIGHT is paramount. The state of that town is described with graphic power and evident knowledge in a work to which we have this week devoted several of our literary columns. After a perusal of that work—after the disclosures there made of the unscrupulous acts to which the Manchester school resorted to stimulate the greatest agitation that ever existed—it may surprise the reader to learn that Mr. ASPINALL TURNER thinks agitation very wrong, of course, when it is directed against his party. He (the President of the Manchester Commercial Association) vigorously protests against "the " right of the mechanics to send demagogues " up end down the country endeavouring to set " the masters against the men, to create an un " kindly feeling where there should be nothing " but kindness, and attempting, in fact, if they " were allowed to continue these proceedings, " to upset the whole manufacturing system." No right to send demagogues about the coun try ! From whom, then, did Messrs. COBDEN and BRIGHT, eight or ten years since, receive their commission ? Did it emanate, like that of MA HOM ET the false prophet, direct from heaven, and do they only thus divinely inspired pos seas the right to agitatate ? But this is the Manchester school again —all must be silent SATURDAY, —all must quail and bend in the presence of Manchester. The Crown and the aristocracy have fallen—now the working classes must b e crushed If Manchester was not to be obeyed, th e speaker hinted that the inestimable blessi ng of its capital might be remov e d t o more favoured spots—to the Rhine, for instanc e As if capital solely possessed the property of ,locomotion; as if, in the presence of the pre. sent emigration, it is inconceivable that labour also may leave Lancashire. "ami ne severed the ties that bound the Irish peasant to his " people," and drove him from his rude hut to a land further in the West. Others, again , aro tempted by gold over the limitl ess sea to an Australian home ; yet to an Englishman the pangs of hunger are less hard to bear than injustice ; and the thirst of gold is not stronger than the desire to escape from oppression. We have the testimony of Lord WILTON that these men are ardently sensitive to kindness, and keenly jealous of encroachment on their supposed rights. And it is to men thus consti tuted that threats and tauntshave been liberally applied. The operatives maybe, and very proba• bly are, wrong in the question at issue, but the masters of the Manchester school are most cer• tainly wrong in the manner in which they attempt to enforce their views. Power may, perchance, enforce a sullen obedience ; taunts and threats will assuredly engender vindictive feelings; and, if the men are in error, the only way in which this strike can be settled satisfactorily is by convincing them of their mistake. This is a duty imposed upon the masters by their superior education and their position. Let them do this, and labour and capital may again unite in useful and harmonious combi. nation ; but when they boast of "putting " down " the Crown, the aristocracy, and the working classes, they overrate their own power, and do not comprehend the temper of the times. And when they speak of factories springing up on the Rhine, let them beware lest labour should also find a new opening on the banks of the Mississippi or the I'aramatta. THE COALITION JOURNALS AND THE EX-LORD OF THE TREASURY. IT is worthy of remark that the Coalition journals have preserved a significant silence with respect to Mr. JOHN SADLEIR and the re velations which, so far as he is concerned. ended by displacing one of her Majesty's Lords of the Treasury. The Times has only cursorily adverted to it, assigning to the record of the facts brought home to the Duke of NEWCASTLE'S " fidus Aehates " about one-sixth of a column. Nor did it comment on the trial in any of its leading articles. When we re collect that the Times has been unsparing in its censures of the Roman Catholic priest', we are astonished why it has I asied without remark the conduct of Mr. SnmEtia's friend Father DEMPSEY, whose " treachery " was M severely rebuked by the presiding Roman Catholic Judge, Chief Baron PIGOT. Of other " individual scoundrels," the Times was volu minous in its reports, and yet here is a case of the most extraordinary nature, in which a Lord of the Treasury was deeply implicated. and its details are kept back as much n possible from the eyes of ENGLISHMEN, thong" all the Irish journals have copiously reportea them. In Lord CLARENDON'S case, the Timm copied the severe article (headed " The Man of the World") which appeared in our cluer, contemporary the Examiner. But it would seem that the employer of Mr. BIRCH had less influence with the Times than the patrons of the ex-Lord of the Treasury, Mr. 3 ° llS. SADLEIR. BURIAL CLUBS. A FEW years ago infanticide in India, espe . cially as practised among the Raj-poot was a favourite subject of philanthropic de mation. Every means was employed to pa t down the abomination. Rewards were lavished on those chiefs who did not make away Ira their daughters as blind puppies or kittens are drowned ; and so far was public quo' t