The Press. — London, England, 1858-04-24 00:00:00

400 sure, and the manner in which he had been recalled was not discourteous. Lord PALMERSTON quite agreed that it was expe dient that the advisers of the Crown should be at liberty to choose their own diplomatic agents, but be did not see the necessity of recalling Lord Howden in so abrupt a manner. He bore testimony to the great ability with which that nobleman bad dis charged the important duties intrusted to him, and lamented that the present Government should have seen reason to place the interests of the country in any other hands. Mr. KER said, that whatever might be the merits of Lord Howden, his successor was one of the best public servants. He would well sustain the honour of England, and was not a man who would submit to act in any way unworthy of his country, or in opposition to constitutional freedom. The Loan Societies Bill was read a third time and passed. The house then went into Supply on the Navy Estimates, when certain votes were agreed to. On the order of the day for the second reading of the India Bill No. 2, the CHANCELLOR of the Ex- CHEQUER proposed to postpone it till Friday. Mr. Hossmax suggested the propriety of discharging the order, as the house bad come to a general under standing to proceed by resolution on the subject of the government of India. (No, no.) The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said that unless there was a general concurrence of opinion that both bills should be withdrawn, it might be incon venient to adopt the suggestion. Lord PALMERSTON said Mr. Horsman was wrong in assuming that there was a general understanding on the part of the house to proceed by resolution on this subject. That he (Lord Palmerston) conceived was a question which the house would have to dis cuss on a future day. He could not accept the sug gestion of the right hon. gentleman (the Chancellor of the Exchequer), that Bill No. 1 should be with drawn in company with Bill N, The motion for p. , onning ?lie second reading of Bill No. 2 until Dada) res ti agreed to. POOR LAW ACT LAIL.I)IIL'..T BILL. Mr. Cams obtained leave to bring in a bill to amend the laws for the relief of the poor. The house adjourned at twenty minutes past twelve o'clock. HOUSE OF LO INDIA RESOLUTIONS. The Earl of ELLENBOROUGH, in reply to Lord Monteagle, stated that the Government did not intend to lay any resolutions on the subject of the government of India before the House of Lords. He trusted they would be very shortly sent up from the other house, when their lordships would have the opportunity of discussing them. The Customs Bill was read a' third time and passed. The Marquis of WESTMEATH presented a petition from householders in the districts of Belgravia and Pimlico against the nuisance of barrel-organs in the streets. On the motion of Lord REDESDALE, it was ordered that no bill be read a second time after the 27th of July, except bills of Supply, or such bills as the house may specially exempt from the order. Their lordships then adjourned. HOUSE OF COMMONS—TuesnAr. Mr. VANCE moved for a select committee to con eider certain duties on ships and other imposts leviable within the port of Dublin. He stated the origin of the duties, which had been imposed for the purpose of liquidating the cost of a refuge harbour. He wanted, he baid, only inquiry into the effect of these duties upon the trade of Dublin. Mr. HENLEY did not object to an inquiry. The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said these tolls originated in a compact to the advantage of Dublin, and to the disadvantage of the Consoli dated Fund, and he should oppose any attempt to relieve the city from paying the amount of the tax. But if the mode in which it was levied was in jurious, he bad no objection to the grievance being remedied, so long as the same amount was brought into the Exchequer. So far as regarded inquiry into any injustice he should not oppose the committee. Lord PALMERSTON suggested that if the committee were appointed the order of reference should limit its inquiry t o the ascertaining whether an equal sum could be levied in a less objectionable manner. Mr. VANCE consented to modify the order of re ference, and th 9 amended motion was agreed to. TRIENNIAL PARLIAMENTS. Mr. Cox moved for leave to bring in a bill to repeal the Act of the first year of George 1., cap. 38, com monly called the Septennial Act, and to limit the duration of Parliaments to three years. Mr. Cox based his argument, in support of his motion, upon the ground that the ancient constitution of the pountry required that there should be annual Par- Jiaments, and that short Parliaments continued to Pe jbo 09plitittltiOn WWI 170 ) Oen ; unfortunately THE PRE S S, APRIL 24, 1858. for the country, he said, a change of policy took place. He contended, also, that the shorter Parlia ments were made, the less expensive would be the elections, and that it was no answer to his argument to say that, on an average, Parliaments were at present triennial, since they often lasted five and six years. Mr. WALPOLE observed that Mr. Cox had not read the parliamentary annals with sufficient accuracy, and had mistaken the sittings of Parliament for new elections of Parliament : The Act of Edward 111., which provided that Parliaments were to sit once annually, did not relate to the choice of members. The hon. member had quoted history for the purpose of showing that in the reigns of Henry IV., Henry V., and Henry VI., Parliaments were frequently held, but if the hon. member would turn to the history of those reigns he would find that Parliaments were not frequently chosen. In the reign of Henry VIII., which lasted some thirty. eight years, the hon. member would find that one Parlia ment sat for six years, during which time the greater monasteries were destroyed. In the reign of Mary, the summonses to which the hon. member had referred were not for new Parliaments, but new sittings of Parliament. In the reign of Edward VI. one Parliament sat for five years. In the reign of Elizabeth, the Parliament of 1552 was nit dissolved till 1585, and during that period it sat twenty-five times. He might go through the reigns of James I. and Charles I. for the purpose of showing that from the first statute quoted by the honourable member down to the act passed in the Long Parliament, in the reign of Charles 1., there was not an instance of law or usage establishing the proposition that Parliaments were to be annually elected. When Mr. Cox called the Septennial Act a violation of the Constitution, he forgot, he said, that if the Parliament of George I. had simply repealed the Triennial Act, there was nothing in the common law, the constitutional law, or the statute law, to prevent its sitting during the whole reign of the King. The question was, whether the extension of the duration of Parliaments from three years to seven, which would have been otherwise unlimited, was wise, and on the whole best, and he entered somewhat fully into the reasons which led him to affirm this pro• position. Since the legislation of the country, he observed, bad improved under the Septennial Act, the authority of the house had not been lowered, and it had been brought by it more into harmony with the other branch of the Legislature, he hoped the house would pause before it repealed the act, and reverted to a measure which had failed. Upon a division, the motion was negatived by 254 to 57. INDIAN RAILWAYS. Mr. LIDDELL called attention to the delay that had occurred in the construction of railways in India, and moved the appointment of a select committee to in quire into the subject. Mr. BAILLIE thought that no great advantage could be derived from an inquiry ; he believed that the railways were going on as fast as could be expected, considering the vastness of the works, and be co Id not consent to a motion that would imply an unde served censure. After some further conversation, the motion was agreed to without a division. Mr. Sergeant DEASY obtained leave to bring in a bill to promote and regulate reformatory schools for juvenile offenders in Ireland. Sir E. COLEBROOKE obtained leave to bring in a bill to amend the law for the registration of the county voters in Scotland. GALWAY DISIMANi On the order for going into committee on the Gal way Freemen Disfranchisement Bill, Mr. WALPOLE said the bill did not deal equal justice to all; it confounded the innocent freemen with the guilty, and, while it disfranchised the bribed, it did not meddle with the briber. In order to enable the committee to deal with the whole case it would be necessary, he observed, to give the com mittee an instruction, of which be read the terms. After pointing out the difficulties and embarrass ments with which the measure would be beset in committee, and the manner in which these cases had heretofore been dealt with by the house in three classes of precedents, he stated his own conclusion, that there were only two courses which the house could take—either to refuse to go into committee altogether, or to adopt the instruction lie proposed, and then postpone the further consideration of the case. He concluded by moving the instruction em powering the committee to include the purchasers of votes. The debate was continued by Lord Lovaine, Mr. Sergeant Deasy, Mr. Maguire, and Mr. J. 1). Fitz gerald. Upon the instruction being put from the chair, ' Lord PALMERSTON said he could not concur in it, but would simply support the bill for disfranchising the voters among whom corrupt practices bad pre vailed. Mr. ROEBUCK remarked that there was an old saying to the effect that what was sauce for the gooso was saw* for the gander, but that it seemed the noble lord the member for Tiverton desired to eat those different birds with different sauces ON Upon the one side, in the case of Galway, were the bribed—the poor, the many. and the unfortunate. They were to be punished wbo:esule under the operation of ihe bill which the noble lord had announced it to be his inten• tion to support. Upon the other side there was a set of men by is horn those poor people had been bribed, and la their behalf the noble lord was ready to come forward and to say, " Do you not recollect we have given those men indemnity?" that indemnity ought to be extended to the poor bribed; but, exclaimed the noble lord, " We punish them wholesale. That is no punishment at all." li e should wish to know what was the meaning of a principle such as that? Why, it was as plain as the sun at noonday, when there was no cloud. The fact was that the poor, the many, and the unfortunate were to be disfranchised fur the purpose of placing the borough in the hands of the bribers. Now, to take that course would be to commit an act of in. justice, not only against the parties concerned, but against the county itself. Upon a division the instruction) was carried by 10 to 121. Colonel FRENCH then moved to defer the committee for six months. Lord PALMERSTON, though he had voted against the instruction, could not consent to get rid of the bill. The house having again divided, the amendment was negatived by 226 to 51, and the house went into committee upon the bill, when the Chairman was ordered to report progress after a short conversation as to the mode of proceeding. Some further business having been disposed of, the house adjourned at half-past one o'clock. HOUSE OF COMMONS—WEDNESDAY, CHURCH RATES. At the mid•dny sitting the motion for going into committee was resisted by _ I Mr. Pacxe, who moved an amendment deferring the committee for six months. He denied that the opposition to the rate was founded on conscientious principles, and referred to the rejection of Sir W. Oa) and other advocates of its repeal at the last elections as proving that their view of the question was not supported by public opinion. Mr. K. SEYMER seconded the amendment. Mr. HUGESSEN supported the bill. It was, he contended, discreditable to the Established Church to argue that the fabric of its edifices could not be maintained except by a compulsory rate levied partly upon dissenters. The controversy had been argued entirely as a question of principle, and he repudiated the assertion that the agitation against church rates bad been based upon " pocket objections." The bill was also defended by Mr. PUGH. Mr. K. SEYMER, while disapproving of the total abolition of the church-rate system, advocated the compromise by which every man who acknowledged himself a dissenter would be enabled to claim ex emption. He thought that the Legislature should prescribe the precise purposes to which the rite should be applied, or the classes by whom it should be paid. Sir G. GREY objected to any arrangement in which it would be possible to revive the impost in places where it had been once abolished. Lord J. MANNERS was anxious to obtain an amicable settlement of the controversy, an object which he feared the present measure was calculated to frustrate. Lord H. VANE believed that the present state of the law on the subject was most unsatisfactory, and that the question was ripe for permanent adjustment. The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER suggested that, as Mr. Puller had put an amendment urn the paper (proposing a substitute for the rates by a rent• charge upon land) which deserved the serious con sideration of the house, and as that amendment could not be discussed in the committee, and the amendment of Mr. Packe would rescind a decision of the house, the latter amendment should be with drawn. Lord J. RUSSELL agreed with Mr. Disraeli, and thought that Mr. Puller's amendment would afford the means of settling the question. After an unsuccessful attempt by Mr. Steuart to obtain a hearing, the SPEAKER put the question in the ordinary form, that the words of the original motion proposed to be left out by the amend ment should stand part of the question, and, no negative being uttered, apparently through lapse of attention or misapprehension by the dissentients, be declared that the " ayes" had it, and the house wen t into committee upon the bill, Mr. Puller being thereby precluded from moving his amendment. Upon the first clause of the bill, Sir A. Eurote moved an amendment, the effect of which was to suspend the operation of the bill fur three years. This amendment, after a long discussion, was negatived. Lord R. Cecm moved an amendment of the same . clause, confining the operation of the bill t o cities and boroughs. Sir G. LEWIS objected that this amendment not carry out the principle in view, it being tect c in one respect and too narrow iu another , and 11a burested tbat thu Propositions of Sir Grey f ur 9