The Press. — London, England, 1854-03-25 00:00:00

•r ►. _ .. As the bill stands at present, it is impos sible, however, to discuss properly the prin ciples it involves ; and we wait to see these elicited in the course of debate. The principles for which it behoves all the true friends of Oxford to be vigilant and even con tentious are well understood. The Univdsity of Oxford has hitherto fulfilled its duty, as a great educational estate, under the two conditions or by the two agencies of its academic independence, and its connection with the Church of England. AR the Coalition inclndes the enemies, secret or avowed, of both, let our friends be discreetly suspicious, and satisfy themselves, before this measure be comes law, that its provisions will in no respect trench upon either. JUS BELLI. AMONGST its other blessings, the impending war seems likely to give the British public some enlightenment on the recondite subject of international law. A good deal of anx- iety, we hear, exists both in this country and in France for a clear understanding with the United States on the vexed question of neutral vessels. The States themselves are, by tradition, sensitively—perhaps morbidly— jealous of any exercise of the right of search. Russian agents have been busily at work in the transatlantic seaports for some months past; and the American Ministers in London and Paris have received intimation that mea sures on the subject are in concert between the two Powers, and will shortly be submitted for the consent and co-operation of the Re public. Again, the British merchants at Riga, through their Consul, wish to learn " what respect " would be paid by British cruisers, in the " event of war, to bond fide British property, " the produce of Russia, if shipped on board " neutral vessels?" The answer i 8 : By the law and practice of nations, a belligorent has a right to consider as enemies all persons who reside in a hostile conotry, or who maintain commercial establish ments therein. Whether these pe3ple be by birth neutral, allies, enemies, or fellow-subjects, the property of such persons exported from such countries is therefore red hos tium, and, as such, lawful prize of war. Stich property will be considered as a prize, although its owner is a native-born subject of the captor's country, and although it may be in transition to that country ; and its being laid on board a neutral ship will not protect the property. Trade must cease altogether between the countries ; Russian merchants must be ruined "for the good of the public "; and the public sin turn must suffer for nobody's good whatever. It will be re plied, it is one of the calamities of war—we cannot help ourselves. Our friends of the Peace Society make their stock argument for " Peace at any price " out of the injuries inflicted upon commerce. Now, we long as earnestly as any pundit of the sect for the time when "the nations shall not learn war " any more." But, until America is indifferent to annexidion, and Russia is rational, and peace societies cease to be pugnacious, and men in drab speak less in the second person and think less of the first,—until selfishness and ambition, fraud and force, are well-nigh banished from the world,—we are content to await the sure accomplishment of the fair vision of peace in " the new heavens and the " new earth." It may be that the last gun will be fired to salute the sunset of the present state of things. But meanwhile, terrible as war is and must always be to those who take part in it, does it necessarily involve the miseries that may now be legally inflicted on neutrals in the quarrel, or even on the (un armed) subjects of the Powers actually at war? Can it not be confined to the forces actually engaged? Can it not be made an pfficial proceeding, and its calamities (to some extent) limited to its officials ? It is so at present between armies and fleets, when they personally face each other: courtesy and chivalry did not die with HENRY and CHAIINDOS, with BAYARD and Du GIIERCLINI: but it is upon the innocent bystanders, the poor natives of the seat of war, or the (as innocent) wayfarers of the seas, that its heaviest brunt THE PRESS. now falls. It is the banditti that straggle and plunder in the rear of the camp, the privateers that infest the sea,—these, after all, cause the real misery of war, and with no gain to either side in the contest. In war (especially iu naval warfare) a nation legalises piracy ; gives free licence to burn houses, sink ships, kill men; to every sort of murder, robbery, and lust ; awl necessarily gives it to them that have pleasure in all this: it arms the worst of the human race, men of fiendlike passions, men even more fiendlike if cold blooded and passionless, the hostes humani generic, against fair, open, honest foes ; and all with no conceivable reason beyond the knowledge that its enemy may do the same against itself. In short, the fundamental principle of the existing jus bah is, that everything which hurts your enemy must proportionately benefit yourself,—a hardly perceptible improvement on the old Scythian theory, that the strength of the slain man passes into the slayer, or the arithmetic of Borneo, by which, if you scalp a man who has already scalped nineteen, you are allowed to credit yourself with the entire score. If the reckoning up of scalps and damage done were with us, as with them, a matter of religious obligation, we could quite understand the existing theory. Our own " religion of war " we may, perhaps, gather from the prayer " to be used at sea every day," and which thousands are now daily offering on shore, that our fleet may be " a safeguard " unto our most gracious sovereign lady " Queen Victoria and her dominions, and a " security for such as pass on the seas upon " their lawful occasions." Oddly enough, the prayer and the Foreign Secretary bring the matter exactly to an issue. Which shall be the rule of warfare, to extend as widely as we can the range and security of " lawful occasions," or the " right to consider us enemies " every body we can include under the title ? We have heard of the boy who " had a good right to be " flogged" with an odd feeling of misgiving as to the extent and multifariousness of an Eng lishman's " rights ;" but Lord CLARENDON 's " right" is at once the most amiable and com prehensive we have ever met with. And yet Lord CLARENDON states the law correctly. We have a "right" to sink English merchandise coming to England—not only in Russian, but in neutral, in any but English bottoms (and how English ships are to come from Russia, or get there, in this time of war, does not appear). A Russian privateer has a " right" to sink an English gold-ship from Victoria. We have a " right " in return to sink a Russian corn-ship from Odessa; finally, everybody under a "letter of marque " has s right to do all the injury he can to everybody else. These are only a very few of the " rights "of war. If her Majesty s Ministers, who are for ever quoting Dr. An !COLD as an authority on matters of which he knew nothing, would listen to him on a sub ject which he thoroughly understood, they have at this moment the first opportunity which has offered within many centuries (the two chief naval powers being for the first time at one) to humanise the system and incidents of naval warfare ; and, if the First Lord of the Admiralty would apply himself to the consi deration of a few of the terrible histories re corded in the Admiralty Court, he would per haps be as usefully and as respectably employed as when spouting pot-valiant bra vado after dinner at a partisan club. THE GOVERNMENT DISFRANCHISING BILLS. Os Monday last the Attorney-General introduced a series of bills to disfranchise those electors of the city of Canterbury, and of the boroughs of Cam bridge, 31aldon, 13arnstaple, and Kingston-upon- Hull, who admitted to the commissioners appointed to inquire into the recent elections for those towns that they had accepted bribes to vote. We entertain a strong opinion that the Government measures are in principle unjust ; and, from the spirit manifested by the House when the first reading of the first bill was moved, we cherish the hope that they will be rejected. When the bill empowering the issue of commissions became law a fundamental principle of English 267 jurisprudence was violated, and the commissioners were empowered to compel witnesses to answer with out reserve questions tending to criminate themselves ; but another bill was also passed exempting witnesses from the pains, penalties, and" forfeiture " attaching to those acts. On Monday last the debate partly turned on the words of the indemnifying clause, but this, we appre hend, will not be the point on which the fate of the bills will depend. The House of Commons will not, we trust, condescend to quibble on the rigid con struction of words, but will consider what was the spirit in which the measure was intended, and what was the sense in which it was understood. The existence of bribery was notorious—its proof, so long as the rules of evidence were adhered to, impossible. Under these circumstances those rules which are founded on justice were abrogated, and persons criminated themselves, relying on the in demnity. The Attorneys General and the supporters of the bills contend that, as it was known that the commissions were preliminary to legislation, these voters, whom it is disposed to disfranchise, must have been prepared for the consequences of their answers. It, is true that general legislation, applicable to the whole kingdom, was expected, but it is not true that particular and limited legislation, visiting on the persons indemnified the consequences of their con• fession, was foreseen ; if it had been, the evidence on which they are convicted would never have been obtained. Not many years since a clergyman was murdered by a gang of burglars, against whom there was a deficiency of proof. The usual course was adopted. One of the accused was induced to turn king's evi dence on the promise of a free pardon. The testi mony of the traitor was corroborated, and his trustier companions in guilt were convicted. But, in the course of the trial, proof of another and independent crime was obtained against the traitor. On this it was proposed to arraign him. But Baron ALDERSON said, " Faith must be kept ; to violate public faith " will prevent the conviction of future offenders. " According to the letter of the pardon we might try " this man, but according to the spirit he wax to be " free from the consequences of all termer guilt," Will the House of Commons interpret words less _ _ liberally than a learned Baron of the Exchequer? Shall the courts of law and the House of Commons invert their functions, and Baron Num: take an enlarged view of justice and policy, whilst Lord Juitm RUSSELL looks only to the words of his bond and the letter of the statute? We trust nut, and have a strong hope that the nation will be saved the dis grace of violating public faith, which the enactment of these unjustifiable measures would involve. FRAUDS ON THE COMMISSARIAT DEPARTMENT. IN the universal execration of the fraud attempted on the Commissariat department, the particulars of which will be found in another part of the paper, there is ,c. 4 1 some danger that principles of sound policy may be forgotten. As Lord BROUOHAM remarked, it is not wise to legislate for particular cases. What Parlia ment has to consider is, not how one detected scoun drel can be punished, but how frauds on the Commis sariat department can be prevented, and the health of the military protected. In the Upper House Noble Lords call for legislation if the present law will not "meet the case;" in the Lower House , in the latter very probable contingency, Sir JAMES GITAIIAM pledges himself to introduce a bill. It is with great diffidence we venture to suggest that such eminent personages seem to confound two distinct and separate subjects—the punishment of the offender and the prevention of the fraud. At first, in this par ticular .` instance, it was said that one of the inevi "split" upon his infamous employer, and divulge 4 the intended fraud; but now it is alleged that the discovery is owing to the restless vigilance of those officers whose duty it was to inspect the trusses of pressed hay. If so, it is a pity tney wasted time by allowing "several hundred tons of it" to be stowed away on board the transports before they acted on their discovery ; and a still greater pity that they were not on duty when many thousand eases of gar bage were passed into the naval stores under the name of" GOLDNER'S preserved meats." That frightful case, which might have caused death and pestilence in every sea where an English pendant flies, suffi ciently proves that those whose duty it is to examine contract stores do not, to say the least, carry their investigations to a vexatious extent. But if they are negligent when, from the state of the law, they have every motive to be scrupulously cautious, what would he their conduct if the law declared that these frauds shall be deemed felony ? For some years after steam was introduced into the navy, commanders, to make quick passages, took "short cuts," grazing isle and headland in their course, until the Avenger rested on bur coral reef T - I 1 IP S I I It