The Press. — London, England, 1854-02-18 00:00:00

146 unpaid subordinate, though leading the House of Commons, cannot coerce a Cabinet. And, if Lord Josh RUSSELL were pledged to any thing, it was to his own bill of '52. Why was that unlucky failure not revived, if the pro mise of '5l be still binding? But, in fact, this ground of defence has never been taken. The agument is, that England needs reform, and that a measure like that before Parlia ment was imperatively called for. Called for by whom, and for what purpose? Have the people of England spoken? No speeches — no public meeting—no petitions—no eager crowd surrounding Westminster-hall —the very galleries of the House of Commons scarcely filled—even of members a moderate attend anee--4 cold; languid curiosity pervading the audience—an hour and a half of frigid state ment unrelieved by one animated sentence on the speaker's part, or, at least , of cheerin g from his hearers—eau this be the inauguration of a reform so urgently demanded, for which the country so thirsts, that it must be under taken amidst the embarkation of troops, and the tumult of arms ? " But the measure is necessary." No doubt it is so—necessary to some persons and for some purposes. It is necessary, after eighteen months of disputed ascendancy in the Cabinet, to place beyond doubt the humiliation of one section, and the triumph of another. It is necessary that the Whig territorial aristocracy should be taught their place, and made to feel that, in the eyes of their new allies, the profession of liberal predilections does not atone for the offence of possessing hereditary influence. It is ne cersary that an inseparable breach and an insurmountable barrier should be placed be tween the Conservative party and those statesmen who, though in office, yet retain a lingering and half-avowed sympathy with Conservative principles. It is necessary, above all, if the warlike preparations which we witness be in reality only a costly pre tence, if that unprecedented state of foreign relations which Lord DERBY rightly described as being neither war, nor peace, nor yet neu trality, is to terminate in a disgraceful com promise, such as Russia demands, and Turkey dreads—that the public eye should be averted from the ignominous catastrophe by the spec tacle of domestic dissension. With war in Europe—war in the Cabinet—war between labour and capital in the North—what was wanting to complete the imbroglio except a revival of the suspended struggle between town and country? But we hear it unblushingly put forward by the agents of Lord ABERDEEN that the bill has a Conservative tendency. Challenged to proof, they point to that portion of it which professes to give a representation to local minorities. And certainly were this idea fairly carried out it might produce the result anticipated. But here, as elsewhere, a sound principle is ap plied to justify a party manoeuvre. For the manifest effect of the plan, as intended to operate, is to introduce Whig or Democratic members into some twenty-five or thirty of the counties, while, as a set-off, four or five great towns only will return one Conservative candidate a piece. We do not now criticise details, else it might easily be shown that the mode of voting adopted is equally novel, •clumsy, and perplexing to the elector. Let us consider the principle on which the disfranchisement of old boroughs and the creation of new seats is based. No problem .of physical science is capable of more absolute demonstration than that assertion so often denounced as groundless, but never refuted — that the representation of the land under the present law is inadequate. The figures arc before us, but we give only results. The Eng lish counties, with a population falling just short of ten millions, return a hundred and 'forty-four members. The English boroughs, • . with a population of seven millions, return 'three hundred and nineteen members. It is true that the unrepresented towns are here classed with the counties. But of these towns :all which contain five thousand inhabitants and upward have a collective population of Jess than one million. Transferring these, therefore, and leaving only to the counties those villages and hamlets which really form part of the rural districts, we have still a purely agricultural population of nearly nine THE PRESS. -------- millions represented by a hundred and forty four seats, while the urban population of eight millions is represented by three hundred and nineteen. And this is the Constitution which Lord JOHN RUSSELL seeks to alter as being too favourable to the land ! Hitherto the small boroughs have preserved the balance with tolerable fairness. The expedient of main taining them for that purpose might not be abstractedly the best, but it answered its object. They are to be disfranchised ; and, whatever artifice may be used to throw dust into the eyes of willing or careless dupes, the towns, large and small, will be the sole gainers by their disfranchisement. Not less iniquitous is the proposal to do away with one of the best of our old constitu tional safeguards against Ministerial ascen dancy. It were sheer irony to assume that no member of the House of Commons can be found of more talent than principle—that there are none who, having obtained their seats by professions of independence, are willing to turn them to account by the accept ance of office. At present such iniquitous traffic is rendered impossible by the necessity of re-election. This necessity Lord JOHN Rus sum. removes by a piece of legislation which ought to be entitled " An Act to Facilitate the C o rruption of Members.' In these remarks we have but repeated a few of the innumerable objections to the mea sure which reach us from all quarters, Whig as well as Tory. We grant that no alternative was left to the Cabinet except that of revolu tion or resignation. That they should prefer the first was natural ; but their choice is not the choice of England : the verdict of Parlia ment has yet to be pronounced ; and, with divided councils, discontented followers, em barrassment abroad, and apathy at home, the Cabinet will have to face an Opposition nu merically strong, augmented by numerous recruits from the opposite side, confident in the justice of their cause, and ready, if need be, to appeal to the English people in defence of the English Constitution. THE ROMAN CATHOLIC OATH. - -- - THE more we consider the course pursued by I Lord JOHN RUSSELL with regard to the oaths at present taken by members of Parliament, the more inexplicable does it appear. At first a parallel seems to present itself in the con duct of JAMES IL, who, when his object was to remove restrictions from Roman Catholics, proposed to grant concessions to Protestant Nonconformists. But the Leader of the House of Commons can scarcely design to render her Majesty's Jewish subjects eligible to serve in Parliament under the pretence of remodelling the oaths, because many who would readily vote for the former would strenuously and justly oppose the latter. For, whatever may be thought of the oaths in the abstract, few will deny that both the mover of the resolution to reconsider them and the moment selected for it were unhappily chosen. Although Lord JOHN RUSSELL proposes to refer all the oaths to the committee, it is but one, the Roman Catholic oath, we need con sider. Framed originally to secure the Church as established by law from any attempt on the part of Roman Catholic members of Parlia ment to endanger its safety, if it has in any degree answered that end, it is not the author of the Durham letter who should propose to re move the safeguard. Previously to the passing of the Emancipation Act one of the questions chiefly discussed was whether any oath could bind a Roman Catholic ; whether, in fact, ono of the tenets of that faith was not that the interests of the Church are paramount to all obligations, and that no oath is valid which does not include a mental reservation in favour of the claims of the Church. The speech from the throne in 1829 was directed to this point : the King recommended Parliament to " take " into deliberate consideration the whole con " dition of Ireland, review the laws which " impose civil disabilities on his Majesty's " Roman Catholic subjects, and consider " whether the removal of those disabilities " can be effected consistently with the full SATURDAY, " and permanent security of the establishments in " Church and State, with the maintenance of the " reformed religion established by law, and of the " rights and privileges of the bishops and clergy of " the realm, and of the churches committed to their " charge." The royal recommendation was answered by the imposition of the present oath, and, although the opinions entertained as to its efficacy were diametrically opposed to each other, both were in some measure justified by the result. Some Roman Catholic members have—withheld by the oath—voluntarily and conscientiously abstained from voting on questions affecting the Church of England, whilst one peer refrained from taking his seat rather than subject himself to a restriction which he must either violate his honour as a man by breaking, or his duty as a Roman Catholic by obeying. Therefore, as the safe guard has to a certain extent been a security, we are at a loss to know what Lord JOHN RUSSELL means when he proposes to exempt Roman Catholics from the oath on the ground that an attempt on their part to abolish the Church in Ireland would not violate their ab juration of " any intention to subvert the pre " sent church establishment as settled by law " within the realm." As Lord Jolt); told the House, he had been studying " Mariana the Jesuit," before he moved for the committee, he may have found some authority for his logic there, or perhaps in tho despatches by which Count NESSELRODE explained that the occupa tion of the Danubian provinces by Russia was not an act of aggression on Turkey. " There is a time for all things," and when it arrives for the reconsideration of these oaths it may be very fit and proper to omit certain parts of them, that, for instance, which relates to the descendants of Jamas IL ; and our ob jection to the motion by no means arises from any superstitious desire to retain every word of them eternally. But the substance of them we would retain; and when Lord Jous Ras- SELL asserts that " Roman Catholics no longer " profess that kings excommunicated by the " Pope may be deposed and killed by their " subjects," and proposes the abrogation of that part of the oath, we think he has been betrayed into an error by his natural failing— over-confidence. It is not long since a fana tical monk made an attempt on the life of the Queen of SPAIN, because he conceived she had sacrilegiously appropriated certain ecclesiasti cal revenues. And if we look around we see enough of the spirit of HILDEBRAND abroad to prevent us joining unhesitatingly in the asser tion that the dagger of CLEMENT is sheathed for ever. Not in England alone, where the disciple of Dr. CUMMING, scared by the sudden apparition of the Cardinal, was startled into the Durham manifesto, but wherever the eye is turned it falls on the insatiable ambition and the in defatigable aggressions of Rome. The dun geons of Tuscany receive her victims ; the constitutional King of SARDINIA she has incessantly attacked; in Holland she has confronted the Government ; in the Grand Duchy of Baden almost overcome it. A tyrant, where she has the power, she dic tates to the minor States of Europe ; astute and unscrupulous, where she has none, she crouches to obtain it. Frowning and arrogant in Italy and Germany, in the United States, where her Nuncio is exchanging amenities with the offi cials of Government, her aspect is one of smiling humility. And in these islands, as if to mark emphatically how centuries in their flight effect no change in her, she sends as her representative to England a second a Beckett, and to Ireland an incarnation of the astrono mical science that imprisoned GALILEO. Un changed, unchangeable, the patron of igno rance, the eternal enemy of freedom of thought and action, this is the Church in whose favour the author of the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill proposes to abrogate a security for the safety of our own. Too much confidence is the predominant characteristic of Lord Jolts RUSSELL; it is thus that he brings in a mea sure of reform which may engender intestine commotion when we are on the brink of foreign . war, to show that he despises danger , that h is soul is superior to apprehensions ; and it is thus, perhaps, when the power of Rome is more visibly displayed than it has ever been the since the Reformation, that he proposes