The Sun. — London, England, 1847-11-30 00:00:00

those which Parliament may adopt, still, that in a limited .area, at a ll events, there does exist a system of terror kept alive by the constant recurrence of crimes of fearful atrocity, by which individuals in the discharge of their duties as landlords, by residing upon their properties, are exposed to the continued dangers of assassination, a system which must lead to the disorganization of all society, and which must present an insurmountable bar tier to every attempt permanently to improve the condi tion of the peoplo.—(Hear.) The House will have remarked what constitutes, in every item of the long and lamentable catalogue of murder which I have read, a remarkable characteristic of the crimes now being com mitted. They h ave a ll b een p er p e t ra t e d w ith fire-arms. I t lear hear.) L e aving, h owe v e r, this part of the subject, I now proceed to another, which I think the house bas a right to expect that I should not altogether p ass bY—I mean the powers now possessed by Govern ment for dealing with the difficulties which present themselves; in other words, the actual state of the and the manner in which that law is administered. — (Re ar.) And I think I may appeal to every gentleman Conversant with Ireland, and who may have recently returned f rom that country, to boar testimony to the v i gour and e ffi c i ency w i t h w hi c h t h e L or d-Li eutenan t 455 administered those powers which the law has given to h im. —(Hear, hear.) It is gratifying to find, in the resolutions of the magistrates which I have already re ferred to—resolutions adopted under circumstances of "u3ual terror and dismay—that no charge is brought against the Executive Government, of having neglected a nY means which could be adopted for their protection, ° , l. of sh ow i ng t h e l east d egree o f i n diff erence toward, lee cri mes w hi ch have b een perpetrate d—(H ear , h ear .) may then t a k e cre dit a t l eas t for the vigour and efficiency of my Noble Friend in discharging his 'unction s for the repression of crime—the protection Or , life, and the encouragement of those—and I am glad to say that there are many such—who are dis posed to co-operate with Government for the main reance of order and the repression of outrage.—(Hear, near.) The Lord-Lieutenant has made what use he W4 B able of the military and police force at his disposal In all the cases in which, in his opinion, the appearance of an overwhelming force might overawe the offenders, or convince them of the fruitlessness of their attempts to rain the advantages they seek for from the commission of nritne.—(Hear, hear.) I have adverted to the pro ceedings in the case of Mr. Roe, and also to those in the case of Mr. Hill, who was shot near Limerick, in both of which all the powers which could be exercised 13 7 the Lord-Lieutenant were rigidly enforced. With the view, however, of pointing out to the deluded perpe trators of these outrages, and all others who were aiding and abetting in keeping up that system of terror and in timidation now prevalent in certain parts of Ireland, the r ; r d - Lieutenant has issued a proclamation which cer rly appears to me to comprise very much of what a ; :) ceneent of the sort ought to set forth. In that pro c &illation, the Lord-Lieutenant, while sympathising With the sufferings of great bodies of the people, is at P a ins to point out that the outrages do not generally eceur in those districts in which the most severe desti tution exists.—(Hear, hear.) Although undoubtedly outrages have been committed upon the pressure of severe,,, di stress, yet the night attacks in L i mer i c k an , d Cl are, and th e assass i na ti ons i n Tipp e rary, the King s County, and in Roscommon, have not been induced by Want.y His E xce ll enc y th en p rocee d s as follows:—" The L ord-Lieut ennat , while affording the well-disposed the prot ection of the law and the support of the Executive G overnm ent in their efforts to maintain order, earnestly asks for their co-operation in suppressing such violations Of the public peace as have recently occurred in the County of Limerick, and in other places, and in endea vOuring to detect and convict those who are engaged in e commission of similar crimes. There is no class, ; l ave the gu il ty t h emse l ves, w hi c h i s not i n t eres ted in and to punishment the highwayman, the burglar , -11 " the assas s i n and the Lord-Lieutenant hopes that a v igorous and energetic co-operation on the part of those os e properties and lives may be sacrificed at the hands of these offenders, will enable the authorities to carry out successfully the endeavours of the Executive Govern ment to vindicate the law and protect her Majesty's Peaceful subjects. The Lord-Lieutenant, therefore, "ulidently appeals not to the gentry alone, but to the Well-disposed farmers and industrious peasantry who 1 1 / l e .ek to earn th e i r li ve lih oo d by honest labour, to aid , 1 8 efforts in suppressing a system of terror, whi h ha feels satisfied is exercised by the few, but which may be overcome by the energy and determination ofthe many, whom it is intended to overawe. His Ex led • thet the misguided people, who are often tr , into crime by a few wieked men, may be persuaded t "'i l "'ten to better advice, and shun the companionship of • fel on and the murderer, w h ose course through life e u su often be traced by the misery which he has drawn , °w e upon those who have unwarily joined them in a means in of crime. His Excellency is resolved by every no w in his power to suppress the wicked spirit which ittiew disturbs the public peace, and retards the social eo P r overnent and the prosperity of the country. The hstabulary will be increased in all disturbed districts iskaw,.,lle,reby an additional burden will be thrown upon the ""), military detachments will be stationed wherever ecessary, in aid of the civil authorities, and efficient 11) atrols maintained ; liberal rewards will be given for :,! ° r,taation leading to the arrest of offenders, and ti ;"Pie protection to all who come forward and prosecute 0 : 1 ; in short, no exertion shall be spared for rigor ,. enforcing the law against those by whom it is vio tee- The Lord-Lieut e n a nt, th ere f ore , warns a ll w h o etgatie, eithe r i n res i s t ance t o l ega l authority., or in att ack s upon lif e an d p roperty, to a b sta i n f rom suc h ' t ees. which will be followed by the severest punish ment --he cautions the people not to join with the ha bitual perp etrators of outrage, nor listen to the evil counsels of men who encourage opposition to the law for their own ends, and will leave those they have de luded into crime to suffer its punishment—above all, he thinks it his duty to make known the penalties that will be in c urr e d by accessories to crime, and that all persons are b y l aw considered accessories who protect criminals against their pursuers, who afford them the means to escape, who aid in their disguise, who mislead those who may be iu search of them, or who harbour offenders in their houses." The Right Hon. Gentleman continued— P erhaps I may here mention that a case recently came before the Court of Queen's Bench, in Ireland, which is Connected with the last paragraph of the proclamation, 4 ed the decision in which will, I trust, have no slight °flee tenforcingthe solemn warning o f D_. my Noble 4:rtend, and in leading the people to see that his are no rimeaning words:—Two persons were suspected of T t v ieg harboured a man accused of an atrocious crime. "Y were arrested, but unconscious, as it would ap- Pear, of the gravity of the offence which they had e cl i tn i reitted, ppd to be admitted to bail. The ' e Justice, in an elaborate judgment, pointed 0 11 ,,t the enormity of the offence and the severity d ' the punishment which would await i t, and iecidedly refused to entertain the application for bail. t. Lru gt, Sir, this decision, coupled with the language of Ile proclamation will have a great effect in checking the i este ,sYrapathy which has been unhappily mani prey' with the perpetrators of crime in Ireland, and of c uring that aid a nd countenance being shown to rds th ose which we have in too many instances had t i e l i t sgis ee to regret.—(Hear, hear.) Allusion was mad& nlioLhei• night to a special commission. Now, lam not is 3 "Ilion to state that a special commission has h _tied for the trial of offences; but let me remind the e llse that the cases that would be so tried have all • Com e on us within the last few weeks. The first case 41 t he sad catalogue which I read occurred only two mouths ago. Since that time every exertion of the (Zeutive Government has been made to detect the vdi Vera—to trace them to their hiding-places; and, not ,_:estanding the many difficulties and obstacles which e been thrown in the way, I rejoice to say, although ' ,eel of the perpetrators of these outrages are still at i t : p. and although no clue can be obtained to their tk"tiplaces, yet that several of the perpetrators of 40 Most daring crimes have been apprehended, and will r e . o . doubt b e b rought to j ustice.—(Hear, hear.) With r 7Peet, how ever , to t h e special commission, the Lord - e etenant, in the frequent correspondence which he mai ntains with us, s t ates t h at t h e i ssuing of such a Commission is the course which he is prepared !.0 adopt the mom en t th a t t h e Attorney-General Inform s him—as he will very shortly—that there are 4 sufficient number of cases to justify such a step.— Wear, hear.) And this leads me to anot h er portion of the subject. In reviewing the state of Ireland, as re spects crime, I find no facts, and I rejoice to find none, showing that juries are disposed to wink at crime.— (Hear, hear.) What may in future be the case, I will not venture to anticipate. But if we can judge of the future by the past, then I find that up to the last quarter sessions the judges bare reported that they have had no reason to be dissatisfied with the verdicts of juries— (hear, hear)—and I therefore do not come to ask the House to suspend the ordinary forms of legal procedure, or to erect tribunals of another character; feeling, as I i de, firmly assured that the ordinary course of law will 'le found sufficient to bring offenders, against whom Sworn information may be lodged, to conviction and P u nishment.—(llear, hear.) But in the meantime crime I. . a k still being perpetrated. Persons are seen lurking busses by day and night, armed with writes and blunder loaded—as a military officer —with such ch arges as that which was extracted from the body of a recent victim—nausely, ono bullet and thirteen swan au°t The: persons using fire-arms, too, are in the habit o f practising at a mark. N ow , by the Censtabu iarY Act, p asse d a year an d a half ago, the Lord-Lieu tenant is e m p owere d to p roc laim districts as being in a St ate of disturbance. There are also Whiteboy Acts, enac ting severe pena l t i es aga i ns t cr imes—now common th rs Ti PPerary and Roscommon such as sending b g oti ce -at eelti ns. Tesistricts, however, nnot e said to be in a state of e disdturbance, because their tieendition does not answer the conditions of the defini • cf " disturbance," as given in the Acts in ooquestion. Th e power vested in the L or d-Li eu t enan t n sists in s en di ng to di stur b e d di str i cts, suc h as Lime ricoekTiPPerary, and p ar t o f Cl are , a limited number of reie, in addition t o th e or di nary consta b u l a ry force, t char ging the expense on the county, but only, however, u be at collected distant periods, when its amount Would probably be lost sight of in the general amount he grand jury presentment, of which it would form t ° ll ll .. l YPart. The Lord-Lieutenant having, then, at present ;_. po w er of increasing the police force in those districts u which h the prevailing crimes are principally coin- Power as felt it to be his duty to avail himself of that s s o far as by Act of Parliament be was tt enabled o to do. He has hitherto, however, thought most prudent not to proclaim them in a state of uisturba nce, when he was unable to do anything r y M ore than send small bodies of poli ce hi t h er —for the rheesreesetadtfeore: at his com man d in Dublin amo un t s , I may in merely to 400 men . I t was at first proposed the Cons tabulary Bill that th e L or d- Lieutenant , e should empowered to send to any disturbed district e ns porti on of the reserved force. Considerable obj( c e was, howwietivlerr raised in thi s H ouse as to that power, principal)yposed on the co ti elyrence to tb• charge to be thus ina were situate, and in which the disturbed districts 4 an 441011 dineat Wll5 carried by which THE SUN,_ I.4ONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 30, 1847. the people. It was not creditable for this country to attempt to remedy the evils of Ireland by mere " stop- gep " measures. If they had some great plan for the profound and complete amelioration of Ireland, why not announce it at once, and satisfy the minds of her re presentatives that they were considering her state, and preparing to meet it e ith substantial measures? The Hon Member read a letter of the late Mr. O'Connill. The writer looked upon it as a matter of the most mo • xnentous importance to imprint on the mind of Lord Devon and the Government the necessity of taking im• mediate steps to remedy the evils of the relations be tween landlord and tenant, and prophecied that the people would be driven by delay to pass out of the hands of those who kept them in submission to the laws! That warning had been almost fulfilled. The people were passing out of the hands of those who lived to restrain them; the clergy were losing their hold over them, and to the bishops and priests that was the most terrible fear in their hearts. He implored them to prevent the completion of the prophecy, and to win for themselves the bright crown of statemanship in removing the cause that had deluged Ireland in oceans of blood, and in re stet ing her people to peace and prosperity. Mr. F. O'CONNOR said it was because he re cognised in this measure the foundation and pretence of more cruelty than it was intended to put down that he gave it his most determined opposition in the outset, and after the experience of the Hon. Member for Kil kenny for 1e33 and 1834, he was astonished that the Hen. Member should place any reliance on the equivocal promises of the Gentlemen opposite. If ho re quired a strong reason for opposing this Bill on prin ciple, it had been furnished by the Right Hon. Baronet who introduced it, because from the beginning to the close of his spee c h every sentence went to prove that, with the present exert i ons of the Lord-Lieutenan t, a ll that could be don e b y l aw to repress clime an d ou t rag e was doing, and w as success f ul. What ha d t h e Ri g ht lion. Gentleman t o ld th em i n the outset? Th a t cr ime had diminished one-third. Wherever the ordinary powers of the law were tried, the Right Honourable Baronet had shown that in every instance com plete success was attained. The Right Honourable Baronet said, let it not be told to foreign countries that Ireland was in this disturbed state •, but with his (Mr. O'Connor's) consent, it should not be told to foreign countries that Ireland was to have coercion, when her people were starving for want of food. Though the Right Honourable Baronet might attempt to give a mild character to this measure, was it not attempting to create a Brehon police, who were to have the power of searching houses for arms, and under this colour of legality, of doing just what they pleased? But it was agreeable to the whole system of English rule in Ireland—it was a sop to the landlords—it was another little bit of compensation for the repeal of the, corn laws. He was not for a temporizing policy; and he would tell the Government that the most insidious and dangerous support they could receive was support of this kind; whilst his (Mr. O'Connor's) opposition was avowed and determined. The Noble Lord and his Government had applied for coercion after coercion, with the promise of propounding remedial measures; but not one remedial measure had they ever proposed. Plight s s t t r r a u e t t i c oo h ii n r o i G g f The system of the Government from fi rst to last had been to create patronage, and to arrest t h e progress of public opinion as far as they possibly cou ld . What was it that produced the tranquillity of E ng l and under the s ex ‘rv i ai s t bn e yi n n c tg e h e o o jr f u ' tdh d ge i s e l t sa r e:st..ss t. ? bh ue t l lt t ahne w d a m s T n d o ha t e d anyn orethne law Oman the late Secretary for the Home Depart ment had attempted not only to strain the ordinary law, but to give the whole law into the hands of the police, and to make them the judges of crime. What was the result ? That the law was despised and disregarded until the Government sent down a just judge to try the persons accused in 1842. In consequence of the mild administration of the law, and the mannnr in which the present Chief Baron pro secuted when Attorney. General, there had not been one violation of the law so far as public peace was con cerned from that year to this. Let them take care, then, how they strained the law, for the inevitable con sequence would be to create suspicion, jealousy, and out rage. It was the duty of Government to employ the means in their hands to restore tranquillity to Ireland. But what had been their system ? 'ro sow the seeds of dissension amongst all parties. The landlords managed their estates, not according to the signs of agriculture, but according to the signs of politics. They no longer required the political support of their tenants, and were disinheriting them. It was one of the strongest re marks of the Right Honourable Baronet that Govern ment could do little for the landed interest. He would tell the Right Honourable Baronet that the Government could do nothing ...for : _the landed interest, whilst the landed interest could do everything fur themselves. As he was told that that they were to wait for the missive from Ireland to see what would be the effect on Irish fee'ilig of being once more bludgeoned, dragooned, and coerced, he should reserve until then the remaining portion of his remarks. If he stood alone he would divide the House upon every single op portunity against this measure, and every other which he considered injurious to the interests of the country. Mr. HORS MAN said although he should support the measure now proposed, because he thought it calculated to promote tranquillity and the security of life in Ire land, he was not prepared to support it either on the ground stated by his Right Hon. Friend who introduced it, or on that to which the observations of the lion. Mem ber for Kilkenny applied. His Right Hon. Friend had dwelt particularly on the present prevalence of outrage and crime in Ireland. That was not to him (Mr. Hors lean) satisfectory, because crime and outrage in Ire land were very familiar to us, as familiar to us as Coer cion Bills ; and we knew that in former periods mea sures of coercion had failed. Neither could he support the measure because it was a milder measure than Mi• misters were expected to introduce, for he considered that he was not to look at a measure, where so much was at stake, to ask if it were mild or severe; his duty, as a Member of Parliament, was to ask if it was a suitable and effective measure. When the preservation of human life was the object to be attained, he feared that a falling off on the side of leniency might be little less pernicious than an excess of severity. The question he asked him self was, was the measure founded on right principles, or was it, as had been predicted by those who threatened opposition to it, founded on the old mistaken principle, a mere isolated expedient to meet a temporary emergency, another in that series of violent makeshifts by which our past legislation in Ireland had been disgraced? Was it founded on that better principle which Parliament esta blished not long ago, that our Irish legislation should henceforth proceed on a system, that such enactments should be part and parcel of a great and comprehensive policy—(Hear, hear)—links in a great chain of intelli• gible measures, each intended to support the other, and all having the same object—the improvement and tran quillity of Ireland 2—(llear.) That was a question which on this occasion they were bound to ask, and especially those who sat in the last Parliament. And they were more bound to do so now than at any former period, because now they were in different circumstances from any which had ever existed when measures of coercion were introduced.—(H ea r, hear.) He wished not to give offence or hurt the feelings of any one, but he could not forget that a few nights past the Honour able Member for Marylebono (Sir Benjamin Hall) had stated, in a speech with which the House generally seemed to concur, that great blame was to be attached to certain associations in Ireland, the whole end and object of whose existence was to excite aversion and hostility to this country, and to hold up the law to the poor man as his enemy and oppressor. According to the descriptions they had heard, the poor man was kept for a long time on the verge of insurrection, on the brink of crime, by the exciting language addressed to him, until at length he plunged in. The law seized him and made an example of hiw, but those who were re presented to be the poor man's instigators, those who really were the causes of the crimes he committed—did the provisions of the law attach to them?—(Hear, hear.) Again, an Hon. Gentleman whom he saw opposite, and who had addressed them in a short and impressive speech which rivetted the attention of the House, alluded to another subject—the priests of Ireland. He wished again to avoid raising any angry feeling; he, as an Englishman, took the Irish system as he heard it de scribed by those who were more familiar with it than himself. He was told that a priest denounced from the altar by name some gentleman who he said was the poor man's enemy. The poor man took aim and shot the person pointed out ; you hanged the criminal who fired the shot, but the not less culpable instigator of the assassin escaped.—(Hear, hear.) He who charged the weapon, who directed the aim, did the provisions of this law threaten him ?—(llear, hear.) Again, they had heard and read, and they knew. from official statements, that the facts were true, that wholesale ejectments went on in Ireland. A whole village was turned out in the road, the infant and the aged, the hale and the sick were thrust out; their cottage was fired over their heads; they took refuge in the nearest ditch, without a roof to shel ter, or a crumb to feed them. The wretched outcast, feeling that the law gave him no protection, took the law into his own hands, and avenged himself. The pro visions of this law applied to him—he would be taken, tried, and executed. Well, the rich man, who by one despotic command, might at any moment jeopardise the lives of his fellow-men, did the provisions of this law affect him? He had alluded to agitators in Ireland, but he hoped that in doing so he should be acquitted of wishing unnecessarily to throw a stain on any of those gentlemen by whom agitation was practised in that country. He had read the history of Ireland with some attention, and he could not disguise from himself, nor was he ashamed or afraid to avow his conviction, that every act of justice which Ireland had obtained from the British Legislature had been obtained by agitation. They had heard gentlemen in that House, and holding high official stati on , d eclare that if they had: been Irishmen, they would not merely have been agitators, but repeaters; and ho himself felt that if in England ono hundredth part of the injustice done to Ireland since the union had been committed he did not believe th e E ng li s h ;Government would be in exist the present moment. These were facts which e th ac (' - y a all knew, and th ere f ore a l t h ough he could not approve of the exaggerations whi c h t h ey were accustomed tohear called forth, or of the proceedings to which those who took the lead in Ireland l en t th emse l ves, still ho must say, that those men being lovers of th e i r country, and seeing the miseries which she had been ma d e to endure from the policy pursued towards her— miseries which, accord ing to Lord Devon's report, were borne with unexam pled patience, and submission—were to be excused, and that he would not criticise their behaviour at all times; nor ask them to restrain their language any more than to repress their feelings. The grounds on which the Bill had been introduced referred to the state of crime now so prevalent. But appalling as were many of the statements which his Right H on . Friend submitted to thelouse, it was not the murderers themselves that to him formed the most horrible part of the picture; nor the fact, though it was a most painful one, that you inhabitants of the district to appro • could not get the inhabita head the assassins; to him the most_ horrible consider- ation was that we had allowed this system to go on ever since we had known Ireland, and that up to this moment we had made no progress in remedying it.—(l.lear.) After referring to oft-repeated demands for coercion Bills, by Sir James Graham, Lord Althorp, Sir Robert Peel, and Mr. Goulburn, he went on to say that, the Earl of Clare stated-----" Happy would he ba if he could go to his bed-chamber at home without enceun tering an enemy, and could close his eyes without ap prehensions of having his throat cut before morning, and seeing his wife and children butchered before his face ; he should be extremely happy if he could ride or walk abroad unguarded, for it was a curious fact but that when he went out his Irish servant broughthim his arms as regularly as his hat;" and he concluded his speech by offering a villa and six acres of land to i.ny Englishman who would go and reside there for six months, being perfectly cealain that the terms would never be complied wish. He (Mr. Horsman) begged to observe that if any Hon. Gentleman would refer to that speech, it would repay him the perusal, and would per hapslsurprise him to see that now, 33 years later, Ire land was precisely in the same state as it was then ; that they were still deploring the same crimes, and tracing them to the same source—not political, not religious, but all agrarian—and listening to the member of Govern ment whose duty it is to bring forward the tale of horror, as if they had heard it for the first time, and unless other measures were to accompany the one now before the House, they were following the pernicious example of former Parliaments, and devoting their energies to the eradication of symptoms, leaving the malady untouched. He had stated thus much,' not merely in vindication of the course he had pursued, and the rote he had given last year, but for a better reason—viz., that he was perfectly prepared to place all the powers asked for in the hands of the Administration—and greater if ne cessary ; and if the statements of crime were to be relied on, he thought greaterspowers were necessary; be was ready, he repeated, with perfect confidence, to give them those powers, provided he saw an equivalent in the shape of remedial measures. He wished to see the re medial measures going hand-in-hand with the coercive measure. He wished to show the people of England that they (the Parliament) were in earnest on the sub ject of Ireland—that now was the time to put an end to the system hitherto employed in governing Ireland — feeding the people one year and coercing them the next—both foolish and costly operations—the burden of which fell on their unhappy constituents, who, as the revenue tables showed, were called to bear it with di minished means ; and, as the Chancellor of the Exche quer would; no: doubt tell them by and bye, with in creased taxation. He felt that this was not a time to trifle in regard to Ireland. For 33 years we had been at peace with every people in Europe except the Irish; who could tell how long the peace of Europe would con tinue, or when the Irish war would be brought to a ter mination ? He felt that they were standing on a vol cano. They bad hitherto, by Heaven's mercy, escaped the judgments they deserved for the enormities that had been committed by the Government in Ireland. Let them not attempt to go further in that direction. Let them retrace their steps, and, by entering upon a new course, show that their repentance was sincere although long delayed. He sincerely trusted that her Majesty's Ministers, by their remedial measures, were prepared to show that they were equal to the emergency. The Noble Lord at the head of the Government had the other evening sketched some of these measures. He told them that he had an important measure in progress, one which he (Mr. Horsman) saw with immense satisfaction —he meant a measure for the sale of encumbered estates. He thought this a measure—he would not say the first in importance, but it was certainly one of the most im portant they could possibly introduce. The Noble Lord had also said that he contemplated introducing a mea sure fir the improvement of the jury laws. He presumed that measures for amending the franchise and the muni cipal corporations would follow as a matter of course. He regretted, however, to have heard the Noble Lord speak with so much doubt with respect to the Landlord and Tenant Bill. He (Mr. Horsman) admitted that there were difficulties on the subject ; but in his opinion there were no difficulties in the government of Ireland but what would be aggravated by delay.— (Hear, hear.) He admitted there was danger in Ire land, but he believed the danger would be greatly in creased by half measures. He felt that the present Government had, with respect to Ireland, an unsual load of responsibility; first, because of the manner in which they bad succeeded to office—pledging themselves pro perly and manfully, and ho was sure sincerely, to a re medial in opposition to a coercive policy—and next because they had entered upon their legislation for Ire land with an advantage which no Government had ever possessed before, and he doubted whether in our time any Government would ever possess again—he meant a perfect absence of party feeling. The government of Ireland had been placed unreservedly in their hands. Upon that point there was a complete unanimity both in and out of doors. Parliament had given them absolute power. The courage and capacity to turn that power to the best account Parliament could not give them, but these were qualities which neither time nor Parliament would suffer to be dispensed with.—(Cheers.) Mr. W. FAGAN felt that these crimes called to Heaven for vengeance, and would sooner or later call down on the perpetrators a just retribution. He ad mitted that they paralysed the efforts of the best friends of the country, and made them turn with disgust from the political arena; and he would say, honestly and fearlessly, that if he thought a Coercion Bill, or Curfew Bill, or an Arms Bill would prevent the perpetration of a single crime of that nature, he would be satisfied, as an Irishman, to live for the rest of his life without the pale of the constitution in order to effect that object; but he had a strong conviction that the proposed measure would have an opposite effect to that anticipated by the Government—that instead of going to Ireland as a mes senger of peace, it would have the effect of increasing the discontent, and consequently crime. Remedial measures would alone cure the evils of Ireland, and he understood that last year a kind of pledge had been given by the gentlemen who now had the Government to their hands, that this was the policy which they would adopt.—(Hear, hear.) The House had been told this evening that therre had been nineteen murders committed in one month in Ireland. At the very period when the late Ministry brought forward their Bill there had been fifty murders in one month, and that had been one of the grounds put forward by the Right Hon. Baronet in support of his Bill. If the present Government thought, upon that occasion, that a Coercion Bill was not necessary when fifty murders were committed in a month, where was the necessity for one now, when only nineteen were committed? He (Mr. Fagan) was convinced that the ordinary laws were sufficient. It had been said, and said truly, by the Right Hon. Baronet (Sir G. Grey), that the peasantry and farmers armed themselves because the law allowed them to do so; it was for self-protection. He knew it was for self-protection, and he asked if the possession of arms by the farmers in the five counties could be the cause of these crimes if, instead of fifty murders a month, there were only nineteen? He asked whether. if this was the case when the possession of arms was permitted, the House could think that the possession of arms was the cause of these crimes? No; the cause lay deeper than the Government were disposed to look at. Let them not imagine that a Coercion Bill, an Arms Bill, or a measure of this kind, would be an effec tual remedy, or prevent the commission of these crimes. The remedy lay deeper; the remedy had been pointed out the other night by the Hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. S. Crawford.) In Mayo the people had been dying 500 at a time, and had there been a single murmur of discontent? Go to Clare, where the starving people explored the rocks for sea-weed to support existence, and where the whole rental of the place was not suffi aient to support the thousands of paupers. And what had been the conduct of the population towards the shipwrecked passengers of the Stephen Whitney? The starving people gave the little food they had to sustain persons who, for the moment, were in a worse situation than themselves. The question was, why is it that, in three or five counties, those crimes were annually committed? Let the House look back for centuries, and they would find this singular fact, that al most for centuries there had been a struggle going on in particular localities; and the question was, why in these particular localities these crimes should exist? There was an unceasing, au almost permanent struggle between the proprietors of the soil and the occupiers of the soil. It appeared from the evidence taken by Lord Devon's commission, that eight acres of land were considered sufficient for a family of five persons, and that there were a great number of farms in Ireland not exceeding eight acres each. It bad been recommended that the small farms should be consolidated, and the consequence would be that 15,000 families, of five persons in each, or 75,000 persons, would have to be ejected in order to consolidate the farms, as suggested. A consolidation had been going on in Tipperary, and that was quite sufficient to account for the crimes committed there. The Go vernment should come forward to prevent this, instead of suggesting a coercion Act,which, so far from:preventing crime would have an opposite effect. Two great causes existed in Ireland to account for this state of things; namely, the undue competition for land, and the en cumbered condition of the proprietors of land. The rental of Ireland had been said to be 14,000,0001., and by some even 20,000,000/.; but it was, in fact. only 12,000,000 L a year, and from this must be abstracted 4,000,000/. for mortgages, leaving only 8,000,0001., out of which the landlords of Ireland had to meet and grap ple with the difficulties which beset them, and he, there fore, would advocate a measure which would enable them to get rid of their burthens. The other cause, the undue competition for land, could be met in no other way than by a system of public valuation. The Bill which had been prepared by the Hon. Member for Rochdale would be a means of tranquillizing Ireland and introducing something like peace there. Perhaps ho might be told that ho ought to have confidence in the administration of the Noble Lord, seeing that the Chief Secretary for Ireland had told them that a Bill in favour of tenant right would be introduced for Ireland. But even if he had such confidence, ho would say the Noble Lord was bound to introduce that Bill prior to any mea sure of coercion. The House ought, as its first step, to conciliate the people of Irieland. He admitted that the House deserved the gratitude of the Irish people for what it did lastyear ; the people of England also deserved the gratitude of the Irish people for their extraor dinary exertions in subscribing a sum of not less than 700,000!.; and he had fondly hoped that the days of co ercion were over; that after these signal acts of kindness n o further st measures House.o of coercion The n would Secretaryld have been expected intro ducedmuch good from the NeW Poor-law ; but ho would inform him that the New Poor-law would disappoint his expectations. Did he think that the quarter-acre clause in the New Poor-law Act would tranquillize the people of Ireland? If so, he would find himself mistaken.—(Hear.) A free -trade measure had been passed, the consequence of which was that the system of cultivation in Ireland must be changed before any benefits could be derived by the farmer; but no such change would be effected unless the tenant 110 W obtained a deeper interest i s th e soil than h o pos sessed. A good deal had been said in the previous de bate about expressions used by the Catholic clergy. Those clergy, he believed in his conscience, to be the link that bound this country to Ireland. By their in structions they kept the people of Ireland tranquil and submissive to the law, and he did not think it became any Member of the British Legislature to bring charges against those men. Reference had been made to lan guage used by a venerable Archdeacon (Laffan). He believed, however, that that ♦enerable individual only wished to draw a distinction between the sturdy charac ter of the English people and the more excitable people of Ireland, and that it was n• intention of his to incite to the commission of crime. He was incapable of such a thing. He was a religious man, teaching the highest morality to the people; and no man that knew him would for a moment attribute to him any intention of the kind imputed to him.—(Hear, hear.) In conclusion, the Hon. Gentleman said he should consider it his duty to divide with the Hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. O'Connor), but he had felt that he could not do so with out stating to the House his reasons. Lord JOCELYN expressed his regret that the mea sure was not of a more stringent and efficacious nature than it appeared to him to be. lie much feared that the measure which her Majesty's Government had laid upon the table of the House would not be found sufficient to enable them to cope with the state of society now exist ing in Ireland, or to put down that monstrous crime and that system of assassination that had disgraced the cha racter of Ireland in the eyes of all civilized nations.— (flear.) lie was sure that there was no body of men rmbued with the common feelings of humanity who would really have opposed any requisition which the Government might have made to enable them to crush the cruel and dastard conspiracy which had been so long in operation ; a conspiracy working silently but effec tually for the destruction of a class in Ireland, who, were their faults even as hideous as they had been fre quently pourtrayed in that House (which, as a general fact he denied), had yet a right to the protection for life and property which every well ordered state was bound to provide for its citizens. Ile held it to be an implied compact between the State and the citizen that this security shonld be made sure. The State was bound to the citizen, and the citizen to the State. This was the groundwork, the foundation of all government ; it was for this purpose, mainly, they admitted the con trol, the interference of the law in their daily actions. If the State failed in this compact, see the position in which the member of the State was placed. The law rendered each citizen powerless to increase its own power, but if the law was itself powerless their he was in a worse position then when no law existed. The law as it existed in this country was the terror of the evil doer, and regarded with affection by the well-conducted. The law had bad on its side individual exertion to carry into effect its ends. It had had the feeling of the great mass of the people, which accompanied it. Here, then, it might be strong enough to meet any emergency. But how different was the picture in Ireland ? There they found in certain districts the law neither regarded with reverence by the well-disposed, nor with fear by the wicked. It was neither a protector nor an avenger— paralysed, powerless—giving no encouragement to in dividual exertion. In certain districts another law was in force ; a most mysterious and bloody one, carrying out its dictates with certainty, and revenging with blood the trangression of its edicts,—(Hear, bear.) But although such had been the result of the struggle, al though the law as it existed might be momentarily defeated, it was in the power of the Gouernment of this country to cope successfully with its anta gonist ; a vigorous determination and a bold front, and the ultimate supremacy was certain.—(llear.) The Government had a reserve at their command ; on them must rest the responsibility whether the power they demand is sufficient for the purpose • they are responsible for the lives of the p eo pl e o f Ireland. If they asked not for sufficient powers on them would rest the responsibility for the future ; if such powers were asked for and refused by the House, then on them be the responsibility. In seeking a remedy they would not fail to investigate the causes of the disease, and there were circumstances connected with these agrarian con spiracies well worthy of consideration. To want and po verty, too often the parent of crime,these agrarian outrages could not be attributed. Such was the opinion of Chief Justice Bushe in 1832. Crime was not greatest in the localities where the sufferings were most intense. They found amongst the most striking features this law of agrarian outrage passively admitted. The districts in which these atrocities took place evince no horror of the deed, and no effort for the apprehension of the murderer ; ready emissaries were found to carry into effect its behests ; in the broad day, on the public road, within a few yards of the police barrack, without fear, shame, or remorse, the doomster carried his bloody orders into effect ; he com mitted the murder and walked quietly away. Although men with arms in their hands were sitting within hear ing of the cries of the victim they remained unmoved. This showed a state of moral depravity, indifference, or cowardly fear, in which the very character of human nature itself seemed changed, and every man must seek for a solution of such a state. These were not singular features in these atrocities —ex uno disce omner ; but it was impossible to believe that even in these dis tricts the milk of human nature had entirely ceased to flow; it was the inefficacy of the law, as it existed, to meet the difficulty. And who were the victims? Were they composed alone of the bigot, the harsh, tyrannical landlords —men, who had justly earned for themselves an unfavourable notoriety? Were they men of penu rious habits, careless of the well-being of those about them? No; the kind, the gentle, the liberal and open handed, alike fell victims under this reign of terror. It might be said the sins of the father were visited upon the children. Heavy indeed was the chastisement they, now bore. Parliament had a right to compel the land lords of Ireland to the performance of their duties. But whilst these duties were rendered imperative let not the Government be unmindful of its first obligation; the landlord had a right to demand from them that his life and property should be secure. The Government had on their side men who knew Ireland well. Did they believe that a paltry Arms Act would be sufficient to meet this frightful system? Did the Right Hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. Sheil) believe that such a measure as this would meet the difficulty? Did he believe that the murderer would find no other and as sure a weapon to carry out his design ? Did he believe that the evidence for prosecution would' be more easily in duced to come forward ? Did he believe that conviction would be more readily obtained by a jury ? Publishing proclamations and writing letters from the Castle, how ever able the documents might be, were not sufficient. Active and vigorous steps could alone meet the evil. He admitted the energy of the Noble Lord at the head of the Government in Ireland. But they acted unfairly to one who understood the position of that country, in not enabling him to carry out his view. He approved of that part of the measure by which a locality would have a pecuniary interest in bringing criminals to justice ; but let the power be given of making domiciliary visits not only by day but by night. Sir G. GREY—For what purpose? Lord JOCELYN—Let a right be given to search for arms. But, above all, let an inducement be given to men to come forward in support of the law. If by tenant right was meant the claim of an outgoing tenant to re muneration for capital invested in the permanent im provement of the land its justice must be acknowledged, and the moral obligation of the landlord God forbid that any one should deny. But could any one really believe that the legal acknowledgment of such a claim would be sufficient to satisfy a secret council whose laws were written in blood, and if tenant right meant what misguided men had been taught too often to believe—if it meant to give the tenant a vested interest, not in the capital which he had laid out on th e land, but in the soil, such a pro position was no other than open and avowed robbery. It was a proposition which required no argument to re fute it, because directly opposed to the rights of property, which were held so dear and so jealously guarded by every member of that and every well ordered state. Should the time come when that right might be regarded with less respect, he did not believe the authors of the change would be more prosperous, more happy, or more secure. Every commission which had been appointed, every individual who bad turned his attention to Ireland, had wound up his opinion by stating that until life and property were made secure, no means could be successful to advance the state or to improve the condition of Ire land. Should the measures which the Government proposed be adequate, should it be their lot to give security to life and property in Ireland, they would have thrown a bridge over an abyss which had hitherto kept Ireland back in the scale of civilization and improvement —they would have thrown the first plank upon which might pass with security, and upon which would pass, he had no doubt, with rapidity and energy, capital and enterprise, diffusing life and vigour through that hitherto paralysed country , . Mr. R. M. FOX (as we understood) thought that unless such a tenant right as would permit the sale of the whole tenancy to the tenant were admitted, Parliament would not at all succeed in doing away with the cause of agrarian disturbance. It was to the unsettled state of the law of landlord and tenant that the crimes which disgraced Ireland were mainly owing. Lord BERNARD believed that he would be wanting in duty if he did not urge upon her Majesty's Go vernment to press forward this measure, and for him i self he should have preferred a far stronger measure o coercion.—(lronical cries of " Hear" from the Irish Members.) Members.) It was better to outrage the Constitutionrc at the present moment., if they could theer:rbyhgelarre) Hep peace, prosperity, and security to Iroland.--(1i had received from a gentleman residing in the county of Cork a copy of a threatening notice addressed to and received by him, in which he was told to take timely notice that " heand. m his made an example to theagabond (meaning the gentleman's agent) would be whole country if they did not mind and behave better to their tenants." That threatening notice was ad dressed to ono of the best landlords in the country,-- (Hear, hear.) lie was able to bear his personal testi mony to the manner in which the peasantry of the most distressed districts of the country had borne their sufferings.—(Hear, hear.) Mr. P. SCROPE said ho believed the time had now come when the general opinion was that the "of Ireland was also the ques ti on of the conditiononfdEitni7 Eng land, for the condition of Ireland now came back upon us, in the shape of heavy mulcts upon the capit a l o f t h e country. We could not allow Ireland to remain in t h e state in which sh e h a d b een for the last twenty or thirty years without England being dragged down to the same miserable and distressed condition by the invasion of Irish poverty and the example of Iri s h cr i me. He had opposed form er coercion Bills for Ireland, on every oc casion, on the ground that Parliament was not justified in passing any law of increased severity for the punish ment of Irish crime unless they at the same time took into consideration the causes of those crimes —(Hear) — security to the occupying tenant against harsh eject- MentS— (Hear)—security to the honest and industrious tenant that he would enjoy the fruits of his industry, and removing the fear of that destitution which was the pre vailing source of crime in Ireland.—(Bear, bear.) lie k did not oppose the measure now brought before the :,\ House, because he thought with many Hon. Members'_''_ that it was a measure of a much milder character than he had anticipated. Still, he feared that the measure would be totally ineffectual and worthless. Its object was to give security to person and property. If he thought it would give increased security either to life or property ho would support it. There was only one way of giving security to the life of the rich, and that was by giving security to the life of the poor man. The first step, then, was to secure the life of the peasant. Parlia ment made an advance in the right direction last year. The poor-law must ultimately prove a valuable measure for Ireland. But those who expressed astonishment that the poor-law had not produced a greater effect in the prevention of crime in that country should remember that it had only been in operation about a couple of months ; in fact it was hardly in operation yet—(Hear. hear) and it was unreasonable to expect that the feelings of the people of Ireland, the result of centuries of misgovernment, should be al ready removed and changed by that Bill. The Irish Poor law, however, only protected the lives of the most destitute classes in Ireland, who would alone accept the severe terms it offered. But the crimes re lated to the House that night were participated and sympathized in by a much higher and larger class, namely, the occupying tenants, who either suggested or sanctioned or obtained the perpetration of such crimes. One of the objects of the present Bill was to protect property in Ireland. Well ! let Parliament protect the property of the occupying tenants in Ireland, in order that they might not fall into the class of destitute paupers. It was the fear of falling into that state that induced them to take a part in the commission of crimes. It was a puzzle to many persons bow such crimes could be brought about, but the explanation was simple enough. If he wanted to describe the matter in it few words he would say, that they arose in the struggle for the means of subsistence, and to retain the livelihood which the peasantry of Ireland for the most part pos sessed in their land. There were a million of occupy ing tenants in Ireland, and the means of living of three fourths of them were confined to the possession of land. These outrages were also frequently committed by persons deprived of other means of living ; a farm labourer turned out of his place would find others to sympathize with him, and revenge his cause. In all cases it was a question of livelihood ; the people dreaded the loss of the means of subsistence. This stimulated the great mass of the peasantry to combine in those secret associations, arid carry out the sentences passed in their midnight tribunals, by means of the low est class of ruffians hired for that purpose. Lord Devon states that the cause of agrarian outrages was always disputes as to the holding of land, and the attempt of the peasantry to convert the tenant's possession into an in defeasible title. In the north of Ireland the establish ment of tenant-right had prevented the commission of these crimes ; but even there, when a tenant had been evicted, without receiving the price of the good-will, outrages had been the consequence. It was said that these crimes were confined to a few districts of Ireland ; but there were few counties where they had not at some time broken out ; with the single exception of Dublin there was no county where they had not at some time prevailed ; and they always followed some series of evictions, for the sake of consolidating farms, which caused other tenants to dread a similar expulsion. The quietest and most prosperous part of Ireland was the province of Ulster ; and there the system which was the object of this kind of intimidation was fully carried out. The tenant right was the secret of the prosperity of Ulster ; and he could not understand why persons took such alarm at the proposal to establish it throughout Ireland, when in Ulster it had proved so beneficial. The landlords there got as good rents as those in any part of the country, as they were sure, when a tenant left, to get his arrears paid by his successor. The cause of these outrages was the endeavour of whole classes, per fag out nefas, to maintain possession of the means of supporting their wives and families by their own in dustry. Sir R. PEEL said—Sir, I should be unwilling to let the first night of the debate on the proposal of her Ma jesty's Government pass without taking the opportu nity of publicly declaring that it is my intention to give a cordial support to that proposal.—(Hear, hear.) 1 cannot resist the force of the appeal which the Right Hon. Gentleman has made to the House. The Right Hon. Gentleman has told you that her Majesty in the Speech from the Throne has recommended you to take into consideration the state of Ireland with reference to the prevalence of atrocious crimes, to the impunity of the offenders, and to the inadequacy of the existing law to give protection to life and property. The Right Hon. Gentleman has justly said that this House, with out committing itself to the details of any particular measure, has, in an unanimous Address to the Throne, conveyed to her Majesty an assurance that it will take this subject into its immediate consideration.—(Hear.) The Right Hon. Gentleman has also truly said that the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland and her Majesty's Govern ment, charged with the heavy responsibility of giving protection to the subjects of the Queen, in return for the allegiance which the law exacts from them, con - sider the state of the law to be imperfect, and that on their responsibility they must demand addi tional powers. The Right Hon. Gentleman has fortified that claim, first made solely on the responsibility those charged with the Executive Government by reciting details of crimes which can leave no doubt ou the mind of any man that it is our duty at once to at tempt, at least, to arrest the progress of what I believe to be one of the most sanguinary tyrannies that ever ex isted in any country—(Cheers)—having a claim to b.s called civilized. I assure the Right Hon. Gentleman that I cannot resist the force of that appeal, because it is precisely the same appeal which some two years since I myself made in vain. —(Loud cheers from the Opposi tion benches.) Now, Sir, let me not be mistaken ; I most fully admit that I think measures of this nature are no remedy for the social evils that prevail in Ireland. f admit the justice of the observation, that they are 11.1 remedy for the evils in the social state of that country. Nay— for I will conceal none of the objections—it is al ways with great reluctance that I have consented to propose, or that I consent to support them, because there is this evil attending them, 'even with reference merely to the peace and tranquillity of the country. that it is impossible to propose them without, in some degree diminishing confidence in the efficacy of the ordinary law, and paralysing its operations.—(Hear, hear.) But still, when I hear, upon the authority of the • Government, and when I find the statement confirmed by evidence, that there exists in Ireland a conspiracy— for the Right Hon. Gentleman told us he bas the best grounds for believing that a conspiracy does exist—for the purpose of employing assassins, in order, without reference to age, sex, property, or condition, to deprive of their lives the faithful and unoffending subjects of her Majesty—l say the permission of this practice is such a scandal, that none of the objections that may apply to the measure appear worth consideration, compared with the evil of conniving at or permitting that scandal to exist. And although I think this is no permanent re medy for the state of Ireland, yet I for one will not wait. I will not postpone my consent to this measure till I hear what are the other measures, what are the more perma nent remedies the Government has to propose. I will enter into no parley or negotiation with these assassins. I say it is our duty, if we wish to lay a foundation ft r the permanent improvement of Ireland, to do all we cats to preserve the lives of her Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects in that country; it is our duty, without ulteri , r considerations, to endeavour to paralyze the arm of the assassin. —(Hear, hear.) I will not wait for other mea sures, though I think other measures are necessary. I hope the House will apply its deliberate consideration to the present proposition though I feel that Ireland, as a part of the empire, ought to be as dear to Englishmen as England itself, and requires the same consideration. I feel strongly that no evil can afflict the state of Ireland that will not react on this country; whether it be want of employment, misery, or poverty, depend on it, the evil effects of these causes will not be limited to the soil of Ireland; they will react on the state of society hero. on the position of the labourer, and the remuneration he gets for his toil. I feel all those things strongly and acutely; yet I am bound to say that any cies who expects immediate results from any measures which are to be permanent in their operation, well in tentioned as they may be, takes too sanguine a view of the power of legislation to remedy evils of long endurance. The length of their assurance is no doubt a reason for the immediate consideration of them, but that is a reason which should make us cautious lest, with the best in tentions, we might in endeavouring to correct them. fall by hasty proceedings, into the worst legislation. Take the remedies generally proposed. One is emigration. At first sight, it seems a simple matter to transfer the superabundant population of one part of the empire to colony in want of additional labour; but wheinarthe dif ficulties u co m to address yourselves to the subject y ou of it; you find how di ffi cult it is f t o transfer portion of the population colonye e so any as of Ireland to st make the abstraction of the population tell great trouble.—(Hear, hear.) in tell withouton the state of Ireland, without great expense a Then there 3 the measure o n which the Hcn. Gentleman (Mr. Scrope) has dwelt so much, namely, the improvement of the relations between landlord and tenant. The lion. Gentleman has laudably directed much of his attention to that subjecet,o7udauhg: a a d ve rted to the good effect of the te nant r i ght in 'Ulster the state ey of fe thingsot ar causes for that andcompared Munster; unster; withhu but there distinction which prevails in those provi nces therefore, I would advis e th e Honourable Gentlem'ananLodi to rush too suddenly to the conclusion that the legiae l same usage a s ex i sts in Ulster intoativ e c in o t n r n e a d u u g e h ti t on a o n f the and Munster would at once pro duce there the same effect. There is another Hon. Gentleman who is equally entitled t o commendation for the attention whi c h h e had given to this subject, I allude, to the Hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. S. Crawford), who has in his own case set an example which many landlords might well imitate —(Hear hear.) I assent to the ju s ti ce o f the principle. which I understand hina to contend for. Ido think that the tenant—particularly in Ireland, w h o has there to bear expenses which the tenant in this country does not bear, such as, probably, the expense of the erection of the place in which he has to live --I do admit that the tenant who has improved his property ought to have some claim against the owners of the land. I think that a principle of justice—(Lear. hear)—but I have heard it contended that the applies. Lion of the tenant right of Ulster is no remedy for the evils of Ireland, but that you must go further ; that you must give the tenant a right (against the adverse right of the landlord well-founded in law), to sell the occupancy, improofvesmucchntahkeinmd7:lo4Z made.WitiloUtilanzus re ferencet thatsa7 t any law o any h o fr c o c m upy ha in v g in t g en a a t n e t, ndtehnocujg, it might produce u temporary to improve the conditi on o f the lull or quiet for some two months on the part of tb., was immediately benefited by it, would be calculated m, than anything else to shake the confidence, to dimin Leh the stimulus to improvement, and to lead to confiscati on, and would be as fatal to the well understood inter of the tenantry as of th e proprietors. (E[ " es ! hear.) I, for one, think th a t th ere ought to b: ► he Lord-Lieutenant's power to send down additional police was limited to the dispatch on this service of 100 men. Such, then, was the actual power committed by the present law to the Lord-Lieutenant's hands, and that power he has efficiently and vigorously exerted. Deter mined, too, to proceed with, if possible, still greater energy, he has represented to the Government his con currence with the sentiment set forth in the resolutions which I have read emanating from magistrates in differ ent parts of the country—to the effect that the powers which he at present possesses are insufficient to enable him to afford that protection to life which it is the duty of every Government to afford to those who, in the dis charge of their duty, reside upon their properties and are anxious to cooperate with the authorities in the sup pression of crime and the promotion of the security of life and property. But the Lord-Lieutenant. Sir, does not ask for any general measure to be applied to the whole of Ireland.—((lear, hear.) Ile only asks for a measure applicable to district , , in which crimes of the same nature may be found to exist, at his discretion.— (Hear, hear.) Indeed, Sir, I may say at once that the touudation of the Bill for which we ask, is confidence in the discretion of the Lord-Lieutenant.—(llear, hear.) Confidence in his administration of the powers to be intrusted to him.—(hear, hear.) If you believe the amendment of the present law to be necessary—if you believe that some further powers vested in the hands of the Lord-Lieutenant are essential to enable him to maintain and vindicate the supremacy of the law— I ask you to leave the discretion of exercising these powers with him, rather than to place it in the grasp of any local authorities ; and I ask this not from any distrust of the local magistracy of Ire. land, who, I must say, have shown in the trying cir circumstances under which they have been placed, an amount of spirit and energy well worthy the commenda tions of their countrymen—but, because I think these magistrates ought not to have imposed upon them, in addition to the onerous and hazardous task which they at present discharge, that most difficult and invidious duty of deciding upon the districts in which the special power shall be exercised, and upon those from which it is to be withheld.—(Hear, hear.) I shall now shortly state the outlines of the measure which we propose. The Bill, in its first clause, having recited that, in consequence of the prevalence of crime and outrage, it has been found necessary to make certain provisions for their suppres sion—the first clause will, I say, give power to the Lord- Lieutenant, with the advice of his Privy Council, wher ever it shall be necessary for the prevention of crime and outrage, to declare that district to be in a state of dis turbance--for if we limit this power to the districts at present technically in a state of disturbance we would not be able to apply it to districts such as parts of Fer tnanagh. The clause goes on to enact that, whenever the Lord-Lieutenant shall think necessary, a proclamation may he issued setting forth that from and after a given day the provisions of this Act shall apply to the district so proclaimed. In settling what shall be the extent of such districts we have followed the words of the exist ing Constabulary Force Act. In that Act it is provided that the Lord-Lieutenant may proclaim any county and city, or any county or town, or any barony of half barony, or any district of less extent in any barony or half-barony through all Ireland. Thus it is evident that the proclamation may be confined to very limited districts—a most desirable arrangement—in order that the pressure of the Act may be only felt in those parts of the country, however small, where crime is actually encouraged or harboured.—(Hear, hear.) The second clause merely provides for the proclamation being ex tensively posted through the disturbed district, together with copious extracts from the provisions of the Act, so as to give full notice to the population so proclaimed. The Lord-Lieutenant is then empowered, without respect to present limitation, to increase the constabulary force in any proclaimed district to any extent lie may think nee( ssary —limited, however, as by the nature of things that extent must be—by the amount of the police reserved force placed at his disposal. The constables so sent from Dublin will be ruled by the provisions of the Constabulary Force Act, to which they are at pre sent subjected. We propose, however, that as the pre sent reserve force amounts only to 400 men, to give the Lord-Lieutenant power to increase it to 600 men, so as to augment to this extent the available force—the necessary expense attending this increase to be pro vided for from the Consolidated Fund. When, however, it becomes necessary to send any additional police into a county, the expense of their maintenance whilst there is at present defrayed by that county, and such amounts are collected as county cess, by means of grand jury presentments. We have, however, thought it desirable, and the Lord Lieutenant considers the provisions to be most important, to introduce two alterations as to the mode of repayment by counties. We propose that where an extraordinary number of police are required, that the whole expense of the maintenance of such police, during the time they are stationed in any district, shall be borne by that district, and shall not fall upon the county at large—(Hear, hear)—while wo also propose, and this other alteration in the present law is suggested by the Lord-Lieutenant himself, that such payments shall not be postponed until remote periods.—(Hear, hear.) —for, Sir, we look upon it in the nature of a penalty to be imposed immediately, not to be repaid in a year after or when order shall be restored, but at once— (Hear, hear)— for the Lord-Lieutenant would prefer that even one-half of it should be repaid immediately rather than the whole at a later period —(hear, hear.) We think also that it is desirable that the district or districts which shall be thus proclaimed shall pay the whole of the sum necessary for the increased establish ment of constabulary.— (Cheers.) And with that view, Sir, there shall be provisions in the Bill for an estimate to be framed of these expenses awl of the sums that will be necessary, and the money to be spent in maintaining the police force in each district for three months; and steps will be immediately taken to levy the amount of the estimate by the same means as the county rate, as soon as any district shall be placed under the operation of this Act. This estimate, as I have said, will be levied for the three months as soon as the increased force shall be sent down; and if they are detained longer than three months, then, at the expiration of that period, the same process shall be repeated for other three months, and provisions made for local payments ; but if it should happen that the police were withdrawn at an earlier period than was anticipated, and before the expiration of the first or the second period of three months, then provision was made for the repayment of the balance which would thus remain over the original estimate to the county teas.—(Cheers.) I now proceed to the clauses of the Bill, and to the police regulations which we think necessary in order to restrain within the proclaimed districts the present unrestricted posses sion of arms by persons who have, by their deeds of vio lence, proved themselves unworthy of having them, and by the use they have made of them have shown that they are not fit to be entrusted with them. The first provision we propose with respect to this subject is, that there should be a general prohibition within the district or districts so proclaimed, from the day of proclamation of all persons, irrespective of rank or amount of rate— (Cheers)—with certain exceptions enumerated in the Bill, and still further exceptions, to which I shall pre sently allude, carrying or having, within the districts specified, elsewhere than in his or her dwelling-house, any arms—[and here follows a long enumeration of the various descriptions of arms which it has been thought necessary to insert, in order to prevent the evasion of the Act that might otherwise take place)—and we propose that any person who shall, contrary to the provisions of this Act, be found with ernes in his possession, shall be held guilty of a misdemeanour, and liable to imprisonment, with or without hard labour, for any time not exceeding two years.—(Hear, hear.) And here let me remind the House that in the penalties of this Act there is no dis cretion allowed to the Lord-Lieutenant. The issuing of the proclamation, if he thinks it necessary, will depend on him, and it will then apply to the district so pro claimed, irrespective of any other or further Act, so that it shall be no longer lawful for persons in such district to go about with arms in their possession to terrify the peaceable inhabitants, and to use them in the execution of their sanguinary purposes, in the com mission of those crimes which are a disgrace to the country.—(Hear, hear.) I now come to the exception which it will be necessary to make in the operation of this clause, for it is absolutely impossible that the dis armament should be universal all over the district. The exceptions a re —j ust i ces o f th e p eace , p ersons emp l oye d n her Majesty's army or navy, in coast-guard service, in the revenue, in the police, in the constabulary, licensed to , killn with' deputations d special constables, and those prso o ns r who powersm licensed, as hereinafter mentioned.— These rnioenseta.T.-- game — (Murmura and cries of " Oh! oh! oh !"%___ a (Renewodmurmurs.) discretione,exeeptions already ay du b l; ow s e hould have to be These are all of them, thosever, that there existing, as to whom no exercised. It has been thought, with e might be cases in which it is necessary should be carried still further. If we could exceptionsrely absolute confidence in the success of this clause —if could by means of this enactment, disarm all those per sonsw who use arms to the terror and intimidation of others, it might be unnecessary to allow the persons, who are the objects of these attacks, to carry arms for their self defence. But, independently of those exceptions, there are persons peculiarly exposed to outrage. There are the collectors of the poor-rates, for example, who are peculiarly the objects of those deadly attacks.—(Hear, hear.) There are also the poor-law guardians, who are compelled to go abroad in the discharge of their duties, and who must necessarily be excepted. We do not pro pose there should be any regular system of licensing those persons for the purpose of carrying arms abroad by means of the existing local authorities.—(Hear, hear.) We do not, as I said before, think it right that the ,magistrates of disturbed districts should have imposed on them an invidious duty in deciding who should carry arms, and in granting those licenses, the discharge of which might expose them to increased danger beyond that to which they are already liable. Here again, Sir, we propose, intending that the prohibition to carry arms shall be the rule, and the per mission to do so the exception, to place the responsibility on the executive of Ireland, in the person of the Lord- Lieutenant ; and accordingly the Act provides that persons nominated by him, and holding high offices in the constabulary, shall, at places assigned, and at a time named, within certain restrictions, attend for the pur , pose of granting licenses to carry arias within the dis turbed districts, in cases wherein they may think it fit to grant them to persons who may be exposed to those lawless attacks. It shall be provided, in addition to this, that it shall be lawful for the police to apprehend all persons unlawfuliy carrying arms, and that they shall have power to search all those whom the y ma y sus p ect of carrying arms within the meaning of the Act, and may find about them, which shalltake a h w e ay n forfeited As an illustration of the way in which the clause will work , I will recall to aar m t o s Crown. the recollection of the House the circumstances which I have already stated with respec t to the murder of Major Mahon. On the day whe n he was murdered two men with arms in their possession were seen lurking about the very spot where the ill- fated gentle man met his death. Though they have net been I arrested, there is no reason, at least no moral reason, to I doubt that they were the persons by whom the fatal act was committed.—(Hear, hear.) If the police had been armed with the power which this clause confers these persons might have been arrested, have been deprived of their fatal weapons, committed to prison, and ren dered amenable to punishment for carrying arms, er if it were proved that arms were found on them or near them, as there is no doubt would have been the case in this instance. This provision does not extend to per sons with arms in their houses. We are not of opinion that the same absolute prohibition to retain arms now in the possession of persons in districts under proclama tion should be enacted by Parliament as is necessary with respect to persons carrying arms abroad.—(Hear.) There is no doubt the possession of fire-arms has been sought for and obtained, and may be so in those pro claimed districts with perfectly lawful purposes by many persons. Many of the small farmers, for instance, have obtained arms for the purpose of defending their houses against midnight attacks, and there were several cases in which these attacks had been successfully defeated by means of the gallant use of these fire-arms.—(Hear, hear) We, at the same time, think the indiscriminate possession of arms, even in houses, in the proclaimed districts, a h.• re a suspicion exists that the parties who have them int,,i,d to use them in the furtherance of crime, and in the I ur suitlot their murderous conspiracies, is not to be stoic tioned.—(Hear, hear.) We propose, therefore, to give the Lord-Lieutenant the power, at his own disere.loo, to issue a further proclamation or notice, to refer either to the whole or a limited portion of the disturbed dis tricts, to call on all persons, not within those enume rated exceptions to which I formerly referred, to apply for licenses to retain their arms, and to order that any persons not so licensed shall deliver up their arms by a day to be named in the notice so issued by the Lrd- Lieutenant, at the nearest police-station within the dis turbed district, or at some police-station adjoining. Ile proposed to enact that after such notice, all pers,tis knowingly retaining arms within their own houses and not being within the excepted clauses, who shall not have a license so to retain them, shall be guilty of a misdemeanour. We further propose that the Lord. Lieutenant shall have power, by a warrant under the hand of the Chief, or of the Under-Secretary for Ireland, to order a search to be made by the police in the houses comprised within the the proclaimed dis tricts, which have been included in the notice, or in other parts of the country if necessary, and to authorise a seizure of all arms found in such districts by the police, and their forfeiture to the Crown.—(Hear, hear.) Such, Sir, are the main provisions we propose that this House should enact with respect to the possession of arms in those districts of Ireland in which crime prevails, and such are the provisions which I am authorised to state the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland considers will enable him, with the additional police force which Parliament may place at his disposal, and with the efficient aid which the military authorities, in concert with them, aro prepared to afford, as well as with the assistance of the well-disposed inhabitants of the country, on which he confidently relies, effectually to suppress the state of crime and outrage —to put an end to the system of intimidation and to the reign of terror which are paralyzing the energies of the Government in that country, and disorganizing the whole condition of society.—(Hear, hear.) There are farther provisions in the Bill, without reference to the state of disturbance in the districts, and without the necessity of proof which is required to make a person answerable to the provisions of the White Boy Act, which render persons guilty of offences not strictly within the meaning of that Act, such as writing threatening letters and notices, amenable to the operation of that Act, and liable to the infliction of its penalties.—(Hear, hear.) There is one other clause which, though it does nothing more than recite the existing law, increases its stringency, and subjects parties transgressing it to the full penalties of their offence, will I trust be found successful in prevent ing the commission and impunity of crime, and in check ing that disposition on the part of the people to side with the criminal, and to refuse assistance to the police, to which I have already had occasion to allude. We propose by this clause that justices of the peace, or con stables in any district where any murder has been committed, or attempt to murder made, or reasonable ground for believing that it will be made, shall be em powered to call on all persons between the ages of sixteen and twenty, residing or being in the district, to assist in the search and pursuit of persons either charged with the commission of crime, and in case of an attempt to com mit it, to discover them, and to require them to join in the pursuit, and investigation of the concealment of the criminal. It goes on to enact, that it shall be the duty of every one so called upon to join in the pursuit, and to do his utmost to assist in the search ; and that every one refusing to join in and assist, when so called upon, shall be guilty of a misdemeanour, and liable to be impri soned, with or without hard labour, for any period not exceeding two years.—(Hear.) Such, Sir, are the main provisions of the Bill which I am anxious to obtain the leave of the House to lay upon the table. Whatever opinion may be entertained with re spect to its adaptation to check those frightful evils which it has been my painful duty to lay before the House, I hope, Sir, the House will allow me to put upon the table a Bill framed with the object rather of prevent ing the commission of crime than of subjecting the whole kingdom, for the crimes and outrages of a few, to the penalties of a harsh and vexatious law.—(Hear, hear.) We do not ask you for the suspension of the law, or to erect any other than the ordinary tribunals of the country, but we ask you to pass this Bill as a means of dispelling the well-grounded terror, which, grounded on the force of arms and intimidation, is stalking through the districts in which those crimes exist. What ever opinion may be entertained of its efficiency for these purposes, Parliament will at once agree with me in saying that it is the dvty of the Government and of the Legislature to endeavour, by the existing law if they can—it not, by an amendment of it—to prevent the re petition and frequent recurrence of crimes to which the attention of the House has been so painfully called. I trust, Sir, that the Bill which is now ready to be brought in may be laid on the table of the House to-night, that it may be printed and placed in the hands of Honeurable Members as soon as possible. I hope that an early day may be fixed for its discussion, and that no protracted debate may take place on this occasion, but that any observations which may arise respecting the Bill may be referred to a future stage in its progress through the House. The Right Hon. Baronet concluded by moving for leave to bring in the Bill. Mr. J. O'CONNELL then rose, on the question being put, but his opening remarks were inaudible, in conse quence of the noise made by the Members leaving the House. He was understood to observe, that he was agreeably disappointed, after the rumours he had heard out of doors with respect to the intentions of Govern ment, at the provisions of the Bill now sought to be in troduced. Ile certainly had been prepared for a more severe measure from what he had heard, and his expec tations had not been met, he was glad to say, by the measure which they had just heard described by the Right Hon. Baronet. He for one felt bound to say he did not consider there was any reason for violating in this instance the usual courtesy of the House by op posing the introduction of the Bill; and ho was not pre pared to say " No" to the motion for a first reading of it.—(Loud cries of " Hear, hear.") The Government ought to have the Bill printed as speedily as possible to send it over to Ireland, that they might collect the opinions of the country there before the discussion came on. The Irish Members were prepared to make every concession to Government consistently with the discharge of their duty in the suppression of outrage.— (Hear, hear.) He was not by any means con vinced that the powers of the law as it stood at present were not perfectly equal to the repression of outrage ; but it would be a very grave thing, considering the re sponsibility that rested upon the Government, to refuse them leave to bring in this Bill. During its progress through the House he implored them, however, to put in force all the force of the existing laws, and to issue special commissions, to see if it were not adequate for the prevention of these outrages without having recourse to any measure of coercion. The Hon. Member con troverted the statements of Mr. Hawley, the assistant barrister, that no person could go through the county of Tipperary without danger, and remarked that the very fact of the Learned Gentleman, whose unfortunate lot it had been to have transported more men than any assist ant barrister in Ireland, being able to attend to his duties without hindrance, was a contradiction to his own report. One part of the Right Honourable Ba ronet's speech had filled him with regret. He had in the course of his remarks spoken very strongly against the outrages of the people, and the enor mity of the crimes committed by them—he had lauded highly the character and conduct of the county magistrates, but he had not said one word of the crimes committed by the landlord against could h h ocoue e ulo t dl d e ut n at hs a r san n uvg t r , eo esabnd the ou he theonn ( 1 opyMuo justiceos r er . w O'C oa rso tononso,hont have stronglyvl e ) thought llh eolnounpe t side.thathreprobated,o se w o h the The of fualal censure.—(Hear, hNve.earre.) markedl'he crime,with ,ith he rela h tio o ns e both ways. They were told that Government intended to They bring id in no m t measures r t ehe m, sof relief, nor did but th where wer e th e y wore. He could assure H on. Gentle ey beginning on th e Treasury know wha t th e y benches it was a b a d way o f beg The moral session t o open it with harshne ss an d severity, of their coercive measur e wou ld b e far greaterlt,: trusteewere preceded by substantial eff or t s o f good-will. they should hear some of the Mi n i stry stating of the measure they intended to b r i ng i n, and the nature ti at which it would be ready for the H ouse . If the nlob jections ho now entertained to the present measure were to be removed by discussion, he would still feel it his duty to give every opposition to it in its latest stages, unless some progress were made in the Bill which was to estab lish thei peace of Ireland by the removal of the un settled relations between landlord and tenant. The Government depended too much on the effect of a poor law. It would be found inadequate to the emergency. Human beings were perishing daily, and such resources as the country possessed could not be developed in time to save them. A large amount of the rates collected le ri. lately were arrears, and when these r ates were expended he wished to know what would be left for outdoor Something should be done to assist the people at once. It was said there was some corn to aid the local rates in feeding and maintaining 500,000 men, but he believed they would have in the ensuing year to give relief to between 3,000,000 and 4,000,000 of souls. By the papers, as far as he was able to see, there did not appear to have been more than 1,600,0001. givers by way of loan and grant to the unions in Ireland—about 1,500,000/. had been devoted to the improvement of land, and 500,0001. to railway companies ; but, on the whole. out of the 8,000,0001. which had been grated by Par liament, there must be 4,000,0001. unemployed, which he implored them to use in saving the lives of the people, or another million of them would perish within the next six months. lie would bring this subject again and again before the ].Louse till he had ascertained whit they would do for