The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1869-02-20 00:00:00

Eke ~itourfyikge Operticr.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY tlO, 1869.

THE QUEEN'S SPEECH.

The Royal speech on opening the Session is
not now of such moment and significance as it
wso for centuries in the history of our country.
We need not go very far haek in that history to
di moover proof that the Sovereign formerly spoke
with greater personal weight than is the case in
our own time. The power of the Crown was too
often in antagonism to that of the people. Our
Queen now, rules more through the love and ef•
fection of her people than by the dower of her
office, though there never was a time when the
throne WY3 more respected, than it now is. Her
Majesty, too, is remarkable for the good taste
with which she has refrained from showing any
favour to this or that Ministry, and hence it has
come to pass that the Qneen's inaugural speech
Is more regarded, so far as any indication of po-
licy is concerned, as the combined utterance of
the Minletry of the day than as the declaration
of the Royal will personally and individually.
But a Royal speech 13 still one of our institu-
tions, as firmly established as any institution can
be, and if we do not read such an oration with
the eagerness of a politician in the times of the
Tudors or the Stuarts, we nevertheless read it
with interest. There are, moreover, circum-
stances which give to the speech of Tuesday
last an unwonted importance. We may briefly
auto up these circumstunces thins—the unnsu-
ally large majority possessed by the Government
of the day; the Irish Church policy of Minis-
ters ; and the important work of retrenchment,
on which the Premier and his colleagues have
evidently set their hearts.
Whether Ministers have acted on the princi-
ple of the least said the soonest mended need
not be closely inquired into, but certainly the
speech is rather a short one. It is, however,
neatly and concisely expressed. But ceasing to
ird the speech fur the moment as a Ministe-
clot !mminent, and looking it as what the nation
to regard it—a Queen's speech—let us ace
what her Majesty has to say.
Her Majesty takes a brief retrospective glance
at recent Reform legislation, and speaks of the
popular branch of the Legislature having been
chosen with the advantage of a greatly enlarged
enfranchisement of her subjects. The usual
precedence is given to foreign polities, and the
Queen is able to congratulate us on our friendly
relations with other powers, and expresses her
hope of the maintenance of peace. The chief
catim of alarni was the threatening attitude of
Turkey and Greece, but although her Majesty
can only speak of preventing any serious inter-
ruption of tranquillity, there is every reason to
hope that the final result of the Paris Confer-
ence will be that Greece, hitherto the stumbling
block in the path towards peace, will agree to
the counsel of the Conference, and that thus
amicable relations will be re-established. In
delicate and friendly terms the Queen refers to
the settlement of the difficulties between our

iA a very pleaaing item in the speech will.
we trust, In soarething to pr,ynota the lovdt
of thst section of the Irish people that have on
happily begin misled by the ignis (roams of Feel-
anisin. The suspension of the Habeas Cann,.
Act will no be renewed. Among the measures
furealinduwocl are an alteration in the modes of
conducting parliamentary and monLipal elec-
tions a 111041irleAtim, of the rating ChiORPP; ed.
neation in Scotland; a referm in th, endowed
schools of flo,shind ; the ostsltlialiment of fioan-
cial boards for counties; bankruptcy reform.
incholing the abolition of iniprisoomont for debt.
and last, and greatest, the question of the Irish
Chorch.

If the speech is to be judged as well by what
is not in it as by what it contains, we cannot hut
think it is in some respects very unsatisfactory.
The meagre reference to the Irish Chnreh ren-
ders it doubtful whether Ministers have deter-
mined on any definite policy as to the revenues
of that Church. The Poor Law urgently needs
reform, but there is no reference to it: and
while speaking of " hardshins in respect of rat-
ing." there is no mention of the greatest hard-
ship of all, the inequality of rating to the poor.
Nor is there any reference to the great need of
reform in regard to edueation in England, the
reform of the endowed schools being merely a
formal promise that has many a time been bro-
ken. Education is less needed in Scotland than
in any part of the kingdom, and yet it is just
in this part that reform is promised.