The Press.
London, England, 1853-07-23 00:00:00

t '

No. 12.—VoL. I.

gte ress.

LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY :13, 1t453.

WHATEVER hesitation there may be on the part
of our Government to look upon the invasion
of Turkey as a «mu belli, no one can justly
accuse them of the same delicacy when our
own internal interests are concerned. The
Coalition have at least declared war against 1
the British Constitution. In the whole his-
tory of our polities there is nothing more pro-
fligate than the position which has been taken
up on this subject by Lord ABERDEEN and his
colleagues.
According to her Majesty's Ministers a mea
sure of Parliamentary Reform is required.
Such a necessity was proclaimed more than
two years ago by Lord JOHN RUSSELL, and the
matter was considered so urgent that at the
beginning of '52 he introduced a bill for the
purpose. That fanatical Reformer, Sir JAMES
GRAHAM, feels so strongly on the subject, that
when the Government of Lord ABERDEEN was
arranged he made Parliamentary Reform on a
"lame' scale the condition of his joining the
Administration. The high-principled Prime
Minister at once assented to the stipulation,
while his ingenuous Chancellor of the Exche-
quer, Mr. GLADSTONE, was privately canvassing
for votes among the supporters of Lord DERBY,
with reiterated assurances that the Ministry
of Lord ABERDEEN was "strictly Conservative.'
Parliament is about to be prorogued, after a
long session, and not a single intimation of
the principles on which the House of Com-
mons is to be reconstructed has been afforded
us by the ardent Reformers and the enthusi-
astic Conservatives who combine to carry on
the Queen's Government.
If urgent, why is this measure of State ne-
cessity postponed? If not importunate, or
if not required, why are such agitating pur-
poses announced ? And why, of all per►son►s in
the world, are the public disturbers the Queen's
Ministers ? We are told daily that the country
was never so prosperous, and that its pros
perity is solely attributable to the wise legisla-
tion of Parliament. Then what need to recon-
struct Parliament, which has evinced a spirit
so prescient and so beneficial ?
The fact is, and it is known to every one, that
Parlhunentary Reform was a device of Lord
JOHN RUSSELL and Sir JAMES GRAHAM to clip
the power of the landed interest, because the
country gentlemen resented that violent and
abrupt change in our commercial system
which was factiously suggested by Lord .Tons
in November, '45, and mainly earried into
effect in the course of the next year, by the
craven treachery of the Member li►r
Without Parliamentary Reform, Sir .IARES
GRAHAM did not well see how he could ever
again become a Minister; and his tactics being
a little disturbed by the sudden resignation of
Lord DERBY, whom the confederates of Woburn
Abbey did not intend to repel from power
until the spring, Sir JAMES recklessly rushed

LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 23, 1853.

to a position which he will not be able to
maintain, and, in order to establish the Coali-
tion Ministry by the united aid of the Radical
members, came out as a " large " Reformer
though, in truth. he has not settled a single
principle, large or small, on which his pro-
jected measure is to be founded.
Does Sir JAMES GRAHAM wish to destroy that
balance between the rural and the urban con-
stituencies which he assisted Lord Caixv in
1830 to establish ? And, if so, why so ? Will
he, for example, advanee the plea that there
has been so considerable an increase in the
population of the towns since the Reform Act,
that the disproportion between population and
political power is preposterous*."lhe sum-
mary of the recent census proves that counting
as the country districts only such as contain
single houses, villages, and towns which have
no markets, and which, in fact, are merely vil-
lages of a larger growth, the population of
Great Britain may now be looked upon as
equally divided between rural and urban in-
habitants. Yet three-fifths of the members of
the House of Cohnnons for (heat Britain are
already members for towns ! But then it is
urged that it is indefensible that Manchester,
with 300,000 inhabitants, should be repre-
sented only by the same number of members
as Thetford, with four or five thousand. But
is it more indefensible than that Macclesfield
and Stockport, the two great townie of North
Cheshire, with an united population of
03,000, should be represented by four mem
bers ; while North Cheshire itself, with a popu-
lation nearly double that amount, should be
represented by only two members :".rake
again South Cheshire : there is only one town
in it. Chester, with 18,000 inhabitants, has
two members ; the county, with iB,OOO in-
habitants, has the same number ! I f popula-
tion 6nly is to be adopted its the test of the
propriety of electoral arraisgemelits, we under-
take to adduce anomalies far more striking and
more numerous with regard to the country
than are so loudly and so frequently alleged
with reference to the town constituencies.
But we will not admit that population is the
only, or the main, eonmideration in the distri-
bution of political power. We hold that, in a
constitutional monarchy like England, the
principal depository of power should be the
land. All our institutions, ecclesiastical and
civil, rest upon it. The largest section of the
middle class, the greatest employers of labour,
are occupied in its cultivation. The only
basis of a free and genuine aristocracy is to he
found in its possession. Upon the mainte-
nance of styli an aristocniey, 114 continually
by the necumulated wealth and distinguished
abilities of the ecaumuiiity, an aristocracy
maintained, indeed, by absorbing all aristo-
envies, the existence of freedom in a Euro-
pean country appears to us to depend. No
country can subsist as a first-rate power that
is not sustained and animated by a principle.
The despotic principle upholds, 111141 organises,
and directs the colossal resources of Russia ;
democracy inspires the United States. Both
principles are adminibly and completely
adapted to the circumstances with which they
have to deal—the men. the country, and the
ronditions of their eivilisation. The principle
of aristocraey has made England a country of
the highest class. We owe to it our freedom,
our order, our pure religion ; we owe to it
even that wealth which we are ashamed to
admit is valued in these days by some even

PRICE SIXPENCE.

beyond freedom and faith. Po not let us be
hew that these blessings will long remain in
a society whit+ repudiates the principle to
which it owes its existence. That eau never
be. The life of cautions is like tho life of man ;
and the country which abjures the element
that has formed its laws, its manners, its cus-
toms, that has ereated its traditions, and given
a colour to its future,—is a corpse.

THE ASSASSINATIONS AT SMYRNA.
Ova rooters have probably seen an account
in the papers of last week of the arrest
and detention of a Hungarian rebel by thu
Austrian authorities in the city of Smyrne,
and the subsequent interference in behalf sof
the prisoner by this American Consul, and the
commander of an Amerieatt vessel-of•war iu the
harbour.
This HUlig/Irian, whose name is KOKI4TA, it
scents, had beets libellaell with the other
refugees of his country, and permitted to retire
to America, under the promise of nut again
returning to the Turkish dominions. in spite
of this s
thiinsyreutitig:ignen Niselnitehltitiittytihtt:lwaAsinseetii
seized
rbey-
tunsed to Asia Minor, stud lived for some time
the crew of an Austrian brig and removed to
the vessel for the purpose of being carried
back into Austria. The American Consul
claimed hint as a citizen of the United States.
but. when examined by the authorities of that
nation he distinctly denied his Ameriean
citizenship, and with it Al claim to American
protection, declaring that he was not provided
with an American passport, and Openly avow-
ing his country, and his resolution to live suit!
die a Hungarian. In spite of this distinct
disclaimer of Ameriean citizenship, the Ameri •
can Consul still claimed him ; and this Ameri-
can captain actually laid his vessel alongside
the Austrian sloop with the avowed purpose of
preventing her departure with the Hungarian
captive. The Austrian Intermmeio at Con-
stantinople, to whom the Turkish Governor
referred the matter, justified the arrest of an
Austrian criminal in the Turkish dominions as
being strictly conformable to existing treaties,
and asserted the right of his Sovereign to claim
his own subject.. Upon the abstract justice sit
this claim we cannot pronounce without a
careful examination of the article in the treaty
Of extradition upon which it is based. Thu
manner of the arrest, supposing it to have
been elwreetly reported, was undoubtedly birth
irregular and illegal ; but, we think the violence
of the American Consul in pronouncing judg-
ment in Isis own favour, and immediately
Inking the law into his own hand and executing
it, require:: a protest from every Sovereign in
Europe who wishes to preserve his indepen-
dence and to mai iota in what little yet remains of
international law.
If American citizenship and an American
isississl secure impunity to all rebels, it is
clear the crime of high treason must he erased
from the code of every country. If this doc-
trine prevails, what should prevent KOSSUTH
himself or M.IZZ I NI from returning into Austria
and Italy, armed with this talisman, and defy-
ing the Sovereign and the police. and invoking