The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-11-09 00:00:00

E4e .3tottrhribge 04sethr.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1872.

OPEN-AIR DEMONSTRATIONS.

The right of public meeting is a right which
in the abstract no one would have the courage or
the bad taste to attack, and therefore there is no
occasiu.tg, defend it. This right is not even im-
perilled, but if anything could have a tendency
in that direction it is such demonstrations, so
called, as took place last Sunday in Hyde Park,
London. The ostensible object of that meeting
was to protest against the continued incarcera-
tion of the Fenian "political " prisoners, and to
"demand "their liberation. Now this professed
object can meet with the approbation of only a
very small fraction of the British people, and of
a small minority even of our Irish fellow-subjects.
The Times puts the matter fairly when it says
that " we can have no sympathy with the crime,
either of the soldier who engages in conspiracy
against the flag to which he has sworn allegi-
ance, or of the plotters who deliberately take
human life in a wild attack upon the law.' The
subjects of our good Queen, taken as a whole,
detest Fenianism, and have no sympathy what-
ever with the agitators who get up demonstra-
tions to liberate prisoners who are justly paying
the penalty of their offences. It is wrong to re-
gard these offeuces as political; they are viola-
tions of public order and common law, and Mr.
Gladstone has over and over again declared that
all those prisoners whom the Government could
regard as having been guilty of political offences
only have been already liberated. To clamour
therefore for the pardon of the remaining priso-
mere is to agitate in favour of defiance of the
law, in favour of breaking the public peace with
impunity, in favour of outrage and crime.
But when we turn from the avowed object of
this demonstration and read the narrative of
what really tonic jilace, we are forced to the con-
viction that the assemblage was one of sach
character that another of the same kind never
ought to be permitted, and we trust never will
be permitted. We decline to reproduce the sedi-
lions utterances in which many of the speakers
indui,ged ; sullies it to say that language of such
a character was employed as would out be tolera-
ted in any country in Europe. But what may
be called the accessories of the demonstrations
were utterly disgraceful. It is said that about
30,000 people assembled in the park. Of course
all the vast number were not pro-Feniaus, but
this fact just shows how dangerous such assem•
blies are. When large numbers of people, ani-
mated by hatred against the existing Govern-
ment or institutions, are blended with many
others who are politically opposed to them, there
is a great liability to disorder and riot. Had
there been any actual riot on this occasion there
is too much reason to fear that there must have
been bloodshed, for the military would inevitably
have been cslled out. We will puts suppositiou
—and let it be charitably presumed that it is an
extravagant supposition .lany of the speakers
indulged in the bitterest language against Mr.
Gladstone, and the bitterer the language the
more it was cheered. Let us suppose that a cry
had been raisesi, " To Carlton House Terrace
and that the mob hail reached thither. We for-
bear to ;speculate on the result; but the mere
supposition we have mentioned will serve to re-
mind people what might have taken place, and
may at any time occur if these monster open-air
demonstrations are permitted. As the 1414
Telegraph well remarks, " The good behaviour of
the masses on such occasions has always been
rather a precarious affair, seeing that by no ex-
temporised discipline on the part of the well dis-
posed leaders could any serious disorder have
been effectually quelled." And how near the
monster demonstration was coming to this we
learn from several accounts. The roughs in-
dulged in " stringing " themselves together, so
as to have an organised onslaught among the
crowd, and in " swaying " so as to "cause not
only a painful inconvenience, but the danger of
crushing or bearing down the weaker persons to
the ground." And there was a good deal of
rough blackguardisin in another way between
portions of the crowd. Some fellows climbed
the trees, broke off branches, and pelted the
crowd below, who returned the charge with any-
thing that came to hand. Some of the subsidi-
ary displays of oratory, or rather pattering, were
also disgraceful, and the mockery of religion was
scandalous in the extreme. Ada to all this the
parading of the " contingents " through the
streets on a Sunday, with flaunting banners, caps
of liberty (the symbol of revolution and blood-
shed), sod blatant bands of music, and it must
lie generally admitted that the whole affair was a
disgrace to all who participated in it, and that it
is high time that for the future all such demon•
strations should be confined within less danger-
ous limits. It was with this view that certain
regulations relative to meetings in the parks have
been adopted by the Government, but there is
some doubt whether these regulations could
legally have been enforced last Sunday. Cer-
tain it is, however, that the demonstration on
that day, in spite of these regulations, was an
anomaly, and that it at the same time proved how
necessary such regulations are; and our hope is
that they will be declared to be in force before
another such a demonstration is contemplated.