The Express.
London, England, 1855-03-12 00:00:00

LORD PA

Anon= peer has
Lord SHAFTESBURY, the
appointed to the sinners
Duchy of Lancaster. La
owned, has thus far unfalteringly 6.
intelligible principle by which his administration has
yet bees marked—the principle, namely, of peerage
monopoly. His ambition seems to be, to become the
champion and paymaster-general of his order. None
but lords, or their family trustees and nominees, are
permitted bj him to have any share in the govern-
ment of the country. Distrusting the court and
despising the people, he seeks to strengthen himself'
in Parliament, which, u now constituted, represents
the predominance and power of the landed clue, and
represents adequately and efficiently no other in the
State. The Pnamint wishes to make sure, if pos-
sible, of a majority in the Upper House first:
he believes it will be all the more way
to secure a majority in the Lower House afterwards.
No one understands better than the veteran viscount
the mechanism of the whispering-galleries that con-
neat the two. No Wizard of the North, whose pro-
fessional character depends upon his skill in telling
fortunes by shuffling and marking a particular peek
of cards, manifests more contempt for the incredulity
of the vulgar, than his lordship does for the prognos-
tics of the public and the press, that he will sot make
sure of a majority of adherents in the Commons by
securing a majority of their owners in the Lords. We
suppose the dullest comprehension begins now to
understand why it was that in December, 1863, Lad
Par.mmurron suddenly quitted the Coalition, rather
than agree to any proposal for materially diminishing
the number of nomination boroughs. His friends
always said that, by consenting to serve under Lord
ABEZDZIN, he had secured to himself the reversion of
the Premiership. But what would the realisation of
such a hope avail, if the implements of the legislative
necromancy, in which he is so profound an adept,
were in the meantime broken or destroyed P Lord
Palmer:nos determined, at all hazards, to preserve
rotten boroughs ; he left the Cabinet on the question,
and refused to return until Lord Joint Rowan had
been persuaded so to mutilate his intended Reform
Bill that when, soon afterwards, it was produced
people shook their heeds, and refused to give it any
hearty support. Lord PALMERSTON has his reward—
he is Prime Minister. The parches. and sale of seats
go on as before ; we have neither a pledge to sup-
port any principle of progress, nor a premise to carry
any question of administrative reform however
argent. The Lords are delighted, while the people
are angry; bat the Pamir= can afford to laugh
with the Lords, and to laugh at the People.
We deem it our duty to direct attention to the work-
ing of the system as it exists, and as it is strikingly
illustrated in all that is taking place from day to day
before our eyes, because we desire to see a more
practical use than heretofore made of each electoral
power as the industrious choose do possess. That
power is indeed limited—'ore limited than people
in general are disposed to believe. But for that very
reason are should be taken that none of it is thrown
away, or permissively alienated to the use of those
who are banded together in a standing conspiracy
against its extension, or its application to the at-
tainment of any substantial improvement in Church
or State on which the people have set their hearts.
Does any one suppose, for example, that it the
Honer of Comm *obtained 200, ay, or even 100,
members sincerely anxious to obtain justice for the
soldiery, it would be possible for any minister, how-
ever strong in the confidence and support of those
interested in the maintenance of military wrong, to
obtain vote after vote of millions of money for army
expenditure, without a single attempt being made to
enforce stipulations for Army Reform P Looking at
the business transacted at Westminster during the
last three weeks; the enormous sums granted for
clothing, pay, and military stores; and the feeble
expressions given to the national expectation that
by this time some plan for the regeneration of our
army should have been promulgated by those in
authority, or if not, forced upon them—one can
readily understand how these nobles in person
and nobles in proxy should grow incurably sceptical
as to the sincerity of popular sympathy or popular
self-respeet. They find the House of Commons to be
a matchless reaping machine, whereby, in the course
of a few hours, they can gather in and appropriate
as they please the fruits of a nation's slow and dili-
gent industry. Is it not written, „One soweth and
another reapstle? All that is asked or desired by
the many whose industry creates the wealth thus
annually reaped by their tax-masters is, that those
who risked their lives and shed their blood in defence
of the prolific field should not be basely cheated of
their legitimate recompense and reward. But though
this is forcibly and faithfully said out of doors, it is
but indistinctly and indecisively echoed within. The
great majority there take neither thought nor trouble
about it. Whose fault is this? Of the Cabinet of
Lords, or of the popular constituencies that have
sent to Parliament men nominated for them by the
jobbing clubs of Pall-mall, instead of choosing for
themselves men of their own order, capable of express-
ing their thoughts and feelings P Assuredly the fault
Use, in too many instances, with the latter. Let us
hips that whenever opportunity shall arias for re-
unsidedag the choice they have made, the electoral
Wise throughout the kingdom will recall these
Wags to mind, and in their future selection of repre-
sentatives act otherwise than they have hitherto done.
For the present things are likely to go on with
segard to the filling up of the subordinate posts of
lbe Government pretty much as they began. Mr.
IRSDIRICK Pau having been found peculiarly in-
sulted to the Under Secretaryship of War, to which
he was transferred in defiance of all meson-
elms, and warning from a department whose
ides hi had performed respectably. is once more
feeds massiing orders. Instead of falling back,
beemever. epee the Colonial-ofiloe, he is now directed
to halt half-way at the Board of Trade. Wooers' he
can be expected to know little or nothing of the
questions waiting for somebody to bring them for-
ward in Parliament on behalf of that department;
and this is precisely the reason, apparently, why Mr.
FREDERICK PEIL is to be made Vies-President at
this particular period of the esseion. As for his elder
brother, having made within a month the grand toy
of the principal departments of the State, and bad •
look at the Ordnance, India Board, and Colonise, in
rapid succession, Sir ROBE= has by the latest ao-
counts arrived at the Admiralty, of which
it is proposed to make him one of the
on-nautical Lords. We do not see why he
should not have been sent there at first, or why be
should not form as creditable a cypher at the right
hand of that most demonstrative of executive deno-
minators, Sir Camila Woon, as any one else whose
name might have been drawn in the lottery of small
civil sinsenres. Bat as a young gentleman of aspiring
mind is always glad to have something useful given
him to do, we would urged that Sir ROBERT Pm
might beneficially to the public menial devote his
ollsial leisure to the reformation of the Admiralty
style of correspondence. When addressing persons
subordinate rank it would perhaps be deemed too
411611111 an innovation if it were proposed that a
epriekling et Down= civility should in future
be employed i bsi we venters to iabmlt that

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