The Express.
London, England, 1848-04-08 00:00:00

soldiers in cities. That was not treason, because it helped
the nob.e lord and his friends into power ; but still it had a
wonderful iesembl ince to the articles complained of at the
resent moment. Although generally, and as a matter of
courtesy, first readings were conceded, ha should on
she present occasion go out, i
fhe went alone, in opposition
to the government proposition..
Mr. H.. M. FOX said that it would be means w
to
restore the prosperity of Ireland if proper means were taken
for that pewee. Every one connected with Ireland would
join with him in abherreuce of the inflated harangues, the
treason or sedition (whichever it was called) of Messrs. Mit-
chell and Meagher; but government might do much, and
the landlords of Ireland might do much, to render such
harangues entirely innocuous. In his opinion quiet might
in ono month be re-established in Ireland if government
would come forward, giving the people a poor-law equal to
tittle distress, and giving them the right to relief. They
must also extend the franchise and the number of represent*,
time. It they would do this, and consent to consider in that
house the much mooted question of the repeal of the union,
tranquillity would soon be restored in Ireland.
Mr. GRATTAN said he rose to state his conviction of the
loyalty of the Irish people. He should never have doubted
that loyalty, but for the extraordinary p ropoait ion of the go-
vernment, and the odious spy system which it appeared had
limit established iu Ireland. lie feared that Lord Clarendon
had been misled into the formidable preparations he had
made in filling every corner of the city of Dublin with
troops. He should have believed that there was no taus •
for alarm, except for old women and unmarried ladies, had
be nut seen an advertisement, headed, " Patrick Hyland,
pike-maker to the castle "—ye laugh)—and something very
similar in Limerick, lame a man who had stood be
hind the chair at a public meeting, and called out
for pikes, turned out to be a government spy. Why,
it was reviving all the horrors of the Castlereagh aye
tem. (Hear, hear.) A. to this bill, it would fail as former
bills had failed, ate: so would their entire system of govern-
ing Ireland. They were governing that country with an
anti, a system which, in the present state of the world, they
could net maintain. They must try some new systim, one
which should send back the absentees. It was Demosthenes
who had geld that the property of the absent end indifferent
became the prey of the present and enterprising. That was
the case in Ireland when the country was in the hands O.
the frieze-coated men. The people of Ireland were starv-
ing, but the y had no wish for separation or a republic. The
only republicans were the favoured people of the
north, while the Roman catholic* of the south bad
direct:y opposite tendencies. As tor the priests, they
were neither republican nor French, for they could not but
remember the treatment their order had received in the first
French revolution. The hon. member concluded by recom-
mending ameliorative, instead of coereive, measures as reme-
dies Mr the present condition of ler laud.
Lord D. ST CART said that the bill before the house was one
for the hotter protection of the crown and government. Now
be thought that the best way to secure the crown and go-
vernment would be to attend to the wants and wishes of the
people. (Hear, hear.) There was no other way, and
the observation applied equally to Ireland, Scot-
land, and England. (Hear, hear.) He was not
one of three who was in favour of rash and hasty
changes, but he believed the people of England would
not long be conten? without an extension of the franchise;
nor would they long be c ntent to see small boroughs repre-
sented by the sense number of members as hug, , populous,
and important cities ; if, indeed, they would be content to
see such boroughs represeuted at all. What the people
wanted was a new reform bill, and that principally because
they believed it would lead to a more equal system of taxa-
tion. In Ireland too there were many things the people had
a right to demand, though he was not prepared to say
that some measure such as that now proposed might n d be
necessary, fur it was impossible to permit treason to stalk
abroad throughout the land without some attempt being made
to suppress it. But when government brought forward
measures of coercion, they were bound, he thought, to ac-
company them with measures to ameliorate the condition of
the people, and supply their wants. This was the opinion
be had expressed in Nov ember last on the Arms Bill, which
be hail voted in favour of in the confidence that government
would lose no time in bringing forward ameliorative mea-
sure. That confidence he was sorry however to say had
been misplaced ; for though April had arrived, with the ex-
ception of a tenant-right bill,which he understood was so
complicated that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to
make it work, and one other bill which hadpmen introduced
in the other house, no remedial measures had br en brought for
ward. That Ireland had many grievances which demanded re-
dress, could not be denied. There was the Irish church, the
representation, the franchise, the municipal institutions,
and many other grievances which they ought to set about
redressing when they proposed measures to put down vio-
lence and sedition. If Irishmen were treated with justice,
their loyalty might at all times and under all circumstnees ha
depended on. He concurred with the hon. member for
Montrase in his condemnation of the gagging clause. He
should oppose the enactment of any law which interfered
with freedom of speech. (Hear.) Liberty of speech was
one of the most valuable rights a free people could possess,
and it could not be too carefully or jealously guarded. He
could assure the government that the people of England
would regard the bill in this respect with jealousy and sus-
picion. In voting for the present motion, his object was
that the merman might be introduced and considered, but
he should reserve to himself the right to vote against the
second reading, should he efterwardi disapprove of it.
Mr. REYNOLDS held that a bill so unconstitutional in
its nature should be met on the threshold. He had warned
the government in November that their Arms Bill would
fail, and there could be no gri ater proof of the failure of that
measure than that mirristers should consider this bill necessary.
The object was to inflict transportation as the punishment
for offences which were now punishable by fine and impri-
sonment. But there was another and more important con
stitutianal objection to the bill, which was, that it left it to
the Attorney-General to prosecute and inflict the punishment
of transportation for words which a man might have uttered
in the moment of passion and excitement, or even for words
he might never have uttered, but which might be proved
against him by some hired incendiary ; and he was sorry to
say Ireland was fertile in the production of such characters
—(a taugh)—and he was equally sorry to add that all
governments, whether wbig or tory, had encouraged them.
He might refer to the conduct of Col. Brown, the police
comraissioner, in sending agents to employ men to
make pikes, the particulars of which hail appeared in
the Freeman and other papers. He thought government
depended too much upon persons of that description for the
information oa which they acted. The Arms Bill was
passed in consequence of the numerous threatening notices
which had been pent, and which, in the majority of
cams, he believed had emanated from the police agents. In
the case of Col. Brown, however, he for one could never
believe what they had been told, that government had sanc-
tioned his proceedings. (Hear.) Let them consider for a
moment what was the condition of Ireland. In 18 months
1,000,000 of people bad died from want of the common
necessaries of lite, and day by day many were still dying
from the same cause. Surely some allowances should be
made for the language of a people naturally excitable
when suffering under such a calamity. (Hear, hear.) If
in England the people were in the same position he
doubted not but that they would he talking treason on all
sides. He could tell them that but for the influence of the
Roman catholic hierarchy in Ireland not all the military
power of the government would be able to keep the peace
in that country forty-eight hours (hear); and were the reli-
gion of the Irish people presbyterian, or any other than
Roman esthetic, they would not endure their present oosi
lion. Let them consider also the political grievances under
which Ireland laboured. To provide spiritual aid for at
most three-quarters of a million of protestants, out of a popu-
lation of 8,000,000, 700,0001. a year was exacted from the
land. The parliamentary franchise was daily
dimin-
ishing; the municipal franchise had diminished almost
to a name; and waste lands were unreclaimed. What, then,
had the British House of Commons done for Ireland ?
He would defer to a more fitting occasion any reference to
the right of Ireland to a domestic legislature. But what
were they about to do by this measure Besides substitut •
ing transportation for fine and imprisonment, all cases would
be tried before pety instead of special juries, and the crown
would have unlimited right of challenge, while the pri-
soner could challenge only 20 ; and when they remembered
the manner in which juries had been packed in Ireland on
former occasions they might well shudder for the result.
(Hem, hear.) But was this bill to be retrospective—wou'sl
it affect those gentlemen who had been held to bail, and were
now waitir.g their trials ? (No.) He was not sure that it
woald net be retrospective if it was passed in its presentsbspe.
He hoped, however, government would pause before they
determined to press this bill ; that they would try the effect
of mildness and conciliation, and depend on the ordinary
tribunals to punish those who violated the law, and if they
followed this course they might laugh to scorn those
who were plotting against them. There was no necessity for
this measure. Government had no right Co
han ticipate any in-
terruption of the peace. (Laughter.) heart of the peo-
ple was Found. Ile was aware there had been much talk—
and where there was much talking there was never much
fighting. The mess who were now talking sedition in Ireland
he believed were hurnbu2s. ((they hail been in earnest they
would have adopted a different course. There was no part
of the Quern's dominions where the mass of the people were
mote loyal or more attached to the sovereign than in Ireland,
and it was too much to wound a whole people and brand
them as traitors because a few individuals made violent

spathe.:
Mr. M. J. O'CONNELL observed that the wound which
this bill would inflict was like that which the surgeon made
in cutting out on unsound part to effect a cure. As an Irishman,
having the intermit of Ireland at heart, he felt it his duty to
support this bill, the object of which was after all but to
Mike the law efficient, tnd to assimilate the law of Ireland to
that of England. The danger, as the law now stood, was
that those who by their violent speeches (and some of them
laiitht be honest) were leading others on to acts of guilt
which nittht invoke them in punishment, might escape
punishment themselves. (Hear.) With regard to Eng-
land, be thought the bill might not be without ad-
Image, as it would enable government to punish men
who I'll,' guilty of treasonable acts, hut whom govern-
ment might not yet wish to elevate into martyrs by
pros/en:its, them for high treason. 01 the loyalty of the
Irish peel. It he bad no doubt, and that their affections were
in favour of monarnhical institutions and the order of things
ts they exiqi.,:t lie was equally certain. Any such change
as the men who had been alluded to were mad enough to
contemplate would be certain destruction. He should be
ready to consider the chase as to spoken treason in commit-
tee, though he did net think this was a time when they
ought to be too chary in adoinistering punishment to men
who, whether by writing or sp'enhing, encouraged others to
son which the law punished severely. If the JAW had
hitherto been lenient to such perkme, it ought not to con-
tinue se. It the man who set fire the stack was to suffer
punishment. 'surely the man who set .him on should not go
scot-free.
Mr. GROGAN supported the bill as one that was calcu-
lated to restore confidence to all classes in Dublin, but