The Express.
London, England, 1858-02-10 00:00:00

TO OUR READERS.

A DOUBLB NUMBER of the EXPRESS will
be published on SATURDAY NEXT, in order to
allow of a full report of the important debate
expected to take place on the introduction into the
House of Commons of the government meaanre re-
lative to India, fixed for Friday evening.

TER Bill of Lord PALMERSTON, leave for the in-
troduction of which into the House of Common. was
obtained last night, is not simply, ILI its title
purports, and as the notice paper announced, a Bill
to amend the laws relating to conspiracy to commit
murder; it is something more; and this something
more is of an importance which it is difficult to ex-
aggerate. The first clause having disposed of the
ease of conspiracy to commit murder, the second
provides for the case of any person who, either
within the United Kingdom or in the Channel
Islands, "shall persuade, instigatsi, or solicit" any
other person to commit murder, either within or
without her Kt.resrv's dominions. This offence
is declared to be a felony, punishable like the con-
spiracy provided for in the first clause with penal
servitude from five years to life. Now, there are
two points worthy of notice here : the first is the
deeming vagueness of the definition of the crime
and the next, that by constituting this vague crime a
felony instead of a misdemeanour, power is given to
the police toseize, isitAsnit warrant, any person who,
according to their interpretation of the law, is guilty
of " persuading, instigating, or soliciting " to commit
what may involve murder on the other side the Chan-
nel. Consider the consequences of such an enactment
as this. Where is the line to be drawn ?
Does it not carry um back at once into a system of
political espionage, unknown, thank GOD, for many
a hag year in this country—a system under which
words and writings were overt acts, rendering the
speaker and the writer arbitrarily responsible to
the judgment of the police authorities. From the
obscurest victim of foreign oppression, flung penal-
less and destitute on these hospitable shores by the
inexorable polies of the very Potentate who now
edsmours against the asylum which by his own acts
Its has crowded with the envenomed foes of his rule,
aid the implacable execrators of his tyranny ; from
the meet squalid knot of hopeless and shelterless
dievaliap who jest sustain life and hatred on
the bitter broad of exile among the smoky garrets of
Chetiwelreet or the polluted cellars of Bt.
hem them outcasts to the refined and wealthy family
allele of Claremont, who in the whole range of the
proscribed and the banished will be safe if this law
were to pale ! Strong language in the pit of the
Opera, on the pavement of Piccadilly, by the grave-
side of one who has passed beyond the reach of
tyrants, beqaeathing to his fellow-sufferers a legacy
of resistance and revenge—the emphatic protest,
the vehement ejaculation, the burning utterances
of sorrow and indignation and despair—ell will
be the material for espionage, the subject of
charge, the occasion of seizure, of commit-
ment, of incarceration. It is not only the
positive act" of high-handed violence to which
such an enactment might give rise that
would form a legitimate subject of regret : the mere
knowledge that such a power existed would taint
and poison the whole social atmosphere. We should
no longer breathe the liberal air of our ancient free-
dom. England would no longer be the land where
" come what may, a man may speak the thing he
" would." And for what should we be making all
this sacrifice ? Aa Lord boas Rosa= pointed out
with great force and clearness, this Bill, while justly
offensive to the people of England as a surrender of
some of their most valued privileges, would fall in-
finitely short of satisfying the Emperor of the
FRENCH.

The difficulty of proving a conviction under the
changed law would cause as much annoyance in
France as the change of the law would create dis-
satisfaction here. As to the deterrent force of the
increased punishment, that would supply no addi-
tional safeguard in the case of men whom the com-
bined influences of fanaticism and despair had
exalted above the fear of consequences.

There probably never has been a debate in which
the force of argument and eloquenoe has been en
entirely on one side as that which last night fully
sustained the reputation of Parliament. Even those
who, like Mr. DISLAELI, announced their Intention
of voting for the introduction of the Bill, carefully
guarded themselves, in meat instances, from anything
like a warm approval of the measure. The result of
the division will be deeply disappointing to those who,
while yielding to nous in their abhorrence of 111111.11.
nation, yet shrink from the notion of introducing so
important a change in our laws at the dictation of a
foreign ruler who has himself been screened by their
protection. It remains to be seen whether the House
of Lords will lend themselves with equal facility to
a measure originated under influenoee so ques-
tionable.

'Ns nominalism of General Eansassz, one of the
aidee-de-osmp of the Emperor of the FILIZICH, to be
Minister of the Interior, in thipplase of M. BlLLauvr,
eau mean nothing else than that the RIIPII3OII
Intends to be his own Home Minister, at least for a