The Express.
London, England, 1867-07-13 00:00:00

THE WEEKLY PRESS.

In the opinion of the Saturday Review, it is idle
to think that the Lords will either reject or mutilate the
Reform measure. It has been said that an effort will be
made to throw out the clause giving the franchise to
lodgers ; but nothing could be more unwise than such a
course. The conservative peers will only make the en-
deavour if they conceive themselves to have the secret
sympathy and concurrence of Lord Derby, and the
ministry would be exposed to a burst of well-merited
reproach if it sanctioned opposition to a provision for the
adoption of which it had made itself responsible. That
the measure will be distasteful to a large majority of the
House of Lords is probable, for they h►ve not been led
gradually to it as the House of Commons has been ; but
they cannot fail to be aware that their opposition must
either be futile, or must lead to much worse things than
the passing of the present bill. They may, under the
circumstances, be reasonably content if they can aid in
making the bill more effective, and as free from ambigui-
ties as possible.

The Examiner says we are on the eve of great
changes in our labour system. Public opinion will be
found irresistible in the efficacy of its influence over ques-
tions between muter and operative as well as between sove-
reign and subject, minister and people. The formsof arbitra-
tion are difficult to decide or to define. A bill, making the
attempt to establish courts of equitable a.I j u stinent between
employers and employed, has passed the House of Lords
this session, and will probably rase the House of Commons ;
and another measure, call*, the Muter and Servant Bill,
putting an end to certain anomalies in the law of criminal
procedure, is also likely to get through. The Examiner fears
that Mr. Neste's propcealto afford protection to the fundsof
trade societle•, when the woman.a are duly audited, is less
likely to receive the sanction of parliament. But our con-
temporary has infinitely more hope from the steady and
continuous action of public discussion, and from the in-
crease of habits of reading and reflection among working
men themselves, than from anything that can be done by
legislative interference.

The Spedator, dwelling on the county interest in the
game laws, refers to the Wiltshire cane raised by Mr. Peter
Taylor, on which Mr. Chthonic, Hardy made so violent a
speech, although, says the Spectator, he could not dispute
a single word of Mr. Taylor's statement. The tone through-
out of these representatives of the agricultural labourers
was a tone of deep and even fierce resentment of any at-
tempt to vindicate for them equal justice ; and a feeling
of passionate partisanship for the unpaid county magistracy
of England—the most conserv►tive, and in many respects
most successful, of our political and social institutions,
and yet, probably, the coarsest, rudest, and, on one class
of subjects, most partial judicial tribunal known to Europe.
When county members show feelings of this kind towards
a most important part of the population they are assumed
to represent, with what shadow of justice can Mr. Disraeli
ask for them a greater political force, founded on the
number of a population against whose advocates they wage
such fierce and relentless war?

Commenting upon public opinion and Professor Beesly,
the Spect ,tor holds it to be a far more disrmoeful act than
Professor Beeely's to reties insertion, as the Times did, to
Mr. Applacarth's letter, printed in Wednesday's Daily
News, in which he distinctly asserts that the expression
in his own speech, which the Times had so heartily ap-
proved, about the imperative duty of " dragging" Broad-
head and all such criminals "to justice," was borrowed
from Professor Beady, wee a mere echo of Pro-
fessor Beesly's own language. As • question of
publii it'dos, it was quite fair, of course, to cri-
ticise Professor Beealy's speech, not as it was meant,
but as it was calculated to affect the public to whom it