The Express.
London, England, 1861-10-26 00:00:00

.SILIT.!1VII lA.

Tins Evinn.n, rDILLIP ql All. AND 111% MONKEY.
4 kney. MJUe. Criale Wepban. l'A
7111111tAt1. -.\..1 rub:MI.4Y AND TUC ‘II.ID MAX. Mr. U.
1111.•r4464 Ansi Mrs. W. eratiN44.—Cularrome .1

WON WATS* AT LONDON JUDO&
TAN NAT—Wawa & A► AR.... Allersona. I 340.
Te•A•Likui—lbwrobasa Ir. Oa. .... Allenom Di lip a.

LON DON, NA T 1.: RIM 1, UM 216.

TO OCR READERS.

SPORTING INTE LLD; F.NCL

A !ate minion of the &Thai it publiehed every
evetkieg .loring the racing mtaasn, containing the
results ut the dad's rate&

TH Z United Kingdom Temperance Alliance has
just held its annual congress at the Free Trade
Hall, Manchester, and the anniversary seems to
have been in every respect • gratifying and suc-
cessful 1.111,. There was an unusually large -
ber of influential members at the council meeting
in them •g, when the report was read ; and the
general meeting in the ev en Mg WM crowded to e zees.,
note' ithztamling the absence of Lord Iteociaise,
who VIM 1 revented from taking the chair by severe
indispsootion. Thu annual report seems also to
show that the Alliance is in • flourishing and
prosperous state, the number of members and
amount of subscriptions having increased during
the year, while the area of its organization and
active crf.rts has been at the same time consi-
derably extended. We are heartily rejoiced to
hear of the activity and growing seems, of such
• motel association. Drunkenness is an enor-
MOUS curse to the country, and every legitimate
effort to diminish the evil is a national service.
The alliance is, we believe, the largest association
of the kind in existence, and it is impossible not
to sympathise with the philanthropic motives and
objects of its members. They wish to do good on
the largest scale by attacking and endeavouring to,
suppress what thy regard as the greatest national
evil. So far they will command the suffrages of
all enlightened and patriotic citizens. Per-
haps, indeed, in their exclusive study of one pocu•
liar fon.; of excess, they may, to some extent at
least, relatively exaggerate its national area and
destructive influence. Fur it most be remembered
there are other vices besides drunkenness, and
other forms of excess almost equally productive of
misery and moral degradation. But wo have no
quarrel with the Alliance on that head. Earnest
men are naturally absorbed in the one object
before them, and drunkenness is an evil of suf-
ficient magnitude to engage the best energies of
the social reformers who devote themselves to its
suppression.

The only question is as to the means which
should be employed for the attainment of this de-
sirable obje.i. Hero we are obliged to part com-
pany with the reformers of the United Kingdom I
Alliance. They would seek to prevent the abuse
of intoxicating liquors by prohibiting their use.
Their simple specific against drunkenness is the
forcible suppression of drinking. They call for
legislative interference to prevent the public sale
of spirituous drink., and would have Parliament
adopt in a modified form what is commonly
known as the Maine Liquor Law. The
measure proposed for this purpose is termed a
Permissive Law, and, according to its pror'ilions,
any town or district would be empowered to pro-
hibit absolutely the sale of spirituous liquors
within its boundaries, provided two-tli;rds, or,
according to one of the speakers at the meeting,
a majority of the inhabitants were in favour of
this course. We must say at once that this
appears to us not only an inefficient but a most
violent and dangerous remedy, which in its logi-
cal results might easily prove worse than the
disease. The question has been repeatedly dis-
cussed, and there is really little new to be said on it.
The great objection* to suchen extreme course are
obvious. It is clear on the face of it that any
such law would be a most serious infringement of
one of the most sacred and essential rights of
citizenship in a free country—personal liberty.
The fuudaniental axiom of personal liberty is that
every citixim be freely permitted to do whatever is
not in itself wrong. But it cannot be pretended for
a moment, with any shadow of reason or justice, that
the buying and selling of wine, or beer, or other
spirituous liquors, is itself immoral. These arti-
cles are in this respect in exactly the same position
as other articles liable to the abuse of immoderate
consumption. That the abuse of one article of
sale may be more common than that of another
does not in the least alfect the essential lawfulness
of the traffic, nor can it furnish any ground what-
ever for legislative interference. If the excess
leads to • disturbance of public order, the civa
magistrate may of course rightfully take account of
the offence, and visit it with appropriate p • It-
ment. !tut to prohibit the use of an article be-
cause of its abuse would be an act of the plainest
tyranny and intolerance, which no number of suf-
frage,' could possibly justify. If a whole com-
munity were unanimous against the traffic in a
given article, legislation would of course be unne-
cessary. Pint if say minority, however small, are
in favour of the traffic, to compel then, to forego
it would be the most direct and obvious invasion
of their rights. And it surely become., those who,
in their zeal for a good cause, have been betrayed
into the advocacy of such a violent policy, to reflect
on what it involves. The arguments urged in
favour of the l'armissive Law would justify
almost soy kind of intolerance and persecution,
would naturally lead, indeed, to the vet,'
worst ree relive laws. A large number, probably
thA 1.1.,,,•••••e majority, of the people of this
country I. here komanism to be a system of
deadly. 'rot more destructive to the souls ..f men
than excise in eating and drinking can be to

heir b: lies. But would this conviction, even
f expresred in the form of • vote, justify the
forced expulsion of every Catholic from the
country ? Take, again, the Liberty of the Press.
This is unquestionably liable to abuse, and is
actually abused to a vast extent. There is • class
of journals, a whole school of low literature indeed,
widely diffused through the length and breadth of
the land, that teach the worst principles, and
infect thousands and tens of thousands of
young minds with a moral poison far worse and
snore deadly than physical excess. It is a tre-
mendous evil, which every good citizen would
thankfully see abated by any lawful means, and
at almost any reasonable cost. Who, however,
because of the abuse, would venture to say abolish
the liberty of the press I Yet this is precisely
the argument of the Alliance in relation to the
analogous physical abuse of intoxicating liquors.
There are many reasons, too, for believing that
such a law as that advocated by the Alliance would
be as mischievous in practice as it is unjust and
dangerous in principle. The mere prohibition of
all traffic in these liquors, instead of in the least
diminishing thu passion for them, would but
stimulate it to more determined effoiL
A thousand illicit schemes for its gratification
would be devised and carried into effect. Those
know little of human nature who imagine that a
national habit can be summarily extinguished by a
legal enactment, that excesses can be suppressed
by an arbitrary prohibition, or virtue established
by the vote of a majority. The Permissive Law
would in the end prove a dead letter, amid mean-
while the attempt to enforce it would excite an
amount of ill-feeling, of contempt and evasion of the
law, and of general disturbance and disquietude,
fraught with the gravest mend evils. Wu cannot,
therefore, but believe that the Alliance would be
more usefully employed in the work of spreading
information on the subject of intoxicating liquors,
and in this way influencing public opinion against
their excessive use, than in attempting to prohibit
them altogether.

DEATH OF Till RIGHT HON. SIR JAMES
GRAHAM, BART., M.P.

Sir 'lames Graham died at Netherby shortly ho-
fore noon yesterday. For the het 18 months he had been
suffering from attacks of acute rain in the heart on the
least extra mental or physical exei tioo. On Thursday
week, baring dined with his family es usual on the pre-
vious day, be was seised with pain of more than tuned
severity 10 the heat:. Remedies were applied ; the attack
yiebbal to their influence, and be gradually improved.
last Thursday he was so much better that he
toll his medical attendant he thought be should
shortly be able to dispense with his services, and
after having had dinner in his la.lrooni, ho retired to bed
about 6 o'clock, saying he felt all the better for having sat
op looser than usual. Soon after that he bad fleecier
attack of acute lain, which 841 not > iel.l to the remedies;
applied. He expense' a strew; conviction that it yr.,
melee to try any more remedies, as be was pule sure.
from the long continuance of spasms and from his general
feeling, that hie cod was at hand. He then gradually sank
daring the night, and died at a quarter before 12 yesterday.
Has faculties were height and unimpaired to the last, and
be diet es preasin; the utmost resifmatioe.
The late Sir James Robert George Graham was the
eldest ace of Sir James the first baronet by Lady Catherine
Stewart, the eldest daughter of the seventh Earl of Gal-
loway, sad was bora 12th of Jon, 1792, coanquently he
was is h Nth year. He married in July, 1819, Fanny
Calleoder, youngest daughter of Sir James Campbell, of
Anti: miss., by which lady, who died in 1837, he loaves inns
Frederick l 'line (married to the eldest daughter of the
Duke anal Duchess of Somerset), and several other 00011; and
among his daughters two are married, one to the lion. E.
Dnisoanbe, M.P., and the other to Colonel Raring.
The hon. baronet represented Hull iu parliament from
181 e to WA In April, 1824, he succeeded to the baronetcy
on the death of his father, and two years afterwards he was
returned for Carlisle on whig principles. llis abilities soon
became apparent after he entered the Howie of Commons,
sad be was deemed a great acquisition to the whip. In
800 be 111111 elected representative for the county, and was
one of the most strenuous and zealous advocates for the Re-
form Bill, as has had previously been for the repeal of the
Test Act, and for Catholic Emancipation. On
the formation of Earl Gre's administration his
Minds were so much appreciated, especially in mastering
details, that without official experience he was placed at the
bead of the Board of Admiralty as first lord, and hail a
seat in the cabinet. After the Reform Bill, in 1832, hewn
elected for the eastern divine of the county of Cumber-
land, which he represented up to 1837. In May, 1834, di.
sercdoos in Earl Grey's cabinet arose on the Irish
church question, which led to the retirement of Sir James
Utahans, together with Lord Stanley (new Earl of Derby),
the late Duke of Richmond, and the late Earl of Ripon.
00 Sir Robert Peel coming into power Si.. James Graham
was sought to join the administration, but he and the other
members of the " Derby dilly" declined to join the
niinistry, and publicly stated at the busting' that ho had no
couthleoce in Sir Robert'', edministiation, which he rube.
fluently supported by his votes in parliament. At the
general election in 1837 be bad the mo&ication of being
rejeetesl by bfs formereonstitueuts, and remained out of the
House of Commons tintl the following seniors, when he was
elected for Pembroke. In 1841 he was elected for
Dorchester. That year, on the late Sir Robert Peel being
called upon to form a ministry, Sir James Graham took
office under that illustrious statesman as Secretary of State
for the Home Department, au office be held until the dis-
solution of the government in June, 1846. During his tenure
of office under Sir Robert Peel he was one of the ablest sup.
porters of the repeal of the Corn Laws, and of the new com-
ment-lel policy which that eminent statesman and his political
friends inaugurated. From 1e47 to 1e32 he was represen-
tative for the borough of Ilipoo, when in the latter year he
was elected for Carlisle. which city he has since sat for in
the House of COILMODL (In the Earl of Abenleen coming
into power as First Lord of the Tr...usury, in
December, 1852, Sir James was appointed First
Lord of the Admiralty. He remained with the Earl's
ministry till the vote on Mr. Roebuck's motion, " That a
select committee be appointed to inquire into the condition
of our army Were Sebastopol, sod into those departments
of the prominent whose duty it has been to minister to
the wants of that army." From that period he has not
sought official employment, although be was offered office on
the formation of the present ministry. The late baronet was a
D.C.L. of Cambridge, elected in li(G, and was Lord Rector
of Glasgow University in 1840. He is succeeded in the
baronetcy sad estates by his eldest son Frederick, who was
born 2nd of April, 1820, and maimed to., in October, 1832,
Lady Hennione St. Maur, eldest laughter of the Duke and
Duchess of Somerset The present baronet was attached to
the embassy at Vienna in 1842, sad subsemently entered
the Ist Lilo Guard*.

The Duke and Duchene of Somernet, Lord nod Lady
Fevereham, Hon. Edward buncombe, the Kirl of I ;Allowny,
Colonel Thou,. Baring. the Doke of klerlbormigh, and
other pernonages of rank, nro pieced iu mourning by his
decease.

THE. Ql• T.CM AT Hon' ROOD. —Wo (Srotimmi) ore
informed by n correspondent that, is addition to the visit
real b. the Queen to the 'tom Botanic (Wilms*, as mem-
timed iu ereterday's teepee...too, her Majesty again left the
Palace a few ndoutea rest four no Wednesday afternoon in
&carriage and four, necomponnsl by the Princess Alice, sad
attended by nee of the ladies-in.waitiug and • gentleman on
horseback. They went rovin.l the west sale of the Queues
Drive, when, sisgslarlv eootigh, not a humus beige we. to
he seen, till they reached the summit level, where they
dienioustod, and, leaving the carriage, netendante
awl bones I. the rear, pmersided to walk on the
footpath dews the mat side of the drive till they nearly
reached Parsoesgromi. At this time her Majesty began to
be recognised, sad a crowd, though by nu mesas large,
bras together, whew the amble was hailed forward, acid
the ladies bawls" got he
it, and the gentleman oo his
hone, the whole proceeded at a elliehiug pace en the palace
amid • burst of applause. By trimmed of her Majesty one
of the royal sermsta tallest no Wednesday morning at the
shop of Mr. Shiclair, bookeeller, Prinote.street, and
«tamed a Detection of photograph. to be sent to the palace.
They were seat at 12 clock. Her Majesty rurclumed a
seleetlos of Kr. Nuttier'. photographic souvenirs of Soot-
hed sod Edialsueb, recently published by him, and a
variety of mietellatieous photographic slhles A selection
was alma males the course of the day at the shop of Mr.
prheesiler, tor the royal family.