The Express.
London, England, 1850-08-13 00:00:00

LONDON, TUEeDAY, AUGUST 13.

Tux last working week of the session has p-oved
in all respects worthy of its predecessors. There has
been abundance of small effort, and of bitter words no
lick ; bat perceptible progr ss onwards there has
been none, and instead of unity of purpose or of
tone, the liberal party is rent by differences and dis-
sensions which are not likely to be speedily healed.
The quarrel between !ministers and the zealous
friends of the Jews has been appropriately followed
by a wide and wanton severance between the whigs
and their Irish supporters in the Commons.
Whatever faults may justly be attributed to the
latter, want of fidelity in party attachments cannot be
ascribed to the Irish members. The opposite charge
has in truth been constantly brought against
them, and not without foundation. On all the criti-
cal occasions when the duration of the government
was st stake, the section alluded to, comprising about
one-sixth of the entire liberal party in the lower house
of parliament, were found performing their functions
as party men, if not always wisely at least only too
well. From the initiatory struggle of the session to
the memorable fight on foreign policy, through each
field of conflict on taxation, colonial rule, or (tom stic
administration, the representatives of liberal constitu-
encies in Ireland sustained their full share of the de- I
fensive warfare waged by the Loldeis of power against
their hungry and angry rivals.
What his been their reward ? To be taken almost
by surprise during the last days of the session by the
production of a whole code of exclusively anti-lash ;
measures—some bearing ostensibly the tokens and '
marks of authority, and others ill-concealing the
cabinet livery and accoutrements. We have ad-
verted already to more than one of these measures in j
their turn. We shall not again analyse them. But;
their fate as a signal example deserves a memento.
Oat of six bills, originating in the House of Lords, !
and having for their object the strengthening of I
landlordism and the depression of the peasantry :
—one only has escaped with half its life'
out of the hands of the Commons. Lord
LUCAN'B two projects, to render distress
for rent and wholesale eviction more easy,
bare both been cushioned. Lord DOSEGAL'A scheme
fur exacting a fine from tenants who holding under
renewable lease., convert their tenure under the act of
last year into perpetuities, thereby putting into
the proprietor's pocket what never otherwise could,
and never by any means ought to get there—this has
also been quashed. Lard WESTMEATII'S two notable
plans for stopping the further sales under the In-
cumbered Estates Commission, and for preventing
tenants under severe penalties from cutting their
crops after sun down, have both been rejected though
not without a prolonged and excited struggle.
Finally the Coercion Act of 1847 which it was sough
at first to renew for four years, has been re-enacted
for two—the majority being wholly made up of actual
holders of offioe and tories.
' It is not the first—would that we could hope it
was likely to be the last—time that the spectacle bas
been presented of this combination of the two aristo-
cratic parties banding together to crush the out-
numbered representatives of the sister country. it
will not do to count Orange noses in a division on re-
pressive laws, and then pretend that a moiety of Irish
members voted with the Treasury benches. Whom
does this wretched jugglery deceive? Or what good
purpose can it answer ? The fact still remains undis-
turbed and irrefutable that against the united protest
and re monstrance of every independent liberal mem-
ber, whether English or Irish, still remaining in town
a stringent coercion act has been forced through the
lower house of parliament by official votes, aided by a
select volunteer contingent from the Carlton Club. And
this ate time of well nigh unexampled tranquillity
and observance of order and law ! Verily, if this be
not the wa7 to alienate the two communities and
sow perennially the seeds of national strife and hatred
—we know not what is calculated to do so.
• On the other hand, let our friends on the other side
of the Channel take the real good that is to be fairly
extracted from the net result of the week's battle.
Insulting as the one act thus passed may na-
turally be deemed, it is hardly probable that in
e any event it will be widely called into operation.
How different would the autumn and winter's
prospect have been had the five other spirit., each
more hateful and hurtful than this, been suffered to
elder upon the statute book, and make, as they all
were intended to do, their permanent dwelling there.
Had a less resolute and compact resistance been
offered in the outset, and a less cordial union of
English and Irish been preserved, eo one can enter-
tain a doubt that the greater and more pestilent For-
tion of these landlord bills wouldere this have become
the law of the land. Exasperated by such sew
torments, and driven ones more to abandon ell faith
in the existence for them of legal justice or
mercy, an excitable people would have been
left an easy prey to the machinations of those
rash and unscrupulous men who in a country
like Ireland are ever ready with desperate counsels
and plans of garret combination. From this new pro-
vocation and this addition.' danger the peasantry
have been happily saved. It is well; but the lessen