Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-07-27 00:00:00

side-wind bill. It cannot be expected that the
Lords will stultify their former decisions , at
least this session, and' give permission to the
House of Commons to alter a form of oath
especially prescribed by an unrepealed act of
Parliament. Nor is there any faith that the
Premier and his colleagues will lend their coun-
tenance to a line of policy which will bring
the House of Commons and the Law Courts
into open collision. If the ministry are in earnest
about Jewish emancipation, they could make
short work of the affair. Matters of much
greater delicacy and difficulty have been carried
through both Houses of Parliament to a success-
ful issue. We have not swept away, one after
the other, the Test and Corporation Acts—we
have not carried Catholic emancipation, and
compelled a repeal of the Corn-Laws, to be
insulted, year after year by this bigoted and
miserable refusal of right—clear and indisputable
right—in the case of the Jew. Shall the great
fabric of civil and religious liberty, the pride and
the boast of every British subject, and the heredi-
tary glory of every true-born Englishman be
permitted to dally session after session in om-
pleting the extinction of the last remnant of our
illiberal and unwise enactments of religious
intolerance ? Are we to wait for the convenience
of fanatical prelates, and until they have learned
to be charitable and to do to others what
they would others should do to them ? We say
not. Reason, common sense, and justice alike
demand that a handful of Tory Lords and a batch
of morbid Churchmen shall not rule the Commons
of England, and constitute themselves a per-
petual barrier against the admission of our
Jewish fellow-countrymen to their political rights.
We must take other means of subduing this
political intolerance of the Lords spiritual and
temporal than a mere annual protest against
their injustice, and a yearly repetition of a
repeatedly-rejected measure. The time for
protests and petitions has passed away. This is
the day for strong language and determined
action.

Seeing, then, that there is no hope of actual
assistance from Lord PALMERSTON, and that Lord
JOHN RUSSELL cannot carry his measure, it may
be asked what is to be done ? We would deplore
a collision between the House of Commons and
the Law Courts, as such must take place if
Baron ROTHSCHILD is permitted to take his seat
by a simple resolution. For although the House
has a right, yea, is bound, to vindicate and
uphold its privileges, we have grave doubts
whether the law would sustain such a course. A
simple resolution of the House of Commons is
not law, although it may be passed for the pur-
pose of regulating its own proceedings, if a positive
act of parliament still unrepealed, aye, and acted
upon, is emphatic against such a line of procedure.
But there is no cause to steer such a course.
Lord PALMERSTON, if he desires, can concoct a
measure of Jewish emancipation, and by having
recourse to a " swamping creation" of peers, '
compel the Lords to abolish the present objec-
tionable form of oath. He can call to the House
of Lords a BRIGHT, a GIBSON, a Lord JOHN
RUSSELL, a BROWN, and several other distin •
guished commoners whom we could name, whose
votes would set at rest the opposition of SAMUEL
of Oxford, HENRY cf Exeter, my Lord DERBY,
and all his fellow peers who row in the
same political boat. To do so would please
the nation. The Baron's Coronet would
sit gracefully on the brows of the gentlemen We
have named. It would be a grateful homage to
statesmen who had laboured for their country's
good, and lent a helping hand in demolishing
the iniquitous corn law imports, the purification
of the Parliamentary representation, and who
have given a hearty advocacy to the mental and
moral illumination of the people, irrespective of
creed or party.

As the time approaches for the next Meeting
of the Council every person is wondering 'what
will be the nature of the report which will be
brought up by the Water Committee in regard
to the withdrawal or continuance of the abomi-
nable Pike bog-wash. Will they persist in
forcing the mixed stuff they are now supplying
the people with clown their throats any longer,
or will they give us back our pure well water
in its integrity, or boldly test the Pike in its
natural state, and thus give the people at large
a fair opportunity of judging of its merits when
unadulterated. These are questions which every
one asks, but no one can answer. The probability
is we shall have some fresh Jesuitical piece of
jugglery in order to perpetuate that system of
chicanery and deception which has been so long
and so successfully practised on the unfortunate
ratepayers of Liverpool by that nefarious gang,
the Pike jobbers, and those who have hitherto
aided and abetted their villianous proceedings.
But we give them timely warning. The patience
of the people of Liverpool, enduring although it
has been, has long since been exhausted, and
although the deep discontent of the people has
not as yet exhibited itself in any open demon-
stration yet they have long been ripe for such ;
and if they find that their heartless oppressors
are resolved to continue to tantalise them—to
persist in tampering in the manner they have
done with their copious supply of pure water—
then they may rest assured that there will be an
exhibition of feeling on the part of the Rate-
payers such as never has been witnessed in Liver-
pool before, and that right:early,
Four hundred thousand people are not to sub-
mit tamely any longer to swallow a mixture
which all abhor, siatriy because a few unprin-