Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-06-07 00:00:00

Palmerstonianism and R

fully confront the Derb

And this is not, it seems, very possible

It could only be done, it

lieved

by such a coalition as would commit Lord John

RUSSELL and Lord PALMERSTON, and their folio

ers respectiv

which they. never could carry out, if they even
• - -

promised. to do so, as

HER MAJESTY

imsters

Mere have, it is true, been very confident report

afloat, even si

the new Pa

mi had already b

ranged. But

no evid

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desirable condition of things, it is indispensably
necessary that certain intercommunications should
be conducted upon a basis of equality." But then,
unhappily, it is just, under such circumstances, that
their dissensions are made manifest. There is so
wide a difference between them, in principles too
which are fundamental, that " intercommunications "
only open out afresh their irreconcilable divisions.
A writer in the same Independent Liberal journal
we have already quoted remarks, —" Now that the
returns to Parliament clearly prove that the Liberal
party have a considerable majority, and that it is
generally believed that Lord DERBY'S Government is
not to introduce a Reform Bill, I think that nothing
could be more natural or proper than a union of the
Liberal members with the old %Vhigs to displace that
Government for the purpose of establishing one which
would faithfully reflect the opinions of the great
body of the Liberal electors throughout the United
Kingdom, and that the existence of the new Govern-
ment to be formed, should be openly declared to be
staked on its power to carry an honest Reform Bill
during the present session, and to preserve a
course of honest neutrality." But Reform is just
the question on which they are at variance.
No Reform Bill that Lord PALMERSTON and his
followers would agree to —and probably none that
Lord JOHN RUSSELL and his followers would agree
to either—could be expected to satisfy Mr. BRIGHT
and his party. Certainly not, if they were true, as
we believe they would be found to be, to their own
principles, and faithful to their own engagements.
But the same writer goes on to suppose a much more
probable case. "It may be asked," he says, " what
should be done if these two noble lords, or rather one
of them (who alone is suspected of insincerity),

should decline to unite for the establishment of an
honest Reform Government on the basis described,
and if they should ask the Liberal party to
join the old Whigs merely in putting out the
Derbyites, and leaving it to the discretion of the
two noble lords afterwards to bring in a Reform
Bill at a ' convenient season,' and of a kind which
shall be more palatable to their aristocratic associates
great body of the people ?" And he
answers the question by unhesitatingly declaring,
that, "in such a case, the Liberal members ought
to have nothing to do with the overtures of the old
Whigs. The Whigs were worse than the Tories
before they were last turned out of office, and they
would be worse than the Tories again if brought
back to power without being bound by -
conditions to their more Liberal associates."

than the

specific

We have here, then, pretty correctly explained to
us how the case of Ministers and the Opposition
actually stands. Upon any point on which the
various sections of the Opposition can unite, they
have undoubtedly force enough, and, to spare, to
upset the DERBY Ministry ; for, as a compact whole,
they a/

a decided majority. Upon a negative
question of Reform they could so unite—though not,
perhaps, upon an affirmative one. Upon a question
of confidence they might probably have no difficulty
in doing so. But then would arise, and oppose
them, the objection so discreetly started by Sir JOHN
RAMSDEN at Leeds, when he declared, as we have
that any member who should propose to
dismiss the Ministry, ought to be able to assure the
House that he saw his way to the formation of a
more lasting and stronger Government." Such, we
say, is, at any rate, the problematical difficulty. It
remains to be seen if it is a practical and an
insurmountable one.

shown,