Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-06-26 00:00:00

the effect would be to lower the whole position, and, in
fact, depress the whole focus of that commercial power,
which has been in connection witba- corresponding power
in various parts- of the country—constituting a much
higher element than the manufacturing interests of the
country. They might have a dozen- Manchesters—they
would not have a second Liverpool. The manufacturing
bodies had sufficient scope before them for strength and
authority in their own sphere, but if it should please
Providence to make Manchester a seaport, let it be so.
But to found upon injustice, and to proceed, by agitation,
to put down a rival whom they could not help admiring,
while they could not love him, was a process neither
creditable to Manchester nor likely to suit, in any degree,
any constitutional politician who was willing, under the
nature and force of circumstances and the development of
time, that hoary institution should acquire a status in the
balance of power, but who would never lend himself to
destroy such a monument of our national greatness as the
port of Liverpool, the fall of which threatened unspeakable
disaster to the commercial world generally. Having
thanked the committee for their patient hearing. counsel
retired.
The committee then rose.
THURSDAY.
The Committee re-assembled at half-past twelve o'clock
this morning, Sir James Graham in the chair.
Mr. CALVERT, Q.C., at once proceeded to address the
committee on behalf of the promoters of the bill. He
regretted that the task of replying had devolved upon him
in the unavoidable absence of Mr. Sergeant Wrangham,
and said that it would be his object to deal with the several
matters before the committee as concisely and distinctly
as possible. In the first instance, in reference to a large
portion of the speech of Mr. Hope Scott, he did not intend
to address the committee—because that it did not appear to
him that it was any part of his business to inquire wt ether
or not it was an advantageous system that the Board of
Trade should make reports to the House of Commons, and
still less was it part of his province to criticise the opinions
of great statesmen—among others Sir Robert Peel
upon arrangements of this character. On the
contrary, he intended to deal with the system as
he found it ; and he found it a regular system, fully
established, by which reports of this nature were presented
to the House of Commons, under the direction and
authority of the House, and under the idea that they would
assist the House and its committee in arriving at a safe
and wholesome conclusion upon matters brought before
r them Or deliberation and inquiry. He thought that the
question (how far these reports were desirable) was more
a question for the discussion of honourable members than
for argument at the bar of the house. Indeed, it had
almost appeared that his learned friend (Mr. Hope Scott)
was under the impression that he was addressing that
assembly of which, at same future day, he would probably
be a distinguished ornament, and that he was discussing
the propriety of sanctioning the issue of these reports.
When he (Mr. Calvert) had seen the formidable pile of
papers which had come from his learned friend's bag,
the impression had struck him that the speech
and the debate upon the same question last year
originated from the same quarter, and that those who
had prompted his learned friend, after having been defeated
in one quarter, had taken advantage of a new opportunity
for ,discharging their vollies of indignation in another.
Without entering further upon the question of the Board
of Trace Reports, he would simply remind the committee
that he appeared before them upon the evidence to which
his learned friend had alluded ; and, he believed, before
his remarks were brought to a close, that he should be
able to satisfy the committee, upon the evidence now
before them, that the question they were called on to
decide, namely, whether it was fit and proper that the
Liverpool authorities should have the exclusive govern-
ment of the Mersey, was one which it was impossib'e
that the committee could decide, in conformity
with the wishes of those Liverpool authorities.
In the first place he wished to call attention to a question
adverted to by his learned friend, which was pertinent to
the enquiry in connection with the debates in the House
of Commons, namely, whether the subject was a fit subject
for legislation by means of a private bill. Mr Hope
Scott had seemed to think it a hard case upon his clients,
that, at one time, a public bill should be introduced, and
that at another the question should be referred to a select
committee. He (Mr. Calvert) contended that it was
greatly for the benefiit of Liverpool that the matter shculd
be referred to a select committee, with power partly
judicial, and partly legislative, so that all the circumstances
of the case might be fully inquired into, and the particular
arguments in frvour of the Corporation be brought before
an unprejudiced tribunal. The learned counsel then pro-
ceeded to reply to the speech of Mr. Hope Scott, in refe-
ference to the conduct of the Great Western Railway
Company, and Mr. Saunders, their secretary. Mr.
Saunders stated that in 1855, an assurance was given bfthe
Corporation of Liverpool, that the scheme of Mr Bendel,
substantially should be carried out, and on the other hand
two gentlemn had been called, men of high honour and
equei veracity to Mr. Saunders, for the purpose of disputing
that,etatement. It was a matter of considerable
importance to Mr. Saunders, that this matter
shoteld.., be. set right, and he believed that when
he should have gone through the evidence of Mr. Tobin
and Mr. Bold, he should have established, to the satisfac-
tion of the committee, that the statement of Mr. Saunders
was strictly and perfectly true. Mr. Calvert then pro-
ceed to read extracts from the evidence, when he was
interrupted by
Sir JAMES Giuliani, who begged to remind the learned
counsel that upon the first day when Mr. Hope Scott
addressed the committee, before he had fully considered
the whole of the evidence, he appeared disposed to con-
sider the contradiction as very direct ; but on the second
day, Mr. Hope Scott modified his opinion, and was evi-
dently of impression that the contradiction was no so
direct. They were all honourable men, Mr. Saunders on
the one hand, and Mr. Tobin and Mr. Bold on the other,
and it was quite clear that in a conversation that took
place two years ago, some misconception had arisen. In
his (Sir J. Graham's) opinion, a great deal turned upon
so narrow a point as the expression, " a low water basin,"
and "the low water basin," the latter expression convey-
ing the adoption of Mr. Rendel's plan, and the former
those of Mr. Hartley. He did not think that Mr. Hops
Scott intended to charge Mr. Saunders with direct mis-
representation, nor did he believe that there had been
any intentional misrepresentation on either side. The
statement of both parties was quite reconcilable with the
existence of a misunderstanding. In his (Sir J. Graham's)
opinion the honor of all parties was perfectly intact.
Mr. MEREWETIIER, Q.C., said he belived that Mr. Hone
Scott had no intention of impugning the honor of Mr.
Saunders—but, his only object was to show that he was
mistaken in the impressions which he appeared to entertain
in regard to the understanding upon which the Great
Western Company agreed to support the bill of 1855.
Mr. CALVERT then continued his address. He denied
the charge Mr. Hope Scott had preferred against the Great
Western Company, of having, for some private and
personal motives, pursued a course in opposition to that
which they had taken in 1855, and which, if successful,
would end in the destruction of the port of Liverpool. The
assertion, he said, was altogether erroneous, and he believed
he should be able to satisfy the Committee, from the evi-
dence already before them, that the statement of his learned
friend had a tendency, though perhaps unintentional, to
mislead the Committee. The learned counsel then quoted
the evidence at considerable length. with a view of
showing that the Great Western Company had not
acted from personal motives, but that they had
taken a course which they believed would be for
the advantage of the public as well as of themselves.
He next contended that Liverpool had acted in the teeth
of the act of Parliament by not completing the docks, com-
mencing the works in September, 1856, the Committee
having refused to alter the plans of Mr. Rendel. The
Liverpool Corporation were at the mercy of Parliament,
or of any one else who chose to take proceedings against
them, for they were acting in defiance of their engagement
every day they were negotiating with the railway com
peeks. Moreover he begged the committee to remember
that at that very moment the Corporation and the Dock
Trust too were defying the Legislature s and certainly it
did not lie in their mouths to call in question the conduct
the Great Western Railway Company were pursuing when
they were trying to. deliver that Corporation from the
scrape into which they had got. And,now he came to the
general system of resistance to this. bill. It seemed to be
thought by the opponents of the bill that its promoters
entertained the impression that the Corporation of Liver
pool were open to censure as regarded the government of
Liverpool. Nothing of the kindwas hinted at. The promoters
of the bill did not wish to take from them any credit which
they might enjoy. Far from it, They entertained no sort
of ill feeling towards Liverpool. Their interests were
bound up together. The prosperity of Liverpool and that
of Manchester would go hand in hand together, and cer-
tainly those who were promoting the bill had no idea of
speaking disparagingly of the authorities at Liverpool in
respect of their government of the Liverpool town. But
the question now was not the government of Liverpool
town, or of Liverpool port ; the question was one of a
totally different description. On one side of the Mersey
was a rising port, with altogether a different physical
capacity to that of Liverpool, and the promoters therefore
said, " Don't put under the authority of Liverpool another
town which would give far
greater advantages to the public
at large than those which nature had supplied on the
Liverpool side of the water." They did not suggest
for one moment that any of the honourable men
who were at the head of the Liverpool board
deriving one tittle of pecuniary advantage for their ser
vices ; the; knew that no pecuniary benefit accrued to
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