The Sun.
London, England, 1855-02-02 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

THE MINISTERTAL CRISIS.
• (Front the Times of ail; day.)

tatives supporting him and his policy, even though the
greatest person in the realm should unfortunately be prepos-
sessed against him. George 111. was long allowed to exeludo
Fox from power because he hated him ; George Iv. was long
allowed to deny Canning his deserved position, because he
hated him; but, even in times when the power of the people
was less, these eminently obstinate monarchs were at last Com-
Paled to receive as ministers the men they disliked. Now that
the people know their, rightsl3ettcr, and are in a better condition
to assert thorn, the exclusion of a sagacious and patriotic states.
man from office, in deference to the personal feelings of the
monarch, would not be tolerated for an instant. This is said
not in behalf of Lord John Russell, or any other individual,
but as a truth of universal application, which Court butter-
flies, and intriguers hackneyed in the ways of office, will do
well to lay to heart.

(From the Morning Herald of this day.)
Once more an obstacle is interposed to prevent the people
of England from obtaining what they have shown their full
determination to obtain—namely, a strong and united Ad-
ministration—united in its determination to carry on the
war against the domination of Russia, and strong in the all
but unanimous support of the British people.
This obstacle has been interposed at a moment critical be-
yond all former precedent—critical to the safety of. the state
—critical to the honour of the nation, and, above all, critical
to the salvation of our army now perishing upon the frozen
heights of Sebastopol. This obstacle it is necessary that the
nation should be aware has been interposed, if not by, at
least for the benefit of, a portion of that degraded faction
which the unparalleled and overwhelming majority of one
hundred and fifty seven has already driven with obloquy from
the councils of the Queen.

It was bad enough that Lord Derby felt himself coerced
by the emergency of the crisis to seek the aid of one who
has for two long years been the coadjutor, if not the
councillor,' of the men whose terrible crimes have occa-
sioned the present condition of the empire. We can well
' conceive, hoWever, that Lord Derby made vast allowances
for the position in which the-individual to whom we allude
was placed, seeing the vital emergency which required the
speedy—nay, the instant—formation of a Ministry able and
willing to save the remnant of our troops, to restore the
honour of England in the eyes of the world, and to rescue the
Sovereign from the fearful situation of appearing to her people
as attempting to rescue a Ministry upon which the country
has now placed its brand and its seal of reprobation.
Such we conceive to have been the motives which induced
Lord Derby to require the assistance of a man to whom many
of his followers felt strong repugnance and valid objections;
but what are we to think of the conduct of the individual to
,whom such an opportunity had been afforded of exhibiting
the highest patriotism, if ho dared to turn it to the purpose
of giving obstruction to the endeavours which an invincible
sense of duty alone could have induced Lord Derby to make,
by dragging again into the councils of our Queen persons
who within a very few days have been specially ejected
from them by the overpowering force of public opinion ?
Nay, if we have heard aright, this individual absolutely
wished t. condition for placing at the head of the War ad-
ministration a nobleman more obnoxious as an administrator
to both Soldiers and officers than any other person who holds
a seat in the Legislature.
The facts to which we have referred are so currently and
confidently asserted that wo feel ourselves bound to comment
upon them, although we still hope that no Englishman could
so far forget his duty to his country, his Sovereign, and the
army, for such a purpose to interrupt arrangements absolutely
necessary to the welfare of all three.
There is no use in concealing names. The nobleman, whom
rumour asserts to have acted as we described, is Lord Pal_
merston. The individuals belonging to the Peelite section
whom he is said to have wished to attach to himself for the
purpose of—disguise it as ho might, such was the fact—,
weakening Lord Derby's Administration were Mr. Gladstone
and Mr. Sidney Herbert ; whilst another, whom we 'cannot
suppose our readers have not already recognised from our de-
scription, is the conciliating, the practicable, and success-
ful administrator, Earl Grey, who, iu the Home-office as a
subordinate, in the War and the Colonial Departments whore
ho was dominant, accumulated an unparalleled amount of
mismangement and actual disaster upon every transaction
in which it was his fortune to be engaged.
We will not affront the Earl of Derby by the supposition
that he for one moment could have hesitated about the ac-
ceptance of such propositions, involving, as they did, insult
to the memory of our sacrificed soldiers --insult to the people
who bad declared their abhorrence of those who had offered
up the holocaust—and insult to the Sovereign whose earnest
wish to acquire the aid of a firm and popular Administration
has been threatened for the moment by a heartless and pro-
fligate intrigue.
We conclude by asserting, that without the aid of any one
of the individuals we have alluded to, Lord Derby has the
most ample means within his grasp of forming an Adminis-
tration powerful, able, united, and capable of commanding
thoroughly the aid of a sufficient number of members to
set faction at defiance, even in the present House of Com-
mons, relying, as lie may do, upon the undoubted fact,
that, if driven to a dissolution, he will receive the hearty sup-
Port of the nation in carrying on the people's war.
On this great truth, however, the person whose duty it
may be finally to form an Administration may rely—the taint
of Peelism in his Cabinet will be fatal to it. With regard to
Lord Palmerston, we warn him, that while the original con-
struction of the Coalition was disgraceful to the individuals
who formed, and degrading to the nation that brooked
it, even for a time, the attempt to re-construct it by dove-
tailing and patching together the rottenest portion of the
now happily shattered mosaic, will bring down upon his head
the wrath of au aroused pebple. And to Lord Derby we may
say, that admitting for one moment the absurd supposition
that he could clasp the hands red with the blood of our
army, and take the Peelites to his councils, he would by that
mere act utterly destroy the party which is still proud to
hail him as their chief, but of whom the great majority will
never, under any circumstances, degrade themselves by sit-
ting on the same benches with Mr. Gladstone and his accom-
plices.

(Front tke Morning Post of this day.)
The public will learn without surprise that the Earl of
Derby has declined to form an Administration, and that
Lord Lansdowne has been summoned to Windsor. It may

therefore be safely surmised that the overwhelming force of
public opinion hag carried the day, and that a Ministry will
ar-o'nee be refined, 'of which Lord Palmerston's name will bo

the guarauteo to the nation.

In this result the country at

large will sincerely rejoice, while}, our Allies and our enemies

will look upon it as the certain indication of a most vigorous

and thoronghly:English policy.

Such an issue was disiinctly

foreseen by all persons practically acquainted with public
affairs. Some, indeed, were surprised that the leader of the
country party should have been sent for by her Majesty ; but
a reference to the division list of Monday night will showthat
it was the large preponderance of the Derby party that gave
such exceeding weight and breadth to the censure
beneath which the Aberdeen Ministry fell to the
groimd. Lord Lansdowne and Lord Palmeritollir,the
only other names that have been canvassed as likely
to have been sent for—lay under a technical though
not real disability, because they were members- of the con-
demned Cabinet. However strongly, therefore, her Majesty
might feel that probabilities were against Lord Derby's suc-
cess, there existed the strongest grounds why the ohance,
such as it was, should be accorded to him and his followers.
He has tried his best and failed. This result materially sim-
plifies the crisis. It leaves the large body of the Conserva-
tives at liberty to accord an independent support to the in-
coming Ministry. They will feel that no injustice has been
done to their leader or themselves, that they have had their
turn, but have not been strong enough to take it, and that,
consequently, any, attempt to-impede the success of the ‘ii-
nister who may be able to form a Cabinet would be factious,
undignified, and unpatriotic.
The presumptive evidence has all along been against Lord
Derby's success. His ownparty was not strong enough, either
in numbers or official ability. He must either have brought
in old colleagues, many of whom have already been tried
and found wanting, arid whose presence would have sunk his
ship in the very first storm that might blow over the often-
troubled waters of the House of Commons ; or he must have
enlisted a long line of recruits—raw men, as far as office is
coricerned, which would have been a still worse alternative.
The only Ministry that can or ought to stand at this moment
is one that is obviously and demonstrably capable in the eyes
of the country. It must bo incontestably strong in these
particulars, at the least—in its Head ;in its War Minister;
in its Foreign Secretary ; and in its Chancellor of the Exche-
quer :to which we may add this sine qua non—it must com-
mand the.cordial confidence of our Allies. The material of
such h Ministry it "%vas impossible for Lord Derby to find in
the ranks of his own party. His only chance lay in a coali-
tion. With the co-operation of certain known and tried men,
be might have succeeded. The names of Palmerston, Claren-
don, and Gladstone would have saved his Ministry.
But we do not want a three-legged Cabinet which stands upon
the redeeming qualities of a few undeniable men. We want
a Ministry that in all its parts—head, body, and members—
is one; coherent and co-operative —that stands upon its own
merits, and needs not to quote the pre-eminent qualifications
of one portion as a set-off against the obvious incapability of
the other. A Government so constituted might last for a
while, but it must eventually fall as a whole before some
violent opposition, provoked by the shortcomings of parti-
cular portions. The mischief of such falls is, that the
innocent go down with the guilty, tbe competent with
the incompetent, and the country becomes deprived of the
services of her great mon through the incapacity of her
lesser ones. A coalition of able men; differing in many
patfticulars from one another but consenting to act together
with cordial unanimity for the obvious geed of the country,
has a priori everything patriotic to recommend it. A coali-
tion between capables and incapables must be short-lived.
Yet that was the only kind of coalition Lord Derby could
have concocted, and, unhappily for him, the incapacity would
have been almost entirely amongst his own friends. He
could not, therefore, hope to succeed, however patriotically
he might have been disposed to waive all personal questions
and private feelings, and, uniting with those from whom
he is often dissOciated, to devote his unflagging-industry
and brilliant powers to the public service. But he did
right to try, and it is more his misfortune than his fault
that he has not succeeded. But his failure is no misfor-
tune to the country. Better a thousand times that he, or
any other Statesman, should fail in forming an Adminis-
tration, than, having formed one, to fail some short time
hence in carrying his measures. We have already said, and
we repeat it, that the Cabinet now to be formed must be
formed with a view to an existence at the least conterminous
with the war, so far as anything human can be so made. It
must see its way clearly through the intricacies of the present
perplexities, right forward _to their disentanglement, to the
strengthening of what has been proved to be weak, to the ad-
justment of what has been proved to be disorganised, and to
the surmounting of those obstacles which have stood in the
way of the success of its predecessors.
Let us hope that a Palmerston Administration may, in
accordance with prophetic • public feeling, . achieve all this.
There's much virtue in a name, for it presents to the mind the
long chain of antecedents which illustrate its owner ; and how-
ever sincere in his desires for peace the excellent Earl of
Aberdeen, however patriotic and experienced Lord Derby,
there is in that one word Palmerston a magic influence with
which none can compare, and which speaks, in its world-wide
fame, of the most glorious days of British foreign policy,
which revives the • memories of William Pitt and George
Canning, and which is identified in Persia, on the Caucasus,
at Alexandria, 'at Athens, or at Constantinople, as at St.
Petersburg; Vienna, or Berlin, in America, In France, or in
England, with the highest principles of liberal progress and
constitutional liberty, and, above all, with the duo influence'
of England, and the prodigious interests of her vast empire.
(From the Morning Chronicle of this day.)
Lord Derby has acted wisely and patriotically. On finding
that he could not form such a Government as he conscien-
tiously deemed equal to the emergency, he at onto abandoned
the task with which her Majesty had entrusted him. It now
remains to be seen whether Lord Lansdowne or Lord Palmer-
ston will meet with a more favourable reception from our
leading and tried statesmen. We only know of one who,
from position or influence, can or will throw any impediment
in their way, and this we deeply regret for many reasons.
Public morality 'has fallen to so low au ebb, and so many
political reputations have been wrecked of late years, that
Lord John Russell's last escapade, independently of its more
direct effects on our foreign and domestic relations, may be
regarded as a national misfortune'. He must have acted
under some extraordinary hallucination, or he could hardly
have failed to anticipate the judgment which would be passed
urea such conduct, even without the itid of the corresrond-

_

ence which was read by the Duke of Newcastle last evening,
and of his Grace's lucid statement and conclusive vindication.
Lord John Russell's most zealous advocates now admit that
he must be content to do penance for a period. The only
I mode of recovering, in some degree, the esteem aud
confi-
dence of his friends, would be for him to repudiate at
once all notion of an immediate return to office, avow an
intention to give a cordial support to the besl 'Govern-
ment that can be formed ou a Liberal or Liberal-Con-
servative basis, and honestly exert his influence with
his remaining followers to do the same. Mr. Staftbrd has
flung his Admiralty peccadilloes into the back ground
by his mission of charity to Scutari, and by his touch-
ing and simple narrative of what he did and saw. Lord John
Russell would do well to imitate his example ; and it would
be for the public service if he could persuade Mr. Disraeli to
pair off with him for the remainder of the session and go too.
The main obstacle to the satisfactory solution of the Minis-
terial problem would be thus removed ; and a stable Admin-
istration might be constructed' with comparative ease. The
sooner the arrangements are completed, and the fewer the
changes, the better ; for an infinity of misohisf might ensue
from a prolongation of the crisis, or from the delay and con-
fusion that might result from the shifting of posts, or from
the introduction of a number of new hands. At the same
time, occasion might be taken to rectify some errors that
wore committed, and some injustice that was unwittingly
done, in the formation of Lord Aberdeen's Government. Thus
Sir William Molesworth should be removed to au office in
which his profound knowledge and admirably-trained mind
could be turned to account ; and Mr. Charles Villiers' claims,
as the enlightened champion of free-trade principles, should
be more suitably recognised than by continuing him in the
post of Judge Advocate. _ .

Others (Mr. Henry Fitzroy and Lord Elcho, for example)
accepted' places in Lord Aberdeen's Ministry confessedly
inferior to their well-founded pretensions, but it is one
obvious advantage of a coalition Government that the in-
ferior offices are filled by a higher class of men than in a
pure Whig or pure Tory one. Indeed this is the very cir-
cumstance that excites the ire of disappointed aspirants like
Mr. Rich. ' There will be a terrible outcry," wrote Wind-
ham, in reference to a projected broad-bottom Ministry,
" amongst the smaller fry on both sides. When two large
bodies come together, the insects on the surface must be
crushed." Malcontents of this description received a tole-
rably broad hint from Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, who was loudly
cheered when he thus pointedly replied to Lord John Rus-
sell :—" The noble lord the member for London, on Friday
last attempted, not triumphantly, to vindicate the Whigs
from the charge of being an exclusive party that required
all power for itself ; and he found a solitary instance for the
refutation of that charge in the magnanimity with which the
Whigs had consented to that division of power which his de-
sertion now recants and condemns. But, in plain words,
his vindication only amounts to this, that where the Whigs
could not get all the poiek, they reluctantly consented to
accept ha'.f." _ _

What with Liberal-Conservative and Liberal claimants, the
Whigs Proper must henceforth content themselves with such
a share of power, great or small, as they can command •by
their talents and their public services ; nor will they have
any reason to complain of being put upon short allowance;
so long as they are represented by so many eminently distin-
guished and tried friends of civil and religious liberty. But
it is utterly impossible, we repeat, for any durable Ministry to
be constructed, except on a coalition basis; and there is no
fear that one of Lord Lansdowne's or Lord Palmerston's
making will bo open to the same objection as the last. It is
prepostereus to accuse Lord Aberdeen of weakness because he
could not, by a mere exercise of volition, compel unanisaity
between statesmen of co-equal authority, two of whom had
claims on the Premiership ; and before Lord Palmerston can
be exposed to the same trial, his Cabinet must include both
Lord John Russell and Lord Aberdeen.
That a Liberal-Conservative Government under Lord
Palmerston, with Lord Grey as Secretary of War, and Mr.
Gladstone as Chancellor of the Exchequer, would receive the
support of the House of Commons, wo entertain no doubt
whatever. The division on Mr. Roebuck's motion was merely
the echo of the senseless popular outcry against Lord Aber-
deen and the Duke of Newcastle, and, so far as the Liberal
portion of the majority are concerned, it may be considered
as a declaration in favour of the noble Viscount. If, how-
ever, this House of Commons, which was elected under Lord
Derby's auspices and through W. B.'s instrumentality, should
prove factious or unmanageable, a dissolution is the obvious
remedy; and a bold appeal to the constituencies would effec-
tually prevent either Lord John Russell, Mr. Disraeli, or Mr.
Bright, from upsetting or embarrassing a Ministry honestly
bent on the vigorous prosecution of the war for the attainment
of an honourable peace.

(From the Morning Advertiser of this day.)

So then the attempt of Lord Derby to form a new Adminis-
tration has signally failed. The humiliating announcement
was made last night by the Noble Lord himself, in his place in
Parliament. We congratulate the country upon the fact. It
would• have been a great misfortune for the nation had we
witnessed the advent of a Derby Administration at such a
crisis as the present. Wo congratulate the Queen, no less
cordially than the country, on the abortive attempt of the
Noble Lord to form a new Government. Her interests, we
need not says are identical with those of her subjects—and if
she, have enlightened and faithful counsellors around her
throne, they will not fail to impress this great truth unceas-
ingly on her mind.
And now that all hope has vanished of tho formation of a
Derby Cabinet, we repeat, what we have so often said, for a
long time past, that Lord Pahneraton is the man, and the
only man, for the Premiership.
In the earnest hope that ho may not be induced, by either
the wishes of those in high quarters, or the solicitations of
private friends, to repeat substantially the error he committed
on a former occasion, we adjure Lord Palmerston to remember,
that it is to his too ready compliance, on a former occasion,
with the wishes expressed by the Court, that he would rejoin
the Aberdeen Administration, after he had seceded from it,
that we are indirectly to ascribe all those evils which have
resulted flora the mismanagement of the war by the Coalition.
His duty plainly was not to return—no matter by. whom
asked to do so—to that imbecile Cabinet. Had he persisted
in his resolution not to reunite himself to Lord Aberbeen's
Government, that Government would have inevitably perished,
and the country have been spared all that miserable incapa-
city, and that crimin:4 neglect, which have well nigh annihi-
lated one of the most-gallant and finest armies the world over
saw.

It is right Lord Palmerston should be reminded that he has
thus incurred the awful responsibility of being, indirectly, a
party to all that has happened in the Crimea. And will ho
be prepared to add to a load of responsibility already, it
might be supposed, too heavy to be borne, by repeating, as
we have said, substantially the gigantic error he committed
in December, 1853 1 If he joins any incompetent Ministry
just now, and enables suck a Ministry to exist, and conse-
quently to do mischief, he will thereby do deliberate violence
to humanity, morality, patriotism, and constitutional prin-
ciples. Without him no Government can at present b,
formed, and therefore he is bound by the highest and holiest
Obligations which can influence the mind, to. keep reso-
lutely aloof from all Ministerial combinations, no matter
by whom made. He can by that means compel those in
high places to confide to himself the task of constructing
a new Cabinet. These are not times for -the practise
of any false delicacy. If others above him have claims
on his loyalty and devotion, he has also claims on their con-
sideration. The obligations and the duties are reciprocal.
He is bound to have a regard for his own character. No
man is to be expected to sacrifice his character to please
any one. But above and beyond all, Lord Palmerston is
bound to recollect what are the claims which his country has
upon him at this crisis.
The claims of country are paramount to all others, and
must not be sacrificed to personal or private considerations,
no matter of what kind. In countries like ours, which are
governed on constitutional principles, the people are not
made for monarchs, but monarchs for the people. It were
well for all our Ministers of State were they never to become
oblivious of this great principle of the British Constitu-

tion. The important truth must bo proclaimed by the press
with greater force and frequency than ever—more espe-
cially when our representatives shrink from the discharge
of the duty—that the people are the source of all-legitimate
power. If this principle had been inculcated in Parliament in

the way in which it ought to have been by those whom we have
sent to that assembly to represent our principles, there would
not now be that unwillingness which all deplore, in one branch
of the Constitution, to confide to the man, to whom every
one points as the fittest person for the purpose, the task of
forming a new Administration.

The time, we reppat, has come when an independent press
must no longer mince its words. We feel that at such a crisis
as the present it is our duty to express ourselves in language
about which there can be no mistake. We repeat then, with
regard, to Lord Palmerston, that he is bound alike by the ob-
ligations which he owes to the country and to himself not to
accept of any secondary office in a now Ministry. Not only
has he personal claims of paramount urgency to the position
of Premier, bUt the dictates of an enlightened patriotism sug-
gest that he should not rest satisfied with any subordinate
place in Downing-street. It is only as the head of the Go-
vernment that he can render effectual service to his country
at this momentous juncture. • With another Prime Minister
he would not be a free agent. It is only as Premier that his
great administrative capacity, his hostility to Continental
absolutism, and his ardent patriotism, could be exhibited
with effect.

Lord Palmerston ought to have been Premier long ago.
And but for his excessive good nature, and his generous
anxiety to please others, ho would have been Premier in De-
Camber, 185-3, when-ho seceded from the Government of Lord
Aberdeen. Our earnest advice to Lord ralmerston at that
time was, not to listen to the counsels a-id entreaties of those
who urged his return to the Home-office ; for we felt as tho-
roughly convinced as if the contingency had been already an
actual fact, that, had he only refused to join the Aberdeen
Administration, it would not only, before ten or twelve days
had elapsed, have fallen to pieces, but that he would have
received the commands of the Queen to form a new ono in its
stead. Lord Palmerston is again out of dice. Let him re-
solutely resist all efforts to coerce or to cajole him into the
resumption of any seat in the Cabinet, of her than that which
appertains to the Premiership ; and before many days have
elapsed all personal prejudices against the noble lord—no
matter in what quarter they may exist—will be made, by the
force of circumstances, to give way to the universally and
energetically-expressed wishes of the country, that the reins
of power be committed to his hands, in order that he may
' guide us through a crisis the most momentous which ever. oc-
curred in the history of Britain.

(From the Daily News of this day,)
Lord Aberdeen's
statement in the House of Lords last night,
late administration, and Lord Derby's announce-
.e to form another, will doubtless be read
regardingeiioti•od fhis
sh failui
announce-
ment
more interest by the public at large than they were list-
ened to by those who were present on the occasion. Nothing
very new or very striking was expected by those who have
been accustomed to hear the discourses of the ex-Premier ;
and most of those who crowded the galleries and the bar of
the House of Peers last night had previoualy learned from
various sources that the mission of Lord Derby was, at least
for the time, at an end. Beyond the formal avowal of this
fact, the Tory leader's speech contained nothing of any signi-
ficance or importance. He made his hearers laugh more than
once indeed, at the expense of the out-going Ministers, ' and
entered a general demurrer to the eulogy pronounced by Lord
Aberdeen on the success of his policy and the prosperity of
the nation. But neither from the Premier that was, nor from
the Premier that many believed was to be, did a thought or a
sentiment fall, upon an occasion sufficiently suggestive, which
any one will be able to recollect if he should try a week
hence.

In truth, however, it was not the expectation of anything
of the sort that filled the house last evening at an early hour.
Something much more racy and provocative to the jaded ap-
petite for Parliamentary discussion than Ministerial declara-
tions, whether ponderous or jaunty, had drawn together an
unusual concourse of senators, fair ladies, political fops, and
critics and gossips of every degree. The Duke of Newcastle,
it was understood, had undertaken not only to defend himself
against the imputation of having by his incapacity brought
obloquy and ruin en the Cabinet of which he was a member,
but, as his friends gave out, he was, by the reading of private
letters, and the disclosure of private conversations, to blast
for ever Lord John Russell's character for manliness, veracity,
• and honour. A morning contemporary, whose diligent and
untiring rancour against the late President of the Council has
never been concealed, strove hard, with its customary love of
fair-play, to prepare the public mind beforehand for the belief
of any tale of treachery or tergiversation which might be told to
the Peers. Conuneuting on a fiubstautially unfair, thoughliter-

.