The Sun.
London, England, 1837-11-11 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

The Tory King of Hanover has, by a Royal pro-
clamation, dated the 30th ult., which our readers will
find with the documents connected with it under the
head .6 Hanover," in another column, fairly put an
end to the Constitution of the 26th of September,
1833, granted by his brother King William. The
laws made under this Constitution are to remain in
full force till altered by his Majesty, receiving, how-
ever, such modifications in the administration as nip..y
be deemed necessary and useful by him. By way of
inducement to the people to remain quiet spectators of
this paternal experiment, they are informed by the
King of his resolution of making an annual reduction
of 100,000 thalcrs from the Ist July, 1838, in the
personal taxes and those levied on trades and profes-
sions. King Ernest, having constituted himself sole
judge of the legality of the Constitution of 1833,
has pronounced sentence in his own favour. His
opinion of constitutional restraints on Sovereigns
may be inferred without difficulty from his decla-
ration that " to avoid the annual meetings of the
Estates of the kingdom, which in fact impede the
Government by their long duration, we shall pro-
posed that they shall be convoked only once in three
years, and that their sessions shall then be no longer
pi general than three months." This is very well for
beginning. It may be found that three months
every three years can be dispensed with. King Er-
. nest does not seem to like constitutional impediments.
It remains to he seen whether events will justify the
policy of this bold act of a Tory King. He may have
taken a more accurate measure of German patience
that! foreign journalists have done. The philosophers
and lear;:.% men of Gottingen will not, at all events,
be interrupteul their profound inquiries by the exis-
tence of a popular as:D.1111;1y in their neiolibourhood•
For our part, we rejoice that. :_,or lot has been cast in
a country in which no man may umn:ke constitutions
and laws at his good pleasure. The value o:
arrangements between Sovereigns and their subjects
constitutional matters is certainly much diminished by
this audacious spectacle of a Sovereign telling his
subjects that it is not his good pleasure to respect the
acts of his predecessors. We fear that inferences not
very favourable to Monarchy will be drawn from the
doings of the King of Hanover. The people will say
that Kings are only to be trusted when they have
been deprived of all power to do wrong. The Tories,
we have no doubt, will not be inattentive spectators of
the Hanoverian proceedings. Should Ernest trample
with impunity on the Hanoverian Constitution, they
will say to each other, " After all, why should we take
so much trouble to fight our battles in registration
courts ? Why not take an example from him whom
we so much delighted to honour ? He has shown us
how easy it is to get rid of troublesome Constitutions.
Is it not notorious that the consent of the Peers was
not voluntarily given to the Reform Bill any more than
the consent of the Estates of Hanover was unani-
mously given to the Constitution of 1833 ?"—Morning
Chronicle.

Our attention yesterday was given to the romance of
life : stern fate now brings us back to its more vulgar
business. From the Queen of England our duty
forces us to sink into those regions where dwell and
grovel the agents, not of her pleasure, but her autho-
rity. In the hearts of her Gracious Majesty's sub-
jects, we see where Queen Victoria reigns. In the acts
of her Ministers we discover where she is not con-
suited. The administration of justice "in mercy"
does not mean, according to the spirit of English law,
or to any rational construction of the oath sworn by the
Sovereign, that the reins of justice shall be entirely re-
leased—that the law shall be loosely and indiscreetly
dispensed with—that guilt shall run its course with
absolute impunity—that wrong shall go completely un-
redressed—that the criminal shall remain unpunished,
and the innocent man unprotected—that magistrates
exercising their judicial functions shall be insulted by
the depositaries of political power—and the convict find
in a Minister of State his readiest and most active
accomplice. Lord Mulgrave first set the example
within the United Kingdom of a Viceroy, the imme-
diate representative of the Sovereign, superseding both •
local Magistrates and Judges, and perpetrating whole-
sale gaol deliveries, at the impulse, if not of wild
caprice', of something worse—viz., a low-minded lust
of populivity—of popularity with the lawless, but
earned by the contempt of the wise, and the terror of
our peaceable and unprotected fellow-subjects. The
gaol deliveries of lAA Mulgrave may well be called
the subjugation of law by the encouragement of crime
and anarchy. But it was not to be expected that a
vicious precedent would, under the actual state of
steam communication, be left to fructify in the soil of
Ireland, without transmitting its venom to this country.
The example has, we regret to say, been followed,
and the English Magistracy and English justice
have fallen victims to the Mulgrave disease. We
publish some documents upon this particular sub-
ject, with a view to enlighten our countrymen upon '
the apt scholarship of Lord John Russell under a
pedigoe'ue so illustrious as the Lord Lieutenant of
Ireland, and in the hope that when next the Home Se-
cretary presenta himself, though it should be in the
train of his Royal mistress, to the eyes of any large as-
sembly of the people of England, his reputation as a
" convict's friend' may entitle him to some marks of
public notice, whether favourable or otherwise we shall
not state, but in either case less indicative of thorough and
and scornful neglect, or we might say of utter ignorance
that such things as he and his coileagues existed, than the
mute, vaeue and unbroken apathy manifested by 400,000
or 500,000 of the inhabitants of London, precisely
while these bedizened nobodies, in their gingerbread
official coats, were passing on Thursday last—the So-
vereign, who hojust preceded, and the hero of a hundred
triumphs, who just came after them, being received by
the assembled myriads of sound, honest, and discrimi-
nating Englishmen, with acclamations which rent the
skies. Compared with such a desolating silence, the
testimony of one good hearty hiss, had it been attain-
able, ought to have gladdened the soul of one or all
of those " Do-nothing ers." It would have shown
that they had sufficient pluck or energy to be hated. It
is for those who hate to hiss ; hut the perfectly des-
pised bear with them the surest safeguard against insult.
Their presence is forgotten, even though their history be
not. The facts whereby we hope to rescue the Secretary
for the Home Department from the risk of any such
want of consideration as he suffered in the recent in-
stance, come to us from the county of Northampton,
and from an authority entitled to implicit credit. They
amount to this—that a man, by name Smith, was pro-
secuted before the Magistrates assembled in County
Sessions for .teaming and carrying away the " will of
his deceased father ;" that he was found guilty of that
heinous crime, and sentenced by the unanimous voice
of a Bench of Magistrates, one of whom was Earl
62eneer, to seven years' transportation ; that, without
any sanction from the Bench which had condemned
this culprit, or the slightest consultation with any one
among them, the sentence of seven years' transporta-
tion, which had been passed at the Easter Sessions
of this year, was in the month of June commuted
:Nfulgrave), by virtue of the sole fiat of Lord
John Russell, into three months' imprisonment in the
Millbank Penitentiary, where it was totally unknown
either to the committing Magistrate, Mr. Wilkins,
or to Mr. Cartwright, M.P. for the county, and
Chairman of the Quarter Sessions, until the month of
September following, after Smith (the convict) had
already undergone his visit of brief duration to Mill-
bank, instead of a long one to New South Wales, and
was enjoying himself comfortably in his own dwell-
ing: The application made to Lord John Russell, and
ass.gned as the ostensible cause of this unwarrantable
license assumed by his Lordship in favour of a crimi-
nal, and against the tribunals of the country, proceeded
from a certain Dr. Watson, who had, as appears from
time letters of Mr. Wilkins, the cominittiii Ma eis-
trate, and of Mr. Green, the prosecutor, asserted
things which were the reverse of true, upon which as-
sertions Lord John Russell thought fit to act ; al-
thoueh his Lordship, after being apprised of their
falsdiood, did not think fit to say why he had so
Ale'is,c acted, or to express regret for the gross and palpable
•k-..--:.:/tItertfief which he had committed, or to offer any, the
4"4.r,T5-ingili-s4 apology or explanation, to the Magistrates of
4 county which he had thus outraged ;
,lattempts, so far as can be (messed, to carry
tfiith a high hand, and to depend on the Rev.
- - .
re son's knowledge of the salutary effects of a
,st

three months' incarceration in preference to the solemn
judgment of the Magistracy, that a seven years' ex►le,
►vith hard labour, was no more tha❑ justice requi.:*ed
Lord J. Russell shall hear of this again, we can in-
form him, long before another 9th of No►•ember comes
round.—Tunes.

Ecce iterunz Crispinus ! Sir Francis Burdett has
been again thrusting himself forward with his usual
absurd anxiety to expose the inconsistencies of his
public life, at a meeting which took place at Ashby-
de-la-Zouch on Wednesday. The renegade
.Baronet
performed the first fiddle on the occasion, and wore
his favourite " motley" suit of black and white with
the self-satisfied swagger becoming the most eminent
of apostates. There is a good and evil fame, as Pope
witnesses in the Dunciad, and Sir Francis seems to
think that the " posterior blast of Fame's trumpet is quite
as good for his purpose as the anterior." There was
no performer of note but Sir Francis worth mention-
ing, and the porformance of Sir Francis is itself not
worth mention on the score of any novelty in the
eccentric role of self-contradiction, on which he plumes
himself. In that certainly he is the first actor of the
day. Anything to tickle the sickly craving of his
appetite for notoriety—even though it be of the kind
which Empedocles acquired, or of the character which
Pope conferred and described—
" Sacred to infamy a whole life long,
And the sad burden of some merry song."
His speech consisted of the old gallimatias, which he
has heaped together on sundry late occasions in honour
of those abuses in Church and State against which he
was erewhile so loud-tongued. It contained, however,
two prominent points—lavish adulation of the Duke of
Wellington, and violent denunciation of Mr. O'Con-
nell. The ex-Conservative Premier we shall leave to
the enjoyment of such honours as the right honourable
turn-coat can bellow on those whom he selects for
the infection of his approbation. His abuse of
Mr. O'Connell is a most desirable advantage. It
may be added to the advantageous body of abuse by
which the Hon. and Learned Gentleman, as he latterly
intimated, has been made what he is—by which he has
been artificially invested with the power of serving—
we might say of saving—his native country. Sir
Francis shows his mortification, by dwelling upon
and attempting to reply to the pointed, but true sarcasm
of Mr. O'Connell—that " he is the best abused man
in the country." How does he reply to it ? By raking
up the puddle of the past, and picking out expressions
of an inimical character against some of the individuals
with whom he has since acted, from the course of a
long and indefatigable public life. Those expressions
are fewer than can be laid to the charge of any man
who has been so long before the public as Mr. O'Con-
nell, or who has carried on so incessant a warfare in
behalf of his country as he has. Would Sir Francis
stand so clear if subjected to the same unfairly ri-
gorous ordeal ? Certainly not. There is no man
existing who has been more exuberant of abuse against
his political opponents than himself. Are we to forget
his ancient truculent expressions—such as " bloody
heroes," " Piccadilly butchers," &c. &c. ? Are we
to forget the scornful phrases which he lavished on
Sir Robert Peel, on Wilson Croker, and, in short, on
all the men with whom he now exchanges lickspittle
compliments of reciprocal laudation ? Are we to
forget that he designated them during Mr. Canning's
brief and hi.jlliant Administration, as " obscene bats,'
and " rapacious 'iirds of prey ?" We will take care
that his past vocabulary of vituperation shall not be
forgotten while he uses such unfair weapons of recri-
mination against his present politic:J opponents.
" Clodious accusat Mcechos; Catalina cethegum."

—Morning Advertiser.
Sir Francis Burdett, than whom, as it has been truly
said, no person living more completely realises the no-
tion of " the fine old English gentleman," has lost
nothing of the manly courage, or, as it is popularly
called, " the pluck," which distinguished the patriotic
exertions of his earlier life. He has met the furious
threats of O'Connell against the subscribers to the
election fund for obtaining •‘ justice to Ireland" with
the calm defiance of a man who despises the sordid
agitator's anger as much as he scorns his friendship.
He has taken up the gauntlet thrown down by the Irish
giant who beareth the grim device of the " skull and
cross bones" upon his shield, and defied him to the
combat—a combat for which, we believe, he has no
more predilection than his Scottish henchman, Sir
John Campbell, has to become his shield-bearer in that
affair. Our readers may recollect that O'Connell, in
furious epistle which he indicted to some simpleton
Lord in Ireland, with the view of intimidating the Eng-
lish subscribers to the Irish fund, of whom Sir Francis
Burdett is one, threatened to move the House of Com-
mons to address the Crown to direct the Queen's At-
torney-General to prosecute the said subscribers. Bur-
dett, at a recent meeting of the Conservative Associa-
tion of Ashby de la Zouch, took occasion to advert to
this piece of insolent bravado, and answers it by a de-
claration of his intention to increase his delinquency by
contributing to the fund in every county with which lie
is connected ; and thus to give Lord Melbourne's
counsellor, and the Queen's Attorney-General, work
enough to do if they mean to prosecute the offence, by
exhibiting several instances of premeditated and impe-
nitent guilt in his own person. He adds—" Gentle-
men, I am the more anxious to enter into this sub-
scription, because I have been denounced as a traitor,
and I wish, in all possible ways, to be included in that
charge of conspiracy of which we have recently heard
so much. Mr. Daniel O'Connell talks of moving that
the Attorney-General be instructed to prosecute the
conspirators ; and I do assure you I should feel ex-
tremely distressed if the prosecution were commenced,
and I was not one of the number included in the in-
dictment." There spoke the spirit which in former
days, when fighting the battle of Reform, encountered
and confronted perils from which mock-patriots like
O'Connell always shrink. Having_ succeeded in effect-
ing the restoration of the vitality of the representative
principle in our mixed Constitution, which gives to its
democratic elements all their useful and legitimate power,
Burdett has resolved to do his utmost to strengthen,
consolidate, and preserve the ancient and magnificent
system of civil polity, which he had passed the greater
part of his life in struggling to restore. O'Connell, t hough
no "alien," being a hater of Saxon institutions an: pro-
testant principles, wishes to pull down the whole edi-
fice, beginning with part of the building called the
" House of Lords." The Whig- Ministers of the
Crown, who formerly denounced him as the enemy of
his country, have, ever since the compact of Lichfield
House, felt disposed to indulge him in his desire to
pull to pieces the very freine-work of the Constitution,
in order to make room to erect a Popish despotism
upon a democratic foundation. Burdett, who could
not tolerate an English boroughmonger with some
half-dozen scats in Parliament, naturally opposes him-
self to the monstrous misrule of the demagogue, who
commands 50 or 60 seats by means of priestly terror
aril the flaerant and atrocious intimidation practised
under the skull-and-cross-bones system, of which the
Master of the Ministry was the boastful inventor
Yet he is charged with inconsistency by the Whig-
Radicals, because the practices which he condemned
in English Whigs and Tories, as mischievous and
unconstitutional, he cannot tolerate when carried
to a much more dangerous extent by the great
Irish boroughmonger. So Burdett, who always
advocated what is called "emancipation," is ac-
cused of dereliction of principle, because lie
will not.allow the " emancipated" Roman Catholics
to enslave time Protestants. But in firmly and deter-
minately resisting the ambitious schemes and insolent
demands of the Popish priests and O'Connell, the pa-
triot Member for North kViltshhe proves the inflexi-
bility of his attachment, under all circumstances, to
purity of election, and the great principles of religious
tolerance and constitutional liberty. Burdett only ex-
presses the sentiments which are felt by all high-
minded Englishmen, be they rich or poor, when he
alludes to the connection between O'Connell and the
Ministry in language of indignation and disgust.
" This Mr. O'Connell, it seemed (said the Worthy
Baronet), now ruled the roast, and an Engliah Admi-
nistration stooped their necks to be trod upon by this
Daniel O'Connell." " The country," he emphati-
cally declared, " will never bear this ; but, be it as it
may, the part of every honest man and every Eng-
lishman is to stand by the Constitution of the
country, and be determined, at least, that it shall
not he ruined by such a councillor as O'Connel.
It was really disgraceful that the name of this man

. _
should be so often in their mouths, and he was per-
fectly satisfied, if it had not been for the Ministers,
Mr. Daniel O'Connell was a bubble that would burst
of itself." The cowipact of LiAfitil House, and the
degrading submission of the Whigs to the yoke of the
man whom they had proscribed as a public enemy in
the Speech from the Throne, taa.% e the tax-levying
tribute-monger an importance which he never before
possessed. That importance, and the sweets of the
Irish patronage, transferred to him by his Whig vas-
sals, he will make a desperate snuggle to preserve ;
but buoyant though he may continue to be for some
time, upon the tide of popular delusion in Ireland, he
has gone so far in the intoxication of his apparent suc-
cess, and the insolence of his vanity, that a spirit
has been awakened in this country which will most as-
suredly stop his further progress, and become daily
more powerful, until the endangered institutions of
the country, with which are associated the most glo-
rious recollections of British patriotism, shall have
been placed beyond peril by his political extinction.
Then, and then only, will there be a chance of any
real amelioration of the wretched state of Ireland.—
Morning Herald.

Three proclamations, just issued by the King of
Hanover, are given in another part of this day's pub-
lication. It appears by the first that Ernest has come
to the determination of dissolving the States, his de-
cree being unqualified in that respect. By the
second the Ministers are dismissed as Members of the
Cabinet, though they still retain their respective de-
partments in the Administration. They are no longer
to be considered as the responsible advisers of the
Crown ; but the manner in which their services are
dispensed with is the most courteous possible. They
are "in gnaden entlassen," dismissed with grace.
The third proclamation contains the reasons which
induced the King to proceed to extreme measures.
It declares that when the States were called into
existence by the patent of 1819 they drew up a memo-
rial on the subject of a Constitution, and laid it
down as a fixed principle that the establishment of
a fundamental law must be the result of a unanimous
cooperation between the King and the States. That
principle wasjviolated in the fundamental law of 1833,
inasmuch as many suggestions offered by the States
were rejected by the Sovereign. The Constitution,
therefore, did not result from the unanimous co-opera-
tion of the King and the States. To these reasons
Ernest adds another, personal to himself, and he con-
tends that not only was the Constitution invalid by
the manner of its proclamation, but because it vio-
lated his rights as Agnate and Sovereign. The do-
cument then declares that the Constitution of 1833 is
extinguished, " erloschen," and that the Constitution
previously established returns into force subject to such
modifications as the King may propose. A sketch of
those modifications is embodied in the patent.—
Morning Post.