The Sun.
London, England, 1837-08-08 00:00:00

TEIE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY, AUGUST 8, 1837

Were the constituencies, even with the present li-
mited franchise, left to the unbiassed exercise of
their own free-will, we would stake our existence
that there would not be one hundred Tories elected
to the 1-buse of Commons. Let any party in the
next Session of Parliament proceed on the suppo-
sition of a re-action having taken place in the public
mind, mid the mistake will be speedily corrected by
more indubitable demonstrations than even the result
of elections ; but this vporiment would be dangerous,
and had better not be tried. The losses of the Re-
formers arc in almost all instances to be traced to the
want of the ballot. Upwards of fifty rejected Reform
candidates owe their defeat to the want of this protec-
tion, and the operation in the counties of the Chandos
clause of the Reform Act. These evils must be looked
to and corrected in the ensuing Session. Ireland and
Scotland, however, arc nobly battling for the great
cause of British freedom. Scotland has already re-
turned thirty-six Reformers, and only eight Tories.
Ireland has as yet returned but five Tories and twenty
Reformers, having but one Reformer displaced by a
Tory, and six Tories displaced by Reformers. These
ate glorious indications of a triumphant result in these
portions of the empire ; let them but progress as they
have begun, and even with the partial advantages
gained in the English counties, the Tories will have
lint little cause of congratulation in the general result
of the elections.—Aforning Advertiser.

To every reflecting politician the question must
now occur, " How is the Queen's Government to he
carried on ? " Except some few people here and
there, who are perfectly crazy, and laughed at by all
who listen to them—the whole country admits that
in the general election the Ministerial, party has sig-
nally failed. No profligacy of misrepresentation can
make head against that general conviction. For two
years the Ministers struggled on, doing little or no-
thing, and always excusing themselves on the ground
that the Parliament was Sir R. Peel's Parliament,
and that, the King being determined not to dissolve
it, they were obliged thus ineffectually to struggle
on, though the country was really with them. Was
this true ? Let the general election give the answer.
It was not true. It was by a false representation
that the Ministers for the last two years replied
to the grave remonstrances of ourselves, our contenapo-
poraries, and our party generally, against the feeble,
shuffling, disgusting manner in which they car-
ried . on a sort of make-believe Government—
a Government which, as the Quarterly Review
sharply says, took every mode of getting rid
of business but the old-fashioned one of doing it. It
is now seen that in a Parliament of their own calling
—a Parliament in the election of which they cer-
tainly spared the exercise of o influence, fair or un-
fair, which a party in the possession of the Govern-
ment could possibly exercise—they arc worse off than
they were in that Parliament of Sir Robert Peel's call-
ing which they so much objected to. As an Opposi-
tion, the Conservatives have gained upon their former
achievement of January, 1835, when they possessed
the powers and influences of Government. This is a
position which no honest, no well-informed man can
gainsay, nor will any one who is not frantic with Ra-
dicalism deny that in this one position is involved a
Conservative triumph of the most decisive character.
We do not boast of the gain as being very great in
amount, but .that matters not to our present argument
—we have gained, with every circumstance (save
the approbation of the electors as constituted by the
Whig Reform Act) against us which was for 'us
in January,lB3s. The present Ministers have with them
the eclat and favour belonging to the commencement
of a new reign—they have (if Lord Durham is to be
believed) everything which Ministers can dciive from
a Sovereign—they have an unparalleled amount of Go-
vernment influence, and no scruple at all as to the use
of it ; and, with all this in their favour, they are not
able to realize a particle of that Parliamentary strength
which they alleged was waiting for them in the country
as soon as a general election could be put it into ac-
tion. Can anything more strongly than this speak the
sentiment of the people—the sentiment which (be
it always remembered) is expressed through the
channels which the Whigs chose for themselves,
and legalized in the Reform Act ? Formerly they
objected to the voice of Parliament, because, said
they, the people are not represented there. The
representation is now arranged according to their own
hearts' desire, so that objection will stand no longer.
More lately they objected to the voice of Parliament,
because, said they, the House of Commons was elected
under the influence of a Government hostile to us.
They have now a House of Commons elected under
their own Government, so that objection also crumbles
into nothing. 'What is to be the next excuse, or, if
there be none, how is the Queen's Government to be
carried on ? The Ministerial papers, with an affecting
sadness, intimate the disappointment of the Govern-
ment in election affairs ; but they also intimate that
Ministers are resigned to their fate, and determined, in
spite of all disappointments, to carry on the Govern-
ment. This is very amiable, no doubt, and the
viituous resolution of Ministers to submit to any-
thing rather than the abandonment of their places
will, of course, meet with great applause, especially
from those who expect anything from Ministerial con-
sideration of their merits or services. But we want still
to know how the Queen's Government is to be carried
on. We do not doubt the will of the present Mi-
nesters to carry the Government, but we do not see
how it is to he managed. It is very easy to say that
they will do so and so, but if they have not the
means in either House of Parliament the assertion is
worth very little. Our readers will, perhaps, be
amused with the mirthfully-tragic marsner in which
the Chronicle at once announces the defeat of the
hopes and the renewal of the perseverance of the
present Government. " The Tories," says our Con-
temporary (untruly), " cannot diminish the majority
in favour of Ministers. An addition of ten or
twenty Members to the Reform party would have
been desirable"—(Here three distinct sobs would
have been inserted, but that the powers of typo-
graphy fail to represent that interesting convulsion)
—" but Ministers will have a majority quite suffi-
cient to enable them to conduct the Government."
Will they, indeed? What I without any addition
to their majority in the last House, and without any
excuse to the public for its smallness? We believe
, the scale will be turned against the present Minis-
; ters ; but we suppose we take it, on the sad assumption
of the Chronicle, that the glorious majorities of 23
sometimes, and sometimes FIVE, will be repeated in
the next Parliament-4ill this be "quite sufficient"
to enable Ministers to carry on the Government ?
The Globe seemed to tell a very different story, not
many days ago. It -is true that the object then
was to induce a different event of the general elec-
tion from that which is now certain ; but, no matter
what the object of the statement was, the thing
stated remains the same. Now the Globe did posi-
tively state that such a " tremulous and dancing
balance of political parties" as that which existedt
in the last Parliament was a thing exceedingly to
be deprecated. The Globe said that the state- of
parties in the last Parliament " rendered the Opposi-
tion presumptuous and the Government feeble." Are
we to understand that affairs are to continue just in
this way, and that the " presumption" of the Oppo-
sition and the " feebleness" of Government are to go
on in secula seculorum? There may be, for aught
we can tell, a pleasure in feebleness which none but
the feeble know, and Ministers may be resolved to en-
joy this pleasure so long as they are permitted to do so.
This would indeed appear to be their determination,
but we suppose that some time or another they will be
so obliging as to remember that the nation's consent is
necessary to this indulgence of their humour. If in
the slumber of their satisfaction at being Ministers of
the Crown they should forget this the nation may
perhaps take the liberty of awakening them with more
roughness than Ministers who delight in feebleness
would like.—Morning Post.
Among the practical proofs which the present
ge-
neral
toa
electionm o r
esober affordssr
ando wholesome
of the return
stateof theof
feeling,
popular
mind
and the exercise of a better judgment than what pre-
vailed some time ago, when the most extravagant and
senseless doctrines were a ready passport to Parlia-
' ment, is the rejection of such men as Hume, Roe-
buck, and Dr. Bowring—the zealous, indefatigable,
and thoroughgoing advocates of wild theories of go-
, vernment, dangerous experiments, and organic