The Sun.
London, England, 1839-07-25 00:00:00

MY DEAR FRIENDS AND FELLOW TOWNSMEN,—The
National Petition has come to an end. But the great
circumstances out of which it arose have not come to
an end ; and the mighty consequences which it must
produce are yet to be seen. Millions of heads and
hearts have been set in motion ; they have been set to
think—to feel—to judge—to determine. Those heads
must cease to think, those hearts must cease to beat,
before the effects of this great petition can be said to
have come to an end.
1 presented it to the House of Commons on the
14th of June. It was received with becoming consi-
deration and respect ; and my humble, but zealous
efforts in its support were treated with kindness and in-
dulgence.
After giving proper notice, and taking the necessary
measures to cause every Member of the House to re-
ceive such notice, 1 then moved the House, on the 12th
instant, to resolve itself into a Committee for the pur.
pose of taking this extraordinary expression of public
opin!or, into consideration. The House again treated
me with kindness and indulgence ; but after a long
debate, finally rejected my motion, with a majority of
238 to 48.
Upon each of these occasions, it is my duty to say,
that her Majesty's Ministers treated the petition with
consideration and respect ; and that, at their instance,
the House of Commons, upon each occasion, suspended
its rules and orders of the day, in order to give prece-
dence to this great and most important subject.
You will do me the justice to believe, that I have
done everything in my power to give force and success
to the petition, and to discharge faithfully,- the important
duty committed to my care. urged and implored the
House, with every humble faculty which the Almighty
has given me, to take this great subject into considera-
tion, in the anxious hope that, if they could not give
all that the petition demands, they- might at least give a
part ; and if they would not grant the reform which is
the right of the people, they might at least grant the re-
lief of the distress, out of which the demand for reform
mainly arises. I urged the 'Whigs and Radicals, as the
friends of liberty, to assist me in extending the reform ;
and I urged the Conservatives, as the enemies of Re-
form, to assist me in relieving the distress which is the
pabulum of Reform. I was ably supported by my ex-
cellent friend, .John Fielden, and by other able and pa-
triotic members. All our efforts were in vain.
One circumstance occurred, in the course of the de-
bate, which was to me " a heavy blow, and a great
discouragement." It is well known that I have al-
ways attributed the grievous sufferings and oppressions
of the industrious classes to the unjust and cruel at-
tempts of the ri Sh classes to convert their paper rents,
debts, and taxes, and other claims upon industry, into
standard gold. For 25 years together I have proved
this great truth, in every possible shape in which proof
can be given. Ten years ago I made this cruel and mur-
derous operation the main foundation of the Political
Union. Two years ago I suspended the second formation
of the Political Union at the request of 13,000 work-
men, and 3,000 tradesmen of Birmingham, in the hope
of obtaining its rectification, through the memorial, and
the deputations to Lord Melbourne. At the great
meeting at Holloway Head, on the 6th of August last,
when the National Petition was adopted, I made use of
the following words, as reported, at the time, in the
Birmingham Journal ; and I am sure that I have used
siniilatewords twenty times over before and since, viz.
They shall give up the Ilouse of Commons into
the hands of the Commons of England, and then, I
trust, that measures will be adopted there which will
give security, happiness, and contentment to all. But,
my friends, I find myself in n painful position. You
all know my opinions respecting the currency. I be-
lieve that no human wisdom and no human power can
make the industrious classes flourish permanently in
England, under the present monetary system. See
then my painful position. The day-is coming in which
these words may appear like a prophecy. You have
placed rue at your head. If I should succeed in giv-
ing you the liberty, and not succeed in rectifying the
currency, and consequently, in giving you the pros-
perity, the liberty will but precipitate anarchy, and
your misery will be greater than even it now is. I
must dare this great contingency ; and I must trust to
the confidence of the industrious classes, and to the wis-
dom and virtue of the forty-nine delegates, whom they
will elect to enable me to insure the prosperity and the
liberty at the same time. Without this, my prospect is
but gloomy. If I fail in the great work of liberty, I
shall 1:i11 under the vengeance of the boroughmongors ;
and if I fail in the great work of prosperity, I shall
flit under the-fury of a dissappointed and exasperated
people." (Loud shouts of " No, no, never.") On the
:30th May last, I expressed similar sentiments in the
House of Commons, quoting largely from all our pro-
ceedings in Birmingham for the last ten years ; and
proving that the pressure of the present gold money
was, in many cases, 400 per cent, upon the industri-
ous classes, and in all cases 100 per cent., instead of
only four per cent., as had been pretended ; and I
took the precaution of sending fifty corrected copies of
my speech among the members of the General Con-
vention of the industtious classes. In the course of my
speech, on presenting the National Petition on the 14th
of June, and also on the present occasion, I had en-
larged upon that most important part of the petition,
which says, " We tell your Honourable House, that
the capital of the master must no longer be deprived of
its due profit—that the labour of the workman must no
longer be deprived of its due reward ; that the laws
which make food dear, and those which, by making
money scarce, make labour cheap, must be abo-
lished." I had enlarged upon the madness of passing
" one set of laws to make scarce the food which sup-
ports man's life, and another set of laws to make
scarce the money which purchases the food." I had
even ventured to give the House my old quotation from
Holy Writ :—" When will the Sabbath be gone, that
we may set forth wheat, making the loaf small and
the coin great, falsifying the balances by deceit ?
Shall not the land tremble for this,?." In short, I had
done everything in my power to prove the absolute
necessity of either restoring a regulated system of
paper money, or of altering the present standard of
value ; and I had repeated my old prophecy and my
firm conviction that, " to persevere in the present
system of the currency, would create so much misery
and distress, that it would ultimately convert the
nation into a nation of demons, or of men like demods."
After all this, what then was my bitter mortification,
when Lord John Russell, as his main answer to my
arguments, produced to the House a placard, unheard
of by me before, and signed apparently by every mem-
ber of the General Convention of the Industrious
Classes, openly rejecting these my known and proved
doctrines and opinions, denouncing what the placard
calls " the power and corrupting influence of paper
money," and declaring that the industrious classes have
been " defrauded by the fraudulent bits of paper,
which our state tricksters dignify with the name of
money, and arc at this moment being robbed by that
system of three-fourths of their labour !! ! "
Here was an argument which I could not answer.
When Lord John Russell, holding the placard in his
hand, and reading its contents, triumphantly inquired,
" Of what use would reform be when my own friends
rejected its most important objects? " I was paralysed.
I had created the General Convention. It was the
off,pring of my own brain. I was surrounded by ene-
mies on every side, many of them interested against me,
and all contending against me. At this very moment,
out of my own camp, a mortal weapon was directed
against my heart
I leave you, my friends, to judge of my feelings. For
twenty-five years I have wasted my life in incessant la-
bours, contending, by day and by night, against the
fraud, cruelty, and oppression which the landed and
monied aristocracy have been practising upon the indus-
trious classes by means of gold money. During this
bas
never period, the hope of personal benefit to myself
never crossed my mind. I had, at last, almost broken
down the oppressors of my country ; twelve hieu,nv.,, dreads
thousand of my countrymen had adopted m
above stated, when the very delegates of the:t met industrious'
classes joined the ranks of my enemies against
I called to mind my prophecy at Holloway Head. I
sew that the doom of my country w
It is said, in natural history, that the sealed.
hear, when a bar
of red hot iron is thrown against
riem ' immediately seizes
torture the red hot
the iron in his paws ; and the
iron inflicts, the more closely more
the monster hugs the
metal, even to his breast.
Fellow-townsmen, I am borne
My dear Friends and
down under the difficulties which surround me. 1
hare always urged upon the people th;e
adnodthiinehsavoef peace, law, order, loyalty, and union
pros,d upon a hundred occasions, that here lies their
strength and their victory.i, The General Convention,
sition to me, have, in a great degree, relied
upon in (NT°,
arms, and and " physical force !" I have alwa •
)S
urges. -
1 the absolute necessity of harmony, friendship,
andn wetual co-operation, and good-vvill between
masters and men, and between the lower and middle
classCS of the community, The General Convention
have not .supported this view of mine, but many of
them have• sown discord and hatred between these
two mns: i,-ctportant classes of men. These differences
of opinion have borne with patience ; but after so
many
years 0: incessant labour, to find all my exer-
tions thrown aw, andmy meastires of relief rejected
alike by the aristo,,:racY, on the one hand, and by the
delegates of the in at:Rtrious elAs.es on the other,

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