The Sun.
London, England, 1837-12-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF TH7 1 /PITILIC JOURNALS

Lord Mellniprne stidtQl last night the second read-
ing of the Civil L..Att Bill in the House of Lords. His
Lordship traced with great force and perspicuity the
connection bet, ecn the abandonment by the Crown of
its feudal rigi.,its and hereditary revenues, and the
growth of tl, e constitutional control of Parliament. In
ancient tirc,es the Sovereign defrayed the civil and mi-
litary '-ec.pensea of the country as well as the expenses
of his Cour., out of the income arising from lands,
and duties of various kinds belonging to the
Crown ; ae.cl it was only in the case of prodigality, or
when the country was involved in expensive wars, that
-an appeal was made to Parliament for subsidies. An
econceaical and parsimonious Sovereign was thus placed
entiraly beyond the control of Parliament, for, as was
observed by his Lordship, though laws might be
enacted fir the frequent meetings of Parliament, of what
avail were such laws when effect could not be given to
ahem ? He illustrated this position by a reference to
"Henry VII., who, by his parsimony was enabled
to set himself above all parliamentary control, and
whose successive encroachmenrs on the rights and
liberties of the country laid the foundation for the
st-.uggles in the reigns of the Stuarts, and the pro-
ttraeted civil war which took place a century posterior
to his reign. At the restoration, and still more at the
revolution, the Sovereign was gradually divested of
those sources of income which had in former times
enabled the Sovereign to place himself beyond the
control of Parliament ; and at the commencement of
the reign of George 111. the Sovereign renounced
all his remaining hereditary revenues, with
the exception of that derived from the Duchies
of Cornwall and 'Lancaster and a few casual
sources, and in lieu of them a regular annual
income was voted by Parliament for what was
called the Civil List; that is, for the support of
his Majesty's household, and also for defraying
the expenses of certain of the civil servants of
the Sovereign ; by which arrangement the control
of Parliament was established on an immoveable basis.
his Lordship, after detailing the changes introduced
by Mr. Burke's Bill, and the more recent arrange-
ment, by which the expenses of the Court of the So-
vereign were separated from those of the various esta-
blishments of the country, went through the different
provisions of the Bill before the House, and concluded
with an impressive appeal to their Lordships to give it
their sanction, as a measure which had for its object
the support of the Monarchy, a form of government, if
not theoretically the best, at least the best adapted to
the circumstances of the state and times, and which
no man without the height of criminality could at-
tempt to alter. The Bill was read a second time,
Lord Brougham's being the only dissentient voice.
Lord Brougham enforced at great length the argu-
ments urged by him on the night the Royal message
was taken into consideration against the policy of a
permanent arrangement, which experience proved would
not be binding on the Sovereign, should circum-
stances render the sums assigned inadequate ; while,
on the other hand, should circumstances lower
the prices of commodities from the decreased cost
of production, or the repeal of the law which kept
the price of Corn in this country so much higher than
elsewhere, the Sovereign would derive all the benefit.
He repeated, too, his objection to fixing the amount
of the allowance to the Sovereign, while they were in
utter ignorance of the resources of the Duchies of
Lancaster and Cornwall. In the course of this part
of his speech the Noble and Learned Lord gave some
curious and instructive details respecting the income
of the Duchy of Cornwall, and supplied some very
cogent reasons for the adoption of the improved ma-
nagement and publicity for which Ministers have
pledged themselves. According to his Lordship, for
every 2/. paid into the Royal Treasury, 11. is expended
in collecting it ; and the system of superintendence is
so defective, that one individual who had a lease of
forty acres was enabled, by what is technically called
in Cornwall " hedging by candle-light," to increase
it to 200 acres taken from the property of the Duchy.
The speech of the Noble and Learned Lord was
addressed to the country rather than to their
Lordships, who, of course, could hardly be ex-
pected to outdo the House of Commons on the
present occasion. His Lordship's speech reminded us
( f his efforts in the House of Commons, for which as-
sembly his eloquence is better suited than for the more
Lately assembly to which he has been elevated. His
highly-wrought conclusion much resembled his
speeches of ten or twelve years ago. We may here
observe that the Noble and Learned Lord rather went
out of his way to find fault with Ministers when
he travelled to Canada for an argument for their
Lordships assembling earlier, more especially as the
events to which he adverted have only been known
in this country within the last few days. By-the-
by, how comes it that of all the servants of the
state, at home or abroad, Sir Francis Head seems
alone to have even the admiration of the Times? We
have always given that gentleman credit for much sa-
gacity and tact; but, for the sake of his reputation, it
is to be regretted that his praise in the Times is uni-
formly coupled with distorted accounts of the conduct
of other Government functionaries in that part of the
world. -Though Sir Francis complains, we under-
stand, of ill usage on the part of the Colonial Admi-
nistration, there is no reason why he should consider
all connection with Ministers at an cud ; and it is a
pity that he did not enjoin his friends who communi-
cate with the Times to be somewhat more discreet,
not in sounding his praises, for to that we have no ob-
jection, but in uniformly connecting his praise with the
censure of others, for it is possible that the efforts of
his friends may he placed to his own account.—
Morning Chronicle.

Notwithstanding our high respect for the acute mind
and the practical knowledge of the Duke of Welling..
ton, we think that he is wrong upon the subject of
Post-office Reform, and that he has been somewhat
rash in the declaration of his opinion. His Grace
says that the impression on his mind certainly is that
the Government has taken the right course on this
subject. We venture to say that this is not the im-
pression on the mind of the mercantile public, or of
any practical inquirer who has considered the subject
of postage duty, with reference to the inequality of its
pressure, and the practicability of combining a decrease
of the rates with an upholding of the aggregate
revenue. The evil so generally complained of is a
high rating, utterly disproportioned to the expense,
There is evidently no regard to rule or measure in
the principles of rating the postage. It is not denied
that the mere expense of carrying letters would be
upon each something less than a farthing for the
longest distance of inland carriage. It cannot be pre-
tended that the carriage of two sheets of paper by the
same conveyance costs twice as much as the carriage of
one. But how stands the practice of the Post-office ?
Say that the postage to Tooting should reasonably be
three pence, taking into account the large expense of
the Post-office establishment, why should two iiencq
additional be put on for carrying the same thing to
Epsom ? rf he net charge of carrying the letter to
Tootir.g is nothing like three pence ; but for the sake
of ,he revenue, as well as for defrayingthe charges
of a great department, a tax laid on the net charge,
which brings it to this sum. But is it reasonable
that not only the charge of conveyance, but the
tax is to be so rash greater on account of the in-
crease of distance from London ? The postage to
yinchley a single letter is three pence ; and to carry
a letter from Finchley to Birmingham costs-
-1.9."), a farthing ; but the Post-office adds seven pence.
st) the practical effect is that a man is charged six pence
three farthings tax for living at Birmingham more than
he would be charged for living at Finchley I Now,
the Post-office is disposed—not from any conviction on
the minds of its managers, but by reason of the public
remonstrance—to try an experiment in reform. But,
Instead of applying the experiment to the evil com-
plained of, the Post-office proposes to apply it to a kind
of postage which hardly any body complains of. The
grievance is, that the postage upon long distances is
enormously out of proportion to the additional expense
of carrying the letters these long distances, and the ex-
periment proposed by the Post-office is to reduce the
rates nn short distances. Another grievance is, that
though double letters cost scarcely anything more for
their conveyance than single letters, and upon a long
distance not a quarter per cent. upon the expense of
single letters, yet the additional charge is cent. per cent. ;