The Sun.
London, England, 1830-09-27 00:00:00

FOURTH.

MAY IT PAUSE YOUR MAJRSTY,
" We your Majesty's dutiful and loyal people, the middle and
working classes of the British metropolis, and its suburbs, as.
sembled on Kennington Common, in the county of Surrey, this
'4th day of September, 1530, in numbers amounting to
persons, most respectffilly approach your Majesty with our sin- •
eere and unfeigned congratulations upon your accession to the
Throne of these realms. At the same time we assure your Ma-
jesty that our Joy is heightened with a just belief that your Royal
consort, Queen Adelaide, is endowed with every virtue, and
possessed of every accomplishment calculated to soothe and to
bless your reign, and that she will exercise her native benevo-
lence and philanthropy, in conjunction with your Majesty's truly
English feelings and habits, in such a manner as will be calcu.
lated to insure to an industrious and a free people the blessings
of contentment and prosperity.
" We know that we should but ill discharge our duty to your
Majesty, if we were merely to offer our congratulations in the
fulsome strains of flattery, or to approach the Throne in the hy-
pocritical caut of adulation—we feel that a e should be guilty of a
compound act of treason to the King and to his people if we were
to come before your Majesty with false and delusive representa-
tions as to the state of the country : such fawning sycophancy we
should deem equally abhorrent to the character of keemen to
offer, and disgusting to a patriot English King to accept.
" We tender our homage to your Majesty in the humble, the
respectful, and the dignified language of truth ; and, although
we feel that it would be arrogance in us to intrude win your
Majesty any thing bearing the semblance of dictation, yet we
know that we should disgrace the name of freemen, and justly
merit the appellation of cringing slaves, if we were to endeavour
to withhold or disguise the truth by imposing upon your Ma.
jest), a repetition of such false and hollow adulation, and such
gross misrepresentations of the flourishing state of the country,
as have already emanated from more than one body of your Ma-
jesty's subjects.
" We, therefore, respectfully, but firmly, offer the following
statement as to the condition of the country, for your Majesty's
serious and deliberate reflection; and we fearlessly appeal to
your Majesty's own recollection, and to your personal know.
ledge, as to the truth of such statement :—ln the year in which
your Majesty was born only EIGHT MILLIONS of taxes were lin-
posed upon the people of this country; at the present time at
least SIXTY MILLIONS of taxes are annually wrung from the in.
dustry of the people. For nearly thirty years this country was
plunged into the most sanguinary wars, waged against the liber-
ties of the people of America and France, during which period
the money forcibly extorted from the hard earnings of the pea le
by unbounded and relentless taxation, was squandered in the
most wanton, the most wicked, the most profuse, and the most
profligate manner, sanctioned by corrupt self-elected Parlia-
ments in the choosing of the Members of which the people who
paid the taxes had no share whatever. This expenditure, in
one or two years, amounted to the enormous sum of Oai HUN-
DRED AND THIRTY MILLIONS per annum. To enable the people
to pay these enormous taxes out of their hard earnings, a delu-
sive, fictitious, and greatly depreciated paper currency, was stab.
i
stituted for that of the current coin of the realm • and an enor-
mous debt of EIGIIT HUNDRED MILLIONS was contracted in this
depreciated paper currency. In addition to this, cruel and op-
pressive Corn Laws were passed, for the purpose of keeping up
the rents of the aristocracy, and which had the effect of filling
the coftra of contractors and loan-jobbers, whilst the labouring
people were suffering the greatest hardships and privations
Since the period above alluded to, that of your Majesty's birth,
the criminals of this country have increased in number tenfold,
and new gaols and other receptacles for the unfortunate allbrd
the most unequivocal emblems of the fallen state of the people of
this once.flourishing and happy country. At the end of FOUR-
TEEN YUARS of peace, amongst many other most objectionable
and oppressive Acts of Parliament, a law was enacted. compel.
ling the industrious people of this country to pay in GOLD, of tllll
standard value, the interest of that debt before alluded to, which
had been borrowed in a depreciated paper currency. During the
period of this depreciation, the Civil I.ist, the salaries of all the
Royal Family, the Ministers of the Crows, all the Officers of
State, the Judges, &c., were advanced at least one-third in
amount, upon the plea of the high price of the necessaries of life
—the Ministers who proposed it, and the Members of the House
' of Commons, the pretended guardians of the public purse, ap-
pearing totally to lose sight of this important fact—that the
people, out of whose pockets this money was to be taken to pay
those advanced salaries, had to pay the same price for their
bread, and the other necessaries of life, which rendered them
less able to bear the burdens of taxation already imposed upon
them, much less to bear the additional burden thus inflicted.
And it is a fact which we cannot refrain from calling to your
Majesty's recollection, and submitting for your humane and
just consideration, That the above-named augmented salaries
of the Royal Family. the Officers of State, the Ministers, the
Judges, &c., still are paid in their full amount in gold, and con-
sequently they. remain now in the receipt of full one-third more
than they received before the currency was depreciated.' In ad.
dition to these acts of cruelty and injustice, a paper has been laid
before Parliament, proving that 113 Privy Councillors, receive
annually out of the taxes upwards of 650,0001. in the gold cur-
rer.ern. consequence of these and innumerable other similar acts
and proceedings, we most respectfully, but firmly and con-
stitutionally, beg to represent to your Majesty, that thousands
of men of property are flying front the country, to add to the
wealth and strength of other stations ; that a considerable por-
tion of those in ahe middle walks of life are fast being reduced to
pauperism ; and that a very large portion of the industrious and
labouring classes are driven to ruin, beggary, and starvation.—
As an instance of the latter fact. we take leave to inform your
Majesty, that the very same newspapers which gave an account
of your Majesty's accession to the throne, recorded this appalling
event, that five labouring men were found starved to death on
one day, within seven miles of your Majesty's Palace of St.
James's. •
" We, your Majesty's dutiful and loyal people, most earnestly
and most sincerely beg to state to your Majesty, that it is our
deliberate, long-confirmed, and deep.rooted conviction that time
evils we have felt it mar duty to describe to your Majesty in
this our humble Address, as well as all the other evils attendant
upon and resulting from excessive and overwhelming taxation,
have wholly arisen from the absence of a full, free, and fair re.
presentation of all the people in the Commons' House of Par.
liament. _ _ _

" We, your Majesty's faithful and loyal people, look forward
to better days, in thecontident hope that your Majesty will cause
o be restored to us the constitutional rights of which the people
have been so long and so unjustly deprived—namely, the right
of every person who pays taxes to vote for a Member of that
Ifouse which imposes the taxes; and the right to exercise this
inalienable franchise free from all unconstitutional controul.
which latter right, we beg to assure your Majesty, can be se-
cured only by giving to the electors the protection of the BALLOT.
" We, your Majesty's faithful and sincerely loyal people, most
earnestly pray that your Majesty's reign may be one in-linter.
rupted scene of peace and happiness, and that your Majesty, in
union with your Royal Consort, may sever cease to deserve and
receive the spontaneous homage, and to live in the hearts of a
free, a prosperous, and a contented people.
(Signed on behalf of the meeting),
1' HENRY HUNT, Chairman."