The Sun.
London, England, 1839-05-09 00:00:00

Whig and Tory boroughs, but as a remedy for the
various evils under which the people laboured.
The speech, at the opening of the Session of that
year, insinuated, as Mr. Brougham said, a fear of
revolution, and it was to put an end to that, and
to satisfy the people, to give them confidence in
Parliament, and restore their respect for the Legis-
lature, that the Reform Act was passed. To such
a pitch had the alarm reached, that even the Earl
of Winchilsea advocated Reform, to " prevent the
destruction of our best institutions." "If the peo-
ple had grievances," said the Noble Earl, on the 4th
of November, 1830, " and God knew they had, and
if these grievances were not redressed, there would
be no security for property, and their Lordships
would live to see our best institutions overturned."
We were surrounded by dangers, and their Lord-
ships would be blind to what they owed to them-
selves, blind to that situation of great trust in which
they were placed, and they would neglect the du-
ties they owed to their country, the confidence of
which in the wisdom of Parliament had been
much shaken, if they did not take some measure
to win back the respect and confidence of the

people.
In the debates on the Bill the same justifying
grounds were taken up, Lord Althorp had every
reason, as he is quoted by Lord John, to hope that
the Bill would inspire the people with confidence
in their representatives. He expected that " the
good sense of Me people would be satisfied when
they saw the crying evils of the present system got
rid of." Lord Grey looked for " permanent con-
tentment, to be produced by a decisive and exten-
sive measure." It was the boast of that Noble
Earl, on retiring from the Ministry, that " Political
and Trades' Unions have disappeared without the
application for any extraordinary powers on the part
of the Government."—(Speech of July 9, 1834.)
The great object then of the Reform Act,—the
end to attain which the machinery of representa-
tion was somewhat improved, was the contentment
of the people. They were to be inspired with con-
tidence in the Legislature, and there was to be an
end of Trades' and Political Unions. What is the
actual result ? Amongst the unrepresented there
is a total want of confidence in the Legislature ;
Political and Trades' Unions pervade the land ;
they are organized into one body, and the Conven-
tion sits in London bearding the Parliament. A
petition signed by one million and a quarter of per-
sons for a total change in the Constitution is ready
to be presented to the House of Commons, and
that number of signatures, we believe, exceeds the
number which all the exertions of the enemies of
slavery procured at any one time to their petitions,
and which were sufficient to induce the Legisla-
ture to change the whole frame of Colonial
society and expend twenty millions of the
public money.
The Reform Act, far from inducing contentment,
and restoring peace and confidence, has exaspe-
rated the dispute between the miadle and lower
classes—between property and labour—into a deadly
quarrel, by excluding from any share in legislation
all the lower and all the poorer classes. By an
extensive change it destroyed all the force of pre-
scription, and substituted nothing which could or
ought to satisfy the excluded masses.
Lord John Russell consoles himself, we believe, by
saying that the constituencies are with him ; and
that few or none of the middle classes belong to the
Convention and follow after the Charter. But that
is one of the worst features of the times, alarming
and dangerous, in proportion as the constituency is
a small part of the whole people, as the discon-
tented are numerous, and as the exclusion is com-
plete, and effected by law. Prior to 1830 the
constituency of the rotten boroughs was perfeetly
well contented, and no amendment was obtained
till the land was in flames. The constituencies
are, we regret to admit, too contented—they would
now probably rather have a Tory than a Reforming
Ministry ; but that only shows, as the mass of the
excluded are in a state approximating to rebellion,
that the Reform Act has put hostility between
numerous classes

It has equally falsified the fears of tive corrupt
faction IN hich has long preyed on the community,
and the hopes of the great masses by whose instru-
mentality it was achieved, and to content x‘hom the
King's Private Secretary requested the Tory Lords
to stay away from the House of Peers.

Lord John Russell enumerates a number of Bills
that have been passed since the Reform Act, to
show that it has not been barren of fruit. But that
they were the consequence of Reform, supposing
them to be ever so good, is not by any means clear,
seeing that, without Parliamentary Reform, the
nation obtained the repeal of the Test Act and
Catl olic Emancipation, which are equal in value
to any two measures passed since the Reform Act
became a law. It may be said, too, of the reduc-
tion of taxation, that it was in progress before Par-
liamentary Reform was the law, and this last year or
two, though assailed by no foreign foes, our income
has not been equal to our expenditure. When the
Noble Lord pointed out the benefits of the Reform
Act, he wisely omitted the coercion law for Ireland,
and that conduct as to Canada, which preceded and
accompanied civil war, and the maintenance of the
iniquitous tax on bread.

We shall have more to say of this pamphlet to-
morrow, we stop now, observing that, on Lord
J. Russell's own admission, he is one who has been
" bli7.dly deceived himself," and seeks still to pre-
serve the delusion, and make others share it with
him. We have shown that on a most important
point the Noble Lord is either an inattentive ob-
server of what is going on in society, or he treats
with contempt the masses and their sorrows, though,
when they were to be used to attain or to keep
power, they were, in the eyes of his party, of infinite
►mportance. To-morrow we shall show that an
aristocratic contempt for the people is at the bot-
tom of the Noble Lord's injustice.

BANQUET at the MANSION HOUSE

The Lord Mayor and the Lady Mayoress gave a
grand dinner on Monday last in the Egyptian Hall to a
distinguished company of the nobility and gentry and
many of his Lordship's fellow-citizens, who were invited
to meet the Prince and Princess of Capua. Those
illustrious persons, however, very much to the surprise
of the majority of the company, never made their
appearance ; but there were some individuals present
who seemed to be aware that forgetfulness was habitual
with both of them. The arrangements and decorations
were on the same scale of magnificence that distin-
guished the great Easter entertainment ; the usual
state forms were observed, and no expense had been
spared to do honour to the Prince and Princess. The
Queen's band played in the saloon and in the Egyptian
Hall during dinner, which had been ordered to be on
table at seven o'clock. The company looked
frequently and disconsolately towards the door for the
arrival of their Highnesses, or what would have been
every bit as agreeable to many whose appetites had
been sharpened by the agony of expectation—an apo-
logy. An eloquent murmur was heard through the ^
drawing-room, and was gradually rising into sounds of
complaint, when the Lord Mayor, at half.past eight
o'clock, submitted to his guests that it was almost time
to go to dinner. At twenty minutes to nine o'clock, the
company were most busily engaged in supplying the
waste occasioned by their long fast, and filling out their
" attenuated forms:' Just after the second course was
deposited upon the table, a letter from the Prince was
handed to the Lord Mayor, expressing his Highness's
regret that he and his Princess were unable to come to
dinner with his Lordship and the Lady Mayoress on
that day.
Amongst the company were Lord Kinnoul, Lord
Burghersh, Lord Petre, Lord Combermere. Lord
Ashley, Lord Bloomfield, Lord Radstock, the Rev.
Lord John Thynne, Sir Thomas Baring, Bart., Sir
Felix Booth, Bart., Sir John Jacob Ansler, Sir George
Houlton, the Rev. D. Ackland, the Rev. R. Burgess,
Doctor Ashurst. Captain Nelson, Captain Locke, Cap-
tain Alsager, Aldermen Thompson, Copeland, and Kelly,
the Sheriffs, &c. &c.
The moment the Lord Mayor intimated to those
near him, that the Prince had sent an apology there
was a general titter, and the seats which had been up
to that time kept vacant for their Highnesses were
filled.

It was mentioned incidentally. that the Prince and
Princess were last week waited for at a party at the
west-end of the town upwards of an hour, and that the
company at last sat down without being honoured by
their presence.

Many of the Lord Mayor's and the Lady Maynress's
guests, who had never partaken of civic hospitality
before, expressed themselves highly delighted at the
splendid and festive scene, and only regretted the mo-
ment of departure.

. _
Lord Combermere returned thanks for the Army,
Lord Radstock for the Navy, Lord Kinnoul for the
House of Lords, Lord Ashley for the House of Com-
mons, and the Rev. Lord John Thynne for the Church,
Alderman Thompson for the Magistrates of London,
Sir Thomas Baring for the County Magistrates, &c.
During the dinner Mr. Whitham, the Superintendent
of Police, had continual communications with the Lord
Mayor, relative to the movements of the Chartists.