The Sun.
London, England, 1839-04-26 00:00:00

explain the Ist and 2d William IV., relative to the
double assessment of the land tax.
Mr. Sergeant TALFOURD brought in a Bill to pro-
vide for the Custody of Infants. There was no opposi-
tion to the Learned Gentleman's motion.

The notice given last night by Sir R. PEEL, of
his intention to oppose the Jamaica Bill on going
into the Committee, gives that question great tem-
porary interest. At present the Island is without
an acting Legislature, and without the means of
providing for the public security, in consequence of
laws not having been passed which the new condi-
tion of that society requires. Perhaps the propo-
sition to suspend the Constitution for five years
may be too extensive, but some means of providing
for the Government is indispensable. What Sir
ROBERT PEEL may intend to propose we are
not certain, but we should apprehend that
to pass an Act to suspend the Constitution condi-
tionally, or unless the Prison's and other Bills be
passed, or to refer the matter again to the good
disposition of the Jamaica planters, long and pa-
tiently tried and found wanting, would be
full of inconvenience and as great a violation of
principle as the plan proposed by the Ministers.
Something, however, must be done. Sir ROBERT
PEEL admits that ; and the question is, whether
the planters, who fancy they have an interest in de-
feating emancipation, should be confided in to
pass the necessary laws, or whether the Imperial
Legislature should take the duty on itself. The
friends of emancipation will feel deeply interested in
this question, and know which side to support.

When we hear so much from the Rodenite Press
about the impossibility of bringing criminals to jus-
tice in Ireland, about juries being afraid to give ho-
nest verdicts, and about murder being committed in
open day, we are naturally led to infer that such
scenes are never heard of in England. It was with
some surprise therefore that we found some exam-
ples of similar conduct in the Report of the Con-
stabulary Commissioners. We do not rely, in quot-
wi_:; on stories fabricated by an exaggerating party
Press, but on a public document, most carefully
prepared, with no view to any political purpose. At
page 41 it is stated by the Rev. Trios. SPENCER
of Hinton, near Bath, that a flourishing allotment
system there was much discouraged by the impos-
sibility of the people protecting their property. At
page 42, a case is described of a man killed by fight-
ing at Llanliwchairn, whose body was swollen, and
black and blue from kicks ; but there was some
party feeling in the case—a faction fight, we sup-
pose—and the Jury brought in a verdict that his
death was caused by excessive drinking and falling.
In the same page is an account of a woman poison-
ing her husband, which we have already no-
ticed, who ran off with her paramour; nobody
would pursue them, and they consequently escaped
punishment. If such a case had happened in Ire-
land under Lord NORMANBY'S Government, what
an outcry the Rodenites would have made. In
page 43 is an account of a man deliberately shoot-
ing another in Devonshire in open day ; the facts
were clear, but the Jury summoned from the neigh-
bourhood, in defiance of these facts, returned a
verdict of accidental death. " Free and unbiassed
justice," says R. SHUTE, Esq., " could riot be ob-
tained in small districts, particularly in agricultural
districts, where the people hang more together
than in the manufacturing." In page 38 it is said that
depredations are overlooked in a part of Devonshire
principally through fear of revenge. Could any
thing worse be said of Ireland ? We have already
quoted from the same page an account of three un-
punished murders presented to the notice of one of
the Commissioners in Lancashire and Cheshire in
one fortnight. In the following page is an account •
of a poacher shooting at a farmer in the open day,
and, though several persons were present, nobody
molested the assassin, and he has never been
punished. Now if that had happened in Ireland the
Evening Mail would have thundered about it
for a week, and the Times, fearful that its own
noise would not be loud enough, would have bor-
rowed the Irish thunder. In page 44 Sir ED-
MUND HEAD illustrates the care which the people
about Cardigan take to correct the morals of their
neighbotirs, and repress any species of conduct
which they dislike, by sending round a wooden hone
in the midst, of a mob with their faces blackened and
torches in'74lheir hand, and this kind of attack is
probably quite as efficacious as being denounced
from the Catho!ic altar in Ireland, or being placed
under the Catholic ban. In the following page is
a specimen of a Lieutenant COLE, and a neigh-
bouring proprietor, who was also an attorney,
fighting for possession of a piece of land, and
maintaining possession of it by the strong hand.
No police force came to separate them, and no Ma-
gistrate appeared to command obedience to the law.
Such a case is quite equal to the contests for land in
Ireland, which supply so many paragraphs for the
Rodenite Journals, and are the source of so much
abuse of Lord NoRmANBY. There is one differ-
ence, however, especially worthy of notice. " Such
acts of aggression, " says Lieutenant COLE,
" are by no means uncommon ; mine was a
case without a parallel, because opposition
in such cases is never attempted ; the poor bend
instead of opposing. Their feeling is that
might overcomes right." The Irishman is not yet
thoroughly subdued. He does not submit with-
out an attempt to obtain redress, or revenge himself;
the humbled English peasant submits to might
overcoming right. He bends instead of opposing,
but if he had the untamed spirit of an Irishman,
the acts of oppression perpetrated on him
are enough to make the land .red with blood.
What the Rodenites complain of is, that they do not
find the same submission in Ireland as in England,
for the Irish peasantry, like their oppressors, en-
deavour by their own right arm to insure the supre-
macy of their own will.

When the Test, Acts were abolished the Dis-
senters became legally, as they before were actually,
possessed of a right to sit in Parliament. When
the Catholic Emancipation Act was reluctantly
passed by Sir R. PEEL, because he could not help
himself, the Catholics obtained the same right. As
our fellow-citizens, paying taxes, and serving in our
armies and navies, they constituted portions of the
State, which is only another name for the whole
of the nation, before those two Acts were
passed, but by them they were acknowledged to be
part of the State, and entitled to share in its power.
They have since then, both as constituents and
Members of Parliament, been as fully endowed
with the powers and privileges of the State, as the
Members of the Church of England. Now the
Government of the country is vested substantially
in the hand of the constituencies and their repre-
sentatives. The latter determine, in fact, who
shall be Ministers, and the ultimate appeal, on all
questions of difficulty, lies to the former. Thus

the Catholics and the Dissenters have come to
have a full and equal share in the Government
with Churchmen, and can dispose of its patronage
and emoluments. Those great changes have con-
sequently given to the union between the Church
and State a totally different aspect from what
it before bore. It was then a union between
the Anglican Church and a State that was also
limited to the same profession of faith ; it has now
become a union of the Anglican Church and a
State composed of Church of England men, Catho-
lics, Dissenters, and men of almost all creeds. The
Church, the arrogant Church, whether she know
it or not, is become dependent on Dissenters and
Catholics.