The Sun.
London, England, 1836-04-19 00:00:00

Lord Melbourne last night prefaced his motion for the
second reading of the Irish Municipal Reform Bill by a
most conciliatory speech. He stated wherein the Irish Bill
coincided with the English and Scotch Bills, and wherein it
departed from them ; and admitting that different parts of
the same empire might require a different system of rule,
his Lordship maintained that justice would not be done to
the people of Ireland were they to be refused that protection
from municipal institutions which had been afforded to the
people of the two other divisions of the United Kingdom.
Alluding to the departure from their usual policy, which had
been displayed by the Tories in the House of Commons
with regard to this measure, his Lordship slily remarked
that Sir R. Peel and the Duke of Wellington " had generally
proposed their measures at too late a period of time, and
they had been too narrow for the exigencies of the occasions
that had called for them ; but that they now, however, in-
tended to go to an opposite extreme ; for as to the course
proposed, the measure was larger than was necessary,
and it was too soon in point of time. It was, in
point of fact, leaping twice as high as was necessary, with
a view of getting over the hedge." This desperate leap,
however, the Tories are about to take. Lord Melbourne's
politeness would not allow him to observe that by leaping
too high a person runs more risk of breaking his ribs or his
legs. But their Lordships are at present in high feather,
and a bold policy will alone go down with them. Lord
Melbourne seemed to condole with Sir Robert Peel and
the Duke of Wellington, who are no longer the oracles of
the Tories, and-who are not the originators of this notable
Qorporation policy. The destructive scheine-appeared to
him to emanate " from another school of policy—from a
school for some of the members of which he entertained
great respect, and who were men of the greatest ability.
He felt that it came from a much younger leader than
either the Noble Duke or the Right Honourable Baronet,
and whose forte was not quite so characteristic of an
absence of indiscretion or temerity." The leader in
question, however, Lord Lyndhurst, is not, it seems,
sufficiently indiscreet for a part of his unruly force,
for the more headstrong Peers wished to throw out the
Bill at once. He conceived they were pledged by their
Address to his Majesty, if abuses were shown to exist in
corporations, to apply a remedy to them, and he was ready
with a remedy, a la St. John Long, to destroy the pa-
tient with the disease. "He knew," he said, " that in this
respect he differed from some friends. Members of that
House, for whom he entertained the sincerest regard and
respect, persons of very high rank, great .constitutional
learning, great love of justice, and unsullied integrity."
Still th Noble and Learned Lord thought the Bill ought
to be read a second time, agreeably to the pledge he had
given. So much for the Noble and Learned Lord's cau-
tion and moderation. Taking the Bill, then, he looked
to the first clause of it, and he saw that it abolished
all the existing corporations, every thing was swept
away ; every charter, every statute, every law at variance
with the subsequent provisions of the Bill was declared
to be annihilated, and the corporations being thus de-
stroyed, he would proceed no further, but leave those who
chose to write their epitaph. And this is faithfully and
honestly the pledge in the Address to supply a remedy for
the abuses shown to exist in corporations ! The reasons
for this bold course lie in a nut-shell. To give to the
people of Ireland town-councils, elected by and responsible
to all classes of inhabitants duly qualified in point of pro-
perty, without reference to religion, would be " to esta-
blish seats of agitation, seats of political discord and con-
tention, for the purpose of perpetuating their own power,
and accomplishing the ultimate objects they had in view,
ultimate objects tending to the final separation of the king-
dom." So the people of Ireland are to be denied the bene-
fit of local institutions, and denied for reasons conveying the
deepest insult to them ! This is not, surely, the way to
cure them of any hankering they might have for a separa-
tion of the kingdom. Effrontery can hardly be carried
further. The Tories found to their cost, in the case
of the English corporations, that all their tinkering
was fruitless that having once let in the inhabit-
ants, Tory dominion was at an end. Between the
preservation of the abuses of the Irish corporations, and the
utter destruction of the corporations themselves, there is no
medium course in which the Tories can find refuge ; and
Lord Lyndhurst tells them to stick at nothing for the pre-
servation cf their influence. They have made the notable
discovery, that the great majority of the Irish arc Catholics,
and that the Catholics are influenced by their priests, and
that it would therefore be dangerous to allow them the
controul over the management of their local affairs enjoyed
by the people of England and Scotland ; and they are mad
enough to suppose that the nation will patiently suffer
them, on such grounds, to consign the people of Ireland to
a system of despotic rule. If a statesman were anxious to
devise the most effectual means for diffusing throughout
Ireland habits of order and obedience to the laws, lie
would recur to Municipal Corporations as the measure of
all others best calculated to produce such a result. With
that view the Sovereign of Prussia, not likely to be ena-
moured of schools of agitation, established Municipal Cor-
porations throughout his dominions, and the result cor-
responded to his expectations. But it is an insult to the
understandings of our readers to combat such arguments as
those offered in support of the barefaced despotism proposed
by the Tories, in order to prevent the loss of their influence.
The Lyndhurst scheme, were effect to be given to it,. would
lay the foundation for unspeakable calamity to Ireland and
the empire at large. Every Irishman of spirit must feel
that the Lyndhurst proposition would fix an indelible
stigma on him.--Morning Chronicle.
The Irish Corporation Reform Bill, as it is generally
called, was read a second time in the House of Lords last
night. The principle is therefore recognised by their Lord-
ships. From the debate, holever, it will be seen that the
measure transmitted from the other House .was not passed
through this important stage without a distinct understand-
ing that certain modifications will be proposed in the Com-
mittee, with a view to prevent the reconstruction of the ma-
chinery by which party spirit has been kept going for so long
a period to the injury of the public at large. It is vain for
the advocates of the Government measure to contend, as
they have done, that, in reviving the corporate bodies
which they have so often denounced as fraught with evil to
Ireland, they are acting upon a conservatism principle. If
the corporate system has worked well in Ireland, let it be
preserved—if, on the contrary, it has worked badly, let it
cease. This is conservation in the broad sense in which
alone it ought to be understood, because this embraces the
broad consideration of public advantage, as opposed to
mere party triumph and aggrandisement. But such is not
the principle on which the Government measure has been
founded. The object of that measure is not to cure the
evil of party preponderance, but to transfer the prepon-
derance from one party to another. It says in effect
the Tories have hitherto possessed all the power
of the Corporations in Ireland, and they have abused it—
let us now give it to the Whigs or the Radicals, that they
may abuse it also. But the question is, how will you mend
matters by this sort of zig-zag Legislation, this game of
" weigh the bucket" in politics ? Will the people of that
country be one whit the better off if the Tories are put
down only to make way for the domination of Whigs and
Radicals? Will not their interests be still postponed to
the interests of party ? And what sort of reformation, or
consolation either, are they likely to draw from the reflec-
tion that their future oppressors are to be a new set of men,
known by a different name ? The tendency of the new
Corporations to promote agitation, and foster political and
religious rancour, was well explained by Lord Lyndhurst,
to whose speech we refer our readers for a masterly dissec-
tion of the Bill now before their Lordships. It is not for
us to anticipate what the result of the proceedings in Com-
mittee will be ; but we are warranted in saying that a suffi-
cient ground has been laid to show the necessity of exercis-
ing the utmost caution, lest, under the pretext of preserving
institutions, the cause of agitation should be fostered, and
political ascendancy secured to a faction as likely to abuse
its power as that which it is labouring to supersede.—
iforning Herald.
It will be seen by our Parliamentary report, that the
Irish Municipal Corporations Bill was read a sekand time
last night. The chief features of the debate may be de-.
scribed in few words. Lord Melbourne moved the second
reading of the Bill in a short and temperate. speech.. The
chief fault he found with the existing corporations was
their exclusiveness ; and the principal, if mot the only merit, •
he assigned to the Bill was, that it " carried out the prin-
ciple of the Emancipation Act." He told the House that
his measure was like to the English Municipal Corporations
Act, except where the peculiar circumstances of Irelr,nd
rendered it necessary to depart from the English stew:lard,
and taking it for granted that the House was fully c‘amer-
sant with the enactments of the English act, he thrAot it
necessary to glance merely at the deviations from that act
in the Irish measure. This, he said, was all he should.baste
thought it necessary to say to their Lordships asking'
them to read the Bill a second time, had it not been for Sir
R. Peel's proposition in the House of Commons. Applying
himself to that proposition, he freely admitted that different-
portions of the same empire might properly be subjected to
different lima. He thought, however, that Sir Robert,..