The Sun.
London, England, 1836-03-30 00:00:00

eluded attorneys—one was that they usually had a great num-
ber of clients amongst the inhabitants of the boroegle and
therefore they were liable to more suspielbn; the other rea-
son was, that they were efteit the conductors and managers of
all the political detttans of the town. With respect to that
rules Met aeparted from it in several large instances, but as
tilsgaidecl the appointment of attorneys who were at the head
of a political party, he knew of only two instrlileeta iqt:Ch
he had departed from it. One was in, thtN:itk.K of Chichester,
the individual having been ti;s66tiq4iiiied by the Noble Lord
who always spoke .air,aing the Government. The other case
was that cif heiager. The person appointed there was re-
torenTendea by another Noble Lord who always voted against
tovernment.—( Hear, hear.) Perhaps some wttil'd say
Itilat he went too far in appointing those gentieilin—(Hear)--.
but he did so only on receiving tht `strongest testimony as to
their respectability. He believed the representations of those
Noble Lords; he was sure they would state nothing but %Oat
the.? believed to be strictly true ; but in makief `Zeiception
tti that kind in favour of a person se rehestly opposed to the
Government in politics, he seedy afforded something like a
proof that they had net Settled this arrangement for the ap-
pointment of then magistrates, with a view to serve any poli-
tical views or his own. The view which he took with respect
to the political opinion of the majority was, that he ought cer-
tainly, in general, to attend to the recommendation of the
town-councils ; but when, owing to the council being equally
deceived, they had no opportunity of making a particular re-
commendation, or when, from affection, or for any other rea-
son, the council had named only those who were of their own
particular party, he felt that he ought to endeavour to place
on the commission persons of different political principles.—
( Hear, hear.) He had acted on that principle with regard
to Liverpool ; he then advised the Crown to put into the
commission ,five gentlemen who were recommended to him,
and who were described as individuals who were not of
what were called Liberal principles. In the case of Hull,
a long list was recommended to him, which did not con-
tain one person of Tory politics. He appointed here two
gentlemen, who, as he was told, were certainly moderate in
their views, but they were decidedly Conservative. In the
Leeds list there was only one gentleman whose politics
were Tory ; he added to that one three others. To the list
from Newcastle-on-Tyne he added the late mayor, a person,
he believed, of great respectability. He put in also two others
who were not in the former list. There were certainly some
cases in which all the magistrates appointed belonged to one
party, there being no individuals of the other party named by
the town-councils, and he not having been able to select any
others ; but he believed that in all instances the individuals
were of great respectability, and fully qualified for the duties
which would devolve on them. With regard to the places
named by the Right Hon. Baronet, there was also Wigan.
Having received a remonstrance as to the manner in which the
list from that town was composed, he sought particular infor-
mation as to each of the individuals, and being assured of their
respectability he did not feel himself justified in rejecting them.
He, however, desired inquiries to be 'made with respect to
some other gentlemen who were named to him as parties whom
it was desired to see appointed. As regarded Rochester, he
received the recommendation of a large body of persons sup-
ported by one of the Members of the town and one of the
Members of the county, who assured him of their respectabi-
lity.—(Hear from the Opposition, responded to by cries of
Hear from the Ministerial benches.) This was a case in which
the town council, being divided, had made no recommenda-
tion whatever. Therefore he thought himself fully at
liberty to recommend to the Crown persons who were per-
fectly qualified to keep the peace, and to administer justice
in that borough. If the time should come when the town
council would be able to act, he should be ready to attend-to
any recommendations which they might forward. • The
Right Hon. Baronet said that in Coventry the magistrates
were all of one mind on political subjects. One of the Mein*
hers for Coventry came to him at the Home-office, and said he
believed that the persons named were all fit individuals to be
in the commission of the peace ; but, with respect to the last
three or four on the list, as to their being men who entertained
liberal political opinions, he could assure him that they were
not. They did not, at all events, vote for that Hon. Gentle-
man ; the Hon. Gentleman told him that they had voted
against him, and in favour of the Tory candidate. If, then,
they did not vote for the Hon. Gentleman, and voted only for
his Right Hon. Friend, it was evident they desired to keep
open one of the seats,-to allow one gentleman of the politics
of the Right Hon. Baronet to be returned as Representative
for Coventry. Let him not be told, then, that these indivi-
duals were violent partisans.—( Hear.) Let him not be told
that they were exceedingly liberal in their politics, when, there
being two candidates in the field, two who were supporters of
Ministers, and two who were supporters of the Right Honour-
able Gentleman, they did not vote for the two supporters of
Ministers, but, having given one vote on one side, neutralized
it by giving another vote on the other side. They might be
liberal men—they might be very good men as politicians, but
surely they were not such violent or ardent partisans that they
ought to be excluded from serving as justices of the peace.—
( Hear, hear.) The Right Hon. Baronet made a complaint
of the appointment of Magistrates for Leicester, but (so we
understood the Noble Lord, but he spoke in a very low tone of
voice) they were not all of the same politics. Then, as re-
garded Plymouth, he knew nearly all those gentlemen, and
they were, all of them, with the exception of Mr. Woodford,
supporters of his, and decidedly liberal in their politics. He
was perfectly satisfied as to their respectability, and knew that
they were fully qualified for the duties intrusted to them.
Sir R. PEEL said he did not question the respectability of
any of those Gentlemen.—( Hear, hear.)
Lord JOHN RUSSELL said it appeared to him that was
the question.--(Hear, hear.) They were all respectable
men ; he had made inquiries and satisfied himself that they
were so, and the Right Hon. Baronet now declared that he
did not raise a question on that subject ; their respectability,
therefore, was to be taken for granted. He was not prepared
to say that the magistrates of the towns, any more than the
magistrates of the counties, should be all of one side in poli-
tics; on the contrary, he should say that it was better that
they should not be : but, at the same time, having declared
that he would give great weight to those recommendations of
the Town Councils, having admitted they were competent to
recommend, he could not set himself up as a superior judge,
and say—" It is true you have recommended respectable men,
I know them myself, and I know that justice will be safe in
their hands ; I know that no political bias will tempt them to
swerve from the line of their duty ; I know that they will be
just, though in being so they must act against their political
inclinations ; still lam not satisfied, and I ask the Town Coun-

cil to give me men of different opinions, and you must choose
between Tory, Whig, and Radical, so as to furnish me with a
fair compound of the whole." If he had addressed that to those
Town Councils he should have been calling on them to act on a
principle which would have been found impracticable. If he had
attempted the task himself, he should have been unable to
give satisfaction ; for very many of those who had been
mentioned, and whom he had put into the commission as
Conservatives, he was told were Liberals, or, in other words,
not Conservatives at all. He, therefore, did not think that,
as a general principle, the advisers of the Crown should look
very scrupulously to ascertain in what way each individual
voted at an election. If he did so, he did not know that the
should get any security there.—( Hear, hear.) He was sure
of this, that even amongst the representatives of the people
they had professors of exceedingly liberal opinions—(a laugh
and cheers)_ -who were not found in this House acting as the
great majority of the Liberal party acted—(cheers)—and might
there not be in the constituency many men of the same sort
as were to be found amongst the representatives? Might he
not discover that he had made a great mistake if he set a man
down as belonging to one party or another, merely because he
had given a vote on some occasion, or had taken a part in
some local contest—might he not commit a great blunder if
he put down such a man as entertaining strong political opi-
nions, or as having a decided political bias ?—( Hear, hear.)
The last case mentioned by the hight Honourable Gentleman
was, he believed, that of the brewers. The first time he ob-

jected to a brewer was in the case of Portsmouth, and he got
thereupon a letter front an Honourable Friend of his, the
Member for Portsmouth, stating at great length the reasons why
he thought it wrong, after the pledge he had given to make a
man being a brewer a ground of exclusion in a case in which the

town council had thought fit to recommend him, and perhaps
had declared why they would place more confidence in him as
a Justice of the Peace, than in any other man. With respect
to Portsmouth, he put a brewer in there, after he was satisfied

by the representations made to him, that this was not one of
the cases in which he should be justified i►► enforcing the prin-
ciple of exclusion. There was another case, in which the

Noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn, who always voted
against the Government, asked him the grounds of the exclu-
sion of brewers ? He replied, that though he should generally
hold that they were disqualified, yet in such a case as that of
King's Lynn, where they possessed the greatest property, and
were the leading persons of the place, there he did not think
it right to enforce the rule and exclude them. He acted on
the principle as regarded brewers, that he applied to the case
of attorneys. When he received from any one, whatever might
be his party, strong recommendations of an individual, assuring
him that he was a person who was looked up to by all parties,
and as happened in many cases, that he had been 20 or 25
years already in the commission of the peace, in such cases he
relaxed the rule both with regard to brewers and attorneys.
He came now to Bristol, and there the Right Hon. Baronet
said an agreement was come to by which one of the parties
chose twelve, and the other chose twelve. He was not aware

of any such agreement ; he was never informed of it. He
certainly did receive a great number of letters respecting the
appointment of Magistrates for Bristol, but none of them stated
that fact.—( Hear.) Of course, any person in his situation,
as well as any person in the situation of a lord lieutenant,
when any person was recommended as a magistrate, must go to
some one or other in whom confidence was placed, to con-
sult them as to the individual in question. And the Right
Hon. Baronet would think it strange, no doubt, if he went and
took the opinion of a person with whom he was not acquainted,
or in whom he had not confidence. The conclusion to which he
came upon the information he received with regard to Bris-
tol was that there were many of the persons recommended
holding Conservative opinions who were proper individuals to
be placed in the commission of the peace ; but that against
others there were reasons which were entitled to considerable
weight. It would be disagreeable, it would be invidious, were
he, with respect to Bristol, and in other cases, to state the
circumstances affecting the individuals which' induced him to
pass over their names.—( Hear, hear.) He could not do so
without entering into particulars with respect to those of Libe-
ral as well as Conservative politics, which, though they
would reflect no dishonour or disgrace on the parties, would
nevertheless, not prove a fit subject for public discussion—
( Hear, hear, hear.) But as the Right Honourable Gentle-
man had mentioned, in particular, the case of Mr. John Da-
niel, he begged to lie allowed to say a word in explanation of
that matter. He had been informed that Mr. Daniel had
on several occasions, publicly declared that, at his present age,
he found himself unequal to the conduct of public business,
his memoay having so greatly failed him that he could no