The Sun.
London, England, 1836-01-19 00:00:00

touch a responsive chord in the hearts of their fellow-
countrymen. Therefore he trusted that the present meet-
ing would have a beneficial effect on the councils of the na-
tion. He knew not whether they could agree to them :
if honest, they would support Ministers in their honesty ;
but if dishonest, they would make their hearts shake
within them.—(Great cheering.) The conduct of the
Tories reminded him of that of Louis the Sixteenth,
who was figuring at a ball at Versailles whilst the Bas-
tile was levelling to the ground ; or like Charles the
Tenth, who was enjoying his mummeries when the brave
men of Paris rose and broke his sceptre before his eyes.
—(Cheers.) They saw the hand-writing on the wall,
but would not believe their own eyes.—(Renewed cheers.)
They recover dominion in England! As soon might they
attempt to pluck the sun from his course. They took the
quiescence of the people for acquiescence—they endea-
voured to move heaven and earth with Conservative as-
sociations and Conservative dinners, and, if they let them
alone, no doubt they would endeavour to deceive the
people as welt as the Crown.—(Hear, hear.) It was,
therefore, time in order to insute the safety and honour
of their country that the opinions of the people should
be vindicated, and the gross frauds of their enemies ex-
posed. If the Tories were suffered to have their own
way a deluge of blood must and would be shed in Eng-
land. Now, observe how near this calamity they stood.
At the late election the candidates were contaminated
with the poison of the Tories, and gained but ten or twenty
of a majority in the House of Commons. The power of the
Tories was great—they had great wealth—wealth wrung
from the industrious classes of the nation.
" The shaft which brings an eagle to the ground,
Is tipped with feathers from the eagle's wings."
Thus did the Tories act towards the people—they plucked
the people's wealth, and then used it as a mortal weapon to
destroy their liberties.—(Great cheering.) Five or ten of
the contested elections in the country bad turned against
the people. What with the power of the landlords over
their tenants—the lawyers over their clients—the banker
over his debtors—and the parsons over the delusions of
their flocks, what with one bad spirit and another bad spirit,
they caused a majority in the Commons. They thought
to ride rough-shod over the people of England, and unless
they spoke out and told them of their errors, he thought
they would get a majority in the House of Commons.
—( Hear, hear.) Indeed, he should not wonder if they
would attempt to impeach Lord Melbourne. He believed,
as there was a God in Heaven, that the Tory Lords would
convict him, and a Tory Court condemn him.—(Cries of
" Never, never.") If, continued Mr. A., you would sub-
mit to it. These were reasons sufficient for bringing for-
ward the Political Union. The people rested in the quiet
magnificence of their strength to-day, and to-morrow they
were rocked like a tempest. They should therefore be on
their guard. They never could and they never would
submit to the abolition of the Reform Bill.—(Cheers.)
They would go as much further as possible, but not a sin-
gle step backward.—(Cheers.) Such was the truth. The
Tories never , listened to truth—they never believed in
truth—and as the poet said—
" Know then this truth, the judgment of the skies—
He that hates truth shall be the dupe of lies,
And he that loves delusion to the last,
Delusion strong as Hell shall bind him fast."
The Hon. Gentleman then continued to say that the people
would be satisfied with nothing short of thorough reform of
the House of Lords. The Commons had now got the
people at their back, and could now advance with security
in the great march of political improvement. Should the
Lords remain unreformed, you would have the screws put
again on the industrious classes ; but he would tell them
what they were to do ; they would want the sum of 5,0001.
only. One hundred thousand men, at Is. per man, would
supply that want. They would then send delegates through-
out the country, rousing the people to action, and becoming
themselves their leaders. That would be the policy ; and
he doubted not the influence which the men of Birming-
ham possessed over their countrymen would command the
success of 20 millions of people and 20 millions of hearts.
The Tories were too weak to fight. A few thousands of
those crawling Conservators could not fight against 20 mil-
lions of brave people ; but he feared that the nation was
upon the brink of famine and anarchy brought on by the
Tories ; and when that fearful period came, he would take
care that they could not charge it on his head. He did not
mean to give them that loop-hole—they should have all the
credit to themselves. Before the reform of the Commons
had been effected, he was applied to by a member of the
Ministry as to his opinion with respect to the creation of
Peers. He told them to make use of the power they pos-
sessed, for if the Tories obtained the upper hand, they
would be kicked and spattered on by them.—(Cheers.)
If an impeachment were to be preferred against any
party in the House of Commons, say Sir Robert Peel
for instance—no matter how great their delinquencies—the
House of Lords would throw a protecting shield over the
delinquent, and render the proceedings of the Commons
nugatory. The Hon. Gentleman next adverted to the Re-
form of the Irish Church, showing its glaring abuses, and
pointing out the absolute necessity of their complete eradi-
cation. He stated that all persons admitted this except the
Tories and the clergy, and they upheld existing abuses under
the plea of their attachment to the interests of the Protes-
tant religion, while their attachment was only to the loaves
and fishes ; it was the means of producing them. He strongly
condemned the conduct of the Irish clergy, who had so long
, concealed from the people of England the real state of the
Irish population, the mass of misery, the extreme poverty
and suffering to which they were subjected, and the repeated
deaths from starvation. These were well known to the clergy
—they were evils which cried aloud to heaven for redress.
A system of poor laws ought to be introduced into that
country. The right to live is the first right of nature. An
army of 30,000 is constantly kept there, for the purpose of
grinding the Irish poor, and taking from the little they have
—not sufficient to supply their own wants—to enrich a pam-
pered hierarchy ; Ireland must have justice done her. Those
landlords—those Tory, Orange, borough-mongering land-
lords—had done much mischief. Would it be believed, that
one of them had actually driven 1,700 Catholics, at one fell
swoop, out of their cabins, with no poor laws to provide
for them, and in the depth of winter, for no crime what-
ever? all that could be alleged against them was that
they were Catholics.—(Shame, shame.) If they were thus
to be driven from home and shelter, and left to starve,
ought not laws to be enacted to find a provision for them,
and which ought to be paid out of the pockets of these
landlords? Many of the Members of the House of Com-
mons, who were formerly averse to the system of poor laws
for Ireland, now were the most strenuous advocates for their
introduction, feeling convinced of their absolute necessity.
The Hon. Gentleman concluded amidst loud cheering, by
moving the first Resolution, to the effect that an address be
presented to his Majesty.
Mr. HADLEY, in seconding the Resolution, said it was
a soul stirring scene to see so vast an assemblage of his
fellow-townsmen met together for the purpose of petition-
ing the King and the House of Commons on some of the
most vital questions which could occupy their attention ;
and it was still more gratifying to find so much enthusiasm
prevailing on such an occasion. He rejoiced that that
meeting had been called by the Political Council instead
of having been summoned by any other class of Reformers,
or by what were called the constituted authorities, be-
cause they had been designated by the Birmingham Orange
Union as "the miserable remnant of the Political Union,"
defunct, dead, and buried, and a requiem chaunted over
their ashes at the late Bacchanal Feast held in that
splendid temple. Let them have it so ; the people of
England did not think so, nor of Ireland, nor of Scotland.
The honest, sincere Reformers in Church and State,
wherever they were to be found, and there were millions of
them, did not think so : they knew that an unquenchable
desire for good government, equitable laws, and equal
rights, must still exist in the minds of those men who stood
foremost in the struggle for civil and religious liberty, un-
aided by the blandishments of friends or the frowns of
enemies. It was true, that for the last two or three years,
they had ceased to agitate the public mind, but it was be-
cause they had effected such a change in the then rulers as
gave them a fair hope that they might live to see a Govern-
ment acting in accordance with the spirit of the age, fully
alive to the people's wants, and as prompt to redress their
wrongs as to assert and defend their rights. They still lived
lin this hope, and he thought they would become traitors to
their own principles if they did not support the present Go-
vernment, while they manifest a desire to improve the insti-
tutions of the country, and adapt them to the more en-
lightened wants of the day.—(Loud cheers.) This was
his determination, and he doubted not it was of that vast
assembly, but, he confessed, he felt himself placed in a po-
sition of no ordinary novelty. They had now two political
unions in that town, supporting principles as much opposed
to each other as the Poles were asunder. He, and those
he then addressed, were for the King and his Ministry ;
the other party are for the Duke of Cumberland and
Orange ascendancy.—(Cheers.) They were for cheap and
good government, in Church and State ; the others for the
loaves and fishes, and the continuance of plunder, corrup-
tion, and arbitrary power. They were for the establish-
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unhappy country , the others for continuing the bloody
tithe warfare and for starving her people into rebellion.—
(Cheers.) Such were the creeds entertained by the two
Political Unions in the town. Both could not be right ;
but as he confessed he was a believer in the opinions enter-
tained by the Radical Political Union, and was prepared to
defend them ; he did hope that if there were any member
of the Orange Union then present, he would step forward