The Sun.
London, England, 1831-10-29 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

Could the cause of Reform at this moment speak
for itself its first utterance should be " Sive me
from my friends!" Its bitterest enemies cannot do
it half the real harm which those friends, for instance,
are now effecting who are calling out for agitation,
Political Unions, and National Guards. The Anti-
Reformers boast that the subject )5 undergoing e
re-action. Nothing upon earth is so likely to pro-
duce this, and thus accomplish their wishes, as that
the honest and thinking part or the community
should for a moment be led to imagine that Reform
is only the watchword, while revolution is the ob-
ject. Now, that revolution is the object of the
great body of Reformers we utterly and totally
deny. What the people really want is to see them-
selves delivered from the grip and tyranny of their
hard task-masters—the beroughmongers, and them,
selves restored to that share in the Goveenment
which is their birthright and indefeasible inhelitance.
And can any one-and-forty Peers long keep out of
this ?—or can it require turbulent associations, or,
still less, armed bands, to accomplish such an object
or to defeat so contemptible an obstacle ? If by
agitation is meant keeping the subject it ermly and
unceasingly alive in men's minds, bf such agitation
we warmly approve, and ere) and will be, ourselves
partekers. But unfortunately the term has, in core,
coon acceptation, acquired a very different metening,
and above all, implies a degree of violence totally at
variance with public tranquillity or private security.
It is not a storm which bring-s tht vessel into harbour,
but a steady wind blowing from the right point. Let
the wind then, we say, blow steadily, but let us avoid
the tempest. The one, under any Ceptairn will brine us
into port ; by the other, under the most skilful pilot-
age, we may after all suffer shipwreck. But, above
all, what need have we of a National Guard ? Such
a mode of employing themselves may suit the hey-
day tone of the French character, and, indeed, was
celled for by the various crises in which that nation
has been placed. But here there is no similarity
between the one or the Other. A National Guard
is the very symbol and off-pring of revolution ;
while here all that the people are requiring, with
their Monarch at their head, is a restoration of one
branch of the Constitution to something like it.;
pristine purity. For this object we do not require
bayonets. it is not necessary that our citizens
should leave their peaceful pursuits to learn that trade
which has been, in all ages, the scourge of hu-
manity. All that is required is that they should he
firm, earnest, and immovable in their one great ob-
ject, and this done, however the attainment of that
object may be for a moment delayed, it is not 41—
no, nor 41,000 opponents who could wrest from
them a sure and speedy victory. But if, instead of
relying on patience and perseverance, they give ea,
to advisers who would lead them into violent and
intemperate courses, they will at once strengthen
the ranks of their adversaries while they thin their
own, and not only postpone the attainment of their
object just es it is within their reach, but run the
risk of converting their country into a scene of
anarchy, rapine, and civil war.---111orning Herald.
Among the tricks and artifices of the borough-
mongers to bring about the re-action they are strug-
gling for, the most successful seems to have been
that of endeavouring to persude the landed interest,
but especially the farmers, that Reform would be
their ruin ; that its immediate effect would be tin
repeal of the corn laws, and an inability on their
part to compete any longer with the untaxed agri-
culturists of Poland, Turkey, and America. Thi•
doctrine seems to have stood them in no bad stead
in Dorsetshire, and is now taking its turn at the
Cambridgeshire election. But the notion proceed-
upon this evident fallacy, that Reform will render it
the interest of one part of the community to bring
about the ruin of another—that the towne, for in-
stance, will see in the ruin of agriculture the surest
foretaste of their own prosperity. Now to tell an
English tradesman that he will be best off by losing
his best customers is un argument worthy of those
who would in the same breath persuade us that

representation means nomination, and that it is for
the interests of the community that the few should
usurp the rights and advantages of the many. Ali
that we can say is, that, if the agriculturists permi,
themselves to be the dupes of such pilings as these,
they may deserve their own fate, but they have
even then no right to entail the consequences of
their ignorance and credulity upon others.—Morn-
jog Herald,
In alluding to our observations upon the new
game law, the Courier says, " We take shame to
ourselves for not having examined the new Game
Act as we ought to have done. Our contemporary
has pointed out sufficient here to show that it must
undergo modification in the next session of Parlia-
ment " Now, for our own part, we think the
public will be of opinion that we have stated enough
of the oppressive and iniquitous character of thi•
law to make any decent and satisfactory modification
of it impracticable, which does not go the length of
abolishing the vicious principle which makes it rotten
at the core. That principle is, that the game on
every farm, field, or land, is in all cases the properly
of the landlord ; so that whatever amount
,of pro-
perly the farmer or tenant may possess, and al-
though he purchases a license to kill game from the
Crown by obtaining a certificate, yet he may be
treated as a trespasser for daring to shoot n hare or
partridge on his own grounds, without soliciting and
receiving the permission of the lord of the fee ! Let
us put the case of an honest yeoman, who in the
politics of the county takes the side of Reform,
having such a qualification by a leasehold pro-
perty as under the old law would entitle him to
kill game—namely, 1501. per annum on a lease-1
hold of 99 years—having also a certificate, which
is, properly speaking, a license from the Crown.
-Let us suppose he is the tenant of one
of the 199 Anti-Reform Lords, with whose un-
enviable celebrity England resounds. Will the
sturdy independent yeoman go cap-in-hand, and
humbly sue to the imperious aristocrat for peimis-
Rion to kill the hare or partridge which has been
bred upon his land, and nurtured with the produce
of capital and labour ? Or, if he could bring him-
self to solicit this favour for himself or his friend, is
he likely to receive it ? Let Lord Alt harp answer
these questions, and then tell why his Bill to
amend and mitigate the game laws has done so
much for the aristocracy, and so little for the people.
Is this premedited oppression, or only an inadver-
tence? That it is not an inadvertence is clear from
other provisions of the Bill, which are in harmoni-
ous accordance with the spirit of feudal tyranny
which the above enactment displays. Even under
the feudal system the law did not vest the property
in game in the land-owners. Under that system all
game was supposed to belong not to the land-
lords, but to the King, by virtue of his prerogative,
°and lords of manors only derived their right
to kill game from the Crown by a grant of
a portion of the Royal franchise. But what
has Lord Althorp's Bill done ? It has abso-
lutely abolished the King's prerogative as to game,
not for the purpose of relieving the people,
but solely to increase the already overgrown
power of the aristocracy. And thi, is the law which
the King's Ministers have introduced into the
King's Speech as a boon and concession to the
Commons of England ! To show, more manifestly,
the extent of this boon, let us suppose the sturdy
yeoman, of whom we have spoken above, and who
is qualified according to the terms of the old law,

and who possesses acertificate—let us suppose that
this yeoman is tempted on some evil day to shoot
a partridge, hare, or pheasant, on his own fields, or
to permit a friend 'to do-so. The gamekeeper or
other menial of the Anti-Reform landlord sees this,
and knowing that the yeoman's lease has no special
agreement as to game, and that he has not obtained,
permission to kill from his master, orders the yeo-
man or his friend to give up the hare, or partridge,
or pheasant, which he has just shot. The luckless
sportsman refuses—the pampered menial collars him
and attempts to take it by force—the 14:,r,glish spirit
of the assaulted party cannot brook this, and
struggles with the assailant—he is knocked down

with a bludgeon or other weapon—he springs
again upon his feet—his blood is up—and a fight
: takes place in which the gamekeeper or servant re-
ceives any hurt which, under the Game Liws, may
•be construed to be a wound—the yeoman or his
friend is liable to be dragged to prison as a felon—
pieced in the dock with robbers, burglars, and other
• criminals, and sentenced to a felon's penalties and
degradation, with a forfeiture of his property to the
Crown. The Courier is wrong in saying that here-
tofore many landlords did not permit the destruction
of hares and rabbits upon the land occupied by their
tenants. They could not prevent their tenants from
destroying rabbits, except where there were parti-
cular rights of warren, because rablets were not ac-
counted game; though they could always prevent
them if not qualified and not having a certificate for
destroying bares; but by Lord Althorp's Act they
cannot, even with a certificate, kill rabbits unless
they have the special permission of the landlord.
Thus the license from the Ceo!to: is as nothine, un-
less confirmed by a license front the feudal Lord.
There are More objections to this Act of a liberal
Administration than we have yet stated. At present
we shall only add, that it is likely to cause more
between the privileged and unprivileged
classes, and more breaches of the peace, violence,
bloodshed, crime, and misery, than even the old
laws, whose odious tyranny it professed to mitigate
and correct—Mortling Herald.
The Member now opposing the Reform candidate
in Cambridereshire, Captain Yorke, has the support
of his reletive, Earl of Hardwicke, the Lord Lieute-
nant of the county. The Lord Lieutenant is the
individual who, in effect, names the Magistracy, and
Iris powers of influencing a county election are of
necessity very great. As was well stated in a
speech of a celebrated ancestor of the present Lord
Lieutenant, Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, on the
subject of the Scotch heritable jurisdictions, the
people are chiefly influenced by those under whose
immediate authority they are placed, and who have
the power to injure them ; and when it happens
that a share of the royal authority is delegated to
persons hostile to the Government, the people have
a strong motive for being also hostile to the Go-
vernment, coming only in contact with the posses-
sors of the delegated authority. It is, therefore,
quite ridiculous to talk of independent county elec-
tions, with all the Lord Lieutenants but twelve hos-
tile to them. If we deduct the influence derived
from the royal authority in the last general election,
in the counties in which the Lord Lieutenants
turned the influence of the Crown against Reform,
the remaining Anri-Reformers will be few indeed. We
some time ago alluded to the share which the Lord
Lieutenants of counties had in throwing out the Re-
form Bill. There were thirty-three who voted
against the second reading—some of them possess-
ing three counties, and some two. The number in
favour was only twelve. Let us see how the Go-
vernment on former days has acted toward, Lord
Lieutenants voting in opposition to it. On the
Bth February, 1780, the E irl of Shelburne, father
of the present Marquis of Lansdowne, made a mo-
,ion for an inquiry into the public expenditure, with
a view to economy and retrenchment. On that
occasion his Lordship showed, in an able manner,
that the Crown was fettered in the exercise of the
prerogative, to the great detriment of the public
service, by the necessity of employing in preference
persons possessed of Parliamentary influence. " The
Sovereign (he observed) had the power of confer-
ring all favours and graces ; the appointment of offi-
cers civil and military; the bestowing of titles of
rinds and honour, Bse. These were high prerogatives,
but were placed very properly, and of course gave
him extensive influence; and attached those who,
in their different stations, experienced the notice
of a gracious Sovereign. But influence, as he ob-
served before, reversed the whole order of things;
the power o hich should solely originate with the
Premier began in Parliament ; thence ail pretensions
ro favour were established ; and instead of consider-
tog the real claims, the personal vote or Portia-
mentary weight were put in the scale against long
service, great abilities, experience, and all the qua-
lifications necessary to constitute the statesman, the
sailor, or the soldier. The Crown thus became
robbed of its native and proper influence, and an in-
fluence of another kind was substituted in its stead,
as the price of creating an undue and unconstitu-
tional influence in Parliament. To restore to the
Crown its constitutional power, to render Parlia-
ment independent, and place Government upon its
only true grounds, wisdom, justice, and public vir-
tue, which will ever secure the confidence and affec-
tion of the people, was his most earnest wish ; and
that could not be effected without striking at the
root, which appeared to him (no matter from what
cause, or how it came to grow to is present enor-
mous growth) to exist now in Parliament." Among
the Peers who supported Lord Shelburne were
the Marquis of Carmarthen and the Earl of
Pembroke. Lord Carmarthen said—" A most
respectable body of gentlemen, clergy, and free-
holders had called a meeting in the county over part
of which he had the honour to preside as Lord Lieu-
tenant (York). He was invited to that meeting,
but was prevented by priva'e business from attend•
ing. The proceedings at that meeting, so far as
they corresponded with the present motion, met his
ideas very fully, though he could not say he ap-
proved of the Associations or Committees of Cor-
respondence. He spoke, he said, on the occasion ;
he wrote to the Committee after they had agreed to
the resolutions, assigned the reason for his absence,
and his sentiments how far he approved or disap-
proved of their proceedings." Before supporting
he motion of Lord Shelburne, he had resigned his
situation of Vice-Chamberlain to the Queen; but
this resignation did not prevent the Ministry from
also removing him from the office of Lord Lieu-
tenant of the East Riding of Yorkshire. The follow-
ing is his statement of the business. "He said he
had, a few days since, resigned a place in the House-
hold (Vice-Chamberlain to the Queen), the occu-
pying of which he should ever esteem one of the
greatest honours of his life. Why had he resigned
it ? Because his duty to his Sovereign and his
country, and a regard to his own honour, would not
permit him longer t-o retain it. He could no longer
give his support to a Ministry which had, after a
series of repeated trials, proved themselves pusillani-
mous, incapable, and conupt—who had brought
the nation to the brink of destruction, and still
persisted to plunge it deeper into calamity and
danger. These were the reasons which induced
him to resign his place in the Household. While he
remained in place, he did not think it decent to op-
pose Government. He could not, in conscience,
absent himself from his duty in Parliament at so
momentous a crisis ; the only method which. there-
fore presented itself to him, to get rid of the em-
barrassment, was to resign. But what had been the
consequence of this moderate conduct ? That of
dismissing him that morning from an office he held
under the Crown, the Lord Lieutenancy of the East
Riding of the county of York." The Earl of Pent-
broke did not speak on the occasion ; but he voted
in the minority, and signed a protest on the rejection
of the motion. The Earl of Pembroke was, in
consequence of his vote, dismissed from the office of
Lord Lieutenant of the county of Wilts. He had
been a Lord of the Bedchamber ; but, like the
Marquis of Carmarthen, he resigned it previous to
the vote, from motives of delicacy. His family had
been Lords Lieutenant of Wilts ever since the office
was known in England. The subject was brought
before the House of Lords on the 6th of March by
Lord Shelburne, who proposed the following mo-
tion, at the same time assuring their Lordships, if
any one Lord could rise and declare upon his honour,
he did not believe these two Noble Lords were
displaced from their offices for giving their votes in
Parliament, he would withdraw it ; " Whereas the
Marquis of Carmarthen was dismissed from his em-
ployment of Lieutenancy of the East Riding of the
county of York on the morning of that day when
his intention to support with his vote a motion that
was; made in the House on the Bth day of February
last was well known; and whereas the Earl of Pem-
broke was, likewise, dismissed from the Lieute-

`~

nancy of the county of Wilts soon after he gave his
vote on the same question, which office, of Lieute-
nant has been at all times important, but most pecu-
liarly so under the present constitution of the militia ;
and whereas no cause has been suggested or com-
municated to either of the said Noble Lords for such
dismission, this House, therefore, hath every ground
to believe that the same had reference to their con-
duct in Parliament ;" and it was therefore moved,
" That an humble address be presented to his Ma-
jesty, to desire that he will be graciously pleased to
acvaint the House whether he has been advised,
and by whom, to dismiss the said two Noble Lords,
or either of them, from their said employments for
their conduct in Parliament." In the debate on
this motion, Lord Stormont observed, that " the
two Nobie Lords held their offices through the fa-
vour of the Crown, and bad, therefore, no right to
complain when it was withdrawn ; for they lost no-
thing they could call their own." Lord Denbigh
said, " if the fact had been as stated, and the cause
assigned for the removal of the two Noble Lords
was on account of their conduct in that House, it
would not be without numerous precedents to sup-
port and sanction it. He believed it had often
been done since the Revolution, and under the
favourite administration of the Noble Lords who
would vote for the proposed address ; and there was
a recent instance of the kind early in the present
reign, when some of his present Majesty's confiden-
tial servants were in power—he meant the case of a
Noble Earl lately deceased (Temple)—who, for a
vote given in that House, had been removed from the
Lieutenancy of the county of Bucks." The Earl of
Hillsborough " thought the King had an undoubted
right to appoint and dismiss the officers of the
Crown as he pleased ; nor could it be an object for
Parliament to interfere with, unless that power was
grossly abused." The Lord Chancellor (Thurlow)
said, " If his Majesty's royal will were subject to
Parliamentary controul and examination upon every
promotion or removal which prudence directed him
to put into execution, such modes of proceeding
would end in a total subversion of the prerogative."
The motion was lost by a majority of 92 to 31.
Here then we have a striking instance of the exer-
cise of the Royal Prerogative in dismissing Lord
Lieutenants for their votes in Parliament, when such
votes were in favour of motions directed against the
corrupt influence which it is the object of
the Reform Bill to destroy. Lord Shelburne
was right in seeking to free the Crown from
the necessity of carrying on the Government
through the purchase of persons possessed of Par-
liamentary influence—hut he was obviously wrong
lin challenging the exercise of the prerogative. But
if the Tories deemed it advisable to displace two
Lord Lieutenants at a time when their majorities
were large, and when perhaps those were the only
two Lord Lieutenants in the minority, how much
more necessary is it now, when there is a conspiracy
of the possessors of undue influence in Parliament
to retain their usurped power in spite of the Crown
and the people, and when nearly all the Lord Lieu-
tenants abet that conspiracy, by treacherously em-
ploying the power delegated to them by the Crown
against the Crown itself? No Government on
earth can exist, if it be so foolish as to allow those
to whom the grand authority is entrusted of naming
and controuling the local Magistracy to turn its
authority against itself. It was petulance in the
case of the North Administration in 1780, to dis-
place two Lord Lieutenants for their votes ; for the
tendency of Lord Lieutenants being naturally in favour
of supporting the corrupt system, there was little
danger of the example being catching. But at the
present time, when all the corrupt interests of the
country are bearding the Government, there is an
absolute necessity for withdrawing from these cor-
rupt interests the powers delegated by the Crown,
and which to allow to be wielded against itself is to
be consenting to a felo de se. We hold it little less
than treachery to the Crown and the people to allow
the authority of the Crown to remain in the hands
of persons who use it against it. In the case of the
Cambridgeshire election, report says that the Lord
Lieutenant, the Earl of Hardwicke, has subscribed
10,0001. for the support of the opposition candi-
date. This is monstrous. We trust the people
generally will see the importance of supporting Mr.
Townley. But Government ought also to support
him, by preventing the indecency of a Lord Lieu-
tenant supporting a candidate pledged to oppose the
measure by which that Government stands or falls.
It is absurd to say that the people have fair play in
a county where a rich University, the Lord Lieu-
tenant, the Clergy, &c. are arrayed against the can-
didate of their choice.—Morning Chronicle.
The advice of the people of England to unite
and co-operate in their several counties, towns, pa-
rishes, &c.—first, for the promotion of the cause of
Reform, and, that being secured, or unhappily in-)-
peeled—for the protection of life end property, against
the detailed but irregular outrages of the mob, as
well as for the maintenance and advancement of other
great interests, against the systematic violences of
an oligarchy made desperate by opposition—has, we
rejoice to see, struck more than one class of persons
in the community with terror, which they arc unable
to disguise. That there are bodies of men in Great
Britain who regard the existence of rank, and wealth
and law, and order, as so many hindrances to their
own projects, and therefore so many nuisances
which they would at once abate, if in their power
to do so, sufficient testimony has been afforded by
speeches addressed to large assemblies of people, and
indeed by some corresponding transactions, within
the last few days. Propositions have been made,
which had for their object to inflame the pas-
sions of the people against all accumulation of
property—no matter of what description—and to di-
rect their future efforts to its overthrow. The
authors of such discourses, and many of their hearers,
are naturally panic stricken by the prospect of an in-
stitution, which would necessarily combine and arm
all classes of men of property throughout the king-
dom against the single class which had none. But
there is another order of men, whose conclusions re-
specting the rights of political society are not a whit
less revolting than those of the mob-orators in rela-
tion to the rights of property. As the paup'er revo-
lutionists demand, and would execute by force, a
general dispersion of other men's property, so the
oligarchs, who are but a different tribe of revolution-
ists, would retain in their own hands, by force if
all more indirect means were wanting, a monopoly
of other men's political rights ; that is, they would
fight for plunder already won, as their ragged
rivals would fight to win it. These oligarchs,
these self-imagined grandees, constituting the
boroughmonger and Tory faction,—are no less ter-
rified at the notion of a national armament for a
reform of law and a recovery of power, than the
mob are at the consequences of a league for the pro-
tection of house, person, and money. Against both
sets of robbers it is that, if requisite, the people of
England ought to stand upon their defence. As for
the specific arrangements by which that defensive
league might be constituted, and guided to its proper
ends, they are matter for cool, though not for dilatory,
deldeeration. To what extent the " Conservative
Guard" ought hereafter to be placed in connection
with, or under the controul ef, the executive autho-
rity the State, will of course be an important
question. The principles on which the French
National Guard has been formed are well worth
consideration here. For the old volunteers, it
seems to us that they hung together too loosely
to be susceptible of much confidence in their effi-
ciency upon critical occasions. There must be set
over each local body of the" Union" some power of
enforcing orders by adequate sanctions, that the
common enemy, whether the rich or the ragged one,
may not be justified in treating us with scorn.—
Times.

With us it is no subject of satisfaction to observe
the deep and fearful spirit of inveterate hatred
towards the bench of Bishops, displayed, without
resistance or dissent, at every one of the county
meetings which have already taken place, and to
which we have daily been adverting. The desire to
affix some public and enduring mark of national dig•
countenance upon that devoted body, has become

indeed no less a characteristic of the time than has
the passion for political Reform itself, of which indeed
the expulsion of the Bishops from Parliament, and
a general " overhauling" of the finances of the
Church, are universally held to be no unimportant
branches. For the " expulsion" of the Bishops, it
is, we are afraid, a necessary preliminary toNaids
their full restoration to religion, as we are sure,
without it, they never mote can enjoy the public
confidence or good-will. Nor is there lack of
precedent for such a compulsory transfer of
their Lordships' services from the cause of
Mammon to that of righteousness. There was not
less of the influence of true religion upon men's
lives in England after the fall of Charles 1.,
than after the restoration of his unworthy offspring.
But upon the subject of the why and wherefore
" Bishops ought not to have votes in Parliament ?"
we present our readers with the following curious
paper, which was found inserted in a folio volume
of political tracts, deposited in the British Museum,
and forming part of a gift of George 111. to that in-
stitution. The volume is lettered, " Declaration and
Acts of the King (Car. I) and Parliament ;" and
the paper in question is next to one which bears date
1640. The wonder is, that with matter of such
long standing in the minds of the nation against the
Right It-!verend Bench, it has never, since the resto-
ration of Charles 11., of pious and Protestant memory,
been clipped of some of its profaner privileges.

" REASONS OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS WHY BISHOPS

OUGIIT NOT TO HAVE 'VOTES IN PARLIAMENT.

" 1. Because it is a very great hindrance to the exercise
of their ministeriall function.

" 2. Because they do vow and undertake at their ordi-
nation, ashen they enter into holy orders, that they will
give themselves wholly to that vocation.
" 3. Because councils and canons in several ages do
forbid them to meddle with secular affairs.

" 4. Because the twenty-four Bishops have a depend-
ence, i.e., on the two Archbishops, and because of their
canonical obedience to them.

"5. Because they are but for their lives, and theref.re
are not fit to have legislative power over the honours, in-
heritances, persons, and liberties of others.
" 6. Because of Bishops' dependancy and expectancy of
translations to places of great profit.
" 7. That several Bishops have of late much encroached
upon the consciences and liberties of the subjects, and
they and their successours will be much encouraged still to
encroach, and the subjects will be much discouraged from
complaining against such encroachmtnts, if twenty-six of
that order bee to bee judges upon those complaints ; the
same reason extends to their legislative power in any I3ill
to passe for the regulation of their power, and upon any
emergent inconvenience by it.
"8. Because the whole number of them is intrusted to
maintain the jurisdiction of Bishops, which hath been
found so grievous to the three kingdoms, that Scotland
hath utterly abolished it, and multitudes in England and
Ireland have petitioned against it.
" 9. Because the Bishops, being Lords of Parliament,
it setteth too great a distance between them arid the rest
of their brethren in the ministry, which occasioneth prlle
in them, discontent i❑ others, and disquiet in the church.