The Sun.
London, England, 1838-09-08 00:00:00

pealed, but with it the Corn-laws would be most cer-
tainly extinguished. Thus the exasperated people are
driven, by the excessive and accursed injustice of the
landlords and the tithelorde, boldly to aim at the
overthrow of the Constitution.

At the Glasgow meeting, not only Universal
Suffrage was &mantled, but also the reduction of the
national debt. That was described "as a robbery,
to be got rid of as early as possible." The cry of the
landlords, that they are overburdened with taxes, has
found favour with the Glasgow operatives, and they
seem disposed to make common cause with them in
demanding the reduction of the national debt.
The labourers feel, we are aware, the grievous
burden which the taxes impose on them ; and
we think they arc justified in endeavouring to get
every possible reduction. If they were to ask that the
whole burden of that debt should be thrown on
the landlords, we should not much blame them. But
in the landlords, who have long had all the legis-
lative power in their hands, by whose votes, and at
whose recommendation, and for whose special advan-
tage this debt was mainly incurred—for they and their
great allies, the so-called Christian Priesthood of the
Established Church, were the great promoters and
abettors of the war against the French Revolution,
to preserve the power of the Aristocracy and of the
Priesthood—in the landlords, grumbling at the debt, is
condemning their own former profligate conduct, and
seeking to get rid of it is a scandalous breaking of their
own voluntary contracts. We are grieved, for the cause of
justice and of truth, to see the operatives of Glasgow
willing to aid in the spoliation, and to make common
cause with those who now thrive, and have long thriven,
by legally plundering them. We are not of opinion
that the national debt, as the great mass of the taxes
are paid by the Customs and Excise, which fall far
heavier on the townspeople than on those who, like
the farmers, mainly subsist on their own produce, which
pays no Customs' duties, and is only partially sub-
ject to the Excise—we are not of opinion
that the national debt is a greater hindrance to
our farmers, in competing with foreign farmers,
than it is to our manufacturers in competing with
foreign manufacturers ; and:we are sure that the aboli-
tion of the Corn-laws would: so increase the resources
of the country, as to make the burden of the national
debt comparatively light. But letting that differ-
ence of opinion between us and the operatives at
Glasgow pass, we see in their declaration against the
national debt, a trumpet sound of defiance, which will
rouse into active exertion against the Universal Suffrage
men the great mass of the middle classes. Such a pro-
ceeding does not confirm the opinion generally enter-
tained here of the sagacity and good sense of the
Glasgow workmen, and which, we know, made a
powerful and even alarming impression on all those
who heard the evidence given by the Glasgow cotton-
spinners before the Combination Committee. But letting
that too pass, it seems to us more important to direct
public attention to the fact, that the whole of our
Constitution, and even the existing legal right of pro-
perty, is seriously threatened and endangered by the
mad injustice of continuing the accursed Corn-laws.
They exasperate the people, and provoke the attack
on all our institutions. And though it may be possible
to put down the Universal Suffrage men—yet we must at
the same time state, on excellent authority, that they are
very numerous, and their organization is complete—
still the property and the prosperity of the country
will 'be shaken and greatly damaged by the trial.
Feelings of great bitterness towards the upper
classes, and towards all the proprietary classes,
and feelings of deep mistrust in the Legislature
—the source of all our institutions—have been
' generated by the obstinate adherence of the
law-making landlords to their scheme of taxing and
plundering other classes by means of the Corn-laws.
Their example encourages emulation ; and though we
almost dread whether it he not now too late to pre-
vent a serious commotion in the empire, nothing even
can save it from great disasters (fur it would be a great
disaster to bring the proprietary and working classes into
conflict), but that all those who possess property, and
who do not profit by the accursed Corn-laws, should
at once step forward and demand their repeal. There
seems no choice between the abolition of the devil's
laws—well are they worthy of that name—and exposing
all the institutions, and all the property and prosperity
of the country to the imminent hazard of a conflict be •
tweets the most numerous and most useful classes in
the community.
We see in the Coventry Herald and Ob-
server of yesterday an account of a meeting of the
Chartists at that city on Monday, but we are pre-
vented from inserting it, even in an abridged form, be-
cause it seems drawn up in rather an unfriendly spirit.
The meeting is said to have consisted of not more than
2,000 persons ; and it is described as occasionally threat-
ening serious collision. The principal speaker was Mr.
FEA RGUS O'CONNOR, and after him Mr. SALT, one
or a deputation fin Birmingham. At this meeting
the national petition for the Charter was unanimously
adopted. The banners bore such inscriptions as these,
on one side :—" Universal Suffrage, and Cheap
Bread ;" on the other, " Cheap Law, Cheap Religion,
and Cheap Money," Here again we trace the Corn-
laws in conjunction with an agitation— if not its parent
—to pull down much of what is established. We
should feel these things as of less importance provided
we knew any persons anywhere, in Parliament, or
out of Parliament, who entertain and avow a convictien
that the majority of our institutions, including, of
course, the Church and the House of Peers, are
based on the laws of eternal justice, and are not men ly
the offspring of chance and expediency, with no
, • ,
other
authority to support tnem tnan that—
which we
rescri ►ptidmit to be a high authonty—
se
of on, antip habits and customs of the
the
no longer exists.
people. But this high author:L."-
Recent great chancres have destroyed all the rn'LliuritY
cr
of prescription ; and the great masses of the com-
munity who meet at Birmingham, Glasgow, Coventry,
and the metropolis, expressly declaring ureic animosity
towards our institutions, and seeking to set them
aside, prove that those institutions have no longer
any support in their habits and sentiments. Not
being founded on justice, and no longer supported
by habit and prescription, we cannot but conclude,
though the Government and the upper classes seem
to slumber in quiet security, that such meetings as we
have now adverted to, and such doctrines as have
at them been delivered are of intense importance, and
pregnant with vast consequences. If out of them should
grow great disorder, and even revolution, tire Corn-
laws, which respect no property, and are only tire legal
expression of the selfish and dishonest desire of wealth
in the landowners, will be the seed of these bitter
fruits.

In another column will be found a letter from the in-
defatigable Member for Greenock, Mr. WALLACE, on
the important subject of Post-office Reform, to which
we invite general attention. Mr. WALLACE'S evi-
dence, prepared for the Committee on Postage, only
reached us this morning ; but we shall endeavour to
find room for it in The Sun of Monday or Tuesday
next.

Our City article, entitled " Price of Sugar," aup.
plies an excellent illustration to-day of
fottior
tfihsactalglrao,,wvgn.
The duty on foreign coffee as compared
in the West Indies is so great, that our merchants
suppose it will lie advantageous to import coffee here