The Sun.
London, England, 1838-02-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The proceedings in the House of Commons to-
night are looked forward to with much curiosity.
Little surprise is felt that a stripling like Lord Maid-
stone, with the rashness natural to his years, should
seek to embark the House in an inquiry which must
redound so little to its character and credit, and which
must waste the time which ought to be devoted to the
public business of the country ; but much surprise is
felt that the more reflecting of the Tories should not
at once have seen the folly of an inquisition into the
proficiency of the Members of the two Houses of the
Legislature in the use of hard words towards their op-
ponents, and have confined within the limits of pru-
dence this scion of the house of Winchelsea. What
practical end can be answered by an inquiry like that
on which the Tories have so madly entered ? Ever
since we recollect Committees of the House of Com-
mons they have been deemed the very worst of all con-
ceivable tribunals. Old George Rose used to say that he
would not load his soul with a participation in the guilt
of downright robbery which was constantly practised in
committees on private bills ; and it seemed to be ad-
mitted on all hands, when the now Lord Littleton en-
deavoured to improve these tribunals, that there was
no conceivable degree of corruption and injustice with
which they were not chargeable. With respect to
election Committees, it seems to be understood as well
as anything can be understood that they follow no pre-
cedent.; are governed by no fixed principles ; and that
it would be the very height of folly to expect in any
case a decision favourable to a Liberal member from a
Committee of which the majority are Tories, and vice
versa. As it is sufficiently evident that an oath is no
obstacle in the way of a majority, it is to be regretted
that, in addition to the injustice, they should be
obliged to be guilty of what might be avoided, the taking
superfluous oaths. When an improvident relative of
Dr. Franklin borrowed a hundred pounds from him, and
was hying hold of a piece of paper to write an acknowledg-
ment for it, the Doctor seized the paper and secured
it in his drawer, observing that was worth but a half-
penny, but there was no use in throwing away even a
halfpenny. Oaths have been most wantonly sported
with in England, and the Legislature seems to be at
last aware of its error in depraving the national con-
science by useless swearing ; and it were well if the,
Members of the Legislature themselves reflected that
they are men with the failings and weaknesses of other
men, and-avoid exposing themselves to the temptation
of committing an injustice which oaths may serve to
cloak over but cannot prevent. Perjury in a Court of
Law is a word of some ineanine,', not on account of
the oath, for the man who would tell a lie would
not hesitate to swear to it, but on account of the
punishment which follows detection and conviction.
But the Member of an Election Committee who lends
himself to an unjust decision knows that, as Sir
Robert Peel said of a Peer in Parliament, he is re-
,-nonsible only to himself and God. The records of
Pa:-Ytament are full of criminations and recriminations
Of perjury. George the Fourth was accused by seve-
ral Bishops and temporal Peers of violation of the co-
ronation oath in assenting to the Catholic Emancipa-
tion Bill. The Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert
Peel were accused of advising their Royal Master
to commit perjury. The Bishop of Exeter accused
all the Catholic Members of the two Houses of per-
jury. The Archbishop of Canterbury and the
Ecclesiastical Commissioners have been accused of
violating the oaths taken by them at their consecration.
to .maintain the rights and liberties of the Church
Mr. O'Connell has charged the English and Irish
gentry in election Committees with perjury. There
is. in short, no end to these charges. Some people
are wonderfully nice in their distinctions. They
would laugh at you if you should for a moment sup-
pose that they would be simple enough to refrain
from availing themselves of their majority to perpetrate
injustice ; but perjury—oh : they repudiate the very
idea of perjury—guilty of perjury, not they !' But
the injustice—that is quite another affair. If Mr.
O'Connell has charged the English and Irish gentry in
Committees with injustice, that would have been nothing.
These gentlemen would have deemed that charge a mere
compliment to their party zeal. But then, perjury—
horrid thought ! Let the foul slanderer be dragged before
the House. But pray, good gentlemen, what do you pro-
pose to do with him ? Would you, if you had the
power, treat the world to a repetition of the scenes
'which gave so much importance to John Wilkes ? Do
you mean to disfranchise an Irish constituency because
_Mr. O'Connell will name words offensive to ears po-
? Are you anxious to ascertain whether Mr.
O'Connell or the Bishop of Exeter be entitled to carry
off the palm for proficiency in hard language ? We
ourselves would back the Bishop not only against Mr.
O'Connell, but against any drayman in London ; and
in this case he has the merit of having set the example
in this becoming warfare. Whether the House ca
gain by the course on which Lord Maidstone has e
tered may well be questioned ; but there can be n
question that much amusement will be afforded to a
'who are indifferent to the estimation in which ti
}louse is held, and wish merely to witness a se
to between Mr. O'Connell and the Bishop. W
trust all the Tories have not taken leave
their senses on this occasion. Some Member
of weight and character in the House—ought,.
instantly after Lord Maidstone's motion has been
made and seconded to rise for the purpose of putting
an end to this unseemly trifling. Lord John Russell's
motion was merely conditional. His Lordship of
coarse expected that the more reflecting Tory Mem-
bers would in the interval between Friday and Monday
prierail with Lord Maidstone to abandon his foolish
motion. But should the motion be made and seconded,
the matter should be instantly quashed—by a mode of
proceeding sufficiently obvious to Members acquainted
with the forms of the House. We can see no end or
object in suffering the matter to proceed. For the
credit of Parliament let the Bishop of Exeter be suf-
fermt.to proceed uninterrupted in the career in which
he has attained such distinction ; and instead of
wasting time in inquiring whether men sworn to do
jut tice, who commit injustice, ought to be pronounced
lty of perjury, let means be devised for having re-
turcrs tried by a tribunal better qualified to decide cor-
rectuty, and less tempted to decide unjustly, than the
present Election Committees.—Morning Chronicle.
The motion to be made this evening by Lord Mai
stone is one wihch does credit to the decent pride, th
upright feeling, and justly offended honour of tha
uncorrupted nobleman. When such an adventur
as Mr. Daniel O'Connell, at a tavern meeting of whic
he is himself the hero, tells the people of this count
that " Ireland is not safe from the Irish and Scot
gentry," viz., from the " perjury of the Tory poll
ticians,” it is nothing more than that description
scurrilous calumny which might be expected from s
:foul a quarter. But when he proceeds a little furthe
sand ores a more pointed /signification to his words b
asking 'whether it is not horrible that these same Eng
lishand Scotch gentry " should be perjuring them
selves in the Committees of the House of Commons !
—that " the time is come when it should be pro
claimed boldly that there is foul perjury in Me Tory
Cornmitteesof the House of Commons"--that "he does
not mince the matter ; his words may appear in the
public press—he hopes they will. Ireland is not safe
from the perjury 9fthe English and Scotch gentry, who
take oaths according to justice, and vote according to
party"--it becomes, we say, a young nobleman un-
.hacknied in political depravity—a young " English
gontiman" of a manly and intrepid race, who has
himself been a member of those very Committees
against the British portion of which the Irish Papist
vociferatem, :o come forward with his formal protest,
and his personal complaint, that he should himself be
made the subject of such imputations, and to wring
from the slanderer either a more specific charge, fit
matter for a regular and searching inquiry, or an aban-
donment of that indiscriminate one which has been ,

mai le, or, failing the latter course, to fasten upon the
Lisle Agitator such a construction of the lanluage
-I)lsys § :b him as may become a suitable prelimina-y to
/ eition, whether or no the learned anti-Saxon has
~, --...,Ki ,n been guilty of the grossest " breach of pr ivi-
,4`.' ilege.",
::: _llr.l.)an:i O'Connell': life to somep sordid and selfish
jV!.,-
,rro .tlye.L _ ere are now no less than two petitions pend-
' ------_, 1 tiy;', in ea of which that learned libeller takes a strong
Aita r, wmakinterest—of these, Youghal is one—to be de-
........4.„
'cit i by a Committee, the majori •
ty of which consists

of " English and Scotch" gentlemen. Dublin is an-
other case of such petitions, wherein the chief per-
sonage complained of as an usurper of other men's
political rights, and of a seat to which he has, we be-
lieve, no more just title than to Queen Victoria's
Crown, is the individual Mr. Daniel O'Connell.
If, therefore, the Crown and Anchor speechmaker
can contrive by boisterous abuse and blackguardism I
to bully the English and Scotch Members of the above
Committees out of their conscientious views of
the evidence produced by the respective petitioners,
and into a return alike inconsistent with the claims
of those suitors for redress, and with the free-
dom and purity of election, in the name of which
they make their applications to Parliament, he, the
said Daniel, will have gained all he looks for, and
made, in the eyes of such a man, no unprofitable
bargain. He may indeed, by this " flare up" of
effrontery, effect even greater things than he did in
the last Parliament, inasmuch as he then could only
manage to defraud the rightful Members for Dublin of
their seats for two sessions, or from 12 to 14 months ;
whereas by frightening the " English and Scotch "
Members of the Dublin Committee from acting as
their conscience dictates, he may be lucky enough to
" bag" the representation of Dublin during the entire
Parliament. This we take to be the true secret of
Mr. Daniel O'Connell's virulence against the British
aristocracy, which is oftener with him an affair of cal-
culation than of impulse, and belongs, like most trans-
actions of his wicked life, to the category of scheming
falsehoods. If the gentlemen of England and Scot-
land feel that this man has offered an insult to the
gentry of both realms and on both sides of the House,
they will leave a record of their indignation upon the
journals, which the Irish adventurer may long regret
that he has invited. But the richest source of satis-
faction this evening is expected to be the fulfil,nent of
Lord John Russell's pledge to bring forward a motion
against the Bishop of Exeter for some offence in the
nature likewise of a breach of privilege, we suppose,
by that Right Rev. Prelate, on account of expressions
said to have been used by his Lordship in a charge to the
clergy of his diocese, delivered above two years ago. The
gist of the Right Rev. Bishop's observation was, so well
as we can remember, that those Roman Catholic members
of Parliament who had supported by their votes the
measures framed for the spoliation of the Established
Church had violated the oaths taken by them as Ro-
man Catholics, by which they engaged to do nothing
that could injure or impair the Church. Now, there
is nothing so much to be desired by all friends of the
Church of England—nothing to be so longed for by the
Bishop of Exeter, or by one and all of the innumer-
able enemies of Lord John Russell, as that lie should
bona fide keep that most spiteful, pitiful, disgraceful,
anti ludicrous pledge. Only let him attempt it—only
screw up your courage, my slipperkia of a Lord,
and try a second fall with the Bishop of Exeter, if
You have yet recovered from the b! vises of your first
encounter. It is the soreness of those bruises that
still smarts and galls the little-minded Secretary of
State. " Let me have—oh, let me have—ona
drop of sweet revenge on that tremendous Bishop !"
What, then, does the feeble spirited Home Se-
cretary ? This Lord, who licks a Repealer's
foot, and indemnifies himself by snarling at
every loyal man in the country—this Lord, we say,
stupified out of his right senses with terror, lest
O'Connell, if unsupported in his outrage upon the
aristocracy of Great Britain, should run desperate, and
leave Ministers to take care of themselves, turns to the
servum pecus behind the Treasury bench for encou-
ragement, and, hacked by their yells, has the reckless
folly to give notice, that if the foul-mouthed Irishman
who still sits for Dublin shall be called to account be-
cause of his insolence to a race of gentlemen, no one
of whom would condescend to acknowledge O'Connell
for his equal, he, Lord John Russell, that Cabinet
Minister whose office most peculiarly binds him to pro-
tect the Church of England, and whose social station
ought to make him deeply sympathise with the " gen-
tlemen" of England against the aspersions of O'Con-
nell—he, Lord John Russell, actually threatens, that if
any one shall dare to stand up for the gentlemen against
their libeller, he will make common cause with the
Papist libeller, and do his best to sacrifice an English
Bishop I Mind, that Lord John Russell did not attempt
on Friday evening to justify O'Connell's words, or to
deny that they called for the sharpest visitation from
the great body of English and Scotch representatives,
composing five-sixths of the Imperial House of Com-
mons. He did not dissuade Lord Maidstone on the
ground that there was any reasonable or constitutiona I
objection to that Noble Lord's motion—not at all—
but " Don't touch my agitator ; or, if you do, whether
right or wrong, here goes, right or wrong, a shot at
your Bishop." Very well—so let it be. Lord John
Russell is aware before this time how much Dr. Phill-
potts regards his threat, and what sort of pains he has
taken to deprecate and prevent Lord Maidstone's mo-
tion ! His Lordship knows by this time into what a
panic he has thrown the formidable Prelate ! The
Noble Secretary we acknowledge—nay, we insist—
must go on—he must execute his contingent obliga-
tion. He must bring forward before this House of
Commons, which has not existed more than four or
five months, a motion for breach of privilege, the sub-
ject matter of which was of and concerning some
Members of another House of Commons, in existence
two years ago, but has long since been defunct. The
exhibition will be a delightful one, and the beauty of
it is, that Lord John Russell cannot, as a man or as
a Minister, flinch from his engagement. The double
baiting of bruin and his monkey bids fair to make me-
morable sport.—Tinges.

THE BALLOT SICULICERS AND THE MINISTRY.
—The constituents of Sir Henry Parnell, Sir John
Campbell, Mr. Poulett Thomson, Sir George Grey,
and the other Members returned by Liberal majorities,
who skulked from the Ballot division, must regard the
conduct of their Representatives with shame. These
men wanted courage either to stick by the Minister, or
to vote as their duty to their constituents demanded.
They trembled for their seats—they durst not offend
Lord John Russell ; so they sneaked out of the
House. Lord Melbourne has fitting supporters. The
Duke of Wellington would have served them according
to their deserts, and dismissed the whole set the next
day ; but Lord .Nlalbournei not only allowed his su-
balterns to desert—he winked at the'opposition of his
Master-General of the Ordnance and one of his Trea-
sury Lords. Mind that, electors of Dundee. Mr. R.
Steuart disregarded Lord Melbourne's blandishments
and Lord J. Russell's frowns. He had the courage
and the honesty to vote for the Ballot ; and he keeps
his place as well as his promise to his constituents.
Contrast his conduct with that of your Representative,
the Right Hon. the Paymaster of the Forces. Sir
Henry Parnell retains his office; but what have be-
come of his principles ? of his original compact with
the Dundee constituency ? of his virtual engagements
even at the last general. election ? That he intended
to persuade the Dundee simpletons that he should be
at liberty in future to give the Baallot question his
support, none can doubt who reads the following
passages from his speeches at the last election. To
the Political Union he said :

" There was no one present who was a more sincere friend
to the Ballot than he was. He had always been so. Hs con-
sidered that the arguments in favour of it were sound and con-
vincing ; and he had no hesitation in saying that the arguments
adduced against it were not so. He would not enter into the
question at large. The system of corruption and intimidation
which prevailed made it quite clear that the elective franchise
was rendered ineffectual fur the purpose intended; and his
opinion was, that it was a great mistake in a Liberal Ministry
to oppose it. He considered that the security and existence
of a Liberal Government depended on the Ballot being car-
ried. * * He had been exerting himself with the Ca-
binet to induce them to make the Ballot an open question.
He had not succeeded, it was true. Reesons were given him for
refusal, which he hoped could no longer be urged."

On the hustings he said—
" There is no man more sincerely in favour of it than I am :
will go so far as to state, that I consider the existence and per-
manence of a Liberal system of Government depend on the
carrying o 1 the Ballot. All the arguments in favour of it
are, in my opinion, good; and the arguments against it are
not worthy of regard. I do assure you that I will use every
exertion to induce the Ministry to mako it an open question. I
trust that, as the circunistance.s of Ministers ere changed, this
and other great questions will be made open questions."
And so the Ballot is an open question—to those mem-
bers of the Government who dare to treat it as such.
Again we refer to Mr. Robert Steuart's and Sir Hussey
Vivian's votes. But the electors of Dundee have for
their Member a gentleman who rates place at a higher
value than Mr. Robert Steuart, and who will not risk

it--small risk indeed !—for the sake cf maintaining his
own principles, and giving his constituents the advan-
tage of his vote on the question which of all others they
deem most important. Fortunately, Glasgow was re-
presented by " honest William Bentinck" and Mr.
Dennistoun ; Greenock by Mr. Wallace ; Perth by
Mr. Kinnaird ; but the other principal towns in Scot-
land—Edinburgh, with Leith, Dundee, and Aber-
deen—were ♦oiceless on that great question. None of
the English skulkers are so notorious as Sir Henry
Parnell ; but the conduct of each and all of them is
so pitiful, that their expulsion from Parliament would
be most desirable. It is not merely for their pre-
ference of place to principle and duty on this one ques-
tion ; there is, of necessity, an end to anything like
confidence in them. One lie damns the credit of a
witness, and one act of political meanness destroys the
public character of him who is guilty of it. He is
thenceforth estimated by a low moral scale. He is re-
garded with suspicion, and brings discredit on the
party with whom he acts, instead of furnishing a gua-
rantee for the honour and high principle of his asso-
ciates. In this view of the case the injury which Sir H.
Parnell, once a man of unblemished public reputation,
has done to himself by his miserable inconsistency and
evasion of may on the Ballot question, is irreparable.
Once it would have been hazardous in Lord Melbourne
to have quarrelled with him ; but the Premier may dis-
miss the Paymaster to-morrow, with no more detri-
ment to his Ministry, as far as public opinion is con-
cerned, than if he sent Lord Dalmeny, and half a
score such, to the enjoyment of their private leisure.
—Examiner.

We regret to perceive from a report, and from ad-
vertisements which will be found in another part of
this day's paper, that an ultra-Radical of very small
influence in the Borough of Marylebone, has so far
prevailed over the good sense of Colonel Perronet
Thompson, as to induce him to declare that he will
go to the poll, against the favourite and reforming can-
didate, Mr. Ewart—in other words, that failing in his
own person to secure a majority of suffrages, his friends
will not only play into the hands of the Tory party,
but actually support the Tory candidate. We have
some portion of respect of Colonel Thompson, both in
his literary and political capacity ; but truly if Colonel
Thompson will allow himself to be made the cat's-paw
fof anv one, we must for ever relinquish our confidence
in him. We tell him again, that he has no chance of
'representing the borough of Marylebone—that every
influential voter is in favour of his rival, Mr. Ewart,
land that, if through his opposition the Liberal cause
'shall be lost, there are no execrations too loud or deep
,which he will not both receive and deserve. That
Ewart's election is safe, notwithstanding the Tory-
IRadical party of which Mr. Murphy and Colonel
Perronet Thompson are the representatives, we have
little doubt—but a great question ought not to be
placed in a state of doubt. Men of Marylebone, are
you to vote for a good Liberal who has every chance
in his favour, or are you to vote for a Tory represen-
tative ?—lf for the former, vote for Mr. Ewart—if for
the latter, vote for Colonet P. Thompson, and you
will secure the election of Lord Teignmouth !—Marn-
ing Advertiser.
Without nicely inquiring into motives, and, indeed,
without inquiring into them at all, we have given Lord
Brougham credit for his recent exertions to obtain that
liberty and justice for the negro bondsmen of our
West India colonies which the people of Great Britain
• supposed they had purchased of their task-masters
when th©y paid 20,000,0001. as a consideration for
what appears to be, up to this time, but the inoperative
parchment of the Emancipation Act. Lord Brougham,
as one of the Ministers of the Crown at the time when
!that Act passed, we need haidly observe, was a party
Ito the compact between the people of England and
the planters, and is bound to take all the neces-
sary steps which the present Ministers, his former
colleagues, have so sadly neglected, to have the terms
of the compact fulfilled, and to prevent the cruelties
and degradation of slavery being the portion of the
apprenticed labourers. Very consistent with this ob-
-ject, and, indeed, naturally arising out of it, are the
efforts of the ex-Lord Chancellor to induce an indo-
lent, vacillating, and tricky Government to take effec-
tual means to put down the abominations of the foreign
slave trade, carried on by our dear " allies," more
especially the wretched and demoralised Spanish and
Portuguese nations, the latter of which has received
nearly 1,000,0001. of our money, under the false pre-
tence of putting an end to it. As to Lord Palmer-
ston, he has been too much engaged of late years with
his friend, the beaten " hero of Hernani,” in slaughter-
ing the brave republicans of the Basque provinces for
the benefit of the worthies of 'Change-alley, and in
degrading the Royal Marine force of Great Britain to
foment the horrors of civil war—we say Lord Palmer-
ston has been too much engaged in those dis-
graceful exploits, of late years, to allow him any
time to attend to the great duty of compelling, as Fo-
reign Minister, the fulfilment of those stipulations for
the suppression of the slave trade into which Great
Britain had induced foreign nations to enter at an im-
mense expense to herself. But, while Lord Brougham
pursues these laudable objects, we must warn him
against the error into which he appears to be car-
ried, rather by a blind zeal than an enlightened energy,
of attempting to put down one sort of systematic bar-
barity by establishing another. The stealing the
living body of a fellow-creature, and loading it with
the chains of ignominious servitude, is one of the
most serious offences that man, more especially
civilised man can commit against God and nature; but
the strangling or decapitation of a human being on the
scaffold by rope or guillotine is also a barbarous and
disgusting abuse of power—the power with which a
State is armed for the correction, coercion, or refor-
mation of its offending subjects, but not for their ex-
termination. It will be recollected that one of Lord
Brougham's string of resolutions respecting both the
foreign slave trade and colonial slavery, which were
proposed and withdrawn the other night in the House
of Peers, was as follows :
" That an humble Address be presented to her Majesty,
earnestly beseeching her Majesty to take immediate steps for
negotiating with the Governments of Spain and Portugal, and
obtaining the concurrence of the Governments of France and
the United States in such negotiations, with a view to declare
the trade in slaves piracy, wherever he same is carried on ;
and making those who persist in it liable to all the pains and
other consequences."
In reference to that part of the above resolution
which suggested a negotiation between the Crown and
Foreign Powers, for the purpose of declaring the trade
in slaves piracy, the Duke of Wellington made the
following observations :
" Their Lordships were aware that when that House inter-
fered by
pocwuotarhwyaeteoerflsyan Address to the Crown, to interfere with
eliForeign
alwaysa act
meaningon any
defined, o
fi
np
taohrratdti particular
House
at senuoabsjdeotcuot that
b,
twwh
hata t
ethv:subjectcs hr
oowuwiands
was called upon to propose to Foreign Powers. He begged,
therefore, to ask what was meant by piracy? There was no doubt
I what the meaning of this country was, and it must be the wish
lof that House that this crime should be considered piracy ; but
then, what was the punishment to be inflicted on the subjects
of this country in foreign countries, in France, Spain, Portugal,
and the United States, and what was the punishment it was
supposed those countries would permit to be inflicted on their
subjects, if brought here and found guilty of this crime of
piracy? These were questions their Lordships ought to de-
fine before they proceeded to vote an address to her Majesty,
calling on her Majesty to propose to other Powers to confer
with her in declaring that this crime should be considered as
piracy. The Hon. Baron had stated that in the course of the
last year a considerable alteration had taken place in British
legislation with respect to this crime, it being now punished
with transportation for life, the punishment previously having
been the passing of sentence of death. lie should like to
know, therefore, how this crime was punished in France, in
Spain, in the United States, and in Portugal whether it was
in accordance with the legislation of this country ; whether
those persons agreed with this country as to punishment, as the
law stood last year, or as it stands this year, upon this parti-
cular subject."
Nothing could be more correct or business-like than
what the Duke proposed, which was to ascertain what
piracy meant in other countries, before proceeding to
call upon the Crown to negotiate with their Govern-
ments in order to have the slave-trade declared to be
" piracy," and made subject to the pains and penalties
thereof. Now, certainly, the capital punishment
which reviously was annexed to the crime of piracy
by the English law was abolished by a statute which
came into operation the Ist of last October. That
statute is the Ist Victoria, c. 88, and it repeals the
punish rnent of death for the offence, except in such
cases :as the act of piracy is accompanied with an
assault to commit murder, or where the offender stabs,
cuts, or wounds, or does any act by which human
life i; endangered. The Bill for altering the

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1838