The Sun.
London, England, 1836-09-05 00:00:00

is the best answer to the insinuation thrown out by
Sir James Graham, that there was a re-action in
Cumberland. The speeches delivered by Major
Aglionby, who is Chairman of the Quarter Sessions,
and by Mr. Howard, of Greystoke, show that in East
Cumberland, at least, there has been no compromise
with the Tories. Mr. James himself is a Reformer
of the most decided character. He advocates the Bal-
lot, short Parliaments, Church Reform, and, above
all, Peerage Reform. He stated his opinions without
reserve or hesitation, and expressed in glowing terms
his unabated zeal in the cause of reform, and his de-
termination to support the present liberal Administra-
tion. Major Aglionby proposed Sir James Graham
in 1832, but refused to propose him at the last elec-
tion. Mr. Howard, of Grevstoke, who seconded Major
Aglionby; is nephew of the Duke of Norfolk, and
both these gentlemen, as well as Mr. James, declared
for Peerage and all the other Rgforms to which the
Tories are opposed. " On the hustings- (says the Car-
lisle Journal) were some of the largest and most res-
pected landowners in the county, and the most extensive
manufacturers. Are these signs of reaction ? Do these
afford tokens of public approbation of the part taken
by Sir James Graham against the Ministry of Lord
Melbourne ? " The strongest feeling was manifested
by the electors against the part taken by Sir James
Graham, and we are assured that it is hardly possible
to conceive the extent of his unpopularity in East
Cumberland. A man is often the last to hear infor-
mation unpleasant to himself, and it is possible, there-
fore, that Sir James may not have heard that the only
re-action in Cumberland is the general determination
of the electors to shut him out from the representation
of the eastern division of that county. It is in cotem-
plation, we undersiand, to bring forward Lord John
Russell at the next dissolution in opposition to the
Right Hon. Baronet. This intention is alluded to
in the Tory journal, the Carlisle Patriot. The door
at all events, may be considered shut against Sir
James Graham ; and the electors of East Cumber-
land cannot better manifest their attachment to Reform
and their determination to support a Reform Ministry,
than by sending Lord .John into the House of Com-
mons. A perusal of the admirable speeches at this
election will serve to show with how little reason the
Tories boast of the impression their sophistries have
made on the country. The plain good sense of the
Cumberland manufacturers and yeomen is proof against
all their arts. They see that the Tories are fighting
for the power of plundering the people at home and
abroad. Major Aglionby described their views in a
most forcible manner.—Morning Chronicle.
Had the Peers known their own interests—had they
not been drunk in the delirium of usurped dominion,
and blind to the most manifest indications of their
danger, they would have made any sacrifice, short of
the total abdication of their legislative privilege, rather
than have allowed the question of Peerage Reform to
have been brought under public discusssion. The more
the principle of an hereditary Senate be examined, the
more obviously absurd and indefensible must appear its
constitution. Already are men surprised that such a
monstrous system should so long have been suffered
to outrage the reason, and oppose the interests of an
enlightened people ; and those who but a few months
since called out merely for a reform of time House of
Lords, begin now to inquire the use of its existence at
all, and ask, if "one Chamber represent, which, if pro-
perly elected, it would do, the wisdom, property, in-
terests, intelligence, worth, and honesty of a nation,
must not a second Chamber be at best supererogatory ?
—even if it be equally wise and virtuous, must it
not be an obstruction and delay to public business ?
—if it be less wise or virtuous, must it not be a'
nuisance ? and if it be neither wise nor virtuous, but
imbecile and wicked, having neither the honesty to con-
cede the demands of justice, nor the acuteness to per-
ceive its own danger in withholding them, must - -not
the public good and its own safety be best promoted
by removing it from its position ill the legislature ?"
These are questions which are now earnestly discussed,
not so much in the public press, as in the social inter-
course of the country—in those debates—those inter-
changes of thought, whereby individual opinion diffuses
itself through masses and directs their action, and
whereby the public mind is whetted and prepared for a
great movement. The spirit of these communings is
much inflamed by the insensate advocates of the recent
proceedings of the House of Lords, who recklessly in-
stitute a comparison, or rather contrast, between here-
' ditary and representative government—who, in order to
defend the Lords, attack the Commons—who seem de-
sirous to compensate by profusion of abuse and false-
hood the lack of argument and truth—and dare even to
call upon the people to support the House of Lords in
trampling upon their own representatives. In this
respect the Tory press, by its folly and wickedness, is
plunging the 1-louse of Lords deeper and deeper still in
the contempt and hatred of the country—its abuse in-
flames the apathetic, while its sophistry is too feeble to
enmesh the most inane. Let us briefly examine the
manner in which Peerage Reform was discussed dur-
ing the last week by the most abandoned journal in Eu-
rope. The first argument or assertion put forth by the
Times is, that were it not for the House of Lords the
majority of the House of Commons would exercise,
without controul, the whole Legislative and Executive
functions. In reply to this we ask, where ought the
Legislative authority to be vested, if not in the repre-
sentatives of the people ? Will it be contended that
the opinion of the minority should be the rule of legis-
lation, and not that of the majority ? If the House
of Commons represent the people, the will of its majo-
rity should be law—and if the House of Commons do
not represent the people, the elective franchise should
be extended until the public will be fully embodied
and expressed in that aseembly. As to the executive
functions, they could not, consistently with the dispatch
of public business, be vested in any assembly, but the
right of appointing the executive is imprescriptibly the
people's. To deny this would be to strike at the tenure
by which our present gracious Sovereign holds his
sceptre. So that the House of 'Lords, in opposing
and controling the majority of the House of Com-
mons, evince hostility both to the people and to the
Monarch, and prove the magnitude of the danger to
be apprehended if they be not speedily coerced into
an acquiescence with public opinion. The next asser-
tion of the Times is, that one reform of the House
of Lords. ,would not give satisfaction, but that we
should have another and another, till its total abolif-
tion. And " thus the science of government would
retrograde thousands of years." Successive changes
will no doubt be necessary in the constitution of
the Lords. and Commons, but nothing can hasten
the total abolition of the House of Peers more
than its opposition to popular claims and the nega•
tion of all reform in its own body. To leave the
House of Lords unreformed is to rest under the
despotic sway of its barbarous origin, and keep up a
perpetual barrier to general improvement. But while
we are threatened with a retrogade movement of "thou-
sands of years," we are invited to take example from
Greece and Rome, and to abjure popular authority.
The Times makes a most singular prophecy when it
states, in reference to the abolition of the peerage,
Thus the boasted Constitution of this once great,
once glorious country, would dwindle into the worst
of all tyrannies—a sordid oligarchy." So that even by
the Times' own shewing, the utmost stretch of its
imagination could conjure up no vision more dreadful
or horrible than the representation of the present posi-
tion of the country—prostrate under the " worst of
tyrannies—a sordid oligarchy." What greater en-
couragement can be given to innovation than this,
which, in the logic of the Times, proves that we can-
not be under a worse system than we are. The com-
munity are next called upon to " consider well what
uld
be
o thet consequence of their necks being sub-
jectedyoke of three or four hundred irrespon-
sible tyrant Commoners, elected for seven years, and
with the means of continuing their reign for ever by
merely voting it perpetual." Now if the community
wish to appreciate the extent of the evil thus held in
they have merely to review the terrorem before them,
last session, and consider the consequence of having
their necks subjected to the yoke of three or four
hundred tyrannical and irresponsible Lords, appointed
not for seven years, but for ever, through their whole
generation. Here the Times again unintentionally ad-
mits that the worst possible result of vesting the sole
power in the House of Commons, even if its members
could perpetuate their authority which they could not,
would be at least as good as what is to be expected