The Sun.
London, England, 1841-04-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM TILE DAILY PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.
CH R ONICL E.—lt is now little more than a twelve-
month since the Tories proposed in Parliament a formal
vote of watt of confidence in the Melbourne Administra-
tion. The principal ground upon which that vote was
urged was the supposed connection between Whiggism
and Chartism. The MiniAcrial party were accused of
touchline to demecratic agitation, in order to purchase votes.
We said 'at the time that the charge was untrue, and that
the crime of tampering with men whose language and con-
duct proclaimed them the enemies o! all social order,might
be imputed with much more justice to those who were re-
ecia ing on the hustings the support of the Oastlers and
el'tei ',henna than to the Whig Government, whose policy
had proved the greatest possible discouragement to
the cause of revolution. The proceedings connected with
Mr. Walt.e's canvass at Nottingham place this fact of
the natural alliance between Toryism and Chartism in a
mere striking light than ever. A scat becomes vacant in
an important manufacturing town at a time when the
temptation to purchase a single additional vote at any cost
of character and consistency is too strong to be resisted.
Accordingly a candidate is put fora ard, who, although his
support would at any other time be indignantly rejected by
any party calling itself Conservative, eppears the most likely
to succeed in the grand tack of getting the Tories and Char-
tists of Nottingham to merge what the Times, with its ac-
customed delicacy, calls" their ordinary differences," for the
purpose of striking a blow which shall be." felt in the recesses
of Downing-street." Of Mr. Walter's qualifications as a
Conservative candidate there can be little doubt, after the
speeches of his supporters in the Conservative Hall at
Nottingham, as reported in the Conservative papers of
yesterday. According to the express testimony of one of
the principal speakers, Mr. Sweet -:who describes himself
as an " nneortipirami ing eisattlat7,4lt. IffAlcsieshas come
down to Nottingham, sanc.ioned by noless an authority than
that of Mr. Richard Oastler and Mr. Vincent. " I go,"
says the uncompromising Chartist, " by advice of my friend
Mr. Oastler, my friend Mr. John Fieldea, my friend Mr.
Pitkeitbly, and my friend Mr. Vincent, to sweep the
Whigs from the face of the earth. I believe that if
we succeed now in returning Mr. Weber for our
representative, it will strike the death-blow of the
Melbourne Administration." Really the difference be-
tvreen the " uncompromising Chartist" and the " uncom-
promising Tory" is become too minute to be any longer
distinguishable, and the advice of Messrs. Oastler and
Vincent coincides to the very letter with that which we
have been in the habit of hearing at Conservative dinners.
Why Tories and Chartists should not coalesce when they
have professedly the same prime object in view, namely,
" the striking a death-blow at the Melbourne Adminis-
tration," we are at a loss to know. Whether the respec-
table Conservatives of Nottingham will enlist under the
banners of Messrs. Oastler and Vincent, for the
purpose, (to borrow once more the language of Mr.
Writer's uncompromising Chartist supporter, "of
showing to the world their detestation of the princi-
ples and the concoctors of the infamous and damnable
Poor-law," remains to be seen. Perhaps, before doing so,
they will ponder a little on the fact that the Duke of Wel-
lington, Sir Robert Peel, Lord Stanley, and all the most
distinguished Parliamentary leaders of the Conservative
party are, if not the concoctors, the pledged and avowed
friends and supporters of this " infamous and damnable"
law, and of the principles upon which it is based. They
will consider, perhaps, that great as may be the value
of a vote on party grounds, it may be put chased too
dearly by the loss of character to the Conservative
party, and by the palpable encouragement to the re-
volutionary designs of Chartist demagogues, involved in
the return of such a candidate as Mr. Walter on such
grounds as those proclaimed to the world by his most ac-
tive supporters. One good at least must result from this
election, however it may terminate; it will test the sin-
cerity cf the Conservative leaders in Parliament, who
have over and over again expressed, in the strongest
terms, their adherence to the principles of the
Poor-law Amendment Act, and their abhorrence and de-
testation of such language as is now used to forward the
success of Mr. Walter. If after the meeting at the Con.
servative Hall, at Nottingham, the Conservatives of that
town do as a body support Mr. Walter, it mutt be mani-
fest to every one that the Tories are willing to do what
they falsely imputed to the Whigs, viz., to purchase place
by coquetting with revolution.
POST.—Our readers may imagine iha insanity of pre-
:Lidice which actuates the advocates of a repeal of the
Corr-laws when we tell them that these philosophical
gentry can see no difference, as respects the prosperity of
this country, between an abundant supply of corn from
our own soil and an abundant supply from foreign
countries. 'Tis all the same, they cry, " the manufac-
turers and shopkeepers, and the whole inhabitants of
towns, would feel the benefit precisely the same." We
do not at all admit this ; but, supposing it true, is it fair
to consider only manufacturers, and shopkeepers, and
inhabitants of towns? Grant that it is the same
thing to the manufecestreeses,hee.44 the produce of his
capital and industry be exchange corn-grower
of Hungary or cf Hertfordshire, surely it is not the same
thing to the English corn-growers? And, as it happens
that the annual produce of land in the United Kingdom
exceeds in value the produce of manufacturing industry by
no less a sum than one hundred millions sterling, it is,
without a doubt, as important a national concern to look
after the interest of the corn-growers as that of the
manufacturers. It is easy to speak in glowing terms
of the blessings of abundant and cheap corn, but if
we consider that the process by which corn is to be
made abundant and cheap would deprive one half of
the population of the means of purchasing corn, what
would avail the abundance or the cheapness to them?
Would the manufacturers or the importing merchants give
away the cheap foreign corn for nothing to the English
I agriculturists who would be thrown out of work ? No ;
that is not their principle. They would rather sell their
skeletons to foreign bone-fanciers, if they could make a
commission per tentage on the sale. Great, indeed, is the
advantage of abundance of corn, when in every way it
touches upon the condition of our own people—when our
farmers who raise it have not only enough, but to spare,
and can expend the surplus in the purchase of com-
forts which the manufacturers prepare. But it is absurdity,
and more than absurdity—it is mare insanity—to com-
pare with this state of things an abundance which
by the force of competition would drive our farmers out of
our own markets, and leave them without any remunera-
tion for their labour. The inhabitants of some manufac-
turiag towns might not feel the difference, but is it not
perfectly clear that, whe-eas in the one case the country
is made happy, in the other case it would be made mi-
serable ? Nor is it in the least probable that upon the
whale the manufacturers would derive any benefit from
abundance of foreign corn, for supposing the foreign mar-
ket to take off a hundred millions' worth in the year more
than it does at present (that is to increase threefold, which
is an extravagant supposition), still that would not more
than compen, ate for the loss of the home market for ma..
nu`-eturcs. And if the landed and agricultural interest were
ruined, assuredly that home market would be ruined also.
TIMES. —We adverted last week to a feature in the
policy of the present Administration, which is rapidly be-
coming more apparent and more di'gusting. We allude
to their systematic and total disregard of all those ques-
tions which former Governments, of whatever shades of
politics, would have felt it their duty to endeavour to settle,
simply because their want of settlement led to dissensions
and disorders among the people, and thereby proved and
rendered manifest the deficiencies of the existing law.
The marked and studied contempt with which all such
matters are now passed by, in a great measure warrants the
opinion, which is rapidly increasing, that the Melbourne
Cabinet looks with pleasure on these dissensions, and
would by no means desire to end them, inasmuch as
they tend "to keep the people occupied," and thus to
withdraw their attention from the weaknesses and blunders
of the Government. A variety of cases cf this kind might
be specified; but we will only instance two or three.
Nothing can be more lamentable than the state of affairs
in Scotland. The civil and ecclesiastical courts are
there approaching to utter defiance of each other. Se-
veral leading ecclesiastics have, for months past, braved
the strongest threats of the Court of Session • and a very
short time more may see a fearful flame lighted up, the
quenching of which might be synonymous with the extinc-
tion of the existieg church establishment. Never was there
a case in which it was mere evidently incumbent on
a Gcvernment at least to attempt something in mitiga-
tion, if not in removal, of those prodigious perils. But
the Prime Minister, when asked with great anxiety by his
brother Peers what his intentions are in this matter,
carelessly replies, with more than his customary non-
chalance, that he really has no intentions whatever !
In England the law of Church-rates, though not
fraught with one-half of the perils which threaten
the Scottish Establishment, still works fur both
hurchinan and Dissenter by its various obscurities,
ndless trouble, litigation, acrd heart-burnings. In
1831 Lord John Russell and his colleagues introduced
into Parliament a measure for the settlement of this ques-
tion, which was generally accepted by Churchmen, and
only opposed by Messrs. 'Hume and Hawes and the Dis-
senting Radicals. Why has this Bill never been again
brought forward ? Ministers could pass it, or something
amounting to the same thing, this very Session if they
chose. But they " have re) intention "of even attempt-
ing And why not? Chiefly, we fear, because it is
supposed to answer their party purposes better to leave
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odtheDr,issenter, finding full occupation in ha_
the question still in dispute and doubt, so that both
might have no leisure to quarrel with
the imbecility of the Government.
HERALD.—We have allowed the County Courts
Bill an interval of repose. It is now several weeks since
we disturbed the parental solicitude of Mr. Fox Maule by
ruddy exposing to public view the misshapen proportions
and rieketty deformities of this precious bantling of his
logo-legislative genius. Gently did the mild spirit of
a temporising Conservatism conceal its defects. Silent
was that excessive charity which occupies the seats of
Opposition, and which, rather than disturb the quirt
of the House of Commons, can look on while all
our most valued institutions are crumbling away beneath
the tinkering of the clumsiest workmen, and most
ruthless destroyers in the world. Nay, even flowers
were strewed by some so-called Conservative hands upon
the cradle where Mr. Fox Maule's darling, fresh from the
Home-office nursery of little monsters, awaited the magic
touch of the Parliamentary wand that was to send. it forth
a full-grown and gigantic evil on the country. We trust
that before that time comes, we shall have consigned it to
that state in which it will be only fit to bo preserved in
t pints, and deposited among the dusty lumber of some mu-
seum of ugly curiosities. We have spoken of having diSe