The Sun.
London, England, 1840-02-28 00:00:00

of common sense would put upon this appointment? It
was this that the Government wanted to remunerate an
old partisan for his party services. They were afraid, in
consequence of their own professions of economy, to ;.eve
him a pension at once, and therefore they gave him this
office as a sort of stepping-stone to a pension.—( Hear.)
Then I come (said the Hon. Member) to the third pert el
the job, and upon this every Hon. Member must have all
the circumstances fresh in his memory. About the mid-
dle of the last Session, the late Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer had:gicen such dissatisfaction to almost all com-
mercial men throughout the whole country, that the
Governmert found they must positively get rid of him from
that office, or that the commercial interests of the country
would make them go out of oflice.•—( Hear, bear, and
laughter,) Having found it was necessary to get rid of a
most inefficient Chancellor of the Exchequer—and I state
without fear of contradiction from any one who had to deal
with him, that he was inefficient—the Government
did not know what to give him as a sop.—( Lauge-
ter. Plany Members of the Government went about—
and - many Geutiemen present will bear me out
in that statement—canvassing for the Speakership 'Or Mr.i
Spring Rice,—( Cheers and laughter.) It was plainly
t llt
ee
rd thatf
the
Exchequer:Nlr. prht
Spring Rice
Oh
he am%esnt unpopular
°lout rairdao fCII2;oInM
cethat office. It wal said, " You think him inefficient as
Chancellor of the Exchequer ; won't you vote for him as
Speaker?" To that I answered, " I dislike him very
much as Chancellor of the Exchequer, nut I shall certainly
not vote for him ns Speaker. 1 think you had better get
rid of him in some other way, because, if you put hint up
for the Speakerahip, you are sure to be beaten."—( Cheers
and laughter.) Well, Sir, for our good fortune, we have
selected- you as Speaker.—( Loud cheers front both sides
of the House.) It was therefore necessary for the Go-
vernment to find some other retiring place for the
late Chancellor of the Exchequer, and as I suppose he
considered himself very ill-used in not having been made
Speaker of the House of Commons, the Government
were obliged to give him a most disproportioned reward
for his party services—for I cannot call them public sm.-
vices.—( Cheers.) When a man retires from office after
long party services, he has a claim to one of two things.
If he happens to he a needy man, and wants money, per-
haps he has a claim on his party for a good place, which
will enable him to live comfortably for the rest of his days.
If, on the other hand, he cared not for money, but for
power, and the power which appearances give, I think he
may be fairly entitled, for party purposes, to the honeurand
power of a Peerage. But in the case of the late Chancellor
of the Exchequer, you have an accumulation of rewards,
—you not only give him a Peerage, which would be quit.
enough, but you add to it the well-paid office of Comp-
troller-General of the Exchequer.—( Hear, hear.) Having
stated what my belief is of the way in which this office has
been jobbed for party purposes, and against the interests of
the public, I should like to call the attention of the House
and the public to one very important fact, namely, the loss
of public money occasioned by this appointment. I dare
ray I shall be told that what will it signify that 2,0001. or
:3,000/. a year of public money has been given away
to this meritorious person. I say, Sir, it signi-
fies a great deal. That is a sort of argument
which a reckless spendthrift uses when he finds his
fortune ernbarrassed. He says, What can it signify ? I
am half ruined already, and a few thousands cannot make
much difference.—( Hear, hear.) And so it was with the
government ; they went on spending the public money,
but the people will feel it, and they will feel the bad
moral effect which it has in the country. Is this a time
for public extravagance?—is this a time for jobbing, when
there is among the working classes great distress and
almost universal discontent ?—is this the time for giving
them an argument against the existing institutions of the
oountry? Such an argument as this jobbing will make
mere Chartiats than twenty of the most violent speeches
delivered at public meetings.—( Hear.) It is this want
of consistency in public men—this receding from
professions by those who have got into office
on the ground of retrenchment, and Reform, and
purity—it is this which make Chartists and causes men to
be discontented, and to see whether they could not form
some better system under which the public money would
not be so lavished, and public offices so jobbed. The Hon.
Member, after thanking the House for the attention they
had given him, concluded by saying it appeared to him the
whole matter might be summed up in a few words. It was
a job. Not only was it a job, but a job perpetrated by
men who professed a great abhorrence of jobs, and declared
they would be economical of the public money. To sum
it up in one word, not only was it a gross and clumsy job,
but it was a Whig job.—(Cheers and laughter.)
Mr. BARRON thought a most unfounded and shameless
attack had been made on one of the most honest, indefati-
gable, and best men that ever sat within those walls. No
man was more entitled to a mark of the favour of the Crown
than that Right Hen. Gentleman, for his indefatigable
and unwearied exertions in the cause of the people.
If the resolutions of the Hon. Member were passed, it
would be casting a censure upon Sir John Newport, for if
it were wrong to grant the pension, it was equally wrong
in him to accept it. He believed it was the most pure
pensionupon the list, and he would fearlessly poll the nation
upon the question, whether there was one name upon the
list which had such a right to be there for services ren-
dered to the country? His Right Hon. Friend had forced
more useful reforms than had yet been carried by the Re-
formed Parliament, and that under very adverse circum-
stances, having the support of from thirty to sixty Mem-
bers only ; and the benefits he had conferred had not been
confined to one country, hut extended equally to Ireland
and to England. It was said that he had only done his
duty as a Member of Parliament. Because he was
a Member, and bad done his duty well and persever-
ingly, was he to be debarred;from:receiving anytbounty from
the Crown? A poor poet, or the writer of some twaddling
romance, might enjoy the Royal beneficence; but because
a man bad spent 26 years on the opposition side of the
House, ho was to be debarred from it.—( A laugh.) lie
could assure the Hon. Members opposite that if any of
them sat 26 years on the benches opposite he would vote
for a pension of 1,000/. to him if he did half as much good
RS his Right lion. Friend. It was known that he was a
man of such honour end ability that men of all parties rated
for him in the city of Waterford ; and were lion. Gentle-
men now going to cast a stain upon him in his old age for
political and party purposes ?
Mr. O'CONNELL rose to protest against a part of the
speech of the lion. Member for Westminster; he com-
plained of his attack upon Lord Monteagle, ns it was merely
made for the purpose of wounding another party. The
deeds or doings of Lord Monteagle were not before the
House. The motion was as idle a one as had ever been
made in that House, unless it were intended to inflict a
stain upon the charaoter of an aged and afflicted man. The
intention might be different. The avowed object might
not be so; but be defied any man to contradict the Noble
Lord, when he said that the case of Lord
Montoagle was wholly separated from that of Sir John
Newport. The question was whether the Government
was to be censured for the arrangement by which Sir
John Newport was allowed to retire upon a pension upon
the Civil List. The Hon. Member for Westminster, had
not properly stated the facts ; he might talk of Whig
jobbing, but there was such a thing as Chartist cant—
(Cheers and laughter)—and he did say it very much re-
sembled it when the Hon. Member talked of a saving to
the public, when, in fact, there would be no saving, the
only question being into whose pocket the money
should go If that was a question bringing the
whole trananction before the House, it would be
deserving of a different consideration, but in the shape in
which it came before the House, it was a mere porsonal
attack upon an individual who deserved so well of Ireland
that be could net give a silent vote upon it. It was Sir
John Newport, who by his indefatigable inquiries enabled
the Government to abolish Church-rates in Ireland, and
he deserved well cf the country. He must repeat his
strong protest against assailing cue party through :mother,
as had been done by the Hon. Member for Westminster, and
he would have much, plemotre iii voting for the amendment.
Sir JAMES GR. A HAM rose amidst loud cries of
" Divide, divide." He found it impossible to remain silent
after the speech( s of the two Hon. Members ohs spoke
last. If lie was of opinion that the motion ender consi-
deration faller directly or indirectly censured the cha-
racter of Sir John Newport, no individual in the House
would have more strenuously resisted it than he would.—
, (Cheers.) Having known that Gentleman formany years.
he could rot cell to his recollection any public servant
whom he considered mere honest, more independent, or
more useful than be was.—(Cheers.) It was stated also
upon authority that the private circuit stances of Sir
John Newport were embarressed.—( Hear, hear.) He
considered the misfortunes of the good as sacred, and
therefore it was that he took part in the debate with pe-
culiar pain. Ile acquitted Sir John Newport of all blame.
het he accused Ministers, beeriest! !hey had exposed Sir
John Newport to unmerited (tli (ly, and placed liim in
most painful situation. But be should be ashamed of him-
self if any private considerations could deter him from
!rankly expressing his opinions upon any subject. He was
A party to the resolutions passed in 1832, upon
which the pension arrangements were founded in
the Civil List Act ; but he confessed he did

not adopt them with any strong predilection
in their favour. He though it was for the public advantage '
that there should be a harbour of refuge, in which old and
deserving Statesmen might escape from the cold ingrati-
tude of friends. The Clown was the scat of reward as
well as of mercy, and he thought some sun should be
placed at its disposal for the relief of old and distressed
statesmen. He thought, that if, instead of appointing him
Comptroller of the Exchequer her Majesty had been ad-
vised to grant a pension to Sir John Newport,
whatever might have been the conduct of others, not
o word would ever have fallen from him against it.
His object. in rising was this, as he had taken an active
po,rvae the Act for the alteration of the management
diuring' thEex candemqinneirs,traatni and alsof Lordin theG reAyc t
for
re-
gulation of pensions, heonfelt
both of the independencet. of the .mCsoemlfptrboolulenrdshi
s. hi
that the present transaction was utterly subversive
Exebequer,•and a direct violation of the Act which hPtoacolfbstetaehtnee
passed with respect to the pensions ranted to official persons.
xmc,inlcieueerve.rny.cepffe)nrt to relater the Comptrollership
of
~head.;.
with the administration of
hile
r
ars;
ipstriepry
joecoi
inhnttntmyo..Neetni
the
eofcoSuni
affairs.diay‘: ' LC
contendedw aldcontahenectetnetdth of the Government of the
ght years old,
I Newport was a bad one
and was at the time abohti(Lo:7
t r Johny.—
( Heir, hear.) In April, 1839
to Lord John Russell his inability to dischargeevvpart notified
of the office. From the end of May,when
n the duties
it
ascer-
tained that Lord Monteagle could not obtain tliewS"peAer-
skip of that House—throughout the month of May,
months of June, July, and August, until September,y,the
when the Session of Parliament was over, they kept the
situation open, and then they immediately appointed their
own Cabinet colleague to the office of sole Comptroller
of the Exchequer, and sole Comptroller of the expendi-
ture of the country.—(Opposition cheers.) The present
was not an attack upon Sir J. Newport, but it was a
direci, attack upon the conduct of the Government, for
having given to one of their colleagues an office
of great responsibility and control, under circum-
stances of great suspicion.—( Loud Opposition cheers.)
He would ask what were the great feats performed by
Lord Monteagle before he bad left the House ? He
omitted to fund Exchequer Bills when ho might have