The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-10 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 10 1841:

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
CHRONICLE. The state of the revenue is naturally
enough a sore subject to men who are about to take office
pledged to oppose the only measures by which it is possible to
make good the deficiency, without adding to the burdens of
the country. They are most acutely sensible that the exist-
ence
of a Tory Government is staked upon being able to go
on without imposing new taxes. But how to go on without
new taxes, and at the same time without breaking up their
party,. by adopting the measures of their predecessors, and
attacking monopoly—here is the dilemma. Plausible oratory,
dexterous trimming between opposing interests and parties can
do much, but it cannot do all. It canot, as Sir R. Peel will
shortly find to his cost, put money into the Exchequer ; it can-
not enable manufacturers, who are shut out of foreign markets, to
continue working at a profit; it cannot enable the workmen,
who were employed by those manufacturers, to find work else
where ; ' it cannot enable the labouring classes generally. to
spend in sugar, beer, coffee, tea, and other taxed commodities,
the money which is wrung from their earnings to pay the land-.
lord's tax ; it cannot prevent the Governments of the Brazils,
of the United States, and of the Prussian League, from making
good their threats of using reprisals against us, if we
persist in
the war of prohibitions and exclusioes; it cannot, in a word,
ward off the inevitable loss of the foreign trade, which is at once
the most productive source of -revenue and the principal sup-
port
of our commercial and manufacturing greatness, it we
persist in the suicidal policy of alienating our best customers,
encouraging our most formidable rivals, and imposing an enor-
mous burden on the industry of ti-c country for the benefit of
a few bloated monopolists. Sir Robert Peel and the more
sagacious 'Furies know this, and they are therefore far from
participating in the exultation of the hungry crew of
subordinate partisans, to whom the prospect of making
a successful grasp at the good things of office is all in all. They
feel that until nionopolg, with its consequences, is fairly con-
trasted with free trade and the consequences of free trade, the
battle can hardly be said to have begun. They feel also, that
although they have partially succeeded in disguising the real
nature of the contest at the present elections, the state of the
revenue affords an insurmountable obstacle to their doing so
again; and that, unless Providence sends the first Tory Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer a couple of millions from some source
as yet undiscovered, twelve months cannot elapse before they
are compelled to break cover, and show themselves w the coun-
try without evasion or disguise. No wonder, therefore, that
the state of the revenue is a sore subject with the Tories. In
the mean time they naturally enough try to put the hest face
they can on the matter, by imputing the deficiency to
.Whig
mismanagement. This is soon disposed of. If it be misma-
nagement to have relieved the country from the house-tax,
the coal-tax, the candle-tax, the soap-tax, the high rates
of postage, and other oppressive taxes, to the amount of
8,000,0001. and upwards annually, the Liberal Govern-
ment must plead guilty, for there is no denying that they
have done this. If it be mismanagement to have reduced offi-
cial salaries, pensions, the cost of collecting the revenue, and
other civil expenses, to a million below the amount pronounced
the ne plus ultra of economy by the Duke of Wellington's
Administration ; to this also the Liberal Government must
plead guilty. If it be mismanagement to have expended money
for the purpose of effecting the emancipation of negro slaves in
the British dominions, once more the Liberal Government
must plead guilty. If it be mismanagement to have reduced
the naval and military establishments of the country during a
time of profound peace, and when the political horizon became
clouded to have raised them again by a judicious and moderate
increase, which, although much less than the amount clamoured
for by the opposition, has sufficed to maintair. and extend British
influence in every quarter of the world, and to obtain results
more brilliant-and more solidly advantageous than many a Tory
Government has had to show for an expenditure of hundreds of
millions—the Liberal Government stands convicted ; that they
have done so is notorious to every body.
TIMES.—That Sir Robert Peel will have in the new Par-
liament a majority exceeding sixty, and probably not less than
severity, appears to us to be by this time a matter of absolute
certainty. But we have no doubt whatever that even if the
majority were less, even if it were no greater than forty or
thirty, the Conservative leader would still be able to governs
the country, and to carry through Parliament those measures
which he might esteem necessary for the public welfare, so
long as he conducted his Government upon really Conserva-
tive principles. Upon any other principles we have no wish
to see him govern, and it would be idle for him to make the at-
tempt, even if he were disposed to do so. Entertaining these
feelings, it has been with unaffected astonishment that we
have seen a respectable evening contemporary, in his na-
tural anxiety to stimulate the county constituencies to
increased exertion, playing into the hands of the enemy
by vague expressions of doubt and apprehension, as un-
founded, in our judgment, as they are unseasonable. We
have been told, that if the majority do not exceed thirty,
" the farmers may make bonfires of their ploughs," and that
the Whig-Radical Ministers will, in that case, soon find their
way back again to office by the favour of the Crown. This is
sheer nonsense. A majority of sixty can no more secure a
Ministry against dismissal by the arbitrary exertion of the pre-
rogative of the Crown than one of thirty ; and without some
such intervention of prerogative, the Whigs could not succeed
in recovering office till the majority, whether of 60 or 30,
should be converted into an absolute mini rty. We have no
fear of either of these contingencies. The Queen, we are sa-
tisfied, will never make any unbecoming use of her preroga-
tive; and Sir Robert Peel will not, by res .rting to the vio-
lent measure (albeit, recommended by our evening contempo-
rary) of a second dissolui ion within the present year, or any
other similar insanity, give the Crown occ. sion for such a
change of Ministry as the country might be content to ac-
quiesce in. Still less (if anything could be less) probable would
be a diminution of Sir R. Peel's majority below the number
of those who may now be returned as his pledged supporters,
in any event except that of a departure, on his part, from Con-
servative principles. Does any man suppose that the agricul-
tural Whigs, for instance, however unwilling they may have
been to desert their party when in office, will be particularly
anxious to bring them back again for the express purpose of
repealing the Corn-laws? Nothing can be more obvious than
that there must be a considerable moderate party, consisting of
men now classified by the Ministerial prints under the
general title of Reformers, who may be depended upon as an
eventual reinforcement to the ranks of the Conservative Mi-