The Sun.
London, England, 1847-01-27 00:00:00

trn itning IMAL

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 1847.

Ireland must have an extension of the poor-law.
Without a better administration of that law, the
beneficence of Government, the munificence of Par-
liament, and the sagacity of our leading statesmen
will be exerted to no purpose whatever. Without a
juster distribution of the national alms, and a more
rational arrangement on the part of the poor-law
guardians in Ireland, it is folly to anticipate any
effective diminution of the unparralleled miseries
with which that country is afflicted. Lord Joins
RUSSELL acknowledged as much on Monday
evening, when he announced the intention of the
Ministry to bring in a Bill conferring additional
powers on the poor-law guardians, " to afford relief
either in or out of the workhouse to ALL parties disabled
by bodily ailment." The circumstances under which
the Prime Minister made this announcement are
most significant as to the necessity for some proceed•
ing of the kind. Although Lord JOHN RUSSELL had
just broached his scheme of district relief committees ;
although he had just recommended to Parliament
the granting of 50,0001. to the land proprietors of
Ireland, for the purpose of enabling them to purchase
seed for potatoes ; although he had just proposed a sys-
tem of loans advanced upon the terms of the Drainage
Act, namely, at an interest of three and a half per cent.,
with the intention of affording assistance towards the
improvement of estates, and the reclamation of waste
lands ; although he had just submitted to the consi-
deration of the Legislature one of the most
comprehensive propositions ever made by Prime
Minister for the alleviation of the distress consequent
upon the famine and destitution, he yet felt it to be
his bounden duty, as one of her MAJESTY'S ad-
visers, and as a patriotic statesman, to demand of the
Imperial Parliament extended powers for poor-
law guardians. It is this especially which as-
sures us that Lord JOHN RUSSELL has the Genius and
the Courage which are most essential in the Premier
at these epochs of peril and disaster. It is this which
imparts such homogeniety to the speech delivered by
the Noble Lord on Monday evening, which ren-
ders that speech admirable, not merely for its dissec-
tion, one by one, of the several exigencies of Ireland,
but for its sagacious and systematic indication of the
remedies which are alone calculated to re-organize
the society of that kingdom, and which, above all,
enumerates those remedies in a sequence so natural
and judicious as to render them compact and effec-
tual, instead of casual and disjointed. The Noble
Lord was conscious that millions might be lavished
upon the completion of unremunerative public works,
that thousands might be expended in the purchase of
seed for potatoes, that bog-lands might be drained
into cultivation, and tracks of dry soil irrigated into
fertility, and that still the demon of starvation might
continue triumphant, and men and women perish
with hunger in the ditches. Lord JOHN RUSSELL
saw that this would be inevitable unless some sub-
stantial provision were made for the famishing pea-
santry. He saw the calamitous consequences which
would be inevitable unless Parliament were prepared,
as he himself emphatically expressed it, "to enact
that relief should be given by law to the destitute."
Under the existing state of things the assistance
afforded by the poor-law guardians is restricted
within very narrow limits, while the destitution
which requires assistance is altogether unrestricted—
it is boundless. So many paupers can be accommo-
dated in a given workhouse, say 250, and there may
be some 550 souls starving in the parish. What be-
comes of the 300 for whom there is no accommoda-
tion whatever ? The board says at once to the 300,
"Be off! There's no room for you here. We are
crowded as it is, and have no particular wish to breed
a fever by close packing in the sleeping quarters."
The natural and ostensible result of which is that the
300, finding themselves denied all aid by the paro-
chial authorities, and excluded from all opportunity
of shelter in their sorest troubles, become reckless—
try to get by foul means what they find it impossible
to obtain by fair—turn rapparees and vagabonds, and
are not unwilling to earn a guinea from the agents of
"Molly Maguire " by driving a bullet through a
" marked man," or bludgeoning a prosperous tenant
upon his own threshold. Those are the evils arising
from this systematic niggardliness. The workhouses
being constructed only to contain a limited number
of the poverty-stricken, there is always, from the per-
petual pauperism of Ireland, a surplus of the local pcor
denied admittance within their walls. 1 In extraor-
dinary periods of privation like the present, that sur-
plus is naturally increased to a frightful extent.
From this insufficiency of relief the peasantry are
driven to the commission of offences against the law :
they are transformed from the victims of famine into
the perpetrators of crime : they are forced into a.
lawless struggle for the preservation of their lives :
they are incited to acts of insubordination and goaded
to deeds of bloodshed. It is useless to mince the
matter, and would be sinful to conceal the truth.
When uneducated multitudes are refused all aid by
the guardians placed over them by the Legislature, the
necessary consequence is, that they feel themselves
impelled to appease the cravings of their own hunger
by the help of brute force. All this might be readily
obviated were the poor-law guardians, like those
mentioned the other evening in the House of Com-
mons by Sir H. W. BARRON, to hire some additional
premises whenever the dearth may make the applicants
more numerous than the workhouses will contain.
What can be more idiotic, in fact, than to build shel-
ter for so many and so many sufferers, and to remain
inflexible to whatever contingent misery may he pro-
duced by an unforeseen emergency like that of the
potato murrain ? As if poverty could be curbed with
bricks and mortar; as if inanition were preventable
by the restrictions of parochial parsimony; as if
poor-law guardians could stand before the bil-
lows of famine, like CANUTE, and obstruct
their advance by an idle mandate I Some-
thing must be done to compel the various boards
of guardians throughout Ireland to apportion this
distribution of assistance to the extent of the local

destitution. These wholesale and retail rejections of
the starving peasantry from the thresholds of work-
houses must, in some manner or other, be prevented.
Either supernumerary lodgements must be provided
for the latest applicants, when the workhouses them-
selves are thronged, or the granting of out-door relief
must be rendered more frequent than heretofore.
Otherwise the mortality of Ireland will still continue
on its present frightful ratio of increase, and the
duties of coroners will become more onerous than
ever. That some arrangement of the kind just men-
tioned is necessitated by the present calamity—a
calamity, says the Prime Minister, " such as has not
been known in modern times "—is plainly shown by
the statements and propositions of Lord JOHN
RUSSELL. Impressed with a conviction of the perils
resulting from the shortsighted distribution of the
public moneys, hitherto sanctioned by the poor-law
guardians, the Noble Lord has urged upon the
Legislature the advisability of empowering those
officials to relieve all the able-bodied applicants out of
the workhouse whenever, by the influx of paupers, their
admission within the workhouse has been rendered
impossible.
What we have here observed is of course applied
simply to the extremest cases of destitution, to
cases, for example, where the peasantry are denied all
help from public or agricultural works by the
peculiar position of their locality, or where physical
infirmities, whether produced by the dearth or other-

wise, preelude them from redeeming their fortunes
by manual labour. Excepting in these instances, the
multitude of sufferers in Ireland will be relievable by
employment upon the completion of the unremune-
rative works already undertaken by Government, or
upon those agricultural enterprizes and organised
reclamations of waste land, which it is the intention
of the Government to promote. Under all circum-
stances the workhouse is a dernier ressort, but, in
GOD'S name, let there be that dernier ressort, Don't
deny to the poor man the sorry consolation of having
the workhouse, or a substitute for the workhouse, to
fly to in the hour of his direst affliction. Don't de-
prive him of the last straw which he has to grasp at
in his ocean of misery. Don't debar him from that
scanty succour which is provided by every civilized
state for the outcast and the pauper. Let the policy
of such a denial be duly weighed, and let its respon-
sibilities be never forgotten.

In addressing the House on Monday evening, Lord
JOIN RUSSELL observed that it was needless for him
to solicit their indulgence, he felt assured it would be
voluntarily bestowed on him. The result fully justi-
fied his anticipations ; his discourse was listened to
with indulgence, nay more, with approbation. That
discourse is now before the country, where it will
assuredly meet with as cordial a reception. On
Monday evening party differences were forgotton ;
the Parliamant met to deliberate on ,the necessities of
the people. In the contemplation of their terrible
sufferings, all minor considerations vanished, all fac-
tious quarrels were laid at rest—the Opposition could
no longer oppose. And; in like manner, we doubt
not, will all prejudices of creed and country be
annihilated—nay, the very distinctions will not be
thought of when the gloomy reality of Irish suffering
becomes fully manifest to the English people. In
the calamities of the present hour the recollection of
former animosities will be effaced, the memory of
former grievances will be appeased.
" Disputes shall cease, and ancient feuds shall fail,
Returning Justice lift aloft her scale."
The very distinctions of English and Irish, of Pro-
testants and Catholics, will be obliterated in the com-
mon brotherhood of fellow- subjects and fellow-men. It
is at a time like the present that such sympathetic senti-
ments are more especially required; and it is precisely
at a time like the present that, happily, they arP most
likely to prevail. It hai been said that -a
common
suffering-will make friends even of foes; how much
more, then, should community of sorrows strengthen
the bonds of those who should be as brothers ! That
such will be the case we cannot doubt ; and we
cannot doubt that the speech of the Prime Minister
will meet with a hearty response throughout all Eng-
land. It can hardly fail to do so, indeed, for it has in
a twofold degree claims on our approbation. In the
first place, it excites sympathy for suffering, and
points out and demands the means of alleviating it ;
and, secondly, it elicits our approval for the ex-
ceeding justice and advisability of the great prin-
ciple which it enforces—namely, not that we
should regenerate the Irish, not that we should do
everything to help them, but that we should endea-
vour, to enable them to effect their own regeneration
—that we should help them to help themselves. This
is the great object to which all these new improve-
ments tend ; this is the great object to which both
the Marquis of LANSDOWNE and Lord JOAN RUSSELL
so eloquently and so strenuously alluded ; this is the
great object which every lover of Ireland, which
every well-wisher of ,the United Kingdom, must
most ardently desire to see effected ; for by its
achievement, and by its achievement only, can the
well-being of millions be assured.

In native strength, in native ranks,
The only hope of freemen dwells."

anr-rdrit might
might
b
phtichtiaEmnagkle a dead body
to
oarquis of LANSDOWNE'S
We might as well
singularlyattemw
people b. y
appropriate..dee_wi,hi benefit
a
speak or move as expect
ex-
ternal influences. The
only to the
illustrationthe
temporary w a s
assistance
Ti.thewas
ren-
derextended to Ireland,
supporthe o b
thes observed—" vt er
c was bending its
head to a temporary blast, but
vigour in the roots of the tree
andto the vitality
which it had in itself, that they must look for its
permanent restoration." Let us trust this metaphor
may be happily realised. England will be ready to
do her possible—notwithstanding the privations to
which the people of this country must....
,aubj ..
ne ected,
they will be ready to afford help in the hour of need.
They will cheerfully contribute their aid to support
the branches of the tree during the passing of the
storm ; let us trust that in the meantime its roots will
be imbibing a new life. That such a trust will not
be vain we have every reason to believe. The
speeches both of the Noble Marquis and the
Prime Minister tend to encourage the most
sanguine hopes ; indeed, much as we admire
the various details of the Government plans,
there is no part of the discourses of the noble
speakers which elicits our hearty concurrence and
cordial sympathy more fully than does the earnest
and confident tone in which they declare their as-
surance that the exertions of the Irish will not be
found wanting, and that the prosperity of Ireland is
not to be despaired of. " I do not despair," said
Lord JouN ItussELL, " I see no reason why Ireland
may not become a state enjoying the greatest pros-
perity." In order to effect this desideratum, how-
ever, he added that other than Government
measures are required :—" I feel, with respect
to these and other measures that there
are things which the Crown cannot grant, which
Parliament cannot grant, such as a spirit of self-
reliance and a spirit of co-operation. I must say
plainly that I should indeed despair of this task, were
it not that I think I see symptoms amongst the people
of Ireland, both of a greater reliance upon their own
energies and their own exertions, and a greater will-
ingness to co-operate with us." We would earnestly
adjure all those who, alarmed at the proposal for the
relief committees, imagine that the Irish are to be-
come a nation of paupers, and that the English are to
toil for the maintenance of the idle—we would earnestly
adjure all such dispassionately to peruse the foregoing
observations of Lord Jowl RUSSELL. The whole
speech of the Noble Lord, indeed, breathes the same
inspiriting sentiments. We are not asked to work
for the Irish, we are asked to enable them to work.
Let us not regard that suffering people as some idle
beggar who must be fed by our bounty, but rather
as some unfortunate individual incapacitated by want
and sickness. We will give him food to recruit his
strength—we:will give him medicines to restore his
health—we will
set him in employment—we will
make him • d
in ependent—and then we have done with
him. By the sweat of his own brow he will support
himself—aye, and perhaps pay us back some day, with
interest.

On a dispassionate survey of all the Government
measures they will be found to have this one object
in view, the affording of temporary assistance until
permanent improvements are in progress. Many
of the propositions can only be justified by the
pressing exigencies which demand them; we must
not confound them with the more salutary and
durable reforms. The temporary and permanent im-
provements :may almost be regarded as the edifice

and the scaffolding. What should we think of their
common sense who should cry out against
the latter, becaus3 it was not of elegant appear-
ance and of durable materials, because, in sooth,

was not adapted for the purposes of habita-

tion, forgetting all the while that the habitation
was behind it In a little while the edifice itself
would be raised, just in proportion, elegant in design,
lasting in material, the theme of general admiration ;
while the unsightly scaffolding—having served the
purposes of its erection, having sustained the separate
fragments till they formed the perfect whole—now,
"its occupation gone," would be removed and seen no
more. So will it be with Ireland. Pass but a few
years, and our loans, and donations, 'and relief com-
mittees will disappear—they will only be ap-
parent in the benefits they have tended to
procure. We are inclined to believe with Mr.
FRENCH., that " the fearful calamity with which it
has pleased PROVIDENCE to afflict Ireland will do
for that country, what neither king nor statesman
could effect, by leading to the adoption of measures
which will give her a fair field, and go far to promote
her regeneration." For years Ireland has been the
scene of distress, and the source of difficulty—let us
trust, nay, let us believe, she will be so no longer.
PANDORA'S box of evils has been poured out on that
unhappy land, but now we have reached the bottom,
now at last we have obtained Hope.