The Sun.
London, England, 1840-07-29 00:00:00

e

LONDON:
WEDNESDAY, JULY 29, 1840.

Our Second Edition of last evening recorded the
premature, and at last sudden death, of the Earl of
DUIIIIAM. His Lordship was born on April 12,
1792, and had, concequently, entered his fortv,-
ninth year. He was created a Baron on January
27, 1828, a Viscount r.nd an Earl on March 15,
1833. He has enjoyed his Peerage, if he can be
said to have enjoyed it at all, for a very short period ;
but not as a Peer, as a conspicuous and influential
member of society, are we called on to consider
him. The particulars of his death, and of the de-
voted affection by which he was attended till his last
xoment, are described by our Correspondent in an-
other part of The Sun.

JOHN GEORGE LAMBTO N was the descendant.

and representative of one of the oldest and most
opulent families in the county of Durham. His
father, who represented the city of Durham in
Parliament, died at the age of thirty-three, Mole
he had developed the great talents for which his

friends gave him credit. Mr. LA MBTON, who was
five years of age at his father's death, on attaining his
majority stood for his native county, and was elected
in 1813. At that period, as the eloquently de-
scribed its condition at Sunderland in 1834,

"there was no public feeling in it of any
description. The gentry of the county were
chiefly Tories—the magisterial bench was filled
with the same party—all public meetings were
held at the gates of the Bishop's palace.
The Rev. Prelate generally attended. Instructions
were given to the tejiants how there were to vote,
and theis hands were held up according to the incli-
nation and in obedience to the bidding of their land-
lords." Under such circumstances it was an act
of (Treat boldness in Mr. LAMBTON to offer him-
self to the freeholders. He succeeded through the
influence of his father's character ; he laboured in-
cessantly afterwards to uphold and strengthen rite
independence of his native county, and it has ever
since been one of the foremost in the LiberaA cause.
Lord DURHAM in the course of his Part:ramentary
life saw many of the principles which Ire advocated
againSt great majorities ultimately triumph ; hut
we doubt whether any one of his 'aiumphs gave him
equal satisfaction to his lasting success in creating
and preserving the indepenr!,ence of Durham.
He no sooner entered Parliament than he made
himself conspicuous by tile fearlessness and sincerity
with which he advr
fatted popular principles. At
that time the dip:omatic portioning of kingdoms,
which gives a spur to ambition and sanctity to
usurpation, was in vogue, and Mr. LAMBTON was
one of those who zealously opposed in 1814 the
annexation 'of Norway to Sweden, and in 1815 the
sacrifice of Genoa to Savoy. The opposition was
not successful, and these countries now form por-
tions of States which, if not hostile, are not friendly
to Great Britain, when they might have been trained
rto rely on her for protection, while they nourished
in their own bosoms those principles of democracy
and good government of which they both con-
tained the germs. He moved in the latter case for
papers to illustrate the mode in which the Genoese
were " handed over like droves of cattle to the King of
SARDINIA;" but though there was a "spark of the
ancient English spirit" in the representatives of the
people, it, could not prevail against the stifling effects
of the CASTLEREAGII policy. A sanction was
then given by our deliberative asseinlilies to the
prir.cipie, thus incorporating it with the public law
of Europe, that men may be transferred from Rule
`to Rule, as if, like slaves, they were property at-
tached to an estate. Mr. Letata-roti distinguished
himself by energetically opposing that principle.
In 1815 he made another step towards gaining
the confidence of the masses, and laid down a
noble principle, which is the very foundation of all
popular government. He voted against the Corn-
/aw, because " he never would vote in support of a
8,111 against which the wishes of the people had
been so strongly, so generally, and so unetiuivocally
expressed." The result of this law, which is rapidly
undermining the social fabric, proves the compre
pensiveness of that wisdom which defers to the
popular voice.
Through the dark period which' followed, distress
begetting riots, and riots begetting, first massacres,
and then coercive laws—all springing from the
starving iniquity of the Act of 1815—Mr. LAMB-
TON was a constant and zealous opponent of the
measures of the CASTLEREAGII Administration.
He took an active part in a great county meeting,
held at Durham, to oppose it, and was one of the
most zealous opponents of the Sisc. Acts. The
great support which that most un-English. and most
Tory of all our Ministries found in the, House of
Commons, strengthened Mr. LAMBTON 'S convic-
tion that nailing could be done for the people in
Parliament without extending the basis of the re-
presentation. He had been, from the first, a Par-
liamentary Reformer, and in 1821 proposed a Bill
to the House founded on household suffrage, the
extinction of rotten boroughs, and triennial Parlia-
ments. Though he lived to be one of the authors
of a Parliamentary Reform JP, which, with
alterations, was carried through Parliament, his
motion in 1821 was rejected bya very large majority.
No alteration of his principles followed, but he saw
the inutility of wasting his strength till the tide
turned, and he never, we believe, while a Coin-