The Sun.
London, England, 1841-02-06 00:00:00

MORNING EDITION

POLITICAL SUNIMARY OF THE

MORNING PAPERS.

-
We are gain compelled, from wart of space, to confine
ourselves to a brief summary of the leading articles in the
Morning Journals of yestt ?jay. The Times, in comment-
in.. en some recent remarks in the Journal des Debats on
the subject of the Queen's Speech, justly observes :
" The desire is, we may say, universal in this county}
that France should be no longer separated from England
and from the rest of Christendom; that the former sym-
pathies between the only two free nations in Earope should
be restored ; and that France should re. enter, upon honour-
able terms, the great political confederacy." The Morning
Chronicle remarks, with reference to the approaching trial of
the Earl of Cardigan :—" It is rumoured that the Noble Earl
means to plead benefit of clergy. It is not generally un-
derstood that Peers are entitled to the distinction, by
statute, of being allowed to plead benefit of clergy. 13ut
it is understood that, by the canon law, a clerk is in cer-
tain cases incapacitated from claiming the benefit of clergy,
and as a Peer is in the same predicament, it is expected
that some curious and somewhat delicate inquiries eiil
become necessary should his Lordship be advised to urge
the plea." The Morhing Advertiser remarks as follows
on Mr. Labouchere'a Bill for the better regulation of
IZalaays:—" It is one which, if we mistake not, will be
sure to command the unanimous approbation of Parliament
and the public, and will bee eckoued among those measures
of practical good which, removed from the sphere of party
politics, perhaps confer upon the nation the greatest and
meat lasting benefits." The Morning Post, speaking of
the late election=, cat's_—" The Ballot has by no means the
merit of being a certain cure for the evils of bribery and
intimidation, but even if it had this merit, we might well
shrink from the adoption of a plan tending to degrade and
falsify the exercise of political privileges." The 3forning
Herald, says of Lord Morpeth's speech in the house of
Commons on Thursday, that " it was, as compared with the
ache of preparationlwbieh bad been sounded for it, cne of
tt:e most lackadaisical efforts which was every exhibited
torore a wearied audience."

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.)
(From the Globe.)
0:r readers will perceive, from the preliminary discus-
eion of last night on Lord Morpeth's proposed qualification
end registration measure for Ireland, that our anticipa-
Sian; have Len verified as to the probable unde-
signed results of Lord Stanley's one-sided essay
at i.uief:.ng the present electoral body in that country.
We adhere, indeed, to Lord Stanley's construction
of the principle of the Reform Act. We agree with
him in his understanding thet " the right to vote ehould
depend, not up :n the gre ss amount of the population of
any town or county, but upon the number of that popu-
lation who were in possession of a certain amount of
property, which property should enable them to hold
such a station of
.respectability in society as might be
expected to permit them to exercise the elective fran-
chise with honesty Red independence." We wish
Lord Stanley's pi esent party had at that time per-
mitted his former friends to carry out that sound prin-
ciple, as regarded freemen and independent tenantry.
Lord Morpeth justly remarked last night that, when he re.
erred to the novel principle introduced by the 50/.tenant-
at-will clause, in the English Reform Act, he owned
that the practical working of that clause, as far as it had
yet been developed, did not fill him with a wish to in-
troduce a similar principle upon a more extended scale
into the constituency of Ireland I The question is, whether
Lord Stan's'', and his present party, who, it appears, are
capable of intiolucing new principles, when they think
it will suit their purposes, as they are crpable of dis-
regarding old ones, when they have ceased to serve
them, are entitled on this occasion to retort similar
oliargee on the Government. We think not; and Lord
Iluvs ick gave good and a ffective arguments for the same con-
elusion. It must be observed that Ministers are not
wantonly meddling with this Irish suffrage question.
The conflicting cpinii,ne of the highest authorities force it
*on their attention. The pressing of Lord Stanley's 13:11
renders some legislation unavoidable. The question, then,
is, a Lether lecislation can be ccefined within the limits of
that Bill. The. Shylock style of " Justice and the Bond"
does not suit political questions. Whatever legal doctrine
may prevail on the present extent of the franchise, the
Legislature, which fixed that extent, did not intend to
diminish its numbers. If it appears that those numbers
are diminishing—if Lord Stanley's measure, whatever
its effect, would, in eff_ct, still further diminish them
—thee Lord Stanley's intention in his Irish Re-
form would be foverated by the passing of his Irish
registration. He tells us his intention is already frus-
trated by the fraud and perjury practised under the Irish
Bill, as it now works. We find that measure frustrated
in another sense, by the dwindling numbers of voters,
motwithstateling all these illicit practices. What remains
then, if it gislation is forced on us, but to remedy imper-
fectionvon both sides—imperfect securities against wrong,
and imperfect sccu Hes for retaining rights ?
(h. cm the Standard.)
'The Irish Registration Bill of Lord Morpeth is now, as
for as its principle is concerned, before the public, and it
will be found to have accomplished thediffieult task of restor-
ing interest to a discussion, the interest of which had been
previously exhausted. The interest, however, which the
14IJble Secretary has given to the question, is altogether
at his own and his party's expense—it is the same kind
of interest that one takes in a rat-hunt or in the pursuit
of a pickpocket by the market crowd. Lord Morpeth
neves intended that his Bill should pass into a law—nay
more, never hoped that any one could suspect him of in-
tending that it should pass into a law. It is a Bill to pre
vent a reform of the Irish registration, which Lord
Morpeth at length acknowledges to be abominably
corrupted by baud sod perjury. And for this end it is ad-
mirably adapted; it is a Bill for household suffrage, for such
must be a Bill for a five-pound rated franchise. What would
be thought of such a Bill of this kind for the counties of
England, where so much complaint is mr:e by Liberals of
the enfranchisement by the Duke of Buckingham and
Chandus' clause in the Reform Bill of no/. tenants ;
and yet how much higher is the relative position of
Ll. householders in England than in Ireland? All
rents in Ireland arc extravagantly high, but licuse-
rent is higher in prop:it-Aim than land-rent, as it
always will be where the interest of money is
high, and where payments are precarious. This
is a fallacy which runs through all calculations
of Irish rents ; whether house rent or land rent, the
rents are estimated at what is commonly agreed to
be paid for a given class of house, or a given amount
of land, and not what on the average of years
is actually received, or expected to be received.
This may serve well enough for comparing things
Irish among themselves ; but it leads to the grossest
errors when we come to compare the station of the
ieliebitants according to the rents they pay. Many a man
occupies a house in Ireland that, according to the usus
loci, must be rated at ten or fifteen pounds, who in Eng-
land would be the inmate of a workhouse. Nine-tenths
of Lerd Morpeth's 51. electors would be actual paupers.
But it is nearly as absurd to deal seriously with such a
proposition as it was to make it.
(From the Courier.)
The unanimity of the Ministry and their adherents is
really wonderful this Session about the fraud and per-
jury of the Irish registration system, as contrasted with
last, when the fact was flatly denied by Mr. O'Connell
and not dared to be admitted by the cowering officials
around lint then. Lord Morpeth last evening, was
allowed to be even eloquent in illustration of the pre-
mises so long in litigation. "It had (he observed) been
admitted on all hands that there were many imperfection's
and abuses attached to the pressnt system of registration
in Ireland. This evil both parties have admitted, and bare
agreed in opinion that sonic remedy should be applied.—
( Hear, hear.) As to the precise extent of those abuses—as
to the nature of them, or the ex Let degree of fraud practised
—as to its comparative extent with the fraud practised in
this country or Scotland—it was not, he thought, a sub-
ject necessary to excite ccntrovcrsy, although he knew
these questions had, on former occasions, created a great
difference of opinion. It had been admitted by all
parties that this system had furnished, generally,
great means and facilities for fraud in Ireland ;
this had scarcely been denied by any who had addressed
himself to a consideration of the subject. The
point which had been more especially adverted to
was the system of certificates, which, of itself, was the
cause of frequent instances of fraudulent perscnation of
dead or absent voters, and the retention on the registry
of voters who had been placed there after being duly
qualified, but who were then left without any opportunity
for subsequent correction or revision, that is, under the
present Irish Reform law, for a period of eight years."
The scandalous system here described by a Member of
the Government, under whose observation its practical
working must more peculiarly have fallen, was suffered
to exist, and its abominations winked at, without one
attempt to enact and apply a legislative remedy, until
Lord Stanley took the monster grievance in hand, and
grappled with it vigorously for the fall. The instant it
was found that registration iniquities were doomed, and
that profit would no longer be tolerated from the perpe-
tration, Lord Morpeth is seized with a pious fury for re-
form, but a reform after the true Whig fashion, for whilst
'fleeting zealously to co-operate in the eradication of one
abuse, he lends his aid only on condition of inflicting an.
other, politically more perilous, although, perhaps morally
less gross in the abstract.

MONEY MARKET and CITY NEWS

(THURSDAY EVENING.)
TIME 9.—By advices from Hamburgh the price of gold
is 422 k per mark, which, at the English Mint price cf
31. 17a. 103 d. the ounce for standard gold, gives an ex-
change of 13. 31, and the c.mrse of exchange at Ham-
burgh on Loudon at short being 13. 41, it follows that gold
is .21 per cent, lower at Hamburgh than in London.
The premium on gold at Paris is 5 per mille, which, at
the English Mint price of 31. 17s. lOid. the ounce for
standard gold, gives an exchange of 25. 27i, earl the ex-
change at Paris on London at short being 25. 30, it follows
that gold is .10 per cent. lower at Paris than in London.
The course of exchange at New York on London is
108 i• per cent., and the par of exchange between England
and America being 109 23-40 per cent , it foilows that the
exchange is .82 per cent. against England ; but the quoted
exchange at New York being for bills at 60 dn.,' sight,
the digruunt on these 60 days must be deducted from the
aforesaid difference.

SCRIPTURE.—Unnatural as it may appear, it
Is notwithstanding true, that we find much less clear ideas
in regard to flys cenon of Holy Scripture in the erliaer
ages than in the later. The word Scripture was used,
as we shall tee, in a latitude with which no church or
party, eteept, perhaps the Quakers, have used it. Ire-
mug does not quote all the books which we of the Church
of England esteem canonical. Those which he omits are,
Ruth, Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Ecclesiastes,
Canticles, Obadiah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Higgii-
But the mere eiruumstance of hie not citing' them can-
not, of course, imply any doubt turfo'their inspiration or
canonicity. lie had no occasion to do so for the purposes
of his argument. It is only wonderful that he thought
himself obliged to quote so largely upon such a subject.
Brii Maga rine.