The Sun.
London, England, 1846-03-12 00:00:00

Ng MARCH 12, 1846. PRIcE SD.

" Would it not be better to devote time, attention, and
legislation to ameliorate in some degree the condition of
so miserable a population, instead of devoting time, at-
tention, and legislation' to devise modes of unconstitu-
tional coercion for that unhappy people ?
" There are many other horrible clauses in this Bill
which I shall recur to again. But I wish to pause
for one moment, to call the marked and deliberate at-
tention to the most important and absorbing considera-
tion of one simple fart.
" That matter of fact is this, that the entire hope of
the Bill treats with indiscriminate and undistinguishing
severity the innocent as well as the guilty; and more
especially that, in the attempt to detect a comparatively
small number engaged in crime, punishment is not in-
flicted alone on the guilty smaller number, but is equally
inflicted on the innocent great majority.
" Thus, for example, a crime is committed, or obliged
to be committed, for it is all the same, in one district or
county, and immediately a proclamation may issue of
outlawry, not only against the district or county in which
the crime was committed, but also any adjoining dis-
trict or county. The number of criminals in such case
would, at least in a'l probability, not exceed six or eight
--the number of persons effectually punished in their
property would amount to ten thousand, twenty thou-
sand, or perhaps one hundred thousand, or even more.

" It is a =idol in our law, and often quoted by the
be-t of our judges, that it is better that one hundred
guilty should escape than that one innocent should suffer.
This Bill, however, goes on a directly opposite principle.
It punishes one hundred innocent, upon the chance of
inflicting chastisement upon the one guilty.
"And all this medley of legislation is facetiously called
a union between Great Britain and Ireland.
"I reserve the consideration of the other and most
hideous clauses for my next letter.
" For the present, I have only to observe, that it is re-
ported that Lord St. Germans has graciously conde-
scended to limit the duration of the Act to about four
years. I hope and trust the firmness displayed by the
Repeal Association has made him shrink from the more
atrocious enactment ; but the little Lord is not to escape
in that way. He formed, fostered, and matured the
Bill, with all the odious tyranny of a perpetual law. If
Ireland shall ever have justice done her, the iniquity of
the project will, I trust, be adequately punished.-
" For my part, I will not spare him a single observa-
tion. What a miserable estimate he must form of our

love of constitutional rights. Freedom reckons by the
hour—liberty is counted by the day—and he who would
acquiesce in one day, one hour of servitude, is as
despicable a miscreant as the base tyrant who imposes
the chain.

My fifth objection to the Bill is the unlimited power it
gives over the persons of the Irish people.
" By the 15th and 16th sections, any person who hap-
pens to be out of his place of abode, at any time from one
hour after sunset until sunrise, may be arrested by any
constable or policeman—that is, by anybody—and
transported for fifteen years. Mark the offence, and
mark the punishment. Gracions heaven ! fifteen years'
transportation for being out of a man's house for five
minutes.

" It is not necessary to give any proof against him, but
the fact of his being out in the open air. It is not ne-
cessary to prove that he was out for any unlawful pur-
rose. I repeat, the only proof under this Bill to enable
the Court, whatever it may be, to condemn to fifteen
years' transportation, is the mere fact of his being in the
open air within the prohibited hours.
" The prosecutor in such a case is bound to no proof
of guilt ; but the unhappy prisoner is told he will be
allowed to prove his innocence.
"See what a total violation of the first principles of our-
criminal law is this ! Our criminal law declares em-
phatically, in the language of all the Judges, that every
B-itish subject is to be deemed and taken as innocent
until his guilt is proved—proved on the oath of wit--
nesses. But this Bill reverses the maxim, and declares
the man guilty, unless he is able to prove, on the oath of
witnesses, his innocence.

"Fifteen years' transportation upon an accusation
unless innocence be proved.
"I have often spoke harshly of the Emperor Nicholas;
but I will do him the justice to say that he never issued
such a Ukase as this.

" The sixth objection to the Act is another frightful
power. It is one enabling the magistrates to issue a
warrant to enable any person to break by force into any
house in which liquor of any kind is sold, in a proclaimed
district, and to arrest any person in the house not being
an inmate or traveller, and such person, fOr the mere
fact of being in such house in the prohibited hours, is
liable to fifteen years' transportation.
" Mark this—a man is found in a house where liqueur
is sold, at night, unarmed, defenceless, and sfor that
offence—offence !—he is liable to be transported for
fifteen years.
"I am sick of this Bill. There is a group of other
offences, some not punishable at all at common law, and
the others punishable only by fine or imprisonment,
which are made liable, in proclaimed districts, to trans-
portation for fifteen years.
" Two topics more, briefly touched, will bring me
to a conclusit n.
The first relites tOthe imperative necessity of every
repealer exerting himseu to prevail on the people to
keep the peace, and not to violate the law. There never
was a period when it was so emphatically true,
" That whoever commits a crime
Strengthens the enemy.'
" The next topic relates to what fills my.mind with
the bitterest anguish, namely, the hideously mistaken
and unconstitutional course that the Ministry adopt in
respect to Ireland. We repealers are inost anxious to
put an end to crime, and to see the country tranquil-
lised. We know that it can be done by adopting the
proper course. Let the Irish people be conciliated. In-
stead of Coercion Bills, bring in Bills to equalise in
Ireland the elective franchise with that in England.
" Secondly.. Give Ireland her equal proportion of re-
presentatives in the House of Commons.
Thirdly. Give Ireland equal municipal rights with
England, and give them without reservation.
"Fourthly. Above all things, immediately amend the
law of landlord and tenant. Give to the landlord his
adequate rent ; but secure to the tenant possession of
the land until he shall be repaid for all actual improve-
ment made by him upon the premises.
" Fifthly. Place the law of landlord and tenant upon
the same footing with the law respecting all other con-
tracts, and take away all the relics of the feudal supe-
riority of the landlord.
" Sixthly. Impose without delay a heavy absentee tax
in Ireland upon all non-resident landlords, and apply the
produce to lighten the burdens of county-cess and poor-
rates on the occupying tenants.
" Let the Government do all these things before it
presumes to bring to the House of Commons a Bill to
trample down all constitutional rights and liberties.
, They may deem it a shorter and easier course to, abro-
gate the constitution than to concede constitutional
equality.
"Is the Parliament of Britain only competent to
coerce, and not to equalise the franchises and rights of
both countries ? I believe so.
" Still, there is one course open to them—it is that
of abdicating a power which they abuse, and cannot
apply to useful purposes.
"Let them awow their incapacity, and restore to the
People of Ireland their domestic legislature. Let them
thus establish tranquillity and prosperity in Ireland,
secure the stability of the throne, and the permanence
of the connexion between both countries,

" Believe me to be, very faithfully yours,
"To M. Ray, Esq." " DANIEL O'CONNELL.
Mr. GRATTAN, M.P., moved the insertion of the letter
on the minutes, and then entered into an elaborate con-
demnation of the Coercion Bill, expressing his convic-
tion that penal enactments were wholly inadequate to
meet the evils of the country. Till a better. feeling
sprung up between the aristocracy and the people,
there could be no peace in Ireland, and that consum-
mation could only be hoped for in a satisfactory and
final adjustment of the landlord and tenant question.
A vote of thanks to the electors of Mayo having been
proposed and adopted, the rent of the week was an-
nounced to be 2831. 4s. sd.
The meeting then adjoured.
THE POTATO DISEASE.

GALWAY, MARCH 7.—We fear that the worst antici-
pations of the people, respecting the state of the potato
crop, are about to be realised. Already the markets
are but scantily supplied, and hundreds clamour for this
almost necessary article of food, but cannot procure it
even at exorbitant prices. It is really pitiable to witness
crowds of poor creatures, whose means will not allow
them to buy in a week's supply at the Saturday's market,
looking, but in vain, for a day's food during the week.
On Wednesday there was scarcely a cart load to be had
for love or money, but since then some few baskets have
been brought into the town for sale.
• SLIGO, MARCH 7.—The famine anticipated by the
failure of the potato crop has actually set in at Sligo. In
the half-barony of Coolavin, a portion of the people are
now without food, or the means of procuring it ; they
are living on the bounty of their neighbours, wholvill be
u r we
trust
l 1)
soon reduced to as sail and deplorable a c?ndition. as
themselies. The Government is about •to bring Indlan
corn to. this port ; so far so grd—but. they must.give
iituth
bwill .pel egErtmahnepittenoyde.manens ot fisbuwyhiantgiist,
roerq
ut
reei rd aat we
STATE OF CRIME—TuE ROMAN CATHOLIC
CLERGY.

The Right Rev. Dr. Browne, Catholic Bishop of El-
phin, has issued a Lenten Pastoral to the clergy and
laity of that diocese, dated from Athlone. The following
are extracts :
" We earnestly solicit and intreat, that, guided by
that good sense, and those lively convictions of the
faith which we know you to possess, you would put from
amongst you, as the deadliest enemies of your happiness
and p: ace, those who would seek to connect you with
secret societies or secret obligations. For we have
heard that there are some among you who walk disor-
derly, working not at all, but curiously meddling. Now
these that are such we denounce, and we beseech them,
in the Lord Jesus Christ, that working with silence,
they would eat their own bread. And if any man obey
not our word by this epistle, note that man, and do not
keep company with him, that he may be ashamed ; yet
do not.esteem him as an enemy, but admonish him as a
brother. But you, my brethren, do not weary in well
doing.'
" We allude to that accursed and illegal system of
idolly-Maguitism,' equally condemned' by the. law of

God and the law of the land; for, as the Apostle says,
' Let every soul be subject to higher powers, for there
is no power but from God; and those that are ordained
of God; therefore he that resisteth the power resisteth
the ordinance of God, and they that resist purchase to,
themselves damnation.' A system which encourages
the midnight assassin as well as the noonday murderer—
a system, the impious abettors of which hesitate not
(for their interested purpose) to attribute even to the
ministers of their religion a culpable indifference to the
wants_ of the poor, and a base subserviency to the
caprice of the rich, charges as wicked as they are false.
" We are perfectly aware that the poor have many
grievances to complain of, and that it is oar duty to aid
in alleviating their sufferings ; but it is not by violence
or outrage this great end can be attained ; it is by
humble supplication to the Throne of Mercy, andin the
midst of danger and of difficulty to place our entire con-
fidence in the God of Justice. We most earnestly
exhort the opulent and the wealthy to be indulgent and
charitable to the poor, to sympathise with them and
their wants, rather than, by adhering too rigidly to their
rights and privileges, provoke indignation, and thus in-
duce a people already too sensitive, vainly, and irre-
ligiously to imagine, that there is no redress for them,
save by illegal combinations and lawless violence:"
VICEREGAL COURT.—The Lord-Lieutenant- enter-
tained the following party at dinner on Saturdity, in
Dublin Castle :—Hon. Mrs. Robert Daly, the Marchio-
ness of Sligo, Lady Elizabeth Browne, Lady H. Browne,
Captain and Lady Adele Ibbetson, Lord Sidney Os-
borne, Lord Henry Loftus, Mr. and Lady Eleanor
Fetherstone, Lady Florence Balfour, Mr. Lowry Bal-
four, Lord and Lady Castlemaine, Hon. Miss Hand-
cock, Lord .Dunsandle, Mr. and Mrs. Vernon, Mr. Corry
Connellan ; Hon. R. Daly and Mr. Cust, aides-de-camp
in waiting.