The Sun.
London, England, 1846-06-20 00:00:00

was the most accurate and authentic record. That was a cir-
cu instance that could not have escaped the calm consideration
of the House. About which did they commit their mistake?
Upon one of the most extraordinary statements that ever was
ma le by a Minister of the House of Commons.—( Hear,
hear.) That was a circumstance that could not
' for a moment be forgotten. Now, he would put the matter
fairly before the House, and state the facts as they had oc-
curred, and he must not be stopped by the generous interpo-
sition of the Noble Lord the Member for London. The Noble
Lord was so habitual a supporter of the Right Hon. Gentle-
man, that though it was supposed he would have an encounter
of a different kind, and campaigns of a very
y different charac-
ter to those in which be had lately mixed, it appeared he had
generously come forward to declare that there was no proof of
the allegation of his Noble Friend ; but be should wish the
Noble Lord to give him his attention,whilst he shortly
detailed the facts of the case. Hewould ould accept for moment, for the purposes of argument, that the heas-
s
umption which had been made was
eperfectlyr
( Hear.) He would assume that ther,, t which
had appeared in the Mirror of Parliament" or thee
newspaper (he did not care whether it be two authorities,m Times"
whether it be one) bus. that the report which appeared in the
" Times" newspaper or the " Mirror of Parliamect" de-
clared that the Right Hon. Gentleman said, in 1829, that he
was prepared to consent to the settlement of the Catholic
question. He would assume, hepeated for the sake of ar sit
mutt, that the Right Hon. Gentleman said that. Now, l'he.
wanted to know, independently of that report, what proof there
was that the Right Hon. Gentleman said that ? He begged
the House to understand that he as umcd that the Right Hon.
Gentleman said that ; but he would not accept the report of the
" Times" newspaper—he would not accept the report of the
" Mirror of Patliament" as a proof of what he said, though
for the sake of argument he assumed that he did say
it, but he wanted to know what proof there was that he said
it ? Assuming that he said it, he ( Mr. Disraeli) produced
very dis inguisbed Members of Parliament to recollect the
real state of facts. Now the report of the " Times " must
he forgotten. The Right Hon. Gentleman (he meant Sir
E. Knatchbull) said on the occasion alluded to, that he was
indisposed, and he was therefore not in the Houss. But he was
in the House ; because in March, although he was so indis-
posed that he could not speak upon the subject, he found in
the division list the name of Sir Edward Knatchbull.—
( Hear, hear.) Now he begged the House to recollect that
important fact. He was not arguing the case, he was
sure, with any vituperation,—( Hear, hear.) It was
the Right Hon. Gentleman himself who had challenged
him to this investigation. The Right Hon. Gentleman said
the other night that he (Mr. Disraeli) had got up to make this
at tack upon him. God knew it was with the greatest reluctance
that he rose to speak in compliance with the request of his
Noble Friend, because he happened at that time to be parti-
cularly indisposed.—(Laughter.) It was a charge of his Noble
Friend's, made certainly in the excitement of the debate, but
it was the honest expression of his convictions. The Right
Hon. Gentleman did not choose to allow that to pass; he took a
certain time, and came down and made an elaborate defence of
himself—( Hear, hear)—.and then because his Noble Friend
asked him (Mr. Disraeli) to speak, because he himself could
not speak again, the Right Honourable Gentleman
came down and said he (Mr. Disraeli) made a
malignant attack upon him. But assuming that he did not
offer it as a proof that the Right Hon. Gentleman did not ad-
mit that in 1825 he said this. Had he (Mr. Disraeli) no
proof ? He would bring before the House a Member of Parlia-
ment who said that he did, and that that Member of Parliament
was in the House at the time was very clear. Now, he was
going to quote an authority, and it was not Mr. Ban OW who
had reported this—it was. not the collective council at midnight
of the most accomplished reporters of toe London press that
retorted this. This was a corrected copy by the Right Hon.
Gentleman himself of his speech, on the sth of March. Now,
he begged the House to observe this paragraph. This was a
speech in which the Right Hen. Gentleman had made a very
important admission—that admission being the one to which
Sir Edward Knatchbull referred. Now he would read this
extract from the corrected report of the Right. Hon. Gentle-
man's speech of March 5. The Right Hon. Gentleman said,
in 1828, however the House might choose to view this matter,
and they did not choose to agree to a resolution favourable to
the principle of adjustment, he wished then to observe that
he was then in the same situation which he was in 1825, and
he determined to retire from office. He intimated his fixed
intention in this respect to the Duke of Wellington, but he
felt it his duty to accompany that intimation with respect to
retirement with another, to the effect that he would not, in
his private capacity, any longer obstruct the settlement of the
Catholic question. That was what the Right Hon. Gentleman
said in 1825.—(N0, no.) Very well; that at least was a
faithful report of what had been said, according to his infers
mation—and he hoped he would show that his information
was right. Now he would quote from '• Hansard"—a report
of what the Right Hon. Gentleman might have said on
March the 6th. His (Mr. Disraeli's) Noble Friend had only
quoted from the" Mirror of Parliament," as he wished to put
the case clearly before the House. This was from " Hansard,"
and from a corrected speech of the Right Hon. Gentleman.
He fairly admitted that he did not mean to represent that
every speech of the Right Hon. Gentleman reported in
" Hansard" was a faithful report, but he was only quoting
from " Hansard," for they all knew how correct were the
reports of such eminent Members as the Right Hon. Gentle-
man in that publication. Now this had never beets brought
forward in the course of the debate. This was in answer to
the question to Lord Uxbridge, to which the Right Hon.
Gentleman had referred as being reported in the " Mirror of
Parliament."—( Hear, hear.) Now he (Mr. Disraeli) would
not quote in answer to Lord Uxbridge, that there was a
material difference in his situation in 1827, and his situation in
1828. In 1827 a new House of Commons decided against
concession, but in 1828 it decided in favour of concession.
Mr. Secretary Peel then adopted the course which
he took in 1825, when Lord Liverpool was
elected at the head of the Government. We had this
passage, that he then took the course which he adopted in
1825, when Lord Liverpool was at the head of the Govern-
ment. In 1828, when the question was put forward, and it
was likely that the Government would be in a minority, he
said " Tbe time is now come when a new Parliament has de-
cided against me, and when the House of Lords are in a state
of division upon the question. The time is arrived when an
attempt to settle the question must be made, and to that attempt
I will lend my aid."—(Cries of " Oh, oh," " Hear, hear," and
"Order, order.") That was not the cheer that was made in
answer tcrthe speech of the Right Honourable Gentleman
when he alluded to this case—(Cries of Hear, hear")—
but they would set their case temperately and fairly before the
House. They thought it an unanswerable case, and he would
now come to what was a most important feature of the case ;
but his intent was not in doing so,—(lronical cry of " No,
no !") The Right Hon. Gent. said he was ready in 1845 to
take the course which he took in 1835; and he described
the grounds upon which he took these steps, for he raid that
the time had arrived when an attempt must be made to settle
the Catholic question, and to that attempt he would lend his
aid.—( Hear, bear.) Very well, then, if there was no truth in
these books, or they were not to be accepted as evidence ; if it
were true that the Right Hon. Gent. in 1825 was prepared to
do that which he did in 1838 ; and if the report in the " Mir-
ror of Parliament" was not a true report of what the Right
Hon. Gent. said, that he was prepared to cars y that question,
he ( Mr. D'lsraeli) had a right to assume that which he as-
sumed only. Was there any truth that the Right Hon. Gent., in
hie speech of March 8, did use these expressions which were
recorded in the " Times," newspaper? He would not say
that he quoted the report of the " Times" newspaper, but
he would quote Sir Edward Knatchbull himself as to what
the Right Hon. Gentleman had said. He put the case fairly
before the House. He might be wrong—it was very well for
them to say that he had no right to offer facts like these in
support of his arguments. And Gentlemen who said " no,
no," when he ( Mr. Disraeli) quoted these facts, ought to get
up and negative these facts by argument.—( Hear, hear. )
He wished the question to be put fairly before the House.
He wished it to be put without any passion, and if any per-
son could answer his arguments and facts, let them answer
them.—(Hear, hear.) But it was utterly impossible that
this question could be settled in the manner in which it had
been discussed by she Right Hon. Gentleman. When the
Right Hon. Gentleman occupied 20 or 30 minutes in this chance
allusion to the " Edinburgh Review"—when the Right Hon.
Gentleman entered into a minute comparison of all the reports
of all newspapers to which he had referred. he ( Mr. Disraeli)
naturally asked himself, why did not the Right Hon. Gentle
man explain to him why Sir Edward Knatchbull had made
the speech that had beets reported in the papers—and why, on
the sth and 6th of March, he himself made those admissions?
—( Hear, hear.) Now, a, to this affair of the " Edinburgh
Review" case, he (Mr. Disraeli) never put faith in the fact.
The " Edinburgh Review" insinuated that the Right
Honourable Gentleman had written a letter to the Earl of
Liverpool. And what did the Right Hon. Gentleman say ?
He said, " I will clear my character, for I will bring all the
letters that Lord Liverpool wrote to me." What answer was
that ?—( Hear, hear.) Two days had been wasted on a discus-
sion in these matters, but he would ask the Right Hon. Gentle-
men would it not have been better, if, instead of sending- to
Drayton, he had sent to Sir Edward Knatchbull to ask him if
he had made the speech attributed to him, and if he had given
a simple response to that simple inquiry, and i t he had then
walked to the table of that House, and read that letter
from Sir Edward Knatchbull, denouncing that version
of his speech as a forgery, would not that course
be more satisfactory to the House?—(Hear, hear.) The
Noble Lord did not make this charge upon the authority of the
, newspapers, but upon the authority of the printed records of
the Parliamentary debates. The Noble Lord would never
have done anything of the kind. None who read the reports
in the newspapers could help admitting that the present system
of reporting was a wonderful, probably almost the most won-
derful accomplishment of the scrsiety in which we lived ; and
though very much improved to what it was twenty years ago,
nobody would attempt to make a charge against a public man
upon the authority of the reports in the news-
papers.—(Hear, hear.) The Noble Lord never looked into
the reports of the newspapers when he made that charge.—
(Hear, hear.) He made that charge upon what he heard
from the highest authority—the persons among whom he
lived, and who were acquainted with Mr. Canning, and who
were then the Members of that House—and the Noble Lord
could not for a moment doubt the truth of their statement. He
must remind the House, too, that the speech was heard by the
Noble Gentleman himself, and the speech of Sir E. Knatch-
bull was also heard by him, and therefore they could
not expect that a man who was himself present,
and who spoke from his own personal experience of public
life at that time—they would not expect that such a man was
bound to look into all the newspapers before he ventured to
make his statement. The Noble Lord made his statement
principally from his own recollection of the affair—from what
he had himself seen and heard. It was he who brought the
newspapers. The Right Hon. Gentleman compared the
variations in the newspapers, and accused him (Mr. Disraeli)
with having referred to all the newspapers. Why he
(Mr. Disraeli) referred to the newspapers with very
great reluctance, and even upon reference to the
" Times," he only availed himself of it because it
was very well known that the reporting staff of it was
by far the most extensive,' most complete, and most skilful
of any of the public journals. He offered it in evidence on
that account.—(Hear, hear.) He looked to the " Times,"
which was used amongst the authorities, and he found that
the speech was there reported verbatim Now he would put
the case fairly before the House. He would put aside all the
" Edinburgh Reviews," and all personal imputations, and all
personal sarcasms and sneers. He would put the question
before the House, and he did not care what their feeling
might be—whether they decided in favour of the person who
then spoke, or the person who had spoken—the case would be
decided by the calm and deliberate judgment of the public. If
the facts which he had put before the House could be ex-
plained away—if they could be explained away from the
" Mirror" of that unfortunate Mr. Barrow,
have supposed he would have been referred to in this
who never could
debate in the sarcastic article in the "Edinburgh,"ieh
or all those varieties in the newspapers from which
they had quoted —if these facts could D
I plained away, then the Right Hon. mightGentlemearniect;
but
indeed appeal to the country with Public why the
confidence fora d
if he could, in fact, explain to the English
mo of Parliament
most respectable and influential
u eMe make a violent speech
should have got up
in that House
andupon the assamption that
against him, all of which proceededadmitted that in 1825 he was
the Right Hon. Gentleman hadthe settlement of the Catholic
ready to contribute his aid
couldexplainin to the country why such express
question. If he
hsc' read tothe House, and which he
lions as he (Mr. Disraeli)
1 he could explain, why, in
one of the most
• detail--if could not
memorablerecapitulate'n
speeches he positively declared
I ,
I that in settlingee
estion in 1828 he was prepared to
r
do what he bad intended to do in 1825.41 the Right Hon.