The Sun.
London, England, 1833-01-01 00:00:00

%%Inch it can be preserved and advanced, not satis-
fied with a cold approbation of the public conduct of
Mr. Thomson, but in order to mark their pe-
culiar sense of the importance to the country of
the course he is pursuing, soliciting him, though
a stranger, and without solicitation on his part,
to represent them the very moment the suffrage
was communicated to them. Mr. Poulett
Thomson was known to the Manchester elec-
tors principally from his connection with the
question of free commerce. His general poli-
tical character is in perfect accordance with the
politics of the mass of the educated population
of Manchester ; but that alone, much as they
were satisfied with him in that respect, would
never have caused him to be even thought of,
had it not been combined with his bold and
enlightened opinions on trade. It was to
strengthen and encourage him in his career, to
silence the curs who were perpetually snarling
Ott him—it was to give a demonstration which
could not be challenged, that he had the en.
lightened commercial world on his side, that the
electors of Manchester were chiefly anxious to con-
nect him with them as their representative. His
election cannot be said to be the work of any delu-
sion fostered by the Press—any unfair influence ;
for of six newspapers published in Manchester,
five were bitterly opposed to the return of Mr. P.
Thomson ; and this affords a proof that those
who attribute omnipotence to the Press, forget
that the Press is powerful only in the pro-
portion in which it espouses the good cause.
The electors of Manchester, at all events, have
Proved that they can think for themselves. The
electors of Manchester were not only assailed by
their own newspapers, but strong recommenda-
tions of Mr. Loyd appeared in our own co-
lumns, and also in the columns of our contem-
poraries, the Times and Globe. The truth is,
we believed Mr. Loyd to be an able and con-
scientious Reformer, and we were aware at the
time neither of the prevalence of the wish to
return Mr. P. Thomson, nor of the importance
which they attached to his return, as a triumph
of sound principles. Neither had we been made
acquainted with the influence which the ap-
pearance of a Conservative candidate in Man-
chester had on the liberalism of Mr. Loyd. If
ever, therefore, a candidate appeared under cir-
cumstances little calculated to aid the cause on
which his claims rested, it was the Vice-Presi-
dent of the Board of Trade. All the other
candidates had completed their canvass before he
was thought of, and Mr. Loyd had even enjoyed
the advantage of the strong newspaper recom-
mendations to with we have alluded, and the re-
commendations of many respectable fiends in
Manchester, and the support of the influence of
the Bank establishment. And yet the Manchester
electors, judging and acting for themselves, were
steady to their purpose, and in the contest for
the principles of Mr. P. Thomson, obtained a
triumph without incurring any other expense
than that of a few placards and advertise-
ments. Mr. Thomson was completely a stranger
in Manchester ; and we have been assured by a
most respectable merchant of that city, that
there were not perhaps twenty people in it who
could say they had ever set eyes on him. We
yesterday gave a brief abstract of the proceedings
at the dinner. We this day give from the
Manchester Chronicle what appears to be a
pretty full account of the speech of Mr. Poulett
Thomson, which will deservedly be the subject
of much discussion throughout the country.
The very great length of the report in the Man-
chester papers—that in the Manchester Times
extending to ten closely-printed columns—will
not allow us to do more than extract the speech
of Mr. Thomson ; but as it is of immense im-
portance that the motives of the Manchester
electors, in this selection should be properly ap-
preciated, we must here avail ourselves of the
following passage in the very able speech of Mr.
Shuttleworth:—

" His election was exclusively the act of the electors
themselves—(Cheers)—and in fixing upon him for their
choice—in desiring to connect him with this, perhaps,
the most important borough in the empire, they vt ere
influenced not only by an anxiety to give their most seri-
ous and emphatic sanction to those measures and that
policy to which the Right Hon. Gentleman was favourable
—(Cheers)—but also by an anxiety to add to the effect
of those means and opportunities to do public good—ol
that power to promote the national welfare, which the
Right Hon. Gentleman, as a public Minister, possesses.—
(Great cheers.) If the Right Hon. Gentleman bad not,
by his past public life, secured the confidence of the elec-
tors, as a sincere and earnest friend of all practical and
constitutional ameliorations and improvement in the Go-
vernment—of the most rigid and severe retrenchment and
economy in the national expenditure—and, as the intelli-
gent and powerful advocate of the principles of commercial
freedom—(Cheers)—in all our domestic and foreign rela-
tions, he might have sought the representation of this
borough even unto his dying day, without the smallest
chance of success.—( Great cheers.) But having secured
this confidence, the distinction, whatever that may be,
has been freely and spontaneously tendered to him—(Great
cheers.)"
Having thus placed the election and the
dinner in what we trust is the proper point of
view, we must say, adverting to the speech of
Mr. Thomson, that we like it exceedingly. It

is by acting in the spirit which pervades that
speech, that Ministers can alone hope to steer
with success through the difficulties which will
beset them in the Reform Parliament. Of the
two speeches recently delivered in Lancashire
by members of the Administration, we need
not say which we think best calculated to serve
the Ministry. Adverting to the alleged incom-
patibility of the principle on which he was re-
turned, with the Government with which he was
connected, and which would place the Admi-
nistration in a
.position !apposed to one of its

members—
" The answer," said Mr. Thomson, " that I would
give to those who dare thus to calumniate the Govern-
ment of which I am a member—(Loud cries of " Hear,
hear," and cheers)—is one which not only I would give,
but which has received confirmation from one far higher
than I can hope to be in the Councils of my Sovereign
—from one far higher in glory and far higher in the af-
fections and the esteem of his countrymen—(Applause)—
the answer, I say, that 1 give to those calumniators is this
—that no Government from which the confidence of the
people of Manchester—accorded upon the principles upon
which it has been given to me—has been withdrawn, can
hope to stand in this country, or ought to stand.—
(Tremendous cheering.)"
No Government ought to stand that arrays
itself against the intelligence of the country.
Even the Duke of Wellington, in the lucid in-
terval which preceded his league with the bo-
roughmongers, and when he was inclined to give
the franchise to several of the large towns, ad-
mitted, at a public dinner at Manchester, that
no Minister ought to think of retaining his place
a moment longer than his conduct received the
approbation of 'the intelligent middle classes of
the country. The idea of Government having
a will of its own, independent of the sense of
the community, is a piece of monstrous absur-
dity fitter for the meridian of St. Petersburgh
than Westminster. The ballot is evidently a
word which grates on certain ears, though it
must and will be adopted. We have never yet
seen a shadow of argument against the princi-
ple. The most despicable cavilling at points
unconnected with the essence of the question is
all that has }'et fallen under our notice. In de-