The Sun.
London, England, 1851-03-01 00:00:00

He boasted that he had retained office during the Irish fa-
mine, during the commercial crisis, and also during the re-
bellion in the cabbage garden in Ireland. It was not likely,
he suggested, that after weathering those storms he would
Lave abandoned his vessel in a calla, amid commercial
prosperity and general peace, and with an overflowir;g
balance in the Exchequer. Considering that. the speaker,
by a coalition with the Protectionists, forced Sir
Robert Peet out of office at a period when the Irish
famine was already known to be inevitable, it would' have
been strange if the calamity which could not check his am-
bition had alarmed him into a resignation of place In
truth, as Lord John Russell well knows, none of the disasters
to which he refers involved the Ministry in any Parliamen-
tary embarrassment. They never lost a vote because pota-
toes had rotted, or because money iu the City was at 10-per
cent., or because democracy was fighting in France and
spouting in Ireland. The calamities of the country rallied'
all men round the constituted authorities of the day. It
would have been idle to ascribe the potato rot tosthesWhigs
but the Durham letter was the work of the Premier, and the,
new winlow-tax of Sir Charles Wood. After all, it san
idle inquiry whethef the Minister was likely to desert
his post: Pis followers complain not of the probabilities
of', the :case, but of the fact that he has deserted
it. Sir James Graham's speech was , 3 masterly ex-
position of that progressive policy which can alone secure for
any Government th confidence and approbation of the coim-
try-:-resting as .it does on the broad principles of complete
religious toleration, unrestricted commercial liberty, and an
extended political franchise. It was evident that his expo-
sition of the difficulties attending the anti-Papal legislation
.had a far greater effect than could have been produced by
any attempt to flatter popular prejudice. When Sir James
Grahatu admitted—in terms which appeir to us too strong
and unqualified—kis convicticn that the country at present
would not support a Ministry opposed to any penal measure
of repression, he only indicated the state of parties which
made it diffichlt ihr his single section of thillonse.to forsn'int
independent Ministry. It would have been ungenerous on his
part to call attention to the circumstance that all the
obstacles to the attempted coalition were connected with the
person of the Whig negotiator; but it will not the less be
perfectly apparent to the public that Lord John Russell is at
this moment the only real impediment to a prompt and satis-
factory solution of the present crisis, and that it is his perti-
nacious attempt to maintain an absurd and impossible posi-
tion which alone keeps the country without a Government.
A member of the late Cabinet, comparatively nnpledged to
"Aggression" might probably have come to an arrange-
ment with the conscientious opponents of an error
which is deprecated by almost every statesman. If
Lord John Russell intended to speak in the tone
of a Minister, he has at all events failed to explain
the additional strength which is to justify his return to
office. There are suspicious indications of an understanding
with the Protectionists, who may, since the failure of Lord
Stanley, be inclined to support a pliable opponent. Not a
word has been said of the financial scheme which is to sup-
plant the late abortive Budget. We are too sensible of the
evils of an interregnum to wish either to impede the forma-
tion of a Ministry, or to harass it with unnecessary opposi-
tion. It is possible that the financial plan may have been
reconsidered, so as to make it more satisfactory to the coun-
try. But the error of the Aggression Bill is incurable. The
late feeble Ministry, returning to office feebler than before,
would scarcely be likely to survive its collision with the
wall which it built as if fur the purpose of knocking out its
brains.
HERALD.—On the morning of this day week ner Ma-
jesty, deserted by a Ministry who appeared to seize the
earliest opportunity of flying from her service, sent for Lord
Stanley. Let us say that the accusation against the Whig
Ministry of deserting the Queen's service does not consist, as
Lord John Russell appears to suppose, in a charge that they
left office when they thought that they could permanently
keep it. No sane man ever dreamed of bringing such an ac-
cusation against the Whigs; but the charge against them is
this—that fancying at no great distance Parliamentary de-
feat, they anticipated that defeat by a resignation, the ex-
pediency of which rested, not upon the necessity of
the Queen's service, but upon the convenience of
party. Summoned to the Queen's presence to advise
upon a void in her councils, occasioned by the act of her late
servants, who had abandoned her without any constitutional
justification for their conduct, Lord Stanley pursued the
course which a high-minded statesman—not grasping for
office—not calculating the low chances of party interests, but
anxious for the principles of the Constitution and the honour
of the monarchy, ought to pursue. He did not refuse to
obey her Majesty's commands to form a Cabinet, but he
advised her that those commands should not be given; he
did not tell her that he was unprepared to form a Cabinet,
but as a Privy Councillor he advised the Queen that the
exigencies of her service did not yet require that task to be
imposed upon him. Inquiring into the reasons that led to the
resignation of the late Ministry, he felt that those reasons
pointed, not to an entire change of the composition of the
Cabinet, but to an effort to add to its strength, by a union
between its leading members and that section of Commons
which—though entirely unrepresented in the Cabinet—
had given to their general policy so powerfully and so
steady a support; and, offering this advice, Lord Stanley
assured her Majesty that it' this negotiation failed, he would
then be ready to make an effort to fulfil the duty which the
confidence of his Sovereign had sought to impose upon him.
This high-minded and constitutional advice the Sovereign
acted on. Lord John Russell was recalled, and Sir James
Graham and Lord Aberdeen were commanded by the Queen
to give him their assistance.. Here, however, tfie difficulty
of the Papal question intervened. Neither of these lattet
statesmen would consent to any legislation in resistance to the
Papal aggression, whilst Lord John Russell would not—in

. ...-
deed, could not—be a member of any Cabinet that would not
adopt measures for its repression. The attempt there-
fore, to effect this combination failed. Her Ma.

jesty then gave the strongest proof of her de
votion to the principles of constitutional Government
by offering the formation of a Cabinet to Lord Aberdeen,
Upon the refusal both of Lord John Russell and Lord Aber-

()e'en to form a ➢tinistry from the majority of the House, the
Queen fell back upon Lord Stanley's engagement, that if her
late servants persisted in their determination of resigning, he
would then undertake the task which her Majesty had con-
fided to him. That he did honestly and to the utmost of his
ability endeavour to fulfil his commission no one can doubt.
That he succeeded in filling up his offices with men capable
of carrying on the business of the ccuntry even his opponents
must confess; but, guided by that high sense of pubtic duty
which has marked every act of this noble-hearted states-

man throughout this tr3-ing crisis, he felt that the Ministry
he could form was not one possessing Parliamentary influence
sufficient to struggle against the Parliamentary embar-
rassments in which the precipitate resignation of the
late Ministry had entangled their successors. He therefore
informed her Majesty that he had not succeeded in framing
a Cabinet which he could feel justified in saying would be
strong enough to relieve the Queen and the country from the
unprecedented difficulties in which the abandonment ofhis
post by Lord John Russell had left them. Placed in this
novel and embarrassing position, her Majesty has sought the
advice of the Duke of Wellington, and upon the result of the
crisis it is useless and indeed impossible to speculate.
Out of what materials the Ministry may ultimately
be formed it is not easy to conjecture. If we set
aside the opinion of Mr. Wakley, that the one
ing:edient essential to the' success of any Admi-
nistration is the presence in the Cabinet of Mr. Hume, the
debates in either House give us but little help to conjecture.
Lord Aberdeen's explicit declaration that in the present state

of public opinion it was imposiible even to attempt the
formation of a Cabinet that would not undertake the task of

legislating on the Papal question, and his refusal of the

QUeen's commission upon that very ground, appears conclu-
sively to preclude the attempt to form an Administration of
which Sir James Graham and his followers are to be a part.
Lord John Russell, on the other hand, declares his opinions on
the subject to be unaltered ; and professes his readiness to
modify the Bill in compliance with the scruples of Sir James
Graham and the objections of Archbishop Murray! Lord
Stanley has clearly and manfully laid down the principles
upon which he claims the confidence of the country. _ The

abolition of the odious and oppressive income-tax, and the
supplying of the deficiency by a moderate duty upon imports,
including that of corn, would have formed the basis of his
financial plan. Upon the great question that has agitated
the country he was ready to legislate fully and finally;
while, to avoid the risk of hasty legislation, he recommends a

complete Parliamentary inquiry into the subjects to which
that legislation should relate. If we add to this, that Lord
John Russell has declared his readiness to bid for

Radical support by introducing a new Reform Bill,
a measure which, in a moment of indiscreet candour,
he tells us he reserved for the year before the general elec-

Lion, and that Sir James Graham owns that the events of the
last week have made him change all his opinions upon the

subject, we briefly, but we believe correctly, sum up the de-
clarations of the leaders of the three parties, whose accession
to office was among the possibilities of last week. By what-
ever compromise or expedient the difficulty may be tempo-
rarily surmounted, the conduct of Lord Stanley must raise
him, if possible, still higher in the estimation of his Sove-
reign and the country. The principles of action he has laid
down must commend themselves to the judgment of the na-
tion, and the day cannot be distant when the voice of the
national intelligence will place him above the difficulties of
conflicting parties—the First Minister of a nation that im-
plicitly confides in his courage, his wisdom, and his honour.
ADVERTISER.—Assuming, which, as our readers well
know, we have done all through the piece, that the Minis-
terial crisis will, sooner or later, terminate in the resumption
of the reins of Government by Lord John Russell, there are
two or three things which we would earnestly impress on the
mind of the Noble Lord. As we remarked in our paper of
yesterday, in the article in which we announced the failure
of the attempt to form a Stanley Administration, it is in
Lord John Russell's power to become one of the most power-
ful and popular Ministers which modern times have wit-
nessed. Notwithstanding all his short-comings—and they
are great and manifold—there still attaches a prestige to his
name, which does not attach to the name of any other living
statesman. No friend of civil and religious liberty eaoawDse
insensible to the obligations which that sacred cause
std
to the Noble Lord. He has, on various occasions,
boldly forward, at times when few other men
To him
the strenuous advocate of the rights conscithe repeal of
the Dissenters are chiefly indebted fordthaugh it was
the Test and Corporation Acts; sonfos.noe did, as
not immediately through his
ed, there was no
tholic Emancipation was achieved,
of the great mea-
inis_truan_mentality that Ca-
more zealous advocate tbi!ll
cause which the country
These are services to the popular
will, will Y
come what never forget.
sure which received the sanction of the Legislature in 1829.
Las not forgotten, and,hce
notN obbeleenLo. rd is, that his policy of
in consonance with his
lateo ur
3o.enaler-setuaasrrenlsiitistshit
has been, on various
former principles, but that it has been essentially a retro-
gressivelending a helping baud to marr his own work—that very
in
hich must redounded to his honour, and which, if not
work w
policy. He
himself, would transmit his name to an ad-
posterity. For this recreancy. or rather perhaps we
g
this infidelity to his former principles and
orouirihnt destroyed by
say,
policy, we have not been slow to arraign the Noble Lord,
nor have we been sparing in our condemnation of his con-
duct. Neither shall we cease to censure the ex-Premier,
should he persist in tat retrogressive course of action which
we have seen him, with so much regret, pursuing for
some time past. We have adopted this course on two
grounds. First and foremost, we have dune it, and,
should circumstances render it necessary, will persist in
doing it, because of the attachment we feel to the
cause of popular progress. We have seen the Noble
Lord proving the great obstacle to the advancement
of that cause. We have seen his retrogressive course of ac-
tion grieving the minds of the friends of civil and religious
liberty, and rejoicing the hearts of the foes of freedom. We
mulct not 19Qv>a melouvinly Right, wl‘hvut dctug 1020