The Sun.
London, England, 1833-02-01 00:00:00

King's Council. The Jamaica Council is
either a branch of the Legislature, as it asserts
itself, or it is not, as is asserted by the planters.
If it is, why should it not have the power of
proposing projects of law, like the House of
Peers at home, or like any other upper class of
senators ? If it is not, why may it not propose
measures in its capacity of counsellors of the
Crown or Government? The right
i of free de-
liberation, adoption, or rejection, s not at all
interfered with by any consideration of the quarter
whence the proposition proceeds. As we have
formerly adverted twice or thrice to the other im-
portant topic in Lord M ulgrave'qspeech,—name-
ly, the right of the British Parliament to legislate
in every instance for the internal regulation of
our colonies, with the exception of enacting
fiscal laws, " its power being only limited by its
discretion,"—we shall not here again enter upon
the subject. It would be desirable that the
planters should act upon our recoinmendations,
and make themselves the laws necessary for at-

taining the object which the humanity and justice
of England place before them as indispensable,
but if they resist earnest persuasion coercive legis-
lation must be employed. Already they talk of
the slaves viewing with rebellious hope the ter-
mination of this misunderstanding between the
Governor and the House of Assembly. What,
then, would become of them were the British
Government compelled either to use more vio-
lent measures or simply to leave them to the
mercy of those exasperated bondsmen whom they
have provoked by their oppression, and whom
we are endeavouring at once to improve and to
restrain—to protect and to control ? The
friends and connexions of the plasters in this
country, equally unthinking and inconsiderate
as the Assembly of Jamaica, have begun to raise
the absurd cry that Ministers intend an imme-
diate abolition of colonial slavery. Their object
is probably nothing more than to alarm the fears
of the timid or the moderate, and to hold up
the Government as rash speculators in colonial
anarchy and massacre. But let them beware ;
their instrument is double-edged, and as last
Christmas was signalized by a rebellion in Ja-
maica, mainly occasioned by the absurd or
wicked rumours of the colonists themselves, or
their agents, so another insurrection may
spring from the same cause. There is not a
word of truth in the report so audaciously cir-
culated.— Times.

The editor of the New Monthly Magazine
combats with great ability the arguments of Ali-
nisters, for pronouncing sentence of condemna-
tion on the Whig body, by choosing a Tory for
Speaker. The article was written before Mr

Hume's motion ; but in a note written subse-

quently, Mr. Bulwer observes, that " if the Mi-
nisters instead of Mr. Hume had brought for

ward Mr. Littleton, his election would have
been certain."

“ All the ostensible grounds (he observes) that have
been alleged by the Whigs in favour of this restoration
(save only that of economy) are so unfortunate as to tell
against their own power and dignity as a body. ' Where
so fit a man ?' say they—' Where one of the rank, ex•
perience, and station, sufficient to be a worthy riv il to Mr.
Manners Sutton ?' What! in the proud and aristocratic
party, now in its most palmy state—the party of th-
Russells, the Howard,, and the Cavendishe.—no fit man
to propose as a Whig Speaker of the House of Commons,
in opposition to the choice of a faction nearly extinct ?
Can they say that no man of statiou and popularity amongst
them has studied sufficiently the forms and regu-
lations of the Legislative Assembly to become its Presi-
dent? For we must not suppose this study would require
any very great assiduity, or any very inordinate expe-
rience. Few, if any, of these regulations rest upon mere
traditionary custom. Certain and numerous volumes
contain an explanation of all the forms, orders, and cere-
monies of the House, and a man of ordinary application
would learn them all in a month. What a confession,
then, of the proverbial Whig indolence, to say that among
the distinguished Whigs who have sat in Parliament for
the last twenty years, no one—even when excited by the
ultimate ambition of becoming the first commoner of
Great Britain—has acquired a competent knowledge of
these ceremonial details ! Oh, what a stigma upon Whig
respectability, if those who have acquired with great pains
this superficial knowledge, have not the station or distinc-
tion to aspire worthily to the honour of displaying it !
The question resolves itself into a dilemma—either among
the Whigs there is some man fit to be Speaker, or there
is not ; if there be not, it speaks a grievous want of re-
spectability in the party—if there be, their bringing for-
ward a Tory evinces no less grievous a want of grati ude to
their partisans !”
Mr. Bulwer endeavours to account for the
choice of Mr. Sutton, in the fear of Ministers,
that as Mr. Littleton, with a thousand admirable
qualities, is not popular among many Members
of the House, were Mr. Sutton to have been
brought forward by the Tories, he would have
obtained a majority of suffrages even among the
Whigs themselves. This policy, he thinks, was
mistaken.
We believe (he observes) that if, for instance, Mr.
Littleton and Mr. Manners Sutton bad been both pro-
posed for the Chair, any capricious prejudice against the
eminent claims of the former would have merged at once
in strong party feeling. The Press would have fomented
that feeling—Members would have felt that their consti-
tuents would regard their decision as something more than
a ceremony ; it would have been an election between a
Reformer and an Anti-Reformer; and men just returned
from a triumph resulting from a similar cuntest, could
neither houourably nor decorously vote diametrically oppo-
site to the principle upon which they themselves had been
elected."
We quite coincide with him in opinion. Of
all policies, the sneaking policy is the worst. It
creates enemies where there were none. When
it is known that the best chance of being favoured
is to be an enemy, there will be no lack of ene-
mies.—Morning Chronicle.
There is a large portion of the taxation of
this country which has inevitably a demoralizing
effect, and, if for no other reason, ought to be
abolished. We will, at present, only instance
the malt tax, which, beside the mischief it has
inflicted on the agricultural interests, has been
extensively influential in breaking down the
morals of the labouring classes. That tax pre-
vents the cottager from brewing a cheap and
wholesome malt beverage for himself and family.
It drives him to expend his wages upon cheap
gin, which has equally pernicious effects on his
health, his habits, and his morals; or it fur-
nishes him with an excuse for tippling in the
beer-shop among the vicious company for which
those dens of dissipation seem to have been
especially provided. In every way the malt tax
does mischief to the comfort, the health, and
the morality of the poor. When the Welling-
ton Administration proposed the Beer Bill
as a boon and a relief to the labouring
classes, we suggested that the real relief
would be a repeal of the malt tax. We
showed that a Beer Bill, instead of being a pubilc
relief, would become a public nuisance ; where-
as the repeal of the malt tax would benefit both
the farmer and the labourer, by increasing the
consumption of the produce of the one, and add-
ing to the family comforts of the other. Toe
Beer Bill has covered the country with hovels
in which the labourer is induced to pass his
hours away from his family, indulging in the
" delights" of bad beer and worse company.
Not an assizes or a quarter sessions occurs in
England that does not elicit lamentable proofs
of the demoralizing effects of that legislative