The Sun.
London, England, 1833-06-13 00:00:00

question to employment of the military and the police.
They are perfectly distinct from each other. It has
been necessary for some time past to employ the mili-
tary and the police—it has been impossible, in certain
districts, for any individual to collect tithes, or effect the
service of civil process, without being protected both by
the military and the police.—(Hear, hear.) But their
employment has been restricted to that of affording pro-
tection to persons engaged in such duties. This is not
unconstitutional. Surely the Hon. Gentleman does not
mean to assert that it is. A great deal of observation has
been made about a supposed opinion of the law officers of
the Crown, as to the legality of breaking open doors in
serving process for tithes. I can only assert that, up to
the time of my quitting the office of Secretary for Ireland
I knew of no such opinion of the law officers of the
Crown. On the contrary, there was an impression of the
officers of the Government that they had no right to break
open doors in such an employment.—(" Captain Gunn's
case.") I repeat, that there was no such opinion, and
that I know of no instance of such an act.—(Hear, hear.)
As to the alleged severity with which tithes have been
collected, I will just mention that, up to February last,
only 2,0001. out of 104,0001. had been levied, and that
because the clergy felt unwilling to enforce, to the full
extent, the powers with which the law had invested them.
As to the pledge which the Government are said to have
given, that pledge was not that the arrears of tithes should
be got rid of, but that it was the intention of his Majesty's
Ministers to submit to the House a plan which would
render it unnecessary to carry into effect the provi-
sions of the Act passed last year relative to the arrears of
tithes ; and it was the intention of my Noble Friend to
submit that plan this evening to the House ; and I may,
perhaps, add, that it was a plan formed upon that nrin-
ciple which we were told last year would be most satisfac-
tory to the people of Ireland, namely, a commutation by
way of land tax, or a general tithe composition.—(Hear,
hear.) I regret that my Noble Friend shou!d not have
been able to make his statement of the proposed plan ;
but it should be remenab ,red that he distinctly stated that
he could not pledge the Government till that proposition
should be adopted to order a cessation of the collection of
tithes throughout Ireland.--(Hear, hear.) It was the
wish of the Government that the collection of the arrears
of tithes should cease, and when my Noble Friend heard
that it was going on, an intimation of that wish was sent
over to Ireland ; and for the present it has in fact ceased.
—( Hear, hear.) The Hon. Member for Kildare has
brought forward a case of a police constable who has
broken into a house in search of tithe defaulters. The
report of that person, made on the sth of June, 1833,
stated, that he found it impossible to get at certain tithe
defaulters in the day, and that he had taken a strong party
of constabulary, and had broken open a door at a very
early hour of the morning, in order to get at these parties
and arrest them. Now the present motion is to cast a
direct censure on the conduct of the Government.—
(No, no no.) No ? Let any man with the slightest
sense of honour in his breast read this resolution,
" That it is the opinion of this House that the pledges
given by his Majesty's Ministers have not been fulfilled,"
and then let him say, if he can, that this is not a direct
censure.—( Hear, hear.) Is it not ?—( Hear, hear.) Is
it not an assertion that they have artfully violated their
pledges ?—(No, no.) No? I trust, Sir, that I shall never
see the Government that will submit to such a charge, or
indifferently allow to be pissed upon them such a censure
which, if it ought to be ca.Tied,wou:d show them unworthy
of retaining the confidence of this House.—(Cheers.)
(Some Members on the opposition benches intimated that
it was a censure on the Government.) lam glad that is
admitted : then it is a censure. Now mark how little it
is deserved. On the sth of June, 1833, this report was
made to the castle. On the 7th of June this answer was
sent to it :—" Referring to your report of the sth inst.,
and from what appears there, that in order to effect the
arrest of certain tithe defaulters, you have broken open the
doors of the houses of these persons, I am desired to say,
that his Excellency thinks you have acted in direct diso-
bedience of the older of the 11th of May last. You will,
therefore, forward to the castle a further explanation of
your conduct."—(" To whom addressed ?") This answer
is directed to Captain Hinter. This paper is in itself
a vindication of the sense and of the feelings of the
Government—(Cheers)—and it does so happen (which
I had not before observed), that this paper refers
to orders issued at a certain date—orders of the
I 1 th of May ; and that appears to have been
the earliest time at which any communication
was made to my Noble Friend of this system
of attempting to collect the tithes in Ireland. I therefore
say, Sir, that the Government are fully cleared from the
charge of violating any of the pledges they have given.—
(Chters.) I admit that there is a great difficulty in
maintaining the system of collecting tithes. I havealways
been desirous to alter it. I will not go again into the thousand
times repeated expression of " the extinction of tithes."
I must submit to the misinterpretation so sedulously put
upon it; but there is no man who has ever ventured to
say—at least there is no man who has ever ventured to
say in this House—(H.ar, hear, hear)—that by the ex-
tinction of tithes he meant the cessation of all payments
from the land to the clergy; and when the Hon. Member
fur Cork says that we insult them by proposing a comtnu •
tation, that throws the direct payment of tithes upon the

ti-- of th

landed interest, who would be more severe upon the
tenant.—(lllr. F. O'Connor said, that what he had said
was not his own argument, but a repetition of that of the
11,ght Hon. Baronet, the Member for Tamworth.)
when he said this, he meant that there was to be no pay-
ment of tithes whatever, I say that was not my meaning ;
and I call on him to give us here his views of what was
meant by the extinction of tithes. If I am told that the
introduction of a land tax, which last year was bailed as
a sort of panacea for the evils of Ireland—if I am now
toll that that is a change from had to worse, I think I
am entill d to call on those who say so, to give us a dis-
tinct knowledge of what they mean.—(Cheers.) My
Noble Friend has truly stated what are his intentions ;
but when we are met in this way, when we are told,
" And so you go from tithes to commutation, and from
commutation to land tax, and always from bad to worse ;"
we are entitled to ask those who say so, what are their
real wishes and opinions ?—(Hear, hear.) If Hon. Gen-
tlemen mean to get rid of tithes altogether—(No, no)-1
am glad to hear that disavowal—(Cheers)—but if they
do mea❑ that, I ant desirous that gentlemen should fairly
state to the House, and take the sense of the House upon
their propositions.—(Hear, hear.) I regret that my
Noble Fiend has been prevented from making his state-
ment—l regret, too, that I have been compelled to trouble
the House at such length ; but I do trust that they will
feel there is no ground whatever for casting on the Go-
vernment the censure contained in the Hon. Gentleman's
resolution.—(Hear.)
Mr. MORE O'FERRALL explained.
Sir R. PEEL explained, and stated that what he had
said was that the absolute extinguishment of tithes
would not be a benefit to the Irish peasantry, bt cause, in
demanding their tithes, the clergy made a reduction, but
that would not perhaps he the case with the landlord,
who, as he had let his land low on account of the tithts,
would, if they were abolished, have a right to demand an
cirtivalent in the shape of rent; but he never recollected
saying that he was adverse to the commutation of tithes.

Mr. LAMBERT explained, and said he could easily
produce plenty of instances of the truth of what Fe had
asserted.

Mr. O'CONNELL—The Right Hon. Gentleman had
asked what they, on that side of the House, had meint by
the extinction of tithe ? He would tell the Right Hon.
Gentleman what they m,ant. They did not mean any-
thing like the comae pursued by the Government of which
that Right Han. Gentleman formed a part —(Hear.)
He would ask what had he done—what had his country
been guilty of, that it should be treated in the ruffianly
manner in which it had been treated ?

Mr. STANLEY rose to order—He believed that such
language was perfectly unparliamentary, and be was sur-
prised that any Member of that House should dare to make
use of it.—(Loud cheers.)
Mr. O'CONNELL—The ruffianly shout that accom-
panied the preceding sentence, justified what be had said :
he would repeat, that that ruffianly shout—(Great up..
roar)—
L.,rd SANDON a,ked whether it could be considered
an assembly of gentlemen in which such language was
used ? N, such langua:e ought to be made use of or to-
lerated, it that House wished to retain its character. If

it wished to be considered as repre4enting the feel ngs
Great Britain, it ought not to suffer itself to be addressed
in such language.

The SPEAKER considered that disorderly language
had been made use of on both sides, and that the' House
would be thankful to the Noble Lord who interposed. He
was quite sure, that if the House thought- it necessary to
pass its censure, that censure would be applicable to both
parties. He trusted that the observations that f:11 from
the Noble Lord who had just spoken would awaken the
parties to a feeling of what was due to that House, and
would be a guide to them as to their expressions.
Mr. O'CONNELL wished he knew how adequately to
receive what had fallen from the Right Hon. Gentleman
in the chair, and adequately to express his apology for
any thing he might have said. He would wish to ex-
press himself in the same terms that had been employed
by the Right Hon. Gentleman ; but knowing that he
would fail to do so, he begged to proceed with his sub-
ject. He had been saying that he would tell what he did
not mean by an extinction of tithes—he did not mean

that there should be regiments of horse, foot, and artillery
to collect them—that there should be military and
police employed in their collection—and, least of all, he
never meant that there should be breaking into houses
with respect to them.—(Hear, hear.) He did not mean
that such scenes should take place as had occurred in the
county of Kildare—that the daughter of Mr. O'Don-
nell should be dragged from her residence, and mal-
treated, or that Mr. O'Ryan should have been used
as he had been. He meant something very different by
the extinction of tithes. He meant something very dif
ferent from what had been the effect of the passing of the
Coercive Bill. Several charges had been brought for-
ward by the Hon. Member for Wexford ; all of them re-
lated to the Coercive Bill, and to the abuse of the police
laws under it. Had any one of those charges teen
denied ? In the case of Sergeant Shaw, what proof had
been given that he did not act of his own head ? If he
bail done what, he had done by order, the Government
was to blame ; but if of his own head, he deserved to bi
turned out of his situation. There were 57 cases of a
similar description brought forward, and not one of the
guilty had been punished. There were cheers in that
House for the promises of Government, but the House
would find that there would be very few for the per-
formances of those promises.—(Hear.) The Right Hon.
Member for Tamworth had said that if you abolish the
tithe system, there would be more exaction on the part of
the landlords. The Hon. and Learned Gentleman then
mentioned, that a Rev. Mr. Thompson (of a parish the
name of which we could not catch) exacted out of a rack
rent of, in round numbers, 3,0001. in the shape of tithes,
5501. The Reverend Archdeacon Trench, of Bal-
linasloe, for every forty pounds, exacted five pounds
in the shape of costs and tithes ; and yet the Reverend
Archdeacon was never seen in his parish. Besides
these, not one of the 57 cases against Government was
denied ; and the Hon. Member for Wexford, who was
no decided opponent of Government, was ready to
prove the truth of them at the Bar of that House. So
that one person gave fifty-eight cases of this description in
Kildare, and on the borders of Wexf-ord ; and besides, the
Hon. Member for Kildare had distinctly specified what
acts the police had been guilty of. He recollected having
stated what bad been done in the comity of Roscommon
for collecting tithes, and he had received a letter that very
day, mentioning the violation of the law, and saying that
the Coercive Bin was established to collect tithes, and
that the police acted under it. He would agree with the
Hon. Member for Kirkcudbright, that the Noble Lord
might not to be censured if those cases were riot proved,
and if the Noble Lord had punished those who had been
guilty of them. But as the Noble Lord did not censure
them, he would appeal to the Hon. Member for Kirkcud-
bright if the Noble Lord was not pursuing the course
formerly adopted by Lord Anglesea and his then secre-
tary ? When the Noble Lord identified himself with
those under his command, he was equally liable to censure
with them. For his own part, he doubted whether they
had a right to break open houses, or whether the police
could, by law, act as they had done—he had his opinions
upon that head, and he should like to see them tried. A
wise Government ought to take care that the police should
meddle as little as possible with a man's castle. The
Hon. and Learned Gentleman then alluded to the opinions
of a Gallant Officer (Sir H. Vivian), and said they seemed
to be founded on the impression he had received from
the people of Cork not taking off their hats for him. That
Gallant Officer, strange as it might appear, expressed
himself as wishing to have tithes abolished, and still
wished to have the church establishment kept up. That
was a strange opinion ; but the Gallant Officer's next
opinion was every bit as strange—the landlords, accord-
ing to him, were so bad that nothing could prevent abso-
lute warfare between them and the people. After
attacking the established church and the landlords, this
commander in chief then proceeded to make an attack
upon the courts of law, and said that no justice could be
obtained in them. So that there was to be no law, no
peace for landlords, and no keeping up of the established
church, unless tithes were abolished. Some gentlemen
bad said they bad once confidence in the present Govern-
ment; for his own part he never had, and he knew from
the beginning that the Bill was mainly meant for the
collection of tithes. Was it known what had hap-
pened last week at Middletown with respect to these
tithes? The officers and soldiers were obliged to re-
treat into the town—of course they did not fire upon
the people ; but they gave the people a triumph which
would have dangerous consequences.—( Hear, hear.)
All this happened about tithes, and it was for esta-
blishing and bringing about this that the House so ve-
hemently cheered the Right Honourable Secretary for
Ireland. Well, at any rate, for that night he had used
•his great talents in a fresh way—he had condescend-d to
quit the colonies, and throw a little slavery over the
whites of Ireland. He would not close his observations
without answering one challenge of the Right Hon. Secre-
tary. He had never given it to be underst,,od that he
wished the Ministers of the Established Church to lose one
farthing of their incomes during their life-time ; but he cer-
tainly did say that tithes ought to be extinguished, but
the porti,,n that fell upon the landlord was not, unless a
land-tax was to be substituted in its room. VV hat be
wanted was, to save the Established Church as little

..„
trouble as possible—that it should have nothing more to
do than to go to the Treasury and receive its salary half
yearly. Such a plan would give satisfaction, and he
begged to mention that the landlords of Ireland were not
what they were represented to he. Certain representa-
tions might be well applied to absentee landlords, but
could not be justly applied to the resident landlords. He
repeated, he had no confidence in Ministers; they bad
deceived the Irish, and the Catholics, above all, were de-
ceived with respect to the vestry cess. They no longer
attended the vestries, because they thought it would not
be levied, and thus they allowed it to be voted, and

it in consequence continued to be collected. He
would not lollow all that had been said by the Right
Hon. Gentleman, but be would mention the fact,
that not less than thirty-one bills were Sled in the
Court of Exchequer for tithes, with at least 900 de-
fendants, and allowing the cos's of each defendant to be
101., there would be 9,0001. expended for the costs of
levying tithes. How then, when such was the case,
could he be accused, when he said that Ministers had
violated their pledges? Perhaps they had not dune so
designedly ; but facts bore him out in saying that they
virtually had. Ministers might be ignorant of the viola-
tions of the law, but they ought to punish other violators
of it when they were pointed out to them.
Sir H. VIVIAN, in explanation, said, that he had not
reflected upon the Irish landlords, but upon that class of
persons called middle-men.

Mr. SHAW said that he completely mistook the mean-
ing of the Gallant Officer's statements, if they did not
imply a reflection on the Irish landlords. But at any
rate, the speech just delivered by the Hon. and Learned
Member for Dublin was not calculated to establish quiet
law in Ireland. He would refer to one case mentioned
by that Hon. and Learned Member, which related to the
clergy of the Established Church. The Hon. and
Learned Member had referred to Archdeacon French, of
the parish of B.dlinasloe, and stated that he never lived in
his parish.
Mr. O'CONNELL—Not exactly that—but the letter
from the parish stated that the Archdeacon's peison was
not known to the parishioners.
Mr. SHAW—WeII, the Hon. and Learned Gentleman
had stated that the military were employed in the county
of Cork for the collection of tithes. That was a mistake,
for they were merely employed in serving law processes.
Lord DUNCANNON said that there appeared to be
some misapprehension as to the transaction spoken of as
having occurred in Tipperary. He was ready to admit
that a great deal of unnecessary severity had been used ;
but it was entirely owing to a misapprehension on the
part of Captain Gunn, who, on application to one of the
law officers, with reference to his powers in putting law
processes into effect, bad misunderstood the extent of the
explanation. However, as soon as the Government there
bad been informed of the case, they had sent orders and
directions—the result of which was, that no other in-

stance of the kind had since occurred in Munster.
Mr. FITZGERALD said that the assertion of the
Hon. and Learned Member for Dublin, with reference to

Archdeacon French and his non-residence, was perfectly
correct, for he (Mr. Fitzgerald) had that morning re-
ceived letters from the neighb'iurhood, which fully sub-
stantiated every statement. Another letter also fully bore
out the assertion with reference to the forcible collection
of tithes, particularly in one instance, where Archdeacon
French, a week or ten days ago, went forth at the head
of sixty police, for the purpose of collecting in tithe due
on the Ist of May last.—(Hear.)
Mr. STANLEY explained that he had not said there
was no instance of individual severity; all he had alleged
was, that in general, moderation was observed.

Mr. RONAYNE said that Gunn was not the only per-
son who had been guilty of undue severity. If the douse
wanted to know who was Gunn's evil genius or adviser
in this matter, he (Mr. Ronayne) could tell them, for he

could produce the written opinion of one Green, the At-

Lorney• General's (Ireland) Deputy, authorizing Gunn in
the course he had taken.

O'CONNOR DON read a letter from the chid* nf police
of Roscommon, detailing the circumstances attending the
serving of tithe processes by him there. It thus appeared
that the police were authorized to go out not merely a,
protectors to tithe collectors, but as tithe collectors them-
selves. It certainly did appear to him that in this matter