The Sun.
London, England, 1834-07-02 00:00:00

conclusion to which they had come ; and their lordships
bad heard statements which, he thought, justified that
conclusion. But he would trouble them with another do-
cument, a letter written by Lord Oxmantown, on the 9th of
April, 1834 ; and, in mentioning that nobleman's name, he
could not refrain from observing that the greatest praise was
due to him for the excellent manner in which he discharged
his magisterial duties (Hear, hear) and for his judicious
exercise of those powers, which he had not shrunk from re-
commending, under circumstances of great difficulty and dan-
ger. The noble lord, after giving, in the letter to which he
had referred, an account of the state ef the districts which had
been proclaimed, proceeded as follows :—" Under all the cir-
cumstances which I have stated, the measure which I feel it to
be my duty to recommend Government to adopt is, to proclaim
the barony of Garrycastle under the 3d Wm. IV. without de-
lay, and to direct that the misdemeanors thus created
should be tried by the ordinary tribunals of the country.
Whether the Quarter Sessions had jorisdiction in such cases,
without a special enactment, he was not aware ; but he consi-
dered that they would be better adapted for trying such of-
fences than any other tribunal, because they cold be adjourned
from time to time, and if they had not such jusisdiction, he
thought it would be expedient to apply to the leg-islature to
give it to them. As to the power of the Quarter Sesssions to
try such offences, he ( Earl Grey) had great satisfactfOn in
stating that the government had the opinions of the AttorneV-
General of Ireland, and the Attorney-General of England,
who gave it as their distinct opinions, that the Quarter Ses-
sions had such power to try ordinary cases. There were other
parts of this letter extremely worth reading, particularly one
part which showed the effect of the proclamations in prevent-
ing the spread of offences to districts which lay beyond the
bounds of the county to which the proclamation applied; but
as he had already trespassed longer than he ought upon their
lordships' attention, he did not think it necessary to go further
into them. He had great satisfaction, however, in thus show-
ing that when he proposed a relaxation of the severity of the
law, as it related to trials by courtsmartial, he was proposing a
relaxation which was justified by circumstances, and which
would not in any degree diminish or impair the general effi-
ciency of the measure. With this single exception, it was his
intention, in presenting to their lordships the bill which he
should call upon them if they were so pleased, to read a first
time this night—it was his intention to present a bill renewing
the Act of last session, with all its other provisions. Those
provisions might be classed under three heads. The first were
those that protected property, and went to the preventing of
thoie meetings which might assume a dangerous character, and
which it was known were conducted in such a manner as to be
i njurious to the public peace. The powers for that purpose were
contained in the three first clauses of the Act, commonly
known as the Proclamation Act, which was passed in 1829, and
which it was the intention of his Majesty's Ministers to renew,
but which expired in consequence of the sudden dissolution of
Parliament. The next head into which the provisions of the
bill were divided consisted of those which related to nocturnal
meetings and acts of spoliation and violence ; for the effectual
control and prevention of which in the four districts of Ire-
land the necessary powers were given by this bill. With re-
spect to the latter head, and to the powers which enabled the
government to meet offences of this kind, and to prevent them
he thought he had stated grounds which could leave no hesita-
tion on the minds of their lordships as to the propriety of such
enactments. With respect to the remaining class, it was not
difficult to show that an evil existed which called for a remedy
for if it was necessary to put down with a strong hand that
combination and those excesses which assumed an insurrec-
tionary and almost a revolutionary character, it was no less ne-
cessary to meet by legislative enactments the causes by which
they were produced. He knew no distinction that was made
between what were called predial outrages and the effects of
political agitation. He was aware it was contended that they
were perfectly distinct, and that the one had no relation what-
ever to the other; but to that position lie would not by any
means subicribe. ( Hear.) He could not believe that any
man who had attended to the state of Ireland, and observed
with a calm, tranquil, and philosophical eye, the general work-
ings of human nature, could come to the conclusion that the
perpetual system of agitation which had been pursued had no
influence upon the disturbances which prevailed. The minds
of the people were influenced by exciting topics—their preju-
dices were courted—their passions appealed to—they were re-
proached as the slaves of oppression and the victims of injus-
tice, and were called upon to resist it and shake it off; and
would any man say that these political addresses could
be made to the people without exciting a general spirit of
resistance to authority, and disobedience to the law which led
to excesses, such as we had witnessed in Ireland, and which it
was the object of this bill to prevent? Those excesses might
not have been intended by the persons who were the original
causes of them—they might have exceeded the limits within
which those persons themselves would hare wished to confine
them ; but when the passions of the people were excited, it
was not easy to restrain them. He said it was not the part of
a wise legislature, or of a just and humane man, to enact
severe laws against such crimes as we had witnessed in Ireland,
and to neglect those preventive measures which would remove
the causes which he believed had led to them. It was true the
powers of the act, in this respect, had not been exercised since
it was passed, except in two cases of proclamation on the 10th
and 17th of April, 1834,—the first against the Association of
the National Political Trades' Union ; and the second against
the Association of the Irish Volunteers. It was true, also,
that meetings had taken place, and subjects had been discussed,
of which their lordships must disapprove, and particularly one
subject which, above all, had been pronounced by Parliament
as of a most injurious and fatal tendency, he meant the repeal
of the union. Meetings for this purpose had been held, and
petitions had issued from them—which was a proof, at least,
that the government did not wish to interfere except in cases
of actual necessity. They had let such meetings assemble
under the ordinary powers of the constitution, and suffered
them to take their course, so long as they did not assume the
character of a formidable combination, threatening the peace
of the country. But, although the possession of these ex-
traordinary powers had not induced the Lord Lieutenant to
prevent those meetings which had different purposes in view
from those of the associations, which were the objects of the
proclamations of April 10 and 17, he asked their lordships
whether, looking at the state of Ireland, they would think it
; afe to suffer such proceedings to be continued ? and if not,
whether they did not consider it their duty to arm the govern-
ment with these extraordinary powers ? He asked whether it
would be safe to leave the government unprovided with the
means of checking the proceedings of a central association in
Dublin, sitting as a Parliament, with all the forms of a Parlia-
ment, directing other associations connected with it throughout
all parts of the country, and enjoining a general organization
for the avowed and undisguised purpose of carrying into effect
measures which must be subversive of the security of the coun-
try and destructive of all peace, order, and law ? He could not
think that their lordships would answer in the affirmative to
this question, He could not think but that they would say it
was necessary the Government should be provided with powers
to check in time an association which was dangerous to the pub-
lic peace ; and from the statements he had made, he hoped he
might say, with some degree of confidence on the part of Go-
vernment, that if their lordships intrusted these powers to their
hands, they had a security in their former conduct that they
would not be abused. It was not necessary to detain their
lordships much further, and he hoped that, after what he had
stated as to the general state of Ireland, and as to the effects of
this law, where it had been carried into execution, with respect
to insurrectionary offences, and that important branch of it
which went to prevent political meetings, lie might venture to
solicit that the bill might meet with favour in their lordships' eyes
so far as that it might be read a first time to night. There re-
mained only one point to which it was necessary for him to ad-
vert, and that was the time for which the law should be renewed.
He wished he could judge that, within any very short or given
period, the state of Ireland was likely to be such as to remove the
necessity of these or similar powers, to strengthen the hands of
the government against the offences contemplated by this bill.
But although he could not hold out such an expectation, yet
he certainly thought that, in a case of this nature, where
great and extraordinary powers were given to the government,
it should be for a limited and short time, so as to give to the
country a security that they must, of necessity, be brought
under the revision of Parliament, which should be enabled to
examine in what manner those powers had been exercised, and
to form a deliberate judgment as to the necessity of resorting
again to the same or others, according to circumstances. He
should, therefore, with this view, propose the extension of
this bill only to the Ist of August, 1835, being an additional year
from the time when it would expire, and he trusted their lord-
ships would feel that while his Majesty's government were endea-
vouring to provide against those dangers which called for extra-
ordinary enactments, at the same time they were not inatten-
tive to the principles of the constitution, but were desirous of
bringing the subject under the attention of Parliament at an
early period, not only to enable them to consider of the neces-
sity of renewing it, but also to examine into the conduct of
those who had carried it into effect. He had detained their
lordships longer than he could have wished, but he was anxious
that the conduct of his Majesty's government and the nature
of the measure should be thoroughly explained, particularly
as to the point in which this bill differed from that of last
session. The noble earl concluded by moving that the bill be
read a first time.
The Earl of WICKLOW said he could not withhold his
humble meed of approbation, not only of the clear and satis-
factory manner in which the noble earl had brought the sub-
ject before their lordships, but also for the honest and manly
course which he had taken when he thought it his duty again
to come forward and perform what must be to him a most dis-
agreeable and onerous duty. He fully concurred in the motion
of the noble earl, but he would beg to remind the noble lord
that the reason given on a former occasion for creating courts-
martial was the inefficiency of the juries of the country. If his
Majesty's government had received any information which led
them to believe that the juries were now prepared to perform
their duty in a manner in which they were not able last year to
discharge them, he regretted that the noble earl had not taken
an opportunity of stating it.
Earl GREY said he had forgotten to do so. The noble
earl then proceeded to give some explanation, but the only par
of it that could be heard in the gallery amounted to a re-
t
petition of his former statement, that the quarter sessions
would be the proper tribunal to investigate offences under
the bill.
The Earl of WICKLOW said that the bill in its mitigated
shape must give satisfaction. He would beg leave to ob-
serve, however, that it was last year accompanied by a bill foe
the change of venue, and when he urged that the latter bill
should be continued for five years, the answer of the noble earl
was, that it would be better it should be enacted only for the
same time 'as the Coercion Bill, and that it should be open to
Parliament again to consider it. He hoped the noble earl had
turned his attention to this point. There was one more sub-
ject upon which he wished to say a word. It had been
trumpeted forth by all the declaimers upon the ills of Ireland
that there was one only cure for the disturbances of that
country—namely, the tithes, and that if that cause were talteu