The Sun.
London, England, 1860-05-08 00:00:00

guided with such wonderful ability and wielding such a ter-
rific power, has not by turnslauded and calumniated, flat-
tered and villified. By turns it has vehemently espoused and
bitterly vituperated every party, and advocated and abandoned
every principle. And there is this painful and distinctive
peculiarity about the Times—other journals are content
with opposing the policy or censuring the acts of the Mi-
nister, but the Times always tries to crush the man. For
some years it seemed its special vocation to hunt down,
ruin, and destroy Lord Palmerston, whose official life is
now deemed vital to the nation. Lord J. Russell was once
the idol to be worshipped, but more recently he would have
been driven altogether from public life if the acrimony of
the Times could have accomplished it. So, again, Lord
Derby's first Administration was supported by the Times;
but, in his second one, in the personal persecution of every
leading member, it furnished only another instance of con-
sistency and consideration, and thus with every public man
that is capriciously—and personally, as distinct from poli-
tically—assailed, it is not criticism but extermination that
is aimed at. The practical consequences of all this on our
political condition are very serious. Governments and par-
ties have been lately in a state of weakness and disorgani-
zation alike deplorable and dangerous ; but all this is enor-
mously aggravated when all the vast machinery of the
Times and its gigantic writing power are directed to one
end—that of pursuing to the death, day after day, every
leading man on whom, in turn, the nation (as the Times
comes round to show) must rely; and doing this to an ex-
tent that their public acts don't justifi. The result is that
all our best public men become not only politically weakened,
but personally discredited. Public principles are unsettled
and discredited also, respect for parliamentary government
and political institutions is much shaken, and strong go-
vernment becomes impossible. I avow to you my deliberate
and solemn conviction, founded on much observation and
reflection, that the present confusion in our political world
is to a great extent owing to the manner in which every
leading man and principle and cause have been damaged by
the wavering invective of the Times. As I wish you to re-
ceive this before you go to the house, I have not time to re-
mark on the personal influences by which the Times is sup-
posed to be affected—on the peculiar influences that draw
Mr. Delane to Lord Palmerston, and the anomalous position
and proceedings of Mr. Lowe on the Treasury bench. They
are the subject of comments which I will not now repeat,
butwbich affect bath the House of Commons and the press.
If you receive my observations in the same frank spirit in
which I make them, I shall be happy to follow them up by
a further expression of views that may be useful to you.
Few public men are in a condition to speak boldly to the
Times. There are few men in Parliament who, like myself,
are so indifferent to party to office, or to their seat, that they
are as independent of the Times as the Times is of them, and
fear it as little as it fears them. As lam in that position I
have felt it a duty to tell you what may be useful truths, and
in a plain though not unfriendly spirit ; and if they should
have the effect of leading you to consider what I have said,
and if you will permit your judgment to be influenced by it,
I shall not regret the difference—l trust in that case only of
a temporary nature—that has arisen between us, and which
will have been productive of good results through a circle
beyond ourselves." May I read the postscript ? (Mr.
Walter assented.) "In saying I should have expressed
these views last night, I mean, of course, the general views
on the press, without personal allusions to yourself or
others."
Has ing read that letter by permission, or rather in answer
to the challenge of the hon. gentleman, I leave it without
further comment, except that it shows two things—that
I did not wish to make this a merely personal question, be-
tween the hon. member for Berkshire and myself, and that,
as far as I am concerned, I have not necessitated the bring-
ing the question before the house. (Hear, hear.) Upon
the general and important principle of the independence of
the public press and its irresponsibility, I have a few words
to add in reply to what has fallen from the hon. gentleman
who is its principle representative.
-
Mr. WALTER—I beg to explain.
Mr. HORSMAN—I withdraw that expression. I sin-
cerely regret the inadvez tence in so describing the hon.
gentleman. Whence guises this doctrine of responsibility ?
Every man in this house is in favour of the independence
of the press, as all are in favour of the independence of Par-
liament, but this independence carries with it responsibility.
Every member of this house is, individually or collectively,
responsible. The House of Lords is responsible. The Crown
is responsible. Why is the public pressalone to be irrespon-
sible ? (Hear.) It is the Fourth Estate. It is a mighty in-
stitution. The first law of the constitution is that there is
no power, and there can be no power, which is not accom-
panied by responsibility. In a constitutional Government
power and irresponsibility are perfectly incompatible. Why,
then, is the public press, or why is the Time* newspaper,
to be the sole exception to the rule ? Conventionally you
May say the press is responsible, but practically you find
that the press is irresponsible. Why ? Because it is anony-
mous. But its being anonymous does not remove the respon-
sibility. It only makes it difficult to enforce it. You cannot
enforce it against a man working in the dark—having a
mask before his face. When a muffied`figure, who plants a
dagger, is not punished it is because you cannot identify
him. Nor can you punish the midnight burglar whom you
cannot catch. But the principle of responsibility applies
equally to both. How does that affect the hon. gentleman
the member for Berkshire ? I am afraid that I now come to
the somewhat painful part of the question, but at the same
time a very important public part. By what law of public
responsibility are gentlemen connected with the public press
and having seats in this house to be judged ? I think the
hon. gentleman himself laid down that law on Monday
night. I attempted in the correspondence with him, in
courtesy to him, to detach from him any responsibility with
the Times, but I now mean to fix it upon him. (Opposition
cheers.) What was the leading element of the able speech
of the hen. member for Berkshire on Monday night ? What
was its most telling and effective part? Was it not the in-
dignant and spirited rebuke administered to the hon. mem-
ber for Birmingham for speeches not made here but filer-
where (near.) Did no not tell us that if we wished to see
the hon. member for Birmingham painted by himself we
must read the National Review? What does that mean ? Is
not every member, as a public man and perfectly indepen-
dent, to exercise his rights ? Is he not to express opinions
and disseminate principles wherever he pleases, in this house
or elsewhere, provided he does nOt transgress any rule of
public decorum and propriety ? And was that not the reason
why the member for Birmingham was brought into the
house and the hon. gentleman executed on him his law of
responsibility ? Why, all of us feel that responsibility is en-
forced on every member wherever he acts, wherever he
speaks, in his place or out of it, as it was enforced the
other night by the hon. member for Berkshire. Is the same
rule not to be applied to him ? To Caesar he appeals, to
Caesar he must go. He bays he has no editorial functions
with the Times—he does not know who was the writer of
the article. Who, I ask, employed the man who wrote it ?
(Opposition cheers.) Who paid the man who wrote it ?
(Opposition cheers.) And if, sir, he, as the proprietor of
the Times—
Mr. WALTER—" A" proprietor or " the" proprietor ?
Mr. HORSMAN—As the leading proprietor of the Times.
If the hon. gentleman gets up and tells me he is not the
leading proprietor I have done.
Mr. WALTER—My proprietary interest in the Tones,
if the hon. gentleman wishes to know, is of a very limited
description. I have large property connected with the
Times, wholly independent of a limited proprietary interest
in it.

Mr. HORSMAN—I am sure the house will feel that it
is unworthy of the house and unfit in me to descend to a
controversy with the hon. gentleman the member for Berk-
shire on the exact amount of his interest in the Times. The
hon. gentleman cannot dens that he has a leading interest,
and that he is the greatest authority in the Times. I ask
again, who employs the man who writes, who pays the man
who writes those articles? (Opposition cheers.) And I
say, if the writer received instructions from the council of
which the hon. gentleman is a leading meMber—if the
iter receives instructions and remuneration from him, I
want to know what is the difference between the hon. mem-
ber for Birmingham and, the hon. member for Berkshire as
regards responsibility. Why, sir, the difference is this, and
this only :—The member for Birmingham goes on a plat-
form in the face of day, avows his opinions before all the
world, and braves the responsibility which is brought upon
him in this house, while the member for Berkshire em-
ploys another to do what the member for Birmingham does
himself. (Opposition cheers.) Because the gentleman he
employs works in secret his employer thinks he is to evade
responsibility. I lay down boldly and confidently this prin-
ciple, that between a public writer and a public speaker, on
the ground of responsibility, there is no distinction what-
ever. (Hear.) The only distinction is as to the difficulty
of identification and detection. (Hear.) If the independence
of the press be assailed, every man in this house, and
99 out of every 100 men in the country, will raise their
voices in its favour. I say, as to the responsibility of the
press, that as in the responsibility of public men, it is the
interest of the whole community to enforce full responsi-
bility, If a member of our own body out of this house
makes a public speech which we feel lowers and discredits
the body to which we belong, all are anxious that he
should be called to account, all are anxious to enforce re-

sponsibility, the enforcement of which is a protection to our
own character and honour. So it is with the press. It has
the same interest in keeping up the character of the press
as we have in keeping up the character of public men; and
if there be one organ which lowers the character of the

press, I say. it is the interest of every man connected with
the press to do all they can, not only to discountenance it,
but to enforce responsibility against that organ which would
otherwise throw discredit on the whole body, who are not
more distinguished for talent than for honour, taste, refine-
ment, high principle, and a combination of all those quali-
ties which make the leading contributors favourites and
ornaments of every society which• they enter. (Cheers.) It
is with extreme regret that I have had to say this to the
hon. member for Berkshire. I have sat with him many
years, and I have learnt to regard him with feelings of sin-
cere respect. Although it is impossible that occasionally
there should not have been an incidental recollection of his
connection with the press, my wish has always been to re-
gard him in a different character, as the representative of an
important English county—asone who, while ho does in-
. .

herit a noble inheritance, which we are now discussing,
inherits still more the position of a territorial proprietor,
which puts him on a social equality with the greatest and
noblest in the land. (Cheers.) I believe he owes his seat

not so much to his merely territorial position as to the ex-

ample which he has set of every virtue. 1 know that in his
own neighbourhood few landlords are more popular. There
is no man whose conduct sets a better example in the esti-
mation of all those who live in his vicinity than that of the
hon. gentleman, and my sincere wish is that he may sit
many years in this house, sharing more largely than he has
hitherto done in those debates which, as we all know, he has
already adorned, and receiving from" us that respect and
esteem which as a tribute to his past demeanour he has fairly
won, and to which he is eminently entitled. (Hear, hear.)
Lord PALMERSTON said—l hope this discussion will