The Sun.
London, England, 1860-04-17 00:00:00

THR WEATHER.-SUN OFFICE, APRIL 17, 1860.

THERMOMETER, IN THE SHADE.
57—highest since noon yesterday.
45—lowest this morning and during the night.
53—this day at noon.

BAnoltErmu.-30.27.
WIND, North-Easterly ; fresh and fine.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
THIS DAY.—Morning, Oh. Om.—Afternoon, 12h. Om
To-moußow.-Morning, 12h. 16m.—Afternoon, 12h. 34m

So Mr. MASSEY has given notice to refer the
Reform Bill after the second reading to a select
committee. What is his object—as Mr. DISRAELI
once said, to " waste a year ?" No other effect

could it possibly have. We cannot suppose that
the bill can undergo such an ordeal and then that
of discussion in the House of Commons in time to

be presented to the Lords this year. A select com-
mittee is the approved method of getting rid of
proposals which are too good to be openly rejected,
yet too unpalatable to powerful interests to be
swallowed willingly. It is a kind of painless ex-

tinetion. No one better knows this than Mr,

M Assn', and we must tell him plainly that it were
English and straightforward to move that the Bill
be read a second time this day six months.
The -Whig Chairman of Committees ought not to
have given his party so unkind a cut as this. Of
coarse, the Opposition will take fresh courage, and
if Mr. WHITESIDE'S phalanx of speakers cannot defer
the second reading for ever, they can, after that, join
Mr. MASSEY and the hostile Whigs, and get the
select committee appointed. They will then he sure
of their object. Reform will be burked for the
session ; hon. members will be furnished with a plau-
sible excuse for for declining to seek re-election, and
all will be " merry as a marriage bell." But where
will the Whig leaders be Can even the
head of the Cabinet, with all his well-known aver-
sion to Reform, occupy a decent position, while
Lord JOHN RUSSELL could do nothing less than
retire from office. Reform was, however, so dis-
tinctly avowed a part of the programme of the
prEsent Ministry, the leading feature of the com-
pact at Willis's Rooms, the very thing indeed on
which they rejected their predecessors—that to be
baulked of it and to retain office, without at least
appealing to the country, must disgrace them for
ever.

We are inclined to regard the proposition of a
select committee, as emanating entirely from the
discontented sections of the Whigs. Something
not unlike it is proposed by Lord GREY in the
Upper House. There is a large number of the
Whigs, who in heart quite out-Tory the Tories, are
far more opposed to trusting the people, and whose
main object is to limit Cabinets and Ministries to
a few family cliques ; they are merely party Whigs,
.just as many valuable men among the Tories are
but party Tories. Well would it be if some poli-
tical conjuror Could bag all these individuals and
shake them out again into their right planes—could
transfer the accidental Conservatives to tho ranks of
the Liberals, and the accidental Liberals to the ranks
of Conservatism. We should then have atleast united
parties and intelligible action. Mr. MASSEY has
hitherto merely asked another member for Salford,
his own borough, and a very reasonable request, if
members were in the market. But if the Bill is
not to be a readjustment Bill, but substantially only
a Franchise Bill, it will of course be difficult for
Salford, and for Scotland, to get their fair propor-

tions.
We have never concealed our contempt for the
bill considered as a Reform Bill: Bat we cannot
flay as much of it considered as a fraßehise bill. The
franchises it offers have been declared by every
meeting of Reformers which has assembled
yet, as well worth their acceptance, even

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THE SUN.
LONDON, TUESDAY, APRIL:I7, 1860.