The Sun.
London, England, 1869-07-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The Times asks if it is too late to implore all who value
the interest of the nation and the pacific development of
our institutions to escape from the heated atmosphere of
Tuesday's excitement into the cooler regions of common
sense? It can be to the advantage of no one that the
Irish Church Bill should be withdrawn for a season after
an outburst of every angrypassion that can disturb human
reason. The result would certainly not redound to the
honour of the. Ministry. It would be as little creditable
to the discretion of the Opposition ; and the Irish Church-
men, who are most interested in the issue of
the present crisis, must feel that the postpone-
ment of their fate to another session would be
too certainly an exchange of whips for scorpions.
If the Ministry were to resolve upon withdrawing
the bill upon Tuesday night's division, the sense of the
country would not approve their precipitation. The
Tiines is satisfied the bill may be carried and become law
this session, if the principal agents on both sides could
divest themselves of the passions and prejudices at present
inflaming them. As it is we have Mr. Gladstone
speaking in one House with an intolerant majority at his
back tending in no degree to soften the asperity of
command, and Lord Salisbury in the other with a
majority equally assured of its strength, and almost
as much disposed to rely upon it. If the political
imagination could compass such a fancy as
shutting up Mr. Gladstone and the Duke of Argyll,
as representatives of one side, and Lords Salisbury
and Cairns, as champions of the other, in one room, who
can doubt that they would contrive between them to
settle the terms of a solution already almost completed?
Removed from the excitement of friendly assemblies, they
would yield to the power of reason, and Mr. Bright him-
self might be chosen as their arbiter without • danger of
partial judgment. But the peril—and we acknowledge
that it is imminent—is that the heat of Parliament may
be carried into the Cabinet, and a hasty resolution taken,
deferring the further progress of the bill till another
session, to the distraction of the country at large, and to
the immeasurable detriment of the Irish Church itself.
The Standard declares that the House of Lords had a
duty to perform to itself far transcending in importance
its obligations to the Irish Church. The reception given
by the House of Commons, at the instigation of Mr.
Gladstone, to their lordships' amendments, had rendered
the question of the degree of disendowment of that
Church, before the chief and engrossing one, secondary
and subordinate. The great issue was whether the Peers
should maintain their dignity and vindicate their indepen-
dence by insisting upon some at least of the amendments
so insolently rejected by the Minister, or whether, by
abandoning them en bloc, they should definitively accept
the position of a mere court for the registration of the
decisions of the House of Commons. There was no possi-
bility of blinking the question. The Prime Minister had
taken care that the Peers should find no opportunity, in
any concessions on his part, for retiring with honour from
their position, and the language of his supporters
at public meetings and in the press forced upon every
mind the fact stated by Lord Grey, that his object was
not so much to carry the bill as to humiliate the Upper
House. The practical effect, if not the intended effect,.
of,the adoption of the preamble and the 68th clause in the
jliape in which they appear in the bill returned to the •
Lords, would be to place at the disposition of the Govern- •
ment an immense sum, which they could dangle before
the eyes of the Irish people, and so promote their political,
purposes. Such a power should not be given to any
government. Parliament ought to reserve to itself the
full and entire control of thii property ; and the fact that
the House of Commons has neglected its duty in this
matter is but another proof of the necessity for another •
Chamber, composed of really independent men.

The Post observes that the issue raised by Lord Cairns
in replying to the ereech with which Earl Granville
moved that the Peers should not insist on those amend-
ments to which the Commons had disagreed was clear and
decisive. And this issue virtually was whether the Upper
House should insist on richly endowing the disestablished
Church, and also whether the ultimate disposal of the
surplus property should be postponed for future considera-
tion. On three, if not on four, of the rejected amend-
ments the noble and learned lord invited the
Peers to insist. The preamble, as originally frameZ
by the Government, and as subsequently insisted on
by the Commons, affirmed two distinct propositions—
first, that the proceeds of the Church property should
not be applied to religious uses; secondly, that it
should be applied in a secular manner as prescribed by
one of the clauses of the bill. The preamble as selecting
the Lords omitted all reservation of the uses to which ties°
surplus might be applied, and left that question in all its
bearings open for future consideration. The other amend-
ments dealt with the partial endowment of the Irish
Church. All the points in issue were practically discussed
in the debate on the rejection of the amendment to the
preamble, and, consequently, the public are in as good a
position to form an opinion of the scheme on which the
Lords insisted as if divisions had takenplace on the subse-
quent amendments. With the Lords will rest the respon-
sibility of the course they have pursued.
The Dail!! Xcsrs thinks that the country is in the
midst, not of a parliamentary, Lot of a constitutional
crisis. The Melee of Lords, giving full swing to its reck-
less impulses, has rushed into collision with the Govern-
ment, the Commons, and the country. The Upper
Chamber Las, by a majerity of 7s, once more struck out
of the preamble of the Lid the vital words which the
Commons bad re-insetted by a majority of 124. Its first
vote, and, as it tinned out, its last, was given on
Tuesday evening in favour of removing the declara-
tion against the application of the surplus eccle-
siastical revenues of Ireland " for the maintenance
of any Church, or clergy, or other ministry, or
for the teaching of
religion."
No sooner had the
Lord Chancellor announced the numbers than
Lord Granville moved the postponement of the
consideration of the remaining amendments. The mis-
chievous results which may follow from the courses
which the Lords have taken were very frankly stated by
Lord Shaftesbury, who declared that the conduct of the
Peers would be fraught with injury, not only to the Irish
Church, lint to the Established Churches of-England and
Scotland also, and to the position of their Lordship's
House. The cheers which greeted Mr. Gladstone when
he entered the House of Commons on Tuesday night, after
the Peers' decision was known, are significant. It is fox
the country to say whether it will allow an irresponsible
debating society to stand between it and its deliberate
purposes and convictions, constitutionally expressed.' If
this question should be answered in a sense disagreeable V
the Peere, they will have Lord Salisbury, Lord Grey, and
Lord Russell, who has persistently played into the hands
of the Opposition, chiefly to thank.
It can hardly be denied, says the Herald, that if the
House of Lords were not to surrender at discretion it
could hardly have conceded more, or chosen the points for
concession and for resistance more wisely, justly, and
judiciously than has been done by Lord Cairns. And, iv
truth, a surrender at discretion was impossible. It would,
under the circumstances, have involved that which, as
Lord Grey obierved, is the worst calamity that can befal
an individuel or an order- a loss of honour. When such
a hint is e.roven out by a man of Lord Grey's cold temper,
great ex:,erience, and statesmanlike moderation, who des
sires te see the bill passed into law, it is plain to candid and
impartial minds tha.tgreat pro vocation must have been given.
The Lords had to deal not only with a bill that they dislike,
but with a faction that dislikes them ; not only with an
affront put upon them by the House of Commons, but
with a set purpose to mortify and degrade them want
felted by the First Minister of the Crown. To have
yielded under such circumstances would have involved a
sacrifice of prestige and of power quite as great as would
follow a pitched battle and a total defeat. Happily, the
Lords were not swayed by the argument of fear. By
majority of almost two to one--a majority in which Earle
Russell and Grey went into the lobby with Lord Salisbury
and Lord Cairns—the Peers decided to insist on their
amendment to the preamble of the bill.
The Star affirms that the House of Lords have rushee
upon the certain consequences of defying the national
will. Before midnight they came by a majority of 78 to a
decision adverse to the Government. It revealed the
spirit in which the bill was to be opposed, and the munerl
cal strength which would be arrayed against it. Lore
Granville, whose demeanour had throughout the
night been most exemplary under the most trying
circumstances, at once took the only course pos•
sible at such a crisis. He stopped the bill, and
nothing will now be known until the Cabinet
have deliberated upon this extraordinary vote.
The Lord Chancellor, with great energy and enthusiasm,
spoke in indignant repudiation of the aspersions on the
Government, and in lofty censure of the flippant reckless
Hess with which Lord Salisbury had risked a schism be•
tween the two Houses. Shortly after—when the Earl of
Winchilsea had, with profuse 'action, declared himself
preparediFjrestlt v
ifoN e
for the block or the rope—the House divided.
have already stated. Lord Cairns had pre
i
viously announced the amendments on which lie was pre
pared to insist, but this declaration passes at once into
insignificance in the great crisis upon which her Majesty',
Government have now to deliberate.

The Telegraph believes that since, at the eleventh hour,
tne obstructors have refused to abandon the fatal ground
which they have occupied—the bill mud be regarded as
lost for this session. Months of discussion will have been
wasted, and al; the beginning of a new suasion the work
must be begun again. But it wig nut begin under the
same circumstances. The whole country will be
agitated by mcetingl. which will insist on any
measures that in,y be needed to accomplish the
disestablishmeut and dieendowment of the Irish
Church

In a more stringent form than that which it at

present wears, another ball will be passed aro- ngl
House of Commons and presented to the Peers. That
bill anus! accepted—but accepted under conditions
which will compel the Peers to drive a bad bargain foz
their clients. If anything bad been needed to damage
the interests cf the Irish Church, and to rouse the coon
try into an attitude of passionate resistar,T, it would have
been furnished by the reckless debate of Tuesday
Some Peers seemed to have lost all sense of responsi
bility. Lori Salisbury, in particular, by attribut
ing the measure to the will of " one arrogant
man," did his best to provoke a storm of indignation
throughout the nation, of which Mr. Gladstone is the
chosen leader ; and an emphatic response was given to
Rich denunciations by the deafening cheer with which the
Prime Minister was greeted when, after the division, he
entered the House of Commons. The country has reached
a great crisis, and Ministers must determine the course
which they will pursue ; but after the fatal division of
Tuesday night, the nature of that course can admit Om
• _-•