The Sun.
London, England, 1869-07-10 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, JULY 10, ic.69.

rather more comprehensive character are being
seriously meditated, in regard to the thorough and
radical reorganisation, if not transformation, of that
hitherto, as our contemporary regards it, fossilized or
mummyfied, high and dry, section of the Legislature.
While the Cabinet's liberal supporters among the
morning newspapers are either dumb as to the actual
" situation," or simply suggestive of what is brew-
ing in the way of a Ministerial retaliation upon the
Lords, en revanche for their Amendments, the Daily
News speaks right out, goes manfully to the point
at once, without the smallest attempt at or
affectation of anything whatever in the shape of
circumlocution—insisting upon it that, the Peers
having declined point blank, and very peremptorily,
to bow to the decision of the House of the Com-
mons, a House elected upon this very question of
the Irish Church, and therefore directly represent
ing the opinions entertained in respect to that pre-
cise question by the great mass of the poi ulation,
one course, and one course only, is at this mo-
ment before the Chiefs of the Party now in power,
as the members of Mr. G LADSTONE'S Administration.
That course, it maintains, is simply the popularizing
of the House of Lords, appealing for justification
while so doing to the people out of doors. A
collision between the two houses many are beginning
to regard as at length a result quite inevitable. The
Conservative Peers are angered at heart to the extent
at least of being altogether unconciliatory. The
Ministerialists are, on the other hand, indignant be-
yond measure at the utter transformation of the Bill
by the introduction of the Lords' Amendments.
Rather than accept these, it is conceived that the
Cabinet, relying upon the support of the country,
will signalize their rejection in the way already some
time since proposed—namely, by abruptly closing the
Session, calling the House together a little later on , rein-
troducing the Bill, and swamping the Lords by pouring
into it a very considerable number of Liberal Peers.
At amomentous juncture like this, when rumours of
the most ominous character are filling the air, it
seems simply preposterous that the llouse of Com-
mons should be frittering away its time, as it was last
evening, over such a frivolous discussion as the one
provoked by the member for County Kerry in regard
to a vitally important question as to whether there
shall or shall not be henceforth a grating
to the Ladies' Gallery. Scanning, however cursorily,
the ridiculous and fribbling talk there was over night
upon this topic, one cannot but recognise in the
whole thing—so much "excellent fooling." Fooling so
nonsensical of its kind that those who took part in
it, somehow, seemed incapable of opening their lips
without blundering into some extravagantly absurd
gaucherie. Thus, the very proposer—or as he deemed
himself probably but most mistakenly, the chivalrous
proposer—of the motion " That in the opinion
of this House the grating in front of the
Ladies' Gallery ought to be removed," while
complaining that the said gallery was very dark,
very hot and very low roofed, observed indignantly,
that " The temperature there was always nearly
four degrees higher than in the rest of the House."
At which everybody laughed—when the hon.
member replied with some warmth, " It was all very
well for hon. gentlemen to laugh, but they were there
for their pleasure—(renewed laughter)—while the
ladies came to listen to them ; and" added Mr. HER-
BERT, with an absurd lapsus, " it was a very poor
compliment to the ladies to put them in a
place in which they were to be confined—
(great laughter)"—and so forth ! With no
less preposterous extravagance of diction or
of farcical phraseology, Mr. JOHNSON, in seconding
the motion of the member for Kerry, declared that
the present Black Hole of Calcutta, (meaning of
Vv'estininster) was worse even than the stowing of
the ladies, as of old, away in the ventilator—backing
up la's preference by the coincident evidence of " his
predecessors of both sexes," at which the house
roared again, the honourable member ad ling a cor-
rection hardly less laughter-moving by reason o! i's
naif gravity—" by thos3 of a former generation
then if th 3 House preferred that expression ! " Mr.
BERES F ORD HOPE rendered himself hardly one
jot less absurd, in his turn, whether by his
serious inquiry as to what was, in point of fact,
the object of a Ladies' Gallery at all—" Was it," he
asked, " to enable a certain number of ladi, s to add
one more to the number of evening parties, and
come down here in their- best dresses, or was it to
allow ladies to enjoy one or two hours of ra-
tional, intellectual enjoyment in their morning
dresses and bonnets, without being molested by
impertinent glances? (Indignant cries of "Oh !)"
Mr. BERESFOIhD HOPE closing his serio-comic address
by deprecating the notion of their adding " a flirting
lobby" to the House of Commons. The younger Mr.
SAM UELSON, the recently-elected member for Chelten-
ham, thereupon added his quota to the nonsense,
intentional or inadvertent, contributed upon this
matter last night to the debates in Parliament !
Actually, in the course of his maiden speech,
bungling into the statement that " With regard to
the assertion that ladies would not come if the
grating were removed, because they would have to
appear in evening dress, he did not think that argu-
ment applied for a moment, because it was the
custom for ladies and gentlemen to appear
in full dress or neither. (Roars of laughter.)"
"Hon. gentlemen might laugh [he, too, exclaimed
indignantly, while precipitately correcting himself],
bat he believed he was quite correct in what he had
stated—(renewed laughter)—anfl it was no more
necessary for a lady to come in full dress than for
any hon. member to appear in evening dress." Such
being the frivolous, fribbling, frittering small talk
applied to the discussion of this momentous question,
upon the eve of a political crisis, that, by bringing
the Lords and Commons into actual collision, may
necasitate or prepare the way for a radical change in
the Constitution !

AT the last moment the Lords have come to the '
same opinion of the Life Peerages Bill as we
expressed at the first moment. The bill is at once
too large and too small. It is both revolutionary
and " tinkering." To pass a measure altering the
constitution of one branch of the Legislature,
and at the same time to restrict that alteration
to the ludicrously minute minimum which
the bill proposed, is most unwise and unstates-
manlike. Lord Russzu. wished to surrender
the principle of an hereditary peerage, and to
introduce life peers. This proposal may be wise;
but if it be so, why restrict it to two peers a year ?
If it be unwise, two peers are two too many. The
idea that the introduction to the Upper House of the
two most popular men living would popularise such
an aristocratic assembly as the House of Lords,
simply shews how far removed from popular
sentiment are the peers who entertain the idea. If,
as seems too probable, the Lords determine to throw
out the Irish Church Bill rather than give way upon
their principal amendments, what would two life
peers—what would the maximum number which can
exist at any time—twenty-eight—avail to prevent
that decision ? The recent majorities in the Upper
against the bill, as large as those in the Lower
-House for it, have been composed of professed
Liberals as well as professed Conservatives. The
truth is that when Liberal politicians get into the
Upper House they undergo so great a change
under the aristocratic influences which surround
them that they unconsciously imbibe ideas alien
from those held by the great bulk of the
nation. In any assembly, therefore, in which the
hereditary element prevails there will always be
a strong bias on the side of Conservatism, et whole-

sale creation of Liberal peers may correct that bias
for a time, and enable a great measure to be
carried; but it will not permanently alter the
character of the assembly, and each fresh enlarge-
ment will render even a temporary alteration more
difficult. No doubt a large infusion of life peers
would be of more avail ; but then it must be a large
infusion, and not the homoeopathic proportion sug-
gested by the Lords themselves.
There is another reason why Lord RussimL's bill
should have been thrown out. If it had passed the
Lords it would have gone down to the Commons at
a time of all others most unfavourable for the con-
sideration of this question. Assuming that the Lords
insist upon having their way with regard to the
Irish Church Bill, the question will then arise,
not in an abstract, but in a very practical
and pressing shape, Which House is to give way
when the two cannot agree ? To have presented
this Life Peerages Bill at such a serious moment
would have been not only to provoke a
very strong manifestation of feeling, but to
invite the embodiment of it in a sweeping measure.
It is quite possible that a great constitutional change
like that which the Peers have had under conside-
ration cannot be brought about except under
pressure and excitement. But we have not yet had
proof of this ; and as we would far rather see so
serious a matter discussed with freedom and calmness
than decided with heat and haste, we would have
it postponed to a more convenient season. It
is still possible that the wisdom which the Peers
shewed in reading the Irish bill a second time may
cause them to see the absurdity of destroying the
measure whose principle theyhave sanctioned. Should
that be the case, there will be abundance of time for
deliberation upon this other great constitutional
question. Should a different result unhappily take
place, it will be no time for considering trivial
reforms like this. Pills will not avail to cure earth-
quakes.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOUBIN.TALS.

The Times observes that notice has been given of at least
two attempts to modify the provisions of the Irish Church
Bill before it is returned to the COMMOUL There will
be an attempt to take another vote on the
principle of the Duke of Cleveland's proposal. Our
opinion in favour of the policy of that proposal
remains unchanged, and it has beenindeed confirmed with
singular unanimity by persons of free and independent
thought, yet we cannot conceal from ourselves that the
suggestion will probably meet the same fate as it expe.
rienced last week. We have reason to believe that the
Cardinal• Legate convened the leading members of the
Roman Catholic Church, and intimated his opinion that
gratitude to the Government for past favours should con-
strain all Catholics to vote for the Ministry on this issue,
and it need not be added that an opinion from such a
quarter is equivalent to a command. If the Ministry
themselves saw in the Duke of Cleveland's proposal
the means of reconciling their own promises with religious
equality, the Catholic peers would support them in accept-
ing it, as otherwise in rejecting it. But, whatever may be the
result on Monday—and Lord Russell declared on Friday
that he had not given up hope—we shall have the satisfac-
tion of knowing that our testimony has been given on the
side of reason, policy, and justice.
The Daily News declares that it would have been well
for themselves if the Peers had considered whither the
path leads in which, in spite of prudent advice, they
persist in marching. Like some incautious mountain
travellers, they may find it narrowing as they advance,
until it leaves them with an abyss at their feet at a
point whence they cannot move forward. The only course
then open to them will be a retreat, which cannot be
dignified, which must be difficult, and which may even
be dangerous. Into such an impasse as this the Lords are
blindly hurrying. Lord Clanricarde sees it to be abso-
lutely impossible that the Government, the House of
Commons, the country should accept the bill which the
Lords have substituted for the original measure. The
Upper House will, then, have two courses before
•it. It must acquiesce in the rejection of its own
amendments ; or it must throw out the bill.
The result will be a new bill, possibly of a more
stringent character than that now before Parliament, and
a new House of Lords devised for the express purpose of
passing it. The constitutional obstacle in the way, not
only of one particular measure, but of the harmonious
action of the two Chambers, will have to be removed by
the creation of new peers. Considerations of wider range
than those arising from the controversy of the present
session point to the necessity of some such step as this.
The Star says that the Government are pledged to
nothing, unless the royal grant glebes of Ulster are treated
by the Peers as part of the general property of the Irish
Church. The discussion made a great impression on those
who heard it, and it left wounds, the rankling of which
may, perhaps, affect the temper of the discussions in the
House of Commons. Be this as it may, it will greatly
cheer the spirits of the country. Lord Denbigh's decla-
ration shed new and welcome light on the
concurrent endowment question, for one thing ; and for
another, Ministers have repelled with indignation the
overtures of those who would induce them to re-endow
the minority Church with millions of money sacred to the
use of the whole Irish people. Opposition Peers have
confessed, by their excitement on the subject of the
Government promise, that they do not rely upon their
numerical strength to secure for the Church any advan-
tage whatever. After all their vapouring, their only hope
lies in a few and slight concessions which the Government
have made.

The Telegraph thinks that the advocates of "concurrent
endowment" cannot read the signs of the times. In the
name of the Irish Roman Catholic Prelates, Lord Denbigh
bluntly told them that no scheme of indiscriminate endow-
ment would be accepted by the Irish Roman Catholic
Church. At another stage of the bill he expressed a dif-
ferent opinion ; but, as explained on Friday night, he bad
then been misinformed, and a council of the Roman
Catholic prelates, which was held the other day,
has set the matter at rest. As for the country,
the Commons, and the Government, their minds are
finally made up on the subject. On no condition will they
sanction religious inequality, and on no condition will they
sanction " concurrent endowment." To borrow an expres-
sion from Mr. Gladstone's speech on the first reading, that
decision is written with a pen of adamant. The more
sweeping the changes which the Peers make in the bill,
the more imperatively are the Commons called upon to
restore the original outlines of the measure.
It is asked, says the Saturday Review, what is to happen
if the Lords insist on their amendments, and whether it
would not be better to have a bill embodying a compro-
mise than no bill at all. What is to be done if the Lords
insist on these amendments may .be discussed if it turns
out that they do insist on them. But the first thing is
to decide whether the bill shall be restored substantially
to its former shape, and be dropped if the Lords will not
accept it in this shape, or whether a till answering none
or scarcely any of the purposes for which Mr. Gladstone
introduced his measure shall be got through, in order that
it may be said a bill of some sort has been made law.
There can, we think, be no hesitation whatever in the
minds of those who approve the bill as orig:nally framed.
Let the bill be dropped altogether for this session rather
than have a bill not worth having. If the Lords wish,
when pressed, to give way, something may be done very
easily to smooth the path of retreat for them. Many
concessions were made by the Government through Lord
Granville while the bill was in committee, and the
amendments which the Lords would have to withdraw
are not at all numerous. They might be allowed
to seem to have done a few good turns for their
clerical friends, provided they quietly reverse such decisions
as that respecting the Ulster glebes, which in the twink-
ling of an eye puts a million of money into the pocket of
the disendowed Church. But there are clear limits to the
possibility of compromise ; and if the Lords really mean
to maintain their theory of the bill against the theory
which has found acceptance with the Commons, the
Government, it is to be hoped, will not waver for an
instant, but will face all the consequences of the bill being
dropped, rather than see their measure deprived of the
greater part of its power of doing good. Mr. Gladstone's
bill must become law if the constituencies support it.
The only question is, whether the issue shall again be
taken directly or in a special autumn session, or early
next year. This is only a matter of detail, although it
would involve some difficult questions which the Ministry
could only decide after ascertaining, as they best could, the
temper of the country. But, at the worst, it could only
involve a delay of a few months, and it would be much
better to wait than to hurry through a bad measure now,
in order to have the poor pleasure of saying that an Irish
Church Bill was really passed before July was over.

The Spcctator declares that the Lords must yield in
conference nearly all they have taken ,in committee, and
so surrender precisely the thing for which they were most
interested, their own appearance of power as an indepen-
dent House. Nor can they wrap themselves up in their
dignity, and say that wisdom and statesmanship have
been defeated by prejudice, for they have brought their
defeat entirely upon themselves. Never was there such
a muddle as their management of business on Friday
se'nnight. The majority changed their leaders half•a-
dozen times in one evening, now voting with Lord Gran-
ville, then with Lord Salisbury, then with Lord Cairns ;
took half an amendment and rejected the other half ; con.
sidered every proposition on the plan of the simpleton
who took about a brick as a specimen of his house; and
generally behaved more like a mob than a great party
acting at a grave crisis. They would neither say what
they wanted, nor let anybody else say it ;
would obey no general, and follow no standard ; but kept
making undisciplined little rushes whenever they saw a
fair chance of plunder, or of flaunting even for a moment
the standard of ascendancy. And all this, while they are
fighting a leader whom they dread at least as much as
they dislike, and who, as they are never tired of saying,
has drilled his army into an obedience almost abject. The
scene in committee has destrDyed all the moral force the
Peers had obtained from the debate on the second reading.
That, no doubt, was a great achievement ; but it was an
achievement carried through by the officers, whom the
rank and file immediately after refused to obey con-
sistently. The Lords who speak may be able revisers of
the Commons' decrees, but the Lords. who vote seem
incapable of conducting business so as to secure the
results they themselves at heart desire. At the last
moment they would not have the very compromise they
wished, and cannot be either surprised or offended if they,
obtain no other.

The John Bull says that the great question of the day
is concurrent endowment. To deny the difficulties of the
:luestiun would be childish. On principle, of course, we,
who object to the alienation of Church property at all,
and who thereforq wish to defeat the bill, do not approve
of it. But having been defeated on the second reading,
the question is, What is the Lest course, on- moral and
religions grounds, now to adopt? We conscientiously
believe that the amendment of the Duke of Cleveland
would have done far less to advance the interests of the
Church of Rome than the scheme of the Government. For
while the bill proposes to devote the money to purely
secular uses—which we believe sacrilegious—it really
places the whole'control of the money in the bands of an
irresponsible priesthood. For who will manage the hos.
pitals, lunatic asylums, and other similar institutions?
Practically the Roman Catholic priests. It is surely pre•
ferable to provide them with suitable residences, and at
the same time to maintain the great principle that money
°nee applied to religiaus use shall not be secularised.
From a purely party point of view, the division on the
Duke of Cleveland's amendment was, no doubt, a fortu•
1140 0114 ; for an APPLALlQAkecontryin_likyour . ot Cone

mrrent endowment would, we admit, have been disastrous.
From a political stanilpoint we sympathise to a great
!xtent with the Protestant feeling of the country, to
which the House of Lords would have given effect had
~hey rejected the bill. We believe that the practical
iffect of the measure will be to establish the Church of
Rome still more firmly in Ireland, and that to leave the
existing Church of Ireland in poverty will still further
sid her. The division on Friday week, no doubt, shews
that the No•Popery cry is still a power in the country,
-sompelling statesmen, for their own purposes, to act
against their convictions ; but when men are induced to
reflect calmly, they willbe convinced that in reality the
Government scheme is more favourable to the secret and
unrestricted influence of Rome than some such scheme as
the Duke of Cleveland's.
The Economist thinks that the prospects of a ne
Bankruptcy Bill becoming law are at length very good.
Another important stage in the progress of the measure
has been completed by its second reading in the House of
Lords ; and the bill ought now to be substantially safe.
Whatever alterations the Peers may make, they are not
likely to go against the principle—the adoption of the
Scotch system as the English mode of bankruptcy pro-
cedure. This was the principle of the last abortive bill
introduced into the House of Lords, and it is so strongly
demanded by the commercial world that there is nothing
else at present that would satisfy those interested. The
bill, as it now comes before the Lords, is also substati.
tinily what it has remained through all the amendments.
The machinery for administering estates in bankruptcy,
and the regulations for the bankrupt's discharge—the
peculiar points in bankruptcy law—are very much what
they were. We retain the doubts we have several times
expressed as to whether the Scotch system will answer
here ; but we are glad to see that the experiment will
have a fair chance under a good working bill. Among
other fortunate circumstances, the new bankruptcy
statute has not been appreciably lengthened in its final
progress through committee, and it will be a compendious
piece of legislation. The steps necessary in bankruptcy
after the bill becomes law will be few and simple. The
first meeting of the creditors follows immediately the
adjudication of bankruptcy, and the trustee and
committee of inspection are appointed at once. There
is no delay of any sort, but the creditors enter
into possession and appoint their administrators
almost as soon as the bankruptcy has been declared.
After that there is no other legal intervention until, the
assets having been collected and distributed, an application
is made to close the bankruptcy. The bankrupt it is true
may apply for his discharge, but that is a separate matter.
The creditors will also know whom to look to for their
dividends. They have first of all the trustee ; but the
trustee's duty to call a meeting of his committee every
three months to audit his accounts and have a dividend
declared, imposes a responsibility upon the members of
that committee too. It seems impossible, under a regula•
tion like this, that the scandal of estates neglected for
years can occur. The matter perhaps will not be wholly
dependent on the creditors. The trustee must forward
every three months to the accountant in bankruptcy the
accounts which he submits to his committee. If the
accountant's audit is not to be a sham, irregularities will
be quickly detected and removed. Of course no such
official supervision will prevent extravagant or careless
management, and it remains to be seen whether English
creditors will shew unwonted vigilance about small money
under the stimulus of the present law.