The Sun.
London, England, 1858-03-09 00:00:00

THE RE-ELECTIONS.

NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE.-RETURN OF MR.

ADDERLEY.

The re-election of the Right Hon. C. B. Adderley.,
whose seat had been forfeited by his acceptance of the
office of President of the Council of Education, took
place yesterday, at Stafford.
The hon. gentleman arrived at Stafford by the 10
o'clock train, and a carriage and four awaiting him at
the railway station, he was conveyed to the Crown Court,
at the County Hall, where the Under Sheriff (Mr.
Hand) and some half-dozen of the county gentry awaited
him. In the body of the ball there were not more than
20 :r 30 p-,rsonz:, r.,..l,Nithstal-ding that it w the com-
mission day for the assizes, so little interest did the
election proceedings excite.
Hs GO METNELL INGRA}t, Esq., of Hoare-cross, i❑
a few brief sentences, placed Mr. Adderley in nomina-
tion as a fit and proper person to represent the division
in Parliament.

Viscount INGESTRE, M.P., seconded the nomination.
No other candidate having been proposed, the Under
Sheriff declared Mr. Adderley duly elected.
Mr. ADDERLEY then proceeded to return thanks. In
doing so, he observed that, although the assembly was
on that occasion a limited one, yet he was desirous of
referring briefly to she circumstances under which he
had had the honour of being re-elected as their repre-
sentative in Parliament. When he last stood before
thorn for re-election he had been found fault with by
some of his old supporters for the part he had taken in
the vote censuring Lord Palmerston for the mode in
which he had vindicated the honour of England by chas-
tising the Chinese. (Hear.) He was now amongst
them in conseqnence of another vote of censure on the
noble lord, for letting down the honour of England in
the estimation of foreign powers, and at the suggestion
of a power with whom we were in alliance. He himself
firmly believed that the large majority of the English
people sympathised with both those votes which he had
given, and would condemn the rough tyranny of a great
nation over a barbarous people on the one hand, and the
mean timidity displayed by a great power in correspon-
dence with an equal power on the other. (Hear.) Of
this he was quite certain—France herself was far too
chivalrous to entertain any respect for a friendship
sought to be maintained at the sacrifice of honour.
(Hear.) He hoped that there was not a man in Stafford.
shire whose blood did not boil, as his own did, when he
read the menace held out by the French Minister to-
wards this country, and when he saw the English Mini-
ster ready to truckle to it, and seeking to soften it
merely by private explanation. Let them, as Stafford-
shire men, observe all those gentlemen of the county
who were foremost to rally round the late Premier with
the cry of " Palmerston and the honour of England," on
the occasion of the last election ; he alluded especialy
to the movers of his opponent on that occasion, Sir
Robert Peel and Mr. Bass, and to many others—
who had now been, as they foretold they would, the
first to forsake Lord Palmerston when they found
that the honour of England lay in another direction.
(Hear, hear.) As to France, she had already shown that
she in no way depreciated the feeling of this country, and
the expressions that had been made use of since the fall
of Lord Palmerston. They might depend upon it that
the friendship between the two countries would be none
the weaker by being maintained with honour on both
sides. We should be doubly anxious to acquit ourselves
of any possible abuse, by foreign assassins, of our na-
tional asylum, and France would have double confidence
in the integrity of an ally who bad •not been afraid to
show its sensitiveness to its own honour. (Hear.) It
was the noble apology made by the Emperor of the
French which induced him as well as others to vote for
the introduction of the Conspiracy Bill. The vote of
censure which had been passed on Lord Palmerston
would in no way interfere with the progress of that bill.
But now they had justly censured the late prime minis-
ter, he hoped they should meet the apology of the Em-
peror of the French in a similar noble spirit, and that
they should be enabled calmly and fully to deal with
the conspiracy laws. (Rear, hear.) Now it had been
said that the conservative party had shown great folly
by their eagerness to depose Lord Palmerston, and that
if they had waited a few days longer there was a worse
fall before him inevitable. Now, as to that, it was clear
this occasion was not sought, nor even expected, and
still less wished for by the Conservative party • but when
the vote was proposed—a vote of censure for conduot
which they had already censured—it could not be ex-
pected that they should stultify their previously expressed
opinion, or that they should move the previous question,
and so get rid of the matter, for such a motion
would have been fatal to the measure. (Hear, hear.)
He would next state very shortly his own vie we on
the two great questions now before parliament. In the
first place with regard to the India reform, he should
personally have no occasion to alter his course. He voted
for the introduction of the bill of the late govern.
merit, intending to support certain amendments in
committee as to the construction of the council;; and
he should therefore have to continue precisely the same
course. It was quite clear to him that the whole of that
question had been greatly misunderstood. The celebrated
petition of the company was a tissue of fallacies, and the
misrepresentations of the opponents of the bill showed
how grievously the opposition had been conducted. It
was represented as effecting a total revolution of the
government of India ; whereas it amounted to nothing
more than a complement or completion of legislation
since the year 1774: Every measure passed since that
period had gradually done away, fits: with the commer-
cial, and secondly with the political monopoly of the
company—ha thrown open the commerce of the coun-
try to the world, placing the government under the con-
trol of the Crown. Tais measure, therefore, was simply
the completion of what had already been begon. In
future, let theta bear in mind that the government of
India must almost entirely be conducted, not in Down-
ing-street, nor in Leadenhall-street, nor yet in Cannon.
row, but in Calcutta. (Hear.) The right hon. gentle-
man, in connexion with this subject, referred to the
importance of all questions requiring decisive and prompt
answers being settled on the spot, instead of being
referred to the complicated tribunal of a double 'office
between the two ends of London. The two grand
desiderata in connexion with the future administration.
of the affairs of India were a special training for the
military service of India, and open promotion, securing
the patronage of India from home jobbery. (Hoar.)
With regard to the other great question of the day, that
of a new measure of reform, he might state as his own
firm conviction that the promise of a political reform bill
was far more real coming from Lord Derby than it was
from the late Government. (Hear.) He had himself
come to the conclusion that it was a political juggle
between Lord Palmerston and Lord J. Russell who made
promises not to be fulfilled—who were like two thine-
blare, each anxious to make the country believe the pea
was under his thimble, in the .hope that the country
would take one of o:tein up. (Laughter.) But Lord Derby
gavo them a distinct promise that nextyeara bill would be
introduced which would prove to be more real and valid.
For himself he (Mr. Adderley) could only repeat as his
own general principles on this subject what he had told
them before. He conceived that in a free courtry like
this admission to the franchise ought to be the rule, and
exclusion the exception, and as property and intelligence
spread, the possession of the political franchise should
spread, pari paean. It was said that Lord Derby was
not likely to introduce such a measure as the " true
reformers," as they were called, would• have brought
forward. Now he had a distrust of the so-called class
of reformers ; they were mere theorists as politicians.
They were men who were ready to square the institu-
tions of the country with their own theory of what was
right, and they were prepared with a model of their own
—namely, America, by which they would by a very
royal process of their own square them. He bad little
confidence in those who recently met in London, the
leader of whom expressed his opiu:on that the represen-
tation of this couniry should be in exact proportion to
the population, however distributed. Why, this would
give to Leedon one-tenth of the representation, and
would exclude Scotland altogether from even " entering
an appearance," as lawyers termed it, at all. (Rear.)
He (alr. Adderley) had much more faith in men who
had a share of sympathy with the question, men whose
opinions were net likely to be abstractedly perfect, per-
haps, but much more acceptable to the country. (Hear.)
Having now disposed of all he had to say to them on
political matters, he would conclude by expressing kis
own gratification that he, their old servant of 17 years,
had been honoured by promotion in station, and he
must say that the office Lord Derby had been kind
enough to place him in was, at all events, the one which
he felt least unfit to undertake. When, however, he
came to give an aocount of what he had done in that
office, he might, he trusted, be able to show that he had
neither neglected or abused the trust.
Mr. Adderley resumed his, seat amidst prolonged ap-
plause.
A. vote of /thanks to the under-sheriff concluded the
business of the election.

NORTH LEICESTERSHIRE.
RETURN OF LORD JOHN MANNERS.

The re-election of Lord John Manners, after his
aoceptance of the office of Chief Commissioner of Public
Works, took place before the Tows,-gall, Loughborough,
yesterday. Tkere was not a very large attendance of
farmers, although the county gentry and the non-electors
were well represented.
Sir G. BEAUMONT, Bart., proposed, and Sir G. J.
PALMER, Bart., seconded, Lord John Manners.
Mr. C. H. FREWEN then, as a freeholder of the county,
begged the opportunity of saying a few words' explanatory
of his motive for retiring from the contest. Upon hearing
that Lord J. Manners had accepted a seas in the Go-
vernment he issued his address, and communicated with
numerous friends who had supported him on a former
occasion. From many of these he received answers
recommending him not to persevere in the contest on
the present occasion, and in deference to that feeling he
deemed it his duty to withdraw, though he disclaimed
that he ever had any idea of opposing Lord Derby's
Government in stepping forward to eppose the noble
lord who had accepted a subordinate office in that
Government. Respecting reform, he would observe
that Lord John Russell had brought in a new reform
bill, which was withdrawn ; Lord Palmerston bad pro-
mised a reform bid, but was turned out before he fulfilled
his promise ; and now Lord Dzby promised that it was
a matter which sh,uld receive attention. He believed
that there were members of the present Government
who were quite prepared to give this question a fair and
liberal consideration. (Hear, hear.) Mr. Disraeli, for
one, and Lord Stanley, for another. The feeling of the
country was such that it was utterly impossible for any
Government to resist a new reform bill. (Applause.) He
thought it was only a fair and reasonable course that
they should give the new Government a fair trial. He
advocated that in any measure of reform which was
introduced, they sheuid go beck to the old plan of not
dividing the counties. In the new plan some divisions
of counties were thrown entirely into the hands of
members of aristocratic houses.

Rev. E. STzvENBQN, a Baptist minister, asked Lord