The Sun.
London, England, 1866-07-20 00:00:00

T E SUN LONDON, FRIDAY VENING, JULY 20, 1866.

COURT OF COMMON COUNCIL.

Yesterday a meeting of the Common Council was
held at Guildhall, the Lord Mayor in the chair.

THE VISIT OF THE KING AND QUEEN OF THE

BELGIANS TO THE CITY.

Mr. Alderman and Sheriff Gibbons, adverting to
the visit of the King and Queen of the Belgians,
suggested that a circumstance so gratifying deserved
mention in the records of the corporation. He there-
fore moved, " That this court desires to record the
expression of its satisfaction at the honour conferred
upon the City of London by the acceptance by their
Majesties the King and Queen of the Belgians, and
by their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess
of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh, of an invita-
tion from the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor to a
banquet at the Mansion House of this City, on Fri-
day, the 6th of July inst."
The motion was seconded by Mr. KELDAY, the
chairman of the Guildhall improvement committee,
who took occasion to refer to the dignified manner
in which the Lord Mayor had dispensed the hospi-
talities of the Mansion House on an occasion which
would always be memorablein the annals of the city.
Mr. ANDERTON thought the Lord Mayor was
eminently entitled to the thanks of the citizens of
London for having entertained their Majesties on
the occasion. (Hear, hear.)
The motion was then put, and carried with ac-
clamation.

THE MANSION-HOUSE RELIEF COMMITTEE.
A letter addressed to the Lord Mayor by the Rev.
William Henry Jones, vicar of Mottram, in Long-
dendale, Lancashire, and secretary to one of the
local relief committees during the cotton famine,
as read by the town clerk. Mr. Jones was de-
puted, by a committee organised for the purpose, to
ask permission of the Court of Common Council to
erect a handsome stained glass window at the east
end of the Guildhall, as "an offering of gratitude
on the part of the operatives of the cotton manu-
facturing districts of England to the Lord Mayor
and the Mansion-house relief committee, and therein
to their benevolent friends throughout the world,
for their timely and long continued succour rendered
to them during a period of unexampled industrial
distress."
The offer was thankfully accepted, and it was re-
ferred to the Guildhall improvement committee to
superintend the erection of the proposed memorial.
THE REFORM MEETING IN GUILDHALL.

A petition, signed by Mr. Olnlond Bales, the pre-
sident, Mr. Nicholay, the treasurer, and Mr. George
Howell, secretary, on behalf of the executive com-
mittee and other members of the National Reform
League, was read, soliciting the use of the Guildhall
on such evening as might be convenient in the next
or following week for a meeting of the electors and
non-electors of the City of London, " desirous of
constitutionally and peaceably expressing their de-
sire to participate in the right of voting for the re-
presentatives of the people in Parliament."
A petition containing a similar request was pre-
sented from the London Working Men's Association,
signed byMr. G. Potter, president, and Mr. R. Hart-
well, secretary. They stated that the association
consisted principally of skilled artisans, whose objects
were the political enfranchisement and social ele-
vation of the industrial classes, that the offices of the
association were in the City of London, and that a
large number of the members were either resident or
followed their usual occupation within its bounda-
ries. Their object, they said, was to convene a pub-
lic meeting of the working men of the City of Lon-
don to enable them to express an opinion on the
question of parliamentary reform at the present
political crisis ; that they had agreed to convene an
open-air meeting in this city, but, understanding
there was some objection to such a course by the
city authorities, they had applied for permission to
hold a meeting for the purpcse in the Guildhall on
the evening of the Ist of August.
The prayer of the petitioners was supported by
Mr. J. Richardson, Mr. Rudkin, Mr. Deputy Fry,
Mr. Alderman Lusk, M.P., Mr. Deputy C. Reed,
and Mr. Deputy Elliott, among others, on the
grounds chiefly that it was reasonable in itself, that
the mode of meeting sought by them was constitu-
tional, and especially deserved the sanction of the
civic authorities, seeing that the petitioners, in de-
ference to them, bad abandoned the intention of
holding an open-air meeting in the City ; that the
hall itself, from the very name of the " moot"

by which it sometimes went, was available for such a
purpose, as a place where in ancient times public
grievances and questions had been mooted and dis-
cussed, and that the corporation of London through-
out its whole history had been prominently iden-
tified with popular freedom.

Mr. Alderman ROSE, on the other hand, reminded
the court that it was the privilege of the Lord
Mayor to preside at all public meetings in the Guild-
hall, and he asked if the Lord Mayor was to preside
at the meeting which was asked? If the Lord Mayor
was not, would the chairman be a person who by his
position and influence could command order in such
a meeting ; and would it, above all, be a meeting
for free discussion ? That very day he had seen walls
placarded with a notification, with routes indicated,
of an organised
and
banners, oprocession,
accompanied by bands
of music h were to pass through
ors, which
various parts of London at night to Hyde-park, and
there to hold an open-air meeting on Monday next.
He looked upon that as a demonstration intended to
overawe the Government, andas an unconstitutional
and illegal proceeding. He objected to a meeting
such as was in contemplation by the memorialists
being convened in Guildhall, because it was to take
place in the evening when all men of business would
probably have gone to their homes in the suburbs.
If the Lord Mayor was to preside over such a meet-

_ .
ing that circumstance would be a guarantee for order,
and he (Alderman Rose) would be content ; but if
not, and the meeting should be held, there should
be a responsible chairman likely to maintain order
and to afford facilities for a free discussion. (Hear.)
Mr. BANISTER stated, as a circumstance wcrthy
consideration in connection with the application for
the use of the hall, that the proposed meeting was to
take place, if the hall should be granted, on the very
evening on which the Lord May or would entertain
her Majesty's Ministers at the Mansion House.

Mr. H. L. TAYLOR did not complain of working
men endeavouring to obtain the franchise, but he
contended that the corporation of London should
hold itself entirely aloof from all political partisan-

ship, and endeavour to steer oleai of any collision
with the' Government of the day. He reminded the
court, besides, that the hall had recently been re-

stored and embellished at vast expense, and it might

be exposed to some risk by a great public meeting
being held in it at night.
Mr. Deputy C. REED, in reply, argued that the
corporation of London had always stood by the
working classes, and he could not conceive upon
what ground it should now turn round and deny a
reasonable request from men who were precluded
from meeting in
the public streets, and who, in the
very desire to procure the use of the hall, which had

been used for political discussion times without num-

ber, sought to place themselves under some rule.
Mr. Deputy ELLIOTT observed that the liberties
of England had been saved before now by the corpo-

rationof London, and he should have beenpleased if
the request of the petitioners bad been granted with
a good grace. If it should be refused there would
be a stronger argument in favour of reform than now

existed. No man was more opposed to this so-called

reform than he, but perhaps he was wrong in that
respect, and he would not prevent tile memorialists
having their " say," provided they demeaned them-
selves with order and propriety.
Eventually a motion to the effect that the prayer
of the petitioners be granted, and that the proposed
meeting be held on a day, and subject to regulations
to be prescribed by the City Lands Committee, was
carried on a dvision by a majority of 25 in a court
of 89 members.

DONATIONS OF THE CORPORATION.
On the recommendation of the Coal, Corn, and
Finance Committee the Court voted £2lO towards
the restoration of the church of St. Bartholomew
the Great in Smithfield, and £lO5 to the City
Orthopaedic Hospital.
The Court then adjourned.