The Sun.
London, England, 1832-03-09 00:00:00

on them to go into a Comtnittee without some ex-
planation. The Government had committed a mistake,
but it was not the first they had been guilty of in con-
nection with the question. They had,-19 it was rightly
observed by the Right Hon. Baronet, the M-mber fear
Tamworth,—been guilty of an error in alluding to the sub-
ject in the Speech from the Throne, without being pre-
pared with some specific proposition to submit to their
immediate consideration. The next mistake they hat
fallen into was the appointment of a Committee which, al-
though composed of men of the highest capacity and un-
doubted worth anti honour, did not include a single Ca-
tholic—( Hear, hear)—a single member of that religious
party which was so deeply interested in the result of thiir
inquiries. The members of the Committee were at the
same time men so devotedly attached to the Constitution
in Church and State as it stood—the majority of them
were so thoroughly convinced that the property of the
Church was as inalienable as any other property in the
State,—that their recommendations could not be looked on
with confidence or saisfaction by the people of Ireland.
(Hear.) The Right Hon. Gentleman had made out no
case for the Committee for which he vked, nor had he
given the House any explanation as to the nature of the
measures which he intended to call on that Committee
to approve. But if it was the intention of the Right
Hon. Gentleman to propose resolutions which should
be made the foundation of coercive measures, without at
the same time recommending the removal of the grievances
which oppressed the Irish people, he (Mr. Wallace) would
oppose such resolutions, because the compact would be
broken by which the Government had pledged themselves
that they would adopt no measitre of co-rcion unaccom-
panied by measures of reme:ly and conciliation.—( Hear,
hear.) He could Lot have supposed that, atter the Mini-
sters had so pledged themselves, they would have come
down that night with a proposition tin- going into Com-
mittee, not fur the remedy of grievances, but solely to
pledge the House to a measure of coercion.—(Hear, hear.)
Amongst the witnesses examined by the Committee, whose
re port had been laid on the table, was the Rev. Dr. Doyle;
and that gentleman,—than whom there was no man who
brought to the consideration of the question greater ability,
a more honest judgment, or more accurate knowledge of
the condition and of the feelings of the people of Ireland,—
said, in reference to the resistance of tithe., that he would
rather give up his last table, his last chair, or even his
life, than pay tithts —(Hear, bear.) Such was the opi-
nion of that gentleman. But, he added, that the resist-
ance which he would offer to their payment would be
passive, not active; and that the people for the moat part
would offer none other. Was the testimony of that gentle-
man of no value? and was it fit that it should be withheld
from the House ?—(Hear.) Was it fit that they should be
called on to legislate on so important a subject when they
had before them no part of the evidence that had been taken
respecting it? Would the House grant the Committee
whilst it was in the dark as to the measures which the
Right Hsneurahle Gentleman meant to submit to it, and
as to the evidence upon which those measures were
founded ?—(Cheers.) The only means which the House
at present possessed of forming an opinion as to the in-
tended propositions of the Right Hon. Gentleman were
furnished by the report of the Committee ; and to judge
of them from that, be (Mr. Wallace.) would say, that evils
incalculable might follow from the course width the Ricbt
Hon. Gentlemsn was taking. He apprehended that there
was in the report an exact specification of the measures
which he (Mr. Stanley) intended to propose. He ap-
prehended that it was intended to give the clergy a re-
medy against tie persons of those who neglected or re-
fused to pay tithes, and to give that remedy, riot accord-
ing to the usual form of the law, but by a summary pro-
cess, upon the affidavit of the clergyman claiming the
tithe, or of the tithe proctor—
Mr. STANLEY reminded the Hon. and Learned
Gentleman that he was somewhat irregular in going into
the discussion of a question which was not before the
House. Besides, the Hon. and Learned Gentleman was
stating as the measure of the Government that which was
not their measure.—(Cheers.)

Mr. WALLACE thanked the Right Hon. Gentleman
for having set him right. But if he bad followed the I
usual course in moving for the Committee, he (Mr. Wal-
lace) would not have fallen into error.—(Hear.) He was
compelled to argue without documents, which ought to
have been before the House when the Right Hon. Gentle-
man made his motion. But in the absence of the infor-
mation which be ought to have, he woulo be satisfied to
hear a statement of the Right Hon. Gentleman's measure,
and if the Right Hon. Gentleman would make the state-
ment, he (Mr. Wullace) would sit down cheerfully to hear it.
(Cheers, and cries of " Oh, oh.") From all the informa-
tion which he possessed, he must infer that it was the in •
tention of the Government to act upon the advice of their
legal advisers in Ireland, who, in their evidence before the
Committee, had stated that it was necessary to give the
clergy a personal remedy against those who refused to pay
tithes.—(Hear.)
Mr. H. GRATTAN regretted that he was obliged to
oppose his Majesty's Ministers on the question before the
House. But they were wrong in going into the Com-
mittee without having first given the House an intimation
of the measures which they would propose ; and they
were still more wrong in the measures, which, it was to
he supposed, from the only information before the House,
they intended to adopt. He objected altogether to the re-
commendations of the Committee in their report. He
objected to the summary remedy which they proposed to
give to the clergy against those who owed tithe, and he
objected to the plan which they proposed to substitute for
the present system of tithes. He was sure that such a
plan would give no satisfaction to the people of Ireland,
and he, for his part,would support no plan less effectual than
that of his Noble Friend the Member for Armagh. There
never was a report—even in the times when the most
virulent party spirit raged, and the must virulent party
had power—there never was a report returned to the
House more pregnant with mischief than that of the last
Tithe Committee.—(Cheers.) The gracious Speech of his
Majesty at the opening of the session recommended the
removal of grievances; and how was that recommendation
followed up ? By a report which recommended that the
law of the land should be superseded ; and that a process
as arbitrary as that of martial law should be substituted
in its stead.—(Cheers.) Did the Right Hon. Gentleman
suppose that the people of Ireland were so ignorant of the
history of their country—so ignorant of their own rights—
that they would lie down quietly in submission to such a
measure ? The gentlemen of Ireland could never fare
their constituents if they consented to go into a Committee
for the purpose of confirming a report which recommended,
amongst other things scarcely less unjust, that the landlords
of Ireland should be made the collectors of a tax for the
support of the parochial clergy only, and ml for the ori-
ginal purposes of tithes—the support of the poor, the
Church, the Bishop, and the incumbent.—(Hear, hear.)
For his part, he would pay the money out of his own
purse, or he would consent to a tax upon his land for the
relief of the distressed clergy, if that tax were to be
ap-
plied to the original purposes of tithe, upon the demise of
the present incumbents.—(Cheers.)
Lord EBRINGTON would not follow the Hen. Gen-
tleman who last addressed the House through the whole
range of his observations; but, as a Member of the Com-
mittee, he felt called upon to state the grounds upon which
he had agreed to the report which had been presented to
the House. Before he proceeded to do so. he wished to
state, that in one observation only of his Hon. Friend be-
low him (Mr. Brownlow) he entirely concurred ; that is,
respecting the unfortunate anomaly which the Church of
olusvgoh 1
chieflyiedni
sr reform Ireland presented.—(Hear, hear.) Ile would not think
d
anything a final settlement of the question which attempted
techti onel
he saw
rtuuesgeraxrdy::
hl
tufot exclude
ahratteelht
therefore,
oeiluic:nuseoaedrn:sso—ahai dinarer(seerrutcali
ettgesiii
Ireland.—(Hear,
winngo.ehrf
beo'rypn sawßrtooi ol
Roman
ae thehne
f
eeasaarpit.aha)roi
to the number of Protestants under their care ; and when
Catholics, he looked upon the system as pregnant with
uTn(hHereaor;
so disproportionate to their congregations; and he should
be glad to see some Inure just distribution of the revenues
thel ea r
clergy
Using
the Church, such as would afford a more adequate
provision for the working clergy—(Hear]—and be ebould
also be glad to see a state of things in which no part
of the revenues of the Church would be diverted Isom
the use of the Church.—(Hear, hear.) lie could think
no settlement of the existing complaints satisfactory,
which, with a due regard to all existing interestms--an fof
God forbid that they should attempt to strip
A anyntemplate
that which of right belonged to him)—di- not cuodition bet-
the reduction of the Church of Ireland to
acondition
inhabi-
ter proportioned to the wants of the Protestantthe
many
' dependently o
tants.— (Hear, bear.) But, in
any immediate
obstructions which stood in the way o thought that
desirable ends, he .
arrangement for those so
within the province of
such an arrangement did not COMIC
is not the wish of the
the Select Committee. It certainly
at present belong-
Committee that any part of the revenue
ockets of the lead-
ing to the Church should go into thelempen in that House
lords; and he would ask the Gent
who were connected with Ireland, whether it was not the
wish of a great proportion of those who encouraged the
present resistance to tithes,
toappropriate the amount to
the Member for themselves? Now his lion. Friend,Ar-
magh, had admitted that the Protestant clergy in Ireland
were placed in a lowa
• tion of great difficulty and distress,
and even of danger; and, under those circumstances, it
was not too much that the Committee should have recom-
mended a law to enable them to recover so much of tltd