The Sun.
London, England, 1832-03-19 00:00:00

tremblingly alive to the consequences of a second
blunder of his administration respecting the disposi-
tions of the Upper House. The effect of the mis-
•ake of last year has been grievously felt throughout
the couny4 ; and another miscalculation would drive
the peck to absolute despair. There is no dis
guising the fact, that though the people coefitle in the
good intentions of Ministers, they yet have not the
s,-Ine confidence in their moral courage. They be-
reve them to be much more eager to stand well
with the caste to which they belong, much more
afraid of the sneers of fashionable coteries, than alive
to the opinions and wishes of the people. The
people cannot of course know precisely the-means
by which Ministers hope to carry the Reform
Bill. But the people know that a majority of
the House of Peers, of 41, have already declared
them•elves hostile to the Bill; they believe that the
chance Is much greater that the Peers will succeed in
deceiving .misters, than the Ministers will succeed
in gaining over Peers; and with the prospect of
convulsion staring them in the face as the conse-
quence of a second failure, they may well be excused
for wishing that an end were put to their apprehen-
sions by an exercise of the prerogative which would
secure the passing of the Bill through the Upper
House. Among the publications on the subject of the
exercise of the prerogative, we havealready noticed an
able pamphlet by Mr. Allan. We have just received
an early copy of one about to be published, without
the name of the author, under the title of " The
Prerogative of creating Peers," highly distinguished
for extent of Constitutional learning, and soundness
of argument. The author has succinctly traced the
English Constitution through its incessant changes
to the last great changes by which this great
country has been enslaved by a caste, whose prede-
minance has prevented our municipal institutions
from accommodating themselves to the new wants'of
soc'ety. It is only accidentally that the Peers
have obtained their present authority over the
Commons ;
" The Lords (observes our author) anciently had no'
pryer over the constitution of the House of Commons,
which was long exclusively vested in the Crown. The
. .

Articles of the Scotch and Irish Unions (which determined
the relative proportions of the representative body), first
gave the Peers a virtual right to l.gi-late on the Represen-
tation, o Kish can now only be changed by Act of Parlia-
ment, and net as formerly by the King's Writ and Char-
ters. The Commons have still no power whatever over
the rights of the Peerage, or on the writs returnkble in the
House of Lords, and they formerly jealously exclu.led the
Pteri from exerciing any power over their rights."
With respect to the prerogative of creating
Peers, the writer shows, from a host of authorities
of the most distinguished names since the ReKlu-
tion, that conjectures like the present give its pecu-
liar value to the prerogative of creating Peers. Sir
Robert Walpole was one of the most strenuous of
the opponents of the attempt to limit the exercise
of the prerogative in 1718-19, and one of the
pamphlets of that day is ascribed to him by the
late learned Mr. Hargrave. Some of the arguments
of Walpole in this pamphlet are peculiarly appli-
cable to the present crisis

" If this preroptive (be says) is taken away, the House
of Lords will be a fixed independent Lady, not to be c ailed
to an account like a Ministry, nor to be dissolved or
changed like a House of Commons. The same men will
meet again with the same resolutions, and probably height-
ened by disappointment, and nothing can stand before
them. If their Lordships should take it into their thoughts
to dislike the Ministry, and commit them to prison, I
would willingly know who should fetch them out. Or, if

the House of Commons should be so unwary as to give
them offence, and their Lordships think fit to ,feclare they
could act no longer in concert with a body who had used

them ill, it is evident the Crown must exert its authority
to choose another more to their Lordships' fancy, and after-
wards use its utmost efforts to keep them in a becoming
complaisance to their bettors. If they should resolve to
have all the great employments in England in themselves
and families or should take a collceit to be like the No-
bles of some other countries, to pay no taxes themselves,
and yet receive the greatest part of what is paid by others
in salaries and pensions; I would ask the advocates of such
a I,w, what recourse the Crown and people have? and I
shrewdly suspect they will propose no other than what the
Commons of Denmark made use of upon the very same
occasion."

The point was agitated during the two Regency
questions, in consequence of the limitations of the
power 9f creating Peers, introduced by Mr. Pitt,
and aPerwards by Mr. Percival in imitation of him.
Fox, Burke, Sheridan, Lords Grey, Lansdowne,
Holland, &c. strongly contended that for the work-
ing of the Constitution the unrestrained exercise of
the prerogative of creating Peers was indispensible.
They all assumed that the end and object of all Go-
vernment ought to be the good of the people; that
the prerogative was a trust for the good of the peo-
ple; that when the Commons are at variance with
the nation, the Constitution has provided a remedy
by appealing to the people ; that when the King,
the Commons, and the people are agreed, and the
House of Peers opposed to them, the exercise of the
prerogative by creating Peers can alone rerore ha:-
niony. A Mr. Joliff has, in the debate on the R,2-
gency, ably summed up the most strik;ng points
urged on this important question.---" The limiting
that prerogative (he said) was to vest in one part of
the Legislature the whole legislative capacity of the
kingdom. The reasons for this prerogative were
two ; the one to enable the Sovereign to reward
merit, and bestow favours on the deserving ; the
other, to prevent a combination in the House of
Peers, which might subvert the very Monarchy
it-
self." We may observe, that in all the divisions in
1811 against the limiting the exercise of the pre-
rogative, his present Majesty,
William IV., voted
for the people, and that he headed a brief and Con-
stitutional Protest on the Journals of the House of
Lords. After showing the purposes for which the
prerogative of creating Peers is given, the writer
proceeds to show the present expediency of using
the Royal prerogative; the extent to which its exer-
cise is essential to the liberties, and therefore to the
happiness of the people.
" Excepting (be observes) in the practical intlu-nce
and superior power of public opinion, the House of Com-
mons bas become annually less a Representative of the
People. The Lower House has been in a great degree a
creature of the Aristocracy and Peers. It has been rem-
eered by its septennial duration independent of the people,
and dependent on the other two Estates of the Realm ;
and has all the properties of a standing Senate. The
qualification of the elected has been limited and periodi-
cally abridged. The Franchise has been practically raised
and subverted. The Representation of the Nation has
been a trade. The Electors and Representatives compute
the utmost a septennial prostitution and service will re-
pay ; and when the Legislature has deb ised the people—
when a thousand millions sterling have been expended in
misgovernment and corruption, and comparatively nothing
for our moral and intellectual interests.—we are denounced
as unworthy the trust of pager and liberty ! Assuredly the
people could not govern themselves worse, and the domi-
nion of misrepresentation has miraculously so long existed.
'Tis Avarice all, Ambition is no more!'

Prerogative has been supported by Influence—Representa-
tion by Nomination—Liberty by Corruption. The fortu-
nate principles of the Gmstitutior. enabled Lord Grey to
redeem his c runtry, and to save the nation from anarchy
and revolution. Will he have the sagacity and moral for
titude to perceive the crisis of the Constitution? Will be
triumph over Aristocratic prejudice, and view with a phi-
losophic eye the state of society? Will Lord Grey substi-
tute the Statesman for the Peer? Will he resist the routine
and conventional reasoning of an Order ?'"
The writer arrives at the conclusion that " a creation
of Peers is essential to the final success of the great object
and pledge of the Administration : it is the ONLY Consti-
tutional means; a creation of Peers can alone realize the
The late House
of c
"uninfluenced by the value and promises of a Reformed Parliament, and alone
p r es eormv et;itohne
sMonarch
observes,and
the Peer ; g
e "
Govern-
ment, and unawed by the Royal prerogative of dissolution
suspended over them, long deluded the Ministry with vain
hopes of success. Can Lord Grey look back on his Majority
of One, 4;r on Vie Motion of General Gascoyne, and for a
moment calculate the fate of the details of his great measure
in that balanced House ofCommons? Will it afford him
no index, no polar star, to his present chances in an Here-
ditary Chamber of Legislators? Lord Grey has redeemed
his pledge of reviving, i i the present Session a measure
' equ.illy efficient,' viz. a Reform Bill equally objection-
able to that House which cast out its predecessor. Has
Lord Grey erected a bridge by which any considerable
number of dissentient Peers can pass to his side ? Can
any reflecting politician hope, much less expect, that a
majority of forty-one, who refused to consider the Bill,