The Sun.
London, England, 1844-07-11 00:00:00

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inimulta

LONDOIA , THURSDAY, JULY 11, 1844.

In the House of Lords the pleadings in the writ of
error relative to the Irish State Trials, were brought
to a close a lit tI before three o'clock, and their
Lordships adjourn 4 till this day, when the Judges
will deliver their of inion, and the appeal be finally
decided-

The Commons met at twelve o'clock, and went
into Committee on the ;:ioint-stock Companies Regis-
tration and Regulation Dill. A number of clauses
were adopted, and the Bill was ordered to be re-
committed on Friday.
.1. brief conversation took place between Sir C.
Nap: ER and Sir G. COCKBURN relative to the state of
the navy, but it led to no result.
Mr. T. DUNCOMBE asked whether any arrange-
ments had been made for giving judgment in the,
Irish State Trials this session.

The SoLI.'•ITOR-GExrIAL said he knew nothing of
the impression. made on the minds of the Judges by
the arguments, and he could give no information
about the final decision.
The Field Gardens Bill was read a second time,
and ordered to be committed on Wednesday.
The Court of Arches Bill was rejected by a.
majority of 30 to 17.
On the order of the day being read for the com-
mittal of the Gambling on Race Course Bill, Mr.
CIIRISTIE moved that CHARLES J. RUSSELL be heard
at the bar against the,Bill. The motion was rejected
by a majority of 30 to 14.
Mr. CHRISTIE then movel that the Bill be com-
mitted that day three months.

A lengthened conversation—for it could not be
called a debate—ensued, which may be interesting to
gamblers.
After a division the Bill went through Committee.
The House resumed. The report to be brought up
this day.
The Sudbury Disfranchisement Bill went through
Committee. To he reported this day.
The House was then counted out.

a The Dublin Pilot gives an account of the present
condition of Toryism in Ireland, which is anything
but encouraging to the professors of that egregious
political faith. " The once Orange north," says our
Contemporary, " has hardly made a manifestation on
its favourite anniversary. The Conservative Society
is dissolved, Tri fact, instead of a stimulated Tory

agitation at present, never was there a time when
Toryism was so divided, so doubtful in its adherence,
or when so many of its best spirits were hanging
loose, or totally estranged from the craft. The causes
of this are fully as important as the fact itself. Every
day the Protestants are suffer ing in common with the
Catholics from the neglect and injustice done the
country, and the deterioration consequent on both;
and they have at length begun, with their Catholic
brethren, to discover the cause. The Repeal agita-
tion, therefore, is now looked upon by almost all
Protestants with indulgence ; by many with approval,
as at least preventing the total neglect of Ireland;
and by some, and these not a few, with cordial con-
currence." The cold, distrustful, and desponding tone
adopted by the majority of the Irish Tory journals
for some time past, warrants the belief that there is
much truth in the above remarks of our Dublin Con-
temporary. But not only in the sister country is
genuine Toryism in a state of all but complete
paralysis; here, in England, it is at an equally low
ebb, dissatisfied with the present, doubtful of the
future, having no faith in the sincerity of the Go-
vernment, none in the sympathies of the people, and
scarcely any even in itself. Even in its mitigated
shape of Conservatism, it is utterly without boldness
and confidence, and being compelled from the pres-
sure of inexorable necessity to give in its adhesion to
a chief on whom it places little or no reliance—know-
ing well that he will send it to the right-about the first
convenient opportunity—it is filled with all sorts of
gloomy forebodings, and in sullen resignation awaits
the hour that shall see it numbered among the things
that once were. We rejoice at the contemplation
of this inevitable issue, for none can deny that modern
Toryism, or Conservatism—or whatever other alias
it may please to assume—is at best but a shuffling
political creed—a sophism, not a truth—a shallow
make-believe, that has not even the sorry virtue of
ingenuity to recommend it. The Conservatives have
been often asked the question what it is they propose to
conserve, but they have never yet been able to give
any satisfactory answer. Moreover, when questioned
about their principles they have been equally at a loss
for a reply ; and no wonder, for their conduct during
the three last sessions—more especially during the
present one—clearly shows that principle has never
once entered into their calculations, but that they
have been influenced in their speeches and votes
solely by the consideration of what was most
likely to accord with the views of their
imperious task-master, Sir ROBERT PEEL. It is a
humiliating fact that though the Tories, or Conser-
vatives, as they prefer calling themselves, have more
than once ventured to show something like a spirit of
independence, and even to array themselves in hosti-
lity to the Pre bier, yet every effort they have made
has had no other effect than to rivet his chains still
closer upon them, and place them more completely
within his power. At the present moment they are
in the most abject state of political thraldom, with-
out, apparently, the slightest prospect of their being
able to emancipate themselves ; nor is there one
servant in his establishment over whom Sir Ito-
BERT PEEL exercises so undisputed a mastery
as he does just now—and we suspect, will long
continue to do—over the Conservatives. And these
degenerate creatures, who dare not call even their
thoughts their own, once constituted the power-
ful, energetic, tyrannical Tory party—that party of
which the Premier was for upwards of twenty years-
of his life the pliant, submissive tool ! Verily the
tables are turned now. He who was once the slave
is become the master ; and they who once laid down
the law to him, are now content, humbly and obse-
quiously, to receive the law from him. How long
this state of things is to continue—how long a
Minister who, laughing at the idea of political
principle, takes expediency as his sole guide
of action, is to be permitted to govern the country
through the agency of a party as devoid of political
principle as himself, it is impossible to say ; but if we
may judge from the signs of the times which are daily
developing themselves with more significance, we
should say that England—as Ireland has long been—
is beginning to be heartily sick of the domina
tion of Sir ROBERT PEEL and his sycophantic
Conservatives, and is anxious to ,be governed ley
Ministry that can rightly appreciate the character of
the age ; that is, not too proud, or too timid, or too
hedged in by party prejudices, to place a manly
reliance on the people ; that knows how to act with
energy and decision at the fitting season, that prefers
to move forward rather than to retrograde ; and, above
all, that repudiates the expediency system of action,
and legislates solely in accordance with principle.

The Committee for Privileges of the House of

Lords on Tuesday, announced their decision on the in•
teresting and important claim of Sir AUGUSTUS
D'EsTE to the title and honours of the Dukedom of
Sussex. The Committee was very fully attended,
and, upon the answers of the Judges, as delivered by
Lord Chief Justice TINDAL, to the case referred to
those learned functionaries by the Committee, we
lament to find that the latter have determined " that
the claim of Sir AUGUSTUS ITESTE has not been
made out."

It will be in the recollection of our readers, that
the gist of the question propounded for the opinion of
the Judges, was this :—Evidence having been offered
to the Lords of a marriage solemnised at Rome, in
the year 1793, by an English priest, in holy orders,
of the Church of England, according to the ritual
of that Church, between A B, a son of hi 3 late Ma-

jesty King GEORGE 111., and C D, a British subject,
without the previous consent of his said MAJESTY,
according to the requirements of the " Royal Mar-
riage Act" (12th Geo. 111., ,passed in 1772), would
such evidence, if held to establish the fact of such
marriage between, the parties in question, indepen-
dently of the provisions or enactments of 12th Geo. 111.,
be adequate to establish the validity of that marriage
in a suit wherein the eldest son of A B claims, eo
nomine, an estate in England by virtue of such mar-
riage ?—The Judges, admitting the rule of our
Ecclesiastical Courts, as illustrated by the luminous

judgments of Lord STOWELL, "that a marriage good
according to the forms of the country wherein it is
celebrated is good all over the world ;" and adverting
to the important fact, that evidence had been given
by qualified officers of the papal jurisdiction on ques-
tions of marriages, to establish the perfect legal vali-
dity in Rome, and throughout the limits of the Papacy,
of the de facto marriage between A B and C D, re-
mark that " the rule of construction with regard to
any statute is, that it shall be construed according to
the intent of the Parliament which has passed it."
Now, inasmuch as the intent of the Parliament of
1772, in'passing the Royal Marriage Act, is not any
matter of doubt—inasmuch as that Parliament clearly
aimed at prohibiting the marriages of any of the legiti-
mate descendants of GEORGE 111. without the Royal con-
sent previously obtained, and inasmuch as its enactments
were, therefore, as binding on A B, as " al3ritish sub-

ject," whether in Rome or any other foreign dominion,
as if he were within the realm ; the Judges were
unanimously of opinion that under the circumstances
this had not been such a marriage as could enable
the eldest son of AB to make a good title to lands
or estate as heir to his father.

It is remarkable that the LORD CHANCELLOR, Lord
BROUGHAM, Lord DENMAN, Lord CAMPBELL, and
Lord. COTTENHAM in delivering their judgments
seriatim, concurred unanimously in dismissipg the
claim of Sir AUGUSTUS ; but each of these Learned
Lords also concurs ecl in the sentiment that the most
cruel wrong had bet inflicted on the parties before
their bar by the Act in question. Under that
statute there could be no doubt the marriage of his
late Royal Highness the Duke of SUSSEX with Lady
AUGUSTA MURRAY -was invalid. Of the de facto
marriage between those eminent persons there could
be as little doubt. Lord linouG Ham, in alluding to the
cruel position of the cla'imant, justly said " the feelings
of every one must revolt at the consideration of that
wrong. It appeared to l lim to be of the highest jus-
tice, of the first claim, tif the slowest discharge of
public duty, that Parlian ler it, which had such a law
as that which had been lancler the consideration of
their Lordships—a law whit h ought never to have
been made—that that Parliat nent should give some
compensation, should make sot ne reparation, to those
innocent parties who had been so injured by its ope-
ration."

Lord CAMPBELL concurred" most fully in the re-
gret which had been expressed L that such a law was
in existence. He thought suc h a law ought not to
have been passed, and he con curred in the opinion
that it ought to undergo s( ime modification. In
these feelings and opinions a it cordially. participate.
When IY9 find the LOAD 1 OiIANCELLOR reminding

the Committee that the marriage, in fact, was proved
by evidence, of its having been celebrated by a law-
fully ordained clergyman of the Church of England,
and that there was further evidence of the ,
mar-
riage being valid according to the law of
Rome; and that Lord COTTENHAM'S opinion against
the claim " was founded solely upon the Royal
Marriage Act, for that was the only point
which had been concluded before them,"
we are induced to press upon the attention of the
public the urgent merits of a case in which the ap-
pellant is turned back upon a mere technicality.
True, as Lord COTTENHAM observed, the Royal
Marriage Act incapacitated the parties from con-
tracting a marriage except upon certain conditions."
But we say that that Act was rnalum per se. It was
denounced and protested against, at the time it was
forced through the Legislature by the active and
indecent canvassing of the Crown—as a cruel and
impolitic and disabling statute—by some of the
best and wisest men, and highest authorities in
the country. It was a tyrannous control, devised
and enforced beforehand, on the human affections as
they might develope themselves in the existing, or
the yet unborn, progeny of the Sovereign. The late
Duke in invoking the sanction conferred upon his
marriage with Lady AUGUrrA MURRAY, by the pre-
cepts of our religion and the ritual of our Church,
not unreasonably assumed that he was pro-
tected and upheld by authority so solemn and
so sacred, that it must override the enact-
ments of a vicious statute. No man, accordingly,
ever took more pains to recognise, by repeated and
spontaneous acknowledgements and declarations, the
fact of his marriage; his own deep conviction of its
legitimate and binding character; and his voluntary
call upon, his family, his country, and the whole
world, to observe these his so remarkable acts of con-.
firmation. What course remained to a gentleman of
high feeling and spirit and intelligence, like Sir
AUGUSTUS D'ESTE, but to reclaim the legacy of the
honours thus descended to him, and by such reclama-
tion to vindicate the honour of his mother, and
the legitimacy of another connexion not less dear
nor less immediate ? The documentary papers
adduced, in his father's hand-writing, were like voices
from the tomb, conveying injunctions which he could
not, and ought not, to resist. He was bound to assert
his position. He has done so, but necessarily at a
vast expense in the collection of evidence and papers.
In the amount of any such expense it is clear that he
ought to be immediately reimbursed. We trust that
so righteous
,a duty will not be neglected for a
moment in the proper quarters. But the whole conduct
and deportment of Sir A. D'EsTE, throughout the try-
ing and spirit-wounding abeyance in which his
claim has been permitted to lie, and the •protracted
period occupied in its formal preparation and trial,
have been of a. character beyond all praise for their
moderation, constancy, and patience. We have no de-
sire to institute painful comparisons by invidious
reminiscences. But we should shrink from the dis-
charge of a public duty, if we forbore to eulogise the
dignified forbearance with which Sir AUGUSTUS has
lived to see the illegitimate issue of his Royal uncle
ennobled, protected, and rewarded, by titles, and
honours, and employments, not one of which was
suffered to be diverted to his own distinguished person.
In a later period of his career he has seen another
paternal connexion, with no such previous claims of
rank or ascertained position as his. Noble Mother,
elevated to the higheitdignity with which the hand of
the Sovereign can invest, in this country, a female brow
—a tribute, probably, of affectionate respect for the
station and character of his illustrious father. But
seeing that, on the one hand, a disability purely,
tecbnical, under a statute which ought never
to have become law,—which. was tainted, in its
origin, by personal pique and resentment in the
Monarch at whose solicitation it was finally carried,—
has defeated his claim, in its recent shape.;-and that
on the other his own unsullied character, his virtues,
his talents, and (we must repeat) the excellent bear-
ing he has shown throughout the long, but unobtru-
sive agitation of his rights, are calculated to impart a
lustre to any dignities or honours to which the generous
munificence of the Crown might be pleased to call him,
in repairing a mere accidental deficiency of the proof.
necessary to the legal. substantiation of his hereditary
pretensions ;—we do earnestly hope that the grace and
favour of tke QUEEN may yet be manifested to Sir
AUGUSTUS 'TESTIS in a manner and to an extent
which may fully and royally repair the present failure
of his equitable claim. Certain we are that such an
exercise of the royal prerogative would be hailed
with signal gratification and sympathy by the private
friends of the late claimant; and with unanimous
approbation by the public.

The friends of Sir ROBERT PEEL ought to use
their best exertions to accelerate the termination of
the present session. He is a species of " perishable
commodity," which deteriorates rapidly in this warm
weather. He will not " keep." If he be not speedily
withdrawn from the corrupting moral atmosphere in
which, as a public man, he seems to " live, and move,
and have his being," we would not give many weeks'
purchase for his official existence. Besides all the
indications of premature weakliness which his Minis-
terial deportment has afforded for the last twelve
months or so, some of the symptoms of organic dis-
ease, apparent in his Ministerial psychology, are be-
coming, almost daily, more and more aggravated, to
the serious alarm of his friends. His overweening
vanity has degenerated into a confirmed obstinacy.
His obstinacy assumed, on the " Bank Charter Bill
discussion, a character of discourteous recklessness;
and his peevish impatience of opposition to that dis-
graceful measure vented itself in a sort of bullying
discouragement of all hostile discussion on a measure
which, of all others that had been introduced into the
House of Commons since the commencement of her
MAJESTY'S reign, most imperatively called for ear-
nest, ample, mature, and unfettered deliberation. To
say the truth, the proximity and example of Sir J.
GRAHAM appear to have communicated to the once
most dulcet of Premiers not a little of the stubborn
acerbity and arrogant reserve which characterised Sir
JAMES'S responses in the House, as Home Secretary,
until the recent untoward Post-office discoveries.
These have so remarkably assuaged and moderated
his tone, that we wonder, so much the more, at the
authoritative manner of his leader's refusals on Mon-
day evening to answer some of the most important
questions which were ever addressed, in a national
assembly, to a Prime Minister. Yet, in truth, a
House of Commons, which has twice. within little
more than twice the same number of weeks, rescinded
its own most solemn decisions at the simple dictation
of that Minister, has little right to complain if this
facility and obsequiousness have produced their natural
effect upon him. Sir ROBERT PEEL, as we shall
show, treats the solicitude of the House for informa-
tion, on questions of the deepest public interest, with
a reserve savouring of the indifference of official
irresponsibility. But the House had, in the first in-
stance, carefully supplied him with the justification for
such conduct towards it.

On Monday last Mr. SIIEIL asked the following
questions :—The first, whether Lord ABERDEEN had
received any answer from the French Government to
his dispatch of the 28th of January, 1842, and if so,
would there be any objection to lay that upon the
table of the House ; the second, had the British Go-
vernment applied to the French Government for an
exequatur for our Consul at Algiert; and the third,
had England done anything amounting to a recogni-
tion of the French title to Algiers ?
It is not necessary to insist, for one moment, on the
vast political importance of any movements or events
which may htsve,a probable tendency, though more or
less remote, to iffea, prejudice, or come into actual
collision with, our influence in the Mediterranean.
This fact, we may assume, as not liable to be put, at
any time, in question between any parties. The re-
ply of Sir ROBERT PEEL appears to us to be emi
nently characteristic of the man—marked by a little
plausibility, a little cunning, more inconsistency, and
an utter absence of all true dignity. To exemplify
this last objection, in the first place the British Premier
says—" I shall feel it my duty to limit my reply merely
to a statement of facts, because whatever passes here on
the subject of Algiers becomes an immediate subject
of discussion in the Chamber of Deputies." What a
reason for withholding explanations or information
from a distinguished Member of the British Parlia-
ment—that they may become the object of comment
in the Legislative Assembly of some foreign country !
What an admirable reason for withholding from the
" Grand Inquest of the Nation" the lights necessary
to guide- its opinions--beeause they might -be -cora-
menteci on in Paris, by French Deputies ! But Sir