The Sun.
London, England, 1844-01-13 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS
IMOM TUE
,EVENING PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.
GLOBE.—W beirSir Robert Peel's evil genius
prevailed over the Right Hon. Baronet's pro-
verbial caution, and induced him to consent to
the prosecution of the repeal leaders, the arch-
fiend's triumph was complete. The Rubicon
was passed. To recede was impossible; to go
tbrward was fraught with fresh perils at every
step ; while the end was yet more fear-
ful than the dangers of the way. From
the hour that this ill-advised and impolitic course
was determined on, one blunder has succeeded
to another. Defects of . necessary forms have
multipled to an extent beyond all precedent in
any former State prosecution. The law officers
of the Crown have acquired an unenviable cele-
brity for deficiency of caution, or a destitution of
the requisite legal ability, unequalled in any
who have been intrusted with the offices they
hold. Ridicule, provoked by their self-created
embarrassthents, Las subsided into scorn for
the petty, paltry advantages by which they
have sought to fetter the traversers
preparing for their trial. This . feeling,
natural to honourable minds, has recently
given place to indignation. The striking of the
special jury panel, when every Roman Catholic
was regarded as ipso facto disqualified because
of his creed, has created not merely indignation,
but alarm. The Government which directed the
proceeding, and the functionaries who con-
sented to act upon its directions, have drawn
upon them the indignation of the Catholics,
who constitute the large majority of the
Irish population, and of every liberal Protes
taut in the country, while they have alarmed
the apprehensions of their friends, lest. the pro•
vocation thus supplied to the population should
prove too powerfUl to be kept within the limits of
legal restraint. Scarcely has the public mind
recovered from the sensation produced by the
stretch of prerogative to secure a partisan jury,
than another " untoward event" for the Govern-
ment is discovered. An omission of sixty-
three names from the High Sheriff's list,
from which the Special pathitl was struck,
has been detected. The High Sheriff's list, nut
being a faithful transcript of the juror's book as
authenticated by the Recorder, by whom the spe-
cial jury list was revised, is manifestly fatal to the
list, in the striking of which the law officers of
the Government had succeeded it, obtainiog a
• jury of oae creed. Titus they disqualified, at
once, those whom the law has invested with the
rights •of citizens. Oa the pending trill
between the Crown and time repeal leaders,
it was essential, no less for the ends of justice
than for :the satisfaction of time country, .that !
Catholics and Protestants should, at least in a
ti.tir proportion, have beet, inmpanelled to try
the issues. The organ of the Irish Government i
(the Dublin Packet), in endeavouring to justify
time course taken by the Government. asserted
that the eleven Roman Catholics expunged from 1
the list were Repeaters. This is shown to he po-
sitively untrue by a reference to time expunged
mottoes. Thus the desperate defence set up for the I
Government in its extremity is demolished ;
and the proceeding in all time hideous chsrac- '
teristies of its manifest unfairness to the ac-
cused, stands forth without even the sem—
blance of an excuse ! The Dublin Monitor
gives an explanation of the mysterious omis-
sion of the six,ty-three names from the list
of jurors, in an article which we quote at
length in another column. It is stated that the
majority of the omitted names are those of
Catholics--a circumstance that renders it- the
more essential to the impartial administration of
iustice that the panel should be set aside,
and a new jury be struck. The difficulty
thus suddenly created on time very threshold
of the trial, has, we scarcely need say, occa-
sioned dire confusion amongst the law officers of
the Government. In anticipation of, and to
provide for, the delay that will be caused by the
applications which will be made to the Court on
behalf of the traversers ; the lengthened argu-
ments which will arise; and the probable
decision of the Court against the validity of the
jury list, the Crown solicitor has served a notice!
on the solicitors for the traversers, of the inten-
tion of the Attorney-General to " move the
Court to-morrow (Thursday) or as soon after
as possible, that should the trials not have ter-
minated on the 31st instant, each succeeding day,
up to the 13th of April, shall be considered
as part of Hilary Term, for time purposes of the
said trials." The Cabinet Council summoned for
yesterday (the second during this week) is sup-
posed to have had reference to this new " diffi-
culty" in Ireland. We venture to predict that
the prosecution will be abandoned. It' Sir Robert
Peel be not positively demented, he will avail
himself of this new blunder to extricate himself
from a , position which every day becomes more
embarrassing to his Government, and more pe-
rilous to the country.
STANDARD:— W e are accustomed to look to
the /Wasik] Chronicle for instruction, as well as
for the amusement which clever reasoning and
clear writing are sure to afford. The instruction
is, however, of a description somewhat narrow,
and, if we may say so, professional. When
our Contemporary's " leaders" are short, we
are apprised that there is something plau-
sible to be answered, but when they ex-
tend to a very great length, we are pretty
confident that- the day furnishes nothing that
can be worked up into a decent case. With the
Morning Chronicle, as with the rest of the world,
rigmarole, as it is disrespectfully called, is the
resource when facts and reasoning cannot be had.
The Mornay Chronicle has to-clay a very long
leading, article. The reader is aware of the infe-
rence. The purpose of this long article, as far as
we can detect a purpose in it, is to show that the
empire is suffering very grievously by reason
of a suggested discrepancy between the decla-
rations and the acts of time present Government.
Now we must deny both assertions; we deny that
the empiresin integro, suffers anything • maintain-
ing on the other hand that, as a whole, the em-
pire holds a higher and happier position titan it
ever held, certainly than it has held at any time
the last 14 years. No less positively do we
deny that t here has been any discrepancy whatever,
between the declarationsand the acts of the pre-
smen t Government. We have spoken too lately of time
actual state of the empire to allow a recapitula-
tion of all the advantages which it has obtained
within the last three years to be necessary. Peace
• conquered, and contirmed—territory profitably
'enlarged—commerce restored and boundless
fieldsopened to commercial enterprise—the value
of the public securities enhanced 10 per cent.— a
• cadly deficient revenue replaced by a rich
isurplus contribution to time Exchequer— the
-rebellion, nursed up, in Ireland, by tetra years
fof Whig-Radical fondling, broken in spirit and
in strength, if not utterly subdued; and its mon-
titer meeting's dissipated by the wind of a con-
stitutional .cominoo law prosecution. And all this
good ()fleeted without expedients and without
iquackery..' Here surely there are no symptoms
()I grievous suffering to the whole empire—we
say to the• whole empire, for time sufiering of
the whole empire, through all its departments and
classes, is time subject of the Chronicle's
complaint. But general prosperity may no doubt
be consistent with the suffering of particular
classes, and may be even- connected with that
t-uffering, and we see that to some extent this
is the case with the British empire. In the
case of- -manufacturea, more particularly, great
prosperity is frequently time effect as well as the
cause of
.much suffering to the working classes;
the effect, because, in the competition of
the world, it must imply low wages ;
the cause, inasmuch as it tends to bring
touch money into the hands of .a few men,
vho are 'the very men naturally disposed to
make 'money the substitute for labour, and
thus further to depress the rate of wages and to
depresssit permattently. It is not, however, of
tvt excess• of manufacturing activity that the
Morning Chronicle complains, •and this, indeed,
is the very last thing of which our Con-
vorary wosid -complain. The distress of time
working Classes is, however, the only ex-
ception to the general prosperity of the
umpire, and that we trust to. see soon remedied.
The second- point „upon.
ith time Moeuhtg we are at issue
discrepancy between the declarations
is time suggested
,sitihnistdere,,clarha.tions and time
sets of the Present-
a negative,tere, front the
impossibility Of proving%ev emttus t chal-
Vnge time positive testimony, and v challenge it
confidently, that no such alleged discrepancy
te produced. 4 will not be sufficient totcaakn
qualified proposition, strip it of the qualifyinge
words, and
.then call it a declaration. This,ve.
Is low, is the manner in which the Opposition
journals have endeavoured to establish the
charge of inconsistency between declarations and,
a-ts brought by the Morning Chronicle. But
Length _such ingenious devices may be well
t tough for newspaper war, no men are s soh fools
a , to follow so gross a fallacy in the conduct of
t meir affairs, and that in fact few have been
a fisted by fallacies of the kind is pretty clear'
fsom time general prosperity which it has-beeli'
our pleasant. duty to describe. If alma' .haire
teen such fools •as to surrender themselves to-
ts delusion, let them not blame times Gos ern-
31.ent, Which has spoken distinctly 'eth,a guard-
e ily, but the dishonest journals that have
Tr4isrepresented the Government. If' we were
not afraid of falling under the suspicion which
e have acknowledged to attach to all long
articles, we should add a third issue with the
.iforning,.Chronicle, in. the shape of a ques-

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