The Sun.
London, England, 1844-06-22 00:00:00

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SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.

GLOBE.—The present position of Sir Robert Peel
towards his party suggests many similitudes ; but
scarcely will it suggest such another as that of this
morning's Herald. With reference to Mr. Duncombe's
apostrophe of the other night in the House of Commons,

_7
the Herald says :—" A saucy, off-hand sort of style may
do very well among the ladies, or even at White Con-
duit House ; but they would tell Mr. Duncombe at the
Zoological Gardens, You had better not touch the lion
with that parasol.' " The Prime Minister then is the
lion, and the House must be understood to form the
rest of the collection. This is scarcely more compli-
mentary, on the whole, than Mr. Duncombe's original si-
mile. Unaccustomed as we are to deal in zoological s-i
miles—if we must needs compare Sir Robert Peel to the
lion, we should have compared his majority to the man
who had got his head in the lion's mouth. " Doth he
wag his tail ?"—demands the wretch, whose brain-piece
is thus compromised—" then the Lord have mercy upon
me !" Sir Robert Peel wags his tongue, and the House

trembles. The Government organ affirms, however, that
all parties have been damaged by the inconsistent votes
on the sugar question. We are content to take its aver-
ment—as it is certainly true of more than one party.
And we want to know what that Government. is, whose
inscrutable course works damage to all parties. At an
early period of this administration Lord Stanley (if we
rightly recollect) applied to its head the spirited lines
addressed to the Protector Cromwell :
" Still as you rise, the State exalted too,
Finds no disturbance while 'tis ruled by you—
Ruled like the world's great scene, when, without noise,
The rising sun night's vulgar lights destroys."
We are now told, however, and to a large extent the
statement is true, that parties, instead of being raised,
are lowered, by the Parliamentary tactics of this Minis-
try. To produce this result, there must be faults on
both sides—there must be somethinc, faulty in the morale
of Parliament—but there must also be something very
wrong, or very defective in its present management.
Sir Robert Peel is entirely unwarranted in citing
the precedent of Lord Althorp, and the rescission of a
vote of the House of Commons upon the Malt Tax. The
vote to reduce that tax occurred in a thin House, and by
surprise. Lord Althorp told the House, when it re-as-
,einbled in larger numbers, that it involved finan-
cial consequences which appeared to have been
overlooked. He therefore invited the reconsideration
of the vote on its own merits. He did not
vapour about it as a symptom of want of confi-
dence, if adhered to. lie did not threaten the House
with the loss of his own indispensable services. He
simply told them what he was bound to tell them, as a
finance Minister. And the House voted with him, be-
cause they believed his word, and deferred to his views,
in that character. Entirely different was the demand of
Sir B. Peel on the confidence of his followers. They
were to rescind their vote, not because it was im-
portant, and seemed precipitate, but because it had
been deliberate, and because it was not important.
That it had been deliberate there was no question—for
Sir Robert Peel chose to call it preeoncerted. It
was fully anticipated, in the City, as in other places,
that Mr. Miles's motion would be carried. Ministers
should have been prepared for this as fully as were all
other men. If there was concert, there was assuredly
no secret conspiracy. Ministers had only to send Tad-
pole or Taper to Mincing-lane or on 'Change, to learn
with accuracy—even within one or two of the numbers—

the coming 17ote. The "great fact" of the division was
counted upon at Liverpool ere it took place in London.
Are we to suppose that Ministers were wrapt from all
mortal ken in their Ida of Downing-street—hidden from
ell men—all men hidden from them—at this critical
moment ? Short of this supernatural seclusion, they
must have well known what was coming. If they did
not, are they not nice men to manage a popular Legis-
lature ? Are they not nice leaders of a party—and
intimately in that party's confidence ? If they did
know what was coming, are they not fine guardians
of the honour of Parliament in making no provision
against such a vote—giving no note of their inten-
tions (Sir Robert Peel sat biting his thumb during
the debate, and no one asked, "Do you bite your
thumb at me, Sir ?")—but silently reserving them-
selves to demand that the vote, when passed, should
be rescinded. We don't believe such a piece of contempt
was ever hazarded on any assembly—that is to say sup-
posing the vote of last Friday week was anticipated.
Supposing it was not—we can only repeat, Nice leaders !
—nice confidential party ! On that supposition, Sir
Robert resembled something more cornuted than our
friend the lion, and was nearly the only man in London
unknowing of the "great fact" which most concerned hi▪
m. '
STANDARD—The House of Lords was last night
occupied for a very considerable time comparing the
rival Bills of Lords Brougham and Cottenham on the
subject of imprisonment for debt, and examining the
pretensions of each measure, both of which were in the
end ordered to be cast into the crucible of a Select
Committee, in order to amalgamate them into something
as nearly perfect as possible. Not having seen
either Bill (for the House of Lords still care-
fully guards its papers), we are in no condi-
tion to form any judgment upon either ; prima
.facie, however, we must of course prefer the
measure of Lord Brougham, who has done so much
good in legislation, to the Bill of Lord Cottenham, who
has done nothing, or at least nothing but mischief !
Upon the general purpose of the two measures, there
can be, we would hope, but little difference of opinion ;
debt is not necessarily a crime, and, therefore, ought
not to be punished as a crime. On the other hand,
credit is very often a crime, and, therefore, the
creditor ought not to be armed with the power of
adding crime to crime by imprisoning and ruining
the unhappy debtor whom he may have en-
trapped. But if credit is often equally blameable
with debt, surely the presumption ought to be in favour
of the debtor ; and the onus of proving a criminality in
the debt ought, in the first instance, to be thrown upon
the creditor. If there is any one who supposes that it
matters nothing with which party you begin in sifting
out the guilt of a debt, he knows very little of the work-
ing of the law of debtor and creditor ; for he forgets
that, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the recovery
of the costs, and not of the debt, is the weapon wielded
by the creditor ; the thing dreaded by the unhappy
debtor. Tkis fiction of the non-existence of costs is,
indeed, a delusion much encouraged by the way in
which questions of law reform are discussed in Par-
liament, and, may we be pardoned for saying it, by the
demeanour of judges on the bench. To read parlia-
mentary debates and the charges of judges at nisi Arius,
one would think that there is no such thing as a bill of
costs in the world. The debtor, says a Noble Lord, a
Member of the House of Commons, may file his petition—
may apply for a, judge's order—may do this or do that ;
whereas, the debtor may do nothing of the kind un-
less he has money in his pocket, and a good deal of
money too, which we suppose is not always the case
with debtors. So in the courts of justice we hear the
judges constantly telling juries that they must give
some damages, because of a legal presumption
(though every one in court can safely swear that
no damage has been suffered), but earnestly ex-
horting
.them not to give intemperate damages ;
and this farce is carried on whilst the difference
between temperate and intemperate damages would
be at most .50/., whereas the difference to the par-
ties between any damages and none will amount
to 5001. Well may the judge recommend tem-
perate damages, when he has himself saddled the
hapless defendant with most intemperate costs. If
law were a merely speculative science, it mi▪
ght
be very well to reject all consideration of costs from
legislation ; just as in inquiries of pure physi▪
cal
science, we do not think it necessary to admit
friction as an element in our calculation ; but, as the
practical engineer will certainly blunder if he make
no allowance for friction in his expected results, so
the legislator who forgets costs will do evil as often as
he does good by his law reforms. The analogy is,
indeed, a feeble one, for no moving power was
ever overcome by friction to the same degree that the