The Sun.
London, England, 1844-07-19 00:00:00

Committee on the Poor-law Amendment Bill. A
number of clauses were adopted, and on clause 60
being read, Sir JAMES GRAHAM moved that the
Chairman report progress, and the House resumed.
After several petitions had been presented, Mr.
THOMAS S. DUNCOMBE called the attention
of the House to the proceedings before the Com-
mittee appointed to inquire into the system of open-
ing letters at the Post-office. The Hon. Member
made an excellent speech on the occasion, and gave
an amusing account of the way in which the inquiry
was conducted. He had been called as a witness, and
requested to produce a list of the witnesses who could
confirm him in his statements made in the House,
but he declined to give the list, except on the Condi-
tion that he should be present to hear the witnesses
examined. The Committee referred the point to the
House.

Lord SANDON, Chairman of the Committee, and
Mr. HUME rose together to speak, when the SPEAKER
said there was no question before the House, upon
which Mr. DUNCOMBE moved that it be an instruc-
tion to the Committee that he bo present at the'exami-
nation of the witnesses he might call. Lord SANDON
said the Committee had no objection to Mr. Dun-
COWIE being present to examine the witnesses, but
he should be present as a member, and incur the re-
sponsibility of the other members. After remarks
from Sir R. PEEL, Mr. HUMS, Mr. LABOUCHERE, and
others, the motion of Mr. DUNCOMBE was put to the
vote, and on a division, it was rejected
by a majority of 90, there being for
the motion 51, and against it 141. Mr. DUNCOMBE
made an excellent speech on introducing the subject,
and in all the speeches that followed no substantial
reason was given for excluding him from the Corn-
mittee. Will Sir JAMES GRAHAM, thus burk
the inquiry, by appointing a Secret Committee to
inquire into the practice of opening letters, and ex-
cluding the very man who could bring the delinquents
to justice ?
On the order of the day being read for the third
reading of the Unlawful Oaths (Ireland) Bill, Mr.
MORE OTERRALL opposed it, and moved that the Bill
be read a third time that day six months.
Lord ELIOT opposed the amendment, and after a
lengthened discussion the amendment was withdrawn,
a d the Bill was read a third time and passed.
The House then went into Committee on the Poor-
law Amendment Bill, and several clauses were added,
at the suggestion of Sir J. GRAHAM.
Mr. R. YORKE moved a clause to restrain the
Commissioners from enforcing the indiscriminate se-
paration of man and wife, but it was rejected by a
majority of 90, their being only six votes in favour
of it.

Mr. BußßouGuEs proposed the addition of a clause
relating to illegitimate children, which was opposed
by Sir J. GRAHAM, but eventually carried by a ma-
jority of one.
The remaining clauses passed through Committee,
and the House resumed.
The House adjourned at a Quarter to Two o'Clock.

The House of Commons is surely, affecting a
return to the good old times of its puritanism and its
prudery ! We see nightly indications of the " Crom-
wellian" facility which carried the decisions of the
Parliament of the Protector always one way—
namely, that which had been previously indicated to
it as the course which "his Highness" would have this
or that particular question or business to follows—ac-
cording to the communications vouchsafed by one of
his Secretaries of State or Chief Commissioners of the
Treasury. This practice has been accurately fol-
lowed by the majorities of the present House in dealing
with such matters at the "Factories Labour Bill" and
the " Sugar Duties." When the head of her
MAJESTY'S Administration remonstrated with the
" collective wisdom" of the country on the in
determinations they had recorded, by important
majorities against the Government propositions re•
specting those measures, the majorities we speak of
, listened and waxed penitent. But when " his High-
ness," with all the gravity and plausibility of the
Protector, and with not one atom less of that arbi-
trary stateman's well-known truthfulness and sin-
cerity, protested that if they did not rescind their
determinations he was determined to expose
the empire to the calamity of his retirement
from office, the obsequious parties to such
unpalatable exhibitions of independent judgments,
submitted themselves to his. They unvoted, by
equally important majorities, what they had voted
and so enabled the Minister to carry his points—
points which it seems " to have repented them" to
have ever thwarted. But the House of Commons of
1844, carrying its rage of imitation to a period some
ten years earlier than the Cromwellian Parliament, is
evidently bent on rivalling its predecessor of 1644 in
its abnegation of all " self-glorifying pretensions.'
It might have already passed the most " self-denying
ordinance" which a Chamber of Conventiclers or
Covenanters could have devised for the expression of
their humiliation, were we at liberty to form our own
conclusions from the tone of the debate of last night,
on Mr. Thomas DUNCOMEE'S motion. Constitutional
firmness, public dignity, and self-respect, appear to be
properties that are becoming obsolete in the House of
Commons even in theory ; and in practice, or vindi-
cation, to have fallen into as utter desuetude as half.
of its own " standing orders."
Mr. DUNCOMBE complained that the " Post-office
Committee," recently appointed, could not, as at pre
sent constituted, carry out its inquiries in a proper
and efficient manner; that unless he were permitted
to be present at the examination of witnesses, they,
either from fear of ultimate consequences to them-
selves, or from other causes, would not depose to all,
or to the most important, facts, which they would
otherwise speak to. He concluded his speech by
moving that he should be " present at the examination
of such witnesses as he might think proper to produce
in support of the charge which had been made by
him." To this motion an amendment was subse-
quently moved, "that the names of Mr. DUNCOMBE
and Mr. MANNERS SUTTON be added to the Commit-
tee." This proposition was lost on a* division. It
was supported by 51, opposed by 141 ; and rejected,
therefore, by a majority of 91.
But the important feature of the debate was this.
In complaining that the Committee "had not made
searching inquiry into " facts of which he himself
was fully cognizant," he took occasion to ask Sir
JAMES GRAIIAM " whether any letters of his (Mr.
T. DUNCOMBE) had been opened by the Right Hon.
Baronet's orders ? This was a question justified by
his oath of allegiance, as a Member of that House.
If his letters had not been opened by order of the
Right Hon. Baronet, they had been pryed into by
othor persons, and therefore it was doubly incumbent
on that Douse to investigate the circumstances, and
to place the facts on record." This was a most serious
question to be propounded thus solemnly to a Minister
of the Crown. All we can say upon the "justification"
to be adduced for it, is, that we should think an outrage
upon the public confidence so gross and scandalous as
the violation of a sealed letter, is one upon which the
meanest or most insignificant member of the commu-
nity has as indefeasible, a right to complain, and in
terms, too, of indignation and displeasure even the
very strongest—as the highest personage in the
country. We have not the most remote doubt, that
the little being who absorbs so signal a share of the
attentions and caresses of royalty and of the aristo
cracy in this country—the soi-disant General 'rost
Tuella himself—would have a good action to-morrow
against all or any of the higher Post-office authorities
for any fact of letter-breaking which he might prove
to have occurred in the case of a billet addressed to his
own imperceptibility, But in an assembly of English
gen tlenten—in the presence of the assembled represen-
tatives of the Corentons of the United Kingdom, such
a charge, brought by one of their own body in respect
of his own letters—against a public functionary, sitting
there in the double capacity, as it were, of 4 delegate
from the people and a Minister of the Crown; must be
allowed to have character of grave and fearful
responsibility about it, which impossible VC ex-
aggerate. Any man in the sittAtimi Af Sir 44114E.1i
GRARAM, Secretary of State for the Home Depart.,
met, it might be imagined, would have responded to
it undera full and deep perception of this responsi-
bility. But how did he meet the question ? Py (in
the first place) a vague' (and sere)y an unmeaning)
compliment to Mr. DUNCOMBE on his little ponpness
" to vapouring." Vapouring, forsooth ! As if to corn-
plain,laudly, on the assumption of haying been the object
of a base, &scurvy, a dishonest system of trickery and
fraud, unknown to the spirit and geniis of gnglish Apal-
ing in public or private _business, Were a mes!P gd.
captanclum exhibit/RR of 0117 int; ! Sir *Limp