The Sun.
London, England, 1844-08-09 00:00:00

almost every day in amount. They had put three editors
of newspapers in prison, and at the present moment the
press:was more exciting than ever. The Nation newspaper,
whose editor was imprisoned, circulated eleven thousand
copies ; that paper was written with distinguished ability,
appealing, perhaps, rather too strongly to the spirit
of nationality in the Irish people ; and the Catholic
clergy, those great representatives of the feelings of the
Catholic people, were, almost to a man, against them.
Ireland was said to be tranquil, but he, who knew the
people of Ireland, who was well acquainted, by a pain-
ful experience with their wretched condition, he, who was
interested in the maintenance of the public peace, and
who took no sort of share, direct or indirect, in the agi-
tation pervading Ireland, told them that the state of the
country was not safe ; that there prevailed a deep anti-
pathy towards this country—an antipathy which at all
times was to be deprecated. But they were now placed
in a position which made it matter, he would not say of
alarm, but, at all events, of deep and meditative forecast,
how they should act towards Ireland. They had taken
a position which he for one commended, which became
them as a great nation to take— which proved
they were determined that England should hold
the noble position she ought to occupy; but he told them
that, possessed of the affections of Ireland, with Ireland
united and reconciled, they would have a far better
muniment than the Martello towers round her coast.
Mr. WYSE said he begged to add a few words to
the energetic appeal made by his Right Hon. Friend to
the House, and through the House to the country. Mr.
O'Connell had not appealed either to the Government or
to that House by petition for the slightest remission of
his sentence; nor had any of the other prisoners; but
the people of Ireland were deeply impressed with the
belief that the trial had not been one calculated to vindi-
cate the majesty of the law, or to give a fair and just
means of ascertaining either their guilt or innocence.
The people of Ireland would not forget that
they had been convicted by a jury of twelve
Protestants. But to that House an appeal was
made to investigate the facts connected with that trial,
which the judges on the bench had declared were at least
liable to suspicion, and that appeal was refused by a
majority of that House. He entreated of them, what-
ever their politics or their religion might be, not to allow
the impression to go abroad that all justice was to be
denied them. He begged of them to be wise in time,
because the people of Ireland had not worn out their
patience. They came not to that House in the voice of
supplication. They were silent, but they waited only
the time when they could wound England in the hour of
her distress. He implored them not in the language of
terror, but in the voice of advice and warning, that they
would think of the words which they heard from the
representatives of Ireland before they returned to their
homes. He beseeched of them, not with feelings of
anger, but in the spirit orkindness, if they intended to
do anything in the way of conciliation, to do it in time.
Lord J. RUSSELL said that, during the time the late
Administration were in office, it was the custom to dis-
perse throughout the country in the summer and autumn,
a pamphlet purporting to be a speech of Lord Lyndhurst
—(Laughter)—pointing out in what manner the various
Bills had been introduced into Parliament, when they
were adjourned, how often they were postponed, and
which of them had not arrived at the consummation of
becoming Acts of Parliament. He never had considered
that course a just or a fair one. He did not consider it
so in the first place, because the Houses of Parliament
themselves, however well they might be disposed to
consider measures, yet in the course of discussion inter-
posed so many obstacles to their becoming law that an
Administration could not be justly chargeable with all
the legislative measures which might occur during the
session. He thought it an unfair course, because it was
notorious that one of the Houses of Parliament was
chiefly composed of Members belonging to one political
party. It was notorious that that party having been in
power during a long period of years, had place in that
House of Parliament about two hundred Members of
their own party ; and of the four hundred Members
of which that House consisted, about two hundred had
been placed there by the advice of the Ministers of that
party during those years. It was natural that those
who entertained those politics, who had entered into
Parliament with strong prejudices of that kind, should
be adverse to the Ministers of a different political party.
It was not difficult, therefore, for persons who had
authority with that Parliament, to secure the rejection
of Bills, however useful, which were promoted by a
Ministry with whom they did not concur. But no
doubt that mode of proceeding made its impression. It
was considered by many persons that the Ministry
must have failed in its duty when so many of its Bills
had not obtained the sanction of the Legislature.
That course he (Lord J. Russell) had never followed ;
it was not a course which he was then about to follow.
If he were about to do so, he thought that he should
have far more reason to object to the Ministry then in
power. In the first place it was notorious, and had been
proclaimed by themselves, that the present Ministry had
a majority having confidence in their administration in
both Houses of Parliament ; in the next place,
the present Ministry had had the greatest
difficulty placed in the way of their legislation. But he
did not see any public advantage which could be derived
from tracing the history of the different Bills, and point-
ing out that many of them had failed.—(Hear, hear.)
But he had, at the close of another session, called the
attention of the House when it was about to separate, to
the existing state of the country.
The Usher of the Black Rod here summoned the
House to hear the Royal assent given to certain Bills,
for which see Lords' report.
On the return of the SPEAKER,
Lord JOHN RUSSELL resumed.—lie said he had
already stated that he thought it might not be without
its use, at the close of the session, to consider what was
the present state of the country, and how they might be
enabled to consult its welfare when they were next
called by her Majesty to meet for the dispatch of busi-
ness. In speaking last year of the affairs of the coun-
try, he had entered at considerable length into the state
of Ireland. His Right Hon. Friend, who had spoken
on that occasion had alluded to part of that great sub-
ject. The Right Hon. Gentleman, when, in 1839, he
was speaking of the formation of a Government under
his auspices, stated, or rather confessed, that his chief
difficulty was Ireland. He was surprised that with the
exception of one circumstance to which he then alluded
—a circumstance that he considered so trifling, that he
should not then advert to it—the present Government
after that announcement by their head, bad never taken
seriously into their consideration the state of Ireland,
with a view to its amelioration. It was true, that when
last year they were 6onsidering this subject, there were
meetings held, and that those meetings no longer took
place ; it was true, that there was language of menace
used by some principal speakers, and that they
didnethear of
that thela
ngua geatpresent. But they would
be very much mistaken indeed if they supposed
the affections of Ireland had been won by the
proceedings which had since taken place. In his view
of the circumstances as they stood last year, he thought
that the Government would have been justified in issuing
a proclamation at the commencement of those meetings
forbidding any further assemblages of the same kind,
and in following up that announcement by a declaration
of their intention to take all the grievances and com-
plaints of Ireland into consideration, witle a view
to their adjustment. That Mr. O'Connell would
have obeyed such a proclamation he thought
tl.ey could not doubt, for on the very first occasion on
which the advisers of the Lord Lieutenant thought he
should declare that a meeting was illegal, the declaration
was followed not merely by instant obedience, nor by
sullen acquiesence, but by the most active measures for
the prevention of a meeting which had been announced.
He thought, therefore, it was impossible to doubt that if
at the commencement of those meetings a similar course
had been taken, a similar obedience would have
been paid. He confessed that the stoppage of these
meetings, by itself, would have been almost a useless
measure, it would have been dealing only with the
symptoms of the disease ; but if they had followed up a
measure asserting and vindicating the law by a measure
of conciliation and improvement, they would then have
laid a foundation for the future prosperity of Ireland. The
course that had been taken, however, was very different.
Mr. O'Connell and other popular leaders were allowed to go
on for seven or eight months without interruption, their
language unchecked, their meetings uninterrupted, and
the only declarations which they had had—one from the
Secretary of State for the Home Department and an-
other from the Lord Chancellor of Ireland—had led him
to the inference, not as a lawyer, but a constitutional
politician, that those meetings were legal. No wonder
that they continued to such an extent as to
menace the peace of the country. At length,
after that six or eight months of impunity, they
were interrupted, and the chief leaders of them
were brought to trial, not for the last of their proceed-
ings, not for any one particular meeting that had just
taken place, nor for any seditious language which had
lately been uttered, but for the whole course of eight or
nine months of a popular agitation, which was qualified
by the legal advisers of the Crown as conspiracy. Such
a proceeding was entirely contrary to that rule which
was laid down with truth and justice by Mr. Erskine in
his celebrated defence of Hardy. On that occasion Mr.
Erskine declared that if there were a particular act of a
man's life which was criminal he should be brought to
trial, but that to look at his conduct for two years, and
from that, combined with his conversation, to endeavour
to drag out an imputation of guilt, was not justice but
tyranny. The bringing of these persons to trial
was so contrived that there being eleven Roman
Catholics among the persons who might have
been on the jury, those eleven Catholics were struck out
by the Crown, and there remained a jury of twelve Pro-
testants, several of whom were known to be parti-
zans—(" Hear, hear," from Mr. Shiel)—pursuing a line
of politics the opposite of those of Mr. O'Connell.
He would ask, could the internal peace of Ireland be
secured by those means ?—(Hear, hear.) In the first
place, was it just to leave these persons to pursue their
course for eight months without any notice that they
were bringing themselves within the meshes of the law?
—(Hear, hear.) In the next place, having determined
to bring them to trial, was that trial likely to produce
the effect which an impartial trial always produced,
even upon those who were the sufferers from it—
when it was known that the prosecutors had cautiously
excluded from the jury every man who was of the same
religion as Mr. O'Connell—(Hear, hear)—that religion
being the religion of the great majority of the people of
Ireland?—(Hear, hear.) He would not have said any-
thing on this subject if he had thought the evil beyond
the hope of remedy—if he had thought that Govern-
ment had taken a step which it was impossible for them to
retrieve.—(Hear, hear.) But he thought that altogether
the Government had been for so long a time ignorant of
the real state of Ireland--(Hear, hear)—or, if not igno-
rant of the real state, at least regardless of the people of
the country.—(hear, hear.) He thought that he had
of late observed symptoms, on the part of the Govern-
ment to pay more regard to the feelings of the people of
that country--(Hear, hear)—and he hoped, that before
the next session the Government would fully consider

the question tilat—theTWould look to the
hopes which had been , held out, and W