The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-27 00:00:00

MR. BRIGHT AT BIRMINGHAM

Mr. Bright's speech at Birmingham on Monday was,
short, an appeal in favour of the Liberal party against
the Conservative, from their actions resriectively hi the
east and their policy as to the future. It was ten yeari ago,
he reminded his hearers, since he had first stood on the
same platform in the position of member for Birmingham,
" About ten years have passed away, and I am here
to-night to speak, not of the 7,000 electors of Birmingham,
as you were then not of the 14,030 as you
were at the last election, three years ago, but
to more than 40,000 electors." He was anxious that those
who had for the first time received the power of voting
should not mistake the real interests of the country. "In
ancient times, when any great public emergency arose, it
was common for the people to consult the oracles, and the
oracles generally gave an answer that was more or less
uncertain and was almost always perplexing and
difficult to comprehend. Now, we have no oracles
of that kind in these days, and therefore we will not
attempt to consult anything of the sort, but I should
like you to consult the past and recent histoiy of the coun-
try, in order to discover the true character of the two par-
ties who are now appealing to you. It is common enough
in very inferior matters to ask for a certificate of character.
Suppose at this moment, on the other side of the Atlantic,
we were engaged in an election like that which is now
taking place in the United States. Do you not think
that we should endeavour to ascertain what had been
the opinions, what had been the acts and the conduct
of the candidates before us? If we found a man
who had never uttered a word, or written a line, or
made a single effort to sustain the unity of a great nation;
who had never stepped forward to uphold the hand of
President Lincoln, but yet came forward and asked to be
admitted to your councils, to become one of your chief
advisers, to make laws for you, and to direct the future
course of your legislation, I say that you would reject
such a man at once, and would take a man who had been
anxious during those four wonderful years of trial to abolish
slavery, to restore the Union, and to make perpe-
tual the grant of freedom to the whole North American
continent. Well, then, if that would be reasonable for
the electors in America, what is reasonable for us to
do in England ? Bear in mind that you are now going
to make a machine more important than any that is
made in the manufactories in Birmingham—you are
going to make a Parliament that shall legislate directly
for the United Kingdom, and indirectly for 200 millions
of men ; a Parliament that will levy taxes in the United
Kingdom and in India to the amount of £110,000,000, and
a Parliament that, when it once takes its seat in West-
minster, is all-important for all these things ; and every
member you send is a part of that grand machine, and
every elector throughout the United Kingdom who shall
vote at the coming contest is a part of the manufactory
of that stupendous machine whose power no man can
tneasure. Well, let us consider the past." And Mr. Bright
proceeded to do so. He commented on the fact that
until 1828 no Dissenters were allowed to hold offices. Roman
Catholics—six millions of them—were excluded from all
the privileges of citizenship. Forty years ago the largest
and most influential towns were without representation.
Members of Parliament were returned by rotten boroughs.
There was nothing like complete municipal government.
The question of public education had not been raised.
Eight hundred thousand negroes were in a state
of apparently hopeless bondagej There were
monopolies which reduced the working man himself to a
state of bondage. The corn laws were unrepealed. Now
these were no more, and the result was that the poor were
provided with bread. Wages were advanced from 30 to 50
per cent. The newspaper taxes had been done away with,
and an education of the people had been spread abroad.
Church rates had disappeared. The hon. gentleman claimed
these improvements as the result of the Liberal policy.
The Tory party had opposed all these improvements.
" Now, may I ask the working men to whom I am
speaking how these changes were made, and who made
them ? They were made first of all by the force of public
opinion ; but who made the public opinion ? This may be
said with perfect accuracy, that that public opinion has
never been created, or stimulated, or guided, although it
has occasionally been obeyed by the Tory party. Let us
go to one question that came before the public in 1861.
You recollect the great treaty with France, that treaty
which ought historically to be called always the Cobden
Treaty—what could there be better in administration or
legislation than that great treaty? It was a treaty of
perpetual amity as far as could be then arranged between
France and England. It was a treaty which stimulated
'argely the industry of the people of England. But who
promoted it, and who opposed it ? It was opposed
by almost the united strength of the Tory party, and that
party was then led by the present Prime Minister. If you
go back during all that period you will find the Dissenters
were only permitted to hold office by a measure
carried in opposition to the Tory party; you will find
that the emancipation of the Catholics was also carried
in opposition to the Tory party ; you will find that
Manchester and Birmingham and the other great towns
were only enfranchised in opposition to the Tory party ;
you will find that the liberation of the slaves in the
colonies was the work of liberal public opinion and of
a Liberal Government ; you will find the monopolies I
have spoken of were abolished, not by the Tory party, bu
. _ _ _ _

by the Liberal public opinion of the country and by the
Liberal party in the House of Commons." Mr. Bright
then adverted to the fact that probably it might be said
that the Conservatives carried Catholic emancipation,

corn law repeal, and the Reform Bill. The former was
proposed by the Duke of Wellington, but 200 Con-
servatives voted against it in the House of Com-

mons. The repeal of the corn laws was pro-
posed by Sir Robert Peel, but against the short-
sighted policy of the Tory party. As to the
Reform Bill, the Tories did not carry the Reform Bill of

1860. " And," exclaimed the hon. gentleman, " there is a
great difference between the conduct of the Tory Govern-
ment now and that of the Duke of Wellington and Sir
Robert Peel. The Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert
Peel did not insist upon retaining office with only a
minority to support them. They did not bring in the
Catholic Emancipation Bill or propose the repeal of the
corn laws for the purpose of keeping their places. They
brought them in because they felt them to be absolutely
necessary for the peace of the country, and when they had
done that they bowed to the majority of the House of
Commons. The present Government tell us that they
have not changed their opinions. All the change is
that they have changed the side of the house on which
they sit, and it is quite impossible to tell what they
would not agree to rather than be compelled to return
to their old places." So much for the past.
But they were told that the Tory party had changed
their skin. " Well, then, we will not ask the past, but
ask the present. What are they doing about the Irish
Church? Is there, of all the grievances to which
I have referred, is there one which is a greater
or more outrageous grievance than the Irish
Church ? . . . What a strange condition must this
country of ours have arrived at when what is called
the gentlemanly interest, the power of the aristocracy
and the landowners, who are supposed generally to sup-
port the Tory party, can only give us a Prime Minister
who sees that the condition of Ireland is satisfactory, with
30,000 armed men in it to keep the peace, with the Habeas
Corpus suspended for the last three years, and at a time

when there are in our penal establishments more than
one hundred Irishmen who have been convicted of

offences against the State ! I say that the Tory party
has not changed ; it exists still ; it is still for supremacy
in Ireland ; it has been wrong during the forty
years and during a longer time, and it wrong still ; and
when it ceases to be wrong it will cease to be a Tory
party. My friends and constituents— although many of
you have had no votes hitherto, and therefore could not
vote for me, I will still call you so, as being citizens of the
town—your interest and duty is exactly my interest and my
duty with regard to our legislation. We must have done
with everything that is intended solely to please and
elevate one class as against another class ; we must be one
people, and we must have one law and one measure of
justice, and one great equality in our institutions; and if
you intend to have this, you must give no more support to
the Tory party now, when you have votes, than you did
by your voices when you had no votes. If it had not
been for that party your fathers and grandfathers

would have had the votes which have only now been
conceded to you. What would you think of the
liberated negro in the Southern States coming forward

to vote for any member of the Copperhead faction that

would have kept him in perpetual bondage? Metaphori-
cally, may I not say that your chains are but just dropped
off ; they lie now at your feet ; your limbs at this very

moment are sore from their chafing ; the sound of their

clinking has not left your ears, and you are impudently and
audaciously asked to vote for the men and for the party who
for hundreds of years have :riveted these chains upon you.
Years ago I appealed to you from this place on behalf of
the franchise, which I said you had a right to, and which
must shortly be conceded to you. I did not appeal in
vain. I reminded you then of what your fathers had done,
the men of thirty years ago, when they had shaken the
fabric of privilege to its very base. I appeal to you now.
Ever since I have been permitted to speak in these open
councils of my countrymen I have pleaded for their political
rights. You have now to a large extent obtained those rights.
I plead to you once more that you should regard those
rights as a sacred trust in the eyes of all your countrymen
—in the eye of Heaven itself ; and that you should use
those rights as an instrument only for good—that you
should seriously weigh the claims of all those who seek
your suffrages, and that you should so vote that you may
expect to influence the Imperial Parliament, and the legis-
lation of your cou..try, so that you may advance the hap-
piness of all its families, and the grandeur awl oecurity
fd this natien,",