The Sun.
London, England, 1844-02-20 00:00:00

_ .
j the weighinss of words, when you should have beer, weigbing
the lives of the Queen's subjects? No rational person will, lam
sure, venture to say that, if there had been in the minds of the
rulers of Ireland a proper sense of the hazard which they were
running, the proclamation would not have been vi-
sible on all hands early on the Saturday morning.
Now, the charge I
bring against the Government on account
of these prosecutions, is one respecting the details which have
been mentioned. The charge is this, that the Government
seems never to have considered the nature and character of
those proceedings, and wherein they differ from a common
action at law—a mere 9555 tans action. It seems to me they
considered nothing but this—whether they would get such a
declaration of law and such evidence of facts as would entitle
them to a verdict and a judgment. Now, in my own opinion,
the judgment in any political case is but a small part of that
for which a Government ought to be solicitous.— ( Hear,
hear.) I should say that this is the only political case in
which a Government has been merely solicitous for
that alone. What a Government should seek to obtain
ought to be, by an exhibition of justice and modera-
tion, to produce a salutary effect upon the public mind.
( Hear, hear.) Of course, the law must be strictly observed ;
but to cause the law to be strictly observed is only one of the
main conditions which would make a wise Government insti-
tute great criminal State proceedings. And if ever there was
a proceeding in which your justice ought to stand is such a
light as not to be questioned, or to have any prejudices enter-
tained against it, it was the case which you had to try. You
were instituting a prosecution —I feel considerable delicacy in
speaking on the matter in the presence of the person chiefly
connected with it, and that delicacy is increased by the succes-
sion of invectives which I have heard uttered against the Hon.
and Learned Gentleman to-night. I regard the end that Hon.
and Learned Gentleman is pursuing as unattainable ; and that
I look with deep disapprobation upon some of the means
which he employed for that end Ido not deny. But I would
wish, whilst speaking on the subject, to observe the respect due
to enemies, the respect due to misfortune, and the respect due
to truth.—(Opposition cheers.) It is impossible to deny that
that gentleman occupies, in the eyes of his fellow countrymen,
a position such as no popular leader mentioned in all
history ever occupied.—( Cheers from the Opposition benches.)
Let us consider, too, that the interest with which he and his
movements are regarded is not confined to these islands, it
extends to the Continent. You cannot sit down to dine at
any table d'hote—(Laughter from the Ministerial benches)._
you cannot travel in any steam-boat or diligence, but the
moment your speech or your accent " bewrayeth thee" as
an Englishman, the first question which the merchant or
manufacturer from the heart of France.—which the plain
cultivator, who is not much above the level of our yeomen,
put to you—is, what is to become of O'Connell?—( Oh,
oh, from the Ministerial benches.) Let those who deny
this assertion take the trouble to read the French journals.
—( Opposition cheers.) I declare this to be a most undoubted
fact. It is an unhappy circumstance, but it is one impos-
sible to dispute, that there is throughout the Continent a
feeling with respect to the relations between England and
Ireland not very much unlike the feeling with which men
generally regard the relations between Russia and Poland.
I do not defend this feeling ; I do not say it is a right
one ; I only assert a fact, which I can prove. And it
is natural that it should be so ; for, in the first
place, not to mention the immense jealousy which
the power of England naturally produces, the with
which anything great and conspicuous—such as the position of
England is—is regarded, the Irish agitation has that in it
which enlists on its side the sympathies of the two great divi-
sions, Liberal and Conservative, into which the population of
France is divided. Its democratic character attaches to it the
followers of the " extreme left," while its being Roman
Catholic attaches to it the members of the Conservative party,
Thus it happens that on this subject there is a variety of
opinions on the Continent, which would not easily be found
on any other question.—( Hear, hear.) I hope and trust that
I shall be believed when I state that I do not mention this for
the purpose of frightening the English Government into
taking any course unworthy of it, but I do say that in a case of
this sort it is of the highest importance that the administration
of justice should be beyond all impeachment—that anything
which would look like an unfair advantage should not be wet.
corned, but spurned away, and considered a greater disaster
than any other evil. Is it a case in which the first opinion on
the question of the jury is that Mr. O'Connell has suffered
wrong
sin the matter? Is it denied, if the law had been carried
exactly into effect, without fault or negligence, that Mr.
O'Connell's case would not have been damaged ? Has any
person ventured to deny that ? I have the word of one of the
Learned Counsel for the defence, and the affidavit states it,
that twenty-seven Roman Catholics were excluded from the
jury.—(Loud cries of " Hear, hear," from Mr. Shell.) Take
the Recorder's own statement ; it is very easy to talk about
716 names, or something of that sort, but reduce the
thing to simple arithmetic, and see what it is.—
( Hear, hear.) You were going to call forty-eight names ;
Now what is the 48th part of 720 ? It is 15 ; if those 15 were
Roman Catholics, there was an even chance that there would
have been another Roman Catholic in the 48. But if, as the
affidavit states, there were 27 Catholics, then there was nearly
two chances to one that there would be two Catholics among
the 48, and thus there was almost an even chance of there
being two more Roman Catholics on the list. Now
will any man tell me that Mr. O'Connell has
not in this matter suffered a distinct wrong ?
Will any person say that it is impossitle, or even highly im-
probable, that the result might have been different if it had not
been for this blunder? For remember the power which the
law gives to jurymen is such, that a single juryman, if he is
determined, and has absolutely made up his mind, may have
quite as much influence in affecting a verdict as ad the other
eleven. Is this my opinion alone ? What is the language of
Mr. Justice Perrin, as I find it reported in the papers
favourable to the prosecution. He says, " there is
about this case such gross negligence and failure
of duty that I am not prepared to say it was the result of acci-
dent."—( Loud cries of " Hear, hear," ' from Mr. Sheil.) Here
is one of your judges, and you call on us to pay the most pro-
found respect to all that your judges say—here is one of your
judges, who says that " he is not satisfied that this was the
effect of accident." He must know a great deal better
than I do, or than any Englishman can know, what sort
of tricks are practised in an Irish office when the object is
to procure a jury to convict; and he says " he is not sa-
tisfied that this is the effect of accident." But I will
come nearer home. 7he Right lion. Secretary for the Home
Department, says, and says truly, " We are not responsible for
the case." I know you are not. " I regret deeply that it
has taken place, and I wish it had been otherwise ; for I feel
the prejudice it has created against the Administration of
justice." What has been said on the other side is precisely
what I say ; " a prejudice has been created against the admi-
nistration of justice," which has tainted the whole of
the proceedings. I do not wish for stronger words than
those of the Right Honourable Baronet, but I wish that
the fact were not so; when in a great and important case—a
case upon which the eyes of millions—the eyes of all civilised
Europe was fixed—a mistake had taken place which created
" a prejudice against the administration of justice." I wish
Government had taken a rational view of the matter, and said,
4, We cannot avail ourselves of it." Hon. Gentlemen oppo-
site seem to think that with respect to striking off the Roman
Catholics from the jury, they have made out a good
case. I am ready to , admit that, in a certain
sense, they have made out a good case. lam ready to take the
facts as you put them. I take it, as you say, that it was ass
excellent thing to strike off all the Roman Catholics. But
there is still the question, was it politic in this State trial to
bring different religions and different races to their trial before
a jury of Protestants only ?—(Hear, hear.) It is a plain
question for every man of common sense. I know that the
law was on the side of the Government, and my charge
against them, from the beginning to the end of these
proceedings, is with regard to the law. We know what are
the principles of the law in such a case ; every thing that can
create a prejudice in the matter is carefully avoided; we
know what the principle de mediatate lingua' is. In the
case of a Dutch sailor, or of any other "alien," who, in a
quarrel might stab an Englishman, he is not left to be tried by a
jury of twelve Englishmen, but by a jury composed of half his
own race and half of Englishmen. Now if any " alien" had
been in the situation of Mr. O'Connell, he would have been
entitled to a jury half composed of his countrymen ; you are
ready enough to call the Irish Roman Catholics " aliens"
when it serves your purpose.—(Loud cheers from the Oppo-
sition.) You are ready enough to treat them as " aliens"
when you think it your interest to do so. But it is only when
you are going to form a jury that you do not treat the Roman
Catholics as " aliens."—( Loud cheers from the Opposition.)
Is it possible for any reasonable man to doubt that in a case where
the feelings of two sects, of two parties, were
greatly excited against each other, that a jury com-
posed exclusive of one sect, and from one party,
would not do justice? This is the opinion of a much better
lawyer than I am, for I, indeed, am no lawyer. But why did
not the Sheriff impannel a common jury, which would have
contained several Roman Catholics ? The difficulty in such a
case would have been none, and that the trial would then have
tended much better to the settlement of men's minds I have
not the least doubt. You wished to get a verdict, and you got
a panel, and from that panel a jury, from which no man could
expect justice. And then you got a charge, which I.
do not mean to say is unprecedented, for doe
State trials of the seventeenth century furnish suoh
precedents—( Loud Opposition cheers)—and after this charge
you got a verdict, and what are you now the better for it ?
Has it tended to conciliate the people of Ireland? You say
Ireland is quiet ; I know that it is so, and it will be so till
the sentence begins to be executed, and for the most obvious
reasons too, because the Irish people feel a deep interest in the
fate of the man whom they consider their leader, and 'they
will avoid doing anything likely to place him in a more
dangerous position.--( Hear, hear.) But your difficulties
will commence when the Court shall have finished its labours.
By what means can you expect there will not be a very se-
rious outbreak of public feeling then ?—( Hear, hear.) Is it
possible for a human being to believe that that man, who pos-
sessed the boundless affection of his countrymen, while he was
receiving honours from them, and while he was taxing them.
will at once lose his popularity, when he becomes a martyr?
I, who am as much attached to the union as any Hon. Gentle-
man opposite, who dislike the means that have been used to
inflame the minds of the people of Ireland against the union--
I feel that Mr. 0 Connell will not lose Isis
popularity. The Right lion. Baronet himself tells us that be
is sorry to say " a prejudice has been created against the ad-
ministration of justice." And if Englishmen, the friends of
the union, are deeply convinced of the fact that there has beer.,
great unfairness, what is the feeling of the Irish people ?—a
people who are not too well informed, and who agree with
Mr. O'Connell on the question of the union, not only
as to its being a hard, but an unjust measure, and
who believed every speech he uttered on the sub-
ject as perfectly justifiable? What are we to expect
to be their feelings ? Will not the power and magic
of Mr. O'Connell's name be just as great when shut up in a
prison as when at large ? But you will not have his personal in-
fluence, which has been so often, from whatever motives, ex-
erted to prevent the Irish people from proceeding to violence
and extremity. At the same time see what has been the
manner in which you have dealt with the agita-
tion ? And now, for the future, as to your execu-
tive measures, they are still to be things of the same sort.
What you gave given us hitherto were soldiers, barracks, un-
wise proclamations, and unjust State prosecutions. As to your
legislative measures, we are, it is true, to have this Bill for the
Registration of Irish voters, coupled with a Bill on the subject
of the franchise. What provisions those measures are to con-
tain we cannot say. All we know, and can say with confi-
dence on this subject, is that it is impossible for you to legislate
tioon it at once with credit to yourselves, with benefit to the
Irish people.—(Opposition cheers.) All we can with confi-
dence say is this—the measure you mean to introduce must either
destroy the last remains of the representation of Ireland,
or the last remains of your own character and existence.
With respect to the Landlord and Tenant Commission, I say
nothing upon the subject until we have the report. Nothio
has yet been done, and when we shall have the report Dam,'
long 0 n
can say. But I feel that I have been trespassing,')7on Berne
the House.—(Cries or " No, no," and " Go onit
-nsportance--
future occasion perhaps I may have an opportunity r
length into a subject of the gravest d h going at
and all I will do now is to takes some I mean the question of the Established Church in
finthlereland
who vote with the Government,
must say, that from gentlemen
man-
ner in which that question fie b met on either side, for I
we have had declarations of like-
seadeenhOthing, so far
From the Ministers who
sons,)—I mean that sort of liberality which is not accompanie
and profess to follow them,
htlareh
ve
as I have ob-
served. ,ed". The Established Church, if we are to jud
by
a vote
espokenworthy
we
fYof
from them, will not be touched.—(Hear.) A :
the speech of the Noble Lord (Stanley), I m
confess that it is impossible for me not t