The Sun.
London, England, 1844-01-08 00:00:00

SFIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OP THIS DAY.
GLOBE.—The striking of the special jury for
the trial of O'Connell and his co-defendapts,
and the subsequent reduction of the forty-et ht
names (drawn by ballot from the list) to twenty-
four, who will be summoned to try the issue
between the Crown and the traversers, have
taken place. These preparations for the grand
'national drama have terminated the temporary
lull of public excitement which the suspension
of the proceedings, by the postponement
of the trial, had produced. The course
adopted by the law officers of the Crown in
the striking of the jury—an account of which
will be found in another column—is applauded
or condemned, in conformity with the relative
political position of the journals and the Govern-
ment. Their rejection, on the part of the Crown,
of every Roman Catholic, is lauded as a master-
stroke of policy by the ultra-Protestant party;
while it is denounced by the Liberals as indica-
tive of a determination, on the part of the Go-
vernment, to obtain a conviction by the aban-
donment of even the semblance of impartiality.
The striking off by the Crown officers of eleven
Roman Catholic jurors and one Protestant (an
Englishman) from the list, must be admitted to
be an extraordinary proceeding ; and calculated
to excite suspicion of a determination to pro-
cure a conviction by whatever means. We will
n'jt, however, assume that even a jury thus sus-
piciously constructed, will necessarily return
a verdict hostile to evidence. But this we will
say—and we expect the concurrence of all who
Are not precluded by.party prejudice from forming
an uubiassed opinion of the case—that no
course could have been adopted so likely to em-
barrass the deliberations of twelve men desirous
of arriving at a just decision on the facts, as ad-
duced in evidence for the prosecution and de-
fence. It will be impossible for the jury not to
feel that they are placed in an invidious posi-
tion by the conduct of the Crown officers. In
sensitive minds such a feeling will produce
timidity. This will be associated with regret
that they as a jury are wholly selected from one
of the two great parties into which their country is,
unhappily, divided. Resentment against the reck-
less officials, if' not against their employers, whose
commands they executed, for having thus endea-
voured to convert the jury-box into the engine
of their purposes, and the jurors into their tools,
will be, more or less, the result, as mind inter-
changes with mind its own views and feelings.
An indignant refusal to be thus degraded, in
their persons as citizens' and in office as jurors,
will be produced. The Irish Attorney-
General's " devil," like the person from
whom he derives his appellation, will be
found to have over-helped those who called
him to their aid, and thus pitched them into
the mud instead of placing them in the saddle.
33ut, take the other view. Suppose a conviction
—and for the purposes of our argument, it
is immaterial Ivbether -the finding be sup-
ported or not, by sufficient evidence—a ver-
dict against O'Connell and his co-defendants,
to be of any service to the Government, or ofany
avail in putting down the agitation for Repeal,
must be in accordance with public opinion.
By impugning the impartiality of the jury,
the Government has destroyed the moral in-
fluence which a manifestly impartial verdict
would have secured. By securing a jury of Pro-
testants, they have neutralised the influence
which a conviction would have exercised on the
thinking part of the community; while they
have converted the prosecution into au addi-
tional provocation to excitement in the coun-
try which they would tranquillise by intimida-
tion. O'Connell convicted by a jury so con-
stituted, the Government—strong as it deems
itself in the possession of Ireland by military
occupation—would be embarrassed by success;
and would be compelled, by fear of an insurrec-
tion, to make a virtue of necessity, and decline to
follow up the verdict by calling the defendants
up for judgment. The Irish Government is put
on the defensive. I n justification of the question-
able policy pursued by the law officers of the
Crown on striking the jury, the Dublin Pachetputs
forth a laboured apotog-y in its behalf. The specious
reasoning of the advocate is frequently fit tal to the
cause for which it is employed. The pains taken
by the Crown officers to obtain a jury of parti-
sans, not only shows something approaching to
fear that a mixed jury could not be trusted with
the case they would be called upon to try, but
also that the bold step of striking off every
Catholic was one which it was necessary to gloss
over by sophistry, mid to bolster up by an ap-
peal to the theological prejudices of the domi-
nant Church. The following extract from the
Government organ, in the article we have al-
luded to, shows the extremity to which its
supporters are driven to find plausibilities for
thy-, sweeping rejection of Roman Catholics, as
unfit to serve, because of their creed, on "such a
jury" :
e We contend that there existed good and incontrovertible
reasons for excluding the persons professing the Roman Catholic
religion from acting upon such a jury. We all know that the
repeal agitation, which forms the essence and subject-matter of
the prosecution, is, with some very few exceptions, maintained
,xelosively by the Roman Catholic population of this country,
2,,,tered and encouraged by the Romish priesthood, two of
:iorn are numbered amongst the traversers; and we also know
that resort is had tl every species of oppresssion and intimida-
tion to draw recruits to its ranks ; and we verily believe
such to be the general feciicg amongst the lower orders of the
people upon this subject that were a Roman Catholic to agree
to a finding of guilty' against O'Connell and the travereers, he
'Mould be subject to every species of persecution, and become an
object of execration to the vast majority of persons of his own
persuasion. This, we admit, is a hard saying, but such is our
solemn conviction; and admitting, as we unfeignedly do, that
any one of the individuals in question would be most desirous
to act conscientiously, even under circumstances so trying and
hazardous, yet it would be an act of the most positive cruelty to
place en individual in a position where the contest might be
between his conscience and his fears."
Tne Trial Of O'C.:etinell and his co-def-ndants
t!den, to be a contest between Roniami Catholics
said Protestants ! The distinctions which long
prevailed, and which, while they prevailed, were
a reproach to the Legislature and a source of dis-
traction and danger to the country, are revived.
The Government has practically re-enacted the
civil disabilities which ex eluded Catholic's from the
sights of citizenship. Its officers have dared public
opinion by expunging Papists from a jury panel,
iu a country the inhabitants of which are of' the
Roman Catholic religion in the proportion of seven
to one ! The religious hostilities, which had pre-
vailed for three centuries, and were beginning to
abate with the late concession of civil rights to
the long-prescribed Many, are revived. The
Government declares that it dare not trust a
Roman- Catholic in the jury-box on the trial of
cause to which it is a pasty. Yet, with wondrous
inconsistency, Sir Robert Peel professes to re-
'sard Ireland as an integral part of the empire;
entitled to equal privileges, and to be governed
by equal laws, with the other parts of her
Majesty's domestic territories ! Lord Lyndhurst
was right in his denunciation of Ireland—
sieht, practically, though wrong constitutionally.
The Irish are "aliens' iu the estimation of con-
sistent Tories. " Aliens in religion '—they are
disqualified to act as jurors between a Protestant
Government and Roman Catholic defendants
This is the substance of tlieDublin Packet's
argument in defe?ce of the (Jove' nment—an
argument in perfect consistency with Lord
Lyedhurst's fulmination. Yet, were they
instead of being only • lly , " aliens, then
would Roman Catholes he in it better position
when prosecuted by die GOVerffillent tits alleged
political offences. They would, ss aliens, be en-
titled to a mixed jury, to pass between them and
the Crown. The Government treats the Catholics
Miens, without allowing theta the privileges

of foreigners. Surely such a panel will be set
aside by the Court.
STANDARD.—The proceedings at the strik-
ing of the special jury for the State trials, to
commence in Dublin this day week, is extremely
amusing, more particularly on account of the
nail affectation of surprise and indignation of the
traversers' solicitor, as some Roman Catholics
were excluded from the panel. The tone of the
attorney was, however, mild and sober, compared
with the reclamation of the Freeman's Journal of
the day following the striking of the jury. Eight
persons are to be tried as members of a combination
assumed by the prosecutor to be illegal. Of these
eight persons some are Roman Catholics, some
at least professing Protestants, and one is a
Roman Catholic clergyman. Forty-eight names
are taken by lot from a list of 717, prepared in
strict conformity with the terms of a statute, the
provisions of which cannot be thought illiberal,
when it is known that the statute was introduced
by the late Sir Michael O'Loglilin and the pre-
sent Mr. Justice Perrin, under the Irish adminis-
tration of the Marquis of Normanby. The list
of 48 being thus obtained by lot, the Crown
solicitor and the traversers' attorney proceed to
reduce it, according to the peremptory direc-
tions of the law, by striking off twelve names
each ; how well soever satisfied with the
whole 48, still the solicitors must reduce the
list.

The Crown solicitor strikes off twelve

names, of which, says the Dublin Freeman's
Journal, eleven (other accounts say nine)
are the names of Roman Catholics, and
the traversers' attorney strikes off twelve
names, all, without any exception, the names of
Protestants. If the striking off names, there-
fore, is to be taken as insult, the professors of the
Protestant religion are prima facie more insulted
than the professors of the Romanist faith. But it
is said by the Freerr•a is Journal that the Roman
Catholics objected to form the whole number
of Roman Catholics in the list of 48. We
know not how this mly be but the Dublin Even-
ing Packet answers the invidious, insulting, and,
we believe, unjust inference that the gentlemen
in question were objected to as Roman Catholics,
by explaining that every man of the twelve
objected to by the Crown Solicitor, whether
Roman Catholic or Protestant, is a mem-
ber of the Repeal Association. If this be
so—and the excellent character of the Dublin
Evening Packet is sufficient warrant for the
strict truth of all its statements—there is surely
no just ground for complaint. It may be the
misfortune of the Roman Catholic middle class
of the citizens of Dublin, that they have been
misled to join the Repeal Association, and it is no
less a public misfortune if the fact be so ; but it
does not follow from their error, that the funda-
mental principle in the administration of justice,
which forbids a man to be " actor et judex," can
be dispensed with. If there be guilt in the acts
charged against the traversers in the state trials,
every member of the Repeal Association is in
specie, though not in degree, as guilty as the
gentlemen named in the indictment. Every
member of the association has, in fact,practically,
and theretore most unequivocally, recorded his
judgment upon the very question to be submitted
to the jury this day week—the legality and the
moral propriety of the association and of its pro-
ceedings; for about the facts of the case there
will, we presume, be little ground for dispute. It
is, we repeat it, a great public misfortune if
Repealism and Romanism are co-extensive
among the middle class citizens of Dublin ;
but though there is, no doubt, the example
of a Pope who condemned himself to the
flames, we must not look for such he-
roical self-devotion in our day, and ask
a man to sit in judgment upon himself merely
because he is a Romanist—least of all in such a
matter as that of the State prosecutions in Ire-
land, which is, in fact, a defence of public
liberty. For if these prosecutions fail from any
default in the adminstration of justice, or are
suspected to fail from any such default, there
can be no doubt of some legislative proceeding—
of course involving an abridgement of the freedom
now enjoyed by the people—in order to put down
a movement so mischievous and dangerous as the
Repeal Association. The Irish Attorney-General
has to vindicate the law in more senses than one—
he has to enforce its authority, and also to show
that it is sufficient for the protection of the public
peace and security; but this last duty he certainly
would not discharge with fidelity, where he to try
persons whom he considers offenders against the
law by a jury of their confederates. We do not
wish to intimate any opinion as to the verdict
to which a fair jury will probably come, but
if a single Repealer were on the jury, and if
the verdict should be an acquittal, or it no
verdict should be obtained by reason of a
non-agreement of the jury, there can be
little doubt to what such a result would be
ascribed, and how much responsibility would
rest upon the principal law officer of the
Crown. We have no question that to object to
so many Roman Catholics, whether they are
eleven or nine, has been extremely painful to
the Irish Attorney-General; but his duty lay
straight before him ; he was to procure a fair
trial, and that fair trial he certainly could not
procure, had he allowed the confederates of
the accused, whether these confederates were
Roman Catholics or Protestants, to con-
stitute the jury to decide upon the guilt or
innocence of their common confederacy. The
insult, for a gross insult indeed there is, has
not been offered by the Attorney-General, brit
those who complain of his conduct. They surely
insult the Protestants of the empire as well as
the Protestants of Dublin, when they say that
twelve Protestants, against any one of whom
personally they have been able to offer no
objection, though they have had opportunity to
object to every man of them, do not constitute
a F jury sufficiently honest, intelligent, and im-
partial to try a case in which no question of
Protestantism or Romanism arises. This is un-
grateful as well as insulting, because there has
been repeated proof of the inflexible inte-
grity of the Protestant juries of Dublin, even in
cases where Protestant feeling might be supposed
to operate.