The Sun.
London, England, 1844-09-05 00:00:00

~~O~~tIITQ ALTS.

LONDON, THURSDAY, sErrEMBER 5, 1844

JUSTICE TO IRELAND.

We have been agreeably disappointed—and every
friend of Ireland will be agreeably disappointed—by
the decisions of Lord DENMAN, Lord COTTENHAM,
and Lord CAMPBELL, in the case of the QUEEN V.
DANIEL O'CONNELL and others. These three law
Peers decided the question. We foolishly thought—
and many of the lay Peers were of the same opinion
—that it was a question for the decision of the
whole House. Even the LORD CHANCELLOR was
impressed with the same conviction. He did not
clear the House of the lay Peers when he put the
question ; he evidently expected that they would be
allowed to vote—and some of them actually did vot(
but their voices were hushed by the President
of 'the Council. He justly remarked that those
Lords who had not heard the discussion on the wilt
of error, and those who were not law Lords, of
course, being incompetent to decide on a point of
law, should not be allowed to vote. Tb;s met with
general approbation, and all the Peers retired except
five. These were the LORD CHANCELLOR, Lord
BROUGHAM, Lord COTTENHAM, Lord DENMAN, end
Lord CAMPBELL. When the battle was confined to
this small army, there could be no doubt as to the
victory. Lord BROUGHAM stood alone for confirming
the judgment of the Irish Bench, and he was happily
overpowered by three of the best lawyers that has adorned
the English Bar. They had, as became their station,
duly weighed the opinions of the judges, but they
found, as every man who has read the details of this
monstrous and anomalous prosecution has found; that
the points for the decision of the judges, drawn up at
the instigation of the LORD CHANCELLOR, diet not
involve the real—the main merits—of the case, and,
like honest men, they formed a judgment for them-
selves. They threw overboard Chief Justice TINDAL
and his colleagues. We make this remark without
"Y disparagenaent of the imperturbable, consci-
entious, and virtuous Chief Justice of the Common
Pleas. He had only cetrtain law questions to anawer.
He answered them honestly; but the real judges had
more latitude ; they were bound to take into con-
sideration the whole merits of the case. They cared
nothing for Lord LYNDHURST or Lord BROUGHAM,
Or the underlings who drew up the questions for the
considergtion of the judges ; they decided according
to their consciences, and declared that Mr. O'CoN.
NELL and his compatriots had been unjustly con-
demned. What a picture of English justice! These
men, one of them the first orator, statesman, and
lawyer of his native land, the greatest bene-
factor of Ireland, the consummator of the
Catholic Emancipation Bill, and the mainstay of
the Reform Bill, have now been imprisoned for three
months, contrary to all law, contrary to justice and
equity; and yet, in this land of boasted freedom, they
'have no redress. Lord CAMPBELL moved the intro-
duction of a Bill to remove the anomaly, but the
Peers raised their voices against It, because, they said,
it was -brought forward for party purposes. It was

brought forward for justice; arid the result has shown
that Lord CAMPBELL was right. Never was such
an ignominy stamped OR the laws of a
country. Can we blame foreigners for scoffing
at us ? The Judges of Ireland had come to cei ta;rl
decisions. The Judges of England have reversed
some of these decisions. The House of Peers have
decided against both, and three men, all, we are happy
to say, of the Liberal party, have asserted the honour
of the country, taken an unbiassed view of the ques-
tion, and done justice to Ireland. Why were there
not four Liberal law Peers ? What became of Lord
LANGDALE ? He was BS fit as Lord COTTENHAM or
Lord BROUGUAM to deliberate on the question
which involves the most important interests of the
empire. He is well paid for his scanty labour.
He was promoted by the liberal party to his present
position—he, in fact, owed his elevation to the politics
of Mr. O'CONNELL—to the determined support of the
Irish to the Whig Government; yet he is lurking in
some corner when he should be in the battle array, de-
fending the interests of his party. We fear the old
Whigs are doomed to destruction. Many of them
have become renegades. The most conspicuous of all
we will not name, because it would be a work of
supererogation. But, thank GOD, we have honest
men among the modern Whigs. Lord DENMAN
deserves the highest honour for his speech on the writ
of error. Lord CAMPBELL has never swerved from his
honourable character, and, at the conclusion of his
speech, he said, in the true spirit of liberty, the
appeal was not from the Irish to the English judges,
but to that Chamber, in the exercise of one of its most
important functions, which he hoped their Lordships
would long exercise for the benefit of the country
and the protection of its liberties. They have exer-
cised one of its most important functions, and
to their honour, notwithstanding all the tricks
of renegades, have done justice to Ireland. We
believe there is no inhabitant of the United
Empire that rejoices more at this happy result
than our beloved QUEEN. Her affections towards
Ireland are well known. From her infancy she
has mingled with many of the people of that country;
she knows that none welcomed her accession to the
throne more than Mr. O'CONNELL, and that no
subject has testified more loyalty to her person than
the man who has been imprisoned unjustly for three
months. Royalty has duties as well as rights. Her
MAJESTY, it is said, is about to visit Scotland a
second time. Why should she not now change her
plan, and visit the sister island ? She would be
welcomed by a generous, a kind, a forgiving, and a
brave people, with enthusiasm ; and Mr. O'CONNELL,
the arch-conspirator, would be the first to we.'come
her to a country that she loves so well.

A Correspondent in the Morning Herald, who
dates from Exeter, states that he is credibly informed
"that notices of objection to the registration of three
hundred and twenty-four Conservatives have been
served in one parish alone in that city, by the hired
agents of the Anti-Corn-law League; that it is re-
ported that in Exeter altogether about a thousand
notices have been thus served, the delivery of which
was made last Sunday; and that the League have also
sent in claims as well as objections ; and that it is
believed that their money has been employed in pay-
ing up the rates of parties who were in arrear." Our
Contemporary's Correspondent adds, as his deliberate
opinion, that similar proceedings have taken place
generally throughout the country, as the Chairman
observed at the last Covent-garden meeting that Com-
mittees for such purposes had been formed in a hun-
dred and forty places; and winds up his budget of
grievances by the following touching reflection :
" Surely it is time for all honest men to unite for the
suppression of such an atrocious combination as that
of the League, in whose hands the Reform Act may
be made an engine of the most odious tyranny that,
perhaps,, England
__ever
_grpp.ned under:' GranAtn,H
the proceedings of the Anti-Corn-law League is
true—and we most sincerely hope it is—then we say
that the course they are adopting is not only justified,
but imperatively called for, by circumstances. But
were it not so, still it is not for a Tory to ob-
ject to their policy, for in paying attention to the
register, they are only following the advice given to
his party by Sir ROBERT PEEL—in fact, taking a leaf
out of the Premier's own book. " Attend to the
register," said the Right Hon. Baronet to the Con-
servatives in his most impressive manner, " for it is
in the Registration Courts that the battle of the Con-
stitution must be fought." Well, the League follows
this advice, looks sharply after the register, with a
view to see that no improper persons are allowed to
appear on it, and that those only shall vote who are
authorised to give a vote. But this, it seems, is an
act of " odious tyranny" on the part of the Anti-
Corn-law League If so, it is a tyranny recom-
mended by Sir Roaaar PEEL himself, and cannot,
therefore, with any show of consistency, be con-
demned by a Conservative. Can that be an uncon-
stitutional act in a free-trader which, when resorted
to by a monopolist, is an act of constitutional necessity?
Can it be right in a Conservative to adopt the counsel
of the Premier, and wrong in a Liberal to follow
the suggestions of the same high authority?
Is there one law of right for this party, and
another for that? The bare supposition of such
a thing is a most preposterous absurdity. The
truth is, the Tories—or Conservatives as they
prefer calling themselves are notoriously in-
tolerant of every species of interference but that
which they themselves originate, and carry out into
practice. When they interfere with the register, then
all is perfectly just and constitutional ; but when the
free-traders, following in their footsteps, presume to
take the same liberty, then the act becomes one of
"odious tyranny," which all good men and good
citizens are bound to visit with their severest repro-
bation! However it may be with the Tories, the
community at large will not understand these nice
distinctions, but will give the Anti-Corn-law League
credit for the just and patriotic spirit that prompts
them in their endeavours to reform the register, and
for the steady determination with which they follow
up this important branch of their public duty.
Abundant mischief has already been done by the
Tory party in their vexatious interference with the
register, and it is now high time that the League
should step bodly forth to prevent the perpetration of
further mischief, and open men's eyes to the real state
of the case. We, therefore, earnestly conjure the
members of this great national confederacy to per-
severe in their patriotic and every way constitutional
purpose. We conjure them to watch the register
with the most active vigilance, and to treat the
clamour- of the Tory faction with the cool, con-
temptuous indifference, to which such an interested
outcry is entitled. "Attend to the register!" was
the advice of Sir ROBERT PEEL to his party.
"Attend to the register !" is our advice to the Anti-
Corn-law League. This is one of their chief instru-
ments of success. It has already answered well
in the hands of the Tories, and in the hands of the
free-traders it is calculated, if worked in a straight-
forward, energetic spirit, to be of inestimable benefit
to the good cause. The very outcry of the mono-
polists is the best testimony to its efficiency !

On a dispassionate review of all the circumstances
connected with the so-called adjustment of the mis-
understanding between France and England on the
Otaheite question, we are compelled to admit that
we are by no means satisfied with the nature or the
amount of the concessions by the French Govern-
ment, to the demand we have made of satisfaction
for " a gross outrage," committed by its servants,
on the personal rights, and the public authority of a
British Consul. There is nothing in all the special
pleading of the French journals—nothing in the
laboured explanations contributed by some of our own
daily Contemporaries—that has yet explained away
either the brutality and insolence of the French
officers, or vindicated, from the impudent slight
which they have put upon it, the honour of our flag,
and the dignity of our SOVEREIGN, disparaged in,
the imprisonment of her Consular Representative.
With all our ardent love of peace, we consider that -
its blessings may be purchased, on too exorbitant
terms; and the worthlessness of the cause of guar,-
ness of the scene of action—the
rel—the remote