The Sun.
London, England, 1845-04-07 00:00:00

ftt irte Vbition

SUN OFFICE, Seven o' Clock.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAT.
GLOBE.—When President Polk made his recent assertion
of the "unquestionable" right of the United States to the
Oregon Territory, and so broadly intimated their intention
to have it by fair means or by foul it is retty evident that
he did a veil, foolish thing. That the first. speech of a new
President, like the first work of a " prentice hand," must be
taken cum grano salis, we are perfectly aware. We offer no ob-
jection to the national taste which extorts from every Presi.
dent, at every opportunity, these fulsome eulogies of his coun-
try and its institutions ; nor do we forget that our transat-
lantic brethren, like their aboriginal predecessors, have a
constitutional tendency to soar into " palaver" of a random
kind; or that the favourite weapon of the red warrior is still
burled by the white orator in high-flown prose. But there
are limits to the allowance to be made even to American
Presidents. ihe British Government has shown itself,
throughout the conduct of this affair, extremely slow to
take offence. No claim has been put forward on our part
which does not admit of ample support by appeal to
every authority which can rationally be appealed to on
such a subject. The value to the British colonies in North
America of the country west of the Rocky Mountains, and
north of the Columbia, is quite equal to that attached by the
United States to a similar outlet to the Pacific. Our North
American trade westward is chiefly in peltries, and
China is our principal market. To give up the dis-
puted territory to the United States, would, there-
fore, be to give up not only what we have a valid claim
to, but what it is of considerable importance we should re-
tain. Were the elements of the case so altered that the
subject of the dispute should be of small value to us, but of
great importance to the United States, the point of right
might be of little moment. If against us, we should have
no interest in pushing the dispute to extremities ; and i f
in our favour the conditions of its cession might be readily
and amicably settled by negotiation. But it is not so.
The labours of several very able men on both sides
have been devoted to the investigation of the respective
claims of the two countries. The result is a very
general admission of the justice of that of Great
Britain, to an extent even greater than that to which it is
now urged. And again, every year increases the number of
settlers in the northern district of the country, who have
placed their dependence for security of person and property
upon the undisputed recognition of British authority from
Canada to the mouth of the Columbia. Since Oc-
tober, 1818, the dispute :has been avoided by a tem-
porary compromise, under which the territory is left
open to the subjects of both Powers, without preju-
dice to their respective claims. But this is an arrangement
which, however satisfactory while the country remained un-
settled and uninhabited except by a few wandering natives
and the trappers and collectors of peltry, is obviously incon-
sistent with the establishment of the forms of government
which become requisite as soon as the regular settler makes
his appearance. Either party is at liberty to terminate
the arrangement on giving a year's notice. But in the
mean time, of course, the rights of both are in abeyance.
The negotiations now going on between Mr. Pakenham
and the United States Government have for their object the
amicable termination of what all admit cannot long endure.
By entering upon them, the American Government has
tacitly Admitted that there is something in the case fairly
liable to doubt or dispute. It is not usual either for men or for
rations to engage in conference upon matters which either
party deems indisputable ; but while such a conference conti-
nues, it is usual with both to preserve a decent abstinence from
,env direct allusion or appeal to popular persuasions or pas-
sions. In meeting our Plenipotentiary, the American Go-
vernment addresses itself to our judgment and our sense
of justice. Does it find in us so great a lack of these
as to necessitate an appeal to our feelings—and is the
American estimate of our courage and our power so
very low as to justify, even to themselves, the special
direction of that appeal to our fears ? If this be Mr.
iolk's view of the matter, we can cofidently assure him he
is wrong ; and that an adherence ton it will not only fail to
facilitate the adjustment of the present difference of opinion
between the two countries, but will probably open up one still
more difficult to settle. No doubt a large portion of the Ame-
rican people believe the claim of their Government upon the
disputed territory to be a just one. The national imagination
is agreeably filled by the idea of extending the Union to
the western shores of the Continent; and it needs but the
suppression of a few facts, and the sturdy assertion of one or
two doubtful doctrines, to make a popular case in favour of
the claim. But we can hardly believe that even the American
populace can be so besotted as to imagine that we are likely
to yield to bullying what we refuse to a fair demand. " The
old country," groan though it may under the horrors of
despotism and heavy taxes, has yet a fair reputation
fur courage—has not commonly been found wanting
either in the ability or the will to fight when fair occasion
offered. We are yet unacquainted, except through the
flowery medium of a President's message, with "the inesti-
mable blessings" of a purely democratic Government—we
do not know a hat it is to have the highest offices of our Go-
vernment filled by gentlemen caught hastily in the back-
woods, with much party-patriotism and little prudence, and
quite uncontaminated by official experience ; but we like to
keep our own—we do not like to be threatened—and we can
fight if we are forced to it.
STANDARD.—The Dublin Freeman's Journal offers the
following notice of some observations that lately appeared in
the Standard:—" The Standard pipes on a new key. That
rabid bigot finds himself lashed into submission, and strives
to restrain the effervescence of its bile by persuading
itself that the increased grant to Maynooth is not a
• concession,' nor yet a measure of conciliation,' but
a measure of compulsion towards the clergy—' a mea-
sure of Government—a measure (says the Standard) of a
sound, and not unjust or harsh poliyc, compelling the religious
teachers' to qualify themselves for their functions. But we
must reprint the passage here though we have transferred
the whole article to another column ;—" The proposed grant
to. Maynooth is not a measure of concession or of ' concilia-
tion,' to use a phrase which abuse and failure have rendered
odious and absurd—it is a measure of Government, a mea-
sure of a sound, and not unjust or harsh, policy, com-
pelling the religious teachers of a large proportion of
the Queen's subjects to qualify themselves for the
office they asssume by a far better education than they now
receive. As such a compulsory measure the Roman Catholic
priests in Ireland treat it, although they cannot honestly con-
fess the truth, because they cannot charge the proposition
with injustice or harshness.' If this sort of coercion
satisfies the Standard, we have no reason to complain.
it is—yes, it positively is—a measure of coercion, says
the Standard. Peel may call it coercion ; the Queen
may call it conciliation ; but we know it is neither. Were
it either, we would oppose it ; but it is not—it is down-
right, though neither unjust' nor harsh,' compulsion to
force those 20,0001. upon the priests, and we will call it such.
Why, then, oppose this proposition ?" The compulsion of
which we spoke is not coercion. It is a compulsion by the
public opinion of a man's class, which though the very re-
verse of coercion, is, in the long run, the most powerful of all
influences in directing the conduct of men ; we say in the
song run, because we think that we have been misun-
derstood upon this point by some critics less unfriendly than
the Dublin Freeman's Journal. We do not anticipate an
early manifestation of improvement in the character of the
eriests—the education of anindividual is not the work of a day,
at less is the education of a class ; but we do anticipate
that the Roman Catholic laity knowing that their clergy
have tle means of respectable education ; and being, as we
trust they will be, better educated themselves, will compel
the aspirants to the priesthood to avail themselves of the
bounty of the State, and will even add something of their
own, should the bouti,;, of the State be insufficient. This we
count the first stage towards the reformation of Ireland, and it
will occupy some years ; but the second stage is morally
certain to succeed. This, it may be said, is drawing hope
from a distant future. It is—and who knows anything of
political science who does not know that the distant future
ought to be a principal consideration with statesmen ? All
great operations in moral, as in physical nature, are the effect
of a long train of causes, acting through a long period of
time ; but if such operations are not undertaken, ex-
cept with the prospect of immediate results, they will
not be undertaken at all. Now to another point. In the
seeming support which Lord John Russell gave to Ministers
on Thursday, his Lordship, in the exercise of the accus-
tomed craft of his party, did his utmost to damage
the measure which he affected to aid, advancing false
and offeesive arguments in its support, and Lord John, we
are sorry to say, was countenanced in the same line by some
who ought to have known better.

TA.TTERSALL'S.-THIS EVENING
Six o'CLocx.

NEWMARKET HANDICAP.
5 to 1 agst Croton Oil
8 to agst Ma Mie
10 to 1 agst Vol-au-vent
10 to I agst Strathspey
VQ THOUSAND GUINEAS STAKES,
5 to 2 agst Nits
3 to I agst hedger
5 to 1 agst Cobweb colt
CHESTER CUP.
9 to 1 agst Obscurity
9 to 1 agst Cataract
10 to 1 agst Semiseria
15 to 1 apt Era
20 to 1 agst Winesour
22 to 1 agst Portrait
30 to 1 agst The Pride of Kildare
30 to 1 agst Pug
30 to 1 agst Ratan
30 to 1 agst Yheomun ac Knuck
33 to 1 agst Queen of the Tyne
50 to 1 agst Fitz-Allan
DERBY.

10 to 1 agst Alarm
15 to 1 agst Kedger
17 to 1 agst Clear- the-Way
18 to 1 agst Pam
20 to 1 agst Cobweb colt
20 to 1 agst liewsmonger
25 to 1 agst Weatherbit
30 to 1 agst Mentor
30 to 1 agst Pantasa
35 to 1 agst Laird o' Cockpen
40 to 1 agst Old England
50 to 1 agst Fuzbos

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.
(THIS EVENING.)

HOUSE OF LORDS.

The LORD CHANCELLOR took his seat on the Wool-
sack shortly after Five o'clock.
,Lord KENYON presented petitions from Bath, and
several other places, against the grant to the College of
Maynooth.
The Earl of RADNOR begged to enter upon the
Journals of the House his protest against the proceed-
ings of Saturday, and that leave should be given to
Noble Lords to sign that protest before the rising of the
House.
The Bishop of WORCESTER presented petitions
from Stourpoint its favour of the observance of the
LorA's-day. The Right Rev. Prelate also presented
petitions praying for the establishment of uniformity in
Divino worship, and an alteration of the Rubric. The
Right Rev. Prelate trusted that the pastoral letter of the
jvc...hbishop of Canterbury would be productive of the
best, effects.
• ,0 40... Sari of POWIS presented several petitions from
..ii:sl4,3ltserot p is of the country against the union of the
g 4:!" ' <feeirptpti :
ja.pßhEaLnLd Bangor.presented a petition from the pro-
-1
-'. 'f.oo-*}lrtni- • .441 es and council of Aberdeen, against any
.IP' , ' - - ' teof Scotch Banking. He trusted
..;
~,,thuge.. , sys m
ti - that tire4TOtifo-Vuke would give sufficient notice to the
r•,..' ':-: -..
ie4 ii 2 0 iit mateeially concerned, of the time at which
mOt
' ould be brought forward, and what the in-
,-
\
t"qtrf other Majesty's Government were,
teTWPake of WELLINGTON could not state th.e