The Sun.
London, England, 1842-04-13 00:00:00

withdrawn, he would come forward with some pro-
position at some future day.—(Hear, hear.) But the
question now at issue was so clearly decided, that no
such proposition could be satisfactory.—(Cheers.) They
all remembered when the Hon. Member for Finsbury
proposed his resolution, that the Right Hon. Gentleman
at the head of her Majesty's Government said he
would take no other course except to give a direct
negative to the proposition, and he had not heard any
different opinion from him.(Hear, hear.) The Noble
Lord said that he understood there was a willingness to
maintain that resolution of the House. He (Lord John
Russell) was quite willing to. maintain that, resolution.
—(Hear, hear.) That resolution was pasfal by the late
Parliament, and was so far binding on the present
Parliament that the Speaker enforced it, and if by
making it a standing order of the House it could be made
more binding he had no objection to that course, but in
the absence of any proposition, and the question
being one as to the reception or rejection of
the petition, he could only say , that he would
give his vote for its reception as he had done on the
former occasion.—(Cheers.) He thought it better when
debates were going on with respect to an income tax,
and when his Hon. Friend had a petition on the subject,
which hemoved should be received, and when he (Lord
John Russell) held two petitions in his hand, that they
should not evade the subject before them.—(Hear, hear.)
Mr. LIDDELL thought the House ought to have had
some formal notice of the intention of the Hon. Member.
He perfectly agreed with the Noble Lord, that it was
impossible to evade the discussion of this question ; it
had now assumed a form in which the public business
would be suspended, if some decided determination were
not come to. The Right Hon. Baronet had taken the
course which he thought he was bound to take.—
(Hear, hear.) They were without notice, suddenly
called on to abrogate a rule of. the Howse which had
obtained for 150 years, and if any one would consult
Hansard, they would see that it was come to in the first
year of William the Third, after the revolution of 1688,
and" that, like most other rules of the House, it was not
established without sound reasons. He thought the
Secretary of State for the Home Department put the
question on its proper ground, when he said
that the rule was a remnant of protection to
the Crown, necessary in order that the
public business should not be obstructed by petitions,
which, if they were once admitted, would flock in from
every part of the kingdom. He believed that the fact of
the Noble Lord (the Member for London) being on the
other side of the House had something to do with the
opinion he had come to on this subject. Looking at the
firmness with which the Noble Lord had, on a former
occasion, maintained the privileges of the House, would
he, if he had been at the head of the Government, have
taken the course he had now done ?
" Credat Judmus—non ego."
He thought at least that they should come to no sudden
determination upon the subject, and that they should
not come to a decision without taking into their consi-
deration the future convenience of the House. On these
grounds he should give his vote against the motion then
before the House, as he had already voted against the
Hon. Member for Finsbury.
After a few words from Lord FRANCIS EGERTON,
which did not reach the gallery,
Mr. THOMAS DUNCOMBE rose and said it was
quite clear that there was but one-or other of two ways
of getting out of the present difficulty ; the one was tor
the House at once to receive the petition, the other was
for her Majesty's Ministers to come down with a stand-
ing order, and pass that order, to the effect that no peti-
tion against a tax should be received. That, as he had
said yesterday, was the proper way, considering the
views of the Right Hon. Baronet opposite, of dealing
with the subject. But what did the Noble Lord, the
Member for Lancashire, (Lord F. Egerton) propose ?
He proposed that this petition should be withdrawn, and
lie would see, in the curse of a few days, whether he
could not make a sort of feather bed fur lil.r Majesty's
Ministers to fall down upon.—(Hear.) That was the
way by which the Noble Lord proposed that her Majesty's
Ministers should escape from the difficulty in which
they were now placed, and the defeat which must at
length, probably that very night, attend their opposition
to the proposal before the House. .Now, lion. Members
upon his side were not prepared in the slightest degree to
compromise their principles. They had placed before the
House and the country the grounds which induced them to
think _ that the people had a right to address that House
by petition, on the subject of taxation, as they must upon
all other measures under the consideration of Parlia,
ment.—(Hear, -hear.) He maintained that they, as the
guardians of the public purse, and as the representatives
of the people, had a right to entertain those petitions, and
that the people were entitled to advise them as to the dis-
posal of their own money in the same way as any proprietor
of an estate had a right to direct his steward in the appli-
cation of his rent.—(Hear, hear.) That was his case ;
and until they were prepared to controvert that position,
it was no use to come down and talk about a practice of
150. years. Such arguments might then have done
remarkably well ; they might have done remarkably
well in the days of Gatton and Old Sarum, but they
would not do at the present day. Public opinion was
against them—common sense was against them—(Loud
cries of " hear. hear")—and justice was against them.
e wanted, therefore, to know vt hat was the use
of the House waiting two or three days, in order
that they might hear the resolution of the Noble Lord,
the. Member for Lancashire ? The Noble Lord had
voted with his (Mr. Duncombe's) party yester-
day, and he trusted he . would again vote with
him that night. lie felt assured, at all events,
that his Honourable Friend who had been entrusted
with the petition would not compromise the interests of
his constituents, but that he would again take the sense
of the house as to whether those petitions should be re-
ceived.—(Hteir, hear.)
Sir 1103ERT PEEL said that he could assure the
Hon. Gentleman that he was not acting tinder any ap-
prehension of any fall whatever, nor did he want any
feather bed to fall upon.—(Hear, hear.) He
had only dischargt d what he believed to be his
duty to the Crown and the public. He believed it to be
his duty to maintain a usage which he found had pre-
vailed for 150 years—(" Oh, oh," from the Opposition
benches)—not because it had prevailed for so long a
period, but because repeated proofs of the inconve-
nience of departing from it had gradually confirmed
into a long-enduring usage the practice which had
originally been adopted. He had felt it to be his duty
to maintain the rule, because he foresaw, that the ser-
vice of the Crown, and the country must be most mate-
rially prejudiced, as related to the means of obtaining
the necessary supplies for the public service, by
the operation of the practice of presenting peti-
tions against the supplies for the service of the
year, and also by debating those petitions.—(Hear.)
He still held the opinion that if the House departed from
the practice—if they would allow petitions to be pre-
sented against taxes, and if those petitions were to be
debated at length, controlled only by the discretion of in-
dividual Members then they would be establish-
ing a rule, from which, in his own opinion, a
great public inconvenience might follow. He therefore
opposed the relaxation of the rule ; and the House hitv-
ing determined by a majority of 31, for its continuance;
it appeared to him that that common sense to which the
lion. Gentleman had referred, dictated to him that
when it was proposed on the following day, that
an individual petition should be presented, it was
his duty, acting upon the expressed opinion of
the House to oppose the motion. The rule in dispute had
not, however, the force of a Standing Order, and he
admitted that a rule of /hat kind could not be main-
tained unless there was a very strong majority in its fa,
vour.—(Hear, hear.) He did nut deny that the narrow
majority by which the rule was supported was a
strong proof that there was not a prevailing
opinion in favour of the maintenance of the existing
usage. But the expressed opinion of the House
in no respect altered his own opinion. Still, as he be-
lieved that a rule of the kind could be maintained only
when supportod by a very considerable majority, he
thought that a majority of one only afforded a very
strong indication that there was not a preponderating
majority in that House in favour of a continuance
of the existing practice. He was also ready
to admit that the power which an individual
Member possessed of offering a petition, and debating
the question, whether it should be received, coupled with
the inability of other Hon. Members, to prevent such a
course of proceeding, induced him to think that the time
might arrive when the Hon. Gentleman might achieve
his object ; especially as it Would not be in the power of
those who differed from him, to come down at four
o'clock each evening, for the purpose of defeating
such motions as the present. He was perfectly
willing to make all those admissions, and it certainly
appeared to him to be desirable that they should not be
left to daily conflicts upon the presentation of petitions.
There would thus be a great eonsumption of the public
time, and a great interruption to public business. It
would not, in his opinion, be creditable t') the House that
day after day they should be engaged in constant conflicts
upon such a subject. He did not, therefore, hesitate
to say that he should be very unwilling from public con-
siderations exclusively to enter into those conflicts, and
without at all departing from his own opinion, he was
ready to yield to what appeared to him to be the pre-
vailing sentiment of the House. He did not
deny that if any convenient mode could be
pointed out of meeting the difficulty, he should be
willing to desist from his opposition upon the question.
He did that in deference to what appeared to him to be
the prevailing opinion ; but he did entreat the House to
consider the position of the House of Commons._
(Hear, hear.) What he understood his Noble Friend to
say 'vas, that a very short interval should be given
that they might consider whether they_ could be
e•
put on a satisfactory feotin or net. He thought
the lion. Gentleman who made the motion could not re-
fuse to withdraw it--(Hear, hear)—and he hoped all
those who voted for the presentation of the petition yes-
terday tinder
_the idea that nothing would be done, would
to-say, vote against the measure. He hoped that
if they were to have petitions from
meetings
that they might be public meetings.—(Hear, hear.)
lie dared say that the petitions against the income tax
would not proceed from hole and corner meetings, but
from meetingSt
publicly called—(Litugliter)—and ne had
no doubt that all those who were opposed to an addition
in the assessed taxes, those who feared an addition to
any taxes, and those whose incomes were under 150/.
a year, would take an opportunity at these public meet-
ings of expressing their opinion against this tax,_
(Hear, hear, and a laugh.)
I.ord HO WICK said he agreed with some of the re-
marks that had fallen from the Right Hon. Gentleman.
The Right Hon. Baronet said that he thought they ought
to. consider the position of the House of Commons, and
he entirely cOncurred with the Right Hon. Gentleman ;
but when he said that they ought not to consent to the
with-It-awe' of the petitions presented by the lion. Mem-
ber fir South Lancashire, on that point he confessed
that he could not agree with the Right Hon. Gentle-
man. .He (Lord Howich) thought that there was
nothing sufficiently clear or distinct in the statemen
of his lion. Friend near him, but he thought that conSi-
dering the position which the Right Hon. Baronet held