The Sun.
London, England, 1842-05-04 00:00:00

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the same ground as he voted the other night for the mo-
tion of the Hon. Member for Rochdale, not for the sake
of the petition, but for the sake of inquiry. When he
looked around him and saw thousands and thousands of
his fellow-creatures starving for want, and when he saw
throe millions petitioning the House for inquiry, he
could not resist granting it.—(Hear, hear.)
Mr. OSWALD opposed the motion of the Honourable
Member for Finsbury, because he thought it a dishonest
and shabby motion, and held out false hopes to the
people.
Mr. VILLIERS was not disposed to deny many
things that he had heard that evening with respect to
extending the suffrage, but when they sat there night
after night denouncing each other, it was not at all as-
tonishing that the people should think the House ought
to be reformed. The people, in the discussions that
had taken place in that House, saw the cause of all their
miseries ; and it was not therefore for the House to turn
round upon them and refuse to hear them. He did not
say the House was bound to adopt all the remedies pro-
posed in the petition, but he could not see how they
could refrain from hearing them, as the result of that I
hearing might be that the House might decide upon I
progressive alterations in the constitution of the House.
He believed the doctrine proposed by the Orange Lodges
was far more dangerous than any proposition contained
in the Charter.
Lord CLEMENTS said, as no Member for Ireland
had yet addressed the House,- and as the Repeal of the
Union had been mixed up with the debate, he wished
to say a few words. In Ireland they were not accus-
tomed to meet with the sympathies of the public in
England. He was not disposed to be made a catspaw of
on the present occasion. The Repeal of the Union was
a question worthy of discussion by itself. He did not
advocate that measure ; but that was not the manner in
which the question of the Repeal of the Union ought to
be brought before the House. If the poorer classes
of England were aggrieved let them bring their grievances
before the House, but he wished not to be coupled up in
any way with this measure.—(Cheers and laughter.)
The sister country had plenty of grievances to complain
of. The great reason of complain was, the manner in
which the representative system had been there carried
out by the Reform Bill.—(Loud cries of " Oh, oh !
Read, read I Question, question !") That system re-
quired great alteration. He considered that the adoption
of the prayer of this petition would be utterly subversive
of the institutions of the country, and he repudiated the
idea that Ireland should be brought forward in this
manner to serve the purposes of an individual.
Mr. O'CONNELL would not be influenced in voting
for this measure by reason of that part of it which
prayed for a Repeal of the Union. His sentiments
on that subject were distinctly understood, but he was
not influenced in the vote he was about to give by the
mention of it in the petition In fact, he did not wish to
be identified with the petition at all.—(Hear, hear.) He
wished to separate himself entirely from the petition. He
was led to give the vote which he was about to give in
favour of the motion, because he belived that Universal
Suffrage was the right of the people, because he believed
that every Ezjglishman was entitled to have a voice in
the election of representatives to that House. If he
wanted a proof of the correctness of this position he
would turn to the speech of the able and Learned Mem-
ber for Edinburgh, who had been unable to draw
the line where servitude should end and enfranchisement
should begin—for all those who were refused the franchise
were in a state of servitude. The comparison made by
the Noble Lord to the case of the juryman did not apply.
The juryman decided on the property of others, the
voter only protected his own. Ile should vote for the
motion because he felt satisfied that the suffrage ought
to be extended. The state of the country was awful—
the petitioners complained of the sufferings they endured
and asked to be heard at the bar, and in asking that he
thought they were not going too far.
Mr. T. DUNCOMBE, in reply, said, that after the
manner in which that petition was about to be treated
by the House, if ever the industrious classes should again
condescend to approach that House, he would become no
party to their degradation. —(Cheers and cries of " Oh !
oh ") If the object of the petition had been to bring
about that sweeping confiscation of property which the
Hon. Member for Edinburgh had denounced the weight
of their indignation ought to fall not on the petitioners,
but oa the person who had brought it to the table of
that House.— (Cheers and cries of "Oh!") Yes ! he (Mr.
T. Duncombe) was the person who was responsible for
the petition.—(Renewed cheering.) No man in the
House ought to have presented such a petitionif such
had been its object, and if he believed such to have been
the object of the petition he would not have presented it.
He would not say that if he had drawn up the petition
he would have drawn it up precisely in its present form;
there were many parts of it from which he dissented.
But what was it that the people asked for ? They did
not wish for a sweeping measure of confiscation ; all
they asked was to be permitted to bring their cause be-
fore the House, and if they were permitted to do so he
would produce at, the bar of that House the advocates of
the petitioners, working men, to show that the evils of
which they complained originated in class legislation,
and those who so had libelled them would then perceive
that these men were not only entitled to the franchise,
nut that the House would be neither dishonoured nor
disgraced by seeing some of these men sitting on the
benches as Members. There was nothing like confis-
cation in the petition. In some parts it was worded
ambiguously, and he would do the Right Hon. Baronet
opposite the justice to say that he had not taken
advantage of the ambiguity. He did not corn-
.
pima, of the conduct of Members opposite—it
was of the conduct of those on his own side of the House
that he complained.—(Cheers.) The petitioners prayed
the House, if it refused inquiry, then to pass the Charter,
and concluded by expressing their desire to promote the
peace of the United Kingdom, the security of property,
and the prosperity of commerce. What was there in
that to show that they desired the confiscation of pro-
perty, the destruction of the Monarchy, the destruction
of the Chnrch, and of the sponging out of the National
Debt. THe Right Hon. Baronet took part of a sentence
from the speech of the Right Hon. and Learned Member
for Bath, who had stated that the petition had
emanated from a malignant cowardly demagogue,
whose name he would indicate if he were not
beneath his contempt. He (Mr. T. Duncombe) did
not know to whom the Hon. and Learned Member
alluded ; but if it were to the individual to whom he
(Mr. Duncombe) supposed it was, the Hon. and Learned
Member had been grossly misled. He had a document
in his possession, signed P. M'Dowal, J. Morgan, and
John Campbell—(Laughter)--and those were the indi-
viduals who had drawn up the petition. These three indi-
viduals, he was bound to say, drew up the petition, and
he did not believe any other individuals even saw that
petition until it was printed and submitted for signatures
to the individuals who had signed it. He was extremely
sorry to see the course about to be adopted with respect
to that petition, for all he had to ask of them was to
hear the petitioners. The Charter was not the question,
in the first instance. After having heard them, it would
be time to rise and propose a remedy. All before
them, then, was simply to give the parties a hearing.
He said that three millitms and a half of the industrious
classes were entitled to that hearing. It would be a con-
solation to those individuals to be heard. He could not
believe, as Hon. Gentlemen had represented there, that
by allowing the working classes to be within the repre-
sentative or electorial branch of the constitution, would
endanger the nation ; on the contrary, he felt convinced
that it would add to the stability of the institutions of the
country.—(Hear.)
Strangers were then ordered to withdraw, and the
House divided, when there appeared—
For the motion 49
Against it

Majority against the motion -238
Mr. STUART WORTLtY moved for returns relat-
ing to the system hitherto adopted for the suppression of
the slave-trade on the western coast of Africa.
Captain PECHELL thought the motion of the Hon.
Member involved a reflection upon the officers of her
Majesty's navy who had been employed on that station,
and that an opportunity of explanation ought to have
been allowed.

Sir G. COCKBURN said, that if he saw any attempt
in the present motion to throw a slur on the officers of
the navy, he should certainly oppose it; but he could
perceive no such thing, and why the Honourable Gen-
tleman could suppose that such a return would
cast a slur on the officers employed on that
station, he certainly could not see. The more that house
and the public wore made acquainted with every
_action
of the navy, the more they would be satisfied with the
conduct of the officers and men. lie had no objection
to the motion.
Captain PECIIELL, amidst (cries of " Spoke,
spoke," " Chair, chair,") explained that his ob-
jection was the absence of all information whereon the
Hon. Member could ground his motion.
Mr. S. WORTLEY was surprised at the Hon. and
Gallant Member's objection. It wasthe first time that
the llon. Gentleman had ever made any complaint with
respect to the motion, though it had been on the paper
upwards of a week, and had been once postponed.
lie (Mr. S. Wortley) disclaimed any intention of
passing a slur on the noble profession of the navy.
Viscount PALMERSTON said, that as far as he was
concerned, he should be happy to support the motion of
the Hon. Member. He considered the exertions of the
navy were beyond all prab2 0, in their attempts to suppress
the slave traffic. Thera was no mode of suppressing it,
except by means of a naval police, and every effort was
made by the Admirr:tty for the purpose of putting it
down.—(Cheers.)
After a few words from Mr. S. WORTLEY in ex-
planation, the motion was agreed to.
PAYMENT OF WAGES.
Mr. FERRAND moved that the following Members
be nominated to the Select Committee on the Payment
of Wages :—Mr. Ferrand, Lord Ashley, Mr. Stuart
Wortley, Mr. John Fielden, Viscount Jocelyn, Mr. Shar-
man Crawford, Mr. henry Redhead Yorke, Mr. Baird,
Mr. George William Wood, Earl of llillsborough, Mr.
Thomas Dimcombe, Mr. Beckett, Mr. Charles Pelham
Villiers, Sir John Hanmer, and Sir John Guest.
Mr. BROTHERTON said that before the motion was
agreed to he would move that Mr. Cobden be named
as one of the Committee. It appeared that there were
eight Members from the other side and seven from his
(Mr. Brotherton's), but there was no person from Lan-
cashire.--(gear, hear.) The Committee appeared to him
to he a one-sided one.—(Hear, hear.) He should like to
have persons who knew the difference between mills and
print-works—(Hear, hear)—persons who understood
something of the subject.—(Hear, hear.) The Com-
initt,de would not give confidence to the country if some
person connected with the manufacturing interest were
not upon it, and he should therefore move that Mr. Cob-
den's name now bo added to the Committee.
Mr. C. BULLER would move that the debate should
be adjourned, After all the nonsense that had been
spoken on the subject—(Cries of Order.) He was per-
fectly in order. A great deal of nonsense had
of
spoken on the subject, and the character of
whole body of the manufacturers of the country was
affected by it. lie had observed that whenever there
was a motion of this sort the Members of the Govern-