Star.
London, England, 1831-05-25 00:00:00

PUBLIC DIFFICULTIES.

The following is the Norfolk petition for an equitable
adjustment often referred to by Mr. COBBETT, and the
adoption of which he recommends to the new Parlia-
ment.

T:) the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled.
The petition of the nobility, gentry, and others of the county of
Norfolk, in county meeting assembled, this 9d day of January,
1823,
Most humbly aheweth,
That your petitioners have always been ready to make any sacrifices
which were necessary to their defence of their country, and to the safety
and dignity of their sovereign's throne ; but that they are now impelled
by their well-known, indescribable, and unmerited sufferings, to
approach your honourable house with an humble prayer, that you
will be pleased to adopt the best means of relieving them from there
sufferings.
That in proceeding to suggest those means, which they do with the
greatest respect and deference, your humble petitioners cannot disguise
from themselves, and they will not disguise from your honourable house,
that they entertain a fixed opinion, that this now unhappy country owes
all its calamities to the predominance of certain particular families,
who, since the passing of the Septennial act, have, by degrees appro-
priated to themselves a large part of the property and revenue of the
whole nation, and who have, at last, by taxes, debts, and changes in
the currency, involved themselves as well as the whole of this industrious
community, in difficulties too great to be removed by the hand of time,
or by any but the most vigorous measures of legislation.
That, whether we look at the church, the army, the courts of law,
the customs, the excise, the colonies, or the crown-lands, we see in
each a channel of enormous emoluments to these particular families,
for whose benefit and aggrandisement, more than for anything else,
she whole of these sources of riches would appear to exist. And that
therefore, though justice and necessity demand a reduction of the in-
terest of the debt, and an equitable adjustment of all other contracts,
your humble petitioners would deem such reduction an act of deep
faiquity, and they deem such adjustment wholly impracticable as long
as these particular families enjoy those emoluments, and as long as
they retain in the legislature that absolute sway which they have ac-
quired through the means of the septennial act, in conjunction
with the notorious and scandalous abases connected with the repre-
sentation.
_ _

That it is well known to your honourable house, that, for more than
twenty years, the particular families received a large part of the
above mentioned emolumenu out of the money borrowed from the
fundholders; that during that period more than a million of money
was taken out of the loans to he given to the church ; and that in fact
no irconsiderable part of the whole of the loans went into the pee.
kets of these families ; and, therefore, your petitioners will not sup-
pose it possible for your honourable house to harbour an intention
to take even a single shilling from the fundholders, so long as these fa-
milh a shall continue to receive those emoluments.

_ ... _
Your petitioners, therefore, most humbly pray that your honoura-
ble, house will he pleased to pass an act for causing an efficient reform
in he Commons' House of Parliament, in order that such parlia-
ment nay adopt the measures necessary to effect the following pur-
poses :--
. An appropriation of a part of the public property, commonly
called church property, to the liquidation of the debt.
2. A reduction of the standing army, Including staff, barracks,
and colleges, to a scale of elpence as low as that of the army before
the last war.
3. A total abolition of all sinecures, pensions, grants, and emolu-
ments, not merited by public services.
4. A sale of the r unierous public estates, commonly called crown
lands. and an application of the money towards the liquidation of the
debt.
5. An equal adjustment with regard to the public debt, and also
with regard to all debts and contracts between man and man.
But, while your humble petitioners are aware, that, to reform the
Commons' House, and to effect the other purposes of justice and neces-
sity, which they have here most respectfully pointed out, may require
a lapse of months, they know that your honourable house have the
power, and they will not believe that you want the will, to afford them
immediate protection against further ruin. They, therefore, seeing the
pressing nature of their case ; seeing the abject misery that hourly
awaits them, pray that your, honourable house will be pleased,
1. To suspend, by law, for one year, all distraints for rent, and to
cause distraints to be set aside where they have been begun.
2. To suspend all process for tithes for the same period.
3. To suspend, for the same period, all processes arising out of mort-
gage, bond. annuity, or other contract affecting house or land.
4. To repeal the whole of the tax on malt, hops, leather, soap, and
carollers.
I bee measures, so Laalogous to others, taken by your honourable
house under circumstances far less imperious; these measures, so easily
adopted—so free from the possibility of inflicting wrong ; and, at the
same time, so necessary to relieve your petitioners from the daily alarm
in which they live; so necessary to afford them a hope of escaping
from the pains and disgrace of the lowest pauperism and beggary : to
believe that these measures—measures of bare protection from further
wrong and ruin ; to believe that these will be refused to your suffering
petitioners, would be to suppose the existence of that callousness of
heart which your petitioners are far indeed from imputing to your hon.
house.
Having thus, with the most profound respect, submitted to your ho-
rmurable house those which they deem the best means for relieving
their distresses, your humble petitioners, though they are satisfied that
evils so unusual and of such uncommon magnitude require remedies of
a nature extensive and extraordinary, beg leave to assure your honoura-
ble house, that they venerate the constitution of their fathers ; that they
seek for no change In the for::: of the government ; that they know how
many apes of happiness and of glory their country enjoyed-under a go-
vernment of king, lords, and commons; that they fervently hope that
this constitution may descend to their children : but that they are fully
convinced, that unless the present evils be speedily arrested and
effectually cured, a convulsion must come, in which the whole of
this ancient and venerable fabric will be crumbled into dust. And
your petitioners will eves pray.

The Earl of Egremont has settled upon his son-in-law,
the Earl of Munster, and his Countess, all his disposable property, In-
cluding the Manor of Wymondhana, from which the family derives
its name—" Wyndham."