Star.
London, England, 1831-07-30 00:00:00

REFORM BILL AND SIR ROBERT PEEL.

The anxiety in the public mind in every part of
the country, as to the progress of this Bill, would
appear to be unknown by the members who,
" night after night," play with the public feelings
by numerous flimsy and often-repeated objections
to the progress of the bill, and wo fear that the
exemplary patience of the people, under the most
procrastinating proceedings that were ever carried
on against any important public measure, will be
exhausted.

We were quite prepared to expect the most fac-
tious opposition from such men as Sir Charles
Wetherell, Sir James Searlett, Mr. Knight, Mr.
Praed, Lord Stormont, and Mr. Croker, " et ed
omne genus," as it will perhaps be the last time,
if the bill should pass, that these gentlemen will
ever sit in a British House of Commons as popular
members ; but wo are not prepared to expect that
Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Goulburn, Sir George Mur-
ray, and other gentlemen who have a character to
support before a British public, and who have been,
and still are, Privy Councillors of his Majesty,
would follow that reckless course which night after
night they pursue. They may talk of their desire
and of their duty to preserve the constitution, and
the " conservative principle" in the constitution ;

and, if there was the smallest hope that the pre-
sent measure of reform was not a national mea-
sure, called for by 99 in every 100 of the
entire population of the country (the pensioned
and paid parties who profit by the existing sys
tern excepted), we should think they did their duty
manfully, and even with pertinacity, to resist such
innovation, of the result only of the day's excite-
ment. Such was their cry and their defence in
the last Parliament ; and they all and often pros,
phesied that the people would soon return from
" (lie delusion" under which they acted, and that
they (the Opposition) would be hailed as the
friends of the sovereign and of the people, by the
assistance they gave. Against such revolutionary
doctrines and measures the King appealed to the
People to test these opinions of Sir Robert Peel
and Co. and does there exist one individual
infatuated enough to assert, that these opinions
have not been ell falsified ; and that, instead of
the nation acting under delusion, the whole coun-
try have risen as if by one accord, and on mature
consideration, and, on their best judgment and
reason, have affirmed that the ministerial plan of
reform is one of a conservative, and not of a re-
volutionary and destructive principle. With one
accord every county, except 11, have affirmed the
mature wisdom of the King and his ministers in
introducing the reform bill now under considera-
tion. We, therefore, again ask what can Sir
Robert Pecl expect from the course he pursues?
What can he hope, if, by delay, he could frustrate
the bill by such vexatious conduct ? We would
bring to his recollection what he stated in his place
in the House of Commons when minister, " that
he and the Duke of Wellington would not retain
power one day if their measures did net meet the
public opinion." We now put the same test to
him, if he has a particle of consistency or of re- ,
spect for the voice of a nation—aye, of an undi-11
aided nation—for the paternal anxiety of the
King, or for the peace of the country, to recon-
cile his present factious and persevering opposition
to the bill.

We will tell him, and those who support him
(many of whom we can excuse, as the struggles of
desperate and expiring men), that the murmurs
from every part of the country against such pro-
ceedings are loud and deep—and that, ere long,
they nioy reach his ear in a voice of thunder.
We have respected the business-like talents of the
right hon, baronet, not for their extent or greater
superiority, but because, coming after ministers
who, for fifty years past, had acted regularly and
perseveringly against the people's and the nation's
just rights and interests, he did a little in accord-
ance with what he had discrimination to see were the
people's wishes. For that little (and GOD knows when
we look back on what has been done, it is but a
little, compared to what, as a statesman and man
of talent, ought to have been done) we were thank-
ful to the right hon. hart. NS'e gave him praise,
we will freely admit, beyond his deserts; and we
now caution him, and all those who have ever had
a desire to secure toy public approbation for
' their acts, or to whom the public eye has even
been favourably directed, to pause before they
prolong their mischievous career. We consider it
unworthy of the independent character which Sir
R. has claimed to believe the reports in circulation,
that he and his coadjutors are acting in unison with

a body of Peers, long distinguished as the pro-
moters of their own advantage, at the expense of
the public—nor can we think that a " union of
Tories," to resist the reform measure of the King
and his ministers, although Sir Robert Peel may
be at the head of that junto, a bit more deserving the
public sympathy than the " Cato-street junto or
union" experienced when their plans were bared to
the public view.
We are friends of our country—we admire the
I spirit and principle of many of her institutions;
and it is because we see the existing state of repre-
sentation at variance with that spirit and principle,
and with the future peace, happiness, and pros-
perity of the nation, that we are most anxious to
see the abuses (which have been introduced in the
working of our establishments, so as to affect the
almost entire change of many of them) corrected
peaceably, constitutionally, with the sanction of
our patriotic Monarch, with the applause of a loyal,
generous, and patriot people; and we wish to
see these changes,which the Reform Bill will effect,
carried, and carried quickly, whilst yet there is
time to make the amendments that are called for
in the popular or democratic branch of our Conati
tution. We would offer a concluding, and to us a
very important argument, to Sir R. Peel, not to
delay the present reform too long, lest the changes
now going on in France may direct the attention
of an irritated people (as the British and Irish peo-
ple
soon will be) to ask for more than the nation
would be now fully satisfied with. To Sir Robert
Peel—if he is acting with his Noble and Very Re-
vererul Friends in another House—we would say,
"Reflect on all this,and act wisely and prudently."

FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE.