The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1852-03-23 00:00:00

high a value o'n the

I am misu
assailed. I

violently

s, not to wish to main':
`msiastic multitude of
.9nce of the as'ault,
zeal of its watchful Protestantism. My Protestantism
changed. Ido not consider the Maynooth question as a
aor matter ; neither do I look upon opposition to the en-
..owment of that seminary as a secondary consideration in the
selection of candidates for the House of Commons. If I had
the power to select, and could find the men, I would fill that
house with sound men, fearing God and hating covetousness,
attached to our Protestant institutions, and resolved to wash
the nation's hands clean and clear of all support and endow-
-111 en t of Romanism, Irish or Colonial.
What, then, has happened? I w,ll tell you frankly and fear-
'v. When 1 have told you, many among you will entirely
-qh me; many others among you will think that I am
one point ' • but no one, who does not doubt my
..„ that I designed any defection from, or
, our Protestant cause. I make no pretensions to
' neither, I presume von.
I will first state briefly th

subsisted between
-id as I said to an enthii_
haste and violen

quite wron
veracity,
betrayal of

inf'llibi

it, I fOr

thought upon th
feel.

facts of the case; then, what I
'ct ; and lastly, what I now think and

ie of the meeting of Parliament, the first weel,
gentlemen waited upon me as a deputatior

ion of the town, to represent
• --,- --‘, nninion and

au me me existing state of affairs, and ask my ~,,,
assistance upon a political question of urgent local impor•
tance. They said, and thought, that in all probability a disso-
lution of the House of Commons would be immediate, and, of
course, an election for Liverpool. They assured me that every
effort to procure suitable candidates had failed ; that our
friend Mr. Horsfall, and others whom they named, bad re-
fused ; that if something was not done, and done instantly, the
present members would he again returned ; and they asked
me if, under these circumstances, I thought, and would help
them and promote union by saying, that it would be better to
invite Lord John Manners and Sit Stratford Canning than
quietly to acquiesce in the return of the present members.
I might have refused to give any opinion upon the subject
That woro '

~uoin nave been safe, selfishly safe; but it would not have
been courteous : and as I did not attach so much importance
to my own opinion as many seem to have done, I promised to
give it. This was on the 4th of February.
On the following day, I wrote the letter which was dated and
sent on the 6th. That letter did not appear in print until
after the occasion which had called for it had passed away.
No immediate dissolution of the House of Commons took
place; and on the Ist of March I wrote another letter to the

gentlemen of the deputation, saying that the emergency was
past—that the arguments in my former letter need be no
longer applicable to their case—that time was given for a
better choice—and I hoped they would now find candidates
concerning whom there need be no embarrassment. Then it
was, after nearly a month, and after a change of ministry, that
my first letter was published, and it was misunderstood and
misapplied. I need not describe the commotion it has occa-
sioned. These are the facts.
. .

2. In writing that letter, I did not think or feel that the
Protestant cause, especially the Maynooth question, was in
the smallest degree involved; and for this stmple reason, that
the gentlemen on both sides, both the present members and
the proposed candidates, (or at least one of them,) are all on
the same side of that question. On that vital point there was
no difference between them. Therefore, in choosing between
them, that point was not touched. Other matters, not indeed
to be compared to that one, but still, in their way, of much
importance, were at stake; and I am one of those who,
whether right or wrang, have never yet given up the old-
fashioned Conservative opinion that two Protectionists, as
they are now called, would be a vast improvement on two
Free Traders.

It is easy to be wise after the event, and to say now the
choice was not so limited, &c. &c. At the time it seemed to
be so. I thought it so, and it was under that impression my
letter was written. I said none of the gentlemen named aro
what we want, because none of them are Protestants of our
stamp; they are not the men we would have if we could
choose—this is distinctly in my letter—but, if you ask me
which among them are to be preferred, I have no difficulty in
saying, that I think you will be in the path of enlightened
political duty in inviting the Protectionists.

I did not -by this feel myself at all committed as to the
future. Neither the gentlemen of the deputation nor any of
their friends could imagine that if candidates differing on the
Protestant question—pro and anti Maynooth men—were after-
wards proposed. I was in any way pledged by what had
occurred. Not in the slightest degree. No, not if Lord John
Manners appeared on one side •; only let such a man as Mr.
Napier. or Mr. Plumptre, or Mr. Colcinhoun, appear on the
other aide, and my letter would become waste paper. It would
have no application. It was never intended to apply to such a case.
But if there be no such men in the field, and you are com-
pelled, when the time comes, to choose between men who are
all, and all alike, in favour of the Maynooth endowment and
Other Popery-supporting measures—what then? Why then,
some of you will say, it is inconsistent in a Protestant, and
particularly in a Protestant champion and leader (as you are
pleased to call me) to support any of them : better, a thousand
times better, to have no members at all. I agree with this.
Better have no members at all; and if you could keep the
borough unrepresented until you find better candidates, the
decision would he simple. Bit unfortunately you must have
two members, and that without delay. The choice at such a
moment is not between two objectionable members, and none
at all, but between two objectionable members and two more
objectionable still. This is a question of political judgment,
not of Protestant principle. On this, in all its details, both as
to whether a vote should be given at all, and if so, for whom,
among men all of whom are below our own standard, we may,
I holle, differ in opinion, without any Protestant division.
Doubtless it is the fault of a constituency, when matters come
to this; but, in point of fact, they sometimes do come to ibis,
and this was the case contemplated.
Such was inyjudtment in this matter—a judgment in which
some of my mos enlightened Protestant friends, whose praise
is in all the churehes,entireii concur.
3. But now, reconsidering the case, with a view to discover,
If possible, what could have cause 1 such a commotion, and
V.startted the Protestantism of Ent'
-4 England," .
nd " I think I can per-
...* sonif.grOttod for misapprehension. fecause my opinion,
..eribadt.Wes not given in a few
ice..
teasing words, to
P.-. • as above tit— ' dePUtation ; but, in my anx;fty to corn-
the gentlemen of tit._ ..4
*Won me, and to promotes unity,
ply with the request presets. ...
that is, to induce others to think ri,
I did, I wrote an 31i: ate
k:lt_e_r;
argument. I might truly say, with, / 11eve, Lord gbil
geld, .' I had not time to be brief." I can rn.'`°o unuersr
bow the character of that argument weans to many 61 you IDC

aspect of a permanent application, and how the bearing ot it
seems to many of you to be a breaking down of high principle
generally, and an apology for taking a lower tone, not merely
in the exceptionable and special -case contemplated, but in
every ease.

Such an interpretation of my letter would, I believe, account
for much, if not all, that has been felt and said, by both friends
and enemies. All that I can say is, that I had no such inten-
tion in writing it, and that so far as it ran be justlij charged
with such .a meaning, I repudiate and withdraw it. Reading it
now, I frankly admit its liability to be so misinterpreted, and
have no difficulty in tracing the cause to what I have already
said, my desire to comply, and, complying at all, to comply
cordially, and if possible influentially, with the request made
to me.

I am not an electioneerer, and have never before gone so far
into it as on this occasion. The experiment is not hopeful.
On the severe things which have been so hastily said of me,
it would he easy for me to speak with some deserved severity;
but I will not do so, because I seek the thintts which make for
peace and Protestant unity ; and unity is not to be attained or
promoted by hasty crimination, even with apparent cause, or
by deserved recrimination.
• .

-It this whole affair shall have the effect of rousing; you to a
sense of your duty, so that you will not talk and write only.
I,et take wise and timely counsel, and practically and with
unanimity exercise your proper influence in the selection of fit
candidate , I shall consider any misunderstanding which has
attached to me more than counterbalanced by the favourable
result. Believe me, always very faithfully yours.
Aigburth, 16th March, 1852. HUGH M'NEILE.