The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-08-06 00:00:00

FRIDAY MORNING, AUGUST 6, 1841

Sir Robert Peel, in his speech at Tamworth, enu-
merated among the circumstances which contributed
to shake the confidence of the people in the ministry,
the fact of their having entered into a compact with
the chief of the Irish Repealers after they had them-
selves denounced his projects in a speech from the
throne. Now the passage in that speech which refers
to the subject is so remarkable, and so well worthy of
being remember€d, that we shall take the liberty of
laying it before our readers in this place. They will
recollect that it was drawn up by the Melbourne Ca-
binet, and delivered by his late Majesty William IV.,
at the opening of the session of 1834. His Majesty
says,—

" I have seen with feelings of deep regret and indignation
the continuance of attempts to excite the people of Ireland to
demand a repeal of the legislative union. This bond of the
national strength and safety I have declared my fixed and
unalterable resolution, under the blessing of Divine Provi-
dence, to maintain inviolate by all the means in my power.
To the practices which have been used to produce disaffec-
tion in the state, and mutual distrust and animosity between
the people of the two countries, is chiefly to be attributed
the spirit of insubordination which, though for the present
in a great degree controlled by the power of the law, has
been but too perceptible in many instances. The united and
vigorous exertions of the loyal and well-affected in aid of the
Government are imperiously required to put an end to a
system of excitement and violence which is destructive of
the peace of society, and, if successful, must inevitably prove
fatal to the power and safety of the United Kingdom."
This was language suited to the occasion—strong,
explicit, impressive. His Majesty would " maintain
this bond of the national strength and safety [the
union] by all the means in his power"—that is to say,
by all the strength of the empire. The attempt to lead
men in pursuit of the repeal of that great bond, he
denounces as one to produce " disaffection in the
state," and as having produced a "spirit of in-subor-
dination too perceptible in many instances," and he
concludes by calling upon the loyal and well-affected
to aid the government in putting an end to a " system
of excitement and violence destructive to the peace of
society, and possibly fatal to the power and safety of
the united kingdom." The Cabinet who drew up this
speech must have had a pretty strong conviction that
the cry for a repeal of the Union was but another name
for rebellion, and they treated the movement as an ac-
tual overt act of disaffection. For so thinking, and so
acting, they had the sympathy and approbation of all
good men. The nation entirely concurred with them
In their views, and for once in his life the Repealer
stood aghast ; he was left quite alone in his infamy,
and his evil practices were for a while put a stop to.
But a base negotiation was afterwards set on foot, and
some of the very men who had advised his denuncia-
tion from the throne, so degraded themselves as to en-
ter into a guilty compact with him, without the re-
quirement of any pledge or promise, on his part, as
he has himself frequently boasted, that he should
abandon his seditious and treasonable designs in any
shape or degree whatsoever. Anything more infa-
mous, or more disgraceful to ministers of the Crown

than this, was never heard of. It is only astonishing
that men palpably convicted of holding correspondence
with a denounCed traitor—voluntarily placing them-
selves in contact with him—and still worse, being un-
der an actual contract of doss alliance with him for
purposes of offence and defence—could possibly sus-
tain themselves in the face of the nation for upwards of
five years afterwards. Such a transaction at any other
time would have hurled the guilty parties to it from
power with a load of disgrace upon their heads suffi-
cient to sink them for ever; but though divulged,

duce
though promulgated, it did not immediately pro
that effect in this case. The ministerial covenanters
had possibly calculated the chances, and found that
whatever amount of stigma the disclosure might cast
upon them, it would yet be insufficient to shake that
usurpation which the compact itself would insure to
them. Infamy however great, said they, cannot de-
prive us of our places. Let the people hiss at us ever
so much, the alliance will give us noses which will tell
upon divisions, and noses will securo us the tin. So
the alliance has endured, and the nation has been of-
fended, insulted, and punished for its sins from that
day to this with a Whig O'Connell ministry. _
Now we are exceedingly glad that Sir Robert Peel