The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-06-15 00:00:00

REPRESENTATION OF LIVERPOOL.-IMPORT-
ANT MEETING• OF CONSERVATIVES.

On Saturday a numerous and influential meeting of the

conservatives was held in In „c
Assembly Room of the

Queen's Arms Hotel, fi

to secure the return of Lord sandon and Mr.. Cresswell, as
representatives of this borough, at the forthcoming general
election. The room was crowded to excess by electors. The

following are the names of a few of those whom we noticed
near the seat of the chairman :—James Aspinall, Esq., John
Shaw Leigh, Esq., John Moss, Esq., Sir Thomas Brancker,
Alexander Smith, jun. Esq., Robertson Gladstone, Esq.,
George Grant, Esq., W. P. Bushby, Esq., Thomas 11.lurrty,
Esq., Henry Moore, Esq., J. 0. Johnson, Esq. Francis
Foster, Esq., Christopher Bushell, Esq., C. T. Esq.,
Esq., H. C. Chapman, Esq., Charles Lawrence, Esq., John
Sheppard, Esq., Samuel Holme, Esq., Robert Ledson,
Esq., Thomas Bold, Esq., R. 'l'. Woodward, Esq., William
Shand, Esq., Captain Taylor, William Potter, Esq., Ed-
mund Lyon, Esq., Peter Leather, Esq., Ebenezer Rae,
Esq., C. S. Parker, Esq., Adam Hodgson, Esq., S. Sand-
bach, Esq., Joseph Ackers, Esq., Thomas Porter, Esq.,
George Greene, Esq., Daniel Ledson, Esq., James Irving,
Esq., John Nelson Wood, Esq., John Parker, Esq., R.
Dawson, Esq., I. 0. Bold, Esq., J ames Bold, Esq., R. Wood-
ward, Esq., W. Troutheck, Esq., Richard Dawson, Esq.,
J. Pownall, Esq., W. Wellstood, Esq., R. Houghton, Esq.,
Thomas Brassey, Esq., W. Robinson, Esq., Geo. Lawrence,
Esq., J. A. Thine, Esq., E. P. Parry, Esq., J. Formby,
Esq., Cottingham Moss, Esq., Thomas Carson, Esq.,
Alexander Currie, Esq., G. A. Arbuthnot, Esq., James
Gillanders, Esq., Warner Shand, Esq., Alexander Shand,
Esq., John. Walker, Esq., Nathan Cairns, Esq., R.
Rankin, Esq., R. Higgin, Esq., Peter Wright, Esq.,
Thomas Dover, Esq., William Birkett, Esq., Isaac
Hutchinson, Esq., Raymond Houghton, Esq., Isaac Holmes,
Esq., Christopher Rawson, Esq., John Wilkinson, Esq.,
J. 11. Heyman, Esq., James Robertson, Esq., Dr. Goulth-
waite, William Peakett, Esq., Richard Jones, Esq., Joseph

Thompson, Esq.
_Mr•. CHARLES LAWRENCE, amidst much cheering, rose

.... ,
to propose a fit and proper person to officiate as chairman.
He said, the first duty of the meeting was that of electing a
chairman. He regretted exceedingly that their old and

valued friend, Mr. 'tobinson, felt hitriself unable to accept
that office. As the chairman from the first of Lord San-
don's committee, he himself might have been justified in

.. . ..
aEpiring to that honour, but he did not consider himself
equal to the duties which would be required of him. On
consulting with his friends, they agreed with him that they
could do much better, and therefore he should retire on

half-pay. (Laughter, and cries of " No, no.") Though the
emoluments of the office were not very great (hear, hear,

and loud laughter,) he considered that some honour had
been brought to it by the 'electors having Lord Sandon for

their representative. (Great cheering.) He would not
shrink from the battle in any other position, and he now

begged to propose as their chairman a gentleman who would

be:ln- ost efficient, and who, he was qiiite_sure, would give

•
unbounded satisfaction to every elector. He begged to pro-
pose that Sir Thomas Brancker be the chairman of that
_ _

meeting and of the united committee of Sandon and Cress-
well. (Three times three cheers were heartily give❑ for Si:

Thomas Brancker.)
Mr. THOMAS Moss seconded the proposition. He had
long known Sir Thomas Brancker, and admired his princi-
ples and activity, and was quite certain that they could not

. _ . .
make a better choice. (Cheers.)
Sir THOMAS BRANCKER then took the chair amidst tre-
mendous cheering and cries of" success to the cause "

`remember old times,

" &c. He said that he had rather

that Mr. Lawrence had remained on full pay than that he
should have been appointed his successor. The approaching

dissolution would afford the meeting and the constituency of

Liverpool an opportunity of testifying their gratitude to their

excelleat representatives and of using their best exertions to
return Them as triumphantly as they did at the former elec-

This was a meeting for business rather than for talk-

ing : they would have plenty of time to talk hereafter, when
they had gained the victory, but this was the time for work.
He would, therefore, at once call upon Mr. Adam Hodgson
to propose the first resolution. (Great cheering.)
Mr. ADAM HODGSON rose to move the first resolution

(for which and the others see the advertisement). He need
not say that he had great pleasure in moving this reso-
lutiorf, connected, as it was, with so much that was gratify-
ing in the past, and so much that was encouraging for the
future. He remembered that about ten years ago, in that
room, he had the honour of seconding the nomination of
Lord Sandon as the representative of this great town. He
remembered having been called upon, as was fit and proper,
Lord Sandon being at that time a stranger, to state the
grounds upon which the expectation had been formed that
the noble lord would prove an efficient representative for the
great mercantile town of Liverpool. He remembered it being
said by their opponents . why bring a young lord into a
mercantile town—what can Lord Sandon know of the com-
merce or of the mercantile interests of Liverpool ?" The

answer was, that Lord Sandon was an apt pupil, and what
he did not know, he would soon learn ! (Cheers.) He
would now appeal to that great meeting and the town at
large, and ask whether there was any man—whatever might
be the extent of his intelligence, whatever might be the ex-
tent of his mercantile experience, whatever might be the ex-
tent of his commercial operations in his own particular line
of business—where would he find any man so conversant
with the various interests of this important borough ? Where
would he find any person so capable of bringing on all occa-
sions so great knowledge to bear with effect on the different
interests which he had to consider ? and whether the noble
lord had not exercised an assiduity, a zeal, and an ability,
as the representative of Liverpool, which could not have been
surpassed, and could have been equalled onlyby few. The
electors were, therefore, not solely to rest their confidence in
Lord Sandon on the expectation of what services he might in
future perform for their benefit, but might look back with
perfect confidence and satisfaction to ten years tried fidelity
and services. (Loud cheers.) They now brought forward
a man with the same principles as themselves ; and if ever
a representative demanded the gratitude of his constituents
for the untiring assiduity and devoted zeal with which he
watched over their interests, it was Lord Sandon—(cheers) ;
and if ever a representative whose high character and inde-
pendence of mind conferred, as well as received, honour from
a town, it was their noble representative, Lord Sandon.
Therefore, if he came here again, merely with the recom-
mendation of having been the representative of a great com-
mercial town, they could not have a better. But it would
be taking a very narrow view of the duties which devolved
upon them—of the duties which they owed to the country at
large in the example they set and the principles they main-
tained, (hear, hear, and loud cheers,)—if they limited their
view to a mere commercial representative at the pre-
sent crisis. (Hear.) They were living in a crisis—that was
a hackneyed expression, but it was true, and roust be re-
peated—they were living in a crisis of no ordinary magni-
tude—in the most eventful crisis that ever happened to any
man in this country. They were assembled under circum-
stances more serious and responsible than this or any other
constituency had ever been called together to witness. They
were called upon now to elect a representative to sustain and
defend the institutions of the country. (Cheers.) It was
no longer a question of free trade. (Cheers.) In this com-
mercial country we were all anxious for free trade; he him-
self had long been an advocate for free trade, and whatever
party was in power they would be anxious to remove all un-
necessary restrictions upon commerce. But, as an advocate
for free trade, he felt confident that all the necessary arrange-
ments for it would be made with far more wisdom and safety,
and he doubted not with far more efficiency, by Sir Robert
Peel's administration than by the administration of Lord
Melbourne. (Cheers.) The real question, however, to be
decided at this election was not that of free trade. We were
called upon to send representatives who should shew to the
country at large what were the feelings of this great town
with regard to the course which Lord Melbourne's adminis-
tration had adopted; $e were called upon to shew what
confidence we had in an administration which, whatever
might be the respectability of the private characters
of many of its members—and he would be the last
man to deny the great respectability privately of many
composing that administration—had unequivocally chewed
themselves to be the ready tools of designing demagogues who
had not even concealed their ulterior designs, who had openly
avowed that they were making use of the ministry as tools to
carry out their ulterior designs, and who had said that as
soon as the ministry had given them power to carry these
designs, they would dismiss that ministry and get one still
more disposed to concede—still more democratic, still more
revolutionary. (Loud cheers.) He hoped that he was not
using stronger terms than the occasion warranted. (" No,
no.") He firmly believed that their measures were revolu-
tionary—not in intention, probably, but in their tendency.
They had been proved to be so. (Cheers.) The electors of Liver-
pool were called upon at this important crisis to shew whe-
ther they felt confidence in a government which changed like
the weathercock at every shifting of the popular gale, and
who had shewn themselves ready, when the storm cams and
the breakers appeared, to barter the constitution bit by bit
for the sake of place and popularity. (Hear, hear.) He
could not place confidence in such an administration ; and
the question which the whole country was now called upon to
decide was, whether what had been done had their approval
or condemnation ; whether, having seen how ministers had
allowed themselves to be subservient to the revolutionary
designs of others, and allowed a democratic current to un-
dermine those institutions which we all venerated, they
could place confidence in such men, and send men to re-
present them who would support the measures of that
administration. (Hear, hear.) He trusted that meeting
would say, " we will not send such men to represent us, but
we will send men who will oppose such an administration,
who will thwart and obstruct and displace such an adminis-
tration, and who will support an administration in which we
can safely confide the government of the country, who will
not allow any demagouge to sap the foundations of the
constitution, and endanger the liberties of the subjects by an
undue use of the prerogatives of the crown." (Tremendous
applause.) It was a very happy circumstance that Lord
Sandon, whom the electors had known so long was sus-
tained and supported in his efforts by their other highly-
esteemed representative, Mr. Cresswell—(renewed cheers)—
who, though not so long known as the noble lord, had shown
himself the uncompromising supporter of the civil and reli-
gious institutions of the country, and who carried into the
House of Commons a constitutional knowledge that enabled
him to offer a vigorous opposition to ministers who were
threatening that constitution, and lend a powerful support to
ministers who were supporting it. (Cheers.) Looking at the
position in which the electors of Liverpool stood, having
two such gentlemen asking for their suffrages, he felt they
would be but discharging the duties of Englishmen at one of
the most important periods in our history, by sending Lord
Sandon and Mr. Cresswell to represent them, and to uphold
an administration which would support the institutions of the
country. (Cheers.) It was not a ministry which designed
to subvert the institutions of the country, which was the
most dangerous government the country could have ; but it
was a ministry with responsibility, and with a certain share
of good intentions, but supported and sustained by men who
had ulterior designs, and were too weak to prevent those
ulterior designs being carried into effect. (Loud cheers.)
It was not by a single blow that the liberties or the insti-
tutions of a country were subverted, rapid as were the mo-
tions of the movement party in this respect, when men's
minds were once brought into a state of activity. It was
well that we had time and opportunity of reviewing the
history of the country for the last two years ; and the country
had condemned the ministers under whose government the
liberties of the people were not safe, and under whom our
institutions would be subverted, because they had not shown
any inclination to throw around them those guards by which
alone the institutions of the land could be shielded. He
begged most cordially to move the resolution which he had
just had the honour of moving. (Loud. cheers.)
Mr. JOHN Moss seconded the resolution. He said lie
had great pleasure in doing so, and that he fully concurred
with every word which had fallen from the preceding speaker.
(Cheers.) The resolution was then put and carried by
acclamation.
Mr. WILLIAM SIIAND proposed the second resolution.
It always, he said, afforded him extreme pleasure to meet
the electors on occasions of the present kind. He was not
disappointed in seeing the room so fully and respectably
crowded. He trusted, from the meeting of that day, that
the samefi rinness would animate them now which had returned
their excellent representatives heretofore. (Cries of " Hear,
hear," and loud cheering.) Not content with opposing the
conservatives on their own ground, certain orators had re-
cently taken it into their heads that the people of Liverpool
were not sufficiently alive to their own interests, and there-
fore they would attend to them for us. The resolution he
bad the honour to propose was condemnatory of such an in-
cursion, it being an indignity offered to Liverpool which had
never been attempted before. The orators in question had
limited their invitations to the meeting to their electors of the
town ; but it was gratifying to find that two-thirds of that
class never attended, and that they were left to adopt their
proceedings without the countenance of the conservative
party. In keeping aloof from them, the conservatives had