The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-03-23 00:00:00

leaning of which is towards an amelioration of the working
of this harsh and inhuman measure. The speech of Mr.

he member for Finsbury, (who, in his capacity as
coroner for Middlesex, has had opportunities such as ft w

Wakley,

other members in the house possess, of arriving at a know-
ledge of the cold-blooded and imperturbable heartlessness

system is characterised throughout,) should
be seriously and attentively read by the people of Liverpool
at the present moment, as well for the strong and undeniable
facts, of harrowing import, which it embodies as for its bold
denunciation of that " liberal" and " reformed" (?) parlia-

with which a

ment which has dared first to inflict such a measure upon the
The speech of Mr. Townley Parker is also

itish people

worthy of a:4-ention, as proving distinctly that throughout the
whole of that district of Lancashire into which the system has
so far been introduced, the expense to the rate-payerp has
been seriously increased instead of being diminished.
The speech of Lord John Russell, however, it is above all
others to which the attention of the public ought to be di-

!he spirit c

mixed up tei

heartless neilitarianism of 1

71 " liberal." Lord

John openly declared in that spe

that " destitution" alone

should form the claim of our suffering poor to relief; that
no distinction should be made between the deserving and
the dissolute ; that the "+.torture" of the workhouse test
must be applied indiscriminately to the decayed tradesman,
to the widow, and to the victim of misfortune, as to the
abandoned and the idle; and that the commissioners were

the must proper parties to regulate the necessity of that test
or " torture," because they cannot be biassed by feelings of
humanity—because they are gifted with the possession of
hearts of adamant ! It had been urged upon the house that
the guardians of a parish—in Kent, I believe—had petitioned
those commissioners for the power of allowing an additional
four ounces of rice per week to the paupers in their work-
house, and that they. had been refused ; and Lord John
Russell dared in the face of a Christian legislature to defend
that refusal

—to deny the right of men, administering their
own funds, to add 4 ounces of rice a week (!) to the pork
broth and rancid cheese by which their unfortunate fellow-

in mountain fastnesses, or beneath the protecting canopy of

darkness

But such a demand, you will say, will not be conceded by
the legislature, even with the additional strength which Po-
pery will have received from the passing of Lord Morpeth's
bill. The Hons., of Lords, at all events, will stand firm
against such a glaring attack upon the religion of their Pro-

testant fellow-countrytnen in Ireland. I admit that sue

.proposition—in purls naturalibus—would not be entertained
in either house as yet. But let it be borne in mind that Po-
pery works for instalments; and we know how readily a re-
formed (?) House of Commons can grant those instalments,
whilst the experience of the present week has shown us how
the House of Lords stands firm ag
great principles of the reformation

ast violations of

dmitting the

Whole force of the objection to such a measure being enter-
tained by the present Houses of Parliament, are we to sup-

poet that the concession to democracy, which is contained
in Lord Morpeth's bill, is to be confined to Ireland alone ?
Oh, no. There is a class in tkis country too upon, whose
" sufferance" Lord Melbourne and his colleagues hold the
reins of government. The fierce voluntaryism which rages

amongst the population of the manufacturing towns in Eng-
land and in Scotland demands to be appeased. The English
radicals in the House of Commoni have the price of their

support of this bill to receive, and that price is at present the
abolition of the rate-paying clauses of the reform bill, if not

as yet the lowering of the franchise

eci rating test

tic interest in

Indisputably the extension of the democra
the House of Commons must follow the pa
Morpeth's bill. With what consistency can it be refused
Upon what plea? Is an Eu

&r, of Lord

:er in cur counti

mechanic in our large towns, less independent or les
ened than the corresp. ondiug clas
will not so far libel illy fellow-countrymen as for a moment to

nlight-

1 the sister country

entertain the supposition. But to what, 1 ask—priniarily—
would the extension of the franchise to the £5 occupiers i

our large towns inevitably lead ?
,to the return of at least 50 members from the large
facturing boroughs throughout the kingdom, bound hand
and foot to further by their votes in Parliament the projects

Why-

I ansm

manu-

of Popery! Could any independent member

.2 any

man who had not previously conciliated the Church of Rome
and brought over her interest

in his favour,—presume to offer

himself as the repreientative of Manchester; with its sa,ooa
Papists, of Preston, Bolton, Stockport, Wigan, and a host of
other towns in which an Irish Catholic working population

is congre.ated ? Undoubtedly not

the operation of a franchise approaching,
sought to be conferred upon Ireland, ti
.

population, tnarelaalle

into a compact body, under the gc

could turn the scale as effectually