The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-10-28 00:00:00

THE MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS

BEFORE we next address our readers, the Bur-
gesses of Liverpool will he required to perform a
very serious and important public duty, and to
exercise discreetly a highly valued franchise. On
Saturday next they will have to make selection of
sixteen fit and proper men—in the room of sixteen
Councillors who retire by rotation—to represent
them in the Town Council, and to administer the
affairs of the Corporation. It is our duty to exhort
them, on the eve of the election, to make a wise,

unbiassed, deliberate choice. We presume not to
recommend a single candidate, or to make a critical
reflection upon ony one who has already served in
the Council, or who offers himself for election ;
but. we implore our fellow-townsmen to weigh well
and fairly the merits of each gentleman, to inquire
rigidly into tris antecedents, to make sure of his
personal respectability, and above all to ascertain
that he is a man of large commercial views, of
steady business habits, of known integrity, and of
undoubted substance. Such men only ought to be
raised to the important position of Councillors of
the borough of Liverpool. It should be borne in

mind that this is no ordinary Corporation ; that it
has enormous funds to administer; that it has the
wants find conveniences of an immense population
to provide for; that it.bas public works of stupen-
dous magnitude to preserve, improve, and to
construct ; that it has daily claims on its attention

demanding incessant watching, judgment, and
despatch. Ordinary persons may -figure creditably
enough in little boroughs ; but the noble and daily
extending town and port of Liverpool requires men
of 'first•rate intelligence and of the highest com-
mercial standing adequately to administer her
finances and to guard her complicated interests.
The present moment is singularly advantageous for
a calm, judicious selection, for no strong party ques-
tions now agitate the minds of the burgesses, excite
their prejudices, or bias their judgment. The
great, the predominant demand of all parties now is

ECONOMY- 'REDUCTION OF EXPENDITURE, and

DIMINUTION OP 'TAXATION. Let Councillors be
elected whO will .keep down the borough rates at
the lowest amount consistent with the due mainte-
nance of the necessary establishments, and who will
worthily represent, in the eyes of the world, the
wealth, the enterprise, the energy, and the integrity
of the second .port and town in her Majesty's

dominions.

THE FRENCH POLITICAL RIDDLE.

THE good people of Paris are still in the enjoyment
of their favourite luxury—a ministerial crisis.. They
talk on it, jest on its, speculate on it, dance on it,
sing on it, and are happy on it. What is very
remarkable, they don't seem to get tired of it. They
have had the same species of game served up to
them every day for the last fortnight—hot, cold, re-
heated, stewed, broiled—yet, strange to say, they
have not yet exhibited any symptom of dististe, or

remonstrated against this toujour perdrix. Certainly
Louis Napoleon, like an artistic chef as he is, fur-
nishes them with an abundance of sauce piquante
to tickle their palates, and keep their appetites from
palling. He supplies excitement with a rare genius
for invention. -One morning he summonses a
Legitimist don to the Elysee, and the ladies of the
Fouxbourg St. Germain are in extacies. In the
afternoon the Legitimist chief announces that he
has succeeded in doing nothing; and then reaction
takes place, and cambric handkerchiefs are in great
request among the dowagers, while the rest of Paris
is indulging in roars of laughter. The next morning
the President sends for a Democratic leader, and
instantly there is jubilation in the Fauxbourg St.
Antoine ; but as the day advances, this, too, receives
a sudden check, and the party of order has a hearty
laugh at the expense of the disappointed Reds. A
third morning an Orleanist receives an invitation,
with a similar result; and so on through the divisions
of parties in Paris, whose name is legion. The
President seems to have discovered the magic art of
pleasing everybody by pleasing nobody. Perhaps
he is endeavouring to prove to France that she can
get on well enough without any Ministers at all
That at least would be an intelligible solution of
his private and personal views. The riddle pro-
pounded by the Prince has defied ti

agitation, pertinacious efforts to force a convict
population on the unwilling colonists—these have
divided the inhabitants of the Cape, one against the
.other,—these have exasperated them against the
parent country, and rendered them incapable of
,combining fur their common defence against the
hordes of wild tribes that prowl along their frontier.
No governor, no general could have organised for
effective "self-protection .so disorganised a commu-
nity. Had he a sufficient military force at his dis-
posal, the General might justly have been censured
for not having suppressed war and rebellion where-
ever they sprang up. But Lord Grey and the
economists took care to reduce the number of sol-
diers to an amount that rendered them incapable,
,er any generalship, of performing the services
required of them. The expense of this wretched
warfare cannot be less than two millions, indepen-
dent of the charge which the colonists will bring,
as in the last Kaffir war, upon the imperial tree-
sury, for indemnification of their plundered cattle, speculate here upon what will be the conclusion
their ravaged crops, and their burnt farm-buildings. of the game for power, now playing on the
This will be a pretty price to pay for having a chess board of France. The, persons sent for
crotchetty minister of the family alliance presiding by the President, and asked to undertake to
over the Colonial Office. The hard-working, over- form a Government, do not appear to have
taxed people of this country will hardly bear to see made any refusal to the total repeal of the
the surplus wrung from their very vitals thus squan- law of May, on the ground of principle or expe-
dered by obstinacy and incurable quackery. diency, or to have raised any objection to the legal
We trust that when Parliament meets it will de- revision of the constitution ; but some difficulties,
mend a rigid account- of the Kaffir proceedings, not yet publicly explained, must have been started,
and that honest men of all parties will unite in otherwise a ministry of some sort would have been
passing the strongest condemnation upon the real formed. The fact is, the public men of France
responsible authors of our sullied honour and our are, almost without exception, a pack of inveterate
tarnished reputation. The galvanic efforts made intriguers, without principle or candour. They are
by some of the thick-and-thin ministerial journals, all trying to circumvent each other. One faction
to make light of the war, would be simply ridicu- wants to restore Henri V., another to bring in the
Thus only that the subject is so grave. The Dublin Count de Paris, a third to establish a Regency, a
Evening Post puts prominently forward in its co- fourth to squeeze in the Prince de Joinville, and so
lumns a letter from some very raw recruit, to prove on, the sole bond that unites them together, and
that the business is done. The writer says, that also links them to the pure republicans, being the
the Kaffirs have been trying to avoid us; when- desire to prevent the re-election of Louis Napoleon
ever we attack, they retire. In fact, most people as President in May next year. The only way in
Qui4 imp cops del' the war at an end. But we have which the Prinet ,car baffle these combined intri.

ingenuity of She wittiest and most ingenious peo-
ple in the world. To repeal the elective law of
May, and yet make not the slightest concession to
democratic ideas ! There is the puzzle; but where
is the Edipus to solve it ? Probably be threw
down this riddle to amuse the minds of his oppo-
nents while he prepared some grand coup de genie.
Be that'as it may, no one has as yet been able to
pluck out the heart of his mystery. The crisis. as

it is called, instead of progressing towards a lucid
termination, has retrograded into a lower depth of
profundity. To add to the difficulty, he has forti-
fied the second position of his problem by declar-
ing the Departments of the Cher and Nievre in a
state of siege, a decree that has caused the gentle-
men who advocate a republic, democratic and
social, to look horribly aghast. It is useless to

guers, is either by some sudden coup d'ltat, which
we do not tbink he will attempt, or by adhering
strictly to the letter and spirit of the law.
By acting with firmness, and confining him-
self to the means placed by the constitution
at his disposal, he may triumph, may effect
the repeal of the law of May, and may render him-
self eligible for re-election as President. The last
on dit is, that M. Billault has finally failed, after
three or four attempts, in forming a ministry;
and that the Prince desires to make terms with
his old ministry, and, in order to soften their hearts,
has invited them to dine with him. Who can say
what effect sparkling champagne and most princely
conversation will have on M. Faucher and his con-
freres ? Time, time alone, can tell. The 4th of
November is fast approaching, when the National
Assembly must meet, and Louis Napoleon give an
account of his proceedings and policy. Till then
we have no hope that the present tangled skein of
French politics will be unravelled.