The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-06-27 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS

We cannot, at present, meet the demand of " Lotus," though
a remedy was given in our columns a few weeks since.
The communication of " Spectator" is important, and shall
meet with attention.
" P. S. M." must stand over.
The reporter of the paragraph which appeared in our paper of
Friday week. headed "CONVICTION OF -," the aces-:
racy of which has been impugned by Mr. /Vlelhuish, one of
the defendants, desires us to say that it was substantially
correct, and that the insinuation of any person .whatsoever,
having interfered so as to induce him to giVe a colouring
to it is entirely without. foundation in fact. The .reporter
adds that hp has attained pretty much the pbsition of the
man, the boy, and the ass in the fable, both parties being
dissatisfied with the report—one stating that it was too
strong against the defendants, and the other complaining
that it was not strong enough against them. Before Mr.
Melhuish proceeds to set. reporters right, however, he
should learn himself to be accurate. lle bad the sum-
mons in his own possession which stated the nature of the
charge against,him, yet for some reason or other he has in-
correctly copied it.

E,l)r Riberpool

TUESDAY 1110R.N1NG, JUNE 27, 1843

If the public interests have sustained no advantage'
from the " obstructive " debate upon the Irish ArmS
Bill, which took place in the House of Com Mons on
Friday night, we have at least had some light thrown
upon the causes of the agitation at present existing in
that country. Simple-minded people have always
,imagined that, amongst the most prominent of Irish
grievances, were the existence of a national Protestant
church, and the agrarian question sought to be settled
by the "fixity of tenure" scheme. They are mistlken;
and we proceed to enlighten them upon their error, in
the words of the extraordinary sage, and most con-
sistent politician, Lord Palmerston, by whom the error
has just been discovered :

" There is another grievance, and I believe it is that which
most forcibly excites the minds of the Irish people, but to
which, apparently, it is less in the power of the present Gov-
ernment to apply an effectual remedy. I believe that which
most excites the people of Ireland is the existence of hon.
gentlemen opposite as a Government in this country. (Cheers
from the Opposition, mingled with much laughter from the
Treasury benches.) I believe, Sir, that the union of senti-
ment between England and Ireland has been dissolved,
although I trust the legislative union never will ; for the peo-
ple of England are determined to have a Tory Administra-
tion, and the people of Ireland are dissatisfied so long as a
Tory Administration exists. (` Hear' and a langh.)
So, then, the people of Ireland are languishing for
the return to power of "the base, bloody, and brutal
Whigs !" The agitation which is distracting that tin-
happy country is not so much an agitation for the
repeal of the union as it is a Whig fever! It is not so
much a longing for the destruction of the Protestant
church, or for the alienation of the property of " the
hated Saxon," as it is a longing for the return of some
Normanby or Fortescue to the Castle of Dublin, to-
gether with a plentiful scattering of pickings and power
amongst the place-hunters of the provinces, and "the
briefless" of the four courts! When the reader has
got over this we shall proceed.

How simple, you will say—or some silly Radical will
say—is the remedy for Irish discontent ! It is only to
send Lord Palmerston to his protocols, Lord John
Russell to the Home or the Colonial Office, Lord
Melbourne to the Treasury, and some tool of Daniel
O'Connell to Dublin Castle ; and Ireland becomes
once more the most peaceably-unquiet country in- the
universe—

" First flower of the earth, and first gem of the sea !"
But, alas! there is, by the admission of Lord Palmer-
ston himself, a fatal obstacle to the: success of such a
scheme of pacification. There is a country, unfortu-
nately, called Great Britain, which claims to have some
voice in the arrangement of these little affairs ; and
Great Britain is just as resolved not to submit herself
to Whig domination as Ireland appears to be enamoured
of Whig laxity of rule.
`• I do honestly believe" continues Lord Palmerston " from
what we have seen passing before our eyes in this country,
that if they were to yield to the appeal when made by us,
they would have another appeal made by the people of En-
gland requesting then. to return to their places. (Cheers,
and a laugh.) The time is not come when any party but
that which sits opposite can advantageously to the public,
and with the general concurrence of the people, administer
the affairs of this country. ! !

Need we say that we are perfectly and decidedly of his

opinion ?

There is a hope, however, it would appear, according
to the testimony of the same noble lord, that at some
distant day the Whig longings of the people of 'lreland
may be safely gratified. " There is something," we
are told, " in what is passing around us, which indi-
cates that we might hold out to the people of Ireland
a distant HOPE (!) that their wishes in this matter may,
some day or other, in the lifetime of existing men, be
fulfilled ; certainly not this year !" His lordship is
quite correct in the latter portion of the paragraph
quoted. It is certainly not this year in which his an-
ticipations of office are likely to be fulfilled ; and if the
Lord Palmerston of the present day is the same
" Hon. Wm. Temple" who was born some sixty and
odd years ago, we fear there is little chance of such an
event during his lifetime, whatever may be the good
fortune in this respect of younger men.
His lordship has, however, other remedies to be
applied to Ireland, pending the arrival of the Whig
millenium which he prophesies. The Romish priest-
hood of Ireland are to be provided with glebes and
glebe-houses, and to be rendered more independent,
and more respectable; and, though Conservatives may
govern, they are to administer the affairs of Ireland
only through Radical and popish instruments—or, in
other words, Protestantism and loyalty to the throne,
in any Irish Man, whatever his talent and deserving in
other respects, are to be made insuperable objections to
his political advancement. The fa`x.rours of government
are, in no case, to be dealt out to men who possess
sufficient independence and amor patrice to have an
opinion of their own upon any public question; whilst
mean sycophantic "waiters upon providence"—men
who have neither politics nor patriotism—are to pos,
sess exclusively the rewards which their country hag
to bestow! With respect to the proposition to permit
the endowment of the Roman -Catholic priesthood,
from private sources, for that we understand to be Lord
Palmerston's proposition, we are not called upon just
now to give even an opinion. But this we must de-
clare—we would not concede one step to men with arms
in their hands! We would not thus teach popery the
path to future triumphs! Let Ireland lay aside her
arms. Let her retreat from her rebellious attitude and
position; and then we may consider the reasonableness
of her complaints. But until that course is submitted
to; until Ireland is tranquil and submissive, we can-
not, with the result of the concession of 1829 before
us, give up that to dictation which we have not as yet
been convinced is due to justice!
With respect to the policy which we are asked to
pursue in the bestowal of the patronage of government,
we have only this to say; that under the present cir-
cumstance's of the country such a policy would be both
suicidal and cowardly. We may, by such a course,
conciliate traitors; we may prolong a treacherous truce;
but we can never thus secure the real and permanent
security of the empire, which is only to be fotuid in the
love and the faithfulness of loyal and patriotic subjects!

It might have been thought that, into a subject so
repeatedly discussed, as the question involved in the
annual vote of the sugar duties, it was next to impos-
sible to infuse anything approaching to novelty. • It
will be seen, however, by a reference to the parliamen-
taryproceedings of Thursday night, that the very ori-
ginal the arch-apostle of the League--Mr.
t mind
o f
Richard Cobden—has .discovered a fact, connected
with the subject of colonial policy in general, which
has escaped the discernment of all the great statesmen

4n4 plitiott toonamialo of tto Proa"'
on
•
Mr. Cobden had diaooveraii, and 'rho
day night propounded to the House of Comm icyon 84
of
truth not to be shaken, that the colonial elnP
loss,
that
Great Britain is only maintained at -a
positive
financial as well as commercial, to. ,--41 the nation e
ted to prove
" our system of colonization and colonial affairs is on
of unmixed evil and injustice"! , Piet
follow-
this striking conclusion is something like the
The mode by which Mr. Cobden attemp
tablish-
nies with army, navy, and civil and militar y es
ing. This country, he argues, " furnishes the coin-
hoolloas-
tnents all over the world; she finds them sc .
'' facts, of
ter's, bishops, and magistrates ; she has built
lighthouses and constructed their canals ;
which, to the sweeping extent in which they are here
Hitherto
alleged, we believed the world at large was
• all
scarcely informed. •We have done and are doing
resource of
this, it is urged. We are developing the t the
our rich possessions. We protect, at some cos.,
0,
interests of
our fellow•countrymen, the inhabitants
thOse possessions; and, as a mercantile speculation:.
looking at the debtor and per contra sides of the aer.
their
,count—the nation, Mr,. Cobden argues, is a los
These colonies, he maintains, (by a very absurdlyto
overdrawn calculation,) cost us annually from
tn five
,a.bie
six millions sterling. They,employ for their presen
tion three fourths of our army (.9 f
and a considera
portion of our navy End ordnance; whilst (cacilisive.o_e
the. East Indies) they only take, of our expoannum.to
amount of ten millions per annum.
iti
questo
,
Certainly, if we could consent to look at the
with Mr. Cobden, in the spirit of a 'pedlar, and if sver
could adopt his facts; if we could weigh the cost 0:
our colonies to the British empire after his fashion, and
set that cost against the' profit derived by the
mightße
from £10,000,000 per annum of esports ;we re
agree with him that, as a mercantile concern, they a,
a losing one.. But we cannot admit that three-fourths
,
of the army and navy of Great Britain are employe°
in the preservation of the colonies, leaving out of f.
of
the East Indies ; nor can we see the reasonableness r
omitting, in a calculation of the consumption
of t
colonial empire, the amount of exports
to the has
c
Indies. We cannot, either, shut our eyes to the f'i
that they are producing as well as consuming colonic!.
that they afford convenient and secure entrepots
our commerce with the rest of the world, and that they
alland almost be regarded as military and naval statiolsl
and fortresses, from which that commerce can, at
times, and against every enemy, be protected. Alienat
e
at e
the colonies of Great Britain, and you strike
roots of her commercial power--nay, of herpower fiS
nation. Alienate those colonies, and you destroy the
fulcra of the levers with which alone you can operate
argue serio
such a position with such an opponent ; and we ire
glad to observe that not a member of the house vole°'
teered, on Thursday last, even a passing word of reply
to the League's chosen apostle. We refer to trash s.°f
contemptible only because it proves incontestiblY,
proof were even wanting, the utter unfitness of till
man's mind to grapple with any question greater tha.°
the peddling statistics with which he enlivens an an
t
l
corn-law debate. Mr. Cobden's is—par excellence"
the huckster's school of political economy. W 41111411:
nation's greatness is measured by its power of c°l
suming the cottons of Manchester, the woollens A°.
Leeds, or the hardware of!Sheffield ; and in the 11°7,
of such a man, or of politcians of his cast, how 00°"1,
would the greatness of this empire be only a tars
past years—a companion picture to the fallen gl°rie
of a Tyre, a Sidon, or a Babylon !

century

There is a small being in the House of Coniiii°ns
named Blewitt—an attorney, we believe, spoilt by beills
w converted into a member of parliament—ho is th

night to move the following resolution :
" That an humble address be presented to her Ninie:stitj;
most respectfully representing to her Majesty that the 13fRily
people have ever been jealous of the interference of :0
foreign potentate or state in their domestic policy ; that 5-101
an interference is a violation of the British constitution, Ilico
is attended with danger to the independence of the corthst
and to the liberties of the people ;. and therefore praying:43 ,
her Majesty will be graciously pleased, so long as hish, Ch
jesty the King of Hanover, Duke of Cumberland in Eng,:fri.
shall occupy the Hanoverian throne,
not to employ his
jesty in any civil or military service, to receive with eautioa
pj
any advice which his Majesty, as a peer of the real` with'
th'
Privy Councillor, may tender to her Majesty, and
"-
hold or revoke her Majesty's Royal license to erla
Majesty to vote by proxy in the House of Lords.
to a
'the insolence of such a motion coming fro ark
person like this Mr. Blewitt, we need scarcely ren.llo.
upon. The silly individual in question wishes wiciig
suit the uncle of the Sovereign—his Majesty the -I