The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-05-09 00:00:00

POLITICAL MISCELLANY.

Mr. Sharman Crawford has announced his adhesion iC
the repeal cause " to the extent of a local parliament."
Rear-Admiral Dundas and Mr. Ward arrived at the
Admiralty on Monday night, from their official tour to
Birkenhead, Dublin, Waterford, Cork, and Holyhead.

MR. SANDARS A ROYAL FORESTER.—On Saturday,
Mr. Sandars, the member for Wakefield, was initiated
into the mysteries of Royal Foresterism, at the Forester's
lodge-room, at Wakefield.
It is stated that the whole of the names of the inhabi-
tants of Newport, were appended to the Charter-petition
from that town. They were copied indiscriminately from
one of Kelly's Directories.—The same course, adds the
Cardin' Advertiser, was adopted in that town.
POLITICAL CIIANGES.—The Earl of Shannon, whose
family for many years were identified with the Whig party,
has joined the Carlton Club. Sir Lucius O'Brien, Bart.,
brother to Mr. Smith O'Brien, has also become a member
of the same club. Sir Lucius entered parliament as a
supposed r. epealer at the East Clare election.
THE MINISTRY.—There is, just now, a remarkable
unanimity of opinion as to the position and prospects of
her Majesty's Ministers. Times, Herald, Chronicle, and
Post all join in the cry that Lord John Russell and his
colleagues are, literally speaking, doing nothing—that
they are permitting the country to govern itself.
THE DANISH DUCHIES.—In the House of Commons
on Thursday, in reply to a question by Mr. Wrquhart,
Lord Palmerston said her Majesty's government were in
negotiation with the contending parties, and it was to
be hoped that an amicable arrangement would be effected.
The papers relating to the subject were now in pre-
paration, and would shortly be laid befor6 the house.
INSOLVENT MEMBERS.—A bill brought in by Messrs.
Moffat and Brotherton proposes to enact that no person
shall be qualified to serve as a member of the House of
Commons if he shall be proved to have suffered any
judgment for the payment of money, to remain unsatis-
fied, or not sufficiently secured, for the space of six
months, unless such judgment shall affect him solely as a
trustee.

JEWISH DISABILITIES BILL.—In the majority for the
third reading of this bill in the Commons, on Thursday,
we find the names of Sir T. B. Birch, E. Cardwell, J.
Heywood, W. Brown, A. Henry, R. Cobden, W. Jack-
son, Sir J. Walmsley, I'. Thornley, and B. Disraeli. In
the minority are Lord H. Bentinck, Sir P. Egerton, W.
T. Egerton. J. W. Patten, J. Tollemache, Col. Peel, Sir
F. Thesiger, and Sir R. H. Inglis.
WHERE IS THE BUDGET ?—What has become of the
budget ? Everybody knows that in the " Merry Wives of
Windsor," Master Slender arranges his assignation with
" sweet Ann Page" by a very simple contrivance—" When
I cry mum, she is to answer budget !" Sir Charles Wood
and his colleagues reverse this arrangement ; for when the
country cries out budget, they answer mum—preserving a
most mysterious silence in regard to the nature and extent
of their financial plans.—John Bull.

INTERVENTION IN SPAIN.—One reason for the "no
House," on Tuesday, is said to have been the desire of
ministers to escape a debate on the recent " intervention"
of 1,,0rd Palmerston in Spain. However, persevering Mr.
Urquhart renewed the subject on Thursday night ; and the
adroit Foreign Secretary not being in his " place," Lord
John Russell answered the interrogator. But the Prime
Minister dropt one or two significant expressions, implying
that Lord Palmerston had been somewhat rather free in
his mode of dictation to the ministers of an independent
government. May the lesson be a profitable one !
M. Guizot was in the House of Lords on Friday even-
ing during the debate upon Lord Stanley's motion relating
to the correspondence between Lord Palmerston, Mr.
Bulwer, and the Duke de Sotomayor. The ex-minister
stood the entire time by the great candelabrum adjoining
the bishops' bench, between it and the Prince of Wales's
chair, and seemed deeply interested in the debate. Many
noble lords from time to time went up, shook hands, and
conversed with him. The Earl of Aberdeen held a long,
and apparently earnest, conversation with him towards
the close of the proceedings.

CONFLICT OF PARTIES AT CHELTENHAM.-A public
meeting was held at Cheltenham, on Saturday week, for
the purpose of adopting a loyal address to Her Majesty.
The provisional committee had selected as chairman the
High Bailiff of the manor, a bookseller, and a Roman
Catholic. The Rev. F. Close moved an amendment to
the address, first, because there was no sufficiently distinct
recognition of the hand of God ; and, secondly, because
the political dogma, Progressive Reform, was introduced.
The original address was supported by Mr. Browne, an
Independent minister. Upon a division, the chairman
declared his inability to decide, and ultimately dissolved
the meeting amidst much confusion. It was announced
that two addresses would go up—one, that originally
proposed, and the other with Mr. Close's amendment.
APPOINTMENTS.-Mr. Arthur Buller is to have the
vacant judgeship in India. Mr. Henry Southern, Secre-
tary of Legation to the British Embassy, is appointed her
Majesty's Minister to the Government of Buenos Ayres.
Sir Dennis Le Marchant, the under Home Secretary,
succeeds Mr. J. S. Lefevre as principal Secretary to the
Board of Trade, and the worthy baronet is succeeded in
the former office by Mr. G. C. Lewis' M.P., now one of
the secretaries of the Board of Control, which place will
in future be filled by Mr. J. Wilson. M.P. for Westbury.
It is said that the Right Hon. E. J. Stanley, M.P. for
Cheshire, will be called to the upper house in the lifetime
of his father, Lord Stanley, of Alderley. The Earl of
Granville has been appointed Paymaster-General, the sa-
lary of which office will be reduced to £2OOO per annum.
Lord Granville will fulfil at the same time the duties of
Vice-President of the Board of Trade, without salary.

FALLACY OF GOVERNMENT RETURNS EXPOSED.—In
a letter to the standard, Mr. George Frederick Young
exposes the fallacious nature of monthly returns laid be-
fore Parliament, of " Accounts relating to Trade and Na-
vigation." in the return for the month ending February
sth, 1848, signed "A. W. Fonblanque, Stitistical De-
partment of the Board of Trade," there is a long list of
articles imported, from the most important to the least—
from corn and cotton to divi-divi and oysters : it totally
omits cotton, woollen, and linen manufactures, as if none
had been imported. From the Custom-house returns for
the same month,,Mr. Young quotes a long list of articles
actually imported, but omitted from the Whitehall return,
including cotton and woollen manufactures in considerable
quantities. _ _

On Monday night, Sir W. Somerville, the Irish Secre-
tary, introduced one of the " remedial measures" for
Ireland so often talked about. It is a bill to settle the
qualification of an elector by official valuation, instead
of, as at present, by rival swearing, and so far may be
good in principle. It also extends the county franchise
to tenant-at-will. In England the amount of qualifica-
tion for a tenant-at-will is £5O; in Ireland it is proposed
to make it £8 ! Our Whig ministers, that is, think an
Irish £8 farmer equal in intelligence and fitness to select
members of the legislature with an English £5O farmer.
A proposition like this may be acceptable to the mere
hack politicians of Ireland, as "a bold approach," in the
words of a Radical journal of yesterday, "to general
suffrage, and likely to satisfy the democratic exigencies."
SUFFRAGE MOVEMENT.—The scheme of the new move-
ment for extending the suffrage as at present contempla-
ted, is something in this nature,—that there shall be six
hundred electoral districts, each containing 50,000 people,
and returning one member; that all occupiers of houses
of £6 per annum, charged to the poor's rates to that
amount, and all 40s. freeholders shall constitute the elec-
toral body, and that parliaments shall be triennial. This
outline has not yet been definitely propounded as the ba-
sis of the forthcoming agitation ; but it certainly embra-
ces the views of several members who will take a promi-
nent part in the discussion on Mr. Hume's motion. Mr.
Gibson's resignation was sent in, it is said, from conside-
rations exclusively connected with this question ; and he
has since been in constant communication with the parties
most forward in the movement.—Manchester Guardian.

Goon ADVICE.—The Manchester Guardian whig paper
in noticing the formation of the new reform party makes
the following reflections, after pointing out the commer-
cial crisis through which we are passing, " Now what is
the obvious remedy for these disastrous affairs? Obviously,
we should say, a restoration of commercial confidence, by
means of a re-establishment of political tranquillity.
Every thing should be done to inspire amongst bankers,
and merchants, and manufacturers, a full confidence in
the preservation of order, anti the stability of the gore...
ment. But other parties, it seems, contemplate a remedy
of a very different kind. They say, ' Let us have MORE
AGITATION ;—let us attack the government, and work
upon the legislature, by extensively-organised political
societies. There is one political agicatiou in the country,
which is doing mischief. Let us set up another, better
organised, and more formidable, and try what that will
accomplish'—We must confess we do not see the force of
the reasoning by which this new scheme is supported.
Certain gentlemen, it seems, do not find themselves quite
so well received, or as favourably listened to, in the house
of Commons as they expected or wished to be. Accord.
ing to one of these parties, they are laughed at,—a fate
which we fear, generally attends those who say and do
foolish things, or even pertinaciously urge measures, good
in themselves, but proposed at
unseasonable periods.
But how can their ill reception in the house justify an
agitation which must tend to prevent the restoration of
mercantile confidence and the revival of trade ? Surely,
there is no urgent and immediate necessity for a violent
agitation, at a time when the profits of the merchant, the
manufacturer, and the shopkeeper, as well as the. wages. of
the labourer, depend entirely on political tranquillity."