The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1835-01-02 00:00:00

TO THE ELECTORS OF LIVERPOOL.

GENTLEMEN,
NO doubt can any longer be entertained that a Dissolution
of Parliament is at hand; the time therefore is now
come for making a public statement of the gro son which I
shall solicit the high honour of being chose a third time your
Representative.
In the first place I feel an honest co ciousness, a conspiring-
nesb in which I ern supported, as well by the cordial reception
which I have suet with from all classes, whenever I have come
among you, as by the express testimonials of many Public
Bodies, that vour local interests, as well general as individual,
have nut suffered from any want of zeal and earnestness, how-
ever much they may t,avc suffered frUm want of ability, on my
part. Indeed in your service, laborious as it is, there is always
this encouraging and elevating consideration, that from the high
station which your great community holds among the Cities of
the Empire, from, its intimate connexion with every branch of
Domestic and Colonial Industry, your Local Interests arc, for
the most part, the interests of the Empire at large ; and that
thus, whoever has served you with any degree of efficiency may
esteem himself to have rendered some service to his country.
Thus, whether engaged in securing to your Town the benefit
of an improved Local Court, or in resisting the attempt to ex-
tend the privilege of Warehousing to Inland. Towns, a privilege
which, by the consent of the best authorities, can only, with
security to the Revenue and the Merchant, be conceded to the
Ports - whether in endeavouring to convince the Government
and the house of Commons of the error into which they had
fallen in attempting to levy a discriminating Duty on Tea, there-
by giving a premium on the introduction of the inferior qualities,
and introducing confusion and uncertainty into the trade; or in
persuading them to reduce the Duties on Articles of Foreign
Commerce • whether engaged in adjusting the terms on which
the vast mill incalculable resources of the Trade with China
should be thrown open ,to the enterprise of the British Mer-
chant; or, above all, in negociating that arrangement, combin-
ing justice with humanity, by which the great and generous,
though unexampled and perilous experiment of emancipating,
at once, eight hundred thousand slaves has been stripped of
much of its peril, and enjoys the best chances of success of
which it is in its nature capable; in short, in whatever instances
I have been called upon to maintain or promote your Local
Interests, I have felt myself engaged more or less directly in
promoting the general good.

FREEMEN,—In upholding, as by every tie of gratitude and
justice I was bound to do, your rights and privileges against
those who have never ceased to revile and persecute you since
you have refused to become the tools of their ambition, I felt
that I was fighting the battle of the poorer classes of Electors
throughout the country, whose rights are an object of peculiar
hostility to those who claim to themselves exchssively the title
of the "PEOPLE'S FRIENDS."
But, GENTLEMEN, I feel that higher interests now occupy
the minds of men. The great, the main principles of our Con-
stitution are assailed. The free exercise of the undoubted pre-
rogative of our King is questioned—if not in words, certainly
in deeds; the independence, nay the very existence of the
hereditary branch of our Legislature is attacked and derided;
every check and balance is to be swept away for the purpose of
substituting in the place of our free mixed monarchy the unmiti-
gated tyranny of one elective body. The Reform Act itself, no
longer held up to our veneration, as it was during the discussion
of the measure by its proposers and supporters, as a second
Charter of our Rights, as a final and satisfactory adjustment of
the Constitution of Parliament, is now treated as a mere step-
ping-stone to farther change ; as, indeed, of no other value than
as containing within itself the seeds of future and constant
change. It was not for such results that, in all its main provi-
sions, I supported the Reform Bill.. I supported it as a measure
of peace, as a measure calculated, by removing not unreason-
able objections to the Constitution of the House of Commons,
to unite and knit together the hearts of all good men'in defence
of our Institutions, not to encourage or enable bad men to de-
stroy them: In this hope I supported it, in this hope I will
maintain it; nor will I lend a hand to Radical Reformers to un-
settle its provisions, or pervert it from its original purpoie.'
Not only is our Civil Constitution attacked, but our Na-
tional Church is assailed with, &Possible, still greater bitter-
ness and animosity. Her opponents have spoken out at last;
they no longer disguise that their ultimate end Is her destruc-
tion as an establishment, and that their efforts for what they
now cail Religious Liberty will never cease till that object is
attained. Of Religions Liberty I used to think I knew some-
thing, having uniformly supported the removal of every civil
disability on account of difference in religious creed, and
having done so against my own interest, and in spite of party-
connexion, and when it was less thau-now the fashion of the
day; but by, that terns I find that I must now understand the
spoliation of Church Property, and the disavowal of all Reli-
gion by the State. To such an object, as involving, in my
opinion, the greatest of all calamities that could befal a nation;
as shaking the foundation of all property by the too easily imi-
tated precedent for other spoliation which it would afford, and
of all order by the destruction of an institution which diffuses
respect for the laws of God and man to the remotest cor-
ners of the land ; as withdrawing from the poor and from the
rich the only permanent provision for their instruction in
Eternal Truth, the benefit of which is extended to all, and even
acknowledged by many of those who dissent froin her Com-
munion; to such an object, or to any steps that lead to it, I
shall always offer the most zealous and unvarying opposition.
These feelings, however, will not prevent me from continuing
to lend a most favourable attention to every measure for the
removal of real grievances, for putting the Maniages of Dis-
senters on a footing not offensive to their religious principles, for
the establishment of a good system for the Registration of
Births, or for an alteration of the system of Church Rates on a
principle similar to that proposed by the Government of Lord
Grey; and I foresee no real difficulty in the way of an arrange-
ment of these points which shall be satisfactory to all who are
willing to be satisfied and who have no ulterior views. I shall also
be glad to see some arrangement made by which the benefits of
an University Education may be opened to the Dissenters
without a Parliamentary interference with our ancient Uni-
versities, to which I cannot consent, and without a sacrifice of
that religious discipline and instruction which I feel to be a
distinguishing exc3llence of their present system, and which,
even by the avowal of those who are most anxious for the
change, would be incompatible with the free admission of per-
sons of different creeds to a common Education.

On the subject of Church. Reform, in which the Curates' Bill
of my revered father gives me an hereditary interest, I need only
say, that I have long looked with anxiety fur some well-consi-
dered measures which shall provide for the less inconvenient
collection of the Revenues of the Church, and the more useful
distribution of them within her own pale, for the regulation and
diminution of pluralities and non-residence, for strengthening
her discipline, and enabling. her better to adapt herself to the
wants of a growing population.
These, then, are the principles on which I ask for your sup-
port. I will resist all farther change in our parliamentary
system; I will support the reform of all that is really abuse in
Political, Ecclesiastical, or Municipal bodies; but I shall require
stronger evidence of the abuse, and look to safer counsel for the
remedy, than that of men who are hostile to the very objects for
which these bodies have been created.

If, by your kindness, I have again the honour of a seat
Parliament, these are the principles on which I hope to be able •
to support his Majesty's present governthent. I confess I feel
it to be of infinite importance, if they carry these principles
fully and fairly into effect, that they should.receive from all real
friends of their country a most zealous and energetic support.
If they fail, what is our alternative government- Willing to
"merge all minor differences" with Republicanism and Repeal,
replaced in power by the Radicals of ,England. and the Agita-
tors of Ireland, and compelled, as a necessary consequence, to
pay fur that assistance, whether they wish it or not, a price too
costly for the British Constitution to survive. Such, in my
opinion, is the option which is, practically, now before us. For
my own part I cannot hesitate as to the choice. I trust I am
not presumptuous in saving, that in these principles I sanguinely
hope to meet with your concurrence.
I um, Gentlemen,
Your obedient and faithful Servant,
SAN DON.
Sandon Hall, 22d December.