The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-11-26 00:00:00

TUESDAY MORNING, NOV. 26, 1844.

We remarked briefly, last week, upon the pro-
ceedings of the worshipful, the borough magistrates
of this town, and "the excellent stipendiary,"—as
he delights to be called,—their Magnus Apollo. We
had no disposition to follow up the affair. We
thought the whole proceedings were but on escapade
of the absurd vanity of the " King Log," which
Radicalism uplifted out of his element, and his
native insignificance, to yawn upon the magis-
terial bench, and lord it over this unhappy com-
munity. Reflection, however, tel.s us that we must
not forbear doing full justice to the various matters
in question, and the various assumptions of the
gentleman who has been the prime mover in them.
Mr. Edward Rushton is the chief-magistrate of a
'Conservative community, His fellow-townsmen
know the amount, and the value, of his magisterial
doings. They know that the empty tub rolled
down a hill, whose noise scares her Majesty's lieges,
is but an empty tub,—loud only because of its
emptiness ;—but the world is not so enlightened.
The world does not know Mr. Rushton; and, lest
his late stage-inspired travestie of Cicero should be
taken for the voice of Cicero himself,—lest the weak-
minded world should mistake the mock-heroic bub-
blings of a Solon goose for the philosophic wisdom
of a real Solon,—we must, the subject being a
tedious one, bestow upon the ambitious gentleman
in question, as Shakspeare as it, " a little of our
own tediousness."

May we, in starting, ask of this excellent and
truly modest functionary two questions ? Firstly—
What does he think are the duties of a constable ?
Secondly—What does he think are the duties of a
stipendiary magistrate. Dogberry says—and Dog-
berry was not far out in his say—that the duty of
the former is to " comprehend all vagroms." Un-
fortunately, the same eminent authority has not
laid down the duties of the latter, for the reason, we
presume, that, in his days, briefless Whig barristers
had not often " the misfortune," as Mr. Rushton
calls it, of being created stipendiary magistrates.
Talent and judgment in Shakspeare's, as in all pre-
vious ages of the world, have been presumed to be
essential to fitness for promotion; but Whiggery
only thought of thus pensioning off worn-out tools,
who were too heavy to rise of themselves, and too
importunate to be got rid of otherwise. Hence we
have no Shakspearian hints to guide us with respect
to Mr. Rushton's duties; and must, therefore, un-
willingly, define them, according to ordinary practice
in localities where such functionaries vegetate and
draw their salaries. With this practice to guide us,
we submit that the duty of Mr. Rushton is to hear
and decide upon all cases which come before him,
according to the law as laid down for him.

Our excellent stipendiary, however, appears to
have a vastly higher notion of his importance and
the extent of his authority. Mr. Rushton imagines
that, by virtue of his office, he sits at the head of a
star chamber,—that he can call before him and
censure men, for crimes not cognizable by British
law—that he can take evidence, and frame depo-
sitions of the doings of individuals in their private
capacity as British subjects, and promulgate censures
upon them ex-cathedrd, and as if ex-auctoritate. All
this Mr. Rushton has done; and the result is just
what might have been expected. He has succeeded
in bringing his office into contempt, and in dragging
his brother magistrates into a share of the ridicule
which he has provoked. He has found the oppor-
tunity of discharging his accumulation of bile upon
the heads of his fancied victims; flourished his mock
truncheon; walked off the stage with the tragic
demeanor of the whole race of Bombastes concen-
trated in his own person, and left the audience,
fiddlers, scene-shifters, and all, in convulsive laugh-
ter from the footlights to the back of the gallery I
But let us come to the cause of this laughter—to
the magn.ficent " resolution" with which Mr. Rush-
ton made his flourishing magisterial exit ;—we call
it "his exit" because Mr. Rushton, the magistrate,
here vanished, whilst Mr. Rushton, the virago, only
remained, and we do not wish to dwell upon the
unseemly explosion of fishwife oratory, of which he
subsequently discharged himself, however appro-
priately such explosion explained the motives and
feelings which prompted his course throughout this
proceeding. It was premised that " Mr. Parker, a
member of the Watch Committee, had attempted,
upon two occasions, to interfere with the officers of
police in the discharge of their duty within the ward
of St. Anne's," and, accordingly, " Resolved.—
That if any individual whatever shall, directly or in-
directly, interfere with any superintendent, inspector,
or other ojicer of the police force, in the execution of
his duty, every officer shall forthwith communicate
the fact of such interference to the Commissioner of
Police, who shall lay the same before the worshipful
the Mayor," 4-c. We shall say nothing of the
abortiveness of this laying of informations. We
shall not remind our stipendiary of the stage direc-
tion—" a f °lrish of trumpets, and enter Tom
Thumb,''—which should in future be the herald of
his approach to similar great feats ; but we will ask
him by what rule such "interference with the police
in the execution of their duty" is to be determined.
If by the course pursued by Mr. Parker, then we
say that he did not so interfere. He offered his ad-
vice to the superintendent of Rose-hill station ; but
be could not be said to " interfere " with them, in
the legal significance of the phrase. If the inter-
ference is an illegal interference, then the resolution
is surplusage. Such interference every officer of
the force is bound to resent by the summary appre-
hension of the offender.

It is plain, therefore, that obstructive interference
is not the interference to be communicated to the
Commissioner of Police, but only such interference
as is not legally liable to be visited with punish-
ment :—such interference, for instance, as was prac-
tised in those good Whig times when members of
market and watch committees could make market
and other constables, in the discharge of their duty,
of course, perform ie offices of canvassing agents,
or twopenny postmen. But we never heard in those
days of any extraordinary zeal to 'interfere with the
duties of the Watch Cominittee. Oh, no That
Whig-radical body and the Whig-radical bench never
jarred in those days ; but, instead, they played to-.
gether a pleasant duetto, the stipendiary's being the
rst fiddle : •
" Music was heard with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell."
But the "interference" referred to—what, we
ask again, is it? Bygones, we presume, are to be
bygones. We are to forget the doings f the high
and palmy days of Liberalism; and, now that we
are a Conservative public, with a Whig-radical
bench, (or, rather, a WhigJradical majority on that
bench, the majority being either magnetized by its
Magnus Apollo, or hopelessly dumb,)—we must
carry out strictly its recent resolution, and permit
no one, however high in authority, to even speak to
an officer on duty.

We have intimated already that it was not our
intention to comment upon the temper and the
arrogance of demeanour manifested by Mr. Rush-
ton towards his brother magistrate, Mr. David
Hodgson, during these proceedings. It is not
necessary to do so for. Mr.• Hodgson's vindication ;
and it would be cruel to the stipendiary himself to
dwell upon matters which so palpably shew his utter
unfitness for the office which, to repeat his own
words, it is " his misfortune to hold,"—his mis-
fortune, because the very elevation of the position
in which it places him tends to exhibit mcre palpably
to the public his total want of the discretion, the
calmness, and the courtesy which such an office
demands. But, whilst in pity we pass over this
portion of our subject, there are one or two remarks
of Mr. Rushton to which we are compelled to direct
his attention and that of his brother magistrates.
Mr. Rushton felt himself aggrieved that any allusion
should have been made " to the Orange matter,"
which, he said, "had, been before disposed of."
i
Now, we must beg to inform him that the matter in
question is far from being disposed of. It is not
half disposed of. Mr. Rushton, may remember
that with the " Orange matter' was coupled a
Ribbon matter. He may remember how sedulously
these two matters were classed together throughout
the proceedings of the magistrates upon the
.subject.
A reference to those proceedings will remind him ,
that the order of the magistrates declared that , no
Orangeman, or Ribbonman, should be permitted to