Brighouse & Rastrick Gazette. — 1892-03-26 (Brighouse, West Yorkshire, England)

COMBINATION.  At the evening sitting Mr. E. Robertson called attention to the law affecting combinations, and moved that the common law doctrine of con. spiracy, by which persons are made punishable for combining to do acts which in themselves are not criminal, is unjust in its operation and ought to be amended.—Mr. Burt seconded the motion, and Mr. Gainsford Bruce moved as an amendment that the House declined to pledge itself to any alteration of the law of conspiracy until it had had an opportunity of considering the proposed amendments in a definite form and embodied in a bill, so that their effect upon the existing law could be adequately considered in connection with all interests affected thereby.—Sir William Harcourt urged that the law of conspiracy was an uncertain law, and that it was left entirely in the breast of the judge to determine what was conspiracy and what was not. The vagueness of the law, and the consequent danger to the subject, ought to be taken notice of by Parliament, as was Cone in 1875 in the case of the Trade Unions.—Mr. Matthews maintained that it was an absolutely novel proposition that a conspiracy should only be criminal when the act, if done by an individual, would be criminal. The resolution was one in favour of boycotting and the "plan of campaign," and its adoption would involve evil consequences far greater than any evils that arose from the difficulty of applying the law of consipracy to varying facts.—Sir C. Russell insisted that the Legislature ought itself to define what were crimes, and not leave them to be determined by the opinions of judges, especially when vague and indefinite questions of conspiracy are allowed to be dealt with by removable magistrates.—On a division the resolution was negatived by 226 against 180, the amendment being then agreed to.  Herman Krouse, a aisappointea lover' 0i annne. spolis, tried to kill his sweetheart, Margaret Ctlntad, and then ended his own life. The girl was not fatally injured.  A street scavenger discovered late on Sunday night a bomb, apparentlly fully charged, in the entrance to a drain in the Rue du Temple, Paris. It has been handed over to the police.  Early on Sunday morning a fatal fire occurred at 37, Strand-buildings, Strand, in the rooms occupied by Mr. T. Rothshak, lodger. Considerabl. damage was caused to the back room on the fourth floor, and Mary Ann Rothshak, aged 50 years, was burned to death.  It is reported that an electric railway is to unite Naples with Altedena, in the Abruzzi, and that motive force obtained from the copious sources of the Volturno will be transported to Naples in the form of electricity. _ _  A serious bank failure is reported from Paris, the Banque des Chemins de Fer having suspended payment, with an estimated deficit of £160,000. Or director has committed suicide, two have absconded, and a fourth has been arrested.  On Sunday evening, as a train was entering West Hampstead Station, a gentleman leaped from the platform on to the rails, and was killed. His body has been identified as that of Mr. Gordon Thomas, of Marlborough-hill, St. John'awood. An official order was published on Saturday at St. Petersburg directing that the small arms factory at Ishevsk, in the government of Viatka, shall be enlarged to such an extent as to be able to turn out 600,000 barrels and chambers for the new rifle annually.