The Express. — 1861-08-17 (London, England)

CHARLFA I. There is, in fact, a considerable analogy between the two cases. In our own country a constitutional monarch attempted to destroy the existing form of government, to abolish the constitution he had sworn to support, and usurp absolute authority. And in order to accomplish this purpose he naturally began by assailing the ancient rights and fundamental prerogatives of Parliament. The most essential of these rights he first practically denied by levying taxes on a royal warrant instead of through the representatives of the nation. Having partially succeeded in the forcible collection of an illegal revenue, be attempted with a high hand to justify the usurpation, and hoped to succeed through the guilty subserviency of a weak, intimidated, and treacherous faction. Had the daring attempt succeeded, the constitution, and with it the rights and liberties of Englishmen, would have been utterly destroyed. Parliament having lost all reel and independent authority, would have been degraded into a court for registering imperial decrees. This is precisely what the Emperor of AUSTRIA is striving to effect in Hunpry. The only legitimate connexion he has with the Kingdom of Hungary is that of a constitutional monarch, bound to observe the ancient statutes and govern according to the fundamental laws of the realm. For a time the constitution was violently suppressed, and FRANCIS Jones, having established a military despotism, ruled in Hungary as an absolute prince. However harsh and oppressive such a government might be, it could hardly be considered dangerous to the fundamental rights and liberties of the nation. Being utterly violent and illegal, it simply suppressed without attempting to change the laws. The recent attempt to subvert the constitution indirectly by a species of political fraud was in all respects farmers dangerous, and had it succeeded, the ancient liberties of the nation would have been more hopelessly destroyed than they could have been by the sword. The representatives of the nation have, however, met the attempt in exactly the same way the English Parliament met the attempted usurpations of Csanns L They may be said, indeed, to have acted with even greater moderation, and a more scrupulous regard to the letter of constitutional law. So far from having at all exceeded its legitimate powers, the Diet has throughout kept carefully within view the letter and the spirit of the fundamental statutes it had solemnly pledged itself to support. This final address recapitulates in a firm but respectful tone the constitutional rights which the Mamma has attempted to destroy. All the Diet has asked from the first was simply the fulfilment of the legal conditions on which alone the crown of Hungary can ever be worn by the Emperor of Anemia. "We asked in our Address," say the representatives of the kingdom in Diet assembled, " for no concessions ; we proposed no new laws "to guarantee our rights. We wished only that " the Pragmatic Sanction, with all its conditions " and the mutual obligations it imposed, should "be strictly observed. We required only that " our ancestral constitution and the laws enacted " by our Diet, which have been suspended by " force, should be re-established, and that the " right of altering and repealing laws should in "no degree be withdrawn from the Diet. In a " word, we wish that legality and constitutional " procedure should not half, but entirely, take " the place of absolute force." This legal claim the Imperial Rescript refuses to grant. The En'axon promises to restore only certain isolated fragments of the ancient Constitution, and even these would be given as Imperial favours, not as national rights. The legal constitution of the Diet is not even reco6mised. It has never yet been completed according to the terms of the constitution, and even if assembled it would, under the new scheme, be deprived of all real power. Its ancient right of determining all questions of taxation and military service, all its independent legislative power indeed, while nominally handed over to the newfangled and dependent Reichsrath, would be really transferred to the Enmities and his Government. The Diet accordingly decides in the mart emphatic and decisive terms that it can have nothing to do with any such act of national suicide. "We declare," say the representatives of the nation, " that we will maintain " unimpaired the right of the nation to vote its " supplies, and regulate its taxes, and military " levies in its own Diet, and will never agree to " the transfer of these rights to the Reichsrath." The writers add that they are compelled to regard all negotiations through the Diet as broken off. They are, however, quite prepared for the result of this serious and decisive step : " It is possible that over our country will again " have to pass through bard times ; we cannot " ward them off at the sacrifice of our duties as