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248 THE LEADER, {0^
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THE PARLIAMENTARY REFORMERS AND THE OBST...
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THE PIONEER CHURCH OF THE COLONIES. Act ...
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The Ministerial Crisis Of Next Week. Pos...
dustry suffer are no figments , and will derive an additional weight from the sense of grievance if they are neglected by a Ministry specially pledged to the " protection of industry . Landowners suffer , but not alone ; the shipowners also ; the farmers most seriously ; the labouring classes ,, both in town and country . Land lies idle , and last year Mr . Disraeli , recognised the necessity of a stimulus for the application of capital to land , which he discerned in a limited partnership : will he have sufficient strength to confer such a boon on the industrious classes P—
or to confer it soon enough to secure confidence in his Ministry ? The fifth great class of questions is that of national defence , —the one on which the late Ministry went out of office . The question is , how to render our national defence adequate to the necessity , without adding materially to the expense P The process is possible—is imperatively demanded ; but it needs a Government strong in will and power . Sixthly , — How are Lord Derby and Mr . Disraeli to coerce their own stubborn and
intractable party into discipline within the tune allowed before an election ? All the questions which we have indicated will be in active discussion at the election , and more to boot , —such as anti-popery , sanitary reform and centralization , & c , and the wretched old question of Protection , which political society has quite outgrown , will be ludicrous among these stirring topics of our own day . But we do not see how the new Ministry , circumstanced as it is , is to shape its policy into such a national form as to attract the support—we will not say of a majority , but even
of a respectable minority . If it adhere to Protection , pure and simple , it is foredoomed ; if it abandon Protection , what else can it take up P And yet it must take up something , or sink among the needless pageantries of trading politics , and so fulfil the solemn vaticination of the seer and the poet , Lord John Manners , by being the last of Conservative Ministries . - Next week , Ministers will have to face Parliament in this unprepared and incapable condition ; even the brief recess has sufficed to develope a Ministerial crisis which threatens their existence .
The fear of imminent extinction may bring their own friends to reason , and supersede the crisis for a time ; but how can that survive long which is threatening to expire in the very cradle , " during the month" P
248 The Leader, {0^
248 THE LEADER , { 0 ^
The Parliamentary Reformers And The Obst...
THE PARLIAMENTARY REFORMERS AND THE OBSTRUCTIVES . The late Reform Conference , as we said last week , sought to make clear the national width of its suffrage claim , and in this it succeeded . All objections made to the narrowness of its programme at the public meeting , and in democratic ¦ journals which nave since come under our notice , have been founded upon overlooking , or not fully appreciating , this avowal of the Conference . Can it be true , as we so often hear from
excellent reformers , that appeals to the people in a generous spirit meet with no corresponding response P We would not that a declaration so saa should be true . We rather think that the conclusion taken by the party who at the Conference public meeting supported the amendment upon Homo Suffrage was foregone . They came to the Conference with their angry prepossessions , and did not feel the force , or understand the nature , or trust the frankness of the explanations offered to thorn . The creation of a
cordial feeling will be a work of more time ; the explanation must be oft reiterated , in good faith and in good temper—reiterated so plainly that it must bo understood , so cordially that it must bo accepted . To this end wo will restate the point as wo understood it . Lord John BusboII ' h parting words tho other night to tho IIouho of Commons he had ceased to load , wore to tho effect that ho would support tho extension of thp franchiso to such as are Jit to exorcise it . This is a form of expression which
will have groat weight , and deserves to have great weight—as all concessions of tho suffrage must turn upon it . Tho dogtrino of fitness must recoivo special attention—must become an object of political study . Tho lfceform Conference thought bo : it unhesitatingly announced itH own definition , and said broadly , that tho real fitness wanted consisted in intelligence , honesty , and indopondonco , on tho part of electors . But how b this fitnesa to bo ascertained P That is tho
practical point . Shall we examine conduct , and inquire into character—of so , who are to be the judges ? Shall education be the standard—if so , who can agree about the test P . Shall manhood be the sign of fitness—then , what is manhood ; and where shall we findits definitionthatallparties will accept P And if manhood is named , what shall we do with those who go further P Even the Westminster Review might ask why womanhood was overlooked P To look in these directions is not to settle the question . We only open
never-ending debates ; and if we persist in their discussion , a generation more will go down to the grave without the franchise , while philosophical patriots are settling the conditions of its exercise . Practical politicians have instinctively turned to the qualification of property as the test of fitness — not as being the test , but as being that which most persons understand and agree about . Lord John Russell , with true Whiggish timidity , lays down the doctrine that " fitness " exists with those only who can pay a rate-rent of
51 . in towns , of 201 . in the country , or 40 s . of assessed taxes . Another party , a little more courageous , venture to suppose that this quality may possibly be found with those who pay poorrates . The National Parliamentary and Financial JJefonn Association take a bold sweep , and deelare at once their conviction that honesty , independence , and intelligence ( the true fitness ) , may dwell with all who pay rates directly or
indirectly ; in short , that all who have a home ought to have a vote ; that every householder and every lodger who may take the trouble to place his name on the parish register shall become thereby an elector . It is very likely , also , that the Bill they will draw up will prescribe only six months ' residence as a qualification . This Home- Suffrage includes so large a portion of the nation—all who have steady habits and common national interests—that the portion not
included may easily find their way to its exercise ; for if so large a mass of electors as Home-Suffrage would create , could not improve the condition of the houseless and the wanderer , no form of legislation will help them—and the vagabond classes will not regret the loss of a vote which , in such case , cannot serve them . Indeed , the _ Home-Suffrage , with six months' residence , will place this country on a level with America in the respect of electoral power . The Chartists who put up an amendment at wilfulli
the Conference Public Meeting , y gnored the large electoral power they were rejecting . Every man in that meeting would have been enfranchised by Home-Suffrage . To become obstructives towards those who propose to get so much is insanity . If every man is to have his own way in all respects , nothing will ever be done . Progress proceeds by measured and unanimous steps , and to effect unanimity a common point of agreement must be set up . As such , Home-Suffrago was adopted by the Conference . Objectors denounced it as " expediency : " overlooking that a wise sense of
expediency is the measure of political wisdom . Many persons regard the Charter as a narrow and confined measure compared with what ought to bo demanded by intelligent men . These persons might with as much reason denounce Chartism as expediency ;„ yet if every man who goes beyond the Chartists should move amendments at their meetings , Chartists would never be able to hold another meeting without having its efficiency destroyed by the appearance of division . Judging from tho distrust some speakers expressed at the Conference Meetings , there is no
ground to believe that tho Reform party , however far they might go , would gain any thing with the demagogues of tho obstructive school . If the middle class wont for tho Charter , Mr . Jones would declare that they intended to betray it . Tho Reform party must thereforo make up thoir minds to stand by thoir own cause , and their own definition of it ; lot them appeal to tho good sense , and the practical sense of tho workingnlnaana ? Inf . flurm ln . lmnr in antidfv tlm flrvrimlfls nf j 4 fi \ sp » J »» -w \ - ¦ m p _* ¦
^ JH *^^ m *^* ** v * **¦ ^ r ^ m ^ * w ^ * -r ^»<^ w »* ^* w *» ****** - ^^ .. m * w ^ *™^ - * . « -r *» - — - * those above , and moot resolutely and emphatically the objoctions- and obstructions of the suspicious below , and the great bod y of tho nation will bo with thorn , and a substantial measure of reform will be won for tho people from those who now garrison tho citadel of political corruption . There will always bo some brawlers whom nothing will satisfy ; but those who will propose a largo practical good , and pursue it strongly ,
will , sooner x > r later , have the good sense of the nation with them . As to " fitness" for the franchise , w $ must sav that if the active politicians of the working classes submit to such guidance as that exhibited at the late Reform meeting- ^—if they willlend themselves to discredit all who work in the same direction as themselves—if they are to be rabidly intolpran * ¦
of all who do not pronounce the Shibboleth of the Charter—if they are to deny the right of private judgment to all who think it unwise to demand of the Government a great deal more than they can get at first—if they Trill hoot down by frantic cries all who would reason with them , "wiey will play into the hands of the common enemy— -they will justify Lord John Russell in denying the universal fitness of the people for the suffrage ; they will do as they did in the Anti-Corn-Law League days—they will make Chartism the by-word of practical politicians , and will alienate from them all who , desiring the enfranchisement of the whole people ) seek to act with the working classes in their public meetings .
The Pioneer Church Of The Colonies. Act ...
THE PIONEER CHURCH OF THE COLONIES . Act upon the mother-country through the colonies in matters relating to the Church , is a maxim wnich has been fully understood and ably employed by the party which would revive synodicai action . ' When Mr . Gladstone was in the Colonial Office , he exerted his high abilities and official influence in furtherance of the policy included in that maxim : and the affairs of the Colonial
Church have so far advanced towards the issues anticipated , concurrently with the organization of the party at home , that we were able , last week , to lay before our readers a bill introduced by Mr . Gladstone into Parliament , which , if passed , will authorize the establishment of synods in Canada , New Brunswick , Nova Scotia , Newfoundland , Prince Edward's Island , Cape of Good Hope , New Sputh Wales , Victoria , South Australia , Van Diemen ' s Ijand , and Western Australia . Hence , speeches in Parliament apart ,
we may conclude , that in the judgment ot Mr . Gladstone and his friends , the question in ~ the Colonial Church is ripe for solution ; and he has attempted to solve it accordingly . Most admirably lias he performed his task . The form of the bill itself is a model of simplicity , clearness , and brevity . The position of the Church in the Colonies is accurately defined , and no reasonable person could take exception to the jurisdiction conferred on the assembly or convocation proposed to be established , since that
jurisdiction is confined strictly to the avowed members of the Church , and is not armed with any authority for inflicting temporalpains or penalties . Theprmciple of the bill , as simple as its provisions , is the right of the Church to regulate its internal affairs ; a principle which cannot be disputed , except on grounds of doubtful political expediency , on which no honest Churchman or Statesman can sincerely rely . The provisions of the measure , in close accordance with its principle , of tlie
are intended only to secure the exercise right , subject to certain necessary and just restrictions . No demand is made on tho State to devise remedies for Church grievances ; tfiat the Church rightly contends is its own special and proper function . This is a logical consequence of the policy so clearly laid down ana so strenuously advocated in the admirable reports of the London Union in Church matters , to whicft wo have so often had occasion to advert in tun
journal . Tho question has now assumed its P 5 ? . I J" 2 J portions . Tho far-seeing policy which dictaieu tho plan of operating on England through W colonies is bearing fruit . Expressed in tho simple language of Mr . Gladstone ' s Bill , tho justice or tho demand for synodicai action is brought homo to every earnest and thoughtful man . And « w * measure proposed bo so obviously just and necu sory as applied to tho Colonial Church , how mucu more so as applicable to the Church a Y lom 0 LSn For the credit of the honest men whoso caus " wolin ™ i » 4 rlvr »™ iAr « flv Vnifc r-nnaistontlv adVOCai «»»
, , wo are proud to remark , that tho nccoasion » Lord Derby to office has not tomptod them iron * thoir strong position , as tomporato but res 0 * assortors of tho right of tho Church to thoman ag > mont of its own affairs . They will not become more politicians , especially party politicians . * is takfnghigh ground . ThVir cry is , " Q " ? T ° d Synods , and wo will do ourselves what it is nw
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 13, 1852, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_13031852/page/12/
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