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the precedents—it has always been so ; but this is an age in which everything has to find a justification for itself ; and no ingenuity could hit upon an excuse for the rising of the House of Commons from yesterday week to yesterday . As to the Lords , who having nothing to do , always take a longer holiday than the Commons , the inquiry might be , not why they adjourn , but why they meet ?—Peers being flies in the amber of the British constitution . But with regard to the House of Commons it is certain that nobody wants these adjournments . Ministers would affect airs of over-work , and speak of the necessity of relaxation from
the treasury benches , in order that they may lie for a day or two " in their places" in the country . That , however , would he a sham of impossible credit ; and to shorten the session at Whitsuntide , when it is certain that the process would occasion a prolongation in August , is statesmanship only to be paralleled by the impoverished Irish gentleman's resource for lengthening the bedclothes , by cutting off a tail-piece with a view to the comfort of his shoulders . And the sham is in this : that hard work at great posts is great happiness ; that ministers of state never do feel work ; and that deprived of the lounge and the emotions of the House in the evening they are ludicrously bored to kill time , as you may easily ascertain by comparing the look at about 10 p . m ., wherever you may happen to meet him ,
of a Minister who is in the Lords , with the look of a statesman who has been fortunate enough not to be born into hereditary legislation—which may be defined as the privilege to do a good deal of work if the Commons would let you have it . Well , if Ministers don't want inter-sessional holidays who does ? Irish members , perhaps , who manage to correct the dissipations of the British metropolis by periodical resort to seasickness between Kingstown and Holyhead . But Irish members might contrive to arrange for that remedy by an agreement for periodical suspensions of Irish business , for in Imperial business they scorn to take an interest ; and would the British public quarrel with a " compact" which diminished the frequency of Irish rows ? Scotch members are too economical to
indulge sentiment by unnecessary visits to their own , their native land ; Mr . J . M'Gregor , for instance , considering himself in these days of rapid communication and cheap postage far too well known to the world generally to require him to be planted on his native heath , in order to communicate his name to gazetteers . Then , as to the mass of English members who glory in their crack club , " the House , " and who , though they have all plenty of personal affairs to look after , can always find more amusement for their evenings at Westminster than anywhere else—these ludicrous and inconsequent adjournments are so much positive injuries ; and were the suggestion divided on , ninety-nine out of every hundred would vote against any sort of holiday . An regards the public , it can afford to have members killed
off by bnd ventilation ; there are always a hundred candidates ready for every seat , and the public con-Bequently has a distinct interest in the uninterrupted continuance of its principal " public amusement" —Parliamentary proceedings . In the grave business view of the matter , these adjournments are mischievous absurdities , and cause the loss of an immensity of money to promoters of private bills , and to the classes affected ( and whose arrange ments are thus anxiously suspended ) by the legislation in progress—as in this instance , the many trades whom the Budget will revolutionize . Perhaps in these calculations we should consider the Speaker , who , simply because ho has not direct mental occupation , ' would not live through a year of constant " sittings . " Doubtless : but Robert Inglis would meet the difficulty , and recommend a corps of Speakers
—say a Irinity . There was one reason , it may be , for this last holiday—iKml John ' s health ; for Lord . John will not take Mr . Gladstone ' s advice , not to over-exert himself , to take rost , change of air—to the Houso of Lords—mid s 0 on—but will totter into the " lead" of the House ; and would rather havo u bed made up for him on the table—the lust of the Whigs treated like a petition ! than not bo there at nil . But it is becoming u question for a " strong Government , " whether it can afford to bo led by nn invalid . Lord John ' s blunders in tho management of tho Houso during his own Premiership
destroyed his Government , and ho in quietly and carefully now undoing on one hand what Mr . Gladstone is doing on the other . Small defeats will , in the end , break up tho strongest Government , for they dostroy tho prestige ' without which no Government can cret on . Lord John ' s notion seems to bo , nlwnys , that if / you take enro of great questions , tho sumll questions will take euro of themselves ; and accordingly , ho i « nailing hw colours of civil and religious liberty to tho moBt , whilo the little leaks below aro sinking the ship . Before Whitsuntide ho put tho Government in a minority on the Convents Infection Bill—tho result
of his incapacity to appreciate the tone of the House j and the first night the House meets after its breathe , he lets the Ministry be beaten on the estimate for the annual whitewashing of Maynooth—again , because he did not comprehend what is in progress , and made no arrangement to meet Mr . Spooner's motion — Mr . Spooner , on the other hand , having packed his Bide , and tricked the Treasury benches . The Maynooth question is fought yearly in two ways . There is the struggle for the repeal of the permanent grant made by Sir Robert Peel in 1843 ; and there is Mr . Spooner's small attempt , at last practically successful , to withhold the annual grant
made to Maynooth as among other " public buildings ;" and the latter is the "little go" of the bigots who , as they cannot get rid of the scarlet lady altogether , will not allow her to patch her cloak . The very meanness of the motion of Spooner should have been an argument for proper precaution ; for the Government which might look liberal if defeated on the " great go , " looks ridiculous if plucked on the " little go . " Mr . Hay ter sneaked out of the lobby into his whipper ' s bureau after such a vote —contemplating , perhaps , his resignation—or Lord John ' s , whose business it was to forewarn him—and , certainly , intending to write a few letters to the Maurice O'Connell class of Irish members , which would
undoubtedly diminish their relish of the Dublin Exhibition —for when Government is beaten Mr . Gladstone cuts Mr . Hay ter , and Mr . Hay ter slashes the " traitor" Irish members ; and as for Mr . Spooner , he strutted about the lobby , radiant , like a true-hearted Protestant , revelling in the consciousness that in 1853-4 , panes of glass and chinks of doors in Maynooth should remain broken and unrepaired , and that if there must be a Host of Belial in Ireland the said Host shall suffer from lumbago ; that if Anti-Christ is to be encouraged he shall have a catarrh . There were few Irish members in the
House in the debate and division , and there were , therefore , none of the natural " rows" and " explanations , " which , at another period , would have followed such a significant event ; but as members came out after the division , and returned to the coffee and cigars , from which the division bell had summoned them , they looked and spoke gravely , frowned at Mr . Spooner , and confidentially deplored , that just now , when a great exhibition is encouraging internationalism , and Irish Roman Catholics are inviting good feeling , and offering graceful hospitality to English officials , so malapropos an insult as this petty , spiteful vote should
have ' been offered , and that the maladroit Russell should have permitted it . Accordingly , the smokingroom was unfavourable that evening to the great Whig chief ; and the probability is , that those who were most vexed with him were the gentlemen who , to their intense disgust , had found themselves in the majority . It is a terrible select committee room this smoking-room ; and if Mr . Spooner had been there , on Thursday , he might have corrected some errors as to the appreciation by this age of , even by pledged no-Popery senators of , men of his class . One suggestion of the smokingroom is , that Mr . Spooner ought to be appointed as
one of the inspectors of convents , for obvious reasons . Another is , that Lord John Russell cannot be in earnest about Jewish emancipation , or he would go up as a peer to plead the cause to the Lords . The Peelito Ministers will appreciate the sagacity of the hint all the more readily from observation of Lord John ' s demeanour in the sudden debate which arose last night on this Regium Donuni . Mr . Cobden , in an emphatic and most impressive speech , which fastened itself on tho House , hud elicited ringing cheers from tho Ministerial side , bv a bold declaration that tho sort of sectarian strife created < flit of the ecclesiastical items of tho
miscellaneous estimates could not go on , and Unit tho end of it all must be—the abolition of all stnto endowment * of all religion * . That declaration had stunned tho Spooner Hide of the House , and if tho warning had been permitted to pass—Mr . Cohden ' s " religious" position giving weight to tho threat—we should not for some months , not to prophesy inoro boldly , have heard any inoro of the cant which climaxes in aiiti-Maynooth Avindow-inending motions . But Lord John
thought a moment had arrived for sentcntiousneKS on civil and religious liberty ; tho elbows fell into tho bunds in tho usual way ; tho House- stared in dread expectancy of what was to bo said for the- Cabinet of the defeat of the preceding evening ; and then Lord John , after a ludicrous confession—Mr . Haytor shuddered that lie Imil been taken by surprise- by Mr .
Hpoonor -Mr . Spooiior grinned—w « nl ; on , " With respect , Sir , to the general question , " to announce that he differed from Mr . OoIhIci ., nn .-I that tho oflecfc on his mind of the defeat was to induce linn to rocoiwider his old theory for the destruction of the Irish difli « nlty ,---vi / .., Ill" endowment of tho Roman Catholic . Church in Treland . ' I ho Treasury benches trembled ; tho candour wn » fatal , tho blunder irremediable , ns Exetor-hall will soon testify .
And Lord John , having made this coup , could not sit down without expressing his regret that Mr . Spooner was so ill-advised as to propose such amendments , which tended to promote religious discord . An Irish and Catholic member—Mr . Maguire—a journalist who is gradually getting a hearing for his very practical , and not too patriotic leading articles—caught cleverly at the point , and wondered " really , " amid cheers and laughter , at the correspondent of the Bishop of Durham rebuking Mr . Spooner for so small a provocation of sectarian warfare . Even Mr . was applauded in correcting Lord John Russell , assuring his " noble
friend , " in a thick voice and disengaged manner—it is Mr . ' s style after eleven—that he ( his noble friend ) did not know what be was talking about ; that business was business , and that the House couldn't afford to " bother" itself with balancing between priests and parsons . " Suit , " said Mr . — in the midst of roars of laughter , " we must cut the painther , and sind for our priests as we sind for our docthors—only whin we want thum . " That was the tone of the significant , however short debate ; the tone of anti-State Church , in the sense of indifferentism ; and because it was so it was madness in the Leader of the House to raise
a new suspicion on the part of the Spooners , without ensuring a single new friend from among the Liberals . But Lord John ' s blunders do not end with Thursday and Friday . He lias matched Mr . Walpole ' s proposal of a militia franchise by his notice of a bill to disfranchise dockyard labourers . The suicidal silliness of the Radical cheers which welcomed that proposal was noticed in this place at the moment ; and the disapproval of the scheme has been deepening since among all classes of members—so careful and scrupulous a party man as Whig Mr . Tuffnell actually putting an amendment on the paper , and defying his chief with
a counter and substitutive proposition of the Ballot . If Mr . H . Berkeley were wise he would throw over his own annual motion , and collect all his ftrength to try the Ballot question on Mr . Tuffnell's amendment ; for ^ t cnnld not but be carried ; and if carried the question would immediately be : —If we protect intimidated Government employes in the Dock Yards , why not enfranchise all other classes of Government employes ; and if we protect Government employes in general , why should we not protect also with the ballot the intimidated classes of the enlightened country generally ? The Ballot Society have here their chance of the thin end of the wedge—that instrument which must "be nearly worn out ; and it i 3
their business to see that their Parliamentary champion , the member for Bristol , does not mismanage i \ great opportunity . That , then , is the damaging position of Government . Lord John must go on to a defeat , or he must mimic Mr . Walpole and attribute his hill to a misconceived jest of Lord Aberdeen ; and in either ease the ballot is presented as the experimental remedy for the unqualified corruption and rascality of the majority of the constituencies in England—a great advance in position ( which they don ' t deserve ) for the reformers . Lord John has fallen into this folly because he has generalized no rules of conduct for dealing with the electoral exposures . He is bewildered and he blunders . Thero are half a dozen writs still suspended ; half a dozen commissions have been issued , each commission
to end in a recommendation of ( lisfranchi . scmcnt ; and still Lord John does not withdraw his undertaking to propose a reform bill in 1854 , tho probability then being that British constituencies will bo praeticiilly lessened one-third in number , and thero being no guarantee that any better morality will be practised by the voting bodies which remain , or would be created . Clearly Lord John is not . logical , and his colleagues may be sure that they aro only postponing their perplexity by refusing to face the question which is now every night put to them upon the successive- motions for new writs—what is to bo done to check the tendency of electoral society in this country to bribe and be bribed ? The dilemma for Englishmen who regard
their country as enlightened is , no doubt , very painful ; to withhold a writ implies that tho affected place is unworthy of the franchise ); and to renew a writ when a member has beon unseated for bribery implies indifference to recognised rascal practices . And tho previous question of all for liberals is—if tho countrymen we have enfranchised are such dead failures t
as independent electors , why add to the corrupion by adding to the numbers of eorrupters ? Or if we cannot prevent , national scoumlrelwm without secret voting why carry on tho B ' ' constitution on false pretences ? These are the inevitable inquiries and perplexities ; tho tone of tho House of Commons at this moment leads to that logic ; and , under such circumstances , a Reformer asking for a Reform Hill is a politician reduced ad abxnrdum . The Canterbury
Commission affords comment on a great number of the movements of tho day Homcwhat prejudicial to their
Untitled Article
May 21 , 1853 . ] THE LE ADEB . 493
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 21, 1853, page 493, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1987/page/13/
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