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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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No notice can bo taken of anonymous communications . Whatever is intended for insertion must be authenticated by the name and address of the writer ; not necessarily for publication , but as a guarantee of his good faith . . we cannot undertake to return rejected communications . All lette * S for the Editor- should be addressed to 7 , Wellingtenystfeet , Strand , Xondon . Communications should always be legibly ¦ wri tten , and on one side of the paper only . If long , it increases the difficulty of finding space for them .
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SPAIN . —THE BOURBONS .
We cannot -understand the political philosophy of those politicians in , 3 ftnglana who gloat over the insurrection in Spain , and yet treat it , carelessly , as a mere- military Attempt at revolution , and us , at least , an isolated , purely peninsular , affair . If isolated , why rejoice at an inconsequent business ? Granted that the Queen ia a naughty girl ; but she has her excuses ; and , whether or
not , spite does not become statesmen . Our Queen happens to bo happy , for those common-place yet not frequent reasons which occur to produce felicity ; and the circumstance , which has become identified with the rest of the glories of our constitution , so far from mailing us savngoly triumphant on the accidents which bofal contemporary vicious sovereigns , should induce in us rather a lofty , but tender , pity . It would not bo illogical to indulge in congratulations , on . tho humiliation of tlio court of Madrid , for other than Spanish reasons .
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682 THE LEADER . [ Saturday .,
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3 &ie * e is nothing so revolutionary , because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain ix > $ k ? ee ^ tliings fixed when till the w-orldis by the very law-of ; ita creation in eternal pro gress .-r-DB . Abipo £ X > .
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PROJECT -EQR A LIBERAL PARTY . The purpose ox * "Ministers in calling the consultation of their -supporters at Lord John -Russell ' s official liouse on . Monday last is said to have been achieved ; but unless the friends who , consented to attend are wholly destitute of a purpose , we do not see tow the meeting can have satisfied them . It has either dissatisfied them , or they are consenting to'be the representatives of the country without acknowledging a public duty . The object of Ministers , it is understood , was to disaum so much , of the discontent and indiscipline amongst their ranks as to prevent an accidental defeat by the Derby Opposition in the expected debate on Monday night last —tljis being now postponed till Monday next . The Derby Opposition confessed their defeat by adjourning their resistance . The Liberals were conciliated by IJord John's appeal to them , duly receired the tacit intimation that' they must not trifle with , the existence of the Ministry , and , expressing Borne humours , acquiesced . But , —while the
respect for . Lord John and his colleagues was not sufficient to keep their supporters ia the room , while men . went away in disgust rather than listen to chaffering suggestions alout the choice of one individual instead of another for a particular post , —there was no direct expression , of opinion , object , or purpose , on the part of the Liberal members . ( The meeting implied that ; they put' up with the . present Government for want of a better ; that , they would rather hare Lord Aberdeen
an joffiee with his colleagues than Lord Derby with his 5 ~ Kaot that they are satisfied with the actual Government of the country . Yet whale it is thus all but declared that , whether in its composition , its principles , or its conduct , the present Government is unequal to that which this country ought to have , there is no proposal of a " better- The popular members do not advance principles or
measures which the present Government ought to adopt , or which ought to be the real basis for a , 'new Government woi'thy of the country and of the Liberal party . The meeting may iwve ( answered the purposes of Ministers , but it was not creditable to those independent iineinbers who consented to attend , and it th ' atinetly mauks out a further duty -which > i'hey , have yet to perform . i > t $ Qme >< concessions were made to Liberal
, expectations . It was understood that a % uasi lYiO ^ vpinconfidejico should be taken , on tho Myote ( of credit for tho purposes of the war ;" . t «^ it » -.. fKi 5 aeufu » JihfiE understood that tho piro-]» Qgatioiiiof BnuHament would not bo of very % ^> i 4 « WAtion . "We wi&li that tho vote of *^ Sdflnctti « oulA be mme * real toetj we wish Mth ^ tJ ^ Bhald « onbie confidence ouvselvea in . tho , wia .-. pu » boBQB of , the . Liberal nicmbeiw to
secure a short prorogation . At a time like the present it is a reproach to the independent members of the Commons that a Ministry should be " in power , '' without either being perfectly under the control of the representatives of the people , or possessing the unqualified > confidence of those representatives . That the present Ministry fulfils either of those conditions does not appear from the facts : it does not possess
the confidence of the popular representatives , or those representatives would not be repeatedly thwarting it . It does not deserve their confidence , since it has not fulfilled its promises , its spontaneous promises , to the Liberal pa ^ ty . Ministers themselves have declared it necessary that there should be reform of Parliament , municipal representation , poor-law , ecclesiastical law , police , and various other reforms branching from these .
They have attested , their © pinion by bringing forward measures ; and none of the principal measures under those heads have been carried on . The pretext is the war ; Ifcut that that is an insufficient pretext every-body knows . There is no opposition to Ministers on account of the war ; the time of any department besides the military is not taken up by war preparations . Heretofore tne good faith and competency of Ministers in that behalf have been taken upon trust ; tlie public has not troubled itself about the war , —does not draw its attention from other business for
fifteen minutes of any day in the week . It may fairly be said of Ministers that while they are prevented by disputes amongst themselves from performing confessed duties , they are so dishonest as to lay it upon a false pretext . Let us admit , without qualification , that there are individuals in the present Government who do not themselves deserve censure . We speak , of the body collectively ^ and the individuals belonging to it so far compromise
themselves as they become a party to this neglect of duty and this parade of a false pretext . But the question cannot stop there . If the Ministry does not deserve im plicit confidence , the worth of individual men is no reason for awarding an undeserved confidence . To give that , is to misappropriate the public trust reposed in members of Parliament . A
Ministry undeserving of confidence on other grounds , —has no right to our confidence in the war business ; and even men who might command our trust individually place it in abeyance while they consent to be parts of an untrusted Government 5 let us add that the membeTs who lea-ve the conduct of a great war in such hands without inquiry or guarantee , themselves forfeit the title to the confidence of their electors .
What guarantee-have wo that the war itself will be properly sustained ? that Austria , for instance , will not bo suffered to compromise this country ? and that tho confessed desiro to end the war will not betray our Ministers into a place which will be a disgrace to tho nation and a detriment to our interests ? "We have very strong faith in the personal honesty of Lord Aberdeen , none in unity , of judgment between him and tho country ; how thon . can the country safely leave the agency of peacemaking to him unquestioned ? ' The
national representatives will not perform their duty . unless tboy take guarantees against mischances of that kind . Wo ought to leave no power in thehimds of MinistorH , uulews-wo know low they fttu going to ubo it . Thero aro men in Parliament , we believe , who aro quite com ) potent to understand those things . , It is not neccsnary tluvfc an Ewglibhmaivftuould have lived two hundred yews ago , qx in JSTortl ^ America , S « ut ) j Africa , or Australia ; , to have ibi-ca or sivgacity for the service wo require . . Are we to . suppose that
a Robert Lowe can be independent , constitutional , and patriotic , only in , the capital of Australia ; that a Roebuck can understand constitutional Government only in Canada ; that John Bright ' s family associations preclude him from understanding common sense in the finance of war ; that a Goderich . can see popular rights only in theory ; that a Blactett's accomplishments prevent his grasping the rights and powers of his position with as firm a hand as if he had no better schooling than a Herefordshire gentleman ? The period would appear to have arrived in British polities when the Commons must attempt to tale Government out of the hands of the aristocracy . That aristocracy is intellectually worn out . A , Government framed out of the whole elect of the aristocracy is weak— -that is an astounding fact but a fact still more astonishing is that the aristocratic Tory opposition is even weaker than the Government . Where , then , are we to look for signs of power and capacity for action—for the practical work—a
day business of 'governing— "but in the scattered " Radicals : " and " Liberals" who are not of the aristocracy , but of the Commons , but , because they are not organised , hesitate to stand independent of the old traditionary tactics of playing "Whig against Torv > The "best brains and purest characters in the present Government are to be found in . xinpatronised because not grandly * ' connected " subordinates : the finest capacities in the House are among the helow-the-gangway Liberals . The Opposition ia the House of Commons consists of one man ; and he is a man who was lost to the Radicals because he saw the Radicals had not his ambition—Power . "We see in such motions as that which Mr . J . Greene carried on Tuesday , and in such sectarian strife _ as that which was rampant on " Wednesday , that the House of Commons is degenerating , and falling into forgetfulness of its grand functions . Reinvigoration can reach it only from those people ' s members who bear in mind that what the constitution meant was something different from a lordly club . The people's members have no business in meetings of supporters" at . " leaders '" houses ; the public * business should be carried on publicly;—we have a set of " official despatches , " one for the Cabinet and one for the country , —let us not have two parliaments —one for the public delusion—and one for the aristocracy ' s management . Looking forward , then , to Monday night ' s debate , we would entreat the " popular members" to obtain some self-government for us . Nay , they ought to seize it ; for it can be had by seizing . In the name of the constitution , we ijpplorea little factiousness .
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. v ^ -r - s ^/ - f SATURDAY , JULY 22 , 1854 .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), July 22, 1854, page 682, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2048/page/10/
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