town with gas. He was returning home The and to sacrifice life in that country, they | that part of the country. He knew that should bring forward measures to protect there were enormous crimes committed by the one, and to defend the other. He did individuals in every society; but still he not speak of a law to protect the rich. He thought the facts he was about to mention challenged any one who knew the country would give an idea of the state of feeling as well as he did to deny that the wish of which prevailed in that part of Ireland in the improving tenant, that the wish of the reference to crime and criminals. He albest class of farmers, and the desire of the luded to the recent attempt to assassinate honest frieze-coated peasant, were for some Mr. Bayly near Nenagh. Mr. Bayly was such protection as he now asked from the a man of whom he would only say that all Government. Let them not imagine, because who knew him would feel that any eulogy they read in large letters of the murder of was unnecessary. He was a man-and he a magistrate, that the system of terror and (Mr. Stafford) said it with grief, though he of alarm ceased there. Let them not ima- found it to be his duty in his place in Pargine that because they saw resolutions liament not to conceal the fact-whose chapassed at meetings of magistrates, or be- racter was such as to affix a deeper shame cause they saw letters in the newspapers and disgrace on the state of society in which from persons in responsible positions, that an attempt could have been made to assasthere was not close by that spot a set of men sinate him. He was in Nenagh, and waitto whom they had to look for the improve-ed there until the shades of evening fell, ment of their agriculture, and for the ame- in order that he might see the result of an lioration of the tone of society and the bet-experiment which he had been most anxtering of the condition of their poorer bre-ious to carry out-namely, lighting the thren. The sympathies of that set of men were with them when they brought forward a measure to protect their properties, which though little, was dear to them, and to defend their lives. Therefore when he asked for strong measures, when he approved of all that Lord Clarendon had done for the protection of property and life, and when he said that he tendered to his Ex-perpetrated, Mr. Head heard the country cellency and to the Government his hearty girl, who had been evidently placed on the thanks, he did not believe that he stood road to watch for Mr. Bayly, and convey there to vindicate the rights of the man the fact of his approach to the assassins by only with a thousand acres, but he was some signal, cry out, "Well done, boys; also the advocate of the honest and indus- now make off as smart as you can. trious poor man. When hon. Gentlemen Head took the body of his brother-in-law spoke of assassination being confined to into the house of a tenant hard by. The the counties of Tipperary and Roscommon wretched man presented a spectacle horand a few more, and that they were caused rible to see. There were people in the by the system of ejectment which was car- house who saw him, and yet when Mr. ried on by the landlords, did they, he would Head cried to them, "For God's sake go ask, mean that ejectments were not en- for a surgeon," he blushed for Tipperary forced in other counties? Even if they-he blushed for human nature-to say proved that ejectments were most extensively enforced where murder was most rife, the case would still not be made out accounting for all these disturbances, and still less a case for opposing a law which was intended to extend not to the whole of Ireland, but which would invest in the Lord Lieutenant, in whom he, for one, had the greatest confidence, a discretion as to the districts to which the coercive mea-it to the House to say, as men and as Chrissure was to be applied. He would, with the permission of the House, state the particulars of one crime which occurred in the district with which he was connected, and which would show the state of society in Mr. that not a single soul would go for the surgeon, and the brother-in-law was himself obliged to leave the victim in torture and agony, and go himself to Nenagh to procure a surgeon. If Mr. Head had asked these people to pursue the murderers, and if they had refused, some excuse might be found for their conduct, much as their fear would be to be deplored; but he would leave tians, how they could reconcile it to their feelings to leave the country in such a state as that case, which they knew was not a solitary one, would exhibit. For himself he lived without barred windows and sures. without bolted doors, and he never had a | their remedies first? The Government threatening notice sent to him, or an at- had first disinherited the Church; they fed tempt made to assassinate him; but he did the landlords upon 25 per cent of the not speak the less strongly on that account. Church property; the free-trade party He left the system which he had described were then allowed to feed upon the landto be dealt with by the House. The Go- lords; and now the hon. Member for Norvernment had acted wisely in calling Par- thamptonshire had said the landlords were liament together, and on that House now not able to feed the people without the help rested the responsibility of further mea- of Government. The landlords had it in their power, he maintained, to discharge their duty to the people to-morrow if they chose. There was just one master grievance in Ireland; and if that were removed, it would do a thousand times more good than setting the people to knock down hills and dig holes. Give the tenantry perpetual tenures and corn-rents, and all would be right; and, until they did that, the Irish people would be eternally coming to the Government for assistance, and the landlords for Coercion Bills. They were constantly hearing of the virtues of every man who was murdered, and the valour of the landlords; but they ought not to forget the starvation and sufferings of the people. Members ought to remember their own avowal, that there was no other employment but on the land in Ireland, and that land must be had to subsist. He could not join in the eulogiums on the Irish landlords. They were not to be compared for a moment to the English landlords. And what was the reason? The reason was, that most of their estates were mortgaged; and their management was handed over to middlemen, in order that they themselves might reside in England; and those middlemen oppressed the tenantry. He entreated the Irish Members to sink all their differences, and unite together for the benefit of Ireland; and, if necessary, he would join them in opposing the attempt of Government to inflict a Coercion Bill on Ireland until they showed the remedies they had to propose. He should consider himself as a soldier in the cause of Ireland, although not now resident there, and he would sit in that House, stand in that House, and sleep in that House until they succeeded. How could they hope that the Catholic population, the outlawed population of Ireland, would all at once come to recognise and respect the law? It would, indeed, take generations to reconcile them to the law; but let the Government proceed peaceably and progressively, and they would arrive in course of time at this desirable result without coercion. Coercion Bills would only check their progress towards it. It was a melancholy MR. O'CONNOR thought the speech just delivered by the hon. Member for Northamptonshire was most ungenerous and most unfair, for if he were to describe murders committed in England he too might harrow up the feelings of the House. But English Gentlemen would not therefore seek for measures beyond the law to put down such crimes in England. No man was more anxious to repress crime in Ireland than he was, and more ready to assist the Government in putting down crime provided that the Government were determined that there should not be a recurrence of crime. They heard of coercion being asked for Ireland, but improvement was never proposed by Her Majesty's Ministers. There was tranquillity in starvation, and quiet in the grave, and as long as these could be obtained there would be no improvement. The power of the Government was sufficient to repress crime, and there was no necessity for coercion beyond the law. The cause of crime in Ireland was misgovernment. He had determined to abide by the proposition of the right hon. Baronet (Sir G. Grey) who had stated that there would be ample time to discuss these subjects; and he should not have risen but for the harrowing and unfair speech of the hon. Member for Northamptonshire. He asked the Government to solve this problem for him, and until they did, they would be justly chargeable with every crime committed in Ireland. How did it happen that with a genial climate, an industrious people, and a fertile soil, the Irish people, in this age of progress, were so far behind other nations not so highly favoured-that they alone were retrograding, while other countries were progressing in civilisation? He would solve the problem for them. It was because they had been disinherited class after class, until the Government were obliged to ask for Coercion Bills, as salves for the wounds themselves had made. What did Government propose with a view of preventing the necessity of other Coercion Bills? Why did they not propose thing to think that to-morrow, on 'Change, | prevail, and the interference which Her the report of a new Coercion Bill for Ire- Majesty's Government felt themselves unland would raise Consols two per cent. Ire-der the necessity of making, for the purland was the battle-ground of the Stock pose of averting, perhaps, a greater caExchange; and Government was obliged lamity than ever had occurred in the comto have recourse to Coercion Bills as a mercial history of this country-this was means of propping themselves up. Instead a subject which appeared to him to require of passing Coercion Bills, let them set the more notice on the part of some of the people to cultivate the land. The land Members of Her Majesty's Government was something. Let the Government pro- than any one had yet paid to it. There ceed to base their measures on a reality, were some very remarkable circumstances and not a fiction. He would quote the connected with the first paragraph of Her motto of the right hon. Member for Tam- Majesty's Speech. It recorded not only worth-The science of agriculture was the fact of the alarming state of public only in its infancy." He had made this credit in the country, but also that Her a household word in every cottage in Eng- Majesty's Ministers, acting, as he really land. He begged them not to talk to him believed, on a very just view of their reof over-population, and emigration, and sponsibility, did interfere, and he thought poor-laws, while one acre of land in the wisely, at a very critical moment, to avert country remained uncultivated. If when the calamity that was impending on us. the land was cultivated to its utmost ex- He gave the Government credit for that tent, emigration should be found to be ne-interference. He thought that if they had cessary, he would agree to some measure of that kind, but not till then. He considered that the present Government not likely long to retain their places, because they were the weakest party in the House; and the proposed measures would not add to their strength. He was willing to give his cordial support to every measure which was for the good of the people; but he should oppose every measure they brought forward, because he had no faith in them. He repeated that he was ready to give his support to every measure that should be propounded for the good of the country; but, as the Government were not likely to propound one of that nature, he should give them his decided opposition. He thought that a good reason, a good notice, and good logic. MR. GRATTAN, after the statement of the hon. Member for Drogheda (Sir W. Somerville), as to the intentions of Government, begged to withdraw his Amend ment. Amendment withdrawn. MR. HERRIES wished to refer to a part of Her Majesty's Speech which had excited no observation, although in point of fact it was the most prominent part of it, and referred apparently to the cause of the House being assembled at such an unusual period of the year. Whether other circumstances mtght not also have prevailed to occasion that earlier attendance, he did not pretend to say; but, independently of them, the commercial distress which had recently pressed upon the country, and which he wished he could say did not now not interposed they would have failed to discharge a very important duty. The position of affairs was this, that the Bank of England, under existing circumstances, was incapable of giving the commercial world that relief and assistance without which, in all human probability, the law of 1844 would have occasioned that calamity to which he had referred. The proceedings of the Government were, of course, irregular in their character. Parliament not being assembled, the Members of the Government, stating that they did so in consequence of a determination at which the Government had arrived, proposed to the Bank of England to do what, without such a statement, and an accompanying assurance that on certain events happening they would be indemnified by Parliament, would not have been done. The Bank of England, receiving that suggestion, acquiesced in it, as they were bound to do. If they had not acted upon it, the responsibility on them would have been tremendous. They did act upon that suggestion, and the public in general believed that this measure saved the public credit, and that through it we were now enabled to congratulate ourselves with an expectation that the worst dangers were passed by. Such being the state of things, he certainly did expect, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, that they would at least have given the House all the papers and documents relating to this, as they said themselves in their communication with the Bank, most extraordinary measure. He expected that they would have applied at the earliest possible period for the sanction | that a communication had taken place beof the House for what they had done. He tween Her Majesty's Ministers and the did not suppose it possible, nor was he yet Bank. It was stated that Government prepared to believe that Her Majesty's had recommended that the rate of interest Government, because the Bank had not should be fixed at as high a rate as 8 per actually exceeded the issues which under cent, and that part of the profit arising the Act of 1844 they were enabled to out of this high rate of interest should be make, would maintain that there had been appropriated to the public service. What no infringement of the law. He was un- part of those profits the public was to dewilling to impute to Her Majesty's Govern- rive, what arrangements had been made, ment anything like subterfuge or sharp and to what extent the Bank had acted on practice. To say that authorising the the suggestions of the Government, and Bank of England to do that which they had discounted at the rate of 8 per cent, could not have done, and would not have remained yet to be told to the House. He done, without the authority given them by was sure he need hardly say, in the prethe Government, was not a contravention sence of such a statesman as the noble of the Act, was absurd. He would, how- Lord at the head of Her Majesty's Goever, at all events say to Her Majesty's vernment, that the act of raising money Ministers, that the House ought to have a without the authority of Parliament was full account of the state of things at the an unconstitutional act, and in every case Bank when they put forward the notice in which it occurred required the special suggested by the Government. They had approbation and confirmation of Parliaat present nothing but newspaper accounts ment. It had been suggested in the pubof the transaction, and they had no au- lic papers that, inasmuch as the Act of thentic copy of what had passed between 1844 had not actually been infringed, this the Bank and the Government. The part of the proposed arrangement with the House should have been told by some Bank would not be effected; but if he read Member of the Government that informa- right, the letter referred to all the adtion on the subject should be supplied; vances made by the Bank under the auand it was not till he saw the House thority of the letter of license issued by actually proceeding to a division that he the Government. That was the point ventured to rise and draw attention to this which he thought should have been advery singular state of things. If it had verted to and explained by some Member been intended to give the House more in- of the Government before the debate formation on the subject, he thought that closed; but he need not say more now, as it should have been given before a division he felt certain that that explanation would was demanded. There was a Motion an- be given. It had been said that no innounced to the House for a Committee on demnity was required; but he was sure this question; but the terms of the notice that a sanction on the part of Parliament did not justify the inference that what had ought to be given before this measure already taken place between the Govern- could be considered a lawful and justifiable ment and the Bank would be the subject measure on the part of the Government. It of inquiry. The notice was given by his would be premature to enter now into disright hon. Friend the Chancellor of the cussion upon the merits of the Bill, as that Exchequer; and he had no reason to think subject would be fully considered when the that his right hon. Friend had any inten- Motion was made for the appointment of tion of bringing this matter under discus- the Committee; but he wished to know sion. He was not prepared to offer any from the Government whether, in the preobjection to the measure itself; on the sent state of commercial distress, they contrary, he thought that it was impera- would venture to proceed, without some tively required. But surely such a de- intermediate suspension of the measure of parture from the law, under the authority 1844, upon an inquiry which would proof Government, on the part of the Bank, bably not be a short one-whether they should come under the solemn considera- would leave things as they were at present, tion of the House, and should either be subject to a recurrence-which, however, formally approved or disapproved of by it. he sincerely hoped might not be the case There was another, too, connected with this matter, not adverted to, indeed, in the Speech, but in those letters which appeared in the public papers, representing of similar evils at no distant period, and from the chance of which the country might now be relieved. The favourable turn in commercial affairs had been at has not-although it might have led to any infringement of the law; but still the Government felt it to be their duty to call Parliament together at the earliest possible opportunity, for the purpose of asking for a Bill of Indemnity, if required; but, at all events, to give the Legislature an opportu tributed to the measures of Her Majesty's Government; and he was very willing to believe that those measures had tended to produce that effect. But the Bank had been reduced to a very low ebb in notes; and although their coffers, which had been so nearly empty, were now largely replenished, yet the same thing might hap-nity of expressing an opinion upon our pen again; and if such were to be the case, were we to depend upon the Government taking the same course they had before taken; or were they prepared to take some measures now to prevent the recurrence of the same evil, before entering upon an inquiry which might possibly be drawn out to a considereble extent? He merely threw this out as a suggestion to the Government. He had thought it right to draw the attention of the House and the Government to what appeared to him to have been an omission on the part of the Ministers in the course of the debate; and hoped that, before the close of the discussion, some more satisfactory explanation would be given. conduct. It is not the intention of the Government to submit any Motion to the House. With respect to the papers alluded to by the right hon. Gentleman, it was impossible for us, consistently with the forms of the House, either to lay them on the table or to make a Motion for their production; but we should be guilty of great dereliction of duty if we did not produce them at the earliest possible opportunity. The letter to the Bank has been withdrawn. The reserve in the Bank is now upwards of 5,000,000l.; the bullion in the Bank amounts to 10,250,000l. These circumstances are sufficient to inspire the whole commercial world with confidence, and I do not think that it is now necessary to continue that letter. Parliament is now assembled, and the Government has the power of applying for legislative sanction to any measure which an unforeseen emergency may require. House adjourned at a quarter past Twelve o'clock. HOUSE OF COMMONS, Wednesday, November 24, 1847. MINUTES.] PETITIONS PRESENTED. From Mr. Cardwell, and other hon. Members, from various places, against, and by Dr. Bowring, from the Unitarian Society in the South of England, for, the Removal of Jewish Disabilities. -By Mr. Ewart, from New South Wales, against Renewal of Transportation to that Colony.-By Mr. Macgregor, from Glasgow, for Alteration of Law, Bank of England; from Glasgow, for Alteration of Law, Railways. The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: My right hon. Friend, if he will allow me so to call him, must see, from the turn this debate has taken, that it was scarcely possible the explanations he wished to hear could have been given, and that what has been, in fact, an Irish debate, Motion agreed to, and Committee apwas not an opportunity for making finan-pointed to draw up an Address. cial statements. He will, I think, acknowledge, that it would not have been a convenient course to mix up these two subjects; and, I trust, will hold me excused for not having made a speech as to commercial affairs upon an Amendment of this kind. I certainly had conceived it most probable that the conduct which the Government has pursued in this matter would give rise to some observations tonight, and accordingly I came down prepared. I admit that the House is fully entitled to an explanation on the part of the Government. The House has a full right to expect it at our hands. But I think they will not consider it necessary for me to give it now. The subject might give rise to a discussion of some length, which would be inconvenient at this time of the night. Whenever the proper opportunity shall occur-certainly on Tuesday next, if not before-I shall be ready to state the views of the Government, LORD JOHN RUSSELL said, that no and give the fullest explanations which appointment of Chief Commissioner had yet the House can desire. I will only say taken place; and by an Order in Council, on the present occasion, that I am glad made by Her Majesty, the Commissioners the right hon. Gentleman approves of under the former Act were responsible for the course we have taken. That course the administration of the Poor Law. THE POOR LAW COMMISSION. MR. BANKES wished to know from the noble Lord at the head of the Government, who had been appointed Head Commissioner of the New Poor Law; what was the date of his appointment; and who were responsible for the operations of the Commission up to the date of his appointment? |