claims, that any great and respectable class of the community could subscribe to that doctrine which was recorded in their published proceedings, of appealing to that hatred which, as Catholics, they were presumed to bear to another portion of their fellow men. And yet, when a Roman Catholic gentleman, attending a meeting of the Association, proposed the erasure of such language, as inconsistent with the dictates of religion and the spirit of Christian charity, his objection had been unanimously over-ruled. Again he would repeat, that he never could bring himself to believe, that any large portion of the people would tolerate such a sentiment as was expressed in the address which had emanated from the Catholic Association. If, however, the Catholics generally participated in such feelings and opinions, then, indeed, how additionally strong became the reason for excluding from political power persons capable of holding such tenets! No; he could not believe that the Catholic community would adopt such principles; for he had always hitherto heard their best advocates entreat that the errors of the few should not be visited upon the heads of the many. It was not a little strange that, whilst several gentlemen called upon the government to permit this association to remain, they were loud in their denunciation of another association in this country, against which the same cause of complaint did not exist. An hon. and learned gentleman (Mr. Brougham) had last night alluded to some supposed difference of opinion among the members of the cabinet upon particular subjects: he had talked of those who were always ready to sacrifice their opinions for the preservation of their places, and that there was one who would pocket any popular opinion of the day, to preserve his official power. He was certainly much disinclined to speak of himself Mr. Brougham.-I did not mean you. Mr. Peel said, he did not wish to separate himself from his colleague, the lord chancellor of England, to whom the observations he alluded to were understood to apply. Of that eminent individual he could not speak in terms of adequate praise. He believed his name would go down to posterity, as that of a man of great and exalted merits, and that notwithstanding the failings imputed by some men to some of his acts, he would go down to posterity as being the most consistent politician who had ever held the great seal. The whole tenor of his official life was the best answer to all the calumnies which had been heaped upon his character. With respect to his own opinions and for them he only meant now to answer he could declare, that his original view of the Catholic question had been strengthened and confirmed by the experience of subsequent events; and he claimed credit for the sincerity of his opinion, when he declared, that he was prepared to make any official sacrifice, rather than abandon his principles. The right hon. bart. had said, that he (Mr. P.) and the lord chancellor, were the persons who ought to be held responsible for the establishment of the Catholic Association. For himself, he could assure the right hon. baronet, that the imputed responsibility was groundless; for he had never opened his lips upon the subject, in the manner in which he was supposed to have done. He was ready to discharge his duty, and he called upon parliament to put down an Association calculated to engender hatred, strife, and every kind of bitterness. If it should be the decision of parliament that the Association ought to be put down, he never could believe that the Catholics would not acquiesce in the decision. The hon. member for Westminster had stated it to be his opinion, that if the legislature should make a law declaring the Association illegal, nothing but the employment of military force could obtain obedience to it. He never could believe that. He was quite sure, if such a law was passed, that law would be readily obeyed by the Catholic body. Mr. Hutchinson warmly defended the Catholic Association, which, he contended, had done more than any body previously constituted, to promote the tranquillity of Ireland. Let them be talked of as a representative body or not, still this salutary consequence had, most certainly, attended their proceedings; and the Catholics, as a body, would feel that any blow aimed at the Association was directed against themselves. Upon the impolicy of ministers in their policy towards Ireland, he entirely concurred in every word which had fallen from his right hon. friend, the member for Waterford. For years he had deplored this fatal policy towards his country, and marked, step by step, the affliction of which it had been the cause. It was painful to have to repeat such sentiments on the occasion of an address to the throne, when the most dutiful feelings to the sovereign ought to be expressed; but he should violate every principle which he cherished, if he suffered the passage in the address respecting Ireland to be discussed, without pronouncing upon it his most unqualified reprobation. The ministers had so far forgotten their duty, as to put into his majesty's Speech that which was not true; they had recorded a false fact, and pronounced a gross libel upon the Catholics of Ireland. It was asserted, that the proceedings of the Catholic Association were irreconcileable to the principles of the constitution. That he positively denied; and he would go further, and declare, that there was nothing valuable in the constitution which had not been obtained by exertions similar to those which the Catholic Association were making. The right hon. gentleman opposite contended, that the proceedings of the Association were calculated to create alarm. Aye; but to whom? To the right hon. gentleman-to those who thought with the right hon. gentleman-and to the faction in Ireland which, for above a century, had oppressed that unhappy country. But, why was the alarm thus created? Lest Mr. O'Connell, and the other respectable heads of that Association, should continue to proclaim the grievances of the Catholics in such a manner, that it would at length become impossible for the most prejudiced persons to contend that their chains ought not to be broken. In that sense, certainly, an alarm might exist. The persecutors of the Catholics might justly be alarmed. They were alarmed by the prospect, that if things continued to go on as they were going on, the Catholic question must, eventually, be passed by acclamation. It was evidently impossible, if the Catholics continued to proclaim their grievances as they were doing, and as they had a right to do, but that the Catholic question must speedily be carried. It was the calamity of Ireland, that the British government had ever ruled her in a spirit of faction. Discord, and not peace, had ever been their motto; and now they were again about to exasperate real grievances by coercion, instead of opening the Statutebook, and expunging from it those bitter penal enactments which disgraced the Protestant, while they oppressed and degraded the Catholic. He rejoiced as much as any man at the liberal principles which the government had lately evinced, and at some of their late measures with regard to Ireland. He had been for years entreating successive administrations to attend in time to the sad condition of the Irish people; and many of the measures which were once scouted, had been since adopted and acted upon by ministers. He implored the government to pause before they precipitated themselves into fresh measures of violence towards the people of Ireland. The Catholics would not, in the present state of society, tamely submit to an unjustifiable exclusion from the privileges which they ought to enjoy; nor ought they to submit to this political degradation. It was idle to suppose that this question would not ultimately be carried; in spite of the opposition of any portion of the government. He denied the assertion made by the right hon. gent. (Mr. Canning) last night, that the proceedings of the Catholic Association had indisposed the public mind in England to the Catholic question. He absolutely denied that assertion, and dared the right hon. gentleman to prove it. That individuals disapproved of some of the acts of the Association, he admitted; but he denied that any expression of hostility had emanated from any portion of the British public against the measure itself. The ministers, by their conduct towards Ireland, had placed themselves in a sad predicament. They were fortunate in having succeeded, by the glorious efforts of our troops, in bringing the late war to a happy conclusion. They were fortunate in having struggled successfully through the difficult period of peace that immediately followed. In being enabled to state, in the Speech from the throne, the great prosperity of the empire in its commerce and manufactures, and the benefits derived from those liberal measures relative to foreign trade, which had acquired for them the approbation of the country, they were most fortunate. But when, in the Speech conveying these statements, they had the infatuation to insert a call on the two houses of parliament to legislate, for the purpose of oppressing and gagging six millions of the population of the empire, who, feeling that they were aggrieved, did not hesitate to express that feeling, they were most unfortunate indeed. Much had been said of the employment of English capital in Ireland; but he would ask the right hon. gentlemen opposite, what chance there was that the monied man of England would risk his property in that country, when he was told by government that it jesty's ministers for the measures they had declared it to be their intention to originate; and he thanked them also, that they were about to originate these measures on their own responsibility, instead of making any previous application for the advice of parliament. That was the principle on which, under such circumstances, all governments ought, in his opinion, to act. was necessary to pass a measure tantamount to a declaration of war against the whole Irish people? How could the right hon. gentlemen feel that they were doing their duty, in thus sounding an alarm, the effect of which must of necessity be, to deprive the inhabitants of Ireland of the benefits which it had been anticipated would flow in upon them from that source? It had been said, that since the Union, Lord Nugent observed, that the right Ireland had been treated with great par- hon. gentleman opposite began his speech tiality and kindness. That he denied. On by a most unfortunate attempt to draw a the contrary, he complained of the neg- parallel between the Roman Catholic lect with which, year after year, Ireland Association, and the body once kown in had been treated. In vain had he, from this country by the name of the Constitime to time, assured that House, that tutional Association. And this parallel every thing was wrong and rotten in that the right hon. gentleman accompanied by country. A deaf ear had been turned to a taunt against those who had implied, all his expostulations. Latterly, indeed, that in their opinion the latter was illegal. a rather better system had been adopted; But, did not the right hon. gentleman but most tardily and inadequately. No perceive that the weapon he was using minister had a right to take credit for that was double-edged? Good God! Had not remission of taxation, which was rendered those who were of opinion that the Conindispensable by the poverty of the country. stitutional Association was illegal, a right Sir Thomas Lethbridge said, that being to say to his majesty's government, "If as anxious as any man could be for the you think the two societies on a par in peace, security, and happiness of Ireland, point of legality, and if you maintain that he could not refrain from applauding most the Catholic Association is illegal, why did sincerely the measures which his majesty's you not institute proceedings against the government had declared it to be their in- Constitutional Association, which, accordtention to introduce. He was firmly con- ing to your reasoning, must be illegal vinced that, for the sake of the Irish also?" No proceeding was ordered to be Catholics themselves, the Catholic Asso- instituted against that Association by the ciation ought to be put down; and being attorney-general. It was true, that a bill so convinced, he felt that he should not had been found against it; but, under the do his duty, if he did not stand up in his direction of the judge, the proceeding place, and thank his majesty's ministers terminated in an acquittal. But if, as for the course they were adopting. Unless was asserted by the opponents of the something had been proposed by govern. Catholic Association, that Association ment, it would have been utterly impossible was illegal, why not put the existing laws for a single week of the session to have in force against it, instead of proposing passed over without notice having been new ones? He should not, however, have given of a similar measure. This was risen on the present occasion, had it not rendered the more necessary, if, as he been for some observations which fell understood, the Catholics of England had from the hon. baronet who immediately united with the Catholics of Ireland in preceded him. That hon. baronet had their proceedings. The Catholic Associa- talked of the unanimous feeling that extion might be considered as a second isted between the Catholics of Ireland and parliament. But, as two parliaments were the Catholics of England. He begged not contemplated by the British constitu- leave to bear his public testimony to the tion, he trusted that this new parliament, correctness of the supposition, that such which had commenced its functions by a unanimity existed. The hon. baronet levying money, taken out of the pockets was perfectly right. He believed he was of the poorest of their constituents, would justified in stating, that the Catholics of be put an end to. A body which trenched Great Britain were disposed to concur so much on the spirit of the constitution entirely, in feeling and in spirit, with the ought no longer to be permitted to exist. Catholic Association in Ireland: and As a representative of the people, he had agreed with them in the propriety of the felt it incumbent on him to take the policy they were now pursuing. He was earliest opportunity of thanking his ma-informed that he should very shortly have the honour to submit to that House a petition on the subject, from the Roman Catholics of Great Britain. He was told it was likely that on that occasion the number of signatures would be three times as great as it had hitherto been. If he was correctly informed, he was most happy that such was the fact; because it rendered it evident, that the Roman Catholics of Great Britain would not be deterred from coming forward at the present crisis, to petition for those rights, the being deprived of which was the grievance which they suffered in common with their brethren in the sister kingdom. Mr. Secretary Peel rose to explain. He disclaimed having stated that the hon. and learned gentleman opposite had said that the Constitutional Association was illegal. The learned member for Peterborough had, he believed, doubted its illegality. The noble lord misunderstood the sense in which he meant to apply the word "illegal." He merely meant to say, that the hon. gentleman opposite had contended, that the Constitutional Association was an Association inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, and that all the objections which could be urged against any society confederating to institute prosecutions, applied with still greater force to the Catholic Association. That was the whole extent of his observations. Mr. Trant said, that in his opinion the apprehension expressed by the hon. member for Cork was without foundation. The hon. gentleman seemed to think, that if measures were instituted to put down the Association, it would have the effect of preventing capital from flowing into Ireland. He had attended a meeting that day, at which the establishment of provincial banks in Ireland was the subject under consideration; and, so far from the contemplated measure of putting down the Association having thrown any damp on the business, it had on the contrary had a favourable effect. He should rejoice if some of that capital which began to overflow here could find its way to Ireland. It would be productive of the best effects. Mr. Denman, adverting to what had just fallen from the hon. gentleman, observed, that a decision which had taken place that morning in the court of King'sbench, namely that a similar company was in direct contravention of the letter of an existing law, might, perhaps, affect the company to which the hon. member had alluded. If either that company, or the Catholic Association, were against the spirit of the constitution let them be put down by the existing law; but let not new laws pregnant with injustice and ruin, be enacted for that express purpose. By the declaration of his majesty's government, however, it was evident, that they were determined, if they could not put down the Catholic Association in any other way, to put it down by coercion, by the sword, or by an army of twenty thousand men. And that at the very moment when they were complaining of the Association as being contrary to the spirit of the British constitution! He remembered a right hon. gentleman, not now in the House he meant the late chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. B. Bathurst)-undertaking the defence of the celebrated Association called, in this country, "Constitutional." That, however, was an imperium in imperio-an Association totally opposed to the spirit of the constitution-an Association which arrogated to itself the official duties of the Attorney-general. Yet, backed as it was by thousands of persons of rank and consequence, it was allowed to pursue an uninterrupted course. His majesty's ministers were perfectly silent with respect to it, unless, indeed, when they spoke in its defence. The fact was, that the Constitutional Association was allowed to go on, because it played the game of power. On this ground was the silence of government to be accounted for. What was the danger here, compared with that which was threatened to the constitution by the Constitutional Association? Defend the Catholic Association! God forbid that he should ever attempt it. He would not be bound to defend the proceedings of any public body-not even the body which he was then addressing. What was it that the Catholic Association had done? They had united for the purpose of defending themselves against the undue administration of the laws [cries of hear, hear!]. He repeated it, the undue administration of justice in that country. For let the marquis of Wellesley have that just praise to which his liberal conduct entitled him, and let the lord chief justice also receive that applause which he so richly deserved, still he maintained, that there was an undue, an unfair administration of justice to the Roman Catholics of Ireland. What was the situation of that large and respectable body at present? After hav to his soul; he would go farther, and express a hope, that the hon. baronet's election did not depend either upon that fact, or upon the assertion of it. It was only two years ago that a celebrated orator, now one of his majesty's ministers, proposed a measure for extending the pri vileges of the Roman Catholics of England. That measure was rejected by parliament; and yet he maintained that those in the country opposed to it formed but a very small minority indeed. Had the opinions just broached by the hon. member for Somersetshire originated with himself, it would not have surprised him: but he did feel surprised at hearing, on a former evening, similar opinions expressed by one of his majesty's ministers; but that surprise was increased when he found that same minister descending to the most vulgar language, and asserting, that the English people were not to be "bullied" into an admission of that which the Roman Catholics claimed as a right. This, he confessed, was a style of language which he was not prepared to expect. It was not his intention to go much further at present, as many opportunities would occur of offering his opinions upon the ing their hopes excited from year to year | but they were not the opinions of the -after having suffered such a variety of people of England. Let not the hon. misery, that the oldest men could only baronet lay any such flattering unction call to mind the register of their hopes and their disappointments-was it, he asked, too much to suppose that they had a right to combine in their own defence? Was such an association to be placed on a footing with one which arrogated to itself the privileges of the Crown-a society which went out of its way, and which said, "We have no object of our own to effect, but we are determined to put down every person who gives vent to a liberal or a patriotic feeling?" Was it to be put in competition with a system which ended as it began in jobs and trafficking? He maintained that it ought not. The Catholic Association had claims on the people of England, inasmuch as it spoke the sense, and represented the feelings, of six millions of their fellow-subjects. Their cause was one which it was the duty of that House to take into its most serious consideration; it was a question which his majesty's ministers were bound to bring forward, but in such a manner as to secure the object sought to be attained; and it was singular, that in this great country, surrounded as we were by danger, and opposed as we were by more despotic powers, we should omit to conciliate so large a portion of our fellow-proposed measure; but of this the House subjects, by giving to them that equality of rights and privileges to which they were so justly entitled. In a little time, it would hardly be believed that such disqualifications could have existed. Their removal could not be long delayed; but the misery that might fill up the intervalcould not be even imagined without horror, by any man anxious for the welfare of England and Ireland. They all remembered the disasters occasioned by the American war; but, by persecuting the population of Ireland by this measure, they were bringing America to their very doors, and were giving the last stroke to ages of oppression and misrule. They had been told by an hon. baronet, that the people of England were opposed to the Catholic Association and to Catholic interests. This he took leave to deny. He, too, thought he knew something of the feelings of the people of England, and he would venture to assert that they were not opposed to the interests and liberties of the Roman Catholics. Buch opinions might be expressed in public houses and other holes and corners, VOL. XII. might rest assured, that he should be found at his post, determined to raise his voice, however feeble, against its being passed into a law. The hon. member for Hertfordshire (Mr. W. Lamb) had told them, that he expected the facts alleged against the Catholic Association would be proved, and that he should then be ready to acquiesce in the proposed remedy. But, if he understood rightly, there were no proofs to be brought forward, and ministers intended to rely on the notoriety of the facts. To do this would, in his opinion, be madness; it would, in fact, be drawing the sword and throwing away the scabbard. Should ministers act in such a manner, he trusted that the hon. member would abstain from giving his powerful support to their measures. If they did this what would it be short of saying, that they were determined to act entirely upon public report? He had read the address put forth by the Catholic Association, and, with the exception of the one sentence, quoted by the right hon. gentleman (Mr. Canning) last night, he entirely approved of it. If he was rightly informed, his I |