MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.
Parliament reassembled on the 5th of-February. The speech, which was again delivered by commission, detailed at length our foreign relations, and announced the continued improvement of the revenue. The all-absorbing topic of interest, however, was that which referred to the coming measure of Catholic emancipation. It remarked:—“The state of Ireland has been the object of his majesty’s continued solicitude. His majesty laments that in that part of the United Kingdom an Association should still exist which is dangerous to the public peace, and inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, which keeps alive discord and ill-will amongst his majesty’s subjects; and which must, if permitted to continue, effectually obstruct every effort permanently to improve the condition of Ireland. His majesty confidently relies on the wisdom and on the support of his parliament; and his majesty feels assured that you will commit to him such powers as may enable his majesty to maintain his just authority. His majesty recommends that, when this essential object shall have been accomplished, you should take into your deliberate consideration the whole condition of Ireland; and that you should review the laws which impose civil disabilities on his majesty’s Roman Catholic subjects. You will consider whether the removal of those disabilities can be effected consistently with the full and permanent security of our establishments in church and state, with the maintenance of the reformed religion established by law, and of the rights and privileges of the bishops and of the clergy of this realm, and of the churches committed to their charge. These are institutions which must ever be held sacred in this Protestant kingdom; and which it is the duty and the determination of his majesty to preserve inviolate. His majesty most earnestly recommends to you to enter upon the consideration of a subject of such paramount importance, deeply interest ing to the best feelings of his people, and involving the tranquillity and concord of the United Kingdom, with the temper and moderation which will best ensure the successful issue of your deliberations.” The tendency of this recommendation to parliament was at once perceived by the advocates of exclusion; and they loudly complained of desertion and surprise, charging the duke with a perfidious concealment of his designs till the last moment, and loading Messrs. Peel and Goulbourn with the most bitter execrations, on account of their supposed apostasy. The usual addresses, however, were carried without a division.
SUPPRESSION OF THE CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION.
The first thing to be done was the vindication of the laws: laws which had been long trampled beneath the feet of the Catholic agitators. In pursuance of the recommendation in the royal speech to suppress the Catholic Association, on the 10th of February Mr. Peel asked leave to bring in a bill for that purpose. The general outline of the measure which he proposed was briefly this. It was his intention, he said, to commit the enforcement of the law to one person only; and to intrust to him, who was fully cognizant of the state of affairs in Ireland, and who was also responsible for the tranquillity of that country, the new powers with which the house were now asked to invest the executive government. He proposed to give the lord-lieutenant, and to him alone, the power of suppressing any association or meeting which he might deem dangerous to the public peace, or inconsistent with the due administration of the law; together with power to interdict the assembling of any meeting, of which previous notice should have been given, and which he should think likely to endanger the public peace, or to prove inconsistent with the due administration of the law. In case it should be necessary to enforce the provisions of the law by which these powers would be conferred, it was proposed, by Mr. Peel, that the lord-lieutenant should be further empowered to select two magistrates for the purpose of suppressing the meeting, and requiring the people immediately to disperse. Finally, it was proposed to prohibit any meeting or association which might be interdicted from assembling, or which might be suppressed under this act from receiving and placing at their control any monies by the name of “rent,” or by any other name. In conclusion Mr. Peel said, that he was of opinion the act should, like that of 1825, which had been intended to suppress the Catholic and other associations, be limited; and he proposed to limit it to one year, and the end of the then next session of parliament. The bill passed both houses without opposition; for although its provisions were somewhat arbitrary in their nature, the friends of the Catholics voted for it as part of a system which was to result in Catholic emancipation. The associators, however, rendered the act unnecessary; for before it was completed, their dissolution was announced. They had gained their point, and for the present they were satisfied; they had demanded emancipation, unqualified emancipation, and nothing else; and when this was promised, when government submitted to their imperious demands, they put up the sword of defiance into its scabbard. The government boasted that they had suppressed the Association. But such a boast, as it has been justly observed, was as if a man should boast of his victory over a highwayman to whom he exclaims, when the pistol is at his breast, “Down with your pistol, Sir, and you shall have my purse and my watch:” the robber would have the best of it, and so had the Association.
REJECTION OF MR. PEEL AT OXFORD.
The University of Oxford had elected Mr. Peel as a champion to the Protestant cause; and when his mind underwent the change it manifested on the subject of Catholic emancipation, he could not in common decency or honesty retain his seat as member for that University. Under these circumstances he addressed a letter to the vice-chancellor, announcing his new views of policy by which he was to be guided, acknowledging that his resistance to the Catholic claims had been one main ground of his election by the University, and tendering his resignation. Mr. Peel, however, was proposed as a candidate at the new election, trusting that he might skill sit as the representative for Oxford in parliament. But in this he was disappointed. He had for an opponent Sir Robert Harry Inglis; and though the united influence of the Whigs was pushed to its utmost limit in behalf of the Home Secretary, Sir Robert Inglis, who was supported by the dignitaries of the church, and by the parochial clergy, was elected. Mr. Peel was subsequently returned for the borough of Westbury; and in this character he brought forward those measures which for twenty years he had repudiated as dangerous and ruinous to the best interests of the country, and which even now he was convinced were pregnant with danger to the constitution.