NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THAT the week has not been of a very stirring character, may be inferred from the fact that the assembling of the " Complete Suffrage Conference" at Birmingham has been the chief event. The delegates repaired to it from all parts of the country ; and there were sufficient numbers, with undoubtedly sufficient confu- sion, to give those present an imposing idea of the sensation they were making. As a proof of the popular activity in political dis- cussion, this meeting may be considered to have considerable in- terest : when men at some cost send representatives—when those representatives travel hundreds of miles to discuss plans of political advancement—the desire for advancement must be strong indeed. But the proceedings certainly lead to no expectation that the mea- sures on which the delegates deliberated are very soon to become law. Any influence which the demonstration might have had was destroyed by its conduct, and by the ludicrous upshot. It has been called "Mr. SynnoE's " Conference ; and the undue promi- nence given to the excellent Quaker—his matter-of-course occu- pation of the chair—imparted an air of personality fatal to the high " national" pretensions of the Conference "invited" by Mr. &names Council. The Chartists waged successful battle with Mr. STORGE for the possession of his. Conference. No sooner was it opened, than they came -forward as the obstructers of scru- tiny into " controverted eleetioni," some of their votes being threatened with extinction. Next, although the Bill prepared by Mr. &names Council and the Charter were admitted to be the same in essential points, a very warm debate arose on the question whether the Charter or the Bill should be considered : the Sturgites could not swallow, any more than the Chartists could concede, the name of the Charter! After fierce war on these tri- vialities, the Chartists carried their point ; they turned the Com- plete Suffrage Conference into a Chartist convention ; Mr. Symms and his party took flight, tuid the two bodies deliberated sepa- rately. Almost as if in mockery, the Conference proceeded to con- sider their Bill and the Charter; and the Chartists discussed the propriety of substituting the very preamble of 'the Bill which they had refused to consider, for the preaMble of;their own Charter ! The result is, that the Chartists haVe made the Conference a laughingstoci, though not without involving themselves in the mess.
