NEWS OF THE WEEK.
LIE course of events on the Continent is such that our Ministers have been obliged to take a distinct position, and to declare that position in Parliament. Foreign relations have thus become, if not the most important, at least the prominent and stirring event of the week within the walls of the Legislature. The whore ques- tion of " the balance of power" was raised by Lord Dudley Stuart, in moving for copies of the communications between the Govern- ments of Austria and Turkey on the subject of Montenegro. Lord John Russell courteously declined to give the papers, but very frankly stated the actual position of -this country in the matter. The almost local dispute raised by the people of Montenegro in stretching the independence that they have enjoyed upon suifer- awe, has called in question the tenure of the Turkish Government in regard to its own Christian subjects and the great Christian states conterminous with its territory ; and while Lord John Rus- sell informs us that the immediate dispute has been hushed up for the time, in great part through the good offices of this country to maintain the status quo, he holds out no hope of maintaining it for long. The interest of this country requires that we should maintain the status quo, while our honour forbids that we should share in any partition ; the fall of the Turkish rule through its inherent weakness is imminent; and Lord John cannot conceive a readjustment Of the Turkish territory without the greatest chance of an European war. In saying these things, he has authenticated the essential parts of the information already before the public, and has given an official stamp to the usual anticipations on the subject This authentic information is very important, in telling us what we have to expect, and thus relieving us from distracting our attention with useless calculations having no basis in proba- bility. Meanwhile, Lord John Russell, though speaking in very moderate language, has placed this country in a position intelligible and firm.
Lord Palmerston has not been equally frank on the subject of the demands emanating from Austria, France, and Prussia, calling upon Queen Victoria's Government to exercise some Lind of compulsion or control over the movements of foreign re- fugees residing in England. In reply to Lord Dudley Stuart, Lord Palmerston said that "no such communications had been re- ceived " : a statement which may be literally true, but it is one by no means incompatible with the previous, reiterated, and uncon- tradieted statement of the Times, that such demands were to be made by Austria, and that the other powers were to join in a note upon the subject.• Lord Dudley Stuart may have erred in the matter of dates or otherwise, and thus saved Lord Palmerston from that which diplomacy abhors, a direct answer. But Lord Palmer- ston did not scruple to declare what this Government would do if such demands were made—it would refuse compliance. The Bri- tish.Government will enforce the law against any who shall at- tempt to break it, whether British or foreign subjects, but it will not givehp the refuge which it has afforded to political un- fortunates.
Ministers have had to maintain their position in Colonial affairs against a rally of the Tory party, headed by Lord Derby ; who en- deavoured to show that the relinquishment of the Clergy Reserves to the Canadian Legislature was an abandonment of trust in the Im- perial Government towards the Protestant Established Churches. If Lord Derby were able to attain any success at all, which we doubt, it can only be in embarrassing the Government. That he can arrest the transfer of authority on local affairs from the Imperial Government to the Colonial Government, is impossible ; for that transfer is re- gistered in the decrees of Fate, and it only awaits final fulfilment. That he can sustain the Church of England in Canada by the will of the Imperial Government, and by compulsory exactions from the inhabitants, is a still wilder dream : any attempt of the sort could only draw upon Lord Derby's own Church a truly American hatred, and would combine the colonists for the destruction of it as an alien monopolist. It is only through freedom and equality, and conse- quent absence of the motives to that any Church, whether of England or Scotland, can maintain its stand in Canada amongst other persuasions, as in the United States. Lord Derby could but sacrifice the Church of his creed to a canting manoeuvre and an Anti-Ministerial success.
Mr. Scholefield's amendment on the Maynooth motion of Mr. Spooner stood as a remainder from the debate of Wednesday last week ; but, relieved of the mere Maynooth question, the discussion took a new form ; becoming, in fact, an oblique contest on the subject of Voluntaryism. Here many of the opponents of Mr. Spooner were ranged as opponents of Mr. Scholefield, and the divi- sion was a signal defeat. No other result could be expected, since the subject of Voluntaryism is not at present before either Par- liament or Public, and the House of Commons seldom likes, espe- cially in the midst of real business, to debate a parenthetical pro- position.
Various reforms that are before Parliament, items in larger schemes, have made more or less of progress. The Lord Chancel- lor has carried his "Registration of Assurances Bill "—an old bill with an odd name—to the second reading notwithstanding a par- tially erroneous opposition by Lord St. Leonards, who discussed some very ancient questions as novelties. There is reason to doubt, however, whether the bill will not frustrate its own ob- jects, defeatin., certainty by its cumbrous machinery of "as- surances," and increasing outlay by its costly process for dimi- nishing expense. Although not at present embodied in a bill, the actual move in the Ecclesiastical Courts question is more impor- tant. Mr. 'Collier gave freshness to the topic by the complete- ness and point of his exposition ; and Ministers redeemed the stale opprobrimit of the whole ' subject by intimations that, when they shall have accomplished some of the measures now upon their hands, they would deal effectually with that nest of abuses. Mr. Williams of Lambeth showed, for the hundredth time, that the Probate and Legacy duties are unequal in their incidence, oppres- sive and inconvenient in their operation : but Mr. Gladstone, on the other hand, showed that the attempt to deal with them by extending them to real property would not be more just, and might be more embarrassing. His language points to processes more searching than any which would remedy injustice by extend- ing it. Mr. Hume made something out of the leavings of Free-trade, by moving an abstract resolution to prune the Tariff of the smaller import-duties. People might have remembered Mr. Hume's services in the cause of Free-trade even if he had abstained from obtruding a superfluous importunity in the path of a Government that has restored to office Free-trade and steady Reform. With his usual amenity, Mr. Hume showed himself very accessible to suggestions that he should withdraw : but the motion which is withdrawn is often better not advanced ; and the condemnation of the present case is conveyed in the fact that the Free-trade toy which Mr. Hume displayed in the House of Commons was laid hold of by the ei-devant Protectionist Mr. Disraeli, as a weapon against the Free-trade Government. Neither the Free-trader nor the over- cunning Protectionist succeeded against the firm position taken by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. From Mr. Gladstone's de- meanour on these occasions we gather that his mind is engaged in a comprehensive survey of the whole subject of taxation ; that he holds it in his grasp, and that he will not suffer it to be trifled with piecemeal : a fact much more promising in real progress than the success of abstract resolutions or motions divorced from imme- diate use thrown forward by "private Members."
