8 MAY 1841, Page 1

NEWS OF THE WEEK.

Ls Parliament this week, political discussion has been placed in abeyance : speakers have betrayed that listlessness which arises from the doubt that all present action may be rendered useless by

some coming event ; and so they reserved themselves for exertion when Mr. BARING'S first step towards realizing the promise of his

Budget should be the signal for renewed contest. Meanwhile, the interest of that one subject was kept up by little skirmishes and preparatives to clear the ground, in the shape of notices of motions or personal squabbles. Nor is the interest of the subject, whether for itself or its effect on parties, confined to either House ; the Parliamentary is merged in the public character'of the dispute : as the great events of mortal life dissolve social distinctions and open the doors of the house of mourning or of joy, so the House of Commons sits, as it were, with open doors, each party which it contains making common cause with sympathizers outside. The bustle out of doors has been even greater than within : the classes whose interests are to be benefited or injured by the proposed measures are in a ferment : Anti-Corn-law -meetings are promoted by busy Ministerialists and zealous Free-traders; while the Tories seize the advantage offered by a common danger to concentrate' the separate interests of agriculturist, shipowner, sugar-grower, and Anti-Slavery humanity-man. The balance of influence and readymade Organization seems in favour of the Opposition. As yet, the sensation throughout the country, considered as a national movement, is as nothing compared to the anticipation of the manceuverers who thought to create it. A show indeed is made in the Ministerial papers, by placing under a large head of " The Corn-law Movement" a great display of type and a long list of places. Let the whole matter be sifted, however, and it is reduced to this—the lucubrations of divers editors, glad enough of being able to impart some novelty to one of their stock subjects for " an article "; announcements of a very few public meetings ; a few requisitions for public meetings, not all of new date, (there is one mentioned dated the 12th April); a few expectations of public meetings ; and things so small as single petitions "in course of signature." This is " great cry and little wool." Either the country is agitated, or not : if it is, it will soon make known the fact; while all the printing in the world would not work it into a phrensy without some more stirring motive. The rousing motive, where is it ? Those who projected the new " movement" confounded two sorts of agitation which may stir a people—one partial and slow, the other sudden and universal : one the work of the few, the thinking classes, who slowly elaborate public opinion by dint of pertinacious reiterations of reason ; the other the act of the millions, who feel a want which is suddenly aggravated, or of which the means for gratification are suddenly exposed to their view and instinctively recognized. That kind of agitation it is which the Ministerial strategy contemplated; the kind which carried the long-wanted Reform Bill, when appetite was sharpened by opportunity. There is the delusive hope that the days of the Reform Bill may be revived on this occasion : would-be leaders of the movement are already speaking in thl elevated tone of actual combatants : but they address themselves to unexcited listeners. For an agitation of that sort the materials are not ready. The project fails in two ways. Its objects are not distinct enough or large enough to appeal to the coarse perceptions of a vast multitude; they are too fine even for stage-effect, too unsubstantial to be used. Mere adumbrations of intentions constitute the most important part of the new initial scheme of free trade : some intention to make some change in some "Liberal" direction is what the public have known about the Corn-law reform ; and when they have known further, as in the case of the little shifting of the Timber-duties, or of the more real but not unchallengeable change ef the Sugar-duties, the practical benefit to be derived has either been doubtful or petty. Before these words can be read, it will be known how far the Corn-law part of the scheme differs from that description.

Next, the boon offered is felt not to be real. To excite the interest of a people, the thing proposed must be one not to be talked about but to be done. The public is not bookish ; it has no will for that which is not bold enough to require and repay the gigantic energies of a nation—simple enough to be practicable to a power made up of huge but ill-accorded limbs—and genuine, sterling, of price for its own sake. The Reform Bill was, or seemed, such an object : it was the thing wanted, and the thing to be done at the time; and it was done. This Corn Reform is of another stamp : it is not the Corn Reform upon which any party are agreed; it has no breadth of purpose to make a common motive for different parties; it is not genuine, or proposed for its own sake : it is something which cannot be done, and is only meant to serve the temporary purpose of one, not the most influential, party in the state. There is this difference between the Reform agitation and the new Corn agitation—that the Reform Bill was the object, the Ministry that carried it a mere incident ; now, the continuation of a Ministry or the muster of a party is the object, Corn-law Repeal the incident.

The other sort of agitation, however—that of the few—may be promoted even by partial agencies. The mere fact that a Government has adopted the principle of a policy hitherto confined to writings and public-meeting speeches—that a theoretical question ' has become an official measure—cannot but disarm the doubts and fears of many in the herd of the servile, remove a multiplicity of inert impediments to the progress of opinion, give to it proportionate facilities, and force it to a higher stage of maturity. For that sort of agitation, then, the Ministerial project, launched with whatever motives, has much that is genuine : and accordingly, the signs of genuine zeal and activity are to be found among that 'limited but determined class of agitators, the professed Corn-law Repealers. The immediate effects of the measure irrespective of the improbable Corn-law Repeal, are already indicated in the events of the week. It has confounded the rivals of the Whigs as much as if a Guy Fawkes had actually sprung a mine beneath the three estates : the discreet, popularity-hunting Tories, the future officials, are puzzleetto shape their hostility so as not to seem hostile. On the other hand, that which has split political parties has united conflicting interests : we see planters fraternizing with Anti-Slavery agitators, East Indians with West Indians, merchants with landowners. Both the great parties in the state, then seem threatened with loss : perhaps the mere Whig party, as it includes many landowners, may be the chief loser. The dissolution of Parliament, which this project was framed to affect—with all the attraction of novelty, the sanction of office and even of Royalty, and all the influence of bureaucratic electioneering, now committed to an AntiCorn-law policy—will result in sending into the House of Commons a number of active and stanch men pledged not to this or that system of politics, but to the carrying out a scheme of fiscal reform ; constituting a new section of the House, a real and effective Free Trade party. To make that party as numerous, as compact, and as weighty as possible in talent and influence, is the legitimate object of the Free-traders : that is the point to which practical politicians will direct all their energies in improving the unexpected occasion which accident and Ministerial desperation have made for their use.

In the mean time, the two millions deficiency is the immediate question : what will the Whigs do with that, for they have not really told us? What would the Tories do with it ; for neither have they told us ? There it sticks, however, like Banquo's ghost, a bugbear for office-hunters.