THE PRESS.
MR. PEEL'S APOSTACY.
MORNING JOURNAL—The Leeds betelligeneer, says that while Mr. Peel was in Lancashire lie persuaded his Protestant friends to refrain front any public expression of their sentiments on the Catholic question. Since he left the county he has been applied to, to know if he would approve of any meeting on this question. Ile has replied, that it would not meet with his approbation,but that, on the contrary, he was desirous that Lancashire should take no part in the proceedings of the originators of the Brunswick cub. Now, what is the natural inference from this marked disapprobation ? Mr. Peel was never so callous before. He never evinced any disposition to suppress public opinion on this question, and his present indifference can alone arise from a change of opinion. At no period in his life was it more incumbent on the friends of the constitution to record their sentiments, yet he prefers silence. Ile knows that the Catholics threaten the public peace, and boast that the feelings of the country re with them. The people entertain a different opinion ; yet Mr. Peel is desirous that they should be dumb, that
they should meet insult v t. christian rity. and turn the cheek to be smit
ten twice. He would hat : us bear act be beaten. lie would letve us let the Catholic orator insult as, the mob of Ireland threaten us with intestine strife and foreign war---hi' would have us submit to contumely and be ruled by a Popish faction, without manifesting any inclination to repel the assault or protect rhat we venerata. Is this the conduct we should expect from Mr. Peel ? No : ! et it is Om conduct that we expect from one who leis deserted his friends, and wh m thinks he ciiri make those friends the instruments of his popularity in the II once cif Commons. But the right honourable gentlemen has overeslued his pat Anis. Ile has gone beyond his depth—he has been led into alll'ottscade—the duke now knows his worth, and like an
old soldier he him.
AUTHORITIES FOR EMANCIPATION.
TIMES—If the yell of "No Popery" had any meaning, or any bearing upon the question whether Catholics who have already the right of making members, and thereby governing many votes in Parliament. might not also, with equal security to the State, have the right of voting, as well as of telling others how to vote,—if that " yell " had any honest meaning, why surely it would not have been confined to the blockheads by whom only (with scarce one exception) it'is uttered. Had the measure of emancipation been of a nature to entail upon the empire any risk from Popery; would not—and we entreat an earnest attention to this list of great and celebrated men, the ornaments of their country—the highest authorities of the last century and the present, in all that concerned the civil liberties of England, with the interests of her constitution " in Church and Staty,"—would not ]'.Jr. Burke, the idol of Torystatesmen, have sounded the war-trump of "No Popery ?" Would not Mr. Wyndham, the acute and high-minded; or Mr. Wilberforce, religious and Protestant, even to enthusiasm ; Mr. Fox the devoted partisan of Whig principles and of freedom in Church and State ; Mr. Pitt, of his whole generation endowed with the loftiest and most masculine spirit, no further a Tory of 1688 than that, by the chance medley of times and circumstances, the Whigs of 1788 opposed hitn,—Mr. Pitt, the object of clamorous and ostentatious worship by those who now convnlse the spheres \Vial this foul tempest of "No Popery,"—would Mr. Pitt not have joined the cry ? Woull he not have thundered it in the ears of Europe, had he dreamed that the cause of Popery would have been favoured by emancipation ? Would Mr. Pill—the pilot, the guardian, the tutelar genius of " Church and State"— have dwelt upon emancipation as one of the national benefits connected with the act of Union, and growing out of it, and crowning and consumtnating that imperial measure,— would he have recommended the Union itself, as naturally leading to the relief of the Catholics, and divesting emancipation of any dangers to be feared from it had Ireland stood alone, if he entertained the least apprehension that the " Church and State " of England would have been impaired by this natural consequence " of the -Union ? Would Mr. Pitt have surrendered an office which was identified with his being, and dissolved a :Ministry which was ahnost incorporated with the State, beeause he could not carry the admission of the Catholic Lords and Gentlemen to Parliatnent, had such admission been by him regarded as anything but beneficial to the Protestant interests of the realm ? Again, we say, would Lord Grenville—as sound a statesman as any of this age, and as upright as any former age could boast of,—would that virtuous and enlightened Minister have blinded his countrymen to the Popish terrors of emancipation, had any such terrors existed ? 1.41r. Grattan—hal civil freedom been menaced by Catholic emancipation, would Mr. Grattan, less the advocate of liberty than her hero—would he have shrunk front denouncing the demon of Popery ? Of men of later growth—lord Castlereagh—shrewd and penetratieg—was consistent in his contempt for " No Popery," and we verily believe that he WaA in that case honest. Lord Grey—Lord Harrowby, wise and conscientieus, though but half appreciated as a statesman,—Lord Lansdowne, Lord Plunkett, Lord Holland, Mr. Whitbread ; and last, the much-hunonred and lamented Canning—these were, one and all, zealous friends of the grand measure of emancipatiD/I. Was ever such a catalogue presented to any people, of men so eminent,—men so nohle,—the Hower of their country,—the landmarks of their time,—of parties opposite,—of opinions and principles independent and diversified,—Whigs, Tories, neutrals, English. Irish, old, smith young, varying in sentiment upon all other questions, but agreed on this alone ? Let, we say, any'rational being of calm and sober intellect cousider but this one argument—this evidence of authority, from NVIliell in the British empire there is no appeal—and ask himself ought he not to blush for listening to the frantic war-whoop of" No Popery ?"
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATIONS NOT NEW.
NEW 'MONTHLY MAGAZINE—CathOEC Associations have been of very long existence. The CoMederates of 1642 were the precursors of the Association of 1828. The Catholics entered into a league for the assertion of their civil rights. They opened their proceedings in the city of Kilkenny, where the house is shown in which their assemblies were held. They established two different bodies to represent the Catholic people, namely a general assembly and a supreme council. The first included all the lords, prelates,
and gentry of the Catholic body ; and the latter co: I of a few select
members, chosen by the general assembly out of the dh ot provinces who
acted as a kind of executive, and were recognized as t:ieir supreme magistrates. These were the " Confederates." Carte, in his UM of Ormonde, calls them " an Association." Be adds, that the first result of their union was an address to the King, in which they demanded justice, and besought him
" timely to assign a place where they might with safety express their grievances." On receiving this address, the King issued a commission under the great seaLeinpowering the commissioners to treat with "the Confederates," to receive in writing what they had to say or propound, and to transmit it to his Majesty. Upon the accession of George the Second, in 1727, Lord Delvin, and the principal of the Roman Catholic Gentry. presented a servile address, to be laid by the Lords Justices before the Throne. They were in a condition so utterly despicable and degraded, that not even an answer was returned. But Primate Boulter, who was a shrewd and sagacious master of all the arts of colonial tyranny, in a letter to Lord Carteret, intimates his apprehension at this first act since the Revolution, of the Catholics as a community ; and immediately after they were deprived of the elective franchise by the 1st Geo. IL ch. 9. see. 7. The next year cause a bill which was devised by Primate Boulter, to prevent Boman Catholics from acting as solicitors. Here we find, perhaps, the origin of 1/se Catholic Rent. Several Catholics in Cork and in Dublin rai,ed a subscription to defray the expense of opposing the bill, and an apostate priest gave informatioa of this conspiracy (lbr so it was called) to bring in the Pope and the Pretender. The transaction was referred to a Committee of the House of Commons, who actually reported that five pounds had been collected, and resolved, "That it appeared to them, that under pretence of opposing heads of bills, sums of money had been collected, and a fund established by the Popish inhabitants of this kingdom, highly detrimental to the Protestant "interest." • These were the first ellints of the Roman Catholics to obtain relief, or rather to prevent the imposition of additional burdens: They did not, however, act through the medium of a committee or association. It was in the year 1757, upon the appointment of the Duke of Bedford to the Viceroyalty of Irehold, that a committee was for the first time formed, of which the great model, perhaps, was to be dis. covered in " the Confederates" of 16.12 ; and ever since that period, the affairs of the body have been more or less conducted through the medium of assemblies of a similar character. The Committee of 1757 may be justly accounted the parent of the great convention which has since brought its enormous seven millions into action. The members of the Committee formed in that year were delegated and actually chosen by the people. They were a parliament invested with all the authority of representation. Their first assembly was hell in a tavern called "The Globe," in Essex Street, Dublin. After some sittings, Mr. Wyse of Waterford, the ancestor of the gentleman who has lately made so conspicuous a figure in Catholic polities, proposed a plan of more extended delegation, which was at once adopted. In 1759, this body was brought into recognition by the State ; fur, upon the alarm of the invasion of Conflans, The Roman Catholic Committee prepared a loyal address, which was presented to John Ponsonby, the then Speaker, by 31e,srs. Crump and Mae Dertnot, two delegates, to be transmitted by him to the Lord Lieutenant. A gracious answer to this address was returned, and published in the Gazette. The Speaker summoned the two delegates to the House of Commons, and the address was then read. 1Mr. Mac Dermot, in the name of his hody, thanked the Speaker for his condescension. This was the first instance in which the political existence of the Irish Catholics was ackowledged through the medium of their Committee.
Previous page
