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is carried out, I believe, through most of the States in the American Union, and to a greater extent on the Continent of Europe, and is being adopted in the Australian colonies.'

The speaker then asked his audience, as reasonable men, as men of business, whether this was spoliation -whether this was agrarian outrage-whether this was stimulating the working man and the agricultural labourer to incendiarism or to something worse? Nothing of the kind. It was but laying before them those just principles of law and practice which were admitted to be just in every other country in the world than this, and which we admitted to be just with regard to everything else, except the single article of land. He and Mr. Cobden were charged with all sorts of dreadful things by the Man in the Mask, but it was really he who frightened the landowners. As a class, the landed gentry-amongst whom, however, were some brilliant exceptions— were not a wise class. On the principles of law and of government, judging them by the past, they were dark as night itself. The landed proprietors could never find out, till Mr. Cobden and a few others told them, that the Corn Law was a great injury to them. They did not know that it actually lowered the value of their land, and diminished the security of their rents, and that it loaded them with an inconceivable amount of public odium; whilst, at the same time, it beggared hundreds and thousands of the people, and menaced this nation with rebellion. Yet for the course he and Mr. Cobden took twenty years ago they were slandered by the gentleman in the mask

as they were now. The Times said everything that was spiteful and untrue then, as it did at that moment. And yet who could tell how much it was owing to the abolition of the Corn Laws that the Queen was now wielding an unchallenged sceptre over a tranquil realm ?

Mr. Bright next alluded to the great system of emigration going on from England and Ireland to the United States, and said he could tell the landowners an important fact they would do well to consider. In America there were 140,000,000 acres of land, surveyed, mapped out, set apart for those who were ready to settle upon them. Under the operation of the Homestead Act, any man of twenty-one years of age might come into these territories, might choose what was called a section, which was 160 acres of land, being one-fourth of a square mile, and on payment of a fee of ten dollars, equal to two pounds English, he might apply to have this land conveyed to him for no other payment for a term of five years. At the end of five years, if he had done what the Government required, the law gave him a patent, but what we should call a Parliamentary title, and the land became his own absolute freehold for ever. If English labourers knew all the facts, the temptation to emigrate would be irresistible to hundreds of thousands who had now no thought of moving to another country. The United States offered social equality and political equality; and they also offered the very highest education to all, for the mere pay

ment of the school-rate prevailing through the various States of the Union. Mr. Bright closed with this eloquent peroration, in which he referred to the nature of his own efforts for the amelioration of the people:

'I ask you if I am wrong in saying to the rich and the great, that I believe, if they knew their own interests, that it would be worth their while to try to make this country a more desirable country for the labourer to live in. If they disregard this great question, we, who are of the middle, and not absolutely powerless class, shall have to decide between the claims of territorial magnates and the just rights of millions of our countrymen. Some men I meet with-and now and then I wonder where they were born, and why they came into the world-regard these territorial magnates as idols before whom we are all to bow down in humble submission. Travellers tell us there is a tribe in Africa so entirely given up to superstition that they fill their huts and hovels with so many idols that they do not even leave room for their families. It may be so in this country. We build up a system which is injurious to our political freedom, and is destructive of the intelligence, and the comfort, and the morality, and the best interests of our producing and working classes. (Cheers.) Now, am I the enemy of any class, when I come forward to state facts like these, and to explain principles such as these? Shall we go on groping continually in the dark, and make no effort to strengthen our position?

'Do not suppose because I stand here oftener to find fault with the laws of my country than to praise them, that I am less English or less patriotic, or that I have less sympathy for my country or my countrymen than other men have. (Cheers.) I want our country to be populous, to be powerful, and to be happy. But this can only be done-it never has been done in any country—but by just laws justly administered. I plead only for what I believe to be just. I wish to do wrong to no man. For twentyfive years I have stood before audiences-great meetings of my countrymen -pleading only for justice. (Applause.) During that time, as you know, I have endured measureless insult, and have passed through hurricanes of abuse. I need not tell you that my clients have not been generally the rich and the great, but rather the poor and the lowly. They cannot give me place and dignities and wealth; but honourable service in their cause yields me that which is of far higher and more lasting value-the consciousness that I have laboured to expound and uphold laws which, though they were not given amid the thunders of Sinai, are not less the commandments of God, and not less intended to promote and secure the happiness of men.' (Great cheering.)

VOL. II.

9

Three days after the delivery of this speech, Mr. Bright was entertained at a soirée given by a number of his constituents in the Assembly Room of Nock's Hotel. On the motion of Mr. William Morgan, a resolution was carried recognizing 'the patriotic labours of the members for the borough.' Mr. Scholefield, the senior member for Birmingham, was unable to be present, but in responding to the motion Mr. Bright gave a long and interesting address upon the history and action of the Reformed Parliament. Ladies were present at the gathering, and in commencing his speech the hon. gentleman said it had not only been common, as Mr. R. W. Dale had said, to create the impression that what are called serious people should not meddle with politics, but that these public questions were entirely out of the field in which women should exercise themselves. He confidently differed from any such opinion, for what was done under the form of political action could by no means be indifferent to the mothers, and wives, and sisters, and daughters of England.

Mr. Bright then went on to say that he had no fondness for political meetings and platform work; and that it was the existence of grievances which for twenty years had called him from the quiet of his own home, and from the pursuit of business. Still, there was a bright side to the aspect of England, in the changes which had taken place of recent years. The first great measure which suggested itself to him was the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, which

gave the right of Parliamentary representation to the whole nation of Ireland. The next great step in making this a perfectly free country was the Reform Act, in connection with which measure Birmingham took so distinguished a part. The speaker then alluded to a still more celebrated measure, that for the abolition of slavery, which affected not England alone, but the opinion of the world. It did more than emancipate 800,000 slaves in the colonies of England; it set an example which the world could not but follow.

You may rely upon it that from this great act is to be dated to a large extent the creation of that conscientious feeling in England which has been growing from that day to this; while it is owing to the unteachable spirit of the slaveholders of another country that a great nation has been brought into the throes of a fearful revolution, out of which I trust not only will that nation itself be purified, but that four millions of slaves will be free.' Then came this tribute to a distinguished Birmingham citizen, Mr. Sturge: And whilst this passes through my mind, I cannot help for a moment touching upon the fact that one of your citizens, now no more, my personal and intimate friend, was one of the most eminent of those who endeavoured to stir the conscience of the English people to that great act of justice; and I never pass, as I do often pass when I come here, that memorable figure of him which you have erected in one of the most conspicuous places in your town, without hoping that every citizen of Birmingham,

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