The Foreign Policy of the Home Government.

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 495, 11 January 1851, Page 2

The Foreign Policy of the Home Government.

Those who take even a slight interest in European politics cannot need to be reminded that the debates in Parliament on the extended subject indicated by this heading, were amongst the most exciting and important of the Session, involving as they did the gravest Imperial questions, and, ujoicover, forming the hinging-pointjQH which the continuance in office of the present Cabinet avowedly turned. Our readers have been made aware by our columns (if not more fully from home sources) that the House of Lords, adopting a imotion of Lord Stanley's, by a decided majorty pronounced, a strong— and, as we have repeat edly intimated in our opinion a just — censure on the course pursued by Lord Palmerston in the late Greek affair : — that the Government, however, declared it would not resign unless this censure was adopted by the House of Commons also : — that therefore Mr. Roebuck brought the subject forward, but in the enlarged shape of a general vote of confidence in the Foreign Policy of Ministers : — and that, after a discussion prolonged through four nights^ that Resolution was affirmed by a majority of 46 (the numbers being for the motion, 310, against it, 266) thus securing the Cabinet, for that time at least, in the possession of office. Our references to these proceedings, however, were necessarily brief, having been only derived from the abridged statements in the Colonial papers ; and we awaited the arrival of our English files to give the subject a space somewhat more commensurate with its importance. Now that we have them, however, we find that the Reports are so voluminous that any quotation of the leading Speeches which would at all fairly convey the several lines of observation pursued by the Speakers, is altogether impracticable ; and, on consideration, we believe that we best .consult, the. wishes of the bulk of our readers as well as the necessities of our own space, by selecting extracts on the subject from a few of the editorial articles in leading London journals, — preferring such of them as, blending summary with comment, may give the most satisfactory idea of the progress and character of the discussions. We first quote from the Spectator a welldigested resume^ of the debate in the Commons, up to nearly its close :—: — The Commons have taken far more time than the Lords in adjusting their verdict on the foreign policy of tho Government j the question being propounded to the Coromom in a larger form, and the Members being more in number, more generally eager to speak, and fixing their intent lesi on the question than on collate rali and special objects. At first, indeed public curiosity was moved to know what the subject of debate would be, as there were three proposition* before the House,— -Mr. Roebuck's original motion, to pass a vote ot emphatic approval on the foreign policy of Ministers ; Mr. Atmey's ameadment, to give that approval an express applicntion to the conduct of Lord Palmerston in Greece ; and Mr. Hume's, to substitute t vote of general confidence in Ministers. But while Ministers would not refuse to Uke in tome more scrupulous but valuable votes which might have been withheld Jfrom the explicit approval of their Greek conduct, they called upou their adherents for a more obsequious support h •-" M*.. flame's too general terms, wUich by shirk-

mg Greece would have implied a tacit assent to the specific ceniure of the Peers; Mr. Anstey, who sctms to liave forgotten his lesion while his schoolmaster Orquhart is abroad, declared himself satisfied witli Lord Palmerston'i recent policy, and left the choice of terms to Ministers. Mr. Roebuck's Whiggish suasive* overcame the shy recalcitralion of Mr. Hume; he returned to his duty as the old steed at the Toice of command, and threw away his redundant " confidence." A« censor- general, Mr. Roebuck has attained a position which makes his rising in his place a matter ol •p prehension to guilty consciences. People were surprised, therefore, to note the perfect tranquility witb which Ministers awaited the burst of oratory — even after the sep»rate conversation between Lord John Russell and Mr. Roebuck. It was almost enough to 'Uggest a belief that the Ministerial conscience was, il we may allowed so strong a term, innocent ! Whatsoever the cause. Ministers were perfectly calm. And the sequel justified their evident confidence that this time Mr. Roebuck did not mean to bite. He poured forth a eulogy on Lord Palmerston'i administration, Greece and all ; and did it so cleverly, that Sir Frederick Thesiger afterwards said Mr. Roebuck merited a ° substantial reward." Some friends of the learned gentleman were indignant at the inuendo that he had not held his biief on honorary terms; but whatever his motive or expectation, the simple averment as to his deserts is an historical fact. It was felt that he had not done the thing by halves. And although Sii Frederick Thesiger called to mind that Mr. Roebuck hfid once likened Lord Palmerston to a " lucifer" match,'' what of that ? Coply was once a Liberal, nnd Southey wiote Wat Tyler. Sir Frederick's revival of the Greek nuisance was rather tedious ; and Mr. Page Wood's thorough Ministerialism did not rescue the debate from its nisi priua character. Sir James Graham took his principles of foreign policy from the recorded speeches of Lord Howick, wbo condemned iriteivention ; applied those principles to Lord Palmersion's achievements ; and further tested the achievements by Lord Paimerston's uniform failure in his professed objects. Thus closed tbe first evening; Ministerial folks looking angry and gloomy. Next night, Mr. Oiborne, who had shared with Mr. Roebuck th« glory of being first to champion Palmerston, resumed the debate with a brilliant volley oi witticisms specially levelled at tbe ponderous knight of Netherby : and all his arrows stuck, though probably they did not penetrate that elephantine exterior. Then minor speakers ; and finally, for that night, Lord Palmerston. Oh the has set it all right, cried his friends, at the end of his five hours speech. It wa«, indeed, for its purpose admirable. The speaker had every topic at his fingers..ends ; he never loit his temper ; he treated his assailants with tbe slighcit possi blfl infusion of acid sarcasm into his goodhumoured fluency : he insinuated charges against Mr. Peel, the Charge" in Switzerland, with an air of tbe most simple confiding tru tin that young gentleman ; he scattered compliments to his friends as spontaneous as his own defence ; he grew solemn and warm only when he spoke of bis duty to protect British subjects and the honour of bis country ; and with an unstudied, conversational manner, plain but animated, he explained away every point that had been raised. Lord Palmer•iton is a great master of his art : ease is the capital of accumulated labour in study— his unstudied air now is the result of proportionate study in the past; he had bestowed his pains in helping to pre-arrange events ; and now, not scrupling to state everything a» if hit wish or his de>ermination were identical with [the fact, he did not commit one pause of hesitation, nor one bit of " ino»nß»«tency^" to suggest a doubt. Fire hours of glib verisimilitude is too much for the sceptic ism of most men, unsustainded by fanaticism or factionism; and Lord Palmerston is a pleasant gentleman, personally liked all around. That night and all next day, Wednesday's truce and yet another day, Paimerston's speech was the sufficing reliance of the admiring Liberals. Ou Thursday the debute proceeded with a calmer and graver tone ; tbe balance of speaking being decidly against Ministers, and two speeches contributing powerfully to the adverse effect. Sir William Moles, worth demolished some of Lord Paimerston's sophisms, especially the pretence that he was bound to foster the development of Anglican institutions in foreign conn. tries in which they are not of indigenous growth ; also the impracticable pretension of enforcing an English law on behalf of English subjects in non-constitutional countries,-— which, carried out to its legitimate completeness, would oblige the Government of this country to make good the depredations of pickpockets on foreign visiien. And bir William was so stern, so dangerously innovating— in other words, so independent and manly— as to tell Liberals that they were bound to tote according to their consciences, although they might thus place Lord Stanley in Lord John Rutted* post, and some strangers in their own seats '- a proper result, he argued, if Lord Paimerston's colleague cau no longer govern the country for its advantage, and it Members no longer represent the views of their constituents. Mr. Gladstone's course was anticipated with some curiosity, for it was known that he would oppose Ministers. The Ministerialists exhibited impatient soreness at hearing him ; for his well-ordered argument was so painstaking, so close, and of so tenacious a grasp, that it was felt to be very difficult to resist its appeal to the understanding and conscience. Mr. Gladstone picked more of the Foreign Secretary's sophisms to pieces. For example, he showed how Lord Palmerston failed to make out that pacific and regular means of obtaning redress, for Mr. Finlay had been exhausted before menace and force were used. ' Thursday night closed with Ministerialists again angry and anxious. Our pen still labours in darkness as to the result of the division which will appear only in the morning. We next extract from the Morning Chronicle an able and spirited Review of the debate, which, as will be seen, was written after its close on the night which will long be remembered for the additional and affecting reason that it was that on h which the late [Sir Robert Peel delivered one of the greatest and unhappily the last of his many great speeches in the House — a speech of which we gave a condensed summary in a former number — and in which he powerfully, though in a kindly and moderate tone, argued against the Foreign Policy of the Government. The numbers, ou division, were 310 in favour of the motion, to 264 against it, leaving the Government a nominal majority of 46— nine more than the hostile majority in the House of Lords. We have called tlhmajority nominal, because, considering tbe circumstances under which it has been obtained, it is clearly impossible for Ministeis to celebrate it as a triumph. But in truth no majjrity, however numerous, conld have effaced the damaging effects of the discussion which has engrossed the attention of Parliament aud the country throughout an entire week, and of which we are about, very briefly, to review the concluding stage. The debate has travelled over a field as wide ft§ the civilised world, crowded with the recollections

of a most eventful chapter of the history of our time*. At it proceeded, wo have listened night after night to speakers representing all the great tedious iato which the House is divided. We have heard from Lord Pnlmerston's own lips a moit complete and copious exposition of his own foreign policy, lasting, as Mr, Gladstone observed, from duikto dusk through a whole luramer's night. The interest of the debate w«s quickened by a sense of the political consequences which hung upon its issue, and from the voluminous reports which have crowded the sheets of the daily press tbe public have had ample materials for forming an opinion how far the judgment of their representatives agree* with their own.. ..Coarse aud acrimonious as it was, Mr. Cockhurn'e speech was undoubtedly a most powerful effort of declamatory infective. * * * \Ve pay a willing tribute to his brilliant, but somewhat heatrical, philippic against the policy of the Holy Alliance—a piece of declamation to which we listened with unalloyed pleasure, willingly permitting ourselves to forget that, except as an argument against that system of propagandises which the speaker had all along been advocating, it had not the remotest connection with the question before the house This tremendous peroration was brushed away, ai neatly as a sweep of Betty's broom demolishes a cobweb, by the first half sentence that fell from the lips of Mr. Cobden. * * His cool, conimoja-sense view of the matter in hand, tiad much (he same effect upon the intellectual atmosphere, which had been insufferably heated by the fervid eloquence of the member, for Southampton, as n draught of Dr. Reids coldest is wont »o produce upon the physical temperature of a crowded house on a hot lummer evening. Talk of plots, cabals, and conspiracies! He scouted such idle stuff. tTell him of Mr. Finlay's land ! He Had walked over every inch of it. Was he to be plied with documents and blue books ? He had read every word of them. He saw nothing in the matter beyond the plain fact that fifteen tail oi the line had been sent to Athens to »bet "an atrocious attempt at swindling," to better Mr. Kinlay's good bargain, and to collect a debt which ought to have been Sot in by yery different means. He reiterated his confebsion of faith in the principle of non-intorferrnce, in language which, if less formal and elaborate than that in which it was afterwards clothed by Sir Robert Peel, was, at least, downrght, nervous, and intelligible. ....The rest of the debate we must dismiss in half-a-dozen words. Sir Robert Peel's speech was straightforward and statesmanlike. He confined himself 1o a temperate review of the principle of the policy which he was called upon to approve— a policy which Lord John' Russell's silly taunt had forced him to treat as standing in broad contrast with that of his own Government, as conducted by his former colleague, Lord Aberdeen. .... Lord John Russell followed with one of his most effective speeches; and Mr. Disraeli wound up, with a rhetorical effort of less than his usual brilliancy, the greatest debate of the session The debate is orer' — the result is before us— and nothing remains but to *«k ourselves coolly, whst is it worth i It was clear when Mr. Roebuck laid his resolution on the table of the house, that nothing less than a large and decisive majority could—we do not say retrieve the position of the Cabinet, but— enable them to face Parliament and tbe nation, and to sustain the attitude which a British Government should hold towards foreign Power*. The Government of this country rests entirely upon opinion, and its vigour, weight, and dignity abroad depend en« tirely upon the mass of opinion by which it is known to be supported at borne. Opinion is with ue, in these day, a power which, when once roused, and fairly brought to bear upon the mechanism of the constitution the compact fabric of party organization itself is not •trong enough to withstand. The vote of the House of Lords is, in truth and fact, an expression of pfiblic opinion, not less real, although less immediate and less overwhelming in its consequences, than a vote of the House of Commons. Sensible of the paralyzing effect of the censure pasted upon them, whilst they pretented to attenuate it, Ministers have concentrated all (heir strength on an effort to reverse it by extorting a vote of confidence from the popular branch of the Legislature. And with what success I We do not forget that their own advocates have themselves warned us against the folly of not looking beyond the figures of the division list. The supplications addressed to the members for the manufacturing districts, but addressed in vain — tbe nervous anxiety shown to sbufllts away from the real issue, and to crib a vote of confidence under cover of a discussion on abstract principles -the endeavour to cross the scent with the red herring of free.trade, a trick now grown stale by repetition— all these circumstances will assist us in forming a due estimate of the weight to be attached to the decision of the Commons, * * * The issue, we bave been told ngain and again, is not between this system of foreign policy and that, but between Protection and Free »trade. That the question was not so viewed on one side, is proved beyond dispute by the speeches delivered by statesmen whose names are more thoroughly identified than that of any man on the Treaiury Bench with the principles of a liberal commercial policy* Bat it would be ungracious to doubt, after the assurance! we have received, that it was so regarded on the other. Gentlemen on tbe Ministerial side of the House walked into the lobby, if we may believe their own spokesmen, not to express their confidence in Lord Paimerston, but for a totally different purpoie— to keep Lord John Russell in, and Lord Stanley out. It was not the foreign policy of the Government that they were thinking about ; it was the re-imposition of the duties on corn. So much for the composition of the Ministerial majority, which we take leave to pronounce tantamount to a defeat. These comments on the dehate, it will of course be observed, are pervaded by a tone on the whole opposed to the recent Palmerston v policy j and, indeed, this is the tone of most ' of the articles which we have seen in the English journals. Not that the party determined at all hazards to uphold the Russell Cabinet were without their organs. Far from it, of course. Nor were their supporters in this instance confined to their own immediate party. The Post, of ancient Tory celebrity, in a jubilant strain declared, " The news is now travelling over Europe that the House of Commons has (by this decision) triumphantly vindicated the cause of truth, of justice, and of England." The secret oozes out, however, that this earnest champion of Protection exulted thus because, in common with others of his party, he averred that the endeavour to defeat the motion " had its rise in a dark and dastardly conspiracy" — (with which, however, Lord bTANLEY, says the Post, though he originated the Parliamentary inquiry, " could have nothing in common") — the object being to displace the Russell r miniVry, at a time when the formation of an out-and-out Protectionist Cabinet was supposed to be impossible, and, so to necessitate the formation of an administration which r^l'l- inrl- ""- '*■

Free-Traders, "such Protectionists only as would have agreed to serve with or under Lord Aberdeen, Sir James Graham, Mr. Sidney Herbert, and Mr. Cobden." The Times ridicules the idea of the probability of any such conspiracy; and it will be remembered that Sir Robert Pbel declared his disbelief in its existence. Indeed when we call to mind who the conspirators must have been — how high in political character, and how varied in judgment on many most impoitant political questions, — (as the names of the parties who voted against the Government exhibits conclusively,) — the supposition to us, calm lookers-on from a distance, seems so absurd that, if we were not aware how fancies become transformed into facts by the magical chemistry of political partisanship, we should wonder how such a notion could have been gravely entertained or asserted. An aspect, however, in which it is important to view the debates, is the position in which they have left the Russell and Palmerston Administration. That position was evidently one of much real discomfiture, mingled with a comparatively little triumph. A majority of thirty -seven against them in the House of Lords, was but inadequately met by a majority of forty six (including many placemen) in their favour in the Commons. " When a Minister," says the Times, " has ouce been so near a run in a full House, on a great question, and after a hard fight, * * henceforth he will rather survive, than live in any active or useful sense of the word." The political positions of parties relatively, have, however, become much more intricately embarrassed since these divisions, by the death of Sir Robert Peed, who was in no inconsiderable degree entitled to the honourable designation sometimes, in late years, especially, bestowed upon him — " the Moderator of Parties." Our next English arrivals may throw light on the probabilities as to the future Administration, by bringing us the concluding proceedings of the Session ; — for although, via California, we have heard of the prorogation having taken place, nothing was told beyond the meagre statement of that fact. The likelihood is that Ministers worked their way without much opposition through the almost routine business of a closing session, and that the real struggle of party warfare, — or at least of organizing and arming for it — was reserved for the Recess.

lUsidknt Magistrate's Court. — Crown Lands' Ordinance.— A case of considerable interest as connected with the working of this Ordinance came before this Court on Wednesday last. Mr. David Gr. Smalr, Ranger and also Pound-keeper for the Hundred of Auckland, was charged by Mr. James Farmer of the Tamaki, with having wilfully made a false entry in the pound-book of the pound at Hobson's Bridge, making it to appear that certain cattle belonging to the complainant had been impounded by the Assistant Pound-keeper Thomas Davey, whereas they had really been impounded by the Pound-keeper (Mr. Smale) himself. Mr. Whitakkr appeared for the Plaintiff, and Mr. Merriman for the Defendant. The case theoretically involved the question of the propriety of combining in the same person the apparently inconsistent offices of Hanger and Pound-keeper, as had been done by the Wardens. Legally, however, it was confined to the point whether a false entry had been wilfully made. The evidence went to show that the practice was for the "Ranger and Pound keeper on driving cattle to the Pound, to hand them overdo the Assistant Ranger, who took them into Pound and lodged a detainer. This system of handing them backward and forward from Smale the Ranger, to Davey the Assistant Ranger, and again from Davey to Smale the Pound-keeper, appeared on the examination of Major Matson, to be pursued under the sanction of the Wardens. After a prolonged investigation, judgment was deferred till next day, when the decision of the Bench was that the defendant was guilty of the offence charged against him in the information; and that, as it was a serious grievance (which was not lessened by its being done under the sanction of his superiors) the penalty of £10 must be inflicted, as directed by the Ordinance.

Mechanics' Institute. — Last night, Dr. Dalliston delivered a Lecture on Chemistry in the Hall, which, we are glad to say, was attended by a numerous audience, whose interest and attention were fully maintained to the close, by a series of simple but striking experiments, which, considering the almost total want of anything that could properly be called apparatus, were highly creditable to the ingenuity and talent cf the Lecturer, — as were also the lucid explanatory remarks with which they were accompanied. The Lecture having concluded so short a time before it was necessary for us to go to press, compels us to content ourselves with this brief notice.

We invite attention to the announcement in our advertizing columns that a Public Meeting will be held in the Hall of the Mechanics' Institute on Tuesday evening next, to consider the expediency of establishing a Lunatic Asylum for this district. We trust that a full attendance will manifest that an interest is felt by the public in this very important proposal.