HC Deb 03 May 1867 vol 186 cc1935-6
SIR CHARLES RUSSELL

said, he rose for the purpose of asking the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been called to a resolution passed at a meeting of the Reform League held in the Sussex Hall last night, by which it was determined (after the reading of the Government Proclamation, prohibiting the meeting announced for Monday next in Hyde Park) "that such meeting be held as publicly notified;" whether, in the event of such meeting taking place, the Vice Presidents as well as the President will be held liable for a deliberate infraction of the Law; and, whether the Home Secretary has received, in common with other Members of the House, a list of the members of the Reform League in which the names of Thomas Hughes, Esquire, M.P., Thomas Bayley Potter, Esquire, M.P., P. A. Taylor, Esquire, M.P., and The O'Donoghue, M.P., are published as purporting to be Vice Presidents of the Reform League? He begged to apologize to the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. M'Cullagh Torrens), whom he saw in his place, on the circumstance of his name being omitted from the list of hon. Members who were Vice Presidents of the League on the Notice Paper. He could assure the hon. Gentleman that the omission was unintentional.

MR. WALPOLE

Sir, in answer to the first Question of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, I may say that my attention has been called to the resolution to which he refers. In answer to his third Question, I am not aware that I have received any such list; but I believe that in the list of the Vice Presidents of the Reform League the names of the hon. Members to whom the hon. and gallant Gentleman refers are included. With regard to the second Question I have to state that, considering the position which those Vice Presidents hold in this House and in society, I cannot conceive that they will be identified with any attempt to resist the authorities of the land or deliberately to infringe the law of the country.