§ DISSENTIENT:
§ 1.Because the Address adopted by the House, in failing to respond to the recommendations contained in her Majesty's gracious Speech from the Throne, is to be regarded as a deliberate condemnation of the policy of her Majesty's Ministers, and, as such, must tend to their speedy retirement from the ser vice of the State, and to the substitution of others as advisers of the Crown, whose known maxims of Government afford no ground of hope that any measure emanating from their councils can adequately meet the difficulties of the present crisis of public affairs.
§ 2.Because that part of the policy of those Ministers to which such condemnation most pointedly applies has been merely an endeavour upon their parts practically to enforce the enlightened and intelligible principle, that it is more just and wise, with a view to the 111 provision of a sufficient public revenue, to remove restrictions upon commerce, and thus extend its operation, than to perpetuate monopolies and increase taxation.
§ 3.Because the political party from which successors to those Ministers must probably be chosen, has uniformly proved itself, whether in or out of power, to be hostile to the reform of abuses, to the rights of conscience, and to the freedom of the subject, and, consequently, must fail, as advisers of the Crown, to command that respect, without which the affairs of a great empire cannot be success fully administered.
§ 4.Because the uniform practice of that party, when in power, has been to foster social differences and religious animosities among the inhabitants of Ireland, a system of misgovernment as injurious in its ultimate results to those whom it professed to favour as to the large number it directly oppressed, inasmuch as its baneful effect has been to divert the attention of the country from important national objects, and to prevent that cordial union of its intellect and strength which would render a continuance of bad Government impossible.
§ MOST ESPECIALLY DISSENTIENT:
§ 5.Because that political party has, either by the actual enforcement, or the constant at tempt to enforce, its own vicious principles of government, made itself justly odious to the large majority of the Irish people. Whatever may be the temporary professions of an Ad ministration composed of members of that party, by the Roman Catholics of Ireland it can only be regarded as a government of their inveterate enemies, who, to the very last, approved and defended the iniquities of the penal code, and who, since its extorted repeal, have been foremost in every attempt to curtail their civil and political privileges. The Catholics must feel, if for no other reason, that the party which insulted when it could not injure, will be sure to injure whenever it can. Between an Administration so constituted and subjects thus justifiably distrustful, but conscious, at the same time, that they are now too numerous and strong to be outraged with impunity, there is little hope that the primary object of all good government can be certainly attained, viz., a prompt and cheerful obedience to the laws, founded upon the conviction that the laws are just and justly administered—on the contrary, in looking to the probable course of events in Ireland, there is too much reason to apprehend that the restoration to power of a party notoriously inimical to so many millions of her Majesty's subjects, must produce in the minds of the latter such a general and deep discontent, as in its consequence must speedily endanger the public peace, and ultimately impair the strength of he British Empire.
§ (Signed)CLONCURRY.