Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/204

 190 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [1822- Duke of York, and of the old Tory faction on behalf of resistance to the Catholics, was responded to by the owners of seats, and whatever was the opinion of the people generally, the voters had to obey the commands of their masters. So that, as was seen when Parliament met, the cause of emanci- pation lost ground by the election. The case of the corn laws was different. The pressure caused by the commercial distress, added to the fear of a bad harvest, was so great, a positive famine being threatened, that ministers were compelled to exceed their constitutional powers, and to open the ports to some classes of foreign corn without waiting for the return of the price averages. Such a course made a special meeting of Parliament necessary, a fact which helped to concentrate public opinion upon the laws, which could only be maintained at the cost of national suffer- ing, and to escape the natural results of which the constitution had to be violated. The new Parliament met on the I4th of November, and, the preliminary formalities disposed of, the King opened the session by a speech, in which he said, " I have called you together at this time for the special purpose of communicating to you the measures which I judged necessary to take in the month of September for the admission into the ports of the United Kingdom of certain sorts of foreign grain, not then admissible by law." This being the only business to be brought forward, there was no real trial of the strength of parties. On the address being moved, Hume proposed an amendment dealing with Ireland, the corn laws, and Par- liamentary reform, but only obtained twenty-four votes in its favour. The bills of indemnity passed without serious dis- cussion, but it was announced that ministers proposed to deal further with the question of the corn laws when the House met again after Christmas. Before the adjournment took place, an important interna- tional difficulty arose which had to be dealt with and explained to Parliament. A new constitution had been established in Portugal which was very distasteful to the reactionary