Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/398

 384 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [1850- tion of titles be prosecuted as an offence. To proscribe such assumption was, therefore, clearly an infringement of existing liberties. The motion to bring in the bill was resisted by Roebuck, Bright, Hume, and Frederick Peel, and it was sup- ported in a contemptuous speech which was worse than opposition by Disraeli. The debate was continued through four nights, although on the I4th of February the votes were for the introduction, 395, and against it only 63. But the moral effect of the measure was gone, and ministers, while certain to carry it through Parliament, were equally certain to lose in character and influence by their action. Before the time came for the further stages of the bill to be entered upon, the weakness of the Government had been demonstrated in the House and acknowledged by themselves. The proper exponents of the cry of religious intolerance to which the Whigs had bowed, were the extreme Church and State Tories ; for any section of Liberals would be bound, even whilst they introduced, to limit the terms of, repression. A The first sign of ministerial unpopularity was given on the occasion of a resolution moved by Disraeli on the nth of February, declaring " That the severe distress which continues to exist among the owners and occupiers of land, lamented in her Majesty's speech, renders it the duty of the Government to introduce without delay measures for their effectual relief." The motion was debated for two nights, and ministers were supported in their resistance to it by the Radicals and the Peelite leaders. It did not appear, however, that the latter could rally the full strength of their party against a resolution which did not nominally set up the principle of protection, and the death of Peel had already done something to weaken the bonds of union. When the division was taken on the I3th of February, there voted for the motion, 267 ; against it, 281, leaving Government with a majority of only fourteen. In the previous year a resolution of a similar character had been re- jected in a smaller House by a larger majority. This proof of waning power was followed by another still more embarrass- ing, the attack coming then from the opposite quarter.