most constitutional and moderate principles.
Their object was to obtain for the people of Ireland, by a concentration
of their parliamentary influence and exertions, those laws by which the
British constitution was guarded, against the encroachments of the
executive power; and by the want of which in Ireland, her constitution
seemed to have but a precarious existence at the pleasure of the Court.
Such were a Pension Bill, for limiting the influence resulting to the
Crown by an indefinite power of granting pensions--a Place Bill, to
secure the independence of the House of Commons, by making the
acceptance of office by a member a vacation of his seat--a
Responsibility Bill, by which the men intrusted with the management of
the public treasure, or enjoying high official situations in the
government of the country, should be responsible to Parliament for their
conduct and advice. These were the measures which the Club undertook at
their formation to press upon minister. They subsequently adopted
others on which the sense of the people became too generally known to be
at all doubtful. The question of reform and Catholic emancipation they
did not take up, until the nation called for them in a manner which
proved the concession of them to be essential to the peace of the
country.

Of the constitutionality of those measures which the Whig Club
originally espoused, no man could entertain a doubt. They were the law
of England. The manner in which these measures were urged by the Whig
Club was equally constitutional. They brought them before Parliament by
bill and by motion, supported by arguments which were answered only by
majorities consisting of those placemen and pensioners, those borough
members and irresponsible officers, against whose parliamentary
existence they were levelled. This constitutional pursuit of
constitutional measures--how did the Irish administration treat it? By
imputing the worst motives to those by whom they were proposed--by
impeaching their loyalty to their Sovereign--by the most open and bold
avowal of the existence, and the necessity of corruption in the
government--by the most contumelious indifference for the public voice,
and, finally, by affixing the most disgraceful and irritating marks of
suspicion on every nobleman and man of property in either house of
Parliament, who dared to support those pretensions of the people to the
benefits of the British constitution. The removal of that good and
est