Sep 27 1833 Mr. James Brougham & Lord Lonsdale's Tithes #1 - Cumberland and Westmorland Newspaper Transcriptions

Sep 27 1833 Mr. James Brougham & Lord Lonsdale's Tithes #1

The Times, Friday, Sep 27, 1833; pg. 3; Issue 15281; col C

MR. JAMES BROUGHAM and LORD LONSDALE'S TITHES.
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[The following extract from the Whitehaven Herald rather demolishes the
statements with which the Conservative scrubs have latterly been imposing upon
gobe-mouches of their own small calibre. By the way, if the Conservative press
of England continue its present course, the people of the Carlist press of
France will not long remain in undisputed possession of the title of the
"greatest liars in Europe"]: -

"We last week, without having any means of contradiction but what were afforded
by the admissions of our opponent himself, exposed the utter absurdity and folly
of the charges successively made by the editor of the Carlisle Patriot against
Mr. James BROUGHAM, and showed that even his own wildest assertions failed to
sustain those charges. We this week are enabled to furnish, from the pen of
Mr.BROUGHAM himself, an entire contradiction of all the assumed facts.

"It must be admitted that Mr. BROUGHAM has shown, in this controversy, a degree
of patience, good temper, and forbearance, commendable at any time, but doubly
so when shown towards a person by whom he has been so outrageously insulted, and
so perseveringly calumniated. We are anxious to treat the editor of the paper in
question with all the respect due from one literary man to another, - a line of
conduct which we have never transgressed, excepting towards persons whom long
experience has shown to be utterly incapable of common courtesy, or of
gentlemanly feeling; but we must say that his conduct on this occasion has
filled us with immeasurable disgust.

"He first of all makes a charge against Mr. BROUGHAM of a sub-fraudulent attempt
to set aside an ancient modus, by an evasion of Lord TENTERDEN's Act. Mr.
BROUGHAM then writes to him a letter, explaining civilly that no such attempt
was made by anybody, and that to the action, such as it was, he was not a party.
What does he do then? He reiterates, in the most offensive manner, the charge in
another form, asserts Mr. BROUGHAM's explanation to be a tissue of distinct
falsehoods, accuses him of being actuated by sordid motives, or by a pitiful
desire to annoy the Earl of LONSDALE, and on a series of assumed facts, which,
if true, would be irrelevant to the question, publicly stigmatizes with
mendacity a gentleman of unimpeachable integrity, the representative of a large
town, and the brother of the first law officer in the realm.

"Mr. BROUGHAM writes again. He does not fly into a passion, he does not threaten
with legal punishment; he simply expresses a desire to put the editor in
possession of the real facts, and condescends to explain every item of the
trumpery fabrication, of which he believes the editor the dupe. What does Mr.
Editor do now? Does he even at the eleventh hour express his regret and
contrition for his conduct? Not he. He does not even give Mr. BROUGHAM the
opportunity of publishing the contradiction in the paper which contained the
calumny. He evades inserting it under the miserable pretext that it arrived too
late for insertion that week, complains of its length, though not half so long
as his own accusations, and, to crown all, picks out a paragraph containing a
contradiction to an absurd fable relative to the Lord Chancellor, which he
publishes in such a manner as to make it appear that he had the honour to have a
friendly 'communication' with Mr. BROUGHAM on the subject of his brother's
health!

"Conduct like this we are unable to characterize, nor shall we attempt to do so.
Mr. BROUGHAM's letter is too lucid to need analysis. He refers to distinct
evidence to prove that the tithes of his farm had been let to the tenant for the
same rent as he now gives, - that all the parish but this farm, with an
inconsiderable exception, is tithe free, - that tithe of agistment was
previously paid to the rector, - that he, Mr. BROUGHAM, took the lease several
years before the farm was bought by Lord LONSDALE, and that the previous
occupant had promised to pay tithe of agistment. The estate belonged to Mr.
HAMLET, the well-known and 'accommodating' jeweller, who bought it for the
disinterested purpose of assisting Lord Viscount LOWTHER in his hopeful scheme
of manufacturing Whitehaven colliers into Westmoreland freeholders - a scheme in
which a peer of Parliament could by no possibility have any concern.

"It is below Mr. BROUGHAM's dignity, it seems, to be a lessee of tithes!
Impossible. The Right Hon. William, Earl of LONSDALE, knight of the most noble
order of the Garter, Lord Lieutenant and Custos Rotulorum of two counties, is
lessee of tithes - ay, not impropriator, but actually lessee. He is lessee of
the tithes of the township of Newby, in the parish of Moreland (contiguous to
Brougham), under the Dean and Chapter.

"Mr. BROUGHAM, in reply to the accusation of annoying Lord LONSDALE, says, 'if I
had done so, I had been fully justified by the example of those you profess to
serve.' Mr. BROUGHAM makes no charge, but can he possibly allude to Newby? We
shall see.

"We are informed, and we fully believe, and if we are wrong, we certainly shall
not accuse of mendacity any one who is kind enough to set us right, that
previous to the late contested elections in Westmoreland, it was the custom in
that township to let the tithes to all the tenants, but that since those
contests, those who voted for Lord and Colonel LOWTHER have had their tithes let
to them, and that the tithes of all who voted for Mr., now Lord BROUGHAM, have
been uniformly drawn, - and further, that Mr. James BROUGHAM has an estate in
that township which suffers with the rest, though the farmer is not a voter.

"This fact (which is not a solitary instance, and Mr. BROUGHAM may possibly
allude to something else) would never have been mentioned but for the wonderful
indignation of the Patriot at persons making tithes a matter of blue and yellow.
We beg distinctly to be understood as meaning nothing like an imputation on the
Earl of LONSDALE, whose servants cannot be expected to consult him about such
trifles, and doubtless his Lordship will be as much astonished and as indignant
as the rest of His Majesty's subjects, should he learn from our humble pages how
disgracefully his authority is abused.