PARLIAMENTARY AND MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS BILL. (Hansard, 25 April 1872)

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
moved to insert a new clause ("Definition and punishment of personation"), taken from the Corrupt Practices Bill.

§ MR. CAWLEY
said, he thought the latter part of the clause was worse than useless, because it provided that if in the course of a scrutiny on the trial of an Election Petition it should be proved that persons who had tendered votes for one of the candidates had been guilty of personation, one vote should be struck off the number of votes for such candidate in respect of every person proved to have been so personated. That would have been intelligible if it had not been previously provided that if a candidate or his agent were guilty of procuring persons to personate voters he should be incapable of sitting in the House.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
explained that no candidate was allowed to take his seat in case of a disputed election unless it was shown that he had obtained a majority of votes, and the cancellation of votes which had been given by personators was proceeded with not with reference to the candidate guilty of procuring a personation of voters, but simply to ascertain whether the other candidate who claimed the seat really obtained a majority of votes.

§ MR. STEPHEN CAVE
suggested that a voter who had a qualification in different parishes ought to be required to state in respect of which qualification he intended to vote, as otherwise the voter might vote in respect of one of his qualifications, and some other persons might vote in respect of his other qualifications.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, the point mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman deserved consideration. But this Bill would greatly improve the law with respect 1850 to personation. Under the present law, a man was not guilty of personation who voted twice, but this Bill made it personation to vote twice.

§ MR. STEPHEN CAVE
said, he thought some plan might be devised by which a voter should be required to state in respect of which qualification he intended to vote, with the view of preventing personation.

§ MR. CAWLEY
proposed to raise the question how personated votes should be dealt with when the schedule was discussed.

§ MR. H. B. SAMUELSON
moved, in line 11, the insertion after "personation," of the words— Or, of aiding, abetting, counselling, or procuring the commission of the offence of personation by any person.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
said, he did not think the words necessary, for wherever a misdemeanour existed the attempt was also a misdemeanour, and the hon. Member's object of making the punishment hard labour would be met by inserting them in the subsequent part of the clause. He should not, however, object to their insertion here.

§ MR. JAMES
moved, in line 9, that the word "felony" should be substituted for "misdemeanour" in the clause. His object was to make personation a felony in England, and in Scotland a high crime and misdemeanour, which meant felony, and that a suitable punishment should be attached to the higher offence of not more than five years' penal servitude or less than two years' imprisonment with hard labour. It would be for the Committee to deal first with the character of the offence, and the amount of punishment to be awarded afterwards. He agreed with hon. Members opposite that under this Bill there would be greater facilities for personation than at present existed, because there would be a greater temptation to a man to commit the offence of personation, when he knew 1851 that his vote being once given could not be recalled, and therefore great care should be taken to prevent the possibility of the voting paper ever reaching the ballot box. An adequate punishment ought to be imposed to deter the committal of the offence. Personation was almost the brother crime of forgery, which was a felony, and which received the highest punishment known to the law, save loss of life. Personation was a crime of premeditation. There was no excuse for it. It was, in fact, an offence against the commonwealth. It might rob an innocent voter of his vote, and cause a constituency to be represented by a candidate they would not choose. Their principal object should be to deter a man from committing the offence, and when they stamped a man with being a felon who was found to commit the offence they would be the more likely to attain their object. A policeman or any other person had a right to apprehend a man on the spot for committing a felony; but he could not do so in the case of a misdemeanour, and if this offence were made a felony, a policeman or any private individual could at once interfere and prevent the committal of the offence.

MR. SCOURFIELD
said, he could not agree with his hon. and learned Friend's Amendment. The Committee the other night expressed an opinion against extreme punishment. If, however, a severe sentence only could deter the committal of the offence, why not attach to it capital punishment at once? There was a great distinction between forgery and personation, and he thought it was quite sufficient to make it a misdemeanour.

§ MR. CHARLEY
remarked that personation was already in some cases, as in that of the ownership of stock, a felony, and that the present kind of personation was a more serious one, as it might decide the election. Moreover, as personation by a candidate or his agents would void an election, it might be practised by a candidate's opponents for the very purpose, the term "agent" being one difficult of definition.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
said, it did not follow that if the Committee 1852 accepted the definition of the offence, they should agree to the amount of punishment it was proposed to attach to it. He agreed that it was desirable to alter the definition of the offence, and principally because, as it had been stated, it would allow of the immediate arrest of the offender. That would be a very valuable remedy, because many men who were known to the police might not otherwise hesitate to commit the offence; but the knowledge that they might be tapped on the shoulder and taken off would no doubt deter them. Another reason for adopting the word "felony" was that it had a nasty sound, and people did not like to be called felons.

VISCOUNT BURY
said, he should oppose the Amendment. The Committee appeared to have lost sight of the fact that this was intended to be a protective measure, instead of which they were constructing misdemeanours by the dozen, and now they were attempting to construct a felony. The offence could be equally as well punished by retaining the word "misdemeanour," and punishing the offence with two years' imprisonment with hard labour. He agreed with the proposals of the Bill up to the penal clauses; but since they had been under discussion he had been in a state of perpetual mental irritation, which increased every day from the fact of their multiplying penalties and threatening voters in every possible way. The Bill, as introduced, was tolerably mild and satisfactory; but since its introduction fanatical admirers of secret voting had proposed Amendments which were at once accepted by the Government, and which had completely altered the character of the Bill. The proposal before the Committee was not brought forward by the Government, and it passed his comprehension to know why the occupants of the Treasury bench should accept it with so much avidity. It was not 10 minutes since the Vice President of the Council moved the clause, and he wished to know why the right hon. Gentleman did not stick to his own proposal.

MR. GREGORY
did not rise to oppose the Amendment, but said no severer condemnation had been passed upon the Bill as a whole than was contained in the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Taunton (Mr. James), who said that the measure gave facilities and inducements 1853 for personation, and as a means of meeting the case, proposed that the offence should be stigmatized as a felony. He hoped that would be understood by the Committee and the country.

§ MR. W. FOWLER
said, he should support the Amendment, for he had no sympathy with the man who committed personation. The Committee were not now discussing the question of punishment, but simply the name by which the offence of personation should be known, and felony was not, in his opinion, too strong a term.

§ MR. DENISON
, in supporting the Amendment, said, that he could not admit that personation was a parallel offence to those other offences that were designated misdemeanours in the Bill. It was exceedingly difficult to prove a conviction under the present law. The only time when it would be possible to bring home the offence to the offender would be in the few moments of time during which the would-be personator asked for his voting paper and attempted to fill it up. It was of great importance that there should be power to apprehend him then and there.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he could not admit the validity of the objections which the noble Lord (Viscount Bury) had taken to the course of the Government. He prepared the clause under discussion; but it was his duty to adopt any suggestions which in his view would improve the proposal of the Government. In that view, the grounds put forward on behalf of the Amendment were well worthy of consideration, and he thought the Government would be very much to blame if they did not consider whether there would be some advantage in changing the character of the offence, as proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Taunton, and if they found that, by so doing, it would be easier to detect the offender, it was their duty to adopt the change. He was not aware of the effect of the difference of the use of the two words when the Bill was drawn, and now that their attention was drawn to it, they would be blamed if they did not attend to it. Therefore, he regarded the proposal as an improvement, and asked the Committee to adopt it. He could not accept the interpretation put upon the Bill by the hon. Member for East Sussex (Mr. Gregory). He thought 1854 that as in the past so in the future, personation would be an offence, and all the Government desired was that it should be punished. On the whole, he thought the Bill would render the commission of the offence less easy than it had been up to the present time.

VISCOUNT GALWAY
objected to the use of the ugly word felony, and suggested that, without altering the verbal description of the offence of personation, power of immediate arrest should be given in cases where personation was attempted.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he was of opinion that a strong reason for supporting the Amendment was, that the use of the word felony would have a deterrent effect.

§ MR. BOWRING
said, he did not see why personation should not be described as felony, because to personate a voter was to deprive him of what most men regarded as a valuable possession.

§ MR. HERON
said, he should support the Amendment, on the ground that the men guilty of personation deserved a severe punishment. They were generally employed at a high rate; they ran the risk; they were unknown, and were selected as being unknown, and sometimes voted 10, or even 40 times.

§ MR. M'CARTHY DOWNING
objected to changing a misdemeanour into a felony, and considered it an extreme proposal on the part of the hon. and learned Gentleman in his desire to make elections pure. He protested against making the offence a felony instead of a misdemeanour, for felony brought disgrace not only on the man, but on his family; and if this offence were made a misdemeanour it would be quite sufficient.

§ MR. WHEELHOUSE
said, he must protest most emphatically against it being henceforward said that the penal clauses came from the Opposition side of the House, and would absolve himself from all responsibility for such a state of things.

§ MR. DIMSDALE
said, he was of opinion that no sufficient security against personation was provided by the Bill, and would, therefore, gladly avail himself of the opportunity of voting for the Amendment.

MR. SCOURFIELD
maintained that there was a wide distinction between personation for the purpose of obtaining 1855 money, as in the case of dividends, and personation for the purpose of obtaining a vote; and the two offences ought not to be treated as of the same gravity.

§ MR. BUTT
said, he must object to the Amendment on the ground that, while in practice it would not increase the punishment for personation, any private person, if the Amendment were adopted, would be able to seize a man whom he had reasonable cause to suspect of being guilty of personation. Was that a wise power to confer upon heated partizans during the excitement of an election?

§ MR. G. BENTINCK
said, it appeared to him that the House was in a state of bewilderment with respect to the Bill. Sides were completely transposed. Hon. Gentlemen on his side of the House had long been charged with being oppressors of the people; but now hon. Gentlemen on the other side were trying to induce the Committee to sanction a system of Star Chamber legislation. The people generally did not look on political offences of this kind as serious offences, but looked upon matters connected with elections as a joke. He trusted the House, therefore, would not sanction this kind of penal legislation, and could hardly believe that the right hon. Gentleman who had charge of the Bill could, in the hopeless prospect before him, expect to spur his almost dead progeny into a state of animation.

§ MR. GORDON
said, he could support the Amendment without fear of being charged with inconsistency. This Amendment would not create any new offence, but would only increase the punishment of a crime from which all honourable men revolted. Forgery committed with a view to acquire money, however small the amount, was treated as felony, without regard to the feelings of those related to the person who committed the offence. The Committee should do all in its power to prevent this crime, and one reason in favour of stamping it as a felony was that it would render the apprehension of the guilty more easy.

MR. HENLEY
said, he was of opinion that with regard to the question under notice, the punishment attached to the commission of a misdemeanour was sufficient, and that more persons would be punished for personation if it were regarded as a misdemeanour than if it were made a felony. At election 1856 times people were occasionally not very particular as to the charges they made against each other; and it should be remembered that a person accused of felony was laid hold of by the police and treated in a manner somewhat sharper than if it was a case of misdemeanour; therefore, he should, for one, be quite satisfied to leave the offence as a misdemeanour, which carried two years' imprisonment—a pretty severe punishment; and he was inclined to believe that by that means they would punish more offenders, because they would find more persons disposed to help them, than if they made it felony.

§ DR. BALL
said, that if the Committee meant to punish, the best punishment would be that which was the most efficacious. With that in view, he was in favour of certainty of conviction rather than of severity of punishment. It was, however, extremely difficult to combine certainty of conviction and severity of punishment; and if he had to choose between the two in cases like this, he should, with Paley and Mackintosh, prefer a milder punishment, with certainty of conviction, to a heavier punishment, with uncertainty of conviction.

§ MR. W. M. TORRENS
said, he must object to the proposed addition to the list of felonies, which was essentially different from any other felony that he could call to mind. Any candid person must admit that in the tumult and excitement of a contested election there would be a considerable liability to mistake the identity of a man who was suspected of being about to commit personation. He did not think it would be wise to convert that measure, which was intended for a very different purpose, into a Bill of severe pains and penalties.

§ MR. M'LAREN
said, the object in view was not to catch as many criminals as possible, but to deter as many persons as possible from the commission of crime; and he was satisfied that if the offence were made a felony, it would have a far more deterrent effect in Scotland than if it were left as a misdemeanour.

§ MR. SALT
said, he was of opinion that, as their present legislation was experimental, the safest course would be to enact the more lenient penalty. If experience proved it to be insufficient for the purpose its severity could hereafter be easily increased.

§ MR. DISRAELI
said, he felt certain that they would have great difficulties to encounter in connection with the measure; and that if they pursued a policy of pains and penalties they would render the Bill most unpopular with the country, and one quite impossible to be applied, to the present state of society. He hoped, therefore, they would abstain from a division, and that the general feeling of the Committee would be to support the proposition as originally made by the Government.

§ MR. JAMES
, who had given Notice of an Amendment making the offence of personation punishable by penal servitude for a term not exceeding five years, said that, perceiving that it was the feeling of the Committee that such a penalty was too great, he would defer to that feeling, and with the leave of the Committee would withdraw his Amendment.

§ MR. H. B. SAMUELSON
proposed, after the words "hard labour," to insert the words— And shall be incapable of being elected or sitting in Parliament during the seven years next after the date of his being found guilty of such offence. The object he had in view in proposing this addition to the previous punishment was that he thought personation quite as great an offence as bribery, and therefore one to be equally punished by civil disqualification.

§ MR. M. CHAMBERS
said, he must object to the Amendment. If it were adopted, John Jones, after personating Thomas Smith, and undergoing two years' imprisonment for the offence, might offer himself as a candidate for an independent ballot borough, and the Returning Officer would tell him that at present he was ineligible, but that after the lapse of seven years he would be thoroughly whitewashed, and might be a most admirable representative. He did not wish to ridicule the proposal, but such would be its effect; and were he able to be a hard worker in this matter, he could detect other extraordinary oversights in some of the propositions submitted to the Committee.

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
said, he was sure that nobody acquainted with his hon. and learned Friend would think that he intended to be ludicrous on this or any other subject. His hon. and learned Friend had shown that the Amendment was impracticable, and the Government could not support it. Whatever criminal penalties might attach to personation, a Parliamentary disability ought not to follow the decision of any tribunal but an election tribunal, certainly not the verdict of a common jury, which, with all respect to such a body, might not be one which everybody would acquiesce in. A Parliamentary disability might be imposed by an Election Judge, but it ought not to be the result of the finding of any other tribunal.

§ MR. HERON
said, he should support the Amendment, on the ground that the person who procured or abetted personation ought to be punished.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he could assure the hon. and learned Gentleman that the person procuring personation would be placed in a most disagreeable position before the end of the Bill was reached.

§ DR. BALL
said, he had been convinced by the remarks of the hon. and learned Member for Devonport that the Amendment was objectionable. It was absurd to suppose that a person who personated or abetted personation would ever be a candidate.

§ SIR FRANCIS GOLDSMID
said, that he wished to substitute for this clause one similar to that which he had proposed last year, which enacted that in the case of bribery being proved against the successful candidate the seat should go to the one next highest on the poll, provided that he had received the votes of one-third of the electors. If in any borough, alongside of two strong parties, there was a third party capable of turning the election and open to bribery, it was important that there should be some means of effectually punishing such bribery. Under this clause, however, an unsuccessful candidate who petitioned against his opponent on the ground of bribery might strike off a few votes from his opponent's score, but would not be secure of gaining the seat. At present a Petition on the ground of bribery was a bad speculation, and the clause would do nothing to mend that defect in the law. His object was to make it unprofitable to bribe, whereas under this clause the penalties attaching to the offence would not be such as always to prevent its being committed. If, however, it was known that the effect of bribing for a candidate would be, not only to eject him from his seat, but also to confer it upon the other candidate, they might be sure that purity in elections would be very generally observed.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, it was now a bad speculation for a candidate to bribe, because he lost his seat if he were found out. His hon. and learned Friend said that if his suggestion were adopted, it would be a better speculation for a candidate to be pure. Undoubtedly it would, but at this cost—that the Act of Parliament would, under these circumstances, make the minority return a Member instead of the majority. Thus if one candidate polled 1,000 votes, and he bribed one or two voters, a candidate who had polled only 400 votes would be returned. Such a result would not be desirable, and the result of the remedy would be too dear a price to pay for the additional security.

§ DR. BALL
said, that the hon. and learned Baronet the Member for Reading appeared to think only of the convenience of the two political parties at an election, and to lose sight altogether of the constituency itself. At Wexford that day an election had taken place, in which one of the candidates had polled over 1860 100 votes, another over 20, and the third had polled none. Now, would it be right to afford an opportunity in such an instance to secure the seat to the candidate in the minority if a single bribed vote could be proved against the winning Member?

§ SIR FRANCIS GOLDSMID
said, that he proposed to make it necessary that the unsuccessful candidate should have secured one-third of the votes.

§ DR. BALL
said, that was very well, but in many of the larger constituencies one-third of the voters would not represent much more than the cypher did in a constituency like that of Wexford.

§ MR. JAMES
moved, in line 2, to leave out "some other," in order to insert "any," so that it might be provided that, where a candidate on the trial of an Election Petition, claiming the seat for any person— Is proved to have been guilty, by himself or by any person on his behalf, of bribery, treating, or undue influence in respect of any person who voted at such Election, there shall, on a scrutiny, be struck off from the number of votes appearing to have been given to such candidate, one vote for every person who voted at such Election and is proved to have been bribed, treated, or unduly influenced by such candidate or by any person on his behalf.

§ MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCK
said, he must ask for some explanation as to the intention the right hon. Gentleman had in framing the clause. For his part he strongly objected to the provision, because it was calculated to create bad votes, and when the proper time arrived he should be disposed to take the sense of the Committee on this clumsy expedient of the Government.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he had no objection to the Amendment proposed by his hon. and learned Friend. With regard to the remarks of the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down, it would no doubt have been the duty of some Member of the Government to explain the clause, had it been brought forward in the usual way. The clause, however, was taken from the Corrupt Practices Bill. The hon. Gentleman might properly raise his question upon it when the Motion was made for adding the clause to the present measure.

§ MR. JAMES
proposed, in line 4, after the word "Election" to insert these words— Or any person retained or employed for reward by or on behalf of such candidate for all or any of the purposes of such Election, as agent, clerk, messenger, or in any other employment, is proved to have voted at such Election. The object of the clause was, in fact, to give a scrutiny to a certain extent, and what he wanted to do was this—if it were proved that an agent for a candidate had voted, a vote should be struck off from the poll of the person whose agent he was, the great probability being that the man would vote for the candidate who had employed him. But the candidate would prevent his agent from voting if he knew that if the agent voted he should lose a vote.

MR. GREGORY
said, the Committee ought to be told what would be the real effect of this clause upon the whole character of the Bill. It seemed to him to propose a rough kind of justice, for it might so happen that one of the purest votes given at the election might be struck off.

§ MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCK
said, that his hon. and learned Friend could hardly have been serious in moving this Amendment. Supposing there was a messenger or agent who considered that he had not been very well treated, all he would have to do would be to go to the poll, vote for the candidate who was opposed to his employer, and the result would be that a vote would be struck off his employer's poll. In that way a candidate, who was quite innocent, would be mulcted in two votes.

§ MR. GOLDSMID
said, he must remind the hon. Gentleman that he appeared to have forgotten that any person employed by a candidate was not allowed to record his vote. If he did, he was guilty of a misdemeanour.

MR. GATHORNE HARDY
said, the proposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to him the extreme of absurdity, because having shut out all 1862 scrutiny and all means of ascertaining what had been done, Parliament now took upon itself to guess at what had been done. The whole gist of the Bill was, that we were never to find out how a man had voted, and was Parliament on that account to take upon itself to decide that in a particular instance a man had voted in a particular way? It was clear, in the case of a person of this class receiving reward for services rendered at the election, that by his choosing to vote against his employer, he practically gave two votes to his employer's opponent. They could not tell how he voted, and so, assuming that he voted in a particular way, they decided against the candidate who was innocent. He objected to this question being treated as a Member's question, when it was essentially one for the constituency; and, practically, the effect would be to give a man two votes who should have only one.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
said, it was very easy to tell your opponents that what was proposed was the height of absurdity, and no case was so inherently bad as that when abuse was resorted to in lieu of argument. That was not only the current opinion in the profession to which he belonged, but he could also testify the fact from his own experience. Let the Committee examine the statement that two votes would be given to the wrong man. If a man was untrustworthy, whose fault was it? That of the man who employed him. The whole theory of election law depended upon this maxim—that a man was responsible for the acts of his agents. He was responsible because he selected those agents. He was not the less responsible because he not only selected but paid those agents. Therefore, if the agents were so treacherous that they voted against the candidate who employed them, as assumed by the right hon. Gentleman opposite, that showed very bad judgment on the part of the candidate who employed them. But he (the Solicitor General) had yet to learn that the general maxim of the law, which said that a man who did something by the hand of another was responsible for the act of that other, was to be broken in upon in the case of an election. In the case supposed—namely, that of a paid agent voting against his employer, not two votes, but one vote 1863 was struck from the poll of his employer.

§ DR. BALL
said, this clause was inconsistent with the theory of the Ballot Bill. It proceeded on the supposition that the person bribed would keep faith with the man who bribed him, while the Ballot was based on the principle that when the voter was protected by secrecy he would record his suffrage independently.

VISCOUNT BURY
said, that on each occasion on which he had supported the Government against Amendments in this Bill he had been defeated by the Government itself accepting Amendments, and not only accepting Amendments, but denouncing in most unmeasured terms those who were faithful to the Bill. In the beginning of the evening it was a misdemeanour to personate voters; but his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Taunton suggested that, instead of a misdemeanour, it should be a felony, and his right hon. Friend (Mr. W. E. Forster) at once discovered that the Amendment of his hon. and learned Friend would be a great improvement of the Bill, and when the Friends of the Bill demanded that the right hon. Gentleman should adhere to the Bill, he went into the lobby and voted against them. And now as to the clause immediately before the Committee, his hon. and learned Friend suggested another Amendment. Not only was that Amendment at once accepted by the right hon. Gentleman, but the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General got up and spoke with some warmth in favour of that Amendment, as if it had been originally inserted in the Bill, and denounced those hon. Gentlemen who refused to follow his hon. and learned Friend in making a change in the Government Bill. The principle of the Ballot Bill was entire secrecy; but the principle the Government were now endeavouring to establish was either a violation of that secrecy, or a constructive violation of it. A Permissive Ballot Bill was, in his opinion, a fully justifiable and good measure; but to bolster up that Ballot Bill by one penal clause after another was essentially un-English, and contrary to the principle on which the Government originally said they intended to proceed, and on which the Bill was allowed to be read a second time. The clauses were penal enough 1864 already, and to make them more penal was not worthy of the House, and that course would be denounced by the country.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he thought his noble Friend misunderstood the position of the Committee, and the reason why this clause was proposed to be inserted in the Bill. This clause was one of two clauses in the Corrupt Practices Bill, which both sides of the House—and especially the opposite side of the House—wished to be incorporated in the Bill when it reached the Committee. The Corrupt Practices Bill was as much a Government Bill as the Ballot Bill. The clause now under discussion was almost precisely similar to the 23rd clause, which was passed in the Ballot Bill of last year, and to which his noble Friend did not object, and of which he believed he approved.

§ SIR MICHAEL HICKS-BEACH
said, that the clause as it stood seemed to him to be the height of absurdity, notwithstanding what the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General had stated on the subject.

§ MR. JAMES
said, that the contingency of a treacherous agent was a very unlikely one. His Amendment was designed to prevent the colourable employment as agents of a large number of voters who would virtually be bribed, and to secure that the agents should be few in number and high-minded men. Without it there would be a danger of numerous Petitions, and of innocent Members being unseated for the acts of persons whose proceedings they never sanctioned.

§ MR. HERMON
said, what had just fallen from the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. James) convinced him that there was no safety in the Bill at all. If there were no means of ascertaining how the electors voted, there was no necessity for Election Petitions at all. It was the duty of the Government to frame a clause to verify the votes. He wanted to know from the right hon. Gentleman who had charge of the Bill how he intended, when an Election Petition was presented against the return of a candidate, to prove whether there had been any guilt or not connected with the election? He saw nothing in the Bill to bring guilt home to anyone.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
, in reply, said, that if a man not entitled to vote was seen to vote by the Returning Officer or any person in the booth, he would be subject to the present punishment, and a Petition would lie against the election on that account.

MR. GATHORNE HARDY
said, he agreed that persons voting who were not entitled to do so should be punished. Why, however, should any one else be punished? The hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General appeared to think treachery impossible, but the whole Bill was founded on the supposition of treachery. There never was formed such an opportunity for bribing as under the clause; and by it, it would be a most judicious investment to bribe the clerks and messengers employed by one's opponent, for if six persons employed by A voted for B, six votes would be struck off A's poll, thus gaining 12 votes for B. Cases of treachery had, however, come before Committees of that House. In one instance, a candidate told his committee it was time for them to vote, whereupon they all went and voted for the other candidate, and so turned the election. The Bill would enable them to act thus without being found out, and it was now further proposed to punish a candidate who might be quite innocent by guessing at what had occurred. The punishment would also be inflicted on the constituency, which had a right to be represented by the candidate with the majority of good votes. The Bill, moreover, shut out a scrutiny—the present means of ascertaining who had the real majority—and it was proposed to make a guess that, under certain circumstances, a vote was given in a particular way. Now, in one of the American States—Ohio, he believed—evidence might be offered to show how it was likely a man would vote, the jury deciding whether he had actually done so, but here the matter was to be decided without evidence at all; and questions upon which there was no knowledge, and on which, according to the principles of the Bill, there ought to be none, were to be decided, and a constituency was to be insulted by a Member being imposed on it who had not a legitimate majority.

VISCOUNT BURY
wished to ask his right hon. Friend—whose extreme courtesy in answering his perhaps warm speech he gratefully acknowledged— 1866 whether the Amendment of the hon. and earned Gentleman the Member for Taunton formed part of a clause taken Torn the Corrupt Practices Bill, in accordance with the general understanding to which he had referred? If the words proposed by the hon. and learned Gentleman formed no part of the clause of that Bill, he (Viscount Bury) thought he had not misapprehended the question, and had not entirely merited his right hon. Friend's rebuke.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he was glad his noble Friend had put the Question, as he did not wish a false impression to prevail. The words now proposed were not in the Corrupt Practices Bill, nor were they in the Bill of last year. He had understood his noble Friend's criticisms to be directed at the principle of the whole clause, and the discussion had appeared to him to be drifting—as not unfrequently happened—from the actual Amendment to the principle of the whole clause. If he had been wrong in so understanding his noble Friend he must apologize to him.

VISCOUNT BURY
explained that he had objected not to the whole clause, but to the readiness with which the Government accepted the Amendments of the hon. and learned Member for Taunton.

MR. STAVELEY HILL
said, he thought they ought to adhere to the old law—that a person who was employed as agent for the purpose of the election was not an agent beyond the purpose for which he was employed. He hoped they would not sanction an Amendment which would allow a person who committed a fraud on his employer to vitiate the whole election.

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL
said, he must firmly contend that a man was responsible for the acts of his agents. The present proposal would deter candidates from employing voters, which was very often done from impure motives. If this Amendment did no more than prevent the employment of voters it would do much to promote purity of election.

§ MR. G. BENTINCK
asked the right hon. Gentleman, if it was his intention to deal with the subject of agency in Parliamentary elections? If so, he (Mr. Bentinck) hoped he would take care that a clause was inserted clearly defining what was and what was not agency.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
, in reply, said, he had that day been considering the definition of agents under the Bill, and believed that it was sufficiently defined in a subsequent clause; but if not clearly done he would undertake that before the Bill went through Committee it should properly define who were agents.

§ COLONEL BARTTELOT (for Mr. PERCY WYNDHAM)
rose to move the following clause:— (Limit of the Act.) This Act shall remain in force from and after its passing and during the twelve whole calendar months next following the first General Election that shall take place under the provisions of the said Act, and shall then expire. The hon. and gallant Member said, that no one who had watched the progress of the Bill in Committee could fail to perceive that it had not received from the Government that careful consideration which a measure of such importance deserved. It was a Bill of Pains and Penalties, and the right hon. Gentleman in charge of it himself could not deny that he had been unable to fix the amount of the penalties. The term of two years' imprisonment originally proposed as a punishment for certain offences had been reduced to three months, at the suggestion of an hon. Gentleman who sat below the gangway; whereas, in another part of the Bill, three months' imprisonment had been increased to six months, on the proposal of an hon. Member who unfortunately sat on the Opposition side of the House. By its vote the other night, the House had expressed its opinion in favour of permissive secrecy, and therefore he thought he was justified in asking that the country should give the measure one trial before it was finally accepted. If it failed to do that which its supporters believed it would accomplish, we might revert to the old method of open voting, and do away with this miserable secret system. The hon. and gallant Member concluded by moving the clause of which Notice had been given.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, the hon. and gallant Member seemed to think 1868 the Bill ought only to be in force for a year because, in his judgment, the Ballot would be permissive. The Government, however, were of opinion that the Bill ordered the voting to be conducted with secrecy; and that, notwithstanding the rejection of the Amendment of his hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Leatham), which would have subjected to a certain punishment electors who displayed their votes, there remained in Clause 4 the strongest possible enactments for insuring secrecy. The hon. and gallant Gentleman had also argued that the Bill should be in force only for a year because certain alterations had been made in it during its passage through Committee; but surely that circumstance could not be seriously adduced as a reason for giving only a temporary existence to the measure. Moreover, as a matter of fact, very few alterations had been made in the Bill, considering its magnitude and importance. He, therefore, felt sure the Committee would not, by agreeing to the clause, pledge the next Session or the next Parliament to the certainty of having to discuss another Ballot Bill.

§ MR. FAWCETT
, in rising to move the insertion of a new clause providing that the expenses of elections be charged upon the rates of the localities in which the elections are held, said, he thought it was unfortunate that the clause should be discussed as a question of admitting working men to Parliament, for the principle of the clause, involving as it did the question as to who should bear the legitimate expenses incurred by any person in obtaining a seat in that House, was so important, and he also thought was so just, that it was desirable to pass it, even though under its operation no single working man was elected to Parliament. Moreover, the House, in order to remove what might be considered a reasonable prejudice of working men that they were at present prevented from attaining that desired end, ought to show that it wished to erect no insuperable barrier to any man, be he rich or poor, in obtaining a seat in Parliament. The great majority by which the proposal of the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. W. M. Torrens) to charge the expense of elections upon the Consolidated Fund was rejected showed that 1869 the majority of those who wished the candidates to be relieved from the payment desired that the payment should be made from the rates; and, therefore, all those hon. Members should be in a position now to support the proposal he laid before the Committee. Though he had voted against the hon. Member for Devonshire (Sir Massey Lopes) the other night on the question of local taxation, he acknowledged the importance of that question; but he must remind the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Buckinghamshire that, in the course of the last debate on this subject, he said the Conservative party would oppose any proposal to lay fresh burdens upon local rates; but the right hon. Gentleman could not oppose the present clause consistently with the fact that but for the assistance of the Conservative party the Education Act, which imposed a somewhat considerable expense upon the local rates all over the kingdom, would not have been passed. He could not expect that anything he might say would induce hon. Gentlemen opposite to change their opinion, and he feared that the result of the division on his clause would show that there was very little truth in the rumour that there existed a peculiar connection between hon. Gentlemen opposite and himself. If, however, a number of those hon. Gentlemen would come over and support him, he could bear with equanimity and composure a repetition of the taunt which had been directed against him. The principal opponents of his clause were the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt), and the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Taunton (Mr. James); but with regard to some of those Gentlemen, what did they witness only a week ago? The hon. and learned Member for Oxford stood up like a penitent, and repudiated the assistance he had derived from the hon. and learned Member for Taunton, whom he described as his "guide, philosopher, and friend." He hoped the hon. and learned Member for Oxford would remember the unfortunate guidance, and that he would again treat the House to a similar act of repentance. The opponents of the Bill based much of their opposition to his proposal on the statement that it would be unpopular with the constituencies, because it would increase the number of candidates, and so add to the cost; but 1870 he knew, as the result of his own observation and calculation, that it would not increase the rates by an eighth of a farthing in the pound, and would not cause the occupant of a £10 house to pay more than three-halfpence once in two years. Moreover, putting the question broadly, he did not think there was any assembly of Englishmen but would admit the unfairness of taxing a Member of Parliament for the privilege of serving his country and his constituents who had imposed a considerable amount of local duty upon him. He could not accept the view that the placing the cost of elections upon the rates would increase the number of candidates, for at present any candidate, even though he had no chance of success, was looked upon as a benefactor by those among whom his candidature would cause money to be spent; but if the ratepayers had themselves to bear the cost, they would concentrate their energies in opposition to the candidature of men who might involve them in costly and unnecessary contests. He believed, further, that no proposal had ever been brought before Parliament which had been received with greater unanimity by the public Press than had the one he now asked the Committee to agree to. Every organ of the public Press in London, with the single exception of The Morning Post—and the exception was an instructive one—had urged Parliament to accept the principle of his clause. Whether, however, the House accepted or rejected his proposal, he should not quarrel with the decision. If the verdict was for rejection, he should persevere with it year after year—as he intended to do with another question to which it was not necessary further to refer—and when public opinion had so far re-acted upon Parliament as to induce it to accept his proposal, he hoped hon. Members would not be found to charge him with having turned his back upon his principles. The hon. Member concluded by moving the insertion of the clause of which he had given Notice.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, that as claimed by his Hon. Friend, he must admit the importance of the clause proposed; but he feared that a majority of the House would not be in favour of its adoption, and he deeply regretted the fact. If, however, the principle advocated by his hon. Friend was not accepted then, a comparatively short time would elapse before the hopes of his hon. Friend would be realized; for he (Mr. W. E. Forster) believed public opinion was tending to the conclusion that it was the duty of the constituencies to bear the expense of returning their representatives to Parliament. But his chief argument was this—that there never was a time when it was more important, more expedient, or more wise, that we should do out utmost to induce every man and class of men who had strong political feelings to take their part in the constitutional government of this country. Important questions were coming before us, questions in which many of our fellow-subjects took a deep interest, on which they might be mistaken, but which affected the most important interests of the community, such as the position of labourers and capitalists, of those who held property and those who did not; and nothing could be of greater consequence than that those who had views on those subjects should not be discouraged from taking a part in their discussion. We should earnestly wish that those men should be on the floor of the House to hear the arguments which might be advanced against their views; and he believed that the present provision, which threw the legal expenses of election on the candidates, did operate to prevent them from coming into the House of Commons. It would be said that this was only a small part of the legitimate expenses. That was true, but a man, for instance, who was a member of a trades' union would be enabled to avoid a good many expenses, such as advertising, which other candidates would have to pay. He earnestly desired that such men should be in the House, and he would give his cordial support to the clause; indeed, he thought it was a mistake to oppose their entrance.

§ MR. CORRANCE
said, he had voted for this proposal of the hon. Member for Brighton six years ago, and although it might be said that he ought to wear a white sheet in consequence, he saw no 1872 reason to repent of what he had done. But there were reasons why he could not record his vote for the clause to-night. Ever since he had been a Member of the House he had given a consistent vote, and six years ago, when he voted with the hon. Member for Brighton, he anticipated that the burdens of local taxation, which pressed so heavily on the taxpayers, would soon be removed. In that expectation he was disappointed, and, therefore, he threw on the Government, who had failed in reducing the inequalities of local taxation of which he complained as well as in other matters, the responsibility for the vote which he would give to-night.

§ MR. MAGNIAC
said, this was a very important question, and it was not right that it should be hustled through the Committee. There were three important points involved in this proposal—the main question, the question of rates, and the question of justice. He felt confident that this was a clause which the House ought not to pass, and equally so that there was not the slightest chance of its being carried. He did not quite understand whether the Government were going to support the clause. [Mr. W. E. FORSTER: Certainly we are.] The House could not have forgotten what had occurred a few nights ago. He (Mr. Magniac) supported the Government the other night against the Motion of the hon. Baronet the Member for South Devon (Sir Massey Lopes), who attacked a special point of local taxation. What was the main argument of the Government in opposition to the Motion of the hon. Baronet? The strongest point urged by the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board was, that if the Resolution of the hon. Baronet were carried, the Government would not be in a position to touch local taxation; and yet here the Government were supporting the hon. Member for Brighton in his proposal to add to the rates which already existed. Moreover, the adoption of the clause would contravene the principles which the House had agreed to; for while in the present case it was not even proposed to divide this rate between the owner and occupier, yet one of the great stumbling-blocks in the way of the Education Act was, that the occupier had to pay the whole of the rate. Did the Committee suppose that if this new proposal 1873 were carried, there would be no grievance for boroughs and counties? After the election, when the collector went round collecting their half-pence, pence, and shillings from the poor people for the expenses of the candidate to whom they were probably opposed, did the Committee think there would be no discontent? It might do very well in large boroughs, such as that which the hon. Member for Brighton represented, where the constituents were almost all of one way of thinking; but in the smaller boroughs, where parties were pretty evenly balanced, they were going, if this clause passed, to compel a very large minority to pay the expenses of the man to whom they were opposed. Did any one mean to say that that would be satisfactory to the country? Was it to be supposed that there was a magistrate in the kingdom who would send a man to prison for refusing to pay the rate? The consequence would be that the law would be broken. As to the 2nd clause forming a part of the scheme of the hon. Member for Brighton—

THE CHAIRMAN
said, that as that clause was not then the subject of discussion, the hon. Gentleman was out of Order in dealing with it.

§ MR. HUNT
said, he must submit to the Chairman that the clause to which the hon. Member was referring was subsidiary to that actually before the Committee, and that it was impossible to ascertain the true import of the clause moved unless the whole scheme was discussed.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the clause under consideration had reference to the payment of election expenses out of the rates, but the hon. Member was proceeding to read and argue on the following clause when he stopped him.

§ MR. HUNT
contended that the first clause dealt with the payment of expenses generally, and that the second dealt with providing funds for that purpose, when there was more than one county rate. The two formed part of the same scheme, and it was competent for the hon. Member to discuss the two clauses, because it was impossible to see the full bearing of the first unless the second were referred to.

MR. GLADSTONE
contended that that was a new doctrine, and that while the hon. Member would be in Order if he referred generally to the character of the 1874 Plan, he would not be in order in building an argument on the words of the 2nd clause.

§ MR. DISRAELI
said, he would call attention to the fact that the hon. Member for Brighton had in his argument entered generally into his whole scheme, and in order to follow him it was absolutely necessary to discuss the whole scheme. The Committee, therefore, had under its consideration the general scope of the scheme proposed by the hon. Member for Brighton, and if the ruling of the Chairman were supported it would be impossible to have the discussion.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, that if the hon. Member for Brighton had made any allusion to the 2nd clause it had entirely escaped his notice.

§ SIR GEORGE JENKINSON
said, he wished to ask a Question—namely, whether the clause had been divided into parts; and, if so, which part was under he consideration of the Committee? ["Order, order!"]

THE CHAIRMAN
said, the question before the Committee was the whole of the first clause, moved by the hon. Member for Brighton for the payment of election expenses, and if the hon. Member for St. Ives had confined himself to that, he should not have interfered on the point of Order.

§ SIR GEORGE JENKINSON
said, he must again appeal to the Chairman to state to the Committee the point upon which he had stopped the hon. Member.

THE CHAIRMAN
said, upon the point that there was no question before the Committee for dividing the clause.

§ MR. MAGNIAC
said, that it was impossible to discuss the clause without touching upon the following one. He would, however, point out that the fact that the 2nd clause gave compulsory powers to the justices showed how impossible it would be to carry out the scheme. Upon the question generally he submitted that the amount which would be added by the scheme to the rates was not a matter for consideration. The church rate grievance was evidence of that. He did not wish to pay the expenses of hon. Gentlemen opposite, and he presumed they had the same feeling with regard to his.

MR. H. R. BRAND
said, he had voted for the principle embodied in this Amendment when moved by the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. W. M. 1875 Torrens), and had since seen no reason for changing his opinions. He did not sympathize with the objection that the scheme would produce a multiplicity of candidates, and, at the same time, thought it was utterly wrong in principle to preserve the the representation in the hands of the wealthy. It was equally wrong in principle, either that the candidate should be obliged to pay the expenses himself, or that he should depend upon others for the payment of them. He concurred, however, in the opinion that whenever the public expenses of elections were made a charge upon the locality, it would be right and proper for the different candidates to give some pecuniary guarantee for the bonâ fide nature of their candidature, that they intended to go to the poll, and that they had a resonable chance of success. As to the second objection—namely, the burden that would be thrown on the rates, it was for that reason that he had opposed the proposal of the hon. Member for Brighton, and supported the clause on that subject in the Government Bill of last year. But since that time the situation had entirely changed. It was more than a week ago that the House decided by a very large majority that the present incidence of local taxation was unjust; and it seemed to him quite clear that the result of that vote would be that the existing Government, or any Government which was in power, would have to take up—and he trusted that this Parliament itself would take up—that question, and remedy some of the grievances under which the local ratepayers undoubtedly suffered. Thinking that those grievance would be so remedied, he would, for the sake of the principle it involved, support by his vote the Motion of the hon. Member for Brighton.

§ COLONEL BERESFORD
said, he must oppose the clause, because it would encourage candidates coming forward in large numbers for their own gratification merely. As to the clause admitting working men, he believed that the poor candidates who had stood for that House and had not succeeded in obtaining seats, owed their exclusion to no difficulty on the score of money, but to the unwillingness of the electors of their own class to return them. He also objected to imposing that additional burden on the ratepayers.

§ MR. PELL
said, he was astounded that the Government, in the face of the decision come to the other night on the subject of local taxation, should now give their assent to a clause proposed by an hon. Member below the gangway for throwing new charges on the already overburdened rates. He could not understand how a Minister could reconcile such a course of conduct with the respect due to a solemn decision of the House.

§ MR. M'CARTHY DOWNING
said, that when this proposal was made last year, he voted against it. To-night, however, he intended to vote for it. Since the Prorogation he had consulted his constituents, and found that this proposal had their universal assent. He would for that reason, and also because his own convictions on the subject had entirely changed, now give it his support.

§ MR. GREENE
said, that the logical conclusion from the arguments urged in favour of that clause must be the payment of Members. The expense of getting elected to that House was not to be compared to the expense of sitting there; and how could a working man who could not pay the cost of the hustings afford to maintain himself while acting as a Member of that House? Moreover, the ratepayers most strongly objected to defray the expenses of candidates, and would tell them that if they wanted to get into Parliament they must pay them themselves, or, if the would not do so, that there were plenty other candidates who would.

§ MR. SERJEANT SIMON
said, it was with regret he found that the Government themselves had not brought forward such a clause as a part of their Bill, as it was the logical corollary of the abolition of the property qualification for Members And, further, the present state of the law on that subject was most unsatisfactory.

§ MR. FAWCETT
said, after the result of the division, he would at once withdraw the other clauses of which he had given Notice.

§ MR. WHEELHOUSE
proposed a new clause, providing for the use of voting papers for sick, infirm, or disabled voters 1877 unable to go to the poll. It was a great hardship that a person should be deprived of his vote from a circumstance over which he had no control, and if voting papers were proper for University elections, it must be right to use them in cases of this kind. These papers would be a great safeguard; to allow their use would be an act of justice; and the proposition therefore deserved the consideration of the House.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, it had been already decided not to adopt the principle of voting papers, and the wording of this clause would present special difficulties, because a description of the voter being required, the secrecy of the Ballot would be entirely destroyed. He admitted that the cases in question were arguments in favour of voting-papers, but the Committee had come to the conclusion that the principle of personal voting must be adhered to.

§ MR. R. N. FOWLER
said, he thought the subject too important to be discussed at so late an hour (20 minutes to 1 o'clock), and would move that the Chairman report Progress.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
expressed a hope that the Motion for reporting Progress would not be pressed.

§ COLONEL NORTH
then moved, That the Chairman do now leave the Chair.

§ MR. W. E. FORSTER
said, he had no wish to prolong the discussion, and if the hon. and gallant Gentleman would withdraw the Motion he had just made he would consent to report Progress.

§ MR. C. S. READ
said, that he had been already 13 hours engaged in public work, and had to be on a Committee at 12 o'clock again. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would be satisfied with the discussion they had had to-night.