REFORM PETITIONS. (Hansard, 7 December 1831)

§ Lord Althorp
I have received for presentation to this House, a Petition from the important county of York, in favour of Parliamentary Reform, and I feel very much honoured by the confidence which that great county has reposed in me, by placing in my hands the petition which I have now the honour to present. Those Gentlemen who were in the House when the petition was brought in must be aware of its magnitude, and of the difficulty which I should have in presenting it in the ordinary mode. The petition is signed by nearly 50,000 inhabitants of Yorkshire, and it prays that, in the measure to be brought forward by his Majesty's Ministers on the subject of Reform, there should be no departure from 98 the main principles of the Bill which passed this House during the last Session. The petition also prays us to apply ourselves to the measure with every despatch consistent with a due consideration of the subject. In presenting this petition, I beg leave to state, that I most entirely and cordially concur in the prayer which it contains. I certainly should be sorry to see any measure relating to Reform presented or proposed which did depart from the principles of the Bill under our consideration during last Session; and, when the day comes for my noble friend to propose the Bill, of which he has given notice, the House will find that, whatever improvements may have been made in the details of the measure, his Majesty's Ministers have redeemed their pledge of abiding by the principles contained in the last Reform Bill. It is not, of course, desirable for me at the present moment to enter at large into this question; and I shall, therefore, conclude, by expressing the satisfaction and gratification which have been afforded me by being intrusted with a petition conveying the sentiments of the inhabitants of the county of York on the question of Reform.

§ Lord Morpeth
said, that the present petition was the answer which the county of York gave to the imputation that a re-action had taken place, and it appeared to him, that the argument was a very weighty one. In addition to the very satisfactory remarks which had fallen from his noble friend, he begged leave to state, that he was present at the meeting when the present petition was adopted. It was afterwards circulated throughout the county, and received, in five or six days, upwards of 40,000 signatures. No person was allowed to affix his name to the petition, who was either under age, or who could not write his name with his own hand; the present petition, therefore, besides being an evidence of the feelings of the people of Yorkshire on the subject of Reform, was a convincing proof, that the schoolmaster possessed extensive sway in that county. The meeting at which the present petition was adopted, was held immediately upon the arrival of the intelligence of the rejection of the late Reform Bill; and he confessed, that he had attended that meeting with much anxiety, because he knew that deep disappointment did not usually express itself in moderate language, and because he had heard, that scenes of disgraceful outrage had occurred in other places. He was, however, happy to inform 99 the House, that no assemblage of men could have exhibited a more peaceable and orderly behaviour than the freeholders of York did on that occasion. There was one passage in the petition with which he entirely agreed, although it was far from being complimentary to the ingenious criticisms and long harangues which had been heard in that House, during the last Session, on the subject of the Reform Bill. The petitioners prayed the House to pass the Reform Bill with all possible despatch; and he trusted, that their prayer would be attended to, for he believed, that to the delay which had been opposed to the settlement of the question, was to be attributed much of the stagnation in business and public distress which at present prevailed.

§ Mr. Croker
would tell the noble Lord, notwithstanding all he could say of long speeches and harangues, and ingenious criticisms having been passed upon the Bill of last Session, that he was entirely mistaken as to his facts, and the deductions which he made from them. The delay complained of had not arisen from those who conscientiously opposed the Bill; for they had acted from the most honourable motives, and their object was, to prevent injury being inflicted upon the vested interests of the country. The delay originated in the conduct of the various classes of Reformers, few of whom could be found to agree with each other; and the consequence was, they had altered and amended the Bill at their good pleasure. Those Gentlemen who opposed the Reform Bill on principle, complained, that great injustice would be done by it to such places as Salt-ash, for example; and, while the daily Press was exhausting complaints against delay, the noble Lord himself had fully concurerd in the justice of those opinions for a revision of the question relating to that place, which he (Mr. Croker) had called attention to in the last Session. It was very easy to complain of long speeches and ingenious criticisms, but the noble Lord ought not to be the person to make such remarks, for, on the last night of the last Session of Parliament, he had detained the House for a considerable time by a very long speech. With respect to the difficulties which had arisen in the country, and with respect to the stagnation in trade, which the noble Lord deplored, he could only repeat what he said last evening, and which had been much more ably said by the right hon. member for Tamworth, and attribute it, as it was justly due, to the very unnecessary agitation 100 caused by the Reform Bill which had been introduced by his Majesty's Ministers. The Ministers had shaken the whole frame of the social edifice, and it was no wonder that its several parts should be dislocated. The Ministers might talk loudly and boldly, but this he would venture to prophesy, that the agitation, the very unnecessary agitation, of the former Reform Bill, would, upon reflection, be found to have caused the present stagnation in trade, and he feared it might yet further lead to some more terrible convulsion, which might destroy the best interests of the State. He did not believe the Government contemplated any such results, but he was satisfied that their Reform Bill would produce them.

§ Mr. Strickland
thought, that the petition now presented was not only a triumphant answer to the assertion of a re-action, but that it was a proof of the perseverance of the people of Yorkshire in the pursuit of that great object of Parliamentary Reform, in which, he was proud to say, they had first led the way, under the auspices of Sir George Saville, many years since, as the records of that House could testify. He thought it most essential that, upon this subject, the House should come, not only to a satisfactory, but to a speedy conclusion. Instead of agreeing with the right hon. Gentleman in the prophecy they had just heard, he was convinced, that the adoption of the measure would produce a most beneficial effect on the prosperity and happiness of the country. He took that opportunity to bear his testimony to the great respectability of the meeting at which this petition was agreed to, and the orderly and proper manner in which the whole business of the day was conducted.

§ Mr. Hunt
thought himself challenged to say a few words, in consequence of the frequent allusions to re-action by hon. Members. He had been the first man in that House to speak of re-action; but, when he spoke of it, he did not say, that there had been a re-action against the cause of Reform, but against the plan of Reform brought forward by his Majesty's Ministers. He should like to ask the noble Lord opposite, how many of the names signed to the petition which had been presented were from the towns of Leeds and Huddersfield?

§ Lord Althorp
There were 22,000 from Leeds.

§ Mr. Hunt
was desirous to be informed of the number, because he had visited those places since that petition was agreed to, 101 and he had attended a larger meeting at Leeds than the meeting at York, where this petition had been adopted. At the meeting at Leeds, which he attended, there had been 10,000 persons present, and they all differed from those who had signed the petition which had just been presented to the House. He did not mean to say, that those who had attended the meeting at Leeds were not reformers—they were, every man of them—but then they were radical reformers, and wanted more than this petition prayed for. He had attendee also a meeting at Huddersfield, where a large body of persons had assembled, and, with two exceptions, they had disapproved of the Ministerial measure of Reform; but then they also were radical reformers. They did not approve of the "bit-by-bit" Reform proposed by Ministers; they wanted something for themselves; and, it was his opinion, that those who pretended they did not, were arrant hypocrites. He did not mean to join those hon. Members on that (the Opposition) side of the House, many of whom, he was sorry to say, he now found to be no Reformers at all. From the tone of some of them he had expected that a more extensive measure would have met their approval than the late Bill. He remembered, that the right hon. Baronet, the member for Tamworth, had said, he would more readily adopt the plan proposed by him (Mr. Hunt) to establish the household franchise of Preston, than the 10l. franchise proposed by his Majesty's Ministers. The people wanted more than this measure would give them—they looked for something beyond it; but the Ministers had honestly stated, that this was to be a final measure, and it was for that reason that he was opposed to it. He believed that nineteen out of twenty of those who had signed this petition imagined, that it was a petition for Reform, but did not understand that it was meant in favour of the Ministerial plan of Reform. They had been imposed on, he was sure. When the measure was first brought in, ninety-nine out of one hundred were in favour of it; but, he believed, that that was not the case now. As to the number of persons who had signed this petition, he would only tell the noble Lord, that if he was allowed the same money that had been expended in getting up this petition, he would undertake to get one up in Yorkshire, with double the number of signatures, for Universal Suffrage, Annual Parliaments, and Vote by Ballot.

§ Lord Morpeth
said, that he had some more "re-action" in the county of York to show the hon. member for Preston. He had now to present a petition from Wakefield in favour of Reform.

§ Mr. Croker
How many signatures from Wakefield are attached to the county petition?

§ Lord Morpeth
Twenty-seven hundred.

§ Mr. Croker
said, that the House had been told, that the county petition had received 22,000 signatures from Leeds, and 2,700 from Wakefield. If the other large towns of Yorkshire had contributed in the same proportion, very few of the rural population of the, county could have signed the petition.

§ Lord Morpeth
said, the petition lay for signatures in the great towns, but it had also been signed by the inhabitants of the adjacent villages.

§ Lord Althorp
remarked, that the Yorkshire petition contained 1,794 signatures from Northallerton.

§ Mr. Croker
said, that the provision of the late Reform Bill, with respect to the town of Northallerton, was what he might venture to call a job. The newly constituted town of Northallerton was to be seventeen miles in length, and yet it had only produced 1,794 signatures to the petition just presented to the House.

§ Lord Althorp
begged to observe to the right hon. Gentleman, that if he recollected the situation and circumstances of Northallerton, he must admit, that it was very unlikely a job should be concocted in that place by his Majesty's Ministers, or those who supported them.

§ Mr. Croker
begged to remind the noble Lord, that jobs could be created for obtaining interest as well as to keep up what was already in existence.