WRIT FOR HORSHAM.

HC Deb 31 March 1848 vol 97 cc1136-42

The EARL of MARCH

moved that a writ be issued for the election of a Member for the borough of Horsham.

MR. HUME

said, that if the question of which he had given notice had come on on the preceding day it was his intention to have submitted to the House the propriety of suspending the writ for this borough, and every other place of which the election had been declared void, until a separate Committee should have been appointed to inquire into the extent and nature of the bribery and corruption practised at such election. In the case of Horsham, it appeared from the evidence which had been printed, that the Gentleman contending for the seat had declared that, having obtained all he wanted, he had not gone further with the matter, and. consequently, the whole truth of the case was not before the House. It was utterly impossible, therefore, for the House to say to what extent the system of bribery and corruption had been carried. Was the House sincere in their endeavours to put an end to that system, or was it not—was it conniving at bribery and corruption? The hon. Member then adverted to the evidence before the Committee, from which it appeared that the night before the election a revel had been held at which upwards of 160 persons were present, many of whom were electors. If such scenes were allowed to continue, there would be great danger of that House being despised by the people. He should, therefore, move, as an Amendment, that the writ should be postponed until a Committee was appointed to inquire into and report upon the extent and nature of the bribery and corruption practised at the election for Horsham and every other borough which should be declared to be void on that ground.

LORD COURTENAY

having been chairman of the Committee in the case of the Horsham election, was anxious to make one or two observations. He should feel it his duty to support the Motion, because he thought that no fact had been proved, nor any case established, that would justify the House in refusing the writ. Under the Act of the 5th and 6th Victoria, c. 32, Election Committees had the power of going into the question of a compromise, if they considered there was any ground for suspecting it; and in the present case the Committee had felt it their duty to institute such an inquiry, and had called the agents on both sides before them; but from each of these parties they received a distinct denial and disavowal of the impression that had certainly existed in the minds of the Committee, that a compromise had been effected. Under these circumstances, the Committee felt they could go no further, and an unanimous hope was expressed that the minutes of the evidence would be laid before the House, in order that they might be in possession of the whole case. At the same time he thought it was a matter well worthy of the consideration of the House, whether, in cases where there was a failure of proof of any grave charge of bribery alleged in a petition, the Committee might not be directed to mention the fact to the House; leaving it to the House to take such course as they should think fit.

SIR J. HANMER

said, the House had the fact before them that the election had been declared void on the ground of corrupt treating, and on that ground he would vote against the issue of the writ at present. It was impossible to say that the electoral condition of this country was in a satisfactory condition, either as regarded the constituent body, or those who were returned to Parliament. The question was whether the House should deal with these cases by a large general measure, or by detail, as cases like the present arose. Ha should prefer the latter method, and whenever a Committee reported that an election was void by reason of corrupt proceedings, he thought the House ought to suspend the writ, in order that an inquiry might be made, and that they might ameliorate the elective franchise of that place. If the House visited the whole of the consequences of corrupt practices upon the sitting Member, and then issued another writ to the electors who had forced such practices upon him, probably against his will, the House would but empower this corrupt constituency to return to its old practices, and would commit one of the greatest possible absurdities. He knew the feelings of the people upon this subject, and when an industrious working man living in a 6l. or 8l. house, and not able to have a 10l. house, saw a freeman rolling drunk into a gutter, he knew that the iron entered into the souls of these working men, and that discontent rankled in their hearts. He wanted a remedy for such scenes, because he regarded them as evils fraught with the greatest and most pernicious consequences. He was prepared to resist the issue of a writ either for Horsham or any other place, where the chairman of a Committee reported that corrupt practices had prevailed. Unless they adopted some such course they would have an accumulation of a dozen Sudburys, the seats for which Parliament would have to distribute among new constituencies

SIR DE LACY EVANS

was also of opinion that quite enough was done to warrant the House in suspending the writ when a Committee reported that corrupt practices had existed. The House should remember that only a fractional part of the corruption that took place in the country ever came before the Committees of that House. He knew a very large city where, before the last general election, forty-five public-houses had been kept open in the interest of one candidate for six months. These cases were not brought before the House, because the parties resorting to such practices did not succeed in obtaining their seats. He would support any Motion that had for its object the eradication of such a shameful system of corruption.

MR. H. BAILLIE

objected to a Motion for withholding the issue of writs for an indefinite period, without some steps being proposed for prosecuting an inquiry into such oases. The hon. Member had better alter his Motion, and give notice of a Committee of Inquiry on the subject.

MR. SHERIDAN

defended the proceedings of the Committee, of which he was a member. The only suspicious circumstance that came before the Committee was an abrupt and unexpected admission of treating on the part of the sitting Member, Mr. Jervis. The Committee made the counsel for the petitioners give in a list of the parties alleged to have been bribed, and of the parties by whom the bribes were alleged to have been given. There was no evidence to show that any compromise whatever had taken place, and he would readily support the Motion of the noble Lord for issuing the writ.

MR. WAKLEY

They had been told that it would be unjust to the borough of Horsham if they did not issue the writ; but he thought it would be unjust to the electors of this country if the writ were issued. Was it right, he would ask, to punish the candidate alone, and not to punish the corrupt body of electors who may have forced him into such proceedings? In the case now before the House, the sitting Member had been most completely victimised by the corrupt proceedings of the electoral body. Why should not the House punish the parties by whom the sitting Member had been led into a trap and then abandoned? The case was one most deserving of the suspension of the writ.

LORD J. RUSSELL

said, there were two distinct questions before the House in coming to a decision on the Motion of the noble Lord, and on that of the hon. Gentleman. One was as to the conduct of the Select Committee, and whether they had acted according to the law providing for such cases; and the other was, what course the House ought to pursue if the conduct of the Committee had been irreproachable? upon the first question it had been shown that the course taken by the Committee was in strict conformity with their duty. The question before the Committee, and which they were directed by the Act of Parliament to inquire into, was, whether any compromise had taken place between parties. The Committee were of opinion that no such compromise had taken place; and he thought they had come to a right decision upon that point. Although there were allegations in the petition respecting bribery, they were not gone into; and the Committee could not report upon such cases to the House. But in coming to the opinion that the Committee had acted legally—that the evidence did not bear out any suspicion of a compromise—and that with respect to bribery there was no evidence to show it had been practised, it nevertheless did not appear to him that the House would be justified in issuing the writ. The allegations were, that gross and systematic bribery and corruption had taken place, and that these corrupt practices were open and notorious in the borough of Horsham. He might say respecting the Act of Parliament which he had himself introduced, that he should have been glad if it had given a special power to Committees where similar allegations were made, to order such cases to be further heard by the Select Committee, without any special report from the Committee to the House. He was disposed to think with the hon. Gentleman, that further inquiry should be made before issuing the writ in a case of so much suspicion. He said this, however, without being exactly aware of what had been the practice of former Committees, and the course which had been taken in respect to other boroughs. Without, then, being prepared to agree with the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Montrose, he might support an Amendment that the House should not issue the writ without further inquiry. Allegations might only affect one or two electors, and not the general character of a borough; and if that were the case there might be ground for further inquiry, although it could not be had under the forms of an Election Committee; and on the ground of further inquiry he was prepared to vote against the issuing of the writ.

MR. BANKES

was glad the noble Lord had done justice to the Committee. Their desire had been to perform their duties with all the impartiality of jurors and judges, and throughout their proceedings their opinion had always been unanimous. With respect to bribery, the noble Lord had with truth observed that the Committee not only had not inquired into the question, but had not possessed the means of inquiring, for, under the circumstances of the case, the parties were not bound to put in any lists; and neither the Committee Clerk nor the Clerk to the General Committee had been supplied with those lists. There had been no evidence whatever of bribery laid before the Committee.

SIR R. PEEL

wished to understand clearly what the noble Lord at the head of the Government intended to do. As the question stood, it was proposed that a new writ should issue for the borough of Horsham; to which the hon. Member for Montrose moved, as an amendment, that a general rule be established, which would have the effect of tying up the discretion of the House, by providing that if any Member be unseated upon charges of bribery or treating, the issue of the writ should be absolutely suspended until an inquiry before a Select Committee should have been instituted. In many cases of this kind there appeared to have been a very lax practice; and he thought it might be very desirable to institute inquiry in many of those cases where charges against Members might not, on technical grounds, have been inquired into. But It did not appear to him expedient to adopt a rule absolutely preventing the issuing of the writ in every case where a Member had been unseated for treating, because there might be many instances in which a Member might be properly disqualified for sitting without any imputation resting upon the purity of the borough. He did not agree with the hon. Member that the House should prevent the exercise of its own discretion in particular cases by an inflexible rule that in every case of this kind, even in those where the treating had been confined within the narrowest limits, the writ should not issue until there had been a preliminary inquiry before a Select Committee. He understood the noble Lord to object to the Motion of the hon. Member for Montrose, but understood the noble Lord also to be of opinion that in the case of the borough of Horsham sufficient had been disclosed in the evidence before the Committee to justify the proposition for further inquiry; and that the noble Lord consequently proposed to suspend the issuing of the writ in this particular case, not indefinitely, but with a view to further inquiry. Was he (Sir R. Peel) right in this view of the noble Lord's intention? [Lord J. RUSSELL: Yes.] If that were the case, and if the noble Lord proposed a temporary suspension only, with a view to further inquiry, he should defer to the authority of the noble Lord, and was prepared to support that view of the case.

LORD J. RUSSELL

explained: He had objected to the Motion of the hon. Member for Montrose as of too general a nature, but had expressed the opinion that there should, in the present case, be a suspension of the issuing the writ until there had been some inquiry by the House into the state of the borough of Horsham.

The EARL of MARCH

, after this expression of opinion regarding the suspension of the writ, begged leave to withdraw his Motion.

Motion and Amendment withdrawn.