Sitting of 23 June 1836

MINUTES.
Bills. Read a first time:—Sugar Duties; Paper Duties; Lighthouses; Notaries Public.—Read a third time:—Fisheries; Benefit Building Societies; Chapels of Ease (Ireland).
Petitions presented. By several HON, MEMBERS, from various Places, for Abolition of Tithes (Ireland).—By several HON. MEMBERS, from various Places, praying the House to adhere to the Irish Municipal Reform Bill as originally passed by them —By several HON. MEMBERS, from various Places, for Vote by Ballot.

PROCEEDINGS IN COMMITTEES.
Mr. Humerose to move in relation to the Committee on the South-West Durham Railway Bill, the order which was then discharged. He did so because it appeared to him that the Committee in coming to the resolution they did had deviated from the rules and instructions laid down by that House on the subject of Railway Bills. The Committee had been ordered to re-assemble for the purpose of reporting to the House the reasons on which it had come to the resolution, that the preamble to the Bill had not been proved; and when it re-assembled, it came to the following resolution:—"That the reasons upon which the Committee came to the resolution that the preamble had not been proved, could only apply to those Members who had voted on that proposition." This, he contended, was limiting the number of Members who should vote in the Committee, and he called on the Speaker to say, whether such a power resided in a Committee. He also called on the House to support his motion. This was not a question as to the merits of the Bill, but one that regarded the proper course of proceedings in Committees. The hon. Member concluded by moving, that the Committee on the South-West Durham Railway Bill do re-assemble for the purpose of reporting specially on the preamble of the Bill, on the ground that their previous resolution restricting the votes of Members of the Committee is contrary to the practice of Parliament.
Mr. Rigby Wasonwould move as an amendment the following Resolution— "That when any party has just reason to complain of the conduct of the Members of a Committee upon any Private Bill, the proper remedy, according to precedent and authority, is to appeal to the House for a Committee of Appeal." He con tended that the admission of the hon. Member, that this was not a question as to the merits of the Bill put him out of court with his present motion. His motion, under such circumstances, should have been for a Committee of Appeal. The hon. Member quoted various prece-
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dents, and the opinion of the late Speaker, in support of that view of the question. No Members of the Committee had been prevented from voting by the resolution complained of by the hon. Member for Middlesex. He believed that this motion had been entirely got up by the attorney for the Bill, who could not get his bill of costs paid, and who was anxious to have such an order made by the House as would induce the shareholders to sub scribe an additional 1l. per share, the greater part of which would go into his own pocket. No injustice had been done to any party by the decision of the Committee, and the resolution they had passed had, consistently with common sense and the meaning of the English language, explained the previous order of the House. He would certainly divide the House on the subject.
Sir J. Grahamsaid, that having voted for the Report agreed to by the Committee, and having also been a party to the resolution of which the hon. Member for Middlesex complained, he should, nevertheless, vote for the motion of that hon. Member on the present occasion. He was ready to agree with the hon. Member for Ipswich, that the present proceeding was a novel practice; but the whole question of railroads was a novel one, and the instructions with regard to them had been sanctioned by the House. The Resolution complained of certainly only expressed a fact, for the reference of the House could not apply to Members of the Committee who had not attended and had heard none of the evidence on the Bill, for they could give no reasons for voting that the preamble was not proved, as they did not vote on that question at all. He had been, therefore, a party to that resolution, as he thought it a less evil than adopting the absurdity he alluded to. In common, however, with the hon. Member for Middlesex, he had thought it right to apply to the highest authority in that House on the subject. The question was, whether it were competent for a Committee to pass such a resolution, and the right hon. Gentleman in the Chair had, upon two grounds, decided that such a resolution could not be sustained.
Amendment withdrawn.
Original Question agreed to —Committee to re-assemble.

THE BALLOT.
Mr. Humepresented

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a Petition from Bristol in favour of the Ballot.
Mr. Harveypresented a Petition to the same effect, but the name of the place from whence it came was inaudible in the Gallery.
Mr. Leaderpresented a Petition from 5,000 inhabitants of Bristol to the same effect.
Mr. Grotespoke as follows:—I am about to propose to you, Sir, the motion, notice of which stands on your paper, respecting the mode of taking votes at elections for Members of Parliament. I mean to ask for leave to bring in a Bill, providing, that votes shall be henceforward taken in secret, by way of ballot. Sir, on the previous occasion, when I introduced this subject to your notice, I did so by moving a simple resolution of the House, to the effect that secret voting at elections for Members of Parliament was expedient and preferable. On the present occasion I shall move for leave to bring in a Bill to accomplish this object; and I make this slight change in my mode of proceeding, because I imagine that there may be some Gentlemen who, though not un favourable to the system of secret voting, are yet mistrustful as to the possibility of carrying out the principle into detail conveniently and effectually; and, therefore, hesitate to affirm the abstract resolution when simply and nakedly proposed to them. If I am allowed to bring in my Bill I shall show the House that the regulations essential to a system of secret voting may easily be framed with perfect convenience to the voter and entire certainty to the main object; and I may safely promise Gentlemen, that if they are not at variance with me on the ground of principle, they shall have very little reason to complain on the score of deficiency in the details. By assenting to my present motion they will not be called upon to pronounce an irrevocable determination in favour of secret voting until they see the details through which it is to be brought into operation. Sir, it is not my intention to trouble you with any long preface or introduction before I proceed to state the grounds on which I presume to claim your favourable hearing. Gentlemen will not need to be reminded that we sit here as the representatives of the people—chosen by them, and for their benefit—chosen by them generally as the guardians of their persons and
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properties, and more especially as the guarantees of their public franchises and their political liberty. The preservation of that tie which connects us with the people at large in all its integrity, is a matter of the deepest public concern. It would be superfluous, Sir, at this time of day, to insist upon that which all constitutional writers have unanimously admit ted—that the efficient operation of the elective principle is the primary condition and characteristic requisite of every Government pretending to the honourable title of a representative Government. It has never been yet disputed, and I do not expect to hear it disputed this evening, that pure and free elections are vital wants of the British community in particular; and that any cause which subverts the freedom or impairs the purity of electrons, is fraught with serious and incalculable mischief. In pressing, therefore, upon the House the consideration of the vote by ballot, as an indispensable element of all practical purity and freedom of election, I shall not be accused either of trifling with your time or of aiming at any end which has not been recognised as strictly constitutional and legitimate. I hold that our most solemn obligations to the people will remain undischarged, so long as we permit them to be deprived in practice and reality of these their best political rights, and their only effectual security against public extravagance and misconduct. To justify myself, Sir, in calling for the interposition of this House, I must offer you proof of the existence of some evil requiring remedy, and susceptible of remedy. I must make out to you a case of exigency, such as nothing but the powerful and commanding arm of the Legislature can effectually deal with. Now, Sir, how do the facts stand with reference to your elective system? Have you pure and free elections, or any thing at all like them, as matters stand at present? Put this question to any man of any politics, and I apprehend that the answer which you will obtain will be one and the same. However indisposed men may be to act vigorously in rectifying the evil, there are but few who are bold enough or blind enough to deny its reality; nay, Sir, I believe that on this subject I labour under a difficulty the opposite to that which is commonly experienced by those who submit motions to Parliament; for the evil which I seek to correct is

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not unknown, not unperceived, not of recent growth, but trite, too familiar, and of too long standing to excite those feelings of repugnance which properly and intrinsically belong to it. Gentlemen talk of election abuses as a matter of course, which it may be decent to punish for the sake of appearances when a flagrant case happened to be detected, but which none but visionaries or enthusiasts will ever pretend to suppress or eradicate. Sir, I shall not now stop to inquire how far this tone of restlessness and levity as to a great political evil is justifiable in a representative of the people; but gentlemen must keep in their recollections that the present times are not quite analogous to the past, and that election abuses cannot be safely blotted out from all serious or deliberate considerations as they were formerly. Practices which might be in full keeping and consonance with the general rotten ness of our system of representation as it stood previous to the Reform Act now stand out in glaring contrast with the principles of that measure, and still more with the promises and declarations of its authors. When the noble Lord who first introduced the Reform Act announced his memorable purpose of guaranteeing to us a House of Commons possessing and deserving the confidence of the people— when Lord Grey proclaimed to the world that nomination of Members of Parliament should cease to exist, and that re presentation should be erected everywhere in its place—I contend that these declarations did, in their fair meaning and spirit, imply a pledge to have none of the known and standing disorders of the elective system without correction and redress. I now call upon the noble Lord for the fulfilment of his beneficent pledge, and I am sure he will not be surprised if the electors whom his own act has created entreat from him that protection which is necessary to the quiet and conscientious exercise of their franchise. But, Sir, there is one other circumstance yet behind, which, even if it stood alone, would render a prolonged indifference on this subject in tolerably disgraceful to our character as a legislature. Sir, the extent and prevalence of these election abuses does not now depend upon mere presumption, however general and however confident; it is not now a matter which every one believes but no one can formally prove; it rests upon something better and stronger
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than all this—upon positive, authentic, and indisputable testimony, collected and sifted by your own Committees. I should be justified in what I now assert, even if I had nothing else to appeal to than the statements proved in evidence before various special Committees of the House, in reference to particular Parliamentary boroughs. The House will not forget that there have been several special investigations of this kind. They will not forget the disclosures made before the various Parliamentary Committees on Stafford, Warwick, Hertford, Ipswich, York, Yarmouth, and other places, They will not forget the reports made by the Municipal Corporation Commissioners, in reference to the conduct of the freemen in many important Parliamentary boroughs. These multiplied investigations have brought to view a body of dark and infamous details, which cast a melancholy shade over the general picture of election management in England. What description will any future historian give of the real working and interior spring of that which we extol and sanctify under the name of representation when he finds documents such as these—contemporary and unquestionable documents — to guide him in his researches? But, Sir, over and above the testimonies collected by these special Committees, important as they are when singly taken, and still more important in their aggregate effect—there is yet another document, more weighty and conclusive than all of them. I allude to the Report of the Committee of last year on bribery and intimidation at elections. It will be recollected that the House appointed this Committee last year to inquire generally into the ex tent and prevalence of these evils, and to suggest the best means of preventing them. I hold in my hand, Sir, the voluminous series of evidence received and published by that Committee, and I scruple not to assert that proofs more irresistible can hardly be conceived of the depravity and the subjection which now so largely pervade our elective system. No man can read this Report without shame and un easiness, unless he has prepared himself to disregard and laugh to scorn all idea of purity of election. Gentlemen who have looked over the volume will at once perceive that the portion of evidence relating to bribery is the least novel; but even here there is much to arrest our attention. Mr. Cockburn, a barrister, ex-

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amined before that Committee, who gave evidence distinguished for its ability, stated, that from all the information with which his practice and inquiries furnished him he concluded confidently that bribery prevailed at elections to an extent of which the House and the country had scarcely any idea. The witnesses whom the Committee examined from Bristol, Leicester, Norwich, and Ipswich—Mr. Staff, Mr. Hudson, and Mr. Cowell—go far to corroborate and sustain the conclusion. You see in these places and elsewhere a system of bribery, standing perpetual, incorporated with the habitual proceedings both of agents and electors. You are plainly told, that a candidate who refuses to conform to it conducts his election at the greatest disadvantage. You are apprised that it enters into the calculations of a certain class of electors like the annual return of the fair and the races. The forms of bribery do, indeed, vary from one town to another—the gift or the promise some times assumes a peculiar dress or a local name in one town, which would be foreign and unintelligible in another — but the substance and essential characteristics are just the same throughout. Such, Sir, is the tenor of the evidence which the Committee on bribery and intimidation collected with regard to the first branch of their subject. Now how stands the fact in regard to the second branch? Sir, the testimonies collected by the Committee in proof of intimidation are even more abundant and more decisive than those in proof of bribery. And not only are they more abundant and decisive, but they derive additional value from this circum stance, that they are furnished by persons of opposite political parties. It seems that all parties whatever make loud com plaints of intimidation, some from one quarter, some from another; but all with one accord proclaiming that this mighty evil is of continual occurrence. Such, indeed, was the sense entertained by the Irish Government under the hon. Gentle men opposite, in January and February, 1835, of the violent intimidation alleged to have been practised at the elections which had been just terminated that they directed special inquiries to be made by several of the chief constables, and Re ports to be sent to them on the subject. It is from these Reports that much of the evidence taken before the Committee on this branch of election intimidation is
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drawn, some of the chief officers in the constabulary force having been personally examined before them. These witnesses depose to popular tumult and violence in many parts of Ireland, for the purpose of overawing electors, and constraining them to vote on the popular side; they depose further that these violences were in many cases inflamed and countenanced by the Catholic priests; and they state several cases of exposure of voters, who were about to vote against the popular candidate, to alarming threats and ill-usage from the mob, as well as to the risk of being ruined by resolutions of exclusive dealing. With regard to other branches of intimidation, we have not the same ad vantage of elaborate inquiry, undertaken by local functionaries, under the special direction of the Government. Yet, not withstanding this disadvantage—notwith standing the absence of official investigation—a body of testimony no less conclusive and authentic was furnished to the Committee by numerous spontaneous witnesses. It has been incontestibly shown that intimidation by the people and the priest, take it at the worst, is only one amongst many varieties and descriptions of intimidation. If the free-will of voters is occasionally borne down by the violence of the mob, it is still more frequently over ruled by the dictation of landlords and agents, and generally of rich purchasers and consumers. If one set of electors are ex posed to injury for voting against popular will, another class are obnoxious to ruinous loss and severe persecution at the hands of their landlords, if their consciences are found stiff and uncomplying on the day of election. Perhaps hon. Gentlemen might imagine that these mischiefs and abuses are peculiar to Ireland. Would, indeed, that the fact were so. But it is in this case as in others, Irish abuses are the same in kind as English abuses, only on a gigantic and exaggerated scale. The testimonies collected from various quarters of England reveal the same mischiefs, the same oppressions, the same sufferings and prostration of the voter on this side the Channel as on the other. If hon. Gentlemen will peruse these evidences in reference to the towns and counties of England, they will see the same active warfare going on against the freedom of election—they will see landlords, magistrates, clergymen, attorneys, creditors, master manufacturers, patrons of every

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kind, under every name, and, lastly, the assembled crowds of poor electors or of non-electors—they will see all these various parties, each in its separate sphere, engaged in the same work of aggressive interference, against the rectitude and the liberty of their neighbours' political con sciences. It would be easy for me, Sir, to enforce and illustrate everything which I have stated by ample extracts from the volume which I hold in my hand; it would be easy for me to quote sentence after sentence out of the evidence of Mr. James, Mr. Cowell, Mr. Roberts, Mr. Terrell, and others, in reference to the intimidation practised by the wealthier classes; or evidence to the like effect, from the evidence of Mr. Gilbert and Mr. Craven, in reference to the intimidation exercised by the general mass of poorer inhabitants in a large town. You cannot open this book without finding abundant and striking illustrations on the mischiefs on which I have touched; and the only reason why I abstain from reading them to the House is, because it would carry me into a multitude of details too long for their patience and attention. I content myself, therefore, with stating in general language the bearing and tendency of the evidence, and the wide extent of intimidation which that evidence attests; nor do I at all fear that I shall be accused, by any one who has gone through this volume, of having performed the task partially or unfaithfully. Sir, the general facts which I have cited from the Report of the Committee on bribery and intimidation will be in part familiar to the House —in part, perhaps, novel and surprising. The evidence taken before that Committee has been very largely quoted and very emphatically insisted on in this House by Gentlemen opposite; but I must say that they have not dealt fairly either with the evidence or with the subject. To hear their speeches one would have imagined that encroachment on the freedom of electors was an offense committed by no one in this realm except by Catholic mobs and Catholic priests, instead of being, as it is, the regular practice among powerful men in the country, of all professions, creeds, and varieties. Then, again, Sir, with what feelings have they approached this subject, and what are the inferences which they have endeavoured to raise from it? Have they bent their minds to ascertain the real nature and the full extent of the evil, in order that they might be enabled to suggest an
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adequate remedy? They have manifested nothing of such a disposition; they have magnified even to exaggeration this special branch and fragment of a widespread evil, with no other view, as it should seem, than that of swelling the outcry against Catholics and Irishmen. Sir, I know not how the House may deal with my proposition of to-night, but of this I am most certain, that I approach the subject with feelings very different from those which I have been just describing. I approach it with a sincere desire to understand the evil in its full extent, and to fathom it in all its depths and recesses—I approach it with no purpose of making a part stand for the whole, or the species for the genus; and, above all, I approach it with the deepest anxiety to provide an adequate remedy—a comprehensive and all-sufficient remedy. I stand upon this plain and broad position, that elections ought to be free—free absolutely and universally; I try to put down, without reserve, all intimidation, from whatever quarter it may come; I furnish the elector with a shield against every sort of tyranny over his vote, whether it be a single-headed or many-headed tyranny. I should think it a waste of your time to examine which species of intimidation is the most mischievous, or which the least —which is aggression, and which is retaliation—admitting, as I do, that all are bad, and that all ought to be put down. One thing I shall just remark, in reference to the Catholic priests, because it connects itself with the general question as to the latitude of interference admissible. It seems to be assumed by Gentlemen opposite, that Catholic priests have no right to interfere in elections at all—that they are debarred by the functions which they exercise from doing so. Now, Sir, this is a position to which I can by no means accede. I never can consent to divest any man, be he lay man or ecclesiastic, of his character of citizen; because there is no man of any profession who is not interested in the good ness of the laws, and in the proceedings of this House. But, Sir, though I strenuously uphold the right of the priest to interfere at elections, yet there is a right and a wrong way of interfering; and priests as well as landlords, or any other men, may interfere in the wrong way as well as in the right. If a priest thinks one candidate better than another, he is fully war ranted in urging all such reasons and considerations as he may think relevant to the

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case, to impress the same persuasion on the minds of his neighbours. So far he is perfectly justified. But if, instead of con fining himself to persuasions, he should proceed to menace or injure those whom he could not persuade—if he should instigate his own friends and partisans never to hold communion or intercourse with this man, never to buy anything at the shop of another man, because the person so denounced chose to vote for the Tory candidate—if the priest does this, he then lends himself to an act of intimidation, and is guilty of wrongful and unwarrantable interference. Sir, if Gentlemen will read the evidence of Mr. James, of Hereford, taken before the Committee on Bribery and Intimidation, they will see that the clergy of the Church of England are not behind-hand in zeal and active industry at the critical moment of an election. And in the evidence of James King, Gentlemen will find a statement still more strikingly illustrating this conclusion; they will find it recorded, that the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge dismissed his gardener from his service, because the man refused to comply with his request, that he would vote against the right hon. Gentleman, the present Member for the town of Cambridge. Now, Sir, do I complain of the Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge for interfering at elections? By no means; he had the clearest right to interfere if he chose: but I say of him, what I should say also of a Catholic priest, that he had no right to interfere in a way utterly subversive of all liberty and sincerity of voting. I do not hesitate to maintain, and I am borne out by the Constitution in saying so, that whoever violates the freedom of election, ought to be regarded as a public enemy, be he priest or landlord, Englishman or Irishman, Catholic or Protestant. The nation, in its collective majesty, has a paramount title to the free and independent suffrage of each separate elector: the elector, on his part, is entitled to the un disturbed exercise of his franchise, according to the lights of his own conscience; and neither the nation nor the individual are to be ousted of these precious rights by any intimidator, be his station ever so dignified, or his property ever so overwhelming. Sir, I repeat again, that it is in the name of freedom, and purity of election generally and impartially, not for the purpose of ensuring a monopoly of intimidation to any one class or party, that I now
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call upon the House to interpose; and if freedom of election be at all valuable in their eyes, I do not see how they can refuse to interpose. For the evil is now not merely inveterate and notorious—it is formally authenticated—it is proclaimed in the evidence taken before your own Committees —it is proclaimed in a way which you can no longer avoid seeing or noticing. What shall we urge in our defence, Sir, if we neglect to apply any remedial measure, when the distempers in our electoral sys tem have been thus proclaimed as it were by authority, thus blazoned forth in the full daylight of parliamentary recognition? Have Gentlemen made up their minds to see this leprosy cleave to us and to our posterity for ever, or do they fondly expect that it will die of itself, without any active precautions on our part to counterwork or neutralise it? Sir, I am so far from ex. peeling any future abatement in the practice of intimidating at elections, that I see every reason to fear a contrary result; I see strong ground for anticipating that undue power over the liberty of voters will be exercised henceforward more vigorously and audaciously than ever. Men grow bolder and bolder in a pernicious course by the prospect of impunity; and when it it is seen that the House, after having fully laid open the vastness of the evil, de cline even the attempt to apply a remedy, I ask what inference can be drawn, except that we are still inclined to look upon electioneering abuses with indifference at least, if not with secret favour and connivance? Sir, if we wish to escape a suspicion so heavy and so discreditable as this is, and to maintain some reputation as faithful guardians of the freedom of election, I contend that we can no longer defer the application of an adequate remedy. Now what are the remedies which have been suggested to correct it? According to my view of the case, the only remedy is secret voting; but is there any different proposition started by the ingenuity of others for the accomplishment of the same end? Sir, I regret to be obliged to state that this Report, explicit and voluminous as it is in the exposition of existing evil, is miserably poor and unproductive in the suggestion of remedies. All the witnesses to whom the question is put agree in thinking that any direct and formal enactment, imposing specific penalties on intimidation at elections, would be ineffectual and un availing; in point of fact, every witness,

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who proposes any remedy at all, confines himself to the suggestion of vote by ballot. So much then, Sir, is undeniable, that the evils attending the present system of elections are most extensive and revolting, and that no other remedy has been or can be, propounded for them, except the vote by ballot. On this ground alone I am entitled to ask, that you do not reject my proposition without attentively and deliberately weighing it; for this at least must be admitted, even by the warmest opponents of the ballot—that it is a simple and intelligible change—that it trenches upon no existing rights—that it neither confers new political privileges on any untried fraction of the people, nor cancels any existing privileges which the law at present, sanctions—that it neither unduly aggrandises, nor unlawfully depresses any order of your citizens. Nor can it be said that the adoption of the ballot involves the necessity of any other special changes, or of any costly machinery to be created for the purpose of carrying it into operation. Seeing, then, that you have no other remedy to propose against mischiefs like the present, I might fairly ask you to try the ballot, were it only as a matter of experiment. If it should fail in curing the evils of which we com plain, and disappoint the expectations of its advocates, you can but return to your present system of open voting, and you can do so without being worse off then than you are now. If the trial succeeds, much will be gained; if it fails, nothing will be lost. Sir, I might, without presumption, press for the adoption of the vote by bal lot, as a promising and innocuous experiment, even if the reasonings in its favour were less conclusive than they actually are; but I feel that I am entitled to recommend this measure as something better than an experiment, on grounds much stronger and more decisive. I shall not so far dishonour my proposition as to rank it in the category of mere possibilities. I present it with confidence as a certain protection, in so far as political reasonings admit of certainty, against mischief otherwise irremediable. For what is the specific character of this mischief? It is, that intruders from with out can work upon an elector's fears, by their power of doing him evil, or withdrawing from him advantage, conditionally upon the way in which his vote is given. You cannot, by any stratagem, rob them of this power, so long as they know the way in which the elector votes. But de-
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prive them of such knowledge, and all the power of disturbing the liberty of the vote is at once extinct. As to secret acts, every man must be his own master; whether he be weak or strong, poor or rich, timid or resolute, he is equally out of the reach of human violence, neither reward nor punishment can attach to him when he has been rendered invisible to those from whom it proceeds. You can no more punish a man for an unseen vote, than you can punish him for his dreams, or for his uncommunicated thoughts. He must be a free and self-determining agent when he votes in solitude, for he can offend nobody by following: his own convictions, he can offend nobody by forsaking them. Voting by ballot is only another name for unfettered and unbiassed voting; and when Cicero, in speaking of the ballot at Rome, calls it Tabella, vindex tacit æ libertatis—the upholder of silent liberty, he says nothing more than what is accurately and emphatically true. Well then, Sir, when the complaint is, that there exists grievous intimidation at elections, which prevents you from getting at the real sense and sincere feeling of voters, am I not warranted in asserting that the ballot is an antidote precisely applicable, and thoroughly adequate to the urgency of the case? It will be said, perhaps, that strangers, though they cannot see an elector vote, may guess or suspect how he has voted; or the elector himself may be compelled to tell them. True; he may tell, but who is to determine whether he tells the truth? You may compel him to tell you. He may tell you what he dreamt last night, or any other personal matter, unknowable except to himself; but can you have the smallest assurance that his statement is an accurate one, if he has any interest in making it otherwise? Whether the elector tells or not, however, I do not in the least doubt that his vote will be in many cases guessed at or suspected. But why is this? Because his political sentiments are guessed or suspected; and it will be assumed, as a matter of course, when he votes secretly, that his vote follows his real sentiments, whatever they may be. Now this very presumption shows that the ballot is perfectly efficacious towards its proposed end; because it shows that no elector voting in secret, can have any motive for voting contrary to his own real feelings. A man may have enemies on many different grounds, private as well as political; but he can make neither enemies nor friends

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by means of his votes when votes are taken secretly: no persecution, real or pretended, can ever be made to operate in determining the way in which his vote shall be given. Now, Sir, why is it that men persecute or intimidate electors, as matters stand at pre sent? It is for the express purpose of deter mining the votes of these electors; for this single purpose, and for no other. They wish to acquire dominion over votes, and they employ intimidation as an instrument for accomplishing this object. Once show them that no dominion over votes can ever be realised, and all their inducement to resort to intimidation is at an end. Surely, Sir, I am not too sanguine in concluding that intimidation itself will die away when it is thus rendered impotent and unprofitable for the acquisition of political influence. Throughout all the records of penal experience there has never yet been discovered any method of suppressing crime so efficacious as that of removing the motive to the perpetration of it, and rendering it no longer conclusive to the interest or ambition of criminals. Sir, I challenge any one to refute this reasoning—I challenge any one to disprove the alliance—the eternal and indissoluble alliance—between secrecy and freedom. We are seeking for a remedy against intimidation, and for protection to the liberty of the honest voter: I contend that the remedy stares us in the face if we do not wilfully avert our eyes from it. If there be any Gentle man to whom intimidation of voters by the mob is an object of genuine abhorrence, and not a mere theme for declamation against the political capacity of the people, I will call upon him to sup port my present motion. He may assure himself that no mob-united assemblage of people will be able to divert or appropriate to themselves the suffrage of one single unwilling voter when votes are given by ballot. All the price which Gentlemen will have to pay for the accomplishment of this object is, that they must see all other kinds of intimidation banished at the same time. My proposition goes to rescue the political conscience from every species of constraint and tyranny, and to leave to the act of voting what the Constitution promises it shall be—free, indifferent, and spontaneous. I cannot be content with any thing less than the entire emancipation of the voter; and I have this comfort at least, that it is far easier to protect him against all modes of inti-
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midation at once, than to guard him against some of them partially while you leave him still exposed to the rest. The most impartial and comprehensive remedy is, at the same time, the easiest of discovery and the simplest of application. I well recollect, Sir, that when the Committee on bribery and intimidation was appointed last year, the right honourable and learned Gentleman, now Attorney-General, ob served that he hoped the appointment of such a Committee would render the ballot unnecessary. I, on the contrary, took the liberty of saying, and I repeat it now, that the ballot affords the only sufficient solution of the important problem confided to the Committee. Indeed, I believe that many of my opponents do not at all dispute the sufficiency of the ballot as a guarantee to liberty of suffrage. They object to it on different grounds; and one objection is even founded on this allegation, that it makes the suffrage too free— that it relieves electors too completely from every kind of external responsibility. The elector (we are sometimes told) holds his franchise for the benefit of the community, and ought to exercise it under responsibility; for which purpose publicity of his vote is essentially necessary. To me, Sir, it seems that this much-extolled responsibility of the elector, is either a phantom—a word without meaning—or else it is nothing but a mask for the precise mischief of intimidation, to be let in and legalised under another name. For to whom is the elector to be responsible? I shall be told that he is to be responsible to the public. Rut the public, to each individual elector, can be no other than that fraction of the public with whom he is in immediate dealing or communion — his neighbours, or townsmen, or fellow constituents, who alone take any cognizance of the way in which he votes. Your responsibility therefore comes to this— that an elector is to be rewarded with the good-will of his neighbours if he votes as they approve: he is to be punished with their ill-will if his vote be such as they disapprove. Admit this to be just, and you sanction the principle of intimidation at once. Why, what are the very cases which have been so much complained of in the Irish elections? A Catholic free: holder in an Irish village holds Conservative principles, and wishes to vote for the Conservative candidates; the bulk of his neighbours around him are all Liberals,

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and it is to them that he is responsible for his vote. The responsibility takes effect against him by the unhappy methods recorded in this Report—by resolutions of exclusive dealing—by a social proscription —a sort of interdiction (if I may be al lowed to translate a Latin phrase) from the communion of fire and water. A few miles off, perhaps, you have the case reversed; you find a great Protestant landlord, of Tory principles, surrounded by tenants, many of whom are Catholics and Liberals. Here the only substitute for your imaginary public, the sole enforcer of responsibility, is the landlord, whose tenants are compelled to endure the bitter consequences of his ill-will, unless they prefer his bidding to the dictates of their own consciences. Now, Sir, these are specimens of the identical evils which every one complains of, and which your Committee were directed to devise means of preventing; yet they are the inevitable results, the outward and visible manifestations, of this principle of responsibility of the voter. It really means nothing except liability to evil at the hands of the stronger power—single-headed power, or many-headed power, as the case may be. Sir, if you consider for one moment either the nature of the elective franchise, or the number and interests of the aggregate electoral body, you will find that responsibility in their case is as needless as it is impracticable. For why is responsibility necessary, and how comes it to be practicable in the case of Ministers, and Members of Parliament, and other special functionaries? It is because the smallness of their number gives them an interest of their own, apart from and often hostile to the community at large; it is because this same smallness of their number and con spicuousness of their position, enables the public to keep a steady watch upon them; lastly, it is because the specialty and continuity of their functions also enables the public to judge whether the duties as signed to them are faithfully or negligently discharged. Now, Sir, every one of these three leading circumstances is reversed in the case of the parliamentary electors. In the first place the numbers of parliamentary electors is so large that their interest is identified with the people. As an aggregate body they can have no separate interest of their own. They are, in point of fact, the people themselves in miniature, and on a reduced scale. Their voice is a
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compendious expression of the voice of the whole nation. Next, this extension of the numbers of electors, which identifies them in feelings and interest with the entire mass of the people, and thus gives you the best possible security for their choosing well if they are left to themselves—this same circumstance, I say, renders it preposterous to talk of them as a body of intermediate agents, responsible to any extraneous and ultimate superior. How idle would it be to pretend to attach any responsibility to an aggregate body of 700,000 or 800,000 persons, and that, too, a scattered, fluctuating, and untraceable multitude. If goodness of election depends upon the responsibility of electors we can not too soon repeal the Reform Act, and cut down our electors to a select few—for the smaller the constituency the more perfect will responsibility become; nay, the constituency of Old Sarum before the Reform Act presented an example of electoral responsibility exalted to its highest point. Lastly, Sir, I beg to consider what is it that an elector has to do, and then ask yourself how the performance of his task can ever be made the subject of unaccountability to parties without. He has no specific train of duties to perform on which the criticism of the public can fasten; he has only to record his preference, without any reason assigned, between two or more candidates, and the virtue of the process consists in his delivering his judgment genuinely and sincerely—integro et libero animo. Now, Sir, I confidently maintain that this is a process which must spring exclusively from the free will and inward conscience of the elector himself. No human supervision can extort from him a true verdict, because no human eye can discern what the true verdict is. If responsibility to the public has any effect upon him at all it will induce him to abandon his own judgment altogether, and vote for that candidate whom he believed to be the favourite of the public; thus violating the most essential obligation of the franchise. Look at it which way you will, Sir, this idea of the responsibility of the electors is a compound of mischief and illusion. The numbers of the body and the nature of the franchise conspire to render it use less to any good purpose, and effectual only in silencing the free and honest expression of individual conscience. Sir, on the former occasion when I brought forward this motion the noble Lord the Member for

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Stroud contended that, though the ballot does away with all evil influences over voters, it removes them at the same time out of the reach of all good and improving influences. I may safely challenge the noble Lord, or any one else, to prove that such an effect will flow from it. Surely there can be no good influences except those which operate upon the elector through the medium of his own conscience and conviction — those which he obeys freely and spontaneously, apart from all calculations of future profit or loss to him self. Now, will any portion of such influences as these be enfeebled when the suffrage is rendered secret? Sir, I con tend that they will all be left entire and unimpaired. They will be as powerful under the ballot as they are at present; nay, they will be expanded and fostered to a degree much beyond what it is at present practicable. It is against the evil influences, specially and exclusively, that the ballot makes war—against those compulsory influences which determine the vote of an elector, without any reference to his own feelings and conviction — against those appeals to his hopes and fears which vitiate the integrity of the vote altogether. Sir, I am as anxious as the noble lord can be to multiply good influences over voters as much as possible; and I defy him to point out any mode of accomplishing this object half so effectual as secrecy and freedom of the suffrage. The evil influences at elections are now most formidable and triumphant; it is publicity alone which secures to them this triumph; it is publicity which renders thousands of honest voters traitors to their political convictions and to their inward conscience, though it cannot in any case create a sense of public duty in the bosom of the dishonest. Make the suffrage secret, and you banish all these evil influences at once. You leave uncontrolled scope to the gentle ascendancy of persuasion and advice from those who can engage the elector's esteem; you impose upon every one who wishes to obtain a vote the necessity of appealing to the inward reason or feelings of the voter. This is all which public authority can do, and I may add all that public authority need do, to multiply good influence over voters; and this will be assuredly accomplished by means of the vote by ballot. Hitherto, Sir, I have spoken chiefly of the effects of the ballot in extinguishing intimidation over electors. But, perhaps,
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I shall be told that it will not be equally effectual in preventing bribery. No doubt, Sir, the specific agency of the ballot is against intimidation; but its effect will be important and powerful in checking bribery. It will entirely suppress bribery according to the modes at present practised; it will greatly hamper and discourage bribery under any conceivable form or process; it will render the attempt to bribe, even under the most favourable circumstances, more uncertain, more costly, more difficult, and more hazardous. When the suffrage becomes secret you cannot buy an elector's vote individually and separately; for he cannot sell the certainty of his vote; he can only sell the probability of it; this is the best which he has to offer. He may certainly offer this contingency for sale, if any one will buy it; but what man in his senses will ever pay down the purchase money for a commodity of which there is to be no assured and ostensible delivery? Surely this is a speculation so unpromising and perilous that very few bribers will be at all inclined to embark in it. A good deal of bribery now goes on through indirect channels, and by the agency of friends and partisans of the candidates, and by the help of admission to charities and other descriptions of patronage, as the House will find detailed and illustrated in the evidence of Mr. Visger and Mr. Hudson before the Committee on Intimidation. An elector entitles himself to a share in these good things by constantly voting as a Blue freeman or a Yellow freeman. But how can this condition be certified, or this corrupt traffic continue to be carried on, when votes are taken secretly? But then it will be said, that a candidate may make his bargain with particular voters, agreeing to pay each of them a sum of money conditionally upon his success. In a large constituency I believe that any such bar gain would be totally out of the question; I believe that it would not answer the purpose of either party. In a small constituency I shall not deny that such a corrupt agreement might probably be made and acted upon; but, Sir, if this be admitted— if it be admitted that small constituencies carry with them an inherent and incorrigible possibility of corruption—what is the proper inference which follows? Not surely that the ballot is faulty and defective, but that small constituencies are faulty and defective, and that large constituencies alone are trustworthy. Still,

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Sir, though I subscribe to this argument as an objection against narrow constituencies, I am not afraid to contend that in every constituency, small as well as large, the Ballot will render bribery far more hazardous and deceitful, far more clumsy and inconvenient, than it is at present. In fact the Bullot will go nearer to eradicate bribery altogether than any other measure which could be devised while the suffrage remains public. There is this essential distinction between bribery and intimidation, in both you have two conspirators who confederate against the freedom and purity of election; but in the case of intimidation one of the conspirators is an unwilling agent, and therefore the conspiracy is totally broken up the moment he is left to his own free will. Whereas in the case of bribery both parties are willing agents, in so far as they can trust each other, and, therefore, the same precautions are not so omnipotent to their in tended purpose—they serve only, but they do serve most effectually, to disconcert and confound such a conspiracy, by destroying all evidence or certainty of the consummation of the bargain. Whoever thinks that this is doing little let him show me any other plan which will do as much, assuming the publicity of the vote to be preserved. But surely, Sir, my cause would be complete, even if I were to wave all mention of bribery, when it can be shown that the Ballot will effectually extirpate intimidation. Your honest voters cry to you for protection against intimidation—they are men who would spurn the idea of a bribe, or of turning their votes to any corrupt profit—but they do pray to be guarded against wrong, and loss, and oppression in the conscientious exercise of their franchise. A measure is proposed which completely accomplishes this object; and I am really to be told, as a fatal objection to it—" No; we cannot grant you the Ballot; it is true that it does away with intimidation entirely, but there are some distant possibilities of bribery which it leaves not absolutely barred out, and therefore it is not worth our consideration." I must contend, Sir, that this would be the most extraordinary ground of exception ever yet taken to any legislative proposition. Here are two diseases, both of most pernicious working. A remedy lies before you, by which the one may be completely cured, the other greatly abated; yet you cast it contemptuously away because you
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cannot sweep the country clean of both diseases at once. Let me venture to re mind you, Sir, that if it be difficult, as it certainly is difficult, to prevent dishonest voters from playing you false and betraying their trust, if this be the case, I say the more carefully ought you to watch over and cherish the untainted portion of your constituency. Protect them from being dragged into dishonest voting against their own will, by unrighteous violence and compulsion. If you cannot eradicate corrupt disposition universally, at least keep the path of honesty safe and clear for the willing citizen to walk in. I can hardly persuade myself, Sir, that the Legislature will persist in withholding the precautions necessary for this simple, though solemn, purpose. It is my duty to touch upon one or two other objections which I know to be made against the Ballot, and I shall pro ceed to do so with as much brevity as possible, regretting very much the necessity of troubling the House at so much length. I know that I have to combat a feeling of degradation which some Gentlemen attach to the use of secrecy in any case, or for any purpose. No doubt, Sir, there are numberless cases in which publicity is of unspeakable moment; but reflection will teach us that this rule is far from being universal. What man is there who has not experienced, in the most trying con junctures of his life, the blessing of confidential communication with a friend, enabling him as it does to procure information or advice, which could never be safely proclaimed to the public? What member of a club is there who does not feel that the harmony and kindly fellowship among the general body is essentially maintained by the secrecy with which voting is carried on? Well, then, Sir, the special point of your consideration is, whether voting at Parliamentary elections is one of those occasions on which secrecy is better or worse than publicity. Now, Sir, perhaps I may be considered as unduly presumptuous; but I challenge any gentleman to point out any one good consequence arising from publicity of votes, or any one bad consequence arising from secrecy of votes at Parliamentary elections. One thing is undeniable—such publicity is in no respect conducive, in many respects injurious, to the main purposes of Parliamentary elections, which is to ascertain exactly and faithfully who it is that possess the confidence of the majority of every constituency.

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What profit is gained beyond the satisfaction of vague curiosity by publishing the poll-book with the names of the majority and minority, a record of names often procured as much by forced levies as by voluntary enlistment? Gentlemen, may, perhaps say, that the vote of the superior person must be proclaimed, in order that it may serve as a guide and index to the inferior. There might be some thing in this reasoning if votes were the only way open to a man of making known his political opinions—but I need not remind you, Sir, that secrecy of voting is perfectly compatible with full publication of opinions by the tongue, or the pen, wherever any man chooses to make his opinions public. If there are, however, as in fact there always are, a certain percentage of voters, who do not choose thus to make proclamation of their political feelings; men, who either from backwardness of temper, or from dependence of position, shrink from open collision with their private friends, neighbours, and patriots—where is the advantage of forcing these men to vote aloud, and thus record themselves as formal partisans, against their own tem per and inclination? Sir, I contend there is every disadvantage in putting this constraint upon them; for, by refusing to take their votes quietly and confidentially, you force them to consider, not which is the right side, but which is the strongest side; you incur the risk of deterring them from giving their votes at all; you incur a still greater risk of obtaining from them a spurious vote, instead of a genuine vote. Sir, I look in vain for any one advantage, private or public, derived from publicity of votes; I find no one disadvantage, still more no dishonour, attached to secrecy. His Majesty, in calling a new Parliament wishes to get together a House of Commons possessing the confidence of the people. In order to be sure that he arrived at the truth, he takes the opinion of every separate elector, confidentially, apart from the hearing of any one else. What dishonour can there be in secrecy, when it is only the handmaid of sincerity, the pledge of free speech, as between the voter and the public? I think, Sir, I have some reason to remark, if not to complain, that persons who object to the vote by ballot, overlook constantly the main and direct purpose of Parliamentary election, and fasten their attention upon certain collateral circumstances, which at best can only be taken into consideration, when we
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have ensured the accomplishment of the primary end. For example, many Gentle men assail the ballot on the ground, that it enables an elector to promise his vote to one man and give it to another; or to declare that he has voted in one way, when he has really voted in the opposite. Now, Sir, before I examine the real value of this objection, let me first ask what it has to do with the main purpose for which Parliamentary elections take place? That purpose is, to collect faithfully the real sense of the qualified voters as to the choice of representatives. I believe there is no Gentleman of any party who denies that this is the grand aim of Parliamentary elections. Above all things, therefore, it is necessary to insure that this end shall be attained; and if you do not insure it, you may almost as well dispense with elections altogether, involving as they do so much trouble and expense, so much animosity and uneasiness of every kind. Now, such being the acknowledged purpose of elections, I contend that, in discussing the ballot, I am bound to show that secret suffrage is better than open suffrage, as a means of ascertaining the real sense of the voters. My opponents, on the other hand, are bound to disprove it. Bat do they disprove it? Sir, I con tend that not only do they not disprove it, but they do not even approach the question. I have attempted to prove—and I think I have proved—that secret suffrage is absolutely necessary to protect the honest voter in the conscientious discharge of his duty to the public. Do my opponents refute me, and prove the contrary? They do no such thing. They omit altogether the duty of the voter towards the public, and they carry your attention to the private obligation of the voter, as regards some third party; they expatiate on the maintenance of good faith, as between promiser and promisee. I must consider that this is a pure diversion of your attention away from the main point at issue; for the business of the Legislature is, to place an elector on the best and most convenient footing, for discharging the special duty required of him by the public; whether he tells truth, or keeps his promises to third parties, must be left to his own feelings and his own sense of propriety. But, Sir, let us take the objection as it stands, and inquire what it amounts to. The ballot, we are told, will lead to false promises and false declarations on the

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part of voters. How or why should it pro duce this effect? Does it command any voter to break his promise? Does it hold out to him any new inducement or reward for breaking his promise? No, nothing of the kind; it merely enjoins him to per form the act of voting without a witness, and thus indirectly enables him to vote either according or contrary to any previous promise, without being found out, if he be inclined to do so. Certainly, the same may be said of every private and solitary act of every man's life; but. why are hon. Gentlemen so very much afraid, lest electors who vote by ballot should break their promises the moment they are enabled to do so with impunity? Sir, it is but too well known, that the promise given by a voter is, in a thousand cases, extorted and compulsory; it is a promise neither consonant to his own free will, nor dictated by his own conviction; a promise which he would never have made except, to one who took an ungenerous advantage of him, and who possessed the power of inflicting penalty upon him in case of refusal. Now, Sir, promises like these, the offspring originally of importunity and compulsion, will only be sure of observance through the maintenance of the same compulsion; they may probably be infringed, when the ballot has left every voter to his own free will. But the voluntary promises—those which have been freely given, and which carry the heart and feelings of the voter along with them —promises of this kind will never be bro ken, even though the vote be given in the thickest darkness, and with the fullest sense of impunity. We are told by Milton that
"Ease will recant
Vows made in pain as violent and void."
But wherever the vow has not been made in pain—wherever ease has made the vow, ease will keep it also. This, Sir, is the whole amount of the mischief of promise-breaking, and I intreat the attention of the House to it, that none but compulsory promises are in danger of being broken when votes are given secretly. Let me put the question now, what mischief would ensue if these compulsory promises should come to be broken? A voter ought not to make such a promise if it be at variance with his own sentiments and conscience. Granted; but assuming that he has been guilty of the weakness and the wrong of giving such a promise, are we to arrange our system of voting for the express purpose Of compelling him to keep it? To
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do this would be nothing less than seeking to deprive the voter, by our own act, of the means of faithfully discharging his duty to his country—a duty prior to all private agreements with third parlies—a duty implied in the very possession and exercise of the franchise. Why, Sir, when the choice lies, as it does in this case, between breaking a wrongful promise and violating the duty which the elector owes to his country, can there be a moment's hesitation which of the two we ought to enforce, and which we ought to condemn—we who sit in this House as the chosen guardians of the public rights and franchise—we who derive our sole title to confidence and authority from presumed purity of election? Let me again bring to your recollection, Sir, the object and aim with which the Committee of last year was constituted. We desire to put down intimidation and to uphold the freedom of the vote. But I affirm that we are playing into the hands of the intimidator, and practically annihilating the freedom of the vole, when we countenance and ratify these compulsory promises. The intimidator begins by compelling a voter, to promise; and are we then really to say, "Be cause you have compelled the man to promise against his will, therefore you have acquired good title to compel him to a vote?" Sir, I say, that this would be no less monstrous in principle than inconsistent with our own resolutions and professions. It would be to guarantee the last stage of tyranny out of respect to the first. Depend upon it, Sir, if you wish to put down intimidation effectually you must use a very different language towards the intimidator. You must render the attainment of his final purpose impracticable. You must show him plainly, that whatever be his power of extorting promises he will not be allowed to retain the smallest power of extorting votes; and you will then pre vent these compulsory promises from being ever demanded, when you show that they afford no security for performance. The evil of intimidation, the evil of mendacity, and the evil of promise-breaking, will all disappear at the same time, and before one and the same simple remedy—a free and secret vote. Sir, I am deeply sensible that I have drawn but too largely on the patience of the House; yet, before I sit down, there is one argument which I am obliged briefly to examine, because it is constantly argued as an objection against the vote by ballot. Hon. Gentlemen tell

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me that the ballot will be fatal to what they call the legitimate influence of property. Now, Sir, I deny this assertion point blank in any defensible meaning which the words "legitimate influence" can be made to bear—in any meaning of the words which a patriot or a freeman can acknowledge. I assert, fearlessly, that under a system of secret voting, the legitimate influence of property will be pre served unimpaired; nay, more, that it will be even exalted beyond what it is at pre sent. There is only one species of influence which the ballot will withdraw from a rich man—it will take away the power of rewarding or punishing electors according to the manner in which they vote. Now, Sir, I would ask, and I hope the question will be plainly answered, whether it be re ally this power of rewarding or punishing electors which Gentlemen mean when they talk of the "legitimate influence of property?" Does the House intend to recognise in any one citizen of this community — Peer or Commoner, titled or untitled—a legitimate authority to reward or punish electors for their votes? If we do, Sir, the sooner in all consistency we repeal our statutes against bribery the better—the sooner we drop the farce of affecting to condemn intimidation the better. For, what is this privilege of giving to an elector a reward for his vote in plain and un varnished English, except bribing him? and what is the privilege of punishing him for his vote except a licence of intimidation? But I, Sir, deny the position entirely. I maintain that this influence which arises from the power of rewarding or punishing voters, is repudiated by the law and by the Constitution. I maintain, that a man is no more warranted in employing his legal powers as a landlord for the purpose of seducing and coercing his tenants' votes, than in employing his funded property to distribute among them bribes in hard cash. It is the ancient doc trine of the Constitution that elections ought to be perfectly free, and the ballot can have no other effect than that of realising this strictly constitutional end. But all legitimate influence of property consists fully with freedom of election, and there fore it consists fully with vote by ballot. There is no doubt that wealth and conspicuous station, unless they are coupled with repulsive or contemptible personal qualities, impart great additional weight to the recommendation of their possessor,
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" bene nummaturn decorat Suadela;" his authority is quoted and his example imitated, even by many who have no favour to hope, and no injury to fear from him. His wishes are still further likely to be obeyed if he is the object of gratitude for past favours, or of respect for public usefulness. Now, Sir, here is a very powerful body of influence insured to a rich man unless he forfeit it by his personal demerit. I call it a perfectly legitimate influence, and I call it so not less because. it rests partly upon good personal qualities, than because it is gentle and kindly in its working, looking only for open and spontaneous sympathy and graceful obedience, and implying neither violence on the one side nor degradation on the other. It is the triumph and the glory of this legitimate influence of property that the exercise of it. is perfectly compatible with entire freedom and secrecy of suffrage— nay, more, that it is exalted and enhanced by freedom of election, most powerfully felt where the suffrage is the most free, where the voter is best protected against everything like compulsion and tyranny. Sir, I have now exhausted, not indeed all that can be said on this important subject, but at least all that the House will bear to hear from me about it, and I have to thank them for the patience with which they have listened. Before I conclude, permit me in a few words to recall to your attention the point on which you are about to decide. Permit me to remind you that I am aiming at no end which is not in the strictest and highest sense constitutional. I am aiming at nothing except the freedom and integrity of the Parliamentary suffrage; a purpose not merely within the limits of the Constitution, but absolutely essential to its workings and vitality—absolutely essential to the attainment of a House of Commons really possessing the confidence of the people, which the Reform Act so emphatically promised to us. Permit me further to call to your remembrance the humiliating fact, that freedom of election, as things stand at present, is in many places little better than a dream and a fiction. Your election arrangements are traversed on all sides by corruption and intimidation; your electors are, in many cases compelled to vote against their real sentiments—in. many cases deterred from voting at all. This fact, if indeed it were not already notorious enough, has been

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publicly and incontestibly certified by the evidence taken before your own Committee, and I venture to warn you, that if, after such overwhelming notoriety of the evil, you remain deaf to all suggestions of a remedy, you will implicate yourself in something little short of the guilt of connivance and participation. Now, Sir, for this acknowledged evil I have ventured to suggest a remedy. Let those who object to it provide a better if they can. All I shall say is, that my ingenuity can discover no other remedy either like or second to it. I propose to you the vote by ballot; a measure simple, specific, easy of introduction, and bearing precisely upon the mischiefs under your consideration. I have endeavoured to show you that the ballot is an antidote complete, unfailing, and all-sufficient, as against the master-evil of intimidation, and that it is the most powerful of all correctives as against bribery. I have proved that it is the only expedient for enabling an honest voter to walk in the path of conscience without serious loss and peril; and that the State can have no security for obtaining what is the primary purpose of election — a genuine and sincere expression of sentiment from the elector— except by taking his vote in secrecy and solitude—
" Nam veræ voces turn demum pectore ab imo
Ejiciuntur; et eripitur persona, manet res."
I press upon you the adoption of the ballot, no less as an effectual protection to the honest voter, which he has the fullest right to demand, than as a certificate to the public of the genuineness of all votes, and of the unimpeachable title of all representatives chosen. I he hon. Member concluded by moving for leave to bring in a Bill providing that the votes at elections for Members of Parliament be taken secretly by way of Ballot.
Mr. Leader: Although I feel that in seconding the motion of my hon. Friend, the Member for London, I have a very difficult task to perform, yet were the task ten times more difficult I should have undertaken it with pleasure and alacrity, because I am convinced that the success of this measure would confer a more valuable and substantial benefit upon the people of this country, than any measure of reform which is at present in agitation; for without free and unbiassed voting at elections you cannot have fair and full representation; and without such representation you cannot have good government. The poor, that is, the comparatively poor and de-
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pendent electors (one-half, if not two-thirds of the constituency), complain, and justly do they complain, that the Legislature has given them the shadow instead of the substance—the letter, but not the spirit—the word, but not the deed—the mere resemblance of an elective franchise, and not the elective franchise itself; for it has given to the registered electors the nominal faculty of voting for Members of Parliament, but it has virtually reserved to others the real power, in a majority of cases, of influencing, and compelling and coercing the vote nominally and ostensibly given by the elector himself. Now, there are two kinds of influence; there is, first, the moral influence which a great man, who is also a good man, is certain to obtain over the opinions, the feelings, the very thoughts of his poorer neighbours and dependents; of that influence no man can complain. There is, on the other hand, the immoral influence not gained by goodness; but by strength over weakness, by wealth over poverty, by greatness over dependence, and exercised not with a beneficent desire to advance the welfare of the community, but to augment the power or promote the selfish interests of those who exercise it; such, I regret to say, is the influence too commonly used by the creditor over the debtor—by the rich over the poor—by the great merchant over the small trader—by the landlord over the tenant, by the great and the powerful, in short, over the humble and the weak; to such an extent, indeed, does this system of undue influence prevail in this country, that most landlords appear to think they have as good a right to their tenant's vote as to the rent of their farms. It constantly happens, for instance, that a landlord makes a favour of granting his permission to a candidate, or to a candidate's friend, to canvass his tenants for their votes. As if, forsooth, the candidate would be violating the landlord's property, poaching upon his preserves, if he were to canvass the tenants without the landlord's sanction. Or perhaps the landlord may be opposed in politics (ostensibly, at least) to the candidate, and yet willing from other causes to forward his interest; then we may suppose the candidate, on application for the landlord's vote and interest, to be met with the following answer: "I am sorry that I cannot vote for you myself, that I cannot personally interfere in your behalf, but I will tell you what I can do for you; I give you free permission to canvass all my tenants, I dare say many of them will vote for you." Kind and ge-

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nerous landlord! he condescends to allow the candidate for the votes of the electors to ask those of the electors who may be his tenants what their opinion really is. And yet it is a common form of expression to talk of taking "the sense of the people," while a candidate cannot even ask the people what their opinion is unless their landlord gives him permission to do so. This is clearly stated in the evidence given last year before the Bribery and Intimidation Committee. A witness was asked, "Is it usual before a party canvasses the tenants to ask the landlord's permission to do so?" Yes, "was the reply," and I never knew a Tory give that permission" (to his adversary is of course meant). What says another witness before the same Committee?— "I have known a landlord correspond with a candidate on the subject of the corn laws, and I have known him send a list of the whole of his tenants, and say that he should come with them and vote one way or the other, according to the explanation he received from the candidate." I have known other remarkable circumstances—I will not mention names—but I know the fact of the resident agent of a considerable property, the agent being of a class of political opinion different from the politics of his non-resident master, promising all the votes of the estate to a candidate. I wrote to London to a high family to influence this steward the other way, and the tenants were in consequence all polled contrary to their original promise, through the above agent." Well and justly may the tenants, after this, complain, "that the Legislature has given to them that which to them is not merely of no value, but an injury; for it compels them to go to the poll and tell a moral he —voting for one man when they feel it a duty to vote for another." Again, Sir, to prove that the votes of tenants are considered to proceed not from their own feelings, or knowledge, or conscience, but from their landlord's mandate, is it not notoriously matter of congratulation among Tories, when a great estate passes by inheritance or purchase, or other means, from a Reformer into the hands of a Tory; and, on the other hand, is it not cause of rejoicing among Reformers when a Tory's estate passes to a Reformer. There is a case in point which occurred only last year. In the western division of Somerset Lord Egremont has a large estate, with a command of, perhaps, 200 or 300 voters. The management of the estate was intrusted
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to a resident steward; till within a year that steward was a staunch old Whig. I need not inform the House that the tenants always voted for the Whig candidates. Well, last year the good old Whig steward died, and after a short interval another steward was appointed. The new steward is, like his predecessor, a very respectable barrister; but, unlike his predecessor, he is a very decided Tory. He is, indeed, chiefly famous for having been the unsuccessful Tory candidate in several contested elections. His appointment was of course hailed with joy by the Tories of West Somerset. "What a good thing," they exclaimed, "200 or 300 votes taken from those horrid Whigs, and given to us." My hon. Friends, the two Liberal Members for West Somerset, looked rather grave on the subject, even though they had a majority of 1,000 at the last election—these 200 or 300 votes were no trifle. Well, a short time after an old Tory lady, in the same division of Somerset, died, and left her estate to a very decided Reformer. "Good news," said my hon. Friends, the Members for West Somerset, who had looked so grave on the appointment of the Tory steward, "This is some compensation for that unfortunate affair." Now, Sir, these facts clearly prove one thing— that it is looked upon as a matter of course, that whatever the tenant's real opinion may be, his vote should invariably follow the vote of his landlord. I find another instance of this sort of influence in the evidence given before the Bribery and Intimidation Committee. There are, in South Devon, three parishes lying together, called Rattery, Staverton, and Broadhempston. In the parish of Rattery there were twenty-one votes polled at the last election of 1835. Only one was a freeholder, the rest were leaseholders under one and the same landholder, Sir Walter Carew, to whom the whole parish belongs, Now, in the election of 1832, these electors all voted for Mr. Bulteel, the reform candidate. At that election, their landlord, Sir Walter Carew, voted for Mr. Bulteel; hut in 1835 they all voted for Mr. Parker, the Conservative candidate, against Lord John Russell. What could possibly have caused this total change? When I tell the House that their landlord, Sir Walter Carew, voted for Mr. Parker, they will not, I am sure, think it necessary to look further for any other cause; but Members opposite may say, as the landlord of Rattery conscientiously changed

811
his opinion, why should not his tenants of Rattery have also conscientiously changed their opinion? There is, fortunately, in the peculiar circumstances of this case a satisfactory answer to that objection. It seems that the farmers of the three parishes of Rattery, Staverton, and Broadhempston, form one class of persons, are a very intelligent set of men, and are in the habit of associating very much together; they are all of them Reformers on principle; and, in 1832, almost all of them voted for the reform candidate; but, in 1835, the farmers of one of the three parishes, that is of Rattery, voted against the reform candidate, while their friends and neighbours, the farmers of Staverton and Broadhempston, voted, as before, almost unanimously, in favour of the reform candidate. What is the secret of this partial change? Why, simply this—that in Rattery the farmers were all under the influence of one landlord, who had changed his mind, whereas the farmers of Staverton and Broadhempston were under little or no influence, and could vote according to their own conscientious opinions. In the same division of Devon, there is a parish called Broadcast. In 1832, nearly all the electors of Broadclist voted for the reform candidate; in 1835, six only voted for the reform candidate, while fifty two voted for the anti-reform candidate. What could be the reason of this great change? Were the fanners terrified by the rapid progress of reform, or were they alarmed with the Tory outcry of "No Popery." No, Sir, there is a much more plain and simple reason for their change of vote—they were all under the influence of one landlord, Sir Thomas Ackland. Now, in 1832, he supported the reform candidate, but in 1835, he opposed the reform candidate. What can be more proper, or more natural, in the existing state of things, than that his tenants should implicitly fellow his vote, and change their opinions with the changed opinions of their landlord? I will not weary the House by citing any move instances of this undue influence; let the most incredulous Member look into the evidence given last year before the Bribery and Intimidation Committee, and he must be convinced of the almost universal existence of this immoral and degrading influence. Now if this system is to continue, let us at least get rid of the hypocritical practice of registering the tenants of a great man as so many good votes, Let us act in a straight for-
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ward, if not in a just manner. In South Devon, for instance, instead of registering so many farmers and leaseholders on Lord Rolle's estate, as so many distinct and independent votes, let us at once write down in the register—My Lord Rolle, 500 votes, in right of 500 serfs, or villeins, or farmers, or leaseholders—call them what you will, the name signifies little—who must vote as he commands them. Then, on the other side, put down—the Duke of Bedford, so many votes; and so on with all the great landed proprietors. This method, would, under the existing system, have several very good effects—it would save a great deal of trouble to candidates; instead of canvassing a great number of dependent voters, they would have to ask only for the votes of the great proprietors. It would put a stop to the persecution of voters, and thereby prevent much misery and bad feeling. It would have a good moral effect, as it would prevent most of the tyranny and hypocrisy at present in operation; and it would have the good political effect, that the tenants would become indignant at this open insult, though they now endure the injury with the flimsy veil of registration thrown over it; they would then assert their rights, and dare to say that their votes and their consciences were their own, and not their landlords'. In the feudal times the baron was followed to the wars by his tenants—a glittering train of steel-clad men-at-arms: the system is still the same though neither so war-like nor so imposing: now the landlord is followed to the poll by his tenants—a submissive train of coerced electors; and the results in both cases are nearly the same. In old times, the baron who could raise the greatest number of good fighting men attained for himself by their courage and good service, rank, and power, and consequence; in these times, the landlord who can command the greatest number of good voting men is sure, through their votes, to obtain for himself or his family, place, or pension, or patronage; indeed these things can scarcely be attained in any other way. Now what is the consequence of this pernicious and most iniquitous system? Some Members may think it successful, because the immediate apparent consequence is to give more Members to the benches opposite, than they would otherwise have; but the real consequence which must ultimately appear evident to all the world is this, that the

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gentry of England will raise up a bad feeling against themselves; for in every coerced elector, in every tenant who has been compelled by them or by their agents to vote against his opinion, they will have a secret but a determined enemy; that the rich merchants and manufacturers will find in every coerced workman, in every intimidated tradesman, a secret but determined enemy. I have myself heard the curses and the threats of men who had been compelled by stern necessity to sacrifice their vote to the interest of their children. I have myself heard the son of a voter who had suffered and been half ruined because he would not give a dishonest vote, cursing the author of their misery, and wishing him in his grave. Are these the feelings which the gentry of England desire to produce in the hearts of their fellow-countrymen? They may sneer at curses, they may laugh at threats; trusting to their wealth, and their station, and their power, they may exclaim with the tyrant of old, "Oderint dum metuant;" but the time must come when the people's hate and the people's indignation will make them tremble. I have spoken at such length, and with such warmth on this part of the subject, because I know that the abuse of influence is the great and glaring evil of the present system; whoever has influence exercises it — whether justly or unjustly he never stops to inquire—and so perverted is the public mind on this subject, that most men actually think that they are committing no offence, either against justice or morality, when they are using their influence to compel a dependent to choose between dishonesty and ruin. I come now, Sir, to the question of what the elective franchise really is. Our opponents are continually comparing the responsibility of electors with the responsibility of Judges, Ministers of the Crown, and Members of Parliament. All these persons, they say, are obliged to act openly, and to be responsible for their actions; why should the elector alone be protected, by secrecy, from responsibility to his fellow-citizens? Now this comparison is not a fair one. The Judge is responsible to the community for a fair administration of justice—the Minister is responsible to the Crown and to the country for the fulfilment of his ministerial functions— the Member of Parliament is responsible to his constituents for the discharge of his Parliamentary duties, They have also
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each of them a still higher responsibility— namely, a responsibility to their own conscience for an upright discharge of their several duties. Now, this is the only responsibility which the elector shares with them, for the Legislature has determined that every man possessing a certain qualification, shall, on the fulfilment of certain conditions, have a right to be registered as an elector; the only duty demanded of him in return is, that he shall fairly and impartially, to the best of his judgment, exercise his faculty of voting. The elective franchise therefore, is not properly a trust, but a right, for the exercise of which an elector is responsible, not to his landlord—not to his neighbours—not to the non-electors— but to his own conscience alone. If, therefore, it is shown that the electors generally cannot freely and conscientiously exercise their right of voting under the present system of open voting, the Legislature is bound to afford them protection in some way or another. If this could be done without the secrecy of ballot, it would be an admirable thing indeed; but if it cannot be done without, then it must be done by means of the ballot; for until the voter can give his vote as he pleases, all (so called) representation is a farce, and it is a mockery to talk of the "sense of the people." Now, Sir, to examine some of the arguments and assertions usually urged against the ballot, as to its being un-English, and calculated to encourage falsehood and hypocrisy; such charges scarcely deserve an answer. I wish, however, to observe, that it is much worse, much more likely to cause falsehood and hypocrisy, and, therefore, I suppose more un-English, to coerce a voter and to make him tell an open lie, than to give him the protection of secrecy, trusting to his sense and conduct, after having voted conscientiously, to parry as he best can the questions and insinuations of those persons who had sought to influence him. But, say our opponents, the ballot would not put an end to either bribery or intimidation. They say, that in small constituencies bribery would, under the ballot, be carried on wholesale. Now, granting for a moment that this argument is worth anything, it is an argument not against the ballot, but against small constituencies. Let, therefore, no constituency consist of less than 1,500 or 2,000 voters, and the richest man in the country would soon find his purse exhausted, and his seat too

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dearly purchased, even if he could purchase one at all. Again, in what method do our opponents say that bribery under the ballot, in the case of small constituencies, would be carried on? Why, in this manner — that a candidate should promise, if successful, to distribute a certain sum of money among the electors. Now, under the present system it is notorious, that in many places there is bribery on the part of the unsuccessful as well as on the part of the successful candidate. On the very showing, therefore, of our opponents, half the existing bribery would be stopped. The real fact is, that the ballot would very soon put down bribery altogether. With respect to intimidation, in spite of the denial of our opponents, the ballot must have a very good effect, even though it should not prevent some men from occasionally exercising a tyrannous power over their dependents. Under the present system every vote is known, and a landlord may say to his tenants—" If you do not vote as I wish, you shall suffer for it." Under the ballot, every vote would be secretly given; at any rate every vote would not be known. The landlord could then say only — "If I find you out voting against my wishes, you shall suffer for it." But it would be the tenant's own fault if he made public that which he might, if he chose, keep secret. The secret vote by ballot, therefore, would very materially diminish, if it did not altogether destroy, all undue influence and intimidation. Great horror is expressed by our opponents at the prospect of the influence of property being taken away by the ballot. The bad, the immoral influence of mere property, unsupported by character and moral worth, would undoubtedly be diminished; but the good, the moral, the only proper influence of property, in the hands of a good man enjoying a good character for judgment, honesty, and knowledge, far from being diminished, would be vastly increased by the ballot. Not to weary the House with the many arguments on this point which occur to one's memory, I will refer to a statement made before the Bribery and Intimidation Committee. A witness was asked, "The instant the ballot was established, would there not be on the part of the landlord an entire absence of all canvassing, and of the attempt to make his moral influence felt?—I should say not his moral influence. I say
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a good landlord, like Sir Thomas Acland, whose moral influence is so good, that, differing with his politics, I should be very much afraid of his moral influence over his tenants; but I do not think it would extend to the extreme it does now. Where the yeomanry are not intelligent, and have no strong political feeling, I think a man would have a great deal of moral influence." "You said just now, a clergyman of mild and amiable character, and exemplary conduct, would have more influence over his parishioners than a clergyman of different habits?" "Certainly." Would not that influence continue with the ballot?"—"Certainly." "So you think that a landlord anxious to exercise political power in his own neighbourhood, would, if his sources and means of (undue) influence were taken away, be more inclined to increase the sources of what you considered his moral influence; that is, that he would take pains to impress his opinions as well as his wishes, upon the minds of his dependants?"—"Certainly." But why pursue this topic further? It must be evident that if you take from men desirous of power the bad means of attaining it, they will sedulously apply themselves to the good means—" a consummation devoutly to be wished." I have quoted the above evidence, partly in support of my position, and partly also as an act of justice to Sir Thomas Acland, whose name I have before mentioned in connexion with influence over tenants. Are there not many laws against bribery? And what is bribery but the undue, the immoral influence of property? And yet in speeches in this House we hear of the horrible injustice that the ballot would bring upon the rich, by depriving property of its influence. Now call the elective franchise a right or a trust, as you please, the duty of an elector is to deliver his genuine and conscientious opinion at the poll, whether it agrees or disagrees with that of other people: any elector, therefore, who, under undue influence, gives a vote against his opinion, is guilty of a breach of public duty; but the man who by undue influence coerces his vote, is doubly guilty; the man that makes another thieve is more guilty than the thief; the man who hires a false witness, is more guilty than the base perjurer; the man who pays an assassin is more guilty than the murderer; and thus the man who makes another vote against his con-

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science is more guilty than the man who so votes. "What!" exclaim some honourable Members, even on this side of the House, "are the electors insensible to feelings of independence?" Alas, no; they have strong feelings of independence, but they have also a very natural feeling for themselves, for the welfare of their families, for the livelihood of their children. Can we blame them when we see them tempted by gain (call it bribery or head-money as you like) on the one hand, threatened with misery on the other, if they neglect what they may, perhaps, consider in their individual case an unimportant public duty, in order that they may attain, what to them is an all-important, a vital object, that is, the means of securing a livelihood for themselves and their family. "Are you then prepared (say our opponents) to state that the Mouse of Commons is not composed of the real representatives of the people of England?" To that question I answer, that admitting as I do, with gratitude, the great improvement in representation produced by the Reform Bill, I do maintain that this House does not, even now, fairly represent the real feelings of the electors of this country; and that it never will represent them fairly, until the electors generally can, under the protection of the ballot, give an honest and a conscientious vote. Look to the counties especially; are there not many County Members in this House who represent not the great body of the electors according to their honest opinions—but the clergy, the magistracy, and the few great proprietors, whose tenants are compelled to vote against their real opinions. If an example is wanted of undue influence in a populous city, look to the case of Bristol, as stated before the Committee on Bribery and Intimidation; if an example is wanted of undue influence exercised by one great. proprietor over the constituency of a small town, look to the case of Ripon, as stated before the same Committee. The abuse is notorious, and the people believe that there is no remedy for it but the ballot. After our opponents have alleged such and similar arguments against the ballot, they at least assert, in order, I suppose, to annihilate at once the ballot and its supporters, that the ballot has failed in France and in America, and that it will not insure secrecy. As to its having failed in those countries, facts give a clear de-
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nial to our opponent's assertions. So far from having failed in America, it has admirably answered the end for which it was instituted—that of securing a fair representation of the people. And now that the Americans have clearly established their freedom of choice in elections, the ballot may indeed occasionally be exercised in such a manner as not to enforce secrecy; but the power remains with the electors, and should circumstances ever render such protection necessary to shield them from corruption or intimidation, the secret vote by ballot is in their hands, and to that protection, and to that alone, can can they at all times have recourse. The same thing may be said of France, with the difference—that as in America the ballot is the guarantee to the Americans for all their rights and liberties, so in France the ballot is the last remnant of free representation yet preserved to Frenchmen—the last protection of the French electors against the corruption, the intimidation, and the tyranny of Government. As to secrecy not being insured by the ballot, all that I ask is this—recognise the principle that every man's vote should be his own and not another man's, that every man should be enabled to vote as he pleases, and protected in the exercise of his elective franchise; but so long as open voting continues, this cannot be effected. Allow my hon. Friend, the Member for London, to introduce his Bill, and I will venture to declare that he will so frame the clauses of the Bill, that he will so regulate the machinery of voting, that in spite of threats and of spies—inspite of public intimidation and of domestic treachery —the vote of the elector must perforce remain a secret to every human being but himself. I have now gone through most of the arguments usually urged against the ballot, but it seems to me that in all these arguments and assertions we have only the professed reasons of our opponents for disliking the ballot. It appears to me that their real reason yet remains behind. I should say that their real bona fide reason for opposing the ballot is this, that they know the ballot would take from the wealthy and the powerful their undue influence, and their unjust power, and that it would place the choice of Members (and consequently the chief power in the state) where it ought to be by right, in the hands of the electors. The consequence of this would be, that the rich and the powerful,

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who wished to administer the affairs of the state, would be compelled to render themselves fit by knowledge, energy, and conduct, to occupy those places which they now habitually hold, not because they are fit to hold them, but because they happen to have inherited a great estate, or to descend from a noble family, or because they have zealously devoted themselves to one or other of the two aristocratic parties. It is acknowledged on all sides that corruption is practised—it is acknowledged that intimidation prevails to an unparalleled extent—it is acknowledged that undue influence is exercised in the most revolting manner—and yet, when we offer you a remedy for all these evils, you reject it. How then can we, how can the people, believe that you are sincere and earnest in your professions, and your declarations against these abuses? In this respect I am more surprised at the opposition offered to us by certain Reformers on this side of the House, than by the Conservative Reformers opposite. The present Ministers know (for they have told us) that they are the representatives of the people, as well as the Ministers of the Crown. They are undoubtedly the most liberal and the most honest, and therefore the most popular Ministers who ever ruled this country. They have generally deserved the confidence of the people, and they have had, and (so long as they go on in the same liberal and honest course) they will continue to have, the support of the popular party in this House. Knowing all this—as they well know it— and being well assured that the great majority of the aristocracy of birth and of wealth—that the bar, the clergy, the magistracy, and the squirearchy are generally against them, and that they are maintained in power by the will of the people alone; why, I say, do they persist in resisting as a Government this measure, which above all others would increase their power—by increasing the people's power and their confidence in Ministers? Why are the friends to ballot now in the Government compelled to oppose us? Why is not this question left rather as an open question, on which each Minister may exercise his own discretion? We know that in the Government there are many friends to the ballot; why, then, are they now prevented from giving their powerful assistance to a measure of which they once were the able supporters? Why are their lips to be closed by the seal of office? I trust that before long the
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Government, or rather the anti-ballot Members of the Government, will change their course on this question; and if they will not themselves bring it forward as a Government measure, that they will at least leave it as an open question, and allow their colleagues, who are in favour of it, to speak and to vote according to their previously avowed opinions. But whether this or any future Government may assist us or not, it is now a mere question of time. They might, by their assistance, enable us to carry the question rather sooner than we can without them. They may, by their opposition or their indifference, throw some impediment and some delay in our course; but they may rest assured that, before many years have passed, this question must be carried. The people are every year more convinced of its necessity; the people will, at every election, be more urgent in its favour, because they will every year more clearly see the hopelessness of relief without it, and it must ultimately succeed. Public opinion is setting in in favour of the ballot with a steady flow. You may, for a season stop, by your obstacles, the advancing tide; but it must eventually rise above all barriers, and carry you before it with resistless force. I cannot better conclude what I have to say on this subject, than by quoting the words of one of the chief men in the country: although they were not spoken on this question, they are most applicable to it: the words are these —" The great disease of society, the great impediment to quiet government, the great evil of the day, the greatest prevailing abuse at present is, that every one thinks he has a right to employ his influence over another; each practises it, and each exclaims against its practice in a third person. The landlord enforces it on his tenant—the customer over his tradesmen; they force conscience, and they drive persons against their will to the poll, to vote contrary to their own wishes. I say, then, upon whatever side this influence is exercised, it is a cruel tyranny and a gross injustice. I say that it is a great evil; it is one, too, prevailing in a greater degree in this than in any other country, and that in no other country hut this, where there is a popular form of government, does it prevail." These are sentiments which would do honour to any man; they are the honest, the manly, the straightforward sentiments of a truly liberal-minded man: they are words spoken only a few weeks past, by the Prime Mi-

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nister of this country. He is the most popular—yes, Sir, he is still the most popular, and he is still deservedly the most popular Minister who ever governed this country. And as I believe that the welfare of the people is his only object in retaining power, so is their confidence in him the main support of his Administration. I rejoice, therefore, to hear such words uttered by such a man; for I feel assured, that if acted upon, they will lend to increase and to confirm his well-earned and unshaken popularity. To me these words are as a good omen of our future, and not very distant success in carrying this all important question of the ballot.
Lord Dalmenyin rising to make a few remarks, begged leave to say, that if any speech could induce him to become an advocate for the ballot and the principle of secret voting, it would be the speech of the hon. Member for London. For three successive years that hon. Member had brought forward this motion in a very entertaining and able manner, but as each successive year had only furnished him with additional reasons for believing that the measure was not only one of an impolitic, but of a pernicious nature, the hon. Member must rather attribute his opposition to the nature of the measure itself, than to any want of talent on the part of those who had urged it on their attention. He was not, at the same time, blind to the evils and mischiefs that arose out of the present system. There was no doubt whatever about the disease; the question, therefore, merely regarded the remedy to be applied, and he candidly confessed that he could discover no such remedy in the nostrum of the hon. Member for London; on the contrary, he thought it would lead to those very evils which it affected to cure. Supposing, as the hon. Member anticipated, that the ballot would have the effect of securing the utmost secrecy, of inducing the voter to observe a silence that no power could break, and that even in the expansion of his heart during convivial moments he could not be influenced to disclose his vote—supposing all these improbabilities to be realised, let it be recollected that the principle the hon. Member advocated would strike at once at the root of all responsibility. The very Gentlemen who had been always shouting and agitating for publicity, who preferred that the Exchequer should be impaired rather than that means should not be given to inform the ignorant of everything that
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occurred, from the debates in Parliament down to the lowest parish squabble—men who had been in the habit of branding every private meeting with the name of "cabal," were now the very men to call most loudly for secrecy at elections. The hon. Member for the City of London had talked of putting an end to the intimidation of voters by the ballot. Now, most certainly the ballot would not have that effect, for if landlords had the power of compelling their tenantry to vote in a particular way, and against their consciences, pray, would they not to an equal degree have the power of compelling them to sacrifice their votes altogether, which could be done, too, without any breach of conscience? Would the landlords, who were now said to be so active in persecution and laborious in oppression, be charmed into subjection by the sound of the ballot? Would their agents, who were now said to be so active amongst the tenantry, totally lose their influence? Would there be no secret inquiries, no espionnage, no endeavours to entrap, no bullying in order to extort a confession, or no vigilance to take advantage of evasion on the part of the voter? He had known frequent instances in which voters had refused to declare their intention to the landlord, but at the same time the manner in which they conducted themselves rendered their intention as evident as if they had openly avowed it. He would, therefore, never sanction a measure which would only give protection to a system of tyranny and falsehood, for that must be based upon fraud, the very existence of which depended on secrecy; he would never sanction a measure which would sow dissension between landlord and tenant, and poison all the relations between them. He confessed he preferred the course pursued by those opposed to the ballot, conceiving it to be injurious, to that of those who, though sceptical of its efficiency, would notwithstanding admit of a trial by way of experiment. Now, he detested all mere experiments with the institutions of the country. If the ballot be an improvement, let it be adopted; if it be pernicious, let it be rejected; but let them not be called upon to attempt it by way of a frivolous experiment, in order to satisfy the cravings of idle speculation or still more idle curiosity, and in order to pander to the passions of the multitude. If ever the ballot should pass into a law, one of the first speeches he should have to make in opposition to the hon. Member for London

823
would certainly be in opposing some well digested scheme for eradicating bribery by increasing the elective franchise. It was well known that bribery took place amongst the lower classes. He did not think the ballot would prevent it, and he thought that system one of a most pernicious nature which made secrecy the guardian of honesty. With regard to the appeals which had been made to extinguish the fine old English system and all those sentiments of loyalty with which it was connected, and to substitute in its place a mean, low, crafty, pusillanimous, and dissembling spirit, which must be infallibly engendered by the ballot —with regard to those appeals to the feelings on that subject, he should leave them to those who should succeed him in the debate, conscious that he had entered sufficiently into the general merits of the question. He should also leave to others the task of showing that the ballot had entirely failed in America, notwithstanding the assertions of the hon. Member for Bridgewater. He had never conversed with an American, or with an Englishman who had resided in that country, conversant with elections, that had not told him that the ballot had proved most ridiculously ineffective, and had completely defeated its own purposes. Let him, then, implore the House not to waste its time on these abstract speculations — let him implore the House to suffer a reform in our institutions to have fair play, to have a fair trial, and not to disturb it by this meddling spirit of innovation, but to betake themselves to those real grievances which now more than ever summoned their attention. Let them at least deal with experience before they plunged into theories.
Dr. Bowringsaid, if the speech of the noble Lord had come from the other side of the House, it would have been more in place than it was, having been delivered on this side. All that was asked by the friends of the ballot was that the experiment should be made, and as an assurance that it would succeed they showed that in the cases in which it had been tried it had never failed. Allusion had been made to America; how had the ballot proceeded there? It was adopted in one of the American States, and found to work so well that it was extended to the others. When he visited the cantons of Switzerland he was told that the ballot had had the effect there of introducing peace into the community, and that it had done more to establish harmony and prevent corruption than any experiment that
824
had been made. It was known generally, and the noble Lord must know, that even amongst his constituents the question of the ballot had made great progress; indeed, he must feel, that if there was any one thing more than another which was calculated to put in peril his situation in that House, it was such a speech as he had made that night, and there never was a question which had made such rapid progress in the public mind as this. It was a question not only of reason but of peace. It tended to remove that tyranny which caused so much misery, and the exercise of that undue influence of wealth which caused so much corruption. Its advocates only desire that the trial should be made, their object being to give the people the opportunity of choosing the representatives they desired to choose. One of the noble Lord's objections to the ballot was that it was un-English. He would maintain, on the contrary, that it was not an un-English principle. The noble Lord knew perfectly well, that in those clubs to which gentlemen belonged, when a question arose as to the admission of a new member the election was conducted on the principle of the ballot, in order that there might be obtained the honest, conscientious, and sincere opinion of those with whom they associated, care being at the same time taken not to put the parties voting in a situation of hostility to those whom they felt conscientiously bound to oppose. What was asked was, that the people of England should be enabled to do what they considered right. If a man was in so independent a situation that he could proclaim his votes to the world without sacrifice, there was no reason why he should not do so; the ballot would not prevent him. But in a country like this, for a few independent to that extent, there were tens of thousands who were not. Let those who wished or who dared to make their votes public proclaim them. There might be some who were high-minded enough to prefer incurring a sacrifice to submitting to vote secretly, and he was disposed to honour the man who was conducted to martyrdom, but he certainly would not help to build up the hill on which the sacrifice was to be made. In his opinion there was no stronger answer to those who objected to the experiment than that it had never been made without success. He wished to avoid the suffering which followed a conscientious discharge of duty, and there was a great

825
deal of such suffering. Much apprehension was entertained of the tyranny of the many; he would guard against the tyranny of the few, for he knew that the tyranny of the few was often exercised to compel the many to do that which they felt to be wrong.
Mr. Ewartdeprecated the speech of the noble Lord, which was, in his opinion, more distinguished by eloquence of words than by force of argument. The noble Lord begged the question throughout, that fraud and falsehood must be the necessary result of the ballot, whereas its tendency was to prevent both. The noble Lord who had spoken in the course of the evening had said, "Before I consent to your measure I have a right to ask you to show me your machinery." Now, in reply to this part of the noble Lord's speech, he should say that in France the machinery for the purpose of the ballot was as ample and as perfect as possible. In America also it was found to work well, and here, in our clubs and vestries, whenever it was called into exercise it was found to work well. What occasion, then, for the noble Lord to demand an additional contrivance, when the simple machinery already in existence was found to be successful in its operations? To ask for the mechanism of the ballot before the ballot itself was granted, was only an evasion from the real state of the question. In all the cases in which the ballot had been tried, the mechanism had been sufficient to carry it into effect; we have only to sanction the principle demanded by the hon. Member for London; the machinery of the ballot was all ready for their hands, and he (Mr. Ewart) had not the slightest doubt of its success. The noble Lord had spoken much about the responsibility of the voter; but in order to be responsible he must have the means of expressing his opinions freely and without fear of consequences, which he could not do but by the ballot. The noble Lord had also spoken about the publicity of voting. But in his (Mr. Ewart's) judgment opinions, whether in religion or politics, were matters with which the state had no right to intermeddle. Now the exercise of the franchise was governed by opinion, whether true or false, and therefore the state had no right to interfere with it, nor to compel publicity, when the voter thinks he can exercise his franchise better in secret. The noble Lord had asked what security had we that the ballot would work well? To that question, the
826
only answer that could be given was, (as until we have adopted the experiment it would be impossible to speak from our own experience,) that in those countries in which the ballot had been introduced, we find it has put an end to coercion, and the fair inference is that it would work equally well in this country. In this country, of all others, it had ever appeared to him (Mr. Ewart) that the ballot was necessary; for in no country was there so few, compared with the great number of large proprietors. In France the number of small proprietors was several millions; while in England they were confined to some hundred thousands. In this country, therefore, it appeared that the shield of the ballot was much more necessary as a protection against the interference of wealth and power, in the exercise of the elective franchise, than in France where the wider diffusion of property constituted in some degree a guarantee against such interference. In France, it was the Government which prevented the freedom of election; and that not only in the election of the Chamber of Deputies, but in every municipal election down to the election of the lowest public officer in the kingdom. In England, the influence of property in the hands of the large proprietors, worked perniciously to almost an equal extent. Against that influence we are called upon to protect our fellow countrymen in the exercise of their franchise. There were two ways in which protection might be afforded them, by extending the franchise, and by giving them the power of secretly expressing their opinions: by secretly, he meant freely, for unless they had the power of expressing their opinions secretly, they never would express them freely. There were no means so natural, so obvious, so certain, for giving voters the power of freely expressing their opinions as the ballot. For that reason the House was called upon to grant it; for that reason he had taken this opportunity of expressing his opinions in its favour; for that reason he should as he had hitherto done, support it by his vote, and he should continue to do so to the end.
Colonel Thompsonobserved, it had been stated that voting for Members of Parliament was a public trust, and, therefore, it ought not to be exercised in secrecy; but, admitting that the elector was responsible for the way in which he exercised his right, did it follow that he would perform his duty any better for being exposed to the

827
chance of oppression? It was urged that the constitution did not recognise any such practice as secret voting; now, he could state one very remarkable instance that had been pressed upon him from an early period of his life, in which the law actually imposed the restriction of voting in secrecy, and allowed of no other mode of decision. He alluded to the case of military and naval officers, when sitting in courts-martial, having to decide upon the honour, and often upon the life, of their fellow creatures. Why was that the case? Because it was evidently considered to be the best mode that could be adopted; it was that one of the two plans which would produce the greatest maximum of good, and the least minimum of evil. Every officer was bound not to disclose the way in which he had voted. There was another instance, in the case of medical officers, who, though not bound by an oath, solemnly declared that they would not publish at any time their own opinions. He thought that would be an excellent precedent to be adopted by the friends of the ballot, because it had this effect—no man would ask the officer how he voted, knowing that he would be immediately replied to in this way—" How can you undertake to ask me my opinion, when you know I have solemnly declared that I will not divulge it?" He thought that principle might be copied into legislation upon the question of the ballot. He saw no reason why a voter should not be made to declare, that he would not expose his vote and opinion. That plan, he thought, would have the effect of preventing that intimidation, and those attempts at intimidation, of which so much complaint was now made.
Mr. Brodiesaid it was very seldom that he troubled the House, and he hoped, therefore, he might be heard on the important question of the ballot. He had a natural aversion to secrecy of all kinds, and his aversion had not been diminished by the observations of a very sensible writer. He said—
"Thus much we may confidently state, that the expedient in question (the ballot) has of late assumed a form, entirely new, as regards its importance. The recent conduct of certain persons has advanced it most rapidly in the good opinion of the country. Those persons alone are answerable for the space which the ballot now fills in the public eye. And if it shall be resorted to, and shall be admitted to be a bad remedy for a worse evil, we have
828
them to thank for making that evil so unbearable that we should have been driven to bear any alternative, rather than endure it longer. To them, assuredly, it is owing, that we are now engaged seriously in discussing what, a year or two ago, we should have deemed hardly worth an argument. The most perfect state of things to give the ballot fair play, but one which it would be absolutely romantic to expect, would be the absolute in-action of all landlords, candidates, canvassers, and committees—the non-existence of all electioneering machinery,—so that not a word should ever be said to any voter, either before, or at, or after the election, upon any one matter relating to it. Under the ballot the probability is, that many who now vote openly would not dare to encounter the suspicion to which they might expose themselves; for that it should become the practice to leave voters to themselves, merely because the elective franchise was exercised in secret, is what no one would expect. Now as to bribery. Bribing to pair off, or to stay away, it is admitted, cannot be reached by the ballot. But for bribing actually to vote, one method is obvious and quite sure of being resorted to. Instead of paying the money for the vote when promised, a bargain will be made to pay it, if the party be elected, and thus every bribed voter will be converted into a zealous partizan. Next, as to the morality of the system. In what way can the ballot protect, or rather, in what way does it profess to protect, the voter, who dreads the displeasure of his landlord, his master, and his customer? Simply by enabling him to promise one way, and vote another, without being found out. Thus the voter's whole life must be so adjusted as to deceive the person, whose vengeance he has reason to dread. Having first deceived him, that he might be allowed to vote, he must go on, keeping up the deception, that he may not be punished for the double offence, the disobedience, and the treachery."
He strictly concurred with the writer of those observations. A voter who wished to be screened by the ballot could never dare to state his political sentiments at any time, or in any place. Should he state them at home, in his own house, he might be betrayed —unintentionally, no doubt; yet he might be betrayed, even by the members of his own family. At the tavern and at the public-house—he would have a still greater risk to encounter. At no political meeting—at no political dinner, even, would he dare to show his face: to no petition to Parliament would he dare to put his signature. To this condition, then, would the free-born Englishman be reduced; and after all, probably, he would not be able to keep his secret. These were very strong objections to the ballot,

829
nevertheless, he should not vote against the question. He would not vote at all. He knew that intimidation had taken place and he said shame on those who had been guilty of it, particularly if they belonged to the Liberal party. They at least, ought to respect the feelings of the people; their actions ought to correspond with their thousand-times repeated declarations. Let all parties treat the people with kindness, and then our sacred institutions would last for ever! Treat them with scorn—treat them with contempt—oppress and persecute the people—and it would require no very extraordinary spirit of prophecy to predict, that England would shortly become the abode of misery and desolation. Her sacred institutions would totter, like broken columns in the melancholy waste —an awful, though then useless warning to future generations. He agreed with the noble Lord, the Member for Stroud, as he had expressed himself in an able, eloquent, and argumentative speech, at Honiton, in the month of January, 1835. The noble Lord, speaking on the question of the Ballot, said
" My objection to the ballot is, that secret voting gives to the electors irresponsible power. All other authorities are exercised in the light of day, and subject to public opinion. Our parliamentary discussions are open to the world—the voters alone are to exercise their power unseen and irresponsible. I am sensible (no man more so) of the progress which the question of ballot has made; nor will I deny that, as an ultimate remedy, we may be obliged to adopt it; but let us first exhaust every other. If, by the force of public opinion and public shame—if by rigid investigation and exemplary punishment,—we can find means to check intimidation and corruption, let those means be fully tried. Nay, more, let all hope of a remedy by those means be terminated, before we agree to a change, at variance with our ancient habits, inconsistent with our best institutions, and degrading to our national spirit."
These were the sentiments of the noble Lord, in January, 1835, and he had reason to believe that those sentiments remained unaltered. He was aware of the disease under which the country laboured, but he must be fully satisfied that it was quite incurable, before he could consent to vote for so desperate a remedy as the ballot. He could not therefore vote for the motion, but being convinced that the existence of many evils had been proved, he would not vote against the Bill.
Mr. Villiers: It is sometimes, Sir, difficult to explain the reasons upon which a vote is founded. The hon. Member who has just sat down seems to be conversant with all the evils for which the ballot is proposed as a remedy: he speaks of them from experience and from observation. But he brings down to this House a letter, containing what he calls such eloquent and powerful arguments against the ballot, that he is determined to vote in opposition to his own experience—in opposition to that which he himself admits must ultimately be the remedy of those evils which he has stated at present exist. The only argument contained in that letter is, that it might be possible if the ballot were granted for a man to promise his vote to a certain party, and afterwards he induced to break his promise and vote another way, a proceeding which he calls disgraceful to a free-born Englishman. And he followed that up by telling us, that he has seen oppression and tyranny exercised against the voters—he has seen them dragged up to vote against their conscientious convictions; and yet he tells us, that lest a man should promise his vote to one party and give it to another, he will vote against the ballot. I tell him, that I believe one of the first and most important advantages of the ballot will be, that it will put an end to all canvassing for votes, because every man will feel it useless to canvass; and therefore that most shocking event, of a man's promising his vote one way and giving it another, will never occur. Considering the great importance of this question, I own I am astonished that Gentlemen opposite, who are about to record their votes against this measure, do not think fit to give us any arguments against it. I am inclined to think, however, that they are wise in not doing so; for of all questions which can be discussed this is the least exposed to objections of any I know. The noble Lord, however, who spoke early in this debate, has not followed this wise example; and, so far from having any thing to advance against the ballot, he seemed rather to confirm all its friends in its favour. I own, that after the high and just eulogium which he passed on the speech of my hon. Friend, the Member for London, I was prepared to hear an answer to that speech. But I was surprised to find that he admitted all the evils which the hon. Member urged against the present system, and only contended that the remedy he proposed was not the one which

831
should be applied. Well, I was then prepared to hear from the noble Lord an explanation of what he did consider a proper remedy. But he left, that question quite untouched; and never attempted to show us, after admitting all the evils which are alleged against the existing system, what is the remedy which ought to be applied. I own, indeed, he said he would vote for a resolution declaring bribery to be a high crime, and that it ought to be prevented. But still, the question remains in this state: the opponents of the ballot admit all the evils which the friends of the ballot urge against the present system, but can devise no remedy by which those evils may be removed. The noble Lord contended, that responsibility should be preserved wherever a trust is granted. Why, Sir, I really thought the noble Lord had been attending to the speech of my hon. Friend, the Member for London. But it seems he expected an able speech, (and it was an able speech,) and therefore, though he passed a deserved eulogy upon it, he took care to leave its arguments untouched. For, had he attended to that speech, he would have heard my hon. Friend expressly allude to the argument of responsibility. Responsibility, to whom? I suppose to the non-electors. But the noble Lord, in his argument against universal suffrage, which he said would be the first result of the establishment of the ballot, contended that by universal suffrage you would extend the franchise to the lowest and most worthless of the population. And yet these are the persons to whom he calls upon us to leave the electors of this country responsible! The fact is, the electors have confidence reposed in them, in having the franchise conferred upon them, because they are believed to be fitted to exercise that franchise, and to justify that confidence. Now, if the non-electors are so fitted, why not give them the franchise? If not, how can they be qualified to judge of those who are? I have taken the liberty of speaking upon this occasion, because I know the great interest which is taken on this question by my constituents—a great number of whom are operatives and mechanics —who call upon me to advocate the ballot, as a question of the enjoyment of the franchise itself. When I first solicited their suffrages, they had had but one opportunity of exercising their franchise. But I found many who refused to repeat the exercise of their right; because, in consequence of the conduct that had been pursued
832
towards them, they were afraid, without some protection, to vote according to their judgment. And I found many who told me, that they could not sacrifice their interest for the sake of their opinions; they would not vote against their conscientious convictions, but they dared not exercise the right which the Constitution of their country recognised in them, and which the Legislature had vainly conferred upon them. I must say, Sir, I think the opponents of the ballot would take a more manly and a more open course, by resisting the ballot on the ground of the unfitness of the people to exercise the electoral franchise, than by assigning reasons which are not the real grounds of their opposition. I cast no reflections upon the Government: I am rather disposed to make an excuse for them. I know there exists a great prejudice against the ballot in some minds; I know that many of their supporters are against it. It may be a question, however, whether a person should take office, if he has to suspend the expression of his real opinion. This, at the same time, I feel to be a question between them and their constituents; and if their constituents are contented to send persons here who do not represent their opinions, it is not for me to complain. I wish the opponents of the ballot would consider, what reason have they for distrusting the people in the exercise of their franchise? I ask, when have they abused their power? when have our constituents instructed their representatives to advocate measures hostile to the peace of society—measures injurious to the institutions of their country—at least, to what is estimable in those institutions? We have for the last twenty years had a party in this House, who are ever ready to oppose any measure having a tendency to extend the power of the people. We have had repeated predictions, that from any extension of the power of the people, something will happen. Those predictions have been ever falsified. Notwithstanding all these gloomy forebodings, this country is still in a state of greater prosperity than history can produce any instance of—we have greater tranquillity and order than at any former period, and as a proof of this, among the most timid of all interests, the commercial, there is a greater sense of security than ever existed before. And yet this is also a period at which the institutions of this country are more under popular control, in which there is a greater freedom of speech, and more unrestricted

833
liberty in the expression of opinions, than at any previous stage of our history. Not only is there in our experience no ground for alarm from the extension of popular principles, but I will say, that in no country is there a more industrious, steady, peace-loving population than the population of this country at the present time. In no country are the people more disposed to confide in those above them, more ready to bow to superior worth and intellect, wherever it is found—in no country in the world is there a more superstitious reverence for their ancient institutions. I say, these are all important considerations, in regard to the measure of confidence which you are justified in reposing in a people, when I call upon you to extend to that people a protection in the exercise of that right which you admit they ought to, but which I say they cannot, exercise freely without that protection. What excuse then can you find for not extending to them that protection? We are not particular in insisting upon the ballot alone, but we ask you to devise a remedy which will accomplish our common object; and is it too much to ask, (unless indeed you are prepared to contend that the people should not exercise their rights freely,) that when you refuse us the ballot you will devise something better? But you say, "the ballot has evil tendencies." Now, first I deny that those evil tendencies do exist, and next, I say that, admitting they do exist, your argument goes for nothing, unless you prove that the evils consequent on the adoption of the ballot are greater than those which at present exist; for it is but to assert a truism to say, that to any human institution evils may or do attach. But I believe there are great moral advantages which will result from the ballot. I believe it will improve the character both of our candidates and our constituency. It will teach the candidate that he must earn the good opinion of the constituency in order to obtain their votes, for he will find, that a very different species of qualification is now required for a Member of Parliament to what used to exist. He will find that the head, rather than the head-money is looked to. And it will improve the constituency, for when they are secure in the discharge of their duty, they will be much more likely to discharge it than at present. I am aware it has been said, that even if the ballot were to be established it would not put an end to, but rather increase, the
834
evils at present existing, because it would only excite a great deal of ingenuity in order to extract from a man, or from his nearest relatives, the manner in which he voted, and that it would in short originate a vast machinery for the collecting of information of this kind. But how does this prove the extent to which the evils which the ballot is intended to prevent are carried now! It shows that these evils exist to such an extent, that man will have recourse to such despicable expedients rather than to vote with them. And this only proves more strongly the necessity of some remedy. After ail, if there is any one not yet convinced in favour of the ballot the process of conversion is easy, for he has only to take all the arguments used from time to time by its opponents, and they so perfectly answer and confute each other that they alone must be sufficient, I think, to convince any person. I myself sat on a Committee to try a petition against a return that had taken place on an election in the city of York, where so much bribery on the one side, and so much intimidation on the other, prevailed, that the Committee were obliged to declare that, under the continuance of such a system, it was impossible to have a free election. I was applied to by some of the electors to bring in a Bill to establish vote by Ballot in the city of York, and I refused to do so, simply lest I should appear to be a party to a conclusion that the ballot applied to the city of York in particular, and was not suited to the country in general. The case of the city of York is only one among the numerous instances in which parties have applied to this House for the protection of the ballot in the exercise of their franchise. And I do say, that, before you refuse it, you are bound to show, that there is a better remedy to be applied to the evils that now exist. I cordially support the motion, because I believe there is no danger in trusting the people in the free exercise of their elective franchise, because the protections at present to free exercise are not adequate, and because I believe the ballot to be the only effectual means for accomplishing that object.
Mr. William Rochesaid, that analysed as the subject had been, both during the present and former debates, he rose but to express a few observations in support of the decidedly favourable view he entertained of the motion—that he knew not any measure, more calculated to produce unmixed good to society, or one, more

835
congenial to the spirit, the interests, and calm procedure of our constitutional rights, than vote by ballot—Session after Session we are piling, Sir, statutes upon statutes to repress and punish corruption and intimidation, but without effect, which the reprehensible scenes brought to light on every general election, and on no occasion more conspicuously and painfully than the last, amply demonstrate—when too, the time of the House was so engaged, and its character so affected by the proceedings then exhibited before the Election Committees—and why, Sir, did those statutes and their penal enactments fail of effect, but because we never reached, or extirpated the root of the evil, by adopting a secret system of voting; for where temptation and opportunity are held out to the human mind, the hope of escape from detection overrules the dread of discovery and punishment; but take away the confidence which generates that temptation, and the evil dies a natural death. That he was not, however, so sanguine as to say that every and complete advantage would at once be obtained, because he knew that corruptionists and intimidators would make a struggle to mar its advantages, but that it. would be a dying struggle, for they would soon see that they threw away their money and their threats, and therefore, ere long, fall into (of necessity) the general feelings and wishes of the community. He was, he said, as anxious to put down popular coercion and tyranny, as the tyranny of the landlord, or any other undue influence; and the value of this measure consisted in producing this equal and general freedom from restraint—that he himself during his elections experienced the disadvantage of the present intimidating system, for several persons told him they were unwilling to register their votes, at all, lest they should bring upon themselves the anger of the landlord, or some such master; indeed, he considered that without the protection of ballot, it was, in many instances, quite a cruelty to give the franchise, for many, very many, experience disaster and ruin to themselves, and their families, by voting against the wishes of their superiors, but in accordance with their own feelings and their country's interests—that he was quite sure, that even before we enjoyed the whole and perfect advantages derivable from this measure, we should open our eyes to its benefits and look back with surprise, why we resisted
836
or delayed it so long; and he was confident, that the opponents themselves would soon experience the quiet and happiness which the not interfering with the franchise of their dependants (beyond that of advice and recommendation, a moral influence which must always last) would produce, by removing so ample and worrying a source of discord between themselves and those dependants—that under these views, the motion should have his warmest support.
Mr. Robinsondid not agree with the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, that the ballot would be any improvement of the elective franchise, and, therefore, he should oppose it now, as he always had done before. He wished to ask what evidence there was of a desire on the part of the people for vote by ballot? Did it appear in the number of their petit-ions for it? No. And there was another indication of the apathy which prevailed upon this question, in the fact, that on the very first night the hon. Member for the City of London was to have brought forward his motion, there were no hon. Members in the House to support him, nor, indeed, he believed, was the hon. Member present himself. He represented a very large constituency, and although he was free to admit, that among them there were some persons in favour of the ballot, and that they had solicited him to vote for it, he could not possibly avoid stating that an immense majority, including the humbler classes, were not in favour of it, or at least, had not expressed their anxiety about it at all. He doubted that the ballot would put an end to bribery, as the hon. Gentlemen on the opposite benches expected; there might be less temptation for persons to hold out a bribe, where there was a chance of being deceived, but as long as receivers and payers of money existed, bribery could not be entirely prevented. It would be quite as reasonable for the Members of that House to ask to vote by ballot, as it was for their constituents to require it. Was not every hon. Member placed in that situation when they were called upon to vote, either one way or the other, upon a question which made them very naturally wish they could vote by ballot? He was only stating that which could not be denied,—that hon. Members were often called upon to vote contrary to the wish of their constituents, and that they would therefore be glad to vote by ballot. He would therefore say,

837
that they had a right to ask their constituencies, if they wished for ballot, to allow them to vote in the House by ballot. He recollected that a deputation from some of his constituents once waited upon him and declared, that they could not support him unless he would promise to vote for the ballot. He told them, he was not disposed to give such a promise, and would rather lose his seat. What was the consequence? Every one of them voted for him. There was something revolting in the idea of exercising a public trust, in a secret manner. He had never asked one of his independent constituents to give a vote contrary to his conscience; for he believed the best security for both candidate and constituent, was in public opinion. He denied that the poor only desired the ballot; there was another class of persons who were much more anxious for it—those who wished for it in order to have an opportunity of deceiving both parties, when they pleased. Considering, then, that corruption at elections, would not be removed by the ballot, he should oppose the motion.
The House divided, Ayes 88; Noes 139;—Majority 51.

List of the AYES.

Aglionby, H. A.

Hardy, J.

Ainsworth, P.

Hawes, B.

Attwood, T.

Hawkins, J. H.

Bainbridge, E. T.

Hector, C. J.

Baines, E.

Hindley, C.

Baldwin, Dr.

Hodges, T. L.

Ball, N.

Horsman, E.

Barnard, E. G.

Hume, J.

Bewes, T.

Humphrey, J.

Biddulph, R.

Lister, E. C.

Blake, M. J.

Mangles, J.

Blunt, Sir C.

Marshall, W.

Bodkin, J. J.

Marsland, H.

Bowring, Dr.

Molesworth, Sir W.

Brady, D. C.

Mullins, F. W.

Brocklehurst, J.

Musgrave, Sir R.

Brotherton, J.

O'Brien, C.

Buller, C.

O'Connell, D.

Butler, Hon. P.

O'Connell, J.

Codrington, Admiral

O'Connell, M. J.

Crawford, W. S.

O'Connell, M.

Crawley, S.

O'Conor Don

D'Eyncourt, rt. hon.

Palmer, Gen.

C. T.

Parrot, J.

Duncombe, T.

Pattison, J.

Dundas, hon. J. C.

Pease, J.

Dundas, J. Deans

Phillips, M.

Ewart, W.

Power, J.

Finn, W. F.

Roche, W.

Fitzsimon, N,

Roche, D.

Fort, J.

Rundle, J.

Gaskell, D.

Russell, Lord C.

Guest, J,J.

Sheil, R. L.

838

Smith, B.

Warburton, H.

Strutt, E.

Ward, Henry George

Talfourd, Mr. Serg.

Wason, Rigby

Tancred, H. W.

Whalley, Sir S.

Thompson, Col.

Wigney, Isaac N.

Thorneley, T.

Wilde, Mr. Sergeant

Trelawny, Sir W.

Williams, Wm.

Tulk, C. A.

Williams, W. A.

Turner, W.

Wood, Mr. Alderman

Villiers, C. P,

Woulfe, Mr. Sergeant

Wakley, T.

TELLERS.

Walker, C. A.

Mr. Grote

Walker, R.

Mr. Leader.

List of the NOES.

Adam, Sir C.

Follett, Sir W.

Alsager, Captain

Forbes, William

Angerstein, J.

Forster, C. S.

Arbuthnot, hon. H.

French, F.

Archdall, M.

Gaskell, J. Milnes

Ashley, Lord

Gladstone, Wm. E.

Attwood, M.

Gordon, hon. W.

Bailey, J.

Goring, H. D.

Baillie, H. D.

Goulburn, rt. hon. H.

Barclay, D.

Greene, Thomas

Barclay, C.

Grimston, Viscount

Bateson, Sir R.

Grimston, bon. E. H.

Beckett, rt. hon. Sir J.

Halford, H.

Benet, J.

Halse, James

Bethell, R.

Hamilton, G. A.

Blackstone, W. S.

Hay, Sir J,, bart.

Blamire, W.

Hayes, Sir E. S., bt.

Bolling, Wm.

Hobhouse, rt. hon. Sir J.

Bonham, R. Francis

Hogg, James Weir

Bramston, T. W.

Holland, E.

Brudenell, Lord

Hope, J.

Bruen, F.

Howick, Lord Vis.

Burrell, Sir C.

Ingham, R.

Campbell, Sir J.

Irton, Samuel

Cayley, E. S.

Jackson, Sergeant

Chichester, A.

Jephson, C. D. O.

Clerk, Sir G.

Johnstone, J. J. H.

Cole, Viscount

Jones, W.

Cooper, Hon. W. F.

Knatchbull, rt. hon.

Crawford, W.

Sir E.

Cripps, J.

Knight, H. G.

Damer, G. L. D.

Law, hon. C. E.

Davenport, J.

Lawson, Andrew

Denison, W. L.

Lefroy, Anthony

Dick, Q.

Lefroy, right hon. T.

Dillwyn, L. W.

Lennox, Lord G.

Donkin, Sir R.

Lewis, D.

Duffield, Thomas

Longfield, R.

Dunbar, George

Marjoribanks, S.

Duncombe, hon. W.

Moreton, hon. A. H.

Dundas, hon. T.

Nicholl, Dr.

East, James Buller

North, Frederick

Eastnor, Viscount

Owen, Hugh O.

Eaton, Richard J.

Palmerston, Lord

Egerton, Wm. Tatton

Penruddock, J. H.

Egerton, Sir P.

Perceval, Colonel

Egerton, Lord Fran.

Phillipps, Charles M.

Elley, Sir J.

Plumptre, J. P.

Elwes, J. P.

Pollen, Sir J., W.

Entwisle, John

Poulter, John S

Feilden, W.

Praed, James B.

Ferguson, Sir R. A.

Praed, W. M.

Price, S, G.

839

Pringle, A.

Surrey, Earl of

Pusey, P.

Trevor, hon. Arthur

Rue, rt. hon. Sir W.

Twiss, H.

Richards, J.

Tyrrell, Sir J.

Rickford, W.

Vere, Sir C. B., bart.

Robinson, G. R.

Vernon, Granville H.

Ross, Charles

Vesey, hon. Thomas

Rushbrook, Colonel

Vyvyan, Sir R.

Russell, C.

Walpole, Lord

Russell, Lord John

Walter, John

Scott, Sir E. D.

West, J. B.

Scourfield, W. H.

Weyland, Major

Shaw, rt. hon. F.

Wortley, hon. J. S.

Sheppard, T.

Wyndham, W.

Sibthorp, Colonel

Young, G. F.

Somerset, Lord E.

Young, J.

Spry, Sir S. T.

TELLERS.

Stanley, Edward

Dalmeney, Lord

Sturt, Henry Chas.

Maule, Mr. F.

Paired off.

FOR.

AGAINST.

C. J. K. Tynte

P. M. Stewart

Sir R. Nagle

Hon. R. Clive

H. Bridgman

Thomas A. Smith

Sir R. Musgrave

Lord Clive

E. S. Ruthven

Lord Darlington

M. L. Chapman

Sir H. Williamson

A. H. Lynch

Thomas Gladstone

Henry Grattan

J. E. Denison

W. Clay

Charles W. Wynn

J. H. Talbot

E. B. Clive

W. D. Gillon

Robert Palmer

Sir R. Ferguson

Sir H. Hardinge

Colonel G. Langton

W. Long

G. Evans

R. Howard

Hedworth Lambton

R. Alston

J. Blackburne

W. C. Harland

General Sharpe

Charles Wood

Charles Lushington

G. J. Heathcote

Daniel Callaghan

Sergeant Goulburn

William Tooke

Sir M. S. Stewart

R. Otway Cave

N. Fazakerley

Sir W. Brabazon

Arthur Cole

J. Bagshaw

Sir John Wrottesley

Howard Elphinstone

J. F. Fector

Thomas Bish

Sir R. Peel

H. L. Bulwer

F. Baring

THE FACTORY ACT.
Mr. Hindleymoved for leave to bring in a Bill to amend the present Factory Act.
Mr. Labouchere observed Mr. Labouchere observed, that the feeling of the House had on many occasions been expressed in a manner unfavourable to any further experiment with regard to the existing law upon the subject. It appeared to be the general sentiment of hon. Members, that the present Act had not yet had a fair trial, and he thought, under existing circumstances, if any new measure were introduced, it would be productive of great excitement in the manufacturing districts, and very serious inconvenience.
Lord Ashleyshould be always ready to
840
support any general measure of the kind which the hon. Mover was known to advocate, though he thought the present a most unfavourable time for bringing forward a proposition of the sort, and had done all in his power to dissuade the hon. Gentleman opposite from making such a motion. Still, if the House gave leave to bring in a Bill, the measure proposed should have his most cordial support.
Mr. Wasonwas understood to say, it had been agreed on all sides, that the present state of the law required alteration.
Mr. Younghoped the hon. Gentleman would not injure the cause he advocated by pressing the present motion.
Sir John Hobhouserecommended postponement till next Session.
Mr. Hindleycontended, that the motion he had just made for leave to bring in a Bill, was perfectly consistent with what he had previously done upon this subject. He complained, that the friends of the factory children had been on several occasions charged with all the ill consequences arising from the Act; and even His Majesty's Government had not scrupled to lend themselves to the accusation, but as it was most unfounded, he hoped it would be withdrawn. If it were given up, he should have no objection to withdraw his motion. Government ought to take the responsibility of the measure upon themselves.
Mr. Goulburnrequested the hon. Mover not to press the present proposition, for it could be brought to no successful issue in the present Session.
Lord Francis Egertonconcurred with the last speaker, and joined with him in requesting a postponement of the motion.
Lord John Russellsaid, that His Majesty's Government were not responsible for the enactments of the Bill: it was an act of the Parliament, and Ministers were now only responsible for the manner in. which it might be carried into effect. He certainly had taken steps towards its enforcement, but he submitted, that what had occurred did by no means impose upon the Government the least obligation now to bring forward any proposition on the subject.
Mr. Hindleywould withdraw his motion, but he should be at all times the supporter of a ten hours' Bill.

COURT OF SESSION (SCOTLAND).
The Lord Advocatemoved for leave to bring in

841
a Bill for the better regulation of the office of auditor of accounts in the Court of Session, in Scotland, and for the appointment of two accountants-general in the said Court.
Sir William Raeobjected to the motion, as the Bill would create two new offices, without any necessity for it. This Bill, or at least one very like it, made its appearance last Session; and it was then proposed that one office should be created of one accountant-general for Scotland; but the feeling of the country against it was so strong, that the learned Lord felt himself quite unable to proceed with the measure, without the recommendation of a Committee. A Committee was accordingly obtained; and he could not deny that the Report of that Committee was, to a certain extent, favourable to the measure now proposed by the learned Lord. The evil which wanted a remedy consisted of this —the Court of Session had the power, when it was applied to on behalf of infants and insane persons, to appoint factors or curators to take care of their estates, and the practice was, to oblige them to find security for their good behaviour in the office to which they were appointed. That was all they were bound to do; but that duty had been neglected, and the estates had, in some instances, suffered a good deal. Now, to remedy this evil, the learned Lord proposed to create two new officers. But why should not the Clerks of Session in Scotland perform the duty, receiving, as they did, a salary of 1,000 l. a year, as he might say, for doing nothing, because all their duty was to mark down the terms of the decisions of the Courts. There were four gentlemen who held these offices, and looking at this fact, he would say, that the House ought not to listen for a moment to the proposition of the learned Lord. It ought also to be remembered, that this was the 23d day of June, a period which he considered too late in the Session to bring forward a measure of this nature. On these grounds he should certainly take the sense of the House on the subject.
Mr. Humewished to ask the learned Lord to explain how it was that the reform which was recommended by the House two years ago, with regard to the Court of Exchequer in Scotland, had not been carried into effect. He had heard that it had not, and before new expenses were incurred, he wished to know why the charge
842
of that department in Scotland had not been abolished.
The Lord Advocatewas quite willing that as rigid an examination as could be instituted, should be directed to every measure which he proposed, but then he did say, that if he showed that the measure was consistent with public economy, and necessary for the protection of the properly of orphans and others, it ought not to be delayed, except on grounds applicable to that measure alone. With reference to what had been stated by his right hon. Friend about the creation of new offices, in which he seemed to imply, that the creation of the office was for a particular individual, he denied it, and he challenged him to name any person who had had the smallest promise from him (the Lord Advocate) with respect to that office—nay, he doubted whether any individual he had in his contemplation would accept of that office. But there was a charge made by his right hon. Friend, with regard to the conduct of the Court of Session. He said, that they were deficient in their duty, and that this deficiency had been going on for a long period. Now this was a very serious charge, that they had deserted their duty in regard to giving protection to orphans, and indeed a more serious charge could hardly be brought against a court of justice. But, in his opinion, if one officer were appointed for that express purpose, and if the proposition of his right hon. Friend were carried into effect, the same defective system of which he complained would prevail, and that was the reason why he proposed to appoint two officers. His right hon. Friend said, that those duties might be discharged by the Clerks of the Court of Session, but he apprehended they could not, because it was their duty to be in Court at the very time when those inquiries were going on. His right hon. Friend seemed also to be of opinion, that there was an unnecessary number of Clerks of Session. If he could make out a case to prove that the number was too great, then he (the Lord Advocate) would not be against a proper reduction; but the remonstrances he had received from the Court of Session were to the effect, that he cut down too much, and he was therefore placed in a very peculiar situation. There was only another question upon which he had to touch, and that was the late period of the Session at which this Bill was sought to be introduced. In reply to that, he must

843
observe, that after this period many Bills had been introduced, and this measure had not been brought forward earlier, because, in consequence of the great number of Bills relating to Scotland, which had been brought forward at a former period of the Session, he was afraid it would not meet with the attention of the House.
Sir George Clerkcontended, that the Courts of Session were sufficiently large to undertake the duty, without creating two new offices. He apprehended that the House would require more evidence than that which had been given by the Lord Advocate, before they would be persuaded to create two new offices, when it had been shown that there were ample means in the established courts of justice to effect the purposes which it was the professed object of the Bill to accomplish. With regard to the Clerks of Session, one of these four gentlemen was the professor of Scotch law in one of the universities, and was at the head of the commission appointed to inquire into the state of the law, and he had not yet heard that that gentleman did not amply perform all the duties required of him as a clerk of the Court of Session. There was another of those gentlemen who was placed at the head of another of those numerous commissions appointed by the present Government, and another who was deputy registrar, and had the charge of all the public records, and yet he never heard that the performance of this duty interfered with his duties as a Clerk of the Session. Now, it was quite clear from the easy nature of their duties, that the Clerks of the Session might very well undertake the auditing of the accounts of the factors, of minors and insane persons' estates, and they would have plenty of time; for, in addition to the time the Court was sitting, they would have the whole vacation, which was six months. The Lord Advocate had stated that the salaries of these new officers were to be raised out of fees paid by litigants; but why saddle them with this expense, when the Clerks of Session had a salary sufficiently large for the duties they would have to discharge? Under these circumstances he should give his most cordial support to his right hon. Friend in his opposition to this Bill.
Mr. Wallacethought it was a pity that hon. Gentlemen opposite, who now appeared so anxious for reform, had not done something to prove their sincerity when
844
they were in office. However, all was well that ended well, and he should therefore now address himself to the question. As to the Clerks of Session, they were not competent to do the duty, and no wonder, for the intention in appointing them was, to give to several men a sort of sinecure. He agreed with the right hon. Baronet in thinking the composition of the Court of Session and the way in which it discharged its duty unsatisfactory, and he would add the word "disgraceful." The Supreme Court of Session only sat two hours and two minutes for five days in the week for 104 days. But look to what the Judges of England did. Scotland did not enjoy the advantages which ought to have been extended to her when trial by jury was introduced, in consequence of the desire there was to accommodate it to the system of the Judges retiring for three parts of the year to their country houses. Indeed the Jury Court was compared to the garden of Eden, because it was made for Adam. That system had remained like a millstone about their necks, and there was no chance of having it removed. However, he was of opinion that the Bill of the learned Lord would be an immense improvement, and he should, therefore, give his hearty support to it.
Mr. Goulburndid not think that be should have been induced to rise upon this subject, but after the statement made by the hon. Member who had just sat down, that his right hon. Friend near him had not, during his tenure of office, introduced any reforms in the Scottish courts, or made any reductions in those offices, which ought to have been abolished, he felt himself called on to rise. He believed that the hon. Gentleman was not in Parliament at the time he now referred to; but if he inquired of many hon. Gentlemen upon his side of the House, he would find that they all concurred in the expressions of approbation and praise which were profusely uttered when his right hon. Friend filled the office of Lord Advocate. His right hon. Friend had done more to reduce the judicial establishment of the Scotch Courts than any man who preceded him in that office had done, or any who followed him could hope to do; and at one blow he did away with judicial offices to the amount of 36.000 l. per annum; and, above all, his merit was, that in making those reductions he was dealing with offices to which, in the natural course of

845
judicial preferment, he had a right to look not only on account of the high legal station which he occupied, but of the great talents and integrity which adorned his character. He had merely repeated this for the information of those hon. Members who were not in Parliament at the time, and who might otherwise have been misled by the statement of the hon. Member for Greenock. With regard to the question before the House, relating to the appointment of accountants-general to take care of the estates of minors and insane persons it was admitted that the Court of Session was not overburdened with business, and that they ought to sit more hours in a day and dispatch more business. He said then that the plan of his right hon. Friend met the views of every one who had spoken on this question, and his plan was to impose on the court the duty of looking after the estates of minors and insane persons. It had been shown that the clerks of Session were amply adequate in number to discharge this duty, and they were certainly not overworked, since it appeared that two gentlemen out of the four had been selected by Government to fulfil other very important and onerous duties, which they could perform without detriment to the public service. He was glad to hear that the Bar was in so flourishing a state in Scotland, since no one would accept of an office of 700 1. a-year, for the learned Lord said that he did not believe that any Member of the Bar could be found who would accept the office of Accountant General.
The Lord Advocatewas misrepresented by the right hon. Gentleman. He said no such thing, nor anything approaching to it. What he did say was, that his right hon. Friend opposite could not name any particular individual whom he had in contemplation who would accept of the office.
The House divided—Ayes 93; Noes 69; Majority 24.
Leave given.

List of the AYES.

Aglionby, H. A.

Bodkin, John James

Ainsworth, P.

Brabazon, Sir W.

Attwood, T.

Brodie, W. B.

Baines, E.

Brotherton, J.

Baldwin, Dr.

Browne, R. D.

Bannerman, A.

Byng, rt. hon. G. S.

Baring, F. T.

Callaghan, D.

Barron, H. W.

Cave, R. O.

Bewes, T.

Cayley, E. S.

Bish, T.

Chalmers, P.

Blake, M. J.

Codrington, Admiral

846

Colborne, N. W. R.

O'Connell, M. J.

Collier, John

O'Connell, M.

Conyngham, Lord A.

O'Conor, Don

Cowper, hon. W. F.

O'Loghlin, Michael

Denison, W. J.

Paget, F.

Dillwyn, L. W.

Palmerston, Lord Vist.

Elphinstone, H.

Pease, Joseph

Evans, G.

Pechell, Captain

Ewart, W.

Phillips, C. M.

Fitzgibbon, hon. Col.

Pinney, W.

Finn, W. F.

Potter, R.

Fitzsimon, N.

Pryme, G.

Gillon, W. D.

Rice, rt. hon. T. S.

Gordon, R.

Rundle, J.

Grattan, H.

Russell. Lord J.

Grey, Sir G.

Russell, Lord

Gully, John

Sanford, E. A.

Harland, W. C.

Seale, Colonel

Hawkins, J. H.

Sharpe, General

Hay, Sir A. L.

Sheil, R. L.

Hector, C. J.

Stanley, E. J.

Hindley, C.

Talbot, C. R. M.

Hume, Joseph

Thomson rt. hon. C. P.

Hurst, R. H.

Thompson, P. B.

Johnston, A.

Thompson, Col.

Lee, J. L.

Thornely, T.

Lemon, Sir C.

Tooke, W.

Lennox, Lord George

Townley, R. G.

Lennox. Lord Arthur

Trelawny, Sir W.

Lushington, C.

Tulk, C. A.

Marjoribanks, S.

Wakley, T.

Martin, T.

Warburton, H.

Maule, hon. F.

Wilbraham, G.

Mostyn, hon. E.

Wyse, T.

Murray, rt. hon. J. A.

TELLERS.

O'Brien, C.

Mr. U. Steuart.

O'Connell, J.

Mr. Wallace.

List of the NOES.

Alsager, Captain

Gordon, hon. W.

Arbuthnott, hon. H.

Goulburn, rt. hon. H.

Bailey, J.

Goulburn, Mr. Serg.

Baring, W. B.

Graham, rt. hon. Sir J.

Bateson, Sir R.

Hamilton, G. A.

Bentinck, Lord G.

Hamilton, Lord C.

Blackburne, J.

Hardy, J.

Brownrigg, S.

Harvey, D. W.

Buller, Sir J. Y.

Hawkes, T.

Burrell, Sir C.

Hay, Sir J.

Calcraft, J.H.

Henniker, Lord

Campbell, Sir H.

Herries, rt. hon. J. C.

Coles, Lord Viscount

Hotham, Lord

Conolly, E. M.

Jackson, Mr. Serg.

Cooper, E. J.

Inglis, Sir R. H.

Dick, Q.

Irton, S.

Duffield, T.

Lees, J. F.

Dunbar, G.

Lefroy, rt. hon. T.

Egerton, Sir P.

Longfield, R.

Egerton, Lord F.

Lushington, rt. hn. S. R.

Elley, Sir J.

Meynell, Captain

Elwes, J. P.

Norreys, Lord

Estcourt, T.

North, F.

Forbes, W.

Palmer, Robert

Forster, C. S.

Palmer, G.

Fremantle, Sir T.

Patten, J. W.

Freshfield, J. W.

Penruddocke, J. H.

Gladstone, T.

Perceval, Col.

847

Plumptre, J. P.

Vere, Sir C. B.

Praed, J. B.

Vesey, hon. T.

Rae, rt. hon. Sir W.

West, J. B.

Ross, C.

Wigney, J. N.

Rushbrooke, Col.

Williams, T. P.

Scourfield, W. H.

TELLERS.

Shaw, rt. hon. F.

Clerk, Sir G.

Sheppard, T.

Pringle, Alex.

MINUTES.
Petitions Presented. By the Duke of LEINSTER, from various Place", for Abolition of Tithes (Ireland) By several NOBLE LORDS, from various Places, in favour of their Lordships' Amendments to the Irish Municipal Corporations' Bill.—By the Marquess of LANSDOWNE;, from Devises, for the Corporation Bill (Ireland) as passed by the Commons.—By the Earl of FALMOUTH, from certain Architects, Complaining of the decision of the Commissioners appointed to determine a plan for building the New Houses of Parliament.

COUNSEL FOR PRISONERS.
Lord Lyndhurstrose to move the second reading of the Prisoners' Counsel Bill. This Bill bad been a lung time before the House; and as no member of the Government bad intimated an intention of moving the second reading, and his noble and learned Friends in that Mouse were too much engaged by other important business to do so, he thought it his duty to make this motion. Before doing so, it might not be amiss to trouble their Lord ships with a very brief history of the mea sure. In the year 1834, a Bill similar in principle to the present passed the House of Commons, and was sent up to that House, where it was read a first time, after which no further proceedings took place. Last year the Bill was again renewed, and passed the House of Commons on the second reading without a division, and came up to that House and was referred

761
to a Select Committee. It was so late in the session, however, that it was impossible for the Committee to make any satisfactory report, and, beyond the printing of the evidence taken before them, nothing was done. At the commencement of the present Session, this Bill, founded upon the principle of the former measures, was again introduced into the other House of Parliament; a Select Committee was appointed, and they reported in favour of the Bill; it passed the other House by a considerable majority, and was now on their Lordships' table. During the period to which he had adverted, the Secretary of State for the Home Department direct ed a Commission, which had been appointed for some time, to investigate the state of the criminal law in this kingdom, and to direct their attention to this subject. They had done so, they had taken evidence, they had examined all the reports on the subject, and had made a most elaborate and learned report, recommending that the principle of the Bill should be adopted. Under these circum stances, and with this sanction, it was that the measure was now submitted to their Lordships. The first thing that struck any one who considered the subject was the strange inconsistency that pervaded the English law in this respect. A person litigating any right of property, however small, was allowed the assistance of counsel; but in a case affecting his character, his liberty, perhaps even his life, he was by the present state of the law deprived of that assistance. This was at first view not only a most inconsistent, but if he might apply so strong an expression to the English law, a most absurd regulation. Again, in cases of crimes of the deepest dye, which were visited with the severest of all punishments—he meant those which came under the denomination of high treason—prisoners were allowed the benefit of counsel; and in the lowest grade of cases, which came under the head of misdemeanour, they were allowed the same assistance. Thus the two extremes were put on the same footing; while in the intermediate cases of felony, the prisoner was wholly deprived of the benefit of counsel. Very extraordinary consequences resulted from this state of the law. There were offences connected with coining, which upon the first com mission, were simply misdemeanours, but which, when repeated, became felonies.
762
A man put upon his trial for the first would have the full benefit of counsel; were he indicted for a second offence, the same wit nesses would be examined, precisely the same description of evidence would be gone through, and his counsel would only be allowed to put questions to the witnesses, and to argue points of law; he would have no right to address a single word to the jury. Again, in a case of extreme violence upon a female. This would be a case of felony, and the prisoner's counsel would have no right to conduct the defence or address the jury. If, however, the prisoner was acquitted because the offence was not completely established, and another indictment was preferred against him for an assault with intent to commit the offence, the same witnesses would be examined, the same facts gone through, and the counsel would be at liberty to conduct the defence, and to address the jury. Surely these were in congruities and absurdities that ought to be removed, unless some good cause were shown for the continuance of the present system. He should be enabled to show their Lordships that these were remnants of a barbarous code of laws relating to felons, which had been all got rid of with the single exception of the anomaly which it was the object of the Bill to remove. Formerly, in cases of felony, the counsel were not allowed to cross-examine the witnesses, or to suggest objections on points of law. The unhappy and ignorant prisoner at the bar had the liberty of suggesting a legal objection, but he must do so of himself, without any consultation with counsel; it was taken into consideration by the judge, and if he thought fit, the question was argued by counsel appointed for the purpose. In cases of felony, no witnesses were examined on the part of the prisoner until Queen Mary sent down directions to the Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas to take evidence on the part of the accused. The law, however, remained imperfect, because, though witnesses were examined, they were not examined upon oath. Lawyers were sometimes very astute at finding out reasons to support every existing institution, and they assigned a very singular reason for this practice. They said that it originated in lenity towards the prisoner, because the witness, not being bound by an oath, would speak largely and beneficially for him. This was rather

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a singular doctine, the object of a court of justice being to elicit the truth; but let their Lordships mark its practical effect as exhibited in numerous instances in the "State Trials." The moment the judge began to sum up the evidence to the jury, and to contrast the evidence for the prosecution with that given on the part of the prisoner, he always took care to in form the jury that, in estimating the degree of weight which was to be attached to the testimony on each side, they must not lose sight of the important fact that the witnesses for the prosecution were examined on oath, while those for the defence were free from that obligation. He could state to their Lordships, that the opinion of the legal profession was daily growing more and more favourable to the measure he now proposed. Some ten or twelve years ago it was strongly against the change, but from all the inquiries he had made, he could undertake to say that a great majority of the profession were now decidedly favourable to the principle he contended for, To con firm this statement he need only refer their Lordships to certain passages in the Commissioners' Report. It appeared that the current of ancient authority was strongly in favour of the change. The first authority was that of Sir William Blackstone, a man who, from his considerate and cautious mind, was well worthy to give an opinion. Sir William Black stone said, that he was of opinion that in cases of felony there could be no reason why the defence of the prisoner should not be intrusted to counsel, as well as in cases of misdemeanour. The next authority was that of Lord Coke, who stated very shortly what he considered to be the ground of the rule by which counsel were disallowed in cases of felony. "No counsel (said Lord Coke) is allowed in cases of felony, because the evidence ought to be so clear that it cannot be contradicted." And this passage of Lord Coke's was adopted by Lord Nottingham, on the trial of Lord Cornwallis for the murder of Robert Carr. He said, when acting as Lord High Steward on that trial," No other good reason can be given why the law refuseth to allow the prisoner at the bar counsel on matters of fact, in the result of which his life may be concerned, but only this, because the evidence by which he is condemned ought to be so very evident, and so plain, that all the
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counsel in the world should not be able to answer it." The premises of this argument appeared to him entirely to fail. He knew that in a great many cases in which he had himself been concerned as counsel, or had been sitting as judge, the evidence had been of so extensive and so complicated a character, directed against the life of man, that it was ridiculous and absurd to state that it could not be contradicted; and that the observations of counsel upon it might not have been of the greatest service, not only as far as the conclusion of the jury, and the interests of the prisoner, and the enlightenment of the mind of the judges was concerned. If their Lordships, then, were satisfied that the premises on which the reasoning of those learned persons was founded, failed, and those premises being stated was the only good reason, and that turning out to be no reason at all, then he had Lord Coke and Lord Nottingham as authorities in his favour. But this was not all, The current of authorities set most strongly in his favour upon this subject. He could quote the authority of Whitlock, who was one of the Commissioners of the Great Seal, and also of Judge Jefferies, as being in favour of the principle of this Bill. On the other side, there was certainly the respected and revered name of Sir Michael Foster; but he did not ex press himself very strongly upon the subject. His observation was this:—" I am far from disputing the propriety of this rule. In all these cases we must be guided by a balance of evils and inconveniences." He (Lord Lyndhurst) admitted the authority and even the doubts of that Learned Judge to be entitled to great attention; and it was in consequence partly of those doubts, and in consequence, after an examination of the subject of what occurred to him would be the evil and inconvenience of departing from the present system, that he formerly op posed a Bill similar to the present in the other House of Parliament. He had reason since to observe the progress of opinion upon this subject, and to make inquiry respecting it while he was at the bar, and since he had been on the bench, to see the working of the system; and the result had been, that he was satisfied that the evils and inconveniences of allowing counsel to prisoners had been greatly exaggerated, and that being exaggerated, he thought they ought not to be put in com-

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petition with that which the obvious justice of the case appeared to require. It was said that the prisoner might himself address the jury; and a lawyer of considerable eminence, Mr. Sergeant Hawkins, had said, that an address by the accuser was likely to be attended with a more beneficial effect than when made by counsel. With all submission to that authority, this appeared to him to be a mere mockery. How few persons were there, even of education, who were accustomed to public speaking; and even if they were, how few were there who, for the first time in their lives, being called upon to exercise that power or gift with reference to a subject of this kind, could go into an examination of a complicated case, and point out the improbabilities and inconsistences of the evidence, so as to do justice to himself. That observation applied to persons of education; but how few persons of education were there put upon their trial for felony. The great mass of persons who were thus circumstanced were the uninformed and uninstructed, and when their Lordships took into consideration the condition of such persons, the novelty of their situation, and the anxiety of mind which it must create, and looked at the fatal consequences which might result to them from a mere slip or phrase of speech, how absurd and extravagant was it to say that it was better for the party accused to defend him self, and that he would do it with more effect than if his defence were conducted by counsel. But he begged their Lordships to look at the injustice and partiality of the principle. You allow counsel for the prosecution to address the jury upon matters of fact; but you won't allow the party accused to do so. Could any injustice be greater than that? What was the answer to this? Why it was said that the speech made by the counsel for the prosecution was of infinite importance to justice being done between the parties; it detailed the facts in a cold and unimpressive manner merely in order to introduce the evidence, and that it was beneficial even to the party accused. If that were so now, it was not so formerly; and he believed the alteration which had taken place in the system had arisen mainly from the discussions to which this Bill had originally given rise when introduced in 1825. But what was the kind of speech which counsel for the prosecution made in cases of this description? One likely to have the most fatal effect against
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the accused. He would take the case of a party indicted for a capital offence, where the case depended upon a great mass of circumstantial evidence. What was the kind of speech likely to have the most fatal effect? It would be the speech of an ingenious counsel, who would collect all the little facts of the case, and arrange them in such order and manner, interspersing them with occasional observations, as to lead the minds of the jury to the conclusion that the accused was guilty of the offence with which he stood charged. Such a speech as he had described, introduced as it would be with the expression of great mercy towards the prisoner, and of a hope that he would be able to extricate himself from the toils in which he had entangled himself, was likely to produce a much more powerful effect on the jury, unfavourable to the prisoner, than any speech delivered with zeal and passion, which, by creating a revolting impression, would be likely to produce no effect at all in his favour. But this was precisely the description of speech which counsel now, under the restrictions they were supposed to be subjected to, ad dressed to the jury in that class of cases. It was monstrous to say that the counsel for the prosecution should be entitled to make observations in order to show the coherence of the several parts of the evidence, and that the prisoner should not have counsel for the purpose of exposing the inconsistencies, contradictions, and improbabilities of the evidence directed against him. It was quite impossible, if the object were to administer justice, that reasonable men could sanction a system so partial. But there was another consideration of importance— what did the experience of the world say as to this? What was the practice of the other countries in civilised Europe? We boasted of the tender ness of our laws, at least of the administration of them. We thought that we stood, in that respect, above all the civilised nations of Europe. But there was not a country in Europe where a party accused had not a right to defend himself by counsel, both upon matters of fact and law, except in this country and in Ireland. In Scotland that was the practice. Were their Lordships justified, then, in permitting it in one part of the country, and denying it in another? What were the grounds for that distinction? It was said that the law was different, but there was nothing in the difference of the law upon which they could

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build a reason why a system should exist in the northern part of the island, and should not exist in the southern part of it. What also was the case in the British colonies, where the criminal law of England prevailed. Mr. Dwarris told them, in his Report, that it was the practice to allow prisoners to defend themselves by counsel upon questions of fact as well as law, and that no inconvenience resulted from it. In the United States, likewise, where the common law of England was the law of the country, it had long been the practice to allow counsel to prisoners, and no inconvenience or complaint had resulted from it; nor was it followed by the existence of those evils which it was supposed would result from the practice if it were adopted in this country. Then what was another objection? It was one which no person would venture to state openly, and yet it operated very powerfully against this Bill. It was one which was hinted at, but which no one would avow—it was an objection of time. It was said that it would extend the duration of the assizes and sessions be yond measure, and entail great expense upon the country. But this was stated always with a protest by those who used it, that it was not intended to rest their case upon the argument of time. And justly so, because if their Lordships were satisfied, that in a matter which might result in the forfeiture of a man's life, it was necessary to the ends of justice that further time should be allowed, he was confident that their Lordships would not say that they would not allow that time, because it was inconvenient, and would be attended with expense. They would not, upon such grounds, deprive a party of that full and fair trial which they in their judgments and consciences felt to be necessary for a due investigation of the truth. But then another objection which he believed was nearly obsolete, was this, that the judge was counsel for the prisoner. But he was not the advocate of the prisoner. That was not his situation; and if it were, he had no means of discharging his duty. He had no opportunity of intercourse with the prisoner; he had no knowledge of the facts which could be communicated by the party accused. What was the meaning then of the expression, "the judge is counsel for the prisoner?" It meant, that he would take care to see the law duly administered —that evidence should not be admitted which ought not to be so—and that he
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would see that the trial was regularly, fairly, properly, and impartially conducted. The expression could not have any other meaning. But another great argument was this—that the adoption of the proposed system would change the tone, temper, and character of our judicial proceedings in criminal matters. It was said, that under the present system everything was conducted orderly and quietly; that there was no zeal, no passion embarked in the case; that the witnesses on the part of the prosecution were temperately examined, and the witnesses for the defence patiently and impartially heard; that the judge dissected the whole of the evidence, and then impartially submitted it to the consideration of the jury. He admitted all that. He admitted also, that in some degree some thing like warmth and zeal would make its appearance in the courts of criminal justice, were counsel on the one side and on the other permitted to argue a criminal case. But he still believed that the evils in this respect were greatly exaggerated. And he would tell their Lordships why he said so. The most important and exciting cases were very often misdemeanours involving matters of grave accusation, and in which parties contended one against the other much more than they could be supposed to do in cases of prosecution for felony; and yet in cases of misdemeanour counsel were allowed. In the Court of King's Bench he had heard many misdemeanours tried under the superintendence of the Chief Justice, and also at the as sizes, and yet he never found that there was any want of order, or decorum, or of that degree of tranquillity which should always prevail in the court of justice, and which was necessary to enable the parties called upon to decide the case to come to a correct judgment. In those cases he had heard some most animated speeches addressed by counsel to the jury, who sat as calm spectators all the while, the Judge also being equally calm, both parties feeling that the decision to be arrived at must be formed upon the facts presented to them. Again, it was a great circumstance in an argument of this kind that the objections made were merely speculative. Let them look at what was the practical result of the principle for which he was contending. Did they find that in Scotland the courts of criminal judicature were not capable of investigating the facts, because counsel on each side made ani-

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mated speeches? The evidence led to a contrary conclusion. The Lord Advocate stated, that from experience he was satisfied if counsel had not been allowed to address the jury in many instances great injustice would have been done. There was another point, and which after all was the principal point to be attended to, namely, the best mode of investigating the truth? It was said that an argument between counsel would not assist the investigation; that it would embarrass it, and render it more difficult, because passion would be substituted for cool and calm inquiry. He had considered that particular objection, but what was the fact? In nine cases out of ten it was of no consequence whether counsel had the privilege or not. The facts would be so clear that it would be quite unnecessary to make any observations on one side or the other. But there was a class of cases of the utmost importance, in which the lives and liberties of men were involved. Take the case, for instance, of murder de pending upon circumstantial evidence. There was not a case of that kind in which any man could say it was not of the utmost importance to the ends of justice that counsel should have the opportunity of making observations on the evidence. What was the course of a trial in a case of that description? Witnesses were examined from an early hour in the morning till late at night; the Judge took down the evidence, and the instant that was concluded, he summed up to the jury, commenting on the evidence as he proceeded. If there were a plurality of prisoners, the Judge pointed out the evidence which applied to each prisoner—reconciling apparent contradictions, or exposing real contradictions—showing the probabilities or improbabilities of the statements of the different witnesses, and contrasting the evidence of one witness with that of another. There was no individual (and he had sat in the situation himself), there was no judge who could say at the close of such a case that he was quite satisfied with the manner in which he had executed his duty. It was impossible for him not to be guilty of some omission, either as to the facts, or as to the making of some important observation which might have been suggested to him if counsel had been allowed to address the jury. The counsel, through the attorney, communicated with the prisoner, and all the circumstances
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were made known to him as to the character of the witnesses, and as to the prisoner's own position. These were the clues by which counsel were enabled to wander through that which was very often a labyrinth to a person who had not known anything of the case before. Could any one say that a counsel, under such circumstances, was not in a situation to make observations of importance, not only to the prisoner and the jury, but of infinite importance for guiding the mind and assisting the observations of the judge. It appeared to him that their Lordships had only to look at that class of cases to be convinced that the assistance of counsel was essential to the due administration of justice, and the full investigation of truth. There was one more observation which he thought it necessary to make. It was said that the judge was now considered counsel for the prisoner; but if a speech should be allowed to be made by a counsel for the prisoner, the judge would be compelled to reply upon that speech, and would thus appear to take part against the prisoner. He denied that conclusion. The judge stood high and independent, and was look ed up to by the jury. They had a reliance on his wisdom and experience; and above all they had a reliance on his impartiality. It was not necessary for the judge to embark with zeal in the case. If he dealt in a mild manner with the sophistries of the counsel for the prisoner, and felt it necessary to expose his inconsistencies in argument, and to correct his errors as to facts, by drawing the attention of the jury to his notes of the trial, that would be abundantly sufficient for the purposes of justice. What did experience teach on these points? In trials for misdemeanours the judge was placed precisely in the same situation; but they did not find such a consequence result. He appeared as an arbitrator and a mediator, acting evenly between the parties; presenting- the case fairly and impartially to the consideration of the jury. He had no apprehension of that result which had always been insisted upon in the discussion of this question. He had felt it necessary to trouble their Lordships at greater length than he could have wished, from the peculiar situation in which he was placed; he having in the year l826 taken another view of this question. But he was satisfied that his former conclusions as to the evils and inconvenicncies that would arise from the proposed

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change, were exaggerations; and he was now persuaded that those evils would be of no great magnitude, and would be more than counterbalanced by that great rule of justice on which the change was founded — impartiality. The conclusion then to which he had come upon this question was, that the present system was a remnant of a barbarous practice; that the continuance of it was against the great current of authorities; that if they continued it they would act partially between the accuser and the accused; that it was contrary to the practice of all civilised countries; and in the last place—which perhaps was the most important consideration—an alteration was required, because it was essential to the due investigation of truth in the most important cases that could come before a court of criminal justice.
Lord Wynfordsaid, his noble and learned Friend had adverted to the objection that the proposed change would necessarily involve the consumption of much longer time in criminal trials than was required at present. There was no doubt that the change would greatly pro tract such trials. He understood that one week was occupied in Scotland in the trial of forty criminals. He had at one assizes to try 240. Now in what time could those trials have been concluded, if counsel had to address the jury for the prisoner in each case? He did not, however, urge this as a permanent objection to the Bill, but he did not think that the country was yet ripe for such a measure. If it were to be adopted, it would be necessary to make a large addition to the present number of the judges. Three would be necessary to preside in some counties and four in others, and twelve at least would be required to try the prisoners in London. This, of course, would entail a very considerable expense on the country; but he did not rest on that, for he thought that no expense of time or money could be considered too large, if it had the effect of bringing about an improved system in the administration of justice, or afforded greater protection to the innocent man than he enjoyed at present. He himself did not object to the principle of employing counsel to address the jury for prisoners accused of felony; on the contrary, he had not heard any argument against that pro position which might not with equal force be applied against the employment of counsel in any case. For his own part, when presiding as a judge, he had often
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wished to have the aid of the opinion of counsel on the case before summing it up to the jury. It was not always possible for a judge, who was occupied in hearing a case for perhaps ten or twelve hours to be able in his summing-up to direct his attention to every minute point of the case, so as to bring them fully before the jury as they bore for or against the accused. He remembered a case which was tried before him at Leicester, and which he believed was in the recollection of his noble and learned Friends (Lords Denman and Lyndhurst). In that case a man was charged with having committed a murder at Mel ton Mowbray, which it was alleged, he had come from Barnsley, in Yorkshire, to commit. Amongst other circumstances, there was the evidence of a woman, who proved that the prisoner had left Barnsley on a particular day, at such an hour as would give him just time to be at Melton Mowbray at the time the murder was committed. That, of course, was not the only circumstance in the case; but, connected with others, it was, in his opinion, an important link and made an impression on his mind. The man was convicted and sentenced to death. He (Lord Wynford) had just retired to his chamber, when the attorney for the prisoner came to him, and informed him that the old woman who had deposed to the prisoner's leaving Barnsley, was right as to the day but had mistaken the week. In proof of this, the books of his employers were afterwards produced which showed that the prisoner was at his work at Barnsley on the day which the woman had described as that of his leaving. Under those circumstances, all he could do was to respite the prisoner, and recommend him to his Majesty for an unconditional pardon. Now, that was a case in which the aid of counsel would have been of great importance in addressing the jury for a prisoner, and cases in many respects similar were of frequent occurrence. In the evidence to which the noble and learned Lord had referred, there was a very extraordinary fact stated, namely, that during the shrievalty of a gentleman of the name of Wilde, no less than five persons were saved from being executed upon their several convictions by that gentleman, whose active researches proved that they were innocent of the crimes of which they had been found guilty. And could it be said, that justice was done, when in the course of one year five innocent persons were condemned in the city of Lon-

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don alone? He therefore, for one, was of opinion, that a full defence ought to be permitted to be made by counsel; but at the same time he must say, that additional means for ad ministering justice ought at once to be re sorted to. His noble and learned Friend, however, seemed to be of opinion that the present was a very good time to commence the experiment, and perhaps it was, for the calendars throughout the whole country were, he was happy to say, extremely light. Nevertheless he should have been very glad that additional Judges had been appointed, and still more glad if the other House of Legislature would consent to pro vide money to enable poor prisoners to employ and have Counsel for their defence. Lord Denman said, it must be quite clear to their Lordships that his noble and learned Friend had merely been arguing in favour of the principle of the Bill; every part of which would be subject to examination in Committee, provided that principle was adopted by their Lordships. He was anxious to take an early opportunity of offering his humble thanks to his noble and learned Friend for the very able and completely satisfactory manner in which he had argued this important question. He agreed also with his second noble and learned Friend, that it was essential to carry this principle into practical execution, for the honour of the laws, for the due ad ministration of justice, for the realization of truth, and for the protection of innocence. His Majesty's Government had always taken a strong interest in behalf of this measure, and in the course of this Session it might have fallen to him (Lord Denham) to propose this great alteration in the law, if he had not felt that it would have been very inconvenient for a person in his situation to propose such a change without being confident that it would be adopted by the Legislature. This case was placed upon a true and triumphant principle, when it was said that it was essentially necessary for the advancement and establishment of truth. It was perfectly obvious that no one reason could be given for denying this privilege to an accused man, which would not apply with much greater force to parties in civil cases. He was tempted on this occasion to refer their Lordships to one of their standing orders, in which the principle of this mea sure was stated in the best and most authoritative manner. By that order their Lordships would perceive that this House,
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being the highest Court in the Kingdom, and ready to set an example of justice to all other Courts, had ordered, for the due and more impartial administration of justice, that not only copies should be given to all the parties accused before it of all documents and papers connected with the accusation, but also that counsel should be assigned to defend such parties if they desire it. The standing orders 147 said:—" This the Lords do, because they wish that justice shall be done in all cases that come before them, criminal as well as civil, and because they think that no legal help can protect the guilty, and God defend that the innocent should suffer from the want of it." That was the opinion of the Lords in an order made 200 years ago. Their Lordships would remember what took place at the trial of Lord Lovat, who was accused of high treason in the year 1745, at which time counsel were denied to those impeached by the Commons. The words of Lord Lovat must, he thought, carry conviction to every mind capable of it. It was a most remarkable expression —the expression of a man of eighty years of age. He thus appealed to the House of Lords—" If you do not allow me counsel it is impossible for me to make any defence by reason of my infirmity. I do not see; I do not hear. I come up to the bar at the hazard of my life. I have fainted several times. I, therefore, ask assistance, and if you do not allow me counsel, and such aid as is necessary, it will be impossible for me to make any defence at all." This description of that infirm old Lord might be the description of every prisoner called upon to answer for his life. In addition to the authorities quoted by his noble and learned friend, he would refer to that of Sir Robert Shower, who, in reference to some arguments on the other side of the question, said, "In the name of God, what harm can accrue to the public in general, or to any person in particular, if in cases of state treason counsel should be allowed to the accused? What rule of justice can warrant the denial of counsel in that case, when, in the case of his stealing a halfpenny, he is able to plead by himself or an advocate." But it was not necessary for him to dwell upon authorities. The difficulty which he always felt upon the subject was, that he could never meet with any serious argument against the principle of allowing counsel to prisoners. He had had frequent com-

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munications and conversations with many learned persons who differed from him upon the subject, but he had never found any one who did not admit that principle justified a contrary practice to that which existed. Then was it to be allowed that the law of so great a country as this should be administered with such an admission, that there was something hanging about it which the most ingenious men were not able to justify upon principle? As to the difficulty that would attend the adoption of the principle, there was no state of things so bad from which something good might not result; nor was it possible to avoid incur ring some inconvenience, even by a bad state of things being set right. But the question, and the only question, was this—what did the principle require—what was it that justice and truth demanded at the hands of the Legislature? Before he quitted the subject he hoped he might be allowed to refer to the authority of his late lamented friend Sir James Mackintosh, who in 1824 brought the matter under the consideration of the House of Commons and made a most convincing speech in favour of the principle contained in the present measure. He wished also to be allowed to state that his noble and learned friend Lord Brougham, who last year thought it right to institute a full inquiry into the matter before a Committee of the House, in deference to the scruples which were entertained by some high authorities, had authorised him to state that he was of opinion that the principle of the Bill now proposed ought to be adopted. Lord Brougham became a convert to the opinion that counsel ought to be heard in the de fence of prisoners in the year 1826. Previous to that time he had entertained doubts upon the point, but further inquiry and more mature consideration operated to remove those doubts, and in 1826 he spoke in favour of. a measure of this description in the other House of Parliament. He was not disposed to attach much weight or importance, as far as regarded the discussion of this question, to any evidence that might have been given of improper convictions, ft was quite enough for the principle of this Bill that the proper administration of justice required it. At the same time it must not be for gotten that two weighty authorities, Sir Frederick Pollock and Mr. Alderman Harmer, in their evidence before the Lords' Committee, both stated that they had
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known instances where innocent men had been convicted, and actually executed; and similar evidence was given by Mr. Wilde, and also by his hon. and learned Friend Mr. Hill, before their Lordships' Committee last year. Of the various assertions he had heard urged against the principle of the Bill, he thought none were entitled to weight. In the first place it was said that the aid of counsel would rather do harm than good to prisoners. Now, the object of the Bill was not to do good to prisoners, generally speaking; but to take care that the innocent man should not be punished as the guilty, and that he should not run the risk of being so punished. The persons to be benefited by the Bill were those who were accused without being guilty. He entirely differed from those who thought that it would afford additional facilities of escape to the guilty. He did not think the guilty man more likely to escape in consequence of a full light being thrown upon all the facts and all the circumstances of the case. He denied also, that the permission to prisoner's counsel to speak, would prevent any case from being fully, calmly, and dispassionately heard, considered and determined. On the other hand, he thought that the existing system was far more calculated to excite warm and irritated feelings, and to interfere with that calmness which ought to prevail in every court of justice; for he had seen many instances where counsel were pinioned by the existing practice, where great excitement prevailed at the bar, and many disagreeable personal contentions arose, which could never take place if the counsel were al lowed to speak in the defence of the prisoner. With respect to the assertion of time, he believed that the proposed alteration of the law would not lead to any thing like the great consumption of time that was supposed. In one particular, indeed, he thought it would lead to a general saving of time, namely, in the cross-examination of witnesses, out of which the prisoner's counsel were now compelled to make their whole defence. This cross-examination would be greatly shortened if the counsel were at liberty to speak. Another argument which had been much pressed, and was thought to be entitled to great weight, was the supposed incompetency of the chairman of quarter sessions to take trials when they had to make observations to the jury on what had

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taken place, and to distinguish between the sophistical and the just and true arguments advanced by counsel. He felt convinced that there could be no difficulty upon that head. There might, perhaps, be some question as to the propriety of putting the judge always in the situation of replying to the counsel for the prisoner. That, however, appeared to him to be a matter of detail, which would most properly be considered in Committee. It could not affect the principle of the Bill. In circumstantial cases, which almost always lasted a long time—where much prejudice existed—where the judge was placed in possession of all the evidence before the trial commenced, in such cases he could not conceive that any one fit to fill the situation of judge, would deny that he was desirous of hearing what an able and ingenious counsel could say on the side of the prisoner. The situation of the judge on such occasions, was one in which no man ought to be placed. The task of at tending to the circumstances as detailed in the indictment, the duty of attending to the evidence and taking notes of it as it was adduced before him at the trial, and at the same time forming an opinion which he was to carry through the whole case, of how the evidence in all its bearings affected the guilt or innocence of the prisoner—this was more than any man ought to be called upon to do. The judges were not anxious to express any opinion whatever with respect to the pre sent Bill, but it had naturally been a topic of conversation amongst then), and without presuming to intimate in the most distant manner what their feeling upon the subject was, he could not refrain from stating what fell from one of his learned Brothers on a late occasion. "It is probable," said he, "that the fate of the man who is now before me depends upon the view I take of the case and upon the manner in which I submit it to the jury. It may be a long, contradictory, and difficult case. Yet I have no time to form an opinion or to reason upon the matter at all, except during the short interval whilst witnesses are undergoing the ceremony of taking the oath." The position of a judge so situated is most painful. After alluding to the mockery of calling upon an ignorant man at the close of a long trial to defend himself, the noble and learned Lord concluded by stating that to the principle of the Bill, as far as it went to take away the
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existing prohibition on counsel to address the jury on behalf of prisoners, he was decidedly favourable. All beyond that appeared to him to be matter of de tail, and demand further consideration before it were determined.
Lord Abingerhad great doubts as to the policy of the measure, and was afraid of their Lordships becoming too much in love with theory. He was therefore, unwilling to give an opinion, lest it should be a hasty one, respecting the Bill. But on the best consideration which he had been able to give it, he must admit the principle of the proposition;—at the same time he thought their Lordships ought to make it as an experiment, rather than as a permanent measure. Entertaining these opinions, he did not offer any objection to the second reading of the Bill; but there were parts of it in which he did not concur—for instance, he did not think that in all cases the prisoner should have the right of reply by Counsel. These, how ever, were matters which could be gone into only in the Committee.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor, feeling that he could add nothing to what had already been so well and so ably said by his noble and learned Friends upon the subject, rose merely to express his entire ac quiescence, in the principle of the Bill, as expressed in the first clause. He hoped that the stigma which had so long attached to the practice of our criminal courts would now be removed, and that in those cases in which it was most important that the truth should be ascertained, the ordinary means of obtaining it would be sup plied. His noble and learned Friend (Lyndhurst) had stated, that he had felt it his duty to bring the subject under the consideration of the House, because no Member of the King's Government appeared disposed to do so. He begged to assure their Lordships that he should not have failed to bring the matter forward; though he now rejoiced that he had not done so sooner, inasmuch as that the delay had obtained for the measure the powerful aid of his noble and learned Friend.
Bill read a second time.