The Statesman. — London, England, 1820-05-18 00:00:00

TUE STATESMAN. twenty per cent., he tootl a ret-y fortunate, but a very ;Mary insta.sc.! of the c:frct of that chauge.—(A laugh.)—Tlw Lica augmenting the salary of the Lord Lieutenant did not originate with the Duke of Iti. - hrrotsi. Lord Harass-it ke, on leaving the Covert ment ot that country, had made a strong representa- Non that nu nubleuatti could succeed to that lattice, at ller salary then received, without impairing kis rivals. t. rtonc . And with respect to the principle contended c. 0.. that none hi: men of great lass.e.siuns ieleemeel I •,•ted (or such an oilier, he raised his voice against it. lie thought that turn of inf. rior fortunes. hut of equal I...iwetn ;mai. ought to be selected fur Liza otEir, sax t.ei..ts such torn as the Duke of Bedford, imr the Duke um Dsrunshire, however high the merits of thewm No m iettien might hr. He thought that it would be a hardship that a Nobleman like burl Whitworth, 'an hid been in and whose talents were acknowled ! red, P1141U141 not he allowed to till the place of lAnil-Lientet.ant ..f Ireland mitt:nut making himself a beggar for life. 3lr. SHAW expressed .his regret and astonishment t.. hear any Irish 31ember suggesting in that Mouse, t:t..! policy of abolishing the office of Lord Lieutenant ot Ireland. Dublin had suffered most severely by thr -let of Union, and no sating that might follow the abolition of the other could be compared to the dr strm•ii in u hick that measure would bring upon time citizen+ of Itithliti. Every one at all arlittallttPst with tie state of Ireland, knew how ninth, and 1i .w verelh she starred by absentees; but if thr office of I.Jrd Litutroorlit—the last remaining indUrellielit for men of property to remain at home, was abolished, it would havd the edict of baildoing them altogether Lion Irelan.l. Sir JOON NEWPORT explained. 1k did nut re anmend the :tholition of the office of Lunt Lieutenant, I e only spoke of the increased amount the expenses • ! that office. Mr. WELLESLEY POLE spoke in favour of the efet. : the increased anon ante. he contended, was i.—olutelv necessary. Th.: Lord Lieutenant aas nut a r.cate individual supporting a splendid and expensive a:Abre.litment ; he had public tlntie4 to perform. It nu.; expected by the people that the name of the Lord Lieutenant should stand at the head of the various public charities in Ireland : this he was in fact hound to Jo, if he wished to stand well in the eyes of the pe plc, or to preserve the dignity of his station. He wag convinced that nothing would give more dissatis- I Letion to the people of Ireland, than the notion of abolishing the other of Lord Lieutenant. He agreed with the Ilan. Member for Dublin (Mr. Shaw), the! suds a ut-..sure amnia excite great discontent, and would be as great a calamity as Ireland ever felt. Families of rank in that country would be deprived of a Court ; they world have no Court to resort to, to which they might present their wives and daughters. —(A could assure She Douse, that the Stentlettien of Ireland were as high and as proud as e .old be found in any other part of the world; they would look on it as a degradation, if, having cummu in...aloft: of importance to snake to the Dos-eminent, they were referred to the Chief Secretary. instead of having a direct communication with the representa tive of Majesty. Events had happened. and might hsi•pen again in Ireland, which might require mea ,•t:es of the utino..l promptitude and decision. The Lord Lieutenant, in critical emergencies, could take I.l',Un himself to act with vigour. when a person of toe rank of the Secretary could not venture to do so. l!e believe I, indeed, that there was no man of re spectability in Ireland who a uulti wish to see the office ut Lord Lieutenant abo:ished. As to the salsry,when i. was settled at its present increased rate, it was never 1 nagineil that it was adequate to rover the expenses of tie office, hut it was intended that it should he such as to enable a man of fortune to exercise the other, without too much encroaching on his property. No min could undertake properly to till the office of Lord Lieutenant without spending 10,601;/. a-year of h:3 private income. Mr. TIERNEY said, lie hail never lent himself to ary such proposition as that of the abolition of the arficr of Lord Lieutenant. lie had always conceived that propositions respecting the abolition of offirrig retainad at the Union should conic from Irish Gentle men. Sir H. PARN ELL wisl►ed to he understood that he la;:d not imiolotell the least blame to Earl Talbot. As to the proi,riety of retaining the office of Lord Lieu tenant, t here it as a difference in his opinion and that of his Right Hon. Friend, of the ►iew taken of that quest:on in Ireland : :u►d the difference was easily ae-, wanted f•tr. His Right lion. Friend (Mr. W. Pole) f ad sl•eot most of his time in the castle, at Dublin, where there was not a whisper, no doubt, against such an office. Ile (Sir It. P.) on the other hand, spent most of his time in the country iu Ireland, where he of en heard the opinion that a change might advert tageously take place in the Executive tiovernment of Ireland. It wry nut his wish to abolish the office of Lord Lieutenant without finding a sebetitate t but Ile tioatight the business of the police of Ireland would much better managed by appointing Lords Lieute nants of counties, after the. English system. Much difficulty was at present f It from the want of autho r4ies in t've different eminties, to communicate with the Governn►ent, as the litovernors of comities did not answer this purpose. Formerly there was a strong upin:un in favour of the olf►ce of Lord Lieutenant, but at present the general opinion respecting it was much changed. Mr. RARING allowed that it was not proper for an English Member to interfere to propose the abolition of such an office as that of Lori, lie►►te►►ant of Ireland, and be though•, that whatever little pomp remained in the cap•tal of Ireland should not he ahuoished. k. observed, in general, that propositions for the in urea.e of the salaries of offices passed very easily in t!.e House, and that during all th• time he had sat there, he had never known that any reduction of those salaries bad been made. When 10,0001. was ...del to the salary of the Lord Lieutenant, there was a sort of pretence for it. which did not at present east, rid. in the stale of the currency. '1 hough it w.ut haposaible for him to know whether 20 or 30,0001. a year was precisely tI e fit salary for a Lord Lieute nant, be 'untested against the doctrine that salaries should be ineresatoi, merely because it was said that otherwise only men of great fortune could fill the of ices. Ilia might lead to au icdefiui:e augweatatiou of salaries. instance, if it was asked why the liu sernor of the rape of hood Hope had nuts 10,11Itth. a year, or twice a, noich a • any other ti u sernor, which was perfe.aly absurd: The saute rnswer ntiOtt he wale, that u Wood such a salary, only those w hom the Nohlr Lord canes' the Leviathans of fortune could till the otli,e. Since the change in the state of the eirculation, there was no man of any n .lition whose nortnne. numerically in ponails sterling, bad nut been diminished ; tlo.ug Is it was a got scion whether the ,tittl they now i ussessell would not go so fur in the pur chase of I. e necessaries or comforts of life, as the larger nominal sum would heretofore. It therefore because, MI least, a fair snattel of consideration, si he ther the salaries of the great Ottldir te.lieers Which had been increased (luting the depreciation Of the currency, should not also sutler re•lnction. 'I he clause %las uerrosl to. The 11 ,, 11ge resu•ned, and the report was Ordered to be revelled to-ntorcow.— Adjonrneol. THE I'HoGRESS PITLIc OPI.VIO.V UN PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. No. XIII. MR. PURKL ., ORJEI - 114 . N . : TO A :AtO..T I VRATION RR P.ttiLl /Com tided jrt.m oar Paprr of Maradat ) It i, 11 More r. sut rfasufill for a radio al Itelortio in P.lrliallient, or thr extension of the elective Latteloise. than are suggested loy the following representotious which 11r. Potrkto Words of the Mote of the present corruptions, while ior is labouring to shrw the evils, which, nutter the existing systent, uou.d result f f.roptent elections •• Theory, I ' sirs lir, .` wonlol suppose, that every Keorral election is to the Representative a day of judgment, in which he appe.irs before his constitmentoo hs aceuunt for the use o' the talent with whirh they eatrusted him, anol of the impro.vesuent he bas made t of it for the public ads atotage. It wonlol be so, if every corruptible Ilepresentative were to find an en- ! lightened and iterotroptible constituent. Pont the practice and knuttledge of the norld will nut r us to be ignorant, that the constitution oil paper is one thing, and in fart and experience is a !wilier. We st know that the randidate, instead of trusting at his election to the testimony of his behaviour in Parlia ment, must bring the testimony rot' a large suns of mousy, I the rapacity of liberal expense in entertainments, the power of serving and obliging the rnlrrs of corporations, of wit 11l i l ig, over the popular le.olers of polilirrl elttba. associations and neighbuotrboolls. It is ten thousand times inure necessary to slim himself a man of power than a man of integvite, in al . tost all the elections with which I hale been acoplainto tl. Elections, there fore, become a matter of briny expense; and if con tests are freoptent, to many they will heroine a utatter of an expense to.ally ruinous. u Melt no fortunes ran bear; hut least of all the landed fortunes, etsrutsiber..tl as they often, indeed as they mostly are, with debts, with portion‘, with jointures; and tied up in the hands of the possessor by the limitatiodo• of settlement. It is a material, it is in my opinion 0 lastilg considera tion. in all the optestions concerning election. Let no one think the charges of elections a trivial matter. "The charge, ther , fore, of e!ec:ions might never to 1w lost sight of, in a questimt rimeerning their frt.- ; qucucy ; because the grand oli.ect you seek is lode prudence. Independence of mind will ever be more or less influenced by independence of fortune; anal if, I every three years, the exhausting sluices of entertain- spent*, drinkings, open house., to say nothing of lid- , !wry, arc to be periodically drawn up and renewed ; if liovernment-favours, fur whirl, now, in sonic shape or other, the whole rare of morn are candidates, are to be called fur on every occasion, I are that private fortunes will be washed away, anal every, even to the least, trace of independence, borne down by the torrent. I do not seriously think this constitution, even to the wrecks of it, could survive five triennial elections. If you are to fight the battle, you must put cm the armour of the ministry ; you roust call in the path lie, to the aid of private money. The expense of the last election has been compote(' (anal I : n n permitalleil that it has not been over-rated) at I,:ittlyinti 0 . :—tlirre shillings in the pound more in the land-tax. About the close of the last Parliament, and the lw!ri tttt ing of this, several agents for hor.inglis went and I remember well that it was in every one of their mouths—' Sir, your election will cost you 3,0110/. if von are independent; ' but if the ministry supports you, it may he alone for two, anal perhaps for less,'—anal, indeed, the thing spoke itself. Where a Living was to be gut for one, a Comniission in the Army fur another, a lift in the Navy for a third, sad Custom-110ov offices scattered about without measure air number, who tlouh a but , money may be saved ? The Tres'ory may even add money ; lint indeed it is superfluous. ? gentleman of 2,0611'. a year, who meets another of the same fortnne, fights with equal arms ; but if to one of the candi dates you add a thousand a year in places for himself.. sod a power of gibiug away as much among others, I one moist, or there is no truth in arithmetical demon- titration, ruin his adversary, if lie k to met him and to ' fight with him every third year. It will be said I do nut allow for the operation of character; but I do; and I know it will have its weight in !nest elections; perhaps it may be decisive in some. lint there are few in which it will prevent great expenses. " The destruction of independent fortunes will be the consequence on the part of the candidate. What will be the conaequetire of triennial corruption, trien nial drunkenness, triennial idleness, triennial law suits, litigation', prosecutions, triennial phrensy, of widely dissolved, industry interrupted, ruined; of those personal hatreds, that will never be suffered to soften; those animosities and fends, which will be rendered immortal ; those quarrels, which are never to be appeased ; morals vitiated and gangrened to the vitals? I think no stable and useful advantages were ever made lay the money got at elections by the voter, hut all lie gets is doubly lust to the public ; it is I looney given to diminish the general stock of the community, which is in the inilit"try of the subject. I an; sure that it is a good while before he or his family I settle again to their business. Their heads will never 'cool; the temptations of elections will he for ever glittering before their eyes. 'llls y will all grow poli- ticiaus; every one, quitting his bitsiness, will choose I ' to enrich himself by his vote. They will all take the I. goofing- o !; fit Vl' VialeCal will be wade fur them; they II will ran to the Custoni-house quay, their looms and ploughs will he deserted. " So was Rime destroyed by the disorders of conti nual elections, though those of Rome were sober dis orders. 'I hey had nothing bat faction, bribery, bread, and stage plays, to debauch them. There the contra was only between citizen and citizen ; here you have the contests of ambitious citizens on one side, supported by tile Crown, to oppose to the efforts (let it be so) of pirate and Loom, parted ambition un the other. Yet Rome was destroyed by the frequency! and charge of elections, anal the :monstrous expense of an um-emitted courtship to the people. I thick, there fore, the independent candidate and elector may each lie destroyed by it; the whole boilv of the conmoinity will Ise an infinite sufferer; and a vicious ministry the only gainer. tietithalien. I know, feel the weight of this argument: they agree that lb:, rota , ' be Ile ryas.. yoince of inure fro/rent elections, IV TIANT./ WEIR TO CoNTINCI: AS TIIKY AXE. But they think the treat was and frequency o the evil would itself be a rewelly for it; that, sitting but for a %hurt time, the Member would not tied it worth while to make such vast ex ' pen-es, while the fear of their constituents will hold them the more effectually to their duty. " To this I answer, that experience is full against them. *I his i= no new thing: we have had triennial Parliaments. At Ito period of time were seats store eseerly ~a t tested. The ...citruses of elections ran higher. taking the state of all charges, than they du now. The ex penselif entertainments was such, that an Act, equally severe and ineffectual, was made atrainst it. Every !! iument of the time bears witness of the ex• prim.: and tof the Acts against corruption in elections were then made. All the writers talked of, it and lamented it. Will ally one think that a corporation will be contented with a howl of pate.h, or a piece of beef the less, because elections are retry three, in-! stead of every seven years ? Will they change their, wine for ale, because they are to get e ale three! years hence ? Don't think it. Will they make fewer demands fur the advantages 4.f patronage in favours, and offices, breatise their 31emlwr is brought more un der t' .'r 1 tower? We have not wily our own historical! experience in linglaini upon this subject, but we have the expelienre co-existing with us in Ireland, where, ! since their Parliament has been shortened, the expense of elections has beets so far (rolls being lowered, that it has been very hear doubled. Formerly they sat fir the King's life. The ordinary charge of a seat in Parliament was then 1,500/. They now sit eight years, ((air sessions. It is now 2,500/. and up wards. '1 The spirit of etnnlation has also been ex tremely in.:meted ; and all who :ere acquainted with the tone of that 1:0011try have no doubt that the spirit is still grow ing ; that new candidates will take the field ; that the contests will be more violent, and the! expenses of elections larger than ever. "It 'fever ran br otherwise. A seat in this (louse,' for good purposes, for bad purposes, for no purposes at all (except the mere eonsitleration derived from being concerned in the public counsels) will ever be a first-rate object of ambition in England. Ambition is no exact calculator. Avarice itself does not calculate strictly when it ;causes. flue thing is certain, that in this political game the great lottery of power is that. into which men will purchase with millions of ehaners against teem. In Turkey, where the place. where the fortune, where the head itself, are so insecure, that scarcely any have died in their beds fur ages ; so that the bow-string is the natural death of Bashaws; yet in no country is power and distinction (precarious enotieb t Doti knows, in all) sought for with such boundless avidity as if the value of plare was enhanced by the clanger and insecurity of its tenure. Nothing trill ever make a seat in this (louse not an object of desire to numbers, by any 'wens or at any charge. but the depriving it of all power and all dignity : this will do it. This is the true and only nostrum for that pur pose. But a :louse of Cum ttttt its without power and without dignity, either in itself or its Members, is no House of Commons for the purposes of this Constitution. " But they will be afraid to art ill, if they know that the day of their account is always near. I wish it were true ; but it is not ; here again we have rape rience, and experience is against us. The distemper of this age is a poverty of spirit au..l of getting; it is trifling ; it is futile; worse titan ignorant, superficially taught with the politics anti murals of girls at a boariling-sal 1, rather than of men and of statesmen: lint it is nut yet desperately wicked, or so scandalously venal as ill foraier tithes Did not a triennial Parlia ment give up the national dignity, approve the peace of Utrecht, and almost give up every thing else in taking every step to defeat the Protestant sot:cession Was nut the Constitution saved by those, who had no election at all to go to, the Lords, because the Court applied to electors, and by various means carried them from th it true interests; so that the Tory Ministry had a majority without an application to a single Mem ber'? Now its to the conduct of the Members, it was ,then far from purr and independent. Bribery was ill 'finitely noire dagratit. A predecessor of yours, Mr. Speaker, put the questinu of his own expulsion fisr 'bribery. Sir William Musgrave was a wise man: a grave man ; an intlependant man ; a man of good for tune, and good family; however he carried on, while in opposition, a traffic, a shameful traffic, with the Mi nistry. Bishop Hornet knew of 41,000/. which he had received at une payment. I believe the payment of autos in hard ttttt ney, plain naked bribery, is rare among us. It was, then, far from uncommon. " A triennial was near ruining, a septennial Parlia ment saved your l'onstitution ; nor perhaps have you ever known a more flourishing period fur the union of national prosperity, d gnity, and liberty, than the sixty years you have passed under that constitution of Par liament.* The shortness of time, in which they are to reap the profits of iniquity, is far from checking the avidity of corrupt men ; it renders them infinitely more ra venous. They rush violently and precipitately on • The compliment paid, la this passage, to t►e constitution of Parliament. and the condition of tits kingdom at t►e pe riod referred to, might be;triklogly contrasted with t►e sen timents expressed b}• Mr. Burke himself, not long befo►e, and immediately lifter, respecting the pernicious teadeney of 'ministerial and eneonsthntionsi ialuence on the antra of Mate, and the Interests of the country. This boasted syaSes Isis been thirty put to the test of 'aperient-v. Forty yeas have passed since It received the adulation of Mr. Burke; the eonstitolloa of Part!gloved has continued nnreforsed ; land whet is aOlit the ecestiltion of the Uoverpatent and P"Fle their o'vject : they lose all rezarl r, decorum. TI mend of profits ~re precious; never are men so al -lod I, during 3 ertierA morality. I. was s., in the cr.,. plague at Athol.; et ery symptom of w:,ich fatt•L this is its wont sytnitt among the cesi . ) is s.: tine' s r .. latel by a creat historian of mciquity. It was the phroe of Lott,:toi, in 1665. It appears in sol.lier, s a il or s, e v :. tl hoever would cootrive to tender the life of man touch 6 1 1 rter than it is, would, I am satis. tied. find the surest receitit for increasing the nest of our mann.. '11,114, in my opinion, the shortness of a trienni I sitting would liar:. diy following ill effects; it wow mate the Ilcnthrr more shatnele•sly antl 611011111 g: corrupt ; it word , ' increase his d.•pendenre on Citt:e hest support him at his election ; it srot.J sera:•:: and tea.. to pieces the f mines of those wh, stood upon th••ir own fortunes and their pti►ulz i:•r• rests ; it would 'mike ti►e elector, infinitely more ►enll ; a•nl it would the u h de buds• of pl:ple, who are, whether they hare votes or nut, y o u r e eti ,d in !ectio u, tore lawle,s, more idle, mare debau• 11.,1 ; it would utterly destroy the sobriety. the itt►lu.try, the inte grity, the simplielty of all the people t an I underni'.ne, i an► untrh afraid, the deepest and br•t laid fonnda ions of the commonwealth. " Those who have sp. km and written w , sri this sub. ject without :oars, do not so much deny the probable emistence of these inconvenient CA, ill their toe 'sure, as they trust for their prevention to remedies of vacioat sorts, which they propos.% First, a Place Bill ; if this will not du, Ls they (ear it will no', then they say, we will have a rotation, and a certain number of con shall be rendered incapable of helm; elected for ten years. Then, for the electors, they shall Isalbd ; the Members of Parli.tmeut also shall deride by bal:J; ; a fifth project is the change of the present legal l'. :•res-ntatives o f th e kingdom. On all this I shall observe, that it will be very unsuitable to your wisdom to adopt the project of a Bill, to which there are objection., insuiserable by any thiug in the Bill itself, upon th , hope that this.; objections may be removed by suh.e. t ueut projects; every one of which is full of difficolties o f it s own , and which are all of them very essential alterations in the Constitution. This seems very irregular and a- usual. If any thing should make this a re.y doubtfnl measure, what can make it more so than that, in the opinion of its advocates, it would aggravate a:I our obi inconveniem•es in such a manser as to require a total alteration in the Constitution of the kinsd rat?' The sketch of the Honourable Member's argue nt was left, it would appear, uufinished is his manu script, rand even the sentence following that last quoted, was incomplete. The compliment., however, to the mover of the Bill, with which it was designed to mol lify the resistance to his moti •n, was carefully pre pared. After expressing his hope that the worthy Alderman would see the respect that was paid to the prieciple on which he went, as well as to his intentions and abilities, Mr. Burke very anxiously la boured to have it well understood (and the terms in which at that season he expressed his sentiments, ought at no time to be forgotten by his preten 'ed foloxers. that he did not &Want s he trotisn of Mr.Sashrl lge" tv motives low and unworthy, and as geoun Hess as they are injurious. / (continues he) do net 'Tett to be frightened with the proposition, as if ao:ne hicee s spectre had started from hell, which was to be sent back Alain by every firm of exorcism, and every kind of incantation. / invoke no Acheron to vivre-betas him in the whirlpools of its muddy gulf. /do not tell Cie respectable mover and seconder, by a perversion of their sense and expressions, that their proposition halts between the ridiculous and dangerous." But temper ing the spirit of cpposition with muds suavity of addieis, be concludes his intended speech with that very delicate and courteous appeal in which remark was made in the notice of the actual debate. in a pre ceding number, and which, unhaispily, be disqualified hums. If from making on certain subsequent occasions of controversy with the most estimable of all his for mer friends, " I hope," says Mr. Burke !referring to Mr. Alderman Nawbridge),"l hope he sea and feels, and that every Member sees and fe..is :long with him, the difference between amicable dissent and civil dis cord." TRILAION AND POIITICAL Ecovout.—A Gentleman who happened some tlme ago to he in the steam-boat in which some of the 11AtilealS defeated at Bonnymnir were conveyel from Sterlinx to Et:inburgh, entered into rout ersat . with Baird, ti.eit captain, whittle allowed to walk on deck. his individual boasted of the part he had acted. and laid, the only regret he felt was, that they were unable to overturn thitiovera ment. The Gentleman said he thought liberty anti property were as w.. 11 secured under our Goverment as antler any other of which any thing bad come to his knowledge. and asked him why be wished to overturn sorb a tiovertnnent ? Baird immediately replied — Po yea call that a good Government, Sir, which keeps its people in the utmost distress by imposing re. strietions on their in.instry ? Si r, if it were not foe the as just and I mpolitie remit:Bons o! the Goy. ?Men?, witio:t prerent the pro4lnce of other countries from manias ours, our tuanufa -toren might at th 4 moment be to troduced into many places from which h .y aro excluded. and our starving people nirht be in full employments." The sentint nts of this rebel captain are said to he more general among the labouring classes of the /red of Scotland than is commolly supposed. What is singular is, that people sensible enough to row, ia this way, should bis at the same time so stupid fr to think that they can recommenii their opinions by the sicked and unjustifiable means to which they retort, or so ill-informed as to the strength of this powerful • Government, as to suppose that with their paltry WOO they are able to overturn it. We have heard gals ii martyrs for the tree religios, and martyrs for Mold' floe, bat since the tint mention of political etrOarmy. we believe this is th- first instance of any me um' taring his neck for it. A meeting of the county of Sussex took paw me Thursday bust, at which the High Sheri/ porligh when it was unanimously resolved to apply to Piffle meut fur not Act directing th it all future election d I knights of that Shire shall be held at Lewes. Mr. Austin, the drawing-master of eccentric me. story, well known to the Electors of Westminster some years ago. for his singular exertion 10 support of Mr. Fox. when a candidate for that city. died a few lays ago at Brighton, in the lifith year of his ale. r~ ■ a I I tli , in rei is It Tr en th la II i ii ti f h a