The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1867-02-19 00:00:00

NOTES OF THE WEEK.

I.—Burnam has at length received its
development in the form of "Resolutions
and we confess that, notwithstanding all the
carping with which these resolutions have
been met, we conceive them to be broad and
comprehensive enough to cover a complete
settlement for the present of the Reform
question, if only accepted and applied in a
proper spirit by the House and by the
country. It is the duty of any Government,
not to say more especially of a Conservative
Government, to bridle the unbounded license
of popular demonstrations, which if carried
out unchecked must simply imply revolution.
But it is a great and constitutional concession
in an Administration so situated to come
forward for the sake of conciliation and
boldly and frankly say, as in the first Reform
Resolution, that the number of electors in
this country ought to be increased. The
mode of effecting that increase is quite a
matter of detail. Here is the grand principle
affirmed, and henceforth all sections of the
House of Parliament are, and must be in
earnest, in accomplishing an extension of the
Franchise, however much they may differ as
to the direction in which it is to be done.
Even on that hand the resolutions are very
explicit; the property qualification is to be
lowered, and other franchises are to be
added. Mr. Disraeli was once the author
of some fancy franchises not easily realised
perhaps, but which involved excellent
principles however difficult to reach, these
principles, so far as we remember, comprising
intelligence, providence, and respectability.
But in the present instance he leaves us in
doubt, because he specifies at once and
directly that it is desirable that a more
direct representation should be given to the
working classes. No doubt this bold and
almost unexpected announcement comes
qualified with the constitutional safeguard
against the preponderance of numbers. But
the very essence of representative government
is to take care of that, and unless we
are to invert all the historical procession
of affairs in England we can never adopt
any other maxim let us extend the basis
of representation as we may. Well then,
these being the doctrinary principles of
the Government propositions, the points of
detail may be said to commence with the
adoption of rating as the test of qualification.
We have always said that nothing could be
fairer than rating. One man may connive
with another to a fiction of rent, but
rating is a reality. There are the rate books,
and these placed before the revising barrister
at once decide the whole lists of qualified
electors, and obviate the thousand and one
questions of the existing system. We confess
that there is one point contained in the fifth
resolution which, notwithstanding Mr.
Disraeli's explanation, remains too vague, and
that "the plurality of votes" may either mean
one thing or another. But this, perchance,
is one of those make-weight matters, thrown
in only to be thrown out, and not to have it
said that the propositions, should they be to
any extent successful, were blindly and im-
plicitly adopted. For the rest—there is to
be a re-distribution of seats; and all the latest
attempts at that difficult adjustment having
proved so singularly abortive, is is hardly to
be hoped or expected that this can be done
without a commission. That indeed would
stand very much in the way of an immediate
settlement; but there may be no help for it;
anything that could be arranged without it
might be found crude and unsatisfactory. Yet ,
at the same time there is danger, not only of
the Reform Bill being carried and settled this
session, should the Government insist on in-
quiry by commission into the rights of places
to share in the representation, but there is in
the first place danger to Reform altogether,
and danger to the existence of the Govern-
ment itself, since they seem to be for the
present the only party calculated to hold the
scales of justice and deal evenly betwixt the
conflicting interests of the body politic.
Bribery and corruption are to be i
put down;
the registrations are to be assimilated n town
and country; and, instead of the ballot, polling
papers, as in municipal elections, are to be
allowed, together with other minor improve-
ments, which csnnot but be pronounced
beneficial; and altogether the proposals merit
to be well tve,'%hed and made the most of, as
such another `ol.lportunity of really settling a
vexed question mey not soon again arise.
ll.—Tns Azimut, SPSZCH of the Emperor of
the French is distinguished by • spirit of "it
sufficiency which ascribe.' alike to sumer fil!ff
failure, to intervention and non-interventwnt m
current events, an almost on:impotent predang-
nano* to the power and influence of France. Thus
she is at one movient represented as having, with-
out arming • single soe, been able to arrest
the conqueror at the gates of Vienna, and to
bring about pesos on terms honourable to all con-
tending parties; with what degree of truth, how-
ever, the world is as well able to judge as the
Emperor to tell us. But probably the most
amusing of all the Imperial explanauona is that
which His Majesty has been pleased to pet upon
the awkward stem of matters in Mexico, in say-
that the French influence there examined
indeed • beneficial effect, bet that the result! so
gained were " compromised by an inaniptooes