The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1860-06-08 00:00:00

'TIS TAIRTY YEARS AGO..

Oun earliest ide.as of Reform are associated with
the'lnemory of one of the most exciting periods of
our national.histOry,—of a time when the whole
body of; the people had been roused to the utmost
degree.,of enthusiasm, and. was inspired with a
firm deterniination to carry the Bill, the whole
Bill, and nothing but the Bill. If those times
were fraught with the dangers of precipitate and
unwise action on the part of the multitude, they
were to a great extent redeemed by the noble
testimony then borne in favour of earnest pa-
triotism, and all the exalted virtues which are the
natural inheritance of a great people. The great
Reforni Bill of '32 having at last received the
royal assent, the enthusiasm of the people seemed
to know no bounds. The originators and pro-
moters of the measure were popularly idolised, and
the fruits to arise from its enactment were esti-
mated as likely to be so exuberant and plentiful,
that the expression of the general joy was limited
only by the exhaustion of every possible and
available variety of public jubilation. Since
then, nearly thirty years have gone ! during
which those who were then but children have
attained the years of maturity,—*we hope also
of discretion,—'-and those who were in the prime
of life, have grown old and grey-haired. Nearly
thirty years have gone ! with all their cares and
pleasures, leaving behind, to those who survive,
only the memory of many who were .then an
ornament to life and the pride Of the nation, not

less confided iu by loving hearts at home, than
esteemed and cherished by • the general mind.
Nearly thirty years have gone ! during which
many changes have come o'er the spirit of our
dream in political as well as in social life, and
sometimes we .are alniost inclined to breathe a
sigh for the good old times before those degenerate
days began to dawn upon England, and to wish
them back again. 'Tis but a passing weakness.
We are now taught, to think that the olden time,
beforeßefortnßills 'were dreamt of, was a wretched
epoch—unworthy of an intelligent people—cha-
racteristic only of a nation of bondsmen. Nearly
thirty years have gone! and another Reform Bill
is in the most critical .stage of its existence; or
rather is just about to be gathered to its fathers
—to pass away into the limbo of abortive and ill-
devised schemes which the author of the present
measure has produced so plentifully ! We have
acquired a habit of looking for a new Reform
Bill at the commencement of each session, that
we may kill it by neglect, or kick it out in
disgust before the session is over. We . ought
to he a happy people if apparently endless
trafficking in Reform Bills can make a people
'rejoice ! The habit may be a good or a bad one,
but we have learned it ; and now we have our
new Reform Bill every year as a matter of course,
and we enjoy it as we would a cigar, until it is
done, when we throw it away and look for
another. In Reform Bills, as in the luxury we
have mentioned, tastes vary ; some preferring a
dry whiff, while others incline towards the
enjoyment of the weed in a more luscious appli-
cation of the narcotic.. The annual Reform Bills
answer many purposes during their ephemeral
existence. Our politicians use them as gentle-
men do their canes, or ladies their fans ;
and like these they vary in style and mode accord-
ing to the " fashions for the season." Great
Reform ,Bills are no longer in fashion—we now
prefeetliem little : and the latest has been called
.par excellence "the little Reform Bill." People
speak playfully of it as Grandpa RUSSELL'S sickly
little bantling ; and there are many people soft
enough to feel for its parent in the prospect of
another bereavement. But this is a mistake, of
course, for it is well known he never cared much
for the "little 'un," and scarcely expected or
desired that it should cut its back-teeth. People
were wont thirty years ago' to shout and bully
about " the bill," but the, fashion is now widely
different, and such a demonstration would be
considered an unpardonable piece of vulgarity.
Every attempt to check the progress of the bill
of '32 seemed likely to lead to instant revolution,
and people swore terrible oaths as to the conse-
quencea of its being much longer delayed. Now-
a-days everybody is impatient to see the little
brat kicked under the table. It has had its
session, and is not that enough ? It has become
a bore, and people wonder why it is not strangled
out of the way, once and for all, i.e. for the
session ; for, of course, we shall look for a new
one again when the season comes round.
Is Parliamentary Reform then altogether a
dream of the past, a toy of the present, an inter-
minable quantity—a mere " repeater" for the
future ? Is our system of popular representation
perfect, and incapable of further improvement ?
Or is it not the general belief that now is the
time for a sound measure of reform ? Is it not
universally admitted that there ought to be an
extension of the franchise, and some redistri-
bution of seatS"? If it be so—and it is not to be
denied—who are the authors of this despicable
system of trifling with the feelings and wants of
the country, and by what terms can We depict
the hideousness of the conspiracy to cheat us out
of these'nitional requirements? 'Those factious
and unpatriotic Whigs
" Palter with us in a double sense,
Keeping the word of promise to the ear,
And break it to the hope."
The course pursued by the Conservatives,
'although it may have been susceptible of
improvement in detail, has been a very model
of consistency and honour, as compared with
the paltry shuffling of Lord JOHN RUSSELL
and other sham reformers. We all remember
well the programme Lord JOHN RUSSELL gave
:when in Opposition—how Stern and strict he was
as to the only conditions on which the represen-
:tation of the country ought to be reformed—and
how heroicallihe challenged a verdict from the
House of Commons that led to a dissolution. We
-remember well how, when speaking under the
grave responsibility of an expectant Minister, he
defined very minutely the qualifications for the
franchise—how he urged on a vote adverse to
Lord DERBY'S Government, and appealed to the
opinion of the country in his own favour. The
high-toned -programme with which the present
session was commenced is also fresh in our minds.
Is it possible that the high Reform Policy which
'destroyed a Ministry, dissolved a Parliament,
and the discussion of which has occupied the
best part of another session, has already melted
away ? Is it true that Lord JOHN RUSSELL,
after all his fanfaronade in Opposition, after
`having enjoyed the most ample opportunities for
maturing his schemes.in the advantageous position
of a ;Minister of the Crown, and after coming
forward with the most• pompons pretensions of
definitively legislating on the subject this session,
has entirely broken down, and succeeded only in
'proving
his own incompetency and inconsistency?
Alas ! it is so. He has . himself proved to a
demonstration that he does not in any way con-
template the achievement of the policy he himself
'has recommended. He now forces us to believe
that Mr. DISRAELI spoke prophetically when he
warned him last year, that he had been exer-
cising from the first on this subject a sinister and
a fatal influence upon the fortunes of his party
and upon his own reputation—that he had been
' induced to recommend a policy, out of office, which
he would tad. it impossible to accomplishas a
Minister. Has not this solemn warning
realised? ierd JOHN RUSSELL has' hazarded t;he.
safety .of the. country in order, not even
,that he
may realise a fair reputation
as a reformer, but
that he might, perchance, carry out—in a manner
ta__e—an
tahntcliti',bpy means.andwhwichh
ichareh7
have to
to
hdlignify
unwise, an immature, and, even now, we will say,