The Press.
London, England, 1858-06-12 00:00:00

THE BALLOT.

Mr. 11. BERKELEY repeated his annual motion for
leave to bring in a bill to cause the votes of parlia-
mentary electors to be taken by way of ballot. He
founded his advocacy of the ballot, he said, by which
he meant emphatically secret voting, upon one sound
atioin—that Parliament had no right to create a
functionary without giving to that functionary ade-
quate protection in the discharge of his office. He
reiterated most of his former arguments, founded
upon principle and upon successful experiments, in
favour of this mode of taking votes, contending that
under the present mode elections went for nothing,
and the nation was not fairly represented. The first
step to a reform of Parliament, he said, was to free
the electors, who were now bound hand and foot, and
there was no other way of doing this than by giving
them the ballot. He illustrated his arguments by
familiar examples of the application of what he
termed the " screw."

The motion was seconded by Mr. W. P. MAnTlx,
who expressed his belief that the ballot was not only
a just, but, as it appeared to be in Australia, a Con-
servative measure.

Mr. HUNT explained an allusion made to him by
Mr. Berkeley.
Mr. S. ESTCOURT, in resisting the motion, urged,
among other reasons for desiring publicity, that
secrecy in the discharge of a public function was un-
English—that is, it was directly at variance with the
habits, customs, and notions of Englishmen. He
maintained that the franchise was a public trust, and
that all public trusts ought to be openly exercised.
In his opinion, the ballot would not put down intimi-
dation and bribery, while it would introduce evils of
its own; the principle would work ill for the public,
and cause misunderstandings, jealousies, and heart-
burnings.
Sir A.. Euros supported the motion. There should,
he said, be no artificial restraint upon the free action
of the voter. The ballot would enable him to act
independently of all influence, and was the only
means of securing his independence, whereas open
voting counteracted the natural intention of the
Reform Bill.

Mr. BENTINCK remarked that Mr. Berkeley must
know as sell as he did that the proper title of a bill
for introducing the system of the ballot ought to be
" a bill to prevent the detection of bribery." lie
defied any one to show that there would be any other
result from the ballot system except that it would he
per:ectly impossible under it to detect systematic
bribery•.
- _

General THoMpSON endeavoured to remove a mis
apprehension upon this question, by observing that
there was no wish to prevent a voter from making his
vote public; all that was desired was that the act of
voting should be such that the vote could not be
known unless the voter pleased.
Mr. HOPE denied that success had attended the
experiment of the ballot, which had been tried re-
peatedly in France, and the result did not justify
Mr. Berkeley in saying that the cause of the ballot
was the cause of liberty. It wag in the cause of
liberty and progress he (Mr. Hope) protested
against the ballot.. If introduced into England the
first stone would be laid of that edifice of oligarchy
and despotism which existed in America.
Sir G. LEWIS remarked that this question had
been argued on both sides on the supposition that
the ballot would produce a system of secret voting ;
but the position he wished to see established was
that the ballot would produce a system of secrecy.
He contended that in the United States the ballot
Was not a system of secret voting. With the excep-
non of one State, the votes taken by ballot were
Practically as public as in England ; the real dine
rence was that in the United States the ballot, being
a piece of paper, is put into a box, and there is no
authentic and official record of the vote, so that there
Could be no indictment for bribery. In other re-
hpeets, voting in the United States and in England
was Practically identical. Unless universal secrecy
Were secured, no effectual protection would be given,
and the ballot did not secure universal secrecy in the
Lulled States.
Mr. Msesit described the working of the ballot in
Australis where, he said, it had produced not good
but harm, and read reports of strange proceedings
10 a colonial legislature.
Mr. AVETON supported the motion. He argued
that the baUot, if it would not extinguish, would