The Express.
London, England, 1851-08-11 00:00:00

gfte erpreols.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.
A Sewed Whim sf " Tra Eterms." esstsistiii .114 man emmiser
" (Amite." is pratriheil emu Tuesday sad Irina, Willis la
Ist post.
urements into...ten for "The Lap's" Lesion Evening paper,
wt to. aUK Itnee, 10. flourene-elMet b Tye °Work on the
My of ratification.
PURR WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
Tolle DAT—Magnin, Ih. Om. Afternoon. 2n. MIL
T..lBllo.—Xutninit, 20. Xs Altman, 21. Os.

LONDON, MONDAY, AUGUST 11.

THE SeSSiOn is over. The national representatives
hare done their year's work ; it is now for their con-
stituents to say how they are satisfied with the
way in which it has been done.
We do not mean that the electors of any county,
city, or borough, have at this moment a special call
to express on opinion of the conduct of their own
particular represt Motive or repmentativew With a
very few exceptions there is just now little to
choose between any members of " honourable house?'
Every succeeding session shows a diminishing I
amount of business got through, and that in
a more ensatisfactory manner. Fur this no one
appears to be to blame more than another. Mr.
This and Mr. That, ministers and miniaterial-
irits, conservative:4 progressive and conservatives
obstructive, whip and something more, and
independent liberals, MI seem alike to have come to a
dead lock, to be imapuble of dui ll g anything. It is
no single constituency that is called to sit in judg-
ment upon its own representatives; the aggregate
constituencies of the empire are called to sit in judg-
ment upon the aggregate representatives.
It' little or nothing is done in parliament, it is not
because there is little or nothing to dn. There are
still large arrears of what was promised in I:430 as
the sure and speedy results of a reform bill to be paid
up; and during the twenty years that have since
elapsed, changer have taken place in the body politic
that render necessary changes in our laws and insti-
tutions to adapt them to the novel circumstances.
This, if denied by any party in parliament, is denied
by a very small party, and very faintly; and yet no-
thing is done, or nothing to the purpose.
For this anoinalcua position of affairs various rea-
m:Ha may lie asaignetl, all of them helping. But
there is tine which is more influential than any of
the others, one that can more easily be amended
than uny of the otheru, and th at is the unsatiaffietury
composition of the Hour of Commons:.
'the lb l'orm Act of was an incomplete
lam of work. It was demanded without modifica-
tion by the people, and that wisely ; for, as matters
stood when it pawed, if they had not got it, they
might burn got nothing. nut it is obvious that a
good deal of skilful juggling had been employed
to patuerve a great number of purchaseable and
ninninatimi boroughs ; that even the ten pound
qualification fur electors excluded a numerous class,
who, us possessed of political power, ought, in ac-
eord.witv with all wand political principle, to have
been made loyal to the constitution by being made u
part of it ; that the ten pound franchise was with-
held from nearly one-half of the constituencies; and
that limitations were imputed on the choice of dee-
tore in the shape of a property qualification fir
members of parliament. and captious and unmeaning
oaths admiinstered to them before tiny are allowed
to take their seats.
And the origitial (*.erects of the measure have been
much Moreau d by ,lounges that have occurred Mine
it passed. The' distribution of the population has
altered materially; some towns and districts have
because more populous while others have become less
fro Tlw distribUtioll Of property has altered mate-
riidly ; whisk, classes are rising to comparative
wealth, while others. if not retrograding in this re- '
spect. are Math:oar; . Lastly, changes in local ad-
unniatration have created new official classes, who
hate siert:what to the influence fornwrly exercised by
the old. Even had the Iteform Act of the late Earl
Gass gisen us a constituency identical with the
politically powerful population, the changes which
Lave taken place since it beanie law are enough to
make it leave many without voto or sole° who are
amply entitled to both.
The national constituency is no longer identical
with that part of the population which in virtue of
its intelligence and independent position possesses
political power. As toil us a constitution ex-
cludes from the exercise of the elective fran-
chise a part of this section of the community,
the ilou- ut Colon 11l l s mars to is; a fair
exponent of the national will. And as soon
its the House of COHIMOHS Malt in this manner
to hen fair exponent of the national will, it loses its
power for good. Sectional interests obtain an ascen-
dancy in it that enables them to thwart and bottle
measures required for the common benefit. When the
power of these sectional interests is sufficiently great
to enable them to effect their own petty and selfish
schemes then n remedy, though often a rough one,
is at hand, for the nation refuse's to tolerate them.
But in this country at resent they are only strong
enough to thwart the national will, not to make
their own law. In this condition, however, they
are aide to make the Hour of Commons more con-
temptible in proportion as it is less dangerous. 'the
utter intitieienty of that braneh of the legislature, so
univemally complained of, is attributable to the in-
fluentv which cliques and coteries have obtained in
it through the defective condition of our electoral
system.
Lord JOHN Ressm. telt as that he is going to
remedy this. But lord Jona Ressm has fur some
years hero nuking many promises which he is either
unwilling or unable to fulfil. Ile was to bring the
Jews into parliament, he was to reform our sanitary
police, he was to reform the municipal government
of London. With sorrow we say it, a promise from
Lord Join RUSSELL that anything shall be done is
enough to warrant grave fears that it will not be
done. If we ore to have such a reform of the House
of Commous as will make it work well, we must not
lie on our oars and kayo the task to Lord Jolts
Et:saw—

Btvides, we have no means of knowing in what
spirit or after what fashion Lord Jonv proposes to
set about reforming the House of Commons. He has
been most frank in telling what he will not do, but
he has been close as a church-boa when asked what
he will do. The plan of reform which he is to de-
velop next sc.-ion may, or may not, meet the wants
and wishes of the country. If it does not, and the
people have not been bestirring themselves is the
meantime, there wilt be a session lost.
The recess is the time in which all who are im-
pressed with a clue sense of the urgent necessity of a
further reform in parliament ought to be indefati-
gably Nov. Let them take counsel one with
another, aid be prepared when parliament meets, in
the event of Lord Joitv IffsseLL's proposing an in-
adequate reform, to say not merely "your lordship's
plan will not suit us,' but "here is the measure of
reform that we want."

Two days before the prorogation of parliament—
that is to say • hen for all pramical purposes of legis-
lative information they would be of no possible use
—the annual returns of
.agricultural produce in Ire-
land were printed and circulated among the members
of the House of Commons. This is not the first
time that this has been done. When the first
volume was announced for the year 1848, some al-
lowance was reasonably asked and accorded on ac-
Count of the novelty cdthe attempt. When the second.
that, namely, for 1849, we forbore to criticise
with seventy the culpable dilatoriness that
rendered its publication, when the session of last year
was over, comparatively useless. But we are un-
willingly compelled to ascribe the repetition of the
offence on the present occasion less to negligence
than design. The withholding of important docu-
ments from the legislature until it can hardly be
made use of by any except those official infallibili-
ties who are responsible for its being thus kept back,
seems to be part of a regular system. It is an-
other specimen of the desire of the bureaucratic
clique to oust popular control, nay to baffle
representative inquiry with a smooth floc
of feigned unconsciousness. The shameful revela-
tions of the Irish tenses were unwarrantably with-
held for weeks after they might have been laid
before parliament, and would perhaps hare been