The Express.
London, England, 1866-04-24 00:00:00

TEE,

_ JjeillAGHT rose to saeak andilst load cheers, in the
midst of an immensely crowded house. Commencing his
alieeadt with au apidoig to Mr. Lowe for having a recent
pwbNo inessehig &intentionally attributed to him some
winiM Well i let uttered, the hon. member pro;
medal to reply to the charge of
which bad been retorted upon him by" caatz,-
ley with regard to two divisions which took place
a few years ago, one in reference to the China war,
and the other to the Conspiracy to Murder Bill. On
the first of these questions, Ur. Bright explained thnt he
was not in parliament during the session in which it was dis-
cussed, nor even in the country, and that the first he
heard of the subject was in a news-room in the city of
Rome. As to the Conspiracy to Murder Bill, nearly 100
members, including Lord Russell, Mr. Milner Gibson, and
himself, voted against its introduction ; whilst Lord
Stanley and his friends warmly welcomed and supported
it But when Mr. Gibson gave notice of a resolution
which WSJ subsequently debated and carried by the house,
the noble lord and his Mends turned round on their policy,
supported Mr. Gibson, went into the same lobby with him,
and thus put Lord Palmerston's government in a minority.
If, then, there were any conspiracy in that case, it
came from the other side of the house ; and if it
WWI a " dirty conspiracy," the " dirt" was imported into
it by the noble lord and his friends. Turning, then, to
the question immediately before the house, the hon.
member observed, speaking first to the amendment of
Lord Grosvenor, that he suspected, if the truth were
known, that even were the goverrunent to lay upon the
table a distribution of seats bill which was no snore ex-
tensive than the Franchise Bill it would equally meet with
that noble lord's opposition ; but the one being absent
was made an excuse and a weapon for destroying the
other. Reverting to the speech of Lord Stanley in
seconding the amendment, he characterised it as much
more ingenious and much leas candid and straightforward
than that of Lord Grosvenor ; but it landed the house in
the same position. For during the speech twice, if not
oftener, he used the words " balance of power" with res-
pect to the representation of the people. Now, they ha 1
pretty well done with the " balance of power" on the con-
tinent ; and he trusted that the time would arrive when they
would cease to hear the phrase in that house, and the House
of Commons become the fair representative of the whole
people. Whatever might be the future arrangement of
seats, it must lead to greater popular power in the house ;
and whatever might be the extension of the franchise, it
must be attended with the same result. It was a painful
and perilous thing, then, to see the heirs of two of
the most ancient, wealthy, and powerful of the
houses of the English nobility oppose themselves
to this moderate and just bill, and by means of
a coalition in this house setting themselves
to expel Lord Russell from power, for the simple offence
that he wielded the authority of his high office to extend
in what he believed to be in a moderate and oonservative
degree the franchises of his countrymen. The course
which Lord Grosvenor was taking tended, in fact, to sever
the connexion of the most important members of the Whig
party with the liberal and popular party in that house and
the country ; and if that were the coiwequence, if he did suc-
ceed in dissevering the most intelligent of the wing nobility
from the great popular party, transported them to the
opposite side of the house, and ranged all the dukes and
nobles on one side of parliament and the popular party on
the other, history would teach him that whenever the
great popular party in a nation was fighting by itself
against the nobles, whatever their virtues and their
power, they might rely upon it that the popular party
would win and the nobles would go to the wall. Passing
to the manner in which it was proposed to deal with the
question of reform by separating the scheme for the redis-
tribution of seats from that of the extension of the fran-
chise, the hon. member justified the course adopted by the
government, and contended that a franchise bill which
did not adjust the question for at least, thirty years, was
a measure which it was not desirable that the house should ,
anent to, and that a Distribution of Seats Bill which did
not settle that branch of the question for as long a period
was equally undesirable. Analysing the electoral returns
which had been
figures by the government and com-
paring them with supplied to him from the Pot-
tense( and other p , Mr. Bright concluded from the
whole that the estimate formed by the Chancellor of the
Exchequer of the number of working men who would be
admitted to the fmnehise bythe billwas excessive inthepro-
portion of one-third • that was to say, it would be 116,000
only instead of 180,000. The hon. member continued :
The right hon. member for Buckinghamshire once asked
the question with which I began my speech.
He said—" Can this question be kept in obey-
ance ? " That question was asked in 1859 ; and
now I ask—Can it be kept in abeyance in 1866! (Hear,
hear.) You may defeat this bill. I am not learned in
parliamentary computation. There are gentlemen on both
sides of the house who can tell the majority either way
within a vote or two. I know nothing of that. I will
admit, if you like, that you can reject this bill, defeat the
government, and drive Lord Riewell from office. The right
hon. member for Buckinghamshire has no doubt a parlia-
mentary " Bradshaw " of his own, all the lines of which
converge to
Downing-street--a place to which I have un-
wittingly helped him once or twice ; but I had very soon
after to help in expelling him from that paradise of official
men. If he goes now to Downing-street, are you, his sup-
porters, prepared to say there shall be no reform ? Are
you prepared to let the right hon. gentleman and his
friends, who in 1859 prepared a measure which his ex-
perienced oolleagues declared would be fatal to the consti-
tution—are you prepared to let him deal with the ques-
tion! Does it not always break up a party ? (" Oh," and
a laugh.) When you come to deal with reform you will
find a difficulty, and if you refrain from dealingvrith it your
difficulty will not be less. You may depend upon it, on
whatever side of the house you sit, whether the Chancellor
of the Exchequer carries his bill or not, there still remains
the nation outside this house ; and there will still remain
the great questionof parliamentary reform. I believe there
never was a bill submitted to this house by a government
connected with the liberal party that it was more clearly
the duty and interest of what is called the conservative
party to support. (Hear, hear.) In lgrd the tory party
opposed the Reform Bill of that time, went to the constituen-
cies, and was destroyed for the time ; and if this bill musses
the enlarged constituencies will not probably look favour-
ably on the party who tried to prevent it from passing.
When you see a man like Lord Russell, who was the chief
spirit of 1832—("No," from the opposition)—yes, he pro-
moted reform for years before it made its appearance in this
house, and proposed the bill on the part of the government
—when you see him, knowing as much as any man in this
house, so convinced of the necessity of doing something
on this question, and offering a bill so reasonable ,sthis,
I cannot help saying that gentlemen opposite must be mis-
led by their leaders, or else have driven their leaders into
a corner periloustothe true interests of their party, in op-
posing the bill. Perhaps there never was a bill which
seemed more gradually and moderately to accommodate
itself to the advancing intelligence of the people. There
is not a whisper of disaffection against it. (" Oh, oh,"
from the opposition.) I speak, of course, of those persons
who are in favour of any improvement of the representa-
tion, and, so far as I can learn, even those who are called
the conservative party in the country are weary of the per-
petual discussion of this question, and would be glad to
settle it on the terms which the government have pro-
posed. (Cheers. and " Oh, oh," from the opposition.) I
slid not rise with the expectation that I should con-
vince hon. gentlemen opposite that they were wrong
and I was right ; the most I could hope WAS
that some fact or argument might find a lodgment
in some minds, and moderate their opposition to a measure
which I think the country requires, and which I think the
country is anxious to receive. I have not spoken in favour
of the government. I think their figures are wrong, and
that the case they laid before the house is unneces-
sarily and un injurious to their own canoe. Will
the house believe for once that I am speaking in no party
spirit, from no wish to do anything in the country, or to
the country more than they would wish ; that my view of
the public interest is as honest and conscientious as theirs
can be. I have been misrepresented, condemned, and
denounced by gentlemen opposite, and by not a few writers
in their lure ; but my conscience tells me that I have
laboured honestly to destroy only that which was evil,
and to build up that which was good. (Hear.) The poli-
tical gains of the last twenty-five years which were summed
up by the hon. member for the Wick Burghs are my poli-
tical gains in as great a degree as they are those of any
living Englishman. (Loud cheers.) If now, in all
the great centres of our population—in Birmingham
with its busy districts, in Manchester with its belt of
towns, in the populous towns of the West Riding of
Yorkshire, in Glasgow, amid the industry of the West of
Scotland. and in this great Babylon in which we are Resem-
bled, and which our people have built—if I say, at this
moment, we do not find ourselves surrounded by a hungry
and exasperated multitude, if now, more than at any
time within the last hundred yeers. it may be said, quot-
ing the beautiful words of Mr. Sheridan " Content sits
basking on the cheek of toil," if this house and its states-
men glory in the change, have not I as well as any other
living man some claim to partake of the glory ? (Loud
cheers). I know, and every practical man among you, and
those gentlemen who sit on that bench opposite rind lead
you to this enterprise, know that the policy I have urged on
the house and the country, so far as it has hitherto been
accepted by parliament, is a policy conservative of the
public welfare, strengthening to the just authority of
parliament, and adding from day to day fresh lustre and
dignity to the crown. (Loud cheers.) And now, when I
speak to yuu and ask you to pass this bill—when I appeal
on behalf of theee who are not allowed to speak them-
selves in this house—if you could raise yourselves for this
night, for this hour, above the region of party strife—if
you could free yourselves from the pestilent atmosphere
of passion and prejudice which so often surrounds the
house, I feel confident that at this moment I should not
plead in vain with the imperial parliament on behalf of
the English constitution and the Eneed people. (The
hon. member resumed his seat amid loud and general
6141i1184
Mr. VHITEATDA described the *each of Mr. Bright
as the language of the platform, and declared emphatically
that the bill was the inspiration of the hon. member for
Birmingham, and that the government had allowed them-
selves to be pot forward u its author, in order that the
ulterior objects which he had in view might be accom-
plished. The bill for the extension of the franchise was
intended as a lever to assist him in carrying the measure
for the redistribution of seats, and that point bed gained
he would go on with his demands until the whole of his revo-
lutionszy programme was exhausted. Referring to the accu-
sation so repeatedly made against the opposition that they