The Express.
London, England, 1860-04-24 00:00:00

PUBLIC BUSINESS.

PROFERSORMUP_OF MODERN HISTORY AT

cAratiitia.
Mr. STEUART gave notice that to-morrow he should ask
whether there was any special canes for not filling up the
Professorship of Modern History la Cambridge University,
and whether the vacancy is to be filled up.
MR. MASSEY'S MOTION ON THE REFORM BILL.
Mr. B. OSBORNE said, perhaps it would be for the coe-
venience of the house if the hon. member for Belford would
state the course he intended to pursue with regard to his
motion, to refer the Reform Bill to a select committee.
Mr. MABBEY—I have only to say that ss the noble lord
the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs announced the
other evening in answer to a question put to bins by SW hon.
member that he should consider my motion fora select com-
mittee as • motion to reject the bill, and as I had no such
object or intention, I ND left without any other alternative
but to abandon my motion, and I therefore beg to gins
notice that I shall not proceed with it. (Hear, hear.
THE REFORM BULL—ADJOURNED DEBATE.
The adjourned debate ou the Reform Bill was resumed by
Mr. E. JAMES, who said be would just make a few re-
marks on the speech of the right hon. gentleman the mem-
ber for the University of Dublin. The tendeney of the
right hon. gentleman's argument appeared to be that the
extension of the franchise to the occupiers of 61.
bonen in boroughs, was calculated to give a great
preponderance to the democratic element, and to be of a
&aprons and revolutionary character. If it were, it be-
hoved the gentlemen on the opposition side of the house to
have met the motion for the seems i reading of the bill with
a direct negative. The right hon. gentleman's speech fol-
lowed that of the hon. member for Leeds, who gave them
statistics proving the provident habit. of the working
claws, of their intelligence, and of their increased aluintion.
But the right hon. gentleman met the whole of that speech
with a sneer ; aal he was the more astonished at that, be-
cause he found on referring to the debate on the bill of the
late government in 1450, the right hon, gentleman solo-
gne& the bill as calculated to enfranchise the working
dames, and he mei a letter from an intelligent
elector of the borough of MArylebooe, which stated that the
bill was entitled to the support of the working classes,
because it would add 15,000 of the skilled artisans of the
borough to the constituency. Why then had the right hon.
gentleman now this dread of the admission of the working
classes to the franchise! He appealed from the right hon.
gentleman to the right hen. baronet the member tor Hen-
fonlshire (Sir E. B. Lytton). No one would ever forget
the eloquent speech uttered by the right hon. baronet, in
support of that bill. "We are not likely," the right hoe.
baronet said, " to fear the working man, awl for my part
lam proud of the English workman, whether it be the
simple English peasant with hie homely virtues, or the more
agitated, hut amid all his faults that noble human being,
the skilled mechanic of our manufacturing towns, with his
thirst for knowledge, and kin dreams of some political
Utopia quite as ration-it as that which Plato himself
dreamed.'" The right lion. baronet, he presumed from his
writibgi, had a better w-quaintance with the working
people of thin country than the right hon. gentleman, and he
had no fear of them, and yet they were told that this bill
was revolutionary. The right hon. gentleman the member
for Bucks (Mr. Disraeli) spoke 'spinet the franchise pro-
posed, because it created what he called • homogeneous con-
sistency. He (Mr. James) did not undentand the argu.
meet, but the bill of the right hon. gentleman himself pro-
po•ed a UV. constituency for counties. In conferring the
franchise they must have some political status, and he could
Dot understand the objection turbos the bill were defieient
in not having other frit...lines, and waless the right honour-
able gentleman had in his mind some mythical awl celestial
constituencies that lived in houses not made with
hands. He would now revert to the speech of the right
hon. member for Droitsich, who omitted no opportunity
of having a fling at metropolitan members. The right hon.
baronet related an imaginiry conversation in which a sulky
elector of Marylebone told hint that he never interfered in
the elections of that borough.
Sir J. PAILLNGTON remarked %heel what the lion.
sad leurnzliCleman was quoting was an extract from a
PalloPki be Sir dohs wia,,h.
Mr. E. JAMLSL-But it was some imaginary conversation
that took pine at the sea side.
Sir J. took
fact.

Mr. JAXIB—WeII, he said such was the peeponder-
ancient the liberal electors that he
to vote at all. Well, perhaps be did not. But might they
not have an imaginary converse/Son with a liberal elector of
Weinrich, whom they could easily imagine saying that be
never interfered with the elections of Droitwich, because
stir John Pakington returned the member for Weinrich, and
that it was no use lighting against him ? They might mul-
tiply Wens of this kind, and they might take ciunties,
and ash what chance had a liberal elector * North Essex'
He would now make cue or two obeervatimis on the defects
of the measure. He thought the bill was defective on ac.
want of its nos-chiefranchisement, and cis account of its non-
enfranchisement, which was the consequence of the non-
diefranchibenset He thought also the bill was defective
in its not giving a lodger franchise, by which they lost a
great deal et the intellect of the country, which would, to a
certain deem, be a safeguani and balance of the vessel of the
state against wiled appeared to be too democratic an element.
He thought the bill was defective by hampering the fran•
chime exacting the payment of rates. The bill, which
to be ea adjustment of a great question, was a
=WO ellalike bill, because it contained no amended system
of ragtime and registration which was essential. A great
deal bad been said as to the extent to which the bill would
inertia' the franchise. The noble lord had stated that the
inter*, of voters in boroughs by admitting lit. householders
would be somewhere between 157.uun and ltiO,ooo, and that
he could give them no notion of the increase that would be
made in the county easetituencies He believed that the
noble lord's statement was entirely fallacious, and that
government WIN not in peenession of the means of affording
to the house and the osantvy anything like a C 111101111•
lion of the extent of the measure. (Opposition cheers.)