Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-01-19 00:00:00

MR. BRIGHT'S SPEECH
AT BRADFORD.

On Monday evening, Mr. Bright delivered a speech to
some four thousand persons at Bradford, in elucidation of
his own Reform Bill.

Mr. Bright, on rising, was received with loud and con-
tinued cheering. After some introductory observations,
he said that he was most anrions that any step which the
Government and Parliament might take might conduce
to the lasting and highest interests of this great nation.
He had been particularly stimulated to address the great
meetings in Birmingham, Manchester Edinburgh, Glas-
gow, and now in Bradford, because he 'believed it to be of
an importance which could not be described in words
that those who wished for reform should know what it
was they wanted, and so understand the question that
they could detect in a moment any imposture that might
be attempted ; so. that there might be no mistake com-
mitted which we hereafter or our children after us, might
have cause to lament. (Ilear, hear.) Everybody was
for reform. He thought that, in coming to Bradford he
had met in the railway carriage one who was opposed to
reform ; but it proved that he was not so ; he only didn't
much like paying to hear political speeches. (Laughter.)
If everybody was for reform, where then was the peril?
Why warn anybody against any possible imposture ? He
as quite willing to allow it to be assumed that his recent
pr6posltif.m.c lAA not been in all things judicious, and that
he might have -:!3‘de mistakes ; but still the comments
of a considerable portion of the press had not been the
comments of those who merely pointed out with a
friendly finger mistakes which he might have committed.
They had been comments dictated by intense hostility--
(hear, hear)—and he knew not whether the press repre-
senting the present Government, or that representing the
last Government, was more to be charged with bitter
hostility. (Hear, hear.) Look again at the panic
into which certain members of the aristocracy had
'been thrown. (Laughter.) They were not anxious that
the question of reform should be discussed by those who
were able to handle it thoroughly—(hear, hear) ; —and
they thought that the people would be let away from the
pursuit of a great object by attributing to him oftentimes
language, and 'always objects, to which he had
never, zimen—the smallest approbation. (Hear, hear.)
Thib-question they had to discuss was really composed of
three questions : —First, what ought to be done with
regard to the extension of the franchise ; second, shall
any alteration be made in the mode in which the right
to the franchise shall be exercised ; and third, what steps
shall be taken to withdraw members from places and
populations wholly incompetent fairly to exercise the
right of election, and to what new towns, old towns, great
towns, or industrious populations, shall these new
members afterwards be distributed ? (Hear, hear.)
Upon the first point, he would say at once that he was
against all fancy " franchises—(hear, hear)—fran-
ehises given not so much with reference to those they
would include, as with reference to those they would
exclude. (Hear, hear.) In this catalogue he grouped,
proposed, or suggested special franchises to lawyers, and
doctors, and members of colleges. 'Why not make a special
electoral body of the worsted-manufacturers of Bradford ?
They were just as useful men in the country as lawyers.
The lawyers had three or four representatives always in the
Cabinet, and just as many more on the opposite benches
waiting to take their places, and there were, he supposed,
not less than one hundred barristers in the house ; so that
lawyers really required no more representation. Doctors
were educated men, and devoted to the great interests
of society in their own department ; but they were
not specially learned in politics. (" Hear, hear," and
laughter.) Then, it was proposed, that £5O in a savings
bank should entitle to a vote ; but upon that arrangement,
if a young man married, and invested his £5O in the fur-
niture of a comfortable home, although he thus became a
more responsible citizen, he nevertheless lost his vote.
(Hear, hear.) All these propositions were submitted by
men who really hail not considered the question at all, or
who had considered it so much that they had found out
modes by which they could manipulate the representation,
.with a view not to confer it upon the actual citizenship
of the kingdom. (Applause.) The real grievance of the
suffrage, as it at present existed, was, that while it was
distributed with a considerable freedom amongst all other
classes of society, it was fixed at a point which necessarily
excluded the most important class of all. (Hear, hear.)
He had never denied that the Reform Bill of 1832 was a
great bill to be the first step taken with a view to extend
political rights amongst the people; but its object was to
exclude, and It did exclude, the great wages-receiving
class ; which exclusion he maintained to be an injury to all
the other honest classes, and an enormous grievance to
the class excluded. (Applause.) Proceeding to explain
his rating.suffragc, the hon. member said he knew that
there was in Bradford an association in favour of household
suffrage. He confessed that he was unable to discover any
real difference between the two propositions. He would
not ask anybody who preferred household suffrage to go
with him for rating suffrage; but with the greatest plea-
sure he would go for household suffrage. He believed there
was no difference but this, which would be conceded :

If no person was to vote except inhabitant householders,
some who had shops, offices, warehouses, or manufactories,
might be excluded, although they might be persons of
much more means—higher in society, according to the
measure of wealth, than many householders. (Hear,
hear.) He was willing to extend the household suffrage
to all boroUghs in the United Kingdom ; and if that was
once done, he believed there would be a consciousness
which nothing could disturb, that so far as that matter
went, at least, Parliament and the law had done fall
justice to all classes of the people. (Hear, hear.) Any
exceptional franchise to admit, or to make it easy for
persons wishing to have a vote to obtain admission to
the franchise, he would be perfectly willing to see
superadded. (Hear, hear.) What he proposed might
in some boroughs increase the number of electors
threefold ; but in all those not strictly manufacturing,
the increase would probably not be more than double
and he inclined to believe that the average would not reach
24 times the present number of electors. (Hear.) This
large number of new voters would be guided precisely
by the same motives which swayed the present consti-
tuencies. All the theories about violence and turbulence
on the part of men who possessed votes, arose from an
ignorance that was positively incomprehensible. He
always imagined that when a man had a vote, and
could go and register his name in favour of his can-
didate and his own opinions, violence vanished from
his heart, and that the club dropped, as it were,
from his helpless hand. (Hear, hear, and loud
cheers.) He was told in a letter from an intelligent
friend in London, " They are getting up a fear that your
franchise would swamp the shopkeepers, and the shop-
keepers are turning against you.' But in 1832, it was
said that the shopkeepers ought not to be included,
because they would swamp somebody above them.
Laughter.):- But they never had done so. (Hear, hear.)
If you went lower io the scale, you would still find men
of the same flesh and blood, the same interests, hopes,
and fears; and it would be found that at elections,
the working classes Would be broken up into
sections as much as any other class. He should be per-
fectly satisfied to see a £lO household qualification
established throughout the counties; for he believed
that that would meet with a large amount of acceptance
throughout both boroughs and counties, and he
had no intention of proposing or advocating a measure
far In advance of public opinion, but rather wished to act
in harmony with that opinion. As to the second branch
of this subject, he believed the ballot to be absolutely
essential. There were 230 members, or more, in favour
of it in the present House of Commons ; an election
without a Reform Bill would add to that number ; but
with a Reform Bill—if it were possible for Parliament to
pass ono without the ballot—the number of members in
favour of that measure would be very largely increased.
He Was as satisfied as he could be of anything to come,
that the ballot was now almost, if not entirely,
within the reach of the constitutencies of the United
Kingdom. (Rear, hear.) The hon. member then
continued :—'We will now step on to the question of the
distribution of members, which is a point on which I
have never expressed myself in more than general terms
in the speeches which I have recently delivered; because
it was impossible, until the list of boroughs .throughout
the kingdom had been carefully gone
over, the census
examined, the returns of taxation consulted and all in-
vestigation made as to the particular population
parti-
cular borou;11; now enfranchised, or of townsonea,t.otught
to be enfranchised —until this had been d
impossible to state anything in detail. I was laskweads
since coming to Bradford, if I could tell what the Govern'
meat bill was. (Laughter.) He was rather a young-
politician who put the question to me. (Continued
laughter.) lam not in the secrets of the Government.
At the same time, I take this opportunity of stating
'with perfect honesty, that no step that I have taken
with regard to this question has been influenced by any
hostility to the government of Lord Derby (applause.)
my experience teaches me, .thdt if there be a great
question to be carried, if there is a great principle to be
passed into law, it is necessary, if you wish to have on
your side the „Ten at heart and conscience of the people,
that you should T
above partips ; that you should go
straight on, not for party objects, but for the great
object which you and the public have in view. (Applause.)
There ire several ways in which the distribution of mem-
bers, if *there be any distribution, may be treated.
But it is, not exactly. the mode of distribution of
which I am now about to speak ;
.because the
members would be left just where they are. It is
possible for the government or any one else to propose
-hat all the little boroughs, which everyone admits ought