The Sun.
London, England, 1865-05-03 00:00:00

BOROUGH FRANCHISE EXTENSION BILL,

A number of petitions having been presented in favour
of this bill,

Mr. BAINES rose to move the second reading of his
bill, the object of which was to reduce theborough quali-
fication of voters to £6. He said he felt he should not be
asking the house in vain for its indulgence, whilst he
urged it to redress an acknowledged wrong pressing
on the great majority of the people; an acknowledged
wrong because the defective state of the representation had
been acknowledged by the highest authority. Five times
they had been reminded from the throne that such was the
condition of the representation ; four Prime Ministers o
the Crown had brought in bills, but without success, and
the house had passed the second reading of a measure
without a division, and yet that objectionable state of things
still remained. He had not been anxious to bring
forward the measure, because he felt there were others
more capable than himself, and he should have been
glad had the Government taken up the subject. He should
have been exceedingly gratified had the right hon. gentle-
man, whose sentiments in that house had done him so much
honour, and which had called forth the gratitude of the
people, had been induced to deal with the matter ; but such
not being the case, he had felt it incumbent upon himself
to attempt to remedy the anomaly. It had been stated as
an objection against the measure that the last session of a
Parliament, which had but twelve months to run before it
died a natural death, was not the time to proceed with such
a bill ; but he felt that of all times it was the most oppor-
tune, because it would enable its being carried into effect by
the new voters created by it. His bill had been copied from
that brought forward by Lord John Russell, but it related
only to the borough franchise. Although a bill had been
brought forward by the hon. member for East Surrey to
extend the county franchise by lowering the qualification
to £lO, it was not such as to meet the great want, viz., an
extension of the borough franchise, so as to admit the great
body of the working class to the exercise of that right to
which they were entitled. The noble lord below him
(Lord Elcho) had given notice of his intention to move the
previous question, as he strongly objected to any lowering
of the existing qualification. He was glad it was so, be-
cause there would be a full discussion of the whole
matter, and thus the great want would receive the
attention which its merits really demanded. He
thought it would be unwise to postpone passing a
bill such as that now before them, because if they did so
he was well assured that in a short time such a moderate
demand would not satisfy the immense body now excluded
from the representation, and i strong, and perhaps irre-
sistible, demand would bo made upon them for manhood
oruniversal suffrage. Hisbill only extended to England and
Wales, and his observations, therefore, only applied to that
part of the kingdom. The upper classes, he contended,
were well represented in that house, but the working class,
as a class, were nearly entirely unrepresented. Some hon.
membersmight represent slew, but they were so scattered
that he contended he was right in his observations. It was
expected that the working class would be loyal, obedient,
well affected, and obeyers of the law, but had they any
hand in making those laws they were expected to obey ?
Certainly not. Again, it was urged as an objection against
the measure that a lowering of the elective franchise
would lower the status of :the Legislature, but he re-
garded such an objection as a complete fallacy, and one for
which there was not the slightest ground. The foremost
men in the country would always deem it an honour t o
have a seat in that house—(hear, hear)—and those, he felt
assured, would be the persons from whom its members
would be selected. Suppose there should happen to be an
election of a working man, he thought the addition of
several intelligent and virtuous men to; seats in that
house would be of the greatest advantage. They would
be enabled to :give very valuable:information— valuable
to the body to which they belonged, and of which many of
the members now knew nothing, and more than likely
those working men might learn something beneficial to
themselves and to the class to which they belonged. He
looked upon it as a vain fancy if for one moment it was
imagined that an adventurer would be elected to a seat in
that house ; on the contrary, he contended that wherever
there was a large constituency there invariably the
most celebrated men that had ever adorned the
legislature had been selected. The hon. gentleman then
quoted a variety of statistics to show the great progress
the country had made in the last few years, concluded by
saying that the bill he had the honour to propose would
give an additional 141,000 voters, excluding the Metro-
politan boroughs, or about 32 per cent. to the oxising
number ; and he felt that the concession would not cost
the exchequer a single farthing, but would increase and
strengthen one of the most valuable institutions of the
constitution.
Mr. BAZLEY seconded the motion.

(LEFT SITTING.)

SKIPPING INTELLIGENCE—This day.

BY MAGNETIC TELEGRAPH.

GRAVESEND, Wednesday Morning.

Arrived, May 3—Koh-i-noor, from St. Lucia ; William
Thornboro, from Guernsey ; Yorkshire and Pride of the
Ocean, from Melbourne.

DEAL, Wednesday Morning.
Passed—La Hogue, from Sydney ; Wynaud, from
Colombo ; Damascus, from Sydney ; E. W. Stetson, from
New York ; Christian, from Algoa Bay ; William Prowse,
from Bombay—all for London ; W. N. D. Commercial
Code, from the west for the river.

Passed in tow—Canadian, from Shanghai; Courier, from
China—both for London.

Railway Traffic Returns for the Week.

Miles Opened. Receipts.
Railways. ~......._........—....
1865. 1864. 1865 1864.
£ £
Belfast and N. Counties 10) 100 2,315 1.755
Belfast and County Down 49 49 917 765
Blyth and Tyne '
Bristol and Exeter l2li 1211 60439 6,69:
Caledonian
Cambrian
Cool e: mouth K & Penrlth
Cook..rmoutli and Workin
Cork and Bandon 2O 20 413 318
Cork, Blackrook, & Passage 6% 6% 173 117
Cornwall 651 651 1,792 1.865
Deeside l7 17 3;43 290

Dublin & Belfast Junction 63 63 1,390 1,30!
Dublin and Drogheda ..... 75 75 1,661 1.540
Dublin and Meath
Dub. & Wicklow and Wexid 9l} 91 i 2,798 2,410
Furness, &c_
__ 50 5 ) 2,988 3.310

. , ,‘.k....
Glasgow & South-Western l9B 198 9,,611 t‘,930
Gt. Eastern,NrflC,&E. Union 063 603 32.254 30,7 5
Great Northern 404 365 34,437 3 ~172
Great North of Scotland 99 99 2,792 2,765
(3t. Northn. & Westn. (Irel.) 7ll 711 ' 723 571
qt.Southn. & Westn.(lrlnd.) 3Bl 1173 i 10,437 9 587
Great Western 1268 1225 71,399 65,350
Hull & Hornsea
_ _

Inverness & Aberdeen June 1171 1171 1,272
Inverness & Perth Junction 119* 119} 1,697 3,326
Irish North-Western 145 145 1,953 1,8 9
Kent Coast 27 27 11,300 140

Lancashire & Yorkshire 403 402 35585 37,320
Limerick and Ennis... 241 241 1; 2 123
Limerick and Poynes 264 261 1 7 116
Llanelly 461 461 752 681
Llynvi Valley
London & North-Western
London and Blackwall 5l 511 125
2,0.,9 1,882
London & South-Western
Lond. Brighton, &5. Coast 267/ 2511 26,074 19,292
London, Chatham, & Dover 721 721 5,985 . 5,320
Do. Metropolitan Extension 11/ 104 2,410 1,450
Lon., Tilbury, & Southend
Man.,Sheffield, & Lincoinsh
Manch. S.J un.& Altrincham 9l 91 1,574 1,362
Maryport and Carlisle
Metropolitan
Midland (incl. N.-Western) 6631 611 45,748 45,428
Midland Gt.Westn. of hind 262 262 5,406 5 016
nonkland 714 711 1,671 1,688
Honmouthsh. Rail. & Canal, 44 44 2,7,51 2,791
North_ British, Edin., Perth

—anti Dundee
N.-Eastern and Stock. & Dail IOA 1095 58,410 58,_80
North London 9 9 3,6;0 3,4 a
North Staffordshire 254 251 7,955 8.815
Rhymney l9/ 198 889 8;6
Scottish Central
Scottish North-Eastern l3B 138 5,345 5,121
Somerset and Dorset 66 66 1,031 671
South Devon
South:Eastern 3OB 306 23,708 19.680

Taff Vale 67 67 6,621 6,615
Ulster 199 16.6 i 3,1(.8 1.653

Vale of Clwyd. . 10- 10 X
171 154
Waterford and Kilkenny 3l 31 436 416
Waterford and Limerick 77 77 1,204 I,lBe
West Cornwall 27i 274 9e6 883
W.Hartlepoolllar)m&ltail s2i 52i 4.295 4.265
W'haven,Cleatorot Egrmnt lO 10 584 803
Whitehaven J unction l3 13 719 1. 79
Whitehaven .5t Furness Jun 35 35 808 1,055
FOREIGN AND COLONIAL.

Austrian B2B 828 32,C01 29,100
Bahia and San Francisco' 76/ 76/ 743 545
Belgian Eastern J unction 261 26i 352 335
Bombay, Baroda, & Cen. India 306 1851 5,660 3,453
6
Detroit and Milwaukie lB9 189
,101 1,C75
Dutch Rhenish loBi 1181 5,532 4,470
_ ._ _ _ . _

Eastern of France J MIL .7,1.
1176- 1428 - 66,8 8 62,071
Eastern Bengal ..- llO 110 3,106 1,489
East Indian
Grand Trunk of Canada 1377 1335 27 247 22,020
Great Central of Belgium 235 2-2 6,271 4,886
Great Indian Peninsula 690 5831 23,525 12,9 2
Great Luxembourg* 134 134 5,091 4.4.5
Great Southeen of -India
Li reat Western of Canada...: 345 3!5 14;15 14,9 3
Madras
Madrid, Saragossa &Alicant cBl 650 2!,706 23,317
Northern of Canada ........
Northern of France........:. 728 728 59,970 52,‘,12
Norwegian Trunk
Ottoman .
Paris, Lyons, & Diediterrn.... 1967 1781 135;418 131,929
Paris and Orleans 1616 1611 70,878 69.431
Recife and San Francisco. &c 771 774 1,369 1,2'2
Scinde lO5 103 1.685 1.000
Do. Punjab, &e 32 32 274 442
South Austrian, &c «.... 1651 1127 51.925 51,323
Southern of France /23 770 27,022 20,434
Victoria
Welland 25 25 --
West & N-Wn. of France

Viscount Gage and Hon. Miss Gage have arrived
at their residence in Whitehall Gardens for the season,
from Firle Place, Sussex.
Count and Countess de Dalianit and the Hon.
Miss Elphinstone de Flahault have deferred their departure
from Paris until the first week ill the ensuing mouth.