The Sun.
London, England, 1854-08-08 00:00:00

THE BRIBERY BILL.

After all the aberrations and extravagances of this
wearisome session, Parliament last night exhibited what
may be be called a lucid interval, though unfortunately
the insanity has been in the Lower House, the reason in
the Upper. This phenomenon has occurred in the
treatment by their lordships of the Bribery at Elections
Bill, which has been very remarkable in many respects.
As the bill emerged from the Lower House, notwith-
standing its title and the lofty pretensions of its pream-
ble, it was nothing more nor less than a bill for legalis-
ing the payment by the candidate of the travelling ex-
penses of electors, seeing that, in the absence of the
proposed declaration, every clause was as nugatory as a
watch without a mainspring, or a Chinese war steamer
with a funnel and straw to do duty for an engine. This,
then, was what their lordships had to consider—viz.,
whether they would make it lawful for candidates to
pay whatever they pleased, or whatever public opinion
would allow, for the travelling—that is, for the convey-
ance, feeding, and recreation of electors. It was rather
a nice question for the Lords, who are commonly sup-
posed to have a vested interest in the lower appetites of
the rabble, insomuch that there are people who main-
tain that if small freeholders and tenant-farmers were
not thirsty in summer we should not have either House
of Lords or Queen. In the Lower House seven Cabinet
Ministers voted in favour of this clause, so that it might
be expected that not only the instinctive love of corrup-
tion ascribed to the House of Lords, but also Ministe-
rial consistency, would secure the safety of the clause.
Strange to say, it was last night quietly and almost
unanimously extracted from the bill and sent to the
winds. The House of Lords has come forward to
protect the virtue of the Commons, and to secure
that small electors, scattered about the country, away
from tha polling-places, shall not have any extra induce-
merkt.t, ‘1,a1,51, cir 6r-a .IJUIXt
ut
Newcastle—in the face of his seven colleagues, who bad
voted for it ; and all the deference or respect he showed
for his colleagues consisted in his refusing to vote for an
amendment of a directly contrary nature—viz., utterly
forbidding the payment of travelling expenses. The Duke
of Newcastle had just so much respect for the lower
house and his friends in it that he would not go quite so
far as the Marquis of Clanricarde wanted him to do ;
but he pointed out how the thing could be managed
rather more quietly—viz., by striking out the clause
altogether.

There can be no doubt that their lordships are right,
much as one is disposed to suspect them in the matter of
elections. Nobody is fit to have a vote if he will not
pay ten shillings or so to carry him to the poll, and, if
the expenses of a voter come to more, then the less the
candidate has to do with him the better. The election
is the elector's affair, for, though there are people so
heroic or so silly as to wish to be members of Parlia-
ment, the only ostensible object of the whole affair is
the good of the people at large. If the representative
attends in Parliament for half the year, sitting great part
of the time from 12 at noon to 2 o'clock the next morn-
ing in a poisonous atmosphere, and with disease and
death rife about him, it is not too much that electors
should once in three or four years—practically once in
a dozen years—spend a few shillings for the good of their
country. It is only rather strange that the House of
Commons should put itself in the very false position of
being taught a lesson of virtue by the landlords. The
cry so often raised by the vested interests, " Thank
God, there is a House of Lords," may now be repeated
by the most zealous sticklers for constitutional govern-
ment, the rights of the people, and purity of election.
But for this timely interference, this deathbed repent-
ance exhibited by the Legislature in the last week of
the session, it would be perfectly lawful to give any man
101. for his vote at the next election. if he only took
caret
itoon b ewaat Cs
aa t
ph
rnoeas
es
h,
ioorg G. a lTwhay o
i e:
tor Paris,
owas
when
e theonthlye
effectual part of the bill, for all the rest is machinery for
e,-orki
onen g s
asrather
tra no longer
andunaccountable
exists. I
that
It only
strikes
there should be so little accord between Ministers in one
house and in the other, and that the Duke of Newcastle
shouldeeaguesentirelya.t liberty There thoaCbtorohwe
sure,over-
board
been a great deal o
which none can show so well as the members of one
thefel work himself
o f
fhi s
so
candourcoll this session—of that candour
Cabinet—and so we presume the candour of the proceed-
ing is only a proper requital for the ca
several other occasions. But the tablesstrangely
turned when the Lords are become the purifiers of the
d are r displayedn o
nou
Commons. The advocates of the Charter must make
Commons than
the next attempt in the Loonredisn, atnhciat the ballot, if passed
by a majority of ten to it 'will have
rather more chance in the has usually
foun
It d.
is just possible, indeed, that their lordships may
have discovered that in elections, as on other occasions,
nobility is very liable to be beaten by the still more
exuberant, self-willed, and lawless power of wealth.
The wealthy parvenu, with his pedigree and coat of
arms manufactured and paid for at the Heralds' College.
beats the descendant of kings, emperors, and divinities, in
the town and in the country, in his mansion in Hyde-park,
his castle in Yorkshire, and his domain in the Highlands ;
in banquets, balls, races, yachts, scientifichusbandry, pic-
tures,— in everything, in fact, within the power of a Medici,
a Napoleon, or a Rothschild. Money is omnipotent in
the command of existing means, end the country gen-
tleman with his estate in his family since the days of the
Conqueror, but so encumbered that the balance is one
way or the other way according to the markets, stands
no chance whatever with the man who has only to
smile, and it rains gold all around him. So their lord-
ships have possibly discovered that two can play at the
game of corruption, and that " Plutocracy, as a cor-
respondent described it the other day, is now a much
more powerful state of the realm than the "aristocracy,
Under these circumstances it is as well to be virtuous,
which at all events is cheap, and who knows but what,
with the assistance of this novel auxiliary, the old Eng'
lish gentleman may once more make head against all o
the
cotton-spinners, railway kings, merchants, and Hebrews
in the world ? However the speculation may taske. with
a
their lordships, we are inclined to believe, sad I a
sober earnest, it is their best chance. Nobility
worshiped their old.
sa
deities, with a mild, compassionate,
the civilised, intellectual Pagans,
semi-humorous form
treat them with un-
sonages that it was impossiblee
qualifiedo of devotion.
res
p
h old lords of the soil, the
worshipedrn:isch still
worshiped in this country, but it is
if i
sttori 1 names, were in the
ca
holders of our ancient,
hoNseosdv,eities wteore such eccentric per-
condition of the Pagan deities, and could not mend their
respect.
have it in their power to set themselves right, and it is
their best policy. Let them come forward as the guar-
reputation, their days would be numbered. But they
guar-
dians of the constitution against all kinds of evil in-
fluence, and in particular against the blandishments and
encroachments of upstart wealth, and they will gain
another lease of their influence in this country. This
may or may not have been the motive of their lordships'
I proceedings last night, but, if it was, they are becoming
f wise in their generation.—Times.

Tut NEW CLOCK TOWER AT LONDON-BRIDGE.-Thill
tower is rapidly rising, and will form, when completed,
a very conspicuous object from the bridge. It belongs
to the perpendicular or best period of Gothic architec•
tune, and will be very like one of the memorial crosses
which are to be found in many of our country districts.
It has attained a height of about 30 feet from the
gr 01440

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