The Sun.
London, England, 1854-03-06 00:00:00

POSTPONEMENT OF THE REFORM BILL,

The postponement, and only too probable sup-
pression, of the Reform Bill, may be regarded as
the first of those sacrifices which the country is
called upon to make at the altar of the implacable
demon of battles. The sacrifice is doubtless a great
one, yet we can hardly hope that all similar sacri-
fices will be made with equal cheerfulness and
alacrity. The ready approbation with which the
House of Commons met the proposal to immolate
this great, liberal, and beneficial measure on the
shrine of their country, or, at any rate, to sequester
it from public view for a decent period previous to
its execution, must not, we fear, be anticipated
when the Chancellor of the Exchequer asks, as he
may probably this very day do, for an increase of the
public burdens, which may curtail our incomes,
abridge our pleasures, and confound our plans. It is
one thing to surrender, from a sense of pattiotic duty,
the disfranchisement of a borough; which with all its
faults has, at any rate, had the good taste to re-
turn one good member to Parliament ; or to post-
pone the enfranchisement of a number of teu-pound
county voters, who, • whatever be their abstract
merits, will have the drawback of swamping a
county influence in which one is. interested ; or to
adjourn the granting of the representation to a
minority in a borough where one's party has hither-
to reigned supreme. These are sacrifices which
every true patriot makes with pleasure ; but the
proposal to forego hard money, or money's worth,
is not likely to be received with uproarious cheers,
or carried, if carried at all, with a burst of accla-
mati on .

We fear there is no denying it,—wherever the
desire for reform resides, it is not in the majority
of the House of Commons. Ministers may see
clearly the wisdom and policy of passing into a
law with as little delay as possible provisions with
regard to our electoral system, which will obviate
the necessity for a considerable time of any fur-
ther change, and, by adopting the state of the re-
presentation to the state of society, may at once
insure the smooth working of the representative
machine and delicate sensibility of the political
balance. But the House of Commons does not
share in this conviction, or, if it does so, it is con•
tent to let it sleep with other convictions till some
imperious emergency shall occasion a disinterment
of buried principles, or the necessity of appealing
anew to popular favour shall cause men to look
about for some topic of interest and excite-
ment. Ministers may give what reason they will
for deferring or abandoning their Reform Bill,
but the one reason of infinitely more weight than
all others put together is, that they have not the
means of carrying such a measure through such a
house. If a Reform Bill is framed on the old
system, on the precedent of the measure of
1832, it will require for its success conditions very
similar to those of that stormy period. There
must be union, there must be enthusiasm, or
a bill which combines against it all the corrupt in-
fluences of the country, by striking at them all, is
sure to miscarry. Taere can be no want of union
among the antagonists of the Reform Bill ; a com-
mon interest and a common danger secure this
without concert or preparation. But where is the
bond which is to unite and organise its supporters?
Every private abuse has its natural champion and
indefatigable defender, but who will enter the
lists ou the part of the public? The great ma-
jority of the House of Commons seem to have no
vocation whatever for this task. Impressionable
they doubtless are, but there has hitherto been no
attempt to make any impression upon them. If
the house has been ready to make the Reform
Bill a holocaust on the altar of Bellona, the
country has shown no wish to interrupt the
rite. Iphigenia is bound to the altar, but no
Diana comes to rescue her. Calchas, in the
form of Lord John Russell, raises the knife, and
there is no Agamemnon to avert his face. The
public mind of this country, though clear in its
convictions and ardent in their pursuit, is certainly
not qualified to entertain many ideas at the same
time. The majority of the middle and the upper
classes are too much absorbed in those lucrative
pursuits which the prospect of war has as yet but
little interrupted, to spare time or attention for a
scheme which requires to be considered and ana-
lysed in order to be understood, and appeals rather
to the understanding than the passions ; and the
people—those by whose voices and whose influence
the first Reform Bill was carried, and by whose
opinion the second must pas 3,. if it be destined to
pass at all—are engaged so entirely in contemplat-
ing the preparations for- war, .and have thrown
their passions and thoughts so completely into this
one:novel and exciting subject, that questions of
domestic policy fail even to get a hearing, and the
national pugnacity, fairly aroused, leaves no room
for any other sentiment.
Since, then, the house will not act without the
people, and the people have not sufficient leisure or
eagerness to drive their legislators into a Parlia-
mentary suicide, we suppose we must give up all
hopes of passing this bill, good as it is, and adjourn
to a future, and perhaps a remote, time the cor-
rection of abuses which, little interest as they may
excite within Parliament or out of doors, are never-
theless of the highest moment, and materially in-
terfere with the working of our constitution, and
detract from the credit due to representative insti-
tutions in general. There seems to be no help for
it, and it is neither prudent nor dignified to pro-
tract a struggle with impossibilities. 'We must,
however, remark that the proposal and withdrawal
of such a measure at such a tune is, though proba-
bly unavoidable, an evil of a very serious nature.
The war must be very unlike other wars if it remains
all through its prosecution as popular as it is at pre-
sent. The public mind is flattered by the exhibition
of our strength and spirit, and dwells upon our
coming glory without counting the cost. If dis-
content, the inevitable concomitant of protracted
hostilities, should arise, every one will be furnished
on the highest authority with a manual of griev-
ances ready prepared to his hand, and we shall not
be surprised to find the call for reform, which is
so silent now, loudly raised at a period when it
will be next to impossible to attend to it. The
county householder will have been taught to feel
his grievance in being deprived of the franChise.
The other classes intended to be admitted to the
suffrage by the provisions of the bill will complain,
tinder increased burdens, that they have no voice