The Sun.
London, England, 1836-07-19 00:00:00

TROUTBECK CASE.

Mr. WARBURTON gave notice that on Friday he
should move that the House should sit on Monday at
twelve. o'clock, in order to proceed with the debate on this
case.

CHARITABLE TRUSTS BILL.

Mr. W. SMITH moved the further consideration of
she Report on the Charitable Trusts Bill. The framer of
the Bill had endeavoured to meet every objection
:hat had been urged upon the subject ; Lord Lyndhurst
a the House of Lords had objected to many of the clauses
of the Bill, because they were similar in their nature to one
then on the table of the House, introduced by Lord
Brougham ; that Bill, however,bad not been proceeded with,
and the present embodied almost all its important provisions.
The great princi, es of this Bill was certainly the elective
principle—but it was not the same in this Bill as that which
had been adopted by this House in the regulation of political
bodies. The distinction was manifest, but the principle was
not a new one, as it had been adopted in the choice of officers
in corporate towns, and the consequence was that those
elections had proceeded much more quietly than any of the
other election. The principle was that each burgess should
have the right of voting but for one half the number of trus-
tees to be elected. It was obvious that this was to provide
against cases where parties were evenly divided. He was
very unwilling to introduce the word " party" at all, or to
bring into discussion the agitation of party questions, but
he must necessarily mention it, as the principle of the Bill
was against party decisions. Where parties were somewhat
evenly divided, the result would be that the minority would
by this Bill have a representation,and it was only in cases where
the majority was so great that the minority had no chance of
competing with them that the contrary practice could pre-
vail, He was not aware that there were any objections to
this principle, but, however, as the main principle of
the Bill he was prepared to adhere to it. The Bill
also provided, that those only who were locally re-
sident and interested should have the right of voting for the
trustees. He was not aware that there was any objection to
the right of voting being confined to this class of persons,
but there were objections to that right being extended to
those persolis who would specially benefit by thiteeharters,
and who were more or less paupers—he meant the freemen.
The Commissioners had reported very strongly against the
conduct of Corporations, and it would be inexpedient,
therefore, to continue the charitable trusts in the old
Corporations. A very important principle in this Bill was
that it would give the property to those Corporators who
were charitable trustees, with charges on it for charitable
purposes. He considered the property ought to rest in the
Council, and that the charge should be paid by the
Council to the charitable trustees. It was clear it
would be their business to increase the surplus as much as
possible, in order that they might take advantage of what
was above and beyond that which it would be necessary to
appropriate to charitable purposes.—(Hear, hear, hear.)
There was one point connected with the principle of
the Bill on which he wished to touch, which was
that of the Mayor being the Chairman of the charitable
trusts. He wished to state the reason why he had intro-
duced the Mayor as Chairman, which was, that it would have
been absurd to make the number who were to elect even,
and therefore it had been deemed expedient to appoint some
person as Chairman who would be in a situation to make an
odd number. It was generally thrown upon the conductor
of a Bill or the party from whom it emanated, that they
wished to serve their own interests—he repudiated his having
any interest in the matter, for, as was well-known to Hon.
Gentlemen opposite, the Mayor of the Borough he had the
honour to represent, held very different political opinions
from himself. He had struck out the second vote which the
Bill formerly gove the Chairman, so that now he would
merely preside and vote only in the event of the trustees
being equally divided. He would be most happy to
adopt suggestion by which the Chairmanship might be
better any
filled ; for instance, he might agree that the
trustees should have a month in which to elect their
own Chairman, and then if they did not agree, that
the Mayor should preside, or anything of that kind.
He had introduced an amendment—an amendment which
would allow the old trustees to carry on suits now
in progress, and nearly concluded. These were all the
amendments made in the Bill, and he hoped it would now
be satisfactory.
Sir ROBERT PEEL was rather surprised at the re-
monstrance the Hon. Member had made against taking
the discussion on the principle of the Bill at an