The Sun.
London, England, 1831-02-02 00:00:00

MEETING AT READING.

Yesterday, pursuant to requisition, a meeting of
the inhabitants of Reading was convened by the
Mayor, in the Town-hall, to take into consideration
the propriety of petitioning Parliament on the de-
fective state of the representation of the people, and
on the numerous mischiefs and grievances resulting
therefrom ; and also for the purpose of obtaining a
rational, practical, and efficient Reform in the elec-
tion of fit persons to serve in the Commons House
of Parliament.

The MAYOR (J. J. Blandy, Esq.) took the chair.
There were also present—Mr. Fyshe Palmer, and
Mr. C. Russell (the two Members for the borough),
Mr. Mona, Mr. Marsh, Mr. B. Simonds, Mr.
Salmon, Rev. Mr. Richards, Rev. Mr. Valpy, Mr.
H. Russell, Mr. Harris, Captain Hall, Mr. Weedon,
&c. The hall, which is large, was completely filled.
After the requisition had been read by the
Chairman, . . _

Mr. MONCK rose to submit a petition for the
consideration of the meeting. It could not be de-
nied, he observed, that the safety of the Constitu-
tion depended upon the integrity of the House of
Commons, and the House of COIIIIIIOIIS could not
be useful or efficient unless it emanated from the
people, and possessed the public confidence. The
question then was, whether the House of Com-
mons was constituted as it ought to be; and whe-
ther the Members of it were in connection with the
great body of the people; or whether a great
part of them had no connexion whatever with
the people, and had few or no constituents ? He
would refer the meeting to a. petition which had
beer. presented to the House of Commons in 1793,
by Lord (then Mr.) Grey, from the Society of the
Friends of the People, accompanied by a declare-
don that they were ready to prove the allegations
at the bar of the House, wherein it was stated that
84 individuals directly returned 157 Members to
Parliament, and 70 individuals returned indirectly
154 Members; so that 154 persons actually re-
turned a majority of the English Members in the
House. He would, however, refer to a case more
recent and near home. In the county of Wilts
there were 34 Members returned to Parliament-2
for the county, and 32 by 16 towns, including Sa-
lisbury. Of these 16 towns, three only possessed
any thing like a popular representation Three
places, Cricklade, Wootton Basset, and Hinton,
were the closest and most corrupt in all England.
The meeting must not suppose that the year 1793
was the acute; then the revenue was about
2,000,0001.: now it was about 60,000,0001.; and
when this expenditure was considered, and the
sources of patronage which it opened, if the repre-
sentation was corrupt then, what must it be now?
It was a misnomer to call the Members of some
places representatives of the people : they had not
only no constituents, but the places were not acces-
sible to candidates. There was a political embargo
laid upon them ; they ought to be called the repre-
sentatives of my Lord So.and-so, and my -Lady
Such-a-one; for ladies now possessed political pa-
tronage, and if he (Mr. Monck) mistook not, a
learned gentleman who had once been, for a short
time, a representative of this town, was now Serv-
ing for Ripon under the best of all banners, that of
the petticoat.—(Loud laughter.)—This might be
ludicrous; but it was a serious evil to the country,
for it showed that we had no security for our inte-
rests, and that persons so returned were at liberty
to pursue their own, and prepared to sup-
port a bad Government, or to be an impediment and
clog to a good one.—(Hear.)---When the eight
Members for Middlesex, London, and Westmin-
ster, representing so much_ intelligence and wealth,
could be outvoted by nine Members for corrupt
boroughs in Wiltshire, was that, he asked, the vir-
tual representation so much vaunted ?—(Bravo.)—
Yet, in the opinion of the Duke of Wellington,
human ingenuity could not devise a better system.
—(ob, ob.)—After some observations upon our
criminal code, and upon the oppressive operation of
the game laws, the speaker proceeded to read the
petition, observing that there was one thing omitted
to which he hoped some speaker would advert—he
meant the vote by ballot.—(Loud cheers.)
Mr. VINES, jun., seconded the motion. Our re-
presentative system was founded on no intelligible
?iinciple. With respect to the vote by ballot, he
was firmly convinced that it was the best means for
securing to the people a Just representation.
The petition was then agreed to unanimously.
Mr. MONCK moved that the two representatives
of the borough be requested to present the petition
and give it their support.
Mr. PYSIIE PALMER cheerfully accepted the pro-

posal; first, because it was the wish of the meeting
—secondly, because the petition expressed his own
opinion as to Parliamentary Reform, and which he
had advocated for the last 15 years. With respect to
the plan of Reform contemplated by the present Mi-
nisters, it was not in his power to say what it was ;
but he agreed with the petition, that, after mention-
ing the mischiefs and the grievances to which the
present system gave rise, the meeting had a right to
call upon Ministers to correct them, leaving it to them
to provide the remedy. The meeting might depend
upon his doing all in his power to effect an efficient
Reform in the representation.—(Applause.)
Mr. C. RUSSELL had so recently expressed his
opinion with respect to Parliamentary Reform, that,
but for the importance of the subject, he should
think it unnecessary to intrude any further observa-
tions. For forty years the question of Reform had
divided the ablest men in Parliament : in such cir-
cumstances, he thought the wisest, the safest, and
the fairest course, was to leave the details of the
measure in the hands of those Ministers—(A burst
of violent opposition interrupted the sentence.) The
Hon. Gentleman resumed. It would be his duty
to present the petition.—he should have great plea-
stile in presenting it, and also in supporting its
prayer for a practical and substantial Reform.--
(Bravo.) A Reform, however, to be practical and
substantial must be temperate and consonant with
the principles and practice of the English Constitu-
tion. This was the principle proceeded upon by
Lord Somers, and the framers of the Bill of Rights.
If there was one principle which prevailed more
than another in that our second Charter, it was a
sacred—an almost religious—veneration, fur the
established institutions of the country. The French
had proceeded upon a principle the reverse of this;
they proceeded upon new and experimental theories,
in the abstraction of reason and the vain principle of
false philosophy ; and they had, consequently, passed
through every form of government and no govern-
ment. With these examples before him, the one a
buoy to direct him, the other a beacon to warn him,
he should steer in the broad, open, and safe channel
of the Constitution. With respect to the vote by
ballot, according to his present view of the subject,
—no man would declare that he would not change
his opinion,—but as he now viewed the subject, he
must oppose the vote by ballot.—(Uproar.)
Mr. SALMON contratulated the meeting on the
unanimity with which they had carried the petition.
It was, however, of little consequence if the object
of the petition was gained, unless another measure
accompanied it, and an additional protection was
given to those who enjoyed the elective franchise
against the influence of wealth and power,—to pre-
serve them from the torture of intimidation, and the
seduction of gold.—( Applause.) To attain this
end there was no better means than the vete by
ballot.—(Loud cheers.) No less than 98 statutes
had been passed to preserve the freedom of elec-
tions. Was bribery abolished ? Was terror dis-
armed ? If not, there was no such thing as
freedom of election.—(Applause.) He had not
heard any one proposition against the ballot which
bore the semblance of an argument. It had been
said in the House of Commons that a landlord had
a right to the votes of his tenantry. He would re-
peat the answer that had been made to this argu-
ment—if so, an English freeholder might as well
become a slave, have his face blacked, and live in
the colonies, as to be told to vote for the man he
hates.—(Loud cheers.)—He saw no sound sense or
logic in any of the arguments against the ballot, and
he thought it was time to endeavour to do that
which 98 statutes had failed to accomplish.—
(Cheers.)—He proposed the following resolution
(not with a view of incorporating it with the peti-
tion) :
" That it is the opinion of this meeting that no Reform
in Parliament can be effectual, unless it be accompanied
with the vote by ballot."
Captain HALL seconded the motion.
_ _

Mr. H. MARSH expressed his satisfaction at the
excellent petition being carried unanimously. In
advocating the vote by ballot he did not consult
his own inclination, which led him to prefer the
storm of an election ; but he was convinced there
was no protection for the poor man against the rich
but the ballot.

Mr. GILCHRIST expected to have heard some ar-
gument against the vote by ballot. He had heard
none. He should he content with moderate Re-
form; he should be content with triennial Parlia-
ments, and the limitation of the right of voting to
householders paying scot and lot; but he should
not be content with any Reform without the vote
by ballot. Give him vote by ballot, and he would,
at least for the present, be satisfied.—(Loud con-
tinued cheering.)
Mr. W. BLANDY sincerely concurred in the prayer
of the petition, but did not think the vote by ballot
would effect the object desired.
Mr. VINES, jun. supported the vote by ballot ;
and remarked, that Mr. Russell had publicly pro-
fessed himself a friend to economy and retrench-
ment, yet the very first and the only vote he gave
was in favour of an unexamined and exorbitant civil
list, and in support of a Minister who had declared
an eternal enmity to Reform.--(Loud cheers.)
Mr. B. SIMONDS opposed the ballot, because it
was neither manly nor constitutional.

Mr. C. RUSSELL said that the vote he had given
on the question of the civil list was, that it be re-
ferred, not to a Select Committee, but to a Com-
mittee of the whole House. A Select Committee
sat with closed doors, had access to no papers, and
could call no witnesses; whereas a Committee of
the whole House was the arena on which Mr.
Hume and other friends of economy fought their
battles for retrenchment. He therefore maintained
that his vote was not against, but for, economy and
retrenchment, for it was a vote for discussing the
question with advantages which never could be pos-
sessed by a Select Committee. But he did not de-
fend his vote on that ground: he gave it because
he believed the life of the ministry was at stake; he
had supported them because he believed them
friends to economy and peace; and if the Adminis-
tration which had succeeded showed the same incli-
nation towards those two objects, he should give
them the same support. (The Hon. Member then
recriminated upon the party who made the charge,
which produced a warm explosion of feeling respect-
ing the late election for the borough, in which Mr.
Ring, Mr. Vines, jun., Mr. Salmon, sad other
speakers, took part.)
The resolution proposed by Mr. Salmon was then
put to the vote, and carried by a large majority,
' there being not more than 30 or 40 hands held up
amongst perhaps 700 persons.
Thanks were then voted to the Mayor, and the
meeting broke up.