The Sun.
London, England, 1840-12-26 00:00:00

LEEDS PARLIAMENTARY RE-

FORM ASSOCIATION.

The Parliamentary Reform Association which has
recently been organised at Leeds is, we understand,
preparing to extend its operations ; and a large meeting
is intended to be held early in next year, at which the
presence of active friends of Reform from various parts
of the country is expected. The Association has for
its object the attainment of Household Suffrage, Vote

by Ballot, Triennial Parliaments, Re-distribution of Elec-
toral Districts, and the Abolition of the Property Qua-

lification for Mernbera of Parliament.

Whenever the public mind shall be sufficiently im-
pressed, whether from the want of improvement or the
necessity of defence, with the desirableness of revivily-

ing the Liberal party, and re-entering upon a course of
combined action, it is in the objects above enumerated
that the basis of the union must be laid. We can per.

ceive no other ground for them to meet upon. And
on this ground, we cue perceive no reason why they
should not meet, and act harmoniously and efficiently.
From the moment that they do so, Toryism is virtually
annihilated.

It was against the objects of this Association that the
Leeds Iv✓lercury directed the arguments lately noticed
by us. The editors anticipate that the result of such
reforms would be to strengthen the aristocracy. A
more prevalent objection will probably be, that the
scheme is too democratical. We take this objection to

be not. less fallacious than the other.
In some recent remarks on democratical Government

it seems to be forgotten that democracy acting immedi-
ately, the will of a popular assemblage, perhaps igno-
rant and excited, having the effect of law, is one thing;
and that democracy, acting by representation, is another
and a very different thing. There is a double filtering
from error in the machinery of representation. A se-
lection is made of one man from among thousands, who
may he fairly presumed to be, in the great majority of
cases, considerably above the average of intelligence
and character ; and the representatives thus selected
subject themselves to those forms of deliberative discus-
sion by which a farther security is afforded that the ul-
timate result trill accord with the permanent will and

interests of the community rather than with any tran-

story enthusiasm which may happen to take a different

direction.

In this country the House of Lords and the Royal
veto are powers which seem to imply for their counter-
poise a representation based on so extended a suffrage
as to render the House of Commons entirely identical
with the population. Accordingly, both these checks
are treated as mere fudge by the apologists of a limited
suffrage. Tney reason as if practically all the powers
of Government and legislation were concentrated in the
House of Commons. The opponents of a fair and fuil
representation give up, by their argument, the efficiency
of the Royal and the Peerage negative ; they are infi-
dels to the Constitution ; and they thus disqualify them-
selves for urging any argument derived from a Consti-
tutional theory against the generality of the suffrage.
Not that any valid disproof can he derived from that
source. Every consistent. theory that can be formed of
the Constitution, requires that., within the prescribed
limits of its power, the House of Commons should be
a democracy.
The fear of the many, as frequently felt, is a most
capricious apprehension. It overlooks real dangers,
and dwells upon perils the most chimerical. Sech, for
instance, is the notion of a division of the property of
the country amongst the population. No body of re-
presentatives chosen by a suflrs,e absolutely universal,
and tied down by the strictest system of mere delega-
tion, would be the least likely to entertain any such
proposition for a moment. It never was attempted in
the French National Convention, when all the checks
(.). representation were dests oyed, and the multit tide
of Paris exercised direct authority over the nominal
Legislature. Politicians of the operative classes are
often irritated, and it is not wonderful they should
be at the glaring inequalities of property, the
means by which the wealthy augment their
wealth, and the scanty remuneration of those who toil ;
but the language of this irritation is very poor evidence
of a design of practical spoilation. In fact, the agricul-
tural class has given as much—we might say moro—of
this species of evidence of hostility to toe rights of pro-
perty than the operative Chartists. It has bee❑ common
for farmers, and their pretended patrons, to state in
their public speeches, and even to affirm in formal reso-
lutions, that if the Corn-laws be repealed the public cre-
ditor must not be paid. Yet it would be very silly on
that account to propose that connection with agri-
culture should constitute a disfranchisement. In this
country wealth has nothing to fear from democracy.
The real ground for fear of the many is, not what they
would do with votes, but what they may be tempted
to do as an alienated and irritated class ; and even of
that the apprehension is often misdirected. It is not
insurrection, or organised violence, that we need stand
in dread of. It is of those forms of crime which igno-
rance, desperation, and the sense of injury may stimu-
late, and the sympathy of the proscribed shelter. It is
of the destruction of the harmony of society, and its de-
moralization by class feuds that cripple society for all the
best purposes of its existence. Here is the danger ; and
it can only be averted by the safety-valve of a more ex-
tended representation.
In the present state of intelligence it is absurd to
suppose that the existence of a large slave class can
be safely perpetuated. Notwithstanding every Tory
obstruction to the educatio❑ of the people, the spread
of education is very far beyond the extent of the
franchise. The plea of ignorance is preposterous for
the exclusion of the authors of many publications
which have issued from the working men. Nor
would the evil be the greatest that can be imagined
if the dread of investing ignorance with poli-
tical existence should prove a stimulant to popular in-
struction. Should the attempt to give vigour to the
spirit of the Reform Bill by expanding its forms be
joined in by the Reformers of Ireland, the useless and
mischievous agitation of Repeal will receive its death-
blow. Considering the real effect of that agitation to
be a diversion in favour of Toryism, we should rejoice
in its being thus superseded by the struggle for exten-
sive and common good to the v.hole United Kingdom.

Mr. Barry Baldwin, A 1.1). for 'lotnes, passed
through this city, this morning, (Tuesday) on his way
to Torquay, and we understand will visit his' constituents
before 11;s return to town.—Western J,uminarg.
It is stated that, with the loss of her Majesty's
brig Fairy, the ten years' scientific labours of the late
Captain Hewett are saci ifiecd, draught copies of his charts,
drawings, and marine observations never having 113 en s4!-
cured by the Lords of the Admiralty, although it is said
this fiervice has cost the country 40,0001., and to tic com-
pletion of which the trading marine wore looking forward
with every hope of advantage.