The Sun.
London, England, 1841-09-13 00:00:00

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AND THE
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Sun Office, Aug. 30, 1841.

kIIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE TO-MORROW
rning t minutes after 0 Evening 14 minutes after I

LONDON:
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1841.

The extent to which bribery has been carried
at the last election has induced a number of

Whigs to question the advantage which the

country would derive from the further extension
of the suffrage. Among the many misthrtunes
of the poor it is not among the least aggravating
that they are perpetually punished for the crimes

of the rich. The poor man does not bribe—he
does not abuse the gifts of GOD to blacken his

neighbour's soul with the guilt of pet jury—he
does not, to procure notoriety for himself as
the representative of others, trample upon the

known and recorded laws of GOD and of his

country ; but because the wealthy and the titled
scruple not to commit these crimes, he is to

have no share in the enacting of the laws by
which he is to be governed, taxed, and perhaps
i nined for the exclusive profit of the law-makers.

To keep the rich and the intentionally corrupt,
not morally hut legally guiltless, he is to be

deprived of the only right of citizenship by

which he can contribute to the enactment and

just administration of those laws which he con-

s;ders essential to the welfare of his country.
The offence of the poor recipient of a bribe is

vc•nal, when contrasted with the enormous crime
or which the wealthy briber is guilty. Between

the two individuals there is the same difference

as between the old serpent and our first parents.
The one is the tempter, the other the tempted.
The wealthy briber is a volunteer in the service
of the father of lies. He devotes his substance
to the moral and religious corruption of a fellow-
creature, whose poverty renders the temptation,
which he would otherwise have spurned, irrr_
sistible. As well might we cut off the haws of
the poor because the rich might employ them
in acts of violence, or cut out their tor,gues be-
cause they might be bribed to tell lies, as to
deprive them of civil rights as a preventive of
all abuse of them.

But supposing, for argument's sake, the cri-
minality of the bribers and the bribed to be
equal, wherefore not mete out to them the same
punishment? If the poor man is not to have a
vote because he may be bribed, why not deprive
the rich man of the suffrage, who is suspected of
-an inclination to bribe him? Is the man capable
of bribing another less to be dreaded than the
poor wretch who pockets the wages of perjury ?
Is he a jot more trustworthy as a citizen or a
legislator ? Most assuredly not. If, then, a sense
of justice actuates the Whigs, who regard with
distrust the extension of the suffrage, let them
strike at the root of the evil. We will not only
believe them sincere, but we will co-operate
with them, if they will begin with insisting upon
the disfranchisement of every Whig and Tory
landlord in the United Kingdom, who was guilty
of bribery at the last election. We have no
objection to follow this measure up with
the disfranchisement of every elector who
.re.ceived a bribe. But we are for punish-
ing the greatest criminals first. In this
way some approach will be made to equal
justice to all parties. But in doing this
we would confine the punishment to the
To refuse a poor man the right of voting
because there is some rich man in his neighbour-
-I,ood supposed vile enough to attempt to corrupt
him, is an act of as gross injustice as to strip
the rich man of his wealth, under the pretext of
preventing him from expending any part of it in
bribery. We -I
I ave no more cause to rob the
'poor man of his
political rights to keep the rich
,
Than honest, than we have to deprive the rich
1U of his wealth to save the poor man's soul
frOm the possible guilt of perjury.
One of the most foul and atroci--m8 maxims
ever broached by the Whigs-,*,,,as that which con-
tended for the sound ;licy of beating the Tories
with their chicx
weapon—corruption. It was the
corninene_.
ement of a crusade of the rank and
lve`..ith of the county against the honesty and
Patriotism of the industrious classes. It was
bringing all that society deemed
great, and
powerful, and commanding in the nation to
bear kwn and crush every principle of pub-
lic -virtue in the minds of the people. Against
Stich a wicked combination no people could
preserve their integrity ; and should this maxim
ever come to be generally acted upon
public liberty will not long outlive the
filmic which it will then receive. Society
must fall to pieces, and a revolution in
the Government visit upon a corrupt aristo-
cracy all the dreadful consequences of those
crimes by which they sapped its deepest founda-
tions. It is the true interest of the aristocracy
to extend and purify the franchise. It is the
duty of the Whigs, if they value the Constitution
under which we live, to protect the people against
the corrupt influence of the Tories. The fran-
rhise ,is the basis of public liberty. The wider it

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