The Sun.
London, England, 1848-06-21 00:00:00

assembly possessed the most absolute wisdom, and if
every one of their measures bore that stamp, there was
still something else to be considered.—(Hear.) They were
to be the representation of the feelings, the condition,
the intellectual, the moral, nay, even the physical,
if you would, of those who were the constituents, or
claimed to be the constituents, of those representatives:
There was another question besides this, and that was,
whether the millions of human beings with whom we were
connected as fellow-countrymen were cherishing in their
bosoms the ennobling feelings of conscious freedom, or were
smarting under the irritation of evil passions, excited by
being treated as only members of a slave class in what
claimed to be a free country. There was no question of home
or foreign policy, no relations of treaties with foreign nations,
no arrangements which might open or close the doors of
admission to fortunate aspirants, no question whatever of
more importance to the safety and continued prosperity and
glory of Great Britain than the state of feeling among the
great masses of the people of whom that House claimed to
be the representatives. The propositions of the Hon. Member
for Montrose had many and varied bearings on the constitu-
tion, but the one practical question to his (Mr. Fox's) mind,
the question in which he felt the liveliest interest, was this—
were the working people of this country represented as they
ought to be, and if nut, could they be so represented with-
out any peril to any valuable institution? This was the
question which interested him. He maintained that they
were not represented as they ought to be. How did the
matter stand in electoral districts? A valuable return had
been moved for in the last Parliament by Mr. Williams,
then Member for Coventry, and delivered in the course of the
present session, from which it appeared that there were only
320,645 101. householders, and out of these where would the
industrial classes be found but in the poorest rank ? The re-
turn was so arranged that it showed the number of house-
holders occupying at a rental of from 101. to 151. and then
from 15/. to 201., and so on. It appeared from the return
that out of this constituency of 320,645 101. householders,
those who paid a rental ranging from 101. to 15'. were only
99,149 persons, that was to say, that the inhabitants of
houses rated at from 101. to 151. were only one-third of the
household borough: constituency. They were completely
swamped by the classes above them ; and when the oocu-
piers of 30i., 401. and 501. houses were taken into the ac-
count, it would be found that they belonged to the higher
portion of the middle classes, who could not be called work-
ing people at all. But out of the entire constituency of-
-850,000 persons, upOn a rough calculation, only 1 in 17 be-
longed to the working classes, and no more. He did
not call that a representation of the working people—of
those who made our clothing, who built our houses and pa-
laces, who cultivated our fields, and who made, in fact, all
our wealth; nor could he understand the feeling with which
Hon. Gentlemen could turn round and say, " You have done
all this, you have created it with your strong arms, but now
we tell you that you are the villeins of the soil, and that
you have nothing to do with the laws but to obey them."
The Noble Lord said that a great many things should ho
done for their benefit, though the condition of a benefit was,
that it should be desired and prized by the party
on whom it w.s bestowed, and though it was
most desirable to take away from the working-
man that incessant occasion. for discontent which arose
from his having no hand in the matter of legislation, and
which led him to fancy that he would have done much more
wisely if he had been consulted. Let the working people of
this country be substantially represented, and in so doing
he would not very minutely inquire into their information
and acquirements or into the amount of their deposits in
the savings'' banks.—(Hear.) They were already taxed;
they contributed towards the exigencies of the state; they
had at least a property in their own limbs and nervous arms,
and was not that enough to mark them out for constituents,
for it must be borne in mind that is was not proposed to
make Members of them? It was not necessary that they,
should be able to unravel the mystery of the Spanish mar-
riages, that they should be versed in the Treaty of Utrecht,
or that they should philosophize on the Norman conquest.
It was only necessary that they should nominate a neighbour
whom they had known all their lives, or some one who had
a national reputation, as the person to whose guardianship
they were willing to confide their interests. That was
all the knowledge which the labouring man wanted. This
knowledge and information which had been talked about
was not required by the House in other matters. By one of
the clauses of the Public Health Bill, a plurality of votes
was given to wealthy occupiers upon the ground that the Bill
affected property. He had no doubt, however, that those
persons would be found to be quite as uninformed on sani-
tary questions as a man in a factory would be on any diffi-
cult question of foreign politics.—(Hear, hear.) One of the
most interesting debates on reform in his recollection was
that which took place in 1822, when the Noble Lord now at
the head of her Majesty's Government brought forward a
motion on the subject in a most remarkable and impressive
speech. On that occasion the Noble Lord quoted a passage
from Blackstone, which perhaps the House, for the sake of
the comment which followed it, would allow him to read.

The passage was taken from book i, chap. 2, of the " Com-
mentaries:"—" 1. As to the qualifications of the electors.
The true reason of requiring any qualification with regard
to property in voters, is to exclude such parsons as are in so
mean a situation that they are esteemed to have no will of
their ewn. If these persons had votes, they would be
tempted to dispose of them under some undue influence or
other. This: would give a great, an artful, or a wealthy
man a larger share in elections than is consistent with gene-
ral liberty. If it were probable that every man would give
his vote freely, and without influence of any kind, then,upon
the true theory and genuine principles of liberty, every
member of the community, however poor, should have a
vote in electing those delegates to whose charge is commit-
ted the disposal of his property, his liberty, and his life."
In reference to this passage, which the Noble Lord quoted in
1822, he continued thus :—" We have not only one free
agent, but there are in this country at least 1,000,000 of free
agents—men perfectly free and independent, men who have
no vote for a Member of Parliament, though they are anxious
to acquire the right, and are in every way qualified to ex-
ercise the functions of electors." On another occasion, so
late as 1835, the Noble Lord also said, "Although
it is a much disputed question, yet I believe that,
in ancient times, every inhabitant householder resident
in a borough was competent to vote for Members of
Parliament."—( Hear, hear.) He would now revert to the
argument used by the Noble Lord in 1822, as it was the
argument which he meant to adopt and apply on the present
occasion. The Noble Lord at that time pointed to the intel-
ligence of the country, and to the growth of that intelli-
gence, as a demonstration that the franchise must be largely
extended. He argued, that in London there were 100 cir-
cujating libraries, and 900 in the country ; and, , that
42t600,000 newspapers had been issued in the year preceding.
He would go back, not to 1822, btit to 1832, when the Noble
Lord realized his own views by carrying the Reform Bill;
and he would assume that he then proportioned the fran-
chise to what he held to be the advanced intelligence of the
country. He could not say, however, that the facts would
altogether bear him out in relinquishing the vantage ground
he might have gained by the Noble Lord's previous eonces-
elsns. The Noble Lord said there were in 1822 1,000,000
persons prepared for the franchise; but the Reform Bill did
not provide for half of that million, and they had been lent
unprovided for since, with a quarter a century of wrong
pressing upon their minds, and depressing their spirits.
While in 1832 the number of newspapers circulated was
32,000,000, the circulation had been for some time nearer
70,000,000 than 60,000,000; and as regarded societies and
institutions established for the people's improvement, he
would only refer to one of which he had read an account in
the papers of that morning. It was an account of a meeting
of the Yorkshire Mechanics Institution, held at Ripon,
where not fewer than eighty-one societies were included and
represented in that institution alone. Since 1832 500,0001.
had been expended by the Government on education; a
much smaller sum than ought, as ho thought, to have been
expended on a matter of such inconceivable importance; but
still that sum had been laid out, in addition to the building
of schools from sources of private subscription and private
benevolence. Since 1832 there had, besides, sprung up a
popular literature altogether unparalleled in extent—( Heir)
—a literature of which our numerous magazines, the publi-
cations of the Messrs: Chambers, and the works of Charle,s
Knight, formed a distinguished part, and which were circu-
lated through the country to an amount previously unex-
ampled.—(Hear, hear.) One of them alone, Chambers's
Miscellany of Entertaining Knowledge, being only one of
the many publications of that house, had been issued to the
extent of 18,000,000 of printed sheets; and he understood
that their sales fluctuated with the state of the manufac-
turing districts—(Hear)— one-sixth of the issue being in the
counties of York and Lancaster. Then, if they looked to
other facts indicative of the advance of intelligence among
the people at large, they found proofs multiplying all around
them. It might be said that these were cheap publications
to which he had referred, and that the public mind would
rather be vitiated than improved by them, that their powers
would be frittered away, such light reading not being adap-
ted to mature the intellectual character; but they must re-
member, that all the standard works of the most celebrated
authors had at the same time been cheapened; that the
works of Bacon could be bought for fourpence, and those of
Shakspeare for two shillings, and that the writings of all the
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(Hear, hear.) It was a remarkable fact that the production
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of new literature had not diminished either. He found in
the history of printing, in " M'Culloch's _Commercial Dic-
tionary," a statement of the number of new works pub-
lished, and the average price per volume, in four years end-
ing 1832 and 1842. In the four years then ending the new
books published were 6,149, and in the four years
ending 1842 they were 18,597; while the average
price per volume was, in the first period 1 ls. 5d.,
and in the second period, Ss. 91,0.—(Hear.) The book-
sellers' circular had recently fallen into his hands, and
he found from it that the number of new works last year was
3,414, and of new editions 570, while the average price per
volume was 6s. 31Ad.—(Hear, hear.) He might refer, also,
to the establishment, since 1832, of parks and places of re-
creation, which, though not to be used as an argument,
might be taken as an indication of growing intelligence.
Take, for, example,.the visitors of the British Museum. In
1832 the number of visitors was 147,896 ; last year they
were 820,965. The visitors to the reading-room of the Mu-
seum, in 1832, were 31,200; last year, 67,525.—(11ear, hear.S
Then, as regarded the economics of the working classes,
they found a vast improvement.—[Here the Honourable
Gentleman pointed out the great increase which had taken
place since 1832 in the deposits in the savings-banks, to
show the improved system of economy now prevalent ; and
also the great increase that had taken place in the
number of public petitions to Parliament, in order to point
out the growing discontent among the unenfranchised
classes.] There was one peculiar fact that could not but
strike every reflecting person at the present day, and that
was the number of writers that were springing up among the
working classes—writers who did not, like the authors of
former days, rest on patrons and private patronage—writers
who courted Ito class above them, but yet who retained
strong within them the feelings of the working class in
which they had been born and bred.—(Hear, hear. )
-Nothing like this was known in former times; but in the
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of the class to which they belonged. Perhaps he
should be naming authors whose names would sound strong
to the great majority of those he addressed were he to run
over the list, and yet they were a class of writers whose
works every legislator would do well to consult.—(Hear,
hear.) He could not understand the spirit of his country
unless he did consult them. They had in them the rich
and racy spirit of our old English writers; and when they
had the sense to avoid the conventionalities of mo-
dern authors, and follow out the dictates of their
own aspirations, they indeed brought forth "thoughts
that breathe, and words that burn."—(Hear, hear.) He
might refer to Bamford, the Radical author of Lancashire,
whose graphic description of the stirring times of 1819 the
future historian would transfer to his pages as the best record
of the events of that extraordinary time. He might also
speak of " one who whistled at the plough," whose narra-
tions of the flogging of the soldier were enough to make the
flesh creep upon the bones, and draw tears from the eyes of
the most callous of our race. There was the poet Thom, of
Inverury, who took shelter under a hedge, and saw his child
die there, and who could give his country songs worthy of
Burns; that man never knew what it was to live in
a 101. house. There were such men as William Lovett and
Thomas Cooper. He would not ask the House to take an
estimate of their literary merit and intellectual power from