The Sun.
London, England, 1860-02-15 00:00:00

IMPERIAL PARL.

LAMENT.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.—(THIS DAY.)
The SPEAKER took the chair at twelve o'clock.
PETITIONS.
Several petitions were presented against the abolition of
church rates, the Highways Bill, and legalising marriage
with a deceased wife's sister.
PRIVATE BUSINESS.
' On the motion of Mr. C. FORSTER, the Brighten Im-
provement Bill was withdrawn.
The following Bills were read a second time :—Border
Counties and North British Railway Companies, Caithness
Roads ; Caledonian, Edinburgh and. Glasgow, and Scottish
Central Railway Companies; Consett District Water,
Dublin Corporation Water, Epsom and Leatherhead Rail-
way, Great Northern and Metropolitan Junction Railway,
Horsham and Steyning and Beeding Roads, Leeds Town-
ihip, Leicester Cemetery, London and North-Western
Railway (No. 3) ; London and North-Western, Great
Northern, Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway
Companies; Mersey Dock and Harbour Board, Mirfield
Gas, North and South Lanarkshire Roads, Pontefract and
Castleford Railway, Portsmouth Now Rail Ways, &0.,
Rugeley and Abbots Bromley Railway, and West Hartle,
pool Harbour and Railway.
THE INDIA HOUSE.
Col. SYKES gave notice that, on the motion for the ad-
journment of the house on Friday, he would ask if there
was any truth in the report of the removal of the business
of the East India House to the Victoria Hotel ; that some
of the manuscripte of the. East India House were to be
destroyed, and if so, what steps will be adopted to provide
premises for the East India Company ?
CORRUPT PRACTICES PREVENTION ACT
(1854) AMENDMENT
Mr. MELLOR, in moving the second reading of this
bill, said that, since the introductim of the measure, he
had received letters from different parts of the country, not
only sympathising with the principle of the bill, but ap-
proving of its provisions. He had already explained the
nature of the bill, and ho would notdetain the attention of
the house at any considerable length In the first place, he
would state that lie proposed to gives certain amount of dis-
cretionary power to judges in dealine with parties convicted
of having received bribes or offered bribes, by which the
maximum punishment to be inflicted for such offences should
be six months' imprisonment with herd labour. Some con-
sidered that his bill did not go far esough in dealing with
these offences, and that it should hare been rendered more
stringent in regard to those who were proved to have been
guilty of bribery ; but the fact was that in many cases a
trap was laid for those who were irduced to offer bribes,
and therefore in some instances the party receiving the
bribe was the more criminal party, and consequently should
suffer the severest punishment. The judge would
be able, from the complexion of the case, to
decide between the respective degrees of the criminality
of parties charged with those offences, and therefore to
inflict the proper punishment. He then alluded to the re-
cent case of attempted bribery at Norwich, in which a town
councillor was offered a sum of £5OO to induce him to vote
for an alderman of the borough. To show that an altera-
tion in the existing law was requisite, when an inquiry
into the circumstances was ordered, one of the persons
called on to give evidence refused to do so because it
would tend to criminate himself. He believed he
was correct in stating that there was a feeling on both
sides of the house that something should be done by Par-
liament in order to remedy what was an apparent and
serious evil. He did not propose his bill MI a final mea-
sure, but merely as a provisional one, which would have the
effect of repressing the evil. (Hear, hear.) He referred
to the committee appointed to inquire into the elections at
Gloucester and Wakefield, in the latter of which boroughs
a large amount of money was proved to have been ex-
pended in direct bribing, in hiring bands of ruffians to
intimidate the electors, and in beer and spirits to corrupt
the voters. He proposed by his bill that no candidate
should be allowed to pay election expenses, other than
those excepted by the existing Act of Parliament, and that
any money expended for election purposes should be paid
through the medium of an election agent and election audi-
tor. He did sot approve of the latter official, as he con-
sidered him at present little more than a useless machine;
but he did not intend to deprive him of his func-
tions. Finally, he proposed to do away with paid
canvassers altogether, and ho called on the house to accept
his bill, which, if it was not final in its eperation, would
have the effect of diminishing the evil which was a degra-
dation to the country. (Hear, hear.)
Mr. HUNT approved of some of the provisions of the
bill, though he did not consider it an efficient measure as a
whole. He contended that the evil which the bill proposed
to remedy would not be effectually suppressed unless mem-
bers of that house and candidates for election were prepared
to carry out the spirit and letter of the laws passed by the
Legislature in reference to this subject.
Sir H. GOLDSMID opposed several of the provisions of
the bill, and the principle it proposed of repressing bribery
by severe penal enactments, which experience had
shown to be fallacious. He referred to the history
of crimes in this country, to which severe cunishments
were applied to support his proposition. Y'or instance,
capital punishment had failed to prevent the commission of
forgery, which was diminished by doing away with the cir-
culation of notes of small amount, which removed the
temptation to commit the offence. Again, in the case of
smuggling, the severest punishment had been found
inoperative as a tepressing agency; but when there
was an alteration in the excise the offence was re-
duced, because its commission ceased to be profitable. The
hon. member then proceeded to argue in detail in support of
his proposition, that bribery, like other offences, was to be
prevented or repressed by removing the temptation to its
commission, rather than punishing it severely.
Mr. A. STEWART approved of the bill generally, but
considered that it would be desirable it should be referred
to a select oommittee. He disapproved of the provision
with respect to paid canvassers or messengers, as being
open to practical objection,
Mr. COLLIER defended the provision of the bill which
gave judges who teisd cases of bribery a atieretionary power
as to the amount of punishment to he inflicted. Hon, mem-
bers iu the house denounced bribery as a degrading of-
fence, but their sincerity would be doubted so long
as they did not invest the judges of the land with power
to
inflict on those committing it a degrading punishment.
(Hear, hear.) He approved also of the provision by which
money for election expenses should be paid only through
an election auditor, and he proposed to add that any person
infringing that provision. should lose his seat. Having
expressed his approbation of other clauses est
appoint a public prosecutor in cases of
the bill, he contended it would be desirab/s3 to
secutor was proposed to be appointed in the
He had introduced a bill last session by which a 'tribe
üblic prrYo-
public officer, and not left to the e
private individual&
generally, by which prosecutions would ce entrusted to a
'casepef offences
Some Pr-de tical difficulty had been
":selessness or malice of
on several grounds
encountered in the detail-
of the bill, but he thought
that the proposal might be adopted
in the present instance, in which public morality
[LEFT SPEAKING.]