The Sun.
London, England, 1860-11-23 00:00:00

ELECTION OF AN ALDERMAN.

I Yesterday, at two o'clock, a wardmote, at which
•
the Lord Mayor presided, was held in Walbrook for
the election of an alderman for that ward in the place
of the late Mr. Wire, recently deceased. For many
years past no seat has become vacant in the Court
of Aldermen for which there has been a keener
contest,. or for which the candidates have been more
numerous, although at the eleventh hour the num-
ber has been narrowed down to two—namely, Mr.
James Clarke Lawrence, a son of the late and bro-
ther of the present alderman of that name, and Mr.
Linklater, the eminent practitioner in the Court of
Bankruptcy, between whom the struggle now lies.
From remissness in registration the number of the
constituency is only about 120, but an unusual
amount of popular feeling, not confined to the elec-
toral body, has been enlisted on both sides, and for
the last fortnight the ward has been marked with
all the tokens and excitement of a contested elec-
tion for a member of Parliament in a little country
town. The candidates were yesterday attended to
the place of nomination by a strong muster of their
friends, and a good deal of partisan feeling was
evinced on both sides, but controlled at the same
time by great good humour. Mr. Tindal Atkin-
son, the barrister, attended as the legal adviser of
Mr. Lawrence. Mr, Linklater was his own client
in that respect. Mr. Henry Child, the Ward Clerk,
having read the precept authorising the election,
The LORD MAYOR, in opening the ceremony,
paid a tribute to the memory of Mr. Alderman
Wire, than whom, his lordship said, there never
was a gentleman who held a higher place in the
Lam ion of his constituents—a compliment to which
the whole meeting returned a generous response.
Mr. Lawrence was then proposed as a candidate,
in complimentary terms, by Sir Anthony Roths-
child, and seconded by Mr. Edward Thompson, of
Salter's-hall.

Mr. Linklater, in his turn, was nominated by
Mr. Benjamin Wilson, and seconded by Mr. J. S.
Dane.

Mr. LAWRENCE then addressed the meeting. He
adverted to the flattering requisition which had
been presented to him to become a candidate for the
vacant aldermanic gown, and to his hearty reception
by the electors in a personal canvass of the ward.
After alluding in some detail to his prospects of
success, he said he based his claims to represent
the constituency partly on the connection of him-
self and his family with the ward, but more on the
great interest he took in the civic affairs, believing
as he did that in the existence and maintenance of
the municipal institutions of the country lay the
secret of its liberties, seeing that by them the citi-
zens were trained to habits of self-discipline and
self-government, which produced in the minds of
the people that attachment to the constitution and
that respect for the laws which rendered us as a
nation the admiration of the world. (Cheers.) Mr.
Lawrence stated, at greater length than it is neces-
sary to repeat here, the views and feelings by which
his public conduct would be guided if chosen to re-
present the ward, and met with a cordial reception
from the meeting in general.
Mr. LINKLATER, after some facetious observa-
tions as to his prospects of success, and a reference
to matters purely personal arising nut of the con-
test, or only of local interest, said that in these
critical times it behoved the citizens to consider
well whom they elected to civic offices. Year after
year, he said, had the corporation of London been
singled out for reform, so called, but which meant
the confiscation of the rights of its citizens. (Hear.)
In every session of Parliament for some years past
it had been threatened with entire annihilation,
and among the supporters of Mr. Lawrence on this
occasion he could point to more than one gentle-
man who, in their evidence before the Commission
of 1854, had gone the length of saying in terms,
though they were not advocates of the abolition of
all municipal rights, that they could wish to see the
Corporation of London swept from the face of the
earth. (" Name, name," and some uproar.) He
cited, in contrast to that expression of feeling, the
culogium of the Municipal Commissioners for Eng-
land and Wales of 1834, in their published report,
to the effect that the Corporation of the city of Lon-
don was a brilliant exception to the rule among
municipal institutions in gcnCral, and that f
time immemorial the public interests f
zens had been zealously guarded and promoted the citi-
omoted b
Court y
the Court of Aldermen and the
ofr Common
then glanced
Council. (Hear, and cheers.)
Heunhappy
briefly at what he designated certain
differences which arose between the Crown and the
City in 1852, resulting in the appointmenta a few
years later of the Commission tht investigated
the position of the Corroa
. of the rwinstances of men who, in ignorance
charac-
ter of the civic constitution, had clamoured for its
reform, but had afterwards, on becoming better
ac-
quainted with its history, functions, and charac-
teristics, become converts to the principle of local
as distinguished from central government,
oiovernemonetnati,naenddac-
knowledged that the c
ele-
ments within itself calculated to render it one of
the first institutions in the world. He pointed to
the Bill of 1856, which he said sought to confiscate
I rights dear to the citizens, and which had de-
! sanded to them from time immemorial. That
measure was withdrawn, but in 1858 another
equally objectionable, as regarded the harm it wa.s
calculated to inflict on the ancient rights and pri-
vileges of the citizens, was introduced, and but for
the timely opposition it received, in particular,
from the present Lord Mayor and one of the mem-
bers for Gloucestershire in the House of Common,
had nearly became the law of the land. Speak-
i•ig of the till of 1859 60, he complained that it
proposed that the livery by whom the Lord Mayor
was elected should cease to have a voice in the
future elections of the chief magistrate, and that
the right of election should be vested in the persons
who had the power of exercising the elective fran-
chise within the City of London. He also depre-
cated the proposed combination of the Words of
Walbrook and Cheap, which would tend to limit
the number, and so lesson the influence and con-
d be pro-
sideration of the Court of Aldermen ;
mised in conclusion, if elected, to devote all neces-
sary 041 e to the duties which the office would