The Sun.
London, England, 1860-06-12 00:00:00

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binding erect which its legislation had had between the
reat body. of the people and the three estates of the realm.
(Lotit che, ,rs.) ,

Mr. NE ,WD EGATE begged to say, whatever had been
the COW7I .3 pursued by ether hon. members, he for one had
never given his approval to the bill of the Government for
the a menu ment of the representation of the people. He re-
joiced in the course taken on the Opposition side of the
hov se in carefully discussing the provisions of the bill on
the second reading. In wishing to reduce the county fran-
chise to £lO, the hon. member for Birmingham's sole ob-
ject, was to keep the majority of the people subject to an in-
adequate representation—to declare them represented by
the peers, a lad then, it the peers exercised an undoubted
privilege with respect to taxation, the hon, member assailed
therm most bitterly. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Bright) had
said the hen. member for Rye had never carried any mea-
sure in that house. The hon. member for Rye certainly
never prepared a reform bill, and also maps illustrating its
working, or had circulated such a measure throughout the
country, and then when the question of reform came before

the house, had failed to submit the bill so prepared to the
consideration of Parliament. (Hear, hear.) His object in
rising, however, was to declare that if the county franchise
was reduced in the manner proposed by the present bill or
to any great eat ent, the county constituencies would never
rest satisfied with the inadequate representation at present
allotted to them, but would insist upon the right of the
majority of the people to a larger portion of representation
in Parliament. (He .Kr.)
Mr. E. JAMES said he must confess that the speech
made by the right hon. gentleman the member for Bucks

contrasted very gracefully and strongly with the speech
made by the noble lord at the head of the Government on
the occasion of the right hem. gentleman introducing his
Reform Bill. (Hear, hear.) The noble lord (Lord Pal-
merston) had said that the then Government should not
withdraw their Reform Bill, and that they were bound to
proceed with the bill, for they had taken the Government
with all its engagements. (Hear.) He did not wish to

make any comment on the funeral oration on the fall of the
bill which had been spoken by the noble lord the member
for the City of London, but if the bill should want an epi-
taph to be inscribed on the stone where it lay, there was
one he remembered reading in the elegant extracts when
he was a boy :

4, If so soon that I am done for,
I wonder what I was begun for."
(Laughter.) He thought the lines would form a very apt
inscription in memoriam on this short-lived child. (Renewed
laughter.) The noble lord (Lord J. Russell) was told very
early in the present year by some hon. members that the
introduction of the bill would be its certain destruction
during the session. He thought that Ministers had in-
curred a very serious responsibility by its withdrawal.
(Hear.) In justice to hon. members on the Opposition
benches it might be said that the bill had been introduced
in such a form—was such a mere skeleton of a constitu-
tional measure—that in bringing forward amendments they
could not fairly be charged :th obstructive and unneces-
sary delays. There was/ no registration provided by the
bill, although the bill. of the fight hon. gentleman the
member for Bucks contained clauses of registration. He
(Mr. James) had called the attention of the Government
to the fact, and the answer he received was cold, official,
bureaucratic, whigocratic—(a laugh)—it was that at the
proper time, the Government would introduce another mea-
sure to provide for registration. A 4'ter that answer he saw
at once the bill could not possibly pass. (Hear, her”.) If
the measure had passed in August there would have been
no election until 1862, and if a dissolution had taken place
afterwards, they would have had twenty-five seats disfran-
chised without any member being returned for the new con-
stituencies. He could not consider the taking the census
was any ground for postponing the bill. The Go, ernment
had taken xpon themselves a serious responsibility in with-
drawing it. If they had followed his advice with regard to
registration—advice which was given out of pure benevo-
lence-(laughter)—and then had had the courage and
energy to go on with the measure, he felt sure it might
have been carried. (Hear, hear.)
Mr. D. GRIFFITH contended that hitherto the subject
of electoral reform had not been treated in a general and
comprehensive way. They had never had, at any period,
so favourable an opportunity as the present one for the in-
troduction of a real Reform Bill. But the noble lord had
not been consistent in the principles upon which he had at
various times attempted to deal with the question. In 1852
he had introduced a bill founded upon very different prin-
ciples to those which were adopted in 1832, announcing
that the disfranchisement of existing constituencies should
no longer form part of his plan, but when in 1854 he again
approached the question, he had proposed another measure
of disfranchisement. If the principle of 1852 was good,
how was it that the noble lord abandoned it in 1854 ?
and how was it that the great authority upon reform,
who introduced a large and comprehensive measure in,
1854, could ask the confidence of the house and country
when he produced a measure so limited and faulty as
that which was now to be withdrawn No one would
deny that the house represented every section of pub-
lic opinion, and there being no pressing grievance to
remedy, he thought they might take time for full
and fair consideration before legislating upon the subject
of Parliamentary reform. What the noble lord had this
year proposed was an extension of the franchise without
any check whatever, and he (Mr. Griffith) contended that
in any extension of the suffrage to the working classes they
ought to provide an equivalent compensation to the upper
classes.
Lord FERMOY said in the very few sentences which he
wished to address to the house he should n,t attempt to
follow the previous speaker, nor should he follow the right
hon. gentleman the leader of the Opposition, upon the
question between himself and the hon. member for Sunder-
land, nor did he mean to follow the hon. member for Bir-
mingham in his discussion of the sincerity of the Emperor
of the French, the advantages of the French treaty, and the
merits of the budget which had been altered in another
place, but should confine his observations to the immediate
question before the house—the withdrawal of the Reform
Bill by the noble lord. But the character of public men
and political parties ought to be dear to every member of
the house, and he must say he heard the announcement
which had been made that evening with feelings of dis-
appointment—nay, with feelings of dismay, because if
ever there was a Government, and if ever there was a
House of Commons, whose only mission appeared to be
to carry a Reform Bill for England, they were her Ma-
jesty's present Government and the present House of
Commons. (Hear, hear.) He had not been able to dis-
cern in any of the reasons given by the noble lord any
good and sufficient ground for the withdrawal of the bill.
What had been the history of the government with regard
to this question of reform ? They came into power on the
express and clear imderstanding that they were the only
parties in the country who were willing and at the same
time able to carry a reform bill through that house of par-
liament, and that—and that alone—was the ground upon
which they entered office. Now the noble lord gave as his
first reason for withdrawing the bill the time of the session
at which they had arrived ; the next ground was the Chi-
nese war and the necessity of voting the estimates for car-
rying it on; then he gave as a reason the state of the na-
tional defences ; and finally, he wound up by implying—
more than saying—that there was a want of enthusiasm in
the country which compelled him to withdraw it. (Hear,
hear.) Now, with regard to the late period of the session,
whose fault was it that they had arrived at the month of
June without the bill having got into committee ? (Opposi-
tion cheers, met by counter-cheering from the ministerial
benches.) Parliament assembled this year much earlier
than usual, as they all thought for the express purpose of
enabling the government to carry out their pledge on the
subject of reform, and he, in common with many others,
had been led to expect that the first day of the session, or
at all events before the close of the first week, the bill would
be introduced. But what took place ? On the second day
he believed it was after parliament met they were told that
the Reform Bill was not to be brought in for a month, then
it was further postponed for a fortnight, and again the bill
was not to be brought forward until an auspicious day—
that day of fair auspices being the Ist of March. (" Hear,
hear," and laughter.) Here then was a loss of two months
—(no, no)—well, of at least six weeks—and by whom was it
caused ? By the government. (Cheers from the opposition.)
The noble lord, though he had not actually said it, bad
implied that the delay was owing to the hon. gentlemen
opposite, New in candour he (Lord Fermoy) could not say
tnat any proposal or amendment ha•l been brought forward
by the other side of the house, which could fairly be
characterised as unanswerable on such an important subject.
No question could possibly arise that was more likely to give
rise to long discussions and important motions than aßeform
Bill, and hon. gentlemen opposite were perfectly justified
in giving notice of questions which they considered of mo-
ment in reference to the principle of representation on going
into committee. He must say, then, that the house was
perfectly free from any charge of wasting time, and the ar-
gument of time fell to the ground, when it was remembered
that this, which was to have been par excellence the reform,
had lost six weeks at the commencement of the session
before they brought in their bill. (Hear.) Then as to the
Chinese war and the defences of the country. He did not
see any reason why they should not provide for the Chinese
war and the defences of the country, and for a Reform Bill
also. (Hear.) At all events this was no sufficient reason
why a Government pledged to a Reform Bill, as the pre-
sent Ministry were, should abandon that pledge, seeing that
the Chinese estimates might be as well submitted, and the
defences of the country as well provided for by hon. gentle-
men opposite as by those who now filled the ministerial
benches. (Cheers.) Again, as to the want of enthusiasm on
the part of the country on the subject, the noble lord had, as
he always did on such occasions, favoured the house with
sundry chapters of constitutional history, and reminded them
that in the several cases of Catholic emancipation, the Re-
form Bill, and free trade, when the principle of those mea-
sures was onee carried by a majority of that house, they were
certain to triumph. He would ask the noble lord did those
measures triumph by being abandoned by their own pro-
moters ?—(Opposition cheers)—yet such was the course the
noble lord took in the present instance. How could they
expect enthusiasm in the country when the very men who
came into power for the express purpose of carrying for-
ward a bill for improving the representation of the people,
abandoned it as soon as they experienced the slightest op-
position? (Cheers.) At the same time, after the speech
of the noble lord on Monday night, the right hon. gentle-