The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-23 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TITURSDAY EVENING., DECEMBER 28, 1888,

perty in the_parish. One roan may, give one vote,
and another man give, 'perhaps, mx. It is a plan
not very pleasant, wherever it is carried out, to
those who have the smaller number of votes ; -but
the defence and justification of it are this—that as
the question i 3 a question of expenditure in the im-
mediate locality—tile making of roads in some
cases, and a variety of objects requiring to be
attended to by our various local governments—
that it might possibly end in throwing an enor-
mous inequality of expenditure and. taxation on a
particular firm, or a few individuals, in a particular
parish or district. But when you come to a ques-
tion of Parliamentary representation, where not
taxes only are to be considered, but rights, and
personal rights, and not taxes only and personal
rights only, but all questions affecting the great
policy of the country, both at home and abroad—l
say that it would be to cast the most deadly and
unchangeable, ineradicable insult upon the work-
' ing classes of this country if anybody for one single
moment contended that I should go to give my six
votes at the poll for a member of Parliament, and
that one of the operatives in my employ should go at
my side and give his one vote. (Cheers.) Till you
are prepared to do full justice to a great propor-
tion of the unenfranchised class I would advise you
to allow matters to remain as they are. lam sure
that opinion is growing, intelligence is growing,
' power is growing, combination is growing, and
before long it will be seen to be the interest of all
those who value the tranquillity of the country
and the contentment of the people that political
rights should be widely and honestly, extended
among all classes of our countrymen. (Cheers.)
There is one question about, the suffrage which, I
believe, I have never yet touched upon in any pre-
ceding speech I have delivered, and that is with
regard to the possibility of conferring the franchise,
in some shape or other, on those who are not rate-
payers, but what are called lodgers. (Hear, hear. )
In England we have no such franchise ; in Scot-
land you have. I don't know whether it is by in-
difference in the SCotch Reform Bill—l rather
think it must have been by a
_different interpreta-
tion being put upon it—that persons in lodgings
for which they pay as rent £lO per annum—the
rental required for a house which gives a vote—
that such lodger can claim to have his name put on
the register; and in Edinburgh I learn that there
are a few—l believe not more than 30—on the list
under such conditions. If that be so, there cannot
be, I suppose, much difficulty in reducing the £lO
to some smaller sum which shall become in some
degree accordant with the principle on which the
general franchise is based, in order that persons of
this description who are ambitious to have a vote—
and I do not want any one to have a vote who is
not ambitious of it—that these persons should be
placed on the electoral roll. I now come to the
question of the counties, in which in England we
have a considerable advantage over you in Scotland.
I understand that in your counties you have no
franchise whatever less than a £lO property fran-
chise and a £5O occupancy. In England we have
a lower property franchise, coming down as low as
4s. a-year ; and, though many persons may exag-
gerate the number that would be admitted, and I
have made no calculation as to what the number
would be, I think he must be a very fas-
tidious person indeed who thinks that the British
constitution would be overthrown, and the safety
of anybody worth preserving—(laughter)—be in
the smallest degree put in jeopardy by extending
the 40s. franchise to that part of the United King-
dom called Scotland. (Cheers.) One has to tread
with remarkable particularity over the various
steps of this great question, for if by any chance I
say anything that is not fully explained, it is sure
to be explained in a manner favourable to some
supposed inconsistency. And if any point I have
spoken on at a previous meeting is omitted, it is
said that I have seen reason to change my opinion
on that subject. (Laughter.) In Edinburgh my
voice was very bad and the meeting crowded, and.
I was anxious not to make a long speech, and so
said nothing of the question of the ballot. It was
insinuated, therefore, that possibly I did not hold
the same opinion ox the ballot that I did in Man-
chester and Birmingham. So we won't altogether
leave out the ballot to-night. (Laughter.) If the
franchise in your boroughs be reduced so much as
to double the whole number of your electors—if it
be reduced so much in your counties as to increase
by probably more than a half all the number of
electors in these counties, I think, if there be any
call now for the adoption of the ballot, that call
would be imperative if such a change in the fran-
chise were made. lam quite certain that in the
district from which I come, the county of Lancaster,
there is but one opinion among the great body of
those persons who are hoping by any Reform Bill
to be admitted within the pale of the constitution
of their country. And I think they would to a
very large extent implore the House of Commons
Snot to confer upon them the right of franchise, un-
less they conferred upon them also the power, which
I believe the ballot alone would give them, of ex-
ercising that franchise in_ accordance with their
own convictions. (Hear, hear.) I cannot compre-
hend why any man should oppose the ballot. I can
understand why men should think that we exaggerate
its importance, but I cannot understand the man
who supposes that it would be likely to inflict in-
jury upon the country. Every good and legitimate
influence would still exist. The rich man would
still be rich and powerful ; in the nature of things
he must be so. the educated man, the intellectual
giant, the benevolent man, the man of religious and
saintly life, would exercise among all those who
were of his circle, and knew of his excellent repu-
tation, an influence which is most beneficent, and
which the ballot would not, I believe, in the smallest
degree impair. But the influence of the landlord,
of the creditor, of the customer, and the influence
of the strong and unscrupulous mind over the feeble
and the fearful, that influence would be as effectu-
ally chocked as, I believe, it can be by any human
contrivance whatever. (Applause.) But there is
another aspect of the question of the ballot, which,
I think, is more important than its political one,
and that is its moral aspect. How would canvass-
ing be conducted under the ballot ? Ido not know
how you conduct canvassing in this large constitu-
ency. I suppose it is not very accurately done at
all. But I can tell you how it is conducted in small
and moderate boroughs in England. The candidate
goes round to see as many of the electors as possi-
ble ; the next thing is to try to find out about
doubtful electors, who is his landlord or employer,
or who did some particular kindness perhaps to one
of his children, or has some kind of influence over
him. Then half-a-dozen or a dozen get together
and call upon him, and though there is somebody
in that small number who has done him a benefit,
and who expects to have a return; or somebody who
has a power aver him, and expects to be obeyed; ansl
while the professed purpose is that a canvass and soli-
citation are going on, it is in thousands of cases
little better than a demonstration of force and
tyranny. Every man who, for want of the ballot,
votes contrary to his convictions, is a demoral-
ised .and a degraded man, if he is not so be-
fore. (Applause.) He feels it necessary for the
sustaining of his character that he should turn
round and belie the principles that he has always,
up to that moment, held, and declare that he h.lds
contrary principles now, and therefore did not vote
against the conviction of his conscience. There is
no portion, I can assure this meeting, of, the propo-
sitions for reform that have been submitted to the
public in other parts of the country in England
that has been received with such unanimity and
such an enthusiasm of resolution as the proposition
that the ballot shall form a portion of the coming
Reform Bill. (Applause.) We come now to that
question which, after all, is more difficult than the
others to which I have referred—l mean more diffi-
cult of obtaining or carrying through" Parliament—
viz., the determination as to the mode in_which
members shall in future be allotted to electors and
constituencies. I presume that any Reform Bill
will draw some line, and. below that line will dis-
franchise a number of
,boroughs ; assu ming that
their population is too small, their number of elec-
tors too limited, their interests too circumscribed to
justify them in returning a member to Parliament.
And the more of those boroughs that are thus cut
off the larger will be the number of electors which
Parliament will have to distribute among our con-
stituencies. Now, what 'should be done with such
a burgh as Glasgow ? Are you content to go on
with your brethren in Edinburgh, with a popula-
tion of, I forget exactly how many, but approach-
ing half a million now—will you go on contentedly
returning four members to the House of Commons
to represent your vast and annually increasing in-
terests and population, and that a population no
greater than yours shall return, as the case may be,
50, or 80, or 100 members elsewhere. You are not
the lovers of freedom that I take you to be—you do
nqt understand this question as I am satisfied you:
do—you have not resolved to brace yourselves
up for this great contest as I hope you
will to-night resolve, if you 'are content at all
to go on in the same condition of things which
yOu have been under in times past. (Applause.)
I am not about to state what I think should be
the limit that ought be taken. The limit that
ought to be taken I am perfectly satisfied will not
betaken. Lord J.Russell proposed that all boroughs
whose population was under 5,000 should be dis-
franchised. Many persons proposed that allboroughs
under 10,000 should not return members to Parlias
ment, but should merge in the counties, electors for
bOroughs becoming in future electors for counties,
to the vast improvement of the county representa-
tion. 3 will leave that point, for in my mind, if I
had the drawing of a bill, it is not a settled ques-
tion, and I know nothing whatsoever about the in-
tentions of either the Government or of anybody
else who may be likely to take a prominent part in