The Sun.
London, England, 1859-01-26 00:00:00

tion at once c. tntral e.nd convenient. Money
would be saved, t une would be saved, the regular
course of proceedin .gs -would be materally facili-
tated, the comfort of all parties engaged in the
administration of the 'laws of the land in connection
with the different cot' arts of justice, wculd be practi-
cally consulted; for tl le first time the dignity of those
high courts would be duly cared for. England
would at length post )ss a Palace of Justice worthy
of sheltering under its roof-tree the legal dignitaries
holding office as the administrators of the law,
under the authority of the Crown of these.
realms. One of the r aost essential of the great
public buildings of th a metropolis would at last
be discoverable somew. here within its precincts.
The end would then 1• lc put to what is surely, to
say the very least of i t, a flagrant anomaly— the
fact that while we hay e, at an enormous expense,
erected a Palace at \V esl:minster for the fabrication
and amendment of the laws of the land, we have
nowhere raised an edifice designed for the labour
of the administration of those laws when made and
amended. As the administration of the army is
conducted from the central point of the Horse
Guards—and that of the affairs of the navy from
the central point of the Admiralty—so assuredly
ought the administration of the laws to be conducted
from the central point of a Palace of Justice. Under
the shelter of this great Palace of Justice ought to
be gathered together in close contiguity the Courts
both of Common Law and Equity, now respectively
divided—the Equity Courts in Lincoln's-inn, the
Common Law Courts at Westminster Hall. In
their respective courts, distributed over the
proposed edifice, ought to sit.—the Lord Chief
Justice of England and the four Judges
of the Court of Queen's Bench—the Lord Chief
Justice and the four
,Judges of the Court of Com-
mon Pleas—the Lord Chief Baron and the four
Barons of the Court of Exchequer. There, too, in
their several courts, should sit—the Lord High
Chancellor of England—the two lords Justices of
Appeal—the Master of the Rolls- —the three Vice-
Chancellors. There, moreover, grouped in their
immediate neighbourhood, should sit, each in his
appointed court, the five Commissioners of Bank-
ruptcy and the London Commissioners of Insolvency.
There, likewise, should sit the Judge or Judges of
the Courts of Probate and Matrimonial Causes.
One comprehensive Palace of Justice, collecting
together under its roof the members of the Bench
and of the Bar, the wearers of ermine and coife,
of silk gown and of bombazine.. As we have already
often intimated, the cost and the site of the proposed
edifice, have alike been delibe rated upon and de-
cided upon by competent authorities—the actual
site selected being the plot of ground (at present
little else than a foul abomination) situated between
the Strand anti Carey-street, Lincoln's-inn. There,
for very little over half a million of money, a palace
worthy of the design might, it is estimated, be
erected. "At all events," says the Report of the
Law Society in regard to this estimate, " at all
events, we may safely consider the ultimate cost as
between £500,000 and £7so,ooo—the larger sum
representing, at 3 per cent., an income of only
£22,500 per annum." Recollect this—the cost of
the proposed Palace of Justice is calculated at
£750,000 at the utmost, a sum representing at 3
per cent. an income of only £22,500 a year ! And
the annual rents for the present inadequate accom-
modation provided in the scattered courts now used
(some among them literally mere makeshifts), is
calculated to amount absolutely to more than
£so,ooo—a sum representing a capital exceeding
£1,500,000. Eventually, therefore, the creation
of this costly and palatial edifice would be a clear
saving of £27,500 a year—or otherwise a diminu-
tion in the required capital of at least £750,000.

The English do like " pluck." The word is their
own, in the vocabulary of common life, and the thing
is thoroughly English. Lord JOAN RUSSELL has
saved himself many times, at the last election re-
markably, by the quality designated by this homely
little word. He must, however, now yield the palm
to JOHN BRIGHT. We have heard no more, lately, of
Lord JOHN and his Reform_B ill than if they had been
shut up in a Ballot Box. He, the Hero of Reform
in 1832; who never before that time feared to tell
his views, is now utterly silent. Tories speak out,
Radicals speak out, but Whigs, and Lord JOHN and
Lord PALMERSTON, also, say not a word. They are
timid, no doubt of it. They reserve themselves,
although they have been leaders, for the pitiful
work of criticising and carping at others' Bills.
They will plead, perhaps, the miserable excuse that
to bring in a Reform Bill is the task of Government
not of a private member. We take leave to desig-
nate such an excuse by the only epithet it deserves,
" bosh." They are both men who, if they are
earnest Reformers, are as much entitled to lay a
bill on the table of the house as the Cabinet itself.
They are what we may term consulares, may be
again at the head of affairs, and both have either
given us, or promised us, Reform Bills since 1832,
indeed within the present lustrum. They have
allowed, however, Mr. BRIGHT completely to beat
them in point of moral courage. He has not shrunk
from submitting his Bill, his schedules at least, and
his proposed franchises, to the criticism of his legion
of opponents. Well knowing the disadvantage, to
himself, of throwing his bill on the table of the nation,
there," he says, " there it is, do your worst
with it." His countrymen will appreciate his bold-
ness, his frankness, his readiness to take them into
his councils,—and they will tolerate no unfair
criticism of a leader who deals openly with them.
Mr. BRIGHT has, we consider, fulfilled his Edin-
burgh pledge of making his bill " irresistibly strong
in its moderation." Heartily would his antago-
nists have rejoiced had it been less moderate. It
annoys them most by its not going far enough.
Right glad would they have been had he cut up
the old kingdom into equal electoral districts, or
had he given to the metropolis, and the larger
towns, the proportion of members to which the
Rule of Three would entitle them. Alas, London,
and all the provincial Londons, rejoice in a prof-
fered proportion of members, according to which
the eighty-four boroughs in schedules C and D,
and even the twenty-three in schedule E, beat
them hollow in representative power ; one man,
even in Bath, being as good as three Manchester
men, and one man in King's Lynn, Lord
STANLEY'S borough, being as powerful in the
House of Commons as half-a-dozen in the great
cotton city. He has given more members to the
large towns, it is true, but he has allowed the
smaller towns a much larger proportional share of

representative power•
What, however, will be most looked at by the
country gentlemen will be the effect of Mr.
BRIGHT'S bill on the county representation. To
advert first to the redistribution of seats :
In
1832 the aristocratic reformers of that day gave
about half the vacant seats to the counties, and
allowed their opponents to enhance the Tory value
of those scats ten-fold by the Chandos clause. In
1854 Lord JOHN RUSSELL again brought forward
an aristocratic Reform Bill—one even yet more
aristocratic than that of 1832. It gave just about
two-thirds of the sixty-four vacancies it created to
the counties ! But now, in 1859, we have a Re-
former, who comes forward in the people's interest
—we may say at the people's request—and he