The Sun.
London, England, 1866-05-31 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The chief nations of Europe will [in a
few days meet at a Conference of which almost
every one has spoken ill by anticipation. If there
be an advantage in entering on any great enterprise
with limited expectations, the representatives of the
great Powers will have it. They may not, like an-
cient augurs, laugh in each other's faces, but they
may well sigh when they think of the ambition, the
obstinacy, and the desire of vengeance which three
of their number have left behind them at home. In
the capitals of the hostile Powers the Conference is
declared to be a useless, though, perhaps, a neces-
sary ceremony. It may be well to conciliate the
good will of neutrals, and to remove the scruples of
those who shrink from the shedding of blood. To
refuse to meet a public Council of the European na-
tions would be savage and ungracious, and as the
deliberations cannot last long, and the time can be
excellently employed in bringing troops into the
field, there can be no objection to send an envoy or
even a Minister for Foreign Affairs to hear what the
neutral Powers propose. But the politicians of
Vienna and Florence profess to have no faith in the
power of ceremonious old statesmen to stay the dis-
putes of nations, to still patriotic enthusiasm or
military ardour. That the Conference will be a
failure is the burden of all the opinions from the
neighbourhood of the Courts which will have to de-
cide on war or peace. It is well to bear this in mind,
for whatis called official;intelligence has a strangely
powerful effect even on the most sagacious intel-
lects of this country. When English people find
all these Princes and statesmen taking such trouble,
and appointing a solemn meeting with so many for-
malities, they can hardly believe but that some
great consequences must flow from it. The agree-
ment of the intending belligerents to send repre-
sentatives is looked upon as evidence of a change of
purpose, and war seems less menacing the moment
the world consents to discuss its causes. Our Con-
tinental neighbours, who depreciate the importance
of the Conference, judge perhaps more truly,
and certainly more prudently. The safest plan
for all will be to attribute no effect at all to it until
we really see how the principals in the dispute actu-
ally demean themselves. If the plenipotentiaries
reallypublish the protocol of each day's proceedings,
the world will soon be able to judge whether the
Conference affords a basis for any settlement what-
ever. If things take a favourable turn, we shall be
all the more agreeably surprised; if they do not, then
it will have been well to have escaped disappoint-
ment. The three Powers have acceded to the invi-
tation without committing themselves to anything
whatever, and until the first meetings of the Con-
ference it is impossible to say whether it holds out
any opportunity of reconciliation. The course which
the discussion will take may, however, be predicted
with tolerable accuracy. It is almost certain that
at the first meeting Italy will make a formal demand
of the Venetian territory, and declare that the sa-
tisfaction of it is an indispensable condition of nego-
tiation. Of the three parties, Italy is the only one
which actually asks a definite concession. Austria,
on the other hand, will probably declare her deter-
mination to stand politically on the defensive ; to
make no demands, but to abate no pretensions. She
has accepted the invitation of the neutral powers,
and it is for them to explain why they have sent for
her, and what it is they would propose to her. The
doctrine of the Viennese Government is that it arms
only to protect its own territory, which has descended
to it from past generations, and been acknowledged
to belong to it in successive treaties. To defend its
own province in the south, its own rights and the
rights of the German Confederation in the north,
will be proclaimed to be its purpose, its clear right,
and its bounden duty. For this it has 800,000 men
in arms, and is increasing its forces every day. In
spite of provincial discontent and pecuniary diffi-
culties that are near upon bankruptcy, it possesses
its immense army splendidly equipped, and with a
war material inferior to that of no State in
Europe. The world knows this, and the con-
sciousness of it will no doubt cause Austria to as-
sume a lofty bearing at the Conference. The Em-
peror is convinced that if he has only Prussians and
Italians to deal with he will gain a not very difficult
victory. With a quarter of a million of men in the
South, he defies the Italians to wrest Venetia from
him, and with a still more magnificent host in
Bohemia, led by Field-Marshal Benedek, one of the
most approved soldiers in the world, he may possibly
contemplate taking a signal revenge on his chief
enemy. The neutral Powers must be prepared to
find the Austrian as obstinate and supercilious as
the Italian is passionate. They will probably be
told that neither in Germany nor in Italy the
Austrian Emperor listen to any terms of accommo-
dation which involve concession to his opponents,
and they will be invited to propound,
if they can,
something which shall insure the peace of Europe
without hurting in any way the honour 'of the
Emperor. Prussia, though with less haughtiness,
will probably be equally disinclined to initiate any
proposal, for she thinks that time will aid her
designs in the Elbe Duchies, and that if left alone
either peace or war must eventually take the Au s-
trains out of Holstein and bring its own troops in.
On the neutral Powers, therefore, will fall the bur-
den of proposing terms for the adjustment of these
disputes, and the more clearly they express their
opinions and lay down what they think to be the
duty of the intending belligerents the better will be
their chances of success. If the two German Powers
could be prevailed upon to submit the ques-
tion of the DUchies to be decided by the Gen-
federation, aad would bind themselves to abide
by the decision, the original cause of these troubles
would be removed, and peace would then be far
from hopeless. There is, at least, reason to
hope that they may be prevailed upon to make some
such arrangement. There would then remain the
question of the cession of Venetia. This undoubt-
edly forms the most difficult part of the programme.
It cannot be omitted ; it is difficult to settle it ;
but though we cannot be sanguine on the matter,
yet we may be allowed to hope that a time is coming
when Austria will find that it is advantageous to her
interests, and not prejudicial to her honour, to re-
tire from this province. R e venture to make no
suggestions as to the manner in which the negotia-
tion should be carried out, because we feel that there
are many difficulties, and cannot admit the solutions
which have been proposed. For we may say at once
that, however plausible the scheme of a territorial
compensation maybe, it is most questionable in prin-
ple. It is easy enough on paper to compensate Aus-
tria for Holstein at the expense of Germany, and
for Venetia at the expense of the Turkish empire,
for such arrangements are not so easily made as
they were 50 years ago, when diplomatists portioned
out the map of Europe at their pleasure. Such a
scheme, for instance, as the subjection of the Danu-
bian Principalities to a foreign yoke in order to give
the Venetians freedom and independence argues a
complete want of reflection. The world would never
tolerate so gross an outrage on political morality as
the sacrifice of one people for the benefit of another,
The indemnification of Austria at the expense of
Turkey might not be so flagrant an act, for the
Sultan's Government has few merits, and the people
at the north-western extremity of his empire would
hardly suffer by being exposed even to Austrian
taxes and Austrian conscription. But there are trea-
ties in the way, nor is it at all unlikely that Austria
would refuse to have a Bosnian population added to
the races of the empire. Possibly it may be necessary
at last to propose nothing but a pecuniary indem-
nity. Money is a common-place, but still a good and
honest equivalent for territory or anything else, and
it would show more sense in Austria to accept it
than to endeavour to extend her sway over another
discontented people.
POST.—The debate to which the motion for the
second reading of Mr. Clay's Elective Franchise Bill
gave rise in the House of Commons yesterday fur-
nished a not inappropriate interlude in the pause
between the commencement and the close of the
great party struggle which is taking place on the sub-
ject of the Ministerial Reform Bill. What ought or
what ought not to constitute a qualification for the
possession of the franchise are questions the solu-
tions of which have been so various that the Govern-
ment, in the scheme which they have submitted to
Parliament, have been fain to keep in the beaten
track marked out'for them by the Reformers of 1832,
simply contenting themselves with widening the
thoroughfare. It is true that in doing so they have
necessarily exposed themselves to the charge of act-
ing capriciously, since they are necessarily unable to
assign any intelligible grounds for fixing limits which
are purely arbitrary. If £lO is too high a property
qualification for borough voters, why should it be as-
sumed that £6 would be too low, and that £7 con-
stitutes the happy mean ? By what possible train
of reasoning could it be shown that the man who
pays a rental of 140 s. is a fit person to have a voice
in the election of a member of the House of Com-
mons, and he whose rental is Is. less is unfitted to
exercise the same privilege. These objectiois are,
of course, in their nature unanswerable, and are met
by those who consider a property test a good one
with the assertion, which very few are inclined to
deny, that it is necessary to draw the line somewhere,
and as that line must be arbitrarily drawn, the best

01,1111.11•10

that can be done is to draw it in such a way as to
admit the bulk of those who are fairly entitled to
share, however indirectly, in the government of the
country. There are some, however, who are dis-
satisfied with a system which capriciously excludes
many who are confessedly qualified, by their intelli-
gence if not by their wealth, for admission to the
electoral body, and they accordingly seek to devise
some means by which each individual may be en-
abled in his own proper person to vindicate his right
to the exercise of the franchise. It is not often, how-
ever, that schemes founded on these principles are
brought within the sphere of practical legislation, and
Mr. Clay is therefore entitled to the credit of having
been the first to submit to Parliament a measure of
Reform which, ignoring all property qualifications,
would confer the franchise on every male inhabitant
of a city or borough who could furnish evidence of p.os-
sessing a certain amount of education. It is so (lA'
cult, if indeed it is not absolutely impossible, to
deny the proposition that every educated man ought
to be allowed to exercise the franchise, that most
persons would be inclined to think that the funda-
mental principle of Mr. Clay's bill is a sound one.
What he asks is, in effect, that out of that large
number of townsmen at present unenfranchiset
those who are enabled to pass a test examination in
writing from dictation and elementary arithmetic,
shall be entitled to vote for the representatives et
the boroughs in which they reside. Of the means
by which this extremely simple Reform Bill is to be
carried into effect it is only necessary to say a few
i
words. It provides that examinations shall be held
under the direction of the Civil Service Commis-
sioners in the several Parliamentary boroughs, the
standard of such examinations being the same as
those of candidates for appointments to subordinate
situations under Government. Candidates are fur-
ther required to make application by registered let-
ter addressed to the Civil Service Commissioners In
London for admission to examination, and to PI
certain fees as well before as after passing that
ordeal. Unsuccessful candidates will be entitled
the expiration of twelve months again to submit
themselves for examination, and provision is made
for the enrolment of the names of all those Ivo.°
have succeeded in satisfying the examiners of their
proficiency in the subjects above referred t.cl;
Such are the most salient features of a 131',
which is specially remarkable as being the firs"
attempt, we believe, in this country or in any
other at applying the test of examination as 3
means of ascertaining the qualifications of indi-
viduals, not to hold particular appointments, but
simply to record their votes in favour of those whomi
they wish to represent them in Parliament. 1\1!'
Gladstone, in advocating the rejection of the bill,
exhausted the various and serious objections
which the most hasty perusal of its contents
must have suggested to nearly every one. Ihe
educational test is a bad one because it is particu-
larly invidious in its nature, and it is equally 1.11/'
satisfactory in its results. It is not young men whc;
happen to be the possessors of what the Chancellor
of the Exchequer rightly designated as a little scho-
lastic learning who have the strongest claims t°.bo
po
admitted to the electoral body. Regarding the elini
of a Parliamentary representative as a matter whic,
would in all probability be most judiciously exere
cised by men of mature age and experience of t,
world, the effect cf the proposed measure would
to exclude those ho, having long quitted seb9°'
would be unable to support the test of an exaill,
tion which, for persons in their condition of l u;
would be a very severe one. Mr. Clay's measurt
simply provides for the wants of those who are ne
£lO householders, or who, if the Government mea-
sure of Reform should become law, will not be eln
£7 householders—that is to say, for the humbiuet
section of the working classes. But of these we cioitim-
if there are any considerable numbers who would be
prepared to write from dictation (no easy taskli
the way, for persons of average education), an
*,
pass. a satisfactory examination in addition, subtraeo
tion, and division of money. Mr. Gladstone went sf
far as to say that many members of the Hous.e.o%
Commons could not solve problems in the divl,slr,
of money, and as Lord Robert Montagu inters
rupted him by declaring that no one could divier
money by money, the Chancellor of the Exebecif lithe
was probably justified, amid the laughter 01.,,u5.
house, in pointing to the noble lord as an.
tration of the accuracy of his observation. Dim.
0..
ing, however, considerations of this kind, it is I_,
possible to avoid feeling that even if this bill beealuot
law it would be practically inoperative. Abninges.
a qualified universal suffrage, if such an expres-
sion sion may be permitted, it would add comparativ
few to the existing number of the electoral be,°,l,
There are not many who would seek to Vat',
themselves in the manner required for the Pot.oo
sion of the franchise, and of those whose educate
~0.1
would entitle them to seek examination fewer s'
would pay the necessary fees and surrender a day
,„
work with the possibility of rejection and the erie:',o
sequent loss of their money and their time. -t'd
arguments advanced in support of the bill res",eo
almost exclusively on abstract reasoning, from ti,`lo
general proposition that an educated man should 1.1..
entitled to vote. In practice, however, we are eelp.
pelled to look beyond the sphere of ingenious theelZ,
Tested by the touchstone of practical common
Mr. Clay's Educational Franchise Bill will be 1.1,
to be wanting, aud, although the debate was intent';4ot
rupted by the adjournment of the house, it is
difficult to foresee that the measure will be e°
signed to the limbo of abortive legislation.