The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-25 00:00:00

BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION.

Proposed Bill.—An act to require from Members
returned to serve in Parliament a Declaration
against Bribery, Treating, and undue Influence.
Whereas, notwithstanding the laws now in force
for preventing corrupt practices in the election of
members to serve in Parliament, such practices
having been proved to be extensively resorted to
by candidates, their agents, and other persons in
their interest at such elections ; and whereas it is
expedient that more stringent and effectual provi-
sion should be made by Parliament for the preven-
tion of such corrupt practices, and for better secur-
ing the freedom of election ; be it therefore enacted,
by the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty, by and
with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual
and Temporal, and Commons in this present Par-
ment assembled, and by authority of the same, as
follows :

Section I. That every person who shall in future
be elected and returned a member of the House of
Commons shall; before he shall sit and vote after
the choice of a Speaker by the House of Commons,
make and subscribe at the table of the House the
following declaration :

"I (A-. 8.) do solemnly and sincerely declare that
I neither before, during, nor since my election for
(the county, division of a county, borough, univer-
sity, cinque-port, as the case may be), have directly
or indirectly, by myself, or any other person on my
behalf, given, lent, or agreed to give or lend, or
offered, or promised to procure, or to endeavour to
procure, any money, or valuable consideration, or
any office, place, or employment, to or for any
voter, or to or for any person on behalf of any
voter, or to or for any other person in order to
induce any voter to vote for me, or refrain from
voting against me at my said election, nor have
I paid; nor will I repay by myself, or by or through
any other person, any sums of money corruptly
given or promised by any agent or other person in
respect 0,. my election ; nor have I corruptly, by
myself, or by, or with, or through any person on
my behalf, or by any other ways or means, at any
time, either before, during, or since my election,
directly or indirectly given, or provided, or caused
to be given or provided, nor have I been accessory
to the giving or proziding, nor have I paid, nor will
I pay, wholly or in part, any expenses incurred for
any meat, drink, or entertainment or provision to
or for any voter in order to be elected, or for being
elected, or for the purpose of corruptly influencing
any voter to give or refrain from giving his vote at
such election. Nor have I, directly or indirectly, by
myself or by any other person on my behalf,
made me of, or threatened to make use of, any
force, violence, or restraint, or inflicted, or threat-
ened the infliction, by myself or by any other per-
son, of any injury, damage, harm, or loss, or in any
other manner practised intimidation upon or
against any person in order to induce or compel
such person to vote for me, or refrain from voting
against me, or on account of such person having
voted at my said election; nor have I. impeded or
otherwise, interfered with the free exercise of the
franchise of any voter at my said election. And I
make this solemn declaration conscientiously be-
lieving the same to be true. And by virtue of the
provisions of an Act made and passed in the 23d
and 24th years of the reign of her Majesty Queen
Victoria, intituled "An Act to require from mem-
bers returned to serve in Parliament a Declaration
against Bribery, Treating, and undue Influence."
And such declaration and subscription here-
inbefore directed to be made, shall be entered on a
parchment roll, to be provided for that purpose, by
the Clerks of the House, and shall be filed and kept
by them.
" Section 11. And be it further inacted that any
person who shall make and subscribe to any such
declaration as aforesaid, knowing the same to be
untrue in any material particular, shall be deemed
guilty of a misdemeanour, and, upon conviction,
shall be liable to be imprisoned for any term not
exceeding two years, with or without hard labour,
and be incapable of serving as a member in Parlia-
ment for ever after.

" Section 111. And be it further enacted that if
any person who shall in future be elected and re•
turned a member of the House of Commons shall
sit or vote as a member of such House before he
shall have made and subscribed such declaration as
aforesaid, his election shall be void, and a new writ
shall bc issued to elect another member in his
room."

(From the Times.)
Mr. Edwin James has opened ground for the
ensuing parliamentary campaign by circulating a
proposed bill " to require from members returned
to serve in Parliament a declaration, against bribery,
treating, and undue influence." The bill carries
out its title with that superlative and redundant
phraseology usual to those who wish to do by word
what is difficult or impossible in deed. We cannot
say that it adds anything to the usual idea of a
self-purging declaration, or suggests any security
which shalt redeem the bill from the usual charac-
ter and fate of well-intentioned measures. It ex-
hausts, indeed, all the possible modes of corrupt
action, and even includes under its terrible ban
some that elude mortal apprehension. For our
part, we cannot understand how a man can do a
thing after an election in order to obtain a vote in
it, though this is one of the crimes distinctly and
emphatically denounced by Mr. Edwin James. The
only conceivable meaning it will bear is, that if a
member of Parliament should either do any kind-
ness whatever for a constituent, or show the least
coldness to a man who had not voted for him, he
shall be liable to the extreme penalties of the act,
which are imprisonment for two years' hard labour,
and exclusion from Parliament fo,r life. Now, it is
quite possible that a man like Mr. Edwin James
may be incapable of stirring a step, writing a line,
speaking a word, or giving a look in favour of a
voter, not only before or during an election, but
even after. It is quite possible that no mortal eye
may be able to detect any difference in his bearing
to a warm supporter or a bitter antagonist. But
that is not the real qUestion, or the true test of this
measure, even in the case of a Marylebone elector.
Would the public-houses of that borough be open ?
Would Mr. E. James's supporters find themselves
utterly excluded from the benefit of those kindly
mediations with the heads of departments now ex-
pected from members ? With regard io the coun-
try at large, our misgivings as to the working of
the measure are even more serious.
There are many such declarations known to the
law, and they are always either wholly inoperative
and swallowed as a matter of course, or they are
simply traps for tender consciences, giving the free
and easy an advantage over the scrupulous. The
declarations required in the way of church " secu-
rities" under the Catholic Emancipation Act have
been laughed at by agitators, have kept out some
excellent .men, and have been generally explained
away, and in practice altogether forgotten. We
believe that everybody would now wish they had
•never been required. There are declarations against
what is called simony in the Church of England,
which do not prevent acts of this character. The
only effect is that when a living is to be sold some-
body buys it for the man who wants it; and, if the
sale takes place during a vacancy, as a scrupulous
man will not make the declaration, an unscrupulous
man gets the living cheaper, just as you pay less for
a piebald horse, or one with a rat tail. The clergy
are further required to make certain annuzl declara-
tions, intended to secure full residence, and the per-
formance of other duties. The conscientious, of
course, keep a diary; the others don't. But, after
all, these declarations can only come under the
general character of purgative oaths, which modern,
legislation has wisely reduced to the smallest num-
ber possible, from an extreme distrust of their effi-
cacy. It is, indeed, contrary to the English notion
'of law and justice, that a man should be compelled
either to criminate himself, or to 'purge himself, or
to plead in any fashion, unless there be a proved and
recognised ground of suspicion. Mr. Edwin James
has made his declaration so elaborately searching
and comprehensive that we cannot see how any
man can take it without winking at something or
forgetting something. If so, public opinion would
soon hit on a view which would emancipate not only
one member, but all; and the nabob who had paraded
his money-bags through the town and bought men
at £5O a-head would take the declaration, and jus-
tify himself by the example even of Mr. Edwin
James, unless the next election for Marylebone be
very different from the last.
The question is one not of words, but of acts ;
and we have to consider what actually takes
place at an ordinary election, of which an ad-
mirable example is detailed' in our columns
to-day. As soon as the candidate is introduced to
his committee he communicates to them his earnest
desire and solemn determination that there shall be
no bribery, treating, or undue influence of any kind.
They assure him that they are quite of the same
mind, and that nothing of the kind shall occur as far
as they are concerned. He goes through with the
election, or, at least, may go through with it, with-
out once putting his hand into his pocket, or letting
anybody else do so, or committing himself to the
least exercise of Parliamentary influence. If he uses
his eyes and ears, he must become painfully aware
of an cxpcndituregoing on upon his account, but he
feels that the less he knows about it the better; and,
if he does recognise it, it is to deprecate it witfi the
utmost energy of language. When all is over, some-
body, it matters not who—perhaps his lawyer, per-
haps a man lie never saw Lefore—tells him that his
political friends will suffer a loss they cannot afford
unless he can help them out of it with £2,000 or
v 5,000, as the case may be. What is he to do ? Is
he to let his zealous and too open-hearted, open-
handed friends, be ruined on his account ? That I
would be simply atrocious. He cannot think of it.