The Sun.
London, England, 1859-03-15 00:00:00

LORD GREY ON THE REFORM BILL.

We have received for publication the following
letter from Earl Grey to Lord Ekho on Lord John
Russell's proposed motion and the Government
Reform Bill :--

" Carlton House-terrace, March 12.
" My dear Elcho,—On thinking over our conver-
sation of yesterday it has occurred to me that there
may be some advantage in my expressing to you
rather more fully than 1 then did, and in writing,
my opinion on the resolution which Lord John
Russell has given notice that he will move as an
amendment on the second reading of the Reform
Bill. -

"I think this resolution highly objectionable, and
I deeply lament his having determined to move it
as well on account of the public evil it has a ten-
dency to produce, as from the regard I have for so
many, years entertained for him. The question of
parliamentary reform is fast getting into a state
very dangerous to the country; it seems to me,
therefore, to be the duty of all public men to give
their, best assistance towards settling it, and at all
events strictly to abstain from using it for the pur-
po,.7e of party warfare. But if the settlement of the
question is the object they have in view, I cannot
understand how the party opposed to the Govern-
ment can doubt that they ought to agree to the
second reading of the bill that has been introduced.
It is true the bill is a bad one, and I certainly could
not vote for its.passing in its present shape. But it
contains provisions for creating new rights of vot-
ing, for, partially disfranchising some places that
now return members to Parliament, and for enfran-
chising others. These principles, applied more or
less extensively, are those' on which any possible
reform bill must be founded, so that amendments
which the committee would have full power to in-
troduce into the bill, as coming within its original
principle, might bring it into any shape that might
be thought right—even into that recommended by
Mr. Bright, if his views should unfortunately gain
acceptance.
" Hence, if the second reading were agreed to, all
who disapprove of any of the present provisions of
the bill would have the opportunity of proposing
others in lieu of them. Were this course followed,
the house and the country would be enabled to
form a fair judgment on the several schemes that
might be brought forward, and the discussion of
these could not fail to throw much light on the
question (at present so obscure) as to what changes
in the constitution arepracticable, and really desired
by the public.
" But instead of allowing the bill to be thus col

sidered in detail, Lord John Russell will invite the
House of Commons to get rid of it by a resolution
condemning it on account of defects which, grant-
ing them to be as great as they are alleged to be,
might still be removed in the committee. The re-
solution is to declare the opinion of the house.
That it is neither just nor politic to interfere in
the manner proposed in this bill with the freehold
franchise as hitherto exercised in the counties of
England and Wales; and that no re-adjustment of
the franchise will satisfy this house or the country
which does not provide for a greater extension of
the suffrage in cities and boroughs than is contem-
plated in the present measure.' The importance of
the first part of the resolution is taken away by the
announcement that the Government intends to mo-•
dify the part of the bill to which it relates. The
second is more matdral. Its effect would be to
pledge the house to some unknown extension of the
suffrage in towns, so that it may be supported by
persons holding every variety of opinion as to what
the borough franchise ought to" be, from those who
go to 4he full extent of advocating universal suf-
frage, with Mr. Ernest Tones.
A majority in favour of a resolution of this
kind might succeed in overthrowing the existing.
administration, or in compelling it to dissolve Par-
liament (the last in my opinion would be a great
misfortune at the present moment) ; but lam
totally at a loss to see how it would conduce to the
safe settlement of the difficult question of reform.
Suppose that a majority in favour of his resolution
led to Lord John's being himself raised to the office
of prime minister, either immediately, or after a
new Parliament had been elected—is there the
slightest chance that he.would be more fortunate
than his predecessors in finding a concurrence of
opinion in favour of his own views ?- If he were to
propose a £5 rating franchise, for instance, he must
of course reckon upon the opposition of the mem-
bers who support the present Government, and also
on that of Mr. Bright, and those who share his
views. He would also most probably find it neces-
sary to propose a much more extensive disfranchise-
men.,, of small boroughs than the present Govern-
ment recommend, and on this point likewise he
would encounter a great conflict of opinion which
would be very difficult to deal with. With these
obstacles in his way there is little probability that
he could carry a measure even through the House
of Commons, much less through both Houses of
Parliament. All therefore that we should gain by
the move would be the disturbance produced by a
change of Government and probably by a general
election, together with a great increase of the diffi-
culties of this already difficult question, by making
it the subject of a party battle, and influencing
men's passions with regard to it.
" I must add, that stopping the progress of a bill
by voting a resolution in favour of some abstract
principle which might be embodied in clauses And
moved in committee, is a course -which has not very
often been pursued by the House of Commons, and
never I believe with advantage. There are only
two cases strictly in point that I can remember.
One was the resolution, carried by General Gascoyno
in April, 1831, the object of which was to defeat
the first Reform Bill, by declaring the opinion of
the house that the total number of members re-
turned for England and Wales ought not to be
diminished. The other was the celebrated resolu-
tion carried by Lord John himself in 1835, which
declared that no measure upon the subject of tithes
in Ireland could lead to a satisfactory
.and final ad-
justment, if it did not embody the principle of ap-
plying the surplus property of the Irish Church to
general education. Both these resolutions afford,
I think, warnings of what ought to be avoided, not
examples to be followed. The first was universally
condemned at the time as a factious proceeding ;
it led to the immediate dissolution of Parliament
and the signal discomfiture of its authors. The
second (in which I have never ceased to
regret that, much against my own judgment,
I was induced to concur) was so far successful that
it stopped the progress of Sir R. Peel's bill relating
to Irish tithes, and overthrew his Government, but
it pledged the House of Commons to a principle, of
legislation to which it was unable to give effect. It
delayed the passing of any Irish tithe bill for three
or four years, keeping up in the meantime a most
mischievous struggle and agitation, and in the end
the House was compelled to abandon the principle
it had declared, with no slight discredit to itself and
to the party on whose advice it had acted. I can an-
ticipate no better result from the move now contem-
plated ; I hope, therefore, that the resolution which
is to be moved will be resisted by yourself and
others who prefer the interests of the country to
those of a party. In your place I should certainly
vote against it, even though I concurred in the prin.
ciples set forth in the resolution, and were prepared
to support them if brought forward in the proper
form of amendments in the committee on the bill.
" I have no wish to conceal the opinion I enter-
tain on this subject—on the contrary, I should be
glad to have it known ; you are, therefore, quite at
liberty to make what use you please of this letter.
—Yours very truly, " GREY.
" The Lord Elcho."

(From the Times.)

Everybody knows what it is to be thrown all at
once out of a noisy crowd into a quiet little corner,
such as a churchyard or the quadrangle of a City
Hall. You have the same feeling as when a sudden
bend of the shore brings your boat under the
shelter of a rock, or as when you get into harbour
after a rough passage. Lord Grey and Lord Elcho
must have found themselves in just such a nook,
whence they could talk and write quietly about
Lord John's Resolution and Lord Derby's Dissolu-
tion, and the precedents of 1831 and 1835 bearing
on the point, and what is to come of these things.
They would seem to have agreed so entirely that
nothing remained but for Lord Grey to put on
record the results of the conference. We now,
therefore, have a report of the proceedings, with
the decision of the Court. When we add that we
entirely agree with that decision, and think both
Lord Grey and Lord Elcho men of great sense, our
readers will perceive that we are quite serious in
this account of Lord Grey's letter, and the conversa-
tion which led to it. We are sincerely of opinion
that these two most respectable spectators of the
fray have come to a very correct estimate of Lord
John's Resolution ; that it can answer no good pur-
pose ; that it is an invitation to the Whigs to affirm
what is either superfluous or vague ; that it proposes
to do at a wrong time, and against Parliamentary
usage, what can be done more conveniently and
properly in committee—that being the time'to settle
particular questions of enfranchisement and dis-
franchisement and rates of qualification, All this is

very good, and were these two noble Lords histo-
rians, writing as historians love to write' on
events at least a hundred years old, or were they
members of a well-regulated debating society, with
a similar rule as to the date of their thesis, we
should think this a very good piece of political
criticism. But when we have expended our admi-
ration of the letter before us it then occurs to the
mind to ask, " What is the good of it ?" Who
will pay the smallest attention to it ? Will Lord
John Russell withdraw his Resolution in conse-
quence ? Does Lord Grey touch the motives
which prompted the step ? Was this the way in
which Lord John himself considered the question,
and can any point be named up to which he and
his critics agreed ?
The fact of the case most prominent in Lord
John Russell's mind is one that Lord Grey has
overlooked, or thought unworthy of notice. Lord
John considers that he has a right to reform ; that
the subject is not only in bad hands, but in the
grasp of a depredator. His resolution means nothing
more or less than " Stop thief !" That is the whole
philosophy of the. question in his eyes. If he saw
the thief turning a corner half a mile off, or sur-
rounded by a body of confederates too strong for
attack, he wou'Al not cry " Stop thief!" partly be-
cause it would be useless, and partly. because he
might suffer something worse than t'he loss of his
property. But, having taken a rapid measure of the
distance, the vicinity, the people about, and all the
circumstances of the case, he concludes that it will be
of some use to halloo, and that he may do so, if not
with success, at least with impunity. So he fixes at
once on the most exceptionable points of the' bill,
and, without caring for principles and usages, pro-
claims war at once. This it is hoped will kill the
enemy. It is something to knock your bird down,
even though you don't know what is next to be done.
What will next happen, of course, will be a dis-
solution, which Lord Grey thinks anything but
a desirable event. There, probably, is no one point
on which both Lords and Commons and all the good
and wise people of England, Ireland, and Scotland
are more unanimous than. this. There is scarcely
any minor public calamity that would not be pre-
ferred to the necessity of spending a million of
money in the most unsatisfactory possible way,
merely that 650 gentlemen may find themselves
either where they were before, minus so much
cash and character, or rninvs cash, character, and
seats into the bargain. We could fancy we hear
the cheers of the 650 at Lord Grey's remarks on
a general election. But there are at least two
gentlemen'tolwhom all the " difficulties," and "dis-
turbances," and " passions," and "party battles,"
and all the rest that we should get by a general
election, are matters of the utmost insignificance.
To Lord John Russell the first of all human consi-
derations is to get into office, and Lord Grey does
not venture to doubt that this Resolution is the

straightest way to that end. To Mr. Disraeli it is,
for various reasons, most important to stay in as
long as he can ; and the dissolution which Lord
Grey is so concerned to see in the horizon may be
managed so as to give the present occupants of
power three or four more months of it. This is
their view of the case; though Lord Grey does not
seem to observe it.

At this time of day it is vain to be very indig-
nant at a step the only object of which is the
overthrow of one party and the rise of another. It
is the sort of thing that men will do to the end of
the chapter. The maxim, " Measures, not men,"
may do very well at the hustings a hundred miles
down in the country, but the "men" themselves who
are made the subjects of this invidious comparison
cannot be expected to postpone themselves so com-
pletely to certain paper schemes. Lord Grey, how-
ever, seems to intimate that, granting a general
deal°n to leave things much as theyare at present,
and granting Lord John Russell and his friends to
be in power, they would only find their troubles
rather aggravated than otherwise by their new po-
sition. Well, possibly they would. Very likely,
for the first month or two, Lord John Russell
would not sleep so soundly as he does now. He
would have to defend a position continually at all
points, instead of taking his time about it, and at-
tacking here or there, as the fancy takes him. He
would find the independent sections of the house
still ready to join against the possessors of power.
All this is true, but the risk is Lord John's, so he
thinks, and he is ready to stand it. Lord Grey
reasons as if the only object was to do a good
amount of safe Parliamentary Reform. Strange
to say, the impression in the country at large has
been most honestly and unconsciously the very op.
posite of this. It has been assumed throughout as
a simple, and not at all a discreditable fact, that
the object of all this talk about Parliamentary
Reform has been to get this man or that man
into power, or to keep him in. When Lord John
re-opened the question which he had the credit
of closing twenty-seven years ago it was taken for
granted that he had become dissatisfied with that
state of the representation which left him out of
office, and that he conceived another Reform Bill
might bring him in at least, if not keep him in.
Again, nobody supposed that either Lord Derby or
Lord Palmerston was an enthusiast for Parliamen-
tary Reform. It was only a necessity of their
position. Lord John Russell conceives the course
he is now taking to be a necessity of his position.
He sees a weak paint in the defences, and he pro-
poses an assault, with a view to get in. If he fails
to get in, and stay in, he may possibly wish that
he had thought as Lord Grey does about the affair.
If he succeeds, as he hopes, we will find the posses-
sion of office and power a very sufficient reply to
Lord Grey's strictures on the policy and duty of the
steps he is now taking. But that the whole affair
is a struggle for Office—a mere question of " Ins "
and " Outs "-'-no one less charitable than Lord
Grey can doubt.

(From the Morning Chronicle.)
Lord John Russell has reckoned without his
" host." A party leader should make sure of his
followers, ere he stakes his reputation, and their
prospects, on the fortunes of a factious movement.
The Noble Lord the Member for London in his
eagerness to outbid a rival claimant for office, has
forgotton the most essential element of success.
There was a time when the name, alone, of Lord
John Russell was a tower of strength. But that
influence sprang from the moral support of a great
party, although a certain species of reflected pres-
tige might survive its withdrawal. The. Noble
Lord is now sorely testing the intrinsic value of
that prestige. To the Independent and Unaffi-
liated Members below the gangway, he may ap-
pear not to have lost his wonted importance, but
for every strain of flattery that alures his ears in
those regions, he is compelled to hear a jarring
remonstrance from his ancient associates. One
most important section of his former followers
now openly attach themselves to the fortunes of
another Chief; and there are symptoms of further
defection, even in quarters where such conduct
might least have been expected. It was but
the other day, Mr. Edward Ellice—a gentleman
always supposed td be in a mysterious way a baro-
meter of Whig opinion—wrote a temperate and
well-argued letter, setting forth the reasons which
would induce him not to oppose the Government
Reform Bill. Now we have Earl Grey delivering
himself in the same strain.

" The question of Parliamentary Reform," says
the noble earl in his letter to Lord Elcho, " is fast
getting into a state very dangerous to the country;
it seems to me, therefore, to be the duty of all pub-
lic men to give their best assistance towards settling
it, and, at all events, strictly to abstain from using
it for the purposes of party warfare." That is to
say, " Reform" having recklessly been made the
stalking horse of a party, and the question having
been undertaken by the present Government on the
default of their predecessors, it is to the interest of
the,community that a rational and well-considered
measure should be passed, with the consent and aid
of all parties, rather than that they should exhaust
each other in struggles for supremacy, leaving the
question at last in the hands of demagogues and
democrats. Earl Grey sees, as other shrewd and
well-meaning Whigs have seen before him, that if ,
the effect of Lord John Russell's resolution were to
defeat the Government Bill, there would then be no
alternative but the wild and destructive theories of
Mr. Bright. There would, of course, be an inter-
mediate period of Ministerial crises, furnishing
.4.t0
that gentleman fresh weapons against the aristo-
cracy and the middle classes; but, unless Lord
John Russell could hope to be more successful than
Lord Derby in carrying a measure, with the consent
of all parties—which Lord Grey demonstrates to
be impossible—" all we should gain by the move
would be the disturbance produced by a change of
Government, and probably by a general election,
together with a great increase of the difficulties of
this already difficult question, by making it the
subject of a party battle, and inflaming men's pas-
sions with regard to it."
Lord Grey, then, recommends Lord Elebo and
bis friends in the Lower House to vote for the
second reading of the bill, so as to afford an oppor-
tunity for discussing in committee the provisions
which may be deemed objectionable. This would
afford a clear stage to all parties—even to Mr.
Bright. There are few public men from whom a