The Sun.
London, England, 1835-07-31 00:00:00

f of the Bill, it would be found by whom the new constitu-
ent body were to be composed. It would be found that any
man in any one of these borough communities, who possessed
rateable property to any amount, not to the amount of 101. or
201., but to the amount only of one farthing, would, under
the provisions of this Bill, have a right to have his name upon
the rate, and having that right—provided he had paid his
rate about two years and a-half before the periodical arrival
of the time when the election for municipal officers was to
take place--he should have the further right of voting in the
election for the new governing body of these institutions,
ovhich governing body was to be called the Council. Now,
when he said that the admission of a man to the elective fran-
chise who paid not only not more than one shilling per annnm
in the shape of rate, but perhaps infinitely less than the amount
of one shilling in the coin of the realm would admit of—when
he said that the admission of such a man to the elective fran-
chise was in fact to establish a democratic principle, he thought
he was not using an exaggerated phrase, and certainly did not
speak without authority ; for even in France in 1792, the
philosophical democrats and philanthropists—the march of in-
tellect men of that period, did not admit the right of voting
on so low a scale. So much for the electors. In page 17 of.
the Bill would be found a description of the sort of persons
who were to become the rulers under this new dynasty. There
was to be. a Mayor and Council, and their Lordships would
naturally inquire what were to be the qualification of the
Mayor and Council ? He had already, by anticipation, given
the answer ; for, as the electors had no qualification to elect
the Governors, so pari rations, the Governors, who were to
represent the electors, were required to have no qualification
of any description whatever. This was unlike anything ever
proposed before. Even in the time of the French revolution
it was required that persons appointed to such responsible
situations, should possess a considerable qualification. He
would next call their Lordships' attention to the powers
which these newly elected and newly constituted bodies were
to possess. They were to have the whole administrative and
executive powers which at present belonged to existing Cor-
porations. Indeed, on referring to page 52 of the Bill, it
would be seen that they were to have a power infinitely greater
than any which at present existed in the members of any ex.
isting Corporation ; for the provision contained in that page
of the Bill, it was declared that they should have the power of
making such bye-laws as to them should seem good for the
proper government of the borough, the suppression of nui-
sances, &c. There was a new and by no means a limited sort
of power—a power which, intrusted to such hands, might
lead to the greatest and most dangerous abuses. Again, if
the Bill were closely examined, it would be found that there
was a little too much of Downing-street in it. The opera-
tion and effect would be to render the municipal officers
throughout the kingdom little else than Crown officers—the'
mere tools and instruments of whatever Minister, or whatever
party might happen for the time to be in power. That was
itself an innovation upon the fixed and sedentary principle
which had rendered the ancient Corporations of the king-
dom so valuable ; and in the place of that excellent
principle they obtained what ?—A principle new and un-
heard of in any era or time of the British Constitution.
He should be glad to know from the supporters of the Bill
what charter ever delegated so monstrous a power as was
delegated by this' Bill ? There were many precedents in
which the King's Judges had interfered in such matters ; but
it was monstrous that Corporations should be formed into
these new councils with the permission of the Secretary of
State : an individual who never ought to be allowed to inter-
fere in such matters. He would now go on to call the atten-
tion of their Lordships to a still more extraordinary and mon-
strous power—he alluded to that power which was called, in
the House of Commons, the power of the purse. The House
of Commons always loudly protested against the interference
of their Lordships in money matters. They were also most
happy if they detected any Interference of such a nature to
expel a Bill in which it appeared from Parliament : they
assumed to be peculiarly the guardians of the public purse.
Now, he must say, that he thought that in many cases it was
evident that these guardians of the public purse had not read
the clauses of the Bill which they had passed ; but that they
had merely glanced over the marginal notes, and caught, or
fancied they caught, their meaning. Let their Lordships see
what the Municipal Chancellors of the Exchequer and Lords
of the Treasury were empowered to do by this Bill. The
Bill transferred to the new councils which it created all the
Corporate property of the existing Corporations. Now, in ge-
neral, when persons appointed bankers or agents, they looked
to the credit of those persons. But this Bill discarded all
such low and earthly—it despised all such miserable and
terrene considerations. These men, themselves, possessed cf
no property, and who were to be elected by persons who had
no property, were to have the management of all the real and
all the personal property of the corporations to which they
were to succeed ; amounting to a sum so large, that he was
apprehensive of subjecting himself to a charge of exaggera-
tion by steting it. Certain it was, however, that many mil.
lions would be thus transferred from the present curators of
corporate property to this new body of persons, whose only
qualification was, that neither the electors by whom they were
chosen, nor they themselves, need be worth a hundred, or
fifty, pounds. It was further stated in the Bill that its objects
were, " the public benefit of the inhabitants generally, and
the improvement of the boroughs." Some of the gentlemen
composing the council might perhaps, however, think that the
benefit of some of the inhabitants might best be consulted by
allowing them a participation in the corporate property. But
that was not all. What were these faithful guardians of the
public purse in their respective spheres further to do ? They
were absolutely armed with the powers of taxation : that
power which the House of Commons was generally so anxious to
arrogate and confine to itself—that most nervous of all powers
—that power, the exercise of which touched every heart, in-
flamed every passion, and excited every sensibility ; that power
was given to the new councils by the Bill. They had power to
raise money ad libitum by county rates. Now if their Lordships
looked at the history of all the boroughs, they would finethat
although tire corporate bodies, in some of them, had a right to
levy county rates, yet that, in the great majority of cases, they
did not exercise that power. It was monstrous, therefore, to
give those new bodies a power so seldom exercised by the au-
thorities already established. He would now call their Lord-
ships' attention to another part of the subject. By one of the
clauses of the Bill, this new council were empowered to grant
licenses to public-houses. He recollected having heard many
long speeches on the enormity and iniquity of the system of
allowing- the magistrates to license public-houses. But by
the present Bill they would commit to the new council an
instrument of authority which would, of necessity, be used
in a worse manner than by persons of higher rank and cha-
racter. He would now call the attention of the House to
the magisterial part of the Bill. It was generally understood
that the Crown was the fountain of justice as well as of
honour. But according to this 13)11, the Council having
made out a list of persons whom they thought fit for magis-
trates, permitted the King to appoint their own nominees !
The power of selection was taken from the Crown, and trans-
ferred to this self.elected body. In his humble opinion there
was nothing more illustrative of the democratic and republican
principle of the Bill, than the clause to which he now allu-
ded. But there were one or two other topics to which it was ne-
cessary for him to advert. By the Bill, the Council might
also constitute police-magistrates, who also were not required
to have any qualification of property. The whole of their
wealth might be described in the word nihi/. It was true
that the value of nothing was elegantly praised in a poem
quoted by Dr. Johnson in one of his lives :
" Felix cui nihil est
Non timit insidias; fares, incendia temnit."
Certainly no man could be so securely happy as the man who
had nothing, for he could not be work—it was impossible to
rob him. How happy nothing could make a man, had also
been sung by a French poet, who dwelt on the advantages of
this negative wealth. The qualification of having nothing,
was a qualification whiCh ran through the 'whole Bill. He
would pass to another part of the Bill. lie alluded to the
power which these newly created institutions were to possess
in the character of trustees of charitable funds. It was well
known that there was at present an immense amount, not only
of real, but of funded property, standing in the names of cor-
porate bodies in their character as trustees of charitable
funds, or in the names of persons empowered by them. Now
all these funds were to be immediately taken out of the hands
of the corporate bodies, or out of the hands of the persons
empowered by the corporate bodies, and were to be trans-
ferred to the honest, to the pure, to the conservative hands

of the body who, by the authority of the Bill, were to be
henceforward the custodes of all such charitable trusts. To
those persons the large funds, now administered by the cor-
porate bodies, were to be entrusted. He really could not
imagine that the framers of the Bill were aware of the
extent of the property at stake. The Corporation of Bris-
tol had funds of this kind under their management amount-
ing to little less than 13,0001. a year. At present those
funds were under the supervision and control of the whole
body. No order was valid with respect to them, which was
not given under the corporate seal; and the corporate seal
cculd not be affixed, except with the consent of twenty-one
Members of the Corporation, being a majority of the forty
Members of which it consisted. Many other corporate bodies
were placed in similar circumstances. Such were the origi-
nal powers of the corporate bodies, which bodies were now to
be destroyed, in order that these new institutions might be
built on their ruins. This new system was to occupy the place
of that which had existed for centuries. The ancient Corpo-
rations were no longer to exist. And why ? If they were
defective, could not their defects be supplied? If they re-
quired rectification, could not they be rectified? Were they
so thoroughly impregnated with vice and wickedness, was the
blood which flowed in their veins so corrupt, were they so
afflicted with leprosy, that it was utterly impossible to cleanse
and purify them ? That would be the only ground on which
the Bill could be defended. It could be defended on the
ground that the existing system was so intrinsically vicious,
that it was utterly impossible to deal with it in the way of
amendment; that it was like a carcase emitting pestilential
exhalations, which men hastily buried lest they should be con-
taminated by even an approach to it. If Corporations were
found to be so bad that they ought not to exist, why not bring
in a Bill to declare that there should be no Corporations at
all. No," said the Reformers, " we do not dislike Cor-
porations—we dislike your Corporations, it is true, bpi give
us Corporations felpided on a democratic basis. give us Re-
publican-
Municipalities in the shape of Corporations, and we
will contend that they are admirably adapted to the comfort
andsecurity of the people." The Reformers did not like
the old Corporations, because they were not founded on
the principles of annual elections, and universal suffrage—
(for he had forgotten to state that the Bill provided
pthoVad tionliri tUI-1
that a third of the Members of the Council should go
elections and universal suffrage ; give them corpo-
robafuttiao nngnsuiYaal orrmed with the most dangerous, wanton, and extrava-
jn
gant powers—powers such as no King ever confided in similar
pogiooed Ye erypriyncea principles
bodies; give them constitutions of Radical instead of regal in-
out a n d t