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

stitutions, and, they are instantly real), to adopt them. He
had gone swiftly through the diflerent clauses of the Bill, and
he believed he had fairly represented their character and
effects. They were in violation of the tide of the measure.
Instead of regulating they confiscated. Let their Lordships
read the preamble of the Bill, and see why these bodies, who
had been invested with power by the legitimate exercise of
the Royal authority, were to be thus tyrannically and despoti-
cally treated. In the preamble three reasons for the measure
were stated. The first was :---," Whereas, partly by defects in
the charters by which the said bodies corporate have been
constituted ;" the second was—" partly by neglect and abuse
of the privileges by such charters granted and confirmed ;"
and the third was—" partly by change of circumstances since
the said charters were granted." Oa these three grounds it
was declared, that " the said bodies corporate, for the most
part, have not of long time been and are not now useful and
efficient instruments of local government." Now with regard
to the first allegation, that of defects in the charters, if there
were such defects, the Crown could easily amend them. But
the term " defects" was so vague and indefinite, that it was
difficult to understand it. What were or what were not defects
must depend on numerous circumstances that ought to be in-
quired into. It was the next allegation, however—" partly by
neglect and abuse of the privileges by such charters granted
and confirmed"—it was the next allegation on which all the
corporate bodies in the kingdom were impeached. That
was the hinge on which the Bill turned- The question
then was, whether in the bodies complained of, such
neglect and abuse of privileges had prevailed as rendered
them useless and inefficient instruments of local govern-
ment. This was a direct question of fact, and ought to
be treated as such. It ought to be inquired where there had
been neglect and abuse ; what were the negligences and
abuses ; whether the offence had been a positive or a negative
one ; whether any thing had been done which ought not to
have been done, or whether anything had been left undone
ix hich ought to have been done. These were questions wltn
ought to be fully lied satisfactorily answered before ii", Leg is_
'
lature proceeded to put on end to a hundred ad forty-three
charters. As to the third reason in the U*- amble the " change
of circumstance," the phrase was se, general and so fallacious
that it was hardly possible to Oeeal with it in a tangible form,
and that reason might fairly be considered as melted down into
the other two. Those two allegations were tangible ; with
those he, in the lawyer's phrase, was at issue ; with those
he was prepared to grapple ; or he would have been pre-
pared to grapple if the Bill had declared that no corporate
bodies whatever should exist; instead of substituting for the
existing corporations, corporations moulded according to the
new system. By one of the provisions of the Bill it was to
be enacted, that after the passing of the Act no persons
should be admitted as freemen in Corporations. The conse-
qence was to cut off a large number of persons who had
not worked out their apprenticeships, and to deprive them
of the elective franchise. This began to be understood
throughout England and Wales, and the system of depriva-
tion and robbery which the Bill contained would soon be
I universally deprecated. The present active members of
Cot porations were to have nothing whatever to do; they
were to be relieved from all their arduous duties ;
they were, if he might so express it, to be turned
on the pan". The Mayor, the man of the highest
rank in a corporation, and who had filled all the inferior
offices, be he whom he might, a Mr. Tomkins or a Mr. Jen-
kins, was, instead of sitting for six or eight hours a day in the
discharge of his magisterial functions, to be thrown into a state
of complete idleness. This might appear a light matter, but
it was not so. He put it to their Lordships, who held so
exalted a rank in the country, and who hoped to continue to
hold it; who looked back to the honours of their ancestors,
and forward to the honours of their successors ; he appealed
to them whether, if they were suddenly stripped of the dig-
nities which they enjoyed by the beneficence of the Crown,
aided by their own merits, and turned loose into general so-
ciety, it would not be a severe infliction on their feelings to be
pointed out as persons cast down from their high station ; and
that not for any vice or misconduct, but on false allegations ;
on allegation§ of neglect and abuse of which they had never
been guilty, on allegations of a change in circumstances over
which they had no control? He did not think the great body of
the Peerage, he did not think that even the Bench of Bishops
would like to be met walking about the streets at the west
end of the town ; neither would the great body of persons
whose advocate he was like to be consigned to perfect idle-
ness. The framers of the Bill, however, were too sublimated
in their notions to attend to such feelings. By the unheard of
brutality of the measure, at least four thousand persons would
-be driven out of posts which they now usefully and respectably
occupied, to roam about, subject to the taunts of the democra-
tically elected Council, as if they had just quitted the tread-
mill. There was another body of persons on whom the Bill
would operate—he meant the hundred and forty-eight Re-
corders. And here he could not help commenting upon the
invidious manner in which the Commissioners had in their Re-
port attached the word " Peer" to those Recorders, twenty or
thirty in number, who were Members of their Lordships' House.
Did not the Commissioners know that almost every Peer
was a Magistrate, sitting at Quarter Sessions ; and that
many Peers were among the most zealous and active Ma-
gistrates in England ? There was one case, that of Lyming_
ton, in which the Recorder was stated to be an Admiral.
Did rot the Commissioners know that it was the duty of a
warrior, in the time of peace, to turn his sword into a plough-
share,
and thus to amalgamate his various duties? By-and-
by, he supposed, they would be told that any body who had
been at the battles of Waterloo and Trafalgar was unfit for the
exercise of civil and peaceful functions, But the fact was,
that something vulgar, something low bred, something which '
he found it impossible adequately to describe, pervaded the
whole Report. It was couched in a style hardly fit for such
works as " Roderick Random," or " Tom Jones"—a style
similar to that of the books which were to be found in some
little circulating library at Ramsgate, or Margate, or South-
end, or Sheerness, or at any genteel, or mock-genteel water-
ing-place, or in any of the steam-boats which conveyed the
public to those places. And yet, on the statements of such a
report as that their Lordships were called upon to legislate—
a Report, the scorn of those who examined its arithmetic—the
laughing-stock of those who regarded only its pleasantry. He
had inquired as to the number of persons who were to be sub-
jected to the new discipline which the Bill proposed to esta-
blish ; and, unless he was misinformed, the number of persons
who had been living under the protection of the corporate be.
dies established by the royal charter for centuries, and who
would be handed over to the care of the new democratic bo-
dies, would be at least 2,200,000. Taking into account the
operation of the last clause of the Bill, which, under the pre-
tence of enabling the King to constitute new corporate bodies,
actually disabled him from doing so, and would compel the in-
corporation of the Tower Hamlets, the purlieus of Marylebone,
&c. He thought the amount of persons subjected to the new
system, withdrawn from the legal, royal, and constitutional
principles of the realm, and handed over to the new radical,
jacobinical, and republican institutions, would be nearly
3,000,000. He had a table showing how the Bill affected the
interests of the different corporate bodies. Taking a single
instance, that of Berwick-upon-Tweed, he found that the cor-
porate property of that place was valued at 120,0001. But he
should desire his clients to publish the details in the shape of
a brochure. What he maintained was, that in the con-
test which political party should carry on the govern.
ment of this country, a large class 'of his Majesty's
subjects ought not to be sacrificed by the dominant party
making what they termed a municipal regulation an engine of
political influence. How were the matters of fact contained
in the Bill proved? What evidence was there to establish
the charge in the preamble, of neglect and abuse? On en..
tering upon this part of the subject, he begged to say a few
words on the nature of the Commission, upon the Report of
which the Bill was founded. The Commissioners were de-
sired to go booted and spurred on their mission ; to lose no
time, to be as quick as they could, to use their utmost dispatch,
so as to enable Parliament to legislate on the subject early in
the next session. Under such circumstances, and thus urged
to a full gallop, their labours ought to be spoken of in a good-
natured style of remark. It was impossible but that a great
mass of error should creep into the statements of men who
were sent over the country in such an urgency of haste. It
was expected, no doubt, by their employers, that there should
be a golden harvest; that the sheaves of corruption should be
bound and brought into the political granary. It so turned
out, however, that in many cases where it was supposed the
greatest malversation of all kinds existed, that the reverse
proved to be the case. Of die 183 boroughs to which the
Bill referred, no less that 96 stood on the Report of these
Commissioners. And when alluding to the Report, he might
perhaps be allowed to venture so far on the condescension of
their Lordships as to express a belief that not five, or at all
events ten, Members of their Lordships' House had read the :
Report of these Commissioners of Inquiry. He might, how-
ever, be somewhat mistaken on this point, and it might per-
haps be found that some of their Lordships (like the Roman
senators, who were, it is said, in the habit of employing secre-
taries to read over documents to them) had directed their se-
cretaries to read to them some portions of this Report, and
thus, by a kind of vicarious vision, made themselves acquainted
1
with its contents.

Lord BROUGHAM here rose and said that it was almost
unnecessary for him to remind their Lordships that the Learned
Counsel must be in a state of great exhaustion, from the length
at which he had addressed their Lordships ; and that it would
be but granting an indulgence which ought certainly to be ex-
tended to him, if he were allowed to retire for ten minutes.
Their Lordships too, no doubt, required some slight relief
after the fatigue they had undergone, and he should therefore
move that the House adjourn for ten minutes.

This proposition being agreed to, almost all their Lordships
retired ; and having, after a lapse of about 20 minutes, re-
sumed their places, _

Lord KEN YON rose, and informed their Lordships
that the Learned Counsel, rom the extreme heat of the House,
and the great exertion which he had made, found it quite im-
possible to proceed with his address that night. He was sure
that their Lordships would extend their indulgence to the
Learned Counsel so far as to allow him to resume his address
to-morrow, particularly when he gave the best proof of his
unwillingness to protract the discussion unnecessarily, by ex-
pressing his readiness to address their Lordships to-morrow,
at as early an hour as they might think fit. -

Lord BROUGHAM observed that nothing was more pro-
per than to take into consideration the great exertions made by
the Learned Counsel, and also the extreme heat of the House._
Though it was exceedingly hot where he (Lord Brougham)
sat, the heat was still greater at the bar, from which the
Learned Counsel addressed the House, and to which the Hon.
Members of the outer House were admitted, and who were
now afforded an opportunity of judging of the beat to which
the Members of that House were subject. It would, how-
ever, he thought, be well if the Learned Counsel were to pro-
ceed with his address at three o'clock to-morrow. If their
Lordships were to meet at that hour, the addresses of the two
Counsel might, he apprehended, be finished in the space of
time originally agreed on,

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