The Sun.
London, England, 1859-01-29 00:00:00

us no reasonable expectation that they would be
able to resist the many temptations which richer
and unscrupulous men would offer them at elections,
in order to induce them to give their votes in a man-
ner not consistent with their opinions and their
consciences, if they have any in the matter, and
inconsistent also it may be with the interest of the
representation of the town or city in which they
resided. It is curious that among the thousands of
letters which I have received on this question during
the last three months, I have had more applications
from working men, asking me to specify my views
on this particular point,than I have had from any
other class. (Hear, hear.) One man writes to me
—" I am in favour of the widest possible suffrage
to every one of whom it is presumed that he is in
the least independent," but he adds, " I don't think
that a man in my neighbourhood who is so idle, so
profligate, so intemperate, and so abandoned, and
who so neglects his family that there is not a single
duty of citizenship which he ever undertakes or
performs—l don't think that las an industrious,
frugal, and striving working man have any interest
whatever in such a person being placed on the elec-
toral list, knowing as I do that when his vote comes
to be exercised he will be open to every possible
evil influence that can be practised upon him."
(Cheers.) That, of course, is a question which will be
for the ultimate determination of Parliament, as
indeed all these questions will be ; but whether we
take the proposition of household suffrage or rating
suffrage, there is a difficulty which must be met in
consequence of the different modes in which the
subject of rating is treated in various parts of the
country. In Scotland, for example, I found that in
Edinburgh, and I don't know whether it is exactly
the same in Glasgow, it is not the custom to rate any-
body who lives in a house of lower value than £4 a-
year ; the reason is this—that persons who occupy
houses of lower value than that, being the most
helpless and poorest of the population, it is found
impossible to obtain one-tenth probably of the
amount of rate from them which it would cost to
collect it. The landlords not paying the rate as is
the custom here, it was found impossible to collect
it from tenants of this poor and suffering descrip-
tion. Therefore, a rating suffrage in Edinburgh
would at once exclude all that class. Well, lam
prepared to maintain that it is consistent with the
establishment of the bestconstituency, and consist-
ent also with the public opinion certainly of the
present electoral body in this country, that persons
who are in a condition so absolutely dependent—
many of them, perhaps, begging from house to
house, many of them receiving parochial relief, all
of them living from day to day in a state which
we must all deplore, but which puts it wholly out
of their power to act an independent part in almost
any relation of life—should not be admitted upon
the electoral roll. The difficulty is not with regard
to Edinburgh, because you will observe that my
plan of rating franchise would of itself exclude
all those who were not rated on account of their
extreme poverty, and from whom no rates can be
raised; but when you come to Lancashire, and
other parts of England, you find, to a large extent,
that a custom has prevailed, sometimes by law and
sometimes by agreement, by which the landlords
pay the rates even upon the poorest and lowest class
of dwellings. Thus you will see that a rating fran-
chise would admit a class to a franchise in England
which the same clause in a bill would exclude in
Scotland. That is a distinction which, of course,
Parliament would not be expected to sanction, and
which certainly would not be just, because it would
grant the suffrage to a considerable section of the
community in one part of the kingdom, and with-
hold it from the same section in another. Then
comes the question whether you. are to lay down
some rule by which that unfortunate class in Scot-
land is to be admitted, or one by which the corre-
sponding class in England is to be shut out. Now
I should recommend a plan something like this :
It is, I fear, almost impossible to make the matter
quite clear to everybody, but I have received so much
correspondence about it, and I find it to be so
much the subject of discussion, that I think it
necessary now, which is perhaps the only oppor-
tunity I may have before Parliament assembles,
to meet this question, and briefly to discuss it.
(Cheers.) I think it is extremely likely that if Par-
liament were to entertain a proposition so extensive
as I have suggested, they would say that it is far
better the corresponding class in England, whom
you acknowledge to be utterly dependent in Scot-
land, where your own plan excludes them, should
also be excluded in England ; and they might pro-
pose that the clause should enact that down to a
certain point of assessment, as low as they like to
descend, whether the tenant pays the rate or
whether the landlord does so, the tenant should be
enfranchised, but that below that line, which is
supposed to set apart the very dependent class,
every man who is ambitious to have a vote must go
to the poor law officer who manages the rating, and
tell him that he wishes not only to be rated, but
wishes as tenant and occupier himself to pay his
own rate, the amount of which might of course by
some arrangement be deducted from his rent, and
then he should be as free as any of those above him
to be placed on the electoral register. If a system
like that were devised—and I am only suggesting
and discussing it—you will see at once that, what-
ever may be the number of the class that is ex-
cluded, there will be no single individual among
them who had paid, perhaps, but 4s. or ss. in the
course of a year in the shape of rates, and who had
had the industry first to acquire, and then the fru-
gality to save that sum, and who also had the
ambition to become an elector—that no such person
could possibly, or at least necessarily, be shut out
from the franchise which I propose. Another point
on which I have received a great number of letters
relates to the line to be drawn for the county
franchise. I am constantly asked what is the reason
why a man living in a house of £4 or £5 rent in a
borough should be allowed to vote, while the man
who lives in a house of the same rate in a county
is not to be allowed to vote ? I can only give the
answer which I have given elsewhere, that I be-
lieve myself this is the least defensible part of the
proposition which I have submitted to the public
—(hear, hear)—and the more I examine the ques-
tion, the more I am satisfied it would be desi-
rable to bring the franchise in the counties to
a lower standard than I have fixed -upon. I have
not the smallest doubt when the next Reform Bill
passes, if it does establish the county franchise at
a rent of £lO that only a few years will elapse be-
fore motions will be made in the House of Commons
-for the purpose of bringing it down, if not to the
,safile level as the franchise in boroughs, at least, to
aTliiwer point than thiit laid -down by the coming
measure. The fact is, the niore people look at this
question of the franchise, -handle it, and see its
working, the more their fears wgkanishb-The fear
'M the rich and the great at the iotes of the people
arises from a suspicion, based I believe almost en-
tirely-upon an ignorance, first, of the character of
the people, aad, next, of the effect which the pos-
session of a vote has on the mind and on the actions
of every man intrusted with it. (Cheers.) I have
spoken of a £lO county franchise simply on this
ground. I believe there is a majority of the House
of Commons in its favour. There would probably
not be a majority for anything below that. It is
that which public opinion has fur several years
rested upon with respect to the counties, and I am
anxious ineverything not to go impractically, as it
were, a-head of wTiat the country is prepared for,
but get as much of public opinion as I can to go with
us in doing the greatest and the best thing that is
possible in the day in which we live. (Cheers.) I
shalt not detain you by any discussion on that ques-
tion,which is not one of degree, but one which a man
must say either Aye or No. I mean whether voting
shall be made compulsory open, as it is now, or shall
be conducted by secret ballot. (Cheers.) I believe no
meeting has been held during the last three months,
and I have read the.accounts of nearly all of them, at
io
when ha se tno
there
erpe
arliletbye of giving
there appears to have been any difference of
e
further
x shelteretens
extension
theo
ballotp f
the suffrage. I hold the ballotanyto be inevitable. It
is not in the power of any party in the House of Com-
mons to prevent it—(cheers)-230 members of that
assembly are at present in its
ddfavour; every dissolution
of Parliament must
proposition from anya to its supporters. Any
Government to bring in a
Reform Bill considerably
suffrage would, I believ ber widely extending the
with-
out enthusiasm, almost with distaste, if it did not
received flatly,
offer the ballot along. with it. (Cheers.) I come
now to a question which I Was aboutt
o is
much more important than either of the sayotler
but which has been very-little discussed at publics
meetings; that is the mode in which the seats
should be distributed among the constituencies. Let
me tell you, as I have told other assemblages, that
the working men who are now enfranchised should
Particularly study this point, that although to give
a man a vote may be to please his sentiment of in-
dependence and equality, and he may like to go up
and poll with his richer and more free :neighbour,
yet, as regards the legislation and the composition
of Parliament and the action upon your Govern-
ment, by giving a man a vote or 1,000,000 of men
votes may be made of no effect, no value what-
ever, unless that which I call the soul and jewel
of your representative system be fairly considered
and equitably adjusted. (Cheers.) The other day
at Bradford I laid before the meeting and before
the public certain schedules, showing what number
of boroughs I should propose to disfranchise, what
number of seats I should obtain from that process,
andd
how those seats were in my view to be dis-
tributed anion.. the old and new electoral bodies
throughout the kingdom.
Now, I am bound to
state—and I think I say no more than the truth
when Ido so—that the reception which thatscheme
has
has met with generally from the public has been
much more favourable - than otherwise. (Cheers.)

Of course those persons who said that I was
going to turn everything upside down pretended
remarkable astonishment, and even satisfaction
that they were not about to be turned out
of the windows. (A laugh.) They said, "Why,
this is not at all like the violent speeches
which were made at Bradford and at Man-
chester !" But the fact is there never were any vio-
lent speeches. (Cheers.) The violence and the
folly, and the misrepresentation and the misstate-
ments of facts, and the iteration of all that was
illogical and absurd, were found day after day in
the leading articles of newspapers and nowhere
else. (Cheers and laughter.) I shall refer to the
criticisms of only one journal, and that notoriously
the most important and most influential in this
kingdom—the Times newspaper, as you know.
(Cheers, and some hisses.) I would not express
any disapprobation, because, after all, the Times
newspaper will, no doubt, do your cause great ser-
vice, and it will begin to do it, and to do it ear-
nestly, the moment it sees that you are in earnest.
(Cheers.) The Times said the other day that it did
not find much fault with my scheme of disfranchise-
ment, but that my distribution of the members
gained from the disfranchised places was very un-
fair ; I think. it said that it was " a gigantic fraud,"
and that to take 87 seats as proposed from the
boroughs by Schedule A from one side of the house,
or from one interest in the house—the landed in-
terest—and to put them on the other side, meaning
the side of the commercial and the popular interest
made a difference in a division of 174 votes ; and the
Times assumed that those 87 seats were all seats
for very small constituencies connected with what
they call the " agricultural interest," although
there is not the smallest connection really, or, at all
events, it is a very trifling connection, between
what is called the " landed interest" and the " agri-
cultural interest." Now, the Times has a very short
memory. Six weeks ago in that newspaper there
was a proposition which I was very glad to see,
although I thought at the time that the editor was
rather extreme in his views. (Cheers and a
laugh.) He proposed to disfranchise every
borough with less than 10,000 inhabitants, and
that boroughs with less than 25,000 inhabi-
tants should not return more than one member.
If that plan had been carried out he would
have obtained from the disfranchised boroughs
not less than 47 seats more than I have obtained.
The Times also proposed that 20 or 25 new mem-
bers should be given to the counties. Now, when
my plan came out—which is really a more reason-
able plan, a much more reasonable plan than that of
the Times, for I disfranchise only up to 8,000, and I
take only 120 seats, whereas he would have taken
about 170—forgetting what he had written six
weeks before, he condemns my plan as very.ex-
treme, and happily for us he produces a rival
scheme of his own. (Hear, hear.) lam told that
in the Times of to-day—for I have not seen the
paper—there is a considerable correction of that
rival scheme. That scheme was, in fact, what is
called a.plagiarism; it was, not to speak offensively,
stolen from my schedules. They:got my child, and
they took off its decent clothing—(cheers and
laughter) ;—they put on it rags of their own, and
they marred its countenance that it might excite
pity. (Renewed cheers.) Leading articles, you
know, may be written almost anyhow—that is,
they are published this morning, and are forgotten
when the paper comes out to-morrow morning, and
it does not always matter whether everything that
is in them is very correct ; but when you come to
figures and to give us tables there is an amount of
truth in the multiplication table which even great
authorities like the Times cannot wholly dispute,
and their blunders are easily detected. Now, the
Times complains of this—that in distributing the
members which are obtained from the disfranchised
boroughs I give far too large a population to the
towns and far too small a proportion to the counties,
and he says that in his scheme he gives to every
county with more than 160,000 inhabitants an extra
member. But how does he make out his list for
those counties ? I will illustrate his mode of doing
it by a reference to these counties Which I have before
me, and I believe there are others of the same de-
scription. We will take Berkshire, Buckingham-
shire, and Oxfordshire, and all of which are much
under the population to which I propose to give an
additional member. And how does he make them
up to this amount ? He forgets that the boroughs
in those counties are represented, and he includes
in the population of the counties the population of
the boroughs. For example, take the county of
Berks, in which the principal proprietor of the
Times has an estate, and on which he is very much
to be congratulated. (A laugh.) The population
of that county, exclusive of the boroughs, is
131,000 ; the Times calls it 170,000. The popula-
tion of the county of Bucks, in the same way, is
129,000; the Times calls it 164,000. The popula-
tion of the county of Gloucester again, exclusive of
the boroughs, is 250,000, but the imes calls it
458,000. Well, a man might make a mistake in a
figure, and one would not complain of or condemn
upon that account a great scheme ; but when such
a huge and absurd blunder as this has been made
throughout the whole of his table, as I believe it
has, I must say that, instead of proposing schemes
of reform, the Times had better take to some other
occupation for which it is better fitted. I could
show you a great many other faults in that scheme.
The town of Chatham, for example, to which he
proposes to give an additional member, making
two ; and the town of Rochdale, to which I pro-
pose an additional member, are within some 2,000
of the'same population. But it happens that Rochdale
is the more populous place of the two. The Times,
however, drops one member for Rochdale, and
keeps one member additional for Chatham. Now,
Chatham is to a large extent a Government borough,
and you had much better have one member and
Chatham one, probably, than that you should have
one and Chatham two; and the object, no doubt,
of leaving a member to Chatham and taking him
from Rochdale is that the power of the Minister of
the day, and not the power of the people, should be
strengthened. There is another borough which is
particularly favoured in that scheme, and that is
the borough of Nottingham. I don't know at all,
of course I can't even guess, with any certainty
whence that scheme comes. But when one finds
that the county of Berks, where the proprietor of
the Times has a fine estate, and the town of Not-
tingham, which he happens to represent, are espe-
cially favoured, one cannot help thinking that
somehow or other the person who concocted that
scheme has not been so impartial in dealing with
all places a
nd all interests as I have been in the
scheme which I have proposed. But there is
another great error in the proposition which has
appeared in the Times, to which I must call your
attention, and which is of a much more serious
character. He disfranchises all these boroughs in
England and Wales, and he distributes the mem-
bers in England an Wales; he has made no pro-
vision for an extension of the number of members
to be granted to that part called Scotland or to
Ireland. He gives to Liverpool and to Man-
chester, as I proposed to give, six members each,
but he does riot propose to given even an additional
member from those disfranchised boroughs to the
great city of Glasgow, possessing at this moment
400,000 inhabitants. But are Edinburgh and Glas-
gow not parts of this United Kingdom as much as
Manchester and Liverpool ? I propose to disfran-
chise a less number of pqces than the Times, and
I propose to give to Scotland—l forget the exact
nurnbcr, but I think 18 nr 17—additional members-
(Cheers.) The justice that I would do to Scotland
touches the heart of Scotchmen everywhere, and do
you think for a moment that 3,000,000 of en-
lightened people north of the Tweed, who pay in
proportion to their population as much of the taxes
of the United Kingdom as any other portion of the
kingdom, will be content with a proposition which
leaves them as they are now and have been here-
tofore, and wholly ignores the enormous strides
which that portion of the kingdom has taken
in all that constitutes the wealth and strength
and prosperity of the empire ? Well, but
now we will come to the real question of
the proposition which I have made, and that is,
whether I have dealt unfairly to the counties of
the United Kingdom. I can hardly hope that this
part of my subject can be very- interesting to every-
body, but I assure you that it is of the very pith
and marrow of the question before the public. The
statement which the Times makes, and which others
make who object to my scheme, is, that I disfran
_ _

chise a great number of small boroughs which it is
generally admitted ought to be disfranchised ;
that I get in England and Wales—l leave out of
view Ireland at present, and in Scotland I disfran-
chise no boroughs-121 members, for whom it is
necessary to find constituencies, and that in finding
those constituencies I show great partiality to the
towns, and do great injustice to the counties. That
is the case against me. In England and Wales,
though there are but 52 counties, there are 81
either counties or divisions of counties, many of the
larger counties, as you are aware, being subdivided.
Let us see, then, what the facts arc. I have taken
those counties that are purely agricultural—for it
is that great landed interest that complains—(a
laugh)—and I have taken those that are to a con-
siderable extent manufacturing and mining; and I
have taken the county of Lancaster and the West
Biding of Yorkshire alone,.as being exceptional to
all others from the vast population and the enor-
mous manufacturing interests which they contain.
Of the purely agricultural divisions there are 62
out of the 81. They would have by my scheme,
which is pronounced to be unjust to the agricul-
tural interest, 128 members, and the average num-
ber of persons, men, women, and children, to every
member would be just 55,000. I come, then, to the
manufacturing and mining counties, of which there
are 16. They return 36 members, and the ayerage

population to each of them is 66,000. You will
observe, therefore, that the purely agricultural
counties and divisions are much more fully
represented than the manufacturing and min-
ing counties, inasmuch as a population of
55,000 to a member is better than one of
66,000 to a member. Then, with respect to Lan-
cashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire, which
I call three divisions, because I divide the former
into North and South Lancashire, I propose that
they should return 13 members, and the average to
each member would be 137,000. Therefore, you
will see at once that at any rate I have not shown any
partiality in the distribution of members to the
three divisions of North and South Lancashire and
the West Riding of Yorkshire. (Hear.) Now I
must compare these with the 'great boroughs, be.
cause that is the question of the counties alone, the
purely agricultural are much the most represented,
and those that are manufacturing and. mining are
less so, and Lancashire and the West Riding are
much less represented than any other counties; now
I come to the consideration of 17 of the largest
boroughs, 12 of which, according to my scheme,
were to receive four members each, and five six
members each, in all 78 members, and every one of
those 78 members, representing the largest 17
boroughs in the kingdom, would have the constitu-
ency, or rather a whole population of 62,000 ;
therefore, inasmuch as every member of any purely
agricultural county has but 55,000 of a population,
and every member of those large boroughs would
have 62,000, you see that I do not give to those
large boroughs an amount of representation equal to
that which the agricultural counties would have.
So far, then, as these large boroughs are concerned,
the answer is complete to the Times, or to anybody
else who calls in question my impartiality. (Hear.)
But I come now to consider other boroughs, be-
cause as we descend the list we shall find many
smaller boroughs than those to which I have re-
ferred, and with them the representation appears
to be considerably in excess. You will recollect I
stated that the Times asserted that taking
87 seats from those disfranchised boroughs
was taking 87 seats from the landed interest,
and transferring them to the commercial interest.
I want to know whether there are no boroughs left
—still called boroughs—which are just as much
county seats and connected with the landed interest
as those which I propose to disfranchise. Take
the county in which we live ; many of you know
the town of Clitheroe, it's a small town. The last
time I was through it I am sorry to say that it
looked less prosperous than even when I knew it
many years ago. But the town of Clitheroe does
not return the member for Clitheroe. I saw yester-
day, in a very influential paper in the north of Lan-
cashire, the Preston Guardian, an article on the
subject, and it states, and I presume that it is true,
that the borough of Clitheroe is 14 miles long, and
that there are in that neighbourhood, and chiefly
within the borough, not less than five landed pro-
prietors whose united income from land is about
£45,000 a-year, and the incorporation of all that
land with the little town of Clitheroe gives their
representation into the hands of the proprietors of
the soil. The member for Clitheroe, therefore, is
just as much a member of the landed and what they
call the county interest, as the member for any
county in the kingdom. Take, again, the borough
of Lancaster, which, I see, the Times proposes to
treat more hardly than I did, for I proposed to leave
it as is, and he wishes to take one member from it.
The borough of Lancaster, I learn from the same
authority, is united with about 20 townships ; all
that land, therefore, which lies adjacent to the
borough gives great influence in. the elections for
borough; and boroughs of that nature may in con-
sequence be regarded as more connected with the
landed interest than they are with the commercial
and manufacturing interests. Although in the
vicissitudes of party, you find, of course, occasion-
ally the land triumphant, while at other times the
independence of the population makes head against
landowners, and members of another character are
returned. I have looked over my three schedules
B, C, D, and I have marked no less than 47 seats.
I believe there are far more, but I have been ex-
tremely careful in my marking, which my scheme
leaves as they now are, every one of which may be
considered to be connected, directly and insepar-
ably, with the countyrepresentation of the country.
The Times ignores that. lam charged with trans-
ferring all those little boroughs and their seats from
the land to trade. But lam told that I leave 47
seats—and I may say nearly 60 seats in the small
boroughs, which may be said to be generally as
much connected with the landed interest in the
counties in which they are situate as the majority
of those boroughs which are proposed to be disfran-
chised. Now, let us see how the figures stand. If I
take all the population of the counties of England
and Wales, exclusive of Lancashire and the West
Riding, and if I add to that the population repre-
sented by those 47 seats, and if I divide that whole
population by the members for those counties, added
to the 47 seats, I show that the representation of
the counties stands thus—that there is one member
for every 45,400. I will not confine myself to the
great boroughs which I spoke of before. I will take
the boroughs with six members, those with four
members, and those with three members,, being al-
together 147 seats, and adding to the counties those
boroughs the increase of population since the last
census was taken it becomes capable of demonstra-
tion and cannot be contradicted that those 147 per-
sons represent each a larger number of population
than each of the counties and the small borough
members to which I have referred. (Hear.) But
there is another point in which this should be
viewed ; take the 42 counties of England alone for
example (I call them 42, because Yorkshire counts
as three), take them and reckon any county with
all the population in it, both borough and county,
with all the members, both borough and county
members, and how do the counties stand ? They
stand in this position—that there are six of these 42
counties that have their exact number of members—
that is, the counties and the boroughs within them.
There are also nine of them that have somewhaj,
less than they ought to have ; and, again, there aig
23 that have more, and some of them considerably
more than they ought to have, while there
are four that are greatly deficient—namely,
Lancashire, which according to my scheme
would still be eight membe-:s deficient; Middlesex,
which would be nine deficient; Surrey, which would
be six deficient, and the West Riding of Yorkshire,
which would be 11 deficient. Thus these four po-
pulous counties would be 34 deficient, and these 34
members are really distributed among "those 23
other counties which, as I have stated, have really
an excess of representation. (Cheers.) Now, I shall
be met by the argument that it is not fair to take
any given county with the boroughs in it, and add
all the members together and say that this county
is fairly represented in its county interest. But I
would ask you to look over the counties of England,
so far as you are acquainted with them, and then
you will find that there is a great union of interest
between any particular county and the boroughs
in that county. Is there no community of interest
between the agriculture, such as it is, of Lancashire
and the manufacturers of Lancashire ? A very
strong blending of interest we find everywhere.
And, in like manner, if you go to a purely agricul-
tural county you will find the little town in that
county has strong. affinity with what may be called
the agricultural interest that surrounds it. The
people in the town are relations of the people in
the country. The people in the country come into
the town to make their purchases. Their interests
are greatly blended together, and therefore, in
looking over the general representation of the whole
kingdom, I think it is quite fair to draw the line
that I have adopted, and to show that, taking every
county by itself, its county population with its
borough population, and its county:members with its
borough members, all these counties have a fair
distribution of members ; and these only have any
real or important deficiency—viz., the Vest Riding,
Lancashire, S urrey, and Middlesex. And if the county
gentlemen of England and the Times wish to give
more members to these four counties, for my
part I have not the smallest objection. (Loud
cheers.) But now there is another point. The
landed proprietors of England may be styled
" the leisure class of England ;" they are not
half so busy as merchants and manufacturers tied to
their counting-houses or to their mills from morning
till evening. The landed Classes are those who offer
the greatest number of their members as candidates
for Parliamentary honours, and you find that in a
great number of boroughs which may be said to be
a sort of neutral. territory, for you don't know
whether they are for trade more particularly or
whether they are for land. These are represented
in vast numbers by gentlemen connected with the
landed interest, and whose sympathies are altoge-
ther opposed to any policy which may be deemed
adverse to that interest. (Hear, hear.) I believe
that when this scheme of mine shall be more
thoroughly understood, or completely understood
by any impartial person, he will come to the con-
clusion that if it were passed into law the landed
interest would still have—l will not say a great
preponderance in the House of Commons—but that
it would have a power in excess of anything that it
could justly claim. (Hear.) But then we have
another question, which is the character of the
House 101 Lords. I want the Times and theme

gentlemen who are complaining of injustice to the
landed interest—l want them to give us some
explanation of this case. The whole mass of the
Lords is territorial. There are a few lawyers and
a few soldiers—(laughter)—and a few men who,
from one cause or another—but a most insignificant

number—are_put into that house little Connected

with the land. But nineteen-twentieths of them

are distincly-and closely connected with the land,
and that is the original reason, and the still ezbtaut

reason, why they find themselves in that house -at
all. (Hear, hear.) Now, I have asserted, and I
am prepared to contend against all corners, that the
House of Lords does represent that which is strictly
the landed interest of the country, not the agricul-
tural, not the farming, not the county population
interest, but the landed interest—the interests of
the great territorial proprietors; and if I wanted
an authority for it I might quote a member of that
house recently put into it, not because he is a
landowner, I presume, but because he is sup-
posed to have done in his time great service to
the party who made him a Peer. In a speech
made during the passing of the last Reform Bill by
Mr. Macaulay, now Lord Macaulay, I find this pas-
sage :—" Our decision (the decision of the House of
Commons) is the decision of the nation. The deci-
sion of their lordships can scarcely be considered
as the decision even of that class from which the
Peers are generally selected, and of which they
may be considered the virtual representatives—the
great landed gentlemen of England." Well, that is
what I have asserted—that the House of Lords was
intended to represent, and, I believe, does repre-
sent, with a considerable amount of accuracy, the
wishes, the prejudices, if you like, the opinions
of the great proprietors of the soil of the United
Kingdom, (Cheers.) Now, will any man dispute
with me on this point—that all the interests of this
country—a free country—have not equal rights to a
fair representation in, and to a fair legislation from
both Houses of Parliament ? And if the land have
greatly the preponderance in one, which nobody
denies, it has no right to assume to itself—and we
bid them beware in time—(cheers)—it has no right
to assume that it should have also a preponderance
in the other house. These discriminations lead a
good wayif people will but follow them. They lead
at any rate to the question of equal electoral dis-
tricts, which I have never mooted—(a laugh)—al-
though 50 newspapers in England have asserted
the contrary. (Hear.) They lead also to the ques-
tion of a constitutional change in the character of
the House of Lords—(hear)--a question which I
am not now about to discuss, and which is not now
before the public. In the first speech I made at
Birmingham I said the question you have to con-
sider in reforming the House of Commons is this—
whether the Lords and the great territorial pro-
prietors with whom they are allied, and whom they
represent—whether they are to rule the people of
England through the House of Commons, or whe-
ther the people of England are to rule themselves
through the House of Commons. (Cheers.) Now
let me toll you that this is not a question between
us the inhabitants of the towns and the rural popu-
lation. The inhabitants of the small counties are
the small freeholders who were the backbone of
the friends of freedom before the Reform Bill; and
the farmers themselves make no complaint
against what we are doing. The great proprietors
complain, it may be, but the people of the counties
have made no complaint. Why, how can they ?
Look at the political condition of the farmers ; to a
farmer an election is not the pleasantest time in the
world. (Hear.) Unfortunately we know it too well
that to study politics, to form conscientious convic-
tions, to have a desire to exercise his franchise
honestly for his country, is very liable to subject a
farmer to a supervision akin to martyrdom. Do you
think that the farmers will ever get anything from
what are called the representatives of the landed
interest ?If they ever get freedom—if they ever get
anything—economy of expenditure, fairness of taxa-
tion, repeal of game laws, shelter of the ballot—if
they get any one of those things, they will never
get them or get it through the members for the
landed paoprietors in the counties ; but they will
get it through the power and combination and re-
sources of the freedom•loving and freedom .earning
people of the towns and cities of the kingdom.
(Cheers.) Some years ago, as many of you know, I
took great interest in the question of the game laws.
I had a committee of the House of Commons upon
that question. We had examined before that com-
mittee many most respectable farmers. I had letters
from hundreds of them in all parts of the kingdom.
Do you believe that if the members for the counties
were the real representatives of the farmers—the
cultivators of the soil, do you believe that the game
laws, as they now are, would last for a single session?
(" No, no.") The farmer taking his farm, having it
stocked with, animals which he dare not touch by
the proprietor of the farm, and himself or his son
not able to walk about the very land for which he
pays a rent but he must be dodged by the suspicion
and the espionage of his landlord's keeper ? Why,
' if you talk to all the farmers now, there is not an
intelligent man among them but will tell you that
his interests and ours are precisely the same. He
was once deluded by his political landlords into the
belief that Protection was of value to him. Now he
knows—and that enlightenment has gone so far that
the county members themselves not only know, but
admit—that the repeal of the corn laws has been a
great blessing to everybody connected with the
land. (Cheers) The farmer knows—pursuing his
industry as we pursue ours—that he has the same
interest, the same desire for freedom, the same wish
for a light taxation, the same longing for economy
in the Government—that, in fact, there is not a
single thing which the electors or the populations
of the towns can fairly ask, or even do ask, but in
which the great bulk of the farmers of the United
Kingdom may not join with as much earnestness
and readiness as we ourselves. But with the county
members, so long as they represent the great pro-
prietors,-th6 ease is wholly different. They are the
ruling class; therrnake the government, they en-
joy the patronage,. and they profit by, the expendi-
ture. (Hear.) What do the sons of men in this
meeting expect to do in Rochdale ? Your manufac-
turers' sons becothe manufacturers ; those who have
shops in the town, according as their capital be
large or small, look to
.some industrial pursuit for
their children ; but the great landed proprietors—
they never look to Manchester, or to Leeds, or to
Liverpool, or to the City—l. mean the commercial
part of London ; but their yoga der sons look almost
invariably to the great depart ekts.and services of
the State, for which your 40 millions of taxes, be-
yond paying the interest of your debt, are e2cpended.
This is the great patrimony of the younger sons of
this class. (Loud cheers.) Let me tell the farmers
from this platform that there is not a man in all the
thousands that I have addressed during the last
three months, nor in all the hundreds of thousands
that have had the opportunity of reading what I
have spoken in the towns of. the north of England
—there is not a single man who would not hold out
his right hand to every farmer in the kingdom, and
say, " You are a son of industry as I myself am ;
you live in a country aiming to be more free; you
have an interest in a good and economical govern-
ment, in peace, just laws, and a happy people; be my
friend and brother for ever, and secure the blessings
for us all." (Great cheering) Now, I ask you, is this
great reform that we are discussing,—is it worth
the notice—is it worth the struggle which a people
must ever make to secure or to enlarge its freedom?
It is for the towns to decide this with such help as
the county populations can give them. lam told
that things are so comfortable that people don't
care about political reform ; but those people in the
west end of London, who walk from great houses
in Grosvenor-square to still greater houses in Pall-
m9.ll, they don't know all that is passing in the
minds of the people in Yorkshire and Lancashire,
and all the populous parts of the kingdom. (Hear.)
I have seen more persons met together within the
last three months than anybody else has. I know
the sympathy that has been expressed on this ques-
tion. I have seen the light, the fire in thousands of
eyes. I know that the people do care for this ques-
tion, and I know that they are sensible that they
have reason to care. Are we not the most industri-
ous people on the face of the earth ? Have we no

more steam-power, more perfect machinery, more
complete means of locomotion, more productive agri-
culture and manufactures, more of that which de-
velopes wealth than is to be found among any other
people of equal population or of any population on
the face of the globe? (Cheers.) And yet at this
moment, with all our boasted civilisation and free-
dom, I believe we have a greater number of paupers
than we have of electors. We bury every 20 or 25
years 1,000,000 of paupers, but there is always a
new crop, always a substratum of society-, deplor-
able, lamentable to contemplate, which hitherto we
seem to have been able to produce no sensible change
in, and that million of paupers is a very inadequate
representation of the suffering that exists. When a
man is once a pauper, when he gets rid of the feel-
ing of aversion to a state of dependence, when he
feels no longer that it is a position somewhat degrad-
ing, and finds himself secure of a living for the rest
of his days, it may be in the workhouse, it may be
in some hovel where he puts himself, and where

the guardians allow him-some out-door relief, he is
free from anxiety with regard to the future. But
leave the million of paupers, and cast your eye for
a moment on the million
,just above them, who have
not lost self-respect which makes a man contented
with pauperism, who have families and homes, who
have around them those dearest to them in life,
expecting from day to day at their hands their
daily bread, who have employment—it may be pre-
carious and small, and often inadequate wages—
who find themselves now a little more comfortable,
and again depressed and verging upon the very
brink of pauperism—imagine the suffering in those
families, imagine these men struggling—struggles
which we in other circumstances know nothing of
—then, I say, having formed an inadequate con-
ception of all this as the human mind can only
accomplish, let us ask ourselves " Why is it that
all this exists in this country, with our magnificent
power of production, with our ability to invite in
every clime under leavtn the surplus of every
people, to add to the luxury and the comfort of
every home in England ?" (Loud cheers.) Is it
Heaven that is in fault ? Has God forgotten to be

'.gracious ? Is it the Creator, omnipotent and bene-
volent ; or is it man, with his crimes and his blun-
ders, that has occasioned these evils ? Who have
been your rulers for generations back ? Who have
squandered your money ? Who have shed your
blood ? For whom have the people of England
toiled and sweated and bled for generations back—
and with what result ? Why, to be insulted now
in the year 1859, and told with a lordly arrogance,
that it is not fitting that they should be admitted
to the franchise in this kingdom. (Hear.) Why,
I am charged with stating unpleasant facts with
regard to the aristocracy of this country. We have
had them our rulers for long periods, and we see
the result. At least, if I have said anything against
them, they and their defenders have avenged them-
selves in the wholesale detraction which they have
passed upon the character of the great body of the
people of England, of whom they say that it is
not safe to give them the franchise, and that if
they had it England would be a country of tur-
bulence and violence, not of order and of peace as
we now behold it. (Cries of " Shame !") Now,
don't let us pursue the question of reform without
understanding that there is a result to follow from
it. If you want any great measure now, what is
the process for obtaining it ? You generally have
Ito contend for it up to the point of civil war. This
has become so much the custom in this country,
that the ruling class never believe that we are in
earnest until you get up to that point. Now, they
tell you the people don't care about reform. You
.don't find 100,000 men assemble on Newhall-hill, in
Birmingham—you don't find men assemble in vast
multitudes in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and
threaten that if the bill be not granted in the course
of a week's time they will be on their march to
London. Of course not, and I hope nothing of the
kind will Borne, for I hope nothing of the kind will
be necessary—(hear)—but the fact that they taunt
us with the absence of this is a proof that they are,
however unconscious of it, influenced by the notion,
and in fact by the knowledge, that no great thing
is ever wrested from the Government of this country
by the people, except it be at the point of violent
action. We are like subjects contending with a
conqueror—like the Irish Catholics contending with
the invading and subjugating Protestant—like the
Lombard, if it be so, contending with the Austrian,
When you got the Reform Bill you were within 24
hours of a revolution. When you got the Corn
Bill in 1846, you had the help of the most stupen-
dous famine that for many hundreds of years had
visited any civilised country of the world. And now,
if you want a measure, how do
.you get it ? Take
now the questions of minor importance. Take
Church-rates, for example, which is much more a
matter of sentiment than pecuniary importance to.
anybody. It is a mark of subjugation, and there-
fore we resent it—(cheers)--but for 20 years the
Church-rate question has been debated in the House
of Commons. The argument was as plain 20 years
ago as it is now; but the rate was not abolished.
Take, again, the question of the ballot. Imme-
diately after the Reform Bill the speeches in
favour of the ballot were as overwhelming in
point of argument as they have ever been
since. Nothing has exceeded the logic and power
of argument displayed by Mr. Grote upon that
question after the Reform Bill ; but the ballot is
not yet the law of the land. The House of Lords
and its three-fourths of the House of Commoni
vote, year after year, anything they like. There
may be an enormous majority of the people in
favour of any particular course, but you want a
majority which almost comprises the whole, with
your present distribution of members, to' carry any
great measure of reform in the House of Commons.
(Cheers.) Before Sir R. Peel repealed the Corn
Laws Mr. Villiers, I believe, never had the votes of
more than 100 members in favour of the repeal, and
yet everybody knows that, although 100 members
do not represent one-sixth of the House of Com-
mons, five out of six of the actual population of the
United Kingdom had long condemned the Corn
Laws. (Hear, hear.) This is a proof that we have
not at present a real representation of the people.
What we want is, not that you should transfer
great political power from the great landowners to
great merchants or great manufacturers, or to the
owners of great factories ; but that equally through
all parts of the kingdom, all interests, all opinions,
all wishes, should affect:the Legislature, that mem-
bers who sit in Parliament should feel that they
are not the members of any section, but of the great
body of the people ; and you would find that as
opinion grew and consolidated itself throughout
the nation, it would act gently, steadily, omnipo.
tently on the House of Commons. (Cheers.) In-
stead of our having to contend with our rulers as if
they were a foreign conqueror for every change,-we
wish we could find one soul animating the Parlia-
ment, the people, and the Crown,and the Government
would be stronger and more honoured, and the peo-
ple would be happier and more contented. (Hear.)
Now, I ask you, is it to be deemed a heresy to hold
these opinions and to preach this doctrine ? Is it not
rather to follow the labours of our fathers and to
complete their work ? Am I to be charged with
setting class against class when I wish to break down
the wall of partition by which classes are created,
and to make all Englishmen brethren before the
law and in the eye of the Constitution of their
country ? (Cheers.) What have been the objects
of my political life ? You, my townsmen, know it
perfectly well. (Cheers.) I call you as witnesses
on my behalf. (Protracted cheering and waving of
handkerchiefs.) I have laboured with an earnest
and successful band—with Villiers, and Cobden, and
Gibson and George Wilson, and many others
whom I cannot mention, but who live, and who
ever will live, in my remembrance. (Cheers.) I
laboured with them to give the people their daily
bread, and now 20 millions' worth of food finds its
way every year to your shores which but 14 years
'ago you weie .not allowed to speak of without being
charged with treason to your master class. (Hear,
hear.) I laboured with earnest men to strike the
stamp from newspapers, and to establish a free
press, and I am told-.that since the abolition of that
stamp 300 cheap newspapers have sprung into life,
conveying information on every topic every day to
almost every house in. the kingdom. (Cheers.) I
have striven, but I grieve to say without success,
that the precious earnings of the people, and their
still more precious blood, might not be squandered
by guilty statesmen in guilty wars, and now—con-
sistently, as I believe, witll4ll the past—l ask for
my countrymen that Which is the promise of their.
Constitution,—that they shall have a fair and full
representation in the House of Commons. (Cheers.)
It is a just demand. (Cheers.) I ask you_l ask
all my countrymen, to speak for it with no falter-
ing, with no uncertain voice. Speak, and you will
be listened to. Ask in tones that cannot be mis-
understood, and that which you ask will certainly be
granted. If you come of a great ancestry, as your
historians say you do, do not disgrace it now ; and
if you are, as you boast yourselves, the heirs of free-
dom, rise, I beseech you, and take possession of the
heritage that is yours.
The hon. gentleman resumed his seat amid loud
and continued cheering.
It was moved by Mr. HEAPE, and seconded by
Mr. PETRIE :-" That this meeting is of opinion that
the time has arrived when a large and comprehen-
sive measure of reform should be granted to the
people, and pledges itself to support Mr. Bright in
his endeavours to procure the passing of a Bill
through Parliament in the ensuing session which
shall secure to the people their just political
rights."
Mr. WILSON and Mr. Alderman LIVESEY also
addressed the meeting, and the resolution was
unanimously agreed to.
Mr. BRIGHT moved a vote of thanks to the
mayor for presiding, and the meeting concluded
about half-past nine o'clock.

MR. BRIGHT AND REFORN.

(From the Morning Herald.)
Few of Mr. Bright's ardent admirers could have antici-
pated that his great Reform Bill would be a nine day's
wonder, and nothing more; that the agitation inaugurated
at Birmingham by two aggressive orations on all our insti-
tutions, and carried with such vigour to the populous centres
of commerce, Manchester, Glasgow, and Bradford, could
turn out a mere flash in the pan I Who would have
imagined that the measure solemnly entrusted by the ad-
vanced Liberals, the veteran Roebuck, and the London
Reform Association, to the legislative care of the member
for Birmingham, would come still-born into light, and ere
the echoes which welcomed it into the world had died away,
be consigned to the limbo of disappointed hopes and abor-
tive schemes ? Yet such is the sad history of the Bradford
plan now chronicled in the catalogue of popular delusions
and frustrated designs. We speak not of ourselves, who
inserted the bill in one column and its sentence of condem-
nation in another, who pointed out the worm of nnfn.irness
eating at the vitals of the Quaker's gourd ; nor of the
slower utterance of the oracle of Printing-hour-square,
which, after three days' ominous silence, terminated the
suspense and perplexity of its tantalised votaries by charac-
terising the bill as "a gigantic fraud to be practised on one-
half., of the people for the alleged benefit of the other half
but of most of the Liberal papers, several of which declared
the project to be an attempt to make the factory chimns
the centres of political power—an attempt certain to mis-
carry, because the rest of the nation would not stand. it.
statelt boefctohimnegss. an iHnteowresctain wngr
aececuloauntiotnfo tro
the m
curiousqmrephhe
into this-
nomenon that the man selected by experienced members of
the House of Commons, and keen business men in London,
Lancashire, and Yorkshire, as most fitted to prepare a plan
for remodelling our representation,. should have failed so
utterly in his efforts at legislation As a Parliamentary
speaker Mr. Bright has won his way to the foremost ranks
in the Commons and the country; for fearlessness and
independence of character he stands pre -eminent ; the fierce
passion of his oratory moves ; his deep pathos melts •
his biting sarcasm wounds ; but there we pause' Successful as a speaker, he has broken down as a legislator'.
His barren triumphs as a demagogue cannot retrieve his utter failure as a statesman. Mr. Bright will continue to
be what he has been—a brilliant meteor, giving forth flashes
which dazzle for a moment, but affording no steady and
certain light—to be gazed at, but never to be followed.
Three months ago he was chosen as t 149 loader of the