The Sun.
London, England, 1832-08-20 00:00:00

upon the Bridgewater election came to the
following resolution :—" That persons rated,
and not having paid their rates before
the day of election, the rates having
been legally demanded, and no fraud ap-
pearing on the part of the overseers, are dis-
qualified from voting ;" but subsequently the
Committee on the Shaftesbury election,
having heard argument on the question " whe-
ther persons rated, and not having paid the rates
before the day of election, the rate having been
legally demanded, and no fraud appearing on the
part of the overseers, were disqualified from
voting," came to the resolution that " this
Committee does not confirm the resolution of
the Bridgewater Committee." It has also been
decided that where a voter, upon a public notice,
paid one rate, and said he did not know that he
was two in arrear, the overseer promised to call
on him, but never saw him, and the voter hav•
ing tendered the money at the poll, the vote was
good. But, again, when a voter, having been
two rates in arrear, was rejected at the poll,
went, with others, to the house of the overseer,
who was in bed, and offered the rates to the
wife, who declined taking them, upon which
the money was left on the shelf, and the voters,
having returned to the poll, were admitted, the
Committee struck the votes off as bad. In the
case of " Cullen v. Morris," tried in the King's
Bench in 1820, it appeared that Mr. Cullen
tendered his vote for Mr. Hobhouse (the pre-
sent Secretary-at-War). It was objected, that he
had not paid his poor-rates for three quarters of a
year preceding. On the objection being take❑ he
went away, and on the 27th called upon the
collector, and paid the amount of four quarters
of a year poor-rates, there being only three
quarters then due ; after which he again tendered
his vote, which was rejected. It appeared in
evidence that the collector had made application
at his house for the rate on two different days,
but (lid not see him, and left no written memo-
randum of the object of his visit, nor (lid he
make at any time a personal demand. It was
also admited that, whenever he had previously
applied to him for the rates, the plaintiff had
paid them, unless he happened to be particu•
larly engaged. Afterargument heard upon those
facts, the judgment of Chief-Justice Abbott
(now Lord Tenterden) was, that " Mr. Cullen
had a right to vote ;—he paid rates for some
years befbre, and no personal demand was made
upon him, or any paper left at his house to say
that his rates were in arrear, though a demand
might have been made at his house, of which he
was ignorant." These are only a few of the
cases which prove the uncertain state of the law
as to the disqualification of scot and lot voters by
non-payment of rates. We have quoted them
merely to show what a labyrinth of litigation the
Attorney-General opens to scot and lot voters
when he refers them to the " old law." We say
that the Reform Bill ought to have been so
framed as to set those disputed points at rest ;
but never was there a Bill, involving great prin-
ciples, that was inure clumsily framed, or worse
managed in the details.—Morning Herald.

The hardship of being called upon to pay
rates, and the excellence of insolvency as a qua-
lification to vote in borough elections, continue
to occupy much of the attention of the most
thinking people in Wapping and Tothillfields.
The intelligence of the metropolis manifests itself
in the usual way ; meetings are called, speeches
are made, resolutions are adopted ; the majesty •
of the many assumes a sturdy attitude of resist-
ance, such an attitude as practice has rendered
familiar to the Honourable Members for Essex
and Hull. The orators of the million scarcely
know whether, for this untoward event, they
should blame their own folly or the faithlessness
of their allies. This only is clear, that the finan-
cial statement of the new constituencies is as
unsatisfactory as that of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, and that the electors of the first
Reformed Parliament have conceived a most
unfortunate fondness for the beauties of the fruc-
tifying system. Finsbury frowns, with her hand
upon her purse-strings, and the Tower Hamlets
shout, with ancient Pistol, " Base is the slave
that pays !" It is very amusing to remember
that from the blame of this outrage upon popular
rights the Tories are well shielded. In the
blunder or the trick which, in the belief of Co-
lonel Evans, has made the Reform Bill practi-
cally a dead letter, and turned Manchester into a
sort of overgrown Old Sarum,:the Tories at least
had no share. No Sugden deceived on this
point, by a professional subtlety, the unsuspect-
ing simplicity of Lord Althorp. No Wetherell
wr ui) wrung an
of Lord jocohinicesio sn from
Russell.
the
The mo-
deration
pro-
vision
effctsbeythehaveben
Whigse
was
ofwhii)crio) jetcit'eedand
terrible
applauded by the Radicals, and it be-
longed to that part of the great measure
which the country received with the most clamo-
rous delight, which to attack was blasphemy,
and to amend profanation. There are many
who upon this occasion give our Ministers credit
for a marvellous ignorance, and there are many
who give them credit for an ingenious fraud.
For ourselves we believe that they were perfectly
prepared, when this part of the Act was framed,
for the manner of its operation. They feared,
as their adversaries feared, the undue infusion of
the democratic influence, which, for the securing
of a brief popularity and the fulfilling of an ill-
advised pledge, they were about to pour into
the Constitution. They narrowed, therefore,
by every means in their power the limits of the
original grant. They insisted upon the pay-
ment of all arrears of landlord's rent as part
of the voter's qualifications ; and this they
were compelled to abandon. They pro-
vided for the continued occupation of the same
premises as necessary to the voters qualification ;
and this they were compelled to abandon. They
proposed that a half yearly reservation of rent
should be essential to the voters qualification.
Poor Mr. Gregson ! lie could never make the
innocence of the Cabinet comprehend the extent
of such a change. But this, too, they were com-
pelled to abandon. There remains yet this one
security against the evil, we apprehend, that the
voter, lor some time previous to the period at
which he claims to be registered as a voter, must
have borne his share of the burdens of his parish.
The day of registration was well chosen as the
day on which the claims of the parish must ap-
pear to be fully satisfied. We know well by what
means, in the hubbub of a contested election,
the rates are paid up, which nothing but the
flags, and the feasting, and the drinking, and
the drums could have drawn from the pockets
of the electors. On the day of registration
there is none of this intoxicating display ; and
the candidate is not so certainly ready to smooth
the difficulties of disbursement, and assist a
worthy citizen in the discharge of the duties of
his citizenship. There is a hope, therefore, that
under the Reform Act, as it now stands, our
registers may include the honest householder,
who pays his rates because his rates are due,
and exclude the zealous partisan, who pays them