The Sun.
London, England, 1859-07-01 00:00:00

nation from the change of Ministries may be of a
purely financial character. Well, let us see
whether we have at last hit upon the right con-
jecture. In what consists these presumeable
financial advantages ? In the reimposition of the
detestable Income Tax—or the substitution
of some other tax almost as objectionable ?
With this agreeable alternative before us,
the gain is obviously not in the department
presided over by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Possibly the yet undiscovered advantages relate
to the Colonial Administration ? Yet the notion
becomes preposterous to the meanest capacity upon
the instant—when it is borne in mind that by the
substitution of the Coalition for the DERBY Minis-
try, we run an imminent risk at the moment we
were preparing to witness the extinction of the
Hudson's Bay Company's monopoly, of seeing the
expiring charter of that Company renewed, and
the monstrous monopoly resulting from it thus

perpetuated!
Can the inscrutable gain relate to the still further
strengthening of our military and maritime arma-
ments ? Hardly—when General PEEL, being re-
placed at the War-office by Mr. HERBERT, and
Sir JOHN PAKINGTON at the Admiralty by the
Duke of SOMERSET, his Grace and the Right Hon.
Gentleman the Member for South Wilts are to num-
ber among their colleagues the ultra-economic peace.
at-any-price believers in the efficacy, under all cir-
' cumstances, of pure and simple and unarmed arbitra-
tion, the member for Rochdale and the member for
Ashton-under-Lyne !

The advantage, therefore, is clearly one not of
measures but of men. The national gains are these
—that we have Mr. LOWE as Vice-President of the
Privy Council for Education ; that we have Mr.
WILSON as Vice-President of the Board of Trade ;
that we have Mr. CARDWELL in lieu of Lord
NAAS as Secretary for Ireland—that the Duke
of ARGYLL is Lord Privy Seal in place of the
Earl of HARDWICKE—that Sir CHARLES WOOD 1S
now ruler of India instead of Lord STANLEY—that
Sir GEORGE C. LEWIS occupies at the Home-Office

the post filled successively of late by Mr. SPENCER
WALPOLE and Mr. SOTIIERON ESTCOURT.
Eureka! The problem is solved—the salvation
of the country depends in some mysterious manner
once more upon the country swallowing without a
qualm, and, as a panacea for all kinds of political
evils, the olla podrida of a new Coalition Govern-
ment.

The Quarter's Revenue for the quarter and year
ended yesterlay has been published this morning
in the usual official form, and exhibits a very satis-
factory statement. There has been an increase on

. £229,379
. 319,000
. 23,000

1

20,000
500

161,680

DECREASE.

£753,559

. £123,788
417,481

541,269

-hence this appeal. Every precaution seems to

have been taken to place the subject before him in
the least objectionable way. Noble lords don't
like Ballot Societies and Registration Associa-
tions with whom they have had inconvenient cor-
respondence before ; some gentlemen were there•

'ore selected to represent the wishes of the larger

part of the Liberal electors to his lordship, inde-
pendently of these societies, and that honest,
liberal, and highly-respectable citizen, Mr. SAMUEL
MORLEY, was made the organ of the committee.
All, however, was of but little avail, or rather
worse, for his lordship now seemed quite em-
boldened by the prospect of no opposition. At
the late election he did not think quite so badly
of the Ballot as he had before ; and at the election

previous, his brother CHARLES was employed at a
ward meeting to disseminate the notion that, after
all, Lord JOHN was not so much opposed to it

as might be thought ; but then, " a young man
from Northampton" threatened his flank ; it was
best to be prudent—to abide by ambiguities and
suggestions, if he had nothing better to offer.
On this occasion he had no opponent, felt quite

secure, and he cared neither for electors nor elec-
tors' arguments. He and PALMERSTON meant
to be decided on that question. Two-
thirds, or more, of their Parliamentary sup-
porters had Toted for it, and two of
those whom he has felt compelled to ask to join

his Ministry are out and out friends to it, but the

two Lords are as determined against the Ballot as
they once were against Church-rates, and will no
doubt have to change their determination on the
former subject, as Lord JOHN has been com-
pelled to do so openly on the latter. The truth is,
that plain common-sense matters like Church-rate
Abolition and the Ballot are understood but too

well by our governors ; they know that the people
have seen through them also long ago ; but they

will trade on evasion and on political accidents as

long as they can—indeed, they will do it till the
common sense out of the House will bear it no

longer, and sends up such majorities as they can
no longer resist.
Mr. MORLEY and his friends appeal to the
flagrant instances of bribery and corruption at the
last election, to the unquestioned case of a Peer
ordering his numerous tenantry to turn round in
South Durham, and their utter inability to resist
the order ; and—most conclusive of all, the argu-
ment from the lips of Lord JOHN himself—he had
distinctly stated on the hustings at the Hunting-
donshire election% that he wished for nothing more
than the unbiased decision of the electors in re-
gard to the Liberal candidate whom he proposed,
Mr. lIEATTIC CITE ; but that " the opinions of
electors being one way, foreign dictation had
been introduced to induce them to vote the other."
This was precisely the case which he had
declared when ejected from South Devon, would
induce him to propose the Ballot again, as he be-
fore proposed it to the Cabinet of Lord GREY. As
Lord Jon could not repudiate the testimony of
his own speech, and would not be inclined to deny
that the diminished Liberal majority at the last
election was caused by undue influences of all kinds,
honest Mr. MORLEY thought he had him now
fairly in his logical clutches.
But lords will bolt when they cannot argue.
The question was a very modest one—" Whether
the apprehended evils whiehhitherto, in your opinion,
have oVerbalanced the advantages of the Ballot, are
great enough to prevent an experiment being made
whether the Ballot will act as a preventive against
the enormous moral evils with which the late elec-
tions were attended."
To this rather long and gently phrased question,
Lord JOHN returns an answer—not himself, but
through a subordinate who " is directed to acknow-
ledge, &c., and that his lordship continues to be
of opinion that the evils of the Ballot would prove
greater than those which now exist." We are sure,
of two things—one that his lordship sin-
cerely thinks, as he says—the evils of
tenants voting, independently of their landlords,
and of rich men not being able to purchase Mary-
lebones on the one hand, and smaller boroughs on
the other, would, in the view of a Duke's son, be
tremendous evils. He might wish Mr. HEATH-
COTE to get in for Huntingdon, but he would
rather accept, as he was obliged to do, his failure,
than deprive all the Dukes throughout the country
of their power to coerce their tenants.
The second thing of which we are sure is, that
Lord JOIIN believes that the Ballot would unhorse
the Dukes, and all others who ride into power on
the backs of coerced electors, and our reason
is this—Mr. MORLEY'S letter asks for an
experiment of the Ballot, not for its universal
adoption. This Lord JOIIN evades. Why so ?
Why just because one experiment would be
the refutation of all his imaginary evils. In com-
mon with others, while we demand the Ballot
universally, we have yet often said give us at least
a few trials—make them where you like,—select
places like Harwich, Norwich, Cambridge, Notting-
ham, or any other where bribery is said to be in-
curable ; give us one or two divisions of some
county where there is most complaint of coercion,
or say Huntingdonshire itself, and let us try how
the Ballot will work amidst both bribery and coer-
cion. The evasion of this fair and honest demand
we must always hold to be a proof of the dishonesty
of the person who is guilty of it. It shows that he
believes the arugments of the friends of the Ballot,
and disbelieves those by which he would justify
his opposition. Lord JofiN believes that the Bal-
lot would repress bribery and intimidation ; but-
for that very reason he believes that it would inter--
fere with the reign of his order. And this is tho
Reform Bill Maker for whom we have turned out
men who could have got for us a ten-pound.
county and a six-pound borough franchise !