The Sun.
London, England, 1818-12-31 00:00:00

LITERARY REVIEW.

REFORM 'WITHOUT INNOVATION ; or, CURSORY
THOUGHTS on the only practicable REFORM of PAR-
LIAMENT, consistent with the existing Laws, and the
Spirit of the Constitution.*

As this is the age of political speculatio
democratical clamour, tending to the danger of
destroying THE CONSTITUTION, under pretence of
reforming it, we feel it to be our duty to drAw the
attention of our Readers to this interesting and
valuable Tract. We took notice of it some time

ago, and extracted a part of its contend but,
not to break the chain of its reasoning, we. now
deem it proper to present the whole to the Public.
It was written by a Gentleman independent in mind
and fortune, whose sole objects are the pOrity of
Parliament, and the consequent welfare and hap-
piness of the People. The. only Reform of Par-
liament that ought really to be adopted, is-a strict
adherence toTHE LAW as it stands, and as it is fully
explained, illustrated, and demonstrated in the
work before us. The Author has supported his
principles, sentiments and; counsels, with so much
strength, perspicuity, and good sense, that we
have only to refer the Reader to the Tract itself.
Convinced that it ought to be circulated
throughout the Empire at large, and read by all
people, in hider to put an end to delusive• theories,
impracticable projects, and ruinous innovations,
we shall print an additional number of our
Papers this day, earnestly tecomn►ending the
Work to the attention of Ministers, whose duty
we conceive it to be to use their influence in

promoting the diffusion of it to ail quarters,
in order to enlighten every class of the com-
munity, on a subject so important, and
as it may convince them of the fully, as well as

the danger, of listening to the specious pretences,
insidious sophisms, and clamorous demands for
Annual Parliaments and Universal Suffrage.

" The public mind being at this moment great-
ly agitated, ou account of certain abuses, gene-
rally uttderstootl to have taken place in the ado&
nistration of certain departments of the State, it
has been thence concluded, 'that a considerable
portion, not to say the whole, of the evils com-
plained of, has arisen from a defective representa-
tion of the democracy in the lower 1-louse of Par-
liament ; and a general outcry has been conse-
quently raised, in almost every part of the king-
dom, for such a reform in that representative
body, as shall bring it as nearly as Erosible to,
what is termed, the true and genuine Spiro of the
British Constitution. To this cod various dis-
cordaot,and impracticable plaits have been at dif-
ferent periods proposed,' most, it not all, of
them deemed by the more sober and enlightened
part of the commouity completely wild and
vi-
sionary ; unadapted, as well to the present con-
dition of things, as to the existing circumstances
of the times; and so far front being applicable to
the remedy of arty abuses, supposed to exist,
as demonstrably to bring with them much greater
mischiefs than those they are proposed to remove.
One speculator in this line is for universal suf-
frage ; so that every male, from a certain age up-
wards, shall have a voice at the election of his
department ; another is for the opening of all
boroughs generally, not ouly to their residents,
but their neighbourhood within certain limits; or
without any limits at all, but those of the county
in. which such boroughs chance to be situated ;
another, for doing away- the boroughs altoge-
ther, and transferring the elective rights to the
counties at large, &c. &c. In a vvord, to de-
tail all the plans of all the different projectors
on this subject would alone occupy a volume
of no inconsiderable rnagni, tide ; suffice it there-
fore to say, that they all appear, to the cool and
reflecting mind, rash and impracticable in the ex-
treme ; and not a single one of them more likely
to suit the fancies of the other Reformers, who,
Llthough looking to the same professed end, are
yet eager to proceed to it by far different routes,,
than the present existing state of things, under
all its pretended circumstances of abuse and mis-
management. With respect to the supposed cor-
ruption of Parliament, partly attributed to the
influence of the Crown, and partly w the Borough
System, an unprejudiced and consiutrate mart
would naturally say„, first ascertain the facts on
which you found your conclusions, and do not
lay down premises which may be afterwards de.
monstrated to be fallacious, and then -argue from
them as if they were proved. -Let it be in the
first place considered, that the Crown having the
disposal of animmense revenue, dispetseil through
every department of the State, must necessarily,
and in the very nature of things,. have a consider-
able influence over those departments, in. ail their
several branches : and, in what manner, if it be
deemed an evil, such evil can be remedied, must
remain with the proposers of Relorrn to suggest.
Would they annihilate the revenue and resources
altogether ? or* throw the direction of them into
the hands of the aristocracy, or democracy ? or
how else would they dispose of them ? ‘Vithin
no very long space of time, restrictions have been
laid upon the Royal Prerogative, and various de-
scriptions of people disfranchised of their rights,
either to sit in Parliament, or to give their voices
fur Representatives in it, on account of their
supposed connection with the inirnediate servants
of the Crown ; and had not the increased Reve-
nues of the State occasioned a proportional in-
crease lii the number of those employed in their
collection, as well as of those through whom

4' If this most interesting Tiact should excite that. atten•
tion in the Public to which it is so well entitled, and there
should be an increased demand for our Paper, we shall deem
it our duty to reprint it in a future numberf conceiving that
we can hardly fill our columns with matter hetter calculated
to quiet the minds of the People, and to ht smote the interest,
of the Country.

Reremtcs are disrensed, the 'Crown hail at
this moment possesced any influence at
1111 ; (lope at !east in any degree adequate to the
i!ein4MlS ot strictly constitutional necessity. Voi*
'it should he considered, that without a certain
portion of influence on the part of the Crown, the
puldic husiness could not be carried on, probably
'is,►r a single day ; but the state engine, with all
its nice and complicated machinery, would fall in-
to confusion at (nice.

" With regard to the Borough system, it seems
the twural and necessary consequence of the or-
dinary progress of human affairs, that certain parts
of a great eommonity should mount io tile scale
of population and opulence, whist others pro-
portionally sink in it ; and if every ri!y, town,
and boroogh, in the kingdom, were to have their
chartered and representative rights done away,
the moment their commerce, their In anulactilie!,,
or other s:otrees of population and opulence be-
g-a,l to decay, there would be no eint ro such
bottees in the municipal bodies of the state ; as
mast in that case be for ever necessarily va •
ryme. according to the ever varying coedHoo of
oe did. I Ilt 1,0,5, 1 Ildepen'enilv these Ir0!t-
Sifkriti(lllll, \Odell cannot tad to have their weight
with every thiuking man, is it peastoialde to
seppose, that AO assembly, so constituted
the lowa, House 01" Parliament now is, woold
solimit, without the compulsious of external
filet., to any such extraordinary modes of Rea
fin it, as either of those above alluded to,
I.y which one moiety of its at the
It , would he immediately deprived of their
seats, and • with them of the ;;seater part of their
personal consequence ; and the other moiety be
rtii.!.'rsal :he absolote slaves of a wild Democracy,
• out `a rower of judeiog, or acting, for them-
selves ; hot he compelled, like pwee's, to play
such parts in the political drama, as teoin week
to week, and from di'.y to day, shoeld be arbi•
trarily assigned to them by their Constituents
any 'reflecting mind he wined for one mo-
ment to this view 01 the, subject, sod the to-
tal impracticability of such. a measure, without
soelr' others of extern:if compulsion-as should tend
to overturn en't'ry part of. the -eXiST Colit,titil-
tioo, must he sullicteolly apparent to mender re!l
other seatemeuts, awl all other aratonents on the
• otmccessary, Whit then, it will Ise said,
remains to be done, or attempted, with any,pro-
handily of success Various abuses are sappos•
eti to haae b,To discovered, which demand a re-
nte,ly, god if those who have been guilty of them
Will not apply it, either the people must take the
power into their own hands, or some conciliatory
Measures be adopted by those who possess that
rotor, ellcol!ted to anteliwate future prosiest.,
Old to afford a gort of earnest to the people, that
the unauthorized commission of such supposed
•abuses will hereafter be tarovided against. This,
itf ti,e loonble opinion of the writer, is no other-
• to he oracticarly 'effec'ed, than by rendering.
the lower House of l'arliament as respectable as
the spirit of the existing Laws and Constitution
of the Conotry will admit of, without abandon-
ine first principles, or exciting any violent, con-
vidsion in the-State. And this every one most al-
low to he desirable in the highest degree, though
low to be effected may no: be so immediately an-
parent. The very short and simple plan the
writer has to propose trill, he humbly submits,
ontie the Gordian knot, and solve the diflienity at
once ; not only without altering the spirit Of a
single existing law, but merely by a strict miller-
ence to, and enforcement of, the genuine prin-
ciples of those already in existence ; the spirit of
which has been shamefully violated, equally to
the evident dishonour of the representative and
the just dissatisfaction of the constituent bodies.
A violatiou,,..by which in (lit ect contradiction, or,
at least, evasion, of one of the Plainest, and most
clearly expressed Acts which the Legislature of
this Coutatry ever framed, the lower House of
P4tdiameot, instead of being constituted of indi-
viduals, each and all of them possessing a certain
defined stake in the great national interests, is be-
come an asyhtm for men of ruined awl desperate
ftirtunes, who seek their seats in it at any expense
of bottom., or money, or other means within their
teach, for the purpose of sheltering themselves
from the defratids of their just creditors 4(', and of
obtaitting besides a chance for their share in the
general scramble, according to their several mea-
sures of talent, or want 01 principle, which chance
too seldom turns tip a blault, if welt snpported by
both those constituent parts. Perfectly aware
that ioviolabilify of person is absolutely essential
to the ireedom of Parliament, the writer would
be one of the very last to propose i•ti infringe-
ment in the most distant' way ; so far indeed is
any such intriugernent front his intention, that it
would be the warmest wish of his heart, that
every member should not only be free in his per-
son (so far as is necessary to the execution of his
functions), but be equally. 'so in his
thoughts, and his actions, and alike respectable
throughout, in his coutluct, hit character, and his
situation. This the writer, upon the best founded
conviction, not only believes., but knows may he
done by a rigid adherence to the sense and spirit
of the Q,:aliiicatioti Acts, as they nowt stand—By
the Act of the 9th of Queen Anne, Chap. sth, it is,
for the better preserving the freedom and consti-
tution of Parliam6u, enacted, that `no persou
shall bc capable to sit or vote as a member of the
House of Commons, for any Cou4aty, City, Bo-
rough, or Ciolue Pot t, within that part of Great
I;iitsin called England, the Dominion of Wales,
and Town of Ber tt iek-upon-Tweed, who shall not
have an estate, freehold, or copyhold, for his own
life, or for some greater estate, either in law
or equity, to and for his own use and bene-
fit, of or in lands, teosutents, and heredita-
tnents, over and alcove What Will satisfy
fool clear all incombrances that may affect
ae sans, lying or being _within that part' of
Great Britain called England, the dominion o:
\Vales, and town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, of
the respective animal value hereafter limited, vi-
delicet, the annual value of ,six huodied pounds,
above rept ises, for every Knight of a Shire ; and
anuttal value of three hundred hounds, above
reprisk-s; for every Citizen, Burgess, or Baron of

* An ipstance hao. r:Tently occurred, where a party, actually
in prison, ;40e,ur,i himself to he elected., and thus obtained
Lip culaocipriiion and !mute protection, with that money
tt otlit • have been applied in satiifactitin of the dc-
in4;ALIA of his CA tditors.

the Cinque Pottts ; and that if aeny person; Who
shall be elected or returned rose• ye in any Par-
liament, as a Knight of the Shire, or as a Citi-
zen, Burgess, or Baron of the Cinque Ports,
shall not, At the time of such election and return,
be seized cif, or entitled to such an estate, in
tenetnents,.or hereditaments, "as for such
Knight-, 'or for such Cit izen, Burgess, or Baron,
respectively, is hereinbefore required or limited,
such election and return shall he void,'
" in -order the better to insure the observance
of the above statute, another Act passed in the
33d of thelate King, chap. 20, by viticla, after
teceing the former Act, it was enacted, that
order to enforce and tender the said Act more ef-
fectual, every person who shall be elected a
Member of the House of Cntmoons, shall, be-
lose be presumes to vote in the House of Com-
mons, or ,it there during any debate in the said
of Commons, after their Speaker is chosen,
produce and deliver in to the Clerk of the said
House, at the table in the middle of the said
House, end whilst- the Home of Continuos i•-;
there duly sitting, With their Speaker in the chair
of the suid House, a paper or account signet' by
every such Mentherecontimining the name or [lames
of ti.e parish, township or precinct, or of the se-
veral parishes, townships or precitirts, and also
of tire county, or of the several counties, to
which the lanes, leo:mews; or hereditaments do
lie, whereby he makes our his qiielifiration, 4e-
clariog the same to be of the annual value of six
hundred pounds above teprises, it a Knight of a
Shire; and of the annual value of three hundred
pounds above reptises, a Ci'tzen, Burgess, or
Baron of. the Coopme Ports ; and shall also, at
the same time, take and subscribe the oath therein
set fold) to verify the fact.'
'' By tl:e second section of the las' no'ntioned
act, the election of persons precutting Co act with-
out being so qtralitied, is declared to be void.—
Now it should he observed, that the quantum of
this q ial•fieation was fixed in times, when money,
by it, proportional scarcity, was in fart entt,l, in
teal valise, to three or ftter times the saute .tioam-i-
-nal atoottot in those we live in ; so that a fair
demand might perhaps be made by the people for
its proportional increase; hut as that would he
attended with various difficulties, as to the precise
aseetteiemsnt of the now; propottional equivalent,
time writer, whose sole object is to attain much,
or at least as much as he thinks at all necessary,
at the smallest possible expellee, coosentS to Vt'alVe
that consideration altogether, and content hint-
self simplywith thespiri- of the law as it now stands;
the evasion of which is notoriously, and every
day, practised without the ainallest -notice what-
ever. Alen without a single foot of land in the
world, without a single gitinee they can justly
claim as their own, borrow qualifications as they
'purchase 'scale in Parliament, and frefluently of
the very same parties ; the- turoishing a qualifi-
cation being made a specific part of the contract
for the seat. Now to do away this evasion eito-
gether, and relider the Representative at least as
indepeodent as he professes to be, and ought to
he, the writet's proposal is, that every qoulifica-
lion, whether real or hotrowed, shall remain
lial le to the demands of the Member's creditors,
dating the whole petiod of his sitting in Parlia-
ment ; instead of its being lent, as is frequently
the case at present, for tour end twenty houra,
for the mere temporary purpose of enabling the
Alleuther to take his seat, and to be then returned
to the teal owuere—hi other words, if a person.
really choose to accommodate a Member with
a qualification, let hint do it at the peril of be-
ing liable,. to that Membet's debts. In order
to avoid all possible inconvenience, respect-
ing duubtfol or disputed demands, the writer pro-
poses, that the claims of creditors should not at-
tach, or become a lien upon time qualification, un-
til a judgment shall have been actually recovered
at law for the ;mount ; anti that immelliately af-
ter'the recoidiug of such jodgment, the member
should have three months time given him to tar-
nish an additional, or new qualificatiote; so that
he should at all tones possess a clear unincumbered
qualification to the stipulated legal amount, while
he sits. in Parliament ; anti in detatilt thereof,
that his seat should become, ipso facto, and irre-
vocably vacated.. By this simple measure, with-
out any inooset ion on, or substatoial alteration
ot, the-existing laws, the end anti object of those
at present in force, for desiguating cite qealifira-
lions of Representatives, would be preserved ; and
every ruined, or much-incronbered illdlVjdUal, ice-
stead of seeking refuge from the claimer of his
fair Creditors in the House of Commons, would,
from the publicity of the measure, fly from it, as
from plagmte, pestilence, and famine ;' and the
body at large, thus purified, become at once time
most mespectable, and the most respected too, of
any that bistro), has handed down to us in the
annals of the world. Every 'days: e would then
lots'e a teal stake in the political game, and not
be !table to be driven, by persoual distress, into
measures injurious to his country, and eiisho-
noorrible -to himself. The writer is well as are,
that so moderate and plain a mode of reform, as
is here proposed, cannot hit the tastes of all alike,
The Crown and Anchor Reformers will probably,
on the one hetid, consider it as nothing ;
_a mete
drop in time ocean of corruption, which could
twit:ter purify its waters, or alter the course of i,s
current ; whilst the men of ruined and desperate
fortunes,"now basking in the sunshine of Repre-
seotative immtinity, would piociaitn it one of
the most visionary, impracticable, and inefficieto
schemes ever submitted to time consideration of
the public. Visionary, however, and ineffi-
cient as it may appear, nothing can he more
easy Than its execution ; and nothing more
certain and salutary Omens its effects. With-
out either abetioe or infringing the spirit of
any existing law, the Representative Body would
thus be at once purged of its most objectionable
and destructise parts; and new life aud vigour, in
consequence, be restored to winterernains. Every
individual occupying a seat in the Lower House
of Parliament wouid- then be, in eirenmstaileee,
at least, of some itidejeendence ; and whatever
germ: at eon opr ion might be discoverable'in him,
moat be co-existent with his oasurel frame and
coestoutioe ; and not derived from the circum-
staeces of exterior' situation. It will be asked,
perhaps, how, in such titnes as the present, when
the prices or every article, essential rot only to
the comfort*, but even the necessities of

have expel ie need so ittimoderate and dispropottlone
ed a rise, could the possession of a clear three
hundred, or six hundred pounds a .year, place a
matt beyond the reach of corrupt influence ? The
all/11ver is, that, though it might not do so wholly
(which pt obably might be the case),' yet would it
he well worth the experiment ; fur surely one
possessing either of those incomes, or the tunic-
ty, or even the quarter of theme " above re-
prises.," would stand upon mach more respectable
grooml than another, who does not posse” any
income at. all, and is induced, by that Yet y cir-
cumstance, to seek an asylum in Parliament front
the just demands of his creditors. The former
May 'prove, it is true, a". very dishonourable and
unworthy member of society ; hut the latter, al•
most necessarily, is before he would aspire
to a seat in Patliament, on the grounds, and for
the purpose stated ; -and, should any spark of
honour lurk !wept. in his frame, is liable to have
it extingoishtd by the eel first drop from the
phial of temptation that is poured upon it.
How many individuals do we not know tinder
this degradiug predicament ? f 1 tw many
finis c! wider the cloaks of patriotism, and pre-
teoded 'Leo' for the rights of the people,
who are themselves the grevest enemies to
those rights, by an equal disregard of their
honour, and the claims of those who have
ju,t dem audi 'on them? Ilow-malq, on the oilier
hand, become the most active and mischievous
creatures of ;Ministerial influence, horn the same
degra,!ing 1111,1 dishonourable motives ? West men,
betore they courted seats itt Pailiameot, to place
themselves in a clear and indepeodent situation,
and be enabled to enter that respectable assembly
with erect coelyemoices, and say,' ' We claim
our sears bete as chosen itqieseutatives of. the
People, to deltaic) their rights, ati l nialifiain 'Our
; bete ale Our COLS, 10 that property
SO' kites our legal Tialtficalioos—assaiL them
who may, -we stand-at all rime's 011 -oar defence,
perfeetly cowcious that.ottr ',Wore involves the
ot that situation which we have beet'
mot., ambitious en outaioing.' How trally
te-
sliectable would an assembly of such Rept esen-
tat i es render themselves, not merely in the eyes
of their Constituents, but of the world at l'zrge;
and, what is more than all the rest., in theieown?
lostead of heit;g pointed at, as is now frequently
the case, with the finger of scorn, as substat.iolly
aliens horn that community whose rights they are
bound to protect ; us fugitives from law hod jus-
tice, under the shadow of_ privilege, and shelter-
' log tbetliselves under the meanest evasions, for
the basest anti most criminal of pUrposes, they
would then become the true ant! fair Representa-
tives of the Peolde who elected them, with no
other bias to betray their trust, than what might
he referred to the failings of our common nature,
to the total eradication of which no human
insti-
turit,tls can apply. Titus. by a simple adherence
to the spirit of the existing laws, hich had their
origin both in reason aod expediency, anti were
Dever yet evaded even in letter, withoot the vir-
tual breach of O so/man oath, would the supposed
tects in the representative body be at once reme-
died, so far as (lie Constitution permits, without
a deteliction of tights, or principles, on the one
hood, or a forcible iovasioo of them on the
oilier. The Representative would thus be rep.'
tiered respectable ; and the Constituent 'content,
at least to all reasonable Proposes, and to the full
satisfaction of every reasonable mind: for he who
expects that any plan could be formed, or hint
suggested, that should equally meet the otjeets
alit wishes of all parties, would he just as' weak
as the countryman of &sop, who attempted to
adjust the Managemeht of his beast conformably
to the advice of every passenger ; aud with as ra-
tional a hope, as to the ultimate result, as the other
of klorace,'who
ltustieas exoectat dam deibiat ;minis, at ins
" Lit,itur, et I ibeiur in mune voluyis worm."