The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-02-20 00:00:00

THE BALLOT.

Mr. GEOTE rose to move, ." that leave, be given to bring in a
bill for taking the votes of Parliamentary electors by way of
ballot." He did not ventore to imagine that he could bring
much new argument to a discussion of the subject,. but experi;
fence was a severe preceptress, and he hoped that members
fresh from the recent elections would approach the examination
of the subject with minds more candid and unprejudiced than
heretofore. It could not be denied that bribery aucrintimida-
trealWserious ev'rlas thet ti....a„,iateeted every vein and artery
of ent-e ective system; m.';(l t..-44rietie existing securities against
them were impotent and contemptible. A remedy was needed;
and what sew-n(1 remedy, what other measure of any promise
. or efficiency, hails ever beau proposed by those whose aversion
to the ballot was most unconquerable ? Since Lord John Rus-
sell's speech on the first day of the session, it had become com-
mon to couple the ballot with other measures of reform; but he
proposed the ballot simply and separately—not because he was
insensible of the advantages of an extended suffrage and short
parliaments, but because it would of itself remedy the grossest
abuses of the electoral system, and because it could be support-
ed by arguments belonging to itself separately and especially.
For three years the evidence taken before the bribery and inti-
midation committee had been on the table of the house; and
this important body of testimony was not left to stand alone.
Far example, the resolutions of the gentlemen who commenced
the Spottiswoode subscription declared, that freedom of election
was entirely subverted ialreland by intimidation. The speeches
of Mr. Taylor, who proposed the Tory candidate at Birming-
ham, of Sir George Clerk at Edinburgh, Lord Palmerston at
Tiverton, Lord Milton at Doncaster, and the charges of inti-
midation in tory newspapers against the great whig landlords,
all proved that the complaints of illegal interference with the
freedom of election were not confined to -one party, but were
made by tories and Whigs as well as radicals.
Mr. WARD rose to second the motion. He was awase of the
difficulty ofaddiog any new argument to those adduced by Mr.
Grote, who had so completely mastered and almost exhausted
the su!)..lect; and he should abstain from any remarks which had
note bearing on the practical part of the question. He called
iipOn Sir Robert Peel not to shelter himself under the silence he
obsei end under the two last discussions of the question. It was
admitted by his own supporters that gross abuses existed ; and
Sir Robert was bound to adopt the ballot or propose another re-
medy foi them. At present the franchise was a curse even to
the farmers, who gained it through the exertions of their friend
Lord Chandos. It was a fatal boon to the honest man who
differed in opinion from his landlord. The votes of the ten-
rtants were in all cases looked upon as the chattels of the land-
lords; and they were expected to veer round' when their land-
lords changed He then adverted to Lord John Russell's de-
claration against the ballot, as having strongle increased the
public feeling of its necessity, and reminded the house or the
speeches and votes in its favour, which had been made both by
ministers belonging to the cabinet, as Sir John Hobhouse and
Mr. P. Thomson, and by ministers not of the cabinet, as Sir
Hussey Vivian and Sir Henry Parnell. From these gentle-
men, and others who had expressed their opinions, the people
expected a plain answer on this question, ay or no; and if a
government opposition to it should be attempted, he must tell
the ministers that front that moment a new combination of parties
mast arise. -
Sir SIDNEY HERBERT very ably answered the speeches of
the mover and seconder. They had shown that a remedy was
wanted, but net that theirs was a remedy which would succeed.
He would even give to them, in addition to their own instances,
those of the Irish priesthood, and of the clubs or unions; but
still there was no proof iu favour of the remedy proposed.
Intimidation would not be .diminished; and, as to bribery, it
would be positively increased, because, as there would be no
pas, unless the corrupter were reaurrsed, very many would
willingly invest their money in a seat who would have declined
to spend the same sum upon an uncertainty. Gentlemen might
deride the nation that England was entitled to take a Lighor
tone of morality than other countries, and to repudiate, as lead-.
ing to meanness and falsehood, a mode of election which other
countries had already adopted ; but if we had not a right-to ex-
pect a higher tone here than is found among other states, our
free iciatitutions and religious education had been lamentably
thrown.a.way, There was a trust in each elector to be faith%
fully•diseharged; if the vote were a mere property, unaccom-
panied with trust, the voter would have a right to sell it. The
policy is to combine duty with interest, but the effect of the
ballot is topreate a regular system for the violation of duty by
perpetual falsehood.
Mr. CA VKN DISH, who opposed the ballot expressed his hope
that ministers would propose some other remedy for the existing
evils.

• 'Lord SANDON would be very desirous of co-operating with
her,,llajesty's government in any wise measure for the purpose,
ordliniuishing the existing amount of corruption and intimida-
tidn. The real•question, however, at present was whether the
remedy now proposed was not likley to produce a greater evil,
rotii:,,gentlemen 'on the tither side seemed to consider that the
essence of a man's political life and conduct was con-
tape,cl;_in his vote, and that by concealing his vote he might
co** his politiCal character. Had the ballot had that effect
itr„Ate: countries in which it had been tried—in France and
Armica fur instance? As.to Greece and Rome, those examples
bdWalAed to times too remote. We know little about them; yet,
airlr,as we could ascertain, it was apparent that in those states,
will secret voting, corruption and tumultuousness increased.
I ,e would ask, had the vote by ballot put an end to intimida-
tion,or produced secrecy in America ? He believed those Ame-
rican states which had not adopted secret voting, were as proud,
of their open voting, and had as much horror of secret voting
as we had. He said that neither in America nor in France had
the ballot been successful in producing secrecy; for in the for-
mer, President Jackson, four or five years ago, complained in
his message to congress of the corruption practised by the
United States Bank, which openly swayed the electors; and in
France it was notorious that the government exercised an ex-
tensive iftfluence upon the elections. Now he would ask were
intimidation and corruption in all cases retorted to for the pur-
pos of punishing or rewarding a man after he had given his
vote? Look at the Roxburghshire election, and see the treat-
ment which voters-received who had' not given their votes.
Those men were subjected to violence, because their opinions
were known, and, he would ask, would not men's opinions be
known before going up to the balloting box, as well as before
giving, their open votes ? At the time of the discussion on the
Reform Bill, gentlemen at his side of the house were taunted
because they were supposed to consider the franchise as a pro-
petty, and not a trust. Now he contended, in opposition to
the gentlemen on the other side, that it was a trust, end that
every man had a right to know how his neighbour exercised
that trust. Had they not themselves supported this view by
their conduct at the last election at Wolverhampton, at Liver-
pool, and other places, where they called upon the non-electors
to watch over the exercise of that trust. He hoped that we
should hakte a better remedy than the ballot for intimidation.
lie hoped we should have a moral remedy; and he thought he
saw strong symptoms of it amongst those who exercised the
influence which they possessed with so mucholelicacv—(cheers
and laughter from the ministerial side). Gentlemen opposite--
thought that " we" —whoever " we" were—ought to be always
in a majority, and that when they were left in a minority at
their elections, it must be owing to some undue influence. Hebelic...ted there was a general and growing feeling in the country
no! tu interfere with the exercise, of the franchise with any de-
gree of rudeness or roughness. He believed also that we might
extinguish corruption if, in regard to boroughs, we did not pro-
ceed to disfranchise whole communities ; but, by visiting the
penalty sti kilt? on the individual offender, raised a moral stan-
dard which would be a defence against the prevalence of the
.
practice. '
Lord S. RUSSE tr. said the evil, though ser;ous had been much
exa=e'rated. If the people had submitted to such wholesale
intimidation as Mr. Grote apprehended, the inference would be,
that the spirit of liberty was extinct in such a nation, and. that
no mechanical device would restore it. The admission that under
the'ballbt deceit was inevitable, and the accompanying attempt
to justify that deceit, gave hint a strong repugnance to the pro-
posal. He thought electors, like members and like ministers,
should exercise their functions under the public eye; and he
was glad that those who denied the franchise to he a trust had
not alarmed the country by setting up that doctrine at the time
of the reform bill, when the right of toting was taken away from
so many boroughs upon the very ground that the franchise was
not a property in the individual, but a trust for the public. The-
concession of the ballot would lead to further changes. The non-
electors, when they should find themselves excluded from the
view of what the electors were doing at the poll, weuld insist on
•he extension of the franchise to themselves.

At the close of Lord John's speech, confussion and noise
reigned paramount for a time. Several members attempted to
address the house, but the speaker was unable to procure a hear-
ing for them. In the course of the disorder, Mr. E. Rice, Mr.
Hall, Lord Worslev, Captain Pechell, and Mr. W. 0. Stanley
were understood to speak in favour of the motion; and Mr.
Slaney opposed it.
Sir ROBERT PEEL rose, and order was restored. He said that
the reason why he had not spoken recently on this question was.
that he had not changed the opinions he had expressed on three
several occasions since 1830, and that he was averse to going
over the old beaten ground. He certainly should not, however,
decline the contest invited by Mr. Ward. And, in opposition
to that gentleman, heat once plunged into an argument to prove
that the franchise was a trust as well as a right; that the two
were not incompatible; and that, because the voter was a trus-
tee for the public, he ought not to be allowed to vote in secret.
He maintained that the secrecy in the performance of a duty
was opposed to the habits and feelings of Englishmen—" You
are trying to engraft the principle of secret voting upon a coun-
try all of whose institutions are founded upon the principle of
free discussion and publicity. You are trying to introduce
amongst a people, whose manners, and habits, and feelings are,
and have been, alien to it, a system of concealment and secrecy;
and it is because I am fully convinced that this system of secret
voting is revolting to the fixed habits, institutions, and feelings
of the people, that I mainly object to the proposition of the
honourable member for London. Ido not deny that some evil
exists in the present system ; but, at the same time, I believe
that those evils have been grossly exaggerated. In the midst
of great excitement, and at a public election, where there is a
peculiar lat.- -h, where every appeal is
encouraged a feelings and interests of
the -vaters,v use of, andthreatsoffuture
vengeance ,ver intended to be carried

into actvij„c
inz teireo22t,
count 00,4
I not 9
lieve theotc,
The righ•Oti,
of future,'Ail

nstances in which wcupy-
of their holdingkon ac-
eir landlords are very rare.
f such a threat; but I be-
rare of its being enforced.
1 to show the probability
mgement, and secondly as

. r;
✓'

to the political and moral effect; and he quoted a sentence from
Pliny, very graphically descriptive of the wretched voter by
ballot—Poposcit tabellcu, styluni accepit, rapist condidit, neminern
verelur —se condemnat. lie showed that the measure had failed
in other countries; and he warned the house that as the ballot
was an encroachment on the charter of the reform bill, so in
three or four years other proposals would arrise to encroach
upon the concession of the ballot. `
After some further discussion, the house divided—
For the Ballot
Against it

Majority
The farther consideration of the report of the controverted
elections bill was postponed till the 7th of March.
The, exchequer b►lls bill, and the transfer of aids bill, went
through committee, and were ordered to be reported to-day.
The House adjourned at half past one o'clock.

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