The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-01-29 00:00:00

CONTEMPORARY PRESS.

Never, per'haps, in the history of legislation was there •
so signal a failure aS the Mlnicipal 'Reform Bill. The
inhabitants of the various cities and town* have, already
found its effects in the increase of the local debt; and the
consequent in-crease in the local taxation. The ministers,-
have discovered its inelliciency for the purpose they .had •
in view in concocting it—the promotion of
.their elec-
tioneering. influence ; and now. the individual of their
body who proposed it to parliament sees not only that.the
bill is useless bat .that it is mischievous,--aod mischiev7
ons on a point that he had thought of sufficient impor-
tance to be battled with the House Of Peer;:.
It will reeollected that when the lords atnended the
clause g,ivin.,r4o the new-corporations the power to ap-
point magistrate% because they thought such, a power,
was,ari infiringement of the royal prerogative,Lord John,
Ittissell act oa.ly lost Ins temper. He did not feel it prd-
dkt; inct4ed; to oppose* the. Amer-anent introduced by
the Upper House, by which the Secretary-of State• was
with a vero;.wherrthe lists of ma,ist rates should
be presented to hith.;• but he made a declaration to the
effect that he world riot interfere with the choice of the
reformed town councils. How wretchedly, then, must
the bill work, when even Lord John—with this ,avowed
predetermination to be partial—finds himself under the
necessity of virtually admitting himself to have been
wrfiriZ• Yet such is the fact. We learn froM the Leeds
Integigencei• that when the list of Magistrates nominated
by the new corporation of that borough • was sent up to ,
his lordship he was so surprised at seeing- none of the
names (with two or three exceptions) that he had been.
accustomed to, as those of the leading and influential
men of the town, that he felt obliged to interfere. He
wrote to the mayor to desire a particular statement of the
professions or trades of the parties recommended, their
position in society, and their "standing" in the borough.
What will now he thought. of the jod,ment of the men
who in their wild adMiration of the intelligence and dis-
cretion of the new town councils, were anxious to make
over to them a portion of the prerogatives of the crown ?
What of the -consistency of Lord John Russell, in de-
claring at one time that the revision of the corporate no-
minations should, as far as depending on him, become a
dead letter, and then taking an early opportunity of ob-
jecting to their choice? And what will be said of the
"Reform" that has given power to a class of persons who
have exercised it in such a manner as to call forth the re-
hictant censure even of our revolutionary ministers?
Surely we do not exaggerate when we call the Muni-
cipal Corporations Bill a lamentable failure. It is a mea-
sure from which we can anticipate only one good conse-
quence—if the House of Commons be not wilfully blind
it will be warned by the present example not to extend
the. same mischievous system to any other part of the
king's dominions.—Morning Post.

ROMANCE OF REAL LIFE.