TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE SCHEDULES.
IN framing. the Reform Bill, it seems to have 'oeen the wish of Mi- nisters to stick as close- asTossible to the old system—to make no alteration which was not absolutely neoess,ary_to give the country a thermic, h practical reform, and noth.Mg more. It was in t his spirit that they adhered to the distinction of town representation and country repres,.ntation,—a distinction which had :Is origin in.the peculi- arities of society at the period when the pri3ciple of rpresentation was introduced into Parliament : and in the same spirit they de- termined to disturb the existing relations between the town and the counlry as little as possiblo. If it had heen possible to create for the different boroughs in Schedules A and B a town constituency, adding to each one parish or any number of parishes, none of these boloughs would have been disfranchised. It was evident, however, that by such an arrang&ment we should not secure a number of boroughs either dependent or independent, but a num- ber of small counties. It was this consideration, then—namely, the impossibility of procuring, not a country constituency, for by tra- velling to a sufficient distance that might have been got, but atown constituency—that led to the condemnation of one set of boroughs and the reduction of members in another set. In drawing the line as to boroughs where a constituency was not procurable at all, and as to boroughs where a constituency sufficient to justify the ap- propriation of two members was not procurable, it was found that 2,000 included all, or nearly all, that could be fairly reckoned in the former class ; and that 4,000 included all, or nearly all, that could be fairly reckoned in the latter class. As we observed last week, there is no magic in these numbers. If Aldeburgh and its companions could not have been included within the line of 2,000, as it is contended that, by the returns of 1831, they cannot, then 2,500, or some higher line, must have been chosen. In a word, the present line was drawn, not because it was impossible, under any circumstances, for a borough of 1,999 inhabitants to furnish a fitting constituency to elect a member of Parliament, but because, in fact, no borough in England, rated in the population returns of 1821 at 1,999 inhabitants or less, does, at this moment, furnish such a constituency.
The difficulties which Ministers have to combat, in establishing the principle of disfranchisement, arise entirely from the selfish- ness and cavils of their opponents. Would the Commons sit down
in justice and good faith to regulate the representation in such a way as to exclude partial interests and to give to the people at
large an effectual voice- in the choice of their legislators, no line would be required. No man, in such a House, would. dream of babbling about the rights of Appleby, any more than of Old Sa- rum. But in a• House of Commons constituted as it is, Ministers - well know that an appeal to honesty and plain-dealing would be hopeless. They know that if they appealed to these principles, they must adopt the very course into whiclrit is the wish of their opponents to drive them—that they must be prepared to debate the merits of every one of the ninety-seven boroughs in Schedules
A and B, as well as of every one of the thirty-eight in Schedules C and D ; that they must make up their. minds to the hearing of evidence and of counsel in every instance where an objection is preferred; and, by consequence, to a delay of years, to the aban-
donment of the Bill,to the laughter and contempt of their enemies, and to the execration of the nation at large. It was to prevent such a catastrophe, that they fixed on the lines of 2,000 and 4,000, and the evidence of the population returns of 1821. There is a difficulty in ascertaining precisely the limits of the different boroughs to be disfranchised and reduced, which neither the returns of 1821, nor any of the previous returns, nor, we may add, those of 1831, afford the means of overcoming. In some instances, the borough, and the parish of which the borouch forms a part, are separately enumerated ; but in others no such distinction
is, made, or indeed can be. In open boroughs, the limits are com- monly known, but who would be at the trouble of determining the
limits of a close borough? But though the boundaries of a bo- rough could not, there was another boundary that could be easily ascertained—the boundary of the parish in which the borough was situated. This, then, being the boundary which in the vast majo- rity of eases the returns had assumed, the Ministers had recourse to it, as one that was beyond dispute. The adoption of this rule, or rather this extension of a rule already adopted, has been the sole cause of the trifling changes which have been made in the two first schedules..
The extension was made in strict conformity with the principle first laid down,—namely, that no borough and parish should .es- cape disfranchisement. unless it possessed the materials of a suffi- cient town constituency. It was required, in every case, that the town, if not the borough, should be conterminous with the parish, or that the towns and villages in the parish should, taken together, be. able to furnish a proper. number of voters. Apply these plain rules to the cases of which so much has been said, and mark the satisfactory answer which they offer. The parishes of Beerferris, of Downton, and of St. Germains, possess each more than 2,000 inhabitants, but they have no town constituency. We leave out of consideration their want of 10/. householders ; for were we to extend the suffrage in these parishes to householders of every hind, nay, to inhabitants generally, we might get a rural consti- tueney-we might get cottiers and small farmers—we might con- stitute three additional: counties in Devon, Wilts, and Cornwall— but we would not create three additional towns-there.. Appleby, so long and so loudly and so ignorantly insisted on, offends even more against the principle laid down by Minis- ters than any of the three we have just adverted to. The entire town population.of Appleby does not amount to seventeen hun- dred.souls. True, if we include two extensive rural parishes, we may get above two thousand ; and if we proceed to join parish to parish, we may swell Old Sarum to two thousand. But we are not forming towns by this process, we are forming rural districts, We are neglecting in tolo a distinction which is coeval with the origin of the Commons House—that it should consist partly of members chosen by proprietors of land, and partly of mem- bers chosen by inhabitants of towns. We have often occasion to- mark. the obtuseness of the House of Commons, but in no case that has come under our notice, at least of late, has it been more apparent than in this attempt to mingle the two great divisions of our constituency—to make the case of Bassetlaw not an exception, but the rule by which the representation of the country is to be regulated.
If we are to have district representation, we beseech the oppo- nents of Reform to recollect, that there are two conditions on which alone we will accept of it. In the first place, the rule must be universal. We will not allow honourable members to apply it where they think fit, and lay it aside where they think fit. The Anti-Reformers affect to be lovers of simplicity—let them take number, or property, or both ; but let them take one or both im- partially. In the second place, we must have the ballot. We gave up the ballot to the Ministerial plan, because we thought we per- ceived in it so much fairness and practicability, that the ballot might be safely dispensed with. But we cannot consent to dis- trict representation without the ballot. Many Reformers enter- tain serious doubts about the scheme of dividing counties into two parts. We are by no means sure that even that division may not endanger the independence of electors; but we have not the slightest doubt about the scheme of dividing them into eight or ten parts. In the latter case, independence without the ballot is impossible.
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