SCOTLAND.
MR. BRIGHT AT GLASGOW.
Mr. John Bright kept his appointment with the Glasgow reformers, and duly appeared in the City Hall on Tuesday. The Lord Provost had declined to take the chair, and Mr. Walter Buchanan, one of the city members, was prevailed upon to assume that post. Mr. Bright delivered a long and flowing oration, gliding easily from topic to topic, and turning aside now and then to refer to the unfairness with which he is treated by the newspapers. He restated his main positions that Great Britain is badly represented whether judged by the standard of numbers or property or taxation, with new illustrations, contrasting the immense population of the great towns, their vast pro- perty, their great contingent of taxation, with the paucity of their members as compared with a number of small towns. He described the House of Commons as a convenient club, a nice lounge, where men pre- tend to be not absolutely idle, and "infinitely more careful to preserve monopolies and privileges than the general rights of the great body of the nation." He denied that he had abandoned any sentiment he had uttered at Birmingham, or that he spoke the temper, sentiments, or passions of the hour. Me is no conjuror, he has no specific for national happiness; he only puts forward a rational and substantial project for the management of our representation, which has had, during the last sixty years, the sanction and approval of many of the greatest minds and of the greatest patriots of our country. " Until you are prepared to do full justice to the great portion of the unenfranchised classes, I would advise you to allow matters to remain as they are. I am sure that opinion is growing, intelligence is growing, power is growing, combina- tion is growing, and before long it will be seen to be the interest of all those who value the tranquillity of the country and the contentment of the people, that political rights should he widely and honestly distributed among all classes of our countrymen." Mr. Bright repaired some omis- sions in his other speeches by distinctly declaring in favour of the ballot and of the lodger franchise. He took up mach time in picturing the evils which the law of primogeniture and entail inflict on Scotland, locking up the land in huge estates, placing the tenant and labourer at ._:.•?.!2'f.A413t1S3filt;$45f) 041fickaRigq7k igligtStVrWiltation Would #■.9 :VeRlitg Ales .14 4,00.0p, hie has no great ,iedaw. The present winat "*tmil.ter of the Oblig COL WO io"? iiipd a man of "'id a f1dktt4n to the world of the itteditryietency'of the Oe'rvliYlthshM nlaithlry gentlemen eV the United' 'XingdowL(is dUy!key-uiand.thatte still more to be remarkeds ieesideuee that ,pkiitalyrihowil theslatirdlify which edema their character, lin! thius permitting its4-(iwee.„!!! and Jaughter)—Mr. • Pima said on moristhaa one 'recent ocession,that. the lexpeindiAure. depended. on nmant by that that thspublic expenditure depended else* T.oraign. policy, , New' our past foreign policy has been of a very questions able character. ' fiae entailed upon us a permanent payment, from which there is no honcitirable escapp, of a sum of fiventy-eight millions sterling per annum ; and our present foreign Tolley, and matters connected with it, involve us in the'present payment of twenty-tiro millions per annum for our great military and naval preparations and expenses When you come to our foreign policy you arc no-longer Englishnien--you: aro' no longer free: you are neammendad not to iaquire.:. If you do you: are told you cannot understand; you are mulshod, you are hustled aside. We are told that the matter is too deep for common understandings like ours—there is great mystery ,about it,. We have what is called diplomacy. We have a great many lords engaged in what they call diplomacy. (Laughter and cheers.) We have a lord in Paris, we have another in Madrid, another in Berlin, another (at least we had till very lately) in Vienna, and auother lord at Constantinople; and we have another at Washington—in fact, all over the continent; particularly whore society is most pleasant and the cli- mate most agreeable there is almost certain to be an English nobleman to represent the English Foreign Office, but you never know what he is aping. . , I will not talk of what war is—we .have had a.specimen of it. 3e it necessary or be it unnecessary—be the quarrel just or be it unjust—he it for the rights of the nation or to gratify the stupidity of makers' of the war, or the intrigues of a minister—war, nevertheless, is one of the greatest ca- lamities that can afflict any kingdom or the human race—and you, the people, are ignorant of the steps by which you are drawn into war.— . . . I hold in high estimation Lord Aberdeen, who, iu his place , in the House of lords, Openly declared the non-necessity of the contest in which we. were then striving. Is the people, are the nation, to have the blame of those ca- lamities thrown upon them when tliessdo occur Who form, your Cabinet? Not the merchants of Glasgow—not the shopkeepers nor the artisans—no, lint Members of the peerage of thernited Kingdom. (Loud Luughter.) Half ofyour cabinets are formed from the House of Lords, and the other half from the House of Commons are so directly connected with the Peer- age that they may be regarded as belonging to that class. Don't let us have the conduct of public affairs remain with a few leading families, who enjoy. all the emoluments and all the places; and when such a one as I am steps forward. to point out the faults which they make, the blunders they copula, and even the crimes they are guilty of, if I tell them of the suffer- ings which my countrymen bare endured—sufferings great and lasting, sufferings which never will be known or revealed to us, and which are known only in eternity—don't let us have it said that the people are in favour of wars, when they have in reality so little to do with them. (Cheers.) It is a shocking thing to observe the evils which nations live wider, aud the submissive spirit with which they yield to them. I have often compared, in my own mind, the people of England with the jieople of Egypt, and the Foreign Office of this country to the temples of the Egyptians. I am told by those who pass up and down the Nile, that you perceive on its banks temples with stately statues and and massive and lofty columns—statues each One of which would have appeared to have exhausted a quarry in its production. You have further vast chambers, and gloomy tortuous pas- sages; and some innermost recess, some holy of holies, in which, when you arrive at it, you find some loathsome reptile which a nation reverenced and revered, and bowed itself down to worship. In our Foreign Office we have no massively constructed columns ; we have no statues ; but we have a mystery as profound, for in the innermost recesses we find some miserable intrigue, in the defence of which your fleets are traversing every ocean, your- armies are perishing in every clime, and the precious blood of our country's children is squandered and regarded as valueless. (Ap- plause) 1 hope that an improved 'representation; will change all this ; that that great portion of our expenditure, which is increased in carrying out the secret and irresponsible doings of our Foreign Office, will be placed directly under the free control of ti Parliament elected by the great body of the United Kingdom. (Cheers.) And then, and not till then, will your industry be secured from that gigantic taxation to which it has been sub- jected during the last 150 years. (Renewed cheers.) . . . . "I come amongst you not to stir up any animosity between class and clads—that is the charge brought against me by men who Wish that one class may be per- manently made to rule over another classI come here amongst you that we should deliberate on those great question on which our success and our prosperity depend. You knowat least if you do not know it I will tell yon—that I am no frequenter of Courts: I have never sought for office or the emoluments of place. I havens) Mitring for popularity, I think I have but little of that Which may be called hist for fame. I am a citizen of ii free country. I love my-country--I love* its -freedom ; but I believe that that freedom eati-only be extended anti-retained by a fair and honest re- presentation of the people ; and it is be:causal believe that, that I am here tonight to .ask you, through the power of your intelligence and your numbers, to step into the position which. now -opens up to you." (Loud
cheers.) • 11r. "Monerieff met his constituents at Leith on Monday, and delivered a long speech on the past-and present state -of politie,s. He had the cou- rage to defend Lord -Palmerston's Governinent, of.which he was a mem- ber, and to -describe his fall as a public misfortune—because it had de- stroyed a government with a powerful majority capable of working great changes without compromise ; because the position Of the present Minis- ters is so weak that the doctrine of. Ministerial responsibility is shaken to its foundations ; and because the Liberal party is disunited. On the referiu Question Mr. Moucrieff said he was entitled to speak, having brought in a Reform Rill six years ago, which would have given a larger franchise for Scotland than that proposed by--Mr. Bright. Mr. Moncrieff
proposed a burgh franchise of SI. •
"We are going to have a rating franchise in Scotland generally. Now I would like to know what a rating-franchise is,' for I was asked in 1852-if it was possible to make the Poor-rate available for a franchise in Scotland, and I answered—It is totally impossible, for in the first place you have got a great number of parishes where there is no rate at all; in the second place there are three ways of rating : you may either rate upon the whole rent, or you may rate on half the rent, and half on means and substance. , Si the Whole thing is in such a state that, as to making it the basis of A franchise, the thing is totally impossible. And thus, as has happened be-
• ,,•■• !Ti); • • 1 'its:ill in III fOre now, we have a great and culightted Statesinah :GOToitig ttcly%.„ illumine the darkness of this northern atmosphere and his greaqrsapesa-,,, tion is one which it is utterly impossible, merely. from the mettnim un portant and contemptible circumstance of its living iinpossiblc,Hi.ittFly. posilite—to carry out in any practical way. The ride in Engliipll spw thing such as we have never had here at all. It depends . 01,1)14000 which are, I admit, mysterious to 121N" mind,' but which I isuPpohe. are clear to the minds of thoseamustamed ; but it is something, entirblyrand perfeetlystitterent frairt anything: that-prevails in Stotiands ite,thiltsisrating franchise:levet of the stnestion."'' Mr. -Muntaieff opposed the ballotmad electoral districts. The meeting
give hint a vote - of confidence. ' " A public meeting in favour of Parliamentary. Reform ism held: ,at Paisley on Monday.. Mr. Crum. Ewing, the 'through Member, was pre- sent. In the course of a speech he made-he -said he was in favouis of household suffrage, the ballots and triennial Parliaments. -
"He was also sensible of the anomalous nature and injustice of tile present division of the country' into electoral ,districts ; but lie hail not yet heard any opinion on the subject in which he could fully concur. The is great danger in exact proportion of mernhers to the population, and he inataneed the case of London, which, - on this principle, :might, have fifty or sisty members, who would, as the metropolitan members now do., combine for carrying out greis jobs—such,, for example, as purifying the Thaincs- whieh they would fain have done at the espouse of the ,whole countrys while London Might alone- to twee the cost.
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