MB. BUCKINGHAM'S PLAN FOR POPULAR ELECTIONS. IT is rather a
trait in Mr. BUCKINGHAM'S character to put himself forward in any popular movement ; to advocate its objects, and not unsuccessfully, by great activity, great fluency, a fair enough stock of self-complacency, with an agreeable personal address ; and then, when the matured business is at last accomplished, to exclaim, like Coriolanus of his exploit among the Volscians, " Alone I did it." Thus, he omits no opportunity of telling everybody how he opened the trade with India and China ; Temperance is all his own—and in this matter he certainly did get a report from a Committee of the House of Commons such as no other mortal could have ob- tained ; CLARKSON and chronology are rather against entire claim to the abolition of Slavery, but what he did do by votes, speeches, and so forth, as well as by " resigning the command of a frigate which the Imaum of Muscat employed to convoy slavers," he does not allow to be hid under a bushel.
As Free Trade and Chartism seem to be just now the broadest popular objects, Mr. B. has been travelling in Yorkshire to lecture on the Whig Budget. These Lectures he here republishes from the newspaper reports, a new plan of Universal Suffrage preceding them : and he forestals any objections of Messrs. LOVETT, COL- lam, and others, against claims to originating this movement, by giving the history of its conception and composition. " It may commend itself to some minds the more readily, when they know that it is not an effusion of the moment, got up for the present occasion as an electioneering effort, but the result of much reflection on the working of the present system as witnessed in many actual contests. It was written, indeed, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, on board the ship President, on her way from England to America; and the greater portion of it was penned amid the profound stillness of the midnight-watch, when the greater part of my fellow- passengers were buried in deep sleep. It was not meant to serve any political party, or to gratify any personal ambition; but was designed, in the event of death—to which all who encounter the perils of the sea are so liable—to be left as a legacy to my countrymen, and one of the sincerest proofs I could offer them of the earnestness of my desire to see our common fatherland purged of one of the greatest stains upon its national character, viz. the profligacy, fraud, and corruption exercised at those very periods when the whole nation ought to be animated with the purest spirit of patriotism, and enter upon the duty of choosing their legislators with all the disinterestedness and solemnity becoming an act scarcely less important in its consequences than a right dis- charge of the duties of religion itself." The objection to Mr. lluexixouAm's scheme is, that it is too fine for practice : in endeavouring to refine and polish up Universal Suffrage so as to make it acceptable to the bettermost sort of folks, he has made it practically unworkable ; for in theory the sail- ing is all fair enough—clear, running off glibly, and looking alto- gether like a well got-up child's-play at elections. That every male of full age should have a vote, who is not insane, has not been con- victed of crime, and is not in the receipt of parish-allowance, is a broad and intelligible qualification, as all qualifications must be. Property, habitancy, corporate freedom, are all tangible things ; so is a diploma from a learned body, or admission into a learned pro- fession ; so would be a certain amount of public stock, or a certain number of shares in recognized public companies ; all very simple in their essence, however the carelessness of the claimant, the arts of an opponent, or the indifference and incapacity of public officers, may complicate the matter. One of Mr. BUCKINGHAM'S tests, the power of reading to the Registrar, &c. " a page or sentence in any ordinary History of England, opened at random," and of writing half-a-dozen lines of any thing his mind or memory might suggest," is test enough of that power ; but the capability of reading and writing to this extent is merely mechanical, and furnishes no great " proof of qualification " ; for a person incapable of such reading or writing may be an honester man, a shrewder judge of character, and every way more fitted to discharge the duty of elector, than one who is capable. The test, however, is simple and perfect in itself: but when we are to require proofs of " moral purity," and especially to exclude all " habitual drunkards," a wide field is opened to fraud, litigation, seduction, and all the other arts of electioneering which it is Mr. BucxrNGHam's object to destroy. This is his plan for proof the second. " The second proof—of good moral character for sobriety and integrity— would be given in certificates from known residents of the town, or persons with whom the party was connected in business, either as a master or workman, or by relatives and friends ; and on this head there could be no more difficulty than is experienced by those who can obtain no situation of trust or employ- ment without this requisite testimony to good character and conduct."
This, like the statement of a clergyman in a pulpit, looks all very well when it cannot be examined ; but tried by examination, it breaks down. In the first place, the simile does not hold ; housekeepers eschew " a written character." And if experience repudiates this where opinion operates as some check upon improper colouring, and the law punishes fraud, every one may anticipate the value of a certificate from partisans anxious to increase their number of voters. Besides, these certificates could not be deemed final ; they might be impugned by facts : and then only fancy the moral inquisition these Registration Courts would become, and the scenes of seduc- tion to which they would lead! As registration-time approached, for example, Mr. Easily-led, a confiding Liberal, is introduced by Mr. Sly, a Tory agent in disguise, to Mr. Pleasant-tipple, a man of no politics : a series of merrymakings are the result, and the Liberal some thrice a week is seen home by the police : the fact is clear, for the authorities prove Mr. Easily-led's incapacity to take care of himself about every other night. But then arises the 'lineation of how long this conduct is to be persisted in to shake a
" certificate for sobriety," and whether circumstances of tempta- tion are to be admitted as an excuse, and if so to what extent. It is easily seen, that with such questions, an inquiry into treating by a Committee of the House of Commons would be dulness itself compared with the edifying amusement of a Registration Court. Not to mention, that if no persons are fit to be electors but such as have a high degree of morality,—or, as Mr. BUCKINGHAM ex- presses it, " all habitual drunkards, [are to be excluded,] as per- sons who are not fit to be intrusted with the discharge of a solemn trust, which requires a high degree of reason and moral purity to exercise rightly,"—other foibles besides tippling should be inquired into.
Mr. BUCKINGHAM is averse to canvassing, to separate adver- tising-addresses, speechifying in the open air, and the attendance of non-electors : the last not improperly, as under the new system they would only consist of women, children, the insane, the con- victed, and persons of habitual moral impurity. Mr. BUCKING- HAM is friendly to secret voting, but not to the Ballot—the Ballot is not his own invention. His principal alleged reason is that " taking men up to the poll is the relic of a feudal and barbarous age." This is his
PLAN TO SUPERSEDE THE BALLOT.
The Registrar, having a card containing the names of the several candidates printed on it in a clear and uniform manner, should then provide a sufficient number of these to furnish one to every elector ; which, for security, should be forwarded to him through the post-office, enclosed in a printed circular directing him to draw his pen through the names of the candidates for whom be wished to give his vote ; then to put the card in a blank envelope, seal it, and inscribe his name with his own hand on the outside of such envelope, so that it might give assurance of its coming from him as a registered elector; and then to nt the whole in an ordinary letter-cover, addressed to the Registrar, at his i.ce, and send it, for security, through the post-office, on the following day. * *
On the day appointed, the letters are delivered by the post, at the office of the Registrar himself; his two assistants and an agent of each candidate being present to see justice done to all. The outer seal is first broken, and the first enclosures, with the voter's autograph signature on each cover, are arranged alphabetically, as they come out, (the card containing his vote being still kept secret in the second enclosure, which is still sealed up.) When all are thus disposed of, the next process will be the opening of the registration- book, the calling over from it the names of the voters, according to their alphabetical entry ; the comparison of the autograph signature of each person on the letter- cover with the autograph signature of the same person in the book to establish their identity, rejecting for future inquiry any duplicates, or forgeries, or doubtful names—if any of either indeed, under such a system, should be likely to occur.
The verification of the signatures being completed, the next step would be the opening of the inner sealed covers, throwing the printed cards into one box and the written envelopes into another ; which, for the perfect security of secrecy, might be done by youths, under the check of the parties already acting as Registrar and assistants, or blindfolded, if that were deemed necessary, as in the case of drawing tickets in a lottery, to prevent any one from seeing oat of which particular envelope any particular card was taken.
It requires very little consideration to perceive that such a scheme has all the alleged evils of the Ballot, without one single chance of secrecy : all doubtful voters would be compelled to "draw their pens through the names of the candidates" in presence of the party coercing them. It would, in fact, be worse than the present system : persons who yield their vote to a flatter- ing request, though containing a concealed threat, might resist the personal dictation and mistrust of this demand, though intending to keep their word ; and would of course be treated, not as unfriendly voters, but as tricky rascals, who had made a promise and broken it. The criticism on evils existing is better than the schemes for the abolition of evil. Though by no means new, the remarks on the failure of the Reform Bill are patly put, and the generic descrip- tion of the House of Commons is good. It seems to have struck Mr. BUCKINGHAM, that some hard-headed and unpolite Chartist might inquire, why, if he saw these evils and their remedies such a long time ago, he did not bring in a bill when he was a Member of Parliament : to which he replies by this sketch of
A ROUSE OF COMMONS.
In that assembly the great majority, Whig and Tory, are men of large landed or funded property ; who, whatever they may profess in their speeches, are extremely prejudiced against all changes, and more strongly hostile to changes in the state of the representation than in any thing else. By far the greatest number desire to see only men of rank, fortune, and influence in the Legislature; believing that by them the caste-interests of the nobility, gentry, and clergy, will be best preserved. They dread, therefore, any extension of the franchise—any addition to the influence of intellect over wealth ; and fear nothing so much as an approach to a curtailment of what they call " the legi- timate influence of property." Such a bill as this would, therefore, have no more chance of a favourable reception in the House of Commons, than the question of Catholic Emancipation had when it was first introduced there, or the Abolition of Slavery, or the Relief of Dissenters, or the Reform of Par- liament itself.
The House of Commons, indeed, is the last place in the kingdom in which to originate reforms of any kind. It never moves till it cannot longer remain inactive. Every measure of good that it has ever consummated has been origi- nated out of doors; and it has only been when the whole community has been agitated, and its voice made to penetrate the walls of St. Stephen's in tones of remonstrance and almost of menace, and when Members have felt that their seats would be endangered by any further delay, that they have bestirred them- selves to do, with regret and reluctance, what could be no longer left undone.
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