IMPROVEMENT IN THE ELECTORAL REGISTRATION AND FRANCHISE.
TO TUE EDITOR OF THE SPECTATOR.
Wooler's dill, Pershore. 15th February 1836.
SIR—Your readers are indebted to you for the manner in which you have fre- quently called their attention to the difficulties attending the present system of Registration; and as the Attorney-General as well as Mr. D. W. HARVEY have both given notices of motions, but not so as to meet many of the evils as I see them, I cannot help troubling you with a few observations, which, if you ap- prove of them, you can bring in any way you like before the public. My remedy would be this—I would, without distinction, give to every house- holder rated on the fair annual value of 51. or 61., the right to vote. The lists to be made out by the Overseers in every parish, as at present required in bo- rough'. The test of the qualification would then rest on a reference to the rate-book ; and the whole business before the Barristers, at present so com- plicated and expensive, would be brought into a nutshell. A few forty-shilling fieeholders, but very few, might be disfranchised,—freeholders ig name, but none in reality, who, working under the principal farmers in their parish, are as much bound to vote with them as they in their turn are bound to vote with a 'Cory landlord. Such electors would be more than replaced by many intelligent ones in small towns, at present without the franchise. If it be further objected that the claimants to vote for property in different counties would also be cut off, I answer, that at a general election they are nearly so already ; and would be quite, if the polling were limited to one day as in boroughs, which I hope to see. I think there is a general feeling abroad that the present machinery entails a greater annual expense upon us than either of the opposing parties in the state relish ; and such an alteration as would simplify it into one uniform and cheap system, might meet with general support. I beg to remain, with best wishes for the continued success of your paper,
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