NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE event of the week in Parliament has been the recommence- ment for the season of the fight upon the Irish Registrations : Lord STANLEY introduced his bill on Tuesday, and the rival Government bill was introduced by Lord MORPETII on Thursday. Lord STANLEY brought forward his measure in a speech remarkable
for its quiet and rational tone; and the bill itself has been re- _ Inodelled so as to partake in some degree of its framer's newly- 'acquired moderation. The notice of claim, directed by the bill, which last year was so complicated as would have rendered it next to impossible to exclude fatal errors in a great proportion of cases, is now simplified ; the notice of objection, which, in keeping with the oppressive character of the whole measure, was of a merely general nature, is now specific ; and instead of disfranchising, by one sweeping clause, all the voters whose claim rested upon the possession of certificates, that class of electors is to be allowed to retain the right during the term of existing certificates. These are the chief mitigations in the severity of the measure; but it still remains what we described it last year, a bill of pains and penalties. " The object of the bill is still, not to protect the rights of the Parliamentary voter, but to protect some one else against the Parliamentary voter : the voter, by the tenour even of the amended bill, is assumed to be a sort of aggressor, who is to be challenged and impeded at every step.
Lord, MORPETH'S bill is of a much more comprehensive and statesmanlike scope. Instead of topical remedies for abuses rowing out of the undefined and undefinable tenure of the fran- chise in Ireland, the root of the evil is attacked : the franchise, while restrictions are imposed upon its improper exercise, is sim- plified and defined. The qualification of a Parliamentary elector is, to consist in the occupation of property in which the occu- pant shall originally have had fourteen years' interest, (the lowest tenure under the Irish Reform Act,) at the yearly value of five pounds, (the lowest rating under the Poor-law at which the occu- pant becomes liable.) There is to be an annual revision ; and the appeal from the Revising Barrister is to lie with a newly-created court, consisting of three barristers appointed by the Speaker, and sitting in Dublin. This is a franchise which has the merit of resting upon a broad and simple basis ; while it is of so liberal an extent that the Tories denounced it as a Universal or at least a Household Suffrage. It seems a pity to mistrust the bearers of such a proposal, but the question will intrude—how much of this is for real use, how much for show ? What is the reason that Ireland alone is to receive a new Reform Bill ? And assuming the fairness of the preference, how much of the promise held out by Lord MORPETR is intended to be realized ? It is not enough for states- men to write new laws; they must also carry their enactment. It is rather too late in the day seriously to deprecate paper-legis- lation, yet what besides can Lord MORPETH really effect ? With- out some reasonable prospect of actual consummation, the " New Reform Bill for Ireland," as a practical measure, sinks into an expedient of the day to supply Mr. O'Coisisms. with new materials for getting up Ministerial hurrahs in the Dublin Corn Exchange, and with a plausible excuse for backing out of his Repeal blunder
and becoming a useful man again. The only thing certain about the new plan is, that it involves an abandonment of the Finality doctrine : a member of the Cabinet enunciates the principle, that to set the franchise upon a satisfactory footing as to its regulation, it is necessary that it should be so well and simply defined that it cannot easily be forged—so broad, that temptations to forge it are neutralized. That is something : it is a homage paid by expe- diency to honest opinion, like that which vice is said to pay to virtue.
On Thursday also, Lord JOHN RUSSELL reintroduced his measure of last year for the amendment of the Parliamentary registration in England and Wales. The other acts of the week may be briefly indicated. On Tues- day, Sir Join( CAMPBELL offered " a large instalment of legal re-
form," in the shape of a bill to abolish the Equity jurisdiction of the Exchequer Court, and to appoint two new Judges, whom he designated as new Vice-Chancellors. It does not appear that there is any further " reform" contemplated by the bill, than what is implied in the removal of certain delays and arrears in the
Court of Chancery, and of a long inconvenient vacation in the Exchequer Court. Delay makes justice so dear in Chancery, Sir Joint says, that suits for values under a hundred pounds are never instituted. Sir EDWARD SUGDEN makes out that Sir JOHN has exaggerated the delay ; which is tantamount to admitting that very great delay remains to be remedied. But Sir JOHN did not show that the expedition likely to result from his bill would make justice so inexpensive as to admit all the cases under a hundred pounds to the protection of justice. The measure appears to be no " reform," but only a rather improved arrangement.
The bill afterwards introduced by Sir EDWARD SUGDEN, is more like a real reform : it removes the objection which attaches to appeals carried from the Lord Chancellor in the Court of Chancery to the same Lord Chancellor in the House of Lords, by providing him with two responsible Assistant Judges in the Upper Court ; and it partly does away with the heterogeneous and uncertain con- stitution of the Appellate Court of the Privy Council, by appointing the two Assistant Judges of the House of Lords to attend perma- nently in the Judicial Committee. On Tuesday, Mr. LABOUCHERE made a curious little nibble at the abuses of our restrictive import system, in giving notice of
resolutions which he is to propose on Monday, for, equalizing the duties on East and West India rum. The remarkable paint in his speech is the effort which he made, at one time to magnify his measure into an act of " justice to India," and at another, fearing the West Indians, to diminish it into little more than a formal
concession to the urgent claims of India,yithout any great or'im- mediate practical consequence. If it is so paltry an affair, why men- tion it in the same breath with so vast a subject as "justice to India"? it is a real boon to India, what say the West Indians, at whose expense it is to be made? That remains to be seen ; for the West India Members reserved themselves for the night of the resolutions.
Mr. LABOUCHERE has introduced a bill for the better regulation of Railways ; and especially for enabling the Board of Trade to
compel a certain uniformity in the danger-signals on the different lines, and to issue licences for engineers, without which none should be capable of employment. This bill met with general though not universal concurrence.
The House has scarcely met " for the despatch of public business" before it flings the public business aside, with almost more than the usual want of ceremony. The birds begin to pair on the 14th of February ; but Members of Parliament are more impatient than the feathered bipeds, and several, with the help of the Par- liamentary go-betweens, have already paired off. On TuesdaY
night—an Irish night—there was a very thin attendance on the
Ministerial side of the House ; but that was not the worst exhi.,. bition of deserted benches during the week : on Monday—the first
Monday in the session, when Lord Jonx RUSSELL himself had important business on the notice-paper—there was " no House." This is beginning betimes the trick of counting out ! The talk in the House of Lords during the week has been chiefly confined to arrangements for Lord CARDIGAN'S trial ; and the
passing of a budget of thanks to the three Admirals, British, Aus-
trian, and Turkish, engaged in the Syrian war, and to all the other British officers and men. The Duke of WELLINGTON took the oc-
casion to observe, that, although a combination of skill and luck
had produced such brilliant effects at Acre, ships must not always be expected to succeed against stone walls : he knew of but one
instance of the kind, in the attack of the French fleet, two or three years ago, on the fort of St. Jean d'Ulloa, at Vera Cruz. The Duke's frank and sober compliments to the French are as well timed as they are freely given.
No Church-rate bill is forthcoming this session : Lord MEL- BOURNE told Lord BROUGHAM., on Thursday, that he had no inten- tions on the subject.
