iDebatc1 anti prorcetrinal in Parliament.

1. THE BALLOT.

Mr. GROTE moved the House of Commons, on Thursday, for leave to bring in a bill to provide that votes at elections for Members of Par- liament shall henceforward be taken in secret, by way of ballot. Ile preferred asking leave to bring in a bill, to moving a simple resolution, because he apprehended that many gentlemen favourable to the prin- ciple of secret voting, mistrusted the possibility of carrying it into operation, and therefore would hesitate to affirm the abstract resolution ; whereas, if allowed to bring in his bill, he would show that regulations essential to a system of secret voting could be easily framed with per- fect convenience to the voter, and entire certainty as to the main object. He needed not to remind gentlemen, that they sat in that House as Representatives of the People; that the efficient operation of the elec- tive principle was the primary condition and characteristic requisite of every government pretending to be a representative government ; that any cause which subverts the freedom of election or impairs its purity, was productive of incalculable mischief; and that the Legislature would leave undischarged its most solemn obligations if it neglected to provide security for the independent exercise of political rights. Now be would ask, whether they had free and pure elections, or any thing like them, at present ? Put that question to any man of any politics, and there would be but one answer. The evil he wished to correct was not one of modern growth ; but it should be remembered, that practices which were of apiece with the rotten system of representation, stood out in glaring contrast to the principle of the Reform Act, and could not be lightly passed over and only occasionally punished under -tbe new order of things. Besides, the extent and prevalence of corrup- tion and intimidation at elections did not now rest on presumption : it rested upon clear and positive testimony, collected and sifted by Par- liamentary Committees- " The House will not forget that there have been several Special investiga- tions of this kind : they will not forget the disclosures made before the various Parliamentary Committees on Stafford, Warwick, Hertford, Ipswich, Yolk, Yarmouth, and other places: they will nut forget the reports made by the Municipal Corporation Commissioners, in reference to the conduct of the free- men in many important Parliamentary boroughs. These multiplied investiga- tions have brought to view a body of dark and infamous details, which cast a melancholy shade over the general picture of election management in England. What description will any future historian give of the real working and inte- rior springs of that which we extol and sanctify under the name of representa- tion, when he finds documents such as these—contemporary and unquestionable documents—to guide him in his researches ?"

But there was another document. still more weighty and important than the Reports of the Committees he had referred to—he meant the Report of the Bribery and Intimidation Committee which sat last year.

" No man can read this Report without shame and uneasiness, unless he has pre- pared himself to discard and laugh to scorn all idea of purity or freedom of elec- tion. Gentlemen who have looked over the volume will at once perceive that the portion of evidence relating to bribery is the least novel : but even here there is much to arrest our attention. Mr. Cockburn, a barrister, examined before that Committee, who gave evidence distinguished for its ability, stated, that from all the information with which his practice and his inquiries furnished him, he concluded confidently that bribery prevailed at elections to an extent of which the House and the country had scarcely any idea. The witnesses whom the Committee examined from Bristol, Leicester, Norwich, Ipswich—Mr. Staff, Mr. Hudson, and Mr. Cowell—go far to corroborate and sustain this conclusion. You see in those places and elsewhere a system of bribery, stand- ing, perpetual, incorporated with the habitual proceedings both of agents and electors. You are plainly told that a candidate who refuses to conform to it conducts his election at the greatest disadvantage: you are apprized that it enters into the calculations of a certain class of electors, like the annual return of the fair and the races. The forms of bribery do, indeed, vary from one town to another : the gift or the promise sometimes assumes a peculiar dress or a local name in one town, which would be foreign and unintelligible in an- ther; but the substance and essential characteristics are just the same through- out."

Such was the tenor of the evidence as respected bribery : how stood the facts as regarded intimidation ? So many and so urgent were the complaints of intimidation made to the Irish Government in 1835, that the Committee directed special reports on the subject to be sent to them from chief officers of the Constabulary force in each district- " These witnesses depose to popular tumult and violence in many parts of Ireland, fur the purpose of overawing electors, and constraining them to vote on the popular side. They depose further, that these viotences were in many cases inflamed and countenanced by the Catholic priests ; and they state se- veral cases of exposure of voters, who were about to vote against the popular candidate, to alarming threats and ill-usage from the mob, as well as to the risk of being ruined by resolutions of exclusive dealing. With regard to other

i

branches of intimidation, we have not the same advantage of elaborate inquiry undertaken by local functionaries, under the special direction of the Govern- ment. Yet, notwithstanding this disadvantge, notwithstanding the absence of official investigation, a body of testimony no less conclusive and authentic was furnished to the Committee by numerous spontaneous witnesses. It has been incontestibly shows, that intimidation by the people and the priests, take it at the worst, is only one amongst many varieties and descriptions of int lation. If the free-will of voters is occasionally borne down by the violence of the mob, it is still inure frequently overruled by the dictation of landlords and agents, and generally of rich purchasers and consumers. If one set of electors are exposed to injury for voting against popular will, another class are ob- noxious to ruinous luss and severe persecution at the hands of their landlords, if their consciences are found stiff and uncompiying on the day of election. Pei hap honourable gentlemen might imagine that these mischiefs and abuses are peculiar to Ireland. Would, indeed, that the fact were so ! But it is in this case as in others: Irish abuses are the same in kind as English abuses, only on a gigantic and exaggerated scale. The testimonies collected from various quay ters of England reveal the same mischiefs, the same oppressions, the same sufferings and prostration of the voter, on this side the Channel as on the other. If honourable gentlemen will peruse these evidences in reference to the towns and counties of England, they will see the same active warfare going on against the freedom of election: they will see landlords, magistrates, clergymen, attornies, creditors, master manufacturers, patrons of every kind and under every name, and lastly, the assembled crowds of poor electors or of non-electors—they will see all these various parties, each in its separate sphere, engaged in the same work of aggressive interference against the rectitude and the liberty of their neighbour's political conscience."

Ample quotations had been made by gentlemen opposite from the Re- port of the Intimidation Committee; but he must say that they had not dealt fairly with that document- " To hear their speeches, one would have imagined that encroachment on the freedom of electors was an offence committed by no one in this realm ex- cept by Catholic mobs and Catholic priests ; instead of being, as it is, the regular practice among powerful men in the country of all professions, creeds, and varieties. Then, again, Sir, with what feelings have they approached this subject, and what are the inferences which they have endeavoured to raise from it ? Have they bent their minds to ascertain the real nature and the full extent of the evil, in order that they might be enabled to suggest an adequate remedy? They have manifested nothing of such a disposition : they have magnified even to exaggeration this special branch and fragment of a wide-spread evil, with no other view, as it should seem, than that of swelling the outcry against Catho- lics and Irishmen. Sir, I know not how the House may deal with my propo- sition to-night, but of this I am most certain, that I approach the subject with feelings very different from those which I have been just describing. I ap- proach it with a sincere desire to understand the evil in its full extent, and to fathom it in all its depths and recesses: I approach it with no purpose of mak- ing a part stand for the whole, or the species for the genus: above all, I ap- proach it with the deepest anxiety to provide an adequate remedy—a compre- hensive and all-sufficient remedy. I stand upon this plain and broad position, that elections ought to be free—free absolutely and universally : I try to put down without reserve all intimidation, from whatever quarter it may come : I furnish the elector with a shield .against every sort of tyranny over his vote, whether it be single-headed or many-headed tyranny." He contended for the right of clergymen of all sects to exercise the duties of 'citizenship by taking part in elections ; but he denied their right unduly to interfere by coercing the consciences of the voter in any way. At the same time, he maintained that the Protestant clergy were not behind the Catholic priests in zeal and active industry at the critical time of an election. The Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge, for instance, had dismissed his gardener for voting against Mr. Spring Rice. He was far from anticipating any abatement of the practice of intimidation ; on the contrary, when it was seen that Parliament, with indisputable evidence of the magnitude of the evil before it, refused to apply a remedy, he expected that the offenders, grown bolder by impunity, and trusting to the indifference of Parliament to the preva- lence of election abuses, would practise bribery and intimidation more openly arid extensively than ever. The Report of the Intimidation Committee was miserably poor in the suggestion of remedies : all the witnesses, however, who did point out the means of cure, confined themselves to the suggestion of the vote by ballot. Seeing that no other remedy was proposed, Mr. Grote would call upon the House to make

an experiment of the Ballot. He presented it as a certain protection

against evils otherwise irremediable. Voting by the ballot was only

another name for unbiassed, unfettered voting: to quote the words of Cicero, the ballot—the " tabella "—is the " vindex tacitte libertatis "- the upholder of silent liberty. He proceeded to answer several of the objections against the ballot. It was said that the vote of an elector, though not known, might be suspected, or the elector might be compelled to disclose it-

" True; he may tell, but who is to determine whether he tells the truth? You may compel him to tell you what he dreamt last night, or any other per- sonal matter, unknowable except to himself : but can you have the smallest assurance that his statement is an accurate one, if he has any interest in making it otherwise? 'Whether the elector tells or not, however, I do ni t in the least doubt that his vote will be, in many cases, guessed or suspected. But why is this? Because his political sentiments are guessed or suspected ; and it will be assumed as a matter of course, when he votes secretly, that his vote follows his real sentiments, whatever they may be. Now, this very presumption shows that the ballot is perfectly efficacious towards its proposed end ; because it shows that no elector voting in secret can have any motive for voting contrary to his own real feelings. A man may have enemies on many different gia unds, private as well as political : but he can make neither enemies or friends by means of his votes when votes are taken secretly : no persecution, real or apprehended, can ever be made to operate in determining the way in which his vote shall be given. Now, Sir why is it that men persecute or intimidate electors, as matters stand at present ? It is for the express purpose of determining the votes of tl ese electors— for this single purpose, and for no other. They wish to acquire dominion over votes, and they employ intimidation as an instrument for accomplishing this object. Once show them that no dominion over votes can ever le realized, and all their inducement to resort to intimidation is at an end. Sueely, Sir, I am not too .eenguine in concluding that intimidation itself will die away, when it is thus rendered impotent and unprofitable for the acquisition of political influence. Throughout all the records of penal experience, there has never yet been dis- covered any method of suppressing crime so efficacious as that of removing the motive to the perpetration of it, and rendering it no longer conducive to the interest or ambition of criminals."

But it was asserted that the elector is responsible to the public—that he holds his franchise for the benefit of the community, and that pub- licity is necessary for the security that he does not abuse it- " But the public, to each individual elector, can be no other than that frac- tion of the public with whom he is in immediate dealing or communion— his neighbours, or townsmen, or fellow-constituents, who alone take any cognizance of the way in which he votes. Your responsibility therefore comes to this— that an elector is to be rewarded with the good-will of his neighbours if he votes as they approve; he is to be punished with their if his vote be such as they disapprove. Admit this to be just, and you sanction the principle of intimidation at once. Why, what are the very cases which have been so much complained of in the Irish elections? A Catholic freeholder in an Irish village holds Conservative principles, and wishes to vote for the Conservative candidates : the bulk of his neighbours around him are all Liberals, and it is to them that he is responsible for his vote. The responsibility takes effect against him by the unhappy methods recorded in this Report,—by resolutions of exclusive ilealing, ; by a social proscription, a sort of interdiction (if I may Le allowed to translate a Latin phrase) from the communion of fire and water. A few miles off, perhaps, you have the case reversed : you find a great Protes- tant landlord, of Tory principles, surrounded by tenants, many of whom arc Catholics and Liberals. Here the only substitute for your imaginary public, the sole enforcer of lesponsibility, is the landlord ; whose tenants are compelled to endure the bitter consequences of his unless they prefer his bidding to the dictates of their own consciences. Now, Sir, these are specimens of the identical evils which every one complains of, and which your Committee were directed to devise means of preventing ; vet they are the inevitable results, the outward and visible manifestations, of this principle of responsibility of the voter. it really means nothing except liability to evil at the hands of the stronger power—single-headed power, or many-headed power, as the case may be."

It was necessary that public functionaries and Members of Parlia- ment should be responsible, because the smallness of their number gives them an interest of their own apart from that of the public : it at the same time enables the public to keep a watch over them : the continuity and specialty of their functions enables the public to judge of the manner of their discharge-

" Now, Sir, every one of these three leading circumstances is reversed in the case of the Parliamentary electors. In the first place, the numbers of Parlia-

mentary electors is so large, that their interest is identified with that of the people: as an aggregate body, they can have no separate interest of their own : they are, in point of fact, the people themselves in miniature, and on a reduced scale their voice is a compendious expression of the voice of the whole nation. Next, this extension of the number of electors, which identifies them in feelings and interests with the entire mass of the people, and thus gives you the best pos- sible security for their choosing well, if they are left to themselves—this same circumstance, I say, renders it preposterous to talk of them as a body of inter- mediate agents, responsible to any extraneous and ultimate superior. How idle would it be to pretend to attach any responsibility to an aggregate body of

700,000 or 1300,000 persons; and that, too, a scattered, fluctuating, and un- traceable multitude! It goodness of election depends upon the responsibility of

electors, we cannot too soon repeal the Reform Act, and cut down our electors to a select few : fur the smaller the constituency, the more perfect will respon- sibility become ; nay, the constituency of Old Sarum before the Reform Act presented an example of electoral responsibility exalted to its highest point.

Lastly, Sir, I beg you to consider what it is that an elector has to do, and then ask yourself how the performance of his task can ever be made the subject of

accountability to patties without. He has no specific train of duties to perform on which the criticism of the public can fasten : he has only to record his pre- ference, without any reason assigned, between two or more candidates ; and the virtue of the process consists in his delivering his judgment genuinely and sin-

eerely—integro ac libero animo. Now, Sir, I confidently maintain, that this is a process which must spring exclusively from the free-will and inward con-

science of the elector himself: no human supervision can extort from him a

true verdict, because no human eye can discern what the true verdict is : if responsibility to the public has any effect upon him at all, it will induce him to

• abandon his own judgment altogether, and vote for that candidate whom he be- lieved to be the favourite of the public,- thus violating the most essential obli-

gation of the franchise. Look at it which way you will, Sir, this idea of the responsibility of the electors is a compound of mischief and illusion : the num. bers of the body and the nature of the franchise conspire to render it useless to any good purpose, and effectual only in silencing the free and honest expression of individual conscience."

It had been contended by Lord John Russell, that, by allowing an elector to vote in secret, you removed him out of the reach of good and improving influences; but Mr. Grote maintained, that all those in. fluences remained unimpaired, while the ballot protected him from compulsory influences—against those direct appeals to his hopes and fears which vitiated his vote. The specific agency of the ballot was against intimidation ; but though it would not utterly prevent bribery in small constituencies, it would render it much more difficult, costly, and uncertain in its operation. It was an argument against small con- stituencies, not against the ballot, that there were no means of pre- venting a candidate from promising and paying a reward to the electors in gross provided he was returned. But his case would be complete, if, setting aside all mention of bribery, he could prove that the ballot would give protection to those honest voters who spurn a bribe, but cry out against intimidation. While so much good would result front secret voting, be challenged any person to point out a single evil arising from it. It did not prevent a man of superior mind from influencing others by his example ; for it did nor take away from him the use of his tongue and pen. And when it was said that it enabled an elector to promise to vote one way and then vote the contrary way, he com- plained of the introduction of these collateral circumstances, and re- minded the objector that the use of elections was to ascertain the real opinions of the constituencies, and that it was beside the real question to expatiate on the maintenance of good faith between the promiser and promisee. That was a point between the individual parties, with which the public had no concern. The only promises which would be broken under cover of the ballot, were compulsory promises. In the words of Milton,

" Ease will recant Vows made in pain, as violent and void."

But wherever the vow has not been made in pain, wherever ease has made the vow, ease will keep it also.

" Let me put the question now, what mischief would ensue if these compul- sory promises should come to be broken? A voter ought not to make such a promise if it be at variance with his own sentiments and conscience. Granted : but assuming that he has been guilty of the weakness and the wrong of giving such a promise, are we to arrange our system of voting for the express purpose of compelling him to keep it ? To do this, would be nothing less than seeking to deprive the voter, by our own act, of the means of faithfully discharging his duty to his country—a duty prior to all private agreements with third parties —a duty implied in the very possession and exercise of the franchise. Why, Sir, when the choice lies, as it does in this case, between breaking a wrongful promise and violating the duty which the elector owes to his country, can there be a moment's hesitation which of the two we ought to enforce, and which we ought to condemn—we, who sit in this House as the chosen guardians of the public rights and franchises—we, who derive our sole title to confidence and authority from presumed purity of election ? Let me again bring to your recol- lection, Sir, the object and aim with which the Committee of last year was constituted. We desire to put down intimidation and to uphold the freedom of the vote. But I affirm that we are playing into the hands of the intimidator, and practically annihilating the freedom of the vote, when we countenance and ratify these compulsory promises. the intimidator begins by compelling a voter to promise ; and are we then really to say, Because you have compelled the man to promise against his will, therefore you have acquired a good title to compel him to vote?' Sir, I say that this would be no less monstrous in prin- ciple than inconsistent with our own resolutions and professions: it would be to guarantee the last stage of tyranny out of respect to the first. Depend upon it, Sir, if you wish to put down intimidation effectually, you must use a very different language towards the intimidator. You must render the attainment of his final purpose impracticable. You must show him plainly, that what- ever be his power of extorting promises, he will not he allowed to retain the smallest power of extorting votes; and you will then prevent these compulsory promises from being ever demanded, when you show that they afford no some rity for performance. The evil of intimidation, the evil of mendacity, and the evil of promise-breaking, will all disappear at the same time, and before one and the same simple remedy—a free and secret vote."

He replied to the objection that secret voting would prevent the le- gitimate influence of property : and maintained, that the only check it would give to that influence, would be by putting it out of the power of the rich to coerce the poor,—an exercise of the rights of property which was not legitimate. Mr. Grote concluded his speech by re- minding the House, that he was not advocating any violent or uncon- stitutional proposition-

" Permit me to remind you, that I am aiming at no end which is not in the strictest and highest sense constitutional. I am aiming at nothing except the freedom and integrity of the Parliamentary suffrage ; a purpose not merely within the limits of the constitution, but absolutely essential to its working and vitality—absolutely essential to the attainment of a House of Commons really possessing the confidence of the People, which the Reform Act so emphatically promised to us. Permit me further to call to your remembrance the humi- liating fact. that freedom of election, as things stand at present, is in many places little better than a dream and afiction. Your election arrangements are traversed on all sides by corruption and intimidation ; your electors are, in many cases, compelled to vote against their real sentiments—in many cases deterred from voting at all. This fact, if, indeed, it were not already notorious enough, has been publicly and incontestibly certified by the evidence taken before your own Committee; and I venture to warn you, that if, after such overwhelming notoriety of the evil, you remain deaf to all suggestions of a remedy, you will implicate yourselves in something little short of the guilt of connivance and participation. Now, Sir, for this acknowledged evil I have ventured to suggest a remedy. Let those who object to it provide a better if they can : all I shall say is, that my ingenuity can discover no other remedy either like or second to it. I propose to you the vote by ballot—a measure simple, specific, easy of in- troduction, and bearing precisely upon the mischiefs under your consideration. I have endeavoured to show you that the ballot is an antidote, complete, unfail- ing, and all -sufficient, as against the master-evil of intimidation, and that it is the most powerful of all correctives as against bribery. I have proved that it is the only expedient for enabling an honest voter to walk in the path of con- science without serious loss and peril; and that the State can have no security for obtaining what is the primary purpose of election—a genuine and sincere expression of sentiment from the elector—except by taking his vote in secrecy and solitude: • Nam vertu votes tumdemum pectore ab imo Ejiciontur ; et eripitur persona, manet res.'i I press upon you the adoption of the ballot, not less as an effectual protection to the lamest voter, which be has the fullest right to demand, than as a certifi- cate to the public of the genuineness of all votes, and of the unimpeachable title of all representatives chosen." (Much cheering.) Mr. LEADER seconded the motion. He made several quotations from Parliamentary Reports, and related various instances within his own knowledge, which proved how completely the voters in agricul- tural counties were under the influence of the landlords, or their stewards- " Is it not notoriously matter of congratulation among Tories, when a great estate passes by inheritance or purchase, or other means, from a Reformer into the hands of a Tory; and, on the other hand, is it not cause of rejoicing among Reformers when a Tory's estate passes to a Reformer ? There is a case in point which occurred only last year. In the Western division of Somerset, Lord Egreuaont has a large estate, with a command of perhaps two or three hundred voters. The management of the estate was intrusted to a resident steward; till within a year, that steward wasa stanch old Whig. I need not inform the House that the tenants always voted for the Whig candidates. Well, last year the good old Whig steward died, and after a short interval another steward was appointed. The new steward is, like his predecessor, a very respectable barrister ; but, un- like his predecessor, he is a very decided Tory. He is indeed chiefly famous for having been the unsuccessful Tory candidate in several contested elections. His appointment was of course hailed with joy by the Tories of West Somerset.

What a good thing,' they exclaimed, ' two or three hundred votes taken from

those horrid Whigs, and given to us.' My honourable friends, the two Liberal Members for West Somerset, looked rather grave on the subject, even though they had a majority of 1,000 at the last election—these two or three hundred votes were no trifle. Well, a short time after, an old Tory lady in the same division of Somerset died, and left her estate to a very decided Reformer.

Good news,' said my honourable friends the Members for West Somerset, who bad looked so grave on the appointment of the Tory steward ' this is some compensation for that unfortunate affair.' Now, Sir, these facts clearly prove one thing—that it is looked upon as a matter of course, that whatever the tenant's real opinion may be, his vote should invariably follow the vote of his landlord."

He proposed, that if the House was determined to sanction the continuance of this system, a more straightforward mode of proceeding should be adopted- " In South Devon, for instance, instead of registering so many farmers and leaseholders on Lord Rolle's estate as so many distinct and independent votes, let us at once write down in the register-31y Lord Rolle, 500 votes, in right of 500 serfs, or villeins, or farmers, or leaseholders—call them what you will, the name signifies little—who must vote as he commands them. Then, on the other side, put down—the Duke of Bedford, so many votes ; and so on with all the great landed proprietors."

Mr. Leader concluded a long speech, (in which be went over much of the same ground as Mr. Grote) by quoting a passage from a speech recently delivered by Lord Melbourne- " The great disease of society (said Lord Melbourne) the great impediment to quiet government, the great evil of the day, the greatest prevailing abuse at present is, that every one thinks he has a right to employ his influence over another ; each practises it, and each exclaims against its practice in a third person. The landlord enforces it on his tenant—the customer over his trades- man ; they force conscience, and they drive persons against their will to the poll, to vote contrary to their own wishes. I say, then, upon whatever side this influence is exercised, it is a cruel tyranny and a gross injustice. I say that it is a great evil ; it is one,too,prevailing in a greater degree in this than in any other country, and that in no other country but this, where there is a popular form of government, does it prevail." " These," said Mr. Leader, " are sen- timents which would do honour to any man ; they are the honest, the manly, the straightforward sentiments of a truly liberal-minded man ; they are words spoken only a few weeks past, by thePrime Minister of this country. He is the most popular—yes, Sir, he is still the must popular, and he is still deservedly the most popular Minister who has ever governed this country. And as I be- lieve that the welfare of the People is his only object in retaining power, so is their 'confidence in him the main support of his Administration. I rejoice, therefore, to hear such words uttered by such a man; for I feel assured, that if acted upon, they will tend to increase and to confirm his well-earned and un- shaken popularity. To me these words are a good omen of our future and not very distant success in carrying this all-important question of the ballot."

Lord DALMENY thought that the introduction of the ballot would be most pernicious. It would relieve the elector from all responsibility to his brother elector. It would not give freedom to the elector ; for the same influence which now made him vote in a particular way, would be exerted to prevent him from voting at all. The landlord would always find out how his tenant voted. Lord Dalmeny would never sanction a plan which could only be brought to perfection by systematizing falsehood. The best information from America showed that time working of the ballot there was ridiculously inefficient. He called upon the House to persevere in effecting practical reforms, and not permit its attention to be diverted to any such abstract theories as the ballot.

Dr. BOWRING maintained that the ballot worked well inAmerica, and in Switzerland.

Mr. EWART observed, that if the ballot was not fully practised in America, it was only because it was not required there. Colonel THOMPSON alluded to the practices on Naval Courts- martial.

Those who sat on courts-martial had a most important office to perform ; they sat on the life and honour of their fellow-creatures : and it was demanded of them to vote secretly—why ? Because it was thought that this practice affolded tie best security for a pure decision—because it was considered that this was the more effectual method of ensuring the maximum of good and the niininium of evil. Every man declared solemnly that be would not divulge time votes or proceedings of the courts-martial. There was another case in which an officer declared, not on his oath, but on his honour, that he would not divulge any vote or opinion given by any member of the body or even his own. That lie thought was an excellent principle, and ought to be adopted by the supporters of the ballot. What was its effect ? It was this ;—no man asked the officers how they had voted, and no man persecuted them for not telling ; because it was known that the answer would be "You are as king me to declare • that which I have undertaken not to declare."

Mr. Buena: would not vote for or against the present motion ; but if lie found the disease, the existence of which he admitted, otherwise incurable, he would propose the ballot.

Mr. VILLIEns and Mr. D. ROCIIE supported the motion, Mr. ROBIN- SON opposed it. The House then divided :

For the motion 88

Against it 139

Majority 51

2. TAXES ON SOAP AND NEWSPAPERS.

On Monday, the House having resolved itself into a Committee, Mr. SPRING RICE moved a resolution, " that the duty now payable on Newspapers be reduced to one penny, subject to such provisions, with respect to the size of newspapers, as may be agreed to by Parlia- ment in the present session."

Sir CHARLES KNIGHTLEY then moved, as an amendment, " that the duty on bard soap be reduced from three-halfpence to a penny, and the duty on soft soap from a penny to a farthings pound." Sir Charles con- tended, in support of his motion, that a reduction of the Soap-duty would add greatly to the comforts and cleanliness of the poor, and would especially benefit the agricultural interest ; whilst to lower the tax on newspapers would be to inflict upon the country, in the shape of a cheap and profligate press, one of the greatest curses that could deso- late humanity.

Mr. CHARLES BARCLAY seconded the amendment; not because be supposed that to reduce the duty on soap would really be of service to the agricultural interest, but because he thought that more substantial benefit would result to the country from the reduction of the duty on soap than that on newspapers, and because be wished to relieve the fair trader from competition with the smuggler. He contended, that the loss to the revenue by the reduction of the Soap-duty would not exceed 122,000/. while that on Stamps would be more than l25,000/. as to the difficulty of collecting the Newspaper-duty, he considered that it was altogether a pretence. As the printer of every paper was obliged to put his name at the bottom of it, nothing could be easier than to detect and lay hold of offenders against the law.

Mr. SPRING RICE defended his proposition for the reduction of the Stamp-duties in preference. Already the duty on soap had been lowered from 3d. to 14d. a pound, whereas the newspaper duty was at ifs old maximum. The duty on soap was increasing ; that on newspapers was diminishing. The notice for reducing the duty on soap would never have been made except in opposition to one for taking off part of the Newspaper-tax. lie was in favour of the latter, not for the sake of courting popularity, (for he had suffered even cruel abuse because he would pot give way to the extreme parties on either side,) but with a view to public expediency— Ile had already stated that the duty was at present in a state of gradual di. minution. In 1831, the Stamp-duty amounted to 483,000/. ; in 1832, to 473.0001. ; in 1833, to 445,0001. ; in 1834, to 441,0001. ; and in 1835, had slightly been augmented to 455,0001. exhibiting a gradually reducing duty, and that under circumstances which he believed everyone would admit should have insured an increase of duty under this very head. Was the education of the public diminishing ? had the anxiety for political information lessened ? had all the causes ceased to exist which tended to the circulation of newspapers in the country ? Education, intelligence had, on the contrary, increased ; and a thirst for political information was created and enlarged by the institutions which had of late years been given to the public ; and if there had not been connected with this tax S01112 peculiar circumstances which impeded the tide- sion of political knowledge, there could be no doubt this branch of the ievenue, instead of exhibiting a decrease, would, on the contrary, have shown a very considerable augmentation.

He quoted the well-known passage from the Spectator, in which Addison spoke of the duty on periodical publications as certain to fulfil its object of suppressing them • and observed, that although the benefit derived from newspapers might be exaggerated, yet that serious injury was done to the public by circumscribing their circulation un- necessarily— He would by and by show the evils which had resulted from the smuggling system ; but, in the first place, he must be allowed to say, that he for one was in favour of extending knowledge among the people. If those on the other side of the House differed from him on that point, let them avow their opinion, and tell the people of England boldly, that they were afraid to trust them with cheap information, and would not become parties to diffusing among them the means of sound political instruction. ( Cheers from the Ministerial benches.) No doubt it had been said, the means of instruction already existed, and the people might go to the public-house or the coffee-shop to consult the news- papers of the day. But he for one preferred keeping them at home, in place of sending them to the public-house; and, as Dr. Johnson had said that news- papers were one of the most efficient instruments of diffusing knowledge among the people, he would give the people the means of reading those publications at home.

It was impossible to keep political knowledge from the people, even were it desirable to do so— It was impossible to keep political knowledge from the people, even were it desirable to do so— Could they hope to keep up the exclusive circulation of what they chose to call political knowledge in the high- taxed papers, for which the rich alone could pay ? No such thing ; on the contrary, he could state, that within the City and throughout all the ramifications of trade in England, an active agency was employed for the purpose of violating the law by promoting the circulation, not of newspapers paying a stamp-duty to the state, but of newspapers published in open violation of the law, and without contributing to the revenue. This system was going on increasing. He was not against cheap newspapers, but he was opposed to illegal newspapers anywhere. He was opposed to such vio- lations of the law for two reasons,—because he knew that those engaged in the violation of the laws were not the best qualified to diffuse instruction—no honest man would engage in the open violation of the law ; and then there came the other difficulty—unfortunately the law could not not effectually reach the guilty party. Such was the system to be supported by honourable gentlemen oppo- site. To what extent had it already gone? The total number of newspaper stamps taken in the United Kingdom amounted to 36,000,000. On one single occasion, where the officers of the Stamp department were enabled to drat a seizure, they found on the Thursday an incomplete publication of new-papers to be given to the public on the Saturday, amounting to 40,000 sheets; that single unstamped newspaper, therefore, had acquired a circulation of upwards of 2,000,000 a-year,--equal to one eighteenth of the whole circulation of the stamped press in the kingdom. This was the case of only one paper ; and that there were many others, that the system was going on increasing, extending its connexions and ramifications, no man living could deny. Whenever this subject was mooted, he was charged by one class with pushing his authority to the utmost verge of the law, in the number of Exchequer prosecutions insti- tuted and the fines and imprisonments inflicted ; • whilst others said lie had not gone half far enough, and, in fact, that the neglect of Government had led to the present state of things. But the fact was, it was impossible to carry the law into execution. Government had done all they could, but still they were unsuccessful. The stamped press had an undoubted right to call upon them to enforce the law against its violators. lie had been in constant COU11111Fliels tion with them on the subject, and they had frequently complained that all the efforts of Government had not been sufficient. Ile requested them to suggest any mode conformable to the law by which the proceedings of the unstamped press, both in London and the provinces, could be checked ; but, after exhaust- ing every means in their power, the Law Officers of the Crown had given it as their opinion, that the existing law was wholly ineffectual for the purpose. It was true, the printer's name, as had been stated by Mr. Barclay, was ap- pended to each publication ; but what if it were a false name? That was fre- quently the case: the respectable name of Charles Barclay, for instance, might be given as the printer ; but that would surely not be sufficient to make the honourable Member responsible. Ile adverted to the number of prosecutions that had been instituted against Cleave, Hetherington, and other offenders against the Stamp- laws— In a few weeks, 330 persons had been convicted and imprisoned for selling in the streets, without in the slightest degree repressing the sale. The Member for Sorry would do well to consult the records of the Kingston Gaol ; from which he would find, that 20 or 30 commitments had been made in a single month of persons who had violated this law ; and, notwithstanding, that the same viola- tion of the law had gone on. He would find upon inquiry also, that throughout the whole of England, in rural and remote districts, the circulation of these wistaraped papers was going rapidly forward ; and that the law of the land, as

it stood a' present, was not effectual to put an end to that practice. Well, then, I:e wou:d say, was this a state of things that ought to be continued ? M'as there any man who would justify it, or who would say that they ought not to proceed with regard to newspapers as they ought to proceed with regard to all other subjects in whims the public interest was concerned ? Was there any man who would say, that, for the purpose of limiting the knowledge of political events to certain classes, they were to encounter all this violation of the law, all these prosecutions—that they were to encounter the state of things he had described ?

If this were a revenue question of an ordinary character, nobody would venture to recommend the continuance of such a law for the sake of such an amount of duty as could be collected under it.

Mr. Rice next applied himself to answer the objections of those who called for a total repeal of the tax— In retaining the penny stamp, he had been induced by the consideration that it was essential to the newspaper press to enjoy the facility of a free circulation throughout the country by means of the post ; and to att lin that objet, it ap- peared to him that a penny stamp was the most favourable mode which could be adopted. If he had proposed the total abolition of ':here duties, it would save been indispensable on his part to give up all idea of his proposed reduction of the dirty on paper,—a reduction which was most desirable, not only in refer- ence to newspapers, but in reference to the interests of literature generally. Under these circumstances, he had conceived that he was doing infinitely better in sharing the relief between the newspaper stamps and paper, than in appro- priating the whole disposable surplus to the total repeal of the duty on news- papers. Books were an element of knowledge equally with newspapers, and it would be doing an injustice to literature not to extend to it that relief which would be afforded by the reduction of the paper duty. In proposing to reduce the newspaper stamp to one penny, he was not only not singular in the proposition, but he was more liberal than those who had gone before. In the year 1825, his honourable friend the Member fur Middlesex had brought forward a motion for reducing the Stamp-duty on newspapers to twopence, and had indeed offered his personal security to the then Government in pledge that no loss would result to the revenue front such a reduction. The generous offer, however, was not accepted ; the Chancellor of the Exchequer preferring the actual receipt of the revenue of 450,0001. a year to any contingency on however excellent security. Last session, the Member for Lincoln had brought froward another proposition, in a speech which those who beard it would not soon forget—in a speech con- taining the whole of the arguments upon the subject, plainly, but most power- fully stated. What was the proposition then moved by Mr. Bulwer, seconded by Mr. Hume, and cheered by so many Members of the House ? That propo- sition was to reduce the duty to one penny, allowing that penny for the circula- tion of the paper by the post. The proposition he had, at the time, expressed his regret that he could not accede to, by reason of the then state of the finances; but lie had also stated that he would take the earliest opportunity himself of bringing forward such a proposition. He trusted that the House would admit that he hail now redeemed his pledge. Ile had brought forward the distinct and specific proposition which the Member for Lincoln had expressed his desire to see carried into effect. Yet now, because he took that course—because he hail kept his word—because he had done that which Mr. Bulwer had endea- voured to do—not only the honourable Member, but many of those Members who had supported him on the occasion alluded to, had attacked him its a most undisguised, in a most unremitting, lie would say in a most cruel manner—had charged him with forgi tong every promise, and with disregard of the public interest, although he had not only done that which he had a right to do, but had proposed a considerable reduction of the paper-duty.

He believed that the best way to make a paper respectable and decent, was to extend its circulation—

Ile well knew that the taste of the people of England was such, that they would never consent to prey upon garbage if the means of attaining better food were provided for them. It had been his fate to read much of the unstamped press, for from time to time large packets of them had been forwarded to him ; and he had observed, that just in proportion as the respective papers had in-

creased iu circulation, their quality improved. Indeed, nothing could be more striking than the difference between the character of some of these papers in their outset and their present quality. And what was the cause of this im- provement?—Simply their increased circulation. A paper, while it was con- fined to a particular and limited class of readers, might adapt itself to pandering to the passions or bad feelings of its readers ; but when its circulation became a ore extended and general, its character must change, just as a brook, when confined to a narrow channel, may be turgid and boisterous, but when enlarged into the broad expanse of a river, goes smoothly and placidly on its course. To all those who wished to put an end to contraband publications, he now appealed far support.

Mr. GOULBURN said, that the simple question before the Committee was, whether they should reduce the duty on Newspapers or the duty on Fo.p. Looking at the question in a financial point of view, he differed with Mr. Rice, who assumed that the duty on newspapers was a diminishing duty— If they looked at the returns of the amount of the Stamp-duty for five suc- cessive years, the conclusion to which they would come would be the very opposite of that which his right honourable friend derived from his account. The average of the five years ending in 1830 was 413,000/., and the average of the five years ending in 1835 was 464,000!. Taking the produce then of the five years, it would be found that they had an increasing duty in the stamps on newspapers. But when his right honourable friend selected the year 1831 as the test of his comparison, did he not recollect that at the period in question there was in this country an extraordinary degree of political excitement, and a proportionate anxiety to be informed of all the proceedings in Parliament, which continued during a fur greater portion of the year than had ever before

been consumed in discussion in that House. At the same time also, in foreign countries, events were occurring of immense importance, which excited feelings

of great anxiety. There was then, in 1831, that degree of political excite-

ment which raised the Newspaper Stamp-duty to such a height that it must recede. He said it must recede, because his right honourable friend would observe, that in periods of great political excitement the Stamp-duty received a great addition, and then it declined till some other cause of excitement arose. In 1831 the Stamp-duty on newspapers rose to an amount such as they had never before reached. They fell in the subsequent year. But what was the

cause? Last year, instead of decreasing as compared with 1884, there was an increase. In 1834, the gross amount (that being the fairer mode of making the calculation) was 507,0001 ; the gross amount of the present year was 521,0001. So far, then, from this duty being a decreasing duty, it was reco- vering from the decrease which had fidlowed the great increase resulting from

the excitement of 1831 and the former year. He was not now stating what

was merely his own opinion, but he appealed to what had happened on former occasions with respect to the Stamp-duty on newspapers in support of his argument. The history of the year 1813 most be remembered : the House

must now how the anxiety of the public was kept alive by the great events which occurred in Europe during that year. Now what was the fact in 1813?

The Newspaper Stamp-duty in that year rose to a height that it had never before attuned. It amounted to 394,000/. ; and what was the consequence ? In the succeeding year, from that amount it fell down to 363,000!. —a reduc- tion nearly equivalent to that which took place between 1831 and 1834, and greater than that which took place between 1831 and 1835. The duty on newspapers was an increasing duty ; but the returns showed that in London and in Scotland the quantity of soap brought to charge had been diminished,—d proof that much had been illicitly manufactured in places where the facilities for illegal manufacture were greater than in the inland towns of the country. He contended, that a diminution of the Soap-duty would benefit every class of the com- munity ; while only a fraction of the people would gain any thing by the reduction of the Newspaper-tax- Were not newspapers limited to a certain class ? He found by the return of the number of stamps issued, that there were not more than about :300,000 persons who took in newspapers. The number, then, who were the takers.in of newspapers, were the number who would be directly affected by the relief resulting from a reduction of the duty ; and thus the relief was to be limited to the 300,000. The Soap-duty, he had said, affected every member of thecom- wonky : a reduction in that, therefore, instead of relieving only 300,000, would give relief to 14,000,000 of the population. He did not mean to say that not more than 300,000 persons read newspapers; he only spoke of those who took them in; and he contended that only they would be materially affected by the reduction. He knew very well that every newspaper that was taken was read by a considerable number ; and, viewing the subject in that way, the relief would be equivalent to a twentieth part of the whole. The difference was between the twentieth part of a penny and 4W. and 3d. Mr. Rice said, the duty on soap had been already reduced, and others must take their turn; there- fore he now proposed to relieve the newspapers. It was true that in 1833 there was repealed half the duty on soap ; but was nothing done for newspapers on that occasion? Was no the duty on advertisements reduced in the same year from 13s. 6d. to Is. 611. ? That was a great advantage to the newspaper editors. There seas at that time a great deal of competition in advertisements in other channels ; and the reduction enabled the editors to reduce the price of adver- tisements, or to obtain more extended information than they obtained before the reduction of the duty. But the right honourable gentleman told them that in the present session, for the further relief of the newspaper proprietors, he intended to repeal half the duty on paper, and that he himself estimated at Id. on every newspaper. Was that no relief?

He utterly denied that the illicit trade in newspapers would be stopped by the reduction of twopence in the duty— What was the nature of the contest carried on with the daily press? It was the contest of men who went to no expense against men who went to great ex- pense in providing the article which they offered to the public. The editor of a London journal went to an enormous expense to procure intelligence. He in- curred a very great expense, if he might say so without being out of order, to obtain accurate reports of what occurred in this House. lie went to a still greater expense for foreign intelligence : he had to establish foreign correspon- dents—expresses anticipating the arrival of the post brought him intelligence from abroad. These were amongst the expensive arrangements that were made to secure early information to meet the wishes of those who took in his paper. Such, then, constituted the real tax which the morning papers hail to pay. Talk of the twopenny stamp in comparison with these expenses ! why, it was as no. thing. And the man who edited the paper taking the parts and information which his contemporary who paid for them had been to such an expense in pur- chasing, must ever time into the market on terms so advantageous, that, as a set-off against them, the amount of the stamp-duty was insignificant. When the duty was repealed, would there not be the same attempts to get information, he might almost say at no charge at all ?

Ile would call the attention of the House to the inevitable effect of the proposed reduction on the existing newspapers— The editors of the present respectable 'rapers, not able to compete with their antagonists, would be compelled to forego obtaining that information which was now so accurately given: the press, generally, would be reduced to this—they would no longer be able to give accurate information of what fell from honour. able Members in this House, or of other events of great interest with the public. He feared that they would in this way lower the general tone of the press of the country, and prevent it from being the channel for the dissemination of useful information. He begged to warn the friends to the dissemination of knowledge amongst the people, against lowering the tone of the press of this country. When he compared the daily press of this country with the newspapers of other countries that came before him, he confessed he was proud of its superiority. He saw that subjects were discussed in it, on one side and the other, with the greatest ability. Sometimes, it must be admitted, the daily papers yielded too much to the excitement which existed ; but, generally speaking, they were di.. tinguished by great judgment and temper. When he looked to the press of foreign countries, he found it occupied with long disquisitions on theatrical exhibitions, and other things interesting to the people of those countries; but such matters possessed comparatively little interest for the people of England. When he looked at the newspapers of America, which were referred to as & model of what newspapers ought to be, he must confess he saw in the newspapers of England a superiority in the character, the style, and the manner of dis- cussiug political questions, which convinced him, that if they had not the ad- vantage of a low amount of duty, they had, nevertheless, some other advantages of a most important nature, which they derived from the amount of the duty, and their other press regulations. He was sorry, then, to find a measure intro- duced, such as, in his opinion, would tend materially to lower the character of the press, by causing the proprietors of the respectable portion to forego the expenses for information which he believed to be essential to the proper instruc- tion of the people through the medium of the newspapers.

Mr. CHARLLS BULLER contended that the daily press of this coma- try was inferior to that of France. No person of high literary reputa-

tion, such as Chateaubriand, had any connexion with English news- papers. He thought that the Tories might have found out by this time, that it was not even their interest to keep the people in darkness. He admitted that the people were much excited during the struggle for the Reform Bill, by false statements of the income of certain persons. It was said that the Archbishop of Canterbury bad 81,0001. a year, and that a member of a Peer's family, who had never received any of the public money, had a pension of 12,000/. a year. These things were reported and credited in Cornwall. As to the question of which

should he reduced, the Soap or the Newspaper tax, he certainly, if he were Chancellor of the Exchequer, should prefer retaining that which I e could collect. He did not believe that the reduction of a halfpenny a pound on the Soap-tax would put an end to smuggling, as a reductioa of three-halfpence a pound had been found insufficient for that purpose.

Then, as to the expected benefit to agriculture, he believed that the exporters of tallow from Russia would reap the whole of it. He could not, therefore, support the amendment on the ground of its being bene- ficial to the agriculturists.

Lord SANDON, who was very indistinctly hear I, supported, and Mr. BUCKINGHAM opposed the amendment. Mr. Roraima( said, that this was a question of party politics. The object of the Tories was to keep the people in darkness and igno- rance, in order to reestablish their own power. They professed a de- sire to benefit the farmer ; but they were seen through ; and every- body saw that their aim was to aggrandize the landlord, into whose pocket an advance in the price of tallow might put a little money. He defended the character of the unstamped press : it did not con- tain one tenth of the scurrility and downright immorality of the stamped press— Was any portion of the unstamped guilty of any crime approaching that of the Dublin newspapers, when they gravely debated whether or not Mr. O'Con- nell might lawfully be shot ? It was alleged that the diminution of the duty would lead to a deluge of immorality : what ground was there for any such assumption? Had not the poor shown a better taste than those of the higher rank ? The upper classes, it was well known, delighted in scurrility, scandal, and abuse. ( Cries of "0h, oh, oh ! ") Honourable gentlemen might cry " Oh, uh !" as their only reply to his assertion : "oh, oh !" was very easily said ; but he repeated it, and lie challenged a denial of his assertion, that the higher classes delighted in printed obscenity— ( " Oh, oh!")—delighted also in scandal and personal abuse. They would not find these in the papers circu- lated in the pot-house ; there was no filthy obscenity, no disgusting personal scandal in these; it was in the rich man's paper, in the parsons paper—(" 011, oh !")—in the Age and the John Bull • these were the papers which pan- dered to the morbid appetites of the wealthier classes. They paid their seven- pence for it, and they wished to have a monopoly of it ; and he was quite willing to allow them ; and site he was that if the Stamp-duty were taken off news- papers to-morrow, there would be no increase in the okeenity circulated by means of the press. On the contrary, he maintained that the voice of the great body of the people would bear down the obscenity which already existed In it, and that the aristocracy would at last be ashamed to foster aud encourage it (" 0h, oh !") Again he denied the assertion, and he challenged honour- able Members who put it forward to move it, that immorality would be in- creased by throwing open the newspaper press; unless, indeed, it Were immo- rality in their eyes to teach the people to understand their tights, to stand up for what they ought to demand, and to put down by their united voice the aristocratical domination tinder which the had too long laboured.

KEARSLEY could not help congratulating Mr. Spring Rice and other Members at the same side of the !louse, on the satisfaction with which they had evidently listened to " the disgusting speech "of 31r. Roebuck. (Loud cries rf " Order! " and " Chair! ")

-Mrs Beitsras (the Chairman) called upon Mr. Kearsley to retract the word " disgusting."

The following scene; as described in the report of the Chronicle, then ensued.

Mr. KEARSLEV—" Sir, I am quite aware that I might have used language stronger than the circumstances required. 1 admit that the laragnage was strong; but I must say, that a more disgusting speech I never heard." (Loud cries of " Oa der, order !") The COA BM N —" I am really very sorry to call the honourable Member's attention again to the words which he made use of; but I must beg to repeat it, and in doing so I am in the hands the Committee to he corrected if I am wrong, that the language which fell from the honourable Member was such as was never permitted to be used in this House." ( Loud alert ing.) Mr. Ksausses—" 1 am very sorry that the honourable 31eniber for Bath having charged me with what is not true, 1 cannot characterize his speech by other terms." (Load cries " Order, order !" " (hair, chnir ! ") Mr. Boyrue r: then rose, and as well as we could hear, said—" I trust the Home will permit the debate to proceed, and make allowance for what must be looked upon as an infirmity of the honourable Member opposite." ( Cries of " Rear, hear ! " and " Order! " " Chair! ") Mr. Boyrue r: then rose, and as well as we could hear, said—" I trust the Home will permit the debate to proceed, and make allowance for what must be looked upon as an infirmity of the honourable Member opposite." ( Cries of " Rear, hear ! " and " Order! " " Chair! ") Mr. Mernees rose, amid loud cries of "Order !" and " Chair ! " I think, said the honourable Member, it is due, not only to this Ilouse but to the country, that the Chairman should declare whether the language of the honour- able gentleman opposite (Mr. Kearaley) is such as should be addressed to this House, or such as it is becoming in us to hear without reprehension. ( Cries of " Chair! " and " Oh, uh ') I conic here to do may duty to my constiiii- euts, and not for the purpose of listenimg to language which is unbecoming the dignity of this house." (" Cries of "Chair ! " and " Olt, ! ")

Mr. Be n Na I. rose, and after saying a few words to those near Liar, which were not audible in the Gallery, resumed his scat.

Mr. KEA B■4.Ey then rose, and assuming, an extremely grave awl earnest air, and placing his glass to his eve with one hand, and putting his hat under his lie arm, looked very stedfastly across the House at Mr. Methuen, and exclaimed, " Sir, when the honourable Member for North Wiltshire thinks proper so precipitately to interrupt me, I am tempted to exclaim, " l'aul, Paul, why persecutest thou me! "

[Here the whole House was convulsed with laughter, which conti- nued for several minutes, and which WAS much increased when Mr. Kearsley left his seat on the second row of the Opposition benches, and walked down quietly to the floor of the House, where, after bowing twice, in a style the solemnity of which made it irresistibly ludicrous, he made two efforts to retire, but being stopped at the bar, came back to his place amidst renewed shouts of laughter, and cries of " Chair ! " and " Order ! "] Dr. BALDWIN, Mr. HUME, Lord EBRINGTON, Lord JOHN RUSSELL, and Sir A NDREW LEMI Hay, spoke to order; and after a scene of indescribable confusion, Mr. KEARSLI,Y, after several evasions, apolo- gized for and withdrew his offensive expressions.

Mr. WALTER spoke in favour of the amendment; and

The Committee divided : for the resolution of Alr: Spring Rice, 241 ; for Sir Charles Knightley's amendment, 208; majority, 33.

The Chairman reported progress, mid the Committee rose.

2. SUGAR DUTIES.

The House of Commons being in a Committee of Supply, on Wed- nesday, Mr. SPRING RICE moved a resolution for the equalization of the duties on East and West India Sugar, according to the provi- sions of a bill to be hereafter brought into Parliament. Mr. Rice defended the policy of this measure, in a speech of some length ; from which we gather that it will be about two years before any East India sugar can be brought into the English market on the new terms.

Mr. GOULBURN would not oppose the resolution; but he feared that it would alarm the West India planters, and have a bad moral effect.

Mr. Hums Mr. EWART, Mr. O'CONNELL, and Lord WILLIAM BENTINCK supported the resolution.

Mr. P. 31. STEWART had by 110 means expected so sweepings mea- slue as that proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It would Mr. STANLEY Silk!, that Lord Samion ought to reprove Mr. Bon- ham for having made this a party question, if it were one; for although that gentleman had no possible connexion-110 sort of interest what- ever—with the port of Liverpool, lie had exhibited conspicuous party activity in favour of the bill.

The House then divided :

For Mr. Ewa t's motion 197 Against it 173 Majority 24

So the Sandon bill was lost.

have a startling effect on the West Indiana ; who certainly worrld ham a claim for the abolition of the existing restrictions on the trade of the islands with the American Continent. The trade to the West Indies would be much benefited by the equilization of the duties,--a mea- sure which he should certainly support.

Mr. Pouts.= THOMSON was glad that Ministers would have the tardy support of Mr. Stewart. He denied, however, that because the duties on Colonial produce were equalized, that this gave the West Indians a claim for the abolition of the restrictions on their trade with America.

After a few remarks from Mr. CRAWFORD, Mr. G. F. YOUNG, Dr. BOWRING, Mr. TIIORNELY, and Mr. RICE, the resolution was agreed to.

4. LIVERPOOL DOCKS Btu.

Last night, Lord SANDON moved the further consideration of the report of the Committee on the Liverpool Docks Bill.

Lord CLIVE moved that the bill be recommitted. A clause had been introduced exempting Runcorn and three other ports on the Mer- sey from dosk-dues ; and he intended to move in the Committee to-: exempt Ellesmere, on the Cheshire coast, from the payment of those dues. His object was to put the Staffordshire, Shropshire, and North ‘Vales navigation, on the same footing as that terminating on the other side of the Mersey.

Lord SANDON said, the clause had been introduced without due no- tice, and was contrary to the Standing Orders. It affected the Dock- bondholders to the extent of 1,400,000/. ; and he should move to strike it out.

The SPEAKER, being appealed to, said, that tine clause having been introduced in violation of the Standing Orders, it must be struck out.

There was some discussion as to the mode of proceeding; but finally, Mr. Ewaser stated his reasons for opposing the bill ; the principal of which was, that it took from the Town-Council the management of the Dock estate, which properly belonged to it. lie moved that the report be taken into consideration that day six months.

Lord Smenox supported the bill ; and cemplained that it should have been made as party question, and that Mr. E. J. Stanley should have come down to the House with two Admiralty Lords ill his train to vote against the bill.

MISCELLANEOUS SUBJECTS.

TEA-DUTIES. Mr. SPRING BICE stated, on Tuesday, in reply to a question by Mr. GROTE, that lie did not intend to propose any alteration in tile duties on bohea tea- • He would, however, inform OM House of the determination to which the Treasury had come open one part of this subject. It so happened, that the alteration of the law had been made with the cognizance and at the suggestion of the patties now applying fur relief. That alteration would make the pay- ment of a considerable auto necessary to all who were not prepared to pay the new duty of 2s. Id. per pound. He was aware that it would afford great facilities to the parties to postpone the payment of the new duties to a period after the 1st of July; and to afford those facilities, a special Treasury minute had been issued, authorizing all persons entering tea for home consumption pre- vious to the 1st of July to take a time not exceeding thirty-one days for the payment of the duties to which they then became liable. There was no doubt that there were a great many precedents for granting them such a privilege. There were, however, snare other points connected with this subject, which could not be settled without conning before the House ; and the Treasury minute there- fore contained a direction that a copy of it should be forthwith laid on the table of the House of Commons. The advantage which would he derived from the extension of this period to individuals residing in tl:e City of London, would be extender! to individuals in all parts of the United Kingdom ; for it would be open to great objection if this indulgence had been limited to the City of Lon- don, and not extended to such places as Liverpool, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Dublin.

Mr. ROBINSON approved of the conduct of Government in this matter.

Mr. MARJORII1ANKS said, that the persons engaged in the tea-trade were by no means satisfied with the conduct of Government. Lord SANDON, on behalf of his constituents, protested against any further losses by alterations in the tea-duty. Sir ROBERT PEEL thought that those merchants who had sent out their orders before the increased duty was laid on bohea, were hardly used. On the whole, however, he approved of the conduct of Ministers.

PAPER-DUTIES. Mr. RICE then mentioned, in reply to a question from Sir GEORGE CLERK, the course which he intended to take on the subject of the Paper-duties- With respect to stained paper, the reduction of duty was to commence on the 5th of July ; and with respect to the first-class paper and milled-boards, the reduction of duty should not take place till the 10th of October ; but, in the mean time, in order to relieve owners of paper-mills from the necessity of having their premises burdened with too large a stock, it was proposed to allow them to pats paper into the stocks of the stationers, their customers, under the direction of the Board of Excise, the duty having been paid before it was issued from the mills; and any stock of that paper remaining unconsumed on the 10th of October in the hands of the stationers, would entitle them to a return equal to the excess of duty on that denomination of paper. This would enable the owners of mills to continue their works, and the stationers to keep up their stocks and purchases, and on the 10th of October entitle them to the difference between the high and low duty on the amount of their stocks.

COUNTY RATES AND MAGISTRACY. Mr. HUME, OR Tuesday, ob- tained leave to bring inn a bill " to separate the financial from the judicial affairs of the counties in England and Wales, aud to authorize the rate-payers in counties to choose rer resentatives to form a County Board for the assessment, levying, and administration of the County- rates and financial affairs of counties in England and Wales."

REGISTRATION OF VOTERS BILL. This bill was in Committee on Tuesday. A lengthened discussion—very imperfectly heard except by the few who took a part in it—carried on the settlement of the clauses from the 69th to the 76th.

CHARGE OF BRIBERY AGAINST MR. HARDY. Mr. GULLY. OD Wednesday, called the attention of the House to the charge of bribery made against Mr. nerdy by Mr. O'Connell ; in reference to which he had on a former occasion stated, that he could show by Mr. Hardy's own admission that he had been guilty of bribing the electors of Pontefract. He had obtained a copy of the letter written by Mr. Hardy, containing the admission, and would read it to the House. In this letter, which was dated March 5th 183s, Mr. Hardy said, that, " one way or another," he had paid .50001. on account of his contest at Pontefract; and that he had felt bound in honour, " though much against his conscience," to pay head-money to those who voted for him. Mr. Gully said that he would now leave the House to deal with Mr. Hardy as it saw fit' and concluded by moving that the letter he had read be taken into the consideration of the House.

Dr. BALDwIN seconded the motion.

Mr. HARDY, in reply, said that he had authorized Air. Leatham to give up the letter which Mr. Gully had produced ; and he read a letter which he had received from Mr. Leatham, stating that Mr. Hardy had lost his election rather than bribe voters on the day of the election for Pontefract. Mr. Hardy also mentioned, that'though he had received the promises of 700 out of SGO votes, he had only 429 votes : what became of the difference, he would leave the House to conjecture. His expenses had been swelled up to 56001. by the cost of a petition which followed the election, and the defence of an action brought against him by a little attorney, %A ho claimed 2513. for his services as an election agent, instead of 501., which he thought enough. The at- torney was defeated, but the defence of the action was expensive.

Lord JOHN RessEss wished the debate to be stifled.

Mr. Head: said the matter could not be got rid of so easily. Mr. Hardy had acknowledged the payment of head-money, which was bribery.

Mr. GULLY, in reply to an insinuation on the other side, declared that if he had ever paid head-money, he should deem it dishonourable to deny that Ire bad &ilia

Mr. Hume moved Mr. Hardy's letter be printed.

Mr. RoBINSoN opposed the motion. Mr. Stmt, supported the motion; which, he said, Mr. Hardy had fairly brought upon himself. The House rejected the motion, by 136 to 97.

Mr. HUME then gave notice, that on Wednesday next he should submit a motion to the House, to the effect— "That any candidate at any election of 31embers to serve in Parliament, who should give, or consent to give, any sum or sums of money, under the name of bead-money, or any such similar name, would be guilty of a gross violation of the independence of Parliament, and of the r;ghts of Parliament, and of the rights and privileges of flu; Commons of the United Kingdom."

BRIBERY AT ELECTIONS BILL. Seven clauses of this bill were agreed to in Committee on Wednesday.

roLLING AT COUNTY ELECTIONS. Lord JOAN RUSSELL obtained leave, on Thursday, to bring in a bill for the more convenient division of Counties into Polling-districts, and for tilting the poll in one day.

PARISH VEsTatEs BILL. The House, on Wednesday, refused to read this bill a second time, by a majority of 60 to 42. Lord JOHN RUSSELL opposed it, on the ground that it interfered with the Poor-law.

CHURCH-RATES. In reply to a question from Lord STANLEY, on Monday, Lord JOHN ItussEst. said, that he feared it would not be in his power to introduce a bill this session for the abolition of Church- rates. Mr. Hume said, that the country expected to be told frankly and clearly what Ministers intended to do on this subject. Lord JOHN RUSSELL replied, that he never had given the Dissenters any reason to believe that a substitute for Church-rates would be provided out of the Church revenues. He did not believe that the Dissenters were at all anxious that any bill should be introduced, as they knew he was not prepared to advocate any measure that would coincide with their wishes on the subject.

ENGLISH TITHE BILL. Last night, the remaining clauses of this bill were agreed to in Committee, after a very long discussion ; which, as usual, is scarcely intelligible, and, as reported, is exceedingly dry and uninteresting. The principal debate was on a proposition of Mr. HUME, respecting tithes on hop-grounds and market-gardens ; but from the mariner in which his motion is stated in the reports, it is impossible to get at its exact bearing. Mr. HUME'S proposal was re- jected by a vote of 104 to 23. The bill is to be read a third time on Monday.

NEW HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT : PETITION FROM ARCHITECTS. Mr. HumE, on Tuesday, presented a petition from the unsuccessful competitors for prizes for designs of the New Houses of Parliament, complaining that the Commissioners, in making their selection, had departed from the instructions of the Committee of the two Houses. Mr. TRACY defended the Commissioners. Mr. HUME gave notice, that he should recommend a plan very different from that chosen by the Commissioners, when the report of the Committee was laid on the table.

METROPOLITAN SUSPENSION BRIDGE BILL. On Wednesday, the report on this bill, which is to enable a company to erect a Suspension Bridge over the Thames between Waterloo and Vauxhall Bridges, was received, after some opposition from Mr. TOOKE, and a division of 109 to 30.

REGULATION OF LIGHTHOUSES. Leave was given to Mr. Pou- LETT THOMSON, on Thursday, to bring in a bill to put English Light- houses under the management of the Trinity Board.

IRISH TITHES Bose It was arranged last night, after a conver- sation between Lord JOHN RUSSELL and Sir ROBERT PEEL, that the House should go into Committee on this bill on Friday; and that the discussion on the App; ropriatit n principle, which would be raised oa the .50th clause, should be taken on the Monday following.

SCOTTISH COURT OF SESSION. Mr. J. A. MURRAY (the Lord Advocate) moved, on Thursday, for leave to bring in a bill for the better regulation of the office of Auditor of Accounts in the Court of Session in Scotland, and for the appointment of two Accountants- General in the said court.

Sir W. Rat opposed the motion. The only object of the bill was to give two persons 3,0001. a year for doing nothing.

Mr. HUME wished the bill to be postponed, until it was ascer- tained whether the reduction recommended by the Committee of that House might not render it unnecessary. After a few words from Mr. BANNERMAN, Mr. WALLACE, Mr. GOULRVIIN, and Sir GEORGE CLERK, the House agreed to the motion, by a vote of 93 to 69.

SsoTTisti SHERIFFS AND BURGH COURTS. Mr. MURRAY also had leave to bring in a bill for the better regulation of these courts.

POST-OFFICE. In the House of Lords, on Monday, the Duke of RICHMOND expressed his strong disapprobation of the proposed aboli- tion of the office of Postmaster-General. Ile thought that the reve- nue would be increased by the reduction of the postage charges, and wished the establishment not to be considered so much as one for the raising of revenue. If any bill were introduced to carry into effect the recommendations of the Post-office Commissioners, he should move to refer it to a Select Committee. Lord Dexcaiesosi said, he should oppose such a motion, if he stood alone ; and Lord W'ALLACE expressed his decided concurrence with the recommendation of the Commissi- oners to place the Post-office under the management of a Board. Lord AstieraTos altogether disapproved of making Coe Post-office depart- ment a source of revenue.

PetsoNEns' COUNSEL Bier. This bill was reed a second time by the Peers on Thursday, on the motion of Lord LyNDHURST. Lord Deemas, Lord Wseroen, Lord A BINGER, and the Loan CHAN- cELLoit spoke in favour of the principle of the bill ; but Lord WYNFORD said that additional Judges would be required, as trials would occupy mere thee if the prisoner's counsel were allowed to make speeches.

IMPRISONMENT l'Olt DEBT. Lord Chancellor COTTENHAM gave notice, on Tuesday, that he should next Tuesday lay on the table a bill to abolish Imprisonment for Debt.

Dumas; Poster; BILL. This bill was read a third time last night, and passed.