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March '24, 1860.1 The header and Saturda...
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SECOND READING"OF THE REFORM BILL. milER...
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EUROPEAN POLITICS, /r THE proceedings of...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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March '24, 1860.1 The Header And Saturda...
March ' 24 , 1860 . 1 The header and Saturday Anal yst . 271
Second Reading"Of The Reform Bill. Miler...
SECOND READING " OF THE REFORM BILL . milERE is a family stoiy , that in the nursery at Woburn some X sixty years ago tile child * who attracted most attention and seemed best fitted to make its future way in the world , was the little fellow whose diminutive dimensions caused him to be named " the Wonder . " Lord John Russell ' s present Bill is like its author , singularly small , but so far it resembles likewise its aristocratic parent in being marvellously lucky ; Nay its very want of pretension- and robust figure seems to be the talisman of its success . Had it been a large and liberal measure , it might have been the glory of those who brought it forth and cherishedit ; but it would have come in for hard knocks in the outset of its career , and that career would have been but brief . The
Tory Opposition , ' however well disposed to greet anything for sake of getting rid of the question for the -present , could hardly have abstained from giving battle on the second reading , had the measure been founded upon any great principle of popular enfranchisement like Household Suffrage , or had it involved the abolition of any considerable number of rotten boroughs . It does neither , and . consequently the chiefs of the Garlton Club have agreed to let it go into committee ' without serious molestation , content , if they should be able , there to mitigate and mutilate its provisions so as to make them as a whole even more Conservative than they already are . In . the eyes of the Radicals the Bill is hardly worth opposing . They do not object to anything it contains , though they complain of its many omissions . As for the Whigs , they look upon " it as " a Wonder , " comparing it with its elder brethren of the same stock , and are only too
anxious to patronise and promote it by all the means m thenpower . Theyt have an awful sense of the risk they incur lest a worse thing come upon them , should the present very mild offer"be not accepted ; ' : The owners of borough property well know that they are liable to an action -of ejectment on the title any day or hour ; and though . nothing that can be done by them or by . anyone ' else can positively secure to Lord Exeter the lasting possession of Stamford or to the Duke of Mabx . bou ' ough the political fee of Woodstock , they have a notion that they _ will be somewhat better able to resist hereafter the claims of right and justice , if by a sort of amicable suit the whole question shall be gravely discussed in the High Court of Parliament , and a comwith its sanction
promise on certain points entered . Into ; . . Nor do we profess to come in by way of interpleader to object to the proceeding . Every seat wrenched from the grasp of nomination , and given to a populous county or town , is so much gained for the cause of progress . It is said that the loss of nominative power by the proposed transfer of \ five-arid-twenty . seats will be about as great to one . of the old hereditary parties in the state as to the other ; but the gain to the people will be of the whole five-imd-twenty , if there he spirit and manliness enough in the constituencies to remember liow long they have been kept out . of their rights , and how deeply it behoves them to elect from amongst themselves men identified with their interests and wants , not popinjays of fashion , or fools of quality . And if some four or five hundred thousand householders in counties
and towns shall he endued with the franchise by the present Bill , who do not now possess it , we shall rejoice heartily in such a reinforcement of the electoral garrison , closely beleaguered by the powers of privilege though the constitution still may be . It seems to us ft strange mistake in a man of Mr . Di sitaeLi ' s acumen and forethought , while he agrees in effect to allow the Bill to pass , that he should widen the chasm of jealousy and distrust between liis party and the working classes in general , by JflTinv , nf . ! nrr tlin . muiiairrfl n « ruirs wiiinli ¦ lsivo'f'lv and dnntrnrouslv
adds to their power . It does , in reality , nothing of the kind , It is truly observed by a writer in the Dally News , that , though •«• the phrase working classes be a very convenient one in politienl nomenclature , practically and descriptively it is the most vague and illusive of denominations : " and wo agree with our contemporary that " a very little reflection will suffice to satisfy any candid mind thnt homogeneity is , of nil qualities and characteristics , the last that it implies . Dissimilar trades have dissimilar habits , sympathies , and interests . They have never yet been found united for any good or evil purpose whatsoever .
Two or three branches of industry may , on particular occasions , coalesce and combine , but no example onn be shown of uuivorsnl or unanimous concert of a practical or effective kind . " Out of the three millions of people that inhabit the metropolis not five thousand will be added to the electoral roll by the new measure , and wo doubt if one half of those will be men living by waged labour . Still fewer will be added to the county constituencies , and so few in ono half the cities and boroughs , that the specific influence of the addition in oneli case will bo confessedly inapprecinWo . There arc , perhaps , a do » en , or twenty manufacturing towns whore the six pound franchise , wore it the law of the land , would confer power on those who live by labour j but even thero
it is absurd to talk of property and intellect being absolutely overborne by the facility with ^ vhioh a-homogeneous mass of labour may , be -made to act in combination . The failure of the Builders' Strike a few months since Was admittedly owing to the small amount of active support afforded it by other trades , and still more by the utter impossibility of'inducing the masons and carpenters , the two branches . most nearly associated and identified in feeling as to the cause at issue , to act together . If this be so upon a point where the very existence , so to-speak , of
the parties concerned was at stake , what probability ' -is . there ot identity of action amongst widely dissimilar , trades and callings , where mere political theories of government or taxation arc in discussion ? But were it otherwise , we cannot see what compensation Mr . Disraeli can promise himself from the manifestation of so much fear and jealousy of the great industrial muss of the community , unless it be in the sort of terror he seems to wish to excite among the upper and middle classes , at the tortoise-step advance of democratic freedom .
We shall indeed be glad , nevertheless , if the Opposition , whatever their motives may be , should succeed in introducing in committee some of the amendments which their leaders speak of . The best of those , ' as yet . indicated ,-is a provision preventing the payment of carriage hire for voters going to the poll ' . It is also well worthy of consideration , we think , whether the public portion of the necessary expenditure -for -. hustings ; , polling booths , tally clerks , auditors , returning officers , & c , ought not to be
borne by the county or borough-rate . . llie expense of elections , as we have often taken occasion to point out , is one of the greatest evils of the present system ; and no reform could tend more directly to the benefit of" the -community at large , by contributing to ' abate the'means-arid appliances of indirect . corruption ,-than the-amendments to which ; we have referred . As there is now no chance of the Bill going into Committee before Easter , we shall reserve any further suggestions , as to detailed modifications of its tenor , until a future occasion .
European Politics, /R The Proceedings Of...
EUROPEAN POLITICS , / r THE proceedings of the Emperor of the French with reference to the annexation of Savoy are not calculated to increase the comfort of Europe , and the Germans may not be wrong in viewing the matter with considerable alarm ; but . if their governments had been worth the cost of sustaining them , -the only part of the question which is really of European- , interest would have been effectually secured . We allude to the position of the districts of Genevois , Chablais , andFaucigny , which were made neutral—that is mongrel and debnteable by the settlement of 1815 , and which , notwithstanding the untruthful pretence of
Napoleon III ., are far from desiring to come under his yoke . It was an . absurdity to expect the Swiss to defend a territory which they were not to possess ; and if France should now , in spite of their protestations , and the obvious danger to Germany , persist in pushing its military frontier as far . as the Lake of Geneva , the chief blame of the situation ought to fall upon ' the German sovereigns , who , by their petty jealousies and contemptible reactionary principles , have nullified the power of the nice unfort unately burdened with thoir misrule . South Germany , so far as its princes ore concerned , is in league with Austria , and in seizing a position which dominates Switzerland , Napolkon III .
leaps over a barrier which protected its frontiers , against the operations of France . We shall deeply deplore any evil that may befall the brave , industrious , ami freedom-loving Swiss in consequence of their proximity to dangerous neighbours ; but the Gormans will deserve any mischief which their own misconduct entails . Not only have they failed in the plain duty winch belongs to tsn enlightened people—that of supporting the cause of Italy against her Austrian oppressors—but they liuvo forced the cabinet of tho Tuilories to prepare itself to encounter the pi' 07 bable hostility of the Confederation , ' if the course of events should compel Franco to engage in another conflict with the armies of Austria ,
German papers sec in our Treaty with France a proof of fear and humiliation . According to them , wo have made concessions in the hope of purchasing pence . It is astonishing that any sane persons should make sucsh an absurd mistake ; but unluckily the Germans seem incapable of viewing political foots except through the spectacles of previously-conceived prejudices ; and they arc so blindly drifting towards danger , that it is q-uito time to warn jthem thnt if they " plunge into it , they must got out of it as well as they can , witliput English aid . The physical strength of Germany will never bo concentrated , and available for useful purposes , until it obtains a sound moral Ims . is ; and no ono can have read the diplomatic correspondence recently published , without being grieved and ashamed of tho unlbrLunato 1 ' uot , that , in all its efforts to sustain liberal principles , our Government 1 ms
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 24, 1860, page 3, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_24031860/page/3/
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