multitude whom they have deluded -the establishment of democratic tyranny, from the general suffering which has roused every labouring man into action. The evils of bribery, hitherto comparatively unfelt in this part of the island, will, under the new constitution, spread with unheard of velocity. Struggling for existence with a numerous and audacious democratic faction, Wealth and Property will be compelled to enter the field. Bribery, as at Liverpool, must be conducted on the largest scale. It will emerge from the precincts of the Town Council, to stalk through every street and alley of Scotland. The passion for power among the populace must be combated by their thirst for gold-the rival corrupters of human nature must be arrayed in hostility against each other, but with combined injury to the deluded multitude. And the people will be demoralized equally by their supporters and their seducers. While the democratic press fans the flame of popular ambition, commercial wealth will poison the fountain of public virtue; and the Constitution, hitherto securely based on the property and intelligence of the country, will vibrate between the influence of selfish corruption, and the fury of plebeian ambition. Nor is the actual violence to which these contested elections will give rise, the least formidable consideration in the new constitution, with which we are threatened. England hitherto has only known Scotland as a quiet unobtrusive province of the empire, which took nothing from the national strength, and largely poured the fruits of its industry into the national exchequer. We shall see how long this state of things will continue-how long a garrison of 1200 men will suffice for the reformed kingdom. The riots and devastation have already been mentioned which preceded and followed the contest in Edinburgh, and the other parts of the kingdom have exhibited similar disgraceful scenes of intimidation and violence. At Lauder, one of the electors was forcibly carried off, in defiance of the whole civil force of Berwickshire, at the door of the court-house, the sheriff and Lord Maitland knocked down, and the election, which ran to within one vote, carried by open violence. At Forfar, on the last election, the reforming candidate, the Lord Advocate, was so alarmed at the threatening aspect of the multitude arrayed against himself, that he sent, in the middle of the night, to Perth for dragoons, a distance of thirty miles; although the same learned functionary, on the appearance of the Edinburgh riots against his adversaries, thought fit to order them to leave the town. The radicals of Glasgow, Falkirk, and all the manufacturing districts of the country, were assembled, by printed placards, at Stirling on the day of election, to intimidate the freeholders from voting for the anti-reform candidate; and the admirable firmness and dispositions of the sheriff only preserved the freedom of election. If such is the state of matters even where the lower orders have, comparatively speaking, so little influence, and where no interest of theirs is at issue, what may be expected when the elective franchise is so immensely extended, and when bands of the rural tenantry march into the towns to meet the manufacturers in a contest for the abolition of the Corn laws, or other subjects intimately connected with the pecuniary interests of every elector? They know little of the fervidum Sco-. torum ingenium who can anticipate any thing but bloodshed and civil dissension from such a collision. It is no answer to this to say, Scotland must learn to exercise the rights of freemen. We may be reduced to the condition of the county of Clare in the course of the apprenticeship. If a man in perfect health is compelled to swallow a dangerous medicine, it is little consolation to him to be informed, that, after years of suffering and misery, he may regain the healthful state which he had lost. The confiscation of property consequent on the passing of the Reform Bill in Scotland is another most serious consideration, which has never met with the attention it deserves. There are thirty counties in the kingdom, and their united freeholders amount to about 2500 persons. Supposing each vote to be worth L.800, which, on an average, it certainly is, since in Lanarkshire and Mid-Lothian they have been sold for L.1500 and L.2000 each, the amount of property vested in these freeholds is L.2,000,000. The whole of this property is threatened with destruction; for it is needless to say, that from the day that the L.10 voters are admitted, no freehold will be worth any thing. Here, then, is an equalizing measure, which, deliberately and without compensation, takes L.2,000,000 sterling from the higher orders, to divide it among the lower. It is not surprising that, with such a glittering boon before their eyes, there were numerous signatures from the working classes to the Reform petitions. nents of L.800 each, can make no reasonable objection to being called on themselves to pay L.20. It is no answer to the palpable injustice of such a proceeding to say, that individual interest must frequently give way to the public good. So it undoubtedly must. But when this is the case, it uniformly hitherto has been the practice to make a proper compensation to the suffering party. Thus, when it was deemed expedient, from their obvious bad consequences, to abolish the heritable jurisdiction of particular families, in 1745, due compensation was made by Government to the parties who formerly possessed them. Even after the heats and animosities of the rebellion, the doctrine was not then acted upon, that private rights are to be invaded on considerations of public utility, without compensation to the suffering party. In all bills for canals, roads, harbours, or other public works, when private property is invaded or deteriorated, compensation is uniformly provided. It was reserved for the fanatical supporters of immediate abolition of slavery to promulgate, for a reforming administration to act upon, such a principle. The mode of obviating this injustice is obvious. Let those who acquire a privilege which they did not before possess, pay for it. Let the 100,000 voters, to whom a privilege is to be extended for the first time, compensate those who lose it, or whose property is so much deteriorated as to be of no value. If the reformers really are anxious for political power, and do not make it a pretence for putting their hands in their neighbours' pockets, let them submit to this sacrifice. Men who are clear for depriving their oppo This consideration points out the utter inconsistency of those who stigmatize as interested all the anti-reform petitions, because they spring from persons threatened with loss, and hold up as disinterested all those which emanate from classes promised a gain-that is, the victims of spoliation are grossly interested, because they strive to save themselves from loss; the supporters of it perfectly pure, because they strive to possess themselves of their neighbour's property. Henceforth, the highwayman will be deemed wholly disinterested-the robbed traveller the selfish party. If this great measure of spoliation, under pretence of the public good, is once admitted, what limits can be assigned to the extension of the principle? If titles of honour are assailed, how are they to be maintained after the grand precedent in the case of the elective franchise? If the church is made the next victim, the principle now admitted is of irresistible application. If the fundholder is threatened on the principle of an "equitable adjustment," that is, the confiscation, as in revolutionary France, of half his property, what line can be drawn between his case and that of the sacrificed freeholder? If the estates of the nobility are selected, they will seek in vain for a distinction between their case and that of the original voters. C'est le premier pas qui coute in politics, as well as in morals; every subsequent step is easy, after the original injustice of sacrificing individuals to the public is admitted. There will never be wanting multitudes who call themselves the public, and who are willing to vindicate the robbery of their neighbours under the specious title of the general good. Another point deserving of especial consideration in the Scotch bill, is the new and alarming preponderance given to the manufacturing over the landed interest, not only in the composition of the freeholders, but the actual number of the represented places. At present there are 30 county and 15 borough members. By the bill, there are to be 28 county and 22 borough members. On what principle is this alarming disproportion between the representation of the two classes vindicated? Is it said that the manufactures and wealth of the cities have enormously increased? so they have; but the increase of the agriculture and the landed rent has been at least as great. Such an increase may be a ground for increasing the representation of both interests in Parliament; it can be none for enlarging the one at the expense of the other. The real reason may probably be found in a different cause the experienced tendency of the boroughs to the innovating, of the counties to the conservative side. In truth, there is but one part of the Reform Bill which we approve, and that is the clause giving five additional representatives to Scotland; and the only objection we have to it is, that it does not go nearly far enough. It is clear, that, both with reference to its population and wealth, Scotland is extremely under-represented. The population of Scotland is now 2,500,000; that of England and Wales probably 15,000,000. In proportion to the numbers of the people, therefore, there should be onesixth of the members returned for the one country as the other; whereas the members of Scotland are 45, and those of England 500; in other words, above eleven times as great. The clear revenue yielded by Scotland to the treasury of the empire in 1814, was L.4,500,000, independent of the Scottish duties paid in London, which brought it to L.5,000,000; that of England, L.$6,000,000. In this proportion, therefore, the Scottish representatives, instead of 45, should be 72. If innovations are to be practised on the Constitution, here is a change founded in justice, injurious to no interest, threatening to no class of society. Nor need the precedent be dreaded as applied to Ireland. When that island yields as large a surplus revenue to the empire as Scotland, let her prefer her claims for an extended representation; but not till then. In the proposed disfranchisement of the counties of Dumbarton and Bute, Peebles and Selkirk, it is not to be overlooked, that the sitting members are on the anti-Reform side. Dumbarton returns Lord W. Graham, and has petitioned against VOL. XXIX. NO. CXXXI. Reform; Bute, Sir William Rae, and has done the same; Selkirk, Mr Pringle of Whytbank, the tried friend of the Constitution; Peebles, Sir George Montgomery, also an anti-Reform member. In this disfranchisement, it is not difficult to see the blow aimed at the political influence of the Duke of Montrose, the Marquis of Bute, and the Duke of Buccleuch. On the other hand, these members are to be given to Dundee, the enthusiastic supporter of the Lord Advocate on the last election, and to Leith, of old established radical celebrity. It is in vain to attempt to vindicate the disfranchisement of these rural districts by the scantiness of their population. By the last returns the population of the threatened counties stands as follows: while the county of Rutland, which, under the new bill, is to have four members between the county and the borough, has only a population of 18,000 souls. In estimating also the consequence of this great change, the alarming increase of litigation concerning the small votes is not to be overlooked. Every man practically acquainted with the habits of the lower orders of Scotland, is aware of their extraordinary predilection for forensic dispute, and that the chief duty of every honest legal practitioner is to moderate the litigious propensities of his clients. The astounding facts that there are annually determined in the Sheriff Courts of Scotland no less than 20,000 causes, being almost three times as much as in the whole Courts of Record over all England; and that in the Small Debt Court of Edinburgh and Glasgow there are determined besides, from 6000 to 8000 annually, may convey some idea of the vehemence with which the fervidum Scotorum ingenium has flowed into these new and bloodless channels. 100,000 votes are to be added to Scotland, with the keenness of contested elections, it is difficult to estimate the consequences of such an extraordinary stimulus to the litigious passions of the lower orders. Of no value to their superiors, these votes will be of prodigious conse 3 P If quence to them; and the hard earnings of many years will be squandered in lawsuits in which they have no practical interest, but into which they have been plunged by the ambitious designs of their demagogues. It may be added that, in deciding on these votes, a new and most formidable power is placed in the hands of the Sheriff of the county, an officer in the appointment of the Crown. It is enacted "That the judgment of the Sheriff shall, as long as it stands, be conclusive of the claimant's right be registered and vote; provided always that it shall be competent for any claimant who is rejected to submit his claim to the re-consideration of the Sheriff, and to require, if so advised, the v dict of a jury on any disputed facts: provided that the judgment of the Sheriff may be brought under review by summary petition to the Court of Session: but provided also," that no alteration of the Sheriff's judgment shall affect the merits of any election actually completed and carried through before the date of such alteration, except in so far as effect may be given to such alteration by any Committee of the House of Commons." The result of this is, 1. That the judgment of the Sheriff is final unless the costs of a lawsuit in the Court of Session are incurred, which may be on an average L.60 in each case. 2. That if the Sheriff's judgment is not reversed before the election is completed, the vote, how bad soever, must stand for the successful candidate, unless an expenditure of L.2000 is incurred in petitioning the House of Commons. In either view it is evident that a most formidable power is vested in the hands of the Sheriff, who, though generally a legal practitioner of respectability, is certainly appointed by Ministers, and as certainly looks to them for ulterior promotion. "If I wished," said Frederick the Great, "to reduce the most flourishing province of my dominions to utter sterility, I could not take so effectual a course as by putting it for a few years into the hands of philosophers." "If an empire," said Napoleon, were made of adamant, it would be pounded to dust by the political economists." The experience of what we have suffered, and are likely to suffer, from the speculative men of our own country, gives no reason to hope that Great Britain forms any exception to the rule. The political economists in the Edinburgh Review, incessantly urged the reduction of the duties on whisky; and, in an evil hour, the late administration yielded to the clamour. The" Giant Smuggler," it was said, would thus be demolished: Spirits, from being so common, would cease to be so much prized, and public morality be improved by the change. The consequence was, that the consumption of spirits annually in Scotland rose, at once, from 2,400,000 to 5,600,000 gallons; crime in every quarter was doubled; habits of intoxication spread to a degree almost incredible. Five thousand men were saved from demoralization on the Highland frontier, and 500,000 were plunged into it in the manufacturing districts, and a blow given to the habits of the people more serious than it has received since the foundation of the monarchy. Incessant were the clamours, numerous the arguments, great the exertions, directed from the same journal, against the banking system of Scotland. During the panic following the great bankruptcy of 1825, these principles were embraced by Administration. A system, convicted of no weakness, bringing on no disaster; which, without risk, quadrupled the capital of the country; under which the invaluable habits of saving and frugality had spread to an unparalleled extent among the poor, was threatened with destruction. Here, fortunately, the good sense of the Scottish nation averted the misfortune: the people rose as one man against the threatened change, and a calamity, greater than ever was inflicted by philosophy on mankind, was kept at a distance by those whom its professors affected to despise. It is from the same quarter, and in pursuance of the same principles, that we are now threatened with a subversion of the constitution. The adoption of such a system by men of tried ability, known eloquence, and acknowledged taste, is a striking proof how different a thing it is to censure others and to act ourselves; how perilous are the experiments of speculative men on human institu tions, and how wide is the distinc tion between elegant critique or forensic effusions, and a profound acquaintance with the springs of public felicity. the success of the reforming party in England in the recent elections. It is not the love of liberty which is roused; that is already fully enjoyed: it is the passion for power, and that, like every other passion, is insatiable, and goes on increasing, till, by excess of enjoyment, it destroys itself. While such has been the fate of the elections wherever popular ambition or intimidation could be exerted in England, very different has been the spectacle presented in Scotland. In some places, no doubt, by the force of violence, carrying off electors, or other unworthy engines, the choice has fallen on reforming members; but, generally speaking, the preponderance of the conservative party, against all the weight of adminis tration, has been most remarkable. Scotland will shew a majority of three to two in the next Parliament against Reform. The election of Cambridge has demonstrated the opinion on reform of the men of the highest acquirement in England of Whig, that of Oxford, of the same class, of Tory principles. The vote on the Timber question demonstrated the feelings of the wellinformed of the commercial class: the scene in the House of Lords, on the dissolution of Parliament, of the landed aristocracy, on the same changes. The great majority of the education, intelligence, and wealth of the country, is firmly united against the bill. Nevertheless, the open elections have almost everywhere, in England, gone in its favour. This is not surprising. The proposed change has roused the lower orders in a body against the higher; the sway of learning, the respect to cha- The difference between the result racter, the weight of thought, the in- of the appeal in the two countries is fluence of property, is no longer felt. very remarkable, and corroborates, Dazzled by the prospect of political in the most signal manner, an obserpower, the multitude have every-vation made in the last Number of where revolted against those who have hitherto swayed their opinions. The county freeholders conceived that, in voting for a reform candidate, they were voting for the abolition of tithes and taxes; the boroughs, for a free trade in corn, a large share of political power, and a total abolition of the national debt. The prospect of these boons was immediate ; the King, they were told, favoured the changes; and, within three months of a reformed Parliament meeting, all would be accomplished. Under the combined influence of these feelings, a majority will certainly be returned in Parliament for the proposed changes. We are not in the least surprised at this; it is what we always foresaw would follow the prospect of success to popular ambition. "Il existe," says Chateaubriand, "deux sôrtes de revolutionaires : les uns desirent la revolution avec la liberté; c'est le tres petit nombre: les autres veulent la revolution avec le pouvoir; c'est l'immense majorité." In these words of one well versed in the history of public convulsions, is to be found the secret of this series-viz. that electors have no disposition to resist an extension of their franchise to a more numerous class below themselves, unless it is confined to those who really are possessed of property and education, and who will lose something by such an extension. Accordingly, the Scotch electors, men of education, and capa ble of discerning consequences, and of property, and capable of losing something, are as decidedly adverse to the extension of the suffrage to the lower classes, as the English are favourable to such a change. The reason is obvious, and, being founded in the interests of the different classes of society, must remain the same in all ages and countries. Substantial interest is, in the end, the governing principle of all men. The wealthy elector, therefore, who has much to lose, naturally resists; the poor elector, who has every thing to gain, as naturally supports the extension of the suffrage. He finds, by experience, that he gains no immediate or visible advantage by siding with the conservative, while he is promised the substantial fruits of po • De la Restauration, p. 9. |