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election committees they have lost early all the chance elections that have taken place since the general election. Four or five would have been enough to turn the scale in February last, and more than four or five have been gained by the Tories. Who, then, shall say that the present House of Commons would refuse to act with Sir Robert Peel, in case the king should again choose him for his minister? One thing is quite evident, he could not be weaker than the present ministers; and were the Tories once made to understand that the Whig Irish Tithe Bill is but mere parchment, and utterly useless as a law, they might defeat the Whigs on every measure that could be brought before the House.

Whose fault is this? I answer 'tis the fault of the Whigs. The supporters of the ministry will, doubtless, be angry with me, and assert that I am betraying the liberal cause by thus exposing the weakness of the Whigs. This is an idle imputation, and results only from their imbecility.

"Do the supporters of the ministry believe that the enemy does not thoroughly understand the present position of the House of Commons? Do they believe that votes have not been accurately counted, and the gains and losses duly estimated? Do they believe that the gains of Inverness-shire, Devonshire, Drogheda, Canterbury, Oldham, Cork (county), Devizes, and others, are not appreciated? And if our enemies see all these things, why should we not speak of them? That they do see them-that they do boast of them and that they count on them, we all know; it is like children, then, in us, to attempt to hide the evil by shutting our eyes upon it.

"For my part, I wish the people to perceive the evil; I wish them to know in what it consists. The Reform-bill, and a high degree of excitement, gave the Liberal party a majority in the House of Commons. Every day is diminishing that majority; and, through the imperfections of the Reform-bill, the Tories have been enabled to win back their way into the House of Commons, and will soon be able to seize upon the reins of government. The Morning Chronicle, and other Whig papers, may shut their own eyes, and attempt to blind ours; but this fact is evident, that in ordinary and calm times it will be almost impossible for the Liberals to maintain a majority in the Commons. I do not mean to say that as time goes on the Liberal power will not increase: I think it will; but this increase will be made by the growing feeling out of doors, and will result in spite of the existing election law, and not by aid of it. We shall find

on some fine day that the Tories are safely seated in office. The Liberals will be outvoted in the Commons, and then will come fermentation among the people: another Reform Bill time - in fact, another revolution; and by the aid of this high excitement, the Tories may again be frightened from power. But I ask the people of England-again and again it ought to be asked of themdo they intend to allow this state of things to continue? Are they content to gain the results of good government only by revolution?-by an excitement always dangerous, always costly, and therefore mischievous? Do they not desire to obtain the results of good government peaceably-to live daily quietly under a good government; not to be ever, by threats and excitement, forcing a bad government to be for a time a good one? If they desire this steady good this peaceful and healthy rule, they should set about obtaining it in a business-like manner. Let them go to the root of the evil, and get radically rid of the mischief.

What, then, is the evil? Every day points it out to us. The representation of the people is faulty. The intent even of the Reform Bill, imperfect as that intent was, has not been carried out. The system of registration and the rate-paying clauses, disfranchise above a third of the constituency."

Now, from this and the Spectator we gather, as plainly as words can speak, that in truth and fact the Reform-bill itself is felt to be an utter failure, in so far as the destruction of the Tories was its especial end and object; and that another Reform-bill is now desired, which shall more effectually accomplish that object.

This plan is doubtless both natural and praiseworthy; but we have our fears as to its practicability. True, the Spectator, confessing Lord John Russell to be altogether incompetent to the task, wishes to place it in the hands of Messrs. Hume, Grote, Ward, and Co. Still, though it would be absurd to apprehend the least difficulty on the score of conscience, reputation, or honourable dealing, so far as these gentlemen were concerned, we cannot but fear that the task of throwing such a scheme into a producible form might somewhat perplex even their known ingenuity.

The Reform-bill, as it stands, it must be remembered, was not framed by Tories; nor was a Tory House of Lords permitted to "deform" it by

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any of their "amendments." It was the genuine issue, lawfully begotten, of Whig and Radical, for that express purpose conjoined. There is not the least fragment of it on which any

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Reformer" can lay his finger and say, This was the work of a Tory House of Lords, injuring, as far as it was possible, the whole measure.

If, then, the original measure (being, as it is, a pure, unadulterated, piece of Whig-Radicalism) has failed of its chief, and almost only object-- the keeping the Tories out of all power and influence in the state;-in what way is it conceived, that, by a few strokes of Mr. Hume's pen, it can be made that which it is so ardently wished to be?

We admit, at once, that many corWe admit, rections are necessary. that when an electioneering committee chooses-as Mr. Baines's, at Leeds, did choose to issue nearly 2600 objections, embracing more than half the constituency of the town; and then is shewn, in the sequel, to have grounds for less than 600 of them,-we agree that some pecuniary fine or punishment should be awarded. We admit, also, that some simple general rules ought to be laid down-as to whether service of objection by the post is good as to whether two persons occupying one 50l. farm have each a vote-and on several other points that might be named. And, above all, we need a court of appeal, presided over by some competent individual, appointed by the whole of the judges of the three law courts, to hear disputed cases; so that the New River proprietors may not be all admitted to their votes in Herts, and all excluded from their votes in Middlesex, as they are in this year's registration.

The necessity of moving such amendments as these we willingly admit, and should readily concur in forwarding. But still, as we have no such amendments to propose, on our part, with the special view of aiding the Conservative interest, so we do not well see how any rational proposition can be made, which shall not be absurd and unjust on the face of it, and which shall materially assist the Whig-Radical

cause.

The "Liberals" are disappointed in the result of this year's registration. the boun the host reason

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quite as much aware of the extent of
their defeat as they are themselves.
But, with our eyes wide open to this
must confess our total
point, we
inability to see how they can be ma-
terially aided by any new enactment-
i. e. of a rational character.

They have lost, for instance, the
"forty thieves" of Huntingdon. Sad
case; doubtless, that the Duke of Bed-
ford's steward-(his Grace, of course,
"knows nothing whatever of the mat-
ter")-should be foiled in such a nice
little job as the making forty votes out
of one field of scarcely forty acres.
But how can it be helped? More
careful to make the votes than to make
good conveyances to his clients, the
doer of this snug little job thought he
would, at the same time, do the Ex-
chequer out of half the stamp duty.
And thus this nice little plot was
But how, we
spoiled. Alack a day!

want to know, can a new Reform-bill
provide a sure immunity for such
blunders as these?

Again, the forty-two vestrymen of
Marylebone, who, holding their offices
for only three years, yet got their claims
foisted in, after the legal time, as
having a freehold right in the parish
stone-yard! All these went overboard
Lamentable the
in one fell crash.
thought, indeed, that two-and-forty
such genuine, sound, unimpeachable,
freehold votes as these should be lost.
But, in what way, we are curious to
know, would Messrs. Hume and Grote
provide that such votes should be got
upon the register in years to come?
For our own part, we confess our
utter inability to conceive how one
new Reform Bill, or twenty, could
make good freehold voters of the Mary-
lebone vestrymen.

Nevertheless, a new registration bill we must have. That is admitted on all hands. On our part, we readily admit that the far-famed Reform-bill is stuffed with blunders and absurdities, and those blunders and absurdities we desire to see removed, without, however, expecting either to gain or to lose, as a party, by their removal. The Whigs and Radicals, on the other hand, cry out loudly for a new Reformbill as a means whereby they may defeat the Tories; thereby confessing, as plainly as words can speak, that, with the present bill, though of their own manufacture, the Tories are like to prove, in the

Let them, however, rack their brains for some new scheme which may help them to a permanent majority be it our part-looking to the House of Lords to defeat any manoeuvres of the Humes and Wards and Roebucksto review the past for encouragement and for instruction, and to address ourselves to the future with more ardent hopes and more determined resolu

tion.

We have beaten, then, the Destructive party-the enemies of the constitution, of the church, and of the monarchy-we have beaten them, totally, and decisively, in the very first regular engagement which has taken place under the new system. And shall not this success fill us with fresh courage, and animate us with the most strenuous determination that 1836 shall fully and irrevocably complete what 1835 has so well begun?

Let us, then, not only continue but augment our efforts, and fill up the numerous intervals in our ranks which have been visible in the past year. We now know the path to certain victory; shall we not follow it with the most fervent determination?

First, then, we must continue and improve our organization. This is the main and chief point of the whole. Without organization all is loose, desultory, and uncertain. To explain sufficiently what we mean by the term, we will first narrate what has actually been done, within the last ten months, in one single county of England. And we shall then ask, Why may not the very same course be taken, the very same means be used, in every individual county or district throughout the British Isles?

At the close, then, of the general election of January 1835, the committee of the Conservative candidate in an English county determined that they would not finally separate till they had considered, whether or not a permanent association for the county might not, with advantage to the general cause, be formed and maintained. Adjourning, therefore, for one month, they reassembled in February, to consider and discuss the course that should be subsequently taken.

At that meeting it was resolved that, without mixing in any momentary question of the day, touching this or that ministry, it was clearly desirable that a society should be formed for the

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purpose of placing on the register the unregistered property of the county, and also of purifying it from a multitude of fictitious votes, which had, from the want of any oversight, been permitted to place themselves on the register.

Such a society was then and there constituted; and in one month it reckoned amongst its members between two and three hundred of the most respectable resident freeholders of the county. A governing committee was then formed, consisting of the leading members of the society; and monthly meetings were appointed, at which new members were to be admitted, and the various objects of the association successively discussed.

This society advanced with rapid strides. By the approach of summer its numbers bad increased to above four hundred; and more than twenty local committees had been formed in the various districts of the county for the prosecution of its objects.

Those committees proceeded upon the most natural and obvious plan. They consulted the poor-rate books for the 50l. occupiers, and they canvassed these individually, till, in some districts, they accomplished, after much labour, the registration of the whole.

While this was transacting throughout the county, a working sub-committee was formed in the central town, consisting of gentry, professional men, and tradesmen of some respectability and intelligence, to whom the conduct of the registration itself was confided. These applied themselves unremittingly to the scrutiny of the claims sent in, instituted inquiries in every direction, and, when the time arrived, directed the issue of the necessary notices of objection on the one hand, and provided the means of defence on the other.

The result of this investigation was, that, when the revising barristers had concluded their sittings, it appeared that the Conservative committee had established one-half of the objections they had taken, while their opponents had only succeeded in less than onethird; and that the actual gain to the Conservative cause, by the objections alone, was nearly equal to five hundred

votes!

The final result of these ten months' proceedings is, that, in place of a small minority, in which they were left at the

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general election of January 1835, the Conservatives of this county can now reckon, with the most well-grounded confidence, upon a majority of considerably more than one thousand, on any contest, come when it may.

This is what we mean by organization; and we now once more impress upon our readers throughout the United Kingdom the question, Whether each of them, in his own neighbourhood, is putting forward such a system of operations as this? To every county in England we put the questions,

1. Have you a registration committee; and, if your county is divided, have you one for each division?

2. Is that registration committee well supported and well organized? Have you the name of every leading gentleman in the county, of Conservative principles, as a member? and have you a sub-committee actually at work in every important town and village in your division?

3. Have your poor-rate books been examined, parish by parish, for the qualified voters who are not yet registered?

If all this, and much more, in scrutiny, in canvassing, and in becoming thoroughly acquainted with the state of the district, be not yet done, still remember you have six months before you. Now, then, and without an hour's delay, set about the task, and let nothing stay or slacken your exertions, till you can fearlessly recall to mind Nelson's words, and declare that, for your part, you have done your duty.

But, secondly, we must observe that there is something that every man, individually, can accomplish. And this is, to invest himself, as the law allows him to do, with as much political power as his means will enable him to acquire.

The Whigs, in their Reform-bill, have done what they could to overwhelm and swamp the influence of property, by the flood of the tenpounders which they have let in upon us. Still, however, they have not been able to repeal the law which gives a man a freehold vote for any county in England for which he chooses to purchase a freehold estate. That they look with dislike and with dread on this franchise, which they have been compelled to

member is sufficiently clear

sion, to limit all elections, counties included, to a single day, the effect of which would have been, that a man who happened to hold estates in five or six counties could not by possibility traverse them in time to tender his votes! This notable scheme, however, foundered in its passage, and the County votes remain intact.

The property of the county, then, seeing that a war of the most deadly and unrelenting a character is declared exert its own against it, ought to powers to meet the common enemy on the field which the law has appointed. Every thing that Radicalism can do to keep down the influence of property in this country has been tried; but, still, it has been too much for them to ask that the holder of a freehold in Sussex shall be disqualified from voting because he is also the holder of a freehold in Kent. Thus that influence which ought to have been directly and openly awarded to you, as Horne Tooke himself confessed, is still, though hated and discountenanced, as far as possible, left open to its natural course, through this, its unavoidable channel.

Use it, then, boldly, earnestly, and to the utmost possible extent. Let a Warwickshire man possess himself, first, of votes for both divisions of his own county, then for Worcestershire, Staffordshire, and Derbyshire. Let a Gloucestershire freeholder take care, without delay, to purchase votes in Somerset and Worcester. A resident in Middlesex or Surrey must bestir himself forthwith, to get votes not only in each of these counties, but in Kent also; and a Cambridgeshire Conservative must look to Herts and to Suffolk.

On this system, if the Conservatives will but simultaneously act, the victory must be theirs. We have it confessed, under Lord Brougham's own hand, that the men of 500l. a-year are more decidedly Conservative than the House of Lords. What remains, then, but that these men should act up to their own opinions, and the whole of the counties of England would return Conservative members; and thus the constitution might be placed beyond danger.

But how far are we to go in the manufacture of votes? This is a question which has been frequently asked during the last two or three years by good honest Conservative gentlemen, who mohepts law

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than that it is to be obeyed, not only strictly and literally, but even to the supposed spirit and intent thereof. To these gentlemen it has appeared a matter beyond a doubt that, with the passing of the Reform-bill, all fagotmaking, all manufacturing of votes, was to cease; and every thing was to be of the most high-minded and delicate cast, leaving all trickery and vote-making to the times gone by.

This was really and honestly believed by many good, well-meaning, credulous Tories, up to this present year. The point, however, is now settled. The test has been applied, and it is now confessed, nay declared, without any backwardness or hesitation, that the course the Whigs mean to take is, to make every vote they can, honestly or dishonestly, legally or illegally, by fair or by foul play, by day or by night, above ground or below it. An objection was taken in Middlesex to the Russell-fagots in Bloomsbury,-six regular parchment votes as ever came out of a law-stationer's office. Down came the Duke of Bedford's agent to defend them, and to attest that, for the good and sufficient consideration of five shillings each, the said freeholds were duly and legally conveyed and registered. And these votes stand now enrolled, after investigation and argument, on the published list of the electors of Middlesex!

In Huntingdonshire the like audacity was displayed, but not with the same success. The forty votes there manufactured by his Grace of Bedford's steward were strenuously defended; but, alas! the stamp-office had been defrauded, and thus the "forty thieves" lost their votes.

In Marylebone the case was still worse. Two-and-forty fellows, who had no more right to call themselves "freeholders of Middlesex" than the like number of costermongers from Covent Garden, sent in claims for the parish stone-yard, because they, forsooth, being elected vestrymen for three years, chose to imagine that this valuable freehold vested in them. True, they were struck off the lists, without much hesitation, by the revising barrister; but then the Spectator and the Reform Association immediately discover that a new Reform-bill is indispensably necessary

By these specimens, however, which are only selected from among a multi

tude, we gather that it is the unhesitating determination of the Whigs and Radicals to stick at nothing which may in any way help to prop their falling cause. The coolness and impudence of this resolve may be measured by this paragraph in the Spectator of November 20.

"From the following sneering paragraph in the Kentish Guzette, we are glad to find that, in some quarters at least, the Reformers are preparing for the next registration :

"The Whigs in various parts of the kingdom are vigorously carrying on the trade of fagot-making. Among others, Earl Spencer is accommodating considerable numbers with forty-shilling freeholds from his estates in East Surrey.'"

This paragraph is instructive in a variety of ways. It is pleasant to see the mask thrown off by an out-and-out Radical like the Spectator, which, after eschewing the Whigs and their tricks, advocating the ballot, and professing a vast admiration for purity of election of all kinds, now comes out boldly, when the turn is to be served, as the thick-and-thin advocate of fagot-making! "We are glad to find," says this Radical journal," that the Reformers are preparing for the next Registration !" Very well, good Mr. Radical; and now we understand what your views of purity of election are, it shall go hard if we are not a match for you, even at this game also.

66

The Conservatives have now, at least, fair warning. With Whigs or Radicals alike, fagot-making is all the fashion. Is there, then, any choice left to us? The "forty thieves" at Hartford plead that " by law," if their deeds were but properly stamped, their votes are good. With new stamps they will press for re-admission next year. Next year, also, will come for registration all the newly-manufactured forty-shilling freeholders of Lord Spencer's Wimbledon estates. And are the Conservatives to stand by and see these things done, and be silent and inactive? Are they to see a Radical journal like the Spectator expressing its joy to see "the Reformers preparing for the next registration," and yet to be inactive, possessing, as they do, five-sixths of the property of the country? No; it cannot be! If this is to be the game,-and that it is to be the game is no longer matter of doubt, -then let Conservatives rise up with

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