For Glasgow, v. George Anderson, esquire, Manor of Northstead. NEW MEMBERS SWORN. THURSDAY, MARCH 5. Somerset County (Mid-Division)-John Kenelm Digby Wingfield Digby, esquire. THURSDAY, MARCH 12. Gloucester County (Western Division)-Benjamin St. John Akers, esquire. MONDAY, MARCH 16. Glasgow City-Thomas Russell, esquire. APPOINTED TO MEET 29 APRIL, 1880, IN THE FORTY-THIRD YEAR OF THE REIGN OF HER MAJESTY QUEEN VICTORIA. THIRD VOLUME OF SESSION HOUSE OF COMMONS, Wednesday, 4th March, 1885. 1884-5. Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [3rd March], "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair" (for Committee on the Parliamentary Elections (Redistribution) Bill. Question again proposed. Debate resumed. MR. WARTON said, he regarded the discussion up to that moment as little. more than an explanation of the hon. Member for Liskeard's (Mr. Courtney's) retirement from the Government and his proportional representation scheme. He thought the House would agree with him that the course of their proceedings in reference to the Bill had been somewhat unsatisfactory. On the day fixed for the second reading they had no opportunity for a full debate on the principle of the measure; but it was consideration of the debate being then stated by at least one Minister that, in somewhat hurried or slurred over, the discussion on the principle of the Bill would be taken on the Motion for going into Committee. Altogether the course [Third Night.] B of proceeding with respect to the Bill recognition of the principle of property. had been singularly unfortunate. The No doubt, as far as Scotland was conhon. Member for the Haddington cerned, the principle adopted by the GoBurghs (Mr. Craig-Sellar) gave Notice vernment carried justice with it; but prior to the second reading of his in- that was not the case with regard to tention to move his Scottish Amend- England and Ireland. The population ment. The Speaker ruled that the hon. of Scotland had increased steadily since Gentleman was not entitled to give No- 1881, and he quite admitted that the tice at that time of such an Amend- country was entitled to an additional ment; but somehow or other the hon. 12 Members. During the same period Gentleman secured the object he had in England had been going up and Ireview and got the start of those who land down. England had always rewaited until the Bill had been read a turned a Conservative majority, Scotsecond time before they handed in their land a Liberal one, and Ireland now Amendments. It was a regrettable cir- returned a majority of Liberals and cumstance that, instead of having an Nationalists, and the Prime Minister, important debate on the Bill in the first conscious of these facts, was seeking to instance, the question was narrowed by increase the representation of Scotland, the hon. Member for Haddington's Ireland, and Wales, rather than give Amendment. He was sorry there had justice to the great population of Engbeen a division on that Amendment, for land. If they took the Registrar-Geit was clear that not many Members of neral's Returns and worked them out, that House would wish, after the bar- they would find that, according to them, gain entered into by the two great England was entitled to 505 Members, Parties in the State, to support any Scotland to 72 Members, and Ireland to Amendment, good or bad, with the ob- 923 Members. Those figures showed ject of defeating the Bill. The ridi- the startling effect of the decrease of culous figure which the advocates of population in, Ireland, and the increase proportional representation cut in the in England, because in 1881 Ireland, division showed the real feeling and according to the basis of population, temper of the House. Amendments was entitled to very nearly 100 Memmight be supported by small numbers bers. Wales had not been treated in of devotees and fanatics; but the good the Bill as a nation. If it had been so sense of both sides of the House was dealt with it would have lost five Memdetermined to carry out fairly and fully bers. He observed, however, that in a the bargain come to by the two great Petition which was sent from the PrinParties in the State. No one ought to cipality to the Prime Minister, it was violate that understanding and that stated that if the Government reduced compact. He earnestly hoped that there the number of Welsh Members it would was something in the character of the be regarded as a national affront. Wales English nation that made us better than was, therefore, a nation for the purpose every other nation in the world; but if of keeping Members which it was not we escaped the results brought about in entitled to as such. It appeared that every other country where power had Swansea was to be extended 10 or 20 slipped from the hands of those who miles, so as to secure a population of were fit to exercise it into the hands of over 100,000, which would entitle those who were not, it would be a spe- it to two Members; whereas Wigan, cial dispensation of Providence. There with a population of 57,000, was to was in the Bill the principle of demo- have one of its Members cut off. cracy. That principle had always been Such was the notion of justice which one of counting noses, irrespective of the Government entertained. If the position, wealth, or intelligence. Even population of each of the Three Kingthe Prime Minister, a short time ago, doms remained stationary the injustice did not venture to go further than this, would not be so great; but when the that the measure was mainly based on rate of decrease in Ireland and of inthe principle of population. Instead, crease in England was so steady, any however, of being mainly based on that man deserving the name of a statesman principle, it seemed to him to be wholly would have taken notice of that tendency, based upon it, and he would have pre- and would not have drawn up a Bill ferred to have seen in it a more distinct which exaggerated the existing dispro Mr. Warton answer the expectations entertained by the Party to which he had the honour to belong. The provisions of the Bill were based entirely on the numerical principle. He had long been taught to believe that the great beauty, harmony, and symmetry of the Constitution of this country arose from the different interests, qualifications, and parties represented in the country, and that in that way anything like the preponderance of a particular party or interest was avoided. He could not help saying that in this Bill Her Majesty's Ministers might have followed a different course from that which they had pursued. Household suffrage would have been a much safer principle of the Bill than population. It would have been a durable, substantial, and easily recognizable principle, which could be readily adapted to our wants. In 1858, having himself put forward a scheme of electoral suffrage, and supposing that the principle of the Reform Bill of 1832 had been based on population, he received a letter from Lord John Russell informing him that he was mistaken, and that the lines of the Bill proceeded on two principleshousehold suffrage and the payment of taxes. But in this Bill these principles had been totally ignored, and the population principle had been allowed to reign paramount. That was very different from the view of Pitt, Burke, Fox, and notably Mackintosh, who held that the safety, harmony, and symmetry of our Constitution depended on the combination of different principles. Mr. Pitt, on the 26th of May, 1797, said portion. When Mr. Pitt made his arrangement at the time of the Union, the system of representation was not based upon population merely, because, if it were, Ireland would have been entitled to 215 or 220 Members. Mr. Pitt's principle was to take population and property, and strike a mean between the two. The population of Ireland was now about one-seventh of the aggregate population of the Three Kingdoms; its property was only one-fourteenth; and, by striking a mean between the two, Ireland would be entitled to something less than one-ninth of the number of Members of which the House was to be composed. But, instead of proceeding on the principle of population and property combined, Her Majesty's Government had taken the basis of population alone. That was the principle of democracy, and if the principle of democracy were to be carried out we should find that those who did not pay taxes would have the voting of the taxes, and would be able to say who should pay them. The Bill would give the Liberal Party a tremendous advantage in many parts of the country; and when a Party had an opportunity of obtaining a Party advantage like this, they should be honest enough to say so. He deplored very much that the Bill was based on the principle of population; but he was glad for the sake of public peace and public decency that an agreement had been come to between the Leaders of the two great Parties in the State, and that arrangement must be honestly carried out. It was, therefore, the duty of Members to support the Bill. SIR EARDLEY WILMOT said, he wished to take this opportunity of making a few observations upon the Bill. For many years as a Constitutional lawyer he had devoted a good deal of time and attention to our representative system, and he had always been in favour of the extension of the franchise. He supported the Bill for carrying household suffrage into the counties of the United Kingdom with the greater confidence because he believed it would be accompanied by a Redistribution Bill, based on the old lines of our Constitution, which every Conservative Member might feel not unwilling to support. But, having gone into the provisions of this Bill, he could not say that it was at all such as to "It is not the harsh uniformity of principles, each pushed to its extreme, but the general complexion arising out of the various shades, which forms the harmony of the representation and the practical excellence of the Constitution capable of improving itself consistently with its fundamental principles. Who will say that this beautiful variety may not have contributed to the advantage of the whole? That system was practical, and experience has confirmed the excellence of it; but the present plan goes the whole length of destroying all the existing representation, with the exception only of the county Mem. bers, and bringing all to one system. Are the Gentlemen who propose this system aware of the benefits resulting from a varied state of representation, and are they ready at once to resign them?"-(Parl. Hist. [33] 680.) But this Bill entirely ignored what had hitherto been considered the excellence of our Constitution, and carried the numerical principle to an extent that had [Third Night.] B 2 never been thought of in the Reform | danger to the State and to the safety of Bills of 1797, 1832, and 1868; and he the people. That was notably so in the must express his great regret that the capital of France. He thought it was Bill had been prepared in the spirit in extremely unwise to deprive the City of which it had been, leaving out the in- London, which was the centre of the terests and influences of property. As great commercial and mercantile inteto the First Schedule of the Bill, he rests of the Metropolis, of two seats in thought that the number of boroughs order to confer the right of representadoomed to decapitation, as he would tion upon such districts as Bethnal term it, would have to undergo capital Green, St. George's-in-the-East, or the punishment without trial. But the Strand. They had taken this Bill for number was considerably larger than granted and had put great confidence in the exigency of the times really required, the right hon. Gentleman the Member as there had been no great demand in for Chelsea (Sir Charles W. Dilke); but, the country for this summary execution. of course, the right hon. Gentleman's Of the 79 boroughs which it was pro- object was to make the representative posed to decapitate, many were totally system as democratic as possible. As to undeserving of such punishment; they the portion of the Bill relating to Scotwere not decaying, but were places of land and Ireland, he was glad to support commercial prosperity. He was sur- it. He thought Scotland was highly prised to find that during the late Re- deserving of the 12 additional Members cess they were not in any way eager to proposed to be conferred upon her; but, assert their own claims. The Second at the same time, he strongly opposed Schedule contained a list of those bo- the mode by which it was proposed to roughs that were to undergo partial be effected-namely, by adding 12 to disfranchisement; and in that list the already large numbers of the House; he was sorry to find many ancient in fact, he should prefer, if possible, and historic boroughs, some of them that the numbers of the House should being the capitals of the counties, as be reduced to 600. With reference to Gloucester, Worcester, and Stafford, and Ireland, he congratulated the Governalso an ancient and important city in his ment upon the wise policy which had own county namely, Coventry. He influenced them in the matter, in not would also point out that of the 32 yielding to the cry of those who thought boroughs contained in that list there that numerical principles should be were no less than 15 county towns rigidly observed with regard to Ireland, possessing considerable weight and im- but in looking to the real wants of that portance. That, he contended, was not country. On the whole, he could only at all required. He did not complain regret that the compromise by means of so much of the next Schedule, which which this Bill had been produced had proposed to give additional Members to been of such a character as, he was sure, the larger cities-for instance, Liverpool would endanger the interests of the Con-though he considered the increase in servative Party. It had been wisely their numbers excessive. One of the said by Burke that compromises might principal reasons for his objection to the be good as Party tactics, but were always Bill was that it transferred the electoral bad as statesmanship. It had been said power from the Southern and Midland that the last Bill of Mr. Disraeli was a districts and the counties to the great leap in the dark; but he could not help manufacturing districts of the North, thinking that the present Bill was a leap and, consequently, there would not be so in the dark-a leap in the dark, over a large a representation of all those con- precipice, so far as the Conservative flicting interests which the Constitution Party were concerned. had hitherto provided for. Then there would be the great transfer to the Metropolis, to which, with its suburbs, there were actually no less than 61 Members apportioned, and he considered that was bestowing an inordinate degree of power on one district. It had been said that the overgrown power and influence of the capital of a country were often a Sir Eardley Wilmot SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL said, he wished to make a few observations from a Scotch point of view. He could not help thinking the Scotch Members had reason to complain at being coerced into voting for an increase in the number of Members in the House. He did not like the increase; but from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Charles |