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SECOND HEADING,OF THE REFORM BILL.
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EUROPEAN POLITICS.
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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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JT 1 HERE is it-family story , that iii tlie nursery at Woburnsomc JL sixty years ago the child who ' -attracted mast attention and seemed best fitted to make its future . way-. in the world , was the little fellow whose diminutive dimensions caused Mm : 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 w ho brought it forth and cherished it- 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 liave 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 Carlton 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 Conthe
servative than they already are . In the eyes of the Radicals 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 Wondei % " comparing it with its elder brethren of the saine stock ,, and are only too anxious to patrbnise and promote it by all the means in their power . They have an awful sense of the risk they incur Test 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 Mablbobough the political fee of Woodstock , they have a notion that they will be somewhat better able to resist hereafter the claims of right and
it is absurd to talk of property and intellect being absolutely overborne by the facility with which 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 i ? idueihg the masons and carpenters , the two brandies 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 of identity of action amongst widely dissimilar trades and callings , where mere political theories of government or taxation are 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 mass 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 . The expense of elections * as we have often taken occasion to point put , 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 and appliances of indirect corrupt tion , 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 .
justice , if by a sort of amicable suit the whole question shall be gravely discussed in the High Court of Parliament , and a compromise on certain points entered into with its sanction . 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-and-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-and-twenty , if there be spirit and manliness enough in the constituencies to remember how long they have "been , kept out of their rights , and how deeply it behoves them to j ^ lect from amongst themselves men identified with th eir interests and wants , not popinjays of fashion , or fools of quality . And if some four or five hundred thousand householders in counties
< ind towns' shall be endued with the franchise by the present iJill , 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 a strange ^ mistake in a man of Mr . Disraeli ' s aqumen and forethought , while he agrees in effect to allow the Bill to pass , that he should widen the chasm of jealousy and distrust between his party and the working classes in general , by denouncing the measure as one which largely and dangerously adds to their power . It does , in reality , nothing of the kind . It is truly observed by a writer in the Daily Nwos , that , though
* ' the phrase working classes be a very convenient one in political nomenclature , practically and descriptively it is the most vague and illusive of denominations ; " and we agree with our contemporary that " a very little reflection will suffice to satisfy any candid mind that homogeneity is , of all qualities and charac-¦ toristics , the last that it implies . Dissixnilnr trades have dissimilar habits , sympathies , and interests . They have never yot been found united for any good'or evil purpose whatsoever . Two or three branches of industry nmy , on particular occasions , coalesce and combine , but no example . can be shown of universal
or unanimous concert of a practical or effeotive kind . " Outof the three millions of people thnt inhabit the metropolis not live thousand will be added to the electoral roll by the new moosure , and we doubt if one half of these will bo men living by waged Inbour . Still fewer will he added to the county constituencies , and so few" in one tiblf the cities and , boroughs , that the spocifio influence of the addition in each case will be confessedly inappreciable . Tl »« re are , perhaps , a dozen or twenty manufacturing towns where the six pound franchise , were it the law of the land , ¦ would confer power on those who live by labour ; but even there
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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 , and FnucignyV which were made neutral—that is mongrel and debateable by the settlement of 18 l 5 , 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 \ yhich 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 ' tlie situation ought to fall upon the German sovereigns ,: who , by their petty jealousies and contemptible reactionary principles , have nullified the power of the rncc unfortunately burdened with thoir misrule . South Germany , so far as its princes are concerned , is in league with Austria , and in seizing a position which dominates Switzerland , Napolicon III . the
leaps over a barrier which protected its frontiers against operations of France . We shall dooply deplore any evil that may befall the brave , industrious , and freedom-loving Swiss in consequence of their proximity to dangerous neighbours ; but the Germans will deserve any mischief which their own misconduct entails . Not only have they failed in the plain duty which belongs to an enlightened people—that of supporting the cause of Italy against her Austrian oppressors—but they have-forced the cabinet of the Tuileriqs to prepare itself to . encounter the probable hostility of the Confederation , if the course of ( . vents should compel Prance to engage in another conflict With the
armies of Austria . German papers see in our Treaty with France u proof of fear and humiliation . Acoording to them , we have made concessions in the hope of purchasing peace . It is astonishing that any sane persons should make such an absurd mistake ; but unluckily the Germons scorn incapable of viewing political facts except through the speotacles of previously-conceived prejudices ; and they are so blindly drifting towards dnngQt , that it is quite time to warn them that if they plunge into it , they must get out of it as well as they can , without English aid . The physical strength of Germany will nover bo concentrated , and avuilable for useful purposes , until it obtains a sound moral briais ; : and no one , oan have read the diplomatic correspondence rccontly published , without being grievod and ashamed of tho unfortunate fact , that , in all its efforts to sustain liberal principles , our Government has
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Marcii 24 , I 860 . " ] The Leader and SaturdayAnalyst . 271
Second Heading,Of The Reform Bill.
SECOND HEADING , OF THE REFORM BILL .
European Politics.
EUROPEAN POLITICS .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 24, 1860, page 271, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2339/page/3/
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