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tion of a large portion or the Tory constituencies as their representatives for passing the Catholic Emancipation Act, were evidenced by a gain to the Opposition of fifty votes. The fate of the ministry was evidently sealed; and after a defeat in the Commons in November, the Wellington cabinet resigned. After fifty years' exclusion from office, the Whigs now returned to power underEarl Grey, and immediately introduced their famous Reform Bill. The second reading of the bill was carried in March by a narrow majority of one, which showed the Whig leaders that they had no chance of success, except by a fresh agitation and a new appeal to the country. Accordingly, although the Parliament had only been elected in the previous September, it was again dissolved in April; and every means was employed to infuriate the masses against the Conservatives; the Times, with its usual, and in this case disgraceful, subserviency to popular ideas, counselling the Reformers to use the "brickbat and bludgeon," and to "plaster the enemies of the people with mud, and duck them in horseponds." These efforts of the "friends of liberty were successful, and the most dreadful rioting marked the progress of the elections, especially in Ireland and Scotland. Of the excesses in the latter country our author gives the following brief but graphic summary:

"The Lord Provost of Edinburgh was seized by the mob on the day of the election, who tried to throw him over the North Bridge, a height of ninety feet-a crime for which the ringleaders were afterwards convicted and punished by the Justiciary Court. The military were called out by the sheriff and magistrates, but withdrawn at the request of the Lord-Advocate (Jeffrey), who pledged himself, if this was done the riots would cease. It was done, and they were immediately renewed, and continued the whole evening. At Ayr the violence of the populace was such that the Conservative voters had to take refuge in the town hall, from whence they were escorted by a body of brave Whigs, who, much to their honour, flew to their rescue, to a steam-boat which conveyed them from the scene of danger. No person anywhere in Scotland could give his vote for the Conservative candidate without running the risk of being hooted, spit upon, or stoned by the mob. At Wigan, in Lancashire, a man was killed during the election riots. In London the windows of the Duke of Wellington, Mr. Baring, and other leading antiReformers, were all broken; and those me

morable iron shutters were forced upon Apsley House, which, till the Duke's death, continued to disgrace the metropolis. At Lanark a dreadful riot occurred, which was only quelled by the interposition of the military, and the Conservative candidate was seriously wounded in the church where the election was going forward. At Dumbarton, the Tory candidate, Lord William Graham, only escaped death by being concealed in a garret, where he lay hidden the whole day. At Lauder, the election was carried by a counsellor in the opposite interest being forcibly abducted, and the ruffians who did so were rescued by the mob. At Jedburgh, a band of ruffians hooted the dying Sir Walter Scott. 'I care for you no more,' said he, than for the hissing of geese.' Genius, celebrity, probity, beneficence, were in those disastrous days the certain attraction of mob brutality, if not slavishly prostituted to their passions."

While the elections were going forward, the Political Unions were exerting themselves to the uttermost, not merely to intimidate their opponents by the threat of rebellion, but by organising the means of rebellion itself.

"In March and April, 1831," says Miss Martineau, "the great middle class, by whose intelligence the bill must be carried, believed that occasions might arise for their refusing to pay taxes, and for their marching upon London, to support the King, the Administration, and the bulk of the nation, against a small knot of unyielding and interested persons. The political unions made known the numbers they could muster, the Chairman of the Birmingham Union declaring that they could send forth two armies, each fully worth that which had won Waterloo. On the coast of Sussex ten thousand men declared themselves ready to march at any moment; Northumberland was prepared in like manner; Yorkshire was up and awake; and, in short, it might be said the nation was ready to go to London, if wanted. When the mighty procession of the unions marched to their union ground, the anti-reformers observed with a shudder that the towns were at the mercy of these mobs. The cry was vehement that the measure was to be carried by intimidation, and this was true; the question was, whether, in this singular case, the intimidation was wrong."

"Future ages," says Alison, "will scarcely be able to credit the generality of the delusions which pervaded the minds of the middle and working classes at this eventful crisis. The former flattered themselves that rent and taxes would be abolished, and the sales of their shop goods at least tripled, from the universal prosperity which would prevail among their customers. The latter believed, almost to a man, that the wages of labour would be doubled, and the

price of provisions halved, the moment the bill passed. The Anglo-Saxon mind, eminently practical, did not, in these moments of extreme excitement, follow the ignis fatuus of liberty and equality,' like the French in 1789, but sought vent in the realisation of real advantages, or the eschewing of experienced evils."

The new Parliament met in June, and on the 3rd October the Reform Bill was thrown out by the House of Lords, on its second reading, by a ma. jority of 41. The popular rage now knew no bounds. The Duke of Wellington, the Duke of Cumberland, and the Marquis of Londonderry, were assaulted in the streets of London, and with difficulty rescued by the police and the respectable bystanders, from the violence of the mob. The last-named nobleman, whose courage and determination throughout the contest had marked him out for vengeance, was struck senseless from his horse by showers of stones at the gate of the Palace, amidst cries of "Murder him-cut his throat!" Greater tumult marked the provinces. The terrible Bristol riots were accompanied by others at Derby, Bath, Worcester, Coventry, &c. At Liverpool, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Manchester, Leeds, Paisley, Sheffield, and all the great towns, meetings attended by thirty or forty thousand persons were held, at which the most violent language was used, and the most revolutionary ensigns were exhibited. From his windows in Holyrood, Charles X. gazed on a scene in the King's park of Edinburgh which recalled the opening events of the French revolution; and a speaker at the Newcastle meeting, in allusion to Marie-Antoinette, reminded the sovereign that "a fairer head than Adelaide's had ere this rolled on the scaffold." "A majority," says Roebuck, "of the wealthy, intelligent, and instructed, as well as the poor and laborious millions, had now resolved to have the Reform Bill. They had resolved to have it, if possible by peaceable means, but if that were not possible, BY FORCE."

After a brief recess, Parliament reassembled in December; and in April 1832, the Reform Bill again reached the House of Lords. Although the second reading was carried, after several nights' debate, at seven o'clock in the morning of the 13th, by a majority of 9, an important amendment was soon afterwards carried against the ministry by a majority of 45. Ministers there

upon tendered their resignations, which were accepted by the King, and the Duke of Wellington was sent for. "Matters," says Alison, "had now come to the crisis which had long been foreseen on both sides. The Crown and the House of Lords had taken their stand to resist the Bill, the Commons to force it upon them. When Charles I. planted his standard at Nottingham, the crisis was scarcely more violent, nor the dreadful alternative of civil war to all appearance more imminent." Then were seen the infernal placards in the streets of London, to "Stop the Duke-go for gold !” and in three days nearly £2,000,000 in specie were drawn from the Bank. In Manchester placards appeared in the windows: "Notice-No taxes paid till the Reform Bill is passed;" and a petition signed by 25,000 persons was speedily got up, calling on the Commons to stop the supplies till this was done. Even Lord Milton, now Earl Fitzwilliam, desired the tax-gatherer, who happened to call upon him at this time, to call again a week after, as "he was not certain that circumstances might not arise which would oblige him to resist payment." "Three groans for the Queen!" was the common termination of public meetings; and attempts were made to seduce the Scots' Greys, then stationed at Birmingham. "The leaders of the political unions," says Alison, "were quite prepared to embark in a civil war. And although it is not yet known how far these frantic designs were countenanced by persons in authority, it was proved at the trial of Smith O'Brien, in 1848, that at this period questions of a very sinister kind were put to a distinguished officer at Manchester, by a person in the confidence of a late Cabinet Minister." Those who remember the disclosures respecting “T. Y. of the Home Office" will think this a very mild comment upon the seditious proceedings of the Whig leaders. Roebuck, the Whig annalist of this period, says:—

"The violence of the language employed by persons intimately connected with the Whig chiefs, the furious proposals of newspapers known to speak the sentiments and wishes of the Cabinet, all conspired to make the country believe that, if an insurrection were to break out, it would be headed by the Whig leaders, and sanctioned by the general acquiescence of the immense majority of the Whig party. The consequence was, that a very large proportion of the more ardent

Reformers throughout the country were prepared to resist, and civil war was, in fact, thus rendered far more probable than was ever really intended by those who were using the popular excitement as a means whereby they were to be reinstated in office. Had the opposition peers stood firm, and had Lord Grey retired without having exercised the power confided to him by the King, the Whig party would at once and for ever have been set aside; a bolder race of politicians would have taken the lead of the people, civil war would have been dared, and the House of Lords, possibly the throne itself, would have been swept away in the tempest that would thus have been raised. Fortunately for the fame of Lord Grey and the Chancellor, fortunately for the happiness of England, the practical good sense of the Duke of Wellington extricated the nation from the terrible difficulty into which the Administration and the House of Lords had brought it."

In point of fact the Duke, whose sole and simple-hearted desire was to serve his King and his country at any cost to himself, finding it impossible to form a Government, and urged by the King to save him from swamping the Upper House by a creation of Peers in the Liberal interest.

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sure which the Whig leaders insisted upon-used his influence to induce a number of Peers to absent themselves at the third reading of the bill, which by this means was carried by 106 to 22. On 7th June, accordingly, this celebrated bill became law; but the King testified his disapprobation, if not of the bill, at least of the means adopted by his ministers to carry it, by positively refusing to give the royal assent in person, and it was done by commission.

By the light of the four volumes of Sir A. Alison's new history, we have endeavoured to set forth the just and fundamental grounds which existed for Parliamentary Reform, in the growth of new sections of the population, distinct from, and in many respects opposed to, the landed interest, which enjoyed an ascendancy under the old régime, as well as the wide-spread and fong-continued misery in the nation, which, by producing a morbid desire for change, carried Reform beyond its just limits, and after bringing the country to the verge of civil war, converted the work of renovation into one of revolution. No section of Sir A. Alison's work is better written or more deserving of attention than the long chapter in his new volume devoted to

the Reform Bill, and the era of its passing. It is graphic, succinct, and masterly in no ordinary degree,

the scene shifting, by turns, from the Court to Parliament, and from Parliament to the public, while the narrative sets forth, now the state of opinion, and now the condition of the country. The chapter, which is marked throughout by an impartiality of statement and colouring which is peculiar to this great historian, closes with a series of reflections upon the true tendencies of the Reform Bill, as viewed not merely in the light of theory, but by the light of facts. It is needless to shut our eyes to the circumstance, that the question of Reform, however temporarily postponed by the war, will, ere long, be re-introduced into Parliament, and again form an exciting theme of discussion throughout the country. In such circumstances, it is well to see what are the deliberate opinions on the subject of so eminent an authority as our author.

The obvious advantage of the passing of the Reform Bill, justly remarks Sir A. Alison, is, that it has established the Government of this country upon a greatly firmer basis. It is one thing to weaken the rule of two or three hundred aristocratic or millionaire holders of seats (through the old nomination boroughs) in the House of Commons; it is another and very different thing to overthrow the sway of nine hundred thousand electors, really and practically wielding the powers of Government, and embracing in their ranks those who would have been the most formidable leaders of revolution. Accordingly, the frequent conspiracies which took place between 1815 and 1830, and which aimed at overturning the Government by violence, have been almost unknown since the Reform Bill passed: even the terrible storm of revolution in 1848, which shook every throne on the Continent, failed to shake the steady fabric of the British monarchy. The risk now is of another kind. "There is comparatively little danger now," says our author, "that our frame of government, resting on the basis of so numerous and influential a mass of electors, will be overthrown by a violent convulsion; but great that one portion of these electors, having the majority, may use their power to advance their own interests, without any regard to the effect their measures may have upon

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those of the minority of the electors, or the immense majority of the unrepresented portion of the community."

This is true; but, before going further, let us see what class has the supremacy under the present régime. In the House of Commons, as it now stands, there are 405 borough members, and only 253 for counties. Now, by last census, it appears that the urban and rural sections of the population were just equal, each being ten and a-half millions; and the landed interest pays seven-tenths of the income-tax; so that in point of numbers it is equal to the urban classes, while in point of property possessed and taxes paid, it is considerably superior to them. Yet the counties possess less than two-fifths of the representation of the country! This is one blemish of the Reform Bill. But the "urban classes" is a wide term, embracing the manufacturing, the commercial, and shopkeeping portions of the community; let us see with what section of this town-population the supremacy in the constituencies rests. “Experience has now ascertained," says our author, "what at the time was far from being anticipated, that two-thirds of the constituents in the boroughs are persons occupying premises, for the most part shops, rated from £10 to £20."* Thus, upwards of three-fifths of the House of

Commons are returned by urban constituencies, in which the predominant class is composed of men paying under £20 of rent: so that the supreme power in the State has fallen (as is always the case in a uniform system of representation) into the possession of the lowest segment of the enfranchised population.

Next, who are those £10 and £20 voters who thus give the tone to our legislation? The great majority of them are shopkeepers, and the rest are clerks or operatives, for the most part enjoying fixed salaries. The class, in truth, is one whose interests are peculiarly those of consumers, as opposed to producers. With shopkeepers the great desire naturally is, to have the price of the articles in which they deal lowered, in order that they may transact more business; and in this they are joined by all those (a large class in old and wealthy communities) who enjoy a fixed income from Government or other situations, or in the form of annuities, or as the interest of their money. The interests of these two classes lead them to try to cheapen everything, in order that the one may turn over more goods, and the other get more for his fixed money income; so that the aim of their legislation is to beat down the cost of production; that is to say, the wages

As this is a most important fact, a knowledge of which cannot fail to influence opinion when the Reform question is again revived, we shall quote the note which Sir A. Alison appends to his statement :-"The author is enabled to speak with confidence on this point, from having presided for twenty years in the Registration Court of Lanarkshire, which includes Glasgow, and where there have never been less than two thousand, sometimes as many as six thousand, claims for enrolment in each year. From his own observation, as well as the opinion of the most experienced agents whom he consulted on the point, he arrived at the conclusion that the majority of every urban constituency is to be found among persons paying a rent for houses or shops, or the two together, between £10 and £20, and a decided majority below £25. But in order to make sure of the point, he has examined his note-book of cases enrolled this year (1853), and he finds that they stood thus for the burgh of Glasgow:

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"As Glasgow contains within itself a larger number of warehouses, manufactories, and shops at very high rents-varying from £5 to £1,500 a year-than any other town, except the metropolis, in the empire, this may be considered as proof positive, that over the whole country the majority enrolled on rents below £20 is still more decided. There is no other record but the revising barrister's or registering sheriff's notes of cases which will show where the real majority of voters is to be found. The returns of houses paying the tax beginning at £20 will throw no light on the subject, for the great majority of voters in town3 are enrolled on shops which pay no tax; and even the rating to poor-rates is not a test to be relied on, as it is often made under the real value, and in many boroughs there are no police or other local burdens at all."

of labour and the profits of the producing classes. Thus, cheap bread, at the expense of the agricultural classes, cheap sugar and cheap timber, at the expense of our colonies,and, generally, no duties upon imports, are the great object of these non-producing classes, which now direct our legislation. We may add, that as a considerable section of our manufacturers now work entirely for the export trade, and consequently are independent of the home market and the well-being of the general community, they also coincide with the shopkeepers and monied non-producers in desiring to cheapen everything by free imports, &c., in order that, by keeping wages low, they may be able to undersell the manufacturers of other countries. In brief, then, the Reform Bill threw the chief power of the State into the hands of the lowest segment of the enfranchised population the £10 and £20 voters; and has given it to a class (the last developed in any country, and antagonistic to the producing classes, of whose prosperity it is a product) whose interest it is to beat down wages and prices by foreign competition, and keep everything cheap at home.

The representative system may work very well in a country where the interests of the different classes of the community are identical, or nearly sowhere there is no great conflict between agriculture and manufactures, or, still more, between the producing and nonproducing classes; but in a country like ours, where the division of labour and diversity of interests is so great, the advantages of the representative system, especially as at present constituted, are largely intermixed with evil. Mark the practical results of the Reform Bill, and observe how thoroughly the legislation of the last twenty years has been a class-legislation. "The middle classes," observes Sir A. Alison, of which this non-producing section of the urban population constitutes the dominant body

"Have made no movement to advance farther in the career of reform since they obtained it; they are satisfied with the power they have got, as well they may, since it has enabled them to rule the State. But they have set themselves sedulously and energetically to improve their victory to their own advantage by fiscal exemptions and legislative measures; and they have done this so effectually as to have created a sullen state

of hostility between the employers and the employed, which breaks out at times, like the flames of a volcano, in ruinous strikes, and annually drives above three hundred thousand labourers, chiefly rural, into exile.

In less than a quarter of a century after the Reform Bill had given them the government of the country, the urban shopkeepers had obtained for themselves an entire exemption from every species of direct taxation, and laid it with increased severity upon the disfranchised classes in the State; while, at the same time, they contrived to shake off all the indirect taxes by which they were more immediately affected. They have got the window-tax taken off, and the housetax from all houses below £20, the line where the ruling class begins; and when Lord Derby's Ministry brought forward the proposal, obviously just, to lower the duty to £10 houses, they instantly expelled them from office by a vote of the House of Commons. They kept the income-tax for long at incomes above £150, and now they have only brought it down, under the pressure of war, to £100 -a line which practically insures an exemption from that burden to nearly the whole of the ruling occupants of houses below £20; while a tax producing now above £10,000,000 a-year is saddled exclusively upon less than 250,000 persons in the Empire. They have got quit entirely of the tax on grain, lowered almost to nothing those on wood and meat, and signally reduced those on tea and sugar and coffee, in which so large a part of their consumption lies; while the direct taxes on the land and higher classes, not embracing above 250,000 persons, have been increased so as now to yield above £20,000,000 a-year, or £80 BY EACH PERSON on an average, in incometax, assessed taxes, and stamps! In a word, since they got the power, the notables of England have established a much more entire and unjust exemption, in their own favour, from taxation than the notables in France did before the Revolution -a curious and instructive circumstance, indicating how identical men are in all ranks when their interests are concerned, and they obtain power, and the futility of the idea that the extension of the number of the governors is any security whatever against the establishment of an arbitrary or unjust system of administration over the governed."

Another great error committed in the Reform Bill was, that no provision was made for the representation of Labour. The great body of labourers both in town and country are wholly unrepresented in the House of Commons. The retention of "freemen" in a few great cities cannot be called a representation of labour-it is rather a representation of venality and corruption. To beat down the remuneration of labour, both

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