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speak fully on a future occasion. Of the former, many of our readers may think we have, on former occasions, said at least enough. Our zeal in that cause, we know, has been made matter of wonder, and even of derision, among certain persons who value themselves on the character of practical politicians and men of the world; and we have had the satisfaction of listening to various witty sneers on the mixed simplicity and extravagance of supposing, that the kingdom of the Poles was to be re-established by a dissertation in an English journal. It would perhaps be enough to state, that, independent of any view to an immediate or practical result in other regions, it is of some consequence to keep the observation of England alive, and its feelings awake, upon a subject of this importance: But we must beg leave to add, that such dissertations are humbly conceived to be among the legitimate means by which the English public both instructs and expresses itself; and that the opinion of the English public is still allowed to have weight with its government; which again cannot well be supposed to be altogether without influence in the councils of its allies. Whatever becomes of Poland, it is most material, we think, that the people of this country should judge soundly, and feel rightly, on a matter that touches on principles of such general application. But every thing that has passed since the publication of our former remarks, combines to justify what we then stated; and to encourage us to make louder and more energetic appeals to the justice and prudence and magnanimity of the parties concerned in this transaction. The words and the deeds of Alexander that have, since that period, passed into the page of history-the principles he has solemnly professed, and the acts by which he has sealed that profession entitle us to expect from him a strain of justice and generosity, which vulgar politicians may call romantic if they please, but which all men of high principles and enlarged understandings will feel to be not more heroic than judicious. While Poland remains oppressed and discontented, the peace of Europe will always be at the mercy of any ambitious or intriguing power that may think fit

to rouse its vast and warlike population with the vain promise of independence; while it is perfectly manifest that those, by whom alone that promise could be effectually kept, would gain prodigiously, both in security and in substantial influence, by its faithful performance. It is not, however, for the mere name of independence, nor for the lost glories of an ancient and honourable existence, that the people of Poland are thus eager to array themselves in any desperate strife of which this may be proclaimed as the prize. We have shown, in our last number, the substantial and intolerable evils which this extinction of their national dignity-this sore and unmerited wound to their national pride, has necessarily occasioned: And thinking, as we do, that a people without the feelings of na tional pride and public duty must be a people without energy and without enjoyments, we apprehend it to be at any rate indisputable, in the present instance, that the circumstances which have dissolved their political being have struck also at the root of their individual happiness and prosperity; and that it is not merely the unjust destruction of an ancient kindom that we lament, but the condemnation of fifteen millions of human beings to unprofitable and unparalleled misery.

But though these are the considerations by which the feelings of private individuals are most naturally affected, it should never be forgotten, that all the principles on which the great fabric of national independence confessedly rests in Europe, are involved in the decision of this question; and that no one nation can be secure in its separate existence, if all the rest do not concur in disavowing the maxims which were acted upon in the partition of Poland. It is not only mournful to see the scattered and bleeding members of that unhappy state still palpitating and ago nising on the spot where it lately stood erect in youthful vigour and beauty; but it is unsafe to breathe the noxious vapours which this melancholy spectacle exhales. The whole some neighbourhood is poisoned by their dif fusion; and every independence within their range, sickens and is endangered by the con tagion.

(February, 1811.)

Speech of the Right Hon. William Windham, in the House of Commons, May 26, 1809, on Mr. Curwen's Bill, "for better securing the Independence and Purity of Parliament, by preventing the procuring or obtaining of Seats by corrupt Practices." 8vo. pp. 43. London: 1810.*

MR. WINDHAM, the most high-minded and in selling seats in parliament openly to the incorruptible of living men, can see no harm highest bidder, or for excluding public trusts The passing of the Reform Bill has antiquated ponents of reform principles-which are applicable much of the discussion in this article, as originally to all times, and all conditions of society; and of written; and a considerable portion of it is now, for which recent events and discussions seem to show this reason, omitted. But it also contains answers that the present generation may still need to be reto the systematic apologists of corruption, and op-minded.

pernicious and reprehensible of all political abuses.

The natural influence of property is that which results spontaneously from its ordinary use and expenditure, and cannot well be misunderstood. That a man who spends a large income in the place of his residence-who subscribes handsomely for building bridges, hospitals, and assembly-rooms, and generally to all works of public charity or accommodation in the neighbourhood-and who, moreover, keeps the best table for the gentry, and has the largest accounts with the tradesmen

generally from the money market; and is of pinion that political influence arising from property should be disposed of like other property. It will be readily supposed that we do not assent to any part of this doctrine; and indeed we must beg leave to say, that to us it is no sort of argument for the sale of seats, to contend that such a transference is no worse than the possession of the property transferred; and to remind us, that he who objects to men selling their influence, must be against their having it to sell. We are decidedly against their having it-to sell! and, as to what is here considered as the-will, without thinking or caring about the necessary influence of property over elections, we should think there could be no great difficulty in drawing the line between the legitimate, harmless, and even beneficial use of property, even as connected with elections; and its direct employment for the purchase of parliamentary influence. Almost all menindeed, we think, all men-admit, that some line is to be drawn ;-that the political influence of property should be confined to that which is essential to its use and enjoyment; -and that penalties should be inflicted, when it is directly applied to the purchase of votes; though that is perhaps the only case in which the law can interfere vindictively, without introducing far greater evils than those which it seeks to remedy.

To those who are already familiar with the facts and the reasonings that bear upon this great question, these brief suggestions will probably be sufficient; but there are many to whom the subject will require a little more explanation; and for whose use, at all events, the argument must be a little more opened up and expanded.

If men were perfectly wise and virtuous, they would stand in no need either of Government or of Representatives; and, therefore, if they do need them, it is quite certain that their choice will not be influenced by considerations of duty or wisdom alone. We may assume it as an axiom, therefore, however the purists may be scandalised, that, even in political elections, some other feelings will necessarily have play; and that passions, and prejudices, and personal interests, will always interfere, to a greater or less extent, with the higher dictates of patriotism and philanthropy. Of these sinister motives, individual interest, of course, is the strongest and most steady; and wealth, being its most common and appropriate object, it is natural to expect that the possession of property should bestow some political influence. The question, therefore, is, whether this influence can ever be safe or tolerable-or whether it be possible to mark the limits at which it becomes so pernicious as to justify legislative coercion. Now, we are so far from thinking, with Mr. Windham, that there is no room for any distinction in this matter, that we are inclined, on the whole, to be of opinion, that what we would term the natural and inevitable influence of property in elections, is not only safe, but salutary; while its artificial nd corrupt influence is among the most

matter, acquire more influence, and find more people ready to oblige him, than a poorer man, of equal virtue and talents-is a fact, which we are as little inclined to deplore, as to call in question. Neither does it cost us any pang to reflect, that, if such a man was desirous of representing the borough in which he resided, or of having it represented by his son or his brother, or some dear and intimate friend, his recommendation would go much farther with the electors than a respectable certificate of extraordinary worth and abilities in an opposing candidate.

Such an influence as this, it would evidently be quite absurd for any legislature to think of interdicting, or even for any reformer to attempt to discredit. In the first place, because it is founded in the very nature of men and of human affairs, and could not possibly be prevented, or considerably weakened, by any thing short of an universal regeneration; secondly, because, though originating from property, it does by no means imply, either the baseness of venality, or the guilt of corruption; but rests infinitely more upon feelings of vanity, and social instinctive sympathy, than upon any consciousness of dependence, or paltry expectation of personal emolument; and, thirdly, because, taking men as they actually are, this mixed feeling is, upon the whole, both a safer and a better feeling than the greater part of those, to the influence of which they would be abandoned, if this should be destroyed. If the question were, always, whether a man of wealth and family, or a man of sense and virtue, should have the greatest influence, it would no doubt be desirable that the preponderance should be given to moral and intellectual merit. But this is by no means the true state of the contest:-and when the question is between the influence of property and the influence of intriguing ambition and turbulent popularity, we own that we are glad to find the former most frequently prevalent. In ordinary life, and in common affairs, this natural and indirect influence of property is vast and infallible, even upon the best and most enlightened part of the community; and nothing can conduce so surely to the stability and excellence of a political constitution, as to make it rest upon the general principles that regulate the conduct of the better part of the individuals who live under it, and to attach them to their government by the same feelings which insure their affec tion or submission in their private capacity

There could be no security, in short, either for property, or for any thing else, in a country where the possession of property did not bestow some political influence.

This, then, is the natural influence of property; which we would not only tolerate, but encourage. We must now endeavour to explain that corrupt or artificial influence, which we conceive it to be our duty by all means to resist and repress. Under this name, we would comprehend all wilful and direct employment of property to purchase or obtain political power, in whatever form the transaction might be embodied: but, with reference to the more common cases, we shall exemplify only in the instances of purchasing votes by bribery, or holding the property of those votes distinct from any other property, and selling and transferring this for a price, like any other marketable commodity. All such practices are stigmatized, in common language, and in common feelings, as corrupt and discreditable; and the slightest reflection upon their principles and their consequences, will show, that while they tend to debase the character of all who are concerned in them, they lead directly to the subversion of all that is valuable in a representative system of government. That they may, in some cases, be combined with that indirect and legitimate influence of property of which we have just been speaking, and, in others, be insidiously engrafted upon it, it is impossible to deny ; but that they are clearly distinguishable from the genuine fruits of that influence, both in their moral character and their political effects, we conceive to be equally indisputable.

Upon the subject of direct bribery to individual voters, indeed, we do not think it necessary to say any thing. The law, and the feeling of all mankind have marked that practice with reprobation: and even Mr. Windham, in the wantonness of his controversial scepticism, does not pretend to say, that the law or the feeling is erroneous, or that it would not be better that both should, if possible, be made still stronger than they are.

Setting this aside, however, the great practical evils that are supposed to result from the influence of property in the elections of this country, are, 1st, that the representation of certain boroughs is entirely, necessarily and perpetually, at the disposal of certain families, so as to be familiarly considered as a part of their rightful property; and, 2dly, that certain other boroughs are held and managed by corrupt agents and jobbers, for the express purpose of being sold for a price in ready money, either through the intervention of the Treasury, or directly to the candidate. That both these are evils and deformities in our system of representation, we readily admit; though by no means to the same extent, leading to the same effects, or produced by the operation of the same causes.

With regard to the boroughs that are permanently in possession of certain great proprietors, these are, for the most part, such small or decayed places, as have fallen, almost insensibly, under their control, in con

sequence of the extension of their possessions, and the decline of the population. Consider ed in this light, it does not appear that they can, with any propriety, be regarded either as scenes of criminal corruption, or as examples of the reprehensible influence of property. If a place which still retains (however absurdly) the right of sending members to parliament, comes to be entirely depopulated, like Olá Sarum, it is impossible to suppose that the nomination of its members should vest in any one but the Proprietor of the spot to which the right is attached: and, even where the decay is less complete than in this instance, still, if any great family has gradually acquir ed the greater part of the property from which the right of voting is derived, it is equally impossible to hold that there is any thing corrupt or reprehensible in its availing itself of this influence. Cases of this sort, therefore, we are inclined to consider as cases of the fair influence of property; and though we admit them to be both contradictory to the general scheme of the Constitution, and subversive of some of its most important principles, we think they are to be regarded as flaws and irregularities brought on by time and the course of events, rather than as abuses introduced by the vices and corruptions of men. The remedy-and we certainly think a very obvious and proper remedy-would be, to take the right of election from all places so small and insignificant as to have thus become, in a great measure, the property of an individual-not to rail at the individual who avails himself of the influence inseparable from such property-or to dream of restraining him in its exercise, by unjust penalties and impossible regulations.

The great evil, however, is in the other de[scription of boroughs-those that are held by agents or jobbers, by a very different tenure from that of great proprietors and benefactors, and are regularly disposed of by them, at every election, for a price paid down, either through the mediation of the ministry, or without any such mediation: a part of this price being notoriously applied by such agents in direct bribes to individual voters and the remainder taken to themselves as the lawful profits of the transaction. Now, without going into any sort of detail, we think we might at once venture to ask, whether it be possible for any man to shut his eyes upon the individual infamy and the public hazard that are involved in these last-mentioned proceedings, or for one moment to confound them. even in his imagination, with the innocent and salutary influence that is inseparable from the possession and expenditure of large property? The difference between them, is not less than between the influence which youth and manly beauty, aided by acts of generosity and proofs of honourable intentions may attain over an object of affection, and the control that may be acquired by the arts of a hateful procuress, and by her transferred to an object of natural disgust and aversion. The one is founded upon principles which, if they are not the most lofty or infallible, are still among the most

by whom the frame of our constitution was laid; and it is confessedly a perversion and abuse of a system, devised and established for very opposite purposes. Let any man ask himself, whether such a scheme of representation, as is now actually in practice in many parts of this country, can be supposed to have been intended by those who laid the foundations of our free constitution, or reared upon them the proud fabric of our liberties? "Or let him ask himself, whether, if we were now

Amiable that belong to our imperfect nature, and leads to consequences eminently favourable to the harmony and stability of our social institutions; while the other can only be obtained by working with the basest instruments on the basest passions; and tends directly to sap the foundations of private honour and public freedom, and to dissolve the kindly cement by which nature herself has knit society together, in the bonds of human sympathy, and mutual trust and dependence. To say that both sorts of influence are derived from pro-devising a system of representation for such a perty, and are therefore to be considered as country as England, there is any human being identical, is a sophism scarcely more ingeni- who would recommend the adoption of the ous, than that which would confound the oc- system that is practically established among cupations of the highwayman and the honour- us at this moment,-a system under which able merchant, because the object of both was fifty or sixty members should be returned by gain; or which should assume the philoso- twenty or thirty paltry and beggarly hamlets, phical principle, that all voluntary actions are dignified with the name of boroughs; while dictated by a view to ultimate gratification, in twenty or thirty great and opulent towns had order to prove that there was no distinction no representation; and where upwards of a between vice and virtue; and that the felon, hundred more publicly bought their seats, who was led to execution amidst the execra- partly by a promise of indiscriminate support tions of an indignant multitude, was truly as to the minister, and partly by a sum paid meritorious as the patriot, to whom his grate-down to persons who had no natural influence ful country decreed unenvied honours for its deliverance from tyranny. The truth is, that there is nothing more dangerous than those metaphysical inquiries into the ultimate constituents of merit or delinquency; and that, in every thing that is connected with practice, and especially with public conduct, no wise man will ever employ such an analytical process to counteract the plain intimations of conscience and common sense, unless for the purpose of confounding an antagonist, or perplexing a discussion, to the natural result of which he is unfriendly on other principles.

But if the practices to which we are alluding be clearly base and unworthy in the eyes of all upright and honourable men, and most pregnant with public danger in the eyes of all thinking and intelligent men, it must appear still more strange to find them defended on the score of their Antiquity, than on that of their supposed affinity to practices that are held to be innocent. Yet the old cry of Innovation! has been raised, with more than usual vehemence, against those who offer the most cautious hints for their correction; and even Mr. Windham has not disdained to seek some aid to his argument from a misapplication of the sorry commonplaces about the antiquity and beauty of our constitution, and the hazard of meddling at all with that under which we have so long enjoyed so much glory and happiness. Of the many good answers that may be made to all arguments of this character, we shall content ourselves with one, which seems sufficiently conclusive and simple.

The abuses, of which we complain, are not old, but recent; and those who seek to correct them, are not innovating upon the constitution, but seeking to prevent innovation. The practice of jobbing in boroughs was scarcely known at all in the beginning of the last century; and was not systematized, nor carried to any very formidable extent, till within the last forty years. At all events, it most certainly was not in the contemplation of those

over the electors, and controlled them notoriously, either by direct bribery, or as the agents of ministerial corruption? If it be clear, however, that such a state of things is in itself indefensible, it is still clearer that it is not the state of things which is required by the true principles of the constitution; that, in point of fact, it neither did nor could exist at the time when that constitution was estab lished; and that its correction would be no innovation on that constitution, but a beneficial restoration of it, both in principle and in practice.

If some of the main pillars of our mansion have been thrown down, is it a dangerous innovation to rear them up again? If the roof has grown too heavy for the building, by recent and injudicious superstructures, is it an innovation, if we either take them down, or strengthen the supports upon which they depend? If the waste of time, and the elements, have crumbled away a part of the foundation, does it show a disregard to the safety of the whole pile, if we widen the basis upon which it rests, and endeavour to place it upon deeper and firmer materials? If the rats have eaten a way into the stores and the cellars; or if knavish servants have opened private and unauthorised communications in the lower parts of the fabric, does it indeed indicate a disposition to impair the comfort and security of the abode, that we are anxious to stop up those holes, and to build across those new and suspicious approaches?-Is it not obvious, in short, in all such cases, that the only true innovators are Guilt and Time; and that they who seek to repair what time has wasted; and to restore what guilt has destroyed, are still more unequivocally the enemies of innovation, than of abuse? Those who are most aware of the importance of re form, are also most aware of the hazards of any theoretical or untried change; and, while they strictly confine their efforts to the restitu tion of what all admit to have been in the

original plan of our representation, and to have formed a most essential part of that plan, may reasonably hope, whatever other charges they may encounter, to escape that of a love of innovation.

tion in both quarters? Or, is the evil really supposed to be less formidable, because it ap pears to be very widely extended, and to be the fair subject, not only of reproach, but of recrimination? The seat of the malady, and its extent, may indeed vary our opinion as to the nature of the remedy which ought to be administered; but the knowledge that it has pervaded more vital parts than one, certainly should not lead us to think that no remedy whatever is needed,-or to consider the symp toms as too slight to require any particular attention.

men within doors to the gentlemen without, and when they are reproached with not having clean hands, it may be very natural for them to ask a sight of those of their accusers. But is this any answer at all, to those who insist There is another topic, on which Mr. Wind-upon the infamy and the dangers of corrup ham has dwelt at very great length, which appears to us to bear even less on the merits of the question, than this of the antiquity of our constitution. The abuses and corruptions which Mr. Curwen aimed at correcting, ought not, he says, to be charged to the account of ministers or members of Parliament alone. The greater part of them both originate and end with the people themselves, are suggested by their baseness and self-interest, and terminate in their corrupt gain, with very little voluntary sin, and frequently with very little advantage of any sort to ministers or candidates. Now, though it is impossible to forget what Mr. Windham has himself said, of the disgraceful abuses of patronage committed by men in power, for their own individual emolument, yet we are inclined, upon the whole, to admit the truth of this statement. It is what we have always thought it our duty to point out to the notice of those who can see no guilt but in the envied possessors of dignity and power; and forms, indeed, the very basis of the answer we have repeatedly attempted to give to those Utopian or factious reformers, whose intemperance has done more injury to the cause of reform, than all the sophistry and all the corruption of their opponents. But, though we admit the premises of Mr. Windham's argument, we must utterly deny his conclusions. When we admit, that a part of the people is venal and corrupt, as well as its rulers, we really cannot see that we admit any thing in defence, or even in palliation, of venality and corruption :-Nor can we imagine, how that melancholy and most humiliating fact, can help in the least to make out, that corruption is not an immoral and pernicious practice;—not a malum in se, as Mr. Windham has been pleased to assert, nor even a practice which it would be just and expedient, if it were practicable, to repress and abolish! The only just inference from the fact is, that ministers and members of Parliament are not the only guilty persons in the traffic-and that all remedies will be inefficient, which are not capable of being applied through the whole range of the malady. may be a very good retort from the gentle

It

"With respect to the abuse of patronage, one of those by which the interests of countries do, in reality, most suffer, I perfectly agree, that it is like wise one, of which the government, properly so called, that is to say, persons in the highest offices, are as likely to be guilty, and from their opportunities, more likely to be guilty, than any others, And nothing, in point of fact, can exceed the greedi. ness, the selfishness, the insatiable voracity, the profligate disregard of all claims from merit or services, that we often see in persons in high official stations, when providing for themselves, their relations or dependants. I am as little disposed as any one to defend them in this conduct. Let it be reprobated in terms as harsh as any one pleases, and much more so than it commonly is."-Speech, p. 28.

But, though we differ thus radically from Mr. Windham in our estimate of the nature and magnitude of this evil, we have already said, that we are disposed to concur with him in disapproving of the measures which have been lately proposed for their correction. The bill of Mr. Curwen, and all bills that aim only at repressing the ultimate traffic in seats, by pains and penalties to be imposed on those immediately concerned in the transaction, ap pears to us to begin at the wrong end,-and to aim at repressing a result which may be regarded as necessary, so long as the causes which led to it are allowed to subsist in undiminished vigour. It is like trying to save a valley from being flooded, by building a pal try dam across the gathered torrents that flow into it. The only effect is, that they will ul timately make their way, by a more destruc tive channel, to worse devastation. The true policy is to drain the feeding rills at their fountains, or to provide another vent for the stream, before it reaches the declivity by which the flat is commanded. While the spirit of corruption is unchecked, and even fostered in the bosom of the country, the interdiction of the common market will only throw the trade into the hands of the more profligate and daring,-or give a monopoly to the privileged and protected dealings of Administration; and the evil will in both ways be aggravated, instead of being relieved.

We cannot now stop to point out the actual evils to which this corruption gives rise; or even to dwell on the means by which we think it might be made more difficult: though among these we conceive the most efficacious would obviously be to multiply the numbers, and, in some cases, to raise the qualification of voters to take away the right of election from decayed, inconsiderable, and rotten boroughs; and to bestow it on large towns pos sessing various and divided wealth. But, though the increased number of voters will make it more difficult to bribe them, and their greater opulence render them less liable to be bribed; still, we confess that the chief benefit which we expect from any provisions of this sort, is the security which we think they will afford for the improvement, maintenance, and propagation of a Free Spirit among the peɔplə

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