presented a petition from William Hallett, a magistrate of Berkshire, praying that no concession might be granted to the Catholies, unless accompanied by a reform of parliament. The petitioner was apprehensive that if papists were eligible to seats in that House, they might, by money, obtain an undue influence through the close boroughs; and there was danger that the means might be furnished to them from foreign states. The petitioner, in support of his opinion in this respect, alluded to a report, in which he (Mr. Monck) believed there was no foundation; namely, that the Nabob of Arcott had once been able to send two members into that House, by means of the system of close boroughs. The petitioner also prayed, that something might be done for the relief of the poor in Ireland. In this prayer, he most cordially concurred; for he was convinced that unless some means were devised to better the condition of the poor of that country, the measure of emancipation, though it might do some good, would fall very short of removing the evils which affected Ireland.

said, he had several petitions to present against further concessions to the Roman Catholics. The first was from the ministers, elders, and other members of the established church within the barony parish of Glasgow. It was signed by three thousand nine hundred persons, every one of whom was perfectly competent to form a correct opinion on a plain commonsense question. The next was from the minister, elders, and inhabitants of Govan and Gobals, signed by seven thousand and fifty persons, of as much intelligence as any which could be found with their names to petitions on the other side of the question. The next was from the inhabitants of Bothwell. To this petition he would wish to call the attention of the House. It was agreed to at a public meeting, at which a gentleman, a resident of the next county, but having a house in this parish, attended, and moved a resolution, that it was not necessary to petition at all. This resolution was supported by only one individual. The petition was then carried, and signed by eight hundred and thirty six persons. The next petition was from a parish where, out of a population of five thousand, one thousand nine hundred and seventeen persons signed. Another petition which he had to present was signed by nine hundred out of a population of two thousand, eight hundred; and none of those nine hundred were under sixteen years of age. The sentiments contained in these petitions were those which were now echoed from one end of the kingdom to the other. There was not, he was sure, within memory or in history, any instance where the expression of public feeling was more unanimous than in the present.

said, that as some of the petitions which had bean presented by his hon. friend the member for the University of Oxford, came from the county which he had the honour of representing, and as he had received some information regarding them, he felt it his duty to ask the permission of the House to lay some of that information very shortly before it. He was quite sure his hon. friend could not be aware of the nature and extent of the religious excitement now going on in that part of Scotland from which these petitions came, and in which excitement he believed the greater number of these petitions originated. It was with reluctance, that he felt it his duty thus to express himself, in respect to the petitions of the people. He begged, however, the House and his hon. friend to judge whether he was justified in what he now said.—The hon. baronet then proceeded to read extracts from several communications from most respectable individuals, residing in the neighbourhood of some of the places from whence the petitions came. One letter stated, that the intention of petitioning against the Roman Catholics was announced by the clergyman of Bothwell to his congregation after divine service. He told them, that they had no alternative but to sign the petition, or to have their throats cut by the bloody papists; that the people would be justified in wading to their knees in blood, in defence of their religion. The Catholics were described to the people as being worse, in the sight of God, than the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, and that those would be worse even than the Catholics, who should refuse to sign the petitions against them. After reading other extracts describing the means resorted to in other places to produce an impression of hostility to the Catholics, the hon. baronet said, he hoped that the House considered that he was justified in expressing himself as he had done, in regard to the influence wielded by the ministers of religion among the people in the west of Scotland. He wished to speak most strictly and advisedly on this subject. He thought all loose allegations, where the right and character of petitions were concerned, unjust and unwarrantable; and it was with extreme regret, that he felt himself obliged to state, and he humbly thought to prove, what he had now done, as to the public proceedings in that part of Scotland, where he resided. But he could not help feeling it his bounden duty, when so much stress was laid by many hon. members—and properly laid—upon the number of petitions, and the amount of signatures attached to them, on this great question, and where those petitions were intrusted, as in the present and various other instances, to hon. members of justly high consideration in this House, but who were quite unconnected with the petitioners, he could not help feeling it his duty, as the representative of many of those petitioners, to speak to facts, which local knowledge put him in possession of, and to characterize the petitions in the manner he really believed them to deserve. For he believed the fact to be, notwithstanding what his hon. friend had said, that the number who had really attended to this great question in the west of Scotland and in the city of Glasgow, apart from a feeling of religious fear, was not large; and that the great majority of that number were in favour of concession, in the proportion, as he was credibly informed, of three to one. Among the less well-informed of this population a great proportion was, undoubtedly, hostile to concessions to the Catholics; nor could it be otherwise. They believed, because they were told by their spiritual guides, that it was impossible for a measure to be kind and beneficial to the Catholics, without its being of necessity pernicious and dangerous to the Protestants. And he begged to add, from his own knowledge, that the lower orders in the west of Scotland were very naturally ready to do any thing which, in their opinion, would depress and keep back the Irish Catholics, who poured in upon them almost with every tide, coming to compete with them successfully in all their occupations, and thereby materially lowering the rate of wages throughout that district of the country. When such jealous feelings as these were worked upon by the ministers of religion from their pulpits to their constantly-thronged congregations, the wide and powerful effects could be easily imagined. And hence the great bulk of the signatures to these petitions,—hence, many of the petitions themselves,—hence, in a great degree, the thirty-six thousand signatures to the petition from Glasgow, presented by the noble marquis the other night,—and hence the five-thousand signatures to the petition from Greenock, presented by the same noble lord. He did not doubt that there were the signatures of many most respectable and intelligent individuals attached to these petitions; but he was confident that the great bulk of them were placed there under the excited and prejudiced feelings which he had ventured, from local knowledge, to describe. In regretting the mistaken and misapplied zeal, as he sincerely believed it to be, of some of the reverend members of the venerable church of Scotland, on this great national and not theological question, he begged to express himself with marked personal respect for them. A more able, excellent, and useful body of men did not exist; but he could not help at the same time lamenting and deprecating the undue advantage that some of them were taking of their stations, in attempting therefrom to arrest and to defeat the wise and benignant intentions of government, by working upon the religious fears and prejudices of the people. He would respectfully ask these reverend alarmists in the north, and he would earnestly ask his hon. friend,—than whom a more sincere friend to his country, or better citizen, did not exist—what would be the national result upon Scotland, upon England, but above all, upon Ireland, if these petitioners succeeded in forcing back the all-but-realized and just expectations of the Catholics, by defeating this great measure, on which the stability of the government and the tranquillity of the empire were now indisputably launched? He thought that, in common fairness, the people—at least the petitioning people—ought to be allowed to judge for themselves, in so far as their spiritual guides were concerned, on this great civil question, and be left to reflect upon the appalling, unanswerable, and admirable statement of the right hon. the Secretary of State, as to the state and condition of Ireland upon this great question. If the people were left to judge for themselves, he was confident that a great proportion of his own calculating fellow-countrymen, at least, would not move at all, but confide in the high integrity and character of the individuals forming the government, controlled by the deliberate wisdom of parliament, to arrange and to settle this difficult question, the complicated bearings of which many of them could not possibly know; and a still greater proportion of the people, longing for internal quiet, and heartily tired of this long protracted, anti-social struggle among ourselves, would cordially acquiesce in the wise and liberal arrangement of government. He begged, in his own name, and in the name of thousands in the west of Scotland, who had not, and would not, interfere at all, and in the name of hundreds, whose petitions he had to present—thus publicly to offer the fervent expression of their gratitude to his majesty's government, for the truly sanative, beneficent, and just resolution they had come to on this great question; and he begged especially to thank the illustrious duke, the founder of this great measure, and the right hon. the Secretary of State, without whose powerful co-operation and painful personal sacrifices, for the good of his country, this great state blessing could not have been secured.

said, that his hon. friend had followed the practice, now so common in the House, of objecting to, and resisting the petitions of the people. On the communications of an anonymous correspondent, his hon. friend would reject petitions signed by thousands [cries of "no, no"]. If hon. members set no value upon the number of petitions, upon what would they set a value? He was certain that, if the bill before the House were delayed for a time, the House would have still stronger proofs, if any could be necessary, of the sense of the people of this country being opposed to it. Objections were made to petitions, because a few women and ten or fifteen boys had signed some; but, did hon. members recollect the numbers of women who signed the petitions respecting the late queen? For his own part, he would have no objection to petitions being signed by women, or children, or any thing that had animation.

denied that he had any intention of offering opposition to the petitions; but he had felt it his duty to state to the House the very improper means that were used to induce parties to sign them.

denied that there was any inclination, on his side of the House, either to stigmatize or to reject the petitions of the people. It was necessary, however, to consider how their petitions against these claims, which he admitted to be very numerous, were got up. He had no doubt but that there was, in every village, an active, well-educated agent of the anti-Catholics, engaged in beating up for signatures to them. He did not wish to deprive those reverend gentlemen of the influence which belonged to their situation; but he did wish that they would turn that influence to nobler uses, and would become what they ought to be—ministers of peace and christian charity. It was a very sudden conversion which had led these reverend gentlemen to identify themselves with the people. On all former occasions they had acted, not with, but against the people; as, for instance, when the six acts, which really did trench on the privileges secured to the people under the constitution of 1688, were under consideration. Where were they, when the people were demanding the repeal of the property-tax, the leather-tax, the salt-tax, and other taxes, which pressed upon the country? They were enrolled, on all occasions, with the opponents of reduction.

said, that the Catholic priests had addressed the people on political subjects from their pulpits; and he could see no reasons why the Protestant clergy should not use the same means in self-defence, which the Roman Catholic clergy had used in aggression. He was not surprised that the clergy of Scotland, recollectinc, the persecutions which their religion had endured from the papists—for Charles 2nd was a concealed papist, and surrounded by popish councillors—should be anxious to prevent any chance of their recurrence. If all the pulpits in the country should be filled with appeals from the clergy to their congregations on this subject, he should not be at all surprised.

said, he could not sufficiently condemn the conduct of any clergyman, no matter whether he was Roman Catholic or Protestant, who desecrated his pulpit, by making appeals from it to the people, calculated to irritate and inflame their passions.

said, he did not consider himself responsible for the general conduct of those who opposed, or of those who supported, the present measures. He conceived that those measures were injurious to the best interests of the country, and he therefore opposed them. With re spect to what had fallen from the hon. baronet, from whose constituents he had presented a petition, he knew there was no question except this in which that hon. baronet did not represent the feelings of his constituents; but, as on this they knew that their feelings were not represented, they looked round for those who would represent them, not on local matters, but on the general politics of the country. It was to this alone that he could attribute the honour of having been selected to present the petitions; and he had received petitions from all parts of Scotland to the same effect. With respect to the interference of the clergy, they felt that the question was a religious one, and as such they were bound to interfere, as the natural guardians, of their religion. Not merely temporal but spiritual matters were involved in this question; and the interference of the clergy to get up these petitions could not, in his opinion, reflect any discredit on them.

said, he did not consider it to be a waste of time to consider how these petitions, which were signed by thousands and tens of thousands, were signed. He had been informed, that the reverend supporters of the hon. member for the university of Oxford came to a resolution before they parted, after the late election, to "beat the drum ecclesiastic" in every parish in the country. There was a petition now at the bar, which, though it might represent the sentiments of a mass of conscientious persons in London, by no means represented the sentiments of the most intelligent and influential part of the inhabitants. He might apply to it the quotation which his majesty's attorney-general had last night applied to another subject, and say that it

"Like a tall bully lifts its head and lies."

said, he had abstained from entering into a discussion of the general merits of this question, on the presentation of petitions, in consequence of some forcible remarks on the impropriety of it made by the hon. member who spoke last. The hon. member had blamed gentlemen for commenting largely on petitions as they were presented; but he had just been guilty of commenting on a petition which had not been presented. Which of these two practices was the worst? The hon. member had absolutely said, that a petition which had not yet been presented, lied.—Mr. C. Pallmer then said:—"I am called upon, Sir, to perform the duty of submitting to this House a petition from upwards of one hundred and thirteen thousand householders of London, Westminster, and the places adjacent, upon the subject of the Roman Catholic question. I beg, in the first instance, to assure the House, that it is not my intention to pursue the irregular and inconvenient course of entering into the wide, momentous, but almost exhausted subject to which it relates; but I have felt it only common justice to such a petition to announce its appearance with the respect that is due to it; and I shall feel it an act of justice no less imperious, to claim for it the especial attention of this House. Sir, its language and its prayer shall speak for themselves. [Here the hon. member stated the substance of the petition]. Such is the prayer, Sir, of a petition from one hundred and thirteen thousand householders of that portion of this country which, I think I may say, without disparagement to any other part of it, contains as much property, intelligence, information, constitutional principle, moral worth, and religious feeling, as are to be found in any part of the empire. I believe it will be found to contain the addresses of most of the individuals who have signed it; and I have the assurance of gentlemen whose characters are above all suspicion, that the utmost caution has been used to preserve it from the injuries of injudicious friends, or the acts of insidious enemies. I cannot possibly conceive a more faithful representation of public feeling and opinion. Sir, though I refrain at the present moment from entering into the general question, I hope the time will arrive when I may do this important petition that act of justice. In the mean time, I may be permitted, I think, without departing from my rule, to assert that I cordially concur in the principles upon which this petition is founded; and that in spite of the dogmas and the Rhetoric of those who arrogantly call themselves the intellectual, I feel a conscientious conviction that the measure before the House is a question of the religion of the country—the pure reformed religion—and that this House of Commons has no more right, against the will of the people, to admit papists into the legislature, than they have to reverse the principle and exclude from it the Protestants. Would they dare to do that? Sir, these petitioners approach the House in language which, though strong, is respectful. Though they do not thunder at your doors with obstreperous menace, or hurl defiance at your authority, it is not because they are ignorant of what is due to them from their representatives, but it is because the religion which they call upon you to protect inculcates, that they owe an undivided allegiance, a spiritual and temporal obedience, to only one power—to that sacred book which teaches them to fear God and honour the king, and respect authorities; and because they cannot believe, that a parliament of faithful representatives can so far betray their trust, as to surrender to the threats of an Association—which his majesty has called 'dangerous to the public peace, and inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution,'—that constitution and that religion which the prayers of millions of an obedient and loyal people are daily imploring them to preserve. As a member of parliament, I humbly but earnestly entreat his majesty's ministers and this House to listen to the prayers of the people—to beware how they overlook their legitimate power, how they miscalculate their moral force, to guard against the infatuation of him, who, towering upon the gigantic elephant, mistakes ductility for fear; and whilst he avails himself of the useful energies of his strength, overlooks the tremendous power of his rage. In conclusion, Sir, I beg permission to add, that hoping and believing that in my latest hour I shall look back with indescribable happiness to the humble but hearty part which I have taken in this sacred cause, I shall feel it an incalculable augmentation of that enjoyment to reflect, that it has entitled me, without any other pretension, to the distinguished honour of placing this respectable petition upon the table of the House of Commons."

hoped he might be allowed to trespass on the patience of the House for a few minutes, while he directed the attention of hon. members to a petition more important than any one, or, perhaps, all the petitions that had been presented upon this subject. No individual entertained a higher opinion of the value of the right of petitioning than he, and, probably, no individual among the other sins which he had to answer for, had been concerned in getting up and burthening the records of parliament with a greater number of petitions than himself. But, according to his view of the right of petitioning, it should be fairly exercised, to convey the sense of the people to the legislature in an unbiassed manner. He was far from finding fault with many of the numerous individuals who had signed the present petition. Doubtless they were very respectable persons; but when he saw a petition got up in the manner in which this had been, and signed by individuals such as the generality of these petitioners undoubtedly were, he thought it afforded an instance of one of the greatest abuses of the right of petitioning that could possibly exist, and called for the examination and animadversion of the House. The hon. member for Surrey had made some pretty bold assertions with respect to this petition; and if the hon. gentleman had spoken, not merely in accordance with the instructions he had received, but from his own knowledge of the facts, he should be disposed to give him credit for what he said. The hon. member had stated, that this was the petition of one hundred and thirteen thousand householders of London, Westminster, and the parts adjacent, against the Roman Catholic claims; that every precaution had been taken to prevent improper persons from signing it: and that of the signatures only four thousand were those of persons residing in the parts adjacent; the remaining one hundred and nine thousand being the names of inhabitants of London and Westminster. Though the hon. member made these representations, it was matter of surprise, that he had totally forgotten to tell them how the petition was got up—whether it had been agreed to at a public meeting—who the parties were that originated it—and how the machinery connected with it had been set in motion. He hoped he should not take up the time of the House unnecessarily, if he supplied the deficiency in the hon. member's statement. He dared to say he should be attacked by the gallant member for Liverpool and others, for a supposed attempt to depreciate the right of petitioning, and for abusing the clergy of the established church. He had already expressed his opinion as to the right of petition, and he would add, that no man could be more attached to the established church than he was. He respected the ministers of the establishment, when they confined themselves to their proper sphere of duties; and, in London, he was proud to say, the clergy, generally speaking, acted fairly. They had the same right as other men possessed to attend public meetings, but he thought it was departing from their proper sphere of action, and degrading to their character when they concerned themselves in getting up petitions of this description, and procuring signatures in every hole and corner throughout the town, without regard to who were the parties signing, or to the means resorted to, in order to induce them to affix their names to such documents. He had heard a new and extraordinary doctrine broached that night with respect to petitioning. "What if a few children signed petitions," said an hon. member; "they had a right to do so, and women also." Now, he was as ready as any man to admit, that women were very well in their proper place [a laugh]; but he did not think they were in their proper place, when they came forward to petition parliament. If, however, they insisted upon their right to petition, let them come forward in their proper character, and avow themselves, as in all probability they were, ladies of a certain description. The question came to this—were hon. members to be influenced and governed by the discussions and determinations of that House, or were they to yield up their judgments to the representations contained in parchments, signed by women and children, and the most ignorant part of the community? This petition was prepared at a meeting held at the Crown and Anchor Tavern. Some clergymen, he believed, were there; and he was told an individual went to the meeting, who, by a proposition which he made, threw them all into confusion, because the parties did not meet prepared to enter into any discussion, but simply to agree to some preconcerted resolutions, and to adopt a petition founded upon them. In consequence of the interruption occasioned in their proceedings by the prospect of a discussion, the chairman adjourned the meeting, which he had no right to do, without a motion made to that effect and agreed to. The parties who had convened the meeting then went into some other room in the tavern, in which to agree to their resolutions. These individuals had a chairman, and a secretary too; but neither he nor any one else knew any thing about who or what they were. Prospectuses were handed about, and copies sent through the kingdom, soliciting signatures, though it professed to be the petition of London and Westminster. Here was a petition from a district comprising, according to the late census, a million and a quarter of souls, and they could only muster from all sources one hundred and thirteen thousand signatures in the course of several weeks; whilst be recollected that, in the case of the Corn bill, no less than sixty thousand signatures were obtained at the Mansion-house in a few days. Some of the signatures were from persons at Hull and distant places. The course adopted reminded him of the practice resorted to at Kensington, where all the coachmen, cads, and blackguards that came to sign that petition received, as an inducement, a glass or two of gin. The whole evil arose from the activity of the clergyman of the parish, who, with the assistance of the parish beadle, the clerk, and the grave-digger were the worthy promoters of this system. He should not oppose the reception of this petition, but he trusted the House would not receive it as the sentiments of this enlightened metropolis.

said, he had witnessed with great pain the discussions that had taken place with respect to the signatures attached to petitions. He regretted to see the valuable time of the House consumed by one hon. gentleman, who made an assertion which another hon. gentleman denied. He did not think this mode of proceeding tended to raise the character of the House in the eyes of the people. He made these observations the rather on the present occasion, because it appeared that the worthy alderman had carried the license of debate further than it had ever been exercised before. Parties presented petitions to that House, perhaps under erroneous, but honest and strong feelings, and they were told by the worthy alderman that they came to insult the House—that their petitions were a farrago of nonsense, and themselves fools and idiots. The feelings of the people of this country were greatly excited on the subject under discussion, and it would better become the dignity of parliament, if they received petitions without those discussions which might lead the people to misconceive the feelings of parliament. Were they to tell these people that they laboured under a delusion, and shew no sympathy for the religion of the country, by deriding the prayers offered up for its safety? Would not such a course be likely to engender a spirit of religious controversy, in which the warmth of attachment on the part of the people, to the religion of the country would bring on a state of things much to be deprecated? Artful endeavours might be made to produce an impression, that parliament was indifferent to the interests of religion.

defended the right of the subject to petition, without having imputed to them either folly or idiocy for the part they conscientiously espoused.

was surprised to find the hon. alderman had attempted to describe the persons who were at the bottom of these petitions, by confessing that he knew nothing about them. The petition it appeared, had been sent to churches, vestry-rooms, and the principal bankers, for signature. This naturally called forth the ire of the worthy alderman, who said, he knew more about getting signatures to petitions than any man in that House, and was therefore incensed at the folly of these novices, well aware that when he was active in getting up these matters at the period of the late queen's trial, the best places to obtain subscriptions to a petition were the gin-shops and the stews, more particularly if it was desirable to have the signatures of women of a certain description.

protested against the petition being received as a fair representation of the public sentiment in this great metropolis.

said, that in the borough, and several places in the city, the most disgraceful means of obtaining signatures had been resorted to. He knew of places where the petition to the king lay, in which boys were invited to sign, among other modes, by the following—"Come in, boys, and sign the petition against popery. The king will see your signatures, and you do not know what good fortune may happen to you." He had made inquiries in Cheapside and other streets of the city, and he found that the respectable householders had not signed the petition, and that blank sheets, without any specification of the prayer or object, had been placed in the shops for people to sign, what they could not know they were signing.

said, he must also protest against the petition being received, as that of the householders of London and its vicinity. The most seditious artifices had been employed to obtain signatures to it—artifices worthy of the times of lord George Gordon, and disgraceful to the parties who had recourse to them. If the petition had been the result of a public meeting, he would respect it; but as it was, he must consider it as a gross imposture.

said, he had reason to believe, that the greatest pains had been taken to have the signatures unobjectionable. Three persons were always in attendance where the signatures were received. The answer made to those who had inquired as to the order of persons who had attached their names to the petition was, that boys and women were allowed on no account to sign it, and that the inhabitant householders had all added their places of residence to their names.

contended, that the petition did not express the sentiments of a large majority of the respectable inhabitants of the places it professed to come from. He would say, that two-thirds of the well-informed people of the country were favourable to its prayer. The petition, according to the hon. member for Surrey, had one hundred thousand signatures, professed to be those of the inhabitant householders of London and its vicinity. Now, a simple fact would prove this assertion to be a barefaced imposition—for the last census shewed, that there were but fifty-eight thousand householders altogether in London and its adjacent neighbourhood. Without alluding to the gross artifices that had been had recourse to, to obtain signatures to the petition, he would proclaim it to be one of the greatest impositions that had ever come before that House.

agreed with the hon. member for Callington, that if all the inhabitant householders of London and its vicinity had signed the petition, the number could not be one half of that stated by the hon. member for Surrey to have signed it. It was, therefore, as his hon. friend had stated, a gross imposition. It was not the petition of the respectable inhabitants of London and Westminster. He had no seat in the cabinet to lose, no long train of connexions to abandon, for the sake of supporting emancipation; but he had a seat in that House to lose, and he was ready to give it up if it was de- manded from him; although he certainly did not think that his support of the claims of the Catholics would form, with the electors of Westminster, a reason for requiring such a sacrifice. As a test of the opinions of the people of Westminster, for three elections, no mention had been made of the course which they wished their representatives to pursue upon this question.

said, he had a petition to present, upon a subject which he approached under the influence of feelings of extreme difficulty and delicacy, as it related to the hiatus which at present existed in the representation of the city for which he had the honour to be one of the members, in consequence of the continued absence of his right hon. colleague, Mr. S. R. Lushington, from this country. The petitioners stated, that his right hon. colleague was returned at the last general election as one of the members to represent the city of Canterbury, and that they had hoped to experience a full and fair representation, and to enjoy an opportunity of making their opinions known, and causing their voice to be heard, in parliament, when they elected the right hon. gentleman. The petitioners also stated, that on all subjects of great importance, difference of opinion would naturally arise, and that they thought it highly important that the House should be made aware of their opinions upon such subjects through the medium of their representative. They stated, that they were deprived of this advantage, as far as his right hon. colleague was concerned, by his voluntarily absenting himself, in order to take upon him the government of Madras. They acknowledged the attention with which their former petition on this subject had been received by the House, and expressed themselves anxious to enjoy the full benefit of the representation to which they were entitled at the present moment, when subjects of such unusual importance were in agitation.

said, that towards the end of last session, he had given notice of his intention to bring in a bill making the acceptance of any government such as that in question, by a member of parliament, a relinquishment of his seat, and authorising the House, under such cir- cumstances, to proceed to a new election. He had been prevented from taking the sense of the House upon the subject; which, however, he should undoubtedly do at the earliest moment.

said, he happened to know that Mr. Lushington would have resigned his seat before he left England. if the request to do so had not been conveyed in an offensive manner. He begged to know whether the measure which the hon. member intended to introduce was tc be prospective or ex post facto.

said, it was obvious that this was a case in which the House could not grant relief, except by means of a legislative measure.

hoped, that a bill would be brought in to prevent the occurrence of similar abuses. He also hoped that the case of the petitioners would be taken into consideration; and, however ungracious an act of a retrospective nature might appear, that the proposed bill would be extended to it.

said, he did not mean tc touch the present case, in the bill which he should introduce.

having moved the order of the day for the second reading of this bill,

said, he would take advantage of that occasion to express his regret that the present bill had been proposed without some inquiry into its actual necessity, or into its real nature. Without intentional disrespect, he must say that neither the right hon. Secretary, nor the hon. and learned gentleman, who was understood to have drawn up the bill could have thoroughly understood its real tendency. If they did, he was sure they would have paused before they brought it forward. He did not wish to raise any objections to a bill that was so recommended as that was; and would be willing to overlook minor objections, in order to preclude the throwing any obstacle in the way of the great measure of which the present was but a collateral appendix. But he would say, that but for the constitutional exercise of their franchise by the forty-shilling freeholders of Louth, Waterford, and Clare, the present bill would never have been heard of. It was absurd to allege, as a pretext for it, the conduct and influence of the Catholic priesthood; for all who knew how that influence was exercised knew, first, that it was felt chiefly when it ran with the current of popular feeling, and that it was ever exercised with a view to obtain a peaceable submission to the laws. Neither could it be said, that the tendency of the bill would be to improve the condition of the holders of small farms; for the tenure of farms in Ireland, be they small or large, was different from that asserted by the hon. member; and from that, as it would appear, contemplated by the present bill. He did not see what objection could be justly made to the exercise of a bona fide forty-shilling franchise in Ireland. If it could be procured in Ireland, he was of opinion that such a system would work well. They could as easily regulate the forty-shilling franchise, so as to render it a bona fide one, as they could the 10l. freeholds, which were now proposed to be substituted for it. They knew little of Ireland who imagined that the mere raising of the registry to 10l. would do away with fraudulent and fictitious votes. He would be disposed to suggest measures for the prevention of the registry of such votes, and such, he conceived, as would do away with any evils that could arise from the existence of the forty-shilling freehold system. An hon. friend of his who had presented a petition yesterday on this subject, had complained of the manner in which these registries were made; but his hon. friend appeared not to know the real facts connected with the registry of the forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland. That hon. member, and other honourable gentlemen, seemed to speak of the forty-shilling freeholders as if they were all fraudulent and corrupt voters. Perhaps his hon. friend did not mean to go so far, but certainly other honourable members appeared to labour under such an impression. Now, those who knew Ireland better than those honourable gentlemen, must be aware, that every forty-shilling freeholder there was not the person so described by those honourable members. Indeed, the opinion of their universal corruption seemed to exist in the mind of the right hon. Secretary himself; who had unintentionally misled the House on that point, by stating to them a case, as illustrative of the general existence of fraudulent and fictitious votes in the freehold system in Ireland. The right hon. gentleman had alluded to a county in Ireland, in which there were twenty-six thousand forty-shilling freeholders, and of these he stated that nineteen thousand could not write their names. Now, it so happened, that these freeholders lived in a mountainous part of the country. They were, generally speaking, comfortable and respectable farmers, who were of a certain age, which placed their youth at a period when it was more difficult than at present to procure the advantages of education. These freeholders, therefore, could not write their names, and were obliged to substitute their mark; at the same time, most of the families of those freeholders could write, and had received a certain degree of education. He had, on a former night, expressed his determination to divide the House upon the second reading of this bill, but he had since abandoned that intention. If the bill were somewhat altered, he thought it might effect a great deal of good; particularly if it were applied to the correction of the registry of fraudulent and fictitious forty-shilling freeholders. He was therefore determined, in a future stage of the bill, to move an instruction to the committee to this effect—"That it be an instruction to the committee on this bill, that they have power to render it applicable to a due exercise of the elective franchise by forty-shilling freeholders, by preventing a fraudulent and fictitious registry; and to preserve to the people of Ireland their right of voting for representatives in parliament as at present by law established." His desire was, to secure still to those persons who really possessed a bona fide forty-shilling freehold, the right of voting. This act would effect a great deal of good if it were applied to such a purpose as that. He had no wish to protect fraudulent voters; but by the application of the machinery of this bill he would do away with such voters, and render the whole registry throughout Ireland perfectly pure. He was bound to express his belief, that so many objections would not be raised against this bill in Ireland, as some gentlemen expected. But, when the enthusiasm which pervaded Ireland at the prospect of the passing of the great measure which accompanied this bill had subsided, he conceived that those who would be now disfranchised would have a right to say to their representatives, that they had neglected their duty. This bill would not excite much opposition in Ireland now, because it formed a portion of the great measure which the right hon. gentleman had introduced—a measure which far surpassed his most sanguine expectations, and the most ardent hopes of his fellow-countrymen. As to the present bill, he would repeat his opinion, that it would work well, if its machinery were applied to the prevention of the fraudulent registry of fictitious votes under the existing system, but he could not avoid expressing his condemnation of a measure which went to deprive the present forty-shilling freeholders of their franchise.

said, he was anxious to explain, in as few words as possible, the reasons that would influence his vote upon the present occasion; and he was the more anxious to do so, because, differing as he did diametrically from the view taken of the Disfranchisement bill by his noble friend who had just sat down, he also differed, he believed, from many of the hon. gentlemen who intended to support the measure. Undoubtedly, had the advice of so humble an individual as himself been asked upon the subject, he should have been most anxious to prevent the great measure of Catholic emancipation from being incumbered with the bill for the disfranchisement of the forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland;—but this was not at present the question to be discussed—the measure was actually before the House, and was to be dealt with accordingly. He had been always, since he had had a seat in that House, a parliamentary reformer. He had voted not only for particular, but also for general motions on reform; and he hoped to do so again. But he had always done so under the impression, that such reform would be beneficial to those for whom it was intended, and for the country. It had never entered into his contemplation either to give or to preserve a franchise which was decidedly injurious to those who possessed it. And such he must ever consider the operation of the forty-shilling franchise in Ireland. It had tended, in his opinion, more than any thing else, to the excessive increase of population; to the splitting and dividing of the estates into small, wretched tenements; and the consequent increase of misery and pauperism. It had equally injured the estates of the proprietors, and the condition of the peasantry. Upon these grounds he should cordially support the second reading of the bill now before the House. In 1825, he had voted for the suppression of this franchise, but he was not going to take credit to himself for his consistency, if he did so again. He was well aware the case was materially altered since that time—but was it not altered for the worse? Up to that period the forty-shilling freeholders were slaves in the hands of their landlords, undoubtedly a most degraded condition. They had since, in some instances, and during moments of great popular excitement, been compelled to vote against their landlords through the power of the priests. The consequence of this had been a total dissolution of the social bond which ought to exist between landlord and tenant, to the great injury of both parties, and in short a state of things which could not exist in any well-ordered community.—He was willing to allow, that this state of things had tended greatly to advance the measure of Catholic emancipation; and without the concession of that emancipation, he, for one, would never have consented to the taking away of the franchise. But a new era was now arrived, and, through the wisdom of his majesty's ministers, concession was now about to be granted. Under these circumstances, he should be, he owned, very glad to see the forty-shilling franchise done away with; which, while it existed, must prevent Ireland from being either a happy, a prosperous, or even a tranquil country.

said, be should occupy the attention of the House but for a short time, while he stated his opinions respecting the bill under their consideration. He had felt it his duty, upon other occasions, to act so as to obtain some degree of popularity in Ireland upon just and legitimate grounds; but now, even at the risk of the little popularity which he might possess in Ireland, he was ready to give this measure his support. He did not support the bill on its own merits, but on account of the measure by which it was accompanied. He would at once therefore say, that he would support the second reading of this bill, not intending by so doing to pledge himself to the ten-pound qualification, as the best remedy that could be proposed for the correction of the evils of the elective franchise system in Ireland, but because it was accompanied by a measure which was so eminently calculated to restore peace and tranquillity in Ireland. He supported the second reading of this bill, not because he altogether approved of its principles or provisions, but because, if he understood rightly the position in which they were placed, it was this—the right hon. Secretary came down to the House with the bill of emancipation in one hand, and this disfranchising bill in the other, and, as well as he could collect the meaning of what had fallen from the right hon. gentleman, if they wanted the measure of emancipation, it was in vain for them to deal deliberately or cautiously with this bill of disfranchisement, He voted for this bill, then, as the price of the great measure of emancipation. He had many objections to this bill: it was revolting in many respects to his feelings; but nevertheless he would sacrifice his feelings, if, upon such terms, he could purchase emancipation. It was said, that they might refuse to take emancipation on such terms, and defer it for another twelve months; but he was not for incurring the risk attendant on such delay: the dangers which now pressed upon them might be then increased tenfold, and England and Ireland might, perhaps, be rent in twain. He was therefore disposed to adopt this measure, bad as it was, and to do evil, if it could be called an evil, that good might abound. He was persuaded that good would follow from this measure. It would certainly prevent the splitting of farms; which was one of the great evils of Ireland. If the right of voting in Ireland were now for the first time under consideration, he should be inclined to say, that this measure was a just, fair, and advantageous one. It was calculated to correct many evils; and no doubt, in the long run, it would work well for Ireland. But, when he looked at the events of the last few years, he could not avoid expressing his repugnance to such a measure. He was ready to avow his admiration of the conduct of those gallant, intrepid, honest, and high-minded voters, who had in several counties in Ireland, within the last few years, displayed such patriotism and independence. He would, therefore, confess that to this measure, with all its anticipated advantages superadded to it, he should not be prepared to give his consent, unless he received immediately with it, and had as it were at the moment in his hands, the great pearl of entanci pation. Petitions had been presented to that House, praying an alteration in the elective franchise, upon grounds from which he altogether dissented. Those petitions prayed the House for measures to take the voters out of the hands of the priests, for the purpose of placing them (certainly not in better hands) under the influence of their landlords. That was a very wrong view to take of the elective franchise. If the tenant did his duty to his landlord—if he paid his rent and tilled his land, and discharged all the obligations contained in his lease,—he had done his duty, and his landlord had no right to expect any thing further from him. He knew of no claim more cruel or more indefensible, than that of the landlord to the vote of his tenant. He did not support this measure with a view to take the voters out of the hands of the priests and to place them again in the hands of their landlords. He trusted it would have a different effect. He dissented from the observation of the hon. member who had just resumed his seat, that this measure would be good, in so far as it would go to take the voters out of the hands and influence of the Catholic priests. The freeholders of Ireland had not been led by their priests; they had acted under the influence of a far greater power than that of priestly influence or domination—they had been influenced by that desire for freedom which pervaded the entire mind of the Irish nation. At the elections, the freeholders were asked, whether they would vote for the man who swore that their religion was superstitious and idolatrous, or for the man who would pledge himself to do his utmost to have that odious test repealed? The effect of such an appeal might be easily imagined. The charge as to priestly influence was unfounded; but it had not been made now for the first time. In the counties of Waterford, Louth, Westmeath, and Clare, the same charge had been preferred; but the parties shrunk from the proof, or contented themselves with producing the lamest and most inconclusive evidence to the House on that point. The freeholders had not yielded to priestly influence; but they had been acted upon by that general and extraordinary combination, which existed in Ireland, of the Catholic aristocracy, the gentry, the clergy, the landed proprietors, and the mercantile men—a combination which extended to all ranks and classes, and which, from the peer to the peasant, produced its effects amongst the Catholic community. With that combination the priests were not connected, save as citizens; and it was therefore an unfounded charge to advance, that the Irish freeholders were a priest-ridden people. He was anxious to have an independent race of voters in Ireland, whom the landlords could not influence and direct as they pleased. They were not to judge of the conduct of the freeholders for the future, from that which they had displayed during the excitation of the last few years. They were not to judge of them by their conduct from 1793 up to 1825. He agreed with his noble friend, that it would be a wise course to apply the machinery of this bill to correct the evils of the existing freehold system in Ireland. From the year 1793 to 1825, the freeholders were not free agents. They were driven by their landlords to the county town, and locked up there until they gave their votes for their landlord's favourite candidate. That, without this bill, such things would again recur, when the excitement of the present moment had passed away, might be reasonably expected. About fifty years ago, in the north of Ireland, an excitement of a somewhat similar character arose. The Protestants and Dissenters of Antrim were at that time as much divided as the Catholics and Protestants of Ireland are—(he should rather say were, for those differences, he was delighted to say, were already fast disappearing, in consequence of the healing measure introduced by his majesty's ministers)—an election came on in Antrim; the established church and the Presbytery of Antrim were committed against each other. A Mr. Wilson, who possessed no property in the county, but who was prominent in advocating their cause, was the candidate of the Presbyterians: every exertion was made for him; the clergy preached in his favour from their altars; they influenced the educated, they intimidated the ignorant amongst the voters; and the result was, that the aristocracy were defeated, and Mr. Wilson returned. People argued from this, that the independent spirit exhibited in Antrim would extend throughout the country, and that the freeholders would from thence forward do their duty. But, in a short time, the aristocracy regained their influence, the effects of this election were forgotten, and the spirit of independence which the enthusiasm of the moment excited, disappeared. Such, he believed, was but a picture of what would be likely to take place in Ireland, after the passing of emancipation. He mentioned this to prove that the present elective franchise was not one that could be approved of and upheld, upon sound and permanent principles. He had supported a similar measure in 1824, and that on the same principle; and, chiefly in consideration of the valuable boon that was to accompany it, he would not take upon himself the responsibility of opposing the present bill.

said, be could not refrain from congratulating the House and the country upon the happy effects which were sure to follow from the great measure of concession which had been so wisely introduced by his majesty's ministers. That measure was pregnant with innumerable advantages to the people and to the state. It would dissipate the spirit of party, do away with the feelings of hostility which prevailed between man and man, and establish harmony, peace, and happiness, throughout the country. It would at length establish a real union between England and Ireland; which had hitherto been united but in name. It was a measure which would put an end to religious and political differences, and consolidate the power and resources of the empire. He hailed with delight the introduction of such a healing measure; and he would not cavil with the measure by which it was accompanied lest he should endanger the passing of the great measure itself.

said, he gave the noble lord who spoke first great credit for the fairness of his conduct, and was willing to defer to him, as one of those who were the best informed on Irish affairs. He however, considered the present measure as calculated to afford a substantial benefit to Ireland, and that it was free from the objections which had been raised against other measures of security. It made no invidious distinctions; it applied generally and equally to Protestants and Catholics. He concurred with the hon. gentleman in thinking that the effect of such a general law would be to prevent family jealousies and to obviate the conflict of political interests, managed by large standing armies of freeholders enlisted out of the tenantries. There was a large part of the aristocracy of Ireland desirous to give up this power, and a large part of the tenantry were indifferent on the question. The act of 1793, though the measure was considered an act of justice, gave to the Catholics of Ireland a very considerable superiority, and its effect had been completely to destroy the influence of property. The speech of sir Laurence Parsons, now lord Rosse, in the Irish House of Commons, on that occasion, contained an able exposition of the consequences of that measure; and the right hon. the President of the Board of Trade, who had himself suffered from its effects, could not give a more accurate statement of them than was contained in that prophetic speech of sir Laurence Parsons. He (Mr. Littleton) had been led by the arguments in that speech to introduce in 1825 a bill for the regulation of the elective franchise in Ireland, which had failed. The only difference between this bill and the present was, that the former was prospective. That bill was designed to be auxiliary and concomitant to a measure of doubtful efficacy. This bill was auxiliary too, and concomitant with a measure which would effect a great and lasting good. It was a gratification to him to witness the completion of an object which had become more and more necessary, owing to the increase in the numbers and the wealth of the Catholics since 1793. He gave his hearty concurrence to the bill, which, in his estimation, imparted a great value to the other measure. He called upon hon. members to consider the advice which had been given by the hon. member for Winchelsea, that nothing might obstruct the great measure which was intended for the relief of Ireland,—a measure which they could not do wrong in purchasing at any price. The golden opportunity ought not to be lost. The measure of relief was the great object which ought to be secured; the evils of disfranchisement might at any time be corrected.

said, he should approve of the instructions of the Committee to be moved by his noble friend; but if the measure itself was deemed necessary for carrying the great question of Catholic concession, he would certainly support it. It might be that, in doing so, he risked whatever little popularity he might flatter himself he possessed in the county of Waterford; but though he might lose that popularity, and even sacrifice the seat which he had the honour to hold in that House, he was, nevertheless, forced by a sense of duty to do nothing that might endanger the safety of the great measure of relief to his Catholic countrymen. He could never forget that he was sent by the great mass of the constituency of Waterford to fight the battle of civil and religious liberty, and he should feel that he was a traitor to his trust, if he did anything that might endanger the winning of the great fight. But let him not be thought to support this measure otherwise than as an accessary to emancipation. He could not conceal from the House his regret at its being thought necessary to have the present measure as an accompaniment to the other; for, if men ever vindicated their fitness to vote at elections, it was the forty-shilling freeholders at the late election for Clare. They had been told, that they were slaves to their landlords; they had been taunted with their subserviency; they had been reviled for their helotism; but how, on the first opportunity given them, had they answered these charges? Threats could not awe, promises could not sway them, to prostitute their suffrages, in support of principles which they knew to be inimical to their interests and subversive of their liberties. They had acted in this in conjunction with their priests, and not in subservience to them. How, then, could he be otherwise than reluctant to punish as a crime in practice that which he had been taught to look upon as a virtue in theory? He considered the fear to be vain, that if this measure were not passed the freeholders would continue to vote with their priests. There would be no difference between the landlord and tenant, when there ceased to be a distinction between Catholic and Protestant. The penal code had acted as a chymical test in the separation of landlord and tenant—elements, without the application of that test, indissolubly united. After the great triumph the forty-shilling freeholders had just achieved, he was reluctant to mingle cypress with their laurels, and to cut short the thread of their existence in the hour in which their political life began. He should have thought himself guilty of the blackest ingratitude had he not vindicated the character of so large a portion of his constituents, and done every thing for the maintenance of their privileges, short of the absolute rejection of this bill. If the measure of emancipation had passed he would not consent to this bill; but as one could not pass without the other, he asked himself, whether his constituents would not be more benefitted by the discontinuance of the disabilities under which they at present laboured without having the franchise, than they would be by a continuance of both.

said, he felt as strongly as any hon member the incalculable importance of the measure which had been carried at three o'clock that morning by a decisive majority of that House. It had been stated to the House, in a manner which could not he misunderstood, that that measure was indissolubly bound up with the present—that the fate of the one would decide the fate of the other. This it was which increased the embarrassment under which he laboured in delivering his sentiments, which arose from his disapprobation of the principle of the bill which disposed of an elective franchise. He at the same time protested against the doctrine—and it was an unparliamentary way of discussing any measure—that that House was not at liberty to make an alteration in the elective franchise. He could not discuss the measure with reference to the present state of property in Ireland, as he was not acquainted with it. He should discuss it on the principle of right. If Ireland was a new country—if she had never enjoyed this right at all, and the question related to the establishment of the elective franchise—then he should not object to the limitation proposed to be introduced: 10l. would be a very good limitation if the House was legislating for a new country. But it was said, you must look at the state of Ireland as connected with this proposition. Now, they were not at liberty to look at the question in that point of view. It must be well known to every member, that it was a point of the case, that the elective franchise of counties in Ireland were the same as those in England; that whereas forty-shilling freeholders in England had obtained their privileges about four hundred years ago, they had been extended to Ireland a century later. When he said this, he meant to say, that a franchise so annexed and united, for a period of three hundred years, to a freehold, was a property vested in the freeholder, to take away which was only one degree less a violation of right than taking the property itself. Why did he state this? Was there any ground of law for this theory? Yes; a very high authority. Lord Chief Justice Holt, in speaking of the freehold rights of the people of England, said, "a freehold right is one which, if any person is in the slightest degree molested in the exercise thereof, he may defend by action;" and further, "a freehold right is a most transcendant thing; it is vested in and inseparable from the freehold: if it be separated, then the freehold is taken away." Then Magna Charta itself contained a provision, that "no freeman shall be disseized of his freehold, or the liberties thereof, but by the judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land." Therefore, these freehold rights and immunities were most sacred, protected by the law of the country, and by the sanctity of three hundred years.—He was told, that this privilege had been more abused in Ireland than in this country. That might be: but, he would ask, "is it not your duty to endeavour to correct the abuse, instead of taking away the property itself?" Was this the mode of proceeding which would be tolerated in this country? Was there no instance of such abuses in England? Honourable members might recollect the election in Middlesex some twenty years ago, and the scenes which had then taken place, when a mill at Brentford had been split into several hundred votes. Who had ever thought at that time of meddling with the elective franchise of the people of England? Let gentlemen call to mind the elections for Westminster, forty or fifty years ago; and the perjuries, and corruptions, and bribery, and breaches of the peace; yet who ever thought of interfering with the elective franchise of the people of Westminster? He would ask English members, whether, if any, case occurred of an abuse in elections, they would not proceed to correct that abuse; or whether they would proceed to deprive the people generally of rights which were inseparable from their freeholds?—It had been objected, that the votes in Ireland were not derived from property in fee; and how many tenants were there in England whose property was not in fee? In the place which he had the honour to represent, many of the electors held only a life-interest in their property; and in many places—Sussex, for example—votes were created by the purchase of forty-shillings a year of land-tax; which was not purchased for the profitable employ ment of capital, but solely with a view of obtaining the elective franchise. He could not make up his mind to dispossess persons of their property, especially when the abuse—which was to be considered the ground of the measure—existed elsewhere. Vested rights of another description were regarded: there was scarcely a professional adviser of the revenue board, who did not consider his emoluments as vested right. No man lamented more than he did the scene of perjury which was presented at elections, and he fully agreed that it ought to be remedied. But, when hon members talked of perjury in Ireland, why had they not some feeling for the perjuries committed in corporations? The forty-shilling freeholders of Ireland might be entitled to a lenient consideration. Some of these individuals might not understand the true construction of the law. They might suppose, that if they were unwilling to part with their freeholds for forty-shillings, they were therefore worth so much in the eye of the law; whereas, in corporations and borough elections in England, a man would swear that he had not received a bribe, whilst he knew that it was promised, if not received, and that it would be regularly paid when the period of danger had expired. On these grounds he had differed from the hon. gentleman who had brought in the bill of 1825, which was prospective. He had voted for that bill on its first introduction, but not afterwards. By the present bill, which was not prospective merely, all the proprietors of freeholds between forty-shillings and 10l., who had hitherto exercised the right of voting, were disfranchised, and thereby sustained an injustice only a degree short of the loss of their freehold.—The right hon gentleman then referred to a custom, about this period of the year, of taking the skin from a dead lamb and placing it upon a live one; and observed, that the right hon. Secretary seemed to have committed the mistake of putting the skin of a lamb, not upon a sheep, but upon a wolf. Another argument in favour of the bill was, of all other arguments, the least to be commended. It was said, that the people of Ireland were indifferent about this right—that the measure was not unpopular in that country. But, was 'it becoming in any government to take advantage of a season of enthusiasm, of an ebullition of gratitude, and to accept the surrender of an institution connected with popular rights? Such an argument was open to great objection; for if this House might so deal with the rights of electors, there was no knowing where it would end. He was an enemy to parliamentary reform—an object which, since the introduction of this measure, had become more than ever a topic of conversation. He had heard it asserted, that this bill was a measure of parliamentary reform, but that it began at the wrong end. He was hostile to all such reform, let the suggestion come from what quarter it might—whether it referred to England, Ireland, or Scotland. He should give such a project his decided opposition; and, admitting as he did, from a sincere conviction, that the Catholic bill would strengthen the Protestant interests, he was of opinion, on the other hand, that parliamentary reform would not only destroy the Protestant church, but every other establishment. If the measure before the House solely inflicted inconvenience, or even if it inflicted hardship and injury, provided it fell short of actual injustice and the violation of legal rights, the confidence he placed in the government, who were taking steps to pacify Ireland, would have prevented him from offering any opposition to the bill. But he could not compromise the rights of the people, and consent to a violation of property. If he had happened to be a member of his majesty's government, he might have seen reason to he satisfied of the indispensable necessity of such an arrangement. The course which he thought he should then have adopted was this—he should have endeavoured to prevail on those who were anxious for the measure to make it prospective; it would have been only in the case of their satisfying him of the absolute necessity of this measure to secure the success of the other, that he should have consented to it in its present state. He should not have yielded until the inseparable connexion between the two measures had been demonstrated to him. He had lived too long in public, and mixed too much in its affairs, not to know, that in such a complicated state of things, there may have existed some overruling necessity, to which ministers were forced to yield. Having, therefore, no means of knowing whether this necessity existed, and, on the other hand, being most anxious to do nothing which might, by possibility, seem to evince a desire to delay or impede the other great measure, he felt it proper, under his great difficulty, to abstain from voting at all. His resolution, he hoped, would have no effect upon others. He had not suggested this course to others, and did not wish others to adopt it; but, with reference to the injustice of the measure, and to the precedent it established, he was not disposed to do otherwise.

said, he should not have addressed the House, but for the extraordinary speech which had just fallen from his right hon. friend. He had never heard a speech which had astonished him more. His memory as to the discussions which took place in that House was not always accurate; and, during at least three-quarters of that speech, he had thought he laboured under a great misapprehension. He thought that, in 1825, when the hon member for Stafford brought forward the question of the disfranchisement of the forty-shilling freeholders, that that question had received the support of his right hon friend. But he had been relieved from all doubt upon the subject, when the right hon gentleman thought it prudent to anticipate the objections which might be made on this score, by stating, in the latter part of his speech, that he had voted on the first introduction. Then that which was a lamb in 1825, had become a wolf in 1829 [hear]. For his own part, he gave his entire sanction to the present measure. He had listened with admiration to the speech of the hon. member for Waterford (Mr. V. Stuart), which demanded his unqualified approbation; for he knew the sacrifice he was making: he knew that it was by the forty-shilling freeholders he had been supported. That hon member had, therefore, made a great sacrifice. But the justification of that hon. member would be found in the approbation of the Catholics themselves; who would, by this sacrifice, purchase a much more valuable boon. But his right hon. friend stood on different ground. He knew nothing of Ireland, he said, or of the forty-shilling freeholder; but having voted in favour of this measure in 1825, why, he would ask, did he support it then, if he believed that it was an act of gross injustice? If there was a violation of just principles now, there must have been then. But he would relieve his right hon. friend: he would convince him that he need not repent of having voted as he had done; that no natural or legal right was violated, and that his right hon. friend might give his vote now, if squeamishness and no other ground withheld him. The right hon. gentleman was deeply read in the constitution of the country; he spoke of vested rights, and of the inability of parliament to deal with this matter; and he had read the dictum of chief justice Holt as to the rights of freehold; and he had expatiated upon the sanctity of four hundred years. Now, in the reign of Henry the 6th the right to interfere with the elective franchise was recognized. Before that time, and up to the year 1429, every person had a right to present himself at the sheriff's court and vote for the election of members of parliament, but after that, the votes were limited to the forty-shilling freeholders. But, did the interference stop here? Was not the elective franchise, both of England and Ireland, interfered with in the reign of Henry 8th? Again, was there not a proposed interference with it, with a view to raising the qualification, within the last three or four years? His right hon. friend had asked, was it not monstrous that there should be one scale of qualification for England and another for Ireland? He would, in turn, ask, whether the situation of the elected was not of more importance than that of the elector? And if so, whether the scale of qualification for the former might not, by the same reasoning, be the same all over the United Kingdom? But in the reign of queen Anne, in 1711, the qualification in point of property was limited. The qualification for representing boroughs was not then extended to Scotland, because it was thought that it would not be, at that time, so easy to find qualified persons in that country. There was even now one scale of qualification for representatives in England, and another in Ireland. He thought, therefore, he should convince his right hon. friend, that the proposed measure interfered with no vested right belonging to the forty-shilling freeholders. In 1825, a right hon. friend of his, for whom the right hon. gentleman had a great respect, had, he knew, given his sanction to that measure, though he had not given it his vote; and he was sure the right hon. gentleman would have no regret to follow the example of his right hon. friend. He could not wish by his language, to throw any doubts on a measure, which was said to be necessary to that great measure which he had already supported. That other measure, it had been stated, could not be carried, if this were abandoned. He would not at that time declaim on the merits of that other measure; he would not, when so many gentlemen had done it so ably, depict the blessings which he believed would flow from it: he would only appeal to those who had been, as he had, long struggling for that measure, who looked on concession as the greatest blessing which could be conferred on Ireland; he would only appeal to them to consider what would be the consequences, should the measure of concession not now be carried, and the result of that night's deliberation be to disappoint the hopes of the people of Ireland. He implored his right hon. friend, therefore, not to withhold from the measure then before the House the benefit, not of his vote—for that, he believed, they were not to have—but the more influential benefit of his example. His name carried with it—and deservedly carried with it—great weight in the country; and in Ireland, if the measure wanted his approbation, it would justify the people in believing, that it would not be attended with all the advantages they might otherwise expect from it.

denied, that he opposed this bill from any principle of an equality of elective rights. He was too much opposed to what was called reform in parliament to adopt any such principle. He would now say, so anxious was he for the success of the great measure, that he would willingly give his support to this bill, if it were made prospective.

said, he had heard from the hon. member for Armagh, that the in fluence of the priests was much overrated: he had heard from other members who knew Ireland better than he did, that the influence of the landholder was overrated; but, if the influence of the landed gentlemen was not too much, and if the influence ascribed to the priests was a mere mockery, this measure was a gross act of injustice. It was not wanted, and was not calculated to put an end to the injurious system of voting. For his part, he did not wish to get rid of the measure by a side wind—that was never his mode of proceeding; but he must declare himself decidedly hostile to both the measures, and he did not see any reason for voting in favour of either. This bill was to do away the influence of the priests. After it should be passed, there would still be enough voters to carry any election the Catholics might like. Was it right, he asked, to take away the elective franchise from the people, under a pretext which was contradicted by the Irish members? He cordially agreed with his noble friend behind him; and if he pressed his opinion to a division, he would certainly vote with him.

said, he had abstained from taking any part in the great discussion, because he had thought it his duty not to intrude himself on the House when its valuable time was occupied so much better. He had felt willing to give way to persons who had more weight than himself; but none of them had given the great measure a more cordial vote than he had done. He did not approve of this bill; but he had been told that, if he wished the other bill to succeed, he must vote for this; and under the influence of that assurance, he had come to a determination to vote for this bill, though it had cost him considerable difficulty. But, although he meant to support the bill, he agreed with the right hon. member for Liverpool in most of the objections he had urged. The bill was a sweeping measure of parliamentary reform, and he was afraid the vote he meant to give would at some future time be referred to by the gentlemen opposite, in support of some of their schemes of which he could not approve. He even thought the measure ill adapted to the present wants of Ireland. It would not lessen that dependence which was created by the numbers of the peasantry. It would raise the qualification, but not their character. They would still be tenants on the same terms as before. It was the nature of their tenure, not the amount, which caused their degradation. But, notwithstanding his objections to the bill, he meant to support it, as being necessary to the success of the other great and paramount measure.

said, he rose chiefly to notice an observation which had fallen from the right hon. member for Liverpool. He was astonished to hear from that right hon. gentleman that the object of these measures was, to secure for the ministry popularity in Ireland ["no, no," from Mr. Huskisson]. He had understood the right hon. gentleman to say something of that kind; and he should regret very much if an opinion should go abroad, that the go vernment had framed its measures with a view to popularity in Ireland. He believed the measures had been received with acquiescence; but nothing, more. He be lived, by the accounts he had received from Wexford, the focus of former rebellion, and by the accounts from Waterford, the principal seat of that later insurrection (he meant it notinvidiously) which had recently returned the member for that county—by these accounts he believed that there the measures were acquiesced in; and it had never been anticipated that any thing more would occur. The proceedings of the electors in Louth, Waterford, and Clare, afforded matter for grave consideration with respect to the bill. One fact would show the state of dependence of one class of electors; namely, that out of ten thousand registered forty-shilling freeholds, the parties themselves had not, in any one instance, paid for registering.

said, he regretted much that he was obliged to differ from his right hon. friend, but still more should he regret that any impediment should be thrown in the way of the mighty measure with which the present was accompanied. He would not then enter into the principle of this bill. He wished sincerely that it had never been introduced; but, looking to the success of a great and important measure for which he had long sighed, he would pass over the demerits of this. He knew that difficulties were placed in the way of ministers, with respect to the important measure for removing Catholic disabilities. Some of those difficulties might be seen by any one who looked at what was passing; but there were other difficulties which could not be seen by many. To throw additional difficulty in their way by opposition to this bill, whatever might be his opinion of it in the abstract, was what he could not do. He therefore was content with it. It might be said, that it would be establishing a bad precedent for the future; but bribe him with another measure, so pregnant with benefit to the country, and he would readily pay the same price and make a similar sacrifice. On these grounds, he would give his cordial assent to the motion.

said, the bill had his hearty concurrence, as a measure most salutary for Ireland. It would put an end to the political strife between landlord and tenant. The franchise was a privilege; but though, on some few occasions, it had been exercised with purity, its abuses were frequent. He had no doubt that great benefit would accrue to Ireland from the measure of disfranchisement.

said, he had voted for the measure of 1825 because he thought it would operate beneficially for Ireland, but he owned that subsequent events had altered his opinions. He did not approve of the principle on which this measure went, and he waited until he had heard an explanation of the other measure;—but, from the moment he had heard that explanation by the right hon. Secretary, his opinion was changed; and he was determined to support this, because of the more important one which preceded it. He admitted that this was not a parliamentary ground for voting; but he must take some broad ground, and the best that appeared to him was to give his vote for the bill, which, by itself, he could not approve, for the sake of that before which all minor considerations gave way, in consequence of the immense advantages which it would produce to the country.

said, there was a religious society spreading and extending itself, though subsisting contrary to law, both in this country and in Ireland, with whom it was a tenet, if they were not most cruelly belied, that the end in all cases justified the means, and that it was lawful, if the end should be such as they were desirous to compass, not to be scrupulous as to the means which they employed to effect it. Whether that feeling was justly ascribed to them or not, he did not know, but his conduct throughout life had always been, and he trusted always would be, founded upon other principles. He would not, even for the sake of a great good, consent to do a little evil. Gentlemen who were on the other side of the House appeared inclined to act as this religious society acted; for they admitted that this bill was a something to which they gave their consent with reluctance, and that it was only in consideration of the great good that they would be able to do by means of another bill connected with it, that they gave their consent to this measure, which from the bottom of their hearts they abhorred. In the year 1825 a bill, similar in its nature to the present, was introduced; but that disfranchising bill was not intended to be a retrospective measure, and if ministers would now make this a prospective measure, they should have his vote in support of it; for he considered it to be a laudable improvement in itself. But when he considered that this bill was first of all a retrospective bill, next that it was a bill of penalties, and lastly that it was a bill of spoliation, he could not consent to give it his support. As to the idea of the measure giving content to Ireland, he thought, on the contrary, that it would excite discontent, and that the disfranchised freeholders would soon seek the restoration of their franchise. As long as the forty-shilling freeholders voted with their landlords there was no complaint of them; but the moment they began to act independently they were disfranchised for their independence. That alone was their crime; for yielding to the influence of their priests in a few particular instances they were to be punished by an universal forfeiture of their elective rights. He would agree in the propriety of examining the reality of the forty-shilling franchise; but the machinery set forth in the present bill might be applied to that object. There might have been a time when the measure was necessary; but now, on the showing of gentlemen who gave it their support, it was less necessary than ever, inasmuch as they contended that the first bill would quell all religious discord in Ireland. As to the objections founded on the inconvenience of the great number of these freeholders, that inconvenience would soon disappear, as a considerable diminution of the number would take place by the extinction of the lives for which the present leases were held. Without connecting this measure of disfranchisement with that of emancipation, he should vote against it now as he had voted against it before. On any ground it was impossible that he could support it. not seeing many of his friends now in the House he was not determined to divide on it; but if any hon. member should take the sense of the House upon it he would vote with him.

said, that the House was now about to disfranchise, not the corrupt electors of Grampound, or Penryn, or East Retford, but the honest, independent forty-shilling freeholders of Ireland, and that without evidence, without examination or inquiry as to their conduct, their situation, or their solvency, or as to the manner in which they had obtained their franchise, or the way in which they had given their votes. He contended that a greater act of injustice could not be perpetrated than that which the House was now going to perpetrate, under the false name of civil and religious liberty. This bill was not the barter or price for any other bill; it ought to be called a bill of penalties. Let him vindicate the other bill from the malignant assistance of this bill. That bill did not rest on the disfranchisement of the forty-shilling freeholders, nor on the question of political expediency, nor on the still more important question of a divided cabinet—it rested on the rights which God and nature had given them, which should be as dear to every freeman as life itself, and which ought not to be parted with, but with life. The second measure, the present bill, was, in fact, but a trap to catch the easy consciences of inexpert politicians. The total number of Irish electors was two hundred and twenty thousand; and of these seventy-eight thousand were forty-shilling freeholders. Was that body of voters to be disfranchised at once and without cause? As to the alleged influence of the priests over them, he denied the existence of such influence. At the Clare election the forty-shilling freeholders voted against their priests; so they did in Drogheda against their archbishop and clergy. But supposing the Catholic forty-shilling freeholders to have abused the franchise, why disfranchise the Orange forty-shilling freeholders of the north? That class of electors was most numerous in that part of Ireland. Surely they could not be charged with being under the influence of the Catholic priests. The measure was unnecessary, unjust, and un constitutional. He regretted that this measure should be, connected with another measure, which he was happy to support; and he regretted it the more, because this measure was at once unnecessary, unjust, and unconstitutional.

said, that from the evidence which had been given before one of their committees two years ago, he had been convinced that there was a great evil which imperatively called for remedy in the condition of the forty-shilling freeholders of Ireland. He had no hesitation in declaring, that if the Catholic relief bill had been carried, and this bill had been proposed to them by itself, and on its own merits, he should have given it his best support. If such would be his feelings under such circumstances, how much more likely was he to give it his support now, when he looked at it as the means of facilitating a great measure, to which he attached more importance than he had ever attached to any measure which had been brought before parliament during the thirty years that he had been a member of it. Certainly it was not advisable to meddle with the elective franchise, if it could be avoided: but what was the case here? The interference was unquestionably a benefit to the people of Ireland. Parliament had interfered with this franchise before; and one instance of their interference, in the time of Henry 6th, had been noticed by his learned friend, the Solicitor-general for Ireland. "But," said the hon. gentleman, who spoke last, "you are taking away, by this bill, the rights which God and nature has given to the forty-shilling freeholders." Now, how it could be said that God and nature had fixed the elective franchise at the rate of a forty-shilling freehold, he for one was unable to discern. There were many parts of this bill, on which he entertained doubts, and there were others which he thought deserving of further consideration before they were adopted; but, taking it as a whole, he had no hesitation in declaring, that he would give his consent to the measure, even in its present shape. He would rather sanction this bill in a defective shape, knowing that parliament could hereafter amend it, than incur the hazard of placing in jeopardy the great measure, of which it was a part. He gave his fullest confidence, as far as these measures were concerned. to the members of his majesty's government. They had earned it fully and fairly, by the character of the measures which they had brought forward for the conciliation of Ireland. Feeling the difficulties which they had to encounter and being desirous of affording them every assistance in his power, he should give this measure his unqualified support.

said, he had never risen under more painful feelings than on the present occasion. It was painful to him to express his dissent from any one of those measures, which the government had proposed with a view to procure the tranquillity of Ireland; but, feeling as he did, an insurmountable dislike to this bill, and believing it to be unjust, and not only unjust but unnecessary, he could not refrain from expressing his opinion in opposition to it. He did not see that the two measures were connected together in the manner supposed by some hon. members; nor did he think that the friends of emancipation were bound by any bargain with the government to pass this measure. In the Speech from the Throne the measure was not mentioned as the price of emancipation; which was promised upon the understanding, that the parliament would grant an immediate, summary, and complete power to put down the Association. They had joyfully accepted those terms—not because they were ignorant of the amount of the price, but because they thought the purchase worthy of it. Having paid that price, it was impossible to believe that the government would withhold from them their part of the bargain. Neither the present nor any other government could be guilty of such conduct. The cause for which the government were willing to concede emancipation was state necessity, and nothing had occurred since February to weaken the importance of that cause. The bill of 1825 was not so general in its provisions as the present. As an instance of which, he might mention, that that bill did not touch estates in fee simple, while this bill would affect them among the rest. He objected to it also, because it appeared to him to be conceived in a spirit of punishment and vengeance, rather than in one of conciliation. The only intelligible reason for it was, that the persons on whom the bill was intended to operate were Catholics, and likely to be influenced by their priests. If so, the House would be doing the very thing which his right hon. friend stated he wished to avoid, It would not be giving an equality of political rights and an abolition of civil disabilities. It was said that the disfranchisement was not confined to the Catholics, but extended to the Protestants. In the first place, he did not consider it any consolation to the Catholics, that the skirt of the storm which swept them away passed over the Protestants. He contended, that they were not placed on an equal footing with the freeholders of Great Britain, mainly because there was a difference between their religious opinions. Therefore, these measures would still leave the Catholic question behind them; and parliament, in passing them, would be defeating its own ends.—Some persons asserted that the effect of raising the franchise would be to improve the morals of the freeholders of Ireland: but he could not avoid distrusting the moralist who began his system by committing a flagrant act of injustice. It was said, that frauds and perjury were now daily practised. If they did prevail, he should be happy to concur in any measure to lessen their prevalence. Fraud and perjury were unquestionably an injury to the honest bonâfide freeholder; but it was most unjust to make the existence of one injury the reason for inflicting another. Was it any thing like justice to take this short and sweeping method of extinguishing rights, because parliament did not choose to apply a specific remedy to a partial abuse? It was to be observed, also, that there was no charge against the honest bonâfide freeholder, but that he had acted independently and according to the dictates of that best and surest guide, his conscience. It was argued, that parliament must step in to prevent landowners from cutting up their property into small freeholds. This course might be very kind, paternal, and considerate, but he thought it a very unnecessary, if not an officious interference. There was a government in Europe which he would not name, not supposed to be much interested in the welfare of its subjects, and where they were dealt with rather upon the principle of predestination than of freewill. He was unwilling to take a leaf out of the book of that government; and for that reason he was desirous that the landlords of Ireland should be allowed to take care of their own interests. If they chose to be so foolish as to ruin their estates for the sake of obtaining political influence, he did not think parliament ought to be called upon to interpose.—But, the statement on which the bill was founded was not borne out by facts. He did not believe that landlords generally, had divided their estates for that purpose, and it was to be recollected, that the registry of a freehold was no proof of the creation of a vote at the time of the registration. The practice might have prevailed among a few landlords, but they were the exceptions and not the rule. On the contrary—as had been well stated by his noble friend, who had shown himself so well acquainted with the situation of Ireland, where he had spent so much of his time, and had proved himself so good alandlord—the tendency of landlords was rather the other way: a system had been carried on for thinning the population—whole families had been removed from estates, without consideration of the miseries and distresses to which they were thereby exposed. It had been said as an excuse for this bill, that it would create for Ireland a substantial yeomanry. The gentlemen who used this argument could not wait for the regular progress of society towards improvement, but they must hasten the consummation by a special enactment. What was to be done? And when it was done, what was gained? an Irish ten-pound freeholder. And was he to be compared with the substantial freeholder of England—as if all this machinery would manufacture yeomanry at once? Ere long the ten-pound franchise would be found too light; then it would be raised to 20l.; and when that proved insufficient, where was it to stop?—He apprehended that a great mistake was prevalent in this country as to the subdivision of property in Ireland, its causes and consequences. He maintained, with his right hon. friend, that it did not arise from the election laws, but proceeded from the state of society; and the truth of this was demonstrated by the fact, that in the lands belonging to church corporations, where no vote could by possibility be created, the holdings were as much subdivided as were the estates of the most aspiring political landlords. The distribution of property must more or less affect the size of the holdings. In an agricultural country, where large capitals were afloat, large farms would exist; but in a country like Ireland, the farmers were possessed of little capital; they subsisted by manual labour, and it was idle to expect, by an arbitrary enactment, to accelerate the consolidation of farms. Moreover, if a bill would accomplish the object in a country without manufactures and without other means of employment, the effect would be to create a degree of misery which could never be counterbalanced by any abstract advantages from any theory, however beautiful. Perhaps gentlemen were not aware of the difference between the distribution of the population in Ireland and in England. He would mention one fact upon this point. In Ireland there was a population of seven millions, and yet there were only thirty towns in the country with inhabi tantsexceeding five thousand. In Scotland where there were only two millions of people, there were thirty-three towns with more than five thousand inhabitants. Yet, taking the total number of inhabited houses, it would be found that the population was nearly the same. It was in vain, then, to think of accelerating the progress of society by arbitrary enactments. He earnestly wished that ministers had not enforced the necessity of agreeing to this bill; and he yet hoped that they might be prevailed upon to accede to the proposition of his noble friend, and thus allow time for the regulation of the evils, before they proceeded to a measure so violent. He should not be disposed to scrutinise too closely any machinery by which that regulation was to be accomplished, which should begin by the correction of abuses, and the remedy of admitted evils. An alteration was unquestionably required in the system of registry, in order to protect the bonâfide freeholder from the intrusion of fictitious votes. A measure for that purpose might accomplish a great national object, and induce those who were disposed on some conditions, to concede the claims. It was a mistake to suppose that the bill under consideration was favourable to Protestant parliamentary influence. It proceeded upon the supposition, that when the cause ceased the effect would cease also. True it was, that in a moment of great excitement, during the late election for Clare, the priests had exercised an amazing influence; but, what were the circumstances under which that election took place? There was a central government in Dublin, and in the provinces a tremendous degree of excitement, well described last night by his right hon. friend. This enthusiasm pervaded the whole south of Ireland, and it was aided by large pecuniary resources found in the Catholic rent. That temporary agitation was now over, and when the question was once settled it would not be revived. Things would return to their former state— the natural influence of landlords over their tenants would be restored, and he was convinced that those freeholders who were about to be disfranchised were more likely to be well-disposed towards the Protestant interest, than the higher class of yeomanry which this bill was intended to create.

commenced by expressing his cordial concurrence in the observation of a right hon. friend, that though, as a general principle, each measure submitted to parliament should be considered on its own merits alone, yet there were some questions which could not be disposed of otherwise than with reference to the principle of mutual compromise. Different members might entertain different opinions with respect to every clause in a bill; and, if each were to persist in establishing his opinion, there would he an end of all legislation. In nine cases out of ten, all practical advantages would be lost by a too rigid adherence to form. What was the course which the House pursued with respect to the bill for repealing the Sacramental Test? They sent it up to the House of Lords in one shape, and it was returned in another. The House wisely consented to accept the advantage of a repeal of the test, instead of insisting on having the bill in the form in which they originally sent it up to their lordships. If ever there was a measure which justified the principle of compromise, it was that to which the attention of the House was now directed. He could not sufficiently express his admiration of the magnanimous conduct of the hon. member for Waterford, who had expressed his determination, perhaps at the cost of some personal sacrifice, to bestow upon his constituents a permanent benefit. The great difficulties which had hitherto opposed the settlement of the Catholic question, rendered it incumbent on those who were favourable to that object to compromise, in order to effect their object. The noble lord who spoke last, said, that the session commenced with a compromise; which was, that the Catholic Association should be suppressed, in order to arrive at Catholic emancipation. The noble lord admitted that he was a party to that compromise; and therefore there was an end of the argument against the principle of compromise. The noble lord said, that the price of the compromise was to be unqualified concession. He denied that: the only promise held out was that of an attempt to adjust the question on safe and satisfactory grounds. In how difficult a situation was the government placed! Last night the House was told, that the conditions of the King's Speech were not observed, because unqualified emancipation was offered to the Catholics; and now, the noble lord said, that government had not kept its engagements, because they did not grant emancipation without conditions. These contradictory assertions proved how difficult a part was that of a mediator, who desired to reconcile conflicting opinions, and to obtain a safe arid satisfactory adjustment of the question. From two different quarters he was met by distinct objections—first, that the concessions were of too unqualified a nature; and next, that they were so qualified as to be useless. He, notwithstanding, asked the consent of those who were opposed to this measure, because he believed it to be essential to the carrying of the other, in the propriety of which they were agreed. Under these circumstances, he asked them to wave their objections to this bill, in order to secure the success of that for removing civil disqualifications from the Roman Catholics. He hoped it would not be conceived that he put the matter forward in a menacing manner. He could assure the House, that he had not brought forward the question with that view. His object was, not to find specious objections to the Catholic question, and then abandon it because the country was against him: his object, from the first, had been to carry it. He did not assume this tone, in order to menace the opponents of the present bill, who were favourable to the success of the other, with the prospect of government throwing out the latter if the former were not carried; but he candidly declared, that he considered the passing of this measure as essential to the success of that which had been connected with it. Ministers, in bringing forward that bill, had not resorted to any securities, as against the Roman Catholics. The fact was, when he proposed that measure, he never professed to place any value upon securities; and he thought it infinitely better not to introduce securities, which to the Protestants could be of no value, but which would be unnecessarily galling to the Catholics. The bill did not proceed on that principle, nor did it go upon the plan of restricting the legitimate exercise of the Roman Catholic religion. The principle was similar to that contained in the bills of Mr. Grattan, lord Plunkett, and his late right hon. friend, Mr. Canning,; and the object of the attempt was, to make the measure, as far as it could be effected, satisfactory and conciliatory to all parties. However, had the proposition been one of simple and unqualified eman cipation, a well-founded argument might have been brought against its supporters, if they had omitted any notice of the elective franchise; a failure in the adjustment of which must endanger the bill. Why did they attempt to touch the elective franchise in 1825? And why did hon. members, who now professed different opinions, at that time support a measure. for its modification? He would be the last person to allude to former occurrences in a reproachful manner; and he was quite ready to admit that, if hon. gentlemen had altered their opinions upon this or any other point, no doubt they thought themselves justified in what they did by a change of circumstances. But why, he asked, in arguing this question—omit any reference to the elective franchise? Why did a large majority of the House consent to the bill which his hon. friend brought in for the purpose of effecting an alteration in it?—why, but because they thought that considerable danger was likely to result from the present mode of exercising it? It might be said, that in 1825 securities were offered, and it might be demanded, why propose emancipation now without them? This was supposing that the present bill had not been introduced. It was also said, that this measure differed totally from that of 1825; and that it did, to a certain extent, could not be denied. The bill of 1825 was very skilfully drawn up; but it was a complete disfranchisement of the existing freeholders. The existing freeholders were positively disfranchised if they omitted to register their claims. It was required, before the voter attempted to exercise his privileges, that he should register his freehold; and the bill affected every freeholder who omitted to comply with that form. You never before told him that it was necessary to do so; yet the right hon. gentleman stepped in and said, "You who have not registered your freeholds shall be disfranchised; at the same time that you who have been registered by your landlord or by a liberal club, shall preserve your privilege intact." Those who were disposed to quarrel with him for giving unqualified emancipation to the Roman Catholics without securities; what an argument this volume of Roman Catholic evidence taken in 1825—what a conclusive argument—what a powerful case it made out against them upon this point! He took the evidence of Roman Catholics of the highest respectability, who were deeply interested in the prosperity and tranquillity of the country—of persons interested, as in the case of Mr. Blake, in securing a moderate and reasonable ascendancy to the Protestant establishment. Mr. Blake was asked, whether he did not know that the priests had a great advantage over the landlords in contested elections, and he answered, that in many cases they were enabled to take away the freeholders from the proprietors, and carry every thing as they pleased. He was also asked his opinion as to whether raising the qualification would naturally diminish the influence of the priests, and he replied, he thought it would, and that in every view of the case such a measure was essential to the peace of Ireland. Why should we disregard unsuspected testimony like this—the testimony of a Roman Catholic lawyer, of high respectability and intelligence—and his opinion, with respect to the best means of securing the peace of Ireland? Mr. Blake was asked, at what rate he would fix the qualification for voting, and he said he should propose to carry it as high as 20l. After this, what would have been said if he (Mr. Peel) had not taken 10l. as the qualification, but left it as he found it? What said Mr. O'Connell on the subject? He admitted, that the system of forty-shilling freeholds in Ireland was essentially different from that of England, and that freeholds held by a derivative interest afforded an immense encouragement to perjury. On being asked, did he think there would be any objection to raising the freehold qualification to 20l., he said, yes, and he thought we might avoid the evil of perjury by raising it to 10l.; at least that there would not be any thing like the same temptation to perjury then as now. Mr. O'Connell said, many independent voters would be dis, qualified, if the franchise were raised to 20l.,—none, if it were only raised to 10l. This, he (Mr. Peel) contended, would be a serious objection to the proposed measure of emancipation, if it were to be conceded without an adequate security against the undue exercise of the Roman Catholic interest, directed by the priests. It was only fair to the parties to state, that no Roman Catholic party, or individual, had been consulted in this matter: indeed, he thought it much more becoming that the act should be the independent legislation of the government. He did not think it would have been dignified in ministers to have asked any man to accept concession on a principle of compromise. His right hon. friend said, his chief objection to the present measure was, that it laid the foundation of reform. If his right hon. friend objected to the proposition mainly on the ground of its affording a precedent for reform, it was rather singular, that the argument of his right hon. friend himself should be susceptible of a similar application. His hon. friend said, "protect the existing franchise—make the existing franchise independent of this measure—and I shall give you my vote." Here, then, in his right hon. friend's own proposition was an argument for reform; for the prospective dealing with the elective franchise. was as much an argument for reform, as a present interference with the privilege. He repeated—prospective measures of arrangement and alteration were at least as powerful arguments for future reform in England or Scotland, as could be deduced from this measure, with respect to a reform more immediate; therefore he could not admit the force of his right hon. friend's argument against this measure, as it related to reform, because the same argument, if good for any thing, was good against the admission made by his right hon. friend himself. The fact was, up to the year 1825, the forty-shilling freeholds were an instrument by means of which, and over which, the Protestant landlord maintained his ascendancy; but at that period a change was effected in the state of things—the weapon broke short in his hands—it was wielded by other and hostile powers—and there was a prospect that it could only be so wielded to the imminent danger of our Protestant institutions. We were about to give the Roman Catholic a great compensation: he was now under a stigma of exclusion and humiliation: we were about to say to him, "we will place you erect, in your free and natural position;" and, in return for a concession such as this, we were entitled to demand his ready acquiescence in a measure like the present. In acting thus, we did not take the course which his right hon. friend said: we did not call in our bad halfpence, giving nothing in return; but we called in our bad halfpence, and gave good coin in return for them. He could not consent to place the present measure on the ground of a penalty directed against the Roman Catholics. It was not an exclusive penalty; the fact was, if it were a penalty towards any, it was an equal penalty towards all. It would affect Protestant and Catholic alike. But, on the subject of penalty, if we took the case of any one Roman Catholic forty-shilling freeholder ho had registered his privilege, in compliance with the directions of his landlord—of one of these marksmen, who could of write his name—if we looked at the individual loss that would be sustained, we should find that it could not be very great. This was sufficiently clear, if we looked at the evidence of Mr. O'Connell, who said, he had seen many contests arising between the landlords and the priests—contests which he hoped never again to see—for they were productive of ruin to the object of them—the forty-shilling freeholders. He might allude to the Clare election while upon this subject. Major Warburton had narrated some of the events connected with it, and he should never forget the peculiar case of an individual whom he that gentleman had seen, the circumstances of whose story he narrated, and whom he could not advert to without tears. At the commencement of the Clare election, a landlord of the county had promised what was called his interest to his right hon. friend (Mr. V. Fitzgerald); the landlord had a voter on his estate, who was under great personal obligations to him, and previous to the commencement of the contest he said to this voter, "I shall vote for Mr. Fitzgerald, I suppose you mean to do the same." The man was only astonished at the implied doubt which his landlord's mode of expression appeared to convey, and declared his determination to imitate the example of his patron at the approaching election. Well, as the struggle grew nearer e degree of excitement was produced, to which it was only necessary to allude: the freeholder did not escape its effects—he came to his landlord with 60l. in his hands and addressed him thus:—"I have saved this sum while your tenant, and upon your property. I cannot redeem the promise which I gave you, there—take the 60l. make use of it to promote the interests of Mr Fitzgerald, but my vote I must give to O'Connell." Could any thing be so painful as the situation of him who was obliged to perform such a part—to observe such double contract between his religion and his conscience? He admitted he did no think he should have been able to have sustained the measure upon such strong grounds, except in so far as he believed it calculated when carried into effect, to raise up a real, substantial, independent yeomanry in Ireland, and to rescue the forty-shilling freeholders from the consequences of such a conflict as he had just described. These grounds should not be omitted, on a consideration of the question; but at the same time he admitted, that except we were able to promise a satisfactory adjustment of the Roman Catholic question, there was not the least chance of this measure being listened to. He never would have endeavoured to withdraw existing privileges, however they might have been abused, unless he had been able to offer a compensation, by granting the enjoyment of beneficial and legitimate, for the dangerous and illegitimate power, which he proposed to take away.

observed, in explanation, that the words he had used were to this effect:—That he would submit to any hardship short of positive injustice, or a forfeiture of legal rights; but to that forfeiture he could not submit under any circumstances, except those of uncontrollable necessity. He could not admit that we were placed in circumstances of such necessity; consequently, he must withhold his approbation from a measure like the present. It was under these feelings that he had spoken of the proposition as one likely to afford a dangerous precedent.

attempted to obtain a hearing, but the cries of "question," and other indications of impatience on the part of the House, were so loud and uninterrupted, that we could only collect from the hon. member's remarks, that in the last parliament he had voted against a measure of this kind in concert with his right hon. friend, and that he should do the same now.

The House then divided: for the second reading 223; against it 17; majority 206.