wished to ask the noble Lord at the head of the Government whether, as the Attorney General, who had given notice of a Motion to refer this subject to a Select Committee, was unable to attend that night, he would not, out of compassion, give him a Government night for the discussion of the measure?

said, that as his hon. and learned Friend was unable to attend, he would himself make that Motion in his absence, and he hoped the hon. and learned Member would not disagree to it.

would ask the House in that case to listen to the reasons he had for introducing the Bill; it was because abuses in the administration of criminal justice were of paramount importance, and because many of them must be attributed directly and immediately to the want of public prosecutors. He asked the House to declare its opinion that the most exalted functions of the Crown, and the most sacred rights of the subject, should not be left to the discretion of attorneys and policemen, but that the means of enforcing public justice should belong to an influence more august and commanding. Whatever varying boundaries might in other matters be allotted, according to the varying opinions of individuals, to the function of the Government, there could be but one opinion that it was the duty of Government to provide for the pure and exact administration of justice, where the lives and liberties of the subject were at stake. When the law, by its indirect operation, gave an advantage to the rich over the poor, extending more aid to the man who could put it in Motion than to him who could not, precisely to that extent it established a sense of injustice, and produced a mischievous effect upon the moral sentiments of the people. In the present administration of the law frequent instances must necessarily occur where such was the case; because the law threw upon the injured party the whole responsibility of bringing the criminal to justice, in spite of its own theory and language, according to which every offence was crime against the state. Such a state of things was unwise, preposterous, indecent, and without any parallel in any legislation, ancient or modern. It gave cause to scandals and evils to which it was astonishing that we submitted. When, from the reluctance of the party injured to encounter the labour and expense of a prosecution, a ruffian, who had injured a defenceless woman or a helpless child, was allowed to escape with impunity, all the objects for which society ought to be supported were overthrown. The certainty of punishment was the great barrier against offences; but when, in addition to the uncertainty of all earthly things, there was added the uncertainty arising from the criminal apathy of the law, which did not impose upon any one party the duty of bringing malefactors to justice, the chance of escape to atrocious criminals must be multiplied to a frightful degree. The security to life and liberty, which was only to be secured at a great expense and outlay, must be the monopoly of the few; and he felt assured that many of those even whom he was addressing had consented to pay an unjust demand rather than submit to an expensive litigation. It was not his intention in any part of his Bill in the least degree to encroach upon the authority of the Attorney General. The desirableness of the establishment of a public prosecutor was testified to by Lord Denman, by the Recorder of Leeds, Mr. Rutherford, Mr. Roscoe of Liverpool, the Crown Solicitor in Ireland, and by very many of the most eminent magistrates. It was also clearly established by multitudes of cases on record, one of which was that of a stepfather who, clearly proved guilty of most horrible cruelty to a child, was allowed to go free on agreeing to pay a weekly sum to support the child in the union. On a great question of this kind he was almost ashamed to enter into so subordinate a question as that of expense; but the House might be assured, from the evidence taken before a Committee of the House, that, so far from the expense now employed on public prosecutions being increased, it would be considerably diminished by the stop that would be put to frivolous prosecutions for the sake of gain. He would gladly accept any suggestions that might be made to him on the subject; but he thought it was most important that the House should show that the right of the poor and of the rich to criminal justice stood upon an equal footing, and that the woman and the workhouse child should know that they might take their place under the eye of public justice, and, instead of shrinking, as at present, from the difficulties they had to encounter, that they might know they had now provided for them a guardian to whom, when oppressed, they might at once apply, aud by whom they should certainly be supported.

said, he went quite along with his hon. and learned Friend in his views upon this subject; indeed, he thought the necessity for legislation was so evident that nothing could be said against the principle of the Bill. He considered that the provisions of it were perfectly satisfactory, and he trusted that the House would agree to its second reading, and that the whole subject would be then referred to a Select Committee.

said, there could be no doubt the subject was one of very deep importance, not only to the personal interests of the community at large, but as involving also the great question of public morality and of the discontinuance of crime. At the same time, the proposal to establish a public prosecutor was one on which it was well known that there existed great diversity of opinion. The example of Scotland an Ireland might be quoted in favour of such a measure; but there were grounds upon which it might be doubted whether that which succeeded in those countries would be equally applicable to the larger area of England, and the more numerous and complicated transactions which came before English courts of justice. At the same time, the House, he thought, would not be prepared either to deny the principle of his hon. Friend's Bill or to adopt at once the arrangement he proposed. It was the intention of the Attorney General, had he been present, if the House chose to allow the Bill to be read a second time, to propose the postponement of further procedure upon it, and that a Select Committee should be appointed to inquire into and examine the subject to which the Bill related. It was not the Bill which it was proposed to refer, but the subject; it was obvious that the reference of the Bill merely would be too narrow for the accomplishment of the object in view. The subject was well worth the consideration of Parliament. No doubt, the appointment of a public prosecutor, if the details of such a measure could be so arranged as to avoid giving rise to any new inconveniences would be a great advantage. Yet, if, on the one hand, those who, from their position in life, were too poor, or from the want of information, too ignorant, successfully to prosecute a wrong before a court of justice—if such persons would derive great benefit from the existence of a public prosecutor, and if vexatious proceedings would be to a great extent stopped, yet, on the other hand, it was obvious that a great responsibility and a great discretion must be vested in such a public officer, and that he must operate through a great variety of private agencies, for he could not in his own person conduct all those prosecutions, or even himself decide which should, and which should not, be carried out. The question, therefore, as it appeared to him, although well deserving of serious consideration, would require great preliminary care, information, and investigation. He would submit to the hon. and learned Member that, whether the Bill were then read a second time or not, further proceedings should be suspended, and that the House should agree to the appointment of a Select Committee, which the Attorney General on an early day would propose, and which should inquire into the whole subject-matter to which the Bill related.

concurred in the recommendation of the noble Lord, and hoped the hon. and learned Gentleman would withdraw his Bill, in order that the whole subject might be referred to a Select Committee. He hoped, too, that that Committee would have power to call for persons, papers, and records; for this was altogether so novel a proposition in our criminal jurisdiction that he was quite sure it could not be fairly considered without the fullest inquiry beforehand.

would take the liberty of seconding the proposal of the noble Lord to postpone the second reading of the Bill till after the receipt of a Report from a Select Committee to be appointed to consider the whole subject. The subject was one of very great and serious importance; and the Commissioners appointed to consider the state of the criminal law had expressed their opinion that the establishment of a public prosecutor would necessarily introduce great changes in the criminal law, and should not be consented to without the greatest caution and consideration. When it was considered that such a measure would probably be followed by an alteration of the law as to the system of grand juries, that it might lead to the appointment of stipendiary magistrates, that it might render unnecessary the existence of clerks of assizes and clerks of the peace, that it might involve a greater jurisdiction in magistrates and a greater power of preventing cases going to trial—when all these circumstances were taken into consideration, it would be obvious that a most careful examination was necessary, before the House adopted any particular measure relating to this question.

said, he concurred in what the noble Lord had said as to referring the whole question with which this Bill dealt to a Select Committee; and he was willing, therefore, that the second reading should be deferred for a month or six weeks.

said, he would assent to the proposition of the noble Lord, provided it was distinctly understood that it was the subject and not the Bill that was referred to the Select Committee. The Bill was liable to insuperable objections, seeking as it did to effect a radical change in the constitutional principle upon which criminal prosecutions were conducted. A responsible public prosecutor alredy existed, the Attorney General having, theoretically, the powers of such an officer, and it was open to him to a great extent to convert the theory into practice. The law on this subject was identical in England and Ireland, the Attorney General having authority to conduct any prosecution himself, or to employ a barrister to do so, where the general tranquillity of the country or the prerogative of the Crown was concerned; and it had unfortunately happened that in Ireland many cases partaking of an insurrectionary character had occurred which had called for the frequent intervention of the Attorney General. He thought, however, that to take the prosecutions in England out of the hands of the magistrates, as the Bill proposed to do, and as was done in Ireland, was not at all necessary, and he should be sorry to see it done.

in moving the second reading of this Bill, said, that he had introduced a similar measure in 1853, which had been referred to a Select Committee. His reason for wishing to amend the law at that time was, that, as the law then and now stood, counties had a permissive power of adopting, if they pleased, the provisions of the Rural Police Act, but there was no compulsion put upon any county to adopt that Act, unless it chose to do so; and accordingly there were in England not less than twenty-three counties which thought themselves sufficiently served by the provisions of the Parish Constables Act; and his object was to have those Acts placed in the best possible condition for affording an effective administration of the law. Those twenty-three counties, he thought, had a right to have those Acts amended, if they could be amended for their benefit, and without interfering with those counties which had adopted the Rural Police Act. Now, his Bill would not at all interfere with those counties which chose, of their own accord, to adopt the Rural Police Act, and those counties which might hereafter choose to do so were exempted from its operation; but as the Motion brought forward by the noble Lord now at the head of the Government to make the adoption of the Rural Police Act compulsory had been withdrawn owing to the opposition it received, it was most desirable that the law relating to parish constables, which prevailed in many counties, should be amended and placed upon a satisfactory footing. This object his Bill was designed to effect, while, at the same time, it would render the transition easy and simple for the application of the Rural Police Act to the counties now exempted from its operation, should it hereafter be wished to extend it to them. Although he did not anticipate any objection to the Bill at that stage, he found that he had two classes of opponents—one class consisted of those who had tried to introduce the rural police into their own counties and had not succeeded in inducing them to adopt them; the other, those who had tried the rural police, and who did not like them on account of the expense. He (Mr. Deedes) thought that his Bill would not interfere with either; for the transition, if it should be found advisable to adopt his Bill, would be very simple and easy; and, at any rate, as so many counties were concerned in this question, they were entitled to an improvement of the law. His hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Rice) had failed in bringing in a Bill upon this question, but he thought that, at all events, he was entitled upon this occasion to his hon. Friend's support. He (Mr. Deedes') Bill in 1853 was referred to a Select Committee, and great pains were taken with it; its provisions were thoroughly considered, and he now offered it to the House in the shape in which it had come out of that Committee. He had not thought it right to alter it in any degree, although he should take the opportunity of moving some slight alterations in Committee. The principal points in his Bill were these. Under the present slate of the law, counties acting under the Parish Constables Act, and having nothing whatever to do with the Rural Police Act, had a permissive power to employ a superintendent constable for every petty sessional division. He proposed to make this power compulsory instead of permissive. His reason for proposing this was, he was convinced from experience that all attempts to carry out the law as it now stood, without a supervising power, would be perfectly useless. He proposed also that the system should remain in force for a period of five years, so that if the country at the end of that period was dissatisfied with the working of the measure, it could be put an end to under a mode of procedure pointed out in the Bill. He proposed also that there should be a chief superintendent constable, but this provision was not to be compulsory. He, however, felt satisfied that a chief superintendent constable would, from his experience in the county with which he was connected, be a saving of expense. He also proposed to amend the mode in which parish constables were elected; and towards the end of the Bill there were some clauses referring to the high constable—which office he proposed to get rid of altogether—to the jury-lists, and other details, which would be better considered at a further stage. He did not wish to interfere with any privileges, but it was his desire to make the law for the counties in these respects as perfect as possible. He would only add that he would be ready to take into consideration any alterations that might be suggested in Committee.

said, he could not agree with the opinion which his hon. Friend had of parish constables, and should greatly prefer the establishment of a new system to the propping up of an old one that was worn out and generally condemned. He must make an observation with respect to the heavy tax which the office of parish constable laid upon the persons who were called upon to perform it. They were usually small farmers, tradesmen, carpenters, blacksmiths, and others of a similar class. Their time was of value to them, and they were much better employed in attending to their business than in discharging the duties of an office for which they were not fit. It was owing to their merit that they were not fit for that office. With respect to the Rural Police Act, he did not think that counties could now adopt it with the same economy as if there was a general system of police. He believed that a general system of police had been recommended by a Committee of the House. He had heard that the average career of a London thief was six years; he believed it would not be six weeks if there was a uniform police throughout the country. He had not proposed a Bill on this subject, because he was of opinion that a question of this kind, involving the protection of property, the prevention of crime, and the maintenance of public peace, ought to emanate from Her Majesty's Government, and, he therefore, regretted that Government had not introduced a general measure on this subject in the course of the present Session.

thought it objectionable that, while the Rural Police Act was permissive, this Bill, by its second clause, should be made compulsory. He admitted that the measure would be of great service in counties where there was no police, as it would enable the justices to pay the village constables sufficient salaries; and he had always been of opinion that, if they were properly paid, efficient men could be found in every parish to discharge the duties. He was happy to say that in the rural districts, owing to the improved condition of the people, crime sensibly diminished, and that the offences were of a trifling character committed chiefly by tramps and vagrants and not by residents. In the district of the county in which he acted as a magistrate, they had a gaol built to accommodate seventy-six persons, and at the present moment the number of inmates was less than thirty. It was not, therefore, matter of surprise that the magistrates were exceedingly unwilling to impose the burden of a rural police. A large portion of the expense of prosecutions was now paid by the Treasury, enormous sums were annually voted for the constabulary in Ireland and the Dublin police, and there was a general tendency to take the management of gaols, police, and all matters connected with jurisprudence out of the hands of the local authorities, and centralise it in the Government. The whole of the police Acts pointed to that result, and therefore he objected to make the system established by this measure compulsory on the counties. If his hon. Friend (Mr. Deedes) would make the second clause permissive, his opposition would be withdrawn, but, if that were not conceded, he should persist in his Motion, that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.

said, the measure was undoubtedly an Amendment on the existing law relating to parish constables. It had been carefully framed, and had gone through the ordeal of a Select Committee; its provisions, he believed, were the same as those agreed to by a majority of that Committee. He, therefore, could not agree with what had been stated, that the Bill ought not to be read a second time, and he should be disposed to vote for it. At the same time he did not think that the Bill, if it came into operation, would altogether give satisfaction to all counties; but whatever was objectionable in its provisions might be modified in Committee.

wished the hon. Gentleman had attended to the suggestion of his right hon. Friend (Sir J. Trollope), as to the propriety of Government taking up the question and contributing to the support of the police of the country. It was the more incumbent on the Government to do so as they had, by abolishing transportation and by granting tickets of leave, doubtless increased the number of criminals in this country, and should, therefore, bear a portion at least, of the expense of instituting an efficient police. He thought the noble Lord at the head of the Government ought to take up this question and bring in a Bill for the general constabulary of the whole kingdom. He could assure the noble Lord that his experience as a magistrate sitting at quarter sessions had enabled him, much to his regret, to ascertain that crime, at least in the district in which he resided, was rather upon the increase than undergoing any diminution. In that particular locality the number of cases of undetected crime was especially on the advance. But the noble Lord might ask why, under these circumstances, not have recourse to the services of a body of rural police? His (Mr. Miles's) answer to that question would be, that the expenditure attendant upon the employment of rural police would be greater than the inhabitants of the county were willing to support. In Somersetshire the county rate already amounted to from 1¾d. to 2½d. in the pound, and if to that sum were added the charge necessary for the maintenance of a body of rural police the rate must fall very heavily upon those by whom it was paid. If a general system of rural police, however, were introduced, the expense attendant upon their support would fall much less heavily upon the ratepayers of each particular district; and he felt bound to say that he thought it was the duty of the Government to frame some such system. In the absence of any Government measure, however, upon the subject, he deemed it to be his duty to give his support to the Bill under the consideration of the House.

said, the hon. Member who had just sat down had brought two very unfounded charges against him. First, the hon. Member asserted that it was owing to Her Majesty's Government that the punishment of transportation had ceased, and that, as a consequence, crime had increased; and in the next place the hon. Gentleman said, that the Government had not introduced any measure on the subject of a rural police. Now, to the first charge he begged to make answer, that it was perfectly well known that the cessation of transportation was not the result of a deliberate determination of the British Government here—on the contrary, the British Government very reluctantly submitted to a necessity imposed upon them by the decisions of the Colonies abroad. It was because those prosperous and improving communities, feeling that their civilisation and character were injured by a perpetual inflow of criminals from this country, resolved that they would not have any further increase to their population by the transportation of criminals from the mother country. It was simply in deference to the strong remonstrances, as well as to the decisions of our thriving Colonies, that the system of transportation was abandoned. Therefore, as far as that charge went, Her Majesty's Government were perfectly free from the origination of that decision which the hon. Gentleman had imputed to them. At the same time, they were quite aware that great inconvenience was likely to arise from the cessation of transportation to the Colonies, and that the question would have to be met as to what was to be done with those persons who hitherto, after having gone through the whole or a part of their sentence, had been absorbed in the general population of the Colony to which they had been transported. It had been suggested that penal settlements should be established in various islands, some near our coast, and some in remote parts of the world. But the objection to all such plans as this—not that the Government were at a loss for any place in which to confine convicts during the period of their sentence; for there were ample means at home, or in islands adjacent for that purpose; but that after the expiration of that period the difficulty arose. Hitherto, after a criminal had undergone his period of sentence, or even before that period expired, if his good conduct justified it, he was allowed to merge in and be absorbed by the free population of the Colony; whereby he had the means of becoming a redeemed man and of converting himself into a useful member of a free community. But that change of character could not be accomplished in an island like that of Norfolk Island, or others that had been suggested, because there there was no free population to absorb them; nor could those convicts be sent to foreign countries, because those countries would justly have remonstrated against England inundating them with what they would call a deluge of crime. Therefore, the Government had no alternative but to resort to the experiment now in operation—and which he thought had so far succeeded—of giving to well-conducted convicts, after a certain period of punishment, the same conditional ticket of leave at home which the Government had been in the habit of giving them abroad. He had thus disposed of the first charge of the hon. Gentleman. With regard to the accusation that the Government had not originated any measure for the better management of the county police, surely the House could not have forgotten the manner in which the measure that he himself proposed was met in a former Session. The Government, having seen that many counties in England had adopted the permissive Bill, which had been passed for establishing a county constabulary; having observed the good effects which that measure had produced by the suppression of crime in those counties where it had been adopted; and having ascertained that there was not that amount of undetected crime in those localities which the hon. Gentleman had stated to exist in his county, where the Constabulary Act was not in force, they felt it their duty to introduce a Bill to make the law compulsory throughout all the counties of England. Having observed that those counties which had recognised the Rural Police Act had thereby expelled from within their limits the foul waters of crimes which had hitherto been stagnant there, and having also observed that those waters had thus been thrown into unhealthy marshes, by which new crimes were generated in places where that salutary measure had not been adopted, the Government at once resolved upon a general drainage system, and accordingly proposed that every county should be compelled to recognise and establish the Rural Police Act. Well, what happened? Was the measure so proposed a measure of centralisation? On the contrary, the whole management of the details of that police force was left in the hands of the county authorities in which it had hitherto been placed. Could it, then, be truly said that the Government had not made any proposal on this subject? But, how was that proposal met? By a most extraordinary combination of Members of boroughs as well as of counties. There came up to London upwards of sixty mayors of boroughs to protest against the Bill being applied to them. Well, in order to accommodate the provincial towns, he consented to omit the boroughs from the operation of the Bill. Having done this, he naturally concluded that the House would agree to the Bill in its application to the counties. Not a bit. The county Members were just as much opposed to its application to the counties as were the borough Members to its adoption in the towns; so that, in point of fact, he had no more chance of passing the Bill in that House than a parish constable in Somersetshire had of apprehending a thief. He was, therefore, obliged to abandon it. The hon. Member had, however, said that the reason why this permissive Bill was not carried into operation in more places was the great expense to which it would subject the counties. But he should like any man to look at the two opposite sides of the account; and consider first what the county would have to pay in direct expenditure for the maintenance of a good county police, and what was lost by all those detected, and the much greater number of undetected crimes, which were committed solely for want of a good constabulary force. He believed, if these two totals were cast up, it would be found that the people of Somersetshire lost a great deal more for the pleasure of having no police at all than they would lose if they maintained a police that would secure property and establish good order in the county. That, however, was a matter to be left to the opinion of hon. Gentlemen to be formed among themselves at quarter sessions. With respect to the Bill now before the House, he certainly considered it to be a very imperfect measure; and its adoption might possibly tend to supersede a desire of establishing a general county police. But he asked himself whether he was justified in resisting a measure, which to a certain degree might mitigate an existing evil, for the purpose of allowing that evil to grow greater, in order finally to compel people to adopt a better measure? He thought not. He thought this measure, imperfect as it was, would tend to improve the parish police, and would, therefore, operate as a partial remedy for an evil admitted to exist. Under these considerations, it was his opinion that the House would do well to adopt it. He should be inclined to think that if they had a good county police, whose functions extended to the whole of the parochial divisions of the county, a smaller force would be required than of parochial constables, and therefore such an arrangement would be superior in point of economy. This measure, however, would no doubt improve what at present was a most defective system, so far as it was improvable, and, therefore, he was willing to agree to it; but when he was reproached with not having proposed a measure of more extended character, he replied that he had done so, and that the measure in question had been rejected by acclamation. The hon. Member had insinuated that if there was to be a general county police force the Government ought to be prepared to agree to a measure by which the police should be paid out of the public revenue. [Mr. MILES: Partially.] But the House should remember that, if the Government were let in as paymaster, it must be let in as commander in chief; and therefore the proposal of the hon. Gentleman went to the establishment of a system of centralisation, vesting the control of the county police in the Executive Government. Now, although that might in some respects tend to the greater efficiency of the police force, he (Viscount Palmerston) did not think that, upon the whole, any advantage would result from withdrawing the county police from the local management of the magistrates. There was a great advantage in placing in the hands of the magistracy the management of all the local affairs of the county; and if you could compel them to hare a county police, it would be a good thing that they should have the management of the force.

observed, that the noble Lord complained that the hon. Member for Somersetshire made two unfounded charges, and in answer to the first he had stated that the Government at home had not originated the abolition of transportation. It was perfectly true that it was Lord Derby's Government which did away with that system, but the noble Lord had correctly stated the ground for the proceeding—namely, the strong indisposition of the Colonies to receive convicts. But he (Sir J. Pakington) did not think the noble Lord had been equally successful in answering the second complaint made by his hon. Friend, that the Government had not brought in a Bill on this subject. The answer of the noble Lord amounted to nothing more than this, that he had brought a measure forward last year which was not successful. The fact was, the noble Lord had never tried it; he never brought that Bill to a second reading and never tested the feeling of the House upon the subject. At the commencement of the Session referred to, a question was put to the noble Lord, he being then Home Secretary, as to whether he was prepared to deal with the police question; and his answer was very similar to that which he gave the House yesterday upon the subject of church-rates. The noble Lord said the question was too difficult for Government to deal with. But it was the duty of Government to deal with difficult questions. In his (Sir J. Pakington's) opinion, no Government ought to shrink from dealing with a question which was in so unsatisfactory a state as the county police question. It was incumbent upon them to face the difficulties, whatever they might be, more particularly as the whole aspect of the matter had been changed by the cessation of transportation and the adoption of a new system of secondary punishment in this country. Although it was not a Government with which the noble Lord was connected which did away with transportation, it was the noble Lord himself who tried the dangerous experiment of turning convicts loose on the country. Whether that were a wise one or not he (Sir J. Pakington) would not venture to say, as he did not wish to condemn it prematurely; but, at all events, he was prepared to say that it was an experiment which made the settlement of the county police question vitally important. His hon. Friend the Member for Somersetshire had complained of the deficiency of police in his county, and was apprehensive of the expense; if he (Sir J. Pakington) might be allowed, he would advise the hon. Member to try the experiment of the establishment of rural police there. In his own county three months did not elapse after the passing of the Rural Police Act before its provisions were applied by the magistrates; and although, at first, some little complaint of the expense was made, its good effects soon became so apparent that now no one complained, and the magistrates were actually engaged in considering the best mode of complying with the applications from various districts for the extension of the system. He believed that there was not one of the twenty-two counties which had adopted it which had not been benefited thereby. With regard to the present measure, although he should be sorry to oppose any plan proposed by his hon. Friend with the laudable object which this Bill had in view, he thought it a most unsatisfactory measure, being an attempt to obtain an improved police without going to the expense necessary to effect the object. His hon. Friend said, the constables under this Act would have power throughout the country; but it must be recollected that the force would consist mainly of shopkeepers instead of a trained body of men. It did not appear to him that the measure was a good one; but if the House were disposed to try the experiment, he would not oppose it, although he still retained his opinion, now that the system of secondary punishments was changed, that the Government ought to introduce a measure on the subject.

thought that his noble Friend was quite justified, after the experiment made last year, and the great indisposition that was then felt to assent to his Bill, in declining to propose any measure this year. He (Lord J. Russell) must, however, say that he felt much disappointment at the present state of this question. When he introduced the County Constabulary Bill, he was in hopes that it would have been effectual, and that, as in the counties referred to by the right hon. Baronet, its benefits would have been so apparent, that before this time all the counties in England would have adopted its provisions; and he was convinced that the advantages of such a force would counterbalance any little increased expense. It appeared to him that by passing the present measure they would be taking a retrograde step. By the establishment of a county constabulary force, a trained body of men were placed under one chief, and were able to act in concert all over the county, whereas whatever powers might be granted to the parochial constables under this measure, the fact remained that they would be locally disconnected, and, in all probability, would be engaged in trade. It was, therefore, with considerable difficulty that he could give his assent to the second reading of this Bill.

said, that he was not altogether satisfied that the evidence which they possessed with reference to the evils of the ticket-of-leave system in this country was such as to sanction the alarm felt upon that head by some hon. Members; nor was there any decisive evidence that the state of the counties which had adopted the provisions of the Rural Police Act had been such as to inspire all the rest with a desire to try the experiment. The applications for the extension of the rural police force in the county, referred to by his right hon. Friend the Member for Droitwich, seemed to him rather an argument that the good as yet effected was not so very great. The difficulty of the question seemed to be this—have what rural police they would, from the large area of the ground to be traversed, they could not dispense with the local constabulary—it was a delusion to suppose that if you had a rural police you could get rid of the parish constable. The real fact was, that the condition of the counties in England differed so much, that what was absolutely wanted in one was not at all required in another. He thought that it would be better not to interfere with the present law, but to leave it to the counties to decide for themselves whether they would have an additional police force or not.

supported the Bill.

, speaking for the county of Leicester, remarked that the rural police had been adopted in that county, that the expense was by no means heavy, and that it was cheerfully borne by the ratepayers. The adoption of that force in Leicestershire had completely answered the purpose, and the more serious crimes of horse, sheep, and cattle stealing, which used to be very rife, now scarcely ever occurred. He wished that every other county in the kingdom would follow the example of Leicestershire in this respect; for he was convinced that the proposed Bill would afford but a very poor substitute for the rural police.

observed that the opposition to the proposed Bill appeared to proceed almost entirely from Members representing counties where the Rural Police Act had been adopted. He could only say that in Berkshire the question of introducing the rural police force had been frequently canvassed, and that upon every occasion it had been rejected on account mainly of the heavy expense which it would entail upon the county. It was as much the duty of the Government to prevent crime as to punish it. They had undertaken to pay the expenses of prosecuting criminals both at the assizes and the sessions, and he thought that they ought to pay for, or at least to contribute towards the expenses, out of the finances of the State, of the maintenance of a force whose chief functions would be to prevent crime. But be that as it might, he could not see why the real property of the country should be charged with the whole expense of preventing crime, more particularly since the great majority of offences were against personal rather than against real property. He thought that the Bill was a step in the right direction, and, in the absence of a more general measure he should vote for the second reading.

replied, and said that if the Government would state their intention of bringing forward a measure on the subject, he would at once withdraw the present Bill.

said, that although this was called a Dissenters' Marriages Bill, it very materially affected the marriages of Church of England people, and that it would encourage clandestine marriages to a very great extent. It was a great grievance to many clergymen of the Church of England that persons who got certificates came to them and insisted on having their marriages solemnised in the church without going through the regular canonical forms. People belonging to the Church of England who did not take out licences, but who had their banns published, had to give three weeks' notice, and he (Mr. Henley) did not see any reason why Dissenters in the same class of life should not he subjected to a similar ordeal. He saw no reason why they should be able to go to a registrar and obtain a certificate without any further trouble, and without in most cases any inquiry being made, and then go to the clergyman and insist upon being married without going through the ordinary canonical observances. The clergyman might know that there were impediments to the marriage—obstacles which rendered it unfit and improper that the marriage should be solemnised, and yet according to this Bill he would have no option. He should be glad to know whether it was the intention of the Government to let the Bill go through.

said there were many objections to the provisions of the Bill, one of which was that it limited the amount of publicity. The Bill repealed the publicity now given, by requiring marriages to be announced to the board of guardians—in many cases, he admitted, a most unpleasant proceeding—but it did not provide a security that marriages about to take place should be made known so as to give opportunity for the interference of those who might be able to detect the impropriety or illegality of the marriage. The Bill provided that notice was to be given to the superintendent registrar, who, it was assumed, would make it public, but in this there was obviously no sufficient security. He was surprised at the fourth clause of the Bill, which declared that when two parties lived in separate districts it should he sufficient if notice were given in one district only. He could not see why the amount of publicity should be halved in that manner, it would remove a very obvious security. In licences a notice of seven days was now required. The Bill proposed to reduce the time to twenty-four hours, which he thought objectionable; on the whole it appeared to him that the objects the Bill sought to accomplish would be obtained at a considerable amount of risk, and he trusted the hon. Gentleman would not press the measure at the present moment.

explained that the object of the Bill was not to interfere with the marriages among members of the Established Church, but to remedy what was considered by Dissenters a hardship. The first clause of the Bill provided that no notice of marriage need be read or published before the Poor Law guardians of the parish, or transmitted to the clerk of those guardians, and its object merely was that Dissenters should no longer be subjected to a most unjust stigma. With regard to publicity, Dissenters could not provide for this, as Churchmen did, by means of banns. Dissenting ministers would not be willing to take upon themselves the functions of a civil officer by proclaiming the banns; but persons who wished to know what marriages were about to take place could apply to the office of the registrar. As the law at present stood a member of the Church might get a licence and be married on the same day, while he provided in this Bill that a Dissenter should give twenty-four hours' notice.

said, the more they examined the Bill the more they would find that it was drawn to encourage clandestine marriages to a very great extent. The Bill took away the notice from the only place where it at present existed, but substituted no other which would secure equal publicity. The second clause would enable two minors to make an oath or declaration that there was no impediment to their union, that they had resided fifteen days in a particular place, and that the consent of those persons whose consent is required had been obtained. It would open a very wide door to perjury. Another clause took away the publicity which was properly required from members of the Church of England; while another (the 14th) provided that after any marriages by licence should be solemnised, it would not be necessary to have any proof of the validity of the marriage beyond the production of the licence—that no evidence should be given in opposition. That was contrary to all the laws and the constitution of this country.

thought that, omitting all question of Churchman or Dissenter, if they enacted a law by which the publicity of marriage was taken away, very great evils would ensue. The hon. gentleman was fairly entitled to press a Bill by which the declaration now required to be made before a court of guardians should be done away with, and it was very natural that Dissenters should feel that this was an objectionable mode of securing publicity; but then it was only proper that some substitute for that publicity should be provided. The hon. gentleman said that dissenting ministers would not like to proclaim banns, and of course no one would wish to impose on them a duty which they thought they could not properly perform, and which was connected with civil functions; but there ought to be some way or other by which society should be protected. While of opinion, therefore, that the relief of Dissenters from anything which was galling to their feelings was a proper object of legislation, he agreed with the right hon. gentleman opposite that the Bill had better be postponed for the present, and its provisions reconsidered.

hoped the House would allow the Bill to go into committee pro forma, and then the amendments could be introduced.

was favourably disposed towards the object of the Bill, but the Bill contained some provisions which were quite unnecessary to attain it, and which might injuriously affect all classes, Churchmen as well as Dissenters, and hoped the hon. Gentleman would adopt the suggestion made to him.

having expressed his acknowledgments to the House for the spirit in which the measure had been received,

asked if the Bill had the approval of the Government? It would completely alter the distribution of the personal property of intestates, and he hardly thought it safe to proceed with a measure of so sweeping a character unless it had received the sanction and approval of the law officers of the Crown.

said, it appeared to him that the Bill was intended to secure three objects—first to abolish certain peculiar customs; second, to place the children who had lost their mothers on a footing with those who had lost their fathers. Those two objects he thought beneficial. But there was a third object in which he could not agree, namely, the distribution, making all the children equal to the heir. He thought that was bad. If the mover would withdraw that portion of the Bill he would support it.

said, his hon. Friend (Mr. L. King) proposed to abolish the customs of London and York, which established a different distribution of the estates of freemen of the city of London and persons residing in the city of York from that which applied in other parts of the kingdom. He (Mr. Malins) agreed in the desirability of abolishing customs that interfered with the general law of the land, and he thought that that part of the Bill which related to advancements made to a child by a father, and advancements made by a mother, was also unobjectionable. He was not disposed to dissent from the principle of the Bill, but he considered that some of its details, affecting the rights of heirs-at-law, were open to objection.

expressed his readiness to accede to the suggestions of the hon. and learned Gentleman, with the view of amending the clauses to which he had referred. He thought the abolition of the existing customs would place heirs-at-law in a much more favourable position than they held at present.

considered that it was advisable, whenever it could be done, to have uniformity of legislation for the United Kingdom, and asked whether it was intended that the Bill should extend to Ireland?

thought that the hon. Gentleman had, on the whole, done wisely in taking that course, but he regretted that the objection had been made. The Scotch law was much more accordant with justice than the English; and he was sorry that it had not been adopted. He had himself passed a Bill through the House which assimilated the Scotch law with that of England, except upon this point; but that he could not prevail on himself to give up.

suggested that some inconvenience would be occasioned if the Bill came into operation immediately upon its passing. He thought its operation should be delayed for, say a period of three months, in order that persons who had made dispositions of their property depending on the existing local customs might be enabled, if they thought fit, to alter the distribution of their estates.

observed that this Bill was most admirably drawn, presenting a view of the state of the law which was at once intelligible, not only to lawyers, but also to persons who were not lawyers, and he would recommend it as a model to all parties who were concerned in the preparation of Parliamentary Bills.

said, the great importance of the subject, and the novelty of it to many persons, as well as the mistaken course, as he thought, which the noble Lord had adopted in respect to this matter, must be his excuse for delaying the House a short time upon the first stage of the measure. When he before addressed the House upon a similar subject, he could only argue upon the title of this Bill; but since then he had had the advantage of seeing the Bill brought forward with respect to Victoria, which was in pari materiâ with the present. He would call the attention of the House to the points involved in this matter, which were of importance to the Colonies, and he would afterwards make some remarks upon the substance of the present Bill. With respect to the point of form, it seemed to him to be quite clear that the noble Lord, by the course which he had adopted, would not do the thing he proposed to do. He presumed the noble Lord meant to give to these Colonies certain constitutions; but if he carried the Bill in its present shape he would not give any constitution at all, and the vote of that House upon the subject would be perfectly null and nugatory. This might seem an extraordinary statement to make with respect to a Bill brought forward, no doubt, after consideration. As he stated the other night, the Colonial Cuncil acted under limited authority; for these Colonial councils were not like the Imperial Parliament, possessing full and undivided authority, but their authority was a limited authority, derived from Parliament; and if the councils went beyond their powers their act would be void, and it would not be in the power of the councils to pass it, or of Her Majesty to give assent to it. Well, the council of New South Wales in the present case had passed an Act repugnant to a number of laws already in force in the Colony, and therefore that Act was clearly void, because the council had attempted to do that which the authority delegated to it did not empower it to do. The Bill being sent home, the noble Lord, having curtailed it by striking out that particular part to which the colony attached the utmost importance—finding it a nullity as it were, and yet cutting something out of it—proposed now to make it lawful for Her Majesty to assent to it. But, even if Her Majesty did give her assent to the Bill, that would not make it a valid law, binding on the people of New South Wales. For by what authority could it be binding? Certainly not by the authority of the Act of Parliament constituting the Legislative Council, for the powers of the council were confessedly exceeded in the Bill they had sent home; nor could it be by the authority of the Bill which the House of Commons was now asked to pass, for that did not assume to make the Bill of the Colonial Legislature valid, but simply to enable Her Majesty to give her assent to it. The only result of passing this Bill, therefore, would be to leave matters just as they stood. To constitute an assent there must be the concurrence of two wills on the same subject—in this case, of the will of the Legislative Council on the one hand, and of Her Majesty on the other. But the noble Lord had altered the Bill which the Colonial Legislature had sent home, and then he proposed to give power to Her Majesty to assent to that to which the Colonial Legislature had not assented. The Bill was a nullity, therefore, and in its present shape could not stand. It might be written on the statute book, but it would have no effect. This was certainly not an advisable mode of proceeding in a matter of fundamental law, in which, above all things, it was most necessary to be clear and explicit. The noble Lord might propose to get over this difficulty by inserting words to give the Bill a Parliamentary sanction, which would provide not only that Her Majesty should give her assent to the Bill, but also that it should be valid, just as if Parliament had given its assent to it. But, if that were done, Parliament would be really taking upon itself to make a law from beginning to end; it would be converting itself into a legislative assembly for the colony, just as if it had undertaken to legislate for the colony in the first instance, as had been done in the case of New Zealand three years ago. If Parliament did thus legislate for the colony—if, instead of leaving legislation to the authority to which it had already been delegated—it chose to take the matter into its own hands, it was bound, at least, not to legislate at the dictation of the Colonial Assembly, but to exercise its own reason on the subject, and to come to its own conclusions, whether the provisions laid before it were right or not. It must take the Bill clause by clause, sentence by sentence, and endeavour to do justice, according to its lights, to the interests of the colonists. He had now shown, he thought, that this Bill would effect no purpose whatever in its present shape, and that the only mode by which it could be invested with an operative result would cast upon Parliament the duty of investigating the subject, and of acting upon its own convictions instead of degrading itself into a mere machine for registering the acts of Colonial Legislatures. This case was of much more importance than that of Victoria. He should never have taken upon himself the responsibility of preventing the passing of the Act relating to that colony, because that was a case of great emergency, and he knew that however faulty the Act might be, it was not objected to by the generality of the colonists. But the case of New South Wales was different, and he felt perfectly justified in doing everything in his power to defeat the passing of this Bill, because he knew it was contrary to the feelings and wishes of the great majority of the most respectable portion of the colonists, because it was made by a Legislature which in no respect represented the public opinion of the colony. He should oppose it because he saw clearly in it the indicia of the corrupt bargain on which it had been framed; because it involved in itself principles fatal to all good government in the colonies; and because it gave a civil list of unexampled extravagance, which appeared to be the consideration by which not a few of the votes in favour of it had been obtained. He would not attempt to go into the details of the Bill, but on the Motion for the second reading he should be able to prove all he had asserted. His first great objection to the Bill was that it perpetuated a most iniquitous electoral division of the colony—a division by which all power was thrown just where it ought not to be, and by which property and population were alike swamped and sacrificed—a division which was merely geographical, and which treated all counties as equal, though some of them were the seats of populous cities and others mere sheepwalks. He could not mention a more pregnant instance of the extraordinary manner in which the colony was divided than the county of Cumberland. It was one of the oldest settled counties of New South Wales, it contained four-ninths of the population of the colony, and 12,000 electors, the whole number being only 22,000, and yet, such was the division of electoral districts in this colony, that, out of the thirty-six members constituting the Assembly, that great county only returned eight, the others being given to thinly-peopled districts, more or less under the control of the Crown, and who were, of course, far from representing the general feelings and wishes of the colony. One-third of this body was nominated by the Crown, six being officials, and six non-officials; and even though there were no materials from which to form an opinion as to the real feeling of the colonists, he thought he had shown that the Legislative Assembly was a body the representations of which ought to be received with very great jealousy. But they were not left in the dark with regard to the wishes of the colony, for it appeared from the blue-book that, while eighteen petitions, signed by 8,000 persons, had been presented against the Bill, only two, signed, if he remembered right, by eighty-four persons, had been presented in favour of it. He himself had presented, in the course of this and the last Session, five petitions in this House from New South Wales against the Bill, one of which was signed by 5,000 persons, and there was this anomaly, therefore, that, while the Legislative Council was asking one thing, the colonists themselves were asking another. In fact, the case for the Bill had gone by default, for it appeared, while those opposed to it had called meetings and petitioned against it, its supporters had never dared to call a single meeting, or to present petitions cither to this House or their own Legislature in favour of it, with the exceptions he had just mentioned. Therefore, if the House of Commons passed this Bill, it would he doing not only a very irregular thing, but a thing which would be absolutely obnoxious to the wishes of the colonists. His second objection to the Bill was equally forcible. Parliament had established at the Cape two elective chambers; it had given to Canada the power of turning her nominated into an elective chamber; New Zealand had obtained a purely elective provincial chamber; Van Diemen's Land had taken to herself an elective chamber; South Australia had shown her wish to do so, and Port Philip had actually done so; but this Legislative Council of New South Wales now actually petitioned Parliament in favour of a nominated chamber. He firmly believed—and he was a witness as well as an advocate in this case, being perfectly well acquainted with the state of feeling in the colony—that this nominated chamber was nothing hut an iniquitous device on the part of a small oligarchical clique, which, having got all the power into its own hands, believed that it would be thus able to retain it and to exclude the people from that fair share to which they had a right. It so happened that the waste lands in the colony had got into very few hands; persons who had left England a few years ago, with nothing in their pockets, to seek a fortune in the Antipodes, were now proprietors, under leases from the Crown, of tracts of land as large as an English county. These persons, cooperating with the nominees and with the Government officers, who secured to themselves, in case they were removed, retiring pensions equal to their full salaries, combined together to make the monopoly of legislation and Government as complete as the monopoly of the land, and so to shut out the legitimate influence of the representatives of the colonists. Yet this was the system which the House of Commons was now asked to confirm, and to register in this irregular manner the edicts of the Colonial Legislature—thus putting the yoke upon the necks of their fellow-subjects. In the next place, the civil list was enormously and profligately extravagant. Owing to the discovery of gold in the colony the salaries of the public officers were raised, and properly so; but it was wholly unprecedented that a Legislature should first raise those salaries, and then vote the officers pensions for life at that increased rate, thus fixing the retiring pensions, merely because the higher scale of salary had been received for two or three years, at the highest standard. The thing would really be inexplicable, were it not that the very Gentlemen who helped by their votes to pass the Bill dealing thus liberally with them—namely, the Colonial Secretary and the Attorney General—sat upon the very Committee which recommended the Assembly to make these grants, and actually voted upon their own salaries. Another objection to this measure was of the same class as the preceding, and was based on the nature of the Legislative body which passed the most objectionable Bill they were considering. That body was so packed and manipulated that it did not represent the great mass of the colonists. But that was not all. These Gentlemen, thinking they had got a good thing in passing this Bill, were determined, if possible, to keep it; and the House of Commons was, therefore, asked to assent to a clause declaring that this Bill, constituting a nominated Chamber, should not be subject to alterations, unless two-thirds of the Legislative Council were in favour of the change. So that this odious system was to be perpetuated until two-thirds of this packed body were induced to consent to its abolition, and the nominated Council would remain in possession of powers co-ordinate with those of the Legislative Chamber. He would put it to the House, after the statement he had made of the irregular and improper manner in which this subject had been brought before them, after the proofs he had adduced that the Legislative Council did not and could not in any way represent the feeling of the colonists, and, after the indications he had given of the corrupt mode in which the civil list had been dealt with, and of the grasping motives which actuated those who brought in the Bill—whether this was a proper measure for the British House of Commons, the professed friends of civil and religious liberty all over the world, to inflict upon our Australian colonies? He spoke freely on this matter, but he had no desire in the least to embarrass the Government. He must, however, call the attention of the House to the difficulty in which both the form and the substance of this measure placed them. They were involved in this dilemma—that they must either send this Bill back to the colony if they meant to do justice, or they must pass an Act here themselves. The first of those courses would, doubtless, save the House from the trouble and, what was of much more value, from the responsibility of forcing such an obnoxious measure upon their fellow-subjects in a distant colony. But in the case of New South Wales, to remit the measure to be reconsidered by the Legislative body would be little likely to redress the evil done to the colonists, New South Wales was lately a penal settlement, and the first consideration of the new Legislative body there was, how it might invest some of its members with the rank of a hereditary peerage, a signal proof of its unfitness to make a constitution. Therefore, the House might clear itself of the responsibility of this odious measure, but only by acting selfishly to save itself from trouble. If, on the other hand, they undertook to legislate here, the House, he feared, was not wholly ripe for the performance of such a task, and would experience much difficulty in dealing with local questions, which might be perfectly easy if they only possessed the requisite local information. Under these circumstances, and acknowledging the matter to be one of great difficulty—for the Bill could not possibly stand when a Crown lawyer came to look at it—he would respectfully submit to the noble Lord whether he might not spare himself much anxiety and the House much trouble, on a subject with which it must of necessity be little familiar, by sending this as well as the Victoria Bill before a Select Committee. No one could be more competent to deal with these Bills in such a Committee than the noble Lord himself; but, if he had not sufficient time for the purpose, there was the right hon. Baronet the First Commissioner of Works (Sir W. Molesworth), who was eminently qualified for such a duty. Let the Committee be impartially constituted, and not composed of men of a particular shade of politics, and then they could take the three Bills, and compare and collate their clauses with the view of seeing whether, if they were to legislate at all on this subject, they could not frame a creditable and uniform law which should apply to all the Australian colonies. Then they would have some chance of doing justice to the wise and well-considered rules and practice of that House, and also of giving satisfaction to those for whom they legislated. If it were shown that the colony did not object to such a measure as this—if it were really content to have a nominative Chamber, caricaturing the worst anomalies of English institutions, let it be so; but he protested against that House being made the tool and instrument by which an oligarchical faction in a colony should rivet a galling yoke upon the necks of their fellow-subjects. He submitted, therefore, to the noble Lord, that having come suddenly as he had done into his present office, he should pause before he pressed this matter forward, and obliged him (Mr. Lowe) to occupy, as he was afraid he must do if this Bill went on, much of the time of the House, and to raise topics which it would not be very agreeable to have discussed, but which might be amicably and speedily settled in a manner to afford satisfaction to the mass of the people of the colony, if they were referred to a Committee upstairs. He apologised to the House for detaining it so long; but this question was really so important that he felt very strongly upon it, and he spoke not as an advocate, but as a witness, who knew the men who carried this Bill, and was cognisant of their secret springs of action, though, of course, he could not then state all the grounds of his allegations. And sure he was, that if this Bill passed, it would only give the signal for a course of perpetual agitation, which must tend to weaken the bonds of union between this country and the colony. The worst effect, however, if they assented to this measure would be, that for these lamentable results they would make themselves responsible, because after declaring that they had delegated these functions to the Colonial Legislature, they would be taking from them the authority which they had devolved upon them by the Act of 1850. Thus that House would be accountable for all the mischiefs, the ill-blood, the heartburnings, and the turmoil of colonial agitation; and their impolitic legislation might hereafter prove a dangerous stumbling-block and cause of offence between the mother country and the colony.

Sir, I cannot claim the excuse which the hon. Gentleman has made for me—namely, that I come on this occasion entirely new to the subject, because it was my duty, in the year 1850, to propose and to discuss at great length, and very frequently, the provisions of the Bill (which afterwards became law) for the government of the Australian Colonies; and it is because I have become familiar with the clauses of that Act, and have seen what the Colonies have done in respect of those provisions, that I now ask the House to consent at least to the introduction of a Bill which gives force and validity to one of the constitutions which have been enacted in Australia. What Parliament did in 1850 was this:—it passed a Bill enacting certain constitutions for New South Wales, and for the other colonies which had been separated from it, and giving them power to make such laws for their own welfare as should not be repugnant to the laws of England. The 32nd clause went on to confer on those colonies authority to alter their constitutions, and to establish—in lieu of a single Legislative Council, partly nominative and partly elective—a Legislative Council and a House of Assembly, or of representatives; and, in short, so to modify their organic constitution as they might think fit. Now, New South Wales having had, besides this legislative sanction, an intimation from a right hon. Gentleman not now present, acting as Secretary of State, that the Crown would receive with satisfaction a Bill by which a Legislative Council and an Assembly should be created, and by which the Legislative Council should be nominative, the hon. Gentleman proposes to say to the colony, "Now that you have exercised all these powers, and, acting likewise upon our intimation, have adopted a constitution for yourselves, we will set your constitution entirely aside—we will consider it as though it had never been adopted at all, and appoint a Committee of the House of Commons to frame a totally new constitution for New South Wales." I do submit, Sir, that this course would not be a just one towards the colony. Besides this, there are important powers which, if those Acts pass which have now been some ten months before the Government of this country, will give New South Wales that control over its own waste lands which it and other colonies and colonial Assemblies much desire to possess. Well, if you have a Select Committee searching for a constitution and endeavouring to inform itself of the number of inhabitants in each district, and of the manner in which the representation should be distributed among them—subjects with which the hon. Gentleman is familiar, though many of the other members of the Committee are not—and supposing also that the Committee at length agree to a report as to the nature of this new constitution, and legislation on this subject is, as a necessary consequence, postponed for another year—such a result the hon. Gentleman himself will hardly deny would be calculated to excite great disappointment in the Australian colonies. And this would not be just with regard to the other colonies; for what has happened with regard to Van Diemen's Land? They had passed an Act which was not in conformity with their powers—they had exceeded their powers—but they received the Act in time to alter it, with an intimation from the right hon. Baronet the Secretary for the Home Department, that by making certain alterations they would conform to the Act. This they accordingly did. The Act has been passed by the two Houses, and Her Majesty, by an order in Council, has assented to it. With respect to South Australia, they have, in the Legislative Council, declared that they wished to reconsider the recommendations which they had made, as they had doubts with reference to the constitution which they had proposed. The Act has been sent back for reconsideration, and, provided they conform to the Act of Parliament, the constitution they may desire will most likely be granted to them. If the Waste Lands Bill which I propose to introduce should be passed, they will then have the disposal of the waste lands of the Crown. With respect to Victoria, the hon. and learned Gentleman will not, I believe, offer much opposition to the form of the Bill, so that they will most probably have the constitution they desire and the disposal of the waste lands. But, in the case of New South Wales, which has acted in conformity with the Act of Parliament and the intimation of the former Secretary of State for the Colonies, it is sought to deny to them—at least for a year; it cannot be less—the constitution they have enacted. The hon. and learned Gentleman has made an objection to the Bill on a point of form, which he admits is easily remedied. I do not pretend to dispute a mere technical point of this kind, but I can only say, that this Bill was not only maturely considered in the Colonial Office, but was also submitted to the learned Gentleman who generally draws the Bills introduced by the Government. He is a man of great experience in these matters, and he, with an alteration which he suggested, and which has been adopted, declared that the Bill would be valid. The hon. and learned Gentleman raises this technical point, and says that if the Queen were to assent to this Bill, it might be an assent to a measure which was invalid; but, as he himself said, a few words would correct this defect. A few words can then be introduced into a clause, or there may be an additional clause to the Bill, stating that this House has assented, and then nobody can deny that this Act is as valid as the Act for the Australian Colonies now in force. But then the hon. and learned Gentleman goes into other points, into which I think it will be difficult for the House to follow him—nor would it be wise for the House to follow, could we overcome this difficulty. The Legislative Council being established in New South Wales, and recognised, the hon. and learned Member says, "Yes; but the representation is so unequally distributed that there is one large county, with four-ninths of the population, which only sends eight Members," and he cannot consider any legislation as valid passed by an Assembly whose basis of representation is so unequal. Are we then to have a Select Committee to go thoroughly into this subject—we, whose representation is confessedly so unequal—we, who have never had 50,000 people for each Member, or any equal basis—are we to say, after the question of the form of its constitution has been asserted by the Legislature of New South Wales—"Yes; but your basis of representation is so unequal, that, until that defect be remedied, we cannot admit as good or valid anything which you may enact"? To say this, would be to invalidate all the Acts which the Legislature of New South Wales may have passed. I am afraid that the hon. and learned Gentleman, who has spoken of myself and others as being ill-informed on this subject, is himself too well informed, he has taken too warm a part in the debates of the Legislature of Australia, or has been too considerable a leader of party in those Australian Colonies, and now wishes us to establish that which he then contended for. I must protest against following that course, or of carrying into effect everything which he may conceive to be necessary. He then came to the great blot of all, which is that, in compliance with the recommendation of the right hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich (Sir J. Pakington), the Legislative Council, after great deliberation and frequent debates, which show great ability on the part of those who argued the question, came to the resolution that the members of the Legislative Council should be nominated by the Crown, and not elected. That was the decision come to, not only by those persons who were nominees of the Crown, but also by a majority of two to one of the elected members. Is this entirely new? Is it so abhorrent to all our views and principles that the Second Chamber should consist of members nominated by the Crown, and not elected? Our knowledge on this is to the contrary, for in nearly all colonies this principle has prevailed. We passed an Act not many years ago uniting the two provinces of Canada; that Act, I am happy to say, has been attended with the greatest success, and has contributed to the prosperity of that country, and for several years these great provinces have been content with a Legislative Council nominated by the Crown; and, according to the Act of 1852, the Legislative Council of New Zealand is so nominated. For my own part, I do not profess any special love or adherence to that form of constitution above another applicable to colonies—I think both have their advantages and both have their inconveniences. The advantage of an elective Council is this—it represents a great portion of the property and population of the colony; and its disadvantage is, that whereas a nominated Council can, by the power of the Crown, be brought into harmony with the Legislative Assembly should any difference arise, yet, in the case of two Councils, both elective, representing the people, should there be any difference between them it would be difficult to find a remedy. I do not say that the principle of an elective Council should not prevail—it may be the best form; but I say that it is not so absolutely so that we should insist upon it, if the desire prevail in a colony to have a nominated Chamber. I am not exclusively for that form, for I lately brought in a Bill for Victoria, in which an elected Assembly is declared to be valid; and I have, within the last few days, informed the Governor of New Zealand, who has just gone out, that if it should be the desire of the Legislature and of the people to have an elected rather than a nominated Council I should at once advise the Crown to comply with their desire. I think, therefore, that It is best to allow the people to judge what may be the form best suited to the interests of the colony. If you were to have a Select Committee and take fifteen Members of this House who were the best acquainted with the Colonies, I doubt very much whether the Act which they would frame would give half the satisfaction to the people of New South Wales as the Act which their own Legislature has framed. The hon. and learned Gentleman says, that a great number of petitions have been presented against this Bill. There is no doubt of this, or that in the places where a large number of people are collected there has been great industry used to obtain signatures to those petitions; but it is impossible to decide this question entirely upon petitions, for, in the counties in which the body of the people are formed of the old settlers, they are contented with the decision of the Legislature, and, supposing that its wishes will be attended to, have not deemed it necessary to petition in favour of its decision for a nominated Council. I do not know that there was any other topic propounded by the hon. and learned Gentleman, but I must remark that he himself admits there is considerable difficulty in saying what course it would be right to adopt. No doubt these Legislatures have exceeded their powers; but if they had not done so, if they had not trenched upon the powers of Parliament, the hon. and learned Gentleman cannot deny that the advisers of the Crown would have been competent—I should say that it would have been their duty—to advise that the Acts agreed to by the Legislature, with the amendments of the Councils, should be passed into law. If that be the case, where is the fairness of taking hold of what are, after all, nothing but technical difficulties, in order to oppose an obstacle to the enactment of this constitution. The hon. and learned Gentleman admits, that if we were to send this Bill back to the colony, the Legislature is so constituted that we cannot expect a better devised constitution than that which we have now obtained. Then he says, that if we attempt in a Committee of the whole House to frame a new constitution for New South Wales, to act towards New South Wales in the way we have acted towards Van Diemen's Land and South Australia, it is not likely, as our acquaintance with the affairs of South Australia cannot be very deep or minute, that we should come to a very satisfactory conclusion. Thus we are, by the hon. and learned Gentleman's own confession, debarred from the two modes of meeting the difficulty which I have not adopted, but which I rather understood the hon. and learned Gentleman the other day to recommend, although he now thinks that neither of them would be satisfactory. Then the hon. and learned Gentleman proposes an entirely new mode of proceeding; he proposes that we should say to the colony of Victoria—that colony having considered their constitution and being exceedingly anxious, as I was assured by a gentleman who took the pains to travel to Vienna to see me upon the subject, to have it enacted very soon, and more especially to obtain the powers they have asked for with respect to the waste lands, while they do not set much value upon the clauses we propose to omit—"You cannot have your constitution, because we mean to throw it into a 'hotch-pot,' because we mean to appoint a Select Committee, which shall extract from it a perfect theoretical constitution for Australia; because we mean to establish such a constitution as suits ourselves; and, therefore, although the Secretary of State has repeatedly declared that you should have your constitution immediately, you must wait for it another year; but then you will have the satisfaction of obtaining a good constitution from a Committee of the House of Commons." I think this would not be a satisfactory mode of proceeding. I am quite ready to admit that these Legislatures have exceeded their powers, and, by trenching upon an Act of Parliament, have placed us in a position of considerable difficulty; but I own I cannot see that the course suggested by the hon. and learned Gentleman would be preferable to the course we propose to adopt.

said, that he concurred in the objections taken to the principles of the Bill by the hon. and learned Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Lowe); and he did not think the noble Lord, in replying to them, had stated them quite fairly. The noble Lord declared the opponents of the Bill were resisting the wishes of the colonists; but he believed the ground of the hon. Member's objection, and certainly the ground of his (Mr. Duffy's) objection, was, that it did not represent the wishes of the colonists, but had been passed in opposition to their vehement protest. Parliament had offered to New South Wales a boon fit for a great Legislature to offer to a great colony—namely, responsible Government; and this measure was a dishonest attempt to render that offer null and void. The colonists were determined to get rid of their present system of Government; but if this Bill passed, the present system would be maintained, and the present Legislature would in fact, under a new guise, continue to have the supreme control. It was proposed that the very men whom the colonists were determined to get rid of should have the power of nominating the Legislative Council in which the supreme authority would be vested for five years. This alone was a fatal objection. Then how was the Legislative Council to be constituted? Why, in the most objectionable manner. In the first place, one-fifth of its Members would be able to hold offices of emolument under the Crown. It might be desirable to have in the Council men trained to public business, but it was shown in an able pamphlet by Mr. Chapman, the late Colonial Secretary for Van Diemen's Land, that persons who held offices under the Crown in the southern colonies were frequently quite unfit for the business of legislation, and it was not uncommon to see a dumb Ministry, not a single Member of which was capable of explaining its views. By constituting a Council in such a manner they would prevent that reform of the land system which was universally desired by the colonists. The new Council would be a sentry over the monopolies of the class from which it would be mainly selected, the squatters and land jobbers. It would, perhaps, be very effective for this object, but undoubtedly it would be an entire failure for all purposes of legislation, as it would neither possess the confidence of the country, nor have any reliance upon itself. Then, how were they to get rid of the Council, if the state of feeling arose which the hon. and learned Gentleman had suggested? No alteration could be made in it, excepting with the consent of two-thirds of its own Members.

said, he had omitted to state that he proposed to give power to the Legislature to make alterations in itself by the usual majority.

said, he was speaking at a great disadvantage before he had seen the proposed measure of the noble Lord; he was referring to the Bill as it had been sent from the Colony. They ought to remember that they were legislating not only for the half million of people now in the colony, but also for the constant flow of population from this country, and they should take care not to legislate in such a manner as to check that flow, and to deprive the colony of the services of perhaps better men than it now contained. In Canada they had substituted an elected for a nominated Upper Chamber; at the Cape the Upper House was elective; and in New Zealand the Upper Chamber was about to become elective. Why should they establish in this colony the very thing which they had destroyed elsewhere? Another objection to the Bill was, that, although the large mass of the population thought the House of Assembly was elected upon an unfair basis, and with an unfair distribution of the representatives, the present arrangement was rendered permanent, and could only be got rid of by two-thirds of its Members committing political suicide. In truth, it was in no sense the Bill of the colonists; the elected Members, with a few notable exceptions, were taken from a class with whom the people were at war; and the official Members, in voting for an Upper House of nominees, acted under the impulse of the Colonial Office. In this sense it was less the Bill of the colonists than that of the right hon. Baronot the Member for Droitwich; and even the elected Members, a majority of whom had supported it, had voted for it in the expectation that they would be nominated to the Upper House. Men of intrigue got into the present Legislature who would never find their way into a new one created wholly by popular suffrage. The noble Lord said it was very hard to set aside the wishes of the colonists, but from the petitions presented to Parliament, they were decidedly opposed to a nominated Upper House. He had analysed those petitions, which were very numerous, and, taking the number of signatures, he found 12,152 against the Bill, 228 in favour of it, and forty-eight, out of a population of nearly 500,000, in favour of a half and half House, partially nominated and partially elected. The noble Lord found it difficult to decide what to do under the circumstances. It appeared to him the best course to send the Bill back for reconsideration, with directions to the Governor to dissolve the present Legislative Council, and to call another, in which he would take care that the nominees were men enjoying the people's confidence, and not merely partisans pledged to support a nominated Upper Chamber. If a fair election took place he had no doubt the new Council would frame a constitution representing truly the opinions of the colonists. If another course were adopted, and the Bill sent to a Select Committee, it could be deliberately considered in a fortnight or three weeks, and brought into harmony with the expressed wishes of those who were so deeply interested in it. If neither of these things were done—if the Bill was sent back in its present shape, while in New Zealand, in Victoria, and in Van Diemen's Land the Upper Chambers were elective, he was sure the people of New South Wales would not be contented, and the constitution would become a permanent source of irritation. The Earl of Derby had said that Cabinets hated colonies. If this Bill passed in its present shape the feeling would be reciprocal—colonists would hate Cabinets—and they might judge from the state of a neighbouring colony, that such a feeling, once roused in New South Wales, would not sooner easily be allayed. Whatever course the hon. Member for Kidderminster might adopt, he should take every opportunity of opposing the measure.

said, that the only reason assigned by the noble Lord for this Bill was that it was passed by the elected chamber; but the feeling of the people was clearly against it. What should be done was to leave the colonists to choose their own form of government. If they did not do that it would lead to continued trouble and difficulty, and final separation from this country. He would recommend to the noble Lord to send back the Bill to the colony as suggested by the hon. Gentleman opposite.

said, that it was quite evident from what had already been said in the discussion that there was great inconvenience in debating a Bill which was not yet laid on the table of the House. He had every reason to believe that no excitement existed in the colony on the subject of the Bill; it was easy for an active party to get up petitions, but the number of signatures affixed to those against the Bill was very trifling. The measure before the House came from the only constituted authorities competent to inform them of the wishes of the colonists. The Government propose to adopt the measure and give power to the colonists to alter or improve it at a future time. From his short experience of the colonies be knew that the best way to render a measure unpopular amongst the colonists was to endeavour to impose it on them in consequence of the recommendation of a Committee of that House; the only safe way was to adopt the proposals coming from the colonists themselves.