said, he would beg to ask the Secretary for the Home Department, whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Ministers to take any steps towards extending the provisions of the Corrupt Practices Prevention Act to Municipal Elections?

said, the Corrupt Practices' Prevention Act with reference to Parliamentary Elections was now at that moment under his consideration, and he was endeavouring to amend that Act. The result of several Election Petitions last year had induced him to think that, what occurred in the course of those petitions might suggest Amendments which might be introduced into the Bill; and, therefore, if the House would allow the subject to stand over for ten days or a fortnight to consider such Amendments, he would lay a Bill on the table. Having done so, he should propose to refer the Bill to a Select Committee, as had been the case before, and it would then be brought down to the House for their consideration. He saw no reason why the provisions of the Bill should not be extended to Municipal Elections, but he thought it better to put the Act respecting Parliamentary Elections into a satisfactory shape before they applied it in the way suggested by the Member.

said, he would beg to ask the Secretary for War, whether it is true that some of Her Majesty's Regiments of Infantry in the East Indies are still armed with the old smooth-bore musket; and if so, what has caused the delay in changing those arms for the En-field Rifle, which has long been issued to the rest of the army, both at home and abroad?

said, that every one of the regiments sent from this country in 1857 had been furnished with the Enfield Rifle. The regiments which were serving in India previous to 1857, were originally furnished with a smooth-bore musket; but there had been sent out last year 35,000, and up to the 19th of the present month 82,000 rifles for their supply, a number quite sufficient for the arming our troops in India. Of course the distribution of those rifles depended entirely on the East India Company, and, it having- been reported to the War Office that some of the regiments still retained the smooth-bore muskets, Lord Panmure had called the attention of the Company to the fact and requested that all Her Majesty's regiments in India might be furnished with Enfield Rifles. Considering the large supplies of this weapon which had been sent out, he hoped that every one of Her Majesty's regiments would now be armed with it.

said, he wished to know whether the House was to understand that some of Her Majesty's regiments still retained the old smooth-bore musket at the present moment?

replied, that previous to 1857 they had, but since that time the number of rifles he had mentioned had been sent out, which would be quite sufficient for the supply of all Her Majesty's regiments now in India. The distribution of these rifles, as he had stated, depended entirely upon the East India Company.

said, he wished to ask the Chief Commissioner of Works, whether his attention has been called to a memorandum left in his office by the late Chief Commissioner of Works, with reference to the unsatisfactory Estimate sent in by Sir Charles Barry for the completion of the Works at the Palace of Westminster, and whether any and what determination has been come to on the subject?

said, his attention had naturally been called to the memorandum in question, and he had lost no time in communicating on the subject with Mr. E. Barry, who was acting on the part of his father, then suffering from ill- ness. In consequence of those communications, details and estimates had been sent in for the entire completion of the Palace of Westminster. Those estimates had been submitted to the Treasury, and in a few days would be in the hands of Members.

said, he would beg to ask, when the Returns of the Money saved in Wages by paying off eight Line-of-battle ships in the spring of 1857, of the expense of refitting the ships Duke of Wellington, Exmouth, &c, and of the number of Continuance-Service Men in the Fleet on the 1st day of January 1857, will be laid on the table?

was understood to say, that the Returns referred to by the hon. and gallant Gentleman would be ready by Monday next.

said, that several documents had appeared in the German newspapers on the subject of his question, and he therefore begged to ask the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether he will lay upon the Table a Copy of the Report made in May, 1857, by Consul General Ward, of Leipsic, to the British Government on the differences which had arisen between the Duchies and the Kingdom of Denmark; as well as a copy of any Observations or Reply communicated by the Danish Ministry to Her Majesty's Government in reference to the said Report?

said, the subject was one which excited the greatest interest throughout Denmark and Germany, and it was also one on which Her Majesty's Government, and probably the other Powers of Europe might be called upon to express an opinion. The paper referred to by the hon. Gentleman was a Report which Consul General Ward was requested to draw up in order that it might be confidentially considered by the Government; and the hon. Gentleman would no doubt see that upon a matter of this European importance, which was still pending, and as to which Her Majesty's Government might have to adopt a particular line of policy, it was not for the convenience of the public service that a confidential Report of this nature should be published to the world, as it would be if laid on the Table of the House. The hon. Member said that documents had appeared in the German papers in reference to this subject. He (Mr. S. FitzGerald) was informed that that was the fact; but as these documents had not appeared in extenso it would be understood that good reasons existed for the reserve which had been exercised. As regarded the latter part of the question he had only to inform the hon. Member that Mr. Ward's Despatch had been confidentially communicated to the Danish Government, but that no further communication had passed respecting it.

said, he wished to ask the Secretary for War whether the Government will make some allowance to the Captains of the sixteen disembodied regiments of Militia to compensate them for the losses they must sustain by their not being able to recover the debts from their Companies in consequence of their regiments being suddenly disembodied?

said, it was his intention to follow the precedent set in former cases on this subject, and he found that it was not the custom to make any allowance to Captains of disembodied Militia regiments to compensate them for the losses referred to.

said, that on behalf of many hon. Members who took a great interest in this question, he would beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman the loader of the House to reconsider the determination he had expressed not to give a day for the discussion of the church rate question.

said, he really could not, with a fair regard to the progress of public business, give a day for the discussion of church rates or of any other subject. On Thursday, however, he should propose to the House, that on and after the 13th of May (Thursday fortnight), Orders of the Day should take precedence over Notices of Motion; and in that case it would be open to hon. Gentlemen to make this an Order of the Day, which would, he trusted, afford the hon. Member the opportunity he desired.

I wish, Sir, to ask a question respecting a matter of very considerable importance which has appeared several times on the Notice Paper. I mean the Motion with reference to the Cagliari, and the conduct of this country towards Sardinia. As the question is one which affects the honour and character of this country, I think the discussion upon it should not be long postponed. At the same time I feel that it would be unreasonable to ask the Government to give up at present any of the days which are devoted to Government orders. But it appears to me that on Tuesday next no notices are given of very urgent business; and, therefore, seeing that my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesex (Mr. Byng) has the first notice on that day, I venture to request him to postpone that notice, should the House agree then to consider the Motion of the hon. Member for Bridgewater (Mr. Kinglake) respecting the Cagliari.

said, he would beg to state in reply to the suggestion of the noble Lord, that he should have much pleasure in postponing the Motion which stood upon the paper in his name for Tuesday next, in order that the important subject to which the noble Lord had referred might be brought under the notice of the House, he must, however, remind the noble Lord that he should feel it to be his duty to take that course only in case the hon. Member for Cork and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford, in whose name notices for the day in question stood upon the paper, should also consent to give way upon that occasion.

said, he wished to ascertain from the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade—he having announced it to be his intention to nominate a Select Committee to inquire into the operation of the Stade Dues—when the accouchement might be expected to take place.

said, that although he had been unable to hear distinctly the question which the hon. Gentleman had put to him, he supposed it referred to the nomination of the Committee upon the Stade Dues. If that were so, he begged to assure the hon. Gentleman that he should have moved that Committee that evening had he not been anxious to send the order of reference in the first instance to the hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. J. L. Ricardo) for his consideration. He had sent the order to the hon. Member on the previous day, and, not having heard from bin that he disapproved the terms in which it was couched, he should have no hesitation in moving the appointment of the Committee to-morrow.

said, he felt very much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for having taken the trouble to send him the order of reference, but he had unfortunately never received it.

said, he rose to move for a Select Committee to inquire into the expediency of further improving the administration of justice, by increasing the number of assizes for civil business in the several counties of England and Wales. At present there was an extraordinary inequality between the mode of administering justice in London and in other parts of the country, for while there were ninety-six sittings in London and Middlesex in the course of the year at which causes might be tried, there were only two in such counties as Stafford, Gloucester, and Lancashire. All the great provincial towns were now placed in exactly the same position with respect to the administration of justice in which they had stood before the passing of the Reform Bill in relation to political representation. To prove to the House how very unequal, as well as inconvenient, was the working of the system under the operation of which that state of things prevailed, be might mention the fact that while a person residing at the Middlesex side of Westminster-bridge was afforded an opportunity of having an inquiry instituted into a question of injury done to his real property sixteen times in the year, a person living upon the Surrey side would have that question tried only upon two occasions. So great, indeed, had the grievance arising from the anomalies of the present system been found to be that various remedies for it had been devised— among others the establishment of County Courts, which tribunals had, however, failed to give that amount of satisfaction in that regard which the country was entitled to expect. The establishment of a winter assizes had also been found to be but a very partial remedy for the inconveniences to which he adverted, and he might add that the Committee of the Incorporated Law Society had stated it to be its opinion that the true remedy for those inconveniences was to be found in a measure giving the same facilities for bringing on cases for trial in the country as now existed in London. Mr. Gordon, Master of the Common Picas, had also published a pamphlet, urging the expediency of adopting that course, and the Law Review—the organ of the law reformers—had in two articles advocated a precisely similar policy. He might also state that the law societies of Manchester, Hull, Plymouth, and Liverpool had all expressed themselves as being strongly in favour of having three assizes in the year, and the only law society, he believed, which had not approved that proposition, was that of Devon and Exeter. An objection had been raised to this course on the score of the additional expense it would entail on the country, but he did not imagine that it would be so great as had been supposed, inasmuch as it would, in his opinion, be unnecessary to appoint in consequence an additional number of Judges, and if the expenses of jurors should be increased there would, on the other hand, be speedy justice and prevention of delay in the settlement of mercantile disputes. The hon. and learned Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) had moved for a Committee to consider the expediency of establishing Tribunals of Commerce. Now, he thought that it would be better to improve the old courts than to establish new ones. The County Courts had already cost £100,000 a year, and in respect to Tribunals of Commerce, the best that could probably be said of them would be what was said of the old Courts of Requests, that persons would get a great deal of injustice for very little money. The adoption of the course he advocated involved no novel principle, inasmuch as the Great Charter which had been passed in the reign of King John provided that writs of assizes should be issued four times in the year, while in the reign of King Edward I. it had been twice expressly enacted that assizes should be held annually three times. Another point which was well deserving of consideration was the great distances which persons now had to travel in order to reach their assize towns — in some instances no less than eighty miles. In order to meet that inconvenience a suggestion had been made to divide counties. That plan was no novelty, for it had already been adopted in respect to Lancashire, which now possessed two assize towns, and a further division had been proposed in order that Manchester business might be disposed of upon the spot. If that proposition were carried out it was estimated that the cost of building courts, even to the extent of £50,000, would be saved in one year by the reduction of expenses. Then, again, the great county of Yorkshire, with a population of 1,800,000, had but one assize town, and the inhabitants of the West Riding, numbering 1,325,000, were compelled to go to York to dispose of their law business. Out of the 1,325,000 inhabitants of the West Riding, only 72,000 were nearer to York than to Wakefield, which had been suggested as an assize town, and 736,000 were more than thirty miles, some fifty-five miles from York. There were other counties, Warwickshire and Staffordshire for instance, which required division, and altogether the subject was one which was entitled to consideration. He had no objection to adopt the Amendment notice of which had been given by the hon. and learned Member for Knaresborough (Mr. Collins) that after the word "assizes" in his notice of Motion there should be inserted the words "and assize towns," and that after the word "civil" there should be inserted the words "and criminal," and therefore he should move

A Select Committee to inquire into the expediency of further improving the Administration of Justice by increasing the number of assizes and assize towns for civil and criminal business in the several counties of England and Wales.

seconded the Motion.

said, that as the hon. and learned Gentleman had adopted his Amendment, it would be unnecessary for him to detain the House on the subject, further than to say that, in giving his notice, he had merely followed the words of the Royal Commission which was issued about a year ago. The condition of Yorkshire alone was a proof that some change was necessary, the inhabitants of the West Riding being especially interested in the adoption of some more convenient arrangements than those at present existing. The population of the West Riding is nearly one million and a half, and 19–20ths of this population live within a circle of fifteen miles of Leeds and Wakefield, and are distant an average of thirty-five miles from York. I am at a loss to say what reasons can be assigned for carrying this vast population out of the West Riding into another. South Lancashire, with a smaller population, and a much smaller area was to be subdivided, and why not Yorkshire. This change had been recommended by a Judicial Commission as far back as 1834, and two of the Judicial Commission last year had reported in favour of a separate assize at Wakefield in the West Riding; and I, for one, would prefer to support the view maintained by my right hon. Friends the Member for Droitwich and South Lancashire to that held by the judicial part of that Commission. It might be said, indeed, that the grand juries had on several occasions passed resolutions in favour of retaining York as the sole assize town for the county; but I don't think much weight should be given to this. The grand jury come for the week and enjoy themselves, and return not, nor wish to do, to their own homes at night. York possesses a pleasant club as every Yorkshireman knows, pleasant walks by the river's bank and pleasant societies, and both to bar, and bench, and magistracy, is a more pleasant place of sojourn than manufacturing towns like Leeds or Wakefield. To the petty jurymen, however, to witnesses, and parties generally, any plan that would reduce the distance they had to travel, and enable them to return to their homes at night, would be a great boon. He hoped that something would be done, and that the House would not be satisfied simply with the opinions of the Judges upon this point, but that Her Majesty's Government would pay that attention to the opinions of their colleague the right hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich, and to that of the Member for South Lancashire, which such opinions eminently deserved.

said, that before the House assented to the Motion for the proposed Committee they ought to consider whether it was necessary or desirable that they should obtain any further information upon that subject. The hon. and learned Gentleman who had made the Motion had directed their attention to the Report of the Commissioners who had been appointed to inquire into the common-law judicial business. Now a Commission was issued—

"For the purpose of inquiring into the present arrangements for transacting the judicial business, civil and criminal, of the superior Courts of common law in England and Wales, and also into the times and places at which assizes are now holden, and as to the division of the country into circuits; and to report whether any changes can be made by which such business may be transacted with greater convenience and at less expense; and also whether any reduction may be made in the present number j of the Judges of the said courts without detriment j to the public service."

The House would therefore see from the directions given to the Commission that the inquiry which they instituted was, in point of fact, of a far more extensive character than that contemplated by the Motion before the House. The inquiry of the Commissioners was not only more extensive than that now proposed, but, with great respect for hon. Members of that House, he doubted very much whether the Report of a Committee of the House of Commons would carry with it greater weight than the recommendations of the Royal Commissioners. On that Commission were the Lord Chief Justice, Viscount Eversley, Lord Wensleydale, Sir Cresswell Cress-well, Baron Martin, his right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty, Sir J. Fakington, Mr. Wilson Patten, and the Under Secretary for the Home Department, Mr. Waddington, of whom he would take that opportunity to say that a more able public servant, or one better acquainted with the special subject under discussion, did not exist. It was a pleasure to him (Mr. Walpole) to make that public acknowledgment of the hon. Gentleman's services. As, then, the inquiry by the Commissioners had been of the most extensive character, and been conducted by men of the greatest knowledge and experience, was it likely that the House could obtain, through the medium of a Committee, any further information to enable them to deal with this subject? He doubted very much that they could. The object of the hon. and learned Gentleman's Motion being to increase the number of assizes for civil and criminal business in the several counties of England and Wales, he (Mr. Walpole) was confident that that could only be obtained by a large increase of the judicial staff, and he wished the House to consider what would be the consequences. If they were to have more assizes for the transaction of civil and criminal business than at present, they would greatly curtail the important business which. was transacted in London, and impose upon the Judges a greater amount of labour than they could get through with anything like satisfaction. The Commissioners stated in their Report that they should have been better satisfied if arrangements could be made for holding an assize three times a year in every important assize town, but they were satisfied that, owing to the number of Judges that would be called on to leave their town duties for that purpose, this object could not be effected without very serious incon- venicnce to the public, which would more than counterbalance any advantages to be derived there from by the particular localities. The House could only get over that difficulty by increasing the number of Judges, and against any arrangement of that nature he was sure his right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Oxford would seriously set his face. But, independently of that, he wished the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. M'Mahon) to consider whether the addition he had suggested to the number of assize towns was really required at the present time. Thirty or forty years ago the case was very different. The means of communication were then much less than they now were. They had not then established County Courts all over the kingdom. The whole of the business at that time was much delayed by the want of facilities for rapid communication, and by the want of more circuits; but he doubted whether they would improve the administration of justice by laying down a general rule that they were to have three circuits for civil and criminal business all over the kingdom. With regard to the criminal business of the country, it would be within the knowledge of the House that special Commissions were issued in the winter for the transaction of that part of it which lay in the northern counties whenever the state of the business to be transacted called for such a course. He stated the other day, when a question was put to him on this subject, that the adoption of the recommendations in the Report of the Commissioners materially hinged on the success of a Bill which had been introduced by the corporation of Manchester to enable them to hold assizes in that city. When it was seen how that arrangement worked the House would be in a position to consider whether Wakefield or Leeds should be added to York as an additional assize town, or whether those towns should claim the right to have assizes holden there in lieu of York. Taking all these things into consideration, he thought the best course to take was to go over the Report of the Commissioners, and see how far, by acting on the recommendations contained in it, any defects in the administration of justice were likely to be supplied, and how far the objections taken by the hon. and learned Gentleman could be removed. For the reasons he had given he did not think it expedient to grant the Committee.

said, that as the Com- mission had conceded the principle of the Motion before the House, he could not see why the right hon. Gentleman had objected to it. If the rule was to be that the additional assize depended upon considerations of the area and population of a district, he was at a loss to conceive why a concession was refused to Yorkshire which had been granted to Lancashire, as the case of Yorkshire was much stronger. Sheffield, which was at such a great distance from York, contained more people than some counties, and he could cite numerous cases in which injustice had been done, in consequence of the expense of bringing the necessary witnesses to the assize town. He did not think that to effect the alteration asked for any increase in the number of Judges would be necessary. Formerly there were only twelve Judges, now we had fifteen, and in the Common Pleas there was not half business for the Judges of that Court. The true principle on which they ought to act in all these matters was to bring justice as much as possible home to every man's door.

said, he was glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department say he was not disinclined to consider the claims of the West Riding. He must say, on behalf of his constituents, that they were little inclined to acquiesce in the Report of the Commissioners in so far as it affected them; and the inconveniences to which the West Riding was subjected had been so clearly proved by the hon. and learned Member for Wexford (Mr. M'Mahon), that he had nothing to add to his observations except that he entirely concurred in them. With regard to the proposition of Wakefield being removed from the Northern Circuit, and attached to the Midland, he should prefer to hear the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) say he would agree to grant this Committee rather than that he would consider the question when the time came for carrying into effect the recommendations of the Commissioners. As to the expense, the right hon. Gentleman seemed to fear that to incur it would bring down upon him the censure of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford; but he should remember that the good administration of justice was a thing superior to all considerations of expense, and with regard to the West Riding of Yorkshire it was next to impossible this could exist without the establishment of a a separate assize.

said, he consi- dered the question now before the House was not whether the recommendations of the Commissioners should be implicitly adopted, but whether an inquiry with a view to certain alterations in the present system should be granted or not. With respect to this, he thought that the reasoning of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Walpole) was entitled to great weight. It was highly inexpedient to have a Committee to inquire into facts which were sufficiently known already through the Report of the Commission. Many memorials were presented to that Commission and to the claims of the memorialists the closest attention was paid, and a variety of important recommendations made regarding them. They expressed an unanimous opinion that it was inexpedient to have three assizes uniformly throughout the country, but recommended that a third assize should be held for criminal business in cases where a gaol delivery might be advisable during winter, and they also recommended that in Yorkshire and Lancashire a third assize for civil business should be established; and, in consequence of that recommendation, he believed that assizes had been held in some twenty counties during the course of last winter. He did not understand the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary to say that the Government would consider itself bound by the recommendations of the Commission though he considered these were entitled to the highest respect and ought to be carried out in so far as that could be done. He thought, under all the circumstances, that there was no necessity for the inquiry proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Wexford.

said, he hoped the Select Committee would not he granted. As far as regarded Yorkshire, the county with which he was connected, he could fairly say that the distances which witnesses had to travel to and from the assize town was a matter of very small importance in these railway days; and it was scarcely necessary for him to state that not a single witness need sleep at York. In addition to that he did not think that any town in the West Riding was at present prepared to supply the necessary accommodation to the Judges, barristers, and witnesses, and all those who attended the assizes.

said, that, as the hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite (Colonel Smyth) had the honour of representing the City of York, there was no great difficulty in understanding why he objected to the Motion before the House; but he was surprised that the hon. and gallant Gentleman did not see that a great case was made out with regard to the town of Wakefield and its neighbourhood. He (Mr. Bright) had received a letter that very morning from a magistrate at Wakefield, independently of a document forwarded to him in common with every other hon. Gentleman in that House, setting forth in a forcible manner the claims of the West Riding to have a third assize. Now, it would appear that the country was perfectly well satisfied with the experiment which had been tried with reference to Lancashire, and they were about to extend it. Well, then, if Manchester had made out a case for itself, was not the claim of the West Riding much stronger? He (Mr. Bright) was not competent to say which was the best town in the West Riding, although no doubt Wakefield was the capital of the Riding, and probably would be chosen when any change came to be effected. At present, a poor man committed to take his trial at the assizes—and poor men formed the bulk of persons charged with crime in our courts of law—was sometimes obliged to bring his witnesses from one end of the county to the other, and it therefore stood to reason that his chances of acquittal were fewer than they would otherwise be. This threw great difficulties in the way of a man proving his innocence, and was one of the greatest hardships to which the citizens of any country could be subject. In his opinion there was no necessity for a Committee, because the facts of the case were patent. The change which had worked so advantageously in Lancashire the people of the West Riding must necessarily acquire, and he thought they had an absolute right to ask the Government to make it for them. The only result of a Committee would be to produce a vast blue-book without making the case a bit stronger than at present, and he would therefore ask the hon. and learned Gentleman not to press his Motion to a division, but rather let the inhabitants of a district, where a necessity for a change in the periods of holding the assizes was felt, bring their claim before the Home Office, and, if necessary, before Parliament.

said, that as the representative of the borough of Wakefield, he begged to express his thanks to the hon. and learned Member who had brought this question forward. There would be great convenience in selecting the town of Wakefield for the assizes of the West Riding. Lancashire had two assize towns already, and was about to have a third. The principle had also been acknowledged by the Government in the Probate and Registration of Wills Act. A court was held at Wakefield under this Act, which had been the greatest been ever granted to the inhabitants of the West Riding. He hoped that the Government would bring forward some measure for the more easy and convenient administration of justice in counties.

did not wish to prolong the debate, but the House would not fail to observe that, while the Motion of his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Wexford related to the administration of justice in England and Wales, the question had been debated almost exclusively in relation to the West Riding of Yorkshire. The noble Lord (Viscount Goderich) might rest assured that when the Report of the Commission came under the consideration of the Government, due regard would be paid to the claims and interests of the West Riding. He doubted whether any evidence could be delivered before the Select Committee which would not be found in the Report and appendix of the Commission. A question had been raised whether the county of York should not be taken from the Northern Circuit and thrown into the Midland Circuit, so as to necessitate a redistribution of the counties composing the present circuits. He wished also to remind the House that, with regard to the only two counties in England that had been mentioned in the debate, the Report of the Commission recommended that provision should be made at the winter assizes for the administration of justice in civil as well as criminal causes. No one had suggested any inconvenience in any other county in England except York and Lancaster, and they had been provided for by the Report of the Commission.

said, he was anxious to see a third assize established all over the country for criminal business; and in proof of this, he called the attention of the House to the hardship of the case of those prisoners who, committed in the month of August, might have to remain in prison six months waiting for trial in consequence of the present system. He looked upon the administration of justice by assize courts as one of the last relics of barbarism, and thought we were approaching the time when we should see a far greater extension of the system of local courts. Those who had any experience in assize courts would be able to tell the House how the arrangements were made and what were their consequences. The Commission days for the various towns were struck in London, and if at any particular place a heavy case came on for trial, it was either made a remanet or else it deranged the whole business of circuit. In consequence of the present system, many causes were hurriedly tried, while in others suitors were put to enormous expense in having to conduct their cases before a referee—generally some barrister who had no practice, and who was inferior in experience to the County Court Judges. He believed that the House must look to a further development of the system of County Courts, and that the remedy must go a great deal deeper than his hon. and learned Friend had contemplated in his Motion.

observed, that although a great deal had been said about Wakefield, he would maintain that Leeds ought to be the town selected for the assizes of the West Riding. It was more convenient, and its population alone entitled it to the preference, while it had other claims to be selected.

said, that although he did not approve the system upon which assizes were at present conducted, he could not support the proposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman for the appointment of a Select Committee. The Report to which the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) had referred contained all the information which was necessary for the formation of a correct judgment on this subject. He conceived, however, that the matter was one which could not be determined by such an inquiry, but that it was purely a question of practical administration which ought to be decided by the executive Government. He concurred with his hon. and learned Friend below him (Mr. Bowyer) in the belief that the prompt administration of justice would be greatly promoted by the development of those local tribunals which had been recently established.

observed, that he entirely concurred in the reasons of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department for declining to assent to the appointment of the proposed Committee. They had already abundant information before the House. The Report which had been referred to contained the evidence of law officers of all descriptions, such as clerks of the Crown, clerks of assize, and other persons who were familiar with assize business, and it appeared from their statements that the expediency of establishing additional assizes should be dependent upon the general convenience of the inhabitants of the districts, and the cost with which such arrangements would be attended. It seemed that in one circuit there were five large and important assize towns, in which the average number of causes tried was not more than five or six at each assize. He therefore thought that there were but few places where additional as sizes were needed, and that the establishment of even these should depend upon special requirements, which might, from time to time, arise. The Committee would multiply expenses, and would prove, he believed, entirely useless.

expressed his general concurrence in the views of the noble Member for the West Riding, and hoped the Secretary of State for the Home Department would give this subject his serious consideration. He could state that in Yorkshire great annoyance, dissatisfaction, and expense, were occasioned by the circumstance that witnesses and attorneys were compelled to resort to the assizes at York from the remotest districts of that extensive county. The hon. Member for York had alluded, and very properly, to the great advantage derived by the public from the facilities afforded by railway trains, in which he quite concurred; but against that, he omitted to mention that a taxing officer was now appointed by Government, and that the costs allowed by him to witnesses, attorneys, and counsel, are reduced to so low a scale as to he utterly inadequate to cover inevitable expenses, and as a natural result, more especially in criminal cases, no encouragement being held out to the police and parties aggrieved to do their duty, the ends of justice were not unfrequently entirety defeated.

remarked, that he was convinced that, under the present system, the assize business was frequently conducted in a very hurried and unsatisfactory manner.

observed, that one part of the Report of the Commission was against much of the evidence, and he would, on a proper occasion, be prepared to prove that such was the case. He agreed in the principle that it was desirable to extend the administration of justice according to the population, but in the Report it was proposed to give additional facilities at the expense of the Principality of Wales, which would be unjust and a very great hardship upon Wales.

said, he rose to call the attention of the House to the Report of the Select Committee of 1856, appointed to inquire into the expediency of establishing equitable tribunals for the amicable adjustment of differences between masters and operatives, and to move for leave to bring in a Bill to enable masters and workmen to form Councils of Conciliation and of Arbitration. The subject had been for many years brought before the notice of Parliament, and was one of very considerable importance, because it was the general impression that, if such a measure as he suggested were carried out, one of its effects would be to put an end to the frequent disputes which took place between workmen and their employers, which disputes too often terminated in "strikes.'' These strikes were often of the most lamentable character, and attended with the most disastrous consequences to all involved in them. During the Preston strike, the loss to the operatives was calculated at between £50,000 and £60,000; the loss to the masters was enormous; and the poor tradesmen who supplied the workpeople with necessaries, and who were, of course, entirely innocent of all connection with the strike, were also great sufferers. There was great hope that these calamitous events would be prevented by meetings of delegates from the operatives and the masters, at which the whole of the circumstances on either side might be gone into, and the case settled on principles of justice to both parties. It would, perhaps, be said, that the law did not sanction any system of equitable coun- cils. He found, however, that in 1824, a Committee of that House, consisting of no fewer than forty-six of its leading Members, agreed that a Bill should be brought in, whereby these councils should become part of the law of the land. He was not, therefore, now asking the House to affirm a new principle. Again, in 1856, a Committee, over which he had the honour to preside, examined a great number of witnesses on this subject, and although the opinions of the masters was equally balanced, the operatives were entirely in favour of the establishment of those Councils of Conciliation and Arbitration. To show the absurdity of the existing law he might refer to the evidence of Mr. Ham-mill, the Worship Street magistrate, who explained the difficulty at present experienced by magistrates in deciding disputes between masters and workmen. In one case, the question which came before him was, whether the work done by a silk weaver was such as it ought to be. How was it possible for the magistrate to decide satisfactorily such a question, which was one rather for persons skilled in weaving than for magistrates? The conclusion which the Committee of 1856 arrived at was, that the attention of the Legislature might with advantage be directed to this subject, and they were of opinion that the formation of Courts of Conciliation in the country, more especially in large commercial, manufacturing, and mining districts, would be beneficial, and would probably lead to the amicable settlement in many cases of disputes between masters and workmen. From all the information which he had been enabled to collect, the operatives were of opinion that the existing law dealt with them in a very unfair spirit, inasmuch as whenever they happened to have a dispute with their masters, the case was submitted to the consideration of a magistrate, whose tendency they alleged was to support the masters against them. The Bill which he proposed to introduce, had for its object, the removal of the inconvenience which resulted from that state of things, and he therefore trusted it would receive the sanction both of the Government and the House. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving for leave to bring in his Bill.

seconded the Motion.

said, at this stage of the measure he should not trouble the House with any observations further than to say, that he thought it only reasonable that the hon. Gentleman should have an opportunity given him of bringing in his Bill. He granted that there were inconsistencies in the existing law relating to masters and workmen, which might be properly and justly considered. In addition to that, the law as it stood, with reference to arbitration, had not operated successfully, and he thought that certain provisions might be adopted to give further facilities for referring disputes to arbitration. He would not venture to express an opinion upon the Bill, until he had seen and examined it; but on the second reading, he should be prepared to state on the part of Her Majesty's Government, whether they thought it desirable that it should pass or not.

said, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to extend the Franchise in counties in England and Wales, and to improve the representation of the people in respect of such Franchise. When he last brought forward this important question for consideration, his Motion for leave to bring in a Bill was, in a full House, rejected by a majority of only thirteen. But for the chivalrous assistance received by the noble Lord then at the head of the Government, from those hon. Gentlemen who now formed and supported the present Government, that Bill, instead of having been rejected, would have been carried by a considerable majority; for the noble Lord could only muster, of his own immediate followers, thirty-one supporters, and those, too, hon. Members more immediately connected with the Government. Soon afterwards, the noble Lord having received another Parliamentary defeat—for he (Mr. Locke King) was of opinion that the rejection of his Bill by a majority of only thirteen was tantamount to a defeat—made an appeal to the country. He did not get up as a cry the question of Parliamentary Reform, but he adopted a cry which was calculated to rouse the British lion, and talked of an insult offered to the British flag. The country, however, after the excitement of a few days, no longer dwelt upon that cry, forgot the Chinese question and Commissioner Yeh, and began to think of Parliamentary Reform. He might say that this very Motion, which he had only submitted a few weeks before to the House, met with general support. He did not bring the question before the House in the last Session, for the noble Lord then at the head of the Government took the wind out of his sails by promising, in an unguarded moment, to introduce a measure of Reform in Parliament. The noble Lord, with much dexterity, contrived to convert his promise into an understanding that no question of Parliamentary Reform should be brought on until the following Session, and consequently he (Mr. Locke King) did not bring on his Motion. He had had some experience of Ministerial promises which were made in one Session in order to stave off to another disagreeable questions, and he believed that little faith was to be placed in promises made for a subsequent Session. If they looked hack to the history of the progress of this question of the county franchise, if would be found to be nothing more than a series of broken promises. He had not brought forward this question in any spirit of hostility to the present Government, for he had brought it before the House every year, except during the war, and it had, in fact, become an annual Motion. The objections which were generally urged against it, resolved themselves into a very small compass. One was, that it was not desirable to proceed with it, inasmuch as a general measure of Parliamentary Reform was about to be introduced; but after the experience of the past, that, he thought, was an objection which was entitled to no great weight. Another objection which was urged against it was, that the present was not the time to deal with the subject to which it related; but that was the stereotyped argument in favour of delay in dealing with every description of question. It was also said that it was extremely inexpedient to proceed by what was termed piecemeal measures of Parliamentary Reform; but, in the present state of the feeling of the House and the country, the only way in which the question of reform could be dealt with was by bringing forward small, honest, and just measures of the kind he proposed for their adoption. Indeed, he preferred small, honest, and just measures to a large one, which often afforded scope for the introduction of dishonest provisions. He would not go into the details of the Bill he proposed; the House must be quite familiar with its plan, and he would not weary them with statistics, which he bad on many former occasions laid before them, but would only say that no one had ever assailed the class he sought to enfranchise. The existing state of the franchise in counties was one of the greatest anomalies in the country; for, whilst one individual living in a town had the right of voting for a representative in Parliament, another individual who resided, it might be in an adjoining town, in a house better in all respects, and paying a higher rent and a larger amount of taxation, was not allowed to have any share whatever in the representation. On a former occasion, when he had brought the measure before the House, the right hon. Member for Carlisle (Sir J. Graham) suggested that he should take care to provide against the creation of faggot voters. That recommendation of the right hon. Gentleman he was willing to adopt, and he proposed that a part of the qualification which was to give a vote of £10 might be a dwelling-house of the annual value of £5. Before sitting down, he could not help adverting to a circumstance of rather a curious kind which took place previous to the last election. A rumour had prevailed that the late Government intended to support the introduction of his (Mr. Locke King's) Bill, and that rumour was afterwards confirmed by a noble Lord a Member of the Cabinet, who said that it had been agreed by the Government to support the Bill, in order that in Committee such modifications might be introduced as would render it a judicious extension of the county franchise; but he added that afterwards it was found the Bill had not been draughted in such a shape as to render that possible, and therefore it was decided that it would only have been a waste of time to allow a Bill to be read a second time which was found to be such a measure as the Government could not support. Now, this statement was an entire fiction; for there was no Bill before the House, the Motion only being for leave to bring one in. He trusted he should receive some explanation of the mistake, and he hoped the present Government would not fall into the same error as the last, for they must recollect that the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton, however well disposed to assist them upon this question, could not give them the same support as they had been able to give to the noble Lord when he was in office. The hon. Member concluded by moving for leave to introduce a Bill to extend the Franchise in counties in England and Wales, and to improve the representation of the people in respect of such Franchise.

said, he would give his reasons for seconding the Motion in three sentences. He did so, first, because he was anxious that a sound, and, as he ventured to think it would be, a comprehensive measure of Reform should be passed. Next, because he ventured to think that by this measure they would practically enfranchise many towns and considerable villages which were now unrepresented. And, thirdly, because he believed that by so doing, and by enlarging the basis and area of their representation, they would comprise within its scope a large class of the community, intelligent, honest, and well calculated to enjoy the privilege of voting for the return of Members to Parliament.

Sir, I have no objection to urge against the purpose of the Bill which the Hon. Gentleman proposes to introduce. I have no objection to extend the franchise at present enjoyed by the counties; and I think that an extension of that franchise may improve the exercise of it. I rise with no prejudice whatever to the general purpose of the Motion of the hon. Gentleman; but, Sir, before acceding to his request to bring in a Bill, which, in the new version of his Motion, is to extend the franchise in counties in England and Wales, and improve the representation of the people in respect of such franchise, I may say that there are several considerations which induce me to fear that the introduction of this measure will be a source of embarrassment to those who seriously intend and wish to improve the franchise. The Hon. Gentleman, in describing the Bill which he now asks leave to bring in, says it is a measure "small, honest, and just," the tendency of which would be to remove the greatest anomalies. Now, how stands the general question of the representation at the present moment in England? I speak from memory—and I may be erroneous in some slight details; but I am confident in the general results— you have a certain number of members returned to Parliament for those counties with whose franchise the hon. Gentleman only deals. You have, I think, 150 or 160 county Members, returned for Eng- land and Wales, and they are returned to Parliament by something more than half-a million of electors. You have, on the other hand, about 330 borough Members who are returned to Parliament by a little more than 400,000 electors. Well, Sir, those who are Parliamentary Reformers, and who bring to the great question of the re-construction of our representation an impartial spirit, must, at the first blush, be rather struck with the impression that the, balance between the county representation and the borough representation was not particularly exact and just, and it would seem somewhat strange that more than half a million of electors under our present scheme should only return 150 or 160 Members of Parliament, whilst 400,000 other electors should return 330. One might almost be disposed to say that this would figure amongst the greatest anomalies to which the hon. Gentleman has referred. But what is the remedy which he offers to the House, and which he offers to us, mind you, because he despairs of any great and comprehensive measure of Parliamentary Reform being introduced, and says that we can only take refuge in these "small, honest, and just" measures? The measure of the hon. Gentleman, as I collect it from his brief but lucid narrative, is this:—"There being a great inequality at present between the number of Members who are returned by the half million of electors of counties compared with the number of members returned by the 400,000 constituents of the boroughs, I will introduce a Bill which shall aggravate that anomaly. I will introduce a Bill which must add, and, perhaps, add greatly, to the number of electors who return the county Members; but, as I despair of any further change, I would leave the arrangement by which the small number of electors return the large number of Members untouched and uncriticised." This, then, is the course by which he proposes to remove the anomalies that are recognised in our representative system, and, to use his own language, improve the franchise of the country. Now, I think the House ought well to consider this question. If we agree to the Motion of the hon. Gentleman on the grounds upon which he has placed it, namely, that any hope of general improvement is impossible, and that, therefore, we ought to agree with his "just and small and honest" measure, we shall land ourselves in this position—that we shall have a very small number of Members returned to this House by a very large constituency, and a very large number of Members returned to this House by a very small constituency. Now I draw from a statement which is not speculative, which is not hypothetical, but depends upon facts which arc lying upon the table of this House, and upon arguments which are founded upon returns moved for by the hon. Member for Surrey himself, what appears to be the irresistible inference, that if you make up your minds to deal with the question of the franchise in this country, you cannot deal with it partially, and that whatever may be the objections against what are called large and comprehensive measures, I feel persuaded that when you are dealing with the representation of a great people, it is impossible by those "small, honest, and just" measures to perpetrate anything but what will be large in injustice, and vast in impolicy. I cannot understand how the hon. Gentleman could ever have brought his mind to take the position which he has done on this subject, for whilst he seeks for a great extension of the suffrage in that class who already possess the enjoyment of the franchise to a greater degree than the rest of the country, he introduces his Motion with the simultaneous proposition that any further change is almost to be despaired of. Is the House prepared, then, for the state of things which the hon. Gentleman contemplates, and which the passing of his measure would bring about? At this moment, in the counties—to which the hon. Gentleman's Motion alone refers—every Member of Parliament represents 3,300 electors; whereas, in the boroughs, every Member of Parliament represents 1,280 electors. Why, Sir, when I hear talk of great anomalies, it appears to me that this is a state of affairs which is also somewhat anomalous. But what is the Motion of the hon. Gentleman? It is, as I said before, to aggravate this anomaly. It is, if passed, that the Members of Parliament for counties shall represent a much greater number of electors than at present, and that a Member who represents a borough constituency shall represent much less. I do not confound this important point with any question of what is called the agricultural interest or the urban interest. Unquestionably there are boroughs whose constituencies are entirely agricultural, and there are counties where the constituencies are manufacturing and commercial. That is altogether another question. The question as to a fair and equitable ba- lance of those interests is entirely removed We have a hard arithmetical proposition to consider at present—why it is that 500,000 men should at the present moment return only 160 Members to Parliament, and 400,000 men return 330. And when a measure for Parliamentary Reform, which we are told is "small, and honest, and just," and the only one we can obtain, is brought forward to aggravate all those circumstances, and increase the disproportion that at present exists, I ask, is the House really prepared to sanction such a proceeding? If there be on the part of the House—what I cannot doubt there is—a sincere desire for a wise and well-considered settlement of this long-mooted and long-controverter question as to the due and fair representation of the people in this House, I cannot conceive how they could take a Motion more retrograde than that which the hon. Gentleman has brought before us to-night. Sir, I am not opposed to the extension of the franchise in counties. I think there are classes of persons in counties that might be brought to exercise the franchise with advantage to the State, and with perfect security to all those great institutions which I trust will always be honoured and respected and cherished in this House; but it is impossible any longer, with the information that we have on this subject, to resist the conviction, that if you deal with the county franchise, you must deal also with the franchises that are enjoyed by the towns; and the great Reformer who comes forward and tells us, "I despair of a general measure that will on the whole secure adequate justice, therefore I will bring forward a little measure which on the face of it must perpetrate great injustice," is not, in my opinion, with great deference, one who proposes a course which will conduce to the advantage of the public interest, or achieve and accomplish those results which I think all sober-minded men who have duly considered this subject wish to realise. Sir, I cannot make that appeal to the hon. Gentleman, which was made by the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton on a former occasion, as I have not that claim upon the confidence of the hon. Gentleman which the noble Lord has the honour to possess. I cannot appeal to the intentions of the present Government with any hope that he will be influenced by my statement. But I am bound to say, as an indication of our present intentions, and in the cause of truth, that the fair and sufficient representation of the people in the Commons House of Parliament is a question which will undergo and command our deep and sincere attention; but I cannot for one moment hold out the hope to the hon. Gentleman that it will be my duty ever to propose to this House a scheme conceived in the spirit of the measure which he now introduces to our notice, telling us at the same time that probably it is the only measure we shall ever be able to obtain. That, I think, would be but a partial settlement of the question, one which would lead to great jealousy, to great public inconvenience, and I cannot doubt to protracted agitation, perhaps, to a conclusion which would be little satisfactory to the nation. The Bill of the hon. Gentleman, which he now asks leave to introduce, may, as far as it goes, be what he calls a just measure; but if it be, as he announces, an isolated measure, it appears to me one that will aggravate the injustice, of which experience is now said to be felt. I cannot understand upon what principle the hon. Gentleman can vindicate a measure which, under the circumstances to which I have referred, would deal only with the franchise of the country, and not subject to the same revision and consideration the franchise enjoyed by the constituencies in towns. It appears to Her Majesty's Government and myself that this question of the fair and adequate representation of the people in the House of Commons is one which must be considered as a whole; that it is one, no doubt, which must be approached in a calm and temperate spirit, in a mood of mind very different from that which in times long past accompanied the agitated discussions to which this subject gave rise in this House. Still I cannot doubt that, with the knowledge which we possess, and with the desire among all classes and in all parts of this country to come to a safe and practical solution of the questions which have been brought forward within recent years with reference to this subject —I say I cannot doubt that if Parliament approaches this great subject in a mood of mind not unworthy of it, it would be possible to produce a measure which might give satisfaction to all who consider the subject divested of passion, and with the anxious and sincere desire to add to the strength of the constitutional institutions of the country; but I cannot believe that we are dealing worthily with the question if we permit a Bill such as the hon. Gentleman proposes, and proposes almost in the light of a final measure ("No!") to be brought forward. Well, then, as a substitute for a final measure. I ask the House, was not the tone of the hon. Gentleman this—"I bring forward this measure because I despair of any larger one being introduced—because there is a general feeling that no other alteration will take place; and therefore I propose this to your notice?" Propose what? That which under the circumstances he himself describes would be a most unjust measure, and if the circumstances to which he refers are not well founded—if there be a fair prospect of dealing with the question generally and largely — then I say the hon. Gentleman is not justified in bringing forward this Motion. I will not make an appeal to him to relinquish his present purpose in consequence of the intentions of Her Majesty's Government— I have no claim upon him to do that— but, as representing the Government, who are seriously desirous of considering the question on all its merits, and if possible, of bringing forward a measure for the consideration of Parliament which shall be worthy of their acceptance, I am bound to say that, so far as I am concerned, I cannot sanction the introduction of any measure like that of the hon. Gentleman, which, if carried, would create a great injustice, and be a great embarrassment to our future legislation. On these grounds, therefore — because, if the measure be carried, it will aggravate an anomaly that already exists; because it will give to that portion of the constituency which is already imperfectly represented in this House, with reference to the other portion, an increase of electors with a relative diminution of representatives; and because it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to give their consideration to the whole question of the representation of the people in Parliament—an assurance which I do not wish at all should influence the course of the hon. Gentleman—I shall feel it to be my duty, whilst in no way differing from the hon. Gentleman in the general purport of his Motion, not at all opposed to the extension of the franchise in counties, and believing that extension, wisely and well-considered, would tend to the improvement of the representation of the counties, but believing also that the question of county representation cannot be effectively and beneficially dealt with unless we take into our consideration also the representation of other parts of Her Majesty's dominions— then I say that, under these circumstances, I shall feel it to be my duty to move as an Amendment the Previous Question.

The right hon. Gentleman who has just addressed the House hardly denies that the proposition of my hon. Friend (Mr. Locke King) is a fair one. He does not deny that the franchise in counties might be usefully extended; and he does not deny that those persons with a £10 occupation are a respectable class, and worthy to enjoy the franchise; nor does he give any good reason against the introduction of the measure on grounds of general policy. But the right hon. Gentleman goes off upon a distinction which he is very fond of making, but which I have always thought is one of a very unsubstantial and untenable character—namely, that the counties have a certain number of electors and of Members, and that the boroughs have a certain other number of electors and also of Members. I believe the right hon. Gentleman is entirely mistaken in making any such sharp distinctions as he draws between the counties and the boroughs; because, in the first place, there are some counties which are so much inhabited by persons engaged in trade and commerce that they constitute very much a town population—such, for example, as the metropolitan counties and Lancashire; while, on the other hand, there are many municipal boroughs situated in agricultural districts which are little else than representatives of the agricultural interest. Therefore, the distinction drawn by the right hon. Gentleman was not one founded in actual fact. I remember that Mr. Canning, speaking of the differences in the Cabinet to which he belonged, said the line that separated the two parties was not a straight, but a serpentine line. I may say also that the line by which the right hon. Gentleman separates the counties from the boroughs is not a straight, but a serpentine line. I must say that I dislike those extremely sharp and microscopic distinctions between the various classes which exist in some other countries, and I think it is a great advantage to this country that they do not exist among us. If the right hon. Gentleman's theory was well founded, he would prove that we had given an immense advantage to the counties and the agricultural interest by the Reform Bill; but it was not so. At that time there were eighty representatives of English counties and twelve of Welsh counties. We increased the number to 150, while we reduced in a similar proportion the number of borough Members. But did we thereby intend to give an advantage to the agricultural interest? Far from it. The general purport of the Bill was to increase the influence of the large towns—such as Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds—not to give any preponderance to them, but to give them representatives in Parliament, and place the trading and commercial classes on an equality with the agricultural interests. If the theory of the right hon. Gentleman was right, it would have a precisely opposite and different effect; but I will say to the right hon. Gentleman, that so far as the practical ratiocination and effect of his theory is concerned, he will find that the effects it produced are diametrically opposed to his expectations. With respect to the number of electors, the right hon. Gentleman says there are 500,000 electors who return only 150 Members; but, surely, if you wore to add to the number of electors, you would not diminish, but give greater weight to the counties. If their Members are sent to represent a greater number of electors than before, instead of this being any unfairness to them, it would increase their influence in this House. The right hon. Gentleman also made use of an argument to which, if it had been employed by my noble Friend the Member for Tiverton, I might have been disposed to listen. He said we should take up this question of Reform as a whole. I certainly cannot find fault with that, argument in itself, because it is one I have used myself. Seven years ago I certainly thought that Reform should be considered as a whole, and that, when it was resolved to make a change in the Reform Act, the provisions thought to be necessary should be embodied in one comprehensive Bill. But we have had some experience during the last few years. We have bad Bills introduced, and I have myself had the honour of introducing two of them. Now, if we found that there was some inconvenience from the heat and violence that existed in this country at the time of the Reform Bill, there was at least this effect produced, that the great majority of the country was bent on one measure. They cried for the Bill, and the whole Bill—the majority of the country being of one mind; and, therefore, both this and the other House of Parliament consented to pass the Bill. But I doubt very much whether, with the calm, dispassionate, and quiet consideration which it is now proposed to give to the subject of Reform, there is such a chance as we had in 1831 of carrying any large measure of Reform; because, in proportion to the calm and dispassionate temper of the people, all the private interests rise in their strength to influence and affect it. There is, perhaps, one part of the Bill that is introduced very obnoxious to some fifty hon. Gentlemen of this House, who think themselves affected by it. There is another part of the Bill that strikes against the views and opinions of 100 other hon. Gentlemen. These club their objections together, and even those most anxious for Reform find parts of the Bill that are so objectionable and obnoxious to them, and either resolve to oppose it altogether or follow such a course as makes it easy for those opposed to Reform to obstruct its progress. I will give an instance of this. In the last Reform Bill which I introduced, I proposed a considerable disfranchisement of small boroughs, and to a certain extent to give representation to minorities; but, though that Bill made a very extensive change, the hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) fixed on that part of it relating to minorities as one very obnoxious to him, and denounced it as a trick. What I thought a very fair proposition, the hon. Member for Birmingham seemed to regard as an artifice, and this may be taken as a sample of the kind of objections to which any Bill that may be introduced is liable. Now, if this be so, I will not say that I despair of a large measure of reform; but I will ask if there is not such a feeling of difficulty with regard to a largo and comprehensive measure as to make it wise in us to adopt the proposition of my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey—a proposition to which in itself but few persons will be found to object. The effect of his Bill will be to add a large number of persons of respectability and character to the constituencies of the counties; and surely it will not be disputed that by adding to the electoral body those respectable persons, and thereby extending the basis of our representation, we shall increase the confidence of the country in this House, which is certainly one of the great objects to be promoted by any Reform Bill that may be introduced. The right hon. Gentleman speaks with very natural doubt and hesitation of the particular measure which he himself expects to introduce in the name of the Government. I must repeat, on that head, that I have a deep and strong impression on this subject, arising from what was declared by the present Prime Minister when be accepted office, he said he must have time to consider this question—that it had been kept so long dangling before Parliament, that he was fairly entitled to have time fully to consider it; but beyond this he did not go. He took care to say, with that manliness that belongs to him, that if he were to come forward next Session and state that he had no Bill of Reform, that he had no scheme to improve the representation of the people, he had said nothing that could expose him to the taunt of having violated any promise or broken any pledge. Seeing that is the case—seeing the inherent difficulties of the subject in its various attitudes and phases—seeing the difficulties that a Ministry with a largo majority in this House must encounter in such an attempt, and considering that we have a Ministry whose majority is very doubtful — looking to the apathy of the Government and the extreme lukewarmness of the Prime Minister, I must say that my doubts very much exceed my hopes on this subject. For my part, I think the right course will be at once to accept the Bill of my hon. Friend, and not listen to the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman that we should vote for the Previous Question. We should remember that "a bird in the band is worth two in the bush," and in that spirit support the Motion of the hon. Member for Surrey.

said, he should not have risen at all on this occasion were it not to vindicate a noble Friend of bis (Earl Granville) from a charge of insincerity made against him by the hon. Member for Surrey (Mr. Locke King). That hon. Gentleman asserted that Earl Granville stated that it was the intention of the late Government to have moved certain alterations in the Bill of the hon. Member for Surrey in Committee, and that this could not be a correct statement, because, in point of fact, until the Bill came into the House, they did not see it, and could not have intended to alter it. It was true, however, that the members of the late Government intended to have supported the introduction of the Bill, and afterwards to move certain Amendments in Committee; and it was not till they came down to the House that they found that that course was not open to them, and that they must oppose the Bill. It was quite true that the House refused leave to bring in the Bill, but the hon. Member for East Surrey had in the previous Session laid that measure upon the table of the House; and, as they found from his speech that he intended the Bill to be exactly the same as that of last year, they had just the same opportunity of considering the Amendments they would introduce as they would have had if the measure had been actually brought in. It was unnecessary among those who knew Earl Granville to vindicate that nobleman's truthfulness. But at the sumo time he had thought it necessary to state the facts he had already mentioned, which he thought would satisfy the House that the late Government in point of fact had the Bill before them, and that that being so, it was their duty to examine the Bill and sec if it was possible to make those Amendments which they intended to introduce. On the present occasion he thought they were not exactly in the same position. His hon. Friend now brought in a Bill under a different title, and the contents of which would not be precisely the same as the previous one. They were therefore, he conceived, perfectly at liberty to act in the same way as they intended, under similar circumstances, to have acted on a former occasion; and he for one, therefore, should certainly vote now for leave to introduce the Bill. For his own part, he did not think that either the course of reforming Parliament by a general measure or of improving the representation by a series of smaller ones, was absolutely right or wrong. There was much to be said for both courses, and the main thing to be looked at was the times and circumstances under which such measures were brought in. He must confess, however, that if they had any certain and immediate prospect of a general measure of Reform being brought before the House by a Government in whom he reposed confidence, he should not be disposed to vote for these smaller Bills introduced by individual Members, because he thought there were many advantages in viewing the question of Reform as one great whole, and that the question was better in the hands of the Government than in those of individuals. But with his noble Friend (Lord J. Russell) he must say that, looking particularly at the general composition and feelings of the present Government, and to the vague and uncertain nature of the promises which they had made upon this subject, he entertained no very confident expectation that a measure would be proposed to Parliament during the next Session which was at all likely to receive the support of the House and the country. For those reasons, he was unwilling to debar the House from the advantage, whatever it might be, of seeing the Bill which his hon. Friend (Mr. Locke King) now sought to introduce. The present Government also had, he thought, rather cut away the ground from under their own feet, and debarred themselves from giving any opposition to the introduction of such a Bill, for a few days ago they had consented that a measure reforming the representation, by abolishing the qualification of Members, should be brought in. They have not, therefore, shown any indisposition to allow other Reform measures of this kind to be laid on the table, and he thought they might with consistency have suffered this Bill to be introduced, reserving to themselves the right upon the second reading of taking any course they might think expedient.

said, as the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had invoked the aid of arithmetic on this subject, he should like to ask those gentlemen who fulfilled the important office of taking the divisions of that House whether they could tell when any hon. Member was returned by a thousand or five hundred votes? He should also like to ask the House whether when a division ran close, the vote of any hon. Member who was returned by a constituency of 300 was not as good as that of any hon. Member who was returned by 5,000? Several returns had been made to the House showing the amount of representation as compared with population and property. One of these returns was moved for by the hon. Member for Stock-port, which showed a very remarkable result. It showed that, in round numbers, the county Members were returned by nearly 3,000 voters, and the borough Members by about 1,000 voters. A calculation which he (Mr. Philipps) had himself made showed that each county Member was retained by 2,978 voters, and each borough Member by 1,306 voters. The Bill of the hon. Member for Surrey (Mr. Locke King) did not refer to Scotland, and yet in Scotland the disproportion was less conspicuous, for there the county Members were returned by a smaller number of voters than the borough Members. In Bedfordshire, the county from which the family of the noble Lord (Lord J. Russell) took its title, one county Member was returned by 2,138 voters, and one town Member by 439. He would next turn to the three largest coun- ties in England. In Devonshire one county Member was returned by 4,222 voters, and one town Member by 521; in Lincolnshire one county Member was returned by 5,125, and one town Member by 479. In Yorkshire the disproportion was very conspicuous; in the North Riding each county Member was returned by 6,052 voters, and each Member for the towns by 664, or in the proportion nearly of 10 to 1. But the West Riding was the most conspicuous of all, each county Member being returned by 18,000, and each Member for the boroughs by 1,354 voters. He was not prepared to deny that in some cases £10 householders would be a very valuable addition; but in other places they would entirely alter the character of the constituency. This was not a time to indulge in lucubrations about Parliamentary Reform; but he could not help expressing a wish that the franchise should be more connected with the payment of taxes than it was at present. He could not disguise from himself the fact that the action of constituencies had been to reduce the general taxation, and to encourage particular expenditure. A fortnights ago every hon. Member for those towns in which there was a Government dockyard supported a proposition, contrary to all the rules of political economy, for increasing the wages of dockyard artificers without reference to the laws of demand and supply. To be sure, one of the Members for Portsmouth stood up manfully against it, but he would appeal to the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Baring) whether his fidelity to the general interests of the country was not maintained at the expense of his own personal popularity in the borough. The action of constituencies had been lately rather in favour of what he should call giving the British hon. an airing; but, however valuable that animal might be, they might depend upon it that he did not go out without some expense, and that some of his escapades were more costly than they were worth. He, therefore, thought that in any scheme for the reform of the representation, the connection of taxation with representation ought not to be lost sight of. Though not opposed to the consideration of alterations in the franchise, he could not support the proposal of the hon. Member, believing that no plan which utterly disregarded the inequalities he had pointed out ought to receive the attention of the House.

said, the real point had been lost sight of in the debate. There had been minute calculations as to the relative number of electors in counties and towns, but the question for the House to consider was whether or not the class of voters which the Bill proposed to enfranchise were a class of men who could be properly and justly entrusted with the franchise. He agreed, to a certain extent, with the noble Lord the Member for the City of London that it would be better to take these questions one by one, and thought that if parties were fit to be entrusted with the franchise they ought to be allowed to become members of the constituency. The difficulty which had arisen with respect to large measures of Reform was that none of them bad given satisfaction to any large majority of Members. One measure which was regarded by many of the most eminent Reformers as a sine quâ non in any extensive scheme of reform was the Ballot, and he believed that such a measure as that now before the House might be objected to on the ground that it was improper and impolitic to intrust so largo a body of men with the franchise unless they received the protection of the ballot. There was, indeed, an opinion prevailing very generally, that it would be much better to disfranchise instead of enfranchising unless the ballot were conceded. All those hon. Gentlemen who had addressed the House seemed to concur in the opinion that the £10 householders in counties were fit and proper persons to possess the franchise, and for his own part he would support the Motion of the hon. Member for East Surrey. It was the opinion of many persons that without the protection of the ballot disfranchisement would in many cases be better than enfranchisement. With respect to the question now before the House, he had no objection to the granting of the franchise to £10 householders in counties. The proposition seemed to have received the assent of almost every hon. Member. With regard to letting loose the British lion, he was glad that the British hon. had been let loose, and, he must say, that whenever let loose, he performed his part in a manner which almost invariably did honour to his country. And when they found that he had amongst his admirers at the same time the noble Lord the Member for London (Lord J. Russell,) and the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. M. Gibson) it might well be said that extremes met; and when the British hon. returned to his lair ha might retire in comfort and satisfaction.

was understood to oppose the Motion, on the ground that the Bill which the hon. Gentleman asked leave to introduce would, in fact, cause a large addition to the influence of the town constituencies, as contradistinguished from the rural population. Even at present he thought that many rural districts were very inadequately represented, and that if any places should he deprived of representation it was the unimportant and nomination boroughs like Morpeth, Midhurst, &c.

said, the only argument he had heard against the measure was that it would increase the great anomaly which existed at present. Now he thought that it was one of the greatest recommendations of the Bill, because the more glaring the abuse, the more speedy became the remedy. He would do hon. Members for comities the justice to say that he did not believe they considered it a grievance to be elected by large constituencies, and in his opinion the larger the constituency which sent a man to Parliament, the greater the honour of his position and the respect which he obtained in that House. But when they had made this anomaly so glaring it must strike hon. Members on the other side that there was a ready way of remedying it. They might ask themselves in what way it was to he done, and they might find a solution in the suggestion made by an hon. Member opposite, that the first thing to do was to destroy, as far as their Parliamentary life was concerned, a number of small boroughs, and redistribute the seats. He agreed with his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Locke) that this was not the chief point of discussion; but the chief point of discussion was simply this—Did the Bill of the hon. Gentleman propose to admit into the franchise a class every way deserving it? He thought it did so, and he should therefore support the measure, not in despair of obtaining a largo measure of Reform—not as a substitute for a large measure of Reform —but as the readiest and best preparation for one.

said, the very remarkable speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Taunton (Mr. Labouchere), was characterised by great plainness and candour. In short it was the most remarkable speech ever heard in the House, because, if he rightly understood the right hon. Gentleman, he expressed his readiness to adopt the principle that a Member of the House was entitled to vote on any question, black or white, according to the circumstances in which he was placed. ["No!"] That was what he understood the right hon. Member to argue. It was true that was a principle often acted upon, but not usually acknowledged in that straightforward manner. The noble Lord the Member for the City of London objected to the distinction drawn by the Chancellor of the Exchequer between boroughs and comities, and said he disclaimed those sharp distinctions. He was not surprised at that being the case because at the present time they told strongly and inconveniently against the object the noble Lord had in view, but he remembered the time when the noble Lord did not dislike those distinctions when they could be. brought to bear on a different phase of the question. The feeling of antagonism which now existed between counties and boroughs was, in his opinion, to be attributed to the noble Lord himself, and to those who supported the doctrines of which the noble Lord had been the advocate for so many years. That feeling had been brought about by various causes, but mainly by what was called recent legislation. It was a feeling that it was difficult to allay, and he contended that in any measure of Reform it would be necessary to see that the counties of England were not overruled as they were at present by borough representation. Another remarkable statement of the noble Member was, that the influence of a Member of the House depended upon the number of his constituents. Now, he should like to know if a Member having a double number of constituents had power to give two votes instead of one. The breadth of the noble Lord's "basis" was great, for he believed a Member for the City of London represented a constituency of 20,000. On the other hand the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton represented a constituency of about 200, and yet it was generally supposed that the influence of those noble Lords in that House was as nearly as possible balanced—therefore, taking it even on that ground, the noble Member's argument was not a good one. The noble Lord (Lord J. Russell) was also of opinion—and no one was better able to form an opinion—that there was at present no excitement on the subject of Reform, and that they might approach the consideration of this question with calmness and in a candid manner. He heard that statement with the sincerest pleasure, and he could only say for one that there was no man more anxious than himself to see the question settled, because he believed nothing could be more unjust and more anomalous than the present state of the representation of this country. Not only were these numerous classes excluded from the franchise who were fully entitled to have it, but owing to the Reform Bill introduced by the noble Lord, the representation of the counties was such that they were not justly and fairly dealt with. He considered that they were entitled to a very much larger share of the representation than they now had, and that, he apprehended, would be one of the principal subjects of discussion when this long-talked-of Reform Bill made its appearance in the House. He would only further say, with reference to the measure before the House, that he was not prepared to give his support to it, after the statement, in which he entirely concurred, of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who showed distinctly that this measure could only extend the injustice and anomaly which now existed.

said, he should have been contented to give a silent vote upon that occasion were it not that being a member of the great Conservative party his silence might lead to the inference that he was opposed to any extension of the suffrage and to any alteration of the Bill of 1832. Now, he put no faith cither in the completeness or in the finality of that Bill, and, if the House were called upon to pass an abstract Resolution, staling that it required amendment, he should find it difficult to meet a Resolution of that nature with a direct negative. A great injustice—the result of the uniformity introduced by the measure of 1832—was that the poorer classes had, owing to the disfranchisement of the freemen, been deprived of their fair share of the representation in that House. There were, it could not be denied, great anomalies in the existing system. The question however which the House had then to consider was, whether the present proposal was an improvement of the Act of 1832. The proposal did not affect boroughs, and it was not surprising that borough Members should support a measure which had a tendency to swamp the independence of counties. If any alteration was made, it ought to be one which would make a fairer proportion between towns and counties. At present the Isle of Wight, with 1,949 electors, returned one Member; while Newport, a town on the island with 654 electors, returned two Members. If it were intended to reduce the county franchise to the standard of the boroughs, surely the new voters who would be created in the towns of Ryde and Ventnor and others should vote for the borough which, with a small number of electors, returned two Members, rather than for the island which only returned one Member. In any system of representation the object ought to be to have all classes represented, and not to establish a uniformity of qualification, and therefore if they were to have a £10 franchise in the counties, he would rather see a £5 suffrage, or even household suffrage, in the boroughs, than the same suffrage as that which existed in the counties. He was as anxious as any one for a measure of Reform, but he could not consent to the present proposal, as he objected to a proposition which would give the now dominant class still greater power.

said, he thought the course of the discussion had shown the impolicy of bringing forward such a measure at the present time, because it had turned not so much upon the Bill which the hon. Gentleman sought leave to introduce as upon the general principles of a Reform Bill. It had proved that it was impossible to touch the present system without making a general change, for when they once began to tamper with their present system, they did not know where they could stop. It was proposed to fix the franchise in counties at £10 for the sake of uniformity, and, perhaps, in a few months or weeks, they would have another alteration; but were they prepared to maintain the franchise in boroughs at £10, because, unless they did that what would they gain? He always thought it was a great advantage that different classes were represented in that House, and he feared that it would be a serious disadvantage to the country when the large agricultural class should be so completely superseded in the representation in Parliament as they would be if the Bill of the hon. Gentleman were passed into law. If they adopted this measure the agricultural classes would he swamped by a number of voters who lived in towns.

said, he rose to call the attention of the House to the state of the law affecting pilots in the Isle of Wight and Portsmouth districts; and to move for returns from the Trinity House showing the rate of profits accruing to such pilots. He brought forward the subject as a matter of justice to a valuable body of men who were led to believe they were treated with injustice, but at the same time he hoped the House would not fancy that the question was one of local interest merely. In 1853, when the Merchant Shipping Act was introduced, the question of the remuneration to the pilots of Southampton was urged on the attention of the House. It was then shown that there was no reciprocity between the Southampton pilots and the pilots of the Isle of Wight, for while the Southampton pilots were allowed to enter any port of the Isle of Wight, the Isle of Wight pilots were obliged to leave the ship they were piloting the moment it entered Southampton Water. The remuneration given to the Plymouth pilots was considerably larger than that given to the Southampton pilots. For piloting a ship drawing fourteen feet water the distance of three miles and a half into Plymouth harbour, the Plymouth pilots wore paid 5s. per foot or £3 10s., while the Isle of Wight pilots got only 3s. 9d. per foot or £2 12s. for piloting such a vessel from the Needles to the Motherbank, a distance of twenty-two miles. With respect to the Merchant Shipping Act of 1853, he admitted that it ought to be considered as a monument of the ability and industry of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the City of Oxford (Mr. Cardwell); but unfortunately words had crept into it which were never intended to be introduced—aliquando dormitat Homerus. He believed it was the intention of the President of the Board of Trade at that time to leave the law as to the exemptions of personal pilotage in the same state as it stood previous to that measure. But the introduction of three little words—inserted, he believed, in forgetfulness that the Isle of Wight came within their operation—had suddenly deprived the Isle of Wight pilots of the ad-vantage of the boat trade. Another regulation of which the pilots complained was that by the terms of the Merchant Ship-ping Act the conditions of any agreement they might enter into with the captain of a ship must he entered in the log-book of the merchantman and in that of the pilot-boat; but in stormy weather, when the pilots were most wanted, it was physically impossible to comply with that condition, and thus they were left at the mercy of the captain as to whether they should be paid. The remuneration to the pilots was now so small, owing to their great number, that he thought it would be advantageous if the Government in future would put some limit to the number employed. His license cost the pilot £2 2s., and his net earnings were little more than 12s. a week, being just the wages of an agricultural labourer. A more gallant, more industrious body of men than the pilots did not exist. They were ever ready to face danger in the pursuit of their vocation or for the preservation of life and property, and he thought that no class had a better claim on the favour of those hon. Gentlemen "who live at home at ease" than those whose cause he was then advocating. If the Government would take up the question and look into it, he felt assured they would come to the determination that something ought to be done to put these men on a better footing than they were at present. The hon. Member concluded by moving for returns of the profits of the pilots of the Isle of Wight and the Portsmouth districts distinguishing the gross from the net profits.

said, he would not then enter into any examination of the minute details raised by the Motion of the hon. Member. He had no objection to make to the production of those Returns, as far as they could be furnished by the Trinity House; and, indeed, he doubted whether the hon. Gentleman might not find the greater portion of the information he desired to obtain in documents which had already been laid before Parliament. He believed the real reason why those men earned a less sum than could be desired was, that there were too many of them for the work they had to perform. In the four rears ending in 1857 the number of those pilots had actually been increased, for twenty of them had been appointed during that time, while only seventeen vacancies in their business had occurred. It certainly seemed to him to add in that way to the number of persons engaged in a pursuit in which the sum earned had previously been too small.

said, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to amend an Act of the 5th & 6th years of King William IV., c. 63, relating to Weights and Measures. The object of the Bill was, in the first place, to provide that corn and all other grain should be sold by measure. In the next, he desired to correct an error which had been committed in the framing of the Act of William IV., which Act, although intended to abolish all local measures, nevertheless contained provisions by which its main object was defeated. 13y the 6th and 11th sections of that Act it was enacted that articles should be sold by imperial weights and measures, and if it had stopped there no objection could be taken to it; but the 6th section, went on to provide that persons might sell by vessels which were neither imperial nor local, nor customary measures, and by a proviso in the 11th section any sale by a multiple or aliquot part of a pound might be made. In consequence of these provisos, and some decisions of the Courts upon them, the Act was entirely broken into, and at the present time there were all sorts of weights and measures in use throughout the country. Great inconvenience was occasioned to purchasers in ascertaining the proportion which these measures bore to the imperial bushel, and he believed, judging from the petitions which had been presented on the subject, that an alteration of the system was most anxiously desired. With respect to grain, he believed that the advantages of selling by measure were very great, and, above all things, such an arrangement was calculated to close the door against fraud. They were all, he believed, agreed in favour of uniformity in the system of weights and measures throughout the country. Some, however, contended for a system of uniformity by weight; others, like himself, for uniformity by measure in the sale of corn. Mr. Page, an eminent authority upon the question, and who wrote to The Times under the name of "Jacob Hardcastle," was examined before the Committee on the sale of corn which sat in 1834, when he stated that the proper mode of regulating the sale of grain was by measurement, although the most perfect mode would be measurement tested by weight. However, he only proposed to make it compulsory by the present Bill, that the sale should take place by measurement, and that was quite in accordance with the evidence of Mr. Page. What the Committee of 1834 recommended was, that corn should be sold by measure, tested by weight; and undoubtedly, by that plan, the purchaser arrived in the most certain manner at the quality of the grain; for, although a pound of bad corn might weigh as heavy as a pound of good corn, a bushel of bad corn would not weigh as heavy as a bushel of good corn. He did not, however, wish to attempt more than there was a probability of carrying out. He proposed, in the next place, that the copies of all weights and measures used for public purposes should be reverified from time to time; and the 3rd section of the Bill imposed a penalty upon all persons making or selling false beams and scales, or weights and measures, a provision strangely enough omitted from the Act of William IV. By the 4th clause of the Bill inspectors were empowered to examine the beams, scales, weights and measures used by persons huckstering in the streets, in the same manner as they were authorised to inspect those used in regular shops. Another section of the Bill provides that the owners of the market should supply beams, scales, balances, weights, and measures for the use of the market. That, he believed, was done at present in the case of Covent Garden Market, but nowhere else. Trusting, then, that the measure contained no provision in any way interfering with the liberty of the subject in the conduct of his trade, he should commit it to the indulgent consideration of the House.

said, he did not mean to oppose the Motion; but, in his opinion, corn ought to be sold by weight, and not by measure, and, indeed, that was the general practice throughout the country, and consequently those who advocated the adoption of the measure in the sale of corn really wished to make nine-tenths of the people of this country conform to practices of the remaining one-tenth. His hon. and learned Friend himself would, in reality, introduce a system of selling by weight, and not by measure. [Mr. LOCKE: By measure, tested by weight.] He really could not understand how selling by measure to ascertain the weight was not selling by weight. In a Bill which he (Mr. M'Cann) intended to introduce he proposed that corn should be sold by a pound avoirdupois, its multiples and its aliquot parts; and this he thought would be the most convenient system.

believed that the proposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman was calculated as nearly as possible to procure for the country an uniform system of weights and measures. The House must bear in mind that the sale by measure did not preclude any one from ascertaining at the same time what was the weight of the contents of that measure.

said, he was very glad that the hon. and learned Gentleman had introduced the Bill, and he wished him well through with it. At the same time he thought the question was surrounded with great practical difficulties, for he had heard many discussions upon similar questions, and never had he heard more dissonance of opinion than upon this subject. For his own part, he thought that the arguments in favour of the measure were fallacious, inasmuch as where, in some instances, 60lb. weight of corn went to a bushel, his own often weighed 64lb, or 65lb. Therefore, he hoped the hon. and learned Gentleman would allow himself plenty of time to mature his scheme.

said, he thought the attempt to reconcile two things so opposite as weight and measurement must be vain, he believed, also, that all schemes to produce uniformity of weights and measures throughout the country must be futile.

paid, he rose to move for copies of the Civil Bill Ejectment tried before James Major, Esquire, Q.C., Assistant Barrister for the county of Monaghan, at Castleblaney, at the last January Quarter Sessions, wherein Colonel Lewis was plaintiff and John Byrne was defendant; and, of the entry in the book of the clerk of the peace in relation to said ejectment, containing the names of the witnesses examined on behalf of the plaintiff and of the defendant. The defendant, John Byrne, was a tenant on certain property called Inniskeen, which was purchased by Colonel Lewis in the Incumbered Estates Court in 1855. Colonel Lewis, not content with devoting his attention to his duties as a landlord in the improvement of the industrial habits of his tenants, conceived he had another duty to perform, and introduced among them the religious and sectarian element. At the time of the purchase there was on the estate a national school, which, from all he (Mr. O'Brien) could learn, was conducted in a manner that gave the greatest satisfaction. This Gentleman, however, established another school on his own estates, and placed over it a scripture reader; and hero was the first invasion of the peace which reigned in the county of Monaghan. His tenant, John Byrne, was afflicted with a family of nine children, and Colonel Lewis made it a sine qua non that the children of this man, who was a Roman Catholic, should be sent for instruction— and religious instruction—to that school, from which he had excluded not only the Roman Catholic clergyman, but the Protestant clergyman of the district. John Byrne declined to allow them to be proselytised, and refused to send them to the school, and thereupon Colonel Lewis brought an action of ejectment against him at the sessions, and succeeded in evicting him from his farm. He (Mr. P. O'Brien) had given notice of his intention to bring this subject under the attention of the House before the recent change of Government; but when that event took place he allowed the matter to rest, in hopes that Colonel Lewis would be converted to a better frame of mind by the expression of public opinion. As that was not the ease, and as it was a case of great hardship, he thought it was right that the House should have an opportunity of declaring that it would not tolerate such proceedings.

seconded the Motion.

said, that the transaction took place in his own immediate neighbourhood in Ireland, and having inquired into the circumstances, he could confirm in the main the statement of the hon. Member. He believed it to be a very gross and most unfortunate case of the abuse of the legal power possessed by landlords in that country. The agent of Colonel Lewis fully admitted in a court of justice that the cause of the tenant's eviction was nothing more nor less than his refusal to take his children from the national school and to send them to the school established by his landlord. If there was a country in the world where the abuse of a landlord's power was more dangerous than another, it was Ireland, and if there was one district in Ireland whore it was likely to lead to more serious consequences than another, that was the district where this transaction took place. Indeed public meetings had already taken place and a good deal of excitement prevailed in the neighbourhood on this matter. The only way to remedy such abuses was to bring public opinion to bear upon them; and he trusted that one effect of this discussion would be to make landlords in Ireland exercise their rights in a more fair and temperate spirit.

said, he thought a great deal had been made of a very short and simple case, and he was glad that the subject had been brought forward in that House, where it could be discussed with- out that excitement to which the last speaker had alluded as existing in Ireland. The simple question was whether a gentleman, who provided gratuitously the means of education for the children of his tenantry was to be coerced by a mob headed by a Roman Catholic priest, and prevented disposing of his property as he liked. Colonel Lewis had built three schools on his estates; he maintained them entirely at his own expense; and, to avoid any appearance of undue influence upon the children of the peasantry, he refused to place them either under the Church Education Society or the National Board; and they remained entirely under his own control and supervision. With respect to the particular school now in question Colonel Lewis was invited by his tenants to build it, they offering, as in other cases, to assist by drawing materials. He agreed, and when the day came for opening the school Colonel Lewis was present, and was met, not by his own tenantry, but by a mob collected for the purpose of intimidating him, and headed, as he had already said, by a Roman Catholic clergyman— this "injured innocence," John Byrne, who had been made the stalking-horse, for the collection of money in all parts of Ireland, forming one of the party. The mob asked Colonel Lewis if he would put the school under the National Board, and he declared that he would not. Then this innocent man said, "Well, you may take your land; I will not live under you as tenant another day." As a matter of course the patriot was loudly cheered by the crowd; but afterwards, when he found that Colonel Lewis was not to be bullied, and began to think that be had done a very foolish thing, he changed his mind and wished to remain. But Colonel Lewis, having been defied before the world, thought it advisable to take him at his word; he therefore served him with a notice to quit his holding, not considering that he was a fit tenant to remain on the estates. An ejectment was brought and in due course was brought to a close, and the man was removed from his farm. He had no one to blame but himself for what had happened, unless it could be said that a tenant was to browbeat and injure his landlord, and set a bad example to all the other tenants.

said, that Colonel Lewis was in court when the declaration was made, but although challenged to give evidence he did not come forward to do so. At the trial of the appeal the J udge said that it was too late for him to make any explanation.

stated, that no practical result would follow the production of these papers.

said, that he did not press for them.

said, he rose to move that the House should on the following day resolve itself into a Committee to consider the expediency of providing for the repair of churches and the maintenance of churchyards by substituting for church rates such an annual renteharge upon all hereditaments, in respect of which church rates might now be lawfully assessed upon the occupiers thereof, as would most fairly represent the total annual amount now raised by church rates, such renteharge to he a fixed and uniform poundage on the rateable value of the hereditaments, and to be made a charge on the owners of the same. He had originally given notice of his intention to move this Resolution as an instruction to the Committee upon the Bill of the hon. Member for Tavistock (Sir J. Trelawny); but, to his regret, the forms of the House had pre-vented his taking that course, and consequently he was compelled to adopt the present mode of bringing it forward. The main principle of his Motion was to substitute for the present liability of the occupiers of lands and houses a renteharge upon the owners, confining the application of the money so raised to the repair of the fabric of the churches and the maintenance of the churchyards. During his canvass at the last general election he was, like most other hon. Members, much catechised upon the subject of church rates; but, although he had declared that he could not vote for their simple and total abolition, he received much support from the Dissenters. When he asked the opponents of those rates if they were desirous of seeing the sacred edifices in their parishes suffered to go to ruin, the reply was almost invariably in the negative; but when he asked how they were to be maintained in repair he received no satisfactory answer. There was in this country hardly any class of buildings more deserving of support than the churches. Unlike the mansions of the landowners, which were the property of individuals, and the use and enjoyment of which were confined to individuals, the parish church was the common property of all the inhabitants of the parish, for the most sacred and beneficial purposes, the worship of Almighty God and the teaching of his word. Those churches were scattered over the face of the land, they had been given, most of them ages ago, by pious and generous in- dividuals to their respective parishes, and their preservation had been duo to this, that by the law of the land the inhabitants of each parish had, as was declared in the Braintree case, the undoubted right to maintain and repair their church by taxing the property of the parish. He might here be met with a legal maxim, which was frequently referred to in this question, that the liability to maintain the fabric was a charge not on the land, but on the occupier in respect of the land. To his mind, however, this was only a specimen of legal dust, because, except in cafe of insolvency, it made no difference whether the charge was on the land or on the owner in respect of it. The burden and the incidence of the burden were exactly the same, whether the remedy for non-payment was against the land, as in the case of tithes, or by proceeding against the occupier, as in the case of poor rate. Mr. Rogers said, speaking of chinch rates, "Generally the property ought to be rated, and, though in form the rate is upon the person in respect of the land, yet in substance it is the land which is chargeable." That doctrine, the truth of which no reasonable man could doubt, received the fullest Parliamentary recognition in the Church Building Act, passed in the 58th year of the reign of George III., which provided that money should not be borrowed upon the security of the church rates without the consent of two-thirds in value of the owners of land being first obtained. This point, however, needed neither legal argument nor statutory authority. Could any man doubt that the owners of the land did, by receiving so much less rent, hour the burden of the church rate? It had been said that the amount was so small that it made no difference. That meant that if church rates were abolished the landlords throughout the country would not immediately raise their rents 2d. or 3d. in the pound. Probably they would not. They were most of them too generous and too careless to do anything of the kind, but in the course of time the thing would work itself out. Suppose any gentleman were about to purchase lay tithes, would he not, before making an offer, ask whether the tithes involved the maintenance of the chancel? and if they did, would he not then ascertain the average annual amount of that burden, and multiplying it by twenty or twenty-five, as the case might be, strike it off from the gross value of the tithes. And precisely the same was the case with a tenant before taking land; he naturally inquired what were the charges upon it, and he would consider the poor rates, church rates, and other outgoings before he determined what rent he ought to give. The law had been from time immemorial—namely, from before the Conquest—that the poor people of this country should have their churches repaired at the charge of the property of the parish, and the practical results was that the owners of that property bore the burden of these repairs. But by the Bill now before the House it was proposed to deprive the poor inhabitants of that ancient right, and to relieve the owners of property from their ancient burden. By returns before the House, it appeared that the money value of this right of the poor was £300,000 a year, which it was now proposed to make a present of to the landowners, who did not want it, had never asked for it, had done nothing to deserve it, and ninety-nine out of one hundred of whom objected to the abolition of church rates. His opinion on this subject—whether right or wrong—was shared in by a large number of the most eminent authorities in the country, although he was quite aware that a different view of this question was hold by the Dissenters of England. They naturally regarded the principle of religious equality involved in it and their own interests, which he admitted would be entitled to great respect and consideration if they were now forming a constitution and were acting independently of all those ancient habits and traditions under which we had grown up, and which were associated with the history of the country. If, then, such a division of opinion prevailed, was it fair, just, or reasonable, to assert that there was only one solution of the matter? The question was, in fact, one which admitted of a reasonable compromise, and it ought not to be settled in such a way as to give one party a triumph over the other. He admitted, that at present Dissenters had a reasonable ground of complaint. The burden being, generally speaking, a charge upon the owner, the manner in which the law had been worked out made it a practical grievance upon the Dissenters, because every shilling being raised by a vestry, which fixed not only the quantum to be levied, but also the application of it when levied, the vote was one in which the majority taxed the minority. That was in itself a perpetual vexation, and one advantage of the substitution which he asked the House to sanction was, that they would get rid of this occasion of strife and make the tax a fixed charge upon the owner of property. Such trifling things as the washing of surplices and other petty items of expense ought to be paid by the voluntary contributions of the congregation, and he did not wonder that Dissenters objected to provide them; but when a large outlay for repairs, or the reconstruction of an ancient church, had to be met in some poor country parish without a resident gentleman in it, the question assumed a totally different complexion. He was sure there was not a man in that House who did not feel that if church rates were unconditionally abolished, there would be great difficulty in maintaining the fabric of the Church in thousands of our country parishes. The question then arose, how the substitution of a charge or tax upon the landlord, instead of a rate made and paid by the occupier, was to be practically carried into effect. Three points were to be kept in view—first, that the change should be made with as little injury as possible to the owners of land; secondly, that efficient provision should be made for providing for the wants which it was proposed to meet; and, thirdly, that there should be as little interference as possible with the institutions of the country. One mode which suggested itself, was to ascertain the actual amount raised for the last year, and to commute that for a rentcharge of corresponding amount, payable by the landlord. But, although that plan had been successful in the ease of tithes, it could not be applied to church rates without combining the two faults of injury to the owner and inefficiency in providing for the wants of the Church, because, where the landowners and the inhabitants had most efficiently discharged their duty, and had maintained their church in good repair, the amount that had been raised would be the greatest, and the amount to be paid in future under the commutation would be the greatest also. On the other hand, in a parish where the church had been allowed to fall into decay for want of adequate rates, inasmuch as the levies had been small, the rentcharge would in future be small also, and the means of maintaining the church would therefore be in the inverse proportion to the requirements of the locality. If the plan of commutation were not adopted, they must resort to something in the way of substitution. It would be a hopeless task to attempt to untie every knot. The House, if they did anything at all, must take a broad view of the subject, preferring that plan which could be worked out in the fairest manner to all parties. If they substituted a tax upon the owner, that tax might be of two kinds. It might be an elastic charge, varying according to the wants of the parish, so that in some years there might be no demand at all made upon the owners; while in others it might be considerable in amount. That was the plan adopted in the Church of Scotland. In Scotland the repairs, and, if necessary, the rebuilding of a church and manse were provided for by a charge on the heritors of a parish; there being a legal power on the part of the local presbytery, which comprised the ministers and certain elected lay ciders of the district, to compel the heritors to discharge their duty in this respect if they neglected it. That method, however, would hardly be applicable to England; we had no such machinery, and our landowners were hardly prepared for the imposition of so stringent a system. A better mode of dealing with the question was to lay on all property now liable to church rates, a tax or rentcharge of fixed and uniform amount—that amount being such, that the sum collected over the whole of England would fairly represent the total sum raised in the form of church rates according to the last returns. The total sum thus raised was now £314,000 a year; but that amount included the interest and instalments annually payable on a debt of rather more than £300,000 borrowed on the security of the rates. Until the debt was liquidated, there must be, it was agreed, a power in the vestry to continue levying the rates. Deducting the interest and instalments, there would remain about £280,000 a year to be provided for. The latest returns showed the total annual value of the rateable property of the country assessed to poor rates to be £67,000,600 in 1850; and if he reckoned that it had increased by this time to £70,000,000, he would probably be within the mark. Striking off from this, the property charged for the maintenance of the chancel, and which could not be justly charged also for the maintenance of the nave, there would be between £65,000,000 and £66,000,000 of property liable to the impost left, on which a tax of 1d. in the pound would produce £270,000 per annum. The task of providing for an expenditure which varied so much from year to year as that belonging to the necessary repair of a parish church from a uniform charge of 1d. in the pound upon the lands and houses might not, at first sight, appear to be a very easy one. But he proposed to follow a principle very familiar to the House, and which was adopted in all friendly societies, in all assurance societies, and in the government of this country itself—the principle of throwing small fixed annual sums into a, common fund, out of which those who paid in should draw out larger sums from time to time as occasion might require. He understood there was an objection on the part of some hon. Members to that principle, and that they would prefer placing the payments, whether large or small, of each parish to a separate fund. That, however, was a matter of detail which might be fairly considered in Committee. In submitting the Motion of which he had given notice he proposed to omit the last four lines, which provided that the proceeds of the rent charge in each diocese should form a central fund from which grants might be made fur the repair of churches and the maintenance of churchyards, as he thought that part of his plan could be bettor discussed in the Committee if the Mouse thought fit to grant him one. An objection had been raised to his plan on account of its effect on parishes which had for some time refused to make church rates. The claim of particular parishes to withdraw themselves from the operation of a general tax, to be levied on the whole country for the benefit of the poorer inhabitants, did not appear to him to be a reasonable one. The body by whom church rates had been discontinued was practically a vestry of occupiers; and the body on whom the new tax would be imposed would be the owners. The occupiers had but a transitory interest in the property, and dissent prevailed to a larger extent among them than among the owners, and it might very well happen that the owners would not be disposed to resist the charge if the decision were left in their hands. But this, again, was a matter of detail, and it would be open to every member who thought that a particular class of parishes ought to be exempted from the proposed rent charge, to propose that in Committee, by way of exception, to the general measure. He earnestly hoped that both sides of the House would give a full and candid consideration to this question. The subject was one on which it was most desirable in the interest of all parties that peace should be restored. Nothing could be so injurious as the local agitation to which it now gave rise, and the mixing up of matters touching so closely on religion with the debates of that House was seriously to be deprecated. It could not be expected that the churchmen of England, with their earnest convictions that they were in the right, would all at once give way to the views of their opponents, however strongly entertained. Both sides must make up their minds to one of two things —either to accept a fair and reasonable compromise, or be prepared for a continuance of the existing strife and dissension. If twenty or thirty years ago the rate had been made in form as well as in reality a charge on the landlord, and had been confined to the maintenance of the fabric, did any single Member believe that we should ever have heard a syllable of objection to it from owner or occupier or any one else? The hon. Gentleman concluded by his Motion.

seconded the Motion.

:^* It has appeared in the debates on this Bill that the resistance to it arises chiefly from the feeling that, if we did away with church rates, we should be robbing the Church of her property, and that our next step will be to rob her of tithe as well. If that were so, it ought to be, and I think it would be, fatal to this Bill. Nothing could be more disastrous than that Parliament should trample on the sacred and inviolable rights of property. But are church rates the property of the Church? Surely not. It seems to me that no two things can stand further asunder than tithe and church rates. With respect to tithe, the law undoubtedly regards the rector of a parish as part owner of the land. Whatever right the landlord has to his rents, such precisely is the rector's right to his rent-charge. But does the law look upon the parish church as if it were a human being endowed with a lien upon the parish property? The law does not indulge in any romance or sentiment of the kind. With the plain good sense which marks English law, it merely takes the parish church for what it is; the law regards it as the property, as one of the goods and chattels, of the people in the parish. They are welcome to let that property down, or to keep it up; the sum total of what the law does is to cause the parish to act as a whole. That is to say, in this as in other parochial concerns, the lesser is made to yield to the greater number. As far as church rates go, the law takes no cognizance of the Church; it only recognizes and enforces parish self-government. Surely there is here no property, no possession of any kind, except indeed the legal enjoyment of a privileges by the majority of ratepayers. We need not, then, feel uneasy lost, in taking away that privilege from the ratepayers, we should be stripping the Church of wealth that belongs to her, or should be setting a precedent for the confiscation of tithes. This difficulty fades away when it is looked into, and we are left free to discuss the question as one of expediency; and, as a matter of expediency, it seems to me that, so far from dealing a blow to the Church by this measure, we shall root her more firmly in the hearts of the people. I am not one of those friends of the Church who would rather see her rich in money than rich in love; and in this matter we have to choose between the two. At the same time one cannot but feel some regret in pulling down an institution which has stood for ages. Nor can I help wondering at the heat of the Radical party on the matter, seeing that the church-rate system is both low church and democratic. It is low church, in that it treats the churches as the chattels of the people. It is democratic, in that it recognizes the power of majorities; in that it entrusts the care of the House of God to the people themselves; in that it allows the right of the poor man to be found by his richer neighbours in the means and appliances for worship, and not only for worship, but for the performance of the rites of baptism, marriage, and burial. Sir, one might have rejoiced had this holy trust been still regarded as rather a delight than a burden. But that is so no longer. In a vast number of parishes church rates are an unfailing spring of bitterness and ill-will. I have been surprised at the stress that has been laid on the fact (if it be a fact) that church rates have been carried in nine-tenths of the, parishes in which they have been asked. Why, Sir, we must know little of village politics, if we are unaware that the great mischief is not done where the opponents of church rates have got their way, but where they have been defeated. It is there that you find a grumbling and growling minority, who are made sore against the Church, and not only against the Church but against their clergyman, by having their money wrung from them. Now, I do not believe that the irritation caused by church rates usually springs from any conscientious horror about aiding a false religion. Some Dissenters may have scruples of that kind, but nowadays most of them are willing to look on the Church as their fellow-worker rather than their foe, and their objection to church rates has more sense in it. They dislike paying for our buildings and our services, not because it is a sin, but from a reluctance which, in the corrupt state of human nature, is not surprising—a reluctance to pay other people's bills for them. They say, and there is a kind of wild justice about it, that if we don't like catching cold in church, we had better send for the bricklayer to stop the holes up, but not charge the cost to them. They have their own chapels on their hands, and their own ministers, and they hardly see why they are to look after our comforts. For, after all, it is not a question of spreading the Gospel abroad, it is simply a question of comfort. And I really doubt whether it it not wrong, absolutely wrong, for us to squeeze other people's money out to pay for things with which they have no concern. We were told indeed, that it is the sacred indefeasible light of majorities to tax minorities; but surely that is only so for purposes common to the whole, not for those which touch the majority alone. So far then as Dissenters go, it is open to doubt, whether church rates are not the triumph of might over right; and I feel no doubt that it would be worth more than all the silver and gold we screw from them, that our Church should stand clean handed before them, instead of looking like a plunderer. But now, Sir, we must not fancy the whole clamour against church rates to be of this fair and respectable land. A large part of the outcry comes from those who belong to the Church of England—from those who share in the good things for which church rates pay. That outcry comes in some from principle; in more from mean stinginess. Notwithstanding, it would be well to stop it, for nothing, no, not even the feeling of ill-usage on the part of the Dissenters, does so much to keep the Church in hot water and set the pastor at loggerheads with his sheep. This, then, is the state of things that we have to deal with. Not only to those without her pale, but to those within it, these rates give our Church an ugly look of greediness and grasping, and, therefore, I cannot but wish the system of church rates to be swept away. But though we yield so far, still I think we are bound to weigh calmly and thoughtfully, whether any of the plans for raising money in the place of church rates are not worthy to be approved. It is a very nice thing, of course, to talk of not drawing money from people who don't like paying it; yet somehow or other the money must be got, and the question is, how to get it. The pleasant thing for us would be to put a vague trust in voluntary subscriptions, and let the matter take its chance. Surely that course would be more easy than right. It may be feared that, in many rural parishes, the churches would fall into disrepair; in many more into ruin. Most often, however, the work would be done. But by whom would it be done? It would be done mainly by the clergyman. Now, already the clergy spend far more on their neighbours than any other men do, in the way of schools, reading-rooms, clothing-clubs, and direct relief. I shrink from burdening them still more; I shrink for their own sake; and I shrink too lest those schools and charities should be skimped by this further claim. But above all, because it seems to me to set the matter on an utterly wrong footing. It is not for the clergyman's good, it is for the good of the laity that they should worship God; it is not the clergyman's matter, it is the laity's matter, that their churches should be snug, and the services well done. And yet, if we make a clean sweep of church rates, without setting up anything in their stead, we shall in reality force the clergyman to do for the laity, what the laity ought to do for themselves. On these accounts, and on many others, we are bound not to throw overboard the schemes that have been brought forward, without looking into them fairly, and thoroughly; and especially is such consideration due to the proposal to leave a share of the maintenance of the churches on the owners of land. This seems to me perfectly just, fair, and wise. No economist, I believe, denies that the church rate is reckoned in the rent paid for land. The bulk of it then has realty lain upon the shoulders of the landlord, and to abolish it would be to put money in the pocket of every squire in England. Of course if our farmers had not to pay church rates we should raise their rents. The hon. Baronet who moved this Bill dwelt on this, and he called on the landowners of England to aid him in passing it, because it would put money in their purses. Sir, I too would impress the same truth on what my hon. Friend the Member for Sandwich called the bucolic mind in this House. I would again remind the landowners in the House, that the abolition of the church rates will send into their pockets the money which used to go to keep up the parish churches; and I remind them of it, because I am persuaded that most of them would scorn to catch a penny in any such way. They might hold, as I do, that the present way of raising these funds is a vexatious and hurtful way; but the proposal not to readjust, but to repudiate, a burden which has lain for ages on their land, and to make a profit—a profit to which they have no claim—by the transaction—this proposal would not, I think, meet with acceptance. It would then be a fair and convenient settlement of the church-rate question, just as it was a fair and convenient settlement of the tithe question, to levy the money at once from those who have really to pay it in the long run, without first wringing it from the tenantry. It may be asked, how we shall do with a dissenting landlord? Those cases might be easily met. Experience has shown in the case of tithe that no practical difficulty arises on that point. Such cases in fact would not he very common, for there is no such persuasive eloquence to faith in the Thirty-nine Articles as that of broad acres. If, therefore, my hon. Friend the Member for Herts had proposed that in rural parishes, and in them alone, a small addition should be made to tithe for this purpose, I should have withdrawn the first of the Amendments of which I have given notice, and should have given this Motion my humble support. But, Sir, this Motion seems to be, not for merely making an addition to the tithe paid by landowners in the counties, but for throwing on the possessors of house property in towns a perfectly novel charge. And to that course there is this fatal objection, that it would stir up that very strife, that very exasperation, which it is our express object to allay. Sir, it seems to me that if we are not willing to trust the parish churches in towns to voluntary subscriptions, then there is no legitimate way of raising the money except by allowing pew-rents to be levied in the parish churches, just as they are already in most district churches. People seem to think pew-rents a strange and new tiling. Why, Sir, I do not hesitate to say, that there are thousands and thousands of churches in which pew-rents are raised, without the smallest difficulty or annoyance of any sort or kind. I know there is a feeling against them in the minds of many persons. But it seems to me that all the sound objections to them would fall to the ground, if, say a third of the sittings, were left free for the very poor, another portion were let at a rate low enough to be within the reach of respect-able working-men, and the remainder at the usual price. Those gentlemen who are most intimate with the working class in towns will agree with me in believing, that a low pew-rent would not keep them away from church, but would draw them to it. A main reason why the Dissenting chapel is more popular with town mechanics than the parish church is, that they pay for their sittings, and so feel a right to them. Nothing is so distasteful to the working-men of the better class as to be treated like paupers; nothing would attach them more to the Church than to feel that they had seats of their own; and this would be still more the case, if every man who paid for a sitting had a share in electing the committee who should lay out the money thus raised. The man who paid half-a-crown for his sitting might have one vote; the man who paid a pound might have eight votes. Thus the Church and its services would be kept up by those who would enjoy them, without any vexing declaration as to their being Dissenters or Churchmen. It seems to me that by such a plan two sound principles would be brought into action: those would pay for the commodities who used the commodities; those would manage the funds who provided the funds. I believe that by a small addition to the rent-charge in rural districts, and by graduated pew-rents in town, enough money would be raised to meet the running expenses. But, Sir, I would just add that many of our parish churches are not mere places of worship for the parishioners, but are architectural monuments of great value to the country. It is not fair to them, nor is it fair to the parishes in which they stand, that the whole weight of their repairs and restorations, which is much the heavier, because of their architectural splendour, that the whole of that burden should fall on the people of the place. It would be a fair equalization of the burden, and it would do much to preserve or to restore those architectural monuments, if a part of the cost were defrayed from the wealth of the whole Church; and I am persuaded that ample funds for such a purpose would be forthcoming, if the vast real property in lands, mines, and houses, belonging to the Church of England, and now administered by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, were all sold off and the proceeds invested in the funds. There is enormous waste, there is enormous pecuniary loss, in the attempt of the Church to play the part of landlord to property scattered throughout the country, the mere supervision of which involves a great outlay. If all those properties were brought to the hammer, and the money got for them were more judiciously invested, the Church would be very far richer than she is now, and might spend that extra income on the preservation of those ancient buildings, which ought to be her glory, but too often are her shame. The sum of what I have been saying is, that, by doing away with the church rates, we should not be trampling on the rights of property, or laying a stepping-stone to the confiscation of tithe. And that, although one cannot but fuel regret in laying the axe to such a time-honoured institution, this must be done, because church rates are not fair towards those without the Church, nor wise towards those within it. But that, if we leave the thing to be done by voluntary subscription alone, we shall lay upon a few generous men, and above all upon the clergy, a burden which it is the duty of all churchmen to bear. And that it would be set upon the right shoulders, if in country districts a small addition were made to the rentcharge; and in towns pew-rents were affixed in the parish as well as in the district churches; and if the extraordinary outlay, required by extraordinary architectural splendour, were partly met by a wiser investment of the wealth of the Church of England.

said, he saw an objection to the original Motion, which bore upon the propriety of an Amendment. They were told that church rates fell upon the landlords or owners. So they did, and those were the very men who complained, or who would complain; for the owners were many of them Dissenters. It was very likely that the man who at present saw his chair or table taken for church rates, had a more lively sense of suffering than the landlord who had only a dim and misty notion that 7s. 6d. might be ultimately deducted from his rent-roll. But let the landlords once sec the thing in the shape of a direct impost, and they would quickly be heard of in this House, with power greatly superior to that of the present complainants. The original Motion, if carried, would only be a phase through which they would pass to an increased resistance to church rates; and therefore he would second the Amendment.

said, it was his intention to negative the Motion of the hon. Gentleman. He must first, however, congratulate the Government on the fact that assistance in their difficulties had been thrown out to them from the opposition side of the House; for the Motion of the hon. Gentleman below him (Mr. Puller) was of the same nature as the suggestion of the noble Lord the Member fur London with regard to the India Bill, and it must have been quite a godsend. With regard to the plan of the hon. Gentleman, he did not think that it could be entertained, fur so far from providing a remedy for the existing state of things, it fixed the injustice still deeper. Church rates were at present a contingent tax, but the hon. Gentleman wished to make them permanent. In five years church rates would abolish themselves, whereas the hon. Gentleman now sought to make them perpetual. He did wonder then that hon. Gentlemen opposite should have received the plan of the hon. Gentleman with so much favour. As proposed, however, it was open to much criticism and, in his opinion, would never work. Who was to have the control of the central fund which must be established? Its distribution would cause continued squabbles among the clergy of different opinions in the Church as to who were to get the most of it; its management would be bad and be liable to jobbery. In fact, the speech of the hon. Gentleman answered itself. The hon. Gentleman proposed to make a present of church rates to the landlords. But the main objection was that the Motion was inconsistent with a solemn Resolution to which the House had come. No plan which involved anything but the entire abolition of the tax would succeed, and feeling that it was necessary to get rid of church rates altogether the House came to the Resolution which had been recently agreed to. The hon. Gentleman then came with his Motion which was a complete anachronism, and which went hack to the mediæval age of this question. If the same form of religion prevailed throughout the whole population, there might be something like justification for it; but where the number of Dissenters from the Established religion was so great, it was a great hardship to impose a general rate. With regard to the architecture of churches, he would contend that so far from church rates having tended to improve it, all that had been done in the way of the advancement of church architecture was duo to the voluntary principle. In fact he knew one church where, under the system of church rates, granite pillars had been whitewashed over, and he could mention another where the water came down into the pulpit in such abundance, that the unfortunate clergyman who preached last Sunday was almost washed away. He objected to the levying of pew rates—believing it to be desirable that churches should be open and free to all classes. It was said that the church rates were a fixed charge, and could not be abolished; but how did they differ from ministers' money, which had been abolished? He felt it incumbent on him, as having charge of the Bill for the abolition of church rates, to oppose the Motion.

said, he wished in a few words to recall to the recollection of the House the present position of this question. On Wednesday the House went into Committee on the Bill of the hon. Member for Tavistock (Sir J. Trelawny), when able speeches were delivered by men of the greatest weight in that House, and there seemed to be a disposition on all sides to come to some understanding on the subject. They were precluded, however, from amending the Bill before the House, or from dealing with the question of church rates, except in the way of simply abolishing them according to the principle of that measure. That was, no doubt, a very simple, but it was at the same time a very dangerous mode of dealing with the subject, and was not likely to be satisfactory to a large body of the Members of that House. There were, however, other courses which it was open to the House to pursue. There was the proposition of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire (Mr. Puller), which might be described as a commutation. Another plan was that proposed by the right hon. Gentleman (Sir G. Grey), which proposed to recognize the confiscation of church rates in all parishes where for a certain term of years the rate had been refused. But there was another mode of dealing with the subject which he thought entitled to the respectful consideration of the House, and that was the exemption of Dissenters from the payment of the rate. They were told that the Dissenters had conscientious scruples against paying the rate, and, though not willing to admit the force of the objection, he still thought it entitled to respect. He thought that on a person making a declaration and promising to take no part in the ecclesiastical business of the vestry for a year he should be exempted from church rates. He would not be denied the right of attending the church or receiving the consolations of religion, but he would be prevented from holding the office of churchwarden and interfering in the management of the church rate. It was his intention to bring in a Bill embodying this provision, which he thought, if carefully and dispassionately considered, would, without any sweeping innovation, relieve conscientious scruples and allay all ill-feelings.

said, he wished to state shortly why he could not support either the Motion or the Amendment. The Motion of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire (Mr. Puller) sought to impose a compulsory charge on the general property of the country for the maintenance of the Church; but the present church rates were a parochial charge, levied by the majority of a vestry only. Practically speaking, for a number of years, in 10 per cent of the parishes of the kingdom, including one-half of the population of the kingdom, church rates had been practically abolish- ed; but the hon. Gentleman sought to convert what was now a voluntary charge, levied partially, into a general compulsory charge. He proposed also to deprive the rate of its parochial character and make it into a diocesan charge, so that a parish might possibly not obtain the benefit of the whole sum which was collected within its limits. For these reasons he could not give his support to the Motion. The form in which the Amendment was put before the House was not quite correct. The hon. Member for Newport (Mr. Buxton), by an addition to the tithe charge, sought also to put an additional charge on property; but to effect that it would be necessary to move first, that the House resolve itself into a Committee on a certain day to consider the subject, which the hon. Gentleman had not proposed to do. Certainly, if the House should resolve to go into Committee on the Motion of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire, it would be competent for the hon. Member for Newport to move his Amendment; but as it stood at present it was not in order. Apart, however, from the question of form, he was not prepared to agree to the solution of this question as proposed in the Amendment. Either the House must make up its mind to abolish church rates altogether, or it must agree to some modification of them. It would never do to supply their place by an entirely new charge. The proposition made last year by the right hon. Baronet the Member for Morpeth to abolish church rates de jure in parishes where they had been practically abolished for a certain time, and in the other parishes to permit persons dissenting from the church of England to have their names struck off the rate, would have removed most of the objections to the present system. It was accepted by Sir William Clay, who had then had charge of the Church Rates Abolition Bill, as satisfactory to the Dissenters with whom he was acting, and if hon. Gentlemen opposite, who now seemed to wish for such a solution, had then consented to it, in all probability it would have become law.

said, that it appeared to him that the objection taken by the right hon. Gentleman opposite to the proposal was, that nothing should be done to interrupt the course of the House in abolishing church rates. He believed there was a large number of hon. Members anxious to consider the proposal of the hon. Member for Herts, For himself, he entertained a full conviction that, either now or hereafter, some such proposal as this, supported, he believed, by the great body of landowners, would afford the solution which the House desired—would remove the inconveniences incidental to the collection of church rates, while at the same time the fabric of the Church would be maintained, but maintained not out of pew rents, but out of the land. He did not think that the House would represent the interests or the feelings of the people if they rashly cast aside what must be considered as a direct offer on the part of a landowner, representing no doubt many landowners, on this question. It would not be a popular ground on which to go to their constituents, to tell them that they had refused to consider a proposal which would have relieved those who conscientiously objected to church rates, and at the same time would have furnished a fund from the land for the maintenance of the Church. He did not approve of that part of the proposal which related to a diocesan collection for the fund, but he had understood the hon. Member to say that he would consent to a modification of that part of his proposal in Committee, so as to reserve to each parish the amount levied from the proprietors within it. That would meet the objections of many Members on that side. He should not think that the House, acting with the circumspection and liberality which ought to characterise it, would refuse the hon. Gentleman the opportunity of submitting his plan to their consideration. There was a party in the House determined to abolish church rates as a stepping stone to the disestablishment of the Church, but he did not think that was the intention of the great number of Members who wished a settlement of this question. He believed they desired to maintain the Church for the poor, an object which the voluntary principle could not permanently effect, and he hoped they would not be so illiberal as to refuse to the hon. Member for Hertford the opportunity he wished to obtain.

said, when they were discussing the subject of church rates on Wednesday last he stated he thought the proposal of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire (Mr. Puller) a fair matter for deliberation. He had now heard the discussion on this subject and had examined the proposition of the hon. Member, and he must say the two objections which had been taken by the right hon. Gentle- man the Member for the Radnor district appeared to him to be sound objections against the proposal of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire. He thought it objectionable to impose a rent charge upon property which had been for a long time exempted from the payment of church rates. He also considered it objectionable to place the control of the rate in the hands of a body in each diocese. As long as the charge existed, it ought to be a parochial one. With regard to the subject itself, he had only to say that he really could not understand how they could have a national Church Establishment without some provision or other for repairing its places of worship. They had such a provision both in Scotland and in Ireland, and it did seem to him that it was unreasonable to say, that they should have a provision to maintain the minister, but no provision to maintain the churches. He was ready to listen to any reasonable proposal for a substitute for church rates. Although he felt great objections to the proposal of his right hon. Friend the Member for Morpeth (Sir G. Grey), he would be ready to consent to it rather than leave the matter as it had been, an occasion of strife. He was willing, he repeated, to consider any fair proposal on the subject, but if they came to the question of an absolute abolition of the rate he must vote against that as a violation of the principle of a Church Establishment.

said, that the whole question was, whether they should go into Committee. He thought that his hon. Friend the Member for Hertfordshire (Mr. Puller), in his able speech had demonstrated in the plainest terms that to abolish church rates was, in other words, to put money into the pockets of the landlords which did not belong to them. But, at the same time he could not but feel that the objection taken to the specific proposition of his hon. Friend by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Radnor district (Sir G. C. Lewis) was really an unanswerable one. Whatever they did as a compromise, he thought they ought not to put a new charge on property. As the right hon. Member for Morpeth (Sir G. Grey) was not in his place, would the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Radnor allow him (Mr. Walpole) to request him to press on his late Colleague the propriety of bringing forward substantially the proposition which he announced when he occupied a seat on the Treasury Bench? With part of that proposition he (Mr. Walpole) agreed, and with part of it he could not agree. As to that part of it which said absolutely that they were to abolish church rates because they had not been levied, he thought that was wrong in principle. That part of the plan which said where church rates had not been levied for two years they were not to be levied hereafter, he considered would be holding out a mere premium to agitation, and therefore he could not consent to it. But that part of it which provided that an opportunity should be afforded to proprietors notwithstanding the mortmain laws, of voluntarily charging their land with the amount of the church rates which had been paid in respect of that land, so as to raise a fund for the maintenance of the fabric, was a proposition so reasonable and just in itself, that he could not but regret that it had never been put to the vote in that House. He thought that would be a reasonable and just form of compromise; and he could never see the reason why, conjointly with that plan, a person entertaining a conscientious objection to the payment of church rates should not be absolved from them, provided he was willing to forego the privileges which belonged to a member of the Established Church. Some such plan as that would be to his (Mr. Walpole's) mind a proper settlement of this question. The question, certainly, was one of great difficulty; but that difficulty arose rather from the manner in which it had been treated in that Mouse than from any inherent difficulty in itself. In the meantime he could only say that, while opposing the Motion of his hon. Friend (Mr. Puller), he certainly never could consent simply and solely to vote with the hon. Baronet (Sir J. Trelawny) that church rates should be abolished without an equivalent, which was merely putting money into the pockets of those to whom it never belonged. He believed Parliament was now prepared to accept a compromise in this matter, and he hoped the House would resolutely apply their minds to make it a just and equitable one.

said, the occupants of the Treasury Bench were so much accustomed to derive aid from hon. Members on the Opposition side, that he was not surprised at the appeal which the right hon. Gentleman who had just spoken had made to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Radnor to get them out of trouble. If the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) thought that the Church Rate Abolition Bill, which had passed a second reading, was in itself so very detrimental, why did he not, in his character of a Minister of the Crown, come forward with a proposition agreeable to his own feelings and in accordance with the principle of his objections? From that straight forward course the right hon. Gentleman shrank, and then came to that (the Opposition) side of the House to ask them to assist him in the performance of his duty. He (Mr. Roebuck) was not inclined to do the duty of anybody. And when the right hon. Gentleman said the House had not discussed this question, did he recollect that, when the noble Lord the Member for Tiverton was in office, the House passed the second reading of this Bill, which involved its principle? What was the principle of the Bill? Why, that church rates should be abolished. That they were to he abolished he (Mr. Roebuck) was convinced; and he and those with whom he acted were determined that they should be abolished. They did not intend to enter into any compromise. Compromise was the very breath on which the occupants of that (the Treasury) Bench existed. The promoters of this Bill would have nothing to do with compromise. They were determined to get rid of church rates, and during the present Session too. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) said that the speech of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire had not been answered; but at that hour—twelve o'clock—what time was there for answering it? No grounds had been shown why church rates should be made a distinct charge on the land. The charge was in the individual will of the parishioner; and if that seal could not be broken off the bond, it would be impossible to support the proposition of the hon. Member. One-half of the parishioners of the country had refused to pay church rates, and now the hon. Member came forward to ask the House to make them a permanent charge on the rental of the land. Was nut this, then, a new tax; and could this new proposition be brought in aid of the old law? Not a hit of it; and they were determined that it should not be. He did not intend at that time to occupy the attention of the House; but if the question were to be argued as a politico-economical question, he should be prepared to go into it, if brought forward at a time when it could be argued. The principle was already before the House; it had passed a second reading, and it was in Committee, and in that Committee it should be decided whether it should go out as a Bill or not.

said, he rose only for the purpose of expressing a hope that the hon. Member for Hertfordshire would take the opinion of the House upon the Resolution. He thought it was not open to the objection urged against it by the right hon. Member opposite (Sir G. C. Lewis) because the obligation was at present on the parish to provide the necessary funds. The principle of the Resolution was nothing more than to substitute for the existing common-law obligation a certain nominal pecuniary charge, which would be less in amount than the existing charge. It had been said that the effect of it would be to revive the charge where it had become virtually extinct. This objection might be met and provided against in Committee. He should vote for the proposal of the hon. Member for Hertfordshire or for the Amendment, as he believed that the clergy of the country would welcome any proposal that would provide for the maintenance of the parish churches.

explained that in the remarks he made with respect to the state of the law, he referred to the decision of the House of Lords in the Braintree case, which was to the effect that, legally, church rates could only be made by a majority of the vestry; and, if they refused, there was no power to compel them to make them.

said, that the right hon. Gentleman would find that in the Braintree case the law was also laid down by the Judges as he (Mr. Wig-ram) had stated.

said, he would withdraw his Amendment.

in reply said, he wished to make one remark in reference to an observation made by the hon. Baronet the Member for Tavistock (Sir J. Trelawny), to the effect that the present Motion was a godsend for the Government. All he could say in reference to that observation was, that it was not he, but the hon. Baronet himself, who contributed to seat the present Ministers in office. Having a clear opinion that there should be a reasonable and fair compromise between different parties in the Church of England holding strong opinions on this question, he thought himself justified in bringing forward the proposition now before the House; but after the manner in which the Motion had been received by the Government and by the noble Lord the Member for London, he felt that, as far as he was concerned, he should be wrong in putting the House to the trouble of dividing, and therefore he was billing to withdraw his Motion.

said, that he wished to move the adjournment of the House, and he should persist in that Motion if he should not receive from the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Lygon), who had given notice of his intention to move for leave to introduce a Bill for the amendment of the law of church rates, an assurance that he would not do more, if the sitting were continued, than merely bring forward his Motion without any comment, for the purpose of having the measure introduced and printed.

said, he did not wish to do more upon that occasion than to move, without entering into any explanation, for leave to introduce his Bill.

said, he hoped the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) would not persist in his Motion for the adjournment of the House, but would allow them to proceed with the Orders of the day, to which he believed no opposition would be offered, and which it was very desirable that they should at once advance a stage.

said, that if the hon. Member for Tewkesbury were to introduce his Bill, he should rather that hon. Gentleman accompanied his Motion with an explanation. He was not disposed to take any unfair advantage of the hon. Gentleman, although he could not think that he and his friends had been well treated on Wednesday last, when the debate on the Church Rate Abolition Bill was prolonged until an hour when it became impossible to take a division upon it.

said, he rose to offer an explanation of the course he had pursued on Wednesday last, but was met by cries of "Spoke."

said, he thought there was nothing unfair in the course taken on Wednesday last by the opponents of the Church Rate Abolition Bill. They had merely sought to afford the House an opportunity of considering on a future day a compromise of that question, founded on principles which had received the approval of the right hon. Gentleman the late Chancellor of the Exchequer, and of the right hon. Gentleman the late Secretary for the Home Department.

said, that if the opponents of church rates pressed the Motion for the adjournment, in order to prevent the introduction of this Bill, they would prove that their object was to prevent the settlement of this question.

said, he would recommend his hon. Friend to withdraw the Motion for the adjournment of the House, and suggested that the hon. Member for Tewkesbury should select another day for the introduction of his Bill.

said, he would call attention to the fact that it was then twenty minutes to one o'clock, and remind his hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury that if this Motion was defeated, it might be repeated as soon as he had addressed the House.

said, he would consent to postpone his Motion until Wednesday, with the view of finding some day on which he might bring it forward; at the same time he wished to disclaim having been actuated by factious motives on Wednesday last.