said, he was desirous of saying a few words in order to remove a misapprehension which seemed to prevail that there was any conflict between this Bill and the Epping Forest Bill which he had himself introduced, and which stood for second reading that evening. The object of this Bill was to enable the Corporation of London to purchase the manorial and private rights in Epping Forest for the purpose of applying them to public purposes; and he did not suppose that his hon. and gallant Friend opposite the Chairman of the Metropolitan Board of Works (Colonel Hogg) would oppose the second reading, but would rather desire that it should be referred to the Select Committee upstairs, where only its details could be properly considered and discussed; and the question could be there raised whether the Corporation might not apply its own property to an object much more useful than the festivities in which they at present spent it. There was, moreover, a misapprehension regarding the connection of the Chief Commissioner of Works and the Corporation property. Now, he had no responsibility and no duties relating to the government of the metropolis; but he had invested in his hands the administration of a large amount of Crown lands not only in the metropolis, but throughout Great Britain, and extending as far as China and Japan. His own Bill only redeemed a promise given last Session, so as to fully carry out the policy of the House that Epping Forest should be maintained as an open space.

said, he could assure the right hon. Gentleman and those who had charge of the Bill, that he should offer no objection to the second reading; but the Metropolitan Board of Works would take care to protect the interest of the ratepayers.

asked the Chief Commissioner of Works, When it is intended to pull down the unoccupied houses in Abingdon Street, which have been purchased by the Office of Works under the powers of the Act 30 and 31 Vict. c. 40; and, whether it is his intention to carry out the works authorized by that Act for the security of the Houses of Parliament?

said, he was not aware that it was necessary to carry out any works for the security of the Houses of Parliament; but with regard to the first Question, the Treasury had ordered the houses to be pulled down, and that order would shortly be carried out.

asked the Secretary of State for War, Whether he will take into consideration the desirability of building dormitories for the children of married soldiers in all new barracks, and of adding the same, as far as practicable, to those barracks now in existence?

Sir, we have not, as yet, completed the provision of separate quarters for married soldiers in the older barracks, for which money is annually voted in the Estimates. In the meantime, the introduction of short service will do much to diminish the necessity for an expenditure which would otherwise have become very considerable.

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Select Committee on the Master and Servant (Wages) Bill will receive evidence; and, if not, why not?

replied, that it was the Bill, and not the subject itself which had been referred to the Committee. The Committee was not empowered to take evidence, because, in the opinion of the Government, there was ample information contained in the Reports of Select Committees, and of Commissions by whom the subject had been considered, more especially of the Commission of 1871. To enlarge the inquiry would, in the opinion of the Government, tend to defeat the object of the measure.

said, that in consequence of the answer of the right hon. Gentleman, he would on Friday move that it be an Instruction to the Committee to receive evidence.

I wish, Sir, to ask, When the explanatory letter with regard to the proceedings before the Geneva Tribunal will be laid upon the Table of the House?

said, he desired, before the Question was answered, to put another, of which he had given private notice to the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Gladstone). They had no right to inquire the grounds upon which the Government based their hope of bringing this matter to a favourable conclusion, nor did they wish to know the arguments on which the Government intended to rely. What, however, the country desired to know, and had a right to learn, was the exact decision at which the Government had arrived. ["Order!"]

said, that the hon. Gentleman was out of Order in employing arguments, and must confine himself to stating facts hearing on the Question which he desired to put.

then asked, Whether Her Majesty's Government had presented the Counter Case, subject to the denial on the part of Her Majesty's Government that the Indirect Claims were either within the jurisdiction of the Arbitrators, or that they, the Arbitrators, had any power to determine whether the Indirect Claims were within their jurisdiction or not; or, whether the reservation made by Her Majesty's Government was limited to guarding the right to protest against any award made under the head of Indirect Claims, or on account of such Claims?

Sir, I may answer the last Question put by the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Cumberland (Mr. Percy Wyndham) by saying that, as I understand it, the reservation of Her Majesty's Government is a reservation of all their rights whatever, and is not limited to any particular points. But the substantive part of my answer to him will be my answer to the right hon. Gentleman opposite, who has asked me when the explanatory letter will be laid upon the Table of the House. By "explanatory letter" I presume he referred to what I call the Statement accompanying the Counter Case. It will be laid, together with the Counter Case, on the Table of the House, formally, to-morrow, although I am afraid that as one of the documents is very bulky, two or three days may elapse before the copies are actually placed in the hands of hon. Members.

I thought the expression "explanatory letter" was borrowed accurately from the right hon. Gentleman; however, I am perfectly willing to adopt it in the sense he uses it for the convenience of the moment. But what I wish to know is, whether this Note may not be in the hands of hon. Members without waiting for the Counter Case? It would be extremely convenient to the House—and I believe satisfactory to the country—that we should be in possession of the precise language used in that document.

The Note is a very brief document, and I see no reason why it should not be in the hands of hon. Members on Wednesday morning. [Cries of "To-morrow."] I do not quite see how that can be done.

Then it is understood the House will be in possession of the Note and the language in which the Counter Case is presented to the Council of Geneva certainly by Wednesday morning?

assented.

asked the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight, From what newspaper he the other night read a paragraph stating that eight persons in Taunton, whose names were mentioned, were members of the International, and were said to have signed the Republican document? As a matter of fact, no such persons existed in Taunton, for that borough was as loyal as ever.

said, had the hon. Member given him Notice of the Question, he would have brought the extract with him; but he would endeavour to find it and communicate it to the hon. Gentleman, because he quite agreed in thinking it a matter which should be cleared up. But, as the House knew, he never made a statement except upon well-founded authority. ["Question!"]

The Question is, that Returns be ordered of the number of Houses assessed to House Duty in the year ending on the 5th day of April 1871, in each county and division of a county in England and Wales, distinguishing the number charged as follows:—Under £30; £30 and under £50; £50 and under £100; £100 and under £150; £150 and under £200; and so on, rising progressively £50; and, showing also the total amount received in each county and division of a county (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper No. 384, of Session 1867).

rose to Order. A question having been put to him, he wished to know whether he was not entitled to state the authority on which he had made his statement. He read from a printed document extracted from a newspaper, and he should be happy to communicate it to the hon. Gentleman, while, at the same time, he was very happy to hear that the Society had no branch in Taunton.

proposed to omit the 5th sub-section of the clause, which made it penal to take any ballot paper from the polling station without authority. He condemned the punishment of two years' imprisonment enacted in the sub-section as being inordinately severe.

supported the Amendment, and remarked that the liberty of concealing one's vote would be bought too dearly if it carried with it—as it would under this clause—the risk of being imprisoned with hard labour for two years through an act which might be the result of accident, If it were impossible to work the Bill except by pains and penalties, the Committee should not proceed further with it.

hoped that the Amendment would not be pressed, for if he had not attempted to guard against the secresy of the Ballot being evaded, he believed he should have been blamed by hon. Members on both sides. That was not only the last of the precautions against the "Tasmanian Dodge," but it had an object which would be admitted to be of considerable importance, for without it, there would be no penalty against any agent, or even against the Returning Officer himself—if such a supposition were allowable—sending out voting papers for the purpose of influencing the election. An agent might get hold of a voting paper, send it out, and thereby the stamp might be imitated, for it was possible that a man might take hold of his voting paper, and afterwards coming to a conclusion that he would not vote, might put it into his pocket and go out. It was very desirable that the voter should not do that, because that voting paper might get into the hands of some person outside. At the same time, care should be taken to prevent an innocent act from being punished as criminal, and he would therefore propose to add to the clause a proviso, to the effect that nothing in that section should render any person liable to any penalty for putting into the ballot box any paper other than that authorized by law, or for taking any ballot paper out of the polling station, unless he did it fraudulently.

condemned such penal legislation as this in a Bill intended to encourage people to vote, and believed that these penalties would deter voters from going to the poll at all, and thus increase the apathy already existing among the electoral body.

suggested that a great deal of time might be saved in the discussion of that Bill if the right hon. Gentleman would adopt the proposal he had repeatedly brought before him both as to the material of a voting card and as to the mode of taking the votes. In the polling room compartments similar to those in the telegraph office of that House should be fitted up opposite to where the Returning Officer sat, and to each voter a card should be issued in which nothing could be concealed or wrapped up. Then they would only want one policeman to see that nobody interfered with the voter in the compartment, and another to see that the voter as he passed along dropped his voting card into the ballot box through a hole like the slit in a letter-box.

, in reply to the hon. Member for Rochester, said, that many hon. Gentlemen had offered him plans, to discuss which might occupy weeks. His hon. Friend's plan was a very good one among others; but it would easily be within his ingenuity, and much more within the ingenuity of the hon. Member for Whitehaven, to propose a great number of Amendments in that plan.

thought the sentences to be imposed under the 3rd clause were disproportionate to the offences against which they were directed. His experience in the administration of the criminal law led him to believe that the threat of a very severe penalty did not deter so much as the certainty of conviction and punishment. In the case under notice, two years' imprisonment with hard labour would be nothing to an habitual criminal; but it would be excessive in the case of any person committing the offences in question, which were being created offences for the first time by statute, for those persons might naturally be supposed not to be of the habitual class. He should have thought that the penalty of six months' imprisonment would render conviction more probable, and would be effective to deter from the commission of the offence.

said, the question before the Committee was, whether the provision they were speaking of was to be considered an offence at all. After that was decided, it was open to his hon. and learned Friend to raise the question whether the penalty proposed was too severe.

thought that the course of proceeding adopted by the right hon. Gentleman showed an absence of knowledge of human nature. All hon. Members of that House must know the large class of persons who would not pledge themselves to go to the poll, and such persons were not likely to provoke such punishment as was proposed. The first person likely to be punished would be some blundering, honest fellow, while clever, unscrupulous persons might continue to evade the law.

said, there were two classes of offences mixed up in this clause, which were of a very different nature—forgery, and marking the papers. That difficulty might be met by leaving out the sub-section.

said, that the Bill bristled with misdemeanours; for it, among others, made it a misdemeanour punishable with two years' imprisonment to take without due authority a paper out of the polling station. He should like to know what the due authority was, for he saw no explanation on the point in the Bill. Two or three lines in the last part of the clause made the attempt to do the same thing a misdemeanour, and when such a heavy penalty was proposed to be inflicted it was desirable that the Committee should be informed what constituted the due authority. He wished also to know what was meant by an attempt to "go out" to which the Bill referred? He desired also to be informed when these charges of offences were to be tried? He thought it was making legislation almost ridiculous to inflict such heavy penalties for offences of such a trifling nature.

said, he deemed it necessary that some such words as those under consideration should be introduced, and at the end of the clause he would move a proviso, which would remove any ground for apprehension on the part of the right hon. Gentleman.

protested against this Star Chamber legislation on the part of a Liberal Government. It seemed that the right hon. Gentleman did not understand the character of the people with whom he had to deal. Much had been said about the horrors of corruption and abominations of bribery, but that was all House of Commons' talk. He ventured to say that among the people of this country no moral turpitude was supposed to attach to the practice of bribery. What were they trying to do now? The right hon. Gentleman was trying to create new offences, and invest them with all the odium attaching to forgery and theft. The right hon. Gentleman would never get the people to believe that abstracting a paper out of the ballot box was really a moral offence. There was an old saying that "All was fair in love and war," and that was the feeling that prevailed with respect to electioneering tactics.

said, it must be remembered that there was no public prosecutor in England, and it would be possible for any man to punish a political enemy in a matter of that kind, and he thought that was a power which ought not to exist in the hands of any man.

said, he had always been ready to assist the right hon. Gentleman; but he was afraid that on this question he could not go along with him. The difficulty in this case might be provided for under another section, and the Solicitor General might improve his knowledge of the Bill by looking at the 6th section. He objected to the creation of these new offences, and afterwards fixing the penalties. He thought the penalties should be discussed in the first instance. He had already handed in an Amendment to strike out the words "with or," which would get rid of hard labour. He hoped some other hon. Member would strike out the words "two years," which would be an advantageous mode of dealing with another part of the sub-section.

believed the creation of all these new offences would deter many electors from exercising the franchise which had just been conferred upon them. A person going into a telegraph office thought nothing of taking away a blank telegraph form; and many persons would attach no more criminality to the taking away a ballot paper. The penalty attached was out of all proportion to such an offence.

asked, how the public could be made aware of the enormous penalties attached to these new crimes?

had no doubt that honest voters would be found proclaiming aloud how they had exercised the franchise. The Ballot was not necessary for honest people; it was simply to protect the knaves. He was astonished to find Draconian penalties attached to these new offences.

observed, that the penalty did not, as the hon. and gallant Baronet imagined, in the slightest degree apply to any voter saying which way he had voted. He was asked how the constituency were to be informed of this law? That was an objection which applied to every penal provision proposed by Parliament. But the apprehension of the hon. Gentleman who put the question would be considerably allayed by the fact that there were 650 hon. Members, and generally two candidates for each seat; so that there would be more than 1,000 individuals whose interest it would be, backed by an array of agents and friends, to inform the constituencies how the vote was to be taken.

said, he had called the attention of the Committee the other night to a danger which was sometimes found to exist with reference to pillar letter boxes, and which might be extended to ballot boxes—namely, the introduction of explosive or dangerous materials into the ballot box during the poll. That was a point of very considerable importance in his opinion, and the Solicitor General had promised to take the subject into consideration. The hon. and learned Gentleman had informed him that the point had occupied his attention, and that he considered the case was met by sub-section 6. What he wished to point out to the Government was this—that under the provisions of the Bill the voter was bound to place his ballot paper in the box; whereas if the presiding officer was to place the paper in the box in the presence of the voter, there would be no necessity for many of the penal enactments contained in the Bill. The point to which he wished to call attention was one which the Postmaster General would appreciate, because it had been found that, in pure mischief, fusees and explosive substances were dropped into private and pillar letter boxes; and, if a ballot box were supposed to contain a large number of votes antagonistic to a party, nothing would be easier than for their voters to fold up such substances with their voting papers. These substances were not bulky, and it would not require a juggler to introduce them into the ballot box. He would suggest that, if the right hon. Gentleman would insert a provision to compel the presiding officer to put the ballot papers into the box, he would effectually prevent that kind of abuse.

would bear the suggestion in mind, though he did not think there was any danger which this sub-section did not sufficiently guard against. He might, however, explain that Government had framed the clause as it now stood, because they thought that the voter would have more confidence if he put in the paper himself.

moved the omission of sub-section 6, which had reference to the gravest offence that could be committed against the secresy of voting. If a party of rioters broke open the ballot box and scattered the voting papers, in order to prevent the result of the voting from being known, the offenders were only liable to two years' imprisonment, with hard labour. He maintained that the offence ought to be declared felony and more severely punished. The hon. and learned Member said he did not intend to press his Amendment.

moved an Amendment, to the effect that the offences set forth in the clause should subject the offenders to imprisonment, with hard labour, for the term of six months only, instead of two years. He thought the shorter term would be an adequate punishment for the offences named, and cited the saying of a distinguished person—Sir Francis Burdett—that nobody who had not experienced it could conceive the misery and tedium of three months' imprisonment, even under the most favourable circumstances, for it should be remembered that he had his friends to dine with him in the Marshalsea every day.

pointed out that six months' imprisonment was not a sufficient punishment for forgery, whereas it was too severe a one for the offences named in sub-sections 3, 4, 5, and 6.

remarked that the offences were very badly grouped together. Six months' imprisonment would not be a sufficient punishment for forgery, and, in his opinion, the offence of destroying a ballot box ought to be placed in a clause by itself with a very severe punishment attached. As the matter stood, he should vote for the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Ipswich (Mr. West), as the alterations he had suggested might be introduced on the Report.

said, that two years' imprisonment was the maximum punishment which could be inflicted under the Bill, and that the Judge who tried each case would be able to apportion the sentence according to the magnitude of the offence. The punishment proposed by the clause was, in his opinion, sufficiently mild. The offence to be dealt with was forgery, which, in the case of a bill of exchange, for instance, was punishable with penal servitude for life; but the Bill simply proposed to render the offence punishable with a maximum of two years' hard labour, or the same penalty as was now awarded to misdemeanour with the addition of the hard labour.

complained that in a penal section like this, there was a great want of precision and an inequality of punishment in respect of different offences. He suggested that the right hon. Gentleman should withdraw the clause, and re-consider the whole matter.

thought that hon. Members forgot that the Judge would have a discretion to apportion the punishment within the limit of two years. This limit had been inserted, because it was desired that the punishment should be accompanied by hard labour, which would not be the case if the period were longer. It was true that one or two of the offences in the section might appear to be trivial; but in that case it would be provided that there must be a fraudulent intent. Hon. Members might be somewhat misled by the use of the word "forgery;" but he believed that he was right in saying that the offence was at common law only a misdemeanour, whilst forgery was by statute a felony.

asked, how the offence of forgery was to be proved in connection with a ballot paper which was not to be signed with any man's name?

explained that the proper meaning of "to forge" was "to fabricate;" and that word was correctly used in the Bill. If a man initiated a genuine paper, even although there were no signature, he would be guilty of forgery. A man might forge the body of a deed, or part of a bank note, without doing anything with a signature.

still wanted to know how a forgery was to be committed in the case? If there were a ballot paper worded exactly as the genuine paper, would that be a forgery? The words in the section were copied from the University Elections Act, where they were properly used, because in those elections the paper was signed by the voter.

said, that if a man copied a ballot paper, and put a mark upon it, that would be forgery.

recalled the attention of the Committee to the fact that the question was, whether the punishment should be two years or six months; and added that he should support the proposition that it should be six months. In the case of a great number of papers being destroyed or fabricated, each separate paper would, in his opinion, constitute a separate offence, so that such an offender could be adequately punished. A large penalty would, in his opinion, induce juries not to convict; and a mild punishment, with certainty of conviction, would be better than a large punishment accompanied by a difficulty in obtaining a conviction.

could not see if they were going to reduce the penalty to six months' imprisonment, why these offences should not be triable by the magistrates in quarter sessions. He believed that two years' imprisonment was by no means too heavy a punishment for forgery and tampering with the ballot box, and he trusted, therefore, that the Government would not give way upon the point.

hoped that the right hon. Gentleman would not give way upon this question, for some of the offences referred to in the section would be most serious; because half-a-dozen men might, by a preconcerted scheme carefully carried out, vitiate the election, and practically alter the representation of a great constituency for six years.

observed, that he had not in the course of the debate on this Bill heard any opinion which amounted to such a condemnation of the measure as the one to which the Committee had just listened. If the Ballot were to introduce those things, would they not be safer with open voting?

thought that these were only imaginary evils. It should be considered that if the penalties were made too severe juries would be reluctant to convict. He was afraid, also, that the fear that some of these offences might be inadvertently committed might keep many ignorant voters from the poll. He should vote for the Amendment.

objected that offences of a wholly different character were to be met with the same punishment. He should himself vote for the Amendment, and, so far as the offence of forgery was concerned, he should leave the Government to get out of the mess as best they could.

did not object to the point which the hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite (Colonel Barttelot) had made against the Ballot Bill, and he would candidly admit—though candour was sometimes an unfortunate quality in anyone who had charge of a measure—that there were evils in the measure which they had to weigh against the advantages which they expected to derive from its passing. He had no doubt that the opponents of the Ballot Bill were delighted when they were discussing these penal clauses; but as there was the possibility that the system of the Ballot might give rise to new offences, it was his duty to provide for such things. It seemed on one side to be overlooked that the Judges would exercise a discretion as to punishment; and on the other, those who advocated severity of punishment should bear in mind that public opinion would require a certain amount of education in these matters, and it would be better to err on the safe side, and try first a low penalty, in the hope that it would succeed, and that there would be no necessity for severer resources.

thought that the whole system of vote by Ballot would be looked upon as a good joke, and the man who successfully evaded it would be the hero of the day. From the moment they did away with the possibility of a scrutiny, they would open the door to the most unmitigated corruption. It was perfectly impossible that the new system would survive more than one General Election. The fact was, that the country would not stand the helpless and endless confusion it was sure to create, and the right hon. Gentleman and his supporters would bitterly regret that so much time and trouble had been wasted in adjusting the details of a so-called reform that would turn out so impracticable.

did not see the distinction made between the different offences. He considered the stealing of the ballot paper as a greater crime than the mere forging of it. He was in favour of making one year's imprisonment applicable to all the offences created under the Bill.

did not see the necessity of creating six offences merely to do away with the evils of personation. Was it worth while to go on with a Bill which was promising to be so impracticable?

said, he did not think his right hon. Friend was formed of such squeezable material as he had proved to be. He, in the first instance, assumed the severity of Draco, and then, on a slight pressure, he gave away entirely—

"When pleasure begins to grow dull in the East, He orders his wings and is off to the West."

remarked that the hon. Member for Waterford had great experience in farces; but he thought he would find six months' hard labour no pastime.

said, he had no doubt six months would be sufficient.

suggested that the clause should be remodelled. Those guilty of infringing the 1st and 2nd sections, forbidding the forgery of nomination or ballot papers, he recommended should be liable to a penalty not exceeding two years; those guilty of the other minor offences might be punished by imprisonment not exceeding six months.

said, it was not the terror to the voter he had so much in view as it was to stamp on his misdeeds the reprobation of that House.

said, the Committee had no idea what terrors a penalty of three months created in the minds of possible offenders. There was a man now under sentence of three months' imprisonment for misconduct in the case of a municipal election, who, though of comparatively small means, had appealed to Westminster, and had employed very eminent counsel to defend him.

moved that the words at the end of the clause which made the attempt to commit an offence under the Bill equally punishable with the actual commission of the offence should be omitted. He also wished to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether that was not the proper time to apportion the punishments imposed by the Bill according to the gravity of the offences indicated? As the Bill stood at present, both light and grave offences were subject to the same punishment; and seeing that the measure created 19 new offences, that point was rather an important one. Moreover, it was all very well to say that it was within the discretion of the Judge what to do, but that power was always invidious. It was especially so here, for this was a class of offences in which as little discretion as possible should be left to the Judge. If the words he proposed to leave out were omitted, those attempting to commit an offence created by the Bill would be subject to imprisonment only, without hard labour. Under these circumstances he would move the omission of the words to which he had referred.

hoped that the Amendment would not be pressed, for all the offences enumerated in the clause were offences committed with the same object—that of preventing an honest election. He believed that by the general criminal law the attempt to commit an offence was as punishable as the offence itself; but the reason why these words had been put in was in order that they might operate as a warning.

said, that if these words were omitted, the offence would be left a misdemeanor, and rendered liable, not to six months' but to two years' imprisonment.

, having presided annually on several occasions at the taking of ballots, could bear testimony to the fact that there would be no difficulty whatever in detecting any attempt to use a wrong paper.

asked whether there would be any limitation on the number of persons who would be present when the ballot paper was placed in the ballot box?

said, a provision of that nature was contained in the 19th section of the 1st Schedule. That provision was—

"The returning officer shall appoint a presiding officer to preside at each station, and the officer so appointed shall keep order at his station, shall regulate the number of electors to be admitted at a time, and shall exclude all other persons except the clerks, the agents of the candidates, and the constables on duty."

gave Notice that on the Report he would move Amendments for dividing into separate classes the offences under this clause, with penalties appropriate to each.

moved to strike out the word "agent." This Bill, which was bristling with penalties, would subject the agent to imprisonment for three months, with lard labour, for communicating before he close of the poll any information as to the name of an elector who had or lad not applied for a ballot paper. Such a proposition was monstrous. If he right hon. Gentleman wished to make the Bill a working measure, he would not encumber it with provisions which were so much opposed to all the ideas of the electors of this country.

could not accept the Amendment. The agent was in the polling-booth for the purpose of seeing that the election was fairly conducted, and he should accept that mode of voting and the condition of secrecy which was imposed. The presence of the agent could not be dispensed with, considering he was a necessary check on personation.

would have thought that if a man came up to personate a voter, he would be more easily detected by allowing the agent to communicate his name to some one outside. He did not know, however, that the Amendment of his hon. Friend was the best for carrying out his object. In his opinion, the best course would be to move to omit the words "the name of any elector who has or has not applied for a ballot paper or voted at that station," thus allowing the agents inside to give all the information they might think necessary to the Returning Officer.

said, that there were few cases of personating a man likely to go and vote. The parties personating always went early, and generally personated those who were absent from the town, or were not likely to vote early. He agreed with the provision in the clause.

, while regarding the clause as, to some extent, a necessary accompaniment to the Ballot, remarked that the phrase "without due authority" implied that there was some authority by which information as to particular electors having voted or not, and as to the official mark, might be communicated. In that case, he was utterly in the dark as to what those words, as there used, meant, as there did not appear to be any "due authority" for what was sanctioned by implication. It was quite possible that in boroughs, at least, the Returning Officer would be a man of strong party feeling; and would it be right for him to have power to communicate information? The retention of the words under any circumstances seemed to him fraught with mischief, for the due authority ought to be defined, and in default of that he would move the omission of the words.

explained that the words were necessary in order to provide for cases where the presiding officer or his subordinate would have to give information on prosecutions for personation, as also information before the close of the poll with regard to the official mark. Any Court or magistrate before whom the question arose would understand that the words signified such authority as was necessary in conducting the election.

urged that the authority ought to be clearly defined, otherwise a person might, under a mistaken belief that he possessed the authority, give the information prohibited by the clause. He did not see why the Government could not have inserted the words "Returning Officer."

said, the Returning Officer could not be inserted, as it was necessary to guard against his improperly communicating information. It was very unlikely that the clause would require to be enforced against a Returning Officer, but it was necessary to constitute disregard of duty on his part an offence.

asked whether the Returning Officer was to be held the due authority for the disclosure of the information; and, if not, who was?

wished to know who was the "due authority" mentioned in the Bill who was to empower the officer, clerk, or agent, to violate the secrecy of the vote?

admitted that the difficulty suggested by the hon. and learned Gentleman had occurred to himself, and that he had consulted the draughtsman of the Bill on the subject. He could cut the knot at once by inserting words defining "the due authority" to be the presiding officer; but, unfortunately, the clause was aimed against that person, and therefore it would not do to give him power to authorize himself to violate the secrecy of the vote. The truth was that the magistrates would have to decide whether or not such violation of the secrecy of the vote had been made upon reasonable grounds.

suggested that, after the explanation of the right hon. Gentleman, it would be as well to substitute the words "without just cause" for those standing in the clause.

said, those words would not be necessary. There must be communications made with regard to certain persons voting. Suppose it were said to a voter—"Some one else has voted in your name;" or—"You have voted before," the Returning Officer could not be shut out from giving information. The words "without just cause" were very wide. If the words "without due authority" were used, they only allowed such communication as was necessary to carry out the purposes of the Act. If they asked—"Who was the person authorized?" the answer would be given by the magistrate or the Judge.

thought the words complained of were clear and intelligible, and that they referred to the thing authorized to be done, and not to the person to give authority for doing it.

said, his interpretation of what was intended by the words under discussion was that the High Sheriff or Returning Officer was implied; but he could not regard words which had already received four different interpretations from the last four speakers as being clear and intelligible. Perhaps it would be better to substitute for them words to the effect that the secrecy was only to be violated in accordance with the provisions of the Bill.

thought the words "without due authority" did all that was necessary. No tribunal could doubt the meaning of the words. The object of the penalty was to enforce secrecy; the penalty was to prevent an infringement of secrecy; and to operate unless facts were divulged under some authority authorized to allow the divulgence.

asked whether, in the case of a person coming into the booth to vote in the name of a person who had already voted, the previous fact was to be divulged?

observed, that the draughtsman wanted to say that an authorized communication should not be made. Therefore, if the Act authorized any communication, then that communication was made with due authority. The previous section showed that the words used in the present section did not refer to the presiding officer.

conceived that the explanation of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General did not tally with what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill, because the right hon. Gentleman stated that if it were not for the possibility of the presiding officer committing a fault, he should have no objection to substitute "presiding officer" for the words "due authority."

said, he understood the words "due authority" to cover the personal authority of anyone having a right to give the information, and also to cover the provisions of the present Bill, as well as the provisions of the law outside of the present Bill. He really believed that they were as intelligible as if the word "improperly" were used.

thought that the words "due authority" were improper, for they appeared to refer to an authority to be given by some individual who was not named.

, on the contrary, maintained that the words meant some authority conferred by the present Bill, or by some other Act relating to the subject of elections. He did not see that better words could have been used, and it would be for a Judge to decide what, in accordance with law, was "due authority."

considered that the words "without due authority" vested too much power in the Returning Officer. It would be of less importance if the clause referred only to counties—there was no bribery there—it was in boroughs that all the corruption and bribery occurred. ["No, no!"] Wherever bribery had been proved, the proportion was 100 to 1 against boroughs. The words as they stood ought not to be sanctioned, and some distinct definition should be given of the authority holding that unlimited power which might be so prejudicially exercised.

directed attention to the penal clauses of the Bill, and, having regard to them, wished to know how these words could be satisfactorily construed? It was the duty of lawyers to point out how litigation might arise, for magistrates called upon summarily to convict parties making disclosures without due authority would find themselves in considerable difficulty in determining what construction should be placed on those words.

suggested that in place of the words "without due authority" these words should be inserted, "except for some purpose authorized by law," which would include all purposes made legal by the present Act; while, on the other hand, they would guard against its being supposed that the words were confined to a personal authority only.

hoped the words suggested by the right hon. and learned Gentleman would enable them to settle this disputed point.

proposed to omit from the clause the words forbidding any officer, clerk, or agent, to communicate "the name of any elector who has or has not applied for a ballot paper or voted" at any station. He did so because, if retained, they would materially assist a person in the commission of the crime of personation. Those voters who were personated were generally men whom it was known could not vote early in the day, or who were sick and unable to vote at all. Now, if such men were personated, the quickest and most certain means of detecting the fraud was to make known to the agents the names of those who had voted, and the agent, on finding a man was supposed to have voted whom he knew had not come to town, would quickly detect the fraud. It was, therefore, advisable that no obstacle should be placed in the way of publishing who had or had not voted. Means would be taken to ascertain who had voted, and it was well the information should be disseminated in an authoritative and trustworthy manner. He accordingly moved the omission of the words he had read.

declined to accept the Amendment, on the ground that the uncertainty which would prevail as to whether a man had voted or not would very much increase the danger of personating. Men would not be disposed to risk asking for a ballot paper in the name of a man who might already have voted, because detection would in that case be more likely to follow. Besides this, the absence of all information as to how the polling was going on, and how far the constituency was exhausted, would go far to prevent what was known as the "Two o'clock bribery."

said, it was important not only to discover when personation took place, but also to ascertain when a bad vote was given. For instance, when he and the hon. Member who now so well represented Banbury (Mr. B. Samuelson) contested an election there, the hon. Member beat him by one vote. But that vote would not have passed before the scrutiny of a Committee of the House of Commons, because it was given by an inspector of police, who would have been disqualified on that account.

said, that no one probably had had more experience of questions of bribery and personation at contested elections than the hon. Gentleman opposite. As the House would agree, any Gentleman who had contested Dartmouth would not be entirely ignorant of matters of the kind. He believed the hon. Member had given Notice of a Petition upon the matter referred to; but having an opportunity of being returned for the rotten borough of Midhurst, he withdrew. But he did not see how that instance would have been influenced in the case of the Ballot if the polling clerk had communicated the fact that the man had voted.

had desired to make the matter as light as possible for the hon. Member, but now he was obliged to tell him that he had won his election by undue influences. ["Order!"]

remarked that the hon. Member, on reflection, would see he had used an expression which should not have been used.

withdrew the expression.

, deeming it equally desirable that the number should be published as the name, moved the insertion of the words "or number on the register of the voter."

moved the omission of the word "officer" in that part of the clause forbidding any officer, clerk, agent, or other person to overlook or interfere with a voter in marking his vote. His objection was, that the clause as it stood precluded the possibility of an uneducated person receiving any assistance whatever in giving his vote. He had no knowledge of English constituencies; but it was necessary, in order to obviate the serious consequences that would attend the absence of such a provision, that the Committee should consider the state of education in Ireland. Since the last Census there had been no analysis of the education of the Irish people; but in the Census of 1861 there were at least two provinces in Ireland in which it was absolutely indispensable that some provision should be made for assisting the voter. In Munster, out of a population of 1,500,000, nearly 800,000 could neither read nor write; and in Connaught, out of 913,000 inhabitants, 574,000 could neither read nor write. There were, moreover, in Connaught 163,275 persons unable to speak a word of English, while there were 400,000 who habitually spoke Irish, English being a sort of foreign language to them. Now, as the voting paper would not be given to the voter until he entered the polling-booth, and as he would be urged to vote instantly, so as to prevent any communication with outsiders, it would be a pure accident where a man unable to read or write, or unacquainted with English, would put his mark. Were he actuated by political motives he should not raise the question, for he believed the overwhelming majority of the uneducated class were supporters of the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government. Indeed, his most enthusiastic supporters were among those persons. If, therefore, they were left unassisted, and happened to vote as they intended, he himself should not lose a vote; while if, from a certain tendency in the Irish nature, they made a mistake, they would blunder into right, for their blunder would take them from the wrong side over to the right one. That, however, was not exactly fair, and he did not see that the Ballot would be infringed by allowing the High Sheriff, Returning Officer, or assessor to assist a man unable to mark his paper, just as was proposed in the case of blindness or physical infirmity. He should be quite willing to say that persons unable to read or write should have no votes, but such a thing ought to be enacted in an open, honest, and direct manner. Some of his patriotic Friends below the gangway—who made themselves heard on a variety of sentimental occasions in defending the rights of Ireland—ought to support him in this matter. He should object to an agent giving the assistance; but it might be given by the presiding authority, who would be bound to secrecy, and in whom everybody would have confidence.

admitted the question was one which ought to come before the Committee at some period of the discussion. He could not, however, enter into the right hon. Gentleman's statistics, which he presumed included women and children. [Dr. BALL assented.] The Government believed they had made a provision by which the right hon. Gentleman's compatriots, with their natural shrewdness, would find no difficulty in voting, though unable to read or write. That, however, was not the place at which to raise the question, and unless questions were raised at the proper time then discussions would continue throughout the whole of the Session. He had no hesitation in saying that the word "officer" must obviously be retained, or every presiding officer would be at liberty, without being asked by the voter, to overlook or interfere with him in marking his vote; and hon. Members on his side did not wish the Ballot to be discredited in such a manner, and hon. Members opposite could not wish to pass a measure which would be stultifying itself. Moreover, the 24th rule in the Schedule contained a provision for blindness, and the right hon. Gentleman would probably wish to extend it to persons unable to read or write; nor would such an extension be precluded by the word "officer" in this clause. It would, however, obviously be necessary to restrict such overlooking or interfering to cases where assistance was solicited. He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would be content with having stated his views with his accustomed clearness and eloquence, and that he would, if dissatisfied with the provision made by the Government, revive the question at the proper time.

said, he was glad that the right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Dr. Ball) had raised the question, for without the provision suggested a large number of persons would be disfranchised, but thought it would be more properly discussed at a future stage.

moved the omission in line 25 of the words "and no person whatsoever," contending that if these words were allowed to remain in the clause the principle would be established that no one should be allowed to assist a person in giving his vote. His own experience of elections for the last 30 years, he said, proved to him that the state of things in England exactly corresponded with that which his right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Dublin described as prevailing in Ireland. There were in this country a number of voters who would not go to the poll unless they were accompanied by some one—such as the nervous and infirm; and if the words of which he proposed the omission were not struck out of the clause there would be a wholesale disfranchisement of that class of electors. By such omission the penalty of three months' imprisonment could be confined to the "agents, clerks, and officers" who might reasonably be prohibited from interfering in the matter.

said, that he could not accept the Amendment. The object of the words was to prevent a voter being influenced by anyone who might wish to interfere with his vote, or to bribe him. If voters were to take persons with them to the polling-place, there would simply be an end of the Bill; for every employer might accompany his employés, and everyone who had influence might accompany those who were dependent upon him.

said, that supposing two voters were recording their votes at the same time, and if one of them looked over the other while so writing, he was to be liable to three months' imprisonment with hard labour? Was not it mere childish nonsense, that if the Returning Officer saw Hodge looking over Podge while he was writing, Hodge was to go to the treadmill for three months?

pointed out that the right hon. Gentleman who had charge of the Bill had given way half-a-dozen times that evening, and he could not, therefore, see why he should now persevere in a proposal which would have the effect of disfranchising a great number of electors. He (Mr. Bentinck) would take a division on the Amendment, because he strongly felt that, as he had said, hundreds of thousands of ignorant voters could not vote without assistance, and that the proposed penalty of three months' imprisonment with hard labour was quite intolerable.

suggested that the proposed penalty for the offence should, at least, be more lenient.

said, that for one person to "overlook" another while writing in a polling-booth might be ungentlemanly, but was hardly an offence to be visited with three months' imprisonment. He, therefore, proposed to leave out the words "overlook or."

said, he had no objection to omit these words, the object in view being covered by other words in the clause, "or otherwise obtaining information."

said, he thought it was too much to punish a man with three months' imprisonment for communicating "at any time to any person" information as to the vote of any elector. He proposed, therefore, the omission of the words "at any time," and the substitution of the words "before the poll is closed."

said, he must oppose the Amendment, for the disclosure of information as to the vote would probably be with a view to intimidation.

rose to move, at page 3, line 32, after "voted," the insertion of the words—

"And no voter shall, after marking his vote on his ballot paper, wilfully display such paper in such manner as to make known to any person the name of the candidate for or against whom whom he has so marked his vote."

asked whether it was intended by the Amendment to make it a statutory offence for a short-sighted voter to ask a confidential friend whether he had marked his ballot paper rightly?

said, that a great number of persons, especially when the new system was first introduced, would be ignorant of the proper mode in which they should mark their ballot papers, and without intending to disclose the secrecy of their vote, they would hold up their papers and ask the Returning Officer, or one of his clerks—"Is this the proper way of voting?" Yet that would render them liable to punishment. Instead of giving their votes freely and independently, such penalties would deter half the electors from voting at all.

thought they ought to have some explanation why that Amendment, about which he felt considerable difficulty, was not originally included in the Bill. He understood that they were to allow a person to conceal his vote if he desired to do so. He thought that that was a very just and proper object, and that was in the Bill as it stood at first. The Bill also provided very properly for another thing—namely, that persons who interfered with that concealment which the voter desired should be punished. That was the 4th clause as it now stood; but his hon. Friend (Mr. Leatham) proposed to introduce an entirely new thing—namely, to make it a crime on the part of a person openly to declare his vote. That was not in this Bill at present. He understood that it was in some former Bill, but was afterwards omitted. It was a totally distinct thing from what they had yet considered. He was willing to give every protection to the man who wished to conceal his vote; but he was not prepared to say that, under any circumstances, it was a crime for a man to say how he voted, unless he did it with a corrupt intention, and to further some corrupt bargain. If his hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield, instead of the word "wilfully," would insert the words "with corrupt intent" before "display his vote," he should be satisfied with the Amendment, because that, as being part and parcel of an act of bribery, ought to be punished. They did not object to a man saying—"I vote for Mr. So-and-So," because that might not be true. They proposed to treat his saving that which might be false as venial; but his saying that which was true, was to be made a misdemeanor. Supposing an elector for Bradford not only called out—"Forster for ever!" but showed his paper with Forster upon it, it would be very hard to send that man to prison. Why, they would in that way fill the gaols of the West Riding. That seemed to him to be entirely wrong. He therefore desired to substitute the words "with corrupt intent" for "wilfully," because in a case of bribery the showing of the ballot paper would be part of the evidence of a corrupt transaction. He might be told that his suggestion would not meet a case of intimidation. A person might threaten, if the voter did not show him his paper, to take away his lease or his house, or to turn him out of his employment. How was it now proposed to reach that? Why, by saying to the voter that if he did show his paper he should go to prison. That was not a very comfortable position in which to put the unfortunate voter. If he did not show his paper he would lose his lease or his situation; and if he did show it he would go to prison. What would the man do if placed in that awkward dilemma? Why, he would inevitably be deterred from voting at all. Surely, they did not want to add to the burdens of the unhappy elector who was intimidated, but rather to punish the person who intimidated him; and they ought to make it a misdemeanor for any person to use undue influence to induce another to display his paper. In that case, the act of displaying his paper would be part of the evidence to prove that some other person exercised undue influence towards him. But if the voter was neither corrupted nor intimidated, and merely showed his paper to somebody in a fit of enthusiasm, partly political and partly physical, which sometimes happened at elections, to send the man to prison for three months under those circumstances was a thing to which he could not assent. There seemed to be a growing passion for the creation of misdemeanous. The moment they got hold of something which they did not like, they determined to send everybody to prison who did it. An eminent draughtsman had said to him that they were now manufacturing misdemeanors at the rate of about 500 per annum, and creating more of them in a year than had formerly been created in centuries. There was only one defence against that legislation; and that was, that juries and magistrates were more reasonable than the House of Commons, and declined to take any notice of the misdemeanors they manufactured. Did anybody believe that if any voter without corruption or intimidation went into a polling-booth and said—"Here is my ballot paper," any Judge or jury would be found so tyrannical and absurd as to send him to prison? They had better confine their penal legislation to acts which the moral sense of the country would condemn, for if they carried it further by sweeping provisions of that kind, public opinion would not support them. He begged, therefore, to move the omission from the Amendment of the word "wilfully," in order to substitute "with corrupt intent."

said, that at last they had had a really Liberal speech from the other side of the House. He must congratulate the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt) on his boldness and courage in having broken through the trammels of the tyrannical attempts which had been made by Her Majesty's Government on the patience and endurance of the House. He used the words advisedly, because he begged the Committee to understand the exact position in which it was placed with respect to this Amendment of the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Leatham). At the beginning of the evening the Committee spent a very agreeable hour in mitigating and toning down the penalties as they first appeared in the Bill of Her Majesty's Government; but now the hon. Gentleman asked the Committee to reverse the process, and insert penalties in the Bill which it did not at present contain. In what manner had this proposal been supported by Her Majesty's Government? The Committee was told that after all it was no new penalty; that the Bill as introduced last year contained it, and that it dropped out by accident. At another time, however, it was said that it was in consequence of the lateness of the period, and with a view to sending up the measure to "another place," that the penalty was omitted last year; but he begged leave to say that neither in the draught of the Bill of last Session, as originally introduced, nor in the draught of the Bill as it was sent up to the House of Lords, was that penalty contained. In the Bill as introduced last year the penalty was £10. He now proceeded to canvass the other position of Her Majesty's Government, that this provision was given up very reluctantly last year. He had referred to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, when making the announcement last Session that the provision would be withdrawn, and he found that the right hon. Gentleman used these words. On the 27th of July, the right hon. Gentleman, addressing the Speaker, said—

"We have been very careful in going over the clauses and considering what, with due regard to the object we wish to accomplish in the Bill, can safely be omitted. I feel sure that the House would not desire, notwithstanding the length of our discussions, that we should strike out of the Bill any clauses which in our opinion are necessary in order that the Bill, when it actually becomes law, should be duly carried out…… Nevertheless, we have carefully gone through these clauses to see whether any of them could be safely omitted, and we have come to the conclusion that we can only recommend the omission of one, though that is an important clause. That is the 30th clause, which is one of the penalty clauses, and provides penalties against voters who do not follow the directions given in regard to voting secretly. We have come to the conclusion that as the Committee assented to the 19th sub-section as it then stood—the 18th as it now stands—of the 3rd clause which declares a vote void and not to be counted unless that provision be complied with, we hope that will be a sufficient penalty, and that Ballot may he enacted without any other penalty."—[3 Hansard, ccviii. 314–15.]

, said, the noble Lord must have forgotten the other Bill affecting their representation, with which he and his Colleagues had so much to do, or else he would hardly have found fault with the Government for having changed their mind as to a matter of detail, important though it certainly was. Such a reproach ought hardly to have come from the noble Lord, for changes were made by the noble Lord's Colleagues and himself—not between one Session and another, but even within the course of one week, in matters which seemed much more important than this. The Committee, no doubt, had a right to ask for some explanation with respect to the provision, and he would give it. In the Bill brought forward two years ago by his noble Friend (the Marquess of Hartington) this particular provision was contained. In the Bill of last year, included among several provisions on the subject of voting, was the penalty of £10. In looking over the Bill on the 27th of July, with an earnest desire to see what could be struck out, he had more doubt about this particular provision than about any other. The Bill, however, went up to the House of Lords without the provision, and was rejected. In preparing the Bill of this Session he took up the measure that was rejected by the House of Lords; and in which, therefore, there was not this provision. He discovered, however, that it had been overlooked, a few days after the Bill was introduced. But after all the real point was, whether the provision should be included or not, and here he must differ from the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt), for the Government never intended that there should be a penalty on a man who said how he would vote. What he had always said, and what the Government considered as one of the necessary conditions of a good and really workable Ballot was, that there should be a secret vote, and that the voter should not be able to prove how he had voted. Then came this provision, which would not take effect unless the voter positively proved to an agent how he had voted. He could not accept the substitution of the words "with corrupt intent" for "wilfully," and his hon. Friend himself had acknowledged that they would not meet the case of intimidation.

said, the right hon. Gentleman seemed to have forgotten one thing which ought to be a maxim in all legislation—namely, that we could not legislate with effect in advance of public opinion. We could not persuade a man that that was a crime which he believed not to be a crime. The act of voting was not the only act at an election, it was only one of a series of acts; and to say that we would send a man to prison for three months, because when he said that he would vote for a particular man he showed that he had voted for him, was monstrous. Of course, if a man acted corruptly it was a different matter, and they might punish such a man as severely as they pleased; but he was sure that no conviction could over be obtained under the Amendment of the hon. Member for Huddersfield.

said, the people wanted to have the Ballot, and that being so they must be protected by secret voting, or it would be absolutely useless. He was astonished that hon. Gentlemen could not see the possibility of a corrupt motive in a voter showing his ticket, because if a man sold his vote for £5, he showed his ticket to prove how he had voted. If they did not wish to have secret voting, they had better have no Ballot Bill. It was idle to say they had the Ballot if each voter could show how he had voted.

thought the proposed penalty of three months' imprisonment was out of all proportion to the crime of showing a ballot paper. What was the penalty for exposing prints which were prejudicial to the morals of society at large? Merely £2. And yet, could there be any comparison between the offence of a man who displayed his ballot paper and gave an honest vote, and an offence against good morals?

contended that electors ought not to be exposed to the dangerous ordeal which the hon. Member for Huddersfield proposed. Recently, at a school board election, many of the voters, who could not comprehend the vague ballot papers, felt it necessary to lay them before the Returning Officer, in order to get instruction low to fill them up. What could be more natural? And yet the hon. Member for. Huddersfield proposed that if a similar course should be taken by an elector with regard to ballot papers at an election under this Bill, he should be liable to an imprisonment of three months.

said, when this Bill was brought in, the House was told it was essential that the new electors should have a certain protection—that they should be allowed, if they so pleased, to vote secretly. He agreed with that, and voted up to that point. But when it was proposed to go a great deal further than that—when it was proposed to attain secrecy for its own sake, and to enforce that secrecy by a penal clause, then he was obliged to part company with the Bill and vote against it. If this penal clause were added to the many penal clauses of which the House had heard lately, then the electors would have to study the Ballot Bill for a considerable time before an election, in order to discover what they might do, and what they might not do, without being sent to prison with or without hard labour. It had been proposed to treat as crimes things which the people of this country did not, and never would, believe to be crimes. In his opinion, the House ought simply to provide protection to an elector, and leave to his good sense the way in which he should avail himself of that protection; and if they did that, then they would have a really good Ballot Bill; but, on the contrary, if the Bill were bolstered up with penalties for misdemeanors in the way proposed by the hon. Member for Huddersfield it would be a failure, and should be immediately withdrawn.

believed it to be contrary to the spirit of our Statute-book, and to all sound legislation, to inflict a penalty not upon the intimidator, but upon the man whom he intimidated. He admitted that it was a virtue of this Bill, that it endeavoured to put an end to bribery and intimidation; but it was a vice of the Bill that it introduced great opportunities for fraud, dishonesty, and immorality of all kinds.

supported the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt). He objected to any person being visited with a penalty of three months' imprisonment because he had inadvertently or by accident exhibited his ballot paper. Who was to prove whether he had done so wilfully or not? Supposing he (Sir Henry Hoare) flourished his ticket in a moment of excitement, so as to show how he voted, was he to be imprisoned on the ground that he had done it corruptly?

understood the view taken by the hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Muntz), but not the course pursued by the Government, if they were correctly represented the other night by the Solicitor General, who said that showing a ballot paper by a voter would be an offence, whether it was marked or not. In that way, it seemed as if they wished to place the innocent and the guilty in the same position; and therefore he regarded the whole measure as a senseless and arbitrary attempt at legislation.

said, he must object to the use of the word "corruptly" in the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. V. Harcourt), stating that the Corrupt Practices Act had become nugatory, in consequence of the use of that expression in reference to treating, because, although Judges might find that something had been given to influence a voter, they hesitated before deciding that it had been done corruptly. If they proved that a thing had been done corruptly, they proved bribery; and, therefore, in prosecuting for that offence, they must prove bribery or nothing. The Amendment of the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Leatham) contained the pith of the Ballot.

said, that when the Bill was before the House last Session he made inquiries with respect to that very point, as to what had been done in America. He found that the experiment which was now so earnestly advocated by the hon. and learned Member for Taunton had been tried and had been repudiated in the United States. Nay, it had been tried in New Brunswick, and failed, and now the whole Dominion of Canada had altogether rejected the Ballot. He repeated, that the attempt to enforce secrecy against the will of the voter was tried in the United States—and particularly in Massachusetts—and then it was formally and deliberately abandoned. Those whom he consulted on the subject sent him The New York Tribune newspaper, and told him that an article which it contained expressed the experience of the United States. He had heard from them again, and they confirmed the statement; when the hon. and learned Member for Taunton spoke of practice, he had given him practice. In the United States these attempts at enforcing secrecy had been made over and over again, and had over and over again failed. The expression in the article to which he referred was this—"The people would not submit to such penalties." Now, why was the House to presume that the people of England were to be expected to submit to penalties for enforcing upon them a restriction which had been over and over again found utterly objectionable, and had been resisted by the people of the United States? The value which the people of the United States attached to the Ballot was this—that any man who desired to do so could conceal his vote; but the moment that the Legislatures of the various States had been induced to go beyond that, the people had found the Ballot intolerable, and had reverted to the former practice. Now that was a matter of experience. They said that the Ballot was not satisfactory in the United States; he told them that the means by which the Committee were now asked to render it satisfactory had been tried, and found to be insufferable in the United States. He did not pretend to be an advocate for the Ballot, but he felt that he was entitled to warn the Committee that the majority were induced by the inexperienced advocates of the Ballot to attempt to enforce upon the people of the country a tyrannical system of coercion to which they could not reasonably be expected to submit. The Bill would be lost, or the Act rendered a dead letter. As an opponent of this Bill himself, he could wish for nothing better than that they should declare that, in the parallel case cited by the hon. and learned Member for Taunton, the Judges had been all in fault, because they could not interpret the word "corruptly" in the case of treating as the hon. and learned Member desired. Well, treating was far more exceptional than voting, and he thought they must be conscious that it was impossible not to allow, in the case of all voters, the discretion which the Judges in this country had found necessary to justice, and the Americans had found necessary to their freedom. They were legislating for the sake of those whom they admitted to be a weak minority. They would be rash if they attempted to enforce upon the whole constituencies of England, for the sake of that experiment, a coercion which had been found insufferable by the people of the United States.

thought the Amendment of the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Leatham) was open to the same objection that was urged against the proposal now before the Committee. As had been stated, it was impossible in many cases to define the meaning of the word "corrupt," and the same difficulty would arise in the case of the word "wilfully," which the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Harcourt) proposed to introduce into the Bill.

thought the Amendment would, if carried, introduce into the Bill a principle against which all who supported freedom of thought and action ought to protest. Supposing an agent wished to discover whether his bribery or intimidation had been successful, nothing would be more easy than for him and the voter to go into the polling-booth together, for the voter to show his ballot paper, and then for the two of them to swear that the exposure was accidental. Then, again, the question arose, whether the vote was the absolute property of the man who gave it, or whether it was to a certain extent a national trust. ["No, no!"] Hon. Members cried "No, no;" but it would be a new thing for England when a man felt that in voting he simply voted for himself. When a man who regarded his giving his vote as a public and a national act said—"I claim the right to exercise that public and that national act in a public manner; I do not want to give my vote in secret; let those who wish to vote in secret do so,"—he regarded it as an act of tyranny to impose three months' imprisonment upon him. He ventured to say that there were many in that House who would endorse that view. ["No, no!"] He heard cries of "No, no!" proceeding from behind the Treasury bench; but he begged to remind hon. Members who gave utterance to those cries that he had voted for the Ballot when hon. Members who used to sit behind that bench—and even those who sat upon it—were voting against it. He had never voted against the Ballot; but what he meant by the Ballot was, that the man who desired to vote in secret should be able to do so. He ventured to predict that it would be the verdict of every platform in England, that it was contrary to the feeling of Englishmen and to the spirit of the nation that they should treat as a heinous crime the act of a man who sought to discharge a public duty publicly. Parliament might pass laws and impose penalties if they pleased; but those laws and penalties could not be carried into effect against the wishes of the nation, and the instincts of Englishmen would not let them see a man sent to prison for three months because he had done nothing more than claim to discharge a public duty publicly.

said, the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett) had stated that he had voted for the Ballot before hon. Members on the Treasury bench and behind it had done so; but in that case why did he speak against it now? Was it because, like some others, he had turned his back upon his former principles, or was he still a supporter of the Ballot as a permissive and optional measure? But the Ballot, wherever it had been tried in America as a permissive Bill had failed; wherever it had been tried as a secret measure it had been successful. If a measure was to be passed by Parliament, how was it to be carried out in practice except by penalties?

was of opinion that the Ballot had failed in America through an inherent vice of the system rather than through the genius of the American people.

said, his explanation of the alleged oversight of the framers of the Bill was, that they did not regard as a vital principle of the Bill a clause which they now professed to regard as vital.

said, his hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Leatham) had said that he had turned his back on his principles. But whatever opinions he entertained it was not his habit to turn his back upon them. He had said nothing that was inconsistent with his former principles; for what he said was, that if a man happened to vote publicly and then exposed his ballot paper, it was a serious thing to expose him to three months' imprisonment.