the democratic party in the House of Commons, the Duke of Wellington was perfectly right in his famous declaration, in November, 1830, in asserting that he never would be a party to any such alteration, and that the popular interest was already as strong in the Legislature as was consistent with the stability of the Empire. But viewing the change as made on different principles, as an extension of the elective franchise to persons possessed of considerable property only,-to the owners of houses rated at L.50 a-year, or the payers of direct taxes to the amount of L.10 annually, it would have been attended with very different effects. Experience has now proved that the representatives of such constituencies would, almost unanimously, when matters approached a crisis, have sided with the Conservative party. If the constituency of Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, Glasgow, or Edinburgh, were framed of persons of this description, there cannot be a doubt that the whole representatives of these cities would be Conservative, and that the Movement party in every one of them would be defeated by a majority of

two to one.

Herein, then, was the fault of the Tories in the great crisis of the Constitution. It was a fault, not of commission, but omission: it arose from the long pursuit of a mistaken system of policy dictated by the democratic party in towns, an apprehension that any farther concessions would overturn the Monarchy, and an insensibility to the fact, that, by a prudent extension of the elective franchise to the higher classes of the great towns, the barrier against Democracy might have been strengthened instead of being weakened, and the efforts of the Revolutionary party retarded instead of being advanced.

Very different was the fault of the Whigs when they came into office, and by such violent and unconstitutional methods forced through the Reform Bill. Theirs was a fault, not of omission, but commission; they plunged the dagger into the heart of

the Constitution, and left only the shadow of a Monarchy, without either its stability, its safeguards, or its security.

Argument or illustration would be worse than useless on this subject. The lapse of time has now confirmed the worst anticipations of the opponents of that fatal measure, and confounded, whatever they may say, the expectations of its friends. When we turn back to the consequences we foretold three years ago, as likely to result from the adoption of that tremendous change, which were then derided as the ravings of a frantic Tory, we find them all accomplished, or in the course of accomplishment.* complishment. We foretold that it would convulse Ireland, as the most inflammable part of the Empire; and the Coercion Bill demonstrates that the anticipation was well founded. We foretold it would lead to the emancipation and destruction of the negroes in the West Indies, and, through it, to the ultimate severing of those splendid colonies from the Empire; and that event is in the course of taking place. We foretold it would prostrate the Crown so completely as to render it powerless and contemptible; and Ministers have now been compelled, by a narrow division in the House of Commons, to surrender up the pensions -that is, the prerogative of the Crown-to the examination of a Committee of the popular part of the Legislature. We foretold it would ultimately occasion a confiscation of the Funds; and already that doctrine is openly proclaimed by the great Agitator, the leader of the Democratic party throughout the Empire. We foretold it would lead to the extraction of the existing surplus revenue and Sinking Fund, and the abandonment of all attempts to liquidate the Debt; and that deplo rable effect has already ensued. We foretold it would at first shake, and at last overturn the Corn Laws, the sole protection of British agriculture against a ruinous foreign competition; and already the Radical party have mustered so strong when the question was brought forward

(stronger than they ever did before the French Revolution of 1830 on Parliamentary Reform), and the Cabinet has shewn itself so divided on the subject, that the repeal of these laws at no distant period may be considered as certain. We foretold it would lead to the overthrow of the Church, and the ultimate appropriation of its funds to the liquidation of the National Debt; and already the right of patronage in Scotland, in other words, the propriety of vesting the nomination of the clergy in the Ten-pounders, has been remitted to a committee of the House of Commons; while in England Lord Grey has declared that he has a series of bills in preparation,. which will concede ALL the demands of the Dissenters, except the separation of Church and State; and, in the Commons, Lord John Russell has stated it as his opinion, as a Cabinet Minister, that Church is to be regarded as national property, and that after providing for the ministers of religion, the Legislature may dispose of the remainder for national purposes; in other words, they may give every clergyman L.50 a-year, and then, like the Constituent Assembly, carry the remainder of the ecclesiastical revenue to the credit of the consolidated fund.

It is unnecessary to go farther. Nothing can be more apparent, than that Government is now completely prostrated, and that no class or interest in the State can calculate upon any resolution or course of policy being adhered to for any length of time together. The direct and immediate interference of constituents with their representatives, is the cause of this lamentable state of things. Instructions, remonstrances, threats, or praises, arrive every morning to the representatives of populous places, from their hundredtongue constituents; representation has given way in a great many cases to delegation; the nation has ceased to be a constitutional monarchy, and become a turbulent democracy. All the evils of direct popular influence are in consequence developing themselves; the mutability, vacillation, selfishness, and uncertainty, which from the earliest times has characterised all nations where self-government was in any degree esta

blished, are daily becoming more conspicuous; doubt and hesitation as to the future, are more than ever obscuring the prospects of England. This is a fact upon which men of all parties are now as one: They differ, indeed, as far as the poles are asunder, as to the ultimate tendency of this state of things; the Revolutionists arguing that it is the commencement of a new and brilliant era, in which the intelligence, virtue, and wisdom of the people, are to extinguish all the evils which afflict society; the Conservatives, that it is the opening of a disastrous period, in the course of which all the institutions of Government, and all the safeguards of property, are to be violently overthrown, or gradually worn away by the incessant attacks of an insatiable, anarchical faction; but as to the fact of the present weakness of Government, all men of all parties are now agreed.

The excessive and unparalleled vacillation of the House of Commons, upon the most important subjects of State policy, affords the clearest evidence, that its members are alternately acted upon by opposing forces, and that without any decided power of self-government, they yield to the strongest current to whose influence they are exposed. We put the matter upon the most favourable ground for the Legislature, and in the anxious wish to increase rather than diminish the respect in which they are held in the country. Their decisions have been fluctuating and contradictory to an unparalleled degree; it is better the inconsistency should rest on their constituents than themselves. Last session they first voted in a full House, by a majority of ten, that the malt tax should be taken off; they voted, in four days afterwards, by a majority of above an hundred, that it should be put on again. They first voted, by an immense majority, on the West India Question, that the Planters should receive a loan of L.15,000,000 in indemnification; next, by a still greater, that it should be a gift of L.20,000,000. In the present session, they first voted, by a majority of 97, that Baron Smith's case should be remitted to a special committee; in less than a fortnight this resolution was most honourably and properly rescinded

by a majority of 6. They first rejected, by a majority only of 4, in a House of 400, the proposal that in any reduction of taxation, the agricultural interest should in the first instance be considered; and next they carried by a majority of 101, in an equally large House, that no reduction is to take place on the Malt Tax. They first determine by a majority of 4, that the existing Pensions having been bestowed by the Crown, in the free exercise of its prerogative, could not, on constitutional principles, be subjected to examination of the House of Commons; and in a few days the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself moves for, and carries unanimously, the appointment of a committee for that very purpose, with more ample powers than were sought for by the Radical mover, Mr D. Whittle Har

vey.

We do not bring forward those instances of inconsistency with the slightest wish to disparage the Reform Parliament in the eyes of the country; we do so with an intention the very reverse-in order to shew that these contradictions arise, not from the fault of the Members, but the faulty principles on which the House is constructed. It is with institutions, not men, that we are concerned it is to bring about the amendment of institutions, not lower individuals, that our efforts are directed. We are quite aware how these seemingly inexplicable contradictions occur, with few, if any, individuals being reduced to the humiliating necessity of rescinding their own vote. We know perfectly that great numbers of Members are compelled, in opposition to their better judgment, and under pain of losing their seat, to vote in accordance with the wishes of their constituents; and that when the result of their vote has placed Government in such a predicament that they must either rescind the vote or resign, the implicated Members stay away, deeming it better to incur the lesser evil of contradictory resolutions being passed by the Legislature, to the greater of the nation being delivered over to a Radical Administration. All this we are fully aware of; and we have no doubt, that if we were ourselves placed in similar circumstances, we should find ourselves

VOL. XXXV. NO. CCXX.

But the

obliged to do the same. point we rest upon is this. What chance is there that the empire can flourish, the Constitution, broken down as it is, subsist, or even the Monarchy endure, under a system of government which brings the vacillation and passions of the people so directly to bear on the decisions of the Legislature? Instability and weakness in the Executive, is the radical evil which in all ages has beset democracies, and rendered them invariably but the prelude to dictatorial power, or military despotism-to a Cæsar, a Cromwell, or a Napoleon. Or supposing that the temper of the people, and the habits of a free country, are a sufficient guarantee against such an anarchical catastrophe, what is to save us from a Revolution as complete, brought about by different and bloodless means; from the gradual and pacific grinding down of all our institutions by the unceasing inroads of the Revolutionary party, let in to flood the Constitution by the Reform Bill? It is this sort of Revolution which the Radicals look for; it is this sort of a Revolution in the middle of which we are now placed. Let us attend to their own words on the subject: "It seems to be the notion of our statesmen," says the Westminster Review, "to avoid a danger by letting it alone. They talk of averting Revolution, while the Revolution is left in full progress. Not indeed a Revolution of force and blood such as they conceive, imagining the possibility of no other; but the gradual casting off the old skin, and putting on the new;-the silent change of opinion which is inward, moving with a force accelerated by the resistance offered by these cobbling Statesmen. The Revolution which is their dread is but one possible phasis of the Revolution which is going on; the temper eager for change resisted, and irritated by resistance. They know if they were to repeat the cry that Reform is not needed, a Revolution of blood would come; but they vainly conceal from themselves that the same temper, mortified by the continual disappointment of expectations of greater good than is given, may be roused to the most violent steps. Suppose the occurrence of any of those thousand political acci

2 N

dents which have many times heretofore dashed to the ground the hopes of the age, is there no danger? A day may bring forth that state of things which makes a Revolution of violence inevitable for who could quell the vehemence of an ignorant people-in politics ignorant-if excited by want, and despair of the good which has been promised?"* This, then, by the admission of the Movement party, is the state to which they have reduced the country by their Reform in Parliament. Undergoing a silent, but progressive Revolution, which is rapidly throwing off the old slough of the Constitution, and quivering on the edge of a bloody convulsion the moment that any serious check is given to the demands of an "ignorant people."

The excessive weakness and vacillation of Government is apparent to all the world: to none more than their late noisy and extravagant adulators among the Revolutionary party. Let us again hear what the Radicals say on the subject." The Government, that is, the few chosen from all the people as the men fit to rule the land, and whose opportunities and intelligence should render them leaders and guides to the House, have turned out hare-brained riders. At one moment they run to outstrip the thing needed, and the next fall back trembling at the speed they make-blind leaders of the blind. There is not, nor has there been, a more awkward thing in nature

or nature's works, than the present House of Commons. The mob of Rome might be counted upon with as much certainty as this mob of gentlemen." Such is the account of the effects of the first great Democratic invasion of the Constitution, from the very persons who were most strenuous in supporting its introduction. We do not refer to their opinions as an authority: we quote them as the testimony of an unwilling witness.

The divisions of last Session are amply sufficient to demonstrate this alarming weakness of Government, and those of this Session, short as it has hitherto been, place it in a still stronger light. We say the weakness of Government, because the present is no question of Ministry or place, of Whig or Tory; it is that of order against anarchy, of monarchy against republicanism, which is now at stake. On the great constitutional questions which involve the very existence of a mixed constitution, and in resisting motions which struck at the very foundations of the monarchy, the majorities of Government were so small, and their defeats so frequent, as to leave Ministry repeatedly on the verge of dissolution; and such as under any former Administration, and under the influence of any weaker feeling, than that in abandoning the helm, they would expose the empire to certain shipwreck, must inevitably have led to their resignation.

Would that we could add, that,

† Ibid., p. 389.

For the Committee

Against it, with Ministers

Ministerial majority

160 In the House,

For the motion

Against it.

Ministerial majority

66.