or speaks without being disturbed." Of the reluctance with which his majesty, therefore, was brought at length to consent to the introduction of the bill, no doubt could be entertained. The duke of Wellington admitted, that his efforts to obtain that consent had been continued during the summer and autumn; and it was pleaded as the excuse for the short notice, on which the measure was proposed, that that consent had been wrung from the king only a few days before Parliament met in February. His majesty's resistance, therefore, had been long and firm; it was not wonderful that he should at last have yielded to the representations daily urged by those in whom he most confided, that a continued refusal could have no other effect, than to keep one part of his empire in misery, and expose the whole to rebellion-it might be to dismemberment. No room was left for counteracting the views thus assiduously pressed upon the

royal mind; for the knowledge of what was going on was carefully confined to the operators themselves; nor was it ever made known to those who might have interfered, that interference was necessary, till it was found that his majesty's consent had already been extorted, and that interference came too late. That consent enabled ministers to bring forward their plan fortified by the approbation of the Crown; that approbation, and their own influence, enabled them to command the majorities by which they carried through a measure, acknowledged by themselves to be a sacrifice to what they thought expedient, of what they had ever held to be right and constitutional, and which they admitted to be so heartily disliked by the country, that they claimed merit for having given up to what they termed a sense of duty, not only all political connections, but even the approbation and esteem of the public.

THE

THE bill, which admitted Catholics to the Houses of Parliament, and to all offices of political power and trust, had been accompanied, throughout its whole progress, by another bill for disfranchising the whole body of fortyshilling freeholders in Ireland, and raising the qualification of an elector to 10l. The object in view in this regulation was, to free elections from that absolute control which late experience had shewn could always be exercised over them by the influence of the Catholic clergy on these miserable Catholic voters. In the alarm, which that control had excited, is to be found one main cause of emancipation having been made a government question. Irish members began to tremble for their seats; the right of voting seemed to have been transferred to the priesthood and the Association; to mount the hustings, and refuse to pledge yourself to support the Catholic Question, was to ensure defeat in your election. Mr. Dawson, brother-in-law of Mr. Peel, was the first who sounded in Ireland the note of approaching concession; and members themselves could not but see, that unless some remedy were applied, they would have no power, however strong their

interest might be, in the Irish elections. The remedy which they sought, lay in diminishing the number, and increasing the respectability of the voters. The fortyshilling freeholders had been manufactured by the landlords themselves, for no other purpose than to create votes which should be at their absolute disposal. The instrument was a powerful one; but it had now passed into abler and more energetic hands; it was wielded against themselves by a power, to which, from its nature, they could oppose no successful resistance. They could not regain possession of the instrument: it was resolved, therefore, to destroy it. Ministers, however, believed that it would be ungracious to attempt, and impossible successfully to carry through, so important a change, as the depriving a great portion of the population of the highest political right which the constitution bestows, without giving a great political boon in return. They admitted, that to raise the qualification would be an efficient remedy, and that Parliament was competent to apply that remedy; but they would not ask Parliament to apply it, without providing a substitute, in the form of unlimited emancipation, for the political privilege which was to be

the voters would be raised. It would be necessary to determine upon some specific mode of ascertaining who were 101. freeholders -some tangible mode of ascertaining the real character of the freehold. For this purpose it was proposed, that, after the passing of the bill, a day should be fixed in every county in Ireland, for the purpose of opening a bona fide registration of 10l. freeholds. At present the right to vote did not accrue until twelve months after the date of the registry. This seemed to be an unnecessary restriction of the individual right, and it should in future accrue in six months instead of twelve. On the assistant barrister was to devolve the duty of registering these freeholds, and of making every inquiry which the nature of the application might appear to him to require. The exercise of this power was to be checked in two ways. If the right to vote was denied, the party should have the benefit of an appeal to the next assizes, and of a decision by jury, upon the right which he sought to establish. It should be always open to the freeholder to produce fresh evidence. Leases for life, and the tenant-laws of Ireland, were to remain unaltered; all that was to be done was, to raise this nominal forty-shilling freehold to a real 101. franchise. Neither was this restriction to be extended to corporate towns; that would not be quite fair, while the right of the corporations to make freemen was left undiminished. Were the freehold franchise within their juris diction raised to 107., a corporation could overpower the public voice by the exercise of their right to make freemen.

The bill founded on these principles went on pari passu with the Relief bill, and encountered far less opposition. From the opponents of emancipation it met with none; for the placing of the elections beyond the control of the clergy was a measure which they themselves had desired. The whigs, properly so called (for there was now at once a splitting and a coalescing of parties, which almost deprived words of their power to discriminate and describe) supported it, hostile as it was to popular rights, and destructive of vested political franchises, as an essential part of a whole, the other, and what they thought, the better part of which they were unwilling to lose. Mr. Brougham said, he consented to it, "as the price-the almost extravagant price-of the inestimable good which would result from the other;" and sir James Mackintosh described it as one of those tough morsels which he had scarcely been able to swallow. It did not pass, however, altogether unresisted-Lord Duncannon, lord Palmerston, Mr. Huskisson and some others opposed it, as a measure not called for by any necessity, and not fitted to gain that object which alone was held out as justifying it. It was said that it was absurd to allege, as a pretext for it, the influence and conduct of the Catholic priesthood; for all, who knew any thing of that influence, knew that it was chiefly felt when it ran with the current of popular feeling, and that it was ever exercised with a view to maintain submission to the laws. If the forty-shilling freeholders had been corrupt, like those of Penryn, their disfranchisement might be defended; but the only offence of the persons, against

whom the bill was directed, had been, that they exercised their privilege honestly and independently, according to the dictates of their consciences. The Relief bill was a great good, demanded equally by justice and expediency; yet it was plain enough that, but for the independent exercise of their privilege, by the forty-shilling freeholders of Louth, Waterford, and Clare, that great good would never have been heard of expediency and justice would have called in vain. Yet they were to be punished for effecting that, which the very men, who proposed the punishment, declared to be a great public blessing. If landlords in Ireland had been too prone to subdivide their estates, with the view of obtaining political influence (a statement which, it was alleged, was not borne out by facts), that was an evil which might safely be left to cure itself. The subdivision of property in Ireland depended mainly on the state of society in that country; and any sudden attempt at consolidation in a country, where there were no manufactures to afford employment to the superabundant population, could be productive only of extensive misery. In Ireland, the population of which was seven millions, there were only thirty towns which contained more than five thousand inhabitants; whilst in Scotland, whose population was but two millions, there were thirtythree towns containing more than five thousand inhabitants. It was in vain to endeavour, by arbitrary enactments, to anticipate the progress of society. Neither would the bill effect its object. They knew little of Ireland, who thought that the mere raising of the registry to 10l. would do away with fraudulent and fictitious votes. If the

bill were passed, and a 10l. yeomanry established, could they be compared with the substantial yeomanry of England? It would soon be discovered that the 10. yeomanry were of too low a denomination, and that it was necessary to raise the qualification to 20l.: and indeed it would be difficult to know at what point to stop. The House had been told, indeed, in language which could not be misunderstood, that on the success of this measure depended the success of the Relief bill; but it was denied that Parliament had made any such bargain with the government. In the speech from the throne, Parliament had been told that the price required for Catholic emancipation was the immediate and summary suppression of the Catholic Association. That was the only bargain which Parliament had made with government; and, the price demanded having been paid, it was impossible, in the event of the bill before the House being defeated, for government to turn round and refuse to fulfil its part of the bargain. It was absurd to suppose that government could withhold emancipation. Neither this government, nor any that might succeed it, could do so. What had induced the present government to advocate emancipation? State necessity, and that necessity had not been weakened during the last three weeks. Such a compromise was the less justifiable, as the object said to be in view could be equally well secured in another way. That object was to get bona fide voters. Now what objection could there be to a bona fide forty-shilling freehold, or what difficulty in obtaining it? They could as easily regulate the forty-shilling franchise, so as to render it a bona fide one,

as

they

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