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3
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THE BALLOT
CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE AT ELECTIONS.
THE BALLOT
COKRDPTION AND EXPENDITUEE AT
ELECTIONS,
A COLLECTION OF K'iSAYS AND ADDRESSES
OF DIFFERENT DATES
W. D. CHRISTIE, C.B.,
Fijfincrly Ihr Majesty's MUiislcr to the Arycntine Confederation ami in Brazil ;
A uthor of " Life of the First Earl of Shaftesbury."
Ifonbou :
I\I A C M I L L A N AND CO.
1872.
['/'/('• Ji'/i/Jif 0/ Trail: lid iov aiir/ Jxcjiyi ilnrtuiv ?.•> rcKcrrirl.
LONDON :
U CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, PHINTEKR,
BREAD STREET HILL.
CONTENTS.
I'AIIM
rKKFAOE AND DePIOATION TO KkV. F. D. MaUUICE vii
I. ,
An Argument in Favouu of tiik Bam.ot, 1839 1
II.
SrEEGii IN Favour of the IUlt.ot in the House of Commons,
June 21, 1842 65
III.
Suggestions fok an Okganization for Restraint of Corrup-
tion AND Expenditure at Elections, 1864 75
IV.
Electoral Corruption and its Remedies, 1866 105
V.
Address to the National Refor.m Union, Manchester, on
Election Corruption ,\nd Expenditure, Nov. 16, 1869 . 161
VI.
Scotch P^lections and the Paiiliamentarv Elections Com-
mittee of 1868-9, 1869 181
C4^b
TO THE
REV. FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE,
Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Cambridge.
My dear Mr. Maurice,
I have been chiefly moved by your approval,
and by that of Mr. Mill, to hope that the following
collected Essays may be usefully republished on the
eve of a session of Parliament in which the whole
subject of Ballot and election abuses and election
inquiries is to come on for discussion and legislation.
The last of these Essays has appeared within the
last two years ; the first was published thirty-two
years ago, at the time when I was first known to you,
and when I remember the strong influence on
young minds both of Oxford and Cambridge of
some of your earliest writings, — then not so widelv
i known as your name is known now, after a loup-
PREFACE AND
term, poorly enough requited, of good works and
learned labours and firm unostentatious battling for
conscience.
It may not be known to some even whom the
subject of j)urity of elections specially interests,
that you have found time, amid your many pro-
fessional and literary labours and various works
of philanthropy, to write on the law and practice
of elections.^
I felt that you did me a great honour, some
years ago, when 3^ou kindly came forward to co-
operate with me in an efibrt for reform of elections ;
and I feel greatly honoured now by being permitted
to connect again my name with one so excellent
and eminent as yours by dedicating to you this
volume.
In view of the renewed discussion of the Ballot
which is near at hand, I shall do a good service by
making known that your name is not enlisted
ao;ainst that much-abused measure.
I am able also to claim the honour of your
agreement w^ith me in opinion that many other
1 "Corruption at Elections," in Macmillan's Magazine, July 1864.
"The Means of checking Bribery and Corruption in the Election of
Members of the House of Commons," a Paper read before the Juridical
Society, 1866.
LEDTCATION.
me<asures for reform of elections should be passed,
in addition to the Ballot.
The prohibition of paid canvassing was omitted
in Mr. Forster's Bill of last year. The tone in which
Mr. Forster spoke of paid canvassing leaves no
ground for doubt that he himself is favourable to
legislation against that evil, and gives much reason
to hope that the Bill of the coming session will
not be chargeable with the same fault of omission.
Baron Martin suggested to Lord Hartington's Com-
mittee of 1868-9 that paid canvassing should be
prohibited.
The Bill of last year did not propose to give
effect to a recommendation of the Committee of
1868-9, that the use of public-houses for committee
rooms should be prohibited. The same Committee
had abstained from recommendino; the closino- of
public-houses on the days of nomination and
polling. It is to be hoped that the new Bill will
include provisions for both objects. Baron Martin
said before the Committee : " I have a very strong
opinion indeed that the public-houses ought to be
closed on the day of polling. I think the quantitj' of
drink on the day of polling, and the state in which
many voters were alleged to have come up to vote,
62
PREFACE AND
was perfectly scandalous ; they were so drunk in
two or three cases that they did not know who they
came to vote for. In one case, at Norwich, the
voter would insist on voting for Patterson and
Steward, the brewers there." So again, of using
public-houses for committee-rooms the same Judge
said : "1 think that ought to be stopped. I am
satisfied that it is made a pretence for treating."
Mr. Justice Willes had some doubt as to the practi-
cability of dispensing with public-houses for com-
mittee-rooms, but none as to the good effect in
the way of increasing purity of election, and he
seemed to fear that in many places no other rooms
might be to be found ; but Mr. Charles Villiers, a
member of the Committee, seasonably asked the
Judge, "If it was forbidden, do not you think
that rooms would very soon be provided for such
occasions ? " The Judge replied : " I have not
sufficient practical knowledge to answer that ques-
tion, but I would, if it were practicable, prohibit
their being held at public-houses." There can be
no doubt that demand will quickly produce a
supply of suitable rooms and buildings.
Mr. Forster's Bill proposed to abolish public nomi-
nations, but not public declarations of the poll.
DEDICATION.
The latter ceremony is as often, and as much, a scene
of drunkenness and rioting, and as useless for any
good object, as the former. There are boroughs — as
Cambridge, for instance — where the public declara-
tion of the poll is made on the very day of polling,
in the evening, in order to avoid a second day of
disturbance. It is the practice also in the borough
of Cambridge for the losing candidates and their
friends to absent themselves from the public declara-
tion of the poll, in order to diminish rioting. In
large constituencies, the votes cannot of course be
counted up in time for the public declaration on the
day of polling. In the late School Board elections
there was neither public nomination nor jmblic
declaration of the poll ; and why should it not be
the same, for the sake of decency and order, in
parliamentary elections ?
The Act of 18G8, under which Judges of the
Superior Courts of AVestminster have been lately
triers of election petitions, expiring at the end of
the coming session, it will be for Parliament to
determine in this session whether the present system
is to be continued or a chans^e to be mnde.
My belief is that there should be substituted for
the present s}'stem one of effective supervision of
PREFACE AST)
elections during their progress, and of investigation
and judgment by competent barristers immediately
after tlie poll and before the return, with a power
of appeal from the barrister's return to a Judge or
Judges of the superior Courts. Such a plan is ex-
plained and advocated in the fourth Essay of this
volume, and was earnestly recommended by Mr.
Mill while the present Act was passing through the
House of Commons.
To set the superior Judges to work at the primary
election trials is like " cutting^ blocks with a razor."
To send them about the country to grope into all
tlie elements of election chicanery and filth is to use
them in a manner unworthy of their high offices
and duties and qualifications. If an election peti-
tion is treated as a private lawsuit, the public
interest in the matter is not represented, and dis-
covery of corruption becomes mere matter of acci-
dent or of private interest. The increased assimila-
tion in practice of an election trial to a private
lawsuit under the new system — as, for instance, by
requirement of particulars of charges of corrupt
practices to be delivered before trial, and by the
more or less rigorous application of the ordinary
rule of costs — has increased discouragement and
DEDICATION.
difficulty for petitioners ; and the discovery of
- corruption depends practically on the willingness
of unsuccessful candidates and of their friends to
incur the expense, labour, risk, and invidiousness of
petitioning. AVhat is needed is a suitable machinery
for preventing corruption and lavish expenditure
while the election is going on, and for detection of
malpractices not only on the spot, but also at the
moment, before zeal has subsided, and when there
has been no time for culprits or witnesses to be
spirited away, by a lawyer with general powers, as
to whom there will be the safeguards of legal com-
petency and of power of appeal to a superior Judge
or Judges.
The most valuable part of the evidence presented
by the Committee of 1868-9 is, as was to be expected,
that of the three Judges whom they examined — •
Baron Martin, Mr. Justice AVilles, and Mr. Justice
Blackburn. It is refreshing to read their hearty ana-
themas against corruption and profligate expendi-
ture. They all speak under a painful feeling of their
inability, under the powers given them, or in the
necessary conditions of their high judicial position,
to grapple with all the evils of which they obtained
knowledge. They have recommended various im-
PREFACE AND
provements in the Act under whicli tliey have tried
petitions, which will need to be attended to by
the Legislature, whatever tribunal is next devised.
The following recommendations were made : —
1. That power be given to the Judges to void a
seat where there has been unreasonable expenditure ;
as at Westminster, where Baron Martin, in whom
zeal against corruption was not wanting, did not
find himself empowered to unseat Mr. W. H. Smith,
who admitted an expenditure of 9,000Z. ; or at
Youghal, where an expenditure of 5,000^. in a
small borough would not have sufiiced to enable
Mr. Justice O'Brien to unseat Mr. Weguelin.
2. That the Judges be enabled to unseat for an
extensive practice of illegalities, showing design
to violate the law ; as in conveyance of voters,
voting of employed persons, &c.
3. That whereas now, under the 23rd section of
the Corrupt Practices Act of 1854, the giving of
refreshments to voters on the days of nomination
and polling, on account of having polled or being
about to poll, is illegal, and subject to a fine of
forty shillings if sued for, there should be a more
stringent prohibition of refreshments, and for a
whole week before the election ; and that giving
DEDICATION.
refreshments to voters during the previous week by
a candidate or agent should upset the election.
4. That more stringent provisions should be made
for ensuring accurate and complete returns of ex-
penses from candidates' agents, and that these should
be delivered before the trial of a petition. On this
point Mr. Justice Blackburn specially dwelt. He
said, " I would make it the law that the period for
petitioning should be extended till after the return
of the accounts : and what I think is even more
important, I would make it a substantive ground
for unseating a member if he or his agents wilfully
kept back any vouchers, or any expenses which
they had incurred or paid."
I have already mentioned the recommendations
of Judges for prohibition of paid canvassers, for
prohibition of committee-rooms, and of meetings at
public-houses, and for the closing of public-houses
on the day of polling.
Mr. Justice Blackburn points out in a passage of
his evidence how the Judge's power of discovery is
limited by the lawsuit character of a petition ; how
the parties can at their will blindfold the Judge.
" A Judge cannot know anything about the matter,
except what is brought before him, and it does not
PREFACE AND
always follow that the persons who impugn the
election are willing to brinar it before him." In
another place the same Judge expresses the opinion
that a public prosecutor would be desirable, if prac-
ticable ; " it would remove one very considerable
imperfection in election petitions at present, namely,
that you can only get the evidence which the party
chooses to produce."
A remark of Mr. Justice Willes at the end of his
judgment on the Coventry petition is very interest-
ing, as showing how the interest of the public in an
election trial dawned rather late on that acute and
public-spirited Judge's mind, and as suggesting how
the public ends of election inquiries ought to be fur-
ther considered in legislation on this subject. The
three Judges of 1869 had agreed in the outset to
follow the rule of the Common Law Courts as to
costs, that they follow the event. Mr. Justice Willes
announced this rule and acted on it in the first elec-
tion trial, that of Windsor, decided on January 15,
1869. But by the seventeenth of February the
claim of a third party, the public, had become
evident to Mr. Justice Willes's mind ; and he thus
candidly confessed himself : —
DEDICATION.
" As a rule, costs ought to follow the event, and in
ordinary actions in the courts to which I have been
accustomed, they almost invariably follow it, the
exceptions being rare. When I set off npon this
circuit, I certainly did so with the intention of
acting upon my old notions, and of dealing with
these cases as if they were ordinary suits between
party and party. I have, however, become deeply
impressed with the feeling that there is a third
party, no less interested than those who are im-
mediately engaged in the petition, and that I ought
in each case to consider, not merely whether the
petition has failed or has succeeded, but whether,
upon the whole, I think there are grounds, not
founded merely upon the belief of such witnesses as
many of those who have been called before the
court upon this occasion have displayed themselves
to be, but founded upon the very character and
history of the transaction, upon which it was for
the public benefit that the petition should be pre-
sented, and upon which I think that the petitioners
have had reasonable and probable cause for insti-
tuting this inquiry, which I am satisfied that if I
had been in their place I should, without anger and
without prejudice, have thought it right should be
instituted. I say no more upon that point unless it
is desired that I should do so. I think this is a
case in which a petition has been most reasonably
PREFACE AND
presented and prosecuted, and therefore I say no-
thing about the costs, although the petition has in
the end, in my mind, altogether failed of arriving
at the result of unseating the members."
No system of election trials which makes all dis-
covery dependent on the action of petitioners, can
satisfy the public interest, or even approximate to
what is needful for promoting purity of election.
There is a clause in the " Parliamentary Elections
Act" of 1868, which, if it really means what it
seems to imply, should be sufficient to ensure effec-
tive inquiry by a Commission in most cases where
corrupt practices have extensively prevailed. Clause
56 of the Act provides that if, on a petition pre-
sented within a certain time, signed by any two or
more electors, alleging that corrupt practices exten-
sively prevailed, or that there is reason to believe
that they so prevailed, an address be presented by
both Houses of Parliament, praying the Crown to
appoint a Commission to inquire ; and if Commis-
sioners be appointed, they shall inquire in the same
manner as Commissioners appointed after report of
a Judge to the same effect on trial of an ordinary
election petition. This, if it means anything, must
mean that a petition of two or more electors, affirm-
DEDICATION.
ing extensive prevalence of corrupt practices or
belief in such prevcilence, is to lead to an address
which will lead to a Commission of searching
inquiry. The z/'can only have been meant to avoid
appearance of binding Parliament and the Crown.
If the Legislature had intended to leave action on
the petition virtually open and subject to parliamen-
tary debates, the clause might as well have been
omitted. Not one single case has yet occurred of
such a petition. It has been possibly thought that
this clause was not intended to give any two elec-
tors the power of ensuring a Commission of inquiry
by a petition unaccompanied by any security for
costs. But as the clause stands, and as it ought to
be interpreted, it is in the power of any two electors
to procure a full inquiry by petitioning, without
expense or risk of expense ; and if this power is
admitted and generally used, no better security
against corruption than it would afford is needed.
But I can hardly believe it possible that the two
Houses of Parliament would ao;ree to address the
Crown for a Commission, the costs of which are to
be defrayed by the accused borough or county, on
the mere allegations of two electors, unchecked by
PREFACE AND
requirement even of security for costs if the allega-
tions are unfounded.
We are probably agreed on tlie great desirability
and importance of the measure, which was first pro-
posed by Professor Fawcett, and was included in
Mr. Forster's Bill of last year, but was not very stre-
nuously defended by the Government, for relieving
candidates of the public expenses of elections, and
placing these on the public rates. Such a measure
will not only be useful in itself, but further useful
as giving an example and an impulse for entire
chano-e of that tone of thouo;ht which reo;ards a seat
in the House of Commons as the rich man's privi-
lege and the pastime of high position ; which makes
the House of Commons to a great extent less
a place of earnest business than a club for the
wealthy and a lounging-room for the fashionable ;
which upholds a high scale of expenses as a sort of
property qualification, obstructing the entrance into
Parliament not only of honest and intelligent work-
ing men, but also of gentlemen of culture, of in-
dependence, and of leisure, who possess only mode-
rate means ; which thus injuriously restricts the
area of choice of our legislators, and in various ways
DEDICATION.
gives advantage — to use the cmpliatic and memorable
words of Mr. Justice Willes before the late Com-
mittee — " to the rich dullard over the poor man of
intellect."
Believe me,
My dear Mr. Maurice,
Yours very sincerely,
W. D. CHEISTIE.
December 20, 1871.
I.
AN ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR OF THE BALLOT.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
The following essay was published as a pamphlet in the
year 1839. It was the production of a young writer. In
now reprinting it, I have made changes in words and style,
and have here and there omitted passages, but I have made
no substantial change in the argument. Parliamentary
election committees, having first been improved from what
they were in 1839, have latterly been superseded by trials by
Judges, This change has occasioned change of phraseology
in the parts of the essay dealing with scrutinies after elec-
tions. The present election tribunal is greatly superior
to the old one, even in its latterly improved state. So far,
there is diminished strength in the part of the argument
resting on the evils of scrutinies : but that is a trifling
element in the question.
Though scrutiny generally must vanish after the adop-
tion of Ballot, I am not sure that power of upsetting an
election should not be reserved in cases where the number
of bad votes given may exceed the majority of the suc-
cessful candidate over a petitioner: but such cases will
necessarily be rare.
When this essay was first published, in 1839, Mr. Grote
was the champion of the Ballot in the House of Commons.
In that year the debate on the Ballot had been unusually
B 2
ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
interesting, and the ndnoritj' in its favour had been larger
than ever before. When Mr. Grote first brought forward
Ballot in 1833, — the first year of the reformed Parliament,
— one hundred and six had voted with him. This number
had steadily increased till, in 1839, the minority was two
hundred and seventeen. The Cabinet of Lord ]\Ielbourne
had decided, in 1839, to make Ballot an open question. Mr.
Macaulay, just returned from India to the House of Com-
mons, had made his first speech in the Ballot debate, and
liad powerfully advocated the measure. The great progress
of the Ballot in public opinion was attested by increased
activity of opponents, and by the appearance of Mr. Syd-
ney Smith's pamphlet, the wit and fun of which have done
more to discredit the Ballot than any serious arguments.
I extract from the preface to the first edition of my
pamphlet some remarks on Mr. Sydney Smith's witty
production. " Its desultory, discursive method is singularly
ill-adapted for the full and fair discussion of a question
like the Ballot. Here nice moral considerations are to be
w^eighed, and tendencies to evil scrupulously compared with
tendencies to good. It will not do in such a case to pick
topics, merely as they happened to be most amusing, and
for the same reason to confine one's view altogether to one
side of the account. This is not the way, most especially
in the case of a question like the Ballot, to travel towards
truth or to work conviction."
In the same preface I mentioned with the respect
due to them, Mr. James Mill's powerful essays,^ and Mr.
Albany Fonblanque's many brilliant articles in the -£"3::^-
vnner newspaper, in favour of the Ballot.
^ " Ballot," in the Supplement to EncTjdopoEdia Britannica (1824) ;
i'cstminste)' Review, vol. xiii. (1830) ; Lcndon Review, vol, i. (1835).
OF TUE BALLOT.
Time has not diminished my sense of the honour done
me by Mr. Grote's approval of this essay on its first appear-
ance thirty-two years ago ; and among others who conveyed
to me their approval of the arguments, and who have since
passed away, were the accomplished Professor Empson,
afterwards editor of the Ediiiburgh Review, Mr. John Allen
of Holland House, and Mr. H. G. Ward, member for Shef-
field (afterwards Sir Henry Ward), wdio, when Mr. Grote
had ceased to be a member of the House of Commons,
succeeded him in 1842 as the proposer of Ballot.
AN ARGUMENT, etc.
Of those who possess the elective franchise in England,
a large number are more or less dependent on others for
their livelihood and happiness. Tenants are dependent on
landlords, servants on masters, tradesmen on customers ;
and over and above this, all who are poor, or to whom
pecuniary assistance is likely to be grateful, may be con-
sidered more or less dependent on others with whom riches
abound, and who, if a purpose is to be gained, are likely
to be willing to be generous with their abundance. This
state of dependence of a large munber of electors thwarts
very often, and to a very considerable extent, the purpose
for which the elective franchise is bestowed, and turns
Avhat might be a fruitful blessing into a mischief. Under
a system of election in which every man may see how
every other man votes, intimidation is extensively ex-
ercised by landlords and masters and customers, and
bribery widely prevails. So far as this is the case, the
purpose for which the elective franchise is bestowed is
thwarted. It is intended by the state, that each man to
ARGdMENT FOB THE BALLOT.
whom the elective franchise is entrusted, should exercise
his own judgment on the merits of the candidates between
whom he has to choose, and vote for him whom, on the
several grounds of honesty, intelligence, and the general
tenor of political opinion, he himself holds most worthy
of a seat in Parliament. So far, then, as votes are given,
not in accordance with the opinions of the voters, but in
order to avert injury or in return for a bribe, so far does
the existing scheme of representation fail of being carried
out, and so far is the state foiled. But the evil does not
end here. The possession of the elective franchise, pro-
voking thought on political questions, and tending, through
the power which it confers, to foster the feeling of self-
respect, may be an effective engine for the mental and
moral improvement of the humbler classes of society.
But when men are forced to vote at the bidding of a
superior, or tempted to sell their independence for a bribe,
the elective franchise ceases to be a means of education,
for it is exercised blindly and imthinkingly at another's
behest; and further, instead of raising, it has become an
nstrument to degrade, the character of the voter, turniug
him into a slave or staining his soul with venality. Nor
do the intimidator and the briber come away themselves
unscathed.
It is desirable that some measure should be resorted to,
which may remove or diminish the practice of intimidation
and bribery, from which these evils ensue. And this is
no question of party, nor one on which those w^ho are for,
and those who are against, an extension of popular power,
must necessarily differ. It is to be presumed rather that
ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
persons of all parties will join in supporting such a
measure, if only they agree in thinking that the will of
the state should be fulfilled, and that it is better to have a
system of election which may raise, than one which must
degrade, the character of the humbler classes of society,
and provided it can be shown that no evil or evils will be
entailed by the adoption of such a measure suf&ciently
large to overbalance the good that it is likely to produce.
It may seem to some that penal enactments against
intimidation and bribery, and a properly contrived system
of election-law, though these cannot be expected entirely
to remove, may considerably mitigate the evil. There is
no doubt that, as regards bribery, much may be done by
their means. Yet, the best-contrived laws always admit-
ting of evasion and escape, and the preventive tendency
of these particular laws being sure to be impeded by the
eagerness with which men seek for a seat in Parliament,
while, on the other hand, little assistance can be looked for
from any strong prevailing feeling as to the immorality of
bribery, much, even as regards bribery, would still remain
undone. The most, indeed, that can be said of punish-
ments, even as regards bribery, is that they would be an
useful auxiliary to any other more effectual mode, if any
such can be suggested, of mitigating the evil. As regards
intimidation, penal enactments or election-laws can do
literally nothing. You cannot interfere between a landlord
and his tenant, or between a master and his servant ;
nor can you say to a customer, " You shall distribute
your custom equally and impartially between your political
friends and foes — we will punish you if you change your
OF THE BALLOT.
baker or butcher on the ground of his vote." And though
power may be given to cancel or alter a return clearly-
affected by intimidation, yet it is so easy to give a threat
the form of a request, making the black seem comely,
and to find pretexts for the ejection of a tenant, or the
dismissal of a servant, or the abandonment of a trades-
man, that, when a motive exists for caution, it would be
very seldom that this power could be exercised.
Declarations, either by a candidate that he has not
bribed and knows nothing of bribery on the part of friends,
or by any persons having influence of any kind at any
election (if it be possible to obtain declarations from these)
that they have not intimidated, admit so easily of evasion
that they are able to do little. So far as they go, they
may be useful auxiliaries ; but he must be moderate indeed
in his hostility to intimidation and bribery who would
confine his hopes to their sole unassisted operation.
Unable, then, to satisfy ourselves with the degree of
efficacy possessed by such expedients as have now been
mentioned for mitigating the evil, we are led to turn our
eyes elsewhere. What if votes were given not openly, but
secretly? It is clear that a voter could not be made to
vote in compliance with a threat, if he had tlie power to
conceal his vote from the intimidator ; and it is clear also
that were a man who had received a bribe able to vote
secretly, he would have the opportunity of foiling the
briber. The concealment of the vote would thus, to say
the least, place difliculties in the way of intimidation, and
diminish the inducement to bribery. As elections are now
managed by open voting, the intimidator and briber have
10 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
full play; tliey see how the vote is given, and can instantly
follow up an obnoxious vote by fulfilling the threat or by
withholding the promised bribe. If secret voting were
substituted,— if a dependent voter could thus prevent an
intimidating landlord or master or customer from knowing
how he voted, unless he himself chose to reveal it, obliging
him otherwise to resort to indirect and laborious and not
always gentlemanlike modes of arriving at the secret, and
after all to get no further than suspicion ; and if a poor
man, who may have been bribed, could also thus make it a
matter of uncertainty to the briber that his vote had been
given in accordance with the briber's wishes; we may expect
— unless men are likely to spend money without security
of getting Avhat they have paid for, and unless the gentry
of England are likely to turn generally spies and eaves-
droppers and suborners of eavesdropping, and become
tyrants on suspicion — that intimidation and bribery, and
the evils which spring from them, would be very con-
siderably mitigated. We cannot expect from secret voting
an entire removal of the evil. But simple and direct
in its operation, — tending to impede the intimidator and
briber in the doing of the foul deed, instead of punishing
after the deed is done, and acting only by example,—
and ef&cacious alike against intimidation and against
bribery, this expedient may be expected to mitigate the
evil to a very considerable extent. Combined with the
other expedients which have been mentioned, it may be
expected to mitigate the evil to an extent short only of
entire removal. Thus efficacious, then, against intimidation
and bribery, it is necessary to inquire whether secret voting
OF THE BALLOT. 11
will introduce any evil or evils sufficiently large to over-
balance the good that may be expected from it.
It is my object to explain the merits of secret voting,
under its familiar name of ballot. This will be done
ahnost entirely in the way of answering and extenuating
objections. The nature of the question, in which all that
concerns the goodness of the end, and the mode in which
secret voting operates as a means, lies within a nut-
shell, renders the adoption of this defensive method
imperative.
The objections brought against secret voting, or Ballot,
may be conveniently considered under two heads. First,
there are objections against its practicability; and secondly,
objections against its beneficial tendency. Adapting my
argument to this twofold division of objections, I shall first
endeavour to prove that elections can be managed with
secret voting or by Ballot, or, in other words, that secret
voting, or Ballot, is practicable. Having established its
practicability, I shall proceed to combat such objections as
tend to disparage its efficacy or to impute to it the pro-
duction of mischief, hoping to prove that a very large
balance of good will result from the adoption of secret
voting or Ballot.
I. — First as to the practicability of secret voting. It is
sometimes contended that secret voting, whatever might be
the amount of good to be derived from it in the way of
mitigating intimidation and bribery and their attendant
evils, would derange the machinery of elections, making it
altogether impossible to be secure of proper returns.
Those by whom this is contended consider secret voting
12 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
incompatible with precautions to prevent unqualified
persons from voting, or again, in cases where more than
one member is to be elected, to prevent qualified voters
from giving more than one vote to any one particular can-
didate ; and they think also that it will enable returning
officers and their clerks to tamper with the votes without
certainty of detection. It is for these reasons that the
Ballot is sometimes pronounced impracticable as a mode of
voting. Were the reasons valid, there is no doubt that it
would be so ; and further, there is no doubt that a mode of
voting which foiled so essentially the object of elections,
must, no matter how eflicacious in mitigating the evils of
intimidation and bribery, at once be abandoned. It may
be shown, however, that fears as to the incompatibility of
secret voting with precautions against an improper number
of votes, or against improper conduct of persons to whom
the care of the votes is entrusted, are unnecessary and
unfounded.
In order to show this, it is necessary to describe some
particular system of election in which secret voting is
incorporated. It is of course allowed to the advocates of
secret voting, to suppose a system possessing all possible
collateral advantages, and also, if there should be a choice
of modes of secret voting, to adopt that mode which is the
best; else the Ballot will not receive a fair trial. And
it is incumbent likewise on opponents of secret voting to
conduct their argument with reference to the same best
possible system of election.
Mr. Sydney Smith objects to the friends of the Ballot
supposing any contemporaneous change in the system of
OF THE BALLOT. 13
election, which Avould either co-operate with secret voting
to diminish intimidation and bribery (as the abolition, for
instance, of anomalously small constituencies), or prevent
blame, properly attaching to the non-adoption of such
change, from being laid at the door of the IMlot. Tlius,
when some improvements in the present machinery of
registration are suggested, which, increasing the security
for the right determining of qualifications to vote, would
improve generally the system of election, and more than
make up for the loss, which Ballot brings, of power of
subsequent scrutiny, Mr. Smith exclaims, — "The answer
of the excellent Benthamites to all this is, ' What you say
may be true enough in the present state of registrations,
but we have another scheme of registration, to w^hich these
objections will not apply.' There is really no answering
this Paulo-post legislation." Faulo-post legislation is a
happy term ; but admiring the humour, I deny the justice,
of the joke. The friends of secret voting are entitled to
require that their project be tried under the most favour-
able circumstances, and that evils arising from the neglect
of obvious collateral precautions be not ascribed to the
Ballot.
Votes may be given secretly, either by means of a paper
containing the names of the whole number of candidates,
from which the voter has to expunge the names of those
for whom he does not vote (this is the mode in the United
States), — or by balls, which are all of one colour, and which,
according as a voter wishes to vote for or against a parti-
cular candidate, must be placed in different boxes or in
different compartments of the same box, — or again, by balls
14 ARG UMENT IN FAVO UR
of two different colours, which, so far as regards any one
candidate, may be placed in the same box. These are three
modes of voting secretly, and other modes may be men-
tioned or devised. Any one of these modes may, with
more or less trouble, be accompanied by effectual precau-
tions against improper votes and against tampering on the
part of returning officers and their clerks, and may thus be
made serviceable for elections. The first mode, that of the
printed paper, is most simply and easily adapted to the
purpose. It being clearly unnecessary to describe more
than one system of election by secret voting, I shall choose
for this purpose, out of the three modes of voting that have
been enumerated, that one which is most simply and easily
made serviceable. The circumstance, however, that there
is no scarcity of modes that may be made free from the
objections which have been brought, is not to be lost sight
of, illustrating as it does the value of the objections.
Adopting, then, the mode of voting with a printed paper,
I shall suppose the following system of election : — First of
all, I suppose (as I am entitled to do) a good machinery of
registration, conducted by proper persons and on proper
principles, and so managed that a registration shall always
take place shortly before an election. I may observe, in
passing, that it will be no longer possible to reconsider
votes after the election, with a view to abstracting them
from one candidate or the other.^ When secret voting is
^ It will be possible to reserve the power of cancelling a return and
ordering a new election, when a number of votes greater than the number
of the winning candidate's majority over his opponent has been dis-
allowed for i)ersonation, want of qualification, &c.
OF THE BALLOT. 15
adopted, there can be no sucli scrutiny. The registry last
before an election will, probably, be made final for that
election ; and when the election takes place, the appear-
ance of one's name on the register will be the sufficient,
as it will be the necessary, qualification to vote. I sup-
pose then as good a registration-machinery as is j)os-
sible. When the election takes place, the voters must first
present themselves to clerks appointed by the returning
officer for the special purpose of ascertaining that they are
registered. The voter's name is demanded — a reference is
made to the register — a declaration of identity perhaps
required; where identity is distinctly impugned, the
matter may be referred to the returning officer, who may
hear evidence and decide, recording perhaps the grounds of
his decision. The voter, if adjudged qualified, after the
necessary and sufficient precautions have been taken to
determine liis identity, is furnished with a ticket which
enables him to give his vote. Lists of the tickets given
are kept by the persons whose business it is to give thenu
The voter, having received his ticket, now takes it to one
of the clerks appointed by the returning officer to tend the
boxes, and having presented his ticket, which is tiled, re-
ceives one of the printed voting-papers. He then retires
into another room, or into a recess, from which there is
no egress save by the way by which he has entered, and
where, unseen, he expunges from the list the names of
those for whom he does not vote. Having done this, he
returns to deposit his vote in the box. The box-clerks (as
we may for shortness call those who watch over the boxes)
cannot open these boxes, the keys being in the hands of
16 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
the returning officer. At the close of the election the re-
turning officer, sitting in public, first ascertains the number
of persons who have voted, which is furnished both by
the box-clerks' files of tickets, and by the lists kept by the
qualification-clerks; and afterwards, opening the boxes
and causing the votes for the several candidates to be .
counted, ascertains the number for each candidate, and the
result of the election. All this being done publicly, the
returning officer and his clerks have little opportunity of
playing tricks with the lists ; while, again, the number of
voting-papers produced is checked both by the box-clerks'
files and by the qualification-clerks' lists of votes. These,
too, are checks upon one another. The returning officer
announces the result, and there is no scrutiny.
Let us consider, then, the objections to the practicability
of the Ballot, with reference to this system of election by
secret voting.
1. It is said, that secret voting is incompatible with pre-
cautions, which shall prevent unqualified persons from
voting. Now the only additional facility (if additional
facility it can be called) given for the admission of such
unqualified persons, proceeds from the impossibility, which
has been already explained, of instituting a revision of the
register subsequently to the election, in order to deprive the
member returned of particular votes on scrutiny. In Mr.
Sydney Smith's words, " If there is Ballot there can be no
scrutiny, the controlling power of Parliament is lost, and
the members are entirely in the hands of returning
officers." Now freely admitting the fact, I have to remark
in answer to the objection derived from it : first, that the
OF THE BALLOT. 17
difference caused by the disappearance of an after control-
ling power of scrutiny over elections, cannot possibly be a
difference as between impossibility of excluding voters on
the one hand, and perfect power of exclusion on the other,
but can at most only be a difference in degree of precau-
tion taken and security obtained ; secondly, that there are
evils arising from tribunals of appeal for scrutiny, such
as increase of expense to candidates and increased oppor-
tunities of chicanery, which will more than countervail the
good to be derived from them, even on the most favourable
supposition ; and thirdly, that ample precautions may be
taken by a proper system of registration, by a proper use of
the register during the election, together with the adoption
of means of determining the identity of persons applying
to vote, and of punishments where such identity is falsely
assumed, to prevent the intrusion of unqualified voters.
This objection has probably to a great extent originated in
an ill-digested experience of systems of election, in which,
combined with secret voting, there is either no registry, or
an ill-managed registry, or no use is made of the register
at the time of an election.^ At all events it is very unjust
^ Tlius in America, where elections are conducted by Ballot, and where
it is said that persons having no qualification vote in considerable num-
bers, there is no registry, or an imperfectly constructed one. The chief
safeguard against bad votes is the power possessed by every citizen of
challenging any voter at the poll. When so challenged, the person
claiming to vote is required to swear that he is a citizen of the United
States, that he has resided six months in the coimtry, that he is at the
time resident in the ward in which he claims to vote, and that he has
not voted before, anywhere else, in the pending elections. The oath of
course is no obstacle to many who have yet no sort of right to vote ; and the
qualification is of a sort which renders the proof of perjury peculiarly
C
18 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
to assert that, so long as power of scrutiny remains, un-
qualified voters can be entirely excluded, while, so soon as
it ceases, they will be able largely to intrude themselves.
It is necessary, under any system of election, to take
precautions for excluding persons who are not properly
qualified to vote from the register, and for preventing
persons who are not registered from voting. Under a
system of which secret voting is a part, the following
measures of precaution are as available as when votes are
given openly. A system of registration, conducted by
proper persons and on proper principles, will exist, and
may be expected to suffice, for the proper determining of
qualification to be placed upon the register. When the
election takes place, measures such as have been mentioned
in the above-described system of election by secret voting
will be taken to ascertain, whether a person applying to
vote has his name upon the register, and whether he is
the person whom he professes to be, before he is allowed
to vote :
" lUe tamen faciem prins inspicit, et trepidat, ne
Suppositus venias, ac falso nomine poscas.
Agnitus accipies. "
Notwithstanding, however, all precautions to determine
identity, and all security for having these precautions
properly carried into effect, a few unregistered persons may
still, by assuming the name of some one who has either
died since the formation of the registry or who is absent
from the spot, succeed in deceiving the qualification-clerks,
difficult. Cases are known in which foreigners have been carried to the
poll, straight from the emigrant ship in which they have just arrived.
OF THE BALLOT. 19
and be admitted to vote. But these instances of persona-
tion must always be rare, and can seldom, as regards a
single election, affect a return. But is it not a mockery to
pretend, that to preserve scrutiny would be to render per-
sonation impracticable, or add anything worth taking into
account to the security against it ? Power might indeed be
reserved of cancelling a return, where the number of per-
sonations and bad votes is proved larger than the majority,
and with this view the register might be not final.
2. The next objection, that voters may, in cases where
more than one member is to be elected, give more than
one vote to some one particular candidate, cannot by any
possibility apply to the plan of election above described.
Being able to put no more than one voting-paper into the
box, the voter can give no more than one vote to each
candidate for whom he votes. Any voting-paper in which,
by reason of not enough names being expunged, more
candidates would seem to be voted for than there are
members to be elected, is of course null and void There
is, however, nothing to prevent plumping, or voting for any
number of candidates less than the number to be elected.
The modes of voting with balls, to which the attention
of the objectors has perhaps been restricted, may have
suggested this objection, which, where voting-papers are
used, is without ground or even excuse. But the modes of
voting with balls, also, may be so arranged as to fuard
effectually against an improper number of votes. ^
^ I think it as well to explain in a note the way in which, when votin"-
with balls is resorted to, the giving of more votes than one to a)iy one par-
ticular candidate may be guarded against. [When
c 2
20 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
?). Neither need we alarm ourselves with the prospect,
held out in the third ohjection, of tampering on the part
of returning-officers and clerks with the votes entrusted
to their care. This is effectually guarded against in the
plan which has been described : first, by having two lists
Wlien balls are used instead of voting-papers, the balls either may be
all of one colour, having different meanings as they are placed in different
boxes or different compartments of the same box ; or they may be of tu'o
different colours, aud to be placed, as regards any one candidate, in the
same box.
When the balls are all of one colour, it will be necessary that there he
two boxes or two compartments of a box for each candidate. There will
be a separate clerk for each pair of boxes, or for each double box, if the
mode of compartments be adopted. If there be two boxes, it will be
necessary that tliese should be placed in an inner room, and the clerk stand
outside of the door, so that he may not, by seeing in which box the voter
places the ball, know how he votes. But if the mode of compartments be
adopted, the box-clerk may stand by the box (which is better) and see the
voter place his ball in the box. The voter will, at each double box or
each pair of boxes, receive one ball ; and, getting rid of one ball before
he receives another, he will not be able to put more than one ball into
each box.
When the balls are of different colours, and, having of themselves dif-
ferent meanings, may be placed in the same box, it will be absolutely
necessary to have a pair of boxes for each candidate, one of the boxes
being for the reception of waste balls. In this case a box of two compart-
ments will not answer the purpose. There is a clerk for each pair of
boxes, always standing by the boxes. The voter, going separately to each
clerk, is provided by each with two balls, one white and the other black,
with one of which he votes, and the other of which he puts into the waste
box. Thus his vote is concealed from the clerk, who cannot see which
ball he puts into which box ; and at the same time he cannot carry away
either of the balls, wherewith to do mischief in any of the other boxes.
All the arguments urged in the text against the objections, which im-
pute facilities for the admission of unqualified voters and for tampering
with the votes by returning-ofScers and their subordinates, apply of course
to a plan of election comprising these modes of voting, as well as to
in one which voting-papers are employed.
OF THE BALLOT. 21
of the voters — the list of names kept by the qualification-
clerks, and that supplied by the tickets filed by the box-
clerks — which will check one another, and either of which
wiU be a check upon the number of voting-papers ;
secondly, by the possibility of comparing, in a last resort,
the number of voting-papers with the number of names
upon the register ; and thirdly, by obliging the returning-
officer to open the boxes and carry on the computation of
the votes in the presence of the public. It may be added
that the box-clerks will necessarily be numerous ; and as
the voting-papers contained in each box may be separately
compared with the tickets filed by its own box-clerk, any
tampering with the votes by any one of these functionaries
may immediately be brought home to the real offender.
Thus much for the objections to the practicability of
secret voting or Ballot, — objections sometimes very posi-
tively urged, but yet very easily removed. When we
consider that the Ballot is not a thing altogether new
and untried, but that men have the experience of clubs
innumerable to prove the compatibility of secret voting
■with precautions to exclude unqualified persons from voting,
and to prevent such as are qualified from giving more than
one vote to any one candidate, and, again, to prevent those
who are entrusted with the care of the votes from tam-
pering with their charge, the fact that such objections are
urged and insisted on is surprising. Nor is it to be for-
gotten, that ]Mr. Grote was for some time at some pains to
circulate through the country specimens of an ingeniously
contrived and most practicable ballot-box.-^
^ The mode of secret voting recommended by Mr. Grote, for which his
ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
II. — Having thus established the practicability of secret
voting or Ballot, T proceed to speak of its advantage,
hoping to show that a large balance of good will result
from its adoption.
The nature of the good to be derived from secret voting
or Ballot follows immediately from the nature of the evils,
arising out of intimidation and bribery, which it is its
lutUot-box is framed, is essentially the same ^Yith the mode described in
the text. It is the mode of voting with voting-papers. But Mr. Grote's
])lau absolutely requires that these papers should be cards. In his plan,
the voting-cards are not given into the hands of the voters, to be by them
deposited in the box. They are suspended in a frame, a glass allowing the
names to be seen, and there being a series of holes opposite to the names,
through which a voter, pricking, may mark the card opposite to the names
that he favours. As Mr. Sydney Siuith wittily, but not very accurately,
describes it, "you stab the card of your favourite candidate with a
dagger. " The box is immediately below the frame holding the card ; and
as soon as a voter has marked the card to his satisfaction, either he, or the
clerk in his presence, draws away a slide, and lets the card drop into the box.
There is an advantage in Mr. Grote's voting-cai'ds and frame, that the
votei', not getting the card into his hand, is not able to show it to others
after it is marked. In the United States, .sufficient precautions are not
taken for secrecy in the marking and depositing of voting-papers. The
general mode of proceeding with ballot-voting in the States has been
thus described to me : " The machinery of the Ballot, as established here, is
extremely simple ; a closed box, with a .slit in the top, receives the folded
ticket, containing the names of those voted for. The voter gives his,
ticket to the inspector of polls, and the inspector deposits it in the box.
Though I believe that secrecy might be easily attained even by these
simple means, yet in practice so little care is taken to conceal the vote
given, that each party has generally an agent at the polling-place to
challenge adverse votes. And this, too, is how the door is opened
to bribery." In the system of election with voting-papers described in
the text, precautions, which would 2")robably be [sufficient, are taken to
ensure concealment.
A full description of Mr. Grote's box is to be found in the Spectator
newspaper of Febniary 25, 1837.
OF THE BALLOT. 23
object to diminish. These evils may be enumerated as
follows: — (1) A frustration of the existing scheme of
representation and of the state's purpose, so often as a
vote is given not in accordance with the opinion of the
voter, but under the ini3uence of a threat or in return for a
bribe ; (2) The unjustifiable infliction of pain on many
who, performing their duty, vote in opposition to the
wishes of landlords, masters, and customers ; (3) The
deterioration of moral character accruing to those who
are either coerced or bribed into voting according to the
wishes of another, and, in so far also as men are led to
take up with others' opinions in place of forming them
for themselves, the diminution of incentive, for the humbler
classes of society, to mental improvement; (4) The in-
jurious effect of tyranny on the intimidator himself, and of
bribery on the briber, and, in so far as a seat in ParKament
can be gained by the employment of foul means, the
diminution of inducement for the higher classes to cul-
tivate the intellectual accomplishments and the virtues
which rightly should be the sole conditions of success.
The nature of the good to be derived from secret voting
consists in the mitigation of all these evils. By the
adoption of secret voting, a fuller carrying out of the
purpose of the state, as expressed in the existing scheme
of representation, will be secured ; the amount of pain
unjustifiably inflicted in the way of ejecting tenants, dis-
missing servants, and discontinuing tradesmen will be
diminished; and for the humbler and higher classes of
society alike, for those who are now intimidated and bribed
as well as for those from whom threats and bribes proceed,
24 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
the means of moral and mental improvement will be en-
larged. Such is the nature of the good which is expected
to result from the adoption of secret voting or Ballot.
The degree to which it may be expected that this good
will be attained, or, in other words, the evils arising out
of intimidation and bribery mitigated, depends necessarily
on the degree to which the practice of intimidation and
bribery will be diminished. This, again, depends on the
way in which secret voting will operate to prevent intimi-
dation and bribery. ISTow the modus operandi of secret
voting or Ballot, which has already been indicated, may
be described as follows : — Every voter will be obliged to
give his vote secretly. The intimidator, instead of, as
now, seeing how a particular voter, whom he wishes to
coerce, votes, will be obliged either to depend on the
voter's own statement, which may be false, or to resort
to rather laborious and not very gentlemanlike modes of
arriving at the secret, which after all will carry him no
farther than suspicion ; and instead of being able, as now,
instantly to follow up with punishment an obnoxious vote,
he will be obliged to punish, if he punish at all for voting,
merely on suspicion, punishing very possibly a man who
has voted in accordance with his wishes, and at all events
committing a greater act of tyranny, and one more likely
to provoke public indignation, than were he to punish on
certain knowledge ; or, at best, he must content himseK
with ordering those whom he can influence to abstain
from voting at all, and with punishing them if they dis-
obey this order. Thus (to say the least) very considerable
difficulties will be placed in the way of the intimidator.
OF THE BALLOT. 25
The briber, too, instead of being able, as now, to withhold
a promised bribe if the vote be contraiy to his wishes, can
gain nothing by waiting until the vote has been given,
and, should he have bribed beforehand, will necessarily be
uncertain as to whether the vote be after all in accordance
with the object of the bribe ; for he cannot place depend-
ence on the honesty of a man who takes a bribe, nor can
he repose faith in his statement, nor can any other means
still within his reach of approaching to a discovery of the
secret, carry him any further than suspicion. Thus the
briber, too, necessarily uncertain as to the efficacy of his
bribe, will, if any reliance can be placed on human nature,
lose almost the whole of his inducement to bribe. It may
be expected, then, that intimidation and bribery will be
very considerably diminished by the adoption of secret
votuig or Ballot ; bribery almost entirely, for it is silly to
suppose that men will continue to give bribes when they
must be uncertain of their efficacy; intimidation not
perhaps to so great an extent as bribery, for to oppose
difficulties — the mode in which secret voting operates to
prevent intimidation — is generally not so eflectual as to
abstract inducement, but yet to a very considerable extent.
The opponents of the Ballot, however, placing much
reliance on such means as may still exist of approaching
to a discovery of the secret, and on modes by which still
occasionally intimidation and bribery may be practised,
are in the habit of disparaging and sometimes, indeed,
denying the efficacy of secret voting. The expedients on
which they thus build their hopes have been most of
them alluded to in t^e above account of the operation of
26 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
secret voting ; and perhaps they require only to be men-
tioned in order to show the futility of objections derived
from them, and their utter inadequacy to destroy, or even
in any considerable degree to damage, the efficacy of the
Ballot. It may be as well, however, as much importance
is often attached to the objections brought against the
efficacy of secret voting or Ballot, to consider them a little
more at length.
First of all, it is to be remarked that those who, not
content with disparaging, go so far as to deny the efficacy
of secret voting or Ballot, assign a wrong and unfair
meaning to the word efficacy. Otherwise they could not
deny it. These persons assume that secret voting is
recommended in the hope of entirely removing intimi-
dation and bribery, and the evils which spring from them.
They accordingly represent that this entire removal of the
evil is the object of the Ballot ; and then discovering, aa
they easily may do, some means by which a voter's vote
may be suspected, or perhaps even found out, or again
some mode by which intimidation and bribery may still
occasionally be practised, they at once triumph in the
proved inefficacy of the Ballot, and think, or profess to
think, the argument at an end. This fallacy or quibble
is by no means a subtle one. Secret voting or Ballot is
recommended, not in the hope of entirely removing, but in
the more moderate one of diminishing to a very consider-
able extent, the practices of intimidation and bribery, and
the evils which spring from them. It has been already
explained in the account of the mode of operation of secret
voting itself, that the Ballot is not adapted for the direct
OF THE BALLOT.
aud entire removal of the evil ; neither can we so far ascribe
perfection to a human contrivance as to assert that the
Ballot, which is adapted to mitigate these evils, will be
efficacious to the extent of entire removal. To be sure,
even though the entire removal of the evils were professed
to he the object of the Ballot, and this entire removal were
not achieved, yet much good might be done, and the
adoption of the Ballot be justified. But still, as the object
professed was not attained, and expectations were broken,
tlie quibble of inefficacy might plausibly be resorted to,
and with many it might pass. Inasmuch, however, as the
friends of the Ballot look to no more than a very con-
siderable mitigation of the evils, and are satisfied, as they
easily may be, with this, the question between them and
tlie objectors cannot possibly be other than a question of
degree, and the quibble is altogether without excuse. It
remains then to be seen whether these objections, which are
utterly inadequate to destroy, can damage in any consider-
able degree the expected efficacy of secret voting or Ballot.
These objections will be stated and considered in the
following order : first, those which suggest expedients for
baffling the secrecy afforded by Ballot ; secondly, those
which suggest modes of intimidation that may still be
practised ; and thirdly, those which suggest means of
bribery.
1. A person possessing influence, and wishing to exert
it in an improper way, may still, it is said, ask the
dependent voter how he intends to vote, and gain more or
less information from the answer, and act on that informa-
tion. Now I believe (thus differing from some advocates
28 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
of the Ballot) that canvassing may continue, even though
secret voting be adopted ; and I may add, that I think its
continuance not necessarily undesirable. If canvassing
were entirely to cease, electors might have but scanty
means of judging of the honesty and intelligence of can-
didates ; for five minutes' conversation is often worth, for
such a purpose, a hundred speeches from the hustings.
There could be nothing either like an intimate connection,
such as is desirable, between a member and his consti-
tuents. But I cannot myself see how Ballot will interfere
with canvassing generally. It will doubtless tend (as I
am about to show in considering this objection) greatly to
diminish the motives for questioning with a view to
intimidation and bribery, and will thus interfere with
imjproper canvassing. But it will leave proper, wholesome
canvassing untouched ; for Ballot or secret voting creates
no actual obstacle to the putting of questions. Admitting,
then, the power of putting questions, I proceed to show how
this cannot diminish, in any but the most insignificant
degree, the efiicacy of Ballot against intimidation and
bribery.
Now supposing any such question put, the answer must
either be a direct one, that the vote is to be against, or
is to be according to, the wishes of the questioner ; or it
must be an evasive answer ; or there may be no answer at
all. I will consider these different cases separately.
If there be a direct answer and an unfavourable one,
there can in this case certainly be no reason to discredit
its truth, and the landlord or master or customer may, as
under a system of open voting, proceed, if he receive such
OF THE BALLOT. 29
an answer, to inllict punishment. So far it would seem at
first that nothing is to be gained. Bribery is of course out
of the question, under either open or secret voting, in the
case of men who would give this honest answer. But as
regards intimidation, it might have been hoped that the
Ballot would rescue these bold, honest men from punish-
ment. We shall be able to judge better wliether there
will not be a gain even for these men, and also how great
that gain will be, wlien we have considered the case in
which a direct and favourable answer may be given.
In this case the questioner cannot conclude at once, and
for certain, that the vote will be as it is said. It is not
necessary, mind, that the answer should be false. A land-
lord or master or customer, disposed to exercise in an
unjustifiable manner the influence tha,t he possesses, would
most naturally suspect the dependent voter of a desire to
avert its exercise ; and so a man, who is known to be
ready to bribe, would be prone to ascribe to the expecta-
tion of money some effect upon his respondent's veracity.
Thus, even though no lie were told, the questioner could
not be satisfied that he had been told the truth. And the
natural consequence of this, again, even without the inter-
vention of lies, would be, that questioning with a view to
bribery and intimidation would be diminished, if indeed
it would not almost entirely cease ; for a briber can gain
nothing like the certainty that will alone justify him in
spending money, neither can an intimidator be satisfied
that the vote which is promised to him will not really be
against him. The practice of improper questioning must
necessarily be diminished, when the motives for it are
30 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
diminisliecl ; and indeed the motives will be almost
entirely taken away.
Now the great diminution of improper questioning thus
brought about will obviously operate for good in the
case which has been already considered, the case where a
dependent voter will dare to give an unfavourable answer.
Those men who, under a system of open voting, their
honest obnoxious votes being seen, would be punished,
will now pass unquestioned, and vote according to their
opinions and their duty, unharmed. Thus, where a
moment ago it seemed that there could be no gain, the
gain will be almost all that can be desired. If the ques-
tions were put, the gain might certainly be none ; but the
questions will not be put.
There yet remain the cases where an evasive answer is
given, or an answer is refused. In these cases a strong
suspicion that the vote is to be adverse will certainly be
warranted. But yet as against intimidation (as to bribery,
there is none, in such cases, to be dealt with) there will here
be no inconsiderable gain to be derived from secret voting.
For, first, though the questioner may strongly suspect that
the vote will be an adverse one, yet he is by no means
certam : and as it is possible that the evasiveness or the
refusal of an answer has arisen from notions of duty, and
that the voter may after all vote according to the wishes
of the questioner, and as, while there is a chance of this,
he will be loth to inflict punishment and alienate a
friend, even thus alone, in these cases, a smaller amount of
punishment must be inflicted. But secondly, even if the
intimidating questioner is not restrained thus, he will
OF THE BALLOT. 31
commit an act of much greater tyranny, and one more
likely to provoke public indignation, if he proceed to
punish on suspicion, however strong, than were he to do
it upon certain knowledge. Tlius public opinion too, in
these cases, will serve more effectually to restrain punish-
ment. Thirdly and lastly, the great diminution of the
practice of questioning, as already explained, will operate
also in these cases. Eewer questions will be put, likely
to call forth evasive answers or refusals to answer, both
because even the most favourable answer cannot be relied
on (and this even though no lie be told), and because also
these answers, which may warrant pretty strong suspicion
will yet not be nearly so good to proceed upon as the
certainty afforded by a system of open voting.
Thus, then, having admitted the power of questioning, I
may yet conclude that, under the Ballot, questioning of
voters can serve but in an insignificant degree the evil
purposes against which Ballot is directed. There will, in
truth, be little or no questioning. The direct favourable
answer, which is that wanted by every one that questions,
cannot possibly justify the briber in bribing, neither can it
assure the intimidator. Thus at once will the motive to
questioning be very much diminished, if not entirely taken
away. Questions consequently will not be put to those
who would give unfavourable or (what is the same thing)
evasive answers, or who would refuse to answer ; and
these men will now escape the punishment which, under a
system of open voting, they would inevitably incur. The
power of questioning, then, wliich can give no assistance
whatever to bribery, can also, at most, give but a very
32 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
insignificant aid to intimidation. The efficacy of the
Ballot will certainly snrvive the shock of this objection.
At most only a little bit can be taken ont of it.
2. A person disposed to exercise illegitimate influ-
ence, even though foiled when questioning a voter, or
though abstaining from questioning him, may yet, it is
said, arrive by many indirect methods at a strong sus-
picion as to his vote. He may observe who are his
associates, learn what political opinions he expresses
among these, or, should he be a silent and reserved man,
he may follow him into the tavern and there note down
the political talk which must inevitably escape, when wine
shall have relaxed his rigidity. Again, the voter's wife
must surely be in his confidence, and as surely must she
be a gossip. Will he not have children too, whose artless
prattle must some day let out the secret ? These and other
similar modes of approaching to or perhaps of discovering
the secret, and of thus, to a certain extent, baffling the
secrecy of the Ballot, have been often gravely put forward,
in grave articles in reviews and grave speeches in Parlia-
ment. Now it is clear, at first sight, that if these are the
modes which must be resorted to in order to discover a
vote when Ballot is established, the discovery will be much
more difficult than under a system of open voting. And
by the increase of difficulty alone much will be gained,
even though voters have friends with whom they occasion-
ally get drunk, or wives and children whose tongues now
and then place them in jeopardy. But again, these are
surely modes to the emplojrment of which, many who
would not object to punishing an obnoxious vote which
OF THE BALLOT. 33
they have seen, would indignantly refuse to resort. A
gentleman would not resort to them himself; and he miglit
have some scruples even about employing an agent for the
purpose. These modes, too, will not necessarily, after all,
carry the intimidator beyond suspicion ; and it has already
been explained how many, who might punish on certain
knowledge, would not care to resort to means that will
carry them no further than suspicion, or, even if the sus-
picion, however strong, were formed, would be loth to
proceed upon it. Thus, even the power of resorting to
these indirect and somewhat laborious and not very
gentlemanlike modes of worming out the secret may still
leave much eflEicacy to the Ballot.
3. It is said, again, that many voters will publish how
they have voted, and' that thus it will be comparatively
easy to calculate how the remainder have voted, or that at
any rate suspicion will fall upon such as avail themselves of
their privilege of secrecy. It is taken care, in the system
of election by secret voting which has been described, that
every voter shall be obliged to vote unseen. The publica-
tion of a vote will be therefore only through the voter's own
statement ; and even though that statement be true, others
cannot be certain of its truth. Thus this publication will
not necessarily assist very much towards the discovery of
votes which are given silently as well as secretly. Many
of the votes, too, which are given silently, may be given after
all in accordance with the wishes of superiors, but kejit
secret from notions of duty. How can the man who wants
to punish know that it is not so ? And how can he be safe
in punishing ?
34 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
4. Tliere is yet another expedient which I shall mention,
more, however, for the purpose of showing to what lengths
the ingenuity of the opponents of Ballot has carried them,
than because I attach importance to it. I give it as nearly
as possible in the words in which it has been suggested.
The voter, it is said, runs a great risk of discovery from
the " calculations of canvassers, who, now that the polling
goes on in several places at once, are enabled to check the
hourly returns from each booth wdth their canvass-books,
and (especially if they have a note from the poll-clerks of
who came up during the hour) to tell pretty accurately
whether promises have been kept or broken."^ This ob-
jection by way of disparagement of the efficacy of the
Ballot can at once be overthrown by preventing the hourly
returns. In the system of election by secret voting which
has been described above, it has been expressly stated that
the boxes will not be opened till the voting is over, and
that then they will be all opened together. So this spectre
vanishes.
5. But even though all the expedients for counteracting
the secrecy of the Ballot, which have now been mentioned
and considered, should be of little avail, and though intimi-
dation, practised in the ordinary mode of inflicting punish-
ment for an obnoxious vote given, should be greatly
diminished, yet the opponents of the Ballot are not without
resource. They say, though a man disposed to exercise
improper influence may not be able to find out and punish
1 Ediuhv/rgh Review for Januaiy 1833 (Article on the Ballot, p. 553^.
This article was attributed to Lord Brougham, aud I believe that he was
the author.
OF THE BALLOT. 35
an obnoxious vote wlien it has Leen given, yet tliat lie may
order a suspected dependent voter to abstain from voting,
and may annex to his voting at all the punishment which,
under a system of open voting, -would follow an obnoxious
vote. The placing difficulties in the M-ay, then, of intimida-
tion, as it has hitherto ordinarily been practised, will, it is
said, lead to the adoption of this new mode of intimidation.
" If the voter cannot be trusted, he will either be paired
off with some known adversary, or at least required to
remain at home. The argument for the Ballot all along
presupposes two things ; — the existence of power in the
landlord over the tenant, and the disposition to use it op-
pressively. The farmer will therefore be forced to pair or
stay aw^ay, unless the landlord can make sure of his vote,
and ' trust him in the dark.' " ^ Now I am ready to admit
that this mode of intimidation will be practicable, and that
many who are baffled by Ballot in what has hitherto been
the ordinary mode of intinddating, may be disposed to
resort to it. But at the same time I -would offer the fol-
lowing considerations by way of breaking the force of this
objection. First, attention is more likely to be arrested,
and public opinion thus turned against the intimidator,
when a voter is known to be anxious yet afraid to go to
the voting-booth, than when, going and giving his vote
under the influence of some superior, to wliose sway he has
long been accustomed, he may easily pass with his vote
unobserved, and the reasons which have determined it un-
inquired into. Secondly, intimidation of this kind will be
exercised always upon suspicion, as distinguished from
^ Edinburgh Revi''v\ .Taiiuary 1833.
D 2
36 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
certainty, of an adveroe intention. Now so long as there
is no certainty, there will yet be a chance that the vote
may he given in accordance with the wishes of the superior.
And persons who would not otherwise scruple to intimi-
date, v^ill often be loth to lose one, however small a, chance
of obtaining a favoura.ble vote, by forbidding the vote to be
given. Thirdly, we must remember that to diminish the
practice of intimidation, which is a part of the immediate
end of the Ballot, is again itself but a means to another
end. A better fulfilment of the state's purpose, as expressed
in tlie existing scheme of representation, is a part of this
ulterior end. And towards attaining to this part of the
ulterior end something would be done, even though pre-
cisely as much intimidation were now exercised in this
way as formerly in the other. For a voter, who would
otherwise be obliged to vote according to the wishes of his
superior, and contrary to his own, is now, by the supposi-
tion, "paired off with some known adversary, or at least
required to stay at home." In the first of these cases, lie
virtually expresses his own opinion, whereas under a sys-
tem of open voting he would be obliged to do violence to
it : so that here a genuine vote is gained. And even in
the second case there is some gain, as regards the greater
or less fulfilment of the purpose for which the franchise is
bestowed, for by not voting at all less violence is done to the
voter's opinion than by his voting in direct opposition to it.
6. It is said that a similar expedient may be resorted to
by bribers. A man may be bribed to pair off or to stay
away. The last of the three remarks made upon this ex-
pedient, when it is employed by intimidators, applies also
OF THE BALLOT.
with full force when it is employed by bribers. It is to be
remarked also upon tliis expedient for bribery, that, inas-
much as pairing off or staying away will be a considerably
less return for a bribe than a vote in accordance with the
briber's wishes, there will be a considerably less induce-
ment to bribe in this way under the Ballot, than, under a
system of open voting, there would be to purchase a vote.
7. A person who is able and disposed to bribe, may also,
it is said, bribe sometimes under the Ballot in tliis manner ;
he may promise a sum of money to be distributed among
liis supporters, or among so many as choose to avail them-
selves of his generosity, in the event of his being elected.
Such a plan of bribery, whenever it might occasionally be
adopted, would have a more wholesale character than be-
longs to the purchasing of separate votes, and would thus
be more pernicious. But still this plan of bribery, even on
the most favourable supposition, can seldom be resorted to.
It can be resorted to only in very small constituencies, —
constituencies so small (though JMr. Sydney Smith will, of
course, object to the "Paulo-post legislation" tendency of
this remark) that their continuance is an anomaly, and an
objection founded on the supposition of their continuance
is unfair ; and also only by extremely rich persons, who are
the exceptions and not the rule, even in the parliament-
seeking w^orld. Again, it is to be remarked, that when
a candidate who has resorted to this plan of bribery has
been successful, and the time for the division of the j^rize-
money has arrived, there will be no means of being satis-
fied that all who claim a share have been supporters.
Even though no foes falsely represent tliemselves as friends.
38 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
yet the candidate who pays will be apt to suspect the oc-
currence of such tricks. And as men will not like to think
that they are first voted against and then bled, the bare
possibility of this proceeding may be expected to counter-
act, to some extent, the temptation to resort to this mode
of wholesale bribery. Lastly, it is to be remembered that
bribery will of course continue to be a punishable offence ;
and also that, though scrutinies cease, election tribunals
for cases of extensive bribery will continue to exist. This
is a plan of bribery which will obviously afford great
facilities for detection ; and with anything like properly-
contrived bribery-law^s, it may be said to be quite out of
the question.^
I have now examined all the objections which are
usually brought in disparagement of the efficacy of secret
1 I qnote tlie following from an admirable article in the London and
Wesiminstcr Revieiv, written by the late Sir Arthur Buller (vol. iii. p. 497) :
— " The grand argument to show the insufficiency of the Ballot, as a pro-
tection against bribery, is generally put forward in this way :— A candidate
will say, ' If I am returned, such and such a quantity of money shall be
divided among my supporters.' But now, be it recollected, that, in order
that this inducement shall have any effect, it must be generally made
known, and the electors must be few in number ; and how can it be gene-
rally made known, without coming to the ears of some person well dis-
posed to betray it, and who would lay himself out for the bribe ? Of
course, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, this wholesale bribery would
emanate from the candidate himself, or, at all events, he would sooner or
later be cognizant of it Let him go on with his experiment. He
is returned, we will say, having polled 400 votes : at the day appointed for
the division of the promised money, 600 electors will come to present their
claims : how is he to recognize the 200 impostors ? Howevei', their ap-
pearance will raise a hubbub among the faithful. ' Holla ! treachery ! '
they will cry. ' Who are the rogues ? ' If, in this state of things, the cat
does not jump out, we shall indeed admire the bag and the holder."
OF THE BALLOT. 39
voting or Ballot, and I hope that the examination has not
been conducted unfairly. Witli every disposition to allow
these objections their full force, I assert at the close of
this examination, that they are not only utterly inadequate
to destroy, but that they can even damage only in a very
small degree, the efficacy of the Ballot. The net gain from
its adoption may, I think, fairly be stated thus : — Bribery,
as it is now practised, will cease almost entirely, because
men, being no longer able to be certain that they receive
the votes for which they pay, will abstain from paying for
them ; while, as regards new modes of bribery which may
be substituted, paying for an election when it is carried
can at most very seldom be resorted to, and bribing to pair
off or stay away will be less hurtful, as well as necessarily
less frequent. Intimidation, also, will be very greatly
diminished, because, in the place of certain knowledge of
an obnoxious vote, there can now at most only be suspicion,
and the means of arriving at such suspicion will be also
considerably laborious, and will themselves have an un-
popular character ; and again, to punish upon suspicion
will be more outrageous than to punish upon certainty.
As to the expedient of intimidating to pair off or stay
away, this (as has been already said of the similar expe-
dient for bribery) will be less hurtful, as well as necessarily
less frequent. Of one class of intimidators, indeed, —
customers, whose connexion with their tradesmen is much
more remote than that obtaining between landlords and
tenants, or between masters and servants, and who there-
fore will not and cannot resort to circuitous means of
discovering a tradesman's vote, or to circuitous and com-
40 ARGUMENT JN FAVOUR
pai'atively fruitless expedients of punishment, — it may be
boldly said that their power will be entirely destroyed.
The power of landlords and masters, too, will be very
considerably crippled. Thus, despite all the disparaging
attempts of the opponents of Ballot, the practice of inti-
midation and bribery will be very considerably diminished,
and the evils which ensue will be very considerably miti-
gated. The good which Ballot has a tendency to produce
may be expected to be produced in a very considerable
degree.
Having now ascertained the nature of the good to be
derived from secret voting or Ballot, and the degree in
which it may be expected that that good will be attained,
I have yet to take into consideration any evil or evils
apprehended from the Ballot, in order that the tendency of
this measure for evil may be compared with its tendency
for good, and the nature and extent of the balance deter-
mined. And I shall conduct this, as I have conducted the
previous part, of my argument, in the way of answering
objections.
The objections tending to impute the production of
mischief to secret voting or Ballot are numerous ; and it
is difficult to arrange them upon any sufficient principle of
classification. Some of them may be called political, and
others moral objections ; but yet some will be as deserving
of one name as of the other, and some again cannot claim
either. Classification apart, then, the evils apprehended
from the Ballot may be enumerated as follows : — 1. That
it will put an end to power of scrutiny. 2. That if all
OF THE B ALLOT. 41
are obliged to vote secretly, blind men, who are dependent
on others' assistance, will be nnable to vote, and that
Ballot Mill thus introduce a disqualification not contem-
plated by the state. 3. That Ballot will destroy the
influence which the higher classes ought to exercise over
the humbler, both generally and in the performance of
their political duties. 4. That it will give rise to per-
petual distrust on the part of superiors, and to a system
of tyranny on suspicion, thus making the last state of the
poor man " worse than the first." 5. That secrecy of
voting will take away all responsibility of voters to
public opinion. 6. That the habit of secrecy alone will
have an injurious effect on character. 7. That this secrecy
will greatly facilitate mendacity, turning, perhaps, a
hitherto open, honest, truth-telling nation into a nation
of rogues and liars. Tliese are the objections which are
now to be considered with a view to removing or ex-
tenuating them.
1. Ballot will put an end to the power of scrutiny.
This objection has been already incidentally discussed,
and may be briefly disposed of On the one hand, there
is no likelihood that the securities for proper returns
will be materially diminished by the cessation of this
parliamentary control ; and, on the other, certain good will
ensue irom it. An additional means of imposing expense
on candidates will be taken away, and opjiortunities for
chicanery now existing will cease.
2. Blind men will not be able to vote if all voting is
conducted secretly. Certainly it would be a fair objection,
so far as it went, to the Ballot, if it entailed the disqualifi-
42 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
cation of a class of men, who may be in every way lit to
exercise the elective franchise, and who are consequently
intended by the state to exercise it. But there need be no
such disqualification, and they are blind men who would
lead the blind against the Ballot. For the benefit of blind
men, there may be a certain number of voting papers
printed with raised letters, such as are designed for the
use of blind men. I understand that a very slight ele-
vation is sufficient to enable blind men to read by touch,
and that the degree of elevation which may be effected by
thick viscid ink, freely used, is almost always sufficient ;
so that there need be no great difference between the two
kinds of voting-papers. Every person born blind, or be-
coming blind at a very early age, who is either in a con-
dition of life to exercise the elective franchise, or likely to
care about exercising it, will probably have learned to read
with raised letters ; and as to persons who may become
blind at an advanced age, it is known that, if they have
been able to read before, they now learn how to use raised
letters with much quickness and facility. But even
without this contrivance, there could be no conceivable
objection to a blind man being permitted to appoint some
one, in whom he confides, to give his vote for him, and
thus to appear by his next friend.^
1 With Mr. Grote's ballot-box, blind men may vote without any con-
trivance of raised letters, and simply by feeling the holes opposite to the
card containing the names of the candidates. These names are arranged,
or may be, alphabetically, and the first name will be opposite to the top
hole. Finding his way down, the blind man can select the proper holes,
and, according to Mr. Grote's fashion, prick them.
OF THE BALLOT. 43
3. The adoption of secret voting, or Ballot, will destroy
the proper iniluence of the higher over the humbler classes
of society. There are two different meanings which may
be attached to the phrase, proper injliience ; and it will be
necessary to consider the objection separately with refer-
ence to each of these meanings.
First, to recjiiire a vote in accordance with the superior's
wish, and contrary to the opinion of the voter, may by
some be considered proper influence. There are, perhaps,
men who honestly entertain this opinion. The conduct of
the Duke of Newcastle, as defended by his memorable
phrase of " doing what one likes with one's own," can be
explained in no other way, by such as will not refuse con-
scientiousness to a political opponent. But though it may
plausibly be contended tliat a poor man cannot form a
proper opinion for himself on deep political questions, and
that to make every tenant follow his landlord, and every
servant his master, is the only means of evolving good out
of the evil of a wide distribution of the elective franchise ;
yet, on the other hand, it is to be remembered that the
higher classes are as liable to be led away by sinister
interest and by prejudice, as the humble by ignorance ;
and that, where perturbing causes may operate with all,
there is a greater chance of nullifying these, and of ol^tain-
ing the right result, in proportion as we have a greater
number of separate independent opinions. But witliout
entering into the why and the wdierefore, it is enough that
the state designs no feudo-political system. Each voter is
to express his own opinion. To prevent his expression
of his own opinion violently, is to exercise an improper,
44 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
and not a proper, influence. The destruction of this im-
proper influence, by means of Ballot or in any other way,
is a good, and not an evil.
But there is also a thoroughly proper influence, with
reference to which the objection that I am now consider-
ing is sometimes made, — the influence, namely, of superior
reason and virtue. How can the Ballot interfere with this ?
It is diflicult to perceive. The landlord who has the co-
operation of his tenants tlirough a deferential belief in his
abilities or virtues, — one, to whose reasoning they ever
yield a willing assent, and whose character tells them that,
whatever his intellectual superiority, he will scorn to avail
himself of it to mislead, — one (suppose) so marked out by
the just tenor of his ways and the equilibrium of his nature,
that were he himself ambitious of a seat in Parliament,
political opponents might exclaim, " Such a man should
have a place in the legislature, if only that the example
of his honour and tolerance and inflexible justice may be
conspicuous," — such a landlord as this can lose none of
the respect which rightly belongs to him, and which must
always be beneficial in its influence. Neither can the
customer, whose opinions the bookseller or the grocer
always waits to hear before he makes up his mind which
candidate he shall support, lose his opportunities of argu-
ment because secret voting is adopted, nor can his argument
lose its efficacy. So far, everything must remain entirely
as it was.
But Mr. Sydney Smith says that, when Ballot is esta-
blished, there will \)q no means of knowing whether even
the man who is most re-^pected has voted in accordance
OF THE BALLOT. 45
with his conversation, and it will become " easy to whisper"
away the character of the best men." If this is the only
way in which virtue and reason are to be robbed of their
influence, surely, as regards the " best men/' such whispers
will be disregarded. Let us, however, hear Mr. Smith : —
" There is a town (No. 1) in which live two very clever
and respectable men, Johnson and Pelham, small trades-
men, men always willing to run some risk for the public
good, and to be less rich and more honest than their neigh-
bours. It is of considerable consequence to the formation
of opinion in this town, as an example, to know how Johnson
and Pelham vote. It guides the affections, and directs the
understandings, of the whole population, and materially
affects public opinion in this town ; and in another borough
(No. 2) it would be of the highest importance to public
opinion if it were certain how Mr. Smith, the ironmonger
and Mr. Rogers, the London carrier, voted; because they
are both thoroughly honest men, and of excellent under-
standing for their condition of life. Now the tendency
of Ballot would be to destroy all the Pelhams, Johnsons,
Rogers's, and Smiths, to sow an universal mistrust, and to
exterminate the natural guides and leaders of the people ;
political influence founded upon honour and ancient
honesty in politics, could not grow up under such a sys-
tem. No man's declaration could get believed. It would
be easy to whisper away the character of the best men ;
and to assert that, in spite of all his declarations, which
are nothing but a blind, the romantic Rogers has voted on
the other side, and is in secret league Avitli our enemies."
Now all this, however amusing, is a complete non sequiticr.
Certain men are respected, says jNIr. Smith, bjcause they
46 ARGUMENT IK FAVOUR
are known to be honest men ; when the Ballot is established,
some one may accuse them of dishonesty, and the know-
ledge of their honesty must cause this accusation to be
believed. So, because they are clever men, an idle sus-
picion of dishonesty will rob them of the respect due to
cleverness, and will rob their clever arguments of force.
No ! the Pelhams and Johnsons and Eogers's and Smiths,
their high examples and means of usefulness, will remain
untouched. Their reputations for honesty cannot cease
merely because their votes are not seen. Their several
abilities may be employed as before, and as usefully. Mr.
Eogers, the carrier, may still eloquently disseminate the
political wisdom which his trips to London procure for
him, and should carry as much weight as formerly. Mr.
Smith will continue to write pamphlets, which will be
cheaply circulated and eagerly read, and make withering
jokes against his opponents. Tlie fancy of the " romantic
Kogers " will not be wasted in the ballot-box, nor the wit
and wisdom of the sacred, salient Smith.
4. The Ballot will introduce a system of tyranny on
suspicion. The answer to this objection has already been
virtually given, in considering the means suggested for
baffling the secrecy of the Ballot. Men will find that it is
looked upon as a greater act of tyranny to punish upon
suspicion than to punish upon certain knowledge, and they
will be led to abstain accordingly. Besides, men acting
upon suspicion may often be mistaken, and punish a friend
for a foe; and men will not like to think that they are
doing this. Tliis will be a second reason for abstaining
from such tyranny. Again, the obvious tendency of
OF THE BALLOT. 47
tyriiimy on siispicion (and this is strangely thrown in tlie
teeth of the advocates of the Ballot) would be, that men
who are otherwise ready to vote according to the wishes of
superiors would, in order to avoid suspicion, abstain from
voting altogether. Why, wherever a man who would
otherwise vote under dictation, abstains from voting, there
is (as has been previously explained) a gain for the cause
of genuine voting. It is forgotten also that this conse-
quence will be disliked by the tyrants themselves ; for it
is their object to get as many votes as possible, and they
will now cause votes to be utterly lost, which, were they
given, might very possibly be given for them. But, even fur-
ther, may we not cherish the hope, that the very establish-
ment of Ballot, being, as it would be, a solemn protest by
the state against tyranny of superiors, would of itself act
as a spell on the tyrants, arresting the thoughtless and
causing misgivings even to the most bold, — thus rendering
all petty calculations of interest superfluous. For a long
time has the jjoor dependent voter been compelled to sacri-
fice duty or suffer grinding tyranny : and the state, look-
ing quietly on, has done nothing to protect him. The
state's apathy has been the tyrant's power. But now, and
for the first time, men would hear the state say, " "We will
protect the poor voter in the honest performance of the
duty we impose upon him ; we will stay, if we can, your
tyranny ; you shall no longer thwart our will, and trample
on poor men's honesty ; no longer shall you wickedly set
yourselves above other men's consciences, saying to the
poor man, and to him who lives by the toil of his hands
and the sweat of his brow ' Obey conscience, and we will
48 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
bring penury upon you, and consign to famine the wife
and the cliildren whose bread comes from your earn-
ings.' " Let us hope that such language will not fall on
deaf ears.
5. Secrecy of voting will destroy the responsibility of
voters to public opinion. This objection may be more
fully and adequately expressed thus : — A voter, when he
votes, has to fulfil a trust conferred upon him by the state,
or (changing the phrase) to discharge a duty to the state,^
and it is right that the state, which confers the trust and
towards which the duty lies, should be able to know that
the trust is properly fulfilled, or the duty properly dis-
charged. Now the state, which is the aggregate of indi-
viduals in the country, both voters and non-voters, cannot,
if votes are given secretly, know that they are given to
proper persons, or in obedience to proper motives. With
secret voting, therefore, the state cannot exercise any con-
trol, either by punishment or through what is called public
opinion, to prevent improper votes. Punishment, to be
sure, is out of the question, unless in the case of bribery,
which is not now spoken of, and which may be punished
equally well under a system of secret or of open voting ; but
the influence of public opinion, or (changing the phrase) a
responsibility to public opinion, would be highly salutary
to prevent votes from being given to men of bad character,
or in the mere indulgence of private spite or partiality.
Hear, for instance, what Mr. Sydney Smith, a great autho-
rity, says : — "The landlord has perhaps said a cross word
to the tenant ; the candidate for whom the tenant votes, in
opposition to his landlord, has taken his second son for a
OF THE BALLOT. 49
footman, or his father knew the candidate's grandfather.
How many thousand votes, sheltered (as the ballotists
suppose) from intimidation, would be given from such
silly motives as these? How many would be given from
the mere discontent of inferiority ? or from that strange,
simious, schoolboy passion of giving pain to others, even
when the author cannot be found out? — motives as per-
nicious as any which could proceed from intimidation. So
that all the votes screened by ballot would not be screened
for any public good." And again the witty writer ex-
claims : — " ' Who brought that mischievous, profligate vil-
lain into parliament? Let us see the names of his real
supporters. Who stood out against the strong and uplifted
arm of power? Who discovered this excellent and
hitherto unknown person ? Who opposed the man whom
we all know to be one of the first men in the country ? '
Are these fair and useful questions to be veiled hereafter
in impenetrable mystery ? Is this sort of publicity of no
good as a restraint ? Is it of no good as an incitement and
a reward for exertions ? " This salutary influence of public
opinion, so admirably described by Mr. Smith, is, he con-
tends, a means of control belonging of right to the state
from which comes the duty of voting.
The objection, thus put, presents two points for con-
sideration : the first, that an effective responsibility to the
state through public opinion is assumed to exist when
votes are given openly ; and the second, that a responsi-
bility to the state is assumed to be the proper and neces-
sary accompaniment of the duty of voting imposed by
the state, I will consider these two points separately.
E
50 AR UMENT IN FAVO UR
First, then, is there (as is assumed in this objection)
an effective responsibility througli public opinion when
votes are given openly ? Now it is a voter's duty to vote
for the candidate whom, on the several grounds of honesty,
intelligence, and the geiaeral tenor of political opinion, he
thinks most deserving of a seat in Parliament. If he votes
for anyone whom he thinks an improper person, or votes
merely from private partiality or pique, he does not per-
form his duty. There is no doubt of this ; but what se-
curity against this violation of duty is derived from open
voting ? Absolutely none. He gives his vote, and we will
suppose that the vote is disapproved of One man hints
disapprobation, another openly remonstrates, a third per-
haps declares that the voter does not deserve to have a
vote, because he has supported such a scoundrel. This is
the way in which public opinion is communicated to the
voter, and in this way alone can it be brought to act upon
him. Well, he has an obvious answer to all these expres-
sions of disapprobation, — that he has voted for the candi-
date whom he thinks the best; that is his duty, and he
has performed it ; he has acted upon his own opinion,
which the state has told him to do, and, however ready he
may be to listen to the opinion of others, he is not bound
to adopt them. Such is his answer. And even supposing
that he has voted for one who all the world besides agrees
is an improper person, or against another towards whom
he is known to entertain a grudge, this answer cannot
be overcome. You cannot penetrate into his thoughts,
save by the assistance of his own words ; and if he tells
you that he has voted for the man whom he thinks the
OF THE BALLOT. 51
best, you can say no more. You are baffled. So that
after all, with open voting, there is no effective re-
sponsibility through public opinion to prevent an improper
vote.
I have hitherto supposed that the vote which is dis-
approved of, is really and without doubt an improper one.
But it even may be that the voter has supported a candi-
date, whose politics only the friends who quarrel with his
vote disapprove of. In this case, is it right that the ex-
pressions of opinion which come to him should be heeded ?
Or again, having to choose between a political adversary of
unspotted character, and a man whose politics he approves,
who also possesses talent and eloquence, but who in
private life is a spendthrift, or of loose morals, or perhaps
even of doubtful integrity, — he may yet have voted for the
latter, thinking that the influence of public opinion and
the control exercised by a constituency, in whose hands is
the power of re-election, may secure the honest, consistent
performance of his public duties, while his abilities cannot
but do good service to the cause which he supports. Is
this necessarily a %vrong choice ? Far be it from the writer
to disparage the value of honesty, or to contend that the
bad man deserves to be exalted, or even to say that it is
not better not to exalt him ; but here is a choice of evils,
and the choice supposed may easily be a choice of
the lesser evil. At any rate, Mr. Smith knows well that
under the present system of open voting, votes are given
almost invariably on the ground of politics alone, and little
or no heed given to questions of private character, tlis-
tory may supply an instance or two to show that private
E 2
52 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
immorality does not always incapacitate for public nseful-
ness. Mr. Wilkes was a man of dissipated habits, but for
all that the electors of Middlesex confided in him ; and
they were no more wrong in this than were royal and aris-
tocratic politicians in extending their patronage to Mr.
Sheridan, Even Mr. Fox, the noblest-hearted and truest
of English statesmen, was a gambler. Great as was
Mirabeau's prodigalit}^, and inordinate his excesses, the
National Assembly could have " better spared " many a
" better man."
Now this difficulty in determining what is an improper
vote is of itself a strong argument against the establish-
ment of an effective responsibility, even if it were practi-
cable. This point, however, may be argued in a more
general manner. The state confers the elective franchise
on those whom, either by reason of possessing a certain
amount of property, or in consequence perhaps of direct
proof of education, it deems likely to express an honest
aud intelligent opinion. This qualification, whether of
property or of education, is the only precaution which the
state takes. It does not reserve the power of taking away
the franchise, nor does it assign punishment for what those
who urge the objection we are considering, call improper
votes. Nor is it proper that it should. The object of con-
ferring the elective franchise is to obtain the genuine,
independent oj)inion of him on whom it is conferred ; and
to control the voter in any way would, by interfering
with that opinion, frustrate the object for which the
franchise is conferred. An effective responsibility to the
state, so far from properly accompanying the elective
OF THE BALLOT. 53
franchise, is inconsistent, therefore, with the object of the
state in conferring it.
I have treated this objection, of the loss of responsibility,
as if the responsibility spoken of were always intended to
be a responsibility to the state, made up of both voters and
non-voters. The objection is very frequently urged, how-
ever, as if it were a responsibility solely to the non-voting
portion of the state. It is said that a certain portion of
the community are selected to be invested with the elective
franchise, and that it is but just that those who are ex-
cluded from the possession of the franchise should have
some control over those who are enfranchised. I will not
go again into the proof that no effective control can after
all be exercised ; for a proposal to subject men who are
pronounced fit for the possesijion of the elective franchise
to the control of others who are pronounced unfit, is one
so glaringly absurd as not to warrant serious discussion.
6. The habit of secrecy will of itself have an injurious
effect on the character. This must be what is meant (at
least if anything is meant beyond mere abuse) by the
phrase often in the mouth of objectors, that the Ballot is
un-English, Whether the Ballot be un-English or not, in
the obvious sense, attaching to the word un-English, of
unknown in England, is a matter perfectly indifferent,
supposing it can be shown that the Ballot is beneficial ;
and any objection founded on the Ballot in this sense
■would be as irrelevant as it would be powerless. But if
the word un-English be used as convertible with secret,
and if the phrase be really pregnant with the meaning
that the Ballot is hurtful by reason of its secrecy, then it
54 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
may not be altogether amiss to bestow a word on the
objection. Secrecy is not in itself bad. An action per-
formed secretly is not necessarily a bad action. It so
happens that men generally resort to secrecy when they
perform bad actions : but the actions are bad indepen-
dently of the secrecy, and the hurt to the character arises,
not from the secrecy, but from the badness of the action.
The objection evidently arises from an association formed
in men's minds between secrecy and badness, owing to the
number of bad actions performed secretly. But the asso-
ciation leads here to a mistake. Good actions may for
particular reasons be performed secretly, and remain good
actions still, or even their goodness may be enhanced.
Thus are we specially enjoined to be secret in our benevo-
lence, "not letting the left- hand know what the right
hand doeth," in order that the merit of the benevolence
may be increased by secrecy. Here surely secrecy can
have no injurious effect on the character, neither can it
when a voter votes secretly, purposely concealing his vote
that he may foil an iutimidator, and vote according to
what he knows to be his duty. Even if there were any
necessary harm in secrecy (which there is not), the idea of
duty, under whose presiding influence the secret action is
performed, would sanctify it for good.
7. But even if secrecy of itself has no injurious effect,
it will be hurtful as giving facilities to mendacity. This
objection is perhaps more relied on by opponents of the
Ballot than any of those previously considered. It is
thought, or professed to be thought, that the Ballot wiU
cause mendacity to so great an extent as to turn a nation,
OF THE BALLOT. 55
of wliicli truth and honesty have long been the proud
attributes, iuto a nation of rogues and liars.
What has been said in a previous part of the pamphlet,
in explaining the mode of operation of the Ballot against
intimidation and bribery, and the manner in Avhich it will
tend also to diminish questioning with a view to these
practices, will assist us much in answering this objection.
It is said by the objectors that, when secret voting is
adopted, a man may receive a bribe and afterwards vote
contrary to his promise to the briber ; or he may tell his
landlord or master or customer tha,t he will vote according
to his wishes, and afterwards avail himself of secrecy to
violate the promise. The gain, then, of the Ballot, it is
said, is a gain procured chiefly, if not entirely, at the ex-
pense of truth. Now, first of all, I must observe that, in
the account given in this pamphlet of the mode of operation
of the Ballot against intimidation and bribery, no part of
the calculation has been based upon mendacity. But
secondly, the whole tenor of the argument for the efficacy
of the Ballot is to show that there will ver}^ seldom, if
ever, be the asserted opportunities of fraud. It has been
shown that, under the Ballot, the briber will lose almost
the whole of his inducement to bribery, and that thus
bribes will very seldom, if ever, be given ; very seldom, if
ever, then, will voters have an opportunity of deceiving
bribers in the manner asserted by the objectors. Again, it
has been shown that great difficulties will be placed in the
way of the intimidator, and that, being unable to gain
certainty by questioning, he will now cease to question
with a view to the exercise of intimidation ; very seldom,
56 ARGUMENT IN FJVOUR
if ever, then, will voters have an opportunity of deceiving
landlords and masters and customers in the manner
asserted by the objectors. The answer to this objection,
so far as it imputes any great amount of mendacity, is
therefore of a most triumphant sort. The very same
argument which proves the efficacy of the Ballot, refutes
it. If intimidation and bribery are diminished by the
Ballot, they will be diminished in such a manner as to
render, at the same time, the asserted mendacity imprac-
ticable.
It is out of the question, then, to suppose that the
Ballot will afford such great facilities for mendacity as
to be likely to work a complete change in the English
character, or, even short of this, that it will afford any
great facilities for mendacity ; and it is not only absurd,
but wicked and unjust, to say that the friends of the
Ballot calculate on this mendacity for their gain.
But still I am free to confess that lies may in some few
cases be told when secret voting has been adopted, which
would not be told if votes were given openly, and any
such lies could at once be detected. Some few men may
certainly be found foolish enough to spend money without
any security of getting what they pay for ; and a greater
number, perhaps, will continue the practice of questioning
voters who are dependent upon them, even though they
are unable to rely on the favourable answer which they
desire. In some few cases then, necessarily very few, a
man may take a bribe, promising to vote with the briber,
and afterward vote otherwise ; perhaps, in a greater num-
ber of cases, though still few, a man may give a favourable
OF THE BALLOT. 57
answer to a landlord or master or customer, who questions
him as to Ms vote, and afterwards vote contrary to his
statement. I say I freely confess that lies may thus some-
times be told under the Ballot, and as freely do I confess
that, when they are thus told, evil is introduced by the
Ballot, I know it is generally said that the men who will
thus lie would lie also in another way, under a system of
open voting, when they would necessarily vote with the
briber or intimidator, and would thus break a virtual
promise to the state to vote in accordance with their own
opinions. I cannot myself recognize this argument.
Even if metaphor may be stretched so far as to allow of
this violation of duty to the state being called a lie, yet
its effect on the character cannot be compared with that of
a plam actual lie. And it is by reference to the effect on
the character, not by disputing whether the same name
can or cannot be given to the two violations of duty, that
the improper vote in the one case and the lie in the other
are to be compared. Now, however degrading it must be
to a man to be bribed or coerced into an unconscientious
vote, there is in these cases, under a system of secret
voting, the deep degradation of a lie added to that worked
by bribery or intimidation. The degradation of a lie is
itself greater than that brought on the man who is either
bribed or intimidated ; but here one degradation is added
to the other. I cannot doubt, then, that whenever a lie
is told, as in a few cases it possibly may be under the
Ballot, greater evil arises than would exist in the corre-
sponding case, under a system of open voting.
This amount of evil, such as it is, caused by the Ballot
58 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
must necessarily be set against the good whicli it Las been
shown that Ballot will produce. It is necessarily very
small, the cases in which bribes will be given, and ques-
tioning with a view to intimidation will take place, being
necessarily .very few. But the following considerations
will serve even still further to extenuate this evil.
It is certainly true, that in these cases deception will be
practised, which could not occur if votes were given
openly. Yet it is not fair to say that the Ballot is the
cause of this deception. To some few persons, whose tone
of morality is low-pitched, and who are ready to deceive
when they have an opportunity of doing so, the Ballot
will give the opportunity. But, even in these cases, the
Ballot will not produce the disposition to deceive, nor
generate the immorality. This exists independently of
the Ballot, and the Ballot simply develops it. I know
that every separate act of immorality, every separate fraud,
every separate lie, works its own bad effect upon the
character : and I trust that I have shown no disposition
to disguise this. But yet I would put it to those, who
thus make the morals of the nation their care, and cry out
against the Ballot, because here and there a rogue may
have an opportunity of deceiving, or a liar may now
and then teU an undiscovered lie, whether to take account
(as they would recommend) of individual opportunities
of giving effect to evil dispositions, and to refuse these
opportunities (whatever amount of good, in other respects,
may be produced by the measure which would afford
them), is a mode of interference either befitting the
high end which it is designed to serve, or befitting the
OF THE BALLOT. 59
power and dignity of the state, — whether it is not a paltry,
peddling plan of legislation. If it is your real and sin-
cere object effectually to encourage the growth of good,
and to eradicate bad, dispositions among the people, diffuse
knowledge and power, — found a large, liberal system of
education, — be not niggardly with the franchise (by a
generous confidence you will implant the feeling of self-
respect, the sure precursor of morality) — but above all
establish a national system of education, poisoned by no
party-spirit, narrowed by no superstition of form or doc-
trine. Then may you do some good. By refusing the
Ballot, you will at most but prevent one lie, where lying is
habitual, — one fraud, where twenty others, day by day,
are committed. But if you refuse the Ballot, and at the
same time neglect to diffuse power and Icnowledge among
the people, you incur the blame of first perpetuating im-
morality, and then availing yourselves of it, to deny a
measure fruitful of good. I will not charge any political
party with the wilful adoption of this wicked course. But
I would seek to impress most deeply on the mind of the
reader the utter insignificance of the question of the
Ballot, as affecting mendacity in a nation. Mr. Sydney
Smith exclaims, not with much sense or meaning, in one
part of his pamphlet, " When two great parties in the
empire are combating for the supreme power, does Mr.
Grote imagine, that the men of woods, and forests, and
rivers, — that they, who have the strength of the hills, —
are to be baffled by bumpkins thrusting a little pin into a
little card in a little box ? that England is to be governed
by political acupunctuation ? " If this attempt at argu-
60 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
ment has weight with Mr. Smith and his admirers — if
there is anything which they deem magical in this alter-
nation of " little " and big words, I willingly take np this
language forged in the Smithian smithy, and ask whether
the honest, truth-telling men of England, — they who have
the open simplicity of doves and the truth of angels, — are
to be made rogues and liars " by thrusting a little pin into
a little card in a little box ?" — whether England's character
for truth depends on " political acupunctuation ? "
I have now examined all the objections which I can
think of, imputing the production of mischief to secret
voting or Ballot. What is the result of this examina-
tion ? It appears that evil of one kind, and that of very
small extent, may arise under the Ballot, Lies may some-
times be told to gain a bribe, or avert a threat ; but, on
the other hand, bribes will seldom or ever be given, and
intimidation will be greatly diminished, and the disposition
to tell lies must exist after all independently of the Ballot,
and be brought out rather than caused by it. And against
this small evil we have seen the great amount of good
which is to be set. There can be no difficulty in striking
the balance.
It has been already observed that the Ballot is no
question of party, nor one on which those who are for,
and those who are against, an extension of popular power,
must necessarily differ. Men disagreeing in every possible
way as to the extent to which the franchise should be
distributed in a state, must yet be agreed that every one
actually enfranchised should express his own genuine
OF THE BALLOT. 61
opinion, and not be bribed or coerced into the expression
of another's. It is to be presumed, then, that all are
equally ready to support a measure directed against
intimidation and bribery. All must agree on the value of
the end for which the Ballot is recommended as a means.
And again, as regards this particular means, men may agree
as to the efficacy of the Ballot, and the comparative
amounts of good and of evil which it will produce, even
though they differ as to the principles by which the ques-
tion of extension of suffrage is determined, and which
divide them into political parties ; again, agreeing as to
these principles, they may differ upon the Ballot. The
Ballot, then, is no party c^uestion. It is a question simply
and solely as to the mode of attaining an end on the value
of wdiich all are agreed ; and the considerations serving to
determine the goodness of this particular mode are con-
nected in no way with those critical of party, dividing
Tories from Eadicals, or Conservatives from Eeformers. In
consonance with this view, a difference on the Ballot has
always existed within one of the two great political parties
in the state, that party which has been generally called
the Liberal party, and which has been known as more
favourable than the other to the extension of knowledge
and power among the people. But the conduct of the
other party presents an unfavourable contrast. They have
been banded, almost as one man, against the Ballot. Yet
there are those among them wdio should see that opposition
to Ballot is not necessitated by their principles.
Into the question of the Ballot many nice moral con-
siderations enter, and some careful calculation is required.
62 ARGUMENT IN FAVOUR
It is not a question which can be referred to some one
general principle, and thus turned off in a sentence, but
it needs patient, accurate discussion. Now those who are
themselves liable to be intimidated, and who must thus be
deeply concerned in a remedy for the evil which they
suffer, have the strongest motives to a full and fair in-
vestigation of the question. Men, on the other hand, whose
interest in it is more remote, and who are besides distracted
with a multitude of other calls upon their attention, are
less likely to go through the labour of thought indispen-
sable for an adequate investigation. This, then, is a ques-
tion on which members of Parliament may often very
properly attend to the opinions of constituents, who are
likely to care more, and therefore to think more, and there-
fore to know more, about the Ballot than themselves. I
am not recommending anything like slavish submission of
opinion on the part of a representative to his constituents.
I recommend only that the opinions of constituents should
be attended to as a matter of evidence, in a case where
these opinions are peculiarly deserving of attention. And
there is even still anotlier point of view in which the
opinions of the constituent body, or of larger or smaller
portions of it, are most important upon this question. It
is one of the loudest and most frequent objections to the
Ballot, that men will be able, if the Ballot is adopted, to
take bribes and afterwards deceive the person who has
bribed them. The injustice of this charge against the
Ballot has been already shown ; but it must be, to all
minds, a powerful confirmation of the reasoning by which
this charge has been answered, if men of unimpeached
OF THE BALLOT. 63
integrity ask for the protection of tlie Ballot, or if con-
stituencies whose character is unstained proclaim by
petitions their support. Such men and such constituencies
are not likely to ask for the means of immorality. They
are not likely, at any rate, to turn the Ballot to such a
purpose themselves.
Finally, the Ballot is an urgent question. It concerns
vitally the morals of the nation. Shall honour and public
spuit or sordid venality prevail in English cottages ? Shall
the English peasant, shall the English mechanic, shall the
English tradesman be a crouching cowering slave, or shall
he venerate himself a man ? Such a question cannot brook
delay. Every moment lost is, perhaps, some soul given
over to corruption or lowered into slavery. Humbly then,
but earnestly, I address myself to Ptcformers and say,
" Exert yourselves for the Ballot, and not only this, but
even concentrate and confine your exertions to the Ballot,
as among questions of parliamentary Eeform, until the
Ballot be carried."
11.
SPEECH IN FAVOUR OF THE BALLOT IN THE
HOUSE OF COMMONS, JUNE 21, 1842.
INTKODUCTORY NOTE.
I WAS a member of the House of Commons, sitting for
Weymouth, when Mr. H. G. Ward, member for Shettield,
who was afterwards Sir Henry Ward and died Governor
of Madras, brought forward the question of the Ballot, on
June 21, 1842. The Conservatives were then in power,
and Sir Eobert Peel Prime Minister. INIr. Grote had
retired from Parliament on the dissolution of the previous
year. There was an amicaljle rivalry Ijetween Mr. Ward
and Mr. Shell, as to who should take up the question ; the
latter gave way. ]Mr. Ward's motion was seconded by
Mr. Henry Berkeley. Silence reigned on the Government
side ; no one rose to reply from the Conservative benches.
A third speech was made in favour of the Ballot by a
Liberal member, Captain Layard. Again, when he sat
down, no one rose. I then delivered the following speech,
which had the effect of bringing up a highly respected
Conservative member, Mr. Granville Vernon, who said
that he was " especially tempted to rise to protest against
the remonstrance addressed by the member for Weymouth,
in forcible language, to the First Lord of the Treasury."
The debate thus begun went on. The speakers for the
Ballot were Captain Berkeley (afterwards Lord Pitz-
F 2
6S SPEECH IN FAVOUR OF THE BALLOT.
hardinge), Captain Bernal (now Mr. Bernal Osborne), Mr.
Charles Ponsonby (now Lord De Mauley), Mr. Morgan
John O'Connell, Mr. SheH, Mr. Serjeant Murphy, jVIr.
O'Connell (the great O'Connell), and Mr. Wakley; the
speakers against were ]Mr. Monckton Milnes (now Lord
Houghton), jNIr. Byng, Lord John Manners, Sir James
Graham, and Lord John Eussell. On the division, there
were 157 for, and 290 against, the Ballot. The numbers
in 1839, when Mr. Grote last proposed the measure, were
217 for and 335 against.
When I sat down on that occasion, Mr. O'Connell, who
was sitting under me, asked my excellent colleague and
friend, Mr. Bernal, who was so long Chairman of Com-
mittees, to introduce me to him, and I had thus the honour
of making that celebrated man's acquaintance.
The subject of corruption at elections was prominent in
the course of 1842, owing to the number of election peti-
tions which followed the general election of 1841, and to a
number of compromises to avoid discovery, which led, at
iNIr. Eoebuck's instance, to the appointment of a special
Committee of Inquiry.
SPEECH, ETC.
SiE, — I sTiould have tlionglit that, on a question of a
measure which has gained considerable favour among the
public, some of the many who ^^dll presently vote against
it would have thought it right to explain the reasons of
their votes. But as no one has risen on the other side to
answer speeches whicli, when they go forth, the country
will think worthy of notice, I will come forward on the
same side, hoping that I may be engaged in a not altogether
unprofitable task in clenching the recital of existing evils
that has come from the honourable member for Bristol
(Mr. H. Berkeley), and putting anew one or two of the
principal points of the question so ably treated Ijy the
honourable member for Sheffield (Mr. H. G. Ward).
First of all, what is it that we propose to do by tlie
Ballot, and how is it that we expect to do what we propose ?
The hope and the object of those who support the Ballot
is to diminish to a very great extent bribery and intimi-
dation at elections : and I beg the House to mark the
word " diminish." We expect to diminish bribery and
TO SPEECH IN FAFOUR
intimidation. AVe do not Lope entirely to remove
tliem ; it Lelono's to no Iniman expedient to be entirely
snccessful. But we say that the Ballot Mdll diminish
these evils to a A^ery great extent : and being an expedient
that will be simple and direct in its operation, stopping the
liriber and the intimidator in the doing of the foul deed,
instead of waiting till the deed is done, to punish him
then and to act on others by example, it will diminish those
bad practices to a greater extent than any other expedient
which can be suggested. Now, this distinction being
observed, there is at once an end of a very favourite argu-
ment with opponents of the Ballot, which consists in
alleging some mode — often imaginary, but sometimes, I v/ill
admit, really probable — in which bribery and intimidation
may still be practised, and then exclaiming, " What becomes
of the efficacy and success of the Ballot ? " For instance,
it is said that if the vote cannot be seen as it is given,
there will yet, for a person anxious to punish a voter, be
other ways of coming at something like a knowledge of his
vote. Or again, if there is no intimidating or bribing a
A'oter to give the vote you want, you may still intimidate
or bribe a man to stay away. Now, I say, granting all
this and a great deal more, what does it prove, but that,
first, bribery and intimidation will be more difficult of prac-
tice with the Ballot than without it, — else why resort to
these clumsy circuitous expedients? And, secondly, it
proves that while the entire removal of these evils is not
to be looked for, the Ballot may be most efficacious and
successful to diminish bribery and intimidation.
The diminution, then, of bribery and intimidation being
OF THE BALLOT. 71
the oLject of the Ballot, how is this object to be attained
by it ? Simply in this way. The voter will deposit his
voting-card in the box, unseen by any one, and may thus
elude the intimidator and foil the briber. I do not say
that he will, but he may do so. Had the voter promised
his vote in consequence of a threat, or in return for a
bribe, he might keep his promise, but the intimidator or
briber could never know that he did, — could never know
that the threat had been nugatory, or that the money
which had been paid had not been thrown away. In this
state of necessary uncertainty as to the result, w^ill threaten-
ing and bribing of voters continue undiminished? Will
a man, as heretofore, incur the labour and risk the odium
of intimidation, "udien he has no longer the means of
securing its efficacy ? Will a man give his money for a
vote, when he cannot see that vote given, and cannot
know, except by the assurance of the voter, which, in the
case of a man who has taken a bribe, will hardly convince,
whether the vote has been given to him or not ? I say,
then, that the Ballot will take away inducements to bribe
and intimidate.
And now I come to consider by anticipation (for by
anticipation I am compelled to do so) one or two objec-
tions often urged against the Ballot.
One of these is, that the franchise is a trust, and that
those in whose behalf the trust is conferred, the unrepre-
sented portion of the community, should see the vote
given, and control the exercise of the trust. Why, if the
unrepresented portion of the community is not invested
with the franchise because it is judged unfit to hold it.
72 SPEECH IN FAVOUR
what is the consistency and propriety of saying that this
portion is fit to control those who by reason of supposed
superior fitness Iiave the francliise ?
There is another objection made to the Ballot, that it
will tend to encourage lying. It is generally put thus :
that it will do the good which it is intended to do through
the medium of lying, enabling a man to promise his vote
one way to his landlord, or his master, or a briber, and
then, under protection of the ballot-box, vote the other
way. Now I wish to deal fairly with this objection: and
1 will therefore say at once that I do not at all agree in
the answer generally given, that the man who would tell
the lie, if he voted secretly, would vote under the influence
of a threat or a bribe, and so give the lie to his own
opinions under a system of open voting; and that, the
unconscientious vote being a lie, no additional harm will
come of the Ballot. Now, I say that this is no answer at
all; and I say at once that I can see no comparison
between the actual lie in the one case and the metaphorical
lie in the other, and that if I believed no other answer than
this could be given, I would yield to the objection, and
cease to advocate the Ballot. But let us consider this objec-
tion a little more closely. The way in which the Ballot is
to act is by rendering threats profitless, and bribes to no
purpose, by taking away the motives to spend money and
exercise the influence of one's position, by removing there-
from all occasion for those questions which, if men have
bribed, or have threatened, or intend to threaten, it may
be very natural for them to put, but which, if they do
neither the one nor the other, would be entirely useless,
OF THE BALLOT. 73
and would not be put : and if questions are not put, lying
answers will not be elicited.
And I would ask, by way of anotlier answer to this
objection, are corrupt constituencies anxious for the Ballot,
as they would be if the Ballot is to give to corruption the
additional protection of mendacity ? What does Sudbury
say ? In the extracts which have lately been published
from the Eeport of the Handloom Weavers' Commission, it
appears that the Ballot is the most unpopular of measures
at Sudbury, and that a candidate suffered in that sink of
corruption because he was a supporter of the Ballot.
I believe, candidly, that the Ballot will not do mischief
in any proportion to its good, and that it will effectually
diminish the evils of intimidation and bribery, which now
so widely prevail, and the effects of which are to degrade
voters, lower the tone of feeling among persons who
resort to those practices, and foil the purpose for which the
Pteform Bill has bestowed the franchise. And if the Ballot
will do this, it cannot now surely be needful, when every
day unfolds to us some new tale of corruption worse than
that which went before, to impress on the House the
necessity of adopting it. Eather would I say that, next to
giving bread to those who are starving, it is our first duty
to stay this moral pestilence which is spreading, and which,
as it spreads, destroys honour, virtue, truth, courage, manli-
ness, among the humbler orders of our society. When I have
heard the right honourable baronet (Sir E. Peel), who is at
the head of the Government, more than once make his new
Tariff and his Income Tax the reason for postponing inves-
tigations into bribery, and declining to undertake legislation
74 SPEECH IN FAVOUR OF THE BALLOT.
on the subject, I have thought that this was not the course
which should be taken by the First Minister of the country
on a question more vitally than any other affecting the
morals of the nation, and, as a moral question, requiring
his first care. Talk of the credit of the country, and its
military renown, and tlie glory of our commerce and manu-
factures, which Income Tax and Tariff are to foster and
enhance : why, when the virtue and morality of the people
are in peril, and aspirants to the legislature and to power
are doing their worst to make slaves and hirelings of elec-
tors, and perverting institutions given for freedom's sake,
and to elevate the holders of the franchise, to the enslav-
ing and debasing of our countrymen, is it not time to
reflect that, when the internal elements of greatness have
gone, material prosperity and fame among the nations are
only so much gilding and tinsel hiding filth and rottenness
within ? If you will adopt tlie motion of the honourable
member for Sheffield, you will serve the cause of morality,
and while vindicating our electoral institutions and pre-
paring for their further development, will give a worthy
impulse to the social and political progress of the nation.
III.
SUGGESTIONS FOB AN ORGANIZATION FOR
RESTRAINT OF CORRUPTION AND EX-
PENDITURE AT ELECTIONS
INTRODUCTOKY NOTE.
The following essay was read at a meeting of the Depart-
ment of Jurisprudence and Amendment of the Law of the
National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, on
Fehruary 22, 1864. Two editions were published in that
year by the Association. Mr. John Stuart Mill attended
a discussion on the essay, and gave an emphatic approval
of the plan. He said : — •" I think there are legal measures
which could be made effectual, but only if backed by a
moral demonstration of a sufficient number of honest men
who woidd league themselves together against the political
crime, expressly or virtually pledging themselves both to
abstain from it personally, and to use all their influence to
prevent it. They would probably be able to obtain from
the Legislature any such enactments as may be desirable,
wliile they would supply the only powers which could
enable those enactments to be enforced. Great credit is
due to Mr. Christie for having, as it seems to me, ' hit the
right nail on the head.' "
The Eev. F. D. Maurice honoured me by writing an ar-
ticle upon this essay in Macmillans Magazine^ from which
^ July 18G4, art. "Corruption at Elections; Mr. Christie's Suggestions."
SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
the following is an extract : — " Nothing may do more to
justify the existence of this Association (the Social Science),
and to explain its real oljjects, than an effort to which Mr.
Christie, the late Minister in Brazil, has incited it. In an
admirable paper, which he read on the 24th of February,
he proposed ' an organization for the restraint of cor-
ruption at elections,' He gave specimens from Blue-
books and from the evidence before election committees of
the extent of the evil. He showed — without any exag-
geration of language — in manly, vigorous English, that,
whatever efforts had been made for its repression, it was
still debasing the moral and political life of our country.
He pouited out the importance of directing public opinion
against the briber ; the duty of treating many of what are
considered the lawful expenses at elections as practically
bribes ; the necessity, therefore, of educating every class to
a more enlarged apprehension of the sin, as well as a more
intense abhorrence of it, than any of them can be credited
with now, Mr. Christie had the high privilege of being
supported in a few weighty and pregnant sentences by Mr,
Mill, who came down to the Association expressly that he
might give his adhesion to the movement. To have com-
menced that work will be always a high honour for the
Association. Mr. Christie has appealed earnestly — more
respectfully than we deserve — to members of my profes-
sion. He has called for our co-operation in redressing an
evil which we must know does more to impair the morality
of the country than all our sermons can ever do to raise it.
I lioije that co-operation will be afforded by every clergy-
man in the country."
An endeavour by the Social Science Association to es-
tablish such an oruanization as is sketched in the essav did
OF CORRUPTIOJ AND EXPENDITURE. 79
not receive sufficient encouragement to warrant persis-
tence ; and the scheme fell to the ground ; but not before
it had obtained the approval and co-operation of several
distinguished men of different political opinions, and
among others, of Lord Shaftesbury, Lord Eussell, Lord
Lyttelton, Sir John Pakington, Lord Stanley (now Lord
Derby), Sir Joseph Napier (formerly Irish Lord Chan-
cellor), Mr. E. Baines, j\Ir. W. E. Eorster, Mr. Stansfeld,
Mr. T. Chambers (the Common Serjeant), and Mr. Thomas
Hughes.
In 1864, when this essay was written and published, a
new general election was regarded as necessarily not far
distant. The dissolution occurred in the following year.
The new Parliament then elected, in 1865, Avas a splendid
triumph for the Prime ]\Iinister, Lord Palmerston, too
quickly followed by his lamented death. But the triumph
was not without alloy ; for there are several statements,
registered in Hansard, of respected members of both
Houses, to the effect that there was a greater amount of
corruption in the general election of 1865 than in any
which had preceded it. So said, among others, Earl Grey,^
the late Earl of Derby,- and Mr. Vivian,^ member for
Clamorganshire, who was Chairman of two Election
Committees in 1866 ; and Mr. W. E. Baxter,* now Secre-
tary of the Treasury, who was Chairman of the Bridge-
water Election Committee of 1866, also denounced in
strong terms the general prevalence of corruption.
1 House of Lords, May 29, 1866. "- Iliid. May 29, 1866.
a House of Commons, May 29, 1866. ■* Ibid. May 1, 1866.
SUGGESTIONS, etc.
This paper has a practical oloject and one idea. Can a
moral enthusiasm be roused, and moral influences brought
to bear, widely and effectively, by combined efforts of indi-
viduals, against bribery and extravagant expenditure at
elections, which legislation is powerless to destroy ? Can
this Association organize or initiate such an action ?
I couple extravagant expenditure with bribery, and need
hardly explain that the greater part of the expenses of ex-
pensively contested elections are virtual corruption. The
expensiveness of elections, independently of bribery, may
be regarded as a social question deserving the attention of
social reformers, inasmuch as it restricts the area of choice
of representatives, helps wealth against intellect, thwarts
political earnestness, and degrades constituencies. Mr. John
Mill, in denouncing the expenses of elections as " one of
the most conspicuous vices of the existing electoral sys-
tem," forcibly points out the importance of the ruling idea
under which elections are conducted and votes sought and
given, and suggests the effect on an elector's mind, auxiliary
to corruption, of the simple fact of a patent large expendi-
CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 81
ture by candidates to gain a seat in Parliament. " In a
good representative system," gays Mr. Mill, " tliere would
be no election expenses to be borne by the candidate.
Their effect is ^yholly pernicious. Politically, they consti-
tute a property qualification of the worst kind. Morally,
it is still worse ; not only by the profligate and demora-
lizing character of much of the expenditure, but by the
corrupting effect of the notion inculcated on the voter, that
the person he votes for should pay a large sum of money
for permission to serve the public. They must be poor
politicians who do not know the efficacy of such indirect
moral influences. The incidental circumstances which sur-
round a public act, and betoken the expectation entertained
by society in regard to it, irrevocably determine the moral
sentiment which adheres to the act in the mind of an
average individual. So long as the candidate himself, and
the customs of the world, seem to regard the function of a
member of parliament less as a duty to be discharged than
as a personal favour to be solicited, no effort will avail to
implant in an ordinary voter the feeling that the election
of a member of parliament is a matter of duty, and that he
is not at liberty to bestow the vote on any other considera-
tion than that of personal fitness. The necessary expenses
of an election, those which concern all the candidates
equally, should, it has often been urged, be defrayed either
by the municipal body or by the state. With regard to
the sources of expense which are personal to the individual
candidate, committees, canvassing, even printing and public
meetings, it is in every way better that these things should
not be done at all, unless done by the gratuitous zeal, or
Q
82 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
paid for by the contributions, of bis supporters. Even now
there are several members of parliament whose elections
cost them nothing, the whole expense being defrayed by
their constituents : of these members we may be completely
assured that they are elected from public motives ; that
they are the men whom the voters really wish to see elected,
in preference to all others, either on account of the principles
they represent, or the services they are thought qualified to
render."^
Perfection is unattainable in this world, and a jDcrfect
representative system is an impossibility. Human nature
has everywhere engendered bribery and rioting in popular
elections for places of honour, and corruption in parlia-
mentary government. But, though perfection is unattain-
able, improvement is best effected by keeping a perfect
system in view as a goal, wdiich may be ueared, though it
cannot be reached : and luoral influences have already done
much to purify English government. In the seventeenth
century there was not only general corruption of constitu-
encies and notorious bribery of members of parliament, but
there w^ere also venal Ministers of State. It is long since
there w^as even a suspicion that an English Minister of State
could be bribed. The corruption of members of parliament
by Government bribes was rampant in the last century, and
there are men living who may remember traces of it ; but
we may say that bribery of members of parliament has
been for many years extinct. The corruption of constitu-
encies remains to be cured. Words used by Andrew Mar-
veil in 1678, to describe the evil which had then suddenly
i " Tliouglit.s on Pailiaiuentary Eelbna," by Joliu Stuart Mill. 1859.
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 83
assumed large proportions, are still applicable to a large
number of English constituencies. " It is not to be ex-
pressed, the debauchery and lewdness which upon occasion
of elections to Parliament are now grown habitual through
the nation. So that the vice and the expense are risen to
such a prodigious height that few sober men can endure to
stand to be chosen on such conditions." ^
Bishop Burnet, in the general review of the moral and
social condition of England, with which he winds up the
" History of his own Time," covering four reigns and half a
century, wrote thus in 1708 on bribery at elections : — " All
laws that can be made will prove ineffectual to cure so
great an evil, till there comes to be a change and reforma-
tion of morals in the nation. We see former laws are
evaded, and so will all the laws that can be made, till
the candidates and electors both become men of another
temper and other principles than appear now among
tliem." 2
Since the Eeform Act, and more especially since the
general election of 1841, Parliament has passed a number
of Acts against bribery at elections ; and an able historian
of our own time, having passed in review this series of
Acts, each rapidly proved inefficacious, makes some remarks
which, after the lapse of a century and a half, are an
unconscious reproduction of Bishop Burnet's observation.
" To repress so grave an evil," says Sir Erskine May, in his
" Constitutional History," published in 1861, "more efi'ec-
1 Marvell's " Growth of Popery ami Arbitrary Government in England."
Worlds, vol. i. p. 540.
=* Baiuet's "History of his own Time," vi. 208, ed. Oxford, 1S23.
G 2
84 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
tual measures will doubtless be devised, but they may still
be expected to fail, until bribery shall be unmistakably
condemned by public opinion. The law had treated duel-
ling as murder^ yet the penalty of death was unable to re-
press it ; but when society discountenanced that time-
honoured custom, it was suddenly abandoned. Voters may
always be found to receive bribes if offered ; but candidates
belong to a class whom the influence of society may re-
strain from committing an offence condemned alike by the
law and by public opinion." ^
I W' ish to suggest whether, at this moment, when a gene-
ral election cannot be far distant, but while there is yet
time to act on public opinion, and while, before parties are
engaged in passionate contention, the voice of reason may
yet be heard, an Association might not be called into exist-
ence to rouse, concentrate, and guide the moral feeling of
the nation, and to arrange and superintend an extensive
system of concerted practical effort, for an object which
all respectable men desire, and which laws will not
accomplish.
The sudden turn of feeling, which within our memories
suppressed the long-cherished and strongly rooted fashion
of duelling, gives encouragement to hope for good effects of
a well-aimed impulse to public feeling on corruption at
elections, which is not favoured, as duelling was, by opinion,
but which is connived at from habit, and sheltered by chari-
table indulgence, and practised with compunction of con-
science under the influence of circumstances, passion, rivalry,
and temptation. I believe that the formation of the Anti-
^ May's " Coustitutioual History of England," L p. 336.
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 85
duelling Association in 1844 liad some share in bringing
about the sudden great change of public opinion on duelling
which occurred shortly after, and I feel sure that the for-
mation of an Association against corruption at elections,
comprising the leading men of all parties, and perha])s
combining for a social reform dignitaries of the Church and
of the Law with the most eminent in political life, would
be itself a great stride towards success.
Such an Association might of course act on opinion bv
large public meetings and circulation of suitable pamphlets ;
but I look chiefly to the following mode of action, aided
by the enthusiasm which the existence of the Association
would engender.
Endeavours should be made to include as many members
of parliament and candidates for seats, and leading mem-
bers of coustituencies, as possible of all parties. Every
one in becoming a member of the Association would thereby
pledge himself to abstain from corrupt expenditure by him-
self or friends, and to do everything in his power to dis-
courage and prevent it.
Local committees composed of leading men of all parties
should be organized through the constituencies. Endea-
vours should be made everywhere to procure agreements
between opposing candidates, and opposing leaders of parties
in constituencies, to abstain from bribery and to limit ex-
penditvu^e. Sucli agreements could probably be made with-
out much difficulty, in most cases, some time before an
election. All candidates have a strong common interest in
abstaining from bribery, and election expenditure is for the
most part a matter of forced habit and involuntary rivalry.
86 SUGGESTIO'NS FOR RESTRAINT
There can be uo doubt that it is generally the wish of tlie
respectable leading men in all constituencies to put down
bribery and profligate expenditure at elections. They know
and regret the bad effects on the classes which furnish the
bribed, and must care something for the reputation of their
own communities. But in this as in other matters, what
is everybody's business is nobody's ; no one initiates a re-
form ; political opponents do not naturally come together
to talk of joint action; there are those interested in keep-
ing up the system ; the election comes on, candidates spend
largely because they cannot help themselves, following the
habits of the place, and one doing what the other does, and
bribery is practised at the last to win, or to meet bribery.
In many boroughs compulsion is put upon candidates by
inferior persons, having influence among the poorer electors
which they use for their own profit, and encouraging large
expenditure for the same object ; where one such middle-
man of corruption exists on one side, his fellow is generally
to be found on the other; these men might generally
be overcome by previous concert between candidates and
leading electors.
It is to be expected that these agreements, deliberately
made between gentleman and gentleman, and comprising
the leading supporters on each side, would in general be
honourably and completely fulfilled.
Public meetings might, if necessary, be held in constitu-
encies to promote the desired end : in some cases, perhaps,
a body of electors of different politics might act together
to require from the candidates and leaders on both sides
solemn promises to abstain from corrupt expenditure. I
OF CORRUPTIOX AXD EIPENDTTURR. ST
should look for much aid from the clergy both of the Church
aud of the dissenting bodies for this movement in consti-
tuencies.
In many cases, parties will remain in the same relative
position in constituencies after such an agreement. Can-
didates will save their money, the cause of public morality
will gain, and the result of the election be the same. In
other cases where a candidate could only gain his end by
bribery, he and his party will make up their rninds to lose
by the agreement only what could not be securely won (for
there always remains the danger of an election petition and
its consequences) ; and what one political party loses in
tliis way in one constituency, the other will probably lose
in another. The balance of parties will probably be little
affected on the whole. In some of the many boroughs,
where parties are nearly balanced, and a small corrupt
phalanx turns the scale (and some of these are among the
worst cases of corruption), there will probably be compro-
mises, by which each party will obtain an uncontested
seat. Here again the cause of public morality will gain,
and the peace of the borough will be secured ; and in these
cases of nearly balanced parties a large minority, which a
few accidents or more care in succeeding registrations might
convert into a majority, has a fair claim to a share of the
representation. Such compromises occurring in several
constituencies would probably not disturb in the end the
balance of parties. This may be considered a low mode of
treating the subject, but it is well to endeavour to conciliate
political partisanship.
All the money comes from candidates and wealthy
88 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
supporters. If these can be got by agreement to abstain
from spending money, there will be no corruption.
A witness before the Committee of the House of Com-
mons of 1860, on the Corrupt Practices Prevention Act, a
gentleman of large experience in elections, Mr. Philip Eose,
used a phrase in recommending suspension of writs for
corrupt boroughs, which I would appropriate. Mr. Eose
said, " I should treat a venal constituency as I would a
drunken man, I would take away the stimulant in the hope
that it would recover ; and if "Wakefield or Gloucester, for
instance, were kept without their members for five or ten
years, a new class of voters would arise in those boroughs,
and corruption would be very much lessened." Now this
is my plan, to take away " the stimulant." I propose to
invite and incite candidates through the country to co-
operate and combine to keep " the stimulant " in tlieir
own pockets. The suggested agreements and compromises
will take away " the stimulant." Habits of corruption
may then die away by disuse, and the appetite for bribes
decay for want of the food which it has fed on.
Let us ascend from the leaders of constituencies to the
leaders of parties. It is generally known that there is an
organization for promotion of elections at head-quarters in
each party, and that, on the occasion of a general election,
there have been always large subscriptions on the side of
the Government and on the side of the Opposition. The
Association might begin by addressing itself to the head
of the Government and the leader of the Opposition, in
order to obtain their co-operation in this movement, and
assurances that they will urge those, with whom respec-
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 89
tively a word from either would be a command, and who
influence many others, to abstain from everything which
can excite or facilitate corrupt expenditure, and to give
every aid in promoting agreements and compromises,
whose object is to prevent corruption.
It is impossible to exaggerate what might be effected
for the object in view by an agreement between the heads
of the two great political parties, and by injunctions from
both to the gentlemen who are in their confidence for the
superintendence of elections, to abstain from and discoun-
tenance all such proceedings as have from time to time
oozed out, and involved public men of high standing in
suspicion and discredit ; as sending down for candidates
sums of money which can only be wanted for corrupt
purposes, and communications with election agents, whose
notorious and avowed business is traffic in corruption.
The reports of the Sudbury Commission of 1844, the
Committee on the Derby Election of 1852, and the
Gloucester Commission of 1859, furnish examples of un-
happy proceedings in which the names of men in high
position are found in connexion with low election agents
and gross corruption. One word from the Prime jNIinister
to his political Secretary to the Treasury, and one like
word from the leader of the Opposition to his super-
intendent of elections, could stop the mischief that comes
from the London Committees, and that is a very large part
of the whole. An agreement between the Prime Minister
and the leader of Opposition for this purpose would be an
example of the best augury and most potent effect for the
proposed movement. Lord Palmerstou spoke as follows, in
90 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
the House of Commons, on the 9th of May, 1842, as to the
Ijribeiy which had prevailed in the general election of
1841, since when the evil has even increased, and succes-
sive legislative measures have, one after the other, proved
abortive : —
" I speak it with shame and grief, but I verily believe
that the extent to which bribery was carried at the last
election has exceeded anything that has yet been stated
within these walls. ... If the inquiry be not as extensive
as the evil, it had not better take place at all. These
corrupt practices I hold to be one of the most dangerous
symptoms of the times, tending more than anything else
to sap the foundations of social order, and to undermine
the Constitution, and I hold also that it is the bounden
duty of Parliament to provide an immediate remedy for
the evil."
Lord Stanley^ said, on the same day : —
" No man deplores more deeply, or is prepared to cen-
sure more strongly, than I, the bribery and corruption in
large towns and in small towns. There is no member of
this House who will be prepared to go further in applying,
it' we can apply, an effectual remedy."
Let me add to these remarkable declarations of Viscount
Palmerston and the Earl of Derby some words uttered by
the late Sir Eobert Peel on the occasion of the intro-
duction of a Bill, by Lord John Piussell, for the repression
of bribery, June 6th, 1842. No words could more forcibly
support my recommendation of agreements between candi-
dates and leading politicians in constituencies.
1 The late Earl of Derby.
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPEXDITURE. 91
" In every borough there are certain individnals "who
take a lead in all political matters, and altogether iutliaence
the electors in their respective places. Now, I believe
that if these influential persons of both parties in boroughs
set their faces against bribery, and came to an under-
standing to discourage all unnecessary expenses, they
would do a great deal more towards the suppression of the
evils complained of, than all the acts of the Legislature.
1 do not therefore underrate the law, but I think that good
example and improved habits will more effectually lead to
the diminution of bribery — its extinction I scarcely hope
for — than any legislative enactment whatever ; and I do
hope that the leading men of the country will set their
faces so effectually against it, that after the next general
election, come when it may, there shall be little or no
cause to complain on the score of bribery."
Patronage provides other modes of influencing votes at
elections, less gross and palpable than bribery, and " lends
corruption lighter wings to fly." This brings us to the
subjects of oiu' administrative system and party -govern-
ment, admitted, I believe, to be within the limits of social
science, but divided by thin partitions from the questions
of passionate politics which here must be avoided. There
are thoughtful men who regard the rivalries of party and
the possession of large patronage by the Government for
distribution among political supporters, as necessary to
good parliamentary government. I cannot think this. I
regard these things as defects and blots. One of the chief
advantages, I conceive, of the system of examinations for
appointments which has of late years made progress
92 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
among iis, is its tendency to purify representative govern-
ment. The full advantage can only be derived from free
competitive examinations. Tlie small places given away
in all the boroughs and counties by the great public
departments, the Treasury and General Post Office for
instance, through political supporters, might be given as
prizes of local examinations. A suggestion of this sort
was made in 1844, some years before the first introduction
of examinations into our administrative system, by the
present Lord Grey (then Lord Howick) in the House of
Commons, on the occasion of a motion by Mr. William
Ewart, on public education. Lord Grey urged the insti-
tution by Government of periodical examinations in dis-
tricts, for the benefit of schools of the lower orders, and
added : — " Government might bring candidates to their
examinations by holding out more substantial rewards to
a few of the children. This could be done at no expense
whatever. They all knew how earnestly situations in the
lower ranks of the public service were looked for among
the classes likely to send their children to these schools ;
and if a few such situations as tliose of tide-waiters,
for example, were made prizes for perseverance, attention,
and ability, the hope of winning them would attract great
numbers of persons to the examinations. By a small
sacrifice of patronage this important object might be
attained."! I remember that I myself recalled attention
to this suggestion in the House of Commons, on the
occasion of another motion of Mr. Ewart's, in 1846, and
then read an excellent passage in recommendation of it
1 Hansard, July 19, 1844.
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 93
from a letter of Mr. Dawes, tlie Dean of Hereford/ then
a clergyman in Ilampsliire, zealously promoting public
education in his parish, which is printed in the Minutes
of the Committee of Council on Education for 1845. ^ I
believe this to have been one of the earliest, as it is one of
the most practical suggestions of a plan which combines
the advantages of extension of education, improvement of
local administration, and lessening of electoral corruption.
This plan of giving local appointments to local examina-
tions has never been adopted. The plans which have
been generally adopted, of appointment subject to an
examination, and of nominations for limited competition,
fall short of producing all the desired good. The patronage
system remains. Patronage is even increased by the system
of nominations for limited competition, each nomination
being a favour. ]\lembers must still go to the Treasury to
ask favours for their constituents, like the Eoman clients
thronging the patron's doorstep for the well-filled basket.
" Nunc sportula primo
Limine parva sedet, turbai rapieuda togata3."
Constituencies can only lie made thoroughly pure by re-
moving all sources of corruption. So long as nominations
can only be got by application to the Government, how
can voters and Members help, or how can they be blamed
for, making applications ? How can the Government be
expected, while the system remains, to favour their
opponents ?
^ Dean Dawes lias died since this paper was written.
2 Hansard, July 21, 1S46.
94 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
When, eighty years ago, Mr. Pitt had defied a large
adverse parliamentary majority, and successfully appealed
to a general election, and stood by the result on a super-
eminent pinnacle of personal ascendancy, one of his most
attached and most celebrated friends, Mr. Wilberforce,
thought (as it is recorded in his Life) that "he was then
able, if he had duly estimated his position, to cast off the
corrupt machinery of iuiluence."^ " Party on one side,"
said Mr. Wilberforce, " begets party on the other." The
ungoverned fury of contending parties begets and perpe-
tuates corruption.
The leader of a great party is in this matter in the same
position and difficulty as a great many candidates for seats
in Parliament, that he does not know all that is done by
others. But this can hardly ever be altogether an inno-
cent ignorance. Friends and supporters will not in the
end do what the chief is really determined shall not be
done. As it is, leaders and candidates are not told what
goes on, and they do not inquire. Contented, like Words-
worth's poet, —
" Contented if tliey may enjoy
The things which others understand,"
they resign themselves not without reluctance and mis-
giving to this contentment ; and the action of public
opinion is needed to save them from it and its con-
sequences.
To return to the subject of agreements to abstain from
corruption ; where any candidate or his committee should
^ " Life of William AVilberforee," vol. i. p. 6i.
OF CORRUPTION AND EIPENDTTURR 95
refuse, ou being formally applied to for tlie purpose, to
joiu in such an agreement, lie will be an object of sus-
picion. Amid the hubljub of a general election, the
suggested Association may be a central eye to watch
everywhere, and a central head and hand to aid in ex-
posure and punishment through existing laws.
I have not mentioned coercion and intimidatiiju, but
these also may be regarded as forms of corruption, and the
proposed agreements should include all illegitimate influ-
ences, such as of customer over tradesman, landlord over
tenant, &c.
In a paper read by Mr. Chadwick before the Law
Amendment Society, in February 1859, the collection of
information on a large scale by a Commission as to exist-
ing constituencies in order to lay a basis for a measure
of parliamentary reform was powerfully recommended. I
have only to do here with so much of Mr. Chadwick's
proposal as concerns corrupt proceedings. Men of all
opinions on parliamentary reform will concur in an obser-
vation of Mr. Chadwick's that the Legislature cannot be
in the best position for extending or lowering the franchise,
until it has obtained full knowledge of the kinds of cor-
ruption prevailing in constituencies, and while so much
corruption exists, and is even in some places increasing.^
A similar opinion was intimated before the Corrupt Prac-
tices Prevention Committee by a gentleman, whose pro-
fession, experience, and well-known political opinions
^ The late Sir James Stephens presided ou that occasion, and made a
most remarl<able speech ou the lanUiuess of our system of legislation,
which was published with Mr. Chadwick's paper.
96 SUGGESTION'S FOR RESTRAINT
give peculiar value to liis statement. I refer to Mr.
Joseph Parkes, who said, " A certain class of boroughs
are much influenced by attorneys on both sides, and also
by the licensed victuallers and beerhouse keepers, which
latter I consider the most growing evil of the day, joar-
ticularly if the franchise is to he loivcrcd." The suggested
Association may do the work of Mr. Chadwick's proposed
Commission, as regards corrupt practices, by collecting
information about bribery and corrupt expenditure. By
printing and widely circulating facts as to corruption in
constituencies, it will do further good, — strengthen the
feeling against the existing evils. The misdeeds of corrupt
constituencies may thus be widely made known for shame,
and in the same way the conduct of pure boroughs, re-
turning members in the public-spirited manner mentioned
by Mr. Mill, may be held up in tracts widely circulated
for general admiration and example.
In constituencies like the large metropolitan boroughs,
where there is no purchasing of votes with coarse money
bribes, it would well become leading men to combine to
regulate and limit expenditure, the greater part of which
leads to virtual corruption, and which has often notoriously
become so large in amount as to deter candidates. In the
evidence already referred to, taken by the Committee of
the House of Commons of 1860 on the Corrupt Practices
Prevention Act, there are many interesting and instructive
particulars as to the corruption involved in general ex-
penditure, showing, what perhaps does not need to be
shown, how voters who let carriages are secured by hiring
their conveyances, printers by lavish printing, publicans
OF COrxRJ:PTION' AND EXPENDITURE. 97
by refreshments to supporters and hire of committee-
rooms, and how an unnecessary number of voters and
their relations are engaged as paid canvassers, messen-
gers, &c. &c. These expenses, whicli the fury of election
rivalry carries beyond bounds, might, by agreement be-
tween the leading men of a large borough solicitous for
its political reputation, some of them be got rid of, and
others reduced to the limits of necessity.
]\Ir. James Vaughan, who was the chief commissioner
for the inquiry in 1859 at Gloucester, strongly recom-
mended the prohibition of paid canvassers, and limitation
of messengers. A great deal of this might be effected by
agreement. It would be, in the long run, the same for
both parties. " In the evidence we received," Mr. Vaughan
said, "we found 112 messengers employed on the one side,
and 150 on the other, and it was stated that ten or twenty
could do the work."
jMr. Vaughan also conducted an inquiry at Tynemouth,
in 1852, and says : " There were 882 on the register, and
669 polled ; the publicans who voted were 108, and in
that case we found scarcely a single instance where there
were not either refreshment orders, or dinners, or suppers
provided by the publicans, and the publicans were waver-
ing backwards and forwards as they received a good order
from one party or the other."
Mr. Vaughan says of paying expenses of voters from a
distance : " We found at Gloucester there were a gi'eat num-
ber of voters brought up upon either side, and the result
was that the expenses to the candidate were largely
augmented, with no practical result as regards the success
H
98 SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
of the candidate ; there would be ten men brought up on
the one side and ten on the other."
I should think that in large boroughs where public
spirit prevails, there might often be no difficulty about the
appointment of a Committee, having the confidence of the
whole constituency, to regulate the mode of conducting
elections, with a view to limitation of expenses and
suppression of corruption ; and he would be a rash
candidate who would not thankfully abide by the rules.
In large boroughs, in the metropolitan boroughs for
instance, a great deal of good might be done by organi-
zation among the electors of one party — say the Liberal
party, which usually predominates in the metropolitan
constituencies : but it is men of leading influence who
must initiate the organization. The inferior standard of
the generality of metropolitan members has often been a
reproach to the London constituencies. The size of the
boroughs makes combined action more difficult. If there
were more co-operation and organization for the selection of
a good candidate, and for securing his election, the number
of rival candidates would be diminished, and less rivalry
would be quickly followed by less expenditure; there
would be less hope for the rich man who trusts only to
his riches, and for whom it is now often easy to strike in
and win by lavish and demoralizing expenditure.
The limitation of the number of attorneys employed to
one for each candidate was strongly recommended by Mr.
I'igott, the present Judge. Of the employment of attorneys,
he said : " I am sure that it leads to undue influence. If
}uu employ attorneys, they have influence over a great
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 99
number of voters ; in a borough particularly. Some are
debtors, some have mortgages, some expect a lawyer's
letter; in one way or another there are numerous modes in
which an attorney has influence over voters." Mr. Vaugliau
said on the same subject : " We found that tliere were a
large number of solicitors employed at Gloucester. Solicitors
know a great deal about people in a town, and they are no
doubt employed in consequence of the influence wdiich
they can bring to bear. I recollect that one voter mentioned
he felt he must vote on a particular side, because the
solicitor on that side had a mortgage on his cottage." j\lr.
Joseph Parkes, a distinguished member of the profession,
and most experienced manager of elections, strongly
protested against payment of attorneys as agents, and
made the following statement. " I think that it is an evil
to the public and an evil to themselves [to pay solicitors
as agents] ; nearly all the professional men in towns and
counties act gratuitously. I myself, after 1826, never tcjok
a fee in my life, and I never would. I know all the valu-
able agents in AVarwick, in Coventry, and at Birmingham,
and I know that at the town and county elections, most of
them, whether upon the Conservative side, or upon tlie
Liberal side, are volunteers ; they are the men who do the
work, and it is the class of the young solicitors, and tlu-
class of generally inferior men, who do a great deal of
mischief, and incur useless cost. I should wish to state
only one reason why I should object to the employment of
solicitors. It is notorious that every agent causes intae
people to vote in consequence of the fee given to him, and
I think it is a gross anomaly, that, because he is a law}er,
H 2
]0() SUGGESTIONS FOR RESTRAINT
he is to be receiving the candidate's money ; you might
just as well give a fee of fifty guineas or five guineas a day
to a medical man, who would be equally influential. A
general practitioner, from his influence among families,
would bring up more people to vote than even the lawyer
could. How absurd it would be that you should retain
a surgeon ! Why should the legal profession alone be a
paid class ? I take it to be a custom fraught with evil."
There is no class of men whose co-operation would be
so important as that of solicitors in a general movement
for the diminution of election expenditure and the destruc-
tion of corruption. Other eminent solicitors versed in
elections gave evidence before the Committee, Mr. Eose,
Mr. Clabon, IMr. Drake, and others. The members of the
profession throughout the constituencies, animated by the
spirit and example of these witnesses, would be invaluable
aids for the proposed Association.
I will only mention the notorious fact of a great increase
of corruption in many boroughs by corrupt practices at the
annual municipal elections. jMr. Philip Rose speaks of the
municipal contests as the " nursery of the evil." He says :
" These oft-recurring contests have led to the establishment
of what I might almost term an organized system of corrup-
tion in tlie municipal boroughs throughout the kingdom,
which provides a machinery ready made to hand, available
when the parliamentary contest arrives. I am sure that if
members of parliament on both sides of the House will
inform the Committee accurately, it will be admitted that
the great strain upon them by their constituents is not so
much for the support of charities or public institutions, as
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPEXDITURE. lOI
it is for tlie support of tlie municipiil contests in Novenrner,
the argument invariably being, on the part of tlie local
agents, that 10/. spent at a ninuicipal contest is better and
more advantageous tlian 100/. spent at the i)arlianientary
contest." Other witnesses called attention to this sul)jcct.
Boroughs rapidly get worse and worse under an annual
administration of "the stimulant" at municipal elections;
and a strong imjnilse from without for local organization
against corruption becomes more and more necessary.
Sir Erskine May's condensed account of the general
results of the inquiries which have been prosecuted by
Commissions since 1852 is a painfully striking statement :
"At Canterbury, 155 electors had been bribed at oiw
election, and 79 at another ; at Maldon, 76 electors had I'e-
ceived bribes; at Barnstaple, 255 ; at Cambridge, 111 : and
at Kingston-upon-Hull, no less than 847. At the latt'-r
place, 26,606/. had been spent in three elections. In 1858,
a Commission reported that 183 freemen of Galway hail
received bribes. In 1860, there were strange disclosures
affecting the ancient city of Gloucester. This place had
been long familiar with corruption. In 1810, a single
candidate had spent 27,500/. at an election; in 1818
another candidate had spent 16,000/. ; and now it appeared
that at the last election, in 1859, 250 electors had been
bribed, and 81 persons had been guilty of corrupting them.
Up to this time, the places which had been distinguish ^.d
by such malpractices had returned members to Parliament
prior to 1832 ; but in 1860, the perplexing discovery was
made, that bribery had also extensively prevailed in tlie
populous and thriving borough of Wakefield, the creation
102 SUGGESTION'S FOR RESTRAINT
of the Eeform Act ; 86 electors had been bribed, and such
was the zeal of the canvassers, that no less than 98 persons
had been concerned in bril jing them." ^
And how many more boroughs may there be equally
steeped in corruption which have escaped inquiry ? Let the
leaders in all such boroughs, if they care for the reputation
of their towns, bethink themselves that detection may
auotlier time fall on them. The above statement, in a work
which will live, casts discredit on English civilization.
Should not every effort be made to diminish such an evil ?
Every Act of Parliament proves inoperative. May not the
(^.vil increase ?
The Association might also make it one of its objects to
consider, prepare, and urge measures for restraining bribery
and expenditure, which require the interposition of the
legislature ; and among such measures which have been
from time to time suggested, are a comprehensive declara-
tion for members on taking their seats, so framed as to
prevent evasion by a man of honour, and the plan of
taking votes by voting-papers collected from the voters'
houses, which has been often strongly pressed by Mr.
Chadwick, and was recommended by Mr. Philip Eose in
his evidence before the Corrupt Practices Prevention Com-
mittee, which was the subject of a bill proposed by Lord
Shaftesbury in 1853, and was introduced into the Eeform
JUll proposed in 1859 by Lord Derby's Government.
But the great object is to rouse an enthusiasm against
electoral corruption, and to cover the country with it, and
to carry it into every constituency. We have this advantage
1 May's "Constitutional History of England," i. p. 364.
OF CORRUPTION AND EXPENDITURE. 103
to begin with, that the moral sense of the nation already
unmistakably condemns bribery. There is no need to
create a feeling ; we have to intensify it, and to make it
conquer. It is only among inferior people who profit by
cnnuption, and whom temptation and habit have degraded,
tliat there is any insensibility or want of conscience on
this subject. The classes from which candidates for seats
in Parliament come, are entirely opposed to bribery.
Suggestions have latterly often been made for the applica-
tion of degrading punishment to candidates convicted of
bribery, which could never have been put forward, if
bribery were not condemned by opinion. Such punish-
ments were recommended by several witnesses before the
Corrupt Practices Prevention Committee, among others by
the present Baron Pigott. This distinguished witness
recommended that the punishment should be incapacity
from holding any office of trust or public employment.
Let us make one great endeavour to attain the desired
end by a large plan of co-operation for prevention by
persuasion and agreement. I have thought that such an
effort might well be made, at this moment, under the
auspices of an Association, whose object is to utilize social
science and promote all social reform, which numbers
among its members leading men of all the parties that
divide the State, and the name of whose President ^ is
already conspicuously associated with this question.
^ Lord Brougham.
IV.
ELECTORAL CORRUPTION AND ITS REMEDIES.
"These corrupt practices I hold to be one of the most dangerous
symptoms of the times, tending more than anything else to sap the
foundations of social order, and to undermine the Constitution."— Vis-
count Palmerston, May 9, 1842.
"There are no defects iu the distribution of the franchise, however
unjust, which are so destructive of public virtue or of the credit of our
representative system, as these acts of bribery and rorru]>tion. " — TiOUD
John Kussell, February 11, 1853.
"So far from diminishmg, the evil is on the increase, and has perhaps
been practised more generally at the last than at any other previous
election." — Earl of Derby, May 29, 1866.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
One great fault of the unsatisfactory Bill of Parliamentary
Eeform of 1866, which broke up Lord Eussell's govern-
ment, was the absence of adequate or of any considerable
endeavour to deal with corrupt practices at elections. It
contained only one small proposal for that object, which
was unjust and preposterous, — the disfranchisement of
voters in dockyards on account of their subjection to
Government influences, the exercise of which is the voters'
misfortune, and the fault of governments. Election peti-
tions tried in the course of the session of 1866 led to the
issuing of Commissions to inquire into electoral corruption
in the four boroughs of Totnes, Eeigate, Great Yarmouth,
and Lancaster. The foul revelations of election iniquities
in these boroughs shocked and excited the public mind :
and when Lord Derby's government met Parliament in the
beginning of 1867, a new measure against election corrup-
tion was a necessity. The Government proposed a Eeform
of the Eepresentation Bill, and another Bill for the repres-
sion of Corrupt Practices at Elections. The first was passed
during that session. The second, considerably changed
and improved from the first proposal, became law in the
ensuing year, 1868.
108 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
The following essay was published before the meeting
of Parliament in 1867. The state of things which it de-
scribes is what existed before " The Representation of the
People Act" of 1867, and "The Parliamentary Elections
Act " of 1868.
In the course of the discussions in the House of the
latter measure, Mr. Mill described and strongly recom-
mended the scheme of reform propounded in the following
essay, and referred in complimentary terms to the author.^
Some changes have been made by the two Acts of 1867
and 1868, which affect several of the arguments and re-
commendations of this essay.
The Pepresentation of the People Act contained a clause
prohibiting electors employed for payment six months
before an election from voting, and making the voting a
misdemeanour. The same Act made it illegal, in boroughs,
to pay money on account of the conveyance of a voter to the
poll, either to a voter or to any other person, and subjected
the violator of this law to punishment. Prohibition in
both cases was recommended in the following essay. But
enough has not been done to enforce the prohibition in
either case. The only effectual mode of prevention is by
voiding the seat if voters paid for employment vote for
their paymaster, or if a can-ididate or agent gives money hn-
conveyance of voters. This is the deliberate opinion of nil
the three Judges who tried the election petitions which
immediately followed the general election of 1868, — Mr.
Justice Willes, Mr. Justice Blackburn, and Baron Martin,
— as given in evidence before the Parliamentary and
Municipal Elections Committee. All three think mere
penalties after prosecution inoperative : the fear of losing
1 Hansard, March 2G, 1868.
AXD ITS REMEDIES. 109
the seat is the only effectual deterrent. ]\Ir. Justice Willes,
speaking particularly of Section 11 of the Eepresentation
of the People Act, which makes the voting of A^oters em-
ployed for money by a candidate a misdemeanour, calls it
" nugatory and exceedingly lame," and adds, " It appeared
to me to be quite ins-ufiicient, because the voters will vote,
and it is a chance whether it turns out that they have been
]);nd ; and if it does turn up, then for the reason stated by
my Brother JNIartin, no one would take the trouble of in-
dicting them." Baron jNIartin expressed his desire that the
Judges should have power to void an election in case of
several proved breaches of the law by a candidate or his
agents, which the Act made only liable to fine and impri-
sonment on prosecution.
The rarliameutary Elections Act of 1808 introduced an
entirely new mode of trying election petitions. Under that
Act the petitions are tried by Judges of the Superior Courts,
who go to the respective county or borough to try them in
the scene of election. But while this plan is obviously a
great improvement on the old system of Parliamentary
Election Committees at Westminster, the new measure is
very defective, as leaving the discovery of bribery, almost
as exclusively as before, to the action of a defeated candi-
date or his friends, able and willing to incur all the expenses
of a petition and impelled to do so by the hope of obtaining
tlie seat, and also as comprising no new provisions for pre-
vention during the progress of the election of corrupt or
lavish expenditure. The scheme suggested in this essay
proposes that properly qualified l)arristers should be re-
turning officers and also judges of the elections, with powers
of supervision and control at the time and of summary
judgment between the polling and the return : reserving a
110 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION AND ITS REMEDIES.
power of appeal which, it is here proposed, should be to a
Committee of the House of Commons, aided by a legal
assessor. When this proposal was made, it was not ex-
pected that the House of Commons would consent to part
with its power over elections. It did so in the Act of 1868,
and transferred its jurisdiction to Judges of the Superior
Courts. It may now be easier to induce the House of
Commons to substitute duly qualified barristers for the
Judges for first trials, and give an aj^peal on points of law
to one of the Superior Courts, or to a special tribunal
composed of Judges of the three Courts.
With this modification, which woukl be a decided im-
provement, I again strongly urge the adoption, in its main
features, of the plan described in this essay, which in 1868
was unsuccessfully pressed by Mr. John Mill upon Mr.
Disraeli's government.
It is one of the advantages which have resulted from tlie
trial of election petitions by judges, that the law of elec-
tion agency, the former unsatisfactory state of which is
spoken of in the following essay, has been clearly and
satisfactorily settled by concordant judgments.
ELECTOEAL COERUPTION, etc
A PLAN was put forward in 1864, under the auspices of
the Association for the Promotion of Social Science, which
included an endeavour to organize in all constituencies
committees composed of leading men of different politics
for restraint of corruption and expenditure, and to promote
agreements between opposing candidates and leaders of
parties in constituencies to abstain from and prevent
bribery. Some weighty words of Sir Eobert Peel, de-
livered as long back as 1842, were used in support of this
proposal. " In every borough there are certain individuals
who take a lead in all political matters, and altogether
influence the electors in their respective places. Xow I
believe that if these influential persons of both parties in
boroughs set their faces against bribery, and came to an
understanding to discourage all unnecessary expenses, they
w'ould do a great deal more towards the suppression of the
evils complained of than all the acts of the legislature." ^
It was the hope of those who attempted the movement of
1864 to establish a central Association, strong with the
^ Hansard, June 6, 1842.
]l-2 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
auilioriiy of distinguished names, and sufficiently supplied
with the pecuniary means indispensable for extensive and
effectual action, through whicli, a general strong feeling or
enthusiasm being roused and fashion enlisted on the side
of purity of election, the requisite impulse might be given
in the several constituencies. Sir Robert Peel, in the
speech already referred to, had looked to "the leading men
of the country" to give the critical impulse. " I do hope,"
he added, " that the leading men of the country will set
their faces so eflectiially against bribery that, after the next
general election, come when it may, there shall be little or
no cause to complain on the score of bribery." These
words, as has been said, were spoken in 1842. There have
since been five general elections, and all five have been dis-
graced by extensive and scandalous corruption. In April
of this year the disclosures of some of the Election Com-
mittees, tame enough in comparison with the later revela-
tions of the Commissions of the autumn — which again,
however, are not more striking and revolting than those of
previous Commissions — led a writer in the Times to enun-
ciate very similar ideas, — that " nothing but a thorough
awakening of the national conscience on this subject will
deter men of no more than average scruples from doing as
others have done," and that bribery will be cured only
" when high-minded and honourable men cannot be found
to become candidates for seats which can only be attained
l.ty bribery, and v:licn the more rcs'fcctaMc electors league
themselves iogctltcr, vjitliout distinction of 2)arty, to haffle and
crush it." ^ But in boroughs like those which Commissions
1 Times, April 24 and 26, 1866.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 113
liave lately been investigating (and it is well known that
there are many others just as bad which have escaped in-
quiry), it is obviously a hopeless task for any few righteous
men that may exist within these political Sodoms and
Gomorrahs to purify dense masses of corruption without
external aid ; a strong and general movement from without
is needed to fortify, if not to initiate, any reforming efforts
within.
There appeared in the Times of September 7 an interest-
ing letter signed M.P. ; and the writer describincf himself
as having sat, since the passing of the Eeform Act, for a
borough in the West of England, with a population of
about thirty thousand, and a constituency of from twelve
to thirteen hundred, it is not difficult to identify him as a-
Liberal member of the House of Commons of high cha-
racter and varied attainments.^ The writer of this letter
proclaims the purity of his own borough, and puts it for-
ward as an example of the efficacy of a high moral tone
among the leading inhabitants. " I do not hesitate to affirm
that the chief, if not the only, cause of the total absence of
corruption in this particular borough has been the deter-
mination of the leading gentlemen of all parties within it,
indeed I may say of the entire mass of inhabitants, to pre-
serve a high tone of public morality, to set their faces
against any attempt to stain the character of the constitu-
ency, to ostracize any voter who should try to make private
profit of the public trust confided to him." Now this is
all very well in the borough of Stroud, where, as is said by
the writer, the great bulk of the constituency has always
^ Mr. G. Poulctt Scrope, since dead.
I
114 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
been pure, but who is to begin the work of purification
with hope of success, unaided, in Totnes or Eeigate, Great
Yarmouth or Lancaster ? With a strong national excite-
ment caused by a central agitation, with "a thorough
awakening of the national conscience," such as these Com-
missions which have been sitting might well produce, or
wliich might have been produced by equally shocking dis-
closures of previous years ; with well-directed systematic
efforts through the constituencies carried on as efforts are
now being carried on in every borough to effect a lowering
of the suffrage, there might be hope of turning generally to
profitable account the following excellent advice of M.P.
in his letter to the Times : — " Above all, let the educated
and respectable dwellers in parliamentary boroughs rouse
themselves to the conviction that it is their fault, and theirs
alone, if the reputation of the jilace they inhabit becomes
infamous through these foul and criminal practices, and
the very foundation of all morality, private as well as
public, is destroyed Ijy their cynical encouragement or
indifference to them."
The scheme of 1864 for an organization for a general
crusade against corruption in constituencies was soon aban-
doned, and the objections and difiiculties under which it
succumbed may be usefully reviewed, as they are the objec-
tions and obstacles which confront all proposals of remedy.
It was objected to the effort of 18G4 that the extinction
of bribery was an Utopian dream, and that to extinguish it
was simply impossible. This is a very old and common,
and yet a very obvious, fallacy. Perfect success is seldom
obtainable in any enterprise, and all that was proposed or
AND ITS REMEDIES. 115
hoped for was greatly or considerably to diminish corru}>-
tion. Sir Eobert Peel, in that speech which has been
already cited, also said, " I think that good example and
improved habits will more effectually lead to the diminu-
tion of bribery — its extinction I scarcely hope for — than any
legislative enactment whatever." It is no answer to those
who propose to diminish, to say that they cannot destroy.
The same objection has been made to the Ballot, but its
reasonable advocates have never pretended for it more than
that it would greatly diminish illegitimate influences. tSo
of a proposal made by Sir John Pakington in 1849, for a
declaration to be made by a candidate, it is not difficult tu
make out that it would not always be successful, but it
might still do a great deal of good. " Half a loaf is better
than no bread." This objection is so obviously incon-
clusive that, while many doubtless have advanced it
unthinkingly, many must use it as a pretext.
In an organization for influencing the public mind on
this question, the co-operation of a considerable number of
members of the House of Commons is of prime importance
— of members of eminence to give authority, and of mem-
bers generally to facilitate the good work in their respective
constituencies. This is a question in the agitation of which
I'eers would feel scruples as to taking a prominent part.
But, while a few members of the House of Commons of
both political parties joined the movement, the generality
kept aloof. The truth is that, with a general j)revalence of
corrupt practices of one sort or another in constituencies,
there are few members who might not foresee some diffi-
culty with influential supporters through their joining such
I 2
llfi ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
a movement, or might not shrink from incurring the strict
and solemn obligation to prevent all corrnption in connexion
with their own elections, which would arise out of member-
ship of an anti-corruption association. It need not he said
that many members sit in the House of Commons through
the operation of corrupt practices, either studiously " know-
ing nothing," but yet strongly suspecting and perhaps even
virtually knowing, or really not suspecting or dreaming of
anything wrong. Even in the last class of cases, knowiug
supporters would be unwilling to see their members com-
mitted to a general crusade against corruption. Then
again, there are several modes of corruption besides gross
money-bribery, and local managers of elections, who may
conscientiously say that there is no " bribery " in the
limited sense of the word, may yet find profuse expenditure
necessary to secure a return, or they may have an interest
of their own in keeping up this profuse expenditure ; and
members who wish to keep their seats cannot always inter-
fere with, or ahbrd to risk to offend, their leading committee-
men. Candidates are by no means always free agents ; the
established " manager " for the party in the borough, or the
regular leaders of the committee, are often despotic, and
will manage the election their own way, and kick at a
candidate's interference. To gain or to keep a seat in Par-
liament is a matter of strong desire ; but the desire of local
party-chiefs to gain the election is also strong, and is with
them an independent motive of action. Now all this is
said to show that members, who might in simplicity be
expected generally to guide their constituents, may often
be oppressed by them ; and the same local exigencies which
AND ITS REMEDIES. 117
baffle the free action of members would be impediments for
any inhabitants, themselves standing apart from and above
impurity, who would desire to ])urify their boroughs. The
same circumstances w^ll contribute to explain the slack-
ness of zeal on this subject in Parliament, but for which
assuredly by this time the evil so long known would have
been " stamped out. " Then again, where, as is often the case,
both sides are tarred in a borough, there is a disposition to
combine to keep things quiet, and not to employ the re-
medies w^hich the Legislature has provided, such as criminal
prosecutions and actions for penalties and petitions, to say
nothing at present of other difficulties in the way of these
remedies. For many reasons, then, IMembers of the House
of Commons are, as a rule, not disposed to rush forward on
this question. Let the system be changed ; well and good,
all will rejoice ; but while the system is unaltered, each is
more or less unwilling to take any step which may risk the
loss of his own seat, highly prized, and attained perhaps
after much waiting and by much labour and expense. And
is the value set on a seat in the House of Commons unna-
tural and inexcusable ? Is it strange that in order to gain
or keep a seat men of fair character will reconcile it to
their consciences not to see many things which they need
not see, and not to make themselves suffer by being more
scrupulous than most others ? What is a seat in the House
of Commons ? It is not only a possible gateway for some to
society or to lucrative office ; that is the least part of the
temptation ; it is a necessary condition of political life and
political usefulness and political power for all Englishmen
who are not Peers. Without a seat in Parliament no man.
118 SECTORAL CORRUPTION
however rich or high-born or able, can be a member of any
Government, or aspire to the political offices which spur
the ambition of English statesmen. The loss of a seat may,
even with men of high reputation and great connexions,
make a long break in a political career. When Lord Pal-
merston lost his seat for Hampshire in 1834, it was not
without some difficulty, though he was Foreign Secretary,
that he found, after a time, a convenient refuge at Tiverton.
When Mr. Gladstone lost his seat for Newark in 1845, he
remained for some time out of Parliament. These are men
of the highest mark. What must it be for the multitude ?
Apart from political office, participation in parliamentary
life and its opportunities of usefulness and fame is a laud-
able or noble ambition. We may therefore look with some
indulgence on cases of submission to existing circumstances
and to an apparently unshakeable enthronement of evil.
Mr. George Denman, in his late Address at the Man-
chester meeting of the Association for the Promotion of
Social Science, signalized another noAV prevalent form of
paltering with the conscience on this matter. Urging the
necessity of a higher tone in high quarters, he observed
that " members of the House of Commons must be more
unanimous in the feeling that to pay thousands of pounds
down without inquiry, in order to secure a seat which their
own agent will return as a seat which costs him only as
many hundreds, is an act unworthy of a gentleman." This
is strong language and just. Yet there is a singularly ac-
commodating power in men's consciences, under the influ-
ences of strong interest and passionate desire, contagion of
general laxity, and encouragement given by a general dis-
AND ITS REMEDIES. Hi)
position, amiable aud not quite unreasonable, to condone in
individuals what, in the abstract, none refuse to reprobate.
This evil of electoral corruption has taken hold of the
nation like a nightmare ; the victims desire to get rid of
it, but they are bound down and cannot move. A strong
excitement or enthusiasm, such a whirlwind as " fitliest
scatters pestdence," is needed to clear the air and enable a
sick multitude to breathe freely. As the Tines said, we must
have "a thorough awakening of the national conscience
to deter men of no more than average scruples from doing
as others have done," and " high-minded and honourable
men from becoming candidates for seats which can only
be attained by bribery."
An opinion prevails that there is a disposition among
what are called the governing classes to keep up the ex-
pensiveness of elections as a virtual property qualification ;
and large expenditure and corruption are really insepar-
able. This opinion is probably much exaggerated, and
reluctance to deal with this subject may be partly other-
wise accounted for. It is difficult to believe that any one,
if free to choose, would not prefer a cheap to a dear elec-
tion. If elections were cheaply conducted, and bribery
banished, the chances of election in boroughs for country
gentlemen, members of old families, men creditably known
in their neighbourhoods, and men also of personal merit,
though not locally connected, could not but be increased.
The losers by the change would be the new men of wealth,
the class of borough-seekers from a distance, who have
nothing but money to recommend them, and who outbid
all men with moderate fortune^ and swamp all local claims
120 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
with long purses and large patronage in boroughs open to
corruption. There is nothing new under the sun, and in
the first beginnings of corruption of constituencies, when,
two centuries ago, the House of Commons sought to legis-
late against the new evil, we find a member saying that
" these charges arise, commonly, from competitors that live
in another country," and that the residents "must be
undone by out-doing him that comes from another country
with indirect intentions;" and there was then a general
desire to exclude strangers by requiring that all candidates
for boroughs as well as counties should have an estate in
the respective county.^
Many persons say that they feel a difficulty about this
question, thinking it unjust to denounce and punish the
poor man who takes ten or twenty pounds for his vote,
and to eave untouched the attorney who requires his fees,
or the gentry, small and great, who profit by getting
places. Many also use this seemingly plausible argument
as a pretext for inaction which they find convenient. This
objection involves a confusion between two evils which
are distinct, and in a great measure independent of each
other. If attorneys desert their politics for a retaining
fee, or if voters are bribed to vote by gift or promise of
places, this is pure bribery ; and no one could distinguish
between such cases and cases of bribery with money ; any
measures against bribery at elections must apply to all
these cases. But the attorney rarely changes his politics
for the occasion. If the candidate of his own colour re-
1 Debates on regulating of Elections, Jan. 22, 1674 ; Nov. 12, 1675. —
Pari. Hist. iv. G5S, 783.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 121
tains liini, he works and votes for him ; if not, he does not
act for the other side. It need not be said that there are
very many solicitors who are far above this sordid mode
of proceeding, as there are doubtless some who are more
sordid, and are ready to go whichever way they are re-
tained; IN"ow it is very desirable to get rid of the practice,
utterly indefensible and degrading to solicitors, of retaining
them as election agents and procurers of votes ; but the
question of bribery may be separately dealt with. So,
again, there is a difference between bribing with patronage
and finding places for steady supporters. The former
comes within the scope of our subject : the latter, so far
as Government patronage is concerned, is part of a separate
important subject, — our system of party and patronage.
Some of the evils of this system have been well described
by Lord Grey, who calls it a system of corruption, but
yet seems to regard it as inseparable from Parliamentary
Government.^ Whether this be so or not, there is a pal-
pable difference between bribery of voters and distribution
of favours, from a dukedom or garter, or from a colonial
government to a nomination for a clerkship or tidewaiter-
ship, among political friends ; and \ve may endeavour
to get rid of the scandalous evil of wholesale corruption
in borough elections, without attacking the question of
government by party.
The Government machinery of course may be put in
motion for bribery, as it has been done systematically
among voters in dockyards ; and here the obvious remedy
^ "Parliamentary Government," by Earl Grey : Chapter on Evils and
Dangers of Parliamentary Governmcui.
122 -ELECT on AL CORRUPTION
is not the strangely nnjust proposal of the Bill of last
session to disfranchise a whole class peculiarly open to
demoralization by the Government, but to ensure (which
should be easy) action of the Eirst Lord of the Admiralty,
who is a member of the Cabinet, to purify dockyard
administration from all political influences. If there is
corruption among Government-dockyard voters, it is the
Government which corruj)ts ; the straight and easy way is
to stop the evil at its source, which is the Government
itself; and the threatened dockyard victims of Treasury
and Admiralty jobbery might fairly have said to Lord
Piussell, " Physician, heal thyself" It is also, of course,
likely that favours granted by Government to parliamentary
supporters for their constituents may be used for bribery ;
and it may be more difficult sometimes to detect or defeat
bribery of this sort than the vulgar money bribery: but
this only brings us back to what has been said before, that
we may do a great deal, though unable to do everything,
and because we cannot do everything is no reason for doing
nothing. There is a Government machinery for superin-
tendence of elections, arising out of our system of party
government, which doubtless fosters and strengthens the
corruption of elections ; tlie political Secretary of the
Treasury has his election agent, who again has his myr-
midons in London and throughout the country: and the
Opposition " whip " has a corresponding organization. As
long as there are two political parties, some organization
on both sides may be a necessity. But considering that
the heads of the two organizations are the actual and the
future (or late) Prime Minister, the chief agents the actual
AND ITS REMEDIES. 123
and future (or late) Secretary of the Treasury, and the
chief assistants London solicitors of high standing, it
should be easy for the leader of either party to secure
scrupulous adherence to what is right, and scrupulous
abstinence from all connivance at impurity and all con-
nexion with persons of doubtful or disreputable character.
Yet we have lately seen the " private and confidential "
correspondence produced at Totnes between the head
electioneering agent of Lord Derby's party, Mr. Spofforth,
and " my dear Sir," " Eobert Harris, Esq.," the Tory briber
of Totnes, containing these passages : — " Failing Mr. Dent,
I will endeavour to procure you a commercial man of the
spirit you require." — " The only difficulty is finding a man
with plenty of money to carry the seat." Mr. Spofforth,
when afterwards called before the Commissioners, said that
he had not known, at the time of his correspondence with
" Eobert Harris, Esq.," what manner of man Eobert Harris
was. But Mr. Spofforth must have known what was
meant by what he himself wrote of " a man Avith plenty
of money to carry the seat," and of the " spirit " required
for Totnes. The heads of both parties should, as they
easily could, stop all this semi-official subornation of
corruption.
The magnitude of the scandal of our electoral corruption
has been so broadly asserted by leading statesmen during
so long a period, — indeed, ever since the passing of the
Eeform Act, — that it may well be matter of wonderment
that we are where we are in this matter in the year 1866.
Not to go back further than 1842 for authoritative decla-
rations of widespread and gross electoral corruption, Mr.
124 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
Thomas Duncombe, early in that year, inquired of Sir
Robert Peel, whom the general election of 1841 had
brought back to power at the head of the Conservative
party, if the Government intended to introduce any
measure for putting an end to "that wholesale system
of bribery to which he believed the vast majority of
the members of that House w^ere at present indebted for
their seats." ^ Later in the session Mr. Roebuck's famous
Committee to investigate a number of cases of corrupt
elections, which had led to compromises between peti-
tioners and sitting members, produced a startling sensa-
tion ; and, in the discussions which followed, Lord Palmer-
ston and Lord Derby (then Lord Stanley, and in the House
of Commons) both spoke out. Lord Palmerston used
these words : —
" I speak it with shame and grief, but I verily believe
that the extent to which bribery was carried at the last
election has exceeded anything that has yet been stated
within these walls. These corrupt practices I hold to be
one of the most dangerous symptoms of the times, tending
more than anything else to sap the foundations of social
order, and to undermine the Constitution ; and I hold, also,
that it is the bounden duty of Parliament to provide an
immediate remedy for the evil."
And on the same day on which these words were
uttered by Lord Palmerston, Lord Derby said : " No man
deplores more deeply, or is prepared to censure more
strongly, than I, the bribery and corruption in large towns
and in small towns. There is no member of this House
1 Hansard, February 4, 1842.
AND ITS RFJIEDIES. 125
who will be prepared to go further in applying, if we can
apply, an effectual remedy."^ But after the lapse of four-
and-twenty years Parliament has not provided the remedy
for the evil which Lord Palmerston, in 1842, declared to
be its bounden duty to provide immediately; and Lord
Derby has now the opportunity of making an earnest effort
in the coming session, and thus gaining an advantage,
which would be to his honour, over his predecessor, who
omitted the subject in last year's Eeform Bill. After the
general election of 1847, Sir John Pakington questioned
Lord John Eussell, as ]\Ir. Buncombe five years before had
questioned Sir Eobert Peel, asking if the Government in-
tended to propose any measure " in consequence of the
extent to which bribery and corruption were imputed to
have prevailed at the last general election." ^ Lord John
Eussell replied, at the moment, that the Government had
uo such intention. But the usual disclosures of the Com-
mittees arising out of a general election produced the
periodical fever against corru]3tion, which has so often
appeared and passed away ; and, during the session of
1848, public opinion influenced Lord John Eussell to make
an attempt at legislation. Sir Eobert Peel, holding then
the position of an impartial and dignified arbiter, had
made a further strong appeal to the Government, saying,
" I retain the opinion that it was the duty of the noble
lord (Lord John Eussell) to make some proposition to the
House, when there was such a multitude of instances of
gross corruption brought under our notice, with a view of
^ Hansard, May 9, 1842.
2 Ibid., November 25,. 18i7.
126 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
instituting some new inquiry."^ This was on the occasion
of a motion for issuins; a new writ for the borousjh of
Derby, in which an election committee had reported ex-
tensive corruption ; and in the same debate Mr. Cobden
liad said, " From an investigation I have made, I am sure
that the majority of members of boroughs sent from Eng-
land to this House are returned either by bribery, or
corruption, or patronage. That is my deliberate opinion,
after having taken pains to look into it." Lord Brougham
said, August 21, 1848, that "it was absolutely necessary,
for the honour of Parliament as well as for the morality
of the country, that a stop should be put to the practices
which commonly j^revailed all over it at elections, and
never to such an extent as at the last." But bad as was,
in Lord Brougham's estimation, the general election of
1847, he afterwards pronounced the next, of 1852, to be
worse ; saying (February 25, 1853) that " there had hardly
ever been a general election in tliis country at which more
bribery and corruption had prevailed than at the last ; he
feared he might go further and say, so much had prevailed
on no former occasion." The general election of 1852 was
under Lord Derby's auspices, and that of 1847 had been
under Lord John Eussell's. On the eve of the general
election of 1852, Lord Derby had again spoken out as to
the evil, — " the extended, and he feared he must add, the
extending system of bribery at elections."- On the 11th
of February, 1853, Lord John Eussell, then acting as
leader of the House of Commons in Lord Aberdeen's
Government, spoke as follows : " There are no means of
1 llausarJ, June 23, ISiS. • Ibid., March 22, 1S52.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 127
Parliamentary representation, however partial and limited,
no defects in the distribution of the franchise, however
unjust, which are so destructive of public virtue or of the
credit of our representativ^e system, as these acts of bribery
and corruption."
It is needless to carry on the history of our electoral
corruption from the general election of 1852 through those
of 1857 and 1859, to the last of 18G5. The strong declara-
tions of former years of Sir Eobert Peel, Lord Palmerston,
Lord Derby, Sir John Pakington and others, still apply.
Mr. Baxter, the member for Montrose, made a statement
during the last session, the truth of wliich will be univer-
sally admitted :
" It was not into the existence of the evil that they
needed to inquire, but into the remedy. He was sure that
lionourable gentlemen would bear him out when he said
that there was no part of our constitutional system of
which we ought to be so tlioroughly ashamed, and which
intelligent foreigners, whether from the Continent or from
the other side of the Atlantic, were so apt to put their
finger npon, as the continued existence of constituencies
which, as they all knew right well, could be bought and
sold in the market." ^
Mr. Vivian, member for Glamorganshire, who was Chair-
man of the Eeigate and Gal way Election Committees, said,
May 29 of last session,^ " that he believed it was generally
admitted that probably at no previous time had bribery
existed to a larger extent than it had during the late elec-
tion." And on the same night Lord Derby said in the
1 Hansard, May 1, ISG'J. 2 iggg^
128 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
House of Lords, that lie agreed with Lord Grey in thinking
that "so far from diminishing, the evil was on the increase,
and had perhaps been practised more generally at the last
than at any other previous election."
Now what has been done during the last four-and-
twenty years for abating the evil always so fully recog-
nized? The efforts made for this purpose when, after
general elections, each renewal of public scandal has pro-
duced a passing fever-fit, have all been signal failures :
and the failure of all these efforts should now teach
wisdom.
First, there was Lord John Eussell's measure of 1842,
passed in the excitement caused by Mr. Eoebuck's expo-
sure of the " compromises " of that year, and specially
designed to provide means of investigation of bribery in
boroughs, if petitions in the interest of candidates were
not presented, or were, after presentation, withdrawn. It
contained two principal provisions with this design : 1, K
a petition charging bribery were withdrawn, after nomina-
tion of an Election Committee, or if any charges of bribery
contained in a petition, or asserted in recrimination, were
not proceeded with before a Committee, the Committee
was empowered to inquire into the causes of abandon-
ment, and to report to the House recommending further
inquiry ; and if such recommendation w^ere made, the
Speaker was to nominate an agent to prosecute the inves-
tigation, and the Committee was to reassemble within a
fortnight to inquire and report, having all the powers of
an Election Committee, but such further inquiry was not
in any way to affect the seats. 2. A petition alleging
AND ITS REMEDIES. 129
general or extensive bribery, but not to affect tlie seats,
presented, with certain conditions of time, after the period
prescribed for presentation of election petitions, or a
similar petition presented within twenty-one days after
the withdrawal of an election petition which had charged
bribery, was to be treated and proceeded with as an
ordinary election petition, the costs of the petitioners to
be borne by the public if the Committee should report
that there was reasonable and probable ground for the
allegations ; the petitioners, however, being required to
enter into recognizances for the sum of 500/. for the event
of their being made liable for costs. The results of this
piece of legislation have been that, during the four-and-
twenty years which have since elapsed, there have been
only two cases of further inquiry founded on special
reports of Election Committees (the cases of Plymouth
and Eyde in 1853), neither of which two inquiries had
any practical consequence, and there has not been one
single case of a petition for inquiry into bribery in the
absence of election petitions. The Act, therefore, has
been useless, and it is not difficult to say why. Com-
mittees were empowered, but not enjoined, to investigate
the causes of withdrawal or abandonment of bribery
charges. The Act may have stood in the way of com-
promises to withdraw petitions after the nomination of
an Election Committee ; but it could in no way affect
compromises to prevent presentation of petitions, or to
effect their withdrawal Icfore nomination of a Committee ;
and the number of timely withdrawals of petitions in pairs
during the last session was considerable. Still there have
E
130 SECTORAL CORRUPTION
been many cases where an Election Committee might have
exercised the power given by the Act; but Committees
have not brought themselves to consider it a part of their
duty to go beyond what the lawyers of the two sides put
Ijefore them, and what affects the seat ; they are none of
them anxious to prolong their labours by an inquiry which
tlie Act leaves at their option ; the office thus left to their
<iption is an invidious one, of thankless labour ; and the
House has never shown any disposition to press Com-
mittees to exercise the further powers given to them. As
to the petitions for investigation of bribery, empowered by
the Act of 1842, inasmuch as they were not to affect the
seat, who could be expected to incur the risk of heavy
costs, and all the labour and odium of such an enterprise,
with nothing to gain, and only to expose the depravity of
a constituency for the public good ? Who can wonder
that not one such petition has ever been presented ?
The second measure was that of 1852, for appointment
of Commissions on a joint Address from both Houses
stating that a Committee of the House of Commons had
reported that corrupt practices had extensively prevailed,
or that there was reason to believe that they had ex-
tensively prevailed, in a constituency. The Act gave very
full and stringent powers to the Commissions that should
be so appointed, and authority to give certificates of in-
demnity to truthful witnesses; and, on the other hand,
A\ itnesses were not to be excused from answering questions
on account of privilege or self-crimination. In pursuance
of this Act, Commissions were issued in 1853 for the
boroughs of Barnstaple, Cambridge, Canterbury, Hull,
AND ITS REMEDIES. 131
Maldon, and Tynemouth. A great sensation was created
by the evidence which these Commissions extracted, as a
great sensation has been lately created by the evidence as
to Great Yarmouth, Eeigate, Totnes, and Lancaster : but no
good has ever folloAved beyond the temporary sensation.
Bills introduced into Parliament in 1854 to disfranchise
the electors whom the Commissions had reported guilty
of bribery were resisted on the ground that the Com-
missioners' certificates of indemnity, which, by the words of
the Act, were to free witnesses telling the truth from " all
penal actions, forfeitures, punishments, disabilities, and
incapacities, and all criminal prosecutions," ought to pro-
tect them against disfranchisement, and all the parties
reported guilty had confessed and received certificates.
Some similar Commissions were issued later ; for Galway
in 1857, Gloucester and Wakefield in 1859, and Berwick
in 1860 ; but the same difficulty always stood in the way
of disfranchisement of the guilty. It would seem that
there was no mode of bringing home guilt to individuals
to the satisfaction of Commissions except by their own
confessions. The guilty parties, then, having made their
confessions, got off scot-free, and the Legislature was not
able even to disfranchise or purify the constituencies. All
the expense of these Commissions, which was considerable,
went for nothing. At last an Act passed in 1863 (26 and
27 Vict., c. 29) repealed the clauses of the Act of 1852
concerning the certificates of indemnity, and provided
anew that certificates given by Commissioners should be a
protection only against criminal proceedings or actions for
penalties. The Legislature, therefore, need no longer be
K 2
132 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
restrained by such certificates from passing Acts of dis-
franchisement. The Chairmen of the Bridgewater and Gal-
way Committees of last session seem, then, to have acted
under an erroneous impression when they desisted from
moving Addresses for Commissions to inquire into the
corruption of those boroughs, because no good could result.
There would have been two more cases to strengthen the
impression produced by the revelations of Great Yarmouth,
Reigate, Totnes, and Lancaster ; and the words " all penal
actions, forfeitures, ^punishments, disabilities, and incapa-
cities, and all criminal prosecutions," having been repealed
and replaced by the words "information, indictment, or
action," there seems no question but that extensive dis-
franchisement might follow.
It is to be observed, however, that no good at all can be
effected under this Act, — that there can be no Commis-
sion, — unless there has been a petition, and it has been
persevered with, and an Election Committee has reported
reason to believe that there had been extensive corruption ;
many difficulties, therefore, have to be got over, much
risk run, and much money spent, before the Commission
can be arrived at : in only a few cases can the Act take
effect, and its operation is, at best, that of a lottery. Its
terrors, which are at most exposure, little cared for by
most bribers and bribed, and possible disfranchisement,
are greatly diminished by the many chances of escape
from its operation. It is clear from the published pro-
ceedings of the late Commissions that certificates of in-
demnity against legal proceedings have been almost
universally given.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 133
The two measures of 1842 and 1852, which have been
described, were confined to providing means for the dis-
covery of corruption. The objects of a third principal
measure, the " Corrupt Practices Prevention Act" of 1854,
were to prevent and punish. The chief provisions of this
Act were : — 1. To create a public ofiicer, called the Elec-
tion Auditor, to whom all accounts were to be sent in, and
through whom all expenses were to be paid by candidates
or their agents, and who was to publish in due time the
candidates' expenses ; candidates being required also to
notify to the election auditor their agents for election
expenses ; such agents to make solemn declarations of
" not knowingly making, authorizing, or sanctioning " pay-
ments except through the Election Auditor ; the Election
Auditor also having to make a solemn declaration that he
would perform his duties truly and faithfully ; and various
penalties being assigned to candidates for infraction of
these regulations, while any wilful act of the Election
Auditor contrary to his solemn declaration was made a
misdemeanour. 2. To define anew and with precision, and
more comprehensively, the offences of bribery, treating,
and undue influence ; making all acts of bribery and
undue influence, as defined in the Act, misdemeanours,
and also prescribing penalties to be recovered by action ;
making acts of treating similarly liable to penalties ; and
further providing that any voter who had been convicted
of bribery or undue influence, or against whom judgment
had been obtained for any penalty for bribery, treating, or
undue influence, should be disqualified to remain on the
register of voters, and that the Eevising Barrister should
134 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
expunge liis name from the list, or disallow liis claim, as
the case might be, and insert his name in a separate list, to
be called " The list of persons disqualified for bribery,
treating, or undue influence," and to be appended to the
register of voters. Let the result of the provisions under
the second head be first stated. There is not one single
instance of a Eevising Barrister's being called upon, since
this Act passed in 1854, to expunge or refuse to insert the
name of a voter branded by a coui't of law as guilty of
bribery, treating, or undue influence ; not one single in-
stance of such a list of disqualified voters appended to a
register. There have been no cases of prosecutions or
actions, or if any, next to none ; the difiiculties of proof,
the chances of being mulcted in costs, the necessary ex-
penses, the necessity of recognizances, the want of any
strong interest, and the invidiousness of the office, have
repelled prosecutors. So far, then, as regards these pro-
visions for punishment, the Act has been a failure. And
the failure of the provisions for preventing illicit ex-
penditure through Election Auditors and Election Agents
has been as complete. The intended checks were easily,
extensively, and grossly evaded. The authorized Election
Agents often knew of and assisted to manage these
evasions. "Cooked" accounts were sent in to the Election
Auditor, who accepted them without inquiry, sometimes, it
is even said, took part in the deceit. Other agents than
those notified to the Election Auditor made the illegal
expenditure for corruption. Much astonishing evidence
w^s given on this point before the Committee of the
House of Commons which inquired in 1860, with Mr,
AXD ITS REMEDIES. 135
Bouverie as Chairman, into the operations of the Corrupt
Practices Prevention Act.
In consequence of this evidence, and much more to tlie
same effect, the Election Auditor was dispensed with by
the Act of 18G3 (2 Vict. c. 29), the second Act framed to
amend the Act of 1854. But this amendment has not
mended the matter. Agents are still to be nominated by
candidates, and the Eeturning Officer, who under the Act
of 1854 appointed the Election Auditor, has now simply
taken the place of the Auditor, without any new powers.
The Election Agents now send in the accounts to the
Returning Officer, who publishes them. The agents can
and do continue their evasions and deceits as before, and,
wherever there is corruption, the published returns are as
illusory as ever. Violation of the provisions of the new
Act by agents or candidates has been made a misde-
meanour ; but increased severity of threatened punishment
is not increased efficacy, and when lesser penalties never
come into operation, it is folly to try increased severity.
The Commissions which have lately sat have established
in each case the falsity of the returns of expenditure
published by the Eeturning Officers. The House of Com-
mons goes through the form, after every general election,
of printing, at some expense to the public, these returns
of election expenses without any inquiry into their truth-
fulness. Much evidence was given by witnesses worthy of
attention and respect before the Corrupt Practices Preven-
tion Committee of 1860, as to the desirability of improving
the Election Auditor's office, securing a better class of
officers, and giving them some powers of control over
136 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
accounts and for purity of election. If the Act of 1863
had done something of that sort, it would have done some
good. As it is, all the evidence given to the Committee of
1860, altered only by omission of the words " Election
Auditor," is apphcable to the present state of things, and
the machinery of Election Agents and published accounts
continues in corrupt constituencies to be not merely an
useless, but a really mischievous farce ; for it really serves
there as a machinery of screens and of aids to deception :
and the appointed Election Agent acts like a lightning-
conductor, but for mischief instead of good, by drawing off
observation and responsibility from others and helping
censure and the dangers of the law to pass away inno-
cuously for corruption.
This history of the legislation of the last quarter of a
century against electoral corruption is, then, indeed a
" beggarly account of empty boxes." It is clear that the
widely prevailing electoral corruption has had, and has,
little or nothing to fear from the checks and pains and
penalties of the Corrupt Practices Prevention Acts ; that
there is no chance at all of exposure of corruption except
through Election Committees ; and that the only real pre-
ventive force is the fear of a petition which aftects the
seat. The fear of being unseated by such a petition tends
to prevent bribery ; the desire to wrest a seat from the
member returned may lead to exposure of bribery through
a petition, which may possibly end in a Commission of
Inquiry, The only available motive at present for action
against bribery is the desire of a defeated candidate, or
his friends, to gain a seat, or at least oust the sitting
AND ITS REMEDIES. 137
member. To this motive of self-interest in individuals the
Legislature practically trusts : and how great are the diffi-
culties and obstructions placed in the way of petitioners !
The enormous expense of election petitions is matter of
notoriety. Then, besides expense, there is great dis-
couragement arising from increased difficulties as to evi-
dence through delay and distance, from uncertainties of
election law and conflicting decisions of Committees, and
from distrust of the tribunal. These combined causes of
discouragement deter many from presenting petitions, and
many others from prosecuting them when presented ; and
the hope of escaping a petition, which is beset with so
much difficulty, counteracts the deterring effect of this
single remedy in practice.
A declaratory Act might and should have been passed
long ago, settling questions which are always in dispute,
and on which Election Committees have made conflicting
decisions. Lord Derby, as long ago as 1837, when he was
Lord Stanley and in the House of Commons, forcibly
directed attention to this matter, and suggested the ap-
pointment of a Committee to examine conflicting decisions
and prepare a declaratory Act.^ In 1849 Sir Eoundell
Palmer strongly urged a similar recommendation ; he said,
in Committee on Sir J. Pakington's Bill for preventing
Bribery of 1849, that " while they were every session
endeavouring by a sort of rambling legislation to prevent
bribery and corruption, they were wholly neglecting one
important course of proceeding, that of settling by law
tliose points in regard to bribery and treating which were
1 Hansard, November 21, 1837.
138 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
constantly coming before them."^ The questions in doubt
are not very numerous. One of these questions, — what is
an "express decision" of a Eevising Barrister which an
Election Committee may review under the authority of
the 98th section of the 6 Vict., c. 18, — would best be got
rid of by repealing the provision, giving the Eevising
Barrister at the same time proper powers for enforcing
attendance of witnesses and production of documents,
and making the register, as settled by him, final, except
for the appeal on points of law, as now provided, to the
Court of Common Pleas, and except as regards disabilities
by statute which may arise after the revision.
Of the fitness of the tribunal, much improved as it has
been by the series of Acts passed from 1839 to 1848, some
judgment may be formed by one only of many samples
of evidence, given to the Committee of 1860, concerning
Election Committees as now constituted. The evidence
relates to two points, capacity and impartiality.
Mr. Serjeant Kiuglake, a member of the House of
Commons, said, when pressed by JVIr. Eoebuck, " I can
only say this, that I have often been very bold before
Committees;" and, in answer to Sir George Grey, "I
know, when I used to practise before Committees, we
used to look with great anxiety to who was to be
Chairman,"
It is admitted on all hands that there has been im-
provement of late years in the constitution and conduct
of Election Committees, and a careful observation of the
Committees which sat in the last session discovered very
■^ Hansard, June 6, 1849.
JND ITS REMEDIES. 139
little ground for suspicion of political partiality in the
Chairmen. But there is a flaw in the metal; and the
very provision made to check partiality, of selecting two
members from each side of the House and adding a picked
man for Chairman, proves the danger of political bias in
members of the House when judges of elections. Sitting
on Election Committees is an irksome part of a member
of Parliament's duties ; its irksomeness should be much
increased by the knowledge that the want of legal attain-
ments and practice increases costs, that the decisions of
the tribunal do not command confidence, and that, under
the present system, corruption spreads instead of being
checked. No valid objection can be stated against giving
the trial of elections to lawyers appointed, like Eevising
Barristers, by the Judges, or appointed by the House of
Commons. That the House should retain its jurisdiction
over elections is a phrase, and not an argument ; sufficient
skill and fit arrangements to ensure justice and to baflie
corruption are what is needed for the efficiency and purity
of our representative system ; our Judges can be entirely
trusted ; lawyers might be selected for the adjudication of
elections of rather higher standing than the generality of
Revising Barristers ; but there can be nothing more satisfac-
tory than the impartiality and skill with which the duties of
Revising Barristers have been almost universally performed.
If the House of Commons really desires to make effectual
war against corruption, it will not allow a feeling or pre-
judice — indeed, it may be said, a misconception — about its
own jurisdiction to stand in the way of providing the best
possible tribunal and procedure for election inquiries. Re-
140 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
vising Barristers, appointed not by the House but by
the Judges, determine the electors' lists; and Election
Committees, though composed exclusively of members of
the House, are empowered and controlled by statute. Can
there be a more absolute subjection of the House of Com-
mons to law than that furnished by the compulsory
clauses of the Election Petitions Act for service of mem-
bers on Committees ? Can there be anything more
opposed to the ideas of autonomy and privilege ?
It is not only necessary to reduce the costliness of
trials of elections as conducted under the present system,
but also to provide a means of inquiry not dependent on
private action. A great deal of censure has been lavished
on compromises and Avithdrawals of petitions ; but so long
as election petitions are prosecuted by individuals at their
own expense, who is entitled to compel them to proceed
one moment longer than they choose? Protection to
sitting members against frivolous and vexatious petitions
was strongly urged by several witnesses before the Com-
mittee of 18G0, But the expense of election petitions is
generally a strong protection against their abuse ; and it is
much more important to facilitate inquiries by lightening
the burden on petitioners. Vexatious petitions are now
presented, in hope either of effecting the withdrawal by
exchange of some other petition of the opposite political
party, or of frightening the sitting member into retirement
to avoid expense ; and the minor abuse is, indeed, a crea-
tion of the expensiveness to individuals of the present
system, — an offshoot of the greater evil.
Agency of the candidate as to corrupt practices is one
AND ITS REMEDIES. 141
of the questions on wliich varying decisions of Election
Committees have been a chief subject of complaint. Much
of the variety on this point is necessarily to be attributed
to the different circumstances of different cases; but the
general want of confidence in the tribunal has caused
variety of decision to be almost exclusively regarded as
matter of blame. There has latterly been a tendency to
uniformity of decision which is favourable to corrupt ex-
penditure, from two causes. The first cause is the Act
of 1851, amending the Law of Evidence, by which can-
didates can be examined; and when they come before
Committees and declare on oath ignorance of corrupt
practices which may have been proved to have been com-
mitted by their friends, Committees find it difficult to
make them responsible. The second cause is to be found
in the operation of the provision of the Corrupt Practices
Acts for appointing agents ; the appointment of an osten-
sible asjent servinsr to disconnect the candidate from other
friends, who illegally operate for him. The effect of this
requirement to appoint agents may be best stated in the
words of a Parliamentary counsel, of great experience
and reputation, Mr. John Clerk, who said before the
Committee of 1860 : —
" Heretofore, when corrupt practices had occurred at an
election, the persons who were going to prove the ex-
istence of these corrupt practices sought out all those who
seemed to have been engaged in the election, and to have
taken any ^oxi in it whatever, and they would find that
one person took part with regard to agency at the election
and another person another part. Now, from the cu'cum-
142 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
stance of one person being appointed as the agent for
election expenses, lie manages the legal part of the expen-
diture, and keeps clear of all those persons of a suspicious
character in the borough ; and therefore, when there has
been a great deal of corruption going on, he can come
forward, as he often does, and say, 'All these corrupt
practices may have taken place ; I never sanctioned them :
the candidate never sanctioned them.' And so it has
happened during 1857, and remarkably so since the last
General Election, that a great deal of corruption has been
proved at many places, and hardly a member has been
unseated on account of the corrupt practices which pre-
vailed, because the agency has not been proved."
Mr. Clerk states, then, that this provision of the Corrupt
Practices Prevention Act has " tended to prevent the de-
tection of agency." The later tendency to uniformity of
decision as to agency has been thus a tendency to increase
facilities for corrupt practices. That the difficulty of
proving agency to the satisfaction of Committees has not
been diminished by late enactments is illustrated by the
Great Yarmouth and Totnes Election Committees of last
session. Both these Committees showed their determina-
tion against corruption by reporting a general prevalence
of corrupt practices ; hence the Commissions, whose reve-
lations are before the w^orld. Yet the Great Yarmouth
Committee did not feel themselves justified in unseating
the two members, and the Totnes Committee unseated
only one of two.
It has been already mentioned that there have been ex-
ceedingly few prosecutions for bribery under the provisions
AND ITS REMEDIES. 143
of the Corrupt Practices Prevention Act, and it has been
explained ^Yhy private individuals do not prosecute. But
where Election Committees have found persons guilty of
bribery, prosecutions might have been instituted by the
Attorney- General. Mr. Dew gave the following evidence
before the Committee of 18G0 : —
"In the Parliament which was elected in 1847, and
which, sat up to 1852, sixty-eight voters were reported by
Election Committees as having been bribed. In the next
Parliament, which was elected in 1852, and which sat up
to 1857, 101 persons were reported as having been bribed.
In the Parliament elected in 1857, fifty-five persons were
reported as having been bribed ; and in this present Par-
liament, elected in 1859, ninety-one persons have been
reported to the House as having been bribed.
" In how many of these cases were the parties recom-
mended by Election Committees to be prosecuted ? — In
not one in the whole of these cases. I believe that the
only instance of any prosecution having been recom-
mended by a Committee, with reference to bribery, was
in the case of Beverley, in the present Parliament, when
the House ordered a prosecution in the case of two
bribers."
It has certainly been competent for Election Committees,
since 1848, to make reports recommending prosecution by
the Attorney-General, or a reference of the evidence to
him for consideration, with a view to prosecutions, under
the 87th clause of the 11 and 12 Vict., c. 98. But they
have not done so ; the clause is permissive, and not
compulsory, and does not specify subjects of report;
144 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
Committees follow custom, and are not eager to go be-
yond the questions which are put before them affecting
the seats. This may be viewed as a proof that Election
Committees, as constituted, are not very sharp instruments
against corruption. It was provided by the Act of 1863
(26 and 27 Vict., c. 29, s. 9) that the evidence should be
laid before the Attorney-General, with a view to a prose-
cution, in all cases where Election Committees report
persons by name as having been proved guilty of bribery
and treating, and it does not appear that they have been
furnished with certificates of indemnity. Then the pro-
vision assumed a compulsory character; yet no prosecu-
tions appear to have been instituted after the reports of
the Election Committees of last session. Why is this ? It
would seem from some observations of the late Attorney-
General (Sir Eoundell Palmer) on Mr. C. Buxton's motion
of May 28, that he waited for a special recommendation,
and reference of the evidence from the House.^ If this is
so, the fault is now with the House. It may, perhaps, be
considered that the Chairman of the Election Committee
^ Mr. C. Buxton moved, May 28, 1866, a resolution "That in eyery
case where any voter is reported by any Election Committee as having
received a bribe for voting or abstaining from voting, the Attorney- General
shall be required to examine the evidence in such case, and to jirosecute
the person who has offered or given the bribe, should the evidence, in his
opinion, be sufficient to render a conviction probable." This resolution
would seem to have been unnecessary, after the provision of the Act of
1863. Mr. Buxton moved his resolution as an amendment on another
moved by Mr. Hussey Vivian, that persons reported guilty of bribery by
a Commission appointed under the Act of 1852 should be deprived of the
franchise, and disqualified to sit in Parliament for life. Mr. Vivian's
object would require the passiug of an Act ; and it might be well to
distinguish between briber and bribed.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 145
ought to follow up its report by a motion for referring the
evidence to the Attorney-General, as the Chairman is
always looked to for moving an Address for a Commission,
after a report of a Committee of the prevalence of corrupt
practices.
After the last General Election, petitions charging cor-
rupt practices were presented in the cases of forty-four
constituencies, — no more. Petitions were prosecuted and
tried in only twenty-two of the forty-four. Only fifteen
members were unseated : only four Commissions of In-
quiry have been issued ; there have been no prosecutions
for bribery by order of the House. This is what there is
to show after a General Election, universally believed, and
loudly proclaimed by men of authority in Parliament, to
have been marked by grosser and more widely-spread
corruption than any that has gone before.
A return made to the House of Commons in the last
Session (No. 77, Election Petitions), shows that from 1832
to the dissolution of 1865 petitions charging bribery had
been presented in the cases of eighty-eight constituencies :
nineteen of these had been subject twice to bribery peti-
tions ; eighteen three times ; five, viz. Cambridge, Cau-
terbuiy, Carlow County, Dublin City, and Maidstone, four
times; and the borough of Ipswich, six times. But no
one supposes that even eighty-eight is the whole number
of constituencies tainted with corruption. It is remarkable
that of the six constituencies which have had the honour
of being at least four times accused, there were, this time,
petitions charging bribery in only two cases, Canterbury
and Maidstone; and only one of the two went to trial, that
L
146 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
q{ Maidstone, in which the petitioners failed. Petitions
were either not presented or not prosecuted for a number
of places, where it is matter of notoriety that the grossest
corruption prevailed.
Notwithstanding the great difficulties in the way both
of election petitions and of the petitions permitted by the
Act of 1842, the House of Commons discourages to the
utmost attempts to procure investigation into corruption
at Elections by Select Committees, which would entail no
expense on petitioners. Between the passing of the Re-
form Act, and the adoption in 1839 of Sir Robert Peel's
improved measure for the trial of controverted elections,
there were several investigations into corruption of par-
ticular constituencies by Select Committees. There was
such an investigation for Stafford in 1833, and the Select
CJommittee voided the election; and a bill to disfranchise
the borough was founded on its report, and passed the
House of Commons, but was rejected in the Lords. There
were similar investigations in 1835 for York and Great
Yarmouth ; and the report of the Select Committee in the
case of Great Yarmouth led to the disfranchisement of the
freemen of the borough. Why should not the House now
encourage individuals who desire to purify their consti-
tuencies, and who are deterred by considerations of
expense from election petitions and the petitions of the
Act of 1842, to come forward as ordinary petitioners for
inquiry into their statements by Select Committees?
Some words of Lord Palmerston, who always expressed
himself with becoming warmth on the subject of electoral
corruption, may here be aptly quoted :
AND ITS REMEDIES. 147
" This question of bribery is one of sucli importance to
the House and the country, — the abuse strikes so vitally
at the root of everything on which the influence and
character and respectability and usefulness of the House
depend, — that I think the House ought at all times, if it
errs at all, to err on the side of extending opportunities of
inquiry, rather than to take that view of the case which
might sanction the supposition that bribery can be practised
with impunity." ^
It is not to be denied that certain improvements have
been effected during the last five-and-twenty years in the
law as to corrupt practices, and in the proct'dure of Elec-
tion Committees. The provision of Lord John Eusselbs
Act of 1841, for allowing general inquiry into acts of
bribery before proof of agency ; the similar provision as
regards treating in the Act of 1863 ; the power given by the
last Act to Committees to compel witnesses to answer all
questions with the gift of a limited certificate of indemnity ;
and above all the definitions of corrupt practices and the
provisions against them of the Act of 1854, which leave
little to be desired, if there were a proper machinery fen-
setting in motion and applying the provisions, — are so much
gain ; but, imfortunately, of very little avail while the
present system of election petitions and election inquiries
continues.
It is well to know the disease and all its symptoms and
the history of past failures to cure, before proposing new
remedies. No one can doubt that, if any serious abate-
ment of electoral corruption is to be hoped for, Parliament
1 Hansard, March 15, 1848.
L 2
148 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
must provide the means of severe control over the pro-
ceedino-s of candidates and their friends durin,cj an election,
of surer, quicker, cheaper, more skilful, and more search-
ing inquiry afterwards, and of much nearer approach to
certainty of punishment of evil practices.
The following suggestions are now made for the better
prevention and discovery of corruption at elections and
determination of right to be elected. Minor matters of
detail, easy to be settled, are omitted, ami the scheme is of
course susceptible of modifications, and may be improved
by criticism.
1. Appointment of a duly qualified officer, a barrister of
the standing now required for a Eevising Bairister or a
Commissioner under the Act of 1852, either to preside at
the election in lieu of the present Returning Officer, or to
aid the Returning Officer in his duties, such as they now are,
as assessor and legal adviser, and also to exercise a super-
vision over the election and all proceedings of candidates
and members with reference to it, and to hold, after the
polling and before the return, a court of scrutiny and
general inquiry. It would be better to supersede the pre-
sent Returning Officers, and give the old name to the new
functionary. The Returning Officers of the present system
have no particular qualification ; they are almost always
electors and generally partisans, while their legal advisers
are local solicitors, often very keen partisans, and some-
times even agents for candidates. The barristers who are
to aid them or to take their places, to be appointed, as Re-
vising Barristers now are, annually by the Judges. Revising
Eai-risters, Recorders of Boroughs, and County Court Judges
AND ITS REMEDIES. 14^
to be eligible ; aud if these functionaries could always be
appointed, expense might be saved. The payment to be a
small annual salary, and so much a day during an election,
from the issuing of the writ to the making of the return.
An advantage of an annual appointment will be, that there
will always be some one w^hose duty it is to take notice of
proceedings of candidates before the election fairly begins,
and of members and defeated candidates after the decision
of the election. As with Revising Barristers, it will be
the practice of Judges to reappoint so long as there is no
reason against. The annual salary of the Eeturning Officers
to be paid by the public ; the expenses durmg election to
be paid from the borough or county fund.
2. The provision of 26 and 27 Vict., c. 29, s. 2, requiriiig
candidates to appoint agents and notify them to the
Ileturniiig Officer, to be repealed, and the candidates to
be directly accountable. Candidates not to be permitted to
retain more than one solicitor for advice. Conveyance of
voters to the poll in hired carriages to be prohibited, except
on medical certificate and with the sanction of the Ee-
turning Officer, or his Deputy in the polling district in
counties and large boroughs. Votes of electors carried
to the poll, and of parties hiring carriages in violation of
law, to be void, and the parties hiring to be subject also
to fines. The old disability to vote of paid agents and
servants of candidates for the election to be revived. Paid
canvassers to be prohibited. Candidates to be required to
notify to the Eeturning Officer the names of chairman,
members, and officers of Committees, of solicitor, clerks,
messengers, &c., of printers, stationers, and all tradesmen
150 ELECTORAL CORRTJPTLON
employed, also of all places engaged for Committee rooms
or meetings for the purpose of the election. All accounts,
except those for personal expenses, to be sent in to the
Heturning Officer, who will be empowered to tax them, and
will be required to sanction no solicitor's charges except
those strictly professional of the one solicitor named. All
payments to be made by the Eeturning Officer, who will
call on the candidates to pay to him what is requisite. He
win have the power of calling for hotel-bills and accounts
of personal expenses, and examining hotel-keepers, &c.
Candidates and members to be also required to notify to
the Eeturning Officer all subscriptions to local institutions
and charities, at the time when made. The candidate to
make a solemn declaration that he has not made, and will
not make, any payment whatever for the purposes of the
election or with reference thereto, except for strictly
personal expenses, but to the Eeturning Officer. The
failure to comply wath any of these regulations to be
visited with fines. The Eeturning Officer to have power
to enter all Committee rooms, and rooms engaged for the
election, and require information as to composition of
Committees and persons employed, and all matters relating
to the conduct of the election ; also to have power to
limit the number of persons employed, l^o Committees
or meetings to be held at public-houses.
3. The poll in boroughs to be taken always in wards
and subdivisions of wards ; number of polling places in
counties to be increased. Expenses of polling places, and
of all persons employed under the Eeturning Officer, as
well as the expenses of hustings, to be charged on the
AND ITS RE3IEDIES. 151
borough or county fund. IMeasures to be taken to prevent
the state of the poll from being known and published until
the close of the polling ; but this need not prevent employ-
ment by candidates, if they desire it, of check-clerks, who
must not send out lists ; nor must personation-agents.
4. At the close of the polling, the state of the poll to
be made known ofiicially, and the Returning Officer to
give notice of an early day, not earlier than the fourth or
later than the seventh, for holding an open court of scrutiny
and inquiry. The poll books to remain in his custody,
and to be open to inspection of candidates and electors,
who may have copies. All bills and accounts of can-
didates to be sent in to the Eeturning Officer at latest on
the second day after the poll.
5. The powers of Eevising Barristers, under 6 Vict., c. 18,
for enforcing attendance of parties whose votes are in
question and witnesses, and for production of papers and
documents, at the courts for revision of registers to be
made complete ; and so much of clause 98 of that Act as
gives to Election committees power of revising expres.s
decisions of Eevising Barristers, to be repealed.
6. The Eeturning Officer on the day appointed to make
a scrutiny of the poll He will also inquire generally as
to corrupt practices at the election, and will have generally
the same powers for inquiry as are given to Commissioners
under the Act of 1852. Certificates of indemnity not to
be given where proof enough is obtained without the con-
fession of a corrupted party ; never to be given to the
person bribing, treating, or guilty of using undue influence;
and never to protect against disfranchisement. The
152 TXECTORAL CORRUPTION
Returning Officer will also hear and decide any question
as to the disqualification of a candidate.
Candidates may appear before the Eeturning Officer
holding this Court, in person, or by a counsel or solicitor ;
but not more than one counsel to be employed on each
side. The Eeturning Officer not to be restricted to the
cases brought forward by the candidates. After this in-
quiry, the Returning Officer will make a return of the
state of the poll, and he will also make a detailed report
of all votes rejected or admitted by him in the scrutiny,
with the reasons for his decisions, and of the general
evidence taken as to corrupt practices, and whether the
persons who are elected according to the figures of the
poll are or are not duly elected, and whether any of them
were guilty of bribery, treating, or undue influence. He
may also specially report on any matter relating to the
election. His report, with shorthand writer's notes of evi-
dence, to be sent to the Clerk of the House of Commons,
on occasion of an election for a new Parliament, otherwise
to the Speaker. Report to be made public at the time.
7. Where the Eeturning Officer reports that a candidate
elected on the poll is not duly elected, such person cannot
take his seat, unless the decision of the Eeturning Officer
is reversed on appeal. Appeal to be given to candidate or
elector against decisions of Eeturning Officer, to be sent, in
case of a new Parliament, to the Clerk of the House of
Commons, or otherwise to the Speaker, within a fortnight
after the return, such appeal to specify the particular deci-
sioa or decisions objected to, and the grounds of objection.
Complaint may be made that the Eeturning Officer has not
AND ITS REMEDIES. 153
sufficiently investigated corrupt practices, or any other
complaint may be made of his conduct. Copy of appeal
to be communicated to the Keturuing Officer, and by him
publislied. If no appeal at the expiry of the fortnight,
where Eeturning Officer reports that a party was not duly
elected, new election to take place hy proclamation of
Returning Officer under the old writ within seven days.
8. At the beginning of each session the Speaker to ap-
point a Committee of Elections of five members ; and he
will appoint to hold his office durmg good behaviour a
legal assessor with a salary of not less than 1,500/. a year.
All reports of Returning Officers and appeals to go before
this Committee. Where there is no appeal, the Returning
Officer's decision takes effect. An appeal once made not to
be withdrawn before reference to the Committee of Elec-
tions, which will inquire into its allegations and visit the
appellant with costs at its discretion. Appellant to be
confined to the specific allegations of his appeal ; and
Committee to have power to award costs against ai^pellaut
in respect of abandoned allegations, or allegations made
without probable cause. Tiie Committee, with aid of
Assessor, to hear and decide the appeal. Each party may
be represented by solicitor or counsel, but not more than
one counsel on each side ; Returning Officer to attend and
give explanations. Where the presence of witnesses is
judged necessary by the Committee, the case to be ad-
journed, and all the witnesses needed summoned. Com-
mittee to have discretion as to charging cost of witnesses,
or portion of same, to the public, or to the borough or
county fund, or to any of the parties. Committee also to
164 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
liear and decide complaints against Eeturning Officer ; to
have power to order a new local inquiry for specific pur-
pose by another barrister. The decision of the Committee
to be final as regards the seats. It may make special re-
ports and recommendations to the House as to disfranchise-
ment of constituency or of a part of it.
9. The Eeturning Officer will, at the inquiry held after
the polling, bind over all witnesses of bribery, treating,
and undue influence, to appear before the Courts, and will
indict guilty parties, and, at his discretion, bring actions
for penalties, under the provisions of the law. All penal-
ties recovered to go to the credit of the borough or county
fund. All fines imposed by the Eeturning Officer under
his powers to have same destination.
10. Eeturning Officer will have power to inquire at any
time as to any payments in a constituency made by or for
a member, or candidate, relating to a past election, whether
made before and not discovered till after the decision of
the election, or made after such decision : he will decide
on their bearing on the election and report as before ;
member liable to be unseated at any time on discovery of
corrupt practices with reference to his election.
11. Member, candidate, or other person, found guilty of
bribery, treating, or undue influence, to be disabled for life
from sitting in Parliament.
The above suggestions are offered in the hope that they
may furnish, at least, a foundation for an effectual measure.
If it be thought that they involve great innovation, it
must be remembered that many efforts to mitigate this
great evil have failed, that there has been shown a wonder-
AND ITS REMEDIES. 155
fill power of eluding well-meant legislation, that our elec-
toral corruption has been long a great national scandal,
and that feliis scandal is even increasing.
" Diseases, desperate grown,
Must be relieved by desperate apiilianee."
The certainty of a seorching inquiry, immediately after
an election, and on the spot, by a competent and impartial
judge, armed with the full powers now given to the rarely-
appointed Commissioners, will be an effectual alarm. The
number of appeals will probably not be great ; and there-
fore it is proposed to nominate for the Court of Appeal a
Committee of only five members, and only one legal as-
sessor, who should be a lawyer of standing and authority.
The Speaker will select for the Committee of Appeal mem-
bers of the same standing and character as those now
generally selected for the General Committee of Elections,
and for the Chairman's panel. Where there are appeals,
definite issues will be raised before this Committee, which
will generally be capable of being shortly disposed of. The
appointment of legal assessors in aid of the present Elec-
tion Committees has been often sugoested. Mr. Charles
Buller, in his Controverted Elections Bill of 1837, pro-
posed the appointment of three such assessors ; and Sir
Eobert Peel then favoured the plan.^ AVhere counties and
boroughs have to pay a portion of the expenses of an elec-
tion, the constituencies will become keenly interested in
shortening the inevitable inquiry, for which they are taxed
at so much a day, and in preventing the recurrence of an
election through the voiding effect of corrupt practices.
' Hansard, April 2, 183S.
156 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
It would be well to require of every member on taking
his seat a solemn declaration, such as was proposed by Sir
John Pakiugton in his Bill of 1849, that he is entirely
innocent of corrupt practices.
Allusion was made at the commencement of this pam-
phlet to the use of Government patronage for corruption.
Mr. Eobert Harris, the Tory briber of Totnes, mentioned
to the Commissioners that the place of postmaster at Totnes
became vacant shortly before the late change of Govern-
ment, and that it was given to a person whom he described
as the Whig briber ; coolly adding that, if the vacancy had
occurred a few weeks later, he himself would have received
the appointment. How much does this little bit of evi-
dence tell as to the working of the present system ! Why
should not all the small appointments of the public service,
which are now distributed by nominations of different sorts
among political supporters, be given through competition
to which there shall be access without favour, or by pro-
motion as reward of good service ? Lord Grey long ago,
and before the beginning of the Civil Service Examina-
tions, made a very excellent suggestion ; viz. that the small
places in the gift of the Treasury, General Post Office, and
other public departments, which now almost all go to fill
tlie great sewer of party patronage, should be given as
prizes in local examinations.^ Such a place as postmaster
might, in a good system, be given to a Post-Office clerk
who has earned promotion by service. Sir Stafford North-
cote, who was associated with Sir Charles Trevelyan in the
re-organization of the Civil Service by examinations, is a
1 Haosard, July 13, 1S44.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 157
member of the present Cabinet. The cravings of party
and of private patronage have greatly interfered with tlie
realization of the reforming; ideas of the two originators of
the system. The application of those ideas to all Govern-
ment appointments, which can serve for gratification of
electors, wonkl be a very valuable auxiliary measure
against electoral corruption ; and it would be further very
valuable as an example from the Government, and as a
proof of its earnestness and determination.
It was contended in the last Session that it was neither
customary nor suitable to introduce provisions for purity
of election into a Bill of Parliamentary Eeform. At first
sight, certainly, no provisions would seem more suitable
for such a measure, and there is authority for the conjunc-
tion. It is known that the Committee of the Cabinet,
consisting of Lord Durham, Lord Duncannon, Sir James
Graham, and Lord John Enssell, to which Lord Grey in
1830 referred the preparation of a lieform Bill, suggested
the insertion of vote by ballot in that measure ; and it
has never been supposed that the Cabinet declined this
suggestion, because they thought that the prevention of
bribery, if the Ballot could prevent it, was unconnected
with amendment of the representation. It may be here
mentioned incidentally that Lord Durham and Lord Dun-
cannon were advocates of the Ballot, which had another
distinguished advocate in Lord Altliorp. Lord KusseU, in
an explanation which he has lately published of the prin-
ciples which guided him when he helped to frame the
Reform Bill of 1831, has stated that he endeavoured to
obtain an electoral body which, though bribery could not
158 ELECTORAL CORRUPTION
be entirely excluded, should not, as a mass, he tainted
with corruption.^ It is surely proper and important, in a
measure for diffusing the electoral franchise and distri-
buting seats, to endeavour to obtain, as far as possible,
pure voters and healthy constituencies.
The connexion of legislation against corruption with the
objects of last year's Eeforra Bill is indeed as close as
the connexion between the two subjects of extension of
franchise and distribution of seats. The purification of
constituencies will in one way, as an equitable adjustment
of seats will in another, qualify and correct the operation
of an uniform suffrage. The distribution of seats and the
size of constituencies will, in turn, have more or less influ-
ence on purity of election. As a general rule, the larger
the constituency the greater the difficulty of achieving an
election by bribery ; but where the opposite parties in a
large constituency are nearly equal, it may be as easy to
turn the scale by bribery as to buy a majority in a small
borough. It has not yet been proposed in any Reform
Dill to take even the moderate number of a thousand fur
the minimum of a constituency ; and there is a very fair
argument for the preservation of some small borough.s, that
they may make their useful quota of contribution to that
general representation of classes, interests, professions,
pursuits, and capabilities, which would make a House of
Commons the whole nation's mirror and epitome. When
it is known that the four boroughs which have lately been
exposed by Commissions are only four, which had the bad
^ New edition of Lord Rusbell's " Essay on the English Government
und Constitution," 1865.
AND ITS REMEDIES. 150
luck to be caught, out of perhaps at least a hundred which
are bad, would it uot be well to have some general exa-
mination of constituencies, in order to get rid of existiug
causes and elements of impurity, and start fair with a
newly-organized scheme of representation ? A proposal
made in the last Session by Lord Grey for a Commission
of general inquiry did not receive sufficient attention, and
was certainly not opposed by any adequate argument.
Whenever Commissions are now appointed, the past elec-
tions for a long time back are searchingly investigated ;
the Commissioners admit no limitation of time ; and why
should not the antecedents of all other corrupt constitu-
encies be investigated, with a view to total or partial
disfranchisement, as each case may require, in a readjust-
ment of the representation ? It was proposed in the last
year's Bill to group together in twos and threes a number
of small boroughs. Was it not important to know the
character of each of these boroughs, which it was proposed
to join, for better or for worse, with others ? How many
of them are like Totnes ? How many of them are pure
boroughs, whose purity would be overwhelmed by the cor-
ruption of proposed mates ? In how many of the proposed
groups might it have become easier for the agents of cor-
ruption to carry an election by a nicely calculated balance
of votes in one borough of the group ? Take Totnes, which
has now been thoroughly exposed, as an example : must
not evil, rather than good, come from associating it with
other boroughs ? There is much to be said generally
against the grouping of distinct boroughs. It is obvious
that it must, pm tanto, increase the necessary expenses of
160 ElW-TORJl CORRUPTION AND ITS RF.MEIJIF.S.
an election ; and it will often afford facilities to corrupt
operators, balancing one portion of the group against an-
other. The concentration of a constituency is favourable
to public spirit ; and it is observed now in our largest con-
stituencies that there is much indifference to the exercise
of the franchise. When the example of the Scotch groups
of boroughs has been cited, the expensiveness of their elec-
tions has probably not been inquired into or thought of.
Much is it to be hoped that provisions against Electoral
Corruption will form part of the next Bill for amending
the representation, or will accompany or even precede
a measure for regulation of the suffrage and of seats. The
highest authorities of different political opinions agree in
declaring this corruption to be the greatest evil of the
present system. It is a very dark blot on our scutcheon,
a great national scandal. It makes shame and ridicule for
us abroad. It owes its vigour to the apathy of Parliament
and of Governments, who " bid be done,"
" When evil deeds have their penuissive pass
And not the punishment. "
There should at last be an end of an inaction, which is in
truth connivance and culpability.
V.
ADDRESS TO THE NATIONAL BEFOBM UNION,
MANCHESTER, ON ELECTION CORRUPTION
AND EXPENDITURE, NOVEMBER 16, 1869.
M
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
The following address was delivered at Manchester, in
November 1869, after the close of the first session of the
present Parliament, elected under " The Eepresentation of
the People Act" of 1867 ; after the close also of the Elec-
tion petition circuits of that year, during which petitions
liad been tried by superior Judges in Great Britain and
Ireland, and of Commissions of inquiry into corruption
resulting from election petition trials, including those of
Bridgwater, Beverley, and Norwich.
Early in the sittings of 1869, Mr. Bruce had announced
that the Cabinet regarded the Ballot with favour ; and a
Committee was appointed, on his motion, to inquire into
" the present modes of conducting Parliamentary and
Idunicipal elections, in order to provide further guarantees
for their tranquillity, purity, and freedom." A Cabinet
Minister, Lord Hartington, presided over the Committee.
It took evidence during the whole of the session, and the
three Judges who had conducted the English election
petition trials were in time, after concluding their circuits,
to put the Committee in possession of the results of their
valuable experience. The Committee, at the end of the
session of 1869, reported all the evidence which they had
taken, and drafts of reports and recommendations pro-
M 2
164 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
loosed by the Chairman and by other members, to be read,
considered, and discussed in the parliamentary vacation ;
and they recommended that they should be re-appointed
in the next session to consider their report.
The draft report of Lord Hartington, the chairman, con-
tained an unfortunate passage declaring " great difficulty
in framing an enactment for the purpose of abolishing the
use of paid canvassers," and discountenancing an attempt
at prohibition. The report of the Committee, agreed upon
next year, contained a similar paragraph, "jvorded as
follows : —
" We do not think that it would be possible to prohibit
absolutely the employment of paid agents for the purpose
of an election, and there would be much difficulty in
enforcing the prohibition of the use of paid canvassers.
Although the employment of paid agency is sometimes
carried to an unreasonable and improper extent, so as in
some cases to assume a corrupt character, an election
cannot always be conducted without paid agents of some
kind."
Only three members of the committee, Mr. C. Villiers,
]Mr. Dalglish and Mr. Fawcett, voted against this para-
graph.
It may be that there must be a paid agent or agents ;
but it need not be that there should be paid canvassing
agents. Canvassing is an overt act easy of proof. The
three Judges who gave evidence before the Committee, or
any three lawyers in the House of Commons, would have no
difficulty in framing an enactment against paid canvassing
which could be easily enforced. It would not be necessary
to do more than to visit paid canvassing with ordinary
penalties ; the canvassing of a paid agent should void
the member's election.
REFORM UNION, MANCHESTER. 165
If paid canvassing is permitted to go on as it does, tlie
Ballot will not have a fair trial. Paid canvassers assigned
in sufficient numbers to wards of boroughs, or parts of
counties, can do an infinite deal to frustrate the uses
of secrecy.
The meeting at which the following address was
delivered, was presided over by ]\Ir. George Wilson, of
jNIanchester, who was known thirty years ago as the Chair-
man of the Anti-Corn Law League. As a member of the
House of Commons, I was humbly associated with Mr.
Cobden and Mr. Bright in support of Eepeal of the
Corn Laws, and I was a member of the Anti-Corn Law
League. The opening sentence of this address refers
to allusions made by Mr. Wilson to my connexion with
that League.
ADDRESS, ETC.
I AM miTcli gratified by the Chairman's allusion to che-
rished memories of former days. I shall endeavour to
make this address as practical as possible, and not remain
content with mere declamation on the enormity of the evils
of electoral corruption, which are notorious and universally
admitted. ]\Iy subject is twofold, — corruption at elections
and expenditure at elections. These subjects are distinct,
and yet they are much, if not inseparably, connected,
Eecent investigations by our Judges have made us
acquainted with three boroughs, Bradford, Youghal, and
Westminster, in which, in the last general election, the
expenditure of a winning candidate was 7,000/., 5,000/.,
and 9,000/. respectively ; and though in two of these cases
the lavishly spending member was unseated, the Judge
was unable, in the case of Westminster, to arrive at a like
decision. It is clear that the evil of undue expenditure
should be dealt with, as well as what the law defines to be
'' corrupt practices." The law defines " corrupt practices "
to be bribery, treating, and undue influence : and in the
cases of the three boroughs which have been named, the
ADDRESS, ETC. 161
Judges could not, even with such enormous expenditure,
find themselves able to report that " corrupt practices "
generally prevailed. The three Judges who have con-
ducted the election trials in England during this year have
given evidence before the Conmiittee which has sat, under
the presidency of Lord Hartington, to inquire into parlia-
mentary and municipal elections. Their evidence is a
valuable storehouse of facts and opinions for election
reformers. The Judges have strongly recommended an
improvement of the law, which shall enable them to
unseat members proved to have incurred a lavish, extra-
vagant, or unreasonable expenditure. It would further
be well, if the Judges' reports in such cases were always
followed by Commissions for full inquiry. In order to
meet an objection that it would be difficult to determine
precisely what amount of expenditure should be regarded
as improper, Mr. Justice Blackburn suggested that any
expenditure beyond 5s. per head should be treated as
unreasonable. Calculations have been made that Mr.
Eipley, unseated for Bradford, incurred an acknowledged
expenditure of 19s. per head, not of the whole constituency
but of those only who voted for him ; and that Mr. W. H.
Smith, who was not unseated, the Member for Westminster,
spent at the rate of 15s. per head of his own voters. I
can say from my own experience that such unreasonable
expenditure has not been confined to England and Ireland ;
and that in a Scotch borough which I contested in the last
general election, the borough of Greenock, the gentleman
w^ho carried away from me the seat, and who on petition
was declared duly elected, returned his expenditure at
168 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
nearly 3,000/., thus acknowledging that the votes which
were given him cost him all but 20s. per head of those
who voted for him.
I believe, with deference to the three distinguished
Judges who after trial of many petitions have appeared
before the Committee, that a very much better remedy
would be found in specifying what shall be legal heads of
expenditure, and allowing no candidate to expend any
money, except for any of the specified purposes ; and in
ensuring the means of an effective supervision, during
the contest, of the expenditure of candidates. Such recom-
mendations are not my own invention, but were made
so far back as 1860 to a House of Commons Com-
mittee by two barristers, Mr. Vaughan and Mr. Wilford,
who had been commissioners for an election inquiry at
Gloucester. The House of Commons has long since had
good advice on this subject, but it is very slow to follow it.
While the Act of 1868 was passing through the House of
Commons, Mr. Mill made a strenuous endeavour to induce
the Government to consent to a plan for appointing for
all elections a public officer, a lawyer, to act as assessor to
the returning officer, to watch proceedings during the con-
test, and hold an inquiry immediately after the election,
being invested with powers for rigorous enforcement of the
law against corrupt practices. Prevention is better than
punishment. The most zealous economist need not be
alarmed at the expense of such a plan. The end to be attained
is so important, that the necessary outlay would be wisely
incurred ; and it is not likely to be greater than the cost of
the Judges' elections trials of this year, which is estimated
REFORM UNION, MANCHESTER. 169
at 12,000Z. or 13,000/. Part of the expenses of these
assessors should be borne by the constituencies and charged
on the rates.
This leads me to say that I am an advocate of j\Ir.
Fawcett's proposal to charge the public expenses of elections
on the borough and county rates. The addition to the
rates in consequence can never exceed a mere trifle, a frac-
tion of a farthing : candidates wiU be relieved from a heavy
charge. The whole charge on the rates will be considerably
less than the charge on candidates ; the ratepayers will
see that what they have to pay for is economically done,
whereas returning officers have little or no consideration for
candidates' pockets. More economical methods of returning
officers will help to give an economical tone generally to
election contests.
Much expenditure at elections, wdiich the law does
not proscribe, yet involves and generates corruption :
the money, for instance, spent on agents, printers,
clerks, messengers, &c. Expenses for these purposes, all
necessary in a degree, should be reduced as much as
possible : for lucrative employment or custom furnishes
means of gratifying voters, and paid canvassing leads
directly to improper influences and corrupt practices.
Again, the purchase of refreshments, which do not come
within the provisions of the Corrupt Practices Acts, makes
an opening for corrupt influence. The conveyance of
voters, though made illegal, is still practised, because the
Legislature has not enacted that a violation of the law
shall disqualify a candidate.
A large expenditure for purposes not illegal is mis-
170 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
chievous as furnishing pretexts and excuses to others, and
assisting corrupters to cloak corruption. That very ex-
perienced and astute gentleman, Mr. Spofforth, the
election- manager for the Conservative party, told the
Commission that he was not surprised or made uneasy by
a demand of 2,000^. or 3,000^. for a candidate's expenses
at Brido'water, because he took for wanted that most of
it was to be spent on lawyers and canvassers, which the
law permits. It is now known that the largest part of
the large sums which were no surprise to Mr. Spofforth
were spent in pure bribery. How this sort of expenditure
blinds other men's eyes has lately received most powerful
illustration in Scotland, in the case of the Lord Justice
Clerk Patton, who had been unconsciously led into bribery
at Bridgwater, and whose sad suicide should be a strong
lesson ; for you will probably remember how his legal
adviser and agent, Mr. Pitman, an Edinburgh writer of
the highest respectability, declared that the large expenses
at Bridgwater did not seem to him, who had the care of
Mr. Patton's interests, surprising, knowing as he did what
large sums were spent in paying Scotch lawyers in Scotch
elections ; and he instanced the expenses of my opponent
at Greenock, the now sitting member, who returned an
expenditure of 3,000Z., nearly 2,000^. of which went to
payment of writers and accountants as paid canvassers.
The evil effects of such expenditure are further shown
in their natural action on the minds of poor voters, who,
seeing the large sums spent for getting into Parliament,
conclude that they expect somehow to repay themselves,
and naturally thinlv it to be no worse for them to help
REFORM UNION, MANCHESTER. 171
themselves in their difficulties and struggles for living by
getting something out of the candidate in return for their
support, Mr. Mill, in an admirable passage of his work
on " Eepresentation," has spoken of " the corrupting effect
of the notion inculcated on the voter that the person he
votes for should pay a large sum of money for permission
to serve the public." He proceeds to say unanswerably :
" So long as the candidate himself, and the customs of
the w^orld, seem to regard the function of a member of
Parliament less as a duty to be discharged than as a
personal favour to be solicited, no effort will avail to
implant in an ordinary voter the feeling that the election
of a member of Parliament is a matter of duty, and that
he is not at liberty to bestow the vote on any other con-
sideration than that of personal fitness."
There are two objects to be kept in view : one is to get
rid, as quickly as possible, by any means whatever, of
those foul practices of corruption which are a disgrace
and scandal to the nation ; and the other is to take steps
for the reduction of expenditure at elections, in order to
enlarge the circle of choice for members of Parliament and
improve the quality of our representatives. In the first
election trial which took place, that of Windsor, where
the sitting member was unsuccessfully petitioned against,
Mr. Justice AVilles, who tried the case, took occasion in
admirable language to comment on an expenditure of
27/. for champagne by the sitting member at an Odd
Fellows' dinner held during the contest, remarking that
it was the more objectionable, " because even if a man of
wealth could spend 27/. in an evening upon drink for
172 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
others, it seems like an exclusion of men in moderate
circumstances from being candidates, if profuse expendi-
ture of this kind is to be resorted to." The Judge added,
" If there were not a distinction between bribery and
treating, what must I have said of that ? " The same
excellent Judge — all whose language, both in his judg-
ments and in his evidence before the Committee on
Municipal and Parliamentary elections, breathes the finest
public spirit — pointedly said to this Committee that a chief
evil of the prevailing expenditure at elections is that
" you give a rich dullard the advantage over a poor man
of intellect." Yes, this is a cardinal point of parlia-
mentary reform. Wealth conquered wisdom at West-
minster. There were many other such instances in the
last general election. A number of advanced Liberals,
bred in the Universities, were similarly defeated : Mr.
Eoundell at Clitheroe, Mr. Brodrick at Woodstock, Sir
George Young at Chippenham, and Mr. Godfrey Lushing-
ton at Abingdon. These men of high culture Avere all
beaten by power and by money; and there were many
other cases of "poor men of intellect" vanquished by
"rich dullards," or (as Shakespeare would have put it)
learned pates forced to duck to golden fools.
I have, ever since I could think, been a zealous advocate
of the Ballot, and time has not diminished my zeal.
It is ill-judged to expect more from the Ballot than it
can accomplish. The Ballot cannot do everything, but it
would greatly diminish the evils of bribery and undue
influence. Of course bad men might sometimes thwart
its beneficial operation, but that would not prove it to be
REFOBM UNION, MANCHESTER. 173
useless. There is much reason to hope that Ballot
will, with the consent of both the great parties in the
state, be the law of the land. A distinguished Conservative,
Mr. Ward Hunt, the Chancellor of the Exchequer of
Mr. Disraeli's Government, has drafted resolutions in
qualified favour of the Ballot, in the House of Commons
Committee. I must express my deep regret that Lord
Hartington, the Chairman of the Committee, has in his
report thrown doubt on the practicability of abolishing
paid canvassing. If paid canvassing is not abolished, the
operation of the Ballot will be impeded, and Ballot will
not have a fair trial.
An argument which has been much used against the
Ballot is this, that it would not be effective in small
corrupt constituencies, like Bridgwater and Beverley,
where practised electioneerers would be able to calculate
the number wanted to make a majority, and where the
election might be secured by the promise of a round sum
to those known to be venal, if a certain candidate were
elected. This at most would only show that there were
cases in which unscrupulous men might, under certain
circumstances, prevent the success of the Ballot ; but these
would only be a limited number of cases, while in a large
majority of cases the Ballot would be successful. Now
what might thus happen in small constituencies might
equally happen in small districts or wards of large con-
stituencies, particularly where parties are nearly balanced,
by employment of paid canvassers assigned to the dif-
ferent wards. I trust that Lord Hartington's unfortunate
scruples will not prevail, for there is a very great body of
174 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
opinion both on the evils of paid canvassing and on the
practicability of getting rid of it, which I trust that the
Committee and the Cabinet and the House of Commons
will consider and act upon.
The Judges have expressed their opinions very strongly
against paid canvassers.
Baron Martin initiated before the Committee the subject
of prohibiting paid canvassers, and said : " A great many
canvassers are persons who are, I expect, not the honestest
people in the world, and not honest to the people who
employ them, and I am satisfied that there are many per-
sons employed as canvassers who readily bribe. I am
satisfied that paid canvassers are people not to be trusted."
Mr. Justice Blackburn said : " I think myself that paid
agents are a nuisance and an evil, and I wish that they
were done away with. I strongly suspect that a great deal
of the lavish expenditure, which people naturally assume is
gone in corruption, is intercepted by paid agents. I think
it highly possible that where a candidate has spent some
1,700/. or 1,800/. on an election, it would be found that
where a hundred went in corrupt payments, many hun-
dreds were intercepted by the canvassers and paid agents."
Mr. Bright, who was a member of the Committee, has,
in a series of resolutions which he moved, rightly spoken of
fees paid to legal agents as " scarcely distinguishable from
bribery and other forms of corruption." Lord Hartington
himself was not insensible to the magnitude of the evil
which he is timid about trying to remedy. He says, in a
passage of his draft report : " A system of canvassing
which notoriously prevails in many, if not in most.
REFORM UNION, MANCHESTER. 175
boroughs, especially in the smaller constituencies, is a
system of working npon voters through private con-
siderations, whether of interest, hope, or fear, for political
purposes ; and this system, in which undue influence in a
modified form is used, is almost universally practised."
It is often said that the abolition of small constituencies
would be a powerful remedy for corrupt practices, — would
itself do much towards abolition of bribery and other
corruption. I fear that this is by no means necessarily so.
Large constituencies are divided into wards or districts ;
these are small and compassable ; separate agents are
employed for each ; the subdivision gives facilities for tlie
action of paid canvassers in each similar to those which
they have collectively in a smaller undivided constituency;
and where there is nearly an equal division of the two
parties in a ward, it is the same advantage to agents and
paid canvassers as in a small borough. The Committee of
last year has produced much evidence to prove the cor-
ruption of municipal elections in very large boroughs.
The Mayor of Kottingham said, that of nearly scA^en thou-
sand voters, about one-third were always open to payment
in municipal elections in that city. I need not tell you
that the parliamentary and municipal franchises are now
identical. The Mayor's was a sufficiently strong state-
ment ; but Mr. . Joe Bradshaw, a town - councillor of
IsTottingham, said that he thought the proportion of venal
voters were larger than a third. Of Liverpool it was said
by a witness, that in his ward the municipal voters
numbered 5G3, and that 70 per cent, of this number were
always open to money. Another witness, IMr. William
176 ADDRESS TO NATIONAL
Johnson, said that during seven years he had carefully
watched the Liverpool municipal elections, and that with
one or two exceptions in the north ward, they had been
always altogether corrupt. Of Blackburn one witness
said, that at a contested municipal election he thought 90
per cent, had a substantial reason for voting. Mr. James
Briggs of Blackburn also said, that in his ward almost
every man who voted received money for his vote ; some,
in fact, who had presented themselves to receive payment
had astonished those who paid the money. We cannot
then, we must not, throw the whole blame of corruption
on small constituencies.
I may here mention that I was urged by Mr. Cobden,
when I was many years ago a member of the House of
Commons, to investigate the subject of corruption at mu-
nicipal elections, with the view of bringing it before Par-
liament for a remedy. Circumstances jjrevented me from
complying with Mr. Cobden's request and advice. A
Manchester audience will appreciate the pride witli which
I refer to this proof of the early good opinion of one whose
name is now a talisman for all reformers. I was then a
member of the Parliament which was also Mr. Cobden's
first Parliament. Known he then was, and honoured
where known; but all England had not yet learned to
appreciate him. He began his political. career late in life,
and it is wonderful with what rapidity he attained, in a
few years, to world-wide celebrity ; and having prema-
turely died, he is already canonized as one of England's
best worthies and brightest illustrations.
The discoveries of the recent Election Commissions
REFORM UNIOy, MANCHESTER. 177
have excited the horror of reformers, and the question is,
What will be done in the next session of Parliament ?
But I remember that three years ago, in 1866, equal horror
was excited by the similar discoveries in the boroughs of
Totnes, Reigate, Great Yarmouth, and Lancaster ; and we
must not expect much. There is no strong tone against
bribers. Notwithstanding all the corruption discovered at
Great Yarmouth by the Commission, the two members
who had succeeded through it had escaped from the fangs
of the Election Committee, and had not been unseated.
They were both Conservatives, supporters of Mr. Disraeli.
A member rose early in the session of 1867, and seriousl}^
asked Mr, Disraeli how he proposed to deal with the two
members who continued to sit, now that the Commission
had laid bare the corruption through which they became
members. Mr. Disraeli replied jocularly and with alacrity,
that he thought them two excellent members, and should
be sorry to miss them from the House. The reply of
course raised a laugh. We are not likely to read of a
similar reply from Mr. Gladstone, should he be similarly
questioned. There are fit times for mirth, but a " merry
descant on a nation's woes " is not seemly.
The Bridgwater and Beverley inquiries have elicited
proofs of, to say the least, very dubious relations between
corrupting candidates and the head election-agents of the
Government and of Opposition. It is admitted that it is
one of the duties of these agents, who take recognized
rank in the two parties, to keep a register of boroughs and
be ready to give information as to the sums required in
different constituencies for securing elections. It is
N
178 JDDBESS TO NATIONAL
astonishing to see the cool manner in which these London
head election-agents receive information of large sums
professedly necessary for carrying small boroughs, and
never wonder, or suspect anything wrong.
The high-placed leaders of political parties should see
that the gentlemen who serve them in the position filled
by Mr. Drake or Mr. Spofforth should preserve themselves
above suspicion. If local agents who dabble in corruption
mistakenly address themselves to such gentlemen in the
hope of pecuniary aid, or to get, through their instru-
mentality, candidates who will " bleed," those who are at
head-quarters must be partly to blame for the mistake.
There is a well-known triplet waitten by a lady for the
warning of her sex which, with one alteration (lie for she in
the beginning of the second line), may be mentioned as a
good rule for the head election-agents of the two great
parties in the state : —
" Let this strict maxim he my virtue's guide :
He is to l)larae in part who has been tried ;
He comes too near who comes to be denied."
We may have much hope in this matter from TNIr. Glad-
stone's fervour and comprehensive mode of dealing with
public questions. Let us hope that there is a better time
coming. I hope to see the Ballot enacted and paid can-
vassing abolished. There is no necessity for more than
one election-agent, and he need not be a law^^er. Our
respected Chairman [Mr. G. Wilson] would conduct an
election better than any lawyer. Otlier measures for
which popular opinion is waxing strong, and as to whicli
I hope there will be no difficulty, are the abolition of
REFORM UNTON, MANCHESTER. 179
public nominations and declarations of the poll, which
are in many places simply occasions of drunkenness and
rioting ; proliibition of committee-rooms and of meetings
at public-houses, and the closing of public-houses on
the day of polling. I trust there, will be no difficulty
in carrying these measures. ]\Ir. Justice Willes has
strongly recommended to the Committee that all refresh-
ments given under any circumstances during one week
before the election shall be illegal, and if given by a
candidate or his agent shall upset the election. That
would be an excellent enactment. If measures such as
these are carried, we may indeed hope to see a new reign
of electoral virtue ; a parliamentar}- election may then be
an affair of reason and not of riot, and virtue and order
prevail where drunkenness and vice have so long been the
lords of electoral misrule. If the Ballot becomes law, we
may hope to see agricultural labourers and artisans of
townis voting as free men, and not as serfs under landlords
and superiors, while election-managers with loose con-
sciences, and local attorneys who play the game of land-
lords in counties and make a trade of bribery in boroughs,
will find their occupation gone, and the making of the
House of Commons will be transferred from the county
magnate's drawing-room and the attorney's office to the
public hall and the market-place, and the whisperings of
wire-pullers be drowned in the pure free voice of the
people.
The English Constitution has from time to time been
vaunted by ourselves and admired by foreigners as a
marvel ; but we must all see with shame that these
N 2
180 ADDRESS, ETC.
dreadiul disclosures of corruption periodically made are
a great disfigurement of its beauty, and a great reproach
to its wisdom. Poets and philosophers have traced a
divine influence in our polity and its origin. Shake-
speare says —
" There is a mystery in the soul of state
AVhich is in operation more divine
Than breatli or pen can give expression to."
If our political constitution is a fabric of divine origin,
should we not strive to prevent this thing divine of excel-
lence and beauty from degenerating, like the ancient
poet's imaginary monster, into fishiness, and, touching
heaven as it does above, save it from trailing below in
filth, nastiness, and corruption ?
VL
SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENT-
ARY ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 18GS-^9.
INTKODUCTORY NOTE.
The Eeport of the Committee ou Parliamentary and
Municipal Elections of 1868, which Lord Hartington pre-
sided over, contained the following as to Scotland : —
" In Scotland, it is stated without contradiction that
bribery is almost unknown. This is attributed in a great
measure to the superior education of the Scotch people,
and partly to the fact that, the constituencies being com-
paratively new, there exists no corrupt class, long familiar
with the traditions of bribery, similar to that which in
many English and Irish boroughs has not only retained in
itself, but spread through the constituency, the desire for
corrupt expenditure."
I have no desire to draw a bill of indictment against
Scotland : but this paragraph, more by incompleteness
than by misstatement, gives an incorrect picture of elec-
tion morality in Scotland. That sinks of inveterate
electoral corruption, like some notorious English and Irish
constituencies, do not exist in Scotland, and that coarse
money bribery is scarce, is happily true. But it is also
true that, under a widely prevailing and strongly estab-
lished system of jiaid canvassing, conducted chieiiy by
184 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE FARLUMENTARY
solicitors, called writers in Scotland, the corrupt practices of
treating and undue influence are rife in contested borough
elections : and I can say from my own experience that
actual bribery in small sums is not unknown. Scotland
is not free from the infirmity of human nature, which
in England and Ireland produces interference of masters
with workmen. The paid canvassing is a gigantic evil in
Scotch elections, of which the Parliamentary Committee
has taken no notice in special reference to Scotland.
The Committee have admitted the existence of intimi-
dation in Scotch counties. They were unfortunately in-
spired to select as chief witness the Editor of the Scots-
man, Mr. Eussel, who was not more eager to find fault
with elections in Scotch counties, where Conservatives are
powerful, than to give a flattering account of elections
in Scotch burghs, where Conservatives make little show,
and where the fights are generally between Liberals and
Liberals.
A truer account of the state of things in Scotch burgh
elections appeared in the Star newspaper of October 4, 1869,
while the S>tar was edited by that very able writer and
independent politician, Mr. John Morley, now the Editor
of the Fortnightly Bevievj, in a letter signed "A True
Scot." The writer of this letter was the Eev. W. H.
"Wylie, a Baptist minister, Scotsman by birth, who was
residing in Scotland during the whole of the general
election campaign of 1868, and was particularly con-
versant with the elections in the West of Scotland, of
which Mr. Eussel confesses his ignorance. After de-
scribing the intimidation in Scotch counties, as to wliich
Mr. G. Young, the present Lord Advocate, is a powerful
witness, and which the Editor of the Scotsman was eager
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9, 185
to proclaim and denounce, tlie " True Scot " proceeds to
speak of Scotch burglis : —
" If excessively large expenditure of money by a can-
didate is any evidence of an impure election, tlien many
of the Scotch burghs stand condemned. At Dundee, J\Ir.
Guthrie and Mr. Armitstead spent 8,352/.; at Falkirk, Mr.
Meriy, in a contest of only a few days' duration, expended
2,885/.; at Stirling, Mr. Henry Campbell spent 2,543/.
against his unsuccessful opponent's 1,863/.; at Glasgow,
the vain attempt of Sir George Campbell to win the third
seat was made at an expense of 5,143/.; while Mr. Bouverie
retained his hold of Kilmarnock by spending 1,616/.
Perhaps the worst case of all, comparatively, was that of
the burgh of Greenock, won by the Provost of the town,
who, at the outset of his struggle for the parliamentary
prize, avowed his intention to 'bleed freely' in order to
win, and who was as good, or as bad, as his woi'd, for the
official account shows his expenses to have been 2,801/. — a
pound a head for each voter — or more, comparatively, than
the expenditure at Bradford, which Baron Martin stig-
matized as 'iniquitous,' and on account of which Mr.
Pipley was most righteously unseated. The petition trial
at Greenock, which extended over five days, presents a
most gloomy picture of political immorality ; and any one
who reads the judgment delivered by Lord Barcaple must
wonder why his lordship did not unseat Mr. Grieve.
That gentlemen, it was proved, had employed nearly all
the solicitors and several accountants in the town as paid
canvassers ; and the sums admitted to have been paid to
these lawyers for their services in going about influencing
voters amounted to nearly 2,000/. The evidence revealed
modes of working on the part of these paid legal agents as
unscrupulous and immoral as anything that has transpired
in the worst English borough. All their acquaintance,
gained professionally, with the private business and family
affairs of their neighbours, was utilized by them on behalf
of their employers, to coerce the timid and to make more
186 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PjIRLIAMENTJRY
resolute men remain at least neutral ; and so effectually
was their work clone that jMr. Morton, the present chief
magistrate of the town, solemnly asserted his belief before
Lord Barcaple that a thousand electors had been induced
to violate pledges which they had most willingly made at
the commencement of the struggle. So dead was the
moral sense of many, that even a leading Free Church
clergyman of the town, a Eev. Mr. Stark, published a
letter, in which he treated the employment of all the
lawyers in the capacity of paid agents as an exceedingly
good joke, and expressed his warm admiration of the
candidate who had the astuteness and the cash to carry
out the plan. To do justice to the Scotch Judge who
presided at the trial, he had more respect for decency than
the minister of religion exhibited. His lordship most
cordially condemned the employment of the monstrous
regiment of paid legal canvassers as illegitimate, and said
it nmst not be repeated.
" It woidd be easy to accumulate thousands of facts to
show that, in spite of her intelligence, Scotland is very far
from being without electoral corruption, much of it more
grievous and deplorable in one sense than the gross bribery
and treating which abound in certain English boroughs,
inasmuch as the Scotch system involves the coercion and
turning aside from the path of duty of men who have
education, intelligence, convictions, and who in very many
instances are susceptible of the anguish which so seized
the spirit of poor Lord Glenalmond that he sought deliver-
ance by self-destruction."
I was the losing candidate and petitioner for Greenock in
the general election of 1868. The flippancy and ignorance
of Mr. Eussel, in his evidence, can hardly be better tested
than by his statement as to this petition. " The Judge threw
it out ; it was some very small charge about whisky : " this
is j\Ir. Eussel's account of it. Lord Barcaple, the Judge,
though he did not upset the election, did not take so slight
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 187
a view of the petition. The following is an extract from
his judgment : —
" I think that the present discussion is a very serious
one indeed. I have felt it to be so throughout, and I have
felt some matters connected with it to be of extreme diffi-
culty. The first that we heard of this election in the
evidence was a letter from the sitting Member, in which,
certainly, an ill-advised and unfortunate expression was
used. He said, writing to his correspondent, ' If I go in I
must do it properly to win, and I suppose that Christie is
not prepared to bleed freely.' Nom', I do not in the least
degree assume (very far from it indeed), that that im-
ported any intention on the part of Mr. Grieve to spend
any money any illegal way. That is not the thing, and I
do not believe it did ; but it did import an intention to
come into the field with money ready to be spent, and that
freely, for the purpose of overcoming an opponent and
gaining the election. I cannot imagine a worse key-note
to be struck at the commencement of the contest than this.
If it comes out, it will certainly be very imfortunate for
the candidate ; and whether it comes out or not, if the
election is conducted upon the footing which that seems to
indicate, it will be extremely liable to give rise, at least, to
suspicions, whether well-founded or not, as to how the
election is truly conducted and is gained.
" Now it is quite unquestionable, I think, that this deter-
mination Avas carried out. There were employed for Mr.
Grieve, besides his principal agent, Mr. King, eleven ward
agents, as they are called; but that is, as every person
who knows Greenock must be perfectly well aware, not
an agent for each of eleven wards, for there are only five
wards, but three agents for the first ward, and two agents
for each of the rest. The result of that was, that a sum
of 1,715/. 10.S. was paid to those eleven agents and Mr.
King, — Mr. King's bill, however, being only a hundred
guineas. I am excluding at present all charges for outlay
and clerks ; but for fees, for remuneration, there were bills
188 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND TEE PARLIAMENTARY
sent in to the amount of 1,715/. 10s. I think, if it stood
alone, and it does not stand alone, the charges of that
sort would be a very large sum indeed to expend in this
way in an election of this kind. It is true that the elec-
tion lasted for a long period of time, and that probably
increased the expense. But then the expense was being
carried on upon the footing of employing so very large a
proportion of the law agents in this place, subject to the
payment of a fee for this kind of work, and the charge I
observe is quite in general terms, ' To fee for acting as
agent in Parliamentary Election.' I think that is the way
in which the thing is stated. In the case before me, it is
157/. 10s. that is charged. Then, in addition to those
agents, three of whom w^ere thought necessary for one
ward, and two for each of the rest, I find there were two
accountants who had charges somewhat of the same sort.
One of them is an account sent in in these terms : ' June
13th to November 16th, time and trouble employed be-
tween those dates in conducting your canvass, 90/.' Now,
I must say that I think that that is a very strong course
of expenditure, and that it was not likely that an election
could be conducted upon that footing without its attracting
attention, and by attracting the attention of opponents
creating a considerable tendency to look with suspicion at
the whole expenditure throughout the election. I do not
say that in itself it is a ground upon which an election
can be set aside. Possibly, however, I think that in a
strong and aggravated case it could. These gentlemen, no
doubt, are not paid to vote, but in consequence of their
being paid they must not vote, and I do not advise the
experiment to be tried to any much greater extent; at
least I would rather hope that it will not be again tried to
this extent, for I am quite satisfied that it is an unfor-
tunate course of procedure."
In a case of bribery which was brought forward, the
Judge, after announcing that he would not unseat the
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 189
member upon it said : " I can conceive other persons taking
a very different view of the matter. I think it is a point
that balances very nicely indeed : and I have felt, I con-
fess, some difficulty in deciding it, but the decision I have
announced is that to which, after much consideration, I
have come."
I have made these references to Lord Barcaple's jvidg-
ment in the Greenock case in order to furnish some truth
as to a Scotch burgh election, and give an example of the
untrustworthiness of the evidence of Mr. Eussel, editor of
the Scotsman.
It would be much more agreeable to me, if truth allowed
me to join in the Committee's complimentary estimate of
the purity of Scotch elections, and if I could follow them
in attributing the alleged great superiority to superior
education. But truth must conquer partiality ; and the
best friends of Scotland will not wish to stifle or repress
needed improvement by exaggerated praise. I am not so
sure about the correctness of the current boasts of Scotch
education. A very careful writer, with special oppor-
tunities of knowledge, has lately exhibited to the public
some startling statistics of education among the Scotch
lower classes.^ He publishes official tables showing the
state of knowledge as to reading and \\Titing, of all the
criminals who entered the Scotch prisons during each of
the six years 18G3 — 1868. I will give the statistics for
the first and last years of the six. In 18G3, of a total of
22,452 prisoners, 4,457 could not read, and 10,415 could
not write; 12,597 could read with difficulty, 542 could
1 "The Public Houses (Scotland) Acts: their Success and Faihire (with
important Statistical Tables, &c.)," by John Welsh, Superintendent of
Police, Perth. Edinburgh: Menzies and Co., 1869.
190 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTARY
sign name merely, and 9,477 could write with difficulty ;
5,398 only could read well, and 2,018 only write well. In
1868, the total of prisoners was 26,843 ; and 5,539 could not
read, and 11,914 could not write ; 14,187 could read with
difficulty, 602 could sign name merely, and 12,352 could
write with difficulty; 7,117 could read well, and 1,975
write well. Mr. Welsh, the author whom 1 am quoting,
attributes this ignorance and crime to drink : and what
Scotchmen have called the " national vice " of Scotland
may be expected to appear in parliamentary elections, and
whisky does play a prominent part on election-days.
It was so in Greenock on the election-day of 1868, and
some evidence was given in proof. But the Senior Bailie
of the burgh, Bailie John Hunter, was brought forward on
behalf of the sitting member to swear that on the week of
the election he took his turn as presiding magistrate, and
was struck with the small number of offences which came
that week before the bench, notwithstanding the excite-
ment of the election, and that he had at the time expressed
his surprise to some of his friends. The Judge natui'ally
attached great weight to this evidence, and thus expressed
himself in delivering his judgment : —
" Then, though it does not fall under my duty to report
upon it, I may, in passing, observe that 1 am extremely
glad to find, in the course of the evidence, that some
appearances, wliich there were at one time, as if there had
l)een some extraordinary amount of dissipation connected
with the election, and a great and unusual number of
drunken people in the streets, did, when the matter came
to be fairly investigated, die away altogether. It was
stated, upon what seemed to be competent authority, that
rather tlie reverse was the case. It is very probable, I
think, that Bailie Hunter, who certainly was in a position
ELECTIONS C03IMITTEE OF 1868-9. 191
to judge very ^A'eU of tlie matter in some respects, as he
left town rather early in the afternoon may not have seen
some of the excitement which prevailed, and not unnatu-
rally prevailed ; but I must take it upon the whole of the
evidence now that the instances which we have had
spoken of (and some of them are very important as
matters of evidence as regards some of the charges of
instances of individual intoxication, or of three or four
intoxicated men being seen at one time), were not indi-
cative of the general state of the population, even of the
working classes of Greenock upon that day."
But Bailie Hunter had discovered, after giving his evi-
dence, and before the delivery of Lord Barcaple's judgment,
that he had made a mistake in swearing that he was the
piesiding magistrate that week, and that he liad at that
time observed, or related to any one, the paucity of offences
which drink might generate. He did not attend the bench
that week. All the evidence given on oath by Bailie
Hunter, which made the Judge dismiss as valueless the
contrary evidence, was a hallucination of the Bailie.
He was thinking of the municipal elections week, three
weeks later. The Bailie, when he found out his mistake,
was anxious to go again into the witness-box and publicly
correct the error, but the sitting member's counsel, Mr.
Rutherford, Clark, the present Scotch Solicitor-General,
whom he consulted, thought it his duty to prevent the
Bailie from telling the Judge the truth. INIr. Rutherford
Clark is therefore responsible for having allowed the
Judge to make an important statement as to the quiet and
sobriety of the election, resting on an entire mistake
made known to him in time to save the Judge from
his involuntary error. It is not likely that the error
affected the question of the seat, but Lord Barcaple was
192 SCOTCH ELECTIONS, ETC.
inveigled into an erroneous statement which has been
quoted as high authority for orderly conduct of an im-
pugned Scotch burgh election.
The following paper appeared in the shape of two letters
in the Edinhurgh Daily Revieio in December 18G9, while
it was edited by Mr. Henry Kingsley.
SCOTCH ELECTIONS, etc.
I PROPOSE to review the evidence on Scotch elections
given in the last session of Parliament before the Parlia-
mentary and Municipal Elections Committee.
It should cause surprise, and it is certainly a matter
of regret, that there was only one Scotch member, Mr.
Dalglish, on this important Committee, numbering in all
twenty-three.
It is, doubtless, owing chiefly to this small representa-
tion of Scotland in the Committee that the evidence
taken as to Scotch elections is so smal], fragmentary,
and unsatisfactory. There were indeed only two wit-
nesses whose evidence is of primary or substantial
character : Mr. A. Eussel, who, being asked his profes-
sion, described himself " Editor and part proprietor of the
Scotsman" and Mr. J. H. M'Gowan, writer in Dumfries,
who in the last general election was agent for Mr. Noel
in the Dumfries burghs, and was agent for Sir Sydney
Waterlow in the county in his second unsuccessful contest
in March 1869. All the other Scotch witnesses came to
194 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTARY
speak to points, chiefly single points of fact, raised in the
evidence of those two witnesses. Mr. Otto, Lord Lothian's
factor, and Mr. W. Scott, a tenant of Lord Lothian, whose
lease being about to expire in 1870 is not to be renewed,
spoke to a statement of Mr. Eussel about the refusal to
renew this lease in which it is clear that Lord Lothian was
greatly misrepresented. Mr. J, Kennedy, a tenant-farmer
of Dumfriesshire, Captain Yorstoun, a Dumfriesshire resi-
dent, and Provost Harkuess, of Dumfries, contradicted
points in Mr. M'Gowan's valuable evidence. The most
careful and conscientious may fall into error, and it may
be admitted that these three gentlemen have pointed out
some errors in some of Mr. M'Gowan's specific statements,
but much that is valuable remains uncontradicted, and all
indeed that is of substantial value in the Scotch evidence
taken by the Committee is in Mr. M'Gowan's evidence.
Mr. M'Gowan spoke from special knowledge acquired
by practical experience in elections in Dumfries county
and burghs, and it is this which gives value to his evi-
dence. Mr. Eussel appears to have been called as a repre-
sentative of all Scotland, and his information is certainly
as sHght as it is general.
As Mr. Eussel was the first witness, I will speak of him
first. He thinks that "corruption is almost entirely un-
known in a pecuniary form, and certainly it is not on the
increase." In municipal elections he " never heard of a
single case ever being suspected in any burgh." As to
undue influence exercised by customers on tradesmen, he
" would say that the shopkeepers are rather masters of the
situation now in the towns." There has been only one
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 195
case of unseating on the score of corruption in Scotland
since 1832 [the Falkirk Burghs, 1857]. There was only
one petition charging corruption that he can remember
after the general election of last year. " That was at
Greenock, but the Judge threw it out ; it was some very
small charge about whisky." Voters in burghs are apt
to be afraid of losing custom or employment, "but it is
generally their own idea, I think, rather than any threat,
in the burghs." He does not know very much more about
the city of Edinburgh elections than others. " There are
plenty of people to work them in Edinburgh without me,
but I know a good deal about them. I think, although
they have lately gone against the way I wished, they
are entirely free from anything like corruption. Of
course, importunity, deception, and things like that may
have been brought to bear, but not corruption certainly."
He would not at all admit the absence of intimidation in
counties. In the burghs " there is a little, but it is getting
very small now." He thinks this is because for twenty
years there have been no contests between political
parties in burghs, but he admits that there have been
plenty of contests between individuals. He scarcely
thinks, however, that the nmnicipal inhabitants in burghs
take as warm a part in contests between individuals
as they would if they turned on politics. He thinks
intimidation decidedly on the decrease in all burghs, large
or small, especially with the upper classes. But not
so in counties ; he has had a good deal of experience in
county elections ; and in the counties " there is a great
deal of intimidation in the milder form of influence or
o2
106 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTART
inducements by favours, and a great deal also by threats."
Tenant-farmers, as the lease approaches a close, are open
to a good deal of pressure. He would like to see the
Ballot introduced. He thinks then " there would be less
canvassing, especially in the counties ; it is very irritating,
the canvassing, especially by ladies." The new small
county voters introduced by the Eeform Act " were most
tremendously squeezed at the last election, especially by
ladies. . . . There was tremendous pressure brought upon
them." There were threats by ladies of withdrawing
custom, and threats carried out when the small tradesmen
voted against the ladies' wishes. " There were hundreds
of cases of that sort." It is chiefly on account of what
thus takes place in Scotch counties that he desires the
Ballot ; but he thinks the burghs would be better of it
too. He does not know what may happen with the new
constituencies. " There is a new class that has not been
well tried yet, and the practice may come of employers
coercing their workmen. We have not got that yet, but
Ave have had only one election. We can hardly say that
we have had a political contest in the burghs." The chief
advantage of the Ballot would be " its making the elections
work smoothly, and there would be less of that imtating
canvassing and hanging on people day after day." A
countess would then not sit for half a day with a level-
crossing keeper, trying to get his vote. He has had ex-
perience of elections " all over Scotland, except a little of
the west, which I do not know much about." He does not
think there would be a balance of advantage in the aboli-
tion of public nominations. " It is perhaps a little bit of
ELECTIOAS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 1!)7
sentimftiitality, but I do not like the idea of proceeding on
the hypothesis that people cannot meet together for an
important political purpose without rioting or otherwise
disgracing themselves. I do not think of an election as
something shocking or offensive to view, like an execution."
One cause of the want of disturbance at nominations in
Scotland is " that you cannot hire a mob in Scotland, and,
as I said before, the mob is all on one side." In answer
to Mr. Gathorne Hardy, the witness admitted that in
Perthshire and Fifesliire there were some mobs ; " they
were not very serious, but they were ugly." There is " a
very vile habit " of spitting on adverse voters ; the mob
does this, "just the mob." The ministers of religion use a
good deal of influence, " not like Ireland or even England,
but there is a good deal. They do not canvass the people,
but they harangue a little." They use their pulpits " in
favour of particular religious views. I do not think that
they would name a candidate. It is very slight, and on both
sides. I may mention I scarcely heard of it till the last
election. I must say that I think the clergy of the
Established Church were very shy of doing it last time :
less than before, I think." The following questions and
answers I extract entire ; Mr. Eawcett was questioner : —
" Are any elections in Scotland very expensive ? — Yes,
there have been some very expensive ones, and some very
cheap ones.
" What is one of the chief items in the expense ; is it
paid canvassers ? — No, I do not tliink it is ; conveyance
in the counties is a very expensive item.
198 SCOTCH 'ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTARY
" Is it customary in Scotland to have paid agents ? —
Yes.
" Have you ever thought it would be well to place
some restrictions on the employment of paid agents ? — I
would rather have restrictions on canvassing than on paid
agents.
" You would be in favour of restrictions on canvassing ?
— If it could be stopped, but I do not know how it could
be ; it is a tremendous evil for both sides,
" It is not at all usual to spend much upon treating in
Scotland, is it ? — No, it is quite unusual.
" And there is no increase of drunkenness either on the
nomination or the polling day ? — Not very frequently ;
perhaps there may be a little in some counties."
The witness further said with reference to expenses of
elections : —
" I may perhaps be misleading the Committee about
expenses; I do not know what you call an expensive
election. The county of ]VIid-Lothian, where about 2,000
voters polled, cost Lord Dalkeith about 4,000^. — 3/. a vote
for the votes he polled. I do not know whether that is
considered expensive or not."
What innocence, ignorance, and unconcern in a witness
picked out of all Scotland to instruct the Committee on
Scotch elections ! I have given a faithful summary of all
til at is material in Mr. Eussel's evidence. Intimidation
in counties, and the ladies very worrying; but nothing
wrong in burghs. It is true that the witness has no
special knowledge of any town, except Edinburgh, of
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1S68-9. 199
which he says he does not know very iniieli more than
of others ; and he confesses that he does not know much
about the west. Paid canvassing, he chooses to say, i.s
not a chief item of expense. He would rather restrict
canvassing than paid agents, but he does not see how
canvassing is to be stopped; and as it would be easy
to restrict paid agents, it is difficult to see why he would
work directly against canvassing, as to which he does
not see how it is to be stopped. As to expensiveness
of elections, some are expensive and some are cheap ;
but he does not know what "expensive" is; 4,000/. for
one candidate for a county where 2,000 voters polled, or
3/. a head for the candidate's own voters, seems nothing
to him. He would like to see the Ballot, as a protection
against undue influences of landlords, factors, clergymen,
and above all ladies in counties. It necessarily strikes
one as a wonderful variety of human nature that town
ladies are so harmless when county ladies are so mis-
chievous. They who were instrumental in producing Mr.
Eussel as the chief witness on Scotch elections would
hardly have been aware of the idiosyncrasy against
county ladies which has evidently absorbed his powers of
observation and thought. I am far from undervaluing the
importance of protecting him and other modest and timid
men from the terrors or temptations of females; but 1
think that the Ballot can be recommended on more
serious and stronger grounds, and that one who is not
so morbidly afraid of being squeezed by a lady or of
half a day's conversation with a countess may see in
the expensiveuess of Scotcli elections, which Mr. Eussel
200 SCOTCH ELECTIONS 4ND TEE PARITAMENTARY
seems to think of no importance, and in the "tremen-
dous " evil of paid agents which Mr. Eussel ignores, but
to characterize which I borrow his favourite epithet, matters
demanding much more serious attention than any spoken
of in this witness's flippant and imsatisfactory evidence.
The evidence given by Mr. J. H. M' Go wan, writer in
Dumfries, before the Committee, is that of a man who
really knows something, and contains valuable solid
matter. I need not dwell on that part of his evidence
which relates to undue influence in the Dumfries county
contests. The prevalence of undue influence in the Scotch
county contests of 1868 may be taken as undisputed.
Dumfriesshire and Eoxburghshire were almost exclusively
spoken of before the Committee. The present Lord
Advocate spoke out strongly and deliberately soon after
the general election, as to landlord intimidation in Wig-
townshire; and like accusations are rife as to Ayrshire,
Buteshire, and Perthshire. The Conservatives — the losing
party in Scotland — fought in most of the county fights.
In the cities and burglis the contests were in almost all
cases between Liberals. Mr. Russel's assertion that these
contests between Liberals are less keen than contests be-
tween members of opposite political parties is contrary to
all the facts, and to human nature. The exceeding keen-
ness of all the many contests between Liberals in cities
and burghs is notorious. There seems unfairness, not to
say Pharisaical hypocrisy, in gloating over Conservative
misdeeds in counties, and slmtting the eyes to Liberal
malpractices in burghs. Corrupt practices at elections
(and this term includes undue influence as well as bribery)
ELECTIOKS COMMITTEE OF 1 808-0. 2(11
are not, and have never been, confined to one political
party.
The Committee, by calling Mr. M'Gowan, obtained in-
siglit into one Scotch burgh constituency, and it is much
to be regretted that the Committee did not call witnesses
capable of giving them special and reliable information as
to other towns. There were fierce contests in Glasgow,
Dundee, Leith, Paisley, Greenock, and the Kilmarnock,
A}T, Stirling, Wick and Wigtown burghs. Why no in-
quiry in any of these cases ? A pamphlet by Mr. Chad-
wick, a defeated candidate in the Kihnarnock burghs,
suggested much for inquiry. Lord Barcaple's judgment
in the case of the Greenock petition, though affirming the
validity of the election, was also an excellent brief for an
inquiring Committee, and any one who has read that judg-
ment will know that it contains many grave strictures on
the mode in which the confirmed sitting member's election
was conducted, and that Mr. A. Eussel's account of the
petition, " It was some very small charge about whisky,"
is as misleading as most parts of his evidence.
On the subject of treating, Mr. M'Gowan stated as fol-
lows : — " That he had been engaged in several of the
previous elections in the burghs, and at the election of
1865 had had charge of one of the wards in Mr. Ewart's
interest ; that his instructions were to hold ward com-
mittee meetings nightly in one or other small public-
house, and that he believed the other ward agents had
like instructions ; that business at these meetings was
soon got through, and then drink was ordered in and
freely supplied to all comers, even until after the legal
202 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTARY
hour; that was practised extensively for three or four
different elections in Dumfries by both parties, and it
was most disgusting." In the election of 1868, Mr.
M'Gowan, acting for Mr. N'oel, was instructed by this
candidate to spend no money in treating, and to hold no
committee meetings in public-houses. Mr. Noel firmly
said that he would rather lose the election than permit
one or the other. In consequence of Mr. Noel's deter-
mination, Mr. M'Gowan says that there was no treating
on Mr. Jardine's side ; and, pointedly asked to what he
attributed the cessation of treating in the Dumfries burghs
in 1868, Mr. M'Gowan said : " I attribute it entirely to
the views of my own client, giving me instructions to
abstain from anything of the kind, and that exercised a
salutary effect on the other candidate, who was delighted
to give up the old system. Treating," he added, " is illegal,
but we should have still continued to practise it unless we
had been ordered to the contrary. On both sides it was
carried on till the last general election." Provost Harkness,
of Dumfries, who had been principal agent for Mr. Ewart
in 1865, and under whom, therefore, Mr. M'Gowan acted,
Aveut before the Committee to pick holes in Mr. M'Gowan's
evidence, but contradicted only the statement that there
were nightly ward meetings in each ward. The sys-
tematic treating he did not deny. Does any one doubt
that similar evidence would have been forthcoming from
other burghs to contradict Mr. Eussel's audacious state-
ment that expenditure on treating is very unusual in
Scotch burgh elections ? Or will any one doubt, that treating
would not liave been practised in the interest of the late
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 2(13
Mr. Ewart, of all men — one of the most delicate-minded
and public-spirited of men — if it had not been an esta-
blished and stereotyped mode of conducting elections by
agents in Scotch burghs ?
Next, as to paid agents : Mr. M'Gowan speaks of them
both in the county and in the burghs. In the county, he
says, " There was a great deal of influence used by bank
agents and lawyers, a most disgusting mode of using in-
fluence, and derogatory to all professional dignity." From
twelve to fifteen lawyers and bank agents were, he says,
on the Conservative side ; they received fees from eighty
to one hundred guineas ; " they were paid for the influence
they could exercise on their clients more than for any work
they could have done in canvassing." There being six
districts of the county, with one polling place for each,
the Conservative candidate had fifteen agents, and there
were five on the Liberal side. But it is fair to add, from
Mr. J. Kennedy's evidence, that Sir Sydney Waterlow, the
Liberal candidate, took down a staff of professional men
from London, so that he might therefore have required
fewer agents of the county. But, severely cross-examined,
Mr. M'Gowan persisted in saying of Major Walker's
fifteen agents, " That they did no work sufficient to justify
so large an expenditure, and that they were paid for their
influence more than for what they did."
So much for the county. As to the Dumfries burghs,
Mr. M'Gowan said that Mr. Jardine, who gained the elec-
tion, had thirteen paid agents, receiving each of them sums
averaging from 200/. to 300/., in a constituency of 2,379
voters ; that in three of the six burghs, numbering 1,356 of
204 SCOTCH ELECTIONS AND THE PARLIAMENTARY
the 2,379, there were as many as nine paid agents, while
Mr. M'Gowan was sole agent on Mr. Noel's side. " I
think," said Air. M'Gowan, " that the Ballot is insufficient
in itself, unless something is done to put a stop to can-
vassing by factors, and lawyers, and bank agents, who get
a fee in consideration of the influence that they bring to
bear. I should like to see canvassing entirely done away
with. It was done entirely away with on our side in the
burghs. I never saw it done before, but it was done in
our case. I think that if the Ballot were introduced, and
canvassing were done away with, we should attain to
almost absolute purity."
Mr. Noel was a perfect stranger in the burghs : " He
had never been in the town before, and knew nobody."
Mr. Jardine is a territorial magnate of the county, and has
much property in one of the burghs. What need can there
be for thirteen agents, paid with large fees, to indoctrinate
the burgh voters in the superior merits of the local candi-
date ? The almost entire absence of money bribery in
Scotch elections is ascribed by both Mr. Kussel and Mr.
M'Gowan to the spread of education. Why do these edu-
cated voters need so many writers, so highly paid, for dry-
nurses ? The work of these writers, says Mr. M'Gowan,
with an honourable pride in his profession, " is a most
disgusting mode of using influence, and derogatory to all
professional dignity."
But Mr. Eussel told the Committee that he did not
think paid canvassing was a chief item in the expense of
Scotch elections. I believe that there has been no Par-
liamentary pulilication of the returned expenses of elec-
ELECTIONS COMMITTEE OF 1868-9. 205
tions for the general election of 1868. I go back to the
published returns for the general election of 1865, and give
some information from them to show the value of IVIr.
Eussel's opinion. I find that in the Dumfries burghs in
1865, Mr. Ewart paid to agents, exclusive of tjieir travel-
ling expenses, 782/. 18s. 9d. out of a total expenditure of
1,204/. 3s. Ad. ; and that his opponent, Colonel Kennedy,
paid 443/. 10s. to agents, out of a total of 730/. 15s. Qd.
I find that in the Ayr burghs, Mr. Craufurd's payment for
agency and disbursements was 311/, 15s., out of a total
of 722/. 19s. M. ; while his opponent, Mr. Oswald, paid
1,090/. to agents, out of a total of 1,686/. 13s. M} I find
that in Glasgow, Mr. Graham paid 1,936/. 19s. to agents,
out of a total expenditure of 3,803/. 5s. Zd. ; Mr. Dalglish
329/. 2s. 9f/. to agents, out of a total of 1,506/. 7s. M. ; and
Mr. Ramsay 2,032/. 8s. M. out of a total of 3,143/. 10s. lid.
Passing to the counties, I find that in Dumbartonshire
Mr. Smollett paid 826/. 10s. lOt/. to agents and canvassers,
out of a total of 1,728/. 13s. ; and Mr. Stirling, 680/. 8s. IQd.
to agents, out of a total of 1,490/. 8s. lid In Inverness-
shire, Mr. H. Baillie paid 1,715/. Qs. 6d. to agents, out of
2,894/. 4s. 10c/. total ; and his opponent. Sir G. M. Grant,
1,275/. lis. 7d. out of a total of 2,146/. 45. lOd. In Kin-
cardineshire, Mr. Nicol paid 1,011/. 17s. lOd. to agents, out
of a total of 2,197/. 7s. 7d. ; and his opponent. Sir Thomas
^ I am informed by a gentleman who is intimately acr|uainted. with the
Ayr burghs that the Liberal opposition to the i>resent Liberal member has
invariably proceeded from the local writers, who are discontented with a
representative who has steadily refused to employ them as paid agents.
Mr. Craufurd's expenses in this direction have ahvays been much less than
those of other Scotch members.
206 SCOTCH ELECTIONS, ETC.
Gladstone, 910/. 14s. 2d,, out of a total of 1,625/. 10s. U.
And in Eenfrewsliire, Captain Speirs paid to agents
2,588/. 10s. 3f/. out of a total of 4,440/. ; and his opponent,
Sir Michael Shaw Stewart, 2,644/. 8s. 5c/, to agents, out of
a total of 4,375/. 7s. Id.
It appears, then, that paid canvassing, after all, does
make a chief item in the expenses of Scotch elections.
It is little creditable to the editor of a Liberal paper, the
Scotsman, to have gone before a Parliamentary Committee
to state what is so far from truth, and throw his shield
over a mode of conducting Scotch elections by systematic
paid canvassing, which involves corrupt influences, and,
being principally practised by writers, brings discredit on
an honourable profession.
THE END.
R. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS, BREAD STREET HILL.
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