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- f PAfiUAIEKTASY JOTTINGS.…

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f PAfiUAIEKTASY JOTTINGS. |, WE had a variety of business on the paper for ^th Houses of Parliament to discuss during the r week of May, bat nothing occupies the M>lie mind so much as the Reform BilJ.. On this P°mt the campaign to the Government has beer; ^duous, the fortunes of war have been variable: 20me great eaptafcis have been beatea, and have their defeat; others have failed in moving roisters, and have retired like Achilles from the Another contest was promised us on the ode of enfranchising the compound householder. m 0r 110 ref°rm or no reform—nay, for many extinction or existence, it was said, waited on I a 6 issue of Mr. Hodgkinson's amendment. Post- ^ed day after day, th.s came before the committee 11 Friday, and a crowded House met, expecting a division, iri. ^hich, for a third time during 6 present month, the fate of Ministers was-tofoe ^(aded. —v before noticing the debate upojrEKs particular Jening, it may be necessary, perhaps, to explain f5 some of my readers what a compoand house- V' W reall-v is* Uritii the queatfon was brought the House the members generally appeared "atirel ignorant of the existence of such persons, ?<* I am firmly convinced that when Mr. Disraeli ^lBa8elf introduced the present Reform Bill he had ever studied the peculiarities of such house- °'aerg. I asked an M.P. the other day, "What ia compound householder?" He replied, "I don't but it seems a bugbear to the Govern- "Ch and so it was for a time, but the ftQcellor of the Exchequer appears to have got hnUi What is the compound house- h a' ^en,? 1^50, Sir William Clay intro jr.Ce<* a bill into Parliament which passed both of }?S8Sj an<^ became law. This made all occupiers l0]?Usea rat''<i at and under compound house- g ?era > at is to say, it makts the landlords of jj .,oc^npiers the persons responsible to the r i. ^0r the rates incident on their occupation, Acg provides that the rates payable by ij^^dlords shall be three-fourths of the rates 1 'dent on their occupation, but that the land- y* shall be liable to this contract rate whether tenements be occupied or not. In other tb a ra^e be levied at a shilling in pound, the landlord compounding for the rates small tenements shall pay no more than nine- •v iece in the pound on their rateable value. This the 8 worke<^ particularly well in large towns; Ce Parochial authorities, even with the 25 per lif tJin ^scount, have received more money value 4,? wher.i the responsibility fell upon the tenant. ja and working men prefer pajing the rates 4 Jea 1 r Weekly rents to giving it in a lump half- j-t V- 'In'admitting the compound householder aE 0franchise Mr. Disraeli first proposed that OQl-fc ant wh° chos^e could put his name down ?at ra^e"books, but would have to pay the full w^ereas he could only deduct from bis w 75 per cent: thus he was "fined"—as if, ]:I re-threepence in every shilling for the .jVUegQ of exercising the franchise. This the b off"186 would not Bubinitto. Then the Chancellor c]JQe Exchequer suggested that every tenant who dp^1116^ right should pay the full rating and bei w^0'e from his landlord, the latter helng empowered to lessen his contract for one j, 'j.186 or several, as the case may be, and so ^r&M- any responsibility. Mr. Bright, Snff an<^ °^htrs went in for pure household einl a^6' the Government adhered to the prin- ,Ple of their bill—" personal rating." It-, was »lown that the- Small ^Tenements Act", was ptionaUy adopted, and although in Manchester II 4114 Birmingham there were thousands of com- ^ound householders, in Sheffield and Stockport were none.. On Friday the compound question was opened j s a different shape. In Clause 3 of the Eepre- &t&tion of the People Bill, Mr. Hodgkin»oa th Ve^ as an amend meut, "That no person other the occupier shall be rated to parochial rates }• of premises occupied by him within the a Parliamentary borough, all Acts to the ^ptrary not withstanding." He said this proposi- ti? was not inconsistent with the principle of the p and might well be accepted by the d ov-ernment. If Stockport and Sheffield could Without compounding, he did not see Jay Manchester and Birmingham could not. was tantamount to doing away with compound householder altogether, the dif- £ as a friend remarked to me, between Disraeli s clause and the amendment is this, that the one says the tenant may be placed on the a an<i become entitled to his vote, and the ^endment sajs he shall." Mr. Gladstone now j n°SeJ and in most conciliatory language aeked the overnment to accept this amendment, which wpnld extend the franchise far beyond the limits any provisoes hitherto introduced. He called ( t, pon Minifiters emphatically to consider the ques- "On- "Here was now an opportunity for them- ) Perhaps the last that would offer-of peace and Loncord in the settlement of the Reform question. et them consider that the Government of this ^nntry went beyond the walls of that house, ( Mien, on a vital question of this kind, the people fQt in thousands in every part of the country Or the purpose of protesting against the pto- ceedings of Parliament." Mr. Bass, of bitter beer celebrity, supported the amendment, and then all were on the tiptoe of anxiety to hear "hat Ministers would say. Mr. Diaraeli. rose 4mid cheers; he had a smile upon his face, he ^ttiled upon his friends around him, he smiled at Mr. Dodson, and he stniled on the Opposition, and, addressing the chair, said, "Mr. Dodsoa, really sir, I should like to carry out the principle of this bill; in our original scheme the Ge- vernment introduced a similar provision to this, but on consideration we came to the conclusion Uiat it would so encumber the ship as to imperil jtae voyage* we therefore struck it out." He further said that he should offer no opposition to the proviso. It was exactly one of those questions that the House should decide. But it was a subject which would be best dealt with by separate legislatioo, nd if the amendment were withdrawn he would Undertake to bring in a bill to carry out the object of the a.mendment. They had made dark allusions to the state of the country, which it was said was n a state of great dissausfacbion, but he did not Relieve in anything of the kind. This was a sur- prise to the whole House. Mr. Sandford, Mr. iieresford Hope, and others sitting beside Lord Granborne, aeemed electrified; even the Attorney- general in a few words conveyed a notion T-hat Mr. Disraeli had gone beyond the sentiments ot his own party. The Opposition seemed ready to shake hands with the Chancellor of the Exche- quer Mr. Gladstone looked nonplussed; Mr. Bright left the House; it was a decision they did Hot expect. Mr. T. Chambers, the member for Marylebone, applauded the Government to the fkies, and said he would be ready to support them "pon every division. Even Mr. Bernal Osborne W¡¡s dumbfeunded, and thought he was dreaming; 4za after abusing the lawyers, especially Mr. phambers, thinking there were too many of them Ili comparison to common-sense men in that liouse, ftdvised the members to leave their case in .b.e hands of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who, in his opinion, was the greatest radical in the House; and he sarcastically remarked that he believed that Mr. Disraeli would not only settle She Eeforna question, but that of the Irish Church, :11 conjunction with Liberals which sat on the opposition side of the House. After sonae further discussion the question was Monday, when, instead of a bill upon the subject- *> i" '¡ ° ah. the clauc-e was to be altered to meet the views of the House. MR. LOWE'S ATTACK UPON THE GOVERN. MENT. When the House met" on "Monday; all appeared smooth with the Reform Bill. Mr. Disraeli's statements were received with,' cheers when he announced the death and Burial of the compound householder. It appeared such plain sailing for the Government, that the Chancellor ouhe Exche- quer said he would on Thursday state the course which it was proposed to take with the bill in order to get it quickly into the House of Lords. But all was not to be quite, unruffled. When the Chairman put the question that the 3rd clause stand part of the bill, up rose Mr. Lowe and gave the House a speech,, the tone of which, was cheered by the present Ministers last year when in Opposition, £ ut>. the taunts of the riglit" hon, gentleman were iiow'as bitter against the present Government as they were formerly against Eitri Russell's Administration. He suggested that the whole of clause three, in which was embodied the borough franchise, should be reprinted for further consideration. He said that until a fe^ minutes ago it was impossible for the House to know whiit the clause meant; but now for the ,first time be heard from the Chancellor of t^e Exchequer^own lips that it meant household suffrage with the admission of any one who chose to call himself a lodger. He admired the dexterity of the leader ot the House, who, in bringing his party up to house- hold suffrage, reminded him of the*plan adopted to conquer a shy horse. There may be a lamp-post, a mile-post, or a perambulator which the animal will not pass, so the groom or master takes him gently up, walks him round the object, shows him what is the real cause of his fright, and makes him touch it if he can; and then, when the process has been repeated often enough, he hopes to get the creature to pass it quietly. Now, this was the process the right hon. gentleman, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, had adopted with his own party, and he had done it—not privately and secretly, but in the eight of the whole country and the whole empire. He only hoped the party liked it, and trusted that the publicity given to the world that their master had been placing with them for the last three months until he got them in the right humour would? be elevating to their minds. In a similar strain to this Mr. Lowe for some time launched solemn warnings against democracy, and stated that household suffra,ge would soon lead us to this. Then, turn- ing his white head and diminutive eyes to the Ministerial benches, said, emphatically, I am not the' least surprised that the fertile genius I see opposite me has hit upon this scheme there is nothing-new in it; ih has ever been a part of the tactics of an oligarchy to ally itself to the lower sections Of a democracy. It was so in the ,course of the French Revolution, and it is re-, corded over and over again in the annals of other countries. I say, I am not the least surprised at this; but what I am surprised at is that you, the gentlemen of England; you, with all you have at stake; you, with your ancestry behind you and your posterity before you, with your great estates, with your titles, with your honour, with your state of every kind, with the amount of imperial prosperity and happiness, of dignity and honour, which you have enjoyed for the last 200 years, such as never before fell to the lot of any class in the world-—that you, ,will fiingl111 this away without, as far as I can see, .the shadow of an equivalent of any kind. Do you loolc for au equivalent in any personal good ? Your interests are diametrically opposed to the course you are pursuing. Is it for the good of your country? Have you so totally u.nlear.trt..tKe simplest lessons as to believe that it is by going into the dept-hs of poverty and ignorance that we are to find the wisdom to manage the delicate affairs of this great empire? I believe you have; and by so doing you have branded yourself with a stigma that your party can never escape from." In his manly, practical fashion, Mr. Henley. pointed out the logical inevitability of the point at which the borough suffrage had 'arrived; and the Govern- ment appeared to be content to leave the defence of the clause in his hands, for the rest of the dis- cussion was left to protesting Conservatives of the third or fourth degree, of whom Sir Riinald Knightley- who let o Lit that he and the rest of his party were" whipped" up on Friday to oppose Mr, Hodgkinson's amendment, and were proportion- ately astonished at its prompt acceptance by their leader—Mr. Baillie Cochrane, Mr. Beresford Hope, and Mr. Sohreiber were specimens. These gentle- men delayed the passing of the clause for a while, but at length it was finally incorporated in the measure, and the few members who remained to witness the formal operation cheered lustily. Space will not permit me to dwell upon Mr. Mill and his Female Franchise. It was humorously received and humorously replied to by various members, and eventually Mr. Mill found seventy- three members to vote with him; but as 196 were opposed to him, the word person" could not be si) bstituted for "man."

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