358 Parliamentary Reform. 



laid to the rotten boroughs. To the charge that this change was an 

 inroad on the Constitution, he asked : 



" What was the theory of the Constitution ? When men talked to him of 

 the new Constitution attempted to be introduced, he asked them what was 

 the old ? Was it this that the mound of Old Sarum, or the park at Gatton, 

 should be represented ? What lawyer would dare to assert that such was 

 the old Constitution of England ? He recollected a circumstance which hap- 

 pened some years ago in one of the courts of law in Ireland. At the Union, 

 certain close boroughs were disfranchised, and, by a precedent by no means to 

 be imitated, compensation was given, not to the voters who lost their suffrages, 

 but to the patron, who arrogated to himself the right of selling them to the 

 highest bidder. The borough of Askeaton was one of them, and 13,0001. was 

 given by Parliament to Massey Dawson, as compensation. Shortly after- 

 wards, his brother, the other member, claimed half, and brought an action in 

 one of the Irish courts to recover it. No sooner had the plaintiff's counsel 

 opened his case, than the learned judge on the bench told him, that he must 

 be nonsuited ; and further added ' Sir, I have a great respect for you per- 

 sonally, but I must tell you that your client is a most audacious man to dare 

 to come into court with such an action/ And yet it afterwards appeared, 

 from a statement which he heard made in the Court of Chancery, that this 

 very judge, together with the father of the honourable member for Limerick, 

 were the trustees named in a marriage-settlement, by which it was provided 

 that the nomination to the borough of Tralee should be set aside as a pro- 

 vision for the younger children of Sir E. Dennie. And yet this was called the 

 old Constitution !" 



Having thus given with perfect fairness the leading arguments of the 

 most efficient advocate of the measure, we give, with more gratification, 

 the plain and manly view of the case supplied by Sir Robert Inglis. 

 Rising immediately after Lord John Russell's detailing his plan, and, 

 of course, without any of the advantages supplied to the subsequent 

 speakers by time for preparation, or the study of the details, one of the 

 matters on which the ministers prided themselves being their skill in 

 concealing every feature of their bill, until the moment when it was 

 brought into the House, the honourable baronet exposed himself to 

 difficulties encountered by no other speaker ; but a slight sketch of his 

 speech is the best evidence how vigorously and intelligently he was 

 fitted to cope with the question. 



He commenced by adverting to the assertion, " that now was come 

 a crisis, when the nation demanded the change in the Constitution with a 

 voice which it was impossible to resist ; or which, if any attempt were 

 made to resist, it must be at the imminent hazard of national ruin." 

 But this tone of intimidation had been adopted overhand over again, on 

 all occasions where a party called for a change in the Constitution ; it 

 had been resisted on those occasions; the menace turned out to be 

 vapour, and the Constitution survived. If so then, what was there in 

 the present circumstances of the country to make the difference ? What 

 was there to make the people of England more really anxious for 

 " Reform" now, than on other occasions? et Every man," said he, 

 " always regards his own times as the best or the worst ; he sees what is 

 before ; but he forgets, or he never knew, what is past. The conse- 

 quence is that for a succession of generations we have a succession of 

 speeches about misgovernment, unexampled decay of trade, profligate 

 expenditure, corruption, &c. &c., so like each other, that it would be 

 worth while to reprint in 1831, some of those elegies of the ruin of 

 England, only changing the date from 1731. So again, with respect to 



