date

1[?] Jan y 1810 Parl y Reform
1[?] Jan y 1810

Parl y Reform

1 '.4.

Ch.12. IV Bribery of [...?]

'.4.

'.4. Mischief to Bribe giver's mind

10

1

'.4. Mischief to the Bribe giver's mind.

{For shortness this section may vie with one /a chapter/ of Montesquieu.}

If the conduct of him by whom, for a vote /given/ on a particular occasion given, given in a "dry and sordid" shape is received as scandalous, need {the state of} his mind in respect thereof reputed /deemed and taken/ tainted and contaminated, the mind of him by whom the "dry and sordid matter" is administered, will not it is perceived be to be found in a state very distinguishably /clearly/ /in any very high degree/ different?

Of what quality so ever the effect be which is produced or endeavoured to be produced , the concurrence /action/ of both these agents is employed in or towards the production of it.

But the situation of the bribes being /is/ that of donor, and the situation of the person bribed /corrupted/ being that of one who at his hands has received /receives/ a benefit - the briber /corruptor/ the person in whose breast the design which is brought to bear originated being moreover the corruptor, the situation of the corrupted party seems in general to be considered as being of the two the most scandalous, that of the corrupt or the least scandalous.

Much however in this as in all other cases depends upon "greatness of character" and "height of situation": insomuch that, if in the case in question the predicament /behaviour/ of him to whom the bribe /matter of corruption/ is administered be of the two commonly deemed and taken to be the more scandalous, that of him by whom it is administered the less scandalous, and the "taint and contamination" of the mind less deep and dark coloured, it is only because, and therefore in so far as the person by whom the said matter of corruption is administered is more apt to belong to the class of great characters than to the class of humans[?], or other little ones.
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    Diffusion of scandal their state of mind, see[?]

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    Of any considerable mischief of this description the non-entity may already to some eyes appear sufficiently established. But let us endeavour to make sure.

    When the shape in which the matter of corruption is applied is pecuniary or quasi-pecuniary consisting of money or money's worth and the amount of it liquidated. Money, as a sum of ,50 or money's worth, as a suit of cloathes, (a) in any such case the matter of corruption so administered receiving in common language the appellation of a bribe, and for a traffic of any kind to receive a bribe is universally understood to be an immoral act: the mind of the agent being therefore in this case conscious of his having committed an immoral act is by such evil consciousness " tainted and contaminated". But even in that case we have seen how slight the taint is, and how easily worked out by approved detersives with which the dispensatory is well provided.

    But when /if/, at law the shape in which the matter of corruption is applied in any one of those refined shapes in which in common conception it is not understood to come under the denomination of a bribe, as when of the endeavour to produce the parliamentary result, mischievous or not mischievous, the object or expectation is to serve a friend with or without the expectation of being on some similar occasion served by him in the same way, in this case there being no such evil conscience no "dry or sordid matter" to gall and afflict the conscience[?], there is no such " taint or contamination".

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    The complaint, if I mistake /misrecollect/ not, was Sir Robert Walpole's, that he was forced /found himself obliged/ to bribe men meaning Members of Parliament /Parliament men/, to make them do even their duty. In /Out of/ this complaint he made an apology, or rather a justification. The complaint served for an apology or rather a justification. For how is government to go forward or society to be kept together if government duty is not done? But whether it did or did not amount to a full justification, at any rate if any person there be to whom it appears that in the eyes /sight/ of the Minister himself it bore that character, to that person it can hardly appear that by the giving way to so imperious a necessity any very deep "taint or contamination" could have been imprinted on so Right Honorable a mind.

    But of whether either in the character of an apology or in the character of a justification the observation had any justice in it in the mouth of Sir Robert Walpole, it is difficult not to suppose but that the practice must not unfrequently present itself in the same justifiable or at least venial light to any other person whose lot should have placed him under the yoke of the like unpleasant necessity. And so often in whatever number of instances it shall have happened that this view of the matter, correct or incorrect, shall have presented itself, really and bonâ fide presented itself, to the /our/ bribe-giver's mind, in the same number of instances must it have happened that whatsoever spot may have imprinted itself in the intellectual part of his mind must there have stopped, without reaching the moral part of it.
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    Of our five species of parliamentary corruption there remains but one more, and that is, delivery of a vote for a corrupt consideration, in which though corrupt be composed of a benefit to be received by the Member in some shape or other for himself or some other person or persons connected with him by some such "virtuous" tie as that of "friendship or affection" is not in such sort determinate and liquidated and determinate, as to present to view any of that dry and sordid matter towards which the aversion of our Right Honourable Censor is so unconquerable, nor therefore to come in one short word under the denomination of a bribe. Of the genus parliamentary corruption or [...?] the essential character /characteristic/ is the dry and sordid matter so often spoken of, and in the one species of parliamentary corruption none of this dry and sordid matter being according to the description here given of it to be found the consequence is that in the thought the[?] system of the /our/ Right Honourable Censor /Naturalist/, no the genus parliamentary corruption nor consequently in his black book, alias otherwise present his seat of disreputableness no place for it is to be found.