date

[clxvii. 90] 1821 March 23
[clxvii. 90]

1821 March 23

Rid Yourselves

Anti Constitut.

2. Corruptive influence

Such the transparency of the mask, by any other ingredient, could any addition be made to it? If there were, an Article such as the following might furnish it.

In the same manner says Article 130) they can not during the continuance of their deputation, nor for a year next ensuing the last instance of the exercise of their functions, obtain for themselves or solicit for another, either pension or dignity (condecoracion) which is conferred by the King. Now suppose the wording to have been thus - where would have been the difference this same meaning expressed in these other words. At the expiration of a year next after the last exercise of the functions of a Cortes, every Member may obtain for himself - ever Member may solicit for another any pension and any dignity which it belongs to the King to confer to the obtainment of which the signature /concurrence/ of the King is necessary the Kings grant or concurrence is necessary. What shall we /will you/ say of the discernment of the penner of this clause? what will you say of his sincerity? licence intended /granted/, prohibition pretended.

Here then is a supreme legislative body, composed of Members who may be every one of them on the point and with the assured expectation of being provided not only with lucrative offices to any amount held during the Kings absolute pleasure H but with pensions to any amount held likewise during the same Royal pleasure! And this political body is the Assembly by which the sole controul /check/ is to be applied, by which the government /nation/ can be prevented from running full speed into the gulph of despotism out of which it has so lately and by such extraordinary exertions been recovered! /drawn up!/

HQuere? [...?]

Note to p.5

"Empleo del Rey". What are they - the employments which by these words were meant to be understood /designated/? Those alone in the instance of which the manifestation of the Kings single will (as attested suppose by his signature is sufficient? or those likewise, in which the giving effect to such his will requires the concurrence of another /some/ other person, namely one of the seven Ministers? or those in the instance of which he does but choose one individual out of several those for instance presented to him by this or that other authority - say by the Council of State, as per Art. 171, 237 Say the Cortes, as per Article 233. For the purpose at present in hand an observation to this effect is /was/ hardly worth mentioning: but with a view to the logic of legislative penmanship it may perhaps be not altogether without its use.
Similar Items
  • Title: [1820. Aug 18 Emancipation Spanish]
    Description: 1820. Aug 18

    Emancipation Spanish  Discarded?

    Summary

    '.5 Corruptive influence

     Omitt what follows in these two sheets?

    Observe now /As to/ the provision made against corruptive influence by the Constitution as it stands.

    "During the period of his deputation" (says Art. 129) "no deputy can admit of for himself, or solicit for another any employment or grant from the King, nor any degree of increased rank, as there must be no step-ladder in his respective career."

    "He can not" (says the next Art. 130) "during the period of his deputation, and one year afterwards, obtain for himself, nor solicit for another, any pension or dignity whatever, that may proceed from a grant of the King."

    Spaniards I am no advocate for corrupt influence but as you see an enemy to it. An enemy to it: and in this character it appears to me that I am opposing /proposing/ no small obstacle to it, by humbly proposing as I venture to do, that these two articles should as soon as may be, be erased /repealed/. Why? Because in my view of them, instead of opposing the effect of them I do no say the design is to give license and establishment to this same influence.

    What I had been expecting to have found was - that at no time of his life should any member of the Cortes be permitted to accept of any "employment" pension or dignity at such hands In that case, what would have been my remark?

    of a provision to any such effect the object is to induce on the part of the people at large a persuasion that if in the instance of the minor functionary in question he has the obtainment or solicitation has not proved, his conduct as not at the /by the/ hands of the chief functionary been made to swerve from the path of duty by corruptive influence: in a word that such non-obtainment coupled with such non-solicitation is conclusive evidence of incorruption. If such evidence were justly conclusive, all suspicion would be needless and injurious. Unfortunately in the case in question so far from being conclusive, these circumstances are not worth a straw in the character of evidence of any such apparently purifying provisions, the only effect therefore is to lull suspicion asleep, and to cause a set of men who are perhaps every one of them corrupted, to be regarded every one of them pure.

    The professed object of it is to prevent the effect of all such influence. The effect of which
  • Title: [[clxvii. 81] 1820. Aug. 9.]
    Description: [clxvii. 81]

    1820. Aug. 9.

    Rid yourselves of Ultramaria

    '5. Corruptive influence.

    "watchful to extend the bounds of their prerogatives, and to advance their power, had, by places and pensions judiciously bestowed, maintained a corrupt influence in the popular assembly; for, as we have already seen, when giving a description of Toledo, the Junta insisted that the representatives of the Commons should be paid by their Constituents, and receive neither place nor pension from the Crown.

    "Yet, notwithstanding all that could be offered to the avarice or to the ambition of the members, the Cortes, ever troublesome in representing grievances, and difficult to manage, occasioned such embarrassment to the Kings and to their ministers, that, not desirous of listening to complaints, they were tardy in their application to this intractable assembly, and never, but from absolute necessity, issued a proclamation for calling them together."

    As, under the existing Constitution, as the King can not carry on the business of Government without the concurrence of the Cortes, the consequence is - that from any coercive power, capable of being exercised by the King or his advisers - exercised either over the people at large, or over their representatives in the Cortes,- they can not, during the existence of this same Constitution, have any thing to apprehend. At the same time, in the hands of those same advisers - in the hands of the Council of State, in conjunction with his own, the whole expenditure of government, together with the disposal of Ecclesiastical and judicial power, in all their branches, and administrative and executive power, in all their highest branches, together with factitious dignity in all its shapes. Upon the breasts of the representatives of the people in Cortes, without need of so much as a word said in this view by any body to any body, will the aggregate mass of all these instruments of felicity be operating in the character of matter of corruptive influence.

    In a mixt monarchy, at any given point of time, the greater the quantity is of the matter of corruptive influence which is lodged in such hands, in which it operates of itself to that effect, the nearer is the period at which, pure despotism, if not anticipated by revolution, will have been reestablished. By the dominion in question, if kept or attempted to be kept, the quantity of the matter can not but receive an enormous encrease: an encrease to the amount of which no determinate limits can be assigned. Even in the first instance it could scarcely fail to be more than equal to the quantity to which it would constitute an addition. For, as above shewn, ('.2) the population of America exceeds already the population of Spain: and, being so much more dispersed, it will, on that account, present a demand for a correspondently greater number of functionaries.

    Under
  • Title: [1820 Aug. 9 Emancipation Spanish]
    Description: 1820 Aug. 9

    Emancipation Spanish

    Summary

    Corruptive influence

    Townsend

    In the following passage in Spanish history, as referred to by

    Townsend may be seen a series of events by which an illustration of the above

    observations may be presented to Spanish eyes. In the first place the existence of

    the matter of corruptive influence in the hands in question, and its operation on the

    /a/ Cortes; in the next place the resistance, which, before the quantity of it had

    swollen to a certain pitch, was capable of being opposed to it and the obstruction

    applied by that resistance to the consummation of despotism; and lastly the removal

    of that obstruction by the encrease given to the dominion of that King of Spain, whose more common appellation is the Emperor Charles the fifth.

    Townsend II. 261 I. 319: 2 d edition: "It appears,

    by the 5th. article in the requisitions of the Santa

    Junta, (a) that the reigning Monarchs, ever watchful to

    extend the bounds of their prerogatives, and to advance their power, had, by places

    and pensions judiciously bestowed, maintained a corrupt influence in the popular

    assembly; for as we have already seen, when giving a description of Toledo, the Junta insisted that the representatives of the Commons

    should be paid by their constituents, and receive neither place nor pension from the

    Crown.

    "Yet, notwithstanding all that could be offered to the avarice or to

    the ambition of the members, the Cortes, ever troublesome in representing grievances,

    and difficult to manage, occasioned such embarrassment to the kings and to their

    ministers, that, not desirous of listening to complaints, they were tardy in their

    application to this intractable assembly, and never but from absolute necessity

    issued a proclamation for calling them together."

    As, under the existing Constitution, as the King can not carry on the

    business of government without the concurrence of the Cortes, the consequence is -

    that from any coercive power, capable of being exercised by the King or his

    Advisers,- exercised either over the people at large or over their representatives in

    the Cortes,- they can not during the existence of this same Constitution have any

    thing to apprehend. At the same time, in the hands of those same Advisers - in the

    hands of the Council of State, in conjunction with his own is lodged the whole

    expenditure of government, together with the disposal of Ecclesiastical and Judicial

    power in all their branches, and administrative and executive power in all their

    highest branches, together with factitious dignity in all its shapes. Upon the

    breasts of the representatives of the people in Cortes, without need of so much as a

    word, said in this view by any body to any body, will the aggregate mass of all these

    instruments of felicity, be operating in the character of matter of corruptive

    influence.

    Note (a)

    (a) viz. of Castile, addressed to the Emperor Charles 5 th as King of Spain A o 1520 or thereabouts.

    Townsend I. 319. 2 d edit. This Santa

    Junta was "an assembly composed of the Deputies of all the Cities." The

    disregard shewn to the above requisitions produced a civil war, which after

    continuing two and twenty months, ended by the surrender of Toledo to the King, A o 1522, in consequence of the defection of the Ecclesiastics and

    the Nobles: "and thus" (says Townsend I. 320.) "the Nobles in Spain, as in all other

    countries, rather than give liberty to the people, submitted to receive the yoke"