date

3 Dec r 1809 '.4 Parl y Reform
3 Dec r 1809 '.4

Parl y Reform

Influence

Ch.1. Explanations

'.4 Corruption

(7 or before) 1

2?

In every instance of corruption there are two parts noted: that of the corruptor /him by whom/, and that of him who is corrupted /to whom the matter of corruption is administered/. These two parts there will be frequent occasion to distinguish: in the one case /on the one part/ the corruption has been said to be active; in the other, passive.

Even in /where the corruption is of/ the active kind, the part taken by the corruptor is in many if not most instances such as in the stage[?] may be termed inactive: [...?] to produce whatever effect can be aimed at by the corruption it is not /may perhaps never be/ necessary that on his part any explicit discourse or deportment /active line of conduct/ should be uttered /exhibited/, that in a word any thing should be done.

When by corruption the effect it aims at is produced, it is by means of a particular species contract of a particular species entered into for that purpose.

In point of possibility /the nature of the case/ this, like any other contract, is, in respect of the course taken for the communication between mind and mind, capable alike of being either[?] express or implied. Express however, this like many other sorts of contracts it scarce ever is in point of practice.

When a man bespeaks of his shoemaker a pair of shoes, what he says to him make me another pair of shoes: what he does not say to him is - and when you have sent them to me together with your bill, I will pay you, as I have been used to do, the fair value. This would be superfluous a mere waste of words.
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  • Title: [4 Dec r 1809 Parl y Reform]
    Description: 4 Dec r 1809

    Parl y Reform

    Influence

    Ch.1: Explanations

    '.4 Corruption

    2

    3

    Still less does the shoemaker say to the customer - yes: you shall have the shoes: but it is on condition that you engage to pay me, and not otherwise. This would be not only superfluous but affirmative.

    Where on any given occasion, in virtue of some relative situation between two parties, though obsequiousness takes place of its own accord /spontaneously/, such obsequiousness may be in any degree undue, and mischievous, there is neither need nor room /place/ for any act of corruption - for corruption on the active side.

    But in the obsequiousness consisting the mischievous effect /consists all the mischief/ and the whole of the mischievous effect, the state of mind on the part of the obsequious person, is not the better for the absence of corruption in this sense, but all the worse. On the part of the other /another/ party in the situation of corruptor were an act necessary, no act of corruption no act of obsequiousness - {that is in the case of undue obsequiousness on the part of a trustee, no breach of trust} and thence where the obsequious party is a trustee and the act of obsequiousness undue because {the} prejudicial to the trust no breach of trust.

    The cause of the corruption, and that a sufficient and efficient one is in the situation, the mutual and relative situation itself. In the instance /On the part/ of the corrupted person The corruption is but the more constant and the more sure, because there is no need of any act by any other person to produce it.
  • Title: [4 Dec 1809 Parl y Ref m Influence]
    Description: 4 Dec 1809

    Parl y Ref m

    Influence

    '. Dependence how produced

    4

    Though by a single benefit received and conferred and received all at once no dependence is not produced, yet by two or more such benefits it may happen that dependence /corrupt dependence/ shall be produced.

    But in this case the production of the dependence depends upon the production of hope, looking to benefit from the same source. Hope in the /some corrupted/ breast looking to the receipt of future benefits from the same corrupting hand.

    In the natural course of things, and in default of special grounds for the contrary expectation, as between protector and protegé, every good benefit is considered as a pledge and earnest of future benefits, howsoever indeterminate and contingent, as about to flow into the same reservoir from the same source.

    If on my first coming into a new neighbourhood I send for a shoemaker in the same street, and after having been /after being/ measured bespoke of him a pair of shoes, by this transaction, a hope of my custom in future is naturally excited in {my} /his/ breast, and in a degree correspondent to the expected value of my custom, he is by this transaction placed in my dependence.

    If instead of thus dealing with a shoemaker to whom I am known, I drop into a Yorkshire warehouse where I am not known, and there with ready money, and without making myself known buy and carry with me a pair of shoes ready made, by this transaction I create not in the breast of the master of the shop any such dependence.
  • Title: [4 Dec 1809 Parl y Ref m Influence]
    Description: 4 Dec 1809

    Parl y Ref m

    Influence

    '. Dependence how created

    5

    But if after having bought my pair of shoes at the warehouse, it happens to me to drop in to the same warehouse once more and there to buy another pair of shoes, the master at the same time recognizing me as one who on a former occasion had been his customer, an /a particular/ expectation, how slight so ever, of future custom, of finding in me, who am thus become known to him a future customer in future begins to be raised in his breast: the expectation the hope strengthened, and with it whatsoever degree of dependence it is in the nature of a profit in trade so circumstanced to create.