date

1818 June 23 Parl. Reform Bill
1818 June 23

Parl. Reform Bill

Prefat

Advantage recommend not

3

Not so the Whigs. In this article such as it is, it is impossible to them not to be

feeling /experiencing/ on every occasion an object of annoyance. But the use of it

not being less necessary to them than to their more factional /overbearing/

opponents, hence[?] it is that the person itself and the only antidote to it and that

a most effectual /indisputable/ one are inveighed at: inveighed at perhaps in the

same breath.

Before me lies a Whig Newspaper: on the Wednesday influence a bad /sad/ thing: a sad

obstacle to /in the way of/ the otherwise indubitable success of one of his heroes

But Two days before this in this same paper and in this case too as in the former

from the mouth /pen/ of the Editor comes /had come/ out a prose Epigram in which the

ballot /secresy of suffrage/ is consigned to scorn, and to render it the more

poignant it is put into the mouth of the second Bill

Had the ballot been in use I should have I should have had the seat without fail –

how often have I not /will you not/ heard the observation from a Whig mouth. Well

then this security for free suffrage would you wish to see it adopted /in actual use/

and applied to every seat? Oh no, that’s another thing.

Why not wish to see it adopted? Because so sure as it were, so sure would it kill[?]

all influences. Now /of influence/ there are two sorts of influence: there is

sinister influence and there is legitimate influence. Sinister influence is the

influence that is employed against us: this is bad, and ought to be destroyed.

Legitimate influence is the influence that is employed for us. This is good: and so

good that the salvation of the country depends upon the preservation of it.
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    9 continued. Ah poor silly creatures! they have a sad /sad is/ propensity to betray themselves. Give them freedom in any shape they are sure to be the worse for it: freedom of conscience, freedom of suffrage freedom of choice in every shape. Every thing should be chosen for their betters: religion, by the Bishops: votes by Tories, and Whigs: not forgetting the Reviewer who seeing what bad use they would make of freedom is at all this pains in the hope of keeping it for ever out of their hands.
  • Title: [+ 1819 Oct. 10 Parl. Reform Bill.]
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    §.5

    §.8

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    Go to Westmoreland! Go to Cumberland! according to his conscience! To vote according to conscience! /learn there how good and joyful it is, brethren to vote according to conscience! how sad a thing to vote against conscience! how wicked a thing to force men to it!/ Good: but how? by voting out of the sight of tyrants? of tyrants on one side, as well as on the other? Oh no, that would be “wild and visionary, absurd, visionary, and senseless”: practice in America is not practice: never could any a man have thought of such a thing, had he been as conversant with men as with books.

    When the subject many – when Peoplesmen have condemned secresy of suffrage, it has been for want of thought: when the ruling few – when Tories and Whigs – condemn /have condemned/ secresy of suffrage, it has been from the result of thought: when the others have condemned it, it has been because they knew so well.

    Suffrage, open or secret: say which of the two you will have? This question – this is the spear of Ithuriel. At the touch of it, with not less agony than the most outrageous Tory, the Parliamentary Whig writhes.

    Say secret suffrage – secresy of suffrage. Do not say ballot. Election may be by ballot, and yet no secresy. Such will of course be the case, wherever the design is that the secresy professed shall not be preserved. Matters are so contrived that there is no secresy, and then you are told there can be none.

    When a Whig Candidate solicits a vote, the only answer need be this question. In and out of Parliament, will you do your utmost to procure Election in the secret mode? If he declines or remains silent – Go hypocrite! the most undisguised advocate of despotism is less profligate than you. Such should be his dismissal. – What? Is it to ambition such as yours, that the bread of my family and of so many hundreds of families is to be made a sacrifice? Is this your patriotism? Yes: knowingly and wittingly, you and those you act with, are either among the creators, or among the preservers of all the evil you profess to lament.
  • Title: [1819 Oct. 8. Parl. Reform Bill.]
    Description: 1819 Oct. 8.

    Parl. Reform Bill.

    Reasons

    §.5

    §.8

    Art Secresy of suffrage

    II Oppression or Conclusion

    3

    Never does a man lose an election /the loss of an Election take place/, but the seductive influence of the adversary is the cause: the seductive influence, partly in the corruptive, partly in the intimidative shape: but more particularly the intimidative that being the more tragical[?] shape, by which the image of men’s antipathies and through antipathies sympathies are most stirred.

    Well them will you have both excluded at once? will you have the secret substituted to the open mode? Oh no – not so: for then would the influence of property would be removed /excluded/ altogether: the influence of property the legitimate influence: for all influence howsoever irresistibly intimidative: all intimidative influence which is the influence of property is legitimate. Issuing from this source is Intimidative influence absolutely bad? Oh no: it is bad or good according as it is applied. Applied in favour /support/ of the Tories /a Tory/ – oh yes says a Whig it is bad indeed: applied in favour /support/ of a Whig is it then bad? Oh no, nothing can be better: it is employed /operates/ in favour of men of probity, and the only men who are so. Whatever is most bad if acted against us and ours, is most good if acted in support of us and ours. /is most good./ We are the salt of the earth. Not measures but mine are to be regarded. We are the only men: the only men who deserve the name. This is one grand maxim: this is one creed.

    See Fox’s History. : and Earl Greys speech in his motion on the State of Nation June 1810.

    Suffrage open or secret: say which you will have? This question – this is the spear of Ithuriel. At the touch of it, with not less agony than the most outrageous Tory, the Parliamentary Whig writhes.