1818 Dec. r 9

Parl

Principles

Beginning

§.1. Misrule

20

Anti Reformist. But of these same Electors suppose a majority each having a separate

personal interest of his own distinct from and opposite to the interests of the

minority to confederate together and concurr in giving to the aggregate sinister

interest thus composed an advantage such as that the interest of some one or more or

even of all together of the interests of the minority is sacrificed by it?

Reformist. If by the Electors of no more than one Representative – if by the

majority of this body of Electors and no other, the confederacy is entered into it is

a confederacy without an object: for supposing the supposed unapt and mischievously

/treacherously/ disposed Representative chosen, still towards the supposed desired

sacrifice still if this be all nothing can /will/ be done.

Suppose seats in any number thus mischievously /unaptly/ filled still if that number

be not so great as a majority nothing will be done.

Unless therefore the number of seats thus filled be a majority of the whole number

of seats no effect can in this way be produced. But if the number of seats thus

filled does amount to a majority of the whole number of seats, then is the interest

thus supported not any interest opposite to the interest of the majority of all the

members of the community, but that very interest itself.
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  • Title: [1818 Dec. r 11 ┴ Parl. Reform Bill]
    Description: 1818 Dec. r 11 ┴

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    Beginning

    §.1. Misrule when necessary

    21

    Anti-Reformist. True, if in the choice of the several integral and particular

    confederated interests the confederates are wise: {wise though it be only in their

    own generation that they are so wise.}

    But may it not be /happen/ that they are unwise? In the choice of his own personal

    interest, in a case where no other person’s interest is at state every man is apt to

    be unwise: every man acting for himself by himself: and therefore with at least

    equal, not to say greater probability every man while thus acting for himself, in a

    confederacy with the others acting for themselves.

    Reformist. Doubtless. But to allow /admitt/ this possibility is no more than to

    allow that wisdom, perfect wisdom, belongs not to our[?] imperfect creatures

    But the question here is – not concerning an absolutely and perfectly good

    government and form of government, for that is unattainable: his only concerning[?] a

    comparatively good government: the objects of comparison being on the one part /hand/

    Monarchy, or Aristocracy, or both together, on the other part /hand/ Representative

    Democracy with virtually universal suffrage /a scheme of representation, far[?]

    /real/ and adequate/.

    The sacrifice thus supposed to be made by a deficiency in the article of wisdom –

    this sacrifice of real to imaginary to erroneously imagined interest is incident to

    every man, and therefore to every form of government.
  • Title: [1818 March 25 + C 1819 Nov. 9. Not now]
    Description: 1818 March 25 + C 1819 Nov. 9. Not now

    Parl. Ref. Bill

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    IV. Eligible – who

    § 2 Qualification no other

    1. Foreigners

    1

    1

    In the constitution as it stands if a vote in one form receives correction it is by vote in another: aristocratical tyranny from fraud and insincerity

    Note Difference between absolute and comparative majority how influenced

    Number of the candidates

    Unless a hint were put to the number of Candidates, for the sake of confusion and Non-Election thousands or neither might be proposed and offer themselves

    Question 1. Why is no special qualification proposed to be required.

    Answer Because any such principle of exclusion is needless and being needless is by reason of the complications involved in it, pernicious.

    Question 2. Why needless?

    Answer. Because there is not any the smallest probability /it is not presumable /probable// that any number of seats capable of affording the means of actual mischief would be filled by persons more palpably /mischievously/ unfit for the trust than many others whom no manifest principle of exclusion could exclude.

    To take the strongest case suppose a foreigner chosen and that foreigner a subject in a state of actual hostility with our own state. What probability is there, that to the prejudice /exclusion/ of the whole number of their fellow countrymen in so much as a single Election District the majority of the Electors would under the here proposed Plan of Representation /Delegation/ concurr in the making of such a choice? Yet might a considerable number of men so circumstanced be chosen and being chosen sit and act, and yet no real ill consequence ensue.

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  • Title: [1818 Dec. 24 Parl. Reform Bill]
    Description: 1818 Dec. 24

    Parl. Reform Bill

    Dialogue II

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    Evils & Remedies

    I Evils

    31

    12

    Anti-Reformist: Act[?] Office-bearers[?]? Custom House officers, Excise men?

    Corruptionists, as you call them, - the whole lists of them?

    Reformist. O yes; even were they more than they are The case is – facts not words

    are what I look to: realities not professions and make-believes: substance, not made

    show. For all practical purposes, so long as they can not be so in reality, evils

    which are so but in tendency, are no evils are thrown /I throw/ out of the account:

    just as you would fractions of a farthing in a pecuniary account. Appeals to the

    public at large out of the question even in the House itself, a minority, supposing

    it to remain always a minority – a minority though it wanted but two to be a

    majority, would produce no effect at all consequently no evil effect: it would be but

    a fraction and that an inoperative one. In the case of the aggregate number of voters

    in an Election District, a minority be it ever so large an one, is still more

    palpably ineffective: it is but a minute fraction of that same inoperative fraction.

    The whole tribe /list/ of these seemingly objectionable persons suppose them to

    combine and a together and to be disposed to vote on the same side – not that this

    could ever happen: how many seats would they be able to fill? Disposed as they would

    be, probably not one. But suppose them to fill a dozen: what would that signify? Just

    nothing. But they would not do any such thing. First, because they would not all

    agree. Secondly because being so dispersed /dispersed as they/, they would produce no

    considerable effect upon the poll any where. 3. Because it being made impossible for

    any man to know which way they gave their votes, they would be altogether exempt from

    the only sinister influence by which voters can be acted upon in the considerable

    numbers in numbers capable of giving an effectual support to a general system of

    misrule.