date

[129b-416] 22 Mar. 1817 Plan
[129b-416]

22 Mar. 1817

Plan Cat

2 o

Introd

§.11. Seat Traffic

II. Absorption certain

3

To the reader {of Old Mortality’s[?] the popinjay} to him whose acquaintance with French customs has brought it under his view, the cocapus, best of the how[?] the cocapus may serve to pourtray the situation to which in this country the C – r General is indebted for so large a portion of his power. What the {popinjay was or is to the sharp shooters what the} cocapus was or is or was to the scramblers, the pile /pyramid/ round which the assemblage of bribes royal is kept suspended above /over/ and in view of all heads is to the band /squad/ of corruptionists corruption hunters and corruption hunters To engage men in the pursuit no particular invitation applied individually to individuals can ever be necessary: permission – general and even universal permission is quite sufficient Permission if in the most general head /terms/ nor even that expressed by words. There stands the pile with the popinjay at /hanging from the/ top of it, shoot at it who will /list[?]/: there stands /rears its head/ the pyramid with the assortment of bribes royal all around it, scramble for it who will. Of the scramble for ribbons a view has been given by the historian of /biographer of Captain/ Gullian[?]: but a ribbon is but one out of the vast number of objects of concupiscence with which the cocapi of the Corrupter General is bedecked.
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    {Unhappily the means of making addition to the number of seats filled by persons listed /men engaged/ in the service of misrule /C| |r General/ are not confined to the hands of the /his/ official are not confined to the class /gang/ /fellowship/ of corruption-eaters. Equally numerous – or still more so may be expected to be the class of corruption hunters. Taken both together, the aggregate body of those two classes will naturally be much more numerous than that of the Whigs and Peoplesmen taken together. Here then on the side of those whose force is employed in swelling the mingled tide of waste and corruption the number of bidders for the seats as they come upon sale is likely to be greater than on the side of those whose force is with more or less sincerity and energy, employed in the endeavour to stem that overwhelming tide.}

    {Moreover having in imagination /before their eyes/ a prospect more or less near and inviting of a share of /in/ the spoil – of being admitted into the class of corruption-eaters, the value of a seat will in the eyes of the corruption-hunters the value of a seat will naturally by the difference between the estimated value of the whole of their prospects compared with the estimated value of the whole of the Whig prospects be greater in the eyes of the corruption hunters who have the game already in view than in those of the Whigs who have it not as yet in view: for as to the People’smen, countered[?] as such, no value, pecuniary or quasi-pecuniary can it have in their eyes. A People’sman belongs not to the hunt.}
  • Title: [[129b-430] 16 April 1817 Plan]
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    To this part of the plan of moderate reform of a moderate reform it can with propriety be said to belong the following observations present themselves

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    2. That by leaving untracked it confirms and establishes that principle which in a preceding Section has been shewn to be in a state of irreconciliable opposition to probity and justice and common sense.

    3. That to the case of such corruptionists as are as yet but corruption hunters it has no immediate application: at the same time that to this same case is /will/ any adequate remedy applied /so formed/ by either of the two remaining heads of proposed arrangement as above mentioned.

    No application has it to the case of any one of the following classes of corruption-hunters, viz

    1. Peerage-hunters

    2. Baronetage-hunters

    3. Ribbon-hunters

    4 Corruption hunters in whose instance the object of choice is either money /pecuniary profit/ in the shape of office, pecuniary profit in any other of the infinitely miscellaneous various shapes in which from the source in question pecuniary profit may be derived: d o in whose instance in that shape or any of the /those/ three other shapes profit may be derived to and to the immediate benefit of relations, friends and dependants.

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    3 Official persons belonging to the department of the Law, perhaps: - but this remains to be explained.
  • Title: [[129b-415] 20 Mar. 1817 Plan]
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    20 Mar. 1817

    Plan Cat

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    Introd

    §.10. Seat Traffic

    11. Absorption

    2

    Quere[?] as to futurity purchased into. Castlereaghs[?] cuts[?] the next presentation, improbable[?] as to the advowson. Seats /Advowsons/ bought by Tories may be expected to continue. But, no certainty here

    The stack of the […?] suffice and will always suffice to add to the scramblers as long[?] as there can be need of.

    On this occasion the difference between the case of the next presentation and the case of the advowson must not be out of mind. Principally be terrorism – by the power exercised by the constraint over the dealer – Some seats the Treasury has been said to have the advowson of: of the advowson the purchase does not seem well adapted to the situation of the C – r General. Of himself and by himself few indeed are the businesses that can be carried on by him: and this is not of the number: what in this way is done for his use must be done by other hands. Of himself he is indeed a corporation sole. But as yet no Minister is a corporation sole: Neither is the Treasury nor any other Board a corporation aggregate To the purpose here in question viz. the possession of land or burgage tenements. True it is that here and there a seat may be found so circumstanced that of the votes by which it is filled the majority are in general at his disposal. But the power by which this effect is secured is principally the sort of power by which a great influence rules his dealers.

    Under these circumstances, the representative by whom whether as proprietor of the advowson, nominee of such proprietor, or by purchase made of the next presentation or by him /one/ whose nominee he is the sort of person on whom with most convenience the situation of Corrupter General enables him to operate in the way of influence: and as in this case, by a /the/ sort of persuader[?] which there has already been sent frequent occasion to bring to view, effect may be and is produced without action, hence so it is that by a mode at once so commodious, so sure, and so all comprehensive, all need of resorting to modes less commodious is /may be regarded as/ superseded.