[clxvii. 127]

1821 April 1

Rid Yourselves.

'.11. To Ultramarians, share in Spanish Constitution worthless

1. In the first place, under the Code, no such system of representation can they have.

2. In the next place, if they had exactly such a system of your's, still no adequate protection would it afford to them: no use could it be of to them against your Representatives and your other rulers. For, in pecuniary matters your common interest, and thus the interest of your representatives and your rulers being in a state of not irrevocable opposition, as you have seen, to that of their Ultramarian provinces, to that of each of them, and all of them, /at the outset, and so on for an indefinite length of time/ as the Spanish votes would outnumber the Ultramarians all together, no /effective/ protection would the Code with its constitution afford to them, against a system of taxation which, as against their own if not, as it most certainly would be, itself would in their eyes be excessive.

3. In the next place if taken altogether, in Your Cortes the Ultramarian Deputies outnumbered /were to outnumber/ the Spanish Deputies, still against any such disproportion to their disadvantage no adequate protection would the Code with its Constitution afford to them. For you have seen how effectually prostrate your /the/ Code has laid all the Representations of the people at the feet of corruptive influence: how sure at the hands /certainly in its nature/ of a constantly effective majority of them it has rendered /served/ an adequate corresponding stock /mass/ of corrupt obsequiousness: and as whatsoever were gained from any part of Ultramaria, would to some to themselves and other persons so much more nearly connected with them in point of interest than the Ultramarians, it is to the prejudice of the Ultramarians much more than to that of you Spaniards, that this /such/ corruptive influence would be made to operate.

Governorships, Intendantships, lucrative Judicial officers, lucrative Ecclesiastical Offices /all having Ultramaria for their [...?] - all these benefices would in the hands of your Ministers and Your Counsellors of State be so many instruments of purchase employed.