Reform Act 1832

“ Yet the century which has elapsed since the accession of George III. has also witnessed occurrences not only full of exciting interest at the moment, but calculated to affect the policy of the kingdom and the condition of the people, for all future time, in a degree only second to the Revolution itself. Indeed, the change in some leading features and principles of the constitution wrought by the Reform Bill of 1832, exceeds any that were enacted by the Bill of Rights or the Act of Settlement. ”

“ There are some people who lay down a sort of mechanical test; they say the House of Lords should be at liberty to reject a measure passed by the Commons once or more, and then if the Commons send it up again and again, infer that the nation is determined. But no important practical question in real life can be uniformly settled by a fixed and formal rule in this way. This rule would prove that the Lords might have rejected the Reform Act of 1832. Whenever the nation was both excited and determined, such a rule would be an acute and dangerous political poison. ”

“ This question was not the only one on which a Conservative government, without a majority at its back, was compelled to make concessions. For some years past a growing disposition had been displayed among the more earnest Liberals to extend the provisions of the Reform Act of 1832. Lord John Russell’s ministry had been defeated in 1851 on a proposal of Locke King to place £10 householders in counties on the same footing Reform Bill, 1859. as regards the franchise as £10 householders in towns, and Lord John himself in 1854 had actually introduced a new Reform Bill. ”

“ During the generation which began with the Reform Act of 1832 the Liberals, indeed, extended the franchise to the middle classes, reformed the poor law, overhauled the criminal law, introduced a new and more satisfactory scheme of municipal administration, instituted public provision for elementary education, enacted statutes to safeguard the public health, removed the disabilities of dissenters, and assisted in the overthrow of the protective system. ”

“ The feeling attending the passage of the Reform Bill of 1832 (S582) had passed away; but now a popular agitation began which produced even greater excitement. Although the act of 1832 had equalized parliamentary representation and had enlarged the elective franchise to a very considerable degree, yet the great body of workingmen were still shut out from the right to vote. A Radical Party called the "Chartists" now arose, which undertook to secure further measures of reform.
They embodied their measures in a document called the "People's
Charter," which demanded:
1. ”

“ The Reform Bill of 1832 mocked in many directions the hopes of the people, but it at least marked a great social as well as a great political departure, and with it came the dawn of a new day to modern England. As the light broadened, the vision of poets and patriots began to be realised in practical improvements, which came home to men’s business and bosom; the standard of intelligence rose, and with it freedom of thought, and the, sometimes passionate, but more often long-suffering demand for political, social, and economic concessions to justice. ”

“ The change to which all are looking forward, has not been pressed upon the ruling powers by impetuous and formidable demonstrations of public sentiment, nor preceded by signs of widespread discontent with the working of the existing political institutions. It was thought a great thing that the Reform Bill of 1832 could be passed without an armed insurrection: to all appearance, that of 1859 will become law without having required, or occasioned, any unusual amount even of peaceful agitation. ”

“ The Chartists were sent to prison when they broke the law, their meetings were sometimes dispersed by force, and they were sometimes shot dead in the course of riots. For several years after the Reform Act the Whig Government was engaged in watching and suppressing political agitation almost as regularly as the Tories before it. But more than one important economic reform was carried through Parliament about the same time, and conferred considerable benefits upon the common people. One was the Act of 1834, which reconstructed the Poor Law system. ”

“ The bill also greatly increased the number of electors by extending the right of voting to all persons owning or leasing property of a certain value. We can scarcely exaggerate the importance of this Reform Bill.
CHARTISM: THE REVOLUTIONARY YEAR OF 1848.—But while the Reform bill of 1832 was almost revolutionary in the principle it established, it went only a little way in the application of the principle. It admitted to the franchise the middle classes only. The great laboring class were given no part in the government. ”

“ It turned the scale for many years, and just enabled the Liberal party to carry a series of measures in harmony with intelligent public opinion. It was a tree of justice and freedom that bore abundant fruit. It is hardly too much to affirm that every great law under which we are now living and working was made or amended in the quarter of a century which followed the Reform Act, and is due to the Liberal party. ”

“ His biographer rashly denies the reality of those dangers, and says, that the Reform Act has not produced any of the calamities which his lordship then saw in such ominous prospect. But to this the natural answer is, that the Reform Bill is little more than a dozen years old; that though the power of property in so great a country as England, and the voice of common sense in a country of such general and solid knowledge, could not be extinguished at once; and though the national character forbade our following the example and the rapidity of a French revolution ”

“ It is quite impossible for me, having been one who brought forward the measure of reform, who feel bound by the declarations then made, to take any part in these large measures of reconstruction, or to consent to the repeal of the Reform Act, without being guilty of what I think would be a breach of faith towards those with whom I was then acting. If the people of England are not of that mind they may reject me. ”

“ Agitation was begun for the reform of this corrupt and farcical system of representation. The contest between the Whigs and the Tories, or Liberals and Conservatives, was long and bitter. The Conservatives of course opposed all reform. Bill after bill was introduced into Parliament to correct the evil, but most of these, after having passed the Commons, were lost in the House of Lords. At last the public feeling became so strong and violent that the lords were forced to yield, and the Reform Bill of 1832 became a law. ”

“ It would indeed be a dead letter if the constituency of England returned anti-reformers—men who had exerted all their power to prevent reform in the church, the law, and the state. The Reform Bill would prove no good to the country unless they returned to Parliament, which the King’s writ had just issued to assemble, men prepared to carry out into beneficial effect ulterior measures, which its framers and supporters contemplated, when by their efforts it became the law of the land. (Cheers.) ”

“ The speech of Lord John Russell, when on March 1, 1831, he introduced the first Reform Bill, opened a debate which practically lasted until June 5, 1832. The Whig ministry knew that the fate of their party depended upon that of the Bill, and they came to realize that the fate of the dynasty itself might depend upon the same thing. The Opposition were no less desirous of victory, seeing in the Bill a measure which threatened the prosperity of the people and the very existence of the State. ”

“ The Reformers were the first to propose covertly and insidiously, a great and important [389] change in the Reform Bill. What did they mean by first bringing in a Bill which was based on perpetuating the rights of freemen and recognising them as an integral part of the Constitution, and now, within three years, bringing in another intending to deprive them of their rights? Was not this a precedent for breaking up the final settlement, which might be followed on future occasions? Might not another Ministry deem it for their advantage to extinguish the £10 electors? ”

“ Under a reformed system we should not see, as we now often see, the nation repealing Acts of Parliament as fast as we and the Lords can pass them. As I believe that the Reform Bill would produce this blessed and salutary concord, so I fear that the rejection of the Reform Bill, if that rejection should be considered as final, will aggravate the evil which I have been describing to an unprecedented, to a terrible extent. ”

“ That the widespread misery which existed in England after 1832, as the result of the excessive increase of our population and the failure alike of law and of philanthropy to keep pace with the exigencies of a vast industrial growth, should have been so quietly borne, proves how great was the success of the Reform Bill as a measure of conciliation between Government and people. ”

“ But the debates on the Reform Act of 1867 hardly tell anything. They are taken up with technicalities as to the ratepayers and the compound householder. Nobody in the country knew what was being done. I happened at the time to visit a purely agricultural and Conservative county, and I asked the local Tories, "Do you understand this Reform Bill? Do you know that your Conservative Government has brought in a Bill far more Radical than any former Bill, and that it is very likely to be passed?" ”

“ A national constitution is the act of the people antecedent to government; a government cannot therefore determine or alter the organic law it temporarily represents. Pitt's bill to reform Parliament involves the absurdity of trusting an admittedly vitiated body to reform itself. The judges are to sit in their own case. "The right of reform is in the nation in its original character, and the constitutional method would be by a general convention elected for the purpose." ”

“ Was there anything so peculiar in the nature of those bodies of freemen, or in the rights which they possessed, as to induce us to retain and perpetuate them? He knew of nothing of the kind. If this had been simply a question of altering the constituency fixed by the Reform Bill, though he thought the freemen as a body more liable to corruption than other classes of voters, he would have been for retaining them; but now that they were constructing; a new corporate right, with a view to the better government of towns, it was necessary to remodel the body. ”

“ Borough would be dragged into Parliament in requital for borough, and the result would be a series of angry retaliations, or of disgraceful compromises. We do not hesitate to avow our belief, that the operation of gradual reforms, advised by Lord John Russell, would take up at least one-third of the time of the House of Commons for the next twenty years, and, after all, disappoint the intentions of its author, by driving Parliament to some much larger measure than any it has yet seriously entertained. The last Reform Act was a summary, a severe, and, in some respects, a final measure. ”

“ The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun under the Republican administration, should be completed by the further extension of the reform system, already established by law, to all the grades of the service to which it is applicable. The spirit and purpose of the reform should be observed in all executive appointments, and all laws at variance with the object of existing reform legislation should be repealed, to the end that the dangers to free institutions which lurk in the power of official patronage may be wisely and effectively avoided. ”

“ But although still menaced, we felt it to be our duty to recommend to her Majesty to introduce the question of reform when the Parliament of 1859 met; and how were we, except in that spirit of compromise which is the principal characteristic of our political system, how could we introduce a Reform Bill after that election, without in some degree considering the possibility of lowering the borough franchise? ”

“ The exposure of the evils of the system, which was made in the report of the famous Poor Law Commission appointed in 1832, and the attempt to abolish them by the provisions of the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834, ought to be studied by every citizen who desires to perform his full duty as a guardian of public interests, and especially by every individual whose sympathies lead him to undertake any practical effort for the amelioration of pauperism. ”

“ The statement that democracy has advanced and will advance, is sometimes taken to be fatalistic. People who make the assertion may answer for themselves. I should answer, as I think we should all answer now, that the advance of democracy, desirable or undesirable, depended upon causes far too deep and general to be permanently affected by any Reform Bill. It was only one aspect of vast social changes which had been going on for centuries; and to propose to stop it by throwing out the Reform Bill was like proposing to stop a child's growth by forcing him to go on wearing his long clothes. ”

“ How many peers, it is not necessary to state—it has not even been stated, by the noble Lords opposite: it is enough to say, a sufficient number to force the Reform Bill through the House. It is only necessary for me to state the proposition. If this be a legal and constitutional course of conduct—if such projects can be carried into execution by a minister of the crown with impunity—there is no doubt that the constitution of this House and of this country is at an end. ”

“ A two thirds vote of each house is necessary to propose an amendment. Not more than one article at a time can be amended, and the same article not oftener than once in four years. Finally, a majority of those voting at an election is required to adopt an amendment. [13] As a result, many reforms that depend upon amending the constitution are practically at a standstill. The advocates of different amendments block each other. The friends of the initiative and the referendum prevent the reform of the general property tax and vice versa. Each demands the right of way. ”