what chances the present system gives to objectors, to the disadvantage of electors.

At the recent revision at Liverpool, so extraordinary a number of objections were made by the Tories, that, at the conclusion of the revision, 5,000 objections remained undisposed of!!! The law provides that the revision shall commence on the 1st of October, and conclude on the 15th of that month. The court sat for fifteen days: yet all was labor in vain; for eventually they had to fall back upon the list of 1839. The Mayor of Liverpool in closing the court with propriety observed; A legislative measure 'must, in my opinion, be applied to remedy a grievance so great as that which, for fifteen days, we have endured. It is not possi'ble to revise a list of objections so indiscriminately made on this 'occasion as to exceed 7000 names; and I do hope and trust that, in future, either by making the objector pay costs where the ob'jection shall be deemed frivolous and vexatious, or by some other plan, the evil of which we have all so just cause to complain may 'be removed.' His worship submitted the matter to the town clerk, and the following is the opinion of that officer upon the unprecedented circumstances of the case;-an opinion which appears to be consistent with the law:

Being called upon by the worshipful the Mayor, as the Town-clerk, to advise him as to the course which, according to law, he ought to pursue with regard to the list of burgesses now before him, I submit my opinion as follows:-The revision has now proceeded from the 1st of the month to this day, the 15th, inclusive. It commenced with a list of 14,417 names,-a list of 607 claimants in addition,—and a list of objections to 7303 names of the 14,417; and now, after having proceeded the full period allowed by law, save only so much of this day as would be barely sufficient to complete the requisite formalities, there remain of cases of objection unheard 5000, interspersed over the various pages of the list. The whole list is not revised;-what is required to be done by the act is not done ;-the list is in point of fact imperfect and informal. The question then is, whether his worship can carry into effect the following provision part of the 18th section of the Municipal Corporations' Act: And the Mayor shall, in open court, write his initials against the names respectively struck out or inserted, and against any party of the said lists in which any mistakes shall have been corrected, and shall sign his name to every page of the several lists so settled.' If his worship should sign every page of this list he must certify 5000 cases as revised when not one of them has been before the court. In order to be prepared to advise his worship on the present state of things, which for some days past has been expected, I have availed myself of the opinions of eminent counsel,— amongst them Sir Frederick Pollock and Mr. Wightman,—and all

• Vide Liverpool Mercury.

whom I have consulted concur in the opinion, that his worship ought not to sign a list under these circumstances. The consequence will be that, in the opinion of all the counsel whom I have advised with, no burgess roll can be founded upon this list, and the provision of the Municipal Amendment Act, 1 Victoria, c. 78, s. 6, will attach. That enactment is as follows:- And be it enacted, that in every borough in which, by reason of any neglect or informality, a new burgess roll of the said borough shall not have been duly made in any year within the time directed by the said act, the burgess roll which was in force before the time appointed for the revision shall continue in force until such new burgess roll shall have been duly made.' As to my own opinion I at first considered this case one of difficulty; but after the fullest consideration I now entertain a decided opinion that the only proper course is for the Mayor not to sign the list; and that the consequence must be that the burgess roll of last year will continue in force: which opinion I give to his worship under all the responsibility that can attach to it.'

Town-hall, Oct. 15th, 1840.

R. RADCLIFFE, Town-clerk.

The result was that several hundred qualified electors were disfranchised. Yet the Tories boast of triumphs,' achieved in this manner! The same party pursued a similar course at Leeds, and brought matters to the same issue. The result is, that 1300 persons, who would have possessed the franchise if the revision had been completed, have been disfranchised!!! No one can peruse the speech of the Mayor of Leeds without astonishment and indignation:

'Our powers (said his worship) have now ceased by effluxion of time, and it is hardly necessary for me to announce to you that the Court has not been able to get through the revision so as to complete the new burgess roll. This has been caused by the very great unparalleled number of objections and claims which have been brought forward. The claims might very well have been got through, if this great number of objections had not been made, for by a statement which I now hold in my hand, being an analysis of the revision that has taken place in the first five wards, I have to announce to you that the number of objections substantiated is very small indeed. In those wards containing objections, there have not been one hundred made good. (Loud cries of shame, shame.') This is my opinion, and, as I think it will appear to every one who is disposed to consider the matter, is a very reckless abuse of the privilege which is allowed by law. Had it not been for that, as I have before said, the revision would have been got through, and the new roll made out; but as it is I presume that the next election of counsellors for the borough must take place on the roll of the last year. There will be disfranchised in

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* Vide Leeds Mercury,

the five wards which have been gone through upwards of thirteen hundred persons who would have possessed the franchise if this revision had been completed.'

Lord John Russell may be considered the parent of the Municipal Corporation Act :-will he be content to leave it in its present imperfect and anomalous condition? If the practices we have described, which grow up and are fostered by the present system, are not put an end to, the whole municipal power of the country will become vested in the hands of the Tories; and the poor population of our cities and boroughs will be rendered reckless and depraved. Lord John Russell owes it to himself and the country to bring the subject before Parliament in the ensuing session. Let us now turn our attention to the practices which prevail during the canvass and election.

III. It is impossible to witness the scenes at a municipal election without feelings of intense disgust. One set of candidates canvass the wards, leaving the impression that there is no other candidate in the field. An advantage is thus gained over their opponents; for when once promises have been made, many electors will not retract them. The next step is to open houses, where all comers are supplied with pipes and ale. These houses are nightly visited by the candidates, who sit with the company and often carouse with them till midnight! Punch and ale are administered freely-every nerve is strained ;-customers canvass their tradesmen. Those who have promised their votes, are urged to violate their promises, and vote for the other party: and those who cannot be induced to do so, are entreated to go out of the way, and not vote as they originally promised. Banners and music increase the excitement; and the canvass may well be described, in the words of the Rev. Sydney Smith as, the ten 'days dominion of Mammon and Belial!' The most venal are directly bribed; and others are set down' as messengers, runners, and canvassers. In many places it is impossible to carry on a contested election without employing a large number of the latter class; who, being labouring and working men, say that they cannot give up their days' work without compensation. Thus the present system of voting begets canvassing, and canvassing begets practices unfavourable to the independence of electors. The day of election comes on; and, excepting the bathing in horse-ponds, the hootings, duckings, and fractures of olden times, we have every evil attending parliamentary elections in operation. Business commences with general breakfasts supplied gratuitously. To those breakfasts, the Tories invite all those voters who are about to split between both parties; i. e. give one vote to a Liberal, and the other to a Tory. As votes are delivered by voting papers, in the municipal system, an effort is made, at those breakfasts, to change the voting papers. A Tory agent asks

a voter to allow him to see if his voting paper is correctly filled up :-the agent says 'It is all right;' and slips back a paper, in which the names of the two Tory candidates are inserted, instead of the Liberal and Tory candidates!! Some are unable to read, and in the excitement of the first rush to the poll, it is almost impossible in any case, to detect the trick. Again: Tory agents lie in wait for stray voters;-invite them into public houses; and while they ply them with liquor, make alterations and erasures in their papers. These are the methods by which the Tories succeed; and at victories achieved by such degrading means, sounds of exultation ring through the land! The manoeuvres of Liverpool and Leeds are celebrated as conservative triumphs;' and changes effected by force of bribery, are pointed to as evidence of reaction in public opinion!

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Without dwelling longer upon scenes which are familiar to many of our readers, and can readily be imagined by all, we shall advert to the last of the four points, which we proposed more especially to notice.

IV. The mode of voting at municipal elections.

The votes are taken by a most defective method of BALLOT. It is not an open, viva-voce mode of voting; nor is it secret. It, in some cases, certainly protects a voter from sudden ebullitions of mob-wrath; but it does not keep him safe from his employer, or his customer, nor protect him from the vengeance of the Tory party, which is steady as the march of time, and keen as the 'scent of death.' It affords facilities to fraud, as we have already demonstrated; and gives security to the briber that the voter will fulfil his corrupt contract. A correct account of the polling is taken from the voting papers by the town clerk, which is open to public inspection. The voter, therefore, knows if he does not vote according to his bargain, that he will receive no pay. The presiding alderman, too, at the polling place of each ward, inspects each paper; and partizans, thus presiding, are known to smile on, bow to, and even say, 'thank you sir,' to the voter who has voted in conformity with his wishes. There is a Ballot box on the table, but it is useless; as there is a spy set on the electors, who intimates by his manner the direction of the votes, so correctly, that an account of the poll is published every hour! The British public are already aware of the cases of intimidation which occur at our city and county elections; when landlords, who think, with the Duke of Newcastle, that they have a right 'to do what they like with their own,' order their tenants to the hustings and dictate to their tradesmen; but they have as yet no adequate conception of the petty tyranny, narrowed into wards and parishes, and enforced upon householders of every grade, by residents inflamed by jealousy and resolved upon revenge. The irritation of parliamentary elections subsides after a time; and there

is no one interested in maintaining a system of unrelenting local persecution. But the case is different in municipal affairs. The persons offended reside in the parish or ward with the offenders; the cause of offence recurs every year!!! These considerations, it cannot be denied, are of the very highest importance; and it is to be hoped, that those who are opposed to the application of the BALLOT to the parliamentary elections, will feel them sufficiently forcible to induce them to concede the protecting influence of that shield of liberty to the householders entrusted with the election of the municipal councillors. What independence of spirit can bear up against daily frowns from wealthy neighbours,-rebukes, and sarcasms, and desertions on the part of customers,-studied exclusion from every local trust of importance-the imposition of disagreeable offices? How many are there who can exert freewill when the director of the bank asks a favor? and who is there that does not feel alarm when it is hinted that at the next revision, all the cunning of the Tory objectors, and all the acumen of the Tory attorneys, will be levelled against his vote? In many cases, overseers, churchwardens, and tax collectors pay their earliest visits to the houses of those poor men who have opposed the Tory candidate, and hector their families; in others, mechanics are dismissed from their employment. If a man votes against the Tories, he loses present rewards and future prospects; and gains their implacable enmity. Under these circumstances the will is not free. Under this state of things it is a matter of human impossibility that men can make an unbiassed and independent choice.

Let us then, have a system of real and genuine BALLOT established at municipal elections. Nothing else can cure these evils. Mr. Grote's admirable Ballot box, has now for some years been before the public, and no one has ever ventured to assert that it does not insure perfect secresy. Let us have this Ballot box then, in every municipal polling place in England; and let the present absurd method of voting be exploded! We call upon the friends of free election, both in and out of parliament, to press the demand for the Ballot, at municipal elections, upon the legislature. They cannot refuse to yield it, in this case; and if it proves successful in municipal elections,— as assuredly it will,-then, as a matter of necessity, it will be applied to ALL ELECTIONS. The friends of Ballot as a principle, and the friends of democratic municipal institutions must, therefore, unite and call for its adoption. The municipal corporation act can produce no salutary fruit without it. The more we reflect upon the circumstances of the country, and upon the principle of secret voting, the more we feel persuaded of the necessity of its application to them. The reform act is imperfect without it :without it, the municipal system will be a scourge in the hands