on the Union, some violent speeches were delivered. Plunket talked of " the villany of Government." With the exception of Plunket, none of the greater actors took part in the discussion. Mr. Dobbs made an extraordinary harangue. He repeated his arguments against the Union, founded on the Book of Daniel and the Revelation. He declared his confident expectation of the speedy appearance of the Messiah as a temporal prince at Armagh. Entertaining these ideas, he was not alarmed at the progress of a Bill which he detested, as he was convinced it never would be operative.

After the Bill was read a third time in the Commons, it was carried up to the Peers by Lord Castlereagh. On its second reading in the Upper House Lords Farnham and Bellamont proposed some clauses which were negatived. It was then committed. It passed the committee without amendment, was reported in due form, and after an uninteresting debate, was read a third time and passed on the 13th of June by a majority of twentyseven, the voting being forty-one to fourteen. The Royal assent was given on the 1st of August, the anniversary of the accession of the House of Brunswick to the British crown. The next day the Lord-Lieutenant put an end to the session with a Speech from the Throne.

CHAPTER VIII.

Accusations against the Government.-Compensation to the proprietors of boroughs.-Bestowal of peerages.-Alleged interference with the right of petitioning-Dismissal of Government officials.

"PARLIAMENTARY reform," said Pitt in 1785, on introducing his scheme in the British House of Commons, "could only be brought about by two means, by an act of power, or by an adequate consideration which might induce bodies or individuals to part with rights which they considered as a species of valuable inheritance or of personal property. To a reform by violence he, and, he was sensible, many others, had an insurmountable objection, but he considered a reform in the representation of the people an object of such value and importance that he did not hesitate in his own mind to propose and to recommend to the House the establishment of a fund for the purpose of purchasing the franchise of such boroughs as might be induced to accept it under the circumstances which he had mentioned." Pitt's proposal was to raise the sum of one million to purchase from thirty-six boroughs their right of returning members, and to distribute the seats

1

1 Cobbett, Parl. Hist. xxv. 442.

A HISTORY OF THE LEGISLATIVE UNION.

179

thus acquired among the counties and populous towns. The sum proposed to be raised for the purchase of seats would have provided upwards of 27,000l. for each borough. But Pitt thought that this price was likely to be considered inadequate, for his plan further provided that, if any of the boroughs considered his offer insufficient, the money should go on accumulating until it reached an amount which would enable the Government to propose such terms as could not be refused. This scheme of Pitt's was approved and supported by, amongst many others, the high-minded Wilberforce.

Fifteen years afterwards, at the time of the Union, Pitt did not hesitate to offer to the proprietors of Irish boroughs terms of compensation for the loss of their rights, but their compensation was settled upon a much lower scale than that proposed for English proprietors. The Irish scheme was regulated by the then market value of such property, which was about 16,000l. for a borough and 8,000l. for a half borough, as all the Irish places returned two representatives. In 1797 the price of a borough was, as Grattan informs us, from 14,000l. to 16,000l., and their value was rapidly rising.1

The growth of a private interest in Parliament and the practice of buying and selling the privilege of legislation were undoubtedly repugnant to the spirit and theory of representative government. But the ownership of boroughs had grown up insensibly, and they had long been looked upon and treated as private property.

1 "It is known that the price of boroughs is from 14,000l. to 16,000l., and has in the course of not many years increased onethird."-Address to the citizens of Dublin, 1797.

2

It has always been a characteristic of the English mind to pay regard to vested rights, if these rights have acquired strength from the custom of generations and the tacit acquiescence of the public. The dispensation of justice in a country affects all the subjects, and can never be regarded as the source of private advantage, yet when the heritable jurisdictions in Scotland were abolished, full compensation was granted to the individuals whose interests were affected.1 In the case of the Irish boroughs it must be remembered that, as Grattan tells us, many of these had been originally granted by the crown to individuals as private property distinctly. It is easy to see how the system of granting some boroughs to individuals as private possessions begot the idea that others might be legally acquired. We have seen that Grattan himself, who declaimed so often against borough ownership, purchased seats on two occasions. This custom was as general in England as in Ireland, and it did not excite any feeling of repugnance in that kingdom at this time. Many English statesmen believed that the system of private nomination to seats in Parliament was a good one, and pointed, as an argument in its favour, to its results. History informs us of a long line of distinguished men who owed to this custom their first introduction into public life. The names of many such will at once recur to our readers. We need only mention

1 A sum of 161,000l. was paid on the abolition of these jurisdictions.

2 "Most of the forty boroughs created by James were so. It appears from the grants themselves that they were intended to be private property."-Parl. Reg. xiii. 160.

some of these names: the great Lord Chatham, Pitt, Burke, Canning, Fox, Wyndham, Brougham, Sir Samuel Romilly, Lord North, Lord Granville, and the Marquis Wellesley in England; and Flood, Grattan and Plunket in Ireland. The system may have been bad in Ireland, but it was quite as bad in England, and infinitely worse in Scotland. In England 371 members out of 513 were nominated by the Government, by peers, and In Scotland there was not a single free seat, the whole of the Scotch members, forty-five in number, being nominated by peers or influential commoners.1

commoners.

It has been objected that no compensation whatever should have been allowed to the proprietors of Irish boroughs, inasmuch as the return of members to Parliament is a public trust. It is hard to understand this squeamish delicacy of feeling in a generation which has witnessed the disestablishment of the Irish Church, and the payment of large sums to owners of livings for the withdrawal of their rights of patronage. The cases are exactly similar. If the return of members to Parliament is a public trust, the nomination of religious pastors is no less a sacred duty. If the patrons of livings may be compensated, surely the proprietors of boroughs deserved something to re-imburse them for the loss of long acknowledged rights, caused by a radical change in the constitution. But this nice criticism dis

1 In England and Wales the nominees of Government were sixteen of peers, 218; of commoners, 137. In Scotland peers ; disposed of thirty-one seats; commoners of fourteen.-Oldfield's Hist. of Representation, vol. vi. 300.