constitutional arguments, which, instead of inflaming the populace, were addressed to the good sense and judgment of the middle classes. From his first entrance into public life Lord John Russell had made this great question his own; and he supported his frequent motions by speeches full of promise of his future statesmanship. His political reputation was already identified with this measure; and the confidence of all reformers was centered in him, at that proud moment of his life, when, as a member of Lord Grey's administration, he rose in the House of Commons, to propose the first Reform Bill which had ever been submitted to Parliament on the responsibility of a Government. Society was convulsed for two years with the struggle which ensued; but at length, in 1832, three laws were passed, which have been termed the political Magna Charta of modern times.

Notwithstanding the popular cry of the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill,' it was impossible that a system of representation, theoretically perfect, could be supposed to be established. Some of the most flagrant evils and abuses of our ancient system were practically corrected; and so great was the extension of the franchise, and the increase of popular influence, that in any country in Europe but our own such a reform would probably have been nothing short of revolution. And so it was regarded here by its opponents; whose predictions, however, the experience of nearly twenty years has satisfactorily disproved. The Duke of Wellington, who had asked, how any ministry would hereafter ⚫ be able to conduct the King's Government?' was to be seen, in little more than two years, conducting that Government in his own single person; and Sir Robert Peel's short-lived administration of 1834-35 was a token, that with adequate preparation, and a favourable opportunity, that great statesman would be able to re-construct his party, and resume his former authority in the House of Commons. Preparation was made, and an opportunity offered; and again, within ten years from the passing of the Reform Bill, Sir Robert Peel was at the head of affairs, and had commenced the most memorable and successful administration of modern times. His policy and his success were the best answer to the Duke's question, How was the Government to be carried on in a reformed Parliament? Not, indeed, as it had been carried on before, not by mere party influence, not by reliance upon the shallow prejudices or interests of particular classes, and at times even of particular persons, but by bold and enlightened legislation for the public good. He knew that the fashion of the times had changed, and that the Parliamentary tactics of the eighteenth century would have been as much out of place in the present House of Commons, as

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the bag-wig, sword, and buckles, in which the more formal statesmen of George III. had once rejoiced to figure. Old conventionalities had passed away; and his policy was adapted to meet and satisfy the requirements of the time. In spite of reproaches, sarcasms, and insults, he carried out that policy triumphantly, a policy which, without Parliamentary Reform, could never have been attempted, and which, by a Reformed Parliament, will never be reversed.

The

The work of Parliamentary Reform was not completed in 1832. Improved arrangements for the registration of electors, and for their polling at elections, have since been added. old qualification of the reign of Anne, which had marked the sole ascendancy of the landed interest, gave place to a new qualification of members, more consistent with a rational representation of the people; and there have been recent indications that the exclusiveness of even the present qualification will not be much longer retained. In 1850, the provisions of the Irish Reform Act were extensively revised. The constituencies, both in the counties and boroughs, were enlarged; and the old law of registration was replaced by a simple and efficient system, designed to facilitate the exercise of the elective franchise.

Closely connected with Parliamentary Reform, and nearly equal to it in importance, was the introduction of improved municipal institutions into the cities and towns of the United Kingdom. No sooner had the Reform Bills passed than Ministers applied themselves to the task of devising a system of local representation, and popular municipal government. The reform commenced in Scotland, where it was most needed. The system of self-election which had prevailed in the royal burghs for centuries was summarily abolished in 1833, and their ancient free constitutions restored. The Common Councils were thenceforth to be chosen by the Parliamentary electors, and the magistrates and officers by the councillors. A similar municipal constitution was conferred upon those burghs and towns which, though not royal burghs, had acquired the right of returning, or of contributing to return, members to Parliament. In Scotland, the old corporate bodies had been so long and so loudly condemned, that they fell almost without a struggle. But in England, their great political power, their extensive property and interests, and their numerous local peculiarities, forbade so summary a treatment of them. A Commission, however, was immediately appointed to inquire into the state of all these corporations; and in 1835, its Report was presented to Parliament. No time was then lost. A comprehensive measure municipal reform was forthwith prepared, on the basis of a

of

household suffrage, and was speedily passed through the Commons. The Lords had refused their assent to the Reform Bill until it had passed the Commons three times; but this Bill, which was said to establish 178 republics, passed in a single Session. It is true the amendments made by the Lords were very unacceptable to the Government and the Commons; but as the great principle of local representation was retained, the alterations in question were not suffered to delay so important a measure. Municipal legislation, however, was still incomplete. In the following year a Bill was brought in, which was lost in consequence of the amendments introduced by the Lords; and, again in 1837, another Bill narrowly escaped the same fate, but was saved by concessions and conferences, almost interminable.

The task of reforming the Corporations of Ireland was not so easily accomplished. A Commission of Inquiry had been appointed in 1833, and on the receipt of its Report, in 1836, a Bill founded upon the principles of representative government, as in England and Scotland, passed the Commons. The Lords, who were willing to abolish the existing corporations, refused to constitute any new corporate bodies. The Bill was consequently lost, but only to be again sent to the Lords, in 1837; when the death of the King and the approaching dissolution were fatal to its further progress. In the following year, however, the Lords so far conceded as to allow new corporate bodies to be constituted, but differed upon the elective franchise; and again, for the third time, the measure was defeated. In 1839 the Bill failed, for the fourth time, in the same manner. And, in 1840, the recurring story seemed likely to be repeated; but the amendments of the Lords, including a 107. qualification, were ultimately agreed to. Thus, after eight years of inquiry and discussion, free municipal institutions were at last secured for each of the three Kingdoms. The difficulty with which this great legislative work was accomplished, and the calm perseverance by which it was brought to a peaceable and successful conclusion, may serve as a lesson to impatient Reformers. A great principle once recognised is certain to be adopted by Parliament, sooner or later; but without some compromise and concession in matters of detail, practical legislation under a mixed Government is scarcely possible.

The principle of local representation and self-government has been largely extended by Parliament since 1830. By Hobhouse's Vestry Act,' in 1831, a system was established in English parishes for the election of open vestries by the ratepayers. And, in the very numerous Acts for local improvements,

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the same principle has been universally adopted. In 1850, an important measure for the police and improvement of towns was added to the other laws for the municipal government of Scotland. Mr. Milner Gibson has lately proposed to transfer from the justices of the peace, to boards elected by the ratepayers, the financial administration of counties; but, though the principle of his measure has met with much encouragement, he has not yet succeeded in completing the circle of our representative institutions by a county municipality.

So great an enlargement of the political and municipal franchise would have been incompatible with the maintenance of religious disqualifications, which had originated in the narrower polity of a former age. Of these, however, the greater part had already disappeared before the reign of William IV. În 1828, the repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts had been forced upon the Government by Lord John Russell and a majority of the House of Commons. This measure was regarded, at the time, as a sure forerunner of the repeal of the Catholic disabilities; and the next Session was signalised by the passing of the great Act of Catholic Emancipation. This just and necessary measure had occupied the attention of William Pitt, and of the most eminent statesmen of George III.; but the personal influence of the sovereign, and the repugnance of a Protestant Church and people to the Roman Catholic faith, had long opposed insuperable obstacles to its adoption. Public opinion, as yet uninstructed, and misled by sectarian prejudice and political suspicions, no longer, if ever, warranted, had been more decidedly adverse to Catholic Emancipation than Parliament itself. Before the Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel had yielded to their fears for the tranquillity of Ireland, the propriety of conceding the claims of the Catholics had been four times acknowledged by the House of Commons; and the Lords, who, in 1828, had refused their assent to a resolution of the Lower House, by a majority of 45, agreed to the Relief Act, in 1829, by a majority of 100. Public opinion, however, had not undergone a similar conversion. Petitions, in thousands, remonstrated against the Bill; and Churchmen and Dissenters vied with one another in denouncing it. Not only the law itself, but the circumstances under which it was passed, caused a disruption of the old Tory party, and converted many of them into sulky reformers: and thus the Relief Act, which established the great principle of civil and religious liberty, destroyed the power of that political party which had always been opposed to it. In consideration of their agreement on this one point, the English people had hitherto been willing to waive many of their objections to the Tories.

This object now ceased, while a new era in our legislative history was about to commence, which these events contributed to introduce.

There were still other civil disabilities to be removed. The Oath of Supremacy had excluded the Roman Catholics from Parliament; and now the case of Quakers, Moravians, Separatists, and some other Dissenters who objected to any form of oath, claimed to be considered. Their conscientious scruples were respected, and they were held entitled to take their seats in Parliament, on making a declaration to the same effect as the oaths prescribed by law. Unfortunately less respect has been shown to the conscience of the Jew. In 1830, Mr. Robert Grant brought in a Bill to remove the civil disabilities of the Jews; but it was thrown out by the Commons on the Second Reading. In 1841, a Bill for the admission of Jews to corporate offices was passed by the Commons, but rejected by the Lords. That body, however, usually appears open to conviction, sooner or later,-especially when a measure comes before them recommended by a statesman whose opinion they have been in the habit of accepting. Thus, in 1845, Lord Lyndhurst proposed and easily carried a Bill, by which the exclusion of Jews from municipal offices was removed. They had, indeed, been excluded by an accident rather than by any deliberate act of the Legislature. The declaration required by the Corporation and Test Act contained seven words, 'upon the 'true faith of a Christian,' which no Jew could possibly have uttered, except in a non-natural sense;' and thus he found himself deprived of a privilege which his fellow-subjects, of all other religious denominations, enjoyed. These same words in the Oath of Abjuration, are the occasion of the continued disqualification of the Jews from sitting in Parliament. Again and again have the Commons sent up Bills to the other House for clearing our Statute-Book of this religious disqualification; but, for the fifth time, the Lords have, in the last Session, persisted in their refusal.

The friends of civil and religious liberty are naturally indignant that these efforts should have been so long resisted; and attempts have been made to strain, if not to violate, the law which they have thus been unable to correct. These attempts have failed, as the House of Commons has declined to usurp an independent legislative authority upon a matter which had so often been the subject of express legislation; but the question of Jewish Disabilities has been greatly advanced by the discussions of the last two Sessions, and particularly by the exposure of the inconsistencies and doubtful construction of the law. If Lord Lyndhurst would only quietly take up the subject, and in