met by active measures of repression, and by frequent Government prosecutions. But the Administration did not find it necessary to have recourse to extreme methods; the constabulary in some of the larger towns was reorganised, and a small addition of troops asked for and obtained from Parliament; but in other respects the existing laws were found sufficient to meet the evil. Vote of want of confidence defeated. Jan. 31, 1840. The weakness of the Ministry in Parliament and the disturbed state of the country induced the Conservatives at the beginning of 1840 to move a vote of want of confidence. The ground on which it rested was the inability of the Ministry to secure that peace at home and abroad which it was its duty to secure; and the cause of this failure, according to the assertion of their opponents, was to be traced to their weakness in tampering with disturbances both in England and in Ireland, and to the meddling policy they pursued abroad. They were however able to make out a case good enough to secure the support of the House ; and the motion of want of confidence was lost by twenty-one votes. By a narrow majority of nine they also succeeded in saving their policy with regard to China from an adverse motion of Sir James Graham. Yet every division displayed their real weakness, and their position was rendered worse by the growing indignation at the undisguised tenacity with which they clung to office. Failure of May 1840. A The great party battle-field, both this year and the next, was Ireland. It has been already mentioned that the Government had succeeded in passing the Irish Municipal Corporation Bill through both Houses only by accepting the adverse amendment of the Lords. This virtual victory of the Opposition was followed up by the introduction by Lord Stanley of a Bill for regulating the registration of voters in Ireland. system of registration had existed there before the passing of the Reform Bill. A new system had been introduced in England; but, before assimilating the process in the two countries, it was thought desirable to see how the experiment would work. It had proved successful; and as there were some palpable deficiencies in the registration arrangements in Ireland, it was understood that the time had arrived for bringing the two into harmony. But Government, although it appeared to recognise the duty, had neglected to produce any Bill for the purpose. That duty the Opposition, represented by Lord Stanley, now undertook. By the existing system the registration in Ireland was revised before permanent officials (assistant barristers), as a part of the quarter sessions work at the assize towns. There was no appeal, 1840] IRISH REGISTRATION BILLS 47 and each claimant had to make good his claim, which was objected to as a matter of course. Having succeeded in making it good, he was given a certificate, available for eight years; but, as he might procure such a certificate every half-year, an easy opening was given for the creation of fraudulent votes by the dishonest distribution of these certificates at election time. Stanley proposed to bring the systems of the two countries into harmony; to make registration annual; to allow names to stand on the register without production of fresh proof unless objected to, and to give an appeal from the revising barrister to the judges. It is difficult to understand the objection to the Bill, but it seems to have been regarded as a covert method of excluding a number of voters from the constituency, and as such was vehemently opposed by the Government and by O'Connell. Morpeth declared that it would obstruct the legitimate use of the franchise. O'Connell regarded it as a Bill which would entirely disfranchise Ireland by enormously increasing the difficulties in the way of keeping a vote. The register was to be opened every year, and, as the Tories would dispute every Liberal or peasant vote and carry the matter if decided against them before the judges, the peasant would have to walk fifty or sixty miles to the assize town twice every year to make good his claim. Stanley, who had originally parted from the Reformers on disapproving of their weak and conciliatory action in Ireland, and who was therefore the declared enemy of O'Connell and his friends, found himself at once assaulted with extreme violence. O'Connell, with his usual want of self-restraint, spoke of him as "scorpion Stanley" outside the House, and within the House heaped every sort of abuse upon him. Although frequently beaten in division-for the virulence of O'Connell's partisanship, and the apparent reasonableness of the Bill they were opposing, had withdrawn some support from the Ministers-the Government threw every form and sort of obstacle in the way of the measure. No less than ten divisions were taken on it, in only one of which did the Government secure a majority. Yet the interposition of every form of delay was so successful that Stanley, drawing attention to the unusual and obstinate opposition he had encountered, and to the lateness of the season, prudently withdrew his Bill, promising however to re-introduce it in the next session. This he accordingly did; but on this occasion the Government attempted a new method of thwarting him. Lord Morpeth introduced a counter proposition, which, while it contained nearly the same provisions as the uncompleted Bill of the previous year, had tacked to it a provision ་ Failure of Morpeth's Irish Registration Bill. April 1841. ་ intended to make it attractive to the Irish party in the House, and thus to outbid Stanley. This provision was a definition of the franchise, which was, by Lord Morpeth's proposition, to be given to every man rated at £5 to the poor-rate. The outcry against this Bill on the part of the Conservatives was very great. Much had been said by the Government of the finality of the old Reform Bill, and here there appeared to be a distinct alteration and lowering of the franchise. It was urged that the Bill was nothing but a new Reform Bill in disguise. Many of the more conservative Liberals were themselves alarmed at it; and the Government, who appeared really to have no opinion but what was supplied them by others, made no difficulty in raising the proposed franchise to £8. For four nights a bitter discussion was carried on, terminating in the passage of the second reading by a majority of five only. In committee the Government encountered fresh embarrassments. Lord Howick, who had seceded from the Ministry, introduced an amendment of no great importance in itself, but which was carried against Government by a majority of Defeat of April 26, 1841. twenty-one. Defeat however produced no result; they accepted the amendment, and proceeded with their measure. Even the final destruction of the Bill, which was thrown out by eleven votes, failed to loosen the hold with which they clung to office. Financial difficulties. A still more complete defeat was necessary, and room for such a defeat was found in their financial policy. Mr. Spring Rice, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer since the retirement of Lord Spencer in 1835, was not a careful financier. As a rule, neither the actual receipts nor the expenditure corresponded with his estimates. But he had no doubt laboured under much difficulty; the depression of trade and of agriculture prevalent at the time and the difficulties in Canada had both limited the revenue and increased the expenses. A certain number of taxes had also been taken off, and the result for the last few years had been a constantly increasing deficit. In pursuance of some changes which had taken place in the Ministry in 1839, Mr. Spring Rice had retired from office. Room was found for him in the Upper House as Lord Monteagle, and Mr. Francis Baring was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. The new Chancellor proved no more successful than his predecessor. Though he honestly attempted to meet his difficulties, events had proved too strong for him. Trade did not improve; the Canadian expenses continued; and, in addition, a war had broken out in China. 1839] PENNY POSTAGE 49 The revenue had also been very largely decreased by the somewhat reckless adoption of a very excellent reform. The con- Introduction of dition of the post-office had for some years occupied penny postage. public attention. The arrangements were in many respects very inconvenient, and in spite or rather perhaps in consequence of the high rates charged, though the trade of the country was increasing the receipts of the department were falling off. The expense of postage pressed heavily upon the poor and on the mercantile classes, an inordinate amount of office-work was required to settle the sum chargeable upon each letter, which varied according to its weight, the distance it had to travel, and the means of carriage to be employed. A great waste of time attended the distribution and rendered frequent deliveries impossible; it was calculated that on an average two minutes were employed in delivering and receiving the payment for each letter in London. Mr. Rowland Hill has the credit of suggesting in a pamphlet a method of removing these inconveniences. He advocated the application to the post-office of a principle which was gradually making its way with regard to taxation, and urged that a low rate of postage would, by the increase of correspondence thus secured, render the post-office more profitable; that a uniform postage would get rid of much useless clerks' work, and that the prepayment of letters would render their distribution easy, and give opportunity for frequent deliveries. His suggestions were adopted, and a uniform prepaid postage of a penny upon the half-ounce substituted for the old rates. Much opposition was offered to the plan. The Postmaster-General pointed out that it would require no less than 480,000,000 letters at the reduced rate to produce the revenue derived from 24,000,000, which was the number then delivered yearly. No apparatus, he declared, could be devised for carrying on so enormous a business, no building would be large enough to contain it. In spite of the threatened diminution of revenue the Government boldly determined to risk the change, and the result in the first year was a loss to the country of £1,000,000. Though the wisdom of making the change at the moment may have been questionable, the soundness of the principle has been thoroughly vindicated. The number of letters has risen to more than three times the figure which caused the despair of Lord Lichfield, not the slightest difficulty has been found in carrying on the business, and the clear revenue derived from the Office is considerably more than £3,000,000. There already existed a deficit of £2,678,000 on the last three Budgets. If the loss on the post-office should prove to be as great as VICT. D Baring's May 15, 1840. was expected, it seemed likely that at the end of 1840 there would be an arrear of nearly £6,000,000. For, while Mr. Baring estimated the expenditure of the year 1840-41 at £49,432,000, he was afraid to put the income at more than £46,700,000. To meet the alarming deficiency there was no resource according to the existing system of finance but increased taxation; and, as taxes once removed could scarcely be reimposed, the only course left open to the Chancellor of the Exchequer was to suggest that a percentage should be added to the existing taxes. The expedient did not prove successful; the revenue fell short of the Baring's estimate, and at the beginning of the financial year 1841 there proved to be a deficit of not less than £1,800,000. Nor could the Chancellor of the Exchequer honestly speak of the coming year except as one of increased expenditure. He estimated his requirements at £50,700,000, and expected at the close to find himself with a deficit of £2,400,000. The want of elasticity in the revenue was capable of easy explanation. The diminution had arisen chiefly on molasses, sugar, wine, spirits, tea, and the post-office. High differential duties restricted the use of the two first articles; the prospect of a commercial treaty with France naturally checked for a time the importation of wine; the extraordinary spread of the temperance movement in Ireland under the influence of Father Matthew explained the diminution of the spirit duties; while the tea-trade was hampered by the war with China; and the new arrangements of the post-office entailed great initial expenses. Under these circumstances, since honest and careful endeavours to balance the Budget on the old system had proved an entire failure, Mr. Baring and his colleagues determined to have recourse to a large application of the Free-trade principle. Two commodities, timber and sugar, especially lent themselves to this treatment. In the case of both of them large differential duties protected Colonial production. While the duty on Colonial timber was 10s. a load, the duty on Baltic timber was 55s. a load; while Colonial sugar paid 24s. a cwt., foreign sugar paid 63s. Baring proposed, in each case, very largely to destroy this difference. With regard to timber, he suggested that the 10s. should be raised to 20s. on Colonial timber; the 55s. reduced to 50s. on Baltic timber. With regard to sugar, while the 24s. a cwt. on Colonial sugar was left unaltered, the duty of 63s. on foreign sugar was to be reduced to 36s. According to the Free-trade view this partial opening of the market would produce such an increase of importation that it would be safe to estimate |