MOTION FOR PARLIAMENTARY REFORM
Early in this session Lord John Russell called the attention of the commons to the subject of parliamentary reform. The scheme he proposed was to add one hundred members to the house, to be returned by the counties and larger towns, and to divest the minor boroughs of half the privileges they enjoyed. This was a moderate proposal, and yet it met with the most strenuous opposition, and especially from Mr. Canning. He conjured the house to oppose the introduction of any visionary schemes; and asserted, that a search after abstract perfection in government was not an object of reasonable pursuit, because it would prove vain. He added:—“I conjure the noble lord to pause before he again presses his plan on the country. If, however, he shall persevere, and if his perseverance shall be successful, and if the results of that success be such as I cannot help apprehending—his be the triumph to have precipitated those results, mine be the consolation, that to the utmost, and the latest of my power I have opposed thorn.” The motion was negatived; and the proposal of a general resolution by Mr. Brougham on the influence of the crown, which was introduced with the same ultimate views of reform, shared the same fate.