“Dr. Temple says, in a letter to the Daily News, ‘I know that when Emerson was in England he regretted to me that all the more cultivated classes in America abstained from politics because they felt themselves hopelessly swamped.’”
These last words were given in italics, the only construction I can put upon which is that the noble Lord thought if many of these small boroughs were disfranchised the persons he desires to see in this House would not come here, else I do not see what is the application of the passage. He goes on to say:
“It is very rare to find a man of literary taste and cultivated understanding expose himself to the rough reception of the election of a large city.”
There is a compliment to many of the noble Lord’s most ardent supporters. But he continues:
“The small boroughs, by returning men of knowledge acquired in the study, and of temper moderated in the intercourse of refined society—”
Where the members for large boroughs never go, I suppose—
“restore the balance which Marylebone and Manchester, if left even with the £10 franchise undisputed masters of the field, would radically disturb.”
Whether that means to disturb from the roots or to disturb from radicalism, I do not know.
“But besides this advantage, they act with the counties in giving that due influence to property without which our House of Commons would very inadequately represent the nation, and thus make it feasible to admit the householders of our large towns to an extent which would otherwise be inequitable, and possibly lead to injurious results.”
So that the proposal of the noble Lord’s Government, coupled as it is with the disfranchisement of these small boroughs, is in his opinion inequitable certainly, and possibly likely to lead to injurious results. He goes on: