places.[1] The representation is made up of persons chosen by electors having very different, and sometimes very discordant qualifications; in some cases, property is exclusively represented; in others, particular trades and pursuits; in others, inhabitancy and corporate privileges; in others, the reverse. In some cases, the representatives are chosen by very numerous voters; in others, by very few; in some cases, a single patron possesses the exclusive power of choosing representatives, as in nomination boroughs; in others, very populous cities have no right to choose any representatives at all; in some cases, a select body, forming a very small part of the inhabitants, has the exclusive right of choice; in others, non-residents can control the whole election; in some places a half million of inhabitants possess the right to choose no more representatives, than are assigned to the most insignificant borough, with scarcely an inhabitant to point out its local limits.[2] Yet this inequality has never, of itself, been deemed an exclusive evil in Great Britain.[3] And in every system of reform, which has found public favour in that country, many of these diversities have been embodied from choice, as important checks upon undue legislation, as facilitating the representation of different interests, and
↑Paley's Moral Philosophy, B. 6, ch. 7, p. 380, 381 to 394; DeLolme, Const. of England, B. 1, ch. 4, p. 61, 62; 1 Kent's Coram. 219; 1 Tuck. Black. App. 209, 210, 211; 1 Wilson's Law Lect. 431.
↑Mr. Jefferson, in his Notes on Virginia, insists with great earnestness upon the impropriety of allowing to different counties in that state, the same number of representatives, without any regard to their relative population.[a 1] And yet in the new constitution adopted in 1830-1831, Virginia has adhered to the same system in principle, and her present representation is apportioned upon an arbitrary and unequal basis.
