attention, and has become a person known to the law. Before these Acts were passed, corruption and intimidation were considered to be the private concern of the local body invested with the franchise, and public opinion encouraged the non-interference of Parliament;[1] so time was it that the ultimate elements of the electorate seemed, to be not the individual citizens but the local bodies or corporations Even to-day the opposition and competition between the two ideas shows itself by a marked distinction between the reform Acts which define the qualifications of voters, and the redistribution Acts which carefully distribute the representative power between the electoral bodies. In 1832, in 1867, and even in 1884, the redistribution of seats excited more passion, and was thought of more consequence, than the qualification of voters. This shows how difficult it was for the English public to recognize and admit the idea of political rights belonging to all citizens as individuals. Mr. Gladstone’s Acts,[2] affecting as they do both the extension of the franchise and the distribution of seats, has for the future put an end to the interest, or at least the importance, of the distinction between the two. In these Acts the individual triumphs, and the historical bodies are dissolved, by means of the introduction of
- ↑ [Parliament has from a period long preceding the Reform Act of 1832, treated corrupt practices as offences (see Blackstone’s Commentaries, i., pp. 178, 179). What Monsr. Boutmy no doubt refers to, is the recognised existence of (so-called) rotten boroughs. (D).]
- ↑ [See the Representation of the People Act, 1884, 48 Vict. c. 3, and the Redistribution of Seats Act, 1885, 48 & 49 Vict, c. 23 (D.)]
