Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/44

30 liaments as constitutional, and as having been illegally altered; states that by the statute 8 Henry VI. the Parliament then elected by the commonalty at large, passed an Act to disfranchise the greater part of the constituents by establishing the forty-shillings qualification; and then refers at length to the decay of old boroughs, the representation of which is controlled corruptly either by the Crown or by hereditary owners, whereas new and large communities had grown up which are entirely unrepresented; and it ends by the declaration that, whether as regards population or property, the representation is essentially unequal. On the presentation of this report, it was resolved that annual Parliaments are the right of the people, and that "the present state of the representation is inadequate to the object, and a departure from the first principles of the Constitution." At a meeting on the 22nd of March, with Fox in the chair, and Burke, Sheridan, and Beckford present, we come upon the first reference to the ballot in a resolution—"That the obtaining of a law for taking the suffrages of the people in such a mode as to prevent both expense in elections and the operation of undue influence therein, is necessary towards the freedom of Parliament."

A change was now made in the form of the committee. On the 3rd of April a sub-committee, consisting of Fox, Sheridan, and Colonel Fitzpatrick, was instructed to draw up a plan of an association, to be submitted to a general meeting called by advertisement, addressed to "the nobility, gentry, clergy, electors, and other inhabitants paying taxes to Government, resident in the city and liberty of Westminster." At the public meeting the plan of association was adopted; the committee then became "the Committee of Association," and Fox was again elected chairman. Contact with popular feeling seems to have strengthened the tone of the committee, and enlisted its energies more definitely on behalf of Parliamentary reform; for a sub-committee was appointed, which reported to a meeting on the 27th of June. The report, which was submitted by Mr. Brand Hollis, was long, elaborate,