WILL should have the full and free opportunity of being
publicly ascertained and known.

Wretched as the state of representation is in England, it is every
day becoming worse, because the unrepresented parts of the nation are
increasing in population and property, and the represented parts are
decreasing. It is, therefore, no ill-grounded estimation to say, that
as not one person in seven is represented, at least fourteen millions of
taxes out of the seventeen millions, are paid by the unrepresented part;
for although copyholds and leaseholds are assessed to the land-tax, the
holders are unrepresented. Should then a general demur take place as to
the obligation of paying taxes, on the ground of not being represented,
it is not the Representatives of Rotten Boroughs, nor Special Juries,
that can decide the question. This is one of the possible cases that
ought to be foreseen, in order to prevent the inconveniencies that might
arise to numerous individuals, by provoking it.

I confess I have no idea of petitioning for rights. Whatever the rights
of people are, they have a right to them, and none have a right either
to withhold them, or to grant them. Government ought to be established
on such principles of justice as to exclude the occasion of all such
applications, for wherever they appear they are virtually accusations.

I wish that Mr. Grey, since he has embarked in the business, would take
the whole of it into consideration. He will then see that the right of
reforming the state of the Representation does not reside in Parliament,
and that the only motion he could consistently make would be, that
Parliament should _recommend_ the election of a convention of the
people, because all pay taxes. But whether Parliament recommended it
or not, the right of the nation would neither be lessened nor increased
thereby.

As to Petitions from the unrepresented part, they ought not to be looked
for. As well might it be expected that Manchester, Sheffield, &c.
should petition the rotten Boroughs, as that they should petition the
Representatives of those Boroughs. Those two towns alone pay far more
taxes than all the rotten Boroughs put together, and it is scarcely to
be expected they should pay their court either to the Boroughs, or the
Borough-mongers.

It ought also to be observed, that what is called Parliament, is
composed of two houses that have always declared against the right of
each other to interfere in any matter th