ities or boroughs, except in the City of London, in Westminster,
and in Southwark, unless he were a householder rated at ten pounds a
year, and unless, moreover, he had paid his parochial taxes for three
years, within three months after they became due, and had lived in the
constituency for six months previous to the election at which he
claimed to vote. The fifth clause proposed that the unrepresented
parts of London should have among them four or six additional members,
that eighteen large towns should have representation--and let the
reader try to realize for himself what the supposed representation of
the country could have been when at least eighteen large towns were, up
to that time, wholly unrepresented--and that twenty counties should
send two additional members {130} each to the House of Commons.
Another paragraph limited the right of voting in the newly enfranchised
towns to householders rated at ten pounds a year or persons qualified
to serve on juries. Lord Durham approved of the rating qualification,
but, consistently with his objection already mentioned, struck out the
words which connected the right to vote with the right to serve on a
jury. It is not necessary to go through the whole list of the
proposals set out in the sketch drawn up by Lord John Russell. Those
which we have already mentioned possess a peculiar historical interest
and illustrate in the most precise and effective manner the whole
nature of the system which, up to that time, had passed off as
constitutional government.

[Sidenote: 1831--Vote by ballot]

It will be seen that, on the whole, Lord Durham was a more advanced
reformer than even Lord John Russell. The entire scheme, as drawn out
by Russell, consisted of ten paragraphs or clauses, and it was at once
submitted to the consideration of the four men who formed the
committee. There was much discussion as to the borough qualification
for voters, and the committee finally agreed to recommend that it
should be uniform, and thus get rid of what were called the freemen and
the scot-and-lot voters, a class of persons endowed with antiquated and
eccentric qualifications which possibly might have had some meaning in
them and some justification under the conditions of a much earlier day,
but which had since grown into a system enabling wealthier men to
create in constituencies a body of thoroughly dependent or positively
corrupt voters. The desire of the committee was to extend the vo