icipality was to consist of a Mayor and
Councillors, the Councillors to be elected by resident ratepayers. It
was proposed that the rights of living freemen were to be maintained,
but as each life lapsed the right was to be extinguished, and thus the
whole freeman system was to die out and all exclusive trading
privileges were to be abolished. The Bill, as introduced by Lord John
Russell, only applied to England and Wales; but O'Connell demanded that
Ireland should also be included in the reform, and it was finally
agreed that a Bill of the same nature should be brought in for Ireland,
and that arrangements should be made with the Scottish representatives
to have the provisions of the {259} measure applied also to Scotland so
far as might be consistent with the usages and the desire of the
Scottish people.

Sir Robert Peel did not offer any direct opposition to the measure,
although he criticised it severely enough in some of its provisions.
His speech, however, was distinctly a declaration in favor of some
comprehensive scheme of municipal reform, and might fairly have been
regarded rather as a help than as a hinderance to the purposes of the
Government. The example set by Sir Robert Peel had naturally much
influence over the greater number of the Conservative party, and only
some very old-fashioned Conservatives seemed inclined to make a stand
against the measure. Mr. Grote seized the opportunity to introduce a
motion for the adoption of the ballot in municipal elections, but it is
hardly necessary to say that he did not secure support enough on either
side of the House to win success for his proposition. The Bill passed
through the House of Commons without any important change in its
character, but it met with very serious maltreatment in the House of
Lords. The majority of the peers did not see their way to compass the
actual rejection of the Bill, especially after the liberal and
statesmanlike spirit in which Sir Robert Peel had dealt with it; but
they set themselves to work with the object of rendering it as nearly
useless as they could for the purposes which its promoters had in view.
Lord Lyndhurst led the opposition to the Bill, and he could, when he so
pleased, become the very narrowest of Tories, while he had ability and
plausibility not included in the intellectual stock of any other Tory
then in the House of Lords. Under this leadership the Tory peers so
disfigured and mangled the Bill that before lo