Sir Robert Peel's proposal, was subsequently moved by Mr. Praed on
the clause, to the effect that no county franchise should arise from the
possession of property of any kind situated in a represented borough,
and that forty-shilling freeholders in boroughs returning members should
be entitled to vote for the borough members only; but this amendment was
likewise negatived. No division took place on the clause giving three
members to certain of the middle-sized counties, although it was
denounced as monstrous and unjustifiable on any principle of fairness
or common equity. In the preceding session, while the former bill was
in committee, the Marquis of Chandos had succeeded in carrying as
an amendment a provision which conferred the county franchise on
tenants-at-will paying a rent of not less than fifty pounds per annum.
Ministers had opposed this, but had been defeated; and they now,
although they had made the provision part of the new bill, sought to
get rid of it by an amendment which went to strike it out of the clause
altogether. The amendment was moved by Sir Robert Heron, and supported
by Lord Milton and Mr. C. Ferguson, but only thirty-two members voted
for it, while two hundred and seventy-two supported what was now part
of an original clause. A variety of amendments on the clause fixing the
qualification of borough electors at ten pounds was moved by Mr. Hunt
and others, but were all negatived. The clauses which regulated the
formation of registers of the voters, the duration of elections, and the
mode of polling, were carried without giving rise to much discussion.
By the 20th of February the committee had gone through the different
clauses, and then proceeded to take up the schedules, which it had been
agreed should be postponed till the other provisions of the bill should
be arranged. Mr. Croker argued that great inconvenience and injustice
would result, if the committee proceeded to determine what boroughs
should stand in schedules A and B, before they had ascertained whether
the calculations on which disfranchisement was made to depend were
correct and uniform. In some boroughs, he said, game-certificates and
yeomanry exemptions were included, while in others they were omitted: if
the rule was not uniform it would be unjust. The fifty-six boroughs for
schedule A, and the thirty for schedule B would come up to No. 86 in
the list: Helstone No. 84; neither the yeomanry exemptions, nor the
game-certificates fo