, or in
furtherance of, such bribery and corruption, may question the same at
any time within twenty-eight days from the time of such payment; or if
this house be not sitting at the expiration of the said twenty-eight
days, then within fourteen days after the day when the house shall next
meet." This resolution was agreed to, many members regretting that
it did not go further, and maintaining that a bribery-oath should be
administered to the members as well as to the electors. Subsequently
petitions were received from Liverpool, Warwick, Stafford, Hertford,
Londonderry, Carrickfergus, and Newry; and in all these cases it was
proved that gross bribery had been resorted to at the elections.
Writs were suspended for Warwick, and bills were brought in for the
disfranchisement of Stafford, Hertford, and Carrickfergus, while several
individuals were ordered to be criminally prosecuted. As the session
was drawing to a close, the bills were not persevered in before its
termination. An attempt was made by Mr. Grote, one of the members for
the city of London, to establish voting by ballot; that alone, in his
estimation, being the only means of securing purity of election. This,
however, was negatived, after a long and earnest discussion, by two
hundred and eleven against one hundred and six. Another discussion
relative to the constitution arose on a motion by Mr. Tennyson, for
leave to bring in a bill to shorten the duration of parliaments. In
support of his motion, Mr. Tennyson enforced the ordinary topics, that
the septennial act had been passed to meet a temporary emergency; that
it had originally been an exception from the rules of the constitution;
that the consequence of it had been general corruption both among the
electors and the representatives; and that it rendered the members too
independent of their constituents, and in so far defeated the object of
a representative government, and prevented the operation of the public
opinion. There was a difference of opinion, he said, as to the number
of years which ought to be fixed for the duration of parliaments, some
being in favour of five, others of four, and others of three years. He
thought they were bound to consult the general wishes of the people, and
it appeared to him that they were in favour of triennial parliaments. At
the same time, in the bill which he proposed to bring in, he intended
to leave the term of future parliaments unfixed, so that it might form
a subject