ned little or nothing of the bill which had been sent up
to the lords. Out of one hundred and forty clauses, one hundred and
six had been in substance omitted, while eighteen others had been
introduced. A bill had been put up for regulating and renewing
corporations in Ireland on the same conditions as in England and
Scotland; they had received back a bill which abolished them entirely,
but which preserved to many of the persons who held office in these
bodies all the power and profit of their situations. In order to meet
the concurrence of the lords, however, instead of abolishing the whole
of the corporations, it was proposed that the larger towns, originally
divided between schedules A and B should be placed in one, and that all
the clauses for the government of corporate towns should be restored
to the bill, with the view of applying them to these particular towns.
These towns would be Dublin, Belfast, Cork, Gal way, Kilkenny, Limerick,
Waterford, Clonmel, Drogheda, Londonderry, Sligo, and Carrickfergus. In
regard to the other towns, he would not give them corporations; but at
the same time he would not leave them subject to the provisions of the
lords' bill. He proposed rather, that the provisions of the act of 1828
should be applied immediately to twenty-two of the towns in schedule
C, and that so soon as the five-pound householders in these towns
had chosen commissioners, the corporate property, and the right of
appointing to the necessary offices should vest in the commissioners.
There would be commissioners elected by the inhabitants, instead of
being appointed by the lord-lieutenant. In regard to the remaining
boroughs of schedule C, as they possessed but little property, he would
neither subject them to the expense of a corporation, nor compel them to
elect commissioners under the act of 1828; but would leave it to them
to have recourse to the latter, if they thought fit. The lords had made
other alterations in other clauses of the bill, regarding the granting
of quarter-sessions, &c.; but these alterations did not impair the
spirit of the original bill, and therefore he would not quarrel with
them. The difference which still remained between them was one of
principle--should there be municipal governments or not? He thought
that municipal government, placed on a popular basis, and under popular
control, was excellent and useful in itself; and that in Ireland it
would tend to public tranquillity, by assuaging j