sonation was detected, moreover, there was great reluctance on the part of those who had been injured to prosecute the

the conflict was over, that the battle had been lost and won, and that it would be but a poor exercise of power to crush the unlucky man who had been induced to personate a voter. Personation was a great and a growing evil, and it would be much increased, not diminished, by a system of Ballot which was private and secret too.

Question put.

The House divided:-Ayes 382; Noes 137: Majority 245.

Several other Amendments made to the words reinstated by the said disagreement.

for a scrutiny. That hon. Gentleman, in 1869, had even a scheme of his own for giving a scrutiny, by putting all the voting papers into an oven and compel-personator, for it was usually said that ling the Election Judge to bake them until an invisible number appeared on their backs. But within the last two years the hon. Gentleman had yielded, and now supported the Ballot without a scrutiny. The present Bill proposed to bring to the polling at elections the evil of privacy and the virtue of secrecy, but it was now proposed to give up the virtue and retain the evil. Opportunity after opportunity would then be offered. to poor men to dispose of their votes to the best advantage, and no doubt they would embrace those opportunities even to a far greater degree than they did at present, for if the voter were led to suppose that his vote could be traced, his course of action in all probability would be to vote according to his interest, as he did now, rather than according to his conscience, which it was the object of a Ballot Bill to enable him to do. There was no necessity for a scrutiny either, for in the case of a defeated candidate who had been beaten by 20 votes, no one would know how any of the voters had polled; and if there were known to be 25 cases of personation it might be found by means of an expensive process of scrutinizing that all the personators had voted in favour of the defeated candidate. A scrutiny, therefore, was not wanted for cases of personation, because personation could be as well discovered without knowing how the voter had voted as when that knowledge was obtained. He knew that so far as the result was concerned it would be useless to divide the House on the subject; but it was not useless to enter a protest against the course which was being pursued, and with that view he should take the sense of the House upon the question.

MR. BIRLEY said, he would venture to say that in a large constituency 500 or 1,000 persons might be personated, for he was satisfied that the Bill would

give the utmost facility for personation in our large towns. He had no doubt it would be found that all the penalties proposed would be useless to stop personation, and he said that from experience of the present system, with all the checks and safeguards which, with public voting, were adopted by candidates and their supporters. When per

Mr. James

MR. DODSON said, he was sorry that the Government had in a moment of weakness consented to give way so far as they had, and thought it would be convenient that the House should be informed what kind of scrutiny was proposed. The division which had just been taken affirmed that there should be a scrutiny, but it would be interesting to know by what means his right hon. Friend proposed it should be carried out, and what the securities for secrecy were in case of a scrutiny.

MR. W. E. FORSTER said, he thought he had already explained that matter to the House. The machinery for the scrutiny would be that which was contained in the Bill of his noble Friend the Chief Secretary for Ireland. The number of the vote was placed on the counterfoil, the same number being stamped on the voting paper. The security against the number being discovered, except in case of a scrutiny, would be this-the counterfoils would be sealed up and the voting papers also after the election was decided, and there would be no permission to look at them; the vote would be inviolable, unless there was an order from a tribunal for it to be delivered up after it was declared invalid. There would be this security-that in the next clause words would be introduced making it penal for any agent or officer, either at any polling station or at the time of counting the votes, to attempt to obtain or give information as to the numbers on the votes. He also proposed to introduce

a provision similar to what was in the Bill of his noble Friend, requiring the presiding officer, at the time of counting the votes, to keep the voting paper upwards.

MR. HERMON suggested that the counterfoils should be sealed up before the ballot papers were counted.

MR. W. E. FORSTER said, a provision to that effect would be introduced.

Amendment disagreed to.

("or as to the number on the back of the

ballot paper given to any voter at such station. the counting of the votes shall maintain and aid Every officer, clerk, and agent in attendance at in maintaining the secrecy of the voting, and shall not attempt to ascertain at such counting the number on the back of any ballot paper, or communicate any information obtained at such counting as to the candidate for whom any vote is given in any particular ballot paper.")

Amendment agreed to.

MR. W. E. FORSTER moved that the House disagree to the Lords Amendment providing that there should be a polling place not more than two miles from any voter's residence. The House decided by a large majority last year in favour of four miles in preference to three, and this year they decided in favour of four miles in preference to two. He should have been anxious to adopt the Amendment could it be safely done; but the condition of the country under the new arrangements must be ascer

MR. W. E. FORSTER proposed to disagree with the Lords' Amendment in line 22, by which the property in the ballot papers was vested in the Clerk of the Crown in Chancery instead of in the Returning Officers. He believed the effect of the Amendment had not been understood in the House of Lords, for if adopted it would introduce a principle different from that which had reference to municipal elections. He proposed to substitute instead words vesting the counterfoils as well as the ballot papers in the Return-tained before such a step was taken, ing Officer. He was informed that an action for theft would not lie against the Returning Officer, who would have to be proceeded against for misconduct. The question they had to deal with had reference to what would happen if the papers were stolen from the Returning Officer.

In reply to Mr. WALPOLE,

THE SOLICITOR GENERAL said, this clause had nothing to do with the custody of the papers, but related to the person in whose name the property was to be laid for the purpose of indictment. In a Post Office indictment they laid the property in the name of the Postmaster General, although he never had the custody of the property. This was merely machinery for the convenience of criminal proceedings.

Lords Amendments disagreed to.

which would involve inconveniences. in their arrangement of parishes, increased cost, and a difficulty in finding so many presiding officers.

MR. HUNT urged that facilities for conveying voters to the poll would be less under secret than under open voting, and he believed the reluctance to vote would be much greater. The question was, whether that should be counteracted by additional facilities for polling, and by relieving the voter from the expense of riding four miles, for many would not have sufficient time or strength to walk that distance and back. The Amendment was materially qualified by the words "as far as is reasonably practicable," and by the Proviso that no polling-place should be created unless there were 400 registered electors within its radius. He hoped, therefore, the House would accept it. His right hon.

Then words inserted "as well as the Friend (Mr. Henley) had said that four property in the counterfoils."

MR. W. E. FORSTER moved that the House disagree with the Amendments in lines 25, 26, 36, relating to the obligation of secrecy on the part of the officer, clerk, or agent as to voting at the polling stations.

Amendments disagreed to.

miles was neither walking nor riding; but under ordinary circumstances it would be riding, and it was desirable to fix such a distance that in most cases the electors might walk.

MR. GOLDSMID pointed out that the four miles would be a maximum distance, and that in most cases the voter would have a shorter distance to travel. A two-mile limit would involve many

MR. W. E. FORSTER moved in line additional agents, presiding officers, and 38, after ("voted") insert

clerks, and would make county elections.

SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH, who had a Notice of Amendment on the Paper with regard to the subject, said, he hoped the House would not accept the Lords' Amendment, and that, in spite MR. SYNAN remarked that in Ire- of what had been said by the right hon. land great inconvenience and difficulty Gentleman, the House would support would result from the adoption of the him in resisting it. The Lords had done Amendment. all in their power to multiply pollingMR. HUNT reminded the hon. Gen-places, and then to make them as extleman that the clause did not apply to Ireland.

MR. J. G. TALBOT said, he must strenuously deny that school-rooms were public buildings; in many instances they they had been built and maintained chiefly by private munificence, and he could not admit that the Parliamentary grant gave Parliament a right to use them against the wishes of the managers. Last year it was proposed that such conMR. W. E. FORSTER said, that, sent should be necessary; but the hon. although the Government were of opinion Baronet the Member for East Gloucesterthat these buildings might be fairly used shire (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach) profor election purposes, they were not pre-posed to make their appropriation compared to object to the Lords' Amend-pulsory. He wished that they could now ment, which seemed to commend itself divide on the same issue as they did last

year. He emphatically protested, in | The number of rich men was also inthe name of liberty, against the schoolrooms being taken in opposition to the will of the managers.

MR. LOCKE said, he desired to record his experience that school-rooms were the best places for taking the poll. Otherwise, hustings would have to be erected in the streets-so far as the metropolis was concerned and that would be not only disagreeable, but expensive. His remark especially applied to the borough with which he was connectedSouthwark.

creasing yearly in the House; but he was far from saying that the eloquence or intelligence of the House was increasing. He was surprised that the House of Lords, with curious perversity, had struck out of a bad Bill almost the only good provision it contained.

MR. BERESFORD HOPE said, that one practical matter had been overlooked in the debate. They were going to take the school-room for one day, but it would be required for three or four days. The school-rooms had fittings and fix

MR. W. E. FORSTER said, the Go-tures which would require to be taken vernment had felt it to be incumbent on up that the ballot-box and all the hocusthem to consider the apparently strong pocus of voting by Ballot, and Heaven feeling of the House of Lords; but it only knew what, might be put into the was quite clear that the feeling of the school. Now, was he or anyone else to House of Commons was equally strong. confiscate these schools for any such He did not think this was a matter in purpose? The practical inconveniences which the Lords could expect the Go- of this scheme were not merely sentivernment to go against a decided ex-mental-they were very real. If the pression of opinion from both sides of the House. It was quite true he first assented to the proposal to use the rooms with the consent of the managers; but upon consideration he was almost immediately convinced that this arrangement would be worse than no alteration at all. After the decided expression of opinion on both sides of the House, the Government, at all events, would not put the House to the trouble of dividing.

MR. BIRLEY said, one of the objections to the use of school-rooms in large towns was that there were frequent elections in such towns, and it was very objectionable to give the children a holiday on an election day. Besides, a school might imperil its Government grant by these compulsory holidays. If the matter were made optional instead of compulsory the difficulty might be

overcome.

SIR HERBERT CROFT said, that

schoolmasters and the Diocesan Board of Education in his county were opposed to giving up the school-rooms. Hitherto education had been kept free from politics; but now there was a talk not only of taking the rooms compulsorily, but of compelling the schoolmasters to be deputy Returning Officers. In France a similar use had been made of schoolmasters, and see to what a condition it had been reduced.

SIR RAINALD KNIGHTLEY said, that by increasing the number of polling-places the expenses were increased.

Government had adopted this Amendment the House also would have adopted it, and it was only a few county Members who were in the e-way.

Question put.

The House divided:-Ayes 365; Noes 86: Majority 279.

The next Amendment disagreed to. Subsequent Amendments, as far as the Amendment, page 8, line 20, agreed to.

The next Amendment in line 28, after ("room") insert ("not being a school").

MR. J. S. HARDY asked the right hon. Gentleman, whether the managers of schools would be allowed to count the

days when the school-rooms would be occupied for election purposes in estimating the amount of the Government grant; and would the holiday be limited as to time?

MR. W. E. FORSTER said, he did not think that the fact of the schoolrooms being used occasionally for election purposes should be a ground for reducing the amount of education given

to children.

Amendment disagreed to.

Page 8, line 20, after ("Act") insert Clause (A.)

"At every contested election of a member or members to serve in Parliament after the passing

of this Act, the poll shall continue for one day only, and shall commence at eight of the clock in the forenoon of the day appointed for that pur