When the session of parliament was opened, on the 19th of January 1809, it appeared, by a recommendation in the royal speech to augment the regular army, that the design of foreign expeditions was not abandoned by ministers. The disgraceful convention of Cintra, and the ministerial conduct of the war in Spain, formed the first subjects of debate. Motions of thanks were carried to the commander Sir Arthur Wellesley, and to the of ficers and privates who had won the battle of Vimcira. The same thanks were voted to the victors of Corunna; and both parties in the house were emulous to express their zeal in decreeing a monument of public gratitude to the lamented Sir John Moore.
To this discussion succeeded one of very considerable interest and importance, in regard to the abuse of power at home; the person chiefly implicated being no less than a prince of the blood, his Royal highness the Duke of York, in his capacity of commander in chief. The circumstances which led to the investigation, originated in a way not very creditable to any of the parties con cerned. A discarded mistress of his Royal Highness, (Mrs Mary Ann Clarke,) conceiving she had reason to complain of the non-fulfilment of pecuniary engage ments, became the willing instrument of a Col. Wardle, in disclosing corrupt and improper influence respecting the disposal of military commissions and offices during the time of her connection with his Royal Highness. The rank of the person implicated, and the pretended extent of the abuses, created an uncommon degree of interest throughout the nation ; and the House of Com mons, for many weeks, pursued the investigation with much perseverance and zeal. Col. Wardle, and the leading members of the opposition, supported the charges against the Duke, while Mr Percival, and the principal members of administration, endeavoured to exculpate or palliate his conduct Much evidence was brought forward on both sides; and the result, al though, considering the conduct and motives of the par ties which were disclosed, it did not, in the opinion of the house, lead to criminate the Duke, as regards a direct knowledge or participation of pecuniary advan tages, or intentional corruption, yet established suffi cient evidence of improper conduct, and produced three separate propositions for an address to the throne. The proposition adopted by a majority of 334 to 135, was brought forward by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and stated the regret of the house, that his royal high ness should have formed so immoral a connection, and a hope that he would, in luture, imitate the bright ex ample of virtue held out by his royal father. This pro position was adopted on the 17th of March, and, on the 20th, the Chancellor of the Exchequer communicated to the house, that his Royal Highness the Duke of York had made a voluntary resignation of his command, which had been accepted by his majesty.
The subject of reform was brought forward by Mr y Curwen in the month of May, who moved for leave to bring in a bill for securing the independence and purity of parliament, by preventing the obtaining seats by im proper means, and also to extend the laws respecting bribery. Leave to bring in the bill was unanimously granted. Alr Curwen proposed to attach the severest penalties to the purchase and sale of seats, and super adding the oath of the representative, with respect to the mode of his introduction into parliament, accompa nied by the usual guards against perjury. While the ministerial antagonists of reform, struck by the irresis tible power of facts which this motion elicited, and weakened by many concessions which they had them selves made, both as to the existence of venality, and the necessity for putting sonic check to it, succeeded in breaking the force of the bill by amendments. An open and unqualified opponent of reform, Mr \Vinclham, resisted the motion, not on its peculiar features or enact ments, but upon its whole scope, essence, and principles. The measure, Mr Windham averred, was ill timed, in judicious, founded upon false facts, false views, and false assumptions, calculated to produce no good in the first instance, and liable and likely to lead to the most serious mischiefs in future. The House of Commons, he contended, was adequate to all the purposes of its institution; the constitution was already good ; and, as there was no temptation to change its structure, so there was positive risk in trying the unknown results of visionary experiments. To prevent the sale of seats in parliament, you must take away the influence of pro perty, and make it penal, for any one to have the power of nominating a member. So long as there arc persons in a situation to say, I can make an offer of a seat in parliament, so long will there be persons to treat with for that object, and so long will means be found for com mitting, in some way or other, the influence so pos sessed, on considerations valuable to the possessor.
According to Mr \Vindham's argument, it is equally futile, even equally unfair, to prevent the buying of scats, from a multitude, as from an individual. The influence of property cannot be got rid of. The just, wholesome, and legitimate use of property, he might be told, was a totally different thing from the sale of seats. But we are now arguing (said he) upon principle, which by its nature, unites things different in forms, but which are ultimately the same in substance, and does not found distinctions on accidental varieties. The influence of property is the same, whether it actually sold a seat in parliament, or gave the individual a seat to sell. The influence of property might be strained and refined, so as to retain little or nothing of its primary character, just as a certain physical impulse of our nature is refined from its original grossness into all that is delicate and sentimental,—it may branch into acts of beneficence, it becomes only the power and opportunity of virtue. But is this (he continued,) the only way in which property exerts its powers ? Is it always taken in this finer form of the extract or essence ? Is it never exhibited in the substance ? It is here that the comparison will begin, and that the question will be asked ; while the advo cates of reform, who do not mean to extend it to the abolition of all influence of property, will do well to be prepared to answer, How, if the sale of a seat, or any commutation of services connected with such an object, be gross corruption, can we tolerate the influence which property gives, in biassing the minds of those who are to give their votes ? How are they to suffer a landlord, for instance, to have any more influence over his own tenants, than over those of another man ? How will they suffer a large manufacturer, to be able to bring to the poll more of his own workmen, than of those employed in the service of his neighbour? How will they prevent an opulent man, of any description, spending his fortune in a borough town, from being able to talk of his influ ence among the smaller tradesmen ; or be at liberty to hint to his baker, or his butcher, that, laying out every week such a sum with them as he does, he expects that they should oblige him by giving a vote to his friend Mr Such-a-one, at the next election ? " If all this," said Mr Windham, "is not corrupt, on the principles of re formers, I know not what is. What has money, spent with tradesmen, or work given to manufacturers, or farms let to tenants, to do with the independent exer cise of their right, and the conscious discharge of their duty in the election of a member, to serve them in par liament ? A fine idea truly, that their decision, in the choice of a representative, is to be influenced by the consideration of what is best for their separate and pri vate interest; or, that persons, the advocates of purity, and who will hear of nothing but strict principle, should attempt to distinguish between the influence which en gages a man's vote by the offer of a sum of money, and that which forbids the refusal of it, under the penalty of loss of custom, or loss of work, or of the possession of that, on which his wife and family must depend for their bread. I shall be curious to hear in what manner, not the advocates of this bill, but the advocates for the principles on which this bill is enforced, will defend themselves against these questions, and be able to shew, that, while it is gross corruption, gross moral depravity in any one who possesses such influence, to connect his own interest with the use of it, even though he should not use it improperly, it is perfectly innocent io create that influence by the means just described. Or, on the other hand, if such means arc not lawful, how the influ ence of property is to continue such as it has at all times subsisted in practice, and been at all times considered as lawfully subsisting, it is indifferent to me which side of the alternative they tplie ; but let them be well aware, that such is the alternative to which they will be reduced, and that if they contend generally, as it is now done, that such and such things are corrupt, because they ad mit the consideration of interest, in matters which ought to be exclusively decided on principles of duty, it is in vain for them to contend hereafter,that any man has a right to influence his tenants, or or workmen, by any other means at least than those by which he may influence the tenants, tradesman, or work men of any other person, that is to say, by his talents, or by his virtues, by the services which he may have done, and the gratitude he may have inspired.