end also, and instead of going to his shop to ask the tradesman for his vote, the candidate would apply to the beggar on the bridge, or the scavenger in the kennel, or to the hospitals or Channel-row, and those places where the poor are now wisely supplied with bread, instead of being intoxicated with hand-bills, offering, in the place of bread, the hopes of returning the parliament, and becoming a third constitutive part of the legislature.

"Such would be the state of election under this plan of personal representation, which from a revolution of power would speedily lead to a revolution of property, and become a plan of plunder as well as a scene of confusion; for if you transfer the power of the state to those who have nothing in the country, they will afterwards transfer the property, and annex it once more to the power in their own persons; give them your power and they will give themselves your property; of such a representation as this plan would provide, the first ordinance would be robbery, accompanied with the circumstance incidental to robbery, murder."

The United Irishmen immediately attempted to justify their plan of reform, by the following address to the people of Ireland.

The society of United Irishmen in Dublin to the people of Ireland.

We submitted to your consideration such a plan for your equal representation, as would, in our judgment, if carried into effect, give you your just and constitutional weight in the legislature. We exulted in the thought, that our exer.

tions had contributed to raise the public mind to that elevated point, from which it might view its widely extended rights; from which it might discover the real insignificance of every proposal towards reform, that should not seek the full measure of justice; which should not give to all, who were in any degree bound by the law, the power of choosing those who made the law. We thought the simplicity of the plan the best test of its honesty, and that its appeal to the common sense of the nation rendered any explanation of its principles unnecessary. We are, however, now called upon to justify its primary principle by the objections which have since been raised against it; and, should we succeed, our triumph must be that of argument over invective; of reason over prejudice; and of justice over power.

It is an apprehension with some, that should every man be allowed to vote for a representative in parliament, the monarchy and the aristocracy of the constitution would soon be overborne and destroyed by the exorbitant power and republican spirit of the democracy.

Let it be remembered, that the British constitution has amply provided against the probability of such an event. It has appointed a sole executive officer, invested with prero. gatives to strengthen that executive power, and with a certain portion of legislative authority to defend those prerogatives. It has instituted a substantial aristocracy, not deriving all its weight and authority merely from the king's patents, but hereditary, and possessing a mass of property, by which, backed and supported, if necessary, by the executive prerogatives and legislative authority of the crown, it is enabled to withstand the attacks of the democracy. Away then with the idle apprehension. Can any danger attach upon so much influence and so much power? On the contrary, can any thing short of pure democracy maintain against them the integrity and independence of the house of commons?

But it is said, that the lower classes of the community being without property, have no stake in the country, and, therefore, ought not to vote for any part of the legislature. In consequence of the representative system, every man is supposed to be either individually, or by his delegate, a party to making the laws by which he is to be bound. The elective right cannot, therefore, be denied, on constitutional prin

ciple, to any one, and even the poorest should be allowed the exercise of that right, as they are bound by law as well as others. Laws operate on life, liberty and property. Why is property represented? Because it is valuable to the pos sessor, and may be affected by the law. Why should liberty and life not be represented? Are they not more valuable to their possessor, and may they not also be affected by the law? Since liberty and life are the most important objects of legislation, the poorer class have a right to some controul over the legislature, and it is just that they should exercise it. The spirit of many of our laws is aristocratic, and by no means calculated for the protection of the poor. To pass over the remarkable instances of the game-laws and the stamp-act, the latter of which, by operating on legal proceeding, shuts the door of justice against the poor, we shall refer to a much more important system, our criminal code.

If the lower classes of the community had been represented in parliament, when their necessities first urged them to insurrection and outrage, under the denomination of whiteboys and defenders, parliament would have inquired into and redressed their grievances, instead of making laws to punish them with death. The acts, which are prohibited by many of our laws, are unquestionably great crimes; but the punishments, inflicted by those laws, are still greater crimes. The reason of this disproportion is, that the rich man is never guilty of sheep-stealing, and the poor man has no one to plead his cause in the senate.

If, however, it be a principle, that no man who does not contribute to the support of government, should be immediately concerned in legislation, such principle would be no exclusion of the poor, for they contribute in proportion to their means.

The poorest man in the land pays taxes for his fire, his candle, for his potatoes and clothing: and the poorer he is, the greater occasion he has for a vote, to protect what little he has, which is necessary not to his qualification merely, but to his very existence. He has a property in his labour, and in the value it will bring in the market, the field, or the manufactory; a property, on account of its smallness, of more real value to him than thousands of pounds to the rich and luxurious; a property, which must render him more in

terested in the honest disposal of the public money, since one additional tax may crush him, than those can be who receive that public money by virtue of places without employment, and pensions without merit.

Property is merely the collection of labour; it possesses the very same qualities before as after it is collected into a heap, and the scattered labour of the lowest ranks is as real, and ought to be as really represented, as the most fixed and solid property. Reason, we think, says this; and sad experience has manifested, that giving political power exclusively to property collected, not to the mass of living labour, has been, in all ages, and particularly in modern times, the true cause of feudality, of vassalage, and of aristocratic despotism.

It is also used as an argument, that although in theory every man has a right to vote, yet the exercise of that right among us would be impracticable, or attended with outrage from the multitude of voters. To that we answer, that the practicability of the measure depends on a few regulations, which we apprehend, can be easily contrived to render elections practicable and tranquil. Let there be a division of the kingdom into parts, sufficiently small, and, as nearly as possible, equal with respect to population, and let the several elections annually commence and conclude throughout the kingdom on one and the same day.

Some friends to universal suffrage in a new country, urge a local objection to its being applied to Ireland. They say, that the lower classes of people in this country are peculiarly unfit for the exercise of suffrage, on account of their extreme ignorance. We know of no description of people unfit for the exercise of their rights; and, if we did, we would fit them for it by giving it to them. What has made those elasses so extremely ignorant? The privation of those rights, which, if enjoyed, would have procured them knowledge. Apply the reverse of that which has debased, and it will exalt them. Give them the elective franchise, and let them exercise it immediately. It is not just to judge of what the people would be, when embodied into the constitution of their country, from their present state of debasement, in which they feel themselves unconnected with it. We trust that our countrymen, even the poorest, who are now stigmatized with the appellations of swine, wretches and rabble,

would, if restored to their rights, evince an elevation of sen timent, which, setting every species of corruption at defiance, must humble the pride of wealth by the superior lustre of virtuous poverty.

Opposition seem surprised that the people should view their debates with indifference. We will tell them the reason. It is, because nothing passes of a nature to animate and interest the people; nothing from which an individual can promise himself more happiness, or the community more splendour; it is, because enthusiasm no longer lights up the countenance of Grattan, and swells every heart with some. thing great and good, and with the prospect of something greater and better; it is, because there appears no internal spring of action, no fixture of character, but good and bad qualities, as it were, external, and neither virtues nor vices their own; it is, because once in seven years the people are treated as majesty, and, in the interval, maltreated as mob.

We have not, in our plan of reform, paled in little parks of aristocracy. Our plan has not been described with a pair of compasses, nor have we defaced, with childish circles, the system of nature, and the chart of the constitution. There is no truth in any political system, in which the sun of liberty is not placed in the centre, with knowledge to enlighten, and benevolence to warm and invigorate; with the same ray to gild the palace and illuminate the cottage. "The earth moves," said Galileo, " and the sun stands still." He was imprisoned for the heretical assertion, for a libel against the law of nature, and for exciting sedition among the stars; but the earth moves notwithstanding; and, in spite of fine, imprisonment, pillory and transportation, the rights of man are the immoveable centre of the British constitution, that has hitherto regulated time, and determined revolutions.

Indeed the local circumstances seem to us rather in favour of introducing it into Ireland. We have lately had occasion, in considering the catholic claims, to examine into the foundations of government. The catholic has taught all Ireland, that to be taxed or legislated for, without being represented, is an oppression, which sinks the sufferer into a slave. He insisted on his right to the elective suffrage, because he was bound by the laws, and contributed to the expences of the state. The doctrine, once broached, can never be forgotten;