FULL TEXT OF THE LAST LETTER WRITTEN BY
MR COBDEN, v

93 SUFFOLK STREET, PALL MALL,
LowpoxN. 22nd March. 1866.

Mx Duar PorrEr,
I return Mills letter.— Everything from him is
entitled to respectful consideration—but I confess, after the best
attention to the proposed representation of minorities which I
oan give it, I am so stupid as to fail to see its merits, He speaks
of 50,000 electors having to elect five members, and that 30,000
may elect them all, and to obviate this he would give the 20,000
minority two votes, but I would give only one vote to each elector,
and one representative to each constituency. Instead of the 50,000
returning five in a lump, I would have five constituencies of 10,000,
pach returning one member. Thus, if the Metropolis, for example,
were entitled with a fair distribution of electoral power, to forty
votes, I would divide it into forty districts or wards, each to return
one member, and in this way every class and every variety of
opinion would have a chance of a fair representation— Belgravia,
Marylebone, St James's, St Giles’s, Whitechapel, Spitalfields, etc.
would each and all have their members. I don’t know any better
plan for giving all opinions a chance of being heard, and, after all,
it is opinions that are to be represented. If the minority have 2
faith that their opinions, and not those of the majority, are the true
ones, then let them agitate and discuss until their principles are in
the ascendant. This is the motive for political action and the
healthy agitation of public life. I do not like to recognise the
necessity of dealing with working men as a class in an extension of
the franchise. The small shopkeeper and the artisan of the town#
are socially on a level. The subject is, however, too large for 8
sheet of notepaper.

Believe me,

ours very truly,
(8gd.) R. COBDEN.

Taos. B. Porrer, Esa.