un) THE FORTY SHILLING FRANCHISE. 305

rine than you are. This they did, and successfully, and 1844.
o that means gained the counties.” But,” Cobden con- Ar. 40.
ued, “there was another clause in the Reform Act, which
We of the middle classes—the uuprivileged, industrious men,
Who live by our capital and labour—never found out,
namely, the forty-shilling freehold clause. I will set that
8gaingst the Chandos clause, and we will beat them in the
Counties with it. . . . . There is a large class of mechanics
Who save their forty or fifty pounds; they have been ac-Customed
 perhaps to put it in the savings’ bank. Twill not
885 a word to undervalue that institution; but cottage pro-Perty
 will pay twice as much interest as the savings’ bank.
Then what a privilege it is for a man to put his hands in his
Pockets, and walk up and down opposite his own freehold,
tnd say, ¢ This is my own; I worked for it, and I have won
1s. There are many fathers who have sons just ripening
nto maturity, and I know that parents are very apt to keep
their property and the state of their affairs from their children,
 My doctrine is that you cannot give your son your
confidence, or teach him to be entrusted with property, too
early. When you have a son just coming to twenty-one
Years of age, the best thing you can do, if you have it in
your power, is to give him a qualification for the county ; it
accustoms him to the use of property, and to the exercise of
% vote, whilst you are living and can have some little
ludicious control over it if necessary.”
The reader will observe that Cobden’s design was free from
the sinister quality of manufactured voting. He supposed
that men would acquire property in their own neighbourhood,
the natural seat of their political interests and activity.
What ig politically mischievous in this franchise only happens
When a number of strangers in possession of a factitious
Yualification invade a district and help to nullify the wishes
¢ Speech st Covent Garden, Dec. 11, 1844.