JB/109/072/001

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1819 May 19

On the frequency of Elections we have left ourselves no room
to dwell at present. They may be too frequent for exciting universal
attention and national sympathy. Whatever is very frequent becomes
familiar. It is viewed with little interest, and done with no
spirit. We subjoin the following argument against annual
Election from an unpublished work of Mr. Bentham which we have
the good fortune to possess, – not for the puerile purpose of charging
him with inconsistency, but because it contains unanswerable
reasoning conveyed in clear an precise language.

"Next to the having no periodical Elections, is the having
them as frequent as possible: Why? Because, the oftener they come
round, the less the danger is of a change. As the mischiefs of changing
so often as you might change are so palpable, and as you
see no more reason for changing one time than another, you even
take things as they are, and enter into a sort of implicit engagement
with yourself not to change at all.

'This is no speculative conjecture: it is but a key to facts
offered by experience. In England, wherever regular succession is
not the object,* * Examples: Lord Mayor of London; Sheriffs of London. annual elections prove in effect appointments
for life, subject only to a periodical power of a Motion inaction which is
rarely exercised:† † Examples: Chamberlain of London: Chairman of the Justices of the Peace for Middlesex: President of the Royal Society – (to which may be added the Common Council of London.) while longer terms product frequent changes,
and still more frequent struggles.‡ ‡ Examples: Member of Parliament. (Remarks on the Judicial
Establishment in France, chap 5 title 3.)'

Identifier: | JB/109/072/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 109.
Date_1	1819-05-19	Marginal Summary Numbering	28 or 1
Box	109	Main Headings	Parliamentary Reform
Folio number	072	Info in main headings field	Parl. Reform or Disfranchising
Image	001	Titles
Category	Copy/fair copy sheet	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	E7
Penner		Watermarks	[[watermarks::I&M [Prince of Wales feathers] 1818]]
Marginals	Jeremy Bentham	Paper Producer	Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
Corrections	Jeremy Bentham	Paper Produced in Year	1818
Notes public		ID Number	35727
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