2-995-680 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

J. W. Malcolm, Esq., the newly-elected M.P. for Boston - from a photograph by Claudet, 1860. 'Mr. Malcolm...received his education at Eton, and at Christchurch, Oxford...Malcolm said he...wished to extend the franchise [ie the vote] to all who were qualified for it by their education and position in society...The things we had chiefly to lament were undue interference with the exercise of the elective franchise and extravagant public expenditure...there was undoubtedly, owing to faults in the administrative system, great waste of the public money. But these evils would never be corrected by cries for the points of the Charter, universal suffrage, or vote by ballot...the whole administrative system must be gone through, and altered where found defective...One of his strongest objections against the ballot was that it was a thoroughly un-English and sneaking mode of voting. If a man was fit to be trusted with the franchise, let him come forward and give his vote openly'. From "Illustrated London News", 1860.