t the
Whigs did nothing during their long lease of power to bring democracy
nearer, and were entirely contemptuous of popular aspirations. At the very
time when the democratic idea was the theme of philosophers, and was to be
seen expressed in the constitution of the revolted American colonies, and
in the French Revolution, England remained under an aristocracy, governed
first by Whigs, and then by Tories. It is true democracy was not without
its spokesmen in England in the eighteenth century, but there was no
popular movement in politics to stir the masses of the people, as the
preaching of the Methodists stirred their hearts for religion. Democratic
ideas were as remote from popular discussion in the eighteenth century as
they had been made familiar by Lilburne for a brief season in the
seventeenth century.

"WILKES AND LIBERTY"

A word must be said about John Wilkes, a man of disreputable character and
considerable ability, who for some ten years--1763-73--contended for the
rights of electors against the Whig Government. The battle began when
George Grenville, the Whig Prime Minister, had Wilkes arrested on a general
warrant for an article attacking the King's Speech in No. 45 of the _North
Briton_, a scurrilous newspaper which belonged to Wilkes. Chief Justice
Pratt declared the arrest illegal on the ground that the warrant was bad,
and that Wilkes, being at the time M.P. for Aylesbury, enjoyed the
privilege of Parliament. A jury awarded Wilkes heavy damages against the
Government for false imprisonment, and the result of the trial made Wilkes
a popular hero. Then, in 1764, the Government brought a new charge of
blasphemy and libel, and Wilkes, expelled from the House of Commons, and
condemned by the King's Bench, fled to France, and was promptly declared an
outlaw. He returned, however, a year or two later, and while in prison was
elected M.P. for Middlesex. The House of Commons, led by the Government,
set the election aside, and riots for "Wilkes and Liberty" broke out in
London. The question was: Had the House of Commons a right to exclude a
member duly elected for a constituency?--the same question that was raised
over Charles Bradlaugh, a man of very different character, in the
Parliament of 1880. Again and again in 1768 and 1769 Wilkes was re-elected
for Middlesex, only to be expelled, and finally the House decided that
Wilkes' opponent, Colonel Luttrell, was to sit, although Luttrell was
manifestly not chose