PETERSFIELD POLITICS. —The miserable consequences of our present system of election are not grievances of a day, they last for years. In the borough of Petersfield, in the present year 1849, the wealthy are suffering immense losses, and many who have, by a life of industry, accumulated provision for age, are losing all they possessed in consequence of the election of 1833,—in consequence of what is called the true old English system of open voting. The effect of the election in 1833 was hostility of parties, the loss of customers the conscientious voters, and the gain of the servile, truckling, and fraudulent. The evils of the time were quite enough in all conscience, but these were comparatively of small amount. Mr. Hector, a real reformer, obtained by his election the opposition of the Tory party; and the consequence was the honest failure of his bank, stopping business, but paying 20s. in the pound in 1841. And for what purpose was this respectable banker opposed, to the ruin of his establishment? Was it in order that the borough should have in its place more secure bank for deposits? It was nothing of the sort, the object was merely to serve a political purpose and gratify party spleen. The defeated candidate. Colonel Hylton Jolliffe, established the bank to revenge his opponent. The results have been a loss to himself, as is believed, of ten thousand pounds, when he withdrew, and now the principal of the bank absconded, its business in great confusion, and the hopes of a dividend so small that a 30l. cheque, offered in the market for a sovereign, could not obtain a purchaser. This is what the people of Petersfield have gained from Tory monopoly, by allowing the Tory candidate, because he could not monopolise their suffrages, to monopolise their banking business. The whole of the evils which, during 16 years, the people of Petersfield have suffered from the election of 1833, and which has just ended so deplorably to the loss of all parties, has been consequent on election feuds excited by the honest, open, true old English system of voting. It has not been merely the hostility of two rival banks, but of depositors, that is, of the electors. Every town has grievances enough from the same cause to make them heartily sick of it. We hope Petersfield will now agitate for the ballot.— Keane's Bath Journal.
