ditional powers." And now, for the first time, there came brief adverse comments from two members. On April 9th there was appointed a select committee, consisting mainly of the same members as the previous one—predominantly state-officers, of one class or other. On the 20th, the report of the committee was received. On the 26th, the bill was recommitted, just before two o'clock in the morning; and on the report there came some short comments, which were, however, protested against on the ground that the bill was not to be publicly discussed. And then, to end this brief history, observe the reception given to the only direct opposition raised. When, to qualify a clause defining the powers of the police, it was proposed to add, "that the justices before whom such information shall be made shall in all cases require corroborative testimony and support thereof, other than that of the members of the police force," this qualification was negatived without a word.
And now, what was this act, passed the first time absolutely without comment, and passed in its so-called amended form with but the briefest comments, made under protest that comments were interdicted? What was this measure, so conspicuously right that discussion of it was thought superfluous? It was a measure by which, in certain localities, one-half of the people were brought under the summary jurisdiction of magistrates, in respect of certain acts charged against them. Further, those by whom they were to be charged, and by whose unsupported testimony charges were to be proved, were agents of the law, looking for promotion as the reward of vigilance—agents placed under a permanent temptation to make and substantiate charges. And yet more, the substantiation of charges was made comparatively easy by only requiring a single local magistrate to be convinced, by the testimony, on oath, of one of these agents of the law, that a person charged was guilty of the alleged acts—acts which, held to be thus proved, were punished by periodic examinations of a repulsive kind, and forced inclusion in a degraded class. A House of Commons, elected by large constituencies, many of which are now chiefly composed of working-men, showed the greatest alacrity in making a law under which, in sundry districts, the liberty of a working-man's wife or daughter remains intact only so long as a detective does not give evidence which leads a magistrate to believe her a prostitute! And this bill, which, even had there been something like adequate reasons (which we have seen there were not) for dispensing with precautions against injustice, should, at any rate, have been passed only after full debate and anxious criticism, was passed with every effort to maintain secrecy; and this on the pretext that decency forbade discussion of it—all the while that Mordaunt-cases and the like were being reported with a fulness proportionate to the amount of objectionable details they brought out! Nor is this all. Not only do the provisions of the act make easy the establishment of charges by
