A similar commendation
cannot be given to the constitution of the only provincial boards we
possess, the Quarter Sessions, consisting of the justices of peace
alone; on whom, over and above their judicial duties, some of the most
important parts of the administrative business of the country depend
for their performance. The mode of formation of these bodies is most
anomalous, they being neither elected, nor, in any proper sense of the
term, nominated, but holding their important functions, like the
feudal lords to whom they succeeded, virtually by right of their
acres: the appointment vested in the Crown (or, speaking
practically, in one of themselves, the Lord Lieutenant) being made use
of only as a means of excluding any one who it is thought would do
discredit to the body, or, now and then, one who is on the wrong
side in politics. The institution is the most aristocratic in
principle which now remains in England; far more so than the House
of Lords, for it grants public money and disposes of important
public interests, not in conjunction with a popular assembly, but
alone. It is clung to with proportionate tenacity by our
aristocratic classes; but is obviously at variance with all the
principles which are the foundation of representative government. In a
County Board there is not the same justification as in Boards of
Guardians, for even an admixture of ex officio with elected members:
since the business of a county being on a sufficiently large scale
to be an object of interest and attraction to country gentlemen,
they would have no more difficulty in getting themselves elected to
the Board than they have in being returned to Parliament as county
members.
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