While I was a member of the City Council, the question of the proper qualification for electors of municipal councils and of the legislature, was much under discussion. I told my Reform opponents, who advocated an extremely low standard, that the lower they fixed the qualification for voters, the more bitterly they would be disappointed; that the poorer the electors the greater the corruption that must necessarily prevail. And so it has proved.

In thinking over the subject since, I have been led to compare the body politic to a pyramid, the stones in every layer of which shall be more numerous than the aggregate of all the layers above it. And this comparison is by no means strained, as I believe it will be found, that each and every class is indeed numerically greater than all the classes higher in social rank--the idlers than the industrious--the workers than the employers--the children than the parents--the illiterate than the instructed--and so on. Thus it follows as a necessary consequence, that the adoption of the principle of manhood suffrage, now so much advocated, must necessarily place all political power in the hands of the worst offscourings of the community--law-breakers, vagrants, and outcasts of all kinds. This would be equivalent to inverting the pyramid, and expecting it to remain poised upon its apex--which is a mere impossibility.

Whether the capstone of the social pyramid ought to be king or president, is not material to my argument. On republican principles--and with the French King, Louis Philippe, I hold that the British constitutional monarchy is "the best of all republics"--the true theory of representative institutions must be, that each class of the electors should have a voice in the councils of the country equal to, and no greater than, each of the several classes (or strata) above. This would greatly resemble the old Scandinavian storthings, in which there were four orders of legislators--king, nobles, clergy, and peasants, each of which had a veto on all questions brought before any one of them.

Thus, the election of members of local municipal councils would be vested in the rate-payers, much as at present. The district (not county) councils would be elected by the local municipalities; and would themselves be entitled to elect members of the provincial legislatures. These latter again might properly be entrusted with the election of the Dominion House of Commons. And to carry the idea a step further, the Dominion Legislature itself would be a fitting body to nominate representatives to a great council of the Empire, which should decide all questions of peace or war, of commerce, and other matters affecting the whole body politic. To make the analogy complete, and bind the whole structure together, each class should be limited in its choice to the class next above it, by which process, it is to be presumed, "the survival of the fittest" would be secured, and every man elected to the higher bodies must have won his way from the municipal council up through all the other grades.

I should give each municipal voter such number of votes as would represent his stake in the municipality, say one vote for every four hundred dollars of assessable property, and an additional vote for every additional four hundred dollars, up to a maximum of perhaps ten votes, and no more, which would sufficiently protect the richer ratepayers without neutralizing the wishes of the poorer voters.

On such a system, every voter would influence the entire legislation of the country to the exact extent of his intelligence, and of his contributions to the general expenditure. Corruption would be almost, and intimidation quite, impracticable.

To meet the need for a revisory body or senate, the retired judges of the Upper Courts, and retired members of the House of Commons, after ten or twenty years' service, should form an unexceptionable tribunal for any of the colonies.

I am aware that the election of legislators by the county councils has been already advocated in Canada, and that in other respects this chapter may be considered not a little presumptuous; but I conclude, nevertheless, to print it for what it is worth.