Sec. 3.

What agreements are legal.

C. P. Act, 1854. s. 2, s.-8. 5.

hand, where large sums were proved to have been distributed in shillings and half-crowns to poor people (who were not voters) in the streets of the town, it was held not to be bribery under this subsection.

2. Legal Agreements.-On the other hand, an agreement between two candidates standing together, that the one should pay the expenses of the other is, as the Coventry case (ubi. sup.) shows, in the absence of any corrupt intention, perfectly proper.

Similarly, "a subscription instituted for the purpose of paying the expenses of a candidate is not in any way an illegal or unconstitutional proceeding." But "it would behove a candidate to look well, that the money of which he availed himself of his own knowledge is legitimately applied, because he incurs a responsibility the moment he holds himself out as a person to be elected by those means" (Belfast, 1 O. & H. 285).

So, too, one candidate may subscribe to the election fund of another, standing quite independently of him, without thereby becoming responsible for the corrupt misapplication of the money so subscribed (ib.)

"Legal expenses bona fide incurred," as fees and remuneration paid to legal agents, who are often selected because of their local influence and knowledge, though in one sense paid to a person in order to induce him to procure the return, are of course not bribery within this clause, being protected by the proviso, which see infra.

Sub-section 5 of section 2 enacts:

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Every person who shall advance or pay, or cause

"to be paid, any money to or to the use of any other 'person, with the intent that such money or any

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part thereof shall be expended in bribery at any "election, or who shall knowingly pay or cause to be "paid any money to any person in discharge or repayment of any money wholly or in part ex"pended in bribery at any election: Provided always, "that the aforesaid enactment shall not extend or be "construed to extend to any money paid or agreed "to be paid for or on account of any legal expenses "bona fide incurred at or concerning any election" [shall be guilty of bribery and punishable accordingly].

Sec. 3.

expended in

The 5th sub-section is directed against those Money to be persons, whether candidates or contributors to the bribery. expenses of a candidate, who (1) advance or pay or cause to be paid any money to any person with the intent that it should be expended in bribery; or (2) who repay money to any person knowing it to have been expended in bribery, at an election.

To or to the use of any other person, i.e., the money may be paid into a bank (see Aylesbury, 2 Peck. 259; Rye, 2 P. R. & D. 122) or otherwise on his account.

With the intent that it shall be expended in bribery, i.e., it need not be proved that it was paid to or for a particular person in order that he should bribe. It is sufficient to prove the intention to bribe, whether by that person or by any one else. Similarly, where the money is repaid after the election, it does not matter whether the payee himself or some other person spent it in corruption, provided the person paying it knew that it had been so expended; so that the repayment to a person of a sum of money

at

not actually expended in bribery, but given as repayment for money so expended, will come within the clause, e.g., where B. repays to A. money spent by him in bribery, and is himself repaid by C., both B. and C. are guilty of bribery.*

At an Election.-It has been questioned whether the clause applied (a) to the case of money lodged after an election, to be expended, not "in discharge or repayment" of money already spent in bribery, but in original bribery itself; but whether it does or not, such a case seems to be covered by the last words of sub-sec. 1, "or shall corruptly do any such act, on account of such voter having voted or refrained from voting;" (b) to the case of money lodged previous to an election, to be so expended after the election; (c) to the case of money paid either before, during or after the election, to a person, with the intention that it should be expended in paying after the election in accordance with prior corrupt agreements, and the repayment of money so expended. The question, it will thus be seen, turns upon whether at is to be quite literally taken, or so as to include transactions after, but still directly connected with, the election. Upon those points no decisions appear hitherto to have been given, and it may therefore suffice to observe that, in construing remedial statutes, though the judges "are not tied down to the letter of the enactment, effect must not be given to a penal statute (such as is the present) unless the offence charged comes within the very words of it" (Huntingtower v. Gardiner, 1 B. & C. 299).

* Rogers, 369; Cunn. 146.

Yet, on the other hand (to quote the words of Coleridge, J., in Henslow v. Fawcett, 3 A. & E. 58), "in construing penal statutes, we must not, by refining, defeat the obvious intention of the legislature, or for replacing any money expended in such payments."

Sec. 3.

limited.

The sub-sections dealing with bribery do not Time not specify any time, whether before or after the election, within which the act of bribery must be committed. "Any act committed previous to an election, with a view to influence a voter at a coming election, whether it is one, two, or three years before, is just as much bribery as if it was committed on the day of the election" (Sligo, 1 O. & H. 302; Stroud, 20. & H. 183). But this statement must be understood to be modified by the rule of evidence, which prohibits generally acts done at former elections for the place being gone into,* and now also by the provisions of s. 49 of the Act of 1883, which precludes inquiry into any election prior to the passing of the Act. And so, bribery committed at a previous municipal election may upset a subsequent Parliamentary election, if a connection between the two is established, as in the Beverley case (1 0. & H. 143), where, although little or no bribery took place at the Parliamentary election, the sitting members were unseated on account of the flagrant and notorious bribery which had prevailed during the municipal contest a fortnight previously.† But where no such connection is proved, the validity of the election will be upheld (Hastings, 1 0. & H.

Cp. Cunn. on El. p. 312.

The Legislature has left it in doubt whether at a Parliamentary Election the ballot papers used at the Municipal Election can be opened. Gloucester, 2 O. & H. 60.

Sec. 3.

Bribery at municipal,

Parliamentary, election.

217; Southampton, ib. 226). In the latter case Willes, J., said: "The elections are prima facie when avoiding distinct; there is no necessary connection between them, and it is not enough to show misconduct with reference to the municipal election, without connecting that election in some way with the Parliamentary election. There have been cases in which it was clear that the municipal and the Parliamentary election were part of one political contest, and that corrupt action at the municipal election either was intended expressly to operate upon Parliamentary elections, or that the necessary result of what was done at the municipal election was to affect the Parliamentary election; where, upon the principle being applied that persons must contemplate the natural consequences of their acts, an intention to affect the Parliamentary election ought to be attributed, both to people who were shown to have misconducted themselves with reference to the municipal election, and to agents of the members who have been guilty of corrupt practices in the course of the municipal election, but with a view to the effect of such practices upon the Parliamentary election." In such cases the Judges have held that the two elections were, under the circumstances, really parts of one and the same political contest, and that the members in the Parliamentary contests were bound by the acts of their agents in the course of the municipal contest.

Proviso.

The section concludes with a proviso which excepts from the operation of the section "any money paid, or agreed to be paid for, or on account of "any legal expenses bona fide incurred at or con

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