COUNTY OF CARLOW. The Committee was chosen (1) on Tuesday the 25th of April, 1837, and consisted of the following Members: Petitioners-Electors in the interest of Thomas Bunbury, Esq. Counsel for Parties admitted to defend, and for Returning Officer- Agents-Mr. Baker and Mr. Fitzgerald. THE petition was by electors in the interest of Mr. Bunbury. It contained allegations of bribery and intimidation, and of improper conduct on the part of the Catholic (1) Before the Committee was balloted for, an application was made on behalf of the sheriff, for him to be allowed to join in striking off from the list of members drawn by lot. A report of the arguments of the counsel and the decision of the House of Commons on this question, will be found in an Appendix to this case, for which we are indebted to Mr. Rushton. See Appendix, p. 83. B 1837. Clergy which were not gone into. There were also charges against the sheriff of having appointed as assessor, a member of "The General Association of Ireland;" of having allowed persons to poll for Mr. Vigors, whose votes had been struck off the register by order of the Speaker of the House of Commons, others who had no sufficient qualification, others who had parted with their qualification, others whose names were not on the register; and of having struck off one of Mr. Bunbury's votes from the poll after it was closed. It prayed that the election and return of Mr. Vigors might be null and void, and that Mr. Bunbury might be declared to have been elected, or that the parties might be sent to a new election; and that the register might be amended by striking off all persons unduly or improperly registered. The petition also prayed that steps might be taken to restrain the sheriff from making an undue return at any future election. At the close of the poll the numbers were— for Mr. Bunbury . 633 The petitioners proceeded by way of scrutiny to strike a sufficient number of votes off the poll to destroy the sitting member's majority of 36. JOHN ALLEN'S CASE. Mr. Thesiger proposed to strike off the vote of John Allen, whose name was included in List No. 8, of which the heading was as follows: "List, containing the names of 16 persons, who, upon the trial of the last petition complaining of an undue election and return for the county of Carlow, were objected to as not being entitled to vote, and whose votes were determined by the Committee assembled to try that petition to be bad 1837. votes, and whose names were duly removed from the register, in obedience to the warrant of the Speaker, but who afterwards voted at the said election for the said Nicholas Aylward Vigors, having been again registered upon the same qualification which had been adjudged to be bad by the said Committee." He produced two affidavits of the said John Allen, the first dated in 1832, on which was indorsed the following memorandum, "struck out of register by order of Committee;" the second, dated the 22nd June, 1836: he also produced the poll-books of both elections, from which it appeared, that John Allen had on both occasions voted for Mr. Vigors; and the following minute in the poll-book of the last election, opposite to John Allen's name, "both oaths put, objected, vote allowed." He also stated, that he was prepared to prove, that John Allen was the person whose vote had been struck off from the register at the trial of the last petition, and that he had not since changed or altered his qualification. Mr. Maule asked if the ground of going into this case was, that John Allen was not duly registered, either in 1832 or in 1836? Mr. Thesiger answered in the affirmative. enter into nation of a voter's qua Mr. Maule then objected to the case being gone into, mittee reon the ground that the vote had been placed on the fused to register of 1836 by the assistant barrister, upwards of an examisix months before the present election, and that no Committee of the House of Commons sitting under the lification, Grenville Acts, has authority or jurisdiction to sit in name stood appeal upon the decision of the assistant barrister, or register. to try the merits of his registration. He cited the first Carlow case, (I) and the two cases (1) C. and R. 459. P. and K. 393. where his on the |