He expounded his proposals at Bradford on 17 Jan. 1869. They comprised the extension of the borough franchise to all rate paying householders, and all lodgers paying 10l. a year; the county franchise to be on a 10l. rental; elections to be by ballot and the expenses levied from the rates. The government reform bill, memorable by its 'fancy franchises,' was introduced by Disraeli on 20 Feb. Its introduction was preceded by a conference between Bright and Lord John Russell, which excited much surmise. Monckton Milnes was of opinion that Lord John bound Bright over to moderation, Sir Hugh Cairns that he conceded the ballot and redistribution as the price of an alliance. In the event, Bright's speech against the second reading (24 March) was exceptionally temperate and was silent as to the ballot, though it insisted on the need for redistribution. The bill was defeated by thirty-nine votes. A dissolution followed. On 30 April William Scholefield [q. v.] and Bright were returned for Birmingham, their opponent, (Sir) Thomas Dyke Acland [q. v. Suppl.], being in a minority of nearly three thousand votes. Cobden, through Bright's influence, was at the same time returned for Rochdale.
The conservative ministers resolved to meet parliament, but were defeated on Lord Hartington's amendment to the address (10 June) and resigned. Bright had been forward in procuring this result. At a conference of the liberal party held at Willis's Rooms on 6 June he had accepted the leadership of Palmerston and Russell on condition that they pledged themselves to parliamentary reform. He spoke in support of the amendment (9 June), and the public were expectant of his inclusion in the new administration. Four years before, Delane, the editor of the 'Times,' had written that Bright and Cobden must have been ministers but for the Russian war. Cobden was offered and refused a seat in Palmerston's cabinet. 'Recent speeches,' wrote Lord John Russell on 25 June, 'have prevented the offer of a cabinet office to Mr. Bright.' Palmerston, in conversation with Cobden, was more explicit. 'It is his (Bright's) attacks on classes that have given offence to powerful bodies who can make their resentment felt' (cf. Bright's speech of 18 Jan. 1865). The whig families had neither forgiven nor forgotten the philippics of the autumn. During the session Bright delivered two luminous speeches on finance. In the first (21 July) he criticised the incidence of the income tax and advocated the equalisation of the duties on successions; in the second (1 Aug.), on Sir C. Wood's Indian loan bill, he argued for a reduction of military expenditure and for a decentralisation of Indian government. But neither of these speeches was so fruitful as a suggestion, made by him in the course of an attack upon warlike expenditure (21 July), of a treaty of commerce with France, which should replace the prevailing distrust by common commercial interest. The suggestion was noted by Chevalier, the French economist, who was led by it to write to Cobden a proposal for its realisation. In pursuance of this idea Cobden visited France in the autumn of 1859, and negotiated the preliminary treaty of commerce, signed 29 Jan. 1860. During these preliminary negotiations, and those which, protracted from 20 April to 5 Nov. 1860, were occupied by Cobden at Paris in adjusting the French tariff, Bright was in constant correspondence with him, and was his mouthpiece in the House of Commons. On 23 Feb. he defended the preliminary treaty, indirectly assailed by the conservative opposition. While Cobden was complaining at Paris that the negotiations were rendered difficult by Lord Palmerston's provocative language towards France and by his large projects of fortification. Bright delivered a speech (2 Aug.) against the war panic in England and the expenditure entailed by it, not the less cogent and effective that it occupies twenty-eight columns of Hansard, When Cobden's work was finished Bright visited him at Paris, and the two had audience of Napoleon III, who expressed to Bright his sense of the good work he had done in endeavouring to maintain friendly feelings on the part of the English towards France (27 Nov.) A consequence of this interview was the abolition of passports for English travellers in France. In connection with the French treaty Gladstone's budget of 1860 assumed exceptional importance. The conservatives especially attacked its concessions to the French treaty by the repeal of duties on manufactured articles. Part of the scheme involved the repeal of the paper excise, the item most fiercely resisted by them. Having passed the third reading in the commons by 219 to 210 votes, this portion of the budget was rejected by the House of Lords (21 May), Bright threw himself with ardour into the constitutional question of the power of the lords to deal with tax bills. He was nominated a member of the committee to inquire into precedents, and drew up a draft report involving elaborate historical research. In his judgment the commons should have insisted on their right by sending up a second bill to the lords. He justified his position in a
