ABSTRACT
This chapter exhibits the close dependence of legislation, and even of the absence of legislation, in England during the nineteenth century upon the varying currents of public opinion. For, in the first place, there exist many communities in which public opinion—if by that term be meant speculative views held by the mass of the people as to the alteration or improvement of their institutions—can hardly be said to have any existence. In the second place, to point to realms where laws and institutions have been altered or revolutionised in deference to opinion, but where the beliefs which have guided legislative reform have not been what the chapter mean in England by "public" opinion. In the third place, the law of a country may fail, for a time, to represent public opinion owing to the lack' of any legislative organ which adequately responds to the sentiment of the age.
