Bianconi, King of the Irish Roads by Igoe Brian

Author:Igoe, Brian [Igoe, Brian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Brian Igoe
Published: 2013-08-23T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 4. The Mayor.

In 1835 the Municipal Reform Act was passed by Parliament. As a result 178 boroughs were granted permission to allow the townspeople to have their own councils. The 1835 Act stated that:

(a) all ratepayers should have a vote in council elections;

(b) each town was to be divided into wards, with councillors being elected for each ward;

(c) the elected councillors were to chose aldermen who would form one-quarter of the council;

(d) the council was to elect a mayor;

(e) the council might, if it wished, take over such matters as the water supply;

(f) the council had to take responsibility for the local police force.

The effect of the Act on Clonmel was to throw open the local vote to rate paying Catholics, for there was no distinction in the Act, no ‘Penal Clause’. However it was to be another nine years before Charles was elected Mayor, for it was not until 1844 he could afford the time. He was elected on the Liberal ticket of O’Connell, to the great surprise of the sitting Tories who had become used to owning the Mayor.

“If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, / Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch.” might have been written about Charles. He had that indefinable attribute, the ‘Common Touch’. Thomas Drummond, the ‘Irish Under-Secretary’ who had chaired the Commission looking into schemes for the construction of the Dublin to Cork railway line, which of course cut through Charles’ territory, commented about Charles in that report

‘With a capital little exceeding the expense of the outfit he commenced with, Fortune – or rather the due reward of industry and integrity – favoured his first efforts…. By a system of steady and just treatment he has obtained a complete mastery, exempt from lawless intimidation or control, over the various servants and agents employed by him, and his establishment is popular with all classes on account of it’s general usefulness and the fair and liberal spirit of its management.’

That was in 1836, 8 years before he became Mayor, and his spirit of absolute fairness and integrity was as strong as ever. He still lived by the family motto learned at his Grandmother’s knee, ‘Cassis tutissima Virtus’. He was always transparently, totally, honest. So he was well suited to the office of Mayor in 1844, for it was far more than a ceremonial office. The Mayor was the town manager and the Chief Magistrate, and routinely sat as such. But how was he to manage? wondered Charles. He had absolutely no experience in municipal management, but assumed he would need to have a grasp of relevant legislation. He wrote to his friend that great barrister Daniel O’Connell to ask him to recommend appropriate legal books. The Liberator replied:

‘If you wish to discharge the duties of the mayorality (sic) with perfect satisfaction, act upon your own sound common sense and do not look into any law book.’

And that is how he set about it. His inauguration speech is worth

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