the controul of parliament, or that the minister who exercised it improperly was to be exempt from censure; but in what manner he understood this limitation, he would state when called upon to make his defence.

The question, however, now, was not whether ministers had acted properly, or improperly; it was, whether the house should announce to France, that the supplies of the year were to be stopped, and the exertions of the executive power suspended.

Mr. Fox stated, in explanation, that he had only said that extraordinaries were, in some measure, inevitable, but were an evil not to be extended beyond the necessity, and that it was criminal to resort to this expedient when other means might be employed.

Sir William Pulteney declared, that it was with much concern and astonishment he heard, that the minister had taken upon him to appropriate so large a sum of the public money without the consent of parliament. The controul of the house of commons over the public purse was the main point upon which rested the whole of the constitution of Great Britain; and though Mr. Fox might be accustomed to use strong language, yet this was a case which every man must feel to be of the last importance. The justification offered by the chancellor of the exchequer was chiefly grounded on two arguments, drawn from the words in which the vote of credit must be granted in every year of a war. First, that it was meant to defray the extraordinary expenses of the year. Undoubtedly it was, and unfortunately it happened, that extraordinaries and a vote of credit must be granted in every year of a

war: but, surely it never was inténded that subsidies to foreign powers should be supplied by a vote of credit. New circumstances might occur to render it proper for ministers to exercise their discretion; but here the circumstances were foreseen, and had been laid before parliament; the discovery that this sum had been advanced came out in a very suspicious manner indeed; it could no longer be concealed; there seemed to have been a desire of concealing it as long as possible, and a disclosure was only compelled by necessity. He could not however go to the length of stopping the supplies, though he was of opinion that a very strong mark of censure ought to be inflicted by the house. As to the influence a parliamentary sanction to this measure might have had upon public credit at an earlier period, he thonght it too trifling a consideration to weigh against the fùndamental principles of the constitution, and with regard to the' credit which the minister assumed for acting advantageously when he concealed from the enemy the intention of affording supplies to our ally, he considered that concealment as having a very different effect; for it was, in a great measure, on the supposition that this country refused all pecuniary supplies to the emperor, that the French were emboldened to make redoubled efforts, and advance so far into the heart of Germany. The right honourable gentleman had asked, whether, in order to pass a previous censure on his conduct, the house would adopt the proposition of Mr. Fox, and, in this critical emergency, stop the supplies of the na tion? It was this dilemma which' aggravated the misconduct of the minister, who put the house in that situation,

situation, that it must either acquiesce in an expenditure made in so blameable a manner, or bring danger on the country by stopping the supplies, and afford some room for a charge against national faith.

He trusted that this proceeding would not pass the house without receiving strong marks of disapprobation; and he hoped it would never witness in future a similar violation of the principles of the constitution.

Mr. Grey expressed his surprize and indignation at what he termed the desperate measures of the minister, in an animated speech. Had the house, he said, perceived sooner the danger which threatened the constitution, the present measure would never have been attempted; and if their obsequiousness and servility had not encouraged the design of ministers, they never would have seen this bold and daring invasion of their rights.

How must the astonishment and displeasure of the house be increased when they found, that, when parliament had been sitting, when the embarrassment government had felt for money was so great, these advances had been made! nay, at the very time when be himself had asked Mr. Pitt, what he intended as to an Austrian loan, very consider able advances had been made, and only 77,000l. had been given during the recess of parliament. Such was the fact proved by the dates in the account on the table.

"I am aware (continued Mr. Grey) that the right honourable gentleman will rest his defence on the general principle of army extraordinaries; that he will tell us a case of real exigency must and ought to supersede the inferior demands of economical, or even legislative prudence. But I reply, that no financial exigency can be

paramount to the constitution; that no duty is so sacred as its support: true, its most vital parts have been attacked, and their vigour essentially crippled and destroyed, but it is nevertheless incumbent on the friends of order to uphold what, remains of it, and struggle for the restoration of such of its fundamental elementary attributes as have been either subverted or abused. The existence of the constitution, in fact, depends on the vigilance of a discerning house of commons respecting the acts of ministers. Such a house will not be satisfied on great constitutional questions with pompous declamatory denunciations of the opposers of ministerial arrogance, or the foes of ministerial profusion: it will not be satisfied with retrospective and unconstitutional measures of any kind, but will in every situation evince, by the conduct of its members, that there is still a barrier to encroachments, a line beyond which not even his majesty's ministers can extend their predatory efforts. the present case, it cannot for a moment be argued, that it was not the duty of ministers to come forward with a specific proposition, soliciting the advice and concurrence of the representatives of the people before the money of the people was applied in a way that must subject them to be assessed with new and extraordinary burdens. That the public money was thus applied is evident; that the constitution was infringed, is equally so; but the right honourable gentleman has told us, that the sum advanced to the emperor was advanced under circumstances, and at a time, when it was necessary that an exception should be adopted.

In

"Thus he takes the exception, and argues from the necessity of the case. We might in the same way

give an unlimited vote of credit to ministers; perhaps we shall be told next, that any account of the disbursement of the army extraordinaries might thus be avoided; so it might. There was a time, however, when he would have, called such an exception paltry; a time when he was an enthusiast in the cause of liberty; an economist; a reformer. In the year 1782 this circumstance of extraordinaries would have been reprobated as an evil by the right honourable gentleman, which could not be too jealously watched: a principle that could not be too severely condemned; an infringement ever to be resisted. These avowedly were then his sentiments of that species of ministerial chicanery, insomuch that, immediately after he was made minister, the house was called upon by a speech from the throne, to watch with jealousy, and repel with dignity, every such attempt to dilapidate and infringe the constitution. The extraordinaries being thus formally and solemnly made the subject of a speech from the throne, it is not a little remarkable that the minister himself has adopted the exception instead of the principle; has frittered away the laws, and attempted, by a sort of special pleading, to deprive us of our liberties."

Mr. Grey then mentioned the act of parliament, whereby a certain sum was given to his majesty for the service of the year 1795. The application of this sum was restricted to certain purposes: it was to be applied in such a way as the exigencies of affairs might require; but it was meant prospectively, not retrospectively. He could prove, he said, to the house, that the sum then granted had been used retrospectively instead of prospectively. On the 31st of December, 1795,

150,000l. was given to colonel Crauford. He was certain that the right honourable gentleman was abstractedly of opinion, that any appropriation, such as he had made of that vote of credit, was unconstitutional, nor did Mr. Grey think that the last parliament, servile and obsequious as it was, could have intended, could have considered that vote of credit as conveying unlimited power to ministers. He asked, if there now were present any gentlemen who were members of that parliament, whether, if it had been stated to them at the time the vote was passed, that two millions and a half were to be given as a subsidy to the emperor, at the discretion of his majesty's ministers, whether they would have agreed to place such extraordinary power in the hands of the executive government? Many apprehensions had arisen from the danger of an invasion: he ventured to affirm, that no invasion or attack would go more decidedly to the destruction of all that was valuable; namely, the liberty of the country.

Viewing the subject in this light, it was his duty to oppose, or, at least, vote for suspending the supplies. If he were asked, were those supplies to be suspended which would afford to government so much weight and vigour? he would answer yes, and he was certain that we should not negociate less favourably if the French saw that the house was determined to maintain its rights; the firmness with which they asserted their own dignity would be a pledge of the spirit with which they would resist the enemy. Assuming that exalted state on which a free people ought to stand, they would negotiate more advantageously with a free people; a people that he hoped would remain free; a people whom the right

honour

honourable gentleman now considered as capable of maintaining peace and amity, who had now snorted away the undigested fumes of the blood of their sovereign, and with whom he had now condescended to treat.

But the proposition did not go to negative the supplies;. it was intended to suspend them till the wound given to the constitution was made whole. He moved an amendment, that the second reading should be postponed till the next day, and he would then move the house to resolve that the minister had been guilty of a high crime and misdemeanour.

Mr. Wilberforce was averse to postponing the passing of the resolution, even till the morrow, on the score of propriety and policy. The nature of the vote of credit, he said, had not been sufficiently commented upon; it would be found to convey an impression that ministers were authorised in employing it in such a manner, or on such measures, as the state might require. This construction was so literally obvious on the face of the bill, that it could not be contested.

Upon this a question arose, whether the mode in which ministers had applied the money was, or was not, necessary to the cause in which

the nation was embarked.

He thought that the mode in which the money had been applied was a proper one; the representatives of a generous nation would not make the saving of the Germanic empire the subject of censure. At the time the money was remitted the emperor was on the verge of a great precipice, and all Europe in danger of being ruined by his fall. To that seasonable supply might be attributed, in a considerable degree, the good reception lord Malmsbury met with from the di

rectory of France: and had that transaction been publicly known at the time of its completion, it might have injured our public credit. Gentlemen, he said, might rant about the excellences, the wounds, and the death of the constitution; but it ought to be remembered, that those to whom they addressed their medley effusions were more sincere supporters of freedom than they.

Mr. York contended, that the assistance given to the emperor was out of a sum of money granted by a vote of credit to defray any extraordinary expenses which might accrue; and as those extraordinaries were not then voted, it was consequently a separate consideration. Yet the opposition side of the house had proposed a negative to the resolutions of the committee of ways and means, on the principle that the money granted by the vote of credit in a former year was misapplied, and thereby to postpone the supplies necessary for the current year.

Mr. Curwen declared, that the safety of the British constitution was involved in the question then before the house. The commons were always considered as the guardians of the public purse, and in that view this question was more impor tant to them than if the threatened invasion had been put in execution, and the French actually at our doors. Supposing the assistance given to the emperor to have been instrumental in saving Germany, still the British constitution was not to be destroyed on that account; the minister had various opportunities of pleading some necessity to parliament for informality in granting that assistance, or he might have applied for a bill of indemnity.

The master of the rolls and lord Hawksbury defended the conduct of administration