invitation to it by ministers. This complicated violation of all law, in seizing papers, in punishing before any guilt was established, in treating suspected libellers like convicted felons, was to be traced to lord Sidmouth's Circular Letter; and a stronger instance could hardly exist of the mischief of government's interfering with magistrates, and prompting them as to the mode in which they were desirous that their judicial functions should be exercised. An hon. friend of his (Mr. Lambton) had called this bill the winding up of that system of injustice which the ministers had been acting upon. He wished it could be so considered. To himself it rather appeared as a prelude to farther exertions of power, and to future denials of justice. The reports of the committee of both Houses declared, that it would be necessary for the magistrates to persevere in the same exertions as they had hitherto made. It has been therefore necessary to violate the law; fresh violations of it by the magistrates will be necessary, and a better ground is thus laid for a bill of Indemnity in the next session for those illegal acts of authority which the magistrates seem thus encouraged to commit. Let it be recollected that all this has taken place under the mild government of king George 3rd, exercised by a viceroy in his name, and by his authority.

It remained for him to speak of the third object of the bill; the protecting those who had given information to government, from supposed danger. In England this was a policy quite

new and unheard of. It was true, that in the bill of 1801, an act in which a similar recital was found, as in this; but the circumstances of those times were quite different from the present. The traitorous designs then spoken of, were an alleged correspondence with a foreign enemy, and the information received was said to be from persons then in the power of that enemy. But the danger that it is pretended now exists is from popular outrage or private revenge, against those who may have dared to give evidence against offenders. But what symptom has ever yet discovered itself of any such feeling in this country? No complaint of the kind has ever been made: no alarm respecting it has ever been expressed: none of the reports of the Secret Committees make any mention of, or have any allusion to it. At Derby, in London, at York, there appeared no unwillingness in any witness to give his evidence; and nothing had happened to impede, in any way, the due administration of justice. It was plain, then, that this was an unfounded pretext. It was not that the government supposed there was any danger, but they were desirous of concealing the unworthy means which had been used to obtain information, and of sanctioning the future recourse to this new system of employing spies and informers.

Sir S. Romilly then took notice of Mr. Canning and Mr. Bragge Bathurst, and digressed to the humble agents of ministerial vengeance, Castles, Oliver, and their accomplices. He con

cluded

cluded with the following animated apostrophe: "That this example may appear in the greater force to future times, our Journals will preserve that long detail of multiplied sufferings which are enumerated in the various petitions that have been presented to us, and with them the record of our having twice refused to institute any inquiry into the truth of them. When those who are to come after us shall suffer under the evils we are now inflicting upon them; when their liberties shall be violated after the example which we are establishing, and they shall reflect with bitterness on the memories of those who have been the authors of all their wrongs; it is at least some consolation to us to reflect that it will be remembered that there was a small number of members of this House who endeavoured to avert this evil, who, though overpowered by numbers, and discouraged by the triumph of a confident majority, yet made the best stand they could in defence of the constitution, the laws, and the liberties, which had been transmitted to them by their ancestors, and who feel more satisfaction in having thus discharged their duty, though without success, than their opponents can derive from the victory they have gained."

The Solicitor General, who rose next, exerted himself with all his powers to confute his adversary. He seriously called upon the House to consider what had taken place in the last year; and urged that it would be dealing unfairly both by ministers and magistrates, to refuse them the

protection required. The state of the country was such as to induce parliament to suspend a part of the liberties of the people. The papers laid before the committee last year, clearly proved that there existed a treasonable conspiracy in the country, and the report of that committee recommended to parliament to arm ministers with a power sufficient for the preservation of the public tranquillity. Ministers applied for such power, and obtained it. When this power was about to expire, another committee was appointed, in consequence of the report of which, ministers were allowed to retain the power vested in them for a further period. As soon as the public disturbances were quelled, and that such powerwas no longer necessary, ministers voluntarily resigned it, although the period for which it had been entrusted to them had not expired.

Another question which presented itself was, whether an indemnity ought to be granted as an act of justice to those to whom the execution of the trust contemplated by the acts of suspension had been confided. Here he must at the outset deny the proposition of the hon. and learned gentleman, that no indemnity could be desired, except for the purpose of guarding his majesty's ministers against the consequences of their unjust or illegal acts. He denied that the present measure had ever been introduced or supported on the presumption that ministers had been guilty of the least irregularity. The reports of committees appointed by the House had led to the two acts of Suspension, and, together with

the

Al

the report recently received from a third secret committee, could never be laid aside in the consideration of this measure. though the bill of Indemnity was not their necessary consequence, its merits could not be fairly understood without a constant reference to them. It was an important part of them, that the authority of the last committee directly sanctioned the belief, that although a traitorous conspiracy no longer existed, yet that the disposition out of which it had before grown, remained unaltered and unabated, as far as could be judged from the conduct and declarations of those who had already been the principal objects of suspicion.

The hon. and learned gentle man had asked, why, if the law had not been exceeded by ministers, was a bill of Indemnity called for? To this he would answer, that ministers were not anxious to have the bill passed on their own account, as they could easily justify themselves for what they had done; but they were desirous that the sources. from which they had obtained information, should not at present be disclosed. Besides, it was found, that though there no longer existed a necessity for the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act, yet such was the state of the country, that the utmost vigilance was necessary, as there still existed in the minds of many persons a disposition to disturb the public peace. This being the case, it would be highly improper to point out those persons whose information enabled government to check in time those evils

which threatened to over-run the country.

The hon. and learned gentleman had dwelt with particular emphasis on the enormity of authorizing, by virtue of this bill, the proceedings of those magistrates who had searched the houses of individuals for papers, under the authority of lord Sidmouth's circular letter on the subject of libels. Surely he had not read the recital of this bill, when he ascribed such an interpretation or meaning to it, and dwelt with so much pathos and effect upon the evil of such a construction. He had, however, presumed that such was the nature of the bill, for he maintained that it could not possibly apply to the apprehension or seizing of papers of any except persons suspected of treasonable practices. If in such cases magistrates had overstepped the strict legal limits of their authority in search of evidence so material to the discovery of the treason, would the House not say that their meritorious exertions did not entitle them to legal protection? (Here Sir S. Romilly said, across the table, that in such cases the magistrates would have acted according to law).

The Solicitor General in continuation remarked, that all then which could be alleged against the bill was, that it was unnecessary. He then touched upon the case of Swindells, Oliver, and some other dangerous offenders; and in answer to the question, whether those persons who had suffered by imprisonment on suspicion of treason were to be denied all redress, he made the following

$

reply:

reply that private interest must in extraordinary cases give way to the public welfare; and that it were better some private injury should be sustained, than that the constitution should be endangered, which would be the case, if those persons were allowed to act with impunity. He further added, as a reply to the objection of his antagonist to the bill, because it was not merely co-extensive with the Suspension, but went as far back as January; that if ministers or magistrates found it necessary to arrest disaffected persons before the Suspension of the Habeas Corpus act, they were as much entitled to protection for having so done, as they were for their acts during the Suspension.

Such were, for the most part, the observations made by the Solicitor-general in relation to the

keen 'attacks with which Sir Samuel Romilly supported his own cause. As we have already dwelt, perhaps too largely, upon the proceedings which the Indemnity bill excited in the House of Lords, we shall cut short all the remaining argument in the House of Commons, and only mention the result of the whole debate.

The question being put, that the Speaker do now leave the chair, the House divided, Ayes, 238: Noes, 65. Majority, 173.

On March 13, the Attorney General having moved, That the Indemnity bill be now read a third time, the question was put on the third reading, which was carried by 82 against 23. After several amendments were negatived by the majority, the bill passed without farther discus sion.

CHAPTER

ON

N February 13th Lord Archibald Hamilton rose to make his promised motion relative to the late transactions in the burgh of Montrose. He said that he should commence by declaring what his intended motion was not; and then proceed to state what it was. It was not any disguised motion for parliamentary reform, nor had it any necessary connexion with that unwelcome topic. His motion would be for the production to this House of those proceedings of the privy council which were technically called the Act or Warrant, by which a new election of magistrates had been granted by government to the burgh of Montrose, and a radical and important alteration had been made in the old constitution of that burgh. The learned lord advocate had declared in the last session, when he (lord A. H). had supported the prayer of some Scotch petitions for parliamentary reform, that the people of Scotland were satisfied with things as they were. They who had observed what had passed in that country for the last six monthswho had noticed how many public meetings had been held for the sole purpose of considering the abuses and mismanagement in

their burghs-had seen how all the newspapers had teemed with resolutions from the different burghs stating their grievances would find some difficulty in believing the learned lord's assertion of the former year. He need state one fact only to show the state of things in those burghs. The inhabitants of a burgh, who had no voice in the appointment of their magistrates, and no control over their conduct, were nevertheless informed that they were liable for whatever debts they might, in their magisterial capacity, contract. This abuse was founded on another still greater; namely, self-election in the magistrates; an abuse of such a nature, when applied to a body which had duties to perform, that the wit of man could not contrive a mode better calculated to produce the most domineering arro gance in these municipal governors, and the most abject state of subjection and servility in the helpless governed.

He would now proceed to detail the particulars which had occasioned his motion. In the course of the last year, an irregular election of the magistrates took place at Montrose. It was deemed, indeed, wholly void; and thus the burgh in its cor

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