Parliamentary History. 5 GEORGE THE THIRD, A. D. 1765. FOURTH SESSION OF THE TWELFTH PARLIAMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN. THE King's Speech on Opening the Session.] January 10, 1765. His Majesty came to the House of Peers and opened the Session with the following Speech to both Houses: "My Lords and Gentlemen; "The situation of affairs both at home and abroad has enabled me to allow you that recess which has been usual in times of public tranquillity. "I have now the satisfaction to inform you, that I have agreed with my good brother the king of Denmark, to cement the union which has long subsisted between the two crowns, by the marriage of the prince royal of Denmark with my sister the princess Caroline Matilda; which is to be solemnized as soon as their respective ages will permit. "I observe with pleasure, that the events which have happened in the course of the last year give us reason to hope for the duration of that peace which has been so happily established, and which it is my resolution strictly to maintain. The courts of France and Spain have given me fresh assurances of their good dispositions. The future quiet of the empire has been confirmed, by the unanimous choice of a successor to the imperial dignity; and the peaceable election of the king of Poland has prevented those fatal consequences, which upon similar occasions, have so frequently been destructive to the repose of Europe. I am happy, therefore, to meet my parliament at a time when no foreign disturbances interrupt their consul[VOL. XVI. ] tations for the internal good order and prosperity of my kingdoms. "Gentlemen of the House of Commons; "I shall ask of you, for the current service of the year, no other Supplies than such as are necessary for those establishments which have already met with your approbation; and I will order the proper estimates for this purpose to be laid before you. "I must, however, earnestly recommend to you the continuance of that attention which you have hitherto shewn, for the improvement of the public revenue, and the diminution of the national debt. For these desirable and necessary ends, I am persuaded that you will pursue every proper measure which the state of my dominions, and the circumstances of the times may require. "My Lords, and Gentlemen ; "The experience which I have had of your former conduct, makes me rely on your wisdom and firmness, in promoting that obedience to the laws, and respect to the legislative authority, of this kingdom, which is essentially necessary for the safety of the whole; and in establishing such regulations as may best connect and strengthen every part of my dominions, for their mutual benefit and support. "The affection which I bear to my people excites my earnest wishes, that every session of parliament may be distinguished by some plans for the public advantage, and for their relief from those difficulties which an expensive war has brought upon them. My concurrence and encouragement shall never be wanting, where their welfare is concerned: and I trust that, for the attainment of that great object, you will proceed with temper, unanimity, and dispatch." The Lords' Address of Thanks.] His [B] Majesty having retired, their lordships agreed upon the following Address: "Most Gracious Sovereign; "We, your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Lords spiritual and temporal in parliament assembled, return your Majesty our humble thanks, for your most gracious Speech from the throne. "We acknowledge with gratitude your Majesty's goodness, in acquainting us with your having agreed to a marriage between the prince royal of Denmark and your Majesty's sister the princess Caroline Matilda, to be solemnized as soon as their respective ages will permit. And we beg leave to assure your Majesty of our entire satisfaction in the choice of this alliance; which, under the blessing of Providence, cannot fail of cementing and strengthening the union which has so long subsisted between the crowns of Great Britain and Denmark, and thereby conducing to the support of the Protestant cause. this kingdom; and to establish such regulations as shall appear to be most conducive to the mutual benefit and support of all your Majesty's dominions. "With hearts full of duty and affection, we offer our unfeigned thanks to your Majesty, for your paternal care and tender concern for the difficulties which have been brought on your subjects by a long and burdensome war, 'and for your royal wishes that your parliament may take every occasion for their relief. Animated with these sentiments, we assure your Majesty that we will proceed with that temper, unanimity, and dispatch, which your Majesty is pleased to recommend to us, in the pursuit of those great and important objects to which your Majesty has directed our attention." The King's Answer.] His Majesty returned this Answer: "My Lords, "I thank you for this dutiful and affectionate Address. The satisfaction which you express, on the intended marriage of my sister, the princess Caroline Matilda, is particularly agreeable to me: and I ac, cept with pleasure the assurances you give me of your zealous endeavours for the advancement of the prosperity of my kingdoms, and the happiness of my people, which I shall ever have most sincerely at heart." a The Commons Address of Thanks.] The Commons being returned to their House, lord Warkworth moved the following Address, which was agreed to nem. "We sincerely rejoice in those events of the last year, which seem to promise a continuance of the peace so happily established; and we receive with gratitude the declaration which your Majesty is graciously pleased to make, of your resolution strictly to maintain it. We hope that the fresh assurances which the courts of France and Spáin have given of their good dispositions, the quiet of the empire confirmed by the unanimous choice of a successor to the imperial dignity, and the peaceable election of the king of Poland, will contribute to the security of the general tranquillity of Europe, and that it will long remain fixed on a firm and last-con. ing basis. And we beg leave to assure your Majesty, that, as the present undisturbed state of affairs abroad affords so favourable an opportunity for the deliberations of your parliament on such objects as may be most conducive to the internal good order and prosperity of these kingdoms, nothing shall be wanting in care and attention on our part, which may promote the welfare and honour of our country. "Permit us, Sir, to offer to your Majesty our humble acknowledgments, for the gracious approbation which your Majesty is pleased to declare of our former conduct; and to give your Majesty the strongest assurances, that we will firmly persist in exerting our zealous endeavours to promote due obedience to the laws, and reverence to the legislative authority, of "Most Gracious Sovereign, "We, your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of Great Britain, in parliament assembled, beg leave to return your Majesty the most humble thanks of this House, for your most gracious Speech from the throne. "Permit us, at the same time, to offer to your Majesty our dutiful congratulations upon the marriage agreed to be solemnized between the Prince Royal of Denmark and her royal highness the princess Caroline Matilda, as soon as their respective ages will permit: which happy union cannot but be most pleasing to your faithful Commons, as it must tend to cement and strengthen the ancient alliance between the crowns of Great Britain and Denmark, and thereby add security to the Protestant religion. "We beg leave also to declare our sa- | Denmark, and my sister, the princess Catisfaction at those events of the last year, roline Matilda. My constant endeavour which promise the continuance of the shall be employed to preserve the public peace so happily established and maintain- tranquillity, to secure the rights, and proed by your Majesty's wise and steady con- mote the happiness of my people." duct; and to express our hopes that the fresh assurances, which have been given by the courts of France and Spain, of their good dispositions, the unanimous choice of a successor to the imperial throne, and the undisturbed election of the king of Poland, will secure and confirm the general tranquillity of Europe. In this situation, we think it our duty to give our particular attention to such regulations, as will most effectually promote the internal good order and prosperity of these kingdoms. "Your Majesty may be assured that we will, with cheerfulness and dispatch, raise such supplies as shall be found necessary for the current service of the year. And being thoroughly sensible of your Majesty's paternal concern for the relief and welfare of your people, in recommending to us the improvement of the public revenue, and the diminution of the national debt, on which the future safety of Great Britain must depend, we will apply ourselves, with the utmost zeal and assiduity to carry into execution every proper measure which may contribute to these great and salutary purposes, and which the state of your Majesty's dominions, and the circumstances of the times, shall require. "We acknowledge, with the liveliest gratitude, the gracious expressions of your Majesty's tender affection, and of your constant care, for the mutual benefit and support of all your subjects. And we assure your Majesty, that, animated with these sentiments, we will endeavour to deserve the confidence which your Majesty is pleased to repose in us, by pursuing every plan which shall appear to us to be calculated for the public advantage; and will proceed therein with that temper and firmness, which will best conciliate and insure due submission to the laws, and reverence to the legislative authority of Great Britain.” The King's Answer.] To which Address his Majesty returned this Answer: " Gentlemen, "I return you my thanks for this very dutiful and affectionate Address: and I receive, with the greatest pleasure, your congratulations on the marriage agreed to be solemnized between the Prince Royal of Resolutions of the Commons relating to the Poor Laws.] January 22. Mr. Blackstone reported from the committee, appointed to revise and consider the laws relating to the poor of that part of Great Britain called England: and to report their opinion thereupon to the House, as to the defects, the repeal, or amendment, of the said laws, and as to making of any new provisions or regulations for the better relief, employment, and settlement, of the poor; that the committee had considered the matters to them referred; and had come to the following resolutions: Resolved, 1. "That it is the opinion of this committee, That the laws relating to the poor are, in many respects, defective. 2. That the present method of regulating the poor by annual parochial officers, in separate parishes and townships, is, in general, ineffectual for their proper relief and employment. 3. That the present methods of applying the sums raised for the relief of the poor are, in general, grievous to their respective parishes, and of pernicious effects to the public. 4. That the employment of the able poor, in such works as may be suited to their strength and capacity, will be very benefi cial to the kingdom. 5. That the appointment of a competent number of districts throughout England and Wales, by authority of parliament, with proper powers for uniting and incorporating the several rishes, townships, and places in each, and the establishing a proper hospital, workhouse, and house of correction, in each district, under the management of governors, directors, or trustees, to be specially chosen for that purpose, will be the most easy and effectual method for relieving the impotent, employing the industrious, and reforming the vicious, poor." pa The said Resolutions were agreed to by the House; and a Bill was ordered to be brought in, pursuant thereto. Debate in the Commons on General Warrants.] January 29. On the motion of sir William Meredith, the proceedings of the House of the 14th of February last, in relation to the question proposed, That a General Warrant for apprehending and seizing the authors, printers, and publishers, of a seditious libel, together with their papers, is not warranted by law: and also the proceedings of the House of the 17th of February last, when the House resumed the adjourned debate upon the said proposed question, were read. Then sir William moved, "That a General Warrant for apprehending the authors, printers, or publishers, of a libel, together with their papers, is not warranted by law, and is an high violation of the liberty of the subject." It was supported with the same Arguments as before, with some retort upon the administration, that the question was not now sub judice, as in the action brought by Mr. Wilkes against lord Halifax; for Mr. Wilkes being outlawed, that action could not be tried. The ministry, however, still insisted that the question was sub judice: particularly in the cases between the printers and the messengers, where bills of exceptions had been brought, and which were not yet argued. There was fallacy in this argument, as those bills of exceptions did not touch the legality of the warrant. It is true, the court of King'sbench did, several months afterwards, when some of those bills of exceptions came to be argued, solemnly condemn the warrant; but that question was not strictly before them, and they need not have done it, had they not been so inclined. The ministry likewise insisted, that the delay in obtaining this determination in the courts below, was entirely owing to the solicitor for the prosecutors; and they dwelt particularly upon the impropriety, as they called it, of one House of Parliament only, coming to a resolution upon a point of law; that such resolution was no security to liberty, that it was ineffectual as to the purpose intended, and that it would be nugatory in a pleading in Westminster-hall, the judges there being bound to follow the law as made by the three estates, and not the sentiments of the House of Commons alone. In the course of the Debate, Dr. Hay narrowed the question, by proposing an Amendment to the question, by prefixing thereto these words: "That in the particular case of libels, and of no other crime, it is proper and necessary to fix, by a vote of this House only, what ought to be deemed the law in respect of general warrants; and for that purpose, at the time when the determination of the legality of such warrants, in the instance of a most seditious and treasonable libel, is actually depending before the courts of law, for this House to declare." An Amendment was proposed to be made to the said proposed Amendment, by leaving out the words "and of no other crime." And the said Amendment was, upon the question put thereupon, agreed to by the House. Then the question being put, That the said Amendment, so amended, be prefixed to the question first proposed: the House divided: Yeas 224; Noes 185. So it was resolved in the affirmative. Then the main question, so amended, being put, "That, in the particular case of libels, it is proper and necessary to fix, by a vote of this House only, what ought to be deemed the law in respect of general warrants; and for that purpose, at the time when the determination of the legality of such warrants, in the instance of a most seditious and treasonable libel, is actually depending before the courts of law, for this House to declare, that a General Warrant for apprehending the authors, printers, or publishers of a libel, together with their papers, is not warranted by law, and is an high violation of the liberty of the subject;" it passed in the negative. The decision, however, of this important question was not carried without a very long and warm Debate* concerning the nature of treason; the illegality of General Warrants in any case; the actual pendency, before the ordinary courts of justice, of a case similar to that upon which it was proposed the House should now pronounce; and, in fine, the propriety of the House's pronouncing, when it had itself allowed the existence of that circumstance; and as it was impossible, that it should hold out so long upon the arguments which before supported it, and the difference in the alteration was alone sufficient to give room to new ones, many new ones were made use of. For, as there was no law, totidem verbis, to determine any of these points, recourse was had to the spirit of the constitution. Parliamentary resolutions were brought against parliamentary sation out of the House, and a hand-bill was cir"This Debate caused a considerable senculated, in which an eminent lawyer was asserted to have said, I think it better to fall with the laws than to rise on the ruins of them."" Gentleman's Magazine, 1765, p. 94. resolutions; judicial decrees against judicial decrees; opinions of able lawyers against the opinions of others equally able; parities against parities; and all of them, resolutions, decrees, opinions, parities, one promiscuously against another. The principal Arguments made use of on this occasion both within and without doors, were as follows: council, and to be, besides, registered in the council books, in order to make such members answerable for every warrant they signed. That, if since that time, in order to prevent the growth of a most alarming evil, the great number of rogues and vagabonds, it has been thought proper by the legisla ture, to direct and authorise general privy searches for such pests of society, yet no committed, if he can procure a responsible house-keeper to give security for his future appearance; or be detained above six days, if committed on suspicion of felony, unless some accusation is, in the mean time, brought against him. That, if general warrants describing the offence, do not give officers in general a right to seize the innocent, they throw in the way of messengers, who are to be so well paid for taking care of the offender's person, a temptation to enquire into the cha in some shape, to convert these subordinate ministers of justice into so many spies and informers; that such an enquiry, even when conducted in the discreetest manner, might injure the most virtuous in their reputation and fortune. It was urged, that, in the reign of king Charles the 2nd, when, if the laws them-person suspected of being either can be selves were not so favourable to the real dignity of the monarch, the ministers of them must be allowed to have been more liable to lean towards his interests, and in an affair, in which the monarch's cause was made a common cause with that of both Houses of Parliament, the earl of Bristol having exhibited a charge of treason against the earl of Clarendon, and alledged, that the said earl of Clarendon had endeavoured to alienate the affections of his Majesty's subjects by venting opprobrious scandals against his Majesty's per-racter and life of all persons, and thus tend son, and that he had traduced both Houses of Parliament; and the judges being ordered to give their opinion whether this be treason or no, they unanimously agreed, that, if the matters alledged in the charge were admitted to be true, although alledged to be traitorously done, yet there That, if a general warrant for seizing was no treason in it; that, independent of the authors, printers, and publishers of a this argument, and only allowing that se- libel, seditious and treasonable in the eye ditiousness, nay treasonableness, is often of a minister, was liable to so many objecbut mere matter of opinion, and murder tions, one for seizing their papers was still a matter of fact, yet no coroner, till within more so; since papers, though often a few years, even after the finding of a dearer to a man than his heart's blood, murder by the joint opinion of 12 disin- and equally close, have neither eyes nor terested persons, a much more respectable ears to perceive the injury done to them, tribunal than any two ministers of state, nor tongue to complain of it, and of was ever known to issue a general warrant course, may be treated in a degree highly for apprehending the unknown perpetra- injurious to the owners, before they can tors of it; that, if the legislature thought get into the hands of a minister? And that such libels, as ministers might think that, though a minister may have less proper to consider as seditious and trea- temptation to satiate avarice by the garbsonable, required equal restraint, they ling of such papers, he may have what is would certainly have provided for it; that a great deal worse, a much stronger to to prove it was not through any inatten- glut his revenge, by combining or disjointion (not that any inattention in the making them, so as to make of them engines ing of laws can excuse any neglect in the capable of working the destruction of the ministration of them) of the legislature, most innocent persons. such provision was omitted, at the passing of an act at the time of the Revolution for suspending the Habeas Corpus Act, by granting the king a power to secure and detain such persons as his Majesty might suspect were conspiring against his person, every such warrant for detaining and apprehending any suspected person, was to be signed by six members of the privy That even a particular warrant to seize seditious papers alone, without mentioning the titles of them, may prove highly detrimental, since in that case, all a man's papers must be indiscriminately examined, and such examination may bring things to light which it may not concern the public to know, and which yet it may prove highly detrimental to the owner to have |