Star. — London, England, 1810-03-26 00:00:00

THE PROPRIETORS OF EAST INDIA STOCK. I LAMBS AND GENTLLSEN, INCE I had the honour of last . addressing you, -LA and of requesting, your Votes and Interest at the General 1 Election, when, in consequence of the death of Mr. ROBERTS, a Vacancy will occur in the East-India Direction, I have continued my persoral Canvas ; and, I have peculiar satisfaction in assuring you, that I have met with the most decided and flattering sup port, not only from the Proprietors who honoured me with their suffrages at the last Election, but also from a great number of those whose votes were at that time pre-engaged. Under these circumstances, I shaliproceed with confident, and, I trust, well grounded hopes of success, to the Ballot, which is fixed for. We dnesday the 11th of April, when I earnestly request your atten dance in my favour. If I should obtain the highly honourable situaticn which I soli cit, my Isrst endeavours shall be exerted to maintain the just rights and to promote the real interests of the East India Corn pany.—l am, Lsdies and Gentlemen, with great respect, Your obedient and very humble servant, strand, March 26, 1310. RICHARD TWINING. Mr. Twining's Committee will meet daily, at the King's Head Tavern in the Poultry, where all communications will be thank fully received. P4IRLIAMENTARr PROCEEDINGS. HOUSE OF LORDS, MARCH 24. - - The STEALER of the House of COMMONS, attended by the Usher of the Black Rod, and the Clerks and Officers of his own House, having come to the Bar, his Majesty's Commission di rected to the Lord Chancellor and other Lords, empowering them to grant the Royal Assent to certain Bills, which had passed the two Houses, was read. In virtue of this Commission, the Royal Assent was then given, in the usual form, to the Royal Marine Mutiny Bill, the Sugar Bounties Bill, t he Greenland Whale Fishery Bill, the Customs Frauds Bill, the Salt Bill, the Masts, &c. Bill, the Lambeth Poor Bill, and the Southampton Water-works Bill. The Commissioners were, the LO RD CBANCELLoa, Earl AT. MESTORD, (Steward of the Household), and Lord WALSTNOILASS. The Exchequer Bills Annuity Bill, the Corn and Provisions Pill, and the London Port Imprisonment Bill, severally went through Committees, and were reported without any Amendment. —4dpurned. . HOUSE OF COMMONS. The Seamus having taken the Chair, Mr. QUARME, Deputy Usher of the Black Rod, appeared at the Bar, and desired the attendance of the House in the House of Peers, to hear his Majesty's Commission for granting the Royal Assent to certain Bills read, The SPEAKER, attended by the Clerks and other Officers of the House, accordingly went to the House of Lords, and on his return, stated, that he had heard the Royal Assent given by Com mission to several Bills.—(For which see the House of Lords.) There being no business before the House, nor any Members present, the House immediately Adjourned. • al i FRIDAY'S DEBATE. The following is a more copious Report of some of the Speeches in the Debate on Mr. SHERIDAN'S Motion on Friday, for re ferring to the Committee of Judicature a Petition against tke Bye-Law passed by the Society of Lincoln's Inn. [We regret that we arc not able to give a fuller report of Mr. SHERIDAN'S Speech than we gave in our last ; but when Mr. S. was applied to for assis tance, he replied, " that he had long since given up the prac:ice of ccrrecting his speeches.] Mr. STEPHEN said that his connection with the society of Lincoln's Inn, of which he had had the ho nour of being a member for thirty-five years, might ;alone have led him to take a part in the debate ; but a particular consideration, known to many Gentle men around him, and of which he should probably put the House in possession before he sat down, call ed on him more strongly to express his sentiments on this occasion. He hoped nothing that might fall from him would be construed into any disrespect towards the Benchers of Lincoln's Inn : he felt for them col lectively, and as far as their characters were known to him, individually too, the most unfeigned respect. Among them, he could reckon some of his earliest and most intimate professional friends ; and he be lieved that men of more liberality of sentiment could not easily be found. But he must nevertheless freely avow his concurrence in the views of the Right Ho nourable Gentleman who made this motion, and de clare, that he thought the regulation in question highly illiberal and unjust. He doubted not it must have proceeded from some hasty feelings, and would on due consideration be revoked. To fix a stigma upon a whole class of men, by shutting against them indiscriminately, the door of a liberal and honoura ble profession, open to all the rest of their fellow sul:s jects, was in his judgment quite unjustifiable, unless there were something in the common description which belonged to them, that implied of necessity a universal unfitness for that profession; or unless their exclusion by any other and fairer criterion could not be attained. Now it could not be alledged, in the case of admission to the bar by the law societies, that there was no power of ascertaining the qualifications of students applying to be called, and inquiring, if it were thought fit, into their past character and con duct. Already, the standing regulations required, that every Gentleman, before he could perform his exercise, or if he remembered right, before he even entered into Commons, must produce a certificate from a practising barrister of the society, that he was qualified in point of character for the profession of the bar ; and prior to his being actually called, he must have a like testimonial from one of the Bencbers themselves. If these precautions wore net sufficient, further and stricter ones might be framed, so as to scrutinize effectually into the moral and intellectual character of every individual candidate fur admis sion, without branding the class of fellow subjects to which he had belonged. There was not in this case, therefore, such an apology, as necessity or strong reasons of public convenience might afford, for a general rule of exclusion. Was it then the principle of this regulation that persons who had at any time written for a periodical press, and not written gratui tously, were, as such, universally unworthy of ad mission into an honourable profession ?IA reproach in illCh Johnstone and Hawkesworth, Steele and Ad dison, would have been included, was surely more likely to reflect disgrace on its authors than its ob jects. He was at a loss for the distinct views on which such a prejudice against persons waiting for newspapers could be founded. Was it supposed that persons of that description were always destitute Of education and liberal sentiments, or were, in point Of origin and connections in life, if those were mate rial circumstances, unfit for the society of gentlemen? —Without admitting that writing for the periodical press, though a man's original occupation, and how ever long persevered in, wopl4 constitute any dispa iagement, cases might be put, in which, from acci- i.... • .3. _~ dental circumstances, a Gentleman, originally de• to the profession of the law, might have been resource stilted . driven to engage in such an employment as a _ for his immediate subsistence, and continued in it, perhaps, but for a brief period, without much inter ruption of his professional studies, and yet by this harsh rule his return to his professional path would be for ever cut off. I will, for instance, (said Mr. S.) suppose a young man by family and education a Gentleman, and from his earliest years designed for the legal profession, to be a member of Lincoln's Inn, regularly prosecuting his studies as a lawyer, and to have arrived at within a year and a half of the proper standing to entitle him to be called to the bar, when' by the death of his parents and previous family misfortunes, he finds himself totally deprived of all present means of sup port. The resource which he might have found in the aid of near relations is preoccupied by fellow orphans, who from their sex and tender years are more helpless than himself, or perhaps he finds his heart too delicate or too proud for dependency. He has con fidence enough in himself to think that when the time comes that he can put on the gown, he shall find in it an ample resource. But what expedient can he possibly explore in the mean time for his subsistence ? In this emergency, a literary friend, a man of charac ter and honour, connected with one of the periodical prints, proposes to oar young law student that he ' should undertake, as a temporary expedient, to con duct for a liberal remuneration, one of the depart ments of his newspaper in which there happens to be a vacancy. He proposes, for instance, that of re porting the debates of this House ; can it be doubted, Sir, that if the rule now in question had not existed, such an offer would. be joyfully accepted ? Let us suppose it, then, to be so. During one session, our young student reports the debates of this House, and performs what he finds an arduous, duty, with satis faction to his own heart, recording honestly and im partially the deliberations of Parliament, for the in formation of his country. At the end of a single year, he finds himself enabled by the death of a rela tion, and its consequences, to resign this employment, and resume his professional path, and he is grateful to HEAVEN for an intermediate occupation which had not only rescued him from dependence and want, but improved his qualifications for future success at the bar. But when he petitions the Bench of this So ciety to be called, how sad would be his disappoint ment, how cruel would be his humiliation and dis tress, to find that this inexorable rule of the Society has given a death-blow to his new-born hopes ! How would his mind be stung when told that the expedi ent which he had regarded with self complacency as his honest refuge from dependency. and distress, had covered him with indelible disgrace, and for ever barred against him the door of an honourable pro fession ? Sir, (said Mr. S.) I can conceive better than .1 can express what would be the anguish, and what the indignant feelings of such a man as I have described, on such an occasion. But I may be thought, perhaps, to have stated an imaginary and highly improbable case. No, Sir, it is not so. The case that I have described, is not imaginary ; it really did exist ; all but the rejection, which did not take place, because no such rule as that in question had then been made. In other respects the case is real. Thirty years ago, it was•the case of the individual, who has row the honour to address you." (Re p:aged eria of Hear, hear.) When the cheers of the House subsided, Mr. Stephens proceeded to say—" I feel, Sir, not at all abashed at this avowal. It is an ir.ci dent of my life, which I am much more disposed to be proud of, or let rue rather say, to be grateful for, to a kind disposing PROVIDENCE, than to blush for. I should indeed blush to be supposed to be ashamed of it. Ido not believe, thatany Gentleman in this House, or in my profession, will think meanly of me on this account ; but should there be such a man, I hope I shall never hear of it, for I should be tempted to hold him in more contempt, than it is allowable for us frail beings to feel for any of our fellow mortals."— Mr. Stephen went on to state, that his own case was by no means too favourable a specimen of the class of persons who were his contemporaries in the same employment. He could recollect about eight or nine of them, and of these he did not know one, whose subsequent conduct in life reflected any discredit on his former occupation. He believed only one of them still continued connected with any periodical. press. Of the rest, five or six had been called to the bar ; and he never heard that any of them had been sup posed at all to discredit his profession. One had been since very eminent :n the Courts of our sister island ; another had made a fortune in the colonies, and had since held a situation of honour and confidence under the Crown ; a third had retired from the English liar I on the acquisition of a private fortune, before his very eminent talents, natural and acquired, had time to be known in his profession. He was now, alas! no more; but this he would say of him, that no man he ever knew in his very varied walks in life possessed a nicer sense of honour and integrity. The-la-st.he should no- I Lice of thittit, and whom he might without impropriety mention, was long a Member of that House, and the very intimate friend of the Right Hon. Gentleman who made this motion ; he meant the late Mr. Rich ardson. He must add, with gratitude, that to his kind ness, under PROVIDENCE, he was indebted for tha tseaso nal:de resource in misfortune to which he had lately ad verted. Mr. S. added, that, with a single exception or two at the most, he did not know who the o.entlemen were that now conducted that department of the newspapers, in which he and the friends he had al luded to were once employed. He could not speak, therefore, from any private partiality to them, and was confident, that such Members as took the trouble to observe how his speeches had in general been reported, would not think he was much in their favour ; but it was the profession or employment it self, not the individuals who now or at any other time filled it, that he thought it his duty to defend against an unjust proscription ; and it could be hardly i thought that there was any thing essentially degra ding in the employment itself after the facts of which he had mentioned, in addition to those which had been alluded to by the Right Honourable Mover of this question. For his part, indeed, he could 'not, see, what there was more disparaging to a gentleman', or a man in a liberal profession, in reporting the proceedings and debates of the Legislature, than in reporting the judgments of a Court of taw.— Mr. Stephen then proceeded to argue against the regulation in question, on grounds of public and con &motional policy. To fix a stigma Ca any class pg % ' , men, tad degrade them below'their fella* subjects, by eichisio - n from a common privilege, was the surest way to make them disaffected to the State. Such, at least, must be the case, when the ground of exclu-' sion was an impeachment of their moral or honorary character. But if such oppression was to be intro, duced in this land of freedom and equality, at least we should take care not to select, as the victims of it, a set of men who had so much political power in their hands as the conduction of the periodical press. The military profession was every where held honour able, and to degrade it would be felt by every body to be in the last degree imprudent and dangerous ; but he would be bold to say, that the military had not more the f a te of the country in their bands under despotic Governments, than the Conductors of News papers had in this kingdom. Against their united and systematic hostilities, the Constitution could not long stand. To sanction an innovation therefore, that would tend to raise an esprit du corps among them universally against our public establishnients, would be to aggravate greatly the dangers of the country. As a friend to the liberty of the Press, he deprecated such a precedent ; for the Press would soon become dangerous and obnoxious, if it was to fall into the hands of degraded and disaffected cha racters. It was in this view chiefly, that he thought the interference of Parliament justifiable, it the per severance of the Benehers should make it neces sary, notwithstanding the arguments of the Attor ney-General. It was not a private or particular case, to be redressed by appeal to the Judges, but a case of general and public mischief, fit for the presi ding wisdom of Parliament, as the guardian of the public weal, to notice and correct. He regarded such-stigmas on a particular class or cast of men, in any society, as cruel and mischievous in another view. If they did not find men worthy of contempt, they would soon make them so. Degrade any por tion of society, and you will infallibly reduce its mo ral character, till it seems deserving of the ignominy to which it has been unjustlylsubjected. He had lived long in a part of the world which furnished a striking proof of this remark ; and there was nothing more odious in a contemptuous oppression, than its cor rupting effect on the minds of its unfortunate victims. If this were so when the badge of degradation was the colour of the skin, or some other subject of public contempt which the individuals derived from nature or some other unavoidable source, how much more when entering into the degraded cast, was matter, not of necessity, but choice. Men would not choose an employment proscribed as dishonourable,• unless their moral character were already corrupted. Were we prepared then, at once to maintain the liberty of the Press, and to say that its conductors should here after be men so low in moral and honorary senti ments, as to choose an ignominious employment. Mr. Stephen further argued, that to select the po pular, open profession of the bar, as the only subject of this degrading disfranchisement of a portion of the Commons of England, was peculiarly improper and strange. That profession was in a pre-eminent man ner the partrimony of the people at large ; and to it indeed, they owed, more than to their Parliaments,l that general equality of rights, and exemption fromi all aristocratical oppression, which it was their dis-, tinguishing happiness to possess. The Courts of Law, by their liberality, had abolished that distinc tion of casts, which, in the times of Villanage, de graded a great majority of our ancestors, and exclud ed them from liberal professions. It was a blessing which the people of England owed to their lawyers, and it was singular that a departure from the prin ciple of constitutional equality, should in these days begin in the same profession. He 4 could not help suspecting, in this regulation, a latent principle of aristocratical pride and contempt for poverty, as such; for why otherwise, should the restriction apply only to those who wrote Tor emolument ? If the act of writing for the newspapers was immoral or disho nourable, he did not see how the doing it ratuitously could redeem the act from reproach. Certainly it was presumable, that those who exercised such an employment for gain, were not in affluent circuro stances ; but if poverty or humility of origin were to , become reproachful in the Inns of Court, many a proud scutcheon which now ornamented their walls, must be taken down. In other professions, as the church, or army, hereditary claims or fortune might facilitate preferment ; but at the bar, a profession which was a much more frequent road to rank and fortune, no such extrinsic advantages were of any avail. On the contrary, it was proverbial, that a ne cessity arising from poverty in the early part of life, was almost the only source of splendid success at the bar. It was the most amiable and valuable fruit of our happy Constitution, that every path of honourable am bition was open to talents and industry, without dicinc. tion of ranks;. but in the law, especially, the strongest examples of the happy effects of this equality were to be found. On the whole, therefore, if we were to begin to form proscribed and deg raded casts in this country, he thought we should, at least, not begin the innova tion in the profession of the law, and against those who were in possession of the great organs of public information, the conductors of the periodical Press. —Mr. Stephens concluded by saying, that he should vote for the practical course proposed by the Right Honourable Mover, merely because it had been pro posed by him, and was the only remedy at present, 'suggested. Had Mr. Sheridan moved for leave to bring in a Bill declaring such disfranchisements of any class of British subjects, by the inns of Court, un constitutional and void, lie would also have sup ported that measure, or any other that raight be more proper to be taken for the same just and necess end. Sir JOHN ANSTRUTHER, as a Bencher of Lincoln's Inn, greatly regretted that the regulation in question had ever been adopted, and professed his entire concurrence in all the sentiments which the last speaker had so eloquently expressed. The cha racter of the Honourable and Learned Gentleman was as convincing an argument as any that he had used. , No man who considered what the profes sion and the House would have lost, if that Gen- , tleman had been excluded from the Biir, by a rule of this kind, could hesitate to pronounce it both unjust and unwise, and one that ought not to be Suffered to exist. ln fact, the regulaticii had been suddenly adopted by a very small Board of pePchers, aftei dinner, on a sufgestion from some Barristers in l ir the Hall. Though it might surprise the ppsip the Barriiter whose name was at the head of t ose who aigaed Upt proposition was no other than ~, erth _ '4.4" - ford--(Neer, hMr)—and the Bendier in the Chair, about four only being present, was the late Lord Chancellor Erskine,-4 Hear, hear, and a tsretty genera' laugh.) Sir John Anstruther added, that knowin g the opinions of several of his fellow Benchers on the subject, he had no doubt that when the return ( - ,f term gave a proper opportunity for the purpose, the regulation would be withdrawn, and he hoped there, fore the Right Honourable Gentleman would not press his proposition, which he deemed an improper and unnecessary interference with the Benehers in the government of the Society ; especially as an appeal might bring the particular case to the revision of the twelve Judges. The SOLICITOR GENERAL thought himself' bound in candour to confess, that he was one of tha few Benchers who, on the suggestion of eight Barris ters, had hastily adopted this regulation, which he would not undertake to defend. He paid very high compliments to Mr. Stephen, both on the score of his talents and personal character, and said thax like Longinus, he had illustrated by his own example, his own tenets on this subject. His own charac. ter was the best proof that such a rule ought not at least to be indiscriminate. He strongly main tained, in opposition to Mr. Sheridan, that the Twelve Judges had a jurisdiction, nor merely to redress the individuals aggrieved by the rule in quest i on, bat to reverse the rule itself ; and, therefore, the interference of Parliament woald, at least, be premature. The pe titioner came/it,- saltum to the House, before he had pursued the regular course to obtain legal redress.-- The Solicitor General, however, professed his confi dent expectation, that the Benchers of Lincoln's-inn, now that the merits of the question had been dis cussed, and were better understood, would see cause at least to revise and alter th 4 regulation, if not wholly to revoke it. Mr. CROKER, in strong terms, condemned the regulation as illiberal, impolitic, and unjust, and thought that the credit of the Honourable Society demanded its repeal. He also professed the highest respect for the character of Mr. Stephen, and the manly manner in which he had conducted/himself on this occasion. To say more would only be to repeat the arguments of that Gentleman, in all of which he heartily concurred. But he trusted that the Right Honourable Gentleman, on seeing that his object was likely to be attained in a more satisfactory way, would withdraw his motion. Should the event be different from what such respectable Benchers of the Society as had expressed their opinions, expected, he pledged himself to support a future application to Parliament to the best of his power. The motion was accordingly withdrawn. SIR FRANCIS BURDETT.. The following Letter has beeri addressed by Sir FRANCIS 13CRDETT to his Constituents 66 GRSTLEBIEN—The House of Commons having hya w s aeoni h misdr.ce i s c tyt Iselsad a erLtn m eaop i c : mwt u b : serdn i o s atorsisf t nt o rht: oh a eeeeoLrrg declaration emeaoenenwaeig h t than r free - men, 1,; More n t think degrees g even ee i ny t passed Constituents, m w Man h ya o g nO s d e ruad p taye r h s t o a: r n t You,ta a lt 7 ll upon the decision of this question—a question of no less importance than this : Whether our liberty be still to be secured by the laws of our fotefathervor be to lay at the absolute mercy of a part of out fel: low-subjects, collected together by means which it is not necessav for me to describe ? gg In order to give to this subject all the attention to which it is entitled ; and to avoid the danger to be apprehended from partial views and personal feel ing, it will be advisable to argue the question on its own merits, putting the individual (however we may deplore his present sufferings) out of view ; though, at the same time, every man ought to consider the case his own; because, should the principle upon which the Gentlemen of the House of Commonshave thought proper to act in this instance, be once admitted, it is impossible for any one to conjecture how soon he himself may be summoned from his dwelling, and be hurried, without ttial, and without oath madi against him, from the bosom of his family into the clutches of a jailor. It is, therefore, now the time to resist the doctrine upon ,which Mr. Jones has been sent to Newgate ; or it is high time to cease all pre tensions to those Liberties, which were acquired by our forefathers, after so many struggles and so many sacrifices. " Either the house of Commons is authorized to dispense with the Laws of the Land ; or it is not.-r If the Constitution be of so delicate a texture, so weak a frame, so fragile a substance, that it is to be only spoken of in terms of admiration, and to be viewed merely as a piece of curious but unprofitable workman p; if Magna Charta, and all the wholesome laws of England, be a dead letter: in that case, the affirmative of the proposition may be admitted; but, if the Con stitution lives, and is applicable to its ends ; namely, the happiness of the community, the perfect security of the life, liberty, and property of each member and all the members of the society ; then the affirmative of the preposition can never be admitted ; then must we br. free-men ; for we need no better security, no more powerful protection for our Rights and Liberties, than the Laws and Constitution. We seek for, and we need seek for, nothing tom ; we ask for no more than what our forefathers insisted upon as their own; we ask for no more than what they' bequeathed unto us ; we ask for no more than what they, in the Tes tament which some of them had sealed, and which the rest of them were ready to seal with their blood, expressly declared to be the Birth-right of the Peo ,ple ot England ;' namely,' ,he LAWS of E R GLAND ! : To these Laws we have a right to look with confi deuce for smirks ; to these laws the individual no .w la imprisoned has, through me , appl ied for redress vain. Those who have imprisoned him have refused to (listen to my voice, weakly e x p ressing the strong this principles of the Law, the und eniable claims of E wi n t f i li t tl e an fo 's rc ' e 4 Birth-right." and, I am not without hope, that it may proves r . the tible, if it proclaim to this House of Conl!li° 114 " toe d to the Kings of old, 6 NOLUMITS Ltots ANous torow` same tone as the tongues of our anCestors TAttl aYndougrreyaotierce remsapye.ccto;m; ;' in our own more clear and not lefes • L NOT languagi t T I M LAWS OF ENGLAND S HAL CUANORD.! ° " POW contending is the same ?rumple for whi cil Fellow Chia, for which!! .obe I