The National Register.
London, England, 1820-09-18 00:00:00

ZVOJ€FOLK PETITION.

To the llonounible the Common ;of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and I rehmil, in Parliament assembled; the humble
Petition of the Ftecholders and Inhabitant: of the County of
Norfolk, slieweth. that
" Your Petitioners are apprieed, with the most serious concern,
that a Bull of Pains and Penalties, against the Queen Consort of
England, is now betere the House of Lords, having for it,
objcet • to deprive her .Majesty of the title of Queer, and of all
the prerogais es, rights, and privileges appertaining to her as
Queen Consort Of this realm, and for dissolving the marriage
between their Majesties, and undoing the same null and void,'
and that the said Bill may come before your Honourable House.
" Your Petitioners ate by no means dieposed.at present, to give
an opinion on, or to interfere in the question of the guilt or
innocence of the Queen Consort, but item it their duty us
Englishmen, to protest against any mode of proceeding with
respect to a.l accused person, in any rank of life, where power and
uudue influence, or tiny other cause, is likely to affect the course
of public justice.
Your Petitioners beg leave humbly to state to your Honour-
able House, that ' Acts of Parliament to indict Pains and Pe-
nalties beyond, or contrary to common law to serve a special
purpose, can never be warranted, except by some imminent
danger to the State, to be removed in no othei way, because they
enable die Government to create the (deuce (where no offence
existed befine) to reguitue the moot, to decide upon the evidence,
and to apportiam the punishment ; and dine plainly to tainfaund
the executive. le.;islative, and judicial authorities, upon the se-
pal:item of w Men the liberty and justice of the country depend.
" Your Petitioners beg leave, moreover, humbly to state to
your Honourable House, that the advisers of the Crown have
instituted a negotiaton with the Queen Contioit upon the subject
of the present prosecution, and have thereby virtually admitted,
ttat no imminent danger to the State would accrue from not
entering into an enquiry, which, by their own acknowledgment,
it must he iErogatory to the dignity of the throne, and injurimie
to the interests of the nation.' And this said negotiation entered
:nto by command of your Honourable House, was rendered null
and void, because Ministers would not advise the Crown to re-
insert her Majesty's name in the liturgy, from which it had been
erased before any proof of ofiimce.
•6 That the Bill aforesaid was brought into the House of Lords
in consequence cf a report of a Secret Cenumittee of the said
House, nominated by Ministers, and that the omission in the
said Bill of any specification of the time when, end the place
where, the offence alleged to have been committed; and the re-
fusal also ofany list of witnesses whereby the accused may be pre •
pared with the means of a fair defence is at variance with justice.
•• Your Petitioners beg leave to declare to your Honourable
House their sedum apprehensions, arising from the connexions
and dependence upon the executive Government, in Parliament,
which must have a tendency to attiset the judicial character of the
Bill in its progress, and that concern for the characters and res.
pousibility of Ministers, who arc the prosecutors, must have a
tendency to mix itself unseasonably with the votes of Jae legis-
lative Judges.
" Most earnestly, therefore, do your Petitioners implore your
Ilonatuable House to reject the Bill of Pains and Penalties
against the Queen Consort if the same should conic before your
Honourable House, who, as the Representatives of die People,
ought to be the peculiar protectors of the subjeet from injustice
and oppression.
" sot that your Petitioners are insensible to the evil arising in
certain cases front even an iniputed breach of motality in the
Queen Consort, when considered with regard to the public morals,
or the danger to the succession to the throne. But in the present
instance the latter danger can only be incurred by die present
mode of proceeding against the Queen, and as to the former, they
are convinced that breaches of morality ought only to be visited
by the laws of strict justice ; that an appearance even of persecu•
non raises pity for the offender, and defeats the impression which
a judicial visitation ought to produce, and that it is better tar a
State to leave indiscretion and vice to etnet their own disgrace,
than by any act of violence to relieve itself from inconvenience ;
it being better that a State should stiller than commit an injustice,
or crust by power tli.i victim that it would sacrifice on the plea
of public good.
" Signed on behalf of the Meeting of the County of Norfolk,
" GEORGE WALI'OLE."