The Sun.
London, England, 1852-05-07 00:00:00

simple and intelligible to the most ignorant man in the.
country. Upon this clause he would take the sense of
the House in respect to his proposition. The Hon.
Member concluded by moving the ouiLsion of certain
words from the clause, with the view of carrying out his
object.

The CHAIRMAN having put the question,
The ATTORNEY-GENERAL said be believed that

the Hon. Member for Montroso was not in the House

when a question upon the subject was asked by the Right
Hon. Gentleman the Member for Northampton. His
Right Hon. Friend the Secretary for the Home Depart-
mentgave such an answer at the time as seemed to

satisfy— the Right Hon. Member for Northampton. He
(the Attorney-General) believed that some of those Acts
to which the Hon. Member for Montrose reterred were

passed prior to the 42d George 111., c. 90, and that the
others related to Ireland and Scotland. Now if the Hon.
Gentleman would take up the 42d George 111., he would
find that the first section repealed all the prior Acts re-
lating to the militia, so far us they related to England;
and, therefore, in point of fact, the 42d George 111. was
the existing and prevailing law upon the subject at pre-
sent. With regard to the Acts passed subsequently,
there really was little alteration made, and none of the

slightest importance as regarded the present question.
Ho was satisfiod that if the Honourable Gentleman
would turn his attention to the particular statute to
which ho referred he would find that there was no

obligation whatever to revert to any other Act in the
present Bill than the 42d George 111., which
was intended by this Bill to be the governing law in
respect to the militia. He agreed with the Hon Gen-
tleman that it was most desirable that the law on the
subject should be rendered intelligible to those particu-
larly who were to administer it. He was, however,
afraid that many of the class of persons to whom his
Hon Friend referred could not read the law—and if
they even could, they would not understand it. It was,
however, most desirable that the law should be clear
and definite. The Hon. Gentleman proposes to repeal
all the Militia Acts in regard to England, Ireland, and
Scotland. He said that he was desirous of consolidating
them, and including them in the one Act. Well, inas-
much as the only Act which could apply was the 42d
George 111., all that he could accomplish would be this
—that he would take the 42d George 111. and repeat it
clause by clause in the provisions of this Bill. Now, he
asked, how could they make the matter more clear and
intelligible by taking such a course? Everybody was
presumed to know the law. Ho, however, confessed he
did not believe that after this Bill passed into a law the
people would be better acquainted with the state of the
law than they were before. It appeared to him, then,
that it would be perfectly unnecessary, and but a waste
of time, for them to consider the provisions of the 42d
George 111. He submitted that the course taken by the
Government was the better one. There was no want of

clearness and intelligibility in the measure before the
House.
Mr. HUME reminded the Hon. and Learned Gentle-
man that the late Sir R. Peel, when Prime Minister,
had in one of his greatest and most important measures,
consolidated seventy or eighty Acts connected with Cus-
toms, and he frequently took pains to lay it down as his
principle that the old laws should be repealed, consoli-
dated, or brought into one Act. He did not think that
the Hon. and Learued Gentleman had made out a case
for departing from that principle on the present occa-
sion. Tho course he proposed might no doubt entail
some trouble upon the Government; but he hoped it
would not be considered offensive if he told them that
they were well paid for their trouble.
The ATTORNEY-GENERAL said that, in the case
referred to by the Hon. Member, there were seventy or
eighty Acts to be considered, but in the present there
was virtually only one.
Lord PALMERSTON said he perfectly agreed in prin-
ciple with the Hon. Member for Montrose, thinking it
most desirable that the several Acts passed upon this sub-
ject should be consolidated into one. It was entirely in
accordance with this view that he took the liberty of
suggesting when the Bill was first brought in that it
should consolidate all the previous Acts passed; they
were, however, on the occasion referred to in the month
of •February, when the House had ample time to act
upon the suggestion which he threw out. He would re-
mind the Hon. Member, after the changes which had
taken place, and under the peculiar position of Parlia-
ment at the present time, that it was deemed advisable
and it was the general understanding that nothing would
be done during this session but what was absolutely ne-
cessary. Now, although the proposal was a good one,
he did not think it so necessary to occupy the time of
the House in discussing so extensive a subject. It might
be equally well done in the next year. All the main
provisions of the law were to be found in the 42d
George 111., c. 90. He hoped that the Hon. Gentleman
would not consider that he was altering his opinion
upon the principle of his amendment if he thought, in the
present state of the session, it WAS not necessary to press
it, as there was a general expectation that the business
would be finished early, and that Parliament would be
dissolved.
Mr. V. SMITH regretted that the supporters of this
amendment were not to have the assistance of his
Noble Friend the Member for Tiverton. The law
was on all sides admitted to be unpopular in its
working. It was, therefore, the more desirable that
it should be clearly known, and that there could be
no mistake about it. He certainly did not under-
stand the Right Honourable Gentleman the Secretary
for the Home Department to assent to the proposition
when be urged it upon him on a previous evening ; but
it would appear from the Hon. and Learned Attorney-
General, that he must have assented to it, as he ( Mr.
Smith) appeared at the time to be perfectly satisfied
with his reply to his interrogatory. He, however,
hoped that the House would support the amendment of
his Hon. Friend, who had greatly the advantage of him
(Mr. Smith), inasmuch as he was evidently in the con-
fidence of the Government.—(" No, no," from Mr.
Hume.) Why the fact of the Hon. Member for Mon-
trose having that evening read a Ministerial paper which
had not been produced on the table of the House, was
tolerably good evidence that he was in the confidence of
the Government.—(Hear, hear, and laughter.) Now
he should like to inspect that paper that had passed be-
ween the Right Honourable Gentleman the Home Se-
cretary and the Hon. Member for Montrose. He be-
lieved that the supporters of the present measure did not
wish that the obnoxious character of their Bill should be
generally known to the public. He did not know
whether his Hon. Friend the Member for Manchester
(Mr. Bright) was aware that there were some stringent
clauses in it which especially related to the order to
which he belonged. If any member of that order was
unable or unwilling to provide a substitute ho was sub-
ject to the penalty of a heavy fine, which it not paid left
him subject to imprisonment.—(Hear, hear.) He did
not think that the Hon. and Learned Gentleman was
acting respectfully to the House in the course he was
taking.
Mr. RICH objected that, as the Bill stood, if a man
deserted—say from the Dorsetshire militia, and was
found in Northumberland, he would then have to be
handed over to the colonel of the Cumberland militia,
and so from county to county, until ho arrived in the
county from whose militia he had deserted. Such a
provision as that, he granted, might have been very do.
sipable when there were no railways in existence; but
he put it to the Committee whether it was not alto-
gether inexpedient and unnecessary in the present state
of locomotion in this country? By another clause it
appeared that the 6/, bounty was to be paid to the
militiaman free of all charges; but he did not under-
stand how that could be when 4d. a day was to be de-
ducted. Such provisions as these rendered it necessary,
in his opinion, that the measure a hould bo considered
and amended by the Government before they pressed it
further through the Committee.
Mr. WALPOLE said it was from no disrespect to the
House that the Bill had been introduced in its present
shape. The Government had con sidered the matter
maturely, and, seeing that it was in feta a Bill for carry-
ing out a voluntary enlistment, they t bought it would be
much clearer and better understood ig it were passedh
in
that shape. At the same time, he agreed wiiiet Mr.
Hume that it was advisable, wherever it could
cdaotneii
to consolidate laws, and if this Bill were passed, h
would be extremely desirable, in another sessiofP Par-
liament, to consolidate the old Acts with this,
that the whole body of militia law might be included in
one measure.
Mr. BRIGHT was astonished at the course which
Ministers had taken. He could only account for it by
the fact that they were a new Government,in difficulties,
in a Parliament in extremis, and that therefore they were
anxious to shuffle through the Bir e without sufficient
consideration of the gravity and imp ortance of the 80-
ject upon which they were legislating.—(oh, oh, and
hoar.) As to the Noble Lord the Member for Tiverton
(Lord Palmerston), he appeared to have fallen into
lamentable inconsistency upon the q uestion. It was but
recently that he expressed himself •most strongly in fa-
vour ot consolidation; but he seer ned to be so wedded
to the idea of getting through some thing in the shape of
a Militia Bill, and of introducing I:he thin end of the
wedge this session, that he cared no t to sacrifice his con-
sistency upon that part of the ques lion. Let the Com-
mittee bear in mind that the Act of 1802 was passed at
a period wholly different from th, a present, when the
punishments, not only of the military, but the civil code,
were brutal and sanguinary to a degree, which would
not now be tolerated; and even civi ;1 rights were not for
one moment held in the balance wh ere
the necessities of
the military service were concerned.. He contended then
that it was an improper thing for the Parliament of 1852
hastily, and without any cause of ui.gency being shown,
to re-enact and incorporate in this 33 ill a measure such
as that. On that account he agi eed with his Hon.
Friend (Mr. Hume) that it would be batter to delay pro-
ceeding further with the measure in the present session.
Sir G. GREY was surprised to hei tr that Governmentfterany
had resolved upon the course theytow took, a
deliberation upon the subject. The House would re-
member that an amendment was rooved by Lord Pao fl-
raerston upon the motion of the late Government r
leave to bring in their Bill, and th at part ot the Noble
Viscount's amendment was to insert the word " consoli-
dated."—(Hear, hear.) The House adoptediowed—an thatd yet the amend-
ment—a change of Government t.° 1
Right lion. Gentleman (the Home S ecretary) came down
to the House, and without giving it the slightest reason
to suppose the Government were not of the same opinion
with the House that the militia-law& ought to be conso-
lidated, introduced a Bill which was merely to amend
those lawn.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER—It
was quite true that the course takes t by her Majesty's
Ministers with regard to the Militia Bill was the result
of the deliberation due to so important a subject; but
deliberation was exercised, not merely as to that subject,
but as to the circumstances under which the question had
devolved upon them. They had before them two modes
of consolidation—one was the /plan now proposed by his
Hon. Friend the Member for Montrose; the other, by
reference. And as it was their opini on that, if they
adopted the former, they would not succeed in carrying
a Militia Bill through the present Parliament, under the
peculiar circumstances in which the -new Goverment