The Sun.
London, England, 1837-12-07 00:00:00

the Lords, the Judges, and the King's Majesty. Sir, such
naturally is the wicked propensity of mankind to meddle in
the affairs of others, and to promote quarrels and disputes
amongst their neighbours, on the Lucretian principle, I pre-
sume-

" Suave maria magno turbantibus mquora ventis
E terra magnum aiterius spectare laborem"—
such, I say, Sir, was this propensity, that it was found neces-
sary, at a very early period of civilised society, to make it an
offence, and provide some remedy against it ; and accordingly
I find in the Roman law an express enactment forbidding the
practice, denouncing the offenders as the pests of society, and
subjecting them to the condemnation of fine, imprisonment,
and perpetual infamy. After some farther historical illustra-
tion, which we regret that we have not space to insert, the
Hon. Member proceeded :—Then, Sir, if I have satisfactorily
established the principle, who can doubt that an infringement
of it is a breach of the privileges of the House ? It is and

must be a contempt, and consequently a breach of privilege,
for any person to do that which the House says he shall not do.
Sir, a petition against the return of a Member to Parliament is

altogether in the nature of a civil proceeding, though some
Hon. Members perhaps may consider it a very uncivil one.
The petition does not seek to prosecute criminally an alleged
offender, but is in the nature of an appeal for the trial of civil
rights. I have before shown that to assist in getting up such
a petition, or to support it with money, is forbidden by the
law, and by the practice of this House, and that such assist-
ance and support have been pronounced by judicial authority
as an act of maintenance at common law, and a crime. If
then, Sir, maintenance be of itself an offence of so highly cri-
minal a nature, how greatly must that crime be increased
when it is superadded to and incorporated with another of
equal if not of greater magnitude 1 I mean, of course, con-
spiracy—which then becomes conspiracy—to do an act of
maintenance. Such then, Sir, are maintenance and con-

spiracy in statute and common law. I will now show how
connect them with a breach of Parliamentary privilege. It
appears to me, upon a full consideration of all the cases that
have occurred in Parliament on the subject of privilege from
the commencement of its records to the present day, that
whenever any crime or offence, either at common law or by
Act of Parliament, has occurred to affect the proceedings of
Parliament or electior.s, or any other matters concerning
Parliament, the same crime or offence has been adopted and

naturalized and engrafted, as it were, and acted upon as
part of the lex Parliantenti. This, Sir, appears to me
the only rational basis of our judicial privileges. What I
claim, therefore, for this House as an undeniable privilege,
founded upon the law and consistent with the law, is, not
the right of ourselves to make new laws, but the sole right
of applying the laws as they exist to all matters affecting
elections or any of our proceedings—the sole right of ad-
judging whether in such cases the laws have been broken,

and the sole right of punishing those whom we may have
found guilty of a breach of the laws which we are so entitled

to administer. The Honourable Member then cited several

cases in support of his views of the privileges of the
House. He then continued :—Sir, I think I have now
said enough in support my first four resolutions. They will be
found to embrace the following list of crimes and misde-
meanours :—1 st. libel ; 2d. maintenance ; 3d. conspiracy ;
4th. contempt of Court ; sth. breach of Parliamentary pri-
vilege ; the last uniting them all in a sort of Gordian knot,
which this House will not allow to be cut, and which it may, I
think, baffle the ingenuity of Hon. Members to untie. I now
come to my fifth resolution. Sir, the reference I ask for to
the Committee of Privileges is founded upon the passages
lam about to read from the Standard newspaper. [The
Honourable Member then read the resolutions adopted
by the meeting at the London Coffee-house, Ludgate-
hill, on the 30th of August last.] He continued :
I shall not imitate the example of those who have taken upon
themselves to prejudge the cause of poor persecuted Ireland,
whose singular ill-fortune it is ever to be thought in the
wrong. Upon the proceedings detailed in these papers I
shall make no comment. There is no proof before the
House, and, therefore, I will not assert that any meeting
took place—that :any Committee was formed—that any reso-
lutions were passed—that any subscriptions have been made.
In order to avoid the possibility of injustice, I should be even
willing to become an adherent to Bishop Berkeley's philoso-
phy, and to believe, if I could, that no such papers as I hold
in my hand were ever printed, and that no such person as
Mr. Andrew Spottiswoode ever existed. Sir, I shall now
make a few observations on the principles attempted to be
established by my first four resolutions. Whatever may have
been heretofore thought by Honourable Members on the
other side of the House, they will now see that in these at
least no party question is involved. We are all equally
interested in the maintenance of those rights and privileges
which we hold in trust for ourselves, for our successors, and
for the people. There is no man, however humble,
who may not make it an object of his ambition to obtain
a seat in this House. Our privileges, therefore, are privi-
leges of the whole nation, and in them every Member of the
community, has a direct and immediate interest. Sir, the
subject to which I have been calling the attention of the House
affords a fruitful field for declamation, and had I been ac-
tuated by no other feeling thin that of making an ostentatious
display of rounded periods and studied sentences, my speech
might perhaps have been more agreeable to your cars, though
not so satisfactory to my own judgment. I have throughout
addressed myself to the reason cf Hon. Members, and not to
their passions. If I have failed to convince the House of my
honest opinions, I shall of course readily submit to their deci-
sion. I do, however, beseech the House to ponder deeply and
anxiously upon the results that may ensue from it. Our rul-
ing princess, though as yet but in the springtime and blossom
as it were, of her maiden intellect, is wise, virtuous, and be-
neficent. I believe, Sir, that to her we might surrender all our
dearest rights without a fear that our confidence would be
abused. But let us recollect that life is uncertain—that there
is a power more mighty than kings and queens, to whose in-
scrutable decrees the high and the low, the bad and the
good, must succumb. The time will arrive (long, long be it
averted I)—but the time will arrive, and we know not how
soon (fur in the midst of life we are in death 1) when that
virgin Queen, who is now the object of our fondest hopes,
shall be torn from us, and laid to repose in the sepulchre of
her illustrious predecessor. What may then happen, Sir, lies
unseen and unknown in the womb of futurity ; but should
another despot ever arise in this country, and presume to
treat as a bauble yonder mace—the emblem of your autho-
rity, and of the House's power—to what should we fly for
succour if not to those privileges which have been handed
down to us as an inheritance from our forefathers, and which
it is now my object to have transmitted to our children's
children, unimpaired ether by royal influence or by aris-
tocratical encroachment, as the best, the only safeguard for
the rights and liberties of the people. I conclude, Sir, by
moving that the five resolutions which stand on the notice-
book be adopted by the House.
Mr. HUME having seconded the motion, the first resolu-
tion was put from the chair.
Mr. WA RBURTON expressed a hope that the Hon.
Member would confine himself to the last resolution which he
had read, and merely move for a Committee to inquire gene-
rally into the transaction. There might be much difference
of opinion among Hon. Members as to the details and bear-
ings of the question, but he thought there could be 'none as to
the necessity of the House being acquainted with all the facts
of the case. Suppose, for instance, it should appear that
among the subscribers to the fund alluded to there were some
foreign potentates.—(Cries of " Oh, oh," and cheers from
the Ministerial benches.) Hon. Members might exclaim, but
the thing was by no means impossible that among the sub-
scribers to this fund there were certain would-be despots, to
whom it should be of the utmost consequence of what mate-
rials that House should be composed.—( Cheers.) He did
not say the case was so, but it was not impossible, and therefore
it was he conceived it became necessary for them, on being ap-
prised that a large collection was being made to turn Members
Out of the House by persons other than electors, to institute a
rigid inquiry into the allegation.---( Hear, hear.) It was pea-
fectly notorious out of doors that there were subscriptions to a
large amount raised with a view of trying to influence the de-
termination of the Election Committees. He had seen a list of
the subscriptions to this fund, and he thought it would be well
to ascertain whether the names there represented were real
or not. An Oxford newspaper bad been sent to him contain-
ing one of those lists, on examining which he found no less
than 700 names of bachelors and under-graduates subscribing
ten shillings each, besides various anonymous contributions of
251. and 20/. each. Now, all this ought to be a matter of
inquiry. For his own part, though he might not be willing
at once to agree to these resolutions of the Hon. Gentleman,
the first of which called on the House to designate as a
breach of its privileges the institution of this fund, if he only
moved for a Committee he should readily have his vote.—
( Hear, and cries of " Withdraw.")
Mr. BLE WITT, seeing that the wish of the House was
that be should not press the first four resolutions, and merely
move for the Committee, at once submitcd to its desire.
The question was then put and agreed to that the first reso-
lutions should be withdrawn.
Mr. FRENCH submitted to the Honourable Member
whether he might not as well wait for the motion of the Hon.
Member for the county of Limerick which stood for to-mor-
row, and which was precisely for the Committee the Hon.
Member sought, and thus let the matter come in more ma-
tured shape before the House.—( Hear.)
Mr. W. S. O'BRIEN said that if he were allowed to re-
serve that portion of his motion which stood for to-morrow,
and which referred more immediately to the conduct of the
Hon. Baronet the Member for North Wiltshire, he had no
objection to the Committee being appointed at once.
The ATTORNEY-GENERAL was strongly of opinion
that the best course would be to postpone moving for the
Committee until to-morrow, when the petition of the
Hon. Member for Limerick being printed, the whole sub-
ject, whether as regarded its laws or facts, might be brought
under consideration, and it might be directed whether the
case should be referred to a Committee of Privileges or to a
Select Committee. His own opinion was, that neither Com-
mittee would be found expedient.—( Cheers.) He was not at
all of opinion that the institution of the fund in question was
of the grave, alarming, and dangerous tendency which was at-
tributed to it. As to a Committee of Privileges, he hoped
never to see another. It was, in point of fact, a Committee
of the whole House, at which all manner of confusion prevailed.
Mr. BLEW ITT said, that on the understanding that the
matter was not to drop entirely, and that it should be
brought on by some more experienced person, he was willing
to let it stand over for the present.—( Loud cries of '‘ Hear,
hear 1" from the Ministerial benches.)
Sir E. KNATC BULL thought that the motion should
be either at once negatived or waved altogether.—( Loud
cheers from the Opposition benches.)
Mr. HUME begged to remind the Right Hon. Baronet,
that in point of fact there was at present no question before
the House, and all the Hon. Member had to do was to leave
the matter as it stood.—( Cheers and laughter.)
Mr. WYNN denied that the first resolution had been with-
drawn, and appealed to the Chair as to the fact.