The Sun.
London, England, 1831-09-20 00:00:00

GAME LAWS' AMENDMENT BILL.

The Duke of RICHMOND rose to move the second
reading of the Glow Laws Amendment Bill. Looking to
the evils which had flowed from the system of game
laws hitherto in force, and the ill blood which they had
occasioned, there could scarcely be a second opinion as to
the necessity of change. If the dissatisfaction to which
they had given rise was nothing more than rabble clamour,
he would be one of the last amongst their Lordships to
take any measure in defirence- to it. But it was impos-
sible to consider the present game laws without being
struck with their unreasonableness, injustice, and oppres-
sion.—(llear-,. hear.) Amongst other most unjust enact-
ments, the Legislation had constituted into a crime the
buying or selling of game—acts which, upon no principle
of morals, could any man acknowledge to be criminal.
Bid as such a law was in principle, it was in practice in-
finitely worse. One of the objects of the Bill to which
he now prayed the attention of their Lordships was, to
render that innocent in the eye of the law which was in-
nocent in the eyes of all mankind. The Bill, therefore,
proposed to repeal all the laws by which the sale of game
was prohibited. The next great evil which it was desired
to remove lay in the unjust and oppressive laws respecting
the qualification to kill game. Those, like all other bad
and unjust laws, were inefficient for the purposes for which
they had been enacted. It was unnecessary to dwell at
any length upon the absurdity of laws which permitted the
eldest son to shoot, whilst they prohibited the lather.
When a man, convicted under the 24th and 25th of
Charles the Second, of shooting a partridge or a pheasant,
was sentenced to three months' imprisonment, and before
the ink was dry upon the paper which contained his sen-

tence, the Magistrate himself who signed that paper would
give permission to one of his own younger sons to go out
and shoot game in violation of the law. Could it be won-
dered, then, that the people should. say there was one law
for the rich and .snot• er for the poor. The more those
laws were looked into the more unjust and unreasonable
they would appear. He might be told that the poacher
was a bad and desperate character. Certainty he was not
disposed to stand up there and defend the poacher, but
to condemn the laws which encouraged) the poacher in
his occupation.--(Hear, hear.) The farmer was not
allowed to kill or to sell the game which was fed
eipon his own crops. But the richer sort of people in
the great towns would have game upon their tables,
and the market must be supplied, and in that way
a temptation was held out to toe labourer to violate ti e
laws. He is led on from crime to crime, arid sometimes
finisher his career on the scaffold—the victim of laws of
which the princip el effect was to hold out temptation.
Some notion of the extensively mischievous operation of
those laws may be formed by looking to the number of
convictions which had token pl ice under them from 1827
to 1880. Those convictions were no less than 8,502,
making an average of upwards of 2,000 yearly; and of
the persons so convicted many were under twenty years of
age. In the same years 29,670 were committed. to prison
for offences against those laws. From these facts he felt
authorized in calling on their Lordships to amend a sys-
tem which served as a nursery for crime. He would not
then detain the House by going into the details of the Bill,
which would be more properly considered on a future
occasion.

....
The Duke of WELLINGTON was opposed to the Bill
brought in by the Noble Duke opposite, not because hr
vas frvour..ble to the present system of game laws, but be-
cause he was convinced that no amendments which he had
yer seen propo►ed would effect the objects which the Noble
Duke hid in view. The Bill would do away with that
principle of qualification which had been recognised in the
country since the reign of Richard li. Hitherto property
in land had been the basis of qualification, but the Bill now•
before the House would give the qualification to any man
who might take out a licence from the Commissioners of
Assessed Taxes. The Bill wooed do away with the evil,
which was in reality the breach of the law, ha, the law would
still lie broken. Indeed, breaches of the law would he much
more frequent, bee Luse the Bill would give increased faci-
lities for the s ile of the game. The preserving of game
gives present empl.,yment to thousands of individugs; and
what would those people do, if the gentlemen who employ
them were to be deprived of that exclusive right which
they had possessed for five hundred years, and which w
recognised in every country in Europe except in France
where, since the Revolution, it had been abolished ? The
only penalty which the Bill allowed for shooting upon
another man's ground, under a licence, was for trespass.
How was that to he recovered from a temot, who had a

right to go over the ground, the right killing pine be-
ingreserved
ill rcd.
old
Tnio, et pbeei
f he nratt tenant a
l.
ctyovaeirk""dird fro lm'ein
onlyg
for to
the
tenant in the ease which lie put, and
licence, the landlord could have no remedy against him
for infriniting upon his reserved right.
trespass, tll
The of RICHMOND was understood to say that
the ioli Duke
jccrion might be removed in the Commiteee,
The Duke of WELLINGTON said that it would be
productive of great inconvenience that the Bill should come
into operation on the 10th of October ; that is in the
middle of the shooting season.
Lord NVHARNCLI FEE had called the attent',;.a of the
ti„use to that subject in that House tv;:,A; 1n the House of
Commons ; and now he w:.ta sappy that the Government
had at length cpenei. their eyes to the evils occasioned by
the present Game Laws. If the alteration proposed %you'd
not remove all the evils, it would at least prepare the way
for their removal.—(Hear.) As long as there was pt-o,
perty to he plundered, there would-also he thiens; and as
lona a, there was game there would tic y.oachers. But all
that the Legislature could da was to put the laws on such
a footing, that tlxre could be no su-picion of injustice, of
partiality, or of monopoly on the part of the L. gislators,
He objected to the principle of the Bill which saic',, tkat the
game did not belong to the owner of Soil, but to him
who held the land. The of that would be, that the
landlord would ha-i:e -..-. o power over nine.'entbs of the land
he paKtessed, so far as the game on it was concerned, but
would be quite at the mercy of his tenants. The custom,
which had origin ited, perhaps, in a feeling of feudal re-
spect fir the landlord, arAd by which 4 was now always
allowed to sport over his tenant's land, would be destroyed
by this 1.1.111- Then, what was the punishment to the
tenant, if he trespassed ? He was fined ; but he could not
trespass on his own land. This was an extraordinary
oversight in those who had drawn the Bill, but tht.; might
be remedied in Committee; and he 1-..nderatood that the
Bill was now to go thrnugh the COmmittee only pro
forma Fle should not; therefore, oppose its doing so.
The Earl of WESTMORLAND was opposed to the Bill
—not because he thought the present lay; good--7but, be-
cause he thought the Bill now introduced would make 'lie
matter worse. 1, Noble Lord, 04 Presenting g petition
from a political Union, had.tuldtherSl:he other night, that
0:1.24 House should tike care of its chat acter. He thought
it would he almost entirely lost if this Bill was passed;
for of all the acts of oppression of which he had heard,
this was the worst. The principle of the ail'. was, to
abolish all distinctions; but, by 0,-,e way. in which it was
framed, the gentlemen L-if the Political Union would be pre-
vented f.-•nra enjoying the sport, as well as the first Duke
For, first there was an obstruction in the shape of a
4n the land. There was a Bill for them.—(A laugh.)
pretty
heavy penalty for a licence, and then they could not stir a
step beyond their Own grounds, withoutleing liable to be
taken to prison for trespassing. He contended, that As 00

could enjoy the pleasures of sporting, if his lands onl'
xtended over forty or fifty acres, th'a Bill would only IN
n advantage to great landed proprietors.
Lord SUFFIELD thought this Bill a great benefit; a•.
'y making game property, it would make the people uo-
ierstancl what they could nor comi.r...!.coti under the pre
sent laws—that the illegal taktitz f ame was a crime
He, therefore, gave his 'most hearty tlaoiks to the Govern.
rent for introducing the measure. Those statutes whici
Noble Lords spoke of as qualifying, were, in fact, disqua
ifying, statutes ; for, before them, every man was entitle.
shoot g !me. The present laws were dead letters, be
ause tht y did not receive the support of public opinion
l'he right of sporting might now be a matter of agreement
tetween landlords and tenants, and both would be equalb
trorected. He should heartily support the Bill.
Lord TENTERDEN sail the present game laws wee
had that he should he willing to support almost an:
:lin that went to alter them.—(Hear, hear.)
The Earl of CAERNARVON objected to some of tin
letails of this Bill, though he should approve of it if it was
ikely to identify with respect to game the legal and the
"lora! offence. He should not oppose the Bill going pm, '
/I.rma through the Committee.
Lord ELDON would not discuss it till it had been con-
sidered in Committee, after which he should be prepared
to give his opinion upon it.
The Duke of RICHMOND observed, that as the law
now stood it was constantly violated, for there were many
persons in the highest ranks of life who were not by lay.
qualified to shoot game. Foreign Ambassadors were not
nor were many Irish and Scotch Peers qualified as to Rog
!and. Peers second sons were also unqualified, and yet all
these persons were in the daily habit of violating the law ;
he consequence of which was that offences against th.
,!tune laws were no where considered as crimes. He liked
the trespass clause best of all in the Bill, for he thought
that a tnan ought to be the acknowledged owner of his own
land, so that he committed no nuisance upon his neighbour's.
The Bill then went through a Committee, and was or-
dered to be recommitted on Wednesday.
The Exchequer Bills' Bill went through a Committee.