The Sun.
London, England, 1824-06-18 00:00:00

That out of the subscription is defrayed the expense of col.
lecting and methodizing such information, of supporting the
necessary establishment, and of rewarding persons who have
meritoriously exerted themselves in any transanction connected
with commercial navigation ; and your petitioners may also be
allowed to add, without violating any sentiment of delicacy,
that the same fund has not unfrequen,tly been applied to stimu-
late the brave defenders of their country, both in the navy and
army of Angland, and to relieve the individual distresses of the
relatives of those who have fallen in war.
That your petitioners, and the other Underwriters resorting
to Lloyd's, have established Agents in nearly all the principal
ports in the civilized world ; their number at present amounting
to about three hundred and fifty, from whom information is re.
ceived equally important in detecting fraud, and in giving fa-
cility to merchants to establish their claims for losses sustained.
Such agency has been created by slow degrees, during a very
long period, and is now believed to be of immense importance
to the best interests of commerce.
• That the progressive advance toward perfection of the systern
of Insurance, includingthe arrangements before mentioned,
has induced many additional persons to engage therein, and
greatly increased the number of private Underwriters ; in.
so much, that the premiums received are in very few instances
more than one half the rate usually paid prior to the year 1792.
That competition among private Underwriters is carried to
such an extent, that the aggregate of premiums would inevi.
tably fall short of the amount of claims for losses, if any part of
the protection afforded by the present system should be with-
drawn; it will, therefore,_ appear obvious to your Lordships
that the maintenance of the system is essential to the interest of
persons having property to insure, as well as to the safety of
the Underwriters ; and it is equally clear that such system can
only be maintained by leaving the private Underwriters in pos-
session of the means by which it' is supported.
That the protection afforded to the public by the re-
sponsibility of so great a number of private Under-
writers, is very considerable, and has been found fully
adequate to the purposes of commerce ; and the losses
sustained by the failure of Underwriters will be found not to be
equal to those which have arisen in any other branch of com-
merce; and your petitioners would have no difficulty in spew-
ing that extraordinary losses by failure have generally been
occasioned by the excess of competition beyond reasonable li-
mits, so that the premiums fell greatly short of the amount of
risk incurred ; and having been refused by experienced Under-
writers, such risks have been offered to individuals of less in-
formation, who have confided in the brokers or merchants by
whom the premiums were proposed, and have encountered ruin
as the consequence.
That claims for losses upon private Underwriters are settled
with the utmost liberality ; and your petitioners are prepared
to prove that, in this respect also; very great advantage is de-
rived to the public by insuring with private Underwriters.
That the system which your petitioners have but imper-
fectly described, has grown out of the provisions of an Act of
Parliament, passed in the sixth year of the reign of his Ma-
jesty, King George the Frist, which restrained all corporations,
bodies politic, companies, societies, and partnerships, from en-
gaging in the insurance of ships and goods at sea, or going to
sea, and from lending money on bottomry, except the two cor-
porations therein-mentioned.
That your petitioners have constantly regarded the Act be-
fore referred to as a solemn legislative pledge, that the busi-
ness of Marine Insurance should be confined to private Under.
_ writers, except so far as the two corporations then authorized ;
and that no other joint interest should exist, either during the
continuance of those corporations, or at any time afterwards.—
in other words, the stud Act, after providing for the formation
of two companies, established, in effect, a system of open, in-
dividual competition, which was rendered more perfect by the
negative enactment, that no other companies of the like nature
should ever be established. _

That a Bill has been recently introduced into your Lord-
ships' House " for repealing so much of the Act of the 6th of
George the First, as restrains any other .corporations than those
in . the Act named, and any societies or partnerships, from ef.
fecting Marine Insurance."
That such measure is not required either for the purpose of
reducing the rate of premium, or of furnishing additional ca-
pital for the protection of commerce; on the contrary, your pe-
titioners have shewn, and are prepared to prove, that any in-
crease of competition • that should further reduce the rate of
premium, would operate to.the ultimate disadvantage of com-
merce, by rendering the contract of indemnity insecure, or by
causing a reaction so soon as the terms of insurance were found
ruinous to the Underwriters :—and your petitioners are also pre-
pared to prove that full and ample means exist for the insurance
of every fair risk where the parties are willing to give a just
premium. _

That the said measure does not originate in any public .in-
convenience to he removed, but in the private views of a com-
pany or partnership recently formed, under the name of the
Affiance Britisli and Foreign Life and Fire Insurance
CoMpany ;" and although introduced in the form of a public
Bill, your petitioners hope to be allowed to prove at your Lord.
ships' Bar, that it is in substance and reality as much a private
measure as if it had been introduced upon the petition of the
partners in the Alliance Company, who are its real promoters.
That no evidence has been adduced in the progress of the
Bill through the Lower House of Parliament, to prove the ex-
pediency of the measure; but your petitioners have been sub-
jected to great disadvantage from the form of proceeding
adopted, and they beg to state the following for the informa-
tion of your Lordships. They have not had the opportunity of
contesting the propriety of the measure upon the absence of any
case on the part of theiromoters of the Bill ; they have been
subject to the prejudice produced by the statement of facts in
the progress ot the Bill, which your petitioners have not been
permitted to contradict or explain, although some of your pe-
titioner prayed here to be heard by their witnesses at the liar
of the Lower House against the said Bill ;*and afterwards by
another petition prayed leave to be: heard by their witnesses
before a Committee of that House against the clauses.of the
said Bill,. and in consequence of the form of the Bill, Mem-
bers of Parliament directly interested in the said Alliance
Company were entitled to vote _upon the question, although
your petitioners were advised, that if the said Company had
openly petitioned for the object which they. seek to obtain by
the said Bill, and had obtained leave to introduce a Bill for
the avowed purpose of enabling them to undertake Marine
Insurance, it would not have been competent to Members. of
Parliament directly interested therein, to vote upon a division
respecting the same.
That an attempt was in the year 1806 to obtain from Par-
liament permission for the Globe Fire and Life Insurance Cow-

That while the said Bill, if passed into a law, would operate
to the total ruin of many persons whose subsistence depends
upon their employment as agents or brokers, to get insurances
effected, and greatly to the injury of merchants having occasion
to make insurances, it has not the slightest recommendation,
either in particular expedience or general pOliey.
That the pretext on the part of the most active friends of the
measure, has been, that the principle of the Act of his late
51kiesty King George 1., was inconsistent with the principles
of free trade and open competition which form the present
policy of the country; but it will not escape your Lordships'
penetration, that if the measure is really to depend upon that
volley, it will be found utterly destitute of foundation, because
its promoters have not the courage to propose the abolition of
the two chartered companies, but, on the contrary, seek to
ti description, companies,
in-
undate commerce by inviting canal companies, gas companies,
corporations of every character an
societies, and partnerships of all classes, to invade a branch of
commerce which not only can be, but for more than a century
has been, beneficially carried on by individuals ; and if such a
scheme could succeed, a state of actual free trade would be sup-
planted by one of exclusion and monopoly.
That your petitioners respectfully, but solemnly, protest
against a measure that would deliver them over to a collection
of companies, who might be rivals for a time, but would have
the power of combining whenever they should find it desirable.
That it would be trifling with the misfortunes of your peti-
tioners to assert that the private Underwriters would still exist,
and might be resorted to by those who should prefer effecting
Insurances with them : it is obvious to the experience of your
petitioners, that the private Underwriters could'always success-
fully compete with the Marine Insurance Companies now ex-
isting, but that the large proportion of Insurance business
which would-for a considerable time be engrossed by the new
companies during their career of rivalry?, anti the low premiums
at which business would be undertaken during that period, as
well.as the adventurous spirit of those companies, rendering
them bold in the proportion in which they were ignorant or un-
principled, would deprive the private Underwriters of the pos-
sibility of continuing their business, because they could not be
expected deliberately to defraud the Merchant by undertaking
contracts which they could not fulfil, nor would they blindly
encounter ruin by accepting premiums lower than the reduced
rate established by the rival companies, which would be neces-
sary in order to furnish a motive to individuals to prefer the
private Underwriters.
That the experiment created by the proposed law would be
seriously injurious to commerce in any event, as the system of
the• Underwriters, which is now supported at great annual ex-
pence, and is further maintained by daily and hourly attention,
and extensive correspondence; would sink by the weight-of-the
establishment, and would be lost to the nation and to the
world, and could not be revived except by slow degrees ; and
during the progress of that revival, the public would have to
pay such high. rate of premium as the absence of the system
would render necessary. •
That your petitioners do not discover in the Bill in question
any provision compelling corporations, bodies politic, com-
panies, and societies, who .may enter upon the business of
Marine Insurance in pursuance of the proposed law, to provide
any additional capital to meet the new engagements into which
they are to enter, or to afford evidence in any shape that they
are in fact in possession of any capital ; and therefore the autho-
rity to undertake marine risks may be injurious as well to those
who shall make insurances with such corporations, bodies poli-
tic, companies, and societies, as also to those individuals who
shall previously have contracted with them-in respect of the ob-
jects of.their original establishment.
That your petitioners contemplate the permission to trading
partne-rships to engage in the dangerous adventure of Marine
Insurance as highly objectionable, as well to merchants whose
property is to be insured, as to the general credit of such part-
nerships.
That many of your petitioners endeavoured to obtain permis-
sion to establish by evidence in the other House of Parlianient
h
the injurious nature of the proposed law, but the course of pro-
pceuebdliineginasdtocapdtetolfbayptrhievaptreomßioltras deprived the petitioners of
that opportnnity, of the Bill in making it a
and it has passed through its several stages
without any evidence to establish the expediency thereof.
Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that the said Bill
may not pass into a Law, but that your Petitioners may be,
heard by themselves,' their counsel, agents, and witnesses, at
your Lordships'
Bar, or before a Committee-of Peers, or in
such manner as your Lordships may be pleased to order.
And your Petitioners will ever pray, &c.
[SLOWED BY SEVERAL iIUNDRED PERSONS.]

Earl ROSSLYN opposed the Bill altogether, and moved,
in amendment, that it be committed this day three months.
Lord SUFFIELD defended the Bill.

The LORD CHANCELLOR said, that if their Lordships
looked at this morning's Papers, they would find that it was
proposed to establish a Society for protecting persons prose-
cuted under such laws as the present Bill, if it should receive
the sanction of Parliament.

. The question was then put, and the Amendment agreed to.
The Masters and Workmen Bill went through a Committee,
and was reported.
The Earl of SHAFTESBURY presented various Petitions
from Insurance Brokers in London and Underwriters engaged
in insuring, against the Marine Insurance Company Bill.—
Laid on the table. _ _

Mr. Swiwßum; presented four Quarterly Accounts from
the Commissioners of Westminster Bridge.—Laid on the
table.—Adjourned.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

The House was summoned to the House of Peers to hear the
Royal Assent given by Commission to various Bills.
Mr. EASTOR presented certain Returns from Mr. Jones,
Martial of the King's Bench.
The Southwark Bridge Bill was read a third time and passed.

PROTESTANT DISSENTERS.
Mr. NV. SMITH rose to present a petition of so much con.
sequence to the parties petitioning, that he trusted he might be
allowed the indulgence of the House for a short time. It came
from the Protestant Dissenters in and about the metropolis, and
was signed by ten thousand names. Yet it was not for them
alone, but for the whole body of Protestant Dissenters, except.
ing Baptists, in this kingdom. They , complained that their
difference from the discipline of the Church subjected them to
certain civil disabilities, which they prayed to have removed.
They stated that the main objection in that House to the prayer
of the Catholics was not applicable to their case ; namely,
that they did not acknowledge the authority spiritual or tem-
poral in a foreign Potentate. He should, however, rather place
the question upon the broad ground that difference in religious
opinion should not make any difference in civil qualifications.
It was not his intention to found any motion upon the
petition, but strongly recommended it to the attention of the
House. -

Mr. ROBERTSON objected to the prayer of the petition.
After a few words from Mr. W. SNITII, the petition was
ordered to be printed. _ _

HILL presented a Petition from
the Dean and In-
habitants of Derry, in vindication of the instructions given by
them to their Representative to apply to Parliament for an
Act providing a fund for the repairs of the Cathedral of Derry.
They were then not aware of the existence of any fund having
such an object, and the course they adopted was therefore
perfectly justifiable. The
i Petitioners prayed that the ques-
tion might be inquired: Into, and disposed of in the next
Session. _ • _ .

Mr. Alderman WOOD observed, that the Right Hon.
Baronet had Already had access to every information upon the
subject befbre the Committee up stairs. The inhabitants of
Londonderry had attacked the Irish Society of. London, and
accused them almost o 1 robbery. But if they looked to. th
records of the: ociety, it would be found, that the first segues-.
trator, who was a Bishop of Derry, had embezzled their