The Sun.
London, England, 1841-02-17 00:00:00

DANISH CLAIMS

Mr. CRESSWELL rose, pursuant to the notice he
had given, to move that this House will, upon Tuesday,
the 23d day of this instant February, resolve itself into a
Committee of the whole House, to consider of the fol-
lowing Address to her Mejesty, that is to say, that an
humble Address be presected to her Majesty, praying that
her Majesty will be graciously pleased to take into conaide-
tion the Report, bearing date 12th May, 1840, made by
ti.e Commissioners to whom it was reterred to examine
and adjudicate upon the claims of certain British subjects,
fur losses sustained by the mime and confiscation of their
slips and cargoes by the Government of Denmark in the
year 1807, and that her Majesty will be graciously pleased
to advance to such claimants the amount of their respec-
tive losses as ascertained by the said Commissioners, and to
assure her Majesty that this house will make good the same.
The Hon. and Learned Member briefly alluded to the
facts of the case, and to the classes of claimants—those
who had ships and goods, and those who had goods ashore
and book debts. He had hitherto been opposed by the
Government; but he would not then enter into the merits
of the question. If, however, he should hear any new
arguments urged against the motion, he should use his
prmileee of replying to them.
Mr."HUTT said—l rise for the purpose of seconding
this motion. It has been with feelings ef regret that 1
have for some time observed the Right Hon. Gentleman
the Chancellor of the Exchequer give to this subject the
same opposition as his predecessors, and adopt all the er
parte considerations by which they were influenced. From the
straightforward, manly character of my Right Hon. Friend,
I would have imagined that he would not interpose his au-
thority to prevent the compensation justly due to those
claimants. With, every feeling of respect, I must say,
that I believe the Right Honourable Gentleman does
not understand the merits of this case. When this British
property was seized by the Danish Government the Bri-
tish Government had seized upwards of 1,300,0001. worth
of Danish property, without providing any protection
for British merchants. That property was always
represented and understood to be intended as a fund
from which compensaticn should be given to the British
merchants who were sufferers by the course pursued by
our Government. These persons have constantly since
that time down to the present period, pressed their claims.
The House of Commons has ordered payment to be made
to two classes of claimants—to those who had claims for
beck debts, and to those who had their good's seized in the
ports. Now there is a third party who have had ships
and cargoes seized at sea by Danish ships. I cannot see
how the Right Hon. Gentleman can oppssc himself to
these applications. The judgment of the House has been
on two several occasions pronounced in their favour; and
I am sure, Sir, that it does not become the character of
this House, to do that which would be considered mon-
strous in a Court of Justice—to reverse the decision which
is has twice pronounced, when there are no new facts by
which its judgment can be influenced. I cannot think
the House will do so ; still less can I think that the Right
Hon. Gentleman the Member for Tamworth, who hes ever
shown the greatest regard for maintaining the character
and consistency of the House, would recommend such a
course. For my own part, I must say, thaVhaving advo-
cated those claims for nine years, it is with feelings of in-
dignation I am compelled to come forward nn this occa-
sion. A large sum of money was obtained previous to
the war at the sacrifice of British property. Surely no
one will pretend that the object was to plunder the owners?
—( Hear.) I hope the House will do them fair and honour-
able justice.—( Hear, and a laugh.) They ought to be
paid not only the principal, but I am quite sure that thine
claimants whose case has been so improperly delayed,
ought to receive compensation fur that delay.—( Hear.)
I will not further trouble the House on this occasion; but
I will say that this is not a party question. The House
has twice declared itself in favour of these claims; and I
trust it will not now reverse its decision.—( Hear. )
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER was
sorry, after what the Hon. and Learned Gentleman had
said, to announce that he should not only fellow the course
of his predecessor upon this question, but was fully pre-
pared to appeal for support sad approbation to the
House, and even to the country at large.—(Cheers from
the Tory benches.) The Hon. and Learned Gentleman
was an old advocate, and he bremeht to bear upon this
question his habitual adroitness. The Hon. and Learned
Gentleman always put this question as between the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer and the claimants. That was a
most adroit way of putting the question certainly ; but the
real question was, were they justified in calling upon the
people of England to pay those claims. Were they justi-
fied in taking the money out of the pockets of other people
to put it into the pockets of these respectable persons re-
siding in Liverpool ? From the best consideration he had
been able to give the subject, be was of opinion that they
had no right to call upon the public to do so. Tae 11,n.
and Learned Gentleman, and the Hon. Gentleman who
had followed. him, had carefully avoided all allusion to that
portion of the question. He had alluded to the decision
which the House had already made. He admitted that
the Hen. and Learned Gentleman had had one decision in
his favour; but the first decision which had been come to,
and been come to by the very Parliament which had
directed the other classes of claims to be paid, had been
against the claims which the Hon. and Learned Gentleman
was then advocating. In accordance with the expressed
cpiniou of the Reformed House of Commons Lord Spencer
had given way, and cdmitted the claims of the two first
classes of claimants, which claims had been paid. The
very claims which the Hon. and Learned Gentleman was
now advocating had been submitted to them, and they had
refused to admit them, It was remarkable also that Sir
James Mackintosh, who was the first who had brought the
subject of the Danish claims before Parliament, held in his
speech on that occasion only alluded to those claims which
were already settled. Those were the only claims which
he thought the country called.on to pay. In that speech
he had stated that there were certain acts which the Danish
Government had committed contrary to the laws of war
and the laws of nations ; by those acts British subjects
had euffcred wrong. The English Government, at the
making of peace, had a right to call upon the Danish Go.
vernment for compensation for these wrongs. They had,
however, neglected for some reason or other to do so,
and he had argued that, in consequence of having thus ne-
glected their duty, ehich was to enforce these claims as
against the Danish Government, they had taken upon
themselves' the duty of compensating the English
subjects, who ought to have been compensated
by the Danish Government. That the claims
now brought forward by the Learned Gentle-
man had never entered into the contemplation of Sir James
Mackintosh, appeared still more clearly from the calculn-
tiona which he had made on the subject. On that occa-
sion, Sir James Mackintosh had stated that the outstanding
claims amounted to about 200,0001., but that they had
been reduced by various circumstances to about 100,000/.
Now the Government bad already paid 284,0001. on ac-
count of those claims, and here was another class of claims
now brought forward, amounting to an additional quarter
of a million. It was obvious that there was a great dis-
tinction between there claims and those which had already
been paid. Denmark was bound to pay the other classes
of claimants; she might -have been compelled to do so.
Now there was no doubt that, according to the laws of
war and the lows of nations, Denmark- was perfectly justi-
fied in coefiscating the property in question. She was per-
fectly justified in making this seizure; consequently no
claim could be' brought' against Denmark, and no
claim could be made against her for compensa-
tion. Therefore, the grounds on which the former
claims had been voted did not exist in the pre-
sent instance. The following argument had also been
attempted to be raised in support of those claims. It was
stated that we having received a large sum of money for
seizures taken from Denmark were bound to give compen-
sation to these claimants. He knew not on what ground
the Hon. and Learned Gentleman assumed that they were
in possession of that sum of money. As far as he could
ascertain, after the expenses of the captors and of adjudi-
cation had been liquidated, and the other expenses had been
paid, the suns remaining had, if not the whole at least, by
far the large portion of it, had been already paid for those
Danish claims which Parliament had already voted. The
payment of those claims had, as nearly as possible, eaten
up the whole of the money received as the produce of
those seizures. The Hon. and Learned Gentleman had
contended that those claims ought to be satisfied out of the
droits of the Crown, but as be had before stated, the Hon.
and Learned Gentleman was mistaken if he supposed that
after paying the expenses of the captors and tne payment
of the claims already liquidated, there was any surplus re-
training.
Mr. CRESSWELL here expressed his dissent.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER—
Would the Hon. and Learned Gentleman put it upon
that footing? He could assure the Hon. and Learned
Gentleman that after paying c iptions, and expenses, and
other claims, it would be found that there was scarcely any
yT
intohe Hon.the
subject and
a and
d he Gentleman
(the
Chancellor
not
gone surplus remaining, certainly nothing like the amount of
100,000/., or 200,0001., as the Hon. Gentleman seemed
to imagine.
of the Exchequer) would not detain the House by any
lengthened observations. He perfectly admitted that if
the claim were founded on justice the amount of the claim
ought not to be taken into account. But if there were
Gentlemen there who were under the influence of that
active canvass which he knew ha been carried on, he
very ull
warned them that the case was not a trifling one, and that
which happened once might happen again. He thought
it necessary to caution them that they would not be vot-
ing a quarter of a million, but a million in full. There
were five cases of the same nature in which he believed
similar claims would be put forward, and he would tell
them that they knew not what might happen if they once
opened their doors to such applications. It was sup..
posed that the Danish claimants were the only claimants
of the kind ; but if the House should grant the
motion of the Honourable and Learned Gentleman
they would have similar claims submitted to them on the
part of the Spanish Governments for the amount of
60,6001. The more they admitted sueh a principle the
more would
.parties endeavour to avail themselves of it.
If they let in one end of the wedge the rest would be
sure to follow, and they would find that the annual ex-
pense
in meeting such claims would form a very large
item in the public expenditure. The Hon. and Learned
Gentleman had urged the claim then under their conside-
ration, at a very unusual time—before they had voted
any of the supplies on the estimates gar the Army, the
Navy, or other public expenses. But let them lock to
the nature of the claim itself. He found that there were
out of the million about 55,000/. paid. to Insurance offices.
Now be (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) did not see
why the underwriters should come and recompense them-
selves out of the taxes of the country, which they were p
put into their own pockets, because they must have been