The Sun.
London, England, 1846-03-10 00:00:00

LAW OF MORTMAIN.

Lord BEAUNION r said he had a petition to present,
signed by a large number of very wealthy inhabitants
of Durham and Northumberland, praying that
steps might be taken to restrain the power of
the Roman Catholic Bishops in the law of Mort-
main, or else the result would be oppressive to the
clergy ani unjust to the laity.
Lord BROUGHAM said he was aware that many
highly respect Ale Roman Catholics, possessed of very
large property indeed, had declared that they
thought the law of mortmain did not go far enough in
affecting real property only. He was aware that some
of those persons were worth five and six thousand a year
He was desirous of obtaining the same advantages in
the law of England as is obtained in the provision
of the French law ; he believed that according
to the code of Napoleon it was devised that
no clergyman, medical officer, or solicitor, who
was in attendance during the last illness of any in-
dividual, should take any bequest under his will
without a very explicit declaration of his fes,lings, and
he thought too great care could not be taken in
this country, or the subject.
Lord CAMPBELL could not refrain from expressing
the very high satisfaction he felt at the general good
sense his Noble and Learned Friend had just now
evinced. He believed that it was highly necessary
to obtain the advantage of securing an individua
in a case of severe illness, from solicitations to rob
his own family, from what was generally termed
pious purposes. It was the law of every other country
in Europe, and the regulations of those laws were, if
possible, most stringent, and the greatest care was taken
to hinder the attempts of interested individuals from
interfering with persons who were quite unable to think
for themselves, and he thought that any measure that
might be determined upon on.the part of Government
would be in the highest degree satisfactory.
CORN-LAWS.

The Duke of RUTLAND presented several petitions
against any alteration in the corn-laws.
SCOTTISH SCHOOLMASTERS.

The Duke of RICHMOND wished to inquire whether
any steps were likely to be taken by the Government to
revive the Committee of last year for providing any
suitable dwellings for the schoolmasters in Scotland ? It
was well known that the Commission of last year led to
no result.

The Duke of BUCCLEUCH said that the Committee
of last year was likely to be revived this session, but
it waited fur the attendance of several Noble Lords that
reside in Scotland, and whose assistance it was desirable
to obtain in that Committee; the subject had not escaped
the attention of Government, and as soon as they ob-
tained the report of this Committee they were prepared
to act. He hoped in the course of a day or two, in conse-
quence of the attendance of Noble Lords to whom he
alluded, to move the re appointment of the Committee.
PROTECTION OF LIFE AND PROPERTY (IRE-
LAND) BILL.
Lord DENMAN said that he would proceed in the
shortest possible manner to state to their Lordships his
views with regard to the Coercion Bill for Ireland. In
the first p'ace, he had heard with abhorrence and regret
the statement which had been made in that House the
other night, when its sanction to the Bill had been so-
licited. He did not mean to enter at any great
length on the Bill, but he believed that the less
stringent the Bill was in its nature, and the less it inter-
fered with the ordinary feelings of mankind, the more
likely it was to be efficient. With regard to the first
clause giving to the Lord Lieutenant the power of placing
any district where a solitary offence had been committed,
under the operation of the Act, it was altogether
too great a stretch of authority. It appeared that where
any murder or attempt at murder had been made, or
any assault, with intent to inflict grievous bodily harm,
had been perpetrated, that that solitary fact was to be
sufficient ground for calling this measure into action.
The House was aware that such crimes were occa-
sionally committed in every country, and yet the com-
mission of a single crime was to be a justification for
using' this Act. He had suggested to their Lordships
that the justices of the peace in every county should
make a representation to the Lord Lieutenant, in the
event of this measure being necessary, but that pro-
position was not approved of. He had, however, found
on inquiry that the Lord Lieutenant had sufficient
information from the ordinary police reports, and he
(Lord Denman) could not see the objection to giving
his Excellency the power of calling this Act into opera-
tion, on his own responsibility, as such a course would
be preferable to the present system.—(Hear, hear.)
With regard to the transportation a:m.4e, where any
person found out of his dwelling after sunset and before
sunrise was liable to that punishment, lie confessed
that he could not help feeling a very strong reluc-
tance to an Act granting such a power, with-
out the fullest proof of the necessity for it.
He owned that the mere right of taking ap indivi-
duals who have been found out after sunset and before
sunrise, was, in in his opinion, giving a very extended
power to the Executive Government. He thought,
therefore, that the person so taken into custody should
be allowed to make an explanation before being taken
to prison ; and he was glad to find that this
clause had been altered in the Bill, for this purpose
the person being taken immediately before the petty
sessions. He was sorry to find that there was one con-
dition in that clause which pressed rather hardly
up In the individual—he meant that which provided
that if oily one to igistrate were sitting at the ses-
sions the person should be taken to prison. He thought
the 'iberty of the subject ought not e. depend upon the
accident of only one magistrate being at the time
at the petty sections. He regretted also that the punish-
ment consequent upon the offence was so severe. He
felt a repugnance to transportation for fifteen years, or
(as it was now reduced) seven Tears, Ile did not
think this severe punishment Whuld be attended with
any good effect. Their Lordships were perhaps ILA are
that a transportation for seven years was in many cases
a transportation fur life, because ,persons in
that humble station of life guild hot always
command the means ef returning home. He was told
that transportation was a punishment they dreaded, and
that they cared nothing for imi.risonment ; but the
power of apprehending was a power for the prevention
of mischief for the time, at least, and let the House
depend on it that imprisonment was not a light
punishmept to a labouring man. He had been
induced the other day to speak to the Noble
Lord who had introduced the measure, with a
view of making the punishment proportionate, that was
to say that the individual should be slightly punished
for the first offence, more heavily punished for
the second, and when offending the third
time that he should be held contumacious, and
sentence of transportation be passed upon him,
There was other subject to which he would refer.
It was that which related to the change of venue to
another county to that in which an • offence was COMP'
mitted. If a strong case was made out for this Act at all,
then ought the power to change the venue be given, in
order to put down such schemes and associations as were
supposed by the Act to exist.—(Hear, hear.) The law
which existed in this country on the subject ought to
be extended to Ireland. Ile could not agree with the
Noble and Learned Lord b-hind him, that it was
a great privilege for parties charged with offences
to be tried by their neighbours ; there were many cases
in which it would operate injuriously for persons to be
tried within the limit of small jurisdictions ; and
there were many instances in which it was
much more convenient for offenders to be tried
out of the county in which the offences were
Denman)shrie county. Yorkshire
to
committed than in it. There were many parts in Lan-
cashire, rlkesahire and Lincolnshire, in which it was
fund much more convenient to try persons in the ad•
joining
r al
that
awast thae great
Nobleerd (
consolationtheEtoarhlismt.(LGoerrd.
mans)in hisstatement the other evening, did not state that
juries were intimidated in the discharge of their duties ;
still he (Lord Denman) could not but think that such
must te the case if the violence and insubordination stated
to be the foundation of the Bill had au existence. It
would be better and safer in hisopinion, however, that
instead of introducing the power of changing the venue
in any particular Bill, like the one he was considering,
to introduce the principle into a general Act of Parlia-
ment, so that the practice might he the same in