Star.
London, England, 1818-05-14 00:00:00

House to proceed further. in this- 'ease would 1A an
unwarrantable persecution, and he should therefore
vote against the Address.
Mr. LYTTLETON did not conceive the offence
to be so atrocious, morally speaking, as to require
that the House should punish it with the utmost pos-
sible rigour. He did not suppose that any severity
which might be used towards the present offender
would in any degree operate to prevent such offences
for the future. Instead of thinking that the dignity
of the House required that it should agree to the
Address, he thought that it would injure the House
very much in the opinion of the country if it should
pass such a vote. Whether his Honourable Friend
meant to ground any general measure on the present
proceedings he did not know. At all events he should
vote against the motion.
Lord FOLKESTONE was in favour of the Ad-,
dress. It appeared that the office which Mr. Fer-,
gusson held was not his only means of subsistence;
but that he was a writer or clerk to a writer. It also
appeared that he had made use of the influence of
his office to obtain the vote of an elector—(No,
from many Members).—lf the House negatived this
Address, it would imply an approbation of the in-
terference at elections of persons holding Govern-
ment offices.

Lord BINNING said, he was the person who took
the objection to the motion in the Committee, that it
be an instruction to the Chairman to move an Address
to remove Fergusson from his office. He had moved
the previous question. This motion came unrecom-
, mended from the Committee. There had been but
one case of an interference with the purity of Elea;
tion, in which the person offending was sent to New-
gate, and also deprived of his office. The first case
was that of the Bishop of Worcester, who was Al-
moner of the Crown, and who, having interfered in
the freedom of Election, his office of Almoner was
taken {rem him, the salary of which was £1 00 a year.
But what a differencebetween the punishment in this
case and that now proposed. Fergusson did not, as
a Noble Lord (Folkestone) had asserted, interfere .in
his capacity of Surveyor of Taxes, but wrote the ob-
jectionable letter in his absurd zeal to serve a friend.
The next case was that of the Mayor of Winchester,
who was Returning Officer, and who endeavoured,
by threats and menaces, to procure an Election.—
Ile was ordered to be taken into custody, but he
was not sent to Newgate; and an Address was voted
to take from him his situation in the Customs. The
next was the case of the Receiver-General for the
County of Stafford, who was sent to Newgate, but
what affinity between his situation and this paltry
office of 12t.Y. a year held by Fergusson? The nextl
case was that of the Inspector of Customs between!
Berwick and Hull, who interfered in the Election of!
Haydon, giving a bond for a certain sum to be paid!
out of his salary, to procure the return of a certain
indiv;dua'. The next culprit was the Receiver-Ge-
neral for the C ninty of Den'ngh, Mr. Middleton,
who was also High Sheriff for the County of Den-1
high. This person had taken on himself to return
Sir John Middleton, contrary to the majority on the
Pull, and without having made any subsequent exa-
mination, and who had afterwards altered the said Poll
to give a colo•.hr to the return. The House decided,
that he had acted partially and illegally, to the ma-
nifest viol ititn of the lawfail rights of the Freeholders,
and the privilege of Parlian►ent; and for this offence
he was struck out of the Peace, and deprived of the
office of Receiver-General. What similarity between
this case and that of Thomas Fergusson ? It was
necessary for the House to punish such offences, to
prevent attempts of this kind in future. But still the
House would nut consult its own dignity if it went
beyond a proper severity. He believed ►f the office
of Surveyor of Taxes were taken from Fergusson,
the bulk of his income would be taken from him.—
The salary of this office was 120/. a year. He was
not a writer, but a clerk in the office of Mr. Camp-
bell, of Blytheswood, formerly a Member of that
House. He had only farther to say, that it was his
conviction, and he believed the conviction of every
IP:ember in the Committee, that his Noble Friend,
Lord Douglas, had nothing to du with this inter-
ference. The Noble Lord concluded with moving
the previous question.
Mr. BROUGHAM said, with respect to the in-
quiry into the Committee, in was quite decided to
his satisfaction, that Lord Douglas had not com-
mitted any breach of the privileges of Parliament.—
It was necessary that he should state this, as he, for
one, when the case was first stated to the House by his
Noble Friend, thought that prima facie, there was
enough against Lord Douglas to call on him to chal-
lenge farther inquiry. The result of the inquiry had
given satisfaction to himself on this subject. There
was no evidence of any interference on the part of
Lord Douglas.
Mr. CANNING said, from the best consideration
which he was a)le to give to the whole case, it
ap-
peared to him that the measure of punishment was
already sufficient. A Noble Lord (Folkestone) had
said, that it was in his character of officer of Govern-
ment, that he had committed the crime. But theie
was nothing like evidence to shew that Fergurson's
office was made use of to influence Mr. Dykes ; and
there was not, therefore, any peculiar propriety iu
the application of the peculiar punishment now pro.
posed to this peculiar offence. It could not be said,
that when the Bishop of Worcester interfered, that
he had interfered as Lord Almoner, and yet he had
been removed from that office, as a mark of their
displeasure at such interference, But in the case of
this individual, they would nearly deprive him of
his subsistence if they displaced him. On a full con-
sideration of all that had come out, he was of opi-
nion that the House had already made its option, and
that this accession of punishment would not, as in
the case of the Bishop of Worcester, be a mark of!
their displeasure, but the utter ruin of the individual.
Mr. C. W. WYNN vindicated the course of pro-
ceeding in the present case, as being, consonant to the
invariable practice of the House. in a Court of Law
the inquiry was, was a certain person guilty or not
guilty ? But here the matter for inquiry was, who
was the guilty person? In the case of an objection-
able publication, it was not enough when a Printer
was called to their Bar, that he admitted he was the
printer of such publication ; the House did not stop
there, but endeavoured also to ascertain who was
the Author, and who was the Publisher. The objectl
of the Committee, in the present case, was to ascer-
tam if any higher person was behind the curtain. It
would have made a difference in their views, if they