Star.
London, England, 1818-03-10 00:00:00

good reason; not for the purpote of having any
tiring communicated by him, but that he might be
confronted with Tiersons.who might have said that he
was present at many of those meetings and thus tbe '
base fraud used on that occasion would -hare been
detected. He ought to apologize, as this was thel
first opportunity he had h'ad of making the statement,
and he did it for the purpose, that if any blame
was to be attached for having Oliver at Derby, it
night rest upon him. Now it had been proved that
there had been an intention to bring about a revolu-
tion. and if there were such an intention, whether
this conspiracy existed only amongst the lower or-
ders, or was secretly instigated by persons of a higher
rank in society, was of no importance—it was the
duty of Government to prevent it from taking place.
.1t could not be denied that means were used to work
upon the passions of the misguided people in the most
atrocious way, and this was by an attempt to de-
stroy their religious feelings. He would venture to
say, that the, tendency of those blasphemous publi-
cations that had been so widely chsssminated, was to
undermine and destroy all the principles of religion
amongst the lower order's, who had hitherto regarded
them with reverence and veneration. There must

be few persons who could not see that this was one
of the objects of' such publications ; and when he
heard it asserted that they had not had much circu-
lation, and that persons who wanted to buy them-
out of curiosity could not obtain them, he was abso-
lutely astonished. It was impossible to walk through
'the streets without seeing them at every shop win-
dow. They were hawked about in the country, and
Most industriously circulated—and the per sous were
stopped, from the circumstance of their being liable
to the penalty under the Hawkers' Act, for having
no license; then these infamous productions were
given away ; they saying they could not be proms.
cuted for giving away what they pleased. Thus no
reran who knew what had been lately palsing in this
country, could deny that this was a principal means
brwhich the people had been corrupted. Then, if
the conspiracies had been formed for the purpose of
producing insurrection, surely it was necessary for
the guardians of the public peace to act as they had
done; and it must also be admitted. that they
would have been guilty of a gross dereliction of their
duty if they had acted otherwise. If then they were
warranted in apprehending those persons, they were
also warranted in doing other acts. Now when, under
the warrants that were issued for apprehending cer-
tain in lividuals, they also seized their papers, it ap-
peared to him they did right, for they thus prevented
information being conveyed to their coadjutors.
Another part of this Act was to indemnify persons
for the seizure of arms. If there was no desire to stir
up insurrection, then every thing that had been done
in this way was wrong ; but if otherwise, he would
say that those who searched for arms, were bound
to do so for the preservation of the tranquillity of
the country. One of the Petitions that had been laid
on the table of that House, (he believed it was that
from Francis Wird) complained that some persons'
entered his House at Nottingham, for the purpose of
searching for arms, but none were found. He begged
the House to recollect what was proved to have oc-
curred at the time. It was on the 10th of June, just
at the moment that the insurgents of Derby werel
marching from thence to ttingham, at which
te
the apprehensions had occurred a day or two
rn; yet the search took place when the whole
town was in alarm, and when there was a body of
men in that town ready to receive those who should
arrive from Derby to take possession of that place.—
Would it not occur then, that at such a time it was
the duty of Magistrates to make a strict search, in
order to see whether the suspected persons had arms,
at a period when those they were combined with had
assembled, and preparing to join them? He would say,
they would have been most negligent of their duty,
if they had not taken all such proper steps to take
away arms from every suspected person. In short,
nothing whatever had been done that was not abso-
lutely necessary for the preservation of the peace.
Then, surely it was fit that those who had so pro.
perly and actively conducted themselves, should be
indemnified for their acts—(hear, hear,)—or if they
were to have actions brought against them they
would have no means of defending themselves, but
by disclosing the names of those who had given them
the information ; though he must repeat that those
names should not be exposed. For if once it were
to be laid down, that Parliament should act upon
the principle that those who have given information
to Government of treasonable conspiracies were to
be exposed, no such information would in future be
obtained, for every person would be afraid of afford-
ing it—(hear, hear.) If the House did not think
themselves called on to pass such a Bill, he would
say that they encouraged future conspiracies, which
would be carried on to a dreadful extent, and there
would be no possibility of preventing them, or secu-
ring the kingdom from the danger which threatened
it. There was a passage in the rt of the last
Committee, to the effect that it was hoped the minds
of the people were restored to a just state, but that
'it would require the utmost vigilance of the Magis-
tracy, and all well-intentioned people, to prevent the
same sort of disturbances from being renewed. This
was the purport of the passage ; his memory did not
serve him to quote it correctly; but he most consci-
entiously believed that the spirit which had given
rise to the late disturbances was by an means extinct,
and that in many quarters attempts were still going
on to keep up and expand this spirit, and to get
large. bodies of
_people together for the pretence of
petitioning for Reform, but with the real object of
producing new insurrections—(hear, hear.) Rut let
let no man suppose that he was of opinion that any
thing in the shape of a reform was an outrage upon
the Constitution. He thought no such thing—but
the Reformers of the class to which he alluded were
daring and desperate enthusiasts, who said in their
speeches that the people had a right to carry their pe-
titions in one hand, and their 'Swords in the other.—
(" No, no rfrow the Opposition Benches.) That was
the doctrine which they held (No, no I) for he saw it
publicly stated in those publications which were dif-
fused among them, and which had their sanction.—
That was the species of Reform which they insisted
upon as their constitutional right; and here he would
take leave to say, that Universal Suffrage and An-
nual Parliaments were only a circuitous way for ex-
pressing Revolution—lNeer, hear.) They never did
enter into the Constitution of this Country—further,'
they never could rpm I part c the constitution of