The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-03-17 00:00:00

HOUSE OF COMMONS.-WEDNESDAY

The adjourned debate on the question of privilege was re-
sumed by

Lord J. RUSSELL, who referred to what bad been done
upon former occasions, in order to show that the house was
in these matters surrounded with difficulties. He feared
that the course suggested by Sir T, Wilde would be attended
with the most serious inconveniences, while on the other
hand the course proposed by the Solicitor-General was
making the courts of law judges of what were the privileges
of the House of Commons. It would at once invest those
courts with the'power of curbing and controlling the House
of Commons in the exercise of its privileges. The House of
Commons was the only check upon the misconduct of the
courts of law, and those courts might be very much gratified
to find that they had the power of limiting the privileges of
the house in return. If the judges went on enlarging their
own powers, while curtailing those- of the House of Com-
mons, the result might be that the latter branch of the
legislature would become less beneficial to the country than
it was intended that it should be by the constitution. See-
ing all the difficulties of the case, he should feel disposed to
say that they ought not to allow the plaintiff in the action to
be entirely free from examination. It would be very absurd
to have committed the present plaintiff when acting as a
subordinate in opposing the privileges of the house, and yet
take no step against him when he proceeded to act as a prin-
cipal. He would therefore suggest that he should be called
to the bar and examined, and if he was proceeding against
and in despite of the authority of the house that he should
be committed. This wou:d deter others from a similar course
of procedure. The noble lord concluded by moving that
Thomas Burton Howard should be desired to attend at the
bar of the house on Thursday (yesterday.)
The ATTORNEY-GENERAL said that in theory be quite
agreed in the resolutions which had been formerly agreed to
by the house. After the former debate it was impossible to
doubt that the house was the only judge of its own privi.
leges, and from that principle he never would recede; but
he still thought it was not becoming of the house to commit
attorneys' clerks and sheriffs' officers, and plaintiffs, for seek-
ing redress for what they conceived to be a wrong done them
in the only way which appeared to them to be open. In the
former case the privileges of the house were admitted, but
damages were given for excess in the execution of their war-
rant. The object of the plaintiff was, no doubt, to get as
much money as he could, and if was called to the bar he would
probably provoke the house to commit him, in order to en-
hance the damages by holding himself up as a martyr to op-
pression. In the case of " Burdett v. Abbot," the house had
not only pleaded but had obtained a verdict ; and yet it had
permitted one of its own members to defy its powers so far
as to carry the question to the House of Lords. When the
former case was decided in favour of Mr. Stockdale, he was
of opinion the House of Lords should have been appealed to,
that the opinions of all the courts of law should have been
exhausted, or that they should have proceeded at once to le-
gislate. The Court of Chancery had this power of commit-
tal, though it could not trace that power to its origin ; but
this was not the sort of precedent which the House of Com-
mons should choose to follow. He thought the course the
house ought to adopt would be to plead to the action, taking
it for granted that the courts of law in Westminster Hall
would take cognisance of the privileges of the house as part
of the law which they had to administer. He should there-
fore oppose the motion of Lord J. Russell.
Mr. ELPHINSTONE said that great inconvenience might
arise if the privileges of the house were permitted to be ques-
tioned. He suggested the propriety of passing an act autho-
rising the Speaker to stop actions by injunction, being in each
case empowered to issue such injunction by a vote of the
house.
Mr. BORTHWICK opposed the motion of Lord J. Russ:ell.
Sir R. PEEL said he would readily accede to the suggestion
of Lord J. Russell for a select committee had he not, on the
part of the Government, determined to assume the direct
responsibility. He was at first strongly disposed to refuse to
plead and to rely upon their privileges, but recollecting that
if the action went on the house would be compelled to com-
mit innocent parties who were merely subordinate functiona-
ries, he came to a different conclusion. He was the more
induced to this by the consideration of the powerful minority
opposed to the former course of proceeding, and to the fact
that public opinion was against such a stretch of power. He
felt deeply that the whole of the privileges claimed in modern
time by the House of Commons were essential to the exercise
of their functions, and he also feared; that the courts of law,
naturally jealous of their own authority, and closely looking
into all the technical bearings of the case, might not take a
favourable view of the privileges. According to the consti-
tution, the house had a controlling power, and if the decision
of the Queen's Bench in the case of Stockdale had been al-
lowed to pass unquestioned by parliament, it would have been
a foundation for the complete degradation of the house.
Although he would not hesitate to commit the plaintiff in
this case to Newgate if it were necessary to do so for the pre-
d o
stob e pllatinwtioffu
pre-
servation of their authority, yet under existing circumstances
hn eo
tdbi de notvthink it to
enter would
übpeon a
judicious
contestt
with
o
at
the bar unless they were ready to go through with the pro-
ceeding by committing him. He thought it would, upon the
whole, be better for the house to obtain a clearer definition
of the law, and then pass an act which would give them full
and unquestioned authority to support their privileges.
Mr. WYNN was of opinion, that all modern precede t
committed the house to the necessity of pleading
in the ns
pre-
sent instance.
Mr. ESCOTT supported the proposal of pleading to the ac-
tion.
Sir T. WILDE regretted that the course recommended by
Sir 11. Peel did not corresponsl with the sentiments he had
expressed. All difficulties might be obviated by a manly
assertion of their privileges, of which they were after all but
trustees for the benefit of the public. As to passing an act
of. Parliament to define their privileges, it was not in the
power of mortal to surmise what might be the functions
which that house might not be called upon to exercise, nor
perhaps was it desirable, on public grounds, that those privi-
leges should be defined. Eminent as were Lord Denman
and Mr. Justice Patteson, they had laid down most startling
provisions as regarded the privileges of the house, and if they
persevered in their present course they would place the House
of Commons subordinate, vot only to the House of Lords,
but to the courts of law also, and thus make a serious inroad
on the constitution of the country. The precedents relied
upon should be rather regarded as so many warnings that a
similar course should be avoided hereafter. They were by
the proposed course of pleading to the action only postponing
the evil after all, and rendering it more difficult to be dealt
with when it should arise. He could not admit the unpopu-
larity of the power claimed by the house to be a legitimate
reason for not exercising it,when, in any other point of view,
circumstances demanded that it should be exerted. He op.
posed pleading to the action, because, in so doing, they were
not following bad precedents, but-making a new precedent
which might become seriously injurious to the authority of
ParliaMent.
The SOLICITOR.GHNERAL said he admitted the import.
ance of not taking a false step in the present ease, and he
regretted that, notwithstanding all the learning displayed by

Ebt 2therpeot itanDarb.

FRIDAY MORNING, MARCH 17, 1843.

Under the circumstances attendant upon our posi-
tion, with regard to the authorities and the people of
China, a feeling of jealousy, if not of active hostility,
towards us might well have been anticipated. We had
extorted from that people, by force of arms, vast con-
cessions for our commerce—concessions in the benefit
of which it is as yet uncertain how far other nations
were to share ; we had inflicted, too, a deadly wound
upon their national pride; and we might have safely
calculated, therefore, not only upon being met, for a
time, in our new relations with them, by every petty
annoyance within their reach, but, as well, by the
secret intrigues of the residents of other nations, to
embitter and increase existing jealousies, and impede
the march of our commercial enterprise in that coup'
try. What, then, under such circumstances, was the,
imperative duty of every British merchant, and 01
every commander of a British mercantile vessel,
trading in a Chinese port ? Obviously, it was to
exercise every possible circumspection, to use every
effort, in the carrying on of their business operations,
to avoid any unpleasant embroilment with the popula-
tion, and by conciliatory and careful conduct to allay
the ill-feeling so naturally existing against thernselYee
and their country. - Yet this, we regret to say, does
not appear to have been the policy pursued by the re-
sidents at the port of Canton; and, as the result, w°
are advised by the last mail of a serious outbreak by
the population, directed exclusively against the British
.r
residents, and attended with the destruction of WI.
factory, whilst the property of every other foreigner
was protected—a calamity out of which may arise very
t
serious results, and which at all events serve to
injury upon British commerce, by retarding the red
turn, on the part of the population, to a state of g°°
feeling towards the entire British nation.
Whether the tone of reproof, in which the mercantile
body in Canton have been addressed on the occasinii;
by Sir Henry Pottinger, is fully merited or not, we
shall not presume to express an opinion. That officer
goes the extreme length of stating that, during the
as
entire period of eighteen months, during which lie. b
to
been engaged in the effort to settle our entangleinen
with China, the merchants trading in the waters of
_it
Canton have, by their conduct, retarded, rather th'of
aided, his success. If such be the case, we kl°"od
no language too strong to characterise their folly
r.
wickedness. Trusting, however, that no English illieno
chant, in Canton or elsewhere, can have been s° ji"tio
to every feeling for the honour and advantage of b
country as to have pursued the course pointed at ~
the British plenipotentiary, there does certainly aPPeave
from every information which we can gather, to h of
been most unjustifiable proceedings on the part
i °f
some of them. Opium smuggling, and srnugg,'a
an
every description of merchandise, have been openly
00,
insultingly carried on, both at Canton and Wham')
and to an extent which, had even the conduct °f h
riotous crews of the Fort William and other Ships al
precipitated a popular commotion, must lb—. co
have drawn down a remonstrance from the Chinese
authorities, if not led to a second rupture between cb
eu
two countries. Indeed, it is openly hinted, that
.;es
a consummation would not, to some of the parlikeii
question—the speculators in tea—have been one
to be very unwelcome. poutonl
We trust, for the credit of the merchants or 1-1
it
that such conduct will not be persisted in ; a. 12
0
ot
might to some extent conduce to the preservo° ..sb
a
tranquillity in China, if the owners at home, of jirit3
ships trading to Chinese ports, were to insist tIP°
exercise of strict regulation over the conduetlfeasult:is
by whom they are navigated. This much, at-_.atuahls
;co o
certain. If our commerce in China, however v
re
to us as a nation, cannot be carried on without h
on the part of traders to a system of gross dis°es t?
i 1. t
3,:°:riroa ris t°g
and outrage of all law—a system almost amo ting our
opfiraGcyr—eatit
Bcarnitanin no longer
equipgerbecofineseitseteannd n
consistent w the a
armies and establishments for the protection of

so flagitious and disgraceful. letter
We take the following extract from a private
dated Hongkong, Dec. 31, 1842: iverit9
"The correspondence relative to the Canton riots
a wise,"
perusal, and will prove that the Plenipotentiary Bete ,800,
Tshe feeling here, or rather at Macao, among the Mere-
they
i
that the Chinese will break faith. I believe they ".i6l' that
would, as it would give a grand lift to tea at home; °nriyal
ground alone they have set up such a howl. The n°ll-3rirorn-
of the Imperial Commissioner at Canton is an ugly io,
o
stance. However, here at the Government-house nOhipise
trust or apprehension of bad faith on the part of the Cof LoY
is
entertained;
at the same time, the non•receillt