Edwardsville spectator. [volume] (Edwardsville, Ill.) 1819-1826, 1819-12-04

| 10y tHc StdlutS " ~ aifu -, chapter =,
(which is now in .orce, It is enacted that
every person who has not freehold es-
tale Of the clear yearly value of 1901.
or leasehold estate of the value OF ! sol.
for the term of 90 years or longer, except
he be the eldest son of an Esquire, or
some person of higher degree, or the
owner or keeper of forest, park, chase,
or warren, stocked with deer or comics,
for their necessary use, is declared to be
person MOI allowed by The laws ofthe
realm TO haue or keep, for himself or
any other ferson, any guns, 6ozvs, grey
honnds, setting dogs, Jerrets, cony dogs,
larchers, hays, nets, low6eis, harehihes,
gins, snores, and other engines for tax
ing or killing game. M
| A person, therefore, to be qualified to
keep gun, &c. must either-lst, Have
a JreehoLd estate Of 1901. fler annum !;
or I'd, II leasehoM estate for the term of
80 years or more, 9l5oL; or Sd, Be
the eldest son Of an Esquire, or some
ferson Of a higher degree, or be the
owner or kee4er Of a Jprest, chase, or
zvarren.
The object of these laws is stated by
Blackstone to be-the preservation of
game--the prevention of idlcness in the
lower classes of the community-last,
though not least-,tor The Preventing
ghofniar instructions and resistance
10 the government, by lDIS.4R MING
THE BULK or THE PEOPLE;
which last, says he, with more candor
than he usually exhibits in his common
taries, sis reason Qflener meant than
aVo7oed blythe makers ofthe game lazvs."
The effect Of these laws must be, when
enforced as they are by heavy penalties,
to dlsarm agreat majority, at least ninety
nine hundredths of the population. If
the people should be goaded on by their
present suifelngs to resistance, they
must enter the contest under great dis
advantages. The probable result will
be a suppression of the Instruction, and
their letters would be more firmly riyet-
ted. The only fair prospect they can
have OF success is from corrupting the
soldiery. What the female societies NAV
do IN this way we cannot tell, but if this
forms part ofthe plan of the retormers,
it will be easy to find agents among the
$4,000 prostitutes of the city of London.
The British faction in this country, be-
gin evidently to feel alarmed for their
dear England. A writer in the Boston
nai1y a Tverficcr cat,c
eve only fear that these disorders
will lead to material change for the
worse in the system OF British liberty !;
that it will tend to assimlate that go
vcrnment in some degree to those of the
continent of Europe, and will lessen that
spirit of freedom which wa, the praise
and glory and happiness of the country
from which we descended, in whose well
fare we are most deeply interested, and
FOR whose success we ought most ear
nestly to pray"
The game laws are specimen of Bri-
fish liberty; it is the liberty of the rich
to Cypress the poor. To pretend to as
simulate the freedom ofour country to that
OF England, is an insult to the common
sense of the community; yet this writer
has the cffrontery to say,
" We hear perpetually from our pre-
JUDGED and half instructed and informed
travellers, Of the abuses that prevail in
that country, and yetit is true that Great
Britain presents picture of domestic
society, of laws, of independence, indi-
yidual and social, so nearly ike our ozyn,
that ii is IMPOSSIBLE 70 discern tie mi
mute distinctions"