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HOUSE OF COMMONS.

Tuesday, May 8.

[PETITION FROM THE LIVERY OF LONDON, RESPECTING THE COMMITTAL OF SIR F. BURDETT, &c.] Sir William Curtis rose and stated, that he held in his hand a Petition from the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Livery of the City of London, in Common-hall assembled, which he was desired to present to the House. The petitioners, among other things, he observed, expressed their sorrow and regret at certain proceedings of this House, and stated grievances for which they desired a remedy; that it had been declared in this House, that the doors of Parliament should be open wide to petitions, and therefore they came for relief. The hon. baronet said, it was but fair he should mention to the House, that the petition was not exactly the petition of the whole body of the Livery; because, though the hall was rather full, yet there were many thousands not present. At the same time, he must declare, that the meeting was constitutionally convened by the Lord Mayor, and the sentiments of the Petition were those of the Livery so assembled. The petitioners, observed the hon. baronet, after stating certain grievances of which they complain, beg this House to re-consider the measures lately adopted with reference to the committal of Mr. Jones and sir F. Burdett, to retrace its steps and to expunge from the Journals the resolutions come to on that occasion. Now, these sentiments, though coming from the Livery, it is my duty to convey to the House, as one of the representatives of the city of London, yet I must declare that they are very far from being my own. The Petition was then brought up and read by the Clerk at the table, as follows:

"To the honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled. The humble Address, Remonstrance, and Petition of the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Livery of the City of London, in Common Hall assembled,

this 4th day of May, 1810. "We, the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Livery of the city of London, in common hall assembled, beg leave, with feelings of the most anxious concern, to present this our humble Address, Petition, and Remonstrance; and we earnestly entreat your honourable House to give to it a

favourable reception; for how can we hope for redress and relief, if the bare statement of the wrongs and grievances of which we complain be rejected; We also beg your honourable House to believe, that in the language we may have occa sion, and are indeed compelled to employ, no offence is intended to your honourable House.

"The circumstance which most deeply afflicts us, and which most strongly impels us at this time to approach your honourable House is, what appears to us to have been on your part, a violation of the personal security of the people of the land. We humbly conceive, that, without law, and against law, you have imprisoned two of your fellow-subjects, and that without a trial, without a hearing, you have condemned them. Law requires legal process and trial by jury of our equals. Justice demands that no person shall be prosecutor, juror, judge and executioner, in his own

cause.

We beg leave to express our conviction that this eternal principle of immutable justice cannot be annulled by any House of Commons, by any King, by any parliament, by any legislature upon earth. But it appears to us that your honourable House have, in the instances of Mr. John Gale Jones and sir Francis Burdett, assumed, accumulated, and exercised all these offices.

"We feel it a duty which we owe to you, to ourselves, to our posterity, to state, that, in our conception, this jurisdiction is unfounded; and we humbly, but firmly declare our opinion against the existence of this power in any hands;-a jurisdiction unknown to us, a power above the law, and which could be enforced only by military violence; a violence made manifest by the breaking open of an Englishman's castle, made by the preceding and subsequent murder of peaceable and unoffending citizens.

"Permit us humbly to observe, that the construction of your honourable House prevents our surprise at this conduct of enter into the details, so often and so ably We will not your honourable House. stated to your honourable House, by which it appears, that upwards of 300 members of your honourable House, in England and Wales only, are not elected by the people, in any honest sense of the word people; but are sent to your honourable House by the absolute nomination or powerful influence of about 150 peers and others, as averred in a Petition to your honourable

"Under the agonizing feelings excited by the late imprisonment of our fellow subjects, can it be necessary for us to recapitulate the many instances, as thus appears to us, of refusals to institute just and necessary inquiry; to pursue to condign punishment public delinquents and pecu

House in the year 1791, and which remains on your Journals uncontroverted. This is the great constitutional disease of our country. This is the true root of all evils, corruptions, and oppressions, under which we labour. If it be not eradicated, the nation must perish. "In support of this our sincere convic-lators; to economize the means and retion, we need only refer to the never-tobe-forgotten vote of your honourable House, refusing to examine evidence on a charge against lord Castlereagh and Mr. Perceval, then two of the King's ministers, for trafficking in seats in your honourable House.

"

"We remember well, that when it was gravely averred, and proof offered, in a Petition which stood on your Journals, and the complaints thereof unredressed for more than twenty years, That seats for legislation in the House of Commons were as notoriously rented and bought as the standings for cattle at a fair," the then honourable House treated the assertion with affected indignation, and the minister threatened to punish the Petitioner, for presenting a scandalous and libellous Petition. But we have lived to see a House of Commons avow the traffic, and screen those accused of this breach of law and right, because it has been equally committed by all parties, and was a practice "as notorious as the sun at noon day." At this vote, and at these practices, we feel as our ancestors would have felt," and cannot repress the expression of "our indignation and disgust."

"Under these circumstances, may we not be permitted to ask, where is your justice, where your dignity? Mr. John Gale Jones is confined within the walls of Newgate, for an alleged offence against yourselves, which, if committed against any other subjects of these realms, or even against the King himself, must have been adjudged by the established rules and laws of the land! Lord Castlereagh continued to be a principal minister of the crown, and is now a free member of your honourable House! Sir Francis Burdett, dragged by a military force from the bosom of his family, is committed to the Tower for exercising the right of constitutional discussion, common, and, indeed, undeniable to you, to us, to all! Mr. Spencer Perceval continues a member of your honourable House, taking a lead in your deliberations, the first minister of the Crown, and the chief adviser of the Royal Councils!

sources of the state; to administer to the people relief and redress for the various disgraces which the national honour has sustained, for the lavish profusion of British blood and treasure, extravagantly wasted in ill-contrived and fruitless campaigns, and more particularly in the bumiliating and ignominious expedition to the coast of Holland, in which the greatest armament that ever left our shores, was exposed to the scorn, contempt and ridicule of the enemy; and the flower of the British army left ingloriously to perish in the pestilential marshes of Walcheren, without succour! without necessity! without object! without hope!

"These and similar proceedings of your honourable House require no comment; but we cannot, by our silence, become accomplices in the ruin of our country; and dare not conceal from you the wholesome, though unpleasant, truth, that they appear to us to have materially shaken what remained of the confidence of the subjects of these realms in the wisdom of your honourable House.

"We therefore humbly, but firmly, entreat you to reconsider your conduct, to retrace your steps, and to expunge from Journals all your orders, declarations, and resolutions, respecting Mr. Gale Jones and sir Francis Burdett; and that as sir Francis Burdett has not been expelled from your honourable House, he be no longer prevented from exercising therein all the duties of a member of the same.

"Above all, we earnestly pray your honourable House, in conjunction with sir Francis Burdett, and in conformity to the notice he has given, to devise and adopt such measures as will effect an immediate and radical reform in the Commons' House of Parliament, and insure to the people a full, fair, and substantial representation, without which, they must inevitably cease to exist, a great, a free, a glorious and independent nation."

Sir W. Curtis then moved that it do lie on the table.

Mr. Secretary Ryder stated, that he felt less difficulty in objecting to the reception of the petition from the admission of the

them. The late meeting was legally called together by the authority of the lord mayor, and was as numerously attended as any he had ever seen; and out of 3,000 persons then present, he believed that not 50 held up their hands against the reso lutions. If, therefore, the petition of such

the right hon. secretary, were not to be considered the legitimate and real sense of the livery of London, it would be impossible, upon similar grounds, to consider the proceedings of that House upon many occasions, as the proceedings of the House of Commons. If, as had been stated, or rather insinuated, by his hon. colleague, many of those liverymen who were present had been deterred from delivering their sentiments, from a fear of the reception they would meet with by marks of disapprobation from the majority, they certainly might have evinced they did not approve of the petition, and that it did not contain their sentiments, by holding up their hands against it. Every man had the power of doing that: and from the number who availed themselves of it being so small, it was evident that the petition contained the opinions of nearly all who were present. He was always sorry to see the smallest interruption given to any person in delivering his sentiments at a public meeting, whatever side of the ques

worthy baronet who presented it, that it was not the opinion of the great body of his constituents; but even were it the unanimous opinion of the whole of the livery of London, he would resist its reception. Why he felt that to be his duty he would explain. In the first place he observed that notwithstanding all the pains bestow-meeting, according to the arguments of ed and abilities exerted in drawing up the petition, it went to carry a direct insult upon the character and dignity of that House. It went to traduce the whole conduct of that House in a manner perfectly unnecessary-uncalled for by any other object than the wish to degrade it in the estimation of the public. Why ask that House where was its justice and where was its dignity? It did not rest satisfied with that insult, severe as it was, but proceeded to comment in the most offensive manner upon the construction of that House, and that from that construction the petitioners were not surprized at their proceedings. He thought it was the more necessary to reject this petition, because the petitioners had endeavoured to take advantage of what had passed on a former night relative to another petition, and had studiously and ar fully attempted to word it in such a way as should steer clear of the objections made to that of the freeholders of Middlesex, by stating every thing as opinion and not as matter of fact; but it was clearly evident that the intention he might incline to; but it was well tion was the same as that of the other, and they only cloaked their design under different form of words, which were, in his opinion, equally inadmis-ible and disgusting. If the House permitted such petitions as this to lie on the table, it would lose its dignity, character, and consequence in the eyes of the whole world. He should therefore, without trespassing further on the time of the House, move that it be rejected.

known, that in all large popular meetings there was no preventing great numbers from giving way to their feelings, and shewing their disapprobation of the conduct of public men, which was not agreeable to what they thought just and right. As to those of the minority, who did not think proper to express their dissent to the petition, in the meeting at the common hall, and who afterwards met in another place for the purpose of drawing up other resolutions, by way of a counter-declaration of the livery of London, such

Mr. Alderman Combe said he was extremely sorry to see any opposition to this petition's lying on the table. He express-meeting was unquestionably illegal-not ed his great surprise that the right hon. secretary should in the first part of his speech, have assigned, as one reason for objecting to it, that it was not the opinion of a majority of the whole livery of London. So far as that could be ascertained by a public meeting, it certainly was the opinion of the majority, and of a very de. cided majority. It was altogether impossible that the whole livery, which consisted of 12,000 persons, could get into Guildhall, for it would not hold half of

being covered by any authority, and could not be an expression of the public will of the livery. On the whole, he hoped the House would consider this matter with the serious attention and consideration which the petition of so highly respectable a body as the livery of London in common hall assembled, had always been allowed to merit, and that the House would pause before they suffered themselves to be persuaded to reject it.

Sir W. Curtis, in explanation, said, the

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right hon. secretary had certainly misapprehended him. He did not mean to state that the petition was not the opinion of a majority of the livery who were present, but merely that it was not that of a majority of the whole body.

Sir C. Price said, he wished to make a few observations on the present occasion. He was clearly of opinion, and perfectly satisfied in his own mind, that the House of Commons had not, in any of its late proceedings, done any thing which it had not a perfect right to do, and as such he had given his vote in the case of all the petitions which had hitherto been presented on the subject. He had attended the late meeting of the livery of London, but he was not permitted to state his sentiments, or he would have told them freely and fairly, that he thought the House had acted as it ought to do; but clamour was the order of the day, and he could not obtain the hearing he wished for. He was sure this petition, though certainly that of a body duly and legally convened, did not contain the sentiments and opinions of a majority of the whole livery, but merely those of a junto, who endeavoured to carry every measure relative to the city of London, in their own way. The hon. bart. asserted that the majority of the livery did not entertain the doctrines which the petition contained, and he should be unfit to represent that city if he did not state so much. He was satisfied from the declaration issued at the counter meeting, that the respectable part of the livery were of different sentiments. He must therefore maintain the sentiments of the declaration, and could not subscribe to the general opinions of the petition, nor lend a hand to support it, but vote for the motion of the right hon. gentleman.

Sir James Shaw said, the common hall was numerous, and many respectable liverymen were present; still he would not say that the majority of those present were of the livery. It was, however, a meeting legally and constitutionally convened. Since that hall was assembled a counter meeting of the livery had been held, and since he came that night into the House, he understood that the declaration agreed to at that counter meeting had been subscribed in the course of that day by 1,500 liverymen. Now, he could assure the House, that at the common hall, in his opinion, the number of the livery present did not exceed 1,400! The petition was, however, the decision of a legal

and constitutional meeting, and being so he would most certainly agree in the motion, that it should be laid upon the table.

Mr. Whitbread said, if any thing could excite surprize at what passed in that House, it would unquestionably be the conduct of the right hon. secretary on that evening. Even since he had spoken, he appeared to exult in the declaration of the worthy baronet behind him (sir W. Cur. tis), though he had been told by the worthy baronet that he had misstated and misapprehended him, and founded his first objection to the petition on its not being the opinion of the whole body of the livery. Was there ever such an objection heard of? The House had been told by one worthy alderman (Combe) that it was a very decided majority of 3,000 of the livery who were present, and by another (Shaw) that there were 2,000 present; and yet this is a majority which would not content the right hon. gent. If this doctrine were allowed to hold, what would become of, or what would be said to, the majority of that House? Was it for the right hon. gent. to resort to such an argument, when he and his colleagues had so lately grasped at a majority of 38 for sending sir E. Burdett to the Tower? Let them look also to many other still more trifling majorities under which they had sheltered themselves, and then let the right hou. gent. blush to find fault with the majority to the present petition. The right hon. gent. was equally inconsistent and unfounded as to other objections he made to the petition. He found fault with the language used by the petitioners. What language would he have them make use of? The House had thought fit te commit Gale Jones to Newgate, and sir F. Burdett to the Tower, on grounds which the people think is an assumption of power the House had no right to exercise; and the livery of London as well as others have petitioned against this: they think the House have acted wrong, and they tell them so in very warm language, certainly; but when the feelings are roused the language will be warm, and the right hon. gent. and his colleagues may blame themselves for having forced the petitioners to say what they think. The right hon. gent. then said, that on account of the animadversion on the construction of that House, the petition ought not to be received. The construction of the House of Commons! he exclaimed: look at your

between that House and the people. He would tell them, if they did not petition in his form they should not petition at all. How did the people stand now? said he, The right hon. gent. says to them, You are not to petition as Middlesex did, nor as the Livery of London did, but you may do as Westminster did, which was the strongest of the three. Mr. Whitbread alluded to what had fallen from the right hon. gent. in last night's debate, respecting the right of the livery of London to have their petition presented to his Ma

Journals, would it not there be found re-, corded, "that upwards of 300 members in England and Wales only are not elected by the people, but are sent to the House by the actual nomination or powerful influence of about 150 peers and others;" and in another place, is it not stated on the same Journals, "the seats in that House were as openly bought and sold as stalls for cattle in a fair." And what do do the petitioners say more? They use the language of truth and of the journals of the House; and yet their petition is to be rejected on account of that language.jesty on the throne. He contended against Without adverting to what was recorded upon the journals of that House, let us consider a very recent case, in no small degree illustrative of its construction. The new teller of the exchequer (Mr. Yorke) upon his appointment to that office vacated his seat in this House. He again applies in a county, where for his private virtues and attention to its local interests he was respected, for a repetition of its confidence. The county of Cambridge, indignant at his public conduct in this House, almost unanimously dismiss him. They speak a language not alone depending upon majorities, but actually recorded in the crown office. That right hon. gent. even subsequent to that dismissal, is appointed to an office of high responsibility, and again finds his way into this House. As the representative of what body of Electors? By what influence returned? Can the right hon. secretary, so jealous of the character of the House, contradict me when I say, that this representative of the people of England is nominated by a peer? "Is it possible," said Mr. W. that such things should be that they should be known to the people; and that when they speak of them they should not do it with warmth and indignation." He lamented that he was absent when the Middlesex petition was presented, as he should most certainly have voted for receiving it. It had been rejected by the House, though, in his opinion, not to strongly worded as that of Westminster which had been received; because the freeholders had stated circumstances, not as matters of opinion, but as facts actually existing. The peti-informed, and believed it to be true, that tion of the livery (the most moderate of the three) was drawn up so as to avoid these objections, and yet that was to be rejected also. At this rate, if the right hon, gent. continued in office long enough, he would bring on an irreconcileable breach

the arguments of the right hon. gent. which referred to Wilkes's case, which he could not express in English, but had recourse to the French, with his boutefeus of the day; he maintained that the livery had for a long course of years been always allowed to have that right; and that the infirmities of his Majesty had been inde corously and falsely mentioned to justify the late rejection of the claim. (Here Mr. Ryder shewed an inclination to explain,) but Mr. Whitbread said he would not allow any thing like explanation in the middle of his speech, when he was in possession of the attention of the House; if he had been wrong, he should have been called to order.-The House should therefore-[Here the Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke to order, and said he thought it disorderly to allude to what had passed in a former debate.] Mr. Whitbread said, the right hon. gent. having spoken to order, he must desist; but he would not be interrupted by explanation. He then proceeded to state, that at the time when the petition of the city of London was of fered to be presented by the sheriffs, the secretary of state wrote a letter to the city to say, that the infirmities of his Majesty made it impossible to receive the petition on the throne. This he denied to be the fact; the infirmities alluded to could be no bar to receiving them in that way, and it was highly improper to mention them. The right hon. gent. had as sured the House, that since he had been in office he had received no petition that had not reached his Majesty; but that had not always been the case, for he was credibly

when lord Hawkesbury was secretary of state at a particular period, when many different bodies thought it necessary to petition, those petitions were delivered to the secretary of state, and that not one of them had ever reached the King. This

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