come rather a forlorn hope; for perfons with such intentions; could have but few to liften to their plans, for, thank God,.... the eyes of the people of England were pretty well opened :but their fufpicions of the intentions of fome few among them not yet entirely gone. Under a conviction of thefe points, he appealed to the House to fay whether they thought, they ought now to withdraw the power which prudence had. induced them to grant to the executive government? Mr. Courtenay obferved in explanation, that he wished to have brought before the Houfe the facts which he had stated; and he brought them forward upon this occafion as an aggravation of the fyftem which was established under the fuf penfion of the Habeas Corpus Act, and fo far as reafons againít renewing that fyftem. Mr. Tierney faid, he was under the neceffity of delivering his fentiments upon the fubject now before the Houfe, becaufe he stood in the fituation of a perfon going to vote against a measure which he had fupported laft year. Upon the laft. vote of the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpus Act, he had fupported the motion. He was now about to vote the other way, for he was going to oppofe the fufpenfion of the Habeas: Corpus Act. Therefore before he thould entitle himfelf to be acquitted of inconfiftency, he would fhew that the cir cumftances of the cafe are different now from what they were then. Since nothing but difference of circumstances could justify a man for difference of conduct, unless indeed he was now convinced that his conduct was wrong then, which was not the cafe; for under the fame circumstances, he fhould, at all, hazards, purfue the fame conduct as he did last year upon this fubject. But how ftood the cafe, and wherein did the difference of circumftances confift? Laft year, a little previous to the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpns, the Houfe received an intimation from his Majefty, that there was a preparation for the invafion of this country; and that there were, in this country, fome perfons who were ready to aid and abet that defign. In addition to that defign there was a bill of indictment for high treafon found by a grand jury. against certain perfons: whether either of these things would have been fufficient to fufpend the Habeas Corpus Act, he need not argue; for it was enough that both united were fufficient. But now there was no apprehenfion of invafion; nor did he believe that any rational man in the kingdom felt any alarm upon that fubject. Then came the correspondence of traitors and feditious fpirits. He was not aware of any perlons perfons in this country who were carrying on any corref pondence with the enemy. There were 82 perfons taken up within the laft fix months under the authority of this act, and only 25 of them remain to be tried; and it was too much for him to fay, that without the fame grounds he fhould obferve the fame conduct as he did last year. With regard to the manner in which gaols were conducted, he confeffed he confidered that alfo as a reason why he should not vote for a continuance of the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpus Act; becaufe, if men were treated like felons, and against them there was nothing but fufpicion, that was a reafon why fuch a meafure fhould not be voted, unless there were fome very cogent reafons alledged on the other fide, hone of which he had heard. There had been a difference of opinion among very well meaning men, how far folitary confinement was good or bad; and perhaps the greater part of that question depended upon the conduct of the magiftrate who had the care and management of it: but be that as it may, he had never yet heard any man who thought that fo litary confinement ought to be the punishment of any man until he has been convicted of fome offence; and he conceived that there was a material diftinction in the cafe of a gentleman, who was a colonel in the service, fufpected of treafon, and any man actually convicted of felony; for folitary confinement was the effect of an order for what was called clofe cuftody. This strengthened his opinion that there ought to be laid before the Houfe fome better grounds than any that had been offered, previous to the Houfe agreeing to the measure which was now before it. Even under the best treatment that could be fhewn to prifoners, he fhould be unwilling to vote for the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpus Act, unless it was indifpenfibly neceffary for the fafety of the ftate; but under fuch a treatment as that which has been stated that night, he thought it intolerable to vote for any power that might continue it. The minifter had fome time ago charged him with a wish to court popularity, but he really did not think that his conduct, especially upon this occafion, deserved to be fo treated. He had no idea of any popularity from voting for the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpus A&t last year; nor had he any idea of popularity in voting against it now; the truth of the matter was, that he was guided, in each infiance, by a fenfe of duty, and not in any refpect with any view to popularity. He voted laft year for the fufpenfion of the Habeas Corpus Act, because he thought that by doing fo VOL. I. 1798. he he was voting for the fafety and tranquillity of this kingdom; and he verily believed, in his confcience, that by voting now against that measure, he was not putting in hazard either the fecurity of this government, or the tranquillity of the realm. He believed there was now in this country a general fpirit that put out of all question the fecurity of the realm. He did not think there was to be found in this country now any body of men, not even among the very loweft condition of fociety, who had any refpect for what is commonly called French principles. He thought that the Directory of France had done more against French principles than any thing we had done, or could do. Believing thefe things, and not hav ing heard any good reafon affigned for the meafure now before the Houfe, he could not vote to fufpend the liberties of Englishmen for a fingle hour. The Attorney General faid, there was nothing he fo much regretted as his not being prefent when the laft hon. Gentle man but one fpoke. He was defirous to hear the opinions and fentiments of every gentleman on this question, and did hope, that every mind difpofed to candour would receive fuch impreffions from the remarks it was his intention to make, as would lead to a conviction of the falfehood of moft of thofe charges which had been alleged against the officers of government, and of the neceffity of continuing in the hands of his Majefty's minifters, the power they derived from the fufpen fion of the Habeas Corpus Act. Before he proceeded to ftate the reafons upon which was founded his decided approbation of the measures purfued in confequence of fufpending this act, he thought it not inconfiftent with his duty, and not unconnected with the prefent difcuffion, to remind the House of what an hon. Gentleman, who appeared to confider it his duty to abfent himfelf from Parliament, not long fince faid of the manner in which libels are punished by the laws of this country. That hon. Gentleman, at a time when the ftate of Europe was very different from what it is at prefent, thought fit in a public fituation to fay, that the punishment for this offence is particularly fevere and as this reflection involved the court of King's Bench in a very ferious manner, he had been led to examine its records. to trace the hiftory of its proceedings in this refpect. The refult of his enquiries authorifed him in diftinétly affirming, that never fince the law took cognizance of libel, were the fentences of the courts lefs rigorous and fevere than for the laft fix years. When libel was far from being fyftematic; in other words before For before the circumftances of this offence were fo much aggravated by the indifcriminate abufe of every perfonage and inftitution in the country, that inftead of being grofsly calumniated deferved to be revered and praised, the law of libel was administered with a feverity unexampled in our days. If Gentlemen would only take the trouble to compare the fentences of the court of King's Bench paffed in the period he fpoke of with thofe of any other period fince the revolution, fure he was that it would be feen the judges of our time, without neglecting their duty, had much foftened the character of punishments in general, and that the punishment for libel in particular was not fufficiently fevere. merly, the practice had been for the Attorney General of the crown to direct the punishment when perfons were brought up for judgment, but he had acted upon a fentiment of a diftinguithed and infinitely able lawyer, the Attorney Gencral of a diftant period, whom he then regarded with affection, and ftill revered, he meant my Lord Thurlow. This noble Lord who firft diffufed the immemorial practice of directing punishment; and if the tempered and mild judg ments of the court did not wholly arife out of this circumtance, certainly much kindness and lenity fucceeded it. Would Gentlemen contend that the libels of the present day lefs outrage decency, and lefs offend against the laws? Let them look to the flate trials of the year 1794. In those trials they will find that public meetings were in many places held for the purpose of propagating fedition: that not merely the minifters of the crown were libelled, but every inftitution, religious, political, and moral, with every individual, in whatever confpicuous fituation in the administration of the laws or the government of his country he may have been placed, ( cry of bear! hear!) Gentlemen might attempt to embarrafs him by their interruptions, but he would repeat it. There were, at the period he alluded to, Correfponding Societies and Correfponding Clubs, inftituted and affiliated, not for the purpofe of making the members of that Houfe refponfible for their conduct, or to procure a constitutional reform of any abufes fuppofed to have entered into the practical part of Government, but for the purpose of destroying that Houfe-of erecting a Convention on its ruins-of fubverting and overthrowing the Government, and in its stead to introduce the wild and gracelets fyftem of a neighbouring country. It could not be that Gentlemen approved of thofe proceedings; and yet what was there peculiar in their cha 002 racter racter but those features he had juft defcribed? and did not the leaders of difaffection the members and agents of the correfponding fociety, juftify every libel, and encourage every outrage on the character and conduct of Parliament and the Crown? But to fpeak more immediately to the queftion before the Houfe. What, truly, was the cafe of Mr. Smith, of whom in ftrains of lamentation an hon. Gentleman had faid fo much? Why this-he had been fecretary of the correfponding fociety; certainly it might not be illegal to have been fo, but it was no high proof of loyalty in any man. He had published libel upon libel, and if, as perhaps was his duty, he had profecuted him for every libel published at his fhop, no fingle life could have longevity enough to pass through the feries of the years of imprisonment to which the law in its wifdom would have configned him. Did the hon. Gentleman ever read the book for which this man was profecuted? It had fuited his purpofe indeed ludicrously to mention it only as a pamphlet called "the Duties of Citizenfhip." But the perufal of it would have taught him to confider it as inculcating anarchy and treafon. He would have found that every thing facred, honourable, and good, in the nature and character of inftitutions and men, is there blafphemously and wickedly libelled and traduced. He would have found religion and its minifters held up to ridicule; the law and its officers mifreprefented and vilified; his Majefty upon the throne mentioned with contumely; and that conftitution, under which fo many and fuch exclufive bleflings are enjoyed, made the conftant theme of rude, unfounded, and unprovoked invective. It was the hon. Gentleman's duty to have read this book before he came down to the Britifh Houfe of Commons to reflect on the fentence and proceedings of the court of King's Bench. No man could competently judge of the mode in which the officers of the Crown performed their duty, without examining with great care the ground they proceeded on, and leaft of all could the hon. Gentleman competently judge of the kind of proceeding against Mr. Smith without reading the book alluded to. It was not merely his own character that he fought to rescue from the afperfions and reproach of the hon. Gentleman on this occafion: he owed it to the court of King's Bench, thus to remind that hon Member, that it is a delicate fubject at any time to difcufs the nature and circumstances of verdicts of Juries and the fentences of Judges, but to comment without difcriminating on the acts of a court of law, to comment on |