GENERAL HISTORY. 



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I 



considered themselves pledged to 

 guard against such unjust en- 

 croachments in future. The evi- 

 dence on such an inquiry must not 

 be of the ex-parte and suspicious 

 nature which their lordships were 

 induced to accept of last year. 

 Nothing would satisfy the coun- 

 try but a full and impartial inves- 

 tigation. He trusted it was un- 

 necessary for him to urge the 

 importance of this right on their 

 lordships minds, but he could not 

 help dwelling upon it. It was 

 the most ancient of all the rights 

 of the people of this country. It 

 rested neither on Magna Charta, 

 the act of Habeas Corpus, nor the 

 Bill of Rights, though it was re- 

 asserted in them. The act of 

 1672, in the reign of Charles 11, 

 by which it was legislatively 

 enacted, did not constitute the 

 right. The ancestor of the noble 

 lord, the earl of Shaftesbury, then 

 stood up honourably and man- 

 fully for this best right of the 

 people, and contributed greatly 

 to the measure by which it was 

 confirmed. And at what time 

 was that important act passed? 

 At the moment when the Houses 

 of Lords and Commons were in 

 the state of the greatest alarm 

 from the apprehension of plots 

 and conspiracies. Even in those 

 convulsed times no plot had been 

 thought sufficient to warrant the 

 legislature in depriving the sub- 

 ject of personal liberty. 



Returning to the act of last 

 session, his lordship again asserted 

 that no ground for it had been laid 

 at the time when it was passed, and 

 that nothing had since occurred 

 to show that there was any thing 

 in the state of the country which 

 called for it. But the noble earl 

 opposite had declared, that he 



was ready to prove, not only that 

 the measure was justified by the 

 state of the country at that time, 

 but that it had been productive 

 of the greatest advantages. That 

 the country was in better circum- 

 stances now than last year he was 

 happy to believe ; but whatever 

 improvement had taken place, 

 certainly was not owing to the 

 suspension of the Habeas Corpus 

 act ; for were the truth of this 

 assertion of ministers to be ad- 

 mitted by their lordships, there 

 would be no longer any security 

 for personal liberty. If they 

 could persuade parliament to sus- 

 pend the Habeas Corpus act on 

 ex-paiie evidence, they would 

 have nothing more to do than to 

 come forward the next year, and 

 say, " You see what advantages 

 have been derived from following 

 our recommendation." 



After touching upon the case 

 of Hone, and affirming that these 

 prosecutions bore about them 

 such mai-ks of hypocrisy as he 

 had never before witnessed, he 

 returned to the suspension of 

 the Habeas Corpus. It was, 

 he said, an act of the most 

 pernicious tendency to suspend 

 the personal liberty of the sub- 

 ject in a time of profound peace, 

 and formed a precedent of the 

 most lamentable efiect. Such 

 acts left rents in the constitution 

 which could not afterwards be 

 closed. He trusted, however, 

 that a strict inquiry would be 

 made as to the manner in which 

 this act had been executed. 



Lord Sidmouth, in paying par- 

 ticular attention to the speech of 

 the noble lord, began with his 

 lordship's statement that there 

 was no necessity for the act of 

 the last session. He affirmed on 



his 



