Where, but in that place which was the professed sanctuary of the rights of the people-the House of Commons; where but before the grand inquest of the nation, the guardians of the constitution, and the liberties it conferred? The noble lord had talked much about the law which he did not seem to understand; but was it meant to be said, that the right of the people to meet and petition was to be left to a private action, commenced by some starving weaver, or some old woman who might take upon herself to be the championess of the nation? A great constitutional right was at stake, and the House of Commons was the only proper forum for inquiry. After some further remarks upon the point whether the Court of King's Bench would grant a criminal information against a magistrate, unless malice or corruption were proved, the hon. and learned gentleman proceeded to notice the dismissal of earl Fitzwilliam. It was known that there was not a man in the country more opposed to the visionary and absurd schemes of the radicals, yet ministers had removed him; and, what was the inference from this fact, but that, as they intended to substitute a military for a civil force, they did not think that he would be an instrument in their hands sufficiently complying? They feared that his ardent love for the constitution would oppose a barrier to their plans in Yorkshire, and that he would support the resolutions of the House of Commons in 1680, when it was declared that those who misrepresented the objects of the people,. when they met for redress of grievances, betrayed the liberty of the subject. If it were quite clear that the magistrates would come out of the inquiry pure and unsullied, they would not thank the Prince Regent's ministers for their injudicious friendship in refusing to allow them to justify themselves to the world. But, notwithstanding their refusal, it became the House of Commons to act for itself, to consult the wishes of its constituents, and he never should think the worse of it for sympathising with the people.

that a meeting should be put down by force, at which no such resolutions had been passed. The first meeting advertised would undoubtedly have been illegal, and on this account the object was changed, and the second Manchester meeting, of the 16th August, took place. What followed? Hunt and his associates were arrested, and after the warrant of the magistrates had thus been executed, the people assembled were cut and trampled down by the yeomanry. The noble lord had asserted that the magistrates never contemplated the dispersion of the mob by the military. Would the public give the noble lord credit for this important fact? Would they not require that it should be proved at the bar? As a lawyer he agreed that the Riot act need not be read before the dispersion of an illegal meeting, and he also agreed that if in a contest with constables in dispersing an illegal meeting, the civil power destroyed life, it was justifiable homicide; but he denied most firmly that, if persons continued on the ground after the arrest of the ringleaders, the yeomanry, by any law of this country, were authorized in cutting them down. Those who remained were guilty of a misdemeanor, but only of a misdemeanor; and it was quite too much to say, that to prevent a misdemeanor life might be destroyed with impunity, though it was otherwise in cases of felony. It might be said that the yeomanry only endeavoured to arrest; but did they se cure one individual, or did they take a single man to the New Bailey? Certainly not; and, in this view of the question, supposing the meeting to have been illegal, the military had been guilty of a high offence in the deaths they had occasioned, and the wounds they had inflicted. What complexion, then, did the transaction take? The people meet to petition. The magistrates issue a warrant to arrest certain individuals; and that being executed, the yeomanry disperse the crowd at the edge of the sabre: three days afterwards, the thanks of the Prince Regent were given, both to the civil and military authorities; and what was the unavoidable inference, but that opinions, however absurd or preposterous, were to be put down by the bayonet, and that ministers in tended to act on a system of military coercion? Did not this demand inquiry? Did not this call upon the whole nation to insist that inquiry should be instituted? Where, then, ought it to be conducted?

The Attorney-General rose, amid loud cries for the question, and for an adjournment. He congratulated the House on the general admission that the meeting at Manchester, on the 16th of August, was illegal; and he imagined that the hon. and learned gentleman who spoke last must have forgotten that the efforts of the yeomanry were not directed, in the first

rescinding the vote the House had passed last night. If so, that was a course in which, according to the rules of proceeding, the hon. member was not at liberty to take.

Mr. Blake said he rose to protest

The Speaker said, it was open to the hon. member to submit a resolution to the House, to prevent any repetition of such a proceeding; but it was requisite, either that a regular notice of such intention should be given, or, at all events, be made the subject of a separate consideration. But no question, save one of privilege, could precede the regular discussion fixed for the day.

Mr. Hume then rose. He began by saying, that his object in pressing the motion of adjournment last night, was to afford many gentlemen the opportunity of meeting the statements and assertions of the noble lord opposite, with the information they possessed, and the conviction they entertained relative to the transactions which formed so prominent a part of his speech. He felt at the time the correctness of the course he pursued, and he was now convinced, that, when the papers presented that evening were read and distributed, the public would see the propriety of the proceeding. In the course of his speech, the noble lord had made statements, and had converted allegations into facts, upon which, from the information he had received, the noble lord would feel the necessity of affording the House further explanation. He was extremely sorry, that in the Speech from the throne, there were some points with which he could not agree; and he did consider it the duty of that House to pause before it gave to them its sanction. The Speech from the throne, stated, that a hostile spirit was abroad; he was sorry to acknowledge that such a spirit existed, but it was for the members of that House to reflect upon the causes which occasioned such discontent. What had they done during the last session to appease it? Had any effort been made to mitigate, much less remove, the accumulated sufferings which pressed so heavily upon the people? To what a situation had such a policy reduced the kingdom! Those hon. members who had so recently travelled through various parts, could bear evidence to the state of agitation that prevailed. The din of war was to be heard in every town!-military recruitings were to be seen every where, as if the

government were preparing for an arduous contest! And against whom? Against our fellow-subjects! In a period of profound peace with foreign nations, we were adding to our military force-with a declining revenue we were increasing our military expenditure. When that expenditure amounted to twelve millions, the ministers of the Crown were embodying an additional force of 10,000 men. To such a ruinous proposition he could never give his assent. The next point in the Speech to which he objected, was one which he felt could not be substantiated; he alluded to the passage in which the distresses of the country were attributed to the embarrassment of foreign states. In what way could such alleged embarrassment affect the internal peace and welfare of this country? Did the noble lord in adverting to foreign embarrassments, allude to France? He could not. There was no country in Europe more embarrassed than Great Britain. The true source of our difficulties and distresses was to be traced to our overwhelming taxation, and to the denial of a proper reform in that House. The question was not that the proposed Address was objectionable; but should the amendment be added, in his judgment that amendment was consistent, proper, and moderate.It was stated last night by the noble lord, that the magistrates had given no orders to the military to dismiss the meeting at Manchester. If that was the case, in what a situation was the country placed! It was that day placed under military authority. Where, then, was the constitutional security? What could have prevented the military, if they pleased, from turning round on the very magistrates themselves and attacking them? In two of the letters from the magistrates presented that night, it was stated that the warrant for the apprehension of the parties was executed without any difficulty. How did this statement correspond with the assertions of the noble lord? He would not rest satisfied with the assertions of the noble lord, or of any man; he must have proofs on which to form a satisfactory opinion; he must give credit to the statements of eye-witnesses of the facts, who had no interest in any misrepresentation. Where was the proof of the magistrate being trampled upon when in the act of reading the Riot act? Where was the proof of what the noble lord asserted, that it was read three times? Nothing

of the kind was to be found in these let- | ters; they merely glanced at it in these words:" in the mean time the Riot act was read, and the mob dispersed." A right hon. and learned gentleman, for whose character and talents he entertained the highest respect (Mr. Plunkett) had asserted last night that the meeting of the 16th of August was illegal. He had heard him with surprise state, that meetings might be illegal in four ways, namely, by numbers, by devices, by threats, and by language. What was the numerical criterion? Was a meeting of 30,000 legal; and did an additional fifty constitute its illegality. He denied the law which recognised such a principle, or the page of the statute book that constituted a precise number a proof of illegality. The whole population of the country were supposed, and might, if there was accommodation, be assembled in the court of King's-bench. Did the number there make the assemblage illegal? He acknowledged his ignorance of any such principle; he believed it was not law, at least on this side of the water. If the assembly of the 16th of August was illegal, ministers were highly culpable for not dispersing others equally large or larger, subsequently assembled with the same banners and ceremonies. From the papers, it was clear that, on the morning of the 16th of August, no notion was entertained that the projected meeting was illegal. What, then, had altered its nature before noon? and where were the overt acts that warranted the attack upon the defenceless multitude? He was bound to take the report of the magistrates as the most correct; and he regretted to observe the light and trifling manner in which the important subject was treated by many of them. He gave the noble lord credit for being sincere when he said, that he believed the information he had obtained; but he entreated ministers not to be too credulous. He begged to ask what confidence ought to be placed in Mr. Norris and men like him, who, on the 17th of August went to the Exchange, and had it and all the shops closed, because he was informed that 50,000 radicals were on their march to the place. Were men to be relied upon who talk of danger which they fear, and who are in such a state of terror themselves, as scarcely to know whether they stand upon their heads or heals? The hon, member for Bramber had said last

night, that the plan of the Manchester radicals was to remain on the ground until midnight, and then to fire the town; but what authority did he adduce for his statement? Did not the absolute ridiculousness of the plan give it a sufficient contradiction? Was this spirit, which was so much complained of, to be put down by heaping injustice on injustice? There were thousands and tens of thousands of individuals in the country, who suffered the most poignant distress, and, afflicted as they were it was really surprising that they had not been goaded on to acts of violence before this time. There were, he believed, many individuals who wished to take advantage of their distresses to inflame and irritate them; but if their efforts had any success, it was to be attributed to the conduct of his majes ty's ministers. They were itinerant quacks, or field orators, who stimulated the passions of the people; but they would have been banished from society-they would not have been listened to-if they had not derived a spurious importance from the conduct of his majesty's ministers. The hon. member for Bramber had viewed, with dreadful alarm, the occurrences which had recently taken place, and wished the House to look on them with a similar feeling. But he would ask, could any just comparison be drawn between the state of England at the present moment, and that of France at the period of the revolution? In his mind, there could not. If the government of France, in that momentous hour, had conciliated, instead of oppressing and insulting, the people, in all probability the serious consequences which followed would not have been produced. If ever there was a question which called for mature and serious consideration before gentlemen came to a decision, it was undoubtedly the present. By agreeing to the amendment, of which he heartily approved, they would not pledge themselves to any line of conduct in future. They must be well aware that, from one end of the country to the other, an anxious desire to obtain justice, whoever the offenders might be, had been decidedly expressed. He begged to caution those members who imagined that a contrary spirit prevailed, and who were opposed to an inquiry into the circumstances which happened at Manchester, against being influenced by such a delusion. Let them look to the way in which counter-addresses had been got up

In

in different parts of the kingdom. most instances, the parties who were anxious to have them signed had not appeared openly and boldly. They had not declared, in the face of day, what they meant to do. No; they felt that injustice had been perpetrated, and they knew that it demanded inquiry, although they took measures which must defeat that object. He would not decide whether it was or was not proper to institute an inquiry at the bar of that House; but if it was not fitting that such a proceeding should be adopted, they could, as they had done on other occasions, order prosecutions to be instituted before a proper tribunal.

Lord Castlereagh said, he wished to say a few words in explanation. He was sure the hon. member who had just spoken had inisrepresented him, not intentionally, but in consequence of having misconceived what he had stated on the preceding evening. He wished to set the hon. member right, rather because his observations affected the interests of others, than from any feeling personal to himself. He had last night stated, and he had good authority for doing so, that the meeting was dispersed in a manner not originally contemplated by the magistrates. Their intention was, that the assembly should be dispersed in the ordinary legal manner, the riot act being read, and every necessary form gone through. It was, as he had stated last night, the conflict with the troops at the hustings, which produced that state of things not originally contemplated by the magistrates. The hon. member had inferred, what was not warranted by the facts, that the meeting was dispersed without the interposition of the magistrates. That was not the case. He thought, however, that when the troops were attacked, they had a right to repel force by force, even if there were no magistrate present. The hon. member had accused him of not having produced proof of every fact he had stated. This would not have been consonant with the course he conceived it right to adopt. He contended, that the House of Commons was not the place where such proof ought to be adduced, and he merely undertook to repel assertion by assertion, in order to clear the characters of a number of individuals from the unjust attacks that had been made on them-attacks that were not warranted by the circumstances. The hon. member had argued, that because he

admitted the meeting to have been dispersed in a way not at first contemplated by the magistrates, he therefore conceded the point, that it was not dispersed in a legal manner. He had conceded no such point. He said, that the military, when assailed, were justified in repelling force by force; and he would now state, what he had forgotten to mention on the preceding night, that it was by the order of the magistrates that the meeting was dispersed. The facts were these:-A small force about forty of the Manchester yeomanry was appointed to accompany the peace-officer to the hustings. When they arrived there, a conflict took place between the people and the yeomanry. A magistrate who was in conversation with colonel l'Estrange and colonel Dalrymple, at a window which afforded a full view of the place, saw these forty yeomen, in the midst of 50,000 persons, assailed, and he might say, overpowered. He observed to the officers," Don't you think those yeomen are placed in a most perilous situation?" They agreed with him that their situation was critical and dangerous, and, in consequence, an immediate order was given to support the yeomanry and disperse the assembly. The 15th dragoons and the Cheshire Cavalry advanced to the rescue of the Manchester yeomanry; and in so doing, acted distinctly under the authority of the magistrate, who, on a fair view of the case, felt himself bound to give the necessary order. The hon. member seemed to consider, that the documents now laid before the House contained the whole of the information on which government formed its judgment. What he had stated last night showed the contrary. Government proceeded in a considerable measure, on the statements of the two individuals who had been sent up to give necessary information, and who were enabled to state the facts. How was it possible that a magistrate, at 12 o'clock at night, after what had occurred in the course of the day, and while the town was still in a riotous and tumultuous state, could detail, in a hasty letter, all the circumstances connected with the case, and which operated in his mind in forming a judgment of what ought to be done? He entreated the House not to give way to the idea that the case was to rest on the documents now laid before them. He had always stated that it was not, and he further said, that the transaction was not to receive judgment in that House. Go