Chapter III: Part 3

Sir William YONGE then spoke to the following effect:--Sir, however I may be convinced in my own opinion of the impracticability of the inquiry now proposed, whatever confidence I may repose in the extensive knowledge and long experience of those, by whom it has been openly pronounced not only difficult but impossible, I think there are arguments against the motion, which though, perhaps, not stronger in themselves, (for what objection can be stronger than impossibility,) ought at least more powerfully to incite us to oppose it.

Of the impossibility of executing this inquiry, those who have proposed it well deserve to be convinced, not by arguments but experience; they deserve not to be diverted by persuasions from engaging in a task, which they have voluntarily determined to undergo; a task, which neither honour, nor virtue, nor necessity has imposed upon them, and to which it may justly be suspected, that they would not have submitted upon any other motives, than those by which their conduct has hitherto been generally directed, ambition and resentment.

Men who, upon such principles, condemn themselves to labours which they cannot support, surely deserve to perish in the execution of their own projects, to be overwhelmed by the burdens which they have laid upon themselves, and to suffer the disgrace which always attends the undertakers of impossibilities; and from which the powers of raillery and ridicule, which they have so successfully displayed on this occasion, will not be sufficient to defend them.

They have, indeed, sir, with great copiousness of language, and great fertility of imagination, shown the weakness of supposing this inquiry impossible; they have proposed a method of performing it, which they hope will at once confute and irritate their opponents; but all their raillery and all their arguments have in reality been thrown away upon an attempt to confute what never was advanced. They have first mistaken the assertion which they oppose, and then exposed its absurdity; they have introduced a bugbear, and then attempted to signalize their courage and their abilities, by showing that it cannot fright them.

The honourable gentleman, sir, who first mentioned to you the impossibility of this inquiry, spoke only according to the common acceptation of words, and was far from intending to imply natural and philosophical impossibility. He was far from intending to insinuate, that to examine any series of transactions, or peruse any number of papers, implied an absurdity, or contrariety to the established order of nature; he did not intend to rank this design with those of building in the air, or pumping out the ocean; he intended only to assert a moral or popular impossibility, to show that the scheme was not practicable but by greater numbers than could be conveniently employed upon it, or in a longer space of time than it was rational to assign to it; as we say it is impossible to raise groves upon rocks, or build cities in deserts; by which we mean only to imply, that there is no proportion between the importance of the effect, and the force of the causes which must operate to produce it; that the toil will be great, and the advantage little.

In this sense, sir, and nothing but malice or perverseness could have discovered any other, the motion may be truly said to be impossible; but its impossibility ought to be rather the care of those who make, than of those that oppose it; and, therefore, I shall lay before the house other reasons, which, unless they can be answered, will determine me to vote against it.

It cannot be doubted, but the papers which must on this occasion be examined, contain a great number of private transactions, which the interest of the nation, and the honour of our sovereign require to be concealed. The system of policy which the French have, within the last century, introduced into the world, has made negotiation more necessary than in any preceding time. What was formerly performed by fleets and armies, by invasions, sieges, and battles, has been of late accomplished by more silent methods. Empires have been enlarged without bloodshed, and nations reduced to distress without the ravages of hostile armies, by the diminution of their commerce, and the alienation of their allies.

For this reason, sir, it has been necessary frequently to engage in private treaties, to obviate designs sometimes justly, and at other times, perhaps, unreasonably suspected. It has been proper to act upon remote suppositions, and to conclude alliances which were only to be publickly owned, in consequence of measures taken by some other powers, which measures were sometimes laid aside, and the treaty, therefore, was without effect. In some of these provisionary contracts, it is easy to conceive, that designs were formed not to the advantage of some powers, whom yet we do not treat as enemies, which were only to be made publick by the execution of them: in others, perhaps, some concessions were made to us, in consideration of the assistance that we promised, by which the weakness of our allies may be discovered, and which we cannot disclose without making their enemies more insolent, and increasing that danger from which they apply to us for security and protection.

If to this representation of the nature of the papers, with which our offices have been filled by the negotiations of the last twenty years, any thing were necessary to be added, it may be farther alleged, that it has long been the practice of every nation on this side of the globe, to procure private intelligence of the designs and expectations of the neighbouring powers, to penetrate into the councils of princes and the closets of ministers, to discover the instructions of ambassadours, and the orders of generals, to learn the intention of fleets before they are equipped, and of armies before they are levied, and to provide not only against immediate and visible hostilities, but to obviate remote and probable dangers.

It need not be declared in this assembly, that this cannot always be done without employing men who abuse the confidence reposed in them, a practice on which I shall not at this time trouble the house with my opinion, nor interrupt the present debate, by any attempt to justify or condemn it. This, I think, may be very reasonably alleged; that whether the employment of such persons be defensible by the reciprocal practice of nations, or not, it becomes at least those that corrupt them and pay them for their treachery, not to expose them to vengeance, to torture, or to ruin; not to betray those crimes which they have hired them to commit, or give them up to punishment, to which they have made themselves liable only by their instigation, and for their advantage.

That private compacts between nations and sovereigns ought to be kept inviolably secret, cannot be doubted by any man who considers, that secrecy is one of the conditions of those treaties, without which they had not been concluded; and, therefore, that to discover them is to violate them, to break down the securities of human society, to destroy mutual trust, and introduce into the world universal confusion. For nothing less can be produced by a disregard of those ties which link nations in confederacies, and produce confidence and security, and which enable the weak, by union, to resist the attacks of powerful ambition.

How much it would injure the honour of our sovereign to be charged with the dissolution of concord, and the subversion of the general bulwarks of publick faith, it is superfluous to explain. To know the condition to which a compliance with this motion would reduce the British nation, we need only turn our eyes downwards upon the hourly scenes of common life; we need only attend to the occurrences which crowd perpetually upon our view, and consider the calamitous state of that man, of whom it is generally known that he cannot be trusted, and that secrets communicated to him are in reality scattered among mankind.

Every one knows that such a man can expect none of the advantages or pleasures of friendship, that he cannot transact affairs with others upon terms of equality, that he must purchase the favours of those that are more powerful than himself, and frighten those into compliance with his designs who have any thing to fear from him; that he must give uncommon security for the performance of his covenants, that he can have no influence but that of money, which will probably become every day less, that his success will multiply his enemies, and that in misfortunes he will be without refuge.

The condition of nations collectively considered is not different from that of private men, their prosperity is produced by the same conduct, and their calamities drawn upon them by the same errours, negligences, or crimes; and therefore, since he that betrays secrets in private life, indisputably forfeits his claim to trust, and since he that can be no longer trusted is on the brink of ruin, I cannot but conclude that, as by this motion all the secrets of our government must be inevitably betrayed, my duty to his majesty, my love of my country, and my obligations to discharge with fidelity the trust which my constituents have conferred upon me, oblige me to oppose it.

Mr. LITTLETON then rose, and spoke to this effect:--Sir, it always portends well to those who dispute on the side of truth and reason, when their opponents appear not wholly to be hardened against the force of argument, when they seem desirous to gain the victory, not by superiority of numbers but of reason, and attempt rather to convince, than to terrify or bribe. For though men are not in quest of truth themselves, nor desirous to point it out to others; yet, while they are obliged to speak with an appearance of sincerity, they must necessarily afford the unprejudiced and attentive an opportunity of discovering the right. While they think themselves under a necessity of reasoning, they cannot but show the force of a just argument, by the unsuccessfulness of their endeavours to confute it, and the propriety of an useful and salutary motion, by the slight objections which they raise against it. They cannot but find themselves sometimes forced to discover what they can never be expected to acknowledge, the weakness of their own reasons, by deserting them when they are pressed with contrary assertions, and seeking a subterfuge in new arguments equally inconclusive and contemptible. They show the superiority of their opponents, like other troops, by retreating before them, and forming one fortification behind another, in hopes of wearying those whom they cannot hope to repulse.

Of this conduct we have had already an instance in the present debate; a debate managed with such vigour, order, and resolution, as sufficiently shows the advantage of regular discipline long continued, and proves, that troops may retain their skill and spirit, even when they are deprived of that leader, to whose instructions and example they were indebted for them. When first this motion was offered, it seems to have been their chief hope to divert us from it by outcries of impossibility, by representing it as the demand of men unacquainted with the state of our offices, or the multiplicity of transactions, in which the indefatigable industry of our ministers has been employed; and they have therefore endeavoured to persuade us, that they are only discouraging us from an insuperable labour, and advising us to desist from measures which we cannot live to accomplish.

But when they found, sir, that their exaggerations produced merriment instead of terrour, that their opponents were determined to try their strength against impossibility, that they were resolved to launch out into this boundless ocean of inquiry; an ocean of which they have been boldly told, that it has neither shore nor bottom, and that whoever ventures into it must be tost about for life; when they discovered that this was not able to shake our resolution, or move us to any other disposition, they thought it proper to explain away their assertion of impossibility, by making a kind of distinction between things impossible, and things which cannot be performed; and finding it necessary to enlarge their plea, they have now asserted, that this inquiry is both impossible and inexpedient.

Its impossibility, sir, has been already sufficiently discussed, and shown to mean only a difficulty which the unskilfulness of our ministers has produced; for transactions can only produce difficulties to the inquirer, when they are confused; and confusion can only be the effect of ignorance or neglect.

Artifice is, indeed, one more source of perplexity: it is the interest of that man whose cause is bad to speak unintelligibly in the defence of it, and of him whose actions cannot bear to be examined, to hide them in disorder, to engage his pursuers in a labyrinth, that they may not trace his steps and discover his retreat; and what intricacies may be produced by fraud cooperating with subtilty, it is not possible to tell.

I do not, however, believe, that all the art of wickedness can elude the inquiries of a British senate, quickened by zeal for the publick happiness. The sagacity of our predecessors has often detected crimes concealed with more policy than can be ascribed to those whose conduct is now to be examined, and dragged the authors of national calamities to punishment from their darkest retreats. The expediency, therefore, of this motion, is now to be considered, and surely it will not require long reflection to prove that it is proper, when the nation is oppressed with calamities, to inquire by what misconduct they were brought upon it; when immense sums have been raised by the most oppressive methods of exaction, to ask why they were demanded, and how they were expended; when penal laws have been partially executed, to examine by what authority they were suspended, and by what they were enforced; and when the senate has for twenty years implicitly obeyed the direction of one man, when it has been known throughout the nation, before any question was proposed, how it would be decided, to search out the motive of that regular compliance, and to examine whether the minister was reverenced for his wisdom and virtue, or feared for his power, or courted for the publick money; whether he owed his prevalence to the confidence or corruption of his followers?

It cannot surely be thought inexpedient, to inquire into the reasons for which our merchants were for many years suffered to be plundered, or for which a war, solicited by the general voice of the whole nation, was delayed; into the reasons for which our fleets were fitted out only to coast upon the ocean, and connive at the departure of squadrons and the transportation of armies, to suffer our allies to be invaded, and our traders ruined and enslaved.

It is, in my opinion, convenient to examine with the utmost rigour, why time was granted to our enemies to fortify themselves against us, while a standing army preyed upon our people? Why forces unacquainted with the use of arms were sent against them, under the command of leaders equally ignorant? And why we have suffered their privateers in the mean time to rove at large over the ocean, and insult us upon our own coasts? Why we did not rescue our sailors from captivity, when opportunities of exchange were in our power? And why we robbed our merchants of their crews by rigorous impresses, without employing them either to guard our trade, or subdue our enemies?

If the senate is not to be suffered to inquire into affairs like these, it is no longer any security to the people, that they have the right of electing representatives; and unless they may carry their inquiries back as far as they shall think it necessary, the most acute sagacity may be easily eluded; causes may be very remote from their consequences, the original motives of a long train of wicked measures may lie hid in some private transaction of former years, and those advantages which our enemies have been of late suffered to obtain, were perhaps sold them at some forgotten congress by some secret article.

Such are, probably, the private transactions which the honourable gentleman is so much afraid of exposing to the light; transactions in which the interest of this nation has been meanly yielded up by cowardice, or sold by treachery; in which Britain has been considered as a province subordinate to some other country, or in which the minister has enriched himself by the sacrifice of the publick rights.

It has been, indeed, alleged with some degree of candour, that many of our treaties were provisions against invasions which perhaps were never intended, and calculated to defeat measures which only our own cowardice disposed us to fear. That such treaties have, indeed, been made, Hanover is a sufficient witness; but however frequently they may occur, they may surely be discovered with very little disadvantage to the nation; they will prove only the weakness of those that made them, who were at one time intimidated by chimerical terrours, and at another, lulled into confidence by airy security.

The concessions from foreign powers, which have been likewise mentioned, ought surely not to be produced as arguments against the motion; for what could more excite the curiosity of the nation, if, indeed, this motion were in reality produced by malevolence or resentment; if none were expected to concur in it but those who envied the abilities, or had felt the power of the late minister, it might be, perhaps, defeated by such insinuations; for nothing could more certainly regain his reputation, or exalt him to more absolute authority, than proofs that he had obtained for us any concessions from foreign powers.

If any advantageous terms have been granted us, he must be confessed to have so far discharged his trust to his allies, that he has kept them with the utmost caution from the knowledge of the people, who have heard, during all his administration, of nothing but subsidies, submission, and compliances paid to almost every prince on the continent who has had the confidence to demand them; and if by this inquiry any discovery to the disadvantage of our allies should be struck out, he may with great sincerity allege, that it was made without his consent.

Another objection to this inquiry is, that the spies which are retained in foreign courts may be detected by it, that the canals of our intelligence will be for ever stopped, and that we shall henceforth have no knowledge of the designs of foreign powers, but what may be honestly attained by penetration and experience. Spies are, indeed, a generation for whose security I have not much regard, but for whom I am on this occasion less solicitous, as I believe very few of them will be affected by this motion.

The conduct of our ministers has never discovered such an acquaintance with the designs of neighbouring princes, as could be suspected to be obtained by any uncommon methods, or they have very little improved the opportunities which early information put into their power; for they have always been baffled and deceived. Either they have employed no spies, or their spies have been directed to elude them by false intelligence, or true intelligence has been of no use; and if any of these assertions be true, the publick will not suffer by the motion.

It was justly observed, by the honourable gentleman, that a parallel may be properly drawn between a nation and a private man, and, by consequence, between a trading nation and a trader. Let us, therefore, consider what must be the state of that trader who shall never inspect or state his accounts, who shall suffer his servants to traffick in the dark with his stock, and on his credit, and who shall permit them to transact bargains in his name, without inquiring whether they are advantageous, or whether they are performed.

Every man immediately marks out a trader thus infatuated, as on the brink of bankruptcy and ruin; every one will easily foresee, that his servants will take advantage of his credulity, and proceed hourly to grosser frauds; that they will grow rich by betraying his interest, that they will neglect his affairs to promote their own, that they will plunder him till he has nothing left, and seek then for employment among those to whom they have recommended themselves by selling their trust. His neighbours, who easily foresee his approaching misery, retire from him by degrees, disunite their business from his, and leave him to fall, without involving others in his ruin.

Such must be the fate of a trader whom idleness, or a blind confidence in the integrity of others, hinders from attending to his own affairs, unless he rouses from his slumber, and recovers from his infatuation. And what is to be done by the man who, having for more than twenty years neglected so necessary an employment, finds, what must necessarily be found in much less time, his accounts perplexed, his credit depressed, and his affairs disordered? What remains, but that he suffer that disorder to proceed no farther, that he resolutely examine all the transactions which he has hitherto overlooked, that he repair those errours which are yet retrievable, and reduce his trade into method; that he doom those servants, by whom he has been robbed or deceived, to the punishment which they deserve, and recover from them that wealth which they have accumulated by rapacity and fraud.

By this method only can the credit of the trader or the nation be repaired, and this is the method which the motion recommends; a motion with which, therefore, every man may be expected to comply, who desires that his country should once more recover its influence and power, who wishes to see Britain again courted and feared, and her monarch considered as the arbiter of the world, the protector of the true religion, and the defender of the liberties of mankind.

Mr. PHILLIPS spoke in substance as follows:--Sir, I am so far from believing that there is danger of exposing the spies of the government to the resentment of foreign princes, by complying with this motion, that I suspect the opposition to be produced chiefly from a consciousness, that no spies will be discovered to have been employed, and that the secret service for which such large sums have been required, will appear to have been rather for the service of domestick than of foreign traitors, and to have been performed rather in this house than in foreign courts.

Secret service has been long a term of great use to the ministers of this nation; a term of art to which such uncommon efficacy has been hitherto annexed, that the people have been influenced by it to pay taxes, without expecting to be informed how they were applied, having been content with being told, when they inquired after their properties, that they were exhausted and dissipated in secret service.

Secret service I conceive to have originally implied transactions, of which the agents were secret, though the effects were visible. When MARLBOROUGH defeated the French, when he counteracted all their stratagems, obviated all their designs, and deceived all their expectations, he charged the nation with large sums for secret service, which were, indeed, cheerfully allowed, because the importance and reality of the service were apparent from its effects. But what advantages can our ministers boast of having obtained in twenty years by the means of their intelligence? Or by whom have they, within that period, not been deceived by false appearances? When we purchase secret service at so dear a rate, let it appear that we really obtain what we pay for, though the means by which it is obtained are kept impenetrably secret. Wherever the usefulness of the intelligence is not discoverable, it is surely just to inquire, whether our money is not demanded for other purposes, whether we are not in reality hiring with our own money armies to enslave, or senators to betray us; or enriching an avaricious minister, while we imagine ourselves contributing to the publick security?

Colonel CHOLMONDELEY replied to the following effect:--Sir, it has been in all foregoing ages the custom for men to speak of the government with reverence, even when they opposed its measures, or projected its dissolution; nor has it been thought, in any time before our own, decent or senatorial, to give way to satire or invective, or indulge a petulant imagination, to endeavour to level all orders by contemptuous reflections, or to court the populace, by echoing their language, or adopting their sentiments.

This method of gaining the reputation of patriotism, has been unknown till the present age, and reserved for the present leaders of the people, who will have the honour to stand recorded as the original authors of anarchy, the great subverters of order, and the first men who dared to pronounce, that all the secrets of government ought to be made publick.

It has been hitherto understood in all nations, that those who were intrusted with authority, had likewise a claim to respect and confidence; that they were chosen for the superiority of their abilities, or the reputation of their virtue; and that, therefore, it was reasonable to consign to their management, the direction of such affairs as by their own nature require secrecy.

But this ancient doctrine, by which subordination has been so long preserved, is now to be set aside for new principles, which may flatter the pride, and incite the passions of the people; we are now to be told, that affairs are only kept secret, because they will not bear examination; that men conceal not those transactions in which they have succeeded, but those in which they have failed; that they are only inclined to hide their follies or their crimes, and that to examine their conduct in the most open manner, is only to secure the interest of the publick.

Thus has the nation been taught to expect, that the counsels of the cabinet should be dispersed in the publick papers; that their governours should declare the motives of their measures, and discover the demands of our allies, and the scheme of our policy; and that the people should be consulted upon every emergence, and enjoy the right of instructing not only their own representatives, but the ministers of the crown.

In this debate, the mention of secret treaties has been received with contempt and ridicule; the ministers have been upbraided with chimerical fears, and unnecessary provisions against attacks which never were designed; they have been alleged to have no other interest in view than their own, when they endeavour to mislead inquirers, and to have in reality nothing to keep from publick view but their own ignorance or wickedness.

It cannot surely be seriously asserted by men of knowledge and experience, that there are no designs formed by wise governments, of which the success depends upon secrecy; nor can it be asserted, that the inquiry now proposed will betray nothing from which our enemies may receive advantage.

If we should suppose, that all our schemes are either fully accomplished, or irretrievably defeated, it will not even then be prudent to discover them, since they will enable our enemies to form conjectures of the future from the past, and to obviate, hereafter, the same designs, when it shall be thought necessary to resume them.

But, in reality, nothing is more irrational than to suppose this a safer time than any other for such general discoveries; for why should it be imagined, that our engagements are not still depending, and our treaties yet in force? And what can be more dishonourable or imprudent, than to destroy at once the whole scheme of foreign policy, to dissolve our alliances, and destroy the effects of such long and such expensive negotiations, without first examining whether they will be beneficial or detrimental to us?

Nor is it only with respect to foreign affairs that secrecy is necessary; there are, undoubtedly, many domestick transactions which it is not proper to communicate to the whole nation. There is still a faction among us, which openly desires the subversion of our present establishment; a faction, indeed, not powerful, and which grows, I hope, every day weaker, but which is favoured, or at least imagines itself favoured, by those who have so long distinguished themselves by opposing the measures of the government. Against these men, whose hopes are revived by every commotion, who studiously heighten every subject of discontent, and add their outcries to every clamour, it is not doubted but measures are formed, by which their designs are discovered, and their measures broken; nor can it be supposed, that this is done without the assistance of some who are received with confidence amongst them, and who probably pass for the most zealous of their party.

Many other domestick occasions of expense might be mentioned; of expense which operates in private, and produces benefits which are only not acknowledged, because they are not known, but which could no longer be applied to the same useful purposes, if the channels through which it passes were laid open. I cannot, therefore, forbear to offer my opinion, that this motion, by which all the secrets of our government will be discovered, will tend to the confusion of the present system of Europe, to the absolute ruin of our interest in foreign courts, and to the embarrassment of our domestick affairs. I cannot, therefore, conceive how any advantages can be expected by the most eager persecutors of the late ministry, which can, even in their opinion, deserve to be purchased at so dear a rate.

Mr. PITT then spoke to the following purpose:--Sir, I know not by what fatality the adversaries of the motion are impelled to assist their adversaries, and contribute to their own overthrow, by suggesting, whenever they attempt to oppose it, new arguments against themselves.

It has been long observed, that when men are drawing near to destruction, they are apparently deprived of their understanding, and contribute by their own folly to those calamities with which they are threatened, but which might, by a different conduct, be sometimes delayed. This has surely now happened to the veteran advocates for an absolute and unaccountable ministry, who have discovered on this occasion, by the weakness of their resistance, that their abilities are declining; and I cannot but hope, that the omen will be fulfilled, and that their infatuation will be quickly followed by their ruin.

To touch in this debate on our domestick affairs, to mention the distribution of the publick money, and to discover their fears, lest the ways in which it has been disbursed, should by this inquiry be discovered; to recall to the minds of their opponents the immense sums which have been annually demanded, and of which no account has been yet given, is surely the lowest degree of weakness and imprudence.

I am so far from being convinced that any danger can arise from this inquiry, that I believe the nation can only be injured by a long neglect of such examinations; and that a minister is easily formidable, when he has exempted himself by a kind of prescription from exposing his accounts, and has long had an opportunity of employing the publick money in multiplying his dependants, enriching his hirelings, enslaving boroughs, and corrupting senates.

That those have been, in reality, the purposes for which the taxes of many years have been squandered, is sufficiently apparent without an inquiry. We have wasted sums with which the French, in pursuance of their new scheme of increasing their influence, would have been able to purchase the submission of half the nations of the earth, and with which the monarchs of Europe might have been held dependant on a nod; these they have wasted only to sink our country into disgrace, to heighten the spirit of impotent enemies, to destroy our commerce, and distress our colonies. We have patiently suffered, during a peace of twenty years, those taxes to be extorted from us, by which a war might have been supported against the most powerful nation, and have seen them ingulfed in the boundless expenses of the government, without being able to discover any other effect from them than the establishment of ministerial tyranny.

There has, indeed, been among the followers of the court a regular subordination, and exact obedience; nor has any man been found hardy enough to reject the dictates of the grand vizier. Every man who has received his pay, has with great cheerfulness complied with his commands; and every man who has held any post or office under the crown, has evidently considered himself as enlisted by the minister.

But the visible influence of places, however destructive to the constitution, is not the chief motive of an inquiry; an inquiry implies something secret, and is intended to discover the private methods of extending dependence, and propagating corruption; the methods by which the people have been influenced to choose those men for representatives whose principles they detest, and whose conduct they condemn; and by which those whom their country has chosen for the guardians of its liberties, have been induced to support, in this house, measures, which in every other place they have made no scruple to censure.

When we shall examine the distribution of the publick treasure, when we shall inquire by what conduct we have been debarred from the honours of war, and at the same time deprived of the blessings of peace, to what causes it is to be imputed, that our debts have continued during the long-continued tranquillity of Europe, nearly in the state to which they were raised by fighting, at our own expense, the general quarrel of mankind; and why the sinking fund, a kind of inviolable deposit appropriated to the payment of our creditors, and the mitigation of our taxes, has been from year to year diverted to very different uses; we shall find that our treasure has been exhausted, not to humble foreign enemies, or obviate domestick insurrections; not to support our allies, or suppress our factions; but for ends which no man, who feels the love of his country yet unextinguished, can name without horrour, the purchase of alliances, and the hire of votes, the corruption of the people, and the exaltation of France.

Such are the discoveries which I am not afraid to declare that I expect from the inquiry, and therefore, I cannot but think it necessary. If those to whom the administration of affairs has been for twenty years committed, have betrayed their trust, if they have invaded the publick rights with the publick treasure, and made use of the dignities which their country has conferred upon them, only to enslave it, who will not confess, that they ought to be delivered up to speedy justice? That they ought to be set as landmarks to posterity, to warn those who shall hereafter launch out on the ocean of affluence and power, not to be too confident of a prosperous gale, but to remember, that there are rocks on which whoever rushes must inevitably perish? If they are innocent, and far be it from me to declare them guilty without examination, whom will this inquiry injure? Or what effects will it produce, but that which every man appears to desire, the reestablishment of the publick tranquillity, a firm confidence in the justice and wisdom of the government, and a general reconciliation of the people to the ministers.

Colonel MORDAUNT spoke then, in substance as follows:--Sir, notwithstanding the zeal with which the honourable gentleman has urged the necessity of this inquiry, a zeal of which, I think, it may at least be said, that it is too vehement and acrimonious to be the mere result of publick spirit, unmixed with interest or resentment; he has yet been so far unsuccessful in his reasoning, that he has not produced in me any conviction, or weakened any of the impressions which the arguments of those whom he opposes had made upon me.

He has contented himself with recapitulating some of the benefits which may be hoped for from the inquiry; he has represented in the strongest terms, the supposed misconduct of the ministry; he has aggravated all the appearances of wickedness or negligence, and then has inferred the usefulness of a general inquiry for the punishment of past offences, and the prevention of the like practices in future times.

That he has discovered great qualifications for invective, and that his declamation was well calculated to inflame those who have already determined their opinion, and who are, therefore, only restrained from such measures as are now recommended by natural caution and sedateness, I do not deny; but, surely he does not expect to gain proselytes by assertions without proof, or to produce any alteration of sentiments, without attempting to answer the arguments which have been offered against his opinion.

It has been urged with great appearance of reason, that an inquiry, such as is now proposed, with whatever prospects of vengeance, of justice, or of advantage, it may flatter us at a distance, will be in reality detrimental to the publick; because it will discover all the secrets of our government, lay all our negotiations open to the world, will show what powers we most fear, or most trust, and furnish our enemies with means of defeating all our schemes, and counteracting all our measures.

This appears to me, sir, the chief argument against the motion, an argument of which the force cannot but be discovered by those whose interest it is to confute it, and of which, therefore, by appearing to neglect it, they seem to confess that it is unanswerable; and therefore, since I cannot find the motion justified otherwise than by loud declarations of its propriety, and violent invectives against the ministry, I hope that I shall escape at least the censure of the calm and impartial, though I venture to declare, that I cannot approve it; and with regard to the clamorous and the turbulent, I have long learned to despise their menaces, because I have hitherto found them only the boasts of impotence.

Mr. CORNWALL made answer to the following purport:--Sir, if to obtain the important approbation of the gentleman that spoke last, it be necessary only to answer the argument on which he has insisted, and nothing be necessary to produce an inquiry but his approbation, I shall not despair that this debate may be concluded according to the wishes of the nation, that secret wickedness may be detected, and that our posterity may be secured from any invasion of their liberty, by examples of the vengeance of an injured people.

[The house divided.--The yeas went forth.--For the question, 242; against it, 244: so that it passed in the negative, by a majority of two.]

HOUSE OF LORDS, MAY 20, 1742.

Debate On A Motion For Indemnifying Evidence Relating To The Conduct Of The Earl Of ORFORD.

The following debate having been produced by an occasion very uncommon and important, it is necessary to give an account of such transactions as may contribute to illustrate it.

The prime minister being driven out of the house of commons, by the prevalence of those who, from their opposition to the measures of the court, were termed the country party, it was proposed that a committee should be appointed, "to inquire into the conduct of publick affairs, at home and abroad, during the last twenty years;" but the motion was rejected.

It was afterwards moved, "that a committee should be appointed to inquire into the conduct of Robert, earl of ORFORD, during the last ten years in which he was first commissioner of the treasury, and chancellor and under treasurer of the exchequer," which was carried by 252 to 245.

A committee of one-and-twenty being chosen by ballot, and entering upon the inquiry, called before them Mr. Gibbon, who declared himself agent to J. Botteler, and said, that Botteler, being a candidate for Wendover, and finding that no success was to be expected without five hundred pounds, sent a friend to N. Paxton, with a letter, and that he saw him return with a great number of papers, in which he said were bills for five hundred pounds.

Botteler and his friend being examined, confirmed the testimony of Gibbon; and Botteler added, that he sent to Paxton as an officer of the treasury, acquainted with those who had the disposal of money; that his claim to the favour which he asked arose from a disappointment in a former election; that he never gave for the money any security or acknowledgment, nor considered himself indebted for it to Paxton or any other person.

Paxton being then examined, refused to return any answer to the question of the committee, because the answer might tend to accuse himself. Which reason was alleged by others for a like refusal.

The committee finding their inquiries eluded, by this plea for secrecy, which the laws of Britain allow to be valid, reported to the commons the obstacles that they met with; for the removal of which a bill was brought in like that of indemnity; which, having passed the commons, produced, in the house of lords, a debate, in which the greatest men of each party exerted the utmost force of their reason and eloquence.

The bill being read a second time, and a motion made for its being referred to a committee.

Lord CARTERET spoke to this effect:--My lords, as the question now before us is of the highest importance both to the present age and to posterity, as it may direct the proceedings of the courts of justice, prescribe the course of publick inquiries, and, by consequence, affect the property or life of every lord in this assembly; I hope it will be debated amongst us without the acrimony which arises from the prejudice of party, or the violence which is produced by the desire of victory, and that the controversy will be animated by no other passion than zeal for justice, and love of truth.

For my part, my lords, I have reason to believe, that many professions of my sincerity will not be necessary on this occasion, because I shall not be easily suspected of any partiality in favour of the noble lord to whom this bill immediately relates. It is well known to your lordships how freely I have censured his conduct, and how invariably I have opposed those measures by which the nation has been so far exasperated, that the bill, now under our consideration, has been thought necessary by the commons, to pacify the general discontent, to restore the publick tranquillity, and to recover that confidence in the government, without which no happiness is to be expected, without which the best measures will always be obstructed by the people, and the justest remonstrances disregarded by the court.

But however laudable may be the end proposed by the commons, I cannot, my lords, be so far dazzled by the prospect of obtaining it, as not to examine the means to which we are invited to concur, and inquire with that attention which the honour of sitting in this house has made my duty, whether they are such as have been practised by our ancestors, such as are prescribed by the law, or warranted by prudence.

The caution, my lords, with which our ancestors have always proceeded in inquiries by which life or death, property or reputation, was endangered; the certainty, or at least the high degree of probability, which they required in evidence, to make it a sufficient ground of conviction, is universally known; nor is it necessary to show their opinion by particular examples, because, being no less solicitous for the welfare of their posterity than for their own, they were careful to record their sentiments in laws and statutes, and to prescribe, with the strongest sanctions, to succeeding governments, what they had discovered by their own reflections, or been taught by their predecessors.

They considered, my lords, not only how great was the hardship of being unjustly condemned, but likewise how much a man might suffer by being falsely accused; how much he might be harassed by a prosecution, and how sensibly he might feel the disgrace of a trial. They knew that to be charged with guilt implied some degree of reproach, and that it gave room, at least, for an inference that the known conduct of the person accused was such as made it probable that he was still more wicked than he appeared; they knew that the credulity of some might admit the charge upon evidence that was rejected by the court, and that difference of party, or private quarrels, might provoke others to propagate reports once published, even when in their own opinion they were sufficiently confuted; and that, therefore, an innocent man might languish in infamy by a groundless charge, though he should escape any legal penalty.

It has, therefore, my lords, been immemorially established in this nation, that no man can be apprehended, or called into question for any crime till there shall be proof.

First, that there is a _corpus delicti_, a crime really and visibly committed; thus before a process can be issued out for inquiring after a murderer, it must be apparent that a murder has been perpetrated, the dead body must be exposed to a jury, and it must appear to them that he died by violence. It is not sufficient that a man is lost, and that it is probable that he is murdered, because no other reason of his absence can be assigned; he must be found with the marks of force upon him, or some circumstances that may make it credible, that he did not perish by accident, or his own hand.

It is required, secondly, my lords, that he who apprehends any person as guilty of the fact thus apparently committed, must suspect him to be the criminal; for he is not to take an opportunity, afforded him by the commission of an illegal act, to gratify any secret malice, or wanton curiosity; or to drag to a solemn examination, those against whom he cannot support an accusation.

And, my lords, that suspicion may not ravage the reputation of Britons without control; that men may not give way to the mere suggestions of malevolence, and load the characters of those with atrocious wickedness, whom, perhaps, they have no real reason to believe more depraved than the bulk of mankind, and whose failings may have been exaggerated in their eyes by contrariety of opinion, or accidental competition, it is required in the third place, my lords, that whoever apprehends or molests another on suspicion of a crime, shall be able to give the reasons of his suspicion, and to prove them by competent evidence.

These, my lords, are three essentials which the wisdom of our ancestors has made indispensable previous to the arrest or imprisonment of the meanest Briton; it must appear, that there is a crime committed, that the person to be seized is suspected of having committed it, and that the suspicion is founded upon probability. Requisites so reasonable in their own nature, so necessary to the protection of every man's quiet and reputation, and, by consequence, so useful to the security and happiness of society, that, I suppose, they will need no support or vindication. Every man is interested in the continuance of this method of proceeding, because no man is secure from suffering by the interruption or abolition of it.

Such, my lords, is the care and caution which the law directs in the first part of any criminal process, the detainment of the person supposed guilty; nor is the method of trial prescribed with less regard to the security of innocence.

It is an established maxim, that no man can be obliged to accuse himself, or to answer any questions which may have any tendency to discover what the nature of his defence requires to be concealed. His guilt must appear either by a voluntary and unconstrained confession, which the terrours of conscience have sometimes extorted, and the notoriety of the crime has at other times produced, or by the deposition of such witnesses as the jury shall think worthy of belief.

To the credibility of any witness it is always requisite that he be disinterested, that his own cause be not involved in that of the person who stands at the bar, that he has no prospect of advancing his fortune, clearing his reputation, or securing his life. For it is made too plain by daily examples, that interest will prevail over the virtue of most men, and that it is not safe to believe those who are strongly tempted to deceive.

There are cases, my lords, where the interest of the person offering his evidence is so apparent, that he is not even admitted to be heard; and any benefit which may possibly be proposed, is admitted as an objection to evidence, and weakens it in a measure proportionate to the distance of the prospect and the degree of profit.

Such are the rules hitherto followed in criminal proceedings, the violation of which has been always censured as cruelty and oppression, and perhaps always been repented even by those who proposed and defended it, when the commotions of party have subsided, and the heat of opposition and resentment has given way to unprejudiced reflection.

Of these rules, my lords, it is not necessary to produce any defence from the practice of distant nations, because it is sufficient in the present case, that they are established by the constitution of this country, to which every Briton has a right to appeal; for how can any man defend his conduct, if having acted under one law, he is to be tried by another?

Let us, therefore, my lords, apply these rules to the present bill, and inquire what regard appears to have been paid to them by the commons, and how well we shall observe them by concurring in their design.

With respect to the first, by which it is required, that there be a known and manifest crime, it does not appear to have engaged the least attention in the other house; for no fact is specified in the bill, upon which a prosecution can be founded, and, therefore, to inquire after evidence is somewhat preposterous; it is nothing less than to invite men to give their opinion without a subject, and to answer without a question.

It may be urged, indeed, that there is a universal discontent over the whole nation; that the clamour against the person mentioned in the bill, has been continued for many years; that the influence of the nation is impaired in foreign countries; that our treasury is exhausted; that our liberties have been attacked, our properties invaded, and our morals corrupted; but these are yet only rumours, without proof, and without legal certainty; which may, indeed, with great propriety give occasion to an inquiry, and, perhaps, by that inquiry some facts may be ascertained which may afford sufficient reasons for farther procedure.

But such, my lords, is the form of the bill now before us, that if it should pass into a statute, it would, in my opinion, put a stop to all future inquiry, by making those incapable of giving evidence, who have had most opportunities of knowing those transactions, which have given the chief occasion of suspicion, and from whom, therefore, the most important information must naturally be expected.

The first requisite qualification of a witness, whether we consult natural equity and reason, or the common law of our own country, is disinterestedness; an indifference, with regard to all outward circumstances, about the event of the trial at which his testimony is required. For he that is called as a witness where he is interested, is in reality giving evidence in his own cause.

But this qualification, my lords, the bill now before us manifestly takes away; for every man who shall appear against the person into whose conduct the commons are inquiring, evidently promotes, in the highest degree, his own interest by his evidence, as he may preclude all examination of his own behaviour, and secure the possession of that wealth which he has accumulated by fraud and oppression, or, perhaps, preserve that life which the justice of the nation might take away.

Nothing, my lords, is more obvious, than that this offer of indemnity may produce perjury and false accusation; nothing is more probable, than that he who is conscious of any atrocious villanies, which he cannot certainly secure from discovery, will snatch this opportunity of committing one crime more, to set himself free from the dread of punishment, and blot out his own guilt for ever, by charging lord ORFORD as one of his accomplices.