Commons Sitting of 30 May 1808

IRISH HABEAS CORPUS SUSPENSION.
Mr. Sheridan presented a petition from Mr. James Tandy, wine-merchant, of Dublin, stating that above three years since, without any crime or misconduct whatever on his part, he was suspected by the Irish government of treasonable practices; that he immediately surrendered himself and underwent several successive examinations before the privy council, at which he answered fully and truly every question put to him; that after having been detained three weeks in the custody of a king's messenger, without any cause explained to him, he was committed, under a warrant from the Chief Secretary of the Lord Lieutenant, to the common gaol of Kilmainham, where he was confined for three years, and treated with peculiar harshness and severity; at the end of which period he was liberated without being brought to trial, without being acquainted with the nature of the alledged charge against him, or informed who were his accusers, though he had repeatedly and urgently applied to know the same; that he had suffered severely in health, &c. and praying relief.—The petition was ordered to lie on the table.—Mr. Sheridan afterwards presented other Petitions of a similar nature from Bernard Foy, who had been confuted 18 months in the Newgate of Dublin; Thomas Ridgeway, an English merchant, who had been a considerable lime confined in Kilmainham gaol; and Henry Hughes, confined in the ' same prison.
Sir A. Wellesleysaid, he rather believed the government of the country had good grounds for confining those several persons: it was about the period of the last rebellious insurrection which broke out in Dublin.
Mr. Sheridanobserved, that the mere declaration of the right hon. baronet, that he 'rather believed' the government of the day had good grounds for confining these petitioners, was rather a vague mode of

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justifying so severe an injury to them as a long and rigorous imprisonment, without assigning any specific charge, and refusing their repeated applications to be brought to trial to confront their accusers. He thought that British subjects ought not to be subjected to such severities, without strong and positive grounds of crimination. However, there were some other petitions to be presented of a similar nature, and as soon as they should all come before the house, he should name a day for submitting a proposition on the subject, when the right hon. Secretary would have an opportunity of explaining himself fully.—The petitions were ordered to lie on the table.

FIFTH REPORT OF MILITARY INQUIRY.
Mr. Rose, pursuant to his notice, begged to call the attention of the house to that part of the Fifth Report of the Commissioners of Military Inquiry, which seemed to reflect upon the conduct of the Board of Treasury, from the year 1796 to 1799, as if that Board had been, as insinuated in the Report, inattentive to its duty, in controlling the expenditure for the hospital department. The right hon. gent. then shewed, that the Treasury Board had not been negligent of its duty on that head, as would appear from the paper for which he meant to move. He then bore, testimony to the merits and integrity of the Apothecary General, who had supplied medicines to the army on more reasonable terms than the Apothecaries Company did to the navy, and concluded by moving, "That, there be laid before the house copies of all proceedings of the Lords of the Treasury, between the 1st of Dec. 1790 and the 31st of August 1799, relative to payments made to the Apothecary General for medicines and surgical instruments supplied to the army,"—After a few observations from Mr. Yorke, in corroboration of the testimony in favour of the Apothecary General's conduct, and calling on the house to suspend all judgment upon this report till the whole of the case should be before them; the motion was agreed to.

SMALL POX PREVENTION BILL.
Mr. Fullerrose to move for leave to bring in a bill to prevent the spreading of the Small Pox infection. It was not his intention to attempt enforcing the vaccine inoculation. He would leave that open to the operation of its own merits. But with respect to the Small Pox, it was often found that the infection was widely spread from the modern mode of treating that disease;
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for the patients, instead of being closely confined to their rooms, as was formerly the custom, under the modern practice were ordered to walk abroad, by which means the air of the vicinage was infected, and the disease communicated through whole districts. His object in this bill, then, would be to prevent any persons from opening houses for Small Pox inoculation within less than three miles distance from any great town, village, or assemblage of dwelling houses joined together; and to oblige all such persons to keep their patients within doors during the whole continuance of the disorder; and also where any person shall have caught the infection in any such town, &c. to enable the parish officers, at the parish expence, to remove such person to the distance of three miles, until recovered from the disorder; and where any infected persons shall appear abroad, to enable the parish-officers to enforce their return within doors. He meant also to enforce the observance of this law by penalties, which should be applied to the relief of the persons who, by their means, shall have caught the disease: but such penalties not to be paid until two months after conviction: and then, if no mischief shall have accrued to others from the misconduct of the parties, the magistrates to have a discretion in mitigating the fine. If leave was given to bring in the bill, he meant to have it printed, and to be over until next session.—Leave was given accordingly.

BANK OF IRELAND.
Sir John Newportrose to bring forward his promised resolution for declaring catholics eligible to fill the high offices of the Bank of Ireland. Of all the restrictions which the penal laws of Ireland had imposed upon the catholics, he commented on the absurdity of enacting that the creed of a Director in a commercial establishment should be a bar to the exertion of his talents in promoting the interests of the concern; or that, in appointing a director, the proprietors of such a concern should be bound, in the first instance, to inquire into his form of worship. Ireland was the only country in Europe where this was the case. But, in the act for establishing the Bank of Ireland, no such restriction appeared; and it was only in the charter made out in consequence of that act, that any idea of religious restriction was introduced. By an act of 1793, the Irish parliament had very much relaxed those restrictions which precluded Irish catholics from holding certain offices, and

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reduced the number to a very few offices of state. But he believed no man ever imagined the office of a bank director was one from which it was intended to exclude them; on the contrary, he had the assurance of a secretary of state for Ireland, that it was meant the catholics should be admitted to the directorship; and, upon recurring to the act of 1793, he found they were eligible to become members of any law body, corporate or commercial, for they were precluded from none but Trinity college, any bye-law to the contrary notwithstanding. The charter, however, ordered it otherwise; law opinions had been taken on the subject, and the counsel on both sides differed. One was of opinion that the catholics were not precluded; but the other thought, that as the preclusion was by a charter, and not a bye-law, the exclusion was valid. By the Irish bank act of 1781–2, it was forbidden to any company, above the number of six, to form any bank or take a public credit, under a heavy penalty, save the bank of Ireland. But the protestants were compensated for this privation in their eligibility to become bank governors and directors, while to the catholics, thus deprived of their common law rights, no compensation whatever was given. But he should think, that if fn any purview of the act it was thought liable to such a construction, it would be the duty of the legislature to restore to the catholic his common law right, or place him on the same commercial footing in this respect with the protestants. He might be asked, why this question was not brought forward sooner? He would answer, the bank charter was not renewed since 1791, and consequently there was no opportunity of bringing it before parliament. There was a period in the history of this country, when a great portion of the people were known to be disaffected to the Hanoverian succession; and it was then the wise policy of the legislature to stimulate those persons to vest their money in the public funds, in order to attach them to the welfare of the state; and if such policy was wise in that case, was it not equally so with respect to the catholics? He knew, from the best authority, that the great body of the bank proprietors were by no means favourable to their exclusion, any more than other liberal men. If a Roman-catholic was possessed of 50,000 l. property in bank stock, was it not a case of injustice that the proprietors could not avail themselves of his talents and abilities in the
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management of their concern? The house had now before them no complaints against their admission; they had not before them the petition of protestant corporations praying the continuance of the exclusion, like those which came before the Irish parliament in 1696, from the protestant coal-porters of Dublin, complaining that one Darby Ryan, a catholic coal-dealer, employed coal-porters of his own persuasion, to the great injury of the protestant interest, and praying that he might be obliged to employ protestant porters to carry his commodities; which petition was referred to the committee of grievances. In 1702 a petition was presented from the protestant mayor and aldermen of Limerick, complaining that papists were allowed to dwell amongst them, and follow their trades and callings, much to the injury of the protestant interest, and praying they might be banished from the city, which was accordingly done; and in 1704 a petition was presented to the same parliament from about twenty catholics, who were suffered to reside in Limerick and Galway, praying they might be allowed to retain with them their wives and children, upon their giving security for their good behaviour; but it was rejected. He hoped he was addressing himself to a more just and liberal parliament, and concluded by moving a resolution, "That catholics ought to be considered eligible to become governors, deputy-governors, and directors of the bank of Ireland, if otherwise qualified."
Mr. Fostersaid, the Irish bank was placed on the same footing with, the bank of England, and he did not see why a distinction should take place in one country which was not proposed for the other. He deprecated thus bringing forward old oppressions to countenance new innovations. In proposing hereafter a renewal of the charter, he did not intend by any means to heap new burthens on the catholics; he would leave the charter just as it stood at present, and if the catholics found themselves aggrieved, they might petition parliament, which they did not do now. He concluded by moving, that the house should proceed to the other orders of the day.
Mr. Windhamobserved, that as the right hon. gent, said he did not mean to exclude the catholics, he hoped he would support the Resolution. As the old penal laws were repealed, why not repeal this? No one surely could say this was so serious a state matter as to endanger the existence of the constitution or the church.
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, he did not see the utility of altering the law; there was surely no grievance in continuing the same law to Ireland which was in force here. If any alteration was to take place, the time would be when the charter was about to be renewed, and not now to engraft a new bill on the old bill. He did not desire that the new charter should prejudice the Irish catholics; on the contrary, he had no objection to enter a declaratory clause in future, giving the legislature a power of interfering in their defence.
Mr. Martinwas glad the right hon. gent, had it not in his intention to re-enact the penal code. He thought our ancestors had as good reasons for their severity as we had now for our exclusion, and he was sure posterity would repay us as we repaid those who went before us. The case of Ireland did not apply to this country at all, where the majority were protestants, but in Ireland he would venture to say the principal merchants were catholics.
On the division there appeared: For the amendment (it; Against it 61.—Maiority 3.

list of the Minority.

Abercromby, J.

Milton, viscount

Anstruther, sir J.

Montgomery, C.

Aubrey, sir J.

Moore, P.

Bagenal, W.

Newport, sir J.

Barham, J. F.

Parnell, H.

Bradshaw, A. C.

Petty, lord Henry

Brand, T.

Phillips, R. M.

Combe, H. C.

Piggot, sir A.

Creevey, T.

Ponsonby, rt. hon. G.

Dundas, R, L.

Ponsonby, Hon. G.

Ebrington, viscount

Power, Richard

Eden, W. F. E.

Russell, lord W.

Elliot, W.

Sharp, R.

Estcourt, J. G.

Shipley, W.

Grattan, H.

Smith, W.

Greenough, G. B.

Talbot, R. W.

Halsey, J.

Temple, earl

Herbert, H. A.

Templetown, visc.

Hippesley, sir J. C.

Thornton, H.

Horner, F.

Tierney, G.

Hume, W. Hoare

Vansittart, G.

Kempe, T.

Vernon, G. G. V.

Latouche, R.

Walpole, hon. G.

Lawrence, F.

Ward, hon. J. W.

Leach, J.

Warnender, sir G.

Lefevre, C. Shaw

Western, C. C.

Lemon, sir W.

Whitbread, S.

Madocks, W. A.

Windham, W.

Martin, R.

Wynne, sir W. W.

Maule, W. R.

Tellers.

Milbanke, sir R.

C. W. Wynne

Miller, sir T.

J. Calcraft.

LOCAL MILITIA BILL.
The house then went into a committee on the Local Militia bill. On the reading of the nineteenth
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clause, allowing volunteers to transfer themselves into local militia,
Mr. Spencer Stanhopestated that a person might remove from one district to another where there would be no ballot, and where he could not get into a volunteer corps, they being full. This man being perfectly free, would receive more wages than the other.—Nothing was done on this suggestion.
On the reading of the twentieth clause, providing that an oath shall be taken by every volunteer entering into the local militia, that he had received no bounty except the two guineas allowed by the act, Mr. C. Wynne observed that in this case a strong temptation to perjury existed, and there was every opportunity for evasion; he therefore objected to the oath. He contended that the frequency with which oaths were administered had much diminished their influence on the public mind, especially when they were administered in cases where there was every temptation to perjury.—Mr. Windham, Mr. W. Smith, Mr. Wilberforce, sir S. Romilly, sir T. Turton, and Mr. Stephens, joined with Mr. Wynne, in his representation of the mischievous effects that resulted to the community from the frequency of appointing oaths to be taken in improper cases,; and declared their conviction of the soundness of the common law principle, which prohibits oaths being taken by persons strongly interested in the cause.—Lord Castlereagh agreed that the oath should be left out, and that the clause should remain with the provision that a declaration to the same purport should be signed by the volunteer, with a penalty of 20 l. if false.
In the twenty second clause, exempting persons who shall have served four years in the local militia from being liable to serve therein again for four years after, two amendments were proposed. One was, that instead of the term of the exemption for four years, the exemption should be till the turn came by rotation. The other, proposed by lord Milton, was, that one who served four years in the local militia should be for two years, subsequent to the close of that period, exempt from the regular militia ballot. Both were agreed to.
Upon one of the clauses, lord Milton moved as an amendment, that the officers commanding in the local militia should have the same qualification in point of property, with officers of the same rank

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in the regular militia. Lord Castlereagh having opposed the amendment, the committee divided upon it:
Ayes 31; Noes 107.—Majority 70.
Lord Temple objected to the clause subjecting the Local Militia to martial law, when called out on temporary duty, and proposed, that a court martial should have the power of inflicting upon them any punishment, excepting corporal punishment, which should not be inflicted upon them without the consent of his majesty, conveyed through the lord lieutenant of the county. Lord Castlereagh contended, that it would be improper to hare one law for the Regular, and another law for the Local Militia. Lord Temple afterwards moved a clause, providing that no sentence imposing a corporal punishment should be carried into execution, till it had received the approbation of his majesty. The clause was supported by Mr. Windham, Mr. C. W. Wynne, sir G. Warrender, and Mr. Lyttleton; and opposed by sir James Pulteney, the Solicitor General for Scotland, Mr. Ellison, and Mr. R. Dundas. On a division, the numbers were: For the Amendment 14; against it 101.—Majority against the Amendment 87. Several verbal amendments were made in the progress of the bill through the committee. The house resumed, and the Report was brought up, with an understanding that the bill should be recommitted on Friday next, so far as respects the new clauses proposed by lord Castlereagh.