Commons Sitting of 13 February 1817

PETITIONS RELATING TO REFORM, &c.
Lord Stanleysaid, he held in his
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hand a petition from Compton, in Lancashire, in which the petitioners used strong language in deploring their miseries; but they only prayed to be relieved from the pressure of their burthens, in such way as the House in its wisdom might think fit, yet adding their opinion that parliamentary reform would be the only effectual remedy. He had several others from the same quarter, and begged to state the general tendency of them all. The petitioners were of opinion that they were not duly represented, and that they could not be so without annual parliaments and universal sufferage as far as related to every male having a vote. The noble lord said he should take that opportunity of declaring that he never would give his approbation to any such wild and absurd theories, which were totally incompatible with any just system of representation. All he begged leave to do was, therefore, to present the petitions.—Leave was given, and they were accordingly presented and read. They were from Compton, Failsworth, Hollinwood, and Great and Little Bolton.

SAVING BANKS BILL.
Mr. Rosebrought in a bill for the better protection and encouragement of provident Institutions or Banks for Savings. It was read a first time, and on the question that it be read a second time to-morrow, the right hon. gentleman said, that the bill which he now brought in was precisely the same as that which was entertained last session, and went through that House, although it did not pass into an act. The objection raised against this bill was, that it was unnecessary, because it had not been solicited by those whom it was intended to protect; but the House would see, on a little reflection, that it was not very likely that application would be made to parliament by persons in that condition of life, the improvement of which was contemplated by this measure. Both the principle and the detail of such an institution were beyond the common ideas of persons engaged in daily and manual labour. In the year 1795, it would be recollected, that a bill passed both Houses of Parliament on the subject of Friendly Societies; at that time no application for relief or assistance was made by the parties immediately interested, though it must be remembered that the measure which then passed into a law was of the very highest benefit to the lower orders of society. Nor had

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he any doubt, that if a law of similar spirit were passed with respect to saving-banks, similar and even greater results would follow. Not only would there arise from this parliamentary interference a protection and security for the poor man's savings, but what was better, habits of industry, honesty, and sobriety, would be encouraged and matured among the lower orders, and one leading evil of inferior life would be checked, if not prevented—he meant the contracting of early and improvident marriages. The two points on which a difference of opinion prevailed last session, were first, the mode of depositing the money in the public funds; and secondly, whether a person who had placed a certain sum in one of these banks should still be deemed a fit object for parochial assistance. He was unwilling to leave out these clauses in the first instance; but if any difference of opinion respecting them still prevailed, it might be discussed when the bill should go into a commitee, where all alterations as to the operative details of the bill would be best made.
Sir John Newportexpressed a wish that Ireland, in the purview of the proposed bill, should be disjoined from England. All the clauses relative to the poor rates could have no application to Ireland, while there were many points necessary for that part of the kingdom that would not apply here. Under these circumstances, friendly as he was to the principle, he wished to be understood, as giving notice of his intention to move for leave to bring in a Bill for the protection of Provident Institutions in Ireland.
Mr. Calcraftobserved, that he still retained his objections to the proposed Bill. He therefore expressed a hope that the second reading would be postponed until the week after next. The House would recollect that the most obnoxious clause, that respecting paupers, had in the last session been disapproved, but that in a subsequent stage, the right hon. gentleman with his friends contrived to get it reinserted.
Lord Miltoncould not acquiesce in the conclusion drawn by the right hon. gentleman, respecting the diminution of the poor's-rate by the bill. In his judgment, its immediate operation would go to place on those rates persons otherwise not entitled.
The Bill was ordered to be read a second time tomorrow.

PETITION OF MR. LYON, RESPECTING THE WARRINGTON PETITION RELATING TO REFORM, &c.
Mr. Bootle Wilbrahampresented a petition from Thomas Lyon the younger, residing at Warrington. It contained a justification of the conduct of those who had been charged by an hon. and learned member, the other night [see p. 211] with forcibly seizing a petition which had been agreed to be presented to the House of Commons praying for parliamentary reform, and in his opinion it was a complete answer to the accusation. Too much stress had been laid upon the fact of Thomas Lyon, the present petitioner, being the nephew of a magistrate. The petition, it would be observed on reading it, showed that the uncle of this young man had been attacked with a paralytic stroke, and for a considerable time past had been unable to execute the active duties of his office.
Mr. Broughamsaid, that with respect to the stress said to be laid upon the circumstance of the young man being the nephew of a magistrate, he wished to remind the House that this was not the point particularly remarked upon: but the circumstance which had astonished him was, that this young man had taken the petition to the house of a magistrate, at which house it was demanded in vain. He was aware that Mr. T. Lyon the elder was afflicted with a lamentable distemper, but the House would do him the justice to remember, that he had expressly delayed to take any steps upon the subject until time should have been allowed for an answer to the accusation. A petition to this effect had now been presented; and it remained for the House to judge, whether it was or was not a sufficient reply to the charge which had been brought against him.
The Petition was then read, setting forth:
"That the petitioner hath learnt with great surprise that a petition hath been presented to the House, in which the names of the petitioner and of his relation Thomas Lyon the elder, esq., have been introduced as connected with a recent violation of the liberty of the subject in the town of Warrington, by the removal of a certain petition for parliamentary reform from the possession of the petitioning body, and as the object of those petitioners, although not positively expressed, appears to be to insinuate to the House, and the country at large, that the removal of the
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petition above mentioned took place under the direction and with the knowledge of the petitioner and of the said Thomas Lyon the elder, he humbly begs leave to lay before the House the true circumstances of the case, in order to repel the base, unfounded, and malevolent attack which has thus been made upon the characters of himself and his relation by the persons who have given so false a representation to the House; true it is that the petitioner had heard, for a few days previous to the 22d of January last, that a petition for parliamentary reform had been banded secretly about the town for signatures by some obscure individuals; and that, by various arts and false representations, many persons, including very young boys at school, had been induced to sign the same, but he indignantly disclaims for himself and his relation all communication or knowledge whatever, either direct or indirect, with any of the parties concerned in the offence complained of, except as hereafter detailed; about seven o'clock in the evening of Wednesday the 22d of January last, the petitioner was engaged in writing a letter in one of the parlours of his relation's dwelling-house in Warrington aforesaid, when a hue and cry was raised in the street adjacent; as the petitioner had a few weeks before been in-rolled and sworn a special constable for the town, he thought it his duty to hasten to the spot whence the alarm proceeded, and taking his staff' of office, he immediately left the room and ran out of the house; not many yards from the door, he saw several persons standing in the street, and, upon the petitioner's going up to them, he found that two of his neighbours, Edward Coates, of Warrington aforesaid, grocer, and Daniel Pollett, of the same place, pawnbroker, had got in their custody the person against whom the cry had been raised, that he knew the man to be Richard Burrows, a person of extremely good character, to the petitioner's knowledge, for many years past, and the petitioner expressed himself in terms of great concern that he (Burrows) should be apprehended under such circumstances, and took him into the house of the said Edward Coates for safe custody, and for the purpose of inquiring into the cause of his being pursued, which the said Richard Burrows, being almost breathless from his attempt to escape had been unable to inform him of; that soon after, going into Mr. Coates's house, the said Richard
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Burrows acknowledged that he had, by way of joke, carried off' the petition for parliamentary reform which had been handing about for signatures, and that he produced two rolls of parchment from his pocket, and delivered them to the petitioner; that the petitioner was at a loss how to demean himself towards the said Richard Burrows on this discovery, but believing, from his previous knowledge of the man, that he had no intention to act criminally, and that he would be forthcoming to answer the charge when inquired into in a legitimate manner, he ventured to permit Burrows to go at large, on his undertaking to appear whenever the parties interested might call upon him to answer for his conduct; that the petitioner did certainly receive the petition into his custody, and he admits that a letter, signed by one Roger Gaskell, was left at his relation's dwelling-house, requiring him to deliver up the petition to him, but that, being advised that he was not the competent authority by whom the petitioner could be called upon, and being afterwards requested by divers persons who had inadvertently signed the said petition to erase their names thereout, he did not comply with either of the requests, but kept the same, in the expectation that the matter would undergo a proper investigation before a magistrate, or other competent tribunal, to whom he has always been ready and desirous of delivering up the same; that the connecting the name of his relation with the petitioner's share in this transaction (as if he had at all interfered therewith) can only be attributed to the vile and malevolent' minds of the petitioners, when the House is informed that it is notorious to them, and the town at large, that for more than ten months past Mr. Thomas Lyon the elder has been labouring under severe bodily infirmity, which has prevented his attending to any business whatever during that period; that, in adopting the above line of conduct, the petitioner had no conception whatever that he should incur the displeasure of the House as committing a breach of its privileges, for which he hath always felt the highest veneration and respect, being conscious that he was actuated by no other motive than a strict sense of what he considered to be his duty as a special constable, and he confidently trusts that the House will dismiss from their minds the aspersions which have been malignantly cast on himself and his venerable relation,

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against the latter of whom the breath of calumny hath never before been raised, during a course of more than thirty years service as a magistrate and protector of the public peace of the country."
On the motion, that the petition do lie on the table,
Mr. Broughamsaid, he thought that the attack which had been made by the petitioner upon those who in the mildest way had brought forward the accusation was entirely unjustifiable. He trusted the House would observe the great nicety of the petitioner's conscience, who had been afraid to give the petition back to its right owners, though they had made a formal demand of it. The petitioner must have been well aware that the petition which he withheld was property of that description, that unless it were given back immediately, it would be of very little value to its former possessors. He left it to the judgment of the House, whether the conduct of the hon. members who brought the complaint before the House, deserved the epithets contained in the petition, of "base, malevolent, unfounded, and false."
Lord Stanley, not having been present when this subject was brought before the House the other evening, wished to say a few words upon it. He had thought it his duty to inquire into the circumstances of the transaction, and the character of the gentleman who had been implicated in it; and it was but due to that gentleman to state, that every thing which he had heard of his character was highly honourable to him. Whether or not, in the present instance, he had acted with propriety, he was rather inclined to doubt. Certainly he had had nothing to do with the transaction until he heard the cry of "stop thief!" He then ran into the street, and seeing in custody a person whom he knew to be a perfectly honest and industrious man, he took him into the house, when the man immediately told him what had happened, and gave the petition into his hands. So far all was right; but he did not think Mr. Lyon justified in withholding the petition from those from whom it had been taken, and retaining it in his possession. As those persons had followed the party into the room, it would appear that the natural course for Mr. Lyon to have taken was to return the petition to them immediately. This, however, he omitted to do. He concurred with his hon. and learned friend, that the petition became of no value unless re-
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turned at the moment. Looking, therefore, at all the circumstances of the case, he certainly thought the conduct of this gentleman had been injudicious and improper. He would not apply to it any stronger terms of disapprobation, because he was persuaded that it arose solely from an error of judgment.
Mr. W. Bootleallowed that Mr. Lyon had not exercised a sound judgment in the affair, but denied that any other imputation whatever could rest upon him.
Mr. Wynncensured Mr. Lyon's conduct as injudicious and improper. What was the duty of a constable under such circumstances? Had he considered the act a theft, he ought to have taken the thief and the property before a magistrate. Had he considered it a joke, he ought to have returned the property to its owners. The petitioner, however, did not say a single word of having returned, or of intending to return to the owners the petition which had been carried off. In fact, the very tone of his address to the House was censurable, for it was not a tone of contrition, as it ought to have been, but of justification exclusively.
Sir F. Burdettasked, whether or not the petition which had been run away with, had been given back to the owners?
Mr. W. Bootlereplied, that he knew nothing further of the business than was comprehended in the statement made by the petitioner. The object of the petition was to show that he had no intention to deprive any of his majesty's subjects of any part of their privileges.
Sir C. Monckobserved, that there appeared to be a determination on the part of the petitioner to continue that detention which, whether a joke or otherwise, was, in the first instance, an unwarrantable act.
The petition was ordered to lie on the table.

COURT OF KING'S BENCH.
Mr. Casberdrose, in consequence of his notice, to move for leave to bring in a bill to facilitate the progress of business in the court of King's-bench, in Westminster-hall. The present means of transacting the particular business to which his motion referred, were wholly insufficient. Redress of the evil could be obtained only by adopting one of two courses: either by an internal arrangement in the court itself, or by a different distribution of the business. The sort of business transacted in the court

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might be considered in one of two points of view: either as formal, or as substantial. A priori, it would appear, that the formal business ought to be made to yield to the substantial. The reverse, however, happened to be the case. The putting in and justification of bail, as a matter of necessity, must precede every other business. The hon. and learned gentleman here explained the way in which this took place. The accumulation however of this business delayed, he said, the other proceedings of the court. Without going out of his way to bestow a panegyric on the learned judges of that court, for their anxiety to do all in their power to facilitate the business of the court, he would say, that they had done every thing they could to remedy this particular evil. They had allotted a period out of the vacation, in order to bring up the arrears of the preceding term. This, however, proved an inadequate and an inconvenient proceeding. Inconvenient, as it required the attendance of persons who at that time were wanted elsewhere; inadequate, as no judgment could be given until the ensuing term. Some more efficient remedy was therefore desirable; and that which he wished to propose, appeared to him to be both simple and unobjectionable. He proposed that it should be made competent to one of the judges of that court to sit apart for the purpose of receiving justification of bail: and that during the interval in which he was so engaged, it should be competent to the other judges of the court to sit in banco, and proceed as usual. At present, it was true, that one judge sat in the court to receive justification of bail, but he was considered by the law as the representative of the whole court; and although the other three judges came down to Westminster-hall, they remained during that period in their own room in inactivity and suspense. He was not one of those who thought that the legislature ought to be called on to interfere on trifling occasions. But this was a serious evil. It was one too which was rapidly increasing. In the last twenty years, the justifications of bail had increased threefold in number. In 1795, they were only 700; in the last year they amounted to between two and three thousand; and were any alteration to be made in the insolvent act, that number would in all probability be still further augmented. It was therefore a serious and a permanent evil; loudly calling for a legislative re-
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medy. If he were asked, if the plan which he had just suggested was the best that in his opinion he could suggest, he was free to admit that he should reply in the negative. Were it not for a consideration which he would presently mention, he would have taken the liberty of recommending, that a power should be vested in the court either to set one of the judges apart in the way he had described, or to appoint a commissioner to receive justifications of bail in the place in which the judges now sat. To this, however, he was aware that an objection would lie. A commissioner so appointed must of course have a salary; and as the expense of that salary must mediately or immediately be defrayed by taxation, it might be said that the present were not times in which it would be wise to increase the public burthens. He might be asked, why he confined his proposition to the court of King's-bench, and why he did not extend it to the courts of Common Pleas and Exchequer. To this he would answer, that he wished clearly to see his way in any measure that he ventured to propose to the House. With the practice of the court of King's-bench experience had rendered him familiar. He knew that the evil there was grievous, and required immediate remedy. Of the practice in the courts of Common Pleas and Exchequer he did not profess to know so much; but he did not believe that the evil was so severely felt, especially in the latter court. If, however, it should appear advisable, it would be very easy to include those courts in the provisions of any act which parliament might think proper to pass on the subject. The hon. and learned gentleman concluded by moving, "That leave be given to bring in a bill, to facilitate the progress of business in the court of King's-bench, in Westminster-hall."
Mr. Lockhartallowed the magnitude of the evil which had been described by the hon. and learned gentleman. He doubted, however, whether it was advisable to make the decisions of the court of King's-bench legal, when only three of the judges were sitting. Our ancestors had felt the importance and value of ordaining that there should be four judges in every one of the three courts of law. The hon. and learned gentleman, however, proposed to ratify, by a legislative provision, the absence of one judge. Cases, however, might frequently arise, in which the presence of four judges would be of great consequence

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to the liberty and property of the subject. At present, when two of the judges disagreed with the other two, no judgment was given. There might be cases of great importance, in which, by the proposition of the hon. and learned gentleman, the decision would be thrown into the hands of two of the judges, when it would be extremely desirable that it should remain in those of the whole four. In his opinion, therefore, the appointment of a commissioner would be the preferable mode of remedying the evil; and the expense of such an appointment could not by any means be weighed in the scale with the benefits that would be derived from leaving all the four judges on the bench.
Leave was given to bring in the bill.