BILL OF PAINS AND PENALTIES. (Hansard, 18 September 1820)

§ Mr. Brogden
brought up the Report of the Committee appointed to inspect the Lords Journals, with relation to the present state of any proceedings had respecting the Bill of Pains and Penalties against her Majesty. The report having been read,

§ Mr. Hume
asked, whether the noble lord had received any communication as to the probable extent of the defence for the Queen, or what time it was likely to occupy? Because, if the noble lord had had no such information, he might be proposing to assemble the House to no purpose, but merely that of a further adjournment.

Lord Castlereagh
observed, that he wished the House to be left open for the exercise of its own discretion as to the period of any farther adjournment. If the bill of Pains and Penalties should be brought down from the other House, it was his present intention to move a further adjournment to the 5th or 10th of November, and that the House should be then called over.

§ Mr. Hume
repeated, that the more distant period would be the more advisable, because it would be more certain.

Lord Castlereagh
still thought a previous meeting advisable to fix the precise time of taking the discussion which they could on the 17th better determine than now. This was a proceeding of too much delicacy to be left standing over; they ought, therefore, to watch its progress, and then determine, should the bill come before them, the earliest possible time when they could devote themselves to it.

Sir Gerard Noel
could not think what the noble lord meant when he talked of delicacy in this business. Surely he did not mean to say that his majesty's ministers had treated the House with delicacy. On the contrary they had treated the House' just as a huntsman did a pack of hounds—they turned them out, and whipped them in, just as they wanted them.

Lord Francis Osborne
begged for some explanation from the noble lord opposite 107 on the subject of the separation of the divorce part of the bill, which had been alluded to by a noble earl (Liverpool) in the other House. It was intimated in the place to which he alluded, that the divorce clause would be abandoned if any religious feeling pervaded the country upon that part of the bill. He was anxious for some explanation of the intention of ministers upon that point. At present, he was quite at a loss to understand the course they meant to pursue. He could perfectly understand the degradation of the Queen now, for acts done when she was princess of Wales so long as her case was within the sphere of the statute of Edward 3rd; but, the moment she was taken out of the operation of that statute, her acts were no longer, strictly speaking, those of the princess of Wales, she became reduced to the level of an ordinary woman. How, then, could the acts of a person placed under such circumstances be said to affect her character as Queen? Suppose, for the sake of argument, that a princess of Wales had been guilty of a thousand acts of levity, it did not therefore follow that she would not make a good queen. How many kings had there not been who had departed from the line of conduct they pursued in the earlier period when they were princes? Take, for instance, the example of Henry 5th, and of others whose names were to be found in history. In his opinion, if the princess of Wales was once taken out of the statute of Edward, she became reduced to the station of an ordinary woman and the acts then ascribed to her could not be said to degrade her as Queen. He thought it very important that the divorce point should be cleared up with as little delay as possible.

Lord Castlereagh
regretted his inability to enter into the legal construction of the statute of Edward with the noble lord, but he thought it obvious that the bill, as at present framed, had two purposes—the one affecting her majesty's rights as Queen and the other enacting a divorce. What he understood his noble friend (the earl of Liverpool) to have stated elsewhere was this—that there was no intention whatever of acting in opposition to any religious feeling which might be excited; and that the part of the bill which went to the divorce need not be pressed, as the measure was disclaimed for the purpose of affording any personal remedy. Upon public and not upon personal grounds its 108 necessity was to be considered. In the present stage of the proceedings elsewhere, it was obviously impossible for him to give the noble lord the explanation he required. There was no person competent indeed to give it as the bill was entirely open for consideration in the other House of Parliament.