§ Mr. Aglionbyrose to call the attention of the noble Lord (Lord Althorp) to the case of an individual convicted at Warwick by Mr. Justice Taunton of setting fire to one or more 1263 stacks. He did not expect any remission of the sentence, nor was he aware that the case called for the clemency of his Majesty. Under all the circumstances of the case, he trusted, that though the person to whom he referred had been sentenced to endure the last penalty of the law, his Majesty's Government would see the propriety of not giving full effect to a sentence pronounced under a state of the law which attempts had been so often made to amend. The principle of a mitigation of the law had been fully recognized and sanctioned by that vote of the House in obedience to which the Bill was read a second time. He now much regretted that he had ever consented to withdraw the Bill; but, certainly, when he did so, it was in the full hope, that all cases, arising at the present assizes would have been viewed with leniency by the executive authority. He admitted, that no direct intimation had been given on the subject by the noble Lord opposite, but the silence of Ministers certainly led him to indulge such a hope. Feeling as he did a very painful solicitude on this matter, he begged to entreat to it the attention of the noble Lord.
§ Lord Althorpreferred to the admission of the last speaker that Government had given no intimation as to what course they might think it proper to pursue with regard to such prisoners as might be tried and found guilty at the then ensuing assizes; he was clear in the opinion that nothing could be more unjust towards persons accused, or more injurious to society at large, than that the law should be rendered uncertain by any discussions that might take place in that House, and he had expressed himself to that effect in reference to the Bill to which the hon. and learned Gentleman had just been alluding. As to the possible effects of that Bill, the hon. and learned Gentleman might make himself perfectly easy, for, considering the time at which it passed its second reading, it was utterly impossible that it should be carried through both Houses, and receive the Royal assent in the present Session. The hon. Member seemed to take for granted, that if a Bill were read a second time, that proceeding on the part of the House amounted to a sanction of its principle; technically speaking, perhaps, that might be true, but in practice it was well known to hon. members that the House often gave a Bill a 1264 second reading, without, by any means, intending to assent to its principle. He could not help observing, that remarks, such as those of the hon. and learned Gentleman placed his Majesty's Government in a painful situation; but, however distressing to his feelings it might be, it was impossible for him to do otherwise than declare, that no consideration would lead him to be accessory to the practice of rendering the law uncertain by means of discussions arising in that House.
§ Mr. Humesaid, that the object of all punishment was prevention, and that the most effectual mode of securing that object was, by causing penalties to accord with the feelings of the people, so that there should be no reluctance to prosecute, and by rendering them certain, unfailing, and expeditious. He regretted much that the Bill just mentioned had not passed into a law.
§ Mr. Ewartobserved, that many petitions in favour of the Bill were presented in the course of the present Session from persons who had been sufferers from the offence the punishment for which it was the object of that Bill to mitigate.
§ Here the conversation dropped.