§ MR. RITCHIEasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been called to the slur cast upon the body of licensed victuallers by a refusal on the part of Mr. Lushington, one of the magistrates at the Thames Police Court, to accept a member of that trade as security for a person bound over to keep the peace, not because he doubted the solvency of the publican, but because he made it a rule never to accept a publican as security for a person bound over to keep the peace; and, whether such a ground of refusal was justifiable in Law?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT, in reply, said, that, in his view of the case, the magistrate's discretion was confined to the amount of bail, and to the sufficiency of the security offered, and, therefore, a person who offered sufficient security could not be refused, on the ground of the particular nature of his employment. He would communicate to the magistrate that view, which was the view of the chief magistrates of the United Kingdom, and he had no doubt it would be acted on.