HC Deb 18 July 1907 vol 178 cc929-30
MR. MARKHAM (Nottinghamshire, Mansfield)

I beg to ask the Prime Minister will His Majesty's Government agree to have printed and distributed the articles of impeachment on which this House impeached the Earl of Oxford in 1715 for recommending the creation of twelve Peers, and also the Reports. made from time to time to this House during his consequent two years imprisonment in the Tower.

THE PRIME MINISTER AND FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Sir H. CAMPBELL - BANNERMAN, Stirling Burghs)

This is an historical inquiry the facts of which can be discovered by any one who has the time to explore the records of the times in which impeachments and executions were freely resorted to. My hon. friend is not quite accurate in saying that the Earl of Oxford was impeached for recommending the creation of Peers. He was impeached on many other counts more serious than this. The creation of Peers was the sixteenth count in the indictment. I presume that my hon. friend does not desire to revive that method of controlling the Government of the country, and I think we had better leave the documents to the historian and the archaeologist.

MR. MARKHAM

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that The Times was not published in 1715 and that the Earl of Oxford was impeached on a charge of misdemeanour, which was not proceeded with, and that the sentence of two years imprisonment was for having recommended corruptly and improperly to the other House the making of new Peers?

SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN

I have not bestowed so much time on the matter as my hon. friend apparently has, but I have examined cursorily the documents, and I do not find that there is any imputation of corrupt creation of Peers. The impeachment turns on at least fifteen other counts as well as this, and it is not, therefore, exactly a case in point.

MR. SWIFT MACNEILL

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the precedent in which the Duke of Buckingham was impeached for selling a Peerage for £10,000 to a gentleman named Lord Roberts? A most interesting case.

SIR H. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN

One archaeologist after another comes before me with interesting cases, but I do not think they will affect my estimate of the circumstances of the present day.