§ The following Protest was entered upon the Journals:
§ "Dissentient, 1st, Because we are fully satisfied that the removal of the unmerited and degrading exclusion to which a most numerous and valuable part of the community have been so long subjected, and the imparting to the whole people of this united kingdom all the privileges and duties of the British constitution, would be a measure of unquestionable justice and wisdom.—2d, Because we conceive that this determination would in itself afford the best security for our civil and religious 696 constitution, whilst the proposal of considering the subject in a committee of the whole house, gave an opportunity of establishing, by the wisdom and authority of parliament, and with the cordial concurrence of all parties, such safeguards as must tranquillize the apprehensions of the most fearful, and allay the jealousies of the most suspicious.—3d, Because, although the increased support and diminished resistance which this proposal has now experienced in both houses of parliament, as well as the manner in which it has been discussed on the part of its opponents, encourage us to look with perfect confidence to its approaching and entire accomplishment, yet we are of opinion that by delay many of its happiest effects are endangered; and we are confident that there never was in the history of the world a moment in which a measure, in itself desirable, was more imperiously called for by circumstances of immediate and uncontroulable necessity.—The uniting, by mutual liberality, kindness, and confidence, the hands and hearts of all his majesty's subjects in defence of the invaluable blessings of security, liberty, and national independence, is, at this perilous crisis, the first duty that we owe to ourselves and to our posterity; and it is the only mode by which we can reasonably hope, under the protection of Providence, to maintain these blessings amidst the misery and subjection of so many surrounding nations. (Signed) Spencer, Shaftsbury, Mendip, Jersey, Fortescue, Suffolk and Berks, Nugent, Buckingham, Bedford, Donoughmore, Ponsonby, Rosslyn, Rawdon, (earl of Moira) for the first and second reasons; Ponsonby, of Imo-killy, Essex, Hutchinson, Lauderdale, Norfolk, (earl marshal), St. John, Vassal Holland, Grenville, Cowper, Stafford, for the I first and second reasons; Spencer of Wormleighton (Marquis of Blandford), Oxford and Mortimer, Wentworth Fitzwilliam, Cawdor, Argyll."
§ "Dissentient; Because the fitness of yielding to, or resisting, in the whole, or in part, the prayer of the petition, so respectfully submitted to the consideration of the house, depended upon principles so momentous, and details so complicated, as, according to the ancient practice of parliament, should have been referred to the more deliberate consideration of a committee. And because the petition having proceeded spontaneously from the catholics of Ireland, supported by large 697 bodies of their p rotes tan t brethren, and sanctioned by that liberal and indulgent policy regarding them which has so remarkably characterised his majesty's reign, it was most especially entitled to our favourable consideration. (Signed) Erskine, Norfolk, (earl marshal), Spencer of Wormleighton."