§
Against Report of Committee for Privileges.
DISSENTIENT—1. Because it has been repeatedly laid down in the Writings of the highest legal authorities that the Crown possesses the right of creating Peers for Life, and this right has been expressly recognised by Committees appointed by the House of Lords in 1817 and the following years, to inquire into the dignity of a Peer, the Reports of these Committees having been printed when presented, and afterwards reprinted by Order of the House, and having remained unquestioned for upwards of thirty years.
2. Because the right of the Crown to grant Peerages for Life which has been thus declared and recognised, has been actually exercised up to a comparatively recent period, several Patents creating Peerages for Life having been granted to women since the beginning of the last century, while it has not been shown that the validity of
1310
such Patents depended on the sex of the persons on whom Peerages were conferred.
3. Because in the face of such authorities and precedents it appears to me impossible to assume that the power legally and constitutionally vested in the Crown has been exceeded by the grant of a Peerage for Life to Lord Wensleydale, and the consequent issue to him of a Writ of Summons to the House of Lords.
4. Because little attempt was made in Debate to disprove the legality of the act of the Crown, the principal stress having been laid on arguments tending to show rather an improper exercise, than an illegal assumption, of power by the Crown, and these arguments, if admitted to their full extent, would only lead to the conclusion that the Ministers, who have advised a wrong use of the Royal Prerogative, are deserving of censure, but could afford no ground for excluding Lord Wensleydale from the House of Lords.
5. Because the Resolution come to by the House of Lords to prevent Lord Wensleydale from taking the seat in the House to which he has been called by Her Majesty's Letters Patent and Writ of Summons, appears to me for the above reasons to be an unconstitutional invasion of the Rights and Prerogatives of the Crown which may hereafter become a Precedent for proceedings still more dangerous and unjustifiable.
GREY,
DEVON.