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Royal affent had been given, by commiffion, to feveral public and private Bills.]

Mr. Jekyll proceeded. "At the moment that I was interrupted by the fummons to attend in the Upper House, I was endeavouring to conciliate the attention of Gentlemen, by ftating my conviction how much the fubject for their prefent confideration had been both privately and publicly difcuffed, and the neceflity which I thence felt of intruding upon their time as fhortly as poffible. In bringing forward this question, it may not be improper to declare that I ftand, both politically and perfonally, wholly unconnected with that Noble Perfon, whofe fate and reputation are involved in the discussion; difapproving even of a great part of his public conduct, and particularly lamenting his feceffion from that phalanx, to which, for a confiderable time past, I have looked as alone capable of effecting the falvation of the empire. When I confider that the question involves not only the character of the Noble. Lord, but is connected with confequences that tend to the difmemberment of the empire, I feel it to be my duty to bring forward the fubject to the moft ferious confideration of the House, and I trust they will feel they are called upon not only by their feelings of what is due to that Noble Perfonage, whofe conduct has been called in queftion, but by the ftrongest motives of patriotifm, and their regard to the moit effential interefts of the country, to enter upon the inquiry, which I fhall propofe to them to inftitute. I have always thought that the Public had an interest in watching over the characters of public men, and in vindicating them from infinuated abuse and unjust afperfion. Public character I regard as public property, ever to be held facred, till it has openly been forfeited; nor is the ftock of public character exifting among eminent individuals to be diminished, or frittered away by indirect attack, or configned to cenfure without inquiry. If we are to believe the affertion of the Noble Lord, his public character has been impeached by his recal from the high office which he held in the government of a neighbouring kingdom. And here I hope I am not to be told that the prerogative which empowers the Crown to dismiss its officers at difcretion, operates as a bar to any inquiry in the prefent inftance. I am disposed to subscribe to the just exercife of the prerogative on all proper occafions. But where the House fee a minifter ftretching the prerogative for particular purposes, and beyond ordinary bounds, I am aware that they are poffeffed of an inquifitorial power to examine into the grounds of fuch extraordinary and unwarranted exertion of an authority delegated by the conftitution, and, if they fhall find necefVOL. III.

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fary, to confine that prerogative within its fair and natural limits. It is particularly the bufinefs of the House to watch over the extenfion of Court influence to that fifter kingdom, whofe fituation forms the principal object of the prefent confideration. This jealoufy of Court influence is a conftitutional principle which ought to actuate the Legislature of both countries, and this vigilance to guard against its progress in either, a duty of reciprocal protection which they owe to one another. That on this fcore there is ground of serious alarm cannot be denied. Let the House only advert to a ques tion formerly brought forward by that great lawyer (Mr. Dunning), whofe feat I now unworthily fill, and adopted in a refolution, "That the influence of the Crown had increased, was increafing, and ought to be diminished." It will not furely be contended that the danger is lefs at prefent than it was at that former period.

Having faid fo much to the general principle, I fhall more particularly advert to the tranfaction which has given birth to the prefent difcuflion. And I think that it must be admitted that the recal of a Viceroy of Ireland by the Cabinet of this country, in the midst of a feflion, and at a time that he was acting with the full applaufe of those whom he was appointed to govern, and that addreffes from all quarters were heaped on his table, is prima facie tantamount to a charge of not doing his duty. On a former day, when the fubject was ftated by my Right Hon. Friend (Mr. Fox), though I then happened to be engaged in the country on a profeffional concern, I have understood that the Right Hon. Gentleman declared in his place, "That whenever the period came for inveftigation, he hould undertake to prove that no blame whatever attached to the minifters of this country for any fhare which they had in the tranfaction."-What was this but a charge by implication? Upon that day then it should feem that an inquiry was in the contemplation of the minifter, and if the blame of the tranfaction did not attach to minifters, it neceffarily must attach to Earl Fitzwilliam. It would indeed have been a more fair and manly mode of procedure if the Right Hon. Gentleman had come forward, and openly charged the Noble Lord with obftinacy and contumacy, with difobedience to the inftructions of the Cabinet here, or difregard to the interefts of the country which he was deputed to govern. It might perhaps however, better fuit the views of the Right Hon. Gentleman to whisper away the reputation of the Noble Lord, and to infinuate blame of his public conduct. It would well, however, become the Houfe to reflect that, if this procedure be countenanced, there is no public man whofe character is safe, or

whofe

whofe conduct may not by the artifice of a minifter be overwhelmed in difgrace or obloquy without the fmalleft chance of inquiry or vindication. This declaration then of the Right Hon. Gentleman," that no blame attached to the minifters of this country," I muft confider in every point of view as a charge against the Noble Lord. In this light it was con fidered by the Noble Lord himfelf, who, in a paper which is published with every proof of authenticity, gives a direct and complete negative to the charge. In this paper, which I shall quote as part of my fpeech, the Noble Eari reprefents, that, previous to his affuming the government of Ireland, the Duke of Portland, and the whole of the Cabinet, concurred with him in his opinion on the queftion of Catholic emancipation; and that, had he found it otherwife, he never would have undertaken the government of the fifter kingdom. Under this conviction he fets out and arrives in Ireland: He there finds it impoffible, both from the fituation of the country, and the opinion of the most refpectable individuals, to refift the immediate difcuffion of the queftion.-And here it is material to attend to dates. He writes two letters to the Noble Secretary of State, ftating to him what was the fituation of the country, and the mode of procedure which he fhould in confequence find himself compelled to adopt. Of neither of these letters was any notice taken, and the Noble Earl drew the conclufion which any rational man would have formed in the fame circumstances, from the filence of minifters. Four weeks were fuffered to elapfe before the Noble Earl received a letter from the Duke of Portland, putting a direct negative on the bufinefs. At last comes out the fens malorum; the Noble Earl had thought it neceffary as a measure of his government to difmifs from office the family of the Beresfords, who, whatever might be their claims in other refpects, were at least no favourites with the Public. And here I cannot help noticing a piece of conduct adopted by the Right Hon. Gentleman in the management of this bufinefs; the Duke of Portland is the perfon felected from the rest of the Cabinet, on this occafion, to wound the fame and the feelings of his friend. This is a refinement of cruelty, in which the Right Hon. Gentleman excels; it was not enough fimply to murder the reputation of the Noble Lord -the hand of a friend must be directed to plunge the dagger in his bofom. The Duke of Portland, connected with the Noble Earl by habits of early friendflip and old political connexion, -appeared to be the fittest inftrument of the cruel and infidious policy of the Right Hon. Gentleman. "Cruelly," fays the Noble Earl in the paper to which I have referred, "cruelly as the Duke of Portland has treated me, I feel no difficulty to

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fay, that his judgment was deceived before he abandoned me: On whatever ground he has fuffered himself to be induced to change his former opinions refpecting the politics of this country, and the characters and views of its principal perfonages, he did change thofe opinions; and, in confequence of that change alone, he has been driven to confent to the measure of my inftant recal." At laft the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself comes forward, and tears off the veil. In a letter addressed to Earl Fitzwilliam he tells him openly the grounds of his removal. He fays, "that on the fubject of arrangements, he felt himself bound to adhere to these fentiments, not only with refpect to Mr. Beresford, but to the line of conduct adopted in fo many inftances towards the former supporters of Government; by thefe fentiments he must, at all events, be guided from a regard to the King's service, and to his own honour, however fincerely he might lament the confequences which must arise from the prefent fituation.” Here the intereft of the Beresford family, and of the former fupporters of Government, is held out as the only ground of diffenfion; the queftion of the Catholic emancipation appears to be a mere stalking-horse affumed by minifters for the convenience of the occafion, while at the fame time every hireling paper on the fide of minifters was reprefenting the conduct of the Noble Earl on that queftion as a fource of the most serious alarm to minifters, and as pregnant with confequences the most mischievous to the country in which it was agitated; confequences which could only be obviated by the immediate removal of the Noble Perfon from office. All the while, fays Earl Fitzwilliam, it was the object of the Right Hon. Gentleman "not to ftrengthen Adninistration by an accession of character, but to debafe, degrade, and difgrace that character; he did not wish for our affiftance, but knowing the importance we gave to the fyftem then pursuing relative to France, he fnatched at the opportunity, and made that the means of dif gracing our character, and rendering us fit for no other service, but to be his vile tools and inftruments." If this turn out to be the fact, a scene of more grofs duplicity, of more scandalous dupery was never exhibited by an artful and intriguing minister in the most credulous or corrupt periods. Here then was a virtual charge, and a recrimination upon which to found an inquiry. But this is not all. In another place, to which the etiquette of Parliament does not allow me more particularly to allude, a Noble Perfon (Lord Weftmorland) condefcended graciously and gracefully to step forward, and diffolving all the regard which had been fo affectedly ached to the oath of fecrecy of a Cabinet minifter, faid that the Chancellor of the

Exchequer, whom he called by an ordinary and a coarser name (the plain appellation of Mr. Pitt), had affured him "That Earl Fitzwilliam had no authority whatever from minifters in this country for taking the fteps which he had done on the Catholic question:"-Nay, he went further, and said, "That they were fteps taken, not only without their authority, but even with their pofitive difapprobation." Mr. Ponsonby in the House of Commons in Ireland, broadly ftakes his reputation, "That all measures adopted with respect to the Catholic queftion under the adminiftration of Earl Fitzwilliam were taken with the previous concurrence of the Cabinet of this country." Here then we have the charge, the defence, and the recrimination, each contradicting the other. Under these circumstances, will the House decline to go into an inquiry, on a tranfaction which involves the public character of a diftinguished Nobleman, perhaps the difmemberment of the empire, and at any rate a great and important conftitutional queftion? Perhaps it was the intention of the Right Hon. Gentleman to degrade the character of public men in the eyes of the nation. It might be part of his fyftem to degrade all those with whom he acted. Where now are his original friends? The degradation of his new allies, he might confider as the beft fecurity for their future fupport. He might feel it to be his policy to degrade others, as it was only from the degradation of others, that he could himfelf poffefs pre-eminence. This fyftem he had in many inftances attempted to practife, though in all he had not been equally fuccessful. The public voice had reverfed the imperious decree, and attached to a removal from office, by that Right Hon. Gentleman, a fentiment very different from that of difgrace. Was the Duke of Leeds confidered as difgraced, when he was removed from his office of Secretary of State? Did any degradation attach to a Noble and Learned Lord who was difmiffed from the Woolfack, because he would not lend his hand. to a dirty job brought forward, I will not fay by what Member of Administration, in this Houfe? Was any prefumption of difgrace to be formed from the removal of the Duke of Richmond from the Board of Ordnance? Let another Right Honourable Gentleman (Mr. Windham) whom I have feen writhing and agonizing under his new friendships the whole of the feffion, which to a mind like his, the defertion of principles, and the facrifice of friendship, cannot but have rendered painful in the extreme, beware of the imputations which he may incur under a fimilar fate; it does not require the aid of prophecy to pronounce, that he will be the next victim of the infidious policy of the Right Hon. Gen

tleman.

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