upon; but Cromwell took the island, and sent Lord Willoughby away. After the restoration, when the plantations in Barbadoes had become very valuable by the increase of wealthy settlers, a controversy arose between Lord Willoughby, those settlers, and the creditors of the late Earl of Carlisle, respecting their various rights. This controversy came before the King, upon petitions which were heard at the Council Board, His Majesty being present three or four days himself. It was at length referred to a committee, of which Lord Clarendon was a member; and the parties interested were heard by their counsel before it on the whole case. According to the opinions of the Law Officers of the Crown, taken by the committee, the grants were void; but the King refused, by the advice of the Council, to resume the island, declaring "that he would make no other use of avoiding the grants, than to dispose of the profits of the plantations to those who, in justice, had any pretence, in law or equity, to receive the same; as it was not thought a seasonable time to discourage the planters, when this nation was so active and industrious in foreign plantations, and when they had so long recognised the patent."

So Lord Willoughby was appointed to the government, to be paid by the inhabitants in possession of the soil. The creditors were to receive a moiety of the profits. The inhabitants were to have titles in fee simple, and the heir of the grantee was to be provided for.

These particulars appearing reasonable to the Lords, all persons concerned were called, and the same being communicated to them, they appeared well contented. Thereupon the Lords resolved to present the same to His Majesty, who made a final order in the matter accordingly.* Now-a-days, civil war, as at the Cape, and massacre, as in New Zealand, scarcely bring about a settlement of such colonial land titles!

SECTION 19.

The Plantation Committee of 1670.

Charles II., by the advice of Lord Clarendon and Sir William Temple, formed a plantation committee of the Privy Council; and out of this arose a regular practice of settling colonial cases of every kind at the Privy Council in the last resort. The instructions on founding this committee are important, although forgotten during many years, and they will be abstracted in the Appendix.

* Lord Clarendon's Tracts, p. 25, and Carribbeana.

A lively account of its first sittings may be read in Evelyn's Memoirs, vol. iii.*

Shortly afterwards, Charles II., when establishing the Privy Council, also, on a more liberal footing, declared, that to govern by the constant advice of such a Council, together with the Parliament, was the ancient constitution.

SECTION 20.

The Plantation Bill of 1696, and Annual Reports to Parliament on Plantation Affairs.

After the revolution of 1688, it was atteinpted to establish this system by an express statute, which the jealousy of the court defeated; but during several years, annual reports of all colonial affairs were regularly laid before Parliament.

SECTION 21.

Plantation Appeals.

The general system of bringing colonial cases, both on appeal and otherwise, before the Privy Council, continued unchanged until the American war; and during all this time, the hearing of those cases upon petitions to the Crown was regular, either with, or without, the interposition of Parliament. In those, great objections were made by the colonists to the character of the Council-board; but such as it was, access to it does not appear ever to have been refused, as now.

SECTION 22.

The General Principle upon which Claims on the Crown are Settled on
Petition to the Sovereign.

In principle, these colonies' cases stood on the same grounds as the cases of parties who have claims upon the Crown for debts or other claims arising upon affairs at home. That principle is settled in the famous case of the Bankers, begun in the time of Charles II., and ending by a compromise. This case produced an argument by Lord Keeper Somers, which seems to remove all doubt on the great point of the right of a hearing by the claimant of money from the Crown, recoverable only by petition to the person of the sovereign. The principle of that case is the stronger, in regard to places, and other benefits which depend upon the royal grace. To the objection, that such a remedy for justice. was precarious, and, therefore, not good in law, Lord Somers replied,

The articles of these instructions concerning native tribes were called for by a vote of the House of Commons, in 1834, but they were not produced.

"It is not to be said, that on the method, where the application is to be made to the person of the king, the condition of the subject is precarious : for this is to suppose, what is not to be supposed in law. It is a supposition contrary to the principles upon which the English constitution is framed, which depends upon the honour and justice of the Crown."

Numerous cases heard at the Privy Council, from the earliest periods, prove, that Lord Somers' vindication of the constitution was well founded in law; and those cases show, that an appeal lies by right from all departments of the State to the Crown, for the correction of error or malice. The difficulty is to get law respected, and right done.

Whenever appeals were not readily admitted by the authorities, parties habitually resorted to Parliament for aid; of which some cases will be found in the Appendix, with proofs that aliens, as recognised by Edward VI., continued to be heard, as well as British-born subjects.

SECTION 23.

Change of System after 1776.

The proceedings were satisfactory on this head, although not on others, until the American war, when a new system of colonial government arose. The Board of Plantations was abolished, and gradually the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies took its present form. For many years, it followed the principles of its precursor-the Board of Plantations, and in particular, it was provided, like that Board, with a law adviser, who has, for some years past, been withdrawn, to the great injury of the public service, and of private interests. (See Appendix, No. 12.) ·

SECTION 24.

Despotism lately introduced into Colonial and Indian Affairs.

This great evil has arisen from the prevalence of despotic principles of late in our colonial government generally, which now share the despotism fostered in the last century in the administration of Indian affairs, as if they could not be conducted upon principles of freedom.

Hence, the Privy Council is habitually closed both to Colonial and Indian complainants of official wrougs.

SECTION 25.

Indian Cases. The Deccan Prize-money.

Recent Indian cases have brought fully forward the new pretensions of the respective departments of the executive government, to be entrusted

* State Trials, vol. xiv., p. 105,

with irresponsible authority, and exhibit in a strong light, the extreme inconvenience of these new pretensions.

The case of the army of the Deccan, and that of Elphinstone v. Bedreechund, both arising out of the Pindaree and Mahratta wars of 1817 and 1818, show, the first, how easy it is to overturn good old principles; and the second, how important it is to establish those old principles, by better sanctions, rather than to let them be thus unreasonably overturned.

In the case of the army of the Deccan, the Lords of the Treasury had, in 1823, solemnly settled certain claims to prize-money made in that war, and a warrant, under the sign-manual, was accordingly issued for its distribution by two trustees. The trustees discovered what they thought was a fundamental error, and a plain act of injustice in the decision of the Lords of the Treasury, who, in 1826, adopted that correction, and a fresh warrant was issued by the king for the distribution of the prize-money, according to the opinions, thus approved, of the

trustees.

After much correspondence, the parties to be benefited, under the order of distribution of 1833, and injured, as they alleged, by the new distribution, petitioned the king for a hearing of the case in the Privy Council, to which the official reply, in 1828, was, that "his Majesty had been advised not to revoke his warrant, or to allow of an appeal to the Privy Council."-(2 Knapp, 118.)

Four years afterwards, the Privy Council took the case into consideration, under an order of reference from his Majesty to hear, but the Board declining to enter into the merits, advised the Crown to refer it again to the Lords of the Treasury to do so.

It was agreed, that the subject matter of the appeal was not cognizable by any court of law or equity; the only point of difference being, as to the propriety of the Privy Council exercising a controlling judgment, in the nature of an appeal over decisions of the Lords of the Treasury, upon a petition to the Crown.

The petitioners showed, that direct authorities supported their claim to the hearing asked for, and that it was consistent with the established principle of the highest acts of the Crown being open to correction on the ground of error, as well as borne out by the ancient history of the constitution.

The advocates of the irresponsibility of the Lords of the Treasury denied that any precedent could be produced of a revision of their lord

The Case of Buenos Ayres, 1 Dodson's Reports 29-The Toulon Case, and the Seringapatam Case.

ship's acts by the Privy Council, and extended their doctrine to a denial of its right" to sit as a Court of Appeal from all the departments of the state."-(2 Knapp 155.) They forgot, that in the earliest stages of this very case, Lord Liverpool, when First Lord of the Treasury, readily acquiesced in the desire of one of the parties, that the judgment of the Privy Council should be taken on the subject-(ib. p. 113.); and to good authorities they opposed mere assertions, and rhetorical flourishes.

SECTION 26.

The Case of Elphinstone and Bedreechund.

In the case of Elphinstone v. Bedreechund, the judges in Bombay had condemned an act of one of the authorities in the same war; but the Privy Council held on an appeal against that decision, that the Indian Court had no jurisdiction in the case. A strong feeling was excited for the injured party, and the failure of justice in a flagrant case, must have aggravated the natural discontent of the conquered. Lord Tenterden, who decided the case, stated, that application for redress should have been to the Crown; but his lordship did not add, that to the applicant in India to the British Crown for justice, it is an indispensable condition, that the complainant be sure of a hearing, and that, unless we take measures to ensure a hearing, as a matter of course, our victims will die in despair and misery, under the denial of justice, or resort to the wild justice, revenge.

SECTION 27.

The Case of the Rajah of Sattara.

Thus, the Rajah of Sattara is now sinking into a premature grave, from which a hearing would save him.

wants.

In 1839 the Rajah of Sattara was dethroned by Sir James Carnac, the Governor of Bombay. Besides being dethroned, he was banished to a distance of 700 miles from his principality. His Highness was stripped of all his private property, and has ever since been living in exile, as a state prisoner, upon an allowance wholly inadequate to his Three charges have been brought against him by the East India Company and their servants. Of the tenor of the first charge, the Rajah was made aware in 1836, but on asking for copies of the evidence, they were denied, on the ground, that the inquiry had been SECRET, AND THE EVIDENCE ALSO. With regard to the other two, which were brought forward in 1838, the Rajah to this hour has never been officially informed of their existence, still less made ac