TO THE COUNCIL OF THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING THE AMENDMENT OF THE LAW, This Report SPEECH OF THEIR PRESIDENT IS INSCRIBED. CONSOLIDATION OF THE CRIMINAL LA W. In rising to address your Lordships on the measure which stands in the orders this evening, and for the discussion of which you have been summoned, I cannot avoid feeling much anxiety and some apprehension, when I contemplate the very great importance of the subject-matter I am about to bring before you, much more, at least, than when I contemplate any difficulties which may be said to surround the question itself. I have this to state in extenuation of the offence of putting myself forward to bring on the discussion of the subject, that I do so most reluctantly; for, as my Noble and Learned Friend on the Woolsack knows, I have withheld myself from it, have expressed my unfeigned reluctance to grapple with it, and done all I could to prevail on my Noble and Learned Friend, with his more ample experience, with his greater capacity, and, above all, with his more powerful influence in the Government, in the country, and in the profession of which he is at the head, to B decide that he (Lord Lyndhurst) should rather take the question up than leave it in my hands. I have no reason to think that my Noble and Learned Friend is averse to the proposition with which I am about to conclude; I have no reason to apprehend any opposition from the Government; I have no reason to expect any opposition from my Noble Friends near me, but I should infinitely rather have preferred that the measure had been supported by the talents, and backed by the authority of my Noble and Learned Friend on the Woolsack. For the purpose of acquiring that support, I postponed introducing the Bill until the very eve of the Easter recess; I then presented it without any statement; but the time is now come when I must either abandon the measure altogether for the session, or, according to the practice of your Lordships' House, proceed with it as I am now doing, offering, at the same time, the arguments I am about to open to your Lordships. The measure originated in the seven reports of the Common Law Commissioners, who sat under a commission which was issued whilst I held the Great Seal, and which empowered the learned and eminent persons named in it, to take a view of the whole of the Criminal Law, in order to the mitigation of its severity, its more complete publication, its more sure enforcement, and, above all, to digest it into an uniform code. To the manner in which these learned persons have discharged the task im |