CHAPTER IV.
GEORGE III. 1771-1773
Re-opening of Parliament..... Proceedings against Shoreham..... Resolutions respecting the Publication of Debates..... Committal of the Lord Mayor and Alderman Oliver to the Tower..... Contest between the City and Legislature..... The question of the Middlesex Election..... The question of the Dissolution of Parliament..... The Session closed..... Release of the Lord Mayor and Alderman Oliver..... Education of the Prince of Wales..... City Petition to the King..... Disputes in the City..... Meeting of Parliament..... Debates on Subscription to the Thirty- nine Articles..... ecclesiastical Nullum Tempus Bill..... The case of Dr. Nowell..... Test and Corporation Acts..... The Royal Marriage Act..... East India Affairs..... The Session closed..... Fate of the Queen of Denmark..... Death of the Princess Dowager of Wales..... Revolution in Sweden..... Partition of Poland..... Investigation of the Middlesex Election..... Changes in the Ministry..... The Meeting of Parliament..... East India Affairs.
A.D. 1771
RE-OPENING OF PARLIAMENT.
When the commons assembled on the 22nd of January, Lord North announced the happy termination of the dispute with Spain, and the intention of government to lay the convention which had just been signed before parliament. Lord Rochford imparted similar information to the lords: in both houses the question gave rise to warm discussion. In the lords the Duke of Manchester moved for all the information received by government touching the designs of Spain upon Falkland Island, and for all the papers passed during the negociations. Rochford moved an amendment, limiting the inquiry to the subject of Falkland Island, and Lord Sandwich moved another amendment, which the Duke of Richmond said would so narrow the motion as to deprive the house of all necessary information. These amendments were withdrawn, and the original motion of the Duke of Manchester agreed to; but even this did not satisfy the opposition. The Duke of Richmond next moved, in order to recommend this ignominious affair to further censure, that all the memorials or other papers which had passed between his majesty’s ministers and the ministers of the King of France, relating to the seizure of Falkland Island by the Spaniards, should be laid before the house. Rochford said that he knew of no such papers, which assertion was questioned by the Earl of Chatham, inasmuch as the interference of France in the matter was a fact that could not be denied. The house, he said, ought never to take the word of a minister, and that the refusal of this motion showed that some transaction with France had passed, though perhaps not papers or memorials. The motion was negatived; but the question gave rise to still further discussion in both houses, of which little is known; as on the great field-day in the lords, all strangers were rigidly excluded. The Earl of Chatham moved on that day, that the following two questions should be referred to the judges:—1. Whether, in law, the imperial crown of the realm can hold any territories or possessions otherwise than in sovereignty? 2. Whether the declaration or instrument for restitution of Port Egmont, to be made by the Catholic king to his majesty, under a reservation of a disputed right of sovereignty, expressed in the very declaration or instrument stipulating such restitution, can be accepted or carried into execution, without derogating from the maxim of law touching the inherent and essential dignity of the crown of Great Britain? This motion was negatived; and subsequently the Duke of Newcastle moved for an address to the king, in approbation of the convention, and of the wise and moderate measures which had been employed to procure it; which was carried by a large majority. So far as parliament was concerned, the question of Falkland Island was, by this motion, set at rest; but out of doors it long continued to be a matter of dispute. One party maintained that the possession of Port Egmont was of the utmost importance to England, and that by the secret article, which it was said existed in the convention, implying that after all we were to give it up, the national honour had been meanly sacrificed. The caustic Junius and other writers took this side of the question. Another party, however, at the head of whom Dr. Johnson may be reckoned, endeavoured to demonstrate that the whole group was worth little or nothing, and that it would have been absurd to go to war about them. Both parties adopted exaggerated language to prove their propositions; but whether they were of any real value or not, it behoved England, according to state maxims, to resent the conduct of Spain, in treacherously falling upon her colony at Port Egmont in times of peace. No argument, indeed, could justify such an invasion of the dignity of England’s crown and the rights of her subjects. But one thing seems certain arose from this affair; namely, that if the interests of the country were sacrificed by this convention, private individuals, at least, reaped great advantage therefrom. The sudden signing of it, when war was well nigh pronounced by the prime minister, gave rise to stockjobbing, and in the course of a few days large fortunes were made in Change-alley. This formed one of the most weighty charges brought by the opposition against ministers in the course of the debate. Colonel Barré, indeed, directly accused them of being implicated in these unworthy transactions. “A Frenchman,” said he, “being in your secrets, has made nearly half a million of money by jobbing in your funds; and some of the highest among yourselves have been deeply concerned in the same scandalous traffic.” In the course of the session this led to a bill for the more effectual prevention of stock-jobbing; but though it passed the commons, it does not appear to have obtained the notice of the lords.