In consequence of a petition lodged against one Hugh Roberts, the returning officer of Shoreham, the public were at this time startled by strange disclosures of corruption in the elections for that borough. A select committee was appointed, according to Grenville’s act, to determine a contested election, in which a candidate who had only thirty-seven votes had been declared duly elected, to the prejudice of a rival who had more than double that number. It appeared from the inquiry that the majority of the freeholders of this insignificant borough had formed themselves into an association, called “The Christian Club,” for the ostensible purpose of promoting the cause of piety and charity. This, however, only served as a cloak for venality and corruption. These associated “Christians,” sometimes performed a charitable act, in order to accredit their professions, but the bulk of the money which they received from their representatives found its way into their own pockets;—and this was no trifling sum. The borough was offered at elections to the highest bidder, and he who offered most was successful. In order to escape detection, the members of this club were bound to secrecy by solemn oaths, and by bonds with large penalties attached to them; and negociations with candidates were carried on by means of a select committee, who, under pretence of scruples of conscience, never voted themselves, but having sold the borough and received the money, directed the suffrages of the rest, and afterwards shared in the booty. Their hypocrisy, however, was brought to light by one in their own camp. At this election five candidates had offered themselves, and the secret committee were sent to treat with the bidders. The best offers were made by General Smith and Mr. Rumbold: the former offering £3000 in cash, and to build six hundred tons of shipping at Shoreham; and the latter offering £35 a man to all the freemen. The secret committee preferred Rumbold, but Roberts, the returning officer, preferred the General, and knowing that a large sum of money had been distributed among eighty-one of the majority, he considered them disqualified, and omitted them in his return. This formed the subject of the petition, and the facts being proved, a bill was brought in and carried, by which eighty-one freemen of Shoreham were disfranchised; and the Shoreham franchise was extended to all the freeholders of the neighbouring district, called the Rape of Bramber, who occupied tenements of the annual value of forty shillings. At the same time Roberts was reprimanded at the bar of the house by the speaker, for his assumption of illegal authority.
RESOLUTIONS RESPECTING THE PUBLICATION OF DEBATES.
Up to this period it had been held that to publish the debates of either house of parliament was a breach of privilege. The editors of periodicals had, indeed, endeavoured to evade the prohibition by publishing mutilated and occasionally invented speeches of honourable and noble lords, under fictitious names; but the people did not even obtain this doubtful information till after the discussion was over, and the matter in debate settled. The public, however, were now becoming more enlightened, and withal more curious, and these garbled and stale speeches did not satisfy them;—they longed for a full reporting newspaper, and the printers were encouraged by the general feeling to venture upon giving the proceedings in parliament from week to week, or from day to day, as they occurred. They were the more induced to take this step because the extent of the power of parliament to enforce this question of privilege had never been accurately defined. The letters of Junius, also, had a great effect in confirming them in their resolution: accordingly, during the Middlesex elections and the debates on the affairs of the Falkland Islands, the public were gratified with certain and immediate intelligence of what their representatives were doing. But this was not likely to be allowed by parliament without a struggle. The members of both houses had been strenuous in their endeavours to shut their doors in the face of the nation—to choke all attempts at publicity, and to seclude themselves as rigorously as a jury, and therefore the proprietors of these newly established papers, must have expected, sooner or later, to be disturbed in their occupations. On the 5th of February their anticipations were realized. Colonel George Onslow, now one of the lords of the treasury, denounced the insolence and wickedness of these proceedings, as tending to the destruction of all things to be venerated in our constitution; and, on the 26th of the same month, he moved:—“That it is an indignity to, and a breach of privilege of this house, for any person to presume to give in written or printed newspapers any account or minutes of debate, or other proceedings of this house, or any part thereof; and that upon discovery of the authors, printers, or publishers of any such written or printed newspaper, this house will proceed against the offenders with the utmost severity.” The motion was opposed by Alderman Trecothick, who wished every man to hear what passed in the house; and by Burke, who in the course of his speech declared, that so long as an interest existed out of doors to examine the proceedings of parliament, so long would men be found to do what these printers had already done. It was also argued that the privilege enjoyed by constituents of knowing what is said and done by their representatives, is founded on the true principles of the constitution, and that falsehood and misrepresentation ought to be punished in a different manner from that proposed, inasmuch as it went to make the house of commons a secret tribunal. Onslow’s motion, however, was carried, and two of the printers, Thompson and Wheble, were ordered to attend at the bar of the house. This order was not noticed, and the sergeant-at-arms was directed to take them into custody: they were not to be found; and another printer, Evans, who was ordered on the 1st of March to attend the house, treated the order with the same contempt. Colonel Onslow then moved for an address to the king, to issue a proclamation, offering a reward of fifty pounds for their apprehension, which was agreed to; and subsequently he denounced six more printers as guilty of the same enormities. Wheble was at length taken by another printer, and carried before Alderman Wilkes, who discharged him from custody, and made him enter into his own recognisance to prosecute the man who captured him at the Old Bailey sessions for false imprisonment or an illegal arrest. On the same day Thompson was also carried before Alderman Oliver, who followed the example of Wilkes, and discharged him. Four printers, out of the six last denounced by Onslow, attended at the bar of the house; a fifth [Woodfall] was already in custody in Newgate, by order of the house of lords, and the sixth, named Millar, refused to obey the summons. A messenger was sent to apprehend him, but Millar had a constable in readiness, and he gave the messenger into custody, and he was carried to Guildhall to answer for the assault. Wilkes, the sitting alderman, said he had finished the business of the day, and would not enter upon the case, and the messenger was then conveyed to the mansion-house. The lord mayor being indisposed, he was kept there for three hours, but in the evening, being attended by Wilkes and Oliver, he admitted the parties: the deputy sergeant-at-arms being also present. The printer having stated his complaint, the messenger was asked by what authority he had presumed to commit the assault? He produced his warrant, and the sergeant-at-arms then intimated that he was there by the speaker’s order, not only to release the messenger, but to take Millar into custody. The magistrates, however, represented that by the city charters no caption could be made, east of Temple-bar, without the authority of the lord mayor; and while they released Millar, they would have committed the messenger to prison, had not bail been given for his appearance to answer for the alleged assault.
COMMITTAL OF THE LORD MAYOR AND ALDERMAN OLIVER TO THE TOWER.
The above transactions were reported to the commons by the sergeant-at-arms, and orders were issued for the lord mayor to attend in his place, and his clerk to bring up the mansion-house minute-book, in which the proceedings had been entered. Alderman Oliver was likewise ordered to attend in his place, while Wilkes was directed to appear at the bar of the house. The two members obeyed the summons, and boldly justified their conduct; but though they were ably supported by many members in the house, and though the public emphatically displayed their approbation of their conduct, they were committed to the Tower. As for Wilkes he defied the government, refusing to attend unless in his seat as member for Middlesex. Three several times he was summoned to attend, but he would not listen to it under any other conditions, and nothing remained but compulsion, which the ministers were afraid of using. His majesty, indeed, is expressly said to have asserted, that he would have nothing to do with him, and he was left to act with impunity. This confessed weakness brought the cabinet into utter contempt, for though ministers resorted to the trick of adjournment with regard to his non-appearance, all men saw that it was fear alone which prevented them from taking him into custody. And that they had reason to fear there can be no question, for had any attempt been made to compel his appearance, it would have revived all the uproar of the election questions, and brought him forward with tenfold powers of mischief, as the champion of the mob: and, even as it was, ministers had brought themselves, by the proceedings against the printers, into no very enviable position. Riots and tumults in the avenues of the house were the order of the day, and the life of Lord North was on one occasion brought into imminent danger. On the day that the lord mayor was committed, indeed, the tumult was so violent that the house was obliged to stop business for some hours, and it was in vain that magistrates and constables endeavoured to restore peace: it was only through the speeches of some of the more popular members, who left the house on purpose to address them, that the minds of the chafed multitude became tranquil. It was thought that Lord North would now resign, and a report had been made to that effect, but he declared that though he wished for retirement, he entertained no such design; that nothing but the king or the mob, who were near destroying him, could remove him; and that he was determined to weather out the storm. He ungraciously charged the minority with hiring the mob to destroy him; upon which Burke’s brother, William, indignantly exclaimed, —“It is a falsehood, a most egregious falsehood; the minority are to a man persons of honour, who scorn such a resource. Such a charge could only emanate from a man hackneyed in indirect measures.”
CONTEST BETWEEN THE CITY AND LEGISLATURE.
Another occasion of contest between the city and legislature arose from the introduction of a bill for enclosing and embanking a part of the river Thames, adjoining to Durham-yard. The city considering that their rights were about to be invaded were heard by counsel. They produced a grant by Henry VII. of all the soil and bed of the river, from Staines bridge to a spot near the Medway, and likewise a lease granted by them of a nook of the river near Vauxhall, for which they had received rent upwards of sixty years. On the part of the legislature, a charter of Charles II. was produced, in which he had reserved the bed of the river, by the acceptation of which, it was argued, that the city had forfeited that granted by Henry VII. It was also contended that the charter of Henry only extended to that part of the river which was within the city, and the lease at Vauxhall was, therefore, an encroachment. These arguments prevailed, the bill was passed, and a pile of buildings, called the Adelphi, was erected on the site, and disposed of by lottery. The disposal of them in this manner was to eke out the ways and means, and this mode of procuring money called forth the indignant denunciations of Mr. Burke and Colonel Barré, who stigmatized it as an iniquitous project to bribe the servants of the public; a use to which lotteries had been previously applied.