On the 31st Dowdeswell moved a question against excise, though without naming it, in the Committee on the Cider Bill, but it was thrown out by 172 to 152, seven of the minority being shut out when the question was putting: so near was the Court run by the minority, though without leaders, and frequently obstructed and distressed by the fluctuation of the family of Yorke, and the duplicity of Charles Townshend, who oftener spoke against than for them, and that generally when he had given the most solemn assurances of his support.
On Feb. 3rd, late in the day, Sir William Meredith moved for the evidence on which the Secretaries of State had granted the warrant against Wilkes. The Ministry complained of the lateness of the hour, and Rigby moved to adjourn. Charles Townshend attacked Grenville on it, and was even seconded by his brother, the General; but the adjournment was carried by 73 to 60.
On the 6th there was a good debate[423] on Wilkes’s complaint of breach of privilege, when Sir W. Meredith and Sir George Saville defended themselves against the imputation of want of candour, in having made their motion late in a thin House; the former proving that many violent questions had been proposed seven hours later than theirs had been. He moved for the warrant on which Wilkes had been apprehended, and for the information on which it had been grounded. To avoid the demand, Sir John Philipps moved the previous question, declaring that he meant to discharge the complaint. Lord Strange was at first for having the warrant produced; but soon retracted, and said the complaint ought to be discharged, as the suit was depending at common law—an argument that had been pressed on the Ministers when Wilkes’s expulsion was agitated, and which they then had refused to admit.
I have more than once, in the former part of these Memoirs, touched on the character of Lord Strange, as a man acting on notions of his own, unwedded to any faction, and above temptations of money. He had, however, been gained by Fox to the Court, in the present reign, by the offer of the post of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the county where his estate and interest lay. The large number of places in the disposal of that officer, could gratify his passion for sway in his own province; so true was the maxim of Sir Robert Walpole, that every man has his price; and so judiciously was this office held out to Lord Strange; for though he accepted the post on the views I have mentioned, he nobly refused to take the annexed salary of 1200l. a year. He seldom afterwards differed with the successive administrations, but rarely attended Parliament.
Sir William Meredith consented to waive his demand of the information, though Beckford protested that he himself had never, as a justice of peace, granted a warrant without information on oath. Norton pleaded, that to grant it would instruct the accuser, Wilkes, in the defence of the accused Secretaries and Under-Secretaries of State; but T. Townshend urged that it had already appeared in the Court of Common Pleas, and in the ordinary newspapers. George Grenville[424] said that producing the warrant would engage the House to pronounce on the legality or illegality of it. Would the House declare that any papers might be seized? Would it declare that none might? Sir Anthony Abdy,[425] a lawyer attached to the Duke of Devonshire, said, a sight of the warrant was demanded as much for the excuse of such members of the House as had been concerned in it, as for blame; and General Conway added, that if the information was the defence of Wood and the others, how would it hurt them? But, said he, this matter is treated as too high for our inspection. I thought I lived in a free country. We have already chosen to give up our own privilege, and now are afraid to inquire on what grounds it is taken from us.[426] Nugent, Morton, Elliot, Wilbraham, Dr. Hay, Wood himself, Lord Frederick Campbell, Forester, Oswald,[427] Ellis, Lord North, and Sir John Glynn, debated the question for the Court, besides those I have mentioned; on the other side, Hewet,[428] King’s Sergeant, Mawbey, Lord George Sackville, Dowdeswell, Fitzherbert, Dempster, Charles Townshend, and Onslow; but the previous question was carried by 217 to 122.
The next day the Cider Bill was compromised, and two shillings imposed instead of five.
On the 9th, the day appointed for considering the Marriage Bill, Charles Yorke opposed going into Committee, and said Sir John Glynn should have stated objections, and proposed amendments; wished to have a bill brought in for that purpose. He talked of the wisdom and temper with which it had been carried through before: the truth of which may be seen in my former account of that bill. Rigby was for going into the Committee, his patron the Duke of Bedford having been, and continuing to be, its warm adversary. Lord Strange ridiculed ecclesiastical law, and frankly spoke of marriage as only legal cohabitation. George Grenville stayed away, and Lord Holland’s friends were for repealing the bill. The Opposition, to court the Yorkes, were against altering it; but it was carried by 157 to 79, for a Committee to re-examine it. It was then proposed to go into the Committee on that day sevennight: Charles Yorke and General Townshend for the Monday sevennight after. Charles Townshend, who had shone so brightly against the original bill, kept away; but it was carried for the Wednesday, by 70 to 39.
On the 13th, the House of Commons entered seriously on the great question of breach of privilege on Wilkes’s complaint, and the first day sat till midnight, four hundred and fifty members being present. Sir William Meredith opened the debate with calling for the three messengers who had executed the warrant, and for Matthew Brown, Wilkes’s servant, who gave an account of what had passed when his master was seized. I shall not recapitulate these examinations, which may be found in the journals of the House; nor what was said by other witnesses. Their depositions lasted till nine at night. Philip Carteret Webbe then made his defence; and it was so scurvy, that he was reduced to plead inadvertence, and his being a servant of the Secretary of State. He even had the front to affirm, that there had been no intention of making Wilkes close prisoner. He then offered to produce his evidence, but, it being late, G. Grenville asked if they would proceed or not? Mr. Pitt said he thought they ought not to stop till they knew whether they still had a Constitution or not? Lord Frederick Campbell, supported by Rose Fuller and General Townshend, moved to adjourn. Thomas Townshend the younger urged that the House had voted the expulsion of a member at four o’clock in the morning—would not they proceed to hear his complaint at eleven at night? Mr. Pitt said it was derogatory from the honour of the House to adjourn. His own first wish had been to crush foreign enemies; now it was to crush domestic. When that was done he should die willingly. The question was then put, but the Ministers not caring to hazard their majority, when the House seemed inclined to proceed, few of their party went out in the division; and thence it was carried by 379 to 31, to go on.
The record of the writ of Habeas Corpus, and the returns to it, were then read; but so many of the members had retired after the division, to eating-houses and coffee-houses to refresh themselves, that the Ministers objected that evidence was not fairly heard on their side; and Sir James Lowther moving to adjourn, it was carried without a division a quarter before twelve.
The next day was spent in hearing precedents of general warrants, in which there appeared but too much countenance for the practice, yet founded on no law. The greater part had been issued against Jacobites, on the accession of the present Royal Family, when their establishment was new, and precarious. The Lord Viscount Townshend,[429] a zealous, bold, and authoritative Minister, had made free with the practice. It had been used even in cases of libels, but always in those of Jacobite tendency. Many in times of rebellion had been issued by the Duke of Newcastle, and three by Mr. Pitt himself, but against persons suspected of treasonable practices. These documents had Carteret Webbe now collected: he printed them, too, in his justification. But the case of Wilkes was not only dissimilar, but was important enough to call for redress of a power so obnoxious and liable to abuse. At one in the morning Sir William Meredith commenced the debate, and to what I have said added the history of those warrants. Fifty persons, he owned, had been taken up on such warrants; and then Wilkes on a like indefinite warrant. His very pocket-book had been seized to find evidence against him. The gentlemen who apprehended him were mere ministerial officers. The first warrant quoted was of 1662, for then was passed the first act for licensing the press: and as that act was temporary, and has not been revived, it is a proof that there is no law since to authorize such restraint. The warrants themselves have been found by the Court of Common Pleas to be illegal. He then read the two resolutions he proposed to move; the first, that a general warrant for seizing authors and papers is not law. The second, that seizing Members of Parliament by general warrant is contrary to privilege. Breach of privilege, he added, might be committed in the manner, even where there is no privilege. These warrants had never been used but in times of danger, and then were followed by Acts of Indemnity, and thence never came to be questioned. They were suspended from 1675 to 1690, and then were resumed to protect the Revolution. Again in 1715 and 1745, the years of the Scottish rebellions. They were now used for such a trifle as a libel, that was in every man’s hand. The licentiousness of the people had been checked: it was time now to quiet their minds by checking the licentiousness of power.