On the 4th of July, when the bill had been returned to the Commons, it was moved, that the amendments made in it by the Lords should be read; but as it had become a money-bill in consequence of the bounties to be granted, and as new regulations were to be incorporated in it, it was thought proper that it should be wholly done away. Accordingly Sir William Dolben moved, that the further consideration of it should be put off till that day three months. This having been agreed upon, he then moved for leave to bring in a new bill. This was accordingly introduced, and an additional clause was inserted in it, relative to bounties, by Mr. Pitt. But on the second reading, that no obstacle might be omitted which could legally be thrown in the way of its progress, petitions were presented against it, both by the Liverpool merchants and the agent for the island of Jamaica, under the pretence that it was a new bill. Their petitions, however, were rejected, and it was committed and passed through its regular stages, and sent up to the Lords.
On its arrival there on the 5th of July, petitions from London and Liverpool still followed it. The prayer of these was against the general tendency of it, but it was solicited also that counsel might be heard in a particular case; the solicitation was complied with; after which the bill was read a second time, and ordered to be committed.
On the 7th, when it was taken next into consideration, two other petitions were presented against it. But here so many objections were made to the clauses of it as they then stood, and such new matter suggested that the Duke of Richmond, who was a strenuous supporter of it, thought it best to move that the committee then sitting should be deferred till that day seven-night, in order to give time for another more perfect to originate in the lower house.
This motion having been acceded to, Sir William Dolben introduced a new one for the third time into the Commons. This included the suggestions which had been made in the Lords. It included also a regulation, on the motion of Mr. Sheridan, that no surgeon should be employed as such in the slave-vessels, except he had a testimonial that he had passed a proper examination at Surgeon's Hall. The amendments were all then agreed to, and the bill was passed through its several stages.
On the 10th of July, being now fully amended it came for a third time before the Lords; but it was no sooner brought forward than it met with the same opposition as it had experienced before. Two new petitions appeared against it; one from a certain class of persons in Liverpool, and another from Miles Peter Andrews, Esq., stating that if it passed into a law it would injure the sale of his gunpowder, and that he had rendered great services to the government during the last war, by his provision of that article. But here the Lord Chancellor Thurlow reserved himself for an effort, which, by occasioning only a day's delay, would, in that particular period of the session have totally prevented the passing of the bill. He suggested certain amendments for consideration and discussion which, if they had agreed upon, must have been carried again to the lower House, and sanctioned there before the bill could have been complete. But it appeared afterwards, that there would have been no time for the latter proceeding. Earl Stanhope, therefore, pressed this circumstance peculiarly upon the lords who were present. He observed that the king was to dismiss the parliament next day, and therefore they must adopt the bill as it stood, or reject it altogether. There was no alternative, and no time was to be lost: accordingly, he moved for an immediate division on the first of the amendments proposed by Lord Thurlow. This having taken place, it was negatived. The other amendments shared the same fate; and thus, at length, passed through the Upper House, as through an ordeal as it were of fire, the first bill that ever put fetters upon that barbarous and destructive monster, the Slave Trade.
The next day, or on Friday, July the 11th, the king gave his assent to it, and, as Lord Stanhope had previously asserted in the House of Lords, concluded the session.
While the legislature was occupied in the consideration of this bill, the lords of the council continued their examinations, that they might collect as much light as possible previously to the general agitation of the question in the next session of parliament. Among others I underwent an examination: I gave my testimony first, relative to many of the natural productions of Africa, of which I produced the specimens. These were such as I had collected in the course of my journey to Bristol and Liverpool, and elsewhere. I explained, secondly, the loss and usage of seamen in the Slave Trade. To substantiate certain points, which belonged to this branch of the subject, I left several depositions and articles of agreement for the examination of the council. With respect to others, as it would take a long time to give all the data upon which calculations had been made, and the manner of making them, I was desired to draw up a statement of particulars, and to send it to the council at a future time. I left also depositions with them, relative to certain instances of the mode of procuring and treating slaves.
The committee also for effecting the abolition of the Slave Trade continued their attention, during this period, towards the promotion of the different objects which came within the range of the institution.
They added the Rev. Dr. Coombe, in consequence of the great increase of their business, to the list of their members.
They voted thanks to Mr. Hughes, vicar of Ware, in Hertfordshire, for his excellent answer to Harris's Scriptural Researches on the Licitness of the Slave Trade, and they enrolled him among their honorary and corresponding members. Also thanks to William Roscoe, Esq., for his Answer to the same. Mr. Roscoe had not affixed his name to this pamphlet any more than to his poem of The Wrongs of Africa; but he made himself known to the committee as the author of both. Also thanks to William Smith and Henry Beaufoy, Esqrs., for having so successfully exposed the evidence offered by the slave merchants against the bill of Sir William Dolben, and for having drawn out of it so many facts, all making for their great object the abolition of the Slave Trade.