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we must make some sacrifices, in some instances, to the general I know taxes are not commercial benefits any more than acts of navigation; but they are necessary, and therefore I do not hesitate to conform to the British act; desiring only, in order to warrant that conformity, that the conditions of the act may be effectually equal. As Irish conformity is necessary to the British empire, so is Irish equality necessary to obtain that conformity; that is the true principle that connects; it is the breath that lifts, it is the spirit that moves, and the soul that actuates; without it all is eccentricity—with it the two nations gravitate to a common centre, and fulfil their stated revolutions in the imperial orbit, by rules, regular as the laws of motion; like them infallible, and like them everlasting! Nor do you here demand an equality of which you are not a purchaser; you purchased the right to equal admission, or equal exclusion, under this act, by a long conformity to its restriction; you have given to Great Britain, for that equality, your carrying trade and your market-100,000l. in plantation goods-360,000 tonnage--nor do you, in fact, desire equal advantages. You do not desire the British market; but you wish to have the speculation of the British market for the chance of your own; it is not another man's estate you desire, but a small channel through your neighbour's land, that you may water your own, without the fear of inundation. The English need not tremble; their estates in the plantations articled to render the produce to Great Britain, will not break those articles. Cork will not be the emporium of the empire. Old England will remain at the head of things.—We only aspire that the little bark of this Island may attendant sail-pursue the triumph, and perchance partake some vagrant breath of all those trade-winds that waft the British empire along the tide of commerce.

"The equality we ask, is not only the birth of our conditionit is the dictate of our laws-see the act of 1782-the same benefits and the same restraints-a principle very inadequate, if applied, as the rule whereby to measure laws not yet in existence; very infirm ground whereon to pledge the faith of parliament to future adoption, but necessary for your conformity to any English act already in existence-a principle of equality is thus registered in your own statutes. The merchants who petitioned, were therefore moderate; they are men respectable as merchants, as men of sense, and men of probity-they did not desire you to re

peal the navigation act, but they did desire that you would not re-enact it; that you would not give any new sanction or authority to the act, without establishing and securing its benefits. They spoke, like freemen, the suggestion of the laws, and demanded their right-equity, effectual equity. They spoke a principle admitted even by the two houses of the British parliament, at a time not very favourable to your liberty; the time of the propositions. The fourth proposition, inadmissible as it was, did not presume to ask of you to adopt English laws of shipping and navigation, on a principle other than that of equality. That proposition was idle enough to expect that you should pledge your faith to a future conformity to future English acts: but equality even there was admitted-even by that oppressive narrow proposition therefore I think I have proved, that in the act under your consideration you have a right to demand equality, and I ask whether the clause sufficiently secures it? The clause recites the rule, and then enacts, and explains nothing--recites no principle, secures no principle, removes no doubt; it leaves you a verbal, not an operative equality; equality of law, but not equality of construction. In support of a clause so circumstanced, two principal arguments have been adduced; one, that the act of navigation is the law already, and the other, that it is not. As to the first, if the whole of the argument rested here, the argument and the bill would be easily disposed of.-'Tis true, the act of navigation has been complied with; the merchants, commissioners, and people, have obeyed it; the doubt must arise somewhere out of this country; and if out of this country, in some quarter appertaining to the British court; it is therefore a proposition from the British court to the Irish nation. When we are employed in discussing this proposition, and in removing the doubt the court of Britain may entertain about the existence of the act of navigation, have we forgotten that there does not exist a much more respectable and more interesting doubt about its construction? and shall we gratify the court by settling the one point, and not gratify, serve, and secure the people, by settling and se curing the other?

"The other argument, that tells you the navigation act is not the law, desires you with all speed to establish it, in order to secure your plantation trade. But has any court of justice impeached the validity of the act? Any merchant disputed it?

Any commissioner dispensed with it? There is the same con formity to the act of navigation now, which obtained in 1780 when we got the plantation trade; therefore, we are not called on to re-enact it by virtue of the covenant. Supposing that settlement to bave the navigation act in contemplation, the plantation trade is confined to the British plantation, and the navigation act is co-extensive with the world; there is therefore a geographical error in the argument, supposing it to have any foundation in the fact; but to put this defiance to issue-I ask the right honourable gentlemen on the other side, have they any authority from the British minister, to tell Ireland, that unless she shall re-enact the navigation law, England will repeal the settlement of 1780? I wait for an answer: there is no such thing.

"The plantation trade is out of the question. I congratulate you; your minds are at ease; that fear is idle. But if you were to examine the value of that trade, with the loss of which you are threatened, perhaps you would find that it is not inestimable. I allow it is of some value; I do not wish to depreciate the grants of England; you do import directly and you do export directly something, but not in any very great quantity. Whence do you get your sugar? From old England what bales of cotton manu facture or woollen manufacture have you exported directly to the plantations? Have we forgotten what we have heard on the subject of the propositions, that our plantation trade did not depend on the act of navigation, but on the issue of the second market, that is, on the equal operation of the navigation act, of the act before you? I thought gentlemen went too far when they talked down the plantation trade, as it were nothing with out the market of England, without this point of construction or operation; but I am astonished that they now urge the plantation trade as an argument for adopting the act of navigation, without taking the precaution of securing that equality under the act, without which, the plantation trade, in their opinion, is inoperative. One gentleman says it is law, another it is not law; but both agree to prepossess your judgment, by exciting a false indifference or a false panic. There is another argument that comes in aid of these, which tells you, it is of no consequence whether the navigation act is or is not law; because the inequality arises from two out-standing acts of parliament; one the act of customs in Ireland, which admits British plantation goods; the

other the act of the twelfth of George III. in England, which prohibits their import from this country; and therefore he advises you to adopt the act of navigation, because there are two other acts of parliament which deprive you of its benefits. Before you pass the clause under consideration, recollect that we have not very indirectly been invited to institute an adjustment with great Britain. I am against advancing on that subject; I do not wish to make new points with England; there are some things might be better adjusted, but I would leave that adjustment to temper and to time. England now receives France and excludes Ireland. I do not believe she need be afraid of being rivalled by either; but this is a consideration for her and not for us; we have done our part; we have opened our market to England; we cannot give our constitution if she chooses to advance; if, ashamed to give privileges to France which she refuses to Ireland, she wishes to relax, 'tis well; we are ready to thank her; but if the court wishes to advance, and proposes the removal of a new doubt, by adopting a new and experimental measure, such as the present, we must assert, we reply, by establishing an old claim and an old principle. My answer to this proposition is to take the act of navigation on its true principle; and my sentiments are, Irish equality, and British shipping; and my amendment is as follows-and my vote shall be for the amendment and for the bill, for the English navigation act on its own principle."

He concluded with moving the following amendment to the preamble of the Act:

"And whereas it is the meaning and intention of the said act, passed in England in the twelfth year of king Charles II., to impose the sume restraints and to confer equal benefits on his majesty's subjects in England and in Ireland, and that both kingdoms shall be thereby affected in the same manner.”

To put the house in possession of the whole measure, he stated that he intended to follow the amendment, by moving the annexed proviso for the Bill:

"Provided, that the said act, passed in England, in the twelfth year of the reign of Charles II., shall bind his majesty's subjects of Ireland, so long as it shall have the effect of conferring the same benefits, and imposing the same restrictions, on both kingdoms."

SPEECH OF MR. GRATTAN,

IN THE

DEBATE ON TITHES.

PREFATORY OBSERVATIONS.

It will not, perhaps, be considered by the readers of this voJume an unnecessary, or an unimportant inquiry, to give a short history of that system which has been so long, and with so much justice, condemned as one of the most fruitful sources of discontent and disaffection, among the lower classes of the people of Ireland; nor will it contribute a little to the proper understanding of the merits, and to the due appreciation of the great talents which are displayed in those speeches which were pronounced by Mr. Grattan, in the years 1787, 1788, and 89; when the south and west of Ireland were distracted by a furious and barbarous association of persons, under the denomination of whiteboys, whose cruelties and outrages could only be accounted for, by the melancholy reflection, that they seemed to have no resource but in the madness of despair-no prospect or hope of redress, but in the wild and senseless devastation of the property of those whom they considered their oppressors. Those who read the proceedings of the Irish parliament, at this memorable and afflicting pe riod, will be surprised, perhaps, that a legislature, composed of men, whose interests should have been the peace and happiness of their poor and oppressed countrymen, could discover no remedy for public grievance but the severest penalties of vindictive law; and that it should refuse inquiry into those complaints, which every dispassionate man in the kingdom acknowledges to have arisen from the greatest injustice ever practised on the poor of any country. He, whose heart was not closed by the seductions of interest, or whose existence did not depend on his venality, and the prostitution of his voice to the purposes of a

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