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would produce two millions per annum more than those articles at prefent afford.

Now if a faithful collection of the excife duties alone, and that too on four articles only, would produce two millions a year more than those articles afford at prefent, furely the House will be far indeed within the bounds of truth, when they fay that a faithful collection of all the excife duties, and of all the customs, would annually produce that increafe of two millions. The truth, then, of this part of the refolution being indifputably eftablilied, I cannot but indulge the hope that it will be adopted by the Houfe; and I am the more anxious that it fhould be fo, from a belief that the public will then draw from it two conclufions, both of them unquestionably juft, and, in these defponding times, of great confequence to the public credit of the kingdom. The one is, that except in a very few trifling inftances, the failure in the revenue that has becu fo much talked of and fo much lamented, is a failure in the collection of the duties, not in the confumption of the people.

The other conclufion is, that there is good reafon to believe that the income of the State may be made co-extenfive with its wants.

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But it is not alone to the public credit of the kingdom that the effects of this refolution are confined; for it involves in it confiderations of the highest moment to the manufacturing intereft, to the intereft of our commerce, to our naval ftrength, and to the general energy of GovernAt present a confiderable part of the community, perhaps the most active and the moft enterprifing part, are employed, not in adding to the riches of the State by their manufactures, or the tillage of the foil, not in improving her commerce or increafing her naval ftrength, but in exporting the fpecie of the nation in return for the manufactures of France, or for the produce of the Eaft Indies, imported in the fhips of foreign companies, who obtain by this means the advantage of fupplying half the confumption of the English market; an advantage, by the way, without which thofe foreign companies could not continue to exift. They are often employed too in combating the fhips, and waging war on the fervants of the Governinent. Powerful from their numbers by land as well as by fea (for a fingle) gang fometimes confifts of 500 men) and armed for the VOL. XIII. conteft,

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conteft, they have established a law of the strongest, on the ruins of every other law.

If from natural honefty, or a fenfe of the obligations of his oath, an officer attempts to discharge his duty, injuries and infolts, and in many inftances lofs of life are his fure reward. Cruelties the moft favage fometimes mark their proceedings. One officer was taken from his bed, and in his own house, in the prefence of his family, was deliberately murdered; others maimed or difabled, cripples for life, are become warnings to the honeft to beware of doing their duty. With fuch dangers before him, the officer is compelled to acquiefce in the commiffion of frauds, which no courage on his part can fuccefsfully oppofe, no diligence is able to prevent; nor can we be surprised if in many inftances the officer becomes an affociate in the crime, and joins in defrauding that revenue which he finds it impoffible to protect. Under fuch circumstances fhall we condemn the conduct of the officer, fhall we remind him of the obligations of his oath? What will be his anfwer, will he not tell us, "Some blame I confefs is imputable to me, but is it not a reproach to Government, that an officer of fifty pounds a year cannot do his duty but at the hazard of his life?" I fear there would be much juftice in fuch a reply; and indeed what refpect will be paid to the executive government, when it is known that 100 veffels of warlike equipment traverse our own feas in defiance of our power. Or what réverence can be paid to the Legiflature, when it is known that not only the most expeditious, but the fureft, and in all refpects the leaft hazardous means of growing rich is to violate the laws? I fay, Sir, in all respects the leaft hazardous, for as things are now circumftanced, the revenue laws are ruin to the confcientious, but they are fure gain to the fraudulent dealer. Thus an illicit trade is eftablished on the ruins of honeft induftry. The wealth of the State is feized by violence or purloined by corruption. The violation of oaths is confidered as a privilege of office, the benefit of which few men refufe, or regard as a matter of reproach. Government itfelf is held in derifion, and the laws are treated with contempt: furely the Houfe will agree with their Committee in thinking that these enormities do deferve the earliest and most serious attention of Parliament. Should the House adopt their refolution, it will encourage them to bring forward their plans for remedying the evils they have defcribed,

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defcribed, and, if poffible, for establishing a compleat and effe&tual reform.

The House then went into a Committee of fupply, to confider of the ordnance estimates.

Mr. Steele moved, that a fum not exceeding 111,000l. be Mr. Steele. granted to His Majefty for fervices done by the Board of Ordnance, but not provided for by Parliament. This motion paffed without any oppofition. He then moved for another fum of 430,000l. for the ordinary and extraordinary services of the prefent year.

Mr. Huffey oppofed this motion in part, as far as it in- Mr. Huffey. cluded eftimates for fortifications, until the Committee fhould be furnished with proofs of the neceffity of them; and as far as it included the fum of 18,000l. for the purchafe of Sir Gregory Page's houfe on Blackheath, for the ufe of the company of cadets at Woolwich.-This brought on a moft tedious converfation, in which the fame members, availing themselves of the privilege of Committees, were up ten times. It turned principally on the neceffity or impropriety of building fortifications round the dock yards.

Mr. Minchin faid, that the whole fyftem of attack with Mr. Min. artillery had lately undergone a total change. Formerly, chin, if a dock was surrounded with good works, it might bid defiance to an enemy who should be able to come fo near even as to make a lodgment on the glacis; from thence he might be driven by the garrifon and artillery of the place; but now if an enemy was to get within a mile even of a dock yard, he would foon reduce all the ftores to afhes with red hot balls and bombs: fo that it was thought neceffary that there fhould be additional works near the fea, and farther removed from the walls furrounding the docks.-This doctrine was controverted by Lord Mulgrave, but fupported by General Conway. At laft a compromife was made at the fuggeftion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. agreed that nothing fhould be granted for new works, or for the purchase of Sir Gregory Page's houfe; but that the eftimates of the expences neceffary to carry on the repairs of the old works fhould be voted. The neceffary deductions, according to this compromife having been made, there remained the fum of 324,9641. which was voted without a divifion. The Houfe was then refumed, and adjourned at eleven o'clock.

It was

The order of the day for going into a Committee on the bill for explaining and amending the receipt-tax act, was moved, and the order was accordingly read.

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Lord

Lord John
Lord John Cavendish then moved that the Speaker do now
Cavendish, leave the chair. The motion was oppofed by Sir Cecil

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Wray, Mr. George Onflow, Mr. Duncombe, and Mr. Robinfon, (members for Canterbury) who all condemned the tax as vexatious and oppreffive. Mr. Onflow in particular faid, that one of his conftituents, a fhopkeeper at Guildford, had affured him that the receipt-tax would make to him a difference in his trade of 500l. a year. The tax, on the other hand, was defended by General Murray and Gen. Rofs, by Lord Nugent and Lord John Cavendish; the latter of these two noble Lords faid he believed the Guildford elector muft have impofed upon his representative, when he told him he would lofe 500l. a year by this tax; for taking all the receipts given by that fhopkeeper to be for forty fhillings each, which was the loweft fum taxed, he muft turn annually 100,000l. in order that this tax fhould make a difference to him of 500l.

The Earl of Surry reminded gentlemen, that the question now was not whether the receipt-tax was a good or a bad one; the question was not whether it should be repealed or not: the tax was actually in being, and the queftion was fimply, whether the Speaker fhould leave the chair, that the Houfe might go into a Committee on a bill for rendering more efficient a tax which had been already imposed by act of Parliament and therefore there was now no ground for debating upon the tax itfelf. The Houfe then divided, when there appeared,

For the Speaker's leaving the chair, 167; 33 Majority 134..

Against it,

The Houfe then went into a Committee on the bill, and feveral amendments were proposed and adopted.

Lord Beauchamp, as Chairman of the Committee to whom it had been referred to examine the Journals, and fearch for precedents relative to inftructions given by that House to perfons vefted with a difcretionary power, touching the exercife or non-exercife of that difcretion, prefented the report drawn up by that Committee. It began with precedents fo far back as the year 1726. The firft was an inftruction or order from the House of Commons to the University of Cambridge, not to chufe for Chancellor the Duke of Buckingham. Others were against the felling of trees on the lands fettled by marriage on the Queen, confort to Charles II. until fuch times as the Houfe fhould have formed certain regulations, which were then under the confideration of the Houfe. There was

another

another precedent of a meffage from the Houfe to the Court of Exchequer, to defire the Court to ftay all proceedings in ejectment then before the Barons, relative to certain lands, which were the fubject matter of bills then depending in the House. There was another, of a refolution, declaring that the Common Council had violated their truft in iffuing money from time to time from the chamber of London for the purposes of elections. There were feveral precedents of addreffes to the King against the exercife of his prerogative, in granting patents, beftowing employments, filling up places, &c. and in the prefent reign were not forgotten the vote for the recal of Governor Haftings, moved by the late Lord Advocate Dundas (at the reading of which that gentleman could not forbear from fimiling) and the addrefs moved by Mr. Pitt to the King, praying that he would grant certain enumerated places for no longer term than during pleasure, while certain regulations relative to thefe places were pending in the House of Commons. As foon as the report was read by the clerk,

many

Mr. H. Dundas faid it was impoffible for gentlemen, from Mr. H, the curfory manner in which they had heard the report read, Dundas., to be able to determine at that moment how of these precedents applied to the end for which they were extracted from the Journals; fome delay was neceffary for the purpose of affording gentlemen time to look into the hiftory of the different tranfactions on which thefe precedents were founded. He therefore moved, that, a fufficient number of copies of the faid reports be printed for the ufe of the members.

The Solicitor General feconded the motion. He faid this The Solici was a business which concerned the public at large; and they to Gen. ought, therefore, to be made well acquainted with the grounds on which the Houfe was about to proceed. It was neceffary, alfo, that gentlemen fhould have time to confider the precedents adduced. To his mind many of them appeared to have not the leaft relation to the refolutions of the Lords, which were the objects to which they were fuppofed to point.

Lord Beauchamp faid he had no objection either to go into Lord Beauthe business then, or defer it till to morrow; whenever he champ. Thould do it, he would endeavour to point out the tendency

and bearings of the different precedents that had been collected by the Committee.

Mr. Fox was willing to allow of a delay; but he did not Mr. Fox. think it ought to go beyond to-morrow. The printing, however would neceffarily occafion a greater delay.

Lord North faid the Houfe of Commons held its privileges Ld. North. only in the name of the people; and confequently gentlemen

could

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