Mr. revenue appropriated for the fupport of it by 12,0qol. a year, which was the fum fettled by His Majefty upon the Duke of Clarence. It was not his intention therefore, for the prefent, to move for any permanent grant beyond 12,000l. a year; but he would alfo afk for fome other fums to replace fuch as had been already advanced out of the civil lift. He then moved, that His Majesty be enabled to fettle upon his Royal Highnefs William Henry Duke of Clarence an annuity of 12,cool. and to charge the fame upon the confolidated fund. Mr. Francis wifhed to know whether favings had not acFrancis. crued to the civil lift, through the death of the late Duke of Cumberland. M. Pitt. Mr. Mr. Chancellor Pitt admitted that the death of the Duke of Cumberland, andalfo that of the Princefs Amelia, had produced a faving to the civil lift; but to balance thefe, other charges had grown upon it; and from the accounts on the table, gentlemen would perceive that the charges exceeded the income by 12,0col. a year. Mr. Powys asked, whether this was the laft permanent Powys. grant that was to be made to any branch of the Royal Family, or whether fimilar grants were to be occafionally called for, in proportion as the rifing branches of His Majefty fhould arrive at that age in which it would be proper to give them an establishment. Mr. Pitt. Mr. Mr. Chancellor Pitt anfwered, that undoubtedly applications would be made to Parliament when the occafions thould arrive for provifion for the other branches of the Royal Family, unless (what was then very improbable), the civil lift fhould be fo relieved from other burdens, as that it should be able to provide establishments for more of the Royal offspring, without further aid from Parliament. Mr. Powys then faid, he now clearly understood that was Powys. not the laft grant that Parliament would have to make in aid of the civil lift. Mr. Baker. Mr. Baker faid, that he was as ready as any inan to make a proper provision for His Majefty's children; and he even felt a partiality for the fpirited Prince who was the immedi ate object of the motion, who had been bred to a profeffion which was firft in the eftimation of the country; and therefore he had not a word to fay against the propofed grant to him: but he thought that after the great addition which had been made to the civil lift, it ought to be deemed equal to the difcharge of all demands upon it. To prove this, Mr. Baker went into a minute detail of various fums which had been paid by Parliament, and among others, certain expences attending the King's illness, which ought to have been paid out of the civil lift; but as they had not been fo discharged, that that lift ought to be able to provide for the fettlement now proposed to be made upon the Duke of Clarence. It had happened, he faid, not only that additions had been made to the revenue by which the civil lift was fupported, but it had also been encreased by the abolition of establishments which formerly preffed very heavy upon it, fuch for inftance as the board of trade. Mr. Chancellor Pitt upon this obferved, that if Parlia- Mr. Pitt. ment had made additions to the revenue by which the civil lift was fupported, it had also made additions to the charges upon it; for it had inftituted a Board of Controul for the government of India; and in fo extenfive a branch of executive government, many expences were neceffarily incurred. The abolition of the board of trade was of very little relief to the civil lift; for the act of Parliament by which that board was put down, provided that the bufinefs ufually tranfacted by it fhould in future be tranfacted by a Committee of Council: this bufinefs, every one knew, was of a very extenfive nature, and could not be carried on without a great number of clerks, who must be paid for their labour. All these charges had been laid upon the civil lift, fubfequent to the period when the increafe was made, when it was intended to make the income of the civil lift equal to all the charges upon it. The queftion was at laft put on the motion for the grant to the Duke of Clarence, and carried unanimously. Mr. Chancellor Pitt then moved, that the fum of 34,210l. 5s. be granted to His Majefty, to make good the eivil lift a like fum advanced to the Duke of Clarence, for his fupport during the last two years, at the rate of 12,000l. a year, and for enabling him, at the outfet, to form his eftablishment. This motion paffed alfo nem. com. Mr. Chancellor Pitt informed the Committee, that, according to the established rule, the annuity out of the civil lift to the late Duke of Cumberland, was payable only to the day of his death, and not to the end of the then current quarter; but as it would not be handfome to difmifs his eftablishment at a day's notice, he thought the Committee would readily agree, that what would have become due by the end of the quarter fhould be paid, as well as what was actually due at the time of the Duke's death. He therefore moved that the fum of 1,800l. be granted to His Majefty, to enable him to difcharge the remainder of the quarter's annuity which had to run after the death of his Royal Highness Henry Frederic, late Duke of Cumberland. This motion alfo paffed unanimously, and the Houfe was refumed. The Mr Fox. The orders of the day having been feverally gone through, Mr. Fox rofe to make his promifed motion, for a grand Committee on the Courts of Juftice, to enquire into fome late decifions of the Courts in cafes of libel. He began a moft able and argumentative fpeech, by declaring that, he was perfectly convinced, that every gentleman who heard him, was fo well acquainted with the duties that belonged to the House of Commons, and its peculiar function conftantly to watch with care, every part of the executive government of the country, that it would be unneceffary for him to use any words in order to fhew that he was not bringing under the confideration of the Houfe, any thing that did not fall within the province of its duty. He faid, he was not going to attempt any thing like innovation, but was calling the attention of the Houfe to one of its most conftitutional and very important duties, viz. to a ftrict attention to every branch of the executive government. The most important part of the executive government was the execution of the laws in Courts of Juftice; he hoped, therefore, he should not excite any unjust prejudices against what he was about to ftate, by urging the neceffity of their watching over this, as well as every other part of the conftitution, as if it implied any thing, peculiarly faulty or blameable in the execution of justice at that moment. If the doctrine, Mr., Fox faid, were once to prevail, that the confideration of matters, relative to Courts of Justice, neceffarily implied a failure of the execution of juftice, that Houfe muft either be negligent of its functions on the one hand, and they muft fit filent and fuffer abufes to grow to a magnitude which it might be difficult to reform; or, on the other, they must do, what no good citizen would wish to do, they muft create an alarm in the country, and excite a fufpicion that juftice was not fully executed, and thereby injure the nation, by encouraging the fubjects of Great Britain to deny that refpect which was due to the laws, and to withhold that obedience which ought to be given to the execution of them. It was true, Mr. Fox faid, that he meant to bring under the confideration of the Houfe more than one point; he should, however, first state the point which weighed moft on his mind, which was, that which related to the conduct of the Courts of Juftice, with refpect to trials on the fubject of libels. He would not, he faid, take up the time of the Houfe with any general declamation on the fubject of the prefs. Whoever faw what the world was now, and compared it with what it formerly had been, must be fenfible that it had greatly improved in the fcience of government, and that that improvement was entirely owing to the liberty liberty of the prefs. From what he was then flating in favour of the liberty of the prefs, no gertleman, he truited, would confider him as a defender of its licentioufnefs. He was, however, a defender of the liberty of the prefs, in that fenfe in which it could be defended. But if even the juft liberty of the prefs were tranfgreffed, he owned, he fhould be an enemy to a fevere punishment being inflicted after the crime was committed. He was alfo an enemy to all previous reftraints on the prefs, because he thought he could prove, that in all countries, and at all times, previous restraints on the prefs had the effect of reftraining the juft liberty of the people, and had never been able to prevent the mifchiefs arifing from its licentioufnefs. Having faid fo much with regard to the liberty of the prefs, Mr. Fox declared, he thought there was no danger to be apprehended from any law, or from any thing which they might propofe to make a part of the law of the country; on the contrary, it was his opinion, that if the liberty of the prefs in this country could be in any way endangered, it must be by a series of judgements and a feries of punishments on free writings: this, he doubted not, he fhould be able to prove. He hoped he fhould not be told, in anfwer to what he had advanced, that they had not only reached the mark of liberty, but had gone beyond it. He hoped he should not be defired to look at the abufe of that facred engine of liberty, as the levelling the good and bad, and making every man apathized to fhame, and infenfible of good character, which was the foundation of every thing great and glorious among men. If perfons were to argue, that from the circumstance of there being fo much licence, there was liberty enough, in his apprehenfion, they would argue very unwifely, and very inconclufively. There was no difficulty in this coun-. try for any man to libel another; but no man could libel the actions of another with impunity, and public characters had as much a right to be defended as thofe who never mixed with public affairs. Any man, if he pleafed, could indeed perfonally libel with impunity any public or private character; they could libel him, or much more refpectable Members of Parliament; they might even go farther, and libel Minifters and the Great Officers of State. But he contended, on the other hand, that there was much doubt whether any man could really freely difcufs the actions of government, in the way in which he apprehended it was the right of every man to difcufs them, without a greater rifque to his perfon and property than prudent men would choose to hazard. Mr. Fox declared, that he felt confiderable difficulty, not only from the importance and magnitude of the object he had had to ftate, but also confiderable difficulty in the manner of the arrangement of the matter, with which he should trouble the Houfe. Perhaps the most easy way would be for him to ftate his ideas in the order in which they had arifen in his own mind, beginning with particulars, and going on to generals, instead of beginning with generals and exemplifying them by particular inftances, which was the more usual method. In the course of the last year, when the Spanish armament was raifed, gentlemen would recollect that there had taken a confiderable degree of difcuffion among the public, with regard, firft of all, to the propriety of that armament; and fecondly, with regard to the conduct of that and the other Houfe, who granted the fupplies. That fuch a bufinefs fhould be the fubject of difcuffion in any country, particularly in a free country, could be matter of furprize to no man; that it would be a fubject of fair difcuffion he thought could not be controverted. On that occafion there had appeared fome frictures in a newspaper on the conduct of the King's Minifters: and that paper, to the aflonifhment of most people, was profecuted! If gentlemeri would take the trouble to read a variety of things that were written at that time, not with regard to the character of public men, but with regard to the conduct of public Minifters, he fhould rather fufpect the newspaper alluded to would not to be found to be among the most eminently culpable, but on the contrary, among the most innocent that had appeared. However, the paper was published, and it was profecuted. The printer pleaded guilty, or allowed judgement to go by default, and judgement was given against him; which appeared to thofe who obferved the judgement, and compared it with the paper, and, he confeffed, appeared fo to himself, to be most inordinately fevere. He could hardly have thought, he said, that a perfon's ftating in a newspaper his general difapprobation of the measures adopted by the King's Minifters; ftating, that he conceived that the oftenfible purpofe could hardly be the real purpofe; ftating the object of Nootka Sound to be too minute to justify fo great a hazard as the country was then about to incur, and that therefore it might be connected with our Pruffian alliance. He fhould have thought that fuch a paper not only did not deferve a fevere punishment, but fuch a paper, in his humble opinion, was no libel at all. His first wonder was, that the printer fhould have been so ill advised as not to defend himfelf. In the next place, he was aftonished that no motion was made in arreft of judgement, on the ground that the paper was no libel at all. He thought the fentence moft fevere; and that opinion had not, Mr. Fox faid, been peculiar to his own mind; be believed he could |