Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

of the growth or manufacture of the other, which are not speci fied in the tariff, such prohibitions or augmentations shall be general, and shall comprehend the like goods and merchandises of the other most favoured European nations, as well as those of either state and in case either of the two contracting parties shall revoke the prohibitions, or diminish the duties, in favour of any other European nation, upon any goods or merchandise of its growth or manufacture, whether on importation or exportation, such revocations or diminutions shall be extended to the subjects of the other party, on condition that the latter shall grant to the subjects of the former the importation and exportation of the like goods and merchandises under the same duties; the cases reserved in the seventh article of the present treaty always excepted. That all articles of manufacture and commerce, not enumerated in the tariff, be admitted from France, on paying the same duties as the same articles pay on importation from the most favoured nation."

The committee divided on Mr. Fox's motion, "That the chairman do leave the chair, report progress, and ask leave to sit again,"

Ayes......... 118
Noes......... 252

and the main question was then put and carried.

May 9. 1787.

THE House having proceeded to the order of the day for the further consideration of the report of the secret committee, appointed to draw up articles of impeachment against Warren Hastings, Esq. it was moved, "That this report be now read a second time:".

Upon which motion an amendment was proposed by Mr. Alderman Wilkes, "That the report be read a second time this day three months."

MR. PITT said that he had deferred giving his sentiments on the question so long, because he found many gentleman who were averse to the prosecution, had hitherto reserved themselves on the various stages through which the business had

already passed, and had taken the present opportunity of delivering their opinions at large upon the whole of the subject, and had then for the first time entered into the defence of Mr. Hastings. As this seemed to be the case, he thought it was but justice to those gentlemen, to Mr. Hastings, and to the cause, to hear what they had to say without interrupting them, or anticipating their general argument in favour of Mr. Hastings, by a particular discussion of the question immediately before the House. Those gentlemen had not taken up the question either as to the form of the articles, or the mode of proceeding, but had confined themselves solely to the broad consideration, whether Mr. Hastings was or was not guilty of crimes sufficiently great and glaring to render him deserving of punishment; and this discussion had been handled in a variety of ways by the several gentlemen that had undertaken it, and all of them had gone the length of arguing that there should be a complete and final conclusion to the whole proceeding-an opinion that he was ready to declare his own perfect and entire, dissent from: for he felt himself totally at a loss to conceive how it could be reconciled to the honour, the consistence, or the justice of that House to stop short of sending up the impeachment to that place, where alone it ought to undergo its ultimate discussion.

The noble lord who opened the debate, and the honourablemagistrate+who followed him, had confined themselves wholly to a collateral question, and not one immediately connected with that before the House, to the merits of Mr. Hastings, which they pleaded as a set off against his offences. This was a ground which he expected and hoped would have been abandoned, after what had already passed upon that subject, both from Mr. Hastings himself, who had disclaimed any such plea, and from many of the gentlemen who had delivered their opinions in the debates on the several charges. For his own part, such was his opinion of many parts of the charges brought against Mr. Hastings, of their importance and criminality, that he could not conceive, if they were well founded, how the highest and the

greatest merits which had ever been alleged in favour of Mr. Hastings, could be set in opposition to them as a plea even against conviction and punishment-much less against inquiry and trial, which were now the objects in question. His learned friend had very judiciously taken a different ground, and given up that set off; but still the principles he went on were no less objectionable than those of the noble lord and the honourable alderman; he had treated the subject as if it was deficient of that consequence or magnitude which could entitle it to the judgment of that high and weighty tribunal to which it was proposed to submit it, and had besides endeavoured to oppose the farther progress of the business in that House, by analagous reasonings from the nature of this form of proceeding in parliament and that of grand juries and other courts. But he could not conceive how any gentleman could possibly consider the charges against Mr. Hastings in any other light than as a very grave, heavy, and serious accusation, such as was supported by evidence at least sufficient to warrant the putting him on his trial, and such as was of magnitude sufficient, if substantiated in proof, to bring down on him very ample punishment.

As to the analogies to other inquests, the learned lord himself, and those who entertained opinions similar to his, had themselves shewn how little their analogous reasonings applied; for they all seemed to go upon an idea, that the finding matter sufficient to put the party on his trial was assuming, for a certainty, that there was sufficient matter to convict. But this was by no means the case; for it was never supposed or imagined that exactly the same degree of evidence which was sufficient to warrant an impeachment of that House, must necessarily be sufficient to support and insure a conviction; neither was this the case in the finding of a grand jury: in both cases the final judicature must have proof considerably more substantial than that which the original inquest would have been justifiable in proceeding upon. But it was impossible for that House to govern itself exactly by the rules of a grand jury: for the subjects that * The Lord Advocate (Mr. Dundas).

were likely to become objects of impeachment, were so different from those with which grand juries were conversant, that no analogy could take place in their modes of proceedings. Besides, if the House of Commons were to take the proceeding of a grand jury as their precedent, and follow it exactly in all instances, it would amount to a complete dereliction of that function which they were then exercising that of impeachment; a function which had been the bulwark of the constitution, and which had enabled that House to preserve and maintain the freedom of their country, through the several struggles they had made for that purpose. Was that House competent to take deposition and evidence upon oath? It certainly was not and therefore if it were not to proceed to an impeachment upon any other species of evidence than would justify a grand jury in finding a bill of indictment, it must never impeach at all; for a grand jury could not find it except upon affidavit. Still he admitted that the House ought never to go to such a length as the carrying up of an impeachment, except upon such evidence as would afford a reasonable probability of their being able to make good their charge before the other House; and was there not here, from what had been produced in support of this charge, and from the collateral and indirect matter which had alone been resorted to in defence of that charge, very reasonable grounds for expecting that they should be able to make good the present?

An honourable magistrate had inveighed with great severity on the conduct of gentlemen who (he thought), in support of the charge, had used expressions of too violent and personal a nature to be admitted in the progress of a judicial inquiry. He certainly was of opinion, that there was much illiberality in any attempt to inflame and excite emotions beyond what might naturally be expected to result from a fair and candid developement of facts in the minds of those who were the instruments of public justice. He admitted that he once was of opinion, that the language of those who chiefly promoted the present proceeding, was too full of acerbity, and much too passionate and exaggerated; but when * Alderman Townsend.

he found what the nature of the crimes alleged was, and how strong was the presumption that the allegations were true, he confessed that he could not expect that gentlemen, when reciting what they thought actions of treachery, actions of violence and oppression, and demanding an investigation into those actions, should speak a language different from that which would naturally arise from the contemplation of such actions..

The honourable magistrate had argued, that the honour of the House was not committed to adopt the resolutions of the committee, and had endeavoured to prevent such an impression from falling upon gentlemen as an inducement to their voting for them. But, was there any danger of gentlemen being influenced by such a consideration in the present case? Had the resolutions of the secret committee been a new matter, perhaps there might then have been some room for cautioning the House not to be drawn into too hasty an adoption of them from motives of consistency, because, in such a case, their adoption might possibly be attributed to such motives; but even then such a caution must prove unnecessary; for no member could consider himself bound to support the resolutions of a committee, merely because they were resolutions of a committee. In this instance, the object of the honourable alderman ought to be to convince such gentlemen individually as had voted for the several charges, that, having done so, yet they would not be inconsistent in now opposing the report; but this argument, he must say, he believed no gentleman would attempt to support; for certainly no gentleman who had supported the charges could, consistently with the principles on which he did so, now oppose the farther progress of the business. But, in fact, he not only considered those gentlemen who voted for the charges individually, but the whole House collectively, as called upon by every motive of honour and consistency, by their regard for the national character as well as their own, to unite and persevere in bringing the matter to a final conclusion before the other House.

The honourable gentleman who had spoken last, and whom

* Mr. Nathaniel Smith,

« AnteriorContinuar »