a placard which had been posted up by them, in which they cautioned all persons to keep their servants, children, and apprentices within doors on that day. It was said that the magistrates ought to have arrested Hunt before that day; but when this objection was made, it should be considered that the magistrates had no charge against him before then. No act had been done by him before then of which they could take cognisance. Mr. Hunt himself had called at their office to know if any charge was against him, and he was answered that there was none: of course they could not have interfered with him. It was also said that the magistrates should have prevented the meeting; but he should wish to know how the passage of a body of 50,000 persons could be stopped. If an attempt of the kind were made by the civil authorities, their power would be set at defiance, as it was after, wards: and he presumed it would not be contended that force should have been resorted to in the first instance; but even if that were the case, they had not a sufficient force. It was next said that they should have waited until some seditious act had been done; but to this he replied, that if time had been given to have the passions of the multitude inflamed by seditious harangues, it might have been found extremely difficult to prevent its effects. The magistrates waited until they had found the leaders fully identified with the multitudes they had collected, and in this he thought they had acted most wisely. If they had waited further until the irregularity of the meeting became more marked, it might have proved too powerful for their utmost efforts to repress. The honourable member then proceeded to contend that the meeting could not have the peaceable intentions which were attributed to them, else why should they have brought sticks out of the ordinary size, and such quantities of stones as he had proved were brought by them to the ground in their pockets? As to the charge of their not having tried the civil power, he maintained that they had tried it as far as it could be done without imminent risk. Neither magistrates nor constables were bound to expose themselves unnecessarily, and it was perfectly clear that 300 constables would have been of no avail against the opposition of such a vast force. Lord Milton said, his honourable friend had spoken of the testimony of some of the witnesses at Hunt's trial, and stated that one of them, Barlow, had spoken in his affidavit before the magistrates of the quantity of stones and brickbats which were on the ground. Now it was singular that this person had never mentioned a word of this in his evidence at York. How could his. account on both occasions have been so different if he had spoken the truth in either? How could such facts as were said to have been sworn to before the magistrates by this witness have escaped the sagacity of his honourable and learned friend (Mr. Scarlett) who had conducted the case? There was another witness who had in his depositions said that he heard one of the persons going to the meeting declare that they would would come in such force as to overcome all the civil and military authorities; but the person who it was sworn had said this was Wilde, one of the accused. At the trial in York the learned judge had said that there was no evidence against Wilde. Would there have been no evidence if Dunthorpe had been examined? Would there have been none if Miller and others had there sworn what the honourable gentlemen had now referred to as their testimony? But if those persons had been called, their cross examination might have gone to negative the facts which they were now cited to prove. These were considerations of great importance in reference to this question; a question which,in his humble opinion, never could be set at rest till it should be set at rest by the investigation of parliament a question which was, as the honourable baronet had said, of dimensions too large for any inferior tribunal-a question which might have been exaggerated on the one side, but which was brought down too low on the other side-a question which affected not individuals only, but the law and constitution of the country. That was the view which he took of the question. He left out of his consideration entirely the conduct and character of Mr. Hunt, whose petition, vilifying all the sacred authorities of the land, had this night been read in that house. If his character should be mixed with the meetings, characters totally dissimilar would be mixed. All he cared for was, that no precedent should be established by the non-interference of parliament to lead to military instead of civil authority being resorted to in this country. It would be recollected that the judge had, at the trial, told over and over again that the magistrates and yeomanry were not before the court. The question before the court had been, whether the accused had been guilty of a conspiracy, whether the meeting was legal, or whether it was riotous. Therefore, the cause at issue between the magistrates and the military on the one hand, and the people of England on the other, had not yet been tried. He re Mr. Wilmot thought that the question could be more deliberately and more safely tried on narrower grounds, than it could be tried in that house. From long acquaintance with Mr. Hulton, he was certain he could have had no intention but the beneficial exercise of a public duty. gretted to see so many petitions presented, because they detailed misfortunes; and because, if the magistrates exercised a sound discretion, casualties were not to make an inquiry necessary. When the magistrates had ordered the military, did it follow that they had foreseen the consequences which followed? Such was the state of affairs up to the time when the magistrates gave orders for the military to interfere. It was not fair for the house to lose sight of that point, nor to separate it from the vague apprehensions of danger which at that time pervaded every man's mind. The noble lord had said, that up to the moment of which he was now speaking, the meeting was peaceable and orderly. He would allow that to a certain degree the meeting was at peace; but it was L 2 the the peace of a thunderstorm; uncertain whether it would pass away or burst with violence over the town of Manchester. If the men who gave the order for the military to interfere were in their general conduct men of character and of humanity, it was only fair to suppose that they had acted under an overpowering sense of duty in giving that order. The satisfaction which lord Sidmouth had expressed at their conduct did not imply that ministers rejoiced in the miseries which had fallen upon some of their countrymen, but that they rejoiced in finding that they had a magistracy who had courage to perform their duty in the midst of danger and difficulty, even at the risk of their personal reputation. The honourable baronet had stated that it was a fearful responsibility which the magistrates had undertaken; and had reminded the house of a passage of scripture, "Whoever sheds man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." Could the honourable baronet mean to say that the blood shed upon this occasion was not shed by the sword of justice? The blood that was shed on that occasion, if it was shed by the magistrates in the exercise of a sound discretion, was nothing more than the exercise of justice on an extended scale. Mr. Denman should be well content to leave the question as stated by the honourable member for Westminster, and by his noble friend the member for Yorkshire; for, notwithstanding what had fallen from the two other gentlemen who had taken part in the debate, he could not conceive that the house did not feel astonish ment at the silence preserved by his majesty's ministers, against whom such grave charges had been brought, and had been allowed to remain unrefuted. The honourable member for Dover had stated that it might be possible that in the alarm of the moment the magistrates had committed certain acts which required apology. To that plea he should have had no objection; but it was not now a question of apology, but of praise-not a question of indulgence, but of reward. Another honourable gentleman had said that the individuals who had suffered on the 16th of August were to be considered as having suffered under the sword of justice. If such doctrines were not immediately reprobated, all the magistrates who were warmed and encouraged by his harangue would go into the country with that sword in their hands, and sheath it in the bodies of their countrymen, whenever a questionable meeting was in their neighbourhood, and they had a military force to back their interference. With regard to the Manchester massacre, he considered it to be an event which was more deserving of compassion than of being held up to the courts as an example worthy of imitation. He offered the magistrates who acted on that unfortunate occasion his compassion for having been made the instruments for the slaughter of their fellow-countrymen, but withheld from them his praise. He cared little whether the de. positions which the honourable member had read were made at the time when they were said to have been made, or whether the riot act had been read to the multitude, multitude, because they had not been put in evidence at the trial at York. If the government could have proved those circumstances, he had no doubt they would; for he could not for a moment admit the excuse made for the learned judge, who had presided at that trial, that he, to prevent a waste of time, had not allowed those questions to be gone into. One objection made to an investigation by the house on a former occasion was that the riot, and all the circumstances regarding it, would be proved upon the trial. The trial had now taken place, and no such riot was proved; and yet even now those assertions of riot were reiterated upon nameless affidavits sworn before no proper authority, subjected to no cross-examination, and in which no indictment for perjury could lie. It was said that the house of commons was not a fit place to inquire into this subject. What! the house of commons not a fit place to inquire whether the right of petition had been infringed! And why was it not so? Because (it was said), as soon as it entered into any inquiry, it disgraced itself. And when was it, and to whom, that this argument was urged? It was urged by ministers to a house of commons which had been ready to engage in an inquiry into the conduct of a persecuted female-a deserted wife-to a house of commons that had been ready to sweep Germany of its pimps and panders to destroy a woman whom the people had saved from the ruin which that house was but too ready to inflict upon her. Were they ready to engage in that dirty domestic investigation, and to refuse inquiry to the case of Some the people of England. people thought that enough had been said upon this unfortunate affair, and that it ought now to be forgotten altogether. If it could have been forgotten from the first, he should have been happy; but it could not be forgotten: for the government had revived the memory of it for their own purposes. They had prosecuted his honourable friend: and when various opportunities had occurred of letting that prosecution sleep, they had persevered through all its stages, even though one of the judges had declared that the trial had taken place in a county where the court had no jurisdiction. The honourable member concluded by stating, that the country, if the house steadily refused all inquiry, would be convinced that it was playing the game of those who wished to degrade and destroy it. The Solicitor-General denied that the proceedings at Manchester had taken place under the authority of government: they knew nothing of them till they were over. He defended himself and the attorney-general for having opposed the charge of venue in Hunt's case, on the ground that they conceived that their consent to his application would have been casting an unjust imputation on the county of Lancaster. He then went at great length into the circumstances of the Manchester meeting, for the purpose of showing that, from the previous state of the country, connected with the appearance of that meeting, the magistrates must have felt great alarm, and consequently were justified in the strong measures which they took for the preservation preservation of the public peace. He conceived that no just imputation had been made against either magistrates or military; or that, if any ground of imputation, the proper course was to apply to the courts of justice for inquiry and redress. He accused the honourable baronet of postponing this case till it was almost too late to discuss it, and complained that he had brought it forward at the end of the third session since the event, when an effectual inquiry was impossible. Mr. Philips (of Manchester) said he should not have taken part in this debate, had he not resided at the place where the transactions occurred, and had he not studiously avoided giving an opinion on the subject when it was last before the notice of the house. Although the state of the country was disturbed, yet justice required him to admit that the general expectation there was, that the meeting of the 16th of August would pass off peaceably, unless it was disturbed by the magistracy; and he had been assured on the best evidence that such was the fact, though after the charge of the yeomanry the utmost confusion and disorganization prevailed. He was very ready to admit that after the 16th of August the people armed themselves very extensively, with a view to their own protection; but he still contended that they had not armed themselves in any large numbers before the meeting, when their peaceable proceedings were disturbed by the yeomanry. To this day it was unknown who had ordered them to advance; this of itself deserved investigation; and the whole case for the sake of the liberties and secu rity of the people demanded inquiry. The debate being adjourned to the next day, a variety of speakers presented themselves, among these the marquis of Londonderry, (late lord Castlereagh,) gave a long explanation. He observed, that after the extent to which the discussion had been protracted, he thought it would be an abuse of the patience of the house if he were to occupy their time in using more argument than was necessary; but he was sure the house would feel, after the many personal appeals which had been made to him in the course of the debate, that independently of the situation which he held, and his responsibility as a minister of the crown, he would not stand justified if he did not enter into some explanation of the question. That he had delayed doing so until that moment was owing to the declaration of the honourable baronet, that not only the Manchester magistrates, but also the executive government, were culpable in those transactions. He did not object to the executive government being held responsible for their conduct, and therefore he would enter into an explanation of that conduct; but before he did this, he begged to say a word as to the situation of government and of the house itself with respect to this question; and here he must protest against the assertion that any of the transactions at Manchester were under the directions of his majesty's government. He could state that government was quite distinct from the whole of these proceedings, and that all the matter now under discussion could not have been controlled or interfered |