Thus, my lords, it appears that the bill can produce no other effect than that of multiplying accusations, since it offers rewards only to those who are supposed to have been engaged in unjustifiable practices; and to procure witnesses by this method, is equally unjust as to propose a publick prize to be obtained by swearing against any of your lordships.
If witnesses are to be purchased, we ought, at least, to offer an equal price on each side, that though they may be induced by the reward to offer their depositions, they may not be tempted to accuse rather than to justify.
Should any private man, my lords, offer a reward to any that would give evidence against another, without specifying the crime of which he is accused, doubtless he would be considered by the laws of this nation, as a violator of the rights of society, an open slanderer, and a disturber of mankind; and would immediately, by an indictment or information, be obliged to make satisfaction to the community which he had offended, or to the person whom he had injured.
It has, my lords, I own, been asserted by the noble duke, that the publick has a right to every man’s evidence, a maxim which in its proper sense cannot be denied. For it is undoubtedly true, that the publick has a right to all the assistance of every individual; but it is, my lords, upon such terms as have been established for the general advantage of all; on such terms as the majority of each society has prescribed. But, my lords, the majority of a society, which is the true definition of the publick, are equally obliged with the smaller number, or with individuals, to the observation of justice, and cannot, therefore, prescribe to different individuals different conditions. They cannot decree that treatment to be just with regard to one which they allow to be cruel with respect to another. The claims of the publick are founded, first upon right, which is invariable; and next upon the law, which, though mutable in its own nature, is, however, to be so far fixed, as that every man may know his own condition, his own property, and his own privileges, or it ceases in effect to be law, it ceases to be the rule of government, or the measure of conduct.
In the present case, my lords, the publick has not a right to hire evidence, because the publick has hitherto subsisted upon this condition, among others, that no man shall swear in his own cause. The publick has not a right to require from any man that he should betray himself, because every man may plead that he is exempted from that demand by the publick faith.
Thus, my lords, the right of the publick is only that right which the publick has established by law, and confirmed by continual claims; nor is the claim of the publick from individuals to be extended beyond its known bounds, except in times of general distress, where a few must necessarily suffer for the preservation of the rest.
This necessity is, indeed, now urged; but surely it ought to be shown, that the present circumstances of affairs differ from those of any former age, before it can with any propriety he asserted, that measures are now necessary, which no other distresses, however urgent, or provocations, however flagrant, have hitherto produced. It ought to be proved, that wickedness had discovered some new shelter from justice, before new engines are invented to force it from its retreat, and new powers applied to drag it out to punishment.
The nation has subsisted, my lords, so many centuries; has often recovered from the lingering disease of inward corruption, and repelled the shocks of outward violence; it has often been endangered by corrupt counsels, and wicked machinations, and surmounted them by the force of its established laws, without the assistance of temporary expedients; at least without expedients like this, which neither law nor justice can support, and which would in itself be a more atrocious grievance than those, if they were real, which it is intended to punish, and might produce far greater evils than those which are imputed to him, against whom it is projected.
It has, indeed, my lords, been mentioned by a noble lord, in much softer language, as a method only of making an inquiry possible. The possibility of an inquiry, my lords, is a very remote and inoffensive idea; but names will not change the nature of the things to which they are applied. The bill is, in my opinion, calculated to make a defence impossible, to deprive innocence of its guard, and to let loose oppression and perjury upon the world. It is a bill to dazzle the wicked with a prospect of security, and to incite them to purchase an indemnity for one crime, by the perpetration of another. It is a bill to confound the notions of right and wrong, to violate the essence of our constitution, and to leave us without any certain security for our properties, or rule for our actions.
Nor are the particular parts less defective than the general foundation; for it is full of ambiguous promises, vague ideas, and indeterminate expressions, of which some have been already particularized by the noble lords that have spoken on this occasion, whose observations I shall not repeat, nor endeavour to improve; but cannot forbear proposing to the advocates for the bill one sentence, that it may be explained by them, and that at least we may not pass what we do not understand.
In the inquiry into the conduct of the earl of ORFORD, every man, as we have already seen, is invited to bring his evidence, and to procure an indemnity, by answering such questions as shall be asked, touching or concerning the said inquiry, or relative thereto. What is to be understood by this last sentence, I would willingly be informed; I would hear how far the relation to the inquiry is designed to be extended, with what other inquiries it is to be complicated, and where the chain of interrogatories is to have an end.
When an evidence appears before the committee, how can he be certain that the questions asked are relative to the inquiry? How can he be certain that they are such as he may procure an indemnity by resolving? Or whether they are not unconnected with the principal question, and therefore insidious and dangerous? And to what power must he appeal, if he should be prosecuted afterwards upon his own confession, on pretence that it was not relative to the inquiry?
Expressions like these, my lords, if they are not the effects of malicious hurry, and negligent animosity, must be intended to vest the committee with absolute authority, with the award of life and death, by leaving to them the liberty to explain the statute at their own pleasure, to contract or enlarge the relation to the controversy, to inquire without bounds, and judge without control.
Thus, my lords, I have laid before you my opinion of this bill without any partial regard, without exaggerating the ill consequences that may be feared from it, or endeavouring to elude any reasoning by which it has been defended. I have endeavoured to pursue the arguments of the noble lord who spoke first, and to show that it is founded upon false notions of criminal justice, that it proposes irrational and illegal methods of trial, that it will produce consequences fatal to our constitution, and establish a precedent of oppression.
I have endeavoured, in examining the arguments by which the bill has been defended, to show that the rights of the publick are ascertained, and that the power of the majority is to be limited by moral considerations; and to prove, in discussing its particular parts, that it is inaccurate, indeterminate, and unintelligible.
What effects my inquiry may have had upon your lordships, yourselves only can tell; for my part, the necessity of dwelling so long upon the question, has added new strength to my conviction; and so clearly do I now see the danger and injustice of a law like this, that though I do not imagine myself indued with any peculiar degree of heroism, I believe, that if I were condemned to a choice so disagreeable, I should more willingly suffer by such a bill passed in my own case, than consent to pass it in that of another.
The duke of ARGYLE replied to the following effect: — My lords, I am not yet able to discover that the bill now before us is either illegal or absurd, that its interpretation is doubtful, or its probable consequences dangerous.
The indisputable maxim, that the publick has a right to every man’s evidence, has been explained away with much labour, and with more art than a good cause can often require. We have been told of publick contracts, of the rights of society with regard to individuals, an
d the privileges of individuals with respect to society; we have had one term opposed to another, only to amuse our attention; and law, reason, and sophistry have been mingled, till common sense was lost in the confusion.
But, my lords, it is easy to disentangle all this perplexity of ideas, and to set truth free from the shackles of sophistry, by observing that it is, in all civilized nations of the world, one of the first principles of the constitution, that the publick has a right, always reserved, of having recourse to extraordinary methods of proceeding, when the happiness of the community appears not sufficiently secured by the known laws.
Laws may, by those who have made the study and explanation of them the employment of their lives, be esteemed as the great standard of right; they may be habitually reverenced, and considered as sacred in their own nature, without regard to the end which they are designed to produce.
But others, my lords, whose minds operate without any impediment from education, will easily discover, that laws are to be regarded only for their use; that the power which made them only for the publick advantage ought to alter or annul them, when they are no longer serviceable, or when they obstruct those effects which they were intended to promote.
I will, therefore, my lords, still assert, that the publick has a right to every man’s evidence; and that to reject any bill which can have no other consequence than that of enabling the nation to assert its claim, to reconcile one principle of law with another, and to deprive villany of an evasion which may always be used, is to deny justice to an oppressed people, and to concur in the ruin of our country.
And farther, my lords, I confidently affirm it has not been proved, that this bill can endanger any but the guilty; nor has it been shown that it is drawn up for any other purpose than that which the noble lord mentioned, of hindering an inquiry from being impossible; it may, therefore, justly be required from those who affect, on this occasion, so much tenderness for liberty, so many suspicions of remote designs, and so much zeal for our constitution, to demonstrate, that either an inquiry may be carried on by other means, or that an inquiry is itself superfluous or improper.
Though none of those who have spoken against the bill have been willing to expose themselves to universal indignation, by declaring that they would gladly obstruct the progress of the inquiry; that they designed to throw a mist over the publick affairs, and to conceal from the people the causes of their misery; and though I have no right to charge those who differ from me in opinion, with intentions, which, as they do not avow them, cannot be proved; this, however, I will not fear to affirm, that those who are for rejecting this method of inquiry, would consult their honour by proposing some other equally efficacious; lest it should be thought; by such as have not any opportunities of knowing their superiority to temptations, that they are influenced by some motives which they are not willing to own, and that they are, in secret, enemies to the inquiry, though, in publick, they only condemn the method of pursuing it.
The duke of NEWCASTLE next rose, and spoke to this effect: — My lords, the arguments which have been produced in defence of the bill before us, however those who offer them may be influenced by them, have made, hitherto, very little impression upon me; my opinion of the impropriety and illegality of this new method of prosecution, still continues the same; nor can it be expected that I should alter it, till those reasons have been answered which have been offered by the noble lord who spoke first in the debate.
The advocates for the bill seem, indeed, conscious of the insufficiency of their arguments, and have, therefore, added motives of another kind; they have informed us, that our power subsists upon our reputation, and that our reputation can only be preserved by concurring in the measures recommended by the commons; they have insinuated to us, that he who obstructs this bill, will be thought desirous to obstruct the inquiry, to conspire the ruin of his country, and to act in confederacy with publick robbers.
But, my lords, whether the nation is really exasperated to such a degree as is represented, whether it is the general opinion of mankind that the publick affairs have been unfaithfully administered, and whether this bill has been dictated by a desire of publick justice, or of private revenge, I have not thought it necessary to inquire; having long learned to act in consequence of my own conviction, not of the opinions of others, at least, not of those who determine upon questions which they cannot understand, and judge without having ever obtained an opportunity of examining.
Such, my lords, must be the opinions of the people upon questions of policy, opinions not formed by reflection, but adopted from those whom they sometimes, with very little reason, imagine nearer spectators of the government than themselves, and in whom they place an implicit confidence, on account of some casual act of popularity.
I shall not, therefore, think the demands of the people a rule of conduct, nor shall ever fear to incur their resentment in the prosecution of their interest. I shall never flatter their passions to obtain their favour, or gratify their revenge for fear of their contempt. The inconstancy, my lords, of publick applause, all of us have observed, and many of us have experienced; and we know that it is very far from being always the reward of merit. We know that the brightest character may be easily darkened by calumny; that those who are labouring for the welfare of the publick, may be easily represented as traitors and oppressors; and that the people may quickly be persuaded to join in the accusation.
That the people, however deceived, have a right to accuse whomsoever they suspect, and that their accusation ought to be heard, I do not deny; but surely, my lords, the opinion of the people is not such a proof of guilt as will justify a method of prosecution never known before, or give us a right to throw down the barriers of liberty, and punish by power those whom we cannot convict by law.
Let any of your lordships suppose himself by some accident exposed to the temporary malice of the populace, let him imagine his enemies inflaming them to a demand of a prosecution, and then proposing that he should be deprived of the common methods of defence, and that evidence should be hired against him, lest the publick should be disappointed, and he will quickly discover the unreasonableness of this bill.
I suppose no man will deny, that methods of prosecution introduced on one occasion, may be practised on another; and that in the natural rotations of power, the same means may be used for very different ends. Nothing is more probable, my lords, if a bill of this kind should be ever passed, in compliance with the clamours of the people, to punish ministers, and to awe the court, than that it may in time, if a wicked minister should arise, be made a precedent for measures by which the court may intimidate the champions of the people; by which those may be pursued to destruction, who have been guilty of no other crime than that of serving their country in a manner which those who are ignorant of the circumstances of affairs, happen to disapprove.
The measures now proposed, my lords, are, therefore, to be rejected, because it is evident that they will establish a precedent, by which virtue may at any time be oppressed, but which can be very seldom necessary for the detection of wickedness; since there is no probability that it will often happen, that a man really guilty of enormous crimes can secure himself from discovery, or connect others with him in such a manner, that they cannot impeach him without betraying themselves.
But, my lords, whenever virtue is to be persecuted, whenever false accusations are to be promoted, this method is incontestably useful; for no reward can so efficaciously prevail upon men who languish in daily fear of publick justice, as a grant of impunity.
It may be urged, my lords, I own, that all inquiries into futurity are idle speculations; that the expedient proposed is proper on the present occasion, and that no methods of justice are to be allowed, if the possibility of applying them to bad purposes, is a sufficient reason for rejecting them.
But to this, my lords, it may be answered with equal reason, that every process of law is likewise, in some degree, defective; that the complications of circumstances are va
riable without end, and, therefore, cannot be comprised in any certain rule; and that we must have no established method of justice, if we cannot be content with such as may possibly be sometimes eluded.
And, my lords, it may be observed farther, that scarcely any practice can be conceived, however generally unreasonable and unjust, which may not be sometimes equitable and proper; and that if we are to lay aside all regard to futurity, and act merely with regard to the present exigence, it may be often proper to violate every part of our constitution. This house may sometimes have rejected bills beneficial to the nation; and if this reasoning be allowed, it might have been wise and just in the commons and the emperour to have suspended our authority by force, to have voted us useless on that occasion, and have passed the law without our concurrence.
With regard to the establishment of criminal prosecutions, as well as to our civil rights, we are, my lords, to consider what is, upon the whole, most for the advantage of the publick; we are not to admit practices which may be sometimes useful, but may be often pernicious, and which suppose men better or wiser than they are. We do not grant absolute power to a wise and moderate prince, because his successours may inherit his power without his virtues; we are not to trust or allow new methods of prosecution upon an occasion on which they may seem useful, because they may be employed to purposes very different from those for which they were introduced.
Thus, my lords, I have shown the impropriety of the bill now before us, upon the most favourable supposition that can possibly be made; a supposition of the guilt of the noble person against whom it is contrived. And surely, my lords, what cannot even in that case be approved, must, if we suppose him innocent, be detested.
That he is really innocent, my lords, that he is only blackened by calumny, and pursued by resentment, cannot be more strongly proved than by the necessity to which his enemies are reduced, of using expedients never heard of in this nation before, to procure accusations against him; expedients which they cannot show to have been at any time necessary for the punishment of a man really wicked, and which, by bringing guilt and innocence into the same danger, leave us at liberty to imagine, that he is clear from the crimes imputed to him, even in the opinion of those who pursue him with the fiercest resentment, and the loudest clamours.
Complete Works of Samuel Johnson Page 266
