had suffered this cruel treatment had arrived in the course of the present week. He (Dr. Lushington) had examined them, and he was perfectly ready to produce them before a committee of the house, if the opportunity of doing so should be granted him. He was quite convinced that no man could see and hear them without being satisfied of their veracity. Another evidence he should have to submit was a poor Irish boy, who had been abandoned in the streets of Jamaica, where he was famishing and suffering under a bad fever, when he was found by one of the petitioners. This boy remained under his roof until the period of his deportation, when he attempted to accompany him; but being prevented, he worked his way to the place where he met his preserver. This boy, who was remarkably acute, he (Dr. Lushington) had also examined, and he would without fear submit his testimony to any scrutiny that might be thought fit. He felt himself now obliged to say, and he did so with considerable pain, that a very great portion of the blame in these transactions devolved upon the Duke of Manchester, who appeared not to have merely acted under the bad advice and the misrepresentations of others, but to have made himself a party in the cause. He had even gone so far as to make assertions which he (Dr. Lushington) had reason to believe were not founded in fact. He (the duke) stated, that it had been proved beyond all doubt that the petitioners were aliens- -an assertion which could not be true, because it was directly at variance with the decision of the court of king's bench and the evidence before the

house. He concluded his dispatch by saying that he should not have thought it necessary to make the details which it contained to their lordships, but that he had believed it was the intention of the petitioners to make some application to them. Not necessary! Could the Duke of Manchester imagine that it was not necessary for him to explain to the British government the grounds upon which he had thought fit to transport two of the subjects of that government, at five minutes' notice, from the island of which they were natives to bar them from their wives and families, and to plunge them in almost total ruin? He (Dr. Lushington) should tremble at the consequences of such a policy as was here avowed by his grace. Upon the statement which he had made, he submitted to the house that it was quite obvious that the whole proceeding was unjustifiable, and that nothing which appeared in the evidence on the table could afford the shadow of an excuse for it. The report of Mr. Burge, the attorneygeneral, upon which the Duke of Manchester relied, was, in many respects, wholly false. It was conveyed in such terms as he (Dr. Lushington) should have thought no man in his situation would dare to use. He talked about "the difficulty of bringing before a court of justice evidence to prove the fact of the conspiracy which he charged to have existed; because the persons who could give that evidence were either parties concerned and would not attend, or slaves whose evidence could not be received." This was false in every respect-it was false from beginning to end; for the

former

former could have been compelled to give evidence, and by the statute law the testimony of the latter was directed to be received in all cases like this. He (Dr. Lushington) would, however, detain the house no longer with comments on these papers, every line of which provoked a comment. He would only call the attention of the house to the gross violation of justice which had been perpetrated against the two petitioners who now called for redress-who at the bar of the house presented an unanswerable case of oppression, and who complained that they had been ruined in their fortunes, and that their families had been plunged into irretrievable misery. Never could the British parliament be better employed than in investigating complaints and redressing the wrongs of petitioners in any part of their dominions. Still more urgent was the claim of these petitioners, because it was evident that by a gross abuse of power, and an utter disregard of the principles of justice, such as had been displayed upon the present occasion, the allegiance of the free coloured population of Jamaica must be alienated from the government; and the result of that could be no other than the total ruin and destruction of the British power and property in the island. The hon. member concluded by moving for a select committee to inquire into the circumstances attending the deportation of L. C. Lecesne and J. Escoffery from the island of Jamaica.

Mr. Wilmot Horton rose for the purpose of offering to the house some explanations, as from the office he held he would be

expected to do, on this subject. He had in the first place, however, to observe, that he thought his hon. and learned friend had not stated this case with his usual candour, because he had omitted to inform the house of a material fact. In a conversation with his hon. and learned friend, he had informed him that it was not upon the papers before the house that the case rested in any degree whatever. There was other evidence which it was not considered consistent with the duty of the secretary of state to give out for general publication. Surely his hon. and learned friend ought to have stated this as well as the further one, that he (Mr. W. Horton), so far from objecting to the institution of proceedings which should be likely to obtain substantial justice, had told his hon. and learned friend that he would consent to the appointment of a secret committee, before which all the papers might be laid. His hon. and learned friend had said, that he (Mr. Horton) was there to defend the proceedings which had been taken against these petitioners; but he begged to disclaim any such intention. He was there only to defend the Duke of Manchester for the course which he had adopted. That course had been founded mainly on the fact of the petitioners being aliens, which the evidence had alluded to would establish beyond all doubt. He passed by the topics which his hon. and learned friend had introduced into the beginning of his speech, respecting the condition of the free coloured people of Jamaica. was enough for him to take things as he found them. The free coloured

It

coloured people of that island were under certain disqualifications, but that circumstance did not free them from their allegiance to the government. The important question upon which this turned was, whether a conspiracy against the government actually existed; and whether the petitioners were parties to that conspiracy. This question could only be decided by the production of the evidence he had alluded to before a secret committee, because it was impossible for the house, or for any committee of the house, to decide upon the conflicting testimony now upon the table. At a period to which the transactions referred, a strong feeling of alarm prevailed at Jamaica. If any body doubted the reasonable grounds of that alarm, he could refer them to a letter written by Mr. Samson and Mr. Scoller, the chairman and secretary of a committee of free coloured people, to Mr. Wilson, in London, in which they spoke of their "long endurance under an oppressive tyranny, which one energetic effort of their own would suffice to overthrow or destroy.". Was it unreasonable to suspect people avowing these sentiments of being engaged in a treasonable conspiracy? The grounds, however, upon which the Duke of Manchester took the step of transporting the petitioners proved to be aliens, were those of an overpowering public necessity. The house of assembly and the council had reported, without one dissentient voice, that the petitioners were engaged in a treasonable conspiracy. What ought the Duke of Manchester then to have done with persons so dangerous and how great would

have beer the responsibility he must have incurred, if he asked otherwise? This course was sanctioned also by the advice of all the officers of the government in the island; and although his hon. and learned friend had not scrupled to apply to them terms of reproach, he was wholly at a loss to know upon what the charges his hon. and learned friend had brought against them were founded. The attorney-general, whom his hon. and learned friend had charged, together with others, with having put into action that monstrous scene of iniquity he had detailed to the house, had always hitherto been acknowledged to be a person of ability and character. He strongly recommended the course which the Duke of Manchester had adopted, and his opinion had been borne out by that of every other person on the spot who had means of forming a correct judgment upon the subject. If the petitioners were innocent of the charges against them, there could be no doubt that they had been very hardly used, and that they were entitled to redress. But he must remind the house and his hon. and learned friend, that the opportunity for obtaining this redress had been offered to him, and although not in the exact manner he wished, yet it was in a way calculated to do full justice. Until this was done, the opinion of the house must of necessity be suspended, and its judgment in abeyance, because the facts of the case were not before it. If Mr. Hector Mitchell had been guilty of the atrocities laid to his charge, God forbid that he (Mr. Horton) should say one word in his justification: but to believe that he had done

So,

so, would be to believe that all the persons, whose duty it was to watch over the administration of justice in Jamaica, had neglected their duty in a most extraordinary manner. But whilst the charge of falsehood was thus copiously made against others, was all that the petitioners had stated true? They had said that they were never engaged in any illicit traffic with St. Domingo, and that they had never carried on treasonable correspondence statements, the utter falsehood of which the evidence he had alluded to would establish, and prove, on the contrary, beyond a doubt, their traitorous intentions. His hon. and learned friend laid great stress upon the petitioners having obtained their privilege papers, and had inferred that they could not have done so unless the fact of their birth in the island had been satisfactorily proved. He held, however, in his hand a paper, in which it was distinctly stated, that the certificates in question had been granted without any inquiry into that fact. This was upon the authority of the attorneygeneral. If the house were prepared to believe that the house of assembly and the council had conspired to falsify the evidence on the case of the petitioners, and that the Duke of Manchester had lent himself to aid their deportation out of the country, then something like a case might be made out until then, and he thought there was no present probability of any such event, the house must suspend its opinion. The evidence of which he was in possession was so satisfactory to his mind, and his knowledge of the private character and amiability

of the Duke of Manchester was such, that he would not concur in any censure, implied or otherwise, which, upon grounds like those before the house, it might be attempted to pass upon him. He would never advocate (in the present instance he had done directly the contrary) the keeping back any evidence which was necessary for the ends of justice. He left it to the house, without hesitation, to decide whether the statement of his hon. and learned friend had established any thing like criminality against the Duke of Manchester.

Mr. Scarlett said, he thought it appeared probable that the Duke of Manchester had been misled by the persons whose duty it was to advise him; and he understood the arguments of his hon. and learned friend to apply rather to those individuals than personally to the duke, who could not be supposed to be actuated by any thing but a desire to do justice in the administration of the trust reposed in him. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Horton) had alluded to documents not before the house; and without intending to say more of them than he was warranted in, he could not help observing that some circumstances connected with the evidence produced tended to throw discredit on the sources whence the other must be drawn. He (Mr. Scarlett) had read the whole of the evidence attentively; and he had been induced the more particularly to do so, because a near relation of his own (Mr. chief-justice Scarlett), to whose learning, capacity, and integrity, he was glad of any opportunity of bearing testimony, had sat in judgment on the subject. There

were

were some circumstances in the evidence which excited strong suspicions in his mind. On the application for the habeas corpus, it appeared the strongest evidence against Lecesne was the affidavit of his sister Lucille, who swore that he was born at Port-au-Prince. Lecesne brought three persons to swear that Lucille told them she had been induced to swear to this, which she knew to be false, at the persuasions of a Mr. Villegreme, who told her if her brother was shipped off, as he would be, in consequence of her affidavit, she would become entitled to one half of her father's property; and threatened besides, if she did not make this affidavit, that she should be imprisoned. Now, although the court had in the first instance granted a rule to show cause, no attempt had ever been made, either by Lucille Lecesne, or by Mr. Villegreme, to contradict the very heavy statements which were made against them. The observations of the attorney-general on this subject were somewhat singular, for he expressed his astonishment that the court had in their decision paid no more attention to the affidavits of Mr. Mitchell, who was well known to them to be a most respectable person, and of Mr. Innis, a police-officer; as if it was the practice of judges to be influenced by the character of witnesses who made affidavits, instead of by the facts which those affidavits contained. While this imputation of Mr. Villegreme's having suborned perjury against the petitioners remained, he (Mr. Scarlett) should suspect whatever came from the same source. It was impossible for the house to pay too much attention to appeals of a descrip

1825.

tion like the present; as it was well known that, in the colonial assemblies, the coloured population was far from meeting with any thing like liberal consideration.

Mr. Canning said, that under all the circumstances, however he might have been disposed to prefer the course suggested by his hon. friend (Mr. W. Horton), he should not now oppose the appointment of a select committee. The short ques

tion

in

upon the present charge, as it applied to the conduct of the Duke of Manchester, was, whether the duke had or not treated British subjects as aliens only could lawfully be treated; that was a simple question, and one easily capable of proof, but one which certainly was neither proved nor disproved by the evidence before the house one admission, however, all parties must agree-that when the Duke of Manchester came forward, offering to wave the privilege which his absence gave him, and submit to clear his conduct by a trial by law, he did entitle himself, so long as the question was pending, to the suspension of every thing like severe or unkind judgment against him. The hon. member for Peterborough observed, that if the Duke of Manchester had done wrong, he had probably been misled. In this opinion he (Mr. Canning) entirely concurred; but it was yet to be shown that the duke, in what he had done, had exceeded his authority: and that he himself entertained no apprehension as to the result of his conduct, was at least to be presumed from the readiness with which he courted inquiry into it. The main feature in the case then came on to be considered-to wit, what