army itself is dangerous, so also is that code of law by which such an establishment is regulated and accommodated. The mutiny bill, or martial law methodized, is not only different from, but directly opposite to, the common law of the land; it sets aside her trial by jury, departs from her principles of evidence, declines her ordinary tribunals of justice, and in their place establishes a summary proceeding, arbitrary crimes, arbitrary punishments, a secret sentence, and a sudden execution. It invests his Majesty with a power to ordain what new offences, and establish what new punishments he shall in his discretion think fit, provided the punishment do not extend to life or limb. "A vast and important trust," says the author of the Commentaries, speaking of an annual, not a perpetual mutiny bill; "an unlimited power to create crimes, and annex to them any punishment not extending to life or limb. These are forbidden to be inflicted, except for crimes declared to be punishable by this act; among which we may observe, that any disobedience to lawful commands is one." The object of this code is to bring those who are reached by it to a state of implicit subordination, and to create in their Sovereign an absolute authority. It furnishes a perfect image of arbitrary power. Accordingly the people of England, whose maxims we should admire and emulate, jealous on all subjects which relate to liberty, have exceeded, on the subject of the army, their usual caution; they have, in the preamble of their annual mutiny bill, claimed their birthright; they recite part of the declaration of right, "that standing armies and martial law in peace, without the consent of Parliament, are illegal;" and having stated the simplicity and purity of their ancient constitution, and having set forth a great principle of Magna Charta, they admit a partial and temporary repeal of it; they admit an army and a law for its regulation, but they limit the number of the former, and the duration of both; confining all the troops themselves, the law that regulates, and the power that commands them, to one year. Thus is the army of England rendered a parliamentary army, the constitutional ascendancy of the subject over the soldier, preserved; the military rendered effectually subordinate to the civil magistrate, because dependent on parliament; the government of the sword controlled in its exercise, because limited in its duration; and the King entrusted with the command of the army, during good behaviour only. And yet that wise people have hitherto considered the army, thus limited, thus dependent, thus qualified, and thus sheath ed, as a necessary evil; and will not even admit of barracks, lest the soldier should be still more alienated from the state of a subject, and thus alienated and armed, have a post of strength, and aggravate the dangerous nature of his condition by the advantage of his situation. When the Parliament of Ireland proceeded to regulate the army, I conceive it should have adopted the maxims of the British constitution, as much as the rules of British discipline; I conceive that it ought to be the policy of this country to go step by step with the British nation in all her wise regulations; and not only adopt her constitution, but pursue the wise and aged maxims which she has formed for its preservation; that mutual liberty may be common strength; that England may not be our tyrant, nor we her enslaver; that Ireland may not be a prerogative country with a constitution inverted, a bad lesson to kings, poisoning their minds with false notions of government, and arming their hands with unconstitutional powers. We have, however, departed from the example and maxims of England; we have done so in the most important concern, the government of the sword; and in three most material instances: we have omitted in our mutiny bill the preamble which declares the great charter of liberty; we have left the number of forces in the breast of his Majesty; and, under these circumstances, we have made the bill perpetual. This is to depart from the prudence of England, in the very case where we should have surpassed her in caution, because we have all her reasons to dread a standing army, and many reasons of our own likewise; we have no foreign dominions to preserve, and we have a constitution to lose, by the violence of an army, by the encroachments of the prince, and by the usurped authority of the British Parliament. The liberty of this country has indeed been asserted by the inhabitants, but has received no adequate acknowledgment on the part of his Majesty; on the contrary, his Excellency's confidential secretary did, on the part of the government, officially, from a written paper, declare that he opposed the introduction of the Irish mutiny bill, upon the principle, " that he conceived it unnecessary, that the English act extended to Ireland;" also his Majesty's Attorney-general did assert, that the British Parliament could bind Ireland. Likewise, his Excellency, just before the arrival of the Irish bill, ordered the troops to change quarters, guarding, by a cotemporary comment, against whatever the bill might import in favour of our liberty. Also the post-office is kept up in this country without seeking an Irish act, contrary to an express engage ment, without any legal existence whatsoever, yet affecting to stand upon a British statute. After such declarations and such acts of government, the name of Ireland exhibited in the British mutiny act, during the subsistence of the contest, with the example of America before us, to arm the chief magistrate, or rather, indeed, to arm the claims of the British Parliament with a perpetual law, for the regulation and accommodation of any indefinite number of troops his Majesty is pleased to keep up in Ireland, appears to me a measure of an unwarrantable and unseasonable, a corrupt and a crazy, confidence. I must observe, that the army, thus rendered by our law unconfined in its numbers, and by the same law made independent of Parliament for its regulation, however brave and respectable, is not a native army, but of that very country which claims to make law for Ireland; also, I must observe, that the minister who, in fact, governs that army, is a British minister, not responsible to your Parliament, nor resident in your country; so that now, by this pernicious bill, this minister, alien in affection, contemptuous in disposition, distant in situation, and free from the control of an expirable authority, may send into this country any number of troops which the return of his pride may require, and the collected strength of the empire, at the close of the war, shall be able to furnish; and he may billet them upon you, in execution of any project of power, or avarice, or revenge; to collect a British tax, or disperse an Irish association, or trample on an Irish spirit; and the people of this country have the mortification to think that they may, by their own law, a law grafted on their best exertions, be obliged to billet and accommodate troops quartered upon them for their destruction: or, though his Majesty's ministers may not choose to come to extremity, yet may they gradually, and at their leisure, armed with our law, and encouraged by our humiliation, raise new regiments, —a measure both of corruption and force; or throw into this kingdom such a body of troops as may break her spirit, watch her motions, control her free action, and, finally, make those who before thought it inexpedient to deny, soon think it inexpedient to resist, the usurped authority of the British Parliament. I say, the minister may do this at his leisure, and build by degrees a system of tyranny on the foundation of our own law. Princes could not destroy liberty by force, if they had not obtained that force by law; nor was any nation ever enslaved, who might not have found in herself the efficient causes of her own servitude: her laws become a suggestion to the tyrant; the principle of political death is laid by the false guardians of public liberty. When I consider the critical situation of this country, I must suppose a mutiny bill, even for eighteen months, an act of confidence, justified by necessity only; that the minister would not have abused that confidence is more than probable: limitation of period changes the nature and softens the exercise of power: before an attempt could be brought to bear, before a sufficient number of forces could be conveniently collected, or before they could be ready for action, the act which kept them together might expire, and the crown, in the attempt, lose its revival: despotism would have wanted a root; the law, in this case, and the wisdom of a free people can do no more than take the best chance for their liberty, and multiply difficulties on those who should invade it, instead of making the passage easy and natural - the law, I say, in this case, would stand in the way of the early encroachment; the apprehension of this would deter the attempt; the army is prevented from flying off for ever from the law, by periodically touching the sphere of the constitution. England has found a limited mutiny bill innoxious, but would not listen to a perpetual one. In fact, mutiny bills are limited on the same principle as money bills; both are certain to be renewed; but on the return to the people of the powers which both include, the purse and the sword, depends whatever of limitation is annexed to prerogative, or of privilege is annexed to Parliament. I have still hopes, if his Majesty's ministers should make an unconstitutional use of this perpetual mutiny bill, our Parliament would struggle for freedom I would refuse its assent to the additional supply and the military establishment, expecting that his Majesty's forces would want provision under the first measure, and disperse under the authority of the last. think his Majesty's forces ought, but I do believe they would not: in strict constitution, I do think the specific consent of Parliament is still necessary for the continuation of our army. I think farther, that the present mutiny bill expires with the Parliament that made it; but these are points which an army will not comprehend, no, it will make good its quarters by the sword. Our best security, therefore, for the privileges which we have left, does not consist in the powers which our Parliament has reserved, but in other resources: the spirit of the nation is high, her ministers are distracted, her liberty is in force, her volunteers are numerous, and the mischief of a military government is suspended by an armed people. -- I must further observe to you, that the mutiny bill is not only dangerous from the above considerations, but from others which I will state to you. The revenue of this coun try is not granted in a manner favourable to public liberty. The hereditary revenue is above 600,000l. per annum; the increase of that revenue, assisted by trade, and eased of additional duties, would be considerable. Hitherto his Majesty's ministers in Ireland have lavished the public money for the purpose of increasing the undue influence of the Crown; but if what is now employed to render Parliament subservient, should be applied to maintain an army independent of Parliament; if power in this country should take the shape of economy; if his Majesty's ministers, encouraged by this law, should try new councils and old resources, I do not say they would succeed; God forbid! But I do say, it was worthy of Parliament to have removed the danger by a limited mutiny bill, instead of prompting the experiment by a perpetual law. I must add, that as an ample revenue is perpetual, so is the power of collecting it perpetual, provided his Majesty do not call a Parliament; for the revenue bill is by an express clause to continue until the end of the then next session of Parliament. These are great defects in our constitution, very great indeed! they have produced a train of the worst consequences; for to these perpetual grants of revenue and power, capable of being cured by a limited mutiny bill, but aggravated by a perpetual one, to these grants do I attribute the frequent insults which, with the interval of a few months in the beginning of the last session, have been offered to the Irish Parliament, and the sottish compliance with which those insults have been borne; the frequent, studious, and almost periodical breach of the privilege of the Irish House of Commons in the alteration of her money bills; the solemn protest imposed, and I might say branded, on the journals of the Lords against the inherent and exclusive right of the Commons, to originate bills of supply; the tedious, lawless, wanton, and successive embargoes frequently laid during the sitting of Parliament, and without its consultation; the continuing to pay, by virtue of King's letter, the very pensions which the House of Commons had repeatedly disallowed; the refusing to give any account of great sums disbursed by the Privy Council under the denomination of Concordatum, and screened from enquiry under the impudent hypocrisy of an oath; from the grants I speak of, has proceeded the plunder of our people, as well as the insults on our Parliament; the vast, indecent, and increasing number of places, pensions, salaries, additional salaries, &c. &c. and all that с |