enjoyed under your majefty's protection, give us the greateft confidence thofe bleffings will be tranf mitted unbroken and entire to our late pofterity. Gratitude, as well as intereft, therefore, will oblige as in our feve`ral itations to contribute our utmost to the fupport of the legal power which that great event hath placed in your majesty's hands, and to manifeft the truth of our prefent profeffion of exerting ourselves at all times to the utmoft in defence of your majesty, and our happy conflitution in church and ftate. Addreffes were alfo delivered from Bristol, Liverpool, the town of Leicefter, Coventry, and the county of Salop, befides fome other places in England; and from almost every part of Scotland. With great grief and forrow, we have long beheld the endeavours of certain evil-minded perfons, who attempt to infufe into your royal mind, notions and opinions of the most dangerous and pernicious tendency, and who promote and counfel fuch measures as cannot fail to deftroy that harmony and confidence which should ever fubfift between a juft and virtuous prince and a free and loyal people. For this difaffected purpose, they have introduced into every part of the administration of our happy, legal conftitution, a certain unlimited and indefinite difcretionary power; to prevent which is the fole aim of all our laws, and was the fole caufe of all those disturbances and revolutions which formerly distract ed this unhappy country; for our ancestors, by their own fatal expe rience, well knew that in a state where difcretion begins,law,liberty, and fafety end. Under the pretence of this difcretion, or, as it was for merly and has been lately called, law of ftate, we have feen English fubjects, and even a mem ber of the British legislature,arrested by virtue of a general warrant issued by a fecretary of ftate, contrary to the law of the land Their houses rifled and plunder ed, their papers feized, and used as evidence upon trial Their bodies committed to close imprisonment The Habeas Corpus eluded Trial by jury discountenanced, and the first law officer of the crown publicly infinuating that juries are not to be trufted Printers punished by the miniftry in the fupreme court without a trial by their equals, without any trial at al [03] The 1 The remedy of the law for falfe imprisonment barred and defeatedThe plaintiff and his attorney, for their appeal to the law of the land, punished by expences and imprifonment, and made by forced engagements to defift from their legal claim. A writing determined to be a li bel by a court where it was not cognizable in the firft inftance; contrary to law, because all appeal is thereby cut off, and inferior courts and juries influenced by fuch predétermination A perfon condemned in the faid court as the author of the fuppofed libel unheard, without defence or trial Unjuft treatment of petitions, by felecting only fuch parts as might be wrefted to criminate the petitioner, and refufing to hear thofe which might procure him redress The thanks of one branch of the legiflature proposed by a minister to be given to an acknowledged offender for his offence, with the declared intention of fcreening him from law Attachments wrefted from their originial intent of removing obftructions to the proceedings of law, to punish by fentence of arbitrary fine and imprisonment, without trial or appeal,fuppofed offences committed out of court Perpetual imprisonment of an Englishman, without trial, conviction, or fentence, by the fame mode of attachment, wherein the fame perfon is at once party, acculer, judge, and jury Inftead of the ancient ard legal civil police, the military introduced at every opportunity, unneceffarily and unlawfully patrolling the ftreets, to the alarm and terror of the inhabitants The lives of many of your majefty's innocent fubjects destroyed by military execution Such military execution folemnly adjudged to be legal. Murder abetted, encouraged and rewarded The civil magiftracy rendered contemptible by the appointment of improper and incapable perfons The civil magiftrates tampered with by administration, and neglecting and refufing to discharge their duty Mobs and riots hired and raised by the miniftry, in order to justify and recommend their own illegal proceedings, and to prejudice your majely's mind by falfe infinuations against the loyalty of your majesty's fubjects The freedom of election violated by corrupt and undue influence, by unpunished violence and murder The juft verdicts of juries, and the opinion of the judges, overruled by falfe reprefentations to your majefty; and the determinations of the law fet afide by new, unprecedented, and dangerous means; thereby leaving the guilty without reftraint, and the injured without redress, and the lives of your majefty's fubjects at the mercy of every ruffian protected by administration- Obfolete and vexatious claims of the crown fet on foot for partial and election purposes. Partial attacks on the liberty of the prefs: the most daring and pernicious libels against the conftitution, and against the liberty of the fubject, being allowed to pass unnoticed, whilst the flighteft libel against a minifter is punished with the utmoft rigour Wicked attempts to increase and establish a standing army, by endeavouring to veft in the crown an unlimited unlimited power over the militia; which, fhould they fucceed, muft fooner or later, fubvert the conftitution by augmenting the power of adminiftration in proportion to their delinquency Repeated endeavours to diminish the importance of members of parliament individually, in order to render them more dependent on adminiftration collectively. Even threats having been employed by minifters to fupprefs the freedom of debate; and the wrath of parliament denounced against measures authorifed by the law of the land Refolutions of one branch of the legiflature, fet up as the law of the land, being a dire& ufurpation of the rights of the two other branches, and therefore a manifeft infringement of the conftitution Public money shamefully fquandered and unaccounted for, and all inquiry into the caufe of arrears in the civil lift prevented by the ministry Inquiry into a paymaster's public accounts ftopped in the exchequer, though the fums unaccounted for by that pay-master amounted to above forty millions fterling Public loans perverted to private minifterial purposes Proftitution of public honours and rewards to men who can neither plead public virtue nor fervices Irreligion and immorality, fo eminently discountenanced by your majefty's royal example, encouraged by administration both by example and precept. The fame difcretion has been extended by the fame evil counsellors to your majesty's dominions in America, and has produced to our fuffering fellow fubjects in that part of the world, grievances and appre henfions fimilar to thofe of which we complain at home. Moft gracious fovereign, Such are the grievances and apprehenfions which have long dif contented and difturbed the greatest and beft part of your majefty's loyal fubjects. Unwilling, however, to interrupt your royal repofe, though ready to lay down our lives and fortunes for your majesty's fervice, and for the conftitution as by law efta blifhed, we have waited patiently, expecting a conftitutional remedy by the means of our own reprefentatives; but our legal and free choice having been repeatedly rejected, and the right of election now finally taken from us by the unprecedented feating of a candidate who was never chofen by the county, and who, even to become a candidate, was obliged fraudulently to vacate his feat in parliament, under the pretence of an infignificant place, invited thereto by the prior declaration of a minifter, that whoever oppofed our choice, though but with four votes, fhould be declared member for the county. We fee ourselves, by this laft act, deprived even of the franchises of Englishmen, reduced to the most abject state of flavery, and left without hopes or means of redrefs but from your majefty or God. Deign then, moft gracious fovereign, to liften to the prayer of the most faithful of your majefty's fubjects; and to banish from your royal favour, truft,andconfidence,for ever, thofe evil and pernicious counfellors who haveendeavoured toalienate the affection of your majefty's moft fincere and dutiful fubjects, and whose fuggeftions tend to deprive your people of their deareft and moft effential rights, and who have trai [04] teroufl terously dared to depart from the fpirit and letter of thofe laws which have fecured the crown of these realms to the house of Brunswick, in which we make our moft earnest prayers to God, that it may continue untarnished to the lateft pofterity, Signed by 1565 freeholders." Narrative of what happened previous to the prefenting of the petition of the livery of London to his majefty, with a copy of the peti tion. THE HE 26th of June, the right hon. the lord mayor fent to lord Rochfort, to know when it would be convenient to present the petition of the livery of London; and received for anfwer, that it was a matter not in his department. Lord Weymouth, being then out of town, did not return till Wednefday; accordingly on Thurfday morning the lord mayor went to lord Weymouth's, but did not fee his lordship; he therefore left his bufinefs, which produced the following card: True copy of a card fent by lord Weymouth to the lord mayor. "Arlington street, June 27, 1769. Lord Weymouth prefents his compliments to the lord mayor of London, and begs leave to affure his lordship that he fhould be extremely glad to give him any information relative to the prefenting the petition of the livery of London to his majefty, as the fecretary of ftate never takes the king's pleasure with regard to the time and place of receiving petitions. They are ufually prefented to the king, either on Sunday, as his majefty is going to or returning from chapel; or on Thursday, as he goes to or returns from the drawing-room." On the 30th of June, the sheriffs went up to court, and requested an audience; which being granted, the petition was to be prefented the 5th of July. Accordingly, the right hon. Sam. Turner, efq. lord mayor, fir Rt. Ladbroke, Mr. ald. Beckford, and Mr. ald. Trecothick, together with the fheriffs, accompanied by Peter Roberts, efq. the city's remembrancer, proceeded in ftate to St. James's, with the petition of the livery of London; where, after waiting a fhort time in the antichamber, his lordship fent in a meffage by the remembrancer to the lord of the bedchamber. He was defired by Mr. Pitt. groom of the bed-chamber,todeliver his meffage. The remembrancer anfwered, his bufinefs could only be delivered to the lord of the bedchamber, and that his orders were to communicate it to none but his lordship. Soon after lord Huntingdon came out, and acquainted the lord mayor, that lord Orford was in waiting, that the levee was leave the king; but if they had any begun, and therefore he could not thing to prefent, they might walk in to the levee. Mr. Beckford an fwered, they were ready to obey the king's commands, and lord Huntingdon returned. After fome time, lord Orford, the lord in waiting, came out, and told them, that, if they had any thing to deliver, they might walk in to the levee, which they immediately did; and the king being near the door, the lord mayor addreffed him to the following effeet: "Moft gracious fovereign, We the lord mayor, the reprefentatives in parliament, together with the fheriffs, of your majefty's After which his lordship prefented the petition to his majefty, who delivered it to the lord in waiting. It was as follows; To the king's most excellent majefty. The humble petition of the livery of the city of London, in common hall affembled. W Most gracious fovereign, E, your majefty's dutiful and loyal fubjects, the livery of the city of London, with all the humility which is due from free fubjects to their lawful fovereign, but with all the anxiety which the fenfe of the prefent oppreffions, and the juft dread of future mifchiefs, produce in our minds, beg leave to lay before your majefty fome of thofe intolerable grievances, which your people have fuffered from the evil conduct of thofe who have been intrufted with the adminiftration of your majefty's government, and from the fecret unremitting influ ence of the work of counsellors, We fhould be wanting in our duty to your majefty, as well as to ourselves and our pofterity, fhould we forbear to reprefent to the throne the defperate attempts which have been, and are, too fuccefsfully made to deftroy that conftitution, to the fpirit of which we owe the relation which fubfifts between your majesty and the fubjects of thefe realms, and to fubvert thofe facred laws, which our ancestors have fealed with their blood. Your minifters, from corrupt principles, and in violation of every duty, have by various enumerated means, invaded our invaluable and unalienable right of trial by jury. They have, with impunity, iffued general warrants, and violently feized perfons and private papers. They have rendered the laws non-effective to our fecurity, by evading the Habeas Corpus. They have caufed punishments, and even perpetual imprisonment, to be inflicted, without trial, conviction, or fentence. They have brought into disrepute the civil magiftracy, by the appointment of perfons who are in many refpects unqualified for that important truft, and have thereby purpofely furnished a pretence for calling in the aid of a military power. They avow, and endeavour to eftablish, a maxim abfolutely inconfiftent with our conflitution-that is an occafion for effectually employing a military force always prefents power itfelf, when the civil trifled with or infulted;" and, by a fatal and falfe application of this maxim, they have wantonly and wickedly facrificed the lives of many of your majefty's innocent fubjects, and have prostituted your majefty's facred name and authority, to juftify, applaud. |