of those advantages which the measure has produced to the common cause. I have now weighed the whole merits of the transaction before the house, and with them I am well content to leave the decision. While we claim a fair construction on the principles and intentions which have guided our conduct, if it shall appear that it has in the smallest instance deviated from any constitutional principle, we must submit to the consequence, whatever be the censure or the punishment. It is our duty, according to the best of our judgment, to consult for the interest of the country; it is your sacred and peculiar trust to preserve inviolate the principles of the constitution. I throw myself upon your justice, prepared in every case to submit to your decision; but with considerable confidence, that I shall experience your approbation. If I should be disappointed, I will not say that the disappointment will not be heavy, and the mortification severe; at any rate, however, it will to me be matter of consolation, that I have not, from any apprehension of personal consequences, neglected to pursue that line of conduct which I conceive to be essential to the interests of the country and of Europe. But while I bow with the most perfect submission to the determination of the house, I cannot but remark on the extraordinary language which has been used on this question. Ministers have been broadly accused with a wanton and a malignant desire to violate the constitution: it has been stated that no other motive could possibly have actuated their conduct. If a charge of such malignant intention had been brought against men, who have affirmed the present war to be neither just nor necessary, and who on that ground cannot be supposed friendly to its success; who have extolled, nay, even exulted in the prodigies of French valour; who have gloried in the successes of the foes of civil liberty, the hostile disturbers of the peace of Europe, men who blasphemously denied the existence of the Deity, and who had rejected and trampled on every law, moral and divine; who have exclaimed against the injustice of bringing to trial persons who had associated to overawe the legislature; those who gravely and vehemently asserted, that it was a question of prudence, rather than a question of morality, whether an act of the legislature should be resisted; those who were anxious to expose and aggravate every defect of the constitution; to reprobate every measure adopted for its preservation, and to obstruct every proceeding of the executive government to ensure the success of the contest in which we are engaged in common with our allies; I say, if such a charge of deliberate and deep rooted malignity were brought against persons of this description, I should conceive that even then the rules of candid and charitable interpretation would induce us to hesitate in admitting its reality; much more when it is brought against individuals, whose conduct, I trust, has exhibited the reverse of the picture I have now drawn. I appeal to the justice of the house, I rely on their candour; but, to gentlemen who can suppose ministers capable of those motives which have been imputed to them on this occasion, it must be evident that I can desire to make no such appeal. MR. CURRAN'S SPEECH, ON THE TRIAL OF PETER FINERTY, FOR A LIBEL. TRIED IN THE CITY OF DUBLIN, BEFORE MR. JUSTICE DOWNS, ON THE 22d DECEMBER, 1797. To explain some allusions in the present speech, it is necessary briefly to relate, that William Orr had, in the preceding year been convicted of treason; but there appearing to the jury circumstances to mitigate his offence, he was recommended by them to mercy. Their recommendation, however, producing no effect, sentence of death was pronounced on him. Previous to the day appointed for execution, various representations were made to the Lord Lieutenant in his favour, and one especially by the magistrate who had originally committed him, accompanied by affidavits which went to impeach the credibility of Wheatley, the principal witness on the trial. In consequence of these representations, it is supposed, the prisoner was twice respited, and it was confidently expected that he would be ultimately pardoned. But government were inexorable. The execution of this unfortunate man seems to have excited the deepest sense of horrour and indig nation among the people of Ireland. At a court held at the city of Dublin, Peter Finerty, editor of the paper called the Press, was tried and found guilty, on the charge of being the printer and publisher of the "following false, scandalous, and libellous letter, addressed to earl Cambden." MY LORD, "I address your excellency on a subject as awful and interesting, as any that hath engaged the feelings of this suffering country. The oppression of an individual leads to the oppression of every member in the state, as his death, however speciously palliated by forms, may lead to the death of the constitution. Your lordship already anticipates me; and your conscience has told you, that I allude to the circumstance of Mr. Orr, whose case every man has now made his own, by discovering the principle on which Mr. Pitt sent you to execute his orders in Ireland. The death of Mr. Orr, the nation has pronounced one of the most sanguinary and savage acts that has disgraced the laws.— In perjury, did you not hear, my lord, the verdict was given? perjury accompanied with terrour, as terrour has marked every step of your government. Vengeance and desolation were to fall on those who would not plunge themselves in blood. These were not strong enough; against the express law of the land, not only was drink introduced to the jury, but drunkenness itself, beastly and criminal drunkenness, was employed to procure the murder of a better man, than any that now surrounds you. But well may juries think themselves justified in their drunken verdicts, if debauched and drunken judges, swilling spirits on the seat of justice itself, shall set the country so excellent an example. Repentance, which is a slow virtue, hastened, however, to declare the innocence of the victim. The mischief which perjury had done, truth now stepped forward to repair; neither was she too late, had humanity formed any part of your counsels. Stung with remorse, on the return of reason, part of his jury solemnly and soberly made oath, that their verdict had been given under the unhappy influence of intimidation and drink; and in the most serious affidavit that ever was made, by acknowledging their crime, endeavoured to atone to God, and to their country, for the sin into which they had been seduced. The informer too, a man it must be owned not much famed for veracity, but stung with the like remorse, deposed that all he had formerly sworn was malicious and untrue, and that from compunction alone he was induced to make a full disclosure of his great and enormous guilt. In this confession the wicked man had no temptation to perjury. He was not to be paid for that. He had not in view, like another Judas, the "thirty pieces of silver." If he was to receive a reward, he knew he must not look for it in this world. Those testimonies were followed by the solemn declaration of the dying man himself; and the approach of death is not a moment when men are given to deceive both themselves and the world. Good and religious men are not apt, by perjury on their deathbeds, to close the gates of heaven against themselves, like those who have no hope. But if these solemn declarations do not deserve regard, then there is no truth in justice; and though the innocence of the accused had even remained doubtful, it was your duty, my lord, and you had no exemption from that duty, to have interposed your arm, and saved him from the death that perjury, drunkenness, and reward had prepared him. Let not the nation be told that you are a passive instrument in the hands of others-if passive you be, then is your office a shadow indeed-if an active instrument, as you ought to be, you did not perform the duty which the law required of you; you did not exercise the prerogative of mercy-that mercy which the constitution had intrusted to you for the safety of the subject, by guarding him from the oppression of wicked men. Innocent it appears he was; his blood has been shed; and the precedent indeed is awful. Had Frazier and Ross been found guilty of the murder committed on a harmless and industrious peasant-lay your hand to your heart, my lord, and answer without advisers, would you not have pardoned those ruffians? After the proof you have given of your mercy, I must suppose your clemency unbounded. Have no Orange-men, convicted on the purest evidence, been at any time pardoned? Is not their oath of blood connived at? was not that oath manufactured at the command of power! and does not power itself discipline those brigands? But suppose the evidence of Wheatly had been true, what was the offence of Mr. Orr? not that he had taken an oath of blood and extermination-for then he had not suffered-but that he had taken an oath of charity and of union, of humanity and of peace. He has suffered. Shall we then be told, that your government will conciliate publick opinion, or that the people will not continue to look for a better? Was the unhappy man respited but to torture him, to insult both justice and the nation, to carry the persecution into the bosom of his wife and children? Is this the prerogative of mercy? What would your father have said unto you, had he lived to witness this falling off. "Son," he would have said, "I am a father; I have a daughter; I have known misfortune; the world has pitied me; and I am not ungrateful." Let us explore the causes of this sanguinary destruction of the people. Is it that you are determined to revenge the regret expressed by them at the recall of your predecessor; and well knowing they will not shed tears at the departure of his successour, that you are resolved to make them weep during your stay? Yes, my lord, I repeat during your stay; for it may not be necessary that a royal yacht, manned and decorated for the purpose, should waft you from the shores of an angered and insulted country. Another cause. Is it to be wondered that a successour of lord Fitzwilliam should sign the death warrant of Mr. Orr?---Mr. Pitt had learned, that a merciful lord lieutenant was unVOL. III. 3 G |