American Independence and the French Revolution (1760-1801). Various

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      13 and 14 April.—Submitting whether it may not be expedient that certain arms belonging to the Middlesex militia, deposited in the vestry rooms and other places of little security in Westminster and the neighbourhood of London, should be removed to the Tower, in case there should be reason to fear a renewal of the mobs and riotous assemblies.

Lord Weymouth’s Reply, dated the 14th.

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      It is highly improper that arms should at any time be deposited in places of little security, and particularly at present when so riotous a disposition appears among the populace. But as there are objections to depositing those arms now in the Tower, his Grace is to take all possible precautions for the present by giving the necessary orders for particular attention and vigilance upon this occasion; and in case of an attempt by the populace to possess themselves of the arms, is to call out the military, orders having been issued to the Secretary-at-War to support the civil magistrate upon every necessary occasion.

A PETITION TO GEORGE III. FROM THE FREEHOLDERS OF THE COUNTY OF MIDDLESEX (1769).

       Source.—Letters of Junius. London: G. Bell and Sons. Vol. ii. 1911.

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To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty. The humble petition of the Freeholders of the County of Middlesex.

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      Most Gracious Sovereign,

      We, your Majesty’s dutiful and loyal subjects, the Freeholders of the County of Middlesex, beg leave, with all affectionate submission and humility, to throw ourselves at your royal feet, and humbly to implore your paternal attention to those grievances of which this county and the whole nation complain, and those fearful apprehensions with which the whole British Empire is most justly alarmed.

      With great grief and sorrow we have long beheld the endeavours of certain evil-minded persons, who attempt to infuse into your royal mind notions and opinions of the most dangerous and pernicious tendency, and who promote and counsel such measures as cannot fail to destroy that harmony and confidence which should ever subsist between a just and virtuous prince and a free and loyal people.

      For this disaffected purpose they have introduced into every part of the administration of our happy legal constitution a certain unlimited and indefinite discretionary power, to prevent which is the sole aim of all our laws, and was the sole cause of all those disturbances and revolutions which formerly distracted this unhappy country; for our ancestors, by their own fatal experience, well knew that in a state where discretion begins, law, liberty, and safety end. Under the pretence of this discretion, or, as it was formerly, and has been lately, called, Law of state, we have seen

      English subjects, and even a member of the British Legislature, arrested by virtue of a general warrant issued by a secretary of state, contrary to the law of the land.

      Their houses rifled and plundered, their papers seized, 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 insinuating that juries are not to be trusted.

      Printers punished by the ministry in the supreme court without a trial by their equals, without any trial at all.

      The remedy of the law for false imprisonment debarred and defeated.

      The plaintiff and his attorney, for their appeal to the law of the land, punished by expenses and imprisonment, and made, by forced engagements, to desist from their legal claim.

      A writing determined to be a libel by a court where it was not cognizable in the first instance; contrary to law, because all appeal is thereby cut off, and inferior courts and juries influenced by such predetermination.

      A person condemned in the said courts as the author of the supposed libel, unheard, without defence or trial.

      Unjust treatment of petitions, by selecting only such parts as might be wrested to criminate the petitioner, and refusing to hear those which might procure him redress.

      The thanks of one branch of the Legislature proposed by a minister to be given to an acknowledged offender for his offence, with the declared intention of screening him from the law.

      Attachments wrested from their original intent of removing obstructions to the proceedings of law, to punish by sentence of arbitrary fine and imprisonment, without trial or appeal, supposed offences committed out of court.

      Perpetual imprisonment of an Englishman without trial, conviction, or sentence, by the same mode of attachment, wherein the same person is at once party, accuser, judge, and jury.

      Instead of the ancient and legal civil police, the military introduced at every opportunity, unnecessarily and unlawfully patrolling the streets, to the alarm and terror of the inhabitants.

      The lives of many of your Majesty’s innocent subjects destroyed by military execution.

      Such military execution solemnly adjudged to be legal.

      Murder abetted, encouraged, and rewarded.

      The civil magistracy rendered contemptible by the appointment of improper and incapable persons.

      The civil magistrates tampered with by administration, and neglecting and refusing to discharge their duty.

      Mobs and riots hired and raised by the ministry, in order to justify and recommend their own illegal proceedings, and to prejudice your Majesty’s mind by false insinuations against the loyalty of your Majesty’s subjects.

      The freedom of election violated by corrupt and undue influence, by unpunished violence and murder.

      The just verdicts of juries and the opinion of the judges overruled by false representations to your Majesty; and the determinations of the law set aside, by new, unprecedented, and dangerous means; thereby leaving the guilty without restraint, and the injured without redress, and the lives of your Majesty’s subjects at the mercy of every ruffian protected by administration.

      Obsolete and vexatious claims of the crown set on foot for partial and election purposes.

      Partial attacks on the liberty of the press, the most daring and pernicious libels against the constitution and against the liberty of the subject being allowed to pass unnoticed, whilst the slightest libel against a minister is punished with the utmost rigour.

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