most importance that the minds of the English people should retain that love for the administration of justice, and that confidence in their own security, for which they had hitherto been distinguished from the people of other countries. The violence and oppression of the police in some cases tended very much to sour and poison the minds of the people, and he would, without mentioning names, quote an instance of improper conduct upon the part of the police, which occurred not long ago in London. The facts were these:-Two persons were disputing about a very old relation, and, in the absence of one, the other brought a constable and took away the relative in question, the policeman threatening to take into custody any servant who dared to leave the house or interfere in the matter. That was a state of things which ought not to be endured, and, if it could happen in London, it was much more likely to occur in remote districts. For the reasons he had now given, he thought there should be a change in the administration of the law; and that means should be taken to put the law itself upon a sounder, more liberal, and more enlightened footing, so that it should be enabled to correspond better with the exigencies of the age. They should not be content with making the Sovereign the nominal prosecutor, but they should recollect that a criminal offence was an offence against society, and that society was bound to interfere in administering justice to the offenders. sphere of private animosity, caprice, and revenge that which ought never to be left to such chances, and to see that justice was properly administered. The main provision of the Bill proposed that the Crown should distribute the different circuits into a certain number of divisions, and appoint to cach division a public prosecutor, who should hold office upon the tenure of good behaviour. In addition, he also proposed the appointment of district agents to collect and examine evidence, to transmit all cases to the public prosecutor for his opinion, and also to conduct the proceedings before the magistrates. He had thought it proper to add another clause to the Bill for the security of innocence, and he proposed that it should be in the power of any prisoner to send to the public prosecutor a list of the witnesses he proposed to call, not as to character, but those merely who could speak to any facts the prisoner thought material for his defence. The expenses of such witnesses should be allowed upon the certificate of the Judge that the witnesses were material. Nothing was more painful than to hear a wretched prisoner twenty miles away from home state before a Judge-“I could have called such and such a witness to prove that I was in such and such a place, but I am poor, and could not afford it, and the expense of remaining in an assize town is more than my friends could bear." Such a state of things was improper, and called for amendment. He had been reading carefully the sections in the Code Napoleon upon this subject, and he found that in France the Procureur Genoral summoned, at his own risk, the witnesses of a prisoner, except those who were called to speak to character. In the preliminary discussions which took place upon that point, and in which the Emperor joined, the objection that was urged against that course was the danger of jobbing being perpetrated in calling witnesses as to character. To remove any objection of that nature, he (Mr. Phillimore) proposed that the expenses of a prisoner's witnesses should not be allowed, except upon the certificate of the Judge. He now wished to allude to a point in which the assistance of the district agents would be particularly valuable, and that was in acting as superintendents of the local police. He did not say the police were worse than any other body of men, but they often had temptations to act in an oppressive and violent manner, and those temptations were not always resisted. He thought it of the ut SIR JOHN SHELLEY seconded the Motion. MR. HUME said, he fully approved of the measure proposed by the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Phillimore). Scotland public prosecutors were appointed, and he had long been of opinion that the practice, if introduced into England, would be attended with great benefit. THE ATTORNEY GENERAL said, the subject which his hon. and learned Friend had brought before the House was one of great importance, and Her Majesty's Government certainly felt that an opportunity ought to be given to his hon. and learned Friend to bring in a Bill, in order that the matter might have ample discussion. At the same time, giving his hon. and learned Friend all the credit due for the measure he proposed, he did not think it was so perfect and complete as might be devised. He was ready to give the most careful consideration to the measure, and 50,000 had taken place in Ireland, in no one of which had the course of justice been assisted, but in more than one it had been seriously obstructed. he took this opportunity of saying that the matter was now under the most serious consideration of Her Majesty's Government, who felt that the principle of appointing a public prosecutor ought to be adopted. MR. NAPIER said, he must express his approval of the principle of appointing a public prosecutor, but he thought the object of the hon. and learned 'Gentleman might be attained without any statute whatever, as in Ireland, where Crown solicitors were appointed upon every circuit to conduct prosecutions. He thought the assistance of some properly-appointed person in investigating a case previous to bringing a party to trial was a matter for important consideration. He considered that a prosecution ought not to be left to the caprice or malice of a private prosecutor, who would not have the same responsibility and interest in arriving at the truth as a public prosecutor, but who would be frequently actuated by indirect motives. There were certain matters which he would suggest for the consideration of the House if the Bill came before them for further discussion. He thought that a plan should be devised which would make the system in this country act in complete harmony with that of Ireland, and he believed it of the greatest importance, whenever it was possible, to have a common system of procedure for both countries. In Ireland there were Crown solicitors for the circuit, and sessional prosecutors also, who were attorneys. Crown barristers prosecuted on the circuit, and had Crown solicitors under them. The circuit staff managed the most important business, and the sessional staff that of a more local character. It was his decided opinion that in the appointment of public prosecutors the public ought to have the best assistance that could be procured, and that it should be properly paid for. While on the subject of the administration of justice, he would beg to draw the attention of the House to the office of coroner. Speaking of Ireland, he could say that most unquestionably when the coroner interfered with the criminal department, justice was almost invariably obstructed. There was a great want of preliminary in vestigation by medical men in cases of a certain nature before they were sent for trial, and in many cases where parties had been convicted, it had been subsequently proved that no crime had in reality been perpetrated. With regard to coroners' inquests, during the last twenty years, about MR. HADFIELD said, he approved of the Bill proposed by the hon. and learned Member, and thought that in any measure to be adopted provision should be made for having offences tried nearer the spot where they were committed, than they were at present. But MR. STUART WORTLEY said, he rejoiced at the intimation which had been given by the hon. and learned Attorney General that this question, which he regarded as one of great importance, was under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government. They had many precedents and examples of institutions analogous to that which his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Phillimore) proposed to establish, of public prosecutors. Without going to France or any foreign country, it was only necessary to refer to the machinery for carrying on the criminal jurisprudence in Ireland and Scotland, to find instances of the existence of such institutions. with regard to the modes in which the preliminary investigation in criminal cases was conducted in the two countries, he must say that the mode pursued in Ireland was not such as to induce him to prefer the course indicated by his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Napier) of refraining from legislating in the matter. And he altogether objected to the proposition of placing in the hands of the Attorney General of the Crown so large an amount of patronage as would attach to that office if the appointments were all left in his hands. two examples which had been adduced of public prosecutors in Ireland and Scotland he certainly preferred that of the country with which he was connected, where the duty of making the preliminary investigation was in the hands of an officer known to the Scotch law as the procurator fiscal, who reported the result of his examination to the advocate depute in Edinburgh—an officer appointed by the Crown, and upon whose responsibility the prosecution was carried on or not. The necessity of some such measure for this country, no one who had had any experience of the administra tion of our criminal law could, he thought, for a moment doubt, for nothing could be more scandalous and mischievous than the negligent manner in which criminal prosecutions were at present conducted, nor anything more scandalous than the defeat of Of the MR. PHILIPPS said, he wished to add his testimony as regarded the value and importance of this measure to what had been stated by the hon. Members who had preceded him. He confessed he was rather alarmed when he heard that a measure of the present character was under the consideration of the Government, as the legal reforms they had undertaken had seldom come to anything. justice in numerous cases that consequently learned Gentleman (Mr. Phillimore), he resulted. His experience had also taught hoped to see it carried out to a successful him that prosecutions were, in too many issue. instances, brought for the mere purpose of gratifying animosity and revenge, and that in others corrupt motives induced their abandonment. Under these circumstances, he thought legislation on the subject absolutely necessary. With regard to the other point that had been referred to the assisting of prisoners who had not the means of employing counsel, he must say that that was a subject of great difficulty, and he would not then dwell upon it, nor would he suggest to what extent the Government should go in remedying the evil. But he agreed with his hon. and learned Friend that nothing could be more painful to a judge or to the bystanders than to hear that a defence which might be true was behind, but that the prisoner at the bar, for want of means, could not adduce it. With these views, he congratulated his hon. and learned Friend in having drawn public attention to the subject. He believed that this was the only country in Europe that stood in the disgraceful position of having no public prosecutor. It was ludicrous to suppose that the coroner stood in the position of a public prosecutor, for, instead of assisting, he feared, as had been stated by his right hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Napier), that these functionaries often stood in the way of public jus tice. MR. HENLEY said, he rejoiced that the subject had been brought under the consideration of Parliament. He quite agreed with what had been said by the right hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. S. Wortley), that the system that prevailed in Scotland was a better one than that which prevailed in Ireland. As regarded the giving the prisoner some means of defence, he did not object to the arrangement upon principle, but the matter required to be carefully looked into, and due precautions taken for the proper administration of justice. As regarded the office of coroner, he must observe, that he did not quite agree with the remarks of his right hon. and learned Friend. The coroner did not stand in the light of a public prosecutor, his duties were of a totally distinct nature, and he should not like to see the office done away with. In many cases where a crime had been committed the preliminary investigation before the coroner was calculated to further the ends of justice. As regarded the measure of the hon. and MR. ROSS MOORE said, although they had in Ireland a public prosecutor, yet his experience of the working of the law had convinced him that the system was defective in one important and essential particular, the not providing a proper machinery for the preliminary investigation of cases brought forward for trial. The result had been that justice had been defeated, and that criminals had escaped in cases, where, if the machinery for the prosecution had been properly organised, the result would have been conviction. He would, at the same time, beg to refer to the mode in which prosecutions were carried on in Ireland, where it often happened, from the improper manner in which they were got up, that the prosecuting counsel only received his brief when the case was called on for trial, and consequently knew little or nothing of the facts and merits of the case. MR. J. G. PHILLIMORE, in reply, said, he was grateful for the manner in which the measure had been received by the House. He was delighted to hear that the Government intended to take up the matter, and, under these circumstances, he would cheerfully resign into the much abler hands of his hon. and learned Friend (the Attorney General) the conduct of the measure, his only hope being that the public good might be brought about in any way. His hope was that the time was come when, instead of policemen and jail attorneys, homines idonei atque integri causam reipublicæ legumque susciperent. Leave given. Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. John George Phillimore and Mr. Hume. Bill read 1o. nial Wines is excessive and impolitic, and that the same be reduced to one uniform rate of 1s. per imperial gallon." During the course of last Session of Parliament I had the honour of submitting to this House my views and opinions upon the important question of the wine duties, on which occasion I urged upon Her Majesty's Government the expediency, upon many considerations of policy and finance, of reducing those duties from their present prohibitive rate to a point that would bring this useful and necessary auxiliary to modern life into universal consumption. revenue derived from a single article of importation affecting the comforts of the community, I did not hesitate to admit that there were several other subjects which might be urged upon the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, as having prior claims to reduction, being of more domestic and immediate concern to the people, when compared with an article of foreign growth, and as yet little known to the bulk of the community-and even designated by some as a luxury reserved for the upper classes only. On the one hand, these considerations had their influence upon me: still weightier causes, on the other hand, led me to withdraw till the present Session a trial in this House of the amount of support my proposition would receive. These causes were contained in the reasons adduced by the right hon. Gentleman, who had at that time before him the very onerous and difficult task of producing a financial scheme, at the very commencement of his official career, with a Government but newly formed, exposed to the hostile attacks of an Opposition, discomfited by defeat, and bitter from the signal failure of its own ill-prepared and unpopular budget, when in power. I was then, as I am now, of opinion, that a large and immediate diminution of the duty upon this "great gift of Providence to man," as the Chancellor of the Exchequer so aptly called it, would, by its increased consumption very soon produce a much larger amount of revenue than it yields at present; and this conclusion is so natural an inference from the results attending the removal of high duties upon other articles that no one in the present day will attempt to contradict it. Another consequence that I ventured to anticipate from a relaxation of the high duty paid upon wine by Great Britain was, that those countries which would benefit by the increased demand for their chief productions, would as well, from motives of reciprocity as from a necessity to supply their wants, become large importers and consumers of the manufactured products of England through the very British shipping that would frequent their ports to obtain wines -thus giving employment out, as well as home, to shipping and seamen of Great Britain. Another and a great benefit I suggested as necessarily to follow, would be that the working community of the United Kingdom would, by the substitution of a wholesome cheap beverage, be improved in their moral tone and general character; for it is universally admitted, that the use of ardent spirits brutalises man, and leads to the commission of crime and its subsequent evils. These, Sir, were briefly the grounds upon which I advocated an immediate and considerable reduction Let me now call the attention of the of the wine duties, to which may be added House to the condition in which we find that stimulus to international commerce, the question after the lapse of a year; and, and the extension of amicable relations as a necessary introduction to that inquiry, between various countries of the world, I must make some general reference to which must necessarily flow from this extension of the principles of free trade. But, whilst pressing my own special views, as applicable to one branch of the VOL. CXXX. [THIRD SERIES.] The reception given by the right hon. Gentleman to my proposal was such as to obtain my ready acquiescence in its withdrawal. For upon that occasion the Chancellor of the Exchequer, though concurring in the general soundness of my proposal, had prior claims upon his generosity, and, looking to the amount of revenue involved, he thought it would bear postponement. At the period when the right hon. Gentleman gave expression to those sentiments, 5th April, 1853, the House was not in possession of his intentions with respect to his general scheme of finance. But, taking these declared opinions as an earnest of the direction in which his policy would tend, I believe that I exercised a wise discretion, as well as a proper confidence in the Administration, by not pressing my motion to a division. the state of the national resources at that period, and the course adopted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in providing for the annual expenditure of the year, Ꮓ and the causes which, in my opinion, led him to postpone (I hoped till this present Session) a reduction of the wine duties. On the 18th of April last the Chancellor of the Exchequer submitted to the House his general statement of the finances of the country, in a speech which all who heard it must admit to have been one of the most comprehensive and masterly compositions ever pronounced in this House. If its composition and its effective delivery were of the highest order, it must be considered likewise as one of practical and minute detail into all the branches of revenue and sources of taxation, examining, in a masterly spirit, all the complicated and varied items of our national income and expenditure-readjusting with a critical and fair discrimination many branches of revenue hitherto unequal in their operation, and effecting so many reductions and total removal of duties and taxes, that whatever disappointment I might have felt at the wine duty being left where it was, I conceived that the same genius and energy which dictated the reductions then proposed, would in due time be applied to a source of wealth only requiring to be developed by a large diminution to render it one of the most productive contributors to the national income. Upon the last occasion when I had the honour to address the House upon this topic, I presented a detailed table, showing that the wine duty had remained stationary in amount for the last twenty years, notwithstanding the vastly increased wealth that had been acquired in the same period, and that the population had more than doubled. We have now passed through another year of general prosperity, remarkable for the stimulus imparted to consumption in those articles subjected to a reduction of duty. I will take four of these articles most used by the community at large: Showing the languor which still affects this article as regards revenue, notwithstanding the remarkable increase in other consumable items. The period when other reductions and alterations in duties, as the stamps and assessed taxes, have taken effect is too limited to be able to form any correct data as to the ratio of increase; but it is obvious that all consumable products have been largely enjoyed by the people all over the kingdom: a result as gratifying in its effect upon the comfort of the population as it is clearly an indieation that these wise and just removals of imposts must have had their favourable action in many ways, and through various channels upon the revenue of the country. And taking the aggregate reduction upon articles subject to duty or excise, as stated by the right hon. Gentleman himself in October last, at two millions, there was in the quarter ending at that period a sum of four hundred thousand pounds over the same quarter in the preceding year, and the surplus upon the past year is of a most encouraging character. The right hon. Gentleman last year removed all the impediments which stood in the way of this question. First, he reduced the duty upon tea by a scale of gradual diminution which, whilst it will give time for the production of increased Cocoa.-The amount entered for home consump- supply, and not suddenly disturb revenue, tion in 1853 Dec. 5, was ... ... 5,840,940 cwt. will, in its beneficial and commercial effects, be felt and appreciated in every cottage throughout the land. The same may be said with reference to the total removal of the excise upon soap-a most objectionable and impolitic tax-and felt to be a grievous burden to the masses of the people. I will not detain the House by going into an Tea.-Amount entered for home consumption in analysis of the numerous articles upon 1851-eleven months ending Dec. 5, was ... 49,764,193 lbs. 51,043,518 54,507,834 " which the right hon. Gentleman either abolished or reduced import duties, by which commercial affairs have been facilitated |