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rebellion. That is a very different thing to dealing with men after the rebellion is suppressed, or upon the field of action. You may find many instances in English history of men put to death who had been taken in rebellious acts. You will find many instances of that sort, but that is not the question we have to deal with. I think the first beginning of what is called by the historians martial law was in the reign of Edward II., when the Earl of Lancaster was taken for rebellion against the King tried before his peers, and sentenced to death. This was called a trial by court-martial by the historians, but it does not appear to have had any reference to martial law. The man was tried by the King, and by his peers, instead of being tried by his peers in Parliament. It was an irregular thing, and I doubt very much whether it was a case of martial law; at all events, the attainder was reversed in a subsequent reign, upon the ground that the whole proceedings had been irregular, the ordinary courts then being opened before which this case ought to have been brought forward. We had no instances of martial law until the insurgents of the reign of Richard II., when Wat Tyler and his followers had been discomforted, and, without the slightest form of trial or any ceremony of that sort at all, were put to death. But it was thought necessary to have an Act of indemnity, even in those days, after the execution had taken place in that irregular manner. In the subsequent reigns of Henry IV. and Henry VI. the practice seems to have sprung up, which was carried to a lamentable excess, of executing those who had taking the field with either of the contending factions during the wars of the houses of York and Lancaster; and as they were captured in the battles they were executed without any form of trial, and the prisoners who fell into the hands of their captors-sometimes men of rank and distinction-were sent from the field to execution, and perhaps only one or two days elapsed but they were always executed without trial. The first instance I can discover in the sense of martial law not of law exercised upon persons taken in arms-was the trials which took place in the reign of Henry VII. after the Battle of Stoke. It appears to have occurred to that subtle monarch, that it might be convenient to have those who had not exactly taken up arms against him, but who had been aiders and abettors in the recent troubles, and therefore he proceeded to try them by some kind of martial law. What was the form of these proceedings, Lord Bacon does not explain; but it seems that the King caused all the persons to whom this law was applied to understand that they were at liberty to compound for their guilt, and the result of that was, that few were put to death. Respecting these proceedings, no one can entertain the least doubt that they were utterly illegal. If it be true that you can apply martial law for the purpose of suppressing rebellion, it is equally certain you can bring men to trial after the rebellion is suppressed by this martial law; because martial law is founded, according to the authorities, upon the absolute necessities of the case We have one or two remarkable instances of martial law certainly afterwards. Every instance is not of martial law applied as it is now proposed to apply it-for suppressing rebellion, but for the purpose

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of preventing particular things which the subjects happen to dislike. We have two most remarkable ordinances and proclamations of martial law in the time of Queen Elizabeth. There are one or two most remarkable cases in the reign of Edward VII. The proclamation in the time of Edward VI. was on the occasion of a popular insurrection which took place at that time, and you are doubtless aware that this reign was remarkable for the tumultuous state to which the people had gone. It was a time when the whole social fabric seemed to be shaken to its very foundation, and the people were everywhere in a state of insurrection, arising in the main from the circumstances of want and destitution into which they had got, and which different causes helped to bring about. In the first place, the monasteries had been suppressed in the preceeding reign, and they had afforded to the poorer orders of the population employment to a very great degree, and to those who were incapable of employment the means of subsistence. Therefore, whatever faults and vices may be ascribed to monastic institutions, we must do them the justice to say they did their duty towards the poorer classes, and supplied to them that which legislation has since supplied them with, and which otherwise at that time would have been wanting. Those who succeeded to the monasteries did not feel themselves under such obligations, and the result was, that the poor were entirely deprived of those means of subsistence and support which they would otherwise have had. And besides, they were beginning at that period to enclose large portions of common lands, which at that time of day occupied a very considerable portion of the land of this country, and were productive of great advantage to the poorer people, enabling them to keep their animals at but little cost. These commons were enclosed, and the people felt it to be a very great hardship. Also about this time the profit upon the sale and exportation of wool was very great, and the practice came in vogue of making arable land into pasture land, which deprived many people of employment. Then there was the importation of precious metals, and subsequent decrease in the value of money. There were all these sources of agitation, and the result was that in various parts of England a most formidable insurrection was got up. In the West 10,000 men laid siege to the city of Exeter. In that part of the country the people were dissatisfied with the change from the ritual of the Catholic to the more severe and sober forms of the reformed religion, and loudly expressed their dissatisfaction at the change. The priests fomented this, and it led to a combination of social and political discontent mixed up with religious fanaticism; and Exeter had nearly succumbed to the siege when, fortunately, the royal troops appeared. Now, one of the things the inhabitants had been in the habit of doing was to call the people together by the ringing of bells, &c., and a proclamation was then issued by the King, prohibiting all his subjects by any device or token whatever from calling together numbers of people or assembling them for any purpose. That certainly was a very strong proclamation; but it was not a proclamation for the purpose of proclaiming martial law in the way it is understood now. In that

proclamation there are specific acts pointed out, which the King says, You shall not do, and if you do these acts you shall be presently executed.' Towards the close of his reign the King issued another proclamation, the reason for it being that the tumultuary insurrection which marked the commencement of his reign was still going on, and in that year (1552) we find him issuing a fresh proclamation. I have searched through the works containing lists of the various acts done by the sovereigns of England, and I have not been able to find out whether that proclamation was acted upon. Let me, however, make this observation, that at various periods of our history it has been the practice of the sovereign to issue proclamations in terrorem for the purpose of terrifying the public by those proclamations, though it was pretty well known it was never intended to act upon them, and that they really went beyond the power and prerogative of the Crown. Lord Hale says that too much importance ought not to be attached to proclamations, inasmuch as they are used for the purpose I have mentioned. In the succeeding reigns procamations were also issued. Queen Elizabeth issued a proclamation regarding martial law, in which she declared that the introduction of heretica works into this country should be punished by that law; and, if I may believe the history of Mr. Hume, she followed in that respect the example of her sister. But I have been unable to discover the source from which Mr. Hume obtained his information; it may probably be true. He cites an authority, but there is nothing in it; and it would be quite beyond the power of the Crown to apply martial law in such a case. But we must not forget the circumstances in which Queen Elizabeth was placed at the time that such proclamation was said to be issued. She had been excommunicated by bulls from Rome, and when the King of Spain thought proper to send his Armada to the shores of this country, a bull was again issued, in which the people of the kingdom were taught to look upon the Queen as an accursed being; and a work by Cardinal Allen had been introduced into the country denouncing the Queen as everything infamous, and urging the people to rise against her. Under these circumstances, one is not surprised at these denunciations from Rome, and the absolution of the people from their allegiance, should have induced her to act in the manner in which she did, and that she thundered on her side against those who were introducing these dangerous instruments and writings into this country. But we cannot doubt that she was going altogether beyond the powers which the constitution entrusted her with. There is another proclamation of martial law. The same cause which had excited the lower orders into a state of insurrection in the reign of Edward VI. still continued. No provision was made for the poor, and great tumults had taken place in various parts of the country, arising from the destitution of the lower orders. There were riots engendered by hunger and destitution. The rioters approached the metropolis, and it happened about that time that the apprentices of London, being for some reason or other dissatisfied and turbulent, joined themselves to these insur rectionary bands. A great deal of disorder took place, and the city

authorities applied to the Government, and requested that martial law should be put in force against these persons. The result was, that the Queen issued a proclamation authorising martial law to be put in force. It certainly was a very strong proceeding on the part of her Majesty. Martial law was ordered to be executed upon any riotous persons, and then it proceeded to that most extraordinary exercise of assumed power-that of declaring that persons who were vagrants should be immediately hung upon the nearest hedge. No one can doubt that that was altogether an unconstitutional proceeding, and beyond any lawful power; but I am happy to say that no one was put to death under that proclamation. A certain number of rioters were taken up; but they were not put to death under martial law. They were brought before the ordinary tribunals of the country and dealt with by them. The next instance is in the reign of Charles I. That King at the commencement of his reign was desirous of embarking in Continental war. His Parliament were not so ardent in that respect as the King, and they desired to obtain a redress of their grievances first, and the result was that they were very sparing their votes. Having tried more than one Parliament, the King at in last had recourse to that illegal mode of obtaining supplies known under the name of benevolences, for the purpose of extorting, if possible, from the subject, allowances where there was no parliamentary power; and in the interval between his third and fourth Parliament, the king had recourse to the practice of quartering soldiers upon such persons as refused to pay those benevolencies. The soldiers who were quartered in this way, knowing that they were quartered upon persons who were obnoxious to the Crown, committed excesses, and the result was that the King finding it necessary to deal with the soldiers by some military process, commissions were issued to try these soldiers who were guilty of military offences by martial law. It was suspected and has been asserted, I do not know whether upon any satisfactory authority, that those commissions for the enforcement of martial law were used for the purpose of trying persons who were obnoxious to the person of the sovereign on account of their having refused to comply with those exactions. But be that as it may, it was at all events though that those commissions might be used for that purpose, and when the King summoned another Parliament, the first thing that Parliament did was to vindicate the rights and liberties of the people of England from those unlawful assumption of prerogative. The celebrated Petition of Right was founded, in which those commissions were declared to be unlawful, and it was solemnly asserted that an English subject was not to be subjected to martial law. The King did his utmost to avoid giving his assent in any way which could bind him to that, but he was compelled at last to give his sanction to it in the usual form, and that Petition of Right, the supplementary charter of English liberties, remains the unquestioned and unquestionable law of the land. We shall have to look presently whether there can be such a thing as martial law. Certain it is, that from that hour martial law has not been attempted to be exercised in England.

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have had rebellions since. There was the case of the duke of Monmouth, in the time of James II., when martial law would have been an extremely useful thing to suppress that rebellion, but it was not put into operation. It is true that Lord Faversham put a number to death, and Kirke committed every species of barbarity. But there was no martial law. All this was done without the form of trial, and what took place was in obedience to Jeffreys; but there was no martial law. Again, we had the rebellions of 1715 and 1745, but on neither of those occasions was martial law proclaimed. It is true that at the battle of Culloden odious barbarities were committed, but there was no martial law. The wounded were put to death; and I rejoice to think that in respect to atrocities which can never be forgotten whilst English history lasts, there is not even pretence for saying that they were committed even under the name of law, much less under that of martial law. I believe I have mentioned every instance in which martial law has ever been proclaimed or exercised. I can find no such thing as martial law in use in this country for the putting down of rebellion; and I am utterly astonished when I find persons in authority and out of it talking and writing about martial law in the easy familiar way in which they do, as a thing perfectly understood and perfectly settled in this country, whereas, in truth, it has never been resorted to or exercised. True it is that it has been resorted to in a neighbouring country. We all have read of what took place in Ireland at the close of the last century, and it may not be unimportant to turn to that page of history to see what took place. From the year 1799, and thereabouts, Ireland was in a very agitated state. In 1795, insurrections were growing in various parts of the country. It would seem that the magistrates took upon themselves to act under the auspices of martial law without any authority whatever. However, they were the dominant party, and they had a large majority in the Parliament of Ireland, and especially it was thought necessary, in order to prevent open rebellion and all the serious circumstances which it entails, that they should have recourse to means beyond the ordinary law. It was equally thought necessary to have an indemnity passed afterwards for those excesses of the law committed in 1795, and that Act was passed in 1796. It shows that these proceedings were proceedings beyond the law, or else they would not have required the Acts of Indemnity to be afterwards passed. Such an Act was periodically passed every six months by the Irish Legislature until we arrive at 1798, and then things had assumed so serious an aspect that the Lord-Lieutenant thought it right to issue a proclamation declaing martial law in Ireland. That proclamation was put in force. Martial law was carried into effect, and many a person executed by virtue of it. Among the most conspicuous of the promoters of the rebellion was a man of the name of Wolfe Tone. He had been to France and obtained the assistance of the French Government of the day for an invasion of Ireland. They sent a force of ships of war; but those ships of war were intercepted by the English, and the invasion was frustrated. One of the ships was

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