thofe provifions, and even that this conftruction is the true and proper conftruction that ought to be given to it. This I fhall now endeavour to prove.

The judgments of every court of justice ought, if the words in which they are expreffed will bear it, to be construed in such a manner as to make them adequate and commenfurate to the points then under confideration in fuch courts, and to the authority legally vested in the Judges by whom they are pronounced, rather than in fuch a manner as will make them extend to cafes not then under confideration, and which the judges therefore have not, perhaps, on fuch occafions a competent authority to determine.— This, I prefume, will readily be allowed; and, being fo, we muft, in the next place, obferve, that the House of Commons, when they paffed that refolution, were acting in a judicial, and not in a legislative, capacity: they were determining whether, according to the laws then in being, Mr. Wilkes, who had been chofen knight of the thire for Middlesex on the preceeding day, the 16th day of February, 1769, was entitled, by virtue of that election, to fit and vote as a member of that Houfe. They did not pretend to a power of making him incapable of fitting there by an ex post facto refolution, if he was legally capable of being elected to fit there at the time of fuch election ; but only, as the proper judges of the validity of all parliamentary elections, to a power of declaring "what the law then was refpecting his capacity to be fo elected:" they therefore had no right to confider, nor to give judgment upon, any other point, but that of his capacity to be elected a member of parliament for the county of Middlefex, on the faid 16th day of February, 1769. No other point was judicially before them : and, if they had clearly and expreffly refolved, that Mr. Wilkes was not only then incapable of being elected a member of parliament, but that fuch incapacity would continue in him during this whole parliament, they would,

in this fecond part of fuch refolution, have acted in an extrajudicial manner, and without a competent authority; and fuch a decifion would have been entitled to but little regard either from themselves on any fubfequent occafion, or from any other perfon. But this they have not done in their refolution of the 17th of February, 1769, above recited, though at first fight it may feem to carry that meaning; for the words of it are," that he was and is incapable of being elected a member to ferve in this prefent parliament; that is, as I conceive, he was at the time of his election on the pre ceding day, the 16th of February, 1769, and is at the time then present, namely, the 17th day of February, incapable of being elected a member of parliament. It does not fay that he fhall or will continue fo during the whole continuance of this parliament, which was a point not then under confideration.

As to the words, "having been in this feffion of parliament expelled this Houfe," which immediately precede the words that declare his incapacity, they are introduced only by way of recital, and are not faid to be the ground of the subsequent adjudication of incapacity, and need not neceffarily be understood fo; but they ought rather to be confidered as a fhort reference to the grounds and reafons upon which he was expelled, fome of which were likewise causes of an incapacity to be elected; and fo the meaning of the whole refolution will be as follows: "Whereas Mr. Wilkes was expelled from the Houfe of Commons in this feffion of parliament, to wit, on the 3d of February, 1769, upon divers good and fufficient grounds and reafons, fome of which were not only good grounds for expelling him, but did really and truly, if they had been properly attended to, render him incapable of being legally elected a member of this parliament; and whereas these reafons, that thus rendered him incapable of being legally elected a member of parliament, do ftill fubfift; it is therefore refolved and

adjudged

adjudged by this House, that he was at the time of his laft election, to wit, on the 16th day of February, 1769, and ftill is at this prefent time, to wit, on the 17th of February, 1769, incapable of being elected a member to ferve in this prefent parliament."

This feems to me to be a reasonable conftruction of this famous refolution: and if the words of it will bear this fenfe, as I flatter myself I have shown they will, it is furely better to understand them in this manner than to interpret them in the other manner above-mentioned, and thereby to make them, byconftruction, contain a dangerous and extra-judicial refolution of the Houfe of Commons in a matter of fuch high importance, which would be no way fuitable to the dignity of the House, or to the character of wife and confiderate judges that were giving a judicial determination of the point that was then before them.

Now, if this mild and inoffenfive interpretation of this refolution be allowed to be juft, there will be nothing in the act of parliament here recommended in any degree contrary to this or any other of the refolutions of the House of Commons upon this subject. This is a fecond advantage in the bill here propofed.

A third advantage arifing from t would be the removing of all the ridiculous doubts and opinions that have been entertained concerning the capacity of an Outlaw to fit and vote in parliament; notwithstanding he is a creature that, as Mr. Wilkes has well obferved, has no political existence, but is liable to have all his goods and chatte!s, and the rents and profits of his lands, taken into the king's hands, as forfeited to his Majefty by the outlawry, and his body kept in prifon during life. No well-wisher to the liberties of his country would, I prefume, defire to fee the reprefentatives of the Commons of this kingdom compofed of perfons in fuch dependent circumstances.

And if, after fuch an act of parliament, colonel Luttrel

Thould think proper to vacate his feat in parliament by accepting the stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds, and Mr. Wilkes, now that his outlawry has been reverfed, and his confequent Incapacity to fit in Parliament has been removed, should again ftand for the county of Middlesex, and again be chofen their representative by a great majority, (as I truft and hope he would ;) and should be permitted to take his feat in the Houfe in confequence of fuch new election, I conceive that the whole tranfaction would do his Majesty's ministers great honour, give general fatisfaction to the people, and, in fhort, prove a happy means of reconciling men's minds to government, and of winding-up this unlucky bufinefs that has kept the whole nation in a ferment, and foured our old English good humour for more than two years paft.

I am, Sir,

Your humble Servant,

IRENICUS.

Draft of an Act of Parliament to difable Outlaws and Perfons legally confined in Prison from being chofen Members of the Commons Houfe of Parliament; and to fecure to the Freebolders and other Electors of Great Britain their Right of free Election, notwithstanding any antecedent Expulfion of the Perfons they fball elect for their Members.

WHEREAS certain doubts have arifen, and may arife, concerning perfons confined in prifon in execution of the judgements of a court of law, or for other juft and lawful causes, and likewife concerning perfons outlawed, whether

they

they are capable of being elected to fit and vote in parliament as members of the Commons House of parliament: and whereas it would be highly inconvenient and prejudicial to the publick business transacted in the faid Houfe of parliament that fuch perfons fhould be chofen members of it, because they would not be able to attend their duty in the fame; and the counties, cities, and boroughs, for which they should be chofen, would thereby be unrepresented in parliament during the continuance of fuch impediment to their attendance; it is therefore declared and enacted by the King's most excellent Majefty, by and with the advice and confent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and the Commons in this prefent parliament affembled, that no person outlawed in due courfe of law, either upon a criminal or a civil prosecution, nor any perfon legally confined in prison in execution of any judgement of a court of juftice, ought at any time heretofore to have been deemed, or fhall at any time hereafter be deemed, to be capable of being elected to ferve in the British House of Commons, as a member thereof, for any county, city, or borough, in either England, Wales, or Scotland, during the continuance of fuch outlawry or legal confinement. Any cuftom, refolution of the House of Commons, precedent, or opinion, or other thing, to the contrary hereof in any wife notwithstanding.

And whereas great difcontents have arifen in the minds of many of his Majefty's faithful fubjects on account of a refolution of the Commons House of parliament paffed on the 17th day of February, in the year of our Lord 1769, declaring John Wilkes, Efq. who had, on the 28th day of March, in the year 1768, been duly chofen and returned a knight of the shire to ferve in this prefent parliament for the county of Middlefex, and afterwards on the 3d day of February, in the year 1769, had been expelled from the faid Commons Houfe of parliament by a majority of the members

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