1

The folicitor general obferved that the principle of the bill was previously recognized by the law already in force, and every objection to the present bill bore equally against that. To afcertain the value of lives, the affeffiment was taken as low as poffible; the tax was to be taken in four different payments, fo that if the perfon did not live till the laft, the tax would not be collected. The duty of an executor was, he contended, made eafier by this tax, as a line was "chalked out" for him. It had a fuperior advantage to other taxes, as it took nothing from what a man had really in poffeffion. A variety of other advantages were pointed out by the learned gentleman. It appeared ftrange to him, that the tax fhould be confidered as injurious from its occafioning the publicity of private property, when, he faid, in other countries it was fuppofed to strengthen credit. In Jamaica, an executor was bound to render an annual account of the property, and was liable to heavy penalties for concealing it.

Mr. Grey thought that whatever might be the policy of that country, it would be extremely prejudicial to the commercial credit of this. In this country, where large capitals were embarked in commerce, if two or three collateral fucceffions were to take place in a fhort time, would not the fubtraction of 6 per cent. make a heavy impreffion, and take from actual employment of capital? Mr. Grey ftrongly fupported the arguments of Mr. Fox, which, he thought, had been by no means antwered.

The attorney general, in a fpeech of great legal ability, stated, that, with respect to this bill affording no exception in the cafe of illegi timate children, this was precifely

the cafe with other acts of parlia ment, and was both moral and politic. This act, however, in cafe the teftator ftated the legatee to be his child, provided that it fhould enjoy the exception in favour of lineal defcent. Several occasions of difpute between the executors and legatee were, he stated, removed by this bill, and feveral doubtful cafes afcertained. According to the exifting laws, there were few cafes in which, if any difpute arofe, the books and private concerns of individuals might not be examined.

The bill was ftrongly oppofed by Mr. W. Smith, Mr. Francis, and general Smith, and fupported by Mr. Pitt. It paffed by a majority of 78 in the houfe of commons; but was again fpiritedly attacked in the houfe of lords by lord Lauderdale, who confidered it, when coupled with the landed property bill, as tending to fweep all the property of the kingdom into the hands of government. Their effects would be the most felt by the members of that house, a house of hereditary members. In time, his lordship faid, it must swallow up the fortunes of their lordships' collateral heirs, who might fucceed to their titles. Had fuch a tax exifted in the laft century, none there would have poffeffed fufficient property to fupport their rank and character. In the cafe of the duke of Norfolk, 600,ocol. would have been taken from his family. Taxes on legacies had, indeed, been impofed; but it was never thought that minifters would extend the principle fo far as to impower themselves to feize the whole capital of the kingdom, and impo-, verish noble families till they were likely to become convenient tools to the minifter. His lordship no

ticed the unequal operation of this bill in the inftance of a military man, who could only fell an annuity left him at four years' purchafe; whereas, thofe who were less exposed to hardships, lefs active in the defence of their country, might difpofe of it for thirty-one years' purchase; yet they would pay the fame tax. If the collateral property of all other defcriptions of men was thus to be affected, his lordship thought that of the church fhould not be exempted; but that all churchmen, upon tranflation or presentation to a living, fhould, for four years, be obliged to give up a proportion of their annual income. The tax was impolitic, upon the eftablished maxim that it was leaft injurious to the community to tax confumption and not capital. Taxes upon productive capital, he observed, tended to withdraw it from the fupport of industry, and diminished that wealth on which circulation depended, and whence national profperity was derived. Our enemies would, he thought, have a very unfavourable idea of our refources, from our adoption of fuch unheard and untried meafures. The arguments of lord Lauderdale were oppofed by lord Grenville and

the bishop of Rochester, who obferved that churchmen paid taxes in the fame proportion with other men: and the bill paffed.

The bill for a tax upon the fucceffion to real eftates met with ftill ftronger oppofition. Mr. Rashleigh, Mr. Newnham, Mr. Crewe, lord G. Cavendish, fir W. Pulteney, Mr. Baftard, lord Sheffield, Mr. M. Robinfon, general Smith, Mr. Harrison, Mr. Buller, fir A. Ferguson, Mr. Francis, Mr. Sheridan, and Mr. Fox, ftrenuously oppofed it; it was fupported by the attorney and folicitor general, the fecretary at war, Mr. M. Montague, Mr. H. Brown, and the chancellor of the exchequer. On a motion from Mr. Sheridan for poftponing the third reading for three months, the majority against the motion was only one. Pitt then moved for its being again read the following day; when the ayes and noes being equal, the speaker gave a cafting vote for the motion. The bill, however, appearing fo thoroughly obnoxious, Mr. Pitt abandoned the measure, by moving the next day for deferring the third reading to that day three months.

Mr.

A

MESSAGE from his majefty, relative to his difpofition to meet any negotiation on

1peaker

speaker on the 8th December, previous to the report of the budget. On the following day, Mr. Pitt moved an addrefs in reply. He obferved that the fentiments expreffed in the meflage were conformable to thofe delivered from the throne at the commencement of the feffion, with a view to the formation of a government in France, with which a fecure and honourable peace might be concluded. He renewed thole fentiments as applicable to the prefent French government, the recent fucceffes of our allies, and the embarrassment of the enemy's finances. Mr. Sheridan wifhed to know what had occurred, in the fpace of five weeks at moft, of fo important a nature as to occafion fuch an alteration of fentiment in the minifter. In fact, however, he had only one week for this change otherwife why not have declared it before the fettlement for the loan, which would have faved the nation two millions? Mr. Sheridan thought this change of opinion could not be fincere, but intended to defeat the motion for peace, of which Mr. Grey had given previous notice. This very government, Mr. Sheridan faid, which the minifter ftated on the opening of the budget to be "not only on the verge but in the gulph of bankruptcy, and rapidly approaching to what muft inevitably overthrow or destroy it;" this very government was now reprefented to the house not only as a form of government with which we may fafely negotiate, but as capable of maintaining a fecure and permanent peace. Would the minifter fay he was more reconciled to thofe who exercifed the functions of government? Of the executive directory, four out of five

had voted for the death of the king. Thefe had been defcribed as men who brought on the war, and with whom no fettled order of things could take place. The revocation of the decree refpecting intermeddling with other governments had long fince taken place. That decree, he observed, had in fact been a retaliation upon the coalition of kings against their own government. This, however, he did not, he faid, juftify. What was the time when the French government was thought fit to be treated with ? when the rulers of it adopted the fyftem of felf-election,-took all power into their own hands, and treated with contempt the rights, opinions, and interefts of the people? Yet then gentlemen exclaimed, this was fomething like a regular government; fomething was now got refembling the British conftitution: and indeed, the way in which they chose to exprefs their attachment to it, was by their eagernefs to retain its abuses. All this looked as if the minifter had fome fubterfuge. Mr. Sheridan further strongly infifted on the propriety and neceffity of not confidering any particular form of government in France as neceffary for peace, whenever it could be effected on fuitable terms; and moved an amendment, which in fubftance went to exprefs the concern of the houfe, that any thing in the internal affairs of France fhould have induced his majefty to a difpofition unfavourable to meeting a negotiation for peace with the ene、 my; that if the prefent circumftances in France only were ad mitted as a ground for negotiation, any change might be confidered as a ground for difcontinuing any treaty which was begun; and therefore the houfe prayed to have this

principle

principle entirely difclaimed, and that the form of government in France might be no bar to negotiation, whenever a peace could be fafely effected; and that his majelty would be pleafed to order an immediate negotiation to com

mence.

The amendment was oppofed by Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. M. Robinfon. In reply to the former, Mr. Grey obferved, that none could with that peace, however defirable, fhould be procured even at the risk of inglorious fubmillion, or that fuch a relaxation fhould take place in the conduct of the war as to prevent our exacting_thofe terms which the king of England was entitled to afk. The government which the French had chofen, was, however, in fact, the fame in prin. ciple with the one with which this country went to war-that which minifters had declared fo odious and dangerous, that we could only find fafety in its utter deftruction. We had, he faid, firft engaged in war with the Briffotines; the fucceffors of that party were at prefent in power, more moderate indeed, but precifely acting upon the fame principles. The only difference was, they had a council of ancients inftead of a committee, and a council of five hundred instead of a national convention. France, he obferved, was ftill a republic, one and indivifible; and he wished to know how minifters reconciled the conduct of declaring at one time that nothing but the deftruction of certain principles could prepare the way for peace, and at another taking advantage of a very flight variation of circumftances, to follow the line of conduct so often recommended to them in vain. At that time, Mr. Grey stated, feveral continental powers had concluded trea

ties with the French, which had never been violated. He further obferved, that we had been baffled every where but at fea -- had spent above 50 millions fterling-and added above 80 millions to the national debt. He thought there was a part both of the meflage and addrefs fo equivocal, that he wished minifters to be tied down really to negotiate by the terms of the amendment, which declared the government of France no bar to this bufinefs.

Mr. Pitt obferved that the amendment went much further than the addrefs: it required minifters to enter into immediate negotiation, whether they faw a proper difpofition on the part of the chemy or not. He denied that our having entered into the war was an ag greffion on our part, or that minifters had ever afferted that the restoration of monarchy there was a fine qua non. From the change which had taken place in the French government, from the change which had arifen in the mode of calling forth its fupplies, — and, above all, the change in the temper and fentiments of the people,

there was a hope that peace might be concluded with them at this time, which had not existed at any other period of the war. The new conftitution, in its formation, admitted the falfehood of the doc-. trine of perfect equality. They admitted of artificial diftinctions, which faftened and kept together the mafs of fociety. They had laid hold of one of the elements which contribute to form a focial state for man- a mixed form of government:-and their prefent legiflative fyftem, however long it might endure, was conftituted on a principle very different from that of pure democracy. The fubject of

the

the decayed finances of France had already been fufficiently difcuffed; in addition to what had been faid, he would only call the attention of the house to the dying confeffion of their old government, and to the infant acts of the new. Mr. Pitt obferved that the British character in war had never been more exalted than in the prefent. What had been done in Holland and Germany? We had gained the three most important points; Martinique, Cape Nicola Mole, the Cape of Good Hope. If the amendment, and the advice of its promoters, was adopted, the difcretion of government would be entirely taken away, and the refponfibility doubled.

The prefent meafure was confidered by Mr. Fox as a total retraction of all the charges which had been made against himfelf: for he had from the first maintained the very doctrine delivered in his majesty's meffage. The amendment, he contended, fo far from exceeding, did not go to the extent of the meffage: it only declared that there were no impediments to treating, in the form of the government in France. In fupporting the amendment, he was far from arguing against the addrefs: he was, in fact, fupporting it by what gave it meaning and force. The meffage, he faid, exprefsly declared that the French had now adopted fuch a form of government that Great Britain might fafely treat with them. If that was the cafe, what poffible objection could there be to a declaration that we would treat with them? The fitnefs of that country to maintain the relations of peace and amity was evident to the whole world, and would have been fo to the minifter, had he been fincere in June laft, when he moved an amend

ment to the motion for a pacification, which he called a conditional declaration that we were difpofed to treat with France whenever there was a government capable of maintaining those relations. With this glaring fact before their eyes, would the houfe again leave it in the power of minifters to juggle with words? Would they not think it prudent to bind them down to a specific act upon their own words? Îf they did not, what confidence could they have in the prefent declaration more than in the paft? Mr. Fox pointed out many evafions which might otherwife occur. The minifters, he faid, had perfuaded the houfe to leave them open, and had neglected the time upon which other ftatefmen had wifely feized, and happily improved. The gentlemen with whom he acted, never did contend that the French conftitution was well framed; and they utterly detefted the atrocities that had been committed there; they had only afferted the capacity of that country to maintain faith with foreign nations. He thought the prefent government no more capa ble of this than any of its predeceffors. The Brillotine party maintained the treaties of their predeceffors. The execrable tyrant, Robefpiere, had obferved, with equal fidelity, the treaties made with Briffot. His fucceffors were equally fteady in the external fyftem which had been adopted. Confidering the treaties which minifters had made, with whom they had made them, and what acts of abandoned tyranny they had not difcountenanced, it was not worthy the manly character of the British nation to abet them in their refif tance to a treaty with France. Mr. Fox expatiated with his ufual ability on what he conceived the ab

furdity