A. D. 1676-7.

committed to the Tower. The Duke of Buckingham, who did not deny the charge of having asserted that the parliament was dissolved, surrendered himself the next day, and was committed likewise to the same place.

CHAPTER V.

Popularity of the imprisoned Lords.-Lord Shaftesbury's application to the King's Bench.-His speech to the Court.His application is refused.-His three Letters.-Petitions the King and the House of Lords.-Makes his submission, and is released. Subsequent resolution of the Lords.

WHEN the lords were first committed, great numbers went to visit them, which so provoked

the court party, that the next day an order was

made that they should be kept separate, and not suffered to meet together; and that no persons should be permitted to see them without leave of the house. But this had not the effect desired for it produced daily applications from many of the peers, and other persons of distinction, for leave to visit them.

The house of lords, being under the influence

of the court, showed its severity against several books which had been published in order to prove

the dissolution. One of these was written by Lord Holles, and was called "The Grand Ques

A. D. 1676-7.

A. D. 1677.

The two

houses adjourned.

The views of the court in the ad

journments.

tion, concerning the Prorogation of the Parliament for a year and three months, stated and discussed." It was corrected from the press by Dr. Nicholas Carey, who, refusing, at his examination before the house of lords, to discover his knowledge of the author, was fined in the sum of one thousand pounds, and ordered to be kept a prisoner in the Tower till it was paid.

Upon the 16th of April, the two houses, by direction from the king, adjourned themselves to the 21st of May, and then to the 16th of July.

The views of the court in these adjournments, for which there was not the least pretence of public business, were very evident; for the four lords might have claimed a right to their discharge upon a prorogation, being committed during the pleasure of the king and the house. The power over them during the recess centred in the king. This method of committing a number of members to prison for delivering their opinions in parliament, and of giving the crown a power to release or continue them in confinement, had a most dangerous tendency. It was opening a way for the king (being sure of a majority) to invade, at any time, the privileges of parliament, to terrify and punish such members as he disliked, and to weaken

thereby every opposition to his measures. It was A.D.1677. doing likewise, under a parliamentary sanction, which must have a worse effect, what Charles the First had done by violence.

Lord Shaftesbury singly stood in the breach on this occasion. He resolved to assert the liberty of the subject in an open regular way; in a way which, he was assured, must draw the attention of the public. If the king had a power to release him, he thought an application to him more proper in his court of justice than in the cabinet. He took, therefore, the usual method, which every subject has a right to, for obtaining his liberty. Having very sufficient bail ready to offer, he peti- Lord Shaftioned the court of the king's bench for an habeas application to the king's corpus; and upon the return of it, directed to the constable of the Tower, he was brought up to the bar, on Wednesday, June the 27th, 1677; but, there being a dispute about the sufficiency of the return, the Friday following was appointed by the judges to take it into consideration.

When the case was argued, his counsel gave many reasons why he ought to be bailed; but the attorney and solicitor general insisted that the court could not relieve any person committed by either house of parliament.

tesbury's

bench.

A.D. 1677.

His speech

in the king's

Upon this, Lord Shaftesbury readily answered their objections in the following speech, the substance of which only is preserved; but, from the inaccuracy in taking it down, its elegance is probably in a great measure destroyed.

"MY LORD,

"I did not intend to have spoken one word in bench court. this business; but what hath been objected and

laid to my charge by the king's counsel, Mr. Attorney and Mr. Solicitor, inforces me to say something for your better satisfaction. They have told you that my counsel in their arguments said that this court was greater than the house of peers; I dare appeal to your lordship, and the whole court, that it was never spoken by them: I am sure it was not by any direction of mine. What is said by my counsel and me is, that this court is the most proper place to resort unto in those cases where the liberty of the subject is concerned. The lords' house is the supreme court of judicature in the kingdom; but yet there is a jurisdiction which the lords' house do not meddle with.

"The king's counsel mentioned it as a wonder that a member of the lords' house should come