On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
operation . With one of those acts you have had a former acquaintance , ft is the old Insurrection Act , which , after having perished , is now revived and re-enacted for Ireland . The other is called the Peace Preservation Bill . Thfi Insurrection Act consists , as you all know , of a complete suspension of the English
con-• _ * - * ¦ - 1 * 41 tf * . 1 _ $ titution—of English law—of the trial by j » ry . Under these new laws , taken together , any seven magistrates may meet , and recommend the county or district to be proclaimed by the Lord Lieutenant as being in a state of disturbance . When the Proclamation has once issued , every person must stay at home after a certain hour . You are
to have the assistance of a learned serjeant from town , who may send abroad offenders in a summary way . Gentlemen , I have seen times , when persons , who , thinking the lives named
ill their tenants' leases were lasting somewhat too long , have > by the aid of such a law , found means to recommend a trip across the Atlantic , to the persons thus unreasonably attached to life ; and thus achieved the downfall of a
beneficial lease , and a comfortable rise of their income in consequence . Such things have occurred : I have known the fact . Gentlemen , I may be told , that the state of the country requires its reenactment . It may be so : I am not in possession of the secrets of the Castle . A desperate state of things calls for desperate remedies .
Gentlemen , the other Act of Parliament is the Peace Preservation Bill * It is a wholesome mode of administering the old powers , already rested by law in the magistrates . Any seven
magistrates may recommend the application of this remedy ; and either for the county at large , or any particular barony or district in the county . If their recommendation should beac ; ceded to by the . Lord Lieutenant , this bill
comes into immediate operation . Now , you are to meet—a head magistrate is to be appointed , at a salary of . £ 700 a y ^» he is also to have a homse and offices—his clerk is to get a salary of 150
^ a year—the constables are to fc ct ^ ioo a year each—any seven of your magistrates may get all this done . J ^ t listen to one thing more—the disurbed district is to pay the expense of th « * hole .
entlemen , * have trespassed long Pon jrovir attention ; but 1 hope , from
Untitled Article
the tranquil state of your county , that I have not unaptly chosen th « present season for making those observations . See the necessity of some public discussion of those subjects ^ in order to extinguish all exaggeration and misrepresentation . I need not travel far back for a
curious instance . I have seen to my surprise , in The Courier newspaper , a story of myself , which has been copied into The Pilot . It is so very short , that I shall read it : — Such is the disturbed state of Ireland , that one of the Judges
of Assize , upon the Leinster circuit , Mr , Justice Fletcher , in coming from Kilkenny to Clonmel , was pelted by stones in the town of Callan , and owed his safety to the dragoons that escorted him . "
When I reached Waterford , I was still more surprised to see one newspaper lamenting that I had been " shot at ; ' * but another protested that it was all a gross falsehood . Now , what was the truth ? As I passed through Callan , an escort of a few dragoons attended me . This escort , by the bye , is one of the
mischiefs of those ajarms , a mischief which never occurs tflwugland . There , the gentlemen of consideration in the county come out to meet the Judge with led horses and equipages , and with every suitable mark of respect and attention - y not , indeed , paid to the Judge individually , nor desired by him , but
an attention and respect due to the law , which the Judge comes to administer . But what was the case in Kilkenny ? The High-Sheriff not appearing at all , perhaps as a duty beneath him , or for some other reason ; the Sub-Sheriflf , unwilling enough to be burdened with the trouble , and anxious to get rid of us ; two or three miserable Bailiffs , mounted
upon wretched little horses , brandishing * an enormous length of halbert , resembling so many Cossacks in every thing but utility , and attended by an escort of four or five dragoons —( for the Sheriff is not at the expense of paying the dra ~ goons ) . —Indeed , where needy or penurious High-Sheriffs are nominated , and where the office of Sub-Sheriff becomes
an affair of indirect management , aa improper and inefficient attendance upon the Circuit Judges is generally to be expected . However , thus attended ( or rather unattended ) , we drove through Callan ; when a boy , about seven years old , flung a stone idly , either at the Sub-Sheriff , or at the dragoons , or both . This was the entire outrage * I did not
Untitled Article
Judge Fletcher $ Charge . 659
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1814, page 659, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2445/page/71/
-