have every trust, and hope, and confidence in you. And to that hope I will add my most fervent prayer to the God of all truth and justice, so to raise, and enlighten, and fortify your minds, that you may so decide, as to preserve to yourselves while you live, the most delightful of all recollections-that of acting justly; and to transmit to your children the most precious of all inheritances the memory of your virtue.

Baron Smith charged, and after a trial of twelve hours' duration, the jury at midnight found for the plaintiff, £10,000 damages, with costs.

FOR JUDGE JOHNSON.

[HABEAS CORPUS.]

COURT OF EXCHEQUER.

BEFORE CHIEF BARON LORD AVONMORE AND THE OTHER BARONS.

February 4th, 1805.

ROBERT JOHNSON was called to the Irish Bar in Michaelmas Term, 1776, and obtained an early reputation for ability. Notwithstanding the prevalent opinion that Mr. Jebb wrote the letters of "Guatimozin and Considicus"-those admirable arguments for nationality—there is much evidence in favour of Mr. Johnson's authorship of some of them at least. † In June, 1800, he was made one of the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas in Ireland.

On the 5th of November, 1803, a letter, signed "Juverna," was published in Cobbett's Political Register. It was written in a bold and bitter style, and having narrated the story of the Trojan Horse, applied it to Lord Hardwicke's stupid, plausible, and vicious rule in Ireland. In that and subsequent papers Lord Hardwicke was described as "a very eminent breeder of sheep in Cambridgeshire;" Lord Chancellor Redesdale is called "a very able and strong-built Chancery pleader from Lincoln's Inn;" Mr. Secretary Marsden appears as "a corrupt, unprincipled, rapacious plunderer, preying upon the property of the state;" and Justice Osborne as "the most corrupt instrument of a debased and degraded government, lending himself as a screen to conceal them from the disgrace their actions would naturally bring upon them."

These are the strongest passages, and what were relied on in the prosecution.

*They were originally published in the Freeman's Journal. The first is dated 16th of April, 1779. They were reprinted in a pamphlet, which ranks with Pollock's "Letters of Owen Roe," and Drennan's "Orellana," at the head of Irish political literature, during the Volunteer Revolution. Indeed for the union of strong sense, and clear, impetuous eloquence, they have hardly, if ever, been surpassed.

† See Mr. H. Grattan's Memoirs of Grattan, vol. v, now at press, for these proofs.

Cobbett was prosecuted for these publications, as libelling Lords Hardwicke and Redesdale, Mr. Marsden, and Judge Osborne; he was tried at Westminster, before Lord Ellenborough, on the 4th of May, 1804. The Attorney-General prosecuted; Mr. Adam defended Cobbett, and called Lord Minto, Charles Yorke, Windham, Lord Henry Stewart, &c., to swear to Cobbett's ultra loyalty; but in ten minutes the jury found him guilty of the libel.

In one of the "Juverna" articles (that published on the 10th of December), Plunket, then Solicitor-General for Ireland, was attacked on many grounds, but especially for his speech in reply on Emmet's trial. "Juverna" represents Emmet as describing Plunket thus: "That viper, whom my father nourished! He it was from whose lips I first imbibed those principles and doctrines which now by their effects drag me to my grave, and he it is who is now brought forward as my prosecutor, and who, by an unheard-of exercise of the prerogative, has wantonly lashed with a speech to evidence the dying son of his former friend, when that son had produced no evidence, had made no defence; but, on the contrary, had acknowledged the charge, and submitted to his fate."

For publishing this libel, and it was a false and cruel charge, Plunket brought a civil action against Cobbett; the case was heard by Lord Ellenborough on the 26th of May, 1804. Erskine opened for the plaintiff; Adam defended Cobbett ably, quoting Plunket's words on the nullity of the Union; but the jury, after twenty minutes' deliberation, found a verdict for the plaintiff, and £500 damages. These verdicts were not enforced. Cobbett gave up the manuscript of the libellous articles, alleging that they were written by Mr. Justice Johnson. The offended parties believed the statement, and it was resolved to ruin Johnson. For this purpose a vast and abominable machinery was resorted to.

On the 20th of July, 1804, an act was passed, entitled, "an act to render more easy the apprehending and bringing to trial offenders escaping from one part of the united kingdom to the other, and also from one county to another," by which, amongst other things, it was enacted, that a warrant from a court in Great Britain might be transmitted to Ireland, be endorsed and executed there by a Justice of the Peace, and the accused party transferred for trial to the court from which the warrant issued.

That all the persons concerned in pushing this act knew its object it would be wrong to say; but it was brought in by Perceval, Lord Redesdale's brother-inlaw, and by Charles Yorke, the brother of Lord Hardwicke, and was mainly and speedily used against Johnson-a case for strong suspicion, at least, against the Irish Government.

The act was soon used. Bills were found against Johnson for Libel by the Middlesex Grand Jury, and on the 24th of November, 1804, a warrant was issued against him from the King's Bench at Westminster, founded on a charge of libel; this warrant was endorsed by Robert Bell, Esq., J.P. for the county Dublin, and under it the Judge was conditionally arrested at his house at Milltown, on the 17th, and absolutely on the 18th of January, 1805. Johnson procured delay, a Habeas Corpus was at once issued, and on the 19th of January he was brought before the Chief Justice and six other Judges, at the Chief's house, and the case immediately gone into. Johnson was ill and sought

* The fact that he was communicated with on the 17th, negatives the charge against government, of having tried to kidnap him-expedition they were bound under the act to use.

delay, but O'Grady, (the Attorney-General) refused it, and Johnson read a statement showing that he had sought to go to Bath for his health (then very feeble) and had obtained leave, though warned that he would be held to bail, and that the whole proceeding was a tyrannical and illegal contrivance. Counsel argued the case, the Attorney-General replied on the 22nd, and an eighth judge having come in that day, their lordships divided, three for and three against, allowing the cause shown on the writ of Habeas Corpus, and two were neuter, The question, therefore, went into the King's Bench, and was there argued, on the 26th, 28th, and 29th of January, by Curran, M'Cartney, William Johnson, for the judge, and by Arthur Browne (the Prime-Sergeant) and the AttorneyGeneral, O'Grady, for the crown. Justice Day decided for release, Chief Justice Downes and Justice Daly against it.

Curran's speech contains nothing of argument additional to the speech he afterwards made in the Exchequer, on the same subject; nor has it any pretensions to brilliant eloquence, except, perhaps, in the concluding passage, which is as follows:

But suppose him arrived in London. What defence can he make there? Yes, I think there is one; there is an inborn enthusiasm for liberty-an innate love of freedom-a hatred of oppression and tyranny, that would redeem the victim and secure him from the attack of the oppressor. But give such a power to a prosecutor, as the construction put upon this statute would give, and there is not a man in England, from the Archbishop of Canterbury to the lowest mechanic, who may not be brought here under colour of this statute, and vice versâ, and tried upon trivial accusations without the possibility of giving bail. The minister going to the House of Commons may be arrested upon the information of an Irish chairman, and a warrant granted by a trading justice. Mr. Pitt is brought over here in vinculis. What to do?-to see whether he should be bailed or not. I remember Mr. Fox was here during the lifetime of this country: in the same way he might be brought over. It may facilitate the intercourse between the islandsany man may travel at the public expense. Suppose I gave an Irishman in London a small assault in trust; when the vacation arrives, he knocks at the door of a trading justice, and tells him he wants a warrant against the counsellor. "What counsellor ?" "Oh, sure every body knows the counsellor." "Well, friend, and what is your name?" Thady O'Flanagan, please your honour." "What countryman are you?" "An Englishman, by construction." "Very well, I'll draw upon my correspondent in Ireland for the body of the counsellor."

What! my lords, is there no apprehension of an outrage of that kind? There is nothing against it but the great expense. The two warrants cannot be obtained for less than five shillings of our money. But the expense of the journey must be defrayed by the public; and can it be supposed that the legislature intended, that the public money should be thus drawn upon at the good will of every petty prosecutor, either to gratify his malice or supply his necessities?

Lord Chief Justice Downes-Give me leave to ask, whether this mischief might not arise in the case of an unfounded charge of felony?

Mr. Curran-No, my lord; accusers are not so easily found in such cases. The atrocity of the charge deters the party from making it. I have witnessed many trials, and I seldom knew a false charge of a capital crime; but there are a thousand instances of false charges of petty misdemeanors.

I shall add to that head of observation, that this is a state prosecution. Yet it must be proceeded upon as every common case between subject and subject. But if anything can impress this particular case more upon the Court than any other, it is the circumstance that it is a prosecution by the state for a libel; see then what a power is put into the hands of a minister, or the rival of a minister. An experiment must first be made in the province, remote from the seat of government, where it may be supposed to pass sub silentio. They would not venture to try it in London, to give up an inhabitant of England to an Irish catchpole, and send him upon a voyage to Ireland, to know whether he should be bailed or not. It would appal the English nation to have such an artillery opened upon them; it would be to stand before a loaded cannon, while a child with a lighted torch was sitting at the touch-hole. If my client must undertake this voyage, let the messenger perform the obsequies by night, and take him to the water-edge in the dark, that his countrymen may not see his last look upon his native shore, which he is never to see again. Let not his wife or children witness his departure. He is to be taken to a place, where his innocence cannot appear, for there is no process to produce the witness who can

attest it.

My lords, this is an odious experiment. It is of late that this perplexed doctrine of constructions has been revived; it flourished

before science had attained its full maturity, and when there was nothing but commentators, and scholiasts, and constructors. Are acknowledged principles to be explained away by some godfather, producing his adopted manuscript-" nullus liber homo capiatur, vel imprisonetur, nisi per legale judicium parium suorum, vel per legem terræ." A manuscript is produced-it

came into the hands of a grandfather's executor-by which it appears, that lex terra is for the common people, but judicium parium means something more; it means the judgment of the upper house-the judgment of the peers. This exposes the freedom of the subject, and his dearest rights, to the uncertainties of caprice and the vagaries of speculation. It is admitted there are real hardships imposed by this statute; but it is suggested it may be amended. Perhaps it may-perhaps it may not. But under the construction contended for by the prosecutor, they are desperate and formidable. If you see one construction which is destructive of former rights, and another which is sanative of those rights, I hope you will adopt the latter. I hope that you will not think this a doubtful casethat it will be understood abroad that it is not-that the prosecutor will be pleased with his failure-that he will feel a gratifying consciousness at going out of court mercifully triumphant. If there be any latent motive against the accused, it will be defeated by persisting in the present measure; they will exhibit him as a persecuted man, rousing and arming every principle of the human heart to pity and protect him. If they have any object, they will lose it by an odious and abominable prosecution. But grieved should I be to look to the compunction of humanity, or await the satiated vengeance of the prosecutor, instead of the honourable and upright justice of the Court, which is to pass sentence one way or the other.

Therefore, I leave my client with you. He has fled to the temple of justice he has fallen upon its steps. I trust in Divine Providence, that he will find there a sanctuary, and that your lordships will order him to be discharged from the custody in which he is now detained.

Pending this, another writ had been issued from the Exchequer. Under it Johnson was brought up on the 4th of February, before Barry Viscount Yelverton, Barons George, (William) Smith, and M'Clelland. Mr. Peter