122 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [1815- " leaves no doubt 'in our minds that a traitorous conspiracy has been formed in the metropolis for the purpose of over- throwing, by means of a general insurrection, the established government, laws, and constitution of the kingdom, and of effecting a general plunder and division of property." They also declared that all this was being done " under pretence of Parliamentary reform." The Commons' report stated that " attempts have been made, in various parts of the country, as well as in the metropolis, to take advantage of the distress in which the labouring and manufacturing classes of the com- munity are at present involved, to induce them to look for immediate relief, not only in a scheme of Parliamentary reform on the plan of universal suffrage and annual election, but in a total overthrow of all existing establishments, and in a division of the landed and extinction of the funded pro- perty of the country." Both committees called for further provisions for the preservation of peace and property against dangers which they believed that the utmost vigilance of Government, under the existing laws, had been found inade- quate to prevent. Ministers lost no time in submitting their remedy for the existing evils. More coercion, more repression, to prevent, if possible, any independent thought on social and political questions, and, at all events, to proscribe any expression of opinion ; that was their plan. On the 24th of February a bill to suspend Habeas Corpus was introduced in the House of Lords ; and on the same day Lord Castlereagh, in the Com- mons, asked leave to bring in a bill for preventing seditious meetings. These were two of the infamous Acts by which for a time public liberty was destroyed in England. The opposition of the Whigs to these measures was half- hearted. They spoke and voted, indeed, against the suspension of Habeas Corpus ; but, on a division, leave to bring in the Seditious Meetings Bill was given by 190 to 14.* The
- The following are the names of the minority given in Hansard :
Aubrey, Sir John Hughes, Col. Waldegrave, Hon. W. Brand, T. Ossulton, Lord Webb, Edward Ferguson, Sir R. Rancliffe, Lord Fitzgerald, Rt. Hon. T. Russell, Lord W. Bennett, H. T II Folkestone, Lord Smith, Wm. Burdett, Sir F. j J Gordon, R. Tavistock, Lord
