LETTER XLVIII.
TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.
28. May. 1771.
- SIR,
ANY man, who takes the trouble of perusing the Journals of the house of commons, will soon be convinced, that very little, if any regard at all, ought to be paid to the resolutions of one branch of the legislature, declaratory of the law of the land, or even of what they call the law of parliament. It will appear that these resolutions have no one of the properties by which, in this country particularly, law is distinguished from mere will and pleasure; but that, on the contrary, they bear every mark of a power arbitrarily assumed and capriciously applied:—that they are usually made in times of contest, and to serve some unworthy purpose of passion or party; that the law is seldom declared until after the fact by which it is supposed to be violated;—that legislation and jurisdiction are united in the same persons, and exercised at the
