Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
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Pages |
A88186
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For every individuall member of the honourable House of Commons
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Lilburne, John, 1614?-1657.
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1647
(1647)
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Wing L2109; Thomason E414_9; ESTC R204503
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7,264
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4
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For every Individuall Member of the Honourable House of Commons ââ¦R THe law of England having alwayes been esteemed by me the visible state security of my life liberty and propriety for the preservation of which I have in the field with my sword in my hand often run the hâzzard of death and being oppressed contrary thereunto by the present House of Lords in Iune 1646. I coould doe no lesse for my own preservation and the preserâation of the liberties and freedomes of my native country then to fly by way of Appeale to the auâhority and jurisdiction of your House my legall Peers and Equalls who by the Commons of Engâand are chosen and betâusted to be the great and grand Patrons and Guardians of their liberties and âreedomes and ought not to suffer them to be trodden underfoot by all the Lords in England And my âormall Appeale from the prison of Newgate I made unto your house the 16. of Iune 1646. now ârinted in the 9. 10 11. pages of The Free mans freedome vindicated which was accepted and approâed of by your House and also read and debated and committed to a select and chosen Committee âhere Mr. Henry Martin had the Chaste before whom I made my plea and since printed it and calâââ An Anatamy of the Lords tyranny who was onây authorised in matter of fact to examine all the Lords proceedings with me ther being then as appealed to me no scruple either in the house or any of âhat Committee about the Lords jurisdiction over a Commoner and having most illegally in a tyrannicall and chargeable imprisonment staid above â6 moneths for that report there being as to mee âppeares some more scruples in your house now about the Lords jurisdiction then was when I first âppealed to you your house resolved upon 15. October 1647. anew to commit the whole âatter of my âeport then lately made by Mr. Martin to a new Committee who are to consider of presidents in âhis and the like cases and to state their opinions to the house what they thinke fit to be done thereupon and the speciall care of it is referred to Mr. Maynard before whom and the Committee I appeaâed the 20. October 1647. and had liberty to make my grand Plea in point of law against the Lords âurisdiction and their unjust and illegall dealings with me which grand plea with my additionâââlea herewith present unto you intreating you as one of my Iudges seriously to read and consider Iâ And on the 1. November 1647 upon a motion in your house for an addition to my Committee that so my long and unsupportable attendance may come to some issue all the Members of your House that will come to my Committee are added to it and by the power of that Committee I am summoned before them the 8. present to state my questions upon which their results or judgements are ãâã âlow or be grounded and being before them apprehended some conceptions in them that the matter was very difficult and weighty although I conceive in my aforesaid pleas I have made it as âââin as the Sun that shines at noone day that the Lords have dealt most illegally and unjustly with me and dare venter my life and being upon what I have before both Committees said against at the Lawyer in England in point of law but in regard I apprehend for all I have said that there is some âcruples in some Members of that Committee and may be much more in divers in the house when it is reported in that slender manner that it is like there being not any results upon the ãâã question ãâã the Committee I therfore crave leave in writing to state my questions I presented to the Committee with some additions to them and in the first place I lay down this position which at my utmost âââllâ according to the rules of law and iustice I will make good viz. That the book called my plea to Iudge Reeves for wrighting of which I was summoned to the Lords bar it an honest and iust booke free from scandals and falshoods and hath nothing but ãâã in it and therefore neither punishable by the House of Lords nor any Court of justice in England but admit it were full of notorious scandalls in the highest nature the maine question will ãâ¦ã 1. Whether the house of Lords by the Law of England have any originall iurisdiction in ãâã oâââââly to summon me a free commoner of England up to their barre to answer a charge for ãâã the foresaid booke or any other booke though never so scandalous in it self which I positively deny and sââven strong reasons or arguments J made before and gave unto the foresaid Committee which you may please to read in my Grand Plea pag. 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 ãâã of which briefly are ãâã also my plea Mr. Martin pa. 9. 10. First that the Lords sit not in their House by any power or authority dââââ from the peoples free election and choice but are meerly and altogether the ââââtures of the King made by his prerogative sometimes of the basest and corrâpââââ of the people being the meere issues of his will who himselfe is limited and bounded by the law ãâã who by his writ that summons them to sit in Parliament only impowers them to confer and treat ãâã him or afford their Councell of certaine hard urgent affaires concerning himselfe the State ãâã defence of the Kingdome of England and the Church thereof but my pretended offence touchââ none of these things And besides the Lords had no conference nor treaty with the King their prerogative foutaine Ergo but read my Grand plea pag. 6 and 7. Secondly I was the 10. of Iune 1646. summoned up to the Lords bar to answer such things aââ stood charged with before their Lorships concerning a pamphlet intituled as before which did not in the least belong unto the jurisdiction of their Court but at the most is meerly an action tryable at the Common law and no where else see Cookes 5. part report pag. 125. De libellis famâsis and 13. Hen. 7. Relway and 11 Eliz. Dier 285. and 30. Assise pla 19. and 3. E. 1. chap. 33. and 37. E. 3.18 and 38. E. 3.9 and 42. E. 3.3 and 2. R. 2.5 and 12. R. 2.11 and 1 part of your own book ãâã Decl. pag. 208. read my Plea pag. 7 and 8. And being so they ought not to have medled with it it being a known maxime in law that when an ordinary remedie may be had an extraordinary is not to be made use of Thirdly no man is to be imprisoned nor iudged but by the known established and declared lawââ of the land see the Petition of Right But there is no established law of the land for the iudgment of the Lords in any thing where the King their creature is not concurrent 14. E. 3. c. 5. Which statute plainly shewes that in delayes of iustice or error in iudgement in inferior Courts