Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A93823
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The State of the city of London, and their humble desires upon the bill for restoring their charters and liberties
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1690
(1690)
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Wing S5316B; ESTC R42892
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3,692
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5
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Liberties Lands and Goods of the whole Body-Corporate 6. Q. Whether it be agreeable to the Proceedings of Parliament or consistent with the English Liberty to determine by this Bill the Interests claimed by the present Magistrates and Common-Council of the City in their Offices and Places without any Offence alledged against them whilst they insist to have the common Liberty of all the Subjects of England to maintain their Interests and Authorities in due Course of Law against any that shall legally bring the same into question 7. Q. Whether in case this Bill should pass into a Law it doth not amount to a Declaration of the Law in all the Cases wherein this Bill affirms the said Judgment to have had any Force or Effect against the Corporation of the City whereby the Law in Westminster-Hall will be changed exceedingly This Case and Judgment being altogether new never heard of or imagined before the treasonable Designs in the late Reigns to subvert the Ancient Laws and Government of the Kingdom 8. Q. Whether the Information in the Nature of a Quo Warranto c. all the Proceedings on the Kings part against the City and the several pernicious Opinions of the Judges about the Case and the Pleadings therein remaining on Record and in no sort condemned in this Bill the Judgment only being declared illegal without any Cause rendred Whether all those Records will not be taken for such Precedents in future Ages as may be of dreadful Consequence to the City and the whole Kingdom 9. Q. Whether upon the whole matter the said Information and Judgment be not absolute Nulities in Law and ought for the Security of the City and Kingdom to be taken out of all Rolls Files and Records that no Memory may be had of such illegal and pernicious Proceedings That hath been usually practiced by Parliaments in Cases of the like Nature and of such dangerous Consequence The Citizens that moved these Questions humbly offered also to their Lordships That this Bill makes void the Elections of all the Common-Council-men chosen legally under their Present Majesty's Government by the Inhabitants of the Wards and yet confirms all the Officers put into Places illegally by the late King James his Commissioners And also all the Livery-men put in arbitrarily by that King's Will and Directions of the Lord Jefferies Mr. Graham and Burton They also put their Lordships in mind That this Bill that in the beginning allows the said Judgment to have dissolved the Corporation yet in a Proviso allows it to be a Corporation whereof there is a present Mayor and Sheriffs which shall continue untill a new Election be made of such Officers And if they have not Legal Authority by their Election to act as Mayor and Sheriffs there is none given them in the Proviso by saying only they shall continue Whereby all the present Authorities are in such uncertainty that it will not be known if the Bill should pass who hath any Authority to cause any Elections to be made and to preside in them They offered many other things needful for the City 's Settlement which are wholly omitted in the Bill in respect of the Orphans and the Administration of Justice But above all other matters they earnestly intreated divers Lords That the Opinion of all the Judges upon the Substance of these Questions foregoing might be taken in Writing for the satisfaction of their Lordships and the Kingdom The Case being altogether new and numberless Consequences not foreseen to be drawn from it in the proeeeding of Judgments in Law Whatsoever shall be the issue of their Endeavours they have acquitted themselves of their Duty and shall humbly acquiesce therein if the Bill shall pass into a Law FINIS Published May 24 1690
THE STATE OF THE City of London And their Humble Desires upon the Bill for Restoring their CHARTERS and LIBERTIES As the same were Offered to many of the LORDS in Parliament by divers Citizens whilst their Petition was depending to be heard TO prepare the Lords to hear what Council should offer upon the Cities Petition it was first prayed That the Judgment against the City and its Liberties might be well weighed the Substance thereof was That the Liberties claimed for the Citizens of London to be of Themselves a Body-Corporate and Politick by the Name of Mayor Commonalty and Citizens of the City of London should be Taken and Seized into the Hands of the King And that the Citizens should be taken Prisoners to satisfie the King for his Fine for Vsurping the said Liberty and Priviledge The purport of the Bill is to Reverse this Judgment as Illegal and Arbitrary and to make it Null and Void to be hereafter of no Effect But shews not wherein it was Illegal or Arbitrary either in Matter or Form whereby the City might be secured against the like Illegal Judgments The Bill also declares in effect That Illegal Judgment to have been of such legal force and efficacy that by vertue thereof the Body Politick of the City was utterly dissolved and destroyed and all their Liberties Lands Goods Debts and Interests as a Corporation even those belonging to their Wives and Children forfeited to the King 'T is herein imply'd That the City to this hour is no Corporation And all that exercise the Powers of Mayors Sheriffs or Common-Councils or any other City Office are in effect declared to be Usurpers and Wrong-doers having no Lawful Authority And 't is also in effect affirmed That the City hath no right nor claim to Liberties Lands Goods Debts or any other Interest unless the Late King's Trustees and Confidents to whom he granted them for that year please to shew the Effects of His Grace to the Citizens or the Chancery shall compel them to it But the City takes these Declarations and Concessions of the Bill to be destructive to their Fundamental Rights and Liberties they claiming to have been a City and Body Politick with divers Liberties and Customs above 2000 years and to have perpetual Succession which could not be forfeited nor destroyed or come under the Judgment of the Judges of the King's-Bench for their being a Body Politick if any Citizens had been Offenders as they were not in this case nothing less than an Act of Parliament being able to destroy their Corporation subsisting by Customs Prescription and many Acts of Parliament Therefore they justly dread a Declaration to be made by Parliament as in this Bill that an Illegal Arbitrary Sentence of the King's Bench Judges have dissolved the Body of the City and may at any time at the Will of an Arbitrary Prince destroy it again and all its Customs Authority and Privileges to the ruine of their Wives and Childrens Interests The City therefore as We humbly conceive justly insists That this Judgment was void in it self and of no force to destroy their Incorporation and are ready to maintain themselves to have always been and to be at this time a Body Politick in due form of Law And they aver That the King neither did nor could by Law take any thing into his hands by force of that Judgment And they affirm That the present Mayor and Sheriffs and Common-Council are legally possessed of their respective Places being duly chosen according to their Customs and Charters They say That the Information in the nature of the Quo Warranto upon which the Judgment was founded was void of it self in the Construction of Law and ought to be esteemed and taken for none being brought against the Body-Politick of the City for usurping to be a Body-Politick which is utterly Repugnant and Contradictory in its self It cannor be admitted to Complain and Aver in a Legal Court That a Body Politick usurps to be a Body-Politick there being in that case no Defendant to answer the Complaint so the very Information is void and null in its self it is in reality no Information against any Body and no Judgment could be given upon it The very Judgment also is contradictory in its self being to take into and continue in the hands of the King the Franchizes of the Corporation and Body-Politick of the City mentioned in the Pleadings when 't is averr'd in the whole Proceedings towards Judgment That there was no Corporation or Body-Politick of the City but that there was an Usurpation only of the name of a Body-Politick The City insists That many Points of Law do arise naturally upon the Bill fit for the greatest Consideration and the Advice of all the Learned Judges the whole Constitution of the Government of the Kingdom being concerned in them as well as the City These following Questions in Law ought to be clearly Resolved before it 's reasonable that the Bill should be made a Law 1 Q. Whether by force of the Judgment the Corporation or Body-Politick of the City was by our Laws actually in King Charles the Second and descended to the late King James and remained in him notwithstanding his Instrument and Grant under the great Seal to restore to the City all that was pretended forfeited to him and that he took from them If the Corporation was never in King James or was restored to the City by him then this Bill will do great wrong to the City by depriving their Officers of their Authorities and Interest without Cause and changing the Customary Times of Chusing Officers and of their holding their Offices the Bill appointing them to continue for Sixteen Months which is a burden intolerable to some of the City-Officers 2. Q. Whether the Officers of the City and Members of Parliament serving for the City being chosen according to the Cities Customs and Liberties be Usurpers of their Offices and Places as the Bill clearly imports 3. Q. Whether by that form of the said Judgment the Cities Franchise of being a Body-Politick be taken and seized into the King's hands all the Lands and Inheritances of the City were by Law so vested in the King that the late King might grant them to whom he pleased This Bill plainly implying the late King James's Lease of all the City Lands to his Confidents in trust to have béen good in Law 4. Q. Whether the Judges of the King's Bench have a Legal Jurisdiction to Judg and if they please to Destroy the being of all the Corporations by Prescription throughout the Kingdom of whose Burgesses the Parliament in great part consists This Bill supposes and allows the Judges to have had a Jurisdiction which shakes the Ancient Foundation of the Government wherein all the Corporations by Prescription are taken to have perpetual Succession 5 Q. Whether any small pretended or real Misdemeanor of some Members of Corporations by Prescription can be a Forfeiture of all the