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A40421 Freedom of elections to Parliament, a fundamental law and liberty of the English subject and some presidents shewing the power of the House of Commons to inflict punishments on those who have been guitly [sic] of misdemeanours either in elections or returns : in a letter to a member of Parliament. 1690 (1690) Wing F2125; ESTC R24341 18,524 34

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them without any Election against the ⸪ All Kings that are not Tyrants or perjured will be glad to bound themselves within the limits of their Laws and they that perswade them the contrary are Vipers and Pests both against them and the Commonwealth K. James 1. Speech to his Parl. 1609. in his Works fol. 531. Course of the King's Laws and the Liberties of the Commons of this Realm by the means and labours of the said seditious Persons whereby many great Ieopardies Enormities and Inconveniences well nigh to the Ruin Decay and Universal Subversion of the said Realm have ensued And therefore the King considering the premises and that the said Lords Estates and other his Leige-people against whom the said Acts Statutes and Ordinances were made had always had great and faithful Love to the Preferment and Surety of the King's Person according to their Duty and that few of the Acts made in the said Parliament holden at Coventry were made for the Weal of the King nor of his said Realm but the greater part of the Acts Statutes and Ordinances there made were laboured by the Conspiracy Procurement and Excitation of the said evil disposed persons for the introduction and accomplishment of their Rancour and inordinate Covetise It was Ordained and Established by the Authority of the then Parliament That the said Parliament holden at the said City of Coventry be void and holden for no Parliament The King Lords and Commons in 39 H. 6. declare the whole Parliament of Coventry An. 38 H. 6. to be void and holden for no Parliament and all the Acts of it are repealed and made void because of the undue and unfree Election of Knights Citizens and Burgesses to that Parliament And that all Acts Statutes and Ordinanres by the Authority of the same made be reversed adnulled undone repealed revoked void and of no force nor effect And although those Acts were repealed upon the justest Grounds and Reason in the world yet so great and powerful was the Coventry-Faction that it raised such a Fermentation throughout the whole Kingdom as never left working till it had effectually wrought the utter Ruin of Henry VI. and his Son Prince Edward as the * Historians joind with our * Cotton's Rec. Speed's History Records do fully shew and make manifest But now it will not be hors de propos to examine the Writ of Summons it self for therein we shall find several Observables worth our taking notice of As 1. That it plainly directs to and enjoins an entire Freedom in the Election of all those that are to be sent up to serve in Parliament The words are Tibi praecipimus Crompton's Jurisd p. 1 b. firmi èr injungentes quod c. Duos milites gladiis cinctos magis Idoneos Discretos Comitat ' prae dicti de qualibet Civitate Duos Cives de quolibet Burgo Duos Burgenses de Discretioribus magis sufficientibus libèrè indifferentòr Eligi fac c. And this is commanded to be done juxta formam Statutorum inde edit provis ' that is That they be freely and indifferently chosen according to the Tenor of the Statutes in that Case made and provided 2. And the Writ does proceed further and says Ità quod iidem Milites plenam sufficientem potestatem pro se Commanitate Comit ' c. ac dict' Cives Burgenses pro se Communitat ' Civitatum Burgorum divisim ab ipsis habeant ad faciendum consentiendum his quae tunc ibidem de Communi Concilio Regni contigerint ordinari super quibusdam Arduis Vrgentibus Negotiis Regem Statum Defensionem Regni Angliae Ecclesiae Anglicanae concernen ' That the said Knights for themselves and for their County and the said Citizens and Burgesses for themselves and the Commonalty of their Cities and Burroughs may have severally from them full and sufficient Power to perform and to consent to those things which shall there happen to be ordained by the Common-Council of the Kingdom concerning the arduous and urgent Businesses of the King the State and Defence of the Kingdom of England and the English Church 3. But this is not all yet we shall observe from the Writ there is another Clause that carries a great weight along with it and that is this viz. Ità quod pro defectu Potestatis hujusmodi seu propter improvidam Electionem Militum Civium aut Burgensium dicta Negotia infecta non remaneant quovis modo i. e. So that the business may not by any means remain undone for want of such power or by reason of the improvident Election of the Knights Citizens or Burgesses One would think there needed no more than this very Writ to convince and satisfie all men that our Choice of Representatives to serve us in Parliament ought to be with all the Freedom Fairness and Impartiality that can be and that all vile Tricks and Artifices should be abhorred For how can those be fully and sufficiently authorised and empowered to act for the Good and Safety of the King and Kingdom that have not been freely elected by the People who must give them that Power which is absolutely necessary to make what they do to become valid and to be accounted the Statutes of the Realm But notwithstanding these good and wholsom Laws to secure the Freedom of Elections and the plain form of the Writ of Summons pursuant to these Statutes and the ancient Custom of the Kingdom yet some Men we have read of have been so bold and daring in their attempts as to bid open defiance to them And although every Parliament almost since H. 6.'s time hath heard loud Complaints against the dangerous Consequences of illegal Elections yet no Parliament though many good Men have by bringing Bills into the House of Commons designed to prevent undue Elections hath had the happiness for the general Peace and Quiet of the Nation to regulate and amend that which so bare-facedly tended to the * Traiterous Subversion The 5th Article of High-Treason against the five Members in K. Charles I.'s time says That they had traiterously endeavoured to subvert the very Rights and Beings of Parliaments Husbands Collect. 4 to p. 35 Sanderson's Hist 473. of the very Rights and Beings of Parliament I shall therefore here in the next place subjoin some few Precedents to shew you how Misdemeanors in Elections have been formerly punished by the House of Commons in the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth King James and King Charles I. But one word first concerning Violent and Irregular Elections and Returns In an Oration made by a Worthy Gentleman viz. Mr. John Hales whom I take by the Contexture of it Fox's Book of Martyrs last Edit 3. Vol. fol. 819. Col. 1. to be one of the Long Robe to Queen Elizabeth and which was delivered to Her Majesty by a certain Nobleman at her first entrance to her Reign he tells