CONSOLIDATION OF THE CRIMINAL Laws.] Mr. Secretary Peel rose, and said:*

Mr. Speaker: I hope, Sir, that the House is prepared to give me its attention, whilst I explain the object of those measures connected with the Criminal Law which I am about to submit to its consideration. To many, I fear, this subject may appear barren and uninviting. It can borrow no excitement from political feelings, nor can it awaken the hopes or fears of conflicting parties; but it involves higher interests, it concerns the security of property-the prevention of crime-the moral habits of the peopleand it prefers, therefore, a just and imperative demand on the serious attention of parliament.

and then leave its importation, subject to that duty, unrestricted. But the question was, what was the amount of that duty to be? Why should this be concealed? There had been too many proofs that the people were to be reasoned out of their erroneous opinions, to doubt, that, upon a fair statement of the advantages to be derived from a change of the system with regard to corn, they would readily concur in it. Why, then, should it be left in mystery? Why should the people be left, in consequence of their ignorance on this subject, to present petitions to the House, drawn up by nobody knew whom, and the statements in which were inflamed by their own fears and the advice of improper persons? If the House would be firm, resolute, and consistent, all the difficulties would vanish. The people might be assured that the rate of their wages had nothing whatever to do with the price of corn. He hoped that corn would be cheaper; and if there were plentiful crops, that would of necessity be the case; but it would be in vain to look to any other cause than the bounty of Providence for producing that effect.

Mr. Peel explained, that he had no wish to repress a discussion on the subject of the Corn-laws, if any argument was to be offered to the House; but when he had heard the petitioners using the terms "relentless obduracy," he had been apprehensive that a debate might arise, the tendency of which would be to produce irritation, without throwing any light on the subject which had occasioned it. With respect to the sentiments of the government on this question, he hoped the hon. gentleman would himself admit, that as a time had been fixed for its discussion, ministers would do better to reserve themselves, than to embrace the opportunity which was now offered, by the figurative petition from Gorbals.

Lord John Russell agreed, that it would be advisable to have the question of the Corn-laws settled as soon as might be practicable; but since a delay had taken place, he hoped ministers would avail themselves of it to consider the nature and extent of the burthens which at present attached to the land. Before any alteration could be effected in the nature of the Corn-laws, those burthens must be alleviated, and the agriculturists brought upon the same footing with respect to the demands as the manufacturing classes. Ordered to lie on the table.

I claim that attention on another ground. Of all the subjects which fall within the range of our deliberations, none perhaps has been more neglected than the Criminal Law. "Inter arma silent leges," is a trite remark applied to periods of civil dissention. I fear that it might with equal justice be said that amidst the excitement of party conflicts, the true principles which should regulate the Criminal jurisprudence of the country have been too frequently disregarded. I conjure the House, therefore, by these high considerations, by the paramount importance of the subject, and by the reparation which is due for past neglect, now to entertain with favour and attention, a proposal for the simplification and amendment of some important branches of the law.

The two measures which I mean to submit to the House, are a bill for the consolidation of the Statute-law of England, relating to the crime of theft. And a bill to improve the administration of justice in some particulars, which I will hereafter specify.

And first, with respect to the bill for the consolidation of the law relating to theft. I presume that I shall not have to combat at the outset any objections to the principle of an attempt to consolidate and simplify the criminal law. It appears so conformable to the dictates of common sense, that the law, of which all men are supposed to have cognizance—and which all are bound under heavy penalties to obey, should be as precise and intelligible

* From the original edition, printed for Hatchard and Son, Piccadilly.

as it can be made-that it is almost needless to fortify by reasoning or authority, the first impressions of the understanding. If authority were required, I could cite some of the most illustrious names that have adorned the civil and judicial annals of this country, the names of lawyers and of statesmen, who have either expressed a decided opinion in favour of the attempt to simplify the law, or who have been actually engaged in the undertaking. To one of these, the first in point of antiquity, as the first in weight and esteem, I will refer, and thus preclude the necessity of summoning other less important testimony. The lord chancellor Bacon submitted to king James 1st a proposal for amending the laws of England. In that treatise, short as it is, is comprised every argument that can be cited in favour of the measure of which I am speaking, every objection is foreseen, and satisfactorily confuted. The lapse of two hundred and fifty years has increased the necessity of the measure which lord Bacon then proposed, but it has produced no argument in favour of the principle, no objection averse to it, which, to use the words of Cowley applied to Bacon himself, "from the mountain-top of his exalted wit," he did not anticipate.

The House will allow me to substitute for my own imperfect expressions the emphatic terms in which lord Bacon has recorded the suggestions of a mighty intellect. In addressing his sovereign, he says, that his object is not to tax the laws, "I speak," says he, "only by way of perfecting them, which is easiest in the best things; for that which is far amiss hardly receiveth amendment, but that which hath already, to that more may be given." "Besides, what I shall propound, is not to the matter of the laws, but to the manner of their registry, expression, and tradition: so that it giveth them rather new light than any new nature."

He proceeds to state, that for the safety and convenience of the proposal which he makes, "it is good to consider and answer those objections or scruples which may arise or be made against this work." Objection the first, "That it is a thing needless; and that the law as it now is, is in a good estate comparable to any foreign law; and that it is not possible for the wit of man in respect of the frailty thereof, to provide against the uncertainties and evasions or omissions of law." The following is the answer of lord Bacon:

"For the comparison with foreign laws, it is in vain to speak of it, for men will never agree about it. Our lawyers will maintain for our municipal laws--civilians, scholars, travellers will be of the other opinion."

But, Sir, I must interrupt my reference to lord Bacon by remarking that the lapse of years has supplied us with an answer to the first part of this objection which lord Bacon had not to urge. Foreign nations have condensed and simplified their laws-and have disentitled us to vindicate the confusion or uncertainty of our own statutes, by the boast (weak and fruitless as an argument, if it were well founded) that those statutes are less confused and less uncertain than the ordinances of other states.

"Certain it is," says lord Bacon, "that our laws as they now stand, are subject to great uncertainties, and variety of opinion, delays and evasion." "Mark,” he observes, "whether the doubts that arise are only in cases not in ordinary experience, or in cases which happen every day. If in the first only, impute it to the frailty of man's foresight, that cannot reach by law to all cases; but if in the latter, be assured there is a fault in the law."-" There is an inconvenience of penal laws obsolete and out of use: for that it brings a gangrene, neglect, and habit of disobedience upon other wholesome laws that are fit to be continued in practice and execution; so that our laws endure the torment of Mazentius. The living die in the arms of the dead."

The second objection foreseen by lord Bacon is this:"That it is a great innovation, and innovations are dangerous beyond foresight." He replies, "All purgings and medicines, either in the civil or natural body, are innovations, so as that argument is a common-place against all noble reformations. But the truth is, that this work ought not to be termed or held for any innovation in the suspected sense." "Besides it is on the favourable part, it easeth, it presseth not, and lastly, it is rather a matter of order and explanation than of alteration."

Another objection stated by lord Bacon, and that which is perhaps most frequently urged at present, is this: "That it will turn the judges, counsellors of law, and students of law, to school again, and make them to seek what they shall hold and advise for law; and it will

of lord Bacon may appear of too remote an antiquity, or who may consider his views too philosophic and abstract, I will for their satisfaction produce another authority more recent, and more practicalthe authority of a committee of the House of Commons.

impose a new charge upon all lawyers, to furnish themselves with new books of law." The reply is: "For the former of these, touching the new labour, it is true it would follow, if the law (the common law) were new moulded into a text law, for then men must be new to begin, and that is one of the reasons for which I disavow that course. But in the way that I now propound, the entire body and substance of law shall remain, only discharged of idle and unprofitable or hurtful matter, and illustrated by order and other helps towards the better understanding of it and judgment thereupon. For the latter-touching the new charge of books, it is not worthy the speaking of in a matter of so high importance-it might have been used of the new translation of the bible and like works."

Lord Bacon adds this brief sentence pregnant with a truth too often disregarded-a truth of everlasting and universal application. "Books should follow sciences, and not sciences books."

Having urged these reasons for the simplification of the Statute-law, he lays down the principles upon which it should be conducted. "For the reforming and recompiling of the Statute-law it consisteth of four parts." The first, "To discharge the books of those statutes, where the case by alteration of time is vanished; as Lombards, Jews, Gauls, Half-pence, &c. Those may nevertheless remain in the libraries of antiquities, but no reprinting of them; the like of statutes long since expired and clearly repealed. The next is, to repeal all statutes which are sleeping and not of use, but yet snaring and in force; in some of these it will perhaps be requisite to substitute some more reasonable law, instead of them, agreeable to the time; in others a simple repeal may suffice. The third, that the grievousness of the penalty in many statutes be mitigated, though the ordinance stands. The last is, the reducing of concurrent statutes heaped one upon ano. ther, to one clear and uniform law."

Such, Mr. Speaker, are the reasons upon which I have undertaken the measure I shall propose, and such the principles by which I have guided myself in the preparation of it. May I not add in the concluding words of lord Bacon, this is the best way to accomplish this excellent work; of honour to your majesty's times, and of good to all times." If, Sir, there be any to whom the authority VOL. XIV.

In the year 1796, a committee was appointed to inspect and consider all the temporary laws then about to expire. The chairman of that committee was the present lord Colchester, and to him we are indebted on this, as on many other subjects, for one of the ablest reports that can be found on the Journals of the House of Commons. That report observes, "that a general revision of the Statute-law appears to have been often recommended from the throne-to have been petitioned for by both Houses of parliament-to have engaged the labours of successive committees, and to have been undertaken by individuals under the sanction of royal and parliamentary authority, but never to have been carried forward to any degree of maturity. After the Restoration, Finch, Solicitor-general (afterwards lord Nottingham, and lord Chancellor), serjeant Maynard, Mr. Robert Atkyns, Mr. Prynne, and others, were appointed in 1666, to be a committee, to consider of repealing such Statute-laws as they shall find necessary to be repealed, and of reducing all Statutelaws of one nature, under such a method and head as may conduce to the more ready understanding and execution of such laws. This seems to be the last recorded instance of this sort. And thus it is," says the report," that parliament has hitherto failed to accomplish this general revision; and has now suffered it to sleep for more than a century, although the delay of it has annually augmented its necessity."

Now, Sir, what I propose is, to break this sleep of a century; of more than a century indeed, for thirty years have passed away since the report of 1796, and each successive year has added its own heavy incumbrances to the Statute-book. I shall, Sir, with the leave of the House. present a bill uniting into one statute all the enactments that exist, and are fit to be retained, relating to the crime of theft, and to offences immediately connected with theft, such, for instance, as the receiving of stolen property.

I select the laws relating to theft in the first instance, because I consider the crime of theft to constitute the most important 4 I

class of crime. There are acts no doubt of much greater malignity, of a much more atrocious character than the simple act of robbery; but looking to the committals and convictions for crime, it will at once be seen, that those for theft so far exceed the committals and convictions for any other species of offence, that there can be no question of its paramount importance in the catalogue of offences against society, and that, if the laws relating to this class of offence can be simplified and united into one statute, we shall have made a most material advance towards the revision of our criminal Statute-law.

periods at which they have passed, will probably create an apprehension that the attempt to simplify their language, to classify their provisions, and to condense them into one statute is a hopeless undertaking. But, Sir, I hold in my hand the visible proof that the undertaking is not hopeless. Here is the draft of a bill which has been printed for the purpose of facilitating the consideration of its details previously to its introduction, and in the short compass of thirty pages, without making any rash experiment to curtail the phraseology of the existing laws, without the omission, I believe, of a single clause, which it is fitting to retain, are included all the provisions of the statute law relating to the offence of larceny.

By a reference to the criminal returns for England and Wales it will be found that in the last year, the year 1825, 14,437 persons were charged with various crimes; of this number not less than 12,500 persons, amounting to six-sevenths of the whole number, were charged with the crime of theft. There were charged with burglary 428, cattle-stealing 42, horsestealing 229, stealing in a dwelling-house to the value of forty shillings 265, from the person 835, robbery on the person on the highway and other places 189, sheepstealing 166, simple larceny 10,087. If any other offence be taken it will be seen that the numbers charged with that offence bear a very trifling proportion to the numbers charged with theft.

In 1825, the same year in which 12,500 persons were charged with theft, were committed, for the crime of arson 22, for murder 94, for manslaughter 122. If a longer period be taken the result will be nearly the same.

In the last seven years there have been, convictions for forgery 331, for murder 121, for perjury 43, for arson 50, while, for simple larceny alone, there have been in the same period not less than 43,000 convictions. I need say no more to demonstrate the immense importance of the crime of theft, considered as a class of crime, and to shew the necessity of establishing, with regard to it, as clear and intelligible a law as it is possible to establish.

The number of the statutes at present in force relating to this offence amounts to about ninety-two-they include a period of time extending from the reign of Henry 3rd, from the statute called the Charta Forestæ, passed in the ninth year of that king's reign, to the last year of all, the sixth of his present majesty. The number of these laws, the remote and various

This reduction of the bulk of the law, has been effected by selecting in some instances from an heterogeneous mass of legislation heaped together in one statute upon matters perfectly unconnected and dissimilar, those enactments that relate to the protection of property from theft, and in other instances by extracting from various statutes which have been passed in particular cases, the principle upon which each was founded, substituting in lieu of various scattered enactments, giving protection to individual articles of property, one general enactment, affording protection to the class of property to which those individual articles belong.

It is clear that criminal legislation has been heretofore left to the desultory and unconcerted speculations of every man who had a fancy to legislate. If an offence were committed in some corner of the land, a law sprung up to prevent the repetition, not of the species of crime to which it belonged, but of the single and specific act of which there had been reason to complain. The new enactment too was frequently stuck into the middle of a statute passed probably at the latter end of a session; to the compounding of which, every man who saw or imagined a defect in the pre-existing law, was allowed to contribute.

To give an instance or two of legislation of this kind: Some member has been injured, or he has a constituent who has been injured by the stealing of madder roots, and a provision is forthwith made for the special protection for the future, of madder roots, not by a single statute, but by including the enactments directed against the stealer of madder roots, in a law of which the following is the comprehensive title:

"An Act to continue several laws therein mentioned for granting liberty to carry sugars of the growth, produce, or manufacture of any of his majesty's sugar colonies in America, from the said colonies directly into foreign ports, in ships built in Great Britain, and navigated according to law; for the preventing the committing of frauds by bankrupts; for giving further encouragement for the importation of naval stores from the British colonies in America; and for preventing frauds and abuses in the admeasurement of coals in the city and liberty of Westminster: and for preventing the stealing or destroying of madder roots."

I will mention another instance of the same kind. There are not less than twenty statutes relating to the preservation of trees from theft or wilful injury, some properly confined to trees alone, others relating to matters so utterly unconnected with the protection of timber, or with the crime of theft, that I shall be almost suspected of fabricating the title of a bill for the purpose of my argument. It seems to have been discovered about fity or sixty years since that the various laws which had previously passed with respect to timber, did not afford sufficient protection to hollies, thorns, and quicksets, and to save the trouble of amending the former laws these neglected shrubs were provided for in an act, which, in taking charge of them, took charge also of the other matters referred to in the following title.

"An Act for the better securing the duties of customs upon certain goods removed from the outports and other places to London; for regulating the fees of his majesty's customs in the province of Senegambia in Africa; for allowing to the receivers general of the duties on offices and employments in Scotland a proper compensation; for the better preservation of hollies, thorns, and quicksets in forests, chases, and private grounds, and of trees and underwoods in forests and chases; and for authorizing the exportation of a limited quantity of an inferior sort of barley called bigg from the port of Kirkwall in the island of Orkney."

Now, Sir, what I propose is, not to lessen the security which the law gives to the owner of madder roots, not to throw open the holly or thorn to wanton depredation, but merely to transplant them to a more congenial soil than the province of Senegambia.

The laws relating to trees are fruitful

in instances of hasty and slovenly legislation. For instance, there passed in the 6th Geo. 3rd, two statutes for the protection of certain trees and vegetable productions in gardens, the 36th and 48th chapters, which must have passed almost concurrently. Neither of them refer to the host of antecedent statutes, and the author of chapter 48, must have been unapprized of the labours of him who had introduced and probably was superintending at the time the progress of chapter 36; for offences which by that act are made a felony, are by chapter 48 punishable only with a fine of twenty pounds. Had the latter statute passed in a succeeding session of parliament, it would have amounted to a virtual repeal of the preceding act. There are no less than three separate acts of parliament extending the provisions of chapter 48 to particular species of trees.

I will proceed to explain the material points in which I propose either to simplify and consolidate the law, or in which I propose to remedy, what appear to be glaring defects in the law; for my undertaking is not limited merely to the condensation of the statutes. Where I find any omission through which notorious guilt escapes, I propose to supply it where I find a just principle at present only partially applied, I propose to extend it to all the cases which it ought to include. I trust the House will bear with me in this reference to details, because details are here of the utmost importance.

There are on the Statute-book, twelve statutes relating to the offence of stolen goods. They are so numerous, because they are founded not upon some definite principle, but because they refer to individual articles of property. One statute punishes the receiver of stolen lead, iron, copper, brass, and bell metal. Then follows a statute to punish the receiver of stolen pewter. Another refers to jewels, plate, and watches. Then comes the general act as to all goods and chattels-but even this was not considered general enough to apply to bank notes and negotiable securities, and therefore. an act was passed in the present reign for their special protection. Now, I shall expunge from the Statute-book all these special provisions, and substitute in lieu of this legislation directed to particulars, one simple and general enactment, founded on this plain principle, that he who receives, knowing it to have been stolen,