But if such a custom did exist, which I contend is more honored in the breach than in the observance, that custom is capable of being abused to the grossest extortion; and that it was so abused will strike your Lordships' minds in such a manner that I hardly need detail the circumstances of it.
Burke warns that customs can be exploited for extortion, undermining their intended purpose.
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More from Edmund Burke
Those who are servants in name, as well as in effect, do not like to be told of their situation, their duty, and their obligations.
This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, but in all its revolutions.
But the course of succession is the healthy habit of the British Constitution.
When such an unwarrantable maxim is once established, that no throne is lawful but the elective, no one act of the princes who preceded this era of fictitious election can be valid.
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