But the true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts.
Edmund Burke
The Public Record
Edmund Burke was an Anglo-Irish writer, philosopher, and politician who is widely credited as the founder of the cultural and political philosophy of conservatism. Regarded as one of the most influential conservative thinkers and political writers of the 18th century, Burke spent the majority of his career in Great Britain and was elected as a member of Parliament (MP) from 1766 to 1794 in the House of Commons of Great Britain with the Whig Party. His writings played a significant role in influencing public views and opinions in both Great Britain and France following the French Revolution in 1789, and he remains a major figure in modern conservative circles.
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No plea, nor pretence, of inconvenience or evil example (which must in their nature be daily and ordinary incidents) can be admitted as a reason for such mighty operations.
In times of high proceeding it is never the faction of the predominant power that is in danger: for no tyranny chastises its own instruments.
But, unfortunately, it is the kind of slavery the most easily admitted in times of civil discord: for parties are but too apt to forget their own future safety in their desire of sacrificing their enemies.
Liberty, if I understand it at all, is a general principle, and the clear right of all the subjects within the realm, or of none.
I confess, Gentlemen, that this appears to me as bad in the principle, and far worse in its consequence, than an universal suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; and the limiting qualification, instead of taking out the sting, does in my…
The Company might suffer above, the natives might suffer below; the intermediate party must profit to the prejudice of both.
These they are bound to obey and follow, and rather to enlarge and enlighten law by the liberality of legislative reason than to fetter and bind their higher capacity by the narrow constructions of subordinate, artificial justice.
But legislators ought to do what lawyers cannot; for they have no other rules to bind them but the great principles of reason and equity and the general sense of mankind.
These strange incongruities must ever perplex those who confound the unhappiness of civil dissension with the crime of treason.
If the prisoners who have been exchanged have not by that exchange been virtually pardoned, the cartel (whether avowed or understood) is a cruel fraud; for you have received the life of a man, and you ought to return a life for it, or…
God forbid that England should ever read this lesson written in the blood of any of her offspring!
Such executions may, indeed, satiate our revenge; they may harden our hearts, and puff us up with pride and arrogance.
As well might the execution of a fugitive negro in the plantations be considered as a lesson to teach masters humanity to their slaves.
People without much difficulty admit the entrance of that injustice of which they are not to be the immediate victims.
If it be, it is surely among such rebellious children that examples for disobedience should be made, to be in any degree instructive: for who ever thought of teaching parents their duty by an example from the punishment of an undutiful son?
Many reasons are alleged by its authors in its favor, grounded on the state of their affairs; none whatever are assigned for the alteration.
They will thank God they have a standard, which, in the most essential point of this great concern, will put them on a par with the most wise and knowing.
The Habeas Corpus Act supposes, contrary to the genius of most other laws, that the lawful magistrate may see particular men with a malignant eye, and it provides for that identical case.
But the use of character is to be a shield against calumny.
I take it for granted, Gentlemen, that we sympathize in a proper horror of all punishment further than as it serves for an example.
If your peace be nothing more than a sullen pause from arms, if their quiet be nothing but the meditation of revenge, where smitten pride smarting from its wounds festers into new rancor, neither the act of Henry the Eighth nor its…
There is no equality among us; we are not fellow-citizens, if the mariner who lands on the quay does not rest on as firm legal ground as the merchant who sits in his counting-house.
If, on the contrary, the colonies are reduced to the obedience of the crown, there must be, under that authority, tribunals in the country itself fully competent to administer justice on all offenders.
I could see no fair, justifiable expedience pleaded to favor this new suspension of the liberty of the subject.
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