ther with the Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons, so summoned and returned as above on the part of Ireland, shall be the Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons, of the first parliament of the United Kingdom; and such first parliament may (in that case) if not sooner dissolved, continue to sit so long as the present parliament of Great Britain may now by law continue to sit, if not sooner dissolved; and that every one of the Lords of Parliament of the United Kingdom, and every member of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, in the first and all succeeding parliaments, shall, until the parliament of the United Kingdom shall otherwise provide, take the oaths and make and subscribe the declaration which are at present by law enjoined to be taken, made and subscribed by the Lords and Commons of the parliament of Great Britain: that the Lords of Parliament on the part of Ireland, in the House of Lords of the parliament of the United Kingdom, shall at all times have the same privileges of parliament which shall belong to the Lords of Parliament on the part of Great Britain; and the Lords spiritual and temporal respectively on the part of Ireland, shall at all times have the same rights, in respect of their sitting and voting upon the trial of peers, as the Lords spiritual and temporal respectively on the part of Great Britain; and that all Lords spiritual of Ireland shall have rank and precedency next and immediately after the Lords spiritual of the same rank and degree of Great Britain, and shall enjoy all privileges as fully as the spiritual lords of England do now, or as any other spiritual lords of England may hereafter enjoy the same, the right and privilege of sitting in the House of Lords, and the privileges depending thereon, and particularly the right of sitting on the trial of peers excepted; and that the persons holding any temporal peerages of Ireland, existing at the time of the Union, shall, from and after the Union, have rank and precedency next and immediately after all the persons holding peerages of the like orders and degrees in Great Britain, subsisting at the time of the Union; and that all peerages of Ireland, created after the Union, shall have rank and precedency with the peerages of the United Kingdom so created, according to the dates of their creations; and that all peerages, both of Great Britain and Ireland, now subsisting or hereafter to be created, shall, in all other respects, from the date of Union, be considered as peerages of the United Kingdom; and that the peers of Ireland shall, as peers of the United Kingdom, be sued and tried as peers, except as aforesaid, and shall enjoy all privileges of peers as fally as the peers of Great Britain, the right and privilege of sitting in the House of Lords, and the privileges depending thereon, and the right of sitting on the trial of peers, only excepted.

clude any person from afterwards putting in a | claim to the peerage so deemed extinct, and if such claim shall be allowed as valid, by judgment of the House of Lords of the United Kingdom reported to his majesty, such peerage shall be considered as revived; and in case any new creation of a peerage of that part of the United Kingdom called Ireland, shall have taken place in the interval, in consequence of the supposed extinction of such peerage, then no new right of creation shall accrue to his majesty, his heirs or successors, in consequence of the next extinction which shall take place of any peerage of that part of the United Kingdom called Ireland: that all questions touching the election of members to sit on the part of Ireland in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom shall be heard and decided in the same manner as questions touching such elections in Great Britain now are or at any time hereafter shall by law be heard and decided; subject nevertheless to such particular regulations, in respect of Ireland, as from local circumstances the parliament of the said United Kingdom may from time to time deem expedient: that the qualifications, in respect of property, of the members elected on the part of Ireland to sit in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, shall be respectively the same as are now provided by law in the cases of elections for counties and cities and boroughs respectively, in that part of Great Britain called England, unless any other provision shall hereafter be made in that respect by act of parliament of the United Kingdom: that when his majesty, his heirs or successors, shall declare his, her, or their pleasure for holding the first or any subsequent parliament of the United Kingdom, a proclamation shall issue, under the great seal of the United Kingdom, to cause the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, who are to serve in the parliament thereof on the part of Ireland, to be returned in such manner as by any act of this present session of the parliament of Ireland shall be provided; and that the Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons, of Great Britain, shall, together with the Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons, so returned as aforesaid on the part of Ireland, constitute the two Houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom: that if his majesty, on or before the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and one, on which day the Union is to take place, shall declare, under the great seal of Great Britain, that it is expedient that the Lords and Commons of the present parliament of Great Britain should be the members of the respective houses of the first parliament of the United Kingdom on the part of Great Britain, then the said Lords and Commons of the present parliament of Great Britain shall accordingly be the members of the respective houses of the first parliament of the United Kingdom on the part of Great Britain, and they, toge

5. That, for the same purpose, it would be

fit to propose, as the fifth article of Union, that the churches of that part of Great Britain called England, and of Ireland, shall be "united into one church, and that when his majesty shall summon a convocation, the archbishops, bishops, and clergy of the several provinces in Ireland, shall be respectively summoned to and sit in the convocation of the United Church, in the like manner, and subject to the same regulations as to election and qualification, as are at present by law established with respect to the like orders of the Church of England; and that the doctrine worship, discipline, and government, of the said United Church, shall be preserved as now by law established for the Church of England, saving to the Church of Ireland all the rights, privileges, and jurisdictions, now thereunto belonging; and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government, of the Church of Scotland, shall likewise be preserved as now by law, and by the act of Union, established for the Church of Scotland; and that the continuance and preservation for ever of the said United Church, as the established Church of that part of the said United Kingdom called England and Ireland, shall be deemed and taken to be an essential and fundamental article and condition of the Union.

6. That, for the same purpose, it would be fit to propose, as the sixth article of Union, that his majesty's subjects of Great Britain and Ireland shall, from and after the 1st day of January 1801, be entitled to the same privileges, and be on the same footing as to encouragements and bounties on the like articles, being the growth, produce, or manufacture, of either kingdom respectively, and generally in respect of trade and navigation in all ports and places in the United Kingdom and its dependencies: and that in all treaties made by his majesty, his heirs and successors, with any foreign power, his majesty's subjects of Ireland shall have the same privileges, and be on the same footing, as his majesty's subjects of Great Britain: that, from the 1st day of January 1801, all prohibitions and bounties on the export of articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture, of either country to the other, shall cease and determine, and that the said articles shall thenceforth be exported from one country to the other without duty or bounty on such export; that all articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture, of either kingdom (not hereinafter enumerated as subject to specific duties) shall from henceforth be imported into each country from the other free from duty, other than such countervailing duty as shall be annexed to the several articles contained in the Schedule No. 1; and that the articles hereinafter enumerated, shall be subject, for the period of twenty years from the Union, on importation into each country from the other, to the duties specified in the schedule No. 2 annexed to this article; viz.-apparel, wrought brass,

cabinet ware, coaches and other carriages, wrought copper, cottons, glass, haberdashery, hats, tin plates, wrought iron, and hardware, gold and silver lace; gold and silver thread, bullion for lace, pearl and spangles, millinery, stained paper, pottery, sadlery, silk manufac ture, stockings. And that the woollen inanofactures shall pay, on importation into each country, the duties now payable on importation into Ireland; salt and hops, on importation into Ireland, duties not exceeding those which are now paid in Ireland; and coals, on importation, to be subject to burthens not exceeding those to which they are now subject: that callicoes and muslins be subject and liable to the duties now payable on the same until the 5th day of January, 1808, and from and after the said day, the said duties shall be annually reduced in such proportions, and at such periods, as shall hereafter be enacted, so as that the said duties shall stand at ten per cent from and after the 5th day of January, 1816, until the 5th day of January which shall be in the year 1821; and that cotton yarn and cotton twist shall also be subject and liable to the duties now payable upon the same until the 5th day of January, 1808, and from and after the said day, the said duties shall be annually reduced at such times, and in such proportions, as shall be hereafter enacted, so as that all duties shall cease on the said articles from and after the 5th day of January, 1816: that any articles of the growth, produce, or manufacture of either country, which are, or may be, subject to internal duty or to duty on the materials of which they are composed, may be made subject, on their importation into each country respectively from the other, to such countervailing duty as shall appear to be just and reasonable in respect to such internal duty or duties on the materials; and that for the said purposes, the articles specified in the said Schedule No. 1 should, upon importation into Ireland, be subject to the duty which shall be set forth therein, liable to be taken off, diminished, or increased, in the manner herein specified; and that upon the like export of the like articles from each country to the other respectively, a drawback shall be given equal in amount to the countervailing duty payable on the articles hereinbefore specified, on the import into the same country with the other; and that, in like manner, in future it shall be competent to the united parliament to impose any new or additional countervailing duties, or to take off or diminish such existing countervailing duties as may appear on like principles to be just and reasonable, in respect of any future or additional internal duty on any article of the growth, produce, or manufacture of either country, or of any new or additional duty on any materials of which such article may be composed, or of any abatement of the same; and that when any such new or additional countervailing duty shall be so imposed on the import of any article into either coun

try from the other, a drawback equal in amount to such countervailing duty shall be given in like manner on the export of every such article respectively from the same country: That all articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of either kingdom, when exported through the other, shall in all cases be exported subject to the same charges as if they had been exported directly from the country of which they were the growth, produce, or manufacture: That all duty charged on the import of foreign or colonial goods into either country, shall, on their export to the other, be either drawn back, or the amount, if any be retained, shall be placed to the credit of the country to which they shall be so exported, so long as the general expenses of the empire shall be defrayed by proportional contributions; provided nothing herein shall extend to take away any duty, bounty, or prohibition, which exists with respect to corn, meal, malt, flour, and biscuit; but that the same may be regulated, varied, or repealed, from time to time, as the united parliament shall deem expedient.

Schedule, No. 1.—Of the articles to be charged with countervailing duties upon importation from Great Britain into Ireland, according to the sixth article of Union.

Articles to be charged with a countervailing duty in Ireland;-beer, glass, leather, stained paper, paper, silk, spirits, refined sugar, sweets, tobacco.

Schedule, No. 2.-Of the articles charged with the duties specified upon importation into Great Britain and Ireland respectively, according to the sixth article of Union.

Apparel, wrought brass, cabinet ware, coaches and other carriages, wrought copper, cottons, except callicoes and muslins, glass, haberdashery, hats, tin plates, wrought iron, and hardware, gold and silver lace; gold and silver thread, bullion for lace, pearl and spangles, millinery, stained paper, pottery, sadlery, and other manufactured leather, silk manufacture, stockings.-Ten per cent on the true value.

7. That, for the same purpose, it would be fit to propose, as the seventh article of Union, that the charge arising from the payment of the interest, and the sinking fund for the reduction of the principal, of the debt incurred in either kingdom before the Union, shall continue to be separately defrayed by Great Britain and Ireland respectively: That, for the space of twenty years after the Union shall take place, the contribution of Great Britain and Ireland respectively towards the expenditure of the United Kingdom, in each year, shall be defrayed in the proportion of fifteen parts for Great Britain, and two parts for Ireland: That at the expiration of the said twenty years, the future expenditure of the United Kingdom (other than the interest and charges of the debt to which either country [VOL. XXXV.]

shall be separately liable) shall be defrayed in such proportion as the united parliament shall deem just and reasonable, upon a comparison of the real value of the exports and imports of the respective countries, upon an average of the three years next preceding the period of revision; or on a comparison of the value of the quantities of the following articles consumed within the respective countries. on a similar average; viz. beer, spirits, sugar, wine tea, tobacco, and malt: oraccording to the aggregate proportion resulting from both these considerations combined: or on a comparison of the amount of Income in each country, es timated from the produce, for the same period of a general tax, (if such shall have been imposed) on the same descriptions of income in both countries; and that the parliament of the United Kingdom shall afterwards proceed in like manner to revise and fix the said proportions according to the same rules, or any of them, at periods not more distant than twenty years nor less than seven years from each other, unless previous to any such period the united parliament shall have declared, as penses of the empire shall be defrayed indishereinafter provided, that the general excriminately by equal taxes imposed on the like articles in both countries: That, for the defraying the said expenses according to the rules above laid down, the revenues of Ireland shall hereafter constitute a consolidated fund upon which, charges equal to the interest of her debt and sinking fund shall in the first instance be charged, and the remainder shall be applied towards defraying the proportion of the general expense of the United Kingdom to which Ireland may be liable in each year: that the proportion of contribution to which Great Britain and Ireland will by these articles be liable shall be raised by such taxes in each kingdom respectively as the parliament of the United Kingdom shall from time to time deem fit; provided always, that in regulating the taxes in each country, by which their respective proportions shall be levied, no article in Ireland shall be liable to be taxed to any amount exceeding that which will be thereafter payable in England on the like article: That if, at the end of any year any surplus shall accrue from the revenues of Ireland after defraying the interest, sinking fund, and proportional contribution, and separate charges to which the said country is liable, either taxes shall be taken off to the amount of such surplus, or the surplus shall be applied by the united parliament to local purposes in Ireland, or to make good any deficiency which may arise in her revenues in time of peace, or be invested by the commissioners of the national debt of Ireland in the funds, to accumulate for the benefit of Ireland at compound interest, in case of her contribution in time of war, provided the surplus so to accumulate shall at no future period be suffered to exceed the sum of five millions: that all monies hereafter to be raised by loan in peace or war, [D]

Great Britain, proposing that great measure and the earnest and solemn recommendation of your majesty.

Deeply impressed with the necessity of rendering the connexion of Great Britain and this kingdom indissoluble, and truly sensible of the repeated efforts which have been made by foreign and domestic enemies to shake that connexion, and to effect their entire sepation, we fully approve and cordially embrace the principle of incorporating Great Britain and Ireland into one kingdom, under your majesty's auspicious government, by a complete and entire union of their legisla

tures.

We do consider the resolutions of the two Houses of the British Parliament, as wisely calculated to form the basis of such a settlement: we have adopted them as our guide in the measures we have pursued, and we now feel it our duty to lay before your majesty the resolutions to which we have agreed, which resolutions we humbly submit to your majesty may form the articles of union be

tween Great Britain and Ireland, and which, if they shall be approved by the two Houses, of the Parliament of Great Britain, we are ready to confirm and ratify, in order that the same may be established for ever by the mutual consent of both parliaments.

We doubt not that your majesty, and your parliament of Great Britain, will consider these resolutions as the most unequivocal testimony of our zealous loyalty to your majesty's sacred person, family, and government, and as an unalterable pledge of our a tachment to the British empire: we offer them in the full conviction, that by incorporating the legislatures, and by consolidating the resources of the two kingdoms, we shall increase the power and stability of that empire and that, by uniting ourselves with your majesty's subjects of Great Britain under one parliament, and under one government, we shall most effectually provide for the improvement of our commerce, the security of our religion. and the preservation of our liberties.

JOHN GAYER, D. Cler. Parl.
G. F. HILL, Cler. Dom. Com.

Debate in the Commons on the King's Message respecting a Union with Ireland.] April 21. On the order of the day being read, for the House to resolve itself into a committee of the whole House, to take into consideration his majesty's Message of the 2nd instant, communicating to this House the Resolutions of the Lords and Commons of Ireland, respecting a union between the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, with their Address to his majesty thereupon,

Mr. Jones said:- Sir; in objecting to your leaving the chair, I intend not the

As far as the

slightest disrespect to his majesty's ministers; butnever having concurred in any one with Ireland, I conceive myself perfectly vote of the House concerning the union justified by that circumstance in opposing your leaving the chair. limited means and capacity I possess will allow, and inasmuch as I consider a measure which in its operation goes to annihilate the parliament and representation of Ireland, and to eradicate and tear up root and branch the British constitution, I feel myself bound to give it every opposition in my power. After the firm, determined, and manly manner in which Ireland has revolted at the projected slavery held out by the present measure, I should have thought it consistent with the prudence, discretion, and moderation of his majesty's ministers to have abandoned it till a season when the feelings of the people of Ireland were less inimical to it. But I am sorry to observe, they are resolved to effect their purpose. To attain which, they first apply to the virtues of the people of Ireland, recommending the measure as one calculated to insure the prosperity of their country. Their virtues determined them to reject propositions so adverse to their liberties. I fear that a different mode has since been

adopted; that an appeal has been made to their vices; that corruption has been resorted to. And no means have been left untried by ministers to accomplish their object. Their motto has been "Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo."

They have stirred up Acheron, in order to attain the apparent sanction to their Before the House favourite measure. adopts a measure like the present, it will be right to consider for what reason Ireland is to be thus disfranchised. Is it because she has fought and bled by the side of England? Is it because, by her own exertions, she has been able to quell a most unprecedented and dangerous rebellion? Is it for this she is to be made the least in the scale of nations? I conceive that the question to Ireland is, whether it shall have a parliament and a national representation, or no? And to England whether it shall have a constitution or no? Perhaps such may not be the immediate effect of the measure with respect to England: but I am persuaded the alteration that will be produced in the constitution of this country, by the introduction of 100 members into its representation,