Representative British Orations Volume 4 (of 4): With Introductions and Explanatory Notes — John Shaqi
Representative British Orations Volume 4 (of 4): With Introductions and Explanatory Notes
History
Representative British Orations Volume 4 (of 4): With Introductions and Explanatory Notes
Speeches, addresses, etc., English
I will take a transaction that occurred not long ago, as an instance
of a case in which, I say, the people of England would not permit a
British subject to be simply amenable to the tribunals of the foreign
country in which he happened to be. I am not going to talk of the
power of sending a man arbitrarily to Siberia; nor of a country
the constitution of which vests despotic power in the hands of the
sovereign. I will take a case which happened in Sicily, where, not long
ago, a decree was passed that any man who was found with concealed
arms in his possession should be brought before a court-martial, and,
if found guilty, should be shot. Now, this happened. An innkeeper of
Catania was brought before a court-martial, and accused under this
law by some police officers, who stated that they had discovered in
an open bin, in an open stable in his inn-yard, a knife which they
denounced as a concealed weapon. Witnesses having been examined, the
counsel for the prosecution stated that he gave up the case, as it
was evident there was no proof that the knife belonged to the man, or
that he was aware it was in the place where it was found. The counsel
for the defendant said that such being the opinion of the counsel for
the prosecution, it was unnecessary for him to go into the defence,
and he left his client in the hands of the court. The court, however,
nevertheless pronounced the man guilty of the charge brought against
him, and the next morning the man was shot.
Now what would the English people have said if this had been done to a
British subject? And yet everything done was the result of a law, and
the man was found guilty of an offence by a tribunal of the country.
I say, then, that our doctrine is that, in the first instance, redress
should be sought from the law courts of the country; but that in cases
where redress cannot be so had--and those cases are many--to confine a
British subject to that remedy only, would be to deprive him of the
protection which he is entitled to receive.
Then the question arises, how does this rule apply to the demands we
have made upon Greece? And here I must shortly remind the House of the
origin of our relations with Greece, and of the condition of Greece;
because those circumstances are elements that must enter into the
consideration of the course we have pursued.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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