The Present State of the British Interest in India: With a Plan for Establishing a Regular System of Government in That CountryAnonymous
History
The Present State of the British Interest in India: With a Plan for Establishing a Regular System of Government in That Country
Anonymous
Bengal (India) -- Politics and government; Great Britain -- Colonies -- India -- Administration; India -- Politics and government -- 1765-1947
Few of these prescriptions have at all attracted notice; the proposal
for protecting the liberty of the subject from the despotism of
government, by the institution of native juries, was indeed extremely
well calculated to please British speculation; and therefore, like the
device of hanging the bell about the cat’s neck, it was highly applauded
by those who never adverted to the difference betwixt Britain and
Bengal, in point of general constitution of government and disposition
of the natives. But, for practice, it must appear a mere chimera to such
as consider, on the one hand, that men, who are slaves to their
government and its officers in every other capacity, cannot possibly be
free in that of jurymen; and that juries, if they are not free and
impartial, avail nothing: and, on the other hand, that if the natives
should be actually endowed with the real cap of liberty in the jury
room, there is danger, nay, there is a certainty, that they would make
bold to wear it elsewhere; and then, adieu to the English dominion in
Bengal. In few words, the power of the English government, and the
freedom of native juries, are two things that cannot possibly exist
together in Bengal; the life of the one must unavoidably cause the death
of the other: and, however harsh this doctrine may sound in a freeborn
English ear, the force and truth of it will immediately strike the
politician.
Equally unavailing is that proposal for securing the liberty and
property of the subject, from the oppression and extortion of
government, by granting to the native a perpetual property in land;
without providing him the smallest security for the free possession of
its produce; which, so long as government stands on its present footing,
is liable to be wrested from him so soon as acquired.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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