liament. Their proceedings were, in that bill, directed
to be of such a nature as easily to subject them to the strictest
revision of both, in case of any malversation.

In the year 1780, an act of Parliament again made provision for the
government of those territories for another four years, without any sort
of reference to prerogative; nor was the least objection taken at the
second, more than at the first of those periods, as if an infringement
had been made upon the rights of the crown: yet his Majesty's ministers
have thought fit to represent the late commission as an entire
innovation on the Constitution, and the setting up a new order and
estate in the nation, tending to the subversion of the monarchy itself.

If the government of the East Indies, other than by his Majesty's
prerogative, be in effect a fourth order in the commonwealth, this order
has long existed; because the East India Company has for many years
enjoyed it in the fullest extent, and does at this day enjoy the whole
administration of those provinces, and the patronage to offices
throughout that great empire, except as it is controlled by act of
Parliament.

It was the ill condition and ill administration of the Company's affairs
which induced this House (merely as a temporary establishment) to vest
the same powers which the Company did before possess, (and no other,)
for a limited time, and under very strict directions, in proper hands,
until they could be restored, or farther provision made concerning them.
It was therefore no creation whatever of a new power, but the removal of
an old power, long since created, and then existing, from the management
of those persons who had manifestly and dangerously abused their trust.
This House, which well knows the Parliamentary origin of all the
Company's powers and privileges, and is not ignorant or negligent of the
authority which may vest those powers and privileges in others, if
justice and the public safety so require, is conscious to itself that it
no more creates a new order in the state, by making occasional trustees
for the direction of the Company, than it originally did in giving a
much more permanent trust to the Directors or to the General Court of
that body. The monopoly of the East India Company was a derogation from
the general freedom of trade belonging to his Majesty's people. The
powers of government, and of peace and war, are parts of prerogative of
the highest order. Of our competenc