e crown, charged with the administration of justice,
which faults were calculated to bring the administration of justice
into disrepute. 7. Nor, in the seventh place, did the assembly impair
the functions of justice, or intend or tend to do so. Even my
prosecutors do not allege that judicial tribunals are infallible. It
would be too absurd to make such an allegation in plain words. It is
admitted on all hands that judges have sometimes given wrong
directions, that juries have given wrong verdicts, that courts of
justice have wrongfully appreciated the whole matter for trial. When
millions of the Queen's subjects think that such wrong has been done,
is it sedition for them to say so peaceably and publicly? On the
contrary, the constitutional way for good citizens to act in striving
to keep the administration of justice pure and above suspicion of
unfairness, is by such open and peaceable protests. Thus, and thus
only, may the functions of justice be saved from being impaired. In
this case wrong had been done. Five men had been tried together upon
the same evidence, and convicted together upon that evidence, and
while one of the five was acknowledged by the crown to be innocent,
and the whole conviction was thus acknowledged to be wrong and
invalid, three of the five men were hanged upon that conviction. My
friend, Mr. Sullivan, in his eloquent and unanswerable speech of
yesterday, has so clearly demonstrated the facts of that unhappy and
disgraceful affair of Manchester, that I shall merely say of it that
I adopt every word he spoke upon the subject for mine, and to justify
the sentiment and purpose with which I engaged in the procession of
the 8th December. I say the persons responsible for that transanction
are fairly liable to the charge of acting so as to bring the
administration of justice into contempt, unless, gentlemen, you hold
those persons to be infallible and hold that thay can do no wrong.
But, gentlemen, the constitution does not say that the servants of
the crown can do no wrong. According to the constitution the
sovereign can do no wrong, but her servants may. In this case they
have done wrong. And, gentlemen, you cannot right that wrong, nor
save the administration of justice from the disreputation into which
such proceedings are calculated to bring it, by giving a verdict to
put my comrades and myself