when he
harangues more credulous assemblies on the subject, he carefully avoids
precise explanations; and the hints which sometimes escape him are
not easily to be reconciled with each other. On one occasion, if
the newspapers are to be trusted, he declared that his object was to
establish a federal union between Great Britain and Ireland. A local
parliament, it seems, is to sit at Dublin, and to send deputies to an
imperial parliament which is to sit at Westminster. The honourable and
learned gentleman thinks, I suppose, that in this way he evades the
difficulties which I have pointed out. But he deceives himself.
If, indeed, his local legislature is to be subject to his imperial
legislature, if his local legislature is to be merely what the Assembly
of Antigua or Barbadoes is, or what the Irish Parliament was before
1782, the danger of collision is no doubt removed: but what, on the
honourable and learned gentleman's own principles, would Ireland gain by
such an arrangement? If, on the other hand, his local legislature is
to be for certain purposes independent, you have again the risk of
collision. Suppose that a difference of opinion should arise between the
Imperial Parliament and the Irish Parliament as to the limits of their
powers, who is to decide between them? A dispute between the House of
Commons and the House of Lords is bad enough. Yet in that case, the
Sovereign can, by a high exercise of his prerogative, produce harmony.
He can send us back to our constituents; and, if that expedient fails,
he can create more lords. When, in 1705, the dispute between the
Houses about the Aylesbury men ran high, Queen Anne restored concord by
dismissing the Parliament. Seven years later she put an end to another
conflict between the Houses by making twelve peers in one day. But who
is to arbitrate between two representative bodies chosen by different
constituent bodies? Look at what is now passing in America. Of all
federal constitutions that of the United States is the best. It was
framed by a convention which contained many wise and experienced men,
and over which Washington presided. Yet there is a debateable ground on
the frontier which separates the functions of Congress from those of
the state legislatures. A dispute as to the exact boundary has lately
arisen. Neither party seems disposed to yield: and, if both persist,
there can be no umpire but the sword.

For my part, Sir, I have no hesitation in saying that I sho