PRIVATE

Apr. 1807

Scotch Reform

1

Letter V

L d G.s opinion of lawyers

Conclusion

L d G.s not consulting the Att y & Soll r General

Conclusion for Letter V or VI

Lord G.'s opinion of lawyers testified by his not consulting the Att y & the Soll r Gen l about any of his Bills, making sure of their support whether they approved of them or no. Romilly not fit for such a purpose. Grant the man[?] for L d Grenville.

On this occasion, my Lord, it has been among my tasks, and surely not amongst the most pleasant ones, to hold up to view the fraternity of lawyers, as a tribe from whom, taken in the aggregate, no dispositions, but what were hostile to the interest of the community and to the ends of justice, under the sway of motives of the most selfish and sordid kind, could with any colour of reason be expected.

To help prove this proposition, in so far as authority can be necessary or conducive to the proof of it, I have the satisfaction shall I say? or the regret, for there is a mixture of both emotions, to be furnished with a testimony no less respectable than Your Lordship's and that ready delivered, and without the trouble of citation on one part, personal appearance and examination on the other.

Reading the three Bills which have successfully had the honour of being laid on the table by Your Lordship's hands, and seeing in them those features which I have been adventurous enough to hold up to view, seeing at the same time in the public prints - the only sources of information to men of my obscure and humble level: paragraphs stating the consultations and great avisandums held by Your Lordship at different times with this and that and t'other luminaries of the state and of the law, I could not but feel a curiosity to learn if possible, whether the learned and official personages, whom I had been accustomed to read of, under the appellation of the law-officers, meaning the law-officers for Great Britain were or were not of this number?