The
Peers have a valuable interest in the conservation of their own lawful
privileges. But this interest is not confined to the Lords. The Commons
ought to partake in the advantage of the judicial rights and privileges
of that high court. Courts are made for the suitors, and not the suitors
for the court. The conservation of all other parts of the law, the whole
indeed of the rights and liberties of the subject, ultimately depends
upon the preservation of the Law of Parliament in its original force and
authority.
Your Committee had reason to entertain apprehensions that certain
proceedings in this trial may possibly limit and weaken the means of
carrying on any future impeachment of the Commons. As your Committee
felt these apprehensions strongly, they thought it their duty to begin
with humbly submitting facts and observations on the proceedings
concerning evidence to the consideration of this House, before they
proceed to state the other matters which come within the scope of the
directions which they have received.
To enable your Committee the better to execute the task imposed upon
them in carrying on the impeachment of this House, and to find some
principle on which they were to order and regulate their conduct
therein, they found it necessary to look attentively to the jurisdiction
of the court in which they were to act for this House, and into its laws
and rules of proceeding, as well as into the rights and powers of the
House of Commons in their impeachments.
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