Page:A Declaration of the People's Natural Right to a Share in the Legislature (1775) (IA declarationofpeo00shar).djvu/142

to the general Liberties of Ireland, have followed the directions of some mere English Acts of Parliament, as esteeming them wholesome regulations of Justice, proper to be adopted for the determination of the Cases before them, yet the Confirmation of such Acts afterwards, at different periods, clearly proves the irregularity of such premature proceedings in the Courts, and that the highest Court of that Kingdom, the Court of Parliament, did not esteem the English Acts of sufficient legal Authority till confirmed by themselves; for, otherwise, the Confirmation would have been unnecessary, since the Acts (if Serjeant Mayart's examples are admitted) were already received into use; and, therefore, all such Court-Precedents, as are cited by the learned Serjeant, are clearly Precedents of Irregularities and not of Law; so that they are not intitled to any consideration at all; especially as the Irish Legislature itself (