his elder brother, Philip Yorke (1720–1790) [q. v.] While still in his nonage he corresponded on learned topics with William Warburton (afterwards bishop of Gloucester), and somewhat later with Montesquieu, Thomas Birch [q. v.], and Thomas Secker [q. v.], archbishop of Canterbury. In 1745 his ‘Considerations on the Law of Forfeiture for High Treason, occasioned by a Clause in the late Act for making it Treason to correspond with the Pretender's Sons or any of their Agents’ (London, 8vo; 2nd edit. 1746; 4th edit. 1795, 8vo), an ingenious defence of one of his father's least defensible measures, established his reputation as a constitutionalist. In 1747 he was appointed to the sinecure place of joint-clerk of the crown in chancery. In the same year he was returned to parliament (7 Dec.) for Reigate, which constituency he continued to represent until the dissolution of 11 March 1768. In the ensuing parliament he sat for the university of Cambridge.
Yorke made his début in the House of Commons by throwing out (7 May 1748) an ill-considered measure for the relief of protestant purchasers, trustees, &c., of papists' effects. He afterwards spoke with weight and effect in support of the regency bill (16 May 1751), the reform of the marriage law (30 May 1753), and the extension of the Mutiny Act to India (8 Feb. 1754). He also once seconded (November 1748) and once moved (1753) the address. On 3 July 1751 he was made counsel to the East India Company, for which he continued to act for many years (see his opinion printed in the appendix to Lord Clive's ‘Letter to the Proprietors of the East India Stock,’ London, 1764, 8vo). In 1754 he took silk, and was appointed solicitor-general to the Prince of Wales. On the formation of the Duke of Devonshire's administration he was appointed solicitor-general (5 Nov. 1756). In this capacity he distinguished himself as Pratt's coadjutor in the crown cases of Florence Hensey [q. v.] and Laurence Shirley, earl of Ferrers [cf. Pratt, Charles, first Earl Camden]. He retained office throughout Pitt's administration, but on the meeting of parliament which followed Pitt's fall he delivered a powerful defence of his German policy and resigned (14 Dec. 1761). Nevertheless on Pratt's elevation to the bench he accepted from Bute the vacant attorney-generalship (22 Jan. 1762), and in spite of the desertion of Prussia, the ignominious peace of Paris, the proscription of the opposition, and the cider tax, he retained the office. He also kept his place on the reconstruction of the administration which followed Bute's retirement [see Grenville, George, and Russell, John, fourth Duke of Bedford], and was thus called upon to deal officially with the difficult questions of constitutional law raised by the publication of Wilkes's celebrated ‘North Briton’ No. 45 [see Wilkes, John]. The bias of his mind was by no means indulgent towards political pamphleteers. He had already (2 Nov. 1762) censured as libellous a whole series of ‘Monitors’ (Nos. 357–8, 360, 373, 376, 378–80), and their supposed author, John Entick [q. v.], had been arrested, his house searched, and his papers seized, under a warrant issued by the secretaries of state, but without the discovery of evidence to convict him. On his consequent release Entick had brought an action against the secretaries, which had resulted in a special verdict, upon which proceedings were pending in error. Such warrants by secretaries of state were neither an innovation nor the revival of an obsolete practice, but were supported by a long course of precedents since the revolution, and Entick's appears to have been the first case in which their legality was contested. The warrants were issued by the secretaries proprio motu without the fiat of the attorney-general. In the case of ‘North Briton’ No. 45 the warrants were issued in anticipation of Yorke's opinion, and described the libel as not only seditious but treasonable. The opinion (27 April 1763) omitted the latter epithet, and characterised the offence as ‘a misdemeanour of the highest nature.’ The discrepancy, or rather contradiction, shows that the opinion was independent and honest. Yorke was also consulted on the question of privilege, and advised that it did not enter into the case, but that Wilkes might be committed to prison even though he offered bail, and there detained pending inquiry as to its sufficiency.
As at that date the only offences recognised as unprivileged were treason, felony, and breach of the peace, this opinion was undoubtedly of a somewhat speculative character, and Yorke did not venture to commit it to writing. In the proceedings on the habeas corpus the legality of the warrant was unsuccessfully impugned, but the plea of privilege was held good. In the printers' actions Yorke showed no sign of faltering, though the juries proved refractory, and his subsequent resignation (2 Nov.) took the world by surprise. Its professed ground was the proscription of the opposition, but Yorke really yielded to the strong pressure put upon him by Pitt, and took leave of the king in tears. Pitt hoped to enlist his services on
