Ireland, acting in their proper and peculiar sphere, and exercising their inherent exclusive right, by raising supplies in the manner they judge best. This great principle of the constitution is so fundamental, and with me so sacred and indispensable, that it outweighs all other considerations."[1]
Shelburne accordingly refused to sign the memorial to North. "Lord Rockingham," he writes to Chatham, "has called here twice, and I have called upon him as often upon this business. I took occasion the last time to tell him, to prevent the possibility of the least disappointment in my conduct, that I should certainly be very much governed by your Lordship's opinion, and whatever my first impressions might have been, should lend a willing mind to your reasoning on the subject, for very obvious reasons. I told him further in general terms, that I had reason to believe your Lordship's opinion to be, that Ireland was the proper place for opposition to the measure, and that here it became a very different question, whether to advise the Crown to reject the desire of the Irish Commons in matter of supplies. I desired it might be in confidence, as I was not accustomed to say more than what regarded myself, except when particularly desired. He expressed great surprise, apprehended that if any measure could produce general union, and draw a person from the country, it must be this, which from daily conversations and accounts, as well as from the nature of it, could not fail to interest and animate the whole kingdom. He concluded by supposing, that either my impetuosity or over-warmth, or some defect in the statement of the question, could alone have given such an inclination to your Lordship's judgment, and that upon a fuller statement and further consideration you might come to adopt a different judgment. I entered as lightly as I could into this part; content to answer my own object, and desirous
- ↑ Chatham to Shelburne, October 24th, 1773. For a different account of the above transaction the reader is referred to Walpole Journals, i. 266. In this account (which Walpole says was conveyed to him by Richmond, who had received it from Rockingham, who had been told it by Burke) the conduct of Shelburne appears in the darkest colours. See too Bentham, x. 103.
