Note 224 — Chapter XI

Mr. Grenville cited from Blackstone’s Commentaries B. C. the passage enumerating the nine cases of disqualification (of which cases expulsion was not one), and ending—“but subject to the standing restrictions and disqualifications, every subject is eligible of common right.” In the editions, subsequent to Wilkes’s case, the sentence goes on, “though there are instances where persons, in particular circumstances, have forfeited that common right and been declared ineligible for that Parliament by a vote of the House of Commons, or for ever by an Act of the Legislature.” (Commons’ Journal, 17th Feb. 1769.)—This difference in the two editions, led to the favourite toast at political meetings of “The first edition of Doctor Blackstone’s Commentaries.” Mr. Grenville’s speech is given by Cavendish, vol. i., where, however, it is not so severe or powerful as the accounts of it in Walpole and Junius (Letter xviii.) would lead one to expect.—E.