Lauderdale, Crawford, and
Sir Robert Murray, among others, were incapacitated: but the king, who
disapproved of this injustice, refused his assent.[*]
An act was passed against all persons who should move the king for
restoring the children of those who were attainted by parliament; an
unheard-of restraint on applications for grace and mercy. No penalty
was affixed; but the act was but the more violent and tyrannical on
that account. The court lawyers had established it as a maxim, that the
assigning of a punishment was a limitation of the crown; whereas a
law forbidding any thing, though without a penalty, made the offenders
criminal. And in that case, they determined that the punishment
was arbitrary; only that it could not extend to life. Middleton, as
commissioner, passed this act; though he had no instructions for that
purpose.
An act of indemnity passed; but at the same time it was voted, that all
those who had offended during the late disorders, should be subjected
to fines; and a committee of parliament was appointed for imposing them.
These proceeded without any regard to some equitable rules which the
king had prescribed to them.[*] The most obnoxious compounded secretly.
* Burnet, p.
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