WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 878: NATURALIZATION ACT, ETC.
By Edward Farr
Open in WeRead

Explore more books like this:

History - BritishHistory - Modern (1750+)History - RoyaltyHistory - Warfare

About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

NATURALIZATION ACT, ETC.

During this session the law of naturalization was extended in Canada. By the act, 179 no person could be summoned to the legislative council, or elect, or be elected, to the legislative assembly of these provinces, unless he was either a natural born subject of Great Britain, or a subject become so by the conquest and cession of the Canadas, or had been naturalized by an act of the British parliament. A bill was now passed giving to a naturalizing act of the Canadian legislature the same effect as to one of the legislature in England; providing, however, that such act should be null and void, unless ratified by his majesty within two years after being presented to him for that purpose. The only other measure regarding our relations with foreign states, besides these already noticed, which occupied the attention of parliament, was the expiry of the Alien Act. This session it died a natural death; and a milder set of regulations, conferring no power of sending aliens out of the country, were adopted in its stead. In relinquishing that power, Mr. Peel said that he had the gratifying consciousness that in no instance had it been abused. The only case in which it had been used was one which had not the slightest shade of a political aspect attached to it. It was that of a person who had menaced a foreign ambassador, and who, it was believed, would have carried his threats into execution had he not been brought before the privy-council and dealt with according to that act.