Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 41.djvu/216

 Mansfield's conduct on the Wilkes case (, Parl. Debates, i. 134–5, 138), and was appointed chief-justice in eyre of his majesty's forests south of the Trent on the 19th of the same month, and admitted to the privy council on 22 March following. In the debate on the petition against Colonel Luttrell's return for Middlesex in May 1769, Norton supported Dowdeswell's motion declaring Luttrell duly elected, and made a fierce onslaught on George Grenville (Grenville Papers, vol. iii. p. cxxviii;, Parl. Debates, i. 431–3). On 22 Jan. 1770 Norton, whose nomination was proposed by North, and seconded by Rigby, was elected speaker of the House of Commons in the place of Sir John Cust [q. v.] by a majority of 116 votes over the whig candidate, Thomas Townsend the younger (Journals of the House of Commons, xxxii. 613). On 16 Feb. following Norton had a violent altercation with Sir William Meredith. Norton's words were ordered to be taken down by the clerk, but the motion that they were ‘disorderly, importing an improper reflection on a member of this house, and dangerous to the freedom of debate in this house,’ was negatived after a long and exciting discussion (, Parl. Debates, i. 458–68). As speaker he signed the warrant committing Brass Crosby [q. v.] to the Tower on 25 March 1771 (, State Trials, xix. 1138). During the debate in committee on the Royal Marriage Bill, Norton contended that the penalty of a præmunire should be defined, a course which gave considerable offence to the court (Parl. Hist. xvii. 422–3, xxi. 260). On 11 Feb. 1774 he called the attention of the house to a letter written by John Horne (afterwards Horne-Tooke) in that day's ‘Public Advertiser,’ accusing him of gross partiality in his conduct as speaker, whereupon it was unanimously resolved that the letter was ‘a false, malicious, and scandalous libel, highly reflecting on the character of the speaker of this house, to the dishonour of this house, and in violation of the privileges thereof’ (ib. xvii. 1006–16, et seq.) At the opening of the new parliament on 29 Nov. 1774 Norton was unanimously re-elected speaker (ib. xviii. 31). While presenting the bill for the better support of the king's household (7 May 1777), Norton boldly declared that the commons ‘have not only granted to your majesty a large present supply, but also a very great additional revenue—great beyond example, great beyond your majesty's highest expence’ (ib. xix. 213). This speech, which was ordered to be printed, created a great sensation. The court highly disapproved of it, and Norton was accused of having used the word ‘wants’ instead of ‘expence.’ Rigby denounced it with great acrimony, but upon Fox's motion a resolution was carried without a division that the speaker had expressed ‘with just and proper energy the zeal of this house for the support of the honour and dignity of the crown in circumstances of great public charge’ (ib. pp. 224, 227–34). On 14 May the court of common council voted the freedom of the city to Norton ‘for having declared in manly terms the real state of the Nation to his Majesty on the Throne.’ No entry of his admission appears in the chamberlain's books, but it is recorded that he declined to accept the gold box, which had also been voted to him (London's Roll of Fame, 1884, p. 60). During the debate on Burke's Establishment Bill (13 March 1780) Norton was called upon by Fox to give his opinion on the competency of the house to inquire into and control the civil list expenditure. Norton in reply declared that ‘parliament had an inherent right vested in it of controlling and regulating every branch of the public expenditure, the civil list as well as the rest,’ but that with regard to the civil list ‘the necessity for retrenchment ought to be fully, clearly, and satisfactorily shown before parliament shall interfere,’ adding that when ‘the necessity was clearly made out it was not only the right but the duty of parliament to interpose, and no less the duty and interest of the crown to acquiesce.’ He assured Burke that he would give him every assistance in his power to carry the bill, and not only acknowledged that his office of chief justice in eyre was a sinecure, but that it ‘was much in his opinion too profitable for the duties annexed to it,’ and that the powers vested in the chief justice ‘were such as ought not to be executed.’ He concluded this remarkable speech with a violent attack upon Lord North for thinking of appointing Wedderburn to the chief justiceship of the common pleas, a post which Norton himself was anxious to obtain (''Parl. Hist''. xxi. 258–269, 270–3). On 20 March, however, Norton apologised to the house for having ‘very imprudently gone into matters totally foreign to the subject under consideration’ (ib. pp. 296–8). On 6 April he spoke in favour of Dunning's celebrated motion with respect to the influence of the crown (ib. pp. 355–9), and in May he denounced the bill for appointing commissioners to examine the public accounts as a mere job for creating new placemen at the nomination of a minister (ib. pp. 561–3). The king having determined that Norton should not be re-elected speaker, the ministers availed themselves of Norton's bad