Page:Letters of Junius, volume 2 (Woodfall, 1772).djvu/172

162 or the ambition of a Princess.—The truth is, Sir, that the greatest and most exceptionable part of the privileges now contended for, were introduced and asserted by a house of commons, which abolished both monarchy and peerage, and whose proceedings, although they ended in one glorious act of substantial justice, could no way be reconciled to the forms of the constitution. Their successors profited by their example, and confirmed their power by a moderate or popular use of it. Thus it grew, by degrees, from a notorious innovation at one period, to be tacitly admitted as the privilege of parliament at another.

, however, it could be proved, from considerations of necessity or convenience, that an unlimited power of commitment ought to be entrusted to the house of commons, and that, in fact, they have exercised it without opposition, still, in contemplation of law, the presumption is strongly against them. It is a leading maxim of the laws of England (and without it all laws are nugatory) that there is no right without a remedy, nor any legal power without a legal course to carry it into