The New Hampshire Gazette

Westminster Petition.

At a Meeting of the Inhabitants, Householders of the City and Liberty of Westminster, held in Palace-yard, on Monday the third of April instant, it was resolved unanimously, That an humble Address and petition be presented to his Majesty upon the present alarming state of public Affairs, and praying him to dismiss his present Ministers from his Councils for ever, as the first step towards a speedy, honorable, and permanent peace.

An Address and petition being read was unanimously approved of, and it was resolved, that it be presented to his Majesty by PETER Moore, Esquire, the Chairman, accompanied by a Committee of Noblemen and Gentlemen.

It was also resolved unanimously, that the thanks of the Meeting be given to the Right Honorable CHARLES JAMES FOX, One of the Representatives of this City in Parliament, for the firm and faithful discharge of his public duty, in the most trying times, and for his opposition to that calamitous system, of which he with prophetic sagacity foresaw, and foretold the ruinous consequences.

In consequence of the above Resolutions, Mr. Moore, accompanied by his Grace the Duke of Bedford, the Right Hon. the Earl Thanet, the Right Hon. Charles James Fox, &c. &c. attended at the King's Levee on Wednesday last, the 12th instant. and presented the Address and petition to his Majesty, of which the following is a copy.

To the King's Most Excellent Majesty.

We your Majesty's most dutiful subjects, the Inhabitants, Householders of the City and Liberty of Westminster, humbly beg leave to approach your Majesty in a crisis of the greatest danger to our country, that it has experienced since the Revolution.

Your Majesty's Ministers have involved us in a War, in the prosecution of which they have already squandered upwards of One Hundred and Thirty Millions of Money. They have already laid Taxes upon the People to the amount of Six Millions and a Half annually; and the Lives which they have sacrificed, and the Sum which they have added to human misery, exceeds all calculation or belief.

We humbly present to your Majesty, that in the hands of those Ministers, nothing has succeeded. Instead of restoring Monarchy in France, they have been compelled to recognise the Republic there established, and to offer proposals of peace to it. Instead of dismembering the territories of that Republic, they have suffered it to add to them the Netherlands, Holland, and a great part of Italy and Germany; and even a part of these Kingdoms, which the fleets of that Republic have insulted, have only been preserved from the calamities of an invasion, by the accidents of the seasons.

In their negociations for peace, they have been equally unsuccessful. It was to be expected. When they asked peace they were abject, but not sincere; they acknowledged their impotence, but not their errors: They discovered their most hostile dispositions towards France, at the very time they proved their utter inability to contend with her.

When they wanted to obtain consent to the war, they assured us that it was necessary for the safety of our commerce.--At this moment most of the ports of Europe are shut against us; goods to an immense amount are lying upon the hands of our Merchants; and the manufacturing poor are starving by thousands.

They assured us the war was necessary, for the preservation of Property and Public Credit. They have rendered every man's property subject to an order of the Privy Council, and the Bank of England has stopped payment.
They assured us, that the war was necessary for the preservation of the Constitution.--They have destroyed its best part, which is its liberty, by oppressive restrictions upon the right of Petitioning, and upon the Freedom of the Press; by prosecuting innocent men, under false pretences; by sending money to foreign Princes without consent of Parliament; while by erecting Barracks throughout the kingdom, they give us reason to suspect their intention of finally subjecting the people to military despotism.

They assured us that the war was necessary for the preservation of the unity of our Empire.-But they have so conducted, and are still so conducting themselves in Ireland, as to alienate the affections of that brave, loyal, but oppressed, and persecuted nation; and to expose the most flourishing of its Provinces to all the horrors of lawless, military violence.

These are not common errors. They are great crimes :--and of these crimes, before God and our Country, we accuse your Ministers.

Our affections to your Majesty's person, our loyalty to your Government, are unabated: your Majesty's virtues are a pledge for the one; the Constitution, which makes you King, for the other. But duty to our fellow Countrymen, and to our Posterity, which is but another name for that affection and loyalty, impels us to represent to your Majesty, that your Ministers are defrauding us of the benefit of those virtues, by destroying the channels through which they flow. They have tarnished the National Honour and Glory. They have oppressed the Poor with almost intolerable Burthens. They have poisoned the intercourse of Private Life. They have given a fatal blow to Public Credit. They have divided the Empire; and they have subverted the Constitution.

We humbly pray your Majesty, therefore, to dismiss them from your Presence and Councils for ever.