The Eighth Commandment does not apply to Crown property. The
House of Commons, on Friday week, passed by resolution that noteworthy amendment on the Decalogue. The Crown owns such portion of the foreshore as has been included in the Thames Embankment. The title is absolute, just as good as that of Lord Derby to the Mersey foreshore, for which the Corporation of Liverpool gave him £60,090. The Government, however, aware as trustees for the Crown of this title, instead of giving it to London, at whose expense the land had been reclaimed, or selling it for a moderate price, proposed, or were believed to be about to propose, to build on it. Mr. A. W. Smith, therefore, on Friday week moved an address condemning that proposal, and, in fact, confiscating the property, which Parlia- ment has a clear right to do by Act—the Crown then assenting— but has no right to do by a mere resolution. Mr. Gladstone, who never can bear to see the Treasury plundered, was very angry, and said some imprudent things about the " mischievous policy " of making grants to London—treated London, in fact, as if it were a mere city, instead of the bonded warehouse for all other cities—and was in consequence beaten by 156 to 106. The House, in truth, decided that if John reclaims a foreshore belonging to Tom, Tom loses his freehold in John's favour. A more extraordinary invasion of the rights of property was never sanctioned, and the matter is not in the least mended by showing that the Crown intended to use its property injudiciously. It was quite open to Mr. Smith to move an address praying for a gift of the land to London ; but the vote of the House was not a request for a benefaction, but an order to give up property without compensation.
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