This spirit animated all ranks and classes ; it was no longer an association confined to one part of the kingdom, composed of ignorant and poor men, without talents or in fluence, and aiming at some local and temporary object. At the head of the Dublin volunteers was the Duke of Leinster ; and, on the 9th of June 1780, with him in the chair, they resolved, "That the king, lords, and commons, of Ireland, only are competent to make laws binding the subjects of this realm ; and that they would not obey or give operation to any laws, save only those enacted by the king, lords, and commons, of Ireland, whose rights and privileges, jointly and separately, they were determined to suppoi t with their lives and fortunes." The House of Commons, which had hitherto gone along with the sense of the nation at large, seems now to have been replaced under ministerial influence, or at least to have been of opinion that the nation were proceeding too rapidly and too far ; for a motion made by Mr. Grattan, that no power on earth, save the king, lords, and commons, of Ireland, had a right to make laws for Ireland, was with drawn ; and the Irish parliament, acting in the spirit which caused this motion to be withdrawn, passed into laws two bills which had been altered by the British cabinet. hence the parliament became very unpopular.
In the year 1781, the force of the volunteers had been augmented to scow men, regularly divided into regi ments, and in high discipline ; and in order to give full ef fect to the object they had in view, the Ulster volunteers resolved to send delegates to Dungannon, to deliberate on the state of public affairs. This measure, however, was by no means approved of by some of the most judicious and sincere friends of the volunteers. The meeting took place, and sonic very strong resolutions were passed, in which most of the grievances under which Ireland had so long laboured, were dwelt upon in a bold and indignant spirit; it was further resolved, " that four delegates should be nominated for each county in Ulster, to act as repre sentatives of the volunteers in that province, and that of these, eleven should form a quorum ; and that this com mittee should appoint nine of their members for a com mittee in Dublin, to communicate with other volunteer as sociations. The parliament, however, were still adverse to the measures which the volunteers had in view, and refused to interfere, in favour either of the commercial or the political amelioration of Ireland. With respect to the Catholics, however, they were more liberal, and scarcely a session passed, in which some of their disabilities were not removed.
The volunteers, having formed committees of corres pondence and a national committee, had thus given to their system a single animating spirit, by which their power was wonderfully increased ; and if the British govern ment still refused to comply with their requests, a crisis must necessarily take place, which would probably cud in warfare. At this period, full of alarm to the best friends
of their country, that administration which had lost Britain her colonies resigned ; and they were succeed ed, n March 1782, by a Whig administration, at the head of which was the Marquis of Rockingham. The Duke of Portland was immediately appointed Lord Lieutenant. Mr. Grattan moved an address to the king, in the ]louse of Commons, which was unanimously carried in both houses, in which it was declared, that " the crown of Ireland was an imperial crown, inseparably annexed to the crown of Great Britain ; but that the kingdom of Ireland was a dis tinct kingdom, with a parliament of her own, the sole le gislature thereof ; that in this right they conceived the very essence of their liberty to exist ; that in behalf of all the people in Ireland, they claimed this as their birth right, and could not relinquish it but with their lives ; that they had a high generation for the British character ; and that their determination was, in sharing the freedom of England, to share also her fate, and to stand or fall with the British nation." The Lord Lieutenant assured parliament that the British legislature had concurrred in a resolution to re move the causes of their discontents, and that his majesty was graciously disposed to give his royal assent to acts cal culated to fulfil their wishes. As an earnest of the sin cerity of this declaration, a law was passed, by which all interference of the British privy council to alter Irish bills was abolished, and the parliament of Ireland thus placed on the saute footing as that of Britain. Acts were also passed for the limitation of the law against mutiny to two years ; for the right of habeas corpus, and for the inde pendence of the judges; and the act by which the Irish house of Peers had been deprived of their supreme judi cial power in their own country, was repealed. These con cessions, however, were not deemed sufficient by some patriots, particularly by Mr. Flood, who brought in a bill, declaring the sole and exclusive right of the Irish parlia ment to make laws in all cases whatsoever, both internal and external, for the kingdom of Ireland : only six mem bers voted for this motion. Mr. Grattan opposed it ; and the volunteers of Leinster, Ulster, and Connaught, were likewise inimical to it.