All thought of leaving London was now abandoned; his practice from this time increased rapidly; and in June 1783, on the formation of the coalition ministry of Lord North and Mr. Fox, and the great seal on Lord Thurlow's resignation being put into commission, he was one of several junior counsel who were called within the bar. Erskine was another ; and it was at first intended to give precedence to him and Mr. Pigott, both of whom were Scott's juniors ; but to this arrangement the latter firmly refused to submit; and his patent, as ultimately drawn out, gave him precedence next after the king's counsel then being, and after Harry Peckham, who had been made one a few days previously, and had been planed before Erskine, though Erskine's patent was of earlier date. A few days after he received this promotion, he was made a bencher of his Inn of Court.
About the same time he was returned to parliament for the borough of Weobly, through the patronage of Lord Weymouth, with whom however he stipulated that he should not be expected uniformly, or as a matter of course, to represent his lordship's opinions. The election took place on the 16th of June. He and Erskine both made their maiden speeches in the same debate, that on the 20th of November, about a week after the opening of the session, on a motion connected with the famous India Bill, which eventually upset Fox's government. The two young lawyers were however on opposite sides—Erskine with ministers, Scott with Pitt and the party destined soon after to come into power. The Coalition ministry was turned out on the 18th of December ; and on the 24th of March 1784, the king prorogued, and the next day dissolved parliament, after the opposition to Pitt and the new government had been gradually brought down in the course of a long series of divisions to a majority of one. Mr. Scott was again returned for Weobly; and in the new parliament he took a prominent part in most of the legal questions that came before the House. In the session of 1785, on the 9th of March, he spoke and voted with Fox against ministers on one of the questions connected with the great Westminater scrutiny; and his speech was considered to have established the doctrine "that the election must be finally closed before the return of the writ, and that the writ must be returned on or before the day specified in it." This principle the government loon after consented to enact as law by the statute 25 Geo. III, c. 84, "To limit the duration of polls and scrutinies." In March 1787 Mr. Scott was appointed chancellor of the bishopric and county palatine of Durham, by the bishop, who was a brother of Lord Thurlow, and had just been translated to the see. In June 1788, on Lord Mansfield's resignation and the appointment of Sir Lloyd Kenyon as his successor in the chief-juaticeship of the King's Bench, the attorney-general, Mr. Pepper Arden, was made master of
the rolls, in room of Kenyon; the solicitor-general, Sir Archibald Macdonald, became attorney-general ; and the office of solicitor-general was conferred on Scott. At the same time he was also knighted. A few days afterwards he was re-elected for Weobly; and he was a fourth time returned for the same place to the new parliament which met in November 1790. He held the office of solicitor-general till February 1793, when he was made attorney.general ou the promotion of Sir Archibald Macdonald to the place of Chief Baron of the Exchequer. On this occasion he was returned a fifth time for Weobly. To the next parliament, which met in September 1796, the last in which he eat as a member of the House of Commons, he was returned, along with Sir Francis Burdett, for the Duke of Newcastle's borough of Boroughbridge.
The period of Sir John Scott's tenure of the office of attorney. general extends to the year 1799. It is memorable for the state trials connected with the political excitement produced in this country by the breaking out of the French Revolution. Muir, Palmer, Skirviug, Margaret, and Gerald, had all been convicted of sedition in Scotland, and sentenced to fourteen years transportation, when iu October 1794, Hardy, Horne Tooke, Thelwall, Holcroft, and their associates, were indicted for high treason at the Old Bailey. Ouly Hardy, Tooke, and Thelwall were tried; all three were acquitted ; and the prosecutious against the other prisoners were dropped. There has been much difference of opinion as to the wisdom of the course taken by the government on this occasion, but perhaps too much stress has com monly been laid on the single fact that none of the trials issued in a conviction. There can be no doubt that the evidence, although it was held insufficient to support the charge of high treason, produced an immense effect upon the public mind ; and the accused were dis missed from the bar unharmed, but to a great extent disarmed. The attorney-general naturally came in for a principal share of the obloquy which the proceedings excited ; but his demeanour in the conduct of the trials was admitted on all hands to have been characterised by moderation and good temper. His answer to the question so often asked,—Why he had not prosecuted for a misdemeanour ? always was, that in his deliberate opinion the offence was treason or nothing; but he never could get over the next question, How could auyone expect a jury to convict of treason, when it required a speech of eleven hours to state the charge ? In his own written account how ever, as quoted by Mr. Twiss from the 'Anecdote-Book,' vol. i.