"
Such a search for precedents was no novelty, and may be thought to have
been especially proper in such a case as this, since history recorded
the appointment of several regencies, one under circumstances strikingly
resembling those now existing, when, in 1454, Henry VI. had fallen into
a state of imbecility, and the Parliament appointed the Duke of York
Protector[117] of the kingdom.
But Fox instantly opposed it with extreme vehemence, declaring that the
appointment of such a committee would be a pure waste of time. It was
notorious, he affirmed, that no precedent existed which could have any
bearing on the present case, since there was in existence a person such
as had never been found on any previous occasion, an heir-apparent of
full age and capacity to exercise the royal authority; and he declared
it to be his deliberate opinion that the Prince of Wales had "as clear
and express a right to assume the reins of government, and to exercise
all the powers of sovereignty, during the illness and incapacity of the
sovereign, as if that sovereign were actually deceased." Such an
assertion of indefeasible right was so totally at variance with the Whig
doctrines which Pitt, equally with Fox, regarded as the true principles
of the constitution, that Pitt at once perceived the advantage which it
gave him, by enabling him to stand forward as the supporter of the
supreme authority of Parliament, which Fox had by implication denied.
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